Amityville: The Awakening (2017)

Well, here we are again; another year, another Amityville sequel, the 18th(!!!) in the series. As is often the case, the story behind the film is often more interesting than the film itself and that is certainly the case here, so I'll make the plot description nice and short (I mean, it's a fucking Amityville sequel, who cares, right?). Luckily, there isn't much of a plot to recount!

40 years after the events that forced the Lutz family to flee, an awful single mother and her child --a wannabe-goth older daughter, an annoying younger daughter, and a son who's been in a vegetative state for two years following a convoluted accident-- move in, operating under the impression that the powers enclosed in the house will somehow cure the son's coma....for some reason. Much to the surprise of everyone his condition DOES indeed begin to improve! Has the house grown benevolent in its old age? Or does the house have plans for the infirm lad?

Anyway, now onto the shit I actually want to talk about:

Dimension Films originally signed writer/director Franck (P2, 2012's Maniac remake) Khalfoun to deliver a Rated-R film, and once the film was shot they, as Dimension has a history of doing, essentially locked Khalfoun out of the building and recut it. However, instead of doing what they usually do and secretly hiring a scab director to reshoot half the film so it makes no fucking sense (see Halloween 6: The Curse of Micheal Myers), they, for reasons unknown to anyone, cut Awakening down to a PG-13--removing some gore gags and an entire incest subplot-- as if this thing was ever going to play theaters. They then proceeded to take the newly-neutered film and shelved it, playing chicken with a release date for FIVE WHOLE YEARS before finally dumping it onto DVD. 

So all that's kinda fucked, right? Those edits against the wishes of the major creative force must be why the movies not so great, right? Guys, I'm gonna be perfectly honest here, I don't think any amount of blood splatters or or weird mother/son bone-zoning would've helped the cliched script, the oddly dull camera work, some of the worst acting I've seen in quite some time, or an obnoxiously meta subplot that includes the other Amityville movies existing as movies in this universe --at one point one of the low-rent Siouxsie Sioux ripoff's friends actually holds the fucking Amityville Horror DVD up to the camera, as if reminding us we could've spent this time watching a better film.

I've seen plenty of reviews stating they believe there was a good movie hidden somewhere in The Awakening but it was silenced by producer meddling. I, on the other hand, feel like the only good thing I can say about it was I'm glad to see the family's fridge was stocked with Big Red instead of any of the more well-known soda brands.

Blu Ray Review: Ice Cream Man

Ice Cream Man, an obscure cult film from the dark ages of horror (ie 1995), might seem like an odd choice for a super fancy, limited-run blu ray release. Honestly, it kind of IS an odd choice, but luckily 'odd' is something I relish.

This film, about a crazed and homicidal ice cream man (played full tilt by Clint Howard) and the small group of kids who are on to his grue-slingin' ways, suffers from an identity crisis. According to the director himself, as quoted from the dreadful commentary track --seriously, multiple times throughout he just stops talking for upwards of five minutes at a time, which one would assume is a major no-no when recording audio-- he recorded for this new blu ray from Vinegar Syndrome, "I tried to make a film that was half kids' movie and half horror movie, and ended up shitting on both." What we are left with is something to full of blood and boobs for kids, yet to soft for most horror fans. However, there's plenty here to enjoy.

Have you ever stumbled across a movie that might not be "good" in any conventional way, but is so unabashedly fucking strange you can't help but like it? You know, something like The Howling 2: My Sister is a Werewolf or the Japanese Evil Dead Trap? Well, Ice Cream Man fits in beautifully with those titles. With logic leaps, nearly hysterical acting, continuity that could be described as "loose" if one were in a generous mood, and bizarre unexplained plot details (my favorite being when Clint "plants" those plastic, spinning daisy lawn ornaments and every other character, including a pair of supposedly sane detectives, treating them as though they were real daisies), Ice Cream Man stands out whereas it might've otherwise been forgotten.

As far as the blu ray goes, the picture and audio are about as good as they're every going to be for a small budget, mid-90s horror film. Aside from the aforementioned commentary track, there are three interviews with Clint Howard,  director Norman Apstein (this interview is much better than his commentary and covers most of the same info), and producer David Goldstein.  The real standout, however, is the Monstervision Summer School Edition, which allows you to watch the film with all the Joe Bob Briggs Monstervision bits from it's TV debut on that program. As a lifelong Monstervision fan, this was one of the best special features that could've possibly been added.

At the time of this writing there are only 177 copies of Ice Cream Man available straight from Vinegar Syndrome, so if any of this piqued your interest I'd urge you to head that way as fast as possible.