Film Review: THE RITUAL OF DEATH (1990)

Where do you find good material for a stage play?  In an ancient Egyptian ritual that’s where.  In The Ritual of Death (1990) a theater troupe decide to try something new by staging a play based on an ancient Egyptian ritual involving human sacrifice.  Doing this has caused them to unleash the evil spirit of a fanatical cult leader who led his followers into suicide.  When one of them becomes possessed by the spirit they soon realize that members of the troupe start to disappear one by one and it is only a matter of time before the Egyptian ritual finds its final sacrifice. 

Starring Leo Robinson, Michael Kelly, Lilian Ramos, Tiao Hoover, Carina Palatinic, Sergio Hingst, and Mara Husemann the film has a staple of interesting actors in the ensemble but they are hampered with a basic ‘90s horror film plot that doesn’t allow any of them to really shine or show range.  This being said there is a handful of interesting deaths scenes but overall the film never reaches the height of becoming a legitimate ‘90s cult classic.  There are worse films out there and this is just a film barely worth watching.

Film Review: SAURIANS (1994)

Nothing is worse than watching a ‘90s film that looks like it was shot on VHS by a novice filmmaker but that’s exactly what you get with Saurians (1994).  This home-made movie of two prehistoric creatures being resurrected after a construction demolition gone wrong is beyond awful to behold.  Written and directed by Mark Alan Polonia this film follows a group of “novice” archeologists searching for the remnants of dinosaurs just in time to see real life ones come to life and terrify the neighboring town and people. 

What makes the film so awful is not just the pedestrian direction and abysmal screenplay but the bad acting and horrendous creature FX.  The audio is also horrendous as the levels never seem to even have been mixed properly (even though much of the film has been noticeably dubbed and/or ADR). It was a chore to get through this entire film because in addition to all these negative aspects of the film it wasn’t even entertaining in a bad-movie way.  It was just plan horrible and a film that should be avoided at all costs.

Film Review: ATTACK OF THE BEAST CREATURES (1985)

Danger awaits a group of survivors from a luxury cruise liner who get ship wreaked on a deserted island in Attack of the Beast Creatures (1985).  The survivors are made up of a diverse group of both crew members and passengers (Robert Nolfi, Robert Lengyel, Julia Rust, and Lisa Pak, to name a few) some of who are at each others throats the moment they land on the island but their personal quibbles are nothing compared to the danger on the island from dangerous plants and acid pools that burn your flesh off to the touch to the miniature terror of beast creatures that inhabit the island and feast on the flesh of everything they come into contact to.  Now the survivors must find a way off the island as they are picked off one by one by the little creatures that seem to be everywhere watching and waiting to strike.  

 

This ‘80s film is littered with bad acting and even worse creature FX (even for a low budget film) in this basic premise of man (or woman) verses nature film that’s barely entertaining despite the copious amounts of blood on display.  The film could have been better (in the entertaining area) if not for the look and execution of the creatures as the premise of a group of survivors on an island filled with little killer creatures could have been excellent but this is otherwise a film better left dead and buried.

If you do happen upon it, at least it’s short (at a meager 82 minutes) and lots of the cast meet a gruesome fate even if it is by a crappy looking monster.