Tag: 1987

Dark Tower (1987)

Directed by Freddie Francis [Other horror films: The Brain (1962), The Day of the Triffids (1963), Paranoiac (1963), Nightmare (1964), The Evil of Frankenstein (1964), Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (1965), Hysteria (1965), The Skull (1965), The Psychopath (1966), The Deadly Bees (1966), They Came from Beyond Space (1967), Torture Garden (1967), Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968), Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny & Girly (1970), Trog (1970), Gebissen wird nur nachts – das Happening der Vampire (1971), Tales from the Crypt (1972), The Creeping Flesh (1973), Son of Dracula (1973), Tales That Witness Madness (1973), Craze (1974), Legend of the Werewolf (1975), The Ghoul (1975), The Doctor and the Devils (1985)] & Ken Wiederhorn [Other horror films: Shock Waves (1977), Eyes of a Stranger (1981), Return of the Living Dead: Part II (1988)]

I’ve wanted to see Dark Tower for some time now. The idea of a haunted high-rise appeals to me, and I thought it might be an interesting idea to play around with. Sadly, though, I don’t think that Dark Tower is the best execution of this idea.

This is likely known by those involved with the movie, too. I’m not someone who delves into behind-the-scenes information, but I did notice that the original director of this one (Ken Wiederhorn) was replaced by well-known Freddie Francis. And yet, when the movie starts playing, we’re told it’s directed by Ken Barnett; apparently Francis wanted his name removed from the film because he was dissatisfied. I should also mention that he never again directed another movie.

It’s not all bad, though – Dark Tower was filmed in Barcelona, Spain, so anytime we see outside shots, we see some beautiful structures and buildings older than the hills. Despite being in English, the film does possess a foreign flavor throughout, which is nice. It doesn’t make the film altogether that much more interesting, but it’s nice all the same

And while many of the deaths here aren’t too memorable there’s always potential. Early on in the film, a window wiper falls from his scaffolding, perhaps pushed by a malevolent spirit. After being possessed by the same spirit, another takes part in a mass shooting, which was at least filmed well. On the other hand, there was a very weak elevator death – I’d personally stick with De lift or Damien: Omen II.

In the finale, we did see someone get electrocuted, and another get impaled. Well, technically, we didn’t see this individual get impaled, but even so. Unfortunately, though, the finale – or, if I’m being honest, the last twenty minutes – seemed a bit of a mess. Here’s just a small example – three characters go to the haunted building (Michael Moriarty, Kevin McCarthy, and Theodore Bikel), and for some forsaken reason, they split up. No reason was given – we see these three characters enter an elevator, and the next we see of them, they’re in completely different rooms (if not floors).

I liked the idea of this movie, but it definitely felt a bit choppy at times. I appreciated aspects of the finale, and while there’s not really a twist, we do learn more about Jenny Agutter’s character. I had thought that it might have gone in the direction it did, and I was happy that they did so. It didn’t really make the ending much better, but it was at least good in concept.

At first, I did think the movie would follow Jenny Agutter (The Survivor, Child’s Play 2, Dominique), but instead we largely followed Michael Moriarty (A Return to Salem’s Lot, Troll, Blood Link, The Stuff, Q). I was surprised, but okay, with this – it’s not that Agutter wasn’t decent, but Moriarty was more interesting to me (though at times, I have to say that his delivery wasn’t stellar).

I think that Theodore Bikel (I Bury the Living) is easily the most enjoyable performance in the film – despite the movie seeming somewhat lifeless, all of his scenes had character. Lastly, Kevin McCarthy (The Sleeping Car, Piranha, Invasion of the Body Snatchers) appeared, but we never really got a great hang on his character.

Dark Tower can be an okay movie to watch, but it’s definitely a far cry from good, and while aspects were at the very least interesting, I can’t say it’s a movie that will really stick out in my mind, at least not with the rather lack-luster execution managed with this movie. Just a shame, in my view.

5.5/10

Howling III (1987)

Directed by Philippe Mora [Other horror films: The Beast Within (1982), Howling II: Stirba – Werewolf Bitch (1985), Communion (1989), I was a Communist Werewolf (2021)]

For the first ten minutes or so, I found Howling III a mess. Not that portions past the first ten minutes weren’t messy, but things did stabilize a bit. Even so, while this movie certainly had some interesting ideas, along with a couple of strong elements, I can’t say that I necessarily found it all that enjoyable.

It’s such a wild story, though. You have werewolves in Australia, a Russian werewolf ballerina defecting to Australia, a young woman wanting to escape her life in her Australian werewolf tribe, and falling in love with a human, all while an American is coming over to Australia to find evidence of the existence of werewolves.

First off, this has nothing to do with the first two movies of the series. There is a reference made by one of the werewolves of a possible group of Lycanthropes in California, but that’s as close as this movie gets to making a connection. Thematically, the final scene is quite similar to how the first movie ended, so there’s that, but for this most part, this is very much a stand alone sequel.

As stated, the story is wild enough, but what’s really interesting is the approach they take to the werewolves in the film. At first, as expected, they’re generally an antagonistic force, but as the main character (Barry Otto) is an anthropologist, he’s interested in purely studying these creatures as opposed to causing them harm, putting him in conflict with the military. It doesn’t help matters that he falls in love with a half-human/half-werewolf, and that’s when things get more fascinating.

Obviously, I don’t want to divulge the end of this one, but it’s just odd. The final 15 minutes took me on a trip I really didn’t expect, and, save a single scene, it’s almost entirely void of what people would generally call ‘horror.’ We follow the lives of four characters, and their offspring, as they live for 15+ years in the wilderness, eventually being found out and brought back into the modern world. It was such an odd, and oddly wholesome, finale, and that final scene in Otto’s classroom was almost emotional.

I don’t know Barry Otto, but I pretty much liked his character from beginning to end. Imogen Annesley was solid, reminding me personality-wise of Louise Jameson’s Leela from Doctor Who. Though his character had his ups and downs, Ralph Cotterill (The Survivor) turned out a solid performance also. Lee Biolos was an oddly decent, upstanding character, and Frank Thring was the MVP. He didn’t get a lot of screen-time, and he wasn’t important to the plot, but I loved his fun character.

Burnham Burnham (Dark Age) was decent, though I wish his character had a bit more to do. Max Fairchild’s character has an interesting route – you sort of expect him to be the main antagonist, especially toward the finale, but that never really happens. His character arc just strikes me as odd. The only main performance to not really leave an impression on me was Dagmar Bláhová’s, though toward the end, I could at least appreciate her.

Though the movie is almost an hour and 40 minutes long, I don’t know if I’d go as far as to say it ever dragged. It’s not a conventional werewolf movie, in many aspects, plus it’s Australian, so it does have an odd vibe to it, but boring isn’t one of the sins Howling III commits.

I do think I could have done without some of the more humorous portions. There’s not a lot, but toward the end, for instance, with the three werewolf nuns watching the television program – that’s something I didn’t need. I also could have done without some of the body-horror elements, such as that kangaroo-like pouch. I get the point, but I didn’t enjoy those portions at all.

In the end, though, Howling III is a very flawed film. I do think it’s better than the atrocious second movie, though – it may be low praise, but it’s what I’ve got. Certainly the finale of this one did carry with it some decent emotion, save the final scene, and if they had been able to expand that to the rest of the film, perhaps the final product would have been better. It might not have been horror – more a wholesome day-in-the-life of a werewolf community – but at least more consistent.

Really, it’s an odd movie. It can be entertaining, and it does have some strong portions, but I still find Howling III a decent bit below average. That said, this is one that I’ll ruminate on, as it does have the potential to move up, I think.

5.5/10

Lunch Meat (1987)

Directed by Kirk Alex [Other horror films: N/A]

More than anything, Lunch Meat is a bit of a tedious film. The plot isn’t anything terrible, but the approach is quite dull, and I don’t really think Lunch Meat has a lot going for it.

In fact, the most interesting thing about the film is that, if you search for it on IMDb, it won’t come up. This seems to be because one of the actresses, Ashlyn Gere, later went on to do pornographic films, and maybe IMDb thinks Lunch Meat is one of them. Maybe because it has “meat” in the title. It’s odd, because other films she was in, such as Creepozoids, Dreamaniac, and Evil Laugh, all come up without an issue.

That’s easily the most interesting thing about Lunch Meat, though. The story isn’t bad – imagine if Wrong Turn were made 16 years earlier on a shoe-string budget, and you’d get the picture. A man and his three sons kill people for meat, and six young folks run amok of them. It might sound like an okay film, and it probably could have been under different circumstances, but it just feels so dull.

To be honest, none of the six protagonists (Bob Joseph, Ashlyn Gere, Joe Ricciardella, Marie Ruzicka, Rick Lorentz, and Patricia Christie) really stood out. I guess Ricciardella had some of the better scenes – trying to set traps against those coming after him – but they were all relatively without character and pretty interchangeable. The four cannibal antagonists (Chuck Ellis, Mitch Rogers, Robert Oland, and Elroy Wiese) were a little more interesting, but not much, and certainly none are anywhere close as fun as we get 16 years later in Wrong Turn.

Also, the gore is pretty non-existent. I guess there’s a decapitation somewhat early on, but it’s one of the least memorable decapitations imaginable, and few of the other scenes do much. Someone gets stabbed a lot, a couple of people get a pickaxe through the foot, and someone gets beaten with a stick, but there’s nothing here that would really impress most people.

A movie like Lunch Meat could have been, at the very least, entertaining, but the approach the film takes is so dry, even during the more action-oriented portions. There’s never much in the way of tension or dread, we never really learn much about the characters, and it’s just a rough movie throughout.

5.5/10

The Lost Boys (1987)

Directed by Joel Schumacher [Other horror films: Flatliners (1990), Town Creek (2009)]

I’ve seen The Lost Boys twice now, and while it’s a moderately entertaining film, it’s never felt special to me. So many in the horror community love it, but when it comes to 80’s vampires, Fright Night is always my go-to.

The Lost Boys is still decent, and I’d probably rate it around average, but it’s not anymore than that for me. There’s only a few characters I really cared for, and some of the comedy just wasn’t my type of thing. I did dig most of the finale, along with the twist they threw in, but other story elements didn’t interest me that much (I can’t tell you how much I didn’t care about Star and her claiming she ‘warned’ Michael before he drank the blood, which is bullshit, as you can’t say something so ludicrous and just expect them to take your word for it, and count that as a warning).

Related, toward the end of the film, Sam and the Frog Brothers ride out to where Sam’s mother works, and Sam attempts to warn his mother about the vampires. It amazes me that neither of the Frog Brothers, nor Sam himself, would realize that he would be utterly unable to make a convincing argument about that, and it’s scenes where people try to convince others of something without good evidence that just drive me crazy. Sam was a decently smart kid, but he thought that would work? Give me a fucking break.

I liked the scenery and locations, especially the boardwalk (actually, more specifically, the comic book store – most of what I saw there seemed to be DC Comics, but I did see an issue of ROM, so that’s promising). It looked way too crowded and busy for me to ever actually want to go to a place like that, but it was definitely classic California imagery.

Despite not caring for many of the characters, most of the performances were decent. Corey Haim (Silver Bullet) and Jason Patric were good as brothers, Dianne Wiest was good as a concerned mother, and Kiefer Sutherland was great as the vampire David. Barnard Hughes got a pretty funny line in at the end, Alex Winter (Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure) was nice to see, and though I couldn’t stand her character whatsoever, Jami Gertz did fine.

Like I said, I do think the film’s decently entertaining, but with the two times I’ve seen it, I never thought The Lost Boys was great. I’d compare it to my views on The Shining, but I rather dislike The Shining, whereas I generally find this movie perfectly fine. It’s just one of my many quirks. The Lost Boys works for many people, but I think it’s just around average.

7/10

Lucifer (1987)

Directed by John Eyres [Other horror films: Project Shadowchaser III (1995), Judge and Jury (1996), Octopus (2000), Ripper (2001)]

This is a bit of an odd film. Lucifer (which was apparently released under the much catchier title Goodnight, God Bless later on) is a slasher with a fantastic opening, but very little past that point really makes an impact.

I have to first say, though, that I don’t quite know the origins of this one. It’s filmed in London, and multiple reviewers call it a British movie, which makes sense, but then IMDb lists the country of origin as Canada, so I don’t know what that’s about. I’ll just assume it’s a Canadian film made in London for some reason, as that’s really all I have to work on.

No matter where it’s from, though, that opening is strong. It’s also sort of sad, because nothing else in the movie comes even close to matching it, but hey, I guess if you start off strong, then that’s the risk you have to run.

A man dressed as a priest approaches a schoolyard – kids are frollicking and playing as kids do, and being watched over by a teacher. The priest enters the yard, and the teacher walks up to him. It’s a short conversation, though, as he pulls out a knife and stabs her. He then pulls a handgun out and shoots the kids. He doesn’t kill all of them – only five children die in the opening (we see their body bags a little later on) but one of the girls he does attempt to kill gets lucky, and becomes the focus of his obsession throughout the film.

Not too many horror films deal with the death of kids in a senseless act of violence like this, and I definitely appreciated how this film ignored convention and began with five young kids getting shot in a schoolyard. Masterful opening, definitely memorable, and it’s a shame little else in the film does much.

Which isn’t to say the other kills are bad – there was an okay one dealing with a police officer falling prey to a spike-trap of sorts, which was sort of fun. There was an almost suspenseful scene in a movie theater in which the priest stabbed a knife through the chair in front of him, which would have killed the target had they not dropped something and was leaning forward to pick it up. Even so, for a slasher film, Lucifer just doesn’t have enough pop, and feels far more sluggish than one would hope.

Frank Rozelaar-Green wasn’t a very interesting lead, but then again, Emma Burdon-Sutton wasn’t particularly noteworthy either, but I guess Jane Price did well as a young kid who almost gets killed multiple times throughout the movie. Really, there’s no great performances here, and that coupled with the sluggish nature of the film, not to mention bloodless kills, is a disappointment.

Oh, I should mention a couple of more things. We never find out the killer’s identity – despite the fact we never see his face and it just seems that his identity might be important, I guess we were misled (which is a mild shame, because while simple in design, I did like the killer’s priest look). Also, the final scene, in which there’s a confession given, strikes me as nonsensical, unnecessary, and somewhat ridiculous.

Lucifer (or as I prefer, Goodnight, God Bless) is a dull film with not much aside from the opening truly going for it. For a late 80’s British/Canadian slasher, I’m guessing there’s not a lot of choices out there, so if you’re desperate, give this a watch. Otherwise, this isn’t a great film, nor a good one, and though I recommend watching the first five minutes, most of this film isn’t worth it.

5.5/10

The Gate (1987)

Directed by Tibor Takács [Other horror films: I, Madman (1989), The Gate II: Trespassers (1990), Rats (2003), Mansquito (2005), Kraken: Tentacles of the Deep (2006), Ice Spiders (2007), Mega Snake (2007), Spiders 3D (2013), Bunks (2013)]

Having seen The Gate once before, I can say that it’s a perfectly pleasant viewing experience. I don’t think it’s a great movie, but it does have that fun 80’s sensibility, and if you want a good time, giving The Gate a chance would be a fine idea.

Plot-wise, it’s not necessarily impressive, but I do think it did well, especially focusing on kid as the main character. What stands out more would be the quality special effects, which included some nifty stop-motion animation which looked pretty good. It may have gotten a little much come the finale, but the special effects overall were on the better side of the genre.

Though a kid, Stephen Dorff (who later stars in the neo-classic Feardotcom) does well, and perhaps stands out with the marginally-more emotional material, and his relationship with his sister (Christa Denton) is perhaps one of the more interesting elements of the movie. Denton herself does quite a decent job as a concerned older sister, and though past a certain point his character doesn’t matter, Louis Tripp did well as a friend of Dorff’s character.

Being a movie aimed toward a younger audience, The Gate isn’t really a violent movie whatsoever, and really, much like Gremlins (which is actually a movie I’d consider more tense), this could be a good onboarding film to get kids into horror. Plus, as I said, it has that 80’s charm, and what kids don’t enjoy that?

Though The Gate isn’t a favorite of mine, I do find the film rather fun at times. It’s not a go-to for me insofar as 80’s horror is concerned, but it was well-made, and never feels too campy or silly, which, based on some of the effects, people might be surprised by. It’s a movie worth seeing at least once, and could well make it’s way into your collection. I don’t love it, but it does what it has to, and if you’re a child of the 1980’s, you may already be charmed by this one.

7/10

Return to Horror High (1987)

Directed by Bill Froehlich [Other horror films: N/A]

In all honesty, Return to Horror High could have been something special. I don’t know what it would have needed to get there – maybe better direction, a more serious approach, something else – but with the meta nature of the film, along with the nonlinear plot (not to mention the plot twists), this had potential. The problem is it didn’t land at all.

And I don’t just mean the finale – I mean all of it. Certain scenes were interesting – the first time they had a scene break for us only to discover it was part of the filming threw me for a loop (I honestly thought it was a flashback), and there were a few decently artistic scenes (such as the love-making sequence, what with flashing lights from welding outside and the 80’s styles of Wendy Fraser’s “Man for Me”), but for the most part, very little in this film made an impact on me.

When I first saw this years ago, I suspect I might have found it somewhat convoluted, and while things generally make more sense this time around (aside from the “Daddy” ending), that cohesion doesn’t really benefit my views on this much. I just found it an interesting concept that was executed somewhat woefully, and not much in the way of performances save it.

Many might mention George Clooney when bringing this one up, and I guess I have also, but even knowing he was in this, I didn’t recognize his face (it doesn’t help that I know very little from Clooney – I’ve only seen two films with him in it, being Batman & Robin and From Dusk Till Dawn). More noticeable by far were Maureen McCormick (who was one of the few elements of comedy I consistently appreciated), Alex Rocco, Brendan Hughes (Howling VI: The Freaks), and Lori Lethin (who had three separate roles here).

There wasn’t much in the way of kills whatsoever. Pretty much all of them are weak save for perhaps the take on a human dissection. Everything else was forgettable, though, but that’s okay, because it fits well with the rest of the movie.

Which may have come out more unkindly than necessary, but Return to Horror High, like I said, had potential. Almost none of it really did anything for me though – not even the mystery of the killer, and that usually at least garners some mild interest from me. I found this utterly underwhelming, and despite some potentially clever ideas, I don’t think I’m going to give this one a third viewing.

5/10

Blood Harvest (1987)

Directed by Bill Rebane [Other horror films: Monster a Go-Go (1965), Invasion from Inner Earth (1974), The Giant Spider Invasion (1975), The Alpha Incident (1978), The Capture of Bigfoot (1979), Rana: The Legend of Shadow Lake (1980), The Demons of Ludlow (1983), The Game (1984)]

It’s been some years since I’ve last seen this one, and though I enjoyed the film the first time around, I’d be lying if I said that I remembered a lot about it, because I didn’t. Aside from Tiny Tim’s presence and a few scenes revolving around him, I went into this without too many memories, which probably helped a bit with the enjoyment factor.

Obviously Blood Harvest is far from perfect, and it may ultimately wind up around average, if not below, but Tiny Tim (who is a singer most known for his falsetto voice and such hits as “Livin’ in the Sunlight, Lovin’ in the Moonlight” and “Tiptoe Through the Tulips”) gives a fantastically emotional performance as he plays a mentally-handicapped man who recently lost his parents and is deeply struggling with it. Some of his antics might seem a bit much, but from the scene of him singing and sobbing in the church, I was hooked. An odd, but great, performance.

Aside from Tiny Tim, though, much of the movie comes across as a bit pedestrian. They throw in some occasionally interesting elements, such as the local farmers being unhappy with someone due to the bank’s recent foreclosures, so much so they vandalize the house of the bank’s spokesperson, and certainly there were creepy moments when someone drugged the main character, played by Itonia Salchek, and then stripped her naked to take pictures of her, because that’s the type of stand-up guys we need in the world.

As far as Salchek goes, this was her sole movie, and amusingly, her IMDb profile states that, to this day, “people are still trying to find or find out what happened to her.” I don’t know if it’s as serious as all that (the profile also says that after filming this movie, she either “disappeared or died” which seems dramatic to me). Regardless of what happened with her, Salchek gives a decent performance, and is no stranger to providing some quality nudity, so kudos for that.

I’ve already mentioned that Tiny Tim is the best performance here, but I’ll reiterate that I really felt an emotional punch at times throughout the movie due to him. He may look silly with clown make-up on, and his “Gary and Jill went up the hill” song that pops up here and there, but what a performance. The sheriff, played by Frank Benson, was occasionally amusing, and while Lori Minnetti (who was also in the odd 1984 film The Game, or The Cold) didn’t add a lot, I did like her appearances on-screen. Dean West didn’t really leave an impression either way.

None of the kills here are stellar, but I do sort of enjoy that oppressive mystery that surrounds Itonia Salchek’s Jill – she gets back home, but her parents are missing, and with no way to contact them, she’s just sort of lost. What’s even creepier is that some of the action is taking place at a barn pretty close to home, and yet she’s not aware of it. The violence here was certainly okay, but I think the mystery is probably the moderately more interesting aspect (aside from the fact that most of the red herrings fail pretty miserably).

Sometimes it can feel like not that much is happening, though, and in that aspect, I think Blood Harvest fails to fully engage the audience (which is a bit of a shame, because the director Bill Rebane also directed The Demons of Ludlow, which, despite it’s current 3.4/10 rating on IMDb, is a pretty fun movie), and though the movie is by no means long, I do think it drags at parts.

None of this is to say the movie is bad. For a late 80’s slasher, it can provide an okay time, and though there are plenty of others I’d prefer to watch, such as Iced, Moonstalker, or Intruder, I could see myself watching this one again, even though I find it a little lacking.

6.5/10

This is one of the films covered by Fight Evil’s podcast. Listen below as Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss Blood Harvest.

Opera (1987)

Directed by Dario Argento [Other horror films: L’uccello dalle piume di cristallo (1970), Il gatto a nove code (1971), 4 mosche di velluto grigio (1971), Profondo rosso (1975), Suspiria (1977), Inferno (1980), Tenebre (1982), Phenomena (1985), Due occhi diabolici (1990, segment ‘The Black Cat’), Trauma (1993), La sindrome di Stendhal (1996), Il fantasma dell’opera (1998), Non ho sonno (2001), Il cartaio (2003), Ti piace Hitchcock? (2005), La terza madre (2007), Giallo (2009), Dracula 3D (2012), Occhiali neri (2022)]

Sometimes considered one of the last great Argento films, Opera is a movie that I’ve long been aware of, and given my love of some of his previous work, a movie I’ve wanted to see for some time, and overall, while I thought a few changes here and there might have worked, I found the film quite solid.

A big part of this would be the gore and quality special effects throughout the film, and there are some really spectacular scenes here. Perhaps the most remarkable would be the slow-motion headshot sequence, in which a bullet exits the gun, shoots through the peep-hole, and, as one can imagine, pierces a poor soul in the head. Also quite solid is a kill with a knife through the jar, and a woman forced to watch lest she lose her eyebrows via needles taped near her eyes (as the poster demonstrates).

For a late 80’s giallo, over ten years since the heyday of the sub-genre, Opera did a pretty good job as far as the gore goes. The mystery isn’t quite great, but you’re left wondering who exactly is committing the crimes, the answer for which isn’t entirely satisfactory, but the showdown between the mysterious killer and Cristina Marsillach is pretty solid. I don’t love the final scene – I can see why some wanted it removed for the US release – but that’s not too much a deterrent.

Cristina Marsillach isn’t the best lead I’ve seen, because her character (and this isn’t just her – this could be applied to multiple characters throughout the movie) made her fair share of somewhat questionable decisions. Ian Charleson was a character I wanted to like more, as he struck me as potentially interesting, but I felt he wasn’t entirely fleshed out.

In fact, I think this is a complaint I have with most of the characters, so not only do many of them make some foolish decisions (Marsillach not going to the police after witnessing the murder, or Coralina Cataldi-Tassoni not getting help for Marsillach as soon as she saw her in the glass, etc.), but they make those bad decisions while feeling like somewhat shallow characters, and though that didn’t make the film terrible, by any means, I definitely noticed it.

Of course, I did enjoy seeing the occasional Argento addition of odd lighting at times (the two women being trapped in the apartment may have been the best example of that), but the film, as far as stylistic endeavors went, seemed quite a bit more tame than Argento’s previous works. I also could have done without the somewhat jarring heavy metal music during the kills, but I can understand why they’re there.

So though the mystery wasn’t great, and honestly, the characters weren’t great (Urbano Barberini being one of the few shining lights, as far as dim shining lights go), the kills were pretty solid, and I can say that I did enjoy the film. I just didn’t enjoy it as much as Deep Red or even Suspiria.

7.5/10

Uninvited (1987)

Directed by Greydon Clark [Other horror films: Satan’s Cheerleaders (1977), Without Warning (1980), Wacko (1982), Dance Macabre (1992)]

So I’ll give the poster credit for being decent, but boy, this movie definitely has some issues. That doesn’t make Uninvited any less entertaining, but I suspect that this film, while somewhat fun once around, might suffer deeply with revisits.

Even seeing it once doesn’t lead to the best time, but the dialogue and acting is so awful, it’s almost good. The cat itself is fine, but the ill-defined creature that exists within the cat that does most of the killings doesn’t look particularly impressive whatsoever.

I do personally appreciate that this film takes place mostly on a yacht (and a few years before Jason Takes a Long Boat Ride), because more enclosed spaces theoretically should increase the tension. Of course, it never really did, but being lost out at sea without a working engine did hold with it a certain despair.

Alex Cord was appropriately campy here, and his character, of course, quite a dick. He did have a slimy charm at times, but by the end, he got somewhat hard to appreciate. Clu Gulager (The Return of the Living Dead and Freddy’s Revenge) was sort of nice to see, but he didn’t have a heck of a lot of screen-time. Better was George Kennedy (Just Before Dawn and Death Ship), who was Cord’s serious-minded right-hand man.

Shari Shattuck and Clare Carey never really caught on with me (they were cute, sure, but they weren’t winning any IQ tests). Likewise, neither Beau Dremann nor Rob Estes (Phantom of the Mall: Eric’s Revenge) blew me away, but I did really like both Eric Larson (Demon Wind) and Toni Hudson. Hudson was maybe a bit more generic, but Larson’s character was pretty interesting, and one of the only ones on board to really root for.

Toward the end, once the surviving characters get into a lifeboat, the cat-creature-thing attacks them twice, with this ridiculous music playing. The sequence was a good example of what to expect from this movie. It’s not overtly silly (though like I said, some of the performances are more than a little camp), but it almost reaches into the realm of comedy with as bad as some of these scenes are.

When it’s all said and done, Uninvited isn’t anywhere near a great movie, but it can be entertaining, and if that’s your main concern, I think you could certainly do a lot worse than this, as bad as this can get.

5.5/10

This is one of the films covered on Fight Evil’s podcast. If you want to hear Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss this one, then look no further.