Dr. Jekyll & Sister Hyde (1971)

Directed by: Roy Ward Baker

Thinking of having a sex change operation? Well, there's no need! There's this potion that you can drink and viola! you're a woman! No nasty and painful surgery needed - the only drawback is that you'll have to kill some prostitutes to get the female hormones needed in the potion. But, you can always let people think the killings are the work of Jack the Ripper... Hm, maybe this only works back in Victorian London, and just maybe it only works in the movies...

"Dr. Jekyll & Sister Hyde" was Hammer Films' third version of Robert Louis Stevenson's "Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde". The other two were "The Ugly Duckling" (1959) and "The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll" (1960), but this is definitely the best and most fun of the three. How could things go wrong with a movie that throws both the killings of Jack the Ripper and the graverobbers Burke & Hare into the mix with some gender bending fun?

It's 1888 and the place is London. A young brilliant doctor, Henry Jekyll (Ralph Bates), is working hard on finding the cure for all diseases only to realize that it will take him too long to finish his work. So, our good doctor starts to search for the "elixir of life". An elixir that will expand his life long enough for him to be able to finish his research and find that cure he so desperately want to give to the world.

He finds that taking a gland from female corpses and use their hormones lets a fly live for days instead of hours. There's a side effect though... the male fly has now turned female. That's nothing that bothers Dr. Jekyll and he keeps going back to the morgue for more of those female hormones, he needs to test the elixir on a human and who better to try it on than himself? He turns into a sexy female, Sister Hyde (Martine Beswicke), for a short period and then turns back (not before the brother of a brother, sister & mother combo who just moved in upstairs from Dr Jekyll, and where the sister has the hots for the doctor, get to oogle the bare chest of "Sister Hyde"). Dr. Jekyll needs more fresh corpses to harvest more hormones so he can stay female for a longer time, but as the morgue has run out of them he gets in touch with the famous grave robbers Burke & Hare (who in reality lived in Scotland and died 60 years before this movie is set... but who cares about small things like that?). But when those two grave robbing bastards get caught it's up to the doctor to get his hands on those hormones. He's starting to kill prostitues in the dark streets of Whitechapel... and hey, we've got Jack the Ripper in the story as well!

The hormones work their magic and Sister Hyde is visiting more frequently, what Dr Jekyll didn't prepare for was her will to stay in his body (and do other things than researching a silly cure for all diseases)... and fool around with that dude from upstairs. The Police start to suspect Dr Jekyll of the murders, but as he needs more hormones he lets sister Hyde do the killing, and she does it well... little evil minx that she is! It soon escalates into a war between Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde over who will get to keep his body... and the ending is classic Hammer (that really needs to be seen)!

I'm a massive fan of the Hammer Horror movies so I'm hard to disappoint when it comes to anything from that studio, but you don't need to be as nerdy as I am when it comes to Hammer Films to like this one. It has all the ingredients (and then some) of the classic Hammer flicks, the period setting, the great looking sets, great actors and actresses (Martine Beswick is too damn delicious for words in this movie, and not just because she's a total hottie, she's so damn evil it's hard to not fall head over heels for her "Sister Hyde" and she goes really well with Ralph Bates, being his alter ego), good horror scenes with some nice murders - not as bloody as some might want them, but this is how it should be in a Hammer flick. And here we, of course, also get the gender bending fun with Mr Jekyll turning into Sister Hyde and the hanky panky that's almost going on with both the brother and sister from the apartment upstairs!

If you're only gonna see one Hammer film I would probably recommend "The Devil Rides Out", but if you're gonna check out two this one should be on that short list. Sure, we got the Frankenstein and Dracula series and anything featuring Ingrid Pitt is a must, but I think this one rises above all of those because it's just a great and fun popcorn movie that's not totally serious all the time... and Martine is just to die for (if you're a prostitute that's kinda literally in this movie ;-)).

Howling II - ...Your Sister is a Werewolf (1985)

a.k.a. Howling II / Howling II: Stirba - Werewolf Bitch
Directed by: Philippe Mora

I brought up bad movies and BAD movies in my first review here (Vampirella), and I would have to class this a BAD movie. A really, REALLY BAD movie... but, still there is something about it that makes me not being able to tell anyone to not watch it. I wouldn't go so far to say that it's so bad it's good (because good it ain't), it's more like a car crash - you can't look away. I remember having this movie on a VHS tape together with "The Lost Boys" (now, that's a great movie) and I watched this flick many times in my teens... Now when I rewatched it for the first time in many years I couldn't really understand why I did that back then, and I really didn't remember any of the story even after having watched it so many times back in the day. Well, the mystery was solved when Sybil Danning entered the picture... her getting topless was probably all I needed to want to watch this flick over and over again back in my teens. I wasn't the only one liking the scene where Sybil rips off her dress to bare her chest, the editor of the movie must have loved that scene as well as it repeats no less than 17 times (yes, 17 fucking times!) in the end credits...

I love werewolf movies, but god damn... the werewolves in this movie looks more like hippies with bad hair days (and a bad personal hygiene) or rejects from "Planet of the Apes". Compared to the first "Howling" movie they're a damn joke, and it doesn't help that the director (or editor) apparently loved the transformation scenes as they are repeated over and over... ugh!


Ok, over to the story... We start with the funeral of Karen White (the main character of the first movie) where Stefan Crosscoe (Christopher Lee) tells Karen's brother, Ben White (Reb Brown), that she's a werewolf and not truly dead. Yeah, that's a dickish thing to do at a funeral, but Stefan doesn't care - he's here to kill a werewolf! After having shown Ben and his reporter friend Jenny (Annie McEnroe) a tape of the death of his sister (which is a extremely bad recreation of the last scene of the first movie) they all end up at Karen's grave where they are attacked by werewolves (among them Karen). After having captured an old, decrepit white haired werewolf they learn that the Queen of Werewolves, Stirba, is hiding in the "dark country" and she's planning to gather a bunch of werewolves to... ugh, I started to drift away a little here, but I'm sure it's nothing good...

The "dark country" turns out to be Transylvania (of course) and the trio heads over there to battle the Queen of the Werewolves. They end up in a small village where everyone acts creepy and weird (not sure if it's only because the script said so or because of shitty acting as there is A LOT of shitty acting in this movie, especially in the Transylvania part of the movie... which is most of it), but luck has it that Stefan has a couple of pals (a priest, a dwarf and a couple of other weirdos) that will help our heroes to fight Stirba. Like in most (good or bad) horror movies the female lead gets captured by the villains and it's all up to the men to save her (while killing as many werewolves as possible). And that is all I care to say about the plot of this movie...

It's always great to see Christopher Lee in a movie, but he's too good for crap like this (even though he has probably done worse movies in his career). I don't wanna go on too much about bad acting (as I usually don't really care as long as the movie is good), but the other two main characters are so fucking stiff and shitty you just want to poke your eyes out and cut off your ears. And to make matters worse, you get to see (and hear) a lot more of them than Christopher Lee in this movie... wtf?!?!?! Sybil Danning isn't the best actress either, but you kinda forgive her for that because no matter what she's delicious as the evil Werewolf Queen (and I'm not just talking about her nudity now, her evil Queen Bitch is always fun to watch). And you know they didn't hire her for her acting anyway...

I feel I'm gonna come off as very schizophrenic now, as I can't say that this movie is any good at all - but still, if you love bad horror movies this is a movie you shouldn't miss. If you want bad b-movie horror, you'll get plenty of it here! And on top of that you'll get an extremely 80's title track that's hard to not like!

The Raven (1935)

Directed by: Louis Friedlander

The good thing about these old horror movies from the 30's is their length... "The Raven" is just 61 minutes long and it's perfect if you want to have your very own double feature (like I did with this flick and "The Black Cat", which is just 65 minutes long), you get two great movies for the length of one! As was the case with "The Black Cat" this is again a Lugosi/Karloff movie and even though I know that Karloff was the bigger name of the two (even though Lugosi became a star first with "Dracula") I do feel that Lugosi should have had top billing as he is without a doubt the star of this movie. Hell, Karloff's character should be considered a supporting character and nothing else here...

Again it's a movie "adaption" of an Edgar Allan Poe story and as usual the movie has nothing to do with the story (or in this case: poem) itself. To justify the use of Poe and the title Lugosi's character is obsessed by the writings of Edgar Allan Poe and we even get a dance number set to a reading of the poem... um, come to think of it, this movie has a lot more to do with Poe than the usual "adaptions"!


When a pretty ballerina, Jean (Irene Ware), gets into a serious car accident Doctor Richard Vollin (Bela Lugosi) is on the case to save her (even though it took some real coaxing from the girl's father for Dr Vollin to even care about it). Vollin, not caring so much about morals, takes one look at the patient on the operating table and quickly wants to play doctor with her... um, not like in saving her life through surgery, rather the hanky panky kinda way. As he's a brilliant surgeon (albeit a bit reluctant to show it) he saves Jean's life and at a follow up visit a month later (these people heal quickly as there is absolutely no sign whatsoever that Jean ever had surgery or took some time to heal) his obsession with her becomes apparent. She won't have anything of that though, but she tells him that she has a surprise for him at her upcoming ballet performance (see? she's doing that this soon after that life saving head surgery... they sure healed fast back in the day...).

At the ballet performance Jean is strutting around on the stage (if that's ballet I'm not sure I ever could be into it) while a Poe look-a-like sits on the side of the stage reading the poem "The Raven". All this while Vollin (who has a serious Poe obsession) sits and drools over Jean, something Jean's father doesn't appreciate (Sure, tell Dr Vollin anything to save his daughter, but don't let him get close to her afterwards!). Vollin doesn't like this little bump in the road, so when a criminal on the run from the police, Bateman (Karloff), comes to Vollin for help to change his face surgically our sweet (and very insane) Dr Vollin agrees to help Bateman only if he will torture and kill some people first.

Not being a very nice guy, Dr Vollin disfigures Bateman to force him to help doing those dirty deeds (as an "ugly person will be able to do ugly things") with a promise to fix Bateman's looks after it's all done. I'm not sure why Vollin needs Bateman really, as when things starts getting done it's mostly him doing it anyway... Jean, her father and her fiancé (yep, she got one of those and Vollin STILL plans to move in on her) and some other people are invited to Vollin's house for a weekend and that's when things start to happen. Trap doors, torture equipment straight out of Poe's stories, moving rooms, crushing walls... hell, being a surgeon must pay damn good as Vollin sure has a sweet set up in his house... I'm not gonna tell you how the movie ends, but Poe is finally "avenged" at least (whatever that has to do with anything, but Vollin isn't very sane and that probably made sense to him).

While not being as good as "The Black Cat", this movie again delivers the macabre we're expecting from Lugosi and Karloff. With his theatrical and over the top performance as the totally batshit insane Doctor Vollin, Lugosi again really shines here. Karloff is great as always, but Lugosi is better... Even though this is a Universal picture it does feel a lot more like those low budget movies Lugosi made for Monogram Pictures and other poverty row film companies instead (with the grisly torture and disfigurement of Karloff's character it feels more exploitative than the usual Universal movies of the time), which it could have been if it weren't for the lavish sets and the fact that Lugosi was teamed up with Karloff. I doubt Monogram Pictures could ever have afforded both of them in the same movie...

There's a DVD set (well, it's one flipper DVD with 5 movies on it) called "The Bela Lugosi Collection" where you'll find 4 of the Lugosi/Karloff movies (this one, "The Black Cat", "The Invisible Ray" and "Black Friday") as well as the 1932 version of "Murders in the Rue Morgue" and it's well worth a buy if you want some real old school entertainment with the masters of the genre.

The Black Cat (1934)

Directed by: Edgar G. Ulmer

Ok, now we're talking! Both Lugosi and Karloff in the same movie and what a movie it is! This was the first of seven movies starring both Lugosi and Karloff (the others were "The Raven" (1935), "The Invisible Ray" (1936), "Son of Frankenstein" (1939), "Black Friday" (1940), "You'll Find Out" (1940) & "The Body Snatcher" (1945)), and even though there are some really great movies among those other six no one comes even close to this one. This is, to me, one of the best movies from the 30's and it's of course an Universal Picture... but, unlike most of the Universal horror movies from this era this one features no supernatural monsters, here we're talking about human "monsters".

Even though the title of the movie is taken from Poe nothing else is... During the opening credits it says "suggested by the immortal Edgar Allan Poe classic" and apparently no one really bothered reading that short story... Lugosi's character (Dr. Vitus Werdegast) is deathly afraid of black cats and that's it, really. So, if you came looking for a great Poe adaption you might wanna look elsewhere, but if you want a great psychological horror flick filled with satanism, necrophilia, sadistic torture, incest, brutal revenge and the two masters of early horror cinema you're right where you should be.

The film opens on the Orient Express and an american couple on their honeymoon, Joan and Peter Alison (Jacqueline Wells & David Manners), who ends up having to share their compartment with Doctor Vitus Werdegast (Bela Lugosi), who's on his way to meet an "old friend". As luck have it they all get off the train at the same station and end up sharing a (very raggedy looking) tourist bus. The weather is shit and the bus driver manages to slide off the road and crash the bus. Good thing Doctor Werdegast's "friend" lives close to the scene of the accident...

The gang (minus the bus driver, who was killed in the accident) ends up at the front door of the noted architect Hjalmar Poelzig's (Karloff) very futuristic looking house (looks more like something a Bond villain would build for himself, but works very well here), and they're quickly set up in guest rooms. Here we get to learn that Werdegast and Poelzig fought together in WWI at a fort that Poelzig's house is built on the ruins of, Poelzig being the commander of the fort sold the rest of the soldiers out when giving it up to the Russians and then fled like a rat into the night. Werdegast went to prisoner of war camp while Poelzig told Werdegast's wife Vitus had died in the camps and married her... Yeah, a real bastard thing to do, but that's by far not the worst he did to poor Dr Werdegast, Vitus had a daughter as well... and yeah, after the new Mrs Poelzig died the daughter became the even newer Mrs Poelzig. How's that for evil? First marrying the poor bastard's wife and then his daughter!

Poelzig isn't just a great architect, he's also an Aleister Crowley wannabe with his very own satanic cult in the basement. And now he's eyeing Joan as he plans to sacrifice her at their next black mass. That should teach you not to go galavanting around the Hungarian country side at night! Poelzig and Werdegast decides to play a game of chess to decide if she will get sacrificed or not... and Werdegast isn't really the great chess player he thought he was. There's a lot more happening, but what the hell? I shouldn't sit here and let you know the entire movie when you could watch it for yourself!

If I were to have a ratings system on this blog that went to 10 I would give this movie a whopping 20, it really IS that good. At least if you, like me, love these old horror movies from the 30's & 40's... it has everything and more that you expect from these flicks and of course the immortal double team of Lugosi and Karloff. Karloff really is the embodiment of pure evil here (and he's clearly inspired by Aleister Crowley) and Lugosi gets to play the good guy (something I wish he could have done more as he really shines here) who at the end gets his revenge.

Crap, it's hard to say something else than just WATCH THIS MOVIE!!!!! Shouldn't that be enough, really?

Night of the Demons (1988)

Directed by: Kevin Tenney

I love the 80's. No, scratch that... I REALLY love the 80's, at least when it comes to horror movies. Maybe it's because this was my decade where I went from a little kid to a teenager and these were the movies that were around at the time, but this is not just a case of nostalgia on my part. I love the stupid hair and clothes, I love the totally non-PC stuff that we really don't see in movies today, I of course love all the unmotivated nudity (if there's anything that can be called "unmotivated" when it comes to nudity) that's thrown in there just for the sake of attracting even more horny teenage guys to the cinema. And I love the "real" gore in these old movies, I hate to see gory effects that are touched up with CGI like in most horror flicks that you see today. And I gotta say that I just love the cheesy synth soundtracks like so many of these movies had (like this one), just by listening to the music alone you know what decade it's from and from that you also know what to expect from the flick.

Something I also like with so many of these horror movies from the 80's is that all the clichés are there... When watching something like this you want the obnoxious fat guy, the slutty chick, the virginal heroine, the macho dude (who always gets killed in a very bloody fashion), the punk rocker outcast (which in this movie is also the obnoxious fat guy) etc etc. This movie has 'em all and more and you can't go wrong with a line-up like that.

Over to the flick now... It's set on Halloween and starts with a grumpy old guy cursing at the dressed up kids that are passing him on the side walk. Yep, old people are assholes and this one is a major asshole. This really don't have anything to do with the movie itself (although, the old dude is back at the very end of the flick), but sets up the tone nicely. Something else that sets up the tone nicely is the next shot, a close up of Linnea Quigley's white panties (or are they pink? I don't know, I'm colorblind... the important thing is that it's a close up of her panty clad butt!) - Linnea plays the boy crazy Suzanne and together with her friend Angela she's having a party at the local abandoned funeral home... It's Halloween after all and what other place could be better than that???

After the batteries in the tiny cassette player runs out and the music stops the gang decides to hold a seance... yeah, great idea considering the place they're in ;-). This is done by staring into a big mirror they were lucky enough to find in the house, and all of a sudden the most plastic looking demon doll ever is shown in the mirror letting us all know that this little "seanse" has set lose a scary demon in the house... The gang manages to miss this little tidbit and soon the party starts again, only to find Suzanne getting possessed by said demon and soon she passes it on to Angela (hey, the demon might look cheesy, but the girl on girl action when it's passed on doesn't!).

The gang splits up in the house only to be picked off one by one, and in the middle of all this the most memorable scene of all in this movie occurs. Where Suzanne puts her damn lipstick through her nipple... top that if you can! You know early who will survive and who will die, but that doesn't matter, it's the journey there that counts! (Oh, yeah... I almost forgot, at the end of the movie we also get to see what happens to grumpy old geezers who don't appreciate Halloween - a sweet and very gory finale to this great movie).

Even though the movie has some slow moments here and there it's nearly the perfect 80's horror movie. Like I said in the beginning it has all the cliché characters, synthesizer soundtrack and great 80's gore effects. It also has the typical wooden acting by the "teenagers" that feels very 80's, but nothing that drags the movie down one bit - movies like these should be like this! You know what to expect from the start and Night of the Demons truly delivers!

There are two sequels to this flick, but I have never watched any of those sadly. After having rewatched this one I do feel it's time to see more of Angela and her demon buddies though. There's a remake coming out later this year of this movie, but I think I'll stay away from that one... I have a hard time believing they could ever top the original (not that any of the remakes do... I did like the "My Bloody Valentine" remake though, but that one feels more like they got lucky once and that won't happen again).

I, Madman (1989)

a.k.a. Hardcover
Directed by: Tibor Takács

Once in a blue moon you stumble upon a movie that you really didn’t think would be your cup of tea, but end up loving. This is one of those movies for me… It’s been a love affair that have lasted for the last 20 years or so, but back in my O.G. (Original Gore hound) days of the late 80’s and early 90’s I usually rated a movie after it’s gore and splatter content. The more gore the better the movie… yep, I know, but I was young a foolish at the time (now I’m old and foolish instead!). So this one didn’t really look to hold up to all those insane Italian zombie movies that I loved so much back then (still do), but what it might lack in gore (there are some, so it’s not totally without the red liquid) it makes up for with a great story and atmosphere.

I’m a sucker for old 50’s sci-fi and horror movies and there are parts in this movie that are scenes from the books the main character reads that are set in the 50’s and they are right up my alley. Very well done and stylish as hell, especially as the budget was probably not the biggest. There’s plenty to love in this flick, I mean, what's not to like? A cute nerdy chick who loves to read trashy horror novels - check! A mad (and he's REALLY mad) doctor - check! A human/jackal hybrid done in stop-motion - check!

Now to the story... Virginia (Jenny Wright) is a used book store clerk (and aspiring actress) with an interest in trashy pulp novels, the more horrifying the better. And the one we're thrown into right from the start (the book plays out on the screen so we get to see the good stuff she's reading) is called "Much of Madness, More of Sin" by the author Malcolm Brand. No matter how many times she closes the book when things get too gruesome she finishes the book and finds out that Mr Brand wrote one more book. This one called “I, Madman”… and if things weren’t looking up enough already it one day appears at her door, without anyone knowing who put it there… spooky, huh?


The main character in the books is Malcolm Brand himself (although he’s called Dr. Kessler, but have no doubt… that IS Mr Brand - the books are labeled "non fiction" after all) and he has the hots for this chick who just happens to look just like Virginia. She doesn’t feel the same for him though, he’s just too ugly for her to love him… so, just like any normal dude he cuts off all his facial features and tells her he will start fresh and make a new face that she’ll have to love. Yeah, THAT must work… The thing is that while reading the book things start to happen around Virginia that seems to be coming right out of the pages of the book. This weird looking man with a black scarf covering his nose and mouth seems to follow her around. And if things weren’t bad enough people around her are getting murdered in the same way people in the book are murdered by the Brand character…

This is a truly atmospheric horror movie that is in a way very old school in its vibe. For some reason I start to think of the TV show “Tales from the Crypt” when watching this flick, it feels almost like it could have been a feature length episode of that show. The 50’s noir-ish vibe that we get in the scenes from the books also reminds me a lot of the early 90’s Showtime series “Fallen Angels” with its use of bright colors and brightly lit sets. That is also one thing that stands out in this movie, not everything happens in the dark…

What I really love about the movie is that it becomes quite clear that the director knew that this wasn’t going to be an A-list movie, so he’s going for the pulpy B-movie vibe whole heartedly. You get the feeling that they knew very well what kind of movie they were making and they had fun making it. And I really have to say that Malcolm Brand is really one of the creepiest and best villains in a horror movie that I've ever seen... If you, like me, love both the old style horror movies from the 30’s and 40’s as well as 80’s gore movies you will probably love this one. I sure do!

The Haunted Palace (1963)

Directed by: Roger Corman

It's a true sign of exploitation film making when the title of a movie has nothing at all to do with the movie itself, but was used only to tag along on a successful movie series (the Corman Poe adaptions). When it comes to this movie it was the film company who went over Corman's head and used a Poe title just so they could sell it as one of his Poe movies. Because a Poe movie it definitely ain't... Even though the title "The Haunted Palace" comes from an Poe poem (and a small part of it is added to the very last seconds of the movie to justify the title), this is a Lovecraft adaption and nothing else. This is Roger Corman's version of "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" and I gotta say that I wish he would have done more Lovecraft stories as this one is among the better of his movies. If you ask me, that is... (not that you did, but this is my blog so I'm telling ya! ;-)).

It's not the first time a movie is "based on a story by Edgar Allan Poe" without having anything to do with the story itself. The old Lugosi/Karloff movies "The Raven" and "The Black Cat" comes to mind... Great movies both of them, but there was really no need to use Poe's name on any of them.


Anyway, the movie starts in 1765 with the dastardly Joseph Curwen (played by Vincent Price) doing all he can to mate the women of Arkham with a monster he has in his cellar. This is probably a monster straight out of the Cthulhu mythos, but I can't say which one it is... looks like a green turd with four arms. The town people are suspicious of his doings and go to his place to kick his butt for being a warlock. Things go out of hand and Curwen is tied to a tree and burned like the man-witch he is... but before turning to ashes he curses the town (like any good old warlock/witch does just before dying in the flames) and promises to rise from the dead and torment the people of Arkham once again. Thems fighting words!


We then jump 110 years into the future (to 1875) and the Wards come to town. Charles Dexter (again played by Vincent Price) and his beautiful wife Anne (Debra Paget) have come to claim the "palace" he has inherited from his ancestor Joseph Curwen. Not only does Charles look exactly like his ancestor, so does all of the town people (a cheap way to save some bucks on actors). It doesn't take long though for Charles to start to act weird at their new home... all thanks to the spiffy painting of Curwen that hangs above the fire place. And soon Curwen is crawling his way back into the body of Charles Dexter Ward to act out his revenge on the town that burned him all those years ago. Some people do hold a grudge...

Even though this is not a real Poe movie, it's still part of those films (the others are: "House of Usher", "The Pit and the Pendulum", "Tales of Terror", "The Raven", The Masque of the Red Death", "The Tomb of Ligeia" and "The Premature Burial" (the only one of these movies that didn't star Vincent Price)) and this is my favorite of the lot. Vincent Price is as good as ever and here you get to see him both as the regular (and a little weak) Charles Dexter Ward and the evil Joseph Curwen and he shines in both parts. We also get to see good old Lon Chaney Jr doing a good job as the kind caretaker of the palace (which might be older than he looks, and maybe not as kind as he first appears).

Corman was the master of gothic horror in the 60's and here you get it all... foggy dark streets, sinister looking mutants, cheap painted back drops (that does add to the fairytale look of it all), warlocks raising the dead, a monster in the cellar, revenge from beyond the grave, the Necronomicon, and the mere mention of Cthulhu and Yog Sothoth is enough for me... Again, I really wish that Corman would have delved deeper into the world of Lovecraft and made some more adaptions as, even though this one isn't extremely faithful to the original text, I place this one up there together with "Re-Animator" and "From Beyond" as the best of the Lovecraft movies.

Vampirella (1996)

a.k.a. Vampirella: The Movie

Directed by: Jim Wynorski

There are bad movies and then there are BAD movies... I love bad movies, I live for crappy movies done on no money at all. Movies where entire cemeteries wobble when you walk by them, where you can see the strings holding up the rubber bats and where actors are being replaced in the middle of a movie while the character stays the same (yeah, I know... most of the stuff I brought up here are from Plan 9 from Outer Space, but that's one of those so called "Bad movies" that I love like nothing else). To me a bad movie can be really good, just as long as it's not a boring movie. Then it becomes a BAD movie... and who the hell wants to watch a boring BAD movie?

Apparently I did as I watched this 1996 direct-to-video (or should that maybe be “direct-to-TV” as it seems it was made for the cable movie channel Showtime) Vampirella effort... This is a flick I’ve been dying to watch since I read about it in an old issue of “Monster Scene” back in 1996. I’ve been a fan of the Vampirella comic for a long time and a movie version sounded like a great thing… don’t think Vampi’s skimpy clothes had anything to do with that (nooooooooo, of course not!). The article in “Monster Scene” brought up a lot of negative things about the movie, but that didn’t stop me from wanting to watch this anyway. But, back then it was hard to get a hold of movies like this here in Sweden – and as I didn’t have any means to import a copy from the UK or the US I never got around to watching it. Today of course everything gets released on DVD and lo and behold, Vampirella got the DVD treatment a couple of years ago with a director’s commentary and all…

I’m not one who cries over missed opportunities, but after having watched this version of the Vampirella story I really wish the 1976 film about our favorite Drakulonian that was planned by Hammer Films would have been made. But some things were never meant to be, I guess…

Ok, enough of that… Before I spew even more negativity over this flick I should maybe mention the story. The movie starts 3000 years ago on the planet Drakulon, a planet inhabited by vampires. But these are enlightened vampires who don’t feed on others (they don’t need to as there are rivers of blood flowing all over the planet). You can’t have an enlightened society like that without some bad apples and the baddest of them all is Vlad (played by Roger Daltrey of The Who). He’s on trial for breaking the Drakulon code which forbids the taking of life. For some reason his captors used some shoddy handcuffs (futuristic looking though) as he breaks free and kills the Drakulon Elders and flees in a spaceship heading for earth.

The stepdaughter of the main Elder, Ella (yep, add “Vampir” to her name and you know who it is), takes up the hunt to get her revenge. Due to a crappy space ship, she ends up crashing on Mars where she puts herself in suspended animation for the next 3000 years. She’s lucky as there’s a manned mission to Mars in the year 2005 and she hitches a ride back with the guys to earth where she’s looking for Vlad (now calling himself Jamie Blood – rock star). Due to some weird shit going on when Vlad and his pals entered the earth’s atmosphere they mutated into what vampires usually are in movies… not too keen on sunlight, being able to make new vampires with their blood and all that. Vampi was lucky though so she can wiggle around in her tiny little red “dress” during daylight hours still being a pure Drakulonian.

Vampirella teams up with an government run "Vampire Police" called "Operation Purge" and hooks up with the agent Adam van Helsing (yes, a member of that van Helsing family). They learn of Vlad's nefarious plans for earth (blocking out the sun and make a smorgasbord of the entire planet for him and his vampire pals) and rush to stop it... and that's pretty much all I care to say about the story of this flick.

I went into this with quite low expectations (due to all the negative reviews of the movie), so I shouldn't have been surprised at how shitty this one really was. But, it was worse than I expected... maybe because I like the comic it's based on and this flick has absolutely none of the charm and wit of the comic. And I hate to say it, but this movie has some of the worst acting I've seen in a long time... Talisa Soto (who plays the title character) feels so stiff you could use her to board up your windows when the next tornado hits town, and Roger Daltrey (who of course is no "real" actor) should be crowned the king of over acting. Every line that comes out of his mouth sounds like amateur hour at the local theater company or something... and don't get me started on that hideous song he performs as "Jamie Blood". The sets scream low budget on this one - papier mache walls and all that, the effects when Vampi's space ship gets in trouble looks worse than the effects in the original Star Trek TV series (and those were made 30 years before this flick) and the worst thing of all... they totally fucked up the Vampirella costume and gave her something that looks like a mix between a bikini and red plastic garbage bags. Shame on you to ruin the most important thing in a Vampi movie!

I really want to find something positive to say about this film, but it's really hard... I think the best thing I can say about it is that it's at least a better vampire movie than Twilight (don't ask me why I know that), but that really doesn't say a lot, does it?

Greetings...

Greetings, my friends... welcome to this movie review blog of mine. I'm not doing this blog because I consider myself a great movie reviewer, I rather do this as I have a tendency to wanna share my love (and in some cases dislike) of movies with people. I won't probably write anything clever or interesting, but I might remind you of a movie or two that you really should watch (or avoid like the plague) and that's all I really want. To point you in the right direction for the movies you've forgotten about or never even knew existed...

I won't review the latest movies around as there are plenty of other places on the web that does that, and my main interest when it comes to movies isn't really the latest stuff anyway... I'm all for 30's horror, 40's film noir, 50's sci-fi, 60's biker movies, 70's giallo movies, 80's slashers etc. etc. etc. I'm not a total movie snob though, so now and then I'm most likely gonna bring up some mainstream movies as well... but, for the most part it'll be all about Zombies, Cannibals, Giant Monsters, Vampires, Werewolves, Bikers, Hippies, Satanic Covens, Dinosaurs, Evil Nazis, Women in Prison and much, much more. If it's horror/exploitation I'm there!

I have special fondness for the movies made by Hammer, Amicus, Universal (30's & 40's), so there will probably be a bit more of those titles mentioned than any other studios.

Meh, enough of this boring introduction... if you check in now and then you'll find out for yourself what this page will be all about (badly written reviews and bad taste in movies ;-)). So, see you all in the future, because that is where we will spend the rest of our lives!

/Sjöberg