The Indie Film Cafe Movie Reviews!

• 

It’s a witch, inna house – it’s Witchouse! And its the the third (and final??) installment of the Witchouse trilogy, with a lil’ bit of Full Moon, a dash of Tempe, and a troika of beautiful Scream Queen Dream Team starlets, including Debbie Rochon, Tina Krause, and Brinke Stevens! What cud possibly go wrong?? Well….

Ok, its not so mooch that anything went wrong so mooch as things cud have been a lot better, given the talent behind this pic. Part of that comes from the budget, which narrows the scope of the film cowsiderably, as well as some questionable narrative choices, and an overall lack of, well, stuff happening. Cowever, there are also a lot of good things in this film too – check out the latest Indie Film Cafe podcast EPISODE wherein Mr. Moody, Director John Ward, and newbie guest co-host Cameron Scott discuss all the house witchery details!

• 

Poor Annie (the lovely Tanya Demsey) gets slapped by douchey Burke (Paul Darrigo, who also wears a fishnet tee shirt, as if you needed further proof of his character’s douchebaggerosity!), and runs off to the very nice beach front property wherein lives Stevie (the lovely Debbie Rochon) and Rose (the lovely Tina Krause), who are, well, in the middle of summoning Satan for shits n gigs (as you do). Well, they’re really filming part of a documentary about witchcraft, but without anything better to do they all get drunk, perform a ‘ritual’, and hey-presto, they summon Lilith le Fey from the first two Witchouse moovies, who begins to torment them because, well, that’s what Angry Summoned Witch-Ghostie-Demoness Thingies do.

Or is that what really happened? After a few odd plot twists and uncowvincing deaths, the narrative devolves into an unlikely pot boiler soap opera, several lovely ladies end up deadinski, and the plucky Stevie has become the next Lilith, kinda-sorta?? I dunno, the plot (and the lighting!) is as murky as vegetable soup, only not as healthy, and the whole thing feels somewhat unsatisfying in the end – which is really a shame because Rochon, Krause, and Dempsey all give earthy, heartfelt performances that really make you like these girls and root for them. Brinke Stevens‘ Lilith is creepy at first, but just sort of hangs around in the end, as if no one is really sure why her character is in the film in the first place.

• 

Well, break out your broom sticks, ’cause this moovie has been scored! Moody went with a 4, while John Ward awarded the film a 3 and Cameron Scott a 5, giving Witchouse 3: Demon Fire a Stink Score of 12, and a Stinky Average of 4.0 – that is a pretty decent score overall (especially this year!), and is testament to there being enough good things to balance out the less good in this indie witchy flick. On the Ladder of Stink, this Witchouse film is on par with an-udder Full Moon picture, Shrunken Heads, which Indie Film Cafe covered wayyyy way back in Episode 10. No boob snuggles here (unfortunately…), but if you are fans of Debbie Rochon, Tina Krause, Tanya Dempsey, and even Brinke Stevens (and if yer not, what the heck is wrong with you!!!) then you should definitely check this out, ’cause these ladies prove they are moore than a pretty face in a hot bikini…although there is, ummm, that too…. ;=8)

• 

Check out the O-fficial trailerage HERE. For streamers you can find it on Tubi as well as Amazon. For those of you who prefer to git yer hooves on the physical media, good ol’ Uncle Amazon also has both the regular version and the fancy-dancy widescreen version too! FYE has it as well. And you can find it re-sale on Ebay too. And, of course, you can always go right to the source and get it from Full Moon Direct.com, which is always the best. Grindhouse Video has it as well. As of this writing this cow has not seen a blu ray release for Witchouse 3, but would certainly support that idea. The kewl purple moovie POSTER can be found at Goldposter.com. Someday it would be mooovelous to have that poster on a mug or tee shirt, but alas we can only dream about it now. If you like the soundtrack you can listen to it HERE. Tempe DVD has a nice press release about the film on their website that is worth tracking down as well. And finally, Witchouse 3 was one of a number of horror moovies featured on Terror Cards, which were kewl cowllectible trading cards put out by Retroscope back in ’04. Terror Cards is now gone digital, but I’m not sure Witchouse 3 or any of the older moovies are on it.

• 

Not without some flaws, Witchouse 3 is still a fun, kewl watch on a late night, with the lights off, especially if you wanna git yer Scream Queen vibe on. The MooCow, and Indie Film Cafe, says check it out! Just don’t summon Lilith, she’s kind of a cranky pants…
;=8)

• 

Oh ye gods, what straaaaaaange looking-glass have the Indie Film Cafe kids stepped through this time, and cow will they survive? No strangers to abysmally bad, weird films, this might be the one to top ’em all! What are we talking about? Why none udder than 1991’s Alien Beasts, by the 1980’s SOV-weirdness king himself, Carl J. Sukenick – may all udder lesser schlockmeisters bow down before him! Cud this be the Holy Grail of Stink? Intrepid moovie explorers Jonathan Moody, the MooCow, and special guest co-host Director John Ward (Axemas I & II) put on their Wellingtons, strap on hip waders, and dive right into the bottomless muck to give you all the scoop on this cinematic poop! Trust the MooCow, you do NOT want to miss this Very Special Episode of Indie Film Cafe! :=8D

So, this is usually the spot in the review where we talk about what the film is about – but since this film gleefully goes out of its way to cowpletely obscure whatever weird unhinged fever dream might have prompted this film, the plot is basically “Yer Guess is as Good as Mine” (SHRUG). There are aliens, kind of, terrorists from Iran (supposedly), the CIA (not really…), some really bad 80’s canned rap moosic, a narrator who describes everything you see, and re-says the same lines over and over, there are some poorly choreographed fisticuffs between….who the hell knows, ’cause we witness it from about 1,000 yards away, there is some cheap gore, some skeezy nudity, and, best of all, there is a very trippy, psychedelic claymation / GI Joe doll mash-up ending that…is a thing that is there.

Honestly, the best description of this film is if you can imagine an alien who has heard of this concept of a ‘movie’ on earth, and without any background or context or information about the topic at all, the alien makes his own ‘movie’ based on a theoretical cowcept that makes perfect sense to the alien, but none to the actual humans. This cow certainly does not believe that Carl J. Sukenick has ever seen a single moovie in his life, not when every single basic element of film making, storytelling, and just plain old logic is snuffed out like a ladybug trampled by some giant drunken insane troll. Nope. No, no, no, no, and no. The troll would have made a moore cowherent film.

WOW, so you might expect something this weird, terrible, and cowfusing would pretty mooch score tens all around, wouldn’t you? Not so fast, mein freind! While Moody and the MooCow (rightfully!) awarded 10’s for this fiasco (and would have awarded 20’s if they cud), special co-host John Ward was charmed by the film’s absolute refusal to be competent in any way, shape, or form – it is the ultimate antidisestablishmentarian film! Well, maybe not, but we were all shocked when he awarded the film a 5! Now that still gives Alien Beasts a Stink Score of 25, and a Stinky Average of 8.3, but honestly we were figuring Neil Breen was going to be knocked from his lofty perch up there among the 10’s. On the Ladder of Stink, Alien Beasts is right there tied with Ankle Biters, Cat Women of the Moon and Prehistoric Bimbos from Armageddon City – pretty lofty stink company right there, but certainly a surprise to the rest of us!

There is a trailer – if you really wanna see what a sneak peek into HELL looks like, then go for it, but you have been warned. Some kind soul, potentially Sukenick himself, has uploaded the film for free onto Youtube, which is awesome because now everyone can, and should, behold the glory that is Alien Beasts. Previously you could only git yer hot little hooves on a copy of his work by mail order right from the man himself, magazines, or via bootleg vhs copies at horror cowventions. There are occasional releases of his work, but they sell out. Tapes on Ebay are expensive. Hopefully some moore of his work will make it into the general public soon because you gotsta see this stuff, folks. I mean, its bad, really bad, but its also extremely entertaining, in that best train wreck kind of way that you simply cannot take your eyes off of. These days Carl is an artist, living in Moo York City – you can see a cowllection of his art (for sale!) at the Community Art Collective website. And if you are at all cowcerned that aliens with 16 noses are going to screw up the US mail (and you should be!), check THIS out!

Well, if yer looking for a film that is soooo bad it goes all the way around to good, and then back to bad, and then good, and back again 5 or 6 times, this is the film for you! Trust the MooCow on this one, folks: you ain’t seen nothing like it!
:=8D

Apparently Carl and David The Rock Nelson are buds! It would be an unjust universe if they weren’t…

Hay, you’ve got your Neil Breen mixed up with my Birdemic! Yeah, but you have your Birdemic mixed up in my Neil Breen! Two crappy stinkers cowbined into one! Lawrence Franzen‘s Alien Prophecy (aka The Oracle) from 2018 is a mumbling, stumbling, incowherent mishmash of a film, and is the sour subject of the latest episode of Indie Film Cafe – Moody found this dreck from udder a rock somewhere, and then co-opted both McKenzie Kelly and Ri’Maku to suffer through it: and of course, the MooCow had to watch it as well because what’s good for the goose is good for the…errr…cow. But believe me, folks, there ain’t a whole lot good about this film! Bad acting, poor FX, bad lighting, an incowprehensible story, and silly gadgets all cowbine to sink this stinker into the briney deep, where it no doubt belongs!
:=8/

Soooo…apparently there is this Hawaiian special forces guy who keeps getting washing up on deserted islands (“Again??!!”), and some alien fossils on the moon that explode, and a chick who does tai chi who has oracle powers, some sort of global conflict between different evil mercenary groups who have hired the likes of Genghis Khan and Hitler (“We forced Socrates to drink the hemlock!” – No, you really didn’t…), a very huggy chick in a railway station who will chase your ass thither and yon, A Haitian chick who works for the French secret agency, a snuggly Australian ninja with machine gun tubes sewed onto her gloves, a hit man and hit woman with machine gun pool sticks, and…well, just about everything else known to man.

Cow this all fits in together is just about anyone’s guess, and writer/director/cinematographer/producer/editor//visual fx generator/etc Lawrence Franzen is not gonna say, nope, nope, not even a little bit. Its one of those films you just have to tread water and hope yer on dry ground when it finally subsides; its a weird fever dream of a film which bombards you with too many ideas, none of which is thought through particularly well, and buries whatever interesting narrative there might have been had someone been there to say STAHHHP! FOCUS!!!

Cowbine all this with some very cheesy Birdemic-level FX, poorly choreographed fighting scenes, and ham-handed editing, and you have one weird, low throbbing headache of a film. There are some decent sets, a few decent locations, and some of the acting was pretty good (while some clearly not), but there is soo much bad that it easily overwhelms the few positives of the film. The udder IFC kids seemed to agree, with Moody awarding Alien Prophecy a full 10, while McKenzie chipped in a 9 and Ri’Maku gave a 9.5. That gives Alien Prophecy a total Stink Score of 28.5, and a Stinky Average of 9.5 – and that is pretty stinky! On the Ladder of Stink, Alien Prophecy is tied with some of the great classic stinkers of IFC, including Birdemic, Hard Rock Zombies, Blood Predator, and Creeping Terror!

Here is the trailer – good luck figuring it out. If you want a physical copy (and you should!), you can get it at Wally World, Barns & Noble, and Deep Discount.com. Or you can stream it on Tubi or Google Play. I cud not find any posters, tee shirts, mugs, or any udder merch for this flick, but then maybe you don’t wanna admit to the world that you love this moovie…
;=8)

Cud this be the worse alien moovie of the season? Well, just wait and see, ’cause here at Indie Film Cafe we’ve always got something worse waiting in the wings…
;=8)

Holy frejoles! The IFC kids have gone back into the Way Back Machine to 1960, for a weird, wacky, and fun Mexican sci-fi/western/moosical/vampire flick called Ship of Monsters, and lemme tell ya folks this one is WEIRD! Directed by Mexican moovie vet Rogelio A. González, and starring Singing Gaucho Eulalio González, Mexican wrestling babe and vampire queen Lorena Velázquez, and former Miss Mexico and Mexican horror hottie Ana Bertha Lepe, plus a whole bevy of weird critters, this episode will have Moody, the MooCow, and special guest co-host Just Jenn wide eyed and slack-jawed! Check out our latest episode and see what all the hubbub is all about!

Gamma and Beta, a pair of hotties from Venus, and their lovable refrigerator box robot Torr, crash land on earth after they have been trolling the galaxy to find menfolk to repopulate their dying planet because all the Venusian men are…well, just gone. They land in a Mexican western film starring the rascally but good-hearted Piporro, and his irritating younger brother Chuy, and then they both fall in love with him – which makes sense when you get a gander at the freaky cowllection of weird critters the lingeried ladies have thus far been able to come up with. Then, Beta becomes a vampire, and is ordered killed, so she switched to the udder side and gets the critters to fight with her, but it all ends up ok, Piporro and Gama hook up, Torr falls in love with a jukebox (I’m not making this up…), and evil is vanquished once again. All with an odd selection of songs and moosical numbers that is somewhat…head-scratching, but totally fun. This is a kitchen sink approach to film-making that actually, strangely, works!

Yeah, this one was moore fun than a box of churros! Everyone seemed to enjoy this oddball little Mexican flick, and we bet you will too. Moody awarded the film an 8, the MooCow went with a 7, and Just Jenn gave the kindest score of all with a 6, giving Ship of Monsters an overall Stink Score of 21, which is a Stinky Average of 7.0! Híjole!

The MooCow cud not come up with an official trailer for this film; cowever, you can watch it for free on a number of sites, including Youtube, Vimeo, and Daily Motion. But, if you want to git yer hot little hooves on the physical medium, you can find it as part of a double feature of Mexican films on Amazon; as part of a 4-moovie set from Shout Factory; as part of a 12 film cowllection from Best Buy, and individually from places like DVDR Party, Ebay, and at our ol’ buddy Andrew Leavold’s site Trash Palace! You can also get this neat colorful poster (as well as stickers and card prints) from Redbubble. And check out the original 1959 Mexican theatrical poster (if you can afford it!) from FilmPoster.net! The same image can be found on a whey kewl tee shirt at Teepublic and also at Redbubble, because who wouldn’t want that?? Teepublic and Redbubble have mugs too, and Redbubble has to get extra props because they also have a great Throw Pillow as well, and hoodies! Finally, Teepublic has a kewl tote bag, ’cause you needs one!

So if yer lookin’ for a fun, wackadoodle flick that has a lil bit of everything, and is still a hoot to watch, you cud do a whole lot worse than Ship of Monster – so go check it out!
:=8D

Welcome to Season 4 of Indie Film Cafe, cats and kitties! And today we have a hard-hitting comedy of terrors brought to you by Josh (AKA Worm) Miller and Patrick Casey, those lovable lugs who brought he world Dorm Daze, Sonic the Hedgehog, and, moost of all, Hey…Stop Stabbing Me, which we reviewed in Season 1, and Gamebox 1.0, which we did in Season 2! So you know yer in for a world of wacky fun! Check out the latest episode with Moody, the MooCow, and fresh victim – errr, co-host, Paige Brooks (who somecow managed to survive the Curse of the Mummy Cat, AND come back for moore!), as they talk about this fun, silly film!

Welcome to the Forsaken Zone, also known as Rural Minnesota, which has broken away from the US to become a sovereign nation where all the crazies are kept because one in four of them turn out to be sort of…funny. In the head. And they like to kill folks – and, umm, that’s not even the cannibals. Poor Frank (Patrick Casey) – he left the Zone for LA, but has been pulled back because his father, the King (Jerome Casey), has died, and there is a kerfluffle going on about who is next in line to rule the Forsaken Zone with a firm sledgehammer. Machinations a la Game of Thrones is surely afoot, and pits brother against brother over who will rule the land, fight the cannibals, and win the lovely hand of Mug (Sarah K. Bizek), the adorable sex-trained handmaiden who can only say “Mug”. Ohh, and watch our for Hell Holes! We did warn you that this film was silly… ;=8)

Well, our third Miller/Casey film was almoost as good as our first two – wacky and fast-paced, the IFC kids enjoyed Sledgehammers at Dawn, with Moody awarding the film a 2.5, the MooCow went with a 3.5, and Paige went with a 4, giving Sledgehammers at Dawn a total Stink Score of 10, and a Stink Average of 3.3. We’re starting off the season on the right hoof!

Well, this is normally the spot where we put in links fer trailers, merch, and places to by the film on either DVD, Blu Ray, or good ol’ VHS – but as this flick is pretty mooch out of print, and can;t be bought anywhere that we know of, we gots nuthin for ya. The production company which made the film, Amazing Schlock Films, does have a website, and there is some info about the moovie, but just about all the links about where to get it are sadly out of date. COWEVER, word has it that the boys are working on getting a proper Blu Ray release of this (and also Hey…Stop Stabbing Me!) in the near future – and when that happens, we will update this review so you can git yer hooves on a copy, ’cause you needs one!

All in all, this was a pretty low key, low stink way of opening up Season 4 here at Indie Film Cafe – bet that won’t last too long! Come see what weirdness follow in our next exciting episode!
:=8D