Bloody Horror

 

 (imdb)

NIGHT OF BLOODY HORROR-1969-Wesley Stewart (Gerald McRaney) seems to have a few problems like his nagging mom and having spent 13 years in a mental hospital for accidentally killing his brother. When he goes out to a bar and gets drunk, 3 jerks beat him up and take his money. He's helped by a nurse. They begin a relationship that's shown in still pictures. Unfortunately, Wes it seems has psychotic episodes that make him kill. When he leaves the nurse on the beach alone (at night), he comes back and kills her with an axe. Or does he? 

This shot in New Orleans, no budget horror bore has scenes that are way too dark. Director/co-writer Joy N. Houck Jr. (THE BRAIN MACHINE (1972)) followed this up the next year with WOMEN AND BLOODY TERROR, also featuring the co-star of TV's “Simon & Simon”.

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Nigel

 

NIGEL THE PSYCHOPATH AT LARGE-1994-How come when people make lists of the worst movies ever made, a garbage film like this isn't there. Well I guess most people haven't seen it. Terrible editing and direction, zombified acting, loud noises, atrocious gore sfx with splattered blood that looks like it was squeezed out of a tube and worst of all the gas mask wearing killer preys on kids and uses a weed whip to kill. One kid has his arm severed and his stump spurts blood. He kills adults too. Meanwhile some yokels are hunting for him. When one of them accidentally kills a kid, his partner just says, "don't worry about it". Actors laugh and smile. A fight scene involving a broom seems intentionally stupid but I'm not so sure. 

The end features a policeman who looks like a high school student, a guy in drag and a drunk who thinks the drag is his ex-girlfriend! What happens when kids who've seen FRIDAY THE13th too much get a hold of a camera! Director Jim Larsen also made a movie called BUTTCRACK (1998).

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Wood Back in Hollywood

 

 (imdb)

THE SINISTER URGE-1960-Lt. Carson (Keene Duncan; the phony swami in NIGHT OF THE GHOULS) and Sgt. Stone (Duke Moore; Lt. Harper in PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE) try to stop the pornography ring run by Johnny Ryde (Carl Anthony; also in PLAN 9) and Gloria Henderson (Jean Fontaine). Mr. Romaine (Wood regular Harvey B. Dunn), a small business operator complains that the police are too concerned with "smut" than crime. Johnny says "I look at this slush and try to remember at one time I made good movies". The chief porno photographer is a German named Jaffe (Harry Keaton). 

Meanwhile a psycho named Dirk (Dino Fantini) (who's on Gloria's payroll) hangs around and kills a woman in a park pond (in some prints there's a topless scene). The organization decides Dirk must go. Johnny arranges for Dirk to be killed in a car crash but that fails. Dirk goes for revenge. He tries to kill Johnny who convinces him Gloria planned his killing. Johnny botches it and Dirk kills him. Gloria shoots Dirk but she thinks she's shot Johnny and winds up incriminating herself when she calls the cops.

"Pornography. A nasty word for a dirty business" says Lt. Carson. 

A scene of Ed Wood fighting Conrad Brooks was actually filmed earlier for an aborted project. This is a typical “morality crime tale” written and directed by Ed Wood Jr. a year after the release of PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. Strangely, though this movie treats porn as a serious moral and criminal offense (and makes a connection to violence toward women) this would be Wood's last attempt at mainstream cinema. The rest of his output would be exploitative soft core sex films....

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Moon in Scorpio...How Did it Get There?

 

MOON IN SCORPIO-1987-This begins with a woman in a straitjacket saying “Moon in Scorpio. What does it mean?”. After the credits a patient escapes from a mental hospital killing two people. Then the police investigate a boat drifting at sea. They find a woman who stabs a cop. Later she's interviewed by the head of the hospital (Robert Quarry) and she talks about ghouls, assassins and a death ship. Flashback to Vietnam: Mark (Lewis Van Bergen), Burt (William Smith) and Allen (John Phillip Law) kill some villagers. Later Allen marries Linda (Britt Ekland). Burt invites Allen and Linda and her friends on his boat. Allen agrees though it's clear he's traumatized and doesn't like water. Besides Burt and his alcoholic wife Claire (Julian Kesner; FIRECRACKER) their mutual friends Mark and his weird girlfriend Isabelle (April Wayne) go along. This flashback is interrupted by an idiotic police officer talking about the escaped patient (the actor is terrible). Back in the past: Before the group leaves an unseen killer does in a fisher-man. Despite all being buddies no one seems to get a long. Also it's apparent the killer is on board using a crossbow. One by one everybody is killed. The killer turns out to be Isabelle the escaped patient. She goes insane. You might too.......

Director Gary Graver was a cinematographer on over two hundred projects including work with Orson Welles and Al Adamson and a lot of porn (some which he directed under a pseudonym). This crazy murder mystery is a miserable paste up job. 

Nominal male lead Van Bergen was in the star of the short lived TV show "Sable". 

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Couch Killer

 

THE COUCH-1962-A psychopath Charles (Grant Williams; THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN) under the care of a psychiatrist Dr. Jantz (Onslow Stevens in his last role) murders random victims at 7 pm and tips off the police before hand. He's screwy because he hated his father and made his older sister his mother substitute after mom died. Despite this he somehow romances the shrink's niece Terry (Shirley Knight). He lies to her about most everything and they plan to marry! He makes a fatal mistake though when he decides to kill the doc who doesn't die as planned. Charles disguises himself as a surgeon and wants to sabotage the surgery. Fortunately he cracks up before he can kill the doc who he believes is now his father. Disappointing conclusion but funny final scene. 

Hal Smith and Harold Gould have unbilled roles. Robert Bloch penned this psychological  drama from a story by Blake Edwards. Director Owen Crump didn't make many feature films.

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Rambo

NIGHTMARE HONEYMOON-1974-A newlywed couple David (Dack Rambo) and Jill (Rebecca Dianna Smith) participate in a weird hick ritual where they have to run away from their wedding while a group led by Jill's father (Pat Hingle) tries to catch them, The couple elude the party but while skinny dipping at a secluded motel they witness two thugs Sandy (Roy Jenson) and the psychotic Lee (John Beck) kill an embezzler (David Huddleson). They discover the couple, knock David out and rape Jill. The redneck asshole sheriff (Richard O'Brien) is no help. David plots revenge. He roughs up smug local boss Ruskin (Jay Robinson) and fights it out with Lee fight in the climax with Jill's life at stake. Dennis Patrick, Jim Boles and Bob Steele have small roles. 

This pretty dismal MGM production was filmed in and around New Orleans by director Eliot Silverstein (CAT BALLOU, A MAN CALLED HORSE) who's next film would be THE CAR in 1977.

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The Lone Star State of Horror

PSYCHO FROM TEXAS-1975-A nutty redneck named Wheeler (John King lll) has flashbacks of his mom having sex. Meanwhile a local rich retired businessman  named Phillips (Herschal Mays), who fishes with an African American kid, plans the wedding of his daughter Connie (Candy Dee). Turns out Wheeler was hired to kidnap and rob Phillips. He and a local fool kidnap Phillips and after tying him up at a remote cabin, Wheeler goes to score some weed. Now he may be psycho but he's not very smart leaving the shit for brains local to watch over their captive. Sure enough while Wheeler is out making a pest of himself Phillips escapes. The local gives chase. They keep referring to Phillips as an “old man" but he takes off and their chase scene seems to go on forever!  Meanwhile Wheeler visits Connie and a neighbor informs her that her daddy is missing. (The kid he goes fishing with found his abandoned car) It seems Connie's fiance Steve (Reed Johnson) is behind the plot. The long long chase finally ends with Phillips stabbing the local ass in the neck. He eventually makes it to police headquarters.  After Wheeler kills Connie's friend, he gets some KFC and visits a bar. Steve is arrested but when he sees Phillips is alive he grabs a cop’s gun and bolts. Yes! Another chase scene! The chase is inter-cut with Wheeler's antics at the very darkly lit bar where he kills the only other customer and makes the bartender (Linnea Quigley) dance naked and pours beer on her (she looks like she's laughing on one point). A cop shoots Steve in the head, father and daughter are reunited and the sheriff (who’s daughter Wheeler killed) shoots Wheeler whose last words are “Don't hurt me, mama!”.  

This fairly boring slasher film began life as the never released WHEELER. It went through several changes and titles before it became PSYCHO FROM TEXAS. The bar scenes with  Linnea Quigley (this could be her first film role depending on when the scenes were shot) were added to this version providing the only actual highlight of the whole film. Seems like they put it toward the end to give at least some kind of payoff. Two directors are credited: Jack Collins (who plays the sheriff) and Jim Feazell.

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Fright

FRIGHT-1971-A college student named Amanda (Susan George) babysits a small child for his weirdly acting parents (Honor Blackman and George Cole). She gets spooked a few times by noises and a stranger hangs around the house but she thinks it's her stupid boyfriend (Dennis Waterman) who shows up and tries to frighten her with scary stories. Meanwhile we learn why the parents acted strangely. It turns out Mom is the process of divorcing Brian, her husband (and father of her young son) a paranoid nut who has recently escaped from his mental hospital. After she thinks her boyfriend has been bludgeoned to death, Amanda is “befriended” by “a neighbor” (Ian Bannen) who of course turns out to be Brian. Poor Amanda cracks up but soon realizes he's a psycho who imagines she's his wife, rapes her and terrorizes his child. Bannen really goes bonkers in the finale. 

It's a fairly good psychological drama but a little too long and a blockhead comic police officer character seems out of place. Director Peter Collinson (who died in 1980) had made THE ITALIAN JOB and later did remakes of TEN LITTLE INDIANS and THE SPIRAL STAIRCASE. 

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Crazy Marshall

DAIL 1119-1959-Usually good guy Marshall Thompson is great as a psychotic killer out for revenge on a psychiatrist (Sam Levene; the same year he created the role of Nathan Detroit in the original Broadway production of GUYS AND DOLLS) who he believes is the cause of all his trouble. In reality it was the shrink’s testimony that saved him from death row!


Thompson holds some customers of a gin mill bar hostage while he negotiates with the police. The customers include Keefe Braselle, Leon Ames, Virginia Fields and Andrea King. William Conrad is Chuckles the bartender.

Director Gerald Mayer made a few more movies than moved over to TV directing episodes of THRILLER, MANNIX, THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN and many others. He died in 2001.

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Everything's Archie!

WILD GUITAR-1962-Arch Hall Jr. stars as Bud Eagle, a Rock-A-Billy yokel who comes to LA and is exploited by agent Mike McCauley (William Watters AKA Arch Hall Sr.). Director Ray Dennis Steckler plays Steak, McCauley’s strong-arm thug. He meets (former amateur ice skater) Nancy Czar and performs on a TV show and becomes a big star. After being cajoled and blackmail (and unsuccessfully seduced by a hooker) Bud and his brother sent things straight. 

WILD GUITAR is a pretty wacky little movie made in the pre-Beatles era of teenage rock and roll. The music is ok but Arch’s hair is really out of control. This was the first feature directed by co-star Steckler. EEGAH! was made the same year by the father and son team. Arch Jr. would star in the eerie THE SADIST the next year.



THE SADIST-1963-If you’ve only seen Arch Hall Jr. in EEGAH! or WILD GUITAR you owe it to yourself to see him in this movie as a deranged psycho! As he proclaims before the credits roll: “I have been hurt by others. And I will hurt them. I will make them suffer like I have suffered”.

Three schoolteachers on their way to a baseball game have car trouble. They pull into a dilapidated gas station for help. Ed (Richard Alden) and Doris (Helen Hovey) are the two youngish sweethearts to be types. Carl (Don Russell) is the older guy. Their quick stop for a new water hose becomes a nightmare when they are confronted by loony thug Charlie Tibbs (Hall Jr.) and his imbecile girlfriend Judy (Marilyn Manning also in EEGAH!). He’s a mass murderer on the run and wants the teach-mobile fixed so he and his moll can make a quick getaway. Fortunately Ed takes practically the whole film to fix the damn thing. However Charlie manages to taunt the trio every chance he gets. He pistol whips Carl and then shoots him in cold blood after drinking a coke. There’s a good deal of suspense and a few interesting plot twists. Hall is really slimy in the lead and quite surprising after the goody teenage roles he had been playing.

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The Sniper

THE SNIPER-Columbia Pictures-1952- Arthur Franz stars as a woman hating, child abused psycho sniper preying on “dames” who reject him. Adolphe Menjou and Gerald Mohr are the police. Richard Kiley is a police psychiatrist who explains a lot! Marie Windsor is his first victim, shot in a Chinese restaurant.

Franz ‘s portrayal is very sympathetic and the ending is very untypical for the fifties. Frank Faylen is the police chief and a gaggle of familiar character actors make unbilled appearances: Charles Lane, Bryon Foulger, Victor Sen Young, Jean Willes, Paul Dubov and John Eldredge.

SNIPER is surprisingly straightforward and well directed by Hollywood veteran Edward Dymtryk (who directed Karloff in THE DEVIL COMMANDS in 1941). Unfortunately, Dymtryk’s later career was over- shadowed by his naming of names to the HUAC committee after spending several months in jail.

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