The Wrong Door (1990) – Bill Weiss.

Student Ted (Matt Felmlee), a gifted creator of audio drama, disturbingly finds himself cast as The Wrong Man opening The Wrong Door, whereupon he coincidentally witnesses the slaying of a young woman, and is plunged frantically into a whip-crack Hitchcockian nightmare noir/mystery. Super-8 indie miracle The Wrong Door has the chutzpah to punch well above its weight, proving itself to be a rousing, smart, breathlessly paced, knock-out thriller. For a feature shot on such a small gauge it has big ideas, and frequently delivers some satisfyingly widescreen suspense! Amiable Young Actor Felmlee is sublime as the innocent naif, the unlikeliest of heroes, relentlessly pursued by two Brat Pack thugs, one of whom is doing his best to channel his inner James Spader, but thuggishly projecting a B-level James Russo, which, quite frankly, ain't too shabby!!!!

Once again, deep-diggers Visual Vengeance, those stalwart curators of intoxicatingly Home-brewed S.O.V Gore-mongery are to be enormously commended for nurturing this compelling S.O.S (shot on Super-8) thriller onto HD for the delight, and universal delectation of cult movie treasure seekers worldwide! The Wrong Door is a cherishable rarity, a hitherto neglected, unjustly obscure, VHS-era Bobby Dazzler, that enjoys quality performances, a cogent, suspenseful text, engagingly visual film-making aesthetic, and a palpably thrilling climax! With its playful, sympathetic protagonist, and serpentine De Palma/Hitchcock plot, I was resolutely gripped throughout, for me, The Wrong Door is a truly inspirational, indie-film-making marvel!

 Isolation (2015) – Cedric Endress & El Gore.

This rather sombre iteration of low-fi Krautshock presents the brutal killing spree of a nebbish-looking serial killer (Philip Petrosky), and the boozy, burnt-out cop (Christian Fryska) increasingly desperate to apprehend him. Not altogether big on verisimilitude, since at no time does Isolation divest itself of the made by a group of film savvy, D.I.Y gorehounds aesthetic, but, frankly, it is their FU, just blow chunks attitude that lends it a ton of watchability. Primarily set within a rural German backwater of unspecified origin, the bulk of Isolation is intercutting between autistic, eerily silent lunatic at home, or outside annihilating randoms with a fuck-off stiletto, and the morose, dipso detective, stuck in a crepuscular office, drenched in whiskey and self-pity. Since the maniac is largely mute, the bulk, if not all of the dramatic content is from the handsome, if increasingly warped cop, who, jut barely pulls it off. At no point was I bored, curiously, I found myself transfixed by Isolation's 'let's gorily stab randoms up in a backyard milieu, it shouldn't work, yet, for me, it mostly does.

Isolation's main strength is its brevity, the frequent, bravura instances of home-brewed carnage, and Rene Bidmon's moody, conspicuously excellent electronic score. Isolation mimics many cheapnis Grindhouse titles of the 60s/70s, and early 80s, appropriating a similar, let's get a bunch of amenable people in one location, and either make with the old in-out, or get hella stabby! Isolation is a scrappy, prodigiously stabby, suburban S.O.V gore-blaster, and I would personally rather see another no-budget sequel to Isolation than one more paltry Hollywood remake. The cop really would be absolutely convincing playing one of Goring's more reprehensible minions, which gives Isolation's nihilistic climax a bit more credibility. The FX are crude and splashy, the performances are crude and splashy, and since at no point in my life have I ever been adverse to crude and splashy manifestations, this serially sanguineous S.O.V slasher proved especially winning.

 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.