The Curse of Frankenstein (1957)

After having a great deal of success with the black and white hybrid sci-fi horror films The Quatermass Xperiment and X the Unknown.  Hammer Films decided to try their hands at full-fledged horror with "The curse of Frankenstein," their first color horror film.  The film took the classic Universal Gothic horror format and updated it with bright red blood and what at the time were shocking amounts of gore.  The film critics hated it, but the audiences loved it, and the age of "Hammer Horror" was born.  The Curse of Frankenstein spawned 6 sequels, and led the way to 9 Hammer Dracula films, 4 films starring The Mummy, and dozens of other monster and horror films on through to the 1970s.

The Corpse in the Tank

The Curse of Dracula stars Peter Cushing as Baron Victor Frankenstein.  Victor Frankenstein is the real monster of this film and it's sequels, he starts off as a promising young scientist, but his obsession with his work leads him down a very dark path, and he soon finds himself committing unspeakable crimes to achieve his goals.  Cushing is great playing this character who is initially likable and sympathetic, but becomes increasingly cold and cruel as the film goes on.  Christopher Lee plays Frankenstein's Monster, and he does a good job with what he's got to work with, but this version of the Monster is not given any emotional depth in the script the way Karloff's Monster was, he's pretty much JUST an angry violent, animal-like creature.  Unlike the Universal Frankenstein movies, which had the Monster returning from film to film, and had people like Frankenstien's son or grandson continuing his experiments, the Hammer films had Peter Cushing return as Victor Frankenstein, and each film would give us new monsters.

Baron Frankenstein and His Tutor and Lab Partner Paul Krempe

This film, along with the films that followed it, helped to repopularize horror films for a new generation of fans, and is a must-see for any fan of classic horror. 

Enraged Monster

MORE SCREENCAPS AFTER THE BREAK...

Return of the Fly (1959)

At the end of the 1958's The Fly, Phillipe Delambre, the young son of Andre Delambre, the scientist who became "The Fly," ask his uncle Francois (played by Vincent Price) about the death of his father. 

Phillipe, "Why did he die?"  They are seated outside in a beautiful green garden, along with Phillipe's mother Helene.  Birds are chirping, the sun is shining, and soft music starts to swell in the background.

"Well Phillipe," begins Francois, "He died because of his work.  He was like an... like an explorer in a wild country where no one had ever been before.  He was searching for the truth.  He almost found a great truth.  But for one instant he was careless."

Phillipe responds, "That's what killed him?"

"Search for the truth is the most important work in the whole world," answers Francois, "and the most dangerous."

"I'd like that," exclaims Phillipe, "I'd like to be an explorer like him.  Well you help me, Uncle Francois?"

"Yes, Phillipe," says Francois, as he and Helene beam with pride at the child.  I guess that is supposed to be a happy ending, as the son takes something positive away from his father's horrifying death.  But seriously, his father just died by having his head and arm crushed in a metal press, to destroy the evidence that he had turned in to a hideous half-human half-fly monster.  Are you sure you want to encourage the kid to follow in his father's footsteps?

If it was me, I'd be, like, "You sure you wouldn't rather work at McDonald's, son?  You can have all the french fries you could ever want to eat!"

To which Phillipe would reply, "Gosh Uncle, that sounds great!  I'm going to work at McDonald's when I grow up!"

PROBLEM SOLVED.

The Adult Phillipe and His Uncle Vincent

But nope, that's not what happened.  Instead, in 1959's Return of The Fly,  a now adult Phillipe has decided he still wants to be an "explorer" like his old man, and reprise his dad's science experiments.  But certainly, armed with the knowledge of what happened to his father, he won't repeat his father's mistakes and transform himself in to a hideous half-fly creature, right?

Right?

Wrong.

Well, I guess it wouldn't be much of a return of "The Fly" if that happened.  So yeah, he turns in to a hideous fly creature.  In the previous film The Fly had a human body with a fly head and fly arm.  This films one-ups it by giving The Fly, Jr. a fly head, arm, AND foot.  So there's that, I guess.

Fly Foot

The 1958 film was a fairly high quality, full color production, but the sequel is much lower budget flick, filmed in black and white, and reusing the same sets and props that had been built for the original.  It's also got more of a b-movie plot involving industrial espionage, murderous criminals, an evil mortician, and shoot-outs with the police.  It does make one nice addition to the half-human, half-animal monster menagerie with a pair of half-man half-guinea pig creatures.  The man with guinea pig hands and feet really just looks silly, sort of like someone in a White Rabbit costume from a high school theater production of Alice in Wonderland.  But the reverse creature:  a guinea pig with tiny little human hands flailing around at his sides, is weirdly surreal, especially when it's horrified onlooker stomps on it, and then has to clean up the bloody mess on the floor.  That was my favorite thing in the movie, unfortunately it only occupies the screen for a few seconds.

The Guinea Pig with Human Hands

None of the original cast returns except for Vincent Price, but for a horror fan like myself, ANY film with Vincent Price in it is worth a look, so if they could only afford to bring back one actor, they made the right choice.

Vincent Price

Unlike the first film in this series, the sequel is not a classic, and I don't think it would make anyone's must-see list.  But if your like me, and you enjoy watching bad and cheesy horror movies almost as much as you like good ones, then this can still be fun diversion.  There was a third sequel "Curse of the Fly" released in 1965, which does not feature Vincent Price.  I'm almost afraid to watch that one, but I suppose if I've made it this far, I should probably keep going, so I'm probably going to watch that one next.

MORE SCREENCAPS AFTER THE BREAK...

Humanoids From the Deep (1980)

I wasn't expecting much from Humanoids From the Deep.  I mean, it stars Doug McClure for Pete's sake....... that's not exactly the "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval."  But still, I was surprised by just how bad this movie was.

The production quality of this film was really cheap.  So cheap, that when I first watched it, I thought to myself, " Hey, I didn't know this was a low budget made-for-TV movie!"  And then the Deep Humanoids started tearing off women's clothes and raping them.  It looked like they spent the entire production budget on boobs.  The scenes with naked women almost seem like they were spliced in from a different, higher-budget movie.  It turns out there's a reason for that.  Apparently, producer Roger Corman wasn't pleased with the job director Barbara Peeters did directing the nudity and rape scenes (A female director not down with the exploitation of women?  Imagine that!) and brought in a second, male director in post production to film additional scenes of rape and nudity.  The final film ended up being quite a different beast from what it was in the original script.  Director Peeters and female lead Ann Turkel were so disgusted by the changes they asked to have there names removed from the film.

The Wolfman (2010) Unrated Director's Cut

I was pretty excited about The Wolfman, Universal's 2010 remake of it's classic 1941 horror movie The Wolf Man.  But then the movie came out, and got pretty bad reviews and word of mouth.  I still wanted to see it to judge for myself, but I kept letting it getting pushed back in my queue in favor of other flicks.  But it's directed by the same guy who directed The Rocketeer and Captain America: The First Avenger, so it should be good, right?  I finally got around to watching it yesterday, only four years late!  And you know what?  I likes it!  Is it a classic?  No, not really, but it's still pretty darn good.  I'll talk about it a bit after the break.

Wild Zero (1999)

 
Wild Zero is has got to be one of my favorite movies of all time.  It's about an aspiring young rock 'n' roller named Ace, who's just finding his way in the world.  He wants to be the next big rock star, and he's got his rock 'n' roll look down pat, with his leather jacket, motorcycle, and greasy hair.  He's even met a cute young girl who might be his one true love.  Now he just needs to learn to, you know, play the guitar.  But just when things look like they are going his way, flying saucers invade the skies, triggering a "Plan 9 From Outer Space" style zombie outbreak!  Plus that girl he fell in love with?  Turns out she's got a penis.

The situation would be hopeless for anyone else, but Ace has an "ace" up his sleeve:  a magic whistle that calls his favorite rock 'n' roll band, Guitar Wolf!  With the help of Guitar Wolf and the power of rock 'n' roll, those zombies and flying saucers don't stand a chance!

The Black Cat (1934)

Boris Karloff!  Bela Lugosi!  Together in what might be the finest picture that pits the two against each other, a story about a Satanic cult, "inspired by" Edgar Allan Poe's The Black Cat.  Read all about it after the break.

KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park (1978)

The film was also known as "KISS Meets the Phantom" and  "KISS in Attack of the Phantoms."

In 1978, at the height of their popularity, rock band KISS made their feature film debut in KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park.  In the film KISS play a super-powered version of themselves as they fight an army of evil androids and unravel a missing-persons mystery at a failing amusement park.  But don't worry, all that doesn't stop them from performing a series of concerts and treating us to several classic KISS songs.  Does this movie sound awesome, or what?  Wait, did I mention it's a super low budget made-for-TV movie, produced by Hanna-Barbera (the same guys who produced Yogi Bear and Scooby Doo)?  Yeah, "awesome" might not be the right word to describe this flick.  Read on to find out what word is...

The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951)

Stop me if you've heard this one before...  A supernatural being takes the form of a human Carpenter, and lives among the people.  He has come to Earth to deliver a message.  A message about putting  one's faith in a higher power.  A higher power that can lead to humanity's salvation if it is heeded, or it's damnation if it is not. However his message is met with disbelief, suspicion, and fear, and the people turn against him and kill him.  But miraculously, after his body is brought to his tomb, the man is resurrected.  He delivers one final message to his gathered followers before ascending into the heavens.

Sound familiar?  Wait, did I mention the fact that the man is a space alien named Klatuu, the tomb is a flying saucer, and the higher power is an unstoppable killer robot named Gort?  No, this isn't the secret theology of the Scientologists.  It's the plot of the 1951 sci-fi film, "The Day The Earth Stood Still!"

Gremlins (1984)

Gremlins

 Weird, ugly little monsters go on a terror and killing spree in a small town on Christmas Eve.  It should be a Creepmas classic, but it falls a little bit short, in my opinion.  I mean, don't get me wrong, I like it.  It's a good movie.  In fact, it reminds me quite a bit of the famous Mars Attacks trading cards from the 1960s, with it's dark humor, violence, and kid appeal. 

Spike Lurks in the Dark

 The problem I have with it is that it sort of straddles the line between a kiddie movie and an adult one, but as a result it doesn't quite work either way.  If we could have seen the gremlins kill people in more graphic detail, like with dismembered corpses, or the gremlins eating human flesh, that would have been awesome. Throw in some gratuitous nudity, and it would have been perfect!  Heck, the movie already has Phoebe Cates and Judd Nelson in it.  They should have just spliced in my favorite scene the pair shared from Fast Times at Ridgemont High in there.  It wouldn't have made any sense, but I wouldn't have complained.

Elton John was kind of weird in the '80s.

The film has some great bits of dark humor in it.  I loved Phoebe Cates's story of how her Dad died on Christmas Eve when she was a girl.  And the bit with the mom and her two kids with no food to eat was hilarious.  It just never got quite dark enough for me, though.  Alternately, I think the film could have worked very well if they had made the lead kids a little younger, and turned the film into a family friendly movie like E.T.  I just think the way it stands now, where it's not quite adult, and not quite kiddie, it just doesn't work as well as it should.   But it's still a fun way to spend a couple of hours in front of the tube, so I shouldn't complain TOO much.  In fact, the more I think about it, the more I like it.  It was actually pretty funny and weird.  So please ignore this review.  Merry Creepmas, everybody!

Strung up Dog

Phoebe Cates Stabs Zack Gilligan (or whatever his name is) With a Ballpoint Pen

More screencaps after the jump, kids...

Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2 (1987)

The Deadly Tapping Toes of "Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2"

 The original Silent Night, Deadly Night (click the link for my review) followed a young boy named Billy, whose parents were murdered before his eyes, by a man in a Santa Claus suit.  He and his baby brother Ricky were than sent to an orphanage run by an abusive nun.  Billy grew up emotionally traumatized by Christmas and Santa Claus.  At the age of 18, he leaves the orphanage and gets a job at a toy store, and seems to be finally coming to grips with his life.  But when Christmas time rolls around, Billy has to dress up as the toy store's Santa Claus, which causes him to snap and go on a killing spree.  He is obsessed with Santa punishing the wicked, and says, "naughty" to his victims while killing them. The film ends at the orphanage.  Billy, dressed up as Santa, has shown up to murder the nun who abused him as a child.  Instead, he is shot dead by the police in front of the other orphans.  The camera pans up from Billy's dead body to that of his younger brother Ricky, who is still living at the orphanage. Ricky glares at the nun, and exclaims, "naughty," as the credits roll.

Santa Claus With an Axe Versus an Elderly Nun in a Wheelchair

Clearly, the set-up was there for a sequel starring Billy's brother Ricky.  Indeed, the next film begins on Christmas Eve six years later, with Ricky, now 18, in a psychiatric prison, after committing a series of murders.  Ricky is being interviewed by a psychiatrist, and as Billy recounts his story, we are treated to a series of flashbacks showing how he ended up a prisoner.  Unfortunately, for the first 40 minutes of the film, those flashbacks are all clips from the first movie!  Eventually, though, we get to Ricky's story, about what happened to him after the first film.  The first film went over the top with a series of bizarre traumas that Billy had to endure, to explain why he eventually snapped.  For Ricky, this film for the most part dispenses with that.  He basically just starts off killing people who piss him off, and then graduates to a random shooting spree.

December 24th?  The psychiatrist picked the wrong day to interview THIS guy.

The production quality for the original scenes shot for this film are a big step below the first film.  They clearly didn't have much of a budget to work with.  The acting by the lead actor, Eric Freeman as the 18 year old Ricky, is especially bad.  His performance is completely over-the-top, and he delivers all of his lines in a ridiculously gruff voice, like a professional wrestler.  But it's one of those performances that is so bad, that it actually ends up being really entertaining.

Ricky's Angry Face

For fans of horror movie violence there are a couple of entertaining death scenes.  There is one where Ricky stabs someone with a closed umbrella, and then the umbrella opens up while sticking out of the guy's back.  There is another where Ricky electrocutes a guy with a car battery until his eyeball explodes, complete with some cartoonish electricity special effects.

Assault and Car Battery

The film is the most fun towards the end, where Ricky just starts killing people on the street right and left, while laughing and spouting inane dialogue, and then the final scene, where Ricky finally dons a Santa suit of his own, and then sets out to finish what his brother started in the first film.  The film ends with Ricky being shot down by the police, just like his brother.  But the film ends with a shot of "dead" Ricky suddenly opening his eyes and grinning, indicating he will survive for a sequel.

Bring Me the Head of the Mother Superior

Over all, this film was a big step down from it's predecessor, but still managed to be entertaining in it's own right when it stopped showing clips from the original film, and started having Ricky kill people right and left like a maniac.  If you're a fan of low-budget 1980s horror flicks, this might be one to check out, although you'll probably want to fast forward it for the first 40 minutes if you've seen the first film.

Garbage Day! (clip from Silent Night, Deadly Night 2)



More screencaps after the jump...

Robocop (1987)

Robocop

I love Frankenstein movies (see my reviews of the original Frankenstein, and it's latter day successor Deadly Friend for some examples).  I also love weird sci-fi and violent action movies.  So naturally, I'm a big fan of Robocop.

What the Robocop Saw

Robocop tells the story  of detective Frank Murphy, a Detroit cop who is murdered in the line of duty, and then brought back to life as Robocop, a hybrid of man and machine, designed to work as a robotic crime fighter for the Detroit police department.  Robocop is supposed to be more machine than man, with all of his memories of life as Frank Murphy erased.  But slowly, Murphy's mannerisms, figures of speech, and eventually, his memories, begin to re-emerge.  Robocop then struggles to regain his humanity, while hunting down his own killers.

"Dead or alive, you're coming with me."

Peter Weller is fantastic as Robocop / Frank Murphy, giving a Karloff-quality performance.  He basically plays three characters in this film. First as Frank Murphy, an average Joe police officer, father, and husband.  Next, as Robocop, an unemotional robot programmed to be enforce the law.  And, finally, as a hybrid of the two, as he struggles to reconnect with his humanity.

Battle Damaged

Director Paul Verhoeven, fills the film with violent and bloody action scenes, but also with a sly sense of humor.  Verhoeven seems to parody and criticize the commercialization of violence in American pop culture, while at the same time reveling in it.  This is something he would take to an even greater extreme in his later film Starship Troopers.

Murderous Stooges

All in all, I would rank Robocop as one of the best sci-fi action films of the 1980s, alongside other off-beat classics such as  Total Recall and They Live.

Big Mac Attack

More screencaps after the jump...

The Invisible Man Returns (1940)

COUNTDOWN TO HALLOWEEN 2013
The legendary Vincent Price in his first horror film!
THE INVISIBLE MAN RETURNS

The Invisible Man Returns

The Invisible Man Returns is the 1940 sequel to 1933's The Invisible Man.  It stars Vincent Price as Geoffrey Radcliffe, a man who has been falsely convicted of the murder of his own brother.  Hours before his execution, he receives a visit from his best friend Dr. Frank Griffin, the brother of John Griffin, the Invisible Man from the first film.  Frank injects  Geoffrey with John Griffin's invisibility serum to help him escape from jail.  What follows is a race against time, as Radcliffe must uncover the real murderer in order to clear his name, and Frank must find a cure for the serum.  The reason for the ticking clock:  like in the original film, the invisibility serum quickly drives anyone who uses it insane!

Vincent Price as The Invisible Man

This film has a lot going for it over the first film   In the first film, John Griffin was insane and cruel from the beginning of the film, so you could never see him all that sympathetically.   In the sequel, Geoffrey Radcliffe is an innocent man, fighting for his life and his freedom.  You want to see him succeed in his plans.   This also makes it much more fascinating to watch as he does begin to go insane, and the line from when the audience should start to root against him is not clear.

Sir Geoffrey Radcliffe Escapes!

The special effects in this film are also superior to the first film, and you see things like the Invisible Man's silhouette in smoke or rain.

The Visible Man

The film is longer than the original, though, and doesn't have the original's humor and energy.  Vincent Price's performance is much more down to earth and human than the over-the-top performance in the first film by Claude Rains, but in this case, I don't think that's a good thing.  Overall, this is still a good film, and a worthy addition to the Universal Monsters series, even if it's not as fun as the first.

More screencaps after the jump...

The Invisible Man (1933)

 COUNTDOWN TO HALLOWEEN 2013

You won't believe your eyes, in 1933's Universal Monsters classic

THE INVISIBLE MAN

Adapted from the classic H. G. Wells story of the same name, The Invisible Man is one of the best of the Universal Monsters movies.  It stars Claude Rains, in his first American film, as the Invisible Man, and was directed by James Whale of Frankenstein fame.  Like Whale's Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein, the film mixes humor in with the horror and madness.

A Strange Face Appears in the Doorway

In the film, Rains plays a scientist who invents an invisibility formula, but makes the mistake of testing it on himself.  What he doesn't know is that the formula induces madness as well as invisibility, and he soon finds himself, tormenting innocent people, plotting murders, and fantasizing about ruling the world, instead of completing his research.

"This is unacceptable!  I distinctly asked for a tiny umbrella in my cocktail!"

Claude Rains is wonderful in a role that consists mostly of just his voice.  In his more rational moments, he sounds perfectly suited as an intellectual, scientific genius that created an invisibility formula.  But he also shines when his personality shifts to that of a giggling, homicidal madman.  In fact, it reminded me quite a bit of The Joker from the Batman TV shows, sort of halfway between the performances of Mark Hamill and Cesar Romero, making me wonder if Rains's performance had any influence on them.  My only criticism of the film is that I would have liked to see what his character was like before he took the formula, to better understand how it affected his mind.

"Blimey!  That bloke's got no blinkin' head!"

The special effects were groundbreaking when the film was released.  They still hold up, and are very entertaining to watch, today.  The Invisible Man spawned a number of sequels (the first starring Vincent Price, in his first horror role!) and remakes, but the original film is still probably the best.  I highly recommend it to any fan of classic horror.

Headline: "Invisible Man Slays Policeman."  Reader: "Says here, he was one day away from retirement."

More screencaps and a music video after the jump...

Breeders (1986)

COUNTDOWN TO HALLOWEEN 2013

Alien rape monsters are on the loose in 1986's

BREEDERS

 

Breeders is cheaply made, sleazy trash.   It features amateurish acting, a monster in a cheesy rubber suit, low quality gore effects, and tons of naked women, in a story about alien parasites that rape virgins.  Sometimes, movies like this can be so bad that they are good.  Other times, they can just be boring, offensive, and no fun to watch.  This one has a bit of both... but mostly, it kind of sucks.

NAKED WOMEN
One thing this movie does have going for it is naked women.  If you like looking at naked women, then this movie's got them, and lots of 'em.  The women in this film are almost all strangely compelled to remove their clothes for no reason.

Walking Around Naked in the Boiler Room

A model, who is also a virgin, is on a photo shoot, when the crew leaves for lunch.  Alone in the studio, she decides to snort some coke, then strip off all of her clothes and do several minutes of nude stretching exercises, then she slowly caresses her body, like she is working up to masturbating.  Seems weird to me, but I'm a guy, so who knows?  Maybe all the women who watched this film were nodding their heads and saying, "finally, a movie that get what we do when we are alone in the workplace!"

Nude Workout in the Photography Studio

A nurse, virgin as well, comes home from work, then strips off all of her clothes in the kitchen, while cooking a pot of "Boiled New England Dinner."  This also seemed weird to me, but I'm not really familiar with Boiled New England Dinner.  Maybe it's traditionally cooked in the nude.  I'm not from New England, nor did I go to culinary school, so I guess I'll have it give this one a pass.

Naked While Cooking

A stylist receives a long-distance phone call from her Mom.  She strips off her clothes while talking on the phone, while discussing the fact that she is still a virgin.  Well, I guess our mothers saw us naked all the time when we were babies... so, that's like a totally natural reaction to hearing her voice?  No?  Umm...

"Hold on a second Mom, I wanna be naked when I talk to you."

Later in the film, women in hospital beds are compelled by alien mind control to strip off their hospital gowns and walk out of the hospital and to a secret lair under the streets of Manhattan.  Strangely, no one notices all these naked women walking around.

Wandering Around the Hospital Naked

The women in the film are all beautiful, too, in a natural looking way that you don't see in movies anymore in our modern plastic surgery era.  With a little bit of cellulite on their butts, a bit of a sag in their breasts, etc...  It's hard to enjoy looking at them, however, because each of them will inevitably be raped by an evil alien monster at some point in the film.  Typically in these 1980's horror movies, they had the slutty, sexually active girls attacked by the villain.  I guess since they decided that all these girls were virgins, they had to make them slutty in some other way, which is why they take off their clothes while boiling dinner, talking on the phone, or just walking down the street.

Naked Women in the Alien Breeding Pit

SO BAD IT'S GOOD
The acting, writing, and directing on this film are so terrible that I frequently found myself laughing out loud while watching it.  This would have been a great candidate for Mystery Science Theater 3000, if it wasn't for the fact that with all the nudity cut out, it probably wouldn't be long enough.

Inspecting a Victim

The film stars Teresa Farley as Dr. Gamble Pace, a doctor who is treating the victims of a series of bizarre rapes.  Miss Farley is very pretty, but she has absolutely no acting skills whatsoever (in fact, her only other credit is for the film "Bad Girls Dormitory," which was released the same year, has the same director, and many of the same actors as Breeders, making me wonder if the films were shot together).  Farley reads all her lines in an expressionless monotone, and shows no emotions until the final shot of the film, where she screams once and then cries, although as it goes on it becomes hard to tell if she is crying or laughing, and I don't think that was intentional.

Dr. Gamble Pace sleeps with her hair and makeup done, and the lights turned on.

Her costar is Lance Lewman as Detective Dale Andriotti, the detective investigating the rapes.  Lewman's acting is marginally better than Farley's but not by a lot.  Together they're like the Mulder and Sculley of 1980s New York.  There is a scene towards the end of the film where a victim of the alien parasite's body rips open and a rubber suit alien emerges from inside.  His transformation is increasingly gory and horrible, and the camera repeatedly cuts away to the doctor and the detective to get their reaction shots.  But neither actor is capable of emoting, so instead it just cuts to them with blank, unexpressive looks on their faces, making the scene unintentionally hilarious.

This is supposed to be a look of disgust and horror.

There is another scene in the film, where the doctor and the detective are in an abandoned subway tunnel.  They come up with a plan to activate the third rail of the train tracks, and decide to look for a source of electricity and a cable to connect it to the rail.  The doctor then stands in one place talking about looking for an electrical source, but never leaving the spot she is standing in.  She keeps her feet firmly planted in the same spot, unmoving, and just moves her head around a little to her right.  And then she says, "there it is," and spots an electrical source off camera.  The detective fares marginally better in his search for a cable.  He also never leaves the spot he is standing in, but he allows his body to rotate around 360 degrees in his search.  Luckily, it turns out there is a spool of electrical cable laying on the ground about 7 inches behind his foot.

Detective Andriotti points at General Zod and exclaims, "You're fuckin' bananas!"

Equally ridiculous is how they find their way underground in the first place.  While running blood tests on the rape victims, a doctor finds red dust from building bricks inside the women's blood cells.  And not just any brick dust, either, a rare brick that is only found in a handful of underground sights in the city.  Apparently the rapist has been spending time under the city, and getting the dust on him.  Then, when he rapes the women, the dust somehow gets inside their blood cells.  It's scientific.

Red Dust from Bricks Inside the Victims Blood Cells

There is also a minor subplot with a male nurse at the hospital.  I'm going to call him "Billy," but only because I don't feel like rewatching the movie to find out what his name actually was.  Billy likes to hang around in the rooms of the comatose rape victims.  He brings them flowers, touches their faces, and tells them he wants to go on dates with them when they wake up.  So, clearly, this guy is a creep of the highest order.  But, the movie doesn't seem to be aware of this, and treats him like he is a nice, sweet kid.  It kind of boggles the mind.

Billy, the Creeptastic Male Nurse, Brings Flowers to a Comatose Rape Victim

NOT-SO-SPECIAL EFFECTS
The special effects in the film are very goofy.  The alien monster just looks like a guy in a cheap rubber suit, to the point that it's unbelievable that anyone would look at him and think he's actually an alien.  It works to a certain extent early in the film, when you only see glimpses of the creature.  But when you finally see the alien from head-to-toe towards the end?  Not so much.

The Man in the Rubber Fly Mask

There is also a small deformed mutant creature that appears briefly.  From the neck down, it's obviously just a little person dressed in some rags, but the head prosthetic on the guy is cartoonishly fun, with misshaped bug eyes, and a jagged teethed vagina for a mouth.  I actually got a kick out of this guy, and wish he had a more prominent place in the film.

Vagina Face Mutant

BOTTOM LINE
Ultimately, even as a fan of bad movies, I can't bring myself to recommend this.  It definitely had it's moments, but too much of it was sleazy, or just kind of boring for me to fully endorse.

More screencaps after the jump...