All Of Them Busty Witches

Considering I generally find Netflix’s ‘erotic thrillers’ hilarious (see: Blood Gnome) I couldn’t think of any reason NOT to watch Witch’s Sabbath.

None. At. Atll.

Quick Plot: A coven of witches led by the artificially large chested Auriana (the fairly amazingly named Syn DeVil) run a well-lit strip club to lure its patrons into an after party held at a private mansion. Once there, randy men and their occasionally bored girlfriends get their faces clawed off and souls sent to Satan as their blood spurts all over naked porn stars like...well...you know.

But they get to see boobs! LOTS of them! Real ones, fake ones, ones wrapped in black leather, ones thinly veiled by fishnet, ones awkwardly coddled by unattractive men...

Yup, as I often find myself saying here, I don’t know that I was the target audience for this film.

And yet...and yet...I actually found myself enjoying Witch’s Sabbath, poorly punctuated title be damned. Though it’s about as sexy as a podiatrist’s waiting room, the film has a genuinely fun spirit about itself and far more energetic performances than you’d find in most of the cast’s back catalog (including porn star Lisa Sparxxx, whose credits include the phenomenally titled Ass Good Ass It Gets, MILF Busters, and the fifth entry in the My Hot Wife Is Fucking Blackzilla! franchise). Even Ron Jeremy shows up for a “special appearance” playing a bible salesman who occasionally dips into a southern accent because, you know, that’s what a bible salesman does. Also, his name is Craven Moorehead which...let’s face it, is amusing.

As the witches amass their collection of souls to feed to the land-bound octopus they call Satan, we switch to the sunnier side of town to meet Eliza, a selectively intelligent blond whose boyfriend likes to play wacky non-sex games such as wearing a black ski cap and sneaking outside her window for kicks. 

No seriously, it’s not a sex thing.

Eliza and her doofy boyfriend Seth decide to visit his favorite strip club along with his never-been-kissed best friend and a poor soul of a blind date. The foursome get a private invite to--whaddya know--a Halloween party at Auriana’s mansion where body limbs fly, ugly leopard print plastic raincoats get stained, and secrets are revealed.

Also, we see more boobs. But you knew that already.

High Points

It’s no secret that I’m a crazy cat lady in training, so the fact that Witch’s Sabbath took the trouble to actually cast and zoom in on a kitten for the all important line “Travis can’t speak right now. My cat has his tongue!” is well appreciated by me

For a cheaply made nudie-horror, Witch’s Sabbath sure put a lot of energy into its gore, and it shows. Sure, some of the severed heads look straight off a Spencer’s Gifts shelf, but there are some gooily great blood squirtings that shows the filmmakers were far more ambitious than something like, say, Santa Claws

Low Points

I get director Jeff Leroy wasn’t thinking of me, a straight woman, while making this film, but does that HAVE to mean that the men get to watch Playboy knockoff centerfolds and I get...well...Ron Jeremy?

Lessons Learned

You can’t break a cop’s wrist! (except you totally can)

Politely applauding at a strip club is also known as getting out of control

Asking “Who’s there? Please, if there’s someone out there, just go away,” when you suspect a prowler is outside your window will most likely not get the results you’re looking for

Remember, Travis plans on getting laid tonight

The going rate for convincing your friend to accepting a blind date with a socially incompetent creep? One pair of earrings

The Winning Line

“Where you going? Crazy ass witch with titties.”

I wonder so hard how many takes it took for the actor to say this without cracking up. I don’t think I can count that high

Credits Curiosity

The opening credits boast a “special appearance by Ron Jeremy,” prompting me to wonder: is that really so special? Doesn’t that guy show up to the opening of a Subway restaurant or pizza buffet?

Rent/Bury/Buy

For a softcore horror porn, Witch’s Sabbath is surprisingly entertaining. Most of the performances are quite sunny and the gore is as satisfying as any low budget gross-out. I wouldn’t recommend putting any money or energy towards it, but as an Instant Watch, it’s not the worst way to kill 83 minutes when NBC decides to show reruns of its shows one month into the fall season. This is why I try to limit my television watching.

Especially when I could just observe the weirdness of veiny fake boobs.

It's Exactly What You Think It Is (But So Much More)

On the list of so-bad-it’s-good cinema, 1982’s Pieces often ranks fairly high. 

Rightfully so.

Quick Plot: In 1942, a sweater vest-clad boy puts together a nudie jigsaw puzzle to the horror of his mother. When she threatens to burn everything he owns, the kid takes the common route and axes her to death.

Sneeze, flash forward 40 years to the then-present day of extreme 1980sness where a young woman recklessly skateboards into a mirror.

Just go with it.

Later that day, a student innocently studies in a college campus park, only to get attacked by a man with a chainsaw. Even LATER that day, a blond slips a raccoon headed student named Kendall a come-shag-me-in-the-school-pool note, only to also get attacked by a man with a chainsaw. I guess that’s why nobody uses the completely public swimming pool on campus. Even to have sex.

Even this guy.

Because he was sort of in the right spot at the right time, the nerdy--yet inexplicable chick magnet--Kendall becomes an unofficial assistant to the detectives assigned to investigate the case. That’s right, just when I thought police officers couldn’t get more incompetent than The Human Centipede, Pieces introduces genre stalwart Christopher George as a cheery lieutenant who takes a shining to the obnoxious underclassman, utilizing the kid to help craft a criminal profile, hang around on stake outs, and, most hilariously, protect the OTHER undercover officer recently enlisted to fight crime.

See, in the 1980s, there was apparently no such thing as ACTUAL female undercover officers. Instead, the police force would recruit eager tennis champions to um...enter dangerous situations where serial killers are hunting young women? Really? Is this what’s happening onscreen right now?

I asked that question a lot while watching Pieces, which would conventionally be a bad thing for most viewers but for someone like me--and I assume, a good deal of you--is pretty amazing. This is the kind of movie that features not one, but TWO scenes involving ballet aerobics and even more notably, the greatest maybe-rape-attempt scene committed by a friendly kung fu professor ever.

Yes, kung fu professor. Who starts to kick and punch our heroine (remember her? the not actually undercover cop/not cop tennis star) on the street in the middle of the night, seemingly as if to, you know, violate her, but stops when confronted by Kendall--who himself was spending the evening having sex with the world’s worst reporter, who was apparently far too noisy in bed for the classy Kendall to go for round two with. Kendall and his KUNG FU PROFESSOR laugh off the misunderstanding? sexual violation? mugging? And that’s that.

Pieces is an awful movie, but gloriously so. You get the sense that actors didn’t know what they doing, but that the craft service table was so stocked with fresh-baked muffins that the cast gave it their all anyway, even if they had not the slightest idea what ‘it’ was supposed to be.

High Points

Cut and banned at its original time of release, Pieces is a puzzlebox full of fairly impressive practical effects

Low Points

So was the identity of the killer supposed to actually be a secret? I assumed it was just a lazily kept one, and this is easily confirmed by the actual reveal. Instead of a shocking ‘pull the mask off!’ moment, our killer just kind of tells a would-be victim about his past. It’s like the filmmakers reached a point where they got bored with the excitement of keeping a secret, or like little kids just couldn’t contain themselves anymore and ultimately just spilled it out in the most random and uneventful ways possible

Lessons Learned

Undercover policing is strictly volunteer

A pool skimmer is the most important weapon a serial killer can have in his or her arsenal

It’s much easier than you think to hide a chainsaw behind your back, yet much harder to put the breaks on when riding a skateboard

Never confuse a psychiatrist with a doctor of medicine. That’s really offensive and you should know better

Unlike Stepford wives, campus walls bleed when stabbed

The Winning Line (Delivery)

“Don’t tell me I’m the bearer of bad news I could KILL myself.”

No, I didn't forget to insert a period between 'news' and 'I.' The real question is: did the screenwriter, prompting the very literal and untrained actor to follow suit, or was this a choice? Either way, it is awesome.

Rent/Bury/Buy

Well OBVIOUSLY I'm recommending Pieces with the Doll's House blue cheese ribbon. Slasher fans can enjoy the gore, while so-bad-it's-amazing connoisseurs will savor each scene like a plate of nachos washed down with ranch dressing. There’s what I imagine is a glorious two-disc special edition out there in the world, so trash fans who find it cheap won’t regret a buy. And come on ladies, don’t even THINK of passing up a chance to spend 90 minutes with this love machine:

Only An Anthology Could Make Me Rap

Anthology horror films are my Target brand trail mix. I'll always buy it, but only parts inside will work. You know what to expect--saltiness, twist endings, karma, too many pretzels--but occasionally get nice surprises that are briefly extremely exciting--chocolate covered espresso beans, killer African tribal dolls, corn nuts, Richard Moll. While neither is ever The Greatest Creation Mankind Can Make, both are a tad more exciting than their rivals. I'd rather eat a mixed bag of Cajun peanuts and pumpkin seeds than a mere box of crackers in the same way I'm happier watching Creepshow 2 than I would be with The Prowler. 

It’s how I roll.

Hence, when my blogging brother Cortez the Killer of Planet of Terror gave me the heads up that Nite (sic) Tales, a two-part horrorshow hosted by Flavor Flav, was streaming, you could bet my own personal VH1 dating show that I'll give it a go.

Quick Plot: Flavor Flav says something about something, some of which may or may not rhyme. 

His enunciation is poor and I didn't really catch much, save for him welcoming me to "the new movie, Nite Tales." 

I like when I'm welcomed to movies, although generally that happens when an usher rips my ticket or an animated box of popcorn dances before telling me to turn off my cell phone. But who am I to judge? I worked at a concession stand for 4 months and never came up with the right quip for when I said "Enjoy your movie" and the customers said "You too...oh wait! YOU'RE not going to the movie" so ultimately, I am on par with Flavor Flav.

Story 1 is called Karma, because like 90% of anthology tales, it involves comeuppance. We meet a quartet of bank robbers with twitchy trigger fingers who find themselves at a Texas Chainsaw-like farmhouse inhabited by the other kinds of hoodies (satan worshippers--I think--not Klansmen). There's a lot of shouting in urban style, followed by shouting in white Southern style. Unlike most shorts, the tale doesn't have a twist per say, although it's sufficiently told in an underwhelming, but competent manner.

The second tale, on the other hand, is not. "Storm" follows a group of teenagers partying at home during the titular bad weather, playing around with pot and Bloody Mary (the ghost, not the drink). Just as the power goes out, Tony Todd shows up dressed like a grumpy clown, a one-earring wearing police offer swings by to put everyone off-ease, and some of the prettier stars get sliced up. 

Now all this sounds fine, especially for a quick 45 minute segment. Except Storm has no concept on how to pace itself and just...keeps...going. As I've said before and will inevitably say again, the biggest crime an anthology film can commit is the act of dragging. The whole POINT of a multi-segmented film is that you take a story that doesn’t warrant ninety minutes and pound us with a complete arc in less than forty. 

Perhaps the problem is that Storm tries to be too ambitious, using not one but two urban legends as its basis. There's the early establishment of Bloody Mary, but ten minutes later, we may have well forgotten that name was ever uttered as the mystery of a loose serial killer (is it the clown? the cop? the kid that keeps talking about pot?) takes center stage. Then falls off the stage. But gets back up. Or something.

It's frustrating, mostly because it means it's not fun. Tony Todd is never not great to watch, and he does what he can to keep our interest, while the young cast flops around in ill-defined roles that we never care about in the least. I don't know what director Deon (Chain Letter) Taylor was going for, and while there is potential in the story's complications, it's just too messily done in its brief running time.

High Points

There's some fun humor to be had in Nite Tales, most of which does not actually come from Flavor Flav's mugging. Coulrophobes should snicker at the way the characters in the second story react to Todd's circus reject "DUDE! You let a CLOWN in my house?"

Low Points

In addition to the already discussed pacing, can we address the fact that Nite Tales (note that I'm already being forgiving of its stupidly spelled title) breaks the SECOND rule of anthologies, i.e., Thou Shalt Always Include a Killer Doll Segment

Lessons Learned

If you love deals, your favorite show is Deal or No Deal

Avoid trusting police officers with questionable diamond earrings

Everything scares Clay Aiken

Working in a bank will blacken your blood, literally

Cuss Police

This is the first time I've ever seen this happen on Netflix Instant Watch: all the curses in Nite Tales are muted out. No, there's no VH1 Showgirls hilarity with dubbed alternates. Just silence whenever a character curses. Huh?

Michael J. Pagan Alert!

He is to the Doll's House what Cameron Mitchell is to a Mill Creek pack. In 2011, I've reviewed a total of four films (and counting) starring this young actor, including one that he co-wrote. Yes, it was Chain Letter (the others being House of Fears and See No Evil) and yes, I'm convinced that we're destined to either marry or destroy one another. 

Rent/Bury/Buy

This is the second film I've reviewed by Code Black Entertainment (the first being April Fools) and while it's certainly an improvement, Nite Tales is still sorely lacking. The first story is passable, if a tad predictable, while the second is built on a strong idea but executed with the sluggish confusion of a dyslexic slug. Anthology fetishists may still enjoy the film and it certainly offers something mildly different in that regard, especially in following black thugs in Karma. I guess it's a must for Flavor Flav fans, although I also hope those don't actually exist so I suppose that means it's not a must for anyone in particular. If that makes sense, like a sixpence, but yo yo friend, I don't know what that mends, cause that's how I rhyme, I just say things that kind of sound fine, so go behave, I'm Flavor Flav.

I think I just rewrote the opening to this film.

Ron Perlman Saves Your Soul

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from both Days of Our Lives and Children of the Corn(s), it’s that no filmmaker should ever, ever never ever, and did I mention never? expect that the computer generated deep demon voice is effective at doing anything other than making an audience giggle like schoolgirls.

Catholic schoolgirls, in fact...

Quick Plot: A pious and pretty nun-watched student sketches cartoons based on Revelations, only to then be sucked up by a demon as priest Ron Perlman (!!!) looks on helplessly. 

I don’t know about you, but you can bet your SAMCRO leather jacket that I’m not putting my faith in a church headed by Hellboy.

Flash forward some years to the present day, where a batch of bad girl teens with fabulous hair are sent to the now empty boarding school. What kind of parents would send their children to an academy with a sordid history of lost students and, more importantly, two faculty members and FOUR OTHER STUDENTS is its own question, but eh, here we are so let’s make the best of it.

Amongst the ‘delinquents’ are Alex, a telekinetic blond, Mara, a sassy lesbian who keeps doing cute things like pretending she might rape you, Cecilia, a blind anarchist with a nose ring, Lea, an overly nice girl who sleeps in ugly pajamas, and Connie, an airhead Wiccan. After a few rounds of pseudo-threatening behavior, the girls discover they all have unique supernatural powers (healing, ESP, shiny hair) which should come in handy as the abandoned school is clearly harnessing some angsty mojo leftover by Father Hellboy’s favorite disappeared student.

5ive Girls is an odd little movie, one that could play to an older or younger audience if it knew itself better. With a primarily teenage cast and a hearty dose of CW-ready music, the film could easily have been marketed a to teenage girls a la The Craft. On the other side, a few more strokes of maturity (you already have attractive young lesbians in schoolgirl uniforms) and you have a sleazy something for adult viewers. But for whatever reason, 5ive Girls doesn’t play either hand with any commitment. 

Tamest sapphic smooch since Britney & Madonna

In a similar vein to Lucky McKee’s okay, not great The Woods, 5ive Girls just sort of moseys along with moments of interest and more moments of eye rolls. The young cast does its best, but none really elevate any of the material to anything Gossip Girl couldn’t do better. Worst of all is the total waste of Ron Perlman in the role of a conflicted? maybe? sort of? or just not? priest. The story itself is simple but fine (something about possession, sacrifice, witchcraft, and deep-voiced demons) but sadly music video director Warren P. Sonoda never seems fully aware of who’s watching.

High Points

I won’t spoil anything, but the ending was far darker than I expected to find in what could almost have been a lightweight PG13 rated horror film

Low Points

Hopefully, the world will one day look back upon the early twentieth century and say “Whatever was our ancestors thinking to believe titling films with numbers that kind of look like letters made any sense?” Seriously, if this trend of ScreFourem and Fiveive Girls catches on, I may need to seek solace on Mars

Lessons Learned

There’s a huge difference between a witch, bitch, head mistress and anarchist

A great way to distract a priest is to ask him about Latin verb conjugation

Bitches always keep their mothers’ maiden names

Credits Curiosity

The opening credits feature Ron Perlman reading scripture in an odd rhythm as a techno beat mixes it up as to sound like a rap. I don’t know what they were going for, but let’s call it awesome

Rent/Bury/Buy

5ive Girls isn’t awful, but its audiences aren’t me...mostly because they’re either 13 year old girls looking for something to program at a slumber party or older gents who get a kick out of girls in knee socks and collared shirts. Sadly for both demographics, the film doesn’t really care to fully please either audience, but there’s still some odd fun to be found in watching Ron Perlman explain Latin grammar or the continuously not good actress from Diary of the Dead summoning Legion himself to possess a bunch of cute twentysomethings playing fifteen year old girls. It’s a mediocre Instant Watch, and one that’s fitting when you’re in the mood for a female-centered boarding school movie that’s a little less good than The Woods.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow (you might go crazy)

It might surprise you to learn that sandwiched between Dawn of the Dead and The Wicker Man, my second favorite film of all time is a little classic known as The Wizard of Oz. Allow me to display some photographic evidence of such:

Yup, that’s me with my big brother and a little Munchkin who visited a local Blockbuster Video in 1989 to sign autographs and pose for pictures with star struck second graders. Note that I am indeed taller. Note that I am also the same height today.

Moving on, there were two things that led me to queuing up 2011’s YellowBrickRoad on ye olde convenient Instant Watch:

1-Its clear connection to the REAL best film of 1939 (screw you, Scarlet O’Hara)

And 2-Like the great premised, terribly executed Vanishing on 7^th Street, it seemed to play with the haunting idea of the disappeared members of the Roanoke Colony, something I’ve always found fascinating. Though YellowBrickRoad doesn’t explicitly name that nugget of history, the idea feels close enough that it must have served as some inspiration.

Quick Plot: Teddy and Melissa are married academic explorers who team up with their professor friend Walter on a research project of Friar, a town where 70 years earlier, the whole population followed a trail and came back dead. Though the locals are reluctant to drudge up the past, the team amasses a few more members (a map-making sibling pair, spacey intern, forest ranger, and New Hampshah townie) to follow the titular YellowBrickRoad into the woods while documenting their findings for a book.

Echoes of Blair Witch sound through the early scenes, but YellowBrickRoad is far more ambitious than it initially appears. First-time directors Jesse Holland and Andy Mitton tell a mostly straightforward narrative, though they occasionally mix in still photographs or recorded interviews throughout. Walter documents the heads of his team, videotaping each member discussing memories or reciting the alphabet backwards to gauge their mindset. As you probably expect, said interviews reveal the slow cracks in sanity that happen when you cross over into Oz.

Sure, YellowBrickRoad’s basic formula is familiar, but the execution is actually quite fresh. It begins with some old timey music, the low undertones of which are heard by the whole group in a ‘maybe we’re crazy, maybe someone’s messing with us, or maybe it’s REAL’ mystery that works because sound designer Daniel Brennan’s work is actually incredible. One sequence follows the group through a high-pitched beeping as they can only communicate on paper. It might sound annoying (and it is) but it’s also quite horrifying.

There are berries to not be eaten (and of course, totally eaten), water not to be wasted (until it’s used to put out fires that didn’t have to be started in the first place), hoarded candy stashes and unrequited love stories inside YellowBrickRoad, and honestly, that’s fine. This is the sort of film that’s culled from other sources, but Holland and Mitton--along with a far better than average cast—work hard to make it pop, giving each character his or her due and payoff.

MILD SPOILERS FOLLOW

YellowBrickRoad clocks in at 100 minutes, and unfortunately like so many new horror films, it seems to check out at 99. For the majority of its running time, the atmosphere—crafted on an effectively used low budget—is perfectly unsettling and each crescendo as terrifying or bizarre or weirdly humorous-turned-bizarre as intended. It SCARED me, and it’s not often that I can say that as I pluck the gray strands out before my 30^th birthday.

But GRRRR did the final shot or two make me say GRRR. While there’s a good chance I’ll look at it differently upon second viewing and am more than open to hearing any defenses, I just found the film lost me once it left the woods. I don't have a theory on the ending yet--was it a twist? was it all about Teddy? Is he now in hell?--and perhaps I'll change my mind upon second viewing. It definitely says something positive to the film that I'm eager to give it one.


THUS ENDETH SPOILERS

High Notes

Sometimes you forget how important good acting is in a genre film. Though nobody channels Meryl Streep in YellowBrickRoad, there’s not a bad performance in the ensemble. We like (mostly) and most importantly, BELIEVE the cast, making their fates all the more devastating

I mentioned this back in the early Doll’s House days when reviewing The Signal (also starring Anessa Ramsay, oddly enough) but it never fails: weaponless violence unnerves me. The first major bout of horror here is primarily made with one’s hands, and while other reviewers may have found it laughable, I found it horrifying in both a darkly serious and darkly comedic absurd kinda way. Likewise, verbal descriptions on neck snapping? Ick!

Low Notes

Aforementioned ending

Lessons Learned

Berries are for squishing (or getting high)

If you already bare a striking physical and audio resemblance to Richard Dreyfuss, you might as well embrace it and quote some of his more famous Jaws lines when appropriate

New England ushers are generally jerks

Rent/Bury/Buy

Now streaming on Netflix Instant, I heartily recommend YellowBrickRoad to those who enjoy good modern horror. It will probably do little to sway those naysayers who despise anything made in the 21^st century, but this is a sharply made horror film packed with pleasantly mean surprises, strong performances across the board, and a unique vision and ear that makes fantastic use of its look and sound. I’d sell my ruby slippers for a more satisfying ending, but I still heartily endorse YellowBrickRoad as an excellent block of evidence that there are indeed good genre filmmakers working today.