VHS is a great way for zombies on a budget to get a horror fix. Much like dope off of the street, quality and selection may vary, but a fix is a fix. Hence this new blog, Tapes of Terror.
Today's Tape of Terror, purchased from the Goodwill for 99 cents + New Jersey sales tax is Eternal Evil, also known as The Blue Man. My copy looked like this:
I picked this out of the large pile o' horror because it starred Karen Black. Like many of her films, she was the best thing this movie had going on.
We start with a guy having an incomprehensible nightmare and getting woken up by his kid. The guy goes to work, where we learn that he is a former filmmaker that now makes commercials in an awesomely 80's office building staffed by a weird french receptionist that looks like the chick from Dr. Caligari.
The body count begins when we lose someone connected to our main guy to a supernatural thing that isn’t too heavy on the special effects -- maybe a harness and some air bladders. The coroner gets the body and introduces our next main character, the cop. He explains that the victim exploded inside, and that's unusual for a heart attack.
The next day, our main guy gets bitten by his father-in-law's dog, and that night, we learn that his kid is an insomniac that draws crayon pictures of the Blue Man, while main guy keeps astral projecting all over the place.
At some point he goes to see his new age girlfriend, who is -- you guessed it-- Karen Black, and he's all, "I'm scared, this astral project stuff in uncontrollable and wacky" and she's all "Keep doing, it you'll get better at it." Her loft apartment is all mood lit with three big lamps on the floor. Main guy and his wife have lamps on the floor at their house too. Like, table lamps. I guess no one in this movie reads at night, unless they lie on the floor when they do.
And while I'm on this movie's quirks, there's this dramatic flute riff in the background all the time. It's supposed to be eerie but it sounds like there's going to be a kung fu showdown any minute. Does this movie have anything to do with Asia? No. Except that the very last scene takes place there, but the fact that it's Asia is not really relevant to anything, so I don't know if that's supposed to be foreshadowing or just new age-y or what.
***This is where the synopsis gets SPOILERific****
Back on the farm the father-in-law has a supernatural "heart attack" complete with minimal special effects, and when he shows up at the morgue, the cop gets suspicious. It doesn't take too long to figure out that the only person connecting the two corpses is our main guy, so then we get more exposition at the office with the '80s decor and the french receptionist, who is now boning the main character's business partner.
The cop has started breathing down Karen Black's neck while watching main guy's last big film, which is a documentary about -- you guessed it -- astral projection and this old couple that say they move from body to body to escape death. The cop tracks down Karen Black for some more exposition, and we find out she's got consumption (or some other kind of blood-coughing disease) and she talks just like the old people in the movie. Oh, she's also a not very bright dancer and a lesbian. Also, the weird French Dr. Caligari chick marries and then murders the main guy's business partner and then goes to meet up with Karen Black because she is, not surprisingly, also harboring a soul of Eternal Evil.
Meanwhile, the kid has been hanging out with the Blue Man, who turns out to be a big bully that makes him misbehave and then later makes him drink paint stripper. Don't get too excited though -- we don't ever see the Blue Man. He just tells the kid what to do off-camera or through some whispering. Mom makes the kid puke up the paint stripper and then dies of a supernatural "heart attack".
So now that the bitch has gone after his family, main guy goes after Karen Black. He's almost thwarted by the cop, but they all end up in a showdown together. Karen Black and the weird French chick are killed, and the cop passes out. After the big ordeal, cop quits his job and moves to Japan, which make the weird flute music finally fit, though I don't even remember if they used it in that scene. It's all over. Or is it???
Total body count: 6. The kid recovered to eat ice cream in a heart-warming final scene with his dad.
Gore factor: Negligible. The one review of this movie on IMDB says that this was a made for TV movie, and I would not be surprised.
Best scene: Most of the scenes with Karen Black.
Worst scene: All of the "astral projection".
Something about this movie reminded me of Audrey Rose with the supernatural stuff and the kid and domesticity of the whole thing. That is the book, not the movie because I haven't seen the movie yet and was in fact not aware of the movie until the lady at the Goodwill told me about it when I picked up the book.
Overall, I give this 2 brains out of 5. It was a little entertaining, but I would probably only watch it again on tv if there was nothing else on.
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