Stranded At the Drive-In HorrorShow

Ahh, the horror anthology, a sadly under-utilized subgenre that irrationally went the way of the leg warmer (and tragically enough, drive-in) when the 1990s rained its plague upon us. Browse through your Mill Creek packs and you’ll find, amongst the adorably inept Guy From Harlems and less adorably but more inept Sunbursts a handful or anthologies that easily clean your palette. On a personal note, it’s rare that a multi-story horror film leaves me totally cold because with anywhere from three to five shots, a few simply have to hit the right spot.

2010's The Drive-In HorrorShow is a cheerful throwback those days of horror yore, primarily the ‘70s and early ‘80s. Directed and co-written by Michael Neel (a horror convention pal I’ve had the honor of sharing bacon bread with), it features five stories that cover such genre tropes as rape revenge, body melting, urban legends and the tried and true slasher. The segments are framed in a post-apocalyptic future drive-in where the host, Zombie Frank, tries his bet to please ghoulishly unhappy patrons.

The first story, Pig, opens upon a frat boy glued tightly inside a bathtub as his date rape victim lords over his frozen body with a running faucet and hammer. It’s a typical morality tale aided by decent performances and some painfully gooey gore, but (MILD SPOILER ALERT) it also has a strangely straightforward storyline. On one hand, it’s oddly (and ironically) refreshing to NOT have to expect the unexpected standard short story twist so widely used in anthology pieces, but at the same time, the structure somewhat deprives its characters of any real arc.

Next comes The Closet, the first of two child-centered tales. The segment follows young Jamie, the black sheep of his crass family. While Jamie dreams of attending space camp and cleaning the kitchen, his parents moon over his overachieving tennis star sister. Everything changes when a good old fashioned monster-in-the-closet offers a hand (or more appropriately, mouth) to Jamie’s plight, slowly tearing through the household to free space and power to our young hero. It’s a fun segment with a great sense of humor (note that the first thing the newly liberated Jamie does is scrub the dining room table) that manages to be a playful exercise in cheeky black comedy. 

In Fall Apart, we meet the sympathetic Dr. Paul Mazursky, a general practitioner who despises the current state of the healthcare profession for its bureaucratic limitations. When he makes a housecall to a mysteriously ill couple, he catches their unpleasant, skin-peeling disease and finds himself suffering a far worse fate. Like Pig, Fall Apart puts some incredibly gory makeup effects on display, aided here by Larry Jay Tish’s likable performance as a man always trying to do the right thing. The segment drags a little during the middle, but ultimately offers a darker and more serious anchor to nicely balance some of the lighter segments.

Speaking of, the fourth story, The Meat Man, is easily the funniest of the bunch. Two little boys trade urban (or rather, suburban) legends of the titular carnivorous villain only to grow suspicious that their own father might be the man in question. Much like The Closet, The Meat Man benefits greatly from how it portrays its young stars, energetically getting their humor and translating it into something funny, familiar, and lively throughout its short running time.

The final story, The Watcher, takes some inspiration from Creepshow 2’s The Raft crossed with just about any backwoods-set slasher. Survivor champions Ethan Zohn and Jenna Morasca star along with two other decent-looking folks camping in the wrong part of the forest. Once the monstrous woods killer emerges, the story moves well with intense human-hunting action. It's a strong note to end on, although my personal tastes would have preferred something with the more unique quirk of the previous three tales.

High Points
Boy that budget goes far! Some of the special effects on display are painfully icky and by painful, I mean they make you think twice about ever touching anybody with the sniffles or slipping rufies to a coed


Low Points
As is the nature of all anthologies, the balance in stories isn't quite perfect, since the best meat seems reserved for the middle segments

Lessons Learned

Water damage is expensive and plumbers aren’t cheap

There’s way too much paperwork in modern medicine

Frat houses tend to keep a ready inventory of industrial strength waterproof glue on hand, perhaps to ensure football trophies can always be safely put back together in case of accidents

In today’s anti-NASA culture, space camp has a dirtier reputation than rock ‘n roll, skateboarding, Pog playing, or gang warfare ever got from your parents

Rent/Bury/Buy

The Drive-In HorrorShow is a neat little nostalgic package, one that should put a smile on horror fans raised to associate Leslie Nielsen with burying Sam Malone in sand just as much as Frank Drebin. The middle three segments offer a genuinely creative batch of laughs and ews, while the surrounding two are a little more traditional but give some impressive low budget gore. The film is now available at the official website, http://www.driveinhorrorshow.com, as well as on store shelves in those places that kind of still exist, ACTUAL STORES!

And if you're a Bostonite, why not see the film on the big screen for all of SIX DOLLARS? A certain little podcast called Outside the Cinema is presenting a very special screening this coming Saturday (July 23rd) at the Hollywood Hits Theater in Danvers, MA. Tickets are sold at the door, but you can stay up to date with the Facebook event page here.

Flower Power

As modern hippies join hands and hold organic bake sales to benefit Earth Day, we horror fans find our own ways of honoring this third planet from the sun most of us call home. Personally, I can't think of a better method than to comb through cinema history for a few films high on environmentally inspired dangers. I don't know about you, but that sounds far more fun than making a compost pile or, you know, trying to save a world that seems so hellbent on killing us.

Terrifying Trees!

While there has yet to be an official Arbor Day entry into the slasher school of holiday-themed horror, trees do get their due, and I’m not just talking about Elm Street (ba dom bump! I'll stop now). William Friedken's abysmal 1990 The Guardian bests The Hand That Rocks the Cradle for presenting the wealthy suburbs’ most viscous nanny (and adds the whole “druid cult that believes in sacrificing babies to oaks” twist that’s much worse than it sounds). Of course, The Evil Dead gives us an infamous lady-raping tree, but the film that truly alleviates my guilt over wasting paper goes back 70 years to the Yellow Brick Road. Whether Oz exists south of the Equator or somewhere deep inside Dorothy’s uppers/downers-filled head, it does boast a forest that could kick the hobbits out of Middle Earth. If my woods ever insulted me with the fervor of a bad standup comic or hurled apples my way with more speed than Johann Santana, I’d say screw double-sided copies and bring on urban sprawl.

Eat Your Vegetables (Before They Kill You)

When I was 8 years old, I started my first great unfinished screenplay titled, quite simply,  “Don’t Eat.” The poster art (done in pre-sharpener equipped Crayola) featured a giant hot dog menacingly squeezing a ketchup bottle’s contents into a dying diner’s mouth as flames spouted out his eyes. I’m still waiting for Harvey Weinstein’s call, but in the meantime, any film about killer food will keep me entertained. Because it’s ridiculous. Obviously, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes is worth its infamy, but for a poetically veggie viewing, I’d hit up Children of the Corn 2: The Final (despite 5 more and counting sequels) Sacrifice. The 1992 installment tosses in an explanation of how chemically rotting corn mold was responsible for driving Isaac & Co. into Bad Seed levels of bloodthirstiness. And here I thought those cobs just had too many carbs.

Villainous Vinery

Invasion of the Body Snatchers has its spores and Creepshow has a fuzzy green Stephen King, but it seems like most ferocious fauna is a tad too alien-based for a day that celebrates this planet. Perhaps one of the most underrated horror films of recent years is The Ruins, a glossy but nasty little chiller that features frisky plant life as creatively sadistic as it is au naturale. Based on Scott B. Smith’s fantastically frightening novel of the same name, The Ruins makes a poison ivy rash look pleasant. Hell, it makes jumping naked into an overgrown garden of three-leaved bushes look more comforting than falling gently into a basket of fluffy towels regularly leapt into by Snuggles, the fabric softener bear.

Emoting in the Wind (which is totally not Happening)

If the world is indeed populated by nerdy, whiny voiced Mark Walberg’s who constantly worry about What’s Happening to The Bees!, then I’m all for deadly wind swooping in to destroy the human population in grisly and thoroughly painful ways. While I admire M. Night Shayamalan’s um, intent to highlight environmental issues, I--along, I’m sure, with most of the non-comatose public who lost 89 minutes to this bewildering bad mess--found his latest disaster to be worthy of extinction. Still, the idea of Mother Nature taking matters into her own hands ain’t bad. 

Now let’s never speak of this movie again.

Deadly Dionaea Muscipula

Let us stop to consider the irony of the venus fly trap. It’s a plant. It’s also a carnivore. In a way, that makes perfect sense (you can never accuse it of cannibalism) but holy shit. A plant eats meat. It’s nearly as confusing as goblins turning humans into greenery for cuisine while promoting vigilant vegetarianism (it's hard to go more than a week without mentioning Troll 2 in some form or another). 

Naturally, venus fly traps make ideal villains. Little Shop of Horrors amps it up by fitting its name to cast its a man-eating flower as a creature FROM outer space, but for a more earth-bound example, look to the animated framing story of Creepshow 2. It even teaches a few lessons about the wrongness of bullying and the importance of teaching youths about gardening. 

So dear readers, how did YOU celebrate your homeland this past week? Non-dairy pizza parties decorated with crepe-shaped hemp paper or learning a lesson about organic recycling with Cliff Clavin in Motel Hell?