Short reviews of weird movies

La Alacrana

Mexico 1986

Director: José Luis Urquieta

Cast: Maribel Guardia, Sergio Goyri, María Luisa Alcalá, Carlos Ancira, Enrique Beraza, Jorge Luke

A woman meets up with another woman and paid lots of money for a video cassette. As she rises with the cassette in her car she is brutally murdered with a cane sword. More people are stabbed by the unknown killer. All were performers of an amateur porn movie. Responsible for the inquiry is Eugenia (Maribel Guardia) a female police officer known as the scorpion. Several trails lead to nothing. In the course of her investigations Eugenia meets Eliseo Mendieta an antique dealer whose wife was the first victim. Mendieta comes then again and again to Eugenia for her or her little daughter to make gifts. What Eugenia doesn't know is that Mendieta is the mad killer. His religious madness drives him to kill all those involved in the porn movie, because his wife starred. The situation heats up as Mendieta stabs Eugenia's housemaid and pursued Eugenia's little daughter to kill her.

An from the italian 70's giallos inspired story about a crazed killer with a cane sword.
There are several pretty bloody killings in close-ups.
A shower murder is clearly ripped off from Hitchcock's "Psycho".
(I'd like to know for how many shower killings in movies "Psycho" was used as a template )
Some nudity and of course the lovely Maribel Guardia as sexy and tough police officer complete the film. The identity of the killer is actually resolved rather quickly but this is not that bad. Sleazy thriller although not the absolute highlight, but offers very solid entertainment.








my vhs (from our mate Bill Knight)

What a wonderful thread, Kothar, and incredible discoveries (as always, from you). You're an authentic fan.

Oh thanks Sweeney Todd i feel very honored

Otro Caso de Violacion

Mexico 1992

Director: Jesus Fragoso

Cast: Miguel Angel Rodriguez, Roxana Chávez, Gerardo Vigil, Alfredo Solares, José Flores

Antonio leads a happy life with his wife Aurora and his little daughter Martina. He has a small car repair shop and driving at night even in passing taxi. But one evening when he is again with his taxi on the way invades a gang of five criminals his apartment and raping his wife. When she resists she is killed by the leader of the gang. The little daughter must watch everything. An old man who has observed how the gangsters enter into the apartment looking for Antonio and told him everything. But Antonio comes too late. He burns down his house, takes the little Martina and goes to his garage which is outside the city. There he cut off Martina's long hair and burns her favorite doll and from now on Martina is raised as a boy. She need fixing cars and must learn to fight with sticks and knives. Antonio does not tolerate any more feminine weaknesses. As Martina gets older she has a rabbit as pet. When she one day once takes in the arm and cuddles it Antonio tears it from her hand and kills it with a stick.
Martina is mercilessly trained to take revenge. Then it's time. One by one they are killed the criminals with a butterfly knife. But the problems begin
when Martina fall in love with Arturo a young man he comes often to their garage. Antonio does not like it at all. Martina wants to break up from this cycle of violence. When she finally killed the last of the criminals, they'll start with the young man a new life. But there is no happy end. When she comes to her boyfriend, it's too late. Antonio has stabbed the young man. Martina takes the dead body of Arturo in her car and drives off. Her father runs after her and wants to stop her, but Martina controls the car down a hill where it explodes. While Antonio desperately must see how Martina burns in the car the police comes and arrest him.

Grim revenge drama with a tragic end. The consequences of hatred and vengeance lead to a spiral of violence will not be stopped.
An interesting story but unfortunately through the cheap style and some directorial shortcomings the movie loses some of its efficient. Surprisingly the killings are rather reserved directed.
Less exploitative than i could expect.

Who perhaps the plot a bit familiar, interestingly enough there was 20 years before a movie which tells almost exactly the same story. And this is probably the best bulgarian movie ever. The 1972 movie KOZIJAT ROG (The Goat Horn) actually tells almost identical the story of an farmer who lives peacefully with his wife and daughter in the mountains. It is the time of the ottoman Empire. One day the family is attacked by four bandits who raped and killed the woman in front of the eyes of the daughter. Here too, the farmer is burning down his house, takes his little daughter cut off her hair and educates her like a man. She must learn to deal with various weapons. Years later, the father goes with the daughter on a vengeance to kill all murderers. And then there are problems when the daughter falls in love. Narrated in powerful black and white images and with only minimal dialogue.
No question KOZIJAT ROG is the much better film of the two but it is amazing how even in exotic countries to be filmed similar stories.
Oh and by the way in the year 1994 there was even in Bulgaria a remake.








my vhs

Ngoo Kong Keng aka Devil Medusa

Thailand 1995

Director: Charin Promrangsri

Cast: Khwanphirom Lin, Withit Ladd

Somewhere in the Thai jungle. A young woman with her ??basket on the way to collect fruit. Three hunters are pursuing a large snake. The woman hid the serpent in her basket. When the hunters come the woman sent they in the other way. When she looks back to the snake that has disappeared. The woman is on her way home, but she falls into the river. She is saved by the big snake. When she returned to her hut one night comes again the great serpent and turns with magic into a handsome young man. They sleep together. The woman is nine months later pregnant but is shunned by the villagers because she has no husband. She brings her child alone in the jungle to the world. It's a girl. Years later. The little girl lives happily with her ??mother. One day the girl wants to play with other children. Suddenly, the children see the something moves among under the headscarf.
As one takes away the cloth they see the girl has instead of hair a lot of snakes. They run screaming to their parents. Mother and daughter are preparing to flee, but there is an angry mob of villagers and sets fire to the hut. When all seems lost, miraculously, a storm comes up and the pouring rain extinguished the fire. The two can escape into the jungle but three of the attackers pursue them. But the persecutors are killed by snakes.
Mother and daughter find refuge in a cave in the jungle. They live together with hundreds of snakes.
Now pass back a few years. From the daughter (because i could not even properly understand again the names (i call the daughter now just snake girl) has become a sexy woman who walks around sometimes even in a kind of leopard bikini. Then a few researchers have come to the jungle to catch lizards. One of them meets the snake girl. The two fall in love.
Then the film takes an unexpected turn. Suddenly criminals come into play. First a drug deal ends with a wild shootout. Then the big boss sends his son off with a couple of thugs. They brutally beat the boyfriend of the snake girl and when she comes to the rescue she is captured. But when the son from the big boss wants to rape the girl a snake comes out of her mouth and killing him. Also his pals were killed by snakes.
The big boss swears revenge and brutally stabbed the snake girl's mother. That was a very big mistake because now the snake girl strikes back.

Another one of those countless snake women movies from asia. In the tradition of DEVIL WOMAN, GIRL SNAKE, SNAKE WOMAN, VALENTINA, SNAKE DEVIL, SEX MEDUSA to name a few. Unfortunately the titular snake woman is only in the last 10 minutes comes to her great appearance. But then it goes again to the real thing. Dozens of snakes in all sizes and types killing all the criminals.
What makes things difficult it is to provide accurate information to NGOO KENG KONG (Year, director, cast etc)
I've just found one review on the net, which is very good and detailed (see here: http://www.mjsimpson.co.uk/reviews/ngookengkong.html)

Interresting is the fact that except of my thai vcd there is also a hongkong vcd . I also have these and this features however completely different credits(in some onlineshops)

Title: Devil Medusa
Country: Hong Kong
Year: 2001
Director: Kwok Kam Ying
Cast: Ho Ka Kui, Sharon Di, Hong Feng

Very strange. But whatever. This is perhaps not the best film in this subgenre, but all in all good entertainment.









and these are the onscreen title of the thai vcd (left) and the hk vcd



and here are the covers of my thai and my hk vcd

Kecubung Sakti

Indonesia 1988

Director: Wisjnu Mouradhy

Cast: Yan Bastian, Johan Saimima, Devi Ivone, Jamal Jentak, Essie Lousiana, Yurike Prastica

Kadrun (Yan Bastian) and Laksmi (Devi Ivone) are students at a guru. They are greedy for a ring with a magic stone that carries her teacher. The ring has supernatural powers. One day when her teacher is sleeping they cut off his hand with a sword to come to the ring. But her plan fails since the ring is immediately solves from the severed hand and flies to the other hand of the teacher. Immediately the teacher cured himself with his ring and casts a curse on Kadrun and Laksmi. Both flee.
Several years afterwards.
Kadrun and Laksmi lived with her two daughters Myra and Sriyati in the Hills.
They are cursed to live in suffering. They need virgin maidens and drink their blood to keep their power and beauty. They use their own childs and students to kidnap the girls from the villages. The villagers, who are terrorized by the demonic group, then fights back in retribution, lead by a religious teacher who has inherited the magic stone.

Actually only an average action / horror mix. Yan Bastian again as a villain. Again, a lot of fights can be seen, almost every minute. Sometimes bloody. But lacks the unexpected moments that characterized some other films. The idea to drink virgin blood once again to be young and beautiful is even now also not so new. New however is that the daughter of Laksmi with the sword cuts the throats of the victims, the blood filled in a cup and gives her mother to drink. That's what i call true mother love.
There are also a few magic elements. Laksmi fly around the area and can her fighters ever turns into snakes or makes them invisible.
At the end of all the bad guys are dead, Kadrun melts into a skeleton and Laksmi explodes the head.
Ok to watch, but there are better from indonesia.








and my vcd

Mente Asesina

Mexico 1987

Director: Alberto Mariscal

Cast: Hugo Stiglitz, Arlette Pacheco, Elsa Montes, Silvia Manríquez, Carlos Rotzinger

Ricardo Gonzalez (Hugo Stiglitz) is a psychically labile surgeon with a girlfriend who betrayed him. He is keen on Christina, the daughter of his professor. Too bad that she has a boyfriend. Ricardo has killing fantasies and one evening he cold-blooded overruns Christina's friend with his car.
At the funeral, he plays the bereaved family friend. Ricardo then digs out the body in the night and separates the head with a spade. He is surprised by the cemetery guard and kill them. He takes the head of the corpse into his lab and throws in an acid bath. The skull he keeps in his lab. But now Ricardo is definitely crazy, because he hears the voice of the dead in his head. He is obsessed by the dead and commit further murders. His girlfriend and her lover must die, and a curious nurse. Then he also kidnapped Christina. But the servant of the professor and also
the police is on his trail.

The movie does have some scenes of terror, but is rather weak. Interesting is a scene as Hugo Stiglitz his girlfriend and her lover captivates and loose rats on them. Also the scenes with the severed head can still convince a little. Genre veteran Hugo Stiglitz plays the mad doctor with full commitment, but can not make the movie even more exciting. I can remember that Bill Knight had in one of his auctions once offered an uncut vhs of this movie. He wrote that the Anchor Bay vhs was cut. It seems that my vhs from JM Productions is also similar cut ?
But I think even the uncut version makes MENTE ASESINA not a good movie. Despite of the relatively short runtime of 77:20 min he is relatively boring. There are only a few highlights. Too bad, i had expected more.






and this is my vhs (JM Productions)

Apocalipsis - Guerreros de la Muerte aka Guardianes de la dimensión prohibida

Mexico 1994

Director: Homero Guadarrama

Cast: Luis Reynoso, Elizabeth Macari, Mario Almada, Marcos Almada, Rosy Garcia

Bad Movie Alert

Juan (Luis Reynoso) lives a seemingly normal life and has fun with his buddy. But sometimes he has strange dreams and visions. One day he meets the beautiful Kaslawa (Elizabeth Macari). She herself has telepathic powers and tells him that he had been chosen to fight against the evil. From another dimension preparing an army of evil to conquer the Earth. Then appear the first two enemies a sort of android or something like that. They are led by Lucy (Rosy Garcia) who enjoy using large knives as weapons. Her partner uses a laser gun. They kill a few people, including Juan's buddy. But also Juan did not survive the first encounter with Lucy. She stabs him. From now on it gets really weird. A guy (Mario Almada) comes from the desert and brings Juan back to live and trains him. He calls himself the guardian and Juan should replace him.
Juan, Kaslawa and the Guardian fights then against the creatures from the other dimension.

Ok, that sounds pretty stupid, but this is the movie too. Oh my God, where should i start now.
There are movies you don't forget and that not because they are so good, but because they are total crazy or extremely bad (or both).
This film is of course in the second category. Although i did not understand a word (since in Spanish), but i think it makes also extremely no sense.
This movie fits into the category of films like TURKISH STAR WARS, 3 DEV ADAM, ROBO VAMPIRE, ATTACK OF THE BEAST CTREATURES, INFRA SUPERMAN, SUPERMAN IRON, TROLL 2, just to name a few. But of course you know what i mean.
Holy shit, here's all over.
Starting with the outrageous story, the actors bad acting, the cheap costumes and the even cheaper FX. This is probably the strangest movie in which Mario Almada has starred. He runs dressed in a poncho in the desert and sometimes he can himself make invisible.
Simply amazing, the scenes where Almada fights with rifle and revolver against a dozen androids with ray guns and stomp all over them all. There is even a western showdown against the leader. By the way, the androids look a bit like racers with their funny helmets and brightly colored suits. In this strange mix of sci-fi, western and fantasy, there are still strange color distortions, hand-painted lightnings, a kind of Darth Vader for poor, copied laser beams, incredible costumes, reminiscent of shows like POWER RANGERS and much more.
In short, an incredible mega trash spectacle.










and my vhs fom MDVC (Million Dollar Video Corp.)

Gadis Berdarah Dingin (Marni)

Indonesia 1984

Director: Ratno Timoer

Cast: Yatie Octavia, Ratno Timoer, Alan Nuari, Muni Cader, Doddy Sukma

Marni, a toddler, witnesses the gruesome death of her parents. They were brutally killed by spearguns. The Killers are Ningrat, Norman, Kusuma, Wijaya, Irawan and Firdaus (Ratno Timoer) who are after the fortune of Marni’s parents. They also kill all the employees of the family.
Around twenty years later, Marni (Yatie Octavia) who grows up to become a quiet and cold young woman who takes vengeance on those who have killed her parents. But Anton, who apparently is the son of Firdaus, is Marni’s boyfriend who is very devoted to her. However, the cold and vengeful Marni insists on killing her parent's persecutors one by one. A hooded fighter helps Marni. Also a gang of teenagers under the leadership of Vivi, a female friend of Marni, helps her. Later turns out that the hooded fighter is Anton. After she has killed most of the murders, she is captured by Firdaus. But she is released from Anton and Vivi and her friends. During the following assault on the house of Firdaus and his henchman it comes to a massacre in which all of the criminals but also many of the teenagers and Anton are killed. Marni and her surviving friends are at the end arrested by the police.

A really cool movie. Not actually an innovative story more a simple revenge story. But the realization. From the first minute the movie gives full speed. Action pur and lots of bloody battles. Fightings with harpoons, spears, swords, bows and arrows, knives, axes and sticks and there is an
extremely high body count. The movie was made at a time when in indonesian cinema many films with female power came out. Only in the years 1983/1984 were still produced the following lady power Movies :
Perhitungan Terakhir, Perempuan Bergairah, Penakluk Srigala, Midah Perawan Buronan, Tujuh Wanita Dalam Tugas Rahasia, 5 cewek Jagoan, Membakar Matahari and more.
Can i only recommended.











and my vcd

Looks amazing

somebody is being killed by an arrow between his eyes

Pembalasan Setan Karang Bolong

Indonesia 1989

Director: Ratno Timoer

Cast: Joice Erna, Baron Hermanto, Farida Pasha, Kiki Fatmala, Rudy Salam

Herman (Baron Hermanto) and Mira (Joice Erna) are lovers who have intercourse before marriage, which leads to Mira becoming pregnant. Herman is willing to take responsibility but his family disapproves. His father, Danu Santoso, asks for the help of Herman’s aunt, Ayu Rukmini (Farida Pasha), to stop Herman’s intention to marry Mira. Ayu Rukmini takes her effort too far. Three Man in her order attacked Mira. In a horse barn she was raped and then hanged.
Mira does not find peace in death and her spirit rises up for vengeance. One by one she kills her murderers. Only Farel is left and feeling threatened, he then asks for help from a shaman. When Farel, the shaman, and Ayu Rukmini, are about to destroy the vengeful spirit of Mira, Herman, who has been visited by Mira’s spirit, goes to the police to report Mira’s vengeful act. The police do not believe him and instead suspect him. So Herman goes to Kyai Achmad (religious teacher) to ask for help. Kyai Achmad then takes Herman to Mira’s grave. The police secretly follow them. At the grave, they find Mira’s spirit being cornered by Farel and friends. Herman helps Mira’s spirit and has a duel with Farel. Farel dies. Ayu Rukmini tries to run away but she is captured by the police. Kyai Achmad then helps Mira’s spirit to find peace.

In the 70s and 80s created in Indonesia dozens of films about female spirits rise from the grave for revenge. A variant of this ghosts is the Sundel Bolong. (Wikipedia : In Javanese and Malaysian mythology, a Sundel Bolong is mythical ghost from the archipelago which is generally described as woman with beautiful long hair and a long white dress (her form is similar to Kuntilanak). The name and myth is closely linked to prostitutes, meaning a "prostitute with a hole in her", in reference to the large hole which is said to appear in her back. In folklore, sundel bolong is soul from the woman who died when she was pregnant, and she had given birth in the grave, or she died during childbirth and the baby is out from her back (this is the reason why the hole was created in her back). which is concealed from men by her long black hair. Sundel Bolong is also said to be a sensitive spirit and if rejected by men she is said to castrate them.)
For the first time filmed in 1981 as SUNDEL BOLONG with horror superstar Suzanna. There are still some more movies. Alone Suzanna played Sundel Bolong in two more movies namely in TELAGA ANGKER (1982) and MALAM SATU SURO (1982). There are also newer movies named LEGENDA SUNDEL BOLONG from 2007 and KAFAN SUNDEL BOLONG from 2011. To most of the movies listed here there are already reviews on the net. So i would like to present a relatively unknown movie on this subgenre. Here plays Joice Erna the Sundel Bolong. PEMBALASAN is not as good as the earlier films, but still watchable. There are actually no that spectacular scenes (a tongue is chewed off, a man being run over, a headshot etc.) but the atmosphere is already dark and creepy. Praiseworthy is also that he has not misplaced unnecessary comedy scenes, what mean that he is more serious. Is not bad, but the older movies are better.






and my vcd