Mouse of Horrors, Bride of Frankenstein in Fun-Land

Okay, let's get this over with.  That scene!  The one with the 15-foot Great White. Completely out of place.  Still...it is a 15-foot Great White in an amusement park slasher film...why not?  I mean, it wasn't like a hot air balloon scene in which two young lovers laugh in glee!  A Great White!  Irrelevant...but a Great White, nonetheless. The film we have today is a 2025 slasher film. Slasher all the way.  This may be the goriest film you see all year.  So let us get to "Mouse of Horrors," directed by Brenda Petrizzo.

Two slag lovelies (Eve Vice and Misti Taylor) in a seaside town are looking for guys to have pre-marital sex with. One will be dismembered by a man in a mouse mask (Lewis Santer), the other will be cut up later. Fun-Land, an amusement park in this town will be the center of the horror.  After a jogger is torn apart by the same mouse man, Meg (Erin Sanderson) will bring her buddies to the place. Meg works there and will sneak back in with her mates to have her buddy Chloe's (Natasha Tosini) going away party. Kim (Allie Moreno), Chloe's bestie is there with a lot more babes and hunks. Oh yes, we meet the mouse man, and his mate, the bear man (Stephen Staley). These two slashers are controlled by mad scientist Dr. Rupert (Chris Lines). Rupert sends these two monstrosities out to capture women and take their body parts. Yep, Rupert is a regular Dr. Frankenstein and is producing a bride for the mouse man, piece by piece.

The kills will be gory...very gory. The bear and mouse will cut off, or pluck out body parts of nubile babes and their hunk boyfriends and feed them to the dying unfortunate. Ick!  Rupert sees Chloe and wants her to be the head of the bride. You'll meet the unfinished bride, later.  Now the bear and mouse scavenge the closed Fun-Land hunting for babes. The hunk BFs will be in the way and will also die in gory fashion, Knives, sledgehammers, machetes, hedge clippers, and other bladed instruments will be the weapons of choice for the psychos. The trio of psychos will go through babes and hunks like crap through a goose.  Then!  The Great White shark!  Out of nowhere!  Wow!  Again...why not? Chloe has spunk and desires to save her mates, or the ones still alive, and goes to war with the psychos.

Will Chloe be the final girl, and if so will she save any of her mates?  Has Dr. Rupert received any funding from USAID, or collaborated with Dr. Fauci?  Will Bear and Mouse have a knock down drag out fight over the sultry Chloe?  This is an extremely gory one which will cause you to avert your gaze from the screen.  For a classic slasher film with real slashers, see "Mouse of Horrors."   

The House of Secrets, Lunatics, A Dame in Peril, and a Schmuck

Okay...it is really corny.  Stupid, if you must. Still, our feature today is a lot of fun.  When it came out in 1936, movie audiences probably were enthralled by this horror/mystery that was more of a madcap drama.  The Berlin Olympics were taking place. The Fuhrer would see Jesse Owens win the Gold.  A mad regime would cement its hold on the most important country in Europe and begin conquering its smaller neighbors.  There was means to escape. The movies, especially this one. Our feature today is "The House of Secrets," directed by Roland D. Reed.

Our beset protagonist is Barry (Leslie Fenton), a good bloke. He meets a sultry dame, Julie (Muriel Evans) on a ship over to England. He saves her from a brute but she decides to remain a mystery. Too bad...she's really hot. Barry pines that he has no means to find the love of his life. Uh oh...he will be played the sucker. The naive and lovelorn Barry will be notified by a lawyer that he has inherited an English manor 15 miles outside of London. Also, he will inherit great monetary wealth and a treasure hidden somewhere on its grounds.  Barry is happy and goes to this mansion, supposedly vacant for a hundred years. Surprise!  Julie is there.  She's terrified and implores Barry to depart and not return. Before meeting Julie there, hounds are released on him and Julie's dad, Dr. Kenmore (Morgan Wallace) orders him off the property at gunpoint.

Barry, valuing his life, leaves but keeps sneaking back onto his estate.  The sounds of lunatics emanate out of basement laboratories and murderous thugs keep showing up, too. The thugs threaten Julie and promise Barry they will shoot him.  Dr. Kenmore keeps showing up with a gun and keeps ordering Barry to leave.  The lunatics keep howling and it is apparent Dr. Kenmore is experimenting on them in the cellar. Uh oh, the Home Secretary (Holmes Herbert) and the police commissioner are in on the plot to keep Barry away from the grounds he just inherited.  Barry, who has met a gal completely out of his league, cannot stay away.  He wants to marry Julie.  Uh oh...to do that, he will have to stay alive and also keep Julie alive.

Just who does Barry have to protect Julie from?  What is being done to the lunatics in the basement? What do the highest reaches of the British government have at stake that they would want to keep Barry away?  Atmospheric and fun.  Ms. Evans is sultry and her relationship with Barry gives all us schmucks hope that even we can land sultry dames. See "The House of Secrets," and forget about war in Europe. 

The Book of the Witch, Mortality, Witches, and Zombies

Our own mortality.  We all will die one day. Scary?  Of course.  There is good news, maybe. Is our own mortality the key to making us vulnerable and needy?  In other words, could we form relationships, love, share, or embrace without it?  What kind of fiends would we be if our lives lasted forever and ever? Our film today explores these questions with a sensitivity and depth that will deliver a horrifying story.  The horror is not that we die...rather, the horror exists if we won't.  Today we look at 2024's "The Book of the Witch," directed by Joshua Sowden.  This film was completed in six days with a crew of two.  Yep, no caterers, drivers, or daycare professionals.  Just people who wanted to make a great horror film.

As our film begins we meet the titular witch (Ali Williams). She's grotesque.  The hag kills, drags the corpse to a pentagram, opens a book with Latin incantations (to Satan, no doubt), and steals the lifeforce from the victim.  This now gives her the food she needs to live forever.  That is, if she keeps doing it. Enter a very likable babe, Victoria (Krishna Smitha). She and August (Danny Parker-Lopes) work second shift as a security detail in an unoccupied behemoth building.  The two are both lonely and have never come close to winning life's lottery.  The two lonely souls understand one another, and care for one another.  Both have suffered incredible loss and only know that they are supposed to carry on. Wait! Victoria has a different gameplan.  We see her backstory and it is sad and scary.  She does not want to die...ever.

Internet research, always a good thing, gives her a solution. Healthy eating?  She tried, but no go. The pretty young mortal finds out there is a witch in the desert who dates back to the 17th century.  Victoria learns of the book and its powers to keep one immortal. Victoria wants the book.  To do this, she will have to venture into the desert and take it. Easy?  Nope.  August pleads with her to give up this quest, he is such a good soul also dealing with loss associated with death. His approach to coping is completely different, but Victoria's memories of her mom's death are just too powerful.  What happens next is horrific, but even in horror, perhaps Victoria has an opportunity to make it all okay...maybe.

Mr. Sowden has crafted a fine story, masterfully. Miss Smitha and Mr. Parker-Lopes were amazing and we loved their portrayals of characters that many of us can vividly relate to.  Oh yes, the witch!  Miss Williams was amazing, and this point is driven home during one of the last scenes  in the film. For a shocking horror film that will cause you to do some heavy thinking, and maybe draw a tear or two, see "The Book of the Witch."    

A Face in the Fog, A Contemporary Telling of Phantom

Can anything released in 1936 be considered "contemporary." In the eyes of history of the world, 1936 was hardly a tick of the clock ago.  In our modern worldview, 1936 is as ancient as the pyramids.  Even more ancient than 1936 is...1925! In 1925, Lon Chaney turned in a magnifecent performance in the title role of "The Phantom of the Opera." Ironically, this silent film dropped the same year as Hollywood's first talkie, "The Jazz Singer." So in 1936, with silents now belonging to a bygone era, Hollywood makes a "Phantom" themed thriller...set in L.A. Our film today is 1936's "A Face in the Fog," directed by Robert F. Hill.

The Paris Opera House? Nonsense. Our feature is set in L.A., in and around a local theater.  A local theater troupe, putting on a Peter Fortune (Lawrence Gray) play is decreasing in size. Many actors have mysteriously been murdered...but by who?  The show is about to close but fake-news reporterette, the sultry Jean (June Collyer) has an idea.  She erroneously reports that she saw the killer and can identify him, figuring this lie will draw him into the open. Bad move...the killer reads this. Now there is a dark-clothed hunchback pursuing Jean.  He will try to kill her with a weird gun, but instead misses and murders bystanders. Her lover, reporter Frank (Lloyd Hughes) is determined to protect his love and to try to identify and capture the mysterious hunchback. This won't go well.  Every plot he tries, the killer is not caught and someone else has died mysteriously. 

The killer? Apparently it is a dark hunchbacked figure. He has a gun that shoots a special type of bullet.  The bullet does not leave a mark or a wound but instead spreads a poison on his victim.  Now he is trying to murder Frank and Jean...and anyone else who has a relationship to the theater troupe performing the Peter Fortune play. Stepping up to help is the star of the show, Reardon (Jack Mulhall).  He has some ideas and claims he knows a guy who would have the know how to commit murders in this manner.  Too helpful?  Maybe, but this is just too easy.  As the theater is on the verge of closing down and ending the Peter Fortune drama, Frank comes up with his own theories.

Why is our hunchbacked killer so intent to destroy the theater and this drama?  Where did Jean learn to lie and pas sit off as journalism?  Probably the Columbia University School of Journalism...just like today.  Will our killer improve his aim and finally be able to take out the fake news?  This is a good atmospheric one and a nice tribute to "The Phantom of the Opera."  See "A Face in the Fog," and get back in tuned with ancient times from before the Berlin Olympics.  

The Amityville Terror, The Best Amityville Film Ever

Wow!  I was not expecting this!  Catfights to the death! A babe with a crossbow! A succubus-type babe with fire coming out of her eyes! Sultry teenage skanks dying horribly!  Babe sister seducing hunk brother! The taboo!  Gratuitous prurient situations! A mega-death count!  The crossbow babe racing through Amityville with a dirt bike! Oh!  A dominatrix realtor who has deviant sex in kitchens or anywhere else...who is also a demon corruptor!  This might be one of the best films ever.  Our feature today is 2016's "The Amityville Terror," directed by Michael Angelo.

Delilah!  Wow.  If Richard Attenborough had put this character in his 1993 film "Shadowlands," people would have wanted to see it. Delilah (Tonya Kay) looking like a sex-craved dominatrix rents the Amityville house to the unstable babe Shae (Amanda Barton). The artist, Shae, invites her brother Todd (Kaiwi Lyman) and his babe wife, Jessica (Kim Nielsen) to move in with her. Of course, their babe teenage daughter, Hailey (Nicole Tompkins) comes, too.  Hailey is always equipped with a crossbow and dirt bike. It is, after all, Amityville. Strangeness occurs. A gory acid bath (very painful), taboo seduction, and a hot Asian gal ejected out the window. Let us talk about the hot Asian gal...Jenny (Lai Ling). She'll try to help protect the crossbow wielding teen, but she'll only get shot out of Hailey's bedroom window just like a cannonball shot out of a cannon.  Her death will be sad...and gory. Happens.

Okay, Delilah has sex with some stooge on a kitchen counter. Relevant to the plot? If you have to ask. Hailey gets a sweet boyfriend, Brett (Trevor Stines). He'll lose his head over Hailey...literally. Jessica, who has great big...er...well...a great big...smile...will lose a bloody battle with the rose garden. Shae will shed all her clothes and become a major league seductress, seeking to corrupt her brother, Todd. Todd, an idiot tries to figure out why Jessica won't have sex with him. Then there is the teenage babe Theresa (Christy St. John). She wants to murder Hailey because the crossbow wielding seductress stole her BF. Oh, ghosts and demons...yeah, yeah...them, too. Okay...there is actually a plot.  Not a bad one, but it is spliced heavily with gratuitous nudity, gratuitous gore, gratuitous allure, and so many graphic kills.

Is this the story Jay Anson wanted to tell but couldn't because he never took a creative writing course? Why don't we have more movies with babe protagonists who wield crossbows and travel around town on dirt bikes?  Why don't we have more succubus/demon/slut real estate agents who...wait...I'm being told we do...never mind.  Do yourself a favor and see one of the best films ever made, and don't fall into the trap by comparing it to 1993's  "Shadowlands," "The Amityville Terror." 

Horrors of the Black Museum, Mad Man Shreds Babes

Ah, the nubile and delightful Dorinda Stevens.  A babe actress who in 1959 portrayed the unfortunate Gail Dunlop.  Remember her?  Sure you do.  When "Horrors of the Black Museum" hit U.S. drive-ins in the 70s, everyone was talking about her horrific demise.  Alas, she was the first of many babes to die horribly in this film.  As misogynistic as the Clintons, "Horrors of the Black Museum" states the misogynistic viewpoint even better than Clinton's lawyers.  Today we look at 1959's "Horrors of the Black Museum," directed by Arthur Crabtree.

Do police agencies actually have so-called black museums filled with the tools of deranged killers? Not advertised, but yes they do...not all, but I've been in one or two.  In our film Scotland Yard has one...a lame one according to true-crime best-selling author Edmond Bancroft (Michael Gough).  So unimpressed by Scotland Yard's effort, he creates his own.  Tools of gruesome murders of beautiful dames grace the museum. How does he get them?  He commits the murders.  The film opens with Gail unboxing a mysterious gift.  She has received a supposed pair of binoculars from, whom she believes, a secret admirer.  When she puts the spy glasses up to her eyes, two spikes shoot through her orbs and into her brain.  Alas, the lovely Gail Dunlop is no more.

Edmond visits the Scotland Yard detectives and taunts them for not being able to solve the cases.  This writer is above suspicion as he appears to be crippled.  He'll strike again and even steal the head of the sultry Joan (June Cunningham) from one scene.  Edmond is on the prowl for more weapons that can inflict gory deaths on babes.  He keeps finding them.  He's smart.  Eye witnesses are fooled and only serve to throw off the police investigation.  Uh oh...Edmond has a laboratory attached to his basement museum.  It's a great laboratory complete with a big vat of acid to get rid of bodies.  Uh oh...his trusty assistant Rick (Graham Curnow) has a new GF, Angela (Shirley Anne Field).  Rick is so taken by Angela's beauty, his lips become very loose.  Edmond will not tolerate loose lips.

How has Edmond become such a misogynist?  Will the nubile Angela survive to the end credits?  Is this film, which taunts the police, the forerunner of the 'defund the police' movement here in America?  Gory and horrific, the cheese in this film will be annihilated in so many imaginative and bloody ways.  For some nice English horror, see "Horrors of the Black Museum."      

Ring Ring, Telemarketer Carnage

Idiots!  Telemarketers!  The bane of our existence, at times.  Wait...I need to renew my auto warranty.  Okay, I'm back. What happens when telemarketers behave badly and do stupid things?  Well, the answer is told to us in our film today.  It'll be a gory mess, actually. I do have to admit, our telemarketer protagonists are likable, if not stupid.  We do pull for them.  Nail guns, captivity, and burnt frozen pizzas be damned, our feature today is 2019's "Ring Ring," directed by Adam Marino.

Okay, the Incredible Hulk lays off his staff at the phone bank for telemarketers.  No, really.  Lou Ferrigno lays them all off and reminds someone that they would not like him when he's angry.  Amber (Kirby Bliss Blanton) and Will (Malcolm Goodwin) can't afford to lose their jobs.  Uh oh...Will has a plan.  Steal the company's phone lists, and go into business for himself. Amber buys off on this idea and the duo steal the client lists. After Will is seduced by redheaded babe, Amanda (Emily Tyra), he loses his phone, which has all the lists on it.  Now Amber and him have to retrace his steps and find it.  An app is activated and the duo call for a ride from an Uber type service.  The ride arrives and is driven by junkie, maniac, serial killer Jacob (Tommy Kijas)...who coincidentally has their phone.

Let's not dwell on coincidence. Now Jacob has Will and Amber locked in the basement of his big old house. Actually it is his mom's house.  She is dead and in the freezer while he lives off her social security checks. Now Will and Amber try to escape.  Jacob is armed with a nail gun.  Amber tries yelling at Jacob, reasoning with him, and seducing him.  Strung out on heroin, Jacob is non-responsive to Amber's sex appeal.  As the film progresses, Jacob realizes he has to murder his two captives and also gets more wasted.

Do Amber and Will have a shot at escape?  Is Jacob's auto-warranty still current or does it need to be renewed?  Do all telemarketers deserve a similar fate?  This is a good one.  Mr. Marino gives us two protagonists who we should despise...but we like them.  Will and Amber come across as cute and naive, though stupid and cunning, too.  See "Ring Ring" and think twice about yelling profanity at the next guy trying to extend your auto-warranty.