Review: Parts Unknown

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2021
Images from the Internet

Parts Unknown
Directed by Richard Chandler
Boston Film Family; Wild Eye Releasing
117 minutes, 2018 / 2020
www.facebook.com/PartsUnknownMovie/
www.bostonfilmfamily.com/
www.wildeyereleasing.com 

There is a natural correlation between professional wrestling and horror cinema. Just seek out releases from Mexico, even from the 1960s. Sure, lots of films use actual wrestlers in tough guy roles. For example, in mainstream there are Dwayne Johnson “The Rock,” “Rowdy” Roddy Piper and Terry Bollea aka Hulk Hogan; but there is also an impact from luche libre made in indie films, such as Gene Snitskey and Samu Anoa’i.

William DeCoff

For this mash-up, its William DeCoff, whose multi-title winning wrestling name was Sean “Battleship” O’Reilly, playing scarred patriarch Hermann Von Strasser (perhaps a nod to DeCoff’s mentor, Fritz von Erich?). He angrily struggles with his place in the modern tech world, where people at matches are more focused on scrolling their cell phones than on what is happening in the ring. I understand this: if you go to a taping of a live television production, be it a talk show, game show or “Saturday Night Live,” you will see people in the audience watching the monitors rather than the real-life action happening a few feet from them. Fascinating to see. But, as always, I digress…

It seems the angrier Hermann gets, the more his western Massachusetts accent flairs, which is delightful, especially in moments when he says things like “We’re all paht of this now... capisce?!” Then again, he says cringey stuff like, “I gotta get some money from the Jew,” meaning sleezy wrestling promoter Gary Wilkerstein (Ralph Regine). It’s plain obvious that nearly the entire Von Strasser family is pretty, well, not nice people. While patriarch Hermann (DeCoff) is a piece of work and his insane/infantile brother Harvey (Alexander Hauck) is a murderous ruffie-rapist who wears a MAGA hat to show just how mentally “off” he is, the scarily insane one is cute, pill-poppin’ sister Kitty (Sarah Michelle), who has a vein of evil that is to the core. Just look at her eyes and the way she twirls her hair… oh, and how much she gets off on people getting killed, even kin. To be fair, though, most of the characters are pretty scuzzy, though one possible shining star of decency may be wrestler Lacey (soapmaker Lizzie Havoc). Let’s see where that goes.

Lizzie Havoc and Sarah Michelle

So, what happens to this evil family when they are asked by some diminutive demonic creature called The Holiness (voiced by wrestler Jake “The Snake” Roberts and embodied by Christina Costello, who is 5-foot tall, the same as my mom; but again, I digress…) for blood sacrifices? Hermann complies, making a deal with the demon with “I live for blood.” And a murder spree is on its way. But honestly, from the time before this, it’s pretty obvious that they don’t need to promise a demon, they’re pretty violent from the beginning.

Christina Costello

I believe this is taking place in 2033, from a radio announcement, which would explain the neon lighting everywhere that’s right out of Café Flesh (1982). In fact, there is a lot of this that reminds me of that film, as well as the director’s (Steven Sayadian) follow-up, Dr. Caligari (1989), including the synth score and the camera angles/editing. Like Café Flesh, this is a film, on a secondary level, about voyeurism and the audience’s lack of ability, which is appropriate in today’s world, never mind 2033. An example of this is a wrestling match between Lacey and Kitty, which becomes downright brutal, yet the audience is cheering it on in flaccid fascination, reminiscent of a theme from Garfunkel and Oats’ “Sports Go Sports”: “You watch genetically superior people/Do things you never will.” There’s a nice nod to Gladiator (2000) to put an emphasis to this.

Alexandra Cipolla

To add onto this story, there is Mary Price (Alexandra Cipolla, who was also good in The Trees Have Eyes, 2020; reviewed HERE) as an undead police detective and possible goddess on the trail of the killer family for justice and revenge. And damn, I’m not even half way through this film.

Lizzie Havoc

While this isn’t necessarily a sequel to the director, Richard Chandler’s previous film, Witch Hunters (2016; reviewed HERE), there is a connection, as they both take place in the same universe of witches and demons, with a character from the previous film, Dominic Damarus (Chandler) making an appearance, and Lacey is the daughter of Sheriff Tormada in that film. There is also a cameo reference to an earlier Chandler film which I have not seen, Gilgamesh (2014).

As is common with Witch Hunters, there appear to be no separation of acts, and the action flows constantly, be it wrestling or physical havoc involving guns, knives, and even a wood chipper. The gore is fun and not necessarily over the top in looks, but the action is at times brutal and the mere suggestion of it is enough to make most (especially women) squirm. There is violence perpetrated by everyone and on everyone, but it’s particular when it comes to women, which I won’t go into detail. Speaking of women, there is lots of skin exposure (one male at a distance), especially the northern territory, be it cleavage, under-hang, or just toplessness. Men are killed, but women are sexually harmed. I’m not going to take a side on the argument, but I am sure there may be bound to be one if you see this as a couple.

My issue with the film, mostly, is just the pure length of it, at three minutes shy of two hours. Sure, the acting is all over the place, and the storyline sometimes gets convoluted, but that’s the nature of indie cinema and you can take it or leave it, but the sheer length is… well, it could be edited down a bit without losing any of the piledriver impact.

Review: Witch Hunters

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2021
Images from the Internet

Witch Hunters (aka Witch Hunt)
Directed by Richard Chandler
Boston Film Family; Gravitas Ventures
74 minutes, 2016 / 2020
www.bostonfilmfamily.com/

This film started its brief and succinct life a few years ago under the title Witch Hunt, at 53 minutes in length. A few additional shots over the years and now it is the full length Witch Hunters. And that concludes the history lesson part of this review.

 There are multiple substories going on here that will, of course, merge at some point. First, there’s the brother and sister witch hunters (shades of 2013’s Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters) from Bosnia and Herzegovina, who wear Hells Angels-type leather jackets that denote their profession: Dominic Damarus (director Richard “Rick” Chandler, who played Hansel in James Balsamo’s The Litch in 2018) and mute Morrigan Ramsey (Carver Riot). They slaughter – usually via knives – witches.

Richard Chandler and Carver Riot

Second, there is the coven of said witches, led by a literally bloodthirsty piece of work (Lilith Astaroth, from the metal band Sorrowseed, who was in Nun of That and the recent Blood Pi), who is not given a name. This is more the traditional film coven, like you may see in Suspiria (1977), Rosemary’s Baby (1968), or The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973), rather than the cutsie ones of The Craft (1996), for example. They huddle over their victims and sacrifice them…yes, using knives.

The third follows a priest and failed exorcist, Father James Costello (Graham King). He’s having an existential crisis, questioning his faith and his once suppressed gay sexuality. He is one mixed up dude. Lastly, there is Sheriff Tormada (Tony Ramos Wright), possibly named after Torquemada, who devised the worst of the Spanish Inquisition (as Mel Brooks said in 1981’s History of the World, Part I, “You can’t talk him outta anything!”); after all, the original tag line for the film is “The Inquisition Returns.” He is a murderous hedonist, riding on his power trip and will take down whomever he likes, just for the momentary thrill of it.

Lilith Astraroth and her Cult

Religion as supernatural has really become almost a sub-genre of late. I am not talking about the general possession type which has been a staple topic since The Exorcist (1973), but rather evil in religious forms, such as The Nun (2018), Beyond Hell (2020), or Red Letters (2020). Here we delve into the Satanic, more than, say, Satan proper. All of these tropes have been used multiple times in previous films, but combining them all successfully creates something new-ish. The question is whether or not it is successful, of course.

Every character suffers from affliction of at least a few of the seven deadly sins, especially those of the flesh. There is a lot of cleavage, nudity, and sex of various forms with numerous participants of either or both genders. For some reason, I find that the films out of New England, specifically between Boston (the environs where this was filmed) and Providence, RI, especially, have been recently focusing more on pan-sexual play, which I think is great. There is as much LGBTQ+ lust here as straight, as it should be. While that is refreshing, it’s definitely more sexual than sensual, as it’s more a meeting of bodies than hearts. There is also a lot of blood, with little gristle, which is also nice. Most of the SFX appears to be practical, rather than digital.

Graham King

What we are presented with is a series of set pieces, where storylines and characters sometimes overlaps like a Venn Diagram. While it loses some on story narration fluidity, what is positive about it is that not all the action is displaced into sections, such as nothing happening in the first act (usually about 20-30 minutes), little in the second act (about 40 minutes), and then crammed into the third act (the rest of the remaining time). Here, the sex, drugs and violence are nicely dispersed throughout. I can live with that.

In this story, the women are pure, be they good or evil; they know who they are and are consistent. The men, however, are contradictions, behaving in ways that betray (or believe it to be so) what they represent.

And when all the stories truly converge near the end, as they are wont to do in multi-line plots, the question of who will live to kill again and who will die to – err – not, is pretty well done, as the viewer is not totally sure who will come out on top. After all, in most straight, big budgeters, the flawed always fall, but in genre films, that is a gray area, thankfully.

For me, I can live with the questionably narrative storyline, seeing each set piece on its own as well as part of the zeitgeist, helped by the editing and cinematography. The “quality” of the image degrades a bit in the darker scenes, but that is common with some cameras (to paraphrase, “the fault…lies within the equipment, not in the director”).

That being said, the weakest point here is the acting, which is often wooden, or over-emoted. Some actors fare pretty well, but one in particular – and I won’t name names – was sincerely off the mark into overacting.

This may sound strange, but I feel like I was underserved on Father Costello’s story. The IMDB Storyline makes it sound like he was the central focus, but of the main characters – and there are at least five – his is one that feels like there could be a lot more. Perhaps a prequel, if not a sequel? I would watch that. Meanwhile, make sure you sit through the credits for this one.