All posts by Rod Lott

Sci-Fi & Fantasy

The Mutations (1974)

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In the 1970s, a television commercial for a margarine indistinguishable from butter played ad nauseam, pushing its tagline into everyday culture: “It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” In The Mutations, Donald Pleasence learns why (minus the vegetable oil spreads, of course).

As Dr. Nolter, university professor and maddest of mad scientists, he seeks to create a new species by fusing man with plant. If that means “recruiting” his own students for hands-on testing, much to the detriment of enrollment numbers, so be it.

Notler acquires specimen by enlisting the kidnapping services of little person Michael Dunn (Frankenstein’s Castle of Freaks) and hulking, hatted monstrosity Tom Baker (weeks from donning the fedora as TV’s Doctor Who). Those mismatched men co-own a circus of “freaks,” which includes a bearded lady, frog man, gator woman and so on. Whichever experiments fail, Nolter gifts back to them — a textbook example of mutually beneficial business.

Rare is the film with the power to immerse the viewer in its environment. In the case of The Mutations, however, said surroundings are a rather dull college science lecture we can’t leave. The first 10 minutes of the movie pairs Pleasence’s (Halloween) wilted yammering with time-lapse footage of blooming flora and sprouting shrooms. The pace picks up a bit once Nolter’s in his lab, feeding live bunnies to his giant Venus flytrap, a monstrosity so shoddily constructed, it looks like an Audrey II from a Little Shop of Horrors production staged by the Kids of Widney High.

Like Nolter attempting to splice this with that, helmer Jack Cardiff (The Girl on the Motorcycle) attempts the same in merging the science and circus plots. Neither quite works on its own, and especially not together — I mean, they do in that a result results, but it hardly operates as intended. In fact, it killed Cardiff’s short-lived directorial career, sending him back to the more fertile ground of cinematography.

Also known as The Freakmaker, a moniker that can’t help but make you think of Mentos, this out-of-touch creature feature isn’t exactly blossoming with surprises; when Scott Antony (Dead Cert) jokes in Act 1 after class, “I don’t want to be a vegetable,” we instantly know his fate. Others with potential for plucking include stunning Hammer starlets Julie Ege (The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires), Olga Anthony (Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter) and Jill Haworth (Brides of Dracula), plus sword-and-sandal refugee Brad Harris (Goliath Against the Giants), who also produced. —Rod Lott

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Action

Stand Alone (1985)

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A veteran of World War II, Lou (Charles Durning, Dark Night of the Scarecrow) just wants to live a quiet life and do things no more strenuous than teaching his grandson (Cory “Bumper” Yothers, Dreamscape) how to operate an RC tank that could actually kill someone. Those retirement plans look to topple after one trip to his pal’s diner, where Lou witnesses a double-donut shoplifter get machine-gunned to death by a drug gang. Oops.

Sure enough, Lou is targeted all over town, primarily by the gang’s gangly, glaring leader (Luis Contreras, Dollman), which begs the question, “Why keep going into town?” And that begs a second question: Did Durning read the script before joining the project? Because he strikes me as the kind of guy who would be concerned over the sheer number of pages containing the phrase “Lou runs.”

Once he fingers the perps in a police lineup, the gang members — all ethnic, of course — head for his home. That’s where the heart is, as well as a box containing Lou’s WWII weapons and whatnot. Lou shoe-polishes his face (not enough to get canceled), Home Alones his house and readies that bayonet so he may — cue the title — Stand Alone. Well, if you don’t the assistance from his police buddy (Pam Grier, Pet Sematary: Bloodlines), that is.

Stand Alone plays a lot like that same year’s Death Wish 3, if Charles Bronson had a basketball-sized pelvis. This Lone Star State-lensed revenger arrived first, by a mere two months. Curiously, New World Pictures marketed the pic more akin to Walking Tall, complete with Durning clutching a wooden bat as big as Joe Don Baker’s hittin’ stick. —Rod Lott

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Thriller

Bone Lake (2024)

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Bone Lake opens with a naked couple running through the woods as they attempt to dodge arrows shot from an unknown pursuer’s crossbow. Movie, you have my attention.

And that’s merely the prologue. The film’s primary lovers are Sage (Maddie Hasson, Malignant) and Diego (Marco Pigossi, Amazon’s Gen V). He’s planning to use their romantic getaway to a lakeside rental home — a mansion, practically — as the pic-perfect opportunity to propose.

Good intentions go sideways with the arrival of a second couple, Cin (Andra Nechita, Bad Teacher) and Will (Alex Roe, Rings), who also have reserved the place. A quick squabble yields a quick compromise: The place is big enough for the foursome — and then some — what with all its extra rooms and a hallway leading to three locked doors.

Starting with Barbarian, this is the fourth movie I’ve seen to use a double-booked abode as a springboard, so something’s in the water culturally. Bone Lake is the first to make it kinky, putting T&A into the BnB. Rather than settle for being your average erotic thriller going through the motions (like up top, from behind, on a car hood, etc.), the screenplay by Suicide Blonde’s Joshua Friedlander chooses to lean harder into gamesmanship than genitalia. With creativity, director Mercedes Bryce Morgan (Spoonful of Sugar) deftly choreographs the horror-adjacent tale’s balance of dark comedy, sexual politics and fireplace implements.

I’d argue that its “twist” is purposely transparent, given how the film is driven more by characterization than plot. For example, Diego is set up as a wannabe novelist who may lack the talent to fulfill his dream, with Sage not only winning the bread, but feeling her boyfriend plays things too safely, both on the page and in their relationship.

But don’t let that make Bone Lake sound like therapy homework. Rest assured, it kicks out the jam of The Exploited’s “Sex & Violence” for good reason — and twice! All four leads have a bloody good time to ensure you do as well. It doesn’t break ground, but it waters it enough to getcha wet. —Rod Lott

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Horror

Party Crasher: My Bloody Birthday (1995)

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Henry Primo’s turning a suh-weet 16! And thanks to his wealthy parents, he’s throwing quite the rager at a local motel, complete with live band, swimming pool and rented rooms. Maybe — just maybe — Henry (Randy Ackerman) will finally get that cute Becky (Laura Sellers) into the (possibly bedbug-ridden) sack.

Or perhaps Henry’s drink will be drugged, causing him not to pass out, but to slaughter seven classmates. After all, the movie under examination is called Party Crasher: My Bloody Birthday, suggesting creator Mark Mason (2003’s The Prize Fighter) couldn’t pick between two titles, so he used both.

Fast-forward 15 years, the now-obese adult Henry (Mason himself) and his Hannibal Lecter half-face mask are discharged from a high-security loony bin to his parents’ home. They’ve “spared no expense” to turn a wing of their abode into a replica of the mental hospital for Henry’s comfort. Because he no longer speaks, Henry communicates solely via pen and paper, like when he’s hungry and writes, “BIG MACS.” His mother asks, “How many?” and he responds with the number “8.”

Perhaps his atrocious dietary requests fuel his ESP abilities? Yes, Henry also possesses the power of ESP. It never comes into play.

Well, Mom and Dad must have skimped on something in the security features, because police are called to investigate a message left on the now-married Becky’s front door … in his own poop: “BECKY WHY DID DO THIS ME.” So many words scrawled so large must have required a great deal of fecal matter, but remember: eight Big Macs. The math tracks. (Plus, this thing was shot in Tulsa, in a state with an obesity rate near 40%.)

Anyway, everyone’s on edge until Henry saves a little girl from a dog mauling and all is forgiven. Naturally, his former classmates — well, the surviving ones — decide to bestow him with an award of courage at the high school reunion. This goes over great until Kizay (Tom Wescott), the Mickey-slipper from the jinxed birthday party, is able to surreptitiously attach jumper cables to Henry’s wheelchair, shocking him into a hulking monster of rage that no amount of all-beef patties can pacify.

You can’t blame Mason for trying. But you can blame him for failing. He’s not just the “star” of Party Crasher: My Bloody Birthday, but also its producer, editor, writer, director and, somehow, second-unit director. —Rod Lott

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Action

The Old Woman with the Knife (2025)

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With believable stoicism, Lee Hye-yeong (2008’s The Devil’s Game) plays the title character of The Old Woman with the Knife, the arthritic assassin Hornclaw. She’s prepping for One Last Job for her employer, which bills itself as a pest-control agency specializing in “eradicating malignant vermin” — in other words, translated to Dexter-ese, people who deserve it.

Or at least that’s how it used to operate, giving the noble Hornclaw another reason to get out of the hit-lady game. She holds distinct disdain for their latest hire, the young, brash, arrogant and unpredictable Bullfight (Kim Sung-cheol, Search Out). Director and co-writer Min Kyu-dong (Memento Mori) wants to keep you guessing whether Bullfight is friend or foe. And guess you will because the movie suffers from a narrative so scattershot, the story doesn’t settle into place until its first hour passes.

Needlessly convoluted, this South Korean film isn’t strong in the engagement department. Sure, the action sequences give it an occasional bump, such as Hornclaw’s version of Oldboy’s famous hallway brawl or being buried alive with thousands of maggots atop her. But these respites stand little chance of sticking when Min’s primary concern is shoving recurring metaphors under our noses again and again.

As if the title, Hornclaw’s impending retirement, Hornclaw’s involuntary shaky hands or Bullfight belittling her with the “hag” label don’t already give it away, our protagonist is elderly. Uncertain you got that and what aging means, Min fills The Old Woman with the Knife’s script with persistent and repeated discussion of bruised fruit no one purchases, injured strays no one adopts and expired waste awaiting disposal. It’s like italicizing what’s already in bold, then underlining it, circling it in red and highlighting it in neon yellow. And maybe even pink and orange, too, jussssst to be safe.

We get it. Boy, do we get it. As Bullfight utters, “So much for being a legend.” —Rod Lott

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