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RobinsonGruesome
Reviews
You gui zi (1976)
A True Cult Classic..
I watched this bad boy last night and I simply loved it!
If you are looking for usual Shaw Brothers' martial arts extravaganza you better to skip this one. There's only couple fighting scenes and they ain't nothing special. Oil Monster likes more to stomp, pound and strangle peoples to death than bust some kick-ass kung fu moves.
But if you are B-movie fanatic like me and you like flicks with monsters in the bad costumes, you will love this movie too! Story is based on the old Chinese folk tale.. Crippled man learns magic spell from his uncle who is sentenced to be executed The spell turns him into a Oil Monster and it's payback time! Monster starts to kill bad guys like there's no tomorrow..excellent!
'You gui zi a.k.a Oily Maniac' ain't horror, I would categorize it as a cheesy superhero tragedy. Yeah, that's right..
Monster itself is like when Superman meets Mr. Hyde and Swamp Thing. This Chinese Toxic Avenger is really cheap looking in bad costume with shining yellow eyes and heart stuck to the chest. Special effects are hilariously poor, especially when Oil Monster turns pool of oil and starts to move around.
'Oily Maniac' has lots of nudity and lots of sexual violence. Every Female character shows their boobs, except Lily Li. Don't show this film to your feminist girlfriend because there's plenty of rape scenes that she couldn't handle.
This movie could be more entertaining with more gore. There's couple of smashed skulls, but nothing more. This might be filmed at same time with Black Magic (by same director Meng Hua Ho), as many of the locations looks pretty similar. The plot is entertaining and acting isn't bad, actually pretty decent. Danny Lee shines in this as usually.
In overall, if you want to see piece of Chinese b-movie cult cinema you need to check this one out.
I also recommend Meng Hua Ho's King Kong -rip off 'The Mighty Peking Man'.
I give 'You Gui Zi' a.k.a 'The Oily Maniac' 7 1/2 oil-stained corpses out of 10
La notte che Evelyn uscì dalla tomba (1971)
Sleazy vs. 'Artsy'...
Here's my quick review:
I have seen this title more then once before and when I bought this bad boy, I was truly surprised. I always had expression that 'The Night Evelyn Came out of the Grave' was a straight Italian horror, but it was a giallo all along! Well, to be precise it's mix of giallo and Gothic horror. It's also mix between sleazy and 'artsy'.
While there's lot of nudity and kinky s/m stuff, 'The Night Evelyn came out of Grave' has really beautiful cinematography and really interesting plot. Director Emilio Miraglia successfully creates, nicely running (except couple of tedious scenes), atmospheric movie that keeps audience in suspense through from start to the end. Murders in this film are really original. If there were gore, it would make the movie more entertaining. Also the score to this flick by Bruno Nicolai is really enjoyable.
The Ending is really nice, one of the best I've seen. True giallo ending that can't be predicted at the beginning of the film.
What makes this film really interesting is the fact, that Lord Cunningham, the original killer doesn't pay for his crimes and turns out to be the hero of the movie! It sickens me. I love it.
So, movie in nutshell: 'The Night Evelyn Came out the of Grave' is really beautiful giallo with interesting plot with lot of titties. Lot of them.
I can recommend this one for all those who loves giallo or Italian horror flicks!
I give 'The Night Evelyn Came out of the Grave' 8 whip-lash out of 10.
Seacrest Out!
Deliria (1987)
Really Enjoyable!
Here's my quick review of Stagefright.
Here's the plot, it takes place at the rehearsals for a new musical production about Killer who wears owl mask. The show's manic director is pushing his cast to the limit with the worry of an impending opening night looming. One of the cast sprains her ankle and sneaks off to a nearby hospital for some treatment so she can continue with her work. What she doesn't realize until too late is that it's actually a psychiatric hospital and as they will all soon discover one of it's patients has smuggled himself back to the sound stage in the boot of her car. The impending terror scenario is made double fold when the irate director locks the cast in for the night to concentrate on their work and the unwelcome guest in their midst is actually an famous old actor gone completely berserk!
Michele Soavi, man who has directed bunch of great horror films, doesn't disappoint on this one either. It's a old 'madman on the loose'-slasher flick but somehow it's fresher than most slashers that came out in the late 80's. You can still find every slasher movie clichés in it, but hey, that's the name of the game!
Plot runs nicely and cinematography looks really well. Soavi creates nice claustrophobic feel to the place (not the word I'm looking for but I'm from Finland, so live with it you bastards!). I was expecting more gore but there is still plenty of blood and guts, my favorite is the first chainsaw scene, it looks awesome! Also so the main theme on 'Stagefright AKA Deliria' is really good with hauntingly beautiful female vocal.
Only thing that I didn't like was the ending. I don't wanna give any spoilers away, but what the f*** was that?! It sure made me laugh. Was it all a play/movie or maybe it's made for a possible sequel? Well, Soavi is known for his bizarre endings.
All in all, really enjoyable movie that I can recommend to any slasher/gore fans out there.
Stagefright AKA Deliria gets 8 owl masks out of 10.
Peace, Rob
5 tombe per un medium (1965)
Not the greatest Barbara Steele movie...
I saw trailer of 'Terror Creatures from the Grave' while ago and it seriously kicked ass!. When I finally saw the entire flick, I was really disappointed.
It is decent flick, not the worst film I've seen, but something is missing. Don't get it twisted, I liked this one more than I liked 'Bloody Pit of Horror' another film directed by Massimo Pupillo.
Set in a pretty atmospheric location, the movie's plot, based on a novel by late great Edgar Allen Poe, is pretty cheesy about revenge from beyond the grave, just like every second Italian movie in the 60's.
You can see a little bit of gore in my favorite scene where the man in the wheelchair commits suicide. Pretty lame, but still on of the earliest gore in Europe. Also you can see pretty dope oozing-plague face make-up. In the end of the movie, when the clocks started to tick, severed arm begins to move and graves started to open slowly I thought that 'awwww s***t, now this movie really starts!', but nothing really happens. I really hoped to see some zombies covered with plague but only thing you can see is silhouettes of hands, which looked nice thou..
The biggest minus comes from too obvious ending.
Like I said, not the greatest movie in the world, but I can recommend this one to all you euroshocker-collectors and Barbara Steele Fans..
I give 'Terror Creatures from the Grave' AKA 'Cemetery of Living Dead' 6 severed arms out of 10.
- Rob-in-Some-Gruesome -
Night Fright (1967)
So bad that its almost good...
Okay, When I bought this flick I though this gotta be the ultimate b-movie, space monkey landing to the Earth and starts right away to kill people!
Well, It was almost everything what I expected, typical low-budget scifi movie from the 60's. Acting has to be the worst I've ever seen, especially the girl playing the lead role and the girl that played the waitress made me laughing my ass off.
So why 'Night Fright' doesn't fall in to category 'so bad that it's good'? Reason why is that some of the scenes were just too long and boring. For example the scene were the police officers are searching clues in the woods it was just minutes of walking without purpose. And then the grand finale, the people's waiting for the monster about 5 minutes and when the space monkey appears it get wack'd in 20 second, end of film.
Yeah, 'Night Fright' is boring, but it got couple of funny moments. I can recommend this movie to all who liked films like 'Zontar, the Thing from Venus' or 'Curse of the Swamp Creature'.
I give 'Night Fright' 4 Space Monkey slaps out of 10..
-Rob Gruesome-