hot blood sundae

this is nothing more than an extremely-softcore porn.  furthermore, it's the worst softcore porn i've ever seen.


the premise.  

the staff of an adult ice cream shop is dwindling.  the reason?... muuuurder!  even billed as a porn, this movie has potential to be entertaining, right?  i mean... i like ice cream... i like scantily clad women.  where could this go wrong?

first of all, the acting is absolutely atrocious.  now, i don’t mean ‘kevin costner’ atrocious... i mean ‘wednesday night at the improv’ atrocious.  and to further emphasize the abysmal acting, the writers (or should i say the director’s 11 year old son) opted to eliminate all organized thought and any chance of rational character development.   essentially, this is a porn... but when the characters would normally commit certain acts of indecency with each other, these characters would break into what felt like a cheesy heavy metal music video.  fake breasted women dancing awkwardly to some simple guitar riffs while the camera guy, clearly suffering from ADD, zoomed in and out (beavis and butthead would’ve had a field-day with this!).

frankly, i’m embarrassed.  i’m embarrassed i had this movie on my Blockbuster queue.  i’m embarrassed that i used our nation’s resources to have this movie shipped through the mail.  i’m embarrassed that i got up from the couch to put this movie in the dvd player.  i’m embarrassed that the main menu had an option to ‘play film’ (film?) and i pressed the enter button.  and i’m embarrassed that i watched as much as i did.  i even watched some of the special features, hoping that the cheesiness was an attempt at irony.  i was wrong.  as soon as the first ‘interview with the cast’ started and one of the characters in the movie explained that it was his first experience as an actor, i knew i had made a big mistake. 

unfortunately, today is sunday and i have no choice but to let this movie sit in my home for another 24 hours.  i thought about taking the ‘film’ to the mailbox anyway... you know... to make a point.  but as i said, today is sunday and i’m far too lazy to make any points.

since i did waste about 40 minutes of my life watching (half of) this movie, i suppose i should share some of the hilarity with you.  i told you that the movie involves an ice cream shop.  well, in every scene involving ice cream, they used some soupy, syrupy substance that more closely resembled melted ice cream than actual ice cream.  seriously... ice cream is what?... $3 a pint?  we couldn’t spring for the real thing, guys?

also, the murder scenes?... there’s absolutely no special effects (just implied violence).  the first victim is ‘stabbed’ repeatedly with the pointed-end of a waffle cone.  there was no breaking of the skin.  no effects.  just an arm making a stabbing motion, an oscar-worthy performance of screaming (ha!), and the addition of corn syrup blood.  another girl is covered with blood (a common theme in this movie and clearly just an attempt to show naked pornstars covered in syrup) while the murderer dumped whipped cream, nuts, and sundae toppings on her... UNTIL SHE DIES!  really?!  this is too much.

i’ve lost a little faith in horror movies... but mostly, i’ve lost faith in myself.  i, now, must reevaluate my entire queue.  

hot blood sundae 2... how’d you get on here?  

severance

[took a sick day from work yesterday and what better way to greet the morning/afternoon than by digging through the vault-- i remember being amused by this movie but that’s about the only thing i remember]


‘severance’ is a brit wit horror comedy. i’d throw it in the same category as ‘shaun of the dead’... but only it’s a slasher and not a zombie flick. this is a huge distinction; it’s a little easier for the average person to find humor in something obviously fictitious (even ‘serious’ zombie movies are amusing) but when you see someone (unwillingly) gutted with a large knife, i don’t think it’s human instinct to laugh. so with that in mind, i’ll take back what i said about it being a comedy... this is really just your basic slasher with better writing. the characters are well-developed and the dialogue is funny... a rare treat in the horror genre.


a group of co-workers heads into the countryside for a team-building retreat. when they happen upon a tree in the middle of the road, their self-righteous and naive boss decides they should take a shortcut to the lodge. the driver of the bus becomes very worried at this point and abandons them in the woods (hint). so the group heads off on foot and the first lodge they happen upon is a rundown building (obviously not a ‘luxury lodge’ like they were promised).  now, things slowly start to go wrong. they find (and start eating) a pie containing a human tooth (hint). while doing team-building exercises, a field of bear traps claims the leg of the brown-nosing dork of the group (hint). oh, and the bus driver is found dead just up the road (hint... oh wait, that one was good enough? we’re gonna start worrying a little bit? oh ok... just checkin’...).


from here, the kill-count steadily rises, but as i said before, i rather enjoyed this movie so i won’t go into great detail on the rest. i did learn a few things from this movie though...


- saucy american blondes make me happy.
- psychedelic mushrooms and serial killers are a bad mix.
- a man’s desire to get sexed up will always be his downfall.
- working for a corporation that produces and distributes weapons of mass destruction might get you killed.
- half-naked strippers brandishing firearms are almost as good as fully naked strippers.
- my upstairs neighbor must hear a lot of screaming coming from my apartment at all hours of the day.


'severance'... not only would i pirate it, but i'd probably buy it (if i found $20 in my pocket and all the beer in the world vanished suddenly).

black christmas

when it comes to phobias... well yes, i’ve got a few standards in my repertoire like public speaking, heights, and i’ve never been a big fan of spiders. but, like most people, i’ve also got a set of ‘special’ fears that are all-my-own.  for instance, i have this weird thing with west virginia and i’ve recently realized that moths give me the heebie-jeebies.  but perhaps the most humorous of the whole lot is my childhood fear of santa.  i kid you not.  and if my word isn’t good enough, don’t worry... there’s also photographic evidence.  i was definitely the kid in the mall making a scene in the line to see santa and looking at the photos now makes me question the intentions of those sadist bastards that took my picture instead of... oh, i don’t know... maybe getting me off that pink-faced stranger’s lap!  but i digress.

given my fear of santa and my desire to actually be scared by a movie, i was relatively excited to see that a christmas/horror movie existed... 'black christmas'.

the premise is simple...  

a psychopathic kid murders his family on christmas.  they’re dead and he’s sent to an institution.  it’s now some 20 years later and he’s escaped (a pretty gnarly escape involving a candy-cane shiv and the neck of a security guard).  well of course it’s christmas eve and he’s heading to his childhood house which is now a sorority house (excellent... i knew they’d work in a little ‘t and a’).  and you can pretty much guess what happens next.

does the premise sound a little familiar to anyone?  maybe if we substitute in one holiday for another... make it halloween instead of christmas?  everyone with me? hmm? hmmmm? ok, i’m done.

the movie gets a C- for originality.  the only saving grace was that this movie portrayed a bizarre conglomerate of murder and joyous christmas cheer.  an ornament adorned christmas tree sits in the corner of the room.  the stockings were hung by the chimney with care... and a yellow-skinned psycho is eating the eyeballs of your pledge sisters.  

which brings me right to my next point... what is the deal with the eyeball eating?!  i’m beginning to notice a trend.  the american public must be really disgusted by anything related to the eyes because these contemporary horror flicks are chock-full of this shit.  

anywho... back to the issue at hand.  ‘black christmas’ was decent but not worth another look.  there was a decent amount of suspense (or maybe i was just sufficiently buzzed) and i definitely had my preemptive-cringe going for a chunk of the movie.  but when the music swelled and the axe fell (no pun intended), i was far from impressed.  and no amount of eyeball devouring and squirting is going to change that.   

another thing to take note of... this psychopath has been sitting in a cell, concocting nothing but murderous and mischievous plans, for the last 20 years.  he finally escapes and now he’s going after who?... a group of sorority girls?  really?  not setting the bar very high, are we?  maybe we’ll move up to puppies and homeless people next?  

not the biggest waste of my time... but the rolling credits were a welcomed scene.

the hills run red

the opening scene of ‘the hills run red’ is someone slicing the skin off their own face.

and then... 

i’m told... in text... of a controversial movie that came out in the 80’s from a one-time director.  the movie was quickly pulled from theaters due to its graphic nature and none of the cast members (director included) were ever heard from again.  and i think it said something about a trailer but i was eating taquitos so who can be sure.

after some time (about 5 seconds), i’m introduced to our leading man who is sitting at a computer watching a trailer for what i’m assuming is our controversial slasher flick.  the rumors are confirmed; a trailer exists!

it’s now 15 minutes into the movie and i’ve already seen several nipples... full sets... all belonging to women, too.  the leading man (played by tad hilgenbrink, perhaps better known for his role as little stifler in the straight-to-dvd flop ‘band camp’) plans on making a documentary... an homage, really... about the controversial movie which was appropriately, if not somewhat obviously, titled ‘the hills run red’.  at this point, he’s already tracked down the director’s daughter who (gasp) is a stripper and (gasp)... a heroin addict!  which is a classic recipe for some purposeless nudity.  there was a sprinkling of intravenous drug use and stifler’s girlfriend has already cheated on him... with his best friend!  dun-dun-dunnnnnn.  

the movie is developing at a courteous rate and we’ve already covered several of a our ‘horror flick essentials’ (also... who the fuck was slicing up their own face?)...

but before we go on, let’s review...

a sexy brunette and two best friends (both in love with said brunette) team up with a sexy blonde.  no one’s shy and we’re heading into the woods to make a documentary about a slasher film.  

well i can’t be positive but all signs point to yes.  yes... i will be entertained.

it’s a decent story line with b-movie acting (perfect!), a sizable volume of fake blood, and     a few bonus points for style (there are some gruesome fatalities).  let’s get to the nitty-gritty though.  you can have EVERY element that makes up a good slasher flick, but it doesn’t mean dick without a frightening antagonist... am i right?  my bloody valentine’s pic-axe wielding coal miner wasn’t remotely scary (even in 3-D),  jason voorhees... well jason voorhees couldn’t swim, and then there’s my personal favorite, gary busey as a murderous gingerbread man in ‘gingerdead man’. aaaaand that one pretty much insults itself.  but in this movie, the image lurking in the night is that of a big beast of a man who has sewn the face of a baby doll to his own.  yea... i’m gonna have to give it a 7 on the creepiness scale because smiling babies and murder just don’t mix.  

all of that being said, i was definitely entertained by this movie.  yup... thoroughly entertained until the last 5 seconds.  the ending was teeeeeerrible!  it left me with more questions than bible class did when i was 13.  i’ll bite my tongue though... i’d hate to spoil such a poorly thought-out conclusion to an otherwise captivating movie.  

after-thought: this movie DID go straight to dvd so a brilliant ending was somewhat out-of-the-question.  i’d pirate this movie though... fo’sh. 

drag me to hell

i tossed ‘drag me to hell’ into the dvd player without knowing what to expect. i’m glad i wasn’t expecting much because i surely would have been disappointed.

i’ll admit it... there were some gross scenes (ie... formaldehyde draining from the mouth of a dead woman... INTO the sultry mouth of Alison Lohman. gross.) but all sincerity was lost when even my impaired, contact-less, eyes noticed the cheesiness of the special effects. i felt like i was watching ‘who framed roger rabbit?’ but only this time... the obviously-animated graphics weren’t cute.

you know those movies... the ones where everything seems to be working out for the “good guys” and you just hope and pray that there's not a happy ending? well this is that movie (and ironically enough... this is also how i feel about director Sam Raimi's career).

ugh, i don't even want to talk about this movie anymore...

28 days/weeks later

i’m sitting here watching 28 weeks later. for those of you who aren’t familiar...

[28 weeks later is the sequel to 28 days later. a government experiment goes awry when a group of PETA-loving hippies releases a shit-load of apes at a science laboratory. what they don’t know is that all the apes are infected with a virus... pure RAGE.

i shit you not.

chaos ensues and, actually, there’s an excessive amount of people forcing their thumbs through the eye sockets of someone else. i'm not sure what i did to deserve to witness such a grotesque scene more than once but that's neither here nor there.

after a period of time (i don’t know... say maybe 28 weeks!), the virus, believed to be contained, is re-released when two snot-nosed little whippersnappers get involved. mayhem breaks out again. thumbs. eyes. it’s terrible. the military calls a “code red” and orders the execution (not to be confused with 'evacuation') of all living people... infected or not. so a group of young go-getters (led by a sniper-gone-AWOL) starts making its way across the city... fighting off infected zombies AND military tough-guys. it’s a battle royale... and further evidence that hippies suck. anywho... as they’re making their way across the city, something happens and they’re forced to redirect their course a few times. no matter where they end up... whether it be a subway tunnel, a random building, or just the middle of some desolate neighborhood, the group always knows where they're going...]

and then it suddenly dawns on me...

i’m relatively new to chicago... a suburban creature at heart. if a zombie outbreak occurs in the city... i’m absolutely boned. the first turn we make, i’ll be completely lost. only this time, i won’t have my faithful computerized-companion to “recalculate” my course. and oh boy... really hopin’ the zombies don’t chase me toward the orange line... or the green line for that matter!

actually, zombies... if we could stick to the brown and red lines from now on, that’d be great. it’s been fun and all but let’s head back to the northside before someone really gets hurt.

the moral of the story... when an apocalyptic uprising of zombies starts terrorizing chicago (and they will), i'll worry about the face-bashing... but please, someone else carry the map.