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One of the best things about the exploitation genre - aside from all the gratuitous flesh and slobbering psycho violence - is the imagination of the men behind the sleaze. Since they recognized right off that they could milk a singular premise over and over again to earn a buck, there was an initial dearth of cinematic invention in what they had to offer. But as time went buy and the raincoat crowd wised up, producers found more and more peculiar ways to peddle their wanton wares. From ersatz scientific studies to mock documentaries, the T&A contingent tried to cover every filmmaking facet of the wild and weird waterfront. It is within this "anything for a dollar" dynamic that the latest from those lovable filmmaking fellows the Campbells (Luke and Andy) arrives. And the best thing about Poison Sweethearts - among a wealth of motion picture positives - is how knowledge...Read the entire review

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2008 promises to be an interesting year for Chris Seaver and his Low Budget Pictures label. After years of relying on a ViewAskew-style universe revolving around the fake suburbia of Bonejack Heights, and the various exploits of community characters like Teenape, Choach, Heather, Puggly, and "Spanish-Indian" Proudfoot, among others, he's finally testing the mainstream moviemaking waters. Later this year, his homage to '80s sci-fi sports sex comedies, Ski Wolf, will mark his first foray into full blown non-LBP product. While we wait for that glorious goofball moment, Tempe is treating us to a few more examples of the madman's amazing output. As part of his growth process, a concerted effort away from the homemade horror humor he's relied on for over a decade, we get this delightful double feature. While one movie remains firmly affixed to his old ideals, its companion is a ...Read the entire review

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When you see the names John and Mark Polonia on the credits of a film, you usually know what to expect - homemade horror delights peppered with a reverence for the '80s disposable direct to video mindset; production values hampered by budget but not imagination; topographical talent and acting; and just the right amount of camp cult schlock. So it may seem odd that, as they've aged (the boys have been in the outsider auteur biz for nearly two decades), the Polonias have both embraced and distanced themselves from their kitschy crap past. An example of their own internal homage was 2007's Splatter Beach. It was a gloriously goofy romp. Their latest effort, Forest Primeval, avoids said silliness, and instead tries to go the serious route. It doesn't quite work.

The Plot:
While hunting for Native American treasure, two friends stumble across an ancient c...Read the entire review

If you've ever dreamed of watching a feature-length film populated by produce, here's your chance. Rich Evans and Mike Stoklasa's Oranges: Revenge of the Eggplant (2004) is just that: it's a thoroughly independent production, helmed by two guys and mostly constructed in an everyday Wisconsin basement. There's an undeniable sense of corniness in the air, but a few surprises keep this ambitious 80-minute project afloat. NOTE: Though a few plot elements should spell it out directly, this animated film takes cues from South Park and isn't intended for kids.

Our story follows the elderly Dr. Charles Sunkyst, whose recent trip to Bananastan has yielded successful results. Managing to squeeze a Trojan horse---full of orange soldiers, no less---inside the city walls, he unleashes a brainwas...Read the entire review

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Ambition has been known to undermine even the most well-intentioned filmmaker. Whether it's grappling with a subject substantially out of your creative league, or casting a far too broad narrative net and incorporating too many unnecessary elements, the results are usually the same. Buried beneath the artistic stumbles, incoherent plotting, and misguided character dynamics is a wonderful idea dying a slow, painful death. When filmmaker Ted Newsom decided to take on the story of slain model Linda Sobek and her murder at the hands of photographer Charles Rathbun, he could have simply stuck to the facts and fashioned a straightforward drama with a controlled, concise three act arc. Instead, the writer/director went for a far more intricate conceit. He would let Sobek tell the story 'from the great beyond', using an In Cold Blood approach that offered truth mixed with psychol...Read the entire review

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You have to give Canadian filmmaker Brett Kelly credit. It's not every struggling artist who would allow his less than successful efforts to see the light of day, let alone permit them to be marketed as clever, campy comedies. As a director, Kelly conforms to the 50/50 school of cinematic savants. On the one hand, he has made some excellent outsider efforts (My Dead Girlfriend, The Feral Man). But then there are those films that should have stayed under wraps (the rather weak Bonesetter series), viewed only by those with a real passion for the man's past catalog. In this regard, Tempe has released The Spacemen and Go-Go Girls Double Feature, a DVD showcasing two of Kelly's short schlock homages. While weak in execution, there is still something strangely likable about this pair of peculiar efforts.

The Plot:
When the planet Uranus runs out...Read the entire review

The Product:
It's about time that the mainstream recognizes the efforts of Luke and Andy Campbell. Since the late '90s, these Ohio adolescents, working with a gang of pals under the Splatter Rampage Productions moniker (now Compound Films), have created some of the cleverest, most endearing homemade horror/comedy mash-ups in all of the outsider oeuvre. Beginning with their pro wrestling homage (the truly insane Splatter Rampage Wrestling) and working through a hilarious serial killer spoof (Midnight Skater) and a slightly more serious teen melodrama monster movie (Demon Summer), the boys have benefited from smart scripting, appealing amateur performances, and a real feel for how movies are made. Now comes their most ambitious project yet, the gang vs. zombie spectacle called The Red Skulls. Representing a real growth in the guy's cinematic language, there is still ...Read the entire review

The Product:
Aside from David Cronenberg, Canada doesn't seem to have a true handle on horror. Granted, part of the reason for this random assessment derives from a lack of exposure to the Great White North's wealth of wicked pictures. We in the lower 48 are so inundated with are own home grown, hit or miss macabre that we barely raise our heads for examples outside our borders. In fact, unless it has an Asian or Mediterranean bent, we believe in our own fright superiority and continue forward with our own terror tunnel vision. Sadly, this means we miss a lot of the world's tremendous dread. One filmmaker trying to change this myopic view is independent writer/director Brett Kelly. Working with noted distributor Tempe Entertainment, and staging his stories within many recognizable fright formats, Kelly has built a creative cottage industry out of juggling genres. His latest effort is a possib...Read the entire review

The Product:
Good ideas don't always guarantee good movies. There are so many factors that can fail along the way that when an excellent concept makes it to the big screen more or less intact, it's cause for critical celebration. On the other hand, most efforts fall into one of several less than successful categories. There's the outright flop, where neither inspiration nor implementation shine. Then there's the missed opportunities, those films that fail in one of their major mannerisms, but otherwise get the point across pretty well. There's both versions of the cinematic spiral – one in which the movie gets better despite its errors and, naturally, one where the entire production seems destined to drop ever downward, barely holding onto its entertainment elements. Somewhere between such a failed chance and an example of failing upward is The Sandman. Tempe titan J. R. Bookwalter, ...Read the entire review

The Product:
Move over zombies – the vampires want to share in your sad cinematic state of affairs. Like their cannibal corpse cousins, the neck-biting brotherhood (with the occasionally sexy sister) has fallen under the underdeveloped auspices of the homemade moviemaker. You know the kind – camcorder in hand, a cadre of friends and family eager to help out, a limited lifetime of horror fandom desperate to get out of their collective geek noggins. As they do with the flesh eating fiends, those intent on dramatizing the plight of the blood drinker can be divided into several camps: the traditionalists, the satirists, the revisionists, etc. In their mind, these mythic monsters are timeless, capable of taking any narrative twist and surviving with gruesome grace. That's not the situation with Dawn, writer/director Jay Reel's reinvention of the Nosferatu narrative. He hopes that by mak...Read the entire review

The Product:
The world has very few genuine characters – individuals whose unusual or unique persona clearly defines them and places them high above the everyday quagmire of the normal human populace. Often referred to as 'eccentrics' or 'oddballs', these decidedly different drummers tend to live along the fringes, only rarely making their way into the mainstream periphery. On rare occasions, however, they become famous, known as much for their talent as their weirdo tendencies. In other cases, they stay in the shadows, quietly practicing their idiosyncrasies out of the glare of the judgmental social limelight. If it wasn't for Harvey Pekar and his underground comic American Splendor, the world might not know Toby Radloff. Even after appearances in the big screen adaptation of Splendor, and a few cult films, including Killer Nerd, Bride of the Killer Nerd, and Read the entire review

The Product:
It's the end of an era. Chris Seaver is moving on. While not completely abandoning the weird ass Low Budget Pictures universe that he's created over the last 15 years, the determined director of such lo-fi classics as Mulva: Zombie Ass Kicker, Filthy McNasty and Carnage for the Destroyer is moving away from the outrageous horror comedy that has filled his filmic oeuvre and is striving for a more 'mainstream' approach. Years of pimping his product through companies like Tempe and Troma have lead to a crazed cult of devoted fans, as well as some personal disappointment. Seaver has his sights set beyond the adoring convention circuit. While his first attempt at such so-called straight filmmaking may never see the light of a legitimate release (the '80s music filled farce The Karaoke Kid) we now have Destruction Kings, his last look at two of his mo...Read the entire review

Movie: Pop culture is replete with examples of comic books converted into movies. While most of them are really bad or fall far short of the imaginary mark we all make in our heads about what should happen, there are sometimes surprises that come out of left field, really deep left field at that. The latest X-Men flick, Spiderman, or even Batman blockbusters aside, the majority of efforts in this genre tend to be modest budget releases that go relatively unnoticed by the throngs of masses at the local megaplex cinemas. Thankfully, mall movies aren't where the creative forces outside of Hollywood cut their teeth these days. No, that'd be the purview of the indie filmmaker who doesn't rely on tens of millions of dollars in special effects, big name stars, or even high end production values. Such was the case with Project: Valkyrie; a labor of love by director Jeff Waltrowski.. ...Read the entire review

The Product:
Over the course of some 15 years, Chris Seaver and his LBP peeps (short for Low Budget Pictures) have made movies for the pure joy of filmmaking. There's never been a real desire to create something classic or socially redeeming. Instead, Seaver is stuck in the gratuitously grand horror subgenre of splatter comedy – and no one is complaining. With a list of terrific titles that tackle everything from reluctant super heroism (Mulva: Zombie Ass Kicker) to outright mainstream spoofing (the LOTR's rip Quest for the Egg Salad), Seaver strives to improve with every film, to move away from the insular aspects of his previous efforts and expand his standing in the realm of independent film. His latest offering, originally entitled Apollyon the Destroyer, has been revamped by Tempe and released as Carnage for the Destroyer. All pointless title changes ...Read the entire review

The Movie

Produced in 1996 and released under the less salacious title of Evil Ambitions, Satanic Yuppies is a low-budget semi-supernatural comedo-thriller full of terrible acting, spotty pacing, and big heaping doses of long and languid dialogue exchanges. It's cheaply-made and not nearly what one would classify as a "good film" -- but it's also pretty clear that the filmmakers were indeed shooting for something more than just a quick-buck trash-fest, and in the realm of low-budget, C-level, "do it yourself" filmmaking, that's worth a few extra brownie points.

Clearly inspired by the 1972 cult flick from television known as The Night Stalker (Yuppies' lead character is named McGavin, an obvious reference to Night Stalker leading man Darren McGavin), the film is about a goofy reporter fella who, with some help from a lovely lady detective, stumbles upon wha...Read the entire review

By its very nature, the zombie film is a pretty straightforward concept. Sure, you can apo-calypso it up all you want, or try to find a way to reconfigure the flesh-eating fiends (we can make them faster, stronger...smarter...stereophonic) but, when it comes right down to it, we're really just talking about reanimated corpses doing the cannibal thang, plain and simple. How you find a way to finesse that foundation, the manner in which you choose to redefine said horror genre staple says a great deal about who you are, both as a filmmaker, and as a fan of the format as well.

Peter Jackson (you remember who he is, right?) obviously loves the blood and gore aspects of the living dead. Both Bad Taste and Dead Alive contain enough grue and guts to make a Balrog weep with envy. Danny Boyle took a step back from eyeing locomotives to focus on the fundamental breakdown of the social order, pos...Read the entire review

Sometimes, we film critics just can't help but cock the proverbial gift of gab gun and shoot ourselves smack dab in the size 12 Keds. We are a reactionary lot, a group given over to endless hours in front of the small/ big screen stewing over subplots that go nowhere, or characters that feel poorly developed or decidedly ancillary to the narrative. We swing from the readership rafters over movies we adore, and have a difficult time taking responsibility when we repeatedly stick that bullet-ridden paw directly into our mouths. Yep, we say some stupid stuff. We also occasionally hit upon the truth. But in the end, it's all about opinions and judgment calls – and you know what they say about those anally related ideals.

Anyway, back in 2002, yours truly more or less foamed at the fetlocks over a little independent goof named Mulva: Zombie Ass Kicker. To do a little of the David Manning for you ...Read the entire review

There is something strangely satisfying about a truly stinky hunk of homemade direct to video cheese. You know the kind of fromage being fretted about – the loony limpets of limburger that sit on the video store shelves, unwanted by customers and uncared for by their creators. This poor orphan offal usually sits there, unloved, until the store goes belly up or Blockbuster, at which point they are mercilessly killed off in a diabolical death sentence to back alley dumpster Hell. More times than not, the homicide is more than justifiable. One peek at these pathetic motion pictures (make that WANNABE cinematic wolves in stupid sheep's clothing) and a slow session of torture for all involved doesn't seem out of the question. But every once in a while, a gemstone can be carved out of the most hopeless reel of ripe Roquefort. If given the proper presentation and marketed to the right regency of farty film ...Read the entire review

Aren't really bad movies fun? We're not talking about the incoherent artsy fartsy crap that purports to be the cutting edge of independent film, but more than likely represents a disgruntled abuse victim's self righteous form of visualized therapy. And Hollywood hack jobs are usually right out, since very few of the Titanic Tinsel Town travesties comes close to unintentional anything, let alone humor. No, what we are going to celebrate today is the no budget bumbling of the good hearted and the helpless – creative types who unfortunately fail to make even the remotest resemblance of a proficient, lucid cinematic statement. These are the dreamers, the so-called freaks and geeks who sit in their basement "studios" and imagine the big picture and motion picture magic. But just like Communism, or choosing a President via the Electoral College, what's good in theory does not always translate into meaningf...Read the entire review

It's a well-known fact that high school is Hell. It's as dead set certain as the competing concepts of individual liberty and social conformity. Often referred to as "the best days of your life that you'll never actually experience in that fashion" to a Nazi-like concentration camp where personality, not ethnicity or religion, is the subject of the genocide, your average institution of standardized learning is a cornucopia of creepy elements. Buried within sterile, unfriendly rooms you find near illiterate teachers more capable of playing the bureaucratic games necessary to keep their job than of successfully teach you about the symbolism in A Tale of Two Cities. You see athletes who strut the halls like their jockstraps don't stink as they begin the pre-professional process of looking down on the worthless losers they're forced to associate with for the next few weeks. There are surgically alte...Read the entire review

Sometimes, ambition can override available attributes. People occasionally reach for the stars, having neither the ability nor the answers on how to even approach the attempt. This maxim applies to most areas of endeavor from bands that have no business writing and recording their own songs, to singers who can't even carry a note, let alone an entire tune, with their weak vocalizations. There are trillions of talentless writers who believe that everything they belch or blog is worthy of mass consideration, not inclusion in the educational tome The World's Funniest Grammatical Errors. From deluded designers to spastic sportsmen, we all occasionally bite off a little more of life's aptitude apple than we have the constitution to digest. But nowhere is this idea more pronounced than in low budget filmmaking. Amateur auteurs, pretending to push the limits of their cinematic craft (while lacking the ...Read the entire review

Of all the lost art forms in moviemaking, the short film seems to be least respected visual entity. There once was a time when a two-reel wonder graced every featured presentation, warming up an audience with some surreal slapstick or borderline social propaganda. But as going to the movies became less of an event and more of a commodity, cartoons, serials and newsreels were lead off to cinematic extinction, rarely to be seen again in the local Multiplex. There are still short films being made: no entertainment wannabe can graduate from most performance based school programs without being involved in one, and individual auteurs looking to make a name for themselves rattle off the mini-movies with unreal frequency. But while the product is still fashioned, there is no real outlet for the results. Sadly, most of these experiments in narrative restriction languish on the back shelf of a home office, or fi...Read the entire review

In the world of the horror film, mood and atmosphere can only take you so far. Presenting a creepy facade, an eerie backdrop or a consistent ambience of unrelenting doom is a necessary element for putting on the frights. But when you fail to deliver the rest of the prerequisites for creating a case of the good old-fashioned heebie-jeebies, all you are left with is a shallow bit of the sinister. Just like the lack of a semi-believable creature makes a monster movie go all cattywhumpus, or the gore-soaked plot clots that result when blood is the sole source of the shivers, tone alone will just not make it. And yet so many filmmakers – especially brash, brave newbies to the genre - try to get by on temperament, hoping no one will notice the lack of other essential fear factors. The resulting flop sweat is usually so stinky and profuse that attentive terror fans avoid the odor like the collective works o...Read the entire review

Elvis Presley is that most unusual of cultural phenomena, the dead celebrity that everyone - or at least a significant portion of the populace - wants to resurrect. Taken from the realm of the living before his time, this self-abusing embodiment of rock and roll's roots experience is inexplicably linked to the founding of a musical and cultural revolution, always over other entities who have more of a place in the pantheon than he (Little Richard, for one). Yet because he was the first to make race music palatable to the ignorant white bigots residing in America at the time, this hip swiveling son of a gun has become an icon for an entire realm of artistry, more so than true pioneers like The Beatles or Bob Dylan. So maybe this inseparable association with the beginnings of something significant and special can account for the number of fat freaks who run around Elks Clubs and dinner theaters mimickin...Read the entire review

It's the most magical time of the year. Sure, you could argue that winter, with its snowy landscapes recalling the most basic hallmarks of holiday memories, generates idyllic enchantment. And fall has its moments too, trees draped in an earth tone triumph of red, brown and yellow as the air is filled with a certain smoky crackle, a sign that the sun will soon be far more fleeting. No, summer is the stuff dreams are made of: long, lazy days starring at the clear blue sky, heat and humidity producing a haze of sweltering sweetness, making everything alive with UV ray resplendence. Summer is the quench of a thirst with an ice-cold bottle of pop, the incandescent glow of a fireworks display and the star field within hands reach of a swarm of fireflies. But not everything about this evocative equinox is so perfectly pastoral. Passions are ignited and made more manic in the sizzle of a breeze-less afternoo...Read the entire review

Short Takes

Now let's get this straight. At first glance, we've got a documentary about "Scream Queens" here, yet the only legit member of that elite sorority is HOST Brinke Stevens? Even her cinematic contributions are only briefly referenced! Where's Linnea Quigley? Where's Michelle Bauer? It's akin to a medical conference only attended by folks who played doctors on TV! Steady. Steady! Documentarian Jason Paul Collum's focus goes a bit deeper, more blue collar: What's it like to BE a work-a-day B-movie actress? The hardships of gettin' nekkid (or worse, NOT!) The measly paychecks. The perilous quest for that NEXT part. All...Read the entire review

The definition of an independent film used to be simple and succinct: anything made outside the massive maw of the studio system was considered an excellent example of autonomous work; usually crafted by artists with no desire to kowtow to standard conventions. No matter how good or bad the result was, just beating Tinsel Town at its own charade was recognition enough. But since the invention (and now widespread availability of) the video camera, the notion of what actually accounts for outsider cinema is changing. At one point in time, Pulp Fiction was the well-established benchmark for inventive independent film. Then The Blair Witch Project came along and zapped that definition all to Burkittsville and back. With the advent of DVD, we've seen the self-produced motion picture take on an even more decidedly down home approach. Recreational auteurs with visions of Sundance in their head...Read the entire review

The Movie

J.R. Bookwalter certainly isn't a household name (except for maybe in the Bookwalter household), but he is well-known amongst fans of low-budget horror movies. This jack-of-all-trades made a name for himself with the release of The Dead Next Door in 1988, a film which was completed with funding from Sam Raimi. Over the years, Bookwalter's film got consistently better. But, his older efforts, such as the recently re-released Ozone show that all of the determination in the world won't necessarily guarantee a watchable movie.

Ozone takes place in a non-descript city where police detectives Eddie Boone (James Black) and Mike Weitz (Tom Hoover) are on the trail of a neighborhood drug-lord. While attempting to apprehend two suspects, Weitz disappears and Boone is injected with a new street drug known as "Ozone". Due to the fact that one of the suspects...Read the entire review

After a son is unjustly murdered by some ignorant kids, a distraught parent turns to witchcraft (and pumpkins) to exact vengeance. Despite some surface similarities, I'm not describing Pumpkinhead, but the latest and final collaboration between Tempe Video and Full Moon Pictures. Dead And Rotting starts off as three friends drive up to the home of a reputed witch on a bet. They're quickly startled by a feral backwoodser and speed off. While discussing the Amazing Jackal Boy™ over a couple of beers at the local pub, guess who strolls in for a nice bowl of milk? A misunderstanding with a waitress ensues, and the three buddies take him out back for an old-fashioned whoopin'. Pox returns home to Mama, licking his wounds, and his mother conjures up the appropriate punishment for his attackers. This kicks off a cycle of revenge that ends up with a pot of Familiar Stew. Abigail the wit...Read the entire review

The Story: Max, a down on his luck television producer, brainstorms a new show. Taking advantage of the reality tv trend, his idea is a show called "The Chill Challenge". The show will consist of daring five babes to spend the night in a haunted house where they will have their fears tested. He offers a one million dollar prize (that he actually doesn't have) and begins casting his five girls... First we have Stacey, the naive, pretty, young blond. Then we have the goth chick, Rainbow (her parents were hippies). Amber the smart sexpot. Marty the abrasive, gutsy athlete. And, finally, Paige the stuck-up, crabby rich girl... Little do the girls and Max know, that the location, the Mason House, is actually haunted, and the spirits within don't want to be disturbed. As soon as the show begins, the spirits begin to pick off the girls and Max's crew one by one.

The FilmRead the entire review