Axemas 2: Blood Slay

It's a tough life in my racket. Hey folks back again for another blog and this time around director/writer/producer/actor John Ward (Chapman's Storage: Fake Commercial, Axemas, Frames of Fear 2, and Meathook Massacre 4) has entrusted me to give his newest creation of the Axemas series a review. Will it be as enjoyable as the first? Dare we hope it surpasses the original? This is Axemas 2: Blood Slay.

A holly, jolly homicide!

Under Dark Park Films and Always Out of The Box Entertainment we open with some good VST for soundtrack and eerie chords as grumpily guy in mid-twenties is chucking the Christmas Tree when he is grappled by Uncle Kris (Drew Marvick of Astro Zombies: M4- Invaders from Cyberspace, Scared to Death, Bob Freeman: Exterminator for Hire, Get Hansel!, It Stains the Sands Red and Pool Party Massacre) and feel some Silent Night Deadly Night 2 vibes are coming our way. Hopefully not awesomely bad as Eric Freeman a.k.a. Ricky Caldwell of the Silent Night Deadly Night 2.  One garbage day quote and I will wince. Well just note his death scene made me smile.

With a morning investigative report on Chapman Storage confirming the timeline that it has been one year later. Surviving girl Sarah (Ashley Campbell of Any Body Can Dance 2, Distortion, Guard Dog, The Trust, Death to False Hipsters, Axemas, Drug Z and My Mom's a Joke) feels a bit more Sydney of Scream and less Laurie of Halloween.  Sarah has still been considered a suspect in these brutal murders...OF HER FRIENDS and yet the cops couldn't find enough evidence to link her to the killings. Surprised they just didn't fabricate some evidence, craft a story to fit their needs and then break for lunch.

Just want to meet a guy that doesn't want to ax murder me.

Montey Chapman of Chapman Storages(Phillip Trickey of House of Pain, Clown Motel Massacre and Axemas 2: Blood Slay) is channeling his inner Mayor Vaughn from Jaws, assuring us those weird mishaps of the year prior has just been an isolated incident, units are available to rent and it's a damn fine day...to move heavy objects.

Sarah still haunted of the ghosts of the past; seeks advice and counseling from Laura (Donna Hamblin of Mark of the Astro-Zombies, Killer Biker Chicks, Demon Haunt, Dead Ink, Sinister, Blood Mercury and Project M). The previous events are shrouding her every waking thought.   Plus, dead boyfriend manifesting to creep her is really off putting. Yeah I am relatively sure those are just hallucinations. A bit of dating advice from Laura seems to put Sarah in a better frame of mind. FYI, Sarah. Don't open a conversation with, "Hi I'm Sarah and my last boyfriend was brutally ax murdered by a lunatic in a Santa costume," Pro tip!

With a jaunt to a used bookstore (the intellectuals' hunting ground, ladies) Sarah roams through the aisles in search of MAN...or possibly a good paperback. Maybe some Charlaine Harris. Who knows. Bumbling into each other, Eric (Ben Stobber of Unwritten, The Immortal Wars, Axemas 2; Blood Slay, The Immortal Wars: Resurgence, Dress Code, Art of the Dead, Reversal and Los Angeles Shark Attack) makes his move after startling Sarah with his Dickens. A Christmas Carol that is. Nothing pervy. Sheesh. Hey this easy going guy even gives her a window of opportunity to bounce if he is a boring plebeian. Rock star move, brohan!

No! Go find your own storage unit for that! Ew!

Prepping for the big date, Sarah's nervous. So begins the first dating dance!!! muahahaha!!!! No, I'm not bitter. After cocktails and dinner, Sarah opts for a night cap.   The end of that puts Sarah on familiar stomping grounds.   She awakes for a new night of terror and the killers (oh yes, plural) are going to take their time with Sarah and drag it out.

Did I mention some kids making their way around this place?  You'd think one Santa slaying episode that happened only a year prior would be giving off hot neon light warnings, but hormones never listen.  Darn you pesky kids!! Git outta my murder place!

Fate is a fickle mistress as Tara (The lovely and talented Tommie Vegas of Project M, The Trust, Date Breakers, Party Night, Nite Nite, Can I Kil You?, Virus of the Dead, Vice Squad: Las Vegas and Vice Squad: Chicago) who pulls the greater Hail Mary save, and gets Sarah on her feet. Now they only have to survive the night and run the gauntlet of this massive complex that is no doubt, locked down for the night. Sarah and Tara (Hey that rhymed!) meet up with Tara's boyfriend James (Nicholas Jackman of Party Bus to Hell, Social Girls, Classacts, Finding Sara, The Auction and Murder 4 Dummies).

Both kids are homeless and were just looking for a place to crash but now it looks like murder is filling their stockings tonight. Wow that last line was pretty cheesy. In fear of Uncle Kris, the threesome are trying to find a way to stay alive and must band together to deal with a crazy Santa.

As was previous for the original, this is logged as a short film for an anthology series. We have solid performances, over the top slasher villain, some great gore scenes and good dialogue. This manages to stay within the same old school cut to gore gag shots and actually gives off a bit of terror. With a bit of a Scream and Silent Night Deadly Night 2 theme, this 34 minutes of evil could easily be deemed substantial work. With an easy premise to follow and an environment with proper mood lighting, you could easily see this in a full length feature. Minor CGI spatters, otherwise old school blood packs and bladders. Not surprising that John Ward has kept the same momentum as the first. 

He seems...less jolly.

 

Nostferatu

What the hell? I have a classic movie and it's a Horror film? Well that can't be right. So this request occurred a month ago and my slow ass finally am getting around to that inquiry. A tale of a loathsome, lonely creature doomed to roam the night and feed on blood. No not Dracula. This is the tale told in silent film format. This is the 1922 silent film classic story of Count Orlok. This is Nostferatu.

Ho boy, think the mushrooms kicked in.

 Based on Bram Stoker's Dracula and written by novelist Henrik Galeen (The Golem, Nosferatu, Dangerous Paths, Waxworks, Zigano, The Man Who Cheated Life, The Big Bluff, A Daughter of Destiny and The Lady with the Mask) a noblity known as Count Graf Orlok (Max Schreck of Der zeugende Tod, The Jew of Mestri, The Street, The Mysteries of a Hairdresser's Shop, Finances of the Grand Duke) is looking for some new digs and gets in touch with real estate agent Thomas Hutter (Gustav von Wangenheim of Homunculus, 1. Teil, Passionels Tagebuch, Die Erzkokette, Kitsch, Der Tempel der Liebe, Romeo and Juliet in the Snow, Das Haus zum Mond and Das Feurschiff) in the German town of Wisborg. I'm told that is a fictitious city.

Drafted by his boss, Knock (Alexander Granach of Wood Love, Torments of the Night, Svengali, The Last Fort, Pavement Butterfly, The Legionaire, The Last Company and Danton) so Hunter makes arrangements for his wife Ellen (Greta Schroder of Nosferatu, Paganini, Victoria the Great, Queen of Destiny, Melody of a Great City, Kolberg and Stars Over Colombo) to his friend Harding (Georg H. Schnell of In the Employ of the Secret Service, Emil und die Detektive, Tannenberg, The Legend of William Tell, Die bunte Platte, The Champion of Pontresina, Die Insel and The Riders of German East Africa) and his sister Annie.

Not too sure about this Anne Rice.

It's a long way to Tipperary...or in this case Transylvania. Hutter stops for dinner at the local tavern and they're shocked at the mere mention of Orlok that they warn Hutter to not go to the mountains at this time of night due to a werewolf prowling the woods. With the locals on the verge of getting ugly (and brother that wouldn't take much) , Hutter waits until morning for a horse drawn carriage (or coach if you prefer) and the coachman refuses to cross the bridge because he won't make it back before nightfall. That's called foreshadow.

A black shrouded coach collects Hutter to cross the bridge and brings him to the castle. Hutter feasts before going to bed (Bad on the digestion tract, buddy) and eerie sounds occur from the woods surrounding the castle. Hey this all sounds familiar. For those playing the home game, yes this has been clearly made from Stoker's book.

Prana Film was a silent era German film that went bankrupt fending off the copyright lawsuits via Bram Stoker's widow, Florence Balcombe. She established they made an unauthorized film based on the novel and well she is correct. The studio intended to create a whole series of paranormal and supernatural themed films but aforementioned bankruptcy made that impossible.

Tense dear? You need a massage. Bow chicka wew wew!!

Let's talk about atmosphere. With it's organ music and orchestral soundtrack being there without actual dialogue, it does set the tone for every scene. From a purely artistic standpoint, the film is eerie, praying on the audience's fears of the unknown and making Orlok a proper visual of this creature that bumps in the night, feasting blood of young helpless women. That being said, Orlok seems damned to his role. Never to know love in its truest forms nor life and the joys it can bring. More of a tragic character than a monster to me. From his elongated fingers with claws to his disturbing eyes and front two teeth made fangs, he does embody a look of aberrant if not ghoulish appearance.

Favorite scene is the Renfield like character just strolling about with a coffin under his arm. Y'know the every day scene of a vampire's thrall going on about his day. Oh if I had a nickel for every time I have seen that...wait, I'd still have a nickel. WTF, movie?? That coffin alone would be almost 200 lbs, then add a body of at least an additional 150 to 200 lbs. Saaaaaay, that doesn't add up at all. Maybe he's related to the Tall Man via Phantasm.

Think of the impact this one film has had on our society too. 1977, Blue Oyster Cult created Nostferatu for the album Spectres. Hell, the Tobe Hooper/Stephen King 1979 miniseries Salem's Lot; our villainous vampire Kurt Barlow with Reggie Nalder looks almost identical to Orlok. 1995 the composer/writer Bernard J. Taylor (Neighbors And Lovers, Wuthering Heights, Pride and Prejudice and Make Me a Musical) adapted the film into Nostferatu the Vampire as a musical. It's kinda his bag really. Lastly the 2000 film Shadow of the Vampire, which is a fictional account of the issues with the film, one of which Willem Dafoe plays Max Schreck, an actor so method even Brando would have had issues.

The first face of evil personified is Count Orlok, regardless of his tragic story, the masses deem him a monster. What I took away from this (Aside from sick to death of organ music. Blame Carnival of Souls for that one) is a first attempt at bringing some true Horror to the screen with an audience deemed too timid or gentile to venture into this genre. So do I feel it has created an impact? Without a doubt. That being said, my copy was quite grainy and courtesy of my old nemesis, Mill Creek Entertainment.

We will see more vampire reviews during the next month. Count on it. See what I did? I did that one thing. Forget it.

Toss me some more rats. I'm hungry.

NES Friday the 13th

Uh Happy Friday the 13^th. I guess. Not really a holiday per-say but plenty of superstitious folk and fans of Voorhees are all excited. Yup Brandon I am still doing this almost every Friday the 13^th.

Well, I was going to review the 2017 survival horror, time-trial multi-player game buuuut, funds weren't available. Yeah I know, a two year old game out of reach. So with that in mind I thought I could slough through the LJN (The Karate Kid, Jaws, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage, Alien 3, Wolverine) faux pas and see how easy it was to beat.  This is Friday the 13^th NES.

Lord Humongous! RUN GEORGE!

Released in 1989, a year after at the height of Friday the 13^th Part VII: The New Blood and a few months before Friday the 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan the cover resembles Jason from Part 7 in his rotted zombie hillbilly mongoloid self and we have seven camp counselors watching over the kids, enjoy the lake and all the wildlife and lush forest.

Of course we can't have the counselors getting some nookie, beer or weed because...Nintendo is a family friendly console. So why do a Horror game? Got me. So Jason is on a rampage and you must protect the kids and look out for your fellow counselors. Let's talk weapons! Yeah!

Rocks! Yeah fricking rocks! With a half-assed 30 degree lobbing arc, you have ROCKS! Against a near 7 foot tall murder machine with terrifying strength, a big machete and whatever other melee weapons he could have and you have rocks. But wait! There's also an infinite supply of what appears to be LL Bean hunting knife that you can chuck at Jason. Of course one hit and you lose that weapon so, NO TOUCHY!!! As you go the madcap maze of the woods, you can also get a hurling axe and you can use fire on Jason as well. After all, fire bad.

Eat...rock.  Yeah it still sounds pathetic.

Well now it gets nutty. Yeah in addition to Jason being a serious massacre waiting to happen, Crystal Lake is overflowing with scourge of zombies, killer crows that look like Heckel & Jeckel, bats, wolves and Jason's mother's severed head. Yeah she flies right at you and bonks you like the damn Medusa heads from Castlevania.

If I had to guess, Crystal Lake resident pilgrims slaughtered the naive and innocent Native Americans and dumps the bodies in the lake rendering them to soap. How cursed could this chunk of land be??

Hot side scrolling action, the main goal is to defeat Jason three times. Not too different with LJN's Jaws. Little interesting how Jason looks to be almost 9 feet tall, wearing a glow in the dark hockey mask and a purple jumpsuit. Swinging massive fists like Mike Tyson's Punch-Out and yeah you guessed it; me stuck with ROCKS!!!

Aside from having the option of swapping out to different counselors who have different speeds and strengths, ultimately if all the counselors are dead, it's game over. Now a strange addition (LJN never cared about source material), Jason can end up threatening and murdering kids. Teens and 20 somethings, even 30 somethings playing teens will die by Voorhees' hands but he doesn't gack kids. Could have something to do with his tragic drowning forever changing his life and undead status.

Zombie depth charge!

This two repetitive soundtracks and sound effects were developed by composer Hirohiko Takayama (The Karate Kid, King of Kings, Ghostbusters II, Time Zone, Trax and Bonk's Adventure) and yeah that continuous looping of music you can't shut it off, change it so it was just turn down the sound. Similar to Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, there is transition from day to night and vice versa.

This single-player survival horror game is...well kinda dull. I beat it in 25 minutes. I am told that is still not that fastest it has be bested at.

Nostalgia wise, this game has a place in pop culture, in 2013 NECA (National Entertainment Collectibles Association Inc.) released an exclusive action figure based on this game's appearance with his purple jumpsuit, an axe, machete and his glow in the dark hockey mask. If you think that looks silly, Freddy Krueger has orange sweater, pants and blades coming out of his fingers and a brown hat.

Naturally the critics took in the name and immediately crapped on it. Complaining about the repetition of the music and the game play was too frustrating. Aside from not giving a damn about the source material, it's just a survival horror game. The first real horror franchise for NES era.

Much better. Eat knife ya zombastich!

Blastfighter

So back again. Thought this time we would head back into exploitation. This time around we hit Italian Action under the helm of Lamberto Bava (Devil Fish, Demoms, You'll Die at Midnight, Demons 2, Delirium and Turno di notte) Son of cinematographer/director Mario Bava (also known as the Godfather of Giallo movies). Today's film follows a revenge story of a ex-cop going to completely sick house on the men that wronged him. This is Blastfighter a.k.a. Force of Vengeance.

Pew!  Pew pew pew!!

Former officer Jake "Tiger" Sharp (Michael Sopkiw of 2019: After the Fall of New York, Devil Fish, Blastfighter, Massacre in Dinosaur Valley and Bad Dog and Superhero) has been released from prison after murdering his wife's murderer. 7 years served and Jake is sprung. FYI, the credits are bonkers. They shift all over screen during stoic no conversation car ride. His buddy Jerry hands an ex-con a Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum and Spas 12 shotgun. Um not sure if Italy is as severe as the states are with allowing violent ex-cons with firearms but it is a big no-no stateside.

US wise, this shotgun became infamous or deemed cool in Sci-Fi/Action thanks to the 1984 James Cameron film, The Terminator during the police station massacre. To follow-up the pump action or semi auto shotgun, this thing has been equipped to launch mini rockets, dragon's breath (magnesium phosphate rounds), rubber loads, AP (armor piercing) and standard 12 gauge double ought. WHAT THE HELL??!!!

That's far enough, Three Dog Night!

Contemplating bloody murder for the attorney that sent up the river, Jake has a last minute change of heart to pass on being sent back and gives in to the idea to make his way to the Appalachian mountains. Fun tidbit, no follow-up to the whole revenge on the attorney subplot. Yeah! Just dropped like a steamy elephant turd and on his way. Blastfighter! The Waffler!

Perhaps the fresh air and cabin life in the wilderness might calm his urge to kill. Unless his porridge is just right then at least three bears will bust in the door, eat his porridge, crap on his floor and mock him profusely.

The composition sounded so familiar and that's when it hit me. Gotta be Fabio Frizzi (Godzilla, Zombi, Contraband, City of the Living Dead, The Beyond, Manhattan Baby, Pieces, The Scorpion with Two Tails, Devil Fish, and Tentazione) the go-to composer for Lucio Fulci, Bruno Mattei, Lamberto Bava and Claudio Fragasso. So that's a good thing...I think.

Getting back to our story you'd think being 7 years in the jug would have sent him woman chasing for at least a solid week. Again, just my realm of thinking if I had to go without sex (not excluding attempted bad touch in the prison shower) with a girl.

Hey, that's not Bronson!

Stocking up on supplies at a general store, I swear Jake passed a grown up version of the banjo playing hillbilly kid from Deliverance. Hoyt Pollard that is.

Attempting to make some semblance of a normal life, Jake has his very strained daughter Connie (Valentina Forte a.k.a.Valerie Blake of Cut and Run, Body Count, Arrivederci Roma, A Wonderful Family, Il giardino dei ciliegi, Mi manca Marcella and I ragazzi del muretto) come and visit him. Seriously man from one Jake to another; invite some girls out and burn off some...aggression?

Well as man plans, the gods do laugh because trouble is up on the ridge as Jake's deer get shot and taken. These inbred hillbillies threatened his life and told him off. Another fine example of civilized men. They have bagged at least 8 deer which any ranger worth his salt is giving them so many citations it's going to cost them into the thousands.

Jake gets hip to a Hong Kong poaching ring that uses the parts for Chinese herb remedies and are cleaning up. Didn't realize powdered deer penis went that great but folks got allergies.

Naturally hillbilly gun nuts are considerate to Jake's feelings, family life and overall health. Oh wait, no they are not.

Feeling like a mixture of Death Wish and Straw Dogs, Jake has his hands full with some poachers that just got to prove their might by popping deer. As if that wasn't enough, the leader of the poacher ring, Tom (George Eastman of Anthrophagus, Absurd, Cannibal Holocaust, 2019: The Fall of New York, Warriors of the Wasteland and 2020 Gladiators) who looks like a hybrid of Kenny Loggins and Nick Nolte is the man with the plan. Yup the crap hit the fan and it was on high.

Following the tropes of the vengeful ex-cop getting revenge and it feels like the film is just building up and counting down the seconds for the bloody rampage to happen. The thing is Tom and Jake were childhood buddies long ago and Tom really doesn't want to have to deal with Jake in the final sense.

Between the eco-system destruction, the high deer kill counts and impending bloody rampage to ensue, this actually is a decent flick. The pace is even and not as slow as I thought it would be. The only gripe I have had was the English dubbing. The translation from Italian to English is awful with swearing. I mean the poachers first meet Jake, tell him to f*ck off and turn their backs on the guy armed with a semiautomatic shotgun. He could have smoked all three before they could have spun around and leveled the rifles. 

 A quick spoiler, yes lady readers there is a rape subplot once again.  Sorry.  I could have done without it too, but I thought you should know.  In case you went to go watch it.

During the erstwhile vigilante justice, this film makes you know that it is making an eco plea. Think of it as a precursor to On Deadly Ground, a decade before. It was actually a fairly compelling story and has some solid action, so overall was a good action movie.

Maybe it's a telephoto lens?

Resident Evil

Hey Folks. I'm back. My hiatus has been a series of headaches, paid writing work and penning Episode 2 of the impending Noir Horror radio show I will be producing, Fiends and Flatfoots. Those excuses aside, I felt I got to make it up to my readers. So what kind of pain should I endure? The pervy standings of Jesus Franco? Nah, not enough agony. Godfrey Ho movie? Well I am editing Robovampire for Rotten Reelz Reviews Video Reviews on YouTube so no. Perhaps a Bruno Mattei movie? Then as though a bolt of lightning charged through, it hit me. I must endure the burden of Barry Burton. That's right! Old school tank controls, lines delivered so awesomely bad and the forever pornographic term, Jill Sandwich. This is Resident Evil.

Jill Sandwich? OMG that is filthy!

A Capcom treasure for so many, brought to us by Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil 1,2,3, Dino Crisis 1,2, Resident Evil: Code Veronica, Resident Evil Zero and Resident Evil 4) in 1996 for Sega Saturn, Play Station, Windows and Nintendo DS. And yes yes yes, nerds. It is called Biohazard in Japan. Frankly a better and more descriptive title. HAPPY?! Now shuddup. Gotta get my Barry on.

Bravo Team of S.T.A.R.S. (Special Tactics and Rescue Service) lost control of their helicopter. It was on the H train. The helicopter crashed and no one has heard anything of them for several hours. Alpha team moves in to conduct the investigation, locate Beta team and find out what's all the hooting and hollering on about, eh?

Hope I get Frost's stereo after he's Zomberman chow.

Set in the time of July 8, 1998 a bizarre rash of murders have broken out around the fictional Midwestern town of Raccoon City. God the name alone. How do you take RCPD seriously at all? Moving on, Alpha team leader Captain Albert Wesker leads his band of special forces and tactical weapons experts in the the woods past Spencer Mansion only to lose the first red shirt, Joseph Frost. The team's pilot Brad Vickers goes complete wuss, fires up the choppa and abandons the whole team and dammit if he isn't getting a hot poker in the ass later.

The team is ambushed by zombie dobermans (Zombermans, you're welcome) and they flee to the nearest structure, the Spencer mansion. Now at this point of this single-player survival horror you can be former Air Forces spec ops, Chris Redfield or former Delta Force, sneak thief and gets waaay more ammo Jill Valentine. FYI, she can pick tricky locks in the mansion and doesn't have to waste time looking for small keys. "The Master of Unlocking!" Oh Barry, how your dulcet tones can make me cringe.

Lockpick?

I chose the Jill route so throughout the cut scenes she is paired up with former SWAT(Special Weapons and Tactics) vet and weapons specialist for STARS Barry Burton. Whose line delivery are as deemed, awesomely bad. Yeah hit YouTube, get the original game walkthrough with no chatter and listen to the Jill scenarios as Barry gives us such gems of utter oddity. 

 For those not clued in the Norwegian voice actor Barry Gjerde worked as a translator in Japan and lent his voice for Clock Tower, Soar High! Isami, Fastening Days, Bloody Roar and Mega Man X7 (Red).

Bear in mind, Barry doesn't defend Jill throughout the game and she is 100% bad ass. Okay a few spoilers...Hey! You had 20 years! Suck it up. The mansion has catacombs, secret caverns, hideouts and highly illegal labs conducting experiments with the T-Virus, a highly contagious and mutagenic bio-weapon or agent. Experiments were conducted on plants, animals and insects creating twisted works...oh what's the line? "He tampered in God's domain." 

With these results, Umbrella Corporation will be using them as bio-weapons to sell at the highest bidder and TAKE OVER ZE VERLD!!! MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! They could also just want to improve their stock portfolio. So there's that.   Can you even fathom the company picnics?  Sir? The Zombermans are loose at the playground.

With random encounters of giant bugs, zombies, lizard creatures called hunters, not everything is as it seems. Betrayal! Corporate overhead! Super soldier creations known as Tyrant, Jill or Chris has some serious issues. For some reason you cannot put items down you pick up so I really hope you needed that defense dagger. Yeah these bizarre happenings is just one of the factors that makes the game a bit odd with its dynamics. Also apparently a size 10 boot can't kick down a door.

Chris' item slots is an amount of 6 to Jill's 8. Chris' campaign is more difficult which yeah a bit sexist. Jill is one of my favorite video game protagonists...so after Paul W.S. Anderson's Resident Evil: Apocalypse, imagine how thrilled I was. Go ahead. I'll wait.

For further mishaps on Bravo Team, look into Resident Evil Zero. Be warned continuity is very tricky in this franchise. I mean not to the level of the Resident Evil movies or God help you, the Highlander franchise but it does get a bit screwy. Also check out the paperback novels of the Resident Evil by S.D. Perry. Pretty entertaining.

Man, that hall rug is gonna need serious steam cleaning.