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EVIL’s Vampiric Power Over the Homunculus is Short Lived! “Decadent Evil” reviewed! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

The Remastered “Decadent Evil” is now on Blu-ray!

An evil vampiric bloodline has stretched from Europe to U.S., specially in the Los Angeles area, where Morella, a centuries year old master vampire, collects the blood of innocent victims and she requires just one more soul to fulfill a prophecy to be the most powerful and invincible vampire ever.  Morella is so cruel she even transformed her once lover into a homunculus, a scaly and green shrunken humanoid, to keep as a caged pet.  When two of Morella’s thralls are uncovered working at a strip club by a dwarf vampire hunter with a grudge, she finds obtaining the last soul to be challenging, especially when one of her subservient vampires, Sugar, is against the whole bloodsucking attribute and falls in love with the strip club DJ.  With Sugar, the DJ, the homunculus, and the vampire hunter standing in her way of total immortality of godlike proportions, Morella has little allies in her corner but has the majority of evil power behind her ancestral lineage. 

An early 2000’s Anne Rice facsimile, “Decadent Evil” is Charles Band and Full Moon’s other Gothically romantic infused vampire feature behind “Subspecies” and “The Vampire Journals,” which are technically all part of the same “Subspecies” universe in one way or another.   The “Puppet Master” and “Trancers” cult filmmaker helms the 2005 low-budget feature and cowrites it alongside a staple Full Moon screenwriter Domonic Weir (“Evil Bong”) in what would be one of Weir’s first feature length films for the longtime genre producing company after gifting the horror community with a “Critters” screenplay in 1986.  After a few minor re-writings of Hong Kong actioners for an English dub, Weir returns to horror with Full Moon and indulges Band on his diminutive obsession with tiny terrors.  And what may you ask is the small creature in a sexy-slathered vampire flick?  A homunculus is written into the story, of course!  Band produces “Decadent Evil” not under Full Moon but Wizard Entertainment in collaboration with Shoot Productions and Astonishing Features with Jeremy Gordon and Jethro Rothe-Kushel as association producers on the Los Angeles based shoot. 

The prologue backstory of “Decadent Evil” can be misleading as to who the main characters will be with a restructured, recut introduction made from bits and pieces of scenes of “The Vampire Jounrals,” another Full Moon production, that uses a power Euro male vampire bloodline as the basis for Morella’s L.A. homebase of operations, which include the ying yang, naughty and nice, vampiric sisters, Sugar and Spyce.  “Blood Dolls” and “Prison of the Dead’s” Debra Mayer, a late 1990’s scream queen for about a decade and half until her eventual departure from acting, plays the head vampire in charge Morella with a firm grip on her subservient thrall, the angsty and gothic-inclined Spyce (Raelyn Hennessee, “Cutter’s Club”) and the sweet-and-innocence exuding Sugar (Jill Michelle, “Erotic Secrets”).  The sisters go through the motions of obedience but to an extent with Sugar basically disavowing her vampire blood in hopes for a romance relationship with her strip club’s DJ Dex (Daniel Lennox, “The Black Magic”) and Spyce pushes the limits of her own control, like a teenager testing their parents, by drinking the blood of those meant for Morella’s grand power count.  With a 67-minute runtime, “Decadent Evil” doesn’t have the minutes to really explore the characters that force the actors to be plain, act plain, and never be anything more than plain.  Even Phil Fondacaro, the headlining star and most recognizable face of the troupe, must purge backstory in a flash upon his acute introduction mid-way through.  The “Willow” and “Ghoulies II” actor is a vengeful vampire hunter after his father falls victim to Morella.  April Gilbert (“The Butcher”), Roger Toussaint (“Illicit Dreams”), John F. Schaeffer, and, of course, it wouldn’t be a Charles Band picture without a half-naked adult film star in Harmony Rose who goes topless for the cause. 

Locally shot near the company home base of Los Angeles, full of either Full Moon actors or greenhorn actors, little-to-no budget for practical or computer generated effects, a runtime of under an hour, and the tacking on of “The Vampire Journals” at the beginning to extend the length to just that under the hour mark is a true show of low-budget colors from Charles Band and Full Moon.  The premise of Morella becoming an omnipotent vampire through a scrapbook collection of pure blood is a solid enough premise that is unfortunately not explored enough to become invested, turning this Full Moon venture into what it has become over the last couple of decade, a feast of female-casted eye candy and fatigued nostalgia without implementing anything new to the vampire or horror genre.  There’s also the matter of the homunculus that becomes a centerpiece and eventually tops as the main motif that hangs around in a bird cage and perversely has eyes for blood while simultaneously carrying around a major libido with scenes of molesting and raping involving the pint size creature.  The whole idea is a bit off, added to sate Charles Band’s fascination of with small creatures, and only adds mild interest in its development through the story which ends in a perversion of slapstick that, again, doesn’t fit, this time in the narrative tone. 

Full Moon continues to upgrade their catalogue, and the “Decadent Evil” films are the latest to be AVC encoded onto a BD25 with a remastered, high-def, 1080p, resolution for the first time ever in HD with a transfer scan form the original 35mm negative.   The early 2000 film sustains a fair amount of its 35mm charm despite most companies flocking to the less expensive digital format and this helps retain a richer saturation and an organically bold image that accentuates the hardlines and elaborately dressed gothic interiors and the smoke-filled darkness of the strip club.  The rest of the settings are standard fair, but the focus is within Morella’s L.A. mansion that has a mistress vampire’s touch.  The digitized conversion and the upgrade in pixels have cleaned up the image some but hasn’t exactly wowed with impressive measure as the details often fluctuate outside stylized lighting and smoke.  There’s often superb, granule detail on the homunculus’s shiny wet gland-filled dermis and deep contoured bone structure in the obvious puppet’s face and head.  The English audio comes with a couple of uncompressed formats with an PCM 5.1 and a 2.0 Stereo.  The 5.1 is more than enough for dialogue, soundtrack, and the ambient environment, though the latter is more for immediate focal points rather than the natural course of surroundings.  For instance, the homunculus’s heavy breathing and slippery skin provide characteristics to the already unique character but since much of the narrative is held indoors in a still mansion, there’s not much to the audio atmospherics, and even the strip club is doused with a rock track that swallows any other diegetic and nondiegetic noise.  Dialogue prominently in front but can struggle with depth in the 5.1 mix that often doesn’t pick it up; there’s better discernibility within the dual channel that maintains a front forward audio rather than trying to diffuse the already distance stilted audio.  “Decadent Evil’s” soundtrack is less carnivalesque than other Full Moon productions because Richard Band is not at the orchestrator helm, providing “Deathbed” composer James T. Sale’s soap opera Gothicism and playful low-tones more opportunities to flourish with this campy vampy film.  Extra features include a behind-the-scenes with snip interviews with the cast, a blooper reel, the original trailer, and other preview trailers from Full Moon Features.  The physical release mirrors much from the same line of DVD to Blu-ray upgrades with standard Amaray case.  The one-sided sleeve art illustration is new, which is a fine collage of characters, yet is uncredited.  There’s no inserts or other tangible extras on this region free, 74-minute, unrated vampire indulger. 

Last Rites: Fans of Full Moon’s “Subspecies” and ‘The Vampire Journals” will find “Decadent Evil” to stagger in its more modern affiliation with a meek story having little-to-no bite, favoring more the shorter stints of an arbitrary homunculus inclusion and Phil Fondacaro’s flyby hunter.

The Remastered “Decadent Evil” is now on Blu-ray!

Put a Quarter in the Slot to Play EVIL’s Game! “Arcade” reviewed! (Full Moon / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Insert Coin for “Arcade” on Blu-ray!

Arcade, the future of advanced, virtual reality-based video games, piques the interest of a group of teenagers eager to beta test the system in an underground arcade.  Vertigo, who engineered and programmed the game, sends the project manager to also hand out at-home editions of the game for continued testing.  When Arcade sucks in Alex’s boyfriend, Greg, into the game, she pleads to video game aficionado and good friend Nick about the game’s sentient dangers.  Nick experiences firsthand the horrors as their friend Laurie becomes entranced by its manipulative power and disappears during Arcade’s reach into reality.  Alex and Nick must venture into Arcade’s world to save Greg and their friends from a malicious machine seeking to invade and takeover the world, but they must find the hidden keys in all seven stages to reach Arcade’s soul and that’s no easy task when the game becomes very real when dying in the game will not grant respawn in the game or reality.

A movie ahead of its time but not ahead of the game, the Full Moon production “Arcade” is a live-action in a CGI-world thriller that’s one part “Tron” and one part “Virtuosity” for independent cinema, directed by the cybernetic and dystopian familiar filmmaker Albert Pyun (“Nemesis,” “Cyborg”).  Charles Band, founder of Full Moon and of a number of low-budget hit franchises, such as “Puppet Master” and “Demonic Toys,” light bulbs “Arcade’s” concept while David S. Goyer, the same David S. Goyer behind “Dark City,” “The Dark Knight,” and the 2022 “Hellraiser,” penned the script, marking the second collaborative production between Pyun and Goyer (“Kickboxer II”) as well as between Band and Goyer (“Demonic Toys”).  Band serves as executive producer alongside Michael Catalano and is show running produced by Cathy Gesualdo, all of whom were involved in the back-to-back productions with Albert Pyun with “Arcade” and “Dollman.”

Early Full Moon films always had an interest cast mix of known and unknown actors and “Arcade” is no exception with the tragically inclined Alex, a teen with nightmares about her mother’s year ago gruesome suicide and her father’s inability to cope since, played by an early 90’s recognizable beauty and then Full Moon regular Megan Ward (“Crash and Burn,” “Trancers II,”), coming off her success costarring alongside Brendan Fraser, Polly Shore, and Sean Astin as the love interest in “Encino Man.”  Ward role isn’t a damsel in distress one as Alex isn’t afraid to take and dive into a game of certain death to be the lone riser up against all odds.  An interesting piece of casting is Peter Billingsley, a name and face that might be familiar as Ralphie from Bob Clark’s “The Christmas Story.”  Instead of pining over a Red Ryder BB Gun that will undoubtedly shoot his eye out, Billingsley embodies the serious gamer amongst his group of friends who pines for the next level of gaming but also pines secretly for Alex, a subplot that’s not explored as well as it was technically setup.  The lone survivors of Arcade’s acute takeover embark into virtual reality to save the rest of their friends, under the cast of Bryan Dattilo as boyfriend Greg, Brandon Rane, A.J. Langer (“The People Under the Stairs”), and Seth Green (“Idle Hands”) in his early years, all of whom either disappear at moment’s notice of the game’s turn to complete evil or have a moment to stand out with dialogue or a pyshical scene.  John de Lancie’s role is small in comparison to his costars but the Q actor for “Star Trek:  The Next Generation” and “Picard” has the gift to protrude positively amongst the cast with Lancie’s quick-wit and timed deliveries as the Vertigo gaming production representative Difford unaware of the game’s conscious, dark design.   Norbert Weisser (“The Thing”), Don Stark (“Evilspeak”), Sharon Farrell (“Night of the Comet), and the voice of Jonathan Fuller (“The Pit and the Pendulum”) as Arcade’s voice round out the film’s amazingly cult chic cast.

In terms of computer-generated graphics of the early 1990s just eking out of the last decade, “Arcade’s” virtual world is of a clunky, chunky enterprise that epitomizes the era’s current technology.  One could argue “Tron” had that same boxiness only forgiven by its award-winning cast.  “Arcade” may not have an accolade-laden cast but the Band and Pyun production does, too, receive a pass for its eclectic and curious cast of well-rounded and peculiar-implanted actors and actresses, and also crew, that gives “Arcade” not only a reason to subdue the heavily-contrasted and bulky CGI but also rises it up to be larger than life, more than perhaps it deserved to be in regard to the story’s influences.  However, this poor man’s version still has a gimmick coating and the third act editing is atrociously choppy to a point where nowhere could possibly know what’s going on as Alex flies through the seven-level pyramid, easily unearthing the hidden keys, and ending in the summit of Arcade’s human brain wave laced soul.  Pieces of the reel were left on the cutting room floor, pieces that would have depicted more rigorous opposition to thwart Alex’s climb in the levels and would explains a whole lot more why she appears bangs up by the end.  Albert Pyun resurfaces some of his best directional work to create unsettling moments of possession or of being unhinged as well as using smoke to diffuse the primary hue vibrance starkly contrasted against the computerized gaming world.

Newly remastered in high-definition with touched up color and detail refinement, “Arcade” now has a new Blu-ray release from the Full Moon Feature catalogue.  Compounding and restoring various elements, the Full Moon team pulls together the best pieces for the best, up-to-date version available encoded on a MPEG-2 AVC, 1080p, BD25 disc.  Honestly, a BD50 would have been better suited for the compression as “Arcade” runs the gamut of effects, coloring, and dark scenes in which, those scenes outside of virtual reality, aka green screen, Albert Pyun’s infuses smoke for the underground arcade to diffuse the colors, spreading them amongst the crowd and the room to create that dive bar atmosphere.  However, there’s a bit of artificial banding surrounding the natural banding that delineates the colors within the darkness.  Details are also impossible to gauge with the choice styles of hazy and CGI but there are moments of clarity that gives “Arcade” a clean bill of image health around the skin textures. “Arcade” must have been made from televisions as the label remasters the ’93 feature inside it’s full screen 4:3 aspect ratio. Full Moon offers two audio formats: an English PCM 5.1 surround sound and a Stereo 2.0. Dialogue has clear projection without any damage or interference for an independent, 30+ year old film from the early 90’s, but the track isn’t as hardy as desired, especially in the multi-channel that doesn’t diffuse anemically through the side and back channels. Separation also can’t decipher between reality and virtual reality with the layers melding together on a level playing field. Range decently plays a wide berth of tonal shades in computerized, “Tron”-like synth-cycling and in-game explosions and distortions. There are no English subtitles available. Special features include an audio commentary with Full Moon found and producer Charles Band and Alex star Megan Ward in a good one-on-one conversational piece about the past production and a little insight rom Ward’s thoughts and Band’s history as a child to a movie mogul but there’s also a lot of Band flirting with Megan Ward. There’s an archival interview with John De Lancie, a rare VFX reel that extends a few scenes plus displays the scrapped original CGI, the typical accompanying Videozone marketing of Full Moon’s streaming catalogue, other Full Moon trailers, and the original film trailer. Inside the blue Amaray case, the cover art features the original VHS composition artwork and a disc concentratedly pressed with one version of “Arcade’s” virtual villains. The region free release is rated R and has a runtime of 101 minutes.

Last Rites: “Arcade” respawns in a newly remastered high-definition transfer that’s greatly cleaned up the flecked rough patches in front of the computer-generated engine but doesn’t smooth out the rocky terrain of the last act that suffers erratic editing for quick pinch pacing instead of really fleshing out the story flow.

Insert Coin for “Arcade” on Blu-ray!

EVIL Sinks Its Teeth into the Reach of the Worldwide Web! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Death Streamer” Now on Blu-ray!

A trio of struggling horror video podcasters stumble across a dark web stream while content mining for their derelict house of God set macabre show Church of Chills.  When they stumble upon a bloodcurdling ritual of drugging women and man vampirically ripping out and feasting on their necks, the footage is all too real based on their research and investigation into the underground live streams that rack up thousands of views and subscribers.  Eager to piggyback off the streams’ success, the Church of Chills reveals the callous, artery puncturing content to the world.  The live streaming ancient vampire master, seeking sacrifices to bring the end of days upon the world, is none too happy with the intruders doxing his content that has amassed a large following and warns them with omnipotent power, sending the three into flight or fight for their very lives and the for the sake of the world.

As the famous chorus line from the legendary rock-n-roll band AC/DC once sang, If you want nudity, you got it!  Or was it blood?  Either way, Charles Band’s “Death Streamer” you get plenty of both!  The new tech, modernized vampire lurks from out of the classic, gothic shadows and becomes the next inspirational concept from the longtime, distinguished founder and filmmaker of Full Moon Entertainment and the “Trancers” and “Head of the Family” director, Charles Band.  The 2024 feature is written from Band’s concept into story detail and dialogue by Neal Marshall Stevens, the screenwriter behind “Thir13en Ghosts” remake “Hellraiser:  Deader” and who has since become a Full Moon staff writer with credits going from touching the “Puppet Master” franchise with “Blade:  The Iron Cross” to new content with “AIMEE:  The Visitor,” penned under Stevens’ pseudonym of Roger Baron as so too with “Death Streamer.”  Full Moon Entertainment’s Charles Band and Nakai Nelson produce their latest with a budget aid alley-oop by a crowdfunding campaign.

“Death Streamers” core cast has small but mighty with Aaron Michael McDaniel debuting in his feature film role as Alex Jarvis, the egocentric host of Church of Chills, and his two beautiful assistants in Emma Massalone as Edwins and Kaitlin Moore as Juniper struggling in a power dynamic over who has creative control over the show while staying financially afloat being unhoused living inside test in a defunct house of God.  Convincing audiences the trio of being adept and meticulous with computers and a video podcast is a hard sell when they live in popup tents and rariely leave the church grounds without much background other than short spats of the show’s brief history, but nonetheless, the three M’s – McDaniel, Massalone, and Moore – make their character emotions and pangs work to the story’s advantage rarther than have it feel like a detrimental free for all for the spotlight.  Creeping into that bright circle is the dark heart of vampire streamer Arturo Valenor, played Sean Ohlman.  The sex club proprietor, operating in the underground markets, drugs beauties with his own blood, rips their clothes off, and has his way sucking the lifeforce from their tender necks.  This dark web act is unearthed by the Church of Chills team and becomes the focal point for them to piggyback and drive-up subscribers with real life macabre only to be discovered and threatened by Valenor’s ever-present powers. Ohlman makes for a good hip vampire but doesn’t exact that gothic depravity of a classic bloodsucker in Valenor’s more erotically inclined sacrifices.  Only in the very showdown end do all four principals find themselves in the same scene together, previous working separately across the worldwide dark web or through Valenor’s giant floating eyes of foreboding.  Yes, floating giant eyes is pretty trippy and old school.  The rest cast constitutes as one half of Valenor’s vampiric acolytes with Chili Jean as the blood serving barkeep and Travis Stoner as the gimp-masked muscle and the other half half-naked Valenor victims in Llana Barron, Piper Parks, and it wouldn’t be a Full Moon Feature without an adult actress making an appearance with Maddy May going fully nude.

“Death Streamer” follows the same formula Full Moon has been following the last few years by pulling inspiration from the latest and greatest, perhaps even from the ugliest, flavor of the month cultural impact item has to offer.  2020 saw the release of “Corona Zombies” to bank off the pandemic, also from 2020 was “Barbie & Kendra Save the Tiger King” spun from the popular Netflix documentary of the same “Tiger King” title surrounding convicted felon Joe Exotic, “AIMEE:  The Visitor” featured sensationally the dangers of A.I. during the artificial intelligence concern of rise, especially amongst the arts industry, and, lastly, a slew of video content infused storylines as TikTok, Facebook Live, X Live, and many other platforms become an overconsumption of media with “Bad Influencer,” “Attack of the 50ft Camgirl,” and “Subscriber” being a few examples.  “Death Streamer” fits in the latter category as well by following a what seems to be an endless horizon of streaming content from music, to vidcasts, to live feeds in today’s highly consumable media world where everybody, and their brother, has streams to be viral.  “Death Streamer” using today’s tech to try and modernize the mythos of one of man’s longstanding lores, vampires.  Charles Band’s two-prong locations keep costs of the crowdfunded dollars down while pushing much of the cashflow toward effects, both practical with off-screen trickery and blood spurts, and compositional VFX that sees large floating eyes and thousands of chirping bats, as well as getting essentially all the female actresses at least to a bare-chested level with even one using her holy cross chest tattoo, nested right between her mammaries, as the final nail in the coffin for one unlucky, or maybe very luck, vampire with a death by a gratuitous emblematic exposure.  Hands down, “Death Streamer” has the best kill scene I’ve seen this year!

Be a subscriber to the end of the world with Full Moon Feature’s “Death Streamer” now available on Blu-ray. The AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD25 seems adequate for the presentation flushed with warm red, blue, and green color filters. Details are sparse depending on the artistic alleyway inside Valenor’s club or inside his POV camera-specs, brighter the gels, lesser the finer points to the textures. The church setting, or the Church of Chills HQ, puts together a better angled lighting and a starker contrast by way of deeper shadows. Insignificant compression issues despite the single layer format but we’re not receiving the cleanest, most refined, looking picture image that’s presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio. Two English encoded audio outputs are both Dolby Digital compressed with a 5.1 surround sound mix and a dual channel 2.0 stereo. Not the strongest or dynamic reproduction of the original, raw audio as it suppresses the action and removes the multiple channel pathways, rendering over mostly in the front channels in what the listing is more 5.1 in name only. Dialogue comes over clean and clearly enough without a spark of obstruction and is layered above the environment as well as what’s usually an overpowering Full Moon carnivalesque or Gothic score. English closed captioned subtitles are available. Special features include a behind-the-scenes of the regularly archived and accompanying Videozone specials, the “Death Streamer” premiere held in Los Angele was cast, crew, and a few select Full Moon friends, such as Barbara Crampton, with a Charles Band pre-movie few words, and a lineup of Full Moon trailers. The standard release of the Blu-ray Amaray has a pulpy illustrative cover art of a bloodied mouth Valenor and his two acolytes splayed in red, blues, and purple. The region free release comes not rated and has a just above an hour runtime of 72 minutes.

Last Rites: As the vampire canon expands with age, new grooves are etched into the classical monster’s lineage tree and “Death Streamer” is a cyber-ghoul knot ready to leave its influential mark only to have its fangs nulled down and overshadowed by the all-powerful naked female figure in another fair-weather Full Moon Feature.

“Death Streamer” Now on Blu-ray!

Dolly Deadlies Exact an EVIL Revenge! “Doll Graveyard” reviewed! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Doll Graveyard” Available for Purchase Here!

In 1911, little Sophia is accidently killed by her verbally abusive stepfather.  He buries her lifeless body in the backyard dirt along with her favorite toy dolls that were the subject of his current tirade.  Nearly a century later and in the same house, Deedee, a teenage high school girl, throws a small party with friends while her father is out for the night.  Her action figure-enthusiastic little brother Guy discovers one of buried dolls in the backyard.  When a couple of older high school boys bully Guy, the spirit of Sophia emerges and pendulates possession of Guy’s mind and body, resulting in the turning of inanimate dolls into killers come alive to protect a hurt Sophia.  Drugs, alcohol, and teen sex quickly come to an end by a seize of small, dangerously armed toys hellbent on spilling blood just to protect a hurt little girl.  Those left still standing must find a way to reverse Sophia’s revenge.

Charles Band’s obsession with toys, dolls, dwarfs, goblins, or a sundry of the mix has yet to slow down his 50-year-career in making independent movies.  The now 72-year-old Band can sit on top of his Full Moon empire and enjoy his repertoire of ravenous rascal horror, including “Doll Graveyard,” the 2005 standalone doll slasher that’s not too dissimilar from the likes of Band’s foremost and unremitting doll franchise, “Puppet Master.”  Band directs the film based off his story and a screenplay treatment by the late director Domonic Muir, credited under the pen name of August White, in what would be one of his first few films with Full Moon in the first decade.  Muir also wrote “Critters,” “Evil Bong,” and venture into the “Puppet Master” series before his untimely death with pneumonia.  Band would produce the feature alongside Jeremy Gordon and Jethro Rothe-Kushel, filmed in Hollywood, California.

A small cast is all that’s required when the dolls resurrect and begin their assault on the youth with their individual ability.  At the story’s core is Guy, an action-figure enthusiast played by Jared Kusnitz (“Dance of the Dead,” “Otis”), and his older sister Deedee, an angsty, boy-hungry, rule-breaker played by Gabrielle Lynn.  Guy and Deedee play the trope fatigued dynamic of a feuding brother and sister complete with blackmail attempts and lots of name calling, opening the door of opportunity to connect in a time of great adversity – in this case, a living doll assault.  Then, of course, no slasher can go without the kill fodder and “Doll Graveyard” has a group of partying teens who come over after Guy and Deedee’s single parenting father, played by Ken Lyle (“Foreseen”), goes off on a date.  Their sneaky, adolescent transgressional gathering of beer drinking, pot smoking, and foreplay into possible copulation is driven by Deedee’s promiscuous best friend Olive (Kristyn Green, “Evil Bong”), a tagalong, morally incorruptible Terri (Anna Alicia Brock), and party-crashing jocks with the insatiable horny Rich (Brian Lloyd, “Candy Stripers”) and Deedee’s lover boy Tom (Scott Seymour, “Garden Party”).  Muir’s story does attempt to branch out from the conventionally themed pathway of authorized partygoers meet their doomed fate with sidebar weaving of past, present, and future relation connections.  Olivia and Rich once had a casual romp that has faded and Rich seeks more difficult challenges with the more prudent Terri while Terri has puppy dog interests into the younger Guy as they share some similar interests.  Meanwhile, Deedee and Tom take their relationship to the next level with precuring steps toward the bedroom that signals the beginning of he end, as the old recurrent theme goes.  The “Punk’s Dead: SLC Punk 2” and “The Amazing Spider-Man” actress Hannah Marks, who makes her film debut in the Charles Band’s film, rounds out the cast as young and unfortunate Sophia.

Eventually, one must ask themselves how many times can someone reinvent the wheel and still think it’s new, innovative, and fresh?  With Charles Band’s proclivity for small malevolence, especially in dolls or puppets, the one of the faces in venerable horror filmmaking has, in a broader sense, regurgitated the same movie over the decades now, tweaking bits and pieces here and there to make it ever so delicately unique.  Yet, “Doll Graveyard” feels very much like an extension of “Puppet Master” without bringing new elements to the table or even really linking “Doll Graveyard” to Full Moon’s more popular, longstanding franchise “Puppet Master,” which is essentially the face of the Band’s company.  We see Blade, we think Full Moon.  We see Six-Shooter, we think Full Moon.  We see Tunnler, we think Full Moon.  But if you show me “Doll Graveyard’s” rustic Samurai or The German with spear tipped helmet, coming around to Full Moon may not be the first to pop into the old thinker.  The story also feels a bit half-baked with the dolls coming to life by unexplained means and audiences would really need to put effort into surmising a reason, such as my own theory that Sophia’s departing soul, trapped beneath the dirt, absorbs into the dolls, giving them animated life and loyalty to Sophia.  None of that hypothesis is authenticated and we’re stuck with little-to-no answers in a film created for the sake of creepy dolls doing creepy things to creep out some cretin kids.

Those suffering from pediophobia probably should stay far away from “Doll Graveyard.” For everyone else, “Doll Graveyard” is now available on Blu-ray home video from Full Moon Features with AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, single-layered BD25. Presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio, back cover states transfer elements were remastered from the original 35mm negative. The original negative print has withstood the test of time with no visually acute damage, granted the print is less than 20-years-old; however, there is noticeable dust and dirt speckles, some of which measure more toward a vertical tilde. Textures are softer than expected for a rather young film in the grand scheme of cinema with rounded and smoothed over contours, especially around defining facial features, that create more of a splotch than an edge. A bright spot is the palette with a diffusion and delineation balance around stock lighting. The lossy English Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is difficult to distinguish between the other audio option available, a Dolby Digital 2.0, as there’s not enough atmospheric or ambient rampage in the side and rear channels when dolls go deadly, which is mostly in the medium closeup to extreme closeup range. Taking hold of the audio reigns, mostly, is the District 78 soundtrack. Likely where the remastered elements come into play with its gothic rock opening credits score, this Charles Band production trades the jaunty carnivalesque for reinforced horror theme elements of isolated piano and electronic notes the musical production has accolades for and this translates throughout when presenting the dolls ominously and when they strike and into the coda credits with a full-on instrumental rock and wordless vocal background piece that’s very circa 2000s. English subtitles are available to select. Special features include a making-of featurette with snippet interviews from the cast with an introduction from Charles Band, a blooper reel, and the trailer amongst other Full Moon prevuews. There are no after or during credit scenes. The traditional blue Amaray goes along with the current Full Moon remastered trend of their horror catalogue with yellow-green primary art, no inserts or tangible features, and a disc press cropped of the focal primary cover art. The region free release has a brisk runtime of 73 minutes and is not rated.

Last Rites: A pedestrian, pale comparison to Full Moon’s maniacal line of moppets, “Doll Graveyard” stands far too short being the lower rung runt among giants in the company’s lineup.

“Doll Graveyard” Available for Purchase Here!

A World Lost in Time Ruled by the EVILEST Animated Lizards with Spears! “The Primevals” reviewed! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Yetis! Reptiles! “The Primevals” Lives Up To Its Title!

Himalayan Sherpas kill what was once considered the mythical Yeti.  The corpse is then donated to a U.S. university for scientific study.  When the grand reveal and world announcement that the abdominal snowman does exist, not only does the mankind go into a frenzy of questions and shock, but also proves sound one self-ostracized student’s long-rejected university thesis on the creature’s existences.  Teaming up with the university scientific department head, who now apologetically regrets personally rejecting his thesis based of speculatory concepts, an expedition to the Himalayas is formed to find, capture, and study the Yeti and sets in motion yet another discovery of a lifetime, a thousands of years old reptilian and technologically advanced alien race that have isolated themselves and have settled in a manipulated climate control river valley of the mountains and has surgically altered the minds of the Yeti to be more aggressive for battle and entertainment. 

“The Primevals” is a film 30 years in the making and is new film by a director who has long since passed away.  The 2023 released Full Moon production began its journey in 1993 with director David Allen, a visual and special effects artist who held prominence in Charles Band’s company as one of the go-to effects artists having played a big part of the crew in the “Puppet Master” franchise as well as note-worthy outside Band’s company with 1970’s “Equinox” and Joe Dante’s “The Howling” with stop-motion animation.  “The Primevals” relies heavily on stop-motion for the Yeti and reptilian race creatures based on Allen’s co-script treatment with another stop-motion and depth/dimensional effects master in “The Gate’s” Randall William Cook.  With all the live-action shots completed over the course of five years due to do Full Moon financial issues and “The Primevals” being an ambitious endeavor, David Allen untimely passes and the film is shelved for the unforeseeable future.  Once the ground under his feet was solid again, Band initiated an Indiegogo campaign to get the film finished and did so with a humble amount raised from contributors.  The Full Moon production was filmed in Romania, with the coproduction of Castle Film Romania, with additional mountain scenes filmed in Italy at the Dolomites mountains. 

Perhaps one of the more wholesome productions from Full Moon, “The Primevals” embraces that made-for-TV bravado of an expedition trek into a journey of the lost world.   The selected expeditioners are diverse enough to encourage character backstories and development, beginning with the civilized contentious history between Matt Connor, a former student whose Yeti thesis was rejected, and Dr. Claire Collier, the department director who did the rejecting on Matt Connor’s paper.  While the opportunity for a smug I-told-you-so moment is missed with a greater rebuff of excuses from the academia elite, respective role takers Richard Joseph Paul (“Oblivion,” “Vampirella”) and English actress Juliet Mills (“Beyond the Door,” “Demon, Demon”) are a cordial couple of platonic researchers who put their differences aside for the greater good of science.  In the real world, this premise wouldn’t fly and really harks back to underneath the bedrock of golden age cinema where creature features and lost world genre films reside.  They’re joined by the sport-hunting rehabilitated tracker and overall sensitive macho man Rando Montana, played by the screaming old man in the woods from “A Quiet Place,” Leon Russom.  Russom’s portrays a solid enough tough guy without really being challenged as such and that hurts Rando’s likeability, credibility, and survivability.  The grittiness, through the vessel of revenge, comes more from the Himalayan Sherpa with a grudge Siku by Tai Thai (“Killing Zoe”).  Walker Brandt (“Dante’s Peak”) rounds out the ensemble, whitewashing as a Sherpa sister to Siku.  With no real motive why she joins the expedition, Brandt’s character Kathleen dons the possible love interest role to Matt Cooper but that also doesn’t necessarily flesh out and secludes Kathleen’s contributions and presence as unnecessary.  Now, perhaps if she played a red shirt character, that would be another story. 

For a 30-year-old production, which still boggles my 40-year-old mind that it was only 1993, “The Primevals” footage was kept in great care by Charles Band and Full Moon Entertainment as it lies and waits to be restarted, and modernly restored, after it’s energizing battery, Director David Allen, suddenly dies.  The film embodies a show of perseverance by Band and company to not only have this homage of harrowing Earthbound sci-fi feature not be lost forever but also to posthumously honor David Allen and his legacy.  The stop-motion animation that was later added to the live action shots has near a seamless quality and is smoother, livelier than earlier examples of its anthropomorphic kind with stronger depth in the matte imagery to create the illusion of space and girth and puppeteering conjoined with more frames represent a sharper realism.  Granted, the Yeti and reptilian race still have the rad appearance of tangible 1990s toys but stop-motion has become a lost art that’s seeing a bit of a comeback in indie horror and sci-fi and it’s a welcome revert from the glossy, smoothed over, and ridiculously unnatural and impalpable computer-generated visual effects of certain films today. 

The epic arrives onto the home media format with a Full Moon Features single disc Blu-ray release.  A single-layered BD25 presented in a 1080p high definition and widescreen aspect ratio of anamorphic 1.78:1, “The Primevals” emerges generally seamless, especially since the work completed on the film spans over multiple decades.  However, what I suspect is the original 35mm print has been slightly smoothed over in the 2K processing and gives “The Primevals” a cleaner, sterile façade without the presence of natural grain.  Now, that’s not deeming the transfer as an enhanced flaw but rather just an observance as the image does favor the retro-adventure style of what the project aimed to accomplish.  Matte landscapes and miniaturized objects and characters meld and unify into one frame thanks to Randall Cook’s dimensional knowhow, the details on David Allen’s puppets, and a solidly uniform transfer of diffuse color, lower contrast, and cared for print.  The English language audio has two options, a Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1, both containing lossy clear, robust dialogue overtop a lively energetic and epic orchestra score by Charles Band’s brother, Richard Band.  Synchronized Foley assists in the anthropomorphic puppetry come to life and can be perceived instinctually through the side and rear channels.  There’s not a ton of LFE in what is more of one-sided octave above around the 4 or 5th.  Subtitles are available in English only.  One area that lacks substance in where one would think after 30-years of effort to get “The Primevals” out from the shadows is the special features.  Likely due to budget constraints, there is no showcasing of bons materials that structure around the struggles of finishing the film or a tribute to David Allen’s legacy and that greatly diminishes a portion of “The Primevals’” context value to audiences that may not be aware of the film’s historical troubles.  The only special feature listed under the static menu is the official trailer.  The standard physical release has little going for it too with a traditional Blu-ray Amaray casing sporting an epically rendered illustration of what to expect and a suitable homage to classic stop-motion adventure-creature celluloids.  Inside is a blue washed image of a Yeti pressed on the disc and there are no tangible inserts included.  Full Moon backdates the numerical order of catalogue releases and lists it as number 87.  The region free Blu-ray comes not rated and has a runtime 91 minutes. 

Last Rites: While its phenomenal to see that the beleaguered “The Primevals” didn’t let death and financial ruin didn’t stop Charles Band and steadfast backers from ponying up time and funds to see this project through to a long-awaited release, and such a marvel homage the film itself is to behold, there’s still a frustration to be had against the standard release that shows little interest in bonus featuring Davide Allen to celebrate the man, the myth, and the story’s ultimate creator. That material you’ll have to wait until 2025 when Full Moon releases the 3-Disc Collector’s Edition.

Yetis! Reptiles! “The Primevals” Lives Up To Its Title!