REBORN (2018)

 

(Director: Julian Richards. Screenwriter: Michael Mahin.)

Review

A stillborn child comes back to life in the morgue via a strange burst of electricity and is adopted by a morgue attendant (Ken Stern, played by Chaz Bono) who keeps her as his prisoner “sister.” Sixteen years later, that child, Tess (Kayleigh Gilbert) electrokinetically flips out on her female corpse-photographing captor and seeks out her birth mother.

Meanwhile, Lena O’Neill (Barbara Crampton, JAKOB'S WIFE, 2021), a middle-aged, Los Angeles actress in a career dry spell, has been having nightmares about her stillborn, sixteen-years-prior daughter. Lena tries tracking down where her daughter’s burial plot. Eventually Tess, now a murderer, and Lena meet and bond─with more tragic results. Also caught up in this craziness is the no-nonsense Detective Marc Fox (Michael Paré, BLOODRAYNE, 2005) and Lena's therapist, Dory Ryder (Rae Dawn Chong, TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE: THE MOVIE, 1990).

REBORN, with its tight screenplay and editing, relatively upbeat tone, largely stellar cast, effective cinematography and sets, is a solid B-movie that does what it sets out to do: entertain, with familiar-genre elements, a refreshing and character-centric twist, and creative death scenes.

This solid, brisk-paced, and modest B-flick is not earth-shattering, but it’s worth watching, especially if you’re a fan of its leads.

THE UNINVITED (1944)

 

(Director: Lewis Allen. Screenplay by Dodie Smith and Frank Partos, based on Dorothy Macardle’s 1941 novel Uneasy Freehold, published stateside as The Uninvited in 1942.)

Storyline

Two siblings move into an oceanside house, unaware that it’s haunted by a supernatural presence.

 

Review

Roderick and Pamela Fitzgerald, brother and sister, purchase the gothic Windward House in Cornwall, England in 1937. Its owner, Commander Beech (Donald Crisp, DR.JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE, 1941), sells it to them for a low price, prompting questions as to why. It’s revealed that the mansion is said to be haunted by the spirit of the Commander’s daughter (Mary Meredith) who fell off a nearby cliff seventeen years ago. Not only that, Mary’s twenty-year-old daughter, Stella (Gail Russell, NIGHT HAS A THOUSAND EYES, 1948)─who shares a mutual attraction to Roderick─is fascinated by the house in an unhealthy way.

Almost immediately, the Fitzgeralds sense something off about Windward House. In the artist’s loft, a brief cold spot, accompanied by a lingering smell of mimosa─a scent associated with Mary Meredith─encompasses the siblings. Talks with the Commander and other locals follows, as spectral things, spine-shivery events occur within and around the spooky, shadowy abode: a woman’s laughter, more cold spots, wind where there shouldn’t be, etc. It seems Windward House wants young Stella, and she, it. Can those around her save her before it claims her like it did her mother?

This hugely successful and popular film is by turns spooky, light and funny (in a quiet way), emotionally intriguing, a mystery, and an all-around deftly made film, a high point in the haunted house genre. Its behind-the-scenes talent is top-notch. Lewis Allen (THE UNSEEN, 1945) directed the film in a leave a lot to viewers’ imagination style, effectively paced by Doane Harrison’s editing─one element is present within the film against Allen’s wishes: the FX shots of an uncredited Elizabeth Russell (THE SEVENTH VICTIM, 1943) as “The Ghost of Mary Meredith,” inserted by producers who did not share Allen’s Val Lewton-esque less is more outlook.

UNINVITED‘s crew also includes: cinematographer Charles Lang, billed as Charles Lang Jr. (THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR, 1947); visual effects artists Farciot Edouart (DR.CYCLOPS, 1940); an uncredited Gordon Jennings (THE WAR OF THE WORLDS, 1953); art directors Hans Dreier (DOUBLE INDEMNITY, 1944) and Ernst Fegté (I MARRIED A WITCH, 1942); set director Stephen Seymour; and legendary costume designer Edith Head.

UNINVITED’s players match their excellence. Ray Milland (THE UNCANNY, 1977) and Ruth Hussey (ANOTHER THIN MAN, 1939) are great as the Roderick and Pamela Fitzgerald, siblings whose familial bond is infused with unspoken affection, understanding and humor. Alan Napier (BATMAN, 1966-8) played Dr. Scott, a friend of the Fitzgeralds’, who helps them solve the mystery surrounding Mary and Stella Meredith. Cornelia Otis Skinner (THE SWIMMER, 1968) is sharp and striking as Miss Holloway, Stella’s doctor. And Betty Farrington’s voice is eerily effective as the voice of “Carmel’s Ghost.”

UNINVITED is one of my all-time favorite ghost house movies, worth watching and owning─provided you’re a fan of relatively quiet, mainstream, atmospheric and light-on-visual-effects flicks.

HELLMASTER (1992)

(a.k.a. THEM; a.k.a. SOUL STEALER; Director/screenwriter: Douglas Schulze)

Review

Shot in a functioning mental institution, HELLMASTER is a fun flick if you don’t mind an often-nonsensical film about a malevolent scientist (Professor Jones, played by John Saxon), whose three-decade Nietzsche Experiment turns hallucinating human subjects into multi-symptomatic mutants who stalk more victims. 

It has entertaining, striking visuals (e.g., a white hallway that leads to red-lit rooms, conjuring up memories of Dario Argento’s 1977 film SUSPIRIA) and lots of melting ickiness.

HELLMASTER quickly becomes a tiring succession of stalk-and-attack scenes around the college (actually a sanitarium)─they have A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET-esque feel (appropriate, given Saxon’s presence). Another noteworthy actor is David Emge (DAWN OF THE DEAD, 1978; BASKET CASE 2) as Robert, one of Professor Jones’s key nemeses—he, like Saxon, imbues his character with enough depth to make this C-flick worth watching at least once. Unfortunately, the rest of the actors, whether through inexperience and/or bland character writing, are not memorable.

The climax─Professor Jones’s comeuppance─is underwhelming. long overdue and lasts less than a minute, although Saxon channels Vincent Price's Dr. Phibes-like sense of grievance. And the ending furthers the Argento/giallo-meets-1990s-video-fare feel.

TRILOGY OF TERROR (1975)

 

(TV/ABC movie, aired on March 4, 1975. Director/producer: Dan Curtis. Teleplay writers: William F. Nolan and Richard Matheson, based on Matheson’s stories.)

Storylines

Karen Black plays four different women in this three-unrelated-stories anthology movie.

 

Review

TRILOGY is a standout made-for-television flick.

In “Julie,” a college professor (Julie Eldridge, played by Karen Black) is roofied and blackmailed by a crass college student, Chad (Robert Burton) who has a twisted crush on her. Things change for him when she warms to his attention. Fans of Dan Curtis and Richard Matheson’s work might recognize the drive-in film Julie and Chad go to see: THE NIGHT STALKER, a 1972 television film written by Matheson, produced by Curtis, and scored by the prolific Bob Cobert, who also composed TRILOGY’s soundtrack as well as Curtis’s DARK SHADOWS (1967-71).

 

“Millicent and Therese” are twin sisters, both played by Black. A vicious sibling rivalry plays out between Millicent (prudish, Coke-bottle glasses, unattractive) and Therese (no glasses, pretty, long blond hair). Scenes cut back and forth between Millicent and Therese─who are never seen in the same room. At different points, two men, concerned about her, visit. Thomas Amman (John Karlen, billed as John Karlin) is one of these men. Dr. Chester Ramsey (George Gaynes), Millicent and Therese’s family physician is the other. Voodoo and dark family non-secrets are mentioned in the course of the tale. Genre-familiar viewers may spot the end-twist, but the performances and voodoo element add freshness to the story.

 

“Amelia,” based on Matheson’s 1969 story “Prey,” is about a woman who brings home a fierce-looking and terrifying Zuni fetish doll and regrets making the purchase. This is perhaps one of the most iconic, suspenseful anthological horror stories to air on American television.

TRILOGY is one of my all-time favorite television films of any genre, running a brisk, short seventy-two minutes. Nolan adapted “Julie” and “Millicent” from Matheson’s stories; Matheson wrote the teleplay for “Amelia.”

Many of TRILOGY’s actors shine (especially Black, who imbues her characters with their own distinctive quirks and neuroses). John Karlen, famous for playing Willie Loomis in DARK SHADOWS (1967-71), played Thomas Amman in “Millicent.” George Gaynes (POLICE ACADEMY franchise, 1984-94) played Dr. Chester Ramsey in the same segment.

Given the massive talent involved in this tight, sometimes suspenseful television film, this is worth your time. A sequel, TRILOGY OF TERROR II, aired on ABC on October 30, 1996.

DEATHBED (2002)

 

(Director: Danny Draven. Screenplay by John Strysik, based on George Barry’s 1977 film DEATH BED: THE BED THAT EATS.)

 

Review

A young couple─children’s book artist Karen (Tanya Dempsey, SHRIEKER, 1988) and photographer Jerry (Brave Matthews, AMERICAN ZOMBIELAND, 2020)─move into a Los Angeles, California flat, unaware that it has a murder-haunted bed in its upstairs room. They find it and begin sleeping on the quaint-looking, metal-framed bed on which the deaths took place. The couple experience waking and sleeping nightmares about the 1920-30s psychosexual killings (shown in black and white flashbacks) of “Ghost Man” (Michael Sonye, billed as Dukey Flyswatter, HOLLYWOOD CHAINSAW HOOKERS, 1988) strangling two of seven women (including Louise Astor, played by Meagan Mangum) with silk neck ties.

The effect of Jerry and Karen’s nightmares bleed into their work and relationships─particularly their dealings with their on-site landlord, Art (Joe Estevez, SOULTAKER, 1990).

Produced by Stuart Gordon, Charles Band (Full Moon Pictures founder) and others, DEATHBED is a loose remake of George Barry’s way-different 1977 flick DEATH BED: THE BED THAT EATS PEOPLE. This remake is a good, makes-great-use-of-its-low-budget work. The production design/art direction (courtesy of Johnny R. Long and others) is mood-consistent with its spare-but-effective soundtrack (composer: James T. Sale, THE HAUNTING OF MOLLY HARTLEY, 2008) and relatively restrained gory special effects (Mark Bautista, MANK, 2020). The direction, Hollywood(land)-centric story (which slyly references H.P. Lovecraft) and flow of the movie is tight as can be, given its mostly well-acted characters and their personalities/histories.

Sonye/Flyswatter, an actor, screenwriter, and lyricist/lead singer of several horror punk/metal bands, primarily Haunted Garage and Penis Flytrap, is fun and ghoulish as “Ghost Man,” the spectral creep/killer whose crimes and spirit continue on well beyond his death. Film nerds may appreciate the brief appearance of Constance Estevez,  billed as Constance Anderson, as a “Maternal Model”─according to IMDb, in 2004 she married Joe Estevez, Martin Sheen’s younger and equally prolific brother.

DEATHBED is a worthwhile movie if you don’t mind its solid-for-its-limited-budget effects, occasional lapses into questionable acting (by supporting players) and its overall low budget. The filmmakers achieve what they set out to do─create a solid, tightly shot and edited minimally funded film─and that's all any reasonable viewer can expect, given the filmmakers' resources.

BLOODSUCKING BASTARDS (2015)

 

(Director/co-screenwriter: Brian James O’Connell, who briefly appears as “Mail Room Boy.” Co-screenwriters: Sean Cowhig; Neil Garguilo, billed as Neil W. Garguilo; and Justin Ware.)

 

Storyline

In this comedy horror film, a new office manager begins turning his subordinates into the undead. It’s up to a quiet employee and his slacker co-workers to stop him.

 

Review

Fans of MAYHEM (2017; director: Joe Lynch) and SHAUN OF THE DEAD (2004; director/co-screenwriter: Edgar Wright) as well as those who’ve worked in corporate offices might especially enjoy this entertaining, light-toned vampire film, a solid, balanced blend of silly and nerd-culture humor, splatterific violence and corporate malfeasance.

The pacing is solid, the characters are well-written and well-acted, its tone is consistent, most of the jokes land, it deftly mocks cliches, and has a refreshing ending that makes BLOODSUCKING stand out in a positive way.

The cast is top-notch. Fran Kranz (YOU MIGHT BE THE KILLER, 2018) is Evan, the responsible but exasperated manager. Pedro Pascal (THE MANDALORIAN, 2019-present) is equal parts charm, arrogance, and casual menace as Max, the corporate shark who replaces Evan. Joey Kern (CABIN FEVER, 2002) is Tim, one of Evan’s curiously dependable slacker employees. Emma Fitzpatrick (THE COLLECTION, 2012) is Amanda, Evan’s smart, driven girlfriend. Joel Murray (HOLIDAY HELL, 2019) is Ted, the friendly but suspect district manager. Yvette Yates Redick (INHERENT VICE, 2014), billed as Yvette Yates, is a blast as the ferocious Zabeth. An uncredited Matthew Lillard (SCREAM, 1996) is the “Phallicyte Executive.”

BLOODSUCKING is worth watching for a laugh, and─around the fifty-five-minute mark─gory, quip-punctuated supernatural action.