Faust

Looking to exact revenge on the gangsters who murdered his girlfriend, artist John Jaspers (Mark Frost) strikes a hasty deal with the mysterious 'M' (Andrew Divoff), exchanging his soul for supernatural abilities and a mean set of arm-mounted blades. But in his eagerness, he forgets that it always pays to read the small print before signing a contract, which in this case states that he must continue to kill for M after settling his score. When Jaspers refuses, M has him buried alive, but somehow (details a bit fuzzy here...) the artist comes back from the dead as a demonic being and once again goes looking for retribution.

Anyone looking for a faithful adaptation of the classic German legend is going to be majorly disappointed by Brian Yuzna's Faust, which is less a tragic study of moral abandonment, more a diabolical, blood-soaked, logic-free comic-book-style fever-dream packed with hokey gore, heavy metal, surreal effects and nudity. In telling his demented tale, director Brian Yuzna gives viewers lots of insanely OTT action full of severed body parts and slashed throats, while makeup artist Screaming Mad George provides some suitably weird prosthetics work (including one effect that sees a woman reduced to a giant pair of breasts and a huge ass with a face), and voluptuous actress Mònica Van Campen gets naked and has sex a lot. All of this is accompanied by a thundering soundtrack that includes the likes of Fear Factory, Machine Head and Coal Chamber.

Literary scholars will most likely be appalled by what they see; students of 'serious' horror will think it churlish; I thought it was one hell of a fun time!

7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb.