Expelled Grey Matter

In the last few years I have become friends with a number of artists and musicians in the towns of Superior and Miami, Arizona.  One person that gets talked about, although I have never met him, is Cory Busboom.  He bought the town of Hayden to use as a filming site and has multiple properties with cars that are used in local films.  He is also into suspension, where metal hooks are placed through the skin and a person is lifted off the ground, often being swung around while being barely held aloft by their own skin.  Enter musician, filmmaker and actor Michael Jason Allen, aka Jason Mysteria.  He has been making feature films and music videos for over a decade in Arizona and obviously something about the suspension culture intrigued him as he decided to do a retro slasher film as a tribute to the subculture.  Don (John Minch) is the leader of an adult rehabilitation group.  To celebrate his latest class's graduation he takes them to a remote town in A...

I remember Lisa Frankenstein being promoted prior to it coming out.  A local group that presents cult movies was offering preview passes and, as usual, I had something happening on whatever day it was happening.  It didn't really phase me much as it didn't seem the sort of movie I would want to watch anyway.  It seemed like another cult film that wanted to force the supposed cult-ness of the production on audiences that were hoping for something new and entertaining.  To top it off it was PG-13.   Fast forward a couple years and this movie has become a genuine cult hit.  It has an '80s aesthetic, a Tim Burton-style romantic plot and has plenty of nods to Heathers .  Despite all that, and despite a number of flaws, it still manages to be its own thing.  Lisa Swallows (Kathryn Newton) is slowly coming back to normality after her mother was killed by a psychotic killer.  Now living with her father Dale (Joe Chrest) and stepmother Janet (Car...

I'm sure there was a lot of pressure on Lamberto Bava to be like his dad but, with his frequent collaborations with Dario Argento, he went in a quite different direction.  The Church and Demons  are his most popular, supernatural features that combine all of his influences, from Mario Bava to Lucio Fulce.  Before those, however, his first couple of films fell clearly within the giallo realm.   Bruno (Andrea Occhipinti) is a film composer working on the soundtrack to a horror film directed by Sandra (Anny Papa).  She puts him up in a large rural villa to do his work, hoping that the atmosphere will influence him, while withholding the last few parts of her movie.  The owner of the villa is a playboy named Tony (Michele Soavi) who has to spend most of his time away in Kuwait.   Bruno soon gets to work and is interrupted by a woman named Katia (Valeria Cavelli), who is murdered a short time later by an unknown person.  Bruno finds clues af...