Return to Boggy Creek (1977) – Tom Moore.

I believe, most sincerely, if everyone in the world today returned to Boggy Creek at least twice, our ailing planet would be a far jollier place to live in. Sequels are problematic entities, even if the originator follows his, or her own work, happily the return of Boggy Creek's iconic bottom dweller is still in rude health! I'm always thrilled by the prospect of a monstrously hairy beast returning to terrorize the bottoms, but that's quite enough of my sordid peccadilloes. Moore's beloved original remains a classic creature feature no matter which way you part your hair, and his Return To Boggy Creek maintains the folksy charm of the original, keeping the legend of this balefully bellowing Bayou behemoth alive. As an ardent fan of all things boggy and sasquatchy, I got no complaints, guy, the cast are fine, with exquisite work from young Nancy Drew-wannabe Dana Plato, and charismatic arm-waving from Big-Footed Louis Belaire.

As a momentary aside, I always wanted to have confirmed whether notable thespian Timothy Bottoms was in anyway related to the Boggy Creek Bottoms? Like an unexpectedly warm autumn night, Return To Boggy Creek remains a treat for stalwart sasquatchers of all ages. Clearly, Return To Boggy Creek is a product from a bygone age, the unhurried pace, lack of screen violence, and wholesome hi-jinks, may, perhaps, appear anachronistic to contemporary viewers, but it is this warmly-fuzzy, time capsule aesthetic that I find so comforting. I'd actually forgotten that Sasquatch have a Jones for catfish Kool Aid, which, finally, and unequivocally reveals the origin of their legendarily far-reaching stink! It must also be stated that lovely Dawn Wells manifestly got that down-home Linda Ronstadt sexiness going on!

 

 Crystal Force (1990) – Laura Keats.

'Mom? Have you ever dabbled in the occult?'

Some cat REALLY needs to sample the overripe Karloffian narration at the introduction of this bawdy 90s occult chiller. The faux fisheye lens deal recalled vintage skateboard videos, so I was kinda disappointed when Stacy Peralta didn't ollie dramatically out of a nearby grave! Crystal Force is triumphantly Tromatic terror tripe, generously slathered with such flavoursome, creamed corn dialogue, any fellow Hallmark addicts should be all over this saccharine shocker like dead hornets in a killing jar! This is talky, hella talky, but the neat concept of a demon-possessed crystal ornament enjoys the musty charm of a semi-spooky 70s TV-Movie-of-the-week. Without meaning to sound crass, Crystal Force's softly diffused scenes of fervidly wet-dreamed in-out certainly livened things up!

I became strongly beguiled by the Crystal's eldritch power, the unexpectedly lusty quotient of T&A, and spicy interludes of Mills & Boon'd coitus proved irresistible. Performances are good, with exceptionally fine work from the gargoyle, once loosed from its crystal bindings, it hornily manifested itself as a satisfyingly bloodthirsty minion of hell! Crystal Force's compelling admixture of syrupy dialogue, MTV salaciousness, and Syngenor-like monster Mayhem was/is ABSOLUTELY deserving of a sequel! No seasoned lover of schlock horror shall remain unmoved by the righteously Slithic nature of the hellzapoppin' finale! The dusty reverend is played by some cat called Dirk Gammon, which is one of the most awesome monikers I have heard in a minute, immediately recalling one of Andy Sidaris's more implausibly macho action/adventurers.

 Cryptz (2002) Danny Draven.

'They came for the titties, and were left in itty bitty pieces!!'

When three aspiring, not altogether convincing musical artistes elect to discover sultry stripper Stesha's (Lunden De'Leon) enigmatic place of work, they all too late discover that members are not just her ardent fangs, they are denizens of an Underworld in a rather more biblical sense! Hip-Hop-inflected horror has provided grisly gems like 'Bones', and personal fave 'Leprechaun in The Hood', it is fair to claim Cryptz has shades of Vamps, but realised on a conspicuously lower budget. The dearth of invention, and prosaic production design engenders a schlocky aesthetic, which is unfortunate, as our 3 protagonists are amiable fellows, and their terrifyingly toothsome predators remain wickedly enticing Voodoo vamps!

I wasn't hugely impressed, but I righteously dug on the jacked Kung Fu-powerlord sensei Truck (Andre McCoy) his fights were clunkily orchestrated, but he's a groovy, if somewhat over earnest, fleet-fisted Vampire snuffer. The entire cast are pretty great, with the especially beauteous ladies providing some exquisitely ebony-hued exotica, distractingly delicious Stesha proving herself to be a magnificently menacing mistress of doom! Cryptz is conventional, but certainly not without fun B-Movie elements. If the otherworldly vibes of legend Kool Keith/Dr. Octagon had been an inspiration for the story, Cryptz would have been aggressively replete with the compelling weirdness it lacked.

 Liberty & Bash Crime Task Force (1989) – Myrl A. Schreibman.

Once I had digested the film's rather unwieldy title, I then began to joyfully cogitate upon the impending enormity of an 80s cop/actioner with midnight movie maestros Miles O'Keefe and big Lou Ferrigno? That's one HELL of a beautifully screwball team up! I can't really imagine that anyone intrigued by this one will truly give a chimp's fart about the gang war plot shenanigans, bloodily unleashed upon the mean streets of Angel city. After A-1 Task Forcer Liberty's (O'Keefe) beleaguered war buddy Jesse (Richard Egan) is executed, he becomes dangerously drawn into the crossfire.

Even as an admirer of chiselled cheesecake O'Keefe, he's especially charismatic as a crusading, straight-shooting good guy, but when Liberty and Bash (Ferrigno) finally tool up and steamroller the double-dealing skells, it proved softer than I anticipated. The poster art is somewhat disingenuous, as this is manifestly O'Keefe's show, Ferrigno's appearances, while playful, are frustratingly brief. Fans of handsome B-hero Miles O'Keefe should find this golden, but those who favour his hulking co-star may, perhaps, be a mite disappointed. The action is quite bloody, usage of L. A.'s seamier-looking locales proved effective, the supporting cast are fine, with Gary Conway really popping in the noisome final act!

'Help Me I'm Dead' aka Die Geschichte Der Anderen (2013) – Andreas Bethmann.

Grisly haunted house Nazisploitation from gore-master Andreas Bethmann, with righteous splatter FX by Olaf Ittenbach, plus a lively performance from legendary Jess Franco alumnus Antonio Mayans?????? Baste my regenerative organs in honey, and let the fucking dogs out! I'm in!!!! As a sweet, disabled psychology student Jennifer (Margarethe Von Sterne) collects thesis material about the differences between individuals that specifically chose the countryside over city life, her growing curiosity about an abandoned property with an especially dark history culminates in a terrifying night of relentless torment.

Bethmann successfully engenders palpable intrigue over this singularly spooky domicile, and one has enormous sympathy for his physically, and emotionally fragile protagonist. While there are jump-scares, the onus is on slowly encroaching malice, as Jennifer becomes a magnet for the house's increasingly unsettling supernatural machinations. 'Help Me I'm Dead' benefits hugely from its macabre J-Horror influences, but the raw, exploitative material provides an additionally lurid patina of Grindhouse satisfaction. Frankly, it's not all that often that a haunted house trip delivers such a charge of old school video nastiness!

 Vampire in Venice (1988) – Augusto Caminito.

Eminent scholar, and stalwart vampire hunter Professor Catalano (Christopher Plummer) is called to a baroque abode in picturesque Venice to root out, and destroy nemesis itself, Nosferatu (Klaus Kinski). While somewhat formal in execution, and prone to theatricality, Caminto's atmospheric Vampire in Venice is voluptuously steeped in Gothic doom-scapes, an enjoyably camp supernatural Euro-creeper with exceptionally fine actors. Many sequences are exquisitely composed, enveloping one in a sinisterly compelling fantasy of forbidden erotica, being drawn deliciously into the bloodiest boudoir of Gothic fiction's most profane fornicator.

Having Herzog's iconic Nosferatu playing Caminito's Nosferatu is, perhaps, a no-brainer, but Kinski manifestly exudes the malign gravitas that so many actors who don the immortal cape pointedly lack. Absolutely NONE creep through crepuscular, cob-webbed catacombs with quite the same appreciable level of ill-omened portent as dirty Onkel Klaus! While Christopher Lee remains the reigning Prince of Darkness, Kinski's evilly libidinous creature is a magnificently dissipated wretch, a degenerate blood-fiend, sinisterly stalking his appetisingly fleshly prey through the spidery back-alleys, set deep within Venice's decaying grandeur. Seen today, it might seem a tad fruity in places, yet Vampire in Venice remains a toothsome terror treat for Gothic romantics.

 Violent Shit II: Hold My Hand Mother. (1992) – Andreas Schnaas.

Savage sequel to Teutonic terror titan Schnaas's immortal S.O.V splat-pile Violent Shit delivers an equally indefensible largess of scintillatingly lo-fi body-rupturing carnality. An investigative journalist takes an interest in a series of vicious killings, whose profane MO is disturbingly similar to those committed in the 70s by a notorious cannibal killer. This altogether brief interlude of non-Ultra violence is certainly not emblematic of Violent Shit II's generous, and prodigiously plasma-packed perfidy. If luridly limb-lopping lunacy be your cup of meaty malarkey, then drink up hearty, as Schnaas's Violent Shit II: Hold My Hand Mother is a gallon drunk of audacious gore! ALL slashers owe EVERYTING to Mario Bava, whereas Andreas Schnaas flicks are solely indebted to his own blissfully errant mind! I appreciated the fact that the lumbering sadist Karl proved to be a dutiful son, providing highly nutritious, farm fresh body flesh delicacies, taking especial care to extract the vitamin-rich brain juice for his darling mutti!

While Violent Shit II takes a rather cavalier approach to its profound dearth of plot, it compensates most zealously with a tremendously exhilarating cornucopia of carnage! If you conjoined Riki-Oh and Violent Shit II, you might very well have the very best that bloody genre cinema can provide. Gratuitous gore ingloriously captured on standard VHS, for me, has an immediacy, a sordid intimacy, the glossier features pointedly lack. Much like the scratchy 16mm capture of war's gross inhumanities, D.I.Y splatter is more satisfyingly voyeuristic. Once violence is overtly stylised it loses much of its impact. Like punk, bands with only a rudimentary grasp of music theory still wrote hugely impactful songs, far more relatable than the virtuosic noodling of 'real musicians'. Horror is certainly no different, I'll take D.I.Y cheapnis schlock over Hollywood's burnished, repackaged silage any fucking day.

 Shrieker (1998) – David Decoteau.

'For he who hears the creatures blood-curdling shriek is DOOMED!!'

Penurious students squatting an abandoned Hospital, are oblivious to the building's dark history, as it hides an especially sinister secret; the murderous, pan-dimensional banshee, 'The Shrieker'. Once again summoned from the stygian depths, this rampagingly evil, twin-headed monstrosity noisily gives our querulous collegiate squatters a MAJOR f'n headache! Life-sized creatures have proven less popular Full Moon protagonists than their diminutive, franchise-building death-dealers, and, sadly, Shrieker was to be another admittedly creative, stand-alone project that unfortunately failed to find an audience. Shrieker is not poorly made, much like an artisan, non-alcoholic ale, it's eminently quaffable, but the fun part is missing!

On paper, this cosmically eerie, Lovecraftian, occult creature feature looks viable, perhaps, suggestive of another 'Lurking Fear', but, as is so often the case, much, if not all, is lost in translation. The squeakily youthful cast are fine, if a little dull, Mark Williams bold creature design is winningly lurid, desolated Hospitals are innately creepy, but Decoteau's Shrieker often feels undernourished, as it never truly takes flight. Unlike Rawhead Rex, Shrieker pointedly lacks visceral incident, fizzling out like a Goosebumps, supernatural gee-whizzer, sleepover romp. The energy is wrong, the Shrieker should be a genuinely WTF netherworld nightmare to be absolutely feared. Shrieker colourfully reiterates the inherent dangers of allowing the little head to rule the bigger one!

 Dead Space (1991) – Fred Gallo.

Dead Space is one of the more relatively obscure 90s Sci-actioners from Roger Corman's beloved Concorde Pictures. Set upon an isolated research facility, a devastatingly mutable virus is monstrously unleashed, ultimately producing a far less schlocky variant of the original mutation seen in Forbidden World. Dead Space remains a breezy blast of retro DTV Sci-splatter for the more avid B-freak/Corman-addict, but it may prove tame if compared to the infamously exploitative source material.

Fred Gallo's remake is a fun, far-flung spacer adventure, with serviceable practical FX, decent production design, a whip-crack pace, and a solid cast, manfully headed by sinewy sexpot Marc Singer, plus an early, absolutely credible performance from Bryan Cranston. Singer's drily sardonic demeanour, making him a compelling, more than capable combatant for the rampaging monster. The palsy rapport between Krieger (Singer) and his loyal Cyborg companion Tinpan is endearingly maintained throughout, perhaps, their empathy for one another appearing more concrete in Dead Space, than the original?

 Forbidden World (1982) – Allan Holzman.

'We've created a little monster, I'm afraid!'

On planet Xarbia, researchers create Subject 20, an artificial lifeform that runs bloodily amok in thrillingly lurid 80s Sci-splatter gem Forbidden World. A kinetically edited intro, wherein cryo-resurrected Jessie Vint bosses a deep space dog fight, dynamically sets the scene for cosmic, chunk-blowing cult classic Forbidden World. I'd like to claim my zealous appreciation is largely down to Susan Justin's pulsingly urgent electronic score, but Forbidden World's free-spirited preponderance of explosive gore, and tantalizing nudity had me transfixed like a tractor beam directly from blastoff! And who couldn't appreciate a prodigiously gloopy B-flick that features the aces line 'What's the gooey stuff?' While the narrative is routine Sci-pulp, it's of on especially rich consistency!

I don't wish to sound trite, but one should NEVER, under ANY circumstance, leave the door to the metamorph's cage open, I haven't done much in my life that I'm proud of, but I felt it was my citizenly duty to reiterate this pertinent fact. If one relates to Forbidden World as an off-world slasher, with an especially mutable killer, it plays better than simply being just another creature featured Corman romp. This lascivious metamorph can't quite keep his multitudinously oozing proboscis off the scintillating ladies! I've said this many times before, but clunkily expository dialogue is better digested when delivered by two absolutely nude, exquisitely lovely women! The salient question remains, which is greater, Cozzi's Contamination, or Holzman's Forbidden World? I shall leave that up to future Siskel & Ebert's to cogitate over!