RECENT VIEWINGS (Bad Movie Thread!)

[LilCerberus]

Tonight's Stinker
The Alien Factor (1978)
https://youtu.be/rh1Blm0-duA?si=zDLHBi7OZf2hsmIg

Actually filmed in 1972, explaining a few things....
So, this young couple are making out in their car, when the boy is grabbed by something that looks like a plastic suit of armor.... Next day, the local sheriff takes the girl to the town doctor, and a pair of locals bring the dead boy, in his car... The mayor shows up wanting to find out what happened, & the sheriff guesses an animal attack...
Later on, a young woman sees an alien in a pair of jeans.... Some local hippies try to find & kill the animal, but get killed... Another guy is killed by a ball of light, & some kids find him the next day.... Then a musical number from the local rock band, followed by a guy leaving the show only to find big foot in his basement....
The sheriff wants to call in the state troopers, but the mayor is afraid it might scare off a new tourist trap... Then an astronomer shows up looking for a meteor.....

Early '70s synth soundtrack which is pretty grating... Stiff looking regional actors... The low budget audio is passable.....
Very riffable..... Couldn't escape this nagging sense that I'd seen all this before.....

[M.10rda]

Yeah, Don Dohler remade ALIEN FACTOR at least once - in the 70s or early 80s! (Wasted no time with it.) I too don't remember if I saw the O.G. or a remake or maybe I've seen two versions... I guess you can't fault Dohler for, uh....... lack of attention span?  His films are a laff riot, though.

[LilCerberus]

Yeah, Don Dohler remade ALIEN FACTOR at least once - in the 70s or early 80s! (Wasted no time with it.) I too don't remember if I saw the O.G. or a remake or maybe I've seen two versions... I guess you can't fault Dohler for, uh....... lack of attention span?  His films are a laff riot, though.

Oh, yeah..... Kinda reminded of The Galaxy Invader(1985), which I saw on a local late night horror show, albeit, I was kinda thinking (at the time) about the Polonia Brothers movie.....

[M.10rda]

MOROZKO aka FATHER FROST (1924):
To check out the poster image on Letterboxd (as well as some of the reviews) you'd think this was a freaky art/horror flick, hence I sought it out and watched it. Don't make the same mistake! This is a 40 minute nothingburger where the eponymous Krampus-lite weirdo appears only briefly and does nothing!

Honestly I couldn't brief you too well on what does happen - a peasant family in snowy Russia sits around their hovel, bickers, then a female member wanders around in the snow and gets lost... maybe is in danger of freezing... then maybe (?) is rescued by "Father Frost" or whoever... makes it home... and there's a party or maybe a wedding? I have no idea and couldn't care less. A handful of intertitles are in Russian w/ no available English subtitles, though the scarcity of foreign text couldn't significantly illuminate this threadbare and uneventful slog. Is Father Frost the West's "Santa Claus"? He's got long creepy claws and doesn't seem too jolly, but then he doesn't kill or eat anyone either (unfortunately) and there is a sleigh.......

And hey, what's up with the plasticine noses (and other facial features) on so many silent film actors? Were these hold-overs from their theatre makeup kits and they didn't realize they looked ultra-fake in close-up/on camera? I'm talking about members of the family here, not the mythical snow-guy of the title. It makes ya' really appreciate the credible self-created FX worn by Lon Chaney during the same era.

2/5 at best. I got nothing out of it. Riffs might help but then I don't even think there's enough here to make fun of.

[M.10rda]

THE CONSTANT NYMPH (1928):
Another early feature that sounds like sheer naughtiness but isn't. Elsa Lanchester apparently has a walk-on somewhere in this (nearly two hour!) melodrama but there are some crowd scenes and I just wasn't motivated to invest any effort in trying to pick her out (much though I do adore her). Honestly THE CONSTANT NYMPH is a nominally "Good" or well-made film, but it's too long and too entrenched in its outre attitudes to do anything other than ultimately grate on one's nerves.

Lewis (Igor Novello from Hitchcock's LODGER) is a musical protege under the lifelong tutelage of the much older, famous Sanger. Lewis sincerely loves his mentor yet repays him by bringing a scrumpy colleague home to Sanger's mountain lodge and introducing said colleague to Sanger's younger second wife, who promptly has a fling with the colleague and incites Sanger to premature cardiac arrest. The first third of the film follows this infidelity plot, but once Sanger is dead it's pretty much forgotten and we follow Lewis back to his metropolitan home, where he marries a nice-enough high society dame but is still pursued by his lovelorn childhood friend, Tessa, who is Sanger's youngest daughter.

Okay - Tessa is played by Mabel Poulton, who is totally adorable (a Kirsten Dunst/Kiernan Shipka/Anya Taylor-Joy type) and is clearly madly in love with Lewis from the first time she appears onscreen five minutes into the movie, and particularly after Sanger dies there is absolutely no logical reason why Lewis wouldn't just embrace her and shack up with and/or marry her - but this is the Ruth Chatterton era of Misogynist/Sadistic Cinema, where no lovely well-meaning young woman can be allowed to enjoy life or be rewarded for her good intentions, and must instead suffer unrequited and then often die, very very slowly, for the gratification of the viewer.       Feh!

A real drag.    2.5/5    Somehow remade at least twice!

[M.10rda]

EL CONFESOR (1920):
Okay, this is just porn... though it's among the earliest porns I've seen or heard of so I guess that's some sort of distinction. A Catholic priest welcomes/hears confessions from and/or generally converses (silently) w/ between one and three dark-haired women w/ badonkadonk booties. One of them is a cleaning lady, another is definitely a parishioner/society type, and there might be a third or else one of them shows up twice. (The ladies look similar enough I couldn't be sure.) Each of them disrobes to one extent or another and engages w/ the priest in activities that the diocese and Vatican don't publicly approve of yet have been known to overlook.  Letterboxed says 35 minutes but I think the copy I watched was 20-something, yet I don't think I missed any errr plot? There's onscreen manipulation of the male member and plenty of frenzied thrusting, though no close-ups of penetration, so maybe those hit the cutting room floor of History...

There's nothing "Good" about EL CONFESOR but there are at least two things about it worth remarking on. One is that I've yet to see a "vanilla" porn from the silent era - the three I've seen are about a black mass, a sexual assault by a satyr, and now this priest-porn. I guess what we can take away from this is that If you were gonna' go to the trouble of making a sex film in the 00s or 10s or 20s, you were gonna' go all the way and make a wild/taboo one, not just a consenting orthodox couple enjoying themselves.

The other thing is that the ladies here, though neither young nor particularly pretty, definitely have the kinds of bodies we call "plus-sized" today, or in other words more or less average/non-athletic human bodies w/ some cushion and cellulite, which I for one am always in favor of vis-a-vis pron.  That kind of physique is a little more common in 21st century adult entertainment but was almost unheard of from the official dawn of the X-rated film in the late 60s through the 20th century. Then again there wasn't a lot of media that promoted what a "normal" or "desireable" or "sexy" human body looked like in the early 20th century, so in a sense, the naivete of EL CONFESOR is slightly charming.     1.5/5        Also the actor who plays the Priest may have been a real Priest, 'cause he looks like he has no experience having sex w/ ladies.

[chainsaw midget]

Doom Asylum (1988)

Doom Asylum is a perfect middle of the road slasher movie.  Just enough good elements to stop it from being a waste of time, but not enough to propel it into the "good" category. 

If I want to be generous, it'd a 6 out of 10 at best. 

The movie barely has a plot.  Isn't too big on the scare or threatening atmosphere, but it's not a total wash. 


SOme years back, a yuppie lawyer guy and his girlfriend are in a car accident.  She dies and he is assumed dead, so they take him away to an asylum to be dissected (or something. It's never realy clear about this.)  Turns out, he's not dead.  He wakes up, kills he guys in labcoats, and the story jumps ahead some years. 

Another weird note here.  His face is only slightly damaged after the accident, but when he wakes back up on the table it's like Freddy Kruegar and the Phantom of the Opera had a kid.  Again, no explanation. 

So, there are two groups of ... kids (?).  One is a three girl punk rock band in scantily clad clothes.  They hang out at the now abandoned asylum to play their music. 

The other group is more the yuppie type.  They decide to go hang out at the abandoned asylum where the story goes that a mad went mad and killed some people some years back.  Two of the girls spend most of the movie in their swimsuits. 

The two groups clash, and the mutilated face guy starts killing them. 

Other than the opening, the entire movie takes place in one afternoon, in what feels like just a couple of hours.  There's no night scenes.  It's shot in an actual abandoned building which gives the location a lot of flavor and style it wouldn't have otherwise had. 

I've seen places online list this as a horror comedy and I just don't get that.  It never feels comedic.  It doesn't seem to always take it's self seriously and has some weird chaoices and characters, but I don't get comedy from that.

[LilCerberus]

Tonight's Stinker
The Monster Maker(1944)
https://youtu.be/XdOG3mZKfi0?si=VXYUs4fKd3UkSktg

A pianist is giving a concert while his manager & his daughter watch.... His daughter notices some creep in the next skybox glaring at her.... During an intermission, he visits them backstage with a fake apology, & says she looks like his dead wife...
The creep starts sending the girl flowers & creepy love letters, so the pianist decides to confront him.....
Turns out, the creep is a doctor looking for a cure for Acromegaly.... He's got a really cool chemistry set & a gorilla in a cage..... When the pianist shows up, an argument ensues, & the creep clocks him & shoots him up with a drug that induces the disease... The creeps assistant reveals (to the audience) just how twisted he is...
Afterwards, the pianist becomes a real machine, practicing morning, noon & night, until his hands swell up & he can't play.... Meanwhile, the creep has found a cure, which he plans to use as a bargaining chip for the daughter...

Has some slow parts in the second half, but is watchable for the most part.....

[Dr. Whom]

EL CONFESOR (1920):

 One is that I've yet to see a "vanilla" porn from the silent era - the three I've seen are about a black mass, a sexual assault by a satyr, and now this priest-porn. I guess what we can take away from this is that If you were gonna' go to the trouble of making a sex film in the 00s or 10s or 20s, you were gonna' go all the way and make a wild/taboo one, not just a consenting orthodox couple enjoying themselves.

That may just be an artefact of preservation. If the present is anything to go by, there may have been any number of low budget movies made just for a quick buck, that nobody thought of preserving. It is the weird stuff that gets kept and eventually ends up on Letterboxd and similar sites.