The ABC's of Death

The ABC’s of Death

Directed by: Nacho Vigalondo, Adrian Garcia Bogliano, Ernesto Diaz Espinoza, Marcel Sarmiento, Angela Bettis, Noboru Iguchi, Andrew Traucki, Thomas Malling, Jorge Michel Grau, Yûdai Yamaguchi, Anders Morgenthaler, Timo Tjahjanto, Ti West, Banjong Pisanthanakun, Bruno Forzani, Héléne Cattet, Simon Rumley, Adam Wingard, Simon Barrett, Srdjan Spasojevic, Jake West, Lee Hardcastle, Ben Wheatley, Kaare Andrews, Jon Schnepp, Xavier Gens, Jason Eisener, Yoshihiro Nishimura.

USA/New Zealand, 2012

Horror, 123 min

The rules where simple, maximum of four minutes, must start and end on a red card, must be based on the designated letter given, and must contain DEATH.

The first time I sat down to watch The ABC’s of Death I was concerned that it was going to fall flat on it’s face, as I was still feeling disappointed with a couple of contemporary anthology films which have been hyped previous to The ABC’s of Death being unleashed. I was also immensely curious to see if twenty-six short films could be compiled into one anthology and if it would work at all. Would the films be too short to tell their story, would it be too eclectic, would twenty six shorts in a row be endurable, would they manage to pull it off or would it fall flat on it’s face like a failed experiment?

After a beautiful title sequence, which form-wise returns in-between films with title and filmmaker credits, the ball is set in motion. Five minutes in and I’m already cringing, a hand has been sliced from the soft piece of skin between index and ring finger so that it hangs from the wrist by a tiny piece of flesh, a frying pan with boiling oil has been thrown into the face of the knifed man by his angered wife. He screams in agony and she sits down to confess that she’s been poisoning him slowly for the last year… External sounds indicate a panic in the streets. The wife apologizes and says that his death was supposed to be much better, but there’s no time to waste now, hence the fast assaults. She lies down next to the man as he pulls his last breath and the frame fades to intense red. The first letter of twenty-six is completed, A is for Apocalypse by Nacho Vigalondo.

With it’s down beat, slow moody narrative, it set’s the tone of he film, and introduces the short form storytelling of the cavalcade about to occupy two hours of your time, and it’s the complete opposite of the surreal visual orgy that Yoshihiro Nishimura’s sushi, maggots, nakedness and gore drenched Z is for Zetsumetsu (Extinction) slams into the end of the parade of depravity.

Short form cinema can be more difficult than feature films, as you need to work extremely efficient to set character, tone, plot and story. It’s no easy task, and a few – only a few, the majority kick ass in their own peculiar ways – a few of the films in The ABC’s of Death unfortunately don’t really manage to make it all the way, like Noburo Iguchi’s F is for Fart, Andrew Traucki’s minimalistic G is for Gravity, or the complete insult that is Ti West’s piece M is for Miscarriage. Damn, is he even trying at all these days?

Although the most of these short form films are top notch. A couple of entries don’t even need to check the boxes or play by the rules, as they are quick mindfucks such as Ernesto Díaz Espinoza’s chapter C is for Cycle or arty set pieces like Bruno Forzani & Hélène Cattet (of Amer) O is for Orgasm. A couple go for the comedic approach such as Thomas Cappelen Malling’s H is for Hydro-Electric Diffusion, Banjong Pisanthanakun’s N is for Nuptials and Angela Bettis - sadly enough only one of the two female directors in the compilation WTF? - E is for Exterminate, which is creepy fun until the climax turns the fun into scream. Two films take an interesting Meta approach, like Lee Wingard’s Q is for Quack and Jon Schnepp’s W is for WTF. Some take alternative approaches, through animation as Anders Morgenthaler’s hilarious K is for Klutz about a woman and her obsessive turd or Lee Hardcastle’s splendid T is for Toilet, the winning contribution of 171 candidates competing for the letter T.

Some directors have gone for a disturbingly dark and gloomy approach – perhaps amplified by the lighter ones around them – which only go for the gut punch offering no relief or closing twist as Jorge Michel Grau does with I is for Ingrown. Others are cunning, and build up to a disturbing rush of insight as Jason Eisner’s Y is for Youngbuck.

Then there’s the real pearl's of the cake, the entries that hit the nail right on the head and bring some truly fantastic stuff, such as my favourite segments; Marcel Sarmiento's D is for Dogfight, Timo Tjahjanto’s L is for Libido, Hardcastle’s T is for Toilet, Srdjan Spacojevic’s R is for Removed and Xavier Genz X is for XXL.

What makes these pieces stand out in my eyes is that D is for Dogfight nails it, brings a great twist, rush of insight and manages to get emotions in there too all in the few minutes available. L is for Libido manages to raise curiosity, build tension, at first make us cheer on the perversity, only to slap us in the face and repulse us, before thumping down a shocking finale. R is for Removed – primarily because it shows that Spacojevic is so much more than the shock monger behind A Serbian Film and gives teasing glimpses into a world that is beyond our comprehension. Remember when Fruit Chan’s Dumplings also was a full feature; well I want a full feature with Spacojevic’s Removed. He’s fucking close to being more Cronenberg than Cronenberg ever was here! X is for XXL is a haunting and innovative comment on the fixation of female ideals, and damn does it’s climax sting. I interviewed Lee Hardcastle at the FFF in Lund last year and he’s a fucking hilarious guy. T is for Toilet is the antichrist version of Nick Park Wallace and Gromit movies - sinister, brilliant, and possibly one of the most violent claymations ever made, and yes, Hardcastle snuffs the kid – with a bog cistern lid.

As a whole, The ABC’s of Death is a pretty damned cool mix, the majority of the films hit the mark, the variation in styles keeps it crisp, the variations of death keep it interesting, the variations in approach keep it from being repetitive, which many other anthology films completely fail at. With a few exceptions, the short form approach is a welcome one and I really enjoyed the ride it took me on.

The ABC’s of Death plays like a mix-tape of mayhem. If you are old enough, you know what I’m talking about, those tapes handed to you by a girlfriend or a friend. You know that there’s going to be tracks you love, tracks that you like, tracks that you won’t like at first but will grow on you, and then those tracks that make you go why the hell is that in there. But that’s the way I like it, unpredictable, intriguing and original. You will be going back to several of the shorts to watch them again because they will stick to you like lint to a scab.

The ABC’s of Death is a smorgasbord of contemporary horror. Mixing everything with everyone who’s anyone, all nations under mayhem and death. If you don’t watch The ABC’s of Death then you can’t call yourself a fan of horror ever again. This IS one of the best anthology films since Romero’s Creepshow and I can hardly wait to go back in to it and pick out those gems all over again.

The ABC’s of Death will be released on DVD in Sweden by NjutaFilms later this year.

From Beyond

From Beyond

Directed by: Stuart Gordon

USA, 1986

Horror, 86 min

Distributed by: Second Sight Films

Every movie reviewer has his or her genesis story. The initial films they started a repetitive viewing of, their portal into obsessive fandom. The first time I was swept up by the magic of Stuart Gordon’s From Beyond was back in the late eighties, when my mate Fredrik - through a quick exchange of a couple of hundred kronor - obtained a bunch of VHS dupes from this guy at or school who had an infamous Xeroxed list of genre films he’d sell bootleg copies of. The school genre fare pusher man one could call him. One of those tapes was Stuart Gordon’s From Beyond, and a continious dedication to the works of Gordon was firmly rooted from that moment on.

The story of From Beyond is classic horror fare, the exploration of the unknown. Crawford Tillinghast [Jeffrey Combs], Dr. Katherine McMichaels [Barbara Crampton] and Bubba Brownlee [Ken Foree] find themselves confronting creatures from another realm when they conduct experiments on the late Dr. Edward Pretorius machine that stimulates the pineal gland with its high resonance. From the other realm the creatures start slipping into ours, and pretty soon the late Dr. Pretorius [Ted Sorel] himself steps out of the pulsating lights unleashing an entourage of slimy creatures and hideously gory moments in his path.

So let’s talk From Beyond and ask the questions if it has stood the test of time? Well hell yeah, it’s still a great movie and I’d even go as far as naming it the best of the Stuart Gordon Lovecraft adaptations.  Lacking the dark comedic elements of Re-Animator, From Beyond delivers a more sinister and darker tone, which suits Lovecraft stories much better than the comedic horror of Re-Animator. (Which still is a blast of a film too.)

Starting off with an initial attack that definitely sets the Lovecraftian tone – as nothing is really shown, merely indicated and suggested through dialogue where Tillinghast tells of the monster that ate Dr. Pretorius head – the movie moves effectively into its post credit sequence narrative. With Combs Crawford Tillinghast character established and the mysterious Dr. Edward Pretorius seen briefly, it’s time to add the second lead character Dr. Katherine McMichaels. Frequent Gordon “heroine” Barbara Crampton is gorgeous as McMichaels, but perhaps even more important to the story is that she is introduced as the sceptic of the piece. Tillinghast is merely dismissed as insane and guilty of murdering Dr. Pretorius, the story he tells - of entities from another realm - is frowned upon as the ramblings of a mad man and he's facing being life behind bars following his evaluation at Miskatonic Hospital. It's when sceptic Dr. McMichaels passion for science and hard facts gets the better of her, making her want to take Tillinghast back to the mansion to check up on his story that the movie starts to change the characters. The Miskatonic Hospital is also where a small subplot with Dr. Bloch [wife of Stuart Gordon, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon] is introduced. The film returns to the location for it's third act and also some of the movies great gore sequences. She’s something of a nemesis to Dr. McMichaels and finds her methods of conduct to be highly controversial and unethical. Dr. Bloch is more of an old-school electroshock therapy kinda gal.

With the plan of taking Tillinghast, back to the mansion on the hill there’s the chance that they either discover that he is a murderer or that there might be some truth to his story.  Private investigator Bubba [Foree] tags along for security, and turns out to be more of a comic relief than anything else. BLinded by possibilities it only takes moments before her scientific curiosity draws Dr McMichaels towards the machine and the gateway to other realms. The enthrallment of possibly standing on the threshold of the greatest medical discovery of all time, lures McMichaels in and even knowing that there could be serious consequences, she hits the switches and brings forth the creatures from the beyond. It’s her greed that motivates her, the same greed that transforms her character from sceptic to believer, from passive to aggressive and also the same greed that leads her right into insanity.

It stands clear at the end of the movie that From Beyond really is an underrated piece of eighties gold. It simply oozes the traits that made Lovecraft’s novels such a thrill. Sparse on explanatory mumbo jumbo, plenty of slimy ancient ones drastic transformations of character roles, and the ever dormant insanity which where all a fundamental characteristics of Lovecraft’s works.

As for the characters in the movie, they are fantastic. The transitions from polarized sides of the axis are great. Crampton's Dr. McMichaels also goes through a full transition from the stiff restrained woman of science to full fledge sex maniac on the fringe of insanity. This makes characters so much more intriguing and filled with dimension than the regular mad scientist of say Re-Animator.

Combs knocks it out of the park with the portrayal of Tillinghast, Dr. Pretorius assistant, who at first has nothing but awe and respect for his master, but as the movie plays through, transforms into knowing the truth and finds that he actually hates and despises Pretorius. His characters role as the victim and his presumed insanity make him vulnerable and easy to empathise with.  There’s also a great use of guilt to fuel his transition, as the respect for his former master slowly wares away and turns into the hatred and repulsion he really held for Pretorius. This is due to the guilt he had over never questioning or opposing the cruel sexual games that the impotent Dr. Pretorius played out in his torture chamber. It’s the guilt of all these suffering women that he could have saved.  Note that even the impotent Dr. Pretorius has a transformation arc as he’s everything but impotent when he returns in his beast shape.

Special effects are brilliant; it shows that some of the great FX people of the era; John Carl Buechler, Mark Shostrom, Henenlotter regular Gabe Bartalos, Greg Johnson and a young Robert Kurtzman. The creatures look superb despite the high def – which usually is one of the areas where old-school FX can come off looking rather poor and revealed as only being effects. Swedish cinematographer Mac Ahlberg – who sadly passed away last year – works his camera magic, and this kind of work always shows what a great artist he was, not to forget the passion he held for his craft.

Gordon, with stable actors Crampton and Combs would all reunite a yet again with their third Lovecraftian tale on Castle Freak. Gordon himself teamed up once more with Brian Yuzna during his time in Spain under Julio Fernández Filmax, for Dagon before tapping into his, to date, last Lovecraftian adaptation with Dreams in the Witch House as part of Mick Garris Masters of Horror TV-series.

I couldn’t really discuss From Beyond without mentioning screenwriter Dennis Paoli, who wrote the scripts to all of Stuart Gordon’s Lovecraft adaptations. What he does with the characters is perhaps one of the key reasons why Gordon’s Lovecraft films resonate louder than other attempts to adapt the ancient ones and unseen horrors for big screen entertainment. The characters have advanced journeys, developing character arcs and frequently end up polarized positions from where they started. Dennis Paoli is undoubtedly one of the best screenwriters of horror film scripts, and where it would be easy to call it a shame that his talents have been so sparsely used, it may very well also be this simple fact that makes his work stand out so much more than others.

The Second Sight BluRay is an outstanding release, with an astonishingly crisp image, vibrant colours and an impeccable print. Much like their releases of Return of the Living Dead and the Basket Case Trilogy, this is a must have release, and Second Sight add yet another solid brick to the foundation of being the best distributor of fine cult fare in the UK. It wouldn’t be a Second Sight "must have" if it wasn’t filled with those customary extras one has come to expect, so how about a Q & A with Gordon about From Beyond, new interviews with Barbara Crampton, composer Richard Band, and screenwriter Dennis Paoli. Featurettes on the Special Effects of From Beyond, Lost and Found footage from the editing room, and a great commentary track with Gordon, Yuzna and Combs, and the reason that makes these films pop out amongst the rest,  spiffy new artwork by the legendary Graham Humphreys.

Make room on your shelves for Second Sight’s Limited Edition BluRay Steel book release of From Beyond, out in UK on the 25th of February.

(With more great eighties horror classic promised to follow)

Land of Death

Land of Death

Original title: Nella terra dei cannibali

Directed by: Bruno Mattei (as Martin Miller)

Italy, 2003

Horror/Cannibals, 93min

God damn it, I love Bruno Mattei’s films. No genre was too far fetched for him to take on and regurgitate his own low budget variants of. Renown for ripping off others, lifting stock footage and sometimes clips from other films, and at times even ripping off himself. But one can’t really aim criticism towards it, as it’s actually something I see as an important Bruno Mattei trait. Production value and anything to make it a better movie, that’s what I see Mattei’s plagiarism, theft and recycling to be. Dedicated filmmaker at his best, and if there’s ever one word that sums up Mattei, it is enthusiasm.

Also released as Cannibal Holocaust 3: Cannibal vs. Commando, Cannibal Ferox 3, Cannibal of Death, Land of Death is no masterpiece in any way, but it’s full of that classic Mattei enthusiasm, and where everyone else was desperately seeking new areas of genre, Mattei stuck to what he knew best, cheap low budget exploitation. I can’t believe that I still write something along the lines of that in each and every one of the pieces I write on Mattei cinema post 1990, but there’s something fascinating about that fact and his dedication to the cheap movies that made him the master of exploitation that he rightfully was.

This time around its jungle adventure with classic cannibal genre ingredients – complete with animal slaughters, punishment of “unfaithful Mrs cannibal”, gut munching, dismemberment, and nihilistic climax.  Not forgetting stock footage of helicopters and jungle wildlife. (It wouldn’t be a Mattei film without slightly out of focus faulty cropped wildlife stock footage would it?)      

Taken deep into the green inferno by cool as fuck, pipe smoking guide Romero [Claudio Morales], a bunch of hard ass soldiers - lead by humorously clumsy rookie Lt. Wilson [Lou Randall] - are on a mission to find the daughter of Colonel Armstrong as she went missing on a previous expedition. (Sound familiar?) As you already guessed it’s only a matter of minutes before they stumble upon the worm-infested remains of the previous expeditions guide, and from out of nowhere, natives’ blow poisonous darts at them. Romero shows his diabolic character when he instead of assisting the soldier shot by a poisonous dart, calmly shoots him in the head – spattering the rest of the soldiers with his brain substance – whist delivering the cold line that there’s no cure for the poison, he merely put the soldier out of his misery.

Upon reaching the village they start spotting items of modern civilization upon the natives, which indicates that they are getting close to their destination, as these items are belongings of the former expedition. A peculiarity familiar trading of modern technology for further directions deeper into the jungle takes place. It’s amazing how much one can get in return for a flick knife these days.

The closer they get, the more carnage they find – one pretty neat skinned corpses hanging from the trees makes it all worth while – Gianni Paolucchi (who worked with Mattei in various positions since the eighties, and more importantly produced, and sometimes co-wrote almost all of Mattei’s films during Mattei’s last active decade.)… Anyway, Paolucchi and Mattei wind it up effectively as the group get closer to their destination. Appalled by the native ways, but also solving the struggle between the native tribe and their nemesis tribe who kidnap and rape their women, they slowly gain the trust of the tribe….

Exposition is always delivered by Romero who amusingly enough always seems to know everything about the natives rituals and habits, and get’s the chance to explain what the hell is going on at every encounter with them. It’s also quite funny that the more the commandos learn about the natives, the more they become infuriated with them, wanting to mount up and blast them away. Luckily they are told by Romero to calm down and lower the guns they have aimed at the cannibals. Yeah, seriously it happens a dozen times and even after they have gained the tribes trust and find Colonel Armstrong’s daughter. If the Philippine actors are stereotypical Italian Cannibals, the soldiers are a scary reflection of US army stereotypes. Gun crazy, trigger-happy stereotypes.

Long time teammate Luigi Ciccarese’s cinematography gets the job done, and the actors do what they can with what one only can imagine be minimal direction from Mattei, Most of the actors from these later films only ever did one or two films before slipping back off the radar. But who’s to complain, as this more or less gave a few lucky actors the chance to star in a “real” movie. (If you still haven’t seen Best Worst Movie 2009, about the legacy of former Mattei collaborator Claudio Fragasso’s Troll2 1990, you should stop everything right now and check it out. It’s a brilliant documentary)

I mentioned enthusiasm earlier on, and I seriously think that anyone watching these films and not picking up on the enthusiasm – after all Mattei and production company La Perla Nera crossed paths on many occasions during the last decade of his career indicating that Mattei eagerly wanted to make these films – are missing the ever so important ingredient that separates Mattei from many others. How many times have you checked out favourite genre filmmakers latest flick (or later productions) only to find it running on fumes with no passion at all. If not for the look of the direct to video productions, I honestly don’t see much difference in the late and early films of Bruno Mattei. No matter if it looks cheesy and cheap or rough and raw, I have the feeling that it was all film to him, and his level of engagement was constant throughout his creative lifetime. Just watch stuff like Snuff killer – La morte in diretta 2003,  L’isola dei morti viventi 2006, Zombi: la creazione 2007, and then compare them to Virus – l’inferno dei morti viventi 1980, Notte di terrore 1984 or even L’altro inferno 1981 and you will note that the only thing that really separates them is the quality of filming technology. Story and content wise they are all Bruno Mattei.

Nailing safe beats every five-six minutes with gore, death or gut-munching, mid point comes with the reveal that the General Armstrong’s daughter Sara [Cindy Lelic Matic, who reunited with Mattei on his next jungle cannibal movie, Cannibal World 2004] is in fact the white queen of the cannibal tribe, and a feisty one to say the least, with no intention at all to return to the decadent civilization of mankind. Snatching her from the tribe, they unleash the wrath of the Cannibals and from her on out it’s all about staying one step ahead of the many tribes they have angered on their path through the jungle and the ipacha tribe who definitely want their White Queen back.

Showing his talent for ripping off other films, Mattei literally uses everything he can imagine and freely borrows a multitude moments that you undoubtedly will recognize from previous cannibal film of the eighties, Deodato, Martino, Lenzi, and why not Franco while he’s at it. But it’s all done in a classic Bruno Mattei fashion, and I wouldn’t want it in any other way. Anyone else and I’d probably have lost interest, but with Mattei it’s a vital trait and half the fun of his films.

All in all, Land of Death is a pretty straight forward action/cannibal flick that uses something of an action plot before turning into something of a testing plot if I where to apply Norman Friedman’s forms of Plot on the film – probably a first time application and mention together with a Bruno Mattei film. Put in other words, first they search and we follow them on their action filled problem solving then the run for their lives as we watch the strong characters is responsible for their own fate. We also learn that arrogance and hostility will never end with success – basically the theme of all cannibal flicks. Norman Friedman’s plot structures are obviously something that Mattei and Paolucchi never gave a single minute of though about, but something that almost all filmmakers subconsciously know and use in their films, even if its only a cheap piece of Cannibal Exploitation.