Bloody New Year (1987)

An utterly crazed, no holds barred final outing for British director Norman J. Warren, the purveyor of such schlockers as TERROR and INSEMINOID. This no-budget, virtually plot less affair is a failure as a film, but contains such individual scenes of imagination and bizarreness that it almost becomes worthwhile. Filmed in Wales, the film meanders from incident to incident as the group of badly-acting British teenagers are picked off one by one by the various evil and invisible inhabitants of the island. Also thrown into the brew is a gang of wicked thugs who cause havoc at a funfair, an American girl to make the film appeal to overseas audiences, and lots of references to '50s culture. We even see FIEND WITHOUT A FACE playing in a cinema at one point! The fashions have dated badly along with the hairstyles and pop music which turns up, and the acting of the unknowns is as wooden as you can get. Even the dialogue sounds like it is cheesy and dubbed, even though it isn't. The special effects, done on the cheap, are also very cheesy and unrealistic in the extreme. These are probably the reasons that the movie is a flop which basically scuppered Warren's interesting career, and he hasn't recovered since. I'm sure you can all feel a "but" coming...I find it impossible to totally dislike a film which has so much madness going on in it. There's a battle at a ghost train ride. Disappearing '50s singers. A ghostly old maid who appears and disappears at will. Snooker balls which move back to the original position after a game has been played. A girl gets sucked into a mirror and is trapped there for the duration of the film. A possessed vacuum cleaner and jukebox. A sheikh jumping out of a cinema screen to electrocute someone. A flying net which attempts to strangle a girl. A slimy monster emerging from a table. Bushes which laugh. Footprints which appears and disappear in the sand from nowhere. A burnt pilot lurking in the bushes who explodes. A plane wreck on the island. A snowstorm inside a building. A thug who punches through a girl.You want more? Railings which attack people. A scene of a man dismembering a zombie which is seemingly a tribute to The Evil Dead. A possessed boy whose arm is sliced off in a lift. A wall which grows hands and kidnaps a girl. A man thrown in a deep fat frier. Kitchen appliances which get a life of their own and kill. A severed arm which reattaches itself. A boy's head sliced apart by a boat propeller. A girl who is sucked through the bottom of a boat. Christ, the hotel in this movie makes The Overlook look like an ideal family vacation spot! Although undoubtedly a bad film, BLOODY NEW YEAR is worth watching for the incident alone and frequently made my jaw drop at the sheer badness/cheesiness/extremity of it all. I love the throwaway line at the end of the film to try and make sense of it all (a pilot was carrying a time-warping device which trapped the inhabitants of the island forever). Incredible stuff.

Man, this one is a must see to believe. First this, I search youtube on a regular base to find some old school horrors and then I will search the Web to locate them. As noted on this issue it was possible to track it down but it isn't that cheap anyway. Redemption had it out on DVD but is now an OOP. So VHS was the way to catch it. I found a version with a pop up VHS box. Just like the limited blu ray edition of Jennifer's Body. It isn't easy to find it without damage but it arrived here from the UK in perfect condition. Even the quality of the tape is excellent for a VHS from the 80's. It's just like it never been watched and that's what happened to this turkey. Oh there are funny moments in it but for a flick from the eighties no titties are shown let's even say, no underwear is even shown. Not that it has to be shown but it is stated that almost all flicks from that era have some nudity. Made at the fall of the slashers and even made at a period when all public holidays have there horror edition, remember, all fools day, silent night..., mother's day...it had to be good to be remembered. But it is a fact, it is remembered but in a bad way. Oh sure, the makers of this flick were addicted to the genre and have been putting every effort in it to make it a great flick but they failed. First of all, the storyline isn't original anymore. Again being on an abandoned island were bad things are happening, but this time it isn't a killer on the loose, this time it is a haunted house , scary isn't it? The movie starts of pretty well with the girl disappearing into a mirror but then it falls apart. We are watching some scene's at a fair but here things go wrong for the youth but also for the movie. It takes too long and it is childish. The bad people aren't believable and if I ever come in front of them well I wouldn't run away. Anyway, when they arrive on the island they hide in a hotel. From then on there is one thing on your mind, they tried to make an Evil Dead replica. You see a normal face, she turns away, her voice changes and then she's possessed and her face has changed, in a terrible way. And by that I mean the make up. Man, it's just like she woke up from a hangover vomit all over her face. You must see it to believe it. Sure, this is a low budget all the way. The only thing worth noticing is the turning of the head. But ghosts appear with a fade in and disappear with a fade out. Jesus, it's the eighties not Nosferatu. The blood never flows, only in the beginning when one of the bad guys is hit by, euh, the feet of an Elephant of a merry-go-round. At the end of the day, it was one to watch. All influences are in it, Evil Dead for the most part, Exorcist, Friday The 13th (the life boat on the end) but still it failed to give you the creeps. It sure is watchable, but watch it for the effects. Bloody New Year? Naaah. Cold Turkey yeah!

gets a good score for its countless scenes of unintentional comedy masquerading as 'terror'! Loads of great bits such as the baddie gypsy with the string belt who keeps popping up and just will not die! others are the tablecloth monster; the melting lift and the baddie who 'accidently' skateboards himself into an enormous cooking pot/wheelie bin that is itself possessed and proceeds to gobble him up! I've just finished at DeMonfort Uni in Leicester where the director of this flick once attended a live discussion on the subject of British budget movies....how he is able to intellectualise any of his films (especially the early exploitation crap) is almost as funny as the man buried in the sand up to his neck versus the sailing boat propellers at the end of BNY! i think the hierarchy cottoned on to Warren's inept film-making antics though as this appears to be his last ever 'feature'. Enjoy!

Reasons this is the best movie ever made... 1.It was made in the 80's 2.The film feels so lonely 3.The last surviving guy and chick both die and they are not the average teens in love couple. 4.The Music rules (Recipe for Romance has been stuck in my head for the last five years. 5.It's not mainstream 6.The zombies look so crappy that you have to laugh. 7.It's my favorite movie 8.The gang that hunts the kids down is a very good plot choice 9.It's Australian 10.No American could ever make a film this good These are the reason this movie rules. If you can think of any others just post me a message. I love this film and want to start a club for it our something Rock on