Sting of Death (1965)

“Sting of Death”'s premise is 60's B-horror: A killer monster ambushes a group of college party-goers on an isolated island during spring break. Unfortunately, the movie doesn't have a heck of lot going for it aside from said killer monster. Also, whether intentional or not, this movie doesn't follow the conventional 60's B-horror formula. My theory is that this odd formula is due to there being two writers working on this movie, Al Dempsey and William Kerwin. After “Sting of Death,” Dempsey went on to do nothing. On the other hand, Kerwin went on to have a successful stage, movie and TV career. That difference shows strikingly. The best way to show this difference is by splitting the movie into two halves.

Karen & her friends get ready to
engage in protracted & unnecessary
party scenes, sorta like every single
fucking movie I've reviewed this
month.

We open to the Florida Everglades where Dr. John Hoyt (Joe Morrison) is planning a reunion party for his daughter Karen (Valerie Hawkins). Hoyt, Karen, and a cast of unimportant characters engage in some playful banter about how excited they are for the party. Among these characters is Hoyt's misfit lab assistant, Egon (more about him later). This form of character establishment is an utter bore. You could picture this “playful banter” scene going on for 3, perhaps 5 minutes at the most, right? Well, try twenty straight minutes of this. To boot, there aren't even any minor conflicts among Karen and the cast of faceless partygoers. Between all the notes I took on “Sting of Death,” I lost count of how many times I typed the phrase “STOP TALKING!”

This abysmal opening is (just barely) saved by one thing: throughout the conversations, Hoyt has a hideous, overgrown mole the size of a half-dollar on his forehead.

No, I'm not kidding. While the movie strolls along at its leisurely pace, Hoyt sports the frightening black growth nonchalantly. It shows itself prominently all throughout the first thirty minutes, and it's nothing less than a small miracle in the world of B-movies. It is as strangely hypnotic as it is disgusting; as hilarious as it is genuinely concerning. The mole cuts through banal dialogue and rivets your attention to it. I shudder as I type about it. (Seriously, what the hell!? You couldn't just wait the 3 months needed for the thing to heal?! What?!!)

At around the halfway mark, however, “Sting of Death” begins to pick up as the movie focuses in on Egon, a depressed and reclusive man obsessed with pushing the limits of Hoyt's marine biology experiments. Take a moment to think about the aforementioned killer monster, and then back to what I just said. Unless you have an IQ of negative W, you should be able to draw the connection immediately. Hoyt and his colleagues never connect A and B together, instead assuming that Egon is an “odd seed.” This goes on for the entire movie, even during the vital horror scenes. It's hilarious. Despite the unintentional comedy surrounding his invisible status, Egon is an extremely interesting character. Once it's established that Egon has unrequited love for Karen, he basically becomes a ramped-up version of Torgo from “Manos: the Hands of Fate.” (In "Manos," Torgo is an awkward, hilariously-underplayed maniac with unrequited love for a female protagonist.)

John Vella invests a great deal of effort into portraying Egon. The unfortunate man's history is never explained, and he's never truly respected as an equal among Hoyt and his crew. From the moment he's rejected at the beach party to the moment he's rejected by Karen, you can see our anti-hero's inner turmoil build and build, resulting in an emotional and bittersweet ending.

On top of all of this, “Sting of Death” has a few excellent horror scenes. William Kerwin is well-known as Detective Pete Thornton in the 60's cult classic “Blood Feast”, and it shows. These scenes feature intense dramatic build-up and fake gore especially graphic for the 60's. Director William Grefe did a decent job given his budget, but when he hits, he hits hard.

In “Sting of Death,” it literally felt as though William Kerwin kicked Al Dempsey off the set halfway through and did everything in his power to revive the movie. I truly wish I could have rated the movie a 6 or a 7, but the first half of the movie is one hundred percent fast-forwardable. It's a shame, too, because Kerwin did an excellent job, here. I feel just as sorry for this movie as I do for Egon.

Satan's Cheerleaders (1977)

In the “party” movies I've covered during Spring Break, there is a distinct cut-off between “party” and “action.” For example, in “Girls' Nite Out,” the first half hour is nearly all party scenes and the latter are pretty much all horror scenes. "Satan's Cheerleaders"'s approach is especially bizarre. This cut is painfully obvious and takes place at the 40-minute mark. If you were to watch a scene from the first 20 minutes and the last 20 minutes back to back, your initial comment would be “How the hell did this turn into this?”

Right down to the nudity, Satan's Cheerleaders does
the cinematic concept of "nothing" much more justice
than Evils of the Night.

The thing that defines Satan's Cheerleaders as a piece of work really is the first 40 minutes. For those of you who read my review of Evils of the Night, I was bored shitless by its useless and protracted establishment shots. On the other hand, "Satan's Cheerleaders" manages to make the concept of “nothing” intriguing and fun. This movie proves that the old saying “It's not what you say, it's how you say it” applies to cinema just as much as real life.

We open on a beach where we see a large group of kids from Benedict High School excitedly playing pick-up football. The group is supervised by a cast of entertaining side characters, including an overly anxious football coach and Ms. Johnson (Jaqcueline Cole), a female cheer coach who seems like a kindergarten teacher. There's also Mr. Brooks (Jack Kruschen), the incredibly sketchy janitor who is there exclusively to ruin the fun, spending most of his time "telling these darn kids off.” Additionally, we meet our quartet of cheerleaders: Chris, Debbie, Sharon and Patti. These characters are ridiculously happy and over the top for the entire introduction. The movie is explicitly aware of this, taking it so far that their cheer uniforms literally bear their names plastered over their breasts in large letters. It's as if the movie is trying to tell you “Yeah, we know these characters have little identity, so we're just gonna put their names right where you're the most likely to look. There ya go!”

It's vastly entertaining to watch this group of high schoolers. They talk trash to an identical group of kids from the opposing school. The school “bad boy” switches the locker room gender signs around, causing the coach to take a local group of holy people right into the girls' locker room where the cheerleaders are changing. Ms. Johnson is there, too, because the girls follow her around like a pack of Pikmin. The football coach is constantly panicking that his players will wind up injured before the big game, vocalizing these concerns whenever they engage in even the most minor of physical contact. These sorts of situations absolutely saturate the first 40 minutes of "Satan's Cheerleaders" and an uber-happy 70's rock and disco soundtrack is notably present the entire time. Nearly no sense of story is established, and that's not a bad thing at all if you don't mind style over substance.

"Satan's Cheerleaders" isn't absolutely devoid of substance, hence the latter 50 minutes. The film focuses in on Mr. Brooks, who is a secret adherent of Satanism. We get our fair share of decent Satanic imagery, but the movie's innocent vibe shines through regardless. After a short prayer, “Satan, oh Lucifer, deliver from my hands... those who make fun of me and laugh at me!” The evil janitor takes off to land our cheerleading team in hot water.

While driving to an out-of-town game, the cheerleading team's van pops a tire. Conveniently, good old Mr. Brooks happens to be driving by. He maniacally drives the group directly into a remote forest, where he proceeds to perform some kind of strange ritual on one of the cheerleaders, Patti (Kerry Sherman). The girl becomes an entirely different personality: previously the mellow member of the group, she is now outspoken, confident, and entirely aware of Mr. Brooks' evil plan. Among the 3 other faceless cheerleaders, Patti definitely sticks out as the best-acted of the group. (Sherman even had several spots on great TV shows such as "Murder, She Wrote", "Hawaii Five-O" and "The Six Million Dollar Man").

Our cheerleaders find themselves in an odd, isolated little forest town where they meet the “sheriff,” Mr. Bubb (John Ireland). His wife, Mrs. Bubb is portrayed by Yvonne De Carlo (Lily Munster from “The Munsters” TV show). The crew is held captive in Mr. Bubb's cabin as Mr. Bubb and his Satanic cult prepare for a ritualistic sacrifice. The scenes that follow aren't great, but they're not bad. The group attempts to escape several times. It turns out that the pseudo-town they're in is actually run by Bubb's Satanic cult. The Bubbs turn against each other, we're given a healthy dose of unintentional humor. It's pretty standard stuff, but it's all shot, directed, and produced pretty well.

The first half of "Satan's Cheerleaders" may outshine the second half due to its relentless sense of charm and happiness, but the movie competently staples the two halves together and it really works. The result is an enjoyable, silly little movie that's definitely worthy of multiple viewings.

Evils of the Night (1985)

This movie sucks.

The above is a perfectly accurate, all-encompassing review of "Evils of the Night." However, I have to write an overly long interpretation of why it sucks because that's my job and, if I didn't, my editor Zeke would have my ass on a platter.

This is what 58% of the first thirty
 minutes of this movie looks like.
I actually researched that statistic.
You're welcome.

I have watched a lot of B-movies in my life, and there's nothing that I hate quite more than B-movies that are boring. It's even worse when said movies feature storylines that really reel you in, only to leave you utterly uninvested. A small group of teenagers are on a camping trip. Meanwhile, aliens land in a nearby town and occupy an abandoned hospital. These aliens offer two stupid auto mechanics (Neville Brand & Aldo Ray) money for any live bodies they can offer for the sake of experimental martian research.

That sounds like a pretty interesting movie, right? With such a storyline, you would easily assume something along the lines of “Wow, this should turn out well!” Well, “Evils of the Night” not only fails to deliver the madcap lunacy you'd expect; it also fails to hold the audience's interest in any way, shape or form.

We open in the forest with a lake that the teenagers are camping out in. The opening relies heavily on sex and nudity. The writers forgot that sex and nudity are not enough to keep the attention of any viewer that is not a fucking idiot and this flaw carries on for quite a while. (In fact, 58% of the first 30 minutes of this movie are centered around sex and nudity).

In any case, once the first 8 minutes of nothing but sex and nudity are tossed aside, it cuts to the abandoned hospital. It's revealed that the aliens need live bodies in order to experiment with lifespan extension. This is explained offhandedly by a monotone lab assistant in one singular sentence. We're not given any of the aliens' names or the history of their race. First missed opportunity.

In the meantime, we see two female aliens acting quite flirtily; one grips the other's thigh, looking at her seductively. Instead of taking a decent route with this and perhaps exploring the social aspect of lesbianism, these two aliens are never examined again. Second missed opportunity.

After that, we cut back to the evening campfire where we're given a better look at our main characters. Despite having absolutely no individual personalities, they do happen to be “characterized” by a couple of traits. Brian is the stubborn one, Connie is the stupid one, Ron and Nancy are engaged, and Heather has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Each of the actors have zero conviction and the topics they converse about over the campfire are as interesting as Martha Stewart's personal schedule on a Thursday afternoon. Third missed opportunity. Oh, hey look, another sex scene!

A half an hour into this 85-minute movie, things get mysterious when Ron and Nancy disappear in the night. This is thanks to the previously mentioned auto mechanics. To Brand and Ray's credit, they look like they're the only individuals who are actually trying in this movie. Their characters are creepy and slightly engaging, but when this is coupled with the bland direction, they are unable to take their characters over the top in any way. Fourth missed opportunity.

The abduction scenes are mediocre at best. The typical formula for these scenes (there are a lot of them) go as follows: Pitch-black background, 30 seconds of dramatic buildup, one scream, and one act of brutality. Even the production team falters in this area: when Aldo Ray hits Brian in the head with a 2x4, for example, there are no bone-crushing sound effects. In fact, there are no violent sound effects in these scenes at all. Fifth missed opportunity.

Interestingly, I actually played a
small part in this movie. I was a guy
who watched a shitty movie in the
middle of the woods.

It isn't until hour into the movie for things to really start to develop. Sixth missed opportunity. At this time, amazingly, we're treated to a decent scene. The three remaining campers wind up tied in the back room of the auto shop. When one of the idiot mechanics comes down to make out with Connie, the two of them have a power struggle. This is where the three campers exhibit some form of personality. However, using this 15-minute scene as rationale to say that “Evils of the Night” is better than I said before is similar to taking a shit on someone's salad and then informing him that you have great desserts.

Absolutely devoid of interest, imagination, originality or talent in any conceivable way, “Evils of the Night” may as well have been titled “Elevator Music: The Movie.” I could say that it's better watched with friends and alcohol... however, the only way I could imagine enjoying this movie would be to drink so much alcohol that I pass out.

Girls' Nite Out (1982)

“Friday the 13^th” was hitting up its third installment by the time “Girls’ Nite Out” was released, so it comes as no surprise that the B-movie crowd decided to cash in on the trend of teenage slasher flicks. “Girls' Nite Out” obviously takes influence from 80’s slasher flicks but also throws in a dash of Hitchcock’s 1960 masterpiece “Psycho.” This mixture is topped with a heaping helping of 80’s B-movie sensibilities.

The movie opens up after the DeWitt Bears have won a huge basketball game. In the locker room, we’re introduced to the obnoxious team. Sitting quietly in the middle of said locker room is Mike Pryor (David Holbrook), a contrastingly gloomy fellow who looks a little like a young Charlie Sheen. The team’s mascot, Benson, pokes a little bit of fun at Pryor and receives a scathing rebuttal. After this bizarre exchange, we cut to the campus itself.

Women: The other alcohol.

Soon, an elongated party sequence ensues at some random dorm. The place is filled to the brim with college freshmen doing what college freshmen do at dorm parties. After a while, this kind of set up gets boring. Luckily, there are a few scenes that stand out as particularly entertaining during this otherwise unengaging exposition. For example, amongst this chaos, a drunken senior with bags under his bloodshot eyes tells a few freshmen the campus mythos of Dickey Cavanaugh, a DeWitt alumnus serial killer. A few of his campus buddies chuckle as he proceeds to inform them that he is going to take off to, in his words, “drink some women”. (You certainly have to commend this man’s ability to shift gears).

Later it’s revealed that DeWitt is holding a large scavenger hunt, the clues to be transmitted via the local radio station. Everybody is excited; everybody except for Benson, that is. Benson, the first victim of our killer, is sprawled out on the floor, his body covered with stab wounds as the unidentified killer proceeds to put on his bear mascot outfit. The dude modifies the outfit a little for maximum killing potential, and off we go on our journey to slasher goodness!

To “Girls’ Nite Out”’s credit, for everything it gets wrong, the murder scenes are great. They’re gruesome, well-acted, and at times downright demented. The movie even makes effective usage of the oft-abused jump scare during a few of these scenes. You’ll have a clueless, happy little freshman girl trotting through the gymnasium looking for the next clue, the music is peppy and happy, and then suddenly… BOOM, BEAR MASCOT ATTACK!

Unfortunately, “Girls’ Nite Out” doesn’t exactly make as optimal use as they could have out of the murderous mascot. The protracted second act of the movie features a large amount of assaults; however, these assaults are broken up with absolutely nothing but build up. Customarily, slasher flicks take the time in between attacks to add a little more character development to the story, something that this movie neglects. Instead, we’re given extended sequences of confused young adults walking through darkened hallways with no pay-off.

This movie suffers from a very common pattern in B-movies; a pattern I'll call “Too Long Syndrome.” Movies that suffer from “Too Long Syndrome” aren't necessarily lengthy. Instead, symptoms include too many pointless characters interacting on an uninteresting level, causing a large amount of scenes that are boring to watch. The aforementioned excessive build up scenes are a great example of this; so is the pointless documentation of the campus freshmen. I could easily picture taking “Girls’ Nite Out,” editing out about 15 solid minutes and coming out with a much more gripping movie.

David Holbrook plays the depressed
outcast Mike Pryor. It's a real shame
"Girls' Nite Out" didn't take advantage
of its talented cast.

“Girls’ Nite Out” features very little character development at all. I could hardly remember the names of all of the characters while watching the movie and even while writing this entire review, I’ve only had to look at IMDB once or twice. These characters are that disposable. It’s a shame, too, because the grizzly* murders eventually lead to a scene where cops question various students, and some of these people are really great actors. As Pryor is being questioned, you can sense his irritation with life in general.

And so for the final half hour or so, “Girls’ Nite Out” fizzles to a halt. We get a few more murder scenes, a ton of pointless build up and an ending that’s simply odd. The movie means well with its great murder scenes, but a vast amount of opportunities are missed primarily due to extreme lack of character development.

*Get it? Grizzly murders? HAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!

The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962)

The history of B-movies is an interesting one. It was between 1950 and 1960 that this film niche got the attention of the general public. There was also a decisive split between the styles of low-budget films being made. While some producers decided to take a more hammy, exploitation-based approach (“The Wasp Woman,” “Plan 9 from Outer Space”), others approached the low-budget genre more seriously (“Attack of the Puppet People,” “The Incredible Melting Man”). In my experience, every 50's/60's B-movie strictly falls under the classification of either “Great” or “Awful.” Unfortunately, “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” falls under the latter classification for an endless number of reasons. This film is also notorious for having an incorrect title card at the end of the original print which read "The Head that Wouldn't Die;” This comes as no surprise to me, given the sheer lack of interest displayed by the entire cast of this film.

“The Brain that Wouldn't Die” follows the maniacal Dr. Bill Cortner (Jason Evers), a man who is infamous among his colleagues for his brilliant, unusual and borderline-unethical medical practices. When his fiancée (Virginia Leath) is decapitated in a horrific car accident, Cortner eschews the Hippocratic Oath to keep her alive. It is at this point - a mere 20 minutes in - that “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” markedly fails in every conceivable department.

After spending 20 solid minutes of screen time searching for a woman to transplant Jan's head onto, Bill finally comes across Doris (Adele Lamont), a childhood friend turned misanthropic supermodel. The woman must have been transplanted from an entirely different movie. Adele delivers an enjoyable, emotional and over-the-top performance, accentuated by prolonged tangents about how much she hates her life and humanity in general.

When making a movie of any kind, a vital aspect is to hook and reel in the audience's interest, and “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” is inundated by a host of boring and underacted characters. Jason Evers' performance doesn't remotely fit the “mad scientist” stereotype. Instead, he's a quiet, monotone man who spends the majority of the movie eying women from afar with that hackneyed “oh, look at what a bad guy I am” face. Even when speaking directly to his wife's head, Cortner has the conviction of a man who is only mildly irritated. Jan is also surprisingly boring in her role as a disembodied head. If there's a single reason to go batshit insane, finding yourself as a head in a vat would qualify. In stark contrast, the woman never emotes accordingly. She opts to go on monotone tangents that amount to nothing more than: “I'm complex. I'm tortured. I never expected that Bill would be capable of such evil. I should be dead. Instead, I now exist in this horrific form. There is nothing more horrific than what I am in this moment.” Boring. Why on Earth did none of the actors take a cue from Adele?

This is Film Making 101. If your characters are not engaging in the slightest, your movie will likely reflect this. “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” contains multiple scenes that invite a certain sense of dread. A scene where Cortner is carrying Jan's head across a field towards his laboratory; a scene where a mutant monster kills in a psychotic rage; scenes where Jan gets into philosophical arguments with Cortner's lab assistant. All of these scenes fail to deliver on that sense of dread because of both boring characters and boring direction.

Considering what they could have done with this movie, it is a shame that “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” came out the way it did. The film is all but devoid of character development and effective storytelling. The sheer amount of “What-ifs” in this
movie render it completely incorrigible.

It is my firm belief that imagery as vivid
and well-done as this belongs in a much,
much better film.

Throughout 2013, we are certainly going to be covering several movies that I dislike more passionately than “The Brain that Wouldn't Die.” However, when I think “Movies that deserved to be covered on 'Mystery Science Theater 3000'” or “Movies that may as well have never existed,” this film comes to mind immediately.

Most importantly, “The Brain that Wouldn't Die” is a prime example of the kind of B-movies that discourage people from getting into B-movies. Speaking from experience, I can say that it's a challenge to get people into B-movies. You have to introduce them to films that are unique, creative experiences; you have challenge their very definition of cinematic reality. Any newbie B-viewer is bound to walk away from this thinking, “Well, that was a waste of 80 minutes of my life.”