I Will Watch EVERY 80s Movie Ever Made!: Catching Up Pt 11

Forgettable. Woman is possessed by demon that previously possessed her mother. Husband and also psychologist try to help. Doesn't help that the print on Amazon Prime is atrocious - looks like the camera lens had vaseline smeared on it. I just couldn't work up an interest - the actors all left me cold. This is the kind of movie that collects dust in the back of the video store, at the very end of the lowest shelf, next to a movie with a title like "Hellgate VII: The Final Rite."

Another by-the-numbers horror film. New mother and baby and husband movie into mother-in-law's house. Spoiler: mother-in-law and husband are evil and want to sacrifice the baby. Mother determined not to let this happen. Events play out much as you can imagine - scare here, scare there, dramatic music, baby seems in danger, baby not in danger, tables turned on mother-in-law and husband by the end. Yawn.

I actually found this film shocking, a rare event for me. Linda Blair is a girl thug in LA, with a disabled younger sister and a posse of fellow girl thugs. They run afoul of the boy thugs, who are much, much worse - their leader is one of the scummiest, nastiest, most repellent villains I can remember. The boy thugs gang rape the disabled sister (!!!). All hell breaks loose and Linda Blair arms herself for war. It's a stark, bleak, grim film where none of these characters are allowed to have futures - the moment someone has hope, it's ripped from them. Yet it's compelling, because the acting is good, and because the film does a great job creating tension that needs to be resolved. It's a difficult watch, though.

Amazon Prime lied and says this was 1980, but internet research seems to indicate '79. It's good enough - the owner of a failing summer camp invites a group of former campers back in the hopes they will donate money, or convince their rich parents to donate money. The campers fall in love, or lust, as they reenact their youth. It's OK. Avoids the worst tropes of the summer camp genre.

Another shocking film, this time by Penelope Spheeris (see Hollywood Vice Squad above), and right in keeping with her work in Decline of Western Civilization. This movie is about a group of misfit punks in Los Angeles who live together as a family in an abandoned house on condemned land. They struggle to find their place in a hostile world that they see as rejecting them. Meanwhile, two local pieces of trash take it upon themselves to "clean the neighborhood" of the group of kids. Conflict develops rapidly, with a shocking finale. It's uncommon to see a movie about punks that takes their side like this - and you really side with them, even as they commit acts of vandalism and whatnot. You understand their struggle, their desire for family, their hopes. Really a good little film, although upsetting.

I Will Watch EVERY 80s Movie Ever Made!