Stylish Snake Hat

In the 1970 horror martial arts flick Devil Woman, the night Manda was born in the Philippines, a freak lightning storm came outta nowhere and somehow transformed the crib rat into “a monster.” (Her dad’s words, not mine, as he saw her and crapped his pants. Neither was shown.)

As Manda gets few years under her head wrap (she’s clearly hiding something besides chronic dandruff), the neighborhood kids taunt her and try to take off the stylish turban. Blocking her in an alley, one kid sticks his hand under Manda’s hat and gets his hand bitten by a snake that was lounging under there. This brands Manda as a monster and she’s tormented relentlessly. Later, when she’s grown up to look like she came from the U.S. even though she was Filipino as a child, Manda vows relentless revenge on her formative years’ taunters.

Those who flaunted their taunts should be visibly shaken — Manda is indeed a monster and has the power to control snakes to do her bidding. This leads to hazardous conditions as the entire village is surrounded by dirt and woods where snakes make their living, a supportive argument for revenge law and demand supply.

Enter a Chinese kung fu master who wears a gold necklace, white V-neck t-shirt and white pants. All he needs is a vertical haircut and he’d be the kung fu master version of Vanilla Ice. His footwear looked like indoor slippers, though. He rescues a young gal, the daughter of a wealthy local dude, from a  gang of hooligans, who work for a gangsta head hooligan. (Full disclosure — he works for Manda.) The kung fu master takes on 20 thugs and kicks all their pants right in the pants. This won’t be the last time he has to deal with these smirking criminals, who mistakenly think there’s strength in numbers.

Manda continues her reptile revenge, killing her tormentors. While this is going on, the kung fu master has six (!) more run-ins with the gang, whose members now count in the 30s. And still, he mops the dirt floor with ‘em. When the local (and single) young gal is kidnapped and brought to the cave where Manda lives (kinda neat — wonder if it has working plumbing?), the master goes to rescue her. He predictably fresh beats the thugs into tenderized pork, jumps and flips over multiples of snakes, and faces off with Manda. It’s here she takes off her hoodie and reveals her hair is not hair at all, but a pile of icky wiggle snakes. (Medusa should file intellectual property infringement.)

Manda controls the snakes by snaking up her eyes and waving her hands in front of her, as if slowly washing an invisible window. This is ironic as most windows are already invisible. The master flings sharpened Popsicle sticks at the snakes and acupunctures their heads. Manda, who no doubt maintains heir coiling coif with Ssssalon Selective™ shampoo, falls after being cornered on a rock cliff. We don’t see her splat. This means, of course, sequel city. (Spoiler: It’s titled Bruka: Queen of Evil/1973).

Meet The New Gods, Same As The Old Gods

When you think about it, Clash of the Titans (the remake, 2010), is Greek mythology’s version of Christianity. You have God (Zeus), Satan (Hades) and Jesus (Perseus), all playing with the lives and minds of humanity. Kinda like beer.

In this case, Argos, a city of the unwashed, is fed up with the Gods not answering their prayers, and destroys all graven images. This, of course, angers the Gods, and they let Hades make them pay for their blasphemy.

The Gods call for the sacrifice of the queen’s supermodel hot daughter, Andromeda. If they don’t BBQ her alive in 10 days they will unleash the Kraken, a mega creature feared by the Gods themselves. Probably because the darn thing is twice the size of Argos and has a wide variety of long tentacles with which to crush and knock over stuff. Just looking at it will cause you to colorize your toga.

Giant scorpions, snake women, gargoyle harpies, flying horses, the Kraken… Christianity was never this cool or fun.

The Gorgon: Python Perm

The Gorgon, a 1964 horror movie from the legendary Hammer Films in Great British England, is the title creature whose gaze can convert you into stone. It worked on me as I’m all rock (heh).

Of course you’ve heard of this mythological monster with snakes for hair and know it as Medusa. And here’s where I blow you away – they’re sisters! There were/are three of ’em: Stheno, Euryale and Medusa. Collectively, they were known by their gangsta name: The Gorgons. Only one G in this movie, and it plagues the German village of Vandorf in 1910, leaving a trail of stone bones in her wake.

The cops won’t investigate the death of a local gal as they believe the legend of the Gorgon to be true. So they pin it on her boyfriend who committed suicide out of grief, not guilt. This makes scapegoat boy’s dad ultra angry, and sets out to clear the family name, which is Goat. (Just kidding, though that would be really funny.)

Turns out one of the villagers is possessed by the spirit of Megaera, sister to Medusa. Red history flag here. She’s a sister alright, but to Alecto and Tisiphone – and this psycho b*tch is the cause of jealousy, envy and, get this, smacks people who do crime things as well as commit marital infidelity. Okay, now the movie is making sense.

The “Gorgon” shows up three times and does nothing more than step out of the shadows, makes THE FACE and turns people into anatomically correct statues. Too bad those snakes weren’t paying attention to that guy bringing up the rear with that swingin’ sword, or “Greek butter knife.”

Taking a little off the top, Megaera’s head rolls around on the floor and reverts back to its human form. So who the stinkin’ heck is it/she? I would tell you, but I’m already in enough trouble with the other two sisters.

Tight Titans

Obscured fantasy/horror classic Clash of the Titans (1981) is one of those cheesy guilty pleasure viewing experiences, right up there with coin-fed adult video machines and looking through my neighbor’s window at night whilst standing on yon garbage can.

Unlike my “power to the peephole” dalliances, Clash doesn’t have boobies. But it does have giant monsters, a flying horse with pigeon wings the size of a really big newspaper opened wide, a reptile woman with snakes for hair (must be hard to comb them) whose glare can turn men to stone, skeletons with swords (that could be a cool metal band name) and the interfering gods from Mt. Olympus who make life a pain for the mortals who are starting to believe in science and technology over some invisible omnipotent overlord in the sky.

The illegitimate son of Zeus (the CEO of the Gods), studly Perseus has to chop off the hand of the swamp demon Calibos. And he has to get the head of the snake-haired Medusa to stop his supermodel princess girlfriend Andromeda from being sacrificed to the giant Kraken monster, which is being released to eat the princess and destroy the city of Joppa by the jealous and manipulative Mt. Olympus gods whom the mortals rightfully mocked.

Oh yeah, there’s an annoyingly cute mechanical owl named Bubo and the aforementioned flying horse Pegasus, who had many opportunities to drop some road apples all over Joppa’s fine chariots from above, but did not do so. Fun, action-packed fantasy movie. Stupid horse.

Merry Christmas, Dracula

Even though it’s grammatically wonky Christmas at Draculas (2015) is in contention for best horror movie title of the decade.

Just think what the holiest time of the year (besides Halloween and National Beer Day) would be like with the Prince of Darkness. I mean, what would you give the guy who has everything? A chew toy? A cherry Slurpee™? A Groupon™ for tooth polish?

So here’s the plot, which has me drooling all over my National Beer Day shirt:

“Told through the eyes of The Invisible Man, Count Dracula has hit rock bottom, so with the help of his noble companion Igor, he decides to throw the greatest Christmas party of all time.”

“He invites The Wolfman, Medusa, The Wicked Witch, Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and The Invisible Man. But when two killers arrive at the door, things slowly begin to spiral out of control. And Dracula’s faith lies in the hands of one creature…Death himself!”

I only have one question – How do I score an invite to this party? If anyone can hook a brother up, I’d appreciate it.