Dracula's Greatest Love

COUNT DRACULA’S GREAT LOVE, Directed by Javier Aguirre (1972).

Hello from the TOG headquarters, Erok decided to hand the keys over to one of the head honchos over at The Paul Naschycast, because most of our writers hands were bitten off by the Italian shark from one of those Bruno Mattei rip offs. Take it away Troy Guinn and thanks for the fun review.

Rod Barnett and I are the hosts of Naschycast. Our first episode was in February of 2010. We were already the two biggest Naschy fans we knew, and realized there weren't any podcasts devoted to him so we decided to start one. In 2017 we did audio commentaries for 5 Naschy films on Blu ray. We have a Facebook page for the Naschycast, you can also find the episodes on iTunes and on Rod's blog site, The Bloody Pit of Rod. 

This movie first drew me into its haunted, languid realm when it played on late night television, at a time when I was just becoming familiar with Paul Naschy’s face, if still a few years away from truly appreciating his importance to, and influence on, the horror films of Spain. Perhaps it was the combination of absorbing a previously-unseen take on a very familiar and beloved classic monster, the exotic beauty of the actresses, and the hypnotic three-note motif of the main score at 2am in a dark living room that left me feeling I had witnessed something singularly strange among horror films. Repeated viewings in the years since have revealed CDGL’s not-inconsiderable flaws, and yet the qualities I appreciated upon first experience have retained their power as well.

Don't snicker at my lockjaw, I stepped on a rusty nail!

After the pre-credits sequence, in which two workers delivering coffins to a castle get a bit too nosey and are brutally dispatched by an unseen assailant, our story proper begins: A group of young people (four female college students and their male friend) are traveling through the Borgo Pass (never a good idea under ANY circumstances) when their carriage is wrecked and the driver is killed in the accident. The companions are given shelter by a reclusive physician, Dr. Marlow (Paul Naschy). During the days of their stay, the girls frolic in Dr. Marlow’s swimming pool, read books about Dracula in his library, and a couple of them even vie for the doctor’s affections. Over the course of several nights, Marlow’s guests are turned to vampires (and subsequently vamp others themselves) until only the doctor and the lady who has won his heart, Karen (Haydee Politoff) are left. Ultimately, the vampiric presence haunting the castle turns out to not only be Count Dracula, but his spirit has been inhabiting Dr. Marlow’s body and he succeeds in overcoming the doctor’s persona completely. Thus begins a complicated series of rituals, intended to restore life to the Count’s daughter Radna and requiring Karen’s sacrifice, yet the Count finds himself seriously struggling with a complication he hadn’t foreseen: ol’ fangs is IN LOVE.

live action dainty thrift store figurines.

Of all the films I consider “essential” in Naschy’s filmography, CDGL is easily the sloppiest in its narrative construction. However, it also just might be the most hauntingly beautiful in its visual realization. Before I go further, let me state that while CDGL will always be considered a “Naschy” film, the credit for its qualities (which are 90% visual) really goes to director Javier Aguirre and cinematographer Raul Perez Cubero. Characters do a lot of walking and talking in this film. Even when they are not talking, they walk…and walk…and walk. Yet, the foggy moors, the sunlit treetops, the mist-shrouded corridors and vampire’s crypts, even the shades and tones of the characters’ skin, hair and clothing make the film wash over the viewer like a virtually unbroken cyclorama of dream imagery. Then there are those moments of more jolting visual inventiveness, such as when the vampiresses leap from the ground onto a rooftop, or when Dracula drives a dagger completely through a hypnotized victim’s neck and fills a goblet with her blood while she stands there mute, feeling no pain. Both of these ideas, I’m pretty sure, were new to vampire cinema at their time.

ACCHH I paid extra to have coffin skin protection, not cool!

In extolling the film’s virtues, certainly much praise must be given to the quartet of actresses who are the lovers/victims/vamps served up for the Count’s desires: Politoff, Ingrid Garbo, Rosanna Yanni, and Mirta Miller. These ladies are radiant, too be sure, and in a genre where creepily sexy vampiresses are plentiful, the vamps of CDGL can lure, seduce and destroy with the very best of the Hammer Films vixens. However, I doubt enough credit is ever given to the performances of the four actresses and how well they convey the individual personality “types” of their characters. One could say that Miller is a bit miscast as the “timid scairdy-cat” girl, but not because of her performance; simply that with her fiery red hair and arching eyebrows (which suggest nothing so much as bats in flight) she looks like a vamp-in-waiting already. When she finally is “turned” and revels in orgasmic ecstasy and fresh human blood spilling from her mouth (and her victim’s nude breasts), it seems as if the real Mirta Miller has finally stood up. Okay, so no shortage of beauty among these ladies, but equally commendable is the chemistry the actresses establish with one another, believably conveying the dynamics of long-time friends.

Despite the ultimate great failings of the script, I still marvel at Naschy’s ability to bring fresh ideas to genre archetypes. In CDGL, we have what has to be one of the earliest portrayals of Dracula as a tragic figure, struggling between fulfilling the destinies proscribed for both his daughter and himself, yet dreading the need to sacrifice the woman he loves. He even sheds tears, and while Naschy is not technically the FIRST crying Dracula (there are those odd shots of Christopher Lee seeming to weep as he crumbles to dust at the end of HORROR OF DRACULA, and his tears of blood as he is impaled on the cross in DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE), at least Naschy’s Count cries over the choices he’s made, not just over his own rotten luck. It is important here to note that CDGL prefigures Anne Rice’s “Interview with the Vampire” and the modern “Vampire as anti-hero” by several years. When Dr. Marlow makes love to Karen, it is seemingly this action that triggers the takeover of his personality by Dracula, in remarkable similarity to what happens to the vampire Angel/Angelus in the 90’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” TV series. Now, I’m not suggesting that Buffy creator Joss Whedon drew this idea directly from CDGL (though the film DID make the television rounds so Whedon could certainly have come across it); I simply take it as more evidence that Naschy was so often ahead of the curve.

Naschy is the genius behind The Werewolf & The Yeti, impressed?

Okay, enough of being nice. Each new viewing of COUNT DRACULA’S GREAT LOVE also makes me aware of what a face-palming mess the script is. That script…oh dear. Yes, anyone who studies this film is aware of its troubled production history: how an accident that injured a few of the cast members caused the filming to shut down, how HUNCHBACK OF THE MORGUE was filmed in the interim (and emerged as the far superior of the two films) and then work resumed to complete CDGL. Such setbacks can allow us to cut the film a little slack, but it can’t excuse everything. We’ll never know how many of the story’s flaws were there initially, and how much stems from the confused production schedule, but the impression is often of a film that doesn’t remember what has happened in the previous scene. Naschy commonly loads his mythologies with overly-detailed rituals and laws, but even a flow chart here wouldn’t help us understand (1) whether Dracula is a sadistic harbinger of evil or an avenging angel, (2) whether Dr. Marlow KNOWS he carries Dracula within him, or is unaware of his vampiric alter-ego (3) why, if Dracula has been dormant inside Dr. Marlow, has he still obviously been operating freely on his own? There’s no doubt it is Dracula who arranges the delivery of his daughter’s body and subsequently vampirizes one of the men who drop off the casket in the film’s prologue.

the negative reviews are in.

Apparently, there were intentions to film a sequel to CDGL that would have focused on Dracula’s resurrected daughter, Radna. While it is enticing to imagine how this never-filmed project might have turned out (just think, it could have been called COUNT DRACULA’S RECKLESS DAUGHTER!), I’m of the opinion CDGL would have been better to have lost the daughter subplot altogether. Instead, the idea of Dr. Marlow and Dracula inhabiting the same body and the one’s attempt to dominate the other could have been more cohesively developed, with Karen’s fate hanging in the balance.

SHHH, She's sleeping be quiet!

Then, of course, we have one of the film’s most odd devices: The elimination of virtually all dialogue once Dracula makes his appearance. The final act of the film instead features narration by Dracula while the cast all bare their fangs and stare at one another. It’s assumed each character is hearing Dracula’s voice via telepathy, but just why this method was chosen remains a mystery. It can’t be because the actors had difficulty speaking with fangs in place, because any dialogue (English, Spanish or otherwise) would have been dubbed anyway; and if the narration was intended to explain to the viewers what is going on, then it is so confusingly written that it ultimately achieves the exact opposite effect. Perhaps the film’s last third would have been better without any words at all, since its greatest strength is its visual poetry. If the last act had been fully relinquished to the dream-like series of images, it might have become the Spanish horror film genre’s closest equivalent to the vampire cinema of Jean Rollin.

Despite its flaws, I still consider COUNT DRACULA’S GREAT LOVE to be a lovely bit of cinema, and I recommend you let it take you on a stroll through its misty forests. The modern phrase of “Just go with it” could easily have been created to explain the seductive qualities of European horror cinema, and it could very well be the key to falling in love with COUNT DRACULA’S GREAT LOVE.

Ilsa Tigress of Siberia

Ilsa Tigress Of Siberia, directed by Jean LaFluer, Starring Dyanne Thorne (1977).

This very Canadian entry in a series of ghastly titillation and Nazisploitation smackers involves real authentic Bitch of Buchenwald Ilse Koch, played by the icy cold busty babe Dyanne Thorne for the third time. No one else could pull off this role but this isn't the first time Koch has been immortalized in cinema. The same year Dave Friedman who was inspired by Lee Frost's Love Camp 7 to use the set of Hogan's Heroes for the unsavory purposes of this production, a Lina Wertmuller arthouse classic came out called Seven Beauties. In that film, Shirley Stoler (who looks very much like the actual Koch) aims to murder main character Pasqualino (Giancarlo Giannini) if he doesn't satisfy her sexual needs. I highly recommend this film, which I saw in my Humanities class at City College of San Francisco.

Der Weinerschnitzel, yes I'd like to order that Descendents happy meal.

This entry is just as unpleasantly repulsive as the first two, but slightly less camp this time around. You don’t need to watch them all in succession to figure out what’s happening and thankfully they aren’t as frustrating and non linear as say, the Back to the Future series.

Zemeckis tried to warn us of the Trump presidency, why didn't we listen?

The racist aspect mostly fizzled out with each sequel, so you could sort of enjoy the busty Russ Meyer babes with a clear conscience. This is the Nazisploitation genre where it’s guaranteed to cause emotional trauma unless you are a Trump-kin or a racist piece of shit 4Chan homophobe and if that’s the case go fuck yourself.

The Eurotrash look of the film is appealing to me and reminds me of those weird Swedish Pippi Longstocking dubbed movies I used to rent during the same time period as when I used to go over to my friend John’s house and secretly watch Hotdog the Movie and Zombie.

The snowy locations give it a air of a Christmassy feel and Ilsa looks just as foxy as ever in that star hat and Wampa skin fur coat. Just in the first 5 minutes we get a smushed in cherry red skull cavity, cracked open by a giant cartoony hammer. I can't imagine anyone hasn't seen all of these in order, but for those who haven't--tuck in, it gets pretty gruesome.

This reminds me of that song by Warrant.

The whole gulag is set up like a Looney Tunes cartoon with man eating tigers and chainsaw arm battles. Ilsa parties with her cossack dudes who all lust after her of course. She does a clumsy dance to Russian bear music that’s part Fonzie part Elaine from Seinfeld complete with thumbs and kicks. Then she has a yucky threesome with two beardos who look like Hugo Stiglitz stunt doubles, they play a library track from Dawn of the Dead during the porkin'. I can just see the Hari Krishna zombie peer out from over the corner.

I'M SOOO OVER THIS!

Hitler is yesterday’s news and the new fascist pin up is Stalin. They torture enough Russians to compete with the Japanese medical camp team from Men Behind the Sun. Every other dude looks like Yakov Smirnov and talks like Balki from Perfect Strangers, but they all worship Ilsa. Man, all of a sudden the ego stroking of a fascist maniacal bitch is reminding me of a needy Orange diaper KKKlown—thanks a lot movie!

Trump's peen looks more like a baby carrot than a gerkin--noted.

One dude with an Axe body spray type name has too much will against state oppression and is tempted sexually with Ilsa’s meat balloons, he becomes an important figure in the second act of the story. I like how a minute after the war is over, they torch everything, murder anyone in sight and move on. No one sticks around to see if the news was reported as hearsay or in jest.

Movie over, I think not!

We’ve got at least an hour to go.

1977 Montreal flashes across the screen I can just hear the Stompin' Tom music and taste the La Batt’s blue! The sleaziness barometer starts to increase as the lone gulag survivor, who’s been hiding out in Canada takes his two pals to a brothel. Looks like they went into the wrong whorehouse because guess who runs it?

in Canada a pearl necklace is not what you'd think.

They capture Andre and he doesn’t even say “excuse me, you can’t arrest me, talk to my lawyer”. Apparently he’s better at withstanding abuse than picking up the phone and dialing a cheap attorney.

This grimy Italian dude that Thorne’s character swindled out of his hooker biz mentions Pompano Beach, which is where I grew up!

check out the fun bags on this hose hound.

There’s more of a Russian mafia aspect to get rid of enemies than shock troopers coming in and butchering people. The methods are just as gruesome however. When I first got wind of this series I was totally appalled, that it until I watched all of them and there's more humor, albeit super dark in tone but they're more entertaining on a campy level than you'd think.

In Tigress they use the loud heart thumps from LHODES and even that same library track from Galaxina as the lone survivor from the start of the movie envisions his worst nightmare. His torture fantasy shows Ilsa as a demented version of a cast member of CATS gnawing his dick off.

The Willy Wonka on dabs plus LSD nightmare machine is pretty creative, it takes your worst fears and attacks your brain with them. Why does this computer exist, who knows but it’s pretty cool.

Oh Shit! it's a horny Phillis Diller in CATS makeup! 

The Russian embassy has a score to settle with “The Bitch” and they send over ninja assassins. One gunman who looks almost exactly like Don Steele (aka Rockin’ Ricky or Screaming Steve from Joe Dante’s cinematic cannon), gets impaled and it's pretty delightful.

This pacing on this one is pretty riveting and I highly recommend seeking it out. You can skip Wanda The Wicked Warden, unless you have a hard on for Jess Franco. 

ONLY AVAILABLE ON DVD AND VHS.

The Devil's Rain (1975)

The Devil’s Rain (1975, dir. Robert Fuest)

Review by Goat Scrote

     We imps at TOG Laboratories have been busy preparing the way to Armageddon for quite some time now. To commemorate our 666th article, we’ve summoned a slice of 70s Satanic cinema so ripe n’ cheesy you’ll think you’ve landed in one of the moister, smellier crevices of Satan’s underpants. “Devil’s Rain” is a stinker but it’s got a ridiculously excessive finale which is worth seeing just for the jaw-dropping amount of slime involved.

Mork calling Orson.

     If you don’t have the patience for the slow pacing and laugh-inducing "action" sequences characteristic of the 1970s, you should still tune in for the fun splatter of the climax starting around the 74 minute mark. You don’t need to understand what’s happening plot-wise to enjoy the best things about the finale. It's a gooey rainbow of B-grade horror silliness as eyeless cultists dissolve into puddles and a regular dude wrestles with the devil. If they’d made the slime red instead of green, this might have been an R-rated grindhouse classic. As it is, it’s a mostly-bloodless 70s PG with a lot of melting zombie-flesh at the end. The effects department must have gone through hundreds of gallons of goop for that oozing, dripping, drizzling payoff.

Insert obligatory semen joke here.

     At the high point of his career, director Robert Fuest made two psychedelically schlocky Vincent Price classics, “The Abominable Doctor Phibes” (1971) and “Dr. Phibes Rises Again” (1972), as well as a couple of other cult classics. “The Devil’s Rain” was such a rancid flop, however, that it killed Fuest’s film career deader than an unbaptized virgin goat at a Black Mass. Fuest was banished ever afterward to the land of TV. Yes, the wretched stink of this movie was so severe that it canceled out the pleasing patchouli aroma of both of the super-swingin’ Dr. Phibes films.

Don't they sell these at Spencer's Gifts?

     Then there’s the curious fact that the filmmakers consulted with the actual Church of Satan while making this film. I imagine they did this partly to stir controversy for attention, and partly to pretend that there was some kind of legitimacy to the supernatural story which the writers had cooked up. They even gave cameos to Anton and Diane LaVey, self-proclaimed High Priest and Priestess of Satan's ministry on Earth at the time. I’m sure the LaVeys were very happy to collect their paychecks and soak up the free publicity on top of that, because why the Hell not? I can't help but imagine Anton LaVey casually reeling off inane occult nonsense with his trademark grim and frightening theatrical demeanor, then laughing cheerfully all the way to the bank.

Leaked! You'll never believe who they've cast as Dr. Fate
in the upcoming Justice League sequel!

     “Devil’s Rain” has campy performances from a reasonably well-known cast which includes Ernest Borgnine, Eddie Albert, Ida Lupino, Keenan Wynn, Tom Skerritt, and extra-large douchebag in human form William Fucking Shatner. Spoiler alert, in this one Shatner gets his punk ass whupped severely, and I found that ass-whuppin’ profoundly spiritually satisfying. Is that wrong?

I love my seventies porn collection.

     Even though Ernest Borgnine plays the villain, he is the real hero for me because he seems to be the only person on screen trying to make a movie which is not boring. He knows he is making a bad movie, for sure, but he still does what he can to make it an entertaining bad movie. I like his hammy, melodramatic performance as the manipulative cult leader who can shift from politely folksy to gleefully wicked to quietly sinister whenever it suits him. It's not nearly enough to counteract all the boring parts, but any time Borgnine is chewing scenery the movie is a lot more fun.

Anyone who sold their soul for this movie
is definitely entitled to a refund.

     I've saved the biggest star for last. This pile of eviscerated sun-bloated hog bowels disguised as a film holds the distinction of debuting an unknown young actor named John Travolta. He doesn’t speak and you never even get to see his whole face, so don’t get too excited. You may also be interested to know that the set of “The Devil’s Rain” is where the larval actor had his first introduction to the cynical money-making machine which calls itself Scientology. That's two, count 'em, two separate real-life cults with connections to this movie!

Can you spot the Travolta hidden in this picture?

     The opening credits roll over close-ups from paintings by Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450 - 1516 CE) depicting vast hellscapes full of creative and awful torments. If only Bosch had made horror movies. His paintings prove that he was very good at crafting disturbing, surreal, gory, and grotesque religious imagery. He was also good at straight-up vicious torture porn. Whatever he filmed it would have been better than the shit I’m watching today, I just know it.

"Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Very, Very, Very Beginning"
A Hieronymus Bosch Joint

  The story begins with a fierce thunderstorm lashing a house out in the desert. Inside, frumpy and anxious Mrs. Preston (pioneering director, writer, singer, and actress Ida Lupino) is dressed in what appears to be a pink checkered tablecloth. Don't let her role fool you, she was one of the toughest, most determined, and smartest people in Hollywood during the 50s. Mama Preston frets about her husband, who is many hours late. Her son Mark Preston (William Fucking Shatner) returns from a search empty-handed. Moments later his father returns on his own, but all is not well.

This is what I get for adding
Bill Shatner to an overpopulated world.

  Papa Preston (George Sawaya) has misplaced his eyeballs and his face is slowly melting. He delivers a message from a villain named Corbis, who is waiting in a nearby ghost town. Corbis wants the family to turn over a book of Satanic power which is in their possession. Then Papa Preston praises Satan and melts into sludge. I wonder if they shoveled him into a bucket for a funeral later on, or if they just let his remains soak into the mud for fertilizer? The movie sort of implies the latter.

This book of alien space wisdom has cured me of gay!

     Mark is drawn away from the house by a ruse and returns to find Mama Preston has been kidnapped. The aged family retainer (TV regular Woody Chambliss, who also played old Sgt. Pepper in the 1978 Beatles film) has been tied up and beaten senseless. This character is forgotten almost immediately after being introduced.

     Mark grabs a pistol and an amulet of protection, jumps in his station wagon, and heads out to do battle with the forces of darkness. He arrives at the ghost town and Jonathan Corbis (Ernest Borgnine) pops up out of nowhere to have a friendly chat.

Borgnine starts the hoodie-and-medallion look.

     Corbis wants the book and demands to know where Mark has hidden it. They have a faith vs. faith challenge inside a creepy old boarded-up church. Within is a Satanic altar and some robed bozos chanting evil hymns to bad organ music. Cap’n Kirk prays his butt off to Jesus and friends, while Borgnine offers adulation to the ruler of the Bottomless Pit. Their competition over who can overact the hardest ends when one of the robed cultists reveals herself to be Mama Preston, now eyeless and enslaved to Satan. Mark loses his cool and shoots one of the minions. Green gloop oozes out and Borgnine makes fun of him for putting his faith in a mere weapon.

The power of Kirk compels you!
The power of Kirk compels you!

     Poor gun-happy Mark has lost the metaphysical battle, so the cultists strip him of his amulet and half his clothes, take him captive, and torture him for the location of the book. The cultists apply an extreme version of good-cop, bad-cop. Corbis torments him a while, then trades places with a seductress. She passionately kisses a willing Shatner… until he realizes that he’s actually slipping tongue to the eyeless, slime-filled, undead shell of his saggy-fleshed elderly mother! Ewwww, on so many levels... Judas Priest! I wish films and TV wouldn't have forced so many innocent people to kiss Shatner. He clearly doesn't get the basic concept and it's fucking embarrassing.

MISTER TAMBOURINE MAN!

     Meanwhile, at the lab of Dr. Sam Richards (Eddie Albert), he believes he is about to "unlock the key to ESP".  Tom Preston (Tom Skerritt) is the Doctor’s assistant and the youngest son of the Preston family. His wife Julie Preston (Joan Prather) is the subject of the psychic experiment. She has visions of bad shit going down involving the Satanic church in the ghost town. The Sheriff (Keenan Wynn) is busy with the aftermath of the big storm, so Tom and Julie are forced to investigate what happened to his family on their own.

Okay, I'll do the movie as long as I'm not in any
scenes with You-Know-Fucking-Who.

     Tom and Julie arrive in the ghost town toting a rifle. The church is dark inside except for the light from a stained-glass window which looks like a prop from a super-cheesy 80s heavy metal video. (That actually makes the window well ahead of its time, I guess?) That’s the only clue Tom needs to figure out that the whole mess is about devil worship. He's a genius. They find his brother's shirt in the church, then their car explodes in a fireball outside. When they run out to investigate, someone driving Mark’s station wagon tries to flatten them. Tom shoots at the car and it crashes, then he chases and fights the psycho cowboy who was behind the wheel.
     This movie has really unexciting action and unconvincing fights. Behold the magic of cinema.

HEAVY \m/ METAL

     Meanwhile, courtesy of Julie's psychic powers, we flash back to the olden days. A bunch of Satanists dressed like pilgrims in a Thanksgiving school play are plotting secret evil stuff. Shatner is one of the cultists. Corbis bitches about the lost book even back then, hundreds of years ago. The other cultists must be really sick of hearing about that shit by now.

Gee, honey, this B&B looks really... inviting.

     A bunch of villagers show up with torches, led by the Reverend of the town (Claudio Brook). Shatner is one of the Satanists, and his wife, Aaronessa (Erika Carlsson) has betrayed the cult to the Reverend on the condition that she and her husband be spared. The Reverend double crosses her and burns both husband and wife at the stake with the rest of the cult. Corbis is not impressed and talks Satanic smack to the crowd while the auto-da-fe proceeds. He isn’t tied to the stake, but he just dances around the pole and stays in the fire anyway. What a fun-loving kook! I don't care if he is evil incarnate, I bet Corbis is fun at parties. As long as no one mentions that dumb book.

     Back in the present, Tom and Julie take the station wagon to get away from the ghost town. On the way out Tom has a crisis of conscience. He decides to go back on foot so he can fight the magic-wielding cult single-handedly and rescue his brother. Did I write that he was a genius earlier? What a reckless idiot, that’s what I meant to write.

Driver, get me to the set of Phantasm!

     Julie drives on to fetch the Sheriff, but the mother-in-law from actual Hell takes a break from making out with her son to magically appear in the back seat. She abducts Julie with embarrassing ease.

     Night falls and the cultists march with torches, dragging a shirtless Shatner toward the altar. Tom is disguised in a cultist robe to infiltrate the evil ceremony. At the big Satanic altar, Corbis holds an evil freestyle hip-hop poetry slam. Check out his hype lyrics: “Let us behold the Father, the Ram of the Sun, the Moon, the Stars! Hail O Deathless One!”

Sucker MCs better watch their step.

     See, this is what happens when real Satanists write your Hollywood rituals for you. If you actually say that last bit out loud you could turn into an evil Satan-possessed goat-person, just like Borgnine does on camera, and just as I did many years ago. Ernest could afford the plastic surgery to cover up his mistake. I personally can't. You’ve been warned!

     Anyway, they finally break Shatner’s spirit and he turns into another eyeless goon. Tom gets spotted by his zombie Mama but he escapes to fetch more help, in the form of Dr. Richards.

This church-sponsored Easter egg hunt is a little "off" somehow.

     Dr. Richards and Tom explore the church and underneath the floor they uncover a giant Faberge egg with golden ram horns. It turns out the egg is full of souls captured by Corbis. The Sheriff appears again, now an eyeless drone, and Tom fights him hand to hand even though both men have guns. Tom wins, of course, but he and Dr. Richards are forced to hide from the other minions. One of the cultists sees that the magic egg is gone, but the heroes have left the Satanic book behind. WTF, idiots? You had one job, keep that stupid book away from Corbis! The cultist (John Travolta) runs off to give the prize to his master. The bad guys are super-psyched about this turn of events.

The golden fleece prepares to devour Oedipus,
just as it was foretold in the Necronomicon!

      The minions prepare to work their magic on Julie, but Tom jumps into the scene and brawls with anyone in a robe. Dr. Richards threatens to crack the eggy thing, which we learn is called the Devil’s Rain. Why in the world would it be called that? Zombie-Shatner gets his hands on the egg. Fortunately for the forces of goodness, Cap'n Kirk is able to overcome his Satanic enslavement and crack the Devil's Rain open.

Oh, you handsome devil.

     The roof blows out at the same moment, I guess because of the souls escaping. Actual rain, which is apparently not the Devil’s Rain, pours down from the sky. That just seems confusing, to have a movie called "The Devil's Rain" in which the only rain that falls is not the Devil's, because "rain" in this case refers to a magic blue egg full of dead people. Hey, don't look at me, ask Anton LaVey's corpse what the fuck this is about.

Give Uncle Satan a big wet kiss, Tommy!

     The rain melts the cultists and since this scene is where most of the budget went, the director spends a lot of time on the gooey, wailing deaths. Satan/Corbis is pi-i-i-i-iiiissed, but the rain melts him down even as he struggles with Tom. Then the Prince of Darkness falls into a hole and explodes because... um... reasons. Eventually the whole church explodes with no apparent provocation. It’s a sludgy mess of an ending. Then as a stinger, Julie turns out to be possessed by the spirit of Corbis and we are treated to a creepy scene of Ernest Borgnine hug-molesting Tom Skerritt.

     Whew, this movie sure does suck a lot! I still have fun watching most of Ernest Borgnine’s scenes, and of course I like the way it ends. If you're interested in this flick you might enjoy the Joe Bob Briggs commentary about it.

Should've gotten a flu shot, stupid.