Prime Evil.

Continuing Women In Horror Month, it made sense to watch another title from prolific filmmaker Roberta Findlay in 1988's Prime Evil.

A coven of Satan worshipers prowl New York looking for sacrifices for their eternal youth ceremonies.

Finding female-helmed horrors on VHS is a challenge, so I had to cheat this time and watch a rip. You know, I wish Findlay's catalogue was stronger. When I watched Lurkers last year, I commented on how her career seemed to be tailing off by this point and Prime Evil did not contradict that. While larger in scale – they certainly made good use of the NYC locale – Prime Evil was another bore featuring a bloated cast of characters walking through clumsily executed set pieces.

I guess my first uh-oh moment was during the opening scene when a voice-over suddenly cut in over the action to explain what was going on. Doubling up on your exposition is never a good sign. Considering her adult film background, I assumed the reason Findlay was introducing all these superfluous ladies was that most were eventually going to get naked. But they didn't. Presumably they were there to pad the running time... and give bad dating advice.

I don't think I really need to mention the demon puppet thing. However, I will say the scene where the mother gets offed was amusing. While trying to escape her attackers, she picked an even worse hiding spot than the fridge girl in Madman.

Admittedly, I can think of worse ways to go than being drowned in wine. At one point, the story shifted to a nun assigned to infiltrate this evil cult. I'd have been interested in that, but it barely comes back to it to the point that when she popped up to save the day I was like, “oh yeah, her!” What followed was basically a way shittier version of the climax in The Devil's Rain. And let's face it, if that's your ceiling, you got problems.

Christine Moore in Prime Evil

So another dud on Findlay's resume. She has made some winners in her career – Tenement was solid, and The Oracle looks bonkers – but Prime Evil was not one of them. I really should have watched The Oracle instead. Maybe I'll leave that for next February.