Scary ships and spooky cities.

Today we're continuing on last weeks theme of exploring old horror films.

We did four films last time, which I think is a bit too much, so this week we're experimenting with two.

Our number one entry is Death Ship (1980). This small movie stars some pretty famous faces, most notably George Kennedy and Richard Crenna. What we have here, is a pretty typical haunted house story, except it is set on a rusty, creepy ship. I could explain the story, but it's too convoluted and odd. To be honest, the ship is the best part of the movie anyway. It's an underused setting, and it's genuinely spooky. Unfortunately, the rest of the movie is weak. I won't say bad, but definitely weak. The horror parts of the script make no sense what so ever, and the characters are pretty bland. One of the characters, a young boy, seems to exists only to go to the bathroom. I'm not kidding people, in a 91 minute film, this kid needs the toilet three times. Was the scriptwriter drunk?

Overall, Death Ship is a middle of the road horror movie. There are many worse out there, but also many better. Worth watching for the theme, or for the sake of completionism. Oh, and don't confuse it with Ghost ship (2002), as that movie is abysmal.

The second entry is Nightmare City (1980), by Umberto Lenzi. In case you're not in the know, Lenzi is one of the big names in Italian horror cinema. So my interest was peaked when I found this. It didn't take very long for my interest to curl up and fall asleep. The biggest flaw in Nightmare City is that it's boring. I won't say it's bad, but if you say so, I won't argue too much.

The story revolves around these zombies, except they're not really zombies. They're people who have been exposed to some sort of radiation, that gives them superhuman strength and endurance. They also desperately need to drink fresh blood, so they're sort of radioactive-vampire-zombie-psychos? Oh, and their faces get all blackened and bloated so that you can tell who's a bad guy. Then, somehow, they infect others, who start killing to get blood, and so on.

This film has three interesting points. 1. It's considered the first movie with rage (or fast) zombies. 2. The rad-zombies use tools and weapons. 3. It's being remade by Tom Savini, the effect maestro. Maybe he can save this train-wreck of a film.

Overall, watch this film only from an academic film history point of view.

That's it for this time. With any luck I'll have some good movies for you soon. We're going to have to see, won't we? Until then, have a great week!