B-Movie Reels

by Alan Spencer

  It trickled toward her, branching out in gooey forks. She was so mesmerized, she didn’t back away until the tip of the sludge made contact with her shoe. The rubber toe sizzled and spat out a curl of smoke. Her big toe itched and an arch of pain branched up her foot. She didn’t know what to do. Alarmed, she fumbled backward, and in the process of gaining her footing, she toppled to her side.

  The slime trail closed in.

  Karen unzipped her windbreaker and frantically retrieved her mace. She sprayed it at the enclosing puddle. She was shocked when the tendrils turned into smoke with each jet of mace that hit them. The goo dried up with a wet smacking noise, and as blue smoke issued from the mass, the strange puddle evaporated.

  3

  Andy was astonished at the spread on the kitchen table. Brisket, rolls fresh from the oven and glistening with butter, mashed potatoes and gravy, fried okra, green beans, and two cherry pies whetted his appetite. Mary-Sue served his plate with a sizeable portion of brisket and then let Andy pick out the rest for himself.

  “Where’s your dad?” he asked.

  “He had to leave. Said a friend in Lawrence needed to use his trailer hitch. Dad used to run a tow-truck service on the side, something he did during the winter when people slid off the roads. He’ll be late.”

  He peered outside through the window at the wooden fence sheltering the dairy cows. “So you’ve been at this farm your entire life?”

  “Pretty much.” She picked at her okra with a fork. She hadn’t taken a bite of anything. “It’s kind of boring living around here. Dad has machines that do the milking of the cows now, so all I have to do is feed them and clean up after ’em—excuse my dinner talk.”

  “I’m not bothered by it.” He ate a forkful of brisket. “Aren’t you hungry? You haven’t eaten much, and I’m stuffing my face. You worked hard on this, I’m sure.”

  “It’s hard to eat what you’ve cooked, and I’m not very hungry anyway.”

  The way Mary-Sue’s eyes slanted when she looked at him, clearly something was on her mind. She looked hurt. Preoccupied.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  She cleared her throat. “What do you know about your Uncle James?”

  He swallowed down another bite of brisket. “He did magic tricks at family gatherings, and after years of struggling to make a living, he got famous. After that, I don’t know much else. Uncle Ned told me during one of his shows he made a little girl disappear, and then he couldn’t bring her back. The girl didn’t turn up. Even now there hasn’t been a word about the poor kid. He quit working the magic shows after that, and then eight months ago, he tried it again…and then you’ve heard the rest. I never believed he was a murderer. What happened to those people at the club, their body parts mismatched, what single human being can do that? If anybody at all? It should be more of an unsolved crime than a conviction.”

  “Yeah,” she agreed, though she sounded bemused. “I didn’t know him very well. Ned came over a lot and ate meals with us, but James wasn’t much for socializing. Not to be critical of your uncle, but he let that house go to shit. It could make a descent boarding house, especially with all the college kids that live just miles from here. You’d make good money.”

  “I don’t want the house,” Andy insisted. “I’m a film student. I want to make movies and documentaries, maybe shoot commercials. I’m out of work right now, but my professor’s got me watching a bunch of old horror movies for an upcoming project. He’s releasing the movies on DVD, and he wants me to help him write commentary and even liner notes.”

  Her interest was limited, so he brought the conversation back to her. “So are you going to take over the farm when your dad retires?”

  “Fuck no.” She threw her head back. “The way you feel about your uncle’s house is the way I feel about the farm. As soon as I figure out what the hell to do with myself and get a job and a husband, I’ll be set.”

  She got up and brought a bottle of Zinfandel from the cupboard and poured him a glass. He sipped the wine and let his stomach swell with food and spirits. “Ah, you’re going to put me to sleep.”

  “And would that be a bad thing?” Her brow arched.

  She then pulled her chair next to him. Perfume scented the air between them, something smelling like flower blossoms. Make-up highlighted her otherwise drab features: a solid wall of foundation, a hint of blue eye shadow, mascara and red lipstick.

  She placed her hand on the inside of his thigh. “Do you have a girlfriend?”

  “Not since about a month ago. H-how come?”

  He was nervous, but he held it down the best he could.

  “I’ll be honest, I like you.” She puckered her lips. “And I noticed the way you were looking at me back at your house earlier. You were looking at my chest—and don’t get me wrong, I like it. All the guys look at my tits.”

  She moved her hand up to his lower abdomen and lifted his shirt to pet his bare stomach. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been with a guy. Maybe you don’t have that problem with getting the girls.”

  She kissed him, her tongue licking across his lips. Her hands roved to unbutton his jeans, but he backed up out of her reach. “I, I’m sorry… I can’t do this. I barely know you. No offense.”

  “It’s okay.” She kissed his neck. “We’re both adults.” Then she laughed. “It’s not high school anymore.”

  He struggled out of his chair and retreated to the front door, nervously throwing out, “Thank you for dinner. I, um, I apologize if I’ve offended you. I can’t do this. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be rude. You’re pretty…you really are.”

  Mary-Sue raced ahead of him and blocked him from leaving. Then her face turned serious. “I’m giving you sex without commitment. Doesn’t that interest you?”

  She unsnapped her bra from beneath her midriff and tossed it across the room. “Don’t you want to see my breasts? I’ll show you the rest of my body…if you let me.”

  In that moment, he saw her breasts through the thin fabric, the nipples the size of a cookie—a hearty-woman’s tits. The primordial urge to obey her instructions throbbed below, but he couldn’t take the first step. It was too soon, and the way her eyes pierced into him, she didn’t look at him, she looked through him. There was a reason for this charade.

  The girl’s appeal was suspicious.

  He still enjoyed her company tonight. “You’re a nice girl. Let me get to you know you first, okay?”

  Mary-Sue opened the door for him. “Then get out, Andy. You’re an asshole. I worked all day on that meal.”

  You’re telling me you wanted sex for the meal?

  He didn’t mean to smirk, and lucky for him she didn’t catch it in the dark once he was outside, officially kicked out of the sex without commitment club. He walked in shame to his Fiesta and returned home, confused and his belly full.

  Andy burned the midnight oil. He worked best during the hours between eight and three in the morning. The project at hand was what mattered. He was determined to watch more of the reels tonight. Attack of the Sludge ran sixty-eight minutes. It was the average second film of a double feature bill at a drive-in. If all of the movies were that length, it wouldn’t take long to complete Professor Maxwell’s assignment.

  He glommed over the notes he haphazardly jotted down during the film.

  Attack of the Sludge. Released 1971. Starring Claire McLeon, Tom Hanson and Misty Jones. Gamma rays are shot from space by a saucer-like craft, the source of the sludge. Whether the rays were from aliens or the government, the plot leads you to question both and fails to explain which is the culprit. It’s interesting how the money is poured into the special effects. Lots of bodies turning inside out without the camera flinching. Police use flame-throwers, Molotov cocktails, water and bullets to stop it, but the blue sludge continues to attack. It never grows in size; the sludge attacks rest homes, a high school football team’s locker room, a hospital, and it all ends at a police station when Chief Stanley Parks fire
s a jet of mace at it in frustration. Other policemen add their mace in a comical climax. The sludge turns to smoke and evaporates. Somehow, the directors added three shower scenes: two of housewives and one of an entire high school football team. Perhaps this was one of the first group male shower scenes in cinematic history. Groundbreaking.

  “What’s next?”

  He shuffled through the stacks of reels and stopped at one entitled Jorg: The Hungry Butcher. The caption written on each of the reel cases read “Jorg liked serving his customers—for breakfast, lunch, and dinner!”

  “Ah, this should be interesting. Implied cannibalism. Nothing beats that.”

  A fork of lightning flittered in the window. The patter of rain thrummed against the shingles. He glanced outside. It stormed in blinding sheets. He checked to make sure the windows were closed throughout the house.

  Finished, he set up the next reel, determined to complete his mission. He turned off the lights. He was ready to forget about the strange episode with Mary-Sue. He still felt the impressions of her fingertips playing along his belly. He couldn’t lie to himself. Her touch was soothing. It was a compliment to be pursued by a girl. Did she really find him attractive? That was one angle, but there was another reason for her advances, and it had nothing to do with his appeal.

  You’ll never figure out women, so why bog yourself down with questions?

  Andy began the next film, taking his own advice. Jorg: the Hungry Butcher played on the screen. Hokey music played during the opening credits, and then a panel shot of a butcher’s shop kicked things off, the front glass window reading: Jorg’s Finest Cuts. The music reminded him of the theme played during Leave it to Beaver, a wholesome soundtrack—a clash against a movie he was safe to assume was about cannibalism and human slaughter. The butcher appeared, a man over three hundred pounds with a fine-trimmed beard and mustache with red rings under his eyes and nicotine-colored skin. In the scene, he was working in a fridge full of hanging slabs of animal torsos, each carcass obscured beneath the haze of cold air. In the next shot, he chopped the head from a pig with a cleaver. The head flopped over the edge of the table and landed in a plastic receptacle with the heads of cows, sheep, and two belonging to a man and woman whose mouths were locked wide open in a permanent scream.

  The butcher ambled from the table over to the two headless human bodies hanging by hooks driven between their shoulder blades. The corpses were naked, their breasts, pubic hair and penis visible. Andy was surprised there was so much nudity. He burst out in a spit-laden hoot when he caught the peg-board of pronged hooks on the background wall. The board was stocked with dozens of breasts, each with a bluish hue and of varying cup sizes.

  He’s got a wall of breasts in his shop!

  What the fuck?

  The butcher retrieved a scythe and swiped the hanging woman’s torso in half in one slash. The legs pounded the ground with the sound of shoes striking cement. He dropped the pieces into an aluminum meat-grinder the size of an industrial dish washing machine. Cranked, the chopping beast chugged out smoke and ground the legs. Blood spat from the top, spattering the ceiling in a reverse rain. A filter on the other side coughed out bones, hair, blood, and then in the other tray, strands of grainy pink meat heaped tall. The butcher sampled it raw, oinking like a pig. “Perfect cuts. Tender like veal. The younger they’re butchered, the finer the taste.”

  The music changed into doom synthesizer mode when Jorg stepped into a back room stocked with piles of clothing, purses and personal effects. He moved through that room to reach the storefront. The butcher stared up at the clock, reading it with widening eyes. “Lunch time.” He then licked his lips.

  The butcher picked up a five-inch knife from the front countertop, wrapped it in a newspaper and walked out of the shop.

  Jorg: the Hungry Butcher was shot in Pittsburgh and released in 1976. It starred James Keoge as the butcher, Wilson Breadley and Julia Switzer. The movie has an interesting conflict: Jorg murders a man’s wife, but the husband is also a cannibal. Jorg’s shop is emptied of the human remains, and Jorg hunts for the person responsible for pilfering his prized cuts. I expected a hack and slash fare—which is what it was—but it also focused on the mechanics of a cannibal. Jorg was born in Germany shortly after the Holocaust. Local shops had an economic falling out, and the small town of Strausenburg turned to alternative forms of procuring food rations since the bread truck no longer rolled into town every week. Jorg’s a victim of his father and mother’s voracious appetite, two murderers that cannibalized many homeless and drunk beggars from the streets. The shot with the bones of dozens of victims in his parents’ basement is harrowing. Filled with over-the-top violence, the visuals and reasoning power of characters is the best aspect of the film. The panoramic views of city buildings were impressive, but the camera is shaky; average low-budget amateur fare in the filming department. The finale stays with me: Jorg and the flesh burglar, his enemy, lock each other in a basement and sample the meat from one another’s body until they’ve both picked themselves clean.

  Professor Maxwell would be amused to hear he was starting to enjoy these movies. Their carefree attitude toward logic and human reasoning lightened the guilt over how Mary-Sue reacted to him turning her down for sex. It was amusing the way she assumed food equaled sex. Even Ned speeding from the house was humorous now. Was this house that awful? Sure, the water from the faucet scalded him, and the attic stairs almost tumbled onto him, but he was having fun in his digs. He was master of his domain, set free from college and watching forgotten horror films.

  It was a quarter till midnight, and Andy had at least another movie to put under his belt. So far, sludge and butchers comprised the double feature—now he was entering new ground: the triple feature.

  Caretaker of the Zombies grabbed his attention in the newest stack of reels. He set up the first reel in the projector, and again turned the lights off. The opening shot focused on a set of wrought-iron cemetery gates with the name Rover Hills Cemetery over them. The gates parted, and the camera shifted over miles of headstones. It was dark outside, the moonlight reflecting the marble and bronze headstones eerily. A haze of fake smoke obscured the distance, blinding most of the background. Next, footsteps crunched over gravel, and a man in a black overcoat carried a medicine bag in his hands. A cigarette dangled from his mouth, the cherry-red tip bobbing on the verge of breaking. The man scoured the headstones for a certain name. He stopped at the slab reading Christopher Alan Jenkins.

  “Hello Father.” He spat out the cigarette. “I’ve been waiting for this chance. The gypsy whore next door made this concoction, Dad. She promised me it’d bring you back. You owe her money, and you owe me even more money, Father. You hid your savings from me, Father. You were being so selfish. You buried it somewhere without telling anyone, Father, you son of a bitch. But I’ll bring you back, and then you’ll tell me where it is, FATHER!”

  The nightwalker unzipped the medicine bag and produced a dark vial. He unscrewed the top, and with an eye-dropper, sucked up the fluid and dripped six milliliters worth onto the grass. It sizzled and smoked through the ground upon touching it. The man yipped in delight, smiling and clapping his hands. “Yes, it’s working! The gypsy whore was right. Father couldn’t keep it in his pants. Oh, he owes a lot of whores money—including that gypsy! That’s why she helped me, Father. She wants her money too.”

  Moments later, the grass—more like turf from a golf course—parted and a gnarled hand covered in dried oatmeal reached out. A skeletal face with worms slithering out of both eyes and mouth poked its head free. The corpse bared its teeth and a collection of earthworms spilled forth from its gangrenous chin. The sternum was bared, the bones randomly cloaked in rotten skin. The zombie was brittle in appearance. The bare phalanges pointed at the man, and then the zombie ambled toward him with rigor mortis speed.

  “Father, it’s me. Your son. Father… Father, can’t you hear me?”

  The zombie cocked its head to the side. The col
d, dark eyes carried no emotion. Again, the teeth opened and more worms were coughed up, pounds of mealworms, maggots and night crawlers.

  This guy’s a bait shop.

  The son stumbled backward. “Father, why are you approaching me like that? I’m not here to hurt you. I just want my money. Where did you bury it? Tell me and leave me alone. Back off, Father!”

  The zombie towered above him, its chest breathing in and out hard, the lungs leather sacks beneath the bone.

  Good make-up effects, Andy thought. Even though I don’t know why the dead guy is breathing.

  “Stay away from me. Back in your grave! I don’t need your money that badly. Go away! I didn’t want it to work out like this, not like this, Father.”

  The shot suddenly skipped to the bony phalanges poking out the man’s eyes. The fingers stirred the sockets until a stew of blood and brains fizzed down the victim’s cheeks, as if someone had mixed dark red Kool-Aid and Pop Rocks as special effects. The zombie’s teeth clamped down upon the man’s trachea and removed a liberal chunk, devouring it hungrily.

  The son choked. “GACKGRAGH!”

  The zombie chewed up the morsel, its lips dripping blood. The man’s throat ejected crimson, his back against his father’s headstone as he suffered death spasms. Leaving the victim behind, the zombie picked up the medicine dropper and walked about the property awakening the other graves. Then, the scene ended with more hands outreaching through the grass. The next shot displayed a horde of awakened zombies stumbling out through the opened gates of the cemetery.

  Caretaker of the Zombies is an interesting concept, and there was plenty of gore and flesh-tearing action, but the idea of having a leader zombie attack a ghetto to reach a gypsy whore who created “zombie juice” to bring the dead back to pay their debts to her is ridiculous. There’s no way the gypsy could’ve slept with all those men and they just so happened to each owe her money. Loophole. The Roma curse of being an unpaid whore is laughable, and a gypsy in New Jersey didn’t make sense either. And the end with the zombies returning into their graves after the gypsy was killed off, I didn’t understand. Sure, the Roma curse was lifted at her death, but why go back to the grave? If I was a zombie, I’d want to roam about and live again—not put myself back in the grave! It was made in the same year as George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, so I guess that’s why it was so overlooked. People considered it a cheap rip-off.