Flesh Burns and Infected Ingrown Toenails Hurt

So, here we are after a lengthy hiatus. You, my legions of fans, and I, that would be.... me. I haven't been writing this thing lately mainly due to laziness and from passing out at 9 p.m. every night after working hard all day. Today, my toe was operated on for a nagging, insanely painful infection that has bothered me on and off since January. I had an ingrown on the side of my toe, but it wasn't the nail itself that caused the problem, it was my toe's reaction to the nail and the subsequent infection. The Dr. said that I had the worst toenail infection he had seen so far in 2009. I'm proud of that. Pride goeth before a fall, so I felleth on my couch this afternoon with my foot elevated and watched "Fleshburn".

"Fleshburn" is yet another VHS purchase from the late, great Video Galaxy XVI. I will be watching the many VHS tapes I bought during their closing sale for a lonnnng time. "Fleshburn" is an obscure revenge flick about a crazed Native American Vietnam vet who escapes from an insane asylum and vows revenge on the psychiatrists who sent him there. The crazy vet is played by Sonny Landham, who, if you are like me and watch "Predator" several times a year, you will recognize as "Billy", the bad ass Indian tracker.


Its a promising premise, and for the first 25 minutes or so, it really seems like the film will deliver. I mean, what's not to love about Sonny Landham on a crazed rampage? Well, he kidnaps his old doctors, dumps him in the desert and then the bickering between the shrinks begins. You know who are annoying? Self obsessed yuppies. You know what's annoying to watch? Self obsessed yuppies bickering. One character, Sam, is pretty cool, he's the survivalist type that is gonna survive come hell or high water. Unfortunately, the other three doctors are super annoying. There's Jay, who bitches about everything and is played by a bad actor. The female doctor whose name I can't remember and isn't worth looking up on IMDB because I don't care, gets to be the super whiny hysterical type. Then there's the gay guy who breaks his leg and finds God and gives Sam a bunch of crap about wanting to kill Sonny Landham. "You're only concerned about proving that your power is greater than his," he says. Shove it, God boy! That's what I would have told him.

The middle to end of the movie is at turns boring, aggravating and disappointing. Although it is great to see Sonny Landham as a crazy bad guy, he is criminally underused. There are usually just shots of him chanting and painting his face before the film gets back to what its really interested in: a bunch of jerky shrinks bickering with each other and Sam making things out of rocks and pieces of metal.

Overall, not very good. The premise is blown by the underuse of Sonny Landham and the ending really sucks. Hope my next entry doesn't take me a month and a half.

I was wondering what Landham has been up to, as he was a great 1980s cinematic badass... came up with this... no wonder he hasn't been in anything lately.

The New Punisher Movie Pwns!

I thought this movie looked kind of crappy. I mean, the first one was cheesy fun, and Tom Jane was excellent as Frank Castle, so I was a little disappointed to see some new guy filling Franky's big black boots. The only thing bad about the first one was John Travolta, but he was the bad guy, so you get to root for his death. I wish Travolta died a violent and horrible death in every movie he was ever in, even "Saturday Night Fever". He and his other space buddy Tom Cruise are basically the modern definition of the term "douchebag". But, I digress. When my good friend and harsh critic Mr. Tim Castle, husband of Mrs. Jill Castle, said it was "punishing....and good." I was surprised. I expected to hear "cheesy but fun" or something like that. "Punishing and good, eh?" I thought while steering my car through the urban blight of Somerville and Cambridge (not! Nice areas.) on my way to the depressing looking Cambridge Entertainment Cinemas.

First off, some great trailers were played. The new "Friday the 13th" is coming out on Friday, February 13th, 2009. Though I am not a fan of re-makes, I am a huge fan of Jason. And I guess these days you gotta take your Jason however those bastards in Hollywood want to serve him up. "The Spirit" looks like it could be either horrible or really incredible. I'm hoping the latter, as it was a great comic book and Frank Miller is at the helm of the film. There is a really crappy looking remake of "My Bloody Valentine", not really a classic in its own right, but guess what? It's in 3D! That makes it a must-see right there.

I don't want to give anything away about "Punisher: War Zone" because I hope people go and see it. If you are a fan of the comic book, the first movie, hell even the 1989 one with Dolph, you will love it. Where this movie really excels is the violence department. This gets the comic book just right, which is ultra-violent. It doesn't have much of Garth Ennis's pitch black humor, but it's definitely got all the exploding heads fans of the comic will need to stay interested. I really hope they make more of these films. Hell, Ray Stevenson is no Tom Jane, but he looks the part and nails the character. Dominic West, better known as drunk ass cop Jimmy McNulty from the "The Wire" is great as Jigsaw, the main villain. Hell, Newman is even in the thing!

This might ruffle some feathers, but I liked this film even more than the 2004 version, of which I am a giant fan. So, that should give you an idea of how awesome it is. AND, I was drinking 40s of Olde English with the Castles at the 2004 big screen release. I was sober this time. That is saying something. When you go see a movie by yourself on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, sober, and can say it was a better film than the hootin' and hollerin' good time you had with good friends movie-drinkin', that means its really good. I give it my highest recommendation for fans of hardcore, good old fashion movie vengeance! If any Hollywood execs are reading this, of which I'm sure all of them are, start work on a sequel!

Sober Night Part 2: Cemetery of Terror

After "Don't Panic", I was on a role with these Mexican Horror movies, so I decided to delve deeper into my "Horror From South of the Border" box set and watched "Cementerio Del Terror". As the credits rolled and the ominous kettle drum/dissonant piano stab/low growling synth music played, I was excited to see that this was, in fact, another Ruben Galindo Jr. film! I immediately liked this film. You know how a certain smell can evoke vivid memories? Like when you're spray painting some apples gold for your holiday centerpiece and it reminds you of the times in your life when you huffed spray paint on the streets, servicing Johns under a bridge with BJ's, HJ's and ZJ's to support your habit? Well, there is a certain type of grainy film stock that does that for me. I can't smell it, obviously, but if I could, I imagine it would smell like dreams. Which is what Ron Howard's jizz smells like.

But that's besides the point. The point is, as soon as this flick started and I saw that grainy film stock and those deep, garish 80s colors, I knew I liked it. Even though this film is from 1985, it could easily be from 1980 or even the 70s. If it wasn't for one character's awesome Michael Jackson circa Thriller jacket and a few of the hairstyles, I would have guessed that this film was no newer than 1982.

This movie has three main storylines. One traces a doctor who wants to have a famous Satan worshipper named Devlon's body cremated. The other involves some jerky young medical students and their dates. The third involves some kids out trick or treating who want to take a "courage test" in the cemetery. How do these three different threads connect? Welp, without giving too much away, a cop and the doctor go to the morgue to get Devlon's body to cremate, but the jerky med students have already stolen it to play a joke on their dates. The jerky med students invited their dates to a "super" "jet set" party which was never going to happen. They made it up as a cheap scam to get some action. They take the ladies to a creepy abandoned house hoping for a make out party. The ladies aren't enthused, and won't make out. One of the jerky med students, who is wearing an incredible ski jacket, decides to wander around the house. He finds a giant black book that says "DEVLON" on the front. He starts reading it and is excited that its all creepy and shit. He tells the other jerky med students that they should scare the hell out of the girls because then they will come running right into their arms.

So, they go and inadvertently steal Devlon's corpse and hold a black mass in the graveyard. During the black mass, they keep chanting "its the sixth day of the sixth month!" Uh, so is Halloween on June 6th in Mexico? The cop and the doctor show up to grab Devlon's body to cremate it and it ain't there. The doctor freaks out and steals the cop's car and drives around looking frantic. After the black mass in the graveyard with the stolen corpse, for some strange reason, the jerky med students' dates are totally in the mood. A couple of them are listening to some great make out jams on a transistor radio. They apparently can't make out without it, because as Devlon's reanimated corpse approaches the house, the signal gets fuzzy. I don't want to give too much away, but Devlon tears some shit up, literally. His main weapon is his claws.

The trick or treater kids are doing their courage test thing in the cemetery, and zombies start popping up everywhere. In what must be a Rubin Galindo staple, all the zombies look like the zombies from Thriller, just not as good. I hate to dis children, but these kids are extremely stupid. There are tons of moments where they run the complete wrong way when fleeing a zombie. Like, the exit from the house in on the left, a zombie enters the scene from the camera's position and they run to the right.

The crazy doctor finds the kids and helps them by punching the zombies. These are really wimpy zombies. They can be defeated by a doctor who looks like Zach Galifinakis. I mean, its not like Zach doesn't look tough or anything, but you know what I mean. There is a super surprise ending that I can't give away, so I'll end this review like this. I liked this movie, It is dumb, and cheap but it is also fun. One fun thing about it is how off alot of the timing is. An actor reacts to something a little too late here and there, and sometimes the camera lingers on a scene well after the action is over. Its fun garbage. I mean, I took a melatonin with a half hour left and I still stayed awake for the whole thing. That's saying something.

Don't Panic! I Took A Night Off.

After the week-long party that was Thanksgiving, my 10 year high school reunion and many smaller reunions of old friends, I decided to take a much deserved night off from the hooch. I also have to take a drug test for my new job tomorrow, and I thought that maybe showing up for it not smelling like a distillery would help make a good, albeit false impression for my new employer. I drank some cranberry juice, took some milk thistle and watched "Don't Panic", or "Dimensiones ocultas" as it is known in its native land. Its part of my "Crypt of Terror" Mexican horror box set.

This film was written and directed by Ruben Galindo Jr., making it what we film buffs call a "vehicle", a Ruben Galindo Jr. "Vehicle". I like to think this blog is educational and informative. Turns out that three of his other movies are included in my box set. Hooray. The film is also somewhat of a Jon Michael Bischof "vehicle", as he is the main star and he wrote and performed the film's ultra cheesy titular (I love that word) theme song. Jon Michael is deserved of praise, not only for his excellent name, his excellent curly mullet or the fact that he's supposed to be 17 years old and runs around in his dinosaur pajamas for most of this film, but for the fact that he apparently recorded the theme song on a Fisher Price tape recorder. There are backup singers, keyboards, all sorts of things going on in that song. It must have been hard to get all that together with no multi tracking and just that little plastic microphone.

Jon Michael plays a kid named Michael whose friends give him a Ouija board for his 17th B Day. The way his friends repeatedly say "Michael" when they talk to him reminds me of Stella (who I'm going to see live a week from Friday!!!) As in all 80s horror movies, the teenagers look like they are 30. Michael's love interest looks like Naomi Russell with a bad unibrow. Don't ask me how I know who she is, we bloggers are just very intuitive with all aspects of pop culture. And big ole butts.

At night, Michael starts having visions of bloody murders and when he opens his eyes, the pupils are huge. Turns out that these murders are really happening and his friend Tony is committing them, because he has been possessed by Virgil, who is actually the devil. So there are some bloody murders while Michael runs around in his dino jammies trying to stop them. The gore, violence and weird imagery isn't exactly mind-blowing, but there's enough of it to keep you awake. As Tony turns into more and more of a zombie, he looks like a zombie from "Thriller".

The ending is extremely downbeat, until they lash some dimestore spirituality on at the end to try and perk it up. The film is really not that great, nor is it too bad to not be bad/good. Its basically bad/good but won't blow you away. And furthermore, Cranberry juice is tasty, even without vodka in it.