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DanXIII

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Horror Fuel

Short Film Review: Shower Sharks (2018)

A shark obsessed dude attempts to write a screenplay as a shark (I predict I’m going to be writing that word a lot in this review) doc plays on the boob tube. Before long a news bulletin interrupts the show warning of a plague of shower sharks…sharks that emerge from drains to menace the populace…and you can guess what happens next! Shower Sharks gives the viewer exactly what you would expect; an absurd and enjoyable bite sized bit of nonsense in the Troma style. Film maker (and lead actor)Noah “Shark” Robertson has a keen eye (two in fact) for delivering off-the-wall horror comedy, and you can tell he has a ton of passion and heart. As for any negatives to be found here (and this isn’t really a “bad” thing…more of an observation of something that stood out); I’m fairly certain that Robertson just filmed an actual EMT call guerrilla style for the film’s coda…this is some real Corman level

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DanXIII
May 19, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Monochrome (2018)

Emma Rose (Jo Woodcock) is a young woman who finds herself in dire straights after becoming entwined in one of your huge financial cock-ups (of the nation wide variety) thanks to her boyfriend socking away millions in knicked pension funds. To escape that hot mess she blows like the wind to the bucolic English countryside where she accidentally discovers (as one does) that she has a real passion for killing wealthy landowners (who employ her for “casual work”). Enter Gabriel Lenard (Cosmo Jarvis), an investigator with synesthesia (you know, like he can see sounds and the like) hired by the British Crime Agency to track ol’ Emma down. Will Gabriel, who’s condition allows him to see things at crime scenes others can not, be able to find Emma and recover the loot? Monochrome is nothing else if but original. The inclusion of the synesthesia (though under used…see below) is a nice element not found in your normal serial killer yarns,

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 18, 2018
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Desolation (2017)

Abby (Jaimi Paige) and Sam (Toby Nichols), her teenaged Son, head out to the remote wilderness to scatter the remains of her husband with her best friend Jen (Alyshia Ochse) taggin’ along. Everything is pines n’ posies for our trio until a beardo-weirdo dubbed ‘The Hiker’ makes the scene and begins the ol’ stalk n’ slay business we laid down our shekels for after our heroes leave some wine bottles behind causing him to go rabid Woodsy. Desolation has some good things going for it. For starters, the tension remains razor sharp throughout much of the run time once The Hiker shows up…which of course is a major plus for a fright flick. Speaking of the H-man; I dug his silent routine…he never utters a word, lurks menacingly, and besides those aforementioned wine bottles, he has el zippo for motivation…he’s just there, ready to kill, and our protagonists are merely in the wrong neck of the woods at the wrong

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 17, 2018
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Laserblast (1978)

Reptilian aliens arrive on Earth to retrieve a big ass laser gun from some sort of mutated teenager whom they quickly dispatch…but, a small plane scares them away before they can pick up the gun. Enter custom van drivin’ Mark Hamill surrogate Billy (Kim Milford), a down on his luck teen constantly left to fend for himself by his over-sexed Mother and hounded by some wacky cops (who complete with their own ragtime piano theme). Billy naturally finds the weapon mentioned previous, and begins to fuse with it courtesy of it’s funky fresh control medallion…slowly becoming a mutant himself. Soon a governmental agent, teen partying, vehicular scene padding, and “pew pew” lasers combine to form one hell of an entertaining sci-fi drive-In flick experience! Look, I’ll lay it out for ya; I’ve loved the hell out of Laserblast ever since I saw it on some regional sci-fi picture show or another in the late ’80’s. It’s chock full of hand

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 13, 2018
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Horror Fuel

Movie Review: End Trip (2018)

It’s just another night on the job for hapless UBER (or it’s rip-off cinematic equivalent) driver Brandon (Writer/Director Aaron Jay Rome) when he picks up his latest fare, Judd (Eric LeBlanc)…a charming professional photographer with nowhere in particular to go who explains that he is going through a messy break-up with his girlfriend after she discovered a dating app on his phone. Brandon and Judd become fast friends, and our hero agrees to help Judd fix his broken relationship. Of course if that were all there was to tell with this tale I wouldn’t be talking about it here at Horror Fuel now would I?!! Suffice it to say, there are shocking truths to be learned, and once they are found out, some serious shit will hit the fan! (and yes, I will sacrifice a decent synopsis to keep a great film’s surprises intact for you my faithful fiends!) End Trip is, simply put, one hell of a fantastic fright

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 12, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Dead By Midnight (11pm Central) (2018)

A mysterious monster movie hostess (Erin Brown; Misty Mundae herself!) begins broadcasting her haunted Halloween hootenanny from within an abandoned studio owned by a doomed rural television station. As the night progresses we are treated to a cadre of creepy cool tales each inexplicably starring a different, and suddenly missing, member of the station’s staff! First up we get the ’80’s set creature feature Jersey Devil which concerns the misadventures of pre-teen Emma and the battered waitress that showed up on her doorstep going head to head with the legendary cryptid of the Pine Barrens. The comedic interplay between Avri Bartolozzi as Emma, and Davi Crimmins as the beleaguered waitress Dani is absolutely fantastic, the story is high on camp, and the creature suit is Grade-A fuckin’ badass…this is a solid gold winner in my beastly book (and if your listening, how about turning this one into a feature)! Next up is Creepy Dolls, in which a trio investigates an

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 11, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Island Zero (2017)

Something is seriously wrong up in Maine; namely a small fishing island has become isolated A.F. thanks to the one ferry on or off the island disappearing. To make matters worse, the phone lines are dead, all boats to the mainland fail to return, and the entire place is under a power blackout. As food supplies dwindle and anxiety levels rise, folks start turning up mutilated and the island finds itself at the mercy of a monster from the deep! Beautifully shot on location, with plenty of steel-grey skies and rain to add to the dreary ambiance, Island Zero certainly looks the part of atmospheric creature feature! Adding to the strength of the picture are rock solid acting, a nice slow burn story line fraught with mounting tension (and a nice layer of mythology) as the isolation begins playing on an ever more desperate populace…and the human remains start popping up, and moments of well realized, practical gore. Sounds great,

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 11, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: The Jurassic Games (2018)

Sometimes I can’t even believe the things I have to type for this column…like this for instance: In the future, death row convicts are forced to compete in a virtual reality game show called The Jurassic Games, where they have to fight dinosaurs to win their freedom…so, this is The Running Man with dinosaurs…this may actually be genius (I mean someone is eaten by a T-rex before even five minutes have passed, so that is a good sign). Alliances and rivalries are formed among the convicts, dinosaurs eat people, and even more story elements are lifted wholesale from the Schwarzenegger classic (including corruption behind the scenes of the games, the “hero” convict being wrongfully accused, merch of the show being advertised during the broadcast…and on and on). Look, no one is ever going to say The Jurassic Games is original (and if they do they may need serious psychiatric help), but I’ll be damned if the film isn’t entertaining. It’s

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 10, 2018
Horror Fuel

Short Film Review: Panther Ridge (2018)

Panther Ridge concerns the fateful night a young acolyte descends into the BDSM underground…and what starts as a fairly rote bondage and knife play scenario, soon spins massively out of control into a level of violence that goes beyond mere sexual gratification and straight into “Holy fuck, you people are out of your goddamned minds” in the blink of an eye (and flash of the blade). Coming from Writer/Director Ryan Swantek, Panther Ridge is an enigmatic and shockingly violent short subject. Clocking in at just over six minutes, the film introduces us to both a novice dominatrix, and her seasoned mentor, not to mention a well dressed man that seems to be guiding the operation…but who he is, who is watching the live feed (the entire event is being filmed by an obsidian camera that almost becomes a character itself, besides being a rather ominous phallic symbol), and other questions are never answered…which could be frustrating if handled poorly, but

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 10, 2018
Horror Fuel

DVD Review: Mad Foxes (1981)

Mad Foxes begins with Easy Rocker from Krokus blaring from the speakers…we may be off to something special here fiends… As far as what follows that sonic assault, it goes a lil’ something like this: Middle aged Hal is driving his (freshly turned) 18 year-old girlfriend out on a date in order to wine and dine her so she will let him be the one to ‘break the seal’ if you know what I mean (and if that bit of crass purple prose wasn’t clear enough for ya, the lady sits underneath a giant tacky painting of an oozing chocolate covered cherry), when he absolutely murders a Nazi biker, as one does. Of course that biker had equally as Nazi pals (at least indoors…their armbands have no swastikas in exterior shots, but they appear as if by magic inside) who arrive and beat the hell out of Hal and rape his girlfriend. Hal then naturally enlists a squad of martial

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 9, 2018

More from DanXIII

Horror Fuel

Short Film Review: Shower Sharks (2018)

A shark obsessed dude attempts to write a screenplay as a shark (I predict I’m going to be writing that word a lot in this review) doc plays on the boob tube. Before long a news bulletin interrupts the show warning of a plague of shower sharks…sharks that emerge from drains to menace the populace…and you can guess what happens next! Shower Sharks gives the viewer exactly what you would expect; an absurd and enjoyable bite sized bit of nonsense in the Troma style. Film maker (and lead actor)Noah “Shark” Robertson has a keen eye (two in fact) for delivering off-the-wall horror comedy, and you can tell he has a ton of passion and heart. As for any negatives to be found here (and this isn’t really a “bad” thing…more of an observation of something that stood out); I’m fairly certain that Robertson just filmed an actual EMT call guerrilla style for the film’s coda…this is some real Corman level

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 19, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Monochrome (2018)

Emma Rose (Jo Woodcock) is a young woman who finds herself in dire straights after becoming entwined in one of your huge financial cock-ups (of the nation wide variety) thanks to her boyfriend socking away millions in knicked pension funds. To escape that hot mess she blows like the wind to the bucolic English countryside where she accidentally discovers (as one does) that she has a real passion for killing wealthy landowners (who employ her for “casual work”). Enter Gabriel Lenard (Cosmo Jarvis), an investigator with synesthesia (you know, like he can see sounds and the like) hired by the British Crime Agency to track ol’ Emma down. Will Gabriel, who’s condition allows him to see things at crime scenes others can not, be able to find Emma and recover the loot? Monochrome is nothing else if but original. The inclusion of the synesthesia (though under used…see below) is a nice element not found in your normal serial killer yarns,

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 18, 2018
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Desolation (2017)

Abby (Jaimi Paige) and Sam (Toby Nichols), her teenaged Son, head out to the remote wilderness to scatter the remains of her husband with her best friend Jen (Alyshia Ochse) taggin’ along. Everything is pines n’ posies for our trio until a beardo-weirdo dubbed ‘The Hiker’ makes the scene and begins the ol’ stalk n’ slay business we laid down our shekels for after our heroes leave some wine bottles behind causing him to go rabid Woodsy. Desolation has some good things going for it. For starters, the tension remains razor sharp throughout much of the run time once The Hiker shows up…which of course is a major plus for a fright flick. Speaking of the H-man; I dug his silent routine…he never utters a word, lurks menacingly, and besides those aforementioned wine bottles, he has el zippo for motivation…he’s just there, ready to kill, and our protagonists are merely in the wrong neck of the woods at the wrong

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 17, 2018
Horror Fuel

Blu-ray Review: Laserblast (1978)

Reptilian aliens arrive on Earth to retrieve a big ass laser gun from some sort of mutated teenager whom they quickly dispatch…but, a small plane scares them away before they can pick up the gun. Enter custom van drivin’ Mark Hamill surrogate Billy (Kim Milford), a down on his luck teen constantly left to fend for himself by his over-sexed Mother and hounded by some wacky cops (who complete with their own ragtime piano theme). Billy naturally finds the weapon mentioned previous, and begins to fuse with it courtesy of it’s funky fresh control medallion…slowly becoming a mutant himself. Soon a governmental agent, teen partying, vehicular scene padding, and “pew pew” lasers combine to form one hell of an entertaining sci-fi drive-In flick experience! Look, I’ll lay it out for ya; I’ve loved the hell out of Laserblast ever since I saw it on some regional sci-fi picture show or another in the late ’80’s. It’s chock full of hand

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 13, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: End Trip (2018)

It’s just another night on the job for hapless UBER (or it’s rip-off cinematic equivalent) driver Brandon (Writer/Director Aaron Jay Rome) when he picks up his latest fare, Judd (Eric LeBlanc)…a charming professional photographer with nowhere in particular to go who explains that he is going through a messy break-up with his girlfriend after she discovered a dating app on his phone. Brandon and Judd become fast friends, and our hero agrees to help Judd fix his broken relationship. Of course if that were all there was to tell with this tale I wouldn’t be talking about it here at Horror Fuel now would I?!! Suffice it to say, there are shocking truths to be learned, and once they are found out, some serious shit will hit the fan! (and yes, I will sacrifice a decent synopsis to keep a great film’s surprises intact for you my faithful fiends!) End Trip is, simply put, one hell of a fantastic fright

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 12, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Dead By Midnight (11pm Central) (2018)

A mysterious monster movie hostess (Erin Brown; Misty Mundae herself!) begins broadcasting her haunted Halloween hootenanny from within an abandoned studio owned by a doomed rural television station. As the night progresses we are treated to a cadre of creepy cool tales each inexplicably starring a different, and suddenly missing, member of the station’s staff! First up we get the ’80’s set creature feature Jersey Devil which concerns the misadventures of pre-teen Emma and the battered waitress that showed up on her doorstep going head to head with the legendary cryptid of the Pine Barrens. The comedic interplay between Avri Bartolozzi as Emma, and Davi Crimmins as the beleaguered waitress Dani is absolutely fantastic, the story is high on camp, and the creature suit is Grade-A fuckin’ badass…this is a solid gold winner in my beastly book (and if your listening, how about turning this one into a feature)! Next up is Creepy Dolls, in which a trio investigates an

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 11, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: Island Zero (2017)

Something is seriously wrong up in Maine; namely a small fishing island has become isolated A.F. thanks to the one ferry on or off the island disappearing. To make matters worse, the phone lines are dead, all boats to the mainland fail to return, and the entire place is under a power blackout. As food supplies dwindle and anxiety levels rise, folks start turning up mutilated and the island finds itself at the mercy of a monster from the deep! Beautifully shot on location, with plenty of steel-grey skies and rain to add to the dreary ambiance, Island Zero certainly looks the part of atmospheric creature feature! Adding to the strength of the picture are rock solid acting, a nice slow burn story line fraught with mounting tension (and a nice layer of mythology) as the isolation begins playing on an ever more desperate populace…and the human remains start popping up, and moments of well realized, practical gore. Sounds great,

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 11, 2018
Horror Fuel

Movie Review: The Jurassic Games (2018)

Sometimes I can’t even believe the things I have to type for this column…like this for instance: In the future, death row convicts are forced to compete in a virtual reality game show called The Jurassic Games, where they have to fight dinosaurs to win their freedom…so, this is The Running Man with dinosaurs…this may actually be genius (I mean someone is eaten by a T-rex before even five minutes have passed, so that is a good sign). Alliances and rivalries are formed among the convicts, dinosaurs eat people, and even more story elements are lifted wholesale from the Schwarzenegger classic (including corruption behind the scenes of the games, the “hero” convict being wrongfully accused, merch of the show being advertised during the broadcast…and on and on). Look, no one is ever going to say The Jurassic Games is original (and if they do they may need serious psychiatric help), but I’ll be damned if the film isn’t entertaining. It’s

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 10, 2018
Horror Fuel

Short Film Review: Panther Ridge (2018)

Panther Ridge concerns the fateful night a young acolyte descends into the BDSM underground…and what starts as a fairly rote bondage and knife play scenario, soon spins massively out of control into a level of violence that goes beyond mere sexual gratification and straight into “Holy fuck, you people are out of your goddamned minds” in the blink of an eye (and flash of the blade). Coming from Writer/Director Ryan Swantek, Panther Ridge is an enigmatic and shockingly violent short subject. Clocking in at just over six minutes, the film introduces us to both a novice dominatrix, and her seasoned mentor, not to mention a well dressed man that seems to be guiding the operation…but who he is, who is watching the live feed (the entire event is being filmed by an obsidian camera that almost becomes a character itself, besides being a rather ominous phallic symbol), and other questions are never answered…which could be frustrating if handled poorly, but

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 10, 2018
Horror Fuel

DVD Review: Mad Foxes (1981)

Mad Foxes begins with Easy Rocker from Krokus blaring from the speakers…we may be off to something special here fiends… As far as what follows that sonic assault, it goes a lil’ something like this: Middle aged Hal is driving his (freshly turned) 18 year-old girlfriend out on a date in order to wine and dine her so she will let him be the one to ‘break the seal’ if you know what I mean (and if that bit of crass purple prose wasn’t clear enough for ya, the lady sits underneath a giant tacky painting of an oozing chocolate covered cherry), when he absolutely murders a Nazi biker, as one does. Of course that biker had equally as Nazi pals (at least indoors…their armbands have no swastikas in exterior shots, but they appear as if by magic inside) who arrive and beat the hell out of Hal and rape his girlfriend. Hal then naturally enlists a squad of martial

Continue reading →
DanXIII
May 9, 2018
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