Category Archives: Demonology

Sometimes Sacrificing for Satan for Favors Does More EVIL Than Good! “Sex Ritual” reviewed! (International Media Network / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

The sudden death of her mother has left Ceren in the hands of a pettish and immoral stepfather.  Smacked around and even possibly raped while unconscious, Ceren becomes reserved while being on defense whenever her stepfather is around.  She ultimately joins a satanist group at the behest of friend Tuna who has ulterior motives of human sacrifice for the 13th of the sacred year where a rare celestial alignment allows Lucifer to grant powers to his disciples in return.  Ceren’s reluctant to be the Satanists’ much needed fourth person for the ritual, involving drinking each other’s blood and eating a helpless kitten, has nearly pushed her to the limit but when a young woman, a promised sinner, is kidnapped, tortured, and murdered on a pentagram and all in the name of Lucifer, Ceren is pushed into immense guilt.  When each of their supernatural powers come to light, Ceren has the ability to resurrect her deceased mother who takes care of Ceren’s immediate problems, such as her abusive stepfather, as well as be a guide to help the falsely accused sinner, the sacrificed young woman, to take revenge on her satanic murderers.

Never in all my horror movie watching existence have I ever seen, or come across, a Turkish horror movie.  Well, there’s a first for everything and Özlem Yesilyurt is the first director to have his horror film from Turkey, entitled “Sex Ritual,” to cross my desk.   Granted, “Sex Ritual” is an eye-catching and provocative title with lots of loaded promises but the conspicuous title is a Westernized conjuring to lure viewers, like me guilty as charged, into an intriguing concept based off title alone.  The real title is “Seytanin Elçiler,” roughly translated as “The Messengers of Satan” a far, far cry from the more outshining “Sex Ritual” title.  The 2023 satanist horror that allures reclusive and repressed individuals into doing horrible things is a scripted story written by Askin Kartal (“Lilith Cinleri,” aka “Lilith’s Demons” and “Zina” aka “Other”).  Mert Ozan Düz (“Zina”) produces the film under his company, Mert Production Media.

The story is casted entirely with Turkish actresses and actors with Yalçin Cemre at the center of the conflict.  Life browbeaten with her mother passing away and she now dwells under the ignoble thumb of an abusive stepfather, Ceren has little-to-no options in life until the opportunity to escape with a new set of friends, friends of the Satanic kind.  Ceren agrees to join at the constant behest of friend Tuna (Atilla Karahan) who has ulterior motives other than to be a good friend to the downtrodden Ceren in a pure case of netherworld summoning exploitation.  Not sure what Ceren was expecting, or perhaps there is some conjecture lost in translation, but when the satanists, which round out with Caner Gölgüoglu and Yagmur Yenice, begin to cut themselves, drink a bowl of their own blood, kill and eat cats, and the event murder with glee satisfaction, a hesitant Certain eventually goes with all of it without much of a stern opposition that makes her just as accountable for all the ritualized death at the groups’ hands.  Yet, the story makes her out to be the duped heroine and the savior of the sacrificed’s spirit, played by Renas Işıklı in life and death as the unfortunate young woman Selin who has her nipples cut off (not shown but implied with edits) during the sacrificial ritual.  Ceren uses her demonic powers for anti-hero good by taking revenge on those who’ve done inherent wrong to others, such as against her stepfather Kazim Arslantas along with Selin, by resurrecting dead mama (Esra Vural) to take exact the revenge. 

Özlem Yesilyurt’s feature can be construed as a very limited budgeted film with only a handful of simple, repeated locations (a scare abode, a vacant warehouse, outside bench), skirted-by special effects, and less-than-effectual emotional and dynamic dialogue between characters to progress a natural story.  Ceren’s stepfather talks a big improper game with threats and innuendos toward Ceren’s youthful beauty, but his actions are rather mild and any physical abuse, other than a handful of open handed slaps, have been crudely implied, barely registering a sexual encounter.  Strobe lights and some clinging-for-dear-life scab prosthetics make up more than most of the special effects efforts coupled by ham-fisted, overexaggerated performances that are more into theatrical play melodramatics rather than embodying a sense of practical realism.  The satanic enthusiasm between Tuna, Berk, and Asli finds refreshing footing with a disturbing appetite to do all the unspeakable rituals just to be granted unnatural powers, ones that prove to be fruitless against Ceren’s revivification of the dead which begs the question of who exactly did the satanist sacrifice for?  You would think if it was actually for Satan himself, he would not have gifted the fourth wishy-washy acolyte Ceren with a formidable ability over his true followers, unless Satan’s a real son of a bitch and likes to see the world burn no matter who bends a knee to him.  The “Sex Ritual” title is pushed to the seams, stretched to sell copies on a provocative promise that isn’t fulfilled as there’s no sex – voluntary, influenced, or forced copulation – to bring about infernal Hell on Earth, or at least in an inner circle of the desperate to be devilish. 

“Sex Ritual” is a conjured up Turkish horror now available in North America on DVD.  The MPEG2 encoded DVD5 comes courtesy of International Media Network, aiming to bring worldwide horror to western audiences.  Presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, IMN isn’t the pinnacle of transfer quality but the digital picture has a fair amount of inherent success that has already done the preinstalled work but “Sex Ritual” is a release that’s essentially from farm to table with an ungraded picture within the framework of a 720p resolution, possibly upscaled through your player and television setup.  To its advantage, the feature doesn’t have the scenic, action, or special effects range to test the format and that makes the picture look better, cleaner, and with greater emphasis on detail than typical effects boosted horror with a snappier pace to build the intensity and the terror.  “Sex Ritual’s” often slowed down, lingers on scenes, because of the budget limitations and this results in never challenging the compression.  The audio is an uncompressed PCM Stereo 2.0 mixed in the Turkish language with English subtitles that synch and pace just fine with no sign of misspelling or broken sentence structures.  The little devilry ambiance instilled is held at bay, reserved to be only accessorial to the maniacal laughing and victimizing screams, and the dialogue supplied has prominence and strength between a mostly conversating narrative contrived of pressure, abuse, and bullying with little substance in Ceren’s beset angst and a proper farewell to dear old dead mother.  The generic stock soundtrack from Ekrem Düzgünoglu (“Lilith’s Demons”) lacks vitality to be impactful and sounds as it pulled and edited directly from a generated percussion and synthesizer you find free online.  For encoded special features, there is only a chapter selection on the static menu.  The physical DVD comes in a standard Amaray case with a simple, yet bold and captivating sleeve art with a similar relevance to Ceren and the pagan act with “Sex Ritual” hovering over top, a good marketable look for the IMN release.  The 82-minute DVD comes unrated, though not listed, with region free playback. 

Last Rites: Between the poor taste westernized title and the stale progression of the narrative, “Sex Ritual” has no path forward in summoning its darkest qualities for power and glory in this Turkish-made, low-budget, forgettable thriller.

Sex Ritual Trailer (2026) on Vimeo

EVIL Sleeps with Women to Anticipate the Antichrist’s Arrival! “Violent New Breed” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Violent New Breed” is a violent Visual Vengeance video available now!

The city of New York is under siege by a new drug as the narcotic Rapture sticks in the arms of his addicts, leaving them mindless and helpless to the effects.  At the head of the snake, a demon race known as Breeders are responsible for trafficking Rapture across the city.  Jack and Steve are part of a covert government operation well versed with the Breeder’s stimulation scheme of the junkie community. Going undercover at a Breeder establishment front, Jack concealed effort is blown and he falls to the Breeder’s vile ways, leading partner Steve, along with Jack’s teenage daughter Amy, down in the underbelly of the Breeder lair where cyborg servants are constructed and human women are led to breed more demonic spawn, one in particular in plan to be the birth of the antichrist.  In a hellish, NYC basement, amongst viscera and body part leftovers, Steve and Amy must complete the mission and stop the antichrist from reigning hell down on Earth. 

Independent horror filmmaker Todd Sheets has become a master of the microbudget horror scene since the mid-1980’s.  His evolution began with humble shorts, such as “Blood of the Undead” and “Dead Things,” with the latter being re-imagined by Sheets a decade later, and those early years really sowed the seeds of his behind-the-camera love for extreme and outrageous gore and horror as he creates low-budget horror through the years a rapid, breakneck pace, releasing titles such as the lycanthropic “Moonchild,” the anthological horror “Hi-8 (Horror Independent 8) that brings eight of the best indie filmmakers together to tell their tales of terror, and “Clownado.”  Yes, “Clownado” is, you guessed it, a tornado swirling with murderous clowns in it’s vortex.  My personal favorite has always been “Dreaming Purple Neon” for its off-coloring performances and survival-esque storyline with demons and drugs.  “Violent New Breed” is in the middle of his career having been released in 1997 with Sheets gaining traction on multiple filming locations, employing more principal and supporting cast members as well as an abundance of extras, and upping the violent tone and degenerate microcosms that transport viewers to seedier and deadlier worlds.   “Violent New Breed” is written and directed by Sheets under his early production label, Trustinus Productions, securing him a producer credit too.

Sheets has never been the type of filmmaker to follow conventional guidelines when it comes to his characters, often switching them around or executing a red herring to flesh out the real protagonist or anti-hero.  “Violent New Breed” plays into the former with a switcheroo of the principal protagonist, initially beginning with Jack going undercover and infiltrating the Breed’s strip club bar used as a front for their demonic dealings and ending with partner Steve taking the antichrist to the finish line.  The audience will get pretty far and involved with Jack’s life as he struggles with his divorce and custody of daughter Amy (Rebecca Rose).  Mark Glover, who has worked with Sheets on “Bloodthirsty Cannibal Demons” and “Zombie Bloodbath 2,” lands the subconscious weight of personal strife as he inevitably becomes the lone cop sheep in a den of demonic wolves that leave Amy fatherless.  That’s when Nick Stodden (“Clownado”) steps into the fold as Steve.  Steve’s not terribly present in the fist half of the film but is thrust into the Breed labyrinth by duty and by promise to his partner to keep Amy safe.  Strodden plays an average hero with Steve’s bravery in plenty of supply, but the character lacks the hand-to-hand combat skills or weaponry for a government agent trained to deal with supernatural killers.   Embracing entirely Asmodeus, the slick-rick head honcho of the demon hierarchy, is “Moonchild’s” Dave Miller who rather dons the nice suit, cocky attitude, and twisted demon leader suitably despite some reckless decision-making faux-pas moments that ultimately cost the character everything he’s worked toward.  The characters a mostly filled in with little human survivors of the foreboding infernal uprising, such as with Tamara (Jenni Geigel, “The Shivers”) and Trixie (Becky Stodden, “The Shivers”) who find themselves caught in the middle, and with Rod Will (“The Shivers”), Joel Hedge, Jody Rovick (“Prehistoric Bimbos in Armageddon City”), and Andrea Ureno as numerous demons, even one that has a carcinization lower body while still resembling a humanoid at the top-half with protruding mandibles, an absurd radical efforted pulled off successfully by Sheets and his limited budget. 

Sheets’ vision has always been larger than his funds, but the ambitious indie horror filmmaker can’t be contained or constrained by the size of his wallet and the size of his heart for the genre that inspires his creativity.  “Violent New Breed” epitomizes that Todd Sheets ingenuity and the image of a horrifying tomorrow with a large cast, lots of blood, and a striving story set on the streets of New York City while not actually taking one step in the Big Apple.  Yes, “Violent New Breed” is completely filmed in the Midwest, more specifically in Sheets’ hometown and state of Kansas City, Missouri, but the urban jungle is sold through the editing with interjected NYC cityscapes. However, none of the action really happens on the streets but in enclosed bars, basements, and backalleys that could sell to be anywhere, USA. Like many other Todd Sheets productions, there’s not a ton of backstory to chief characters, such as with Jack and Steve’s covert company of infiltrating and obliterating Breeder operations in what is considered an off-the-books undertaking, not recognized officially, yet the pre-apocalypse of the Breeders’ mission isn’t worth the money or resources to warrant the assignment more than two men. Breeders also outweigh hundred-fold, have abilities to invisible-phase, and have an army of Cyborgs all with the influencing poison on the streets to control most of the human population. Sheets sets up a David vs. Goliath narrative without much fight in the heroes and heroines with the Breeders’ shortcomings breed essentially from them tripping over their own shoelaces by not taking advantage when advantage appears opportune. The heroes’ dumbluck constantly and consistently happen through the film and becomes tiresome to watch weak torchbearers fumble to save all of humanity against domineering supernatural terror from Hell!

‘Violent New Breed” gets a violent-illustrated new release from Visual Vengeance. The new Blu-ray glorifies Sheets’ SOV artistic style through an AVC encoded, 1080p high-resolution, BD50. The precursing title card warning of the film’s technical imperfections through commercial or economical equipment, a wonted service by the Wild Eye Releasing’s SOV label, are not egregiously touched up but rather accentuate a cleaner, meaner version for show, presented in its original pillarbox full screen 1.33:1 aspect ratio. The world-wide debut Blu-ray contains the director approved transfer of the SD master tape elements. The faded details incline toward a warmer tone that almost seems ablaze with a glowing heat lamp just out of frame and this also, along with the 720p video, suppresses finer textures with notes of aliasing around character actions. Sheets’ color gels and hazy lighting work to an extent but there’s little pop to the graded coloring. The English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo offers more bite than expected out form it’s two-channel output but has some difficulty deciphering distinct layers inside the scene. Dialogue echoes and varies in volume sporadically through the picture with it also melding into the diegetic environment in a less-than-refined sound. However, dialogue does push through to an extent and is discernible with a rock soundtrack scoring through more effectively like a hot knife through butter. There are English subtitles available for selection. Packed with 12 hours of bonus content, Todd Sheet fans will receive a comprehensive look on not only a “Violent New Breed” but as the filmmaker as a whole. Those with older format copies of the film with be familiar with one of three commentary tracks on the Visual Vengeance release that includes director Todd Sheets and actors Nick Stodden, Antwoine Steele, and Becky Stodden. There’s a Tony Strauss of Weng’s Chop magazine commentary and a Visual Vengeance produced 2023 remastered commentary with Sheets and Rob Hauschild, founder of Wild Eye Releasing. Other bonus content contains an interview with actor Jerry Angell and director Todd Sheets, Sheets discussing working with the late “Dolemite” actor Rudy Ray Moore who plays the last-standing city cleric, a behind-the-scenes documentary, a 2023 Q&A session at the Nitehawk Cinema / Visual Vengeance screening, a blooper reel, a behind-the-scenes image gallery, the original Kansas City local news spot, an uncut version of the strip club entrance sequence, Todd Sheets’ 2014 short zombie-western “Fistful of the Undead” from the 2016 anthology “Grindsploitation 2: The Lost Reels,” and the original and Visual Vengeance trailers. Also included are two alternate versions of the film: the DVD version and The Movie Channel’s R-rated cut. Three movies from the prince of one! Now that you’ve gone through 12-hours of encoded content, next stop is the hefty physical content beginning with graphic artist Heavy J’s Ghana-inspired artwork on the pink carboard O-slipcover that unveils inside a more traditional-approach to Visual Vengeance’s orange, yellow, and black, character-compiled primary art for the standard, clear Blu-ray Amary. The reverse side has the original poster art of a blue-tinted negative image of an axe-wielding Breeder cultist. The insert section has a single-sided folded mini poster of the Ghana art, a trifold essay from Tony Strauss with a bio on Todd Sheets, his filmography, and on “Violent New Breed” that also includes behind-the-scene and movie stills, a single fold, cardboard birth announcement for the coming of the antichrist, and a retro sicker sheet. The 114-minute feature is not rated and is region free encoded.

Last Rites: Todd Sheets enlarges an evil urban with an insidious poison coursing through the city, taking women when they please, and bring forth the antichrist and there’s only a handful of ill-equipped humans to stand in their way. “Violent New Breed’s” Visual Vengeance release, packed with extra content and a spiffy physical presence, is a victory for Todd Sheets and all independent filmmakers like him.

“Violent New Breed” is a violent Visual Vengeance video available now!

To be a Rich and Famous Rockstar, You Must Sign with EVIL! “Hell’s Bells” reviewed! (SRS Cinema / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Sign Your Soul To Satan for the “Hells Bells” on Blu-ray!

A pair of middle-aged best friends and rockers named Arthur and Herb have minimum waged jobs, no ambitions, and two level-headed wives on the brink of divorcing them if nothing changes.  All the friends have is their band, Devil Music, and their glam rock music. Out of the blue, a music talent agent signs them in a heartbeat and before they know, Devil Music is rocking out to a packed-full arena full of adoring fans and obsessed groupies, raking in money beyond their capabilities of higher counting.  What they’re oblivious to is the band’s collective souls now belong to the Devil under the contract terms with the servile music agent doing the Devil’s fear-based bidding and whose life and soul hangs in the balance.  When the Devil comes to collect, sending his demonic minions to slay each member of the band, Arthur and Herb must find a way to save themselves from the Devil cancelling their life show forever. 

For over a decade now, filmmakers Jim O’Rear, who’s minor zombie role in George Romero’s “Dawn of the Dead” has launched a career in indie horror in front and behind the camera with “Hayride Slaughter,” “Three Tears of Bloodstained Flesh,” and the “Cruel Summer” trilogy,” and Scott Tepperman, who’s more recent filmography into the indie market also saw highlights of horror, have been in business together ever since co-starring in the 2013 haunted hospital flick, “Hospital.”   From then on, the two had formed their own production company, Los Bastardz Production, specializing in low-budget horror with a select entourage of talent.  The devil and his contract film, underscored with a rock-n-roll fame theme, released in 2020 is duo’s “Hell’s Bells,” a horror-comedy built around if it seems too good to be true, it probably is narrative.  “Hell’s Bells” is also produced by the two filmmakers.

Like most of their produced product, it comes to no surprise that the Los Bastardz themselves, Jim O’Rear and Scott Tepperman step in the principal leads of a Beavis & Butthead or Bill & Ted type of heavy metal music centric duo who are daft beyond repair.  Any innovation aimed for the setup is instantly dissolved by the derivative tepidness as we’ve seen these characters before over the decades now, but O’Rear and Tepperman make for a good dimwitted and guileless pair with a gullibility and an innocence that makes them appear sympathetically simpatico, even when their levelheaded wives (Rebekah Erb, “Death Care,” and pornstar Layla Dawn. “Slumber Party Slaughter Party”) use threatening divorce language to motivate their one-track mind toward another desire in life.  The jokes are a bit long in the tooth and there are a handful of needless fart jokes, but the overall gags do land even if the terrain they contextually touch down on is rocky at best as they play to their individual character strengths of being a grocery bagger enthusiastic about making it big and a loafer who actualy has some intelligence underneath his Jesus hairstyle.  Their band mates, the cocky loudmouth drummer Vic (Paul Van Scott), the butch backup singer Shirley (Lisa Kirk), and the catatonic bassist Gary (Cameron Scott), all have their own quirks, and all are played by actors familiar with El Basterdz having donned roles in previously produced films from the company, such as the “Cruel Summer” series.  As the band Devil Music, they are targeted for soul reaping as a part of a contract byproduct against their music agent Caleb (Tom Komsar), drawn up by the devil himself in Marc Price (“Trick or Treat”) by duplicitous means with deceitful promises.  Without the horns, pitchfork, and red skin, Marc Price makes for a good Devil in human skin with only the economized visual effects fashioned glowing eyes.  Harold McLeod II preludes the story as a victim of contract, Cayt Feinics draws attention with a show of toplessness as Shirley’s lover, Jerry Reeves plays the demon x many going after Devil Music, and a sorely underutilized Jimmy Maguire, as the exasperated grocer manager tired of Arthur and Herb’s lack of common sense, fill out “Hell’s Bells” cast.

To preface with my previous experience with El Basterdz films, “Cruel Summer” didn’t do it for me with a dowdy slasher that’s didn’t leave impression.  Yet, “Cruel Summer” has two sequels plus a 4th soon to be on home video, making this series their most popular commodity.  What can I say?  Cinema is subjective.  That bad taste didn’t deter “Hell’s Bells” from the ever-growing review pile and a second chance to get this long-time horror fan aboard with Jim O’Rear and Scott Tepperman’s blithe outlook toward the horror genre, one that doesn’t take itself too seriously.  With that understanding, going into “Hell’s Bells” was rather easy with no expectations for commentative material and top-notch gags and laughs, but what El Basterdz provides has been long appreciated and continuously favored in genre films:  decent VFX, decent practical effects, and, of course, the provocation of nudity.  There may be times when films can get away with having only one of those key elemental pieces present with great immensity and intense projection that the film can’t be denied it’s due right to seen and heard as a well-made film but have all three and the formula works like a charm amongst genre fans no matter how bad the storyline gets and no matter how bad the acting is portrayed, leveling up a mediocre production to potentially the penthouse of the independent skyscraper.  To be fair, neither the story nor the acting in “Hell’s Bells” is atrocious but the technical aspects during principal photography and post-production throw the film off-balance into slapdash hogwash and that can be rather off-putting right out the gate for most audiences.

“Hell’s Bells” finds itself being a story having been told before, many times over in its airheaded budding duo faced with great task none think possible to complete, but O’Rear and Tepperman manage to befit themselves satisfactorily in archetype with a rock-n-roll nightmare by sticking to their character quirks and incorporating the backbone preferences of shoestring genre filmmaking.  SRS Cinema is a distributing house built on shoestring films and “Hell’s Bells” is another brick in its schlock-sturdy foundation with a Blu-ray release.  Encoded with AVC compression, presented with 1080p high-resolution, on a 25GB BD-R with the purple underbelly, “Hell’s Bells” looks pretty good for commercial grade encoding and minimal capacity.  Details are sharp enough to cause no concern to capture skin variations, the contrasting wardrobe textures, and the shifting compositions between reality and fantasy stemmed from visual effects and fade-in/fade-out montage sequences.   Scenes are mixed bag of grading, some more intense than others that are set with a brighter natural veneer, but all retain their intended quality without any substantial issues from compression.  The English language LPCM 2.0 stereo renders a mix of feeble commercial equipment and green technical knowledge that permits a large noticeable swing in all areas of principal sound recording with most of the pain points affecting dialogue with retreated vocal presence in certain scenes while robust in others, and even an in-moment change of the same scene at times.  Post sound design isn’t marred by the same scenarios that’s a clear as crystal with the added rock soundtrack, crowd cheers, and demonic gutturals.  No English subtitles are offered.  Special features include a commentary track with writer-directors Jim O’Rear and Scott Tepperman, a behind-the-scenes featurette, Arthur and Herb’s Devil Music music video, blooper reel, the feature trailer, and SRS Cinema catalogue trailers.  SRS Cinema’s Blu-ray mirrors their limited 100 count release without the director’s signatures, retailed with a regular Blu-ray Amaray case with illustration composition artwork of mostly the chief principal characters, and as always, the graphic artistry SRS uses is always 100x better the film.  There are no other physical accompaniments.  The not rated release has a runtime of 80 minutes and has region free playback. 

Last Rites: Throw up the sign of the devil horns for “Hell’s Bells’s” comedic contract with a hair metal Satan, but don’t let this narrative fool you by hawking new something old and done before.

Sign Your Soul To Satan for the “Hells Bells” on Blu-ray!

There’s No EVIL Treat with This EVIL Trickster! “The Jester 2” reviewed! (Dread Present / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“The Jester 2” Blu-ray Is a Must-Get Sequel!

15-year-old Max is a girl without friends and with her bordering the edge of maturity that leaves her too old for trick-or-treating.  Dressed as magician with an enthusiasm for card tricks and slight of hand, Max tries unsuccessfully to make the best of her Halloween night as school peers mock and tease her until the animated and sinister Jester comes before her to show her a trick of his own.  When Max foils his trick, the Jester’s undertaking to contractually collect souls for Devil every All Hollows Eve comes into jeopardy as he loses his power to trick others.  The Jester forces Max’s hand to play tricks on others for their souls to be collected by the end of the night before his own soul burns in the internal inferno.  As the night goes on, Max must outplay the supernatural killer whose desperate game to spill as much blood as possible before the end of the night is coming to a full carnage head.

Our review of Colin Krawchuk’s “The Jester” called it “clever, entertaining, and devilish,” concluding out the review with “The Jester” acts the whimsical clown of conscience-stricken torment with an indelible joker different from the rest of the villainy pool. Yeah, we liked it.  Krawchuk and team return for a sequel, simply entitled “The Jester 2,” that opens backstory doors for the mischievous maniac whose mask grins from ear-to-ear and knows all of the tricks of the soul reaping trade.  Only one problem lies in his path, a 15-year-old girl who may be better a deceiving than he is.  The standalone sequel doesn’t segue with the original film, creating a new whole installment that anyone could enjoy without watching the original 2023 film or it’s viral short films both films are based off of.  Krawchuk writes-and-directs to be inherently different not only from the first film but from the large slasher genre that’s seen its fair share of clownish killers as of late.  Traverse Terror and Epic Picture Group collab once again for another Dread Presents release with Epic Picture Group leadership of Patrick Ewald coproducing side-by-side with “Bag of Lies” producing team of Victoria McDevitt, Jake Heineke, and Cole Payne. 

Michael Sheffield returns with his top hat and cane as the manically mute and mischievous Jester but with a slightly different approach to the Jester’s appearance.  Instead of a Venetian mask strapped around his head by an elastic band, the sequel’s Jester has a mask that’s seemingly an extension of his face, delineated by the rivulet of exposed under flesh between where skin ends and where mask begins.  Without Sheffield’s enthusiastic harlequinade and long, drawn out glares and motionless menace through empty, black eyes of the mask, “The Jester” films and shorts would without a doubt not be as entertaining and terrifying.  This time around, the Jester has a new foe in a 15-year-old girl with puerile dreams of magic and trick-or-treating.  It’s safe to say this girl, Max, is a loner with her peers making fun at her expense, but Max, as a final girl against the Jester, is intelligent and crafty in the face of pure evil despite her ounce of fear to live and be free of his threat against those she cares for – mother (Jessica Ambuehl, “Black Mold”) and sister – and strangers, even the ones that bully her.   Making her feature film debut, the then early 20-something Kaitlyn Trentham has a convincible foot in the door of “The Jester’s” awkward teen being the equalizer against supernatural Hell spawn.  Trentham can pivot between dejected loner to confident talent to the improvising fighter in the matter of circumstances, and when one of those circumstantial events involves Max’s family, a game of wits opens the chessboard for the next few moves.  Forced to align before “Halloween” night comes to close, “The Jester 2” is exclusively between Max and The Jester, good versus evil, for most of the narrative with filler, supporting characters weaved into the pattern to support the threat of tension and a high body count a sequel can be proud of.

Sequels tend to do everything bigger with their inlaid bigger budget off the back of a successful first film.  Big name talent, bigger effects, higher body count, etc., but character and story creator Colin Krawchuk doesn’t take the bait for a bigger boat and pushes that need to multiply tenfold “The Jesser’s” presence amongst audiences down to a suppressed level.  While that might seem counterintuitive to the idea of sequels, “The Jester “thrives on story and sf/x simplicity, letting Sheffield and Trentham battle it out and drive the story of certainly a different scenario from the first film.  The original “The Jester” embodies a similar tone but the control was imbalanced to “The Jester” with a supernatural upper hand always on the pulse of his tricked prey.  The sequel kinks the hose, stopping the Jester’s paranormal flow of life and soul snatching to be humbled by his need from a mortal who ultimately has his existence hanging in this teen girl’s sleight of hands.  This creates a perceptional shift from the Jester’s omnipresence, omnipotent immortality to he’s scraping by with desperation and longshot dependency on a young teen magician with a homemade costume.  This is not to say this new installment into the Jester’s ethos and extended qualities is downgraded or is riding the exact same original wave toward a mundane surf as the kills do have incremental whimsical value and there’s certainly more of a visual effects presence than before and it’s done well to push the sequel to be a step up and forward in conjunction with the good versus evil alliance storyline.

Epic Picture Group and Dread Presents returns the Jester for another go-around of illusionary ill intention with a Blu-ray release.  AVC encoded with 1080p, high-definition resolution on a BD25 and presented in a widescreen 1.78:1, the standard for video metrics supplies “The Jester 2” with adequate levels of a color saturation on a graded scale that leans toward ever so slightly a piano black finish.  Details hover between great depth to vague depending on the focus which Krawchuk and “2 Lava 2 Lantula’s” cinematographer Kevin Duggan who play with the perspective focus in the realm of an already detail-vague and hard-lit night shoot that’s contrast heavy, obtaining nice shadows around the contours of the Jester’s mask.  Duggan is not the returning cinematographer from the original 2023 film but really channels Joe Davidson’s (“President’s Day”) style that’s near raw with graded elements and focus precision.  “The Jester 2” offers an English Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound and a Dolby Digital 2.0.  Much of the 5.1 is frontloaded with a trickle of atmospheric coming through side and back channels in a watery compressed copy of the track, that was likely recorded in Dolby.  Dialogues rendered clearly and cleanly, the Jester doesn’t speak anyway so much of his diegetic sounds are the ruffling swifts of his suit and hat with some walking cane taps, and the supernatural and killing ambient action has a punchy quality of a slight toon quality.  English subtitles are available for selection.  Special features include a director’s commentary, a making of featurette which is of Colin Krawchuk speaking on camera about the genesis and fruition of creating a sequel and sustaining villain with clips intercut into the interview footage, and the trailer as well as other Dread Presents’ previews.  The 87-minute Blu-ray is open to all regions for playback and is the film is not rated.

Last Rites: “The Jester 2” is the same but different and kills as a context sequel for a villain on the right path to being a successful franchise.

“The Jester 2” Blu-ray Is a Must-Get Sequel!

A Talking Black Lab with EVIL Red Eyes Target Children. “Where the Dead Go to Die” reviewed! (Mountain Oddities Home Video / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Where the Dead Go To Die” Now Lives on Blu-ray!

The first story in a disturbing 3-part omnibus tale concerns a little boy named Tommy.  Constantly at each other’s throats, Tommy’s troubled  parents don’t burden him down in their mini bickering wars and abusive verbal tirades where he becomes the passive aggressive fodder for each of them to shell the other with, but when Labby, a talking, red-eye dog proclaiming to be a messenger of God’s word, tells Tommy to kill unborn brother because he’s the antichrist, Tommy’s world is turned upside down when Labby murders both parents and the unborn child in the name of God.  In another story, a man steals liquid memories by killing people and extracting an intoxicating substance from their memory glands to inject them into his own body.  One particular liquid memory of a dying prostitute sends him through a warped nightmare of the underworld, one where he may never return to normal.  The last story focuses on a mask-wearing deformed boy named Ralphie, whose Siamese twin brother’s face protrudes out of the side of his face, and his infatuation with schoolmate and neighbor Sophia.  When trying to impress Sophia by relating to her father, Ralphie learns the father records VHS tapes of Sophia being molested by older men and is coerced to partake in an act Sophia is an unwilling participant.  At the behest of Labby, what Ralphie does next will put a fatal stop to the madness that surrounds him and his soulmate crush. 

In the same clunky spirit of crude early 1990’s computer generated imagery or in the early days of the original Playstation graphics, Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s “Where the Dead Go to Die” fully embraces the ungainly graphics in a 3D world of unimaginable horror where kids and demons intersect with wretched results.  The 2012 omnibus reflects three short narratives from ScreamerClauz and combined into one seriously screwed up tale, orchestrated by deal brokered wit Unearthed Films’s Stephen Biro who was sent two of ScreamerClauz’s short films – “Tainted Milk” and “Liquid Memories” – and challenged, or maybe even championed, ScreamerClauz for a third to build toward, and the eventual release of, a feature length product.  With the challenge accepted, the full-time musician and 3D animation artist succeeded with an unforgettable story that’s pure evil at heart and a surreal kaleidoscope of ghastly phantasmagoria.  ScreamerClauz not only writes, directs, and composes the film he also produces under the Draconian Films and Chainsaw Kiss production companies.  

As it has been already established Jimmy ScreamerClauz wears many hats in his production, we can add another with his voice acting of the demonic, fireball-eyed dog, Labby and along with the director’s voiceover participation, other genre actors and filmmakers are casted to voice one, or possibly more than one, of the crudely animated, disturbingly souled characters.  “Subject 87” director, “Reality Bleed-Through” actor Brandon Slagle tackles a double voiceover with the memory addicted man as well as Sophia’s sleazy abusive father.  As Sophia, the once upon a time softcore horror actress Ruby Larocca (“Witchbabe:  The Erotic Witch Project 3,” “Dr. Jekyll & Mistress Hyde”) has real innocent palpability up against Slagle’s aggressively toned, VHS-recording, and peeping perve that is her in character daddy.  Larocca also voices the mysterious advice-giver with the Lady in the Well and as the dying Hooker in the arms of the serial killer-for-liquid memories Man.  Another multi-voice player in the film and who also had a stint in the sex and violence category is Joey Smack with a string of strangler themed films (“Vampire Strangler,” “The Masked Strangler,” “The Bizarre Case of the Electric Cord Strangler, etc.,”).  Smack extends himself into a child and parent performance as the deformed Ralphie in “The Masks That the Monsters Wears” and Tommy’s dad in “Tainted Milk” that gives provides range albeit the quintessential grown man mimicking a child’s voice unmistakableness in the cracking high voice.  Much like Larocca, there’s something pleasant in seeing names like Linnea Quigley (“Return of the Living Dead,” “Night of the Demons”) and Devanny Pinn (“Nude Nuns with Big Guns,” “Bloodstruck”) be credited to voice because that takes the focus on their physical appearances and gives them a chance to actually be seen, or rather heard, with their dialogue performance.  In this instance, Quigley and Pinn embody the rancid maternity of Sophia and Ralphies’ mothers respectively.  “Where the Dead Go to Die” rounds out the cast with more B-movie actors in Trent Haaga (“Terror Firmer,” “Killjoy 2:  Deliverance from Evil”) as Ralph’s ashamed dad as well as Carlos Bonilla, Victor Bonacore, and Joshua Michael Greene. 

How a filmmaker chooses and utilizes his brand of CGI landscape is how that filmmaker’s film should be judged in the gelling of those areas, in my opinion.  “Where the Dead Go to Die’s” crude 3D animation is the intended result from Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s choice in conveying his short story narrative, but that intention won’t stop audiences and critics from browbeating and disparaging the film.  Yet, if accepting the former viewpoint and watch with understanding eyes through that recognition lens, “Where the Dead Go to Die” is one messed up and horrifying dystopia accentuated by the animation that gives each chapter more weight toward wretchedness and wrongdoing, gelling with tremendous intent to scramble the proverbial innocence with demonic forces and human perversions.  Some of the ideas and concepts swirling around ScreamerClauz’s head and make it into the three tales were just images he thought were visually neat but that speaks loudly on the dark mindset of creativity and many of those images are now temporally seared, scarred permanently into our long-term memory lobes.  Granted, tale transitions and recycling back to their sole connection with each other route into choppy territory at best, creating a windy, bumpy road in braiding the three chapters together under a single umbrella of animation style and storytelling, but “Where the Dead Go to Die” is a poignant and throbbing like touching a raw, exposed nerve through gouged muscle and tissue.  Every inch of surreal, sawtooth imagery is like a knife twisted into our virtuous side because upon closer look at Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s story containing children being hurt is only separated by the mere stylistic choice of cinematography. 

Out from the distribution shadows of Unearthed Films and in the hands of adult animation distributor Mountain Oddities Home Video, also in partnership with MVDVisual, for a new Blu-ray release, one we haven’t seen since Unearthed Films released the DVD and Blu-ray in 2012.  The first of two initial releases from Mountain Oddities Home Video, the Blu-ray comes AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition release, on a BD50 packed with extras.  Being mostly rudimentary 3D animation installed into a complexity of kaleidoscopic imagery, critiquing the quality is beyond our control but the compression is amply successful with no artefacts to note and the colorful saturation and grading levels provide an enriched, amalgamated dough of diabolic devil-bread, presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio that’s more compromised to its now out of print Unearthed Films counterpart from more than decade earlier.  Two English audio options are available:  a DTS-HD 5.1 surround sound and a DTS-HD 2.0.  At home audio recordings outside the sound barrier studio boxes are not as refined, capturing mic interference and hissing as well as the differences in varying audio volumes that don’t match between interacting characters in the same scene, creating that unshared space and gap.  Dialogue is unimpeded and clear and ScreamerClauz’s original gloomy-looming score fuels the deep morosity and malevolent themes.  English subtitles are option available.  Extras include a director’s commentary track with Jimmy ScreamerClauz, deleted scenes, an online video-conference interview with ScreamerClauz hosted by Quality Violent Cinema, behind-the-scenes featurettes of snipped dialogue recordings and interviews, including Linnea Quigley, Youtuber Diamanda Hagan’s video review of ScreamerClauz’s animated shorts “The Scuzzies,” and the director’s short film catalogue with “The Scuzzies” (that includes commentary), “Labby vs Mr. Pickles Rap Battle,” “Clinical Sodomy,” “Affection,” “Mutwa,” “Reality Bleed-Through Remix.”   Mountain Oddities Home Video’s Not Rated release is listed as the uncut version with a 95-minute runtime available with region free playback. 

Last Rites: An adult animation pushing the envelope with taboo themes involving kids and when you mess with kids, the public taste goes sour, but “Where the Dead Go to Die” swirls surrealism with poignant acting and strange fever dreaming amongst the basic, albeit creepy, animation.

“Where the Dead Go To Die” Now Lives on Blu-ray!