#103 -- Trapped Ashes (2006)

Directors: Sean S. Cunningham, Joe Dante, John Gaeta, Monte Hellman & Ken Russell
Rating: 3/5

A group of people go on a tour through a movie studio in Hollywood. One of the stops is a creepy house where a classic horror was filmed. The house is somewhat of a maze, and the group ends up getting lost and stuck inside of a revolving room. Their tour guide suggests that they, like in the movie the house is famous for, tell their scariest stories in order to get out. One by one, they go around telling horrifying stories - or what was supposed to be horrifying stories, I guess.


The Girl with the Golden Breasts
In this one, a young actress who is being beaten out of parts by prettier girls decides to get a breast enhancement surgery. This if fine and dandy, and I'm sure not at all rare, but there's one little problem. Her doctor uses recycled parts of corpses in his implants. This causes her nipples to grow teeth, and they're quite the bloodthirsty little buggers. There's a group of drag-queen scientists who use this method as an experiment to find the fountain of youth.

Jibaku
A married couple takes a trip to Japan to re-kindle the lost flame in their relationship. However, the husband is too busy working to pay much attention to his wife, and she finds a flame with a young and handsome Japanese man. He hangs himself in the local cemetery, and then begins to haunt her. It's not a bad kind of haunting, though, not for this woman. She has a horrific affair with this dead monk, and eventually is dragged into Hell to join him.

Stanley’s Girlfriend
A man and his best friend have kind of a love triangle with a beautiful and mysterious woman. One of the men disappears, leaving the other to have his way with the girl. The girl is not what she seems, though. She has been living since the late 1800s, and she's a bloodthirsty little vixen.

My Twin, The Worm
A woman has a parasitic worm growing inside of her, alongside her precious daughter. Her daughter somehow becomes attached to the worm, claiming that he is her "twin." The girls mother dies when she's young, and she is sent to live with her father and stepmother. Her stepmother starves her, and she asks her twin, "You aren't just going to let her kill me, are you?" And of course, being the wonderful big brother he is, he takes care of things.

This wasn't mind-blowing, but it was pretty interesting. The killer nipples are hilarious, for one. My Twin, The Worm has some pretty freaky fetal images. Stanley's Girlfriend is pretty dull and, in my opinion, the worst of the bunch. I'm all for vampires and all, but the way the story was told made it a tad bit boring. The main reason I wanted to watch this was because I noticed Sean Cunningham (creator of Friday the 13th) directed one of the shorts. His creation? Jibaku. This one was my favorite of them all. It wasn't mind-blowing either, but it was definitely the best of the bunch. The dead monk looks amazing, and the sex scene between him and the Wife is pretty gruesome. It's an interesting story, though I didn't understand it 100%. I think it would have been better had it had more time to play out. The wraparound story was okay, though extremely predictable. It's full of sex (so don't watch it with the kiddos!), mild gore, and a few confusing moments.

Another thing I liked about this movie was two of its stars. John Saxon (from A Nightmare on Elm Street) stars as Leo in Stanley's Girlfriend. Though he's kind of an ass, he's great as always. Also, Henry Gibson. If you don't know who that is, he is Grandpa O'Reiley from the made-for-TV Disney movie Luck of the Irish. I've always thought he was an adorable old man, and he was amazing here.

Overall, this was just okay. It can be entertaining for a boring night at home alone, but don't expect to be extremely wowed by it.