Dying To Meet You aka Serial Killer Massacre. (1997) – Michael W. Johnson.

Two rapaciously bloodthirsty serial killers fatefully meet, and upon discovering they both enjoy a brutal peccadillo for mass murder, this evilly-entwined pair of perfectly aligned psychopaths bloodlessly embark upon a mutually beneficial spree of atypical, (almost) deathless domesticity. While this frequently violent, no-budget psycho-slasher has all the finesse of week-old, high-summer roadkill, it doesn't stink up the joint quite as bad, honest injun!!!! I am a beer-rotten, horribly maladjusted, trash-soaked anthropoid, so my ability to guiltlessly consume moronic murder grottage like Dying To Meet You often manifests itself in more favourable reviews than more highfalutin' folk will think as being entirely just. Hey!!! It's an imperfect world, so it would be absolute hypocrisy to decry the skeezicks entertainment value of a cheapnis, guerrilla-shot S.O.V schlocker solely due on its patent imperfections. My fellow mono-brows can expect hokey repartee, Tromatic sloppy seconds, greasy synth sludge, podunk acting, bloody bath-time frolics, cheapnis gore-blasting, and a botty-wateringly maternal climax. I can vaguely recall a schlock-stuffed DVD label called Brain Damage, and Michael W. Johnson's spunky S.O.V snuff-fest would've have been altogether cosily at home there.

 The Second Act (2024) – Quintin Dupieux.

Four querulous actors are somewhat reluctantly working on an indie, AI created Rom-com when their angsty analogue personal lives appear to permeate strangely into the wholly binary construct of the hokey Hallmark-esque feature. I am a great admirer of the director, Deerskin (2019) is a tweaked, absurdist triumph, and the almost Dadaist delirium engendered of whimsically reality-warping comedy The Second Act only reinforces my admiration of this inventive trope-twister! One of the narrative's more appealing conceits is the fact that, on occasion, one is never quite sure of the content, am I watching the cornball dramady, or the sardonic satire of egotistical actors providing a lively discourse over the subjective importance of art in a world hell-bent on its own destruction? The Second Act's playfully mutable, often hilarious digressions makes it so comedically compelling! Smart, surrealistic, and winningly cerebral, the immaculate ensemble cast are uniformly terrific, generously gifted with an especially sly, irreverent, deliciously bone-dry humorous text. Not only is The Second Act uproariously funny, I had a welcome grin affixed to my face right until its all-too swift conclusion. A genuine Gallic delight, and I couldn't help but recall 80s French comedy gem Le Paltoquet, as Dupieux's mise-en-scene shared a similar tonal quality. I absolutely ADORED this film, the shifting lines betwixt the AI-directed material, and the deliciously acidic, behind-the-scenes sniping proved thrillingly compulsive!

 Killer Nerd (1991) – Mark Stephen Bosco / Wayne Alan Howard.

Accentuate the positive!

A lonely, timid, live-with-mom nerd (Toby Radloff) is routinely humiliated by bullying metalheads, and once his secret love hooks up with the office @-hole, the bloodied, but unbowed Harold Kunkle gruesomely revenges himself during a series of brutal reprisals. The title, and the fact that it was distributed by schlock-scions Troma strongly, and quite succinctly suggests the amenably goofy timbre of the piece. Is the serially abused Kunkle's violent spree justified? I might not win many friends, or influence too many people by this, but I sincerely believe, yes, it was an entirely just culling; frankly, the sleazy office clown deserved to get fragged for his asinine humour alone. The spotty text, and cast's over-egged performances are far from nuanced, but this almost cartoonish aesthetic proves appropriate given the narrative's amusingly exaggerated aesthetic. While episodic, and unapologetically crude, Killer Nerd often provides intentional wit, and winningly unintentional hilarity. To purloin Kunkle's mantra, one must accentuate the positive, Bosco & Howard have successfully created one memorably doofoid protagonist, whose desperate attempts to become cool proved erroneous, as Howard nerd-berg Kunkle was always way better than cool as he's a...KILLER NERD!!! While a more than decent oner, Killer Nerd may arguably play better on repeated, communally booze-enhanced viewings!

 Townies (1999) – Wayne Alan Howard.

'The Captain of America would NOT approve!!!'

Wayne Alan Howard's Low-fi indie schlock-com presents the appreciably grungy, quirkily off-beat antics of the multiform nutballs that populate dog-fart Schlarb, Ohio. There's a jolly good reason polymath film-maker Howard didn't call his eccentric, morbidly-inflected comedy Normies, as these entertainingly maladjusted misfits would require their very own ward at Bellevue! My tolerance for films like Townies has been greatly tempered by early exposure to John Waters, Lloyd Kaufman, Nick Zedd, George Kuchar, Andy Milligan, and Richard Kern etc. Is this a good thing? I have absolutely no idea. While I'm not completely in love with all the tweaker-jackanapes presented herein, it is entirely safe to say that Townies Psychotronic credentials are bona fide! Are monochromatic indie flicks artier than their more garishly technicoloured brethren? I tentatively believe, yes, yes, that could well be the case. Slacker-schlock lore suggests that if you film a posterior on video it appears despicably porny, but the VERY same sit-upon, when exposed to Super-8 is mythically transposed into hot-shit cinema verite, dude! Ultimately, I dug most of this, but I'm a remorselessly listless chode who still believes Tiramisu is Latin for a baby Tsunami. Final thoughts, husky dreamcake Caduceus (Shane Koltnow) got me in the mood for some enthusiastic oral gymnastics, Dickie's (Toby Radloff)isolation made me feel horribly sad, as I could manifestly feel his pain, and The Licker (Jeremy Maes) had erotic potentialities worth investigating!

 Schoolgirl Apocalypse (2011) – John Cairns.

Plucky Japanese schoolgirl Sakura (Rino Higa) must protect her picturesque village from the devastation of rampaging males, armed only with bountiful chutzpah, Kyudo, English textbook and muchas Kawaii kick-ass charm. Like a multitude of others, I see a battling sailor suit siren, and I'm all over it like monster testiculi on a prize bull! Not to disparage the Kawaii hero genre, but one expects plentiful fisticuffs, syrupy sentimentality, an evil villain/Villainess, stoic, blood-spattered combat, plus an endearing smattering of bespoke Asian kookiness, happily, Schoolgirl Apocalypse mostly adheres to type. All I can say is, when the world inevitably descends to hell in an AI-adjacent handbasket, one very much hopes there's an army of warrior-caste, sailor suit champions on call to protect us all!!!! Schoolgirl Apocalypse is a zesty, Sci-fied roller-coaster ride that shares a similar (ish) concept to Stephen King's Cell. Sakura is proper adorable, making for a feisty, sympathetically angel-faced, straight-shooting hero. Bucolic small town Japan has an immensely aesthetic appeal, providing an appealing contrast to all the seemingly inexplicable mayhem suddenly unleashed by their sinisterly zombified menfolk. Having an archer saviour perhaps references Greek mythology (Artemis), and the fun, pulpy plot extrapolates into a gonzo Lovecraftian climax!

 Hallucinations (1986) – Mark Polonia& John Polonia.

'This place is freaking out!!!

The feted, and deliciously fetid S.O.V impresarios initial foray into the fungoid arena of cheapnis, analogue schlock provided an oneiric, lysergically loopy extravaganza of unexpectedly cinematic magnitude! Three cracked brothers of questionable competency arbitrarily experience a debilitating series of macabre, sinisterly surrealistic mind-farts during the prolonged absence of their beloved mother. If I loved my mutti with the ardour of the Polonia Brothers, and reacting to her catastrophically neurosis-inducing absence, I might also succumb deliriously to an equally terrifying torrent of tormenting waking nightmares. Sadly, I don't, so I never enjoyed the giddy fortune of experiencing such a kooky kaleidoscope of garishly demented, low-tech brain-spazz. Much like the humble breakfast Weiner, the excitable Polonia bros moorishly pack in a prodigious excess of primitive satisfaction within one plasma-packed hour, a heroic feat of invention, that many other less mutti-orientated film-makers are unable to replicate in thrice that. Expect gut-buckets of Karo-syrupy splatter, menacing inquisitor monks, plasticine phantoms, wispy moustaches, gory gastrointestinal misadventures, phallic fear-figments, nauseating wallpaper, and a shrilly episodic mise-en-scene. To eschew narrative continuity, and aestheticism with such a bravura disregard for the viewer's psychological well-being proved incandescently winning, as 40 years on, stand-alone S.O.V schlock-hammer Hallucinations still walks disturbingly among us, be afraid...BE AFRAID!!! This cautionary S.O.V tale warning prospective mothers over the inherent dangers of neglecting your children's welfare in the selfish pursuit of the almighty dollar feels like a hellacious bumfight betwixt a bargain binned Bunuel and Doris Wishman, Wishman wins!!!YAY!!!

 Brutal (2017) – Takashi Hirose.

'Let's do some love experiments together!'

Takashi Hirose gruesomely presents the twisted existential malaise of ruthlessly opportunistic maniac (Butch), who fatefully meets his (love) match, in the equally maniacal guise of Asami. This explicit examination of contemporary love presents the desires of the killers, juxtaposed with metropolitan normies, intercut with juicily Cat III levels of extremely graphic, sexualised violence. Can naturally born killers experience naturally born love? If such a quandary proves intriguing, Takashi Hirose's bleak snuff romance should satiate those with excessively morbid interests. That being said, it is not only our feline chums who succumb to an unchecked curiosity! It is interesting to note that historical, real-life slayings have filtered through the ether and formed the baseline for many gore-blasting psycho-slashers! Blunt, and a little cold in its execution, Brutal provides a viciously viscous stew of suburban slaughter.

An undeniably sordid, unapologetically bloodied Grindhouse exploration of mass murder in an increasingly plasticized reality without meaning. While many murders are committed in an unsuppressed moment of anger, or by those intoxicated, but it is the enigmatic thrill-killings of serial killers that often provides grisly grist for the more engagingly warped splatter films. Some folk kill because of a tweaked yen for taboo fun, also lending them a fleeting sense of power they manifestly do not enjoy in their otherwise unremittingly grey existence. The woman's excruciatingly penetrative M.O. proved thrillingly wince-inducing. Not a profound observation, but it remains exceptionally rare for any two individuals to discover another that they are uniquely compatible with. I must just say, while I appreciated all the hectic stabby-stabby, Brutal's macabre, metaphysically maternal climax was positively peachy!