Category Archives: Demonology

Sucked Into Hell. Surrounded By EVIL! “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Hell Wants You To Stay for Dinner!  “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” on Blu-ray!

Ivan and his hard-nose partner Harry work between the shadows as protectors of the Earth realm.  The pair of paranormal guardians battle demons attempting to sneak from the Netherworld for more domain and power in the human world.  After thwarting a demon’s reneging plans with a wealthy businessman, they find themselves sucked into a portal to Hell after a group of young partygoers become lost and inadvertently crossover everyone in the abandoned warehouse to the underworld, including the warehouse itself.  Confined to a room with the portal opening, they must band together to survive the night where gnarly demons roam behind every door and are master tricksters with one goal in mind – to breed human women with half-breed demons to procreate more of Hell’s minions.  Its up to Ivan and Harry to see the survivors through until dawn but not everyone is who they seem and when the masks are dropped, real Hell will pounce upon them.  

The northeastern American horror-comedy, “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” is the topsy-turvy and totally-transcendental SOV feature from first-time writer-director Kevin J. Lindenmuth (“Twisted Tales,” “Monsterdocom”).  Shot primarily in Cherry Hill, New Jersey with some exterior city shots of New York City, the film alternatively known as “Hell’s Belles” sought ambitious Hell below Earth undertakings, creating a maze-like dwelling for disfigured dwellers of the demonic kind, and a down-the-rabbit hole story where the head-lopping queen is actually the devil in a leatherjacket playing procreator matchmaker and the Cheshire Cat is a overgrown rat looking to nibble on human flesh rather than cheese.  The rat, as ostentatiously cool as it sound, is simply a slither of one of “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” few themes, which is fear.  Kevin J. Lindenmuth’s production Brimstone Media Productions serves as the studio and Lindenmuth serves as sole producer of his self-funded venture into the vile mouth of the demon world.

“Vampires and Other Stereotypes” follows two difference groups related to the existence of Hell, the demons that inhabit it, and the rogue demons splicing themselves into the human world. One group is the guardians Ivan (Billy White) and Harry (Ed Hubbard) who are very much aware of the esoteric magnitude of the abysmal situation and background while the other group, young Generation X’ers oblivious to the signs of Satan’s underworld seeping into their own. Lead by serial-dater and college girl Kirsten (Wendy Bednarz, “There’s Nothing Out There”) and her two tagalong best friends Linda (Anna Dipace) and Jennifer (Suzanne Scott, “Child of the Sabbat), the ready-to-party trio provide the state of affairs with Kirsten’s nonchalant taste in bad boy boyfriends, believing her courting apathy, treated as an impulse indulgence for the sake of fun, will one day run her out of luck. Enter Erik (Mike McCleery, “Deep Undead”), another misfit miscreant unearthed by Kirsten in her ever unquenching need to be wined, dined, and spoiled by the bottom layers of the dating pool. The two parties clash walking into the epicenter of an open investigation, denoted by an aperture in the middle of the room, where dead, decapitated bodies are strong upside down and Kirsten and her businessman father (Rick Poli, “Blitzkrieg: Escape from Stalag 69) are unexpectedly reunited in an air of something more happening behind the scenes other than Kirsten’s father’s flailing dealings with the demons and Erik’s party-sniffing nose leading them to astray and lost. The rest of the cast comes together with Laura Vale as Rosa the psychic, Monica Batavanis as the wife lost to the dark side, Mike Memphis as the Elvis impersonator, Bean Miller as the Lizard King aka Jim Morrison impersonator, and Sally Narkis as the demon waitress.

Lindenmuth’s dragged to Hell premise is a neat enough concept to peak the interests of the casual and diehard horror fan. However, the executed result is a whole other animal that tends to claw back, trying to maul away your viewership.  The special effects Scotts – Scott Hart and Scott Sliger – pull off practical prosthetics and latex with some side curb appeal that helps lift up “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” as best as possible, but the effects have a difficult time keeping up with the film’s innate ambitious concept to where much of the story relies on character exposition to fill in the gaps and where I note the exposition has a few cracks and leaks in themselves is in the very first word you see in the title that sets the expectation right off the bat before going far into a narrative that constantly and hurriedly builds upon the demonic construct.  That edifice evolves so high and so quick that the air becomes thin when the very first presence of a vampire insert comes late into the third act.  You nearly forget that the word Vampire was ever in the title.  Where Lindenmuth succeeds in this frenzy of fiends and folly is passively providing verbal cues of one of the character’s monotone-delivered pangs of extreme hunger.  Being a New Yorker and a rather large individual, you believe a NYC pizza or a greasy burger would be in mind here to feed the need but then the gag drops with well-timed revelation albeit the severe tardiness inside the narrative framework that suggests maybe the title should have been reworked or better thought through to really add upon that element of surprise and not sit waiting and waiting until bloodsuckers join the jittery jamboree.  While the demons are jovially wicked, their wily ways are playful to a fault compared to an “Evil Dead” Kandarian demon or a twisted and ugly demon from “Night of the Demons,” a class of demons that craft a special kind of deviance that maniacally fun as they rip you to shreds.  Not to say the “Vampires and other Stereotypes” demons are painfully dull or too good to be terrible, quite the opposite in the variety of severed head yappers or an oversized rodent, but they don’t offer that same fear-inducing merriment of playing with their food before they eat it. 

The 12th release on the Visual Vengeance line of dusted off sidelined SOV horror and cult films with a brand-new Blu-ray release with an AVC encoded, 1080p (note: off the original standard definition master 1-inch tape), BD50 presented in the original pillarbox of a 1.33:1 aspect ratio. Visual Vengeance provides the usual prefatory statement about the using the best possible elements out of consumer grade equipment, but I do think “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” has the best details within the Betacam SP camcorder, which was, at the time, the crème de la crème of videotape, and then have the video run through a millimeter gauge emulator to give it a 16, or even stretched to a 35 mm, appearance at times. Tullio Tedeschi cinematography is soft, light, and dreamy that forsakes stark details but does offer a sheen along the surfaces and textures that size up and adds to depth to the objects, even more so with the film’s hard lighting and deep shadows to provide a diversion away from the cheap sets but also a diversion away from what could be lurking from the horror-set tropes. The English language stereo 2.0 has decent dynamism between the dialogue, ambience, and soundtrack. Dialogue has a voice above the other sublayers, separating its prominence in front of the batty surroundings of a demon-riddled rodeo and against a soundtrack, or lack thereof, that’s repetitively uninspiring to takes away from the spirt of the level Lindenmuth attempts to reach with his debut. Optional subtitles are available. Special features include three new audio commentaries with director Kevin Lindenmuth, actor Mike McCleery and Lindenmuth, and Weng’s Chop Magazine’s Tony Strauss. Also included are new, brief interviews with Lindenmuth on the technical tangents of his film, actress Laura McLauchlin surrounding her role as Rosa and various recollection of principal photography, actor Mike McCleery as bad boy Erik fitting into his skintight, nonbreathable demon mask and having a good time on set overall, Suzanne Turner on playing Jennifer, Sally Narkis in her brief role as demon waitress and her sidetracking fashion career, and plus interviews with makeup effects artist Ralis Kahn, special effects artist Scott Sliger, photographer Sung Pak, and publicist Joe Mauceri with behind-the-scenes image gallery, original trailer, Visual Vengeance trailers, and Lindenmuth early Super 8 films along with commentary by the director. As always, the physical presentation is nothing short of a thing of pure beauty with a rigid slipcover graced with new illustration by Tom “The Dude Designs’ Hodge with a traditionally sized clear Blu-ray amaray case with reversible front cover that includes more new looming demon heads art and the original one-sheet on the reverse side that really relates to the dreaminess of the photography. In the insert pocket is stuffed a color trifold essay from Tony Strauss with behind-the-scene stills, a folded mini poster of the Blu-ray case cover art, and retro VHS stickers. Disc art is pressed with the slipcover art. Region free for the world to see, the Blu=ray is unrated and has a 87 minutes. Nominal and ambitious, “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” fights an uphill battle coming off the heels of an extremely gorified video nasties of the 1980s, but Lindenmuth fulfills with an indiscriminate spread of insanity at every turn with some vivid and vibrant vanward effects to drive this one home to the great people at Visual Vengeance, a boutique distributor of lost, but not forgotten, SOV buried treasure ready to be rediscovered.

Hell Wants You To Stay for Dinner!  “Vampires and Other Stereotypes” on Blu-ray!

EVIL Will Always Get You in the End! “Ghoulies” reviewed! (MVD Visual / 4K-Blu-ray set)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Ghoulies” Will Get You in the End With a 4K-Blu-ray set!

When a satanic ritual of sacrificing an infant boy is foiled by the acolyte mother, the child is taken far away from the fathering dark warlock who attempted to harness the boy’s youth for his own.  Fast forward 25-years-later, the malevolent father dies and the curse of the fiendish family tree has thought to be lifted.  The mansion is bestowed to very same young boy, Jonathan Graves.  Now a man in graduate studies and with Rebecca, his longtime girlfriend and love of his life, the inherited gothic mansion quickly entrances him into the urge for dark rituals, finding fascination in drawing and calling out the spirits and demons to do his bidding as their exclusive master.  In spite of Rebecca’s concerns and hoodwinking his unsuspecting close friends into a dark rite, Graves unwittingly resurrects his deceased and powerful father who seeks to pick up where he left off with his own callous ceremony from 25 years ago. 

If there are pint sized characters with a mischievous, devious edge, you better believe it that Charles Band is more than certainly behind the little terror-tykes hellbent on hell’s work.  One of the more successful ventures to come out of Charles Band’s empire, literally out from his Empire Production studio, is the 1984 released “Ghoulies.”  Written-and-directed by Luca Bercovici, as his debut feature film and who would later direct “Rockula” and “The Granny,” and co-written with Jefery Levy, who would go on to inevitably write a pair of sequels off the original film, the American-made production masters a flawlessly edited and sound designed layer composition mixed with the imprudence of 80’s stereotyped horror-teen character and nostalgic lighting and matte effects that make “Ghoulies” a travel-sized cult classic.  “Ghoulies” is produced and distributed by Empire pictures with Charles Band as executive producer, Jefery Levy as producer, and Debra Dion (“Oblivion”) as associate producer.

You can’t have a story about necromancing sorcery and demonic disinterring without big personalities and, fortunately, “Ghoulies” has a few that standout with memorable dark magic melodramatics.  Opening scenes of a ritual’s beginning introduces Malcolm Graves, an infernally flamboyant, wide-eyed, and animated with his hands sorcerer who likely won’t win the father of the year award.  “Mulholland Drive” and “Waxwork II:  Lost in Time” actor Michael Des Barres lights up the lurid life of Malcolm Graves with great enthusiasm and piercing eyes.  Graves eccentricity is balanced by another Lynchian actor Jack Nance as the acolyte turned mansion caretaker who oversees the Jonathan Graves’ wellbeing.   Nance meticulous eye gazes and gestural articulation combat and numb down Barress over-the-top dark magic ringmaster.  The “Eraserhead” and “Blue Velvet” actor definitely transposes his defined and evident presence of idiosyncrasies over to this little monster movie with manipulating occultist mascara that make “Ghoulies” that much more special.  The third actor is principal lead Peter Liapis who swings the pendula between normalcy and obsessive occultist as Jonathan Graves quickly swept up by an invisible force that drives him to become an intermediate master of miniature minions.  Liapis has that on/off switch ability to be sane one second and completely maniacal the next and when acting tranquil and the boyfriend of nicety to Rebecca (Lisa Pelikan, “Jennifer”), you better believe that we are convinced by his prosaic act.  Jonathan’s friends are an mixed lot of stereotypical lambs for the slaughter, to be used as pawns, and never know their role in the ritual of resurrection.  Stoners buds Mike (Scott Thomson, “Parasite”) and Eddie (David Dayan) fill “Ghoulies” with comedic jokester relief, rockabilly rake Dick (Keith Joe Dick) has eyes on the bedding prize with promiscuous Anastasia (Victoria Catlin, “Maniac Cop”), and an awkward dork Mark aka Toad Boy (Ralph Seymour, “Just Before Dawn”) tries to tickle swoon hottie Donna (a very young Mariska Hargitay, “Law & Order:  SVU”) are the paired up friends to fall into the, pun-intended, Graves trap.  “Ghoulies” round out the cast with the blonde and busty “Evil Spawn” and “Mausoleum” actress Bobbie Bresee as an open-armed invitation for sex and sacrifice while persons of short stature, Peter Risch (“Malibu Hot Summer”) and Tamara de Treaux (“Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark”), credited as the smallest actress in the world, made up a pair of mischievous, quarrelling minions fed up with the current incumbent of infernal dealings. 

For a 1984, Charles Band production, especially one of his first to be distributed under his Empire Productions, “Ghoulies” establishes the bar for the miniature maniac mogul’s subsequent earlier films that may have been the peak era for Empire and even Full Moon pictures, having and hitting all the hallmark tropes of effectual horror.  A fog permeating production design with enough gothic hulk in the mansion and in the out-the-window small gravesite to immerse atmospherics, a matte composition of brilliantly simple visual effects blended with the catastrophe force inspired practical effects that aggrandizes the budget, the fantastic editing by now longtime Full Moon filmmaker Ted Nicolaou (director of “Subspecies,” “Don’t Let her In”) to piece together a more-than-palatable sound design and image, the carnivalesque soundtrack by Charles Band’s brother, Richard Band, to enrich impish latency around the characters, and, of course, the icky-coated and reptilian-rinded puppet demons by creator John Vulich (“Dolls,” “From Beyond”) in dynamic surroundings with the living, breathing characters.  What “Ghoulies” could use is fine tuning on was to further the story development.  A little more exposition into the background of who Malcom Graves is or who Jonathan Graves was calling from the slither of beyond could go a long way.  The ending transition also took a lighter approach, an additional aspect in this pre-Full Moon, Empire Production we don’t typical see in the ensuing works that grinds the desolation gears by shifting the clutch into third gear of blood, boobs, and bodies. 

Coming in at number two on the spine of the MVD Rewind Collection, as part of the 4K UHD LaserVision line, “Ghoulies” comes a 2-disc UHD and Blu-ray set. Presented in a 4K Dolby Vision HDR restoration from a16-bit scan of the original camera negative in 2460p and a sister 1080p Hi-Def restoration for the Blu-ray, both transfers exhibit in the original widescreen aspect ratio 1.85:1. Both transfers cherish the source material and even celebrate it with a clean print scan that elevates the definition of a gloomy, brooding abode under the cast of many a shadow. No issues with compression as black levels remain inky and the in-lined picture isn’t blighted by artefacts, revealing the natural grain without a combover to smooth out any original veneer from the 35mm acetated celluloid. Both discs come with an English DTS-HD 2.0 master audio that’s stark as it is clear and orderly with a prominent dialogue track and a ridiculously good sound design edit that enhances the rituals and rambunctiousness of the cult and kids. Boosted levels are balanced and well overlayed to provide max composition as we get a good range and depth of sound and space with the eye lasers, atmospheric house creaks, and an Earth-rattling finale. English subtitles are available on both formats. As usual due to the vast number of gigabytes needed, the Blu-ray special features outnumber the 4K UHD. The 4K special features include once Shout Factory! exclusives, such as a 2015 archival audio commentary by director Luca Bercovici, a 2016 audio commentary with Bercovici moderated by Terror Transmission’s Jason Andreasen. With the Blu-ray, you receive the 4K content plus a video introduction by Bercovici, which is quick, simple, and not much too an opening recollection of the keystone of his career, an interview with editor Ted Nicolau Editing an Empire that more so Nicolau’s career from beginning to current, an interview with actor Scott Thomson A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Waste as he exchanges his “Ghoulies” remembrance in that same stoner-fog as his character, an interview with Luca Bercovici Just for the Chick Man, a half-hour behind-the-scenes featurette From Toilets to Terror, a photo gallery, four television spots, and the theatrical trailer. The physical contents include a faux crumpled cardboard slipcover of the iconic Ghoulie in the toilet marketing ploy complete with security tag at the bottom. Sheathed inside is a black Blu-ray amaray with an ironed version of the cardboard O-slip. Inside, both discs are pressed with laserdisc-esque pattern art, and the insert contains a folded collectible mini-poster of the faux crumpled slipcover. The 80-minute, region A locked release doesn’t list a rating on the back cover but I suspect an unrated feature like with most Empire/Full Moon products and this seems to be the complete, unedited version. “Ghoulies” is a must-see for the casual horror fan, “Ghoulies” is a must-see for die-hard fans, and this MVD 4K and Blu-ray Rewind Collection release of “Ghoulies” is a must-own for the collector at heart.

“Ghoulies” Will Get You in the End With a 4K-Blu-ray set!

Death Penalized EVIL Returns to Wreak Havoc on Young Women. “The Stay Awake” reviewed! (Cheezy Movies / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Can You Keep Your Eyes Open at “The Stay Awake?”  On DVD now!

America, 1969. William John Brown brutally slays and sexually assaults 11 women. Before a judge, the serial killer is sentenced to death by gas chamber where his last words proclaim him as the Angel of Darkness sent Earthbound to ravage women. Nearly 20-years later in 1988, the St. Mary’s School for Girls in Europe is holding a stay awake event where a handful of students and one chaperone stay up the entire night as a fundraiser for their school. Dark and nearly vacant, the school basks in an eerie haven for the murderous William John Brown’s returning spirit seeking new souls of the softer sex. Determined to protect the girls at all costs, chaperone Trish Walton will not stop protecting the frightened girls until the entity is destroyed but when the ethereal malevolent spirit takes shape of a monstrous rodent with outstretching attack tentacles and psychokinetic glowing eyes, chances of survival are bleak.

Malevolent forces crossing oceans to death grip the innocent are films that are few and far in between as most transatlantic terror usually stays put, regionalized and localized to keep an authentic aural blend of superstition and history. Director John Bernard attempts to go against the grain with a small crowd of filmmakers who either overcame the parochial provenance and succeeded tenfold or became lost in foreign land narrative and failed miserably.  Bernard and, assumed brother, Johan Bernard co-write “The Stay Awake,” a South African mixed lot of horror elements brewed together into a supernatural schlocker that’s one-half dark and stormy night, gloomy Church Gothicism and one-half final girl survival slasher but equal parts outlandishly overexerted ghost thriller stretching across multiple continents.  “The Stay Awake” is a product of Heyns Film & Television Productions, produced by Thys Heyns of South African action-thriller flicks, as well as produced by Paul Raleigh, the producer of the “From Dusk Till Dawn” and the notable Millennium Films cofounder Avi Lerner, of “American Ninja” and “The Expendables” franchises, in one of his earliest credits from 1988.

Though the story begins in America and mostly takes place in Europe, the cast is comprised of mostly South Africans trying to pass their accents for British English that is more like a rotating centrifuge of South African sub-accents.  Shirley Jane Harris (“The Most Dangerous Woman Alive”) spearheads the cast of principals with an extremely proclaiming protagonist, delivering lines with flatfeet and flat inflection that makes her one of the more forgettable final girls.  Her foe compares just as bland with a grunting, bodiless entity floating through corridors and hiding behind indoor plants (why would an imperceptible spirit need to hide behind anything at all?) before manifesting into what looks like a giant, big-eyed, and built on steroids rodent that then shows the William John Brown (Lindsay Reardon, “The Masque of the Red Death”) in side profile speaking in omnipresent and menacingly through the beast to taunt his prey.  The script allows just enough the group of young, private school girls to standout cliquishly, contain an ounce of contempt for each other, and underpin some form of individualism to make them retain some interest in their wellbeing.  However, most of the buildup that’s created to antagonize or unify between their personalities ultimately fizzle out into resembling something along the lines of kowtowing sheep or lemmings in more ways than one.  “The Stay Awake” caffeinates with a sizeable cast including Tanay Gordon (“Hellgate”), Jayne Hutton, Michelle Carey, Maxine John (“Howling IV: The Original Nightmare”), Hellie Oeschger, Joanna Rowlands (“Armageddon: The Final Challenge”) as the damsels, Bart Fouche (“Monster Hunter”), Clinton Ephron, Warren Du Preez, and Pierre Jacobs as the imposing boys, and Ken Marshall (“Return of the Family Man”) as the school’s night caretaker.

John and Johan Bernard’s logline for “The Stay Awake” likely looked appealing on paper but a full story treatment begs to differ with an inscrutable concept from start-to-finish.  “The Stay Awake” wades in generalities, oversimplifying locations and periods such as “America, 1969” and “Europe, 1988.”  The setup meat in between the disjointed times periods sets up a standard yet effective backstory for the killer, William John Brown, with a Judge’s voiceover of all his brutal transgressions, flashbacks of his victims at the death scene, and a slow walk down the corridor to the gas chamber that clearly denote him as the villain but then accentuates his supernatural supervillainy with a demonic voice screaming his return before the gas engulfs him.  However, why move from America to Europe and why in the span of 19 years does an unexplained possessed version of William John Brown return and select a group of religious school girls while his previous victims look to be a pact of randoms from off the street?  From the start, “The Stay Awake” has little to stay our fictional plausibility.  Couple the perplexation with dry performances, a possibly Hell originated monstrous, burning eyes rat creature, and the gratuitous horror nudity rug being pulled from under our feet as the schoolgirls tease with a shower scene only to be shown showering with towels wrapped around them and what has looked to be a promising possession of perpetual pandemonium  has quickly turned into a deflated disappointment with the only really good thing to come out of the film is the stationary man in a creature suit rat monster built like a bodybuilder.

“The Stay Awake” arrives onto DVD distributed by Cheezy Movies in a direct rip of the standard definitional 480i VHS transfer with a letterbox 1.33:1 aspect ratio.  Don’t expect a detailed transfer in a jittery and smoothed over standard definition that’s covered in a harsh blue tinted lens, but the condition of the interlaced video is surprisingly close to being damage free in a well-cared for print.  However, delph and range is difficult to determine due to the obvious lack of delineation but mostly because of the blue tint, poorly lit scenes, and contrast levels that make this presentation nearly pitch-black unwatchable in corridors, classrooms, and in the room of the like, but darkness is seriously enhanced and meshed together by Bernard stylistic choices of backlighting characters or using soft light to center the focus to offer a darkened horror picture. An English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo serves as the only audio option which differentiates the soundtrack from the rest of the tracks.  Dialogue mostly separates itself to the top of the audio dogpile but is also well imbedded into the other track fighting to be heard that renders the dialogue dull and flat behind a wall of constant and diffused feedback static.  There’s also hissing at the tail end of sentences and faint crackling throughout.  Subtitles are not available.  The only extras on the static menu are back-to-back, quasi-grindhouse style trailers for two Cheezy Movies distributed titles of the blaxploitation “The Man from Harlem” and a “Dirty-Dozen”-esque “Commandoes.”  The physical aspects include a standard black DVD snapper with a rather enticing original title being sandwich with the demon’s glowing eyes on top and four schoolgirls ready to fight at the bottom.  The disk art is the same image except the four schoolgirls are cropped out and an unfortunate placement on the “The” from the title finds it punched out by the disc center/disc lock to just reveal “Stay Awake.”  The rated-R DVD has a region free playback and a runtime of 85 minutes.  “The Stay Awake” has all the indications of a cheap imitation on an established horror formula and this particular physical release doesn’t help the feature’s cause with an extremely dark and nebulous image to match its narrative.

Can You Keep Your Eyes Open at “The Stay Awake?”  On DVD now!

https://vimeo.com/814964711

When EVIL Won’t Let Go to “Those Who Walk Away” reviewed! (VMI Releasing / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Never Abandon Your Problems.  Face Them!  “Those Who Walk Away” on DVD!

When Max could no longer stomach the sight of his mother falling deeper into severe sickness, he abandons his mother’s side after a year of care.  A year-long hiatus from dating has put a temporary halt on his love life, but as he rejoins the socializing game, he connects with Avery on an online dating app.  Avery appears to be the perfect girl:  smart, witty, and really into him.  The start of their first date is a match made in heaven until the girl too good to be true decides to drive him to a supposed haunted house for uninhibited fun when their original plans fall through.  Inside, a dilapidated abode comes with an appalling story, surrounding a malevolent urban legend spirit known as Rotcreep.  Swallowed by house’s notoriety, Max and Avery grapple with their own personal demons that have come back to haunt them and with no escape, facing the trauma is the only path toward survival.

A lot of films, past and present, are drenched dripping in the trauma theme that the subtopic has become waterlogged in the independent and mainstream scene, but has there ever been a trauma touted full length feature film that was done in one long single take?  That’s the novelty concept to proof of product feature from writer-director Robert Rippberger, a documentary filmmaker who has only recently dipped his toes into fictional storytelling.  After the 2019 unsung release of “Strive,” an urban drama of perseverance starring Danny Glover (“Predator 2”), Rippberger’s latest “Those Who Walk Away” sets two personal distresses into a prevailing evasion of death.   Rippberger’s script, cowritten with Spencer Moleda, materializes one’s own baggage being personified as waking nightmares or a manifestation of shackling malevolence, manacled by past mistakes and centrifugal hurt.  The Chillicothe, Illinois shot picture is a production of Ripberger’s own Los Angeles based SIE Films, Argentic Productions, and is in association with Slated Productions and Sandeep Sekhar Films with Rippberger, Sandeep Skehar, and Argentic’s KT Kent producing. 

At the center of the story are Max, played by “Twilight” franchise’s Booboo Stewart (no relationship to Kristen Stewart), and Avery, played by Scarlett Sperduto (“Float”), as individuals looking for love or connection having met on a dating app.  Necessary lengthy exposition provides the footing for “Those Who Walk Away’s” climatic third act, giving Max and Avery a chance to go to town on their historical credentials during the date as we learn about Max’s ill mother and his sudden departure from her around the clock care before the heartache becomes soul consuming and about Avery’s fight or flight childhood, anecdotal and accounts that are kept closer to her chest,  with her close and adored brother.  The chemistry is palpable between them with nervous conversational exchanges and teasing jocularity that makes their one long scene seem like an actual first date, completely selling the dynamics with the audience who are induced with anxious butterflies and an eagerness to connect, emotionally and sexually, on Max and Avery’s behalf.  The narrative, ultimately, has to change because “Those Who Walk Away” is not a romantic-comedy but rather a dramatic-horror.  Whereas everything seemed to go swimmingly with the two young love birds really getting into the moment, we’re suddenly engaged with a different, if not darker, tone that has come out of the swindling shadows and into the light of a dimly lit, ramshackle haunted house that is the premier first date destination experience, if you’re a sociopathic survivor that is.  “Those Who Walk Away” works with a tight, small cast that finishes off the list with Grant Morningstar, Devin Keaton, Bryson Whereas, Connor McKinley Griffin, and former professional wrestler, veteran stuntman, and veteran actor of such films as “The Mask,” “Barb Wire,” “Hot Wax Zombies on Wheels” with Nils Allen Stewart, aka The Stomper, as the Rotcreep – again, not related to Kristen Stewart, but is father of lead actor Booboo Stewart.

“Those Who Walk Away” has the concentrated acting chops to pull off the two-pronged plot and despite the obscure and incoherencies with the revelation climax, the turn of events still bids a gripping blank check on what to expect next.  Yet, the most interesting portions of the film are not those aspects that do have a degree of excellence for an indie project.  Instead, the single long take from opening-to-ending credits is a mind-blowing feat.  Unless there’s a seamless cut that I’m missing or blind to, “Those Who Walk Away” never edits or cuts away from the action that puts the actors in a position of having to perform to perfection.  Rippberger also doesn’t remain stationary to a single location for the first half of the film, coursing through the populated public park and bustling small town of Chillicothe during Max and Avery’s getting-to-know-you talk-and-walk, and as the story evolves toward more sinister circumstances in a one house setting, Rippberger can’t sit still and uses nearly every square inch of the creepy, boarded up house to his advantage, creating and changing up room interiors that fashion an illusionary creepy funhouse that Max scrambles from room-to-room avoiding Rotcreep and finding a way out of what could be perceived as Hell in a house, a metaphor for Max’s own mother-abandoning torment.  If that isn’t impressive enough, Diego Cordero’s camera handling to make the single take work isn’t bush league cinematography as having the frame trajectory move in tight, confined spaces without a bit of awkwardness, like moving from outside the car to inside the front of the cab then to the back between the driver and passenger seat while keeping characters in frame and keeping the characters acting is a tough, planned shot.  What’s also tough is achieving crisp dialogue in one take and that’s where the film falters a little with the pivotal exposition losing strength and clarity where it’s needed the most, essentially being muddled instead of meticulously articulate if actors are either not vigorously vocal enough, mic placement isn’t exact, or mic picks up other noises that scuttle overtop the dialogue.

Courtesy of VMI Releasing and MVD Visual comes a chilling crucible in “Those Who Walk Away” on DVD.  Presented in 720p on a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, the film is distributed on a DVD5 with a reasonable compression rate to keep the image sharp without a lot of addition fluff to bog down the overall compacted digital transfer.  Instances of off and on lens focus works against the long take, much like the audio, where timely is key but as far as VMI Releasing’s handling of the storage, the resolution and image quality do the work to represent the best quality possible.  Although the DVD back cover states one audio option – an English Dolby Digital 5.1 – there is a second option with a English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo.  Unless you’re setup with a surround sound, the stereo option will have identical dialogue and ambience noise but there is an amplified finish on the soundtrack by video game composer Dmitrii Miachin with the drawn out violins and a brooding, sonorous pitch.  Dialogue is a minorly muddle as mentioned before with the tribulations on a feature length shot but mostly clean and clear to the point of satisfaction.  Aside from the static menu’s original trailer for the film, and the illustratively ghoulish opening sequence, the DVD comes with no other bonus material.  The DVD comes in a standard DVD tall case with a front cover of a bloodied Booboo Steward looking dazed walking through fire and the same image is used for the disc art.  Psychologically scything, “Those Who Walk Away’s” fillets guilt from the bone with scene shooting originality and a cast that nails every second lapse. 

Never Abandon Your Problems.  Face Them!  “Those Who Walk Away” on DVD!

On the Verge of a New Millennium, New Faces and Stories Tell Their Terror on the Same Old EVIL Video Format! “V/H/S/99” reviewed! (Acorn Media International / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Found Footage is all the 90’s Craze These Days! “V/H/S/99” Available at Amazon!

The year:  1999.  The format:  VHS.  The theme:  The most horrifying experiences caught on found footage camera.  A horror anthology for the turn of the century puts together five of the most terror-drenched short films that resurrects the punk-rock dead, turns urban legends into vindictive playthings, televises Lovecraftian game show frights, peers into the stone-cold eyes of a Gorgon neighbor, and goes to Hell and back!  All caught on camera from a first-person view as VHS vicariously relives the glory days through a digital world, capsulated by the horror realm and all its fanatical acolytes for the analogue video format to live undead forever. 

Living in the age of a VHS comeback is admittedly kind of weird.  VHS has become a hot collectible, especially and obvious the rate and obscure that mostly resides in the horror and cult genre.  Most recently, a discovery on a Brazilian VHS cut of Jaws 2 has a couple of minutes of shot footage that no other release holds to this day.  That, being just one example, is sought after power of VHS that saw various versions of one film be disperse far and wide across continents, which the same could be said about DVD that too saw a variety of different cuts due to the diversity of playback formats, distribute cuts, and numerous levels of censorship between countries.  VHS is also making a comeback in format style with gritty, faded, flat colored image veneer and tracking lines and the absent transmission signal of snow statically adorning the screen with beautifully hypnotical and flickering white dots.  So, it’s now surprise that on the heels of 2021’s “V/H/S/94,” another analog anthology is greenlit in 94’s wake with “V/H/S/99” for 2022, written and helmed by newcomers to the series but not necessarily newcomers to the horror scene.  The movie’s sequential lineup Is as follows:  Short filmmaker Maggie Levin writes-and-directors “Shredding,” taking a break from killer sharks is Johannes Roberts to oversee his “Suicide Bid” entry, musician Flying Lotus directs and co-writes with Zoe Cooper with “Ozzy’s Dungeon,” “Tragedy Girls’” director Tyler Macintyre writes-directs “The Gawkers” along with co-writer and fellow “Tragedy Girls’” screenwriter Chris Lee Hill, and the husband and wife tag team of Joseph and Vanessa Winter, filmmakers of “Deadstream,” helms-and-pens “To Hell And Back.”  The Shudder exclusive series latest is produced by Josh Goldbloom (“V/H/S/94”), David Bruckner (director of “Hellraiser” ‘22), Chad Villella (producer of the of 2022’s “Scream”), Bloody Disgusting’s Brad Miska, and “Scream” ’22 and “Scream VI” director Matt Bettinelli-Olpin under the production banner of Studio 71 and presented by Cinepocalypse Productions and Bloody Disgusting.

A new set of five tales of analog rendered terror invoke a new set of actors in each short film that carrier with them a broad range of experience. While a couple of the stories shred the narrative with hectic editing (I’m looking at you “Shredding”), performances throughout come over with blistering consternation and definitely a late 90’s grunge attitude with “Shredding” and “The Gawkers” delivering the full blunt force of period, heckling away in their baggy clothing, bohemian hairstyles, and a penchant for skateboard thrashing. The other films are merely timeless with only mere mentions of date, or their timestamped on the video tape recording, or are just a thematical proverbial nod to the specific point in time, lacking the keep it real essence that is quite idiosyncratic to the hop from a phasing out decade and into a whole new other. The cast of these shorts play their roles with exuberance and wackiness, which if you have lived in or can look back to the converging decades/millennium and see some of the gameshows or cultural shenanigans that defined America as people or, if you want to go smaller, just the pop culture, wacky is a pinpoint descriptor. The short films’ of “V/H/S/99” are comprised of a cast including, selectively, Steven Ogg (“The Walking Dead”), Ally Ioannides (“Synchronic”), Keanush Tafreshi, Jesse LaTourette (“There’s Someone In Your House”), Dashiell Derrickson, Isabelle Hahn, Sonya Eddy (“Blast”), Emily Sweet (“Castle Freak” ’20), Melanie Stone (“Deadstream”), Archelaus Crisanto, Luke Mullen, and Ethan Pogue.

Anthologies have been around for decades and are a great medium to showcase a multitude of individual storytelling from a variety of filmmakers walking different paths in life.  Fans can often salivate over these types of jump-the-shark formats that can start off with the zombie undead, transition 10 minutes later into a supernatural spooky, and then segue into a creature feature with a wraparound bonus story that may or may not connect them all and squeeze each episodic terror vision in a full-length feature runtime.  Though I enjoy a good collection of short and sheer frightful films, anthologies are not my cup of sanguinary tea.  Hopefully, no partisan takes seep out of this review as I attempt to examine “V/H/S/99” objectively.  Out of the five segments, three have landed strong with a right amount combination of style, gore, performance, narrative logic, and, of course, terror, and if you like comedic sugar in your black cup of horror then “To Hell And Back” is a perfect Venti-sized, well-blended mulatto of choice that thrusts two dimwitted demonic ritual documentarians into the pits of dark, gloomy, and malformed creature Hell and fight their way back to their own plane of existence.  Though one flaw some make catch when watching the caboose film of the anthology is that it doesn’t particularly reflect 1999 other than the small caveat, which is pivotal to the story, that at the turn of the millennia is when the veil between our world and Hell is as it’s thinnest.  The other two better entries capture more infinitesimally in detail of the late 90s, early 2000s clothing and discourse.  “The Gawkers” taps hard into the weird aggressive hormones of a teenage boy while exploring the newfound ways to use technology as spyware.   Webcams aboard big boxy desktops chauffeur in a whole new way to be creepy that lands them in hot water not by the law but by the wrath of ancient femme fatale of Greek mythology.  Johannes Roberts rounds out the better half with a sorority haze gone wrong that evokes an urban legend to become more than just a story and Roberts “Suicide Bid” offers, again, that period presence that feels like a tribute throwback to the 1998 “Urban Legend” film itself, but adds a supernatural surprise that utterly creepy and not as deep with only 6 feet underground rather than a 47 meters down, the director is slowing raising his fear to the surface.  The shorts left hanging below the bar are “Shredding” and “Ozzy’s Dungeon” and for reasons that have to do with their style and story. “Shredding” promising premise is plagued not by punk phantasms back from the dead but simply pilfered of focus with a hectic, if not severely chaotic, VHS-graded editing scheme that shocks the perception senses while “Ozzy’s Dungeon” is inspired by Nickelodeon’s Legends of the Hidden Temple gameshow where kids have to compete in toned down ancient society games to race up the temple to win the big prize. “Ozzy’s Dungeon” definitely is weird, sadistic, and Lovecraftian-inspired for sure but its story design loses motivation and often cheats rounding the bases in order to reach the shocking climatic finale.

Acorn Media International brings tape to the United Kingdom with a Blu-ray home entertainment release of “V/H/S/99.” Presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, though doesn’t cater to the standard 4:3 ratio of video tape, the provided image quality purposefully varies to give audiences the titular analog experience. Faded grading, tracking lines, static and that jittery playback is all part of the visual environmental experience and even a few of the filmmakers shoot the film digitally to then run it through VHS to garnish with unnatural base video turbulence. The English DTS-HD 5.1 surround sound mix heightens the exposure and familiarity to of being that person behind the camera as all of these shorts of short POV. Intense and, often, cacophonous, the audio tracks still manage to level out, be discerned, and manage to relay the chaos no matter how much bedlam is thrown at the screen. From the zoom in-and-outs of the video tape recorder, there’s a clean sense of depth and the range is bountiful as the ambient track runs the gamut of omnifarious sounds that give each episode an individualized stamp. English SHD is optional. Bonus content includes an exclusive panel from New York’s Comic Con with guests producer Josh Goldbloom, “The Gawkers'” Tyler Macintyre, and “To Hell And Back’s” Joseph and Vanessa Winter as well as a total arc gag reel. After that encompassing project feature, the girth of the bonus content breaks down into the individual shorts with “Shredding” having a deleted scene and the complete fictious band BitchCat music video, “Ozzy Dungeon” has two deleted scenes, “The Gawkers” has a deleted scene as well as bloopers, camera tests, and The Making of Medusa, and “To Hell And Back” rounds out the features with a hefty look at the raw footage, scouted location, and a storyboard and blocking rehearsals. There are no bonus features for Johannes Roberts’ “Suicide Bid.” Physical features include a slightly thicker traditional Blu-ray snapper, a Europe standard, with a cover art that matches the North American RLJE release, a city being loomed over by skull made out of colorful galactic stars and a pair of video lenses for blank eyes. The disc art is pressed with the same front cover image. Though no mention of a region playback on the back cover, I suspect a region B encoded release as per usual with Acorn Media Interntional. “V/H/S/99” has a total runtime of 109 minutes and is UK certified 18 for strong blood violence/gore. “V/H/S/99” is not my kind of off the heasy subgenre, but the latest series anthology packs a punch and I would never discourage anyone from not experiencing firsthand an homage trip through terror.

Found Footage is all the 90’s Craze These Days! “V/H/S/99” Available at Amazon!