First ever Guest Review at the Vault: Teeth (2007)

The B-Movie Film Vault proudly brings you the first every guest review the site has ever had! Guest writer "Holly Hobgoblin" tackled the dark and twisted horror-comedy, TEETH. This film follows the hardships of Dawn, a girl trying to maintain her virginity in this sex-crazed world we live in. Things take a turn for the super weird when poor Dawn discovers that she has razor-sharp teeth lurking in her lady-parts, but eventually she learns to live with that curious mutation and even use it to her advantage. (i.e. Her vaginal fangs destroy anything that goes into her "hoo hoo dilly" without consent.)

A review for Krull is forthcoming as is a new Genre Watch article and more fun stuff! Stay tuned b-movie fans!

New Review: War of the Gargantuas (1966)

Here is my second contribution to Bearded-Weirdo's "GOIN' APE" Roundtable! Two giant monsters terrorize Japan in Toho's 1966 kaiju classic, War of the Gargantuas. After the events of Frankenstein vs. Baragon (a.k.a. Frankenstein Conquers the World), Japan suffers the wrath of a not-so-Jolly Green Giant in their territorial waters. After a number of boats are sunk, and people devoured, the Japanese Self-Defense Forces roll out and successfully cripple the marauding giant with MAZER CANNONS! But their victory is short-lived because another giant monster arrives to save its injured brother. Will Japan be able to endure the eventual wrestling match between these two gigantic siblings?

Stay tuned for the first ever GUEST REVIEW at the Vault from contributor "Holly Hobgoblin," and another new full-length review for the romantically sub-plotted "Krull," which will be my Valentine's Day gift to all of you constant readers!

Enjoy the weekend and don't miss the Superbowl on Sunday! My team didn't make it, but I plan on rooting for the Colts! Let's go OTHER Manning brother!

New Capsule Review: The Wildman of Kentucky - The Mystery of Panther Rock (2008)

The first new review of the New Year is here, and it's for an amateurish documentary about the existence of Bigfoot and other natural phenomena in the Frazier Land of Kentucky. Check out my capsule review for The Wildman of Kentucky: The Mystery of Panther Rock!

Amidst the footage of the "Reality Team" traipsing about the spooky woods of the Frazier Lands at night and interviews with Bigfoot witnesses, we also get totally out-of-place hard rock music by "Freakhouse," and odd CGI "recreations" of Bigfoot appearances. However, the strangest thing in the entire two-hour running time is probably the CGI Indian dancing for Bigfoot amidst a sea of flames! (No I'm not kidding.)

I have about another five documentaries from Reality Entertainment to check out ranging from Sherlock Holmes, to Vikings, to Alice in Wonderland that I have yet to check out, but they are going to be on the backburner for a bit longer because I have a roundtable review (WAR OF THE GARGANTUAS!) to tackle, along with Robot Monster 3D which was chosen well over a month ago by readers in the last "Torture the Vault Master" poll.

Stay tuned for more b-movie goodness; blog ya later!

Good riddance to 2009!

A lot of sites on the web like to do lengthy articles that take a glance back at the previous year's ups and downs, and well, I've never truthfully been a big fan of that. But I felt that I should write something to ring in the new year, so I suppose it wouldn't hurt for yours truly to take a glance back at 2009, which to me was just a terrible year overall. While I have my own personal reasons for categorizing 2009 as a "bad year," I'd have to say that several big theatrical disappointments and the equally large number of celebrity deaths really put a damper on things.

Now last year wasn't completely awful on the cinema front because there were some truly amazing films that came out, such as Avatar, Sherlock Holmes, The Hangover, District 9, Zombieland, Watchmen, Inglorious Basterds, and well... the list goes on. But the grand cinematic achievements of these films were, to me, marred by an increasingly large number of theatrical releases that were just plain sub-par.

After the success of Transformers, the world waited with bated breath to see the surely superior sequel. Instead, we got an awful special-effects driven film with little-to-no-plot, and lots of extraneous characters. Yeah, I know it was a Michael Bay film, and plus its about a line of Hasbro toys that have been around since the 80s. Still, that's no excuse for the terrible final product, especially after the previous film actually turned out to be pretty decent!

And then there was Fox's idiotic X-Men Origins: Wolverine which actually managed to retain a shred of dignity up until Wolverine, armed with his trademark adamantium claws, proceeded to comically destroy a bathroom. Coupled with a terrible plot, and seemingly unfinished and/or just plain poorly done special effects, this awful movie still managed to make a killing at the box office. Which leads me to two conclusions: A.) Hollywood is getting lazy and thinks that they can shove just about any tripe down our throats and walk away with a profit and B.) the general moviegoing public is more than happy to allow this.

I could rant about this all day, but I think you get my point. Luckily, 2010 is promising a LOT of good stuff (i.e. Iron Man 2, The Wolfman) and I'm crossing my fingers that we get a lot of high quality films this year. In a time where the economy is shaky, jobs are scarce, and the outbreak of a new war is still a possibility, we could use some quality cinema to help get us through the tough times.

And what was up with all the celebrity deaths last year? So many celebs, both cult and mainstream, keeled over and the world was definitely a darker place for it. We lost Brittany Murphy, Ricardo Montalban, Pat Hingle, Patrick Swayze, David Carradine, Dick Durock, Walter Kronkite, Robert Quarry, Farrah Fawcett, Bea Arthur, Dom DeLuise, Marilyn Chambers, Robert Ginty, Lou Albano, Paul Naschy, Dan O'Bannon, and many others. Hopefully this year will be a little easier on us.

So yeah, in my eyes, 2009 sucked, but as of 12:00 AM on January 1st, I mentally hit a reset button and said goodbye to all of that. Here's truly hoping that 2010 is a good year for everyone. I hope to keep the Vault going strong and sincerely hope that the movie gods are a lot kinder to us this year.

So let's raise a toast to our health, and to the health of the entertainment industry. May Hollywood produce more winners than bombs; may Uwe Boll fall into a bottomless well; may Sam Raimi and Sony come to an accord to get Spider-Man 4 off the ground; and most importantly, may all of you have a healthy and prosperous New Year!

Vault Master's Top Ten Cult Christmas Oddities: #7 - Christmas Evil (1980)

Christmas Evil (1980)
85 minutes / Color / Rated R
a.k.a. You Better Watch Out, Terror in Toyland

The Plot: Christmas Evil starts out innocently enough as two young boys and their mother watch Santa pop down the chimney with a sack of toys and go about his usual yearly tasks of eating cookies, filling stockings, and placing presents under the tree. After Santa, alerted by one of the giggling children, hops back up the chimney, mom puts the boys to bed, then goes back downstairs while young Philip and Harry argue over the existence of Santa. (Harry believes that they have just witnessed an honest-to-goodness Santa visitation while the more rational Philip thinks it was their dad.)


To set the record straight, Harry decides to have another peek downstairs and accidentally bears witness to some cos-play action! Santa (most likely Harry's dad) is back and preparing to give mom her present if you know what I mean. ("I saw Mommy get felt up by, San-ta Claus!" and "Then, I saw Mom-my tick-le San-ta Claus! Underneath his pubic hair so white!") Understandably confused and disturbed that mom is having a one night stand with a right jolly old elf, Harry runs furiously up the stairs, smashes a snowglobe, and then cuts himself with a jagged piece of glass. Hmm... I wonder if he's going to turn into a psychotic killer in a Santa outfit? Nah! What are the odds of that happening?!

Thirty-three years later, Harry is a real odd duck. He wears Santa pajamas (complete with cap) to bed, listens to Christmas music every day, and not surprisingly, he works on an assembly line at a toy factory. Even stranger.... he keeps his own personal log of naughty and nice children that live in his neighborhood. How does he know if they've been good or not? Oh, he just goes up on the roof of his apartment building with a pair of binoculars and SPIES ON ALL THE CHILDREN! As the film progresses, Harry begins to lose what little grip he has on reality, and on Christmas Eve, he dons an extremely impressive homemade Santa costume (complete with glued-on beard!), loads up his van (which has a sleigh painted on the sides) with toys he stole from his employers, and heads out to spread Christmas cheer.


He breaks into a few homes and then makes a grand entrance at a children's hospital with a van load of gifts. After delivering his generously stolen donation, Harry pulls up and waits outside of a church, anticipating the eventual exit of his employer. You see, Harry isn't too happy with how certain things are being run at the toy factory, and he is ready to PUNISH! his NAUGHTY! boss. Luckily for said executive, a smart-assed (and possibly drunk) gent begins commenting on Santa Harry's outfit and ride. He pushes Harry's buttons and gets the bayonet of a toy soldier to the eye, followed up by a hatchet wound to the skull.

Harry claims two more victims then leaps into his "sleigh" and drives off into the night. Harry next ends up at a Christmas party, where he's eagerly dragged inside by two drunken men. Harry Claus is hesitant at first and seems ready to start killing people again, but after he realizes that everyone there is good-natured and excited to see him, Harry sticks around, hands out gifts, and has a fantastically fun time! (It is really hard to believe he just murdered three people in cold blood.) After dancing around in circles and making merry, Harry announces that he must go, but before he does, he issues a warning to all the children present:

"But now, I want you to remember to stay good boys and girls. Respect your mothers and fathers and do what they tell you. Obey your teachers and learn a whole lot. Now if you do this, I'll make sure you get good presents from me, every year. Haha. But if you're bad boys and girls, your name goes in the bad boys and girls book, and I'll bring you something..... horrible." [awkward silence followed by hearty Santa laughter!]


Harry's Santa charade continues into the night (the crazy bastard even tries to go down a chimney at one point), while the police begin their investigation and show "Santa line-ups" to witnesses of the night's triple homicide. Things eventually come to a head when Harry attempts to give some presents to a group of children. Harry gives them all gifts, while the children's parents look on in horror. One of the adults decides to act brave and approaches Harry with a switchblade in hand, intent on snuffing "the Killer Claus" before he can hurt the children.

In a surprise move, the guy is disarmed by his little daughter, who picks up the knife and gives it to Harry. Backed into a corner and not nearly crazy enough to harm the kids or use them as human shields, Harry makes a run for it and is soon chased after by a torch-wielding mob! (No, I'm not kidding.) He escapes in his van and goes to his brother Philip's house. Phil freaks out and strangles poor confused Harry, then drags his brother's limp (but not lifeless) body out to the van. Harry quickly comes to his senses, peels out of Phil's driveway and races off, only to be cut off by that pesky torch-wielding mob. (Hahahaha. I still can't get over that!)

Harry swerves off the road to avoid hitting anyone and drives off a cliff to his demise...? Wait, what?! Instead of falling to the ground and bursting into flames, Harry's van begins to fly up into the night sky! That is totally surreal and well.... really unexpected. [Vault Master glances at his drink] Did someone spike my tea or did I really see that?

Christmas Evil isn't exactly a horror film per se, but rather a study of a man's emotional and mental breakdown. It's a slow paced movie and it takes forever to get to the good stuff, but there's something oddly endearing about Christmas Evil that keeps me watching every time. Perhaps it’s the bizarre innocence of Harry, who is hell bent on A.) being Santa and B.) getting others to believe in Santa. I guess in a way, he wants to become Santa Claus so that people will believe in him and it is sort of heartbreaking at the film's climax when he fails his ridiculous mission and then gets strangled by his estranged brother.

And speaking of the climax, what a crazy way to end a film! Things remained relatively believable until Harry is chased by a mob of men and women carrying torches. (What, no pitchforks?) After that, its almost as if we are getting pulled into Harry's twisted world where there's a fine line between reality and fantasy. While this kind of negates the horror film aspects of Christmas Evil it definitely gives this movie more depth and makes for an interesting viewing experience. I guess in a way, this film is like a thinking man's "Silent Night, Deadly Night."

Just a side note here: The version I've watched is the short, eight-five minute cut. If you pick this movie up on DVD, get the longer director's cut that is put out by Synapse. They treat their cult films with great respect, and you get to see fifteen additional lovingly-restored minutes of weirdness that is missing from other DVD releases of the film.

Not sure you want to own this flick? Well swing on by Bmovies.com and watch Christmas Evil absolutely free! Just CLICK HERE!

Why it made the list: Because a dude eventually goes insane after seeing his mom getting down and dirty with "Santa" when he was a child. For some reason this causes him to lose his mind at age forty or so, leading to a laundry list of crimes. He steals toys from his workplace by the friggin' truckload, delivers them to good boys and girls, murders three people in cold blood, gets strangled by his brother, then "flies" away from a lynch mob in his magical Christmas sleigh van. Holy sh*t, this is a weird movie! I'm beginning to wonder if it shouldn't be higher up on this list....

Weirdness Factor: WELL ABOVE AVERAGE. Yeah, forget LOW, MEDIUM, and HIGH, because this movie is in a category all its own. Surprisingly, there are in fact far stranger things to come!

I'm definitely not going to be able to finish this top ten list before Christmas arrives (in TWO DAYS! ACK!), but I'll keep on plugging away until I reach my number one pick for the Oddest Cult Christmas film of all time! Next up on the list is a little indie film from '96 that gives an all new meaning to the word "frostbite!"

BMovies.com is BACK!

After shutting down due to skyrocketing prices for the massive bandwidth needed to keep such an awesome site online, I'm happy to say that BMovies.com is back on the web! This site streams hundreds of cult flicks to your computer for FREE with no membership required, and the webmaster has just uploaded a slew of cool holiday-themed flicks for your viewing pleasure, including "Christmas Evil," "Don't Open Till Christmas," and "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians." Make sure to pay BMovies.com a visit and support it in any way you can!

Vault Master's Top Ten Cult Christmas Oddities: #8 - Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984)

Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984)
85 minutes / Color / Unrated
a.k.a. Slayride

The Plot: On one fateful Christmas Eve, after being terrified by his thought-to-be-vegetative grandpa (as seen here), a young child named Billy Chapman witnesses the murder of his parents at the hands of a homicidal maniac in a Santa outfit. With apparently no immediate family to take care of him and his baby brother, Billy and his sibling are both shoved into an orphanage that is run by a domineering nun known as Mother Superior. Poor Billy is made an example of more often than not by the oppressive nun, and snaps when she forces him to sit on a Santa's lap one Christmas. Billy shoryukens the confused Santa impersonator then (most likely) gets the beating of a lifetime.


The film jumps ahead ten years, and Billy is now eighteen and has just gotten his first job at the toystore of a gent named Ira Sims. Ira isn't too keen on hiring Billy at first, but the troubled teen proves to be a good worker and earns the honor of being cast as Ira's Santa Claus. Billy quietly threatens squirming children, walks around in a strange daze, then eventually snaps when he witnesses an attempted rape in the stockroom of the toystore. Billy, decked out in Santa garb goes on a small killing spree, violently ending the lives of all of his coworkers before venturing out on Christmas Eve to "PUNISH!" the "NAUGHTY!"

He murders a whorish Linnea Quigley... what's that? Too redundant you say? Oh ok, uh... he murders Linnea Quigley (zing!) and her scrawny boyfriend, beheads a sleigh-riding teenager, and gives a trigger-happy the axe. Sadly, Billy's reign of terror is ended while he tries to exact revenge on the abusive Mother Superior of his orphanage. Just as he's about to "axe her" what she wants for Christmas (my apology for the awful pun), the authorities arrive in time to gun him down... in front of a group of orphans. Worse yet, Billy's little brother Ricky witnesses this, and it causes him to snap, resulting in one of the best/worst sequels in film history! ("GARBAGE DAY!")


Silent Night, Deadly Night is one of the most overlooked and definitely one of the most poorly received film in the slasher sub-genre. Upon its release in 1984, the film was quickly taken out of theaters and shelved by Tri-Star Pictures after a huge public outcry. Parents were pissed off that Santa was being presented as an axe-wielding psycho, and film critics, including the mighty Siskel & Ebert rallied against the film as well. While I can definitely see why everyone made such a big deal (I guess we were a far more innocent and decent society back in the mid-80s?), it is sad to see a film get cast into obscurity because it contained questionable subject matter.


Ballsy advertising aside, this film should not have been pulled from theaters. Tri-Star should have just stuck it out and enjoyed the amount of free press their gutsy holiday-horror flick would have garnered. (As the saying goes, "There' s no such thing as bad press!") But this just goes to show you how different things were twenty-five years ago. Had Silent Night, Deadly Night been released in recent years, it probably would have raked in some cash, if only because curious moviegoers would want to see what all the fuss was about.

Sadly, Silent Night, Deadly Night is still a chore to track down as the Anchor Bay DVD releases have gone out of print. The final three films in the series were recently released, but the original and its ridiculous sequel remain a sacred trophy to cult movie fans. While they aren't impossible to find, both films are (usually) drastically overpriced. Hopefully they'll come back into print in the near future so newer generations of b-movie lovers can enjoy them.

Why it made the list: Because a mentally disturbed young man dressed in a Santa outfit goes on a Christmas Eve killing spree. Unlike most slasher films, there's a reason for Billy's mental defect (guy in Santa suit raped and killed mom and shot dad in the head; old nun abused him during his formative years) and you almost feel bad for the guy, even when he begins to kill indiscriminately. Plus we get two rather deranged scenes that stand out from the rest: The scene where a seemingly comatose grandpa terrifies a very young Billy ("If you see Santa tonight boy you better run! Hee Hee!") and a scene where Billy prepares to murder a little girl until she innocently convinces him that she was "good all year." And that "Santa's Watching" song that plays in the film's intro and during the end credits is just plain strange!

Weirdness Factor: MEDIUM. For some unknown reason, though it was preceded by several other Christmas horror films like Black Christmas (1974) and Christmas Evil (1980), Silent Night, Deadly Night is the only one to suffer the wrath of the general public. The film is odd enough on its own merit, but the fact that parents, film critics, and journalists joined forces to nearly erase this film's existence gives it an extra boost of weirdness!

The next film on the countdown shares some plot similarities with Silent Night, Deadly Night but goes one step further in the peculiarity department. Prepare for another dose of holiday weirdness very soon, with yet another killer Santa film taking the number seven spot on my continued top ten list of Cult Christmas Oddities!

Oh and in case you are not paying attention to your calendars.... FOUR MORE DAYS 'TIL CHRISTMAS!