STORMY NIGHT (2005)

Caught in a violent thunderstorm a young goat, Mei, is separated from his friends and takes shelter in an old barn. A little later somebody else comes in the barn, but it's too dark to see who it is. Mei is scared and believing that it's another goat he starts talking to the stranger. But the stranger isn't a goat, it's a wolf! His name is Gabu and he thinks the stranger is a fellow wolf so they keep taking. By the time the storm ends they are friends and even agree to meet the next day in front of the barn for lunch. There secret password to recognize each other is "stormy night". When they meet face to face the next day they are both shocked, but the bond they built the night before is strong and over time their friendship becomes stronger and stronger.

It'd be cruel to tell you anymore. The story is filled with lots of cute moments, but it's also pretty serious. The animation is simple, but very beautiful and I thought it fit the story well. Very sweet film and it deserves a bigger audience (like maybe an official Blu-Ray release here in America) so I say check it out!

I DRINK YOUR BLOOD (1970)

This is one hell of a movie. The wacky as all get out story is about eight Satan-loving hippies who wander into a small town (more like a few houses and a store) and start raising Hell. After they brutalize a young woman and drug an old man, the old's man's grandson gets revenge by killing a rabid dog, putting the dog's rabies infected blood into some meat pies and the selling them to the hippies. Later that night, the hippies start foaming at the mouth and go completely batshit crazy. At first they start attacking each other, but then their violence spreads and some miners get infected and go on a rampage attacking everything.

For being 50+ years old, I DRINK YOUR BLOOD has more blood and violence than I expected (it was one of the first movies to get an "X" rating based on violence), but while it might have shocked audiences back in 1970 it's so low-budget and the special effects are so amateurish that it's impossible to take it seriously nowadays. That doesn't mean it's not an entertaining film, because it definitely is. As far as trash cinema goes this movie is a classic. The pace is very quick and I liked how it never dwelled on one theme for too long: at first there's the hippie Satan cult, then the revenge thing going on and then the revenge for the failed revenge which results in the rabies-infected hippies attacking various people in a wide varieties of ways until finally the miners are infected and suddenly there's a zombie horde assault on a house!

It's probably never going to be inducted into The National Film Registry, but IDYB does deserve a small spot in Cinema history. All fans for horror and trash should check it out.

I'd be interested to know how much of an influence this film was on John Waters.

THUNDER BAY (1953)

Anthony Mann and Jimmy Stewart followed up their collaboration on the excellent THE NAKED SPUR with THUNDER BAY. Stewart is a hardworking man determined to find oil in the Gulf no matter what, even if it fucking kills him! His financial backer (Jay C. Flippen) is just as determined and has invested all of his money into this project. If it fails they're fooked, but things aren't just as easy as setting up a rig and pumping the oil out. No siree Bob, the local shrimp fishermen believe the oilers are gonna kill all of the shrimp, so they'll stop at nothing to get these assholes out of here...even if they have to blow up the entire oil rig!

On a technical level, the film is fine and looks great. Also the acting is good, especially Stewart who carries the entire thing with his portrayal of a man-possessed. The thing that pulls the movie down is the script. It's passable, but I wish that it had been grittier and never included the second romantic subplot between Stewart and Joanne Dru. The Dan Duryea / Marcia Henderson romance actually added to the film, but the Stewart / Dru one made no sense and it was a distraction from the exciting oil drilling story. And speaking of oil drilling, I wish there had been a little introduction to off shore drilling earlier on in the film (maybe in a meeting with the towns folk). I don't know shit about off shore drilling, so when they started yelling about air pockets and water spurting up through the hole I had no fucking clue what was going one except that it seemed pretty important.

Overall, an entertaining picture, but it's pretty dated, simplified and overly melodramatic. A must-watch for Stewart fans though.