Monster Rule Ok!

 

 (imdb)

THE MONSTER CLUB-1981-Aramis (Vincent Price), a vampire bites R. Chetwynd Hayes (John Carradine), the horror writer. Aramis then takes the writer to “The Monster Club” so he can get some ideas and The Viewers do “Monsters Rule OK”. After Aramis explains the genealogy of vampires and werewolves we get our first story in this anthology. A con artist couple have a scheme to swindle a lonely unusual looking guy Raven (James Laurenson) when the girl Angela (Barbara Kellerman) helps him catalog his collections. He creeps her out but she also feels sorry for him. Her boyfriend George (Simon Ward) wants to make a big score and when the guy proposes George wants her to marry him. Raven says he is a “shadmock” and can never whistle. He throws a costume party with his relatives. Angela is caught robbing his safe and he whistles turning her into a monstrosity much to the surprise of George when she visits him. 

BA Robertson performs. Then, vampire/film producer Limton Busotsky (Anthony Steel) shows a scene from his upcoming movie. This is the second story, a young, bullied boy wonders about the night work his father (Richard Johnson) does. His mother (Britt Ekland) says he was a nobleman in Europe. A priest (Donald Pleasence) urges the boy to discover why dad sleeps all day. The boy discovers dad is a vampire and the priest is a vampire hunter. The vampire turns the tables on his hunters in the comical finale. 

Then the band Night performs “Stripper”. The 3rd story is about a “Humgoo”. A grouchy American director (Stuart Whitman) goes to scout a shooting sight in a remote village. An old man (Patrick Magee) tells him the village is run by The Elders. The decrepit townspeople force him to stay. He meets a young girl Luna (Lesley Dunlop) who informs him that the whole village is made up of ghouls. From a diary he learns how some evil ghouls took over the village. The only place they won't go is a church, so he hides out there with Luna, who is half human. They escape but Luna is killed. He's picked up by some ghoul policemen and taken back for “the great eating”. In the end, Aramis makes a great case for allowing a “hume” in the club. Everyone dances to The Pretty Things doing the title song. 

This was the last film produced by Milton Subotsky, who in the 1970's, along with his partner Max J. Rosenberg produced many horror films under the Amicus banner. This was an independent production, however. 

The stories are based on ones written by real horror & ghost story writer R. Chetwynd Hayes who didn't like the movie or Carradine's portrayal of him (he thought the actor too old). The filmmakers had wanted Sir Christopher Lee but he turned it down. It's also the last film directed by the great Roy Ward Baker. Most folks seem to run this movie down and admittedly it's no classic, it's just a fun combo of horror, comedy and music.

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Killer Bunnies!

 

NIGHT OF THE LEPUS-1972-A rancher Cole Hillman (Rory Calhoun) is over run by rabbits. He asks a college prof. Elgin Clark (Deforest Kelly) to help. Clark calls in environment friendly husband and wife scientists Roy and Gerry Bennett (Stuart Whitman & Janet Leigh) who decide to do a hormone experiment on the bunnies. Unfortunately their little daughter Amanda (Melanie Fullerton) switches the test subject hare with a regular one which escapes literally down the rabbit hole. After a truck driver and a miner are mutilated by giant bloodthirsty rabbits they also terrorize the daughter. The old sheriff (Paul Fix) investigates after a family of campers is killed. They dynamite the mine the rabbits are hanging out in but that doesn't do much good. The hungry hares go on a rampage scaring horses and cattle and bloodily killing townspeople. 

Very strange Bert I. Gordon like horror film was produced by AC Lyles and is not as bad as it's been written about. It also features familiar character I. Stanford Jolley in his last feature role. Director William Claxton does an acceptable job of mixing real blown up rabbits with close-uos of fake ones while throwing in some bloody scenes to make you forget how ludicrous the plot is. It's based on a novel by Australian writer Richard Braddon. To read about the novel go here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Year_of_the_Angry_Rabbit

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Eaten Alive!

EATEN ALIVE-1977-This was director Tobe Hooper’s follow up movie after THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE. It was written by the same screenwriter, Kim Henkel and features one of it‘s stars. It didn’t get too wide of a release and was not nearly as well known as it’s predecessor. The first scene features Robert Englund as a john wanting anal sex. Not the best way to start off a movie…

Neville Brand stars a Jed, a mumbling drug addict with a fake leg who owns a motel/crocodile farm. After his attempted rape of a runaway whore (Crystin Sinclair) fails, he stabs her with a rake and feeds her to his “crocs”. A weird couple (William Finley and Marilyn Burns) and their daughter stay in a room after their dog is eaten. They argue a lot and act strange. After Jed kills the father and ties the mother to a bed he terrorizes the daughter with a scythe (she hides under the house to escape him). Meanwhile Mel Ferrer searches for his missing daughter (the first victim) and a hick sheriff (Stuart Whitman) investigates. Carolyn Jones is almost unrecognizable as Miss Matty, the owner of the local whorehouse. Jed feels nearly everyone to his crocs.

Despite Brand’s manic performance and a pretty whacked out climax EATEN ALIVE it isn’t that good! It’s drawn out and cheap looking but the excellent lighting and music help.

After this Hooper’s career kind of took an unfortunate nosedive, as he was replaced on two movies (THE DARK and VENOM) and although he has the director’s credit on POLTERGEIST it’s considered that Steven Spielberg directed most of it. He did manage to make a decent TV adaptation of Stephen King’s ’SALEM’S LOT but this was followed by disappointing features like THE FUNHOUSE, LIFEFORCE, a remake of INVADERS FROM MARS and finally TCSM-2. Lately he’s done TV episodes and another remake, THE TOOLBOX MURDERS. As for this writing he’s suppose direct a version of another King novel, FROM A BUICK 8.

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