Chillerama

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Title: Chillerama

Director: Adam Green, Joe Lynch, Adam Rifkin, Tim Sullivan
Released: 2011
Starring: Adam Rifkin, Sarah Mutch, Owen Benjamin, Ray Wise, Eric Roberts, Miles Dougal, Lin Shaye, Sean Paul Lockhart, Anton Troy, Gabby West, Adam Robitel, Ron Jeremy, Tim Sullivan, Thomas C. Colby-Dog, Joel David Moore, Kristina Klebe, Kane Hodder, Jim Ward, Richard Riehle, Corey Jones, Kaili Thorne, Brendan McCreary, Ward Roberts

Plot: It’s the closing night of the last drive-in theatre in America and owner Cecil B. Kaufman has decided to go out with a bang by holding a marathon of cinematic trash for his faithful cinephile patrons. Unknown to them though is the fact that one of the staff has contracted a zombie virus through some ill-advised necrophilia, ensuring this is going to be nothing short of a memorable closing night.

Review: While many may have hailed Eli Roth as the saviour of the horror genre, a title which he has sadly failed to live up to, especially considering how he is more concerned with taking on producing duties these days than sitting in the directors chair, as only further highlighted by the gap between “Hostel 2” and the forthcoming “The Green Inferno”. Infact if anyone could be branded as a saviour for the genre, I would personally venture that it would have to be Adam Green, whom since unleashing “Hatchet” has only feverishly continued to add to the genre, as he followed it up with not only a sequel to this debut, but also the critically acclaimed “Frozen” which showed that he was more than another splatter director.More surprisingly though he has also givin us the horror version of “The Big Bang Theory” with “Holliston” which he also stars in with fellow horror director and best friend Joe Lynch, who unsurprisingly is also on hand to direct a segment here.

Now the unholy twosome join forces with Adam Rifkin and Tim Sullivan to create this horror comedy anthology, an idea originally devised by Rifkin and Sullivan as a weekly show for MTV, only for it to fall through due to the increased popularity in reality shows. Now recruiting Green and Lynch to their cause it finally makes it to the screen in movie form and I was eager to see how it stood up alongside the classic Anthologies which came before it like “Tales From The Darkside” and “Creepshow”, aswell as the knowing nods to B-movie culture much like we saw with the criminally separated “Grindhouse” whose double feature format failed to make it out of the States as it was released internationally as two separate films.

Comprised of four films with each director getting their own chance to craft their own vision, as they give us here

• Wadzilla (directed by Adam Rifkin) – A monster sized man eating sperm goes on a rampage through New York.

• I Was a Teenage Werebear (directed by Tim Sullivan) – The sole musical entry in the film, set in 1962 were Ricky (Lockheart) a closet gay discovers a mysterious gang, who also happen to turn into leather daddy werebears when aroused.

• The Diary of Anne Frankenstein (directed by Adam Green) – The secret attempt by Hitler (Moore) to create the perfect killing machine to help turn the tide of the war, while in turn giving the world his Jewish Frankenstein Meshugannah (Hodder) 

• Zom-B-Movie (directed by Joe Lynch) – The main meat of the film, which is intercut with the other films, as sex crazed zombies invade the drive through while ensuring the film end with a suitably splatter soaked finale

As you can see it is a real mixed bag on offer here in terms of style and ideas, yet all keep within the general theme the film shows….one that it would seem drenched in bodily fluids and gore, served up with a heavy dose of warped humour, which is not a bad thing and certainly gives the bad taste aficionados plenty to enjoy. The downside though is that like “Four Rooms” the level of talent on offer here is varying to say the least, resulting in a film which is frequently uneven in places as the standard shifts from piece to piece with Green and Lynch easily having the stronger segments, with their experience of working in the genre really coming into play, with Lynch’s “Zom-B-Movie” throwing out cheeky nods to the zombie genre left, right and centre while seemingly also attempting to top the splatter finale of Peter Jackson’s legendry “Braindead” while at the same giving it a sex comedy style twist which has to be seen to be believed. Meanwhile Green’s twist on Frankenstein is so over the top that despite the high potential to cause offence by poking fun at what could essentially be volatile subject matter, is quickly put to rest by the ever increasing levels of randomness, which has a real Mel Brooks feel to it as the film self acknowledges its own stupidity, even having cast step outside of the sets and actors suddenly being replaced by questionable looking dummies.

Sadly were the film hits a major bump is with “I Was A Teenage Werebear” which attempts to give us “Grease” via the way of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”, which is a dangerous idea to begin with when you consider that even Richard O’Brian couldn’t create a sequel to beat his creation, so it is essentially destinted to fail from the start as any number of tepid stage versions trying to capture the magic of the film have only further proven. The main problem here is not so much with the plot, which embraces carefree gay love, aswell as the confusion for a young man still forced to live in the closet, all great themes to see being used and obviously ideas close to the heart of the segments director seeing how Sullivan himself is openly gay (and rather keen to drop this fact in for any promotional material for the film). What lets this segment down is instead the weak collection of forgettable songs being warbled by the cast. None of these song I have to confess would have me rushing to buy the soundtrack, which has been optimistically released alongside the film, while Sullivan has also hinted at a full length stage version, something else that I’m not exactly on tender hooks to see, especially as this segment is only just bearable, thanks to some over the top and frequently original splatter.

One thing which stuck with me about this film though is the continuous obsession with bodily fluids, as the film seems to take any opportunity to ensure that all feature in some form or another with “Wadzilla” with its giant sperm and tidal wave cum shots ensuring that it comes off like a more light hearted version of the body shocker “Bad Biology”. Still the bad taste aficionados amongst you will no doubt appreciate the sheer effort which has been put into this film to ensure that they are all covered for your viewing pleasure, which includes a scatological themed “Deathication”. Thankfully its not a theme which overshadows the whole film, but one which certainly crops up enough to be noticeable.

While the segments might vary greatly in quality and style, the strength of “The Diary of Anne Frankenstein” and “Zom-B-Movie” prove to be more than enough to cover for the weaker parts of the film. At the same time while watching this I couldn’t help but feel that I was missing the audience element which no doubt has made this such a popular film on the horror festival circuit and as such I would recommend watching this with a group of like-minded friends to get the full effect intended.

Iron Sky

Title: Iron Sky

Director: Timo Vuorensola

Released: 2012

Staring: Julia Dietze, Götz Otto, Christopher Kirby, Tilo Prückner, Udo Kier, Peta Sergeant, Aglaja Brix, Stephanie Paul

Plot: In the last days of World War II, a secret Nazi space program established a base on the dark side of the moon. Now in 2018 two astronauts one of which being the black male model James Washington (Kirby) unwittingly spark their plans for the return to earth.

Review: Arriving seven years after the last of director Vuorensola’s cult Star Wreck films which also lead him to co founding “Wreck-a-Movie”. A site which was also used for the production of this film, while also helping with finding the funding for the film with 10 percent of the budget coming from the fans of his earlier films, whom in turn also get recognition for their donation in the credits. Still despite being shot on a shoestring budget the film still looks incredible, with the heavy use of CGI largely cutting out the costs of set construction, while bringing back memories of both “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” and “Casshern”.

Right from the start it is clear that the plot is being played very much for laughs, which is always a plus for myself when it comes to any form of naziploitation. For the more bonkers and insane you can make it, the more I’m likely to enjoy it, as no one really needs to sit through a cinematic reinactment of their hideous acts. In fact it would seem that since these Nazi’s have been on the moon they have very much lost any form of contact with earth and hence maintain the same styles of dress which they arrived with, while their equipment is frequently retro in styling or years behind current technical advances, as especially seen by the fact that a mobile phone has more power than their seven banks of computers, making it clear that while times might have moved on back on Earth, it's still very much 1945 here!

Still having realised what they are lacking the new Führer Wolfgang Kortzfleisch (Kier) is quick to send the highly ambitious commander Adler (Otto) back to earth to obtain new technology, in the hope that they can launch their ultimate battleship “Götterdämmerung”. Accompanying Adler is the Earth specialist Richter (Dietze) whose qualifications are questionable to say the least when it consists mainly of edited prints of Chaplains “The Great Dictator” and the deluded Nazi ideals they carried with them from earth. Unwittingly though their return is spun into the latest campaign of the President of the United States (Paul), who intentionally bares more than a slight resemblance to Sarah Palin and whose frenzied aide (Sergeant) is soon using the arrival of Richter and Adler to launch a new Nazi-style re-election campaign to surprisingly successful effect.

However despite being setup as a comedy, the film doesn’t feel the need to sacrifice the plotting in order to cram in extra laughs and instead Vuorensola has chosen to opt for an almost natural humour throughout, with the film only featuring a handful of intentionally staged funny moments throughout. Meanwhile Kirby is a natural comedic talent, who only becomes funnier the more frenzied Washington becomes, especially when dealing with the fact he has unbeknown to himself been turned into an albino by Nazi head scientist Doktor Richter (Prückner) who for some reason also looks like Albert Einstein, which was almost as random as Captain Gorden in “Godzilla: Final Wars” who bore a striking resemblance to Stalin!

Vuorensola on the whole has assembled a great cast here, with Udo Kier bringing his trademark raspings to the role of the frustrated Führer, constantly being forced to correct his men’s salutes of “Heil Hitler” that his name is not Hitler! Infact the casting of Kier was so central to this film that Vuorensola stated that he wouldn’t make it without Kier. Equally fun to watch is Otto as the fanatical idealist Adler, who when not embodying the Nazi ideals, spends most of his time trying to find ways to eliminate Kortzfleisch on his personal quest to become Führer, though with Paul's almost detail perfect portrayal of a Palin esc. president, it would seem in these modern times, the ruthless quest for power is very much the same no matter which side you stand on.

 

The real selling point for the film is with its climax which sees Vuorensola unleashing Space Zeppelins and B-movie flying saucers on New York, while the earth nations all unleash their own space ships and finally answering the question as to what the Australian space program would have been like. Even though Vuorensola is working with such a minimalist budget he still pulls off some fantastic action sequences and making you question why the likes of “The Asylum” and the other DTV studios have never been able to replicate CGI of this standard? Meanwhile the soundtrack is equally aiming for bigger things much like the rest of film which refuses to be restricted by such things as limited budget, with the soundtrack being a powerful combination of a rousing orchestral score incorporates leitmotifs from the operas of Wagner, while the Slovenian industrial group Laibach also effectively appear throughout the soundtrack. 

Originally one of my top picks for this year “Iron Sky” oozes 50’s B-movie chiq with a dash of naziploitation to flavour, it’s nice to finally find that the film is more than just a fun idea, especially with so many negative reviews surround the release of the film I honestly did enter expecting the worst, only to be pleasantly surprised, while also packing a few surprises along the way. Meanwhile Vuorensola continues to impress as a director and one I’d like to see perhaps working with a larger budget for his future project.