The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge (2004) - Horror Video Game Impressions: 'Rotted Meat No.2'

With so many video games to play and so little time it was obvious that some would fall by the wayside and become abandoned by me. For the second in my 'Rotted Meat' series about games I have given up on, the game I have chosen this time around is 2004's The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge. I had heard at the time that while the game wasn't amazing, it was worth playing for the new musical numbers that appear within it. Would this be the case though?

The Synopsis:

Taking place a year after the events of The Nightmare Before Christmas; Jack Skellington has once again become disillusioned with Halloween. He decides to once again leave in order to find new inspiration, leaving Dr. Finkelstein in charge. This turns out to be a bad move; with Jack gone, Lock, Shock, and Barrell resurrect Oogie Boogie, who is very much in the mood for revenge. Contacted by Sally, Jack returns on Christmas Eve to find the town not only full of aggressive monsters, but also that it has been booby trapped by the inhabitants.

How the Game Felt:

The core feeling I have when thinking back to this game was how extremely dull it was. The game is a 3D action-adventure game that has you as Jack armed with a magical green whip. It takes place within a small series of open areas, with missions taking you back and forth from these locations. You eventually get the ability to change your costume, with the Pumpkin King and Santa Claus ones giving you different abilities. Boss fights usually take the form of musical numbers, with you required to input simple quick time actions to match whichever song is being played.

Reason for Abandoning the Game:

The lure of new music is what led me to this in the first place, but this proved to not be so amazing. From my memory, the music is repurposed from the film, albeit with different lyrics relevant to the situation being added. The new songs were ok but really nothing special, none of them remotely as good as the original songs. That isn't to say the music sounds bad, it sounds excellent, and includes at least one completely new song The main sin of Oogie's Revenge is just how tedious it is to play The back and forth across bland lifeless locations began to grate on me, while the simple gameplay was functional but again, nothing special at all. Even the thought of what I could be missing out on wasn't enough for me to be able to force my way through.

The Job (2025) - Short Sci-fi Film Review

It may not be a horror, but short sci-fi film The Job (directed and co-written by Craig Railsback (Down and Out in Vampire Hills) was still something I wanted to check out due to its intriguing premise and subject matter of A.I.

Arriving for a job interview, Todd (LeJon - Down and Out in Vampire Hills, Garden Party Massacre) finds the place deserted. Hearing a noise coming from behind a closed door, Todd's curiosity gets the better of him, he investigates and finds a strange large wire laying on the ground. He decides to plug it in to see what it was connected to and unknowingly awakens an A.I construct (Dawna Lee Heising - Ballet of Blood, Samurai Cop 2: Deadly Vengeance). This construct begins to interview Todd, with the man getting increasingly antagonistic with how much the A.I seems to know about him.

Over the course of around fifteen minutes, The Job takes the viewer on a journey that became more moving than its beginning might attest to. The interview process is really an excuse for Todd and the A.I to interact, with the job offer itself falling to the wayside. There is a darkness to Todd's past that he is forced to confront via the actions of the seemingly all knowing A.I. This is represented on screen via brief and scattershot flashback images. His reflections and revelations are married with music that makes things seem more poignant than otherwise may be felt. I did feel the flashbacks were a little too abstract, I got the gist, but wasn't sure of the time frame, especially with the appearance of a later prop. The set was devoid of much detail, but this worked in the short's favour. The A.I was represented as a figure on an apparent screen, I felt Heising was perfect for this role, looked and acted the part. I liked LeJon's character also, though the recurring cheesy music he keeps listening to didn't really do anything for me.

The Job was an interesting idea for a short, but the core plot kind of fell by the wayside a bit for something a bit more metaphysical. Obviously not a horror, but as always, I did wish for a little more darkness here.

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Plague (2009) - Short Zombie Horror Film Review

The Joseph Avery (who also stars in this) and Matt Simpson (writer of this) co-directed Plague is an example of a low budget short zombie film done right. It tells a simple story, but manages to keep interest over its 17 minute runtime thanks to unique editing decisions, and plenty of classic slow walking undead.

Latvian refugee Vilhelm (Avery) has been smuggled into England where he hopes to begin a new life, free of all the burdens that he faced working for criminals. Upon arriving in London he gets to unfortunately witness first hand a zombie outbreak, but by hiding away in his apartment, he is able to weather the storm and survive the initial chaos. He heads out to the countryside where he hopes things will be easier than the ghoul infested city, but finds that the undead are everywhere in this bleak new world.

The short is narrated from the start by the protagonist, with the narration provided by Costa Ronin (Homeland TV show, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood). This created a cohesive feel, and I admit I am a fan of stories that begin later on, to then show the lead-up as the film's core. In this case, we have the thick accented Vilhelm giving his story of how he came to be in the U.K, and how he came to survive. With the character in present day with a bloody bandage wrapped around his hand, it seems that things might not end well for the character. From the initial prologue set in Latvia, this follows his journey in a scattershot approach, moving the character around in time to show his various battles. You get plenty of undead, with lovely scenes of him fighting and escaping from them. I particularly liked one scene in which he is cycling down a street as zombies try to grab at him from various sides.

Plague has an interesting editing technique, quick edits of various shots shot-gunned together with very slight occasional freeze-frames on key moments. It gave a chaotic feel to the battles the character gets in, as well as being a great way to show important information to the viewer. Avery was great in the lead role, the narration meaning the character on screen himself never speaks. The impression of a zombie infested world is displayed well, dilapidated buildings, corpses, and the undead themselves, resplendent in basic but lovely make-up and blood effects. From a vaguely slow start, this barrelled into things, taken on a variety of locations, and ending on a pretty cool open finish that could be interpreted in different ways.

Films such as Plague might not do much to innovate, but low budget indie films such as this are the comfort food of the zombie sub-genre of horror, bitesize and immersive, leaving me nostalgic for the time when films like this were commonplace.

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The Rotting Zombie's News Anthology for Thursday 20th November 2025

My second post of the evening (at the time of typing) sees me pick a trio of horrifying, terrifying, and possibly informative news stories from my bloody news sack. Onwards to the news.

The brilliantly titled Girl in the Refrigerator has been released by BayView Entertainment on Digital platforms worldwide, including on FlixFling. This dark comedy fits neatly into the sub-genre of horror about normal people trying to hide the body of a person they have killed (two such examples that spring to mind are the excellent A Young Man with High Potential and Cold Blows the Wind). In this one, a man accidentally kills his girlfriend and makes the fateful decision to try and hide the crime rather than report it. You can probably guess where he decides to store the body to begin with. The dark comedy aspect comes in due to the man then deciding to spend the day drinking with his best friend, before falling for a next door neighbour, who he then invites to his home before remembering about the body. Girl in the Refrigerator was directed by J.Francis Juelkuvsky and stars Jimmy Bevetti, Jaclyn Francine and Maria Brenda.

Music news next with UK South London dark electro duo Palindrones who have released a new video for their song 'Abraxas'. This is taken from their third album; Chapter Two: The Slender Blade and will be featured on December's upcoming double A-side single 'Abraxas & The Brightling Star'. The press release describes this track as '...a paradoxical dance of creation and destruction'. The trippy and fragmented video was pretty neat, and I appreciated the chill vibe of the music at this late time of night where my bed chamber is calling to me.

Finally for today, horror documentary Beware The Demonic has been released on Digital platforms worldwide via VIPCO and BayView Entertainment. The doc explores true evil, with first-hand accounts and revelations about the '...roots and hidden truths of demonic spirits...' This was directed by Albert Edgar Wilson.

Jim Haggerty's Unnatural Causes (2025) - Horror Anthology Film Review

It feels like it has been a while since I last watched an anthology horror film for review, and here at The Rotting Zombie, I sure like anthology films. Jim Haggerty's Unnatural Causes unsurprisingly comes from Jim Haggerty (Housewitch), with him directing, writing, and producing this. The anthology is made up of three short films and a wraparound segment.

With an opening wraparound segment that lasted ten minutes, I expected this part would get a lot of attention. After that opening however, there is barely any more of this. Famous actor; Vlad Eterno (Baron Misuraca - Seymour the Unfortunate Vampire) has passed away, and so two of his fans have managed to sneak into the funeral parlour to pay their last respects. They are surprised then when the man (whose mythos states he is an actual vampire) gets out of his open coffin. He hands the two girls a reel that contains the first three episodes of the horror TV show he had been working on before he apparently passed, before getting into an old car that then vanishes into thin air. Vlad acts as a Rod Serling type figure, introducing each of the three shorts, as well as providing closing comments on the stories that had played out. These parts served their purpose though were a little bland after the initial interesting set-up.

First proper short is Episode 1 'The Other' that feature just the two actors, but intriguingly, far more characters. Gail (Tina Krause - Phil Herman's Unearthed, Coven of the Black Cube) lives a seemingly idyllic life with her loving husband - Dr. Jack Perkins (Ray Taliercio in his film debut), until one day she receives an unexpected phone call. An angry woman with a familiar voice threatens Gail, telling her she should expect consequences if she doesn't leave what she perceives to be 'her' house and husband. Gail informs Jack who tells her there is nothing to worry about, but his actions to the viewer prove different, with this knowledge causing him to head out to remote woodland. From the familiar opening, this goes to unexpected places with a very neat idea. It perhaps got a bit wordy at times, with exposition dumps coming from long conversations, but I enjoyed how silly this became. A recurring small issue here was the blood, I don't know if it was due to colour grading, but the blood looked almost pinkish on screen, something that also happened in one of the later shorts.

Next up is Episode 2: 'The Drag', another half hour short that again deals with infidelity, something which is the unifying theme of all three of the short films here. Wanda (Debbie D - I Slay on Christmas, Jacker) has been cheating on her husband; Tom (Tom Ciociari - Amityville Thanksgiving) with Jerry (Andrew Murano also in his film debut). Tom is well aware of this fact and has a plan that will resolve the issue without causing him any trouble with the law. Later, Jerry gets the assistance of his lawyer friend; George (Justin Levine), who gives him a similar solution that Tom used for how Jerry can get out of his loveless marriage to Polly (Stacey Brook Schwart - From the Inside). An unexpected supernatural element made this one stand out, leading to a predictable yet enjoyable Tales From the Unexpected type finish. The attempt to show a 'Hell' type place didn't really work out, the budget limitations gave this less of a powerful feeling than it deserved.
Levine's George was the stand-out character and so it was a pleasure to see him reprise his role for the third and final short - Episode 3 'Exhumed Innocent'. In this one, with her husband having apparently take his own life, Carrie (Bec Fordyce - Killer Shoes) is free to be with the man she had been cheating on him with. With her dead husband's witch daughter suspecting foul play, she intends to use a spell to return her father to life, so that he can get revenge on those who wronged him. First though, she needs to have the body exhumed. After a bizarre dancing sequence at the start, this goes along in a familiar route with some fun death scenes. It seemed an odd decision to have the returned man look normal and not ghoulish, but it didn't detract. While it was obvious where the story would end up going, it had a near laugh out loud unexpected scene towards the end that I don't think anyone could have seen coming.

The anthology was very indie in its look, background interference was abound, especially in outside scenes, and some of the acting was occasionally not the most amazing. Despite that, I enjoyed this, I thought each of the stories had some unexpected moments to them, with the first two in particular having interesting ideas. There is nudity here in each of the three shorts, with the second featuring some full frontal nudity, not really needed, but I guess that is a plus if that is your thing. Special effects were basic, but they were fun to see regardless, and fitted the indie vibe of the anthology well. Overall, Jim Haggerty's Unnatural Causes wasn't perfect, but it maintained an entertaining feel throughout.

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Stranger Things Burger and Wings - Food Review

Split between getting a succulent Chinese meal and a KFC this evening (at the time of typing, in the middle of Storm Claudia), me and my best friend decided on the later, primarily to try the new Stranger Things Burger and Stranger Things Wings. She suggested I could review it as a blog post and I let her know that I don't do such low-brow content on my site anymore. A few hours later and that seemed like a better idea for a lazy blogger, so here is the review.

Released in time for the fifth and final season of Stranger Things, I had my misgivings about the Stranger Things Burger prior to tasting it. I often find KFC's limited time meals disappoint more often than not, though thankfully that wasn't the case here. The packaging was pretty neat, having vines from the upside down over the box, the show's logo on the side, and on one side it has 'Hawkins Fried Chicken' rather than the correct restaurant name.
The biggest visual change for the burger is its red colour. No idea why red was chosen, but the black sesame seeds on top went well with that colour change. The burger consists of a Spicy Zinger fillet with cheese, pickled slaw, burger dressing, and a special extra ingredient; 'Secret Sauce' (it's literally called that). I was expecting the sauce to be spicy, and it was, but not to as high a degree as I had anticipated. It also manages to have a sweet taste to it at the same time as spicy. For a limited time food item from KFC it wasn't bad at all, we both quite enjoyed it.

The Stranger Things Wings were less exciting, just hot wings covered in the 'Secret Sauce'. That isn't to say they were not also tasty, though I admit to hating getting my fingers covered in sauce while eating anything, so that was a slight issue I had. I think they missed a trick by not calling these simply Stranger Wings.

Likely having milked as much content as I could out of these two items, I would say I enjoyed them both. Neither were something I would rush out to try again, but they sated my post-work hunger, as well as got me and my bestie discussing the show as we ate.

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Asteroid Vixens (2025) - Comedy Sci-fi Film Review

Asteroid Vixens is a comedy sci-fi that according to IMDB was written and directed by Felicity Yeung (White Slaves of K-Town). It doesn't shy away from female nudity, with almost every scene in this 90 minute film having women scantily dressed, half naked, or indeed fully naked. Trying to piece this together is a loose plot that mainly succeeds due to some amusing dialogue between the film's two main characters.

Xex (Kate Ly Johnston - Feral Female) is a fembot, who alongside a floating robot A.I, has travelled to Earth in their spaceship to abduct beautiful women and impregnate them with embryos of hybrid humanoids. Their mission sees them fighting off would be adversaries, while travelling around the globe across time and space looking for suitable candidates.

This sexploitation indie B-movie revels in its purposely cheap looking sets and features no end of female nudity. Despite this there was a lot of variation with scenes set in many different locations. This was almost an anthology of sorts, lots and lots of different things going on, with the lead characters having a slight Mystery Science Theater 3000 feel to their scenes. These were the best parts of the movie, with the space ship represented externally as an obviously CG creation, and internally with a smallish room covered in foil. Computer screens and read-outs are obviously just bits of paper stuck to the walls rather than actual props, and the impregnation beam is a very bright and artificial looking CG effect. I loved the A.I, represented on screen by what appears to be an upside down plastic bowl suspended from the ceiling by a string, with foil strips hanging off of it. This was by far my favourite character, and the scenes on the ship were my favourite moments. Neither of the two characters speak out loud, with it being stated it is all via telepathic communication. Their conversations are almost nonsensical, with both characters going on about the things they are trying to do. They were all universally entertaining, with much of the comedy coming from their discussions. The A.I has a text to speech sound to it, making what they speak about all the more amusing. A special mention to the couple of interview scenes here also, they gave me a real feel of classic parody news show The Day Today with the reporters disinterested delivery.

Most of the film takes the form of different scenes of naked young women hanging around with each other. There are no sex scenes thankfully, but instead you get girls dancing, having baths or showers on their own or with others. There are occasional scenes inserted that have a more traditional film type feel. One of the core side plots being Bouvier (archive footage with her playing a film version of herself) trying to rescue her twin sister who is one of the 'millions' of people that the aliens have abducted. Other plot based scenes included one set in the ancient past that features the legendary Lloyd Kaufman as High Priest, and one set at a party whose male guests all appear unwanted by the girls there. The plot is barebones enough that there did become a moment where I began to wish there had been more to what was going on, with the final third of the film beginning to outstay its welcome ever so slightly. I would be lying if I said I didn't like the frequently trippy visuals, and I also appreciated how well this all was edited together into a cohesive whole, despite it featuring essentially random and unrelated scenes. Despite the very high amount of nudity, it managed to never feel tacky, something that sex scenes would have tipped it over into feeling like.

I liked the B-movie vibe with Asteroid Vixens, especially the parts set on the space ship, and it did feel like something that was different to the norm. I did wish for more of a connective story to all the nakedness (something that even happens in the end credits, with the end credits painted onto a naked dancing woman of course). Asteroid Vixens won't be for everyone, but I personally enjoyed the trippy and non-serious vibe, the integration of space ship and random scenes, and the humorously cheap looking set design.

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Zombies and Cigarettes (2009) - Short Zombie Horror Film Review

Again, taken off the Ultimate Zombie Feast DVD I own, this short zombie film - Zombies and Cigarettes comes from Spain, co-directed by Rafa Martínez and Iñaki San Román (the later who also wrote this). The film is very indie, and doesn't put a fresh spin on films about the undead. It is however, a prime example that within this sub-genre of horror, you don't need much originality as classic zombie stories never get old or dull.

At the end of a day at the shopping centre where he works, Xavi (Samuel Viyela) is treating himself to his favourite ice-cream. On his way out, while trying to impress a girl he is attracted to; Carol (Aroa Gimeno), he accidentally knocks over some cases of a new perfume, and gets covered in the stuff. Almost straight after chaos erupts at the centre. Without explanation, a zombie outbreak has occurred, causing panic as shoppers and staff alike try to flee the fast moving, flesh hungry ghouls that have infested the mall. Xavi accidentally slips over and knocks himself out, waking some time later in a back area store room, having been rescued by three others. The ice-cream merchant, Carol, and sports shop employee - Kendo (Javier Ríos) bring Xavi up to speed, informing him of their plan to make it to the underground staff car park where they are going to use Kendo's boss' car to escape.

The 17 minute short horror starts with a small prologue that takes place deep into the film. It did feel a little pointless as it didn't really leave me with too many questions. I really enjoyed the film. Often with bigger budget movies, there would be sets instead of real locations, here, it is obviously a real shopping centre that has been borrowed for the movie. The initial outbreak was fantastically and chaotically done. People running around, falling over, getting trapped in revolving doors, falling off balconies, while the running zombies leap at their victims to drag them to the ground. So much was happening in this scene that it was a real delight to watch. My favourite part had a man wearing a chicken suit run past the camera just as the iconic 'Wilhem scream' sound effect plays. 
After this exciting intro, the action moves down to the service floor where there is less spectacle, but still a decent amount of undead running around. I thought this part was also fun, though a scene where the floor is plunged into darkness for an extended amount of time seemed a bit pointless.

The zombies looked great in that low budget indie type of way. Plenty of people firing guns at them, and some nice close up action, such as Xavi's use of a metal baseball bat. It seemed some of the effects, such as blood on the floor may have been CG, but if it was, it wasn't that distracting, and makes sense the owners of the shopping centre wouldn't want fake blood spilled everywhere. Blood looked great, and the make-up effects for damage to characters was satisfyingly fun.
The story of the outbreak and end to the zombie outbreak was very simple, especially with how it concluded. This did fit the vague amusement of how hard forgettable Xavi is trying to be the main protagonist, but really he doesn't really achieve much, ending the film much as he was when he started.

Zombies and Cigarettes has barely an ounce of originality to it, but it didn't need to It tells a straight forward indie zombie story in a very capable way. There are plenty of undead, plenty of entertaining characters, and of course, as the title may suggest; plenty of people smoking cigarettes for some reason.

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The Rotting Zombie's News Anthology for Thursday 13th November 2025

It is only after the fact that I realised that October was quite a hedonistic month for me. A reduced blog output and a missed monthly news round-up were some of the results of me choosing pleasure over work. Looking back I can see the bad choices I made, so intend to go back to a regular output of work with caffeine as my only vice while working on this site! Onwards to a terrifying trio of horror news plucked from my bloody mail sack.

VIPCO and BayView Entertainment have released horror TV series - The Hallow Ian Horror Hour: Season 1, it can be found on Digital platforms worldwide, including Plex (here). The first season is made up of 8 episodes, each of which is said to be made up of '...the best in short-form horror'. They include independent short films and music videos featuring a cast of multi-award winning actors, these are interspersed with hosting segments that include such things as small skits, interviews, and the history of Halloween. Season 1 was directed by E.E. Tallent, Sam Arias Mostovoy and Ty Huffer.

Special-needs themed drama - My Apocalyptic Thanksgiving is now on Tubi, as well as other global HD internet and satellite platforms via Freestyle Digital Media. The story is about a zombie-obsessed special needs adult who finds himself caught in a battle between a Korean family and a local gang to be his new 'family'. The man uses his favourite zombie TV show as a way to show these people forgiveness. I said in my respectable 6/10 review that the idea for the movie came from a place of love, and the faux zombie show within the film had some good scenes.

Finally for today, another BayView Entertainment release with Lechuza. Coming from 5-time award winning director Alfons Emilian, this is about a couple who go on a camping trip after ignoring a strange old woman's warnings about the area they have chosen. They come under assault from a vengeful witch-turned-demon (the titular Lechuza). This stars Emilian, Rebecca Blackmore and Jackie Luke.

Zombeer (2008) - Short Zombie Horror Film Review

Whenever I have a week off of work my best friend is always saying I should get a bunch of horror films reviewed to break out in case of emergency. For well over a decade I've owner a collection of short zombie films on a DVD titled Ultimate Zombie Feast. What had put me off watching this was due to the excited tagline stating there were over 5 hours of zombie films on the disc. It only really occurred to me earlier this week that I didn't have to watch this in one go for a review, instead I could treat each of the films to their own review. The first of these was 12 minute short Zombeer, the title I was unsurprised to find existed before any idea for what the short would be about existed. This was co-written and co-directed by Barend de Voogd and Rob van der Velden.

After being found drunk on the job one too many times, the head brew master at a Dutch brewery is told that going forward he is only to work nights at the place. This turns out to be fateful for the alcoholic as alone at night he accidentally tumbles into a giant vat of beer. Of course the man drowns, but he also somehow gets infected by the boiling beer, and the process turns him into a zombie. The next day at the brewery it is business as usual, but the batch of bad beer soon begins to spread and turn all who consume it into flesh hungry ghouls.

Zombeer is a prime example of how it isn't really important to have the biggest budget when making a zombie film. This does everything you would want, though the zombie part of this did come slightly too late into the film. The undead are plentiful and look great on screen (as always there isn't much need for complex make-up effects), but the best part is relegated to an end credits sequence. Weirdly, this begins with a Japanese news report that hadn't been translated - no idea what that part was about. It then goes into a neat found footage segment showing an unfolding zombie outbreak in daytime city streets. It was a shame the very best part of the short took place over end credits.
The story is functional, and the acting is purposely a bit exaggerated, but fitted the events that never took themselves too seriously, obviously realising the silliness of the situation.

Zombeer didn't outstay it's welcome, and for a zombie short it was a lot of fun. The brewery location was one of the best things about this, and I appreciated the special effects were practical rather than CG. Worth a watch, fun in that neat brain-dead type of way that only indie films about the undead seem able to succeed at.

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The Lighthouse (2025) by Social Youth Cult - Music Album Review

Social Youth Cult are a post-punk band based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the UK. 2nd November saw the release of their debut album titled 'The Lighthouse'. This eight track album was recorded at the Bunker in Sunderland, and first single - 'Close to Nothing' was released last month on 18th October. As always, I will just state I have no business reviewing music, but I can only try my best (I am very trying as my friends tell me).

It opens on 'Venus', a booming start that took me by surprise due to not realising how loud the volume on my earphones was. I thought this was a great start, the sound and the singing reminding me of a slowed down version of the manic The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster. Next comes first single; 'Close to Nothing', a repetitive beat being the through-line during the five minute introspective Interpol twinged track - another good one. The end of the first third of the album brings 'The Man in the Photo', another great repetitive back beat, with lyrics almost spoken rather than sang, this was possibly my favourite track of the album.
A change of sound for fourth track 'She's Dread' with a classical music starting beat. Slow and ponderous, transitioning into a faster finish, yet another good song that doesn't feel overlong despite the five minute length. Meandering (in a good way) 'Strange Times' is next in line, with 'Dead Space' and 'The Fall' leading things into the end of the album. The later increases the speed from the shoe-gaze feeling previous two. Final track is titular 'The Lighthouse', 5 minutes in length but sped by.

After a blistering start, 'The Lighthouse' settled down into a more slow and thoughtful pace. I felt some of the tracks, particularly in the middle, did sound a little bit similar to each other, but that isn't to say any of the 8 tracks here were bad. A good debut album. Social Youth Cult are currently doing a bunch of UK dates, with Grand Central in Manchester on 16th November, Lubber Fiend in Newcastle on the 23rd, and Mist Rolling Inn at Nottingham on the 28th of this month. Their debut album is out on all streaming services, CDs, and cassette copies available. There will also be a limited run of vinyl LPs.

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Jacker (1993) - Thriller Film Review

Last month in October, I got to review indie crime thriller Jacker 3: Road to Hell. What had interested me about that movie was it was made roughly 30 years after the second in the trilogy, with some of the original cast members returning to reprise their roles. I hadn't expected I would get to see the first two films due to their age, but was given the chance to check them out to. Jacker was co-directed by Phil Herman (I Slay on Christmas, Doomsday Stories) and Benjamin Stanski, the former of which also wrote this, as well as starred as the titular antagonist, and the later humorously playing three different characters within the movie.

A criminal that has become to be known as 'the jacker' has already been on a crime spree prior to the start of the movie. This mystery assailant, true to his name, carries out car jackings, murdering the victims of these attacks. Meanwhile, Mike (Herman) has fallen under the eyes of the police after his girlfriend commits suicide. Known to the viewer is the fact that not only did Mike murder his girlfriend and then made it look like she had taken her own life, but he is also the notorious jacker! His suspicious behaviour alerts detective Jackson (Patric Jackson in his sole film acting role), who soon finds his own woe when his younger sister is murdered. Jackson and his sister's former boyfriend; James (Barry Gaines - Jacker 3: Road to Hell) start to investigate Mike, while the police also start to have suspicion after a second woman he was intimate with is found dead in his flat.

Truth be told, I figured the sheer fact of Jacker being an indie film in the early 90s would make it a tough film to watch. Of course, this was before the advent of better technology made it easier for indie films to be made, so the sound design and camera work will be rougher than what you may be used to. There is lots of background interference, even with my bad hearing, at the worst of these times I was still able to understand the lines being spoken by the actors. The footage isn't the greatest quality, with a real VHS home movie look to scenes. Panning around locations has a noticeable shake to the footage, and occasionally lighting looks a bit blurred. Unexpectedly, this didn't detract from Jacker but instead added to the atmosphere of it. Never coming across as found footage, this nonetheless occasionally achieved an almost voyeuristic quality to the scenes, ignoring the often rough acting of some of the more minor characters, and with a squint in your eyes, it has a very vague feeling of a snuff film in some scenes, lovely stuff.
The plot actually felt more involved than with the third movie. There is a constant feeling of Mike barely getting away with his crimes, and welcoming the police suspecting him, where in the third film he seemed more like a force of nature, killing much more randomly while the police are utterly powerless to catch him. I did know how the film was going to end, having read a synopsis prior to watching the third film, but even so, it was nice seeing how events led up to what I knew was going to happen.

Herman is great as the nihilistic antagonist, more so than in Jacker 3. This killer delights from causing pain (or so he says), and there is even a little dive into his backstory. Much like with that third film, Mike is often amused when carrying out his crimes, and still features the iconic hat, and typical method of death by a single gunshot to the head. Special effects are minimal here, guns are fired in an exaggerated manner without any sort of effect other than the sound of a gunshot. It was neat to see Debbie D (I Slay on Christmas, Doomsday Stories) in a role here, as her character became an integral part of the third movie, though it does turn out her death was retconned, as here it seems not only did she definitely die, but the police had taken her body from Mike's flat, whereas in the third movie she states she had been assumed to be dead by him and dumped in woodland. Jackson was a good contrast to the killer, and his journey of revenge was fun to watch. With secondary characters it had to be co-directer Stanski who stood out. He not only plays three almost identical looking characters, but they always appear together in the same scenes, with the camera awkwardly cutting to make it look like they are interacting with each other. The humour here is intentional, maybe due to knowing that some of the actors really were not the best at delivering their lines, but it blends in well with the horror. When in the thrilling finale the jacker ends up being chased by a man on a child's skateboard, you know this isn't trying to take itself super seriously!

I came to Jacker expecting that I would be in for a terrible 90 minutes, that the time this was made would prevent it from being entertaining. I was surprised then at just how competent this was. Sure, it is very rough around the edges, but it tells a complete feeling story, fits the length of the movie without feeling drawn out, and even with some dodgy delivery of lines, has a cast of characters who were for the most part fun to see on screen.

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For God's Sake Wake Her Up (2024) - Horror Film Review

I think that showing the concept of sleep paralysis within the confines of a horror movie has to be hard. The idea itself doesn't lend itself to images of captivating and horrific scenes. Conjuring: The Beyond and Dead Awake are two such films that come to mind; both attempted to make a film on the subject and failed. I had low expectations then for the Wayne Moreheart directed and James Howells written sleep paralysis horror For God's Sake Wake Her Up. Not without its issues, but this was leaps and bounds better than any other film I have seen on the subject.

April (Mamie Kakimoto) is a woman at the end of her tether. Nightly she is visited by what she believes to be some sort of demonic entity which causes her sleep paralysis. With both her grandmother and mother having died while in the throes of sleep paralysis, April has gone a little crazy, keeping a huge journal of her research, as well as many video diaries documenting her experiences. The woman doesn't believe she has much fight left in her, and that the entity will one time take the last of her will. 
Elsewhere, school girl Rizz (Sarah Crawford) is not dealing with the death of her mother well. Not only did she refuse to go to the funeral, but the typically good girl has ran away from home on some sort of self destructive path of sorrow. She is joined by her friend - Myles (Queen Legend), a much more street-smart girl who intends to follow Rizz to try and keep her safe. Much to Myles' concern, the pair have ended up in a rough part of the city late at night. Her pleas for reason fall on deaf ears, with the reckless Rizz seeing the open door of an old house as an invitation for her to enter and have a snoop around. Thinking the place to be uninhabited, the friends are shocked to see a woman in a state of some sort of distress in a bed in the bedroom, someone who doesn't seem aware of their presence. This is of course April, who is in perhaps the final night of her sleep paralysis nightmare. Rizz decides that helping this woman may in some way make up for her not being there for her mother during her final months, and so promises to help her. It isn't long after that the pair discover they are unable to leave the house, and that the woman's condition may not be medical in nature but supernatural.

What I liked most about For God's Sake Wake Her Up was that the focus was not on the victim, but on characters who in any other movie would have been secondary ones. By the time they arrive at April's house she is already in full sleep paralysis mode. It was neat to see characters arriving at a supernatural event that was already happening, rather than seeing the slow build-up. We are mainly giving April's story via the video diaries she left behind. We see her in the prologue, but then the action brutally cuts away to the two teenage girls, with it feeling like their story was something completely separate. The film follows them over the course of a day, with plenty placed on Rizz's shoulders, due to all the trauma she is facing at this pivotal moment in her life. I liked how the two stories joined up, with it not feeling unfeasible how they came to be at April's home.

The demonic entity (Isabel Klapwyk) was rarely shown but this really was for the best. It has a humanoid look to it, kind of an Insidious style painted face, but other than that it looked pretty normal and a little bit bland. Even mostly hidden in shadow it was hard to feel too much fear from this antagonist, and it's evil sounding voice came across as a little generic. Its powers also seemed a bit random. April was someone who had been terrorised by it for possibly months and months, and she was still holding on. But then it displays powers that extend to not only the whole house, but even the surrounding area. It is able to magically keep the doors and windows of the house shut, can drag objects and people around, and can even attack people. You could argue the reason for April still being alive was due to the entity siphoning off her life force, but spending months causing sleep paralysis to one victim seemed a long winded way of achieving that goal. April also seemed to have powers to her, able to communicate with Rizz via a broken TV, giving the girl hints on how she might be able to defeat the being. When the end does come, the final confrontation was a bit of a let-down. I will say I did enjoy the ending though, it explained previous moments in a way that I hadn't expected.

This was a very well made indie horror, the quality of the filmmaking was apparent throughout. I liked the blend of found footage (with the video diaries), and I did like the interactions between the two friends, even if I found the dialogue to be occasionally a little too wordy and stiff sounding. Despite the entity not appearing on screen until around the end of the second act, I was still engaged, finding the friend's story to be captivating even before the introduction of horror.

The antagonist may not have left much of an impression me, but the film as a whole was good, an almost great story (a few plot holes to be found), and a surprisingly good score to it that made scenes feel full of dread, even if that dread never really materialised. Some characters are done dirty here, but I did like the handful of unexpected moments that appeared, and exploring relatable grief through the lens of the supernatural worked well. For God's Sake Wake Her Up debuted on streaming platform BloodStream, via The Horror Collective; the genre label of Entertainment Squad, and comes to all major digital and on-demand platforms from December 1st.

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