Oh, R.D, you’re a real pain in the posterior and a kick in the lower abdominal area this week with your ‘squeezin’ the Charmin’, SOV fanboydom. Yes, I am a self-aware man: a man that fights his life of monotony on the highway to mediocrity by binge-watching SOV films.

So, I’ve pretty much — with the other camcorder SOVs, as well as the 16mm-blown-to-35mm-backyard’ers-that-walk-and-quack-like-an-SOV that I’ve dovetailed into our “SOV Week” tribute — name dropped all the essential films and ramble-babbled as to the SOV “about” of it all. (If you click the SOV tag at the end of this review — and all of this week’s reviews — you’ll populate all of our past and present reviews and chit-chat on the SOV/direct-to-video genre.) So, we’ll skip the SOV genre “plot points” and get right into the dual, shot-on-video careers of our camcorder auteurs behind these two flicks: writer Gerry Daly and director Deryn Warren.

Mirror of Death, aka Dead of Night in some quarters, was their joint direct-to-video feature debut. Bloodspell, aka The Boy From Hell, was their second film. Then came Black Magic Woman (1991), which was Deryn’s lone writing credit (and stars Mark Hamill and Apollonia, if that inspires a stream). Then Jerry Daly came to write Crystal Force (1990) (although it looks like one, it isn’t a repack of the Alien-rip, Star Crystal) and Witchcraft III: The Kiss of Death (1991)* — all of which fall under the SOV banner and populate-in-memory on many o’ fans SOV-genre lists. Apparently team Warren-Daly returned with the PG-13 comedy Sweet Tessie and Bags (2008), which is a barren IMDb page and Google quest to nowhere . . . with images of handbags and a child eating an Eggo waffle (which isn’t a film still, by the way).

Today, Deryn Warren is a noted L.A.-based acting coach and publisher on the film arts. As with my previous Google excursion: it’s another digital tundra quest to nowhere, with pictures of Tim and Tyne Daly — and an image of a guy that’s not our Jerry — noshin’ a Smuckers pastry.

Waffles, Smuckers, and damn Jerry’s too-common-of-a-name, oh, my! Where will this yellow-tainted, SOV road take me, now?

Mirror of Death

So, if the cover doesn’t sell it: this is a backyard possession opus. Hold the pea soup and the Lisa and the Devil thrown-up frogs, as we meet Sara. Sara is another one of those bullied mousy-to-hotties that goes from mousy-to-hottie after lighting a few candles and ramblin’ a voodoo incantation. But like Stanley Coopersmith in Evilspeak and those “no false metal” horndogs, Holy Moses, in Hard Rock Zombies: when you mess with Luciferette, you get the hornettes — wrong chants and mirrors cracked, be damned.

What the . . . hey, is this the same red-optical possession effect from Doh Dohler’s regional drive-in’er Fiend (1980; also reviewed this week, look for it)? So that answers all the questions of that film: our poor violin teacher in that film was possessed by Empress Sura from Egypt?

So, our fire from Cairo rises from the looking glass and makes Sarah beautiful, so as to more effectively cruise all the local bars and hotspots Sarah could never go to before. But like Angel Martin in Shock ’em Dead, who went from dorky pizza boy to buff rock star, Sarah — now Sura — needs to pick up men and feed off their souls. (So, just like the fat red worm, two-tentacled octopus-thingy in Dohler’s movie.) Throat rips, heart rips, and the ol’ ancient dagger-in-eye gag, ensues, but are cheaply done and not the least bit overly, well, gag-inducing — which is what we want in our SOVs: to gag. (Then puke our mirco’d-burrito and slightly micro’d Ben and Jerry’s Phish Food: Remember, you have to soften those Fudge Fish into the gooey marshmallow swirls and improve the mallow-to-caramel swirl ratio content in our stomachs.)

And that’s all I am gonna say about that, Forrest. Except that every time I watch Striking Distance, I wait for Bruce Willis to say, “Hey, Lt. Dan! I’m a shrimp boat captain on the mighty Three Rivers.”

This is where the trailer for Mirror of Death was embedded . . . until You Tube cancelled the uploader’s account.

Bloodspell

And team Daly-Warren are back with another ne’er-do-well SOV demon and a put-upon yoot (know your Joe Pesci references) by a dickhead of a dad who’s a dicksicle of a dad because a dickhead of a demon possessed dad, you got that? But, etc., and so on, in a tale that doesn’t not ensue in the “tradition” of The Fury or The Shining, no matter what the copywriters at Marketing Media Corporation and Vista Street Productions tell you. So the demon ditches dad and nestles into junior, so our resident supernatural terror may knock off the student body of the Ed Wood School of Non-Thespin’, aka the St. Boniface Group Home for Bullies.

Yeah, it’s the ol’ Stanley Coopersmith-hold-the-Tranya (know your Star Trek; don’t make us go all-Corbomite on your ass) bit as one too many practical jokes on ol’ Danny boy has sounded the pipes to summon our demon. And, once Danny-not-Torrence turns 18th, the demon will be cast inside not-the-son-of-Jack-and-Wendy, forever.

Is Bloodspell an improvement over Mirror of Death? Yep. Is it still a gore-deprived backyard’er? Yep, and more so than the prior. But at least we have a demon with a woodchipper fetish (but sadly, not for corkscrews, as in our this-week-reviewed SOV’er, The Brainsucker). Then there’s the errant, mind-controlled pigeon into the window that cuts up a bully’s face and a spontaneous-burnt-to-crisp stunt by-mind. And a showstopping (sarcasm) dad-gets-a-metal-pipe-impaling-so-lighting-can-strike gag lifted out of one of the Friday the 13th sequels (it was VI, but Jason was revived and didn’t die from the gag). Oh, and Danny, well, the demon, kidnaps Jenny (Theodora Louise), the girlfriend of Charlie, Danny’s only and now-not friend. Why? Well, to celebrate his birthday because, Danny the Demon is 18 and he likes it. And we wished Alice Cooper came up with another “The Man Behind the Mask” Friday the 13th theme song (again, Part VI: Jason Lives) to make blood worth spillin’ . . . and spellin’.

In the end: Bloodspell isn’t just a film with not-special-special effects: there are no special effects. And no blood of the kill-by-E.S.P variety. And acting so inept-inert that, if Larry “Seinfeld the Soup Nazi” Thomas starred in Bloodspell (or Mirror of Death), he’d apologize for it, as he did with his involvement in Terror on Tour — but, amazing, not for his involvement in an even worse SOV, known as Night Ripper!, so what gives, Lawrence? But hey, Bloodspell — but not Mirror of Death — filled out a programming block on USA’s Saturday Nightmares** — which is how most of us saw it, in lieu of VHS.

This is where the trailer for Bloodspell was embedded . . . until You Tube cancelled the uploader’s account.

Now, why did I make that earlier, off-the-cuff Bruce Willis/Pittsburgh reference?

Well, as is the case with most of these backyard’ers of the 16mm (or 8mm formats, even) or SOV variety, the film’s IMDb pages aren’t complete — with blank actor profiles of thesp’ers who never appeared in another film. However, our resident damsel-in-distress at St. Boniface is Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-born and bred Twink Caplan, aka Theodora Louise back then, who does have a profile — because she’s still in the business.

Remember when Jim Belushi was a comedy-thing? Well, Caplan produced Curly Sue (1991), as well as the Gen-X comedy Clueless (1995) and its related TV series, as well as Amy Heckerling’s follow up, Loser (2000). Acting wise, before Bloodspell, Caplan co-starred in Underground Aces (a pretty awful, 1981 comedy that I only watched because of its Dirk Benedict-Battlestar Galactica connection; it’s not “Animal House in a car parking garage,” trust me), as well as guest-starring on such ’80s series as L.A. Law, Who’s the Boss, and Valerie (aka The Hogan Family). Caplan still picks up parts in indie films and cable-streaming series.

Meanwhile, Ray Quiroga, the producer of Dead of Night, Bloodspell, and Black Magic Woman, continues to produce indie films.

* Witchcraft III (1991) was preceded by Witchcraft II: The Kiss of Death (1989). It all began with the Italian-produced but shot in Massachusetts Witchcraft (1988), aka Witchery, aka La casa 4, aka Ghosthouse II.

** Check out our “Drive-In Friday” featurette honoring USA’s Night Flight programming blocks. And speaking of Animal House and ’80s comedies: we examine those films with our “Drive-In Friday” Slobs. vs. Snobs and Teen Sex Comedy Nights.

Our thanks to Paul Zamarelli of VHS Collector.com.
What would we do without his preservation efforts of all things analog —
be it SOV or 16mm backyard?
Seriously, Paul is the king of clean .jepg images of the lost classics of the home video-era.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Kansas cult filmmaker Donald Farmer made his first film, the short Despondent Yearning, in 1973; by 1976, he completed his sixth short, A Taste of Flesh: based on those titles, we’re guessing they’re skin flicks. After Christopher Lewis single-handedly birthed the home video SOV-market by bypassing con-fest screenings, Grindhouse theaters, and four-walling Drive-Ins for one-off showings, instead opting for distribution exclusively on the new “screens” created by the home video market for Blood Cult (1985), Donald Farmer was inspired to shoot his first feature-length film (90 minutes): Cannibal Hookers (1987).

As you can tell from the artwork, in conjunction with the title, the major and regional chains didn’t stock Cannibal Hookers: only the more out-of-the-way mom & pop outlets for us wee-lads with more discriminating tastes carried it (see Snuff Kill); even then, it was behind the beaded curtain at most of those outlets. While Farmer cleaned and shortened the running time for the impossible-to-find Demon Queen (1987), it was his third film, Scream Dream (1989), that was his first film to receive the most wide-spread distribution on the main floor in the horror section. And for a wee-metal head (moi), the cheesy mixture of rock and horror of the Hard Rock Zombies and Shock ‘Em Dead variety made Scream Dream an instant rental.

Since his meager SOV ’80s beginnings, Donald Farmer has amassed another 30-plus credits, with titles such as Vampire Cop (1990) and Cannibal Cop (2017), the too-irresistible-not-to-rent Chainsaw Cheerleaders (2008), Shark Exorcist (2015) and, we’re guessing, its sequel, Bigfoot Exorcist (2021). In between, Farmer also completed two documentaries on cult film: The Bizarre World of Jess Franco (1988) and Invasion of the Scream Queens (1992), the latter features Janus Blythe of fellow SOV’er, Spine (1986).

Cannibal Hookers

So, when you’re renting a film such as Cannibal Hookers, the title, in conjunction with the cover, its tagline, and a couple of film stills on the back cover of a ripped-out neck and chest is all you need to get the gist of the situation. Plot means nothing, as the copywriters opted to only tell us to “be prepared for a film that is depraved, with bloodsucking terror” that includes ne’er-do-well johns being sliced n’ diced. Of course, in the SOV greylands adrift on the boarders of the adult film industry, there’s more than likely a couple of incognito adult film actresses in the cast and more than likely — like Spine — shot by a porn company looking to move into the legit horror realms. But guess what: there’s hardly any nudity here, just like Spine. But Sheila Best, aka Tara the Southern Bell from G.L.O.W. for your wrestling fans, is pretty good as the bitchy “Carmilla” of the sorority.

Regardless of the suggestive box art, Cannibal Hookers is not the all-out slaughterhouse cross-pollination of the cannibal and vampire genres marketed: this is a “comedy,” after all. And when you’re dealing with a movie that concerns two sorority pledges forced into Sunset Boulevard hooker-servitude for the night, you know you’re getting a T&A comedy. Of course, the sleazy Gamma Zeta Beta sorority is a lesbian vampire coven — and our two pledges are the newest flesh-eating zombie hookers (a great cult title if there ever was one) to join these ladies of the night.

The gore . . . well . . . this is a film where you see the blade coming down, the scene cuts to a scream, and a limb falls into the shot, à la The Spirits of Jupiter comes to my mind. But at least it’s all shot-in-camera practical effects (CGI blood splatter is the bane of my existence). In terms of SOVs overall: Cannibal Hoookers is a rougher VHS ride than most, one that’ll make you load up your copies of the superior Spine and Snuff Kill (1997) for one more spin.

You can view the trailer for Cannibal Hookers and learn more about Donald Farmer’s early career as he talks about the making of the film in the third episode of the SOV The True Independents web series as a You Tube sign-in. You can learn more about the full documentary at SOV Horror.com, your one-stop shop for all things horror.

Scream Dream

Donald Farmer impressively upped his game in this story about heavy metal’s newest superstar, Michelle Shock — whose albums are in the racks next to the faux metal gods of Black Roses (1988). As with those hypnotizing rockers led by the demon-morphing Damien in that film, Michelle Shock lords a supernatural power over her fans: a power so strong, just watching her videos has an effect on the males of the metal species. As with Black Roses, and the guys from Holy Moses in Hard Rock Zombies (1985) before her: when Shock’s band arrives in town to put on a concert, the town rises up in protest.

Needless to say: when the rock starts, the teenagers start to disappear. And when the rumors of Michelle Shock’s (a brunette) devil worship proclivities cause the promoter to cancel the show, her manager replaces her with (a blonde) Jamie Summers (ex-Playboy Playmate Melissa Moore, who’s done her share of Jim Wynorski flicks, such as Sorority House Massacre II and Linda Blair’s Repossessed). Shock then calls forth a demon (an impressive on-a-budget full body-and-mask by Tom Savini-crew member Rick Gonzales) to extract revenge on her band. We soon come to learn Michelle was actually possessed by a demon that’s been body-hoping metal singers over the years — and it now possesses Jamie to carry on the carnage.

The rock and the gore . . . well, we’ve always said Rocktober Blood (courtesy of its first and third acts, natch) is the best of the heavy metal horror flicks, and that hard fact still holds true. We’ll even go as far to say that, in a neck-to-neck race, Dennis Devine’s all female-rocking Dead Girls, crosses the finish line against Farmer, first.

While it’s as campy as Cannibal Hookers, Scream Dream ditches the comedic to play as a straight horror piece, one that’s helped by the familiar and experienced Moore adding a bit of thespin’ class to the SOV proceedings. And it’s kind of hard to hate a film that gives an unknown band, in this case, Rikk-O-Shay, a chance to get their hair-metal grunge tune “Ball Buster” out to a mass audience via a movie . . . that starts with a chainsaw-to-the-vagina bondage dream sequence and a blowjob-castration by demon-babe mouth.

You can view the trailer for Scream Dream as a You Tube sign in.

Demon Queen

So, thanks to the fine folks at Massacre Video, the once hard-to-find Demon Queen is easily accessible for us horn-doggers who need it in our home library.

Ditching the sorority sister hi-jinks of Cannibal Hookers and cheese metal of Scream Dream, we’re now inside a video store with another ne’er-do-well clerk who implores members to rent his favorite horror films, for no other reason to pad out the film’s already-thin plot. The “plot,” such as it is, concerns a homeless female demon, natch, who’s actually a vampire (a bitch’s gotta drink), who moves in with a drug-dealing couple on-the-hook to a dwarf coke dealer for 6Gs.

Hey, it’s an easy swallow at only 46 minutes (40 if we cut the 6 minutes of end credits) — even with its cochlea-straining sound and repetitive Casio-whining synth music, so what’s the problemo? You know you love this stuff: it has all the over-the-top on-the-cheap gore and analog-tape effects that remind of those cheesy Missing Persons and Simple Minds camcordered-hits of early ’80s MTV yore. Oh, yes: the out-of-place “dream sequence” set piece from Scream Dream is back: only our succubus hottie does the dreamin’ as she de-hearts a guy. Meanwhile, those real-life heart-rips turn her victims into fine, Romeroesque citizens. Torn, bloody hearts against naked breasts and fleshy face rips, ensues.

Oh, yes! As with Cannibal Hookers and Scream Dream: I love every minute of the SOV-heart of it all; your own Dalton-ness down by the roadhouse, may vary.

While there’s no online streams of Cannibal Hookers, there’s a streaming copy of Scream Dream on You Tube. You can find DVDs of both films — which are not digitally restored, but straight VHS-to-DVD rips — on a couple of different imprints specializing in cult horror films. You can find Cannibal Hookers DVDs at Amazon and Walmart, while copies of Scream Dream are available at DVD Planet.

Oh, and guess what?! The SOV-lovin’ lads at Letterboxd Funtime You Tube makes my night, as I can sit and watch Demon Queen for the first time, ever. I’m stoked! Sam the Bossman is equally stoked, as he’ll be reviewing that film for our “SOV Week” blow out in September 2021.

Wow, it’s good to be home again, jammin’ on a “new” Donald Farmer SOV’er. Sweet!

From the Never Say Never Department: During the last two weeks of January 2023 we had, yet another, another “SOV Week” blow out — and gave Scream Dream a second, alternate look. Be sure to click through our SOV tags at the bottom of any of our SOV reviews to populate our ever-growning SOV catalog of shot-on-video films from the ’80s and beyond.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

The “brain breaks free of the body” romp that is Mind Killer is an SOV’er that also crosses over into regional filmmaking — two video fringe genres that’s our kind of our jam (yeah, we have a lot of those) around the B&S About Movies’ cubicle farm. Local Denver filmmaker Micheal Krueger made two of them as a writer and director: the shot back-to-back Mind Killer and Night Vision (1987).

As a writer and producer, he made his third film: the rock band vs. werewolf flick — did he see Alice Cooper’s Monster Dog? — Lone Wolf (1988). In that same capacity, Krueger upped his game and shot in Panavision 35mm (but released in the same direct-to-video format as his previous three films), The Amityville Curse (1990). Sadly, the cinematic visions of Micheal Krueger’s mind ended at the age of 49 (of undisclosed causes) on August 27, 1990, in Denver, Colorado — where all of his films were produced and shot.

The copy on the VHS sleeve for Krueger’s first film proclaims it as “an intellectual horror film” — and that’s not just copywriter hornswogglin’. While obvious in its low-budget, the proceedings are far from the amateurism infecting most SOV’ers. Clocking in at a brisk 84 minutes (one hour twenty-four minutes), Micheal Krueger does his best with what he’s got to work with and takes the best of David Cronenberg’s Scanners (1987) and Ed Hunt’s (not released yet) The Brain (1988) — with a pinch of the classic (well, it is to the B&S crew) Fiend Without a Face (1958), and a little bit of Frank Henenlotter’s Basket Case (1982) and Brain Damage (1988) — and engages us with an introspective, but fun n’ sloppy romp. And the acting from the leads Joe McDonald and Christopher Wade (aka Wade Kelly) rises above the expected SOV thespin’ tedium norms.

Warren is a lonely library clerk addicted to self-help books and videos, particularly ones with advice on how to attract women — and he ineptly applies those teachings to the local singles bar scene with his even more awkward co-worker, Larry, and his buff roommate, Brad. Of course, Brad scores without books — and Warren creepily watches as he does — with the librarian he crushes (Shirley Ross, later of Night Vision).

Then, in the library bowels. Warren stumbles across a manuscript that he uses to develop psychic powers, which make him irresistible to women. Soon, his powers get out of control as his brain turns into a monster with a mind of its own — that bursts from his skull.

While this is more tightly edited — at 80 minutes — than the 100 minutes of Micheal Krueger’s follow up, Night Vision, as well as a bit more graphic-gooey than that latter film, the effects are cheesy-campy (but charming-to-inept amusing) and the thespin’ by most of the cast is from the stiff to the overwrought. The sound mix, in places, strains your ears deciphering the dialog. And, as with Night Visions, its all pretty uneventful until those last ten minutes — when our brain creature runs amuck, with slop and humor.

And does the ending remind you a bit of Re-Animator? Yes, and that’s not a bad thing.

The trailer and the conclusion of the film is on You Tube . . . fool me once, video embed elves!

And now for our second feature!

The copy on the VHS sleeve for Night Vision proclaims we will “tune into the nightmare channel and fast-forward into hell” . . . and that bit o’ copywritin’ hornswogglin’ sums up the ol’ haunted electronics plot we’ve enjoyed in the video ’80s with the likes of TerrorVision (1986; a cable satellite system), The Video Dead (1987; a portable TV set), and Remote Control (1988; possessed VHS tapes). Uh, okay. Yeah, yeah . . . and the vapid John Ritter-waster (he made so many; and you’re stuck with Pam Dawber, too) Stay Tuned (1992; a comedic, possessed cable TV hook up, or remote, or . . . I don’t care).

Unlike most SOV auteurs who vanished after one lone, in most cases, tragically inept film (that will still have its charms), Michael Krueger shows us he learned his celluloid lessons with Mind Killer. The production values on Night Vision are slicker and the acting from our leads of Stacy Carson and, as his girlfriend and fellow video store employee, Shirley Ross (from Mindkiller) are, again, above the SOV norms — but her constant gum chewing and smoking (and both at the same time) becomes annoying and ventures into a poor thespian choice (and gross); meanwhile, Carson is too old to play the naive teenager bit.

So, who’s haunted whom, here? Well, Andy Archer, a naive bumpkin from the Kansas cornfields heads into big city Denver — in lieu of his own state’s Wichita — to pursue a writing career. And the muse isn’t calling. Then he buys a stolen, portable TV and VCR from his new friend and local street hustler, Vinnie Sotto (a not bad Tony Carpenter). (Their friendship gives the film an M.C Escher meets a horror-slanted Midnight Cowboy vibe — with Carson as our naive Joe Buck and Carpenter’s Sotto as Ratzo Rizzo. There’s no evidence that was Krueger’s influence or intent, just my take on the material.)

Loaded into the VCR is a videocassette created by a group of electronic-worshiping Satanists (set up in the beginning of the film) — and the gadget — which plays back when it’s not plugged in; shocks you, pricks your finger, and oozes blood when it runs the tape (is it real or hallucination) — can also predict future murders. So our geeky Andy Archer writes short stories based on what’s on the tape — and finds success. Soon, those Satanic rituals and devil worshiping ceremonies on the tape — just as the box copy promises — fast forwards Andy into a Droste effect-type hell as murders sweep Denver — murders that Andy’s accused of, since he’s chronicled the murders in his stories and he appears on the tape as he commits the murders.

Sure, the proceedings plod along slowly, but the shots are professionally framed and the competently edited. But at one hour forty minutes, you can see an easy ten minutes trimmed. In addition, tighter writing could have easily paired Krueger’s Cronenbergian-cum-Lychian psychological thriller into a decent 80-minute film from the 100-minutes we’re watching. Again, it’s a competent effort and you’ve seen worse — far worse — from the SOV and 16mm canons. The oddity here is that Tubi offers Night Vision as an age-restricted sign-in, but there nothing here that’s the least SOV offensive-graphic (and doesn’t kick in until the last ten minutes).

A fan-created trailer and scene clip at the crappiest video store in Denver, is on You Tube . . . you’re not fooling me twice. . . .

You can watch Mind Killer on You Tube HERE and HERE, but the best upload is the free-with ads stream on Tubi. You can watch Night Vision on You Tube HERE, but there’s a better free-with-ads stream upload on Tubi. You can also learn more about both of these Micheal Krueger works, as well as all of the films produced in Colorado, at Colorado Film.com.

We’ve reviewed several Colorado-shot films, with Curse of the Blue Lights, The Jar, and Manchurian Avenger, and The Spirits of Jupiter. Other other, obscure Mile Highers we’d like to review, but there’s no copies to be had, are Savage Water (1979), Lansky’s Road (1985), and Back Street Jane (1989).

As always, our many thanks to Paul Zamarelli and his efforts to preserve the VHS artwork of these films. Visit him at VHS Collector.com and enjoy his reviews on his You Tube channel The Analog Archivist.

About the Author: You can read the music and film reviews of R.D Francis on Medium and learn more about his work on Facebook.