Review: The Ruins

Synopsis: A group of friends whose leisurely Mexican holiday takes a turn for the worse when they, along with a fellow tourist embark on a remote archaeological dig in the jungle, where something evil lives among the ruins.

Review: I'll admit right upfront, I've never read the book that "The Ruins" is based from. So, I can't really comment on how true the movie is to the original story. What I can say, though, is that this movie did nothing to make me want to seek out the book it is based on.

I really wanted to like this movie. I've been so hoping for a good rated R horror movie for some time. All these remakes and torture films masking as horror, have really had me thinking maybe no one knows how to make a new and original horror movie anymore. I was praying "The Ruins" would change that feeling for me, but it has only intensified it.

The film starts off well enough, with a couple of young college couples vacationing in Mexico, when they are given the opportunity to check out some "off the tour guide" ruins, before they have to leave. The first 30-40 minutes of the film is pretty solid stuff. You even come to like the characters a little. Once they reach the ruins, though, the movie starts to lose it. It never is explained exactly where these vines came from, or what the deal with them is. We come to see the nearby villagers are trying to keep them from spreading, but we don't know how or why. The whole threat the vines pose really isn't given any kind of explanation, which only leads to unsatisfying questions that don't get answers.

There are a few really gory moments in the film, but most of it happens within the last third of the film. And by this point, you really just don't know what to make of anything that you care a whole lot about it. It just feels like gore for the sake of it.

The only truly "jump from your seat" moment is when the girls first come to learn of the danger the vines represent, otherwise there is little in the way of suspense in the movie. In fact, the vines seem to do less damage to these tourists, than they end up doing to themselves. So they don't seem to pose much of a threat, after all. And when the lone survivor escapes, you are left wondering what this means for the rest of the world, since keeping the vines contained was made into such an important point in the film. And the ending of the film? Total rubbish, which is all I have to say about that.

"The Ruins" starts off like a classic horror film from the late 70's and early 80's, but soon degenerates into little more than a plodding and uninteresting film, that relies on some torturous moments of gore to try to shock you awake again. It almost feel disingenuous to call it a horror film, since the only thing to provide you with horror, is the realization that you aren't going to get the those 91 minutes of your life back. If there was a moral to this movie, I guess it would be to stick to the tourist traps, when you are in a strange country. But I'd impart the additional moral to stick to renting a good horror movie, over viewing this poorly done effort.

Rating: 1 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

Review: The Incredible Petrified World

Synopsis: Four adventurers descend into the depths of the ocean when the cable on their underwater diving bell snaps. The rest of their expedition, believing them to be lost, abandons hope of finding them alive. Exiting the diving bell, the group finds themselves in a strange network of underwater caverns, as they search for a way back to the surface.

Review: When you think of 1950's sci-fi film, you generally think of something cheesy and scientifically unsound, but not being without a certain quaint charm and some unintentionally hilarious moments. "The Incredible Petrified World," however, will give you none of that, as the only charm it has is to bore you out of your ever-loving mind.

The basic premise of this snoozer of a story, has to do with a group of scientists who are looking to reach the hidden depths of the ocean, but end up in a strange world of undersea caves, deep below the surface, when their diving bell snaps from its cables. Now, they search for a way back to the surface world. Will they make it? Can they find the way? Is there one? Oh, the suspense is killing me...

Actually, the only thing that has any lethal power in this turkey of a film is the incredibly boring pace of the story, which has about as much suspense and tension as watching paint dry. There's just nothing here to engage you. Director Jerry Warren, who's name is synonymous with cheap craploa films, gives the viewers nothing to hold their interest. When you aren't laughing at the inane lack of scientific fact and premise (like how when they find an old man in the caves, he says he's been there for 14 years. But how was he able to tell time down in there?), you'll be bored into a coma with wooden acting and a plodding plot that goes nowhere fast. Even the cast seems to have absolutely no interest in this lame duck of a film. Veteran actors, John Carradine and Phyllis Coates (who's best known as Lois Lane on the 50's Superman t.v. show), are simply wasted in their roles. Carradine spends almost the entire movie standing around and looking worried, while Coates spends her time trying to be catty with the only other female present (played by Sheila Noonan), when she isn't fending off a clumsy attempt at rape by an old cave dweller (played by Maurice Bernard). There is simply no noteworthy performance at all, even if the script did give them something to work with.

The special effects are equally bland. The volcano eruption near the end of the film is a joke, as we never even see the volcano itself. You'd think Warren could have swiped some stock footage of one doing so. About the only bit of interest the film can muster is within the first few minutes after the opening credits, where we are treated to some stock footage of sea life, which is capped off with a pretty neat fight between an octopus and a shark. The film is strictly downhill from there, all the way to its obligatory Hollywood happy ending.

I can forgive a movie being bad. I can forgive it for being cheap and cheesy. I can even forgive it for being pandering. But I cannot forgive it for being boring, which exactly what this waste of celluloid is. The only things that are petrified in "The Incredible Petrified World" are the acting and sense of suspense. Avoid this dreck at all costs, unless you run out of sleeping pills.

Rating: 0 Stars (out of 4)

Review: Kingdom of the Spiders

Synopsis: When a small Arizona town finds itself the target of millions of hungry tarantulas, can the local vet and his entomologist lover save the town from being overrun, or are they all doomed to be the spiders newest food supply?

Review: Right off the bat, you have to know going in, that "Kingdom of the Spiders" is hardly a tour-de-force effort of film-making. It's a low-budget suspense horror film, filled with 70's cheese-tasticness. That said, however, the film does manage to entertain.

William Shatner, the perennial "cool guy" every nerd-boy wishes they could be, plays Dr. Robert "Rack" Hansen, a vet who's town is soon overrun by the eight-legged fury of millions of tarantulas. It seems the destruction of their usual food supply, by the careless use of pesticides, has caused them to look into a new source of sustenance... humans!

The overall acting in the film is passable, if unremarkable. Even the usually flamboyant stylings of "The Shat" are subdued here. There's the attempt to play up some human drama, through a love triangle between Rack, the beautiful entomologist (played by Tiffany Bolling) and the widow of Rack's dead brother (played by Marcy Lafferty). You get a couple of glimpses of Shatner's typical sexual charisma from it, but little else as far as the story goes. In fact, the whole pacing of the story is quite slow for the first 45-55 minutes of the film. This is surely to help set up the film's final act, when the spiders go on their rampage, but it isn't as effective as they probably were intending.

Really, the story and drama hinges on the spider attacks. Building slowly on the creepy feeling invoked by the spiders, watching them move from killing livestock to humans, it does create a sense of eerie tension. It plays to a fear many of us have of creepy-crawly insects and their ability to overwhelm us with sheer numbers. Director John "Bud" Cardos does effectively make the spiders into not only a credible threat, but a menacing one, as well. The scene of the townsfolk running in chaotic panic when the spiders begin attacking in force, will surely make most anyone's skin crawl. And the downbeat ending of the film is, without question, one of the best parts of the film. No typical Hollywood "happy ending" here, which only helps the movie to retain it's cult status. The film's attempt at a morality tale, by showing that mankind needs to show more respect towards nature, is both heavy-handed and poorly contrived, but that's only to be expected in a b-grade piece of 70's horror.

"Kingdom of the Spiders" is a fine piece of 70's kitsch-cinema, which doesn't try to make itself out as much more than that. And while it may pale in comparison to other movies about man facing "nature's revenge" (like "The Birds" or "Jaws", just to name a couple), it certainly is worthy of it's place of cult horror status. Just make sure to keep a can of bug spray close by, as you watch it.

Rating: 2 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

Review: Eaten Alive

Synopsis: Guests who come to stay at the Louisiana motel of a mentally unstable inn keeper, soon find themselves being served up as the main course to his large pet crocodile.

Review: As a bit of a horror film buff, I'm always looking to check out some of the older b-movie horrors of the past, both to learn more about what makes for a good scare, as well as to get interesting insights into exactly how and why those things have changed over the decades. And I can safely say that "Eaten Alive" provided none of that for me.

This is the third film from Director Tobe Hooper (known mainly for his cult classic "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre"). Once again, the film revolves around a mentally disturbed person, living within the southern part of the United States. This time around, the story is about a deranged inn keeper who, for reasons never explained, keeps killing the guests who come to his motel and feeding them to the large crocodile in the swamp next to it.

Those who are familiar with Hooper's style, will see a lot of similarities between this film and his most famous work, "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre", which was the film he made directly preceding this one. It is filled with the kind of strange and oddball cinematography, with weird neon lighting and close-up focusing shots on weird images throughout. But unlike the previous work, it doesn't really gel here. What once might have been directorial excess, is simply pointless and unintelligible nonsense. It is obvious he's trying to set an eerie and creepy atmosphere, but it is just so poorly crafted and lacking in any sense of commonality, that what is meant to feel bizarre and surreal, feels completely unbelievable instead. The script for this must have been about one page long, as that is how bad the plot and storytelling here is.

The acting is, also, very much below par, even by low budget horror film standards. It is shown that the inn keeper (played by Neville Brand) is out-of-his-mind, but we never come to understand why or what it is the guests do that sets him off. This lack of context makes it almost impossible to be scared by his crazy (re)actions and leaves you more inclined to scratch your head in puzzlement, than to feel any sense of dread or menace. None of the other characters really gets enough development for you to care about them, save that of Buck (played by a then unknown Robert Englund). His performance is the only one to have any real resonance at all and even that isn't very much.

Perhaps Hooper thought he could capture lightning in a bottle for a second time, like he did with "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" a couple years earlier (even going so far as to bring back Marilyn Burns to play the part of a victim once more). But as this film shows, it isn't something you can force or easily recreate. As a result, "Eaten Alive" never really comes to life or finds it's own voice (a point only belabored, by the fact this film has been renamed many different times). It just stagnates and meanders, providing no real thrills, scares, or even the macabre tone of TCM. If you are a Hooper completist, you might derive some kind of enjoyment or interest from this outing. Otherwise, you are best just to skip on this uninteresting and plotless bomb. The reason this film is highly overlooked, isn't because it was ahead of it's time. It is because efforts this poor are better off being forgotten.

Rating: 1 Star (out of 4)

Review: Madman

Synopsis: A group of camp counselors find themselves the victims of a legendary killer in the woods, known only as... Madman Marz!

Review: From the late 70's through the early 80's, it was the golden era of the slasher horror film. During this period, many played on the old standby of a killer in the woods theme ("The Prowler", "Don't Go In The Woods", "The Burning" and, of course, "Friday the 13th"). By 1982, this had become "old hat." Yet, late in the game, here comes "Madman"! The basic plot is what you would expect: Some camp counselors wind up as the targets of a legendary kill-crazy farmer, appropriately named, Madman Marz. It is a completely predictable and by-the-numbers slasher formula.

The acting is, as is usually the case in most low-budget slashers, almost non-existent. Save for the character of Betsy (played by Gaylen Ross, under the name "Alexis Dubin," as I guess she didn't want it to be known she was in a cheesy slasher flick), none of the characters gets developed enough to the point you know or care about any of them. The killer isn't really developed any, either, as he is portrayed as the typical "super-human" maniac, showing incredible physical strength and speed, beyond any mere mortal. It's said he murdered his family, but you never really learn why, as the script is more interested in setting up hokey hot-tub scenes, in an effort to provide the prerequisite nudity in such films. Everything just plods along in a very predictable manner.

So, what you are left with is the special effects and atmosphere to provide you any real entertainment. Fortunately, it actually does. One of the things I really liked about the setting, is how well they played up how easy it is to get lost in the woods at night. The sameness of the surroundings actually helped convey a sense of tension in not knowing exactly where you are. And since this is a time before the advent of cell phones, it comes off somewhat realistically. Of course, some of that is undone by a soundtrack which, at times, sounds like someone who got their hands on a Kasio keyboard and suddenly thought they were John Carpenter.

As for the killings themselves, it's a mixed bag that ranges from the extremely gruesome to the extremely phony! Although, some of the kills are pretty inventive, like the one where the girl is beheaded by the hood of the car she is trying to get working. I also like that they tried to keep the killer more to the shadows for most of the film. Something that might have been more out of necessity, than to illicit a sense of mystery, as when you get a good look at the killer the cheapness of the effects shows how much they lacked a budget here.

In the end, the film is merely a typical example of the schlocky early 80's slasher formula. It could be entertaining for those who are fans of the genre, or those who love to mock it. Otherwise, you can probably pass on it. It's simply another unoriginal slasher film, that looks extremely cheap and has not aged very well. Might make for a good Halloween party film, though, as it comes off as the technological equivalent of telling a ghost story around a campfire.

Rating: 2 Stars (out of 4)

Would you want to go to this school???

"Night School," also know as "Terror Eyes." It stars Rachael Ward who was kinda big around early 80's. She would go on to star in the Burt Reynolds film "Sharkey's Machine." Here she plays a college student (looking a little older than the usual), where a killer is on the loose wearing motorcycle gear and brandishing a large silver blade.

Now, beheadings are the way to go here. Who's killing these college women? There's one scene that stands out, for me. A young college girl goes over a college teacher's (older female) place, and does the nasty! Yes, you heard it right... they get it on. This is a little ahead of its time. Then, later you find the younger girl's head in the toilet! No, I'm not making this up. This is the third horror film between 1980-1981 to have a head in a fish tank.

So, the killer seems to be stalking Rachael Ward for some unknown reason. "Night School" was shot in Boston. It was released in theaters around spring of 1981. I saw it on cable in 1983 on the Movie Channel, as I did most horror films back then. Okay, wow for a little spoiler: This is a 28 year old movie, so if you haven't seen it by now you probably won't, since it hasn't been released on DVD. I doubt this will replay again either. Alright, for the spoiler, here we go----------Don't look down any further!!!! You have been warned...

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Rachael Ward turns out to be the killer at the end!!!!! The reason being, that she wanted to pass some stupid test, so she decided that by killing off her competition, it would get her the highest grade.

Now, this one doesn't get high grade. Only 1 and a half stars... Although it does have some decent nudity and a lot of blood shed. Oh, those early 80's cable days are so missed...

Review: Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Synopsis: The trick is on a doctor this time, as he fights against a murderous conspiracy of a Halloween mask company, who are creating their product as a means to sacrifice the lives of children, in a witchcraft ritual.

Review: This film is given lots of bad press, as the worst sequel of this franchise, mostly because it doesn't connect itself to the saga of Michael Myers. But while that might be an unfair bias against the film, it is hardly without many flaws of it's own, that hinder it from being a great scary film.

The biggest problem within the film, is lack of giving proper amounts of information to make something convincing. When the doctor (played solidly by Tom Atkins) shows signs that he has feelings for Ellie (played by Stacey Nelkin) and sleeps with her, it seems to come out of nowhere. There is no build up to it, nothing to indicate that they would feel that way for each other, as they've only just met over the course of a day. Later, when the doctor frees Ellie from captivity and they race to stop the broadcasts, Ellie is revealed to be one of the robots of the evil Silver Shamrock company. But how long has that been the case? Was she one all along? Why didn't she deactivate, when they blew up the factory, like the other ones did? There are just so many things like this, that it takes you out of the moment and you lose a lot of the tension the film should be generating.

That isn't to say the film has nothing good about it. The performances by Tom Atkins and Dan O'Herlihy (as the villain of the piece) are very engaging, especially when they are on-screen together. O'Herlihy brilliantly captures that sense of quiet evil with his performance, as he's all smiles and charm one minute, then the heart of darkness the next. Atkins is great as the reluctant hero, who is clearly in over his head. Also, the musical score is top notch (not surprising, as it comes from John Carpenter). It is very eerie and constantly gives you the feeling of dread. Even the jingle to the Silver Shamrock television ad can give you the spooks.

Still, despite all that, the film ultimately suffers from some very poor script writing and lack of proper explanations. It takes what could have been one of the all-time classic scare films and turns it into a mediocre effort, that should have been thought-out more.

This isn't really a bad movie, but the flaws within it keep it from being truly good. I applaud the makers for trying something different. And while the film should not be snubbed for that, it has plenty of it's own issues that lessen the appeal of it. As loathe as I am of remakes, I actually think this film could benefit from such, provided the script writing was up to par. As it stands, the film is merely watchable. Perhaps something to watch late at night, when you can't sleep. Sadly, it could have been so much more.

Rating: 2 Stars (out of 4)