Black Roses (1988) User Reviews

Goofy 80s Demonic Rocker flick

[ThrownMuse · 4/10 · 8 October 2007]

Famous glam rock band The Black Roses is booked to play their first (?) live shows at its hometown local high school. While all the teens are stoked that their favorite band chose their sleepy small town for their first ever live concert, the parents are less than enthused with The Black Roses and their seemingly demonic lead singer Damien. The teachers and mayor stick by "Free speech" while the parents protest. When the band shows up for the show, the PTA and other authoritative adults attend only to find a Michael Bolton type in a Don Johnson suit singing power ballads. They shrug their shoulders at this harmless lite-rocker and bolt for the exit. That's when Damien strips down to a kinkier outfit (think Cher in "If I Could Turn Back Time) and The Black Roses crank out the hard rock. The kids in the crowd go wild. When the band stays in town to do more three more shows, the kids' become increasingly zombie-like and violent. Their English teacher starts to think that maybe the PTA was right and the kids are becoming possessed by Leotarded Damien and his rocknroll.

John Fasano's follow up to his bizarrely awful "Rock & Roll Nightmare" doesn't fare that much better story-wise, but it's still sort of charming. It lacks the interesting visuals and characters of its predecessor, but makes up for that by adding more puppet-monster action. Nothing happens in the first half hour of the film, which has a really strange feeling, like it's a musical from the 50s instead of an 80s rocker movie. There's even a sequence where the bored lead teenager is trying to woo a girl by dancing around the street, from lamppost to lamppost, saying things like "Let's paint the town red!" The score is equally out-of-place for a movie about a demonic glam rock band. It sounds like something out of an 80s children's adventure movie. The special effects and puppetry are charming and one of the only things that kept my attention. Especially worth noting is a scene where future Soprano's star Vincent Pastore gets gobbled up by his stereo speakers. So while "Black Roses" isn't completely unwatchable, it isn't really a good movie and recommended for only those who really dig this type of thing.

Like no way dude!

[udar55 · 5/10 · 19 September 2006]

Watch out kids! The heavy metal is gonna getcha! Popular metal band Black Roses have chosen the small town of Mill Basin to begin their world tour. But Black Roses has plans outside of just rocking. Led by the charismatic Damien, the band are actually demons who hypnotize teens with their music and then turn them anti-social. It is Tipper Gore's worst nightmare! It is all up to English teacher Mr. Moorhouse (John Martin) to save the town. From the director of ROCK N' ROLL NIGHTMARE, BLACK ROSES is a great 80s time capsule. You have the big hair with sweaters to match, the leather outfits and lots of high pitch screeching. There are some cheap but fun effects and what might be the world's most gratuitous nude scene. Pre-SOPRANOS Vincent Pastore made his film debut (talk about auspicious!) as a metal kid's dad who gets sucked into a mutant speaker by a big spider. Sorry, it reads much better than it plays.

Do you want to see someone get sucked through a speaker? It's here

[ryannemetz · 5/10 · 23 February 2005]

The town of Mill Basin gets their opportunity to host the hard rock band Black Roses. However, I don't think the band tours anywhere else. Anyways, once they arrive in town, it's hell on earth. The kids soon get demoniacally possessed after listening to too much of this hard rock music. The band's vocalist, Damian, is the main culprit for all of the chaos. Damian's got a cool look. He's dressed in all black and has a cool hair style. This story kind of gets its premise from the problem with hard rock and all of the suicide incidents from real life situations attached to such bands as: Slayer, Judas Priest and Ozzy Osbourne. Black Roses was released in 88', which was right around when these law suits unfolded. This sort of music was really popular then and parents and teachers really were against this entire movement. The story basically takes the premise that if you listen to Heavy Metal, you too, will become a maniac. It sure makes one laugh. The kids in this picture begin shooting their parents and beating up their fellow classmates. The script isn't that great, but the 80's music makes up for it. Time after time, you'll hear LIZZY BORDEN's "Me Against The World." This song is featured at least three or four times. There is also a cool song by the title of "Soldiers in the Night." This song, too, really cranks! The special effects are cheesy, but they seem to work for satisfactory basis. I like the part when a guy gets sucked through a mounted wall speaker, case in point to my summary title. Stay away if you can't handle a juvenile script and head banging music from the 80's. 5/10

Criminally UNDERRATED Heavy Metal Horror!

[horror7777 · 6 May 2001]

This film is campy, scary, and totally weird at the same time. I swear every horror fan must at least look at this film first, before making comments about it. The acting is average, the writing is average (i.e. one girl looks into a mirror and rubs her breasts for ten minutes (?)) But this film has a chilling reality to it that was probably appreciated more back when it was released in 1988. Teens killing their parents because they're possessed by the demons playing the rock music? Now that's got to be good!

Of note: Vincent Pastore ("The Sopranos" Salvatore "Big Pussy" Bonpensiero) in his first film saying one of the funniest damn quotes: "You wearing earings, kid? Only two kinda guys wear earings: pirates and homos. And I don't see a ship in the driveway!"

***out of****truly a memorably 80's horror film that went far beyond 80's slasher films that were everywhere at the time.

Beware of the Devil's music.

[BA_Harrison · 5/10 · 17 January 2017]

Heavy metal band Black Roses puts on a series of shows in a small American town, much to the consternation of the adults, but to the delight of their young fans, who are unaware that their idols are in fact demons whose Satanic music causes listeners to commit acts of extreme violence.

If you're too young to remember, or weren't even born, it might be hard to believe just how popular heavy rock was back in the '80s. Men proudly grew their locks, sported leather and denim, and head-banged till their necks seized up. Girls put peroxide in their hair, glammed themselves up with plenty of makeup and strutted around in spandex leggings (actually, so did some of the blokes). The same decade also saw the cheesy horror film enjoying much success, with many movies forgetting all about logic in favour of crazy special effects laden chaos. Black Roses takes both metal and monster madness and combines them in a technically shoddy and often laughable movie that appears to enforce the outmoded notion that rock music is a corrupting influence on the young.

A great soundtrack (if hair metal is your thing), some cheap and cheerful monster effects and a spot of gratuitous female nudity go some way to making up for the lousy script, crap acting and seemingly denigrating anti-metal message, but in the end, it's just another disappointing rock/horror hybrid (see also Trick or Treat, Zombie Nightmare, Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare, Hard Rock Zombies and Shock 'Em Dead for more of the same).

Heavy Metal is the Devil's Music!

[deandraslater · 7/10 · 13 January 2020]

Black Roses tells the relatable story of a heavy metal band that comes to a small town, plays a concert in spite of the protests of some Tipper Gore-esque prudes, and ends up possessing all of the town's children into killing the adults and, sometimes, turning into slimy demon creatures.

At a scant 85 minutes, Black Roses gets in and gets out before you can ask too many questions and that's for the best. The pace is fast and furious and there's never a moment to scratch your head or overthink anything too much. It's the kind of movie made for late night TV where your brain is half-awake and you just want to be entertained. The effects are surprisingly excellent, there's some ok gore, and the story itself is entertaining. Still, I wish I could figure out whose side the film is on. After all, the adult prudes turn out to be right and this band really does bring evil and destruction with them.

Skip this show

[Samiam3 · 4/10 · 1 June 2010]

It seems to me that Z-grade features like Black Roses would be a lot of fun to make. Signing up for this project (as a cast member) you would get to do one of the following: wear scary make-up and play monster, rock out or show off body parts. And because the script is everything but demanding, and there are no studio heads making deadlines for the project, There is never much pressure involved. As enjoyable as the filmaking experience may have been, It is a bore to watch.

It is hard to get away with being deliberately cheesy. A tiny handful of films with names that include Killer Klowns from Outer Space, work exceptionally well as a satirical throwback the days of Ed Wood. Black Roses could just as easily be looked at as a high campy throwback of a movie, but unlike Killer Klowns, this one is likely to draw your attention away from the screen and towards the exit sign.

Only a moron could ask for professionalism in something like this. Even if you set your expectations low, Black roses is still disappointing. Is it too much to ask for a little humour in what is supposed to be part comedy I think. Black Roses is a case of a movie that sells a funny idea. It reads well, but the end product is highly insufficient. I may have laughed in two or three places (but that's it).

the majority of laughter in Black Roses is more likely to be unintentional, like the shakiness of the picture in all the wide shots. There must have been a loose bolt on the camera crane. I've seen video productions that draw less attention to themselves. Seriously who was operating the camera?

There is a reason why Z-Grade movies have earned such a name. I've seen a few which are entertaining, but Black Roses is not among them.

It's ME AGAINST THE WORLD when my satanic heavy metal music starts killing people

[cheekyfilm · 7/10 · 12 February 2021]

So there is a renegade high schooler named Johnny. He is 30 years old, with a mullet and a jean jacket. He hates his teachers and loves metal music. His favorite metal band has a lead singer who turns into a monster while performing cursed songs. There's some great-yet-bad metal music, especially the tune at the beginning. The score is very forgettable 80s synth noodling, unfortunately. It's an alright movie to look at, the acting is passable if you grade on a curve, and the monster effects are pretty decent all considered. This movie kinda has it all if you're into bad 80's monster movies: boobs, a messy script, rockin' tunes, cheesy dialog, and an awful main character you love to make fun of. Big Pussy from the Sopranos makes his acting debut, and it's freakin' hilarious. Lots of mentions of the "satanic panic" of the 80s where the media cast overprotective mothers and pitted them against heavy metal and rap music that had explicit lyrics. The theme of the movie seems to stem from that whole incident

This one was lots of fun to watch, with a great soundtrack and story-line, plus the right amount of cheese, it makes 90min fly by. 3.5 / 5

This is a fairly average movie that's worth a viewing

[kevin_robbins · 5/10 · 20 July 2021]

Black Roses (1988) is a movie I recently watched on Amazon Prime after it was recommended on Into the Darkness. The storyline tells the tale of a traveling rock band whose music turns their listeners into followers of the bands demonic plans. Can the parents and local police force stop the band before their children and friends kill everyone in town? This movie is directed by John Fasano (The Jitters) and stars John Martin (Days of our Lives), Ken Swofford (Annie), Julie Adams (Catchfire) and Sal Viviano (Out of the Box). This movie has some great masks, special effects and transformation scenes. I loved the way the band is depicted, even the gag where they start as soft rock until they need to transform into a hard rock band. Well done by the team. The dialogue, character interactions and storyline were a bit clunky and uneven. The hair in this was hysterical and well done and there's a nice injection of nudity in this as you'd expect from this era. Overall this is a fairly average movie worth a viewing. I'd score this a 5/10 and recommend seeing it once.

Hold on to your mullets, the Black Roses are coming to town!

[Coventry · 6/10 · 3 June 2019]

This probably won't mean anything to people from America, but the opening sequences in "Black Roses", which were the best part of the entire film by far, seriously reminded me of the winning act in the Eurovision contest in 2006. They were a Finnish band named Lordi and dressed up like OTT demonic monsters on stage. It was quite a shock they won the conventional and borderline puritan musical concert, but it was a funny sight. Same goes for the intro of "Black Roses", in fact, because the demonic make-up effects are delightful, but the music sounds more like glamor-rock instead of heavy metal.

During the 1980s, several directors had the bad idea to mix horror movies with metal music. Both were popular separately, so together they must be even more successful, right? Wrong. I love horror and I love heavy metal, but the string of combo-flicks that came out in the 80s is overall disastrous. Although I haven't seen "Trick or Treat" yet, "Black Roses" must be the indisputably masterpiece of the sub-genre! At least it's vastly superior over titles like "Terror on Tour", "Rocktober Blood" "Hard Rock Zombies" and "Rock & Roll Nightmare". Metal band The Black Roses, with their popular front man Damian, announces that they'll kick off their American tour with a series of shows in the sleepy town of Mill Basin. It's delightful news for the local youth, but the parents and elderly townsfolk are heavily against the Roses' type of "satanic" music and life-style. They don't realize how right they are, actually, since Damian and his band are evil minions of Satan that gradually gain control over their fans' minds and bodies during the concerts. Several aspects make "Black Roses" a lot more enjoyable than the aforementioned titles, for instance a better soundtrack ("Soldiers of the Night", "Paradise" and "Dance on Fire" are good songs) and a handful of awesome murder sequences. There's a nasty scene in which a guy is beaten to death with an ashtray and a very sexy high-school sweetheart even strip-pokers her friend's dad to death! The film also remains a pure 80s cheese-galore, with lovely images of spectators turning into skeletons during the concerts and Vincent Pastore (in an early role) getting sucked into a speaker. That'll teach him to make fun of boys wearing earrings!

How not to be corrupted by glam metal

[metalrage666 · 4/10 · 7 May 2013]

As a heavy metal fan while I sat through this I found that I was asking myself what is this movie really trying to say.

To me it appears as a very disjointed attempt at either showcasing what's wrong with heavy metal, thereby siding with those who oppose heavy metal, or an equally weak attempt to make fun of those same opponents by pointing out that their very opposition to this style of music is as stupid as it is portrayed in this movie.

Either that or the whole thing is just having fun with the ideology of heavy metal bands versus sanctimonious America. In any case this is a very silly movie.

Glam metal band, Black Roses decide to get out of the studio and perform a number of shows in this smallish American town. It's the kind of town where nothing much happens, it's full of good God-fearing, church going folk and heavy metal is nothing but the devil's music. So despite the objections by a number of concerned citizens about the impending damnation of the towns' youth, the band comes along anyway.

Black Roses are an unremarkable straight-up clichéd glam metal group, except that the drummer is none other than Carmine Appice himself. (If you don't know who that is, look him up). The other, very notable exception is that they are in fact demons posing as a metal group and their sole aim is to corrupt young impressionable minds so they can become the bands soulless minions. Sounds simple enough and after a while they begin to succeed by turning many of the teenagers against any kind of authority figure, even their own parents. As a result many adults end up killed through various means and in the end it's general anarchy in the once quiet streets of town.

There are subtle changes that take place throughout the movie as the more heavy metal they listen to, the more disengaged with life they become. Eventually the teens go from being energetic, colourful and relatively diligent in school, to more sombre, melancholy, withdrawn, wearing darker colours, different hairstyles and generally adopting the stereotyped heavy metal image. It turns out that many of these teens are in fact now possessed by demons, so throwing people out of windows or running a car over their own parents doesn't appear to bother them so much.

The whole thing comes to a relative end, when one of the teachers decides to actually pay attention to what's going on around him and he confronts the band at their gig. He tries to set fire to the stage and so the lead singer reveals himself as the demon he is and this then results in some kind of weird punch-up on stage. I've never seen a person actually manage to land punches on a demon so this is perhaps the weakest demon I've ever seen. The fire eventually takes hold, the demon stands there howling, (although I have no idea why, fire should be its bread and butter), suddenly the teens come out of their stupor and run out of the place. We learn at the end by way of a news broadcast that the band survived the fire, (duh, they're demons), and they're embarking on a tour of London.

The whole premise of the film tends to be a self-deprecation of the heavy metal industry along with a big middle finger salute to the PMRC which formed only a couple of years prior to this films release. It briefly showcases the 2 opposing schools of thought on heavy metal music, but with the so-called evil influences being so over the top coupled with the fact that the band are actually demons, it just illustrates the narrow-mindedness of people in real life who like to oppose anything they don't understand for no real reason.

When the upcoming Black Roses concert is being debated in an assembly hall, there's the obligatory reading of some "evil" lyrics and naturally the parents are all horrified and opposed. However when an opposite view is presented that this is just music and provides examples of The Beatles & Elvis Presley etc. as equally hated by authority in their time, the parents all nod along in agreement. So just as the teens are brainwashed by the evil of metal, the parents are just as brainwashed by anyone who'll tell them what to do and how to feel. (Sounds just like church).

It's not a bad movie as such, but it's hardly a horror movie, it would barely rate as a thriller it's simply too ridiculous, but if you want to hear some generic glam metal and see a bunch of corrupted possessed teens running riot, then don't let the cheesy effects, poor costumes and lame ending turn you away from giving this a go.

You gotta love it

[war_cat2 · 10/10 · 3 October 2000]

Black Roses is one of those rentals you go get and prepare to have a good time. Bring some friends over to watch it. It is just so damn funny you'll be laughing in no time. The funniest part of the movie is a quote from one of the kids dad:

joke spoiler 'What's this?' -dad 'An earring pop.' -son 'An earring? Only 2 types of men where earrings son. Pirates and faggots. And I don't see a ship parked in our driveway.' -dad end spoiler

Summary: This movie is a howl.

One Hell Of A Concert!!!

[edgeofterror · 7/10 · 20 March 2005]

What a fun movie!This is one of those few horror movies out there that was based on Hard Rock music...the others being Hard Rock Zombies, Trick Or Treat and Rockin Roll Nightmare!This one has a bunch of demonic hard rockers coming to a town called Mill Basin to perform a concert.The adults of the town fear that the music might be bad for the children... and boy were they right!This film like so many other eighties horror films, has some really cool rock music...one of the best being "Road To Paradise" which the band plays on their first concert in the town.There's is also some pretty neat special effects...although their only really good in a fun way... i mean...they don't look realistic or anything but they're still enjoyable! This movie also has Sal Viviano as the lead rock singer of the band who has a really eighties "fine" haired mullet...some of the eighties fashions in this movie will give you a few chuckles but it just adds to the fun fell of the film! Some people might remember Sal Viviano as having starred in The Jitters...which was an insane but equally enjoyable Japanese based horror film!Watch out for the part where Mattthew the high school teacher is attacked by a cool looking demon at the end...it will give you a couple of laughs!!!Rent it for sure!!!

Dull mess.

[gridoon · 3/10 · 4 November 1999]

"Black Roses" is a forgettable, low-budget thriller, which looks inevitably dated today, since its premise links - in a superficial way - rock music with evil demons who want to control the minds of teenagers. The effects are weird-looking and amusingly cheap,although there is more nudity than gore. The film's major problem is its messy storytelling, which has no center to help us get involved. >

Never have there been so many mullets flaunted in one film

[sfhjsth802 · 22 August 2002]

Black Roses. Where to begin? First off, this movie is not for you if you cannot appreciate the comic genius that is a combination of bad metal music and massive mullets. Personally, I love bad movies and those two things have made [and broken] a great many movies for me. Black Roses is a beautiful melding of horrible acting, special effects that wouldn't have been impressive twenty years ago, and tons of terrible metal. Our Demonic band and their flamboyant frontman Damien [who is complete with a disappearing/reappearing mullet] use their music as a portal for evil! There are a great many unanswered questions come the end of the film, but if you are watching this film in the first place, chances are you're not in the market for a high-quality production. This is a great bad horror film, and a must-see for anyone who knows how funny mullets are.

7/10

[A few words on my rating system]

I review bad movies almost exclusively, that does not however mean that my rating system is inverted. A score of 1 denotes a film that is unbearable to watch, whereas a score of 10 epitomizes the best in the world of bad movies. A 5 is average, 6 connotes that there is something worthwhile, a 7 is a definate must-see for people who match the criteria that I will have listed in the review.

Fun concept - Mediocre execution

[horrorcrave · 5/10 · 23 April 2022]

I was really excited to finally watch this on Tubi and in HD no less; though it's only available in physical format on DVD currently in the US.

Heavy metal and horror go together like peanut butter & jelly; however for some reason this film which at first seems like a parody of satanic panic actually ends up proving the panicking parents correct. Strange LOL. It's like the farce of it all actually got the best of the film makers, because they still had a horror movie to make! Some of the horror elements are silly fun, others are serious as a heartattack concerning a slasher-esque parricide spree; while other elements or "terror" are dumb over the top puppets and a 50s scifi man in a rubber suit.

All this being said, I really enjoyed the original songs written and the 80s-ness of it all. Some particular night scenes looked like they were lit in homage to Romero's Creepshow. Loved it.

On the negative end, it's a bit uneven in the pacing, and the message - if it had one, is certainly confused.

To add a layer of interest I would have had the parents in on it; as is revealed in movies such as A Nghtmare on Elm Street, otherwise it just doesn't come across as subversive, but rather supportive of the never ending satanic panic movement.

I'm glad I watched it once, but not one I need to own.

Classic time piece

[zeelu-89550 · 7/10 · 4 July 2023]

First off, if you were a teenager in the 80's and liked Hard Rock/Metal music than this is the movie for you. If not, you will most likely find this movie cheesy, and absurd. For me, this just brings back so many great memories of being a kid. Some great music in this movie and the soundtrack is really good. This is a time period film that just takes you back to the great 80's when we didn't take things so serious. Music was a huge part of every day life. Yes this movie is cheesy but that is what the 80's was all about. Don't take it too seriously and watch this one and if you relate to those great 80's.

Hard rocking 80's horror cheesiness

[dworldeater · 5/10 · 28 September 2022]

The 80's was a prime time for hard rock and heavy metal, but the country also made a shift towards the right in the Reagan years with uptight yuppie parent groups scrambling to squash heavy metal. Blood Roses seems like a project that would be championed by the PMRC. Blood Roses is a ultra cheesy hair metal band that the members of it are demons with a mission statement to corrupt the normie suburban youth. The film itself is equally as cheesy. However, a Hallow's Eve song DIE( Death In Effect) gets played in the film. Also there is a melted Mentors record as well. So the film gets some points for giving props to Metal Blade recording artists. Black Roses is decent production value wise in comparison with other hard rock horror movies. However, to me this is just dated and cheesy and don't really do much to make metal look good to people that don't know much about it. Black Roses could easily be the best or the worst movie depending on your sense of humor.

The corruption of youth, via heavy metal!

[The_Void · 6/10 · 17 July 2006]

It's hardly surprising that Black Roses is an obscure eighties horror film, as despite a relatively good story and some cheesy special effects; the film doesn't have a great deal going for it. However, Black Roses is fun enough and overall, I'd say it's just about worth seeing. The plot takes its influence from the idea of heavy metal bands with satanic lyrics corrupting their young fans, and by keeping the focus on this idea, the film actually has a bit more substance than the majority of similar movies released around the same time. The style is very much eighties, as the schlock horror blends well with the cheap special effects; and the effects team seems to have taken influence from Sam Raimi's Evil Dead II where the demons are concerned. The plot focuses on a heavy metal band named Black Roses. They decide to put on a concert in a small town, much to the delight of the local kids. Naturally, their parents are left rather unimpressed by the band and their music, and so decide to try and stop the concert from taking place...and they'd be right to, as the band are actually demons in disguise!

The film attempts to be both a tongue-in-cheek horror movie and a film about heavy metal, as both the band and the horror are given decent proportions of the screenplay. It has to be said the film succeeds at being neither of the things it attempts to be, as the horror is too silly to be scary and the fact that the band are demons often overtakes the fact that they're a heavy metal band; but most people that see this film won't be too bothered about that. The horror is fairly inventive, and parts of the film that see things such as a monster emerging from a record player are most definitely highlights. The main problem with the movie is the amount of talking, as a lot of the time the parents' attempt to stop the concert becomes the centre focus and it's not all that interesting. The way that the film presents ideas such as the fact that a lot of the Black Roses' fans consider the song writer to be a modern poet are well done, and the band themselves are pretty good too, if you're into eighties metal. Overall, Black Roses isn't worth tracking down and spending a lot of money on; but if you get the chance to see it and you like eighties music and horror, it should suffice.

Satanic Panic Cheesy

[icocleric · 5/10 · 19 April 2023]

Very "Satanic Panic" which because I didn't actually live though, I can be amused by how cheesy this film is. I enjoy bad/cheesy horror, so I did actually enjoy this film. Like I'm sure it was serious at the time, but from a modern lens I think it has a different vibe.

It had highlights like a man being eaten by a music speaker demon. And the music literally turns kids into murder demons. It's really funny because the rock itself is pretty tame.

The acting is not bad, and it has some nice touches. It's just an older film where some aspects aged differently than intended. It isn't badly made either, and the film pacing is okay.

Underrated movie

[bereliefhebber · 7/10 · 12 June 2013]

I think this movie is really underrated. Sure, it might be a little cheesy and it's not the most amazing film of all time, but it is enjoyable. The plot isn't waterproof, but the acting is alright. I'm not gonna say that much about the plot, because there's not that much to say about it.

It's a movie about a demonic rock band and it's just that. It doesn't have huge effects, but it doesn't need that. In fact, great effects would ruin it. You might think it's kinda stupid, but this movie was surprisingly fun. I do recommend it if you like movies like Suck: Vampires Rock with some cheesiness like Killer Klowns From Outer Space.

It's a fun, enjoyable movie for what it is, but don't expect a movie that would win an Oscar. It's definitely not the best movie from '88, but it has nice music and a pretty fun concept.

I recommend this movie, especially if you're bored and if you enjoy this kind of movie. 7/10.

A mediocre movie that wants to let you know that heavy metal is bad for you...

[paul_haakonsen · 4/10 · 9 April 2019]

Granted this movie was from 1988, and it definitely carries that late 1980s cheesy and campy feel. But this movie was not even really close to being as interesting as I initially had thought it had potential to be, from reading the movie synopsis.

Sure, this was a campy movie, by all means, but the overall outcome of the movie was a bit too mundane, nay, bland actually, and the movie suffered from that. Just as it also suffered from some very mediocre acting performances.

And the topic of heavy metal being bad for you and bringing about with it destruction, demonic entities, hell and eternal damnation does wear pretty thin pretty quickly in the movie. At least that is what the message of the movie felt like being; that heavy metal music is bad for the society and a bad influence on the youth.

The music in the movie was pretty tame and not all that heavy, when thinking about the storyline and the topic of the movie. It was hard rock at best and really didn't feel right for the setting of the movie. Nor were the "musicians" really all that interesting to look at and lacked on stage personalities and charisma. This made for an even more bland movie experience, because it felt like they hadn't even bothered going all the way in.

As for the special effects, well... Keep in mind that the movie was made in 1988 after all, and they weren't exactly on a massive budget in comparison to other movies back then.

All in all, a less than mediocre movie. I hadn't heard about "Black Roses" before 2019, when I stumbled upon the DVD by sheer random luck. I gave it a view, and I wasn't impressed.

Heavy Metal Madness Hits Film

[HDude · 10/10 · 20 February 2000]

This is one of two MUST HAVE metal horror movies from the 80's the other being "Trick Or Treat". An Awesome Soundtrack In This Movie. The Story Is About A Demonic Metal Band (With Carmine Appice On Drums) Who Come To A Small Town To Start Their Concert Tour And This Town Is The Test Town Before They Head Out On The Road. All kinds of metal madness takes place. No it isn't scary but was it ever intended to be? Its also a great movie to look at to see how "dressed up" people into heavy metal used to be back in the 80's before the current fashion of looking like a greasey haired bum with hand me down clothes and piercings on every appendage. If you can rent or get a copy of this dont miss it

Satanic panic on video

[BandSAboutMovies · 6/10 · 19 October 2017]

The small town of Mill Basin is about to become the first place that the band Black Roses will ever play a show. Up until now, they've only been a studio band. And parents are concerned because these guys have taken over the hearts and souls of the town's kids. But do you blame the kids? Mill Basin reminds me of where I grew up — there's nothing to do but have sex and do recreational drugs. And if you have bad self-esteem issues, you're gonna just stay in your room reading comic books, playing guitar, drawing pictures of Leatherface and staring at your Traci Lords poster while listening to Among the Living on repeat. Oh wait — I was wallowing in the past.

The kids come back at their parents with knives, just like Charley claimed they would, like Tony running over his dad (Vincent Pastore of The Sopranos) with a car, another kid shoots his dad in the face and one gets her best friend to hump her father to death (one of these deaths is not like the other). Even virginal Julie goes astray, killing her lecherous stepfather and Moorhouse's ex-girlfriend before transforming into a creature that I can only describe as a fetal pig that makes cat noises.

Read more at bit.ly/2yA7j8z

Delicious Cheese

[thesar-2 · 5/10 · 28 May 2021]

Completely out there, felt unfinished, edited horribly, acted badly and all-over-the-place and still, it was "delicious cheese." If you like bad movies for fun with some 80s rock-n-roll rebellion thrown in, watch this.