Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller...

Or C.H.U.D. for short

      In 1984, all I really cared about was playing with my friends, watching He-Man kick the  hell out of Skeletor, and Garbage Pail Kids. We didn't have a VHS player, so we had to rent the machine overnight and grab a couple tapes. I was never allowed to rent a horror film, but I always walked through them to check out the sleeves and always wondered just how scary they really were. One that always caught my eye was C.H.U.D.  Time to find out if this would have scared me...

     We start with a hapless woman walking her dog in the street at night in NYC. Not sure why she's walking down the MIDDLE of the street, but there she is. As she nears a manhole cover, something nasty reaches out of it and sucks her and her poor dogie in. We've met our first C.H.U.D.!
Strange things start happening in the sewers and the homeless that live down there beginning to arm themselves. 3 different people start investigating the oddities and watching them converge to the same conclusion is done really well. While this wasn't a big budget film, the writing is very strong in ways that we're not used to seeing. But also ham-fisted in other scenes. But you'll find yourself ignoring them or smiling to yourself when you remember this was an '80s horror flick involving NYCPD.  This includes one of the most improbable car explosions I've ever seen. As far as the F/X go, it seemed at first that they were going to be cheesy and cheap. But they knew which scene to spend the money on and where to skimp.

     Call it a period piece, but I liked it. I remember a lot of the 80s, and this brings me back to a time when there was no internet, no cell phones, no CGI, and no Michael Bay.  Don't get me wrong, I don't want to go back there, but it's nice to check in on it every once in a while.

Future star watch:

Daniel Stern!
John Goodman!


Friday: Oh, you're a stupid little half-assed cookie/cracker hybrid....

I can't believe I put off a Devils game to watch this stoner 'horror' film...

Evil Bong 2: Devils Harvest or King Bong

     As you know, I'm compulsive with sequels, and once I start, I need to finish the series. For some damn reason, I once watched Evil Bong. I thought it would be a light, silly film. Oh, and I was right,  but I forgot about how out of touch I am with drug culture. Or never was, to be honest. So here I am, on a Wednesday night, watching the sequel to a movie about sentient bongs and a bunch of pot smoking dude-bros. I could be watching hockey, but no. I made a commitment to watch this damn film. Let the groans begin....

     The dude-bros start to notice symptoms from their last encounter with Eebee the talking bong. Most notably, insatiable appetite, narcolepsy, and increased libido.  But all individually, and all to the extreme. One has morning wood attacks all day, one gains 500 lbs, and so on. They travel to a jungle to track the roots of Eebee and to find a cure for these ailments.  Once there, they smoke some 'killer' weed and are cured (groan). But that's only half of this lame story, which is odd because I didn't think there was enough plot to break into 2 pieces. Anyhoo, the other half is they find an even bigger sentient bong named King Bong and he's protected by a tribe of naked hotties named the Poontang tribe (groan). Hits are taken, some bewbs are seen, and an amulet is smashed, the movies over, and I'm out 90 minutes of my life. This is hard to say, but the first movie actually had a deeper plot. Otherwise, same corny weed puns, same dude-bro speak, and I'm just glad it's over.

Some highlights or whatever:

I didn't bother to learn anybody's name other than Rabbit, the delivery guy

Rabbit is turned into a giant jay and almost smoked

How the hell did they string this out for almost 90 minutes? I could only shake out a paragraph.

Thursday: The genesis of Bud

If it involves a prison, butt-holes are sure to be near...

Human Centipede 3: The Final Sequence

   
     The good news is, we are told, this is the last one. That means no more ass-to-mouth horror fetish.

     We 'finish' the series in a prison run by seriously disturbed and unstable warden played by the doctor from the first film.  The plan is to maintain better control of the prisoners by turning them, you guessed it, into a human prisoner centipede. That's the long of the short. Clearly, this prison has no oversight whatsoever. Even with the governor visiting early in the film, it is clear that nobody checks on how crazy this place is. Not only is the warden completely out of his mind, but the prison doctor doesn't even have a license. That's pretty much the only reason the he goes along with the plan.
     I can't tell if this is a departure from the first two, or the third in an over the top franchise. What I do know is, the warden LOVES to yell! He spends the first hour YELLING AT EVERYTHING!!! It's just annoying. Nonetheless, the process begins, and everyone is sewed together, ass to mouth. And thankfully, they show most of the procedure this time....just in case you had any curiosity about that.

Tom Six is an ass freak.

Sadly, that's about it. There's not much meat on this boner of a film, but I did take tally of some unusual things:

Castration!
Abdominal incision rape!
Comatose rape!
Poop eating!
Eric Roberts!

Wednesday: What was I smoking when I picked this out?

Well, what did you expect? It's another damn Nazi zombie movie.

Dead Snow 2: Red vs Dead

     So we pretty much start where the first film left off.  Nazi zombies just wanna have fu-uun. And by fun, I mean slaughter lots of people trying to steal their gold. At this time, I'd like to point out that they probably stole it from Jews. So it's not like it was really theirs to begin with. But they're Nazis. This is just one of the many horrible things they do. Since the zombies were woken in the first film, it's time they got busy and accomplish their original mission: Destroy some stupid town. In the first movie, the Nazombies were simple. They just chased and killed. In this film, they're much more active in things like recruiting, killing, and administering magical powers. Yeah, that last one is a new one. Instead of using zombie bites to infect and propagate, they now use a magical power to wake them once they've been killed. It involves touching them with an enchanted hand. After some arm swapping early in the film, it's now become apparent that in order to combat the Nazombie army, you need to find a graveyard filled with Red Army POW's and wake them up through a process called “magic transplanted arm re-animating”. 

     I know it's been a couple of years since I saw the first film, but I don't remember it being this silly.  It really had a more serious tone for a horror movie. But from the start of this film, that veneer fell away quickly as I watched a scene in which Nazi tank drivers used a victims upper intestine to siphon fuel from a bus to a tank. A tank, I might add, that was a static display and probably hadn't moved in 70+ years. But hey, it's a Nazi zombie movie. Try not to over think it. And as always, I have proof:

I know you're zombies, but don't you think you should rinse that out first? You know what's in it, right?

    Despite the comical path the second installment went, I did like the movie. Mostly because of the the black humor seen throughout, and some of the kills were just over the top violent. The acting and f/x were pretty decent as well, so it's worth your time if you absolutely NEED to see a Nazi Zombie movie.

Tuesday: Time for the third sequence....

Punk never died, it just goes to bed at a more reasonable time..

He Never Died

     Starring Henry E-ffing Rollins!!! Henry plays Jack, an immortal cannibal. He's trudging through life, trying to keep level in order to fight his cannibalistic urges and stay clean. This includes lots of eggplant parmesan and church bingo. Somehow, he integrates into society well enough, but stumbles once in a while and eats a person, or more accurately, their throat. These things happen. His daughter shows up, then some lame mafioso show up...and the blood starts to flow.

     While not a fast paced movie, this is a great watch. While the plot is thin as hell, the deadpan humor made the movie. I can't tell if it's because that's how Henry is playing the roll, or if it's unintentional. Whatever, it works like a charm. I've noticed that often times when I really like a movie, I struggle to find words. Where as terrible movies, I can go on and on and on and on....You get the idea.

Monday: Nazi zombies....why does it always have to be Nazi zombies......

It took a year to get here.....

...and I'm MORE than ready. I've often called Halloween my 'Christmas' because it's the one holiday I actually enjoy. It's not just the movies. It's also the atmosphere: Cool, dry weather, stores filling up with costumes and decorations, candy in 5lb BAGS, movies, little kids dressed up in cheap plastic masks and make-up, the leaves turning color, movies...Since we've been doing this every year for damn near a decade, I avoid horror movies during the regular year and keep a running list of what I want to see. And as always, I have a mix of bad, silly, classic, terrible, strange, and stupid films to wade through. There's also an entire franchise that I want to power through, since that's become somewhat of a tradition for me. So let's dig in with::::::


Deathgasm

Everything in this poster is right and good.

     This feature comes to us from New Zealand, where they clearly know how make a metal-headed horror movie. We meet our protagonist, Brodie, and his dick-headed friend Zakk, as they first meet, form a friendship (complete with blood pact), and form a band with a couple of Dungeons and Dragons nerds. While terrorizing the town, they decided to rob the house of an aging former band member of some long-forgotten death-metal band. One item they stole was sheet music for bringing about some lame-ass demon named Aeloth.  They decided to put the play the music, and all hell breaks loose and we have ourselves a Goddamn horror movie!!!

This was a great film to start the year off with. It was funny, gory, silly, and full of metal, the pacing is spot on. There was never a dull moment or slowdown during it's 86 minute entirety. And don't forget about the blood. Lots and lots of spraying blood. Seems as though they took a page out of the Japanese film making book and ran with it. Here's proof:

Notice that he already vomited blood on her once...why didn't she move after that?

There's also an entire fight scene involving dildos and anal beads the size of golf balls

Sadly, the anal beads were far more effective

My only complaint about the film is this one scene summed up by a single picture. Please observe:

This never happens to a metal head. It. Just. Doesn't.


Regardless, on to Sunday Funday: He wanted to disconnect himself....

An Amusement Park full of Monsters? What Could Go Wrong?

Monsterland
2016

I know we normally only review film (and TV) here but I got this book free in exchange for a review and it reads like an action-horror flick. Kind of reminded me of Jurassic Park meets Killer Klowns From Outer Space with a pinch of Underworld. It's only about 200 pages; I read in like three days. It opens with a beautifully descriptive piece reminiscent of “Of Mice and Men”, the serenity invoking melancholy because you know it probably won't end well. There are a host of characters but the main ones are Wyatt and his friends and stepfather:

Wyatt is decent kid who life has taken a dump on in the form of his parent's divorce and their subsequent meager living. He's in puppy love with a girl who's out of his league, and friends with the local geek squad, Melvin and Howard. Melvin probably ate lead paint as a kid and is socially inept. Later you find out he has some unique family damage. Howard is your classic pocket-protector nerd (complete with glasses) who could be getting some hot interracial action from a domineering cheerleader who has is bad for him. Of course, he hasn't a clue what to do with that.

Wyatt's stepfather, Carter, is an average Joe, just trying to do the right thing by his instant family. Unfortunately, he gets drafted to work security for the story's Big Bad, Dr. Vincent Conrad. Conrad's depiction reminded me of a slightly less wiling Vaudevillian Vincent Price in A Comedy of Terrors. Conrad is the force behind the titular Monsterland, a place originally conceived as a containment and research facility for zombie plague victims - excuse me - the "vitality challenged." Basically he decides, "why not exploit a few other disenfranchised populations if you can, right?" and werewolves and vampires are added to the mix.

An act of compassion earns Wyatt a magic ticket that becomes the catalyst for revolt, personal growth, and of course monster mayhem. The stuff hits the fan pretty quickly once everyone is at Monsterland…and it hits hard and fast.

Pros:
Author Cash provides a believable back-story and attempts to humanize the “monsters” – especially the werewolves (my favorite), for which I am grateful. Whether monster or human, Cash's characters are mostly just trying to get by, hold on to what they have, or expand their resources. Once you’re invested in the characters, the plot unfolds like an action horror movie.

Cons:
I would’ve liked some scenes to have been expanded more (like the lagoon scenario with the dignitaries), and I was expecting something more sinister from the villain. I felt like you were set up to get more out of some of the characters but were denied. Also, sometimes it was difficult to tell who was delivering the dialogue,.

Overall:
All in all it was a very entertaining read and I’d recommend it. I'm actually going to reread it. I hope the author works on a sequel - or script. 4/5 stars.


In case you missed it the first time, disclaimer: I received this item either free or discounted in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.