The Massage Parlour Murders! (1973) – Charles Fox/Alex Stevens.

A maniacally misogynistic monotheist is viciously dissembling beautifully put-together masseurs in gnarly 70s Grindhouse slasher The Massage Parlour Murders! Not only a fascinating time-capsule of Times Square, and the dingier vectors of pre-gentrified NYC, the plentiful, sex-on-legs female cheesecake, and a noisome, ear-wormingly satisfying lounge Jazz/stoner fuzz score provides the Moorish icing on this delectable midnight movie confection. Fans of maestro H.G. Lewis's sleazoid death-o-rama classic The Gore Gore Girls are sure to appreciate the seamier elements of lurid exploitation gem The Massage Parlour Murders! In this instance, the low budget doesn't impinge upon the watchability, in fact, the hand-held, no-permits guerrilla film-making aesthetic merely galvanizes the film's raw nerve intensity. Granted, it remains undeniably grimy Drive-in fare, but frequently delivering a dynamic charge of dingy delirium, making skid row slasher The Massage Parlour Murders! A bona fide, babe-stuffed, B-Movie banger, one that generously offers patrons a happy ending!

Body Without Soul (1996) Wiktor Grodecki.

I had totally forgotten just how much of an epic downer this Documentary is! And Jeez, Louise!!! The self-confessed hedonist, pathologist/pornographer chap is a proper odd duck!!! I've never been big on meeting shady folk in dark alleys, but he's ABSOLUTELY one to avoid!!!That being said, if, like me, you maintain a morbid penchant for autopsy footage, this features, perhaps, one of the more eccentric examples. There doesn't appear to be much in the way of editorialising, the director, to his great credit, just lets the damaged, melancholy young men talk openly about their desperately unlovely existence as male prostitutes. In truth, the bloody evisceration of the cadaver acts a colourful respite from the sad boy's grey litany of despair. 

 Voodoo Curse : Legbas Rache (2009) – Sefan Svahn.

This entertainingly gory German S.O.V Zombie horror concerns Bremen's screamingly suburban, occult-obsessing, pseudo-Goths, and one especially fateful evening, wherein their hedonistic plans for a boozy, cannabis-hazed graveyard conjuring, quite literally, goes to hell in a blood-soaked handbasket! Unexpectedly, there's more pros than cons here, a MAJOR f'n win are Mr. Svahn's gorgeously grotesque-looking, gut-rippingly righteous zombies, his FX work is consistently excellent. Performances are shockingly decent, and the attack zombie 'blah' narrative is certainly no better, or worse, than a million others of its ilk. Sadly, this adherence to D.I.Y splatter dogma means that it occasionally becomes bogged down in the very same cliched morass as a million other lo-fi, dead-headed splatter flicks.

As a huge fan of inventive Italian splatter, and Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things, I absolutely believe polymath film-maker Stefan Svahn's stalwart attempts to bastardize them for his own low budget horror opus proved entirely apropos. Voodoo Curse : Legbas Rache frequently delivers some righteously lo-fi'd gore blasting, tittersome stoner repartee, and a hellaciously gruesome, slow movingly zombie-clotted climax! All that being said, Svahn's Wiccan bloodbath still suffers from an obviously deficient budget, and a painfully derivative text. As a final note, I really must credit the capable indie film makers for their hard work, dedication, and altogether honourable commitment to the greatly revered movie ministry of awesome S.O.V chunk-blowing!!!

 Knocking on Death's Door (1999) – Mitch Marcus.

Newly wedded paranormal investigators Brad (Brian Bloom), and Danielle (Kimberly Rowe) are tasked by sleazy boss Professor Ballard (John Doe) to document anomalous activities in an isolated, notoriously haunted property. More than their marriage is threatened by the vengeful spirit of the murdered boy Samuel (Brian Glanney) in atmospheric 90s DTV supernatural chiller Knocking on Death's Door. Following a grisly-ghostly incident at the doom-laden domicile, fright fans are magically transported through the ubiquitous '20 Years Later' portal into a shuddersome series of mostly compelling haunted house shenanigans. While this Roger Corman'd creaky-creeper is formulaic, it is well made, with sympathetic protagonists, a winningly creepy location, and a suitably spirited climax. Needless to say when David Carradine's ambivalent character drily intones that 'he doesn't believe in ghosts!', you can be darn tootin', that pretty soon some mightily chagrined spectral entity is gonna royally rip him a new one! Knocking on Death's Door should provide Haunted house fans with an engaging murder mystery, eerie, smokily candle-lit ghost hunting, an ominous, Shining-esque score, plus the beautifully bucolic Irish setting has its very own inimitable charm!

 Stark Fear (1962) – Ned Hochmann.

Following the sudden disappearance of paranoiac husband Gerald (Skip Homeier), his increasingly tormented wife Ellen (Beverly Garland) plummets ever more disturbingly into the furtive, scheming, desperately tawdry machinations of her congenitally abusive hubby. This zippy, engaging low-budget psychodrama is given an additional jolt of electricity by the dynamic presence of luscious, powerhouse Thespian Beverly Garland, and, to be fair, her boys put on a darn good show too! Stark Fear is crisply shot in B/W, the jagged, Neo-Noirish edges being occasionally muted by a saccharine score, yet Ellen's desperate search, and painful awakening to the sickening depths of her husband's iniquity proved appropriately stark and fearful. The film's mystery elements are robustly handled, the mawkish, melodramatic content is leavened by a number of palpably dark, surprising mean-spirited sequences, giving Stark Fear the pulse-pounding intensity of a vintage B-horror potboiler.

 The Lamp (1987) – Tom Daley.

It frequently proves interesting revisiting moderately neglected horror titles that are, perhaps, inextricably linked to the VHS home rental boom of the 80s. Much like The Kindred, even after all these years, The Lamp still flickered dimly in my video shop haunted memory. Inevitably, nostalgia plays a dominant role in the enjoyably goofy pleasures supernatural slasher The Lamp fitfully provides. 2 parts generic collegiate slasher, and 1 part creature feature mayhem, plus a frantic frisson of home invasion nastiness, it is this lively admixture of B-horror tropes that maintains The Lamp's lurid luminosity. Happily, the boomingly baritone-voiced genie trapped within the ancient, rather spiffy-looking Lamp is violently antithetical to the one popularized by Disney!

Following a brutal home invasion, the mysterious, undeniably ominous lamp is shipped to a museum, and once ensconced therein, it very soon unleashes its malevolence in an entertainingly schlocky series of gruesome, Djinn-delivered death scenes. The Lamp isn't going to win any belated awards for innovation, yet it remains a playful romp, a boisterously bloody reminder that the 80s were emphatically a heyday for gory, exploitative, mostly by-the-B-numbers teen splattering. Not unlike X-Ray, or Hide and Go Shriek, The Lamp benefits from its eerie location, and the divinely silly, The Gate-esque finale is still pretty neat! I've never related to the concept of a guilty pleasure, you either dig something, or you don't, no need to get all fancy schmantsy about it. Enough sermonising, go check out The Lamp, as, hey!!! you never know, it still might turn y'all on!

 The Ghost Dance (1982) – Peter F. Buffa.

While it happily never became a trope, the vengeful Indian spirit did inspire a number of quirkily inventive slashers, with 80s creepy curiosity The Ghost Dance arguably being one of the more entertaining examples. I'm no expert on the obscure mythologies of indigenous Americans, my scant knowledge is strictly second-hand, mostly from the likes of Olen Ray's cult slasher 'Scalps', but I still appreciate this mystic mode of supernaturally shamanistic slaughter. Regardless of the specific origin, in horror lore, ALL those who dabble in the profane mysteries of the occult often receive more than he, or she initially bargained for, as this ghastly Ghost Dancer sure 'ain't pussyfooting around! Seen today in its lushly remastered edition, Peter F. Buffa's compelling chiller The Ghost Dancer has more to offer horror fans than much of the dully recycled terror tripe of today.

Not dissimilar to vampire folklore, once they dig up the desiccated remains of renegade sorcerer Nahalla (Henry Bal), his vengefully resurrected spirit sinisterly stalks his victims in a host body, even supernaturally appropriating mesmerism/familiars, much like Stoker's immortal fiend. The Ghost Dance eschews the ubiquitous teen scream aesthetic, as the main protagonists are mature adults, with beautiful female anthropologist Dr. Kay (Julie Amato) providing for an intelligent, far more nuanced character than is so often the case. Another bonus is the moodily unhurried pace, allowing for a palpably eerie atmosphere to develop. While the stalk n' slash content is bloodily present, its modus operandi is considerably more refined than Voorhees's mostly monotonous minions. A forbidding atmosphere of dread, fine acting, Joseph Byrd's menacing score, picturesque desert locations, and a genuinely thrilling climax, allow me to highly recommend The Ghost Dance without a single reservation!