Original subtitles

The following 33 videos were successfully prosecuted under the

Publications Act 1959.

However, following a series of acquittals, they were no longer deemed

result in a successful prosecution.

Therefore, they were eventually removed from the official Video Nasties list.

However, in the period before they were dropped, dealers could be prosecuted for

renting them.

Lucia Fulci's The Beyond.

This film was obviously banned because it is full of visceral gore and it has

lots of different baroque interpretations of the body and ways in

configure it. Things like melting flesh and of course the famous eyeless scene

where Sarah Keller gets her throat ripped out by her lovely dog Dickie. The

Beyond is one of my personal favourites. Obviously you can see I have a tattoo

of The Beyond.

And I think that one of the reasons The Beyond is

very important film in terms of art cinema, dare I say it, from Italian

is that Lucio Fulci said that he wanted to make an Arto film, which is a film

that reconfigures the body into a body without organs.

It's very interesting because even though The Beyond is very gory, it isn't

necessarily a violent film. There's not a lot of aggressive violence. It's

simply that when something happens to a body, it starts to metamorphose and

change.

And perhaps because it was incoherent in its narrative and in the way in which

the body was reconfigured, the BBFC were okay with it being at the cinema, but

then when it came out as a video, it was deemed a video nasty and it was cut by

1 minute and 34 before it was then banned.

The Beyond is, in general, a relatively incoherent film and one of the most

interesting elements is the final scene which has no narrative resolution and

Lucio Fulci's films often have no narrative resolution.

Another of his Italian horror films was City of the Living Dead and this has a

very ambiguous ending where a little child just runs out of a catacomb

screaming. Well, in The Beyond we have the two main characters and they come

into a wasteland that was created in a picture and what they find is...

no colour, no horizon, just a few generic bodies lying on the ground,

Lucio Fulci said in an interview that he went outside Paoli Studios in Rome and

he found some homeless people who were all drunk and he said, come inside and

we're going to put you on the floor and put you in a film. And so all of those

people there are not traditional actors. They are obviously special kinds of

homeless people actors from Rome. One of the main actresses in the film is

Catriona McColl and she was used by Lucio Fulci.

in another of the banned films, House by the Cemetery, and she was also used in

City of the Living Dead. So she became like his muse, and it's very interesting

because she's very prim, she's very blonde, and she's very British.

Yes. So she obviously took her Britishness and infiltrated the video

and maybe that's one of the reasons why we don't like to look at our thespians

doing such dirty, revolting things to themselves.

Who else is here?

Nobody here.

At the same time, she takes it very seriously, and I think that one

underestimate that Lucia Fulci's films are very serious in terms of their

artistic merit. They're not camp in any way. However, I think that you can

experience them as camp because they are high gore and high horror, and so one

has to wonder why, even after all the gore was cut out, the BBFC still found

this film too much for them to bear.

One can only imagine what people must have experienced when they found out

The Beyond was banned with the cuts and I'm sure that people diligently sourced

this copy and then they would still be faced with a film that...

didn't make sense because there would be huge leaps and montage gaps.

And so I think that people would probably imagine that the gore was quite

However, I don't think you can be prepared for the kind of gore that Lucio

creates because he really does show you what you think you're not going to see.

He never pulls away. And I think that his beautiful use of cinematography is

you're waiting for the camera to pull away and then go back so you can see

the... post -violence element, but actually the camera stays there and you

there with it. And it's very much a visceral romance between you and these

really heady gore scenes. So much blood, so much melting flesh, so many

violations of the eye, of the face, of the body. And these are really very

enigmatic things that people must have joyfully experienced when they first

discovered this marvellous little gem.

You are Liza, aren't you? Yes.

My name is Emily.

I've been looking for you.

Go back to where you came from and hurry.

Leave this place.

Sixty years ago, everybody in this hotel disappeared.

Every last person.

A painter called Spike,

who lived here, closeted in his room, had found a key.

All those accidents, you think you'll give it up now?

I couldn't do that if I wanted to.

Well,

I won't give in.

There's nobody here.

I can feel a presence. Somebody else is in here.

Oh, some weird story that Emily told me about room 36.

Emily?

Who is Emily?

The blind girl that lives in the old house by the crossroads.

This house was constructed on one of these...

Woe

be unto him who opens one of the seven gateways to hell, because through that

gateway, evil will invade the world.

What was the trend of the time in the early 80s? Halloween clones.

John Carpenter's landmark movie to influence so many of those calendar day

horrors. And here's one of the best.

The Bogeyman.

Directed by Uli Lommel.

When you were a child, did they warn you about the bogeyman?

The bogeyman.

He was from Germany. He directed Tenderness of the Wolves for Rainer

Fassbinder. And he moved to America when he married his wife, Susanna Love,

who's actually the star of The Bogeyman. He told me at the time, because I

actually did go to Los Angeles to interview him on this movie, that he saw

a cross between the arthouse horror of Europe and the American stalking

He hurt bad children and did terrible things to their mommies.

But you can't kill the boogeyman.

That's one of the reasons why it has a supernatural factor with the fact that

the maniac's soul is trapped in the mirror.

He felt the shard of glass and everything to do with the mirror would

a great cinematic image.

By the time they believe in him...

DPP failed to get a conviction on this movie because the BBFC had already

it as an ex -certificate, so they were on very dodgy ground with this one.

Despite the repeated scissor stabbing, the screwdriver through the head, the

pitchfork killing, these were all very well done. The murder set pieces, I

thought, were terrific.

Great style about this movie. It didn't deserve to be on the Video Nasties list,

and it's one of my favourites.

When you were a child...

Did they warn you about the Boogeyman?

The Boogeyman.

He hurt bad children.

And did terrible things to their mommies.

But you can't kill the Boogeyman.

Now, the most terrifying nightmare of childhood returns.

The Boogeyman.

The Boogeyman is going to get you.

And you.

And you.

It didn't scare me.

Had its own power.

The Boogeyman.

You can't hide from him.

By the time they believe in him, it'll be too late.

The Boogeyman.

He's going to get you.

Here we have Cannibal Terror.

which is regarded by those that have actually managed to sit through it all

one of the very worst examples of the cannibal genre. And you know what?

not wrong.

So who directed this film?

Well, it's a bit of a mystery, actually.

It would seem there could be several people to blame for this French -Spanish

-financed Eurocine travesty. Credited on most prints is a guy called Alan W.

Steve, which may be a pseudonym for Alain Durel, a former porno director who

also hides under the name of Alain Thierry.

Spanish prints credit a guy called Julio Perez Tabanero with direction, so it's

possible he's also partly to blame.

And to add to the confusion, actor Olivier Matho may also have had some

since he's also credited in some sources.

True small -time hoodlum.

They meet in the bar and plan kidnapping.

What we have here is a pair of thieves who abduct the young daughter of a

wealthy couple and, with busty babe in tow, hide out in the jungle and await

ransom fee.

Only the jungle is obviously woodland in Benidorm of some sort. Yes, it's that

bad. And to add a bit of ambience, we have loop jungle sounds which repeats

and over to the point of irritation, with the occasional shot of some badly

inserted stock footage of exotic birds and an alligator.

And it could have been an everyday story.

If it weren't for cannibal terror.

One of the trio is caught spying on their host wife and after a chase he

her upright in between two trees and rapes her. Only this scene is so badly

you can tell she isn't really tied up at all.

When her husband discovers what has happened, he tracks him down, ties him

tree and whistles for his cannibal chums to come over.

Family is devoured off -camera, although we do get to see what's left of it

later, which isn't much. And then we have the so -called cannibals, who look

more like a group of Europeans to me, fresh from an amateur face -painting

contest. Death lies in a horrifying wait for them all.

More horrible than anything you can imagine.

So cruel.

You can hardly bear it. They really are hilariously unconvincing.

All they think to do is hold spears and jump up and down. And in one shot of

them, someone leaps up, revealing a G -string hidden under his loincloth. Now,

not that I wasn't looking at that, you know.

And the gore, well, that's laughable too. Every time someone is captured by

cannibals, the following gut -munching scene cuts to a chowing down scene,

features an obvious pig carcass stuffed with all sorts of offal of some sort.

and in one shot you can even see its trotters.

Towards the end of the film, during another cannibal sequence, you get to

what is obviously the arm of a mannequin with the end covered in fake blood and

gore. It was shot in French and the English dubbing must have been done on

cheap because they've actually made no effort to sync it up to the lip

movements.

There's also a scene where a guy plays an acoustic guitar later in the film

which is also woefully dubbed. It's just ridiculous.

Rather surprisingly, though, it made its way onto the DPP's very first list of

17 nasties back in July 1983, only to be dropped in January of 1985 when it was

unsuccessfully prosecuted. Are you surprised?

I rather like the cover art on this one. It sums it up, up its trashiness quite

well. It even describes it as a fast -moving action film, so Christ knows

people thought when they watched this.

So is it worth a watch? Well, not really. It depends on your trash

levels.

Here's the trailer.

Cannibal terror

Lena,

a kind -hearted prostitute

True small -time hoodlums.

They meet in the bar and plan kidnapping.

What they want is money.

And it could have been an everyday story if it weren't for

cannibal terror.

Here.

a horrifying wait for them all. More horrible than anything you can imagine.

So cruel you can hardly bear it.

Cannibal terror.

We will never forget it.

Well, the Italians are expert at ripping off bigger budget Hollywood movies, and

contamination is actually an Italian rip -off of Alien, and it's also known as

Alien Contamination in some places.

Jim, they come from outer space.

Why not?

The film was directed by Luigi Cozzi, a protege of Dario Argento, who

unfortunately hasn't inherited the great maestro's directorial talent.

Anyway, the movie starts with a boat steaming into New York Harbor laden with

alien eggs.

I think this opening is a bit similar to the opening of Lucia Fulci's Zombie

Flesh Eaters. When these eggs burst, they cause people, anyone standing near

them, their stomach explodes.

But the effect is somewhat spoiled by the fact these eggs are just obviously

balloons. And when they pop, you know, the people just next to them pop as well

and in just as equally unconvincing fashion.

The plot of the movie concerns the alien invasion of Earth with all these eggs,

which seems to be run from a coffee factory somewhere in Colombia.

These were found here, on Earth.

Thousands of them.

Investigating this are sexy scientist Louise Marlowe.

You were telling the truth all along.

And good old Ian McCulloch, who of course was also the star of Lucia

Zombie Flesh Eaters, who plays a boozy astronaut.

There was absolutely nothing in there. My favourite scene in the film.

is when there's an alien egg placed in the shower with Louise Marlowe, and she

just seems to stand there and stare at it for ages, and you think, well, come

on, just step past it. That's what you or I would do.

But it's an amusing film, and really, looking at it nowadays, although it has

this one effect of people's stomachs popping open, which it uses to the

It just overuses too much. And because the whole thing is really so silly plot

-wise, it's hardly surprising that when it was reissued a few years ago by

Anchor Bay in the UK, the film was put out uncut and downgraded to a 15

certificate, which pretty much shows a sign of the times.

Not a soul in sight. Really weird.

They come from outer space.

Why not?

How many worlds are there in the universe?

Billions. Perhaps billions.

Unless they come from much closer, but...

Mars

has always stimulated man's imagination. But as far as that cave was concerned,

there was absolutely nothing in there.

You were telling the truth, all in all.

But these are photographs.

But there hasn't been another expedition to Mars. No.

These were found here, on Earth.

Thousands of them.

The woman is Stella Holmes, a first -class mind.

This gentleman and lady would like information about our coffee.

All your questions will be answered here.

It's too late.

Hamilton has got your friend.

Dead and Buried.

Dead and Buried is an odd film. I mean, it seems too glossy a production to be

on a video nasties list somehow.

There are scenes of violence in it, particularly one memorable scene of a

hypodermic being forced into a hospital patient's eye, which didn't do it any

favours in terms of its legal status.

But other than that, there are a number of key talents working on this movie,

which shift it out of the domain of mere exploitation movie.

This movie is blessed with three very creative talents working on it. First of

all, screenwriter Dan O 'Bannon, fresh from his genre -busting success with

Alien. And alongside him, a very, very underrated director, Gary Sherman, who

did the wonderful Brit 70s horror movie Deathline.

And Stan Winston is the third participant who provided the film with

major special effects.

They terrified you with the movie Alien.

Now the creators of Alien take you along the strangest road you've ever

travelled. A road with only one way in and no way out.

The terrors of Alien have come down to Earth. Dead and buried will take your

breath away.

All of it.

Dead and buried.

Now showing at a cinema near you. Check newspapers for details.

The film is in many respects very, very old -fashioned as a horror movie. It

concerns strangers or outsiders who are being brutally slaughtered in this

idyllic rural location of Potter's Bluff. Potter's Bluff.

A nice place to visit.

There's a number of startling scenes in the movie where outsiders are literally

courted and then ritually butchered. The opening is very, very startling where a

wandering photographer is first asked to seduce a young woman on the beach

before a group of residents appear, assault him and torch him with a petrol

And into this kind of maelstrom of violence wanders a hapless local

played by James Farentino. And we really get a sense of pervading paranoia that

he becomes increasingly aware that his residents, his townsfolk and even his

wife are involved with the violence and chaos that takes place.

Unlike many video nasties that were prosecuted in the 1980s, Dead and Buried

a real sense of plotting and character development.

We learn far before the central character does that the actual residents

idyllic rural town are actually dead and reanimated and are under the power of a

dark mortician named Dodd. So we really get a sense of pervading helplessness.

and fatality that will eventually catch up with us here. And I think that really

helps our engagement with Dead and Buried.

What makes Dead and Buried so underrated and so

influential is that it actually contains many of the features that we associate

with so -called postmodern horror that swept America in the 1990s. This idea of

referencing other horror movies. So there's clear nods to both Invasion of

Body Snatchers and Night of the Living Dead, particularly in the finale of the

film where all of the undead townsfolk surround Farentino's character and he

himself finds out that he's dead too.

Alongside this, the use of location is very interesting. It seems as though you

have 1940s film noir.

right up against contemporary 1980s American rural locations, which is very,

very interesting, something that Sherman explored in his earlier movie, Death

Line, where you get Victorian London meeting 1970s swing in London.

Dead and buried.

The movie you'll want to see.

If you dare to look.

Bury me!

So far from being just a minor video nasty.

I think dead and buried is both infamous and influential

From the creators of alien terror

brought down to earth Fear so intense

it will stay with you to the grave and beyond

Welcome to Potter's Bluff

Yeah, what are you doing?

Two murders, Dobbs. Both strangers.

Two murders in a town no bigger than a poster stand.

When you die in Potter's Bluff, expect the unexpected.

Why just lie still?

I'm going to give you something.

It's going to make you feel even better.

What the hell is going on in this town?

My caromaniac is loose up there. First murderous, now body snatching. My God, I

can't believe it.

Potter's Bluff.

A nice place to visit.

whatsoever to reanimate people after they have died.

Oh, so lovely.

So frail. So young. How could anyone mar such loveliness?

Yeah.

I will make you beautiful again.

Even more beautiful than before.

You can only make me dead.

Go on.

Pull the trigger.

Perhaps you need a little more motivation.

Dad, I'm dead.

Please bury me.

Dead and Buried.

The movie you'll want to see.

If you dare to look.

Hi, my name's Brad Stevens, and I'm going to be talking about Toby Hooper's

Death Trap, one of the more curious entries on the Video Nasties list.

Here you see the cover of the VIPCO video release.

It had originally been released by a company called VCL.

The VCL version was the version cut, I think, by the BBFC.

But this release was almost uncut. It certainly contained all the violent

scenes. I say it's one of the more curious entries on the list, because you

to remember, Toby Hooper had made the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which is

absolutely notorious, and it was banned by the British censor.

Death Rap was almost completely uncontroversial. It was released in

There were some minor censor cuts.

And yet it was Death Rap and not the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which ended up

the Video Nasties list.

And also another even less controversial Toby Hooper film called The Funhouse

ended up on the list.

Death Trap is known by a number of titles. In America, it's called Eaten

which presumably leads to a lot of confusion with the Umberto Lenzi film

the same title. It's also called Starlight Slaughter and a whole variety

other titles. I don't even know how many of these titles actually ended up on a

print. Get ready for Starlight Slaughter.

Hello?

No guest has ever checked out of the Starlight Hotel, a house of terror.

This girl doesn't know it yet, but she is headed for Horror Hotel.

Marty Rustin presents Horror Hotel, the new classic in screen fright.

A very interesting cast, in fact one of the best casts for any film that was

included on the Video Narcissist list. Neville Brand, who was not only a well

-known actor, but was one of the most heavily decorated soldiers in World War

II.

plays the serial killer, quite appropriately, given the themes that

exploring.

Stuart Whitman appears in a small role as a sheriff.

The film is actually, in a way, a variation on Psycho, and Whitman was one

the runners -up for, I think it was Martin Balsam's role in Psycho.

Marilyn Burns, who was in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, turns up again in

And very interestingly, Robert Englund, who would of course go on to play Freddy

Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street films, has a small but quite prominent

role in the film.

Hooper would later work with Englund again on a couple of films, including

Mangler and the very underrated Night Terrors, in which Englund played the

Marquis de Sade.

Created by Toby Hooper, the maker of that horror classic, The Texas Chainsaw

Massacre. One thing this film has in common with the Texas Chainsaw Massacre

that, relatively, it's the monster, the villain, who is the center of sympathy,

or at least the center of interest.

The various victims are almost completely uncharacterized.

The exception in Texas Chainsaw is the crippled Franklin, who, in a way, ends

becoming the mirror image of Leatherface.

This pattern is repeated in Death Trap with actually greater coherence in the

character of Roy, the character played by William Finlay, who is ostensibly a

representative of the world of normality, and yet who is clearly every

insane as Judd, the serial killer played by Neville Brand.

Job is in many ways connected to the pioneers of America's past, living by

himself in the modern version of a log cabin, decorated with an American flag,

and very much an inheritor of those rugged He -Man traditions.

But also, of course, as I say, he's a serial killer.

Horror hotel, you check in alive, but check out dead.

And one of the most splendid moments in the film has him walking around his

living room striking heroic poses, while a country and western song with the

lyric, a cowboy is true to his word, plays on the soundtrack.

And this idea that horror can be traced to America's pioneer past is something

we see very often in Toby Hooper's work. In Poltergeist, we're told that the

house is being haunted because it's buried on the site of an Indian burial

ground. And most interestingly, in Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, The cannibal

family of the first film have moved into an abandoned amusement park, which is

decorated with images of heroic cowboys from American mythology.

And the family, in fact, depend their activities by reference to standard

capitalist practice.

If you were one of the millions of moviegoers who were electrified by the

unbearable suspense and sheer terror of Jaws, get ready for a death trap.

Death Rats presence on the video Nazis list is rather mysterious.

It is more violent than the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but frankly, that

saying very much.

There are several scenes in which a child is placed in peril.

And I know some people have speculated that that may be the reason that it

up on the list.

That's quite possible.

I think at a certain point, titles were being added to the list at random

because they were in a certain genre.

I think quite possibly because the film was released by Vipco, who were already

notorious for several of their other titles, most particularly The Driller

Killer.

I think it's worth pointing out as well that, as with their release of The

Driller Killer, Vipco's tape of Death Trap was uncut in terms of violent

content, but was missing several minutes of dialogue.

The missing scene focuses on William Finley's character, Roy, and shows him

coming close to strangling his wife.

It's actually a very important scene because it shows just how close the

normality represented by Roy is to the insanity of the serial killing Judd.

What happens to these people in Eaten Alive will give you the most chilling,

terrifying 90 minutes you've ever spent in a theatre. The trailer of the film

that you'll see on this DVD does not actually have the title as Death Track.

has it as Eaten Alive, which is, of course, the American title, and quite

prominently mentions the producer, Marty Rustam.

Marty Rustam presents a new horror classic, Eaten Alive.

Hooper had had a falling out with Rustam at some point during the production, so

that may explain why his name appears so prominently on the trailer.

If you were one of the millions of moviegoers who were electrified by the

unbearable suspense and pure terror of Jaws, get ready for Eaten Alive.

Eaten Alive!

Created by Toby Hooper.

maker of the screen sensation The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Marty Rushton presents a new horror classic, Eaten Alive.

Into this house of terror comes a handful of unsuspecting innocents.

Hello?

What happens to these people in Eaten Alive will give you the most chilling,

terrifying 90 minutes you've ever spent in a theater.

So here's the 1972 movie that started the whole exploitation cannibal craze in

Italy. Deep River Savages by Umberto Lenzi. It says here, from the makers of

chart -topping film Cannibal, not true. That, of course, was Ruggero Diodato,

and this one, as I said, is by Umberto Lenzi. Lenzi would return to the

genre later on in his career with Cannibal Ferox and Eaten Alive. And at

time, cannibalism didn't really feature that much in this movie, also known as

Man From Deep River.

That man is Ivan Rasimov, who plays a photographer who's adopted by the local

cannibal tribe.

They didn't know what kind of animal he was.

They'd never seen a white man before.

And he had never seen such brutality.

Part of his initiation rite is to eat monkey brains from a just -sliced -off

head of a monkey.

Also, there's another scene in the movie where he's sort of strung up, very much

like that scene in A Man Called Horse and uses a human dartboard.

His tribal bride was played by Mimi Lai, famous in Britain for being a hostess

on Bob Monkhouse's quiz show The Golden Shot.

Apart from the monkey scene, there was an alligator being gutted for real,

was a mongoose attacking a snake, all which sort of led the DPP to really come

down heavily on this movie. It was rejected outright in 1975 when it was

submitted under the title The Man From Deep River. But apart from that... came

out completely uncut on Duran video, standing for Derek and Anne.

Thailand.

A country where two -thirds of the jungle is still unexplored.

Here, death reigns.

They didn't know what kind of animal he was. They'd never seen a white man

before.

And he had never seen such brutality.

You murderers!

Murderers!

Barbaric violence was the law they lived by.

A long series of bloodthirsty tortures had begun.

human being like you.

I'm a man, not a fish.

Just help me to find a canoe.

No, along the river.

Kukuru tribe live there.

Cannibal tribe.

This world, civilization, became no more than a memory.

In the jungle, only the strongest survived.

Here we have Delirium, another sort of bewildering entry on this title. It's no

different from dozens of other kind of cop, psycho pictures. It's not even

particularly well represented.

I mean, there is a psycho killer in it, but that's a subplot. It's basically a

vigilante story about an organization of mad Vietnam vets punishing criminals

who've escaped justice.

But I think its problem can be discerned from the back jacket coffee, presumably

written by somebody who, apart from anything else, gets most of the names of

actors wrong.

The description concludes with this sentence.

Unfortunately, Charlie is out of control, killing wherever he finds a

Included are drowning a hitchhiker, running a pitchfork through the neck of

young farm girl, and hacking to death a delivery man with a meat cleaver. Now...

All of those things do happen in this film. However, they don't happen in

the lurid, gloating, last house on the left way that would otherwise land

it on the video nasties list. I mean, they're all brief, bloodless,

suspenseless, not terribly well -directed ridiculousness sequences

than hard -driving, upsetting horror.

But I think the whole point of The Nasties was to crack down on the

the cover images, and here I think the sleeve copy.

There's a sort of footnote to this film which actually rendered it unworkable as

a British release, and that's that the evil vigilante group's signature tune is

a library track called Approaching Menace.

which here is better known as the theme from the quiz show Mastermind.

So every time the villains are plotting to go out and commit their vigilante

acts, that ba -ba -ba -ba theme is playing. And, of course, everybody in

started doing our started -so -I'll -finish jokes while watching this.

And I imagine watch the rest of the film through a haze of beer -induced

giggling.

The idea that this was ever confrontational or upsetting is kind of

You sort of wonder who watched this film, who made this complaint.

It was on the nasties list for quite a while, although it did disappear.

Delirium. Coming soon to a theatre or drive -in near you.

There were two sleeves for this. This is... just stills with some writing on

there was one which was artwork inspired by the film which is to say artwork

misrepresenting is a much more exciting and gruesome film than it is the thing

is this is the actual psycho killer in the film that's not the bald guy is the

the psycho killer's boss

If you took 16 seconds out of it and re -released it as Psycho Puppet, which did

happen, then it became a completely inoffensive ordinary horror picture,

is what, frankly, it always was.

And it did come out again, but it actually didn't make any waves. It

completely twice.

On the 27th, 1973, the United States and North Vietnam signed a peace treaty,

bringing to an end the senseless killing.

But for some, the war didn't end.

The battlefields may have changed, but the killing continued.

Not about Vietnam, but about some of the men who survived.

And the point of stress that the human mind can...

an innocent girl.

This organization was formed to protect the innocent.

Friends?

Delirium. Coming soon to a theater or drive -in near you.

Don't Go In The House.

In a steel room built for revenge, they die burning in chains.

Now, that's a come -on, if ever there was one. Don't Go In The House, one of

favourite American horror films from the late 70s, early 80s era, when there

were so many of them being made. Also one of the most reviled.

So many bad reviews.

I interviewed the director, Joseph Ellison, and he said when it came out,

could count the good reviews on one hand easily.

And he said that the bad reviews were vehement. They were so anti the film.

I think Robin Wood, you know, the esteemed Robin Wood, said, don't go in

house, can be said to represent the slasher cycle at its most debased.

Well, that's catnip, isn't it? You've got to see it.

Whatever you do, don't go in the house.

Now, this played in British cinemas with its most shocking scene gone.

And it's a shocking scene that the movie builds up to with a great deal of

emphasis and a lot of skill.

And it's gone. So it's an incredibly frustrating experience in British

I did see it. Fortunately, I'd already seen it on video from arcade video

in its uncut form.

Now, this is a film that has not attracted a lot of defenders.

But I've always been very passionate about this film. I think it's a really

great film.

It's about a disturbed young man, rather kind of Norman Bates -ish.

He's been tormented by an extremely abusive mother in his childhood.

He was raised in isolation.

You're a bad boy.

Instructed in fear.

You're evil and you must be punished.

He still lives with her in this rambling old house, and when she dies, he has

the house to himself, and he turns it over to his thick little games, which

involve abducting women.

and taking them up to a room which is purpose -built upstairs, which is

clad in steel sheets, where he ties them up naked and sets fire to them with a

flamethrower.

Well, they do call them horror films.

It's meant to be horrific, and by God, it is. This has got things that, even

people who've watched a lot of exploitation movies, rather take you

particular, the one...

standout scene involving the burning of a naked woman, the one scene that you

see it from beginning to end, is absolutely jaw -dropping. It's

the effects are so good that at the time it was a puzzle to see how it was done.

It was actually done using a prism, I believe, and it was done in camera.

So you had the fire there and the victim there, and then the camera would sort

of superimpose the two via some sort of mirrored device.

Joseph Ellison, the director, said that even on set, when they were shooting

this scene, he was there, he'd written the scene, the actress was there, they

were chit -chatting, then it became time to prepare the shot, they got the fire

going, and he looked down the viewfinder of the camera and went...

It looked convincing even in the room. With all of the mechanics of cinema

around to reduce the impact, he said, when I looked down the viewfinder, he

it was quite shocking to see how convincing that image was.

And when you shout action and the actress starts screaming and writhing,

the whole impact obviously goes up another notch.

And soon he'll share the terrifying secret behind this door in the Room of

Steel. Apart from that one scene, though, the rest of the horror in the

more suggestive. It's more to do with mood. It's a very melancholic film.

And something really interesting about it as well is that it's a film about a

serial killer that presents the killer as a pathetic, lonely

failure in life.

Now he has come of age.

His suffering has ended.

And ours?

It's about to begin.

No way can you watch the film and think, yes, I love serial killers, they're

great.

He's a cluck, and he manages to abduct women more by good luck and

kind of wheedling persistence rather than having some sort of Hannibal Lecter

master plan. So quite a responsible treatment of the character, I think.

It's also a lot more artful than people give it credit for.

In a film where the killer is burning people, it's interesting that the

predominant colour in the film is blue, frequently dark blue. And the colour

scheme and the lighting all kind of work to create this contrast.

So, you know, you've got a... It's a simple aesthetic, but it's an aesthetic.

It's about, you know, in a film about a person who murders people by burning

them to death, it's fascinating that the rest of the film feels like it was shot

in a fridge.

Don't go in the house, because the people who live there aren't people

So, you know, the film has a very strong visual aesthetic, and this is partly

due to Ellison's intentions for the film, and he had worked it out in

but it's also down to the fact that he had a very good DP called Oliver Wood,

who had shot The Honeymoon Killers for Leonard Castle. It was a great film, a

black -and -white film.

and who has now gone on to mega productions such as The Bourne Automatum

Bourne Conspiracy, I think. He worked on two of the Bourne films.

So he's now one of the top -flight DPs in Hollywood, and he got his start, or

least in his early days, he was shooting films like Don't Go In The House.

So it's not making too extravagant a claim for Don't Go In The House to say

the visual side of it and the photography is actually of note. Now, it

originally going to be called The Burning.

That was the original title, and in fact it got as far as having some stills

made for release under that title. But then the filmmakers found out that

another movie was about to be released that was going to get onto the market

first, already using the title Burning, which, interestingly enough, also ended

up on the banned list.

I think it was made by an early version of Miramax.

It was actually shot, I think, as The Burning Man. The original script was

called The Burning Man, and there are some photographs.

taken on set, where the clapperboard and the film canisters have the title of

the burning man on the side.

Don't go in the house.

But if you do, don't say we didn't warn you.

Now, Ellison also tells a story that gives you some idea of the kind of

reception that this film had, which involves a trip that Ellison took to the

cinema to go and see...

his own movie with an audience.

And it was released exactly around the same time as Friday the 13th.

And Ellison said he went to a cinema in New York, a two -screen cinema, Friday

the 13th, ducked in the house.

I thought, great, market research, go and see how the film's going down. So he

said he went into Friday the 13th, stood at the back, and said...

Going down gangbusters, you know, couples screaming and clutching each

cheering, yelling, kind of cries and, you know, punching the air, you know,

name it. You know, a really good, lively response from the audience. And the

film was obviously very, very popular.

Went into Don't Go In The House.

Visible audience, still plenty of people in there.

Not a peep, not a fan.

He said, you realise immediately that he'd made sort of like a completely

different horror.

film to the one that he'd been thinking he might have made. It was not going to

have the kind of brash, energetic sort of vibe that something like Friday the

13th had. He'd made essentially a real downer, you know, a kind of very

downbeat, you know, really kind of sobering movie.

When the violent scenes turned up in Don't Go In The House, it was dead

silence, not a sound, no one cheering.

No girls clutching their dates, you know, it was all just like... So he knew

that he'd made something that was a little bit unusual, perhaps.

In this house, 25 years ago, a child was given life.

Donald, come here!

He was raised in isolation.

You're a bad boy.

Instructed in fear.

You're evil and you must be punished.

Imprisoned by a tormented mind.

Your father let you do things like that, but he's gone now!

and baptized in flame.

Now he has come of age.

His suffering has ended, and ours is about to begin.

You hear that, old lady?

I'll punish you again!

If you would be spared from the fury of his vengeance, whatever you do...

Don't go in the house.

Stairway by stairway, he draws you closer to madness.

Oh, God!

And soon, he'll share the terrifying secret behind this door

in the Room of Steel.

Don't make me do anything bad, Mother.

Don't go in the house, because the people who live there are...

Don't go in the house.

But if you do, don't say we didn't warn you.

Don't go in the house.

Well, Don't Go Near the Park, you can't say they didn't warn you. This is a very

unmemorable vampire flick. This is a movie which opens with the quote, This

is fiction, but is based on actual occurrences that have happened over the

centuries. So, whatever that means.

Don't go near the park.

Any film with don't in the title seemed to automatically flag itself up as a

video nasty back in the day anyway. There was like, don't go in the house,

go in the woods, or...

Don't bother to waste your money renting this film.

There were plenty of them. And in fact, of course, it was spoofed by Edgar

Wright in his Grindhouse trailer of a couple of years back.

Since the dawn of time, man has been plagued by the evil curse of the lusting

vampires. As for the plot, well, after a prologue in which a curse of eternal

damnation is placed on some annoying kids, we move forward.

some 12 000 years or so to find the kids are still around and they're surviving

on a diet of ripped open stomachs but unfortunately the centuries have done

little to sharpen up their acting skills this part

is not for play most of the gore in here is centered around disemboweling scenes

which seem to be the things that got the DPP all worked up into a lather. But

unfortunately, the effects are so poor that it doesn't really seem to matter

anyway. I mean, it's just ridiculous.

It's very, very cheaply made, and it's probably... The main claim to fame now

it features a very early role for Linnea Quigley, the famous Scream Queen star

of films like Return of the Living Dead and Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers.

Linnea Quigley plays this brat called Bondi who's got an amulet which makes...

Rapists explode.

So, with a plot like that, you probably need to be on some kind of medication to

enjoy this, but I know some of you out there are, so enjoy.

Since the dawn of time, man has been plagued by the evil curse of the lusting

vampires.

The living dead have risen again.

Don't go near the park.

Keep out.

This part is not for playing.

The horrible truth will curdle your blood.

They rise from the grave to wreck their ritualistic vengeance on the living.

Zombies on a rampage of blood and terror.

Don't go near the park.

The gruesome reality more shocking than your most horrifying nightmares.

There is no escape from the supernatural fiend and stop yourself.

Beware. You have been warned.

Keep out.

This park is not for playing.

Don't go near the park.

Coming soon.

Don't look in the basement.

One of the ubiquitous don't films.

I love this movie.

I love this filmmaker. He made four movies.

I think they're all fantastic.

This is the only really gory one of the four.

It's a cut version, so it's not as gory as the full version, which we didn't see

for many, many years, but finally turned up.

Advertised with a strapline so casual and so subtle that you just have to love

it. A feeling of unease crept over her. What a great ad line.

Don't.

Don't look in the basement.

Don't Look in the Basement was directed by a Texas -based director called S .F.

Brownrigg.

And he'd got his start working with Larry Buchanan in the 60s as a sound

And then in the early 1970s, he made four movies, as it turns out, within

less than two years of each other.

Now, the reason I sound so surprised by that is that for many years, we accepted

different dates for the films he made, which were spread between 1972 and 1979

in one case.

So research has indicated that... In actual fact, they were all made in a

short space of time and then kind of dribbled out over several years because

they had trouble finding a distributor, the later ones.

Even though this is the only one that touched the video nasty list, I strongly

recommend to anyone that they check out the others as well. Poor White Trash

Part 2, or Scum of the Earth, I think, is the other title.

Don't Open the Door and Keep My Grave Open. All strange, moody.

very atmospheric and well worth seeking out. Don't Look in the Basement is the

only one that has got a real strong exploitation element to it. The violence

quite OTT.

And the setup is great. It's a very, very progressive asylum which believes

in no boundaries between the mentally ill who are being

incarcerated and the staff.

mentally ill are allowed to, say, for instance, work out their frustrations by

laying into a giant log with an axe, you know, whilst their therapist stands

and coos approvingly on the sidelines.

And, well, you can see where that's going, can't you?

So it doesn't take long before this radical therapeutic regime goes off the

rails rather drastically.

On the day the insane took over the asylum.

But then it turns into a sort of a mystery because it moves on from this

axe killing and a pretty girl arrives at the asylum

as a new staff member and she's interviewed by the head of the asylum

informs her of the progressive regime.

But there's something a little odd about everyone, not just the people

incarcerated there, but also the staff seem a little odd as well.

Dr Masters, who has her own idea of the gentle art of healing.

What makes it interesting, beyond the fact that it's quite gory, is the fact

that it's also very well acted. And this is something that you find in all of

Branwick's films. He was drawing on a repertory cast who were theatre actors.

And he worked with the same actors in all four of his films, turning up over

over again.

And they're all very good. And there's a tone, a tonal

style to his films which unites them, which always makes the director

interesting, obviously, if you can unite, if they seem to have a united

focus to their work.

Don't look in the basement.

from Hallmark Releasing Corporation.

This is another one of the films that was distributed by the company Hallmark

who had, you know, a huge sort of exploitation hit with Last House on the

Last House on the Left, of course, now has been rehabilitated and it's a film

that even people who normally wouldn't go near graphic horror have kind of

decided... It's entered the pantheon.

You're now allowed to like Last House on the Left, whereas, you know...

Back in 1982, when these films were on the shelves, you were a thick -twitted

pervert for even arguing that there was anything valuable in Last House on the

Left.

Stephen King, no less, referred to Last House on the Left as the work of morons

with cameras, I think he said.

So even the horror people didn't necessarily like it. Anyway, Hallmark

the ad line from Last House on the Left several times for various films.

Because it was such a successful marketing campaign to avoid fainting,

repeating, it's only a movie, it's only a movie, it's only a movie.

That's the classic advertising campaign for Last House on the Left, which worked

so well that they used it on about another ten films.

And this is one of the beneficiaries of that recycling.

So, you know, just in case you'd forgotten that it was all just a movie,

reminded you again.

Don't look in the basement.

The makers of Last House on the left warn you again.

To avoid fainting, keep repeating.

It's only a movie.

Only a movie.

Only a movie.

The line between sanity and madness can be crossed.

In a single step.

And with this step, you enter the nightmare world of terror.

On the day the insane took over the asylum.

Judge Caban, whose iron self -control hides the urge to kill.

Harriet, a mother's love, twisted into the malignant shape of evil.

The sergeant.

living in the hell of an aimless war, fighting a battle within himself that he

lost long ago.

Allison, in a desperate need for love, an obsession that could drive her to

murder.

Danny, whose sense of humor triggers a violent act of revenge.

Dr. Masters.

who has her own idea of the gentle art of healing.

Aunt Charlotte, who left the world of sanity and security only to be trapped

the nightmare world of madness, a nightmare she cannot escape.

They all met on the day the insane took over the asylum.

Don't look in the basement.

From Hallmark Releasing Corporation Rated R

The

Evil Dead The Evil Dead got a release Cinematically and on video on the same

day, which is a very interesting element of the times that were happening with

video, that people were taking the personal and the public very

It is an unusual case, The Evil Dead, not just because it was the debut

of somebody who was a really important filmmaker, Sam Raimi, but because it was

distributed by Palace, who were a young, up -and -coming company.

backing Neil Jordan's films and about to become a bit of a player on the British

film scene. And also because, basically, Steve Woolley was bloody minded enough

to fight this through the court. It became a sort of a test case. And so,

therefore, The Evil Dead, which is plainly a horror comedy. It goes a bit

far sometimes, but that's sort of its job. But it became a kind of totemic.

video nasty and actually it may well be one of the few films that delivers that

kind of relentless grueling onslaught of terror promised by the ad campaigns of

video nasties stephen king author of carrie said evil dead is the most

ferociously original horror film of the year if you think he's kidding see for

yourself

My first experience of Evil Dead was based on the phenomenon, which was, have

you seen Evil Dead? Evil Dead.

They got up on the wrong side of the grave.

And for my 12th birthday, I had a slumber party with 15 girls and we

video machine, top loading, of course, and we rented the Evil Dead and we all

sat around terrified.

But it was more about a kind of...

a passing over into adulthood of gore film because one always had to say, have

you seen Evil Dead?

And when Demons came out, the front cover in Australia said, leave Evil Dead

dead.

Evil Dead is a strange film because it meshes zombies and the occult and it

has a beautiful take on the shiny, shiny, all -American little group of

that go into the cabin to do things they obviously shouldn't be doing. Your

girlfriend, you take care of her.

However, the people, the characters in the film are very naive and the

relationships they have with each other are intensely romantic and quite sweet.

And so it's a very different kind of teenagers go into the woods to get up to

shenanigans than, say, Friday the 13th.

There is a beauty in Evil Dead based purely on things like the

and Sam Raimi has continued to show that in films such as Drag Me to Hell and

Spider -Man, in that the use of the camera becomes the most important

It's not so much about what you're seeing, but how you see it. So he

things like sped -up camera, like still -framing camera, like extraordinary

shots that go through houses and up and down trees and so forth, and also the

use of stop -motion when the zombies all explode. at the end is much more

reminiscent of a Ray Harryhauser film than of something that is a bucket of

blood.

And I think it may well be one of the films that sort of united the

fans and the film art fans.

Because I remember it was another one of the early films I reviewed.

So it was a sort of film that...

Yeah, young alternative type critics really got behind in a way that they

couldn't get behind. Don't go in the woods.

No, it was the woods themselves.

They're alive, Ashley.

Probably the scene that most people remember is when Ellen Sandweiss runs

the bushes and she is raped by a tree.

And, of course, this relates to the hilarious concept of one getting a root.

The tree pulls apart her leg.

..and trails up vaguely, and one has to wonder what the tree is thinking and

why, indeed, we are having an image where a tree is raping a woman. And I

what Sam Raimi has done is he's invested this kind of notion of possession into

things that are both alive and dead, things that are animate and reanimate,

organic and inorganic, and it all comes from this notion of the book as the

word.

Bruce Campbell, of course, has gone on to become an intensely famous icon in

horror cinema, and he became this way through a shift from being a so -called

actor, one could argue, to the high -camp, almost slapstick actor that he

became in Evil Dead 2, which is essentially a more elaborate, comedic

Evil Dead than an actual sequel.

It seems ironic that Sam Raimi is, of course, now one of the most famous

directors in Hollywood, and he is the person that is sought to do very, very

budget and also big conceptual films such as Spider -Man. And he has created

lot of superhero films, and indeed he's made Bruce Campbell a kind of superhero.

Whereas back in 1983, this film was considered a grotty little piece of...

awful work and it also reminds me because Sam Raimi was very resourceful

this film on little money because he liked to create things and do things

independently

And it makes me think of resonances between another very famous big

director now, Peter Jackson, who his first film, Bad Taste, was also an

individual with very little money who was using very creative resources in

to make a vision of a film that is essentially about the artistry as much

about the content.

I think Steve Woolley did the industry a service by actually fighting for his

films. Most distributors didn't. Most distributors dropped them like hot

potatoes or were willing to... accept whatever cuts the BBFC were willing to

offer and shove them out on the market again.

Most video distributors, frankly, didn't care what they had.

The thing about Palace is that it was a company run by movie buffs and, God

bless them, they saw the Evil Dead early on for what it was. They recognized

that Sam Raimi was a really talented guy and they were willing to stand up in

court and defend them. I mean, the court transcripts and those court cases are

just... hilarious when you get to them. I mean, Sam Raimi practically does a

stand -up act about what it was like going through the British courts.

He'd rehearsed his speech, which he said couldn't help but come out like William

Shatner as Captain Kirk.

What is freedom of expression?

What is that artistic?

And by the time it got to them, the judges just weren't interested in

that anymore.

She's your girlfriend. You take care of her.

Frozen Scream. This is one of those movies I've no idea why this, of dozens

other similar titles, got on the Video Nasties list.

You have to say, well, there are some scenes in which women are menaced by a

killer.

But, hey, how many films can you think of that don't feature women being

by a killer? It was produced by Renee Harmon, who also played the peculiarly

accented... mad scientist sidekick who has a complicated character arc.

You'll feel a little cold for a while, but no pain, I promise.

So, yeah, she obviously insisted on getting a bit of acting work. It has the

same droning, dreadful music score that's in Don't Go Into the Woods. So if

watch them back to back, I imagine your head will explode from the musical

atrocity inflicted on you.

It's one of the... This was quite common in the...

the early video era.

The back sleeve has a complete synopsis of the film. I mean spoilers,

everything. The German version of the movie apparently has a voiceover because

nobody could follow the plot.

Here you just had to read the back of the sleeve and you would be able to

the plot such as it is, which is to do with cryogenics making people immortal

but also

stripping them of their souls.

There's a Wes Craven TV movie later called Chiller which has a very similar

idea, but it's basically just an excuse for turning people into killer zombies.

There's some bizarre ritual chanting on a beach by robed maniacs and there's a

lengthy party scene in which a band who are presumably friends of the

production, you know, do several numbers to pad out the running time. Otherwise

I can't believe anybody is even interested in this film all these years

If it had not been on the Video Nasties list I think it would be utterly

forgotten. As it is, it's mostly forgotten.

Frozen Scream was actually on the Video Nasty's list for two whole months.

And you know what? It doesn't even hold the record there, because Unhinged was

on the list for only a month.

So this is the second briefest banned horror film of the Video Nasty era.

It's not even the briefest banned horror film. It didn't even take that title.

It is the most Frozen Screamiest Frozen Scream movie ever made, but that's it.

Tell him it's urgent.

Life and death.

Judgment day. Time to pay your dues.

And... And... One sound and you've had it.

a message from Tom.

He says that hell is very cold and lonely.

All men are mortal. All men must die.

The Greek letter theta stands for thanatos, the word for death.

The bar above it cancels its meaning.

Potentially, each one of us is a thanatos, immortal.

Death is a stage we can conquer. It is curable.

We can live forever.

The Fun House was Universal's first big -budget horror movie in years. They

entrusted it to the director of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which probably

wasn't the wisest thing to do because it promptly ended up on the Nazis list.

In fact, Toby Hooper, because he was making The Fun House, he missed out on

chance of directing E .T., which was offered to him by Steven Spielberg. So

Spielberg thought, oh, well, I'll go and do that instead. No doubt his

accountant, Toby Hooper's accountant, wasn't too happy about that because the

film didn't do that well.

Who will dare deface the challenge?

It's set in a funhouse, a carnival funhouse, where a bunch of teens, led by

Elizabeth Berridge, get trapped after witnessing the murder of fortune teller

Sylvia Miles by a cleft -headed albino who dresses himself in a Frankenstein

mask. Something is alive in the funhouse.

Something not alive like its father.

Something better dead.

There's some confusion as to why...

Funhouse ended up on the list anyway because it was released at Cinemas Uncut

and from a major studio whereas most of the video nasties are very low budget

movies I think the possibility is that the DPP thought well this is by the guy

who did the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and it was advertised that way and they

figured it was yet another Texas Chainsaw -type movie. The Funhouse. It's

carnival of terror from Toby Hooper, the director who terrified you with the

Texas Chainsaw Massacre. But the ironic thing is, of course, that Texas Chainsaw

Massacre itself was never actually on the Video Nasties list.

A lot of people seem to forget that.

It's also been confused, in some places it's been confused with a film called

The Last House on Dead End Street, which was also known as The Fun House.

Although this film got very, very small release, it certainly would have been on

the nasties list if it had been more widely seen, because it had a lot of

slaughterhouse footage in it.

But as it is, The Fun House is a good old -fashioned horror romp, which you'll

see from the trailer.

To face the challenge of the monster.

Who is mad enough to enter that world of darkness?

Something is alive in the funhouse.

Something not alive like its father. Something better dead.

Something that has the form of a human, but not the face.

This better be good. It's going to be great.

Something that feeds off the flesh and blood.

Come on, here we go. This is it.

Something that tonight will turn the funhouse into a carnival of terror.

I don't know what that's going to be.

I just want to get the hell out of here.

The Fun House, coming soon from Universal Pictures. The Fun House, it's

carnival of terror from Toby Hooper, the director who terrified you with the

Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Well, there's not actually much to say about Human Experiments. It got on the

list. I would suspect, because it was hauled in with the big net that was set

out to trap SS Experiment Camp, and it had experiment on the label.

Actually, it's a women in prison picture with a kind of very minor mad science

subplot. Somewhere between medicine and witchcraft, somewhere between justice

and vengeance, someone is performing human experiments.

It's not particularly terrible. It's not particularly great either.

Looking at the cover, I think that bit of clip art comes from the 1956 version

of 1984.

Those are, in fact, big brother's eyes who are watching this woman here, who is

one of the human experiments.

The trailer has that great line, you know, somebody is watching human

experiments. In fact, not many people were.

It notionally had a theatrical release.

came out it was around as a title for a while in the early days of video if it

hadn't been on the video nastiest list i doubt if anybody would ever remember it

now the only looking at it there's one one

It's got some quite interesting people in it.

Aldo Ray is in it.

Jackie Coogan, Uncle Fester, is in it.

Ellen Travolta, sister of the more famous John.

And Geoffrey Lewis, father of the more famous Juliet, are in it. These things

happen, even in the best of prisons.

What happened to Rachel Foster was the ultimate fear.

Human experiments.

Geoffrey Lewis and John Travolta, those famous Scientologists. I don't know if

that has anything to do with this.

There is a conspiracy theory actually that says that one of the things that

Scientology really hates is psychiatry because they see it as a rival.

And so there's lots of thought.

talk about the quackery of psychiatry. And this is, of course, about mad

psychiatrists. So if you believe that L. Ron Hubbard is out there influencing

films, you could perhaps argue that this is expressing a deep and rather

sinister belief system. However, the notion that this is expressing anything

serious is sort of laughable.

In six months, you'll be a different human being.

This is a film that was on the very first video nasties list and it stayed

for the next four iterations of the list. I assume then somebody watched it

because it was dropped thereafter and never resurfaced again.

This is Rachel Foster.

Dazzling.

Defiant. Sheriff, he's trying to cheat me.

Destined to be free.

But somewhere up ahead, someone was waiting.

Mom?

Anybody home?

Summer and Edwin Brown present

A W. Goodell film.

Human experiments.

This just might be what we've been waiting for.

Came in to use the phone. My car got stuck.

See your stay here rather as a short stop along the road,

a place to heal and rebuild.

On the table, please.

In six months, she'll be a different human being.

These things happen, even in the best of prisons.

What happened to Rachel Foster was the ultimate fear.

Human experiments.

It began as a venture and became a nightmare of unrelenting terror.

Who's there?

Toughly called for them down there.

Rita's dead.

He can't tell anyone.

God, baby.

Somewhere between medicine and witchcraft.

Somewhere between justice and vengeance.

Somewhere between progress and the unthinkable.

Someone is performing human experiments.

Human experiments.

Well back in the days when Mr. Plod and his pals were raiding every single video

shop and building up a healthy library down at the precinct They generally went

for movies with cannibal or zombie in the title because that was fairly

wasn't it?

In some cases, of course, they got a bit overzealous. One of the most famous

cases being when they seized a copy of Samuel Fuller's film The Big Red One

because they thought, a big red what? That must be something rude.

But one of the weirdest films on the list for titles, as far as titles goes

anyway, is I Miss You Hugs and Kisses, which doesn't sound at all like a nasty.

In fact, it was also known as Drop Dead Dearest.

but it was based on a true life story of a toronto real estate agent who

supposedly murdered his wife and in this instance the wife was played by elka

summer the lovely german actress who was in mario barbara's lisa and the devil

and also was in one of the carry -ons and uh i didn't want to see what what

makes this film a nasty to be honest because the murder itself is you know

gets a big building block dropped on her head the screen goes red

and she gets electrocuted in the swimming pool.

But it's a strange little movie, and not one that you'd automatically think of

as being on the list, and I don't know why it hasn't been seen since, really,

because I'm sure if it was reclassified today, it'd probably get a PD or

something.

On a trivia note, the film I Miss You, Hugs and Kisses is also both the very

first feature film score written by Howard Shaw, who of course later went on

do the Lord of the Rings trilogy and a lot of work for David Cronenberg.

Anyway, I Miss You, Hugs and Kisses.

Two months ago, Charles Christian, millionaire husband of former model

Christian, offered a $10 ,000 reward for information leading to the capture of

his wife's murder.

Today, through a dramatic turn of events, Christian himself has been

with the brutal slaying of his wife, Magdalene Christian, who was found

bludgeoned to death in her home.

Charles Christian, her husband, was charged with the murder and later

on a $100 ,000 bond.

Why would I want to kill her when, obviously, divorce is the sensible

way out? All she is, is a money -grubbing little nothing.

It's not 24, it's $27 ,000 with all the extras in it.

God damn little whore.

I just don't give a shit. You were once the best friend of the accused.

We planned to get a divorce.

And then I would come over and we'd get married.

How long have you known about the murder?

Nothing to say. How long have you and Charles Cushon been lovers?

I found myself thinking of ways of killing Mac.

How?

Actually planning it.

Dario Argento's 1980s sequel to Suspiria, Inferno, about the Mother of

is probably one of the most lunatic additions to the video nasty list there

was.

Not only is it a beautiful film, it's one of my all -time favourites. In fact,

you can't see, but I've actually got it tattooed on my arm here.

The photography by Romano Albani was stunning, made it look like a live comic

book to me. I loved it.

Keith Emerson did the music, absolutely wonderful, and it contains some of

Argento's best set pieces, mainly The Underwater.

haunted house sequence, which of course Mario Bava helped out on special

effects.

Dario saw it as like his version of Hansel and Gretel.

If the Spiria was Snow White, the Hansel and Gretel characters in Inferno were

Lee McCloskey and Irene Miracle. Many people on the film have told me that

was very, very ill when he made it and would often direct Lying Down, a reason

why they often couldn't hear him, why it has that sort of ethereal feel about

it, I think.

My favourite story about Inferno concerns the Kazanian rat sequence.

They filmed this at DePaolo Studios on the outskirts of Rome and Dario didn't

really think the Italian rats they had were any good so he asked for some

Chinese fighting rats to be imported.

They got loose in the studio after the scene and interbred with the native

species and created this sort of super breed of rat that infested the studio

years afterwards.

And any director who ever went in there after that always called up Dario and

said, we blame you for this, you're ruining our shots.

Help me!

Oh my God!

Why was it on the list? Mainly because there's a scene where a cat eats a

No big deal. Doesn't this thing happen in real life? But no, that's the reason

why it was pounced on by the DPP.

I do not know what price I shall have to pay for breaking what we alchemists

call Selenium.

The life experiences of our colleagues should warn us not to upset laymen by

imposing our knowledge upon them.

The book. What?

There are mysterious parts in that book.

But the only true mystery is that our very lives are governed by dead people.

In the beginning, there were three mothers, the same as there were three

and three Furies.

Man has always mistakenly called them by one terrifying name.

I'm afraid.

I'm afraid to be left alone.

My

sister.

Where is my sister?

I'm constantly being watched.

And at times I think I actually feel present.

The Killer Nun is an Italian nunsploitation movie set in a retirement

where a number of the poor old residents are being randomly bumped off.

First, let me tell you a little bit about nunsploitation movies.

In its simplest term, it was a genre of film that emerged across Europe during

the 60s and 70s, in which sexually repressed nuns find pleasure, not

God, but through other means, usually other nuns, random men or even inanimate

objects.

Probably the most famous example is Ken Russell's The Devils from 1971.

Anyway, back to this film.

Director Giulio Berruti, a former altar boy, had previously worked as an

assistant director and writer before trying his hand at directing.

Alas, he has only one notable feature to his credit, and that's this one, which

I think is something of a Euro cult gem.

May his soul burn in hell.

Just the thought of what he did to me makes me want to take revenge on all

Just snuff them out like he snuffed out my happiness. No, sister.

Verruti had made some good friends in the industry and was able to persuade

decent talent to appear in his film for little money.

After reading her the script, Anita Ekberg, famous for her role in Fellini's

Dolce Vita, agreed to play Sister Gertrude. And former Warhol star Joe D

'Alessandro was cast as a doctor, who's hilariously dubbed.

Alida Vali, just off the set of Dario Argento's Suspiria, was cast as the

Superior.

Rather surprisingly, the film was actually based on a true event, which

in Belgium in the 1970s, in which a nasty nun was found to be finishing off

residents of a retirement home and stealing all their jewellery.

Please take Sister Gertrude to her cell.

However, this version adds plenty of sex and morphine addiction to the mix.

My favourite scene?

Well, there's actually quite a few to be found here.

OK, well my first one is when Sister Gertrude snatches an old lady's false

out of the glass standing by her dinner plate and throws the dentures on the

floor and stamps them to pieces.

This gives the poor old dear a heart attack.

There's another great moment when Sister Gertrude ditches her habit and goes out

to pick up a bloke and ends up getting bonked standing up against a wall.

Classy. You want another one?

Well, how about the scene where she's preparing her morphine injection and

it up like a chalice?

Or how about the scene where another old deer is gagged and has a series of pins

pushed into her face?

Ouch. It's probably this scene that got the film onto the DPP's list of

forbidden fruits.

It was banned on video in August 1984 and remained banned until July 1985 when

it was eventually removed from the list altogether.

What's even more bizarre is the fact that a lot of the film was shot at an

actual convent and the crew had to make sure nobody saw what kind of film they

were making.

Naughty, naughty.

To cap things off, it was doing phenomenal business at the Italian box

until the Vatican had it pulled.

The advertising campaign obviously upset some official there. What did they

expect with a tagline that screamed from the secret file of the Vatican?

I strongly suggest you make a habit out of watching The Killer Nun.

May his soul burn in hell.

Just the thought of what he did to me makes me want to take revenge on all

To snuff them out like he snuffed out my happiness. No, sister.

That's enough.

That's who you are.

You've been rolling your eyes at me ever since you were transferred here.

Then we'll help him. Won't you, Doctor?

I promise I'll make it very nice.

Sister Gertrude.

It is a nun's vocation to suffer.

Life has always been difficult.

I'm sorry, Mother. What did you say? Nothing.

I agree, Sister Mathieu.

I'm innocent.

Please take Sister Gertrude to her cell.

Give her a sedative, Sister Louise.

I think Sister Gertrude could freak out any second.

Why did you kill Jeannot, sister?

Don't you have any faith in the police, huh?

You're wrong to be so pessimistic.

The police solve crimes.

It's their job.

The police look out for their own interests.

This is to the scalpel.

What's wrong with you this morning?

You know what's wrong, doctor.

She discovered certain discrepancies in the drug register. My son was

responsible. He was addicted to it.

It was morphine.

Of course, I should have reported it.

The international popularity of Last House on the Left really impacted on the

exploitation film industry.

And here's the Italian rip -off, Late Night Trains, or Don't Ride on Late

Trains, it says on the video.

But actually, the title when it comes up is actually Night Train Murders. And

here's the mythical alternative release, one of the holy grails of video nasty

collectors, and it's this, the Cine Hollywood Night Train Murders release.

Aldo Lardo was the director.

He was Dario Argento's assistant director on Burb of the Crystal Plumage.

says he never saw Last House on the Left. It was completely new to him. And

actually added a lot more into the script. For example, he says the whole

deflowering of the main murder in the film was based on something that

to one of his wife's best friends at the doctor's, amazingly.

Masha Merrill, Flavio Bucchi.

Enrica, Maria Salerno and Irene Miracle, these are all past, present and future

Dario Argento stars anyway.

Thematically, it fits in with Aldo Lardo's Jallo movie, Short Night of the

Dolls. The theme of Late Night Trains is all about the upper classes exploiting.

the proletariat.

This is seen in Masha Merrill's upper -class bitch character.

The moment she raises the veil on her hat means that she lets all her

respectability go, and that's why she can indulge in egging on the two, well,

crazed psycho nutters into doing the violence they do on the train. In fact,

when she's confronted by the father of the daughter that she's responsible for

helping kill, she puts her veil back down, which means that she completely

closes off again.

That's how Aldo Lardo... represented anyway. It's shot in a very nice blue

because Lardo, when he was a child, when he actually travelled on late night

trains himself, always remembered the blue light coming in through the window

and so that's something he actually wanted to put in the movie himself.

This is one film I really do believe should be on the Video Nasties list,

because of the awful Dennis Rufus theme song.

Morning, Margaret. Staying here for Christmas?

No, I'm going to Italy with Lisa to stay with her family.

That'll be nice. She'll be warmer down there. Sure hope so.

Bye. Goodbye, girls. Have a good Christmas. Bye. Thank you. Same to you.

They'll be leaving at 1, and it gets in tomorrow morning at around 7 .30.

Oh, so they're coming down by train.

Wouldn't it have been easier for them to fly instead?

Yes, but I'm so scared when they're flying. And besides, planes are never on

time these days.

Has Lisa been behaving well?

Oh, of course.

She's always sweet. She's never behaved badly. Not when she stayed here with us.

She's no angel here with us.

Society must try and find a preventative to violence. I agree. I think it should

start with children. A better rapport between teachers and parents.

Violence is bred by things like boredom and lack of exercise, if you ask me.

One of the better rip -offs of George Romero's classic Night of the Living

is Jorge Grau's The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue.

As in this one, just using the Living Dead title. In fact, Don't Open the

here is actually another retitling of it. I think this film's had more titles

and more versions than you could possibly imagine.

Just so you know, I actually attended a press show of this movie, and here is

the actual vomit bag from that press show.

unused as you'll notice because i was just so amazed by what we were seeing on

the screen i didn't have enough time to throw up why

was it shot in manchester mainly because producer edmondo amati thought

manchester sounded quite exotic and glamorous of course the reality of that

they got to sheffield which is where they mostly filmed the film not

is quite an important one to note um

Anti -establishment is a bit laughable now when you see the hippie stuff, but

that's one of the reasons why people really took to it at the time. Listen,

you keep getting on my nerves and I'm going to give you another kind of house

look after, one with lots of bars in the windows.

They saw that whole anti -establishment message as being quite important and

ecologically sound.

Very violent for its time, very gory. One of the very first films pre -Dawn of

the Dead to feature things like disemboweling, breasts being ripped off.

gut -spilling, quite shocking in a way.

Raymond Lovelock was the star, and he starred in Autopsy and Fulci's Murder

Rock. In fact, he's still an Italian TV star to this day. Arthur Kennedy was the

American star of it. He took the money, came over, thought he was doing another

job for hire, and actually...

ended up quite liking Jorge Graham, what he was trying to do, so he really threw

himself behind it.

Bear a thought for Christina Galbo, who's the lead girl in it. Her husband

two days before the film was about to start, and so her shell -shocked look is

actually quite authentic.

Why she didn't just sort of give up, I've no idea, but she's there and she

really good as a result of it.

But is it possible? I mean, could a film fail to catch an image for any reason?

Well, a ghost, maybe.

This is one of the better films to feature.

on the video Nazis list and it sort of weathers well today.

Not my fault, Sergeant. Christ and saints are out of fashion.

Satan's all the rage these days. Listen, boy.

You keep getting on my nerves and I'm going to give you another kind of house

look after. One with lots of bars in the windows.

We'd better reinforce that door. Take the lamp.

I can just imagine the sergeant's face when he finds out. Craig, can you hear

me?

Sergeant, they're dead people trying to kill me.

Message for you.

Look, I know it sounds silly, but is it possible? I mean, could a film fail to

catch an image for any reason?

Well, a ghost, maybe.

Nightmare Maker was apparently named Best Horror Film of 1982 by the Academy

Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, but it wasn't quite so popular with the

folks at the DPP.

The film itself was directed by a guy called William Asher, who was a very

capable director of TV shows like I Love Lucy, and he also did the A .I .P.

movie How to Stuff a Wild Bikini.

It's actually one of the best movies on the list, I think, quality -wise,

anyway. It stars Jimmy McNichol, who's the brother of actress Christie.

And he plays a 17 -year -old who's orphaned in a car crash. Very well shot

sequences.

And he finds himself lingering with his Dottie aunt, who's played by the

excellent Susan Tyrrell.

And they get into a kind of incestuous relationship.

And the film goes very much into the whatever -happened -to -baby -Jane,

-type territory.

It has some very good sequences, including a decapitation sequence, which

shot uncredited by Jan de Bont, who, of course, went on to direct movies like

Twister and Speed.

And here's a rarer alternative sleeve for the film. And the trailer you're

to see is under its original American title of Night Warning.

So shocking. So terrifying.

So powerful.

Night Warning has been named Best Horror Film of the Year by the Academy of

Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror.

Billy and Julie.

Young. Innocence. In love.

It was all a mistake.

They didn't go looking for trouble. They were just too curious.

Without knowing, they've uncovered a deadly secret.

By accident, they've stumbled onto a grisly murder.

Now they know too much to live.

A chilling tale of a young boy and girl. Innocent victims. Now targets of a

frenzied obsession with murder.

See the award -winning Night Warning.

OK, well, we have Possession by Andrzej Jouaski.

What should it be?

Possession.

It's a very perplexing cover.

It was produced like this, apparently back to front.

No -one seems to quite know why.

Some people speculate that it was a printing error and they just had to go

it. I always imagine that perhaps because the film is very strange and

weird and unusual,

Somebody in the design department thought that would be a strange, arty,

and unusual way of presenting the cover possibility.

So, yeah, it's a perplexing one, but it's a perplexing film. This is one of

films on the banned list that didn't spend very long on the list. It was kind

on and off, I believe.

Goodness knows why it was on in the first place, but eventually somebody saw

reason. I think a case was dropped against it and it was given a re

VTC sometime afterwards with a different design using a different artwork,

which... It was rather more conventional than this, but more attractive as well.

One of the difficulties with this artwork, of course, is that it's all

around an image which the film builds for about 90 minutes to show you. The

cover kind of blows that central image.

But having said that, I saw Possession as a result of seeing it on a shelf and

thinking, good grief, what's that? So it worked.

Inhuman. So what you're doing must be human.

It's made by a Polish director, Andrzej Joachimski, who moved to France in the

1970s when the Polish authorities started to interfere with the content of

films.

He sought greater artistic freedom in Paris, which he obviously attained.

Possession was a film he made in 1981, which was shot in Berlin, made with

French and German money, with Sam Neill, an Australian actor, very famous now

for the Jurassic Park films.

in the male lead, and Isabella Jani, a very highly regarded French actress, as

the female lead.

In this country, back in the day, when it was reviewed in various genre

magazines at the time, it was treated as, at best, a kind of a bizarre

that no one quite knew what to make of, and at worst, as a pretentious pile of

gibberish, which rubbed up a lot of viewers the wrong way because they

really know how to take it.

And the fact is that the film goes out of its way to perplex and to confuse and

to refuse, I suppose, not so much confuse, but to refuse to answer certain

questions. There's a schism in the film to do with what's real and what's not

real. The director, Jouafsky, said that he made it because he wanted to make a

film about the collapse of a marriage, which is part of the story of

But having seen Ingmar Bergman's films, Scenes from a Marriage, which is a

naturalistic attempt to convey the collapse of a relationship.

He felt, although he was a great admirer of Bergman's, that somehow the film had

not caught what it needed to catch, that there was something lost, that it

wasn't getting to where it needed to get to, and that the naturalistic quality

of Bergman's style, or his approach in that film, fell short of what Iwaski

thought it should have attained.

And he decided that there was a symbolic dimension, really, that needed to be

added. And so in a strange, very strange kind of way, it becomes a monster

movie.

The monster is a symbolic enticement that could drive many a

critic wild, either with excitement at the many, many manifold different ways

interpreting it, or with annoyance at the film's refusal to really come down.

and explain exactly what it's doing.

But it's that decision not to explain that suggests that there are certain

things that are ineffable, that you cannot reach with rational thought, that

makes the film so special.

The relationship between the two lead characters is incredibly fraught. and

performances are pitched at a level of hysteria that starts here and then just

goes through the roof. And that's another one of the factors about the

people find hard to take.

If you like your dramas to be measured and you're a

fan of the acting of John Gielgud, this movie is going to drive you...

Fucking batshit because people are at a kabuki level of intensity immediately,

and they just go to take it from there He

said to me when I interviewed him a few years ago

And I asked him about this the what's commonly called the hysterical quality

the acting in his films he said When people criticise my films for hysteria,

just shows me what's missing in their lives, because anyone can whisper.

Go and shriek. It's very hard.

Meaning, you know, people can't let go.

You know, it's very hard for people to kind of really give vent to, you know,

primal, extreme emotions.

And that's what this film is dealing with, and that's where the film takes

Perhaps the people who find it unrealistic...

I've never been to those kinds of places, but, you know, it's certainly

It doesn't strike me as dishonest or untruthful. It strikes me very truthful,

fact, as a film.

You are not different from anyone else.

We are all the same.

This is, I believe, the only video nasty, so to speak, where one of the

Best Actress at Cannes.

There are times when you watch her face in possession and you can barely keep up

with the movement of emotion, the kind of mercurial quality of her performance.

You know, you could literally freeze frame every few seconds and catch a

different demon, if you like, a different kind of presence kind of

through her face just in the course of like one short scene.

Brilliant performance.

Isabella Gianni won.

the award in 1981 for Best Actress, gives you some idea of the difference in

reception in continental Europe for this film and in this country, where it was

regarded as, you know, a bunch of melodramatic, shrieking nonsense,

When you read the reviews, the contemporary reviews, no -one was taking

seriously at all.

Which drove me fucking crazy, because I saw it and loved it and couldn't

understand why it was getting these terrible reviews.

What is it?

Another really prominent, famous name in the credits is Carlo Rambaldi, who

designed the monster effects, and I believe it was around the same time or

before he did E .T., because I think it was late 80, early 81 when he was

designing the Possession monster, and he must have been working on E .T. by the

end of 1981.

So he probably went straight from the one to the other, so there's an

interesting comparison as well.

It's an incredibly complex film, and it was made by very committed and talented

craftsmen and artists.

And I'm very pleased to say that over the years, whereas I used to feel a bit

like you were screaming in the wilderness if you tried to claim that

good movie in this country, finally, I think gradually, people have started to

realise that it is actually a special film. There's something quite unique

it, and it's...

credibility and its reputation have increased in this country now, so that's

good.

As to why this was ever banned in the first place, well, it is, again, another

one of those mysteries. You just have to surmise that somebody somewhere watched

it, was offended by something, and wrote a letter down to the police station

with it. Oh, God knows what, I don't really know how these people work.

These people!

Complainers. How do they do it?

How do you complain about a video? Nasty. You write to your MP, I suppose.

Yeah.

Oh, Mark.

Your wife keeps her own secrets.

Make her talk to me. It'll be the way that she wants.

Tell me.

Well, I think what you want to do to Bob... Inhuman.

So what you're doing must be human.

you can hate me as much as you like but it's you who wants to know things for me

so please make it possible

You've hardened.

For the first time, you look vulgar to me.

You are not different from anyone else. We are all the

same. But in different words.

Different bodies.

Different versions.

Like insects.

Me?

What is it?

This is Pranks, a 1981 slasher movie, officially directed by Geoffrey Obrow,

probably co -directed by Stephen Carpenter.

They were around in the 80s and made a trickle of other, slightly more

mainstream horror pictures.

The Power was one, The Kindred, and more recently Legend of the Mummy. This is

one of those things that's completely mystifying, why this of all slasher

ended on the Video Nasties list.

Looking at the box, I just... expect it was this image here because there was a

feeling that immutable violence was bad so the baseball bat with the spikes in

which is the main murder weapon may well have been thought to be the kind of

thing that football hooligans could use if they found out what a baseball bat

was the film itself is very mild as slasher pictures go it has one idea

kids love to play tricks certain tricks are called pranks like a lot of really

annoying genre movies that have nothing else going for it. There's one tiny

moment of creativity that makes you think, well, why didn't they make the

about that? Because it's really good. And that is that almost all student

slasher movies include a character who is basically, he's usually called the

asshole or the dickhead. He's the guy who plays the stupid practical jokes

get you those fake shocks in the first 20 minutes before the real murders.

start so he's the guy who puts on the scary mask and jumps out just to spook

friends and so later when the murders start there's a sort of an excuse for

people not reacting as they would this isn't funny anymore

pranks but In pranks, this character actually turns out to

be the killer.

So he escalates from playing harmless pranks to playing serious pranks. When

kidding stops.

And you think, well, that's great, there's a real character arc there,

an idea for a movie there, but it's just completely thrown away.

The killer turns out to be the last character who's left walking around

everyone else has died. There's no real thought that's gone into it. It was also

re -released as The Dorm That Dripped Blood.

The end credits call it...

blood dorm or death dorm, so it has multiple incarnations. It's the dorm

dripped blood when it's referred to in the long list of campus flashes in

2 by Randy the Film Nerd, which may well be its lone shot at film immortality.

I watched it again for the first time in 30 years the other week, and I've

already forgotten most of it, just as its details had dimmed from my one time

viewing in the 80s. to my one -time viewing last week.

I doubt if this is anybody's favourite film.

Kids love to play tricks.

Certain tricks are called pranks.

P R A

N

The phone's dead.

K.

A great S.

You've got to trust me.

Pranks is this year's most terrifying motion picture.

You're all alone?

I mean, is anybody else helping you out?

Yes, there's a group of us here.

Did you hear anything up on the roof?

Do you think we need to go up there?

Need to and we don't need to do anything

When the kidding stops, the killing starts.

Pranks. It's a killer.

Prisoner of the Cannibal God.

Oh, hey, Prisoner of the Cannibal God. I think in America it was... Slave of the

Cannibal God, and in Italy, Mountain of the Cannibal God. In their language,

Rarami means Mountain of the Cannibal God.

All of which was the same movie directed by Sergio Martino.

Now, it's interesting, by the time Martino made this movie, which was 78,

central features of what we know as that short -lived but controversial cycle,

the Italian cannibal film, were well established.

So we're thinking of elements like...

panoramic viewpoints of this hostile third world environment, an ill -fated

expedition by colonial explorers that often reveal moral or morally ambiguous

motives, scenes of real life animal slaughter, a variety of homemade booby

used to repel colonial invaders, and a distinction of friendly and barbaric

tribes. All of these features were well established and I think Martino

certainly draws on them in Prisoner of the Cannibal God. The island is covered

by a very dense jungle which surrounds and protects the sacred mountain of

Rarami. Sacred because the natives believe that the mountain is cursed.

I think it's interesting to note that Martino's earlier directorial debut was

the documentary Mondo Sex and for many, many critics the so -called Mondo or

sensational documentary film of the 60s is the clear...

precursor to the Italian cannibal film, mainly because it fused fact and fiction

alongside animal atrocity. And I think that Martino is clearly drawing on these

traits in Prisoner of the Cannibal God.

As well as directing an earlier Mondo movie, it's interesting to note that

Martino's company, Dania Film, actually produced not only Prisoner of the

Cannibal God, but also that most extreme of Italian cannibal films, Umberto

Lenzi's Cannibal Ferox.

So clearly he had an interest in the genre, but it's interesting to note how

unlike other cannibal films, Prisoner of the Cannibal God is.

Let's remember that Martino's main career in the 1970s was producing

jello thrillers, which were often defined by their troubled male

black male and family plots, as well as very glossy camera work. And I think he

brings this element of swishness, if you like, to the cannibal genre.

When you're watching Prisoner of the Cannibal God, you feel that it's more

an adventure movie than a kind of down -and -dirty cannibal film, although it

claims to have a kind of real estate. This is clearly due to casting.

I mean, it has supposedly big stars in it, or relatively big stars in it, such

as Ursula Andress and Stacey Keach. And most of the movies...

He's given over to plot and character development. It's actually quite

-lite in the way that it deals with third -world savagery. The cannibals

really appear in the final moments of the film to distribute justice to kind

greedy Westerners who are trying to kind of poach uranium mines in this kind of

non -Western environment.

Your husband knew that Raoul Armé possessed resources that could bring him

wealth beyond imagination.

All of this so -called Euro -glossiness was clearly lost on the British censor,

who fixated on the scenes of quite distressing animal cruelty that the film

dwells on. And that's the reason it fell foul as a video nasty during the 1980s.

And it has to be said, there are some very, very distressing scenes in the

movie.

scenes of a crocodile and a turtle kind of doing battle, and also an eagle and a

python, which clearly have been put in just to maximise entertainment value.

So it is distressing. Also what was cut in the British release was a fairly

energetic and quite racy cannibal orgy at the end of the movie, which was added

to maximise a kind of grindhouse appeal.

One of the more shocking things I have to say alongside these scenes is just

seeing kind of supposedly big budget stars appearing in what is essentially

a gratuitous exploitation movie.

And I have to say hats off to Ursula Andress in particular who really does

of give a fairly energetic performance as the wife of a lost explorer.

She has to go through various...

tortures and trials to appease Martino's kind of creative edge.

Not only does she have to get smothered in the jelly -like remains of her

husband, but she's also smothered in what appears to be honey for a ritual

ceremony, as well as having to eat the remains of her cannibalised brother.

So I think what is more shocking about this movie is just it's one of those

examples where Euro -chic and Euro -trash meet.

You don't forget the taste of human flesh!

The other interesting thing about Prisoner of the Cannibal God is we

it with Streatham -based indie company Hacutian, but they actually sub

it from the then -small company Entertainment, who subsequently have

great movies like the Lord of the Rings trilogy. So from small exploitation

titles, great big budgets clearly evolve.

I don't know if Henry's still alive.

But until I'm certain that he's dead, I'll keep on looking for him.

Even if I have to do it alone.

I think the only person who could help you is Professor Edward Foster.

This is the Marabata jungle.

It's the area where they say Henry disappeared.

Five miles offshore is the island of Roca. The island is covered by a very

jungle which surrounds and protects the sacred mountain of Rarami.

Sacred because the natives believe that the mountain is cursed.

Animal crap.

She was attacked by a native.

She'll be all right.

He was a member of a tribe called the Puka.

Why is everybody so scared of the Puka?

They were the ancient inhabitants of Rarami.

In their language, Rarami means mountain of the cannibal god.

Burning up. It was crazy to let him come.

If he insisted on coming along, it means he has his own very good reason.

That's right. I have mine, you have yours. Just as Henry had his.

What's yours?

You want the truth?

Your husband knew that round army possessed resources that could bring him

wealth beyond imagination.

We will reach our reach.

We don't forget the taste of human flesh.

Those cannibals forced you to partake in their rituals.

Yes, it was horrible.

This is Uli Lommel's Boogie Man 2.

Remember the original Boogie Man?

Well, he's back, more terrifying than ever, in revenge of the Boogie Man.

This film is very much something that uses the first film in order to extend

and pad it out, so one can only imagine it didn't cost very much. However, this

is a kind of example of a lovely self -referential post -structural, if you

like. in that it is a film that uses its former film as part of its footage, but

it is also a film about making a film. And so there are some quite interesting

examples of a film being aware of its own conditions of possibility and of the

structure of its own creation.

And that comes about very well because Lommel manages to integrate the

supernatural with the actual supernatural nature of making a film

Under the Hollywood sky, a filmmaker's dream becomes a nightmare.

And the story concerns an evil mirror that comes from a childhood trauma

incident very much reminiscent of Halloween.

And this piece of mirror becomes like a fetish or totem object.

And then she finds herself in Hollywood, of all places, as the friend of someone

who happens to be an actress and who is married to a director.

And the majority of the action in the film happens at a Hollywood pool party.

Each of the guests represents a different kind of stereotype of the

industry person. So you have the...

You have the bimbo and you have the sleazy producer and so forth and so on.

as this woman relegates the story of what has happened to her, which was in

first film, but of course, which is being negotiated as an actuality, we get

different interpretations. Some people say, oh, it's a metaphor for something

that happened to you or it's a resonance with a story of my life or something

like that. So the whole nature of reality and of the difference between

film, the fictive, the facts and those kinds of things becomes a key, an

in this film and then the supernatural events of course begin to take place

more and I think that the reason they can is because the people at the party

longer understand the discrepancies and the differences between what is actual

and what is virtual what is supernatural and what is natural and most

importantly what is real and what is constructed and so as the murders happen

Nobody actually understands that murders are happening because they don't

understand the reality of the situation.

And I think for that reason, even though the film in many ways is a traditional

slasher movie, it is also a very interesting lamentation and

contemplation of Hollywood's breakdown of reality and fantasy and of the co

-opting of the experiences of people by other people to make money, to make art

and to make film itself.

Once released, no one can halt the relentless revenge of the bogeyman.

The film was co -directed by Bruce Starr and of course this adds to the whole

idea of the self -referential Hollywood because the name Starr with two R's

is...

incredibly constructed and Uli Lommel appears in the film as an actor as well

being the writer and co -director of the film. The film was only banned for 10

months however Boogeyman 1 was banned for an extensive period.

One can not really imagine why Boogeyman 1 was banned because it seems not

necessarily particularly gory it was pretty much a halloween ripoff and i

that one could suggest that boogeyman 2 was only banned because its parents film

was banned and so

the censors obviously thought that any subsequent bogeymen that were spawned

from the original bogeyman were going to be equally as offensive.

And this also becomes quite ironic because there is no bogeyman in the

kept waiting for a bogeyman, and indeed you will keep waiting for a bogeyman,

and the bogeyman actually is revealed as a little shard of a mirror.

Remember the original bogeyman? Well, he's back, more terrifying than ever, in

revenge of the bogeyman.

A spirit of evil captured forever in the glass of a mirror.

Under the Hollywood sky, a filmmaker's dream becomes a nightmare.

At least no one can halt the relentless revenge of the bogeyman.

The Slayer is actually quite a good little stalk and slash movie.

It's set on a remote island off the coast of Georgia where a bunch of

for a weekend break.

One of them, the star of the movie, is played by Sarah Kendall and she's...

has recurring nightmares about a character called the slayer who appears

dreams it's only a man horrifying nightmare or is it well

in this respect the film can be seen as having parallels with nightmare on elm

street and even invasion of the body snatchers because our heroine tries so

to stay awake because she knows that when she falls asleep this character

the slayer will appear and do horrible things to her friends which she judy

and if it's only a nightmare

why is everybody dead there are some very good gore effects in this which is

probably why it was seized upon by the the dpp one of the best is a fisherman

gets bashed over the head and his scalp lands in a bait bucket and another

sequence involves one of the best pitchfork murders we've seen where a

stabbed in the back and it exits the prongs exit through her breast

Writer -director J .S. Cardone has gone on in recent years to rather blot his

copybook with tired remakes of the classic horror movies The Stepfather and

Night. But in all respects, The Slayer is a much slicker package than you'd

expect from most films on the nasties list.

What you're about to see may shock you.

It may frighten you more than you've ever been frightened before.

Don't worry.

It's only a maddening, horrifying nightmare.

Or is it?

What are you gonna do?

Fire some flares.

Did you give her the pills like I told you?

No.

Maybe it's not a nightmare after all.

There's nothing.

Are they really alone?

Or is there an unwelcome guest?

Is this a nightmare?

Or is it the fear people have when they're alone in the dark?

And if it's only a nightmare, why is everybody dead?

Prepare yourself, because you will never want to be alone again.

Prepare yourself for The Slayer.

Okay, Terrorize.

There's a pun in that. It's quite funny.

I mean, it's one of the wittiest things about it. Although, oddly enough, it was

made as Night School, which is a completely nothing title.

It got theatrical release in Britain.

When darkness descends on the city, something happens to the girls who

Night School.

It was directed by...

Ken Hughes, a good solid British professional who made Chitty Chitty Bang

In fact, I think the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang probably

traumatized more people than the motorcycle helmet wearing slasher of

Terrorize.

Which is, on one level, completely ordinary. It's a really plodding police

movie. But it has actually a genuinely demented

It's this ritual murder to do with chopping people's heads off and dumping

in water.

So it's the old head in a fish tank trick played over and over and over

It was the...

Film debut of Rachel Ward, who, and I'm giving it away, plays the killer.

Although the very voluptuous Rachel Ward does not look at all like the flat

-chested biker leather character who does most of the killing.

I remember being astonished. I actually remembered Rachel Ward from this film.

One, because even with the terrible 80s haircut, she's astonishingly beautiful.

But also, she is astonishingly dreadful in this film. And yet, within a year or

two, she was in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid and Thorn Birds and Sharky's

It was actually giving good performances. At some point, she either

act, or on this film, she deliberately just didn't do anything.

Otherwise...

There is literally nothing going on here.

I mean, it's a head in a fish tank film. What more can you say?

It was rather heavily cut when they pushed it out again as a certificated

version, but not particularly for gore. There was a sort of slight craze for

being upset by scenes in which women were menaced by people with knives.

And so they cut a lot of shots of knives out.

I think this may well have had something to do with the Yorkshire Ripper and

sort of the feeling that we were getting a bit heavy about just merely being

threatening in films.

And I admit that is the sort of thing that upsets some people, but probably

the kind of people who are going to rent out a movie with this cover called

Terror Eyes.

There's a sequence in it which is almost shot for shot, the walking through the

park scene from Cat People.

And it's just not many other video nasties bothered with scenes like that,

suspense sequences.

But that's because Kenneth Hughes was trying to make a proper horror film. He

had a rubbish idea, and it was a stupid script.

But it has at least some sequences that try and be suspenseful.

Prepare for a lesson in terror.

It's odd to me that this landed on the list and Eyes of a Stranger, which is

exactly the same kind of movie and in fact is slightly more uncomfortable to

watch, didn't. So again, luck of the draw, terrorized, lost.

Ken Hughes, didn't work again.

When darkness descends on the city,

something happens.

To the girls who attend night school.

You're not walking home alone tonight, are you? After what happened?

We'll be all right.

Something secret.

Modern man has only to take a short step to wind up in the primeval jungle of

his ancestors.

Something forbidding.

We've had a few kooks in Boston in our time, but headhunters are too many.

Something terrifying.

Who's there?

a lesson in terror.

Night school.

The Toolbox Murders was actually released at UK cinemas and also made the

under the name of the Toolbox Murders for some strange reason which has never

been explained.

Anyway, I figured that, well, you had Driller Killer and Toolbox, you know,

people might be getting tools out and drilling people and hammering people and

goodness knows what. They're all victims of the Toolbox Murders.

What the hell are you doing?

The film itself is a very basic...

sort of stalk and slash type thing with Cameron Mitchell, a very prolific

western star of the 50s, starring as this caretaker in an apartment building

goes around murdering his tenants.

The most famous scene probably is the scene where Kelly Nichols, a well -known

porn star of the time, gets murdered by a nail gun.

The film also features, in a small role, Anita Curso, who was one of the stars

of the Steve McQueen film The Blob back in the 50s, a much milder kind of horror

movie. But The Toolbox Murders, as DIY horror films go, is quite fun.

The Toolbox Murders was actually remade in 2003 by director Toby Hooper, of

course, who made Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Fun House and Eaten Alive.

It's actually not as good a film as this one, though.

This man is about to commit the most atrocious crimes in American history.

Linda Githens, age 22.

Valerie Hoffman, age 24.

Mary Ann Stevens, age 21. These women have one thing in common.

They are all victims.

of the Toolbox Murders.

Who the hell are you?

On July 23rd, 1977, a hooded killer terrorized a small suburb of Los

California.

His identity was unknown, but he committed a series of crimes so fiendish

it shocked the entire country.

He struck with no warning.

He preyed on innocent young women. In his hands, simple tools became the

instruments of death.

Victims died screaming, but for the ones still alive, the worst was yet to come.

The Toolbox Murders, a true story.

When you stop screaming, you'll start talking about it.

Unhinged. What's really odd when you look back at all the movies that became

notorious video nasties is just the wide range of differing titles that ended up

on the banned list.

Alongside kind of Italian cannibal splatter or zombie movies, there are

kind of oddities from American Indian grindhouse cinema.

And Don Gronquist's Unhinged is one of those movies.

It began as an idyllic weekend outing.

But something went wrong.

I guess it's fair to say that had it not been tarred with the video nasty label,

Gronkwest's movie may have just disappeared. It was a very low -budget

indie production.

The violence in it actually is quite restrained. There's three specific acts

violence, with an axe and with a scythe being key examples here. So there's

something about this movie that... The censor and the authorities found

disturbing. At one level, it begins on traditional slasher territory.

Three female co -eds are off to a rock concert when they're involved in a car

crash. And when they awake, they're in a wonderful Gothic mansion headed up by

two dotty matriarchs, a wayward daughter and her wheelchair -bound mother.

Stranded, alone, or are they?

I think the girls quickly realise that something is badly awry in this

when the mother on nightly occasions repeatedly vents her anger against all

mankind and accuses her own daughter of being a prostitute who channels male

visitors in and out the house without her own blessing.

So the girls decide to make an escape as quickly as possible and all three meet

pretty nasty fates in their endeavours.

I think it's possibly the downbeat tone rather than the violence that made

Unhinged a candidate for video nastiedom.

It shares some of the traditional slasher traits but departs in new

in other respects.

The slasher movie usually has a final girl or a lone female survivor who

to overthrow the male aggressor that populates these narratives.

But what Unhinged has is just three potential female victims.

There's almost a kind of savage glee with which it picks each of these three

heroines off.

There's also a fantastic gender twist at the end of the movie, which I think

accounts for some of the disquiet that the censor had.

Unhinged. The nightmare has begun.

But overall, Unhinged is a sleeper slasher, and it just points to the wide

of differing movies that became bound up the whole video nasty phenomenon of the

1980s.

It began as an idyllic weekend outing.

But something went wrong.

Stranded, alone, or are they?

Man, something really weird is going on around here.

That's weird

Visiting Hours is an effective Canadian horror thriller in which Michael

Ironside from David Cronenberg's Scanners plays a convincing woman

psycho on the loose.

After a failed attempt at silencing a female TV presenter, played by Academy

Award winner Lee Grant, he tracks her down to her hospital bed, attempting to

carry on where he left off, dispatching all those who get in his way.

A young nurse played by Linda Pearl, Ashley Pfister from the TV series Happy

Days, catches a glimpse of him and becomes another one of his targets.

William Shatner also pops up as a TV producer and he must have literally

in for the day to do his scenes in between filming Star Trek II, The Wrath

Khan. It's nowhere near as grim as many of the other Nazis, and one can only

assume it was momentarily banned due to its scenes of violence against women,

most of whom happen to be bedridden. Although there are also plenty of

against men scenes too.

It does have a few unsettling moments, though. Although the UK video release

contained a pre -cut theatrical version in which a woman has a knife

suggestively run across her body was cut out, during the late 80s, London ITV

accidentally broadcast the uncut version, which led to numerous

shocked viewers.

Director Jean -Claude Lord went on to direct the 1986 actioner The Vindicator

and continues to work in the Canadian TV business.

What you're about to see is the rare UK TV spot.

And by the way, the shots where the lights are gradually switched off to

skull doesn't appear in the film as this was done specially for the advertising

campaign. And as you'll also see, it played as a double bill with John

Carpenter's Escape from New York.

In this hospital, your next visit may be your last.

All visitors, please leave the hospital.

Visiting hours so frightening you may never recover.

Together with Escape from New York.

In the West End now and across London from Sunday.

The witch who came from the sea.

What can I say about this film? It's a strange coalescence of art house...

of exploitation, of trippiness and of simply indescribable point. I have no

the reason why this film was made but I'm glad it was made. Its main star is a

woman called Millie Perkins who plays Molly.

Millie Perkins appeared in the 1959 Diary of Anne Frank which was nominated

11 Oscars and it won three Oscars and so I think her appearance in this is

particularly interesting because she is also playing another kind of victim

however like anne frank she's a resourceful victim who is she she's a

come out of the sea she's not a witch she's beautiful

The film has a lot of quite intense scenes.

Also the video cover uses the words incest and castration which immediately

bring out warning bells.

The scene of castration however we don't see in depth but the way that we find

out that Millie has become a killer of men is...

flashback scene right at the end where her very large very hairy very brutal

father is on top of her and it's possibly one of the most explicit incest

I have ever seen however I wouldn't say that it was exploitative it simply seems

to be quite harrowing without being titillating which is something that the

said they presumed that scenes of violence and sex were often titillating

they should be harrowing The film has pretensions to arthouse.

It's got incredibly strange music.

And it also has a series of characters that

are a sort of unification of Fatbinder characters

meets John Waters characters and they come from this little town by the sea.

The characters all associate around a bar where some of them are bartenders

some of them are people who drink in the bar, one of which is a very famous film

star. And the women in the film are very strong and particularly Millie Perkins'

character, Molly, is incredibly strong and not simply in that kind of psychotic

female castrator rape revenge way.

She simply seems to have...

celebrated her psychosis so much that she has internalized it and everyone

around her kind of enjoys it she's also um heavily tattooed in one scene which

is quite fascinating i think because she then tries to tear off the tattoo or

she claims to but actually we find out later that all the blood is not from her

the film does represent a certain kind of

imaginary because it has pretensions to art in that the sound is very

experimental, the camera work is experimental in terms of the fact that

opening scene where Millie ties two footballers in a weird kind of

situation to the bed and then she becomes a kind of masculine figure and

all very slow and one kind of wonders whether the video is tearing a little

or something like that so perhaps watching it on DVD is a different

because we know that there's nothing wrong with the actual tape.

Don't you shame me, you hot,

sweet little bitch.

The main actress in the film, Millie Perkins, was married to the film's

director, Matt Simba, and she was also the matron of honour at the wedding of

Jack Nicholson.

I find The Witch Who Came From The Sea an enigmatic film because, of course, it

insinuates by its title that it's going to be a supernatural film, and as it was

a video nasty, it also suggests that it's going to be a very gory film, or at

the very least, it's going to be a horror film. However, this film, I

to be too trite, is a social commentary created in a very artistic way of a

woman whose violence comes not from a need for revenge, but from a certain

of moral and...

cerebral ambiguity and one finds that as a spectator there is a beautiful sense

of ambiguity in the way we watch. I mean, certain perverse scenes like her

nephews feeding her pills and booze and also the analysis of Botticelli's Birth

of Venus as an integral part of the film really does show that this film will

take you by surprise and I recommend it simply because of its perverse delights.

Turn on your television set.

Find out what's happening in the real world.

See it in black and white.

God made all of us perfect. Truly, he did.

How close do you want to be to the woman in your life? I don't know if it's true

or not unless it's on television.

Why was Grandpa lost at sea?

I don't know.

Because he was perfect.

Too good to live on land.

Who is she?

She's a witch come out of the sea.

She's not a witch.

She's beautiful.

Every time you turn around, you see him.

What a name.

Women Behind Bars. This is another Jeff Franco film.

Not one of his best.

It's one of the sad facts that virtually none of the really great Jeff Franco

movies were available on British Video around that time.

We got a bit of a dog's dinner, really, of some of the bottom feeders on his

filmography, things like Oasis of the Zombies and things like that, which are

not terribly good.

But anyway, Women Behind Bars.

Interesting story about this. It's not a great Franco film, but the interesting

story about this is that it was made as a classic example of Franco using the

money that he'd been given to make one film to make another film for someone

else behind the back of the guy who'd given him the money. So I think it was

Erwin Dietrich, the producer who ran a company called Elite Films.

Dietrich gave Franco the money to make a film which eventually came out in the

US as Barbed Wire Dolls. That's probably the most famous title.

Hit video in this country, I believe, in a terribly cut -down version, which

never bothered the video nasty list, is Caged Women, missing about 20 minutes or

something like that. So it's no wonder it never got on the list. There's

virtually nothing left of it. Having completed the film for Dietrich, he then

used the remainder of the money which he'd kept aside, made a second film,

is Women Behind Bars, and sold that film to a different distributor.

obviously having sort of like two bites of the cake from Dietrich's money.

Dietrich knew nothing of this until a couple of years later when he was in a

cinema and was watching some of the footage and thinking, is this my film?

It looks awfully familiar because the cast were from the same film. He'd used

the same cast members, he'd used a couple of the same sort of story ideas.

They're both women in prison films.

Dietrich, though, was quite philosophical about it ultimately and

least he gave me the good one.

And he's right.

Women Behind Bars is not a highlight on Franco's filmography.

The story as it stands, though, is kind of odd,

because when you hear this story, you imagine that basically Franco had shot

women in prison movies on the same sets at almost the same time, the same cast,

and that they would look probably almost identical. In actual fact, they don't.

Women Behind Bars is a rather tangled plot about diamond smuggling.

And it takes about 40 minutes before they actually hit the women in prison

material. And that only lasts for about 30 minutes, and then you've got about

another 10 minutes of stuff at the end. So he did take the trouble to concoct a

different story. It's not just, you know, changing the label, but keeping

everything the same.

They are two quite different films.

It's a women -in -prison film where the prison appears to be, as far as I can

tell, a kind of sports leisure centre, it looks like.

There's a point where the girls are, you know, they're having their prison

dinner, and you look out of the window past them and you can see tennis courts.

They have tennis courts in, like...

barbaric women's prisons. I wasn't aware of this, but certainly they seem to

hear. And I think there's a drinks vending machine visible in one shot as

So, you know, Franco has this amazing knack of not giving a rat's

ass about plausibility.

He will quite happily convene a women in prison story in a sports leisure centre

where... Sort of like the girls press themselves up against the high -security

fence, which is just a chain -link fence overlooking an average car park.

As if a high -security prison has just dropped into the centre of town with a

mesh fence between them and the outside world. He just doesn't care.

He's just not concerned with, you know, is it plausible, is it implausible?

Just like, you know, this is the show. I don't care.

I really don't care.

You've got that kind of cavalier disregard for believability that puts

different world. I mean, if you accept it, if you resist that, then all you're

going to do is just find it annoying.

But if you go with it, you think, well, this is like a different spin on the

real world. It's like a parallel world. He's creating his own rules.

And that takes you into a different place. And it's fascinating to watch a

where, you know, simple things... are suddenly unfamiliar again, you know,

he's ignored a basic tenet of filmmaking and just come up with something so odd

that you could never find it anywhere else. You'd only find it in the films of

Jess Franco.

It's a puzzle, really, quite what it was that, you know, pulled on anyone's

chain as regards to the content of the film. It's not one of the more explicit

films on the list.

It does have...

Perhaps I'm just jaded. Perhaps I should remind myself that it does actually

have a scene of naked flagellation of a struggling, screaming woman.

So I don't know if that's the kind of thing that upsets people. Perhaps, I

know.

There it is, yeah, sort of flagellation, if that's the reason. It's the only

thing I can think of if we're dealing with content that could possibly have

upset anybody.

And even then, it's not anywhere near as bad as certain of the Franco films, for

a start.

It's quite possible, of course, as well, that it's nothing more complicated than

this, which is just the cover.

Naked girls, bars, chains, metal collars, you know, sort of like

violence against women, you know, titillation. That's possibly as far as

went. Somebody just looked at the cover and thought, that looks disgusting,

dodgy and thoroughly reprehensible, let's yank it in.

Yeah, so they may never have even watched the film, which is a shame. They

missed at least one treat that they didn't, because the opening music, at

very least, is worth seeing the film for.

About five minutes into the film, when you get to the credits sequence, if

you've seen the film, you know what I mean. It takes a while to get to the

credits, but there's a shot that lasts for about three minutes of a train

pulling into a railway station, and you see it in the distance, and it snakes

round and eventually arrives in shot down at the front.

The camera doesn't move at all, it just watches.

But the fan track's going completely bananas. It's like a sort of a theme for

piano and, you know, Hammond organ.

Or the Arpsalina, actually, I think is the keyboard. But never mind.

Mainly for piano. It sounds like Richard Clayderman's just had his first line of

Coke. And, you know, either that or he's got to finish recording this piece

before he...

flies off somewhere and he's in a hurry because it's it's kind of a piece of

kind of a tacky sort of lounge music but played at breakneck speed you know uh

utterly insane piece of music all the more insane because it's over an image

that's so static you know there's no actually it doesn't tie in at all so um

i love it i love that moment that's the best part of the film because it's over

five minutes in but there you go

A violent, current film.

Stop! Surley, get in the car.

As for you, Colonel de Bries, go back to your fucking prison.

Welcome to this prison, miss.

Come on.

No, you stay here.

Come on, come on.

Good luck, my old woman. You're going to tell me where the diamonds are hidden

and at what speed.

If I don't believe you, then go.

I don't know anything.

I'll bring you closer to memory.

I don't know anything.

Punishment cells.

Life in a women's prison.

Disputes between prisoners lead to repression.

Torture.

In fear of sadistic or violent punishment, the prisoners give in to the

desire of the director of the prison.

So, do you decide to spit it out?

Huh?

Lina Romay and Ronald Weiss are the protagonists of this true, violent

Where is Laura?

She's at the director's.

It's her day.

Lord, bless our meal. Once again, we thank you for giving us our daily bread.

Amen. Amen.

Give me that paper.

Give it to me right now, or you'll regret it.

Guard, take her to a cell of punishment.

Roger D 'Arton and Martine Stedile will make you live the story of a cell of

punishment.

C 'est une odeur sensationnelle. Je te veux.

Tu l 'as dit ça à toutes?

Salut, monsieur.

or kill the plant that is the diamond.

This is Bruno Matai's Zombie Creeping Flesh, also known as Hell of the Living

Dead. This film had a cinema release but was then released with massive cuts and

eventually became a video nasty.

And it's an extraordinary montage. It's a Frankenstein of a monster because

Bruno Matai has managed to sew together a variety of uncredited music and

stock footage and...

It is simply a film that brings together a lot of different genres that were

very popular in the Italian exploitation field, and yet I think it's quite a

fun little film. You need to hit their head! I told you! See? Like this!

It begins with the stereotype, kind of George Romero -esque idea of

contamination.

creating zombies but then it becomes quite confused and it can't really

out whether the zombies are going to be the kind of hoodoo zombies or they're

going to be contamination science zombies.

And so they are brought together because the film is set in Papua New Guinea.

The whole village is contaminated.

There have been many deaths.

Now they're celebrating the funeral.

One thing I didn't know because there are a lot of

stock footage images used of animals in the same way that they would be found in

films like Cannibal Holocaust and Cannibal Ferox, is that there are

Papua New Guinea, or perhaps there were in the 80s, because I'm pretty sure that

there are no elephants in Papua New Guinea now. The film reminds me a little

of certain films such as Dr Butcher MD, in that there are lovely images of

native... encrusted zombies emerging from the jungle and also these wonderful

bunkers that almost look like SS bunkers that have been destroyed or that

people have fled from.

There's an undertone of a kind of anthropological, ethnocentric

commentary on the suffering of third world people as a result of their...

superstitious understandings of death and burial and so there are certain

elements that are quite complex and also quite engaging.

One can only imagine how Bruno Madhai found these or where this commentary

from.

And so for many reasons this film is also, as well as being a zombie film and

kind of Indio cannibal film, it is very much a kind of Mondo film. Much of the

footage is stock footage from Mondo films, but I think that Mattia has

to really bring together those three very famous genres of Italian

and create something that is unique even though it is cannibalized from other

images and from other music, primarily the music of Goblin. However, Mattia

hasn't simply

a goblin soundtrack, he's put together a kind of greatest hits of goblin in the

film. So in one section, in the opening scene and the closing scenes, for

example, you get the goblin music from Zombie. And then in the middle, you get

some music from Buyo Omega.

Indeed, you get the ballad from Buyo Omega, which is quite fascinating. So

suddenly, instead of seeing a necrophiliac lovingly preserve his dead

girlfriend, you get some...

Papua New Guineans walking out of the forest about to eat the face of some

blonde -looking people.

There's a couple of interesting zombies. There's a very, very small child, and

I'm quite impressed with this child's acting because he can't be more than

or five.

And there's also a very, very old lady zombie.

These kind of points in the film are amusing and they're... Quite delightful,

really. And there's also some serious gore, such as, of course, the

stereotypes of people randomly pretending to eat and gnaw on bones and

But also the idea of a little child zombifying the father and mother, while,

course, it was used in earlier films, is particularly visceral in this example.

There is some eye gouging, there's some corrosion.

And I think that...

If one wanted to introduce oneself to all of the greatest hit elements of

various Italian exploitation in relation to cannibals and zombies, Mattia has

done a lovely job.

The whole village is contaminated.

There have been many deaths.

Now they're celebrating the funeral.

Bodies have to be cremated.

Thank God I knew what's happening here.

I insist that the most serious situation we have to deal with is cremating the

bodies.

Cut it out! Stop wasting your damn bullets, you jerks! You need to hit

head! I told you! Say it like this!

Get away!

Look out!

What's wrong, huh?

You disappointed?

Sorry, boys, I'm not on the menu after all.

Don't let it worry you. I think you will all meet again.

In hell!

Who's over there? What happened? I heard some funny noises in the back there.

Hurry.

Riga, check the coordinates.

Experimental project Operation Sweet Death must be considered a complete

failure. All these high -powered installations.

Like a fact. from a future world.

Safely hidden.

You're all doomed to a horrible death.

Doomed to be eaten up.

First they'll kill you.