Tales from the Darkside S2 E6: The Satanic Piano (1985)

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Directed and written by John Harrison (First Assistant Director on Creepshow and Day of the Dead — not to mention his stunning turn as the villain of Effects), this episode is all about composer Pete Bancroft (Michael Warren, Hill Street Blues), who is burned out on playing the piano, out of ideas and seemingly discourages his daughter Justine (Lisa Bonet) from following in his footsteps. But then Wilson Farber (Philip Roth) offers him an electric piano out of the blue. It’s powered by thought, not by playing, and seems to turn his ideas into hit songs. But you know what they say: if an offer is too good to be true, well…the keyboard acts as a psychic parasite, feeding on Justine’s youthful vibrance. And this is after Pete ignored her talent! Now, he wonders how he can escape this Faustian deal.

At its core, the story explores the commodification of art. Pete Bancroft isn’t just a tired musician; he’s a man experiencing the soul-crushing weight of professional expectation. When Wilson Farber presents the thought-powered keyboard, it represents the ultimate shortcut of output without the labor of practice or the pain of composition. Keep in mind, this was made decades before AI.

Speaking of music, Harrison also composed the score, with cues very similar to those in Day of the Dead.

HOLY SHIT! Born A Ninja/ Commando The Ninja Double Feature from Visual Vengeance!

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This shot-on-video martial-arts double feature from Joesph Lai and IFD Films unleashes pure 1980s ninja chaos as two unlikely heroes are dragged into a war over stolen germ-warfare secrets. Featuring disappearing ninja assassins, endless waves of thugs, criminal masterminds, insane effects and the mysterious ‘Hocus Pocus’ magic fighting style – It’s full-tilt SOV insanity, delivering cult ninja action at maximum volume.

Born a Ninja is a wild SOV martial-arts action romp where espionage, absurdity, and vanishing ninjas collide. When unlikely heroes Larry and David stumble onto a long-lost WWII germ formula created by the mysterious scientist Tanaka, they’re pulled into a deadly web of shadow warfare and secret assassins. On their trail is Simon, a merciless ninja enforcer working for the cold-blooded mastermind Martin, whose scheme threatens global catastrophe. Outnumbered and outmatched, Larry and David rely on nerve, instinct, and their own unconventional fighting discipline – Hocus Pocus, a martial art as unpredictable as it is lethal.

Commando the Ninja (aka American Commando Ninja aka Silent Killers) cranks the chaos up even higher, continuing the covert war over germ-warfare secrets more dangerous than ninja blades. Once again caught in a storm of espionage, double-crosses, and stolen science, Larry and David find themselves facing more ruthless power brokers and endless waves of attackers. As the battle escalates, two fearless allies — Becky and Brenda — join the fight, driving the action toward an outrageous finale of acrobatics, ambushes, and full-blown ninja madness.

Extras include SD masters from original tape elements, Commando the Ninja commentary with Justin Decloux and Will Sloane of The Important Cinema Club, Born A Ninja commentary by Justin Decloux of The Important Cinema Club, The Essential Godfrey Ho and The Law Chi Touch video essays, an interview with Kwan Chung, an image gallery, trailers, two mini-posters, a reversible sleeve featuring original VHS art, a “Stick Your Own” VHS sticker set, a limited edition O-Card by Uncle Frank, a booklet with essay by ninja movie expert C.J. Lines and a Blu-ray sleeve featuring art by The Dude. Holy fuck, this is everything. Available May 12 from Visual Vengeance.

The Screaming and Fungicide from Visual Vengeance!

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The Screaming: College student Bob Martin rents a room from the alluring Crystal Traum, who introduces him to her New Age religion, Crystalnetics. Soon, Bob’s health and mindset dramatically improve. But when a detective reveals a string of mysterious deaths tied to the cult, Bob uncovers the chilling truth – and must face a slew of cloaked assassins, monsters and the cults’ charismatic alien leader. From veteran indie auteur Jeff Leroy (Creepies, Rat Scratch Fever) comes a razor-sharp, unapologetically bizarre takedown of a certain star-studded New Age religion. This twisted tale brims with a sense of doom, draped in shadowy femme fatales and is dripping with grotesque, gooey stop-motion creature chaos. Leroy doesn’t pull any punches, layering the film with satirical bite and underground spirit, ultimately shaping a surreal fever dream that pays homage to pulp horror while taking aim at the power and absurdity of cult celebrity.

Extras include a CD soundtrack of the original score by Jay Woelfel, director supervised master from existing tape masters, commentary with Tony Strauss of Weng’s Chop Magazine, a making of, The Screaming: Reborm, a director remastered alternate verison of film with commentary from director Jeff Leroy, producer Dave Sterling and star Vinnie Bilancio, an image Gallery, trailers, a mini-poster, “Stick Your Own” VHS sticker set, a reversible sleeve featuring original VHS art and a limited edition O-Card.  Available May 12 from Visual Vengeance.

Fungicide: Deep within a tranquil forest, five strangers meet at a secluded bed and breakfast. But one of these guests happens to be a mad scientist, who uses his vacation to accidentally create an army of killer mushrooms. Now unleashed on the other guests, and with the body count quickly piling up, it’s up to the survivors to arm themselves and fight back against these slaughtering shrooms in hopes of stopping them from world domination! From Dave Wascavage, the writer/ director of Rifftrax and Red Letter Media favorite Suburban Sasquatch comes a film that somehow manages to outdo and out-WTF that movie in almost every department, with jaw-dropping mushroom samurai fighting, puppet karate decapitations and near interdimensional level CGI alchemy that will have viewers believing they have actually ingested mushrooms, the good kind.

Extras include director-approved SD master from original tape elements, new commentary from director Dave Wascavage and co-writer / co-prodcuer Mary Wascavage, archival commentary with Dave Wascavage, Mary Wascavage and David Weldon, commentary from Sam Panico of B&S About Movies — WHAT THAT’S ME! —  and Bill Van Ryn of Drive-In Asylum, commentary from Schlock And Awe Films, the full RIFFTRAX version of Fungicide, alternate opening credits, a deleted scene, outtakes, trailers, a reversible sleeve featuring original home video art, a “Stick Your Own” VHS sticker set, a limited edition O-Card – FIRST PRESSING ONLY and a “Grow Your Own Killer Mushroom” seed packet. Available May 26 from Visual Vengeance.

B & S About Movies podcast Episode 123: Bill Van Ryn defends The Bat People

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Bill Van Ryn is the master of all things Groovy Doom and Drive-In Asylum. The Bat People is a movie that he loves and it’s so awesome to hear why it’s one of his obsessions. You can also get issues of Drive-In Asylum at the Groovy Doom Etsy store.

You can listen to the show on Spotify.

The show is also available on Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Amazon Podcasts, Podchaser and Google Podcasts

Important links:

Theme song: Strip Search by Neal Gardner.

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Paper Man (1971)

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This made-for-TV movie aired on CBS’s Friday Night Movies and later had a short theatrical run. Director Walter Grauman may have only made six theatrical films, but he was a master of the TV movie, working on films like Daughter of the Mind, Crowhaven Farm, The Old Man Who Cried Wolf, The Memory of Eva Ryker and, most essentially, Are You In the House Alone? This movie was written by James D. Buchanan and Ronald Austin from a story by Anthony Wilson.

In 1971, we didn’t know about identity fraud involving credit cards. This was all new. So when four college students — Karen (Stefanie Powers), Jerry (James Stacy), Lisa (Tina Chen) and Joel Fisher (Elliott Street) — get a credit card belonging to someone they don’t know, Henry Norman, they create an identity on their university’s giant computers. When it seems they’re about to get caught, they turn to the most intelligent computer guy in the school, Avery (Dean Stockwell), as Jerry uses Karen to sweet-talk him into committing this crime with them.

The problem is that there really is a Henry Norman and that he’s closer to them than they could ever know, turning them against one another and then killing them one by one, using incorrect medication, computer-controlled elevators and even a medical school dummy. It’s at once a giallo, a TV movie, a computer killer thriller and, yes, a mannequin movie.

I really loved the sparseness of this, as it feels like the middle of the night for most of the movie. No one seems to trust one another, and even as Karen and Avery start to warm up to one another, she worries that he could be the killer. He’s concerned that he should never have let anyone in, instead of being a shy computer geek. As for catching the killer, well, dummy drops are always lovely.

You can watch this on Tubi.

The Strangers – Chapter 2 (2025)

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The beauty of this new Strangers movie is that somehow, some way, it has made The Strangers: Prey At Night into a much better movie just by virtue of its existence. Just like The Strangers – Chapter 1, this was directed by Renny Harlin, written by Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland, and shot in Slovakia. 

Does Renny Harlin have photos of studio heads with goats? Because seriously, how does one make some of the biggest bombs in Hollywood history and keep coming back? Who is demanding his movies? Who wanted three Stranger movies that start with the worst conceit: What if a home-invasion movie, centered on the randomness and lack of knowledge about the why of its antagonists, overly explained their motivations to the audience?

Anyways, we’re in Venus, Oregon, a place where we learn that Pin-Up Girl is really a waitress named Shelley (Ema Horvath) and she and the rest of the Strangers — Scarecrow and Dollface — are looking to finish off Maya (Madelaine Petsch), a victim who lost her husband (Froy Gutierrez) but survived their last assault. Now she’s in a hospital, which may as well be Haddonfield Memorial Hospital. She’s half-alive, the cops are covering things up, and she soon is chased throughout the place by the Strangers, even hiding inside a morgue drawer with the body of her dead boyfriend.

As her family makes plans to get her out of town and to Portland, she hooks up with Nurse Danica (Brooke Johnson) and her roommates Chris (Florian Clare), Gregory (Gabriel Basso) and Wayne (Milo Callaghan). Don’t get used to them or the cop who helps her, Billy Bufford (Joplin Sibtain).

At least Maya is able to kill a wild boar and eliminate one of the Strangers, but not before we learn that Shelley and the man who would become Scarecrow attended a school together, where they killed a girl named Tamara. And now you know, I guess.

This whole thing felt pointless, but I was trapped on a plane and couldn’t exactly walk out, so I at least finished it. I await the last chapter, as I will probably watch that on a long flight as well, my chosen place to see movies I feel obligated to watch.

The Hang-Up (1969)

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Directed and written by John Hayes (End of the World, Dream No Evil, Garden of the Dead, Grave of the Vampire, Jailbait Babysitter, and so many more; he also made adult films like Baby Rosemary, Hot Lunch and Pleasure Zone as Harold J. Perkins), The Hang-Up is all about vice cop Sgt. Robert Walsh (Tony Vorno), who the force uses as an undercover transvestite despite him looking nothing like a woman. He spends his nights dressed as the very degenerates he spends his days arresting with a vitriolic, borderline obsessive hatred. And even when he has his landlady throw herself at him, he can’t get it up. Other than that, his life is horrible as he just sits at home, alone, drinking Coors Light in bed. 

Then he meets sex worker Angel (Sharon Matt) and falls in love. And that’s when things get worse for him. He falls in love with her, and we get the idea by the end that she’s just playing with him, luring him into the underworld that he was so intent on destroying. 

I was pretty much astounded by this. Sure, it’s exploitation and has so much rawness in the way people talk and act toward one another, but it somehow aspires to be so much more. The Hang-Up is a fascinating relic of the roughie era. It’s a film that exists at the intersection of hard-boiled detective noir and the raw, unwashed spirit of the sexual revolution.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

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Wes Craven’s second full-length film — if we don’t include the porn film The Fireworks Woman that he directed as Abe Snake — is a trip through the Nevada desert that he wrote, produced and directed. You can see it as straight-forward narrative or you can choose to see it as a parable on how man will always be inhuman to other men.

The Carter family really gets it in this one. After being targeted by a family of cannibal savages in the Nevada desert, the family’s leader Big Bob is crucified to a tree, the daughter Brenda is raped, numerous members are shot and stabbed and also killed, one of the family dogs is killed and even the baby is threatened with being a meal.

But they retaliate with just as much inhumanity as they battle back against the desert clan of Papa Jupiter, Pluto (Michael Berryman!) and Jupiter. Even the second family dog joins in and takes out his rage on the mutant clan.

The idea of an irradiated gang in the desert is intriguing and was inspired by the Sawney Bean clan in 1600’s Scotland, which claimed the lives of nearly 1,000 people.

Additionally, Craven was inspired by The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and ended up making a film that — in my opinion — lives in its shadow. Interestingly enough, the films share product design from Robert Burns, as well as some of the exact same animal parts that decorate the homes of each film’s cannibal lairs.

There’s a sequel, a remake and a sequel to that as well. In the late 1980’s, Craven even debated a third movie that was to be set in space, while his 1995 film produced for HBO, Mind Ripper, was originally intended as the third film in the series.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: High School Girl (1974)

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Cugini Carnali translates as First Cousins, but this movie was also titled The Visitor, Hot and Bothered, La Prima, Loving Cousins, and High School Girl.

This is the story of Nico d’Altamura (Alredo Pea, who was also in two other commedia sexy all’italiana, the Dagmar Lassander-starring Classe Mista and the Edwige Fenech movie The School Teacher), who is a shy sixteen-year-old who falls in love with his city-born cousin Sonia (Susan Player, Invasion of the Bee Girls, Malibu Beach).

This comes from director Sergio Martino, who you may know better from his early 70s master class on making giallo — Your Vice Is a Locked Room, and Only I Have the Key, All the Colors of the Dark, Torso, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail — or his sexy bedroom movies with Edwige Fenech.

Nico comes from a more provincial family than Sonia, and while his parents are strict, they have their secrets. His father is sleeping with the family maid (Rosalba Neri, Lady Frankenstein) and also waiting for their uncle to die, but he keeps alive either out of spite or to keep sleeping with prostitutes. When Sonia comes to town, she causes a scandal by wearing miniskirts to church and sunbathing nude, but let’s face it, Nico has no idea what he’s in for.

Martino was a genre hopper. The year after this movie, he made two poliziotteschi (Gambling City and Silent Action), a giallo (The Suspicious Death of a Minor), and Sex With a Smile, which features Barbara Bouchet, Fenech, and Marty Feldman. This may not be his best movie, but it’s not his worst.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: High Rolling (1977)

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Directed by Igor Auzins and written by Forrest Redlich, who created the Australian soap opera E Street, High Rolling has Tex (Joseph Bottoms) and Alby (Grigor Taylor) leaving behind their carnival jobs to head to the Gold Coast. They soon meet a hitchhiker named  Lynn (Judy Davis) and, along with two dancers, Barbie (Wendy Hughes) and Susie (Sandy McGregor), hijack a bus.

Tex is the impulsive American dreamer, while Alby provides the grounded, albeit reluctant, Australian counterpart. Their chemistry is the engine of the film, fueled by a 1970s obsession with the open road as a symbol of ultimate freedom.

What I didn’t like is that they get the Corvette they drive in by knocking out a gay man, Arnold (John Clayton) and then stealing the sports car. This scene is a jarring reminder of the year this came out. Using a marginalized character, even if they are the drug-dealing bad guy, as a punching bag to facilitate the protagonists’ journey complicates the likable rogue personas the movie tries to build for Tex and Alby.

At least the girls get to do their version of Donna Summer’s “Love to Love You Baby.” And you get to see Chantal Contouri from The Day After Halloween and Thirst on the bus.

Also: Before she became an international multi-award-winning actress, Judy Davis made her film debut in this movie as Lynn.