Big Man Japan (2007)

April 21st, 2019

Directed by: Hitoshi Matsumoto

Written by: Hitoshi Matsumoto

Starring: Hitoshi Matsumoto, Riki Takeuchi, Ua

Quote: "I feel a sense of responsibility about that....  I never really know when work will pop up. I have to always be on call.... I just accept that's the way things are."

Trivia: It was announced in 2012 that Neil H. Mortiz (producer of "Prison Break") was set to produce an American remake of the film.


Growing up watching daytime television in the eighties and nineties I watched a lot of bad soap operas and infomercials. Occasionally, I would find a cool monster flick which became my favorite movies. I loved (and still love) Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans (God bless Ray Harryhausen). I also really liked the old Universal monster movies, especially Frankenstein and the Creature from the Black Lagoon. However, every now and then, there would be one of the Japanese dubbed monster movies from the fifties and sixties. Godzilla. King Kong. Mothra. Giant spiders. I love the over-the-top nature of those Japanese films, the cheesy special effects, and poor acting. Big Man Japan is homage to those Japanese Monster movies, formally called Kaiju films. Big Man Japan is a mockumentary about a superhero who is tasked by the Japanese government to fight the monsters that are trying to destroy Japan. It is ridiculous in a very deadpan way and has an absolute perfect ending that is completely unexpected.

Q: The Winged Serpent (1982)

April 5th, 2019

Directed by: Larry Cohen

Written by: Larry Cohen

Starring: David Carradine, Michael Moriarty, Candy Clark

Budget: $1,200,000

Quote: "Well, I figure something fell out of one of the windows from the floor up above. Hit him. Sheared his head clean off. A shard of glass or something like that... Oh shit! Maybe his head just got loose and fell off. Look, whadda' you want from me?"

Trivia: The film that Larry Cohen was fired from before starting production on this movie was I, the Jury (1982). It cost 8 times as much as Q (1982) but only made one quarter as much at the box office.

Joe Bob Briggs and The Last Drive In are back! The second episode in his new weekly show had a double feature showing Larry Cohen's monster movie, Q: The Winged Serpent and the sexual gore fest Society. I had already seen Society, but, Q, was new to me. I am familiar with a lot of Larry Cohen's other films (God Told Me To, Blue Sunshine, The Stuff) and was excited to see another one of his films. It also helped that Joe Bob said this was the best movie ever made giving it four stars. While I liked the film, it didn't think it was all that much greater than C.H.U.D. (reviewed here), which Joe Bob ripped apart the previous week. David Carradine and Michael Moriarty played great parts, especially Moriarty (Do I hate him? Love him? Pity him?). And I liked the the cop drama parts, but the monster parts were cheesy and, for a monster film, surprisingly didn't really add to the film. I hate to disagree with our Patron Saint of movies, Mr. Briggs, but I give it two stars (maybe two and a half).

C.H.U.D. (1984)

November 11, 2018

Directed by: Douglass Cheek

Written by: Parnell Hall, Shepard Abbott

Starring: John Heard, Daniel Stern, Christopher Curry

Budget: $1,250,000

Quote: "Are you kidding? Your guy's got a camera. Mine's got a flamethrower."

Trivia: In 2011, as an April Fool's Day joke, the Criterion Collection, the USA's most prestigious distributor of home video, announced that it was releasing a special-edition DVD and Blu-ray Disc of the film with spine number 573. It was later assigned to The Music Room (1958). C.H.U.D. did however receive a special edition Blu-ray release from Arrow Video in 2016.

I had previously seen C.H.U.D. five or so years ago when I hosted a horror movie night at my apartment and a friend put it on after watching two other movies. Unfortunately, by the time this third movie played I had already been celebrating the entire day with my friend Jim Beam and could not really recall what the movie was about. Now, after a clearheaded second viewing, I can finally say that I love this movie! While it is certainly not an especially well made movie and does deserves a lot of the criticism it gets, it is a subversive film with some endearing qualities. It masquerades as an environmental horror film, among so many other ones that came out in the 1980s, but in actuality it is more of an urban monster movie. James O'Ehley in a blurb on Rotten Tomatoes wrote "If Woody Allen's Manhattan was a cinematic love song to New York, then surely C.H.U.D. is its hate song!" He's not wrong. C.H.U.D. takes a look at a lot of things that were disgusting and vile in the 1980s. Everything that was meant to be swept under the rug in the Reagan Era of the consumeristic suburban eighties. Like the monsters that the film follows, the movie itself is grimy and dirty. Starring John Heard, who would go on to torment Tom Hanks a few years later in Big and Daniel Stern who would give Kevin Arnold an inner monologue on The Wonder Years, this film is a hate song to a world that was trying to ignore its problems (weirdly enough, Heard and Stern would be brought back to the same city eight years later in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York... but by then it had already begun to become a different New York).

The Ritual (2017)

October 23, 2018

Directed by: David Bruckner

Written by: Joe Barton, Adam Nevill

Starring: Rafe Spall, Arsher Ali, Robert James-Collier

Quote: "My old scoutmaster used to say 'If the shortcut was a shortcut, it wouldn't be called a shortcut, it would be called a route'."

Trivia: The way the monster hangs its victims in the cultists' village mirrors part of asatruar mythology about Odin, who originally gained wisdom and knowledge of rune magic by hanging himself from the world tree Yggdrasil by impaling himself on his spear, Gungnir. In the asatruar mythology, the spear was given to Odin by Loki, though it is unclear if this is an intended reference to asatruar mythology.

The Ritual is a really interesting film that takes the basic premise of The Blair Witch Project and combines it with elements from Nordic mythology. Beautifully shot, the filmmakers take full advantage of the Scandinavian environment to create a stunning and mysterious atmosphere. The film also interposes dreams with reality which blur into a nightmarish world. Unfortunately, the movie falls apart during the last half hour. The monster is shown too early in the movie and comes off looking silly instead of scary. Supernatural movies like this always run the risk of the creature not leaving up to the viewer's imagination and this movie is a glaring example.

Dracula (1933)

October 22, 2018

Directed by: Tod Browning

Written by:  Bram Stoker, Hamilton Deane, John L. Balderston

Starring: Bela Lugosi, Helen Chandler, David Manners

Budget: $355,000

Quote: "...I could just see the lamp by the bed, a tiny spark in the fog. And then I saw two red eyes glaring at me. And a white livid face came down out of the mist. It came closer and closer. I felt its breath on my face and then its lips... oh!"

Trivia: Similar to the prologue in Frankenstein (1931), the original release featured an epilogue with Edward Van Sloan talking to the audience about what they have just seen. This was removed for the 1936 re-release and is now assumed to be lost.

I have been watching so many horror movies lately (I think this makes #142 on this journey) that I thought I should read a bit about it. I recently read Easy Riders, Raging Bulls about the film industry in the seventies and Phantasm Exhumed about the making of the Phantasm movies. Now I'm reading Projected Fears: Horror Films and American Culture. It's a pretty interesting read where the author analyzed ten iconic horror films and how they represented common American fears of that era. The first chapter is devoted to the 1931 horror classic, Dracula, the film that started the Universal Pictures monster movie craze. The book mentions that the movie, coming out at the onset of the Great Depression and during the rise of Fascism in Europe and the first Red Scare, was a product of the times. Cultural implications aside, I thought it was finally time I watched this classic film. I'm going to try to keep in mind that the movie came out almost ninety years ago in this discussion. That being said, the movie starts out strong and Bela Lugosi steals the movie as The Count, but unfortunately, the movie slows to a crawl during the second half of the film. Dracula's offscreen death, also does nothing to satisfy viewers.

The Blob (1988)

October 11, 2018

Directed by: Chuck Russell

Written by: Irvine Millgate, Chuck Russell, Frank Darabont

Starring: Shawnee Smith, Kevin Dillon, Donovan Leitch Jr.

Budget: $19,000,000

Quote: "Consuming sinner and saint alike... who shall be lifted up to rapture when the judgment trumpet blows? None but the faithful brothers and sisters... None but the faithful."

Trivia: Of the film's US$19 million budget, US$9 million went toward visual effects.





The Blob is a remake of a 1958 Steve McQueen creature film, but with the fear and cynicism that is characteristic of the 1980s. Both the original and the remake deserve a place in horror history. The original movie, since its release, has gained a type of cult following due to its originality and it being one of the better creature features of the 1950s. I remember watching it with my dad when I was a kid and absolutely loving the ending when they drop the blob off in Antarctica and the ending screen shows "The End?" I had never seen an ambiguous ending like that before. The 1988 remake is also incredible in its own way. The special effects are top notch. Almost half of the movie's entire budget went toward visual effects. That is $9 million dedicated to visual effects, and it shows. The visual effects are absolutely stunning! Also, the movie benefits from a few plot twists that separates it from its predecessor.

A Quiet Place (2018)

August 12, 2018

Directed by: John Krasinski

Written by: Bryan Woods, Scott Beck, John Krasinski

Starring: Emily Blunt, John Krasinski, Millicent Simmonds

Budget: $17,000,000

Quote: "Who are we if we can't protect them? We have to protect them?"

Trivia: Actor-director John Krasinski has said that the single greatest compliment he received regarding the film, was in a tweet from the master of the horror story himself, Stephen King: "A QUIET PLACE is an extraordinary piece of work. Terrific acting, but the main thing is the SILENCE, and how it makes the camera's eye open wide in a way few movies manage."

Looking at the Stephen King tweet in the trivia above, I feel like King hit the nail right on the head with regards to why this movie is so successful. The acting, the monster, the story are all great, but it is the silence that really brings you into the film. It is this silence that heightens everything else in the film. It heightens emotions, fears, and really causes the viewer to empathize with the characters creating an anxiety that mirrors the characters on the screen. So many times during the film I found myself wondering to myself what I would do if I found myself in this situation. The film stars John Krasinsky (best known as Jim from The Office) who both cowrites and directs. Krasinski understands pacing and is able to really balance excitement and anticipation. Like a slow zombie film, it isn't the fear that you are going to die today, but the anxiety of knowing that eventually you will be killed.

Ghoulies Go to College (Ghoulies III) (1991)

August 3, 2018

Directed by: John Carl Beuchler

Written by: Brent Olson

Starring:  Evan MacKenzie, Kevin McCarthy, Eva LaRue

Tagline: Out of the bowl... and TOTALLY out of control

Trivia: This movie is the film debut of actor Matthew Lillard.









Alright, I'm going to make this a quick one. Growing up Ghoulies II was one of my favorite films. It had some horror elements to it while being largely a comedy. It was one of those bad movies that are so fun. This one however was just bad. It tries to be a comedy but I have no idea who it thinks its comedic audience is. The jokes, score, and sound effects are extremely reminiscent of a "made for TV" Disney movie or Nickelodeon Show. It seemed straight out of iCarly. So one might think, maybe they are making a scary movie for kids (like the previous one, or Troll, or Gremlins). Wrong. The movie is so choked full of nudity that it got an R rating.

Humanoids from the Deep (1980)

July 11, 2018

Directed by: Barbara Peeters

Starring: Doug McClure, Ann Turkel, Vic Morrow

Tag Line: From the Ocean Depths They Strike ... To Terrorize ... To Mate ... And To Kill!

Trivia: Actress Ann Turkel once said why she chose to do this film: "It was an intelligent suspenseful science-fiction story with a basis in fact and no sex". However, with the filming of additional footage, the sex content changed.







Humanoids from the Deep is the quintessential Roger Corman movie. It is cheaply made, contains gratuitous nudity and gore, and is absolutely brilliant! The movie is one of the first movies to address the potential dangers of genetic modification. It also deals directly with racism, land and water rights, and the exploitation of indigenous peoples. Corman uses his trademark sex and violence to package and sell these important topics. Unfortunately, when the movie was originally released people focused too much on the sensationalism in the film and ignored the social messages. It was attacked as being sexist and mean spirited, which isn't completely an unfair criticism, but much less so when the fact that the director is a woman is taken into account.

Feast (2005)

July 8, 2018

Following the success of Good Will Hunting and a string of other successes, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck decided to give a shot at making a reality television game show. The film Project Green Light had contestants compete to create a script and ultimately a film with the winner receiving a movie deal. The season 3 script winner was a horror movie called Feast which would become a gory gross out monster survival movie. The film creates a whole new type of monster with its own mythology making it ripe for a set of sequels. Building on the 2000's move to extreme gore, the film also utilizes the genre's utilization of other gross out effects, especially vomit and bugs. The special effects are great, comedy is used sparingly, and the gore is over-the-top.

Phantasm II (1988)

June 28, 2018

"When you die you think you go to heaven? You come to us!" Nine years later, the Tall Man is still at it! Reanimating corpses throughout the United States to use as his slaves in his other dimensions.

First, there are a few issues that need to be addressed from the get go before getting into the finer points of the movie. The first is the issue of Mike. In the first movie and the three movies that follow this first sequel, Mike is played by A. Michael Baldwin. However, in this movie the studio producers didn't want either Baldwin or Reggie Bannister to play their beloved characters. The director/writer/creator Don Coscarelli went to bat for them and had to pull a few strings just to be able to get Reggie to once again play Reggie. Unfortunately, he couldn't get Baldwin and instead hired James Le Gros to play Mike. While Le Gros did a fine job, the absence of the original actor who played Mike is very noticeable. Also, Mike's brother Jody, who along with Mike was the main character in the original movie, is not in the movie at all. He will also be in the following three sequels. Despite missing two of the three original actors (and one of the central characters) Phantasm II is a really great movie that builds on the success of the original but takes it into a completely different path.

The Stuff (1985)

June 27, 2018

The Stuff is an in-your-face social critique of the consumerist culture of the 1980s with a handful of action film fight and a touch of gore. It features a very bizarre performance by Michael Moriarty who had just been in the Clint Eastwood western Pale Rider and who would go on to play Harry Potter Sr. (no relation) in Troll. He plays a tough guy private investigator with a distracting southern drawl (straight out of a Tennessee Williams play). Throughout the film, he delivers one-punch knock outs to over a dozen Red Shirts and is able to seduce any women he meets. Basically he's James Bond but instead of Sean Connery or Roger Moore, 007 is played by an out of shape, chubby faced southerner. Despite no one buying him as the hero, he does deliver some memorable and bizarre lines: "Well, everybody has to eat shaving cream one in a while." "No one is as dumb as I appear to be." "The name's Mo Rutherford. They call me that because when people give me money I always want mo'."

The Void (2016)

June 23, 2018

The Void is one of the first films I've seen in this journey through horror film that I thought was legitimately scary. Not, I can't sleep tonight scary, but definitely check out the window a couple times to make sure no one in a triangle hood is outside brandishing a knife.

The film begins with the shotgun and burning murder of a woman as a man runs away. He is picked up by a cop who brings him to the local hospital where all hell breaks loose. The visuals in this film are remarkably terrifying: The men in the hoods, the monsters that break out of people but still carry the people with them, the sudden flashes of occult and cosmic imagery. The gore is also used heavily and effectively. It reminded me of Event Horizon, including an early in the film death of a woman stabbing out another person's eyes as she cuts of pits of her face flesh.

Pumpkinhead (1988)

June 21, 2018

Don't let the silly name fool you, this 1988 gem has some really great horror moments! Pumpkinhead is the revenge story of a father whose son is killed by a drunk hit-and-run motorcyclist and he seeks out an old lady in the swamp to summon the revenge demon Pumpkinhead to murder the hit-and-runner and his five friends.

There are a few aspects of this film that make it especially interesting. First, the practical effects of Pumpkinhead himself are incredibly well done for 1988... or for today even. Tom Woodruff, Jr. (It, Aliens, Death Becomes Her, Tremors) did an incredible job on the special effects and makeup of the Pumpkinhead creature. A less talented artist could've created something really goofy and ruined the film, but Woodruff's creature is terrifying looking.

Ghoulies II (1988)

June 20, 2018

Vindication! I was so disappointed with the first Ghoulies and was worried that the second one wasn't going to live up to my childhood memory. It was just as stupid and great as I remember. The producer must've learned a couple lessons from the first one. First, if you make a movie called "Ghoulies" make the movie about the actual Ghoulies. Second, if you put a Ghoulie in a toilet on the movie poster, put a Ghoulie in a toilet in the movie. Third, don't take the movie too seriously, it's about a bunch of goofy stop-animation puppet monsters.

Food of the Gods (1976)

June 20, 2018

In the immortal words of Jeff Goldblum's character from Jurassic Park, "Nature uh uh finds a way." Food of the Gods is a nature horror film about giant animals (mostly rats) terrorizing a group of people who are trapped in the woods. Apparently a scientist has discovered or created something that he calls "Food of the Gods" that causes animals to become giant. His wife, a couple bacteriologists, and two campers must find a way to survive the giant animals.

Ghoulies (1984)

June 19, 2018

I was really looking forward to watching this movie. I had hyped it up so much to my wife. I was adamant that Ghoulies blows Critters out of the water 100%! I grew up watching these little guys terrorize people on the TV screen. I remember being afraid to use the bathroom when I was a kid for fear that a Ghoulie would pop out and bite me. Unfortunately, I think I was remembering Ghoulies II and Ghoulies III: Ghoulies Go To College. I am not positive if I ever actually saw the original Ghoulies. After watching it, I had to eat crow. This movie sucks.

From Beyond (1986)

June 14, 2018

From the director of Re-Animator... From the writers of Re-Animator... and from several of the actors in Re-Animator comes... From Beyond. This 1980s horror flick offers great practical special effects in the vein of Clive Barker and an intriguing storyline based on an H.P. Lovecraft short story.

The movie is about two scientists who create a machine called a Resonator that stimulates the pineal gland allowing humans to see beyond this reality. Instead of new dimensions or other worlds all the characters in this film can really perceive is a bunch of creatures which are there to torture and destroy them. Oh, and stimulation of the pineal gland stimulates sexual arousal so there is some nudity and sexuality, a requirement for mid-eighties horror cinema (remember the year before when a severed head "went down" on that woman in Re-Animator... well the same woman is in this one and at some point she inexplicably goes from being a scientist to a sex-crazed dominitrix).

The Mist (2007)

June 13, 2018

Movies based on Stephen King novels used to be a seal of quality in the 1980s. However King's rising stature in the 1990s as The Master of Horror gave him a lot more creative control of his movies and with it came a quick decline in their quality. It was either that or that studios felt that could earn a quick buck by churning out a made-for-tv movie every other week by slapping King's name on the title. There are so many King movies that draaaaag… luckily, this isn't one of those!