Directed by Jack Bravman, whose other credits include directing Adam West in 1987’s Zombie Nightmare and working as a producer on 1976’s Snuff (“The Film that Could Only Be made in South America… where life is cheap!”). Life isn’t cheap in The Dribbler, but just about everything else is. 

Released in 1990, after the zenith of the ‘80s slasher boom and before Scream ushered in an age of self-aware teenage fright flicks, Dribbler is not so much a forgotten gem as it is…. well.. forgotten. It is the story of Stanley, a waterboy with ambitions of joining the basketball team. Members of the team have a bad habit of turning up dead, and a killer in a basketball-headed mascot costume is to blame. Is Stanley the killer? Before the audience can find out, we will be subjected to numerous sub-Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker wordplay gags. I will admit, some jokes do land for me (“the last time I saw faces like yours… was on the court, about 51 seconds ago.”). But you already know if you are the kind of person who will appreciate humor exemplified by a basketball team having the unlikely moniker of The Watergate Plumbers. 

It is a rather bloodless affair, although not an unpleasant viewing experience. Gregory Calpakis, the actor portraying Stanley, would have a longer career in television, but he isn’t really memorable here. His love interest, Becky, portrayed by Flavia Carrozzi, is cute, vaguely goth, and unrelentingly supportive in a way that undoubtedly appealed to the sort of teenage boy that comprised the film’s target audience. Ultimately, she doesn’t have a lot to do other than spout out After School Special cliches. The true star of this show is TV’s Fred Travalena, playing a dual role as both the coach and the basketball announcer. It is not entirely clear if Travalena is playing two characters or if the school district is underfunded. Either way, movie seems designed as a bit-delivery vehicle for Travalena. You can decide for yourself if that is a good thing or a terrible one.

For years, this movie was a holy grail for me. While attending a slasher movie festival at the Mahoning Drive-In, I overheard another patron reference Night of the Dribbler as an example of the genre that no one else had seen. Of course, that meant I had to seek it out. When I finally found it, I was confused who this movie was honestly made for. The humor isn’t funny enough for the film to be considered a spoof in the tradition of Alfred Sole’s 1982 Pandemonium. There is not enough suspense in the kills to placate the slasher fans. There is hardly any sleaze to speak of to titillate that audience in other ways. It may be the sort of film that is most enjoyable as an oddity to inflict upon friends. There is a Code Red DVD floating around for slasher completionists. For the merely curious, the film can be found on YouTube.

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: Slasher!

About the Author: Parker Simpson is a writer and podcaster focusing on cult films and their social impacts. They currently cohost Where Is My Mind, a podcast focusing on underappreciated films from a variety of genres and countries. They have also held panels, chartered local organizations, and written articles to their blog. When not writing or studying, they like to spend time with their pets and go outside. Check out the podcast Linktree and blog.

Dang, this thing is slo- wait, is that a Confederate flag on the wall? Where does this movie take place? Ohio? That was a union state!

Girls Nite Out lives in the same vein of small town slashers, its brethren being My Bloody Valentine, The Prowler, and Sleepaway Camp. You could also safely say elements of Halloween and Friday the 13th are spliced in for good measure. The basic plot is simple: young people put in a precarious situation involving an unknown killer taking them down, one by one. Girls Nite Out’s spin on this is putting them in a scavenger hunt in this small town, and having the killer be a dude in a mascot suit (to any of my friends who are Five Nights at Freddy’s fans: DOWN BOY, DOWN! SIT. STAY. HEEL!). As someone who has lived in a small college town, how poorly attended is this university to have the student body participate in a scavenger hunt?

Nothing. Happens. For. A. Very. Long. Time. I think that’s how it normally is in Ohio anyhow, unless Joe Burrow is playing football. It’s not a terribly eventful film, relying on the small-town hijinks of several college kids. I know a lot of people get annoyed when a movie just relies on its coziness, but I never really mind it. Jess Franco does the same thing in several of his films, only the cozy is broken up by sex instead of brutal murders. I have no issue either way. The bear mascot is creepy as fuck, constantly calling his female victims “whores” and killing people via knives on his paws (proto-Freddy Krueger?), filling the requirement that there be some gore (however minimal). He’s really the most noticeable character, along with Hal Holbrook’s policeman and the radio DJ. Everyone else blurs together, being treated like meatbags (particularly the women).

Listen, I feel bad not having much to talk about with this. It’s pretty straight to the point, with little attraction outside of the slasher gimmick. Everyone clearly has a good time despite the cookie-cutter plot, setting, and character archetypes. It’s a good “background” movie, if you want to be cruel, and a good comfort movie if you’re tired and just want to watch an old-school slasher. I know my local drive-in double-billed this with Madman, in what I imagine was a very fun, old-timey screening perfect for the beginning of fall. I wonder how many people came to that after the mass exodus that Society produced the previous weekend (more on that later this month!). As for this film (and this review), just like the one meme from several years ago said, “It isn’t much, but it’s honest work.”

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: Slashers

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Adam Hursey is a pharmacist specializing in health informatics by day, but his true passion is cinema. His current favorite films are Back to the Future, Stop Making Sense, and In the Mood for Love. He has written articles for Film East and The Physical Media Advocate, primarily examining older films through the lens of contemporary perspectives. He is usually found on Letterboxd, where he mainly writes about horror and exploitation films. You can follow him on Letterboxd or Instagram at ashursey.

Are we sure that Fred Olen Ray’s gritty, grimy, grainy film Scalps was made in 1983? Are we sure that it was directed by Fred Olen Ray? It really feels out of place in both his filmography and the time in which it was released.

By 1983, we were on the downward trajectory on the slasher trend. Having peaked around 1981, there really was nowhere else to go but down. Still, 1983 brought us plenty of interesting slashers. Sleepaway Camp. Psycho II. Mausoleum. While the plot of Scalps is not terribly interesting in and of itself, there are some aspects worth digging into (so to speak).

There is plenty of digging in Scalps. A group of college students go out to an area in the California desert to perform some archeological research. Of course, at the local convenience store, they are warned by a Native American in his best Crazy Ralph impersonation (“It’s got a death curse!”) to not disturb the ancient burial grounds found in the Black Forest (or something like that—I should take better notes). Do they listen? Of course not, because there would be no movie if they did. Eventually, one of the guys gets possessed by a Native American spirit and chaos reigns. 

It is all pretty standard 80s slasher tropes. But the look of the film feels closer to 1973 than 1983. If I did not know any better, I would have been certain that this film fell into the proto-slasher years. It was definitely made on the cheap with a reported budget of $15,000. Fred Olen Ray himself described the film as 6 Kids, a Station Wagon, and a Tent. He is not wrong.

One aspect I found interesting is how fairly unlikable this group is as a whole. I typically find it more appealing when I like the characters. I like it when a film takes its time to develop the characters and the relationships between and among the group in a slasher. Then I feel bad when they inevitably get killed. I’m not one to root for a character’s death just because they are annoying or downright hateful. Most films in the early 80s trended toward the likable character. It is interesting to see the beginning of the trend in the other direction. Another slasher from 1983, The Final Terror, feels very similar. These two films might make a decent double feature pairing, although it is not one I would be clamoring to see. Both films feel like Friday the 13th cash-ins versus a straight-up rip-off. And both groups of campers are full of individuals I would not care to be around for any period of time.

I did like Scalps more than it may seem though. I do generally like a boring slasher. This one is plenty dull as nothing happens for at least 40-45 minutes. Maybe more. One character eats Kellogg’s Raisin Bran straight out of the box. That’s the kind of product placement I’m here for. There are some really fun practical effects here. And I secretly love Native American cultural appropriation in horror films. It’s not something I’m proud of, but that old burial ground trope hooks me in every single time. Give me a cursed talisman. I even like the “Old Chief Woodenhead” segment in Creepshow 2. I would say that I would try to do better, but I just have no self-control. I’ll just have to ask for forgiveness.

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: 21st Century Horror

Directed, written, produced, and co-scored by Zach Cregger, Weapons is a modern horror movie that people breathlessly told me that I must see. So I did. And it’s fine, but I always feel like I saw the cut that they didn’t, because I’m left with a feeling of, “Oh, that was fine.” Is this how fans of Hitchcock felt when Argento and DePalma started getting big? I really try, though, to look past my dislike of today and find something to enjoy.

Unlike so much modern horror, at least Weapons has a beginning, middle and end. So much horror from now seems to just falter to a conclusion, as if they had a really great idea for a movie, but had no idea how to close it off.

This takes place in Maybrook, Pennsylvania, a town where every child, except one, in Justine Gandy’s (Julia Garner) third-grade class has disappeared. Parents want to blame that kid, Alex (Cary Christopher). Or they want to blame Justine. But there are just no answers as school comes back. Life has to go on, but it can’t for one of the fathers, Archer (Josh Brolin), who is investigating the disappearance for himself.

As for Justine, she starts drinking and hooks up with her ex, police officer Paul Morgan (Alden Ehrenreich), as the episodic film tells us her story, Paul’s, Archer’s, and even that of her boss, Principal Marcus (Benedict Wong). At the center of it all is Alex’s aunt Gladys (Amy Madigan), who totally Burnt Offerings-ed her way into their house and, well, would you really want me to give the whole story away?

There’s some decent camerawork, a great chase at the end and a movie that mixes the narrative flow of Magnolia with the lost children bleakness of Prisoners. The part of this that I had the biggest problem with — the fake-sounding child narrator — was added after test screenings didn’t go well.

Madigan said of her role, “I think she’s a very misunderstood woman! For lack of a better term, I am the bad guy in the movie, but a girl’s just doing what she has to do to get through. She has a plan, but I don’t think she quite knew how that was going to unfold. She’s like an artist; she’s very extemporaneous. I think she’s moved around a lot. She’s had to go to different places, and when one’s not working, she’s kind of a creator of invention: “OK, I’m going to have to reach out to this family.” She’s really needy in the sense that she needs all these people; she can’t do it on her own, and I found that really intriguing about her. She manipulated a few people. And I understand that. But she has such confidence, and she’s charming in this really sick way. She just makes me sit up, Gladys. She just spoke to me.” She’s the best part of this.

Cregger gave her two different options for the backstory of Gladys. “Option one: Gladys was just a normal person using dark magic to cure her disease. She had to adopt this methodology that she uses out of necessity to keep herself alive. I won’t say any more than that. Option two: Gladys was a non-human creature who was using her bizarre makeup and wig in a poor attempt to mimic humans. That’s an interesting perspective to consider. I like that a lot.”

As for that hot dog meal, it’s a tribute to Trevor Moore from his skit “Hot Dog Timmy” on the TV show The Whitest Kids U Know. Cregger was also on that show and friends with Moore. I could totally eat that seven-dog dinner at any time.

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: 21st Century Horror

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Adam Hursey is a pharmacist specializing in health informatics by day, but his true passion is cinema. His current favorite films are Back to the Future, Stop Making Sense, and In the Mood for Love. He has written articles for Film East and The Physical Media Advocate, primarily examining older films through the lens of contemporary perspectives. He is usually found on Letterboxd, where he mainly writes about horror and exploitation films. You can follow him on Letterboxd or Instagram at ashursey.

As they say, if you want to see an example of unconditional love, lock your wife and your dog in the trunk of your car, come back in 4 hours, and see which one is happy to see you.

Indy, the canine star of Good Boy, is indeed a very good boy. His human counterpart, Todd (Shane Jensen)…not so much. In fact, he might just be the worst. On one hand, Todd is sick with some sort of serious illness that causes him to require multiple hospital visits, blood transfusions, and cough up copious amounts of blood. Wanting to get off the grid, and perhaps away from his overly concerned sister Vera (how dare she be concerned for her brother by the way!), Todd and Indy take up residence in dead Grandpa’s old, abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. Grandpa is played here by Larry Fessenden, mainly seen in old VHS footage. Grandpa died mysteriously. They never found his dog Bandit. And now, night after night, Indy sees shadows moving in the corners of the room, blackened figures skulking about, and perhaps the cries of another dog in the basement.

But anytime Indy makes any sort of noise, Todd is there to silence him. The sicker Todd gets, the meaner he becomes. He kicks Indy out of the bed at the slightest inconvenience. Pushing him away when Indy tries to comfort him. Eventually banishing him from the house entirely. Still, Indy remains loyal to the very end. And beyond.

Audiences might have a difficult time fully embracing Good Boy. There will undoubtedly be comparisons to another Shudder release that pointed the camera into corners—Skinamarink. Personally, I could not make it through that movie. I tried just about everything, thinking that watching it around 4 AM in a sleepy haze in a totally dark room would bring the atmosphere needed. It did not work.

Good Boy has a bit more going on at least. Director Ben Leonberg does a nice job of bringing the camera down to the ground (Ozu style) to try to provide that dog’s eye view for the audience. And if you are a dog person, you should just be able to look into Indy’s eyes all day long (or at least for the 72-minute run time of this movie) and just melt. I know that I would rather watch Indy stare into the corner for an hour than watch that fake CGI dog in the latest iteration of Superman. 

It might also change your own perspective when your dog is barking at seemingly nothing. Maybe they are sensing something we can not. Or maybe they are just annoyingly barking at a neighbor having the audacity to walk down their street. No matter the circumstance, we need to be nice to our pets. Definitely nicer than Todd (a low bar to clear). And this month we have the opportunity to give back to some of those pets in need while watching horror movies. 

While Indy may be a good boy, our boy dog, Mr. Beauregard, is the best boy. The vet calls him a distinguished gentleman. We rescued him from a shelter back in 2014. He is always super protective of our daughter. He barks at everything and nothing. He’s just an old hound dog from Deridder, Louisiana, but we wouldn’t trade him for anything.
 

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: Lina Romay

According to Letterboxd, Lina is the most-watched actor in my history, having appeared in more than one hundred movies, trailed only by Christopher Lee, John Carradine and Dick Miller. Well, Carla Mancini is gaining, even if you never see her in the movies she’s in.

Directed by Carlos Aured (House of Psychotic Women, The Mummy’s Revenge) and Sergio Bergonzelli (Blood Delirium) — maybe or maybe not… — and written by Aured, this has a gang that is either pulling off crimes or having sex with one another. Then they decide to kidnap a millionaire’s daughter, Patty Hearst-style. They are Liza (Ajita Wilson, an American-born transgender actress who is also in Macumba Sexual and Sadomania, amongst other films), Ruth (Romay), Tania (Hemy Basalo, also known as Eva Palmer; she’s in Night of Open Sex), Antonio (José Ferro, Macumba Sexual) and Clark (Ricardo Díaz, El fontanero, su mujer, y otras cosas de meter,  Cut-Throats 9), their leader. The virginal rich girl is Muriel (Kati Ballari, who appears in only one other movie,  La vendedora de ropa), and she could be more perverted than all of them.

Speaking of crime…

Two versions were released: an R-rated and an uncensored hardcore version with explicit sex scenes. At one point, the hardcore version wasn’t legal in Spain, where it was made, so it was distributed in countries where it was allowed. Some of the actors who participated in the hardcore sex scenes signed contracts assuring them that the version would never make it to Spain, where it might harm their careers. Obviously, Lina didn’t care.

Aured claimed that he filmed the sex scenes with the help of a professional hardcore actor, as not many men could stay hard when the cameras rolled.

After the law was liberalized, there was an explosion of Clasificada S films, which the softcore version was released as. The Italians got the hardcore. Strange, somewhat, that Aured, who did four movies with Paul Naschy, was making adult films.

The Italian version has a more ironic tone to the voiceover, while the Spanish one claims this is a true story and tries to tie it to Charles Manson. There’s also a square-up at the end, trying to ask how society can make such horrible people, said just minutes after we’ve watched all of them make love, sometimes for real, depending on the cut.

The end is kind of an apocalypse, but not as sleazy or end-of-the-world as you would hope. Then again, a chance to see Lina not being directed by Jess and, as always, her smile makes me happy.

You can get this from Mondo Macabro.

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and providing them with happy homes.

Today’s theme: Lina Romay

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Adam Hursey is a pharmacist specializing in health informatics by day, but his true passion is cinema. His current favorite films are Back to the Future, Stop Making Sense, and In the Mood for Love. He has written articles for Film East and The Physical Media Advocate, primarily examining older films through the lens of contemporary perspectives. He is usually found on Letterboxd, where he mainly writes about horror and exploitation films. You can follow him on Letterboxd or Instagram at ashursey.

I really do not have the expertise to write anything about a Jess Franco film. It’s not going to stop me though. 

Faceless is only the sixth Franco film I’ve watched. And the ones I have watched may not be the ones that spring to mind. Venus in Furs and Bloody Moon seem to be popular (at least according to Letterboxd). My favorite film of his has been The Other Side of the Mirror. And then I’ve watched some really random ones: Night of the Skull and Bahia Blanca. So I do not have a great handle on Franco’s filmography.

I have seen Eyes Without A Face. And I’m not the only one apparently. Faceless owes a lot to Georges Franju’s classic tale of a doctor trying to successfully graft another person’s face onto the face of his daughter. I’ve never really tried to make a ranking of my favorite horror films of all time, but if I did, this one would surely be high on the list.

Apparently, Jess Franco uses this motif a good bit in his films about Dr. Orloff (played by Howard Vernon). Again, I’m really at a disadvantage because I just have not watched these films. But I really want to. And after watching Faceless, I feel a great need to prioritize these Franco films.

In Faceless, we are treated to Helmut Berger as a plastic surgeon who has made an enemy in a former patient who blames him for a botched procedure. When this patient tries to throw acid on his face, he ducks and unfortunately his sister receives the burn. So one does what one has to—get his assistant (Brigette Lahaie, an actress whose films I should also prioritize) to start kidnapping models, and contact the infamous Dr. Orloff to perform face transplants. Unfortunately for them, one of the models they kidnap is the daughter of Teddy Savalas (criminally underused here). He hires Christopher Mitchum (of all people) to go to Paris and find his daughter.

Faceless has pretty much everything I look for in a horror movie this time of year. A stellar cast. An interesting enough plot to keep my interest. Some over the top gore. I really cannot ask for much more.

This selection feels a bit like a cheat since it was supposed to highlight Spanish actress Lina Romay, long time collaborator and eventually the wife of Jess Franco. In Faceless, she only appears in a cameo as Dr. Orloff’s wife. There were definitely plenty of other films to choose from. If nothing else, this day has been a good reminder that I really should focus on more Jess Franco in the new year. Maybe I will make a goal to have Franco be my most watched director of 2026. 

Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and happy homes.

Today’s theme: Bleeding Skull!

About the Author: Parker Simpson is a writer and podcaster focusing on cult films and their social impacts. They currently cohost Where Is My Mind, a podcast focusing on underappreciated films from a variety of genres and countries. They have also held panels, chartered local organizations, and written articles to their blog. When not writing or studying, they like to spend time with their pets and go outside. Check out the podcast Linktree and blog.

Homemade horror films are a huge hit or miss of mine. Oftentimes, I’ll get frustrated with the boring visuals (both film and video), Z-grade acting, and disjointed pacing. Then I remember I couldn’t make anything half as charming, so I shut up and take some sleeping pills to further disjoint the experience. This is no different with The Soultangler, a late 80’s riff on the reemerging mad scientist genre. In it, Dr. Lupesky invents a drug that allows the souls of the users to transplant into corpses. Naturally, this comes with some very severe side effects, from mild hallucinations to downright madness. 

If you’re like me, you could see this as slightly… derivative of a well-known cult classic. The Soultangler initially seems like a rip-off of Stuart Gordon’s classic Re-Animator, taking a doctor’s fascination with life and death to the extremes while characters around him are extremely concerned about what he’s doing. In the latter, you see a clean-cut, no-nonsense Jeffrey Combs slyly manipulating everyone around him as he weasels his way out of every situation. Here, we see a grease-ridden, basement-dwelling hubris-ridden maniac who seems to be significantly more attracted to women yet hates them more than his counterpart. You might be able to see who I like more based on the wording. That being said, I would argue that watching Dr. Lupesky ramble about his work is a strong point of this film, and that he is dissimilar enough to disqualify his character as a mere clone of the indomitable Herbert West.

The film’s main flaw is the pacing. Most SOV/16mm horror films of this era slip into a time distortion, where 15 minutes feels like an hour or more. The Soultangler is no different; this thing drags its feet from the 5-minute mark until the final 15. It is a challenging watch on a small screen, with no one around you to comment on the small yet quirky aspects of everyday life that inevitably pervades all folks in its ilk. Additionally, the majority of the camera work and acting are all stiff as a rod. The saving grace that undercuts those criticisms is the weirdness that suddenly pops up at any given moment. Completely unsynced audio that made me restart a scene? Killer original music? Believable investigative reporting? C’mon, you can’t help but love it. The cherry on top is the goopy gore that is scattered throughout the film; the finale in particular is a lot of fun.

I didn’t hate this. I really wanted to love it, even. If anything, it proved to me that these sorts of films are an acquired taste, which is maybe something I don’t have at this moment. That’s ok; it doesn’t take away the fact that Pat Bishow made a relatively entertaining film with an extremely low budget, and that on its own is remarkable. 

Thanks to the folks at Bleeding Skull for dropping myself and many others a line to this (and many other unknown gems)!