April 1, 2005

WELCOME TO THE VAULT OF THE FORGOTTEN AND OBSCURE!!!

ALTHOUGH THESE OVERLOOKED FOOTNOTES OF MOVIEDOM HAVE BEEN LOST IN THE ANNULS OF FILM HISTORY, THEY STILL EXIST IN THE MEMORY OF OUR CINEMATIC SUBCONCIOUS!

THESE ARE THE FILMS YOU DONT REMEMBER THE NAMES OF, BUT ARE SURE YOU SAW THEM!

THESE ARE THE FILMS WHO’S TV SPOTS SCARED YOU WHEN YOU WERE A CHILD!

THESE ARE THE FILMS THAT WERE MADE IN A TIME WHEN MOST OF THE COUNTRY WAS COKED UP!

SOME ARE HITS. MOST ARE MISSES. BUT EVEN THE FAILURES ARE SO SPECTACULAR, THEY CANNOT BE DENIED!

DO YOU DARE ENTER THE VAULT OF THE FORGOTTEN AND OBSCURE??? READ ON, AT YOUR OWN PERIL! -JSYN.

CHOPPING MALL /1986/ d: Jim Wynorski

Teens of the eighties had three loves: shopping malls, killer robots, and clear soft drinks. This movie had two of those three. Add gratuitous nudity and you got youself a party!

FRIGHT FACT! The cast boasted genre faves like Barbara Crampton, Mary Woronov and Dick Miller! -4/05

THE DEAD PIT /1989/ d: Brett Leonard

An evil zombie doctor and zombie mental patients crawl outta the Dead Pit to ruin some young woman’s day! I’m still not entirely sure what this movie is actually about…

FRIGHT FACT! Director Brett Leonard has worked with box-office heavyweights Denzel Washington and Russel Crowe, while the female lead, actress Cheryl Lawson, went on to become a successful stuntwoman! -4/05

DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK /1973/ d: John Newland

This was actually a made-for-tv-movie and it scared the shit out of me as a child. Aw hell it still gives me the creeps. A young couple moves into a house haunted by these weird little gnomes that live in a bricked up fireplace. My cousin used to call them “The Furnace People” and I never forgot it. Creepy, weird, fun!!

FRIGHT FACT! I once wrote an email to Anchor Bay and asked them to put this out on DVD! -4/05

976-EVIL /1989/ d: Robert Englund

Stephen Geoffreys (aka Evil “Your Sooo Cool Brewster” Ed) from FRIGHT NIGHT? A toll number to Satan? Directed by Freddy Kruger? Guess what… it’s still pretty fucking good! Grim, dark stuff. Cool makeup effects too! I’ll spare you all the obligatory “…and the phone bill is your SOUL!” joke.

FRIGHT FACT! EVIL ED IS NOW A GAY ADULT FILM ACTOR!!! No shit, check IMDB for yourself! -4/05

BLACK ROSES /1988/ d: John Fasano

You remember how back in the Eighties, Heavy Metal was regarded as “the Devil’s Music”? Well whaddaya know? The PMRC was right! The best things about this ridulous one line pitch made into a feature length film were the FX, the music soundtrack and the cool 3-D box cover that I begged Sal from Six Star Video to let me peel off from the rental copy. Unless you lived in Franklin Square circa 1988, you wont get that last part.

FRIGHT FACT! Where you gonna find a mixed-bag cast that includes legendary drummer Carmine Appice, Julie Adams (from Creature from the Black Lagoon), Vincent “Big Pussy” Pastore, and Lou Ferrigno’s wife, Carla? Right here, that’s where! -4/05

TRICK OR TREAT /1989/ d: Charles Martin Smith

And speaking of Satanic Rock Stars, say hello to Sammi Curr! He’s a badass with tight leather pants who dies somehow and is resurrected by the Devil to spread pestilence and ill will on Halloween! Throw in a cool-looking demon puppet, cameos from Gene Simmons and Ozzy Osbourne, and a “mint” soundtrack from then cutting edge (?) rockers (??) Fastway (???) for a truly unforgettable “horro-ck” movie, no matter how hard you try!

FRIGHT FACT! Of all the satanic rock band horror movies of the Eighties, this considered by most the best (????) one. -4/05

PIECES /1982/ d: Juan Piquer Simón

The movie poster tagline stated “It’s exactly what you think it is!” and it had a picture of a sewed up girl and a bloody chainsaw. If it’s exactly what I think it is, then it must be about a psycho who cuts up girls with a chainsaw and sews the “pieces” together! Wow, I just saved myself money and time! Apparently this bizarrely entertaining in a smoke-a-brick-of-pot-kind-of-way movie holds a sentimental place in the heart’s of connoisseurs of crapola. Must be the ridiculous karate scene.

FRIGHT FACT! In Spain, this movie was known as “Mil gritos tiene la noche” (One Thousand Cries Has the Night)! Now THAT is a title with imagination! -4/05

CURTAINS /1983/ d: Richard Ciupka

I remember watching a clip of someone ice skating on a frozen pond decapitating someone with A SICKLE!!! The still-creepy movie poster prevented me ever seeing this one. Next!

FRIGHT FACT! Sorry, I got nothin interesting! -4/05

DEADLY BLESSING /1981/ d: Wes Craven

The legendary Wes Craven directed this movie that I think is about a coven of witches/satan worshippers and I never saw it. The commercial scared me because it showed a girl sleeping and a nasty fucking spider dropping down into her open mouth. From then on, I sleep with my mouth CLOSED!!! And that girl went on to become Miss Sharon Stone! I still say I’m better off…

FRIGHT FACT! Sharon Stone, Ernest Borgnine, and Michael Berryman in one movie? Oh my! -4/05

THE PROWLER /1981/ d: Jospeh Zito

Hey a slasher movie with gore FX by Tom Savini! There were only thirty-seven other movies you could say that about in the year 1981!

FRIGHT FACT! Director Joseph Zito is responsible for some of my favorite 80’s movies, most notably FRIDAY THE 13TH: THE FINAL CHAPTER, INVASION U.S.A. with Chuck Norris, and the definitive Dolph Lundgren flick RED SCORPION. -4/05

HUMONGOUS /1982/ d: Paul Lynch

The TV spot had Movie Trailer Guy spelling out the letters,”H-U-M-O-N-G-O-U-S!” with his fucking scary Movie Trailer Guy voice. That was it for me, crawled right under the bed I did! I think it was about a giant mogoliod cannibal stalking naughty teens on a deserted island. Never saw it but I got the gist of it from the movie poster!

FRIGHT FACT! Well whaddya know? I just checked IMDB and that’s EXACTLY what the movie is about! Wow! -4/05

THE RESURRECTED /1992/ d: Dan O’Bannon

A really, really cool H.P. Lovecraft adaptation with Chris Sarandon and that hot blonde from “Herman’s Head”. This was based on the short story, “The Strange Case Of Charles Dexter Ward” If you like H.P. Lovecraft, hunt this one down.

FRIGHT FACT! Yes, THE Dan O’Bannon… director of RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD, and writer of a little movie know as ALIEN! -4/05

METALSTORM: THE DESTRUCTION OF JARED-SYN /1983/ d: Charles Band

This was the OTHER 3-D post-apocolyptic sci-fi space opera that I watched with glee when I was a boy …the “other” other one was SPACEHUNTER: ADVENTURES IN THE FORBIDDEN ZONE, you nitwits. SPACEHUNTER was a pretty good movie, full of kewl special effects, mutants, vehicles, a nasty lookin bad guy and even the debut of a young Molly Ringwald. I still watch it from time to time. Yeah, I remember in SPACEHUNTER this one part where… oh waitaminute. I was supposed to be talking about METALSTORM, wasn’t I? Sorry my bad. I just got all wrapped up in warm and fuzzy SPACEHUNTER reverie… *sigh* Anyway back to METALSTORM. It sucked!

FRIGHT FACT! Now, I own this movie. I’ve tried to watch it. Many times. I dont know what it’s about. I couldn’t give you one actual fact from this movie if my life depended on it. As a matter of fact… I am not sure I actually ever saw this in the movie theater. I know it was in 3-D, but maybe I am confusing it with SPACEHUNTER? …*sigh* Oh, SPACEHUNTER *sigh* -4/05

TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS /1982/ d: Ferdinando Baldi

Holy crap yet ANOTHER 3-D movie! And this one is badly dubbed! It’s Italian, fantastico! I have this theory of a rhythm or “beats” if you will in rip-off movie titles. For example this is clearly a rip-off of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (which came out in ’81). See, that title has five beats: “BLANK” of the “BLANK BLANK”. And RAIDERS was a pretty successful movie. So by way of deductive logic, I can only surmise the producers of TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS wanted their movie title to have five beats also. Too bad they had the title before the script, because if you actually watch this craptacular mess, there are only TWO crowns! What happened to the other two is anyone’s guess. The very last shot of this movie is so bizarrely ridiculous it makes me froth at the mouth from utter confusion! Now for some nostalgia… I saw this in the Lynbrook movie theater with my brother and father. This was my first 3-D movie and I remember the 3-D glasses vividly. They hurt. All I kept thinking the whole time was. “This isn’t like the commercial”. I was nine years old and I learned an important lesson that day…Things Are Not Always Like The Commercials! Thank you, TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS!

FRIGHT FACT! Believe it or not, the next big thing in moviegoing will be… yep, 3-D again! The next FINAL DESTINATION movie, the new James Cameron movie, and upcoming projects from Robert Rodriguez will all be in 3-D. It seems they perfected the process and the filmmaking community thinks it will cut down on bootlegging and raise attendance. Even George Lucas wants to jump on the bandwagon with a 3-D re-release of his STAR WARS movies! Once again, thank you TREASURE OF THE FOUR CROWNS!!! -4/05

GARBAGE PAIL KIDS: THE MOVIE /1987/ d: Rodney Amateau

This movie sends my friend Hacksaw into fits of rage at the very mention of the title. I don’t even know where to begin. The horror… the absolute horror contained in-between the frames of this unholy living abortion of cinema is truly the stuff of nightmares. Directed by, I’m convinced, Satan himself and filmed on location in New Jersey (coincidence? No, of course not!), GPK:TM contains so many atrocities against man and nature I don’t have the space to list them all. To this day, I cannot get my head around this unhappy mistake. Forget about that videotape from THE RING… if you show this movie to your friends, they WILL try to kill you the second it’s over! Believe me I know from personal experience! This is why trading card companies should NEVER produce motion pictures based on trading cards!

FRIGHT FACT! As a sure sign of the coming apocalypse, MGM has announced they will actually release this hell-turd on DVD July 12. And by golly, I’ll be second on line at Best Buy that day… only after Satan, of course! -4/05

*(editor’s note: Robg. will be 3rd on line at Best Buy on July 12th)

I TRULY HOPED YOU ENJOYED YOUR VISIT TO THE VAULT OF THE FORGOTTEN AND OBSCURE! CHECK BACK HERE EVERY MONTH AS WE UNEARTH EVEN MORE TRAVESTIES AND DELIGHTS!

DO YOU HAVE A MOVIE YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE IN THE VAULT, OR WOULD YOU LIKE TO CONTRIBUTE AN ANECDOTE OR SOME INFO TO ANY OF THE FILMS ABOVE? JUST CLICK THE LINK BELOW AND EMAIL ME!

JAY@ICONSOFFRIGHT.COM

WE WILL BE INCLUDING CONTRIBUTIONS FROM YOU, THE READERS, IN UPCOMING EDITIONS!

SEE YOU NEXT MONTH, JERKS!