Highl-erker

Netflix Instant Watch synopsis: 

“Bloodthirsy warriors from the Middle Ages. A sexy shrink from the present. This isn't your average Viking flick.”

Sold.

Quick Plot: In Viking times, a pair of brothers named Boar (Nightbreed’s Craig Sheffer) and Barek (90210’s John Sears, plus a whole catalog of B-movies’ Paul Johnansson) decide to free Brunhilda, the witch who spurned Odin and was henceforth sentenced to a life surrounded by flames until someone pure of heart frees her. Boar tries and gets burned, while Barek succeeds and asks Brunhilda to save his beloved brother. The catch is that Boar can only be revived as a cannibalistic Berserker. 

who now totally knows how to party

Apparently, some people consider that a bad thing.

Some years later, Barek’s father makes a deal with his now disowned cannibalistic Berserker son for help defeating Erik the Red in exchange for the non-cannibalistic son’s soul. When pops refuses to honor the terms, lots of flames and witch people show up to cause some chaos. Cut to--

THE PRESENT.

Or, at least a version of the present where high ranking psychiatric professionals show up to work in skirts that would make Britney Spears blush.

Enter one of the glowing lights of the B-movie darkness, Kari Wuhrer as Anya, a psychiatrist/reincarnated Valkyrie formerly named Brunhilda. Anya has just taken charge of a mental hospital for the violently insane where a new patient has been suspended from Hellraiser-esque chains for years because, well, he’s a reincarnated Viking warrior.

Plots like these have their reviews write themselves.

Berserker: Hell’s Warrior is written and directed by a man named Paul Matthews, whose name might ring a bell if you recall my recent review of his female-centric western, Hooded Angels. Like that film, Berserker was made in scenic South Africa on what I assume had to be a fairly small budget. This is most prominent in the shoddy CGI, soundtrack that sounds borrowed from the public domain library usually raided by video games, and quality of wigs that seem to have been purchased from a Halloween sale. 

sunglasses were half price

All that being said, I’ve come to find a lot of respect for Matthews’ filmography. Maybe it’s just that I watched the laughably incompetent Hammer of the Gods recently (you can listen to my thoughts via The Feminine Critique Episode 53 here), but Berserker fared somewhat (not much) better than you’d expect a low budget Viking movie to do. It sort of stands one tier above the Asylum Studio’s output. That’s not a glowing compliment, but it gives something of an idea of what to expect.

High Points

There’s a beautiful scene where modern-times Barek and Anya hide out in a rave while being pursued by not-that-out-of-place Berserkers. The real pleasure of such a setting is that it takes me back to one of my favorite undercover storylines on Law & Order: SVU, wherein the gang pull a sting in full glowstick glory.

Low Points

I don’t know if I can properly describe how bad the CGI looks, so here:

Lessons Learned

In case you needed reminding, severed heads onscreen are always funny

Like most cats (not mine), reincarnated berserker warriors always land on their feet

A benefit of being a female Berserker is that your eyeshadow gets automatically applied when your crazy genes kick in

No matter how tight the top, how short the skirt, how tattooed the dame, a pair of glasses will sell a hot chick as a doctor with no problem

Rent/Bury/Buy

Berserker: Hell’s Warrior is streaming on Netflix, and for under 90 minutes, it’s not the worst Highlander-ish background entertainment while you file your taxes or plan your next vacation. By no means is this a good movie, but it’s entertaining in its own little way. 

The Cowgirl Way

In the realm of cinema, can we all agree that "...And Gary Busey" is just about the most promising opening credit one can hope to see?

I thought so too.

Quick Plot: The town of Silver Creek is under attack during the Civil War, leaving its ladies raped, widowed, and childless. After watching her young son run into gunfire, a young woman named Hannah snaps and takes some vengeance on all of the men in range, including an apologetic officer. 

Three years later, Hannah has corralled her fellow ladies to form a gang of bank robbing cowgirls. The team includes the unstable and lovelorn Ellie (she of the modified Rachel haircut, which was all the rage in the 19th century), the mature but still sexy caretaker who goes by the name Widow (Amanda Donohoe from The Lair of the White Worm), and a whole bunch of other impeccably groomed beauties whose names don't ever seem to matter. The gals go from town to town in disguise, never leaving any solid trace of their identity or gender.

Everything changes when they set their targets on a town run by Sheriff Gary Busey. Well, Busey doesn’t really have anything to do with it (he gets a whopping 10 minutes or so of oddly subdued screentime) but his buddy Wes (former Beverly Hills, 90210 baddie Paul Johansson) has been on the lookout for the mysterious gunslingers who killed his pop way back in the fateful Silver City.

Before we can get a high noon shootout, Wes and Hannah have to fall in love (much to the chagrin of the jealous Ellie, who’d rather keep her cowgirl leader to herself). Widow takes up a rather sweet and satisfying relationship with Wes’s pal Jack, but double dates are thwarted by the minor inconvenience of crime, vengeance, and slow motion.

When I saw the fairly ridiculous title Hooded Angels on Netflix Instant, I eagerly added it to my queue because how could it not be terrible? A female western that no one’s ever heard of, a cast composed of no-name model actresses, the inclusion of Paul Johansson...it couldn’t be good, right?

I’m not going to lie: the most disappointing thing about watching Hooded Angels (aka Glory Glory) is that it’s...okay. We’re not talking Unforgiven levels of western grandeur, but truthfully, this is far more passable entertainment (and far more female positive entertainment) than the big budget, big failure that was Bad Girls.

Do most of the actresses speak with unexplained South African accents? Yes. Does the slow motion drama turn tragic deaths into rather amazing moments for giggles? Absolutely. Do I know who half of the characters are? Not in the least. But you know what? This is still...okay.

I wouldn’t necessarily recommend Hooded Angels to lovers of the American (or South African) western, but director Paul Matthews manages to put together a decent little story. The actresses are unreasonably gorgeous and do their best with their parts, even if none will ever make the short list for Academy Awards consideration. The film even manages to offer some genuine feminist solidarity, centering itself on a (somewhat) diverse group of women who banded together so that they would never be victims again. Sure, the camera enjoys highlighting their beauty, but overall, Hooded Angels respects its female characters and never exploits them. That’s not at all what I expected to find here, and it’s certainly a pleasant surprise.

High Points

Widow and Jack’s romance takes a secondary role to the action, but there’s a rather sweet little post coital conversation they have that has a wonderfully natural tone to it. There’s nothing revolutionary about it, but it’s simply nice to see a positive depiction of guilt-free sex between a slightly older woman and a friendly younger guy

Low Points

I suppose it would have been nice to know who all of those OTHER pretty cowgirls were  in order to make their stretched out slow motion deaths hit a little harder

Lessons Learned

Learning how to write will make you feel smarter

All deaths are better when shown in super slow motion

1870s era cowgirls had unlimited access to tweezers and salon waxes

Stray Observations

You now what I’m tired of? Characters hushing other dying characters. I get that the sentiment comes from a “don’t strain yourself” goal, but if I’m DYING, why not allow me to say what I need to say? 

Rent/Bury/Buy

Hooded Angels won’t ever be considered a classic, but it has plenty of pretty scenery and people getting shot off of horses to satisfy a certain kind of audience. If that’s you, then go for it.

A Remake Without Soul

"Wes Craven Presents" have never been three words I’ve looked forward to hearing. The product it generally implies is, well...

Sometimes starring Marc Blucas.

In other words, it’s rarely a good thing for even the catchiest of titles (you know, like, um...They) to be produced by horror’s most famous former college professor. With that in mind, I headed into 1998’s Carnival of Souls with a bar lower than the required height for the kiddie coaster.

Let’s see if it helped.

Quick Plot: Young Alex walks into her kitchen to the pleasant sight of Larry Miller raping her mother. Before you can say Final Destination 5, he snaps her neck and snaps us into the present, where Alex (Bobbie Philips) has grown into a pretty but world weary bar owner co-managing a seaside dive with her younger sister, played by an oddly stable Shawnee Smith. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with Saw's first lady, but there's something very off about seeing her playing normal.

Alex has bigger problems than a dull little sister, primarily the fact that mom-killer (and apparently, child molester) Larry Miller has been released from his lifetime prison sentence. So, apparently, have a bunch of demons and a lot of very menacing water, be it in a Final Destination 4-esque car wash-gone-wrong sequence or an aggressive bathtub. Are these simple daydreams haunting an emotionally scarred Alex, or is there evil afoot in comically oversized floppy red shoes?

Wes Craven Presents: Carnival of Souls is one of the titles that often shows up on Worst Remakes of All Time lists. While it’s no It’s Alive 2009, it’s easy to see why some viewers would be so offended by this film. The original is a verifiable cult classic, an eerie little tale panned in its time and rediscovered in the public domain as one of the era’s very best ghost stories. This version, directed by Adam Grossman and Ian Kressner, is far from the worst horror output of the ‘90s, but in comparison to the rich imagery of Herk Harvey’s film, it suffers quite fiercely.

The movie’s largest issue is the hardest to conquer: it’s boring. Yes, we get Shawnee Smith warbling through a tune. Indeed, we get a character actor generally known for comedy going all out as a pedophile carnival clown with a pageboy wig. Sure, these things are special in their own odd way. But that doesn’t a not dull film make.

Running at just 90 minutes, Carnival of Souls simply takes forever. The beats are repetitive, and sadly there are only so many ‘water! Bad! It’s a dream! Water! Bad!’ cycles a viewer can suffer through before calling it a day.

Or just a bad movie.

High Points

Well, this happens a lot:

Low Points

There’s a very specific moment where Carnival of Souls lost whatever mild interest it had generated. In one of her umpteenth fantasy/dream/water sequences, Alex is haunted by a red balloon that appears out of nowhere. She carefully walks toward it, clearly leading us to a jump of some moment. And she jumps. And THEN Larry Miller’s face appears on the balloon to do some taunting.

Notice a problem?

It’s easy enough to set up a jump scare. Lower the music. Have a character walk slowly. Focus on an object/door/box/noun of some sort that will reveal a minor menace. REVEAL the menace, and we and said character will presumably jump. Have character jump and THEN reveal menace, well, that’s something you only get when Wes Craven is presenting.

Lessons Learned

It is possible to possess stunning green eyes up until the age of five or six, only to see them turn a pleasant if plain brown once you reach your mid-20s

Demon thingies rarely wear clothing, but they do enjoy a hearty dinner and hydration

Look, It’s…

John Sears! Fraternity president/casual date rapist/homophobic bigot/sworn nemesis of Steve Sanders John Sears! Um, he was on Beverly Hills 90210, and I tend to should “John Sears!” whenever he pops up in another late ‘90s horror movie (of which there are quite a few). Also, he apparently directed the much maligned Atlas Shrugged: Part 1, so make of all of these things whatever you will.

Rent/Bury/Buy

Carnival of Souls isn’t the worst thing streaming on Netflix right now, but there’s very little reason to test that theory. I suppose Larry Miller clown fetishists or remake completists will give it a go, but be aware that this is a slog. Not a They slog, but dull time nonetheless.