B-Movie-Palooza V: Damn These Movies Just Didn’t Make Sense

Another Halloween has just passed us, and with it came one of the year’s most amazing tradition. Of course, I’m talking about B-Movie-Palooza! The annual viewing of some of the world’s most terrible/awesome b-movie horrors that Sydney Video can provide. In previous years we’re gone with themes to our b-movie selection, but this year, that theme was scraped... kinda. The movies were selected at random - movies that looked good/ridiculous. Unknown to us was the fact that we had grabbed a pile of the most non-sensical movies that I have ever seen (and that’s saying a lot). It took a lot to get through them all.

For those who aren’t on the know, the B-Movie-Palooza rating/reviewing is a multi-step process. There’s a rating as a film, a rating as a b-movie (which are both measured out of a possible 5 bloody axes). Then there’s a more in-depth look at each movie. I’m sick of explaining this. You’ll get it as we go along. If you don’t, then I guess you should start with B-Movie-Palooza I and work yer way up until you do. For those who ARE on the ball, here we go!

Little Devils: The Birth
 First up on the chopping block was this fine film. The story was (as far as I could gather) a guy made demons out of mud (that looked like ketchup or pudding) that were then possessed and given guns and flame throwers... that come from no where. The twist is, the demons are all under 2 feet tall. Why so small? Who knows! The only person that can stop them is... a freelance writer! Why? Who knows! And what can the writer use to stop the demons? Why, nothing but lemon soda! Why lemon soda? Do I have to say it again?

Highlights: The freelance writer was Skippy from Family Ties! And he said the word “porn” an unsurmountable amount of times. Oh Skippy - that girl wasn’t even Malory! Also, during the credits they talk about how their day was like being in a “bad b-movie.”
Lowlights: Soda? That seemed like a major cop out.
1. Quality: 3 bloody axes not terrible.
2. as a B-Movie 3 bloody axes not terrible enough, but the animatronic demon feet add to the score.

Shredder
 What would happen if you tried to make 2 movies at once? One was a mad-cap snow-bound teenage-sex-romp comedy, and the other was a revenge-slasher movie. You’d get this movie! A bunch of teens go to an abandoned ski-lodge to do some snowboarding. Serious snowboarding. They are creepy-obsessed with snowboarding. They know there’s been murders there, btu they don’t really care. To the point that they pick up random strangers on the way. But hey, he’s from Europe AND he’s dreamy. That makes it okay! Things get really crazy when each one starts dying over the day... yet they don’t really make any major attempts to leave until it gets dark. And why is that? Who knows!

Highlights: “What country are you from?” “Europe.”
The girl hanging from the ski-lift for like 5 trips around in broad daylight was hilarious, as was the death line, “I never loved you.” However, the thing that got watched at LEAST a dozen times: the murderer getting VERY quickly sucked into a giant snowblower. From a sitting position. Smiles all around.
Lowlights: Most of this movie was written by movies that came before it. Quotes galore!
1. Quality: 3.5 bloody axes pretty good quality actually.
2. as a B-Movie 5 bloody axes terrible lines, dumb gimmicks AND boobs! Had. It. All.

April Fool’s Day
 Um... this movie... took place... somewhere. I have no idea. Confused the hell out of me actually. I think it was an island, cuz there was a boat in the opening scenes. Also, it was a murder mystery weekend, but that was given away on the box. I dunno. The actual plot didn’t start til well beyond the half-way point. Up til then, it was just random pranks.

Highlights: Biff (from Back to the Future) was in it! What the hell?! Also, the opening boat accident looked creepily real.
Lowlights: How the hell did any of it make sense?! It didn’t! One of the characters just disappeared, despite the fact that she was given the most interesting background. But what WAS the actual background? Who knows!
1. Quality: 2 bloody axes it had Biff AFTER Back to the Future. That says something.
2. as a B-Movie 4 bloody axes this thing was a d-movie at least.

Trick Or Treats
 It’s Halloween (appropriately) and some woman has to babysit some kid. However, the kid is a weird prankster, and his dad is David Carradine. For no reason. However, his mom’s original husband was institutionalized... for no reason at all, I guess, and he comes back to kill his ex. Only she’s not there! The babysitter is! Only, he doesn’t really care. He’ll kill whoever, cuz he’s crazy now. I mean, the asylum was just a big hall with tarps. Again, this movie confused the hell out of me. The girl had a boyfriend who kept calling for no reason. He was playing Othello! A white version! What?

Highlights: The opening scene where the guy was captured by the asylum guards was good. They jumped into a pool and everything. It was fun.
Lowlights: The sets were pretty terrible. As was the plot. Don’t even get me started on the acting. Also, despite having David Carradine, there was no Kung-Fu at all.
1. Quality: 1.5 bloody axes didn’t even have Biff.
2. as a B-Movie 3.5 bloody axes it had b-movie stuff. I don’t wanna talk about this movie anymore.

Shrunken Heads
 A kind of super-hero-horror b-movie, we have Shrunken Heads. 3 local underdog teens try to take on some local thugs and their boss, Big Mo (who is a woman, played like a man... who knows!) in order to... not be the underdogs anymore! Yeah! Only, while doing this, the thugs shoot them and they die. A friend of theirs, a Haitian ex-cop, who now sells comic books steals their heads, shrinks them, brings them back to life, gives them magical powers, and trains them to hunt/kill bad guys. So far, it makes sense. However, they don’t ACTUALLY kill people. The people become zombies. Nice zombies. Nice zombies who pick up litter and clean up graffiti. Ugh...

Highlights: This movie looked like a weird after school special. Only they said “fuck” way more than they did on ABC. It also had amusing previews for other b-movies at the start. That and one of the thugs was called “Booger.”
Lowlights: The effects were on par with... something stupid and poorly done.
1. Quality: 2 bloody axes just not overly good.
2. as a B-Movie 4 bloody axes points for concept. What the hell were they thinking?!

Killer Instinct
 The Dare Club (like the Midnight Society from Are You Afraid of the Dark only slightly sexier) spend a night in an old abandoned insane asylum. It was closed down because the guy that ran it got a lot of flack because an inmate went crazy(er), escaped, and killed 8 people. They then killed him. However, it seems that the reason he was put in the asylum originally was for his land so that they could build a meat-packing plant (see, their town was going poor) and not for real craziness. That may be a theme for this year - crazies who aren’t crazy, are treated crazy, and then GET crazy! Then, 15 years later it looks like the crazy guy is back and he’s killing the Dare Club. There’s also some random woman who’s trying to buy the land, as well as solve the mystery she knew nothing about until about 10 minutes ago. And why? I have a reason! Is it because she wants justice for this man? No! She’s just a savvy business woman! Plus their attempts to kill her just don’t seem that tough. She kicks the guy in the nuts, tazers him, and she’s good to go. That’s literally what happens. Oh the way these movies work.

Highlights: Dude from L.A. Law was the main villain (to the business woman, not the killer). The fact that there were 2 fairly intricate plots (for a b-movie) is impressive.
Lowlights: None of the characters were all that likable. I had no concern for when people died. Probably because I had no info on them at all other than “hey! We’re rich teens! We do dumb things! Woo!”
1. Quality: 3.5 bloody axes looked shakey at first, but really improved as a bad movie.
2. as a B-Movie 4 bloody axes see the description for “Shredder” but take away the X-treme angle.

The major problem with these movies was the “Quality” category. While they were all really, really terrible, they were really, really enjoyable (except for “April Fool’s Day” that one hurt my brain). So yeah, the quality WAS low, but it was hard to figure out exact reasons why.

But yes, that's all for yet another B-Movie-Palooza. I'm sure we'll be back next year with BMP 6. I'm not sure why, but we will. We're starting to run out of movies at Sydney Video, but I'd say we've got a good few years left. Oh, we cannot die. Like b-movies, we'll always be around. Jerk!