Unspeakable: Beyond the Wall of Sleep

What would happen if you crossed David Cronenberg with the paranoid drug world of William Burroughs? Oh wait, that's already been done-it's called Naked Lunch. As far as I remember, apart from a few original scenes, that film was mostly arty-farty and way too slow. This movie, though, is much crazier and makes the most of its small budget. According to the credits, the story is based loosely on H. P. Lovecraft, but with a very free hand, to say the least! Dream specialist Ambrose London is invited by the neurotic Dr. Barnard to Arkham Asylum to investigate an imprisoned murderer with a split personality. This detainee has it pretty bad; whenever his alter ego takes over, his eye color changes, and blue light streams out of his mouth. Ambrose concocts a cocktail of peyote and amphetamines, which he administers to himself and the patient. Unsurprisingly, things go horribly wrong, and the psychopath quickly takes control of the entire facility, leading to a frenzy where nurses and inmates attack each other like zombies. The plot gets thickened by aliens with huge penises (complete with little faces on the tips) and a cast that seems almost entirely made up of past-their-prime porn actresses. It's the kind of movie where, after every absurd moment, you know an even crazier twist is around the corner-and it does not disappoint. It's a bit unfortunate that, amid all the low-budget chaos, the script does not take the time to explain who the characters are and what drives them, but otherwise, this is a pornographic splatterfest that more than delivers on its promises.

Arriving at a new mental health institute, a young doctor looking into a patient's case for a friend of his involves the bizarre manner the rest of the inmates are reacting to his presence forcing him to discover the strange secret that dwells within him the more he studies the case.

This was an intriguing if somewhat flawed overall effort. One of the finer features of this one comes from the intriguing setup that manages to offer a fantastic look into the type of psychosis displayed within here. The idea of trying to tackle the reasoning behind the type of unconventional displays of psychotic behavior that turns the inmates into raving lunatics who dismember and mutilate themselves to the point of madness that leaves them barely alive is a wholly intriguing way to get this one going. The series of experiments he attempts to look into everything which ultimately uncovers the truth about the situation involving being possessed by an otherworldly entity looking to birth more of its kind in followers helps to provide some understanding of what's going on. As this sets about trying to offer up the kind of bizarre and tormenting imagery featuring the demon origins of the creatures deforming and manipulating those around him to carry out its plans. This is accomplished rather nicely with a solid selection of confrontations that are impressively handled here. These series of encounters come together rather well with the grotesque, unnatural body parts featured here that showcase the attempts made by the demonic beings to exude their power and influence, focusing on the rabid imagery and concepts to work. From appendages turning into fang-lined monstrous beings, generating tentacled beings from their orifices, or seeing the bizarre means of outrageous behavior committed, everything here comes across with a rather fun series of encounters that feature a solid bit of action that gets increasingly more outlandish concepts involving the possessed followers. These are fantastic with the type of chaos presented here involving those possessed followers ripping others apart and offering up the kind of chaos expected from this storyline, making for a lot to like overall. There are a few minor issues that hold it back. The main drawback here is the seeming lack of content behind the connection between the demon cult and what's going on. It feels quite odd that the cult has arrived and started taking over others which just seems to occur with the idea of everything happening because it has to rather than being logically built up. How the dream therapist comes together to uncover what's going on is incredibly flimsy and getting dragged into this story about demonic creatures looking to overtake the world comes off in a hoky manner without too much in the way of connecting everything so it gets explained logically. On top of that, there are some rather obvious low-budget limitations at times that show up here which are somewhat damaging in places and hold this one down overall.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Graphic Male and Female Nudity, and sex scenes.