Cemetery Man (Dellamorte Dellamore)

It's not uncommon for collectors of any classification to harbor or yearn for a "holy grail" item or a "unicorn" piece to acquire that always seems so close and yet so far away. The Anchor Bay dvd run of Cemetery Man has been long out of print for awhile now and this film has been running away from my fellow horror collector Slasher Steve for many a day until last year. We were looking around in our usual spot where we get horror dvd's and blu's from and he was standing next to me while we were scanning the shelves for anything of interest and he just randomly says "I wonder if they have a copy of Cemetery Man." Quite literally as he said that I stared right ahead of where I was standing and there was one copy of it right in my cone of vision. I ripped it off the shelf and shoved it into his hand and he proclaimed "holy shit!" as he flipped it over to look at the back. The sticker said it was out of print and they were selling it for $17.99. Slasher Steve also said something about him not caring about the price, he was just going to buy it. His quest for this film was finally over. He had it for his collection and now I could finally borrow it when he was done with it so I could experience what he kept telling me about a kid's head getting crushed by a bus. And the main guy banging some chick in a cemetery. And random zombies getting shot. Yeah. There are many amazing things that take place during the run-time of Cemetery Man, and now that I've finally watched this Italian cult masterpiece, I can see why he's been digging in the dirt for so long to find it. It's a one of a kind and you'll never see a gorgeous woman get turned on by walking into a wet, dirty crypt in the same picture as Death himself standing before Francesco in all of his practical effects glory ever again.

Your friend looks a little... dead.

What else are you going to cover the graves with?

Where's Ash when you need him? Well, I guess a shovel works just as well.

It takes a lot of energy to satisfy a woman like that.

A fetish for the dead, perhaps?

 Wow, I never knew that Frances The Mute was such a player.

It's Castle Grayskull! (clears throat) ahem, oh wait... no. No, it's not.

You could wait until she comes back to life and call the sequel "Bride of Cemetery Man."

So, you get puked on, some jackass offers for you to take a ride on his bike and you jump on without showering or changing your dress. Wow.

Damn she's beautiful. To bad she's dead.

Zits and zombies, Cemetery Man is a mid-nineties dream for fear fanatics. Great (and weird) characters, a fast pace that might be hard to keep up with in certain spots, a crazy sexy woman that has a strange fetish for death and cemetery crypts, Death himself, Francesco shooting random zombies that keep coming back to life as he's trying to take care of the graveyard grounds and top-notch cinematography that in some ways actually made me think of the Evil Dead franchise. There's also some shit that has to do with Francesco's dick getting cut off for some reason. I don't know. This is great stuff, especially if you've never seen it (like me until about a week ago) and there's plenty of guns, black humor and Anna Falchi's boobs are fantastic. Gnaghi is a funny, spastic side-kick as well. Also, remember to shower after he vomits all over you. That just means he likes you.             

The Room

After nearly a decade of family and friends consistently inquiring "have you seen The Room yet", I finally sat my ass down and found a website hosting the film ad free and uncut for my viewing pleasure. I still didn't fully know what to expect from this piece procured by Tommy Wiseau because somehow after nine years of being assaulted with questions of watching this thing, I still never bothered to look up any clips, scenes or trailers that had anything to do with The Room. I don't know if that had anything to do with the overwhelming amount of mental shoving when it came to this particular cult phenom, but usually with me when a large group of people seem to gravitate towards something and keep bothering me to get involved with it, I tend to distance myself from said activity on purpose because I almost feel like I'm being forced into it. Maybe I finally became sick of it or maybe my curiosity got the better of me this time but either way, last night was finally the right time to experience this disasterpiece of cinema from the disaster artist himself and see what the fuck everyone has been pushing me around about for the better part of a decade. Truly, I don't even know where to begin to even describe how I felt while absorbing this abomination, but the worst film ever made The Room is not. I have seen far, far worse zits and zombies and to be fair I did laugh quite a bit because the acting doesn't really exist in this world of photographed spoons, navel sex and football tossing and really this should be digested in good fun.

Except maybe the ending. That was actually kind of dark. Predictable, but dark.

Cinematography was way to straight and dull, dialogue is absolutely vomit inducing and what little plot there is has holes so damn big you could walk a fucking white elephant through them and still have space left for the rest of the caravan and some pack mules carrying extra shit that you probably didn't need but you brought along for the ride anyway just-in-case. I'm not going to say that this film is great. It isn't. What I am going to say however is that it is an experience of a lifetime that you'll never forget. With the infamous "Oh, hai Mark!" rooftop scene, the execution of the "You're tearing me apart, Lisa!" line and the horrendously delicious cut where Tommy goes into the flower shop for an $18 dozen roses certainly gets the blood pumping because it's all so poorly constructed that this piece of art HAD to become a cult bomb that blew probably just as big as The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The Room has been in circulation in select theaters around the world for just over 15 years now and it's fan base only keeps growing as the years go on. Fascinating stuff, really. 

Rice-R-Roni. The San Fransisco treat.

You don't... you don't take a nap with another guy.

Two's great but three's a crowd. Wow.

Who the hell wrote this music? Sweet Jesus.

All of this overacting is making my eyes bleed.... dear God.

Lisa loves Mark, Lisa loves Mark.

Two sex scenes within the first 17 minutes, complete with shitty RnB music and romance novel quality softcore porn. There aren't enough words to write down.

Hey Denny, back for more perverted voyeurism?

     "I'm tired, I'm wasted. I love you darling."

Again with the sex. Third time. 26 minutes.

You're worried about Lisa-I'm worried about this movie.

"Oh, hai Mark."

Leaving your underwear at someone else's place after getting freaky-yeah, "that's life".

The Room simply is a film that shouldn't have went anywhere. The sheer number of bullet holes, mistakes and errors that make up this mess of cinematic history clearly is what conjures up something like this to be unique and fun to sit through. And with what's left of my dead, blackened heart-I'm all for it. I can come to the conclusion zits and zombies that I actually dug this flick despite every little putrid thing that is wrong with it that should have made it tank actually helped it to triumph in the end, and with a passion project like this, for Tommy Wiseau it's what put him on the map and etched him in the annals of time and space as an artist. And I'm sure he's plenty thankful for it. Now where's that damn box of spoons... I had them all ready to go so I can throw them at the screen when I go to the next showing here in Illinois. Shit. Alright, I'll talk to you undead bastards later.       

Zombie Nightmare

If any of you zits and zombies have seen or have been fans of Mystery Science Theater 3000 for countless years now, you should be aware that one of their more popular episodes makes horrendous fun of the 1987 cheese-fest that is Zombie Nightmare. This thing is fantastic and has a very quick pace about it that doesn't leave the viewer in the dust in terms of boredom or nothing happening. Yes, the film poster does say that Tia Carrere and Adam West are involved in this picture, which of course adds a certain novelty and flavor of curiosity to the overall product-and they don't disappoint. Well, maybe Tia does because she's not really a main-main character and she mostly just runs around all frantic when things get crazy after Tony is brought back to life, but hey... someone has to do it. Adam West is the chief of police, and like all common chiefs, he's an arrogant jackass that thinks he has this thing pegged when in reality he's not even close. My honest opinion tells me that Zombie Nightmare was a solid time with really crappy kills, cute girls, an asshole high school punk Jim (that thankfully and whimsically was stabbed in the stomach with an aluminum baseball bat) as well as really stupid characters and a lackluster ending that I probably could have done better in my own backyard. 

She really is a voodoo child.

The ace of spades!

Shut up fat-ass and hit the ball already.

  Hell yeah, kick their asses!

This dude's mom looks like Lady Gaga when she's 60.

  Wow-I've been to lame dance clubs before, but this is ridiculous.

Damn, this is one seedy town.

So, is grandma here going to perform some black magic or something to bring Tony back?

Voodoo shamans are the shit.

Twist and Creme'? That's an awful name for an ice cream parlor.

Another horror flick with people playing tennis... poorly.

Give it up already you fucking loser.

Adam West is legendary.

I've seen plenty of revenge flicks over the years, but this one has to be the most fun. Jon Mikl Thor as Tony is really the only second time I've ever seen him in anything besides Rock n' Roll Nightmare-and I'm actually kind of hoping I run into him again at some point. He seems to enhance any shitty proceedings to another level, and him mostly as the zombie here in this context was pretty great as far as I was concerned. Shawn Levy was great as Jim too, and he was fucking despicable. I couldn't wait for that nut-sack to get what he deserved, and when it finally occurred I was thoroughly satisfied. Zits and zombies, just because MST3K did a fine job of tearing this apart in one of their more known episodes doesn't automatically make it trash. It's a fun ride and look at it this way-Manos The Hands of Fate was destroyed by them and that pile of dino-feces still has a cult following, so why can't Zombie Nightmare. It's all in the taste, and it's all in the wrist. By the way, Adam West says "bad boy" as calmly as he can and then kicks a suspect right in the damn face as he walks by in the middle of the police department. Priceless.   

Scarecrow Gone Wild

After the monumental disappointment that was Scarecrow Slayer, I was really leaving my hopes out in the open for the final installment of the Scarecrow franchise by York Entertainment to be decent-and in fact, to some degree, it actually was. I've been noticing now for many years that for some reason the first film in a series is pretty great, the second one is garbage and the third one brings it all back. This franchise fits very nicely into this theory as Scarecrow Gone Wild was absolutely better in every conceivable way than it's predecessor (which, let's be honest, couldn't have been that hard to do) with cougar tits, some nice gore and a hilarious looking scarecrow that couldn't have taken anymore than twenty minutes to find the pieces to put that costume together for. I even scribbled down in my notes that the scarecrow mask looks like something that I've seen at Spirit Halloween in the past, and I wouldn't be the least bit shocked if the costume designer ordered it from them online or went in there after Halloween was over and bought it on sale after the holiday had passed and saved it just for when they started filming Scarecrow Gone Wild. With all of that out of the way however, this film is also plot hole city and basically has the scarecrow following a specific group of teens(?) to the beach and killing them one by one. There's even a dude that's diabetic that they tie up to the crow's cross as sort of a hazing type dealy only to have him almost die because he was hanging up there for to long without his insulin. What a bunch of thoughtful classmates.

A corn field-if I see Isaac I'm leaving.

I think I've seen that scarecrow mask at Spirit Halloween before.

 A varsity jacket doesn't mean shit...except that you're a damn tool.

You know, in baseball, we all touch each other's asses.

Cute college chicks and cougar tits-count me in!

If you're not gay, then why did you lick beer off of that dude's chest?

I guess "farting around" in the middle of a corn field can get you killed.

Don't ever do that Stallone impression again. Ever.

Jesus, who wrote the music for this shitty volleyball montage?! It's fucking awful!

The scarecrow needs to add "likes long walks on the beach" to his Tinder profile.

"You look pissed"-wow, what timing.

A doctor that actually cares? Color me surprised.

Zits and zombies, the only Scarecrow flicks worth watching are the original and this one-Scarecrow Gone Wild. None of them are great by any means, but if you're in the mood for some stupid shit that has to do with college students being stalked and killed on the beach by a husk filled with dried straw, then by all accounts give the final entry of this series a ride. Ken Shamrock is also in here as the coach of the baseball team for the college presented in this movie, and adds nothing of value to the overall experience because his "acting" is horrendous and really couldn't be taken serious in a single frame that he was caught in. All you need here is to be drunk or stoned and to also be surrounded by plenty of snacks and toilet paper so you don't miss anything. I bid you adieu and may this trilogy of plot holes, stupid characters and scarecrows finally lay down their heads to rest. Also, I'll probably never want to play volleyball ever again because of that fucking music. It was inexcusable.   

Witchtrap (blu-ray)

Every written/video review that I have absorbed of Witchtrap always makes sure that you, the audience member knows that it is NOT a sequel to Witchboard (which, of course does have an actual follow up) even though they were both directed by the same man-Kevin Tenney. This fantastic slice of late 80's horror cinema also stars scream queen Linnea Quigley in a minor role instead of her being a main focus. Basically, a man inherits a mansion that he can't sell or tear down because of zoning issues and wants to turn it into a bed and breakfast-but there's a catch. It's haunted by the previous owner who was an evil son-of-a-bitch and the film opens up with a Vegas magician getting thrown out the window by said ghost and there is blood. Plenty of blood. The worst team of police officers, detectives and parapsychologists have a meeting with the guy that owns the house, a black guy gets a woody because of Linnea Quigley and then they get their gear together and head over to the mansion. Once they have their initial "sit down" and try and contact the spirit of the evil bastard that lived in the house before he died, all hell breaks loose on our select group of investigators complete with slow-mo ghost shots in mirrors, half faded apparitions in a camera lens and a sexy redheaded medium that constantly gets attacked by the ghost pretty much every time she's in her bedroom trying to sleep or change clothing. Man the 80's were great. 

"The Presence"? I like Witchtrap better.

   I dig old victorian houses like this.

Carno? From Phantasmagoria? Is that you?

  You said that God gave her a gift, but you're an athiest-contradictions abound.

That black man has a hankering for some white chocolate.

I was wondering the same thing-why are you here?

 "You love anything in a skirt."

"You're going up against Casper the fucking ghost. You don't need a detective-you need Bill Murray for Christ's sake."

 Elwin-I thought you were Michael Anthony from Van Halen.

Contacting spirits can't be this easy.

It's okay Elwin... I have a stiffy from Ms. O'Shay too.

You couldn't get up to avoid getting run over? You really couldn't?

Witchtrap is a real treat in the land of 80's terror, and has pretty much anything you would want as a fan or a newbie. You get to see Linnea completely nude before she gets in the shower, as well as getting stabbed in the neck with the shower head after the water gets turned off. This celluloid strip also contains plenty of pentagrams, dark altars and inverted crosses pinned next to the ghost of Lauter himself physically melting onto the floor after bursting into flames as the container he was caught in busted. Amazing special effects. One hell of an ending. And the build up as such made it all the more gratifying. A final side note as well to end this review of Witchtrap-the overall atmosphere through the whole time they are in the house is actually somewhat creepy because there's barely any music and all you hear are noises from the house, them talking and clocks ticking. That's really it. Engrossing. If you've never experienced this piece, get to it already. Just don't get thrown out of a second story window.     

Bikini Girls vs. Dinosaurs

There really is no solid way to begin this review of Bikini Girls vs. Dinosaurs. I'm just going to say that my sights were set pretty damn low on this picture (if that's what you want to even call it) and sort of just went with the waves for this offering. I could tell zits and zombies that the people involved in putting this together behind the scenes had a blast doing so, even though the overall quality is absolutely piss poor-this is the type of indie or underground film that you can't even really make fun of or pull apart (unless you're just a heartless bastard) because you have to sit back and commend the creative energy and do-it-yourself poise that it took to put this 51 minute piece together in spite of everyone knowing that this may end up being a fucking horrible idea to begin with. I actually couldn't really find much about this online anywhere except for maybe that this production was originally a fan fic of some kind? I guess? I don't read fan fiction anyways so I'm not even going to bother trying to find the one that the idea for this even came from. Basically, this starts with what looks like the inside of a bunch of fighter cockpits from Wing Commander III, and the CGI thereafter is absolutely god-awful. It looked better in the original Jurassic Park and that was from fucking 1993. So you figure it out.

What the hell? Am I playing Wing Commander III on the 3DO?

 Aren't you supposed to be looking for Kilrathi? Not chicks in bikinis flying space fighters?

OMG! Blue screen of death!!

A dude dressed like that doesn't like women. I'm sorry.

Man, Deathlok really let himself go.

 A man of science? I'm pretty sure you're a woman, but..... okay.

The brunette and the redhead are hot. The blonde-not so much.

Data, Warf-hit the warp drive. Oops, wrong sci-fi series.

Have fun getting a radio signal 75 million years in the past.

Holy Jesus-the dinosaurs in Dinosaur 3-D Adventure look better than this T-rex does!

 I can't even lie about the plot because I really couldn't tell what was going on-all I know is that two out of the three bikini girls are hot and they somehow ended up going through a black hole that put them 75 million years back in the past on Earth. They karate chop one dinosaur and it falls over, they trick a T-rex into falling off of a cliff by throwing it a wedge of cheese (I don't even know where the hell they got that from) and kill a triceratops by distracting it with a spinning fridge in mid-air??? I absolutely don't get it. The point is that there isn't one. I really wouldn't recommend any of you zits or zombies to watch Bikini Girls vs. Dinosaurs because that's just it-it has no point. It was basically put together by the people involved because they could, and not because they should. Purgatory cinema at it's purest.

Caesar and Otto's Deadly Xmas

There are many things that make Caesar & Otto's Deadly Xmas a great time-it's Christmas themed, the gore is good and plentiful, the laughs aren't completely terrible and the two main characters are likable idiots who kind of just stumble through their situations. It's fun. It also has a fucking mountain of cameos from old school horror icons including Brinke Stevens, Linnea Quigley and Felissa Rose to Robert Z'Dar , Lloyd Kaufman and Shawn C. Phillips (yes, he's actually physically in this film unlike that piece of sewer cake Camp Blood 4) and even wetmovie1 (Youtube) is in it for about three seconds, and I actually pointed at the screen and yelled "holy shit, wetmovie1 is in here?! What the hell?" I thoroughly enjoyed this picture mainly because it didn't even come close to taking itself seriously and I pretty much had a smile on my face the entire run time. The guy that played Caesar and Otto's dad seriously could pass as Alex Lifeson's twin from the band Rush-his acting was few and far between and was dryer than a Walmart chicken breast, but it was still something that added to the overall feel of this flick being fun and entertaining. The plot is dumb which is to be expected with something like Caesar & Otto's Deadly Xmas, and it really just revolves around them getting a job at some shitty basement-run traveling Santa corporation named Xmas Enterprises which ends up being a front for a shitty satanic cult. Otto is obsessed with some mediocre looking chick named Allison that he randomly met fifteen years prior, and he somehow ends up finding her in their journeys passing out fliers for the Xmas Enterprise. Allison lives in a car with her kids and sells used shaving cream on the side of the road. Yeah. How does she even pay her car insurance. Who knows and who cares.

Hang'em high, injun. Hang'em high.

Yeah-she's hot if you like chicks with clown make-up.

Caesar and Otto's Thanksgiving dinner... funded by Dollar Tree.

Damn-Linnea Quigley aged terribly.

   Alex Lifeson sure went downhill after Rush retired.

 Hey, Otto-your hot friend can ride her motorcycle over me if she wants.

Caesar's grandpa is Lloyd Kaufman?! That's fucken awesome!

 You know you're talented when both of your arms have been chopped off and you can still hot-wire a car and drive off with it.

Well hello Roberta Jenkins. Say hello to my penis (ahem).... my friend Johnny.

Yes! Coolduder!

 Linnea: "I was blacklisted." Demian: "For What?" Linnea: "Turning 40."

Wow-just like Silent Night, Deadly Night. 

I know some of you zits and zombies would rather have more horror than comedy, but if you're in the mood for something that flips that idea then Caesar & Otto's Deadly Xmas was written and produced just for you. There are plenty of horrible jokes, bad puns and wicked slapstick to satiate your funny bone with as well as plenty of gore and people's limbs getting severed by Demian for the horror fiend in you too. It's this special duality that raises the enjoyment of this offering higher than it should, as well as making it feel like a necessity to check out the rest of the Caesar & Otto films once it's all said and said. I hope Linnea really wasn't blacklisted. That would be a drag.  

Sorority House Massacre

If you're a fan of really cheesy and mildly spicy nachos, then Sorority House Massacre might be for you. As another release from Concorde back in the mid 80's, this film is basically a filler between movies from another franchise put out by them entitled Slumber Party Massacre (which is infinitely better in my opinion) but the sorority variety does offer a decent time-what with the usual tropes of hot 80's chicks in their 30's playing young college bait, a killer escaping from an institute of some sort for personal revenge (a la Halloween of course) complete with mediocre acting, crappy dialogue and a layer of campiness. Now, I like my nachos on the really hot side so I would have rather there been a lot more gore and female nudity, but hey-I can't consume overly hot shit all of the time. The dvd prints of all three Sorority House Massacre films have been long out of print for awhile now and getting copies of them is a little on the difficult side, but with Youtube and streaming services like Amazon Prime Video make it easier and easier to experience such near forgotten dredge from that time period. I love the 80's. Not entirely, but there a lot of great things that spawned during that decade, and films like this are definitely in the realm of greatness for things to take in from then. There are two sequels as well which are even harder to track down, but I think once you've taken a bite of this overly salted, sodium saturated platter of corn chips, cheese whiz and bottom of the barrel quality jalapenos, you would probably be finished as well. 

This static shot of the sorority house is making me sleepy.

Yeah-it all started when you entered the house.

After a week, I'm not joining anything.

When three little girls tell you to "be careful", then I think you ought to do it.

Hi, Sara-I like your weird 80's outfit. It looks good on you.

Of course it was something at the hospital. Hospitals always make people go ape.

So does crappy sitcom music play every time chicks try on random clothes?

Grand Theft Auto-1980's style.

Spending the night in a tee-pee is a great idea.

 Sorority House Massacre is a slasher flick that I really wanted to get into more because I know what it could have been-but what it really is comes down to is high blood pressure and high sodium count. I enjoyed it, but I needed a bottle of water when it was over so I could quench myself and move on to something a little bit better. Unfortunately, a purgatory movie. Now, if I do ever find copies of the Concorde dvd's of this or any of the sequels, they will end up on my shelf just to say I have them-but it would probably be very few and far between that I would actually ever spend time with it ever again. Unless I'm really damn drunk and I want to see the girls in their lingerie again. Which, of course, why wouldn't I. Okay, I'm done. I need to go pick up the backyard now.