Criminally Insane (1975)

This one also went under the great exploitation title of Crazy Fat Ethel which is probably a bit more memorable then Criminally Insane but the truth is both names work for this sickie from the 70's. No matter what you chose to call this one, you are not likely to forget it anytime soon. Criminally Insane is a all time favorite of mine!

Criminally Insane is great on so many levels. All the greatest elements of a demented 1970's movie can be found here. It's extremely gritty, it's both intentionally and unintentionally hilarious, it's vile and extreme. For these reasons this one has a ton of replay value and works perfectly as a party movie to entertain a group of friends or just a pleasant rewatch while on your own. Priscilla Alden plays Crazy Fat Ethel, a psychopathic tub of lard who was just released from the psych-ward. Now back home with "granny" Ethel swears that the doctors were trying to kill her by starvation while she was away. Of course this is all just in her damaged brain and most likely Ethel was being fed three square meals but none the less, Ethel is never going to hungry again.

Granny tries repeatedly to get through to Ethel about watching her weight and food in take. When granny tells Ethel that her heart is at risk Ethel has this to say "My heart is just fine as long as my stomach isn't empty". In a brash decision granny decides to put locks on the food cabinets and ration out Ethel's food appropriately but this sends Ethel into a psychotic fit and before to can say "feed me Seymour", Ethel stabs her dear old granny to death with a big ole kitchen knife. Now Crazy Fat Ethel has the entire house to herself and we are treated to scenes of the obese slob scarfing shit-loads of food down her gob. We watch Ethel fry up a full pound of bacon with about a dozen eggs, eat the worlds largest bowl of ice cream, down full boxes of cookies and some how she never feels quite full. When you mix the scenes of over the top violence with the gratuitous eating it leaves a funny but nasty taste in your mouth. Sex and food is one thing but food and meat-cleaver gore is another.

  In some ways Criminally Insane reminds me a bit of Don't Go In The House, which would hit the big screen four years later. While the two movies are very different, even with the obvious gender change in our psycho's, its something about the mind of a compulsive loony who gains a demented sense of freedom when they have the house to themselves. With nobody to stop Ethel, it is inevitable that the bodies will continue to pile up and eventually she will self destruct. In this way Don't Go In The House and Criminally Insane have similarities but then again maybe I'm looking a bit to deep into this. I'm sure some ass-hat would say that Home Alone has the same outcome. Anyway the bodies do pile up and its not long before Ethel's place stinks like a cross between John Wayne Gacy's crawlspace and a slaughter house.

While I have never heard anybody refer to Criminally Insane as a sexy movie it does seem that it tried for some sex appeal when Ethel's sister Rosalie shows up. If this in fact the case the film makers failed miserably here. Rosalie is a battered prostitute who spends most of her time doing cocaine, drinking beer, bringing home johns and of course being beaten by her pretty-boy boyfriend, whom wears makeup. However on the other hand makeup can not save Rosalie. She is quite offensive to look at. Something about her face makes me wanna smash my television, so when she falls victim to Crazy Fat Ethel it is always a nice little treat. In one of the films strangest moments Rosalie asks her makeup wearing boyfriend why he beat the shit of her. He delivers this amazingly misogynistic line "Rosalie I'm gonna tell you the truth. You need a good beating once and a while. All Women do but especially you". Of course these words of beauty turns Rosalie into putty and she is back in her abusive boyfriends arms before we know it.

Eventually Ethel's killing spree gets out of hand and people start catching on to her. There was a sequel to this in 1987 which I have not been lucky enough to see yet and another two movies staring Priscilla Alden where she plays a psychotic nurse. Unfortunately I haven't seen the Death Nurse movies either but they are on the list of things to do. However I believe they were shot on video and I highly doubt they hold the same entertainment value of Criminally Insane.

Pigs (1972)

Here's another strange one from the demented 70's. Originally titled Daddys Deadly Darling, which is a very suiting title considering the director Marc Lawrence used his own daughter for the psychotic killer and lead actress. Toni Lawrence plays Lynn Hart, a girl with a whole lot of problems.

Pigs opens up with a bang. Its a incestuous rape scene between father and daughter. After daddy forces himself on his daughter his little girl gets her revenge by stabbing him to death. Little Lynn Hart stabs daddy over and over again with a big kitchen knife. The beautiful thing is that this all happens within the first few seconds of the movie. Now they certainly have my attention. Now we jump forward in time and Lynn Hart is in a mental institution where she is receiving psychiatric help. It seems that Lynn's daddy issues have only gotten worse with time. She spends most of her time talking to her dead, rapist father on the telephone and refuses to admit that he is dead.

Lynn manages to escape from the loony bin and winds up at a remote roadside cafe and hotel run by a old nut-bag named Zambrini. The character of Zambrini is really what makes Pigs worth watching. This guy is as socially awkward as they come. He rants on and on in a very insane manner. I can only really relate it to the madness of characters in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) or something like that. Lets just say this guy is out there. Aside from his awkwardness around people Zambrini has some very strange hobbies. It just so happens that behind the cafe Zambrini has a pig pen full of hogs, hence the title of the movie. The only problem is that Zambrini is feeding these Pigs human flesh. Bodies dissapear from the local morgue and apparently all of the women who have worked at Zambrini's cafe have also gone up missing. The odd thing is that everyone in town, including the authorities seem to know about this but there is always "a lack of proof" that Zambrini is involved, so basically the police ignore the problem and refuse to search the property. Instead dip-shit head police officer just asks Zambrini every few days if he is doing anything wrong and when Zambrini says No! the police just take his word for it and move on.

As the film goes on Lynn and Zambrini develop a strange father and daughter relationship but its not long before Lynn is knocking off the local men. Apparently there aren't to many good looking gals in this town and all the men want a grab at Lynn's massive mellons. "Im attracted to you. We don't see to many attractive women in these parts". The only problem is that when a man gets on top of Lynn, she goes ape-shit and has daddy flashbacks of rape. Naturally she slashes the horny men up with her trusty straight razor in true Giallo fashion. Zambrini covers up his new daughters crimes and feeds the corpses to his Pigs. Over all Pigs is a pretty good watch. It does have some problems with the editing and some times its a bit to dark to see whats going on but as whole its a pretty enjoyable piece of trash from the sick and twisted 70's. This one has some really crazy characters, flesh eating Pigs, stabbings, slashings, and of course a really stupid police force. My kind of movie.

Haunts (1977)

Haunts has some of my all time favorite VHS cover art. The masked killer, the naked girl in the shower and of course those bloody scissors. Its too bad the movie isn't as cool as the art work was.

Haunts isn't a complete waste of time. It is still worth a look. It just could have been improved with more sex and violence.

This early example of the American Slasher film involves a madman terrorizing the countryside with a pair of scissors as a weapon of choice. This guy has the knack for cutting up young girls and the autopsies show that he also rapes them.

Haunts is a sort of mystery as well. We have a number of sleazy suspects. One being a local butcher who wears a silk, pink and black rockabilly shirt and enjoys drinking and driving, talking dirty to the ladies and threatening lives with... yep you guessed it, Scissors! Cameron Mitchell plays a creepy farmer who likes to sneak into the bathroom while his niece is taking a shower. Can anyone remember another 70's movie with scissor murders and Cameron Mitchell? The Demon ring a bell? Hows that for a double bill The Demon and Haunts for a scissor-slasher night.

The director would go on to do the 80's high school slasher Graduation Day with John Saxon. Aldo Ray also shows up in this one along with a local bimbo who calls everyone "a creep".

Haunts eventually changes its tone from slasher territory to a delusional mess where not much makes sense until the very end where everything is spelled out for us.

The only problem with this movie is that there isn't enough graphic murder scenes and somehow they managed to avoid nudity which is very weird for a 70's rape-happy slasher film.

However considering Haunts is in the public domain it is worth the one dollar it cost to buy. Even if you don't like the movie, you could always stare at that cool cover art. This one is also known as The Veil, not to be confused with the Boris Karloff television series.

Edge Of The Axe (1988)

This late 80's Slasher comes in just a step above the average shot on video crap from this time. There is nothing very memorable to speak of with the exception of one semi graphic murder scene in which a street walking female is chopped into over and over again with an axe.

Edge Of The Axe tries its best to be interesting but fails miserably. The characters are boring. The dialogue is boring, the story is boring and there just is not enough axe-em-up mayhem to keep the viewer happy through all the bad romance scenes which eats up most of the run time. You would think due to the cool poster that Edge Of The Axe is going to be a pretty trashy slasher but this just isn't the case. The film focuses on the love lives of two couples and some of the females aren't all that bad to look at but the film doesn't even have the decency to offer up and naked flesh. However we do have a character who looks a lot like Jim Carrey which is kind of interesting I guess because no matter how bad Edge Of The Axe is, it is still better then anything that Hollywood boy Jim Carrey has ever done. We also have a case of life imitating art here. Edge Of The Axe could be considered a sci-fi movie if you wasn't because it predicts the Internet, Its pretty funny to see this early version of a fictional Internet, all of which is in Dos Prompt.

It also comes to a climax with a twist ending. I would have preferred a twisted ending but hey maybe its to much to ask for some mindless violence in my slasher flicks. The pile of 80's slasher films is pretty damn big. If you pass this one by you really wouldn't be missing much. However the German title for this one is pretty cool. Axolution.

Psycho II (1983)

22 years after the Bates Motel massacre Norman Bates is released from the mental hospital. He is set up with a job at a local restaurant where he befriends Mary played by Meg Tilly. The only problem is that Mary's last name is Loomis which means she is a relative of the woman that Norman slashed up in the shower all those years back.

When he invites Mary to live with him it becomes a little to much stress on ole Norman. Lets just say that Norman starts to not feel so well again and people start getting knocked off one by one in true slasher fashion.

Psycho is one of those timeless horror movies where it seems pointless to do a remake or a sequel. Obviously Psycho 2 can't compete with Alfred Hitchcock's classic as far as style and originality goes but I generally like this follow up. In fact it is the only sequel or remake in the series that is worth watching at all and it is fun for what it is.

I feel that the film makers went in exactly the right direction with this one. If you can't out do the original just make it slightly more sleazy. Add in more gruesome murder and a bit of tit and we are on the right track.

Norman Bates still enjoys watching the ladies shower and luckily for us Meg Tilly offers up a quick nudie scene. Then we have a couple of horny teenagers who sneak into the old Bates house to smoke some dope and have sex but that ends pretty quickly at the end of a kitchen knife. My personal favorite character is Mr. Toomey a sleazoid who has been running the Bates Motel while Normal was locked up. When Norman fires the scummy motel manager, Toomey decides he is going to hurt Norman physically "Go ahead Psycho! Pick up the knife". Well Toomey ends up with a kitchen knife stuck through his face and is found later at the bottom of the swamp where Norman is oh so famous for dumping bodies and victims cars.

Then in the films most gory moment a woman has a knife shoved into her mouth which comes out by the back of her neck. Another man is stabbed in the guts and as he falls down the stairs the blade is pushed further and further into his body, An old woman is hit over the achy-breaky skull with a shovel and Norman Bates gets cut up pretty badly himself this time around.

The thing that makes this movie so fun, aside from the increase in violence is the relationship between Norman Bates and Mary Loomis. I wont spoil the ending but it does come with a little twist but most will probably see it coming.

Keep an open mind and don't expect anything spectacular and you might enjoy this one.

A Lizard In Womans Skin (1971)

A Lizard In A Woman's Skin is the very first of Lucio Fulci's Giallo's and it really does have a nice look to it. The cinematography is great and so is the lighting and the sets. Even the murders are cool but there are definitely some key elements which knocks this one down a few pegs.

As time went on Lucio Fulci's films would get more and more gory and they would also make less and less sense. It was almost as if the Italian Godfather Of Gore just said to himself, well the audience wants gore and they don't care about plot, so fuck it! This film however makes perfect sense, the only problem is that it is just so god damn elaborate that you have to be hopped up on speed and not blink once to follow it. I always hated when mystery movies and especially Giallo flicks are over complicated and that is exactly what we have here.

It really is a damn shame too because A Lizard In Woman's Skin has a lot going for it. It has some amazing scenes. My personal favorite shows a girl being chased through an old church by a psychotic killer with a knife. It truly is a heart pounding scene and Fulci even manages to throw bats and a sniper into the mix and that's just fucking awesome. Then we have the nasty split-dogs scene where we see a bunch of white dogs split down the middle with a bunch of tubes hooked up to them and red gore spilling all over the place. The film is loaded with female nudity including some hot lesbian action and it also has a very hippiedellic vibe to it. Then we have some crazy images of a giant flying swan with a hole in it. So we have tons of really cool things going on.

Its all just very unfortunate that we are forced to sit through ten million twists and turns and I personally can never remember the final outcome even days after viewing the film. Still I guess this is nothing new to Giallo fans and those who would follow Lucio Fulci throughout his career shouldn't be to fazed. After all it is close to impossible to make sense out of the majority of his movies without hard drugs or at least a strong attention span.

Despite the confusion of the plot A Lizard In Woman's Skin well worth the watch for the gore and camera work alone.

Ten To Midnight (1983)

Aside from Death Wish, 10 To Midnight is probably my favorite Charles Bronson movie. Based off of the real life serial killings of Richard Speck, 10 To Midnight blends a detective movie with the 80's slasher genre in a very sleazy way.

J. Lee Thompson is the director on this one. He was responsible for a bunch of Charlie Bronson flicks such as Kinjite : Forbidden Subjects, Messenger Of Death, The Evil That Men Do and many more but the slasher film is nothing new to this guy, he also delivered the goods in Happy Birthday To Me. Throw in a naked murderer who was is based off of a real life mass murderer and we are in for one hell of a trashy ride, filled with sex and violence.

Charles Bronson plays Leo Kessler a senior cop who is hot on the trail of a brutal serial killer. Leo is taking this case a little closer to heart due to the fact that one of the killings strikes pretty close to home with the victim being a close friend of his own daughter. Andrew Stevens who I remember best as David's friend in Massacre At Central High partners up with Bronson to help bring down the killer. We have a pretty basic plot here but there are elements within the movie that make it completely different and unforgettable. First off the killer does all of his slashing completely nude. Of course this helps reduce the odds of him ever being caught but it almost seems to be something more. Something more sinister. A sick and twisted fetish almost. "Anybody who could do a thing like that would have to impotent. He uses his knife as his penis".

Aside from the fact that we have a naked madman running around and slashing up young girls there is also plenty of bare breasted ladies to look at. Its safe to say that 10 To Midnight is an outing in trash cinema that can be enjoyed by both sexes. We also have a bunch of memorable moments and quotes from Charlie Bronson. In one of the most memorable scenes Bronson finds the killers masturbater. "You know what this is Warren? Its for wacking off!" Hearing Bronson deliver this line while shaking a male jack-off tool is priceless and makes the movie worth owning for the scene alone. "When is the last time you made it with a girl Warren? You never made it with a girl!... But you get back at them, don't you?"

Do you remember the hot black chick from the beginning of kiddie-toucher Michael Jackson's Thriller? Well if you ever wondered what she went on to do, the answer is within 10 To Midnight. Ola Ray shows up as a nurse who has a pretty lengthy shower scene (complete with tits, ass & bush) and meets her end by our naked psycho. This takes place during the films highest note and for those familiar with the real life case of Richard Speck and the house full of nurses that he killed, it is all reenacted here. One by one the nurses are hacked into and cut to ribbons by the killers trusty butterfly knife and to make things more interesting Bronson's daughter is amongst the victims. You know this is going to end badly for our naked sicko.

As for anyone who is a fan of this movie, I highly recommend checking out the German 70's flick The Naked Massacre which is also based off of the Richard Speck massacre. The two films would go perfectly as a double feature in the name of filth. For a good time with Bronson, a pocket pussy, bare breasts, violent stabbings and naked man-ass call upon 10 To Midnight.

The Deadly Organ (1967)

This slice of Argentinian sleaze comes from director Emilio Vieyra, the same cat who would go on to do the insane The Curious Doctor Humpp and the English dialogue was written by Jack Curtis who I remember best as the director of the awesome 60's monster-rama gore flick The Flesh Eaters but unfortunately The Deadly Organ doesn't quite compete with either of the films just mentioned.

Fans of the superior The Curious Doctor Humpp should understand what I mean when I say the The Deadly Organ is weird, sleazy and interesting but a bit slow moving and confusing. The Deadly Organ is actually extremely slow paced. The only thing that saves the film from putting its audience into a drooling coma is just how strange it is. Of course the good looking Spanish women and the gratuitous nudity helps out a lot but for me the main interest in the film is within the subtext of the plot.

The Deadly Organ is probably known better as Feast Of Flesh by most due to the fact that this is the title it screened under in the United States. It ran on a double bill with the awesome sex & violence filled monster epic from Mexico Night Of The Bloody Apes and the two films would be released through Something Weird Video on a double feature dvd. The Deadly Organ is clearly the duller of the two but as I mentioned the story is strange enough that it works.

Although at times The Deadly Organ may seem like a monster movie it absolutely is not. Its more of an early slasher film then anything else. We have a masked villain that is terrorizing the women of a small town but our killer is not just content with slashing up young women. He lures them in with an entrancing tune from his Deadly Organ. The music gives the film a dream like vibe and is repetitive but pretty cool at the same time. Then the masked killer hooks his victims on heroin and with the help of the entrancing music the females become completely obsessed with him as if he were a drug himself. Then of course he kills them. His weapon of choice is in fact a giant syringe which he plunges deep into his victims chests and leaves them over dosed, cold and dead. Of course he changes it up from time to time and we do get some strangulation and knife-fu but it is usually a giant needle that is found buried in the chest of a corpse.

Now if that's not a cool and twisted plot, I don't know what is. It is never really spelled out but The Deadly Organ almost plays like a warped anti drug horror movie, similar to something like Blood Freak or Frank Henenlotter's Brain Damage. Some would probably say that I am over analyzing this cheep exploitation flick a little to much but there is definitely some kind of social message wrapped up inside this bizarre stalk and kill flick.

The majority of the characters are supposed to be part of the younger generation, the hip generation. They run around naked, listen to "weird music", drive fast cars, have sex with anyone they please and use drugs. The older generation fears for the future and the main characters who represent the older folk are two police/detectives. These guys can't seem to get it right. They can not find the killer any quicker then they can understand the youth. They always seem to a be a bit to late and even when they have a full proof plan some how it falls to shit.

The Deadly Organ is kinda like a drug. You can be wide awake but once you fix yourself you drift in and out of consciousness. If you nod out, you will be pulled out of your dreamlike state for another dose of murder and weird bloodletting. This is not recommended for most. Only hardcore exploitation enthusists will be awake by the films final reel.

Tourist Trap (1979)

This has to be one of the weirdest slasher films ever made. Not weird in an artsy-fartsy kinda way but just weird in general.

A group of four kids on a road trip are stranded in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere. A seemingly nice old man invites them back to his now out of business wax museum where they are stalked by a maniac and haunted by the wax dummies which seem to come to life.

Now when I said this is a weird slasher, the weird part is obviously not the four kids being stalked and killed by a nutso maniac in crazy masks. Its weird that The Tourist Trap blends super natural horror with prototype serial slash-em-up scenes. It all makes more sense as the film runs on and we learn that the dummies are not actually alive but they are being moved by our killer who has a sort of Carrie White telekinetic power going on.

To make things even cooler The Tourist Trap has a sort of Texas Chainsaw Massacre vibe to it. For starters some of the masks are very reminiscent of Leather Face and the film also deals with a demented and psychotic family in the middle of nowhere. The director who was actually born and raised in Texas was probably influenced by the Tobe Hooper classic of 74 but I can not say for sure. The director would go on to do movies like The Crawl Space with Klaus Kinski and later the shot on video embarrassment Puppet Master. Well at least the guy started off strong.

Another highlight of this movie for me is the screen presence of the beautiful Tanya Roberts who I remember best for her wet t-shirt movies and of course the 70's low budget sickie Forced Entry, not to be mistaken for the 70's slasher porno with Harry Reams which goes by the same title. Well unfortunately miss Roberts doesn't show any nipples in this one but we do have the privilege of watching her skinny dip with her girlfriends. Full frontal or not Tanya Roberts is always nice to look at and adds to any horror film.

For me personally I think this film works best for younger genre fans. When I was a little kid this movie probably would have scared the shit out of. There are some very creepy scenes where the mannequins come to life and sort of scream at the cameras. When you are an adult it is all a bit funny, especially if you are like me and seen way to many horror films. Still The Tourist Trap is good campy fun from the late 70's. It comes complete with an axe that is swung into a mans neck, multiple shotgun blasts to the torso, a pole is shoved through a mans back, a woman is suffocated, drownings, strangulation's, stabbings and plenty of evil doll action.

Show this to your 12 year old cousin and it will probably scare the shit out of them.

Blue Eyes Of The Broken Doll (1974)

This Spanish Giallo is also widely known as The House Of Psychotic Women in America and even aired on television as House Of Doom. To think of this movie on t.v. is completely ridiculous. Everything that is cool about it must have been removed. I personally prefer the Blue Eyes Of The Broken Doll title and for multiple reason. First being that it sounds like a genuine Italian made Giallo. Secondly, blue eyes and dolls are both part of the plot.

Blue Eyes Of The Broken Doll was directed by Carlos Aured who I remember best as the director of Horror Rises From The Tomb but it was co written by the great barrel-chest Paul Naschy and I thank the horror-gods for that. Paul Naschy stars in this murder mystery as Gilles. Gilles is a gardener and grounds keeper at a giant mansion. Living in the mansion aside from Naschy is a bunch of hot women. Its a house of hot psychotic women if you will. Or at least that's what they want us to think. Well some of these babes do seem to be a bit off and it is Naschy who seems to be the only completely sane person in the whole damn house. That is at least till the later part of the film.

Well it becomes quite obvious that Naschy helped write this thing because his character does exactly what we expect him to do. He basically walks around and acts tough all the time and takes his shirt off constantly to show us and the females around him his giant barrel-chest that we all know and love him for. Of course the women can't resist him. After all, they never can. They take turns screwing him and it all is just one big excuse for the girls to get naked in front of the camera and Naschy too of course. In fact the movie starts off pretty slow going and the only thing that keeps us from falling asleep is the bare breasted bimbos that are always on screen. If it wasn't for the nudity Blue Eyes Of The Broken Doll would probably be a real drooler.

Eventually the movie shifts gears and becomes less of a Sexploitation flick and more of what we would recognize as a Giallo. We do get a black gloved killer roaming about and knocking off the women one by one in true Slasher fashion. The killer uses multiple weapons but in one of the most memorable scenes the weapon of choice is a simple gardening tool. The small little claw that is used for raking weeds up from the garden but in this scene it is used to claw out a pretty blond haired woman's eyes. In fact there is quite a bit of this eye-gore stuff and we often see the killer roaming around with blue eyes in the palm of the black gloves. Priceless! We are also treated to some maggots pouring out of a corpses eye sockets which is always a nice added bonus in the gross department.

Wait a minute, isn't Naschy a gardener in this movie? Does this mean he is the killer? Maybe... Blue Eyes Of The Broken Doll has so many red herrings. They almost try to pass every character in the movie off as the killer at some point and yes we do get a fair share of twists and turns and chances are you will never guess who the killer is before it is revealed even though there are some hints dropped here and there.

Some of the other scenes that come to mind that are worthy of talking about is a scene where Naschy gets into a knife fight and ultimately is stabbed in the guts. A babe seduces an old fucker while wearing her best cheerleader outfit. We get some cool looking squib effects in a gory 70's shoot-em-up scene and the ending is sure to make you chuckle.

Nowhere near my top favorite Giallo flicks or even Naschy movies for that matter but still worth a watch for plenty of naked female & Naschy chests alike.