Before the internet, movies used to get sold at conventions and they’d give away pins and t-shirts after showing trailers. I had a Shocker shirt that I wore before the movie even came out and man, did I learn my lesson.

Here’s where I upset a good chunk of people by saying that outside of his TV movies, the first Freddy and The People Under the Stairs, I dislike just about everything that Wes Craven ever did.  His films feel pretty lazy to me and like the work of someone who had no interest in doing horror. Shocker is another cash-in on his part, an attempt to make a new slasher villain who, well, acts pretty much exactly like Freddy Krueger.

Horace Pinker (Mitch Pileggi) is that killer and he starts the movie by killing off Heather Langenkamp, pretty much using that whole old wrestling logic of jobbing out someone else’s archrival just to get over a new heel who will never really draw like the original. He also kills the entire family of Lt. Don Parker (Michael Murphy), except for his foster son Jonathan (Peter Berg, yes, the man who would go on to direct Friday Night Lights).

For some reason, Jonathan and Horace have a mental connection, which doesn’t help when the murderer kills the football star’s girl Alison. However, the dream world — umm, yes, this is not an Elm Street movie — leads Jonathan to Pinker who is executed in the chair but ends up escaping, just like House 3 (AKA The Horror Show). Or Prison. Or Destroyer. They all came out before Shocker.

In another example of “because horror movies,” Jonathan is Pinker’s son and the villain has sold his soul to Satan to keep killing via electricity, which is not as cool as getting to sniff Satanic cocaine like the similarly themed El Violador Infernal.

This is the kind of movie where you get bored and instead play spot the cameo of people like former Alice Cooper guitarist Kane Roberts or Ted Raimi or Dr. Timothy Leary.

Of course, no Wes Craven non-blockbuster — well, it did make triple its budget — would be complete without an excuse. This time, it’s the MPAA’s fault for cutting out all the gore.

Shocker was probably best known in my teenage years as providing the soundtrack in which Megadeth covered Alice Cooper’s “No More Mr. Nice Guy,” as well as a title song from The Dudes of Wrath, a metal supergroup made up of The Dudes of Wrath, a supergroup composed of Paul Stanley and Desmond Child on vocals, Vivian Campbell and Guy Mann-Dude on guitars, Rudy Sarzo on bass, Tommy Lee on drums and Michael Anthony and Kane Roberts singing back up. Dangerous Toys also submitted a song about the movie, so there’s that.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Herbert P. Caine is the pseudonym of a frustrated academic and genre movie fan in Pennsylvania. You can read his blog at https://imaginaryuniverseshpc.blogspot.com.

Shocking Dark, also known as Terminator 2, is a mockbuster that can’t even decide what it is ripping off. The film was advertised in many countries as a Terminator sequel, yet it’s basically a remake of another James Cameron film, Aliens, with identical plot points and even characters. The whole thing is so derivative that the film was not even allowed a release in the United States until nearly thirty years after it was made. Although Bruno Mattei manages to eke out a few good scenes, the film as a whole is a waste of his talents.

Shocking Dark follows a rescue mission into the heart of near future Venice, which has been abandoned in the wake of an environmental disaster. A scientific expedition by the totally Tubular Corporation has gone missing, and the “Megaforce” is sent in to retrieve them, unfortunately without the help of Barry Bostwick on a flying motorcycle. The soldiers, accompanied by a female scientist and a corporate apparatchik, soon find that the scientists were wiped out by Venice’s new inhabitants, a race of mutants.

Pretty much every character in this film is a carbon copy of a character from Aliens, only far less likable. For example, Geretta Geretta of Demons and Rats: Night of Terror plays a blatant knock-off of Vasquez, right down to similar-looking clothes and a headband. Even worse is the dime store version of Ripley who serves as our heroine. While actress Haven Tyler is dressed up to look like Ripley, the film removes everything that made Sigourney Weaver’s character entertaining – her compelling back story, her courage, and even her competence. At one point, the Ripley analogue gets several people killed because she keeps pushing the wrong button to open a door while the monsters are attacking. This lack of charm extends to the other characters, to the point that even the Burke analogue manages to be less likable than Paul Reiser’s sleazy executive (something of an accomplishment when you consider that Reiser’s own parents nodded with approval when first seeing their son’s character die in Aliens.)

The film also suffers from some major plot issues, starting with the fact that the origin of the mutants is not adequately explained. It’s stated that the corporation was behind the disaster that ruined Venice, but their role in creating the monsters is only implied. Furthermore, the writers paint themselves into such a corner at the end that they have to insert a deus ex machina to avoid a downer ending. It’s bad when your ending is the equivalent of Adam West Batman pulling some miracle gizmo out of his utility belt.

However, Mattei’s skills as a genre director allow him to pull a few good scenes out of this garbage. For instance, the opening credits give a convincing portrayal of an abandoned, decaying Venice, a rather impressive feat given that Mattei was obviously just shooting parts of Venice from a boat in these scenes. Furthermore, some scenes set in tunnels underneath the city have a genuine aura of dread and suspense, a product of Mattei’s skill at using lighting to create a somber mood previously displayed in Women’s Prison Massacre.

The film also boasts a one-scene wonder in Clive Riche, who plays the deranged scientist Drake, the lone survivor of the first expedition who is under the control of the mutants. Riche appears to recognize that he’s in a piece of crap and compensates for it by chewing every piece of scenery he can lay hands on. Unfortunately, he only appears in two scenes early in the film.

Shocking Dark is available for free on Tubi.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Man, Bruno sure liked making zombie movies. Who can blame him? They sell ad we’re still talking about them! This review originally ran on June 12, 2018.

Director Claudio Fragasso refers to this film as the “last gasp” of Italian zombie movies. If you’re expecting Zombi, well, let’s not forget the movies that Claudio has blessed us with, both by himself and with Bruno Mattei: Beyond Darkness/La Casa 5, Troll 2, RoboWar, Rats: Night of Terror, The Other Hell and Shocking Dark.

The movie starts as researchers discover that the natives are practicing voodoo, so they kill the priest, who places a curse that brings the dead back to life before he dies. Only a young girl named Jenny (soon to be played by Candice Daly, Liquid Dreams) survives thanks to an enchanted necklace her parents gave her.

Years later, she returns to the island to find out exactly what happened. And she isn’t alone — she’s brought a gang of mercs with her. There’s Tommy (Don “The Dragon” Wilson!), Dan (Jim Gaines, American Ninja), Rod and Louise, Rod’s girlfriend. And then there are also some hikers — Chuck (played by 80’s gay porn star Jeff Stryker), David (Massimo Vanni/Alex McBride, who is in a ton of Italian exploitation as an actor and stuntman) and Mad — who have found the underground temple where the curse was originally created.

Of course, they bring the curse back and David is eaten and Mad killed. Rod soon gets bitten and ends up killing his girlfriend. David comes back and kills Dan. Seriously, our cast is pretty much cannon fodder. Tommy volunteers to stay behind and blow the base up to take out the zombies as Jenny and Chuck run back to the cave.

There, Chuck is attacked and killed by zombies while Jenny removes her protective necklace and becomes a super zombie that can rip out its own eyeball and survive. And then, Fulci style, the movie just ends.

The cave set looks a ton like the sets of City of the Living Dead. And the movie really jumps all over the place. But does any other zombie movie have as catchy a theme song as this? Alright, does any zombie movie not called Return of the Living Dead have a song this good?

Severin has the definitive release of this, complete with interviews with Daly (recorded before she died in 2004), Stryker, Fragasso and Drudi. You even get a CD of the soundtrack. What are you waiting for?

You can watch this on Tubi.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This originally ran on our site on June 7, 2018. I absolutely love this ridiculous movie to the surprise of no one.

“Venice before the year 2000. Squares, museums and churches. Tourists crowd the streets. Venice is threatened by the high tide. The seaweed is killing the oxygen in the waters and the putrid waters are corroding the foundations of the city. This is Venice today. What will happen tomorrow?”

Say what you will about Bruno Mattei, but the dude knows how to grab you from the first frame of travelogue footage!

The film starts in a control room, where a bunch of dudes in grey and yellow futuristic jumpsuits watch a research base and most of Venice fall into chaos, as one guy keeps screaming that there are mutants everywhere. There are no survivors, just chunks of videotape that they watch.

Basically, if this feels more like Aliens than the Terminator rip-off you were expecting, buckle the fuck up. While this movie was released as Terminator 2, Mattei and his cohorts Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi, who activated their Wonder Twin powers of insanity to create Troll 2, refuse to stop at covering one film. Oh no — this movie is too strange for that.

They decide to assemble a team — the Mega Force! — to investigate and they bring Sara, a scientist, along to find the diary that has the answers to this breakout. Samuel Fuller from the Tubular Corporation asks to come along, just like Bishop. The fact that two of the members of the team are Geretta Geretta and Tony Lombardo from Rats: The Night of Terror are all the reason I needed to purchase this. The even more amazing fact that Geretta is playing a tribute version of Vasquez from Aliens is the icing on this slice of exploitation tiramisu.

Geretta’s first line is “Alright you bunch of pussies, I’m back and I’m kicking ass!” Then, we watch one of the kinda sorta Space Marines on Operation: Delta Venice practice his nunchakus with his back to the camera. Come on dude — work the hard cam. Also: the Mega Force’s base looks like a high school locker room. Also also: they are not Megaforce.

There’s a member of the Mega Force that has long blonde hair and wears Oakley glasses and a red bandana. I love him already. Geretta’s character, Koster, then starts to yell about Italians being allowed on the mission and gets into a racially motivated fight with another crew member. Mega Force! Get it together!

If you haven’t picked it up yet, I love this fucking movie. This is why I watch Italian low budget genre films all wrapped up in one messy package. The acting is either way too intense or has stilted line readings, sometimes within the same sentence. The costumes are laughable. And the action is everything you wish there was more of in other films without pesky things like character development and a plot to get in the way.

Every time I worry that I’ll never find a film like 2019: After the Fall of New York or 1990: The Bronx Warriors, Italian filmmakers surprise me with something wonderful. All you need are some vests, bike helmets and soccer pads and a fancy synth score and you have a futuristic army ready to do battle with whatever the hell the bad guys in this movie are.

The Mega Force finds a bunch of people inside the alien eggs, but those people beg to be killed before grabbing and choking Koster. Soon, the aliens or mutants or whatever they are decide to throw people around and kill everything in their path. If you love movies where people fall to their deaths, this should be in your collection.

If you thought there wouldn’t be a Newt character, you aren’t watching much Italian cinema. Yep — in the midst of all this craziness, a small child has survived.

The best scene in the film has the soldiers all trapped in a room and the scientist vainly trying to open the door by pushing the left button. Clearly, there is a button on the right, too. She ignores this and keeps jamming the left button like someone trying to make the elevator get there faster. Finally, after screaming, monsters blowing up and much death, someone finally tells this brilliant scientist to just push the button on the right. Holy shit — this movie is awesome.

I have learned many things from this movie. No matter what language you speak, your scream sounds pretty much universal. You can fire a Franchi SPAS-12 one-handed and accurately hit a target. And while I previously was taught that seaweed is really algae and algae helps provide much of the Earth’s oxygen, in the world of this film this is not true. Basically — fuck science!

I wonder — was Samuel Fuller named for the director? Why is Venice the center of the world? And why, when I knew this was also called Terminator 2, was I so surprised and elated that the Bishop character was also a Terminator?

Finally, the ending — if you think that they’re not gonna get time travel somewhere in this wedding soup…just wow.

If you come to a party at my house in the next few months, chances are that you will be forced to watch this movie while I scream like a maniac and laugh my ass off. You have no choice but to comply.

Of course, Severin put this out. Grab one now — don’t delay! You can also watch this on Tubi.

The third time Brent Huff would work with Bruno Mattei — there’s also Strike Commando 2 and Cop Game — this time finds the actor playing Sam Wood, a survivor of a vicious Vietnamese prison camp who is talked into going back into hell with reporter Maryline Kane (Mary Stavin, the 1977 Miss World who is also in Mattei’s Born to Fight, as well as Open House, House, Octopussy, A View to a Kill, Caddyshack II, Top Line and Howling V: The Rebirth, proving that I have seen many of her movies), who really just wants our hero to help her free her father from the prison camp.

Things get more complicated when Wood learns that Duan Loc (Werner Pochath, Colonel Magnum from Thunder 3) is still in charge. Yet instead of being a film that explores the root causes and treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder, Mattei and writer Claudio Fragasso gives everyone watching what they really want: violence, glorious violence.

The beauty of this film is that Mattei references Casablanca while featuring a hero who is so bored with life that he mixes snake venom into the beer he drinks all day long to escape the pain of his past.

Made pretty much hours after pretty much the same crew finished Strike Commando 2, Born to FIght has everything I look for in a Mattei Philippines war movie, which is totally a genre, thank you for asking. There’s nothing quite like a slow-motion Brent Huff unloading millions of rounds of ammunition into bamboo huts while screaming and repeatedly saying his catchphrase, “It can be done.” Maybe he was a Bud Spencer fan?

As for Ms. Stavin, she also dated Manchester United football hero George Best, who was voted the sixth for the FIFA Player of the Century and one of GQ’s fifty most stylish men of the last fifty years in 2007. One of the first celebrity football players, he was nicknamed El Beatle and owned restaurants, fashion boutiques and a nightclub called Slack Alice. Of his life, he said, “I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars – the rest I just squandered.”

Between 1982 and 1984, the fitness craze swept the UK. Lifestyle Records released a series of celebrity albums in which different somewhat famous folks sang cover songs and discussed what working out meant to them. The first two albums, which featured Felicity Kendal and Angela Rippon, sold well. Later releases, well…not so much. Beyond Isla St. Clair, Suzanne Danielle, Christina Brookes, Jay Aston, Suzanna Dando and Patti Boulaye, Stavin and Best released their album, which even had their cover of “It Takes Two” cut as a single. They also covered The Eurythmics “Love Is a Stranger!”