Friday, March 29, 2024

Movie Reviews

Reviews of primarily American movies featuring actors and actresses of Black / African-American descent in the horror-movie, slasher, gore, supernatural and related spooky film genres.

Zombie Island Massacre
You'd be hard-pressed to find a film containing the word "zombie" in the title that has less to do with zombies than this one. A zombie is raised by a voodoo ritual in the first 15 minutes, but it's promptly killed and never heard from again. The film then...
The Final Project horror movie poster
Oh look, it’s another found footage horror movie! Along with glossy Hollywood remakes, jittery found footage films have been the whipping boys of horror fans for years -- justifiably so, given the dearth of originality in the countless Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity retreads over the past decade....
Yambao (AKA Cry of the Bewitched AKA Young and Evil)
The relatively obscure Mexican-Cuban production Yambaó seems to be lumped into the horror genre because of its elements of voodoo/Santeria and spirit possession, but frankly, it deals with those subjects in such a matter-of-fact manner (perhaps reflecting the level of cultural belief that these types of events are real...
Voodoo Dolls
The Canadian production Voodoo Dolls feels like a relic -- even more so than the nearly three-decades-old film already is. Its images of a shirtless black man clad in tribal paint and beaded necklaces, drumming in a trance-like state and menacing the white female protagonist seem like they're straight...
Black Demons horror movie poster
Black Demons is a typical cheesy Italian zombie movie, although this one was filmed after that sub-genre had peaked. Made in 1991, the low budget and corny Euro-trash style make it feel 10 years older. There’s even use of the word "Negro" without a hint of shame or irony. The plot concerns...
Black Voodoo Exorcist horror movie poster
Although the American title of this dirt-cheap Spanish production tried to piggyback on the success of both The Exorcist and Blaxploitation films, Black Voodoo Exorcist is actually a Mummy rip-off that contains no exorcisms and frankly very few black people. The movie begins back in the olden days...
Bram Stoker's The Mummy horror movie
Louis Gossett, Jr. gets top billing (the only billing, really, as the only other recognizable actors are Richard "Family Feud" Karn and the maid from Different Strokes who replaced Mrs. Garrett), but he's not really the hero so much as the crazy, rambling old guy who no one believes....
Caged Terror horror movie poster
Caged Terror stands as a towering testament to why kids should say no to drugs and why hippies should say no to filmmaking. I'm not sure how this movie was promoted when it was released, but it could hardly be considered horror, and it's only marginally a (very tame)...
Doll Graveyard horror movie
The latest addition to the black killer doll army is, um, this guy: Although he'd receive his own film, Ooga Booga, in 2013, in Doll Graveyard, he doesn’t seem to have a name or any real back story other than he belonged to a girl in 1911 and was buried with her when...
Eyes of the Mummy horror movie poster
This early silent film from famed German director Ernst Lubitsch shows that, while he would become vehemently anti-Natzi (being Jewish and all), Lubitsch may have had his own racial hang-ups. The film follows Albert Wendland (Henry Liedtke), a British painter, as he "takes a sejour to study in Egypt"....