Category: Reviews

Directed by Todd Jenkins [Other horror films: N/A]

Sometimes my reviews can go a bit longer than they really need to. For some films, I think it’s worth examining much of the film, from performances to the special effects, and at times, maybe it’s a bit much. I’ll try not to make the same error with Cherokee Creek, though, and the only point I really need to make clear is just how utterly unenjoyable I found this piece of trash.

I honestly thought the film was a joke at first – to me, the film felt so bad, they had to know it was bad, and there was going to be some early reveal about how it was a movie-in-a-movie type situation or something. Alas, that’s not what happens, and the movie kept going and going with these jokes that don’t even approach amusing.

Cherokee Creek is an hour and 56 minutes. We don’t get about any Bigfoot action until about an hour and ten minutes in, and unfortunately, it’s far, far, far, far, far too late to make any positive difference. It’s true that for a lower-budget film, the special effects are good, but damn it, by the time they show up, I wish I were dead already multiple times over. The nudity might have helped out if I was quite a bit younger, but it didn’t do anything for me here. None of the characters were remotely likable, and few of the performances were decent.

If the film had been shorter, the movie still would have been bad, but I will say that, had it been only an hour, the film definitely would have been more digestible and wouldn’t have gotten nearly as low a score. There was an ultra low budget film I saw some time ago called What Happens in the Mountains – Should Stay in the Mountains, a movie that was 40 minutes long and doesn’t even have an IMDb page. That film knew what it was, kept things short, and despite the lower-budget, rather amused me at times.

Cherokee Creek did nothing of the sort. I think I laughed once toward the beginning (with the foul-mouthed old woman), but that was about it.

The movie opens with two of the actors pointing guns at the camera commending the audience for watching the film (providing they paid for it), and went on to comment that if the audience didn’t pay for the film (or pirating it, which is the only way I’d recommend watching this), they’d need to buy it after finishing the film because of how good we’d undeniably find it.

I didn’t pay for this. Luckily, it was uploaded on one of the many streaming sites I use, which is a good thing, as this movie was complete and utter trash. Maybe in the future, I can find the words to explain why, but for now, after having just finished it, I don’t much feel like spending more time on this.

0.5/10

This is one of the films covered on Fight Evil’s podcast. If you’re interested in checking out Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discussing this one, check it out below.

Directed by Katt Shea [Other horror films: Stripped to Kill (1987), Stripped to Kill 2: Live Girls (1989), Dance of the Damned (1989)] & Robert Mandel [Other horror films: The Haunted (1991)]

I wasn’t a big fan of the first Carrie, and this sequel follows much in the same vein as the original, but luckily, The Rage: Carrie 2 is undeniably a better film. Okay, that last part is a joke, before I start getting angry messages sent my way, but it is true that I did tend to enjoy this film more than the classic 1976 movie, so take from that what you will.

What stood out first about this film was all the recognizable faces. Few of these characters (save Dylan Bruno’s) are all that important, but it was still nice. Dylan Bruno, as the main antagonist, is an actor I know rather well from the television series Numb3rs, so seeing him much earlier on was interesting (though he definitely didn’t look like a high school student). He did great as a rapist jackass here, which, for some reason, didn’t surprise me.

Zachery Ty Bryan also did well as a jackass rapist, which definitely felt right. Bryan’s not a name that I knew beforehand, but as soon as I saw his face, I thought to myself, ‘Isn’t that Brad from Home Improvement?’ and indeed it was. His character was despicable here, what with being a rapist, so it was an interesting change from how I usually see him. Mena Suvari and Eddie Kaye Thomas appeared together later the same year in American Pie, as Heather and Finch, respectively. Rachel Blanchard was in an indie comedy/drama I liked from 2008 titled Growing Op.

The main two characters (Emily Bergl and Jason London) are completely unknown to me, but both did a pretty fine job. Bergl was possibly too attractive to really emulate Sissy Spacek’s performance, but she still did a memorable job (though I didn’t care for the whole tattoo thing at the end). London was solid throughout, and though he was also probably a rapist, he was one of the few likable characters in the film. Of course, Amy Irving (only individual to come back from the original film) was decent, but honestly, she didn’t amount to much aside giving a reason to show flashbacks from the original.

A big problem I had with the film dealt with the amount of utterly unlikable characters in the film. Like I said, Bergl and Londons’ characters were both good, but many of the characters were either rapists or those who have no problem with rapists (such as the town government, as the movie shows, which isn’t uncommon when the rapist in question is a football player). Seeing many of them get killed was the most fun this movie had to give us, but at the same time, since only unlikable characters were killed, I don’t know if it’s necessarily the best choice.

At times, it’s true that the special effects are somewhat awful (especially during the horrific dream sequence at the end), but I thought they got more right (glasses shattering, the shards flying into the wearer’s eyes) than they did wrong. I somewhat question the black-and-white sequences, as they seemed unnecessary, and the flashbacks to the first movie didn’t feel particularly relevant either.

I’ll say this for The Rage: Carrie 2 – I enjoyed it more than I did the first one. But it’s still not a movie I particularly liked that much. The finale was pretty solid, and perhaps the best sequence of the film (though easily lacking the emotional resonance the first one had), but for much of the film, though I found it more relatable than the first movie, I simply found it passable, not good.

6.5/10

This is one of the films covered on Fight Evil’s podcast, so if you’re interested in hearing Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss this one, check it out.

Directed by Guillermo del Toro [Other horror films: Cronos (1992), El espinazo del diablo (2001), Blade II (2002), Crimson Peak (2015)]

In many ways, Mimic’s a late 90’s film that doesn’t get talked about all that much. While the movie in of itself isn’t necessarily amazing, I do think that it has a lot going for it, especially in terms of special effects.

The story was pretty interesting, dealing with a genetically-modified breed of cockroach created to eliminate a plague of sorts, only after some years, things got out of control. I don’t know if the story is absolutely great, but it really does a good job of keeping people engaged.

Character-wise, the focal characters are all pretty worth it. The two main performances, those of Mira Sorvino and Jeremy Northam, were both solid, though certainly at times Northam wasn’t particularly likable. Charles S. Dutton (of both D-Tox from 2002 and Gothika from 2003) was pretty fun throughout, and the conclusion to his story arc was certainly worth it. Last person really of note would be Giancarlo Giannini, and though I did like his character, I wish more was done with him.

The special effects here are really what makes the film work, though, as they’re pretty much good throughout the film. Toward the end, a few of the scenes don’t look that great, but overall, where Mimic really stands out are the solid effects.

Mimic’s not a movie that I really have a lot to say about, but it is a well-made film, and certainly in the late 1990’s, a somewhat stand-out flick. It’s not really a movie that I utterly love, but it stood up solidly the first time I saw it, and seeing it again did little to dissuade me of the positive feelings I have of the film.

7.5/10

Directed by Len Kabasinski [Other horror films: Curse of the Wolf (2006), Fist of the Vampire (2007), Wendigo: Bound by Blood (2010), Ninja: Prophecy of Death (2011), Skull Forest (2012), Blood Mercury (2014), Angel of Reckoning (2016), Blood Prism (2017), Swamp Zombies 2 (2018), Schlock-O-Rama (2018, segment ‘Film Trailer’)]

This is a film I have somewhat mixed views on. Certainly Swamp Zombies!!!, at a two-hour run time, is a bit much. They certainly could have cut more than a bit of it out, and the movie would be a more digestible one. At the same time, there’s a certain element of fun to be had here (and given the rather low ratings the movie generally receives, I admit it may just be me), so I still find value in it.

Being a very low-budget movie, there’s not much in the way of performances that are particularly good. However, there were a few individuals who stood out somewhat positively, not because of their acting, but their solid fighting skills (Swamp Zombies!!! is virtually a kung-fu movie at times). Len Kabasinski (who is also the director of this film) has much of the fighting sequences, and he’s decently fun to watch. Certainly he’s one of the most kick-ass park rangers I know. Brian Heffron (who randomly had an origin flashback for some reason) and Dan Severn (who unfortunately didn’t appear much) also got some good fright scenes in.

Overall, the story is about as uninteresting as you could expect, and the zombie attacks, along with the fighting back, are as repetitive as zombie movies tend to be. Gore-wise, nothing really stood out, and while I had no big issues with the lower-budget special effects, I do sort of wish there was a bit more variety insofar as the zombies were concerned.

Another thing that Swamp Zombies!!! threw in was quite a bit of nudity. I guess that’s one way to keep people watching, and admittedly some of the ladies were pretty attractive, but when there’s a woman showering for a few minutes, rubbing soap over her breasts multiple times, adding nothing to the story, I can’t pretend I wasn’t a little bored.

This said, Swamp Zombies!!! is probably the exact type of movie you would expect if asked to imagine a low-budget zombie film. It runs on far too long, but there’s still fun fight sequences and solid neck-snappings to keep us moderately engaged. I saw this once before, and to be honest, I forget what I really thought about it, but seeing it again, while it’s far from being a good movie, I was amused enough to see that, despite how bad many think it is, I almost liked it. I probably wouldn’t recommend this to anyone else, though.

6/10

Directed by Jim Sotos [Other horror films: Forced Entry (1976)]

While not really a lot better than many other slashers that came out around the same time period, Sweet Sixteen definitely isn’t much worse. Some of the kills are a bit on the repetitive side, but the mystery is solid, and there are plenty of enjoyable characters here.

There’s a few performances that really help out. Dana Kimmell (of Friday the 13th Part III fame) and Steve Antin did well as brother and sister, though Kimmell came across as so much more memorable than did Antin. Bo Hopkins does great as a lead here, and comes across well-casted. Oddly, while Aleisa Shirley was beautiful, and shined in her nude scenes, aside from the conclusion, I don’t think she stood out all that much. Others who did, though, include Don Shanks, Patrick Macnee, Susan Strasberg, and Sharon Farrell (who also starred in 1974’s It’s Alive).

As far as gore goes, it’s definitely lighter than others around the same time, and like I said, the kills themselves are rather repetitive, but I don’t really think it hurt the film too much. Since the story was pretty engaging, and can lead one to suspect any number of potential suspects, I think any misgivings about lack of gore can mostly be forgiven.

Sweet Sixteen isn’t really the most memorable slasher, especially as birthday-themed slashers have been done before (such as Happy Birthday to Me and Bloody Birthday), but it’s still a decently charming movie, and adds in some elements of racism against Native Americans to keep things a little more interesting. Really, this is one that I suspect many slasher fans would be fine with, but I don’t think it’d make most people’s top twenty slashers.

7.5/10

This is one of the film’s covered on Fight Evil’s podcast, so if you want to hear Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I talk this one over, check out the video below.

Directed by Lenny Lenox [segment ‘Turnout’ / Other horror films: N/A], Neil McCurry [segment ‘Night Screams’ / Other horror films: N/A], Lance Polland [segment ‘The Range’ / Other horror films: Crack Whore (2012), Werewolves in Heat (2015)], Steven Richards [segment ‘Dead Letters’ / Other horror films: N/A] & Vito Trabucco [segments ‘The Exterminator’ & ‘Wraparounds’ / Other horror films: B-Movie: The Shooting of ‘Farmhouse Massacre’ (2002), Visions of Horror (2007, segment ‘Hooligan’s Valley’), Bloody Bloody Bible Camp (2012), Never Open the Door (2014), Happy Horror Days (2020, segment ‘4th of July’)]

When I first saw this film, I knew I found it below average. What I had forgotten in the years that passed was just how below average this mess of an anthology film actually was.

In Slices, we have five stories plus a framing sequence. Of these six total stories, maybe two are acceptable, and the other four all range from tepidly bad to downright awful. You certainly get a variety here, what with a  vampire story (‘Night Screams’), a slasher (‘Turnout’), a zombie story (‘The Range’), and torture porn (‘The Exterminator’). The last one (‘Dead Letters’) is sort of a Monkey’s Paw-like story, slightly unique in that is occasionally uses what seems to be claymation.

So you do get a variety with these entries, but as very few of them are worth watching, I don’t personally think it means much. Look at ‘Night Screams’ and ‘Turnout’ – both have needlessly dramatic narration (I don’t even know why they thought ‘Turnout’ even needed narration, but whatever) that doesn’t really add much. It’s pretty bad for ‘Night Screams’ because the monotone narration about ‘My life has been molded by a series of bad decisions. Tonight turned out to be another one’ was about as non-enthralling as you could expect.

Also, a bit of the 1968 classic Night of the Living Dead is shown here. They don’t try to pass it off as part of the actual movie (such as O.C. Babes and the Slasher of Zombietown did) but just because the film’s in public domain, it doesn’t need to be seen in every other low-budget horror movie. It gets really old; I’m just saying. Also, it might be advisable to give your stories a conclusion, but as ‘The Range’ lacked one, perhaps that’s just my point of view.

The best thing about this film is Trent Haaga, playing a Svengoli rip-off named Lucius Phibes on Theater of the Macarbe that the framing story’s based around. Haaga did fantastic as the over-the-top and cheesy horror host, and while pretty much nothing else in the movie was worth much, it was great seeing him having such a fun time.

Otherwise, Slices can likely be placed in a Top 10 worse anthology horror film list. There are worse ones out there, don’t get me wrong (such as The Telling from 2009 and Nightmare Alley from 2010), but Slices is pretty inept. Also, this is worth noting, I had no problem with the lower-budget nature of the film – had the stories been made with more money, they still would have sucked. Slices just isn’t really worth it.

4/10

Directed by Mel Brooks [Other horror films: Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995)]

Perhaps one of the most famous horror spoofs of all time, Young Frankenstein is a great flick with mostly solid comedy and a good feel of classic horror films, especially, unsurprisingly, the 1931 classic Frankenstein.

Gene Wilder is an actor I’ve not seen in many other films, but he is great nonetheless. I particularly love his louder moments, from his outburst at the beginning of the movie (“I AM A SCIENTIST, NOT A PHILOSOPHER!”) to the always-fun “IT COULD WORK!” He’s funny throughout, though, from lines like “That goes without saying,” to “What knockers,” all eliciting solid laughs.

Marty Feldman is the other piece that really makes the film work. His often-sassy attitude (“Well, they were wrong then, weren’t they”) is a lot of fun, and he works well with Wilder, though his charade ability really sucks. Also worth mentioning, playing the Monster, Peter Boyle does a fantastic job, and though his dialogue is rather lacking, he does present some great facial expressions.

In all honesty, Young Frankenstein isn’t really the type of movie that I’d go out of my way to see. Personally, I do happen to consider spoofs of the horror genre a part of the genre themselves, but even so, overtly comedic horror films aren’t my go-to (though I am certainly no stranger to comedy films in general). This one did get a bit silly a few times (such as the dancing scene during the scientific demonstration), but much of it was just as funny now as it was when I last saw it. It’s a classic for a reason, and Wilder certainly makes it a film that’s not forgettable.

8/10

Directed by Alex Merkin [Other horror films: No Escape Room (2018)]

For a Syfy original, I think House of the Witch is decent. It’s not great, by any means, but I do think it transcends much of the crap that they’ve put out in the last seven years.

There’s not much in the way of plot – a group of teenagers go to the local haunted house for a small Halloween party, but shortly after arriving, things begin to happen, such as entities appearing in mirrors, and the doors lock, trapping them all inside.

Despite this, I generally found the film enjoyable, albeit easily on the average side. I think a large part of my tepid enjoyment was due to the six central performances all being reasonably decent. Starring Jesse Pepe, Coy Stewart, Michelle Randolph, Darren Mann, Arden Belle (who is probably the weakest link), and Emily Bader, I found most of them acceptable and decently realistic, so while the story itself isn’t overflowing in creativity, it comes together nicely.

Most of the special effects are your average Syfy fair, but there was one decent scene in which one of the characters had a few of their fingernails pulled our – definitely a painful sequence to watch. Another thing I enjoyed was the idea that breaking the windows of the house didn’t lead outside, but into something else (what that could have been wasn’t explained, but I liked the way they went about it).

House of the Witch isn’t the most inspired Syfy original, but I do think it was decent enough to be thrown an around average score. It’s not as good as Neverknock was, but it blew films like The Sandman and Truth or Dare (all three Syfy films from 2017) out of the water.

7/10

Directed by Mark Robson [Other horror films: The Seventh Victim (1943), Isle of the Dead (1945)]

What an amazing film on so many levels.

Once a well-to-do lady becomes concerned about the state of a local mental institution, with a little help from a Quaker, and finding that neither Tory nor Whig seemingly care about reforms, she takes it upon herself to fight for what she believes right. Unfortunately, the head of the institute, played by Boris Karloff, has little interest in the welfare of his patients (which seems too generous a term to describe them, truth be told), and instead plots to throw the lady herself into the asylum, so she can no longer speak out.

There’s a lot in Bedlam to really like. What’s easy is the cast. Boris Karloff (who really needs no introduction at this point) is fantastic as the sinister head of the asylum, and has a pretty satisfactory story arc come the conclusion. Anna Lee, too, is fantastic as the lead character, and she definitely has a passion in her throughout the film. At times, her character is unlikable, but for a woman who is starting to see the poor and maligned people as people for the first time, I think that’s understandable. Billy House (who plays an amusing, mostly inoffensive, pompous lord) and Richard Fraser (who plays a straight-laced Quaker wonderfully) both add a lot to Bedlam.

It’s the story that really makes things work. A woman of high standing, Lee’s character slowly becomes moved by the plights of the mentally unsound, but even when in the institute, she can’t get past her deep fear and mistrust of the insanity surrounding her. And when she does make friends in the institution, they’re the higher class of patients (beautifully comparing her previous life of abject apathy with her new life locked up).

There’s a line in the film that really got to me. “Why should we help.” asks one of the upper echelon of patients to Lee’s character, in reference to the cruelty others are facing, “We are the people of the pillar.” I think it’s at that point that the character finally realized exactly the type of person, even locked up, she tended to be, and then set out to change it, by making beds, and tending wounds, of those who couldn’t do it for themselves.

Earlier in the film, there’s a member of the Whig Party who purports to care (as opposed to the Tories, who, much like many modern-day Republicans, revel in the despair of the poor and unfortunate), but later we see him laughing with the rest at a mockery of a play, using the patients themselves as actors. Like many modern-day Democrats, he gives lip service to the issue, but as a man from the upper class, he doesn’t truly have a concern for the welfare of those beneath him.

It takes a Quaker, one opposed to violence of any type, and not prone to lofty ideals, to really bring the idea of equality between all men, poor and rich, peasants and lords, insane and sane, to Lee’s character. At the same time, this Quaker sets too much faith in the laws to really hold a revolutionary view of the best way to help those who need it the most.

Bedlam has a lot of political ideas, and that deeply interests me, but if you can somehow separate the politics from the film, I still think most people would see what a great and clever film this is.

All of my praise aside, I do wish there had been a few more suspenseful and tense scenes. The trial at the finale was fantastic, and the scenes afterward were damn amazing, but it wasn’t enough to make up for the lack of great suspense beforehand. In some ways, Bedlam’s a slow-burn, but I don’t really know, as great as the ending is, if it makes up for what the movie was lacking previously.

The 1940’s is probably, in my opinion, the worst decade for horror films since the creation of the genre, but there are some really great films that came out in this ten-year range, and Bedlam is definitely one of them. I loved this when I first saw it many years back, and the movie still has so much to offer.

9/10