The terror out of Tokyo…

GHOST STORIES OF WANDERER AT HONJO

Held up against more famous Japanese ghost movies, Ghost Stories of Wanderer at Honjo probably seems a bit slight. But just because it doesn’t aspire to lofty or epic intentions doesn’t mean it’s not a great little movie. It fast paced and fun, low budget but well executed. I was very happy to stumble across it, partly because it was entertaining, and partly because if this one was out there, there must be more. The yokai may only have a cameo, but heck, they really only had a cameo in some of the later Daei films.

And in short…

HORROR OF SPIDER ISLAND
Maybe the quintessential old b movie

NEAR DARK
Definitely a quintessential vampire movie

Even though the two movies reviewed this week for Month of the Living Dead 10 are both schlocky zombie flicks, I think that you can tell the relative quality simply from the following screencaps:

I Am Omega (2007):

Deadlands: The Rising (2006)

The Canadian movie Dan Candy’s Law is something of a rarity. First, it’s one of the few westerns Canada has made, and second, it’s one of the few Canadian movies based on a true story. Donald Sutherland plays the title role, a mountie determined to get his man. After watching it, I think that if they had cast another Canadian in the lead role and retitled it John Candy’s Law, the end results would have been a lot more entertaining.

Although we’re kicking it off a little later than I’d hoped, Teleport City is spending October celebrating the bizarre world of Asian horror films. And what better way to start things off than with…

MR. VAMPIRE

Old Hong Kong movies use the presence of a Taoist priest as a license to print crazy, despite the real world practice of Taoism’s emphasis on quiet contemplation and equilibrium with nature. As these filmmakers would have it, that age old philosophical tradition is all about people shooting cartoon lightning bolts out of their hands, repelling one another with weapon strength, supersonic laughter and, of course, watermelon monsters. In short, exactly the type of religion that might get me to turn my back on my secular ways once and for all.

Elsewhere in our mad empire, horror films in general are the order of the day:

DAY OF THE DEAD
In which I make myself one of the ten people in the world who actually liked this idiotic 2008 re-imagining of the Goerge Romero movie people now insist is a classic even though most of them didn’t like it so much until someone dared re-imagine it. Still, this is the closest thing we’ve gotten to a good old-fashioned Italian zombie movie in years.

MADHOUSE
In which producers go to the “Vincent Price is a crazy guy who devises elaborate, themed ways in which to kill people” well one too many times and come up with a movie that would have merely been “meh” if it hadn’t also happened to be Price’s final horror film.

SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD
In which George Romero attempts to redeem himself for Diary of the Dead by making a movie that is merely dull and soulless, instead of totally unwatchable.

THEATRE OF BLOOD
In which Vincent Price stars as a mad stage actor who murders critics who called him hammy, resulting in possibly Price’s greatest film and certainly one of my favorites.

Also, if you want to read a disjointed “summary by twitter” account of three days at the New York Comic Con/New York Anime Fest, and hassle me for not knowing the guy’s name was Black Adam instead of Black Atom (seriously,what sort of superhero doesn’t call himself Atom???), and for referring to that sexy fishnet stocking magician woman as Zartana instead of Zatanna, you can do that here.

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WARNING FROM SPACE (1956)

The people of Tokyo go about their normal business – drinking sake, hunting and trapping young men, spotting flying saucers, designing the most powerful explosive ever known – unaware that catastrophe threatens in the form of a runaway rogue planet, currently on a collision course with the Earth.

Fortunately, a race of friendly aliens from a planet that shares its orbit with Earth, but is located on the far side of the sun, has already detected the threat. The aliens travel to Earth intending to warn its scientists, but find the process of making contact unexpectedly difficult.

The fact that the aliens look like man-sized ambulatory starfish and go around dressed in their jim-jams might possibly have something to do with it.

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I throw myself into the tenth annual installment examining all things zombie; you reap the rewards. Everyone’s a winner!

Fan of the Dead (2008)

Uncle Sam (1997)

YATTERMAN
Yatterman is a colorful, overblown, largely idiotic live-action adaptation of an anime series from 1977. It’s also a painful illustration of every weak point of wildly hit-or-miss director Takashi Miike while failing to feature anything he does well. For me, it was like a self-indulgent child banging pots together, desperate for someone to pay attention to how hilarious it is — sure, it’s hard to ignore it, but all that noise doesn’t translate into something exciting or amusing.

And some short reviews on T.I.E.:

KURO-OBI
Karate guys kick each other in the head

SATAN’S BLOOD
People get naked and praise Satan

BOXER’S OMEN
Thai wizards chew stuff up and spit it on people

THE HORRIBLE SEXY VAMPIRE
A vampire lives in the walls like Lazlo Hollyfeld

THE LAST LEGION
People find a lost sword in the castle of the guy who last owned the sword, in a building with giant drawings of the sword on it

TALES FROM EARTHSEA
Goro Miyazaki befouls the family name

HIDDEN FORTRESS: THE LAST PRINCESS
Someone dares remake one of my favorite movies, and I was OK with it

WOLFGUY: ENRAGED LYCANTHROPE
Sonny Chiba is an enraged lycanthrope. Enough said.

FORCE: FIVE
Robert Clouse and Fred Weintraub go to the Enter the Dragon once again.