Kill Butterfly Kill: Years after being assaulted by five men, Tang Mei-Ling (Juliet Chan) — or Donna, depending on the language you choose — hunts them down one by one, joined by Richard, a retired hitman (“Tattooed Ma” Sha) and several of her girlfriends. She’s spent six years to get bloody revenge and she’s going to take her time getting it.
The wild thing is that there are times that this is a rape revenge movie, other times when it’s an action film and then moments when it gets surreal. Fog rolls in, neon lighting takes over and Tang Mei-Ling becomes a female demon, purring that she wants to kill. The entire screen itself gets taken over and moves and bends and distorts as we become part of her destruction of these evil men.
Also known as Underground Wife, this is a Taiwan black movie that shares exploitation themes and action with socially conscious themes. That said, these films never forget that they are scummy.
American Commando 6: Kill Butterfly Kill: IFD is a company that you probably know. They had Joseph Lai, Godfrey Ho and Thomas Tang make hundreds if not thousands of similar titled ninja movies that combine other films with hastily shot gunplay or martial arts battles.
It’s like watching two movies that only have one moment where they meet.
Three years ago, special agent Aaron Nolan (Mark Miller) broke up the Garvino gang. But now the brutal Garvino (Mike Abbott) is on the street again. Aaron and his partner Rick Hammet set out to neutralize him. Meanwhile, Donna is a nightclub owner who is their only ally in the war against Garvino, spurred on because years ago, five of his men raped her. Now, teaming with Richard, she’ll get the revenge she needs while Arron goes after his target.
This feels like the two movies are nearly decades apart, much less the quality of the film stock, so in no way does it ever appear to be seamless. And isn’t that how we want it?
If you know IFD movies, you know that the music is always stolen from incredible places. This one features “Arca” by Richard Norris, “Divine Particles” by Takkra and “Oxygene Part 1” by Jean-Michael Jarre. IFD loves some Jean-Michael Jarre.
The Neon Eagle Video release has a new 4k restoration from the best surviving elements of the export English language cut of the film prepared by IFD Films. It also has the Mandarin edit — Underground Wife — and a 4K scan of the IFD remix American Commando 5: Kill Butterfly Kill.
All of these various versions of this unique film are here making their official U.S. home video and worldwide blu ray premieres.
Extras include audio commentary by Kenneth Brorsson and Paul Fox of the Podcast On Fire Network for Kill Butterfly Kill and — worth the price of the entire thing — an IFD trailer collection.
Richard Malone (Burt Reynolds) is a killer for the CIA who finally gest sick of it and quits. He drives across the country, getting lost, ending up somewhere in Oregon where he takes his busted Ford Mustang to the garage of Paul Barlow (Scott Wilson) and his daughter Jo (Cynthia Gibb). Marlow tells him that he should go to a bigger town because getting the parts is going to take some time. Malone has nowhere to go, so he stays in Barlow’s spare room and the two bond over being Vietnam veterans.
The town is being taken over by Charles Delaney (Cliff Robertson) who ends up being more than just an evil rich person and is also a white nationalist — funny how that keeps working out — and eventually his henchman start making life tough for Malone. The ex-assassin puts Dan Bollard (Dennis Burkley) in the hospital and kills that man’s brother Calvin (I really need to make a Tracy Walter appearance Letterboxd) when he tries to get back at him.
Sheriff Hawkins (Kenneth McMillan) may be someone Malone can trust but there are so many bought police officers and killers in town now that Delaney puts a hit on him. His handler, Jamie (Lauren Hutton) arrives to kill him, but come on, he’s Burt Reynolds and they’re soon making sweet love and because she’s a woman in an 80s action movie, she needs to die to give our hero emotion and reason to come back from his depression.
Based on Shotgun by William Wingate, Reynolds was, as always, honest about the movie: “I was attracted to Malone because I thought there was a chance the movie might be more than a guy running away from his past. Let’s be honest. The film is Shane. I am an ex-CIA man whose car breaks down in a small town who then gets close to a family and attempts to battle a Lyndon LaRouche character played by Cliff. I’m not doing Clint in Pale Rider. There’s a little bit of Stallone from First Bloodin this, but I’m not playing the damaged-goods-guy Sly became in Rambo. Just to show you how movies change, Gérard Depardieu and Christopher Lambert at one point were going to play Malone. I wonder how this guy got rewritten into me.”
Reynolds was paid $3 million for this movie but this was a tough time in his career. He was dealing with so much. He knocked out Dick Richards on the set of Heat — Richards later tried to sue Reynolds for $25 million for the assault and Reynolds said, “I spent $500,000 for that punch. If I hit a guy, it’s certain that he will run a studio or become a huge director.” — had been in a series of flops like Stick, The Man Who Loved Women and Stroker Ace. He was also fighting rumors that he had AIDS. He was injured on the set of City Heat when he was hit in the jaw with a real chair instead of a breakaway prop. The jaw pain and TMJ kept him from eating solid food which is why he lost thirty pounds. He also became addicted to painkillers.
The Kino Lorber blu ray of this movie has commentary by film historians Steve Mitchell and Nathaniel Thompson and a trailer. You can get it from Kino Lorber.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This was on the site before but I’m so excited about the Kino Lorber blu ray. It has two audio commentaries, one with director Sam Firstenberg and stunt coordinator BJ Davis and the second with Firstenberg moderated by filmmaker/editor Elijah Drenner. There’s also a making of and the trailer. You can get it from Kino Lorber.
Director Sam Firstenberg and stars Michael Dudikoff and Steve James — that’s as Sergeant Joe Armstrong and Sergeant Curtis Jackson to all of us — are back in the second of five (well, six if you count American Samurai) movies in this series.
Now US Army Rangers, our heroes are helping the Marines, led by Captain Bill “Wild Bill” Woodward (Jeff Weston, who is your trivia answer to what actor could be in an Altman movie — The Player — and a Full Moon film, of which you can choose from Puppet Master IIor Demonic Toys). Their ranks have been disappearing thanks to ninjas, so they called in the right soldiers.
They’re part of a plan by Leo “The Lion” Burke (Gary Conway from Land of the Giants and The Farmer; he also wrote this movie along with James Booth, who was in Avenging Force) who is creating super ninjas from the research of Alicia Sanborn’s father. He has a cool base on Blackbeard Island, his own ninja named Tojo Ken (Mike Stone, forever providing the stunt power behind Cannon’s ninja films, as he was the fight coordinator) and could have really made something of himself were it not for our heroes.
I love everything Firstenberg directed. And seeing Steve James elevated from sidekick to equal hero in this made me beyond glad. It’s basically a comic book movie made with no budget and all the heart in the world.
87 people die in this movie. Ninja war is hell too.
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 is working to save the lives of cats and dogs all across America, giving pets second chances and happy homes.
Today’s theme: Series episode
“Lewis Vendredi made a deal with the devil to sell cursed antiques. But he broke the pact, and it cost him his soul. Now, his niece Micki, and her cousin Ryan have inherited the store… and with it, the curse. Now they must get everything back, or the real terror begins.”
Friday the 13th: The Series was created by Frank Mancuso Jr. and Larry B. Williams and was going to be called The 13th Hour. Mancuso Jr. never intended for there to be an outright link to the Friday the 13th film series, but instead referenced “the idea of Friday the 13th, which is that it symbolizes bad luck and curses”.
That said, the creators did try to tie-in Jason Vorhees’s hockey mask but the idea was discarded so that the show could exist on its own. Mancuso Jr. was afraid that mentioning any events from the films would take the audience away from “the new world that we were trying to create.”
That said, the title was what was needed to sell the show. It did so well in late nights that some stations moved it to prime time. In all, it lasted 72 episodes over 3 seasons.
An antique dealer named Lewis Vendredi (R.G. Armstrong) got wealth and power from Satan for selling his soul, along with being the conduit for people to purchase cursed objects from his store Vendredi’s Antiques. When he tries to get out of the deal, the devil has him killed and gets his soul anyway.
The store is inherited by his niece Micki Foster (Robey!) and her cousin Ryan Dallion (John D. LeMay). They sell off many of the cursed antiques before being stopped by Jack Marshak (Chris Wiggins), who once collected antiques for Lewis before learning that he was evil.
Airing on October 26, 1987, “Hallowe’en” was directed by Timothy Bond (The Lost World, Return to the Lost World) and written by Bill Taub. The cursed object in this episode is the Amulet of Zohar and it can transfer a spirit into a deceased body.
Jack thinks that Micki and Ryan should have a Halloween party at the antique shop to try and fit into the neighborhood. The basement — where all the evil things exist — is off limits, but you know that they’ll soon be used and for the first time in the series, Uncle Lewis will appear. Well, the ghost of Uncle Lewis, who tries to come off as a hero and say that just wants to save the soul of his wife Grace, whose corpse is in a secret room in the store that they have never been to.
Now that he has the Amulet, Lewis has three hours to find a new body and escape back into the real world. He leaves behind Greta (Victoria Deslaurier), a demon who will do anything he asks, to battle Micky, Ryan and Jack.
I was let down that this show wasn’t part of the Vorhees saga when I was young but now I love it. At all times, I have had a major crush on Robey. Come on. Who didn’t?
EDITOR’S NOTE: Young Nurses In Love was on USA Up All Night on January 18 and 19 and August 10, 1991; April 10 and October 3, 1992; May 28 and November 20, 1993 and November 19, 1994.
As I near the end of USA Up All Night month, I felt that one more Chuck Vincent movie was needed. Young Nurses In Love takes its name directly from the 1982 movie Young Doctors In Love and references the poster art, but otherwise it is very much its own movie.
Nurse Ellis (Jeanna Marie, Deadly Impact, Prime Evil) is really a Russian spy here to steal the sperm of Edison and Einstein, much less Abraham Lincoln and George Washington — how did they keep sperm from the past cold so long? — and use it to make Russia smarter. Yet she falls in love with Dr. Reilly (Alan Fisler) all while the hospital seems to be falling to bits, including Dr. Spencer (Jamie Gillis!) giving a mob boss breasts in a screwed up plastic surgery.
There’s also an appearance by Toxic Avenger John Altamura, sex goddess Annie Sprinkle plays a character named Twin Falls and because this is a Chuck Vincent movie, Veronica Hart is in it.
This is a silly movie of hijinks and people having sex all over a hospital. It’s kind of like, well, The Hospitalmade by adult movie vets which I find hilarious because that film has cachet and a budget and this has Jamie Gillis being ridiculous.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Senior Week was on USA Up All Night on February 29 and October 2, 1992; September 10, 1993 and January 28, 1994.
Directed by Stuart A. Goldman — who mostly directed music-based movies and also produced Leona Helmsley: The Queen of Mean — and written by Jan Kubicki, Senior Week is led by Everett (Michael St. Gerard, who played Elvis in Great Balls of Fire! and the Elvis TV miniseries, as well as Link Larkin in Hairspray), who has hired someone else to write his final essay and gets caught by Mrs. Bagley (Barbara Gruen). She gives him another chance and he does the same thing, kidnapping the nerdy Jody (Gary Keer) to write his paper while everyone else parties at the beach, which brings Mrs. Bagely after Everett.
Our protagonist brings along his friends Jamie (George Robert Klek) and Kevin (Alan Naggar), which angers Jamie’s possessive girlfriend Tracy (Jennifer Gorey, Runway Dreams), who brings her friend Stacy (Leesa Zelkin) to hunt him down. Adding to the proceedings is that Everett promised Jody that he will find him a girl, which our geek does on his own by hooking up with Tracy’s cousin Debbie Sue. (Devon Skye).
This movie actually had some publicity, as the opening scene — filmed at New Jersey’s Palisades Park High School — had nudity in an actual school and it got principal Nicholas Rotonda suspended. Maybe the school board was wondering why someone was still making a teen sex comedy in 1987 in the time between the Porky’s clones and the American Pie clones. He was reinstated after his students protested and asked for their beloved principal — the kind of guy that had no problem with bare breasts in a teen comedy — be rehired.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Off the Mark was on USA Up All Night on August 21, 1991; April 4, 1992 and February 27 and April 3, 1993.
Also known as Crazy Legs, this was directed by Bill Berry, who also directed Brotherhood of Death, and who co-wrote this with Temple Matthews.
Howard Markel (Mark Neely) and Dmitri (David D’Arnal) knew each other back when the Russian runner was studying as an exchange student in America. But now, they’re grown up and facing off in the Plutonium Man Triathlon. This movie, however, is kind of like a Zucker brothers movie with rapid fire sight gags but because it’s not made by the Zuckers, it isn’t as punchy. But you know, it’s surprisingly funny in parts.
It does have Terry Farrell from Back to School — and Jadzia Dax on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine — as Howard’s love interest. He’s going to need her and his black friend who wants to be white named Johnny B. White (Clarence Gilyard Jr.) if he wants to beat Dmitri, who stole his dog Shep when they were young. Also: he is handicapped and runs in what is assumed to be a very comical manner.
Off the Mark doesn’t get mentioned much when it comes to 80s comedies. Maybe you’ll watch it and get a new favorite.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Rock ‘n’ Roll Nightmare was on USA Up All Night on December 29, 1990; August 23, 1991; March 14, May 29 and September 4, 1992 and June 18 and October 15, 1993.
I’m 2:25 into this movie and I’m already screaming at the TV in glee. A farmhouse, somewhere that feels like Canada, with a mother — who has hair that feels like the 80s — is making eggs and calling everyone to eat. Then, a scream, to which her husband replies with all the intensity of someone answering a telemarketer. He opens the stove to a skull-faced demon and screams as his son watches.
Cue the credits — it’s time for Rock ‘n Roll Nightmare! This film stars Jon Mikl Thor, who Wikipedia tells us is “the first Canadian to win both the Mr. Canada and Mr. USA titles. During his bodybuilding career, he has achieved over 40 titles around the world. As a musician, he is the frontman for the heavy metal band Thor, billing himself as “The Legendary Rock Warrior.” Thor used to appear in the back pages of 80s metal mags like Hit Parader and Circus, but no one I knew had ever heard any of his albums (here’s the video for 1977’s “Keep the Dogs Away“). You may know him from this insane clip of him dancing and singing that the Found Footage Festival has uncovered:
Getting back to the movie, the credits sequence ranks among the longest and worst shot credits I’ve ever seen in my entire life. It’s even worse than the credits in fellow Canadians Bob and Doug McKenzie’s Mutants of 2051 A.D. It’s shot after shot of pre-Go Pro footage of a camera racing along a dark house, as if we are to find some terror in the accouterments and candles and bric a brac.
What follows next can only be described as fetishistic shots of a white custom van — complete with DUCKER license plate — as it grooves and grinds and rocks its way down the highways and byways of Canada, complete with the ever beefy Thor at the wheel. I’m writing this at 5 AM and my reality is always a bit skewed, but these shots go through more than one song, which is like a wrestling match lasting three commercial breaks. It just isn’t done. If the director’s intent was to show us how remote the farmhouse they’re traveling to is, he succeeded with three and a half minutes of watching a white van slowly drive. I’m shocked we didn’t get a slow-motion scene of turn signals going on and off or break lights slowly being depressed. These are the moments in genre films where you wonder: am I watching an auteur or a complete hack…and do I even know the difference any longer?
Just when you think that this will be an entire film of all establishing shots, the band emerges from the van to learn that they’ll be staying at this farmhouse for 5 weeks of recording. It has gas. It has electric. It doesn’t have a phone or TV…but it does have a 24 track recording studio! The band has grown soft in the city and needs Toronto to make it happen — no hot tubs or Dynasty! After a “comedic” sequence about what bands have been to the farmhouse, I have been led to wonder if this is what life is always like in Canada. Keep in mind — my brief time in the Great White North has not debased me of my belief that everything and everyone is from SCTV and Kids in the Hall.
You know how in most films, they’ll do a brief cut to something ominous to change the tone? This film has these cuts lasting two to three minutes — dark skies, Omen-like choirs, more dark skies and wind. These scenes stretch off into eternity.
Rod, Max, Stig and Thor — and their respective lady friends — have a meal with awkward toasts as we get to know all about them. But now, it’s time for them to tune their weapons and play us a song. Also — their manager has cooked from them and is wearing a paper burger hat (he also had on a sweet Archies leather jacket earlier, so for some reason he’s the 1950s element of the band).
Instead of the band playing, as would normally follow such a setup, we’re presented with the manager and girls doing a synchronized dishwashing scene. Thor emerges outside to tell them they’re almost ready. For some reason, he’s changed into his stage clothes, exposing his pecs in a costume that can only be compared to the High Energy garb of Canuck superstar Owen Hart.
If you loved the long musical sequences in, oh, let’s say Son of Dracula, you’re in for a treat here. “We Live to Rock” is played in its entirety while band groupies get angry, a band wife sews and a weird flesh/sockpuppet pukes in a cup of coffee. A broken drumstick later and manager Phil has to go to the basement to get more. Phil is like if Harry Anderson wore pork pie hats and did competitive improv. Lynn, Stig’s groupie, meets him and comes on to him.
Lynn takes her top off in the most awkward, unsexy manner that I’ve ever seen in a film. Seriously, she gets he outfit stuck and it takes a really long time for her to get it off. One wonders if perhaps a second take would have improved this scene. The chemistry between her and Phil can only be described as impalpable. She takes a huge bite out of his shoulder and Phil’s gone. So’s the van. It looks like Triton is totally trapped in Toronto!
The band retires to their bedrooms. Thor’s girl can’t get him to stop reading lyrics. The keyboard player comes to talk to the guitarist. but he passes out on her. The married couple is making out. And Stig rawdogs Lynn, yelling “As usual, the best!” before going to “drain the dragon, baby! Yeah! I’ll be back!” He then goes to the bathroom where he speaks in a combination of Arnold and Australian, making me yearn for his death. I’m rewarded as a blood puking zombie gives him a clawhold, which possesses him and makes him a better lover. Zombie Stig goes back and the noises of their lovemaking wake up the whole house.
Just then, groupies arrive to the strains of a ripoff of the theme to Phantasm. They’re let into the farmhouse by Phil, who we all thought was dead. He tells them that the band is tired from all the cocaine, but it’s 2 AM and they’ll be down in twenty minutes, so it’s time for them to “whip out those breasts, girls.” He yells at them that they need to cut the cocaine, scream in the crowd and keep the clothes looking good — there are positions to fill! They run off into the b roll night as we slowly — ever so slowly — pan to Phil’s zombified hand. To quote Jack Chick, “HAW! HAW! HAW!”
The married couple is washing dishes, but they’re quickly taken by a zombie. I was thinking, would this director be so bold and/or stupid to have the zombie’s hand come back in frame to shut off a boom box? I was rewarded with a hearty fuck yes, he would.
The first 44 minutes of this movie feel like 44 weeks. Would another music video performance help speed things up? Of course not. Allow me to share the lyrics for the song “Energy” with you:
I live by one simple rule I don’t let nothing get by I sometimes act like a fool But that has kept me alive
I set my goals and I pace myself I land out of all of my needs And when I’m ready to just give You give something I need
YOU GIVE ME ENERGY THAT’S WHAT YOU DO YOU GIVE ME ENERGY YOU GET ME STARTED EVERYDAY
Have you ever seen a couple and thought, “I hope that I never have to watch these people have sex?” Prepare to say that again, times three, as the various couples break off as yet another Thor tune blares onto the soundtrack. Seriously, for those of you who love Thor — I know that at least one of you found the hidden SEO/SEM codes I wrote in here — this is your boner fuel of a movie.
Stig and Lynn go to a very private part of the lake, where a demon claw emerges from his stomach, just as she quickly gets naked and instantly covers up. Too late — that claw grabs a knocker and she’s a goner. Then, the keyboardist and guitar player have a romp that’s about as sexy as eating a Pop Tart. Seriously, this makes the Showgirls hot tub scene look like Last Tango in Paris by comparison. Thor’s woman also gets him to take a shower with her to the strains of Thor’s “Somewhere Rises the Moon.” Thor makes love like some kind of lizard man — he kisses with the tip of his tongue, not his lips. He also moves like some kind of robot. And not the sexy fembot kind of robot. No, like a 1950s Robot Monster kind of robot. Meanwhile — in the midst of the sex scene — the camera moves to give us a clear three second shot of the shower head. No sex — just a showerhead doing its job. I have no idea what the fuck kind of directorial choice that was, to be honest.
Hey! Remember that little kid from the beginning? Me either. He’s back, though and breaks up a romantic moment between the guitar and keyboard couple. For some reason, pan flutes start playing louder than the dialogue at this point. Oh man — just what this movie needs. A precocious child. Actually, he’s another demon, which the couple finds out after giving chase. Man. Thor’s gonna need a new band at this rate. Only he and his girl are left, as nobody else shows up for dinner.
Just because the script says that Thor is going to do the dishes does not mean we need to see him do the dishes. But that said — the next scene is Thor doing the dishes for nearly a minute. Narrative flow doesn’t mean shit in the world of Rock ‘n Roll Nightmare. Thor also acts like someone who constantly reminds you they are acting. When he needs a Coke in a scene, he says, out loud, “I need a Coke. Gotta get a Coke. Yeah. A Coke.” Meanwhile, a piece of chicken comes to life and tries to bite his hand. Luckily, he’s so focused on that Coke!
He sits down to write lyrics while his girl is attacked upstairs, but he’s got his own problems. A penis-like monster with an eyeball where the peehole should be is stalking him (look — I can write mellifluous prose and use my vocabulary and come off as well educated at times, but when a penis demon looks like a penis demon and when it has an eyeball in its peehole, you have to call a penis demon a penis demon). Another demon, this one looking like a plucked bird, attacks just in time for Thor to drop his pen. Somehow, this movie has gone from horror to slapstick. Finally, his girl comes back to tell them that everyone is dead in a demon voice. HOLY SHIT! Now she’s a demon! And she commands an army of penis demons!
Here’s where this movie decides to blow my mind. Thor keeps ignoring the demon, calling him bub, then starts telling him all of his real names. Turns out that no one else in this movie was real, that his entire band and the girls were all shadows that Thor created, based on horror movies, to draw out Beelzebub. “I AM THE INTERCESSOR!” yells Thor, revealing his full stage majesty, all chain, a cape and bare chest and wind machine aided hair. He then makes the same faces I do when I’ve eaten a lot of cheese and can’t properly go number two. “I AM TRITON THE ARCHANGEL!”
Have you ever wanted to see a claymation demon battle a jacked up dude in a metal bikini? Then have I got the movie for you!
Thor defeats the demon, who leaves when a roman candle goes off in front of him. He then goes to a graveyard, where he says, “Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord. If you’ve died in vain — I, His messenger — have avenged your deaths.” We then cut to a totally different house as weird music plays. Roll the credits.
Wow.
I was wondering, what kind of maniac makes this movie? John Fasano, that’s who. He also made Black Roses, along with writing things as diverse as one of Tom Selleck’s Jesse Stone movies and Another 48 Hours. Well, this is a veritable masterpiece. I daresay you’ve never seen a film quite like this. Watch it and be forever changed.
PS – There’s a sequel called Intercessor: Another Rock ‘N’ Roll Nightmare. I’m not sure that I’m ready to watch it yet, but I will.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Rebel High was on USA Up All Night on January 5 and 6, August 17 and December 14, 1990 and June 15 and November 29, 1991.
New Africa High: A Low Comedy by Evan Keliher is a social satire on the plight of Western education in the 1960s and 70s, written by “a high school dropout turned retired teacher” who “smoked so much pot to save my sight that I developed X-ray vision and was arrested for seeing thru girls dresses.”
The movie of the book, Rebel High, was made in Canada by Harry Jakobs, who also produced Evil Judgement. He also did a teen soap opera called Time of Your Life that Keliher wrote for.
New school principal; Edwin Swimper (Harvey Berger) has taken over after the last person to do the job died from stress. There are nonstop gang wars and teachers wear body armor just to survive, so he tries something new: anyone can take any classes that they want. This works out as well as you’d expect, as a gang leader by the name of Calvin Hampster (Kenny Robinson) takes up archery to improve his combat skills and then burns down the Swimper’s office. Swimper quits and the school descends further into anarchy.
Vice principal Norman Relic (Wayne Flemming) is left to pick up the pieces. Organized crime figure and school board head Mr. Wilcox (David McCallum) wants to raze the place and put up a parking lot, but there’s one last chance: Red G. Peckham (Stu Trivax) will take over. He’s fresh from Africa and if he can get the school to pass an inspection, it can stay. He might be even crazier than the students, given to long speeches about Jesus. But then Peckham is shot in a battle between Calvin and Bruno Bataglia (Pierre Larocque). He’s not dead, just resting, as they stash his body in a school locker as the inspectors arrive.
According to the invaluable Canuxploitation, this movie was cast with members of Toronto’s Yuk Yuks stand-up comedy troupe, including Wayne Flemming, Kenny Robinson, Winston Spear, Freddie James, and Stu Trivaxa. It was filmed at the Baron Byng High School on St. Urbain Street in Montreal, a place that was soon torn down.
This tries to be a live action cartoon, but it feels like it last forever and has little joy in it. But you know, sometimes you watch these movies for, well, science.
“This is a story about a high school. It isn’t much of a story, but then, this isn’t much of a high school. It’s full of beer drinkers, dope smokers, hooky players, liars and assholes…and those are just the teachers.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Hellraiser was on USA Up All Night on October 26, 1996 and July 25, October 25 and November 8, 1997.
Horror movies don’t scare me. Not anymore. Some of them disturb me, like the cannibal films. But only one still kind of scares me. And that would be Hellraiser.
There was a time, before the eight sequels to the film and BDSM became well-known fodder on shows like Law and Order that Hellraiser seemed like it came from some alien land more than its true origins. The monsters of the piece, the Cenobites, looked like nothing we’d never seen before, all leather, blood and open festering wounds. The idea that sex and pain could be united wasn’t trite back in 1987, so it’s difficult to convey the power and fear this film had. It feels wrong. It feels dirty. It feels evil.
How this movie was made for $900,000 blows my mind. It looks lush and gauzy at times and at others, like when we see Frank’s heart and veins being formed, positively nightmarish. It shouldn’t be this good — it was Clive Barker’s directorial debut after seeing two of his stories, Underworld and Rawhead Rex, get made into films he didn’t agree with. What kind of deal with the devil did this guy make to turn out something so perfect on his first try?
The misconception that many people have of this film is that the Cenobites are the villains or the horrific part of the film. If we go to the poster for proof, it says “Demon to some. Angel to others.” Pinhead and his gang are there to move the story forward and certainly look frightening, but they are bound by the rules of Hell and the Lament Configuration, the puzzle box that sets the events of the film in motion. Matter of factly, these rules aren’t truly defined yet — is Pinhead a tortured soul stuck in the wheels of some hellish bureaucracy? Who created these boxes? None of this matters — “You solved the box. We came.” Yes, it can be that simple. You don’t need to know all of those answers right now. When Frank buys the box and Morocco and solves it, he gets the answer to limitless pleasure and the drug of all drugs — as Frank says, “I thought I’d gone to the limits. I hadn’t. The Cenobites gave me an experience beyond limits. Pain and pleasure, indivisible.”
That’s one of the real horrors of this film: people will do anything to chase a high. That high may be drugs. It may be pain. It may be a sexual experience that makes the mundane life you’re stuck in — like Julia, bored with a suburban life with a husband she never really wanted in the first place. The chance to be with Frank again, no matter if she has to seduce and kill for him, is everything. Notice that as he gains more muscle and skin with each drop of blood, she becomes more and more attractive, her skin gaining new color.
The main horrors of this film are family and other people. The Cotton family had issues before the Cenobites took one step out of Hell. The most horrific part of the film comes when Frank wearing Larry’s skin, stares at his niece in a moment of sexual longing and says, “Come to daddy.” Sure, there are horror film trappings, but this type of morally bankrupt behavior isn’t something confined to the cinema. So much of the betrayal and madness of Frank and Julia could happen. It happens every day.
Hellraiser exists on the border of reality. It’s fantastic, but it feels like it could happen. It’s the dangerous fiction that could overwhelm your truth if you go too far. In that it’s quite similar to Barker’s Candyman, which posits that saying the name of its titular character three times in a mirror is all it takes for him to come for you. That seems too unrealistic, but do you want to take the chance? And much like the black leather garbed creatures in this film, Candyman must adhere to a dream logic that only comes into our reality when you allow the genie from the bottle.
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