I really hate being disappointed. Really I do. As cynical and jaded as I, like many horror fans, tend to be sometimes, I get sucked
in by hype just as much as the next guy. I hate to admit that, but it's true. So, when a movie comes along that promises (or threatens)
to be "the next big thing", and all early indications point to that hype being a reality, it truly, deeply bums me out when it turns out to be
a total bust. Case in point...Terry West's "Flesh for the Beast"...here's a film that was touted as being a raw and unflinching horror film,
filled to the brim with gooey gore and buxom babes gettin' nekkid...a proverbial throwback to the uber-splattery flix of the late seventies
and early eighties. O, what harsh and terrible lessons are learn'd, alas...
The synopsis...
A group of researchers goes to a purportedly "haunted" house owned by an eccentric (and clearly villainous) millionaire. Apparently, someone
got the bright idea that doing research in this environment would be good thing. Basically, if you cross the godawful remakes of both "The Haunting"
and "The House on Haunted Hill", add some gratuitous splatter and bits from every Misty Mundae "film" you've every seen, put them in a blender set to
"hackneyed", and voila...you've got "Flesh for the Beast". Yep. That's it. The only vaguely original "plot device" occurs whenever someone is
about to die...they invariably get laid. You see, the mean ol' ghosts in this particular house take the form of perky, seductive sirens who lure the researchers,
both male and female, into the sack before dispatching them. In fact, these little scenarios take place so frequently that "Flesh for the Beast", in this un-rated form,
plays more like a soft-core porn flick than an outright horror film. After the inevitable conclusion (the film ends the only way it really could...you'll see what I mean),
I was left wondering just what the hell I had watched. It wasn't scary. It was barely (and I mean barely) titillating or arousing. It wasn't anywhere near as
playfully gory as I had hoped, or in fact had been led to believe by countless magazine articles and such.
I must stress that I tried really, really hard to like this movie. I went into each agonizingly dull and protracted scene and set piece with the attitude of "Well, the last
five scenes have sucked balls...maybe the next one'll be cool." No such luck, dear reader. Clearly, Terry West has the requisite skills to be a horror director. He does a
few things more or less "right": the set design, lighting, and some of the effects work are pretty top-notch for a film with this kind of obviously low budget. However,
all that is for naught when it comes down to it. The proceedings are far too silly and mind-numbingly stupid to generate any real tension, not to mention scares or
shocks of any kind. I dunno...maybe I'm being too hard on "Flesh for the Best". It's not as if, I suppose, anyone asked me to take this film that seriously. Still, I can't
help feeling more than a little bit "huckstered" by the whole moronic affair. By film's end, I was left with the overwhelming feeling that the whole movie existed only
so that someone could hiss out the film's title, "Flesssshhh for the Beeeeaassst", followed by an otherworldly cackle. It's really that stupid, folks.
The disc? Meh...it's run of the mill. It's hard to get excited about any part of this when the film sucks so outrageously hard. So, I had probably better just say this:
Media Blasters usually does a damned fine job of presenting otherwise hard-to-find horror/exploitation films. This film is supposedly the first in a line of "original films"
made and released under the Media Blasters label. I hope, for the sake of their fine reputation as a kind of poor-man's Anchor Bay, that "Flesh for the Beast" is merely an
unfortunate blip, and not indicative of the direction Media Blasters will take more frequently in the future. There.
Now that I feel all dirty and ashamed, I'm going to end this review. It's sad, really. The filmmakers clearly had their hearts in the right place, but the final
product falls so severely short of all expectations that I cannot recommend "Flesh for the Beast" - unrated or not - to anyone but the most die-hard soft-core
porn-cum-horror-freak. On second thought...even that crowd has better taste than this...
Sadly, the bottom line is that you should avoid "Flesh for the Beast" like the plague. It's not even fun on a beer and cheeseburgers level. Sorry, Media Blasters...better luck next time, eh?
I really hate being disappointed. Really I do. As cynical and jaded as I, like many horror fans, tend to be sometimes, I get sucked
in by hype just as much as the next guy. I hate to admit that, but it's true. So, when a movie comes along that promises (or threatens)
to be "the next big thing", and all early indications point to that hype being a reality, it truly, deeply bums me out when it turns out to be
a total bust. Case in point...Terry West's "Flesh for the Beast"...here's a film that was touted as being a raw and unflinching horror film,
filled to the brim with gooey gore and buxom babes gettin' nekkid...a proverbial throwback to the uber-splattery flix of the late seventies
and early eighties. O, what harsh and terrible lessons are learn'd, alas...
