Star Crash (1978)

Title: Star Crash (1978)

Director/Writer: Luigi Cozzi (aka Lewis Coates)

Cast: Caroline Monroe, Christopher Plummer, David Hasselhof, Joe Spinell

Review:

For lovers of cheesy b-movies, Luigi Cozzi’s Star Crash is like the long lost Holy Grail of cheesy space operas. I’d been hearing about it for years and years, and I was dying to finally get a glimpse of it. Thankfully, Shout! Factory has just released it on a jam packed double disc special edition as part of their “Roger Corman Cult Classics” collection. Finally I was going to get to see what has been labeled for years and years as the “Italian Star-Wars”! The film that had David Hasselhof battling stop motion animation robots with a light saber! That’s right, Knight Rider wielding a light saber! Hey, I’d buy that for a dollar! And I did! I finally got my hands on this special edition dvd. Question is, after all the expectation and the wait, was it all worth it? Or was I building up my hopes for something that was ultimately going to disappoint me? Read on…

Caroline Monroe channeling Jane Fonda as best she can

For those that are not up to date on how a lot of Italian genre films were made during the 70’s and 80’s, here’s a bit of news for you: most of the Italian genre films from the 70’s and 80’s were rip-offs of successful American films. And so it went something like this: Alien spawned a film called Contamination (1980), JAWS made way for Great White (1981), Clash of the Titans and Conan spawned Conquest (1983), The Exorcist’s Italian antichrist baby was called Beyond the Door (1974), Escape from New York mutated to 1990 Bronx Warriors (1982) and these are just some of many rip offs that were produced. Actually, if you ever have time in your hands, go ahead and try and find out just how many Escape from New York Italian rip off’s exist, it’ll take you a while. Star Crash comes to us as a direct result of Star Wars. Like Star Wars, Star Crash (notice the similarity in the title?) is a space opera, it’s got light sabers and it’s got villains who want to destroy worlds. We get lightsabers and chatty robot companions. You could safely say that for every character in Star Wars you can find its Italian counter part in Star Crash. The producers had money in their minds, and doing a Star Wars rip off was definitely the way to go for them.

Any similarities with the poster for Star Wars is purely coincidental

But director Luigi Cozzi had other ideas in mind. Like any self respecting director, Cozzi didn’t want to rip-off or re-make anything. Most directors hate the idea of walking over tired territory. Most directors will want to do something different. Influenced by the films they love, but not exactly the same. And so, this is why Star Crash, though groomed to be a Star Wars rip off by its producers actually ended up being more of a homage to Barbarella (1968) and Jason and the Argonauts (1963), two films that influenced Luigi Cozzi as a filmmaker. One can definitely see the influence of both of these films on Star Crash. Caroline Monroe walks around the first half of the film in a skimpy bathing suit, emulating Jane Fonda’s revealing attire in Barbarella. Funny story about that: half way through filming, American investors asked Cozzi to change Monroe’s attire. They didn’t want her to be so revealing because they wanted to be able to play the movie on television and where afraid they weren’t going to be able to do that if Monroe was walking practically naked through out the whole film. And so, this is why about halfway through the movie, suddenly we don’t see so much of Miss Monroe’s attributes anymore. Bummer. Curse those damn producers!

There are a lot of funny stories involved with this production, for example, David Hasselhof kicked an Italian actors tooth right off while filming a fight sequence! Hasselhof’s character and Caroline Munroe’s characters were supposed to kiss during the last scene of the film but didn’t because the actor playing the robot was actually Monroe’s husband! Hasselhof got food poisoning while filming in Italy and so some of his scenes involve his character wearing a giant mask, because it wasn’t him acting beneath it! But by far, the funniest thing in this movie is the films dialog. To start things off, Stella Star (the character Munroe plays) is always accompanied by a robot that talks like he is a honky tonk cowboy with a Southern accent! In fact, he behaves like a cowboy holding his two guns as if he was a character from a Sergio Leone movie. Many compare this film to a Spaghetti western, and they aren’t far from the truth.

"I got my eye on you Hasselhoff! Keep your hands off my wife!"

It’s hilarious to hear the robot say things like “Look! Amazonian women on horses! I hope they are friendly!” Pay no mind that they are on an alien planet with no Amazonian jungle which can only exist on earth! Speaking of this films dialog, wow, holy smokes I hadn’t laughed this much in a long time. Here’s an example of the kind of dialog you can expect to hear on Star Crash:

“I wouldn’t be Emperor of the Galaxy if I didn’t have a few powers at my disposal! Imperial Battleship: Halt the flow of time!”

“For the space of three minutes, every molecule on this planet will be immobilized, but after the third minute, the green ray looses its power. Time will flow once again and everything will explode”

"Dont kiss me, my husband is watching!"

Now if that isn’t laugh inducing dialog, I don’t know what is. And this is exactly why I love this movie. For that and seeing David Hasselhoff having a sword fight with two stop motion animated robots! This was Hasselhoff’s first feature film ever, so he was extra sober, just to make sure he didn’t screw up his lines. As for the rest of the cast, we get Joe Spinell, whom some of you might remember as the psycho killer in Maniac (1980). On Star Crash he plays Count Zarthan. This villain looks like a mix between Satan, Dracula and Ming the Merciless! He cares about one thing and one thing only: becoming the master of the universe! Maybe he should talk to Skeletor about that! Another essential part of the cast is Christopher Plummer who plays the Emperor of the Universe. Plummer got paid 30,000 for shooting all his scenes in one day, then his scenes where spread out through the rest of the film. His dialog is the funniest. He plays his character by speaking everything in a whisper, really cool and calm, cause you know; he’s the emperor of the universe! It’s his job to play it cool!

The multi-colored universe!

Other hilarity inducing scenes are those that take place in space. For some reason, the director wanted the stars in space to be multicolored. So whenever we get a shot of the universe, it’s filled with multicolored stars! Not at all a realistic representation of the universe, but whatever. I was having fun. Plus, the multicolored universe is what gives this one its unique look. One thing I will say about the space battles in this movie, they seem to be never ending! I mean, there is this one scene where there’s supposed to be this battle in space, and spaceships are shooting lasers at each other and flying left and right. This is all fine and dandy in a science fiction film, the problem is that the director kept showing the same scenes of the spaceships flying by over and over again. You’ll see a spaceship whiz by Whoosh! And seconds later, you’ll see the same exact scene with the spaceships passing by. Whoosh! And Whoosh! Again! And just when you think it’s over: Whoosh! Yet again! It gets kind of repetitive after a while.

Hasselhoff with a light saber!

I will say that this was a successful homage to Jason and the Argonauts as a result we get stop motion animated monstrosities on this one! At one point Stella has to battle a giant robot that looks a heck of a lot like the Achilles statue that Jason and the Argonauts fight in Ray Harryhausen’s film. We also get these two robots that the good guys have to battle with their light sabers. The film was to have more stop motion animation creatures, but at the end of the day director Luigi Cozzi wasn’t happy with some of the stop motion animation for some scenes, so he scrapped them. But I will say this, Star Crash is a film that did a lot with very little. They didn’t have the budget that George Lucas had for his space opera, yet Cozzi and his crew managed to create an entertaining, funny, fast-paced science fiction film. I mean, this film has spaceships, aliens, planets blowing up, giant robots, space battles, spaceship cities, kamikaze soldiers, and Amazonian babes! All achieved with a meager budget. In my book, it is a movie that crammed as many ideas as it could into the film, hoping that at the end of the day some of them would end up being good. By the way, the DVD is jam packed with extras! I highly recommend buying the double disc special edition. It has a trailer for the film that was edited by Joe Dante! In depth interviews with Luigi Cozzi and Caroline Monroe! And you can even see Eli Roth dissecting the films trailer. I think its one of the best DVD’s that Shout! Factory has produced to date.

Half of the films budget went to Hasselhoffs perm.

Buttom line is that Star Crash wasn’t filmed as a comedy, but it actually ends up being funnier then a lot of space comedies like Spaceballs (1986) and Ice Pirates (1984). I love the hell out of those two movies, but Star Crash is funny without even trying! Things go from ridiculous, to ludicrous in the blink of an eye. We go from battling Amazonian women who control giant robots with the power of their minds to having entire space cities crashing on our heroes! Star Crash is a non stop barrage of craziness, but its funny and fun every step of the way. Its one of the best “so bad its good” films out there that serves at the same time as a loving homage to old science fiction films.

 

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5

Galaxy of Terror (1981)

Title: Galaxy of Terror (1981)

Director: B.D. Clark

Cast: Robert Englund, Sid Haig, Grace Zabriskie

Review:

Roger Corman (prolific director and producer extraordinaire) has produced some of the best and worst films in the genre. In my book, his good ones include The Fall of the House of Usher (1960) and Frankenstein Unbound (1990) the very last film he directed personally. But he was also responsible for more than a few rip offs. I mean what’s Piranha (1978) if not a rip off of the Jaws (1975) formula that Spielberg successfully turned into the first summer blockbuster ever? And what were Galaxy of Terror and Forbidden World if not Alien (1979) wannabes? Both of these Roger Corman Alien rip offs have just been released on DVD and Blue Ray and today I’ll be reviewing Galaxy of Terror, the first of these two films to get made.

Story goes something like this: a group of space faring dudes and dudettes get sent to a strange and distant planet to see what happened with a ship that crash landed there, and to see if there are any survivors. Unfortunately, once they get there, they discover a deserted barren planet. The ship that crash landed is destroyed, and its crew is all dead. The trail of corpses leads towards a mysterious pyramid that looms in the horizon. Should they go and investigate it?

It’s always interesting to see where a movie that you love and cherish comes from. While watching Galaxy of Terror you will immediately notice similar elements to those found in Ridley Scott' s Alien (1979) and also in James Cameron’s Aliens (1986). The cramped claustrophobic corridors, the diversified crew on the ship and the way they behave will remind you of these first two films. The way that the characters approach the alien planet and the mysterious pyramid will remind you of those first few minutes in Alien, when the miners first enter the space ship and find the Alien eggs. The reason for this is because for all intents and purposes, that’s exactly what Roger Corman set out to do; a rip off of Ridley Scott’s Alien. There are no doubts about that.

What I didn’t know was that at the same time, Galaxy of Terror was actually James Cameron’s training ground for when he would get the chance to direct Aliens (1986). You see, James Cameron worked extensively on Galaxy of Terror and other Roger Corman flicks like Battle Beyond the Stars (1980). On Galaxy of Terror he directed a couple of scenes himself, he worked on set design and special fx. Roger Corman has jump started the film careers of many recognized filmmakers and actors. Joe Dante, Sylvester Stallone, Jack Nicholson and James Cameron are amongst them. As many of you might know, Cameron helped produced some films for Corman; he also later directed Piranha II himself. He would later go on to direct the ultra successful Aliens, but Corman was the producer that allowed Cameron to flex his muscles in the filmmaking/special effects world. Cameron would later tell Corman that on Aliens he simply did what he had done before on Galaxy of Terror, only this time he had money! And you believe him, because one look at Galaxy of Terror and you can immediately see similarities with Cameron's Aliens.

But a rip off is boring only if it is the exact same film it is ripping off, just ask the dudes who made Alien vs. Predator: Requiem (2007) or watch Doomsday (2008). Or asks the Italians who ripped off their fare share of American films during the 70’s and 80’s. If I remember correctly, Universal Studios actually sued the Italian filmmakers behind a film called Great White (1981) for blatantly ripping off Jaws. These rip offs that I've mentioned are no fun because they were ripping off some other film and they didnt even try to be different, they simply plagiarized the formula and did the same thing all over again, which is of course a bore. But, a well made rip off can be a fun thing to watch! A well made rip off essentially takes the same premise and takes things its own way, gives it its own twist. I think I can safely say that Galaxy of Terror was a good rip off, it felt like a cheaper version of Alien, but at the same time it felt like it had slightly better production values than your regular Corman production. You see, Corman produced this flick after he had seen Alien and Star Wars, so he knew he had to up the ante a bit in order to play in the same ball park as those productions. As a result, Galaxy of Terror actually looks decent at times. Kudos to the filmmakers for using miniatures and matte paintings so well!

Galaxy of Terror also alls under the same category as films like Event Horizon (1997) and Sphere (1998). It’s the kind of film where characters confront their fears while out there in the emptiness of a desolate alien planet or in the middle of the blackness of space. Alien planets always a great ingredient for a horror film because filmmakers can exploit that fear of the unknown, which they do on this film. You know how it goes, at one point or another each of the characters is going to end up isolated and that’s when their fears attack them! And that’s when the movie turns fun because they each get attacked by a different type of creature or effect. And most of the fears are amusing; one of the most memorable death sequences involves a giant maggot that eats a female crew member. Now this being a straight forward b-movie, of course the slug undresses the girl before he rapes and kills her!

Speaking of the cast, we have an interesting assortment of actors on this one, some of them would go on to become horror film icons. Robert Englund stars on this one, this was pre-Nightmare on Elm Street, yet I loved the fact that the man who would be Freddy ends up fighting an evil version of himself when he confronts his fears. And at one point he realizes, “this isn’t real, it’s all in my head” and the fear disappears; same as Nancy does on the first Elm Street film! We also get another horror veteran in the form of Sid Haig who accepted to make this movie but only if he could play his part mute, because he hated the lines his character was supposed to say! He does say one line though: “I live and die by my crystals!” which is of course hilarious. Sid Haig’s character walks around with a pair of giant ninja stars that are made out of glass. He loves his crystal stars and is very attached to them! His obsession with them was kind of silly. The cast is rounded out by the always bizarre Grace Zabriskie, whom some of you might remember from a couple of David Lynch films. On this one she plays the crazy captain of the ship.

This films biggest asset is that it looks more expensive than it was. Reportedly, Roger Corman says the budget for this flick was 700,000 and damn, I have to say that for a low budget b-movie they got away with a cool looking flick for that amount of money. A lot of it had to do with James Cameron’s involvement in the film, he helped out a lot, designing and building the sets; he even directed some of the death sequences himself! Though, I hear Roger Corman shot extra nudity for the worm attack sequences and the grand finale of the film because he had to keep those investors happy and they were promised nudity on this film! So anyhows, this movie was well worth the wait. It was exactly what I expected, and a little more actually. A fun b-movie every step of the way.

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5

Tales of Terror (1962)

Title: Tales of Terror (1962)

Director: Roger Corman

Stars: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Basil Rathbone

Review:

So this is one of those anthology movies that include three stories in one film. The anthology film was a type of film that became extremely popular during the sixties and seventies due to the ever growing popularity of EC comics line of horror comic books like Vault of Horror and Tales from the Crypt. During those days, British film company Amicus was making anthology films left and right, films like The House that Dripped Blood (1970) and Dr. Terrors House of Horror (1964) were very successful back in those days. Roger Corman’s American International Pictures was not far behind making these types of films, they did quite a few of them. Corman went through what is commonly referred to as his “Poe Cycle” which was that time when he did a bunch of films based on Edgar Allan Poe stories. Most of them didn’t really stick to Poe’ s writings and only used the premises presented in Poe’s stories as a catapult to do his own thing. The films from Corman's Poe Cycle all starred Vincent Price.

On Tales of Terror, the three stories start out with a narration done by Vincent Price himself. Price talks to the sound and image of a human heart beating. Price (in that spooky horror movie voice of his) asks the question: “Have you ever wondered what happens after death?” And so the first story begins, the first one is called “Morella” and it’s about a man who gets visited by his young daughter Lenora. Her father (Vincent Price) hates Lenora because she killed his wife during birth. She refuses to leave even though he emphatically scorns her. Soon Lenora discovers that her father is so obsessed with his dead wife that he has kept her rotting corpse inside of his room! Is there some deeper darker secret to be revealed? You bet your ass there is!

What I loved about this first story is how spooky it is. Roger Corman had a knack for directing these spooky horror films. I love The Fall of the House of Usher (1960) for the same reason: it’s just so damn spooky! It’s a horror movies horror movie. Lots of spider webs, and old mansion at the edge of the sea, corpses, ghosts, dark hallways, the wind blowing, fog, all these elements that make an old school horror movie fun to watch. And this one has all these elements in abundance. This is a good one to watch if you’re in the mood for that sort of old school horror film. It’s the kind of film you’d love to watch on a Halloween night, and this first story is really the one that captures that Halloween like atmosphere the most. This story has some excellent make up effects for its time, and I was surprised to see they even used some visual effects. And very effectively I might add! My only real complaint with this story is that in certain scenes, Corman chose to use stock footage for the exterior of the mansion, he used scenes from Fall of the House of Usher, but really, its no big deal, cause these shots are so effective anyways, and they fit perfectly into the story. This story does fit in the same universe as The Fall of the House of Usher since both stories are extremely similar. But that’s really a minor thing that you probably wont even notice, this story is excellent. Specially when it comes to its more supernatural elements!

The second story is entitled The Black Cat. This one starts Peter Lorre, who worked together with price on various films after this one. Peter Lorre is a drunkard. All he thinks about is drinking drinking drinking! One day, when he runs out of money for drinking, he decides to walk into a wine tasting event, where all these wine connoisseurs are about to present an Expert in wines played by Price himself. Lorre sees this as an opportunity to get a couple of free drinks so he challenges Vincent Price's wine knowledge! Needles to say, they both get extremely drunk that night! Vincent Price ends up taking Lorre to his house, because he is too drunk to walk by himself. When they finally arrive at Lorre’s house, Price and Lorre’s wife decide to kick start a relationship between them, which of course infuriates Peter Lorre and leads him to take drastic measures for revenge.

The film was adapted into comicbook form by DELL comics

Thing about this story is that it’s not Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat every step of the way, it also has elements from another Poe story called The Cask of Amontillado. It basically takes elements from both of these stories, which is something that Corman did a lot in his Poe Cycle. He would take elements from various Poe stories and made one movie. The Black Cat is told in a very morbid yet funny tone, very black humor type of stuff. Peter Lorre says the funniest puns all through out his evil doings. When Price and Lorre get drunk as skunks, its gold! Specially when it comes to Price's face expressions! Lorre and Price ended up working together again on a couple of films like The Raven (1963) and The Comedy of Terrors (1964). This was the story I liked the least, just because its not as spooky as the other two, and because of its slow pace. Sometimes, this story seemed to stretch things so much it got on my nerves. Sometimes you wish the scene would get to the point already! Its not a bad story, and you will laugh at times, but the pacing killed it for me. Also, the other two stories are so different in tone, that when this one comes in with its dash of comedy, it kind of like doesnt fit in. But its still highly watchable.

The last of the three stories is based on Poe’s The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar and it’s about a dying old man named Valdemar. He has a decease that has him under a lot of pain, so he asks a hypnotist to put him under some kind of trance so that he won’t feel so much pain. The problem comes when Valdemar is hypnotized…and he dies while under hypnosis! So he remains stuck between the world of the living and the world of the dead! What horrors hill he tell us from beyond the grave?

Again, yet another spooky tale. The simple fact that its about a guy stuck in a hypnotic state between the land of the living and the land of the dead, and that he can speak to us from “the other side” is an awesome premise! I got to say, Poe was a genius for coming up with that one! Some might find it cheesy that Valdemar’s spirit talks to us from beyond the grave and that Price’s lips are not moving. All we hear is his voice, like an echo or some sort of ghost talking from the other side. Cheesy or Eeerie? I lean towards eerie myself. Also, it’s cool as hell to see Price as some kind of zombie. Again, this movie surprised me with its make up effects toward the ending of the tale.

The interesting thing about this movie is that it was later remade by George Romero and Dario Argento, that film was called Two Evil Eyes (1999). In it, Romero directed The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar in his very own style and with his very own twists. It starred Adrianne Barbeau as the wife of Valdemar who is after his wealthy inheritance. This movie puts more of an emphasis on the zombie aspect of the story as is expected since Romero was behind the camera. Argento’s version of The Black Cat stars Harvey Keitel as the cat hating photographer of the dead. This story focuses more on the importance of cats in witch folklore. Argento’s version of The Black Cat is a bit more shocking and gory then Peter Lore and Vincent Price comedic version. The only bad thing I can say about Tales of Terror is that some of the more jaded movie watchers might find these movies to be slow in pace. Me? I think they are fun, I love that old school horror atmosphere. As they say, they dont make them like this anymore. Still, for a fun old fashion horror film, with loads of atmosphere and a touch of comedy you can’t go wrong with Tales of Terror.

Rating: 4 out of 5

The Dunwich Horror (1970)

Title: The Dunwich Horror (1970)

Director: Daniel Haller

Stars: Sandra Dee, Dean Stockwell

Review:

I'll start this review by saying that Ive read quite a few of H.P. Lovecraft's stories and that I love them. A lot of them are about otherwordly creatures who used to dominate earth once upon a time and now they are looking for a way back in, to conquer and dominate the earth once again. Essentially, this movie plays with these Lovecraftian themes, only thing is that it does it with a distinctively cheesy Roger Corman b-movie feel to it. Was the film any good? Did it pay respects to the H.P. Lovecraft short story that inspired it?

Well first lets start out with the story, wich was about this guy called Wilbur Whateley, who is very interested in 'The Necronomicon' a.k.a. The Book of the Dead. He has a downright voracious appetite for it! He needs to read it because this book explains how to bring "the Old Ones" here to earth. He goes to the Miskatonic University (which actually has one of the few copies of the book) and ask for it, to inspect it closer and read a few of the passages that let him know what he has to do to bring "the Old Ones" back. While there he meets (and enchants) Nancy Wagner a young girl to wich he is strangely attracted to. He basically plays a jedi mind trick on her and manages to convince her to go with him to his old mansion in the town of Dunwhich. You know, for the weekend. Soon after that, he decides he will use her to perform a ritual wich will bring "The Old Ones" back to earth and therefore bring upon the destruction of the human race!

The Dunwich Horror has this really weird aura to it. Its got a weird feeling of unease and a lot of that has to the with Dean Stockwells eerie and quirky performance as Wilbur Whateley. He is so quiet and mild mannered yet you get the feeling that he has some dark purpose to his actions...you get the feeling that something is not quite right with this guy. Theres something in that look that he gives that is unnerving. Then of course this being a movie based on an HP Lovecraft story that "weird feeling" feels just right. Like many of Lovecrafts stories this movie has that feeling of going into the unknown, of discovering an otherwordly thing that has existed for eons yet we know nothing about. Of knowledge of the universe that could drive you MAD!

One of the best things about this movie is its art direction and its ligthing. As we all know, these are two very important aspects of any good horror movie. The ligthing sets the mood, and in this movie we get dark corridors, filled with shadows and mysterious rooms. The interior of the mansion itself is pretty effective. Lots of old books, statues ancient runes. Love that about the movie! Theres this really eerie scene where we get to see the mansion from its exterior and the house is creeking and making all these weird sounds, and everything looks rotted and ugly, this type of thing just makes everything all the more spookier. What I liked about it as well is that the film was shot near the Ocean, which is perfect for any film of Lovecraftian nature. Remember, Lovecraft was sometimes about ancient creatures coming out of the ocean, like in Stuart Gordons Dagon, another excellent Lovecraftian film.

This movie is vaguely similar to H.P. Lovecraft's original tale. Lovecraft's original story concerns a small town in the middle of nowhere. In that story, the people of a small town out in the sticks are freaked out because something appears to be living in the nearby woods, something alive, something that smells bad, something that burns the woods to a crisp! What is it? Many people think it could be the offspring of that weird Whateley family! Thing is, that the film is very different in tone, and changes many situations around, so do not expect a faithful adaptation of the book. Simply expect a film that was inspired by it. Something that exists within Lovecrafts universe. Characters end up talking about the Necronomicon, The Miskatonic University and "The Old Ones" so lovers of Lovecraft should feel quite at home with this movie even though its not really a faithful adaptation of the story its inspired by.

In many ways, this film feels a lot like The Wickerman, Silent Hill or Rosemarys Baby. The kind of movie were you know something werid is going on, but your not quite sure what it is. Thats the vibe I got when I saw Wilbur pulling his dirty tricks on Nancy, slowly luring her into his world. Same deal with all these other movies about weird cults, at first the bad guys charm you and pull you in, then they pull out their claws and you end up on the sacrificial altar. Thats the vibe with this movie, movies like that always get under my skin.

Then theres "The Old Ones", the creatures that are trying to come into our world and take over. Theres this build up in the film, all this talk about these creatures that impregnated Wilbur...and Wilbur might actually be one of them, so kind of get restless to see the damned things. Well, the creature finally appears in the film, unfortunately, this is where I was completely dissapointed with the film because the monster is a cheap cop out. All we see is the monsters point ov view, which consists of a bunch of psychodelic colors flashing on the screen. Its ultimate purpose is to not let you get a good look at the cheap ass monster they made for this movie. They dont really let you get a good look at the damn thing, and as we all know that is the sign to look for when a film is ashamed to show its creature. When the make up effects guy couldnt come up with something that would look decent on screen, they try not to show it too much. Kind of like those Predaliens in Alien vs. Predator: Requiem.

But ultimately, this is not a bad film! What saves it is Dean Stockwells performance! Its so over the top and spaced out, that it keeps you glued to the screen. And when he dons those ceremonial garments and is getting ready to sacrifice the virgin in an altar to the Old Ones, I was a satasfied Lovecraft fan. I was just so damn dissapointed with that cop out on the creature, otherwise, the film is great. It has great atmosphere and a cool story going for it.

Rating: 3 out of 5