31 Nights of Terror 2015 #37 - Juan of the Dead (2011)

Juan of the Dead (2011)
Director: Alejandro Brugués
Starring: Alexis Díaz de Villegas, Jorge Molina, Andros Perugorría
Format: DVD

Plot: A group of slackers face an army of zombies. The Cuban government and media claim the living dead are dissidents revolting against the government.

Another recent pick up at the Armageddon convention, this is one I've been wanting to see for a while now. I'm a huge fan of Shaun of the Dead, and the name of this movie is obviously meant as a reference to that. And it's Cuban - not sure I've ever seen too many Cuban movies.

Juan of the Dead isn't some kind of remake of Shaun of the Dead. It shares a common starting point in that a zombie apocalypse breaks out and our protagonists are probably the last people you'd want to have to rely on to save you during it. 

Like Shaun and Ed in the English film, Juan and Lazaro are just coasting through life, but a point of difference is that they are always out to make a buck, and try to cash in on the zombie outbreak by setting up a "zombie exterminator" type business. Also, whereas Shaun of the Dead has a romance at its heart, here the "loved ones" trying to re-establish their relationship are Juan and his estranged daughter.

I loved the many references to the Cuban lifestyle, especially how the government tries to pass off the zombies as "dissidents" who are working with the Americans.

In terms of comedy, Juan of the Dead is funny. I didn't find it as hilarious as Shaun, but it's still got some golden moments. I do wonder if maybe some of the comedic timing is lost because it's in Spanish and you're busy reading subtitles (the characters talk damn fast). But overall it's funny and has heart (Juan and Lazaro have great chemistry, which is key to making this movie work).

The special effects are pretty good. There's some good blood and gore and while some of the CGI is a bit dodgy overall it works well.

If you're a fan of horror comedy along the lines of Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland and Return of the Living Dead, you need to see this one.

31 Nights of Terror 2015 #28 - Dead Weight (2012)

Dead Weight (2012)
Director: Adam Bartlett, John Pata
Starring: Joe Belknap, Mary Lindberg, Michelle Courvais
Format: AVI

Plot: Charlie is traveling through the wilderness to find his girlfriend, Samantha, after civilization is destroyed by widespread biological attacks. He must try to survive while dealing with other survivors and his own emotional burdens.

From the never-ending line of low budget zombie flicks comes Dead Weight. Like most people I'm a bit burned out on the zombie craze, but I read a review of this one that made it sound like something a bit different, so decided to give a try. It definitely is different, but sadly not in a good way.

Where to begin? Oh, I know - this movie has bugger all zombies in it! I understand it's low budget, or maybe it was a conscious choice not to fill the movie with gut-munching walkers, but either way it can only work if the story and acting are strong enough to carry the load. They're not.

The acting is pretty awful and the story... well there really isn't one. Our main guy (who's a bit of a douchebag to start with and gets worse as things go along) joins up with some other survivors and heads off to try to find his girlfriend. They meet other survivors, things basically go badly... yawn. The ending tries to be shocking but it can't save what is a boring movie.

The least said about this one the better. Avoid.

31 Nights of Terror 2015 #4 - [REC] 4: Apocalipsis (2014)

[REC] 4: Apocalipsis (2014)

Directors: Jaume Balaguero
Starring: Manuela Velasco, Paco Manzanedo, Hector Colome
Format: Netflix

Plot: Television reporter Ángela is rescued from the building and taken to an oil tanker to be examined. However, it is unknown whether it is her who is carrying the seed of the mysterious demonic virus.

Bringing the Spanish series REC to a close is part four, which wraps things up by bringing back news reporter Angela from the first two movies (she was missing from the third as the focus moved to a side story happening at the same time). But this time she's not in the claustrophobic apartment building, having been transported to a ship in the middle of the ocean.

Joining Angela on said ship are a few other survivors of the zombie attacks (two cops and a family member of the married couple in part 3), a team of scientists (studying the effects of the outbreak) and a shitload of armed soldiers/guards. Of course, things go haywire and soon everyone is fighting for their lives.

As a closing chapter, Apocalipsis unfortunately falls short. It does manage to tie up all the loose ends, and having Angela back is a nice touch, but apart from that it's your standard zombie action flick. The change of venue to a boat could have allowed for some of the same suspense and tension as in the first two parts, but director Balaguero (who co-directed the first two installments) doesn't go that route. Instead he fills it with jump scares, action and smatterings of gore.

The biggest disappointment is that the religious/demon aspect is abandoned altogether in favour of a more scifi approach. The result is a long way short of the out-and-out chills of Tristana Medeiros creeping around in that blacked-out penthouse in parts 1 and 2. While part 4 isn't terrible, I kept wishing they'd gone back to the old building to wrap things up.

31 Nights of Terror 2015 #3 - [REC] 3: Genesis (2012)

[REC] 3: Genesis (2012)

Directors: Paco Plaza
Starring: Leticia Dolera, Diego Martin, Ismael Martinez
Format: Netflix

Plot: A couple's wedding day turns horrific as some of the guests start showing signs of a strange illness.

Continuing the [REC] series, we move on to the first one so far that I haven't seen before. I liked this one but for different reasons than I liked the first two. Whereas the original and its first sequel are identical in style and atmosphere - found footage, creepy dark building, lots of suspense - part three does away with all of that.

For the first time the action ventures away from the claustrophobic apartment building to a much larger and more open wedding venue, where couple Clara and Koldo (dig the dude's name, sounds like a Star Trek bad guy) are celebrating their nuptials. One of their relatives works at a vet's clinic and was bitten by a sick dog - you can guess where it goes from there. Switched-on viewers will of course figure out that the dog in question was the one owned by the family from the first movie.

With the change of venue comes a complete switch away from found footage style. I have to give points for the way this is done, tongue in cheek. While the switch to a straight-up movie is a bit jarring at first, I think it's the right decision. Going for the same look and feel as the first two movies would have just felt redundant by now. There's also a lot more humour involved, at the expense of suspense, but again I don't have a problem with that. The characters are likable and the laughs are done well.

What this movie isn't short of is gore, which is turned up to the Nth degree. We get an infected person chainsawed in half, a tongue ripped from a victim's mouth and a lot more grotesque set pieces. There's also some hokey romance stuff thrown in, but without giving anything away, the ending more than makes up for it.

Essentially, [REC] 3 feels like it belongs to a totally different series. In fact, while watching I began thinking that it might be one of those classic "shot stand alone and renamed into a sequel of a popular series to cash in" cases, until things started tying into the first two flicks. But while I loved parts 1 and 2 for their suspense and scares, I enjoyed part 3 equally for its gore, action and complete fun.

Part 4 awaits next - will it continue to switch things up or move back into more familiar territory? I can't wait to find out.

31 Nights of Terror 2015 #2 - [REC] 2 (2009)

[REC] 2 (2009)

Directors: Jamie Balaguero, Paco Plaza

Starring: Jonathan D Mellor, Manuela Velasco, Oscar Zafra

Format: DVD

Plot: In order to ascertain the current situation inside, a supposed medical officer and a GEO team step into the quarantined and ill-fated apartment building.

Since my girlfriend and I started the 2015 edition of 31 Nights of Terror with the first [REC] movie, it only makes sense to continue with the series, especially since I have the first two on DVD and the next two are on Netflix.

This one I've only seen the once before, so I was fairly fresh going in. I like the way it continues on the same night as the first movie, kind of like Halloween 2, only this one stays in the same location. This time we've got new protagonists, with a SWAT team replacing the firefighters from part one, and a group of pesky kids thrown in for good measure.

[REC] 2 doesn't bring anything really new to the table, it's just more of the same from the first movie. Since the first movie was so great, that's not a bad thing. In the process they manage to expand on the background folklore, bringing more light to exactly what has gone on in the penthouse. And yep, that scary ass monster from the first movie is back to create more spinechilling moments.

I quite like the surprise twist at the end and am looking forward to seeing where they go for the third and fourth installments.

31 Nights of Terror 2015 #1 - [REC] (2007)

[REC] (2007)

Directors: Jamie Balaguero, Paco Plaza

Starring: Manuela Velasco, Ferran Terraza, Jorge-Yamam Serrano

Format: DVD

Plot: A television reporter and cameraman follow emergency workers into a dark apartment building and are quickly locked inside with something terrifying.

Normally when I do the 31 Nights of Terror (this is my fifth year, sixth if you count the first year when I only managed 21 movies) I pre-plan what movie to kick off the marathon with. This year I was a little busy and didn't have anything planned. Scanning the DVD collection with no idea of what to pick, my eye fell upon this fantastic Spanish scarefest, which I first saw on the big screen in 2009. My girlfriend hadn't seen it before, so it seemed a good choice.

And a good choice it was. I love this movie. Even though found footage movies are starting to get a bit old, and the same goes for zombie movies, [REC] stands the test of time. Found footage is done best when it is used to slowly build up the tension, as it is here. And this is of course no normal "zombie" movie. The infected people are more like the ones in The Crazies or 28 Days Later than a Romero zombie flick. These bastards are fast and fierce.

I also love how for most of the movie it's basically a "group of people try to survive zombie hordes" flick, but in the final act it changes tact completely, and boy does it bring the scares. Without ruining anything, the final monster is the thing of nightmares.

I haven't seen the American remake, Quarantine, and I don't want to. [REC] is fantastic, and those too lazy to read subtitles are seriously missing out!

What I Watched - May 20-26 2015

WHAT I WATCHED - MAY 20-26, 2015:

 Deadly Prey (1987) VHS
- Pure “so bad its good” gold from director David Prior and his blond-mulleted actor brother Ted. Take Rambo, take The Most Dangerous Game… remove the budget, the good acting and the special effects and you have Deadly Prey. Every moment of this movie is unadulterated awesomeness. Ted plays a Nam vet who is kidnapped by some bad guys who love to hunt humans. Only they chose the wrong guy this time! Another from my own collection (all of which I’m selling off for space purposes), and one every Z-grade action movie fan needs to see (along with other Prior brothers efforts like Aerobicide, Sledgehammer and Raw Nerve).

Slash Dance (1989) AVI
- That’s a catchy title right? Some nice wordplay on the name of the popular 80s movie, Flashdance. Well, that’s all this pile of crap has going for it. The premise is simple - girls auditioning for a musical start getting picked off by a serial killer so a sexy female cop goes undercover to catch him. There’s nothing wrong with a slasher that keeps it simple. But there’s plenty wrong with a slasher that features virtually no blood, no skin (come on, it’s a movie about dancing girls!) and some of the worst acting ever put to screen (the lead and several other of the “actors” were wrestlers from the short-lived Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, and acting wasn’t their strong point). Instead it has tedious amounts of girls in leotards “dancing” on stage - I use that word very, very reluctantly. Yawn, yawn, yawn.

Mortuary (2005) AVI
- Oh Tobe Hooper, we knew ye well. It’s well known that Hooper has gone from genre hero (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poltergeist) to genre zero (virtually everything after Texas Chainsaw 2 in 1986). Sadly, Mortuary doesn’t represent a return to form for him. The premise is okay - family move into an old house to restart an old mortuary and come under attack by a fungal growth that turns dead people into zombies - but it’s all done rather poorly (especially the CGI, yikes). Not the worst movie ever made, but definitely nothing worth wasting your time on.

JUDGEMENT MAY: I Survived a Zombie Holocaust (2014) DVD
- Pretty much the only time I buy movies on their released date is when it’s a New Zealand movie I really want to see, like this one. It was released on DVD and in a few cinemas here in NZ on Friday May 22. I picked it up a day later and watched it right away, and I wasn’t disappointed. It definitely feels very New Zealand-y, mixing our sense of humour with gore in the same vein as Braindead, Bad Taste and Black Sheep. I love the fact it’s about real zombies attacking the cast and crew of a low budget zombie movie, which gives it ammo to take shots at the movie industry as well as the overdone zombie sub-genre. NZ horror is on a real roll lately, between this, Housebound and What We Do in the Shadows.

Joe (1970) DVD
- With Memorial Day happening in the US, I wanted to watch something very ‘Murican. The cover to this one showed an Army uniform, a guy with a gun and the Stars and Stripes - sold! I knew nothing about it going in and found it to be a gritty, gloomy look at life in the late 60s and early 70s, a time of racial and civil unrest in Vietnam-era America. The late, great Peter Boyle shows off the grumpy chops he’d use so well in the TV show Everybody Loves Raymond, as a disgruntled, racist blue collar worker who befriends a rich guy with a wayward daughter, as the two go on a rampage against hippies. Blunt, un-PC, brutal in places and with a great ending. Kind of like Easy Rider without the motorbikes.

What I Watched - May 13-19 2015

WHAT I WATCHED - MAY 13-19 2015:

Chopping Mall (1986) VHS
- Another title I wanted to give one more watch before selling (I’m selling off my VHS collection to make space). This has always been a favourite of mine. I mean, come on, it’s about killer security robots hunting and killing young people in a mall at night. How could you not love that? I’ve previously reviewed this as part of the Corman-ia 2011 marathon - see that review here (www.moviegeeknz.blogspot.co.nz/2011/06/cormania-2011-chopping-mall.html)

JUDGEMENT MAY: Night of the Living Dead (1968) DVD
- I’ve decided that for the remainder of May the month’s theme will be post-apocalyptic/end-of-the-world movies. And what better way to kick it off with the zombie apocalypse movie that started it all. My girlfriend had never seen this before, making it an even better choice to get this theme underway. Obviously I don’t need to say anything about this one that hasn’t already been said. Absolute classic.

Firepower (1993) VHS
- I had this one sitting among the many piles of VHS I’m setting about selling from own collection, and hadn’t really given it any thought. That is until I saw a trailer for it on another VHS, and found out that the one and only Ultimate Warrior acts in this! My favourite WWF guy from the late 80s playing a bad guy called The Swordsman? Yes please! In the future year of 2007 (hehe), some cities are designated as lawless zones where the police don’t dare to go. But two rulebreaking cops (Steve McQueen’s kid Chad and former world kickboxing champ Gary Daniels) go in under-cover to catch a major bad guy, and fight their way through an underground fighting league (where the aforementioned Swordsman is the champ). Lots of in-ring action (punch/kick fighting and weapons), the best of which is when Daniels is featured. Predictable but good mindless fun!

Hold Your Breath (2012) DVD
- Last May the theme here on Schlock to the System was “May-de to be Mocked” (mockbusters), during which I ended watching way more The Asylum flicks than is entirely healthy. Fast forward a year and I pop on this slasher, not knowing a thing about it, and during the opening credits… yep, it’s produced by those purveyors of budget-conscious tripe, The Asylum. Apparently this was the first movie they ever released to cinemas - I feel sorry for whoever paid cinema ticket prices to sit through this one. Low-budget slasher based around an executed criminal whose spirit jumps from body to body. Think The Fallen without the budget, or the plot. Or anything really. Definitely worth skipping.

Repentance (2013) Netflix
- I watched this under duress after my girlfriend chose it for our night’s viewing, and found it to be not too bad. It has a good cast, including the always-dependable Forest Whitaker and Anthony Mackie, and a plot that starts off predictable but takes a few twists and turns. A little too corny and preachy for my liking, but the good acting and some intense torture scenes kept me in it until the end. Not bad if you’ve got some time to waste and are looking for something to watch.

JUDGEMENT MAY: Vanishing on 7th Street (2010) DVD
- What drew me to this movie the most (apart from the fact I picked it up secondhand for extremely cheap) was director Brad Anderson. I love two of his early movies, Session 9 and The Mechanic. While this doesn’t live up to those, it’s still a solid watch, especially if you’re fascinated by post-apocalyptic movies like me. In this case it’s an end-of-world scenario where most of the world’s population disappears in an instant, leaving just a few confused survivors (including ol’ Annakin Skywalker himself Hayden Christensen and John Leguizamo in a rare non-comedic role). When the enemy is revealed to be shadow creatures, the survivors must stay in the light at all costs. Anderson once again shows that he knows how to build suspense (the gimmick here allows him to re-use a few “lights going out” tricks from Session 9) and while there’s nothing overly memorable about Vanishing on 7th Street, I can give it a mild recommendation.

31 Nights of Terror #18 - Redneck Zombies (1989)

Redneck Zombies (1989)
Director: Pericles Lewnes
Starring: Lisa de Haven, WE Benson, William Decker, James Housely
Format: DVD (Troma)

- This is the 20th anniversary DVD.
- A quite funny Kaufman's Kultural Korner bit before the movie starts, with Lloyd Kaufman (one of the most fun men in movies) and director Lewnes.
- Troma movies without a drum of nuclear waste are like porn without nudity.
- Great country music credits song.
- Most of the acting so far is of the usual hammy Troma kind, but Bucky Santini is genuinely funny as fat good ol' boy Ferd.
- Lewnes is also good fun as a gay bearded redneck named Billy Bob who wants to be called Elly May.
- Jed always getting his sons Junior and Jethro mixed up is a fun bit.
- For a bunch of dirty rednecks the Clemsons sure do have a clean and tidy pickup truck.
- Nice homage/riff on the hitchhiker scene from Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
- Two rednecks watching porn on TV. "I like knockers". "I like knockers too". *knock on the door*. "Someone's knocking." "Yeah, I like knockers too". Top notch comedy right there!
- Man, that scene was trippy as all hell.
- Moonshine in the baby's bottle. That's just wrong.
- The makers of this must have had some fun doing the gore effects. They're pretty damn good for a low budget indy flick.
- Somehow I don't think Andy is as interested in the girls as he makes out.
- It's not hard to see why Lisa de Haven gets top billing. She's actually got some acting chops. Terrible pants though.
- The autopsy scene is hilarious.
- Love the scene with Bob pretending to a zombie but giving himself away. In fact, Bob starts out as one of the lamest characters (mainly due to the acting) but gets funnier as the movie goes on.
- Great ending!

Overall thoughts: As I've admitted before, I'm not much of a fan of Troma movies. And one of the reasons for that is I usually don't find the comedy in their stuff to be very funny. So I had low expectations going into Redneck Zombies, and was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it, and how funny I found it. Make no mistake, the humour is as low brow as you would expect from a redneck movie, so if you're looking for clever jokes, look elsewhere. But if the concept of nuclear waste getting into a moonshine still and turning hillbillies into zombies makes you chuckle, you might want to check Redneck Zombies out.

31 Nights of Terror #9 - I Drink Your Blood (1970)

I Drink Your Blood (1970)
Director: David Durston
Starring: Bhaskar, Jadin Wong, Rhonda Fultz, George Patterson
Format: DVD (Madman)

- Naked hippies in the first scene. Good start. Satan-worshipping naked hippies, even better!
- Groovy 60s soundtrack with bongos. Like far out man.
- "Roger, I'm terribly upset". Great dialogue.
- Hey that's the girl from The Crazies (Lynn Lowry). I knew when I watched The Crazies the other night I'd seen her before. I must have remembered her from this (though admittedly I only watched about the first third of this, some 6-7 years ago).
- My DVD runs 83 minutes. The uncut version is 90 minutes. Damn.
- The kid in this movie sure is a resourceful little bastard.
- Horace Bones the Indian (as in Native American) hippy leader is played by an Indian actor (as in from the country India). Okay.
- I come from a country where we don't have rabies, so I'm not expert on the disease, but I'm pretty sure it takes more than a few hours for it to affect a human.
- I knew I'd heard one of the musical sound effects from this movie before. It's from the intro to the Rob Zombie song
- Rabid construction workers! If they would join up with the rabid Indian hippie and somehow find a cop and a navy guy, we'd have the coolest Village People cover group ever.
- Some of the music is creepy but some of it sounds like Batman should be dancing the Batoozie to it.
- This does have some good gore, especially for the time. I'm wondering if this print really is cut?

Overall thoughts: I can honestly say this is the best rabid satanist hippy horror movie I have ever seen. It's also the only one I've ever seen. All kidding aside, as low budget zombie movies go (I know they're not really zombies, but it still feels like a zombie movie) this one's pretty good. Some of the acting's really, really bad, but that aside it has a charm to it that only low budget late 60s/early 70s movies can have. The heavy-handed anti-beatnik moralising is quite laughable, but looking past that there's a good ol' gorey time to be had watching I Drink Your Blood.

31 Nights of Terror #8 - Dead Snow (2009)

Dead Snow (2009)
Director: Tommy Wirkola
Starring: A bunch of Norwegian people you won't have heard of
Format: DVD (Madman)

- A hot chick who knows about classic horror movies. I'm in love.
- It's been a good last few years for Norwegian horror. I really enjoyed last year's Trollhunter and have heard good things about this one.
- From the goofy menu music I was expecting this to be a comedy/horror but so far it's an effective little chiller with lots of suspense and jump scares.
- Isolation horror is one of my favourite sub-genres and you can't get much more isolated than deep in the Norwegian mountains.
- Zombies that slit throats? What the deuce?
- Norwegian death metal. Rowrrrr!
- The movie geek guy is wearing a Braindead t-shirt. New Zealand represent!
- Jesus, at least let the guy finish wiping before you get it on in the shithouse.
- Nazi zombies is a sub-genre that is vastly underutilised. I can only think of Shockwaves and this.
- And this just went from being a atmospheric scarefest to a blood and guts (or more specifically brains) gorefest.
- I've seen enough modern zombie movies to be able to tolerate running zombies (or zoombies as I like to call them), but zombies that use weapons? Blah.
- Look, it's Zombie Colonel Klink.
- And now zombies that can climb trees. Are there no rules anymore?
- The comedy has increased a lot since the zombies showed up, but without the overall vibe getting too silly.
- Never sneak up on a man in the middle of a killing spree.

Overall thoughts: Dead Snow is fun and entertaining, I'll give it that. The characters are likeable, the zombies pretty bad ass and the setting desolate and remote. After a slow, atmospheric build up the action kicks in and doesn't let up until the climax. A good mix of horror and comedy. And it has Nazi Zombies!

June 20 - The People Who Own The Dark

The People Who Own The Dark (1976)
Director: Leon Klimovsky
Format: AVI (VHSrip)

Alright, a bit of full disclosure to start - I don't think I've seen a Paul Naschy movie until now. I know, I know, that's pretty shocking for any serious fan of horror movies. I'm well versed in the Italian branch of the Euro horror family tree, particularly the giallos of Argento, Fulci, Bava etc. But I've been quite lax in my efforts to investigate the Spanish branch, despite regularly hearing Naschy's name bandied around with that of fellow countryman Jeff Franco (another hole in my viewing experience).

Anyway, that admission aside, I do realise that The People Who Own The Dark is not a typical Naschy film. Here he has something of a supporting role, and a convetional one at that, but he does team up with regular collaborator Klimovsky, the Argentinian director who directed eight of his films.

The People Who Own The Dark is an effective post-nuclear survival tale that throws together a group of rich, influential men (including Naschy; Alberto de Mendoza, THE CASE OF THE SCORPION'S TAIL; and Antonio Mayans, ZOMBIE LAKE) with a number of beautiful models for a weekend of pleasure in the basement of a castle somewhere in Europe - kind of an upmarket swingers' retreat.

But before they can get down to business, nuclear war breaks out. The guests are safe in their underground bunker, but everyone else in the surrounding countryside, including a nearby village, is left blind by the blast.

Venturing out to get supplies, the group of protagonists soon realises these blinded, half-insane villagers are not interested in becoming facebook friends. They want to kill the sighted (how they know the difference is beyond me, but what the heck).

Barricading themselves in the castle, the non-blind soon have to cope with the growing tension and paranoia in their group, as well as the villagers when they come looking for blood. Well, not exactly looking. More like stumbling.

Naschy is great as the snake of the group, who is only interested in saving his own skin. The women are all beautiful, none moreso than German softcore queen Nadiuska (who also played Arnie's mother in CONAN THE BARBARIAN), who is the only one to get fully un-kitted. The female cast also includes Julia Saly (NIGHT OF THE WEREWOLF), Diana Polakov (in a supporting role four years before her feature role in the rip-roaring SUPERSONIC MAN) and Teresa Gimpera (CRYPT OF THE LIVING DEAD). Maria Perschy (MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE) is simply stunning as the host of the party.

Klimovsky does a very good job of building suspense and dread with material that could have come off as corny. Scenes of dozens of blinded people surrounding a main character while waving walking sticks above their heads could have been campy, but instead is quite chilling.

Comparisons with Night of the Living Dead are unavoidable. Trade zombies for staggering blind people, Pennsylvania for the European countryside and a farmhouse for a castle and you've got basically the same plot. Even the ending is similarly-bleak.

But while it may be a ripoff of sorts, The People Who Own The Dark is effectively filmed with a great cast, so is definitely worth checking out.

May 13 - BLACK FRIDAY double feature

Friday the 13th part 8: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)
Director: Rob Hedden
Format: DVD

So today was Friday the 13th, Black Friday. It's a tradition in my house to watch, well, what else but a movie from the Friday the 13th series on this day. It helps that I'm an unashamed fan of the series.

I've watched parts 1-7 numerous times over the years, but I've managed to limit my exposure to part 8 to just a single viewing many years ago (when it first came out on video). I remember being so disappointed and disgusted by it back then, and that bitter taste has stayed in my mouth since.

Tonight I bit the bullet and gave it another watch. I'm not sure if it's because I had such low expectations or just because I was in the right frame of mind, but I actually enjoyed it this time around. No, not as a serious horror movie, but as an unintentional comedy.

First, the cast and crew. Director Rob Hedden's career since Friday 8 has consisted of made for TV movies. No one, and I mean no one, on the cast went on to become a big name (think about that - the earlier entries had Kevin Bacon, Corey Feldman, Crispin Glover, Ron Palillo etc). The most success any of them had after this movie was pretty boy male lead Scott Reeves becoming a regular on soaps General Hospital and Young and the Restless.

The plot has a bunch of teens (what else?) who celebrate graduating high school by taking a cruise to New York City from near Camp Crystal Lake. Only they have an unwanted stowaway, ol' hockey mask himself, Jason Vorhees. And then... well, he kills a bunch of people. What else would you expect?

There are a few things that bother me about this movie, but none more than the way Jason is portrayed. Namely the fact that he seems to have the speed of a ninja. Sure, in the other films he always manages to catch up to whoever he's chasing without breaking his leisurely pace, but at least he doesn't flaunt the laws of physics. In this one, one second he's over there, the next he's over here - it's just not possible!

Plot holes? Ho boy, big enough to drive... well, a cruise ship through! Since when did Crystal Lake join up with the ocean? How did Rennie (Jensen Daggett - about the only decent actor on screen here) have a run in with a young Jason when he's been hunting teens as an adult (albeit an undead one) for decades now? And the ending - I don't want to spoil it, but it makes no sense whatsoever.

But, and it's a big but, if you manage to switch off the ol' brain and overlook the plot holes, if you embrace the unintentional comedy unfolding before you, you might just enjoy it. The bad acting, the fashions, the music, the flaws in logic... they're all worth a few laughs. Hell, it's the only way to make it all the way through this movie.


Zombie Strippers
Director: Jay Lee
Format: DVD

Zombie. Strippers. And if that's not enough to get you to watch, the two names at the top of the marquee are Robert Englund (NIGHTMARE ON ELM ST) and porn star Jenna Jameson. How could you resist?

Englund plays the sleazy owner of an illegal strip club that becomes the unwitting scene of a zombie outbreak. Jameson is his star stripper, who gets infected but rather than becoming a mindless shuffler, keeps on stripping, while munching on some manmeat in between pole routines.

Director and writer Jay Lee presents all this with tongue in cheek and really delivers for B movie fans. He doesn't hold back on the nudity and gore, dishing out bouncing titties and exploding heads with equal fervour.

The supporting cast is eclectic to say the least, with appearances by a former ultimate fighting champion (Tito Ortiz), a goth rock singer (Roxy Saint), a former child star (Whitney Anderson) and a production assistant from The Apprentice (Jen Alex Gonzalez).

The best laughs are for latin comedian Joey Medina (THE ORIGINAL LATIN KINGS OF COMEDY), who plays a Mexican janitor forced to clean up after the zombies go a-munching. The other comedy is very hit and miss, some of it coming off as just plain silly. But it doesn't spoil what is a damn good time for any B movie fan.

Think zombies and you want plenty of blood, entrails and headshots. Think strippers and you want hot women taking their clothes off. Combine the two and you get both. Ain't life grand?