USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK: Party Camp

PARTY CAMP  Directed by Gary Graver (1987).

Reviewed By Machine "Gun" Kristin

Have an hour and a half to kill? Then look further because “Party Camp” ain’t it. This tepid, scattered piece of 80s trash is at best a decent 1987 time capsule. There are definitely better movies ("Summer Camp Nightmare", "Sleepaway Camp" etc) in the niche “summer camp-sploitation” genre that make a whole lot more sense than this one. This movie’s plot is barely held together with spit and chewing gum. Screenwriter Paul Brown is probably better known for “Quantum Leap” (oh boy), but “Camp” was his second outing as a writer. Director Gary Graver has mostly porn on his resume (“The Joi Fuck Club”, anyone?) with one horror credit, “Trick Or Treats” (1982).

Starring Andrew Ross as Jerry (who only has three acting credits) trudges along, hopping a school bus to a camp counselor job, seeking his dream girl. There’s Billy Jacoby as I’m guessing “Miami Vice” influenced, D.A., At some point in real life he was married to the syringe-toting Nurse Brenda played by April Wayne who later have some strange S&M scenes. The secretly kinky authority figures (Sarge and Mrs. Beadle) are almost never seen besides the beginning of the film with dispersed scenes of Sarge grabbing a kid's ear 3 (!) times. The ages among the campers seem to be from Elementary to College, is that normal? The closest thing to camp I’ve been to was a Girl Scout trip ages ago. Then we have the interesting Jewel Shepard as perpetually horny Dyanne whose character seemed to have some kind of manic disorder, just acting off the wall from the jump. I thought she’d start foaming at the mouth when Jerry chews on her pearls when he first meets her on the bus, while her brawn-no-brains boyfriend, Tad chases the bus. 

There are not enough jokes that land to make it a true comedy and not enough nudity to qualify for a late-night T&A type of flick. It appears to have been reedited which is confirmed in Mike McPadden’s “Teen Movie Hell”. At least three times, a character will ask “Are they real?” when talking about a girl's chest. Super weird, I thought for sure the breast implant accusations happened in the late 90s/early 2000s on dating shows such as “Elimidate”. haha. 

We end the “Party” with mentioned once mountain bike competition between the cool guys (Tad and The Falcons) and the dorks (Jerry and the Squirrels). Yay, the movie’s finally over. 

“Party Camp” aired on USA Up All Night on: S4.E19: Mar 6, 1992 with “Naked Warriors” 

 S4.E85: Oct 24, 1992 with “Vampires on Bikini Beach” S4.E88: Nov 6, 1992 with "Spring Fever USA” Link

May 28, 1993 with “Young Nurses in Love” Link

Nov 27, 1993 with "Party Incorporated” and probably many more. You can watch “Party Camp” here

USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK: A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell!

"A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell"(1990)

Director: Brett Piper 

Writer: Brett Piper
Stars: Paul Guzzi, Linda Corwin, Alex Pirnie

Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin

So far, "A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell!" plays like a fully-clothed porno, meaning, what the hell's the point? I think they may have been way too inspired by the music video, "Walk The Dinosaur" by Was(Not Was). Or Was it? 

and maybe decided to make a full length movie based on the video game for "Primal Rage".

It's Troma, so there's zero respect for sanity of their audience. Their movies are 9 times out of 10 an hour and a half too long. haha. I can't hate Troma too much because yes, they're mostly terrible movies, but they're still important. I guess it's reputable under the guise that anyone (and they mean anyone) can be a filmmaker and that's something to behold for sure. No idea too dumb, no plot too thin, no special effects too not-so-special. The Ray Harryhausen style animated monsters (by Brett Piper and Alex Pirnie) sprinkled throughout here in "Nymphoid" were so adorable! haha. 

Gawd this movie is terrible. I'm going to make a rule for myself never to choose the movie based on extremely long, deceptively interesting title. Reminds of the other movie related rule of thumb of the past; never to rent "big box" horror movies at your local video store. I'm not sure if that was always 100% true, but it's still entertaining to think about. For example, my first thought when it comes to big video boxes is a copy of "2000 Maniacs" which I guess in comparison is actually a "good movie" haha. 

The whole movie's explained in the first 2 minutes but I actually forgot about it by the time I got to the ending. I'm not the only one, the film abandoned the storyline too. Basically, a barbarian girl (Linda Corwin) is one of the last women on earth after a major nuclear war that ended civilization and the remaining animals morphed in those awesome animated monsters I mentioned before. If there was an edit of this movie with nothing but those monsters, that would've been way better! The title is pretty deceiving in that there is yes, a couple of icky attempted rapes (not initiated by our female lead, but the gnarly cavemen wandering about), but nothing that would define a nymphomaniac of any kind. 

The music score kept reminding me of "O Holy Night" so I had this bizarre caveman adventure Christmas theme going on in my head for a bit. hahaha.  Hey, at least this movie's mostly set at the beach (somewhere in New Hampshire apparently), so we can enjoy the scenery. A great way to sum this movie up is the first comment on YouTube where Troma has graciously uploaded this video for all to see. Commenter Douglas Berry says: "I sometimes ask myself, why am I watching this? Is my life so empty I'll watch any moving picture? I guess so......"

I rate this movie 3 creatures 🐲🐲🐲  for the FX

1 pile of poo 💩 for the rest of it

USA UP ALL NIGHT airings of "A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell!"

Season 3 | Episode 5 (18 January 1991) A Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell/Young Nurses in Love

Season 3 | Episode 69 (31 August 1991) Joysticks/A Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell 

WATCH HERE (Thanks TROMA!) 

BUY HERE!

There's actually commentary on the DVD by Director/Writer/Creature FX Brett Piper. Would love to hear that! 

USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK: Eat And Run

"Eat And Run"(1986)

Director: Christopher Hart 

Writer: Stan Hart, Christopher Hart

Stars: Ron Silver, Sharon Sharth, Pat Ryan

Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin

"Eat And Run" seems like a somewhat larger budgeted movie from the looks of it, with that glossy New World Pictures logo coming on the screen. At least it seems fancier to me. This movie's pretty gross but it's actually adorably funny in a likable cornball way. It's one of the many New York set films of the 1980s that emphasizes it's Italian community, although it's probably the only one that focuses on the appetizing nature of its people as food versus the food that they create. haha. They generically reference Carvel ice cream cakes which is painfully 80s NY, but surprisingly not Friendly's (even though, they hail from Massachusetts) which seems to be a suburban NY staple. Hell, they even referenced Friendly's in "The Sopranos" haha.

The eating (although, not much running actually) is done by shirt button spitting character actor, Pat Ryan (or sometimes R.L. Ryan). You might recognize him as the sleazy junkyard owner from "Street Trash" which he did around the same time as "Eat..".  Here, he's a humanoid space alien named Murray the Creature that crash landed in New York. A nice Italian man picks him up thinking he's a hitchhiker and inadvertently talks Murray into eating him. This sets a series of murders that goofball detective, Mickey McSorely (Ron Silver) goes on a self-narrating journey to solve.

"I Ordered Fudgey The Fish But They Send Me Fuckin' Cookie Face!" 

I went into this "USA Up All Night" choice of movie thinking it was a horror film, but it's more of a comedy than anything. All the "gore" is done off screen. There are a ton of gags in this, which can sometimes read as trying too hard. Sometimes they kinda bash you over the head with the schtick but it was still charming in a vaudeville kinda way. It was the last movie written by Stan Hart who was head writer of "The Carol Burnett Show" and also had written for Mad Magazine.

I could've done without the icky comedic fully-clothed sex scenes with poofy haired Judge Cheryl (Sharon Schlarth) and McSorely, haha. Some of the dialogue exchanges though were pretty funny like,

Cheryl: "Oh by way, I forgot to ask if you had Herpes?" 

McSorely: "Oh god no, that's one thing I don't have" 

Cheryl: "It's not so bad, it stings from time to time, but it doesn't interfere with my social life" 

Murray eats tunnel-digging Agamemnon from "OZ" 

I think my favorite gag was when the Zeppoles vendor fried his ring, his watch and his ID bracelet.  The least would have to be the weird sex scene with McSorely (he kinda resembles an off-brand Andy Garcia) and Judge Cheryl but she's sound asleep. Yuck. 

This movie is not quite at "Eating Raoul" caliber as far as comedies involving eating people goes,  but it's worth a look. These movies were surprisingly never paired up on "USA Up All Night". 

"Eat And Run" apparently aired 4 times (!!) on "USA Up All Night":

April 8th 1989 Satan's Cheerleaders/Eat and Run 

September 1 1989 Eat and Run/The Kentucky Fried Movie 

November 24 1989 Swim Team/Eat and Run 

November 25 1989 Eat and Run/The Van 

I give this one 2 and half pizzas 🍕🍕

You can watch "Eat And Run" HERE

Find the it for sale HERE

USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK: Fatal Exposure

 

"Fatal Exposure" aka "Mangled Alive" (1989)

Director: Peter B. Good

Writer: Christopher Painter

Stars: Blake Bahner, Ena Henderson, Dan Schmale

Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin

I’ve probably seen “Fatal Exposure” in a video store at some point. I mean, just look at the video cover. Trashy, kinda scary with the big skull in the background. Maybe like a cross between an 80s slasher and a Shannon Tweed flick? In 1994 (S6:EP92) it was broadcast on USA’s Up All Night (paired with “The Sex Puppets”). I’m kind of astounded with the amount of sex and pretty shocking gore scenes that this was watchable in an edited for TV format. Editing techniques weren’t nearly as fancy back then as they are nowadays. (For example, check out the digitally painted on bras in the edited for TV version of “ShowGirls”). Sure, the sex is mostly just nips and super high on the thigh underwear (damn you 1989 fashion!) still on, but you get the point.

We follow the mullet-haired Jack T. Rippington (hahaha), grandson of serial killer Jack The Ripper (played by kickboxer/soap opera actor, Blake Bahner). He believes that the blood of his photoshoot model victims is basically Viagra which he stores in a lunchbox Thermos. He laughably explains what he's doing to the camera as sort of an on-screen narrator. This is done somewhat tongue-in-cheek though because when he first meets his Sherilyn Fenn-type "dreamgirl" Erica (Ena Henderson) she says, "do you always talk to yourself?".

This movie is weird because it should be seen as terrible, unlikable, badly made, etc, but it's really not. I don't know, I liked the characters and felt that they weren't trying too hard. Make no mistake, this movie is pretty terrible, but that doesn't mean it isn't super fun. It would awesome to watch super drunk with some friends and lots of snacks. Like I mentioned before, I was pretty surprised at how viciously gory the death scenes are in this, and there's a lot of them. Heads chopped off, hydrochloric acid ingested resulting in melting flesh.

Whew! We can thank Scott Coulter (who also did "Class Of Nuke Em High" among a ton of credits and still works in effects today) for the kool gore effects.

The tone of "Fatal..." reminded me soo much of "Soultaker" (1990) which was savagely (by that I mean hilariously) made fun of by Mystery Science Theater 3000. I was also reminded of the fantastic, "Panic Beats" with it's extreme gore, house-in-the-middle-of-nowhere and soap opera-y feel. Lots of fun!

You can check out "Fatal Exposure" over HERE

The End of The Wicked (1999)

The End of The Wicked (1999)
Directed by: Teco Benson
Written by: Teco Benson (screenplay), Helen Ukpabio (story)
Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin 

I discovered "End Of The Wicked" through a user made list of movies on the website, letterboxd.com. The list is titled: Atrocities, Odditites, Trash, Trippy, Religious, Tinfoil Hat, WTF, The Worst in Film & Video and boy, is it ever. haha. After sifting through over a thousand films in the list, I found some hand painted posters produced in Ghana. I recently researched these strange film posters, which are displayed and preserved in a nice space in Chicago called the Deadly Prey Gallery. There, you can look at the many different types of movie posters, all pretty much the same style, painted in oils onto hand sewn flour bags. The poster interpretations of American films (mostly action and horror) are just as strange as you may have anticipated if you're familiar with other bizarre foreign posters from countries such as Thailand or Poland. The Ghana posters are in wide, gruesome brush strokes and make some movies look way more interesting than they actually are haha. I couldn't help but be reminded of the "The Mutilator" drawing from the art classroom scene in "Ghost World".

"Oh. I thought maybe this was supposed to be your father."

The thin plotline of "End Of The Wicked" consists of a group of Nigerian shape-shifting Beelzebub worshippers with what looks like hamburger meat plastered onto their faces. Their Lord is a white face make up covered man with a hairy bloody chin and Fat Albert's voice. He commands them to retrieve enough blood to fill a lake in 24 hours, although this goal is never achieved. The dialogue is either difficult to understand through bad audio and thick accents, which ends up being really unintentionally funny. In one scene, where a group of children are being initiated into the Satanic cult, a girl is told to "blow up all electronics in your home, drink bleach, glasses and then cause fever and failure to all of the children in your home" 

 

Beelzebub's Glamour Shot

The sets look to be decorated from those terrible large shops that say "antiques", where everything is brand new, dark pink, fake period piece style chairs, and particle board entertainment systems. Bleecchhh. Or better yet, they hired the set decorator from one of those strange religious shows that sometimes pop up on broadcast TV, with the giant desks and potted ferns in the background. I'd imagine this movie is a cross between "Black Devil Doll From Hell" (which I still haven't seen yet) and "Mystics In Bali" for the absurd special effects and bizarre, super awkward perverse scenes. In "Bali", the floating head (with organs intact), eats a baby right out of the womb, whereas in "Wicked", we're assaulted with the visual of main character Chris' Satan-worshipping mother (aka Lady Destroyer) raping his wife with a giant magic penis. Fun! Even better, we're somehow treated to not one, but two scenes involving bloody crotches! Yay! I feel like I should be running down the "drive-in totals" like Joe Bob Briggs there are so many wacky things in this gawd-awful movie. In one scene (brought to life in a GIF I made below), the evil children summon a plate of inedible looking pasta on the back of some poor guy while he's trying to sleep. After they devour it with their bare hands, the man wakes up in major back pain. So gross. Later, this same man is subjected to his eyes literally popping out of his head in a dream and he wakes up blind. I'm not even 100% sure what he did that was horrible to deserve this, but he ends his life by stabbing himself to death. He definitely made somebody in this movie mad. 

"I Wanna RAWK!"

Meanwhile, our main man Chris is (unbeknownst to him) still constantly being tortured by his witch mother throughout this movie. Until he's finally transformed into a goat and his throat is slaughtered. They appear to have actually sawed a poor goat's throat to achieve this scene and it is gruesome and horrible to watch. Speaking of real life horrors, this movie was concocted by Helen Ukpabio. She appears in this film as a pastor who I guess is supposed to save everyone from evil, but that doesn't seem to happen. This film was produced by Ukpabio's company called Liberty Foundation Gospel Ministries and it's basically Christian propaganda. She's a wealthy evangelist that apparently through her teachings has influenced many to abandon and sometimes actually murder their children believing that they are in fact witches in disguise. There is a documentary on the subject called Dispatches Saving Africa's Witch Children on YouTube. There's a barrage of very negative press about her career and her bizarre teachings. She was actually banned from entering Britain in 2014 and she has sued the British Humanist Association (BHA) for defamation for basically twisting her words around. BHA's reply: 

“The fact that she is threatening to launch a legal claim for half a billion pounds over an alleged distinction between being accused of exorcising "Satan" or "Vampires" tells you all you need to know about Ms Ukpabio.”

Completely crazy! 

Watch "End Of The Wicked" (in two parts, first part linked here) HERE!

Check out my website HERE!

Mondo Cane 2 (AKA Mondo Pazzo)

Mondo Pazzo
Directors: Gualtiero Jacopetti, Franco Prosperi

Reviewed By Machine Gun Kristin

My first impression of "Mondo Pazzo" came from a trailer tacked onto an episode of USA network's, "Reel Wild Cinema". It was almost a companion series to TNT Monstervision, which in its later years was hosted and written by Joe Bob Briggs. "Reel..." however had the Something Weird catalog behind their cinematic choices. "Mondo Cane" the first in the series of these Italian exploitation documentary films in the early 1960s. "Cane" even has a soundtrack that can somewhat easily be found in thrift shops next to usual, endless cast-off records such as the discography of Ray Coniff. Even more bizarre is that "Cane" is considered a "hit" at the box office with a theme ("More") that's been sung by pop music giants Frank Sinatra and Andy Williams among many others. Riz Ortolani, was the go-to mondo film guy and of course handled the electro-stress freakout score for Cannibal Holocaust.

The film opens with a dry-voiced (courtesy of Stefano Sibaldi) explanation as to why the first film ("Cane") was banned in England. The narrator reads on about how they've decided to use its scene cruelest to animals in the very beginning so that censors basically don't screw up the tone of the film. The deadpan vocal delivery of this is almost mocking while we see real dogs having their vocal cords altered to reduce their barking. It's a very upsetting visual. From there, we view more dogs being unnaturally colored to match dresses for a fashion show. Most bothersome is the literal dragging of one dog that refuses to walk down the runway. The scenery is basically British Pathe fashion videos on acid.

Cringeworthy Kisses For Sale

We see the earlier days of drag, seen not so much as a modern art form, but a terrible secret kept from their children. There are cakes made to resemble full dead bodies that are devoured by kids. Tortillas with a light splash of salsa, are then filled with live bugs and quickly eaten. The diners even take a moment catch the escaping flying bugs and toss them back in their mouth. Bleecchhh. They only slightly explain this as basically a revenge killing to these flies that are dangerous to Mexican crops. Even early in this film, I'm already saying out loud to myself, "what the hell is going on?!" Then my eyes are assaulted by old men paying for kisses while air purifying their mouths and unhinging their dentures.

Yay! It's fake! 

There's actually one non-disturbing segment that shows photos being created and set with scenes of fictional horror. It's pretty fascinating and fun to look at it. The models are sprayed with fake blood, and phony knives protruding from their chests playfully.  It was great to have a nice break for a few minutes. Then, we're roasted once again on the fires of the "awesome panorama of human behavior". Followed by scenes more dog torture, Italian guys ramming their heads into a garage door, and an insane scene of an artist in flames painting a portrait of half naked Satan and his entourage.

Satan's entourage is a bit like Vince and the gangs, accept not on HBO.

I'm sure "Pazzo" is small potatoes compared to other notorious "is it real or not?" style shockumentaries such as "Faces Of Death" and others. "Cane" is considered of the first shockumentaries and from what I was reading actually harder to watch than "Pazzo". One of the filmmakers, Gualtiero Jacopetti (who also is responsible for the unsettling "Africa Addio"), admitted though to recreating the scene of a monk lighting himself on fire, despite how horribly realistic it appears. The rest of the chilling scenes I can't say for sure if they're real or not. Phony gore is much easier to handle, we know that the actors can be healed again once the scene is complete at filming. Their blood isn't really shed across the wall, an artist created that fluid using their creativity and ingenuity. When you know it's real, your stomach begins to turn, your brain casts a shadow of sadness but thankfully you can look the other way in your own home.

This about sums it up

You can buy "Mondo Pazzo" HERE

Check out my website HERE

Wilczyca AKA She-Wolf (1983)

Wilczyca AKA She Wolf

Directed by: Marek Piestrak

Starring: Krzysztof Jasinski, Iwona Bielska, Stanislaw Brejdygant
Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin 

Boy did I want to like this one! The opening to similar to "Don't Torture A Duckling", with horrific images of animals eating one another. In this case, a bird picks at a dead, mutilated horse, that looks much too realistic. Matter of fact, there are many scenes of animal cruelty in this that are pretty questionable. Are they real? Are they not? Horses basically scream like crazy in one scene and a dog looks like he's really hurt. The rarity of this film makes it difficult to trace the origins of its creation, so we don't know for sure if there were any animals actually hurt in the making of this movie.

I chose to watch "Wilczyca" solely based on the poster artwork. I know, I know, that could totally go either way. I know I was definitely duped by the Giallo film, "Eyeball". The poster is crazy! So of course, how bad could it be? Well, it stunk! haha. I've even done a past review here on TOG for it. Here in "Wilczyca", we're in Poland, which is unusual within itself. I don't know of too many Polish horror films in particular. They certainly run the gamut on insane poster artwork though. I guess I should've let that be a hint as to the incoherent storytelling I was about to suffer through. I actually did some reading of other reviews after I watched it, which I never do because I don't want to influence my opinion of a film before I start writing. In "She-Wolf's" case, I had to because I had no idea what was going on. There is so much regional, political back story that I didn't understand the events taking place much. There's a pretty concise review on Braineater that explains the plot completely. Even so, it still doesn't save this movie.

From what I could dig up research wise, those who are familiar with the Polish language have pandered the subtitled adaption to be pretty inaccurate in some spots. I'm just thankful that there's any attempt at a translation. I've watched a few movies in the past, (such as a VHS copy of "Cristo Te Ama" which is a 1970s drug infused Mexican exploitation film), that had no subtitles at all, so I had to sort of connect the dots based on visuals only. Apparently in "She Wolf", there's a scene where he refers to somebody as a "bumpkin", which is a goofy word to use within itself, but he actually meant something more complementary than that. Pretty funny. The main character, Casper is completely unlikable, scratch that, no one is likeable! hahaha. He beats his wife Myrna, who lays dying after after a botched abortion (scandalous!) in the opening scene. Casper's been away for months and has just come back. She says that she'll die like a bitch! Whoa! What a thing to say! Turns out, she's a bitch indeed-a dog, er, werewolf! She's even clutching a wrapped up paw from a wolf! Ewww! I guess the best thing to do when your husband is an asshole that beats you and then leaves you for months at a time, is to just pick up witchcraft to pass the time. I mean, hell, it's the 19th century, what else are you going to do? In a later scene, Casper's brother describes Myrna's bizarre behavior, while they're pulling her rough looking casket in the terrifyingly snowy backdrop. Other reviews of "Wilczyca" have described the drenched in snow scenery as "beautiful", but personally it creeped me out. It seemed like the most depressing place to possibly be. While they're burying her, the older brother (I forget his name), starts whittling a wooden steak and says nonchalantly that Casper has to hammer it into his dead wife's heart. Ughhhhh.

From here, the movie draaags. They introduce some more unlikable characters such as Juliet, who is played by the same actress as Myrna. I actually did not notice that until towards the end when Casper realizes it himself. The print of this I watched was pretty grainy, so that may have been why I didn't notice. Or maybe, I just didn't really care, haha. I'm sure there's more I could say about the actors, but I guess if you can't say anything nice, you probably shouldn't say anything.

Besides the beginning scene, the steak hammering and the real or not animal cruelty, the gore in this is pretty minimal. They basically save it all for the end of the film, which is a pity, because it's hard to say if anyone's even made it that far. Thankfully the film clocks in at about an hour and 38 minutes, so it's not excruciatingly long. "Wilczyca" has received some mixed reviews from what I could dig up. People seem to either love it or hate it. I can't say that I hated it, but I don't think I'm going to be watching it again anytime soon. It definitely did its job in creeping me out, but probably not in the way that the filmmakers intended.

RATING: 👨🏻👨🏻 2 mustaches!

Watch if you dare!

Buy if you'd like (scroll down!)

Take a gander at my buttons/pins I make!

USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK RETURNS: The Outing

“The Outing” aka “The Lamp (1987)

Directed by: Tom Daley

Written by: Warren Chaney

Starring: Deborah Winters, James Huston and Andra St. Ivanyi

Review by: “Machine Gun” Kristin 

I saw “The Outing” at a sleepover party, probably when it was fairly recent on VHS in the late 80s. My memory is fuzzy at best so I have a surreal sort of recollection of it. It was on in the middle of the night, and I only remember flashes of the last 20 minutes or so. I thought it was a little scary at the time, or just strange in a way. I’d say it was just the time of night that I watched it also that made it seem scarier. I believe this was the same sleepover party where the resident cat of the household I was sleeping at decided to brush my hair with it claws, cementing a long running distain for pets.

"Come on kids, let's squeeze everyone into the family photo"

Unfortunately, I wasn’t old enough (or just don’t remember most likely) "USA’s Up All Night”, hosted by Gilbert Gottfried and later Caroline Schlitt, then Rhonda Shear which ran from 1989-1998.

I have a better memory of TNT’s “MonsterVision” with the hilarious Joe Bob Briggs which ran sometime in the 1990s.

Another similar show I remember was USA’s “Reel Wild Cinema” which was hosted by Sandra Bernhard and Executive Produced by Mike Vraney of  “Something Weird” video.

The catalog of films shown on “Up…”  is great, mostly horror and comedies. It may have helped create the “late night” cable movie genre which is more or less the little brother of “midnight movies”, but instead you don’t have to leave your couch. Its also another link in the chain of horror host style shows.

“The Outing” is also known as more coherently titled “The Lamp” overseas. I don’t know if it's the first horror genie film, but I’m sure by that time, people couldn’t image “I Dream Of Jeannie” committing heinous murders of naked teenage girls. Unfortunately, the version I watched was super dark, so it was hard to entirely decipher what was happening. This is when the “cleaned up” version of a film really shines, because it displays details we may have missed in past versions. I love VHS formats and grainy videos as much as the next person, but occasionally it's also nice to see a clearer picture because it enhances the creator's original intent. “The Outing” recently received the Shout Factory treatment, but apparently it's still not the right version. Apparently, there’s two different opening sequences, one that explains the Arab women’s possession of the Lamp and another that begins the film past that sequence in the present. There’s also some edits made to a rape scene and I think some of the gore scenes as well. It's annoying as hell when these strange edits are made because then it becomes all the more difficult to obtain the “correct” version of the film.

Original title sequence

something stinks around here!

The movie’s first set in Galveston, Texas (cue Glen Campbell), then later Houston. It’s an okay movie with good pacing, so it's not completely without its charm. It sorta plays like a made-for-tv movie, but with some boobs thrown in. The look of the film for some reason reminded me of “Rush Week”, but I bet that’s just because it was filmed in the mid to late 80s. Here, A lamp with a genie (or Jinn) is brought back from an expedition that took place in 1893 (as explained in the sometimes missing scene from the very beginning of the film). In the present (1986), the lamp is stolen from an Arab woman (played by Deborah Winters, who plays the teacher also) daughter of the owner in the flashback sequence by 3 gross hillbillies. After their demise, (which couldn’t have been sooner haha) the lamp is transferred to a museum’s curator (James Huston) for further investigation. His daughter, Guess Jeans wearing,Alex (Michelle Burke lookalike, Andra St. Ivanyi) puts on a bracelet that makes her the keeper of the lamp and slave to the Jinn/genie. Her class has an after school field trip (is there such a thing?) to said museum and she convinces her classmates to stay after hours without anyone knowing. It's similar to what happened in Tobe Hooper’s “The Funhouse” where they stay overnight at the carnival with disastrous results. Alex’s randomly racist violent ex boyfriend shows up at the sleepover with his cronie. These guys reminded me of super evil bullies in “Trick Or Treat” (1986), where their violent anger seemed so unrelenting. You couldn’t wait for these guys to get killed off. The ending of the movie doesn't make any sense to me when they stop the car to check out the Pepsi truck. Can anyone explain that?

 could you spare some change for the bus?

 may I have this dance?

Most of the cast and crew didn’t seem to much else before or after “The Outing”. Deborah Winters and screenwriter Warren Chaney are actually husband and wife. She made some films in the 60s and 70s, but you might recognize her best from the super fun 1978 horror film, “Blue Sunshine”.

"The Outing" is a fun film, with some nice gore scenes, but overall could've been better. But then again, it could have been worse. I'd give it 2 and 1/2 pairs of blood splattered high-waisted Guess jeans.

You can watch it HERE

You can buy it HERE!

Make sure you check out my online shop HERE. Or if you live in Orlando, FL we have a shop HERE.

The Black Belly Of The Tarantula

"The Black Belly Of The Tarantula" (1971)

Director: Paolo Cavara

Starring: Giancarlo Giannini, Claudine Auger, Barbara Bouchet

Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin 

We meet again, Barbara Bach! I reviewed another film of hers here at TOG, "The Unseen" which you can read right HERE. I knew she looked familiar (she's very pretty, yet strange looking). I randomly chose "The Black Belly Of The Tarantula" because I know the Giallo (Italian for "yellow", referring to the covers of mystery/thriller books) genre can be sometimes tiresome to watch because there's so many, yet so few that are actually solid films. I think the other reviewers of TOG were a bit put off by Giallos in general because frankly, they're just not as much fun as Italian Horrors, even though both genres sometimes blend together simply because of their geographic origin. I think I unintentionally gave myself a spelling test with this particular film because I don't think I've "Tarantula" correctly on my own once while typing this out. haha

Giancarlo Giannini hugging a stray kitty

Here we have beautiful scenery, some good looking people, but mostly chase scenes and a disconnected plot line. I find films like this purely fun to watch since they're a great study in early 1970s European style, like a living breathing "Better Homes And Gardens" book from 1971. The hyper-sexualized soundtrack by Ennio Morricone makes the film seem more disturbing and sexual than it really is. It's more or less window-dressing. 

Here's two examples of songs that includes lots of moaning as well! 

"Black" is one of many Giallo mystery films, not so much horror since there's little gore and more thriller type scenes therein. Also, there are a bunch of these types of films that have much more interesting titles than the actual movies themselves that mostly include animals or insects. Similarly, Fulci's more successful Giallo, "Lizard In A Woman's Skin" uses this same device to give the film a more strange aura to it that may not have been so present in the first place. The visuals in that film are definitely more substantial though. In both "Lizard" and "Black", the title is referenced in only scene, as if it was completely an afterthought. In "Lizard" it's randomly spoken by Los Bravos lead singer, Mike Kennedy. Here, its used as a metaphor for the style of murders that keep occurring with a nasty battle between a wasp and a tarantula. I'd be hard pressed to believe that the title was not created before the film's first line of dialogue was even jotted down. I think if you asked the killer of this film about the tarantula theory, he'd probably disagree. DVD company, Blue Underground though says in their summary, that the killer is "injecting beautiful women with the poison of a rare wasp". I don't remember that at all. 

weird "mannequin hands"

who's hands are who's? 

This is just an okay movie, and I admit the second time I watched it, it was better. A young police detective (Giancarlo Giannini) is trying to figure out a suspect in a serial murder case. The victims are all young, beautiful women who are paralyzed by a large acupuncture needle, then disemboweled. The gore level here is low, but I definitely flinched at stabbing scenes of the needle held with gloved, mannequin like hands. That's always a horrifying scene for me personally in more extreme Italian horror; that otherworldly large floating appendage hacking away at some poor girl. The large hairy arm in "Suspiria", "House By The Cemetery" and "Tenebre" all have that similar killer's body off camera style that always creeps the hell out of me. The actual disemboweling here is a bit weak though, appearing more he's painted their stomachs instead of slicing into them. 

I had a hard time figuring out who was who the first time I watched it because there's at least 3 women with red hair. It was a bit frustrating. Also the overabundance of young guys with blockheads and dark hair was a bit confusing. I'm guessing this helps aid the "surprise ending", but I spotted the killer pretty quickly although when they were revealed him, I wasn't sure if I had the right person. hahaha. 

From L to R: The "friend" seemingly overdubbed by a gay man, the salon manager and the wife

poor Barbie!

I rate "Black Belly Of The Tarantula" 

☆☆ and a 1/2

You can watch it HERE

Here's the trailer:

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USA UP ALL NIGHT WEEK : I Was A Teenage TV Terrorist

I Was A Teenage TV Terrorist (1985)

Starring: Adam Nathan, Julie Hanlon

Directed by: Stanford Singer

Review by: "Machine Gun" Kristin 

There's that "10 o'clock news" blare of keyboard and cardboard buildings of Lloyd Kaufman's Troma film company introduction tacked onto every one of their movies. Here they strike again (check out my other Troma review of "Luther The Geek") with "I Was A Teenage TV Terrorist". I picked this to review solely based on the title, which didn't really work in my favor. This was the second film featured on the much loved USA network cable show, "Up All Night". We follow Paul (Adam Nathan) and Donna (Julie Hanlon), a cute teenage couple from Ohio. Upon Donna's pretentious Greek tragedy high school play ("boo! get off the stage!"), Paul steals a camera which he reveals on their car ride home. The kids are wearing these white masks which immediately reminded me of this crazy "As Seen On TV" gadget I remember seeing the commercial for when I was in middle school. 

I have a photo of it (I like taking TV pictures), but here I found the whole bizarre commercial: 

The beginning sequence of "I Was..." is edited in a "channel surfing" style, with TV flips and white noise. I kinda wished the whole film, (in which the pacing is really slow) had this style, although it probably would become old after awhile. Paul's angry workout spandex clad mother announces he's going to New York for the summer to work for his father's TV company called Romanceco.

Italian for stupid

Your entire retched generation has poisoned itself on their comics and bongo music and the whole lot of you are bound for hell on a road paved with self-indulgence 

I really like that Troma has created a couple of different films in their catalog based on media formats,  here with TV sets and video tapes, and in another better Troma film, "Hollywood Zap" with video games. Adam ends up working the basement of the TV station and starts selling their old tapes to a pawn shop in the city for extra money. Donna tries her hand at acting and flunks a frozen asparagus commercial where we watch her practice while writhing around on the floor in their apartment wearing a Ben And Jerry's t-shirt (whom they thank in the credits).

The Ben & Jerry's workout

Asparagus people!

Of course (who wouldn't?) they become bored and decide to blow up the TV station, making waves as a supposed "terrorist group". It sort of transforms into a teenage, lite version of "Network" where high ratings and star makings surpass any sort of common sense. This when the movie becomes more interesting, using the ridiculous news media to their advantage. I probably watched this about 3 times and fell asleep a couple of times though. Even so, I still liked the film and found it to be pretty charming, although some aspects of it just went right over my head and I missed some of its more clever lines. 

I watched this on Troma's fantastic YouTube channel where you can watch pretty much anything with their name attached to it. Its in all its fuzzy, 3rd generation grainy blurry glory, keeping with this VHS appearance. The only downside to this though is the indiscernible audio and lack of subtitles. 

There's maybe 3 different versions of the same poster for this film. I'm guessing the guy and girl portrayed in each poster is supposed to be appeal to a different social clique in each one? haha.

Also, you can find Adam Nathan in Michael Jackson's over the top 16 minute opus, "Bad". He's only in for a few seconds as a classmate in the first half of the video.

Watch "I Was A Teenage TV Terrorist" HERE

Buy it HERE

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