"Stalled" - - I Can't Go When Someone's Watching . . .Or Eating

I'm a sucker for independent movies. Not like those tryhard "art" films that explore the human condition, or as much of the human condition a 21 year old film student knows about. No, I'm a fan of the independent film that is somehow able to pack in the most punch for the smallest amount of time and money and still be as entertaining as the big boys.

In the same vein, I'm a huge fan of the "single set" film. Give me a house, a cabin; give me a cast and crew stuffed into their grandma's home over the course of 6 weekends. To me, that is the heart of filmmaking. Almost every director worth their salt started in this position. It's the passion, not the budget, that drives the picture.

Also, I'm sure being able to take shots like this and not end up in prison
drive the picture as well.

"Stalled" takes the "single set" film to a whole new level by placing 90% of the film inside a woman's restroom, and most of that action in a stall. One of the main characters, another stall-goer with a badly timed case of the dumps is never seen, only heard. Minimalism is the name of the game here and "Stalled" plays that game like a master.

W.C. is maintence man working late during a employee Christmas part. He walks into the women's restroom with his huge tool box, sets it down on the sink, and begins to plot his next move before he is interrupted two chirpish and overly friendly (with each other) girls. Hiding in the first stall he can sneak into W.C. gets a voyeuristic view of some light lesbian action before Girl One devours Girl Two.

Yes, this is a zombie film.

There is nothing sexy about this picture but since it's now on the Internet
someone, somewhere is getting a boner to it.

I recently made the case against horror/comedy films: The movie is so relentless in proving it's funny that the threat becomes too light. "Stalled" is one of the movies that gets it right. The zombies are a definite force of evil. The humor comes not from how dumb the zombies are or some weird self-referential nonsense but  W.C.'s reactions to his own predicament. After calling for help, a man wearing a suit of protective motorcycle gear bursts into the bathroom. He takes a proper hero's pose, then raises the visor on his helmet to show that he too is a zombie.

"No! Go away! No, I want LIVE people!" W.C.protests.

A large part of the entertainment value of this movie is how inventive W.C., and by extension the filmmakers, are. He's a maintenance man armed with just a screwdriver in his pocket but with that he is able to make modifications to the stall to buy him some time. To get out though, he's going to need to reach the tool box of heavy weapons on the bathroom sink.

This bathroom is still cleaner than mine.

But "Stalled" isn't a one man show. Well, it is, but he does have a co-star

She has a cute face but she's a little flat chested.

Evie is a young woman trapped a stall away. Never seen but always heard, Evie cheers him on and beats him down. She is both the cheerleader and the devil on his shoulder. While he can't see her he does sketch a picture of her. This works for him by giving him another human presence in his own stall and it works for us by letting us getting to know Evie without ever seeing her.

As the movie progresses, the idea that Evie is just all in his head is possible but the end result of her storyline is far more poignant. I think a lesser movie would have made her a simple ghost voice but "Stalled" is not a lesser movie. And hats off to actress Antonia Bernath who spends the entire movie unseen. To sign up for a film where you are never seen is a ballsy approach for any actor.

"Stalled" is not only a great zombie movie but a great independent film as well. It is inventive and extremely well made and deserves to be viewed by horror and film fans alike.

So . . .how about a little head?

"Horny House Of Horror" - - I Don't Pay For Women Or Water, Because I Get Them Both Free

So, originally I was going to review "Starry Eyes," a horror/thriller about what it takes to be famous. I was also considering "Sinister," or the mind-bogglingly good "Coherence." But as I sat down to eat Thanksgiving leftovers (thanks Mom!), I popped in a movie in this movie. Because what goes better with turkey and mashed potatoes than this image shown at the start of the film.

I have no idea what is going on in this picture, and I'm okay with that.

After pausing the movie, washing my brain, and watching an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation while I regained my appetite and finished my meal, I sat back to discover the wonderful, horrifying film that is free on Youtube known as "Horny House Of Horror."

"Pac-Man And The Ghostly Adventures: Mission Impacable!" - - Devourer Of Souls

So, yes, I know. What did I expect when I rented something called "Pac-Man And The Ghostly Adventures: Mission Impacable!", right? Well, I guess I kind of expected a movie. After I rented it (Redbox Exclusive!), I took a look at the running time. 66 minutes. OK, it's a short movie but that's whatever. I figured it would be 60 minutes of Pac-Man eating stuff. I used to watch the cartoon as a kid so let's pop this in and see what's in store.

"Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Watch Past Here."

An experienced movie viewer can tell you that you can judge a movie by the trailers accompanying it. So when I say trailers for a trilogy of cheap "Jungle Book" movie, one for another trilogy of "Donkey Kong Country" movies that look like they were rendered on a Nintendo 64, and *ugh* "Primates Of The Caribbean," I knew I was in too deep.

"Baby Geniuses 3" - - Where's Casey Anthony When You Need Her?

A long while back, a good friend of mine named Santiago had confessed something horrible that was happening to him that he was powerless to stop.

"My daughter, all she ever wants to watch is Godzilla (The Matthew Broderick version). Three, four times a day, it's just on repeat."

I worked at a movie theater when "Godzilla" came out. One of the privileges of working there was the free movies. Well, one day I had some time to kill so I went to the theater. Two "good" movies were playing at the time: "Godzilla" and "Deep Impact." The problem was "Deep Impact" was in theater 9, and there was a dead rat in there. It had been in there for a few days and despite several attempts we couldn't find it's corpse. Theater 9 stank so bad people would ask for their money back. Now, when you smell, what you are actually doing is inhaling the microscopic particles of whatever is causing the smell. So I knew I had a choice between watching "Godzilla" or inhaling decaying rat guts for two and half hours.

"Deep Impact" was a pretty good movie.

"And Now A Word From Our Sponsors" - - The Camaro Monologues

My friend Liz often says I'm the funniest person she knows. That's a bit of an exaggeration, or she doesn't know many people. And while I can usually change her mind about anything else, when I try to convince her otherwise, she just won't listen.

She's also been asking me lately why I never review comedies.

"It's because they are either terrible or funny. There is no in between," is my response. See, a horror movie can not be scary and still be good. "Cabin In The Woods" is not as scary as "The Ring" but it is incredibly entertaining. A Science Fiction movie can have a just a touch of Sci-Fi elements, like "Deja Vu" or "Primer" and also still work.

"Vamps" - - Legally Blood

When I'm watching a movie using my computer, it makes it a lot easier to review because I can take the screenshots right when I'm watching it. Usually, whether a movie is good or bad, I take maybe 6-8 screenshots and maybe post half of those.

While watching "Vamps" I took a record of 22 screenshots. The imagery in this movie goes from the unbelievable to the unbearable, but I think the best picture that sums up the whole movie is this one:

That is Sigourney Weaver's head on a skeleton's body. If you are looking at that picture and thinking: "Wow, those special effects look awful," trust me, they look ten times worse in motion. If this scene had been at the beginning of the film I would have wondered if I was having some sort of hallucination. But by the time this scene appeared the movie had already been so jaw-droppingly bad that I watched it with a laugh and a resigned shrug.

"Stitches" - - The 'Citizen Kane' of Killer Clown Movies

*Note: This movie is really, really gross. So be warned. This review is pretty gross too.

I recently said in my review for the legal drama/horror film "Killjoy Goes To Hell" that clowns do not scare me and I generally don't find clown movies interesting in general. I've had "Stitches" for awhile now but never got around to watching it. A clown movie. Gee, how original.

I watched the first ten minutes or so, where the titular clown Stitches bangs a clown groupie while sound effects played in the background. Ugh. Then he goes to a kid named Tom's birthday party and all the kids are mean to him but since he's already portrayed as such a jerk I didn't really have much empathy for him. Actually, at that point I didn't care about any of the characters. He ends up tripping and getting stabbed in the face with a butcher knife, then some other clowns showed up at a clown graveyard, and I paused the movie and took a nap.

Yes, this is literally the last thing I saw before I went to sleep.

"Killjoy Goes To Hell" - - The Pelican Grief

Imagine that you rented "Ghoulies 3: Ghoulies Go To College."

Yes, that's a real movie.

You take it home, pop it in, and sit back hoping for some knock-off "Gremlins" action and instead are treated to an hour long dissertation on Kinseyian economics from the Rat Ghoulie. Congratulations, you have just seen "Killjoy Goes To Hell."

"Killjoy Goes To Hell" is part four in the "Killjoy" series. While the other three are about a demonic clown dispatching people in various clown-related ways, this movie is about a trial. A very long and boring trial in Hell with witnesses (A mime, a carny who can only speak carny, etc.), a DA (or "Devil's Advocate HAHA!), and all the other trappings of an episode of "Law and Order."

In short, it was very boring.

"KILLJOY IS GONNA GET YOU! Pursuant to clause 817, subsection B by the ratification of the 6th district of Hell, Killjoy has hereby been served to "get you" at a time and place of his choosing. The Court also holds up the right outlined in 'Baphomet v. Charlie Daniels' that an adjudicator must be present if both parties . . . "

I saw the first "Killjoy" years ago when it first came out and it was mildly amusing. I don't have that built in fear of clowns that most people have, so I never followed the series. Recently I got all three "Killjoy" movies when I bought a pack of "Demonic Toys/GingerDead Man" DVDs but I really had no interest in seeing them. But when "Killjoy Goes To Hell" popped up on Redbox I figured I'd give it a shot.

Some might complain that these movies need to be viewed in order. "If you watch the first three then "Killjoy Goes To Hell" is great!" But that's missing the point. Someone who is looking for a movie to watch stumbles across "Killjoy Goes To Hell" and there is nothing to signify it is part four of a series. Each movie has to stand on it's own. You could rent any "Nightmare on Elm Street" and that single movie works. It should make you want to go back and watch the other films. "Killjoy Goes To Hell" makes me hesitant to watch 2 and 3 because I am going to assume now that nothing really happens until the last half hour.


"Killjoy" is also something that I could see a 12 year old saying "Whoa, look a creepy clown! Let's rent this!!!" Then he gets home to watch Killjoy sit in a chair for the bulk of the movie.

I will give the movie credit for a few things: One, Killjoy is a pretty funny guy. Not like slapstick funny but the way he responds to people. Trent Haaga, who plays Killjoy under what seems to be two pounds of make-up, hams it up as a demonic version of Krusty the Clown. Mr. Haaga also wrote "Feeding The Masses" and "Dead Girl," two awesome zombie films. And there is not one but two hot chicks, Batty Boop and Jezebeth, that keep things on the screen interesting even when the storyline itself is dragging.

There's also this weird sequence when the mime bangs an old witch and gets a robot baby sewn into his guts, and the Carny clown builds and army of demon clowns to help Killjoy, but both of those things sound way cooler typed out than what they looked like on screen. Batty Boop also enters the real world and kidnaps Killjoy's last remaining victim to testify for him in court, but again, all that zaniness comes towards the very end of "I object-overruled-call-your next-witness" Perry Mason nonsense.

The last 10 minutes or so was pretty cool, but I fell asleep twice getting to that point. And in the end, the only thing that has changed for any of the characters is Killjoy forgets his name. Actually, everyone forgets his name so I don't know if that signifies the end of the series or if they lost the copyright to the name Killjoy, but one thing is for certain: I'll be more hesitant to rent a Killjoy or whatever they call him movie in the future.

"Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong" - - This bong has issues, dude.

"Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong" is the follow-up to "Evil Bong 2: King Bong." And when I say follow-up I mean it's a direct sequel which means if you didn't see Part 2, you're going to be lost for a good half hour of this movie.

But let's back up for a moment. Let's chill. Relax a little. Let's just kick back and listen to the awesome ending credits song for this movie.




I love that song. Never heard it before watching this movie. It's always nice to find gems like that.

OK, back to the review. When you see a movie titled "Evil Bong 3: The Wrath of Bong" you just have to watch it. Just like "The Gingerdead Man 2: The Passion of the Crust" or (ugh) "The Gingerdead Man 3: Saturday Night Cleaver," it's almost a gut reaction to pick it up. With a title that bad/clever it has to be at least worth watching for a few laughs. This movie was actually the reason I bought a 20 pack of movies (don't worry folks, only cost me $5). I thought "Even if this movie sucks the title rocks!"

And the movie is actually pretty good.

"EB3" follows the trials and tribulations of 3 stoners who, from the dialogue I have to assume have been in all three films. In this movie, they fight an Evil Bong who travels to Earth in a giant weed cocoon . . .





"I got 5 . . .million light years on it."



which crashes to the Earth. The result is creating a field of mind-controlling weed. Also anyone who touches the weed becomes covered in weed, and anyone who smokes from the Evil Bong gets transported to the Evil Bongs home dimension where alien women drain all their sperm to make a hybrid race. It's like Little Shop of Horrors meets the Blob meets my 20s.

Despite the fact the above plot sounds extremely stupid, well it is, but it's funny stupid. The acting is great, these guys really do seem like friends who care about each other's fate. That's the beauty of these low budget films: people do it for the love of making movies. Sure, they want to get paid, but they also want it to be fun.

I enjoyed watching this film. That's always the baseline I have for a movie. The movie did have a few big drawbacks though:

1)The sound mixing was a little dodgy and that's always a minus for me. You'll see me bring that up a lot in future reviews because it's always irritating to have to turn the volume up and down from scene to scene. This movie didn't have the worst (I'm looking at you, Ultimate Killing Machine!) but it did have issues

2) The movie relied heavily on the viewer seeing at least the second Evil Bong movie if not all three. By the time the second act rolls around the characters are spending too much time talking about past events that I started to tune out. Guys, think of your audience: half of them haven't seen the second movie and the other half did but don't remember it. Stoners aren't known for their recall abilities.

3) And this is  might seem like nitpicking but for me this was a huge issue:




That nurse. That damned nurse. She drains the life out of every scene she's in to the point where it's hard to listen to what the hell everyone else is saying. The nurse in this movie was beyond distracting. I don't know if she was cast for her looks but it definitely wasn't because of her screen presence or acting ability. She mimes her way through the remainder of the movie and every time she popped up on screen so did a migraine in my head. What is up with the whole mute thing? It's not funny. And then they cut to a close ups of her! She's like finding nothing but seeds and stems in your stash.

The movie was originally in 3-D so expect to see lots of people poking you in the face or oddly framed shots, but at this point it just adds to the goofy charm. Check out Evil Bong 3, but you might want to check out the first two beforehand.

"Foolish" - - "I don't think P knew what movie we were making."

Foolish is a movie that fails so hard, even the Closed Captioning has some serious issues. Now, I get that whoever did the Closed Captioning for this may not be up on the latest street slang, but at this point who doesn't know the proper way to spell it is "Nigga?" Either A) Racists or B) People who shouldn't be captioning a Master P film.

In the next scene, all the the captions just read "Oooga Booga" and "Where da white wimmin!!!"

The movie itself is a mixture of stand-up comedy from "Foolish Waise" aka Eddie Griffin as himself and a bizarre mafia subplot that is dropped in the middle of the second act. In fact, the last half hour of the movie is a stand up set so the entire plot is dropped at that point.

In between we get: Foolish talking to ghosts, Foolish chasing his girlfriend around with a baseball bat, Foolish talking about getting another girl pregnant six years ago (which is only noteworthy because the actress they chose for the part, but we'll get to that later), and Master P acting how you would expect him to act: badly.

I think Eddie Griffin is funny. I know that Master P sucks. Going into this film, I figured the two would balance each other out for a purely mediocre film. So why did it cross the Rubicon into the land of unwatchable (It took me three days to watch it after falling asleep twice)?

Well, for that we have to go to the director's commentary, where we learn such gems as:

1) Master P personally funded the film, so he had himself put in as a co-star but would only be on set for 15 minutes at a time. His limited availability caused whole chunks of the mafia subplot to be taken out but . . .

2) P put the mafia subplot into the script in the first place. It was originally a semi-biographical story of Eddie Griffin's life until Master P said he would fund the film. Between the two competing narratives there were 15 rewrites of the script (including one where they shoot a man to death in the second scene. What a laugh riot!)

3) P insisted that he have a romantic scene with every female, leaving Eddie with no love interest.

4) P hated shooting outside, where at one point the director had to argue with him to get him to stand outside for an establishing shot. The scene had to be shot in 5 minutes.

5) Foolish's ex, the one he had a relationship with 6 years ago was supposed to be played by Lela Rochon but on the first day she was on set her and Master P got in a "disagreement" (the director tiptoed around what happened, but I assumed he tried to make her say "uhnnnn"). The character is a lawyer who helps them set up their own comedy club. While the director is trying to recast the part, Master P shows up with a girl who looks barely 18 and says "Here's the new actress!" An 18 year old lawyer. Who Foolish got pregnant 6 years ago.

"Clap if you don't know how to make a movie!"

In the original script, it was based on the real life exploits of Eddie Griffin's days in the clubs. But as the title changed from "Tears of a Clown" to "Foolish," the highs and lows of Eddie's story got lost. It was at the point when Master P changed the name of the film that the director lamented "I don't think P knew what movie we were making." It turns out Eddie did, in real life, have huge fights with his girlfriend and in turn smashed up his own car with a baseball bat. Compelling stuff. I'd watch that movie.

But P wanted a scene where they did a home invasion wearing "funny masks." (The director stated this was one scene P insisted having in the film.) There was supposed to be a scene where Master P boxed Mike Tyson . . .why?

Although, watching Master P get punched in the face would have made this movie my favorite film of all time.