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Santo el Enmascarado de Plata y Blue Demon Contra los Monstruos (Review)

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Santo el Enmascarado de Plata y Blue Demon Contra los Monstruos

aka Santo and Blue Demon Against the Monsters

1970
Story by Jesús Sotomayor Martínez and Rafael García Travesi
Screenplay by Rafael García Travesi
Directed by Gilberto Martínez Solares

The most popular hair salon in Transylvania…

When it’s night time and fright time, and things are going bump in the night, the monsters come out to play. A whole football team full of monsters! Luckily, the world has Santo and Blue Demon to do what they do best: Kicking monster butt!

Santo films started out like Cerebro Del Mal where they were more low key and just science fiction influenced capers. Santo played more of a supporting role at first. Many of the Santo films that followed would feature influences from horror flicks of the drive in, as Santo battled female vampires, zombies, a spooky wax museum, and stranglers. But by the time Santo fought the Martians, the Santo films were emulating the 1950s and 60s American B movie pictures that were lighting up the night skies at drive ins across North America. Santo would become more science fiction, engaging in spy episodes, running around with famous comedians, and even battling a famous movie monster or two. Influences would continue, and Santo el Enmascarado de Plata y Blue Demon Contra los Monstruos is no exception, the large amount of classic movie monsters present shows a clear influence from the Universal Monster movies.

It’s hard for a super-intelligent brain alien like me to find a girl, what with being an abomination against nature and all…

Even though there are influences, there are differences and odd themes. Wolfman, Vampire, and Cyclops all have big ears for some odd reason. And the Cyclops acts like the Creature from the Black Lagoon, acting as a surrogate for that missing member. Mummy barely appears in the film, wandering around and acting lazy. He also needs to eat a sandwich. Frankenstein looks like he’s tripping on mushrooms, which I think might have been how the film’s concept was dreamed up. The mad scientist Dr. Halder also has some green thugs that are called zombies but some sources, though I just dubbed them Frankenthugs. The large amount of monsters adds energy and a fast pace to the film, as it rushes to try to give everyone enough screentime, and the pace is rather quick for a Santo film.

According to Jim….lives again?!?!?!

Unfortunately there is a lot of cost cutting in this flick, it’s obvious what little budget there was went towards setting up the monster lineup. Most of the sets are sparse, and there is only one real scene that feels like it takes place at an actual place. There is even an extended sequence at that location that is obviously a stage play filmed for some other reason, and added here for padding and flavor. Santo and Blue Demon Against the Monsters features lots of shots that are shot in the daytime but set at night. Normally movies get around that by applying a blue filter to the movie, but that must have cost too much because they didn’t bother to do it all all.

Director Gilberto Martínez Solares was one of the best directors of early Mexican cinema, working often with Tin Tán, but his star began to fade and he soon was directing schlock like this and even worse things after. Though I think the Santo films and Santo el Enmascarado de Plata y Blue Demon Contra los Monstruos in particular are important features on the Mexican cinema landscape, they aren’t considered quality work, and Solares must have been phoning it in as his trajectory waned.

The Vampire is too cheap to turn the AC on during July!

Despite the budget woes and quality issues, Santo and Blue Demon vs the Monsters still ends up being a fun flick, and is among the Santo films you should see first just to get your toes wet. If you can handle Santo and Blue Demon punching their way through a castle filled with people in bad masks, you are ready to expand your journey. This is one of the easier titles to get, and is visual enough that even if your copy is minus subtitles, it won’t be a big loss.

No, keep your eye on the BALL, not the bat! Ball, BALL!!

Santo (Santo) – Santo the great hero braves all the evils that threaten the good people of Mexico. And also threaten relatives of his girlfriend, which happens far too often to be a coincidence. Santo must be seeking these girls out just so he can beat up monsters! What a freak…
Blue Demon (Blue Demon) – Santo’s best buddy in fiction if not reality, Blue Demon is captured early on in Santo el Enmascarado de Plata y Blue Demon Contra los Monstruos and replaced by an evil double.
Otto Halder and Gloria Halder (Jorge Rado and Hedi Blue) – The brother of the evil Dr. Bruno Halder and his daughter, Gloria, who Santo is dating.
Dr. Bruno Halder (Carlos Ancira) – A mad scientist who has gone crazy with rage and unleashes monsters upon the world, because he’s a jerk or something. He doesn’t really have any motivation besides being evil. But isn’t that motivation enough?
Waldo (Santanón) – Loyal servant of Dr. Halder and also a hunchbacked little fellow, like every film needs. Famed actor Santanón is best known for being Stinky the Skunk in another Monstruos flick. Maybe not really best known, but I declare it so now.
The Mummy/La Momia (Fernando Rosales) – A very lazy mummy who is just there for most of the flick.
The Cyclops/El Ciclope (Gerardo Zepeda) – Cyclops acts like a Gillman, but with big ears! This suit is left over from La Nave de los Monstruos (Ship of Monsters). Gerardo Zepeda also played one of the three zombies/Frankenthugs. He played goons and thugs in dozens of movies, including Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy
Frankenstein/Franquestain (Manuel Leal) – Even Frankenstein (or Frankenstein’s Monster for you purists!) joins the fun of getting punched by Santo and Blue Demon! Manuel Leal played the lead evil zombie Satan in The Mummies of Guanajuato
The Wolfman/El Hombre Lobo (Vicente Lara) – The Wolfman took time off from begging for change at a highway offramp to menace Santo and Blue Demon.
El Vampiro (David Alvizu) – Even vampires are trying to get into the fun, especially vampires with big Spock ears like someone “borrowed” just that element from Nosferatu.
Sonia the Vampire Woman/La Mujer Vampiro (Elsa María Tako) – The Vampire spends his time making vampire babes like Sonia here, who always walks around in her bra and panties and also tries to seduce Santo. There is another briefly seen vampire lady named Fabiola (Yolanda Ponce) but she does nothing important.
Evil Blue Demon (Alejandro Cruz/Black Shadow) – Blue Demon is captured and replaced by an evil duplicate who does evil stuff that is evil. Until Santo kills him! Spoiler… Though the credits are a bit hazy, it is believed that Alejandro Cruz/Black Shadow played the Evil Blue Demon duplicate.
Ship of Monsters Saucer Man (???) – This Invasion of the Saucer Men-style brain alien is another refuge from from Ship of Monsters, though all he does in this film is stand around in Dr. Halder’s lab and look weird. An important job!
Will Santo and Blue Demon defeat the monsters? I’m on the edge of my seat!!!

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Vampire Dog

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Vampire Dog
[adrotate banner=”1″]Vampire Dog. It’s real.

Ace is just like any other new kid at school, until his grandfather from Transylvania dies at age 96 and sends him his dog Fang. Ace soon discovers that Fang is a vampire dog – and he speaks English! Mad scientist Dr. Warhol (Amy Matysio!!) and her bumbling assistant Frank try to capture Fang and steal his DNA in hopes of developing the latest anti-aging technology, but lucky for Ace the vampire dog manages to stay one step ahead of his pursuers. Along the way an enduring friendship forms when Ace and Fang discover that together they are unstoppable. – Written by Vampire Dog Productions Inc.

Vampire Warriors (Review)

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Vampire Warriors


2010
Written and directed by Dennis Law Sau-Yiu

Sparkle THIS!

The announcements of a film starring Jiang Luxia and Chrissie Chau as chicks who fight vampires sounded like it would be the best movie ever. The reality is a far different creature, instead being a disappointing film with a few good moments. Jiang Luxia continues to be the best part of the films she shows up in, while Chrissie Chau continues to be…hot. She also barely participates in the action sequences. The action sequences should be what the film is built upon, but the tone of the sequences shift from practical fighting to insane flying wire fu where people get thrown through every wall in China, except for the one wall you would want to see someone thrown through.

The script itself feels more like a first draft than a full script. Many characters have little motivation, and even those given reasons for why they do stuff aren’t given much else to explain how they got to where they were. More of this complaint near the end of the review. It is obvious that Twilight inspired parts of the film, what with all the moping, the vampire family, and the vegetarian vampire angle. Someone needs to write a teenage girl hopping vampire romance novel quick!

Yank him until he goes full Anime!

When you think Chinese vampire films, you think of the hopping vampires, one-eyebrowed monks, awesome retro effects, lots of goofy scenes, and spooky/gross effects shots. Which is why when one comes out that features exclusively the western style vampires it is sort of interesting. There is no vampire hopping at all in this film, though there is a guy running around in the Qing style uniforms. We got no priests, and the effects shots are entirely digital and sparse. I don’t know if the complete lack of religious figures blasting the vampires is because the film is trying to appeal to more Western audiences who would be confused, or if there is some film guidelines from Mainland China that are against that stuff showing up. I do think the latter is why there were less gross/makeup effects that used to be common in these films.

Only mean people on the internet can make Chrissie Chau sad

Besides Jiang Luxia and Chrissie Chau, there are a bunch of other models in the cast – Haley C, Annie G, Dominic, Laying, Mia C, Suki, all of these are model/lang mo names. One expects the amount of Blue Steel in this movie will keep Pittsburgh in business for a bajillion years. I’m sure other girls with normal names in the credits are also models, it’s almost as if Dennis Law was trolling for dates. We also have two alumni from the original Mr. Vampire film, who are also the only people (besides one old lady) who look over 24 in the film. So please forgive the scant biographical information on some of these girls, as there isn’t any in English. As a final note, the film toys with some lesbian undertones between the main characters, which is sort of weird, especially since this film takes place in the all-too-common Hong Kong world where everyone is attractive 22 year old models who have never had a boyfriend.

Gymkata!

Ar (Jiang Lu-Xia) – Ar is a vampire hunter who spends all night killing vampires. Ar killed vampires with her father when she was young. She is also illiterate and has no money, as killing vampires doesn’t pay well. Jiang Lu-xia is rocking some awful extensions. Did one of the 1000 models on the movie sabotage her hair? See Jiang Luxia also be awesome in Coweb and Bad Blood.
Max (Chrissie Chau Sau-Na) – Vampire Max is Ar’s best friend and is a vegetarian vampire. Max’s favorite food is corgi, and definitely not obviously stuffed rabbit or ketchup. Chrissie Chau is the queen of the new breed of models showing up in Hong Kong called lang mo. Lang mo are models who aren’t fashion models but thanks to the internet get famous via the internet, and publish picture books of themselves wearing bikinis, something that is still shocking to many people in Hong Kong. There was even a big book fair recently where the lang mos like Chrissie Chau were banned and that caused much publicity and the models just showed up anyway as visitors. Chau is in an impressive number of recent films and will probably be in many more and inspire a whole new generation of lang mos.
Mung (Yuen Wah) – Mung is a Vampire Vampire, who consumes the blood of vampires to get powerful or something. Yuen Wah is one of two Mr. Vampire alums, and has been in a bajillion films, including My Kung Fu Sweetheart and Kung Fu Hustle.
Lung (Chin Siu-Ho) – Lung is the dad of the vampire family and is 1500 years old. He likes younger chicks, and lying to younger chicks. Chin Siu-Ho is another Mr. Vampire alum.
Rex (Rock Ji) – The brother in the family and the family member every sister has a crush on, even though Rex is too dense to pick up on it. Rock Ji is a male model. Shocking that another model is in this cast, I know.
Kar (DaDa Lo Chung-Chi) – The 800 year old vampire sister who is sick of living the unfeeling life. She gets her wish, though in the end maybe she didn’t want it so bad. DaDa Lo is a lang mo and also is in a pop group called Sugar Beez with A. Lin. The group appears to be based on the Twins, though most YouTube videos show them performing in front of only a few people at a time.
Lin (A. Lin) – The youngest member of the vampire family. That’s about it for what her character does in the film except almost drink too much water and die. Then she actually dies via Vampire Vampire. A. Lin is a model/singer noted for her resemblance to Gillian Chung. In the group Sugar Beez with DaDa Lo.
Menstruation really hits the spot!

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Makin (Review)

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Makin

aka The Vampire

????
Directed by ????

Makin’ what? Bacon? Cookies? Babies? Probably babies, as that’s what several of the characters attempt to do in a roundabout faction.

Makin is an obscure as frak Thai film that is sort of unique in the Asian vampire genre in that the vampires are solely Western-style vampires! No one is hopping around, no one has their head flying off and zooming around while their guts hang low. It’s all traditional Dracula. I could go on about how there are a limited number of Western Vampires in Eastern Vampire films (most notably in Vampire vs. Vampire and The Seven Brothers Meet Dracula) but most people reading this are so far under a false assumption there will be pictures of naked Thai chicks down below. In fact, there are only pictures of semi-naked Thai chicks, or naked Thai chicks with strategically placed objects. So for the big Eastern/Western vampire discussion you’ll have to wait until I get around to actually reviewing Vampire vs. Vampire, which could happen one day since I own it.

The best widescreen money can buy!

You might not be surprised to know that there is a plethora of low-budget softcore films produced in Thailand (which has a reputation as a sex tourist destination) but as most of them (at least the ones available on eThaicd.com) are barely-there plots about dudes seducing chicks and other boring things that would barely rate a Skinimax softcore film. But even in the boring masses there are a few wacky gems. Previously we’ve run across weird Thai softcore flick Hidden 2002, a movie about loose women at a hotel and the men who secretly video tape them. Finding out information on Thai films in general is almost impossible, and softcore films are talked about even less. And obscure crazy softcore crap like this you have a better chance of tapdancing with a shark than finding out info about this (unless you are fluent in Thai, and even then you will probably have troubles.) Makin is a production of the Prohand Production Group (who’s symbol is a thumbs up! Someone tell Roger Ebert!) and Prohand Home Video. They aren’t anti-hand, they are prohand.

YOU are the reason Edward Cullen won’t return my fan letters!

Oh, subtitles? Forget it! But TarsTarkas.NET don’t need no stinking subtitles! We also don’t need to know who the heck the actors are, so here are all the notable characters (pretty much every character minus one)

Makin (???) – Makin is a Vampire who looks amazingly like Dracula but is totally not Dracula because Dracula would never be this lazy. He’s the laziest mofo in the universe.
Cool Guy (???) – Cool Guy is the main male character who is a totally cool, as shown by the fact he has sunglasses, a motorcycle, and a girl who puts out. Thus, he gets to kill Makin, who was makin’ the beast with two backs with his girl Dah.
Red Hair (???) – Red Hair is one of Cool Guy’s buddies who works on motorcycles and does nothing else until Cool Guy decides he needs some buddies to go all Monster Squad on Makin.
Bandanna (???) – Bandanna is Cool Guy’s other buddy, the one who looks like he could also be cool if he had a motorcycle and a girl who puts out, but he doesn’t so he is not as cool.
Mattei (???) – Mattei is a geeky guy who lives in a shack behind a house filled with hot chicks, and becomes the thrall of Makin or something. This means Makin yells at Mattei in his head until Mattei seduces some women so Makin can have sex with them. So basically the bonus to being a vampire thrall is you get migraines! Maybe I am a vampire thrall, except my migraines are only slightly related to a vampire yelling at me.
Priest A Don (???) – It is nice to know that priests in Thailand are just as screwy about sexuality as priests in America. Even if this is a fictional priest made perverted for comedic purposes.
Dah (???) – Dah is Cool Guy’s best girl, and she becomes the target of Makin because she lives in the house of hot chicks.
Pau (???) – Pau is a hot chick who gets vampired up, Makin style.
Mitta (???) – Mitta is a hot chick who gets vampired up, Makin style.
Landlord (???) – Eh, everyone else was getting a listing, so might as well give him one as well. I am guessing he is supposed to be the dad to the three girls or something, but it is more fun to pretend he just rents his house out to a bunch of hot chicks and a creepy dude. And since no one will ever write about this film in English again there is no one to stop me! MuHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!


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Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl (Review)

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Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl

aka Kyuketsu Shojo tai Shojo Furanken

2009
Directed by Yoshihiro Nishimura and Naoyuki Tomomatsu

Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl (hereafter VGxFG due to our crippling laziness in both typing and copy/pasting the movie title) is from the same Japanese goremasters that brought us The Machine Girl, Tokyo Gore Police, and Hypertrophy Genitals Girl. That’s the movie where the girl has the giant genitals. It won six Oscars. Yoshihiro Nishimura is a special effects expert who has directed several of the gore flicks, while Naoyuki Tomomatsu is a director and writer who also produces a lot of gore flicks such as Stacy and Zombie Self-Defense Force . VGxFG is based on a manga I haven’t read because I only read scifi novels published around the time my mom was born I get from used book stores. I also read books about McBroom’s Farm, but there were never and Vampire Girls fighting Frankenstein Girls. Maybe some of his kids were vampires or Frankensteins, he had like a million of them and also ran a zoo at one point besides the farm where I bet the Silver-Tailed Teakettler fought the Sidehill Gouger.

If you like gore and splatter effects and CGI blood, then this movie has that stuff and you probably already at least know about it. But maybe you haven’t bothered to rent it from NetFlix yet and are deciding on if you should see it or requesting Goonies one more time. And that is where TarsTarkas.NET can help. First of all, go get Goonies from a used DVD store, you can probably get it for like $5 thanks the the economic apocalypse. Second, give us $5 as well. This doesn’t help you, but it helps us. Everyone wins! (Everyone at TarsTarkas.NET!)

VGxFG is much like the Twilight saga, in that there are two specially powered teenagers fighting over the heart of a normal teenagers. Sure, the sexes are reversed, and the werewolf is a Frankenstein monster now, but it is similar. And no one sits in a window for four months while some generic alt rock blares in the background about possibilities. Come to think of it, VGxFG is nothing like Twilight. Forget I said anything!

Let’s get the Roll Call out of the way before I devote another paragraph to how VGxFG is exactly like Lethal Weapon 3…

Monami Arukado/Vampire Girl (Yukie Kawamura) – A lonely vampire girl searching for love by tricking boys into eating her blood. Just like all other women… Yukie Kawamura is a gravure idol so check out her gallery we put together.
Keiko Furano/Frankenstein Girl (Eri Otoguro) – dresses in the gothic-lolita style tough girl with a squad of three gang members who bully Jyugon into being her boyfriend…until Monami comes along. Is eventually killed and rebuilt by her father as Frankenstein Girl ready for revenge.
Jyugon Mizushima (Takumi Saito) – The innocent cute boy trapped in a world where two super-powered girls battle over his heart without consulting him in the slightest. Isn’t love grand?
Kenji Furano (Kanji Tsuda) – Vice-Principal/science teacher and Keiko’s father. Also secretly a mad scientist who experiments on the students.
Midori (Sayaka Kametani) – The over-sexed school nurse Mizushima goes to see because he’s still freaking out. It turns out she is also the mad assistant to Kenji Furano for his crazed experiments in chopping up students.


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Son of Dracula (Review)

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Son of Dracula


????
Directed by Saleem Suma

Bollywood horror is filled with ups and downs. Mostly downs. Every once in a while, you run into something so ridiculously stupid, it is awesome. Unfortunately, that was Shaitani Dracula, and we are now watching Son of Dracula, which is absolutely terrible. All of the fun of random dudes strolling around in dime store costumes is gone, instead we have a disco guy seducing random women, one of which gives birth to Son of Dracula, a doll that is waved around like it is the spookiest thing ever, and a statue looking like bigfoot that spends the entire film yelling. The main crime is none of that is any fun. It should be fun. It sounds like fun. But, brother, it ain’t fun! I originally ordered this knowing nothing except what the vcd cover looked like, and it promised a vampire/Yoda thing. He is in here, but he isn’t as fun as he looks. The lesson for today is disappointment, a harsh lesson I am tired of learning over and over again with more and more films. Luckily, the good jewels make up for the duds.

I am guessing the film was edited by caffeinated squirrels with ADD, due to the hap-hazard cuts, random scenes, and nonsensical anything. Nothing in this film makes the slightest bit of sense. Even if there were subtitles, this thing would be a mess, and the subtitles would probably end up having been stolen from a Harry Potter film. Bollywood horror has a complicated history covered by multiple sources, and a quick summary here would not do it justice. So we will just skip it and dive right into the film, because it doesn’t take a detailed history of a country’s movie culture to recognize that this film sucks. And at TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinking subtitles, so we dive in unaided.

Thanks goodness!

What year this was made in is debatable, because it doesn’t seem to be listed anywhere. The other problem is the cast list, I cannot conclusively link most of the actors to parts, largely due to my lack of finding good pictures or even any information at all about most of the cast. The actors list is credited as follows: Joginder, Raza Murad, Alaudeen Ferozm, Poonm Das Gupta, Sapna, Arif, Mahendrea Tiwari. Joginder is probably Joginder Shelly, and he has been called “the Badshaah of 70s B-grade films” as he was a popular over-acting villain. I am sure you know what Badshaah means, so moving on. Raza Murad is another popular villain character actor. Poonm Das Gupta is Poonam Das Gupta, and is probably Mom of Son of Dracula. Imagine that, a misspelling in the name of an actor in a B-movie. Shocking. I got nothing on any of the others. So there. Drop us a line if you have a clue.

UPDATE: in the blog announcement Vinayak has disclosed that Takul is played by Joginder Shelly and the Inspector is played by Raza Murad: “he stated with “A grade movies” and slowly slipped to “C Grade”.” Thanks, Vinayak!


Takul (Joginder Shelly) – Disco Dracula, I guess. There is a constant cat yelping as he talks. He spends most of the film trying to seduce the random girls who sing songs while dancing in the rain or waterfalls that Bollywood films have taught me litter India like beer cans on the highway. He also seems to have a second good identity where he is a family man, I couldn’t tell if he was supposed to be twins (with one evil) or just a secret identity as the evil guy. Even worse, he lives at the end and seems to be accepted by the innocent family. So, yeah…
Inspector (Raza Murad) – This police chief makes Chief Wiggum look like Sherlock Holmes. Many of his men get killed by a doll, and he is defeated by his clothes vanishing. Riggs and Murtaugh wouldn’t put up with that crap, and just shoot Son of Dracula in the head, revoking his Puppet Immunity.
Witch Doctor Jesus (???) – Witch Doctor Jesus comes complete with trident, and fights the forces of Son of Dracula and Angry Bigfoot Statue. He uses retro effects, waving of hands, and being freaking weird as powers. He also has sit-down talks with bad guys, showing the forgiving spirit of Jesus. This is far more accurate of a portrayal of Our Lord than Passion of the Christ.
Mom of Son of Dracula (Poonam Das Gupta) – As the name implies, she is the Mom of the Son of Dracula. She loves striped socks, odd clothes, writhing around, and giving birth to freaky puppet doll monsters by video toaster effects. Basically, your average girl next door!
Son of Dracula (A doll) – A freaking doll with a rubber mask is waved around by an off-camera dude, and that is the Son of Dracula that terrorizes people in this film like crazy. Every once in a while, Son of Dracula is actually played by a real guy wearing the mask, probably a kid. These rare instances stand out like a hobo at a millionaire’s ball. Despite Son of Dracula’s immobile face and body, he is somehow able to kill around a dozen people thanks to his fangs and Son of Dracula magic.
Angry Bigfoot Statue (A statue) – This statue never shuts up. All he does is yell and yell, and occasionally impregnate someone with the Son of Dracula. So I guess he is Dracula, except Dracula is not a statue, so he is more of a monster that the movie uses Dracula as the name for to get investors to pony up more dollars than Son of Angry Bigfoot Statue.


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