This? THIS is how I'm starting HorrorFest 2023 out?!?

Night Of The Killer Bears

         This is marketed as a Ted knock-off. But right away it's clear this is NOTHING like that. It takes place in Thailand in a small-ish hotel room run by a sadist who is torturing someone in the back room. A couple is checking in for reasons I don't care and won't make much difference to the plot...if there WAS a plot. Pretty soon things go off the rails as guys wearing giant teddy bear masks show up and start killing people. While they're killing people, we find 2-3 more serial killers torturing people because clearly that's a normal hobby in Thailand.

        Eventually it's revealed that the Kill-E-Bears were sent by non other than the female half of our protagonist couple. Why? I'm sure it was in one of the lines of subtitles but I don't recall and I definitely don't care. Everyone in this movie is stupid and should die. And they pretty much all do. That's the best I can do for a happy ending.

    

Monday: Long Live Rock & Bone....

All children are Hell-spawns...

As usual, I want to end this years movie list with something light, fun, easy on the eyes and brain...Instead I picked:

Little Evil

     Poor Gary. He has a new bride, and with that comes a new step-son named Lucas. He appears to be the spawn of Satan. This is probably true. Right away the evidence starts piling up:

*Tells a teacher to 'go to hell', and she procedes to douse her face with lye and jump out of a window , impaling herself on a fence below

*Stares at a TV broadcasting nothing but white noise

*Makes a party clown lights himself on fire

*All previous boyfriends are dead

*Was conceived during a cult ritual (that's a big one).

     After realizing that he probably IS the hell spawn, it becomes clear to Gary he must kill the antichrist. To do so, you need the Knife Of Destiny. But killing a kid isn't that easy, especially after taking said spawn to a water park and bonding. That throws the mission upside down and creepy cultists kidnap Lucas to finish the job. Turns out, in order for Satan to come to Earth, he needs a vessel, and that vessel is Lucas. Kill Lucas, and Satan can have to body. You know what? It's a thin plot, but nowhere near the worst we've ever seen. After a climatic end which featured a demon made of fire, cultists, and a monster truck, we're treated to a happy ending we all could use.

And that's IT! I'm DONE! 31 days, 31 movies, and nearly every one of them knocked down a couple of my already struggling IQ points. Maybe a book will help with that....

'Till next year!

Say "package" one more time! I DARE YOU!!!!

 Shadow in the Cloud

30,000 ft, -40f, 180mph...this scene explodes with realism.

     A young WAC is put in charge of transporting a super special super secret package via a B-17 during WW2. Almost immediately, something is clearly not right and there's SOMETHING ON THE WING!!!

     ahem...anyway, you'll quickly be annoyed by the misogyny by clearly near-rapist air crew. They're being over-played and annoys the hell out of me right away. Where they really driven by their dick 'n' balls? The first 15 minutes tries to convince you they were after the 15th "got your packaged RIGHT HERE!!!" line, it nearly ruins the movie in the first 15 minutes. She's been deployed by a high-ranking general, yet they constantly taunt her and act as though she has no superior to report to. She's gonna tell on you!

     Nothing about this flight is right. She starts with an accent however she loses it quickly after an encounter with a Japanese plane. And she's not who she says she is.  The package (the one she was carrying, not the crotch of the mega-horny idiot airman) is a baby, and that blows the super secret angle to pieces.  Now it's just a dumb monster movie on a plane and the damn thing looks like a bat. And how did she think she was going to transport that baby without it crying?

     Let's once again put away the realism and try to overlook the tense but highly improbable baby rescue scene or the fact that the 'GOAT Generation' were a bunch of filthy pigs or *groooooaan* when she falls out of the plane, and an exploding plane below her propels her right back into the cabin.

She fell out of this hole. Then she un-fell out of it.

     Truthfully,I must admit, it's not fair for me to be so down on this movie. It is fun, and I was engaged throughout the entire movie. But you have to turn your brain off like it was an '80 Stallone movie.

Yep...she went Stallone...

Monday: The final film...

Yep...I peaked with Sky Sharks...

Shark Side of the Moon

     A secret lab in Soviet Russia circa mid '80s has created a shark/man hybrid for reasons unknown. Naturally, the sharks escape and somehow make it onto a Soviet space shuttle and end up on the moon. And somehow they survive for the next 30 years. They survive so well, in fact, that Sharkmen have developed a society and are at war with the only 2 humans on the moon. Brilliant! Why didn't I think of that?!?

     This....is a bad movie. It wants to be good, it wants to be taken serious, but it just looks so stupid! We've been tempered to push realism out the door when it comes to movies, but how the hell are you going to explain ditching a space suit for a chainmail helmet and pea coat? Oh, created on the moon were they? HOW?!? There's no infrastructure to help advance the science needed to create that miracle not-suit. OH, and spear hunting? They're hunting the man-sharks on the moon with fucking spears! How the fucking hell did you sell that to your multi-cultural cast? You want more details? There aren't any! All the man-sharks look like someone tried to do a live-action reboot of the Street Sharks cartoon and somehow one of them speaks perfect ENGLISH...despite being 'born' in Mother Russia. And using a lava field to destroy the man-shark city? Again this is on the moon. And the epilog? A lady-person-shark gives birth to another man-shark hybrid...ala immaculata. This all makes my head hurt. Maybe not make movies, Tubi?

Sunday: My final 2 films, the end is near!

Goodbye, Shark Week!!!...probably see you next year....

Quit wasting cool titles!!!!

 Sharkula

     2 dopey meatheads are invited to work in a fishing village.

Said meatheads

     Their mysterious employer sends his Renfield to greet them and help them settle in. Everything about the town is strange, and Renfield is extra weird. That's because his employer is none other than Dracula! And Drac has a pet shark that hangs out in the water and eats sacrifices offered up by him and his disciples. But none of that is important. What's important is the gross mis-use of a kick ass movie poster and slick title:

...while in reality we're given this jackass again:

Said Jackass

...and this fucking vampire shark:

You went with this?!?

...all while filmed in 20fps. This title and presentation had everything going for it...till you actually watch it. It's at that point you realize they wasted a cool title, kick-ass movie poster, and usable idea and turn it into a steaming tightly packed coil that some lazy neighbor left on our front lawn. This is not a movie to be celebrated, this is a movie to be pitied. Balls!!!

Saturday: I may have peaked with Sky Sharks....

Never turn your back on a shark....

 Jaws Of The Shark

This poster should have been a clue

     You know that feeling when you've been watching movies almost every day for nearly a month and they start to lose their impact? And you run out of things to say about an hour long shark movie featuring a guy in one of the worst shark suits you've ever seen wielding a chainsaw? And it's filmed on a camcorder by people whose first language isn't English? And none of them are really actors? Or script writers?  Yeah, that's what I'm experiencing right now. It's like a cold, emotionless state that doesn't care if a bunch of Swedish idiots go camping in shark-infested woods and (surprise) find a shark that has strange tastes that might be considered 'conduct unbecoming''.

     That's what this movie's about. Sweded doing their best to act American while spoofing shark movie tropes in the cheapest way possible. Is it funny? Yes, it's humorous, stupid, and full of dumb fun. It's a welcome addition after Noah's Shark.

Friday: Wait...this asshole again?!?

The Nuclear Option

 Atomic Shark

     Baywatch -wannabe lifeguards living their stupid lives, watching the water for people in distress and sharks. Their lives suddenly change when burnt fish start showing up on the beach and a glowing shark starts eating and burning (?!?) people. 

     This movie is full of vapid idiots, satirical hollywood types, and peoples general lack of understanding radiant particles and radioactive materials...and sharks. But alas, none of us are here for realism, right? I mean look at this thing:

I know it's a kid, and his head explodes, but he had it coming

     The 'humor' really cranks up (not really) when Dave Faustino pervs his way in mid-film. I'm not going to lie; I did chortle a couple of times at the intentional jokes so it wasn't a complete waste of time. Plus, lots of people die and some even deserved it!

Thursday: Friends Don't Let Friends Make Movies II: The Sharkening...