Wilde In The Future

 

(IMDB)

NO BLADE OF GRASS-1970-When a mysterious virus nearly wipes out England's agriculture and pollutes the water, a man, John Custance (Nigel Davenport) and his wife Ann (Jean Wallace) and two kids along with their friend Roger (John Hamill) head for a farm in the country. Along the way they pick up the violent Pirrie (Anthony May) and his flirty wife Clara (Wendy Richard). It doesn't take long for the group to descend into killing and stealing. The wife and daughter are raped by 3 creeps and their cars and goods are taken by a town. Meanwhile the government has fled and the world is descending into cannibalism. Things don't turn out like they planned and there's a wild fight with a motorcycle gang. They make it to the farm but problems arise with David (Patrick Holt) John's brother. 

Basically this treats a future calamity in pretty depressing chilling dog eat dog terms (more so then say PANIC IN THE YEAR ZERO which at times GRASS imitates). Where as Ray Milland's character worked against a breakdown in society, John readily accepts it's kill or be killed and might makes right (especially in the climax). There are a few lapses but overall this is an ahead of its time feature directed and co-written by actor Cornel Wilde (he and a lead actress Wallace were married in real life) especially with the world situation today.

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The Fury of Hasselhof!

NICK FURY-AGENT OF SHIELD-1998-Before he became a patch wearing African-American leader of a secret US government agency, Marvel Comics character Nick Fury was a patch wearing white guy leader of a secret government agency. For some strange reason David Hasselhoff (TV's KNIGHT RIDER and BAYWATCH) is cast as Fury in this TV movie adaptation. He's terrible even when just lighting his cigar. He's too young and lacks any of the "grizzled hard-boiled roughness" that made the original tick. He seems more like comic parody.

In this Fury is called out of retirement by The President to investigate the disappearance of the body of HYDRA leader Baron Strucker (who Fury killed years before) which for another strange reason was saved in a cryogenics tank. He's joined by Contessa Valentina (Lisa Rinna) and English agent Pierce (Neil Roberts). He also meets with his former "Howlin' Commandos" buddies Dum-Dum Dugan (Garry Chalk) and Gabe (Ron Canada) and says things like "guys like you tend to cling to the bowl no matter how many times you flush" through clenched teeth while chomping on a cigar. The story revolves around Strucker's daughter (badly over acting Sandra Hess) and son (Scott Heindl) and their attempt to resurrect Hitler's "death's head virus". Peter Howarth is Arnim Zola and HYDRA agents don't wear their trademark green robes. Instead they look like CIA agents. At the end Strucker is brought back to life but fortunately for everyone no sequel was made.

Screenwriter David S. Goyer had written DEMONIC TOYS for Charles Band's company and the Jean Claude Van Damme movie DEATH WARRANT. He wrote the screenplays for BLADE (and it's sequel) and DARK CITY which were released the same year. After FURY, he was connected with several comic book projects including writing and directing BLADE:TRINITY and working on the TV series and writing Zack Synder's MAN OF STEEL. As of this writing he's working on "The Justice League of America" movie.

Australian born director Ron Hardy made FURY after a TV version of 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA and an unreleased version of ROBINSON CRUSOE starring Pierce Brosnan, He later did more TV.

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It's Crazy Alright

THE CRAZIES-2010-Residents of a small Iowa town are acting weird (parts were filmed in Georgia though). Timothy Olyphant (TV's JUSTIFIED) is the town's sheriff who discovers there's something wrong with the drinking water. He's almost cut to pieces by a saw wielding coroner (who had already sewn some victim's mouth shut) and another guy burns down his house with his wife and kid in it. Eventually the government gets involved and rounds up everyone including his wife (Radha Mitchell). There's lots of chaos and killing but not much to distinguish it from any of the other "modern day horror flicks" (like the DAWN OF THE DEAD remake which parts of this resemble). And while the original blurred the lines between who's crazy and who's not, this version makes it clear our evil government is once again to blame. It could also be the only horror where victims are terrorized while going through a car wash!

Director Brett Eisner (SAHARA) has taken the premise of George Romero's paranoid claustrophobic low budget classic and turned into a typical drawn out over emoting disaster movie. The acting is better and of course the budget is bigger but there's just nothing new here. Just a lot of cheap thrills and excessive violence. And as usual it makes me wonder about the mental health of the director, although Romero himself was one of the executive producers! One of the writers Scott Kosar also scripted remakes of THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE and THE AMITYVILLE HORROR. The other screenwriter Ray Wright wrote CASE 39 (two writers to script a remake??).

Apparently I'm in the minority on this movie as it was both a box office and critical success.

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Rabid

RABID-1977-While a woman named Rose (porn star Marilyn Chambers) is out riding a motorcycle with her boyfriend Hart (Frank Moore), they have a horrendous accident. She is badly burned but fortunately the accident happens right near a clinic where three doctors are working on a new type of plastic surgery. The head doctor (Howard Ryshpan) decides to use his new "radical plastic surgery" on her. A month later she awakens and craves blood because she now has some kind of deadly parasite in her body. She infects several people (2 doctors, a drunk, a woman in a jacuzzi) and soon there is an epidemic of blood thirsty crazy people who foam at the mouth and kill. The head doctor cuts off a nurse's finger during an operation and a woman goes nuts on the subway. Meanwhile, a clinic associate (Joe Silver) and Hart search for Rose who's running around Montreal infecting anyone she comes in contact with. The city is put under martial law and everyone panics. Even a mall Santa Claus gets shot! This movie has it's moments but the Hart's enraged crying scene in the climax really ruins it.

David Cronenberg made this 2 years after the similar THEY CAME FROM WITHIN (which also featured Silver). Like that film RABID  contains strange characters and situations. Perhaps the strangest of all is the casting of Chambers as Rose. Her acting isn't bad. In fact she's a better actor than Frank Moore who portrays her boyfriend! Cronenberg's first choice for Hthe role of Rose was Sissy Spacek. Howard Reitman was an executive producer.

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French Zombies

MUTANTS-2008-Gory full of its self 28 DAYS LATER inspired horror film from France. Sonia (Helene de Fougerolles), a doctor and her boyfriend Marco (Francis Renaud) hide in some kind of medical building while an airborne virus turns The French populace  into zombies. Sonia, who seems to be immune to the disease gets a message from NOAH, a military/scientific recovery group that they are on the way to rescue the pair. Unfortunately Marco becomes infected. He gets weaker and weaker, his hair and teeth fall out and he vomits blood. Finally he becomes a raving lunatic that pisses blood. Sonia decides to kill him but relents at the last minute and locks him in the basement (so don't go in the basement...). Later two idiots Franck and Nico show up. Sonia and Frank go to an underground radio base so she can send an SOS while Franck fights off some (unintentionally comical) mutants with a machete'. They return but Frank and Nico beat her up until a pack of mutants attack (they seem to have been called by Marco, still in the basement). The finale is a sick CGI video game inspired drawn out chase/battle. 

Director David Morlet obviously thought he was doing something great and by the reviews I've seen he wasn't wrong. It must be me....

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Star Wars, Where Is Thy Sting?

STARSHIP INVASIONS-1977-After some strange looking aliens abduct a farmer (he looks like he could be one of the 3 Stooges) and he has sex with a woman on the ship (not shown!), we are introduced to Prof. Duncan (Robert Vaughn) a serious, easy going UFO investigator. His wife (Helen Shaver) thinks he's becoming obsessed with his research and says that UFOs “are such bizarre things”. Christopher Lee is Captain Ramses, an alien leader from the planet Alpha paving the way for a “massive migration” of this race to invade Earth before his planet's sun explodes. He talks by telepathy, which is a good thing since he looks like if he had to speak the lines he'd break out laughing! 

The group abduct a woman and stick a big needle in her. Later they all wind up dead. Ramses visits “The League of Races”, a group of different space aliens whose headquarters is in The Bermuda Triangle. They even have an intergalactic whore house! Most of the league aliens look like normal humans in funny clothes but some have round bald heads. Ramses and his small crew take over the base and plan on wiping out Earth inhabitants through a beam that makes everyone kill and/or commit suicide. The alien league fights back however and enlists Duncan to help stop Ramses' deadly plan. 

 There's a lot of low budget effects, some unintentionally funny interview segments and a couple of wobbly saucers but the acting is played straight. Some very funny looking robots make an appearance too. It was filmed in Canada by director-writer Edward Hunt who later made THE BRAIN. 

The soundtrack by Gil Melle' (NIGHT GALLERY, KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER, 6 MILLION DOLLAR MAN) is an interesting mix of orchestra pieces and electric piano driven Jazz. 

The same year Lee played an alien in the similar END OF THE WORLD, was in the big budgeted AIRPORT '77 and was on-screen narrator of MEAT CLEAVER MASSACRE. Among other things in 1977, Vaughn was the un-credited voice of the computer in DEMON SEED.

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The Last Man

THE LAST MAN ON EARTH-1964-Despite it's low budget drawbacks and some bad dubbing this first version of Richard Matheson's novel “I Am Legend” is pretty good. It inspired George Romero and John Russo on NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. 

In 1965, three years after a mysterious plague turned the world populace into undead vampire like creatures, Dr. Robert Morgan (Vincent Price) is the title character, a scientist who is immune to the disease. He spends his days scouring the city looking for the secret hideout where the creatures are staying and when he finds any stragglers he drives wooden stakes through their hearts. At night he holds up in his house where a gang of the un-dead try to break in while their “leader” (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart; later in SNOW DEVILS) ( a former living friend of the doctor's) intones “Morgan, come out Morgan!”). They have decidedly vampire like weaknesses too. They only came out after sun down, don't like mirrors, garlic or crosses! 

Flashbacks reveal how things started with Morgan a once happy scientist with a wife and small daughter watching while the plague spreads throughout the world killing everyone around him with corpses (some still living) thrown into a huge burning pit. After his daughter is thrown there he vows not to let his wife go the same way and when she dies, he buries her, only to have a visit from her a few nights later! Back in the present Morgan finds a living dog and makes it his pet but the animal has the virus too and he has to “stake it”. Soon after he meets a mysterious woman (Franca Bettoia) named Ruth who suspiciously shows up and is allergic to garlic. It turns out she's a spy from a reorganized society that has found a temporary cure for the virus! But the group views Morgan as a “monster” and a “legend in the city” because many of the “vampires” he killed were actually part of the group. Ruth was dispatched to keep Morgan at bay so the group can come and kill him at night. “Your new society sounds charming”. Couldn't they have just sent a postcard saying: “Please stop”? 

After giving Ruth a transfusion of his own blood and curing her completely Morgan eludes the group (they seem to bring their women and children along on the hunt) for a short time but he's eventually shot and speared in a church after intoning “You're freaks. I'm a man. The last man”.

LMOE was produced by Robert Lippert and  Samuel Arkoff and filmed in Rome Italy (the film is supposed to take place in Los Angeles) and proved a drawback. As Price himself said “if there's one city on the face of the Earth that looks less like LA it's Rome”! Also the climatic chase scene finale is badly directed, very choppy and dark. Morgan somehow out runs his would be killers who are driving trucks and though they are only a few feet beyond him while chasing him up some stairs they never use their guns! 

Still scenes of the deserted streets littered with abandoned cars and corpses are well staged and the whole film has a eerie claustrophobic feel. The original Italian director is Ublado Ragona. The US version is credited to busy TV director Sidney Salkow (who worked with Price the same year on TWICE TOLD TALES). 

Price gives his all to the role evoking lots of sympathy but never going overboard. By today's standards he's probably miscast (so was Will Smith in the 2007 (second) remake) but who else would have starred in THE LAST MAN ON EARTH in 1964?! He made THE TOMB OF LIGEIA and THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH the same year. 

Richard Matheson co-wrote the screenplay under the pseudonym Logan Swanson (he didn't care for the results of the film). He'd co-written THE COMEDY OF TERRORS (which co-starred Price) the year before.

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First for 2013

Well, it has been a while since I posted but hopefully that will change in 2013. Happy New Year!

MULBERRY STREET-2006-A virus carried by rats turns residents of NYC's Lower East Side into blood drinking, flesh craving zombie rat people in this horror film that uses a lot of character development to cover up the fact it's just another 28 DAYS LATER rip-off with very jerky camera effects. The zombies are fairly grotesque but not very powerful as a bar owner beats a few of them up with a frying pan. The lead character is an ex-boxer named Clutch (Nick Damici) who takes out a few zombies with punches. Meanwhile his soldier-daughter (Kim Blair) wanders the city trying to unite with her dad. Once again the ending seems to say it might have been caused by our evil government. Writer/director Jim Mickle does a competent job handily the cast and gore but it's too dark and frenetic.

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Deliever Us From Bad Zombie Movies

ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE-2011-More nonsense of the living dead! First the infected VM2 virus appears in France. Then few days later 83% of Europe is affected. A plane crashes into Big Ben and then Japan is wiped out. Then somehow the virus appears in Iowa! Soon the virus spreads across the whole of the USA! Our government does its best to wipe it out but SIX MONTHS LATER (when our tale takes place) towns and cities are full of zombies. Ving Rhames (who was also in DAWN OF THE DEAD 2 aka DAY OF THE DEAD which this thing resembles) leads a group of survivors headed for Catalina. They also meet another group that uses bows and arrows. Between smashing and decapitating (and running) the group talks a lot about themselves. Later an undead tiger shows up. Director Nick Lyon also made GRENDEL and SPECIES: THE AWAKENING. An Asylum production.

Thanks again to Tony for getting me this!

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The Conspiracy Continued??

DAY OF THE DEAD-2008-This movie "based on the film by George Romero" is a piece of crap. It must be part of a conspiracy to remake and destroy any decent horror film of the past. While some might argue the original is not Romero's best work it looks like a classic compared to this talky, annoying shit which seems more influenced by 27 DAYS LATER. Once again the zombies are turned into clowns in unintentional funny attack scenes made up mostly of poor CGI SFX.

Mena Suvari (AMERICAN BEAUTY) stars as an Army corporal with an idiot brother (Michael Welch) and Ving Rhames plays an Army captain who's killed in the first half hour of the movie but comes back later and eats his own eye. As usual the government is to blame for spreading a virus that started the whole thing. Ian McNeice is a fat DJ and Nick Cannon is a dickhead private who's death scene is the only highlight of this miserable tale.

Not one likable character in the whole cast makes you wonder if a world inhabited by flesh eating zombies wouldn't be so bad....But what can you expect from a movie that's final scene is like a YOU TUBE screamer??

Director Steve Miner made the second and third entries in the original FRIDAY THE 13th series and lots of TV episodes.

I think this is also known as DAWN OF THE DEAD 2.

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Crazy, Man, Crazy

THE CRAZIES-1973-This amazing film by George Romero was ignored when originally released. It’s a cool follow up to NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (although he directed the never released THERE’S ALWAYS VANILLA and the quasi-supernatural JACK'S WIFE in between) but here the monsters are all human.

A plane crash unleashes a deadly virus (called Trixie) into the water supply of a small town. The military comes in to contain it and all hell breaks loose. No one (including the viewer) is sure who is infected and who is not. The white contamination suited military round up the population and many resist resulting in mayhem and bloodshed. Frightening stuff!

With Richard Liberty (later DAY OF THE DEAD), Lynn Lowry (who starred in the cult film SUGAR COOKIES the same year),Richard France (later in DAWN OF THE DEAD) and Harold Wayne Jones (later in KNIGHTRIDERS). Romero made MARTIN next.

I've heard a terrifiying rumor this is going to be remade!

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