Posted by Horror Film History on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 The
casual viewer of the first hour or so of Brian De Palma's Carrie(1976)
might be forgiven for thinking they are watching some variation of the
'teen makeover romance' subgenre, where the ugliest girl in the school
only needs a new dress and a visit to the beauty salon to suddenly date
the prom king and find out her high school isn't such a bad place after
all ("She's All That" and "The Princess Diaries" being
recent entries). A... Continue reading...
Posted by willy pratiwiharja on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 Carnival of Blood is so beautifully original in composition
and execution that it reminds you what an art form
filmmaking is. This isn't to suggest that some films are
not art or that most are not quality art. Rather, Carnival of Blood
suggests what it does through pointing out the well-worn
grooves of the filmmaking norm by not following most of
them. Cinema is, in many ways, still one of the more conservative
... Continue reading...
Posted by Classic Horror on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 It's possible to make a good film involving mad scientists, South
American revolutionaries, and Hitler. If one doubts that,
then watch The Boys from Brazil. It may well to
be possible to make a good film containing all the above,
plus maggots. That question is left unresolved at the
end of Flesh Feast (1970), a minuscule-budget shocker written and directed by Florida auteur Brad F. Grinter (Blood Fr... Continue reading...
Posted by Classic Horror on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 Between 1965 and 1980, Amicus Productions made nine horror anthology films, of which Roy Ward Baker directed three: Asylum, The Vault of Horror, and The Monster Club. Of Baker's treasuries of terror, Asylum
is probably the best. With help from a solid screenplay by author
Robert Bloch ("Psycho," the novel) and a top-notch cast (including Herbert Lom and Peter Cushing), Baker works a good mix of thrills, chills, and fun into the 88-minute runtime. Dr.
Martin (Robert Powell) arrives at Duns... Continue reading...
Posted by Classic Horror on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 When Roger Corman completed filming The Raven in 1963, it turned out that star Boris Karloff
still had two days left to go on his contract for the picture. Not
wishing to waste those two days, Corman, and four other uncredited
directors, improvised a script and filmed a new film; thus was born The Terror. Corman used sets, crewmembers, and cast members from The Raven. The
film itself is an interesting, but ultimately unsatisfying, trip
through the familiar ideas of Corman’s Edgar Alla... Continue reading...
Posted by willy pratiwiharja on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 Hammer, perhaps in response to The Fearless Vampire Killers (Roman Polanski's spoof of their bloodsucker flicks), sends itself up in this black comedy remake of Curse of Frankenstein.
They replace Peter Cushing with the then up-and-coming horror star
Ralph Bates and inject the tale with more sex, more violent death, and a
wicked sense of irreverence. After knocking up the headmaster's daughter, the Baron leaves the University with his friend Wilhelm (an empty-headed clone of Curse's
Paul... Continue reading...
Posted by willy pratiwiharja on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 Editor’s Note: This review covers the public domain Horror of the Zombies version, which is formatted to fit a standard television and features minor cuts for violence. Although Horror of the Zombies
is the third installment in Spanish writer-director Amando de Ossorio’s
“blind dead” series, it doesn’t really appear that these zombies are
actually blind. Never mind. His work is fairly well known among die-hard
horror fanatics, but this movie is simply awful. From the production... Continue reading...
Posted by willy pratiwiharja on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 Fury of the Wolfman never knows quite what it wants to
be. It starts out with the aftermath of a Tibetan mountain
adventure, turns into a werewolf movie for a few minutes,
changes course to become Dangerous Liaisons
without the charm, adds a bit of a detective and
investigative journalism theme for spice, then devolves
into a cross between a mad-scientist film and an S & M dungeon,
PG-exploitation... Continue reading...
Posted by willy pratiwiharja on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 What a glorious mish-mash this is!
Dracula vs. Frankenstein began life as Satan's Bloody
Freaks, a standard mad science flick featuring J. Carrol Naish as
a mad scientist and Lon Chaney, Jr as his faithful servant. However,
the completed film was not to the liking of producer/co-writer Samuel
M. Sherman, and the movie went back into production to add new scenes
with Dracula and the Frankenstein Monster. However, the new ending
didn't have the "punch" that Sherman wanted, so a new one
was shot... Continue reading...
Posted by Classic Horror on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 In : Movie Reviews
 All
the right pieces are in place for Cannibal
Girls to be a
schlocky, comedic gem: a pre-Ghostbusters
Ivan Reitman at the helm, the fresh-faced tandem of Eugene Levy and
Andrea Martin in the lead roles working with a mostly impromptu
script, and a cheesy "warning bell" gimmick that alerts viewers
of a particularly gruesome death sequence. Yet the potential wallop
that Cannibal Girls
packs with its one-two punch of dark comedy and B-movie cheese never
quite hits the intended mark. Despite the... Continue reading...
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