Jack the Ripper (1959)

1959
Directed by Robert S. Baker and Monty Berman
Starring Lee Patterson, Eddie Byrne, Betty McDowall, John Le Mesurier and Ewen Solon

So recently at my real job, I was faced with a task that required 10 minutes of work followed by 30-minute stretches doing essentially nothing.  That might sound awesome, and it was, for all of two days.  After that, the clock mocked me all night long, and it was time for some good reading material to pass the time.  Fortunately, I've got just such a book for the occasion - "The Mammoth Encyclopedia of the Unsolved," a constant companion of mine for more than ten years that I dig out for rainy days/laundromat trips.  Well, on this particular occasion, the chapter about Jack the Ripper really piqued my curiosity to dig deeper, and it wasn't long until I got myself a 500-page book specifically about the Victorian murderer who has inspired countless theories (quack or otherwise) as to his identity over the years.

To be sure, we've also had plenty of films with crazy theories.  Now, I've never seen From Hell (Johnny Depp gives me a reverse boner), but I'm told that it's pretty out there.  I vividly remember the 1988 TV miniseries with Michael Caine and Jane Seymour, and thinking that it was pretty much accepted fact that William Gull, along with his sinister coachmen, were responsible for the murders as a means of stifling a blackmail plot by the prostitutes of London.  Approximately 17 seconds of research debunks this theory in real life.  I've also heard that the murderer was the English Royal Family, an agent of the Russian government sent to embarrass Scotland Yard, and a doctor getting revenge on prostitutes as a means for making up for his son's death.  More on that theory later.  My theory?  The likely truth - that Jack the Ripper was a nobody like the vast majority of serial killers - is far scarier than anything the fictional mind can come up with involving Oliver Stone-esque conspiracy theories or evil organizations.

Anyway, while the Caine miniseries was quite good, today, we'rel ooking at a movie I caught for the first time on AMC close to a decade ago.  Released in 1959 as part of the wave of interest in the case after an acclaimed TV documentary about the Ripper aired on British television, Jack the Ripper (creative title, I know) adhered to the popular theory at the time that a doctor flew into a rage after his son died of syphilis after a tryst with prostitute Mary Kelly, asked about on the street trying to ascertain her location and killed them to cover his tracks before finding Kelly and completing his mission.  Of course, this theory is also bogus - if it's revenge related, why mutilate the victims to such a degree? (folks, type "Jack the Ripper victims" into a Google image search if you want to see the reality of these crimes as opposed to the romanticized quaint mystery that many people hold it as)  The theory holds no weight, but this movie is an entertaining little piece of nostalgia, occasional bouts of unintentional hiliarity notwithstanding.  It's also one of the most hilariously factually inaccurate movies of all time.  People, nothing - not a single thing - in this movie actually happened, but that's part of the fun.

The movie wastes precious little time getting to the murdering, as a mysterious figure skulks about London killing dance-hall girls and prostitutes - all while looking for a woman named Mary Clarke.  It's just as captivating as it sounds; the dude meets a prospective victim, utters the words "Mary Clarke," slice, dice, repeat.  At any rate, one of the the movie's recurring themes is the mob mentality and public furor, and we truly do get a sense of the public outcry against the police and authorities while these murders were going on in this movie.  One out of ten ain't bad when it comes to accuracy rating.  The person who feels the heat most directly is Scotland Yard Inspector O'Neill (Eddie Byrne), basically this movie's equivalent of the real-life Frederick Abberline.  Realizing that he is in over his head...he calls in a man from New York City with an Elvis haircut.

I'm not making this up.  Lee Patterson plays Sam Lowry, hip, happening NYC Detective and former friend of O'Neill's who soon shows up in 1888 Victorian London with his boss rock and roll hairstyle.  Biting realism, this film is not.  All things told, Patterson does a decent enough job as Lowry - since the movie was filmed in the U.K. and gaining eventual release in the States, one would expect this guy to be a Mary Sue-ish character, and in some ways he is, but he manages to be at least slightly likable and resonant.  That, and we buy him at the end when he's duking it out with Jack.

Moving right along, this movie adheres strongly to the popular theory at the time that the killer must have been a skilled surgeon based on the skill of the cuts performed.  Through some miracle, there is only one medical house open for business (/Wade Barrett) in all of Whitechapel, and it's here where the intrepid investigators focus their considerable talents (/sarcasm).  It's here where the flick's many red herring (and one not so red - oh yeah, spoiler alert) suspects come into play.  It's also where Lowry enjoys a side romance with one of the doctor's hottie nieces, and it's just as captivating as it sounds.

All annoying internet snarkiness aside, this movie actually managed to hold my attention when I first saw it at 2:00 a.m. that long ago summer night in 2006, and it's still got a lot going for it.  For starters, the atmosphere is off the charts.  It may not be particularly high-budget, but the film's directors manage to really capture the desperation and seedy side of 1888 Victorian London.  Or, at least, that's what a film major would say.  The movie IS quite fun to look at, however, and the black & white (with the exception of one scene - I'll leave it to you to discover that one if you're willing to plunk down $10 for a DVD) really ups the ante when it comes to the gritty factor.  The performances, by and large, are also pretty satisfactory, particularly John Lee Mesurier as a rather hard-edged surgeon and the uncle of the aforementioned love interest niece. 

To be sure, the film also has its fair share of negatives - Patterson's character and his Presley do being the most obviously visible one.  It also treads occasionally into boring category when it becomes the story of a bunch of catty chicks working in burlesque shows, but I don't get paid by the hour for these things, so I'll spare everyone the play-by-play when it comes to that stuff.  Oh, and the climax gives us some electric stuff.

*** out of ****.  Don't watch this one for its biting realism, but if you want to suspend disbelief and turn your brain off for 90 minutes, there's worse ways to spend your time.

The Maid (2005)

2005
Directed by Kelvin Tong
Starring Alessandra De Rossi, Chen Shu Cheng, Hong Hui Fang and Benny Soh

Most people who've been reading my stuff for a while are aware (likely to the annoying level) that I'm a big mark for Asian horror.  In no small part due to the fact that I only got into the genre recently after absorbing approximately 98,717 American slasher films, these felt like a gigantic breath of fresh air.  For starters, in these movies, all bets are off - I've seen my fair share of them that end with every single character dead, complete with a nonironic, non-dream-style-Repo Men-esque depressing-as-all-fuck denounment.  That's something you don't get in many American flicks.  Here in the States, we typically get the "ending loud noise scare stinger" as the last image we get in the theater as everyone walks out laughing at yet another "gotcha" ending. 

Compared to Lil' Kayako shuffling down the stairs and walking into Tokyo to wreak havoc at the end of Ju-On 2, it's hard for any of these films to compare.

But I digress.  While I've got the boner for Japanese-and-otherwise ghost films, I don't like every single one of them.  This one included.  The Maid is actually a movie that comes to us from Singapore where it was a huge hit.  It's also a movie that has yet to get any kind of remake that I'm aware of.  It's something that I'm grateful for, because this flick is like A Tale of Two Sisters on valium.  It's a slow burn that never quite burns, so let's examine where this movie went wrong.

Our main character is Rosa (De Rossi, who is both hot and likable throughout the flick), a young woman who has just arrived in Singapore from the Phillipines to work as a family's domestic maid.  I bet you didn't see that one coming.  The early portions of the movie introduce us to the family.  There's Mr. and Mrs. Teo (Cheng and Fang, respectively), who seem like nice enough employers initially (OR DO THEY? - sorry, too much Nostalgic Critic lately) and their mentally handicapped son Ah Soon (Soh).  In between the fascinating bits of domestic bliss that we would expect form the early portions of a movie of this nature, we're also treated to the local customs when it comes to ghosts.  As it turns out, this will be the most interesting thing in this film.

A key plot device in The Maid involves the Chinese Seventh Month, where legend has it that the Gates of Hell open for 30 days.  Throughout the movie, people are doing all kinds of things to appease these spirits - leaving gifts, incense, locking up before sundown, etc.  It also leads to some of the best visuals that Kelvin Tong serves up, with rather scary-looking costumed folk dancing in the relative darkness of the Singapore streets.  Rosa makes more than her fair share of faux pas when it comes to Hell Month, leading to a few stern warnings at the hands of Mr. and Mrs. Teo.  When elderly employers shake their fists at you, you best heed the warnings.

Caution: in this paragraph be spoilers.  While cleaning up the house, Rosa disvoers the ashes of Esther, the previous maid that the Teos employed.  A ghostly vision soon commences where it was revealed that Esther was raped by Ah Soon, and fearing the equivalent of Marcellus Wallace's pipe-hittin' brothers in the court room killed Esther by burning her to death.  Lo and behold, Ah Soon has similar feelings for Rosa.

A big benchmark for success in movies of this nature is whether or not the surprises manage to satisfy, and this is where this movie really comes up short.  There is a major swerve that comes our way in the third act, but it's not the good kind.  Instead, it's the eye-rolling head-scratching kind - the kind that makes you go "oh come on!" to any unfortunate soul who might be sharing the room with you.  Eventually, what we're left with for the rest of the film is the usual brand of chase-and-slash with a large dose of ghostliness.  This sort of thing can work with a character as likable as Rosa, but it all comes up surprisingly flat here.  How much?  I dozed off on three separate occasions the first time I tried watching this movie.

It could be that this is just one of those "it just wasn't my thing" movies.  The Maid...um...made a king's ransom in Singapore when it was released, and won a few awards from film festivals, but for the love of me I just can't figure out why.  This flick is almost the very definition of cookie-cutter; starry-eyed heroine, family with a dark secret, one big turn in the proceedings and a tense, chase-filled finale.  Most Asian horror movies manage to accomplish this formula with no shortage of flair, even switching up the order to make it seem more fresh.  This one?  It's a cure for insomnia and not much more.

* 1/2 out of ****.  This is one for the "avoid" pile.  It's vanilla to the max.

Phenomena (1985)

1985
Directed by Dario Argento
Starring Jennifer Connelly, Daria Nicolodi, Dalila Di Lazzaro, Patrick Bauchau and Donald Pleasence

Out of all the Dario Argento flicks, Phenomena easily ranks as the weirdest.  Coming from the guy who made movies about faceless, vaguely-kinda-ghosty beings trying to take over the world in no less than three separate films, that is some statement.  This flick is a murder-mystery crossed with a telepathy epic crossed with an out-and-out gorefest in its finale with one of the most Jesse Pomeroy-esque disturbing villains I've seen.  Given all of those parameters, it's still a thousand times weirder than you'd expect.

This was also the feature film debut of one Jennifer Connelly.  Without my usual nine minutes of research, I'm a little at a loss as to how she was plucked to be the star of this exclusively Italian production.  But then again, we've also got Donald Pleasence wandering around in the cast, so who knows.  I've never found her to be a particularly charismatic or interesting actress, and the prospect of her playing a relatable teenager was admittedly terrifying to me when I first popped in this DVD many years ago, but by and large she does a decent job. For more bonus material, we've also got yet another awesome Argento score from Claudio Simonetti creeping us into submission throughout the duration of the film's running time.

Well, let's get this show on the road.  The movie starts off with what is admittedly a very creepy introductory sequence, as a young tourist misses a bus and finds her way to a house in the middle of nowhere.  She is summarily killed by some unseen force that lives in the house before we are introduced to Miss Connelly.

A great many of Argento's films take place in artsy academies, and this one is no different, as Jennifer Corvino (and I'm always amused when an actor plays a character with the same first name for some reason; I like to think that John Cena played a character named John in The Marine because that was the only name he would answer to at the time) is being welcomed to the Richard Wagner Academy for Girls, lorded over by Frau Bruckner.  Bruckner is played by Daria Nicolodi, Argento's real-life long-time girlfriend who somehow creeps up in every movie that he does.  Sometimes, she can be quite good (Deep Red).  In this...not so much, for reasons that I can't get into for spoiler purposes.  Gotta keep my loyal audience of six readers in suspense.

Jennifer is the daughter of a prominent actor, and promptly makes friends with her roommate while incurring the catty wrath of all of her new classmates.  The source of that cattiness?  Jennifer's love of insects.  Phenomena was actually called Creepers for its American release for good reason, as a large portion of the film concerns Jennifer's telepathic ability to communicate with insects.  Now, I'm not an insect person.  I recoil in horror from anything with a stinger, and have a diagnosed phobia of grasshoppers (no joke).  As such, this is a difficult movie for me to watch at times, what with all of the close-up shots of various crawly things.  Somehow, it's all pulled off relatively well, especially when this movie's cleanup hitter is introduced.

It isn't long before two murders occur on school grounds, and Jennifer does her best to solve them after the authorities turn up nothing.  Her ally in this mission is entomologist John McGregor, played by Donald Pleasence.  I don't think I've ever seen this guy in anything that I didn't enjoy, and he's no different here, investing every ounce of his ungodly voice and trademark scenery-chewing into the character.  McGregor is an invalid who has a superintelligent chimp helper, but it's Jennifer who serves as his greatest helper of all.  And there's your setup, kids.  This is as close to a police procedural film as Argento has ever done, and it's done WITHOUT the police for the most part, as Jennifer utilizes her gift and McGregor's knowledge to track down various clues leading up to one of the more baffling revelations in the Argento "mystery killer" universe that has somehow managed to fool me in all of his films.  This dude has a gift for pulling the wool over people's eyes.

Judgment time.  First off, this movie has a finale that has to be seen to be believed.  A good, solid 20 minutes of nonstop tension and revelations that doesn't fail in any of your expectations about what the mystery holds.  No matter what your expectation, they top it with this finale, so ten cool points to the movie in this regard.  On the downside, Connelly's scenes without Pleasence are an unfortunate drag, particularly her interactions with the chick playing Sophie.  As such, there are portions of Phenomena that drag, peppered in between what I'll fully admit is a pretty impressive run of money scenes.  How's that for bipolar judgment?

As for another plus, this movie has a chimp that saves the day.  So + an additional half-star.

*** out of ****.  It doesn't have the same rewatchability as some of Argento's other films, but it's still a worthy addition to any horror library.  Check it out.

Pet Sematary Two (1992)

1992
Directed by Mary Lambert
Starring Edward Furlong, Anthony Edwards, Clancy Brown, Jared Rushton, Darlanne Fluegel and Jason MCGuire

Before I get started teeing off on the movie in question today, I just have to point that there actually was a point in time when I liked this movie.  Back in the fall of 1993 when HBO was playing this on constant repeat, I used to really dig Pet Sematary Two for a lot of the same reasons that I liked Watchers.  Seeing a horror flick with primarily young protagonists was a rarity, and I ate it up.  It wasn't until much later that I realized that this flick is a big, steaming pile of crap, but I enjoyed the hell out of it while I could.

That's a shame, really, because this movie had a lot going for it on paper.  A sequel to one of the most popular Stephen King adaptations, the same director as the first film, and a cast who, while they might not have been household names, were definitely a big step up from the "whoever we found passing out movie tickets that day" variety that slasher flicks largely have to get their flesh puppets from.  And it had Eddie Furlong.  Much like Corey Haim in Watchers, that was what really drew me to the movie, since the kid star of the single greatest action movie of all time (and I still believe this holds true today) Terminator 2 was the protagonist.  As a kid, this guy was my anti-Macaulay Culkin.  Given better material, he could have made this movie aces.  Unfortunately, we've got some pretty shitty material.

The flick starts with tragedy, as Jeff Matthews (Furlong) watches his mother - a famous actress - die in an on-set accident.  Soon afterwards, he and his father Chase (Anthony Edwards, who still doesn't have his damn dog tags) move to Ludlow, Maine.  This is one aspect of the movie that I've always been a little mystified by - how a Hollywood actress would be married to a relatively small-time veterinarian.  Generally, they prefer to stick to their own kind, for better or worse.  At any rate, Furlong is indeed pretty dam ngood in this movie as Jeff; he's rough around the edges after the death of his mother, and manages to pull it off without seeming overtly emo.  Edwards, on the other hand, is completely milquetoast and seems to be phoning it in more often than not.  Maybe it was the food they had in catering, I don't know.

It doesn't take long for the burial ground to get utilized in this movie.  This is where the movie really lost me, and I suspect that it is this way for many other viewers, as well.  The first flick was a textbook study in the slow burn.  This, not so much.  Within short order, Jeff's buddy Drew (Jason McGuire) buries his dead dog.  A short time AFTER THAT (/redundancy), Jeff's wicked town Sherriff stepdad (played by Clancy Brown, who will go down in history as one of the best dislikable pricks in cinematic history for his various villain roles) goes in the ground, and this is where the movie really flies off the rails as we get this really bizarre sequence where the dude initially acts uncharacteristically nice toward his family only to pull the swerve on us and go on a rampage. 

Brown, as always, is more than game for this role and does his part, but it's here where this movie's VAST difference in tone from the original film really becomes apparent.  The first was all about internal terror, for the most part, with the struggle that Louis Creed goes through after the death of his son being the driving force behind it.  I remember being at a loss even as a 10-year-old just why Drew would resurrect his hulking mad dictator of a father.  Call it a matter of script convenience.  While all of this is going on, there's also some weird stuff as Jeff and Chase do some tests on the resurrected dog, and for the better part of five minutes this movie becomes Revenge of the Creature as we get all sorts of science-y exposition about how something can be medically dead but still functioning.

Anyway, this movie is essentially all one big stall until the finale, where Jeff brings back his dead mother.  Did I need to spoiler tag that?  I don't think it's necessary; it's what the whole movie is cruxed on, and the screenwriter was wise to deliver.  I'll leave it up to you to absorb the movie's closing chapters (where one of the school bullies who has accosted Jeff throughout the film makes his sudden reappearance).  They're not underwhelming, but they're not balls-to-the-wall awesome, either.

So it goes with Pet Sematary Two, a middling, disappointing sequel to one of the downright creepiest films of all time.  It's shockingly cookie cutter, and the fact that a movie fitting this description came after a movie that gave us Zelda screaming "you'll never get out of bed" makes it even more depressing.  In addition to that, the characters aren't terribly likable; we don't have the same sense of gut-wrenching loss from Jeff and his father that we did from Louis Creed.  And while Clancy Brown is a game villain, he ventures into the realm of cartoony at times.  Kind of like a big-screen version of Damien Sandow's current gimmick.

* 1/2 out of ****.  I give it a BIT more credit than some people on the interwebz do, but I concur with the consensus that this one is a skip.

Curse of the Werewolf (1961)

1961
Directed by Terence Fisher
Starring Clifford Evans, Oliver Reed, Yvonne Romain, Catherine Feller, Anthony Dawson and Michael Ripper (what a great name for a horror actor)

Now, I'm not what you would call a Hammer Films connoisseur.  The total number of movies that I've seen in the vast, vast, EXTREMELY vast expanse of space that make up this catalogue is admittedly very slim.  From this list, though, I can report that Curse of the Werewolf is easily the most downright depressing movie I've seen from this factory of a film studio - in the good way, for the most part.

The flick was directed by Terence Fisher, one of the most beloved horror directors of all time and the guy behind several of Hammer's most famous films.  Dracula, Frankenstein, the Mummy, you name the luminary, this guy helmed films featuring them.  Ordinarily, I'm not a guy who delves deep into the boring abyss that is camera angles and tricks, but I'm a HUGE fan of the way the atmosphere that this guy creates in his movies.  The dark color palettes, the fog, the shadows...so cool.  Twenty years later, I'm still pissed off that I couldn't get Fisher to provide the atmosphere for my grade school Halloween party. 

With that, the movie.  It has what is admittedly a VERY long introductory sequence - close to 40 minutes if memory serves me correctly.  The setting this time is 18th century Spain, and a beggar makes his way inside the castle of Marquis Siniestro (Dawson, who is fantastic as one of the more despicable human beings in any horror film I've seen).  The beggar is subjected to mockery and eventual torture, thrown inside the dungeon for 15 years, during which his only human contact is with the jailer and his mute daughter.  Said daughter, it should be noted, starts this sequence as a little girl and is eventually played by the unbelievably hot and stacked Yvonne Romain.

As this (long long incredibly long) introduction comes to a head, the Marquis - now aging and decrepit - turns on the lechery with Romain and tries to get her into the sack.  When she rejects this, she is thrown into the dungeon with the beggar, who summarily rapes her and dies.  After killing the Marquis in revenge, Romain escapes into the surrounding forest where she is found by the kindly Don Alfredo Corledo (Evans).  Before long, she has the illegitimate child that the beggar...um...equipped her with and dies not soon afterward.  Smiles and sunshine all around, people!

From here...finally...we meet Leon Corledo (Oliver Reed in his first film role, and much like all of his Hammer projects, he really owns it), all grown up after being raised by Alfredo and his wife.  Since we're already well-past the third-way mark of the movie, from here we get the sped-up version of our expected slow-burning buildup to Leon being a werewolf.  Our explanation here (and really, we don't need an especially deep one) is that the tragic, bad circumstances of his conception have given him the titular curse.  Dismembered bodies of sheep and goats begin turning up first, but it is when he goes to work in a wine vineyard and falls for his boss' beautiful daughter Cristina (Feller) that the plot kicks into high gear, leading to an expectedly tragic ending that feels all the more appropriate given the fact that it comes at the end of such dark film. 

If you can't gleam it from the plot description thus far, Curse of the Werewolf is a movie with a pretty low body count.  There is not much rampaging werewolf action to be had in the flick, as most of the second half centers around his relationship with Cristina, his frustration at not being able to marry her, and eventually coming to the realization that being around the love of his life suppresses the curse.  This is a movie much more about emotion than blood and guts.  Movies that go for this approach tend to either hit a home run or come across as mind-numbingly boring, but this is the rare example that comes up somewhere in the middle.  On one hand, there are LONG stretches of this movie that drag.  On the other hand, the acting that we get to enjoy from Reed, Evans and Feller is top notch.  Had this movie been made today with the modern crop of cardboard cutouts that qualify as actors, the second half of this flick would have been terminally boring, but these three manage to save it.

So it goes with Curse of the Werewolf.  As already mentioned, Hammer Films was a studio built on atmosphere, and Terence Fisher creates plenty of that once again.  There is this lush-yet-Gothic quality to all of his films, and that is present here, as well, despite the fact that the story that we're given is occasionally less than stellar.  But what are you gonna do?  Even Steven Spielberg has directed his share of clunkers (Always and 1941, anyone?).

*** out of ****.  If you can put up with roughly 20 minutes of terminal boredom, there's plenty to enjoy in this flick.  Check it out.