Review: Alien 2: On Earth

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2018
Images from the Internet


Alien 2: On Earth
Directed by Ciro Ippolito (as Sam Cromwell)
Midnight Legacy
85 minutes, USD $19.95
Midnight-legacy.com
MVDvisual.com

Fulci. Argento. Deodato. These are names that will sound familiar to those who find joy in the Italian horror sub-genre generally referred to as giallo. The more current ultra-horror films such as Hostel, Saw, and Wolf Creek, may not have existed without these extreme and surgically efficient foreign bloodfests (then again, would the giallo have seen any light without the likes of American pioneer Hershell Gordon Lewis? But I digress…).

Perhaps the biggest promoter of these European films, especially in the New World, was the advent of the new videotape market. During the 1980s, the two largest renters were the extreme horror films and porn. Part of the reason was accessibility. Sure, one could have gone to any of the Times Square theaters and gotten their fill, but anyone away from these kinds of grindhouse theaters would probably be clueless. But then there was the VHS…

One of the problems of seeing these films via video in those heady days of the ‘80 is that the ever-hungry market would release just about anything that might sell, even if it was an incomplete copy; sometimes the story made no sense at all due to sections being removed by a specific European country’s moral codes. This may vary from country to country, so there were many different versions of these releases floating around.

Alien 2: On Earth (originally Alien 2 Sulla Terra) is a supposed sequel to the original Alien, from 1980. While never having an official theater showing stateside, like many of these foreign films, it was released under various names, including Alien Terror and Strangers. Another quirk of the early VHS days was the tendency of the production companies to call just about any film a sequel to anything that did well at the box office. This is a bit of an exception though, because director Ciro Ippolito (who also went by the pseudonym Sam Cromwell for this, his first directorial effort) meant this as an “unofficial” sequel, even though the bonds to the original James Cameron opus are negligible, at best (i.e., human hosts and snake-like creatures eventually popping out).

Alien 2 is, in hindsight, best described as having aspects of Alien, the underground spelunking death-trap of The Cave or The Depth, just a smidgen of The Night of the Living Dead, and the deserted streets scenarios of, well, so many others. The story is pretty simple: an American spacecraft returns to earth, and somehow, between starting its descent and the at-sea rescue (great Mercury-period stock footage is used during the opening shots), the astronauts have mysteriously disappeared. Around the same time, a strange sparkling rock is found by a group of friends (with big period hair, both female and male) in a small town near San Diego, before they head into a large cave system they plan to explore. For some reason, the main character, Thelma (Belinda Mayne), who is sometimes psychic and can tell that something is going to happen (unless it ruins a plot surprise moment, apparently), takes the football-sized rock, puts it in her backpack, and takes it with her from the surface into the cave (why not leave it in the car rather than schlepping it?). This shiny stone ends up actually being an egg for creatures brought back on the spaceship, and when it comes out of the rubbery-looking stone its destination is the host’s body.

From there, it’s a race to get to get out of the cave through alternative directions before becoming lunch. And once outside, will it be much better? Yes, there is gore, as a very puppet-looking creatures busts through a head with an eyeball hanging, or a head slides off a body (both seen in the trailer), for example. Despite the blood and guts, it is more really? than stomach-churning (unless you’re sensitive to these things). However, it is still a pleasure to see devices used rather than CGI.

Oh, and the inconsistent mistakes are wonderful. For example, while running through a supposedly empty city, as the camera follows the main character(s) while a street is crossed, the viewer can see a red light down the block and a car with its brake-light on. When the light turns green, the brake-light goes off and the car starts to move.

Just as with manga cinema, there are definite cues that this is giallo, almost like a checklist. There’s the close-up of the face with a light on it while a mysterious wind blows the flowing hair, the even closer shots of wide-eyes (though the “whites-only” eyes, usually a standard, is missing here), the shrill and two-tone electronic music (ooo-waaaa-oooo-waaaa), the shaky monster-cam view, and the very quick zoom in and out in Dr. Tongue’s House of Horror style. And like many Japanese films, the dubbed, over-enunciated voices are familiar to anyone who has watched a few of these films. In much of this release, while it is obvious that the actors are speaking English, the vocal track is recorded over back into English nevertheless.

Mayne’s character is the only one with any substance (relatively speaking), though there is no history given to her. Everyone else, including her (boyfriend?) (husband?), are inconsequential, or at least the equivalent of the members of the away crew of the Enterprise who were not in the main cast.

Okay, this is a silly film, granted, but as giallo goes, it is a fun flick that will fill an appetite for this genre. Yeah, if you’re a fan of these films as I am, leave your suspension of any disbelief before you slip this disc into your player, and you’re bound to have a fun time. Oh, here are some official things to note about this particular release: it’s in both DVD and Blu-Ray, it’s the first release by new company Midnight Legacy (let’s hope they let a lot more come our way), and it’s widescreen, taken from the original 35mm negative (rather than just copied from one of the myriad of VHS releases) They claim it is the most complete version available. All good news for giallo fans around the world.

So, grab some ‘corn, because it’s just what’s in order for watching this release.

This was originally published on FFanzeen.blogspot.com

Review: Hanging Shadows: Perspectives on Italian Horror Cinema

Text © Richard Gary/Indie Horror Films, 2014
Images from the Internet

                            

Hanging Shadows: Perspectives on Italian Cinema

Written, produced and directed by Paolo Fazzini          
Elite Entertainment         
60 minutes, 2005 / 2013    
www.MVDvisual.com

Before the VHS explosion of the ‘80s, it was rare to see an Italian horror films either on the screen or especially television.  What we did get was usually directed by Mario Bava, such as La maschera del demonio, aka The Mask of Satan, though it as more commonly known as Black Sunday (1960), and the terrifying I tre volti della paura, or as we knew it, Black Sabbath (1963), possibly Boris Karloff’s last truly scary role.

Of course, we kids didn’t know it was Italian, we just knew it was dubbed. Most of the films shown on this side of the Atlantic whatever the presentation medium, were highly edited, thanks to nudity, blood, and the last remnants of the Hollywood Code system. Besides, most horror viewers back then were teenage couples with the guys looking for reasons to put their arms around their dates.

In college, during the late 1970s, I was introduced to New Wave Italian cinema, such as Luchiano Visconti, Roberto Rossellini, and the realism auteur Michael Antonioni. They were great, technically superb, but the left me kind of cold. I wasn’t sure why I was supposed to care about many of the characters and left me asking, “che cosa?” But it wasn’t until a few short years later that I discovered the piasan niche for which I was looking.

Italian horror cinema, as I said, really came into its golden days in the 1980s, when video stores were springing up every few blocks, its clients hungry for new products, with the two biggest sellers being horror and porn. It was easy to walk into any store and find campy and bloody delights. Names started to be known, like Leo Fulci, Dario Argento, and Lamberto Bava. The posters alone would become iconic, such as Fulci’s Zombie (aka Zombi 2, 1979 .

What made these films so popular was the sheer audacity of them. Many of them were silly, campy, or made no sense, but we later found out that was because they were edited, and usually had multiple names with each version being slightly different. We were seeing lots of gore, but distributors seemed to think that the bleak endings would not fit well with Middle America. It took many years to finally see the real end of The Gates of Hell (aka City of the Living Dead aka Paura nella citta dei morti veventi, 1980); in fact, it wasn’t until it was released on DVD.

The gore effects in these films were stunning: maggots falling out of zombie eyeholes, eyes yanked into shards of wood, bodies pulled apart, bugs eating away at flesh, heads pulled through a drill press, and blood spontaneously pouring out of eyes. Again, they ran from realistic to “fakey,” but it was always mechanical rather than digital. I used to love to try and figure out how they did it. I remember seeing a film where a women spews out her entire intestinal tract and laughing, and then not being able to look at work the next day when someone cut her finger.

If you talk to most of the up-and-coming filmmakers I’ve reviewed, such as Sean Weathers, Dustin Wayde Mills and Richard Marr-Griffin, they will all proudly bear witness to their Italian horror viewing backgrounds. This genre’s popularity has not changed over time, either. Just this past fall, a pal had a day of zombie film viewing with his friends (I was included), and two of them (Zombie and Michele Soavi’s Cemetery Man [aka Delamorte Delamore, 1994]) were of Italian origin, and it was still visceral.

This hour-long documentary is an Italian import as well, created nearly a decade ago, but only recently released in a non-academic forum. We meet many of the directors, writers, and special effect artists that contributed to the field, most of them among the most cherished by the genre’s fans, such as Argento, Bava, and late-comer Soavi.

The film explores the methods behind the madness. For example Soavi explains he hates horror films, but is more into realistic images, so cannibals, rather than zombies, eating people is not horror, and he posits that he does not like the title of horror he is often labeled. .He interestingly comments on the comparative and real graphic images often shown on the television news.

Lamberto Bava tells how he came up with the idea for Demons (aka Demoni, 1985), comparing it to mass media: The first film takes place in a movie house where the demons come out of the projected images; in Demons 2 (aka Demoni 2… l’incubo ritorna, 1985), they come out of the even more accessible television; and in a planned but unrealized third film, it was to come out of the press.

In Italian with English subtitles, the talking parts are pretty short and jump from person to person often, though gratefully the subject’s name is presented often. It comes out a bit disjointed, but once you get the rhythm, it’s fascinating.

Mixed in with the taking heads are many shots from the films, usually the gore scenes and often with nudity, though it’s rare that any clip lasts longer than 10 seconds, and there is hardly any that have dialog.

There are two extras here, focusing in on one director each

The first is of my favorite director of the period, “Leo Fulchi, Italian Godfather of Gore.” Lasting a mere six minutes, it delves into the man rather than the movies, which is great. One of the three people discussing Fulchi (d. 1996) is his daughter, Antonella. The second short is “Mario Bava: Wizard of Fear” is slightly shorter, but again, three people describe Bava (d. 1980) and part of his process, such as his use of quick close-ups, that was copied into spaghetti westerns. The main clip they show is from Black Sunday¸ as they call it here, with the lovely Barbara Steele.  

If you’re a fan of these kinds of film, and we are legion, this is a must see. Otherwise, you might find the visuals quite shocking.

Bonus videos: