Behind the Couch

1971 Dir. Al Adamson Long before there was Freddy vs Jason , and  Alien vs Predator , there was the incomprehensible yet utterly sublime Dracula vs Frankenstein . Beginning its celluloid life as a follow up to schlock filmmaker Al Adamson’s Satan’s Sadists , Dracula vs Frankenstein was intended to be a biker movie. Somewhere along the way though, Dracula and Frankenstein’s Monster were added to the  mix. This film has it all: astounding dialogue, terrible acting, cheap and cheerful special effects. Best worst movie ever? Read on... The basic story follows Judith Fontaine (Regina Carrol) as she searches for her missing sister, who, unbeknownst to her, has been abducted by the evil Dr Frankenstein. He's been abducting women for his devilish experiments in his secret lab in an amusement park on a grotty pier. It's never clear what his experiments are or why he needs women. He rambles on about ‘life-giving serums’, the ‘illusion of reality' and how one of the women h...

2007 Dir. Frank Darabont There be evil in that there mist! Stephen King adaptations can be tricky. And often quite schlocky. For every Carrie or The Shining , we get a The Mangler . Not that this is a bad thing, mind. I mean, look whose blog you're reading! I positively delight in this stuff.  Having helmed The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile , Frank Darabont is no stranger to King’s work. The Mist provides us with his first adaptation of one’s of King’s horror stories, though it’s easy to see why the director chose this novella to film. All the ingredients are ripe to make a gripping ‘small-band-of-people-seek-refuge-in-one-location-from-mysterious-force’ movie, akin to Night of the Living Dead or any number of John Carpenter films. The Mist however, manages to exploit the formula for all its worth and Darabont turns in a finely honed piece of taut and suspenseful cinema that still manages to feel fresh and, most importantly, surprising. The characters are...

2007 Dir. Mitchell Lichtenstein The idea of the ‘vagina dentata’ (Latin for 'toothed vagina') exists in many cultures and world mythologies, and is generally thought to stem from cautionary folk tales warning men of the consequences of rape. It is an idea very much connected to female empowerment. While various horror and rape-revenge films such as  I Spit on your Grave ,  Last House on the Left  and  Ms 45  have featured avenging women castrators who defiantly make a stand against aggressive, toxic masculinity, Teeth goes one step further and explores this concept in a very  literal sense. That it does so with such pitch black humour and barbed social commentary really adds to the enjoyment and effectiveness. Dawn O’Keefe is a young woman who, like many young people in Bible-belt America, has pledged an allegiance to God to abstain from sex until she's married. Its in this context that the film has its edge, taking satirical jabs at the oppressive...

1963 Dir. Roger Corman Just after Corman had wrapped up on The Raven , he realised that his star Boris Karloff still had a couple of days left to fulfil in his contract. Corman therefore did the only logical thing and quickly improvised and made a new film in order to utilise Karloff’s remaining couple of days (!). Using the same sets from The Raven and some shots from Corman’s other Poe films, a number of other uncredited directors, including Jack Nicolson, he produced The Terror in a matter of days. The story focuses on Poe-esque lone traveller Lt. Andre Duvalier (Jack Nicholson), a French officer separated from his regiment during the Napoleonic Wars. He stumbles upon a mysterious beach and meets a woman called Helene (Sandra Knight). She gives him water and then disappears. Duvalier traces her to the castle of Baron Victor Frederick Von Leppe (Boris Karloff) and his servant Stefan (Dick Miller). There Andre realises that something deeply sinister is afoot as he discovers t...

1942 Dir. Wallace Fox The Corpse Vanishes  was one of many B-movies to star Bela Lugosi in the 1940’s, a particularly prolific period for the actor. The story follows reporter Patricia Hunter (Luana Walters) as she tries to discover who is murdering brides on their wedding day. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Lugosi is the culprit: stealing the bodies of young brides to extract vital glandular fluids from them to keep his ailing wife (Elizabeth Russell) youthful. Lugosi is aided in his diabolical quest by the freakish sons of his housekeeper: a sadistic dwarf and a dim-witted giant. The film begs no pardons for its exploitative subject matter – it relishes in the sensationalism and its shock value goes for the jugular every chance it gets. ‘Its sensational! Another kidnapping of a dead bride – what a story!’ scream the newspaper headlines that spin across the screen, imposed over shots of a busy printing press. After the bizarre opening shots of Lugosi in...

Directed by John Llewellyn Moxey, this moody and hauntingly beautiful film easily recalls the work of Val Lewton and is as drenched in foreboding and creepy atmospherics as the likes of Cat People or The Seventh Victim . The opening shots of mysterious hooded figures emerging from the mists with clawed and pointing hands are an unnerving delight. The story follows Nan (Venetia Stevenson), a college student who journeys to a creepy town in order to research its bloody and witchcraft-laden past. As Nan’s professor, Christopher Lee provides another knowing and sinisterly suave performance. Much tension is garnered from whether or not he knows more about the creepy goings on in the sinister town than he lets on, and the wry dialogue between him and Nan’s brother sets us on our guard: ‘Have you ever met a witch?’, the brother asks. ‘Perhaps’, comes the cool reply.   The Lewton tradition of creating terror through suggestion is utilised here with graceful aplomb, particularly ...