Tag Archives: SOV

No Film is Complete Without a Flying EVIL Baby! “The Necro Files” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

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I Want To Believe…That You Will Check Out “The Necro Files” on Blu-ray!

An unhinged serial rapist terrorizes the young women of Seattle, ripping into shreds their internal innards and even dabbles in tasting their flesh.  Two detectives hellbent on stopping his reign of terror intercept the killer in the middle of an attack.  Though too late to save the girl, the detectives shoot six slugs into the rapist, stopping his continuous, heinous sexual assaults and grisly murders…at least for nine months later, when a satanic cult resurrects the zombie cannibal rapists from the grave after sacrificing the rapist’s bastard baby from his only surviving victim.  The killing spree begins again and this time being undead provides superhuman strength and a larger penis.  The two detectives, now embroiled in their own corruption, must embark on another manhunt while two of the satanic cult members, seeking to undue the horrors they’ve unleashed, willingly summon a demon into the dead baby to counteract the zombie cannibal unbeknownst to them the demon baby will kill anyone it’s in airborne trajectory.

Just from the above synopsis, this film sounds nuts, darkly funny, and depraved all wrapped into one undisclosed file of sex, gore, and floating baby dolls.  And, you know what?  It’s all true.  The creator behind all this madness is Matt Jaissle who helms the shot-on-video “The Necro Files” as an underground horror spoof of a popular science fiction you made have heard of – “The X-Files.”  The Truth is out there.  Well, the truth is actually not in the sky, it’s under the dirt, it’s inside some scantily cladded woman being molested by a rotting corpse, and it’s in a doped-up cop looking to wipe all the scumbags off the face of the Earth.  The 1997 released is co-written between long time Jaissle collaborators Todd Tjersland (“Faces of Gore” series) and Sammy Shapiro, based off of Tjersland sleazy horror comic series “Psycho Zombie Love Butcher,” and is the third film from Jaissle that solidifies the filmmaker as a certifiable depravity and gore-meister that has themes of rape, necrophilia, heartless exploitation, and disembowelment clothed as clearly a comedy.  Filmed around the surrounding Seattle, Washington area, “The Necro Files” is produced by Jaissel with Tjersland serving as executive producer Washington state-based Threat Theatre International production banner.

The acting pool that “The Necro Files” plucked their talent from must have been severely limited with a cast more concerned about their robotic performances rather than the unsavory story content.  Fine by me!  I don’t expect award-winning caliber thespianism on campy SOV D-movies where the main focus is guts, girls, and the grotesque.  The two detectives, Martin Manners and Orville Sloane, and the killer, Logan, are the principals caught in the middle of everything that is eloquently evil of “The Necro Files.”   Isaac Cooper plays Logan the Rapist aka Zombie Logan the Rapist and the wild-eyed, chimpanzee-running Cooper doesn’t have a lot of dialogue with his unpleasant roles with many of talking parts going toward a third character of a drug pusher before having his head blown off by a traumatized and unstable Det. Manners.  By the way, Steve Sheppard, who plays Det. Manners, has the best monologue about wiping out scumbags while sitting in the police car, looking maniacal, and just admiring his handgun next to a more rational, more off-cue Gary Browning as his partner, Det. Sloane.  “The Necro Files” cast isn’t doesn’t end there as Snell’s film has a surprisingly sizeable, small role contingent, mostly of playing Satanists, drug dealers and sexual miscreant males, and women in compromising positions.  The actresses playing the latter roles are mostly under pseudonyms, alternate aliases that provide more to the film’s campy nature.  Names like Anne R. Key (Anarchy) and Jenn O’Cide (Genocide) are a couple.  Present day, Jenn O’Cide is actually a sideshow performer, belly dancer, and an overall alternative, fearless woman of the strange and usual fine (dark) arts while keeping her stage name.  Another is Dru Berrymore and no, not the “Firestarter” and “Scream” Drew Berrymore we all know of horror fandom.  This Dru Berrymore comes from Germany and is a pornographic actress who’s had bit pars in Katheryn Bigelow’s “Strange Days,” David Lynch’s “Lost Highway,” and even in “Die Hard 2”.  Each of these ladies, including a fourth in Theresa Bestul, are supposedly claimed from the local strip club and don’t mind being the plaything for undead’s wicked whims in their simply objectifiable credited rolls as Shower Girl, Doll Lover, Camping Girl, and S&M Amazon.  The cast rounds out with Todd Tjersland, Jeff Nelson, and Christian Curmudgeon and Jason McGee has hapless Satanists. 

“The Necro Files” bares very little resemblance to the show it spoofs but bares it all with an opening shower scene containing full frontal nudity.  From the get-go, “The Necro Files” plays into schlocky, campy attire with an unpretentious, unapologetic swagger.  The story doesn’t really make much sense and is terribly choppy from a continuation standpoint.  We’re fed fleeting moments of connective information that hardly tether scene-to-scene let alone the nine-month gap where Logan’s baby must be sacrifice by a Satanist cult to randomly resurrect one of the vilest murderers for unknown reasons and then immediately regret it as part of an oopsie, what did I do moment.  Yet, at the same time, these random bits of tongue-and-cheek leave the door open for unknown possibilities and seeing a clear path on how “The Necro Files” case will close is about as predictable as selecting all the Mega Millions lottery numbers right. Matt Jaissle’s gonzo-gore-a-thon is nonetheless a winning jackpot of underground, sadistic-splaying horror with an extensive as it is impressive DIY blood-and-guts effects and makeup by Jaissle and Tjersland. You can’t name your film “The Necro Files” and not have a deluge of viscera be a collective hematoma of popped blood vessels in every other scene in what’s an all ghoul and girls brazen bloodbath of demonism and dark humor.

“The Necro Files” is the second catalogued title for Wild Eye Releasing’s new kid-sister sublabel of extreme, SOV cult and horror films called Visual Vengeance. The Blu-ray release comes with a precaution of video quality, stating that the original elements were pulled from consumer grade equipment and SD video tape masters. The final product is better-than-passable and better-than-expected based off the source material as the 1.33:1 presented feature has an abundance of interlacing, aliasing, and macroblocking throughout. The video format plays into much of the problems with soft color palette and details in which not one single scene looks particular sharp enough to call Blu-ray’s best. For underground SOV horror, the quality is what was expected, if not better, and will continue to expect with future Visual Vengeance releases. Audio options give viewers two formats to select from: An English language Dolby Digital 2.0 and an English DTS-HD MA 2.0. The DTS track is the winner between the two audio arrangements with a slightly hefty decibel soundtrack and a better job isolating the already isolated lo-fi ambient and Foley. Dialogue, to the naked ear, sounds relatively the same with the lossy strength and level inconsistencies (again with 1997 video equipment issues), but overall free from obstructions. English subtitles are option. Special features include two audio commentary tracks with director Matt Jaissle on one and with Matt Desiderio of Horror Boobs and Billy Burgess of the Druid Underground Film Festival on the other, a brand-new graveyard self-chat with Matt Jasissle providing background color on making movies in general and a little history of himself, Dong of the Dead: The Making of the Necro Files with a talking head interview of Matt Jaissle, with spliced in movie clips, speaking on the complete genesis and completion of his film, the original and Visual Vengeance trailer, the super 8 short “The Corpse,” and a bonus movie, the sequel “The Necro Files 3000!” Physical release bonus material includes a reversible Blu-ray cover, a 2-sided artful insert with Blu-ray produced acknowledgements, a mini poster, a Wild Eye VHS sticker set, a cardboard slipcover, and the official “The Necro Files” condom not intended for actual use. Probably just a little something to ward off unplanned evil floating babies! The film comes unrated, region free, and the feature clocks in at 72 minutes with another 65 minutes on the sequel. “The Necro Files” is 137 minutes of sleazy-zombie humpfest that you won’t (you can’t!) forget.

I Want To Believe…That You Will Check Out “The Necro Files” on Blu-ray!

EVIL Masked as a Religion. “Bryan Loves You” reviewed! (MVD / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

All New Blu-ray release of “Bryan Loves You” on Amazon.com

Something weird is spreading across a small Arizona town.  A chapter of a new religion has influenced most of the community into believing in Bryan, a pure and pious young boy from long ago who was brutally slain by the devil.  Jonathan, a local psychotherapist receives a camera from his uncle, also a health professional, with a self-recording that warns Jonathan that Bryan zealots are a dangerous, violent cult.  Deciding to document the situation himself, Jonathan repurposes the camera to clandestinely record the widespread Bryan gatherings and even infiltrate their church where they speak in tongues and wear the scarred mask of Bryan.  As Jonathan goes deeper into the uncomfortable insanities of Bryan’s world, the more Bryan followers takes an interest in reconditioning Jonathan. 

“Bryan Loves You’s” grainy SOV pseudo-documentary lacquer not only captures the icy blank stares, the unabating drone chanting, and the brainwashed coup of an insidious cult assimilating small town America, but the Seth Landau written and directed film also homogenously captures, all too presently well, that sense of ambivalent and conspiracy dread that knots apprehension uncomfortably in the pit of the stomach.  The 2008 released “Bryan Loves You” has the story set in 1993 Arizona made out to be a historical home video and CCTV recorded account of the analyzed and dissected suppressed footage coming to light for the first time incomplete with censored last nights and specific addresses to make the pseudo-doc appear more genuine and shocking.  Filmed in and around the suburbs of Scottsdale and Phoenix, Arizona, “Bryan Loves You” is a found footage subgenre production self-produced by Mike Mahoney and Seth Landau, under the filmmaker’s Landau Motion Pictures, and marks the debut feature film of Landau’s humble career that started roughly around 2003 as a production assistant on “Arrested Development.”

For the average popcorn movie goer, “Bryan Loves You” is about obscure as they come with a no-name director and a cast with relatively no-name actors with the exception of one that might have a chance of recognition by the common Joe Schmo.  Old heads may recognize George Wendt, one of the barflies from the sitcom “Cheers” and the Saturday Night Live sketch of Super Fans, in his brief and strange scene as a patient holding a doll that speaks to him about people who talk about him.  For chin-deep genre fans, Wendt is about the biggest A-lister you can have in an indie film and what’s unusual about “Bryan Loves You” is the stacked list of iconic made-by-horror names that make up the cast list.  It’s impressive.  Landau’s connection to the late great master of horror Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) opened the door to George Wendt, who starred in Gordon’s “King of the Ants,” and, likely, led to the onboarding fan favorites such as Brinke Stevens (“The Slumber Party Massacre”), Tiffany Shepis (“Tromeo and Juliet”), Lloyd Kaufmann (“The Toxic Avenger”), Daniel Roebuck (“The Devil’s Rejects”), Chuck Williams (“Demon Wind”), and Tony Todd (“Candyman”).  Now, with these many names, none of them have starring roles and few have reoccurring scenes, but they are headlined to draw attraction for “Bryan Loves You.”  Honestly, the performances are hardly worth nothing.  Steves and Kaufmann have little dialogue and are shot at weird angles that makes them hardly recognizable.  Best scenes go to Tony Todd as a hesitantly disturbed and full of fear narrator standing in an empty board room and talking directly into the camera about what we, the audience, are about to witness, even directing viewers to turn away or to be ushered out of the theater (did this get a theatrical release?) if the content becomes too shocking to behold.  Seth Landau stars as the principal lead Jonathan who can’t be taken seriously as a psychoanalyst as there is no depth to the character in those regards.  Plus, as someone who’s supposed to uphold ethical standards, Jonathan breaks quite a few HIPPA regulations and breaks into houses with a camera, filming Bryan acolytes without their consent.  “Bryan Loves You” rounds out the cast with Tori King, Candy Stanton (“Exit to Hell”), Shane Stevens (“The Graves”), Jilon VanOver (“Bad Blood”), Tom Noga (“Anonymous Killers”), Jesse Ramiawi, Jacqui Allen (“Blue Lake Butcher”) and Daniel Schweiger (“Die-ner”)

Seth Landau’s found footage cult film is a rough cut of rudimentary psychological suspense restrained by its limiting low-ceiling budget.  The acutely hard cut editing and wonky framing is enormously puzzling within the narrative’s supposed single camera source documentary structure that suddenly diffuses into being a splice between Jonathan’s camera, which he loses halfway through the story, and a bunch of randomly placed CCTV footage across all of Arizona, in which some scenes are randomly placed in the desert where no structures are seemingly present to house a camera.  Who gathered and edited all this multi-video footage together?  Or does that play into the mystery, no matter how illogical, of adding to “Bryan Loves You’” unsettling allure?  What Landau does accomplish compares closely to what directors Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick were able to profoundly achieve with their unexpected breakout found footage blockbuster, “The Blair Witch Project.”  Now, I’m not saying “Bryan Loves You” had the audience gasping power as the “The Blair Witch Project” but the air in the story still feels very uncomfortably still, like in holding your breath, because something sinister is closing in and that type of disturbing presence, coupled with the erratic demonic behavior boiled to the surface if love for the almighty Bryan is absent, is all too relatable in today’s political climate.

Though “Bryan Loves You,” MVD Visual really loves Bryan right back with a high-definition Blu-ray release, remastered and upscaled from the original master source, a digital recorded standard definition, with an approved up-conversion of 172,800 pixels to over 2 million pixels per frame to achieve full HD.  For SOV, the handheld cam footage turns out more detailed than expected with suitable tinctures that are often less vivid in the found footage genre; however, there are still varying levels of quality from lower quality posterization to better than mid-grade delineation.  Though stated as presented in a widescreen 1:78:1 aspect ratio on the MVD Marquee Collection back cover, the actual ratio is a pillarbox 1:33:1 without straying from that display. The English language dual channel stereo track also has varying fidelity levels using the inconsistency of a built-in handheld mic but the good bones behind the range and depth retain the natural auditory proportionate. A few augmented audio tracks are snuck in for effect, such as the preacher’s demon-speak and the school PA system. English subtitles are optional. With a new Blu-ray release comes all new special features with a few short film-length interviews between filmmaker Seth Landau and George Wendt (44:50 minutes), Tiffany Shepis (50:49 minutes), Daniel Roebuck (59:35 minutes), and Brinke Stevens (31:46 minutes) touching upon more than just “Bryan Loves You” but also various career moments and other media cultural topics. Also featured are two commentaries: a 2008 commentary with Landau, select cast and crew, and JoBlo critic James Oster and a new 2022 commentary with only Landau. Plus, a brand new 2022 theatrical trailer. “Bryan Loves You” draws parallels to the 1993 Waco, Texas cult led by David Koresh of the Davidian sect preaching fire and brimstone, but writer-director-product Seth Landau adds his own supernatural concoction in a trade-in of doom and gloom for mindless devotion and diabolism that turns folks into followers and flesh-hungry fiends at times. Maybe not the prime cut of the cult genre but does stand out even if you don’t really love “Bryan.”

All New Blu-ray release of “Bryan Loves You” on Amazon.com

Even After Death, EVIL Fathers Can Still Be Punitive! “Daddy” reviewed! (SRS Cinema / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Come to “Daddy” now on DVD at Amazon.com

In a small lakeside, mountain town, a violent rape of a young woman paralyzes her into complete shock, shutting down her power to speak, and spiraling her into a withdraw.  Newly appointed Sheriff Sylvia Carlsen has a personal stake in the case as the woman is a close and dear childhood friend.  The nature of the rape puzzles law enforcement and frightens the small community after evidence of soil and worms are discovered around the scene of the crime and inside the victim.  When another of her close friends is violently rape the same way, Carlsen’s painful recollection of a dark secret involving her and her friends reagitates a dormant fear and familiarities between her past and the rapes appear to me more than just coincidences.  As the attacks continue, the toll on her mounds and a series of erratic behavior incidents put into question her judgement but that won’t stop her digging into her own case of issues.

Have you ever come across a zombie revenge thriller where the decomposing undead, recently fresh from a risen unmarked grave, stuck his worm (no, that isn’t an euphemism) into a hapless female victim?  While not explicitly depicted in what sounds like a niche fetish of the subfloor adult film industry, the image of soil and creepy crawlers inside the vaginal cavity is very real in director Michael P. DiPaolo’s “Daddy” where daddy issues can be extremely violating and gruesomely decaying all in the same rotten breath.  The “Requiem for a Whore” and “Transgression” filmmaker writes and directs the 2003 SOV-shot style, back from the grave indie production, at one point in time was called under the working title of “Rigor Mortis,” hailing from the Albany proximate Averill Park, New York and was self-funded and produced by DiPaolo and Christopher K. Philippo (“Motor Home Massacre”) under DiPaolo’s production label, Black Cat Cinema.

The actresses to be symbolically lubricated with the Earth’s muck are played by four friends, who just happen to be all blonde as if blondes run together like a pack of wino Golden Retrievers. In her first feature film, not a television role, is principal blonde number one Selia Hansen as the frequently boozing, causal sex engaging, newly appointed sheriff, Sylvia Carlsen. Hansen plays the hot-headed Sheriff eager to prove herself but is shredded emotionally by the violent sexual assault against her friends – Leslie (Katherine Petty), Jamie (Cynthia Polakovich, “Date with a Vampire”), and Allison (Bevin McGraw, “Arachnid”). Other than BFF Leslie, there isn’t too much discourse between the good friends and if is conversing between them, the topic of conversation is about the rapes, leaving the groups’ tightly knit friendship barely tethered to Carlsen’s burdened shoulders. Ravaging the community’s blond population is the titular rapist and to avoid obvious spoilers, I will refrain from divulging the attacker’s reason for stalking Sheriff Carlsen and her male unaccompanied friends. In what is perhaps the biggest role of his scarcely career, Aaron Renning lurks around like deviant, tongue-wagging Uncle Fester complete with chrome dome and a dirty dinner jacket grimed with earth and wiggly worms. Renning’s performance has it easy with zip for dialogue and a penchant for being a raving manic with a libido in hyperdrive. The performance bares no crass crudeness as it’s very to the point without revealing the point – if you get my point. Actors following up from Michael P. DiPaolo’s “Transgression” is David Shepherd as the town’s Doctor Vance and Marc St. Camille as the pushover Deputy Richie Dagg. Yet, the most interesting casted member is John Karyus. The “Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead” to “Big Freaking Rat” B-horror Karyus plays the Sheriff’s ex-husband who’s always peeping and is eager to inform his ex-wife something important but doesn’t ever receive the chance to, marking his scenes utterly pointless.

“Daddy” issues is right. DiPaolo strikes up grave retribution with a zombie degenerate harboring a message, one that I can only hope is accurate, is suppressed emotional trauma can be haunting, if not deadly, when not dealt with its beleaguering demons. However, “Daddy’s” undercurrent is more grossly sweeping and pungent with corrosive, misguided outcomes. Instead of battling trauma, DiPaolo’s depiction of Carlsen’s alcoholic abuse and fleeting affairs coupled with nightmares of the past also speaks illy toward guilt and feeling guilty over an irreversible criminal act done for the right reasons, in self-defense, nonetheless, sets the wrong tone. The finale also doesn’t set well with the fact that DiPaolo inflicts no escape from one’s rapist, no comfort in the knowledge of their death, and that their lives hang in the very balance, targeted by a demented vision. Demented, that’s definitely how I would describe DiPaolo’s serial rapist zombie flick that’s not terribly terrifying as it is one’s twisted filmic folly into incest and inevitable topple of repossession of oneself. “Daddy’s” acting is often stiff and forced, on the cheap effects offer up fake and live worms and a gray palette zombie perv, and the handheld SOV-style camera work from DiPaolo himself is like a fly buzzing around the room at times. “Daddy’s” beyond the dead vindictive nature is only abated by the number of topless blondes being subjected to dry humping in this ill-judged, undead-to-bed fiasco.

Of course, it only makes sense that SRS Cinema would release something to the likes of “Daddy” onto DVD home video. SRS Cinema loves nearly everything shot-on-video, nihilistic, zany, and unconscionable content. Sex and death sells and SRS Cinema has a long history of delivering good on that brand of promise while also luring unsuspected victims, I mean viewers, with exceptional retro-cover art that’s vibrant and detailed in all things macabre. The region free DVD has an aspect ratio of 4:3 and a runtime of 83-minutes. Shot with a videotape camcorder, image quality is about what you expect with an immense amount of interference during night shots and compression artefact issues rampant throughout, especially during black and white flashbacks, but the image is essentially discernible which makes DiPaolo’s use of only natural light more impressive. The English language mono track is hit-or-miss depending on the camcorder’s mic placement with faded hissing to throw another curve back at you. There are moments when the ambience is exquisitely sharp in fidelity and edit, such as the blaring police siren or a car suddenly passing into frame for jump scare effect. Bonus features include a commentary track with Michael P. DiPaolo, a behind-the-scenes featurette with DiPaolo narrating upon how he accomplished more of the difficult and complicated scenes, the feature trailer, and SRS film trailers. Interesting concept piledriven by its creepy subtext, “Daddy” continues to be aversive with a tagline “He comes after bad little girls!” splayed on the front cover that leaves cringed induced wrinkles on my face every time I cerebrate the underground film. In the same breath, I know and love SRS Cinema’s unwavering nihilism, standing admirably behind Michael DiPoalo’s incestuous and rapey, unfatherly film without second guessing commitment.

Come to “Daddy” now on DVD at Amazon.com

EVIL Ditches Satan, Picks Up a Camcorder. “Midnight 2: Sex, Death, and Videotape” reviewed! (SRS Cinema / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Midnight 2:  Sex, Death, and Videotape” now available on DVD!

The sole survivor of the murderous, devil-worshipping cult family, Abraham Barnes, continues to kill under a new outward show as amateur videophile recording everything and everyone to gain their trust.   Instead of harboring his mother’s dark intentions of eternal life, Abraham simply thirsts for killing, documenting his premeditated methods using a camcorder.  When his latest victim goes missing, her friend initiates an investigation with a police detective, but Abraham is always recording, always one step ahead of them both, always on the hunt.  With the trap set and the play button pressed, the blood-lusting survivor of the maniacal, serial killing Barnes family preserves a lineage legacy of death. 

Screenshot from AGFA

Ten years after releasing his moderately successful All-American shocker, “Midnight,” John Russo returns with the Barnes family.  Well, at least one of them in the 1993 release of “Midnight 2:  Sex, Death, and Videotape.”  Also known as simply just “Midnight 2,” the secondary title references the widely popular 1989 Steven Soderbergh film of sexual testimonial video-tales in “Sex, Lies, and Videotape,” starring James Spader and Andie MacDowell.  The sequel gives way to a new motive and theme that’s very different from the satanic panic aspect of the original.  “Midnight 2” enters the mind of a serial murderer with every calculated and cold thought and whim that crosses the killer’s mind laid out in detail to paint a compulsive picture. Behind the scenes, conjuring up resources to make the sequel exist as it stands today, is “Dead Next Door” and “Robot Ninja’s” J.R. Bookwalter, the head-honcho in production and distribution of his own created company banner, Tempe Entertainment. Bookwalter, who also wears the director of photography and editor hat on this film amongst others, produces the Russo sequel that was shot on location in Bookwalter’s home city of Akron, Ohio.

If you’re expecting or anticipating seeing John Amplas (“Martin,” “Day of the Dead”) return to the Abraham role 10 years later, be prepared to be severely let down as Amplas does not return for “Midnight 2.” Instead, profound schlock horror screenwriter and composer, Matthew Jason Walsh, brings a whole new peculiarity to Abraham Barnes and I’m not just talking about his face or mannerisms. Walsh, who penned such David DeCoteau C-list gems as “Witchouse,” “Young Blood, Fresh Meat,” and “The Killer Eye,” goes face-to-face with the camera in a hybrid performance as lead actor and lead narrator of his own exposition into his own executions. Being a sociopath is never fleeting from Walsh who can sink into the sardonicism of the Abraham character naturally as one of the two only traits to carryover from the original film with the other being a killer. Aside from a boat load of archival footage and a verbal recap of nearly the entire first film, the whole Devil-worshipping aspect of the Barness family is dropped in favor of a more undisclosed truth in the hidden agenda of a person who thrives off the hunt and the kill. Abraham goes through verbatim his daily, stalking routine in a publicized manner of videorecording everything and everyone to capture as much detail as possible as well as capture their last moments. Russo does throw in escape clause caveat for Abraham in that if he meets the right girl, the love for her will be strong enough to break him away from killing and possibly start a family and while Russo plays into that tangent a little with Jane (“Killer Nerd’s” Lori Scarlett), nothing much more materializes significantly as a romantic conflict that circles back to that subtheme. Russo ultimately gives in to a more cat-and-mouse game with Jane’s worried friend Rebecca (“Chickboxer’s” Jo Norcia) and the detective who rather slip into Rebecca’s pants than actually solve the case in a stiffer than roadkill performance by Chuck Pierce Jr. (“The Legend of Boggy Creek”).

Screencap from AGFA

I wonder how much ‘Midnight 2″ is actually from the mind of John Russo or if it’s more of the J.R. Bookwalter show in calling the shots from the producer’s director’s chair as the film feels very much like Bookwalter’s usual fare, a SOV, DIY, home brew production of local Ohioan talent. “Midnight 2” also goes from the backwoods suburbia of Pittsburgh to the concrete structures of Akron, leaving behind any remnants of Abraham’s satanic past in the ground along with his dead siblings, but the sequel very dutifully leans into us with a heavy archival footage recap with Walsh narrating the entire damn thing. I kid you not, the recap is approx. a third of the runtime and so essentially, “Midnight 2” is a two for one straight-to-video special. Granted, the archival footage remains in its untouched up state so don’t expect the Severin grade video quality. In one way “Midnight 2” is discerned to be more of a Russo film is the very hesitancy of graphic, blood-shedding violence. Bookwalter’s a bit of gorehound in making some gruesome grisliness out of the singles from a Podunk stripper’s Kmart thong. There’s none of that imaginative ingenuity here with a surprising severe lack of that adored shot-on-video nastiness common of its era, especially from the likes of John Russo in filing a rated 13 release according to the DVD back cover, enervating “Midnight 2” as a inferior sequel that tries on a new pair of shoes but ends up limping with a lame gait.

Screencap from AGFA

Russo might always be remembered for his contribution to the start of the “Living Dead” franchise. The cult legendary filmmaker surely found modest success with his first directorial run with “Midnight.” Yet, “Midnight 2” will have a tough time keeping out of the celebrated shadows of Russo’s credits, but the indie, underground horror label SRS Cinema pulls back the shrouding curtain with a newly released, MVD Visual distributed DVD featuring two cuts of the film. Fitted with a retro look and ghastly illustrated cover art, a superb upgrade from the VHS cover, the region free DVD is presented shot-on-video in a 4:3 aspect ratio on both cuts. Essentially, both cuts are the same with reworked scenes and narration with the except of the 90-minute rough cut having extended archival footage of the first film. The main version runs slimmer at 72-minutes. The lossy image quality abides within both versions with a flat color palette that, at times, had a singularity about its choice of unflattering hue, compression macroblocks consistently flare up, and dimly discernable innate tracking lines with video recording destabilize the image. The anemic English Language single channel mono mix is a bottom of the barrel budget sound design and that was to be expected. Dialogue does come over clear enough but lacks vigor and crispness as there is just too much electrical interference shushing in the background. Depth’s a bit awkward too with the actors conversing in the background but have foreground decibel levels. Aside from the two cuts of the feature, the only other bonus content is the theatrical trailer and other SRS home video trailers. “Midnight 2” works as a standalone in a different shot-on-video horror light but is crammed with unnecessary recapping on a story built around the destined, convoluted conjecture of a homicidal narcissist and his videotape addiction.

“Midnight 2:  Sex, Death, and Videotape” now available on DVD!

Let’s Ride the Ol’EVIL Succubus to Chastity High School in “Sadistic Eroticism” reviewed! “Wild Eye Releasing / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on


At California’s Chastity High School, a strict and sadistic far-right facility body abuse and favor a select assembly of pupils, isolating the semi resembling studious teenagers, who wear black trench coats, innocently worship indie horror flicks, and the idea of women, to the whims to not only a rapist principal and a Nazi fascist assistant principal, but also suffer prolonged torment from the school’s popular kids. When one of the regular teachers slips, falls, and dies on a pool of ejaculate, a voluptuous and alluring substitute teacher, Ms. Lizz, fills in, hoping to become a permeant teacher at Chastity High, but Ms. Lizz has a three hundred year old secret being a vampiric succubus who lures in and possesses the popular, sex-crazed, hormone driven high school jocks who will do her bidding in abducting the beautiful high school sluts and for Ms. Lizz to drink their blood to retain immaculate beauty. Its up to three Troma loving and heroine doping geeks and an odd janitor to stop Ms. Lizz before she laps up slut blood and moves on to the next school.

Like a barrel full of doured high school rape jokes bubbling in a stasis of formaldehyde, the farcical cringe-worthy comedy-horror, “Sadistic Eroticism,” is the brain damaged brainchild from writer-director, Alex Powers, as his debut feature film shot entirely on VHS cassette that pays homage to the SOV horror of the early 1980’s, such as “Boarding House” or “Sledgehammer.” Powers, who went on to helm “GrossHouse” and its sequel, congeals on a slapstick of analogue digressions to introduce himself as an auteur filmmaker who, unrestrained, can exceed beyond the distinct hardline of political suitably that’s not only a testament toward the very title of the film, but also, perhaps, securing Powers on a number of studio blacklists unwilling to touch him with a single junk-destined email originating from the other ends of the Earth. Starchild Video serves as production company, which if entering “Starchild” and “Sadistic Eroticism” in the same search engine field, you’ll get a nice little stern warning about your search results involving child sex abuse and any images depicting such should be notified. Yikes.

More promising than the infamous history of the Hungarian noble woman, Elizbeth Bathory, to which “Sadistic Eroticism” properly appropriates it’s title and abstract character from, is the colorful, if not disdainfully charged, personalities teeming with a variety of depraved intentions and the entire cast embraces the full blown degenerate toxicity. More than likely, most of the cast list is made up of not household names like JD Fairman, James Coker, Nicholas Adam Clark and T.J. Akins as a black Nazi fascist hard up on Christian values and stern punishment. On the flipside of that coin, genre fans can root through the blurry, sometimes overexposed, tape recordings and find familiar faces of the then scruffy looking filmmaker James Cullen Bressack, writer-director of the popular indie found footage thriller “To Jennifer” and producer to the subsequent franchise films, “2 Jennifer,” “From Jennifer,” and “For Jennifer,” suited up in a shirt-sized Confederate flag as one of four high school bullies to fall under Ms. Lizz’s spell. The prolifically half-naked all the time indie actor, Michael Q. Schmidt (“The Pricks from Pluto Vs. The Vaginas from Venus”), straps on BDSM gear for a little sodomy counseling as Principal Buggary, “2001 Maniacs” Field of Screams” Miles Dougal slaps on a wife beater for some sleazy slumber party slime ball in a high school girl’s father role, and, of course, the lovely pornographic actress who branch out and take a break from oral sex, group sex, three-way kissing, and – oh wait – they do and simulate that in this Powers’ as well. Tori Avano, Imani Rose, and Jayden Starr are the three high school sluts who shameless flaunt their assets for Sophie Dee to snatch up and soul suck her way for anomalous aesthetics as a satanic form of cosmetic surgery. The latter actress, Sophie Dee, is endowed, more ways than one, with the role of the vampire-succubus Bathory, keeping well….well abreast her monotonic acting talents with her adult industry persona. All four ladies show an abundance of above waist skin and engage in some solo girl, boy-girl, boy-boy-girl, girl-girl-girl, boy-boy-boy-girl… and now I must sit down a rest my brain. Dou Waugh, Sto Strouss, Paymon Seyedi, Candis Higgins, Mel Martinez, Aaron Granillo, Matt Johnson, Ian Fisher, Jody Barton, and Yajaira Bardales round out the cast.

Jokes and slapstick humor disassociated, “Sadistic Eroticism” still relates to the Elizabeth Bathory backstory told on VHS through a tube television presentation of Ms. Lizz’s abnormal history subjects. The succubus creature is nothing less than a buxom beaut that undresses with her feminine wiles zombifying men to do her bidding without her lifting a finger to break a nail against the hypersexualized school girls; yet, to show this century’s old cacodemon as provocatively dressed and to skim around bellying up the tension isn’t quite enough to sell the dominance an ancient evil should be wielding like she owns the whole damn school. There’s more of visceral presence of evil between Principal Buggary and Assistant Principal Defur and though they’re also vaguely under the influence of the succubus, their combined power is the epitome of “Sadistic Eroticism.” The script, characters, and subject material are indicative of Alex Powers attempting to reel in Lloyd Kaufman and his Troma slum-empire to purchase and distribute the filmmaker’s squawking lechery of a film and yet, perhaps, the Troma acquisition team also saw too much of a yawn-fest to bare the Troma brand as the nearly two hour runtime sluggishly relies too hard on being incoherently schlocky to be coalescing competent to make sense. “Sadistic Eroticism” is more masochistic in it’s ostentatiousness to desensitize power and rape and call it comedy, but rocks a mean cast of players from all walks of life to be a mean-spirited take of The Blood Countess.

Open your lesson books and get ready to be schooled by the twisted and obscene in Wild Eye Releasing’s re-release of “Sadistic Eroticism” on the label’s Raw and Extreme banner, distributed by MVDVisual. The region free, unrated release is presented in a SOV full frame of 4:3 aspect ratio. Tracking is the least of the problems with this uncouth image presentation rendered from pillar to post quality of warm tinges, severe color corrections required, and gauche details emblematic of cassettes, but all that was Alex Powers intended design to relive in the era of SOV. However, there are some less than stellar, even for SOV, that negate the effort, such as high contrast and poor lighting nearly blanking out darker scenes and the entire climatic end has a neon purple border and the scenes are also recorded in an awful tint of purple, making the entire finale be seen through Grimace vision. To top it off, the jagged opening titles, credits, and crooked visual composites are nearly discernible. The English language mono track is touch and go, mostly go as dialogue wanders into a deaden muffle and is also drowned out by a stock score tracks. There’s not much range or depth as much of the audio is picked up by the poor quality of the VHS handheld mics as exhibited on the special features, which include a director’s commentary and a behind the scenes hosted by that James Coker, who does a pretty good engaging the actors for the in-the-face interviews to explain their characters, scenes, and just overall thoughts with porn starlets and actors milling about or in takes. Sophie Dee’s bosomy eye-catchers, Tori Avano’s star-shaped nipples, Imani Rose’s vivacious sexual appetite and a stockpile of lewd, crude, and nude wets the very foundational whistle of “Sadistic Eroticism” bungled in a sloppy heap of first time filmmaking.

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