Taking detours through horror, action, sci-fi, cult, and exploitation films, with pitstops along the way for classics, foreign gems, low budget obscurities, B-movies, and other overlooked and underseen cinematic roadside attractions.
Trailer Park Tuesdays, the place to be for all your needs (as long as those needs are based around movie trailers for upcoming films).
While scrounging around the internet this afternoon, I stumbled across today's trailer, a Mexican horror film about possession and scary kids. Based on the title, I was skeptical. Seemed kind of like a joke maybe (plus it didn't help that I instantly thought about MST3k), but it appears as if this is the real deal in the scary department.
Here's the dime description for Here Comes the Devil: A married couple lose their children near some caves while on vacation in Tijuana, and upon their return it becomes clear they are not who they used to be.
I'm not familiar with writer/director Adrián García Bogliano (Cold Sweat, Penumbra), but I think that will soon change
Here's the trailer:
Here Comes the Devil will be distributed by Magnet Releasing, playing in select cities in the US starting December 13th (which is a Friday).
There is nothing quite like Ninja III: The Domination (1984). It's basic formula can be broken down as this: ninjas + possession + revenge killings x the 80s ÷ aerobics = amazing. Unless there is another supernatural-ninja-aerobics movie out there, I don't think you or I are ever going to see a better supernatural-ninja-aerobics movie.
In case you need further convincing, Here's 10 Reasons You Should Check Out Ninja III: The Domination
1. The Amazing Opening: Ninja Golf Course Massacre
Ninja III is packed with wall to wall action and the first ten minutes is the most jam packed of them all. After a mysterious and heavily eyelinered ninja retrieves his ninja gear from a ninja mountain cave, he proceeds to stalk and massacre a bunch of polo shirt 80s jerk-looking guys (and one woman) on a golf course, all in broad daylight, no less.
He crushes a golf ball right in front of one dude's face and then he lifts a golf cart (partially) off the ground with one hand. After that he runs from the police, jumps over a car, climbs a palm tree, jumps onto a helicopter, and then dives into a lake, all while kicking, punching, stabbing, slashing, and throwing ninja stars into people. It might just be the most important ten minutes in cinema history*.
*Not really, but check out these screenshots!
Also, I of course gotta mention that there's some squealing tires on dirt when the police are chasing Eyeliner Ninja because of course this is the kind of movie that would have that.
After the police gun the ninja down, he stumbles away after a smoke bomb diversion and manages to catch the attention of telephone repairwoman Christie (Lucinda Dickey, star of Breakin' and Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo) who he then transfers all his ninja prowess and powers to via his now possessed sword. The rest of the movie involves Christie getting revenge on the cops who killed Eyeliner Ninja and it is just as awesome as the opening ten minutes.
2. Floating Glowing Sword
This sword floats! It glows! And it's also possessed by an evil ninja spirit! What fun!
3. Aerobics!
This film is drenched in 80s-ness, from the clothes and hair, the music, the decor of Christie's apartment, the arcade game that shoots lasers out of it, the neon, etc, etc, but the most 80s thing in Ninja III has got the be all the aerobics action. Christie is not only a telephone repairwoman, but she also teaches an aerobics class and seems to workout when feeling stressed about all this possession business. Basically, what I'm saying is that leotards and leg warmers are a motif in this film.
4. Flashdance +The Exorcist +Poltergeist
Ninja III is the kind of movie that is an equal opportunity opportunist, stealing ideas from a variety of sources. This movie really is the sum of its parts. As pointed out above, aerobics is a part of the larger package, and Christie's aerobics instructor/telephone repairwoman career path is her version of Alex's steel mill welder/exotic dancer double career move in Flashdance (1983). Also, leg warmers.
All movies that deal with possession are a little indebted to The Exorcist (1973), Ninja III being no exception. This comes across mostly in the attempted-exorcism/spirit conjuring scene with James Hong (Big Trouble in Little China [1986]) as Miyashima, which causes Christie to flip out (literally), scream in a voice not her own, spit smoke in Miyashima's face, levitate him, and have her complexion change. You know, just the usual possession stuff...
Not resting on its laurels, Ninja III also has a scene that is a fairly blatant attempt to recreate the closet-sucking scene from Poltergeist (1983), but to much, much less effect (although, in the same scene, the possessed sword slashes her stereo in half, and that was pretty cool).
5. V-8 Juice: Aphrodisiac
This shit made no sense. Is this the possession talking or is she just a weirdo? I guess the director, Sam Firstenberg, came up with this idea while on the set... In that case, I gotta ask, what the hell, man?
6. The Hairy-Man Beast, Billy
So who is Christie seductively pouring V-8 down her body for? Well, it's her pushy cop boyfriend, Billy Secord (Jordan Bennett), who would be considered the lead male actor of the movie (non-ninja class). He's mostly notable for being absolutely one of the hairiest men ever in motion pictures (he's right up there with Robin Williams). He's kind of a doof, but I guess he's well meaning. Totally pushy, though.
7. The Awesome Dialogue
Movies like this have a way with words. Get a load of these quotables:
First, in the straight truth department...
Miyashima:
"Only a ninja. . . can destroy a ninja."
and in the villainous taunt department...
Christie (possessed by evil ninja):
"HaHaHaHa! You fools! You cannot stop me! I am a ninja! No one and nothing can stop me!"
and in the "wait,what?" department...
A Doctor, speaking to Christie:
"Medically, you're a very fit young woman. No evidence of any abnormality in the brain, no tumor, you have a strong heart, your diet is better than average. You are under severe stress, of course, but otherwise doctor Bowen, the psychiatrist you saw, says there's nothing out of the ordinary. Aside from your exceptional extrasensory perception and your preoccupation with Japanese culture. No harm in that!"
Oh, Ninja III, I think I might love you.
8. Eye Patch Ninja, Shô Kasugi
You know this is a serious ninja movie with Shô in town. Well, maybe not serious, but he does add a bit of legitimacy to the piece as Yamada, the sworn enemy of the evil Eyeliner Ninja. A movie like this needs some ninja vs. ninja action, and we get that in the form of a sword duel in a temple and also on a mountain top. Pretty cool stuff.
His eyepatch is 100% badass.
Shô was one of the faces of the (all too brief) 1980s ninja craze and was a trained martial artist and a highly skilled practitioner of weapons. He starred in the other two (and unrelated) films in this ninja series, Enter the Ninja (1981) and Revenge of the Ninja (1983), as well as Pray for Death (1985), Rage of Honor (1987), and early Jean-Claude Van Damme entry, Black Eagle (1988).
9. That Cannon Films Flavor!
Leaders in the VHS revolution of the 1980s, The Cannon Group, ran by Israeli cousins Manehem Golan and Yoram Globus, seemed to specialize in exploiting all and any 80s trends and fads; Vietnam action movies (Missing in Action [1984]), slashers (New Years Evil [1980]), breakdancing (Breakin' [1984]), Charles Bronson pics (10 to Midnight [1983], the Death Wish sequels), Van Damme awesomeness (Bloodsport [1988] AND Kickboxer [1989]), arm wrestling (Over the Top [1987]), and of course, ninja movies.
Most of their output was low budget and made to turn a quick profit, but they did manage to put some of their money behind some talented filmmakers when they produced Barbet Schroeder's first American film Barfly (1987, starring Mickey Rourke in one of his best roles), Neil Jordan's second feature The Company of Wolves (1985), and Tobe Hooper's Lifeforce (1985) and Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986).
Cannon Films... there's something about them. The analogy I drew up is that they are akin to a ham and cheese sandwich. Something that is enjoyable, has very basic elements, and can very easily be snazzed up. Mmmmmmmm..... that Cannon Film flavor..
10. The Movie Trailer!
Some of that wonderful flavor comes across in this trailer. If this doesn't convince you that you need to see this movie, nothing will. This video is VHS quality, which makes it VHSupercool:
Ninja III: The Domination, what else is there to say? SEE IT!
If you spend enough time digging through old horror films, mining for cinema gold, you'll eventually get to this piece of dusty old cobblestone. Celebrating its 30th year of release, Mausoleum (1983) is a supernatural demonic possession horror flick, and while not necessarily a "good" movie, it does have its moments.
The story starts with young Susan at her mother's funeral. She's with her Aunt Cora who can't seem to comfort Susan, and she eventually takes off running into the cemetery. There, she's drawn to an old spooky mausoleum, and inside she has an encounter with a hooded figure. Randomly, a vagrant stumbles in and upon locking eyes with the hooded one, runs outside screaming and holding his head before his skull partially explodes. Back inside, Susan's eyes glow green and the hooded figure is revealed to have claw-like hands...
Flash-forward: after years of being under the care of her therapist Dr. Simon Andrews (Norman Burton), Susan is a well adjusted 30 year old woman (played by ex-Playboy bunny, Bobbie Bresee) and heiress to the family fortune, living with her lawyer husband Oliver (Marjoe Gortner) in their mansion-like house. Unfortunately, it seems the women in her family suffer from a very particular curse, one that makes them susceptible to demonic possession. Her encounter with the demon years ago finally starts to manifest itself, as Susan starts acting strange, gets a case of the glowing-green eyes, and becomes a lusty kill monster.
First, she blows up a guy's car (with him in it) outside of a nightclub. He was being a jerk inside, and Susan stares at his car intensely until her eyes glow and a fire starts inside the car. Oliver tries to help, but is useless, a pattern he keeps for most of the movie. Next, Susan seduces Ben, the leering gardner, but not before we get a pleasant montage of what Ben's work day is like (chopping stumps, mowing the lawn, taking a break, etc). She then invites him to accompany her to the garage for some sex and afterwards she gets all demonic and stabs him with a hand-rake. Later, when Oliver comes home she has sex with him too. (The lustiness of this demon reminds me of Abby (1974), another possession flick).
Continuing her kill spree, Susan attacks her visiting Aunt Cora by levitating her off the ground and telekinetically ripping her flesh and chest open. It's kind of a cool scene, but unfortunately you can totally see the mechanism that was used to suspend the actress in the air.
Oliver senses that something is different with Susan, but all of these incidents go unnoticed. Their housemaid Elsie (LaWanda Page) might be the only sensible person in the movie, as she first notices that "there's some strange shit going on in this house." After catching a glimpse of Susan's foggy and creepy bedroom, she hightails it out of there, quipping "No more grievin', I'm leavin'!"
During a visit with Dr. Simon, Susan goes under hypnosis, where the demon reveals itself to him, claiming to be named Gomez. Susan remembers none of this and Simon lets her leave to go about her day, thinking that this "demon possession" is just some sort of repression that has manifested itself somehow. It's only later that, after conferring with colleagues (and after Susan kills a few more people) that he comes to believe in the curse that has befallen Susan, and does he comes up with a method (using a crown of thorns) to stop the demon and (hopefully) save her life.
Mausoleum is without a doubt a subpar movie, but it is not without its charms. Its disjointed narrative and odd dialogue add a certain delirium to the story. Maybe if the film was poorly overdubbed it might have helped? (It certainly wouldn't have hurt Bresee's performance). At times it feels like an American version of a Euro-horror film, but one lacking in any direction or style. The lighting has a lot of strong contrast and colors (reds and greens), bringing to mind the films of Dario Argento and Mario Bava (and making you wish you were watching one of those instead).
Susan's demonic possession manifests itself in different stages. First it's just green eyes, then claw hands and nasty face, then towards the end she turns full demon. The make-up effects for the full demon are more than noteworthy, especially for the monster breasts (I don't mean size, I mean they are little snapping monster mouth demons on her chest, and yes, it's as crazy looking as it sounds), which seem to be this movie's calling card. Overall, the effects are pretty good and gruesome, without a doubt the best thing in the movie.
Make-up and special effects maestro John Carl Buechler would provide the magic for Stuart Gordon's From Beyond (1986) and Dolls (1987), Renny Harlin's Prison and A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: Dream Master (both 1988), as well as Eliminators (1986), TerrorVision (1986), Halloween 4: Return of Michael Myers (1988), and Carnosaur (1993). He would also direct and do special effects for Troll (1986) and Friday the 13th VII: The New Blood (1988). He also did uncredited work on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), on the animatronic melting head effect that freaked me out as a kid.
This is Bobbie Bresee's first feature film, and she isn't very convincing as either a possessed woman (see above) or a rich, affluent housewife. Her stilted line readings just fill the time between nude scenes. Her "talents" can also be seen in Ghoulies (1985) and Surf Nazis Must Die (1987).
LaWanda Page is best known as Aunt Esther Anderson on television's Sanford & Son and its subsequent spinoffs. Her portrayal of Elsie the housemaid is obviously for comic relief, but she lands somewhere between clichéd and racial stereotype. Norman Burton would have a long and varied career in Hollywood as a supporting player and he gives probably the most credible performance in Mausoleum. Most interestingly (and iconically) he's credited as playing the "Hunt Leader" in the sci-fi classic Planet of the Apes (1968). He's also appeared in movies I've seen, like Bloodsport and Dead Space (both 1988), and movies I plan on seeing, like Simon, King of the Witches (1971), The Reincarnation of Peter Proud (1975), and Fade to Black (1980).
Marjoe Gortner is an interesting guy. He started life as the "youngest ordained minister" (at 4 years old) and became a "miracle child," traveling the country and preaching the gospel to people at revivals and whatnot. Later he became disillusioned with the preaching business and would start a career in music and in acting. He would star in Earthquake (1974), Food of the Gods (1976), and Starcrash (1978), and is the subject of a great documentary called Marjoe (1972). In Mausoleum, his natural charisma seems to be stifled by the the awful script, although he does seem to have fun during the sex scenes.
Death Hug
Uninspired director Michael Dugan has two other films to his credit, a family film called Super Seal (1976) and teen sex comedy Raging Hormones (1999). One of the writers of Mausoleum (Robert Barich) was also the cinematographer. He would go on to a career in neither.
Composer Jamie Mendoza-Nava would have a long career in genre films, working with filmmakers like John Hayes (Dream No Evil [1970], Garden of the Dead [1972], Grave of the Vampire [1972]) and Charles B. Pierce (Legend of Boggy Creek [1972], Town that Dreaded Sundown [1976], The Evictors [1979]).
It's not often I'll talk about the art direction, but Robert A. Burns gets special mention always, as he's the guy responsible for scattering bones around the sets on The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977). He would also art direct other classics like Tourist Trap (1979) The Howling (1981), and Re-Animator (1985), as well as lesser classics like Disco Godfather (1979), Full Moon High (1981), Blood Song (1982), and Microwave Massacre (1983). His work on Mausoleum goes a long way in setting the mood in the creepy titular location, as well as in Susan's bedroom, with her macabre display of victims. Also, by all accounts and based on the interviews I've seen, Robert Burns was a great guy. RIP, buddy.
Final Thought: Mausoleum is at times a fairly stupid movie. For example, Susan's maiden name is Nomed, which is a stupid last name, until you realize that in reverse it says "Demon," which makes it a really fucking stupid last name. (It's like naming a town full of goblins "Nilbog.") Despite that and other stupidness, there's still some moderate fun to be had at the Mausoleum. (results may vary)
In the summer of 1973, William Freidkin's The Exorcist was unleashed to theaters and onto the general public. The subsequent storm of publicity, controversy, and ticket sales resulted in Oscar nominations and recognition as one of the biggest films of the year. It didn't hurt that is was also pretty damn scary. The popularity of the film of course meant one thing: knockoffs.
They came from around the globe, Turkey (Seytan), Italy (Beyond the Door), Spain (The Possessed), and Mexico (Alucarda), but right here in America we had one of the more infamous Exorcist knockoffs, if only for the resulting lawsuit. Released in 1974 (on Christmas Day, no less), Abby is a possession film that supposes one thing differently than The Exorcist: what if it happened to black people instead? Ostensibly remaking The Exorcist as a blaxploitation film (an early working title for the film was The Blackorcist, I shit you not), Abby is a shameless attempt at cashing in on the success of Friedkin's film. It's not a very good movie, but I'm going to talk about it anyway.
After a fairly static, expository opening scene (set in a very nice city park) the film flashes to Egypt, where Bishop Garnet Williams (William Marshall) is on an archeologic dig searching for information on the God Eshu. Uncovering an old dusty idol, Bishop Williams accidentally unleashes the evil spirit of Eshu into the world. The spirit manifests itself as a wind storm, blowing shit around and knocking people down as it escapes the cave. Halfway across the world, the Bishop's son, Rev. Emmett Williams (Terry Carter) and his wife Abby (Carol Speed) are moving into their new home. It's not long before that evil wind blows into the house, resulting in the spirit of Eshu possessing Abby.
Soon after, she is speaking in a lower octave, trying to cut herself with a knife, levitating off the floor, getting the crazy eye, and she even throws a guy through a door before she spits up foamy vomit on him. Of course, this all plays second fiddle to the major change in Abby: her sexual appetite. It seems the evil deity of Eshu is a sex God, manifesting itself in Abby and turning her into a nymphomaniac. This is a major problem for a preacher's wife.
Witnessing his wife trying to hump anything that moves (while speaking in a voice 3 pitches lower), the Reverend does two things: inquire about her drug history to her brother, detective Cass Potter (Austin Stoker), and take her to the hospital where doctors run a bunch of tests on her. She has no history with drugs and medically she's completely normal, but Abby gets all freaky when he takes her home to recover and she kills an elderly caretaker by giving her a heart attack. After that, Abby escapes, and her husband, her brother, and the just-returned-from-Egypt Bishop Williams have to track her down and try to exorcise the demon.
Abby, being the horny demon she is, heads out to a local club, looking for some action. First she picks up a guy and takes him out to his car to have sex, which of course gets a bit freaky (smoke starts pouring from the car interior, as (off-screen) the guy screams). Abby then goes back inside and starts dancing and grooving with a pair of hip, tough-looking studs, but after her husband and brother show up, Abby starts throwing people all over the bar, over tables, and smashing the place up, before the Bishop appears and starts the exorcism process with the help of the Reverend and the detective.
Doning some ceremonial robes and engaging in verbal combat with the demon, the Bishop believes he is not actually dealing with the God Eshu, but rather a wannabe demon. Whether this is the case or not, the movie sort of leaves ambivalent, but either way, after some levitation and some speaking-in-tongues (not to mention some real cheesy special effects), they eventually drive the demon out of Abby and send it back into the idol that it had originally escaped.
Like I said above, I don't consider this a good movie, even by exploitation standards. Overall, the acting is okay, everyone seems to take it seriously, despite all the ridiculousness. The story doesn't quite make sense, like how or why the demon flies from Egypt all the way to America just to possess Abby, or why her husband is such a bonehead. The special effects are goofy, there's no real shocks or scares (no head-spinning), and the print of the movie is really rough looking, with the colors all washed out and muddy, not to mention the heavy amount of film scratches.
Abby does some wholesale lifting from The Exorcist by setting the opening in Egypt, emphasizing the power of faith, showing the befuddlement of the doctors, using levitation, vomit, and colorful language (she says "fuck" a lot), and by having subliminal flashes of the demon's face, which should be scary, but it unfortunately it looks like this:
What do you expect from a movie made for less than $200,000?? More silly than anything, Abby would still go on to be a minor hit, but it was pulled from theaters as Warner Bros. (owners of The Exorcist) sued (and won), claiming copyright infringement. The WB took almost all of the profits from the film (close to $4 million) and the producers and writer/director William Girdler never saw a dime of money from the film. (In this day and age, a lawsuit like that would never fly, or there wouldn't be half of the movies out on the direct-to-video market like there are).
Carol Speed would get the lead role in Abby after the original actress dropped out when her demands of an on-set masseuse were not met. Speed would write and perform a song in the movie, "Is Your Soul a Witness?" She also starred in Jack Hill's The Big Bird Cage (1972), The Mack, Savage! (both 1973), Black Samson (1974), and (one of my favorites) Rudy Ray Moore's Disco Godfather (1979). If interested, you can read a good interview with her on the making of Abby over on her website HERE.
The same year as Abby, Terry Carter was also in the blaxploitation classic Foxy Brown. Austin Stoker would also star in Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973) and John Carpenter's amazing Assault on Precinct 13 (1976), as well as William Girdler's other two blaxploitation pictures: The Zebra Killer (aka The Get-Man, 1974) and Sheba, Baby (1975) with Pam Grier.
William Marshall was very vocal about his unhappiness with the production of Abby, as he was promised script revisions that never occurred. He did however alter his own dialogue, adding much of the content in regards to the Yoruba religion of West Africa. Marshall is best known today for two things: his titular role in Blacula (1972) and it's sequel, Scream, Blacula, Scream (1973) and as the beloved King of Cartoons on television's Pee-wee's Playhouse.
Director William Girdler was an expert exploitation filmmaker, making nine films in seven years, in genres like action, blaxploitation, and horror. Some have called him the "king of the ripoffs," namely because of Abby and his 1976 film Grizzly, which is essentially "Jaws with claws." Such labels can be rather dismissive of the man and his work, and while the quality of his films may vary at best, his movies always deliver in the areas of excitement and "oh-shit-did-I-just-see-that?". Even Abby, which is a lesser work for sure, still has a certain watchability just because it's unlike anything else you've seen.
