After brief narration giving a bit of information about Lilith, an ancient demon transforming into seductive woman and killing horny men since the dawn of mankind, the infamous Night Angel crawls out of the hole in the ground in front of viewer's eyes. Viewer's eyes will be pleased by the fact the demon already looks like naked woman. The only thing that gives away Lilith's true identity is a disfigured hand with sharp claws. The devil woman changes the shape of the hand before she goes on her manhunt and chooses a head of well known fashion periodical as the first victim. The boss gives the mysterious beauty a lift, Lilith invites herself into his fancy house, seduces him and then slashes his throat with fingernails while rich man's little son watches in horror. She also removes heart from victim's rib cage. Soon, redaction of the magazine becomes a place of witchcraft when Lilith decides to spread evil in the printed form. Lilith first causes a fight between two men at the discotheque, one of them falls into elevator shaft, the other one is badly injured by broken glass. Lilith introduces herself as the right hand of magazine's new boss played by Karen Black and turns the whole staff into zombie-like creatures. Craig, one of the employees, doesn't like the change of magazine's style and becomes another man on Lilith's death list. He tries to defeat the demon with the help of his girlfriend and elderly black woman who knows Lilith's hideous secret... Night Angel represents a perfect example of 80's supernatural horror, packed with mechanical monster effects and latex gore.
Reviews
4 Reviews
Odd horror comedy
21 April 2006
Strange movie, part slasher, part parody, part detective story. The idea of mad killer murdering people and keeping bloody souvenirs in order to satisfy bloodlust of ancient Egyptian god is somewhat reminiscent of H.G.Lewis' Blood Feast (of course, Fuad Ramses didn't use power tools). The director borrowed a few ideas from various horror movies and tried to create crazy combination of black humor and thrills, but it is obvious that he wasn't too familiar with the genre. Mr. Tschetter mentions The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or films by H.G.Lewis as the main inspirations for Picking Up The Pieces in the commentary track of Bloodsucking Pharaohs DVD. He also talks about being shocked when he first watched The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and when he found out that such movies as Herschell's gore epics really existed. Picking Up The Pieces is a horror comedy as directed by an artist usually involved in producing Shakespearian theater plays.It is professionally shot and occasionally amusing but most jokes don't work. Blocker and Birdwell- two cops with lots of personal problems trying to catch insane murderer, are quite interesting duo- Blocker throwing up each time he glimpses blood and Birdwell provoking his buddy by mentioning Blocker's embarrassing sexual problem. Some parts of the movie are played out completely serious, other parts that could be taken from Naked Gun or Airplane!, for example the flashback scene explaining Blocker's trauma from the past, don't seem to fit in the film. The violence is quite tame,but the DVD is surprisingly cut by MPAA although killings consist of shots of murderer manipulating with power saw (or some other tool) and shots of splashing blood. Tom Savini provided one rubber corpse with the top of the cranium sawed off and one neat melting scene. During the final showdown between cops and the killer even good old chainsaw makes an appearance. Unfortunately, nobody is hacked to pieces.
Il bosco 1
(1988)
If only there were chunks of gore in this movie...
18 April 2006
Warning: Spoilers
This was a disappointment. After reading something like "the most extreme excursion into horror in Troma's history" on Troma's website, I was fooled into thinking this would be a strong Italian gore flick. I have expected lack of plot but also the promised gore. What I got was one castration that wasn't overly graphic neither impressive, guy named Tony being repeatedly mutilated by a zombie, Tony's unconvincing rubber head and the final demise of demons via chainsaw and sunlight. There is not as much gore as the promotion promises and Evil Clutch can't be compared to blood soaked splatterfests by Andreas Schnaas. The impact of the violence on display is somewhat weakened by ridiculous reactions of actors, especially the guy who plays Tony, but I don't want to complain about acting in low budget Italian horror movie. The thing that annoyed me was the lack of characters, there are only five people in the whole movie. This leads to overlong scenes of two tourists being chased and tormented by three demons. All characters have very little to do in the second half of the movie. If there were more possible victims of demons popping up just to be massacred, the actor playing bald headed zombie wouldn't have to kill Tony in such ridiculous fashion-first crushing his hands with a stone, then letting him go, later ripping his head off and carrying it around in endless shots that allow viewers to see how fake that artificial head is. It is sad that the makers didn't use their equipment and props more effectively.
Nudist Colony of the Dead
(1991)
Kill all the zealots!
17 April 2006
I was pleasantly surprised, Nudist colony had much more professional look than I've expected.It offers the right combination of campy horror, religious satire and musical numbers to create refreshing and entertaining viewing experience. There was even a bit of funny gore thrown in for a good measure. Mr. Pirro, I applaud you. I've heard of this movie before but wasn't too anxious to see it. I didn't know what I was missing! Lord, forgive me for I didn't know how delightful Nudist Colony of the Dead could be. From the first scenes at the court where angry bible thumpers accuse poor nudists of corrupting the neighborhood to the final appearance of the naked corpses singing their anthem Kill all the zealots, this movie is a treat for all lovers of genuine low budget horror comedies. Nudists oppressed by the moral majority can't stand life without their favorite colony and decide to commit suicide but later they return to kick the butt of those crucifix bashers who dare to set foot on their land... It sounds like extremely funny idea to me. I consider this to be the best shot on Super 8 movie I've ever seen. It has more competent zombie make up than Zombie Lake and some other straight zombie movies that were meant to be horrifying, the humor works fine most the time and I am sure that the director was aware of budget limitations and all the performers did their best. Songs are simple but catchy and religious jokes are presented so often one can forgive that some of them feel a bit forced. There are some truly great characters in Nudist Colony: The black ranger who tries to convince bible thumping visitors of the colony that former inhabitants came back from the grave, one of female nudists dressed in hilarious body suit with wrinkled rubber breasts or the obsessive bible reader who has the Book of the books shoved down his throat... I found Nudist Colony of the Dead to be extremely amusing and witty but I understand that viewers who are easily offended and those who expect acting and production values on par with Citizen Kane even from movies shot on Super 8 would rather choke on Satan's vomit than watch this.
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