Popcorn (1991)

Marketed with the tagline-"Buy a bag...Go home in a box", Popcorn is a quirky little movie, with a very interesting premise. Jill Schoelen stars as the young film student Maggie who has disturbing nightmares about a strange man who uses a long curvy knife in an attempt to stab a girl, and a then a woman who is lying on an altar. The man's severed head is also seen on a dinner-table plate, and in the background there is some explosion or storm through which the girl is running before the man catches her hand.
The entire movie was shot in Kingston, Jamaica and the disused Dreamland theater used by the film students for screening their all-night "horrorathon" is Ward Theater, in my opinion a perfect setting for the crazed maniac to be lurking in wait for his victims, with its numerous rooms, corridors and dark passages. The audiences' preference for reggae music is also attributable to the prevalent Jamaican culture.

The group of film students decide to hold this movie festival consisting of sci-fi B-movies from the 50's- The Stench, Mosquito and The Attack of the Amazing Electrified Man, along with the gimmicks with which these movies were originally released( the clips of these B-movies were made exclusively for Popcorn, and are not part of any actual film). For instance, for Electrified Man, there are electrical "buzzers' fixed to the seats, which are set off in sequence whenever the on-screen character is subjected to electric shocks, and there is a giant prop mosquito which is remote-controlled to fly near the theater ceiling during the screening of Mosquito.
A movie memorabilia shop owner assists the group in their efforts. As they search through the trunks brought in from the shop, the group stumbles across a roll of film titled "The Possessor". When the movie is run through a projector, Maggie becomes deeply affected on seeing close-ups of the lip, forehead and the eyes of the same man whom she has seen in her nightmares. Davis, one of the festival organisers, informs them that "The Possessor" was the only movie made by deranged filmmaker Lanyard Gates, who sacrificed his family during the premiere of his movie, but was also burnt to death in the theater on account of an accidental fire.
At home, Maggie tells her mother (Dee Wallace) about their discovery of "The Possessor". Her mother looks scared and pleads with Maggie to cancel her festival participation plans, and instead to accompany her on a holiday, to which Maggie refuses. Then the mother receives a threatening call and pays a nocturnal visit to Dreamland Theater, from where she disappears.
Later, at the opening of the night festival, Maggie notices a man resembling her tormentor at the ticket counter, but following him, she loses sight of him. She then meets her on-off boyfriend Mark and tells him that Lanyard Gates may be alive, and may have made his way to the theater . The two then wander off in search of Gates.
The death scenes are not gory, however they have been innovatively managed. For instance, the first victim, Davis, is shown to coordinate  the prop mosquito's movements, but he loses control and the killer instead sets it to fly directly to the victim, thus he is killed upon being impaled by its plastic stinger. Then, using a variety of ingenuous devices, the killer creates a skin mask of Davis which he dons in order to escape notice. The second victim, Tanya goes over to 'Davis' in order to steal a kiss from him in the dark, but in the film's most disorienting scene, as she starts kissing him, finds his skin peeling off to reveal a grotesque face.

The killer is revealed to be Toby, who is a film director, a part of the group organising the festival. He takes Maggie hostage and tells her that long ago, he and his mother had been sitting in the front row during Lanyard Gate's screening of possessor. Gates murdered his wife on-stage but before he could harm his daughter Sara, her aunt Susan ( none other than Dee Wallace) shot him dead. In the process, the theater was engulfed by a fire from which Sara escaped but Toby's mother was scarred to death. As for Toby, he survived with horrific injuries and had to go through extensive facial grafts. He also tells her that she is Sara, Lanyard's daughter, and blames both her and Susan for his misery. He discloses his idea to kill them in the same manner as Lanyard had done years ago, as a 'live show' before the audience, while "The Possessor" is being shown in the background.
In the meantime, Mark visits Toby's apartment and through newspaper clippings and pictorial representations, understands Toby's hatred for Maggie, and apprehending danger to her life, rushes back to help her.
Toby then takes control of the screening booth and inserts the roll of Possessor. He plasters Susan and takes her and Maggie to the stage, in final preparation for their sacrifice, which he has planned to mirror the horrific drama which had unfolded during the original screening of Possessor. The waiting audience cheer him on, thinking his antics to be another maverick surprise at the horror-festival.
In the moment of crisis, Mark arrives and uses his belt and a rope to swing towards the stage. He falls down among the props clumsily, but as an effective consequence, the prop mosquito gets electrified by flying sparks, and moves towards Toby, impaling him.
If you are looking for a genuinely enjoyable horror-comedy with lots of schlock and cheese, then look no further than Popcorn. A  minus factor permeating the structure of the movie is the inherent lack of coherence and logic, but otherwise you won't be disappointed !
Popcorn was released on DVD in 2001 by Elite Entertainment. It was discontinued in 2010. Synapse Films is releasing a dual Blu Ray-DVD limited steel box edition in March 2017, and the extras include the usual radio spots and theatrical trailer covered in the Elite DVD plus a making of featurette and interviews and audio commentaries with the actors, screenwriter and the make up artist.

Lisa (1990)

Directed by Gary Sherman, Lisa is the story of the eponymous character, a 14 year old precocious girl, who is prohibited by her over-protective mother from dating until she turns 16, and has a rather strange hobby. Lisa keeps a look-out for handsome men on the street, notes down their vehicle numbers, and then calls up DMV to track down their personal details, which she records in a large scrapbook. Her mother Katherine is open with Lisa on all matters, except boys and dating, and it turns out that she had Lisa when she was only 14 years. She is apprehensive that if she lets Lisa go on dates, her daughter might want to experience a lot of things which she is not emotionally capable of handling as yet.
Meanwhile, a charming restauranter, Richard, is killing beautiful, single women across the city by breaking into their apartments. He leaves a bizarre message on each victim's answering machine- "Hi, I am Richard, I am in your apartment, and I am going to kill you", which all victims hear before being attacked by Richard. The killer rapes these women before killing them, and leaves an elaborate array of candles in the crime scene, because of which he is dubbed as the "Candlelight Killer". It is also disclosed that Richard uses the same modus-operandi as Lisa, i.e., he first spots beautiful women, and after secretly writing down their car numbers, finds out their addresses. Then he sneaks into their apartments, and thereafter kills them, after they have heard his message.
Lisa bumps into Richard one night, when she is returning home carrying groceries, and Richard is just leaving a house after having murdered a woman. Lisa is fascinated by the handsomeness of Richard, and in the same manner as before, is able to find out his name, address and phone number. She then begins to stalk him, and even starts calling him up, in order to flirt with him. Richard is intrigued by these calls, and encourages Lisa to continue talking to him, since now he is the one who is getting stalked by a mysterious woman.
With Easter around the corner, Lisa makes plans with her best friend Wendy to leave for a weekend vacation. She and her mother decide to have an all-girls night out before Lisa leaves, thus Lisa calls up Richard and informs him that she would meet him that night, and that she would be dressed in a 'sexy white dress'. She then makes reservations in Richard's restaurant. In reality, Lisa has set up her mother, who is wearing the white dress, so that Richard may see his mother, and become her boyfriend. Lisa hopes that this way, her mother will loosen up and allow Lisa to start dating too.
Lisa leaves a love note to Richard, who then appears and notices Katherine. He copies her credit card details, and begins his preparations for killing her. Lisa remains oblivious to the danger that she has exposed Katherine to, and leaves with Wendy for the weekend. However, she talks to Richard, and he tells her that he knows where she resides, and her name is Katherine. Fearing that Richard would tell her mother about the calls, Lisa leaves a message for Katherine, stating that Richard was just an annoying kid from school, and that she should ignore him, if he called her. Soon after, Katherine receives she same message from Richard telling her that he would kill her, but based on Lisa's earlier message, she discards it as a prank.
However, Richard has already hidden himself in Lisa's room and when Katherine enters, he takes her hostage. Some time later, Lisa arrives home and starts looking for her mother. She too is attacked by Richard, and upon noticing the candlelight arrangements, she realises that Richard is none other than the dreaded "Candlelight Killer".
Richard knocks Katherine unconscious and drags Lisa to the room with the set candles, planning to kill her first before dealing with Katherine.Lisa is saved when her mother stabs Richard with a knife to his back, and later she sprays acid on his face, in the process disfiguring his face. In the final confrontation, Katherine strikes the killer several times on his head, and he loses his balance, and falls from an open window to a ditch below, dead from the fall.
The movie was made available on DVD first time in 2012 by MGM.

 The Rain Killer(1990)

The Rain Killer is  low budget independent film starring Ray Sharkey , David Beecroft and Maria Ford ( in a small role as a murdered stripper). It is rarely seen and largely does not appear on the credits of any of the actors.

The plot concerns the murders of well-to-do women, all mysteriously done away with at night, and only when it rains. At the beginning of the film, we witness the killer stalk a woman till the underground station, and then as the woman hurriedly boards a train to escape the looming threat, she is stabbed several times on her chest and abdomen. When the police reach the murder scene, they discover no clues of importance- for instance one passenger describes the killer as "a man with a hat, overcoat and sunglasses with reflective lenses..he seemed out of place", which does not lead anywhere. They also find a plastic raincoat on the rail tracks which is covered with the blood of the victim, but as the raincoat is commonly sold over all over town and no identification marks are visible, this is another dead-end.
The washed out cop Capra is assigned to handle the case, but with the body count rising and with no definite leads to apprehend the murderer, the FBI agent Dalton is roped in to assist. Capra and Dalton are shown to be professionally hostile,each trying to outdo the other, and soon become bitter personal rivals as well, when Capra begins an affair with the estranged wife of Dalton, Adele.
The two investigators figure out that the murdered women were all members of a sewing club circle, to which Adele is also a member, but this is unfortunately where the trial runs cold.
As a side plot, a man named Rosewall visits a strip club and picks up a dancer to spend the night with. The next morning, she winds up dead and realising his terrible situation, Rosewall makes a frantic escape. However, the police nab him and seize the suitcase he has been carrying, which is found full of knives. The man's activities are suspicious enough for the police to pronounce him as the notorious 'Rain Killer', and even when a witness to  a victim's murder fails to recognise Rosewall definitely, the police do not consider it a serious setback, and thus all the murder cases are closed.
But as can be expected, a few minutes later into the film, we witness a man wearing the attire of the 'Rain Killer' enters Adele's apartment, and he reveals himself to be Dalton, her husband. When he expresses jealousy over her relationship with Capra, she is dismissive of him. Then in a fit of rage, Dalton smothers her with a pillow and stabs her multiple times.
Towards the end of the movie, an grief-stricken Capra takes Dalton to Adele's workshop( where she builds her sculptures) and Dalton informs him that he has killed all the women, for some obscure motive, which the movie does not attempt to elaborate on. Then Capra shoots Dalton dead, and leaves the place.

The film starts off with interestingly enough and shows potential to develop into a gripping thriller, adding a bit of suspense here and there; but overall, the slow pacing and the disjoint storyline involving numerous sub-plots, along with a ridiculous ending, hamper a story well-written and tolerably well acted.


Update- In August 2015,the movie was released on DVD by Scorpion Releasing (on special license from Califilms, the minor studio founded by Roger Corman which initially distributed the movie) and also had a limited Blu-Ray release by Kino Lorber Films. The picture quality of the release (I only saw the DVD version) is excellent, the images are crisp and bright and fully reveal the glaring blues and reds used during shooting both on the rain soaked streets as well as inside the apartments, which imbue the movie with a niorish feel. It is a marked improvement over the vhs and laserdisc releases where the picture tended to be dark and washed out and thus did not truly bring out the intended atmosphere. However, the sound quality leaves much to wish about, as I had to turn up the volume control several notches up in order to hear the dialogues and background score. There are no subtitles made available, however the extras include a theatrical trailer and 'behind the scenes' trivia segment on the filming aspects. However, keeping in mind the rarity of the movie, I would recommend any serious collector of obscurities to just grab a copy.

Dance of the Damned (1988)


This low-budget movie by Katt Shea Ruben features a vampire and a suicidal stripper as the only two characters, and is a serious take on existentialism and yearning. A reluctant vampire(reluctant because he dislikes drawing blood from humans, and thus starves himself till he can contain no longer) follows his instincts to a seedy strip joint, where one of the dancers Jody is fighting depression and has attempted suicide two times before. The vampire is attracted to a "dark spot" he notices in her and marks her as his next victim. As Jody is locking up for the day, he approaches her and convinces her in spending a night conversing with him. Once, however, they reach his home, he reveals to her that he is a vampire, and he lays bare his plan to kill her and thus end her misery early the next morning. Trapped in the house with no route of escape, Jody begins a conversation with the vampire, both detailing the griefs in their respective lives( he on the death of his mother when he was a young child and on how he spends his days in extreme isolation, as an out-caste from society that cannot accept him; and she on her low-paid job, the 5-year old son she is not allowed to see anymore, the futility of her existence). As the night advances, the two sad souls begin connecting to each other, seeking companionship in their loneliness. There is a moving scene where the vampire takes Jody to the place where her young son resides with his father, and helps her in scaling the wall to reach the window to his room. Here, she wishes her son a happy birthday, and tells him how much she loves him. Then, on a beach, she illustrates to the vampire the sensation of sunlight through a night light. When they return to his home, the vampire reminds her that it is time for her death. Jody then realises that she wants to continue living and resists his attempts to kill her, thus a cat-and-mouse chase begins between the two.The entire movie is centered on the night-long conversations between Jody and the vampire, action is far and between limited to 3-4 scenes, and the increasing sexual tension between the characters is also understated, with a brief kiss thrown in towards the end.
The film is almost forgotten today, and has never been released on DVD, though surprisingly enough, its 1993 eroticised remake, To Sleep With a Vampire, despite having weak plotting and unmemorable actors, has become the better known of the two, and also has garnered a DVD release.