Hello to all those faithfully reading and hopefully enjoying this effort to make even the worst horror movie more watcha... aw, screw that - I'm not that good. If a movie makes you cringe because yet another batch of unlikable teens that are pushing 30 are inching toward their deaths, having a party no one does anywhere ever, a paranormal movie is boring you to tears with unending pans of empty rooms, or thanks to CGI technology when people finally bite it, their blood squirts everywhere except on the victim, the ground, the people next to them... you're in good company and this is the right place for you.

Sunday, May 26, 2013

FLOTSAM AND JETSAM PART TWO





Drive-In Horrorshow (2009)

Anthology movies used to be made in order to showcase short stories, usually having a 'wraparound' story to tie them all together. Now it seems that they're just used to show garbage that wouldn't be tolerated in a full movie. That was VHS, a movie I reviewed 5/16/13. To which apparently, or so I read, they're planning a sequel. Guess there were a few more snippets of garbage to put together.



This particular grouping of horror is the campy type, as seen in the past in such shows as Tales From The Crypt, or even Elvira's Movie Macabre. The world has fallen in an apocalypse and everything is pretty much gone. Except for one drive-in theater. Which is lucky, considering there isn't hardly any of those left to begin with. The proprietor, one of the undead, together with his equally undead helpers show very short stories - their only paying customers a couple of shrouded skeletons who sit in the parking lot on chairs (and constantly complain). And here we go:

The Pig: Your typical boy meets girl at frat party, boy slips rape drug in girl's drink, girl gets raped, girl gets revenge. In this case she glues the boy into the bathtub (the 'glue' looked like, pardon the picture, vomit with lots of corn in it) in order to drown him. The rest of the story is her screeching at him, him pleading with her, him losing some skin as he attempts to loosen his feet to unstop the drain and/or stop the water and the main question that has to be answered really fast: Will he get loose or slowly drown?

The Closet: One of those obvious family situation where one sibling is clearly the favorite, the other abused and ignored. He finds a monster in his closet (very minimal effects here - it is very very low budget after all). The monster convinces him that, one by one, if he feeds the monster his family members he will be sooo happy. And he does. Until he is alone, happy and king of the castle. But then the 'castle' bills come. He realizes too late the obvious - those horrible people payed his way and enabled him to have the things he cherishes in the first place. Well - it's off to the closet. Duh.

Fall Apart: This is about a doctor who cares for all his patients, poor or rich, makes house calls, and does all he can to help the community. Hey this is fantasy horror fiction, remember? Anyway - after visiting a sick farmer with strange skin sores, he starts feeling ill - he loses a fingernail just from bumping it against the sink. Receiving an urgent call from his sick patient he goes to their house only to find it completely empty - and he's being watched by someone in suits. 

Calling the hospital he finds that not only are his patients not at the hospital - they never sent an ambulance like the wife had told him. As he continues to lose things like the skin off his hands, his teeth, etc. the men in suits show up and tell him (in a synthesized sounding voice) they mean him no harm. Duh. The men who are immune have some weird 'thing' on their temple - sorry but it really didn't look like anything to me and it's never explained. Then we get lots of camera shots of needles sticking into the gore of his body. And we get a question with no answer: Is this disease man-made? Will it get out? Do we care?

The Meat Man: A horrible serial killer is on the loose. Targeting healthy individuals, the killer is known as 'The Meat Man' because prime pieces of human 'meat' is missing off the bodies - making people wonder if the killer is also a cannibal. Two small boys coming home from school are as scared as anyone else of this specter and, being imaginative, speculate as to who could do such a thing. 

Then one remembers the time they were playing with the stand alone freezer in the basement (?!?) and they got into trouble with their father because 'it is not a toy'. Could he be the monster everybody's looking for? Being boys they come up with different scenarios by which their father just might be him, after all, he loves good steak and always wants the 'best cut', he travels for his job constantly, etc. 

By then the father comes home and the boys, unable to help themselves, ask him about it. He laughs and assures them that just because someone loves meat, and the best meat they can get, doesn't make them a monster. They laugh and go upstairs. Once gone the father, face grim, goes to the bottom of the freezer which has a hidden hatch and opens it to reveal...

The Watcher: This is your typical two couples spend time in the woods and are pursued by a crazed killer. In this case, the killer happens also to be a cannibal. Best line: "You ape-faced monkey!" Uh, no. But that's the equivalent of their combined intelligence and also their chance of surviving this story.


And our host thanks us and hopes to see us again. Not if I see him first.







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