Re-Animator (1985)

This is one I'd been meaning to do for a long time, and after I asked Jamie if she'd like to be my full-time co-host at the DTVC Podcast, I thought I'd offer this one up as our first one to do, because she's more of a horror person, and to make up for the woefully painful Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark that she had to endure for our first episode together. Also on the episode of the podcast was longtime friend of the blog Fred the Wolf from Full Moon Reviews. You may remember that I lost a bet to him when my Pats lost to his Giants in the Super Bowl, and as a result had to review Do You Wanna Know a Secret? with Joey "Joseph" Lawrence and Teen Star Chad Allen. This was a much better collaborative effort between he and I here I think.

Re-Animator stars the legend, Jeffrey Combs, as Herbert West, a med student who has just transferred from Switzerland after his professor dies in a horrible accident. Turns out the prof bit it after he and West tried a reincarnating serum that didn't work so well. West thinks he's perfected it though, so he moves back to the States and in with Bruce Abbott, who himself is looking to finish med school and marry his sweetheart, Barbara Crampton. At the same time, their professor, one David Gale, is also an expert in the field of brain surgery and keeping brains alive. He's a creepfest and doesn't get along with West. One thing leads to another, and we find ourselves in a showdown between David Gale's reanimated head and his army of reanimated corpses versus West and Abbott. It's a bloodbath carnival.

This is a classic for good reason, and I think a very necessary recovering flick after Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark. This has everything you want in a good horror movie: silliness, creepiness, great characters, gore everywhere, and a nice runtime (of course I had to mention the runtime!). Combs and Gale are perfect as, I don't know, two villains, hero and villain? Both exude charisma, something we take for granted when making movies, but something that's very important. We also had a story that worked well from start to finish, didn't have too many moving parts, yet kept things interesting throughout with few dull moments. For what should be a silly 80s horror flick, we also have a surprising amount of nuance, which is always great to see. The other thing I loved was the ending. It was like a fireworks finale on the 4th of July. The film did a great job with that, building up the gore, the tension, everything, so that when we get to that moment we're looking for a big payoff, and it more than delivered. This was a unanimous hit among all three of us.

Combs is the perfect place to start here. What more can we say about him that hasn't already been said? And this is his signature role, the one that most people know him for. At this point he's a veteran character actor with over 120 credits to his name, and he's always great in whatever he does, even if the film itself isn't. Here though we have the perfect marriage of good material and Combs's skill-set. He's does both creepy and sympathetic well. He commands every scene he's in--except the ones with David Gale, where they both command them together and are great to see. We're more likely now to see him in a low-budget DTV horror flick bait-and-switch with his name all over the cover for only ten minutes of screen time, but it's how he was in this that keeps us renting and watching, looking forward to even those scant ten minutes to see him do his thing.

Whereas Combs's Herbert West character is possibly either baddie or hero, David Gale's Dr. Carl Hill is out-and-out villain, and he's fantastic. He channels that 60s creeper villain perfectly, in that Vincent Price mold, and it's there in everything he does. It's like ghoulish-ness, like he might talk about the "Monster Mash", but at the same time it's not silly at all, purely horror villain, and it works so well. What's great too is that we have the dark humor element of him with his animated head in a metal pan while he instructs his headless body to do things, so we're laughing about how great that is, while at the same time he's that scary villain we hate and want to see vanquished. It's things like that that make a movie like this such a classic.

Rounding out the cast, we had Barbara Crampton, who is great in this and who everyone loves. She's often the lone voice of reason, and also she's really put through the ringer in the finale. Bruce Abbott we've seen here at the DTVC in a flick called Interzone, in which he plays the hero in some post-Apocalyptic wasteland. He was great in that, and great here, though I was wondering here if he wasn't originally supposed to be the hero and sympathetic character and West more of a baddie. Jamie and Fred were of the opinion that no, West was definitely the hero of the film, however misguided he may be. It was just another one of those nuances the film had that added unexpected depth.

I saved Robert Sampson, who played Dean Halsey, Barbara Crampton's father, for this paragraph, because I wanted to discuss something here about killing off characters. Sampson's character is a total dick, and a total dick to Abbott especially. Also he's in bed with the evil Gale because Gale brings money to the university he's the president of. Usually when a character is a dick, we can't wait to see him bite it, but the way Sampson bites it is a bit harsh. First he's killed when one of West's reanimated corpses crushes him with a metal door in the morgue. Then he's reanimated by West. Then Gale lobotomizes him so he can control him and keep him in a straight jacket in a padded room. Finally, as he's watching Gale's disarticulated head violate his daughter, he snaps out of it and goes crazy. Jamie and Fred were on the fence about this, but I felt like it was a tough ride for anyone, even if the guy was a total dick.

You don't need me to tell you this is a total yes. Forget the fact that it's currently on Netflix, you should own a Blu-Ray of it or a special edition DVD--I know I need to too. But the fact that it is on Netflix is good, and if you haven't seen this before, or haven't seen it in a long time, you need to check it out. As far as checking us out, you can find the podcast on all your favorite podcatchers, or follow the link on the sidebar. Also thank you again to Fred the Wolf for joining us, it was a great conversation. Remember to check him out at Full Moon Reviews.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089885/

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All Souls Day: Dia de los Muertos (2005)

This is another of the Stars Play 11, so chosen because it listed Jeffrey Combs and Danny Trejo among its stars. Those two make anything worth checking out. Of course, it's not beyond me that they probably weren't in this much either, but I figured I'd give it the benefit of the doubt.

All Souls Day is about a suspicious town in Mexico, where, on the day of the dead, zombies take it over unless a young woman of Mexican descent is sacrificed. A young couple just happen to be strolling through, a gringo and a Latina, on their way so the gringo can meet his girlfriend's parents. They get into an accident as the sacrificial procession moves through the town square, and then they stop the girl from being sacrificed. Bad move, because the zombies are coming, and unless these kids can figure out why they're coming, or sacrifice another Mexican girl-- say our lovely Latina-- everyone will be dead.



First off, let's get this out of the way: Jeffrey Combs is barely in it at the beginning, as the father of a family from the 50s that tries to stay at the local hotel and is overtaken by the zombies; and Danny Trejo is in it a little more, but is still only ancillary as a kind of de facto baddie. The main characters are Marisa Ramirez and Travis Wester, who play the couple, and Laura Harring as the woman who runs the local hotel. I'm not going to say they're bad, but they aren't Trejo and Combs-- okay, Harring might be, though not in the capacity with which they had her here-- and without Trejo and Combs, we're left with a run of the mill zombie flick with a Latin twist. There were some kills, but not a lot, and some good zombie killing action, but again, not a lot. For me, this is one of those deals where you could do a lot worse at 3AM, but I wouldn't go out of my way to track it down.

Unfortunately the best part is Jeffrey Combs, who, again, has only a very small part in the beginning. He plays this cheapskate father in the 50s who's taking his family (wife, daughter, son) on vacation in Mexico because it's less expensive. They run out of gas because, again, he's trying to save money, and then they end up in the bad town. He was so fantastic as the 50s suburban dad, I could watch a TV show that was just him in that role, say, like a throwback to the golden age of television. With zombies too. Gotta have the zombies.



Danny Trejo was solid as the baddie. His parts take place much further in the past, in the 19th century, after his gang sacrifices the townsfolk by dynamiting them in the town hall. This movie would've been so much better had it been Trejo's character and Combs's character fighting zombies. Alas, it wasn't it, and it suffered for that. What I think we need is a Combs Trejo cop buddy picture, like maybe some DTV Lethal Weapon sequels. Throw in Gary Busey, and you've got yourself pure cinematic gold.

Some other people that you might be familiar with include David Keith-- not to be confused with Keith David-- who plays Combs's son all grown up in the town, and he's who welcomes our young couple when they get there 50 years later. Even he doesn't last though, which is too bad. You gotta imagine David Keith could sort out some zombies. I already mentioned Laura Harring. For the most part her character is a one-note, until she shows some personality near the end. I think she was supposed to be creepy and mysterious, which is fine, but the film was kind of flat and could've used more from her than her character was allowed. Imagine her, David Keith, Combs, and Trejo all fighting zombies? Now that sounds awesome. The other name was Marisa Ramirez, whom I remember from Jordan Knight's video "Give It to You", but she's also done some TV and soap opera work. She wasn't bad, it's just the film would've been better if she and Wester had been supporting characters as opposed to the leads, especially with the great supporting cast we had.



Speaking of Travis Wester from Eurotrip. I absolutely love that movie, so seeing him was a bright spot-- though I would've preferred Michelle Trachtenberg if you know what I mean. I remember right before that came out on DVD, I went to my buddy's place and noticed he had a bunch of Matt Damon movies in his collection, so I was giving him a hard time, calling him a Matt Damon completist. A few days later, I got a phone call on my cell while I was at work, and he was like "dude, you have to watch Eurotrip. You'll know what I'm talking about right near the beginning." And there he was, Matt Damon, singing "Scotty Doesn't Know". Matt Damon.

But enough Eurotrip, let's wrap up All Souls Day. Not enough Trejo, not enough Harring, and definitely not enough Combs. This is your classic 3AM paper procrastination if you find it on cable kind of deal, but I wouldn't spend any money or go out of your way. There's not enough to make it worth it.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0428212/

American Bandits: Frank and Jesse James (2010)

Here we have another member of the Stars Play 11. What made this one a must-see before it was dumped? Fred Olen Ray directed, starring Peter Fonda and Jeffrey Combs. Is that not a must-see for you too? (A little warning: I'm about to kill this movie. My review is in no way intended to be an indictment of the entire Southern United States, merely the misguided notion that the South was wronged in the Civil War and post-War reconstruction, while not once mentioning the evil practice of slavery.) American Bandits: Frank and Jesse James takes place in the South after the Civil War. Upset that the North told them they couldn't own other human beings, and bitter about the fact that all their "honor and glory" in defending such an abhorrent practice couldn't save them when the North came down on their asses with a vengeance (including Mainer Joshua Chamberlain), a few have decided that guerrilla attacks on American governmental convoys is the honorable way to accept the war's outcome. Foremost among them: two real American heroes in Frank and Jesse James (Frank played by Tim Abell and Jesse played by a mix of a Poor Man's Brad Pitt, a Poor Man's Karl Urban, and the mysterious guest star on a CW teen drama-type). The dishonorable Northerner marshal (Peter Fonda) wants these two honorable bandits brought in at any cost, but the man chasing them is a Southerner too, and kind of likes the James brothers. Will they escape alive? Wow, I didn't know people still made movies like this. It's one thing to get something like Gone With the Wind in the 1930s, when people still wore black face-- not that that was okay then, but we like to think we've come a long way since then, that that kind of thing is no longer acceptable; and at least in Gone With the Wind, one could make the argument that it was their inability to cut loose the more abhorrent aspects of their way of life, like slavery, that overshadowed their more admirable traits. We don't get any of that here though, all we get is "the South is great, and they were so wronged in the Civil War". On top of that, we're now rooting for two villains that want to preserve the Southern way of life, including slavery. Why not just go full DW Griffith and have the Klan race in on horseback and save Frank and Jesse as Jeffrey Combs has them at gunpoint. Oh yeah, and it's also a Peter Fonda bait-and-switch. Don't wanna forget that. Jeffrey Combs is only in this at the beginning and the end, and is something of a baddie because he tries to double cross Frank and Jesse-- though they tried to double cross him first by walking off with his portion of the money and making him meet them later on at a ghost town. Did Combs not read the script in advance? Did his agent suggest this one without letting him know what he was in for? Maybe he thought by being a bad guy, the racially insensitive element staining the film wouldn't rub off on him. Well, he's right, because I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt here. According to his imdb bio, Fred Olen Ray was born in Wellston, Ohio, which is in the southern part of the state, east of Cincinnati. With that knowledge, it's not inconceivable that he'd have grown up with a "South will rise again" mentality, and people like Frank and Jesse James depicted as heroes. Is this his true belief, that the US would be a much better place if the South had won? Man, I hope not. Besides, if you know anything about American history, you'd know that a depression hit not long after the Civil War, forcing the North to abandon its reconstruction efforts, which allowed the South to go about their business, only replacing slavery with de facto slavery in the form of an apartheid that lasted unchallenged until the 50s and 60s. As a straight male, when I see a beautiful woman, there's very little that she can do that will make her unattractive. Defending a way of life that included the dehumanizing practice of owning other human beings though is a major turn off. In this case, Lauren Eckstrom plays Jesse James's love interest, and she's a very stunning woman; but the moment she starts talking about how much better the South was before the North came down and sorted them out, she might as well be Cpl. Klinger in drag. Racism is never a good look. The imdb page said this movie was filmed in Canyon Country, CA, but that picture looks like the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Either way, that's not the point, the point is, if the South had had their way, the only African Americans visiting the Grand Canyon would be slaves carrying their master's bags in lieu of donkeys. There's your "honor and glory", defended by a horde in white sheets, burning crosses and stringing up human beings off of trees. Every time this movie sanctimoniously brought up the South's "honor and glory" it made me sick to my stomach. It's actually ironic that this film would choose an image of the US National Parks system though, because one of the best representatives of freedom and equality in this country are our parks and monuments, whether it's the Buffalo Soldiers administering Yosemite, or Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. That's true honor and glory, something worth defending. I'm still stunned that this movie exists, and that Fred Olen Ray of all people would make something like this. Maybe he just didn't know what he was doing, or what his film was saying. I don't know, I heard a lot of mentions of the South's "honor and glory", and no mention of the dehumanizing practice of slavery that they were so honorable in defending. It's bad enough in 1939, but in 2010, it's unacceptable. I understand that there was a bunker mentality after the war that made the North villains to Southerners, whether they agreed with slavery or not, but none of that nuance was on display here; I also know the North was far from perfect, but this movie isn't about the North, it's about the South and some myth of "honor and glory" that's total BS in this context. Oh yeah, and did I mention it's a Peter Fonda bait-and-switch to boot? For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1446675/

Parasomnia (2008)

When I decided to reboot the DTVC Tumblr page over the summer, one of the first things I noticed on this go around was that my Jeffrey Combs pics were getting a lot of attention. A big part of that was the reblogs I was getting from fuckyeahjeffreycombs on Tumblr, which was really cool and turned more people onto the main site. It also made me realize, we don't have a lot of Jeffrey Combs to go to, something we needed to fix, so the first thing I did was fill up my Instant queue with Combs flicks, this being, one and when Netflix let me know they were taking it down last week, I figured I'd make it happen. Because Tumblr wanted it: more Jeffrey Combs.

Parasomnia is about a girl with a problem that makes her sleep a lot-- not like wants to stay in bed all day like clinical depression, but actually sleeping. At the same time, the evil Patrick Kilpatrick is her neighbor at the mental hospital. He's a terror double threat: expert hypnotist and serial killer. He uses his skills to get the parasomniac to kill people, something that's made easier when some weirdo dude who makes silly faces breaks her out of the mental hospital. Now she's killing people, the kid wants to kill Kilpatrick to get her to stop, and police detective Jeffrey Combs wants to bring in the kid, because he thinks he's the killer. We got ourselves a mess here.



I have a rule about movies: anything over 88 minutes is borrowed time. I have another rule about movies: don't let the plot get in the way of the action, especially if that plot is boring the hell out of me. This one broke the second of those two first, meaning by the time they broke the first, they were already in trouble. Seriously, the movie starts with Sean Young jumping off a building, and then grinds to a halt for the next 45 minutes, sticking us with this kid who constantly makes that face you're looking at in that picture above. What is that? It's like he's a teenager working at a grocery store whose boss just told him someone dropped a jar of mayonnaise in aisle 7, and he needed to clean it up. I want to look at that for 103 minutes? Combs was great, Kilpatrick was chilling, there were some fantastic visuals and nice kills, but overall, this was about 43 minutes of material stretched out to 1 hour 43. The ending was also really weird, way weirder than it needed to be, and way weirder than a movie with this little good will could get away with. Ultimately, this is a no go.

The ultimate flaw, was that it spent way too much time on this I don't know what between the sleeping girl who sometimes woke up and the kid. And, of course, the kid making that face. Again, what is that? The worst part was, when the girl was awake, she was either developmentally delayed, intelligent, completely self-unaware, or extremely innovative, depending on the convenience of the writing. There was no consistency in her character. One moment she's wiping ice cream all over her face, the next she's stealing a cheerleader's outfit out of another apartment. And then, through it all, we have that kid's face, which isn't helping anything. It's just another case of a movie romanticizing a relationship with a woman that isn't a complete person, and it comes off as trite as all the other ones. Why are film makers so afraid of women? And why do they need to spend 45 minutes of our time working out these issues?



What this needed desperately was a higher Combs quotient. The whole movie should've been him. Get rid of the kid, have Combs have the affair with the sleeping girl. He would've brought more to the table than just that face. He could've made it creepier-- something that works in a horror movie, no?--, yet maybe more endearing too. Instead he was a police detective, and while he was great, he didn't have that many scenes until we hit the last 30 minutes or so. Still, any Combs is better than no Combs, and he helped make this film bearable.

Another person who made this bearable was Patrick Kilpatrick as the baddie. Absolutely frightening presence, exactly what you'd want in a horror flick. Unfortunately, the movie spends too much time setting things up, keeping Kilpatrick's character chained up in a mental ward. That's the problem, more than half the movie is set up. I get the issue that a low budget flick might not have the cash to have Combs and Kilpatrick on set for that many shooting days, so they can't be in the movie that much, but you mitigate that by not making so much movie. There are very few films that can't be told in 88 minutes or less, and even fewer that can get away with nothing happening for good chunks while their talent sits on the bench.



Even the imagery at the end of the film was hurt by the film's propensity to drag things out. I'm seeing shots cut in here and there of some really striking stuff, only to have the kid, with that look on his face, almost getting away, then stupidly looking into Kilpatrick's eyes so he can be hypnotized again, then coming out of it, then repeating the process. It was like the people making the movie were condemned to death going in; that when the movie was done so were they, so they were afraid to finish it. That's the only explanation for why this was dragged out so long. Not to mention that weird weird weird postscript. That was so weird and unnecessary. Just end the misery.

Funny thing is, I saw a review for this on Dread Central, and the guy enjoyed it, so go figure. For me, they spent too much time on a trite relationship with the kid who made that face and the sleeping girl, and by the time they kicked into any kind of horror goodness, it was too late, and even then, they had a tendency to drag out things that could've been done quickly. Overall, it didn't work for me.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0922547/

Spoiler (1998)

We're staring to exhaust our supply of Gary Daniels films. There are a few others available, and I plan on hitting them in the near future, but after that, it's either waiting for the pile of flicks he's done after 2009 to be released here in the States, or search around and see if some of the more obscure older ones pop up. But we got this one, so we might as well take advantage of it.

Spoiler takes place in the future, where criminals that try to escape from prison are so named, and when caught again, sent into deep freeze for inordinate amounts of time. Daniels is one of these Spoilers, and after he's caught escaping, he's given 26 years. Then he escapes again, and is given a bunch more. And then he escapes again, and is captured again. When he escapes this time, will he let them take him in alive?



If this sounds like a Groundhog's Day scenario in a movie, it felt like it too. The first 40 minutes or so is just the film spinning its wheels. Really, none of it gets us anywhere other than back to where we started. I want to say "who thinks that's a good idea?", but I'm not so sure the people who made this movie cared. All they seemed to care about was this idea of Daniels not aging and seeing his daughter when she's old and dying, and basing a sci-fi actioner around it. Not that this has a lot of action. First off, Daniels doesn't sport his sweet martial arts. Total waste. Why again did you cast Daniels then? And they had all this other talent that they used each for either one scene or a small part: Bryan Genesse, Meg Foster, Jeffrey Combs, (I think) Timothy Bottoms, and (I think) James Booth. This should've been The Fugitive set in the future, with Daniels using his wits to stay escaped-- not get captured and escape over and over. An idea and a film sauteed in wrong sauce.

The thing is, we've seen from films like Rage, that Daniels can do The Fugitive paradigm and do it well. And we had some really great supporting characters in this that could have filled that out and made it so much cooler. The film starts with Genesse and Daniels in dust-up, but it's really just them hitting each other and falling over. Hell no! You've got two great martial artists, and you can't have them choreograph something awesome for us? Then keep Genesse and have him appear in future scenes-- or maybe have him team up with Jeffrey Combs, who was himself a great baddie, but unfortunately only comes in at the very end. What? He should've been the Tommy lee Jones to Daniels's Harrison Ford. This was not a vehicle where Daniels was allowed to shine, and it suffered for that.



Let's get back to the Jeffrey Combs thing, because when he pops in in the last 15 minutes or so, I'm wondering "where have you been all my film?" He was the ultimate baddie, but he had too little time to flex his baddie muscles. The whole Groundhog's Day theme of this film, where Daniels keeps getting frozen and waking up decades later, meant that a guy as great as Combs couldn't appear for more than one small section, otherwise he'd bee too old later. That's why you scrap a silly premise like that. Also, it's probably time I got more Combs on this site, huh?

As I said above, this entire film was based around this idea of a father staying the same age and seeing his daughter when she's really old and on her death bed. Sounds cool in theory, but in practice, it killed everything that could've been good about the movie. I think sometimes these film makers get married to an idea, and can't see that it's sauteed in wrong sauce. When that happens, you get the best from actors like Gary Daniels left on the shelf, and potentially film anchoring performances from great actors like Meg Foster and Jeffrey Combs wasted on tiny parts.



Finally, I really liked the images of the futuristic cities in this. Again, because much of the film is Daniels getting frozen and trying to escape prison, we don't see those enough either. Ugh, it just makes me see how awesome a sci-fi futuristic Fugitive would have been with what they had to work with, and how much it was all wasted.

I can't do this anymore I need to put this review to bed. You want to watch a movie where Gary Daniels doesn't fight, by all means, but it wasn't for me. You want to watch a movie where the first 40 minutes goes nowhere, by all means, but that wasn't for me either. You want to watch a movie where a great Jeffrey Combs baddie gets barely 15 minutes due to a silly plot premise? By all mean, but it upsets me too much to talk about it. I believe this is out of print, but you can get it new or used on DVD from Amazon, but I wouldn't bother.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120187/

Trancers II (1991)

This movie has been long overdue, considering I did Trancers over six months ago. I should've had them all reviewed by now, forget just being on part 2. But we can't go back and fix it-- actually we can, I can just mess with the dates of the posts and make it look like I did them months ago, but I'd never do that--, so I'll just do my best to get them done as quickly as possible from here on in. If you can't wait for me, though, and I don't blame you, Mr. Gable at Mr. Gable's Reality has looked at the others, so you can see what he has to say.

Trancers II takes place six years after part 1 left off. Jack Deth (DTVC favorite Tim Thomerson) is settling down with Helen Hunt, living in Hap Ashby's mansion. Turns out Winslow has a brother though, played by none other than Richard Lynch, and has as one of his top hatchetmen none other than Jeffrey Combs dressed like he was just released from a parallelogram hurling through space. So back in the future, McNulty is sent back in time to give Deth the word-- this time his ancestor is a 15-year-old girl-- and hopefully find Deth's wife from back in the future too, who was also sent back to the past, and is in the extremely hot body of Megan Ward. Will Jack Deth prevail again?



Though this wasn't the 76-minute awesomefest the first one was, it was still pretty good. It had some great one-liners, some great action, and some great performances from the entire cast, which as you could see from the synopsis, was rather prodigious. It wasn't the total 80s sci-fi tongue-in-cheek Film Noir actioner that made the first one so great, and instead it had a tendency to dwell too much on a pretty heavy duty plot that weighed things down at times, but overall, it was a fun time, and worth checking out.

Tim Thomerson is back as Jack Deth, probably his most notable role, and while he didn't have as great of material to work with here as he did in part 1, it was still pretty sweet, and he delivered. He also had to love that he got to make out with both Helen Hunt and Megan Ward. One thing that's never really been discussed before, are Thomerson's numbers for a potential Hall of Fame induction. In an actor, the two things the panel usually looks for are a big DTV resume, and one memorable role; and Thomerson has both of those. Not to mention, the fact that his birthday is only seven days after mine helps his cause: all good people are Aries.



Not an Aries, but someone who celebrated her 42nd birthday only three days ago as of this posting, is Megan Ward. She is really hot, and Charles Band understood that, because he had no shortages of close-ups on her face throughout the movie. Usually, if you're Tim Thomerson, or really, if you're any guy, you're thinking Helen Hunt as my wife, I'll take that. But then Megan Ward comes along and throws herself at you too. Not only that, but she's also your wife. I don't know how I'd feel at 45, if I were married, if my wife left and came back in the body of a 22-year-old Megan Ward. I think I'd feel kind of guilty, because I'm still 45, with saggy pecs and a spare tire around my waist. I guess if you're as awesome as Tim Thomerson, though, you're not worried about it.

Let's round out the rest of this cast. Richard Lynch, as we already know, is a first-rate baddie, and nothing changes here. I'm not going to give away his death scene, but for me, it's second only to the rocket launcher blast he took in Invasion USA for his best death ever. Jeffrey Combs could've had a bigger role, because he didn't have much to do, which for me was a disappointment. He also wasn't playing a crazy guy. He had slicked back hair and a goatee, which, when combined with his black turtleneck and black coat, made him look like he was one of Zod's gang. "Kneel before Combs!" I'd have liked to see Thomerson deal with Combs shooting red lasers out of his eyes. From the last movie, we also had Telma Hopkins, who you may remember from Family Matters, and veteran character actor Art LaFleur. Finally, in a one scene cameo, Barbara Crampton played a TV talk show host interviewing Lynch. One more I want to mention too was Alyson Croft, who reprised her role from first film as Art LaFleur's ancestor, now a 15-year-old. She was great, smoking cigars and making hard-assed detective comments, eliciting "Damn it McNulty!"s from Thomerson. That whole dynamic was one of my favorite parts of the film.



Also reprising his role is Biff Manard, back as Hap Ashby. He wears a lot of Angels gear, which back then would've been the California Angels, but now are the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, and in between, they were the Anaheim Angels. In 2009, I was out in LA, and a buddy and I took the commuter rail from Union Station (which also appears in Trancers II) over to Anaheim to see the Angels play my Boston Red Sox. Very cool experience, and I recommend anyone who's visiting LA, baseball fan or not, to go check out a game there if you're in town during baseball season. The ballpark is right at the train station, so it's really convenient. (As an aside, my Sox lost that game.)

Maybe not as amazing as its predecessor, this still delivers and is well worth it. It's currently on Watch Instantly, but as I've been saying lately, the quality of Netflix's service has left something to be desired, and who knows how long after this posting that it'll still be on Watch Instantly (within days of my Dance of the Dead post, Netflix put up a note saying it'll be gone on October 1st.) For a more sure bet, look for this on DVD or used VHS. Either will do.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103116/

Dead Man Walking (1988)

When I first envisioned the DTVC, over four years and 725 posts ago, it was this kind of movie I had in mind. A Wings Hauser flick co-starring Brion James and the guy from Re-Animator-- back then, we didn't call him Jeffrey Combs, just "the guy from Re-Animator." At that time, my friends and I were on a big Wings Hauser kick, and we'd find all kinds of flicks of his on VHS and have viewing nights. This, unfortunately, was one we didn't find, and probably never would've found had the DTVC not continued on to where it is now, giving me a reason to track it down more aggressively for a review.

Dead Man Walking takes place 14 years ago, ten years after a plague has struck the planet, forcing the world's powers to take drastic measures, including blocking off entire sections of the country to keep the infected people away from the healthy ones. Among the infected, there's a rare few who have contracted a non-contagious strain that leaves its victims with only a year or two to live. These people are known as Zero Men, and they often behave erratically, like our man Wings, who plays Luger, a dude with a penchant for playing Russian Roulette with a chainsaw. After the Unitas Corporation's CEO is killed and his daughter kidnapped by another Zero Man, Decker (Brion James), the CEO's chauffeur, Jeffrey Combs, recruits Hauser to get her back-- from the infected zone. But what secret is Combs hiding?



This is what you came for. Slightly dystopian, slightly post-apocalyptic, slightly psychotronic, but all Wings and all Brion James. I mean, the Wings factor is immense, robust, dare I say prodigious. It's all the Wings you could want. And Brion James is an equally excellent baddie. Throw in Combs as the shady CEO's chauffeur, and some pretty funny black humor, a la Robocop in the form of news casts scattered throughout the film, and you've got yourself a gem.

For people who love Wings, there are certain things he does that stand out. Like he makes this face with his mouth open that is just quintessential Wings, or has this wide-eyes smile, or sometimes stands a little too close to the people he's talking to, or will deliver his lines in a way that's just a little off from what you'd expect someone to say. All of that Wings-ness is on full display in this film. One of the cooler things about this one was to see him act opposite Jeffrey Combs for a good bit. You'd think the two make no sense together, but they actually work.



Brion James. We've seen him play a great baddie before, but here we get him in dyed bright orange hair. It just makes him that much better a baddie, right? He has this one scene that might be too gross for some of you though, so I figured I'd shoot out a warning. A guy he escapes from prison with threatens him with a knife, so he grabs it by the blade, opening a huge gash on his hand. He then goes over to the girl they kidnapped, and uses his finger to take some of the blood-- the consistency of Smucker's raspberry preserves-- and draw a line on her face, then he does the same to his own. Then he licks some of it off his hand, and, with it still on his tongue, licks the girls lips for a good thirty seconds, before the two start making out. I just want to warn you, because it was pretty graphic.

Talking about Jeffrey Combs on a site like this, especially to the horror fans that follow us, is like a girl posting a pic of Michael Fassbender on her movie Tumblr-- like that's the level of giddiness it engenders. And I ain't mad at you either, because I love Jeffrey Combs too. He's not really as off-the-wall batshit crazy as you're used to in some of his horror roles, but he's still pretty Jeffrey Combs, which is good. Definitely a guy we need to do more of on here-- it is kind of embarrassing that I haven't done Re-Animator yet.



Do any of you remember a show called Out of Control with Dave Coulier? Well, Diz is in this as an emcee at Cafe Death, a place where people with the plague go and watch people die and stuff. It was an idea that they didn't do as much with as they could've-- one of the few disappointments of the film-- but Diz was great, going for an almost Elvira slant, until she sets this dude on fire, then she lets out that trademark scream of hers. The problem was, they made too much out of this one death. It should've been two or three deaths, and really hit home the macabre and disturbing elements of it.

But that's one minor issue with a movie that otherwise works. It's only on used VHS, but you can get it for a good price, so it's worth it. Great Wings, great Brion, great Combs, and a pretty solid low-budget 80s sci-fi flick to boot. It was movies like this that got me to start the DTVC, and it's movies like this that keep me going.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092841/

Guyver aka The Guyver (1991)

A while back you may remember I reviewed Midnight Ride with Michael Dudikoff and Mark Hamill. As I was tagging Hamill, I noticed he only had one other film on here, Time Runner. That didn't sound right. I knew I had to have covered The Guyver at some point. Turns out I hadn't. Man, do I have egg on my face.

The Guyver (listed as just Guyver on imdb) is a sci-fi comedy based on Japanese comic books. The idea is that aliens made humans to be the ultimate killing machines. Then they upgraded them so they could turn into large beast like things. Anyway, an ancient alien created a fail safe called The Guyver, which is a suit of armor that bonds itself to a person. Long story short, a college kid gets the armor before the bad aliens that are making people into beasts, and they want it from him. Mark Hamill plays a CIA agent with a moustache.



This movie is great. Tons of fun. It's not very serious, but even as a comedy it's kinda bad, which makes it entertaining both in itself, and to make fun of. I always love guys in monster suits fighting, so you've got that. Mark Hamill in the 'stache is great too. Contrary to what the DVD cover says, he isn't the Guyver. This also has Jimmie Walker. The lines are great, the action is both good and campy, and you've got guys in monster suits-- what more could you want?

When I first saw this, probably fifteen years ago, I didn't get that for the most part it was intentionally silly. To my mind it was utter crap and should be dealt with as such. I think later, when I was five or six years older, I saw it again and got the purposeful humor and liked it more. Now, at thirty, I see where the comedy works, and I see where it's crap, and I'm able to appreciate both. I've always said the hardest bad films to make fun of are comedies, because they're not taking themselves that seriously either. That gives this film an added level of interest, because it's not only an icon of early 90s bad sci-fi, but it's also a comedy, so you know you're a master of the art if you can tackle it.



I have to assume that many of my readers are Star Wars fans. Personally, my favorite alumnus from the series that makes his way onto the DTVC is Billy Dee Williams, but I understand liking Mark Hamill as well. I kinda think he sounds silly, and here with him rocking a 'stache and trying to sound like a tough cop... err CIA agent, it was even funnier. I'm not going to tell you what happens to him in The Guyver if you haven't seen it, but it's pretty funny.



Dy-no-mite! Ain't we lucky we got 'em... Good Times! How can you not love Jimmie Walker? That alone makes this great. Then you got the conehead-like guy, Michael Berryman; scream queen Linnea Quigley; and hottie Asian actress Vivian Wu, who guest starred in a Highlander episode. I wonder if I tagged every movie that had someone who had been in a Highlander episode, how many I'd have. Of course, every Christopher Lambert, Brion James, and Adrian Paul film, so there's a bunch right there.

If you haven't already, you need to see this. This is one of those staples for bad movie fans. Also, if you haven't seen it in a while, see it again. It gets better with age. Probably something that should be in all bad movie collections.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101988/



I saw District 9 last night (yes, I do actually see films in the theater). I was told by some people that it was "awesome". I don't know if that's the word I'd use. Great, intense, thought provoking, yes; but awesome, no. It would be like saying Schindler's List is awesome. If you think visceral metaphors to Apartheid, the Holocaust, Blackwater atrocities in Iraq, or African rebels cutting off arms is awesome, more power to you. Don't get me wrong, the movie was the best I've seen all year, and if you're totally ignorant to the metaphors I mentioned above, you may even think it's awesome. My advice: expect an in your face intro to cultural anthropology delivered in the medium of a sci-fi action film. If you want just a sci-fi action film, go see Transformers instead.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/

Fortress (1993)

I'd been hearing about this movie for a long time. As a big time DTVer, people wondered why I hadn't caught it yet. It's a classic in bad action/sci-fi circles. I think it's technically not a Direct to Video movie, because someone told me once that he saw this in the theater. I did some research on it, but I'm still not sure what to believe. Either way, I finally got my chance to see it just this past summer, when the girlfriend of the friend I was staying with had it. Let's just say it was well worth it.

I'm going to try my best to explain the plot, but it's very difficult to believe. In the future, the US, a country with one of the largest percentages of uninhabited land in the world, has a population crisis. Even crazier, Americans flee to Mexico to have children. Lambert and his wife try this, but get caught, and are sent to a maximum security underground prison run by the dad from That 70s Show, also known as the bad guy in Robocop. Eventually Lambert and his wife escape, and the border with Mexico goes from being the high security affair it was in the beginning of the movie, to a chain link fence.

One of the greatest security measures used to keep the prisoners in line is intestination. It's fantastic. There's a probe inserted in through the mouth, and sits I guess in the intestine. When a dude gets out of line, he gets intestinated. It's like those commercials, you know, "diarrhea is a like a storm raging inside you." If the guy from Robocop gets pissed enough, he'll make the whole abdomen explode. Intestination.

This movie is hilarious on so many levels. I think the best was the very end, when the Mexican border is just a chain link fence. The obvious question is: why didn't they just cross there to begin with, instead of crossing in the high security area and risk getting caught? I know, of course, the answer is that the people who made the movie ran out of time and money, so they just wrapped it up quickly. To take from MST3K's Attack of the the Eye Creatures, "They just didn't care."

But Lambert is a DTVC Hall of Famer for a reason, and this one, like The Minion, would have been unbearable if made as a big budget action movie with Will Smith and Martin Lawrence or Nicholas Cage and John Travolta. I watch a Fortress because I know it's dumb as hell, and my friends and I love laughing at it. There really is no shortage of material to work with in this one, and the major drawback might be keeping you and your friends from talking over each other. I know my buddy and me were just killing it.

This lived up to its billing as one of the great bad films. There's really no reason not to have it or rent it if you haven't seen it before. If you watch it alone, though, you'll probably be so annoyed with how dumb it is, you'll hurt someone and get sued and end up on Judge Judy; or get a serious stomach ulcer that feels like you're being intestinated, both of which is the last thing you want. Definitely only view this with one or more other people.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106950/

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