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.

 

Review: Mark of the Devil

Text © Richard Gary/Indie Horror Films, 2013

Images from the Internet

Mark of the Devil: Yack Pack
Directed by Michael Armstrong
Cheezy Flicks Entertainment
96 minutes, 1970 / 2006 / 2012
Cheezyflicks.com
MVDvisual.com

This German film, originally known as Hexen bis aufs Blut gequält, is a classic in early torture porn. Obviously modeled after the increasingly sexualized Hammer Films of the time, it incorporated the ethos of the graphic violence of likes of Hershell Gordon Lewis.

Taking place in some European country - supposedly England, I believe, considering one of the characters played by Herbert Lom (d. 2012), is named Lord Chamberlain - it takes place around the 17th Century, a time of witch hunters (a role both Vincent Price and Peter Cushing played for Hammer).

Reggie Nalder

The small town that is the focal point of the film is under the thumb of the despotic local hunter, who uses his power to get what he wants, be it money, power, or sex. He needs to keep this control because he is one ugly dude. Named Albino, which strangely he is not, he has a face that was ravaged by fire (in real life) channeled by the underrated Reggie Nalder, (d. 1991), who made a career playing the heavy.

While Albino is supposed to follow Church law and have indictments and trials before the torture and executions, he just takes what he wants, and then burns anyone who he wants out of the way in an auto da fe (look it up). But his power comes under scrutiny with the arrival of said Lord Chamberlain, the governing Church-appointed witch hunter, as well as his student and an underling (who has as much morals as Albino).

Udo Kier

The student and hero of the piece, Christian (of course), is played by now-cult actor, Udo Kier, who would rise to fame just a few short years later as the star of such classics of bad cinema, Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein (1973) and Andy Warhol’s Dracula (1974). He looks much younger in this film; he was quite handsome in the two latter releases, but his blue eyes and baby face are stunningly handsome. I’m not attracted, I’m jealous.



Olivera Katarina

Catching the fancy of Albino and Christian is Vanessa, played by the very heavingly-buxomed, and actually not as pretty as Kier, the Serbian actor Olivera Katarina (last name credited as Vuco here). When Albino can’t have her, she’s declared a witch, and love-interest Christian is out to save her.

The secondary plot, which has some historical truth to it from what I remember, is that the Church gave the landed gentry who opposed the high taxes or balked at oppressive religious laws a choice: turn over their money and land to the Church, or be tortured and condemned to be killed and the Church would get their holdings anyway. That is Chamberlain’s purpose, apparently, which is a turn because at first you are led to believe that he is a savior, rather than an every worse criminal than what we are introduced to in the beginning. Whether he is out for himself or as a direct edict from the Vatican is something unexplained). This is also part of why the US Constitution has a separation of Church and State (the first government to ever do so).

It is sort of like the 1975 James Clavell novel Shogun, where the reader is introduced to the local government which has power of life and death, and then as you work your way through the society with the main occidental character, you find that they were just minuscule in reality to the larger hierarchy. The Church of those times was like that, with those in charge with absolute power (i.e., as Lord John Acton correctly posited in 1887, “…absolute power corrupts absolutely), and yet there were those more powerful above them.

I believe that while this is true, it is especially accurate when embodied by a religious order, who can justify it in their own minds as God makes right. The nastiest person I ever met was a born-again Christian who firmly believe that God wanted her to have what she wanted by any means necessary, even if it meant stabbing co-workers she didn’t like in the back (as she tried and failed with me; I guess God wanted her so bad, He had her join Him in her mid-20s via cancer – note that I believe if there is a God, there is no gender involved, so I’m just using her terminology). The Judeo-Christian West believes that Muslims are alone in their “God is Great” jihads, but Christianity (and Judaism in pre-Roman times) was just as fierce and cruel. There is a lot of injustice in the Bible, for example. Comedian Jackie Mason once stated that according to the Bible, the punishment is the same for adultery and eating non-Kosher food, to which he quipped, “I tried them both and don’t see the comparison.”

There is plenty of torture laid out for the viewer here (which is shown in the trailer, and why it is not included, as I don’t want this to be an “adult” site), including tar and feathering, burning at the stake, various mechanisms designed purely for cruelty (e.g., the thumbscrew), and in the most infamous scene, the removal of a tongue by pincers. The thing rarely talked about is that every one of the implements used is based on reality. The whole Church R&D team of that era was focused on finding ways to help the sinner confess and find God through the most gruesome means. Many are shown here. In college, I did a paper on the Spanish Inquisition, which no one unexpected, and many of the tools shown here are mentioned in detail in books about the period.

And with all this going on, there is an incredulous sappy love story that happens with gooey and tinny music played over and over as a lover’s theme, in typical European films of the time.

This is an absolute benchmark for what would become a genre that includes the likes of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975), Thriller – A Cruel Picture (1973), the whole Italian giallo (e.g., the zombie films by Fulci, and demon ones by Lamberto Bava), the abovementioned Warhol pix, and even continuing to today with the likes of the Saw and Hostel franchises, and A Serbian Film (2010). If you enjoy the genre, then this is a must for you.

There is one complaint I do have, and that’s more about the company that puts this out. Don’t get me wrong, Cheezy Flicks Entertainment re-releases some amazing period exploitative films, and I have never been sorry to see anything they’ve released. I mean, even this one actually has a replica vomit bag that was distributed when it was first released (kudos to Cheezy). However, I often find that my player had trouble reading the discs, and it tends to skip, much as it does with DVD-R recordings. I’m not sure if they’re going the cheap route or what, but it is annoying to have to keep going back to see the parts that were skipped, or to get the digital noise and stalling as the player tries to make sense of it all.

There are some cool extras here, including some retro-trailers and intermission ads that are on many of the Cheezy releases.