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The story revolves around a group of people showing up for Thanksgiving at the house of obnoxious Vinnie Grannucci (Robert Miranda). What they don't know is the turkey this year was used in a Santería ceremony earlier and this results in the devil showing up. OOF! I always wonder about unreleased films and in most cases the rarity is due to the film not being very good. That is definitely the case here. According to the IMDb here, this was filmed as BIGOTS, PERVERTS AND OTHER FINE AMERICANS, proving editor-writer-producer-director Leon Corcos always had a bad way with titles. The cast tries, but nothing is really funny. The aforementioned notability is that one Joe Carnahan worked on this as a producer and provider of extra dialogue. After this, Corcos helped produce Carnahan's debut BLOOD, GUTS, BULLETS AND OCTANE (1998) before Carnahan became a A-list director. You also get Victor Wong in one of his last roles as a Santería priest.

Danny (Anthony Ilott) and a gaggle of friends arrive at Hobb Springs Resort, which Danny has unexpectedly inherited. The two caretakers - brother and sister Jackson (Chris Jarvis) and Sally (Sadie Katz) - set everyone up for their stay, but what the guests don't know is they are part of the inbred cannibal family and Danny might be related.

So this is how it all ends? I swear the only creative effort put into these films are the title puns. The sixth and final (to date) sequel is just another hillbillies-stalk-random-characters affair. Amazingly, the filmmakers opt to have the least sympathetic victims ever as they are all spoiled trust fund stock brokers from New York. Do you want us to root for the villains? Helmer of 3-5 Declan O'Brien split for greener pastures (seriously, he turned this down to make The Marine 4 & 5) and newcomer Valeri Milev takes over. I wanted to laud the series for finally having a female director, but turns out he is just Bulgarian. Pretty obvious English is his second language when he doesn't demand Jarvis - who gives lots of rants about loving his heritage - use a Southern accent. I will give him credit for one scene where Jackson is teaching Danny how to hunt with a bow and arrow that is crosscut with a bit where Three Finger hunts a cop. Of course, all that credit is revoked after the firehose enema scene.

While watching this one, my mind started to wander and I tried to see if I could remember all of the sequels I had seen over the past month. Okay, Wrong Turn 2 was the reality show one with Henry Rollins. 3 was...ah, dang, what was it...(thinks for like 3 minutes)...oh yeah, the prisoners one. 4 was the prequel in the snow. 5 was...heck...(thinks hard for a minute)...oh yeah, the Doug "You're all doomed" Bradley/Assault on Precinct 13 one. And 6 was...I forget. It is amazing how these films have gotten so far on so little. It is just giggling hillbillies attacking folks in the woods and nothing else. Sign of the times I guess, but it really earns this series the title of laziest horror series ever.

Five college kids head to Fairlake, West Virginia for the "Mountain Man" festival on Halloween. They don't make it as they almost hit a man on the road and crash their car. The man, Maynard Odets (Doug Bradley), attacks them and soon everyone is arrested by Sheriff Angela Carter (Camilla Arfwedson). This is bad news because Maynard is a serial killer who just happens to live with our mutant hillbilly trio and, before you can say Assault on Precinct 13, they are descending upon the jail to free him.

I thought this one might have a chance when the title card had the 5 in the form of a severed hand. Funny. After this shot, Bradley asks the cannibals for a hand and one picks it up to hand to him (wahwah). He says, "With the body!" (wahwahwah) showing the film has all the subtlety of Leatherface with a hammer. It is kind of amazing that returning director Declan O'Brien shot this back-to-back with part 4 and it looks so much cheaper. For example, they skimp on the rednecks make up with Saw Tooth and One Eye looking like they are wearing cheap masks. Also, they look like cheap Geico caveman masks. There is gore, but it is cheap too.

Speaking of cheap, Bradley must have been held in glass box in the Bulgarian back lot that said "break in case of unnecessary sequel" and he sometimes attempts a West Virginia accent as his finds 50 ways to say, "Y'all gonna die." His character refers to the rednecks as "my boys" but it is never really clear if he is related to them or a character from the earlier films (remember, 4 &5 are prequels to parts 1-3; you will be quizzed on this). Some people theorize he is their father, but that can't be as 4 opened stating that as teens they killed their parents. Ah, jeez, someone get me a chalk board.

A bus transporting a group of convicts from a West Virginia prison is driven off the road by one of our hillbilly mutants. Guard Nate Wilson (Tom Frederic) is quickly overtaken by the prisoners led by crime kingpin Carlos Chavez (Tamer Hassan) and forced to lead them to safety. Along the way they encounter a armored truck filled with money (!) and Alex Miles (Janet Montgomery), a lone survivor of a rafting group who warns them of the bloodthirsty killers.

The pun in the title might be the most amusing thing about this one. The producers must have made quite a bit off Wrong Turn 2 (2007) as they took the next logical step - they cut the budget and went to Bulgaria (which actually doubles for the West Virginia setting quite well). They also pared down the bad guys, giving us only two (!) mutants and one of them is killed early on. One thing that struck me while watching this is we are three films in and the producers haven't even bothered to given the mutants any identities. Like no distinguishing looks (unless you count cleft lips) and not even a nickname slung by one of their prey. Even the laziest '80s horror series wasn't that slack. Apparently the lead mutant is called "Three Fingers" and has been in all three so far; fans probably only got that info from the credits. Speaking of lazy, wait until you get a look at some of the computer effects in this. There is one nighttime driving shot that made me burst out laughing as it looked like an animation GIF. A shame as helmer Declan O'Brien actually does a decent job with mood setting (he returns for parts 4 & 5 apparently).

A group of folks head into the West Virginia backwoods to shoot a pilot for a Survivor-esque reality show hosted by a retired Marine (Henry Rollins). The premise is you are trying to survive a nuclear apocalypse, but that turns out to be the least of the problems for the contestants as they encounter some real life hillbilly mutants. I saw the original Wrong Turn (2003) in the theater and remember very little about it. I knew they made a couple of sequels, but had no idea they were up to six (!) entries. So this is the series I'm plowing through this month. This starts out really rough as nearly all of the characters are annoying, but once the action starts it gets a little better. Director Joe Lynch fills it with gore and it is cool to see Rollins go Rambo on the family. Unfortunately, there is some of the worst shaky-cam known to man during any of the attack scenes. Lynch tries to riff on the famous The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) dinner scene to no effect. He also offers us a hillbilly birth, masturbation, and sex scene that I'm sure the world didn't need. There are a couple of interesting moments and I appreciated a swerve regarding who the lead is. That said, if this series is just going to be non-stop deformed hillbillies killing random people, I might be in for a long journey.

Sixteen years after her mother died in a fire, Ellie (Erin Marie Hogan) moves into a home with her husband and niece. While it appears that they are a happy family unit, Ellie has other plans as the house has the rep of being a haunted house and she is hoping to use it (and her gifted niece) as a conduit to contact her mother to find out what really happened that night. This is a decent little horror movie from debuting writer-director Kyle Mecca, who gets good performances and delivers some moody scenes in this Buffalo, New York lensed flick. I wouldn't say it is 100% successful as there are some narrative stumbles, but it plays it totally serious and I appreciated that. I actually feel sorry for flicks like this. First, it doesn't stand a chance in today's market flooded with thousands of streaming horror flicks, all with similar looking artwork (graphic designers for streaming horror films be feasting!). How can you catch anyone's attention? Second, if you do manage to capture someone, most likely they will not enjoy it because they are seeking bombastic James Wan-esque The Conjuring vibes that have faux exorcists turned into Avengers superheroes. This results in schizo review pages where some applauded the slow pace and care with characters, while others shout "booooooooooring!" Anyway, like I said it was decent.

This might be the cheapest of the Children of the Corn series, as evidenced by it entering the "and Billy Drago" stage. This keeps everything small as 80% of the film is a young couple trapped on Drago's farm. The movie's big ending is just recycled car crash footage (taken from Bad Boys II) and I'm 99.9% certain the script was written when someone said, "Okay, we have access to this footage." Director Joel Soisson earned his keep at Dimension by directing The Prophecy 4 & 5 and Pulse 2 & 3 before this.

Seeing all seven COTC sequels in such quick succession left me with just one question - why? Not "why am I so dumb?" but "why bother making something so generic?" Unlike a F13 or Elm Street series, there are few attempts to maintain a connected storyline and it highlights how gross the Weinsteins/Dimension were with exploiting the Stephen King property they lucked their way into. Not that I think a COTC series running this long would thrive anywhere else, but at least someone would have given more effort. They should have gone the route of part III and given filmmakers the chance to be more creative with FX and the like. Instead they went the "just show some corn and creepy kids" route and the films are just 80 minute horror flicks designed to induce a rental fee.

Shot in Wales, this ultra-low budget reimagining is the fourth or fifth remake of Night of the Living Dead and by far the cheapest. As a sufferer of NOTLDitis, I knew it would cross my path at some point and I was honestly hoping to get a UK take on the world's most famous Night. Unfortunately, co-writer/director James Plumb doesn't have the budget to do much else as he tells his story of 7 people trapped in a rural home. To give the film credit, it does do something early on that I thought was absolutely brilliant in terms of NOTLD lore. But the rest is filled with dumb people making dumb decisions. Example: At one point the patriarch Gerald goes out in the car to find help and runs into a group of surviving teens with weapons. He just sits there in his car and waits for them to attack. If only he had some kind of heavy metal machine that could, ahem, reverse his bad luck. I also got a kick out of a dying grandfather quoting the Bible to his kin and a granddaughter replying, "How is it you can remember quotes from the Bible, but you can't remember my birthday?" As 2020 has taught us, pandemics don't dull the edges of everyone.

Three kids - Timmy (Nolan Gould), Doug (Jacob Bila), and Barry (Trevor Harker) - are looking to spend the summer of '84 just having fun in their hidden fort. But a series of murders has them soon investigating the town's legend of the Ghoul, a monster that allegedly lives in the abandoned mine shafts. OOF! I copied a couple of original movies off of Chiller a few years back (this and The Monkey's Paw) and finally decided to give this one a spin. Based on the novel by Brian Keene, it is rough going and that is kind of surprising as director Gregory Wilson had previously made the disturbing-but-effective The Girl Next Door (2007). I haven't read any Keene but I think it is suffice to say he worships at the altar of Stephen King (for this book at least). It is almost like he is checking off a list of King themes like bullies, child abuse, childhood trauma, coming of age summers, family deaths, and "humans are the real monsters" moments. It might have worked in book form, but the adaptation is really bad here and some of the dialogue was cringe worthy. The film is ultimately sunk, however, by the terrible kid actors. Kid acting is one of filmdom's most precarious high wire acts. If done right, they can be amazing (see The Babadook). If done wrong, it can be disastrous (see, well, Ghoul). My friend said it best in that if you close your eyes while they are talking, it just sounds like some kids coldly reading the lines off a script they've just been handed.

The plot involves a large group taking a chartered bus to the Burning Man festival. When their driver stops in the middle of the desert, the group is attacked by a cult and quickly mowed down to seven survivors who are holed up in the stationary bus. This is mostly a comedy with a couple of gory moments peppered with punk girl nudity, coming off like a modern Troma movie more than anything. I had previously seen writer-director Rolfe Kanefsky's There's Nothing Out There (1991) and enjoyed it. This is in the same vein but without a budget. Maybe that was on purpose since he dedicates it to Ted V. Mikels. There are some spirited performances by the main cast (Sadie Katz is great as the bus driver) and a couple of funny lines. But even with the end credits starting at the 75 minute mark, it sort of outstays its welcome. Tara Reid fans (do those exist?) will be disappointed that the top-billed star is gone by the 12-minute mark. She looks and sounds haggard and her end credits billing shows her flubbing her lines.

Ten-year-old Roscoe draws a demon named Dimwos that comes alive in his backyard and summons him to the netherworld. After years of dark arts training, Roscoe (James Sizemore) emerges from the ground a grown man. Unfortunately, a group of evil demons is now after him. I picked this indie horror film up a few years back after someone on my feed recommended it; the big draw being that it used all practical special effects. The Demon's Rook is probably one of the most impressive and surreal indie horror flicks I've seen in ages. A lot of the praise can be laid at the feet of leading man Sizemore, who might just be rural Georgia's answer to Peter Jackson as he seems to do everything on this film from acting to music to special effects. He designed and made the demons himself and they are great. There is also tons of gore thrown around and he loves to get crazy with the lighting. As with most indie flicks, the acting is spotty at points. There are also some pacing issues (it is way too long at 1 hour and 44 minutes) and too many "zombies attack random folks" bits. But all of that can be forgiven given the ambitious nature of the project and Sizemore's ability to make something really out there. One of my favorite indie horror views in a long time and I can't wait to see what he does next.

Wannabe reporter Bestoink Dooley (George Ellis) hears that Blood Mountain is "bleeding" again and heads there to try and get the scoop. He meets some locals and a scientist, who soon discover the ancient Indian legend about the bleeding mountain is true. Woooo boy! This horror-comedy indie shot in Georgia and uses Stone Mountain to pretty good effect. Unfortunately, there is the rest of the film which suffers in both the horror and comedy departments. Director Massey Cramer draws it out to such a degree that you feel sorry for audiences that didn't have the advantage of fast forwarding. Not that I did any of that because I felt it was essential to my life to watch Bestoink Dooley -- BESTOINK DOOLEY!!! -- slowly eat some cookies before bed or have dreams where he is a private eye who slooooowly sits with two girls. Ellis looks like a Zero Mostel knockoff minus the funny bone. Camp Video put this out on VHS in 1988 and were really selling it on the fact that Kenny Rogers' wife appears in one scene as a background extra (they even put a full pic of her on the back). They also re-titled it Demon Hunter and gave a fuzzy look at the monster with the hope some unsuspecting fool would pick up the VHS and watch it...oh dang, that's me!

This TV movie tells this "true story" of the haunting of the Smurl family in Pennsylvania. Jeffrey DeMunn and Sally Kirkland essay Jack and Janet Smurl, who move into a duplex with Jack's parents and soon find themselves haunted. This aired on Fox during sweeps in May 1991 and did really well for them. It is notable in that it is one of the few ghost films I can think of that shows a man (DeMunn) get raped by a demon. It is also of interest in that it features the first screen depiction of ghost-hucksters Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Stephen Markle and Diana Baker, respectively). Of course, this is before James Wan morphed them into exorcist superheroes, so they just kinda show up for a few scenes and get spooked. Director Robert Mandel previously handled F/X (1986) and got the pilot duties for a little show called The X-Files after this. Kirkland also received a Golden Globe nomination for this.

Jewel thief Henry Clarke (Michael Caine) is hired by a husband and wife - Richard (Eric Portman) and Fé Moreau (Giovanna Ralli) - to do a job for them. Clarke proves himself on a test robbery, but soon finds himself falling for the lovely Fé before the big job. The "Unseen Michael Caine Train" charges on with this Bryan Forbes adaptation of Desmond Cory's 1965 novel. It is a bit of a mixed bag as there is an excellent 15 minute sequence sandwiched in between some pretty ripe drama. The sequence in question is a burglary pulled off by Henry and Richard that cuts back and forth with a concert the victim is at. John Barry leads the orchestra with accompaniment by guitarist Renata Tarragó and the whole sequence is brilliantly done as the slow and bombastic sections mirror the suspenseful bits during the robbery. In fact, Barry's score is right up there with his best Bond work from the era (and Shirley Bassey even sings the opening theme). Unfortunately, the onscreen drama isn't as good as this section. Also, I can never fully get behind a film where women think Caine is this drop dead gorgeous stud. I will give the film points for its downbeat ending and there is a twist at the end that makes me wonder if the makers of a certain more popular film released six years later grabbed it. In the end, it is revealed that Fé is actually Richard's daughter. This came out a whole two years before Chinatown (1974) was written. Robert Towne, you got some explainin' to do!

An aspiring musician/janitor named Alabama (Christopher Brooks) stumbles upon the possessions of magician Carter the Great in the basement of a San Francisco club. Looking to return the items to his relatives, he ends up smoking some ashes (!) and coming in contact with the ghost in the afterlife. Naturally, this means he starts his own hippie magic show and soon is wowing the world with Carter's old tricks. But turns out his management is hellbent on world domination via TV waves. Oh, and they are also vampires for no specific reason. Writer-director Fredric Hobbs also gave the world Godmonster of Indian Flats (1973) so it is no surprise this is an odd one. I swear I had to listen to the opening monologue three times to make sense of it (something about Nazi doctors who made robots visiting Carter in India where he found a super rare hashish). I'd say the first hour or so is "normal" but then things just get bonkers. Hobbs was apparently heavily involved in the art world in San Francisco and he makes sure to wedge in one of his works (a ghastly repurposed dune buggy he deemed an "energy sculpture" is Alabama's ride when he becomes famous). It is all very...strange. This came out on Elvira's Thriller Video label back in the day and I'm kind of shocked no specialty disc label hasn't jumped on putting it out.

Italian businesswoman Lisa Boeri (Claudia Gerini) lets off steam by going to an exclusive, member's only sex club. Meanwhile, a killer in classic giallo garb is running around Rome violently killing folks. Their only connection is that they all came in contact with Lisa at the club. I'm not up to speed on the neo-giallo sub-genre (having only seen the Cattet/Forzani films and Argento's soul crushing entries), but a friend mentioned this one and it sounded interesting. Perhaps the most intriguing aspect is that veteran Italian screenwriter Dardano Sacchetti is co-credited with the story. There is a cool metaphysical angle as Lisa goes to the club and is told to "release your Tulpa." If that sounds like some weird Buddhist thing, well, it is. It is a being that can be created and released by your metaphysical powers. That makes you think this will be a cool take on the giallo genre with a Cronenberg twist. Unfortunately, writer-director Federico Zampaglione and co-writer Giacomo Gensini use the metaphysical angle as a distraction and the film embraces the old giallo trait of "the killer is just some random person you saw for a second earlier." The end result is something that vacillates between good and bad. There are some cool sequences, but the business world drama falls flat. Tulpa-and-a-half stars out of five.

Down on his luck postman Joe Norson (Farley Granger) makes a grave error when he steals what he believes is a package with $200 in it from a lawyer's office. Instead he discovers $30,000 inside and believes he can finally give his pregnant wife the life she deserves. He thinks he hides the money in a safe place, but it soon disappears just as the goons who run an extortion racket that it belongs to appear. Caught this Anthony Mann directed flick when it appeared on TCM. I enjoyed it, but with some reservations regarding some dumb moves screenwriter Sydney Boehm makes the leading man do. One, he has Joe hand $30,000 disguised as a present for his wife to a bartender to hold for safe keeping. Naturally, the guy peeps and splits with the money. Two, at one point Joe goes to the bad guys to ask about returning the money, even though they had no idea he was the one who stole it. So he identifies himself straight up to them, even giving them his address. He is D-U-M-B! That said it moves at a great clip and the end has a car chase through the deserted streets of New York is really a gorgeous sight to behold. It is also cool to see a very young Granger in one of his earliest leading roles.

American architect Noel Holcroft (Michael Caine) finds out that his Nazi father left him in charge of an account with $4 billion dollars in it. The claim is he wants Noel to make amends with the world for the horror of what the Nazis did, but he soon finds out that the other people involved in the pact have ulterior motives. I continue my journey into unseen Michael Caine with this one that a friend mentioned after I saw The Jigsaw Man (1983). This one is slightly better as it has no moments of Caine doing workouts or funky accents. This Robert Ludlum adaptation isn't John Frankenheimer's best, but there are a couple of cool bits like the B&W opening set in burning Berlin in 1945 and the final shot is fantastic. I do have to deduct points for having the rousing showdown between Caine and the villains being...a heated press conference!? Given the circumstances, Frankenheimer worked well under pressure. Apparently James Caan was the original lead and left the production two days before filming began. Caine was called on a Friday on his last day on Water (1985) and flew to England to start this on the following Monday without having read the script. Pretty incredible. Caine is wrong for the lead role, but Caan would have probably been a lot worse. Co-starring Victoria Tennant, Anthony Andrews, Mario Adorf, and Lilli Palmer as Holcroft's mother.

New World Picturs must have really dug Heathers (1988) as director Michael Lehmann had this in production before that even hit theaters. It tells the story of a group of giant bugs that move from the Amazon rainforest to the USA suburbs and pretend to be humans in order to destroy a nuclear power plant. The parents (Ed Begley Jr. And Stockard Channing) want to project normalcy on their mission, but are stuck with only 1950s stereotypes as reference. Soon their kids (Camille Cooper and Bobby Jacoby) are succumbing to evil American ways and the parents aren't far behind.

This has to be the oddest film in New World catalog post-Corman sale in 1983. Lehmann obviously must have been a big fan of Beetlejuice (1988) as this is totally trying to copy that Tim Burton style here. It must have worked in some regard as after this Burton teamed up with this film's producer, Denise Di Novi, for the next decade. This is actually pretty fun once it gets going as each family member has to hide their foul ups by cocooning people. Kevin Yagher's team provides some impressive big bug FX, but the filmmakers goof in the action climax as all the bugs look the same so you can't tell who is who as they fight the bad bug (played by Dabney Coleman in human form). The fact New World funneled money from successes like Hellraiser (1987) into something like this won't leave you shocked to learn the company was in financial trouble by the time this was wrapping up and delayed the release for several years.

Ben Ryder (David Young) is hitchhiking across Mexico when he meets Mary (Cristina Ferrare) at an abandoned house on a dark 'n stormy night. The two hit it off and begin travelling together. But Ben doesn't know about Mary's insatiable need to drink blood, which leaves a path of corpses in its wake. Grabbed this one randomly to watch and it was pretty good. It can never live up to its amazing theatrical artwork, but what film could live up to that poster? One of the most interesting aspects of it is that it shot in Mexico. That doesn't really matter for the first hour or so, but toward the end director Juan Lopez Moctezuma starts to use the Mexico setting better. Especially good is a section in a Mexican parade where Mary is attacked by a stranger. The stranger is played by John Carradine and his face is cover 90% of the time, allowing the filmmakers to do lots of Lugosi/Plan 9 moments with the character. Also good is a chase in the finale the ends in a barren area that is perfect for the downbeat ending.

I remember when the media was talking about random highway shootings in California in 1987 and it terrified me. We were back in Germany at this point, but it made me think the U. S. was the wild west. Apparently the story impressed a producer too and we ended up getting Freeway (1988). Darlanne Fluegel is an ER nurse trying to recover from when her doctor boyfriend was killed by the shooter. So, naturally, she takes the investigation into her own hands. She is helped by a mysterious stranger (James Russo, really thinking he is James Dean) and a radio deejay (Richard Belzer) when the cops prove to be useless. Perhaps this biggest surprise of this New World Pictures release is it is pretty well made. Director/co-writer Francis Delia got his start in music videos and has a great grasp on the visuals. The shooting scenes are particularly well done. Of course the film gives away the killer right in the opening credits when they list Billy Drago. Keep an eye open for Kenneth Tobey in one scene as well and Clint Howard as a creepy mechanic (who gets Fluegel a muscle car in the oddest way possible).

The Italians seem to be getting their 1440 Entertainment on with this in-name-only sequel to Joe D'Amato's classic Anthropophagus (1980) arriving decades later. A group of seven girls and their teacher (maybe?) head into the hills to spend a weekend locked in a WWII bunker. Why? Who knows as the filmmakers never bother to explain their reasoning. The Tubi plot synopsis mentions it is a "research project" but even that is suspect because the first thing they do when they get into this cavernous bunker is go to bed. Two girls wake up and wander off, only to run into a killer who alternately is seen in a wifebeater or hazmat suit. He then slowly stalks the group. To quote Evil Ed from Fright Night (1985): "Slowly, oh so slowly!" This one is a real headscratcher. Director Dario Germani actually mounts a pretty slick looking production as it is well shot and the locations are great. However, any credit it gets is quickly revoked by its steadfast stance of having zero plot. Want to know why the girls are there? D'Unno as it is never explained. What is the backstory of the killer? D'Unno as he is just there. What was the whole point? D'Unno. It is almost the same scenario over-and-over as girl wanders off/killer stalks girl/killer tortures them in his kill room. Rinse and repeat. It is so odd that they slap the Anthropophagus title on this generic flick as it literally has no connection. You have to wonder who this is even for. I mean, the only person who would immediately be hooked by that title is a D'Amato diehard who dreams of seeing a modern take on gut munching and fetus eating that they scramble to Tubi at 11p.m. On a weeknight to watch it. Oh crap, this was made for me!

Three folks - empath Holly (Laura Petersen) along with scientists Liam (Jed Brophy) and Scott (Jeffrey Thomas) - journey to an isolated farm house. The previous owners split in the middle of the night, leaving all of their possessions (haha) behind and this trio is here to find any evidence of the family's paranormal claims. This builds its scares in excellent fashion. Director Jason Stutter is obviously influenced by classics such as The Haunting (1963) and Poltergeist (1982) and allows his film to "breathe" with terrifying long takes that fray the nerves with just a few sounds or the jerk of a chandelier. For the most part, the characters behave realistically although there is some issue with one character doing a "let's just stay one more night bit" after they've been terrified. The end is also a tad rushed given how long and strong the build up is. Jed Brophy looked so damn familiar to me and about a half hour in I realized he played the biker zombie in Peter Jackson's Dead Alive (1992)

Six girls at a Catholic school in Spain accidentally kill Sister Ursula and put her corpse in the lake. Eighteen years later, Eve (Anita Briem) is drawn to Spain after her mother is mysteriously killed. Doing research, she uncovers the past mystery and encounters her mother's old school friends, who are also being picked off one by one.

Forget The Nun (2018), I'm all about The Nun (2005)! The penultimate release by producer Brian Yuzna and the Spanish Fantastic Factory label, The Nun is a mixed bag. The script by Manu Díez and Jaume Balagueró has the interesting story about the nun seeking revenge from beyond her watery grave and it touches on some taboo subjects. But it also seems like it was churned via committee to include stuff the producers believed they needed for a successful horror film; those things including a Scream-esque cast, scenes at dance clubs, and tiny doses of Blair Witch-style video camera footage, which is oddly never used for a scare scene. Sister Ursula's attack sequences involve her coming via water and, unfortunately, it results in a lot of really bad computer effects bits. Director Luis de la Madrid is making his feature debut and handles the dark-n-spooky night stuff well. This would be his only film so far as he returned to being an editor. There is a nice downbeat twist at the end, but the film is too scattered for it to be truly effective.

The story revolves around a top British spy named Philip Kimberley who defected to Russia. The Russians give him plastic surgery and he comes out looking like Michael Caine (poor guy). They want him to return to England and locate some microfilm he had hidden that details all the payments to British double agents. Once back in his home country, he makes a break for it and contacts his daughter (Susan George) and old boss (Laurence Olivier).

I was in the mood for a good spy thriller so I dug out this VHS. After watching it, I'm still in the mood for a good spy thriller. The film is based on a book by Dorothea Bennett, who used real life Brit double agent Kim Philby as inspiration. Despite such ripe real life material and the re-teaming of the stellar Sleuth (1972) co-stars Caine and Olivier, this film is a bit of a mess. It runs pretty short (end credits kick in at the 85 minute mark) and several scenes show Olivier sporting a fake beard to match other scenes. Looked it up in Variety and, sure enough, it suffered major production issues. It started shooting in April 1982 but production was suspended on June 7, 1982 due to financial woes. The filmmakers didn't get back together to finish everything until November 1982. Former Bond director Terence Young is at the helm, but even he can't make it too exciting. Even glorious cinematographer Freddie Francis can't muster up enough good stuff for this. It is filled with lots of double crosses and the like, but they can't make up for strange bits like Charles Gray giving Robert Powell a monologue about his toupees, Caine doing bizarre Russian and American accents, or the montage of dumpy Caine training to be a bad ass killer.