HubrisWeen, Day 14: The Nest (1988)

Nobody likes cockroaches. Or, at least, nobody likes the common American, German, Asian, and Oriental "pest" varieties. Madagascar hissing cockroaches are actually pretty neat, in my opinion, but then again they aren't likely to be found soiling the food in your pantry.

On the whole, however, cockroaches aren't directly dangerous. Their menace lies in their ability to ruin food, spread disease, and trigger allergies and asthma--these are all terrifying things in actuality, but if a healthy adult found themself suddenly swarmed by hundreds or thousands of cockroaches, they'd come out the other side wanting for a serious scrubdown with anti-microbial soap but otherwise probably very much alive and extremely grossed out.

What if that changed? What if cockroaches suddenly decided that humans were more tempting morsels than our insufficiently secured food? We can't even keep the little bastards out of our homes when all they want is our cereal: if they started gunning for us, we wouldn't stand a chance!

The island community of North Port, California is gearing up for tourist season, which is about the only time anything of interest happens there. Sheriff Richard Tarbell (Frank Luz) is rudely awakened by his dispatch operator radioing him to inform him that a local and a tourist girl are missing. They went missing by the old lighthouse, which seems to be a common place to lose young folk. Oh, and the guard dog at the INTEC Development site is causing complaints again. Tarbell is more concerned with the live cockroach he finds swimming in his coffee, but is unable to flag down the local eccentric exterminator, Homer (Stephen Davies) as the man whizzes past Tarbell's house on his motorbike. So any fumigation will have to wait.

Tarbell stops by the local diner to get a refill on his coffee and a good morning kiss from his girlfriend, Lillian (Nancy Morgan), who runs the place. The gossip in the diner is both about an increase in pests for everyone, and that mayor Elias Johnson's (Robert Lansing) birthday is coming up. And that could mean a homecoming for his estranged daughter, Elizabeth (Lisa Langlois). Not a prospect that Tarbell or Lillian seems thrilled by.

Tarbell goes to the lighthouse, intending to investigate the disappearances when he hears a loud buzzing, like a horde of insects. He goes to investigate--and is ambushed by Jake (Jack Collins), Lillian's father and resident wacky old coot. Tarbell has some words with Jake about not ambushing a police officer who carries a gun, and then asks Jake how quickly he got to the lighthouse when Tarbell saw him outside the diner earlier. Turns out it was because Jake indulged in one of his kooky old man habits of stealing someone's motor raft. Tarbell promises to overlook it if Jake takes it back at once, but is completely flummoxed when Jake asks if Tarbell is gonna marry his daughter. He manages to dodge the old man's question.

The answer, obviously, is no. This is plainly clear when Elizabeth arrives and Tarbell goes to pick her up from the landing strip North Port calls an airport. You see, the two of them were involved before she left after her mother's death. And Tarbell is just the kind of schmuck to date another woman whilst obsessing over an ex.

Tarbell doesn't immediately try to woo Elizabeth again, for what it's worth. He drops her off at home after some rueful words about four years and all that. Elias and Elizabeth are not exactly eager to see each other either. There's some terse discussion about her mother's things being moved to the basement, and all in all it's a pretty unwelcoming return.

Things are about to get worse for everyone, as Elizabeth finds out when she goes hiking by the INTEC Development. She's nearly mauled by the guard dog, and then finds an old favorite stomping ground further down the trail has been fenced off. Luckily for her, she's too far away from where the dog is chained up when that buzzing comes again. Whatever's making the sound terrifies the dog, but it can't escape...

When Elizabeth responds to the dog's cries of distress, she finds it has been stripped almost completely to the bone by the time she can run back to it. Tarbell appears and the two share some terribly ADR'ed dialogue about the state of the dog. Tarbell notices the dog is covered with some strange pellet-like objects. He and Elizabeth notify Elias about the dog but, since it happened on INTEC property, Elias insists that they be allowed to do their own investigation. It turns out he has a good reason for wanting INTEC to look into it, as he calls someone as soon as Tarbell and his daughter are out of earshot to tell them that what they feared might happen is happening.

Tarbell finds a lot more weird stuff is happening in the town itself. Mrs. Pennington (Diana Bellamy), the librarian insists that vandals have torn every page out of the books. When Tarbell examines one book, he points out that it was actually either insects or rodents chewing the glue out of the binding. Mrs. Pennington is less convinced, because how could the glue in every book have been eaten overnight? At the local grocer, Tarbell is shown a packaged T-Bone steak that has been stripped clean and told that every piece of meat in the store is like that. Tarbell notices that more of those pellets are in the packages, too.

That night, Jake gets to find out what's going on when he's shooting at a rat in his junkyard. He keeps missing, but then the rat's severed head lands at his feet--bitten off. As the buzzing surrounds him, Jake proves just how kooky he is by deciding that hiding under the covers is enough to protect him. The spurts of blood, his screams, and his severed arm being dragged away by something unseen prove that to have been a mistake.

INTEC's expert arrives, Dr. Morgan Hubbard (Terri Treas). Elias greets her at the airport and then, ugh, begins trying to talk her into dinner sometime. Hubbard is far more interested in examining the dead dog. Tarbell is immediately put off by the woman's "emotionless" reaction to the dead carcass. I say "emotionless" because despite the hints that Hubbard is supposed to be somehow robotic,, she has plenty of emotion: she just expresses it in standard mad scientist ways.

For instance, once they've found an excuse to get rid of Tarbell, she finds great amusement in using a stray cat as live bait in her trap while a homing signal calls to what she's looking for. The cat suffers the same fate as the guard dog, but now she has the specimens she needed to study in her impromptu lab in the old lighthouse--carnivorous cockroaches. In studying the cockroaches, Hubbard almost takes glee in having the little bastards maul her hand when she's examining them in a glove box. And the dialogue between her and Elias spells out quite clearly what we won't actually be told until much later.

These carnivorous roaches were, as in Guillermo Del Toro's Mimic, genetically engineered to eat regular roaches. INTEC bought some property from Elias to test the roaches out and they were engineered to die after one generation. Trouble is, they thrived. Worse, Hubbard quickly discovers that while the roaches will succumb to a specific poison gas but the amount required is lethal to humans. If they can't find another way, they'll have to evacuate the island.

Tarbell begins to catch up. He has Homer examine the strange pellets and finds out they're roach droppings, but big ones. And then the dispatch operator delivers the info that Tarbell had asked for about Hubbard--she was kicked out of MIT for illegal experimentation. Things get even weirder when Elizabeth goes to investigate the INTEC property and finds Bronson Canyon. It's been fenced off but she finds a way in and finds dynamite and a timed detonator, strange bulbous pods hanging from the ceiling, and is chased out of the cave by a horde of cockroaches. She only heard them, however, so Elias is able to keep his secret a bit longer while trying to evade Tarbell's questioning.

Tarbell takes Elizabeth back home to his place and, off camera, the two sleep together. All this while Tarbell's actual girlfriend--who had earlier strongly suggested that Elizabeth stay away from her man--is fighting for her life against the horde of cockroaches that ate the fry cook before swarming the diner (all set to "La Cucaracha," naturally). Tarbell--Asshole,

Everyone in town is having a bad night. Homer finds Jake's remains and the roaches still chewing on them, but escapes with his life. Mrs. Pennington gets eaten when the roaches crawl into the cast on her broken leg, The local grocer is attacked while driving and--in footage cribbed from Humanoids From The Deep, he drives his truck off a bridge and it blows up. And then Homer manages to blow up his house while making a poison cocktail to kill the super roaches--also via footage from Humanoids From The Deep.

Elias, seeing that the shit may be hitting the fan soon, calls INTEC and demands that they send someone to spray the island with the poison at 5AM. If he cannot evacuate the island, he light the lighthouse and that will be the signal to abort the spray. Unfortunately, the roaches get into the phone lines about then. So when Elias radios Hubbard to tell her, he finds out that she has already discovered that the eggs laid by the roaches killed by the poison are immune to it. So spraying the island will just kill off some of the roaches, leaving only those that are immune to breed.

Whoops.

Tarbell drops Elizabeth at home and heads to the dispatch station--finding the operator has been devoured. He rushes to the diner, where he finds Lillian in the freezer, dead. Apparently she froze to death hiding in there from the roaches while Tarbell was fucking around on her with Elizabeth. Asshole. Tarbell also finds Homer and the two overhear on the radio that Hubbard can't get the signal lit. They head to the lighthouse and try to get some answers from Hubbard, who manages to convince them of the importance of getting the lighthouse lit.

Of course, it's no longer that simple. You see, there's a cocoon in the cage where the dead cat used to be. And when it hatches, the group in the lighthouse discovers that the roaches have developed a completely new mutation: they take on the form of their prey

That's right: Zombie Cat Roach!

Only slightly more evil than an actual cat.

So now not only do they have the roaches to contend with, but their victims, too. Good luck surviving all that and getting the lighthouse to work.

And that Eleventh Hour revelation is why I love movies like The Nest. There was nothing wrong with its "horde of carnivorous cockroaches" premise--aside from it lacking any of the giant roaches represented on the poster--but the film decided to break off in an entirely different direction in the last few minutes. That it didn't even care if the revelation makes sense is even better. Alas, I have not read the source novel by Eli Cantor (under pseudonym Gregory A. Douglas) so I can't confirm if it hails from there or was invented for the film. I would put money on the latter.

Now, to be fair, nothing is really made of this revelation considering the implications. Considering it's strongly implied the entire town has been eaten by the roaches, imagine the characters having to face down the roaches and all their zombie roach victims. Instead, no doubt owing to budget, it turns out the roaches have a Queen that appears to be composed of all their victims. And Homer figures out the Queen is calling the roaches back to the nest, even though he ought to know roaches don't normally have Queens.

I will let that slide on account of the fact that the Queen is awesome.

"Get away from her you bi-- Er, on second thought you can have her. Have all of them, just please don't touch me. Gah!"

Aside from that, the film is definitely very standard. Its characters could have come off a conveyor belt. You have your unscrupulous politician/capitalist who dooms his community--though, hilariously, the implied Jaws ripoff of having a local festival attacked never materializes--and the unethical scientist who created the monsters, both of whom meet their end at the hands of their hubris.

Much like me and HubrisWeen, but with more legs.

The other main characters are the hero cop who won't stop investigating, the old flame who returns, and the comic relief exterminator. You've seen them all before and since, many times. Though usually hero cop is less of a cheating asshole. Seriously, what a lousy douchebag.

The film is surprisingly light on the expected exploitation elements, too. Oh, sure, there's buckets of gore--but there's zero nudity. It rather reminds you of Roger Corman's current output, pre-packaged for TV exhibition on channels where you can tear women apart in graphical detail but you can't show their nipples, than what he was still producing in the 1980s. (Though it was Julie Corman whose name is on this one as producer, it still counts since it was his production company)

Then again, that could describe another Corman production so I suppose the change has been a long time coming.

Mind you, not having sleazy scenes for those in the audience who swing towards women to leer at is hardly a criticism of the film. Merely a curious observation. Certainly, I enjoy the film enough for it to have a place in my collection, but that doesn't necessarily mean a movie is good.

And The Nest is definitely "not exactly good." It certainly hits a lot of the right notes and has a sense of humor--Lillian killing cockroaches to "La Cucaracha", as earlier mentioned--that helps to keep it from taking itself too seriously. Unfortunately, that sense of humor is sometimes full of jokes so stale it's amazing the script wasn't devoured by roaches, and all of them center around Homer. Comic relief characters in movies are almost always the characters you wish death upon who won't die, and while Homer never quite gets that bad he comes dangerously close.

If you enjoy B-Movies, you'll like this one. If you expect your horror films to be truly good, look elsewhere. The Nest is a delightful time waster, but it has very little else to offer.

Other than Zombie Cat Roach: you won't see that one anywhere else.

This concludes HubrisWeen, day 14. Click the banner to find out what else is in store for you.

HubrisWeen, Day 13: Matango, Fungus of Terror (1963)

[aka, Attack of the Mushroom People]

So many horror stories deal with monsters that are out to eat you, but there aren't very many that deal with something that might not seem as frightening at first glance: the monster that wants you to eat it.

When you consider how many examples in nature there are of horrifying parasites that trick their hosts into ingesting them so they can slowly destroy them from the inside, it's kind of surprising that more horror writers haven't exploited this angle.

Luckily, Ishiro Honda's second attempt at what could be considered a traditional horror movie focuses on just that. Adapting the short story "The Voice In The Night" by William Hope Hodgson--which I have not read--Honda delivers a horror even more effective than The H-Man. You could even argue that it is the equivalent of the Ryujin Maru II segment of that film expanded to feature length.

The film begins, much like The Alligator People and Equinox, with the lone survivor of the film's events telling the film's story via flashback. In this case, it's University Professor Kenji Murai (Akira Kubo, the man who seems to have had a lead in nearly every big sci-fi film that Toho released in the 1960s), who is pacing his cell in a Tokyo psychiatric ward. He knows the audience of doctors staring at him through the bars won't believe him, but he swears his story is completely true.

And then we jarringly cut to the opening credits where composer Sadao Bekku's jaunty theme music proves even more mismatched to the dark material than Masaru Sato's in the The H-Man. The credits roll over footage of a yacht at sea, which will turn out to contain Kenji and his timid student girlfriend, Akiko Soma (Miki Yashiro); famous singer and femme fatale, Mami Sekiguchi (Kumi Mizuno!); mystery writer and not-so secret lover of Mami's, Etsuro Yoshida (Hiroshi Tachikawa); Mami's official lover and yacht owner, Masabumi Kasai (Yoshio Tsuchiya); skipper Naoyuki Sakuda (Hiroshi Koizuma); and Naoyuki's first mate, Senzo Koyama (Kenji Sahara!). Right away it's importat to note that everyone in the group is wearing a gaudy gold medallion--except for Senzo, which automatically sets the sailor apart from the group of friends.

The group, clearly having rather a low opinion of life in Japan, have set up their little sailing vacation to get away from the hustle and bustle of city life. But as Mami strums her ukulele and sings a song that continues to have a ukulele part even after she puts hers down to dance across the deck, a horrible storm whips up. There may be no giant lobster to destroy their yacht, but they still end up adrift and at the mercy of the ocean currents.

It doesn't take long before the group are sniping at each other, especially after listening to a news report on their yacht's disappearance saps the last of their radio's battery. There's the typical alpha male posturing even this early on, and Senzo lecherously musing about how women are bad luck on boats because they distract the men. And Yoshida raises a false alarm after hallucinating a ghost ship running them down. Clearly low food and water is taking its toll.

The sight of an island, then, is a welcome one. Except the island--a beautiful yet foreboding place with black, volcanic sands and lush vegetation, but surrounded by fog--appears deserted at first. However, while fetching fresh water, Senzo observes that the stones in the stream have been deliberately rearranged. It isn't long before the group finds a ship that's run aground on the other side of the island, but Naoyuki dims their spirits by pointing out the sails on the wreck are rotted. It's been there at least a year based on that and the corrosion of its metal hull.

Inside, the ship is absolutely coated with mold of all colors--including a blood-red variety in the captain's cabin, where Kenji retrieves the log book. The group finds a lab in the ship, full of strange specimens like a sea turtle with no eyes--mutations caused by radiation. The shelves with the specimens are clear of fungi, so Naoyuki realizes they must have been disinfected somehow. There's some disinfectant fluid in jugs next to a locker labelled "Matango" in English--or at least modern Latin characters. Inside the locker is a giant mushroom, but no one really wants to hazard a guess as to whether it's edible.

Lucky thing that Kasai finds Senzo and Yoshida in the hold, helping themselves to canned food. The group works to scrub the ship's interior clean of mold and make the place livable for as long as necessary. Kenji is particularly unnerved by the ship, as it does not appear to have any distinct nationality--there are items from communist and democratic countries, and even Western and Japanese. It seems to have been on some secret mission, though whether benevolent or sinister is anybody's guess. At any rate, the log book strongly suggests that no matter what they should not eat the mushrooms that grow freely on the island. The crew of the derelict apparently went mad after ingesting them.

Unfortunately, the canned food will only last them a week. So they'll have to find other food by hunting, fishing, or foraging for edible roots and sea turtle eggs. Despite Kasai's efforts to clean the rifle found in the captain's cabin, there seems to be no animal life on the island--and, in fact, while hunting he and Kenji see a sea gull immediately change direction when approaching the island, taking it out range of the rifle. It couldn't have seen them from that distance, and yet something warned it off. Worse, Kenji and Kasai see something moving in the forest--something with a bulbous head and a vaguely humanoid body. Kasai puts three bullets into the figure, but there's no evidence of the thing when the two approach its last position. Other than the shattered chunks of mushroom they fail to notice, that is.

When Naoyuki and Senzo bring the yacht around to anchor it closer to the derelict for repairs, they discover that the water close to shore is riddled with sunken wrecks. The current around the island must trap ships, and worse the ever-present fog means no nearby ship would see them. And then Senzo finds Yoshida and Mami making out--and I do mean making out, something I don't think I've seen in any other Japanese sci-fi or monster film--and the two men fight because Senzo thought everyone had agreed to leave the women alone. Mami is positively delighted by the men fighting over her ("Everybody wants me," she tells Akiko haughtily), but it's the last thing anyone needs. Things look pretty dire even before one night, while Kasai is stealing food from the hold, something seems to attack him. Kasai and the others take shelter in the bunks, but the hatch opens--and a misshapen face that looks to have once been human glares in at them.

"That's...my...bunk."

The next day, no one wants to acknowledge what they saw. Yoshida has been eating the mushrooms on the island and he grabs the rifle and threatens to kill the others if he doesn't get his way. They manage to overpower him and lock him in the captain's cabin, but that's the breaking point. Naoyuki steals all the remaining supplies, including the extra turtle eggs Senzo had been hiding in a cave, and sets sail with the now-functioning yacht. Mami lets Yoshida out and helps him as he uses the rifle to threaten Kenji and Kasai, while demanding Akiko be his. Senzo returns to the derelict just in time to take three bullets from the crazed Yoshida, but that allows Kasai and Kenji to take back the rifle. Kasai banishes Yoshida and Kasai to the wilds of the island to feed on the mushrooms to their hearts' content.

The yacht returns, but Kenji finds that it is deserted--the only sign of Naoyuki being a suicide note the skipper scrawled on the wall of the cabin before throwing himself overboard. Kasai wanders away from the derelict and runs into Mami, who explains she's not hungry anymore. She lures him into a cavern filled with mushrooms and coaxes him to eat them. Kasai relents and has a vivid hallucination of neon signs and show girls. When he comes down and reaches for more mushrooms, Mami tells him that she should have warned him--once you eat the mushrooms, you become a mushroom.

The sound of unnatural laughter fills the cavern as Kasai realizes that Mami's skin has taken on a decidedly unnatural tint. He sees Yoshida, laughing and waving despite his deformed face. And worse, humanoid mushrooms rise up all around him. The laughter grows louder as the mushroom creatures surround Kasai. You see, not only are the mushrooms addictive, but they're very determined to be eaten by anyone who comes to the island--and they won't take no for an answer.

This has "after school special" written all over it.

Matango is one of those movies where you can't help but wonder if it inspired Night of the Living Dead or if they had similar inspirations. Both films deal with how a group of people in survival conditions fall apart and turn on each other, and the sequence of the deformed former crew of the derelict swarming the cabin to drag Akiko and Kasai to the mushroom cavern is highly zombie-like. There's even a severed arm from one of the transitional mushroom men! And both films have an incredibly misanthropic worldview.

What truly is amazing about the film is how well it sells its premise. The mushroom creatures should be goofy and laughable, but with the damned laughter that accompanies them they end up close to terrifying. The film is positively dripping with atmosphere, as well, from fog-shrouded shores, to derelict ships, and mushroom caverns.

The actors all turn in amazing performances, with the true standouts being Kenji Sahara as the sleazy sailor and Kumi Mizuno as the flagrant femme fatale. And the creature designs are marvelous, from the repulsive transitional humans to the full-on walking mushrooms.

Unlike Honda's previous horror effort, The H-Man, we don't waste time with characters not directly related to the main plot. There's no distraction from the monsters--especially since, like any zombie movie worth a crap, it may not be the mushrooms that are the real monsters.

See this, if you can. You won't regret it.

This concludes day 13 of HubrisWeen! Check out what the other maniacs chose for their M movie by clicking the banner above.

HubrisWeen, Day 12: Legend of Dinosaurs & Monster Birds (1977)

When it comes to Jaws rip-offs, nearly every country with a film industry got their chance to make one. And virtually every country that did made sure to make it as unique as possible instead of just making another killer shark film.

Yet there were surprisingly few who went, "You know what would be a great stand-in for a shark? Dinosaurs."

Well, sort of. Pop culture considers anything scaly and prehistoric a "dinosaur," but there are in fact no dinosaurs in this film. There are no "monster birds" for that matter. The monsters in this film are a plesiosaurus (not a dinosaur, but a reptile) and a Rhamphorynchus (not a bird, but also a reptile). Both of which are, as per movie tradition, way bigger than the actual animals in question were.

Yes, I'm a nerd. I think we've fully established that by now.

This film is also damned weird, and we get a taste of that weirdness immediately. A woman is wandering in the woods at the foot of Mt. Fuji, near Lake Sai. We never will find out why, but she is carrying a gun and seems suitably freaked out. She's even more freaked out when she suddenly falls into a hidden cavern full of ice and several fossil eggs. One of those eggs begins to hatch, and the terrified woman goes to investigate--only to recoil in screaming terror when a slimy eye inside the egg looks back. The woman somehow stumbles out of the hidden cave and runs into a group of construction workers before passing out and being taken to a local hospital.

In an airport lounge, the TV station is tuned to a news report about the various strange things happening in the world in 1977, no doubt as a result of man's misdeeds. After reporting an unseasonable snow storm in Hokkaido, the news reports that a woman reported finding a "stone egg" near Lake Sai before being rushed to a hospital. Apparently a "stone egg" is not a usual occurrence since everyone in the lounge is shocked--and Takashi Ashizawa (Tsunehiko Watase) especially takes note. Takashi, an archaeologist, cancels his flight to Mexico and heads to his office at Universal Stone Co, Ltd. in order to pack for a trip to Lake Sai, His boss barges in, demanding to know why Takashi has abandoned his business trip to Mexico. Takashi explains that his father, a paleontologist, found a "stone egg" (which I guess sounds cooler than "fossil egg") at Lake Sai and died after fruitlessly searching for others.

His boss reminds Takashi that he's a geologist, not a paleontologist, but Takashi just puts his cigarette out on the window pane and tells his boss he's going to Lake Sai even if it costs him his job. And, accompanied by the film's hilariously inappropriate 1970s jazz-disco soundtrack, he does just that.

Once there, he runs into some kooky locals who warn him that there are a lot of "long worms" about lately, by which they mean snakes...by which they'll actually turn out to mean either caecillians or eels, I can't quite tell for certain. Takashi ignores them and heads out into woods to go searching for the fossil eggs--but a sudden earthquake knocks him out. He comes to underneath a stuffed crocodile, apparently having been brought to his father's old cabin by a family friend Shohei Muku (an actor whom neither Wikipedia nor IMDb want to credit). I like to think Shohei deliberately moved the crocodile above the bed just to fuck with Takashi,

Shohei and Takashi talk about his late father and Shohei brings out the fossil egg. Takashi muses that if you found a bunch of those you'd never have to worry about money for the rest of your life. I--I don't even know what to say to that, but apparently fossil eggs are worth more than diamonds in this universe. Shohei turns up his nose at that, saying he quite fossil hunting because too many people were only in it for the money (!) and he chides Takashi for being one of those. He also tells him not to get obsessed like his father. His father also apparently actually believed that there was a living dinosaur in Lake Sai for...some reason, so I'd say Takashi should listen to Shohei on this one.

Meanwhile, Akiko (Nobiko Sawa) and Junko (Tomoko Kiyoshima) are scuba diving in the lake, while their puppy waits in their raft. After they come ashore, Takashi stops his jeep to say hello to Akiko--the two having had a history. In Akiko's Winnebago, Takashi tries to make up for lost time--only to be interrupted when Akiko sees some of those "long worms" and recoils in horror.

Meanwhile, in a poorly shot sequence typical of this film, a couple out on the lake in a paddle boat is attacked and killed by something. We are shown this via a shot of log-like object floating towards them underwater--I have no idea if this is meant to be the Plesiosaur or not, but it sure looks nothing like it if it's supposed to be--followed by a close-up on a pen and paper on the shore as we hear their screams and splashing. A diver searching for the couple's bodies is later dragged out of the lake, apparently dead and bleeding from both eyes. It's at this point that Takashi begins to suspect his father may have been right.

He gets more confirmation that evening when poor Junko, out riding her bike with the puppy, suddenly loses control when the puppy tries to chase a loose horse that crossed their path into the woods. She follows the puppy and ends up falling in a mud puddle--right next to the headless horse. Takashi finds her and the horse, and reports the incident to the local authorities. However, the horse is gone by the time they get to the scene so they accuse Takashi of making it up to cause trouble right before the big dragon festival tomorrow. Takashi returns to the scene, finds a strange track that is definitely not a tire mark--and then discovers that the authorities missed the horse because it's now stuck in a tree.

Takashi is convinced this must mean a Plesiosaur is living in the lake. Shohei disagrees and thinks maybe it's a giant snake because that's...more believable? And at any rate, if a dinosaur were to be found alive that would mean the area would be hit with a category 5 earthquake. Wait...what?! I must have missed the part of science that tells us that the mere presence of a dinosaur causes earthquakes.

The lake's dragon festival begins with a concert where--horror of horrors--a Japanese country band is the main event. Akiko has been learning about the history of the lake, and how this festival is part of an old legend that spoke of a red-eyed dragon that lives in the lake. A dragon that, naturally, parents in the area have long used as a threat to disobedient children. Well, apparently that dragon is no more a fan of country music than I am, for a dark object in the lake suddenly destroys the stage, and in the midst of the panic one oddly giddy onlooker, Jiro, points out to farther into the lake. Following his direction, the panicked onlookers see the fin of a monstrous fish--only for an astute little girl with binoculars to realize that the fin is made of cardboard and is being pushed along by two divers.

Jiro was in on the all-too-familiar prank, naturally. Everybody laughs it off and the concert resumes--NOOOOOOOOO--with only Takashi stopping to ask what destroyed the stage if the pranksters were hundreds of yards away? Well, Takashi's not there when the pranksters find out the answer. When Jiro goes to reunite with his co-conspirators, a windstorm whips up and suddenly a whirlpool forms around their raft and a huge, reptilian tail knocks one of them into the lake where he is pulled under. (The editor helpfully failing to cut before we see the doomed man's legs bend when he lands at the bottom of the pool used for filming) The other man is grabbed by the Plesiosaur and it taunts Jiro with the dead body of his comrade clutched in its jaws.

Which means that the filmmakers clearly walked out of Jaws with the feeling that it was a grave injustice that the two little punks with a cardboard fin didn't get eaten by the real shark and decided to rectify that.

Mmm, ironic death!

The Plesiosaur here, and throughout the film, is rendered via a full-size prop head to interact with actors and a miniature puppet. In some scenes, it might even be a man in a suit but I can't confirm that. Neither the prop head nor the puppet are especially good and we get many close-ups on them to fully determine that. Though, in all fairness, they're about on par with the dinosaurs from Amicus Studios' The Land That Time Forgot, so they're certainly not the worst I've seen. And I do have to give them credit, as the prop head and the puppet actually look pretty close to each other. Though the decision to cover the prop head in sea weed and what looks like lawn clippings was a bizarre one.

Anyways, a family of gaijin tourists happens to see and photograph the Plesiosaur swimming through the lake, so they're there to back up the panicked Jiro when he tries to persuade the local authorities that a dinosaur ate his friends. The gaijin tourist , who will later refer to "Lake Ness", insists that, "Nessie is in Lake Sai! This is big news!" (Quick, somebody call Werner Herzog!)

Well, near Lake Sai anyways. At a summer camp a young woman inside a cabin has just gotten into the shower--providing us with some brief nudity--when the lights go out. The woman goes to investigate, getting dressed as she goes, but not noticing the Plesiosaur peering in at her. This would be a much effective shot if the people responsible for it had any sense of scale. Per the film's trailer, the Plesiosaur is 24 meters long (about 79 feet), which is much bigger than the actual animal anyways--but in the shots through the window the creature must be Godzilla-sized. At any rate, rather than going after any of the campers outside or even smashing through the windows, the Plesiosaur smashes through the ceiling to get at its unsuspecting victim.

Meanwhile, Akiko is diving in the lake while Junko waits in the raft. Junko makes the mistake of dangling her feet in the water and...

Plesiosaurs, not having legs of their own, have always hated those who do.

The Plesiosaur lifts Junko high into the air, dangling her by her leg. The long shots for this are completely out of focus in an unsuccessful attempt to disguise the obvious doll hanging from the puppet's mouth. Eventually it drops her back into the water, but as she tries to swim for safety it suddenly comes beneath her. And then, for several minutes, the Plesiosaur stares at Junko, who stares at it while her blood billows into the water. Apparently Plesiosaurs loved to just watch their prey bleed to death.

So when Akiko comes back up, she is understandably confused as to where Junko has gone. Then she notices Junko's hand grasping the side of the raft, so Akiko laughingly grabs her friend's hand--and pulls her severed torso up into the raft.

THIS WAS NO BOATING ACCIDENT!

It is Junko's death that finally spurs the authorities into action. The lake is thoroughly scoured by all the most advanced sonar equipment, to no avail. Eventually, the authorities give up again--though one crazy local accosts a member of the police with a picture of a Rhamphorynchus, reasoning that, "If there is a dinosaur in the lake, it might make sense that there was a pterodactyl, too!" Right.

Of course, he actually is right. Which Shohei discovers when he is hired as a guide by someone--maybe Mister Pterodactyl, I honestly couldn't tell you--and they discover the ice cave and the fossil eggs. Suddenly, a huge talon bursts out of one egg to grab Shohei's tourist and then the Rhamphorynchus sticks its beak out of another egg to grab Shohei.

No, I don't know how that works, either.

Takashi lets the air out of Akiko's air tanks to try and stop her from risking her life while he risks his, he slaps her around a bit, confesses he just wants to see the Plesiosaur once, and then we cut away from their uncomfortable love scene. Akiko waits on the shore while Takashi goes diving, which means she hears the warning that the government is about to drop depth charges into the lake but Takashi doesn't. So he gets stunned by the force of the blasts and Akiko has to rescue his dumb ass. The two swim up into an underwater cave, swimming past severed heads that float back and forth like jellyfish. Once in the cave they find the stone eggs that Takashi had earlier been so lusting after--and the severed limbs of Shohei and his hire.

Meanwhile, the mayor and the town's police are gathered and watching the lake to see if a dead Plesiosaur will float to the surface. But then they see the countryside is glowing, which somebody yells out means there's going to be an earthquake (!) just before someone else points out that the Rhamphorynchus is flying towards them. And thus the "monster bird" makes its move on the villagers set to music that is wildly inappropriate, even for this film.

Cue "Yakkity Sax."

Set to a funkadelic track that sounds like the opening theme of a swinging cop show, the Rhmaphorynchus carries one guy off and drops him to his death. The police hand out rifles and begin firing wildly at the creature, but somebody gave the village idiot a rifle and he manages to shoot the huge bundle of depth charges and kill everyone in the resulting explosion. So the Rhamphorynchus can't even take credit for that.

It goes without saying that the Rhamphorynchus--my favorite pterosaur--is ludicrously outsized here. Per the trailer it is 13 meters (about 43 feet) long, whereas the largest specimen ever found was no more than 5 feet in length. That makes it even more ridiculously outsized than the Plesiosaur! The effects for the Rhamphorynchus are largely just a puppet (with hilariously undersized wings), but they did make a full-scale talon as well. Again the puppet is about on par with the goofy output of Amicus, but I have to say the movie wins out over At The Earth's Core in that, like the Mahars in that film, this creature is supposed to be a giant Rhamphorynchus--but this creature actually looks like one.

Takashi and Akiko find their way out of the cave and promptly find the Plesioaur tooling around on dry land. It moves rather like a seal--and the way its flippers move makes me wonder if some shots were a man in a suit--and none too quickly. Yet it still quickly gains on the pair because Takashi insists on gawping at it until it's almost on top of them. It traps them in another cave when the Rhamphorynchus arrives and now it's time for the giant monster battle royale portion of the film.

"Hey, no fair! You don't taste like chicken at all!"

And here's where I have to take any compliments on the creature effects I made earlier away. Because hoo boy, this is one of the sorriest monster battles ever put to film. Imagine if you will, an excited 5-year-old bashing two plastic dinosaurs together whilst going, "Rar! Grr! Rawk!" You have now imagined a decent approximation of this film's fight. The two creatures literally just bump into each other over and over, not actually biting or scratching at all.

Eventually the Rhamphorynchus does succeed in pecking the Plesiosaur's eye out. However, apparently deciding that this nonsense has gone on long enough, Mt. Fuji erupts. The ground cracks open in multiple places and Akiko ends up danging from a tree over a pit of lava while Takashi tries to reach for her. The Rhamphorynchus is killed by a rain of fireballs and the Plesiosaur plummets into a crevasse. Takashi finally grabs Akiko's hand and-- The End.

No, we don't even find out if our "heroes" made it. Did they escape the lava or fall into it? Who cares? Certainly not the film.

Even reading my description, you probably are failing to understand just how damn weird this movie is. People's reactions and behaviors make no sense, there are non sequiturs aplenty, and the soundtrack is the most ludicrous thing you could think of. Most of the time it sounds like it was stolen from a porn flick. It is rarely, if ever, actually appropriate to what's happening on screen. If I didn't know better I'd think the film was some kind of parody of 70s films, or deliberately strange like House, which came out the same year.

No, I think this film was an earnest effort. Which is why it's so much fun, of course. Now, the film does have its share of dull moments, but when it is moving it is something else all together. If you love killer prehistoric reptiles, Jaws rip-offs, 1970s Japanese cinema, B-movies, or all of the above then you owe it to yourself to see this film.

If nothing else, the sequence of the Rhamphorynchus attacking people set to music that sounds like it could have come from The Visitor never gets old.

That concludes day 12. Go see what everyone else chose for L by clicking the banner above.

HubrisWeen, Day 11: Konga (1961)

One of the more amusing types of films you'll ever encounter are those that either definitely were sold based on their poster before a script existed--like many of American International Pictures' output--or certainly seem to have been. Particularly amusing are those films whose plots take a sudden sharp turn in order to resemble anything like the film their poster promises.

Take Konga, for example. Based on the name alone, you might correctly infer that this is a King Kong knock-off. If you saw the poster, you'd be even more convinced that that is exactly what you were getting.

Yet, upon viewing the film you might conclude that you were sold a false bill of goods. Well, up until the last few minutes, that is.

Oh, and look who's proudly presenting the film to us: American International Pictures! We open with a single engine plane flying over somewhere in an area the foley artists want us to think is tropical. The engine sputters, the plane flies too low and then erupts into massive flames. Cut to a British newscaster explaining that a private plane carrying famed botanist (as if there is any other kind in movies) Dr. Charles Decker has gone down in Uganda, and after a week's fruitless searching it is feared that he and his pilot are dead.

The next scene is a newspaper salesman shouting that Charles Decker has returned to England after a year lost in Uganda. Dr. Decker (Michael Gough!) is greeted at the airport by the English press, who manage to g most of their interview without commenting on the bizarre fact that Decker has a baby chimpanzee clinging to his neck. He explains that he bailed out of the plane just in time to avoid sharing his pilot's fate. He found a nearby native village, where he was nursed to health and was able to further his studies of inectivorous plants ("What are those?" asks dumb reporter. "Plants with animal characteristics," Decker bewilderingly replies) and believes his findings will force evolutionary scientists to "tear up a lot of textbooks."

No, he has not found a Crocoduck.

Oh, and the chimp? That's Konga, and without the little ape's guidance Decker would not have found the native village and survived. The two have become inseparable since so Decker couldn't dream of leaving the little fleabag behind. Back home, Margaret (Margo Johns),Decker's housekeeper and long-time friend--or, "long term friendzoned" based on how she bristles when he refers to her "just a good friend"--jokingly complains that after a year away from her his first concern was all for the new cage for Konga and not for her or his pet cat. Decker barely makes some half-hearted apologies before he is ripping up all the plants in his greenhouse that Margaret carefully tended in favor of the bulbs he's brought from Uganda and turning up the heat in the greenhouse to 90 degrees.

Before you know it, his greenhouse is full of enormous carnivorous plants that--in defiance of actual behavior of said plants--are constantly bobbing around and snapping their jaws open and shut on empty air. Decker happily runs about the greenhouse, feeding chunks of meat to the plants and pruning their leaves. He explains to Margaret that there is a hormone in the plants' leaves that is the key to all his work. He wastes no time in brewing up a serum in his basement lab that he intends to use to on Konga. Decker explains that the village witch doctor put him onto the formula, which can make any animal grow huge rapidly and helpfully renders the animal extremely susceptible to suggestion. So you can make anything into a giant that will also obey your will.

Unfortunately, Margaret didn't close the lab door and the cat got in and began licking up some of the spilled serum Decker is so keen on. So, Decker pulls a revolver from the cabinet and puts two bullets into the cat. When Margaret, not unreasonably, points out that shooting your cat is a Goddamned crazy thing to do, Decker counters that he has worked too long and hard for a damn cat to ruin his experiment. Those few drops would quickly have made the cat grow to the size of a leopard, and how would they explain that?

So Decker tells Margaret to bury the cat in the yard later and moves on to injecting Konga with the formula. Via the magic of an epically awful "wavy lines" wipe and zooming in on an object and then optically inserting it into another shot, Konga goes from a tiny chimp to slightly bigger chimp. Margaret is amazed and Decker is positively beside himself with glee.

Decker resumes his teaching duties at the University in the time-honored tradition of boring his students with a lecture on what he did during his vacation. In this case, by lecturing them on the habits and customs of the Phoney-Baloney tribe he recuperated with whilst showing them footage of what is clearly several totally unrelated African tribespeople. For instance, Decker tells his students that the Fakey-Fake tribe do not normally "scarify their bodies" whilst the film reel shows tribespeople with the typical bone through the nose, hooped earrings, and decorative scarification. At any rate, none of his students bother to ask what the Hell this anthropology lesson has to do with botany.

Among Decker's various students is a young couple, Sandra (Claire Gordon) and Bob (Jess Conrad). Sandra is an eager, bubbly blonde of the naive ingenue variety who just really, really likes botany and thinks Decker's extreme interest in her is just because she's his star pupil. Bob is a jealous doofus of the borderline controlling variety, so naturally even if Decker's interests were wholesome he'd see them as lecherous. Decker is interrupted in his after class discussion with Sandra by a summons to Dean Foster's office.

You see, Dean Foster (Austin Trevor) is concerned that all the press interviews Decker has been giving are reflecting poorly on the university by making it look like they hire reckless mad men. Decker objects to the muzzling that the Dean is suggesting, that he has proved it is possible to inject plant extracts into animals (well, yeah) and that he is close to discovering the key to the evolutionary link between plants and humans (wait, what?!)--but the Dean is adamant. Decker relents, saying he understands that it's fine to make an ass of himself but not at the expense of the university. Poor Dean Foster has no idea that he just tried to step on the dreams of a mad scientist, however.

So Decker goes home and injects Konga again. This time, through the magic of that awful "wavy lines" wipe, Konga grows from juvenile chimp to--a man in a gorilla suit. It's a pretty good gorilla suit as these things go, very expressive and all...but it's still a gorilla. There is no explanation for why Konga turns into a gorilla, other than this movie was made in 1961 and giant apes had to be gorillas. Especially because popular culture at the time saw chimpanzees as cute, largely gentle animals and gorillas are fearsome, powerful killing machines. Never mind it's actually the other way around.

Pictured: what happens when a chimp gets big.

Decker hypnotizes Konga and now the film's true plot kicks into gear. Rather than a King Kong rip-off as its title and poster promised, he film is more of a Murders in the Rue Morgue rip-of. Decker sends Konga to throttle Dean Foster to death. Naturally, Scotland Yard is puzzled because the Dean had no known enemies and the only evidence at the scene are black hairs belonging to some kind of animal--but no zoos or traveling circuses have reported any escapes.

Never trod on a mad scientist's dreams.

Of course, Margaret knows what's up. She confronts Decker in his greenhouse full of carnivorous plants, and after letting him know that she is fully aware of what he's done--she essentially blackmails him for her silence. Decker smugly advises that he doesn't really need her silence because no one would believe her anyways, but he agrees to give her what she wants to show how "generous" he is. So, Margaret demands he marry her. Decker shrugs and agrees that he'll do so after the semester ends so they can have a honeymoon.

So, rather against his wishes, Decker throws a party that evening at his home so they can sell their engagement. One of the guests is of particular interest to Decker, an Indian botanist named Professor Tagore (George Pastell) who is working along the same lines as Decker himself. Tagore is very interested in how plant hormones can influence animal growth. Decker advises that he would love to go over Tagore's research further, so Tagore hands him his card and tells him, "Come after midnight. Be sure to knock loudly on the door as I have no servants." I'm sure he forgot to add, "Also, all my neighbors are away and my home is completely soundproof."

So Decker visits Tagore and, after determining that Tagore's research is still far behind Decker's own, Decker has Konga kill Tagore. I mean, you can't be too careful when you want to take full credit for a discovery, right? Decker steals Tagore's notes and has Konga smash Tagore's lab. So now Scotland Yard has two bodies with no seeming connection beyond the same black hairs found at the scene.

A third will be on the way shortly. Decker takes his class on a field trip to collect plants and has Bob and the other students (including a very cute nerdy redheaded girl in glasses named Hermione, naturally) sit on the floor in the back of his van while Sandra rides up front. Then Decker has Sandra stay with him the whole time, culminating in a downpour forcing the others to seek shelter in a ranger cabin while Decker and Sandra go to get the van. While the kids listen to the least happening music in the cabin and dance around, Decker and Sandra come in laughing with his coat over them and her arms around his waist.

That's all Bob can handle. When Decker sends the class back to the van while he closes up the ranger hut, Bob stays behind. He tells Decker to leave Sandra alone. Decker's rather snarky responses make Bob angrier and angrier and when Decker slaps him, Bob flies into a rage and begins to strangle the crazed botanist. Of course, Bob has no idea how stupid it was of him to stop short of killing Decker and he's even dumber for begging Decker not to report his nearly murderous outburst.

But of course Decker is all to willing to keep mum. After all, the police will never be able to make the connection when Bob is ambushed by Konga as he is getting onto his motorscooter to go see Sandra. That Konga does not steal the motorscooter after strangling Bob to death is the movie's true missed opportunity.

Even Margaret is a bit stumped as to why Decker had Bob killed and she confronts him at breakfast with the film's greatest line, "What are you having with your poached eggs, murder?!" Margaret also points out to Decker that if he doesn't stop all these killings that Scotland Yard will eventually wise up and his research will be ruined. Decker sees her point and agrees that they should soon pack up and return to Uganda to lay low. He'll dispose of Konga, too, which horrifies Margaret. First, though,he should throw the cops off the trail by inviting Sandra over to dinner in order to make it seem like he's comforting a mourning student.

Of course, what Decker really wants is to get Sandra alone in his greenhouse. Once there, overcome with lust for her bullet bra and sweaty skin, Decker declares he wants Sandra to take Margaret''s place and join him in Uganda--and then he attempts to force himself on her. Margaret overheard this and decides to engineer her beloved mad scientist's comeuppance by injecting Konga with the remaining serum and hypnotizing him to follow her orders.

"Just make sure the plumber catches a red shell in the third lap, you hear me?"

Unfortunately for Margaret, the serum makes Konga do is growing thing again and the film's special effects take a hilarious nose dive. The now 15-foot ape decides to smash the lab and start a fire. He then picks Margaret up, or an obvious doll facsimile, and unfortunately listens all too well she orders him to "put me down" and he tosses her into the fire. Konga then grows to 40 feet tall and smashes out of the house and wanders over to the greenhouse. After peering in at Decker molesting Sandra, he smashes through the ceiling and grabs Decker. Poor Sandra gets her arm caught in one of the giant fly-traps, which we've been told can dissolve anything.

You know it's a film with a dim view of humanity when the only character who did nothing wrong is almost raped and then gets her arm eaten by a plant.

Konga carries Decker around London in a series of truly terrible effects shots. Konga does no real damage beyond occasionally swiping at crowds and terrifying people, but the military still rolls out the big machine guns and bazooka troops as Konga stands in front of Big Ben, doing nothing. The military declares they've no choice but to bring Konga down despite him having not been much of any threat.

"Quick, someone take a shot of me leaning on it!"

Now, despite the fact that the current scaling indicates Konga is around 200 feet tall, he's not any bigger in relation to Decker. And despite his height, the animated tracer fire and bazooka explosions from the military barrage indicate they are missing for most of it. Hilariously, Konga retaliates by throwing Decker at the soldiers firing on him. Eventually, Konga succumbs to no visible injuries and--in true werewolf fashion--reverts back to a tiny chimp. Somehow Konga and Decker lie dead beside each other and, The End.

"Well, he's still a better catch than Bob!"

Konga is not precisely a good movie, but boy is it a damned efficient one. It runs about 90 minutes and wastes precious little time in setting up its central premise and setting its titular gorilla loose to kill rival scientists and rebellious youth. It has a lot to recommend it to fans of b-movies. You have terrible nonsense science, a mad scientist the film is so eager to prove ruthless that it has him refuse to donate flowers to a hospital mere minutes before he shoots his own cat, a guy in a gorilla suit strangling a teenager on a Vespa, and finally a truly pitiful giant monster rampage.

Hell, the segments with Decker's students feel like a particularly square version of the rock-and-roll pictures of the same vintage--minus the music that isn't pathetic.

Where the film definitely becomes harder to swallow is when its misanthropy gets the better of it. As I said, even poor Sandra is deemed worthy of a horrible fate--even if the fly-trap doesn't out right kill her, she still gets to have her arm slowly and excruciatingly digested.

Konga is therefore a tough film to recommend. It's a lot of fun when it's firing on all cylinders, but sadly that doesn't include the woefully unimpressive rampage of giant Konga at the end of the film--which is just downright dull.

But up until then, it's a pretty happenin' party. And you know you want to see a jerk on a Vespa get murdered.

That concludes day 11. Go see what everyone else chose for K by clicking the banner above.

HubrisWeen, Day 10: Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993)

There comes a time in any franchise where the formula has just gotten stale or flat. Shoveling out the exact same formula every few years is no longer enough to keep anyone but the most devoted fans coming back for more--and they just don't cut it. So you can either bring the franchise to an end while it's still turning some profit, or try to shake things up.

The Friday The 13th franchise managed to try both approaches.

After Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan failed to perform as well as previous entries--no doubt due to negative word of mouth when people realized its title was basically a blatant lie--Paramount washed their hands of the franchise and sold the rights to any subsequent entries off to New Line Entertainment. New Line Entertainment, bizarrely, decided that the only thing to do with their new cash cow was to wait until the bad word of mouth about its last entry had died down sufficiently--and then kill it.

To do so, they hired the director/producer/uncredited writer of the original film, Sean S. Cunningham, to develop the story of the film. Cunningham had, like most involved in the franchise's origin, long since become like the mad scientist who lost control of his creation and ever since hoped to one day kill it. Given his chance, he decided to go about ending the franchise whilst shaking it up in a way I doubt anyone could ever have expected.

For you see, that hideous demonic worm on the poster is not the bit of blatant dishonesty I assumed it was as a child. And if you somehow have never heard of this film before my review, you'll never guess what I mean by that.

So, stop me if you've heard this one: a shapely young woman (Julie Michaels) drives out to a mysterious cabin in the woods by Crystal Lake. Despite all the strange noises and burnt-out light bulbs, she decides to strip down and take a bath. When the lights go out, she wraps a towel around herself--and apparently glues it there--before she is suddenly attacked by a shambling, deformed figure in a hockey mask wielding a machete (Kane Hodder, in his third turn as Jason Voorhees). She then flees from Jason, who nonetheless keeps up with her despite pursuing a running victim at a leisurely stroll, until she gets to a clearing--and she dives to ground as food lights switch on and FBI agents pour out of every hiding place to pepper Jason with bullets, until someone nails the undead maniac with a mortar round and blasts him to pieces.

Okay, so you probably haven't heard that last part before.

The woman who served as bait was also an FBI agent, you see, and apparently the FBI decided it was high time they put some real effort into eliminating America's most prolific serial killer. Unbeknownst to the FBI, they are being watched by a figure we'll later learn is famed bounty hunter Creighton Duke (Steven Williams, who would play almost the same role as Rufus on Supernatural many years later), who clearly doesn't believe that old Jason can be put down that easy.

Well, it would be a retread of a strong contender for the series' shittiest movie (Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning) if he were wrong, so naturally he's not. You see, rather than incinerating the Jason chunks or putting them in a rocket to launch at the sun, they are trundled off to a crime lab in Ohio for analysis. This proves to be a mistake. While the coroner (Richard Gant) is examining Jason's heart, which is twice as big as it should be and filled with a black, viscous fluid--the heart begins beating. The coroner, hypnotied by the heart, eats it. Immediately he is surrounded by glowing metaphysical energy--and promptly murders everyone in the facility, including the security guard (Kane Hodder, again) who dared to call Jason Voorhees a "big old pussy."

Now, it should be fairly clear to the average horror viewer before it ever gets explained to us that Jason has somehow possessed the coroner, especially when we see that his reflection on a shiny cabinet is that of Jason himself, but trust me--it's actually far weirder than that makes it sound.

True crime TV show, American Casefile, hosted by Robert Campbell (Steven Culp) picks up the story of the massacre in Ohio, as well as several more Jason Voorhees-style killings that indicate the killer is moving towards Crystal Lake. Campbell then cuts to an interview segment with Creighton Duke, who reveals that he knows that Jason is not dead because what was destroyed by the FBI was merely a vessel. The real Jason Voorhees is a creature that can jump from host to host. And it just so happens that Duke knows how to kill Jason, for good--and for a measly $500,000 he'll be happy to do the job. Naturally, Campbell immediately agrees to pay Duke should he produce evidence that Jason is still alive and that Duke has sent him back to the dead.

Meanwhile, Crystal Lake is celebrating the death of its most famous son in true capitalist fashion: the local greasy spoon is having a "Jason's Dead: 2-for-1 Burger Deal". As the proprietor of the establishment, Joey B (Rusty Schwimmer) explains to her fry cook son, Ward (Adam Cranner) while her diminutive husband Shelby (Leslie Jordan) looks on,  that one burger is meant to look like a hockey mask and the trimmings are used to make the second burger. Waitresses Vicki (Allison Smith) and Diana Kimble (Erin Gray) are less than thrilled with the crass exploitation of the murderer's death, but it pays the bills.

Diana has bigger problems. For at one of her tables sits Creighton Duke and he addresses her by saying that he knows who she really is and that he needs her help to truly kill Jason. When Diana's boyfriend Sheriff Ed Landis (Billy Green Bush) arrives to ask if Diana's customer is bothering her, Duke turns nasty and Landis orders Officer Randy Parker (Kipp Marcus, brother of the director, Adam Marcus) to haul him off to the station for disturbing the peace. Diana, however, is far more shaken up by Duke's words than she at first appears and goes to the counter to address Steven Freeman (John D. LeMay). Steven is her daughter Jessica's (Kari Keegan) ex-boyfriend and the father of Diana's infant granddaughter, Stephanie (Brooke Scher). Diana advises that if Steven ever wants to patch things up with Jessica, he needs to come over to Diana's house at 11PM that evening so she can tell him something.

While driving around later that evening, Steven picks up a trio of hitchhiking campers headed to the old Crystal Lake campgrounds. After making some jokes about the usual fate of people who do that in these parts, he drops them off--just barely being able to resist the invitation from the group's unpaired member. Naturally, it's a good thing Steven turned her down, though he can't have guessed why. The coroner appears at the campsite and kills the single woman with a knife, then after the couple seals their doom by deciding to not use a condom--he impales them with a sign post.

A word about the sex scene here: you'll note that it contains probably the only female and male nudity in the entire franchise. This was by the director's design, as he felt it was unfair that the franchise so often only included female nudity. So good on him.

Diana is closing up at the diner when she runs into Josh (Andrew Bloch), another police officer. Josh and Diana exchange some small talk about her relationship with Sheriff Landis and then Josh's married girlfriend shows up to pick him up for some illicit fun while her husband is off at bowling. Unfortunately for them, the coroner arrives and kills Josh's girlfriend by slamming her head in the car door. The next thing Josh knows, he's naked and strapped to a table in the old "Vorhees" (quoth the maiilbox) house. The corner shaves Josh with a straight razor and then leans in as if he were going to kiss him...

Meanwhile, Diana is at home waiting for Steven when she gets a call from Jessica. Jessica currently works as a production assistant for American Casefile. She will be coming home from California with her daughter to visit Diana--and she'll be bringing her new boyfriend with. Said boyfriend being none other than Robert Campbell, as it turns out. As Diana is talking to Jessica, suddenly Josh bursts into her house and attacks her--Jessica gets a hint that something is wrong when the call drops. Diana has no idea what Josh is after: until she sees the reflection of Jason Voorhees in the mirror.

She grabs Josh's revolver and shoots him in the head. Naturally, this does nothing and Josh holds her down as a bizarre serpent begins to snake out of his mouth--but luckily Steven arives just then and tackles Josh off of her. Unfortunately, Josh grabs a knife and kills Diana with it. Steven impales Josh with a fireplace poker and then Josh falls out the window, seemingly dead. But when Sheriff Landis arrives, he finds Steven hunched over Diana's corpse with bloody hands--and Josh is nowhere to be found. And so it is that Jessica comes home the next day to find Vicky scrubbing at the bloodstain in the carpet and finds out that Steven is the prime suspect in her mother's murder.

Steven finds himself in a cell next to Duke, who tells Steven that it was Jason that killed Diana. What's more, he'll tell Steven why if Steven is willing to pay the price--which turns out to be Duke breaking one of Steven's fingers for every bit of information he gives. Diana Kimble was actually Diana Voorhees, Jason's sister. You see, when the FBI destroyed Jason's body, the creature inside of him--the true Jason Voorhees--was forced to find a new vessel. Except, the average human cannot play host to Jason for more than a few days before its body self-destructs: Jason needs a very specific host.

"In a Voorhees was he born. Through a Voorhees may he be re-born. And only by the hands of a Voorhees may he die." Diana now being dead, Jason will try to either possess or kill his only remaining blood relatives: Jessica and baby Stephanie. The thing is, Duke knows how to kill Jason. Or rather, he knows how Jessica can kill Jason. When Steven offers Duke his hand for a third time, completely willing to once again endure a fractured finger, Duke advises him that the rest of the information is on the house--Steven needs to go to the old Voorhees house and find evidence to convince Jessica before it's too late.

Steven uses his broken fingers as ruse to grab Randy's gun and escape from lock-up. He briefly sneaks into the diner where Vicki is keeping baby Stephanie in the back room. Ward finds Steven standing over Stephanie, just as Steven confesses that it was the first time he'd ever been able to touch his daughter. Ward gives Steven his car keys and tells him to run. So Steven heads to the Voorhees house, walking past the jungle gym from The Birds on his way in. Inside he finds where Josh had been tied up and a desk covered with occult objects--including the Necronomicon prop from Evil Dead 2, which Steven leafs through. So Jason is a Candarian demon, huh?

Steven is forced to hide when Robert Campbell arrives, talking on his cell phone. See, Campbell has decided that they need to spruce up the Voorhees house with some body parts in the freezer and other macabre details--and then they'll film Jessica finding her mother's body, which Campbell has stolen from the morgue and hidden in the very closet that Steven is hiding in. Of course, Campbell didn't count on Josh barging in, grabbing him and passing the Jason parasite onto him. And now we discover that the bodies that Jason evacuates very messily melt into nothing.

Campbell wakes up, the parasite having taken hold, and heads off. Now Steven has his work cut out for him. Not only does he have to try to beat Campbell to Jessica, but he has to convince the woman who thinks that he murdered her mother that her mother was killed by a demonic entity that she alone can kill for good. A demonic entity that currently looks like her boyfriend, no less.

Good luck with that,

No wonder he wears a Jason suit,

As a Friday the 13th film, there's little question that Jason Goes To Hell kind of fails miserably. The only sequences involving anything that is recognizable as Jason Voorhees are wholly underwhelming--even as much fun as that opening sequence is--as the make-up for Jason this time around renders him a bulky, clumsy oaf. And in his second appearance, upon being reborn, he proves woefully unable to kill anyone who is not literally handcuffed to him.

Worse, the idea that Jason is actually some kind of body-hopping demon slug instead of the feral man-child and occasionally undead killer makes zero sense from any continuity standpoint. (Even by this series' standards!) And having the familiar Jason appear only at the beginning and end of the film must have been even more disappointing to fans of the series.

Strange then, that Jason Goes To Hell ends up being one of the best films in the series. Regardless of its plot, it has easily the most compelling characters in the series this side of Ginny in Friday the 13th, Part 2. The amount of characters you don't give a shit about is actually outnumbered by the ones you do care about. Even seemingly one-note characters like the diner owners have more depth than they first seem to.

Part of this may be that the film actually focuses on adult characters instead of the usual series reliance on adult actors playing teenagers. Since no one in the series has ever been much good at writing teenagers, that was a wise choice. And while the "estranged couple who have to reunite during a crisis" trope has been done to death, the addition of the couple having a child that the father has never even held adds an extra layer to it. (One that now rings fairly close to home for me, as someone who is co-parenting with an ex) That Steven and Jessica feel like ordinary people instead of typical Hollywood leads adds a lot to the way the audience relates to them, as well,

The makeup effects, aside from Jason Voorhees, are on the whole very accomplished. A particular standout being the messy destruction of Josh after he passes the Jason parasite on. The creature effects are a bit of a mixed bag: the slug we never get all that good a look at, but the demon baby thing that it turns into prior to finding a way to be reborn as Jason is pretty well-done--however the creatures that drag Jason to Hell at the end, as promised by the title, are just plain goofy. In a lot of the promo art you can see that Jason was originally dragged to Hell by some kind of demons--but in the finished film he is grabbed by big, clunky rubber hands. Why the cool-looking demons were jettisoned in favor of this laughable effect is beyond me. They couldn't possibly have been less convincing,

Demons...

...big rubber hands.

Regardless, I have to say that I genuinely enjoy Jason Goes To Hell, even if it's the sort of sequel that might be better off if it were an unconnected rip-off than an actual follow-up. Though, for once that's not because it makes the film look worse by association so much as it just doesn't feell like it truly belongs to the series it supposedly hails from. I mean, how do you rectify a demonic parasite that has to be killed with a magic dagger to anything contained in the previous films?

Either way, this is a really good horror film--though I hesitate to call it a slasher since aside from the death of the campers it never follows that formula--that deserves to be seen by fans of the genre. Hell, if you go about it like I did and watch this before you watch the preceding eight films, you just might enjoy it even more.

10 days down, 16 to go. Click on the banner above to see what the others chose for J.

HubrisWeen, Day 9: Incident at Loch Ness (2004)

Werner Herzog is a truly larger-than-life figure. The man has directed a multitude of films, many of which a less ambitious director might retreat from in fear--whether it's as artistically risky as remaking Nosferatu or are as legitimately dangerous as hauling a an actual fucking steamship over a mountain in Fitzcarraldo.

The man is, however, clearly not without a sense of humor. Watch Herzog's documentary Grizzly Man more than once and you begin to see that Herzog is, as they say, taking the piss throughout the whole thing. And nobody without a sense of humor could possibly have made Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans.

Herzog is, most certainly, not without a sense of humor about himself. Nothing demonstrates this quite so clearly as today's movie, Incident At Loch Ness. The film is one of those delightful films that nobody knows how to categorize--which can be a real detriment to anybody who might watch it happening across it, alas.

For instance, the film is--for all intents and purposes--a horror film. Its premise is a film crew looking for the Loch Ness Monster, while simultaneously faking her existence so they don't turn up empty-handed--only for a hostile Nessie to turn out to be all too real. Yet, the film is also, without a doubt, a comedy. Add in the involvement of a respected director like Herzog and nobody can quite figure out how to pigeonhole the damn thing into a stereotypical category.

My library has the DVD filed under "Drama," which is the farthest thing from what the actual film is that it might as well be filed under "Animated.'

We begin with an introduction to Werner Herzog, playing himself, as he gives some of his background to a film crew, headed by John Bailey (himself), shooting a documentary about him in July of 2003. Here Herzog teases that his next project is to be a documentary called "The Enigma of Loch Ness." Herzog is attracted to Nessie by the fact that he doesn't believe in Nessie one bit, showing off the most famous photo of Nessie and commenting on how the water gives away that it's a miniature. (Oddly he never touches on the fact that the photo in question was revealed, decades ago, to be a toy submarine and modelling clay by the man who took it)

As Herzog and his wife, Lena, prepare a supper for some guests, Zak Penn (himself), arrives. Penn, who is normally a screenwriter of such films as The Last Action Hero, X-Men 2, and Elektra, is serving as the producer of "Enigma of Loch Ness." Penn is a a bit unnerved by the documentary crew's cameras, which seems already a bit suspicious--and he requests to talk with Herzog un-miked. The crew films the conversation anyways, but aside from talks about possible production trouble it's nothing too bizarre.

Then Herzog requests that Penn find him a Nessie expert who is "obsessed, but credible." Herzog doesn't want someone easily dismissed as a whackjob. I mean, that's more the History Channel's thing.

There's a few amusing celebrity cameos as Herzog's guests arrive for dinner, including Jeff Goldblum and Crispin Glover. More relevantly, here we meet the director of photography for "Enigma of Loch Ness", Gabriel Beristain (himself), who was hired by Penn. The first hints of dissension begin to show here as Beristain, Penn, and Herzog discuss the movie. Herzog doesn't understand why the other two are talking about lighting and recreations for the documentary. Penn's manages to avoid answering the questions of either men, but successfully redirects them from the issue.

The next day, the documentary crew follows Herzog around as he prepares for his trip. Bailey asks Herzog why Penn is producing the Nessie documentary when Herzog usually produces his own films. Herzog explains that he basically couldn't pass up the money and enthusiasm that Penn brought to the production.

Once in Scotland, Herzog is greeted by producton coordinator Robert O'Meara (himself), who is none too enthused about yet another Nessie project in his country but clearly couldn't pass up working with such a legend. Herzog is eager to get to work on the project but Penn seems to be trying to herd him out of the production office, and greets the presence of Bailey's crew with clear disappointment.

At the first production meeting we are introduced to Russell Williams (himself) the sound mixer and David Davidson (himself), the captain of the boat the documentary will be using. Herzog is a bit dismayed that Penn and Beristain want to shoot for five days, which Herzog, O'Meara, and Williams find excessive. And then Penn whips out the film's jumpsuits--all designed like uniforms. Herzog, clearly beginning to think that Penn is a childish fool, decides it's time to go ahead and get started on filming some local interview footage and landscape footage.

Penn, meanwhile, heads off to a secret meeting--that Bailey's crew films without his knowledge. Pen is discussing the plans for a remote controlled decoy Nessie with a technician. Whatever Penn is up to, clearly he doesn't want Herzog to know about it.

After shooting a lot of good footage, Herzog is sitting down to a meal with Beristain when Penn brings in Michael Karnow (himself) and introduces him as the cryptozoologist that Herzog was looking for. Herzog buys Karnow as exactly the kind of suitably credible yet slightly insane talking head he wanted, but Karnow's behavior around Bailey's cameras is slightly...odd.

However, the crew encounters a problem: Williams can't get good sound aboard the boat because the engines are too loud. So Penn browbeats Captain Davidson into installing a smaller, quieter engine in the boat--against Davidson's objections that it's not safe. The day before the boat sets off, Bailey interviews all the crew who all seem very optimistic about the project.

The day of their depature, Karnow begins driving Davidson mad with all the bizarre cables and ropes he sets up aboard the boat. And then Kitana Baker (herself) arrives, as the crew's "sonar operator." Everyone is puzzled by her appearance, especially Herzog. So clearly her presence is Penn's idea. Just like the misspelled jumpsuits and renaming the boat Discovery IV--despite there having not been any Discovery's I, II, or III.

While Herzog interviews Karnow and sets up actual equipment, Penn has Beristain and Williams film Baker doffing her jumpsuit in favor of a skimpy bikini to dive into the Loch and set up "sonar equipment." Naturally, she nearly freezes herself to death. When Herzog catches the filming of this bit, he is furious that something is going on without his knowledge.

However, there is no explanation coming for as Herzog is demanding answers from Penn, Karnow shouts out that he has seen something in the water. It turns out to be nothing, but when the crew is setting up a shot for Herzog to directly address the camera--something does appear in the water, which Bailey barely captures. Nobody thinks anything of it and heads back to shore for the day.

Herzog confronts Penn the next day because he's figured out that Penn is trying to set up a very dubious hoax. The prop guy walking in with the room with the remote controlled Nessie only seals the deal. Herzog is ready to walk off the project, but somehow can't bring himself to do it. So the crew heads out on day two, with Penn at least acting somewhat contrite. The engine is struggling, but nobody pays that much mind.

Penn convinces Herzog to let Baker continue playing a sonar operator and interview her about the equipment, especially since---to her credit--she actually researched for the role. During the shooting of this bit, Beristain notices something in the water behind Herzog and Baker. Beristain mostly misses it, but Bailey gets a decent shot--a large, dark hump breaks the surface and submerges. It leaves a wake, surfaces once more, and then disappears. Beristain assumes that Penn set up an effects shot, but Penn--who missed the sighting--expresses ignorance.

In the pub that evening, nobody can decide what they saw. Some think it's Penn, Karnow thinks it's actually Herzog--but Herzog is definitely not sure that anybody could have pulled off that effect so convincingly.Poor Karnow is attacked in the pub by some angry locals for being involved in some kind of hoax at the expense of Loch Ness. The next morning Williams and Beristain are revealed to have deserted the production. Penn persuades Herzog to film--at which point we get a great exchange between the two about Herzog's history of difficult productions.

Herzog and Baker set up the sonar while O'Meara and Penn set up the fake Nessie prop and toss it overboard. Herzog refuses to film it--so Penn pulls out the flare gun and aims it at Herzog, in a deliberate reference to Herzog supposedly aiming a gun at Klaus Kinski. Herzog wearily explains that A) that story isn't true and B) the flare gun isn't even loaded.

And then their argument is interrupted when something slams into the boat. They decide to head for shore as a fog rolls in--but there's a sonar signal following them. Oh, and Penn had ordered someone to remove the guts of the boat's radio because of the noise interfering with the sound recording...and then the engine gives up the ghost.

The sonar signal comes back and slams the boat again, this time smashing a hole in the hull. Herzog sets off a flare, but O'Meara points out that nobody around will come because they all think this is a hoax. And then Karnow is knocked overboard, and the "hoax" closes in on him. It's unclear if the creature, the cold water, or his own panic does him in but Karnow disappears in the fog.

Penn absconds with the life raft (and O'Meara), and leaves the others to their fate. But the destroyed life raft floats back to the boat. Someone must swim for shore, but the water is freezing cold and there is only one wetsuit aboard. And the creature in the water is getting more and more aggressive...

Hey, Klaus Kinski has a cameo!

Doesn't exactly sound like a "Drama", does it?

However, it's hard to say if the film falls more into the horror or comedy genre. There are definitely stretches that play the concept as straight as possible, as with the later sequences of Nessie attacking the boat and crew--but the film credits roll over zany music and then there's the fact that Zak Penn (who directed, along with co-writing the film with Werner Herzog) plays himself out to be the most self-centered, opportunistic slimeball possible.

The film is definitely more hilarious than it is terrifying, so classifying it as a drama makes even less sense than you might have thought at the beginning. But if movies like Evil Dead 2 are qualified as horror, then this film definitely qualifies. Although you could qualify it as a "found footage" film, it actually is a "mockumentary," complete with after-the-fact interviews with the characters sprinkled throughout. Obviously this gives some of the film away in that we know who won't be dying, but it works.

Everybody is essentially playing exaggerated versions of themselves and it works wonderfully. Herzog and Penn are especially great; Herzog just seems to be generally charismatic, while Penn does an excellent job playing up the scheming, opportunistic douchebag role.

And what of the monster, you ask? The filmmakers wisely hedge their bets there. Whether due to budget or an intentional aura of mystery, we never see much more of the creature than its humped back slicing through the water. This allows the film to avoid having to include any explanations of what exactly the film crew is dealing with, which just makes the creature that much more threatening--hell, we don't even know if it's hostile because it's predatory or just territorial.

The answers don't really matter. Not in a story like this, where someone sticks their head in somewhere it isn't welcome and gets it bitten off. All you really need to know is that someone went looking for a monster and they found more than they bargained for. Or, in this case, two people both went looking for something they didn't think existed--and they both found out they were wrong.

And the film actually wants you to laugh at the look on their faces.

Thus concludes day 9 of HubrisWeen. Check out what the other maniacs reviewed by clicking the banner above, won't you?