Games of the Abstract: Dynamite Cop (1998)

 

a.k.a. Dynamite Deka 2

Developer: AM1

Publisher: Sega

Arcade / Sega Dreamcast

One to Two Players

 

Sadly, by the time of the Millennium, certain genres lost their grip as popular game types you could produce a vast quality within, one such example the beat-em-up. Games in this genre were still being made in the 2000s, past the time that Sega would bow out of the hardware industry, but alongside the decline of arcades and the emphasis on genres which allowed for longer "value-for-money", another factor to consider is that the transition to polygonal dimensions sadly was a nightmare for integrating certain genres from the sprite era with their same crispness and fluency. Even if beat-em-ups in 2D still created a sense of space where you could fight enemies at a time, polygonal space within this genre could easily struggle with, to the point tellingly (even if it might be the difficulties of making a three dimensional game on an independent budget) why returns to this genre like Fight'N Rage (2017) are both with a nostalgic mindset to their 2D aesthetic but also looking at the wiser choice for solid gameplay. In the case of Dynamite Cop however, you can see with Sega how you can manage a polygonal brawler, in mind its prequel was as successful, and have absolutely fun with create it at the same time.

There is the curious history to the pair to first consider, and it is apt to bring up as this game is ridding itself of a good marketing choice for the original. This is Dynamite Deka 2, but that it is known as Dynamite Cop without a sequel number in the West comes with the knowledge that the original 1996 Dynamite Deka ended up becoming the desire to remake the 1988 film Die Hard as a brawler, set in a skyscraper rescuing the president's daughter, with a noticeable Bruce Willis stand-in as the male character. Thankfully, rather than be sued for this, Sega had the rights for the Die Hard license and turned that game, for Western arcades and its Sega Saturn port, into Die Hard Arcade. In Japan, Sega already established this as their own distinct franchise, but imagining someone who had that Saturn port, this would have been like Sega, realising this one good licensing idea would have not been practical for sequels, having to flesh the virtues of that first game out without the marketing behind it. Even down to redesigning their Bruce Willis stand-in for this game, thought that version is an unlockable, this is an attempt to take all the virtues of original game and openly embrace more of Sega's delightfully eccentric sense of fun.

Dynamite Cop is a short game, though the Dreamcast version offers additions exclusive to its conversion, but it has a gleefully over-the-top game loop. With a solid structure to it, and the game still a challenge, this like the best of the beat-em-up genre is worth returning to over and over. There are also three ways to play the game, three ways to begin the mission, of rescuing the president's daughter again like the first game off a cruise ship, and whilst they do follow similar plot threads and bosses, they are all with their own idiosyncrasies adding something different. There is also the fact that the combat system is solid, one which is more explicitly from the fighting game genre, with more moves at hand and the ability to vary the combos, making this thankfully a varied game in style. The funniest thing, before you get to the weirdness that creeps into the story, is the series' taste for the requisite weapons and items to throw at enemies in this genre. Knowing you can lift your unconscious enemies up by their legs and bash them around or into their allies is a good sign, as is being able to use giant fish, deck chairs, arcade machines, brooms and your standard weapons before you get to the fire arms. Even those lead to rocket launchers, one laser gun and a couple of anti-tank missile launchers that are a cloud producing crowd clearer. Surprisingly throwing coins from slot machine cups and pepper is just as effective as weapons even if they take longer than the missile launcher to down opponents.

It is Sega being goofy, and this is usually also when they are at their best, as one can attest to the fact that whilst still a challenge, it does not feel like an insurmountable one, the kind of game where you have images you will remember with ease. When you are fighting a killer chef, who keeps a box of grenades in the fridge, or you can beat by lobbing apples at his head, I at least find this far more entertaining than if it had tried to be serious. The inventive nature this sense of humour provides to the gameplay means a lot, and this was in mind that the prequel was already fun its tone, including the Quick Time Event mini-games where, if you press the right button, you can skip sections of conflict with the comedic bonus of swatting an enemy out of the way, something which this follows with including additional mini-games of avoiding objects and the incentive as you are doing so of collecting health. Dynamite Cop decided however to embrace its weirdness further, with its motley crew of men in shark and crab costumes, ghost buccaneers who can split in half and duplicate themselves, and a final boss who thought revenge was bolting cybernetics onto himself. Tellingly this is a beat-em-up where, in all runs, you fight a giant squid as a mid-game boss.

Sadly the second sequel - Dynamite Deka EX: Asian Dynamite (2006) - never got a port outside the arcades nor reached the West, a lost Sega title in terms of this period where, sadly, Sega would bow out of the hardware development industry and be releasing titles on even their rival Nintendo's machines. Sadly, many games from the era from them, just in terms of arcade games, are not readily available and only emulation has really preserved many, and Asian Dynamite for all its distinct changes, from a Chinese developer working under Sega,  is as much a remake of Dynamite Dekka 2 as it has its own distinct touches. There is something to be said for this time of Sega games that is sadly lost, where even the Dreamcast port includes an old Sega arcade game as an extra - Tranquilizer Gun (1980), which is going to raise eyebrows as a game where you sedate wild animals with ones tranquilizer rifle and drag them back to the truck for points - that spark of fun and creation to these types of games which left in a lot of ways when Sega were no longer a hardware developer and allowed to indulge.

I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. (1982)

 

Director: Marius Penczner

Screenplay: Marius Penczner and John Gillick

Cast: Larry Raspberry as Ace Evans; John Gillick as Bart Brazzo; James Raspberry as Rex Armstrong

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)

 

Note: The following is based on the 2005 re-edit version of this film. This does not reflect a review of the original version, which is referrenced in the below entry.

 

One slip up, and we air condition her skull.

A fifties sci-fi parody, I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. is somehow a film I had never heard of but has a compelling enough back story, alongside its onscreen content, that left me surprised it never crossed my path. Director and co-writer Marius Penczner made this film with a budget of $27,000, with money won from an Emmy winning short film of his, and the help of Memphis-area film students¹, as a Tennessee regional production, which (in the cut I am talking of) is a huge addition to what they succeeded with. Likely the reason this film never came up in my readings is how scarce its original screenings were, only shown in 1985 on the "Night Flight" cable program, a cable program originally on cable TV network USA Network which showed full length and short films alongside music videos. Varying between cult films, short films by the likes of the Quay Brothers, music videos, experimental cinema, and collaborations and specials with the likes of KISS to a video profile of Aretha Franklin’s career, Night Flight was with hindsight admirable in its goals, continuing into the nineties and being revived into the 2010s.

The fact this film was only screened back in 1985 means it was not easy to see unless you were watching Night Flight as a regular viewer, with the only close thing to an actual release coming in 2005 with a DVD release¹, one notably (and with this review based on this version) some revisions that were made to the material by the director. Shot in monochrome, this begins with two prisoners, brothers, being taken to their punishment on an airplane only for a UFO to knock the plane they are in out of the air. In mind to multiple cuts – this 2005 version with a new score and cut down from its original running time - it is cool as a no-nonsense take on the b-movie, with a tongue in its cheek about the tribute but taking itself seriously with a zip from the get-go. There is a sense of humour to this as this is around a conspiracy involving rival cola drink plants, when a health cola plant nearby the crash site is where the survivors of the plane crash, the prisoners, and the aliens behind their escape are hatching a shady plan involving taking over another plant for Uni-Cola. This heist with hostages by the brothers is used as a cover to begin a brainwashing plan on humanity. It is not an accurate attempt at a fifties b-movie - no back screen projection, no Criswell monologues or wobbly tombstones - nor an attempt at campiness, only that it has what costumes, vehicles and sets the production are carefully chosen in an ambitious way to get the right tone for this tribute.

Many of the sets themselves, like the jail the brothers end up in, are real locations which have to be commended in being able to secure them for the production, and unlike some films of the past this nods to, least for 2005 cut, there is a lack of pointless padding. Mesa of Lost Women (1953) this is not, with endless dialogue with no engagement to it, and that was shorter next to I Was... is considerably. Following its tale of secret cola formulas and aliens hiding among us, armed with deadly white sci-fi billiard balls of pain and memory erasure, with only a pair of G-Men and one female journalist to stop them, this has no fat on its form which feels pointless in having. There is a Body Snatchers vibe and brain stealing cola, zombification the result with this strangely not the only film from the eighties obsessed with cola stealing one's mind. Surf II (1984), with Eddie Deezen creating Buzz Cola to turn surfers into zombies, inexplicably shares a bonding moment as two films parodying older decades of cinema, that one inspired by early sixties beach films, and the dangers of sugary soda.

A sense of personality here - such as an argument whether people keep whiskey in their car glove compartment or not - really helps, even throwing in a stop motion monster for good measure as a cherry on top, with the funny knowledge this same creature returned, as Marius Penczner directed the music video for ZZ Top’s TV Dinners, where the beast made a cameo¹. Controversially, with no context for the original version, the re-edit does not jar badly at all with this film, which could have botched this badly and felt like trying to bolt on an entire aesthetic, of 2000s technological for film making, onto a production a time long after the materials were filmed with its own technological aesthetics. The music suits perfectly, there is not a moment within the film without feeling threadbare, and the inter-titles placing chapters on this tale, clearly to help explain context, are to be appreciated or can just be ignored without being too much a distraction.

As micro budget films go, this one can raise its head high in the knowledge that it is an accomplished one in the circumstances of this area of cinema. It also has the least expected recommendation that Bob Dylan of all people saw the film and wished he had starred in it¹. This quote is said to come from an article interviewing in Spin Magazine Volume One, number 8 from December 1985¹. Called Don't Ask Me Nothin' About Nothin' I Might Just Tell You The Truth: Bob Dylan Revisited, the article, which is split in two in the magazine², does not talk about this fabled list of films he wished he was in. It does however come from Interview magazine, a magazine first published in 1969, and comes from a February 1986 interview with writer Scott Cohen, where this film is mentioned alongside The Devil and Miss Jones (1941), the original 1959 Ben-Hur, and Raintree County (1957), a romantic western set during the American Civil War starring Montgomery Clift and among others Elizabeth Taylor. For weird details like this, especially when confirmed, I am surprise I Was a Zombie for the F.B.I. never crossed my path. It is a niche production, one which might not be as action packed or outright cheesy for some people's tastes. In huge admiration of its achievements, this does deserve a reappraisal.

====

1) The film's streamable version on NightFlight Plus.com, which includes info on the production.

2) Spin Magazine Volume One, number 8 from December 1985, which has the Don't Ask Me Nothin' About Nothin' I Might Just Tell You The Truth article, preserved on Archive.org.

3) New Again: Bob Dylan, Interview Magazine's re-visit on this original February 1986 review, using Scott Cohen's original writing.

Under Capricorn (1949)

 

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Screenplay: Hume Cronyn and James Bridie

Based on the stage play by John Colton and Margaret Linden, adapted from Helen Simpson’s novel Under Capricorn

Cast: Ingrid Bergman as Lady Henrietta Flusky; Joseph Cotten as Samson "Sam" Flusky; Michael Wilding as Hon. Charles Adare; Margaret Leighton as Milly; Cecil Parker as Sir Richard; Denis O'Dea as Mr. Corrigan; Jack Watling as Winter

Canon Fodder

 

Under Capricorn presents a bad moment for the career of Alfred Hitchcock, where after beginning his American part of his filmmaker career, working under producer David O. Selznick from 1940’s Rebecca to The Paradine Case (1947), he stepped out with Sidney Bernstein to start his own film making company Transatlantic Pictures. Under Capricorn was the film he was focused on making, with Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman, yet irony holds that the film quickly made beforehand, the experiment in long takes Rope (1948), became the film of the two more easy to fit in the image of its director, with its own idiosyncratic and compelling traits to dissect technically and in its content. Under Capricorn, as a melodrama adapted from a novel, had the unfortunate existence that, as an expensive colour production, Bergman became a pariah to the United States, a big source of potential revenue for the production’s release, as by when the film was released, her controversial adulterous affair with Italian director Roberto Rossellini had transpired causing scandal. Under Capricorn was taken by one of its investors, Bankers Trust Company, when a box office failure to coup the lost finances, not seen until the sixties when made available to see again, and the studio Transatlantic Pictures was to be no more into the fifties. Thankfully, Hitchcock’s fifties period onwards would produce some of his most iconic films, even contenders for some of the best ever made for people, but Under Capricorn itself is a curious film to think about. Simply to watch and actually digest this lesser known production is a lot to chew on, and this is factoring in the number of voices championing the film over the decades when you dig into its history.

Set in 19^th century colonial era Australia, this follows an British ex-patriot Hon. Charles Adare (Michael Wilding) wishing to make his fortune there, only to come to Sydney and come under the wing of Joseph Cotten’s Samson "Sam" Flusky. He is for many a suspicious figure, and as the story continues, his pariah status despite his own fortune is learnt of by Charles. A place where convicts are said to be able to step back into respectability, this proves hypocritical as Sam was such a case, still shunned due to the circumstances around his case, murder, as a former tender of the horse stables where he met his wife, Lady Henrietta Flusky (Bergman), who loved each despite their class differences only for tragedy to strike. A luscious film, yet set in a place where shrunken heads are traded secretly in the streets, the film is stepped in melancholia despite its lush colour aesthetic shot by legendary cinematographer Jack Cardiff. Bergman’s lead is ill, explicitly an alcoholic whose addiction is caused by the anguish of the time having had to wait for Sams release from prison in the colony, neither helped by it being very clear the head maid Milly (Margaret Leighton), in love with Sam, has been gas lighting and feeding her mistress’ drinking for control of the house.

It is an odd folly for Hitchcock as much as I can see this be a legitimate grower in its riches, where in contrast to later films which were maligned, digging the virtues out of this one means tackling a film which is out of step from the director’s many trademarks. As much as Torn Curtain (1966) for an example was viewed as a lesser production, his Cold War spy thriller, that at least has stand out set pieces, and his cynical whit written everywhere in its tone, whilst this was one of a few tangents away from the thrillers and suspense dramas Hitchcock rebuilt and innovated in whilst providing more to them. Rope, made quickly before this film, was an experiment that fed into this one’s production, with that tale being told entirely in ten minute long takes, but that was still a taut thriller based on a stage play based on the moral corruption of the heart, the perfect murder. This in contrast is a depressed melodrama, compelling but one that with hindsight would have not been a success for his own studio, even if Bergman’s affair was not a factor, unless the mood of the audience was in his favour, moments in danger of pure dourness, even next to the melancholia soaking in Rebecca which this can be compared to. 

The biggest issue with Under Capricorn, truthfully, is that there are times this feels like it could be directed by anyone else but Hitchcock, and that is factoring in how much is clearly his craft, but with pockets where the film lacks some finesse to match when this triumphs in other moments.  That is an issue, as even Rebecca, notoriously a jostling competition between Hitchcock and his producer O. Selznick for influencing its content, feels fully a piece to the director’s career, whilst here it does feel its length with some padding. Thankfully you see a lot to Capricorn which clearly comes to this, a mature drama about accepting the demons of the past and jealously, even with humour, as fittingly for a known food connoisseur, Hitchcock has an extended joke about breakfast preparation with deadpan expressions at some horrifically cooked eggs. The qualities of the acting help what does feel its length without feeling methodical, and one of the biggest aspects of its production which can be missed, its long extended takes, does lead to moments where the viewer fully engaged with the emotion of the drama. Bergman’s introduction into the film, or her eight minute confession of her traumas, are some of the best moments, which are helped by Hitchcock deciding to force the film to extend takes for longer than usually done, forcing you into the space with these scenes. There are moments where this style clearly did not work, where honestly the film feels morose in its pacing, or where the drama is undercut by scenes of dialogue which have not got the snap of his work before and after, where the film as a technical level, and the tone of the film, needed to be rethought.

His sense of black humour may have also helped as someone, despite rarely writing his scripts, visibly influencing them, as it would have actually helped make the strongest emotional parts more meaningful. Considering how this nudges to some very adult content even in terms of cinema in the decades after, the film is trying at a deft hand at a really serious subject needing to not always lean on these extended long takes and slow pace – Henrietta’s confessions, alongside his alcoholism, seemingly evoke even prostitution or at least a life of squalor part of her life in the slums of Sydney whilst waiting for Sam’s release, either subjects still taboos a century on for some, are where the themes of the film really do become some of the darkest of Hitchcock’s career among many times he entered into this territory, in spite of not explicitly showing a lot. It would have not been inappropriate if the film had embraced its more macabre edges more, or used its languid technical style as a weapon by occasionally stepping into some editing once or twice, especially as where the film feels its weakest is in its lighter moments, too fluffy or insubstantial next to the best comedy in his films, sticking out in contrast to the richness of the emotional angst and pained love, including class bias, for Sam to Henrietta. Tellingly it is the character of Charles where most of this comes from, though he is an important part of the love triangle within the film itself, so there is a sense that the optimistic and lighter moments of the story, and effectively him as a character allowing the viewer into this world of Sam and Henrietta, needed to be rewritten even if in one or two touches as with these few drab moments.

This juxtaposition of where the film succeeds and does feel like it could have been better paced is found in how more vibrant the last quarter is, where its gothic and melodramatic storytelling becomes more prominent, with the machinations of Milly and playing to more lurid suspense in the attempts to psychologically ruin Henrietta come to the fore, including the shrunken heads referenced earlier in this review make their return. It is done without it seeming inappropriate for the rich characterization, and where this film fully succeeds including with the character depth, by writing and acting, of the tale of Sam and Henrietta. It is not a surprise how the film has managed to win more and more respect over the decades - Peter Bogdanovich was a huge admirer of the film¹ – and honestly, this is the kind of production that could easily grow in respect from me, especially if it was readily available in the best restorations to allow its aesthetics to be emphasized, the contrast of rich late forties colour cinema against its bleak heart one of its more enticing favors. I am still going to say, even when the film may become flawless the more times seen, where I find its sluggish moments of pacing dissipate to full admiration, that this was a film that was going to be doomed back in the day as a box office film or be a risk to have even committed to. Some of this is simply Hitchcock’s name had already been cemented to thrillers, but a lot of this feeling comes simply from what this film is, a production even when it offers a happy ending that finds itself intentionally wallowing in its melancholia.

The shadow the film had thankfully subsided. Ingrid Bergman was welcomed back into American cinema with films like The Inn of the Sixth Happiness (1958), and whilst Transatlantic Pictures was the real casualty of this film’s failure, some of Hitchcock’s most legacy defining films in terms of pop culture and cinema, even really difficult ones which force one to challenge him as a human being within his own work, came after this to the end of his career. Under Capricorn is a production lost and in need of more assistance in being brought into attention, especially as what you can get is a slightly hazy DVD only release from a lost vanished distributor in the United Kingdom, in spite of the fact this was Hitchcock’s return to his homeland as a British production. It is not a film to immediately return to, next to the murder’s row of iconic and underrated films in Alfred Hitchcock’s career, but it fascinates and rewards as a serious, somber minded drama with ambitious in dealing with its themes.

 

=====

1) My favourite Hitchcock: Under Capricorn, written by Joe Walsh for The Guardian, published 14th August 2012.

The Bedroom (1992)

 

a.k.a. Unfaithful Wife: Shameful Torture

Director: Hisayasu Satô

Screenplay: Shirô Yumeno

Cast: Kiyomi Itô as Kyoko; Momori Asano as Ai; Kyôko Nakamura as Kinue

An Abstract Candidate

 

Lasting only an hour, this film within the pinku erotic genre is clearly less interested in erotica in a titillating way, but as a theme, about obsession. A woman is our central figure, Kyoko (Kiyomi Itô), whose sister has died under tragic circumstances. Leaving a mystery she wishes to solve about the death, Kyoko before the film starts has already joined a club where, as a willing participant, women are hired to take sleeping pills and let themselves be sleeping beauties for male clients sexually in sessions.

As erotica, from the get-go, this is tonally more ethereal, a mood piece about sexual desire, where for certain scenes the harsh reds, pinks and blues feel apt for the tone as do the scenes of septic white living spaces. There is going to be content here that will make people uncomfortable in content, about playing to faked non-consensual scenarios, but it is something distinct as a tale of a woman who, investigating this mystery, is also trying to figure out her own self. Kyoko also loves a husband who may even be a fake one, desires him, only to feel no love back, and the loss of her sister intermingling within this context adds to the psychological schisms which grow to plague her as the film progresses in narrative. From here, it goes into this weird club of men with curious fetishes and willing dolls, even with Kyoko not taking the sleeping pills and becoming a fully willing participant, even if one female member died of an overdose on the job of these pills, a factor which adds a suspicion of those involved.

These do include kinks which are less extreme but follows a theme of ennui felt in society, where the husband is taking the same type of sleeping pills himself due to stress of his ICT job. It is a malaise leaving men with obsessions of photographing these women to one man who likes oiling people up, which in context is sensual, belying how this is tackling taboos with a neutral stance. These is however the most notorious scene here too, the one which may raise concern, of a client fixated with biting playing by Issei Sagawa. Sagawa is a choice of a scene's casting which is shocking, as he was a notorious figure convicted in France in 198 for an incredibly disturbing case, the murder of Renée Hartevelt in Paris which also involved cannibalism among its many disturbing aspects. He was deemed mentally unfit for trial, but would be eventually able to return back to his own country in the later part of the eighties, which was incredibly controversial, with a growing morbid celebrity he was developing back home and in France itself. It is the one moment which could be seen as morally problematic in casting him, though considering he even became a food critic for the Japanese magazine Spa, you can entirely blame certain pop culture being ghouls too. It is balanced as well as the fact that as a figure whose notoriety ebbed away, the seeming ability Sagawa had to continue as a free man became a curse for him due to how he developed this celebrity fed reputation, until dying in on the 24th November 2022.  Director Hisayasu Satô, whose career in pinku ranged between transgression (Lolita Vibrator Torture (1987)) to explicit homoerotic themes and subject matter (Bondage Ecstasy (1989)) is someone who clearly used pinku cinema to tackle taboos and thinking of his films beyond titillation, so the casting whilst eyebrow raising is clearly in mind to someone who was being provocative in this casting choice even if one with hindsight which may have been a step too far.

The Bedroom is fascinating even beyond this as an esoteric mood piece, apt from its aforementioned director Hisayasu Satô. Alongside Kazuhiro Sano, Toshiki Satō and Takahisa Zeze, he is one of "Four Heavenly Kings of Pink", he was among the group acclaimed in pinku cinema but as explicitly experimental figures. The eroticism is explicit but centred on images like Kiyomi Itô on a bed wrapped in cling-film, it is a disarming tale of disconnected figures attempting to connect through their bodies and sex. It is almost like J.G. Ballard in its septic metropolitan world and obsessions such as the voyeurism of film cameras, Kyoko keeping one on in the fridge to talk directly to, or how the owner of the sleeping doll club is an unseen figure hidden behind an industrial white face mask, who can see all through cameras. The only thing which seems abrupt is the very unexpected twist ending, which is one that may be divisive for those who appreciate the film already for how abrupt it is, even if built upon in the sense of disconnect in the reality of the film. Nonetheless, it is a compelling example to how erotic cinema in Japan became a way to produce some very unconventional productions over the decades, in any tone and genre, winning favour for me the more I see.

Abstract Spectrum: Atmospheric

Abstract Rating (High/Medium/Low/None): Low

Terror in the Wax Museum (1973)

Directed: Georg Fenady

Screenplay: Jameson Brewer

Cast: Ray Milland as Harry Flexner; Elsa Lanchester as Julia Hawthorn; Maurice Evans as Inspector Daniels; John Carradine as Claude Dupree; Louis Hayward as Tim Fowley; Patric Knowles as Mr. Southcott; Broderick Crawford as Amos Burns; Shani Wallis as Laurie Mell; Mark Edwards as Sergeant Michael Hawks; Lisa Lu as Madame Yang; Steven Marlo as Karkov; Nicole Shelby as Margaret Collins

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)

 

A film produced by Bing Crosby of all people, Terror in the Wax Museum if anything feels like a throwback to the horror films of the past, fitting the time in the seventies when nostalgia brought to us films about classic Hollywood, and stars of the past returned for films and television roles. Terror… is a great example of this, just looking at the cast from the history of Universal horror films alongside others, in which Ray Milland (Billy Wilder's The Lost Weekend (1945)), John Carradine (countless horror films over the decades) and Elsa Lanchester (the Bride of Frankenstein) are among the leads.  

Set at a wax museum in the 1890s, at a transition point to a new owner, its original owner Claude Dupree (Carradine) is murdered by Jack the Ripper, one of his exhibits at a morbid museum depicting infamous murderers. His niece and her guardian (Elsa Lanchester) appear afterwards, and what this becomes is a sedate gothic period drama with a murder whodunit at its heart, as more people die over the time afterwards. Regardless of the film’s overall quality, there are highlights here, such as Lanchester herself, the moment she appears as a character catching the eye as a performer; at times detestable in her greed but nonetheless compelling to watch, the idea of bringing an older actor to a film is seen as good thing when it is someone like Lanchester who can give some energy to the material regardless of the size or position of role. It also has its eccentricities, such as poor Karkov (Steven Marlo), a disabled deaf-mute, created through facial prosthetics, who served his late owner and plays for once the sympathetic outsider who is likable. Clearly playing to being the monster of the film, only to be a lovely soul in a story where the monster is something more human, he is a character who we could have had more screen time with.

Beyond this, this is dry and dialogue heavy, exposition based rather than character driven, and Terror in the Wax Museum will be a struggle for many even who like classic horror cinema. It presents a morbid idea at its heart of note – we will have a wax museum on axe murderer Lizzie Borden that packs the public, but not those who helped save lives – but this is within a film which struggles with its pacing, very static and visually straightforward presentation barring one dream sequence in slow-mo. Less said about the segment in the Limehouse area of London the better, which plays into Chinese stereotypes of the “Dragon Lady” and making jokes about chopsticks. The only thing worth mentioning is the actress in the role herself, Lisa Lu, who was born in 1927 and was still in roles as far as Crazy Rich Asians (2018) onwards in her eighties and nineties. She is someone I only encountered one in a while, in a film like this in a thankless and brief role, but Lu belongs to a long list of Chinese and Chinese-American actors, unsung voices, who in a case like hers stretches decades between American television shows and cinema in terms of pop culture as an actress, which is someone to at least pay respect to.

Terror in the Wax Museum in general is undermined by how it casually wanders on in its short length, only over ninety minutes, with knowledge of how we know where the film is going, that it is either a supernatural killer wax statue mystery or a more mortal culprit, but the cast are oblivious to what we know until the final moments. It offers pleasures, and some of the attempts to recreate Victorian London do work, from the outside stages to the morbid songs of one female pub singer, but this does feel like a work not succeeding at all.

Alien Beach Party Massacre (1996)

 

Director: Andy Gizzarelli

Screenplay: Andy Gizzarelli

Cast: John Eineigl as Dr. Bateman; Mark Fite as Jeff; Stacey Havener as Babs; Kourtney Kaye as Robin; Perry Martin as Bud; George Willis as Nagillig; Eric Zumbrunnen as Glue

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)

 

Linda, don’t worry, we know where your arm is.

Surf rock opens up on the opening credits, hurdling into outer space, and it is best for context to explain how a film like this would have come to be. Contextually, the nineties are what I have always viewed as the decade where its pop culture ate its own tail, apt as it was just before the Millennium, a new century, with both the angst of the new era coming and clearly a lot of reflection taking place in popular culture and retro trends. A lot of decades where repeated in just one, where swing revival music met against pulp comic and radio characters being adapted into films, where bands like Combustible Edison brought back lounge music, and there were some obscure remakes of old b-movies, such as Roger Corman’s The Wasp Woman (1959) getting a 1995 television remake. Here, where old b-movies and sci-fi were finding themselves in the likes of Mystery Science Theatre 3000, and surf rock became prominent in the Pulp Fiction soundtrack or new bands like Man or Astro-Man?, this particular film, an entry in the slasher genre with some odd genre mixing and a lot of ironic comedy, makes sense in mind to this. Honestly, the biggest issue with Alien Beach Party Massacre comes from the fact that it does not fully embrace its premise, staying in an abandoned spooky house for the slasher section, even if this has a bit to it to admire, and is a parody with its tongue firmly in its cheek.

Humanoid aliens are in our solar system, having stolen from another evil species (space pig humanoids) a weapon called the “Deathsphere”, a super weapon of horrifying destructive power which they find themselves unable to flee with. Attacked and the ship forced to burn up in Earth’s ozone layer, luck and a hole in said ozone layer leaves one surviving member of the crew, the bumbling cleaner, to protect the Deathsphere. Unfortunately it is confused for a beach ball and brought to a human beach party he is also invited too, everyone believing he is a cousin of a party guest from New Jersey, with one of the pig aliens planning to slaughter anyone in their way to get the death ball back.

There are broad stereotypes at the party: the Bill and Ted surfer dudes (who are also stoners); the obnoxious college jock who presumes beer can be used as a mouthwash and gargled to clean your breath with; his suffering girlfriend; a nerdier girl, an alien obsessed scientist, and other stereotypes. It is jokey, not taking itself seriously, and some of the jokes have not aged well, usually with the women being called “bimbos” etc., but considering this has someone impaled on a surf board, for every joke which does not land and the film feeling stretched at times, a lot has aged well as openly goofy. The biggest disappointment is most of this set-up ending up in a house, when the main cast split off from the party as an excuse to get high, a shame as it means most of this does not actually transpire on a beach. You expect from this title a piss take on the early sixties beach part genre, a niche to parody in itself, only to sadly never get that.

That in truth is the real slight to the film, where a better and weirder film was left on the table un-done, with what we have. Some of the film lurches into more edgier content – there a gag, which I have seen in another horror film called Neon Maniacs (1986), which bluntly involves an act of oral sex being interrupted decapitation and a morbid joke about what happens afterwards, which is the kind of moment which may come off as poor taste than really twisted humour. Most of this is more comfortable, and more rewarding, where it is goofier even with the gore. Losing a limb, as for one character that loses multiple, is something to suffer through with the issue more the inability to drive gear stick in a car than fatal blood loss, the tone better in these types of moments.  It is a one-off from its director-writer Andy Gizzarelli, whose career in cinema is to be found in other production departments, leaving this curiosity from the irony tinged edge of horror and cult cinema which vanished into obscurity. Feeling like the chance for someone to bring what they wished to see in a film to the screen, it shows the indulgences that would result from this, both the things which did not succeed and the sections which did prove rewarding even if the entire film is a flawed mess.

Games of the Abstract: Rockin' Kats (1991)

 

Developer: Atlus

Publisher: Atlus

One Player

Nintendo Entertainment System

 

Atlus, starting in 1986, became famous for the likes of the Megami Tensei series, an RPG franchise which would last for decades and where even its spin-off series, Persona, is as successful and well regarded. Altus has made other games however, and with some exceptions like Catherine (2011), their psychodrama in a puzzle game mould, many have been lost to time. Many sound compelling, like the Trauma Centre franchise, which looked at Nintendo Wii and DS motion controls/styluses and thought performing medical surgery was the right way to use their mechanics as consoles. Rockin’ Kats, as a prolific collaborator with Nintendo, is a traditional 2D platformer but for Atlus is interesting as a cute one in which the story is presented like a cartoon TV series on a TV for the level select, where an anthropomorphic cat has to constantly rescue his girlfriend from a dog Mafioso per level.

The protagonist, Willy, has in his arsenal a boxing glove gun which works also as a grappling hook. Unlike what you would presume, being pulled directly forwards where the gloves goes, Willy swings in full circles unless you contact a solid object or wall, which means that there is a different game play challenge when swinging and making sure you fly off in the direction you wish to, including some moments of swinging over precarious bodies of water. The glove, when shot down, allows for a double jump, as is being able to be launched back when hitting a trash can/rock. It could seem paradoxical to say this, but this can be fiddly to use as game play mechanics but not because the mechanics are faulty, but because you need to get used to the dexterity required, a game play style which would be fleshed out and made easy to pull off, but able to be mastered at a god tier skill level, in a modern indie game based on this structure. Only the restrictions as an older game feel involved in struggling with the commands, and it is telling the secret level when you beat the main story, which ups the difficulty, is as much about mastering the glove’s many tricks to even progress.

The result is a bright NES game, finding oneself against plate spinning pandas in a carnival, which gets into a horror setting midway through, to travelling in the air in literal dog fights. Notwithstanding Native American stereotypes in the western level, it is a wholesome world if with spike traps, goons with guns and women dropping plant pots out of their multi-floor windows out of spite, even if one of the funnier moments is that the way to beat the mob boss’ goliath gorilla henchmen is to get between his legs and constantly punch his testicles. It is a challenge, but there are health pickups, as well as its additional options on the level select. Mini games exist to earn more lives and coins, and as you earn coins in levels too, you can buy secondary weapons in a store, which can be selectable at any time on its own button, weapons which are unlimited in use and effective, be it a super punch or the ability increase one’s jump height. It is an admirable production, a playful game which does win you over even if it is another game which hides its difficulty in its cute veneer. Rockin’ Kats was also a one-off, something which never returned in Atlus’ back catalogue and is thus an obscurity in their midst which is worth tracking down.

Games of the Abstract: Raw Thrills Double Bill - The Walking Dead (2017)/Jurassic Park Arcade (2015)

Developer: Raw Thrills

Publisher: Raw Thrills

One to Two Players

Arcade

I decided to pair these two licensed light gun games together as, dominating the modern arcade scene since their 2001 establishment, Raw Thrills from Skokie, Illinois were a company I came to with an unfair ambivalence. Unfair because, as one of the few publishers/developers who are everywhere in arcades constantly in any English seaside, they are a company who managed to have their machines in multiples in places among the ticket winning machines. Entirely my bias was that, barring Sega and a few others, there is not a lot of arcade machines like those in the past, and Raw Thrills is one of the few who are able to be found everywhere, mostly all licensed titles because those sell. I had not much particular interest in the machines at first, seeing them, not inclined to play them until time has passed, hence a bias which has thankfully passed.

Pairing together two light gun games based on popular licenses, one is not actually a “light gun” game to be technical about it, The Walking Dead a very idiosyncratic choice for its presentation too. Based on the comic book series by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore, which started in 2003 and lasted to 2019, this was a franchise, when it was adapted for television, which arguably helped the zombie go from a horror trope that went in a fallow period in the nineties to suddenly being a pop cultural obsession even in the mainstream. Zombies, whether their popularity has sociological weight in the Millennium, suddenly became more and more prevalent in larger scale when the 2000s came. Based on the George Romero film versions than the Voodoo cultural ones, one big landmark would be television adaptation of The Walking Dead, when it began in 2010 for AMC. By the time of this arcade machine, the series had reached its seasons six and seven, ending in 2022 after Season 11, and having spin-offs such as Fear the Walking Dead (2015).

The Walking Dead however comes with knowledge that it is a much bleaker take on the zombie apocalypse, where other video game adaptations include the Telltale Games graphic adventure games from between 2012-2019, which are acclaimed as they are known as having tragic narrative turns. This presents a strange position for what is a light gun game, [Spoilers] especially when everyone barring your playable character dies [Spoilers End]. There is a pointlessness to the game which, even if you play a tale where you rescue people, even save bonus hostages from zombies (or “walkers”), knowing this is for naught is one of those things which make the adaptation really a curious piece of tie-in merchandise. The idea of presenting this as philosophically rich, about the nature of futility, also does not make sense and seem absurd – an experimental light gun game which would force one to ask tough questions would be a fascinating experiment, but it is telling that most of this game is meant to be action heavy, a romp even in spite of its ending where you find yourself battling the undead hordes.

Technically as well, this is a “light crossbow” game as, set at West Georgia Correctional Facility, location important in the franchise for Season 3 and Season 4, you play a group of survivors unfortunately realizing that their place of residence is not secure from the living dead, and with ammo scare for guns, a crossbow is your weapon of choice. It is a cool touch, forcing a different weapon on you strategically, especially as specific sections change the pace, be it being thrown explosive arrows to use or hand to hand weapons where the zombies have to be up close to actually land blows. The game however also presents an unexpectedly hard learning curve, tougher than other light gun games, by following the trope in zombie fiction that these walkers only fall when hit in the head. With the zombies popping out of nowhere, the number onscreen, and hordes in the background there for bonuses, it is a challenge but a surprisingly hard one, particularly in mind to how short the game is.

There are no bosses, no special enemies, and this one setting only, following a short story of human selfishness, preservation and ultimately futility. It is really nihilistic, and it feels tonally out of place for this genre, in spite of its virtues, particularly as there are moments which are meant to be visually “cool”, such as the slow downed shots to hit zombies as you are jumping off things. It suffers in how it feels a curious teaming of genres, and also personally, because Sega’s House of the Dead exists. House of the Dead is the less serious, more overtly b-movie of the pair but the franchise is also ambitious and proudly ridiculous. Optimistic even with its morbidness, it also has a fairer attitude to allowing all shots to work, only with head shots one-hit kills and allowing more points, and with its own camp sensibilities. Sometimes, depending on the context, tone has to be considered, and Walking Dead, especially as the sit down arcade machine is sold as a spectacle cabinet, not a somber take, presents a questionable choice to a slight game. It is entertaining to play, but it is far from the best of the genre by a long shot, and feels really at odds with the material.

Jurassic Park Arcade is a more ambitious and gleefully fun game. Sega already had a shot with a light gun adaptation, creating a 1994 light gun game from the first film followed by The Lost World: Jurassic Park in 1997, based on the sequel film. Stemming from the 1990 Michael Crichton novel, Jurassic Park in its 1993 adaptation for cinema by Steven Spielberg was a box office juggernaut, not a franchise strange to video game adaptations at all and contextually at a time when, in 2015, we would see the franchise brought back to life for cinema in Jurassic World. The Jurassic Park game follows the inherent folly, as from the get-go in this franchise, of even cloning dinosaurs in the first place and thinking they would be easy to keep in parks as a zoo, the same mistake done over and over in the franchise. Mayhem transpires here because of a volcano erupting on the island the park is built on, letting the beasts out to rampage.

The game is split into three sections, split into stages, all centering on the humans attempting to recapture some of the larger dinosaurs back alive – a Triceratops, a Tyrannosaurus rex and a Spinosaurus in that order – whilst fighting the other creatures like raptors that get in the way, even ones with feathers to reflect real life advancements in prehistoric research. Nonetheless, historical accuracy or not, there is a question about the fact you are “tranquilizing” said feathered lizards or anything else. The opening preview screens before you put a quarter into the machine list all the sub weapons you can collect as “non-lethal, and this is in mind that one of these weapons is a freeze ray, leaving the enemies frozen into ice which immediately shatters into pieces. Unlike The Walking Dead, there is no question about the tonal choice here, it is just funny in a slightly sick way.

Regardless of how many you make extinct, including the tiny ones so cute it seems wrong to blast them despite the horde trying to gnaw on your knees, this unlike The Walking Dead embraces a vulgarity which is more rewarding. Arcade machines, especially when they got into gimmick machines, feel wrong for something like The Walking Dead’s tone unless you were to take a real risk, this a blast and also something which feels like a game than a spectacle cabinet, as you have the ability including points for destroying the scenery which allows for score attack challenges. The game is fun for Raw Thrills embracing cheesy adventure, in mind that their debut game, which got a US Nintendo Wii release, was the digitized actor light gun game Target: Terror (2004), their brashness in their arcade cabinets fully felt here in how one stage has your parachute being grabbed by a Pteranodon, forced to ride the experience, another driving shotgun in a vehicle, among many times, trying to chase a T-Rex. Alongside how every “boss” will force you to restart the last section with a little less health if you fail the requirements, part of hitting targets quickly in a certain time period, and this is a likably gaudy blaster but with that a pure compliment to the developers. The later game softened me to Raw Thrills because of this, any unfair bias lost because they have a personality which is the thing I want to least have with my arcade games, or games in general. Certainly it is an incentive to go to their cabinets.

Dark Echoes (1977)

 

Director: George Robotham

Screenplay: George Robotham

Cast: Karin Dor as Lisa Bruekner; Joel Fabiani as Bill Cross; Wolfgang Brook as Inspector Woelke; Hanna Landy as Frau Ziemler; John Robotham as Dieter Beckmann; Norman Marshall as Captain Gohr; Frederick Tully as Officer Braun; James Dobson as Officer Garth; Alexander Davion as Dereck Stanhope

A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies)

 

A lake with a curse is established in the beginning of Dark Echoes, leading to two older male fishermen dying in a strange drowning accident and the film, shot between Slovenia and Austria, setting out an eerie tone of a piece out-of-time. Cold chills warn those too late of what attacks, apt for a film steeped in its eerie synthesiser score by Sanja Ilic and Slobodan Markovic. A film between European aesthetic locations, Germanic uniforms on the officials to its locations used for the production, the scenario is set up as so severe an American clairvoyant has to be brought in by the local law enforcement. This figure is introduced in an abrupt turn into a commercial for skiing, also evident the composters' score can be proto-vaporwave as, with compliment, their music can turn on a dime into a score for travel advertisements. This is not that strange when one learns to co-composter Slobodan Markovic, born in Belgrade, worked on an entry for the Eurovision Song Contest, 1991 Yugoslavian entry to the Eurovision Song Contest, Brazil, performed by Bebi Dol. Tragically it only got 1 point, coming 21st in the field of 22 competing countries, beating only Austria^1&1b.

An older male psychic from the USA, Bill Cross (Joel Fabiani) is sadly underutilised in terms of his psychic abilities, which seems a plot thread, barring one foreboding image he and we see, that seems actually pointless to have included, among the issues to a film despite its virtues. More so as the character, the real deal, would have been one you could flesh out further than here, deliberately an outsider who instructs a confused European bartender who to mix a martini, eventually the American and the European bonding by way of a good cocktail served in a beer stein. With a potential love-hate relationship with a female journalist Lisa (Karin Dor), and the set up is there. Like many films, dialogue scenes are needed to explain the plot, here about a sea captain blamed for eighty deaths in a sea wreckage accident. This tonal choice is the aspect people dismiss as detraction in many horror films, yet films find themselves feeling they need these scenes as Dark Forces does, to be exposition trying to weave character personality within them, all for our alcohol loving lead able to try to investigate this strange series of deaths among wood panelled walled rooms. The result will put some off because of this, as the film takes its time even at ninety minutes to establish this story this way.

It was a fascinating one-off for director-writer George Robotham, whose career was almost entirely as a stunt man since the 1940s to Mars Attacks! (1996). This means film serials like Batman (1943), the Technicolor fifties era movies like Guys and Dolls (1955), westerns like The Undefeated (1969) as Rock Hudson's double, disaster films of the seventies like The Towering Inferno (1974), to films you would not normally presume would have stunts like Flashdance (1983). As his sole film, one which has been seemingly lost to time barring Japanese VHS tape rips, it is a production caught between its moodier presentation and what is more explicitly more cartoonish in its horror. Mood as nature circles the central place the story takes place in, an isolated town whose cemetery is from the medieval times with its own bone house to store the ancient dead, with an artist who paints the skulls in respect to them, and what is effectively in the subgenre of underwater zombies that films like Zombie Lake (1981) are part of. The amount of dialogue feels like someone making their first (maybe their only) attempt to bring something they wanted to see onto screen, and there is a sense of feeling the story, whilst insanely simple, needed this to flesh the material out. In real life, there would be a lot of discussions for hours in bars by stressed officials, as even Jaws (1975), whilst a blockbuster, was as good as it was as a less supernatural film about dangerous bodies of water, all due to its characters, building them up as neurotic figures, trying to figure out something as less mysterious as a shark and how to stop it.

Here, moments show the paranoia well, of the thing off-screen that growls like a man-wolf, when a German Sheppard barks into the darkness, and the tone of Dark Echoes whilst languid works. It works when it is bordering this tone, aptly requiring one to consult an older wise woman to get more knowledge of this threat, one so at peace with her place crows happily perch on her shoulder. Alongside the few moments of gore too, this is where the one lurid aspect of Dark Echoes ever appears too, as she presides over rituals with robed youths performing ritualistic nude dance orgies, something never returned to, never condemned but the abrupt punch of something more adult to the proceedings until more violence appears.

When the violence does appear, the film finds itself becoming closer to a film like Zombie Lake as a monster film. That was infamously not a good film technically for many about aquatic Nazi zombies, and whilst you do not see the edge of a swimming pool in the underwater footage, which infamously happened in that film, it does feel an apt comparison for better or for worse as this becomes more overtly a b-movie which its set up and languid tone clashes against, entirely about a zombie figure who claws people and is intimidated by his vanity when forced to look in a mirror. Tonally it is a slow work which contrasts this change into this plot tone more, more so as for whatever reason, whilst underwater is a world a world of unnatural and compelling sights in real life, it has a dreary nature when you usually shot it onscreen. Even when a James Bond film like Thunderball (1965) has frogmen armies fighting under the sea, you can find yourself in prolonged scenes which are woozy if you are in the right mood, but are not for everyone, which is also an issue for a film like this when such scenes appear.

Here, finding ourselves with a melted face skull man in a captain's hat, Dark Forces is likable as a film but you also see a film which shows the first cautious (and flawed) attempts of a first time creator. It is still fun, lovable morbid and absurd when an ancestor chews him out for being a murderous coward, or suddenly bringing in a gory decapitation out of nowhere, but this is far from a perfect film at all. It is fascinating to watch, like so many of these obscure horror films are, but this is a case of lowering expectations to be able to appreciate it and get the most from it.

====

1) Result of Rome 1991 Eurovision Song Contest, from the official Eurovision website.

1b) Reference to Slobodan Markovic composing the entry for Yugoslavia.