50 films that I dug up on Tubi.

Enjoy!

Kingdom of the Spiders (1977)

Ah, the 70s. My formative years. Angry nature films were rampant around this time (much to my delight), and now it’s time for tarantulas to be miffed at our overuse of pesticides.

William Shatner plays Rack Hansen (staggeringly good name), a lecherous animal doctor in rural Arizona. When I say lecherous, I mean toward female humans. When Woody Strode finds his prize calf dead, the Shat is called in to figure it out. He calls in an expert from Flagstaff, and unfortunately for the expert, she is hot and blond. Shatner is all over her like tribbles on a starship.

They eventually ascertain the death was caused by spider bites, and then all eight-legged hell breaks loose.

The film is seriously daft in some spots, egregiously misogynistic in others, and cheesy to the extreme, but I had a great time with it. The climax in town is particularly Irwin Allen-style over the top chaos, and the final shot, though portrayed through a sub-par matte painting, is suitably chilling.

Worth a look if you haven’t seen it.

7/10

Slime City (Media Blasters, 1988) and Little Corey Gorey (DML, 1993)

Slime City (1988)

I’m sometimes asked why I haven’t gotten around to watching The Brutalist or Wicked yet, and that’s because I’m too busy watching this sort of stuff.

Alex moves into a decrepit apartment building and soon encounters some fellow tenants (goth poet Roman and seductive vamp Nicole), both of whom are into eating ‘Himalayan yogurt’ and drinking a strange green liquor. It turns out these vittles are the sustenance of cultists who have possessed their bodies, and Alex is next in line. Tempted by the drink and Nicole’s jangly bits, Alex succumbs to the dark sorcery afoot, and slowly turns into a slimy murderer, ultimately going full Darkman. As you do.

It’s all quite daft and low-budget, but the dodgy line delivery and goop-stained pillows are all worth it for the final act, which involves Re-animator-levels of dismemberment (albeit less refined).

Alex’s prudish girlfriend and sex crazy Nicole are played by the same actor, Mary Huner, and I have to give her credit for fooling me. The effects are mucky and rubbery, and there are a couple of funny lines, mostly from Alex’s doofus pal.

A good entry-level flick for other fare such as Street Trash or The Abomination.

Slightly recommended.

6/10

Little Corey Gorey (1993)

I’ve seen this one listed as a comedy (it’s not), and a slasher (still not), but at the end of the day, Little Corey Gorey is just a nasty bit of schlock, and not the good kind.

It’s that timeless story of a teen (9th grader) bullied and tortured by his step-mother and brother to the point where he snaps and goes on an accidental killing rampage. There’s not much else to the plot, but that usually doesn’t bother me when I’m watching one of these flicks.
However, virtually all of the main characters are so cartoonishly vile, including our ‘protagonist,’ that it was ultimately a miserable watch.

Corey, for whom we are supposed to be rooting, is a creepy, knicker-sniffing stalker and, though he certainly doesn’t deserve the abuse from his step-family, it’s impossible to sympathize with him. The only characters in this film with any decency are a Black family that live next door, and I trust this was done for a reason. There is an ongoing subplot about an escaped serial killer, but this one is nipped in the bud fairly quickly when it could have been used in a far more interesting way.

3/10

Rituals (1977)

Here’s a Canadian film (shot in Northern Ontario) that is often dismissed as a Deliverance rip-off — but it’s much more than that. Sure, it takes the form of the tried and tested ‘fish out of water’ genre by throwing five surgeons into the remote wilderness to try and survive a deranged killer, but there’s a grittiness to the whole affair that elevates the film. Also, the characters are well-written, and an early scene where they are trying to cross a river, a scene full of unintended plunges and improvised cajoling, helps us to empathize with the group before their nightmare begins.

The kinetic camerawork gives the film an authenticity, and semi-obscured shots from the killer’s POV provide a real sense of danger. Before this film I’d never really appreciated Hal Holbrook as anything more than an interesting character actor, but he really impressed me with his physical and emotional depth.

Definitely worth a look.

8/10

Grotesque (1988)

You want weird, and yet strangely compelling? I’ve got you.

Grotesque is executive produced (and briefly stars) Linda Blair, and Tab Hunter has a main role in it, along with Donna (Angel) Wilkes, so the schlocky cult movie DNA is intact. However, this home invasion horror is such an odd beast; bookended by a couple of movie fake-outs, and being a lot tamer than one might expect for a film that has special effects at its core.

The tale is as old as time: a special effects artist invites his family to their remote lodge, where they are set upon by a roving gang of ‘punkers’ who proceed to slaughter said family. This is witnessed by a disfigured man-child, who promptly goes on a murderous punk-slaying spree, and then the film shifts gears into a boring police procedural complete with prolonged ‘good cop/bad cop’ routine, while Linda Blair excuses herself offscreen. Then it turns into a sort of Twilight Zone episode and then descends into a ‘comedic’ finale (your experience may vary).

My brain is telling me I enjoyed it — but I really don’t listen to my brain any more.

5/10

The Vineyard (New World Pictures, 1989) and
Insect! (International Spectrafilm, September 25, 1987)

The Vineyard (1989)

James Hong, right? RIGHT?

We all love him, from Big Trouble in Little China to Everything Everywhere All At Once, from Kung Fu Panda to Balls of Fury.

James decided he wanted to make a horror film, so he wrote one, co-directed it, and starred in it. What makes him a legend? Did I mention he wrote this for himself?

EXT. DAY
A large, gothic mansion bordered by lush foliage. A bird cries in the distance.
DR. PO (me, James Hong) is standing on a balcony, fondling the pert chesticles of a blond lady.
CUT TO:
INT. BEDROOM
DR. PO (me) is having it away with the blond lady. She’s still naked.

DR. PO (me)

Awesome. I love knockers, me.

You go, James Hong!

The Vineyard is a tale as old as time (again). The descendant of a long line of immortals has become a famous vintner, but his secret ingredient is chained up ladies, of whom he supps in a strange concoction to maintain his youth (his middle age TBH). When he’s finished with them he buries them in the back yard where they lay as restless zombies, unable to rise because he is keeping them in the ground with Mayan voodoo.

Dr. Po holds a fake audition at his mansion for a fake film and a lot of pretty girls and boys turn up for it, only to discover that they are mere ingredients for his latest vintage. Po is also keeping his ancient mom in the attic room, and she is a dead ringer for Zelda from Terrahawks (if this means anything to you).

Shenanigans ensue, involving much running, shooting of arrows, extremely heavy facial prosthetics and dodgy late 80s visual effects. It’s drastically cheesy and somewhat hilarious, and I had a great time. God bless James Hong.

7/10

Insect! (aka Blue Monkey) (1987)

Find any dictionary worth its salt, look up ‘hokey’ and you’ll find the poster for this film. Then you’ll see a small print addendum that reads “see also: hilariously awesome.”

Insect! is a proudly Canadian schlockfest, and it features a who’s who of the best Canadian character actors; John Vernon, Don Lake, Joe Flaherty, Robin Duke, and a 7-yr-old Sarah Polley!

The main protagonist is a weather-beaten detective played by Steve Railsback, who I always thought had more of a serial killer look than a leading man, but hey ho — I’m sure he has his fans.

Long story short, an old fella is infected by a parasite, which promptly busts out of him, grows enormous, makes itself a mate and goes into egg production, all the while eating the hospital staff.

Speaking of the hospital, this has to be the most unsecure, ethically murky, run-down medical establishment ever put on film — and I’ve seen Session 9.

Anyhoo, nurses are eaten, bugs are squished and Steve smokes next to a pregnant lady. The gore is limited but gooey, and the effects on the whole are surprisingly fun. Special shout out to a gaggle of seemingly parent-less children who run free around the hospital (and are, in fact, responsible for all the deaths in the film).

See it if you enjoy stickiness.

6/10

Previous Murkey Movie surveys from Neil Baker include:

Tubi Dive, Part I
Tubi Dive, Part II
What Possessed You?
Fan of the Cave Bear
There, Wolves
What a Croc
Prehistrionics
Jumping the Shark
Alien Overlords
Biggus Footus
I Like Big Bugs and I Cannot Lie
The Weird, Weird West
Warrior Women Watch-a-thon

---

Neil Baker’s last article for us was Part II of Tubi Dive. Neil spends his days watching dodgy movies, most of them terrible, in the hope that you might be inspired to watch them too. He is often asked why he doesn’t watch ‘proper’ films, and he honestly doesn’t have a good answer. He is an author, illustrator, teacher, and sculptor of turtle exhibits. (AprilMoonBooks.com).