After a brief introduction sets the stage, Hellacious Acres introduces the audience to John Glass as he awakes from a cryogenic deep-freeze in a wooden box located in an old barn. A recorded female voice explains that an apocalypse has ravaged the Earth, leaving it mostly uninhabitable, and that an ongoing war with alien creatures has wiped out much of what remained of humanity. John is being thawed out in order to carry out a mission to try to make the planet habitable again, which is an awful lot to deal with right after waking up from such a long nap.
John has no memory of his past or how he ended up in his situation, and his body is fused to the suit that he wears to protect him from the planet’s poisoned atmosphere. After he takes a minute to sit down and figure out what to do, John stumbles out of the barn and into a mostly uninhabited land that looks suspiciously like rural Canada. The few characters in the film all have a look similar to that of John: home-made outfits and weapons, frequently held together with duct tape, with not a single face or scrap of exposed flesh to be seen. Most of John’s adventures take place in and around barns and backyards, as he tries to figure out how to live in his new environment, avoid the floating aliens threatening him, and carry out his deceptively simple mission.
It’s pointed out on the cover art, so there’s no point in trying to pretend that watching Hellacious Acres isn’t a hell of a lot like watching somebody play Fallout 3 for a couple of hours. John has a forearm-mounted computer system that he uses to gain information, monitor his vital signs, and search his surroundings. He gracelessly stumbles around in order to avoid detection by aliens, and the few people he meets sound suspiciously like non-player characters planted to deliver cryptic bits of dialogue before they go on their way. Of course, Fallout is primarily located in urban locales, so perhaps it’s more accurate to say watching Hellacious Acres is like watching people LARPing a Fallout-style game in their backyards.
Which means we spend an awful lot of time watching faceless John in his full-body suit walking, standing or sitting around while spouting off angsty dialogue about how he wants his old life back and wants to remember how he got here. The film strands the viewer in the same situation, knowing as little as John himself, and the plot meanders as aimlessly as John does. This may have been interesting as a short of around 30 minutes, but at 108 minutes it wears out its welcome early and becomes a serious slog. There’s a nagging feeling that the whole thing is a joke, like another bizarre recent Canadian film, Rubber. Unfortunately, there’s not enough going on here to keep things interesting. Hellacious Acres: The Case of John Glass is a curious cult object, but it’s tough to imagine it finding an audience willing to sit through it repeatedly when they could just go home and play through Fallout 3 again instead.
Hellbenders (2012)
Originally published on Film Monthly 21 February 2014
Filmmaker J.T. Petty has made a name for himself among genre fans with his original independent films Soft for Digging, S&Man, and The Burrowers. While S&Man features some bleak humor in its faux documentary portrayal of the “fake snuff film” underground, Petty’s other films have been more notable for their quiet and careful pacing. So it’s some surprise that his latest feature, Hellbenders, is a flat-out horror comedy, based on Petty’s own graphic novel of the same title. Fortunately, Petty shows he’s just as adept at handling fast-paced action as he is with the more measured approach of his previous films.
Lawrence (Clifton Collins, Jr.) is a former excommunicate and now member of the Augustine Interfaith Order of Hellbound Saints, a group of exorcists who are funded by the Catholic Church, although not officially recognized by it. The job of the “Hellbenders” is to act as a “nuclear option” in extreme cases of exorcism: they live together and constantly keep tabs on their level of sins so they are constantly ready to be damned on their death. This allows them to take the demon into themselves, then commit suicide in order to literally drag the demon back to Hell. Lawrence works under the command of Angus (Clancy Brown), who has been with the Order since 1986. Their team is rounded out by bookkeeper Stephen (Andre Royo), omnisexual Macon (Macon Blair), wannabe pickup artist Eric (Dan Fogler) and Elizabeth (Robyn Rikkon). “I’m a woman and you’re a Catholic,” she helpfully points out to Stephen when he checks up on her current level of damnable offenses. “Everything I do is a sin.”
When the current Pope dies, things start to change. The Church sends Clint (Stephen Gevedon) to investigate Angus’s chapter of the Hellbound Saints and decide whether or not they are worth continued funding. At almost exactly the same time, a tip-off from friendly police Detective Elrod (Larry Fessenden) leads Angus and Lawrence to uncover evidence that a long-dormant evil Norse god called Surtr is planning to return to the Earth, rip open a gateway to Hell and kill God. Clint unsurprisingly is not impressed with Angus and his crew and threatens to cut their funding just when they’re about to enter a battle to stop the destruction of everything, and before long Surtr makes a move on one of the Hellbound Saints themselves. It’s up to the remaining crew to stop Surtr from bringing about the end of all creation, and hopefully Lawrence can also manage to patch things up with his wife Penelope (Samantha Buck), who’s trying to stop drinking.
Petty balances the various plot lines in Hellbenders fairly well, giving most of the crew their own distinct personalities and problems to work out. It’s almost impossible to watch this without Ghostbusters coming to mind, but given its raucously uncouth setup, Hellbenders is a completely different beast. Clancy Brown probably doesn’t get a single sentence out in this film without at least one extremely rude word, and the team’s constant drinking and blasphemies are hilariously inventive. Things sort of unravel a bit in the third act when the scope of the battle gets much larger than the one-on-one exorcisms earlier in the film, but Petty certainly deserves points for ambition. Anyone easily offended–or, hell, reasonably offended–by irreverent humor related to Christianity and Catholicism will want to give Hellbenders a wide berth, but everyone else is in for a treat. This is one of the best horror comedies to come down the pike in some time.
Herschell Gordon Lewis: The Godfather of Gore (2010)
Originally published on Film Monthly 26 September 2011
September 27th is a great day for fans of Herschell Gordon Lewis: Something Weird and Image are releasing both The Blood Trilogy Blu-ray and their long-awaited documentary Herschell Gordon Lewis: The Godfather of Gore. While The Blood Trilogy is a total no-brainer for fans of Lewis and for those who like to archive classic horror films, The Godfather of Gore has only been seen by those lucky enough to catch it at festival screenings. Promising a comprehensive look at Lewis’s career in film and directed by Frank Henenlotter and Jimmy Maslon, it is a serious understatement to say that expectations have been running high.
Luckily for us, The Godfather of Gore delivers. Covering everything from Lewis’s beginnings in industrial and commercial films through to the present day, The Godfather of Gore is packed with footage from a huge number of his films and entertaining interviews with Lewis, David F. Friedman (R.I.P.), John Waters, Joe Bob Briggs, and a number of actors and other people who worked on the films. The interview segments with Lewis and Friedman are easily the best reason to check this out: both of them are old-fashioned, first-rate raconteurs, and it’s a pleasure hearing them tell their stories.
The first part of the film covers Lewis and Friedman teaming up to capitalize on the “nudie cutie” and nudist films before creating the legendary Blood Feast. While a large part of the film is concerned with Blood Feast and Lewis’s other horror films, his other works are also featured, from “Hicksploitation” epics like Moonshine Mountain to such oddities as Miss Nymphet’s Zap-In and The Magic Land of Mother Goose! If I have one minor nitpick regarding the overview of the Lewis filmography, it is the lack of much discussion of his film Scum of the Earth and the “roughie” subgenre it helped to create.
Lewis fans and anyone interested in the history of horror and exploitation films should find plen
ty to celebrate about in The Godfather of Gore. In addition, the DVD features over an hour of deleted scenes, an H.G. Lewis trailer reel, a rare Lewis short (“Hot Night at the Go-Go Lounge”) and a gallery of advertising art. This is unquestionably a must-see for any die-hard film fan, whether you like Blood Feast or not!
HI-8 (Horror Independent 8) (2013)
Originally published on Film Monthly 3 February 2015
VHS has been making a comeback over the last few years, and with it has come a renewed interest in the “shot on video” (or SOV) direct-to-video horror films of the 80s and 90s. Small DVD imprints like Slasher Video and Massacre Video have made their names by re-releasing SOV movies like Boardinghouse and Black Devil Doll from Hell on DVD and some titles on newly-printed limited edition VHS. While some VHS fans are snapping up new editions of these movies, they may not be aware that some of the auteurs of the original SOV heyday are still active even today. Back in 2013, several of these filmmakers got together to work on a new anthology with a twist: each filmmaker had to shoot their entry on the same kind of video formats that would have been available for them to use circa 1995. VHS, S-VHS, and Hi-8 were the order of the day, and the finished product takes its name from that last format: HI-8 (Horror Independent 8).
It’s worth noting up front that anyone not already familiar with the look of old consumer-grade video is going to be in for a shock. HI-8 looks like it could have been made in the early 90s, and the distinct look of SOV is a huge part of its charm. Despite knowing that the sequences were all shot in the last few years, it’s almost impossible to not think they were made 20 years ago. Each filmmaker on deck is very comfortable working with these older formats, and diehard SOV fans will see a number of familiar names: Tim Ritter (Truth or Dare?: A Critical Madness), Brad Sykes (Camp Blood), Marcus Koch (100 Tears), Ron Bonk (The Vicious Sweet), Donald Farmer (Savage Vengeance), Todd Sheets (Zombie Bloodbath), Chris Seaver (Filthy McNasty), and Tony Masiello (SOV: The True Independents). While a few of these filmmakers released their first features well after the first wave of SOV in the 80s and 90s, their entries all feel right at home along with the seasoned veterans of the form.
As with any anthology, the quality of the segments is all over the place, although the SOV look at least gives each entry a visual consistency across the different formats. Brad Sykes contributes both the wraparound story, “No Budget Films Presents…” (in which a couple of filmmakers with a video camera follow around the star of their no-budget movie looking for locations and finding more than they bargained for) and the final segment, “The Scout” (in which a location scouting expedition goes very bad). Tim Ritter’s “Switchblade Insane” is an ambitious psychological mind-twister that tries to cram a lot of plot into a very short time. Ron Bonk’s “Gang Them Style” is seriously goofy but a lot of fun, and it looks like everyone in front of the camera was having a great time. Marcus Koch nearly walks away with the entire movie with his inspired monster effects in his short “A Very Bad Situation.” Despite the number of shorts and wraparound segments, HI-8 never feels too long, and all of the shorts have moments that remind you why you love the SOV style in the first place.
Overall, HI-8 is a consistently entertaining tribute to a very specific time and style of straight-to-video horror, made both by some of the filmmakers who made that time so interesting and by canny stylistic mimicry by some of its biggest fans. If you can’t stand the look of SOV, you’re not going to be able to last 5 minutes into HI-8. But if you’re a fan, this is a much more consistently worthwhile anthology than some of the bigger horror anthologies of the last few years. It’s also a great place to start if you’re curious about the fringes of independent horror filmmaking, with an interesting sampling of different directors and their unique approaches to the genre.
Hidden in the Woods (2012)
Originally published on Film Monthly 17 September 2013
Artsploitation Films has made a name for itself recently by releasing controversial films that other distributors are wary to touch. Their first theatrical releases, Kristina Buozyte’s Vanishing Waves and Maja Milos’s Clip, were a perfect way to introduce the film community to the Artsploitation Films style. Sharing depictions of graphic sexuality, the films otherwise couldn’t be more different. The company has released a number of thought-provoking films from all over the world, recently with a slant toward genre cinema. The latest Artsploitation release is Chile’s Hidden in the Woods, and honestly it’s somewhat puzzling how the film fits in with the rest of Artsploitation’s slate of releases.
Felipe (Daniel Antivilo) lives in a shack in the woods with his two daughters Ana (Siboney Lo) and Anny (Carolina Escobar) and Ana’s deformed son Manuel (José Hernandez), born from Felipe’s sexual abuse of Ana. Felipe’s job is holding drugs for local kingpin Uncle Costello (Serge François), who hopes to recruit the girls as prostitutes when they come of age. One day two police officers arrive at Felipe’s shack to investigate a domestic disturbance call–although who might have called it in is a mystery, as the family appears to have no neighbors–and things end very badly, which is unsurprising given that Felipe is brandishing a chainsaw when the officers first meet him. Felipe panics and begs Uncle Costello for help, while the girls and Manuel finally escape into the woods, hoping to hide at a remote cabin where Felipe and the girls’ mother used to go when the girls were very small.
The fact that this is all just setup should make it clear just how unpleasant Hidden in the Woodsis as a viewing experience. Before the main action of the story even begins, the girls have experienced a lifetime of abuse and isolation, with no one to offer them help or even treat them like humans. The family literally treats Manuel like a dog, keeping him locked up in a room to himself, only interacting with anyone when it’s time to feed him. This is a bleak universe indeed, with very little hope that things might somehow get better. Even after escaping from Felipe, the girls are left to figure out how to survive on their own, and in perhaps the film’s bleakest joke, the only sliver of humanity afforded to the girls is from a man who regularly hires Ana as a prostitute while she tries to raise money to get her sister and son as far away as possible from the small village where they have lived their entire harrowing lives.
True to its “grindhouse” roots, Hidden in the Woods occasionally detours into scenes meant to be played for laughs. Uncle Costello berates his thugs, and a running joke ensures the audience understands they are none too bright. But then a few scenes later, the same characters played for laughs are torturing and raping the girls yet again. Another “humorous” sequence features a montage of Ana performing oral sex on a number of much older men. When she actually has a scene where it appears she is making some kind of human connection, director Patricio Vallardes shoots the scene in a manner that ensures the “exploitation” part of the Artsploitation Films name is fully justified. Unfortunately, the “art” is conspicuously absent here. Hidden in the Woods is a mean-spirited, ugly film that represents the worst aspects of “grindhouse revival” filmmaking. Perhaps the only thing more puzzling than Artsploitation picking it up for U.S. distribution is the fact that Michael Biehn is already in production on an English-language remake. It’s hard to imagine changing the language the characters speak is going to make this material any less unpleasant.
Hit Parade (2010)
Originally published on Film Monthly 5 July 2010
It’s impossible to overstate the huge influence Quentin Tarantino’s early films have had on independent cinema. Although not as prevalent as they used to be, there are still numerous independent productions every year that aim to be Tarantinoesque– most of them miss the mark pretty badly and end up being tedious and grating. Even some of the better ones are entertaining but forgettable. Writer/director Joe Casey’s Hit Parade mostly falls into the later category, with occasional lapses into the former.
Jerome Archer (Jonathan Browning) is a former hit man who retired from the business after being busted for tax evasion. Leaving his glamorous
profession behind, Archer is now a department manager at a franchise bookstore, living in a sparsely furnished apartment and just barely getting by at the actual “management” part of his job title. His quiet life is disturbed by the appearance of a pair of covert Census Bureau agents (Scott Brick and Mariah Robinson) investigating the death of a CIA operative at the hands of flamboyant assassin Speed Razor (Nicholas Lanier). While Archer tries to weigh his options, kingpin Moses Magma (Roger McDonald) tries to talk Jerome into taking his old job back.
Along the way, Hit Parade introduces an awful lot of characters, including Jerome’s co-workers at the bookstore and some porn filmmakers who double as assassins. All these characters don’t necessarily bog things down, but as with many low-budget action films, there’s a lot more talking than action. The barrage of pop-culture references and wiseguy dialogue owes an obvious debt to Tarantino while mostly lacking the flair of the man’s own writing. There are moments when the film feels like a comic book adaptation, which makes sense given writer/director Joe Casey’s background in comics (and as co-creator of hit animated series Ben 10). Unfortunately, the film’s tone veers wildly, making the darker scenes feel weirdly out of place among the more comedic elements.
Those comedic elements, however, end up being the best parts of Hit Parade. There are some very funny moments sprinkled throughout the film, particularly the scenes dealing with Archer struggling to keep his bookstore job while his old life threatens to intrude. Nicholas Lanier brings an infectious energy to the character of Speed Razor, keeping his character just on the edge between endearing and annoying. The rest of the cast is all over the place, but that may be the result of a seriously uneven script that finds characters making inexplicable decisions and undergoing sudden shifts in personality and lapses in logic.
The Unrepentant Cinephile Page 33