Summer of Slash: Capsule Reviews, Part 2

In case you haven't noticed yet, I changed my header and the font for the blog. Why? Well, I figured since I was doing a summer series on horror films I would appropriately change the color scheme of the blog's title (not to mention find a more appropriate picture, but I promise once summer is over Hugo will return…perhaps in a new picture! Exciting, I know.) for the next few months. I also added an "archive" on the sidebar there to the left where you can see all of the films I've reviewed for my Summer of Slash series.  As I continue my push to watch as many horror movies as possible in preparation for the Wonders in the Dark horror countdown here are some more capsule reviews where I take a look at the satirical (?) The Slumber Party Massacre, the Australian monster pic Rogue, and two slashers from Canada in Prom Night and Terror Train. Reviews come after the jump…

The Slumber Party Massacre – A rather ordinary slasher film that runs at a tolerable 77 minutes actually has some nice touches for such a low budget affair. Slashers always get points in my book when they don't hide the identity of the killer (who we see within the first few minutes of the film) and when the action takes place during the day (part of what made Carpenter's Halloween so effective). The opening 10-15 minutes is actually pretty decent (sans a terrible basketball game the girls play, and the required gratuitous nudity in the subsequent locker room scene) for this type of movie as the killer (with a big ass drill) stalks his prey during the day and right in front of other people. Now, that either makes him the dumbest criminal in the world (especially when he disposes his first body in a dumpster right next to where his van is parked!) or really smart because he's getting away with the drilling holes in people's heads in broad daylight and a mere 100 feet from the school he's picking off girls from! Now that takes balls (to the film's, ahem, credit there is a creepy scene as students walk by the dumpster with a corpse in it as the we get a high angle shot showing semi off-putting scene). The film then ventures into your typical slasher territory as night falls and the girls have a slumber party…and well…you know what happens. I will say that there was one inspired scene during all of the ordinariness: a character watches a horror movie on TV as a woman is being stalked and eventually stabbed to death. This is cross cut with a male running from the killer outside the dorm and being stabbed in the same fashion. It's an interesting piece of editing (whoa, what did I just say!) in an otherwise banal film.

What makes the editing of that scene even more intriguing is when one stops to consider that this film was written (Rita Mae Brown) and directed (Amy Jones) by women. Are they riffing on the material, or merely perpetuating gender roles in slasher films (that particular issue was a big to-do around the time this film was released in 1982)? What's even more interesting about this piece of exploitative trash is when you consider that Brown was a feminist activist, which tends to shed a different light on the film; however, I still have to wonder what she thought of all the gratuitous nudity and violence towards women in the film…even if she did write it. Again, was this supposed to be a joke, a parody of slasher clichés? I don't know if the film is that smart, or even aspires to be, but I found this piece of news interesting: Brown has basically written (or I should what was filmed of what she wrote) a generic slasher that contains a checklist of all the elements that would piss off feminists in regards to horror films. Sure the Final Girl gets out alive, and sure the killer's weapon is a drill – a euphemism for the deadliness of the penis as the killer utters lines like "you know you want it" when referring to the drill, and at the end the filmmakers make it a point to show the Final Girl cutting the drill in half – but please, there's nothing here to suggest that this isn't just another lame slasher relying on the same old tired tropes. The only thing that kept The Slumber Party Massacre tolerable (the film contains a number of blasé false scares, a horrendously soggy middle where literally nothing happens, and lame death scenes) was that it only lasted a mere 77 minutes. This is the epitome of one of those films that sat on the back end of triple feature. Even it was intended as a joke it's still a pass.

Prom Night – Boring, if not essential, Canadian slasher that is another example of Friday the 13^th
not being the film to set the trend for slashers, just the trend for making money off of the genre. Prom Night contains every trope that would become tired and cliché, yet clearly aspires to be more than just your generic Friday the 13^thtype stalk and slash gore fest. For starters the film is more interested in establishing its mystery. Characters don't start getting knocked off until well into 2/3 of the film's running time, and even then the action is rather boring and generic as a killer (whose identity really isn't that much of a mystery) goes around offing teenagers who were the catalysts at a young age for a girl falling to her death. There's nothing really more to say about Prom Night. It's one of the most cookie-cutter of the slashers, but really, that's only because hindsight makes it so. Prom Night, like the other major Canadian slashers (Black Christmas, My Bloody Valentine) were responsible for creating a lot of the tropes that became so cookie-cutter. The film's director almost certainly agrees, though, that Prom Night was just a so-so film saved by the presence of Jaime Lee Curtis and Leslie Nielson (he credits the film's box office success with Curtis' presence). They certainly bring an air of credibility to the story, but the film's mystery is un-engaging and the look of the film (not to mention the non-stop presence of disco music at the end) is too tame to be visually arresting. It's an interesting slasher solely for its historic place in the subgenre as the first real film to cash in on the success of Friday the 13^th (despite being made at the same time the film was released just months after).

Rogue – Greg McLean's follow up to Wolf Creek is a fun, tense monster movie that is heavy on atmosphere. A tourist group (filled with all of your expected horror movie character types) explore the outback in a boat headed-up by tour guide Kate Ryan (Radha Mitchell), but as they drift off course into the territorial grounds of a pissed off croc, the tour group fights throughout the night to stay alive. McLean's film is a seemingly rudimentary horror film where things go bump in the night, and the real horror is in the unseen. However, like McLean did with Wolf Creek, there is an amazing amount of tension for a "nature vs. man" type horror film (based on a true story, of course). This is due to two key aspects of the film: one is the cast. Like McLean's previous film he gives more than enough time for his cast to develop their characters and make us care about their plight. Here we have a pre-Avatar Sam Worthington and a post-"Alias" Michael Vartan, both giving some depth to what could have been nothing more than generic horror character types. The addition of Mitchell as the tour guide also gives the film a sense of depth as these actors know to do more than merely scream, swear, and grunt. These characters are thoughtful in their execution of how to get out of their situation (being stranded after the croc capsizes their boat) alive. The other thing Rogue has going for it is McLean's competence as filmmaker. McLean has a real understanding of how to frame a shot, how long to hold it, and when to just let the mood be the most terrifying thing about the scene (there aren't copious amounts of blood, here, which was a pleasant surprise). McLean's understanding of how to shoot a scene creates a beautiful opening as he establishes the beauty of the Outback (much like he did in Wolf Creek), and then by the end McLean films the night scenes with just enough clarity so that we can see what's going on, but still feel like we're out there in the dark not knowing where or when the croc will show up. We feel the uneasiness of the characters in these night scenes because of the way McLean shoots the film. It seems like a small thing, but so often with horror films directors don't know how to light their night scenes. Overall Rogue is a throwaway horror film, and I mean that as a compliment as I think McLean was trying to go for something like the Ozploitation films of the 70's and 80's (some of this film made me think of Razorback, a film I just reviewed last week). I've never been too keen on these "true stories" where people face adversity in the water, but Rogue is pretty decent at establishing its characters and ratcheting up the tension at just the right moments so the film doesn't feel like a repetitious cycle of croc attacks. It's a fun, harmless little horror movie, and it clearly establishes McLean as someone who is not just a one hit wonder, but a horror director to seriously keep an eye on.

Terror Train – Another Canadian slasher movie that is essentially Prom Night on a train as we have a group of people paying for the crimes of a prank gone horribly wrong. Oh, and we have Jamie Lee Curtis popping up again. The film, directed by Roger Spottiswoode (longtime Sam Peckinpah editor and director of the brilliant, masterful farce Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot), and shot by John Ascot (who worked with Kubrick on The Shining) is actually pretty decent looking and does a good enough job of maintaining some tension throughout. However, the film is so one-note (much like Prom Night) that even though it barely runs over 90 minutes, it's tedious because it goes from being a lark (I mean magic is one of the driving forces behind the movie, complete with a cameo performance by David Copperfield) and rather cheesy, to being a seriously viscous slasher during its final 30 minutes. The change of tone didn't bother me so much as the final half-hour actually made Terror Train more interesting than it had any right to be, but the whole idea of the killer hiding behind costumes, and the failed attempts to develop these characters (there's a lot of dialogue for a slasher film as I think they were trying to make a legit mystery, but it just came off as boring padding) adds about 17 minutes (there are countless moments where conductor Ben Johnson checks and re-checks on people he thinks are dead) of film that could have been trimmed. This trimming of the fat could have made the movie a nice little slasher in an interesting location (the train does lend itself to some creepy set designs) and would have focused more on Curtis' great performance. I liked her here more than I did in the boring Prom Night because Terror Train actually gives her a bit of a challenge as the Final Girl, and boy does she ever kick ass at the end of this movie. It's fun to watch. Terror Train isn't the most original slasher (like Prom Night it's obvious who the killer is the whole time, despite the film's incessant need to hide their identity until the final "shock" ending), and its pacing is terrible, but it's still a pretty fun experience…and helluva a lot better made than Prom Night.

Summer of Slash: Wolf Creek

Greg McLean's homage to Ozploitation films is one of the most effective slasher films I've ever seen. The 00's gave birth to the most disgusting and schlocky subgenre – the torture porn – and Wolf Creek unfairly got lumped in with the likes of Saw and Hostel. However, when one looks at McLean's film compared to those monstrosities it's easy to see why so many horror mavens prefer McLean's unflinching snapshot of horror in the outback to the snarky tone of most torture porn. Wolf Creek blindsided me with how effective it was, and in the way McLean doesn't look upon his characters as plot devices or mere "dead teenagers" who are paying for their "sins" of youthful exuberance (they aren't just props to be severed and humiliated for our entertainment); no, there's not a drop of Eli Roth-like cynicism found in Wolf Creek, just an unflinchingly horrifying realism and seriousness to the material and the fate of the characters.

The film is based on true events about a serial killer who stalks the outback. And there ya go. It's that simple. There are no contrivances in the film and no swerves at the end. It's simply a tale about three young people – to no fault of their own – in the wrong place at the wrong time as they experience a series of horrifying events placed against the ironically serene and beautiful Australian outback. And that's where McLean immediately gets points in my book for two things: one, he establishes these characters. For 40+ minutes we're essentially the fourth person in the threesome that includes Liz, Kiristi, and Ben as they embark on a road trip and stop off at Wolf Creek for some hiking (of course, things go wrong when they come back to find their car won't start). The other thing McLean scores points on is his reluctance to fall into the trap of overusing his handheld camera. In the beginning of the film I was dreading the camera work, but it made sense as it placed us within the circle of friends and gave the viewer a sense of intimacy with these characters. However, McLean wisely switches his aesthetic once the characters are in peril and wisely juxtaposes the expanse (and beauty) of the outback with the intense violence hounding the characters. I was thankful that McLean – who was obviously influenced by Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre – didn't go for the claustrophobic, shaky-cam aesthetic, and that's one of the primary reasons I found Wolf Creek to actually be more effective than something like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: it's unnerving the way everything is out in the open…there's nowhere to hide, and instead of forcing us to watch the action up close throughout the entirety of the film, McLean emits a sense of false hope as his characters are often surrounded by beautiful sunset backdrops and wide-open spaces. It's unique for a horror film of this ilk (the serial killer/torture porn film) to understand that shoving our faces in the ugliness is not the best way to be horrified by what we're seeing.

As the film wore on I kept thinking that the film was going to have some kind of ironic twist or sardonic touch by McLean; however, to my delight (as much as one can be "delighted" by a film like this) McLean refrains from these kind of artistic choices that plague the likes of the Saw films, or the snarky tone of Eli Roth, and instead simply focuses on the events in front of the camera with an unflinching, non-judgmental eye. It's quite powerful and effective. Wolf Creek is, dare I say, better than The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I'll let that sink in so all of my horror readers can tell me how crazy and stupid I am. But I've always felt like Hooper's film is a bit overrated. There's no denying its power in certain scenes, but I felt like it was a 45 minute premise stretched out over 80 minutes. Wolf Creek, though, gives us character development and an unconventionally beautiful backdrop to juxtapose the horrifying actions that are taking place. In short: it actually looks good, whereas TCM just reminds you of its ugliness throughout.  It reminded me of the way Cormac McCarthy (I only invoke his name because I've been immersed in his work lately) also used the setting of wide-open expanses as the setting for his stories of bloody violence. Obviously McLean isn't doing anything on par with what McCarthy does, but for a horror film the lo-fi cinematography is quite a triumph.

I kept waiting and waiting for that winking-at-the-camera moment, but it never happened, and because of that McLean is telling his viewers that this isn't like those other horror films that use women being tortured and splattered with blood as away to titillate…he's daring us to watch the events unfold, with the film's open spaces, music, and minimalistic mise-en-scene it's almost as if he's telling us that this isn't a movie at all. McLean challenges his viewers to not just watch the horrifying events unfold (I've read reviews that liken it to being hit in the face with a shovel), but to consider why it is we watch horror films to begin with. There's nothing on display in Wolf Creek that would ever make me want to watch it again (another thing it shares in common with TCM) , but I can't deny its power, its effectiveness in making me feel terror and keeping me hoping that the characters would make it out alive. I wasn't exhilarated by the events of Wolf Creek (who the hell would be?) in the same way that some people are probably exhilarated by the gore of the Saw films or the cynicism of the Hostel films, and that's one of the reasons the film is so good at being an effective horror film. The violence isn't visceral; rather, it's just there, in all of its unmitigated horror. It's rare for a horror film to offer up the violence in such a detached, non-exhilarating way.

Sure it's not the type of horror film that transcends the genre and ushers in new or lukewarm fans of horror (it's far too unrelenting for that) as evidenced by the zero star review the film received from Roger Ebert. And that's completely understandable. I can see how those who are not horror fanatics view the film as nihilistic, pointless, and an absolute nightmare to sit through, but I think that's what McLean is going for, and he succeeds in doing without making the terror or violence pornographic, because there is nothing entertaining about the bloodshed in this film. So yes, the film is a chore to get through, and I don't know if I would ever sit through it again, but I can't deny the experience I had which made me think that McLean is someone to keep an eye on in the genre.

When held up to its contemporaries and the ugliness of the genre it unfairly is akin to, Wolf Creek feels like a masterpiece, and when thinking about the film in the context of exploitative horror, it's so well shot and directed and acted that it's easy to see – should you ever muster up the courage to sit through the film – why I consider it one of the great horror films (alongside The Descent) of the last decade. But be warned: the film is for die-hard horror fans only.

Summer of Slash: Capsule Reviews

In an effort to get through as many horror films as I can for the upcoming horror countdown at the wonderful blog Wonders in the Dark (for which I will be a contributor, and the main inspiration for this summer Horror project) I have decided to cram a bunch of reviews into one post (which I will do frequently) since I need to save time, it helps, too, that a lot of horror movies can't really sustain an entire post on their own, so the capsule review becomes a life (and time) saver. I will reiterate my "rules" for this project: I am mostly focusing on slasher films (hence the title of this project), but I am not limiting myself to just once kind of horror film since I need to (re)watch a lot of them before I construct my list for the Wonders in the Dark countdown. Therefore, I am planning on mostly cramming all of the non-slashers (and some that can only have about a paragraph written about them) into these capsule-review posts to make my life a lot easier. This week the viewing schedule consisted of the low-budge slasher The Town that Dreaded Sundown, Joe Dante's beloved werewolf feature The Howling, the Ozploitation romp Razorback (from the director of Highlander!), and 2010's dystopian vampire sci-fi/horror hybrid Daybreakers. Reviews come after the jump...

The Howling – Joe Dante's tongue in cheek horror film has never been a favorite of mine. I originally saw it when I was in high school and I remember thinking it was one of the most excruciatingly boring horror films I'd ever seen. So, I thought I revisit it in hopes that my original thoughts on the film were just the thoughts of a bored teenager who wanted more blood. I appreciated the film a little more this go-around as I was able to understand the in-references to the genre (specifically the werewolf movie) and could appreciate the slow-burn of the horror and gore. However, the film is still a chore to get through. I know the film is beloved by many, but man does The Howling have a soggy middle. The constant genre riffing and referential jokes just got a old after awhile. Joe Dante would fine tune this tone in the Gremlins films, and he would lovingly pay homage to the types of B-grade horror flicks that The Howling so badly wants to be in his much better (and criminally underrated) Matinee. I guess I can see the appeal of The Howling to some, but I have never been the biggest werewolf fan (I prefer zombies from Italy) and really the few good, bloody moments of The Howling (the transformation scene is outstanding, and the scene in the exam room at the end is brilliant, too) are just too few and far between, leaving me with the same kind of indifference I initially felt towards the film.

The Town that Dreaded Sundown – This period slasher is interesting for a few reasons: its setting, the way it utilizes a lot of slasher tropes before they became cliché, and one of the most innovative kills found in any horror film. The film plays more like one of those cheesy reenactments from an episode of "Unsolved Mysteries" as a narrator guides us through the "true" events of a masked killer terrorizing the residents of Texarkana, Texas. The film is part police procedural (a really cheesy one), part bad comedy (the director of the film, Charles Pierce, shows up as police officer who goes undercover in drag to try and force the killer out of hiding), and part effective slasher. The bad is really bad here as the film does a decent enough job with the post-WWII aesthetic (which got me wondering: why aren't there more horror films that set their stories in the past? I can only think of The Prowler as another example of how a period setting is pretty effective for a horror film), but it ultimately looks cheap and made-for-TV. The comedy brings the film to a screeching halt, a problem for a lot of 1970's horror films as they all felt the need to try their hand at "Dukes of Hazard"-like bumpkin buffoonery. However, the film is a complete waste of time (even if it is a chore to sit through) because the slasher element of the film is actually really effective. If the filmmakers could have made up their mind and decided what kind of film they had here, it could have gone down as one of those forgotten slashers from the pre-Friday the 13^thera.

What makes the slasher element so effective here is that the way Pierce uses minimal effects during the killings. Often all we can hear is the masked killer's heavy breathing – which is extremely creepy – or the screams of the victims. The simplicity of the killer makes it all the more effective, too, as The Town that Dreaded Sundown utilizes the potato-sack-wearing killer long before Jason Voorhees popped up with it in Friday the 13^th: Part 2. However, the best part about this film (and really the only reason it still maintains a kind of cult status) is that it contains one of the most hilarious and innovative death scenes as the killer has tied a woman to a tree and proceeds to attaches a knife to a slide trombone, the killer then tries belting out a tune (!) so that the knife goes back and forth into the victim. It's all at once inane, hilarious, and kind of creepy that someone would go to those lengths to kill someone.

Razorback – After the brutal 90 minutes of Wolf Creek (review coming tomorrow) I needed something to lighten the mood, so I went with another installment from Australia and the Ozploitation movement, Russel Mulcahey's Razorback. Yes, that's the man responsible for the Highlander films, but before he went on to give us Sean Connery and Christopher Lambert kicking ass to Queen, he made this fun, low-budget film about a wild boar known as a razorback terrorizing the outback. All of the elements of a fin drive-in movie are in play here: a director who shows some competence and innovation with a limited budget, bad acting, cheap scares, and some memorable "WTF" moments that make the film a cult classic. I first heard about this film when I watched the documentary on Ozploitation, Not Quite Hollywood (great doc, by the way) and thought to myself: okay, I have to see this. Now, this would have been a lot better with some friends and some beer, but after enduring the brutality of Wolf Creek I was glad to be in the presence of a light-hearted horror affair. What's interesting is how much more I like this monster feature than something like the more famous and heavily praised (and recently re-watched by me) The Howling by Joe Dante. The films obviously have a much different story, but the tone was similar in that both films are supposed to be monster/creature features that are meant to be taken as larks. Mulcahey's film about an animal activist reporter who is doing a story on animal cruelty in a small Outback town; however, her report gets in her in some hot water with the deranged locals who take upon themselves to attack her and leave her for a wild boar (the razorback). Enter Jake Cullen, a crusty old hunter who has a history with the wild boar. The razorback killed his grandchild and wife, and now he wants revenge, so he teams up with the reporter's husband and they go searching for the wild beast in what is a generally tame horror film, but a helluva a lot of fun.

Mulcahey shows his talents for filming interesting scenes using the desert as a backdrop (and getting some nice looking shots in), showing the destruction of the razorback (there's a great scene where the boar rips off the side of a house and the man inside just sits there dumbfounded…drinking a Fosters, of course), and showing us the destruction of the boar without having to actually show us what it looks like at first. It's the classic "use your imagination" technique that grindhouse directors have been employing ever since the 70's, and it's one of the primary reasons why so many visually talented filmmakers get their start in the horror genre, because the limited budgets allow them to showcase their talents. Razorback is light on the gore, but heavy neat visuals (it's easy to see why Mulcahey) was a awarded a significant budget when he headed up Highlander) and the fun factor, and it certainly has that exploitation/grindhouse appeal that so many of us horror fans love about movies like this. America tried to recapture a similar feel with its version of Razorback, the Kevin Bacon vehicle Tremors (which I quite liked, too). Both films are classic examples of a type of fun, creature horror feature that has long been extinct (although the Korean horror film The Host and Greg McLean's Rogue are damn good examples of this particular subgenre making a comeback) and point to a simpler type of horror film that didn't take itself too seriously and could be enjoyed on the back-end of a double bill. This is a fun, fun movie.

Daybreakers – I had the same problem with this vampire movie that I did with The Howling in that I don't care much for vampire films. However, Daybreakers (another Australian horror film, sheesh it's like this was planned or something) written and directed by the brothers Spierig (who made the horrendous, but promising, all things considered, zombie film Undead), is a fascinating entry into the genre for about 20 minutes…then it uses up all of its good ideas, therefore, despite the film's right-on-the-money 90 minute run time, the film is a slog to get through because we've seen all of the good stuff already. The opening ten minutes shows a world where humans, having passed on an offer to assimilate with the vampires, are non-existent because they are being hunted, captured, and farmed for blood – which there is an alarmingly decreased amount of. The opening scenes of the film show the promise of the Spiereg brothers as they create an original looking dystopia where blood is scarce and vampires are getting desperate. The film is also helped by the appearance of some great actors like Willem Dafoe (a vampire, turned human) and Sam Neil (playing a big-time bastard of a vampire) as well as Ethan Hawke, who I've never really cared for, but I have to admit it made me smile to see this pretentious asshole in a horror movie (okay, really I'm just jealous because here is a man who not only acts, writes, and directs films, but he also writes plays, has a written a few novels, and was married to Uma Thurman. What a jerk.). The reason the film failed to hold my interest (the film is essentially about a "banker" – they bank blood in this world – played by Hawke who is recruited by some humans – some former vampires – to start an uprising against the vampires) was because of my lack of interest in vampires. The only vampire film I've ever really enjoyed was Herzog's Nosferatu (and the original silent for that matter), and that had a few things going for it like a modern master behind the camera evoking some genuinely creepy moments (thanks to Herr Kinski as the Count).

The film certainly has a big, bloody conclusion (I mean lots of blood), but its filmed in that annoying, Matrix-y slo-mo that pissed me off because I can just see the filmmakers being so proud of themselves for being "cool". The film left me with an overall "meh" attitude, but I can see why a film like this caught the eye of major critic like Roger Ebert, A.O. Scott, and Michael Philips (just to name a few) as something of an original horror film that just feels different than a lot of the stuff we've been getting with the genre these days. As time progresses so too does the horror genre, usually for worse, as I long for the days of simple, low-key horror films, but I will say this: Daybreakers is about the best evidence I've seen to date for the modern CGI horror film. It's just a shame they used up all of their good ideas within the first 20 minutes.

DVD Review: Not Quite Hollywood

As an unabashed fan of exploitation cinema I have to say I feel pretty ashamed to admit that I had no idea there was an Australian subgenre out there that is like my favorite subgenre Italian horror. The documentary Not Quite Hollywood paints an interesting portrait of "ozploitation", and for fans of this particularly polarizing subgenre this documentary is a treat: a plethora of rental ideas of forgotten (or maybe never discovered) grindhouse cinema from down under. Quentin Tarantino is interviewed the most throughout the doc and his (usual) unbridled enthusiasm is infectious as he talks about how certain film like Patrick crossed over into pop culture (the Italians ripped it off, of course, and made one of their unofficial sequels to the film) and also influenced his films like Kill Bill. Various filmmakers from the Australian New Wave movement are interviewed (most prominently is Brian Trenchard-Smith of The Man from Hong Kong and Dead-End Drive-In "fame") and discuss the ways they made films that people wanted to see, influenced their respective genres with new, innovative ways to film the scenes, and began to affect a whole Australian subculture and industry where the only kinds of films being made were art films like Picnic at Hanging Rock. I found the history of Australian filmmaking to be fascinating, not to mention the various clips from from films that look surprisingly good (and innovative) for the budgets they had. Of course this should surprise no one if you're a fan of exploitation cinema as these types of films were sometimes the breeding ground for young filmmakers with ideas. 

One of the best moments of the doc comes when Quentin Tarantino is describing a scene from one of the films discussed when he says something to the extent of: (paraphrased) "the best thing about exploitation cinema is that initial reaction as your watching something and you're thinking, 'is this really happening…wait…it is…oh my God! How did they do that? What were they thinking? Why would the actors agree to that?' That uncertainty is what makes exploitation cinema so great." Because it's a pretty good bet that the clips from the movies profiled in this doc are the best parts of those movies (for as "fun" as these types of movies are...they're really boring if you aren't watching them with friends) this is a must see doc for fans of exploitation cinema. 

A question for exploitation fans after the jump...

Does anyone have reviews of the following films? I would love to read more about the following movies:

Razorback

Patrick

Long Weekend

Thirst

The Survivor

Harlequin

Roadgame

The Howling III

Next of Kin

Mad Dog Morgan (in the documentary they show a lot of on-set footage from this film…it's worth the price
of rental, or ownership, for those moments of Dennis Hopper all coked-out) 

The Man from Hong Kong (another film that is discussed at length…there are some great stories to this one, too)

Turkey Shoot

Nightmares

Stone

Stunt Rock (my brother and I have watched parts of this one...) 
Wolf Creek (or any other modern Australian horror films)


Leave the links to your reviews in the comments section. Thanks.