Lake Nowhere - review

Lake Nowhere reminds me of a condensed version of the Grindhouse movie.  It perfectly delivers the ambiance of an old VHS 80’s tape, complete with faux beer commercials and mock movie trailers.  Out of all the retro-slasher revival movies I’ve seen I believe this one is the best looking of the bunch; the sounds and visuals are all top notch and will evoke memories of renting VHS tapes from a local mom and pop store.  For me one of the best places to rent horror movies was the grocery store Big M.  They only carried B-movie titles but I never gave a shit; kind of ironic that the horror movie section was right by the butcher shop.  You could pick out The Mutilator to watch and a pack of luncheon meat at the same time; that’s service. 

The story is as bare bones as possible, focusing more on style than substance.  The movie follows a group of vacationers partying in a cabin by a nameless lake, Lake Nowhere.  One of the partiers stumbles upon a graveyard in the woods, and reads the inscription off one of the tombstones out loud.  This seems to evoke the evil spirits of the lake, much like the Evil Dead, and the stalk and slash fun begins.

The killer is unique looking, the close-ups to his face are creepy and slightly off putting as it looks like his eyes are upside down.  His mask is made out of tree bark giving him a naturalistic camouflaged look, almost like a ghilie suit.    The whistling air accompanying these close-up shots was a nice effect as well, the washed out colors of the movie leave an impression of  fall like chill.  The unnamed killer is large and deliberate moving, much like Jason.  If anything this movie could be the love child of Friday the 13^th and Evil Dead.  It wears these influences proudly on its sleeve and manages to exude the same atmosphere of dread in its short 1 hour timespan.  The setup is quick and the filler is mercifully brief. 

Many shots in this film are very well framed, and it doesn’t skimp on the booze, boobs, and blood.  There are a few quick hack edits overlaying other VHS-quality images or sequences into the film, creating the feel of a bootleg tape.  The acting is appropriately and deliberately campy, but not so over the top as to interfere with the horror elements of the movie.  There is even a zombie thrown in for good measure.  The blood seems to resemble the brightly colored corn syrup used in many basement budget horror productions from the 80’s; perfectly contrasting the dark wood grain lighting of the set.  The ending is purposely open ended, but powerful in its imagery and delivery; it doesn’t get undercut by the campiness before, taking on a rather ominous dark tone that fit perfectly for the send-off.  There is a funny subversion to the final girl element as well.  There was a lot of 80’s VHS slasher love behind this one.  Definite recommendation for the retro-slash-head; I am very glad to finally be able to watch this little gem.  Hell I thought the mock trailers were more entertaining and had more charm than some full feature movies.   

Friday the 13th - The Game

Some random art associated with the Friday the 13th game.  This weekend is double CP awards from June 23rd to June 25th.  I'll see you at camp!

Leatherface - October 2017

Leatherface is patiently waiting for his new movie to come out from the French directors of the excellent slasher movie Inside.  Looks like this new movie (8th in the franchise) will focus more on the origin aspects of Leatherface and tie into the TCM 3D continuity.  Check out the poster below.  I will check it out although all these delays don't bode well.  Leatherface should hit theaters around Halloween time of 2017.  See you scared.

 

Slasher MADBALLS

Coming soon from the company that brought on the recent Madball revival; horror icon Madballs!

from BLOODY-DISGUSTING

Humongous (1982)

Humongous  starts out all right, there is a graphic and prolonged rape scene, then the rapist gets savagely ripped to pieces by a pack of German Shepherds and receives the coup de tat from the woman he just defiled.  Emotionally scarred and vacant, she secludes herself to Dog Island to give birth to the monstrosity known as Humongous.  Years after she has passed Humongous roams the island killing anything he can for food, lost in a blind rage over his mother’s passing, when a group of yuppie vacationers is stranded in his kill zone.  Humongous will tolerate no trespassers, having lived in seclusion his entire life the man-monster only knows how to kill with his bare hands, and he does it well. 

Humongous features one of the biggest assholes I can think of in slasherdom; the mullet toting yuppie Nick  He is literally the only reason the crew gets stranded, getting drunk and holding everyone hostage as he slams the yacht into shallow water.  Every ounce of his dialogue is filled to the brim with displaced anger, the kind that only a spoiled yuppie dickhead brat could muster.  He even fires a live round past his brother’s head for seemingly no reason. 

Then there’s Donna, the slut that aspires to be a model.  Her blueberry stained boobs are really one of the only reasons to sit through this slash fest.  Her first introduction as a character is topless, which is really all you need to know about Donna.

When the crew reaches the island the movie spends a lot of time bumping around in the dark trying to figure out what Dog Island is really about.  Humongous trails them, eventually killing Nick and Donna off screen and hanging them on meat hooks in his basement.  After the crew plays Scooby Do for a while Humongous springs his full on attack, crushing a nerdy girl’s head and giving a killer bear hug to the clean cut leader of the vacationers, leaving only the final girl, who was kind of obvious from the get go.  She managers to burn Humongous in a shack, somehow making him even uglier than before, then impales him on a jagged piece of wood.   Cue the slow jazz music.

Humongous is one of those movies that really works on nostalgia, but otherwise it’s kind of a dull toothless slasher.  The characters are more developed than most slashers from yesteryear, however following the first savage on screen death all the others murders seem watered down in comparison.   Old VHS copies of the movie were far too dark to see anything, but even seeing it uncut is kind of a tedious bore.  It borrows a lot from Friday the 13^th but seems to reel back the crowd pleasing aspects of stalk and slash, like the gore.  I feel like it sits right in the cozy middle of slasher flicks if we were going to rank them, not too bad to skip but not so exciting as to really seek it out regularly.  I really want to like it more, just can’t justify it.        

Friday the 13th the game - Retro Jason

Today a new skin is dropping for the Friday the 13th video game.  Dubbed "retro Jason" this new skin captures the color palette used for the NES 8-bit release of Friday the 13th (I've still got it, still works!).  I can't wait to see this guy in action tonight!  There will also be double XP and 1,300 CP awarded to people who play today.  Love it.  I am hoping we get new content in this game for a while.  My house is absolutely addicted to it.  Dead by Daylight is also being released today for consoles.  This will be the summer of digital stalk and slash.

Happy Death Day

A new slasher movie that actually looks really good....count me in...

The premise sounds great; a college student must relive the day of her death over and over until discovering the identity of her masked killer.  Sounds like a horror spin on Groundhog's Day while channeling Happy Birthday to Me and a dozen other giallo-style thrillers.  Awesome.

See the trailer HERE