Sledge (2014)

In this moment, I'm having a hard time recalling a more pointless movie then "Sledge" that I have come across. I've seen some truly awful, cheap, worthless pieces of shit, but nothing that was as so clearly intentionally bad and mind-bogglingly boring as this idiotic fucking 'slasher'... thing.

Campers are killed off by a sledge-toting killer in a mask who thinks he's living in a video game...

What makes "Sledge" so fucking frustrating is that there is not the faintest hint of passion behind it, yet a "we know this sucks, but we don't care" attitude, hence, the obvious last-minute idea to present it as a bad late night horror feature - a movie-within-a movie, basically, hosted by a puppet, under the label Craptastically Horrific Productions, that some bitch is watching on TV. Almost seems as though they started off trying for some kind of legit, micro-budget slasher concept but blew their meager funds on pot and beer early on and decided to goof off for the rest of the shoot with banal, ad-libbed, dick-joke padded dialog. There's nothing humorous about these characters or the annoying, babbling killer who only shows up a mere handful of times when the long-winded, inane dialog ceases, allowing for him a moment to murder someone without the aid of any of those pesky special effects. Unfortunately, the endless uninteresting scenes of sleep-inducing conversation weren't enough to extend what should've been a six minute short into a painfully long 75-minute feature, so they keep cutting to the bitch on the couch watching "Sledge" who has two or three lengthy, ponderous fucking phone calls that we get to hear that don't matter AT ALL. Again, I firmly believe this was a genuine attempt that was given up on early in the production, but sloppily finished and released as a means of inexplicable cinematic trolling. Fuck these morons.

Las Caras de la Muerte (2006)

I guess the title to this Mexican release translates to "The Faces of Death", which definitely had me interested upon getting the opportunity to check it out. Unfortunately, that's some VERY false advertising - as this thing is just bull riding footage. Yeah... Not a Mexican "Faces of Death" by any stretch.

Maybe some of these people died as a result of being bucked off of an angry bull's haunches; it's completely possible, but, from what I could tell, the vast majority of them seemed fine.

That's pretty much all we're talkin', here, aside from a few stadium brawls and random dancing and Mexican drinking game interludes. Granted, I enjoy watching bull riding clips but when it dawned on me early on in this that it was solely bull riding, I knew this was a total con. Maybe there's a 'truer' Mexican "Faces of Death" out there that I haven't come across and, if there isn't, hopefully one hits because this is definitely nothing even CLOSE to a 'mondo' death-film. What an egregious con!

American Guinea Pig: Bouquet of Guts and Gore (2014)

The introductory installment of the new, American-produced "Guinea Pig" series is pretty much just an extended remake of the notorious "Flower of Flesh and Blood" film from the original Japanese GP run. Those films struck me as over-hyped when I initially saw them - although I liked "Mermaid in a Manhole", which was pretty decent. Unfortunately, "Bouquet of Guts and Gore" is an inanely tedious example of 'fake snuff'.

Two women are abducted and drugged in some abandoned warehouse type of building before being brutally tortured and killed. During which, of course, it's all captured on several different types of recording devices (VHS, super 8...).

Effects-wise, they did a pretty commendable job with the gory mutilation work (though I can't say much of it looked real enough to be confused as authentic...) but that's clearly where all the 'energy' went. What it really boils down to is that this shit was obviously more effective and 'shocking' back in the '80s when 'faux snuff' material wasn't as commonplace as it is these days. I applaud "Bouquet..." for the same things I do "Flower of Flesh and Blood" and even "The Devil's Experiment", for going balls-out with bloody carnage and reasonably well done gore FX, but other than that there's nothing more to speak of with these one-note - and ultimately boring - over-the-top 'caught-on-camera' shock-flicks. As much as I love "extreme" and depraved forms of cinema, the 'faux snuff' shit never really tickled my taint, as I typically find most of them dull and limited, for the most part. Only so many limbs can be sawn off before I start looking at my watch. Also, having the two female victims rendered totally paralyzed from the start, yet cognizant, made for obviously ZERO reactions to their torture which I thought stifled some potential effectiveness.  I understand there's some more movies coming out under the "American Guinea Pig" stamp that are apparently different ( and hopefully better...) so I intend on eventually checking those out, but as far as this first foray into the U.S.'s take on the series, it was a miss.

Lucker: The Necrophagous (1986)

What a colossal piece of shit this movie turned out to be. I had heard more good about it than bad and upon finally checking it out, I was left at a loss as to what so many people saw in this one. Sure, its got some rather graphic material at times, but it was all too few-and-far-between among the extensive amount of BORING filler "Lucker" consisted of.

A necrophilic serial killer escapes from a hospital after a supposed suicide attempt - killing a few staff members and stealing a car. Eventually (after fucking a strangled nurse in the car...), he makes his way to town where he kills a few more people and buys a hooker who takes him back to her place where he kills her, lets her body rot for about a week and fucks her corpse...

"Lucker: The Necrophagous" is like the total 'amateur hour' of "Maniac" rip-offs. There's no plot, what-so-ever, which would've been fine if it had at least supplied a suitable array of fucked up shit and sadism'. Instead, the bulk of the movie is the killer walking around or sitting around... I WILL say, a few of the kills are decently violent and the effects in ONE particular necro-involved scene are actually okay, but the movie was just too drawn out and dull for me to get into at all. "Lucker" is definitely not worth hunting down, I'm sorry to say.

First Transmission (1982)

From what I've researched (non-extensively...) as to the back story of "First Transmission" - there was an experimental post-punk band from the '80s, fronted by an occultist tranny, named Genesis P-Orridge. The band started a cult-like network called 'Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth' that was apparently into black magic and rituals centered heavily around S&M. "First Transmission" is a series of four videos - clocking in at about 4-hours of footage, total, that the band put out, that was meant to "express" (I guess) what their organization (cult...) is all about. I could be "off", though.

The first thing we get is a 'spokesman' giving a long-winded spiel that doesn't seem to mean a whole helluva lot. Something about "truth" and the benefits of cumming. From here, we launch into "Ritual of Psychick Youth" - a prolonged sequence of a bound guy being initiated, with whippings and having symbols cut into his flesh. He's eventually pissed on and has blood pumped into his ass through a tube. This footage is all definitely genuine and incorporates some 'artsy' cut-aways and close-ups to spruce it up a bit, although they don't make this any less long and repetitive. That said, it's still pretty fucked up...

Which brings us to "part 2", which starts off on a dull note. A guy is going around filming random people around San Diego (or somewhere else around California...). We then cut to some teenage boys passed out in a motel room. Then more filming people. Shit starts getting interesting when a young looking boy has some kind of electro-shock gadget surgically inserted into his arm before being zapped until he cums. Then more filming random people before another kid has his arm cut up and some some weird, perverted looking shit with the gadget happens before he leaves. Another kid is operated on in the motel room before the coup de grâce - the first kid we saw getting electrocuted has his penis removed. Honestly, I have no idea what the hell was going on throughout this footage due to the total lack of audio other than the faint sound of TV news and Mexican music, but it's some seriously shady, fucked up and all-too REAL shit from the looks of it.

Next we get what is mostly just Jim Jones footage/audio. Toward the end of this section is a tacked on short "artsy" piece showing a woman sitting on a toilet, trimming her pubes. She then puts a bigass centipede-type insect on her vag. Then we see a guy cutting a hole into his dick...

The final segment is easily the most boring. There's an interview with two of the members of Psychic TV talking about TTOPY - then starts the film, "Psychoporn". Sounds good, but it's just various colored blobs moving around that at times resemble people having sex. This goes on for a LOOONG time.

Obviously, as a whole, this thing is way too long and boring with too many failed attempts and being 'artistic', but, however, the first two pieces of footage are definitely some disturbing stuff. Namely, the second one by a long shot! I'm not really sure what else to say on this weird comp. Fans of "extreme" material may be interested in "Ritual of Psychick Youth" and the bizarre dick-removal stuff. The rest is pretty much overly long nothingness.

German Angst (2015)

I was very much into checking out "German Angst" since hearing about the crowd-funding campaign for it a while back (my broke ass didn't contribute, I'm sorry to say...) and after finally getting around to checking it out, I've got mixed feelings. I guess I was just expecting something a bit... different, overall.

The first segment - titled "Final Girl" and directed by Jörg Buttgereit (of "Nekromantik" fame...) - involves a young woman in her apartment who provides voice-over information pertaining to the habits of guinea pigs, of which she has two as pets. She has breakfast while listening to the details of a brutal crime on the radio, before it is revealed that she has a bound man tied to a bed in the other room. She proceeds to castrate him while her voice-over describes how guinea pigs react to castration. Eventually, she begins mutilating the guy with an electric turkey knife...

Next is "Make a Wish", from Michael Kosakowski - about a young deaf couple who go exploring in an abandoned building. Via, sign language, the guy explains the origin of a medallion he's giving her that apparently has the power to allow the person holding it to swap bodies with someone else, which, according to his story (told through a flash-back...), allowed his grandmother to escape the Nazis. Before he can finish his story, however, they are coincidentally interrupted by a group of neo-Nazis who, upon discovering that the couple is Polish, begin brutally assaulting them. That is, until the boyfriend uses the 'magic' medallion to switch bodies with the lead skinhead. From there, the goons unknowingly begin torturing their compatriot.

The last story - "Alraune", directed by Andreas Marschall - is about a photographer who arranges to meet up with a chick he came across online. As they're about to hook up in the restroom of a nightclub, she is led away by some guys as the photographer follows. It takes him to an apartment that houses some weird secret society that he wants to get into in order to get to the chick. He gets more than he bargains for when he's granted admission and finds that they're running some kind of weird, demonic sex ritual thing where you're tied down and fucked by a sexy monster. He becomes addicted to this psychotropic 'sensation' and it leads him down a bad road, so to speak...

First and foremost, I was really disappointed with Buttgereit's contribution to this anthology. "Final Girl" is by far the weakest "story" (it's not even a story...) with an off-screen castration and an all too abrupt ending. I feel like the director was really phoning it in on this one and he was the one I, personally, was the most excited to see contribute to this film.

I enjoyed the second entry, and may even call it the best of the three. There's a good deal of violence and a pretty downer ending, which I liked, but it still wasn't all that great.

The final part provided a good enough story, but still felt a bit disjointed. Kinda felt familiar, like a "Tales from the Crypt" episode or something, but I'd say it had the most solid performances of the film and is shot very well. I wasn't all that blown away by it, though.

In all, "German Angst" is an alright anthology. Perhaps I was just expecting something a bit different - maybe something a bit more 'graphic' and 'extreme', considering it's from "Germany's most shocking directors". Instead, I found it significantly tamer and more 'stylish' than I would've thought, which isn't bad. All three shorts are well shot and acted and two out of the three have decent enough stories, but just didn't dole out the crazy gore I was expecting. I would say "German Angst" is just okay.