Posts Tagged ‘New Year’

To All a Goodnight (1980)

Posted: 31/12/2021 in Trash movies
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

Well, another lousy year is behind us and so we are bringing another lousy review of lousy movie. Genre holiday movies are always fun. Comedy Christmas movies are the obvious genre (see under Don’t open till Christmas), but horror Christmas movies are the next logical choice (see under The Thing). To All a Goodnight continues a nice line of below average holiday horror attempts.

As it is usual set up for such low effort horror atempts here we got bunch of dumb teens as well, ready to die just for our entertainment. This set up takes place in all girls school somewhere in California. Of course, young sluts jumped to opportunity to invite some guys over to Christmas party since the proprietor Mrs. Calvin won’t be there for a weekend. They even drugged their housekeeper Mrs. Jensen (played by Katherine Herrington) so they could whoring in peace. One of the girls Cynthia (played by Lisa Labowskie) was too horny to wait for party so she decides to sneak out in order to meet with Paul who was already waiting for her under the window. As you can guess both of them met only death. Hey rules are simple: no boys and no leaving the grounds without a permit.

Couple of moments after murders, into one of the girls’ rooms busts Ralph (played by Buck West), a strange looking huge guy who seems to be school gardener and religious nutcrack. Hm does this qualify him as potential murderer? I guess we are going to find out during a course of this movie. Ralph really likes shy and introvert Nancy (played by Jennifer Runyon) while other girls are constantly making fun out of him. Anyway, the boys have arrived by private plane and two of them are dressed as Santa Clause. Why am I pointing this out? Because both Trisha (played by Angela Bath) and her boyfriend Tom (played by Solomon Trager) got killed the following evening by person dressed as Santa Clause. Thats foreshadowing for ya all.

The next couple who is going to “retire earlier” to bed are Sam (played by Denise Stearns) and Blake (played by Jeff Butts). After bit of courting and playing “catch me if you can” two of them fall in passionate lovemaking in the middle of living room. Well their passion must have awoken something larger (no pun intended) since shortly after they were both slain by walking knight armor! With a crossbow! If you don’t believe me then take a look at this:

Number of people being killed seems to doesn’t bother the rest of the characters who spend the next day sitting around the place and planning picknick. Group’s geek Alex (played by Forrest Swansen), having lost his virginity previous night with Melody (played by Linda Gentile), gets sudden burst of selfconfidence and starts chasing Nancy around the grounds. Nancy, being shy as she is, runs around giggling until she trips over Ralf’s body which, with no explanation, rises up in sitting position and stays that way. I guess Ralf wasn’t the killer after all. Seriously, this is my favorite scene in the movie.

Ralf’s unexpected demise was a sign that someone finally should alert authorities. Young detective Polansky (played by Sam Shamshak) arrives with two helpers and states that there might be more victims. Lets try to see a bigger picture from his point of view: There is already one body found and several of other guests are gonne missing. Elementary, my dear Watson. So he orders his helpers to scout the grounds and be on lookout. This whole situation doesn’t seem to bother Mrs. Jensen who started dinner going soon after she learned Ralf’s fate. Hm maybe cooking is her way to deal with the stress. Plus she stated that she feels safe now with the police arround. It turns out that it was false belief since both of detective’s helpers were dispatched by killer Santa the following night. One of them was axed and another one died while being on the biggest slut in the group Leia (played by Judith Bridges). She is soon to follow the same fate. Which leaves us with remaining couples. Melody, after deflowering the geek, now jumps on group’s hunk T.J. (played by William Lauer) who again had a thing going with Leia. Both Melody and T.J. weren’t lucky enough to score this night as well since the evil Santa litteraly fished poor T.J. from the tree above.

Bodies and severed heads now started showing up everywhere around. Alex tries calling the police but, of course, all the lines are cut off. I really don’t know why people even bother trying to do that in such movies. Phones are never working in such situations. On the other side of the house Alex and Melody find Leia, who has clearly lost her mind, dancing in the dark. I don’t know why the killer spared her. She was naked and having sex with the police guy. If thats not a red flag then I don’t know what it is. Anyway, all of 3 them confront the killer and it turns out it was mild-mannered Mrs. Jensen the whole time. She rambles something about her dead daughter and how they pushed her off a balcony. That must have been some previous group of sluts. Melody runs for help, Leia is of no use since she is nutty as a fruitcake which leaves poor Nancy to deal alone with ravaging woman. Nancy manages to subdue her by hitting her head with some sort of figurine. And that should wrap it all up, right? Wrong! You see, Melody went after pilot (played by Dan Stryker) for help. He was there the whole time guarding the plane and sleeping under it in a sleeping bag. As it happens the plane doesn’t work and it needs a quick fix. Of course, the killer won’t miss this opportunity to dispose both of them by starting the engine and letting a propeller to do the rest.

What killer, I can hear you ask. Hasn’t Nancy delt with her? Believe me, I was confused as much you are. Mrs. Jensen turned out to be a tough nut to crack. She starts chasing Nancy with a knife around the house until Nancy finally throws her off a balcony. What a poetic justice. Now it is all finally over. Wrong again! As Nancy was crying in relief another Santa brings in Mrs. Jensen’s body behind her. That another Santa is none else than detective Polansky, who turned out be Mrs. Jensen’s husband and grieving father. What a plot twist! He advances on Nancy but then out of nowhere geek Alex shows up and finishes him with a crossbow. Yup the same crossbow. Another poetic justice. Alex and Nancy storm out of the house leaving Leia behind them to dance on a balcony as a living memorial of the events that occured. The end

Nerd’s revenge

Conclusion: The cast is rather weak, and it really makes you question how this school survives. There are very few students, they appear to be from all over the globe with different accents, and the school is “isolated”. Nancy is the school’s “good girl” who is obviously going to be the final girl from the start. The “nice guy” Alex beats the geek victim tradition and makes it to the end to be a hero (probably because he loses his virginity). To All a Goodnight underwhelms. The plot falls in the classic “someone was killed in an accident and someone wants revenge” like Friday the 13th, The Burning, Prom Night (though it does predate them), and you know that the deaths relate to it. The gore and guts aren’t as hardcore as later slashers so you hope that the film would have more style. Some of the later films following Halloween have creative ways of telling a cliché story, but To All a Goodnight isn’t one of them.

Ghostkeeper (1982)

Posted: 31/12/2020 in Trash movies
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
0

This wretched year has finally come to an end and although WM crew wasn’t very active during it’s course (we were forced to get real jobs due to lack of donations), we felt we should celebrate upcoming new year our style with this Canadian gem. And no, in case you already heard of it, this isn’t underrated as many people would say it is. In fact, looking at IMDB rating we would say it is greatly overrated.

We have a young couple Jenny (played by Riva Spier) and Marty (played by Murray Ord) on holiday in some snowy mountain region of Canada, accompanied by a sluttish friend of theirs Chrissy (played by Sheri McFadden) who has the hots for the man. One day they are out on their jet-skis when suddenly their machines pack out!! Oh no!! Luckily for them, there’s a long abandoned old hotel nearby, presided over by a mad Native old bat (played by Georgie Collins) with two sons. There’s one can of food in the entire place, but the group sings songs by the fire and makes the best of the situation they’re in, all the while wondering if people from their own lodge were out looking for them. Something isn’t right with the old lady and her son is never around, either. There go the plans for the party. Soon enough, Chrissie goes missing (of course, we know she’s had a little accident with someone’s blade and her delicate throat in the scene that resembles the popular shower scene from Psycho) and the one working snowmobile has been tampered with. With waist-high snow, a pounding blizzard and no transportation, Marty and Jenny are stuck in the place. Now the party can begin.

It is quite obvious that director Jim Makichuk was attempting to make his own cash-in of The Shining. The problem is that, apart from creeby scenery and music by Paul Zaza (Prom Night, Curtains) he didn’t have any actual plot here. Anyway, as strange things begin to happen, Jenny stumbles upon a book of Native legends and reads about the “windigo”, a giant spirit of the North that feasts on human flesh and the keeper that makes sure it’s fed because of an ancient power. In that moment old lady’s son starts chasing her and ends up impaled on a fence, cheerfuly swinging on it as a gentle breeze and blizzard are moving his body back and forth.

Seeing corpse on a fence Marty completely loses his mind (you might say he is as mad as a blizzard) and starts accusing Jenny of murdering Chrissy and the other guy. He decides then to take a stroll alone through woods. Meanwhile, back at the hotel, local storekeeper (played by Les Kimber) arrives just in time for his own death. You guess it, old lady butchers him. Jenny is back at the hotel too. She finds a shotgun and confronts old lady. In a heartbraking plot twist it turns out that old bat is Jenny’s long lost mother and had been taking care of Windigo (who is also her son). Jenny shoots her and apparently gets possessed by old lady’s madness. Jenny finds Windigo locked away in some basement room and promises she is going to take care of him from now on. She takes over the hotel as the new Ghostkeeper. Oh right, and Marty sits somewhere in woods frozen to death.

Conclusion: Taking its premise from the North American Indian legend of the Wendigo (or “Windigo,” as Ghostkeeper spells it), a Northwoods-dwelling, flesh-eating monster that is one of the country’s only mythical beasts, the film promises a uniquely nationalistic creature feature, but never quite unfolds that way, eventually getting lost in the snowy wilderness itself. There’s a few problems with the pacing as the characters walk around too much and make several boneheaded mistakes. It’s not so bad until it all unravels and you realize that you’re in for a dumb twist and a hairy guy in a cellar who effectively does nothing. Given its potential for creating a distinctive Canadian horror film, it’s hard to classify Ghostkeeper as anything but a spectacular failure.

Jack Frost (1997)

Posted: 31/12/2018 in Trash movies
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

Well, Christmas is past, but there’s still snow on the ground, New Year is upon us and I say that it is still the perfect time for a little holiday fear, so snuggle up someplace warm with a mug of cocoa (tho i recommend some stronger drink for this movie), we are torrenting Jack Frost tonight. And no, this is not to be confused with equally as bad movie with Michael Keaton getting his soul trapped as a snowman. The movie I am writing about is for big boys.

Jack (played by Scott MacDonald) is to be executed at midnight, and is being transported via the “State Executional Transfer Vehicle”, as it proclaimed by large letters on the side. That’s right, apparently Death Row is outsourcing its executions. The van travels through the small town of Snowmonton, which, oddly enough, is the very town in which Frost was captured. It is also, oddly enough, the road on which a truck carrying a vat of experimental acid is traveling. The two vehicles collide, Jack escapes, and ODDLY ENOUGH, gets doused with the acid. Trouble is, this experimental acid binds his DNA to the surrounding snow, allowing Jack to be resurrected as a, yes, you guessed it, psycho snowman, thus making him capable of melting himself into water to creep wherever he likes.

Cheap labor

Like every other escaped lunatic, Jack wants to exact his revenge on the man who sent him to be executed. And that man would be Sam Tiler (played by Cristopher Alport), the local sheriff who caught him during a routine check. Sam still has nightmares since then. And they are about to get worse since someone has just iced some old man in brutal way. Sam starts to be paranoid and he calls Agent Manners (played by Stephen Mendel) to make sure that Jack frost is really dead. Agent seems to know something about that experimental acid. And now he sure it works. Meanwhile, Sam’s son Ryan (played by Zack Eginton) is decorating a snowman he found in front of his house. Yeah he wasn’t suspicious about how a six feet snowman has just materialized there. Anyway, local bully Billy (played by Nathanyael Grey) and his gang show up and tear down snowman because it is blocking a path for their ice skates. Snowman didn’t like to be pushed around so he pushed Billy on the ground right on the path of his friend’s ice skates, thus ending up decapitated. You could say he has been slain by slay.

Later that night Jack went to Billy’s house. I guess he to wanted reunite the family for Christmas. He kills Billy’s father Jake (played by Jack Lindine) by sticking axe handle deep down his throat (really painful way to die) and then moved onto Billy’s slightly demented mother Sally (played by Kelly Jean Peters). Despite the recent death of her son Sally still wanted to feel Christmas spirit and so she started decorating. She even expressed her wish to be an angel on top of Christmas tree. Jack not only granted her wish but he used her mutilated body as a centerpiece of Christmas tree. Ho ho ho

Axed!

The fact that her entire family had just been slaughtered doesn’t stop little slutty Jill (played by Shannon Elizabeth; best known for getting naked in “American Pie”) to do what she wants. And that would be fucking around (literally). So she sneaks out of the house to meet with her boyfriend Tommy (played by Darren Campbell) and then both of them sneak into, at that time, empty Sam’s house. Jack gave her what she wanted in the bathtub after previously dispatching Tommy by firing ice shards at him. And he gave her good. You might say he fucked her to death. Note that in this scene Jack is missing a carrot for his nose. What do you think where it ended up?

Jack now confronts Sam, Agent Manners and scientist Stone (played by Rob LaBelle) at sheriff’s office. Somehow they manage to lock him inside and blow up entire station. But that couldn’t stop Jack so they came up with another plan. They made a set up for Jack and then forced him to church basement using several hair dryers. Once there they trapped him in hot furnace. Poor Jack was completely melt down. But that wouldn’t stop him. See, steam is also one of the states of watter. Jack deals with Agent Manners and Stone. It seems that nothing can stop him… Except for one thing – antifreeze. One of the townsfolk filled rear end of his pick up truck with antifreeze and all Sam had to is to push Jack into the pool. Finally one good idea. Jack got completely disintegrated so they poured his remains into canisters and buried them deep, thus leaving Jack to boil in his own rage.

Conclusion: The movie itself is chock full of pain. There’s no logic. The means to the movie aren’t really explained and are little better than magic, which would have been a better explanation than magic acid. But it knows what it is, and sets out to do its thing with dark humor, logic be damned. As for entertainment value this movie has a plenty. Most of the jokes that can be heard here are lowbrow and would be found funny only by Pedja and his coworkers, but there are a few clever ones, mostly related to dark humor. The effects are simply horrendous and most of the snow doesn’t even convincingly look like snow. When I think about it this movie has much resemblance to Shocker, where another deranged killer is seeking his vengeance from beyond the grave.

New Year’s Evil (1980)

Posted: 31/12/2016 in Trash movies
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
0

It is holiday season and what could be better way to celebrate it than with bloodshed? New Year is just around the corner which means many of seasonal killers are waking up from their hibernation, hungry for blood and vengeance for any demented reason they might have. And who knows, maybe this night you are going to be lucky enough to be picked for dying in the most brutal ways your twisted mind can imagine.

new-year

This MGM/Cannon offspring starts with phone talk between two friends, Diane (played by Roz Kelly) and Yvonne (played by Alicia Dhanifu). Naturally, when two women are yacking on the phone, you can’t expect any constructive conversation. And as usual, they are badmouthing Diane’s husband Richard. To be honest, Yvonne tipped him off to his wife as she had seen him wasted in Palm Springs (I really can’t blame him considering how boring is his wife). Well that was her last gossip since couple of moments later, after hanging up the phone, she ended up brutally slaughtered. Serves her right for getting involved in men’s business she doesn’t understand.

put-a-sock-in-it-or-knifePut a sock in it…or knife!

Diane is punk rock star known as Blaze and New Year’s countdown starts with her hosting Hollywood Countdown show. she seems far too old and unattractive to be hosting this kind of show and given the way she dresses and acts she seem more like she would be more at home hosting games of bingo than a music show that seems to aimed at the punk rocker set. Also she has grown son Derek (played by Grant Cramer) who practically begs for her attention. Anyway, viewers can call her live and vote for the best song.  All is going well until Diane receives a phone call from an odd sounding stranger claiming his name is Evil, who announces on live television that he going to kill someone close to her at midnight. I guess he doesn’t like songs which are presented on voting list. And he is obviously a man of his word since he butchered a nurse while having sex with her (win-win situation). He calls back Diane to inform her about keeping her promise right on Eastern Central Time and announces  when the clock strikes twelve in each time zone, a ‘Naughty Girl’ will be punished ,then the killer signs off with a threat claiming that Diane will be the last Naughty Girl to be punished. Cops informed Diane about both nurse and Yvonne and now she is scared for her life.

hot-lineHomicide hot line

While his mother is going through a living hell Derek cuts her red stockings and puts it over his face while watching her show. I don’t see the point of this scene since we know that Derek is not the killer. Face of Evil had been shown to us in previous scenes but there are some similarities between him and Derek. Maybe the director Emmett Alston wanted to give us false lead. If that is the case he shouldn’t have shown us the real killer before it. Or maybe it is not false lead after all? Anyway, our real killer turns out to be master in disguise. He puts false mustaches on his face (and that’s all, he didn’t even change the haircut or color of the hair) and goes to some club where he picks some bimbo with promise he is going to take her to wild New Year party. His plan went
wrong when she suddenly took her roommate Lisa with herself. Needing a time to improvise Evil cruised through streets while bimbo was dribbling into his ear about  self-help meditations she has been practicing. In that moment even I felt the urge to strangle her with my bare hands. Evil had done the next best thing. He pulled over his car, sent Lisa to buy Champagne and killed bimbo by putting a plastic bag over her head. And then sliced her throat (better safe than sorry). But that was not the end of it. There is still nosy roommate needed to be disposed off. So Evil creates a trail of shoes which leads to nearby secluded dumpster. Of course, Lisa follows the trail and when she approached – big surprise peek a boo, I see you!

 

As it is his habit Evil ran over to the nearest phone booth to inform Diane about his most recent achievement. Lt. Clayton (played by Chris Wallace) now can only wait for new victims hoping for killer to make a wrong move. He also follows the schedule and announces that Evil will strike again at 11 pm. And boy, was he right. Now disguised as a priest, Evil went to the local drive in theater where he unexpectedly killed some unsuspecting biker who got in his way. Beware of hand of God for it shall slice you! But the biker was not alone. Soon motorcycle band stormed in the theater which made Evil started to panic. So he quickly hijacked the car of some teenage couple who were having fun on the backseat. It seemed that the poor girl was done for especially since her
boyfriend was chucked out of the car back in theater. But she was lucky enough to take opportunity to escape when Evil went outside to have a fight with two drunken idiots he almost had run over. Boy, was his face red! Oh, Oh and the movie that was giving in drive in cinema was 1963. horror classic “Blood Feast”. See the link?

60s-slashers-are-the-best-turn-on’60s slashers are the best turn on

Evil manages to sneak into Diane’s show by killing a police officer and taking his uniform. There we find out his true identity. It is Diane’s husband – Richard (played by Kip Niven). He got Diane right where he wanted her to be – in stuck elevator (which he had previously sabotaged; no porn pun intended). He explains to her that he knows about her cheating around. Derek has told him all about that. Derek also said that his mother tried to seduce him and cut his and his father’s allowance (?) So Richard got fed up of her and Yvonne. And the reason why he killed other women is that they are all the same manipulative, selfish, materialistic whores. Hm can’t argue with that. He left Diane hanging by elevator while police cornered him in good old-fashion rooftop chase. There he decides to end his life the only way appropriate for cheesy 80s slashers – ridiculous falling off the building while wearing some kind of comedian mask. And Diane somehow managed to survive. Looks like happy ending. Or is it? You see, Derek took his father’s mask, sneaked in ambulance van his mother was in, took out paramedics leaving him alone with his mother. The end?

 

Conclusion: Overall this one doesn’t have all that much going for it. One of the many problems here is the fact that this one comes off as a bland, boring thriller which just takes so much out of the film. Premise doesn’t really hold up that much. By using a series of utterly obnoxious story lines is where that tends to fall as the different story lines really don’t make any sense. The fact that the premise isn’t really all that spectacular enough is the prime motivator here which requires a lot of excess scenes along the way to hold itself up, some of which is found by it being dragged out indefinitely with a series of endless and utterly innocuous songs of local bands that really aren’t that great.  Kip Niven thinks he’s doing this big theatrical part, but he’s too nerdy to pull it off. His body is tiny, and teeny and yet he can kill women larger than he is. He happens to be in the area where his target victims are and it gets worse: according to the movie, he didn’t plan this. New Year’s Evil ends up being one of the most lifeless, dull films that the Cannon Group ever produced. Watch it at your own risk. The fact that you’re immune to higher-quality mediocre movies just means that you have a higher tolerance for bad movies now. Thank God a sequel wasn’t made.