Unseen Terror 2017: Day 14

Four teenagers go for a hike in the mountains, and seem to be enjoying life to the absolute best. While things seem to be going swimmingly, strange jellyfish-like creatures are popping up around the area. They attack and attach themselves to their victims, all while penetrating their bodies with sharpened tentacles. The teens make the decision to drive away from the scene, and ultimately wind up in a truck stop that is populated by skeptics. Well, save for one: Fred "Sarge" Dobbs, a mentally unstable war veteran who is more convinced by the youths' story that anyone else within the vicinity. Soon, every single person involved will discover the truth about the smaller culprits, and that they may be nothing more than weapons for something, or someone far more powerful who views humanity as nothing but trophies.



If you have ever gotten to know me relatively well over the years, then you'll know how much I adore the adrenaline-filled science fiction/action/horror hybrid known as 1987's Predator. I have an unusual bond with John McTiernan's picture, and know a tad bit too much information on its background, legacy, and overall impact that it's had since cinemagoers first laid eyes on it thirty years ago. What took me by surprise, however, was the existence of a small budget SciFi/horror release titled Without Warning. As you can no doubt tell by the film's plot synopsis posted, there's an uncanny resemblance to the franchise that birthed the Yautja.


The similarities between the two end right there though, and for better or for worse, Without Warning is an entirely different beast. There doesn't seem to be the same "one by one you die" plot that is so frequently found in slasher standouts, but rather an incredibly slow burn with only temporary moments of what constitutes as volume. The second act of the motion picture feels as if it were lifted from another release entirely; focusing on the human characters' predicament and the uneasy feelings among the bar patrons. Martin Landau (North by Northwest, Ed Wood) is public enemy number one during these scenes, and while you can classify Without Warning as one of many projects that the actor most likely did out of boredom and paycheck necessity, his role of a paranoid veteran who is obsessed with otherworld lifeforms is one of the only highlights to be found. Jack Palance of City Slickers fame also pops up as a Quint-style character, but there are multiple times where he appears to be rather disinterested or just going through the motions. Nobody else really has distinguishing feature or quirks to separate them from any other horror/scifi movie out there on the market. And yes, that does include suit actor Kevin Peter Hall (the titular antagonist from Predator....yes, I know) as the silent, but absolutely silly Megamind-esque alien hunter.


I will cut Without Warning some slack though, especially since it was filmed for approximately $150,000. Imagination says that most of its budget was spent conceptualizing and creating the rather strange-looking, bloodsucking jellyfish. Their resemblance to a giant tick if it made love with one of the beings from Metroid does provide for some gooey, if not occasionally bloody sequences. But these bright moments are brought down by the flick's greatest flaw: the pacing is oftentimes excruciating. I don't need to sound like a broken record by stating my thoughts on slow burns, so I'll just say that for the first time in this year's marathon, I felt genuinely sleepy while watching a movie. The more sluggish, quieter moments in Without Warning were crafted so that we can spend more time with our leads, but it doesn't seem to fully work since most newcomers will be getting rather impatient with a lack of action.


When all is said and done, the most fascinating thing about Without Warning is being able to pick out which segments and characters serve as the blueprint for better pictures to come along many years later. It isn't a wholly bad movie, but it moves at too much of a crawl for me to ever warrant an immediate repeat viewing. Perhaps this is one of the few exceptions of an 80s horror relic that is in need of a remake. Most of its flaws could be easily improved should it end up in the right pair of hands. If one ever desires to add this pre-Predator piece to their own prize shelf, then you can pick up Shout! Factory's Blu-ray/DVD combo pack for a fairly cheap price.



Or better yet, just get a hold of Predator again. Yes, the advantage is unfair due to having a bigger budget at its disposal, but it'll make you a god damn sexual Tyrannosaurus.




Tomorrow, we' make a leap forward into the next decade, and take a trip to the wonderful world of one acclaimed Latino director!

Unseen Terror 2016: Day 14

When a large, seemingly abandoned ship wanders into the harbor of New York, a small group of scientists and officers are sent to investigate. While on board, they discover that save for two deceased men, most of the crew has disappeared, and the only objects remaining on board are a collection of coffee crates that harbor large, green eggs inside of them. When exposed to heat and physical contact, the items pulsate and explode into a mess of an acid-like substance, which subsequently causes any nearby recipient's chest to explode from within. After the word of these ghastly revelations gets out to the military, they send in one Colonel Stella Holmes, who is convinced that there is a connection between these unknown eggs and a recent trip to Mars for two astronauts that ended when one disappeared not long after touching down on the planet.



It goes without saying that nearly any and every fan of horror cinema likes at least one or two Italian-based productions. Whether it is something stylish and beautifully macabre (Suspiria, Cemetery Man), an insane, violent romp with a rock and roll attitude (Demons), or something that is just out flat out bizarrely entertaining amongst glorious moments of gore (City of the Living Dead, Zombi 2), there is a little bit of something out there for everyone to enjoy. Lesser known to casual fans of this vastly humongous genre is the smaller offshoot of what has been dubbed over the years as the "Italian knockoffs." While not completely plagiarizing their sources of inspiration, these films had an unabashed, un-ironic tendency to take pictures from the west, give them a bit of a more colorful makeover by upping the blood spillage, increase the amount of buxom beauties shown throughout, and throw in a killer synth-based soundtrack to boot. Hell, even the latter feature from Lucio Fulci mentioned above was promoted as a sequel to George Romero's Dawn of the Dead many years before the actual follow-up was written and sent out to cinemas!


So, judging by Contamination's poster and my knowledge that it was often marketed as Alien Contamination in other circles, I was fully prepared for a nastier version of Ridley Scott's science fiction/horror classic from 1979, which was released to theaters only a year prior to this project from overseas. However, the similarities to that movie are surprisingly more exaggerated than I expected them to be. Outside of featuring the larger-sized eggs which cause explosions from the unfortunate victim's front area, Luigi Cozzi's (also of Star Wars knockoff Star Crash fame) foray into this field surprisingly stands on its own as a fairly unique beast, and shares virtually nothing in common with the flick that gave us the Xenomorph and Face Hugger. Most of Contamination borrows, but doesn't steal from an assortment of stateside thrillers and Sci-Fi features rather than just one singular entity. There is even a small influence from crime dramas thrown into the mix, with the actual bursting kept to a minimum so that it doesn't dissolve into relentless bloodshed with no actual human drama. Yes, it isn't like Contamination is the first to do this, but it feels oddly fresh when you think about the whole shebang and that it could have just made the conscious decision to be ninety minutes of endless violence instead.


Despite featuring some absolutely horrendous "dubbing" from those involved in the post-production and editing areas (the voices on every black character are comically cringe-inducing), most of Contamination's actual cast does a fairly admirable job in the acting department. Ian McCulloch. also of Zombi 2 fame, is a likable protagonist who while initially reluctant to revisit something that obviously scarred him, eventually becomes more than game to just go with the flow of things. It was pretty fun to watch him (along with Marino Mase's over-the-top wiseass cop) at every moment while jointly immersing ourselves in this astronaut's immensely strange, horrific backstory. Louise Marleau brings an occasional pout-heavy, soap opera-level type of performance with her to the flick, but it just ends up increasing one's enjoyment of the entire experience. Still, I feel as though I will never get over seeing any crew distinctly mouth the proper words from the script on screen, only to have somebody clearly not on their same level butcher what they worked so hard at doing correctly. While the aforementioned departments seemingly failed here and there in the realm of voiceovers, they more than made up for it by working on other tasks. The sound effects of the eggs themselves is incredibly creepy, and one wonders if the eerie humming that they emit is coming from the inside of their shells or from the faint, luminescent glow that surrounds them. It's the type of noise that you would absolutely never want to hear if you were attempting to go to sleep (or if you open the refrigerator for breakfast). Better yet, Contamination is blessed to have its score composed by beloved Italian progressive rock band Goblin, whose work on a plethora of pictures from directing great Dario Argento has cemented their legacy in the genre. Truth be told, their pieces help Cozzi's picture save itself on more than one occasion when it begins to lull or if it nearly jumps into the territory of being too silly. When the primary culprit behind these incidents is revealed (tell me you won't get a Mother Brain vibe from this monstrosity), their tracks give off a sense of fascination that easily resonates with the audience, while simultaneously syncing up perfectly with the newly-instilled fear in our protagonists.


Thank goodness for pictures like Contamination. It isn't a particularly great movie per se, and as hinted at, the second half does tend to drag for a bit (though it's turned right back up to eleven during the final twelve minutes), but the amount of heart and B-grade grandeur put into it does make for a rather good way to kill some time. Think of this entry as a pleasantly memorable pit stop in between looking for other foreign productions in the world of horror and peculiar science fiction. Or, if you want to make a more appropriate comparison for the newer generation that reads this, it is as if The Asylum actually knew how to properly make a motion picture with a small budget and honest-to-god effort. If your curiosity has been peaked, a myriad of ways to watch this bad boy online or in person are available. There's YouTube, Amazon Prime, and even a ridiculously packed Blu-Ray from Arrow Video that is readily available for purchase.



And come on, you know that you want to give your money to a grown man who colorized, edited, and released the original Godzilla: King of the Monsters in his home country during 1977. Right?.......Right?





.....okay, I SWEAR that will be the last reference to another god damn kaiju movie on here for at least the rest of the month!





Tomorrow, it is time to catch up yet again with one of the masters of horror literature, and I regale you with a tale from my high school years related to the work in question!