Author Archive: Retro

The modern-day shocker that’s recognized today as one of the best of its genre. A dancing school in a small German town is the setting for unholy terror and some chilling scenes from Italian scaremaster Dario Argento (DAWN OF THE DEAD, DEMONS)

A child’s toy hides certain death.

England 1795: the young Catherine just married Charles Fengriffen and moves into his castle. She becomes victim of an old curse that lays on the family. On her wedding night she’s raped by a ghost and gets pregnant.

The inhabitants of a small, remote island have been practicing voodoo rites and worshipping an evil priest named Damballah for years, but the local law officials generally turn a blind eye to this death cult’s bizarre activities. Captain Labesch arrives from the mainland, determined to crack down on the island’s lawlessness and clean up the ineffectual, hard-drinking police force. He appeals for assistance from wealthy plantation tycoon Carl Van Molder, who owns nearly half of the island and wields a great deal of influence over the population. Van Molder has made the study of parapsychology his life’s work and believes in the secret powers of the mind. He warns Labesch not to interfere with this forgotten island’s ancient ways. Also visiting is Van Molder’s niece, Annabella, a temperance crusader who wants her uncle to help fund the International Anti-Saloon League..

Lise Cohen is taken to a special prisoner-of-war camp for female Jews, a camp run as a bordello to entertain the German officers and troops going in to battle. The camp is run with an iron fist by Commandant Starker and his minion Alma. Starker becomes frustrated when Lise demonstrates no fear, and devises cruel experiments to scare her, to no avail. Once she realizes her guilt is unfounded, Lise begins to play Starker’s game, but even though she begins living a better life, she doesn’t forget the atrocities she has seen and experienced.

Dir. Dario Argento. Jennifer Corvino, the daughter of a famous actor, has had trouble with sleepwalking for some time. Her doctor said that it can develop a split personality. She discovers her alternate personality when she stays at a boarding school that was once the home a Richard Wagner. But someone has been killing the students, and it relates only indirectly to the criminal sanitorium nearby. So it’s up to “the two greatest detectives the world has ever known, or should I say, unknown”

Giorgio is a greedy adulterer who makes a deal with a serial killer to dispose of his wealthy wife, Nora. Unfortunately, a thrill-seeking young couple steal the killer’s car with Nora’s corpse in the trunk, ending up at a run-down seaside villa.

This version of the classic horror tale of dual identities boasts a unique ending that Stevenson probably never dreamed of. Scenerio by J. Charles Haydon. Dir. J. Charles Haydon

A man is haunted by visions of a beautiful woman. When he finally meets her, he winds up involved in a satanic cult.