cpeter133 Reviews

Divine Intervention (II) (2007)

Upsetting for all the wrong reasons

[2/10 · 29 August 2020]

This movie is clearly low-budget, which is obvious in the final product. But cheap movies can be entertaining. Not this one. It tries to paint everyone as a sinner, but makes virtually every character so loathsome that you want to cheer on the killer. But the killer is just a sad zealot with a crossbow and the most terrifying lateral lisp on celluloid. He's not funny, or intriguing nor interesting, and he has a sidekick who has even less personality. There's no logic to any of it, and characters flip sides on a dime without reason.

The one decent character (and actress) is the one who plays the older sister, but by the time she gets involved, the viewer is too numb to care. It's literally sex and drugs and profanity, but no plot or skill. There's a character who is supposed to be an ex-con and who talks like every member of a cheap prison flick, but who looks like a middle-aged accountant. It's actually jatrring to hear him speak.

The ending is completely predictable, but then, so is the rest of the movie. Why this was made is puzzling; why it was released is baffling.

Grindsploitation 4: Meltsploitation (2018)

A mixed bag atbest.

[4/10 · 6 October 2019]

This is typical Troma fare, although many of the faux trailers are from independent studios. It's all here--tasteless vulgarity, cheap effects, and mindless gore. There are a few standouts: Trailers with casts comprised entirely of real cockroaches and plastic army men, or instance. But most never rise past adolescent film-making.

At Troma, bad taste reigns supreme, and this compilation fits right in. To me, one of the biggest issues is that not only do they break up the trailers with old-time theatrical "Coming Soon" bumpers and random intros by producer Lloyd Kaufman, but most of these trailers also have credits. They stop the show dead in its tracks. By the time you reach the last third of the movie, the trailers become raunchier but not any more interesting. In fact, I would recommend that you watch this in short bursts instead of sitting through it in one sitting.

Although adolescent in spirit, it's definitely not for kids. It has many sexually-explicit scenes of questionable taste, and one vignette abandons the tongue-in-cheek tone of most of the others, depicting a serious sexual attack and murder.

Compete to Eat (2013– )

Culinary "Cloverfield"

[4/10 · 22 March 2017]

I learned virtually nothing watching this cooking show. The basic concept is that two homes host competing chefs, who will use whatever is on hand to prepare a 3-course meal. I question how much of the ingredients just happen to be available, but it's not that important.

The biggest issue for me is that whoever directed this seems to suffer from an advanced case of ADD. Everything is shown in 1-2 second clips, with a shaky camera, zooms, etc. It's actually slightly disorienting to watch. Calm down--it's cooking, not a car chase.

Zindy the Swamp Boy (1973)

The Tragedy of Zindy

[3/10 · 4 February 2017]

Zindy and his grandfather live in the swamp because Gramps killed a mobster and he's wanted by the law. Zindy's parents are also dead. Also, it's more jungle than swamp, and major characters include an African chimp and a North American puma. Finally, Gramps (spoiler) kicks off, leaving little Zindy to survive on his own. He meets a girl whose coach overturns--yes, a coach in the jungle/swamp--and just when you think it's entering Blue Lagoon territory, everything hits the fan.

The performances aren't horrendous, although whoever dubbed the kids' voices evidently were competing to see who could whine more. Be prepared for a lot of boat-rowing and random animal shots.

Curtain (2011)

Unpleasant

[3/10 · 25 March 2015]

This short is well-produced and decently acted, but the characters are universally repugnant; I never once cared if they all got sucked down the drain. The biggest offender is the girlfriend, who is a shrieking harpy who NO ONE would live with for more than 5 minutes. The boyfriend is evidently unemployed and has had a fling, but at least he seems fairly human.

The description already says there's a succubus, so it's no spoiler. The thing lives in the bathtub that has religious symbols in it. There's no way anyone would use that shower more than once, but he does.

For me, the thing that is impossible to ignore or forgive is that the girlfriend decides she's going to get revenge on the guy by anally raping him--this is even before the succubus gets involved. A fling is worse than rape? The whole experience is unpleasant and has no internal logic. I gave it a 3 because the technical work is well done.

Suckablood (2012)

Perfect confection

[10/10 · 8 March 2015]

This is a beautifully-done fairy tale in the Old World manner; no pretty princesses and no heroes, just a naughty child, a stern parent, and the inevitable punishment. In this case, the child's unforgivable sin is sucking her thumb. The step-mother calls down the curse of Suckablood, a Nosferatu-like creature who...well, it's pretty obvious. The ending is not.

It's certainly reminiscent of Tim Burton, but not just a knock-off of his style. It has its own voice and texture, and is genuinely creepy. The voice work is very good, with the narrator bringing to mind Boris Karloff without doing an imitation of him. I recommend this to anyone with a love for dark humor and impressive animation/live action hybrids.

Girl at the Door (2013)

So Close, and Yet....

[8/10 · 7 March 2015]

This is a very well-made short film. It's photographed well, lit well, acted well. The story itself is compelling; a guy meets a beautiful woman at a party (or nightclub, it's a little unclear and totally irrelevant) and after a few drinks and a few lines, they go to his place and engage in R-rated rough sex. So far, so good. The next day, the girl shows up at his apartment, says the same things she did the night before, and more rough sex. It happens again and again, with the guy getting more weirded out each time. It also appears that the girl is missing.

**************************

Spoilers: In a moment that turns everything on its head, the girl returns and the guy screams at her to leave him alone, even rushing her with a knife. Then, out of nowhere, she pulls a gun and shoots him. Two cops enter the apartment to find his freshly-shot corpse and her not-so-fresh corpse in the bedroom. The last shot is the girl's eyes opening. So who's the killer, and who's the victim? And how far out in left field was the gun hidden? As I said, it's very well done. But the ending goes from ambiguous to ridiculous at the speed of a gunshot.

Bath Salts the Musical (2012)

I saw it for free, and I still want a refund

[1/10 · 3 February 2015]

This is the kind of bad movie that gives one no pleasure at all. It's not "so bad it's good", it's just bad--a student film made by drop-outs. It claims to be a musical, but forgot to have people who could sing, an lyrics that have anything to do with the hideous soundtrack tunes. It's like a high school talent show skit that embarrasses everyone present but the performers.

It appears to be the story of one junkie's travails with his friends' use of bath salts, but that creates a problem because we really don't know who any of these people are; perhaps wearing signs like "meth head 1" would have helped. But the most perverse aspect of this film is not the constant barfing, the sub-Romero use of offal, or even the lousy music; it's the way bath salts become the hero of the piece. These people are so one-dimensional and useless that you end up wanting them to take the drug and die. Bath salts don't ruin these peoples' lives because they have no lives.

Stand-outs include the shaky-cam work (which I don't think was intentional), a mugger who is the worst singer in a cast of talentless warblers who eventually has part of his body torn off with so little effort that I thought he might have been made of tissue paper, and the main junkie, who manages to out-overact Tim Neeley in "Superstar." I can't recommend this movie to anyone; I cannot imagine anyone but the actual cast wanting to see this.

Stray Bullet (2010)

Don't waste your time

[1/10 · 19 August 2014]

This is absolutely nothing more than a gun "enthusiast's" special porn video. It involves a woman stripping, washing blood off herself, and shooting guns while semi-nude. No plot, no characterization, and even the camera work is seizure-inducing. I won't spoil the ending, because it's just as pointless as the rest of this mercifully-short flick. Only worthwhile if you find gun oil to be a powerful aphrodisiac.

It's hard to even find enough material in this video for a full review. There is no story or plot. The woman enters, covered in blood. Why? Because the director says so, I guess. There's no dialog (or monologue, since there's only one on-screen character.) She then strips down and washes the blood off. She puts on panties, grabs a rifle, and starts killing conveniently off-camera people. Something happens. The End.

Sweet Tooth (2002)

Delightful Short

[8/10 · 30 July 2014]

"Sweet Tooth" follows the night of a somewhat reluctant Wonder Ware saleswoman with a secret. She sets up for a party at the house of an overly-bubbly hostess and soon is joined by the guests--two hateful sisters, a bedraggled-looking woman, and her sleazy boyfriend. There's a death toll and a sweet romance, with a wicked sense of humor.

This is what a film short can be...funny, well-acted, and visually well-done. It's not perfect; the two sisters are a little flat and the director almost kills the joke by letting the scene at the end run a hair too long, but its flaws are slight in comparison to its rewards. The saleslady and the slick boyfriend are the standout performances.

Teenage Diary (1960)

Emotional Beat-down, '50's Style

[3/10 · 20 July 2014]

It's a Chick tract come to life. The unbelievers consist of a drunken, abusive father; an angry, frigid mother; and a confused, immature teen-aged girl. On the side of the Lord is a "good" young man with the occasional impure thought and his emotionally-constipated parents, who make Ozzie and Harriet look like degenerates.

The girl goes on a date with the boy after her hateful father berates the mother for spending money on a dress, and the boy sees this emotional downer as a great time to convert her to Christ. The father and mother continue to argue, with Dad stomping out of the house to go drink (after getting in a parting shot about Mom no longer wanting sex, and who could resist such a charmer?) Eventually, the young couple make out (totally G-rated) on the beach, fully-clothed, when the now-plastered Dad finds them and beats the boy enough to hospitalize him.

Dad gets arrested and gangbanged in prison and....no, actually, BOTH sets of parents blame the boy and Drunky-Dad suffers no ramifications at all. It all leads up to a suicide attempt, a fling in Mexico, and final acceptance of the Lord as personal savior, etc.

Watching this today, it's amazing that nobody had a problem with the drunken, abusive, violent father and that it was the girl who "needed saving." The performances are pretty perfunctory (although Evil Dad seems to get into his role more than the other players), and the script is everything you expect for a religious education film. The young girl, the pivotal character, is the weakest actor and does some incredibly bizarre things with her face--in some shots, she looks like Lucille Ball in high clown-gear. Watch it for the 50's-ness of it all, and relish the progress most of us have made since then.

Goblet of Gore (1996)

Adolescent male fantasies

[2/10 · 6 July 2014]

The movie that dares to show why gold lamé armor never caught on in the Middle Ages. Ostensibly, this is a story about a cursed goblet, the result of a knight killing a sorceress and her pet latex dragon. Once the cup is found by an unlucky archaeologist, it appears at random in several subsequent vignettes, randomly and purposelessly. However, every segment involves violent sex and obvious marital aids--why? We don't know. But every adolescent male fantasy is here: dragons, swords, magic helping you get girls, being well-endowed to the point of wielding a deadly weapon, and even Nazis.

Technically, the movie is primitive on every level; it is clearly low-budget. Even the lighting is bad, but not as bad as the gore effects. The acting is not skillful, but quite enthusiastic in the sex scenes.

The opening and closing credits were annoying; just random images against a garage-band level track. There's really nothing to hang your hat on here (except maybe the marital aids mentioned earlier).

Dead Man's Lake (2012)

Good Effort

[7/10 · 28 May 2014]

This is a short film that, at first, looks like every other teens-in-the-woods slasher flick. I won't go into the plot as there is a circular element to it, but it doesn't end as one would presume...and that's a good thing.

On the plus side, the acting is better than average for this sort of thing, and the gore effects are well-done. The story has an actual, logical plot to it, which is a nice contrast to most of these predictable short flicks.

On the minus side, one of the characters is so obnoxious that nobody would hang out with him, much less go camping with him. There's also a burn scene where 2 seconds of contact with a hot surface completely melts half of a person's face, and that's just not possible. I've had 3rd-degree burns, and this is just unrealistic.

Certainly worth a look, and hopefully a sign of better things to come.

No Thanks (2012)

Nine minutes of nothing

[1/10 · 5 May 2014]

I am not averse to gore, but there really should be something to a movie--even a short one--beyond gore. The central conceit, Thanksgiving, actually is totally meaningless to the story. This is clearly an amateur production, and none of these people should be involved with a camera ever again. It does manage to make light of Native American rituals along the way, which I guess is some kind of bonus. There is no reason to watch this pointless exercise.

Since it is pretty much impossible to summarize a 9-minute flick without revealing spoilers, you are hereby warned: Here there be spoilers. A family sits down to one of the sparest Thanksgiving dinners in film history. Cut to: Someone's idea of a spirit hut on a reservation, where two "punk" Natives take magic mushrooms before being summoned to follow what appears to be a Peter Fonda lookalike aping Michael Jackson. He leads them to the family home (why they are chosen, and why the father would allow these hoodlums inside, isn't explained). Seconds afterwards, shock of shocks, the mayhem begins. Again, no real explanation why. The last few minutes of the film are spent listening to some of the most ridiculous mumbo-jumbo caught on film, and a final gross-out, and then they ran out of tape.

Almighty Thor (2011 TV Movie)

Well, Marvel's got nothing to worry about...

[3/10 · 8 May 2011]

I caught this on Syfy, and I wish I could make them take it back. The plot centered around Loki trying to destroy the earth by killing Yggdrasill, the tree of life. I don't remember if either Thor or Loki mention it by name; I got the impression they couldn't pronounce actual Nordic terms if their paychecks depended on it. Not only this, but Loki keeps talking about Ragnarok, and it is obvious the writers had no idea what the term means. They would probably also call people in a blimp "the Rapture." Anywhoo, the whole plot requires Loki to steal Thor's hammer. Why this is difficult is never made clear, because Thor is a major beefcake meathead. He sounds like a surfer and spends most of the movie looking like he needs a diaper change. Some woman named Jarnsaxa spoon-feeds him every move, which is amazing because she is practically unintelligible--a fact made even more painful when they do vocal effects and her words could not be deciphered even by CIA software.

I won't spoil the ending, because the director and writer already did that. Suffice it to say that it involves a trip to Hell; not HEL, the Nordic afterlife and the goddess thereof, but basically the Christian Hell--fire, lava, the whole ball of melting wax.

Watch this if you need a good laugh; there isn't an ounce of real heroism or grandeur in the whole mess. My biggest disappointment was Richard Grieco, who can be an effective menace but here comes across as a street punk with a wand and a skin condition.

The Skydivers (1963)

Coleman, Coleman, Coleman....

[4/10 · 16 March 2011]

I enjoyed this movie a lot, in spite of the poor scripting and total lack of a coherent script. It has a damn-the-torpedoes cast, many of whom only worked in one or more of Coleman's pictures.

It's a standard love triangle interrupted by some of the most off the wall cameo characters you'll ever see. I can only assume they gave Francis $25 in order to get a line or two. The main characters are game, but Eric Tomlin may well be the most wooden performer ever put before a camera. Anthony Cardoza is his usual somnambulist self, but the real pain involves Kevin Casey, who plays the center of the romantic tug of war.

By pain, I am referring not to her performance but the discomfort she obviously had trying to get a reaction out of either of these "ardent lovers". With competent direction and performers, she might well have parlayed this into a real career.

The plot involves the husband's torrid (if narcoleptic) affair with the town trollop, and her revenge when she is jilted. It all involves acid and sleeping with a druggist and is very sleazy.

(SPOILERS, depending on your definition): The last parachuting scene is truly surreal; it's played out on the tarmac with every loon in Texas. There's a Scotsman in full regalia, a roller girl, any number of inbreds, and some decent music by a local band. Tragedy ensues (it's a Coleman Francis flick; the man could depress Poe) followed by Texas justice.

It's badly shot and written and yet it's no worse than many Lana Turner potboilers. Enjoy it for what it is, not for what it isn't.