The Haunting of Julia (1977) – Richard Loncraine.

'You're not safe, nice Mrs. Lofting!'

Following the devastating sudden death of her 8yr old daughter, Julia's (Mia Farrow) attempts to restart her life in a new abode are thwarted by the manifestation of a malign ghostly presence. This immersive, tender, beautifully photographed supernatural chiller benefits greatly from the achingly delicate, uniquely expressive performance of Mia Farrow. Her maternal grief quite palpable, even if it is occasionally swamped by Colin Town's strident score! What I find most compelling about Loncraine's deeply melancholic piece is that it plays as a wholly interior work about the psychological discords borne of intense grief, and as a sinisterly simmering, increasingly unsettling suburban spook show.

The Haunting of Julia's strong delineation of characters proves effective, Keir Dullea is perfect as the pinstriped, scheming, cold-hearted husband, and who better to play Julia's supportive, charmingly pragmatic friend than dreamily dark-eyed lovely Tom Conti? Produced in the 70s, arguably cinema's most fertile epoch, this captivatingly 'classic' mode of gradually unfurling spectral mystery remains utterly timeless, bolstered with many fine performances, Julia now sits quite loftily amongst the macabre pantheon of truly great goose-bumpers!

 Graveyard Disturbance (1987) – Lamberto Bava.

Following a larcenous snack raid upon a small greengrocers run by none other than Bava himself, our tepid teenaged tearaways drive their dilapidated van until it breaks down in a suitably isolated backwoods locale. Soon utterly lost, these goobers stumble upon a vast labyrinthine series of cobwebbed catacombs, which spookily provides for some hugely atmospheric, exceptionally well-executed B-Horror content. While the text is dull, doing little to enliven the generic protagonists, Graveyard Disturbance boasts truly impressive production design. This compellingly creepy netherworld is stunningly realised, the dread atmosphere of mouldering tombs, crumbing ladders descending to foul pits of malignant purulence, crepuscular serpentine passages that lead maddening back upon themselves, plus a sinisterly surrealistic tavern, plopped incongruously in the midst of this legion of ancient dead!

While the scenario is somewhat implausible, and the absence of gore belies its TV origins, for the most part, Graveyard Disturbances remains a tremendously engaging smoke-slathered, subterranean romp, providing monster fans with imaginatively designed, expertly created, eerily be-rotted ghouls, zombies, and decrepit-looking vampires. Only the most jaded viewer couldn't fine something of value in maestro Lamberto Bava's Dantean, handsomely photographed, Goonies-esque hell-scapes. Excluding the ceaselessly prosaic chattering of the bland cast, Bava's Teatime terror pic has aged remarkably well, unlike the malign innkeeper who is long overdue a deep-cleansing facemask, plus a goodly few restorative hours of sunlight! Watching the Scooby kids ambling fearfully through these madly oppressive glooms, at times, I couldn't help but recall Fulci's equally nightmarish vistas in The Beyond!

 

 Blood Angel 2 (2005) – Ingo Trendelbernd.

It is entirely fair to say that it won't matter a jot if y'all haven't seen the original Black Angel, as part 2 is a rudimentary retread of 70s sleazoid rape/revenger I Spit on Your Grave. I'm largely indifferent to ISOYG, so I'm game enough to see an even more cheapnis iteration. An attractive young woman Mary (Akasha Jones), travelling alone, is cruelly waylaid by vicious thugs, and horribly violated. Given inexplicably short shift by the local plod, Mary becomes dejected, but upon watching an arbitrary TV screening of I Spit on Your Grave, she swiftly turns all business, becoming a steely, vengefully leather-clad 'They Call Her One Eye' angel of death! Now I'm not saying a preliminary heroic dosing of Gin n' many beers had a major role to play in my appreciation of Trendelbernd's grotty S.O.V chunkblower, but it certainly jollied things along!

To be blunt, the photography isn't altogether graceful, the integrity of the fight scenes leave something to be desired, performances/text are uninspired, but plucky Blood Angel Akasha Jones portrays the aggrieved, righteously revenging Mary with convincing brio! One must be forgiving when viewing micro-budgeted S.O.V exploitation, it doesn't mean you are uncritical, but there's little value drawing attention to the obvious limitations of D.I.Y horror productions. While I can see why some have been disparaging of Black Angel 2's credibility, those more avid S.O.V freaks should appreciate the film's skeevier dynamics. Black Angel 2's score is surprisingly nifty, and Mary's deservedly gory slayings are, perhaps, the film's main saving disgrace. There is no production design to speak of, the practical FX are crude, but bloodily effective, and the film's slavish adherence to the tawdry original ultimately becomes a mite tedious.

 Das Deutsche Kettensegen Massaker (1990) – Christoph Schlingensief.

Following the reunification, former members of the GDR, at least 4% of those crossing the decommissioned border are never seen again, Schlingensief's sardonic splatter film grimly suggests they were captured by crazed cannibals, and rendered into sausage meat! I love meat. I love meat in films. Meat is life. Life is meat. Fliesh ist Fliesh! Meat me in St. Louis is a classic, but Das Deutsche Kettensegen Massaker is meatier! The very wurst thing about Das Deutsche Kettensegen Massaker is that it's just not long enough! Oo-er missus!!! If you took all the high-voltaged eccentricity in DDKM, distilled it into an alcoholic beverage, it would headily provide for a monstrously intoxicating brew! I support inventive approaches to the production of artisan meats, yet the sinister meatology appropriated by those deranged denizens of this wonderfully strange, hyperbolically performed film may prove a little too idiosyncratic!

I know I'm not entirely alone in this, but I'm especially fond of genre films that demonstratively increase the viewer's appetite for meat, acting as a meat-accelerator, if you like, and the generously proportioned meat accelerative properties in DDKM are considerably more potent than most! The wildly off-grid, exhilaratingly singular black comedy stylings of DDKM proved wholly irresistible! In celebration, I'm now going to prepare a stiff bloody Mary, wholly organic, ingredients sourced directly from only the finest heavenly ingredients. If, like me, you sincerely believe DDKM to be funnier than Meat The Feebles, we should absolutely get together and enjoy a heroic dosing of all the finest living meats known to humanity!

 Mordsaga aka Story of a Murder. (1977) – Reynir Oddson.

'The spankings were only a pretext for touching you!!!'

This rigorously compelling Icelandic drama vividly presents a broken upper middle-class bourgeois family, a long-suffering wife (Gudrun Asmundsdottir), and 18yr old Anna (Thora Sigurthorsdottir), both boozily oppressed by a cruel, overbearing, patently incestuous patriarch (Steindor Hjorelfsson). Not only is Mordsaga a genuinely suspenseful family drama, the striking interior décor, appealing period fashions, and time-capsule views of 70s Iceland prove no less fascinating. My knowledge of Icelandic cinema is sparse, but I can't imagine I could have asked for a more delicious entre than Reynir Oddson's Mordsaga.

I've long had a penchant for 1970s era cinema, I appreciate the aesthetic, and the philosophic sensibilities, especially when the bolder film-makers take their sharpened scalpels, exposing the rot fulminating beneath 'polite societies' monied facade. I liked how the director revealed his intent for the film by having one of the secondary characters smugly mansplaining Claude Chabrol's cinematic modus operandi to girlfriend Anna, the innocent victim of her father's worst abuses. The truly fine cast are absolutely superb, and the able director most certainly delivers during his thrilling, intensely dramatic final act.

 Mehyo aka Female Leopard (1985)- Kôyû Ohara.

'After doing something bad, your body becomes hot!'

An attractive young woman Yuko (Kozu Tanaka) reunites with her estranged, deeply eccentric artist brother Takuya (Yukihiko Sato), and during her stay in the lavish family estate, she becomes aware of increasingly bizarre nocturnal escapades, noting her brother's erotic obsessions proving to be anything but fraternal. Any eminently disgraceful Nikkatsu production that begins with a kaleidoscopically kinky soiree is sure to escalate in a splendidly thrilling manner, which Mehyo does magnificently! Stating that Mehyo is a trifle fruity is like saying Eli Roth remains an excruciatingly dull film-maker, it simply doesn't do it any real justice.

Acting like a most invigorating tonic, I found director Ohara had a gift for evoking a teasingly voyeuristic milieu of faintly sinister erotica. Filled with outré incident, featuring a deliciously intrusive sequence wherein the increasingly unstable brother brutishly 'investigates' the physical suitability of his erstwhile lover's body. Does she make the grade? Watch Female Leopard and find out! Outside of the impeccable array of ravishingly beautiful women, I also found the score to be altogether spiffing too! While not an example of wall-to-wall Nikkatsu extremity, the performances are fine, it's frequently frisky, bluntly incestuous, competently shot, and is especially blessed by its beguilingly charismatic, exquisitely lovely leading lady.

 Head Case (2007) – Anthony Spadaccini.

This expressly grim, relentlessly downbeat found footage horror is constructed from the many hours of audio/video footage pertaining to an investigation into serial thrill killers Andrea & Wayne, and the alleged murders of at least 100 victims between 1986 to 2007. There's no doubt that the intimate, confessional quality, roughly captured on analogue tape lends an additional charge of intensity to Spadaccini's visceral Head Case. While much, if not all of the content is upsetting, for me, one of the more wickedly compelling elements are the informal scenes, presenting the almost bland normalcy of Wayne & Andrea's suburban day-to-day existence. This queasily elucidates how functional psychopaths can effectively compartmentalize their lives, during the day, the married couple are apparently anonymous working stiffs, smiling dully at a disinterested world, absolute evil hiding in plain sight.

One of the film's greatest strengths is how shockingly unthreatening they often appear, their perverse, feral natures absolutely heightened by the dissonant contrast of faux cosy domesticity, the playful mom & pop banter with their two children ringing disturbingly false. Head Case is terse, and mean-spirited throughout, unflinchingly exposing the utterly ruthless personalities of sadistic narcissists Wayne & Andrea. Their contempt for human life is absolute, two dreary perverts, blithely committing sickening acts of torture solely for their sordid edification often leaves a sour taste. A singularly nauseating couple, their monstrous peccadilloes provide for an especially glum, unhallowed soap opera of numbing depravity. The unfamiliar cast deliver natural performances, including a fine contribution from Brinke Stevens. Not exactly fun stuff, Head Case often proved so immersive, there were many instances when I forgot that it was fiction.