Sorry for not posting yesterday, but doctor's visits and other complications filled up BQ's Monday to the max.......to make up for it.....I proudly present a double feature.
And what a double feature. At about 90 minutes apiece, that accounts for 3 hours of absolute batshit crazy, down-the-rabbit-hole, Japanese horror and sci-fi. You could seriously end up with brain damage watching these two back to back......or permanent cinematic PTSD......
Let's start with the now legendary House (1977), which gives viewers the impression they're either on a bad acid trip or watching coming attractions of every bonkers, special effects laden MTV music video ever made......
Seven schoolgirls, who babble on like refugees from anime or manga, unwisely stay at the remote countryside of home of the lead girl's kindly aunt. Unwise, I point out, cause auntie's one dipsy-doodle crazy-ass witch. And she commences to orchestrate spectacularly loony, phantasmagorical deaths for the girls, customized for each one's personality and quirks.
Don't worry about keeping track of this crowd - they're easily identified for your convenience. The lead is named Gorgeous. The big eater is Mac (I guess because she either digs mac-and-cheese or Big Macs. Take a wild guess as to what the cutie named Kung Fu specializes in The piano player's Melody, the smart one who wears glasses is Prof.....and so on and so on.....
As the film proceeds, drenched in primary colors, stylized sets and assorted editing/camera tricks and flourishes, the girls succumb to their nightmarish, but oddly comic fates. And all of this accomplished with an array of startling special effects that range from genuinely dazzling to deliberately cartoonish.
The overall impression delivers something horror film directors have been attempting since the genre began.......a movie that makes you think you're living inside someone else's worst nightmare, complete with all the warping of people and places you'd see in your own bad dreams.
Put your hands together then for director Nobuhiko Obayashi. Oh brother did he pull it off. (And having watched the Criterion edition of "House", I'm trying to remember if any of the cinema celebs in those 'Criterion Closet' YouTube videos ever plucked this one off the shelves to keep.....) 4 stars (****)
Moving right along, let's hop on a jet plane zooming straight into sci-fi/horror hell, with yet another lunatic cult favorite Goke, Body Snatcher From Hell (1968).
I remember, with great affection from my early career as a Video Store movie buyer, the big fat paper box that the VHS tape of this came in......and what a big hit it was among the store's dedicated horror fan clientele......
And certainly Quentin Tarantino never forgot the film's opening sequence of the plane flying through a hellish, blood red sky, filled with frenzied birds smashing themselves to pieces against the plane's windows. A loving homage appears to that startling sky in "Kill Bill, Vol.1", as Uma Thurman flies through it on her way to Japan.
You want everything but the kitchen sink in your horror? Dig in.....this movie rolls out alien invasion, glowing flying saucers, squishy blobs, zombie-fied earthlings, literally head-splitting make up effects......and vampire blood sucking. What more could one ask for?
Back on the jet plane, this flight features a full compliment of obnoxious, ship-of-fools passengers, most of them doomed to throw each other under the bus when bad things happen....with the possible exceptions of the stalwart co-pilot and plucky stewardess......(as if they didn't have enough problems; the passenger list already included a political assassin and a mad bomber)....
Since these poor shmucks fly directly into a flying saucer attack, lots of bad things happen, starting with the plane crashing, rendered with a burst of miniature special effects that look lifted from an old Godzilla movie. While they're grounded, the alien blob splits open the head of the assassin guy and makes itself right at home there, turning him into a....you bet....a bloodsucker with one hell of a migraine, going straight for the jugular.
Yes, all of what follows in "Goke" fulfills its promise of unfiltered insanity, gooey horror and even a bit of a twist before the fatalistic finale. And kudos for keeping the film up-to-date with the events of its era.....political assassination and the inclusion of an American war widow (Kathy Horan) on her way to Japan to bring back the body of her husband, a Vietnam fatality.
(And you gotta love the go-for-broke, Horan, a beautiful blonde who, as the only English speaker in the cast, somehow gets through to the Japanese cast. Doesn't matter, really....by the halfway point, most of her dialogue consists of shrieking, "I want to live!" Hah....fat chance in this movie, Kathy....)
A visual stunner from start to finish, and a worthy addition to the pantheon of Madly Berserk Cinema.....no sci-fi/horror buff should dare miss it. 4 stars (****)
What a wonderful pair of films to watch together.....except for the possible side effect of leaving a viewer in dire need of therapy.......Enjoy!
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