The Geek (bigfoot porno)
Come Deadly (giallo porno)

Rampop II wrote:

Rock wrote:

The Geek (bigfoot porno)
Come Deadly (giallo porno)

Holy hairy balls of LOLZ!

Bigfoot porn!!??? Where have I been all this time, and why am I just now learning that this stuff exists?

Then again a more pertinent question might be, why am I surprised? 

Vinegar Syndrome released a box set of crappy no budget horror pornos a while back. I’ve watched three of them so far (these two and House of De Sade) and they’re all endearingly goofy, even when ostensibly dealing with grimy material.

Omnomnom! Keep 'em comin, boys! Blood! More blood to slake The Thirst!

How are you guys making all these images the same workable size? When I search images I never know what I'm gonna get (sometimes tiny, sometimes ridiculously huge). I guess I just need to look at the resolution of each one and try to match them? Is there some easier way I don't know about?

Anyway, here are just a few quick–and–dirty takes:

First up, I took a couple of dips into the Kino Cult library. I admit that the world of 1970s European horror is a realm largely unfamiliar to me. Maybe someday I’ll know enough to hang with the cool kids. I do struggle with the audio from this era, and maybe I'm overly sensitive to it. The frequent overmodulation is really hard for me to tolerate, and I can't stand MOS overdubs. Naturally that's going to be a barrier for me when it comes to all the 70s Italian horror that is of such significance in the history of the genre, and is so beloved by my fellow horror fans. Don't judge me!
  

Requiem for a Vampire (1972)
Colorful and surreal, costume party capes and paper fangs, and lots of nudity and kink. Never mind that it doesn’t make any sense. It’s all about the aesthetic, so all questions are best left at the door. Plays more like a dream than a narrative, almost a thread of composed still shots. Barely any dialogue at all occurs for the first 45 minutes or so, and I think the rest of the film would have been better had it been the same way, dispensing with the laughable exposition.  Vivid, absurd, hilarious, depraved no–budget softcore vampyrnography that was reportedly Jean Rollins’s favorite of all his films.

Vampyros Lesbos (1971)
I admit I skimmed through this one. Dragging attempt at “vampire erotica” in which even the erotica part is only slightly above dull. I cannot recommend it, but maybe I’m just uncultured. 

Moving on...

It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958)
I caught a recent broadcast of this, courtesy of Svengoolie, on a hot tip form Jinnistan. Decent late–50s sci–fi “killer alien amok on the spaceship” scenario, notable for being a precursor to Alien. Among other things it passed one of my smell–tests for Classical Hollywood scifi: no sappy string music for male/female two–shots. I fucking hate that.

Dark was the Night (2014)  
Very solid “monster in the woods” movie. Human encroachment is to blame for driving the hitherto unknown beast from its forest habitat and into contact with the unfortunate locals and their pets. Thankfully the tired old “family strained by recent tragedy” theme running in the background is easy enough to overlook. Fans of this monster movie sub-genre will not be disappointed.
 
This is GWAR (2022) 
Excellent. Packed with in–depth details, inside stories and vintage footage that abundantly flesh out the colorful and unlikely saga of this musical/theatrical abomination’s 35–year history. I have come to hate the term “rockumentary” for the shallow, uninformative and yawn–inducing wankfest of unimportant talking heads and vapid glorifications that the term has come to represent. This is GWAR is not one of those. No filler, no empty platitudes, no “who the fuck cares what that guy thinks” moments are to be found. Only people worth hearing from are given the chance to speak, and it seems like the filmmakers found just about every one of them. The outcome is a ride that is every bit as wild as it should be, and it's also unexpectedly touching. And it just might leave viewers wanting to quit their day jobs and apply for a chance to join the thankless, fake blood–drenched toilings of GWAR’s “art slave” minions.   

Midnight Mass (2022)
 A horror miniseries a friend recommended to me; I gave the first episode a try last night, so we're still in the phase of establishing the characters and premise while also providing ample servings of those foreboding indications that things are not quite right. So far, so good.

Jakob’s Wife (2021)
Barbara Crampton takes the lead role as a middle–aged pastor’s wife who finds herself ensnared in the “I’ve been bitten by a vampire” scenario, suddenly pulling the curtains, buying blood from the supermarket meat department and sporting a Nadja look. I had a couple of standard complaints — the head vampire is only effective until it finally emerges from the shadows for a disappointing reveal and the underlying theme gets pushed too hard towards the end — but I had fun and don’t regret the investment. Worthy of a matinee. 

A Page of Madness (1926)
I am slowly working my way through this one. That may seem ludicrous for a 70–minute movie, but the madness is conveyed so well that I’m having to take breaks. Very effective use of geometry, light and shadow to convey its sense of helplessness. The soundtrack (the one created decades later and approved by the filmmaker, Teinosuke Kinugasa) combined with dizzyingly frantic editing drills home the madness with overwhelming force. 
“Insanity is painful, make no mistake about it.”
—Ken Kesey, author of One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest

I enjoyed Knife of Ice recently. I was thinking of checking out the other Lenzi Baker collaborations, but I’m realizing that I have maybe less time this month than I’d hoped, so might cap a few of these explorations of certain directors, especially if the horror element is not so pronounced.

As for Vampyros Lesbos, the only real advice that I can offer with respect to Franco is that he gets easier to appreciate the more of his films you see, as you can compare how he executes the same set of visual and thematic ideas in slightly different ways. He only really clicked for me last year when I watched a dozen or so of his movies late in the year. I do have a review of She Killed on Ecstasy where I go into what I liked about both that and Lesbos, if you’re interested: https://boxd.it/2b9hJZ

I was hoping to dig into Rollin again this month, but we’ll see if time allows.

Last edited by Rock (10/13/2022 8:29 am)

Rock wrote:

I enjoyed Knife of Ice recently.

That's partly what caught my eye, and then I noticed that Shudder had all four titles.  And I noted your appreciation for the Donald Duck cameo.  Maybe not quite as erotic as the Donald Duck cameo in New York Ripper, but what are you going to do?

Looks like you can rent it on YouTube. Assuming the trailer is accurate, it looks to be the restoration as well.

Rock wrote:

I’ve come up dry.

I think Franco can periodically keep it together (I thought he was serviceable in Greta the Wicked Warden, his "Ilsa" movie), but most of his performances carry the aroma of "director casting himself for fun despite total lack of acting talent".

I suppose I need to see Downtown, the movie where he plays the lead role of a private detective. Apparently he wears this hat throughout the movie.

Last edited by Rock (10/15/2022 12:54 am)

Rock wrote:

The Thrill Killers
The Astro-Zombies
Friday the 13th: A Nude Beginning
So Sweet... So Perverse

Nice one with the six degrees to Kevin Bacon; now that's thorough journalism

Encounter of the Spooky Kind
Porno Holocaust
Drive-In Massacre
Night of the Demon