Discopath (2013)

I actually really wanted to like this one more since there were quite a few things I thought it was doing right that fell short, overall, due to all that it ended up doing wrong. "Discopath" is a French/Canadian slasher flick that occasionally hits it's 'mark' with it's horror/exploit 'throwback' aim, but mostly just sucks...

A demure 1970s New York fry cook loses his job after hearing some disco music and seizing up with rage. He then by chance meets up with a chick he used to know who invites him to a disco club where he blacks out and brutally murders her under the stage - thus, hopping a plane to Montreal to start a new life. We catch up with him four years later - working as the "deaf" maintenance man at a Catholic girls college. Once again, he ends up hearing some disco and loses his cool - slaughtering a few of them and reviving the case of the disco killer.

Again, the FEEL of "Discopath" actually reminded me a lot of 'old-school' 70s-80s horror/serial killer flicks, but unfortunately the movie is put together in such a blunderous and disjointed way that it's almost impossible to get 'into'. The main character (killer) is completely underdeveloped and no one else is given the central spotlight long enough, so everything just pretty much falls flat in terms of augmenting a primary character structure. You got your typical detective 'sub-plot' that doesn't fit in at all, with terrible - almost comically toned writing and performances - and there's the killer's psychotic alone-time antics with severed female heads, which is equally laughable when it seemed clear that it was suppose to be disturbing on some level. What I thought worked with "Discopath" was that, in certain moments, the shittiness and lack of direction worked to some degree in formulating a 'feel' that fit the time period in which the film was set. It's a very MILD plus, as far as I'm concerned and I assume it was incidental considering how terribly the film was directed... Also, controversial make-up FX artist, Rémy Couture, handled the gore work for this, which is expectedly good, though it could have used a bit more of his talents, I thought. Still, there's a few decent gore/kill scenes.

In all, "Discopath" sucks, but there was such a potentially decent movie to be done here that it's almost frustrating. Needed more focus on the killer, some more kill scenes and less of the annoying detective shit. And better story structure.

Last House on the Beach (1978)

"Last House on the Beach" is an Italian 'rape/revenge' flick that fails to deliver on pretty much every conceivable aspect of what you would want or expect out of this kinda thing. The result, obviously, is a weak-ass 'exploitation' outing.

A trio of bank robbers experience car trouble after a deadly heist and decide to hide out in a ritzy beach house while they fix it up. Unfortunately for the Catholic girls practicing Shakespeare there for the weekend, they quickly become the terrified hostages and sex objects...

Aside from one less-than-noteworthy on-screen rape, the majority of the violence is implied or just outright cut away from. Namely, a scene in which one of the guys who was earlier stabbed in the pelvis by one of the girls (though, later on his wound inexplicably travels up to his abdomen...) decides to 'get even' by driving his sharpened walking stick into her previously unsullied Catholic slit, which is almost completely off-screen! And because of this, the film's antagonists come across as very non-threatening and prosaic most of the time. So, yeah, much too 'tame' for my tastes, but on the plus side it was fairly well shot... But so what? For more superior 'rape/revenge' flicks, check out "House on the Edge of the Park", "Death Weekend" or "Demented".

Lust in Hell: Edge of the World (2009)

"Lust in Hell" is about as bland and lifeless as I've seen Japanese horror in quite some time. Thing is, there was definitely a story here that I felt could have worked, somewhat, if it just hadn't been so poorly directed.

A teenage girl escapes from a mental hospital and ends up meeting a suicidal hitman (I think...) who is in the midst of flaking out on his organized crime syndicate who, in turn, wants him 'eliminated'. The girl has this ability to pull dead people out of this Hell portal she sees - which usually looks like a flower, but at one point looks like a giant vagina. Turns out that everyone in the movie is coping with some kinda loss and the portal comes into play in saving their lives against the betrayed thugs in the end...

Everything about "Lust in Hell" falls flat, except for the few gorgeous-titted girls, which was absolutely the saving grace of this flick. There's a handful of gratuitous sex scenes thrown in that - as out-of-place as they were - bumps this movie up a notch or two on my nonexistent rating scale. Especially for the girl-on-girl scene. Other then that, it's a very poorly executed premise involving ghosts and... 'non-ghosts' that crawl out of Hell's cunt all covered in tar... But there's very little focus on these elements, overall, as the movie is just cluttered with unimportant characters and back stories and long, drawn out scenes of pure nothingness. Avoid this mess...

Dark Night of the Scarecrow (1981)

Back in the day they could pull off the made-for-TV horror movies particularly well (especially by today's standards...) and among the most famous from that time is undoubtedly "Dark Night of the Scarecrow". I finally just got around to checking this one out and I'm definitely glad I did.

It's set in a small farm town where a retarded man-child rescues a little girl - also his best friend, much to the leering suspicion of the towns folk - from a dog attack. But, of course, the residents immediately think that the mentally impaired oaf was responsible so a mob of local yokels is formed and chases him out into a field where he's attempting to hideout as a scarecrow. They discover him and he's executed on the spot. Several seconds later, a call comes in that the girl is conscious and that he was actually a hero. The following court hearing finds the men involved not guilty, but before long, some kind of vengeful force starts picking them off one by one...

"Dark Night" is far from any straight-up killer scarecrow flick, but actually a slow-burn, character driven suspense story with a bit of a supernatural undercurrent. The performances from Charles Durning and Larry Drake are commendable and the atmosphere is notably creepy at times. Of course, there's no gore or nudity to speak of, but for a network television movie it's pretty dark and 'heavy' in tone, overall. If you haven't given this one a shot yet, I recommend you do.

Nekro (1998)

I hadn't seen this shot-on-video 'shocker' in quite a few years so I put it in recently for a quick re-watch - seeing as how it's only about 20-minutes long. As I remembered, "Nekro" is a very 'hollow' and unmemorable gore short.

A guy pulls up to a house, drags an unconscious woman out of the back of his van and up to the attic. Later, he storms in and stabs her to death before having angry sex with her mutilated body...

There IS a little bit of a "surprise" ending that was obviously thrown in just for the hell of it - although his whole movie had a 'just for the hell of it' vibe. It's basically just meant to offend most and to arouse those who dig necrophilia. That's fine, but I guess it just did neither for me. It's shot fairly well, considering they were clearly working with a budget of ZERO, and the blue lighting was alright. The sound seemed to be dubbed entirely with guttural distortion and over-the-top squishy sound-effects, which was kind of amusing. Overall, it's just a quick film about corpse-fucking. Check out Nacho Cerdà's "Aftermath" or "Inner Depravity Vol. 1" for much better examples of this kinda thing.

Wetlands (2013)

"Wetlands" is a very entertaining 'coming-of-age' German flick that 'hit me' as somewhat of a cross between Lars Von Trier's "Nymphomaniac" and a Gregg Araki film. I found it to be quite engrossing, despite a few aspects kinda missing their 'mark'.

A 'quirky' teenage skater girl with a 'thing' for bodily fluids and testing the hygienic boundaries of her vagina (by occasionally swiping it along shit and jizz covered public toilet seats...) has a serious 'mishap' while shaving her asshole. Compounded by the fact that she already has hemorrhoids, she ends up in the hospital. Following her successful sphincter surgery, she continually attempts to arrange to have her divorced parents show up at the same time with hopes that they will reconcile. As she desperately tries to carry out this plan, she develops a personal (albeit, awkward...) relationship with her male nurse and lies about the progression of her recovery in order to stay...

In my synopsis, I'm actually downplaying how crazy this film is. A few notable topics "Wetlands" covers are tampon swapping, attempted infanticide (I felt this was a particular element that came and went a bit too abruptly...), a group of guys circle-jerking on a pizza in slow-motion and formalistic vag-shaving... Along with the weirdness - the performances are all strong and make for interesting characters and dialogs and the overall 'tone' of the film is oddly upbeat and with a punk-rock 'flair'. Again, there were a few scenes that seemed a bit out-of-place or unneeded, I thought, but overall, "Wetlands" is a highly enjoyable drama with more references to torn assholes then I've ever seen on film.