Whiskey

 

 (imdb)

WHISKEY MOUNTAIN-1977-Motorcycle racer Bill (Christopher George) and his wife Jamie (Linda Borgeson) go looking for grandpa's Civil War treasure on the title mountain. They bring along Dan (Preston Pierce) and Diana (Roberta Collins). Not much happens but they are obviously being watched. After they lose one of their motorcycles, they meet a weird cackling hermit (who stole Diana's underwear) and have dinner with him (Robert Leslie). After about 50 minutes of nothing, the quartet stumble into some pot growing Hillbillies (led by John David Chandler as Rudy). They're a bunch of perverted redneck assholes who tie up the men and abuse the women. With the help of the hermit, the men escape. They get no help in town but get some guns and go back to rescue the girls. Dan is killed and Bill kills all the redneck scum but…

William Kerwin and Pat Patterson are also in it. Director/co-writer William Grefe (DEATH CURSE OF TARTU (1966), STANLEY (1972)) made this in Florida. Theme song by The Charlie Daniels Band.

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Shhhh....

 

 (imdb)

FROM A WHISPER TO A SCREAM-1987-A reporter Beth Chandler (Susan Tyrell) covers the execution of Katherine White (Martine Bestwick) in the town of Oldfield. After her execution Beth visits White's brother Julian (Vincent Price) and 4 tales are related. 

In story one: A nutty psychotic wimp Stanley (Clu Gulager) has a weird relationship with his sister. He's sweet on co-worker Grace. Some-how, they go on a date and he kills her. Later he has sex with her corpse. 9 months later he kills his sister. He seems happy until an undead demon baby (the result of his unholy intercourse) comes to kill him. 

In the second story an idiot (Terry Kiser) escaping from a gangland hit meets the swamp dwelling Felder (Harry Ceaser) who knows the secret of eternal life. 

In the third a glass eater at a carnival has problems when he wants to marry a non-carny woman. They escape but the owner (Rosalind Cash) vows revenge. 

In the last, set during the Civil War, some children take revenge on Northern soldiers (led by Cameron Mitchell) in defense of the insurrectionists who fought to keep slavery legal. 

This is a mixed bag anthology from director Jeff Burr who was later known for his sequels to horror movies (THE STEPFATHER 2, LEATHERFACE: TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 3, PUMPKINHEAD 2: BLOOD WINGS, ETC.).

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Not An Army Of Doctors

 

ARMY OF FRANKESTEINS-2013-A mad scientist accidentally sends a pack of Frankenstein monsters back in time to the Civil War along with Alan, a skinny loser and a little kid from the present day. It's a horror comedy made in Oklahoma with gore influenced by things like ABRAHAM LINCOLN VAMPIRE HUNTER. A crazy southern general creates his own monster and Alan and the famous monster try to prevent John Wilkes Booth from assassinating Abraham Lincoln. It's pretty bad. Director Ryan Bellgardt has made other movies and probably will make some more...

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NYC Underground

NO MORE EXCUSES-1968-Lame amateurish "underground" film directed by and starring Robert Downey Sr as a Union Civil War soldier transported to NYC in the late '60's. While he wanders around Manhattan, the rest of this mess is men and women being interview about their reasons for going to "singles clubs", well known trickster Alan Abel explaining why he thinks domestic animals should wear clothes and a weird part with Don Calfa as stalker/rapist who breaks into a woman's apartment and forces himself on her. Later she seems to accept it and then frolics in bed with a chimpanzee. I've seen a lot of Downey's stuff (CHAFFED ELBOWS, GREASER'S PALACE, PUTNEY SWOPE) and this is his worst.

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Exit Action

EXIT HUMANITY-2011-This stupid movie (from writer/director John Geddes) starts off during the Civil War where hillbilly Edward Young (Mark Gibson) learns about zombies and how to kill them. After his wife and child are infected, he cries a lot and has weird dreams and flash-backs. Some scenes are animated. Later he helps rescue Emma (Jordan Hayes)  the sister of a guy named Isaac (Adam Seybold) but they meet up with some asshole "rebels" experi-menting with the living dead. Dee Wallace plays a medicine woman who helps the trio and it's discover the sister may have immunity to the zombie plague. When the bad guys kidnap the sister somehow Young leads all the zombies to their hideout for an attack. 

This drawn out talky WALKING DEAD inspired horror story is based on a novel and wastes Bill Moseley and Stephan McHattie in minor roles. Somehow they got Brian Cox to narrate it.

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2000 Maniacs

2000 MANIACS-1964-Herschel Gordon Lewis' second installment of his infamous "blood trilogy" after BLOOD FEAST is a bit of a letdown. It's a kind of gory version of BRIGADOON without singing. Maybe Lewis blew it. He could have created the first gore musical! 


Anyway, the ghost town of Pleasant Valley (I wonder if this all happened on a Sunday..??) appears 100 years after the beginning of the Civil War. It's full of a bunch of redneck hicks who also happen to be cannibal murderers out for revenge for the slaughter of their village during the war. They kidnap/trick 6 couples (including BF leads Thomas Wood/Rooney Kerwin and former Playboy centerfold Connie Mason) from the North and plan to use them in their centennial. Four are killed in various HG Lewis fashion. One woman has her arm chopped off. A guy is pulled apart by horses. Another guy is put in a barrel with nails and rolled down a hill. Another woman is crushed by a boulder. That's about it. Mostly it's yokels laughing and saying "yankee" a lot. 


2000 MANIACS was filmed in Florida, where previously BLOOD FEAST was also made but while BF had extreme gore and humor (some of it unintentional) at least it was entertaining and moved along at a good pace. This drags and the hillbilly ranting becomes annoying. 


Ben Moore (who's also in Lewis' MOONSHINE MOUNTAIN) plays an ax toting lunatic.  I love the cool theme song (written and sung by HG) though called "The South's Gonna Rise Again". 


It was remade in 2005 as 2001 MANIACS with Robert Englund in the lead. 


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Happy New Year!

ABRAHAM LINCOLN-1930-This was the first sound film made by the legendary DW Griffith but for years inferior copies missing some scenes had been the only ones in circulation. A few years ago Kino put out a version with the missing scenes restored but the soundtrack for these parts seems to be lost and are shown with subtitles.

Walter Huston plays Honest Abe. The prologue shows a horrifying slave ship (though the African slaves seem mostly to be made up white actors) where some slaves are thrown overboard. The episodic biography begins with his log cabin birth, rail splitting, courting of Ann Rutledge (Una Merkel) and his subsequent pining after her death, meeting and marrying Mary Todd (Kay Hammond), his debates with Stephen Douglas and his election to the presidency and of course The Civil War. It all happens at a fairly brisk clip with each period dealt with just a couple of scenes (although the War is more detailed). It ends with his assassination by fanatical John Wilkes Booth (Ian Keith). Jason Robards Sr. plays his friend Billy.

Like many early "talkies" however it suffers from a mediocre script, stilted acting and stage play like direction. In an earlier scene Huston is wearing a ridiculous amount of make-up but his performance when Lincoln becomes president is heartfelt. Stephan Vincent Benet is credited with the adaptation. Griffith made only one more film after this.

Thanks again to my pal Tony for finding this and thanks for reading!