Trash Menagerie

Dir. David A. Prior Of Sledgehammer , Bleeding Skull’s Zack Carlson said that, “ if you survive it, you’ll never forget it ”. That’s not true. I first saw Sledgehammer a few years ago and remembered nothing of it, except that there’s a ridiculous food fight scene, and that the movie as a whole was quite enjoyable. After watching it again tonight as part of AGFA and Alamo Drafthouse’s digital Terror Tuesday, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that, for the most part, my memory did not fail me. On paper, Sledgehammer is a pretty formulaic slasher; a group of twenty-somethings played by a group of thirty-somethings head out for a weekend of debauchery to a secluded house in the country where ten years earlier, a boy brutally murdered his mother and her lover. After a hefty serving of relationship melodrama and the aforementioned food fight, the group starts getting picked off one-by-one by a sledgehammer wielding maniac. Pretty rote stuff. Notable for being the first SOV ...

Dir. Andrea Bianchi Bimba’s in trouble. In a gothic castle, her family has conducted a seance to try to contact her dead mother, accidentally releasing the spirit of a dead relative that finds its way into Bimba’s body. As Bimba begins to act out in a series of escalating naughty behaviors, it’s up to Sister Sofia, the family’s resident nun-in-training to free Bimba from the curse and save her soul from eternal damnation. Maybe. You’d be forgiven for concluding that Malabimba is a horror film based on the above description. Centered around a young girl being possessed by a spirit in an old gothic castle, the premise is ripe for all the sorts of Exorcist style shenanigans that only Italian rip-off artists can deliver. But director Andrea Bianchi and writer Piero Regnoli have something more important on the mind; lots of sleazy sex. This is much more a psychosexual soap opera than it is a horror film. If you’re looking for blood and gore, or ghosts and ghouls and goblins, you’l...

Dir. Herman Yau Being a fan of splatter movies, more than any other genre, seems to invite people to demand an explanation as to one’s enjoyment of them. No one will roll their eyes at you for watching a period drama, no one will think your sick or depraved for seeing the latest comic book movie, and romantic comedies seem to always squeak by as a guilty pleasure. Even more mainstream horror movies will get a pass if they’re “artsy” enough. But many people still seem to have this puritanical aversion to gore films and the people who enjoy them. I can’t really explain why I like gore movies. Maybe it helps me process my anxieties regarding death. Maybe I find it cathartic to see such extreme displays of bodily carnage. In any case, I don’t need to explain it to you. I like em’ and that’s reason enough. With that out of the way, Ebola Syndrome is a completely indefensible film. Within the first five minutes there is dick stabbing, head crushing, tongue cutting, and an attempt...

Dir. Matthew Bright The older I get, the more I appreciate going into a film as cold a possible. It’s a fallacy that trailers are more spoilery than they the used to be, especially for low budget/horror/exploitation movies needing to ensure maximum ticket sales. But trailers are more ubiquitous today, available anywhere with a screen and internet access at any given moment. It takes a lot of discipline to steer clear of any trailers, reviews, discussions, etc. that might skew your expectations, not just for contemporary films, but really any film that may have been even just a little popular at any point in film history. Of course this isn’t a good thing or a bad thing (or maybe it’s both a good thing and a bad thing), as an overwhelmingly saturated media landscape constantly battles with our brains for attention and money, time seems to become exponentially more limited, and sometimes you just don’t want to risk wasting it on a movie that you’re not at least likely to maybe...

Dir. Kieth Li Love. Death. Mystery. Vengeance. The sins of our ancestors. These are the ingredients of compelling melodrama. But what about spirits, wizard battles, exorcism, astral projected reanimated chicken skeletons, and centipedes? Lots and lots of centipedes? It all goes hand in hand in the world of Hong Kong Category III Exploitation, where bugs and black magic reign supreme. Wai-Lum is called to Southeast Asia (that’s as specific as the movie got regarding location) after his sister falls ill and eventually dies, with doctors having no idea why, saying only that her condition was indicative of radiation poisoning. Of course the audience knows already that she was attacked by a horde of carnivorous centipedes after encountering a man who can only be described as “clearly the movie’s villain”. Investigating with Yeuk-Chee, an old college friend and love interest, Wai-Lum eventually discovers that his family is the subject of revenge for a wizard crossed by his grandf...