Halloween III (1982): or, Tricks Just Ain't What They Used to Be

It's easy to get entrenched in a specific point of view, to an extent beyond the weightiness or even usefulness of the original argument that occasioned it. I'd wager we can all think of times-- whether we were discussing politics, religion, or the whether the responsibility for one party's having nearly dipped her ass in the toilet water is more appropriately assigned to the party who left the seat up than to the party who couldn't be bothered to even take a freaking LOOK at the thing before plopping right down*--where the question itself takes a back seat to the emotional investment both sides have in their stated, taken positions. Heels get dug in, battle lines get drawn, and the war rages independent of the larger considerations of right and wrong.

*Hypothetically

In such cases one runs the risk of becoming intractable, locked into not only a point of view but a moment in time, so that even when circumstances, tastes, or experiences bring new interpretations to the old data, one feels he cannot, MUST not abandon the argument into which he's poured so much time and energy. It takes an epiphany, a special kind of leap to climb out of the trench and reconsider things with a fresh, open mind. And, as it is often said, it takes a big man to admit he was wrong.

I am, if nothing else, a big man.

Also, hairy.

I decided shortly after my first viewing of Halloween III: Season of the Witch, more years ago than I'd care to admit (so long it might actually pre-date the film's production in a weird Dr. Who kinda way), that I just didn't like it. It wasn't because of the lack of Michael Meyers--while I do like the big guy, I'm not as emotionally invested in him as many around the horror blogosphere seem to be. It just failed to click for me, failed to coalesce into anything that stuck in my brain and said, "Hey, check me out--I'm awesome." Apart from a few clips on the requisite Halloween retrospectives and the occasional internet paean to the third flick's undiscovered genius, I thereafter avoided giving Halloween III much thought at all. When it did pop up, my thoughts usually ran, "Oh yeah, that's the one I don't like," and promptly dismissed it.

Well now I'm older, hopefully wiser, and definitely more understanding and forgiving of cinematic craziness than I was in my younger, overly serious days. So after listening to the Duke wax poetic on Tom Atkins's moustache for the umpteenth time, receiving a sealed command to the effect from the Administrative Offices of the Tenebrous Empire, and generally failing to find anything else appropriately holiday-themed and MAD sounding for my Halloween viewing this year, I decided to put the past behind me, swallow my pride, and give Halloween III another chance.

Internets: I was wrong.

Tom Atkins does more drinking and smoking before 10 am than most people do all day.

For the two or three people out there who don't know the story already, here's a quick and probably not entirely accurate history lesson: legend has it that after successfully ripping off--er, improving upon the holiday slasher formula pioneered by Bob Clark's justly revered Black Christmas, a young John Carpenter had Hollywood by the tail, not to mention a trailer full of empty Marlboro cartons. Dutifully cashing in with the relatively quick, right-where-we-left-off sequel Halloween II (a movie that unlike H3 I have *always* liked), the most successful indie filmmaker in history hatched a new and exciting plan for the series--rather than focusing on The Shape, each sequel would focus on the holiday of Halloween itself, delivering a new spook story every year or so, raking in the holiday horror bucks and allowing the directors and writers to flex their creative scary muscles while not being tied to any one set of characters or situations.

It's actually a very sound plan--a sort of "movie series as extended anthology" of the kind attempted by the HBO Tales from the Crypt movies.* But while we can safely blame Dennis Miller for the failure of that latter day series, John Carpenter's scheme was doomed by its progenitor's massive success. The Halloween brand was already locked in moviegoers' minds as "The One with Michael Meyers," and audiences proved unwilling to go along with any plan that did not involve his unsmiling, paleface-Shatner mug. The plan was abandoned and other writers and directors brought back The Shape in a series of profitable but largely bad sequels, leaving John Carpenter to pursue other projects while not sitting home smoking or cashing his steady royalty checks. Therefore Halloween III: Season of the Witch now stands as the only cinematic evidence of what might have been.

*The similarity of these movie-making schemes has led some conspiracy theorists to suggest that The Crypt Keeper is in fact an aged, tobacco-withered John Carpenter himself, trying to give the plot another go. Extensive investigations in comparative photography have not yet ruled out the possibility that the two entities are one and the same.

"Power Rangers? Iron Man? Don't be gauche."

I'm not going to go through an extended point-by-point summary of the plot; the Internets are lousy with them, and I don't need to add to that. In compressed form: the manufacturers of the most popular line of Halloween masks of the season turn out to be evil Druids from Ireland, who have stolen a piece of Stonehenge and are using chips of the magic rock along with modern technology to turn each mask into a Black Magical Head-Bomb! When triggered by a special television broadcast on Halloween night, the masks will kill all the little ghoulies watching by turning their brains into venomous snakes, spiders, and flesh-eating beetles, which will then presumably kill everybody else. Local alcoholic divorced doctor Dan Challis (Tom Atkins) uncovers the mask company's wicked scheme and must fight the CEO's army of superstrong clockwork automatons to prevent all the little monsters (including his own kids!) from getting a treat that would make Charlie Brown's rock-bag look good.

And there's no Michael Meyers. Get over it.

Revisiting H3 after all these years, I can see where it lost the younger me. It starts off silly and just gets progressively more insane until energetically leaping over the line into gleeful batshittery at the end. It does not operate by the same rules that apply to real life, or even cinematic life. It works instead by what La Belle Dame Tenebrous has called "kid logic." For instance, the villain's motivations are never quite clear--basically he's doing this because he's eeeevil, and that's good enough. The logistics of stealing a massive slab of granite from one of the best-known archeological tourist attractions in the world (and somehow smuggling it to a small rural town in California completely under the radar) are brushed aside with a throwaway line of dialog. ("We had a time getting it here--you wouldn't believe how we did it!") And the automatons--entirely gearwork and oil, they somehow have the power to crush skulls and rip heads off spines--that's one tightly wound mainspring! And with a single anonymous phone call, an unknown doctor is able to change the nationwide programming of 2 out of 3 major television networks. To the younger me, it's all just too many pills to swallow.

Of course the older me is ADDICTED to those pills.

Stick out your tongue and say AAAAAAAAAAAAUGH!

Because the thing about Kid Logic is, while it's not heavy on explanation or logistics, it excels at the spooky, stick-with-you idea or image. Why would anyone give a known killer--in an asylum--a razor-sharp hook for a hand? I dunno, but think of that thing hanging on your door handle. It WORKS. Same thing here--only turned up to eleven and set on FIRE.

It helps that the kids themselves are the targets of the wicked, deadly scheme. Baddie Conal Cochran (an excellently elegant and creepy Dan O'Herlihy) is not screwing around here. HE'S COME FOR YOUR CHILDREN. I mean, clockwork guys ripping the heads off hobos and battle-axe women with blowed-up faces are creepy enough, but GRAPHIC CHILD MURDER? That's above and beyond. I would posit that Lil' Buddy Kupfer's icky demise in Testing Room A (why are they testing on the DAY of the event? It doesn't matter) is directly responsible for the continued dismal sales of Jack-O-Lantern masks in the United States to this day.

In lieu of plot summary, I offer you this catalog of awesomenesses, taken chronologically from my viewing notes. Please feel free to add your own geekery over favorite moments in the comments:

• NIGHT SPRINTER! Lacin' up his shoes to keep the Samhain Safe! Crushin' Mormon-Bots between cars in a junkyard! Unfortunately, they know his weak spot. (Hint--the back of the bridge of his nose.)

YEE-OWCH.

• "Eight more days to Halloween, Halloween, Halloween..."
• Mormon-bot goes all Buddhist Monk in the hospital parking lot.
• DR. TOM ATKINS. The look on his face says "Man, I shoulda stayed in welding school..."
• Tom has obviously banged the red-headed coroner--I'm guessing in at least eight of the 24 morgue drawers.
• Wait, Michael Meyers IS in this one--on the TV at the bar. Tom's the only patron--I guess business *is* slow at 10:00 am.
• NIGHT SPRINTER's daughter is a black hole of acting ability. However, compared to Tom's ex, she's irresistible.
• The clerk at the hotel in Santa Mira: IRISH AS FUCK.
• "Where do you want to sleep, Dr. Challis?" "That's a dumb question, Ms. Grimbridge."
• Drunken Hobos: Now with the Easy-Opening Top!

Geezer Geyser

• The world needs more sweaty, freckle-backed Tom Atkins love scenes.
• ZAP! BLOWED-UP FACE FTW!
• Conal Cochran: the Man, the Myth, the Creepy Old Irish Dude.
  
• Tom calls in a favor from the coroner. He pays for his favors in COCK.
• Winnebago dad lists Cochran's accomplishments: "The Dead Dwarf Gag? The Soft Chainsaw?" WHY ARE THESE NOT IN THE MOVIE?
• Tom's always either having sex or throwing back a shot. I bet sometimes he does both.
• Knitting Woman Automaton will forever haunt my dreams.
• 'Little' Buddy Kupfer's death--one for the ages.

That'll never come out of the shag.

• This whole child-murder plot is actually quite chilling.
• DAYTON, OHIO! OMAHA, NEBRASKA! BATON ROUGE! LOS ANGELES! PHOENIX! They're bad, they're Nation-Wide.
• Coroner has to eat a Makita. Buys it Reservoir Dogs-style.
• Money quote:

  "You don't really know much about Halloween... you thought no further than the strange custom of having your children wear masks and go out begging for candy... It was the start of the year in our old Celtic lands, and we'd be waiting... in our houses of wattles and clay. The barriers would be down, you see, between the real and the unreal, and the dead might be looking in... to sit by our fires of turf. Halloween... the festival of Samhain! The last great one took place three thousand years ago, when the hills ran red... with the blood of animals and children."

• Tom's mask-tossing skills are second to NONE.
• OMG ELLIE AUTOMATON. She's been DISARMED.
• I don't know who Dick Warlock is, but I'm betting he's an international assassin.

Conal Cochran: "Suck it, Mike."

So there you go. I think the tally speaks for itself. I'm glad my friends forced me to give this one another go, because now I see what I've been missing all these years. While not perfect, H3 is always entertaining and even manages some creepy moments scattered amongst all the completely insane kid logic of the plot. So H3, I apologize. 2.75 thumbs. I'll be seeing you again...

358 days till Halloween, Halloween, Halloween...

MORE MADNESS...

Summary only...

Danger: Diabolik (1968): or, "Groovy" Begins with a "D"

I flatter myself that, by this point in my film-reviewing career, I've seen more than my share of groovy movies. From the off-the-hook soundtrack of Naschy's Vengeance of the Zombies to the Bond-parody sex-rompiness of the unassailable Zeta One, from the psychedelic kaleidoscope of All the Colors of the Dark to the booty-shakin' credits of Die Screaming, Marianne, on through the brain-melting bananary of the Russ Meyer ouvere, I feel that by now I should know from Da Groovy. I've put in the time, and I've reaped more than ample rewards.

But leave it to a maestro like Mario Bava to show me how barely I have scratched the surface when it comes to cinematic grooviness, what worlds of psychedelic wonder still wait to be explored. My novice-stature in this arena became embarrassingly clear to me earlier this week when I sat down to view Bava's masterpiece of comic book-y, super-villainy goodness, 1968's Danger: Diabolik.

What we have here is basically a master class in Doing It Right, late-60s version. Bava's impeccable visual style, applied to a source material to which it is perfectly, uniquely suited? Check. Hip-wigglin' score by the man who invented Soundtrack Cool, Ennio "Fookin'" Morricone? Check. John Philip Law in the role he was BORN to play? Check. Marisa Mell as one of the most gorgeous femme fatales EVAR, not to mention prototypical James Bond villain Adolfo "Thunderball" Celi? IT'S ALMOST TOO MUCH GROOVY!

Based on the wildly popular (and still going strong) fumetti created by sisters Angela and Luciana Giussani in 1962, Danger: Diabolik recounts the adventures of the master criminal and mystery man known only as Diabolik (John Philip Law). Leaving the origin story for those with the resources and inclination to track them down (or else trusting his audience to know already), Bava presents Diabolik's exploits as a series of distinct capers, each one more incredible and dangerous than the last. With apparently unlimited financial and technological resources, a ruthless, cunning, amoral intelligence, and the assistance of his equally capable lover Eva (the completely stunning Marisa Mell), Diabolik steals millions from the private sector and the government alike, always several steps ahead of his hopelessly outmatched adversary, Inspector Ginko (Michel Piccoli).

The opening episode finds Ginko charged with protecting the transfer of $10 million in hard cash from one bank to--well, somewhere else. Since it's "The largest single shipment of dollars ever made...at six in the morning!" Ginko is worried that Diabolik will jump up to make an impromptu withdrawal. Thinking to outwit the Master Criminal, Ginko sends a heavily armed motorcade complete with motorcycle escort and rooftop sniper protection out the front door, carrying sacks and sacks of BLANK PAPER! The real shipment is stashed in a fake diplomat's car--a Rolls Royce, natch--which will take an alternate route to the harbor where the cash will be loaded on a ship, for some reason. The old bait-and-switch--that NEVER FAILS!

Eyes on the Road

Except when it does, as is predictably the case here. Once the shipment arrives at the seaport, an array of stylish chrome nozzles lays down a multicolored smokescreen, throwing Ginko's well-practiced plot into disarray. The men fall out of the Rolls and start flailing uselessly at the smoke until Ginko tells them to knock that shit off, at which point they realize that the Rolls itself has disappeared! Looking up, the men see the car being magnet-craned out over the water, a lone figure in black leather striking an iconic pose on the hood. Brandishing the sacks full of money and letting loose one of the great eeeeevil laughs of cinema history, Diabolik leaps into the bay amid a flurry of gunfire, having outsmarted, outplanned, and outplayed Ginko once more. Roll credits!

And when I say roll, I mean ROLL. The credit sequence here really sets the tone for the whole flick, with a whirling psychedelic kaleidoscope spiraling out of control under comic sans serif lettering, all to the strains of radio hit and unofficial Diabolik theme song "Deep Deep Down." (Check it out here [youtube, audio only]: you'll be glad you did.) Once the names have been called we join Diabolik in mid-getaway, dodging machinegun fire in his trademark black Jaguar before ducking into a tunnel to evade the cops. Inside he meets Eva in her trademark WHITE Jaguar, switches cars, and sends the untenanted black Jag outside and over the cliff. While Ginko and the cops investigate the wreckage, Diabolik and Eva double back and head toward the supervillain's AMAZING underground lair.

You should see the basement!

On the DVD commentary track, John Phillip Law and Bava biographer Tim Lucas talk a lot about the director's amazing use of matte paintings on glass panes to create sets that weren't there, and according to them, very little of Diabolik's RAD Cave actually existed. Part of me wants to tell them, "The HELL you say!" because the effect Bava achieves here and elsewhere throughout the flick is nothing short of astounding. The lair looks real and expansive, with cavernous rock walls, futuristic walkways and parking pods, and a million other details that make the whole thing come to life. (A scene in which Eva walks up some stairs and across the fake set is so seamless, it puts modern CG-created set work to shame.) This "glass pane" technique had been used in Hollywood at least since the 30s (those famous castle shots in the Universal Horrors made extensive use of painted mattes over real, partial sets), but if anyone ever did it better than Bava did, you didn't hear it from me. A real visual feast.

Diabolik parks the white Jag in a garage-cum-elevator, and having nothing better to do, he and Eva make out most sensuously while the car descends to the lower levels. Yes, they're making out in a JAG, which in turn is IN AN ELEVATOR--why settle for one makeout fantasy when you can have two? Then, after a truly groovy "duelling showers" scene shot through psychedelic glass, we find out why someone as rich as Diabolik REALLY wanted all that cash: to spread it over a gigantic, circular, rotating bed so that he and his amazing blonde girlfriend can have SEX on it, of course! As though there could be any OTHER reason...

Back in London, the Powers that Be are not enjoying being made fools of, least of all the Minister of Finance, played to stuffy British broad-comedic perfection by Terry-Thomas, the lovable gap-toothed comic of Dr. Phibes fame. At a press conference the Minister announces that in view of Diabolik's wanton disregard of decency and the law, Parliament has reinstated the Death Penalty in hopes of deterring further embarrassment. Of course what neither the minister nor Ginko realize is that Diabolik and Eva are in attendance at that very press conference--Eva especially keeping it very low key in a BANANA YELLOW overcoat and UH-MAZING EUROTRASH SUNGLASSES. To show their disdain for the government's attempts to reign them in, Diabolik and Eva release "EXHILARATING GAS" on the Minister, police, and attendant press, and the resulting exhilaration is enough to get poor Terry fired and Ginko in hot water with his boss once again.

Since it was Italy in the 1960s, they actually blended right in.

For me this scene really established the character of Diabolik in the film--not only is he a brilliant criminal, but he also has a playful streak that plays in to everything he does. There's no reason for him to pump the party full of laughing gas other than as a sort of "Nyah-nyah" prank, for which the potential downsides--i.e., getting caught and HANGED--are nowhere near the provisional gain. And yet he does it anyway, because that's just how he rolls. (Also, I think, to make his beloved Eva smile; again, WHAT BETTER REASON?) Though he later racks up quite the body count with his trademark throwing knives and terroristic explosives work, I could never see him hereafter as anything more than a mischievous, playful, very horny kid.

Next, in my favorite totally extraneous scene in the film, we get to see a psychedelic nightclub party in full swing--complete with a Hippie playing a Xylophone Stairway, a Nature Nymph in repose, Go-Go Girls with Bilo-Tatts, Mamas and Papas-style music, rampant drug use, and some of the most athletic fruuging you'll ever see outside an Olympic venue. The police raid the party and we never see it or hear it referenced again, but some things are so awesome that they need no justification. They just ARE.

Taking a different tack, in the next episode Ginko decides to bring down the hammer on organized crime, in hopes that the added pressure will lead the gangsters to join in the hunt for Diabolik in order to get the fuzz off their tips. (Oooer.) An awesome spinning headline montage and some groovy animated map raids attract the attention of crime lord Ralph Valmont, played with wonderful oily menace by Adolpho "Thunderball" Celi. Valmont wastes no time establishing his awesomeness, dropping an uppity underling out the trapdoor of his in-flight aircraft and hosting a party at his pad with a priceless emerald necklace as the guest of honor. Watching the announcement of the party on television in between makeout sessions, Eva asks Diabolik for the necklace as a birthday present. And we're off!

A horrified Valmont realizes he left his Viagra on shore.

The Caper of the Emerald Necklace is better experienced than read about, but highlights include: an awesomely animated Identikit sequence; Valmont calling an underling a "DUMB-HEAD!" as well as delivering the immortal line: "San Francisco crossed you out of the medical register--but I'll drop you out of the HUMAN register!"; Diabolik taking out guards with his patented throwing knives and changing skintight leather outfits to blend in with different colored walls; an amazing escape involving a catapult that had me grinning like a chimpanzee; skydiving interrogation techniques YOU can use; and a method for recovering the jewels that I'm just going to go ahead and call the COOLEST EVAR.

Enough cannot be said about the visual style of the entire flick, and that's all Bava, baby. A recurring mirror motif becomes more noticeable and awesome as the movie goes on, and the brilliant, absolutely clear blue skies in every single exterior daytime shot just open up the frame like all outdoors. The mise-en-scene is never less than painterly (no wonder, since Bava *was* an artist), and the groovy colors and creative compositions mean there's always something wonderful to look at.

The actors are fantastic as well. John Philip Law is an imposing blank slate for much of the film--in fact he has no dialogue at all for nearly 35 minutes, and afterwards his deadpan delivery is less wooden than it is cool and collected--Diabolik never loses control, is never flustered, and seldom needs to raise his voice. Piccoli as Ginko is also good, conveying the capable, intelligent inspector who's nonetheless out of his league, doing particularly well when he's forced to admit his grudging respect for his adversary. Celi owns every scene he's in. Marisa Mell would be hypnotic if she never said a word--therefore, her wonderful portrayal of the playful, completely devoted partner to Diabolik's strong silent-type is an added bonus, and their chemistry is fantastic. (And, according to Law's commentary, very very real.) And even though the most flesh Mell shows is a long, luxurious shot of her smooth, bare back (zang), the sexuality she exudes along with the implication that for Diabolik and Eva EVERYTHING IS SEXY (the capers could be interpreted as complex, dangerous sessions of extremely satisfying foreplay) make this movie seem a lot dirtier than its retro-conned PG-13 rating.

You know, when you wear a mask that EXACTLY conforms to your facial features, it's pretty obvious you're just fucking with people.

In the final caper of the flick, after Diabolik destroys all the buildings housing tax information for the entire British Empire (shades of Fight Club more than 20 years earlier), Ginko takes the extraordinary step of converting a large part of the British gold reserves into one 20 ton ingot, reasoning that even Diabolik couldn't steal something THAT large. Alas, he's predictably, tragically wrong again, and watching Diabolik foil him one last time is nothing but 100% fun.

The commentary track with Law and Lucas is informative and worth a listen, if for nothing else than Law's obvious and contagious joy about the whole thing. They have some interesting observations about the problems with bringing Diabolik back today (he is, after all, basically a terrorist), and how even in '68 Bava dialed back some of the character's cruelty from the comics. Also interesting is the stated fact that Dino de Laurentiis apparently gave Bava $3 million to make the flick, and Mario brought it in for an amazing $400K--when you see the finished result, you'll wonder how even $3 mil could cover it. It's no wonder that the movie has been called one of the greatest comic book adaptations ever, and is still considered so by some, if their purview stretches beyond Spider-Man and The Dark Knight.

So for beautiful camera work all the way through, amazing low-tech special effects, inventive plotting, a spectacular score by Morricone, and no shortage of gorgeous groovy-girls, I give Danger: Diabolik 3 thumbs. Deep, deep down, I think you'll dig it.

OBEY!

Many thanks to Empress Kate of the Tenebrous Empire for providing the pixels and impetus!

MORE MADNESS...

Summary only...

Basement Jack (2008): or, It's the Manager's World, We're All Just Leasing It

If you take a quick look at the handy-dandy labels down the right side of the page, you'll notice that our focus here at Mad Mad Mad Mad Movies trends very strongly toward films of the 1970s. Not for nothing, either--if there's ever been a decade chock-full from one end to the other with bloody, sexy, awesome goodness, that's the one, baby.

But much as I like to sink myself deep into the hot, sticky voluptuousness of a Naschy monster mash or palpate a paean to Satanic Panic from my favorite era, every now and then I do come up for air to see what's up in the World of Horror, Present-Day Version. Most of these explorations lead to a quick deep breath and another dive, leaving only a bubbly turbulence on the surface, but occasionally I see something that catches my attention and gives me hope for the future. And such was exactly the case when I recently got a look at an indie slasher flick with a difference, Michael Shelton's 2008 effort Basement Jack.

Now as far as it goes, Basement Jack does not break much new ground. A young boy abused by his psychotic mother grows up to become a legendary, unstoppable killing machine; a sexy young girl survives one of his rampages and devotes herself to putting an end to his reign of terror before any more innocents suffer under his knife. An inexperienced cop joins forces with the survivor girl against the dictates of his stuffy, by-the-book chief and his deriding coworkers, leading to the expected confrontation with the killer and an ambiguous conclusion that serves as a swinging unlocked door to Sequelville. Eighties' Slasher 101, right?

But remember, I said Basement Jack was a slasher with a difference--and for me it had that little something extra, that distinguishing detail that looms larger and larger upon reflection until at last it grows into a juggernaut of awesome that--for the first time in a long time--has me chomping at the bit for the sequel. That detail is not a what, but a who--and that who is not the Rookie Cop, not the Sexy Survivor Girl, not even the electrified menace of Basement Jack Riley himself.

The detail's name is Nathan Bexton, aka THE MANAGER. Make a note. Jot it down. You're going to want to remember it.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves:

At least one uncredited writer had a hand in Basement Jack's script...

We open with an archetypal Urban Legend set-up (one of my top 5 archtypes): a boy and a girl making out in the back seat of a land yacht up at Inspiration Point or its equivalent. As things get hotter and heavier, the music on the radio is interrupted for a SPECIAL NEWS BULLETIN. A psycho killer is on the loose in the vicinity, a phantom of a man with the unusual MO of hiding in the basements of family homes until his homicidal rage is triggered by a lightning storm, at which point he murders everyone in the house--hence his media-assigned moniker "Basement Jack." Thunder rolls in the background, and the girl's sexy mood dissipates. She insists that her frustrated lover take her home before the storm hits.

By the time they reach the girl's home, the storm is in full force and the power is out. The boy gallantly accompanies his girlfriend inside, where they make the expected gruesome discovery: the whole family--mother, father, younger siblings, the lot--are arrayed around the dinner table, their throats cut, while before them the gutted family dog serves as an attractive centerpiece. A flash of lightning reveals the killer himself in the shadows, a tall thin dude with long dark hair and a dripping machete. Again adhering to the outlines in the back of the 80s Slasher Handbook, the randy boyfriend falls victim to the killer's blade, and after a bit of required tension the girl escapes into the night.

A decade later that girl, Karen Cook (Michele Morrow) is hunting Basement Jack across country, a roadmap in one hand and weather pattern charts in the other. Along the way she meets Officer Chris Watts (young Naschy lookalike Sam Skoryna), a rookie cop in trouble with the department over a recently blown collar. (He forgot to read the suspect his rights--curse you, Miranda protections!) Of course no one but Chris believes that Karen might actually be able to help them capture the previously untrackable killer, and so she is roundly ignored and derided by everyone in the department, except for her beefy first-year admirer. Throughout the rest of the movie, Karen and Chris hunt the killer, their helpful suggestions ignored by the department as Basement Jack cuts a bloody swath through the community every time the lightning flashes, which as you'd imagine is incredibly often this time of year.

Don't hate me because I'm beautiful--hate me because I just killed your damn dog.

However, the movie does not seem as concerned with Karen and Chris's back story and burgeoning romance as with Basement Jack himself. Unmasked from the beginning of the movie and wearing no disguise other than shadows, the titular character is also the center of narrative focus. We spend a lot of time exploring Jack's history and motivations in candy-colored 1950s-style flashbacks, all centered around Jack's...shall we say, "problematic" relationship with his mother.

Jack's mom is one of the two real casting coups of the flick, as the producers secured a true horror/exploitation legend (in Vicarious circles, anyway) for the role, the fabulous Lynn Lowry (Romero's The Crazies, Cronenberg's Shivers, and David E. Durton's MMMMMasterpiece I Drink Your Blood). Lowry is absolutely riveting as Jack's unhinged mother, who cradles and sings to a life-sized toddler doll when she's not punishing her disturbingly silent son most harshly for any and every transgression, real or imagined.

And how does she punish him, you might well ask? Why, with mother's little helper: ELECTRICITY! At various points throughout the movie we see her forcing Jack to stick his tongue to a...well, battery of 9-volt batteries duct-taped together (nota bene: do NOT try this at home--18 volts has more of a kick than you might think), strapping him to a chair in a puddle of water and running live lines near his soaking feet, and most memorably chaining him to a metal post outside just as a thunderstorm starts and telling him "God will punish you!" The fact that she follows each of these punishments up with a sing-song refrain, "Mama loves you, with a cuddle and a kiss!" just ratchets up the child-abuse ickiness another few notches.

"Wet the bed NOW, you little shit!"

(Lynn also has her son take the rap for some neighborly dog-murder for which she is responsible, which leads to another disturbing scene in which the young boy is subjected to electroshock therapy--"with a cuddle and a kiss." But my favorite fucked-up Mommy scene is one in which she takes it upon herself to educate Jack in the mysteries of sex--by forcing him to sit by and watch while she blows a dumpy bald guy! I can't decide what's more awesome about this scene: the excellent looks of comical discomfort on Lynn's assistant's face, cutting his eyes down to the bidness and then back to the eerily silent audience of one--or the fact that, for no reason I was able to determine, the dude is dressed only in the lower half of a CHICKEN SUIT!)

(No, wait, I've decided: it's the chicken suit.)

So there you have it--screwed-up childhood, understandable Mommy issues, and a psychological aversion to but physical tolerance for high levels of electricity--not too shabby, as serial killer back stories go. And as Basement Jack does his dirty work, we get buckets of blood, a few decent kills, a smattering of gore scenes (though we also have to suffer through some rather iffy CG stab effects--as even in the best it is), and some fairly well choreographed fight scenes between Jack and Karen. The quirkiness that spawned the chicken suit shows up in a more restrained form later as well, when in one his basement hideouts Jack discovers a SUPER-MACHETE complete with lower-arm support brace and billy-club grip! WHO has that in their basement--I mean, besides AWESOME people?

(During my viewing I noted this weapon snarkily as a "power-up"--so you can imagine my delight when I found that, in the production notes on the Basement Jack website, writer/producer Brian O'Toole admits that Jack's weapon upgrade was inspired by his love of video games. Credit for Intention, and for Going There when just about everyone would have told you not to. That's the way you take something goofy and make it goofy and AWESOME, IMO. And Brian, if you need a quality tester for Basement Jack: The Game, LET ME KNOW.)

Now I said Lynn Lowry was one of two slices of casting brilliance in Basement Jack--and she is just GREAT, make no mistake. But the other one, the one that has me excited for the sequel and in a happy place generally replaying his scant scenes in my mind, is the aforementioned future icon, Nathan Bexton as The Manager.

The most awesome thing in this picture has no blade.

You see, Officer Watts is not exactly rolling in dough, and so he resides in an ancient, run-down apartment building called The Necropolitan. (Currently #1 and #3 on the Vicar's "Names of buildings I want to live/die in" lists, respectively.) Bexton is The Manager of The Necropolitan, and unless my count is off he has a total of four scenes--and I'd be very surprised if those scenes totaled up to more than seven or eight minutes before the cameras, probably somewhat less. Still, I honestly can't remember the last time an actor with so little screentime made such a huge, lasting impression on me, but Bexton DID it.

You see, I'm a sucker for substrate. I get a little frisson of geeky pleasure whenever a throwaway line of dialogue or a strange bit of business in the background makes the suggestion that somewhere, behind or beneath or even above the actions we're watching on screen, there's a whole OTHER movie going on that happens to intersect this one at just this specific moment. It's not done often, but when done right, little things like this add a depth of imagination and fantasy to the proceedings that sets my brain whirring and ups my enjoyment factor by at least a full point.

And that's the pitch that The Manager knocks out of the park. Bexton invests the character with a knowing, sinister, devilish playfulness that's hard to describe objectively. It's in his old-fashioned wardrobe and exciting facial hair; it's in the way he holds his mouth, the twinkle in his eyes, his small gestures and odd inflections of seemingly mundane pleasantries. Everything about Bexton's performance lets you know that behind that door, behind those eyes, something evil and awesome is going on--and if you're anything like me, you're DYING to know what that thing is.

I really don't want to spoil Bexton's performance for anyone, because it's a tour de force that must be seen and appreciated by all. suffice to say no one collects rent like The Manager, and that's not *all* he collects. A late scene in which he answers the door to Basement Jack while chatting to unknown parties on his cell phone is, for my money, an Icon-Builder, and his return for an ending coda had me bouncing in my seat with glee. It was all I could do not to stand and applaud--which, the more I think of it, I *totally* should have. Nathan Bexton earned it.

One crew member dons shades in order to bask in Nathan Bexton's awesomeness, while The Manager's nearness causes another to erupt with explosive backsweat.

Thus fired with my new cinematic man-crush, I rushed to the Internets where even more stores of glee awaited. I learned that Basement Jack is the second installment in a projected trilogy centering around The Necropolitan and the strange events that occur there. The first installment, Evilution, was also completed this year, and like Basement Jack is still seeking distribution. (In that film The Necropolitan is quarantined after a viral outbreak that turns its inhabitants into kill-crazy monsters--and yes, The Manager is there.) Best of the best? The third installment, currently in development by Black Gate Entertainment/Island Gateway Films, is entitled simply The Necropolitan, and looks like it IS that OTHER movie--the story of The Manager, starring Nathan Bexton! You hear that fluttering sound? It's my hummingbird heart.

Getting back to the film at hand, though--Basement Jack is not without its problems. While imposing visually, Jack himself is too one-dimensional to be very interesting as a character, and the fact that we spend so much time lurking with him as he offs one piece of machete fodder after another did result in a bit of drag for me. Sticklers for logic will also note that the machete is a slashing/chopping weapon, ill-suited for stabbing, though Jack habitually runs his victims through before chopping them up (using some of the aforementioned bad CG, in the most egregious cases).

That said, the flashbacks always held my interest, and Director of Photography Mathew Rudenberg provides a plethora of striking, interesting compositions and atmospheric lighting effects throughout--I don't know what the budget was, but I'd be willing to bet Rudenberg made it look a lot more expensive than it was. The leads and supporting characters all give it their all (though I never quite got any chemistry off Morrow and Skornya), and Eric Peter-Kaiser as Jack does a good job kickin' the serial killer Eerie Von-style. Throw in Lynn Lowry's fantastic turn as Mamma Riley, and then sprinkle on the awesomeness of Nathan Bexton as The Manager, and those gripes outlined above fade into the shadows. It's a movie that, the more I think of it in the cold light of day, the better and better I like it. And how many movies can you say THAT about?

"Hey Ma, what's for d--aw, man, AGAIN?"

I've seen many movies with good distribution deals that would not be fit to rinse Basement Jack's jockstrap, and it's a crying shame that the film is not yet out there in front hungry, appreciative fans. It's running the festival circuit, though, and hopefully one day soon a DVD distributor will pull his head out of his ass long enough to see that he should TOTALLY be putting out Basement Jack. Come on guys, get on the horn--you can even have a back-cover blurb from the Vicar, free of charge:

"Basement Jack is an exciting, kick-ass old-school slasher, and Nathan Bexton walks the earth like a freakin' God!"

I will not stop until that man is an Icon. Mark my words.

Started out a 2.75 thumbs, but further reflection on The Manager has pushed it up to the coveted 3 thumb stratosphere. See it if you can, tell all your friends. And tell The Manager that the Vicar sent you.

And to call me.

"And as God is my witness, I will never go dwarfless again!"

(All photos © Island Gateway Films/Black Gate Entertainment. Check out Basement Jack's official site here. Please don't sue me, guys. Tell Nathan I love him.)

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All the Colors of the Dark (1972): or, Rosemary's Babe

I remember vividly sitting down to watch Lady Frankenstein for the first time, and being completely amazed not only by the fact that no one had ever told me what an awesome, well-made, and gorgeously pervy public-domain flick it was, but also by the inexplicable idea that a creature as gorgeous, talented, and prolific as Rosalba Neri (aka Sarah Bey) had somehow escaped my notice for so long. I mean, she is so TOTALLY Relevant to My Interests, and yet it took a chance encounter with a 50 Chilling Classics disc to bring the two of us together at last. (Yet another reason the 50 Chilling Classics set has been worth its weight in platinum.)

Well, the older I get, the more I learn, and the more I learn the more I realize how little I actually know. The truth of this maxim was brought home to me yet again last week as I watched Sergio Martino's beautiful 1972 psychadelic devil-worshiping freakout All the Colors of the Dark and was introduced--incredibly, unaccountably, inexcusably for the first time--to the cinematic hunk of gorgeousness that is Edwige Fenech.

Seriously, people, you have GOT to clue me in on these things! Throw me a frikkin' bone, here!

In fairness to my readers, though, there's really no reason I should have been so tragically ignorant. After all, Ms. Fenech is hardly an undiscovered flower in the thick-growing jungles of filmdom. From 1967 to 1987 she starred in more than 50 movies, including such you-MUST-have-heard-of-this-one titles as Strip Nude for Your Killer, Five Dolls for an August Moon, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, Blade of the Ripper, and the "now on the Vicar's Netflix queue with a BULLET" flick from the same year as Colors, Ubalda, All Naked and Warm. Hell, she even did a cameo in Eli Roth's Hostel Part II, and if memory serves still looked pretty good. So really, I've only myself to blame.

After a very moody credits sequence that MUST have been the inspiration for the famously creepy Tales from the Darkside opening (an idyllic woodland scene in vibrant colors getting progressively darker and more shadowy until reaching absolute blackness for Martino's directing credit), we're thrown right into the brain-busting action with one of the freakier dream sequences I've seen in a while. On a darkened studio set with strange, cut-out furniture and windows, nightmare tableaux are illuminated by garish spotlights: a horrifying old woman in Baby Jane make-up and costume leers nastily at the camera, arms stiff and jerky like a marionette's; a pregnant woman with a huge afro lies naked on a gynecologist's table, the camera zooming in on her tired, angry expression; extreme close-ups of unnaturally blue eyes give way to a naked Eurohottie being stabbed to death, all while a disturbing "La la la la" song plays in the background. It's surreal, disturbing, and absolutely nightmarish stuff, really unsettling the viewer from frame one.

"Have you ANY IDEA what time it is?"

The dream ends with a speedy trip down a highway filmed in negative, with the camera veering off and crashing into a roadside tree--and then Edwige Fenech wakes up, twisted in the sheets and wearing a loose nightie. Still in her nightmare fugue state, Edwige stumbles to the bathroom and gets under the shower, letting the water run over her white nightshirt and thus expose the wonders beneath. Though I was still reeling from the nightmare from which our heroine has just awakened, I couldn't help marveling that the water didn't turn to steam from the hotness. Nightmares, death, and sex, all within the first few minutes. Don't fuck around, Sergio, just GIVE IT TO ME!

Edwige is Jane Harrison, a woman still recovering from the mental shock of a car accident that took the life of her unborn child and was the starting point for the horrifying nightmares that now plague her sleep. She lives with the baby's father, Richard Steele (Eurostud George Hilton) a marketing agent for a pharmaceutical company who poo-poos her desire to see a psychiatrist, insisting instead that she medicate with the samples he brings home from work. Even when their late-night lovemaking is ixnayed by a waking flashback to the stabby dream, Richard lets Jane know in no uncertain terms that he does not support her desire to seek therapy. As if that weren't suspicious enough, Jane catches Richard making eyes at sexy blonde neighbor Mary (Marina Malfatti) as he leaves for work, leaving the viewer to wonder whether there might be more to his anti-psychiatry stance than mere pharmaceutical prejudice...

Jane's sister Barbara (Nieves Navarro) has no such prejudice, however, though she does have a strange hate/hate relationship with Richard. (In a later scene, Barbara and Richard argue over Jane's treatment while the naked Barbara gets dressed and Richard watches her in a mirror from another room! Richard says things like "Beauty should be shown--why hide yours under all this clothing?" and "You must be the most unforgiving bitch in the world!" with exactly the same tone--weird.) Going against Signor Steele's wishes, Barbara takes Jane to see Dr. Burton, a psychiatrist with whom she works. In the waiting room Jane sees the blue-eyed murderer from her dream, but makes it to the analyst's couch without other incident.

ZANG.

On the couch more dark secrets emerge--turns out Jane and Barbara's mother was murdered by stabbing, and in fact Mama Harrison is the non-pregnant naked woman in Jane's dream. Jane also reveals that she felt ashamed bearing Richard's child while not being married to him, and thus feels extra guilt about the car crash that tragically relieved her of that shame. Add her fear of losing Richard because of her nightmare-induced frigidity, and Dr. Burton has his work cut out for him.

I really can't go any further in the review without mentioning the absolutely GORGEOUS cinematography throughout. Martino seems to specialize in the striking mise en scene, whether it be in that opening nightmare sequence, a wide-angle shot of Richard comforting Jane in bed, overhead views of the apartment or various low- and wide-angle shots--all just stunning. There's nearly always something interesting to look at on screen, and a viewer with a soft spot for the beautiful visual will not be left wanting.

Also worthy of mention is Edwige Fenech's fantastic portrayal of the vulnerable, frightened, very possibly unhinged Jane. Her wide eyes and gasping breath, her way of opening her thoughts to the camera through expressions and gestures, all come together to give us a character we not only understand, but sympathize with and want to protect. As a result the scenes where the blue-eyed killer from her dreams invades her reality--in particular a chilling sequence on the subway, when the flickering lights in the train car show the icy menace jumping closer and closer with each interval of darkness--pack an extra emotional punch.

"Pardon me if I stare."

Fleeing her blue-eyed stalker, Jane winds up fortuitously in the apartment of Mary, the witchy blonde who was making eyes at Richard earlier. Once they're having tea together they find out they have a lot in common--they're both alone all day, in need of companionship, and without many close friends. They make a date for the following day, when during a gorgeously filmed walk in the park Mary suggests a rather unorthodox form of therapy:

"I also used to have problems, and mine were even more serious than yours. But eventually I managed to free myself from them completely...I had to go to a Sabbat. It's a certain type of black magic ritual. It cured me, and I'm sure it could help you, Jane!"

Well, it IS the 70s, after all, so Jane decides to give it a go--especially once her problems are worsened after an appointment with a mysterious solicitor turns into a Blue-Eyed Stalker Attack! (Some great off-kilter spiral staircase shots in this sequence, with the exclamation point of a dog's skull being rolled down the stairs to her feet, followed by a near-miss hatchet swipe!) Mary drives Jane to a gothic mansion in the middle of nowhere, and everything's set. Let the healing commence!

They head inside to one of the most well-attended Sabbats I've ever seen--dozens of folks in attendance, all waiting to lay some Satanic and, as it turns out, sexual healing on Jane. The Sabbat Master--who by the way has to be one of the most AWESOME Sabbat Masters ever to don a goatee and a set of metal fingertips--sacrifices a puppy to Satan, drinks the blood, and then proceeds to work his horizontal black magic while the rest of the coven paws at and kisses the screaming, struggling Jane. It's another nightmarish, borderline psychedelic scene, with extreme close-ups, maybe a fish-eye lens shot or two, and enough rapey ickiness for two such Sabbats or three-quarters of a mid-week soiree at the Duke's.

"NOW how many fingers do you see?"

We transition rather abruptly back to Jane's bedroom, where she's now making love to Richard instead of Satan's favorite nephew. This time they reach completion with no stabby interruptions. "Darling, no more bad dreams!" Jane declares, post-coitus. "I feel strange...I don't feel real, Richard! I don't feel real!" Taking this as a testament to his manliness, Richard falls asleep, well-chuffed.

The joy doesn't last, though, as Jane's Blue-Eyed Boy shows up at the pub where Jane and Richard have lunch the next day, leading her to flee sans Dick to their apartment. Once there she discovers some books on the occult Richard has been reading, leading her (and us) to wonder if he's going all Gaslight Satan-style on her ass. Her suspicions don't stop her from attending a supplementary Sabbat, however, and once there a few of the mysteries are excitingly revealed.

Turns out Mary wanted to be free of the cult, and the only way to do that was to bring in her own replacement, who in the rite of initiation must stab Mary and thus free her "forever and completely." Drugged, Jane holds the dagger while Mary impales herself on it, thus cementing her ties to the coven. "Now you are one of us, Jane," the Blue-Eyed Man tells her. "It's impossible to renounce us!"

The rest of the movie concerns Jane discovering more and more dark secrets about her family past (Mom was a member of the same cult, and died on the same knife that Jane used to off Mary), all while staying a few tense steps ahead of the leering Blue-Eyed Man, who apparently serves the cult as some kind of enforcer. (His strange eyes and ability to pop up anywhere at any given time had me thinking for a while that he was in fact Satan, though I'm not sure the film's denoument bears this out.)

Just Beautimous

Failing to reach either Richard or Barbara, Jane calls Dr. Burton the headshrinker for help. Tthe old man puts her up in his country house where she'll be "perfectly safe." Of course the Enforcer shows up, murders the caretakers and the doctor (we get a chilling scene of the corpses arrayed at the breakfast table, seemingly alive unti closer investigation reveals their slit throats), and Jane flees back to the city where she must determine if the people who love her are trustworthy, are working for the cult, or whether the whole thing is just a product of her disturbed, extremely active imagination.

In an interview accompanying this feature on the DVD, director Martino admits readily that Rosemary's Baby was a big influence, and the parallels are apparent. Fenech does a fantastic job portraying the frantic, vulnerable, possibly unhinged heroine, and Martino's penchant for deep-focus transitions and off-kilter camera angles keeps the viewer disoriented and never quite sure if what he's seeing is real or a nightmare. The supporting characters are great too, particularly Ivan Rassimov as the quietly terrifying Blue-Eyed Killer, Julián Ugarte as the super-groovy and aloof Sabbat Master, and Malfatti as the witchy neighbor looking for an out. In fact I couldn't point to a weak performance in the lot, which is unusual in films of this vintage, be they never so good. Though there are draggy bits spattered throughout the run-time, for the most part the plot keeps you interested and engaged, and the twisty-turny ending has some surprises that should please most exploitation fans, even if it doesn't tie everything up in a neat little bow.

Like I said earlier, this is just a gorgeous film to look at, and I really wanted to screencap the entire thing--Martino's eye for compositions is pretty much unerring here for me, and I can't wait to take in more of his flicks. Add the amazing SMOKIN' HAWTNESS of Edwige Fenech and you've got a definite winner on your hands. 2.85 thumbs, and you can definitely expect more Edwige Appreciation from me in the future.

OBEY!

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