Leviathan (1989)  

You might think 10 years is a long time to wait before ripping off a wildly successful movie like Alien, but Leviathan was released only three years after the even more wildly successful Aliens, so while the concept wasn’t fresh, it was at least fresh on people’s minds.

One of a half-dozen underwater sci-fi thrillers released in 1989, Leviathan takes place in an undersea mining facility where the crew’s been living for three months. Toward the end of their shift, they discover a derelict vessel whose crew was destroyed by an unusual, dare-we-say-“alien” life form. One of the miners accidentally brings it back on board their ship, hidden inside his body until it’s ready to pop out and terrorize the rest of the crew who are stuck there because the company they work for knows more about all this than they’re letting on.
 
Leviathan does have some significant, although superficial-to-the-story differences from Alien, however. H.R. Giger famously designed the creature in Alien; Leviathan’s beast was created by the great Stan Winston, who unfortunately wasn’t doing his best work here. The early stages of the monster look cool, like a killer eel or something, but as it matures, it turns into an asymmetrical version of the Creature from the Black Lagoon-type character from Mad Monster Party.
 
A better difference from Alien is Leviathan’s cast. The movie is watchable mostly for the gorgeous Amanda Pays and her irresistible accent (and underwear), but also because it has Robocop, Col. Trautman, Winston from Ghostbusters, Marv from Home Alone and Callie’s dad from Grey’s Anatomy trying to fight a fish-man. When I think about it that way, it’s actually kind of awesome. —Michael May

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Tourist Trap (1979)

“Oh, this can’t be scary. Old movies aren’t scary like Insidious,” said my tween daughter as she entered the room just after the opening credits of Tourist Trap had finished. One minute and one mannequin appearance later, she bolted for the door.

I wouldn’t qualify Tourist Trap as scary, but several moments of it are extra-creepy and genuinely unsettling. Mannequins and dolls that suddenly, inexplicably move tend to be. This film’s killer even wears a mask that covers all but his lower jaw, which is also unnerving, especially since it makes him look like Leatherface (albeit the transvestite one from Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation).

The titular site refers to Slausen’s Lost Oasis, an off-the-beaten path, now-closed-to-the-public wax museum owned by the lonely widowed Mr. Slausen (The Rifleman‘s Chuck Connors, giving it his square-jawed all). A group of vacationing youngsters (including Tanya Roberts in a tube top) end up there after an irreparable tire strands them. Bet you know what happens from there. (And in case you don’t, then welcome to your first horror movie, and know that they’re terrorized by those things that department stores use to sell you the latest fashions.)

Directed by David Schmoeller (The Seduction, Puppet Master), this decent, semi-novel, inexplicably-PG supernatural slasher comes from the era when Charles Band productions not only didn’t suck, but actually played theaters. If you can remember those golden days of Ghoulies and Troll and this, congrats! You’re old. (Meet you for dinner at Furr’s at 4.) —Rod Lott

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The Black Cobra 2 (1988)

I’d like to think The Black Cobra 2 is the only Fred Williamson movie in which he wears a Members Only jacket and with a preponderance of cowbell on the soundtrack, but since there’s a number in the title, I can’t be too sure.

Fred stars as Malone, a Chicago cop who gets in trouble for exploding a bad guy’s helmet-clad head like a watermelon with a single bullet, just following perhaps the longest opening credits known to man (eight minutes!). So his cantankerous, overweight police chief sends Fred to Manila to hook up with Interpol office Nicholas Hammond (several hills below The Sound of Music and, for that matter, his Spider-Man TV series). To the filmmakers’ credit, it accurately captures enough of the Philippines’ local flavor to make you never ever want to go there.

The Italian-backed actioner almost seems like two movies for the pain of one. In the first part, Fred falls for a buck-toothed, barfy faced girl whose con-man father was found murdered (“I hate to be the barrier of bad news,” Fred says; couldn’t they have dubbed that over?) and then rescues her after she’s kidnapped by slimy terrorists looking for $10,000.

Then she’s out of the picture and part two begins, with said slimy terrorists holding 350 schoolchildren hostage. Since one of them is Hammond’s short-pantsed son, Nick and Fred rub black greasepaint on their faces (well, okay, just Nick) and get all Die Hard-y as only a film like Black Cobra 2 can’t. I’d like to think they don’t show a single one of the 350 kids because of budgetary reasons, but since they didn’t bother to overdub Fred’s gaffe earlier, I can’t be too sure. —Rod Lott

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The Prowler (1981)

Joseph Zito’s The Prowler is a refreshing work. Whereas every World War II vet I’ve encountered mistakes something as insignificant as a friendly nod of the head and respectful smile as “tell me your life story in long, agonizing anecdotes, and spare no details,” the Dubya-Dubya-Two vet here doesn’t speak at all. Plus, you can’t see his face, so you aren’t distracted by liver spots. So what if he also carries a big bayonet? Doesn’t that trump having to hear yet another yarn about fapping to Betty Grable pin-ups in the barracks?

It does, even if this vet holds quite the grudge (or, ju-on, if you prefer). After receiving a Dear John letter from his best gal while he’s overseas, the guy returns home to find her necking with a new beau at the graduation dance, so our vet puts a pitchfork right through ’em both. That’ll show ‘er!

Thirty years later, the town holds the dance again for the first time post-body count, and wouldn’t you know it? The vet is back, and he’s got a hankerin’ to kill all those meddling kids! Perhaps most notably, a busty co-ed gets all points of a pitchfork in her tummy while she’s soaping up in the shower, and Zito doesn’t dare puss out by cutting away.

That’d mean squat if the effects sucked, but they do anything but. Tom Savini outdoes himself here, crafting practical gore scenes that look so realistic, the payoff they provide is worth Zito’s sometimes too-long build-up of suspense. The director next did Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, arguably the best of that series, and the rest is splatter-flick history. —Rod Lott

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