This one’s synopsis goes sorta like this: “Victor (Vic Sotto) is a single father who falls in love with Elisa (Cristine Reyes) who turns out to be an Aswang. But even so, Victor loves Elisa so much that he accepted what she is and even decides to live with her as his new wife and mother for his daughters.

But the problem comes when the leader of the Aswang clan (Jean Garcia) founds out that Elisa and her mother (Agot Isidro) are not eating humans anymore. She sent out other Aswangs to hunt down Elisa and her mother, and also for Victor and his family.

Will Victor risk everything for love and face the leader of the Aswang clan to save his beloved Elisa?”

Aswang? Never heard of them now have you? Well, even Neko was a bit vague on this particular folklore creature’s mythology, and that’s part of the fun of finding these weird lil’ films now isn’t it?

But weird is not always necessarily good…. and we all know I’ve bumped into more than a few stinkers, DVD wise, in my quest for the strange and the goofy movies I like. How does this one stack up? Only one real way to find out o’ Gentle Visitor, and that’s to “Read On”…..

Well…. Aswang. Now these Philippine folklore monsters were new to me, and other than an old Mondo Macabro film release, titled appropriately enough, “Aswang”, I knew very little about them going in to this one. (Luckily…. that’s just what the Internet and Wikipedia are for…. Hehehehe!!) A quick bit of research later and I’m told that the Aswang are often described as a sort of combination of vampires, werewolves, and witches and are almost always depicted as women. Aswang legends seem to vary greatly from place to place in the Philippines and even from person to person, with no one particular set of characteristics that can be agreed upon to describe them. They are often portrayed as some kind of monster with wings which flap loudly when she’s far away and quietly when she’s nearer…. (Ahhhh, yes!! Remember our old Indonesian friend the Kuntilanak? Seems like she’s got a “cousin” here in the Philippines…) Folktales often tell of aswangs living in villages as ordinary townspeople. While so disguised, they are described as being fairly quiet, shy and mostly harmless in appearance. But….. after dark, they can shapeshift into different creatures using their evil magic, most commonly into a large menacing black dog, so they can stalk the night in search of their prey. They are said to particularly enjoy devouring unborn fetuses and small children, often feasting upon their entrails leaving nothing but empty husks behind. Icckk, gross!! Thank goodness love is usually blind in these sorts of films….. otherwise this movie is soooo doomed.

We start this one out at a creepy Satanic ceremony at some old ruins in which the Cult of the Aswangs reaffirm their allegiance to Satan and the forces of Darkness under the light of the full moon. Following this, it’s off to some poor nearby village where the evil aswang run amok killing and eating the villagers in an orgy of cannibalistic frenzy. All of them that is except for Elisa (played by Cristine Reyes) and her mother Ida (played by Agot Isidro) …. who cannot bring themselves to join in the slaughter, choosing instead to sate their unholy appetites on a few of the villagers goats. This doesn’t sit well with the leader of the Cult, Barang (played by Jean Garcia), and her cronies who threaten them with horrible death if they are caught breaking the Cult’s rules…. and poor Elisa is hounded by the unwelcome advances of Barang’s son, who makes it plain that Elisa is to be considered his “property” and that their marriage is inevitable. What an evil doofus…..

We don’t really get a lot of gory bits in this attack, despite what the legends might suggest about the terrifying aswang and their habits, but then this is a Philippine film and they tend to be more restrained about that sort of content. We do get an attack on a small village church and a heroic battle by some gay choirboys that would be perfectly at home in a Thai movie… the comic moment sets the overall tone for this one as a light comedy/ horror piece and it’s here that the film remains from this point throughout. After this, it off to meet our romantic leading character, the widower Victor and his family…..

Victor (played by Vic Sotto) lives the solitary lonely life of a widower, with only the company of his two darling daughters Angel (played by “T2″s Mika dela Cruz) and Aileen (played by Barbie Forteza) to make him happy. It’s not a bad life… he’s successful, has the company of his father and goofy sidekick Tom (played by Richie D’ Horsie) to help out with the kids, and seems reasonably happy… but something is still missing. Someone to share it with.

Luckily for him, fate steps in and Elisa and her mom decide finally to flee the Cult, moving in with her uncle who lives in the suitably creepy old mansion down the street. Vic happens to be on the street the day they arrive by taxi and it’s love at first sight between the two… Well, actually it’s some sort of Aswang hypnotism that Elisa works upon Vic to make him notice her… but what’s the point of having weird supernatural powers if they can’t help you meet up with hunky widowers in need of a sweet girlfriend, eh? There’s the standard bits as Victor and his friends meet up with Elisa’s suitably scary looking uncle in the haunted mansion, then try to help him woo Elisa… and all the standard moments where pretty Elisa meets the girls and becomes their friend without knowing they are Victor’s daughters. You know those bits….. so dang cheesy but also sooo darn heartwarming. Cristina Reyes is absolutely perfect throughout as Elisa, managing to make her character both sweet, charming, sexy and appealing, yet also pull off the aura of potential danger of such a supernatural creature without seeming overly silly.

Eventually Elisa decides to tell Victor the truth and reveal her true nature. We get a sweet lil’ sequence right out of “Bewitched” where Elisa shows him her powers and takes him flying to the top of a city building. Trembling and nearly in tears she expects Victor to be repulsed by her horrible true nature as a cannibalistic creature of the night. (As if he could ever resist her super adorable winsome look and cute litte fangs….Hehehe!!) But by now, Victor is so smitten that despite his initial misgivings, he asks her to be his wife. There’s the little problem of telling his daughters of course…. they miss their real mother and have a promise from him never to marry again. Thank goodness they love their father enough to want to see him happy and once they find out their potential new mom is also their new friend Elisa, it’s all good. Until the evil cult decides to locate and punish their missing brethren that is….

They show up in the form of three vicious female aswang Alpha, Beta, and Keka (played by Jackie Rice, Denise Laurel, and Empress Schuck respectively) doing their best “Brides of Dracula” imitation to kill Elisa’s uncle and mom Ida before attacking Victor and his family to capture Elisa. There’s a neat bit where we learn all about how spices like salt, ginger, and pepper can burn aswang just like acid… a neat folklore bit among many in the film. There’s plenty of flying girls, transforming into big evil dog monsters, and some smacking of evil aswang until they burn to dust. They get driven away…. but Elisa decides to sneak off later that night and surrender to the Cult rather than see Vic or the girls, whom she loves more than life itself, get hurt because of her.

Victor wouldn’t be much of a hero if he let her make that sacrifice, so he leaves his daughters to seek a way to save Elisa from the Aswang Cult. But first…. his father reveals a shocking truth. Long ago, Victor’s grandfather had been an aswang!! It seems there’s a way to escape that evil existence by truly repenting your evil nature and embracing the will of God to forgive you and make you completely human. It was this connection that brought Elisa and Vic together in the first place, each sensing the others kinship on an unconscious level. All Victor need do is free Elisa from the Cult and bring her safely to the church where his grandfather was saved and she can finally live as a normal girl. One trip to a local shaman later and he and his friends are equipped with all the necessary aswang stomping tools they’d ever need, from Magic Rocks of Invisibility and Holy Water, to Swordfish clubs and mystic stingray tail-whips.

There’s only one problem. A fanatic army of cannibal aswang stand between them and Elisa, but some serious monster stomping later they manage to save Elisa and make a beeline for the safety of the church, with Barang and the whole of the Cult in hot pursuit. There’s a short chase scene with the aswang swarming their bus like a horde of monsters intent on killing them all, but thanks to the intervention of the Philippine police they make it to the church. Here we get our climax as Elisa survives the exorcism of the evil spirit within her to embrace the Holy Spirit of God and become a real girl at last. Ahhhh…. don’t you just love a happy ending?

So…. what’s the overall score for this one? Well…. it’s a simple story, and not one too far away from another recent “Big budget vampire romance movie” that just came out here in the US. Even so, Neko really liked “Ang Darling Kong Aswang” overall. It’s not an expensive or pretentious lil’ film, and the chemistry between Vic Sotto and Cristine Reyes works for me…. particularly on her part. Throw in a little light comedy, and some neat Filipino themed folklore I hadn’t heard of, and it makes for a very nice little film indeed. As horror/ comedies go, “Mr. Vampire” this ain’t… but then it’s really hard to top a true classic like that. Even so, I’m willing to give this one a decent 3 “Meows” out of 5 with several purrs for our adorable leading lady Cristine and the nice unique folklore monsters. Top it off with a nicely done Letterboxed DVD with excellent subtitles in English and I’m one happy lady. Isn’t that enough for any film to aspire to?

Of course, I’d never leave you hanging without a final parting gift. So to help you make up your own minds about this one, I snagged you a Trailer, and here it is!! Enjoy!

The synopsis for it reads: “At an exclusive university dead bodies are turning up with alarming frequency, all believed to be victims of the notorious Campus Killer. The police are stumped as to who the killer might be and, of course, nobody suspects innocent looking med student Barbara. A superficial fashion queen whose childhood dream was to grow up to become the living embodiment of her favorite doll, Cindy Superstar, all Barbara needs now is to find herself a real-life equivalent of Cindy’s plastic partner, Glenn. But behind the mask of her perfectly applied make-up is a deadly cross between Paris Hilton and American Psycho’s Patrick Bateman, a female serial killer for whom ruthlessly slaughtering people isn’t so much a question of why as one of why not?

Barbara’s grisly trail of murder fortuitously leads her into the arms of Tomas, a fellow student assigned to the campus morgue who is experimenting with a machine designed to translate thoughts and brainwaves into images. What he later discovers, though, is that with a little tinkering (and the addition of a healthy dose of Ecstasy to his subjects) the machine is able to reanimate the dead. Not surprisingly, this proves to be bad news for Barbara as Tomas begins reviving the Campus Killer’s victims in the hope that at least one of them will be able to identify their murderer. Of course, what he hadn’t bargained for was their insatiable hunger for both revenge and for human flesh. Soon, Tomas finds himself the innocent bystander in a bloody and explosive serial killer versus zombies showdown.”

Hmmm… now this one certainly sounds downright goofy. (And you know how Neko sooo likes goofy!!) So forgoing my usual popcorn and wine coolers, we opt for a movie night of spicy nachos and sangria, hoping the movie fairies will bless Carolyn and I with a delightfully grisly laugh fest to remember!! Think you might just like it too? Then you better “Read On” and find out more!

This one starts out with a scene right out of “Scream”… a girl’s locker room, plenty of sexy young co-eds with all the gratuitous nudity one needs in an exploitation film to set just the right ambiance. Oh, yes…. and a creepy masked killer with a big ol’ machete who stalks poor lone Barbara after all the other girls are off to class… but just who here is the predator and who is the prey? We find out pretty quickly who is who… as does the poor doofus who thought dressing up as a masked killer was a good way to peep on naked girls.

Barbara (played to psycho perfection by Macarena Gómez) is the sexy psychotic anti-heroine of director Miguel Martí’s black comedy and quite effortlessly steals every scene in “Sexy Killer” with her perky Barbie doll approach to sociopathy. She’s equal parts sexy co-ed and serial killer with the arsenal of “Kill Bill” , and  the violent combat skills of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”… minus, of course, any annoying moral conscience and regard for the sanctity of human life. More fun… the film allows Barbara to be an amoral “Ferris Bueller” constantly chatting with the audience about the things in her life that make her tick. Mind you… those are some pretty sick things… but hey… sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do to make all her dreams come true. So… so wrong…. but you end up actually liking this character and it isn’t long before you start hoping she’ll find true love and happiness…. even if it ends up killing everybody else in the film.

And really…. Barbara’s goals are quite simple…. she just wants the life of Barbie doll clone Cindy Superstar. (I guess Mattel wasn’t really keen on associating with this particular young woman’s world view… go figure.. Hehehehe!!) She wants the colorful dream house, the 2.5 kids, the dog and a wonderful, successful, plastic surgeon husband like Glenn who’ll treat her like the Princess she knows herself to be. So what’s so wrong with that? If only everybody would just stop getting in her way…..

It’s just that our perky lil’ killer can’t seem to resist killing all those people that make her life difficult. It doesn’t help that she also finds the bloody slaughter immensely fun and just soooo, soooo sexy and arousing. She just needs to find the right guy who understands all that… a “kindred spirit” to make all her dreams come true. Barbara’s grisly trail of bloody mayhem fortuitously ends up bringing her and Tomas, a fellow student assigned to the campus morgue to help in the investigation of the “Campus Killer”, together and for each of them it’s both love (and lust…) at first sight.

Tomas and his best bud Alex are working with the police to help track down the killer, thanks to the official coroner having been killed accidentally by Barbara during one of her earlier murders. They’re both smart and have also been experimenting with a machine designed to translate thoughts and brainwaves into images. Just the sort of thing to help therapists see and understand the thoughts of the mentally ill…. Not only that… but it can also be used to see the thoughts of the recently dead, reading the fading electrical activity of their brains. It doesn’t take long before they figure out it could be used to give them a view of the mysterious killer… if only they could get a fresh enough body. And even though this invention could possibly end the Campus Killer’s murderous spree, it might just put an end to Tomas’ chances with Barbara. If only he knew…..

But… despite the fact that Barbara freely admits to being the killer numerous times… and despite a very funny dinner sequence in which she murders a woman for a sexy red dress she wants while on a date with him, poor Tomas never figures it out. Worse, Barbara mistakenly believes he’s a soulless killer too… responsible for the death of the coroner he replaced to move up the ranks and steal his job as well as the guy who lends him his tuxedo to help him score with her. Eventually…. Tomas’ friend Alex gets in her way… and so it’s “Bye-Bye Alex”, gutted and hung up to bleed out in the morgue like a side of beef. Then the film hangs a left…..

What’s more fun that a movie about a cute, sexy serial killer? How about a movie where that serial killer’s victims return from the dead as flesh eating zombies to seek vengeance against her for their murders? Oh yeah…. seems that Alex and Tomas’ brain machine has a side effect you see… it doesn’t just let you see the thoughts of the recently deceased, it also reanimates them…. Yep. They start out being pretty normal… if a wee bit grisly looking… but soon decay sets in and they quickly degenerate into the fun loving, instinct driven, flesh-eaters we all know and love. Unfortunately… by the time Tomas figures this out he’s already reanimated the 30 odd victims Barbara has already put in the morgue… whoops!!

Now the film turns into a kinetic zombie fest… Tomas rushes to the campus memorial party to save Barbara and the others from the vengeance of the living dead, only to finally figure out it’s Barbara they are after… that she really is the killer after all… She figures out that Tomas isn’t the stone cold killer she thought he was… But it’s too late, they can’t deny the love that binds them together and so they go all “Resident Evil” on their opponents zombie butts, blowing up the party and killing all the undead fiends and students alike in an over the top ending.

Does this mean that our Hero and Heroine will live all happily ever after and walk off into the moonlight? Will they get the fantasy Barbara has always wanted for her very own? Well… it’s best to remember the old parable of the Scorpion and the Frog….. (as Barbara reminds us at the end of this one…)… and know that a scorpion will always be a scorpion just because that’s what it truly is.

Neko really… really… liked this one… (and you know “slasher” films really aren’t usually my “thing”…) It’s smart, and funny, yet viciously gruesome all at the same time with great zest and style that gives it a hallucinogenic bliss all it’s own. The director Miguel Martí’ and writer Paco Cabezas obviously love the horror genre and the film is peppered with great moments inspired by all those films we’ve all seen, from Wes Craven’s “Scream”, to George R. Romero’s zombie epics, “Friday the 13th”, and “The Silence of the Lambs”, even managing to throw in lots of neat lil’ references to films from other genres including “Titanic” and “Taxi Driver” sure to give movie buffs years of fun catching them all. The cinematography, effects, and editing are sharp and the acting good… particularly Macarena Gomez, who absolutely nails the crucial role of Barbara, a character that could have come across as far less appealing and fun in the hands of less talented actress.

All in all… I can most definitely recommend this one to people looking for something… well… just a wee bit different… from your average horror move. Your Favorite Catgirl Princess gives it 4 “Meows” out of 5 with more than a few contented purrs for the lil’ touches that make me know I’ll be watching it again and again in the years to come. If you like your scares mixed with more than a few laughs or if you ever wondered what “Legally Blonde” meets “Halloween” just might be like… then you’ll probably want to see it too.

The Region 2 PAL formatted DVD is certainly a spartan one… with only the movie itself and a couple of Trailers…. presented 16:9 widescreen in Spanish with excellent English subtitles. It’s sufficient I suppose, but I would have really liked a “Making of Featurette” to watch as well… The nicest thing is probably the price… only 7$ or so US, so you can’t go wrong if you hunt it down.

As always… there’s a Trailer and here it is to whet your appetites!

It’s a horror anthology by local Singaporean writer/director Jack Neo and our synopsis goes as follows: “Every year on the Lunar 7th month is the Chinese Hungry Ghost Festival and Singaporeans with Chinese heritage and background will be celebrating with their beloved family members that have passed away. Most common methods are burning paper money and offering food for their deceased family members. “Where Got Ghost” is a typical Singaporean horror-comedy movie that is divided into three stories, each with some thrills, some chills and quite a few laughs along the way…”

How did it stack up for me as a movie watching experience? Was it as charming as some Chinese ghost comedies? Or did they go with the toilet humor route that most Thai and Indonesian films like to go? (I admit I sorta expected the latter might just be the ticket here….. not that there’s a problem with that, mind you….Hehehehe!)

I guess we’re all about to find out, so you are certainly gonna want to “Read On” and see!

Admittedly I’m a bit of a novice on the topic of Singaporean cinema… I’ve only seen just a couple over the years, but they always strike me as a sort of cross between Chinese and Malay films (and I’m usually somewhat lost trying to follow Malay popular humor….) so I was hoping this one would stick close to the theme of the Hungry Ghost festival which I’m all up to speed on. Thankfully… it did.

Unfortunately, “Where Got Ghost?” bases much of its humor in some very specifically Singaporean situations and day to day ideas such as their obsession with local lotteries. That and some “play on word” jokes based on the differences between the Chinese language and the local Singaporean dialect went completely over my head…. they just didn’t come across when translated into English subtitled form. Without any grasp of these “in jokes” much of the humor sorts fails an audience from elsewhere in the world…. at least they did for me. Luckily there are no shortage of basic universal physical humor to fill in the blanks.

The first of the three stories, “Roadside Got Ghost”, concerns three scoundrels,  Cai, and his lackeys Fu and Shou, who devise a new lottery scam. Realizing the limited number of possible winning numbers in a popular lottery, they decide to make random calls to people, promising each of them that the lucky numbers for winning are theirs courtesy of the “God of Wealth”. Those who win the lottery are asked to pay 20% “offering” to Cai to show their gratitude. Those who try to avoid paying, become the victims of mysterious “calamities” designed to scare them into complying. This works so well that soon the three set themselves up up a company to expand their scam into new markets outside Singapore. Then Cai himself receives a phone call. The caller gives Cai the same offer he’s been making to his victims…. offering the winning numbers to the lottery for a percentage of the winnings. Believing it to be another scam artist trying to move in on their idea, Cai ignores the call, but then tries his luck with the given number anyway out of boredom. Surprisingly, he wins, and wins big. While out celebrating his luck, a strange pale faced man confronts him asking why didn’t he pay the commission. Cai laughs at him and refuses to pay,the man anything telling him to get lost. The ominous stranger then tells Cai that he will be killed by a car as punishment for his insult. Fu and Shou are worried, but Cai laughs off the whole thing and runs out into the middle of the road, daring the curse to strike. Naturally it does, and Cai is crushed by a car that smashes through the retaining wall of the overpass above him. As Cai is dying it is revealed that an angry spirit from who Fu and Shou stole offerings from in Cai’s name has returned to take her revenge. Never steal from the dead….. a lesson Cai, Fu and Shou will never forget.

The second story, “Forest Got Ghost”, tells the story of Nan and Lei, two lazy city dwellers who have become unlucky enough to be forced to take their compulsory army reserve training during the unlucky 7th month. Worse… they have to complete a map navigation exercise through the jungle near a hill widely regarded to be haunted. Warned about the dangers of the jungle, the none-the-less get lost and decide to take a shortcut to their destination despite warnings to stick to their instructed route. The two malingerers soon find out why they were warned…. a “red dress spirit” haunts the area… and soon it’s chasing them through the jungle scaring them silly. Eventually they encounter Yin Yin, a local woman who lives alone in a creepy house waaaay out in the forest. Seeking some shelter, they accept her invitation to stay overnight…. only to become the victims of her and her sister, the “red dress spirit”…. exchanging places with them in death to haunt this part of the jungle till some other unlucky fool is killed to allow them to leave.

The third and final tale, “House Got Ghost”, is the most comedic of the three and concerns a family, haunted in strange and bizarre fashion by their late mother. (Strangest among these…. her constant bothering of one son to find her the favorite “Mickey Mouse bra”…. try explaining THAT one to an exorcist!!) What seems her failings to provide her living relatives with luck due to an in auspicious death, leads to a series of weird encounters that nearly force her family to abandon her funeral plaque to a remote temple is in reality, a lesson in humility as the family finally learns that she has been protecting them from disaster all along from beyond the grave. One should always honor one’s ancestors…..

So… how was this one? Well… as ghost stories go, these weren’t particularly scary… and as comedy, not particularly funny either. Much of the special effects are digital… almost painfully so…. and lack the charm of practical effects, no matter ho obviously fake and cheesy such effects might be. The acting is alright, but no one character springs out to make their face stick in my mind forever. All in all, it’s a competently made film, just not a great one.

Neko can only give “Where Got Ghost?” a meager 3 “Meows” out of 5….. and that’s being generous. It’s not bad enough to put this lil’ Catgirl off Singaporean films forever, but it doesn’t make me want to run out and hunt more down either. Thank goodness they still do all that great subtitling of Thai stuff, so at least I’ll keep peeking in and who knows? Maybe they’ll surprise me next time…..

So… a Trailer you ask? Yep…. and here it is for your viewing pleasure!

Our synopsis goes like this: “This comedy/horror movie tells a story of three youths from Kuala Lumpur; Punai, (Mazlan Pet Pet) a petty thief, Asmat (Cat Farish), a car jockey, and Johan (Sam Shaheizy), a salesman.

They each received a letter from the late Pak Sudir (Piee), inviting them to his house. Upon their arrival, they meet up with Pak Sudir’s assistant, Mustika (Lisa Surihani), and they discovered that Pak Sudir was actually their grandfather who happens to be very rich.

The three of them stands a chance to inherit all of his belongings and wealth but under strict circumstances; they would have to stay at his house for three days consecutively without touching anything, especially an old Congkak. On the first night itself, strange and hilarious occurrences begin to happen.”

I catch a lot of Indonesian films, as visitors here at the ol’ Litterbox might have noticed, but Malay ones are a bit harder for me to come across… Don’t know exactly why…. they just are. Maybe somebody will explain the whole situation to me, but I get the impression that they just watch a lot of the same Indonesian produced films in Malaysia that I manage to find as well…..

So…… Is this one gonna be any good? Is it gonna stink really badly….? I’m not at all certain….. and I’m getting a weird vibe from the cover art… but it does come with those nifty English subs I love for a ridiculously tiny price, so I guess there’s really only one way for me to actually find out…. and that’s for me to give it a watch and for you all to “Read On”.

This one starts out at an exorcism…. a promising start for a horror film… Seems the local sorcerer has died suddenly, and as is usual in these sorts of cases, is still possessed by the many evil spirits he’s controlled to work his magic over the years….. They’re a nasty bunch of troublemakers, and just because the old man is dead, they just don’t get to go away…… Bummer. The comedy starts right off…. making some reference to another film “Jangan Pandang Belakang”, also directed by Ahmad Idham, but unfortunately your favorite Catgirl missed that particular one and the joke slipped completely over my head falling pretty flat in the process. I wish I could say it was the only such one to do that, but this was just the first of many….. Guess most Malay humor is sorta like that…. I got very little of it, and those I did understand, I can’t say I found particularly hilarious….. must be an acquired taste.

Anyway, the villagers just want the ghosts to go away…. otherwise without the sorcerer to control them, they’ll get up to all sorts of mischief. What they don’t know is that the ghosts are just like all of the old man’s other possessions…. something that can be inherited and passed along. His disciple, the evil sorceress Mustica (the most interesting character in the whole movie) wants them…. probably to increase her mystical powers or something like that, but first she’s got to do away with the legitimate heirs to the old man’s legacy, three idiot grandsons from Kuala Lumpur who come to the village to inherit what they think is all the old man’s money….. Big… big…. mistake.

The guys show up, and again your Favorite Catgirl was left scratching her head trying to figure out who these guys were….. I’m assuming they are big comedy stars or music stars in Malaysia…. But to me they seemed… well, honestly… not all that interesting. Maybe they’re Malaysia’s answer to “Abbott & Costello”, but whatever mystique they have in Malaysia didn’t translate to me at least. No slam against them…. I usually get Thai or Indonesian humor and cultural references, but not this time.

So… they watch Grandpa Sudir’s video will… and are told all his stuff is now theirs, as long as they stay 3 consecutive days at his home and not disturb anything while they are there…. Yeah, right, heard THAT one before. It takes all of an hour before they mess with the antique congkak board in the spooky ceremonial chamber and promptly get themselves possessed by three of Grandpa’s ghosts….. the Hantu Raya (a zombie looking thing that prowls the night eating chickens), our old buddy the Orang Minyak (the oily sex maniac maniac himself), and the Toyol (a little green demon who steals money).

The rest of our film concerns itself with the various hijinx that result from the nocturnal episodes where our heroes transform into these ghosts and wreak havoc around the village. Along the way, they manage to meet some nice local girls… fall in love…. run afoul of the prerequisite gang of local toughs who, of course, blame all the village troubles on “outsiders”…. Ah, and dodge Mustica’s attempts to kill them and steal the spirits. Most of this is somewhat amusing, if uninspired…. but doesn’t go anywhere daring or downright hilarious at all. Eventually we get introduced to the Mystic guy from the beginning of the film, who has a couple of funny bits… mostly dealing with how it’s much more impressive to travel by popping magically from place to place or by jumping out windows dramatically rather than simply using the door.

There’s constant Malay pop song references… most of which I missed, with the exception of Punai, who has crazy fits in which he sings Western pop song fragments as he transforms into the Oily Maniac….. (Say what?…), so I’m thinking these guys might just be pop stars. (Anybody wanting to let me in on these gys…. by all means speak up…. this poor lil’ Catgirl feels soooo lost on this.) Ahhh, yes…. and the fat gay shaman (I think….)….. didn’t get that part of the movie at all…..

Confused yet? I most certainly was…. but eventually we do get our big magic showdown between Mustika and the Holy man, everything gets sorted out, and our heroes get the girls. Thank goodness…..

Can’t actually say this one was really my style….. I’ll give it 3 “Meows” out of 5 mostly because the makeup and special effects weren’t all that bad…. the plot had some promise, and I’m assuming that stupid lil’ me just didn’t get half of the “in jokes”….. but that’s being pretty generous. I’m guessing most folk from anywhere outside Malaysia will be just as lost as I was, so it’s really only recommended if you are as goofy for quirky Asian stuff as I am. It’s presented in letterboxed format on the DVD with reasonable English subtitles… but be aware that they are often displayed very quickly, so read fast!! I’m soooo hoping my next Malay film is more like “Chemin” or “Congkak” than this one….. yes indeed!!

There’s actually even a Trailer available for this one! Here it is, for those of you wanting to take your own look…..

Our synopsis goes something as follows: “The Belles of St. Trinian’s” was the first of several British comedies originally inspired by the fearsome girl’s school created by cartoonist Ronald Searle. In this one, Clarence Fritton, bookie brother of the headmistress Millicent , of St Trinian’s School for Girls, sneaks his daughter into the sixth form to pick up racing tips from the daughter of an Arabic Sheik, the Princess Fatima of Makyad, who’s come to stay at the school. His horse, “Arab Boy”, is due to run in the Gold Cup and is secretly being backed by the fourth form girls, Miss Fritton, and the school funds to win a fortune in the race. Cockney spiv Flash Harry is also on hand to make a profit from the girl’s alcohol producing venture, while to further complicate matters, the Barchester police have planted sergeant Ruby Gates undercover at the school as a teacher, and the Ministry of Education are sending a third inspector down after the previous two disappeared without trace. The racehorse is kidnapped by the sixth form, but rescued and wins – saving St Trinian’s from bankruptcy and closure.“

I originally watched this one on our local Public Broadcasting station way back when…. definitely where you wanted to go when I was a kid to watch all those wonderful British imports….. and this one positively had me in stitches as a lil’ girl…. just the thought of what these wicked little hellions were doing at their school had me wondering just what sort of mischief I might get up to!! PBS…. you almost set me on the path to a crazy life of crime with this one!!

So, gentle readers….. you’ve never heard of St Trinian’s? Well it’s definitely time we fix that!! So… by all means.. “Read On”!!

Directed by Frank Launder and written by him and Sidney Gilliat, this was only the first of a series of four films made about the fictional St Trinian’s School for Girls staring many veteran British actors of the time such as Alastair Sim playing both the character of school headmistress Miss Fritton (in drag… Shades of Milton Berle!!…) and also her nere-do-well brother Clarence Fritton, George Cole played cockney spiv “Flash Harry”, and Joyce Grenfell starred as Policewoman Ruby Gates. Other members of the staff were played by Hermione Baddeley, Renee Houston, Beryl Reid, Irene Handl, Mary Merrall and Joan Sims.

This one, while most definitely very “British” in feel and also very definitely dated by modern standards, still holds up reasonably well even today. The girls are wickedly delightful in their hijinx… sowing both fear and horror among the adults of the film as they roll along like a rampaging band of marauding mongols. I love the arrival scene as the train pulls into Barchester station, all the locals scrambling for cover as if they were about to be attacked by an enemy army!! They aren’t half wrong in that assessment either…. Hehehehe!!

Throughout the enitire film series, St Trinian’s itself is depicted as an extremely unorthodox boarding school where all the younger girls of the Fourth Form are all portrayed as dangerous, uncivilized hooligans and the much older girls of the Sixth Form are all sexy femme fatales, who express their blossoming femininity by turning their schoolgirl uniforms into something sexy and risqué by the standards of the 1950′s , with short skirts that teasingly reveal the tops of the dark stockings that the all the girls wear, and with tight uniform tunics and shirts that accentuate their silhouette, creating the hourglass figure and long legs of the classic 50′s sex symbols, all the better to use their womanly wiles to manipulate the foolish men of the films. In general… the girls of St Trinian’s epitomize the classic view of the naughty schoolgirl that has become such a stereotype even today.

Carolyn had never seen one of these films, and we had a fun time watching my newly acquired DVD of the first of the series. This initial outing is a great little comedy that you can enjoy even if you are a bit lost on some of the “British” elements of the plot. If you’ve ever watched any of the “Carry On” films or old “Benny Hill” episodes… you’ll probably feel right at home. Neko gives it 4 “Meows” out of 5 for it’s fun… it’s exuberance and it’s definite “take no prisoners” role model for young girls….. it’s a “G rated” bit of naughty fun that still tickles the funny bone and brings a smile to your lips just thinking about the antics that ensue when the girls go wild even today.

Trailer? Nope… not a Trailer in sight this time out…. but I’ll keep my lil’ eyes peeled for one and when I do I’ll certainly add it in!

Our synopsis reads like this: “Award winning comedy duo James Corden and Mathew Horne (of Gavin & Stacey fame) decide to escape their problems and head to Wales for a weekend of debauchery.

Things don’t go quite according to plan and they find themselves stuck in a village where all the local women have been enslaved by the curse of the legendary lesbian vampire queen, Carmilla. As night unfolds the boys have to put all their fears (and dreams!) behind them in order to rise to the challenge of becoming Lesbian Vampire Killers.”

Hmmmm? Certainly sounds trashy and silly alright. But will it be a fun lil’ movie to watch with my sweet Carolyn on Movie Nite (or will it just utterly offend her and get me trouble?) This will be the first mainstream “Lesbian” themed movie (well…sort of… Hehehehe!!) we’ve ever watched together since we started our love affair…. but she knows all about my lowbrow film tastes and usually just shakes her head and rolls her eyes when it’s my turn to select a film for us. Oh well…. she’s really a good sport, so I guess I’ll find out.

The main question to answer though, as always, is: “Will it really live up to all the hype and promise of it’s silly title or fall flat on it’s face?” Neko’s been disappointed by movies before, (and probably will be again in future….) but let’s all “Read On” and find out how this one fares, shall we?

So…. first up, I must confess to having absolutely no clue who the two main stars of this one, James Corden and Mathew Horne, are…. and I’ve no idea what “Gavin & Stacey” is all about either. That’s either going to have me missing a whole lot of those “in jokes” that often fill a movie like this, or it’s going to allow me to watch without the added encumbrance of preconceptions about what I’m going to get. Carolyn had never heard of them either (and thankfully wasn’t touchy about what was probably going to be a Lesbian Vampire movie made basically for a target audience of horny young men and not lesbian women…. but then my sweet Carolyn does love me deeply in spite of my horrific movie choices) so the stage was set for a fresh look.

Well….. we start off with a properly mythological prologue right out of “Bram Stoker’s Dracula”, explaining the basic history behind the “Curse of Carmilla”, a “Vampire Queen” who was basically seducing the beautiful young daughters of the village of Cragwich and turning them into lascivious lesbian bloodsuckers….. (exactly why, we’re never told…. but it’s that sort of movie so just roll with it) and eventually she makes the mistake of turning her attention to the wife of local Knight off on the Crusades. He’s just a wee bit ticked off to find his wife has succumbed to temptation and become the willing sex toy of Carmilla, and so he uses a magic sword to lop off her head. Unfortunately not before Carmilla utters her dread curse that whenever a girl in Cragwich reaches her 18th birthday, she immediately transforms into a seductive lesbian vampire who will wreak Carmilla’s vengeance upon all men until Carmilla herself is resurrected. The only way to break the curse is for the last descendant of that same brave knight to return to Cragwich and slay Carmilla again with the magic sword of “Dialdo” (more on that silly weapon in a moment…) thus ending the curse once and for all. OK…. so with that out of the way, we move to present day London and meet our two bumbling heroes….

This would be the duo of Jimmy (played by Matthew Horne) and Fletch (played by James Corden) as best friends who have both experienced the absolute worst streak of bad luck two young men might ever have. Jimmy has been serially dumped for the seventh time by his flaky bitch of a two timing girlfriend Judy and Fletch has gotten himself fired from the latest in a long line of menial and demeaning jobs. Finding themselves low on cash, Jimmy convinces Fletch that a hiking holiday in the Welsh countryside is the remedy for their doldrums. Fletch thinks it’s a lame, stupid idea, but without any money of his own, it’s off to the countryside!

The boys are your standard good natured completely hapless guys from any number of other movies, looking for “beer and boobs” and immediately you get the sense that we’re headed for “Porky’s” territory here… but you’d be wrong. It isn’t long before the two get to the odd village of Cragwich… who’s inhabitants have that crazy “villagers from a Hammer film” look about them. The local Vicar mistakes Jimmy right away for the descendant of the famous Knight…. so there’s no real secret to discover later in the film. They direct the boys to the deserted Mircalla Estate (Hmmmm? Now THAT name sounds familiar…) at the edge of the village for free lodging…. Yep, can you say “vampire food”….. Sigh….. A plus though… it seems a VW full of hot female Swedish exchange students are also headed there for the night.

Once there, it isn’t long before night falls, the group gets to partying like there no tomorrow, and then the Lesbian Vampires make their appearance. From then on it’s a vaguely amusing, but generally tame bit of “Scooby Doo” running around the woods. You’d think there would be exceeding lots and lots of scantily clad vampire girls getting naked and making out at the drop of a hat from this point forward, but…. er… ummm… no, there really isn’t. In fact, outside of a few slow motion shots of gorgeous vampire girls kissing, and even a shower scene, there isn’t that much nudity to be seen here at all…. (Sorry, guys, Neko knows you were looking forward to that… you naughty, naughty boys…) You get the usual vampire hijinx, of course, and the effects are well done as our heroes behead, slice and dice the vampire girls who explode, not into fiery ash, but into what looks disturbing like…. er…. ah…. semen. Yep…. I’m not kidding you. Most of the humor is in that direction…. including the mystical “Sword of Dialdo” (Come on… say it reeeaally slowly….) with it’s penis shaped pommel. Carolyn and I got worried just exactly they were planning to do to Carmilla with THAT particular widget…. but no,no, no…  it’s just for slicing and dicing… thank goodness.

Then our fearless Vampire Hunting Vicar arrives to help the boys, and Lotte, the only Swedish girl left, well, “unvampirized”…. to prepare for Carmilla’s return. How will this be accomplished? Well, it seems the vampires need both the descendant of the brave Knight and the blood of a virgin girl to perform the ritual that reconstitutes her. Lotte? Yep, you guessed it. Yep…. just had to see it coming.

Sigh…. I wish I could say this was going to result in an amazing battle to the death between Carmilla and our heroes, but sadly “Lesbian Vampire Killers” is just not up to the task of pulling it off. Don’t get me wrong…. they got most of the vampire stuff just about right for a horror comedy. The girls are… well… just plain gorgeous in that Neo-Gothic Lolita “Undead Sirens of the Night” way, with lots of drifting through foggy forests in diaphanous costumes that the Brides of Dracula themselves would envy, and would have probably been right at home in a Hammer film of the seventies. It’s just that the whole thing is…. bland. A film such as this needs to abandon it’s shyness and just plain “go for it”…. If you are going to fill your movie with a bevy of predatory “Lipstick Lesbian” vampire girls then they better be getting all naughty or else you’ve blown it…… it’s what “exploitation” is all about. That’s why the low budget effort “Werewolf in a Women’s Prison” succeeded for me where this one doesn’t. If you are going to make a tacky, risque, tasteless film, then by all means, just go nuts….. anything else is just bound to fail. From a comedy standpoint, it’s a mixed bag too, with good chemistry between our two heroes but little connection with the other characters in any meaningful way. A couple of funny bits here and there can’t save the film though, which is a shame because the simple premise could have worked and worked well had the movie just had the nerve to go after it’s story with more gusto.

Unlike many reviews for it I’ve read while preparing my thoughts on it, (including a particularly scathing one by a Lesbian movie reviewer), I wasn’t offended by “Lesbian Vampire Killers” and neither was my sweet Carolyn. It’s just…. well…. a fairly forgettable and basically disappointing movie overall. As such, I can only give it 2 “Meows” out of 5, with a single purr for the vampire girls themselves, particularly Vera Filatova (whom Carolyn thought was particularly “yummy” and could try to bite her on the neck anytime……. Grrrr! I’m sooo jealous!!) who did indeed play her part extremely well. However, it looks as if I’m going to be looking further for the next great horror comedy to rival “Shawn of the Dead” or “Army of Darkness”…. Better luck next time, I guess….

Trailer? OMG…. of course there’s a Trailer. It’s probably better than the entire film itself and here it is!

Our synopsis for it reads as follows: “Two bumbling crooks, Bob and Billy, are caught by the police stealing a couple of diamond rings. Rather than be sent to jail they convince the judge to send them to a Mental Institution instead but that asylum turns out to be a haunted place. An unhappy spirit is committing murders and the two are left to uncover the secret behind the paranormal mysteries that lead to the death of the staff as the try to escape from their captivity”

Now you all know Neko-chan likes goofy Thai horror/comedies… she doesn’t hate Indonesian ones…. and some of the best Korean and Chinese ones can make me laugh till I nearly wet myself…. but will I get all giggly and silly for Philippine ones?

Hmmmmm? I guess there’s really only one way to find out…. and you know what that means.. right?

Yep… you are gonna have to “Read On”, gentle visitors to find out with me!!

So this one starts up by introducing us to Billy and Bob… two goofy criminals with a scheme to rob a jewelry store by dressing as women to separate, confound and confuse their victims while they snatch the most valuable rings in the store right from under the noses of management and security. Cross dressing? Wow…. Sounds like a Thai horror comedy already… and we stay pretty much in that vein throughout the rest of “Scaregivers”. This one would probably do very well in Thailand, if this lil’ Catgirl has learned anything from her many hours of viewing such films.

Anyways… after some broad comedy featuring a bit of stuff utilizing the confusion to be had between speaking English and Tagalog, we end up with our hapless duo getting caught after nearly making their big getaway. We even get a wee bit of “Bollywood” with Bob trying to hide in a passing Hindi wedding procession on the street during the chase…. but to no avail. Luckily for them, Billy had Bob hide the valuable booty before they get caught…. by swallowing it. Yep… it’s that sort of brilliant planning that separates the pros from the rank amateurs of crime.

Apparently prison in the Philippines is a nasty and brutal place…. Billy and Bob want nothing to do with being sent there…. they could avoid it by simply giving up the two rings they stole, but noooooo!! Not gonna do that!!! In fact, the police know they probably ate the darn things… they fill them to bursting with water during the interrogation, but once Bob passes them, they get surprised in the toilet by an officer and he promptly scarfs them back down again before they get seen… Ewwwwhhh!!! Yep…. see what I mean?… Neko-chan told you this one was real close to that naughty, “gross you out” Thai style of comedy….

That leaves them with only one option to avoid the horrors of prison… to convince the judge they are absolutely nuttier than squirrel poop, by switching their lawyer’s jar of peanut butter for their “stool sample” and eating it down during the trial. It completely grosses out the judge, the audience and everybody else in the court getting them a one way ticket to the funny farm.

Unfortunately for them…. it’s no safer in the asylum… Seems the one they get sent to is being haunted by the angry spirit of someone who absolutely hates people who are faking insanity in order to avoid jail… it’s been killing those sorts for some time now, as well as taking out it’s vengeance on the nursing staff as well.

Worse…. they are followed to the asylum by a couple of “rent-a-thugs” in the employ of the jewelry store who are supposed to recover the valuable rings. Naturally they have no intention of doing that… their ultimate plan is to get the rings, kill off Billy and Bob, and head for parts unknown. The film then goes into the mode of showing how Billy and Bob cope with asylum life…. the goofy, quirky inmates, the constant medication, the supernatural threat of the ghosts that lurk everywhere…. Womanizing Billy falls for Doctor Jessica, his attractive psychiatrist, little knowing she’s central to the haunting that’s going on. It doesn’t help that the more they see the ghosts, the less sane they end up seeming to the staff…. and the longer it looks like they’ll be stuck in the asylum.

Seems at least one person did escape…. he was a violent criminal who had faked insanity too. Supposedly he managed to find a way out. Or did he? Seems the jury is still out on that one…. Eventually they learn the truth, that he originally romanced Dr. Jessica back when she was only Nurse Jessica, and that she helped him escape by letting him slip into the coffin of an inmate who died and was taken just outside the asylum to be buried in the nearby cemetery. One of the other helpful Nurses, Marcia, befriends Bob and tells him Jessica later dug him up and helped him to get away. Can this clever scheme stolen straight from “The Count of Monte Cristo” work for our goofy heroes as well?

Well… it’s “Spoiler Alert” time…. as Neko can’t really go much into that without giving away the ending…. Let me just say, some of the people here at the asylum are…. well…. seriously “living impaired”…. and that’s it’s gonna make for a dangerous escape plan for our boys. Nothing is ever simple in one of these films now is it?

The last 20 minutes or so of this one are tied up with resolving this plot, revealing the truth behind the haunting and which spirit here is really to blame for all the vicious death and mayhem. It’s fairly easy to figure out if you try, and Neko did so waaaaay in the beginning of the film, but don’t worry…. I’m not going to spoil it for ya!!

Our heroes eventually triumph after finally realizing the folly of their crimes and how they’ll never profit from it and having a change of heart. They give back the rings, and even train as nurses so they can return to the asylum to help all the patients there…. Ahhhhhhh!! Soooo nice!! Ta-dah!!! The end!! Roll the credits!!

So… to wrap up, Neko gives “Scaregivers” a well deserved 3 “Meows” out of 5 for doing the whole horror/comedy thing with at least as much gusto as the Thai films I occasionally watch, if not with the same level of gore or budget. It also rates at least a purr of contentment for the silly bit about Bob constantly swallowing the stolen rings… over and over…. soooo darn gross, but also sooo darn funny.

The disc itself, by Regal Entertainment, is well done, with easy to read, accurate English subtitles and a pile of Trailers on board for at least a couple of other films that Neko might just wanna look for. The film is presented in letterboxed format, and looks well made with the level of production values comparable to those from Thailand or Indonesia. My only quibble is all the stuff you have to sit through while waiting for the main menu to arrive… nearly 10 minutes or so of things you can’t get past to get to the main menu…. but hey, that the way it goes.

Oh yeah…. and there’s even a Trailer available for it, and here it is!! Enjoy!!

The synopsis for it reads: “Former pro wrestler Nathan Jones plays a timid, down-on-his-luck Australian tourist in Pattaya. While out partying for an evening, Barney (Nathan Jones) gets drugged and has his passport and money stolen by a crooked bar girl. Stuck in Thailand, unable to speak the language or defend himself from local thugs, he is taken in by two young girls, Dokya (Sasisa Jindamanee) and Katen (Nawarat Techarathanaprasert). They cook a spicy Somtum salad for him, which turns him into a big red monster who runs amok and destroys their mom’s restaurant. Barney feels ashamed and promises to pay them back for all the damage he caused during his firey rage, and eventually the girls realize that his unusual reaction may help solve their problems.”

Mmmm… yep. I’d have watched this one a while ago, but it’s one of the newer ones out of Thailand released to their domestic market sans those pesky yet ever so necessary English subtitles. Neko has sorted that all out… having secured some decent fansubs, so what are we waiting for? Lets get to it!

So we start this one out getting acquainted with our hero, Barney Emerald, who got himself a problem. He won a wonderful vacation trip to Pattaya City only to run afoul of a gang of crooks that use a bargirl to get him totally drunk, drug him, and steal him blind… leaving only his khaki’s to hide his shame. Without a passport or a baht to his name, he’s stuck until he can either find his passport again or get the money to make it to Bangkok and his embassy to acquire a new one.

He’s a gentle soul… utterly incapable of fending for himself and it isn’t long before Barney finds himself running for his life after getting mixed up in little pickpocket Katen’s latest bit of trouble with some of Pattaya’s local toughs. They survive only through the help of Katen’s “foster sister” Dokya, a kickboxing expert who arrives just in time to save the day. Katen feels sorry for getting the big lug beaten up and takes him to the local Buddhist temple where the senior Monk takes pity on him and puts him up while he sorts himself out.

Barney is the sort of gigantic guy that scares everybody at first, but kids take to his gentle nature like ducks to water, and soon he’s the proxy “big brother” to all the orphans at the temple. Katen especially is drawn to him, although she likes to believe it’s just her way of making up for the beating he got protecting her and she’s the only one who can translate Thai for him. Her “foster sister”, Dokya and Dokya’s mom invite him to visit their restaurant stand and sample some somtum, a spicy local delicacy. Unfortunately, Barney has an almost freakish reaction to it’s spicy flavor. He turns bright red, like a boiled lobster, and goes berserk, smashing the restaurant to pieces while staggering around trying to find the water to quench the fire in his mouth. After calming down, he realizes what he’s done and vows to help Dokya and Katen get the money to fix the place back up… whatever it takes.

Dokya is an amazingly skilled kickboxing prodigy, but her mom forbids her from fighting, so she decides to teach Barney so he can enter local boxing contests to win the money they need. Barney, though, while big and strong and willing to try, is just too kind hearted and timid to fight well. Katen tricks Dokya into attempting a match, making her think it’s been all sorted out with Mom, and fooling Dokya’s Mom into believing she’s just going to do a “Thai Dancing” exhibition.

There, they run afoul of the gang of toughs she fleeced earlier that now see a chance for a little payback. Also…. Katen makes the mistake of stealing the wrong thing from the wrong people. In this case, a group of international diamond thieves and smugglers. You just know THAT’S gonna be bad news…. Dokya survives a brutal fight up against a male opponent who cheats and punishes her for the gang, even managing to win the fight only to have that victory stolen away by some last minute cheating on behalf of the crooked fight promoter.

Bruised and sore Dokya returns home only to have her Mom freak out when she finds out what they were up to, Katen realizes she really messed up with her lies and the whole family looks like they are on the verge of collapse. This galvanizes Barney into action…. he decides to use the one thing he has to try to set things right… his tremendous strength and stamina. He gets a job hauling fish….. and boy, can he haul fish!! While not the greatest job going, he manages to get the money they need to start rebuilding the restaurant, and even tries to help out with the cooking, becoming a big sensation working a huge oversized mortar and pestle to make somtum by the gallon. Soon “Giant Mortar Som Tum” is the hit of the town and business is better than ever.

But…… The foreign diamond thieves finally figure out who stole the shiny crystal “key” to their secret smuggling container. Yep, it isn’t long before Thai gangsters and some big beefy foreign wrestlers are after our little urchins and their big friend, Barney. They kidnap our heroes and threaten them with all sorts of nasty things before they find the crystal… only to have Dokya swallow it accidentally. Ooops!! If you’ve seen any cartoons with a similar theme… you just know where this is going.

Well naturally, Katen has to start feeding Barney all the somtum she can whip up at a moments notice, and Dokya has to get her kickboxing lil’ butt in gear so we can have a big ol’ fight sequence to end all fight sequences, complete with Barney tearing a small lear jet up into teeny tiny manageable chunks. He gets shot in the process, but after a tearful moment with the kids begging him not to die and then trying to use somtum to revive him, he’s up and moving again. Yay!!

Well… we end things all happy and good. The crooks are all caught, Barney gets his passport back, the restaurant is thriving, and Barney sort of adopts lil’ Katen and takes her to America where his experience has made him a successful Thai cook with his own famous restaurant. Cue the final credits!

“Somtum” isn’t a big deep and meaningful film…. lets get that out front right now. The acting is adequate, but relatively uninspired….. even the fight scenes, while clever at times, lack the truly amazing quality of, say, “Ong-Bak” or “Chocolate”… (although Sasisa Jindamanee is a very skillful Martial Artist who Neko thinks has quite the future in this sort of film if she works at it). But then the point of a film like this is to entertain, and “Somtum” certainly does that. The simple, perhaphs overly simple, plot actually does work. There is enough really good stuff in here to make it worth a evening’s viewing, and Neko’s just a sucker for cute lil’ urchins anyway…. hehehehe!! Nathan Jones probably wont give up his main job playing villians up against the likes of Tony Jaa, but it was nice to see his softer side for a change.

So I give it 3 well enjoyed “Meows” out of 5 for being just the sort of sappy PG rated comedy/ action picture you’ll enjoy without having to make your head hurt figuring out what’s going on or just who the bad guys are. Sometimes that’s not a bad thing to be able to say.

There’s a Trailer…. and naturally Neko’s got it linked here for ya… enjoy!!

The synopsis I found tells us: “Taew (Jathurong Mokjok), Cartoon, Mot-dum (Ekachai Srivichai) and Songkram are four aging, yet still outrageous, katoeys who run a boarding house for boys in provincial Thailand. After helping to cover up the mysterious deaths of two local teens, obese ladyboy ‘Pancake’ (Koeti Aramboy) and beautiful local girl Num-Ning (Pei Panward), their two spirits begin haunting the dormitory, forcing the “ladies” to try all sorts of crazy schemes to get rid of the ghosts. Eventually, they realize the only way to do this is to help the ghosts to avenge their deaths.”

Hmmmm? Katoeys? What the heck are those, Neko-chan? Well, katoeys are those cross dressing transsexual guys you see in some Thai movies….. So I guess the best way to describe this one is that it’s sorta like if you crossed “Pricilla, Queen of the Desert” with “Ghostbusters”…. but made waaaay cheaper, and put through the ol’ Thai Cultural Filter….. Yep, this is gonna be a strange one….. no doubt about it.

We start out at one of those Thai apartment buildings you’ve seen about a million times before in a Thai film….. but look out!!….. There’s murder afoot!

Seems every time poor Taew, Cartoon, Mot-dum, and Songkramturn turn around, there’s a dead body lying about threatening to scandalize the apartment and threaten it with closure. First local beauty Num-Ning commits suicide by jumping off the roof….. or did she “jump”? Then Pancake slips and falls in the bathroom conking “her” head on the toilet and going to that big “Drag Review in the Sky”. Naturally you can’t involve the police…… that would just be tooooo easy. So they do the next best thing….. bury the poor victims in shallow graves out in the lonely woods under the cover of darkness. Just one problem. They don’t stay buried….Yep. Pretty soon both of those disgruntled spirits are haunting the place but good, driving away all the young men living there and making life miserable for the foursome.

Pretty much exactly what you expect would happen in a film like this does happen…. Naturally the “ladies” have a competitor who is renovating another apartment building and who wants to steal away all of the tenants. Naturally her son and his worthless friends all stay at the apartment building while those renovations go on….. Why I’m not exactly certain, but they do…. and of course they had something to do with poor Num-Ning’s unfortunate “accident/ suicide”…. but more on that later. Meanwhile we get the prerequisite number of homosexual drag queen jokes and even a couple of goat herding Thai Cowboys who wander by doing the whole “Brokeback Mountain” sketch that, while probably funny in Thailand, just left me a confused and a little lost….

Anyway…. eventually the spirit of Num-Ning manages to possess her old boyfriend and clue him in as to how those evil boys tricked her and tried to rape her in their apartment chasing her until she fell to her death. Now her soul is being used by the wicked sorcerer working for the boy’s mother and she’s being forced to haunt the apartment so it will have to close. Pancake and the “ladies” team up and decide to put an end to the sorcerer resulting in a crazy duel out in the woods where the “ladyboys” all dress up in their best Drag Queen fabulousity to do battle. These outfits are sooooo crazy! It’s like these “ladies” are the Lesbian Love children of Wonder Woman and Sailor Moon….. this alone should have paralyzed the sorcerer with laughter…

But I have to say, just when Neko thinks she’s seen it all, there is something to make me go WTF!?!

Pancake…. dressed like some demented Gay Leprechaun rides to battle on a rocket propelled giant penis statue to try to use it’s “mystic power” to overwhelm the sorcerer…. Yep. Didn’t see THAT in “Ghostbusters”….. Neko kids you not.

So. I guess once the chubby transexxual rides the giant penis you’d say it’s time to wrap things up, right? Yep…. The sorcerer gets his just desserts, the “ladies” get to keep the apartment open, the monks show up and bless the place…. it’s a wrap! All in about an hour and a half.

Well….. Neko can say this one was certainly different. The Taiwanese disc by Shengchi is adequate, with forced Trailers, chapters, no other Features and comes in an All Region NTSC letterboxed format (despite being listed as a Region 3 on the label)….. equipped with excellent English and Chinese subtitles. (YAY!!!)

I give it a 3 “Meows” out of 5, for certainly being the most different film I’ve seen in quite some time, but it’s probably waaaaay to weird and out there for most people. Remember…. Neko-chan has told you many times just how truly trashy her tastes can be!! Still…. if you ever need something utterly strange to inflict on friends some Movie Night, “Haunting Me” will certainly do the trick…. (just stock lots of wine coolers and be prepared to apologize the next day…. Hehehehe!!)

I couldn’t find an official Trailer for this one… but Youtube was kind, and this little clip ought to do!

The synopsis for it reads: “Ajarn Boh (Jaturong Mokjok) is a fake medium who manages to fool the locals with his tricks but is in big trouble with the powerful Au. Meanwhile, Waan (Padchon Kompreawpan) is in love with Wit (Weerayuth Naburana), but Wit doesn’t know Waan is a ghost. Waan was murdered by Au and has returned to seek revenge. Ajarn Boh meets Waan, the first time he has actually seen a real ghost, and teams up with her against Au.”

Hmmmm? Ghosts… fake mediums….. goofy Thai character actors….. potty jokes galore…. sounds like all the prerequisites are there for Thailand’s answer to “Abbot & Costello Meet the Krasue”….

Will it entertain me? Make me giggle uncontrollably till I nearly pee myself? More importantly…. is it worth you all finding your own copy of this? Let’s find out! “Read On”, if you dare!!

This one nearly slipped under my radar, as I’d been under the impression that it was yet another one of those films released in Thailand without english subtitles as of late. If you are a regular here at the ol’ Litterbox, you know that usually only slows me down until I can find some fansubs and work up the ambition to do a little work timing them and correcting them for grammar. Such was the case here…. But then I find out that despite the claims to the contrary….. even on Thai DVD sites that I usually find to be fairly accurate and trustworthy, that this one actually does have english subtitles on it, a nice english friendly Main menu, and was not subbed into Thai as advertised!! Yay!!! I’m used to the utter strangeness and crudity of Thai humor, and love the old “Mr. Vampire” style of slapstick that such horror comedies usually contain, so how could I NOT risk grabbing a copy to see for myself?

This one starts up promisingly. In a sequence shamelessly lifted from another Thai horror/comedy, “The Beheaded” aka “Pee Hua Kurd”, we find a hopeless bunch of underlings involved in a bit of midnight body snatching to collect spell components for a sorcerer brewing love potions. Naturally, they botch the job, and end up dumping the corpse in a river by accident. It’s the body of a poor young girl, raped and murdered, and now it’s not “properly buried” as well…. you just know that’s gonna be trouble, right? Unfortunately, this sequence isn’t a well done as in “The Beheaded”…. which managed to make the whole idea of grave robbing actually funny. Here it just serves to get the plot rolling and set up the doomed love story between Waan and Wit….. Our main story is really about Master Boh…..

Boh is a com man, pure and simple. He reads fortunes… casts “love spells”… and sometimes fakes ghost attacks on the people of the village with the help of his sister and acolytes to trick people into hiring him as an exorcist. It seems to be a pretty sweet deal…. he doesn’t have to work for the Monks renovating the nearby temple, and he lives pretty well off the “gifts” that gullible villagers bring him to curry his favor.

Wit’s friends all work at the temple… and they get suspicious of his beautiful new wife only to discover she’s actually a ghost!! Not just any ghost… the very same begrudged spirit who’s body was stolen at the beginning of the film. Luckily, they have Master Boh!! They convince Boh to sort this out, which he agrees to, never for once believing that there actually is a ghost…. He fails…. but the spirit starts haunting them, trying to convince Boh to help her find her murderers. And as if that isn’t enough to complicate Master Boh’s life…..

By accident…. he actually manages to give away the winning numbers on the Lottery to the villagers who win big from the local bookie. Naturally, this gets Boh and friends into trouble with the Bookie and his thugs. But he’s a powerful shaman… so of course they seek the help of a sorcerer to get even. That sorcerer whistles up the ghost of a local murder victim who’s dad has been stashing his corpse at home rather than burying it. It chases Boh and his friend around until they are forced to seek shelter at the Temple.

Finally…. the ghost of Waan finds out that her killers are none other than the Bookie and his thugs…. she teams up with Boh, and users her ghostly powers along with his con-artist trickery to beat the villains and save the day.

So… was it good and entertaining evening’s DVD time? Well….. sorry to say, this one isn’t as good a picture as “The Beheaded” which I did really like….. it tries hard to be, but it really just isn’t. Master Boh is a neat character…. and in the right movie, I’d probably like him a lot… but here he sort of falls flat. Towards the end, it feels rushed… with an ending that seems badly edited and gives the impression that I was watching a 1hr and 45 minute film cut down to a 1hr and 30 minute feature at the last minute….. It’s safe to say, that although this one got a couple of smiles out of me here and there, my panties remained blissfully dry…… Hehehehe!!

The DVD itself isn’t bad…. it comes with a Trailer, a “Behind the Scenes” documentary, and some posters and stills. The subs are good and separate, although strange at times… In all, Neko-chan gives this one 3 “Meows” out of 5 for trying like a trooper, but just barely crawling outta the grave. Guess I’ll be digging a little harder to find that next big horror/ comedy franchise….

Somehow….. I even found you a Trailer!! Enjoy!