punishmentpark Quite a fantastic little film, which revolves around the brutal killings of seemingly random victims, mainly prostitutes. It's hardly believable that a well to do, caring older brother would let his sister get into this much trouble, but in the end it becomes obvious why things turned out that way. Is it believable that the brother, a famous pianist, would fall in love with an exotic dancer from skid row? Maybe not, but it's portrayed with the necessary integrity. The nasty kill scenes and many gratuitous striptease scenes should clash with the serious themes, but they hardly do. The film maintains a certain amount of integrity, though I don't think it's for everyone - my love for gore and nudity admittedly helps a lot...The story (stories) evolves rather slowly, which leaves room for a believable way of Eric and Louise becoming more and more involved with each other. The ending may be a little far fetched (though I did have a feeling Uni-Save might have something to do with it), but it works well enough, even if the finale is a rather by the book way of concluding a thriller. It helps that Neil Dainard delivers a fine performance as the high and mighty baddie who believes he is just setting things right. The rest of the acting is rather okay, but nothing special.If a mix of gritty thriller and a good dose of exploitation elements might be your thing, check this one out! A good 7 out of 10 from yours truly.

Scott LeBrun One has to wonder why the makers of this film would dub it "American Nightmare" when in fact it's 100% Canadian, showing that those of us in the Great White North have what it takes to make dark and depressing trash cinema.The story is admittedly similar to that in the George C. Scott vehicle "Hardcore": a young man named Eric (Lawrence Day) frantically searches for his kid sister after having received a plea for help from her. This leads Eric into the underworld of Toronto (all shot on authentic seedy Toronto locations), including stop offs at a strip club. The characters, by and large, are kinky if not dangerous, and by the end there's going to be one hell of a disgusting revelation.Directed in a straightforward manner by Don McBrearty, the film can boast Canadian genre icon Paul Lynch (director of "Prom Night", "Humongous", and "Bullies") as one of the executive producers and none other than the original Wizard of Gore, Ray Sager, as the producer. Now, of course it's not going to be for all tastes, but those who enjoy the sleazy and sordid in movies are sure to get a kick out of the various goings on. Enhanced by a subtle Paul Zaza score, the movie does immerse one in its ambiance and tells a reasonably interesting tale that also involves Erics' strained relationship with his fat cat father Hamilton (Tom Harvey).Among the cast are Alexandra Paul ("Christine", 'Baywatch') in her first feature as the ill-fated sibling, Lenore Zann ("Happy Birthday to Me", "Visiting Hours") and Claudia Udy ("Savage Dawn", "Edge of Sanity") as strippers, Page "The Hitchhiker" Fletcher as Mark, Larry Aubrey as drag queen Dolly, and the always welcome Michael Ironside, who's unfortunately wasted in a boring part as the investigating detective. Day is unbearably stiff as the determined hero, but Lora Staley is appealing as the roommate who helps him in his journey and with whom he becomes smitten.The whole thing is pretty crude and reeks of cheapness, but it's still got good moments. For one thing, McBrearty and company know that you can never have too many strip numbers in a movie, and for another, there is one effective stalking / suspense sequence featuring Zann as she tries to defend herself with a pitchfork.Worth a look for hardcore enthusiasts of exploitation.Seven out of 10.

EyeAskance The son of a powerful entrepreneur receives a post from his sister, pleading for him to rescue her from an unspecified danger. With only the letter's return address as a lead, he begins a dot-to-dot descent into the seedy urban underbelly, gathering bits of information from one sleazy miscreant after another.Along the way, a good-natured stripper comes to his aid, and love blooms between the two. Meanwhile, hookers, exotic dancers, and various other reprobates are dropping dead, the victims of an unseen madman.This is a better-than-expected film, one that joyfully wallows in the sleaze of its urban environs, but manages to rise slightly above the lowbrow caliber of gratuitous exploitation cinema. Fine performances and steady pacing catapult American NIGHTMARE above the average for films of its type, but the tawdriness of the subject matter at hand should keep the grindhouse crowd pleased, as well.6/10...reccomended.

Woodyanders This relentlessly seedy and downbeat Canadian "Hardcore" clone largely eschews the heavy-handed moralizing of Paul Schrader's spectacularly lurid '79 feature in favor of wallowing with unstinting graphicness in a festering stinkweed urban cesspool of raw sexuality and total sleaze. A naive, clean-cut young classical pianist (the insufferably virtuous Lawrence S. Daly) tirelessly trolls the filthy streets and grungy back alleys of a gaudy, depraved and morally bankrupt red light district in search of his missing sister. Our painfully out of his element choirboy protagonist, who's the son of a prominent rich jerk who's none too happy with Daly's search for dear sis in the city's down-trodden, despicable underbelly, enlists the aid of a sad, pill-popping stripper (the fetching Lora Staley) and gets no help from weary, jaded, seen-it-all-three-times-over vice cop Michael Ironside.Director Don McBrearty cranks up the dismally debauched scuzzball atmosphere to the garishly sensationalized, yet still pretty ignoble and upsetting max: large portions of the film take place in trashy go-go bars, low-rent apartments and squalid porno shops; the dark, shadowy cinematography gives all the scummy action a properly murky and grungy air; a Jack the Ripper-type self-appointed murderous moralist takes it upon himself to rid the world of irredeemable scarlet harlots; numerous lovely young ladies remove their clothes at periodic intervals (perpetually nude Canuck B-picture regulars Claudia Udy and Lenore Zann among 'em, with a really young, topless and slutty-looking pre-"Baywatch" Alexandra Paul setting the unsparingly sordid tone in the opening scene as the killer's first victim); the secondary characters include such stock degenerates as creepy peepshow booth perverts, strung-out junkies, forlorn strippers and the inevitable swishy, whiny, lisping cross-dressing homosexual; and a cold, grim, utterly hopeless mood pervades throughout the whole movie. Way too bleak, seamy and depressing to be much fun, but still a reasonably engrossing and appropriately grotty celluloid excursion into neon slime territory just the same.