Really Awful Movies: Ep 199 – Army of Darkness

We’re into Evil Dead in a big way. Here, the third film in the trilogy, Army of Darkness, starring The Chin himself, (screw you, Quagmire and Bob Hope) Bruce Campbell.

Ash is transported (along with his iconic jalopy Oldsmobile) to the 14th century, and instead of finding the Black Plague, he comes across an impossibly sunny landscape of Anglia (which resembles southern California, where this was filmed).

He has to find THE BOOK, in order to get back to modernity. That tome is Necronomicon, and an incantation must be uttered to get back home (naturally, Ash screws this up, and is doomed to hanging around the Middle Ages for a bit longer than intended, battling undead hordes).

The film was nearly called Medieval Dead, or Medi-evil Dead, but this Dino De Laurentiis production went through a slew of changes, many of which were vehemently opposed by Mr. Campbell.

So, how does it hold up? If it were made independently of The Evil Dead, would it be more heralded? On this episode of the Really Awful Movies Podcast, a discussion of the tone of the film, Deadites, the production process, viewing films through the lens of nostalgia, and much much more.

Really Awful Movies: Ep 181 – The Evil Within

Mirror mirror on the wall, who’s the most f-ed up of them all? On this episode of the Really Awful Movies Podcast, a discussion of the long-time coming, plagued Andrew Getty-directed/written production, The Evil Within.

The Evil Within came and went in 2017. However, it did generate media coverage. Just not the good kind. The Guardian weighed in on the production of the film, some 15 years in the making, and discussed the labour of love which eventually brought it to, if not the big screen, then the Amazon streaming screen.

Andrew Getty (he of the Getty oil fortune) put his heart and soul into this film, his one and only movie as this was released posthumously when Getty died at the age of 43.

At the heart of The Evil Within is a story of brotherly love, John as custodian/caretaker of mentally-challenged Dennis. Dennis, is plagued by terrible nightmares, the only respite from which is doing the bidding of the evil “Storyteller” (played by the inimitable Michael Berryman, who communicates with Dennis through an antique mirror). Once the requests become more and more sinister, the homestead/community is threatened. Dennis goes from animal killing / taxidermy, to prey of the two-legged variety, offing the local ice cream girl.

This is set against the backdrop of brother John, and his current squeeze Lydia, who is not happy with what she perceives as a figure, Dennis, who’s dragging down hers and John’s romance and future nuptials.

The Evil Within, despite being nearly a decade and a half in the making, comes with well-earned scares. It’s a shame it’s been overlooked.

On this episode of the Really Awful Movies Podcast:

  • Freud, Jung, and dreams
  • Horror films featuring mirrors
  • The meaning behind mirrors
  • The man, the legend, Michael Berryman
  • What plagues our own nightmares
  • Howard Stern’s Wack Pack/Matthew McGrory
  • How long does it take for something to be considered a cult classic?

Really Awful Movies: Ep 109 – Horror Express

Peter Cushing. Christopher Lee. What more do you need? As a bonus, there’s Telly Savalas. And a mad monk.

Horror Express, a.k.a Pánico en el Transiberiano in mellifluous Spanish (Panic on the Trans-Siberian Express) is a 1972 Spanish-British science fiction-horror film produced by Bernard Gordon and Gregorio Sacristan, and directed by Eugenio Martín. The latter worked with Telly Savalas again a year later in Pancho Villa.

In Horror Express, a train is transporting mysterious cargo belonging to anthropologist Dr. Saxton (played by the incomparable Christopher Lee).

The contents of the freight include a frozen, hairy missing link-type creature found in Manchuria.

Naturally, curiosity gets the better of a few of the passengers – to their peril!

Listen to our take on this 1972 classic, reminiscent of some of the Hammer Horror films kicking around at the time.