ADOPT A HIGHWAY: ROAD TO REDEMPTION

On occasion a small movie is released that garners no major attention, released to the fewest of theaters and drawing little acclaim. These movies are quickly, if not immediately, released to disc and even there find few people realizing what a gem they’re missing. Such is the case with ADOPT A HIGHWAY. This film made by actor and first time director Logan Marshall-Green is one you should seek out.

Ethan Hawke stars as Russell Millings, a man heading out into the real world having just been paroled after 21 years in prison. Russell was part of the program instituted under President Clinton, a three strikes convict. His crime? Possession of an ounce of marijuana. Quiet and keeping to himself, Russell leaves prison behind ready to face the world.

But the world has changed drastically since his incarceration. Meeting with his parole officer he’s told he doesn’t have to report every week, just send in his information via email. When he tells the officer he doesn’t have an email and doesn’t understand it, he’s told to figure it out so he doesn’t get in trouble.

Placed in a work program Russell cleans and does dishes at a local fast food joint. He’s well-liked by his boss who wishes she had more like him. His time off is spent rediscovering the world, shown in the film as he attends a local amusement park. One night when she wants to leave right after closing and he has cleaning left to do, she gives him her spare key and tells him to lock up when he finishes and to return the key to her when he comes back after the weekend.

He cleans, does what’s expected and his last chore is taking out the trash. What he discovers changes his life forever. Inside the dumpster Russell finds and an abandoned baby. With no clue who to call or what to do he tries contacting 911 but hangs up, fearful of authority after his time in prison. He takes the baby home, calls her Ella based on a note she has on her and does what he can.

As the weekend draws to a close he knows he can’t take care of the child like this and work at his job. When she falls from the bed, he decides to take her in to child services. They thank him for doing so and begin asking him questions about where he found the baby and how he knew her name. He gives them the information he can and leaves, hoping to keep in touch and find out more about Ella.

That changes when the police show up to his job. As they question him about exactly where he found the child they don’t believe all of his answers. This places his employer in a predicament and he’s let go. Afraid that after losing his job and being questioned, Russell gathers his things and hits the road, heading for Wyoming.

The description of this film would make you believe the entire thing revolves around the baby and how Russell relates to the child. While that is an important part of what transpires it is the journey that her discovery causes that is the heart of this film. It’s a journey that should be experienced rather than described and a satisfying journey it is.

What makes the film work is the combination of story and acting. If either was weak the entire film would fall apart. But the story is compelling as we feel for the poor soul that is Russell, a man out of time who was imprisoned for what is now a misdemeanor and legal in some locations. His difficulties in functioning in a world that seems completely foreign to him makes for great storytelling and pulls you in to the humanity of his situation.

But more than that is the performance by Hawke in the lead role. There is so much subtlety in his performance that it is amazing. While so many names were tossed around for Oscar contention this year this was a performance that should have been noticed. The quiet speaking voice, the subservient behavior and the fear of what surrounds him is portrayed though Hawke in a way that creates a character you have no choice but to feel for, to wish a better outcome to his life.

As I said, this film played virtually nowhere and is not out on disc. Seek it out. Stick with it and watch the journey of Russell Millings. See the fantastic performance of Ethan Hawke that deserves more credit than a simple release on disc. It was a movie that was more enjoyable than expected and one that deserves to be seen. 

Click here to order.

HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY: FULL ON FULCI

Fans of horror are well acquainted with the name Lucio Fulci. While the Italian director made movies in numerous genres it was his horror films near the end of his career that have brought him more fame than the rest. Almost everyone who has enjoyed a horror film has seen ZOMBIE, but his other films didn’t get near the attention until the video boom.

I was fortunate enough to see his CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD/GATES OF HELL when it played in theaters. But finding the rest never seemed to happen. With video I was able to catch a few more but still, not most. It wasn’t until his films began popping up on disc that they were more accessible and more affordable. One of those titles was HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY. I still hadn’t seen it until this release but Blue Underground has gone above and beyond to make adding this one to your collection a must have.

The film has a quick opening of a young couple having just had sex in an abandoned old house. When the girl goes looking for her boyfriend she finds his body mutilated and is killed herself, a knife shoved through her head from behind. As her body is dragged off we change scenes.

Young Bob (Giovanni Frezza) in New York City is looking at a picture of that same old house, talking to a girl named Mae (Silvia Collatina) who he sees in the window. He tells his mother Lucy Boyle (Catriona MacColl) who sees nothing and tells him to get ready. Along with his father Norman (Paolo Malco) they are moving to New Whitby, Massachusetts. They’re moving into the house once owned by Norman’s mentor, Dr. Peterson, who murdered his mistress and then committed suicide there.

The realtor Mrs. Gittleson (Dagmar Lassander) refers to the place as Old Mansion while her employee calls it the “Freudstein house”. She finds the keys and takes the family there, leaving as they begin to unpack. She also sends along a young woman named Anna (Ania Pieroni) to help as a baby sitter. One night Norman finds Anna opening the locked door to the basement.

While his parents were inside the realtors earlier, Bob saw the girl he found in the picture and talked to her. She warned him again not to go to the house but he has no way of stopping it from happening. She also watched as a mannequin had its head severed, a mannequin that looked much like Anna.

Strange things begin to happen in the house. A rather large bat attacks Lucy and bites Norman. Sounds come out of nowhere. Shadows appear and disappear. Murders take place without the family being aware. And eventually Norman discovers new evidence of what transpired in the house, an evil no one suspected and experiments that were not discussed before. Whether or not the family can survive in the house isn’t revealed until the final moments of the film.

Many view Fulci’s works as nothing more than gore fest fueled by the effects people in demand at the time his films were made. Granted they do include the gore that horror films of the period required but they also offer much more. His films also told stories, created new horrific worlds or toppled old concepts on their heads to make something original. This film alone takes the haunted house concept and alters it into something different and yet familiar at the same time.

Fulci was also known not to be all that friendly with his actors and yet he pulls some great performances out of those involved here including the two children, Frezza and Collatina, who could have brought down the entire film. Much has been said about the dubbing of Frezza’s voice over the years but that doesn’t harm the film. Both make their characters believable as does the rest of the cast. This was the last film MacColl did with Fulci and she gives him exactly what her part needed.

Back to the gore effects here for some they seem crude but I wonder if that doesn’t involve looking at the film from the time period it was made in. In recent years we’ve seen a crippling use of CGI blood in films that looks as fake as you would expect. This was a time when practical effects were still in use. It was also a team that while good lacked a certain amount of authenticity in films that I have seen but at the same time did make those effects believable enough. And some of them here can be fairly gruesome to those who aren’t used to them in Italian horror films.

So the next question is why bother buying this new edition? I mean by now you probably own a copy of the film so what makes this one worth investing in? There are many reasons so let’s start with the biggest one. The presentation here. Blue Underground is offering the film for the first time ever in a new 4K Restoration from the uncensored original camera negative. What that means is that the film looks like it never has before with a spectacular sharper image that alone makes this worth picking up.

But they’ve done a lot more with tons of extras to enjoy. There is a new audio commentary track by Troy Howarth (author of “Splintered Visions: Lucio Fulci and His Films”), deleted scenes, theatrical trailers, TV spots, poster & still galleries, “Meet the Boyles” interviews with Catriona MacColl and Paolo Malco, “Children of the Night” interviews with Giovanni Frezza and Silvia Collatina, “Tales of Laura Gittleson” and interview with Dagmar Lassander, “My Time With Terror” an interview with star Carlo De Mejo, “A Haunted House Story” interviews with co-writer Dardano Sacchetti and Elisa Briganti, “To Build a Better Death Trap” interviews with cinematographer Sergio Salvati, special make-up effects artist Maurizio Trani, special effects artist Gino De Rossi and actor Giovanni De Nava, “House Quake” a new interview with co-writer Giorgio Mariuzzo, a Q&A session with Catriona MacColl that’s new, “Calling Dr. Freudstein” a new interview with Stephen Thrower (author of “Beyond Terror The Films of Lucio Fulci”) and a collectable booklet with a new essay by Michael Gingold.

As the sales pitch goes “wait, there’s more!” This release also includes the original motion picture soundtrack on CD by Walter Rizzati. That alone makes up for the costs of buying this new edition of the film.

If you love the films of Fulci, if you love collecting soundtracks to the horror films of Italy, if you’re a horror fan in general then you’ll want to pick up this new edition of the film. Or perhaps like me you never got the chance to see it before. Then by all means pick this one up and add it to your collection. It’s worth the investment. Sell off the old copy and keep this one on your shelf. 

Click here to order.

TRICK: A REAL TREAT FOR HORROR FANS

In the late 70s and early 80s a new genre was born. Perhaps I should say was reinvigorated when it was took a horror genre that had been used in the past and added the new concept of gore to the idea. That genre was the slasher film. It kicked off with Michael Myers and then Jason Voorhees but it wasn’t long before a slew of other maniacal characters were added to the list all with the hope of creating a new franchise that would bring teens flocking to theaters. Some did just that but most failed.

This glut of releases eventually hit the point where audiences lost interest and their output slowed down considerably. But for pre-teens who only found out about the genre via their weekly visits to mom and pop video stores they were forbidden fruit that they went back to discover. Those kids grew up to be adults who were beginning to work in the film business and they began to bring back those films in two ways. One was the obvious remake of those films. The other was an attempt to catch lightning in a bottle once again by creating new movies in the genre. TRICK is one of the latter.

Beginning in 2015 in the town of Benton, New York, a Halloween party is taking place. Not a little kid party but an alcohol induced high school teen party. Playing a version of spin the bottle using a knife with the words “Trick or treat” written on it. When spun by senior Patrick "Trick" Weaver (Thom Niemann) it lands on another boy and the teens egg him on to kiss him. Instead he takes the knife and stabs the boy and begins killing other as well until subdued by one of the teens.

The scene moves to the hospital where Det. Mike Denver (Omar Epps) and Sheriff Lisa Jayne (Ellen Adair) are investigating the crime. Trick is still wearing his mask and when taken off his face is covered in matching make-up. When they go to remove it, he flies into a rage, escapes his handcuffs and begins killing those in his way with surgical equipment he grabs along the way. Chasing him down the hall the two officers shoot him and he falls out of the window several stories to the ground. When they get outside they find the body missing and follow a trail of blood to the nearby docks. Everyone assumes “Trick” is now dead, washed away. When they investigate his life they find his address was a dockyard and he had no parents. Then his mask disappears from evidence.

Each year after that on Halloween night someone in a town long that same river Trick fell into dies. And Det. Denver follows the bodies thinking that perhaps there was some way that Trick survived not just being shot multiple times but falling several stories and plunging into the frozen water of the river as well. Most think he’s crazy but Denver still searches for Trick. During one of those investigations Denver watches as two other agents are killed by Trick in the goriest fashion possible. He swears he will stop him at all costs.

It is now 2019 and Halloween is in full swing in Benton. A new murder finds the word “DENVER” left on one of the bodies. Denver sees Trick and chases him through a graveyard before losing him. A note appears that lures a deputy to the barge Trick lived where she is killed. Denver and Jayne know something is going on but they’re not sure what. As teens celebrate the holiday by attending a screening of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD and walking through a haunted maze, little do they know that Trick is there and ready to strike once again.

His targets are the kids he didn’t finish with that first night long ago. The only thing standing in his way are Denver and Jayne. And as they look deeper into what took place that night they find out that more happened than they were aware of. The question is how do you stop a killer who was able to survive all that should have killed him?

That is actually a bare boned description of the film. It is fleshed out with a number of well-done gore effects and some stand out acting by all involved. In addition to that it provides a new killer for a new age, a boogeyman that seems unstoppable that we haven’t seen in a while. It is the other end of the spectrum from Adam Green’s HATCHET films in that this killer is more urban and motivated than Green’s backwoods killer. Both come from those films of the 70s/80s and pay tribute to those earlier films.

There will be some who will fault this film by comparing it directly with those earlier ones. To those people I say stop and watch the film and forget those from the past. Judge this one on its own faults and merits but let the past stay in the past. Director Patrick Lussier (who gave us the remake of MY BLOODY VALENTINE and DRIVE ANGRY) has done a solid job here keeping the viewer guessing as to what will happen next and questioning how this killer can accomplish the things he does, from surviving early in the film to being able to outmaneuver the police. It is an original story that deserved to play in more theaters when released and should be discovered now on disc.

As a fan of horror films I know I’ll be watching this one again. That doesn’t happen often with me these days. It provided enough nostalgic appeal to me while at the same time being a movie unto itself. For those two reasons alone I would suggest you enjoy this one more than once. 

Click here to order.