Codex Miscellany: Three Dozen MORE Cult Horror Movies!

[jasoncordova]

We are crowdsourcing the miscellany for Codex - Blood 3! This one is called “Three Dozen MORE Cult Horror Movies.” It’s a blood-curdling sequel to the original “Three Dozen Cult Horror Movies” miscellany in Codex - Blood 2.

Submissions should be no more than a short paragraph. By submitting here, you’re agreeing to let us use it (you’ll get a credit on the issue). We’re looking for evocative things; the purpose of the miscellany is to inspire the reader. Please avoid anything that seems like misogyny or sexual predation—we won’t publish stuff like that.

Note: if you’d like your name to be listed differently on the Codex credit, send me a DM here (but please keep your submissions in the thread).

For example, please see the original “Three Dozen Cult Horror Movies,” linked below. Feel free to riff off those, make sequels for some of them, whatever. Importantly, please follow the format: “Name of Movie (Year). Summary: Text. Best Kill: Text.” Don’t forget to include a “Best Kill” after your Summary.

Three Dozen Cult Horror Movies.pdf

[Haladir]

Go-Go to Hell! (1968) Summary: Unsuccessful actress Chrissy Bloom signs a pact with the Devil to become the most popular go-go dancer in L.A. But her end of the bargain is to die for! Best kill: Chrissy kicks the stiletto heel of her go-go boot through a too-friendly spectator’s eye.

[Haladir]

The Rats in the Walls (1986): Summary: Mad scientist Alfred Delapore’s radiation experiments on rats goes horribly awry, and a swarm of the now-bloodthirsty and cunning rodents terrorizes the sleepy community of Arkham, Massachusetts. This low-budget film bears little resemblance to the H.P. Lovecraft short story on which it was based. Best kill: While the radioactive rat swarm is killing the kitchen staff of the local Burger Palace, “Drive-Thru Customer #1” pulls his car up to the microphone and orders “Today’s Special”. Hearing no reply, he proceeds to the drive-thru window, where the rat swarm leaps into his car and devours him.

[Deckard]

Parrots of Death (1993) Summary: A group of friends and lovers go on a wild tropical vacation only to find the birds of the forest have gone mad from a virus. Will any survive or will these friends succumb to the madness?
Best kill: An extra large colorful parrot claws out the heart of Tiffany while she is humping her boyfriend on the side in the forest. It calls out “I want you bad.”

[GroupSoliloquy]

Alligator Orgy! (1979) Despite all the promotional material depicting a sultry, and barely clothed Marie Clesham she never appears in the film due to a much debated royalties despute. The curiois artistic choice to dress the replacement female lead (identity unknown) in a mask of Marie Clesham is incredibly unnerving. Also, who knew there was so much stock footage or Alligator sex?

Best Kill: Selvester the well meaning swamp guide’s death by frog gig is a rare moment of good cinematography; a three minute, single shot action sequence both in and out of the water.

[GroupSoliloquy]

Portrait (1994) Celeste, a talented young painter is patronized by a wealthy widower, Garamond. As the relationship grows more intimate Celeste is asked to paint more and more decayed versions of the life models provided. The final revelation of Garamond’s dead spouse is not only predictable, but ruined by poor CGI. Ugh, 90’s special effects…
Best Kill: Garamond falling from the winodw’s walk is so comically bad it’s been remixed recently into a meme about trying hard to fail.

[Haladir]

Shark Attack: The Bigger Boat (2018): Summary: A group of college students slowly come to the realization that the spate of shark attacks at their New England resort town is somehow related to both the shark-infested weather front that threatens New York City and the prehistoric giant shark that sank a research vessel: All are being controlled by an international cabal attempting to appease the god Dagon. Best Kill: After reaching the cabal’s undersea headquarters, the heroine smashes the glass wall that caged the Sharktopus, which then lashes the cabal’s leader [Bradley Whitford] in its tentacles and drags him into its maw.

[JC_Hay]

Imaginary Fiend (1992)

Summary: A by-the-numbers, direct-to-video “killer child” film notably largely for its bombastic tag-line (“…Jason, Michael, and Freddy were too scared to play with Dakota.”), the elaborate, Rube Goldberg-esque murder sequences, and the poor quality cgi reveal of the titular “fiend” behind the killings.

Best Kill: Dakota and the Fiend kill babysitter Mandy with a life-sized re-enactment of board game Mousetrap, complete with bowling ball, bathtub, and a razor-sharp “cage” finale.

[signalstation]

Dracula: Blood of Bunyan (1976) - This bicentennial bite-fest, filmed in the Philippines, relocates American folk hero Paul Bunyan to the jungle where he clashes with Dracula (Filipino film star Antonio Ocampo) and his paramilitary vampire strike force. Best Kill: As a swarm of bats, Dracula enters Babe the Blue Ox’s mouth, then pushes on Babe’s stomach (a practical effect built with blue stretchy latex), Dracula’s face and claws distending the belly before tearing out, dumping gallons of blood and Ocampo’s stunt double.

[JimLikesGames]

William Shakespeare’s MacDeath (1989)

A community theater stages a production of ‘The Scottish Play’ but the deranged director goes ‘full Method’ and murders each of the actors on-stage on closing night. It’s up to the plucky 3 Witches to stop him.

Best kill: The Flashback Montage to previous productions where The Director has staged similar bloodbaths, in which we actually see a screaming actor exit stage left, pursued by a (bloodthirsty, man-eating) bear.

[Matt]

Heart Attack (1997)

Heart transplant recipient Dot Lang, is plagued by post op hallucinations of terrible murders. Too late she realises her heart donor was one of the US’ worst serial killers and is forcing her to kill from beyond the grave.

Best Kill:
Dot’s double defibrillator kill on the two county deputies trying to take her in. ‘Y’all are under cardiac arrest!’

[Matt]

Dungeon Master (1986)

Unwitting suburban teens are drawn into a deadly game of Dungeons and Dragons. When a player character dies,Disturbed DM Todd kills the player in a similar manner. Production by funds garnered off the back of DnD hysteria. Ironically still one of the best DnD related movies made.

Best kill: After Todd’s first group is wiped out by a red dragon, he excuses himself then returns to the basement with a flamethrower and fire retardant gear. ‘TPK! TPK!’ he chants as he pulls the trigger.

[Gulix]

The Shipwreckers (1984)

In the 30s, a group of bad people set up false beacons on the South coast of Wales to get ships onto the reefs. Then, they could get to the ship, kill the passengers, steal the cargo.
Watch how the McGregor family tried to escape these brutal and pitiless people on the moonless night their ship “Lady Aurora” crashed. Then watch what happened when that mysterious cargo from India was opened and its content unleashed.

[Haladir]

Appalachian Meathook Mayhem (1975): Summary: A cheapo knock-off of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” redneck psycho Deerhead hacks his way through a group of young travelers whose car breaks down on a dirt road in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The film is infamous for including gory footage of a on-set accident where an actor’s arm really was skewered by too-real prop meathook. Best Kill: Deerhead’s first jump-scare appearance in the film, where he erupts from roadside bushes, impales his meathook through the neck of the man sitting in the passenger seat, and drags the struggling body through the car window back into the bushes—with gore spraying everywhere.

[signalstation]

Sn’otters (1986) - Equal parts a horror movie and a promotional vehicle to sell plastic figurines of otters in small tubs of slime, this movie’s ecological message was buried somewhere under eruptions of goo and slithery river mammal attacks. The plot was basic: Industrialists dump toxic goo in river, affected otters kill men in suits. Best Kill: CEO Hoyleman’s shareholder call is interrupted as a sn’otter slides down a conference table and into his mouth, back legs scrabbling. Then an obvious replacement Hoyleman head in close-up is inflated with slime until it erupts out the eyes, ears and mouth in jets.

[SabineV5]

Train Ride to Hell (2007): The Black Iron Crown Steward is a monster of a steam train running between Nebraska and Texas. Upon entering, a group of seven diverse people are confronted with the Seven Deadly Sins and succumb to the temptations, one of the other. Was shown only in very few cinemas along the fictional line that the train took, and is still running in Stapleton, NE, and Sunray, TX.

Best kill: While the tiny Asian lady overcome by Wrath attempts to kill the white dude overcome by Lust, she gets attacked and bitten by the mixed-race kid overcome by Gluttony, but manages to use them to bludgeon and devour Lust.

Everything You Ever Wanted (1955): A melancholy film about a young man escaping from a nameless prison and returning to his devoted father. Strange men with incredible powers hunt the young man, and slowly, the viewer learns that the boy died as a hero and has returned as an undead refugee.
There isn’t a great kill here; but the final twist makes up for that - the boy hasn’t escaped hell. He is running from heaven.

[Alexi_Sarge]

Brunch 2: The Second Course (2004). A follow-up to 2000’s sleeper hit Brunch, this sequel saw a foolhardy band of profiteers buy up the restaurant from the original film and rebrand it as a ghoulish tourist trap called Bloody Mary’s. Mary, herself, predictably, doesn’t take too kindly to their impertinence.
Best kill: Matt realizes that the croque monsieur wasn’t made of ham, but of Other Matt—but as he runs to warn the other investors, Bloody Mary hamstrings him with a sharpened spatula and drags him back into the kitchen where she’s working on the next round of “man sandwiches.”

[RedMagus77]

Food Fright is a Z-rated flick with terrible special effects, wooden acting, and would of been consigned to the dust-bin of history were it not for two related things: The last onscreen appearance of Hollywood Legend Tim Drayford, and the last footage of him alive, as shortly after the Cabbage Ball dance scene he was found dead of unknown causes on the film lot.
Best Kill: The possessed pizza flying out of the oven and decapitating several teens, leaving their bodies to spin wildly on the bar stools.

[BlakeRyan]

The Howling IV - The Original Nightmare (1988). Remake of the original The Howling, this werewolf delight follows a successful author seeking to escape her troubled dreams in a remote town. While some of the locals indulge their darker natures, others are trying to find ways to deal with them.
Best Kill - Person at filling cabinet strangely doesn’t see the 8 foot werewolf walking slowly towards her.

[mcbacon]

Freak Out! (1987). Summary: When an accident in the desert swaps three nuclear test pilots into the bodies of “freaks from the 11th dimension”, the now-monstrous pilots must convince six students in detention at the nearby high school to help them reverse the swap before their stolen bodies (and access to nuclear devices) are used to start an all-out invasion.

Best kill: When the last living pilot (played by a young Tara Drake) teams up with the track star and the drama nerd to murder her own stolen body. “We earthlings have something you don’t,” she taunts just before triggering the trap. “Life insurance.”