Wrong Turn 3: Left For Dead (2009)

Reviewed By: Billy

Rarely has a movie in recent memory been met with such anticipation at Tower Farm as Wrong Turn 3: Left for Dead. The Wrong Turn franchise, after all, is one of our favorites. Part one was a genuinely good movie; the gore effects were perfectly done, the script was strong and suspenseful, and it featured one of the best young casts in a horror movie ever. Wrong Turn 2: Dead End, on the other hand, boasts one of the most insane scripts in horror history, assembles a bizarre cast including “American Idol” singer Kimberly Caldwell, Henry Rollins, and Erica Leerhson, and features mutants having sex and family dinners. Of course, we like this one much better.

Part three, then, has a lot to live up to. And director Declan O’Brien seems to sense this, and so he throws in gratuitous blood and nudity right off the bat. Well, Declan, we at Tower Farm see right through your little ruse of distracting us with giant boobs and eyeballs popping out. And sir…we thank you.

In this opening scene, four “college kids” (who appear to be pushing 30 at best) take a break from rafting down a river to -- what else? -- camp out and smoke out. As the scene progresses, something strange happens: their voices begin to change. At first I thought maybe this was just a problem with my TV…or maybe my ears…but then I suddenly realized it. These aren’t really American kids – they’re British! Yep – just about everyone in this movie is British. For some reason, filmmakers setting a movie in West Virginia decided to populate it with actors from across the pond. Thus, the strange outcome is that half of them try to hide their accents, and half of them don’t even bother. And for those who try to sound authentically American…well, let’s just say Meryl Streep has nothing to worry about. The topless girl in the opening, for example, goes from uttering “We’re in the middle of the woods…who’s gonna notice?” with the perfect California-sex voice of Paris Hilton to declaring “Alex thinks I’m a slut…do you think I’m a slut?” with all the Cockney ridiculousness of Eliza Doolittle. And this is within the span of 45 seconds! Thankfully, she only gets about five lines of dialogue before an arrow is shot through her boob, and then another one pierces her eyeball like a shish-kabob. So, we’re off to a very strong start.
 
The archer, of course, is Three Finger, who has only gotten more creative with his traps this time around. One of the…ahem…college kids, for example, ends up stepping into an intricate contraption that cuts him into three slices. Remember when Kim Caldwell was cut in half in part two? It’s like that…except done with a staggeringly sloppy CGI effect that makes it look like there’s a glitch in your DVD.
 

Next we end up at a nearby West Virginia prison. Here we meet all the tough inmates, covered in fake tattoos and spouting off absurdly racist dialogue like, “You fight one bean, you fight the whole burrito, huh?” And again, there’s a strangely high percentage of British inmates and officers. Chavez – a Hispanic prisoner planning a prison break – sounds kinda like Anthony Hopkins playing the villain in a Merchant-Ivory production. And then there’s the Nazi skinhead who completely bungles the line “Normally I’d slit your throat for less” into “No-mally, Oy’d slit ya throat fa less.” By the end of the scene, you’ll be howling with laughter and sure that you’ve just seen a British sketch comedy troupe doing a parody of “Oz.”
 
Our hero this time around is Tom Frederic as Nate, one of the prison guards who is given the task of transporting an amazingly annoying gang of prisoners through the woods in the middle of the night. At first, Frederic seems to just mumble his lines and appears totally confused by his character. Then – you guessed it! – I realized he’s yet another poor British guy just trying to hide his accent. This prison transfer, by the way, is enormously entertaining due to the fact that we get the 2009 version of the old rear-screen projection trick – a backwoods road computer-inserted behind the windshield. What makes this even better is that in the three separate shots of the windshield – the image NEVER changes! See for yourself – and marvel at the fact that this bus is apparently traveling at 0.2 miles per hour:

Anyway, before long the bus gets run off the road by Three Finger, and our vacationing Brits are on the run through the backwoods of West Virginia. What’s interesting here is that the prisoners end up with all the guns – but for some reason let the guards live and even force them to tag along. Umm, come on guys – you’ve just been handed the most convenient escape a prisoner could dream of! Not only can you shoot the guards and run – but the crazy mutant killer would probably end up being blamed for it! And then the surviving camper from the beginning, Alex, crosses paths with the group – and while the prisoners repeatedly discuss having sex with and killing the girl, they end up just letting her tag along, too. God…what kind of convicts are these?

Unfortunately, the next 50 minutes or so play out like one extended episode of “Prison Break” – with all kinds of internal strife coming up between the inmates, along with a useless subplot involving bags of money that they find along the way. When Three Finger and his random teen-aged son (where did this mutant kid come from, by the way?) finally do pop up again, the special effects drop to a level so cheap they’re the visual equivalent of a Big Lots. In one case, a guy’s face is literally Photoshopped off the screen:

Finally, we get a climactic showdown between Three Finger and Chavez, a fight scene that is as tedious as it is clunky, and one in which the viewer gets the rare opportunity to side whole-heartedly with the mutant villain, considering Chavez has been such a jerky a-hole through the entire movie. Thankfully for us, the posh-sounding Hispanic gang lord ends up with the top of his skull being peeled back like the lid of a jar, and Three Finger eats what appears to be a brain made of Jell-O.

The final chase sequence, though, is the pièce de résistance – a special effects frenzy that must be seen to be believed. After over an hour of being subjected to every sloppy effect under the sun, we get an entire action sequence that appears to be shot in front of the green screen – and let me just say, there are small-market television stations whose weathermen look more natural in front of a keywall. Three Finger – a la Pirates of the Caribbean – uses a hook to hoist himself atop his moving tow truck, and then proceeds to ride a long in the back while Nate and Alex veer the vehicle all over the road. Again – this seems to be done almost entirely inside a studio, which means that as the tow truck speeds through the forest, the wheels don’t actually appear to be spinning on anything!

Really, I’m telling you…this scene is totally worth the price of admission.

So, look, I’m not gonna kid you. For me, Wrong Turn 2 is still the jewel in this franchise’s crown. The whole reality-show-gone-wrong premise provided the perfect framework for a direct-to-DVD cheap horror movie which almost seemed to revel in its cheapness. Maybe that’s the issue here – part three is nowhere near as competent as the first one, and not quite as incompetent and crazy as the second. It just kind of falls in the middle…which is OK, and appropriately worth:

THREE FINGERS!

Strip Nude For Your Killer (1975)

Reviewed By: Billy

Now that I’ve watched both Strip Nude for Your Killer and Delirium: Photo of Gioia, I think I’m pretty much an expert on the Italian fashion industry. Here's what I’ve learned:

1) To be a supermodel, one’s chest must be so expansive that it requires custom-made undergarments.
2) To be a supermodel, it’s imperative that one sleep with one’s photographer, or at least have a lesbian fling with one’s agent.
3) There isn’t actually any fashion involved in the fashion industry, as all photo shoots are done in the nude.

Additionally, in Italy, this apparently constitutes a fashion shot:

This is quite different from the American fashion industry. I’m an expert on that, as well, thanks to endless day-long marathons of “America’s Next Top Model” on Oxygen. In America, being a model includes:

1) Learning to “smile with your eyes”…
2) Learning to “tooch your booty”…
3) Repeatedly saying the word “fierce” while wagging your finger in front of your face.

And in America, this apparently constitutes a fashion shot:

Now, I ask you: which country’s fashion show would you rather sit through?

Anyway, Strip Nude for Your Killer is not a great movie, but it is proof-positive that 1970s Italy is just way cooler than present-day America.  The Italian just always got it right.  For example, in a splendid example of classy movie-making – the movie opens with a bizarre scene in which a doctor who appears to be wearing a Halloween wig digs in between a woman’s legs with a metal shoehorn. Yikes. The back of the box says something about a botched abortion; I’ll just assume this is it, though I have no other evidence to back that up. 

Suddenly we get an awesome credits sequence, set to a funky jazz score, in which we’re given the movie’s Italian title: Nude X l’Assassino. Wow…once again, score one for the Italians.

Anyway, from what I could tell while watching this movie on fast-forward, the bulk of it centers on a sleazy photographer who manages to sleep with pretty much every woman he comes into contact with. Seriously…within the first five minutes of the movie, the photographer – clad in a humiliatingly sleazy Speedo – chases after a woman, snaps some pictures of her butt, then convinces her to have sex with him in a public sauna. This is apparently commonplace in 1970s Italy, as we get further examples of young models hooking up with crusty, swarthy men…like this:

Between the sex/random nudity scenes – one of which includes our photographer doing a naked headstand for no apparent reason – people get killed by someone in a motorcycle outfit. It’s actually more like Halle Berry’s Catwoman suit with a helmet, but I think we’re to assume a motorcycle is involved. Speaking of Halle Berry, take a look at this sexpot:

Anyway, let’s just skip ahead to the unmasking of the killer. So…it turns out to be some blonde woman, who looks an awful lot like the other blonde women in the movie, so I’m not quite sure who she is. It might even be the woman in the picture above...I couldn't tell.  From what I can surmise from the shoddy 30-second explanation given at the end (which, by the way, happens as a woman undresses for the camera, readying to have sex with the photographer), the model who died while having an abortion was having a lesbian affair with the blonde killer, who was so upset that the model was pregnant that she went on a killing spree while dressed in motorcycle gear.

Ladies and gentlemen…we have a winner for Most Eurotrashy Premise For A Slasher Ever.

Oh, by the way…remember how every 1980s sitcom ended with that final punchline which was supposed to have the audience laughing one last time, and always culminated in an awkward freeze frame over which the credits rolled? My recollections are that "Growing Pains" was a master of this. Anyway…it turns out that Strip Nude for Your Killer was pulling this trick back in 1975…except here the joke revolves around the photographer trying to have anal sex with his girlfriend and it doesn’t result in a laugh so much as an uncomfortable silence. Love the freeze frame, though:

So…well…I’m not sure how to rate this movie. I’m not really a fan of Giallo movies, but I am a huge fan of these crazy fashion industry slashers. So, in the words of Tyra, I’ll just say that while overall the movie is a nice beauty shot, there just wasn’t quite enough intensity in the eyes.

THREE FIERCE WAGGING FINGERS!!!!!!

Cyborg 2 (1993)

By JM

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Sequels are always better than the originals. This is what Tower Farm is all about and Cyborg 2 is further proof.

Let’s face it, unlike Steven Seagal, who has never put out a movie I did not like… okay, love… Jean-Claude Van Damme movies are never a sure thing. For every Bloodsport, there is a Knock Off. Honestly, with Van Damme movies, it is about 50/50 whether or not it is going to be awesome (again, I want to make it clear that with Steven Seagal, there is a 100% chance that the movie will be awesome).

The original Cyborg is not one of his best movies. It is surprisingly boring, in fact. Which is something of an achievement given that the movie is about karate-kicking machine-men. So, while I appreciate the insanity of naming the hero in the movie Gibson Rickenbacker, I only wish there had been a Jackson Fender or a Samick Ibanez for Van Damme to fight against.

Unsurprisingly, though, despite its flaws, the first movie was pretty successful. In a world before Terminator 2, the public was hungry for robot-men fighting each other. And, let’s face it, Robocop did not go a long way toward satiating that craving.

So, four years after Cyborg hit theaters, we got Cyborg 2… and its absolutely terrible tagline, “Future Beware: The Soul Is In The Software”. Oh well, at least it rhymes. Sort of.

Now here comes the incredibly strange, and perfectly wonderful, part: In the absence of Van Damme, the main cyborg is played by… are you sitting down?... Angelina Jolie. Yes, in one of her very early roles (and well before anyone had any idea who she was) Angelina Jolie took the part of Cash Reese, the cyborg heroine of the film.

Like many movies of the era, Cyborg 2 takes place in a future where humans are at war with machines. Right off the bat, though, Cyborg 2 sets itself apart from similar films by opening the movie with a Star Wars-esque written explanation of things read by… are you still sitting?... Jack Palance!

Yep, Jack Palance plays a fairly pivotal role in this movie as Cash’s secretive advisor, Mercy. He actually delivers the line, “If you want to dine with the Devil, you’ll need a long spoon” before he opens fire on some soldiers. What?!

Oh God, and he is a cyborg, too.

This movie is just completely crazy.

The joys don’t stop with the two casting decisions already mentioned, either.

Billy Drago, who Tower Farm readers will surely recognize from such films as Vamp, Tremors 4, and Demon Hunter, not to mention his work on the show The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. plays the astonishingly gross character of Danny Bench in this movie.

Also, we have Elias Koteas as Colt Ricks (or Colton Hicks as he is named on the back of the DVD). While Elias Koteas is certainly not as recognizable a name as his costars, he has pretty much been on every TV show and every movie ever made, as near as I can tell. In this particular movie, his character teams up with Cash Reese (yes, the two main charaters are Cash and Colt) and serves as something of a protector to her.

As Colt, Elias Koteas come across as something of a cross between Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver and Law and Order: SVU’s Detective Stabler. Maybe he is the missing link between the two characters, much as the Creature from the Black Lagoon is the missing link that connects fish to man.

Also, in a very small and thankless role, we get Robert Dryer as Pinwheel Exec. #2. He may not be a star to much of the world, but here at Tower Farm, he has earned a spot in our Hall of Fame (still under construction). You see, Robert Dryer played Jake in Savage Streets—the gang leader who terrorized Linda Blair! The guy only has about two lines in this movie, and I am sure I would have never recognized him has I not been watching the extras for Savage Streets. But, sure enough, he is in this movie.

What a friggin’ cast!

Cyborg 2 also includes what may be the greatest movie character of all time, Raven Chen. Chen is another cyborg out for Cash. Now, I am not kidding here, when she is fighting Cash and Colt (does every charater’s name start with a “C”?) she actually yells, “hi-yah!” after one of her kicks… just like Miss Piggy!

So, the movie follows the… ehem… plot of well, I am not entirely clear on what is going on here. Cash Reese and Colt Ricks/Hicks escape a cyborg manufacturing company (that, I guess, is making karate fighting cyborg prositutes). They are helped by Mercy (whose mouth continually pops up on TV sets and gives them advise) and they are hunted by Danny Bench who is employed by the cyborg manufacturers to get Cash back. Oh, and there is some danger that Cash might explode.

Did I mention that this movie is crazy?

While looking up information on this movie, I found out that Director Michael Schroeder followed this movie in 1994 with Cyborg 3: The Recycler, starring Malcolm McDowell, William Katt, and some lady named Khrystyne Haje who takes on the role of Cash Reese. How is it possible that I never knew this movie existed??!! Oh well, given how much I have always enjoyed the madness of Cyborg 2, I suppose I have no choice but to hunt it down.

Cyborg 2 will always be linked in my mind to other mid-1990s Cinemax classics like Return of the Living Dead 3 and The Monster Squad. So, perhaps part of the rating I am going to give it comes from the warm memories I have of my brother and I watching these movies over and over again on weekend nights. Regardless, Cyborg 2 merits…

4 fingers!

Sweet Sixteen (1983)

Reviewed By: Billy

Oh God, I love this movie. Including the best/worst theme song in history, and showcasing one of the greatest meltdowns by a once-respected actress ever, it is a pure delight. Somehow I missed out on this gem for way too long, only having recently received it in the mail. PLEASE don’t make the same mistake.

Let me start by saying there are two versions of this film that are available in DVD – the Director’s Cut and the Original Theatrical Version. I’m actually going to review the Original Theatrical Version, for no other reason than it begins with this title frame, which let’s face it, is wonderful:

It also includes an insane opening in which Dana Kimmell (one of Tower Farm’s favorite leading ladies, having come to our attention in Friday the 13th: 3-D) sits in a church (or some place with stained glass windows and candles) during a thunderstorm reading a book called “Murder Mystery.” She then opens a door and sees a zombie. Let me just be clear here that this is NOT a zombie movie. It’s actually not a supernatural movie at all. Why is this opening included? I have no idea. It is mysteriously missing from the Director’s Cut, so I’m guessing someone else decided it would be a good idea. By the way, Dana Kimmell looks a good two or three years older in this bizarre sequence than she does in the rest of the movie – complete with a totally different hairstyle – so that’s wonderful.

Anyway, suddenly we’re on to the real movie, which takes place in some kind of hillbilly desert town near a Native American reservation. One of the Native Americans is played by Henry Wilcoxon, who was in the 1932 version of Cleopatra that I spent the better part of my childhood being obsessed with. Yes…the guy who played Roman Marc Antony in the 1930s is now playing an old Indian in the 1980s. This, as are many things we mention on Tower Farm, is clear proof that my brother and I create the world.

Next we meet Melissa, played by Aleisa Shirley, who is the new girl in town and wants nothing more than to do drugs and have sex. Melissa kind of looks like a pissed off Valerie Bertinelli, and utters what is possibly the greatest pickup line in the history of film: “You guys ever play with girls…or just yourselves?” It actually works on some poor schmuck, and soon they end up in the back of his pickup truck in the middle of the desert, with her head between his legs. Wow. And when the guy finally drops Melissa back at home, we find out she’s supposed to fifteen, although it’s clear that Aleisa Shirley is at least twenty. Let me just say that Melissa is now officially my favorite slasher movie character ever.

Anyway, the idiot who just got the blowjob from a fifteen-year-old is killed soon thereafter, once his car runs out of gas…and again, it’s in the middle of the desert. I’m not really sure how the killer knew the guy’s car would run out of gas in this particular secluded spot, but it sure it convenient.

Soon the town’s Sheriff is on the case, played by the awesome Bo Hopkins. If ever an actor looked like the Sheriff of a small, hillbilly town in the desert, it’s Bo Hopkins (look him up on IMDb and marvel at the number of times "Sheriff" shows up in the list of characters he's played). What Mr. Hopkins does NOT look like, however, is anything resembling a Native American. However, we later learn that he’s half-Native American. I would say this is about as realistic as Donna D’Errico being the descendant of Tony Todd in Candyman 3. Or Shannon Doerty and Jason Priestly being twins.

Aside from Hopkins, with who I’m now totally obsessed, the cast here is stellar. We’ve got Don “Michael Myers” Shanks as Jason Longshadow, a red-herring Native American character. We’ve also got the wonderful Susan Strasberg as Melissa’s mother. Susan had an incredible career, stretching from major Broadway success in The Diary of Anne Frank to starring in perhaps the most confounding movie ever made, The Manitou, in which she gave birth to a troll or something out of her neck. You all know there’s nothing Tower Farm loves more than a once-respected actress who ends up in low-budget horror, and I’m voting to immediately induct Susan into our Sleazy Women Hall of Fame. Her performance in this movie is not to be missed.

Meanwhile, Sweet Sixteen is a real showcase for Dana Kimmell, who – again – suddenly
looks several years younger than she did in the zombie opening. Dana plays the Sheriff’s daughter, who is an amateur sleuth and spends the movie trying to figure out who the killer is. Basically, she’s playing Nancy Drew, except with a Flock of Seagulls-inspired hairdo:

But the star of this movie, plain and simple, is Aleisa Shirley as Melissa. Hell, she even gets her own theme song. The composition “Melissa” must be heard to be believed. The piano-driven ballad, which includes the incomprehensible lyrics “Melissa…what are you thinking, sweet Melissa? Are you with her still, Melissa? You look so far away…” is kind of like the “Theme From Mahogany” being sung in a karaoke bar by a drunk guy who doesn’t know the words. By the way, as the theme song blares over the soundtrack, this is the shot we get of the character; if this is not a long lost Jordache Jeans ad, then I’m out a hundred bucks:

As soon as the song mercilessly ends, we get another awesome Melissa seduction scene, in which she humiliates the captain of the football team for calling pot “herb” and agrees to meet him near some dumpsters behind a bar so they can do “a little of everything.” God, can I say again how much I love Melissa? This seduction scene, by the way, is so loosely edited that there are long pauses before each line of dialogue, which in turn makes the characters look like they have some sort of mental problem.

Of course, the dumb jock ends up being knifed. Now, this is the second kid that’s been killed just after being with Melissa. But rather than focus on her, the entire town turns against the Native Americans.

Next up we find ourselves at a funeral for the two dead kids. Yes, you got that right…the town is doing a double funeral! At the funeral, we finally get the tense confrontation between Melissa and Dana Kimmell, with Dana pretty much accusing the girl of murder…and then it inexplicably ends in the two of them becoming best friends! I know this sounds like an exaggeration, but seriously…within about 45 seconds, Dana goes from calling Melissa a “stupid little bitch” to Melissa calling Dana’s character, Marcie, “Marce” as if they've known each other for years.

Things hurtle toward a climax at Melissa’s sweet sixteenth birthday party. Even though Melissa’s the new girl in town, and up until now nobody seems to know her, the entire town turns out for the big bash. Mind you, this is the same town that just held a double funeral for two unrelated kids, so they’re clearly a confused bunch. My favorite thing about the party, by the way, is this girl carrying the cake, who can’t contain her excitement at being on camera:

Melissa ends up taking a moonlight swim – nude, of course – and before you know it, her mother has a crazy meltdown and kills some people. Yes, our gal Susan Strasberg is the knife-wielding villain here, and she’s awesome. Susan gets a chance to let loose with dialogue including, “Ssssh! Here’s coming! We have to hide! NO! DADDY DON’T!!!” There’s no real explanation given here, but I guess we should assume Daddy did some very not-nice things to Susan as a little girl. There’s also some talk about Susan and her sister trading places or something…but, I’m pretty sure nobody in the cast actually knew what was going on.

Anyway, the real ending to the movie comes with the swelling of my favorite song, “Melissa,” and a freeze frame of Melissa staring crazily into the camera and holding a knife. So I guess Melissa’s crazy too, now, just like her mom. Maybe. Or maybe nobody quite knew how to end this thing and that just seemed like a good idea at the time. What matters is that we get to hear “Melissa” again. And then it starts all over again as the credits roll. Is this soundtrack available somewhere? If so I need it immediately.

Well…it should be pretty obvious that I loved this movie. Like Pieces before it, I expected absolutely nothing and came away with a new appreciation for slasher movies. This movie is the kind of wonderful mess that we live for here at Tower Farm, and therefore it’s well-deserving of…

FIVE FINGERS!

Saw II (2005)

by JM

For the last few years, I have avoided the Saw movies. The little I knew about them from previews and commercials made them look like Seven, and, frankly, I like my movies to be a little lighter than Seven. I mean, if I wanted to think, I would read a book, you know? Give me Friday the 13^th part 6: Jason Lives any day. The deepest question anyone has when watching that movie is, why did Tommy throw Jason’s mask into his open grave?

Well, I recently found the first five Saw movies packaged together for $20 and just could not pass that up. At $4 a movie, I had to take the chance. Certainly, I would like something about one of them, right?

Well, let me tell you, from laughing out loud while Cary Elwes blubbered and sobbed in part one, to finding, with great delight, Betsy Russell (of Cheerleader Camp!!!!) pop up in part 3 (and 4, and 5), to recognizing, with more shock, Costas Mandylor (of Picket friggin’Fences!!!) hamming it up through sequel after sequel, I can honestly say I am a HUGE fan of this movie franchise.

I should have known that any franchise dedicated to cranking out a sequel each and every year would not fail.

In my opinion, the jewel of this series of movies is the first sequel, Saw II. If you need evidence as to why this movie is so great… well, just take a look:

But, I am getting ahead of myself.

In the first Saw, Danny Glover played the hardboiled detective searching for answers in the case of the Jigsaw murders. In part two, As Detective Matthews, the case-hardened investigator is played by former New Kids On The Block (or NKOTB) singer Donnie Wahlberg. Now, this may seem like a strange choice, but to anyone familiar with his fantastic work in the TV show Boomtown, it will not be totally surprising. He’s kind of like his brother Mark, but a lot more scowl-y. Count me as a fan.

Another welcome face is Dina Meyer, who, as Kerry, is one of the few carryover characters from the original movie. From 90210, to Johnny Mnemonic, to Bats, to Decoys 2, this woman’s credentials are impeccable (at least by Tower Farm standards). I have to admit, though, that I am beginning to find her remarkably wrinkle-free face to be a little disturbing.

Tobin Bell returns as Jigsaw. This time, he has taken his cue from the movie The Cube, as he inexplicably manages to kidnap a group of individuals (including Det. Matthews son, Daniel), allowing them to wake up in a room having no idea where they are or how they got there.

Among this group of hostages is the movie’s real star… Shawnee Smith’s hair.

Shawnee Smith reprises the role of Amanda from Saw… a role that was about 5 minutes long in the first movie. Talk about hitting the jackpot.

I can clearly remember being in third grade at Davis Park Elementary School in Terre Haute, Indiana. The teacher handed out a piece of paper that had a long list of directions. The first one was to read all the directions before we began. From number two on, the directions were ridiculous, instructing each of us to write and color and God only remembers what else. The final direction, however, was to ignore all of the previous instructions. So, only those in the class that read the paper all the way through and did nothing actually were successful.

I can't say that I remember Jigsaw being in that class with me. But, if that teacher had included things like putting our arms into glass boxes that would slice us up if we tried to pull our arms back out again, she would have pretty much nailed the plot of the movie.

This movie also includes one of my favorite taglines ever: "Oh Yes, There Will Be Blood". Add to this the ridiculousness of having a character in the movie actually deliver that line, and we have one hell of a great sequel.

Four Fingers!

Gothic (1986)

Reviewed By: Billy

If we were in the business of reviewing VHS box covers, then Gothic would get a solid five fingers. This was the box that haunted my childhood; something about the picture of a little troll-thing crouching on a sleeping woman’s chest just totally intrigued me every time I saw it in the video section of Marsh supermarket (sidenote: What the heck happened to grocery stores having their own little video rental corners? Those were the days…). You know you have a box cover like that, too – be it Night of the Demons, Sleepaway Camp 2, or maybe even Dolly Dearest (all Tower Farm favorites) – some image tantalized you from the shelf and made you want to keep renting horror.

Well…the bad news is I finally saw Gothic, and it’s terrible. OK…maybe that’s a little harsh. Let’s just say Gothic is like a super-boring Merchant Ivory film if Merchant and Ivory had dropped acid before filming. And honestly, I think that’s kind of the point. I mean, you don’t hire actors like Julian Sands and Natasha Richardson, cast them as famous historical writers, and then make them roll around in mud and have satanic orgies without hoping to shock a few uptight critics. Director Ken Russell has kind of made a career doing that, so it’s no surprise that Gothic is going to feature all kinds of weird set pieces and crazy-looking British people. Unfortunately, it’s also like one of those dreams where you’re running toward something but not actually moving anywhere.

Yeah, it’s exactly like that.

So…according to the back of the box, Gothic takes place in 1816, and attempts to recreate the stormy night on which Mary Shelley was inspired to write her novel Frankenstein and Dr. John Polidori to write his The Vampyre. Now, if you’ve ever seen the 1930s film classic The Bride of Frankenstein, then you know the first five minutes of Bride do the exact same thing that this movie stretches over 97 minutes. That must explain why Ken Russell and cast are forced to time-pad here with scenes of mud-covered orgies, stripping robots, and masturbating men poking themselves with nails.

Front and center in this circus of embarrassment are Sands and Richardson as Percy and Mary Shelley; I guess they both do a good job, although anyone’s performance looks good in fast-forward. But I am really a fan of both actors; I’ve loved Julian ever since I first saw Warlock, and Natasha Richardson was a very talented woman who manages to keep at least a modicum of dignity in this movie even when everyone else around her is totally losing it. Gabriel Byrne plays poet Lord Byron as a sort-of non-musical Phantom of the Opera, slinking around in ridiculous costumes and generally making everyone around him uncomfortable:

Speaking of uncomfortable…this brings us to our other two cast members, Timothy Spall and Myriam Cyr as Polidori and Claire Clairemont, respectively. Now, you gotta hand it to these two – they take hammy English acting to levels not seen since Samantha Eggar got sent to the loony bin in Curtains. Spall as Polidori comes off as an extremely effeminate Mr. Potato Head, spending a good chunk of the movie running around without pants and shoving his sweaty face into the camera while screaming out dialogue like, “Don’t laugh at me!” I, meanwhile, laughed so hard I snorted out an entire glass of milk while watching this scene:

By the way, for some reason Polidori appears to be sleeping in Linda’s Blair’s bedroom from The Exorcist:

Cyr as Clairemont is…well…bizarre. I think at some point she gets possessed or something, because she ends up running around naked, doing lots of creepy giggling, swinging on a gate door, and revealing that her nipples are actually eyes. This last little bit – with the wide boob eyes staring sweetly into the camera – is enough to turn any straight man gay for fear of ever meeting a woman who boasts the same feature:

Speaking of gay, Julian Sands and Gabriel Byrne spend a good portion of the movie holding hands and share a passionate makeout session at one point, none of which seems to have anything to do with the plot. For the lady-loving viewers, we get the aforementioned boob-eyes and this strange robot-thing that strips on command…again, none of which seem to have anything to do with the plot:

If you can bear to stop fast forwarding for a moment, you’ll come across confounding exchanges of dialogue that rival Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction in their incomprehensibility. For example:

PERCY: For God’s sake, Mary, we can do it! What we created with our minds, we can destroy!
MARY: Yes, like God we have created. And perhaps God, like us, wants to destroy his creatures before they destroy their creator.
PERCY: Well, God is already dead!
MARY: But haven’t we raised the dead?

Huh? Oh, well…who cares what they’re talking about? The fact of the matter is that this movie’s biggest asset is that it comes like a pretty box. So can you judge a movie by its cover? Definitely not in this case. But you can blow the cover up into a nice wall poster and sell the actual tape at a garage sale.

ONE FINGER for the movie, FIVE for the box!

Screamfest

By: Billy & JM

Christmas may not come until December...but for Tower Farm, the gifts came early this year. This past weekend, we (along with our father, who occasionally comments on this site as "Ralph Merrye") were able to attend Screamfest in Orlando, FL. We have been attending this horror convention since 2007. As always, this year was an exceptionally good time...with a mix of horror icons, writers, and lots of fans.

Friday night, we've found, is always the best time to get in and meet the horror movie stars who wait to sign autographs and take pics with ridiculously starstruck people like us.

Billy: A highlight for me was talking to Adrienne Barbeau. Of course you'll know her from movies like Swamp Thing, The Fog, and Creepshow. She turned out to be really sweet and looked fantastic, and was nice enough to let me snap a pic of us together. By the way, she mentioned she was just on one of the latest episodes of "Dexter" which I'm looking forward to watching.

JM: As in 2007, Dannielle Harris was in attendance. I have been a huge fan of her work since Halloween 4. How could anyone not be a fan of someone who has been in four Halloween movies to date?... playing two different characters! There was also a screening of a new movie featuring Miss Harris called The Black Waters of Echo's Pond -- which, unfortunately, we missed because we're old and needed to get some sleep.
Billy: Meeting Chris Sarandon was really cool. I have been into this guy since I first saw Fright Night, and of course he's awesome in pretty much every other movie he's made. He was seated across from Alex Vincent, the kid from the original Child's Play...so I can only imagine how interesting it was for these guys to be reunited so many years later at a horror con!
JM: Cerina Vincent of Cabin Fever and Not Another Teen Movie was nice enough to take a quick picture with me. She was also promoting the two books she's written, and looked beautiful as always. My personal highlight, though, was meeting Joey Belladonna. As the former lead singer of Anthrax, I have been listening to this guy since I was about 11 years old. I am sure in my excitement I came across as nearly incoherent. But, so what? Getting to talk to Joey Belladonna was awesome!

Note from Billy: I have seen my brother excited about things before...but seriously...seeing him meet Joey Belladonna was like seeing someone being reunited with their long-lost mother. It was wonderful and bizarre all at the same time, and my brother's giddy reaction was by the far my favorite thing about Screamfest this year! I also have to say that Mr. Belladonna was incredibly nice and seemed genuinely happy to talk with fans like my brother, so I have definite respect for this man now (despite having seen Pledge Night, which he couldn't believe we mentioned!).

We also met several other people with whom we didn't take pictures; among them were Shannen Doherty (who was extremely nice), Tippi Hedren (looking great), and the makers of the aforementioned The Black Waters of Echo's Pond, who were cool enough to sign some posters for us.

Of course the dealer room was fantastic. We all spent a lot of time going through bootlegs and memorabilia. And on Saturday, the three of us were lucky enough to attend a Q&A with the one and only Sara Karloff, daughter of Boris Karloff. Ms. Karloff seemed like a really nice woman and had a lot of interesting stories about growing up with "Frankenstein's Monster." She also talked a little bit about the working relationship between her dad and Bela Lugosi, about which there's been a lot of gossip over the years. After this, we sat through a screening of The Bride of Frankenstein. Watching it projected onto a huge screen was definitely a highlight of the day.

FIVE FINGERS FOR SCREAMFEST '09!!!