Dracula A.D. 1972
“The pre-credit opening sees us joining the finale of a film that was never made, but looks like it was pretty good. Dracula (Lee) and Van Helsing (Cushing) are locked in mortal combat atop a carriage that is careening out of control across London’s Hyde Park. Remember that Cushing and Lee hadn’t been paired together as Van Helsing and Dracula since the very first film back in the late 1950s, so seeing them together again should have been a big deal, at least bigger than a pre-credit sequence that feels like, ‘We now join our regularly scheduled vampire fight already in progress.'”

Part IV of my look at the horror films of Carlos Enrique Taboada: Más negro que la noche (Blacker than the Night, 1975).

Four young women are trapped in a haunted house with the murderous spirit of an old woman. Only this time, the movie is 100% on the side of the ghost (and so am I).

The moral of the story is one I can wholeheartedly endorse: be kind to kitties (or else)!

It’s not quite a Roundtable, but almost.  As I head into my annual “Month of the Living Dead” at Cold Fusion Video Reviews, several other B-Masters have volunteered (and others were strongarmed) to participate by throwing a zombie movie review out during October.  The dead outnumber us, you know.

This week’s new reviews are Dead Heist (2007), a hip-hop heist zombie movie that is probably better than I should have expected a hip-hop heist zombie movie to be.

And then there’s Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004), a corporate celluloid product that singlehandedly justifies all the snarky comments made by Continental European types about American pop culture.

Following in Lyz’s steps, Teleport City now has a section dedicated to short — sometimes super-short — reviews and really old material. Because lord knows I couldn’t let Bloodrayne 2 pass without at least some comment.

Teleport City Shrimp Chips

Farz (1967)
“The terrorist organization consists of five guys — two of whom wear scarves even though their short sleeve shirts indicate that it’s not scarf season — who are constantly berated by a guy who, in a European film, would have been played by Timothy Dalton. The guy’s secret underground terrorist lair leaves a considerable amount to be desired, consisting as it does primarily of some cool Mario Bava-esque lighting and a folding card table with a rotary phone on it. Here’s a tip for all of you who aspire to be a henchman for some megalomaniacal would-be world conqueror. If, on the day of your interview, you get a tour of the secret underground lair and it is furnished entirely with folding card tables and rotary phones, pass on whatever offer you are given. In fact, don’t join up with any secret globe-conquering society that has a folding card table anywhere, let alone in the main control room.”

The Hands of Orlac (1924), in which a famous pianist loses his hands in a train wreck, and has them replaced with one of the most oft-copied plot devices in the history of horror cinema…

Schizoid (1980), in which the infamous Golan and Globus hire the writer/director of the “Dallas” and “Dyansty” pilots to make them a much-belated wannabe giallo…

and…

The Student of Prague (1913), in which one of the earliest 30-year-old teenagers on record sells his soul to hell for a fortune big enough to impress a countess, and gets about what you’d expect from the deal.

People who enjoyed I Know What You Did Last Summer should also enjoy the second sequel, I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer (2006), for one very simple reason: IT’S THE SAME FRICKING MOVIE.