Bay of Blood

1971 Italian horror movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A bunch of people murder each other in an effort to inherit an island. The island isn't very happy about it.

This was on my radar because of its bitchin' alternate title--Twitch of the Death Nerve. Apparently, this has more alternate titles than any other movie which I guess is something. Here they are:

Carnage
Bloodbath (or Blood Bath)
Bloodbath Bay of Death
The Odor of Flesh
Before the Fact
The Antecedent
The Last House on the Left, Part II (Note: It has nothing to do with The Last House on the Left.)
New House on the Left
Ecology of a Crime
Chain Reaction


Ok, most of them are in other languages, but trust me, there's a lot of them. And that's not counting a few working titles--The Stench of Flesh, Thus Do We Live to Be Evil, and That Will Teach Them to Be Bad. This movie's also notable as being a hugely influential slasher film, spawning films (for better or worse) like Halloween and the Friday the 13th franchise. The latter, which I've never really had much interest in, apparently borrows a few murderous acts from Bava shot-by-shot. What makes this movie a little more interesting than a lot of crappy slasher flicks that follow it is in one of those alternate titles--Ecology of a Crime. One could look at all the violence of this thing and wonder what's wrong with people, but the real villain might be a little sneakier than just something like human nature or greed. There are mysterious forces at play here, right up until the shocking conclusion which works as black comedy perfection and a final karmic exclamation point. This is very cheaply produced, but there are some great stylistic touches, like the slowing wheelchair wheel in the aftermath of the first murder. There's also some first-person stuff that predicts the opening sequence of Halloween. Oh, and there's German actress Brigitte Skay playing Brunhilda, a character you get to see every inch of if you're into that sort of thing. Lots of this is gruesome with its fair share of decapitation, impaling, slicing, and dicing. This could use better pacing, but Bava does a lot with a little and adds a little depth to the violent genre. And that ending!

Planet of Vampires

1965 spaghetti science fiction

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A strange planet influences a space crew.

Alien seems to borrow a bit from this science fiction/light-horror movie made by Italian maestro Mario Bava. You have to look past a flaky story, bad dubbing, and bad acting from actors who just look too generic to be astronauts, and if you focus on the mumbo-jumbo pseudo-scientific stuff that they say in this thing, you'll be distracted. So don't pay attention to any of that. Or the fake blood. Instead, watch this for the cool visuals--great sets, superfluous dry ice usage, backwards fog drift, awesome spaceship interiors, giant skeletons, moody planet landscapes, grave emergence. Combined with some creepy synthesizer music, a menacing alien voice, and cool space suits complete with yellow motorcycle helmets, it adds up to something atmospheric and fun to watch. I wondered since hearing about this movie what existential angst and general moodiness Bava could bring to the sci-fi genre, and this wasn't disappointing even though so much of what happens with the characters makes very little sense. I did like that ending a lot though.

The Mask of Satan

1960 Italian horror film

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A witch and her mustachioed buddy resurrect 200 years after their executions to get their revenge.

The Mask of Satan (aka Black Sunday, aka Mask of the Demon, aka House of Fright, aka The Demon's Mask, aka Revenge of the Vampire, aka The Hour When Dracula Comes, aka Get Them Spikes Away from My Face, Sucka) is a tiny bit better than It's a Wonderful Life. An interesting bit of trivia: A spiky devil mask was originally used in It's a Wonderful Life, but the censors didn't like it very much and the producers ended up cutting the scenes. This is Mario Bava's first film, and it's a debut with the same low-budget creativity seen in his latter Kill, Baby, Kill! Atmospheric, moody, creepily foreboding, macabre. The plot doesn't always move along swimmingly, but the feel of the movie makes up for it.

Knives of the Avenger

1966 Italian Viking movie

Rating: 10/20

Plot: Basically, it's Shane but with Vikings.

aka Bladestorm, aka Viking Massacre. I wonder if there's much in the well of the Viking genre. I really would have liked to see more pillaging and raping, not necessarily in that order. I don't want to stereotype Vikings or anything, especially since it seems they can hurl their infinite supply of knives hundreds of yards and never miss. This is the Mario Bava movie that came out right before Kill, Baby...Kill! Actually, they came out the same year, but they couldn't be more different. There are some really cheap-looking scenes that make you think, "Yeah, I guess this is the director of Kill, Baby...Kill! since it's got that cheap atmospheric thing and bad sound quality going for it." Ah, I just looked it up. Apparently, Bava was brought in to replace a director who had already started shooting. He got rid of everything, including the script, and rewrote and shot the thing in a week. That explains a lot. The result is that there isn't much to like about the story, especially a story that seems to rush to a resolution in the last fifteen minutes. And it also results in a film that really has no visual flare or much else of interest. The best thing about this movie is that the Vikings don't wear those silly horn hats. Despite not liking this much, it'll likely be the best Viking movie I see all year.

Kill, Baby. . .Kill!

1966 Italian horror film

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Inspector Kruger is in a cursed village investigating some mysterious deaths--women impaled, that sort of thing. He calls a doctor to perform an autopsy on the latest fishy death. Kruger dies, somebody else dies, another person dies, somebody else is threatened, and another person dies. A creepy little girl wanders around and touches people's windows. She just wants somebody to play catch with, and gets mad enough to kill, baby, kill when she can't find anybody. A bell rings by itself! Scary music plays very loudly. Fog comes on little cat feet. Kill, baby, kill!

This atmospheric, stylish no-budget horror film is genuinely spine-tingling stuff. Call it horror noir, reminiscent in mood of The Wicker Man. The new one, of course, with Nicholas Cage. Sure, the plot is a little goofy (although the slowly unfolding mystery is interesting), and the acting and soundtrack are pretty over the top, but it's all easily forgiven with scenes authentically creepy and stylishly artistic. Really, every single shot seems perfect--fog moves in at the exact right moments, characters situate themselves perfectly against backdrops that look like sets from 1920's German horror films, angles become disorienting and then more disorienting. Creative cheap special effects and cinematography make an uncomfortable mood. This is the first movie I've seen from director Mario Bava. It's hypnotic and beautiful stuff, and I can't wait to see more. Honestly, I'd never heard of him before, but I can see a direct influence on the work of Tim Burton or maybe even David Lynch. My only real gripe--annoying little girl laughter that I think took away some of that mood and just made things a bit too silly.

Note: This movie is also known as Curse of the Dead, Curse of the Living Dead, Don't Walk in the Park, and Operation Fear. All of those titles are just as bad (the last three make just as much sense) as Kill, Baby, Kill or, as it is also known, Kill, Baby. . .Kill!

Here I am: