THE CYCLOPS -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/19/09

 

One of my earliest movie-watching memories is sitting in my mom's lap in the livingroom while my older brother watched THE CYCLOPS (1957) on TV. When the monster, a giant man in a loin cloth with an ultra-hideously scarred face and one big, bulging eyeball, thrust his ugly mug into the mouth of the cave where the main characters were hiding and started roaring at them, it scared the ever-livin' crap outta me. At one point during this grueling ordeal of sheer terror, my mom tried to calm me down by saying, "Ohh, he's not scary...he looks like a funny clown." Well, he didn't look like a funny clown.

In 1993, I caught THE CYCLOPS again on TNT's Monstervision and watched it for nostalgia's sake, just to see what had been so traumatically frightening to me as a young tricycle motor. Back then, even the cheapest B-movie had a documentary realism to it, but now I could see THE CYCLOPS for what it was--a cheap, not-very-competently made schockfest with really bad special effects.

Fortunately, I taped the movie that night and watched it again today after all these years, and, strangely enough, I found it pretty enjoyable this time around. The always adorable Gloria Talbott of I MARRIED A MONSTER FROM OUTER SPACE fame plays Susan Winter, a woman who is determined to find her missing husband, Bruce, and hires a pilot named Lee Brand (Tom Drake, in a bit of a career comedown from his MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS days) to fly her into the isolated canyon in Mexico where Bruce disappeared three years earlier. Accompanying them on the expedition are Russ Bradford (James Craig), an old friend with romantic designs on Susan, and big-ape Marty Melville, who comes along only because he's heard the canyon is full of uranium and wants to get rich quick. Marty's a blustery, hair-triggered loose cannon, so it's fitting that the aging, alcoholic, unpredictable Lon Chaney, Jr. is cast in the role.

The film is written and directed by Bert I. Gordon ("B.I.G."), who loved to make cheap horror flicks about giant men (THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN, WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST), women (VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS, a personal fave), and creatures (EARTH VS. THE SPIDER, KING DINOSAUR, THE FOOD OF THE GODS). He also seemed to have an affinity for really crappy special effects, because his movies are full of them. In this one, the Cyclops and other over-sized beasts that Susan and the boys run into are often transparent, and they rarely seem to blend convincingly into their surroundings.

There's a battle between an iguana and a gila monster in which you can see them being thrown at each other from off camera, then slowly turned over and over by their tails like rolling pins to make it look like they're locked in mortal combat. In one of the worst FX shots ever, a large, superimposed hand seems to close around Gloria Talbott, and then the entire picture, background and all, is simply whisked upward out of the frame to make it look like she's being picked up. You have to marvel at Gordon's wrong-way audacity here even as you shake your head in disbelief.

Meanwhile, the googly-eyed Chaney is so scary as "Marty" that he almost overshadows the Cyclops. During the flight into the canyon, he goes nuts when the plane hits an updraft and, in a blind panic, slugs the pilot out cold! Hilarity ensues as Russ struggles to restrain Marty, who doesn't know how to fly a plane, from taking over the controls while Susan frantically tries to wake up Lee.

Later, the totally selfish and mercenary Marty is so anxious to get back to civilization and file a claim on the valley that he is constantly harassing Lee to fly him back and leave Susan and Russ behind to fend for themselves against the giant critters. I think that if Gordon had just replaced the Cyclops with a screaming, 25-foot-tall Lon Chaney, Jr. stomping around in a loin cloth looking for a bottle of hooch, the movie would've been a hundred times scarier. As "skelton knaggs", a fellow member of the Classic Horror Film Board once put it: "When Lon Chaney throws on the ham, I can just smell dem eggs frying."

But as it is, the Cyclops is the main attraction here, and after all these years I still think he's a pretty cool monster. The makeup job by Jack H. Young, who worked on Margaret Hamilton in THE WIZARD OF OZ and would go on to other triumphs with such films as THE BROOD, APOCALYPSE NOW, and TV's SALEM'S LOT, is a real doozy. Actor Duncan Parkin had his head shaved and was given a gash of a mouth with half the flesh ripped away to reveal his teeth, a protruding bloodshot left eye, and a horrid flap of skin stretched over his other eye. The look is similar to the monster in Gordon's WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST, and it would be hard to decide which is more disturbing--but I think the Cyclops has the edge for pure hideousness.

Renowned voice artist Paul Frees gives the monster a constant series of blood-curdling grunts, bellows, and growls, which was a big part of what scared me so much as a kid. Another unsettling element is the overwhelmingly aggressive musical score by the Luca Brasi of film music, Albert Glasser. As I mentioned in my review of THE NEANDERTHAL MAN, Glasser was the king of blatant, overbearing musical bombast that assaulted the listener like a caveman wielding a big gnarly club. Glasser only knew one gear--over the top--and he floored it. Just listening to his music alone could probably cause some people to suffer a panic attack.

The simple story takes a tragic turn as Susan and Russ make a startling discovery about the Cyclops. (You can probably guess what it is without expending too many brain cells.) When the group finally escapes from the cave and makes it back to the plane, the giant monster shambles toward them as Lee tries unsuccessfully to start the engine. As a last resort, Russ decides to draw his attention away from the others by offering himself as a target for the monster's wrath. What happens next will come as no surprise to those in any way familiar with Homer's "Odyssey."

Seeing the enraged Cyclops bearing down on our heroes brought back some residual childhood fears that still make it hard for me to be impartial about this movie--somehow, the big, ugly oaf still scares me while others might see him only as something to laugh at. But like I said, I still think he's a pretty cool monster. THE CYCLOPS is a movie that isn't nearly good enough to take seriously, but isn't bad in a totally "funny ha-ha" way like PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE or Gordon's schlock epic VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS. It's just a fairly, or maybe barely, decent grade-Z monster flick that is either a fun watch or a grueling bore, depending on your point of view. For me, it's a fun watch. But I still don't think that damn monster looks anything like a "funny clown."


(Thanks to Kerry Gammill for the "Cyclown" pic.)

THE CYCLOPS -- Movie Review by Porfle

TROLL 2: THE 20th ANNIVERSARY NILBOG EDITION -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/15/10

 

It's been so long since I saw the original TROLL, all I remember about it is that it stars Shelley Hack and Sonny Bono, takes place in an apartment building with a troll in it (not Sonny Bono), features John Carl Buechler as both director and makeup effects creator, and, as I was reminded recently, has a kid in it named Harry Potter, Jr.  Oh yeah, and there's a pretty cool performance by a little girl named Jenny Beck who at one point gets to be possessed by the title creature.


The in-name-only sequel, TROLL 2, has none of these things.  It does, however, share one quality with the original--one of the best performances comes from the kid in the lead role, in this case Michael Stephenson as Joshua Waits, a boy who is visited by the ghost of his deceased grandfather, Seth (Robert Ormsby).  Grandpa Seth reads Josh scary bedtime stories about trolls--or, as he calls them, goblins--who assume human form and trick people into eating a gooey substance that turns them into half-human, half-plant hybrids, which is the goblins' favorite food.


Nobody, including Josh's mom (Margo Prey) and step-dad (George Hardy) and his big sister Molly (Connie McFarland), believe him about Grandpa Seth's ghost or his warning that the goblins are real.  So when the family travels to the tiny town of Nilbog (catchy name) on a house-swapping vacation and all the local citizens turn out to be goblins looking for their next meal, it's up to Josh and his ghostly gramps to hold the ravenous little buggers at bay until the rest of the clueless family wises up and takes action.




TROLL 2 may have been made in 1990, but in spirit it's still a product of the 80s.  From the cheesy score, to sister Molly's awful aerobic workout dance, to her horny boyfriend Elliott (Jason Wright) and his chums who are like braindead refugees from a dull edition of "USA's Up All Night", the film is steeped in that golden decade's kitschy goodness.  Not surprisingly, the film known by some as "the best worst movie ever" also glows with the same cheapo charm of a million other junk films of the era that I rented on VHS or watched on late-night cable between used car commercials.


Horror-wise, there's not much on the scary side going on here, with the trolls--sorry, goblins--resembling a bunch of fat little kids in oversized Halloween masks.  These are designed to resemble the ones in the first film but clearly lack John Carl Buechler's artistry.  There's no gore to speak of, since anyone who ingests the tainted goblin-goo instantly starts bleeding green tree sap and literally vegging out. 


The creatures themselves are actually scarier in their mock-human forms, coming off as a cross between the hostile yokels from DELIVERANCE and the pagan farm punks of CHILDREN OF THE CORN.  When they surround the Waits family in their vacation house and start slowly closing in, it's a little like something out of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD.

 


Technically, TROLL 2 is pretty amateurish, with camerawork, direction, and editing that are definitely not so hot.  Yet it remains well-paced and watchable throughout, the story moving at a pretty snappy clip with few draggy spots and little or no padding.  The smalltown locations in Utah are certainly atmospheric--just being in this crummy little flyspeck burg would seem nightmarish enough even without the trolls (sorry, goblins).


As for the acting, most of the leads seem to have been recruited from grade-school plays, yet they invest their roles with conviction.  I love the awkward, stilted dialogue scenes between Molly and her boyfriend Elliott, who infuriates her by insisting on dragging his buds along on the trip.  While these guys aren't so hot in the acting department either, they do make good plant food.  One of them even ends up as a potted plant in the lair of Miss Creedence Leonore Gielgud, who turns out to be the evil queen of the trolls (sorry, goblins). 


Deborah Reed, whose acting dial is clearly stuck on "eleven", mugs her way through this role with the eye-rolling gusto of a horror-movie hostess.  When she's surrounded by her warty minions in the bowels of her inner sanctum, sporting a Technicolor makeup job and playing to the back row like Margaret Hamilton on PCP, the film resembles a particularly demented Sid and Marty Krofft production.




Also of note is Michael Stephenson as Josh, who makes up for his lack of acting polish with an intense performance that oftens has him emoting his little buns off.  There's a nice nightmare sequence early on in which his family turn into goblins as he begins to bleed chlorophyll and sprout branches through his fingers and chest.  Best of all, though, is when a famished Mom, Dad, and Molly sit down to eat a poisoned dinner and Josh has to act fast in order to stop them.  His solution, which was pretty much the last thing I expected, had me howling.



The Blu-Ray/DVD combo labeled "The 20th Anniversary Nilbog Edition" is from MGM and 20th-Century Fox.  The Blu-Ray is in English 5.1 DTS-HD master audio and English mono.  Features as listed on the box are feature film in high definition, 1080p, lossless audio, smart menu technology, and original theatrical trailer.  I reviewed the DVD only, which contains the feature film in standard definition with English mono sound, plus the trailer.  Both discs are in 1.85:1 widescreen and offer English, Spanish, and French subtitles. 


Like a Halloween spook-house slapped together by a bunch of enthusiastic but drunk neighborhood slobs, TROLL 2 is dumb as a doorknob but engagingly lively and fun right up to its startling conclusion.  (And it's one of the few films I've seen in which bologna plays an integral part in the finale.)  Although the whole thing threatens to fall apart any second, it never does.  In fact, for all its faults, the chewing gum and baling wire ingenuity that holds this creaky creature feature together somehow makes it more entertaining than your usual big-budget bomb.    

TROLL 2: THE 20th ANNIVERSARY NILBOG EDITION -- DVD Review by Porfle

VENICE UNDERGROUND -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/20/11

 

The first thing I thought after watching VENICE UNDERGROUND (2005) for a couple of minutes was, "This looks like an episode of a TV series."  But after awhile I began to realize that if this were indeed the pilot for a series, no network executive in his right mind would pick it up.  In fact, if your dad had followed you around with a movie camera when you were a kid and filmed you and your friends playing cops and robbers, he would probably accidentally make a better movie than this one.

A prologue takes us to the office of police captain John Sullivan (veteran character actor Ed Lauter) as the mayor chews him out over the phone because of the ongoing carnage caused by two Venice Beach gangs, the Northside Surf Crew and the Southside Crips, who are waging an ongoing battle to control the local drug trade.  It seems like a hopeless situation until one of his underlings, an ambitious young sergeant named Frank Mills (Randall Batinkoff), waltzes in with a peach of a idea -- they will pluck a group of raw but attractive cadets out of the police academy, set them up in a beach house, and have them go undercover! 

That, of course, will be a lot better than putting experienced cops on the case, because, as Mills explains:  "The kids are all instinct and street smarts.  They know no boundaries."  Visions of "The Mod Squad" and "21 Jump Street" begin to dance around in Capt. Sullivan's head, with a little "Charlie's Angels" and "Baywatch Nights" thrown in for good measure.  What a great idea!

With their origin story out of the way even before the day-glo main titles have hippity-hopped their way across the screen, we are thrust right into the non-action as we join the J.N.F. (Junior Narc Force) keeping tabs on various gang members and trying to fathom their nefarious activities.  But they must deal with their own raging hormones as well, as Agent Tyler (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe) jealously observes her heartthrob, Agent Gary (a not-looking-too-good-these-days Edward Furlong), cavorting with a bikini babe.  It's all part of his cover, of course, but darn it, he just seems to be enjoying it a little too much.



Meanwhile, Agent Samantha (Nichole Hiltz) just failed her home pregnancy test, and isn't quite sure whether the father is Agent Danny (Eric Mabius), who wants to marry her, or good ol' Sergeant Mills, who just can't seem to keep his own member away from certain other members of the task force. 

These romantic entanglements play like a bad script from "Beverly Hills, 90210" performed by a grade school theater group, and the scenes of actual detective work that we witness from time to time seem to have been inspired by random episodes of "Scooby-Doo."  They even have their own mystery-mobile, a candy-apple red, mid-60s Mustang convertible, in which they all sit in broad daylight brandishing their guns as if to announce to any passing bad guys, "Yes, we are undercover narcs." 

Amazingly, though, no one ever figures this out, except for a mysterious figure who seems to anticipate their every move as he secretly watches them through blurry POV-shots like a stalker in a slasher flick, and, early in the story, actually kills one of them with his gold-plated revolver.  Who is this unknown enemy?  You're not supposed to know until the end, so try to act surprised.  Here's a hint:  it isn't the old caretaker at the haunted amusement park.

Director Eric DelaBarre is your basic point-and-shoot man but tries to "hip" things up with shaky camerawork, scattershot editing, and various other effects cribbed from music videos.  The acting, except from old pro Ed Lauter and Robert Rodriguez stock player Danny Trejo, is hopelessly amateurish, and the dialogue they're forced to recite is frequently laughable. 

This film resembles the kind of cheap exploitation flick they used to show on USA's "Up All Night" -- you know, the ones with all the good R-rated nudity and violence cut out and just the boring junk left in, although a few bare boobies make a cameo appearance about halfway through.  Soon after that we see a brief fistfight, and then later there's a small shootout, and at the end the mystery bad guy gets shot and a car blows up.  Actionwise, that's about it. 

I kept thinking about what Andy Sidaris, the guy responsible for all those great low-budget sex-and-violence thrillers like PICASSO TRIGGER and SAVAGE BEACH, could've done with a premise like this.  He wasn't a great filmmaker, but at least he gave us something fun to look at. VENICE UNDERGROUND barely even makes an effort.

 

VENICE UNDERGROUND -- Movie Review by Porfle

IF EVER I SEE YOU AGAIN -- Movie Review by Porfle

(Written for Bumscorner.com in 2005, this review was reposted here in 2011 in light of later events involving the film's writer-producer-director-star Joe Brooks.)


Joe Brooks has written some of the most successful and well-known commercial jingles of all time, including "You've got a lot to live, and Pepsi's got a lot to give" and many more that have probably been forever lodged in your memory over the years. At one point back in the 70s, he decided to try his hand as a songwriter-slash-Hollywood film auteur as well, resulting in the wildly successful YOU LIGHT UP MY LIFE (both the song and the movie were huge hits).

Joe wrote, scored, produced, and directed the film, and actually won an Oscar and a Golden Globe for Best Original Song. With this remarkable debut under his belt, Joe set his sights even higher -- for his next trick, he would not only perform all the duties he had on his first film, but would star in it as well. And that, bad movie fans, is how IF EVER I SEE YOU AGAIN (1978) came to be.

This movie has to be seen to be believed. It fails miserably on every level. Fortunately, since Joe Brooks handled the production, direction, writing, music, and lead acting role himself, there are fewer people to blame for it.



As a romantic lead, he has about as much appeal as a potted plant. His leading lady, Shelley Hack, acts as though she were posing for the picture on front of a box of All Bran. The supporting players include, for some reason, authors Jimmy Breslin and George Plimpton, about whose acting the best thing that can be said is that they are good authors. It's pretty bad when the most professional acting performance in a movie is delivered by a little girl (Danielle Brisebois).

Joe plays a jingle writer named "Bob Morrison" who dreams of being a serious musician, even though all of his "serious" songs still sound like extended commercial jingles, and the classical piece he composes to show off his true talent later in the film would be better suited for a group of musical saw players than an actual orchestra. Watching his dramatic gestures as he conducts this ear-splitting opus in the recording studio, as the dazzled Shelley Hack grins at him like a stuffed loon, is one of the most unintentionally hilarious scenes ever filmed.

If this movie is indeed as autobiographical as we suspect it is, then this scene must be the realization of one of Joe Brooks' fondest fantasies -- having the girl of his dreams gaze at him with naked, worshipful awe as he lurches about among the musicians, grandly flailing his arms as if to literally mold the wafting notes into an aural work of art. Unfortunately, this piece of music is so badly arranged that it could make even the London Symphony Orchestra sound like a high school band at a pep rally.

And then, of course, there's the romance. When "Bob Morrison" makes the trip from New York to L.A. to pursue his musical ambitions, he also decides to look up his old college girlfriend (Shelley Hack's "Jennifer Corly") for whom he still carries a torch. When they are reunited, their scenes together generate all the excitement of sitting in a dentist's waiting room with nothing to read but a year-old copy of "Field And Stream." Shelley Hack, who proved later on to be a pretty good actress in certain roles, seems here to be hovering in and out of a coma. But it would be difficult even for a great actress to pretend that she was falling back in love with Joe Brooks' incredibly bland character, especially with the brain-numbing dialogue she must recite.



Music-wise, Joe was obviously hoping for another big chart-topper like "You Light Up My Life", but its inexplicable success was not to be matched by the cringe-inducing dirge that is this film's theme song. I don't know who performed it, but he doesn't sing it as much as he suffers through it. He seems to be battling his way through a particularly intense bout of constipation as he strains to expel the stomach-churning lyrics, though I doubt if even Debby Boone could've made this song any more tolerable.

The same singer also gets to croak the other big tune in the movie, "California", which is Joe's musical tribute to the state of the same name, but after hearing it you might get the impression that California is the most horrible place on Earth. A more upbeat version performed by a group of singers accompanies a scene of Joe traveling by plane, and sure enough, it looks and sounds just like an airline commercial. We see the plane banking off over the sunlit clouds as the song informs us: "Caaa-lifornia! Wherever you may roam! Californiaaa...is caaaa-lling you hoooome!" You almost expect to see the TWA logo pop onto the screen.

When I saw this movie on HBO several years ago, I just had to have it. I still watch my old tape every so often just to gape in wide-eyed amazement at how truly awful a movie can be. As a bad-movie lover, I hold this perversely-entertaining cinematic messterpiece in high esteem -- it's the PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE of romantic movies. Still, you gotta hand it to Joe Brooks -- he decided he wanted to make movies in the worst way, and he sure enough went out and done it.

IF EVER I SEE YOU AGAIN -- Movie Review by Porfle

Elmer Bernstein's Early Sci-Fi/Horror Themes: "Robot Monster" and "Cat Women of the Moon" (1953) (video)

Before scoring such classics as THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, THE GREAT ESCAPE, and THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN...

...legendary film composer Elmer Bernstein supplied the music for the notorious turkeys ROBOT MONSTER and CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON.


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

Elmer Bernstein's Early Sci-Fi/Horror Themes: "Robot Monster" and "Cat Women of the Moon" (1953) (video)

Shocking Effects Of Marijuana On Users: "REEFER MADNESS" (1936) (video)

More vicious...more deadly...

...even than the soul-destroying drugs opium, morphine, and heroin...

...is the menace of marijuana!

The next tragedy may be that of your daughter...or your son...

...or yours...or yours...OR YOURS!


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

Shocking Effects Of Marijuana On Users: "REEFER MADNESS" (1936) (video)

Amazing World-Class Bad Acting! ("BLOOD FEAST", 1963) (video)

 

Herschell Gordon Lewis' "Blood Feast" was the first major "gore" film.

Although Bill Kerwin is the only decent actor...

...the other actors are encouraged to emote wildly.

Thus giving us some truly, impressively bad performances...

...including that of Playboy Playmate of the Month (June 1963) Connie Mason.


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

Amazing World-Class Bad Acting! ("BLOOD FEAST", 1963) (video)

THE BLOODY APE -- DVD Review by Porfle

Just so I don't give you the wrong impression, I want to say up front that this is a favorable review. I had loads of fun watching THE BLOODY APE, writer-director Keith J. Crocker's affectionate homage to the drive-in trash of yesteryear, and will enthusiastically recommend it to people who come knocking at my door trying to sell me a satellite dish or invite me to their church. 

Now that my disclaimer is out of the way and we can speak freely, I'll try to describe this surreal cinematic artifact to you. Imagine a cross between LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, BLOOD FEAST, and your dad's worst home movies. Whatever your mind comes up with, this is worse. Though filmed in 1997, it looks as though it were shot in 1967, buried, and then dug up by somebody's dog in 1997. It makes PINK FLAMINGOS look like it was directed by Terrence Malick. In fact, it makes almost literally every other movie ever made look good in comparison, unless, of course, Billy Crystal is in it. 

All of this, however, is simply part of THE BLOODY APE's makeshift charm. Crocker, a devoted grindhouse film aficionado who for several years published the popular fanzine "Exploitation Journal" with his pal George Reis, eschewed the "shot-on-video" look of much of today's indy titles and went instead for the more traditional look of actual film. Super 8mm film, that is--exactly the same stuff that all of us pre-home-video auteurs used in order to make our own geeky home monster movies back in high school. Except here, Crocker managed to shoot a feature film and get it released, so you gotta admire him for that. It's this homespun ingenuity and love for moviemaking that help make THE BLOODY APE such a strangely fascinating experience. 

The gleefully bizarre screenplay by Crocker and Reis is another factor. Loosely inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue", it's the story of a carnival barker named Lampini (after George Zucco's character in HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN) and his beloved performing gorilla, Gordo. After being screwed over by an abusive garage mechanic and a crooked rabbi, and then rejected by his girlfriend Ginger while he's proposing to her, Lampini decides to use his ape as an instrument of revenge. Taking a cue from Bela Lugosi's diabolical aftershave murders in THE DEVIL BAT, Lampini mails Ginger some of his special homemade banana cream soap. This lures Gordo to Ginger's apartment, where he kills her roommates in a frenzy of fake blood and banana-scented soap suds. 

In one scene, we get to see what would've happened in PSYCHO if Janet Leigh's shower had been interrupted by a crazed gorilla instead of Norman Bates. Then Gordo chases another naked roommate around the livingroom couch a few times before squeezing the life out of her as she looks into the camera and laughs. Rabbi Rabinowitz and Vic White, the incredibly racist garage mechanic, are next on the list, having been given bunches of bananas by Lampini beforehand. I don't want to spoil too much of the intricate plot, but this is where Gordo rapes Rabbi Rabinowitz' wife and then disembowels her. Although this sounds horrible, the fact that the victim is giggling through the whole ordeal tends to soften the heinousness a bit. 

Gordo's reign of terror then goes on to include car theft--he drives around until stopped by a cop, whose head he pulls off--and the murder of an ill-mannered video store clerk, which is justifiable. Equally shocking is the scene in which a hippie is furtively taking a leak in some bushes when the confused ape mistakes part of his anatomy for a banana, and... During all of this, an incredibly racist police lieutenant named LoBianco (Reis, who also plays Gordo) is irrationally convinced that the whole killing spree is the work of an innocent black man named Duane Jones (after the lead actor in George Romero's NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD), which is a whole other subplot. With his ridiculous hair-helmet wig and fake goatee, Reis is as over-the-top hilarious as everything else about this movie. And as mechanic Vic White, Larry Koster is like a Jerky Boys character come to life. The early scene in which he browbeats the incredulous Duane (Chris Hoskins) out of the garage simply for wanting his car fixed sets the goofball tone for the rest of the film. 

Acting honors, however, must go to Paul Richichi as Lampini. With his dopey porkpie hat, cane, and Dracula cape, the ever-cheerful Lampini is a delightfully absurd character brimming with memorable quotes, as during his romantic dinner with Ginger: "The sky has never been bluer, the grass has never been greener, and Japanese sports cars have never been smaller, ever since I laid my head between your breasts," he gushes over a plate of Spaghetti-O's. "My love for you is as deep and as wide as the expanses of your vaginal cavity." To which the nonplussed Ginger responds: "What's the matter with you tonight? You're acting like a crackpot--like one of those self-proclaimed medicine men from the days of yore." Later, regretting his callous treatment of Gordo, he laments that he has become "so overwhelmed with repugnance for my enemies, that my love for my ape completely disappeared." 

Now, this is where I usually mention stuff like image and sound quality, but we'll skip that part and go on to the bonus features. The audio commentary is an entertaining gabfest with Crocker, Reis, Richichi, and Wild Eye DVD's Rob Hauschild, who directed the informative "making of" featurette, "Grindhouse Gorilla." Next is a Crocker short film, "One Grave Too Many", which boasts a crude sort of creepiness. Lots of other miscellaneous stuff is included: a gallery of covers from the "Exploitation Journal" 'zine, trailers for THE BLOODY APE and BLITZKRIEG: ESCAPE FROM STALAG 69, a pressbook, original VHS cover art, lobby cards, stills, and other related art. 

If you've read this far, you already know whether or not you should watch THE BLOODY APE as soon as possible or avoid it like the plague. It's loaded with exploitation goodies--nudity, violence, badly-done gore, bizarre situations, extreme characters, weird comedy--and done in such an unabashedly crude way that it radiates its own strange kind of fascination. As a Poe adaptation, George Reis accurately comments: "If you're running down the films based on Edgar Allan Poe, it's--one of them." As a study in miscommunication, as Crocker describes it, you couldn't find characters that are more miscommunicative. As cinema, it's like some kind of Super 8mm folk art whose worth can only be measured by each individual who watches it. As for me, I found it to be one of the funniest and most entertaining comedy-horror films that I watched yesterday.

 

THE BLOODY APE -- DVD Review by Porfle

VALENTINE MAGIC ON LOVE ISLAND (1980) -- Movie Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 7/19/15

 

A billion years from now, when they're talking about the worst of the worst made-for-TV movies of all time, VALENTINE MAGIC ON LOVE ISLAND (aka "Magic on Love Island") will still hold its own on the lips and in the hearts of junk film junkies of the far-flung future. 

If they still have lips and hearts, that is.  And even if they don't, this brain-warp of a movie will make them feel as though their lips are shriveling in disgust as their hearts break from sheer id-curdling incredulity.

A bizarre hybrid of "The Love Boat" and "Fantasy Island", from a time faraway back when people still flocked to watch those multi-segment, faded-star-packed chunks of 70s-schlock entertainment, this 1980 crapfest belatedly distills the worst of both and throws in the worst of just about everything else it can get its hands on for good measure. 

The show's incredibly cloying theme song, nauseatingly crooned by a guy with a fake Jamaican accent, lets us know what we're in for:

Floating like a flower in de sea
Waiting to be found by you and me
Feeding all your needed fantasy
Love Island, Love Island
Your island of love

Not on any map or any chart
Only to be found inside your heart
There to give de love in you a start
Love Island, Love Island
Your island of love

The papaya, tasty pomegran'te
Helps you do de t'ings
The t'ings you t'ink you can't [!]
T'rough de voodoo of de island chant
Love Island, Love Island
Your island of love

In de sun your body wants to play
Urging you to let it have its way
T'row your inhibitions in de quay
Love Island, Love Island
Your island of love

Janis Paige, a facelift or two past her prime, stars as a mysteriously magical matchmaker named Madge who brings unlikely couples together at her tropical island paradise resort.  She's supposed to have supernatural powers, but instead of using them for evil--intentionally, anyway--she's like a gushing, overripe Cupid making love connections between grievously mismatched souls with the help of her two bubbly teenage charges, Dominique Dunne (POLTERGEIST) and Christopher "Peter Brady" Knight. 

When things aren't going as love-positive as she'd like, Madge resorts to everything from Tarot cards and crystal balls (so to speak) to whipping up chocolate-dipped roses and other confections that put the love whammy on anyone who eats them.  This is how, heaven help us, she gets Howard Duff romantically interested in Dody Goodman, if you can entertain that thought for more than a few seconds without blacking out. 

The awkwardly-staged intro segments for each main character show us who needs a quick love pair-up on Love Island, and why.  Mary Louise Weller (ANIMAL HOUSE's "Mandy Pepperidge") is shown modeling sexy lingerie for pushy photog Stuart Pankin at his smarmiest before rebelling against the horrible grind and insisting upon an island vacation.  As she goes into freeze-frame, Fake Jamaican-Accent Dude returns to hip us to her plight:

Lady wit' de curvy frame
Sometimes she play nervy game
She needs mon, her ways to tame
Who will be de one?

The "mon" in question, horribly enough, just might be none other than Bill Daily of "I Dream of Jeannie" and "The Bob Newhart Show" fame, here playing a clumsy assistant pastor with Coke-bottle glasses who's a big movie buff.  This guy is such a loss that the head church-guy himself suggests he go away--that is, "get" away--to Love Island as quickly as possible.  Bill's inevitable dating-profile-in-song goes like this:

Man who shy, he miss a lot
Don't use half of what he got
Who'll untie his tied-up knot
Who will be de one?
[The last line, in this case, is spoken dramatically for extra romantic emphasis.]

The horror continues with Bob Seagren as an injured pro quarterback who's one sack away from permanent disability ("Mistah wit de muscles so, he has also big ego..."), a cute pre-nose-job Lisa Hartman as a cornfed checkout clerk named "Crystal Kramer" smothered by her clinging mom (Dody again), and Adrienne Barbeau, God love her, as the fed-up mistress of an overbearing business executive (Duff) who flees to you-know-where.  Her lovelorn lame-erick:

Love may not be on her mind
But she seek and she will find
In de plan dat life design
Who will be de one?

Duff hires a private detective to tail Adrienne, and he turns out to be Rick Hurst, who also falls for her, and...I know what you're thinking.  "Adrienne Barbeau and Rick Hurst?  No. Please, please, just...no."  Well, I hate to say it, folks, but yes.  Just yes.  He will be "de one."  (Or...will he?  Hee hee.)  Rick gets his own verse but I couldn't make out the lyrics because they're warbled bad-Supremes style to catch us off-guard. 

When we finally make it to Love Island, a ghostly Madge wanders around creeping out the new arrivals with her frozen grin as they get off the boat and start intermingling with all the grace of short-circuiting bumper cars.  This is where the true horror (there's that word again) begins, with each potential love-match seemingly more incongruous and repellent than the last and Madge presiding over it all like a sickly-sweet spectre of schmaltz.

Mary Louise Weller starts the ball rolling by strutting around in a revealing swimsuit and getting upset that people are ogling her body instead of her mind, but ends up making out with horndogger Bob Seagren all over the place while Chris Knight lusts after her from afar.  Yikes.  Weller is apparently allowed to ad-lib some of her dialogue in these scenes.  Not a good idea.

Additional laughs are generated by Bill Daily taking off his glasses to appear more attractive to the opposite sex and mistaking Lisa Hartman for Dody Goodman's 50-year-old sister.  Lisa's upset at first, but after dumping her salad in Bill's lap he sorta starts to turn her on, which is just gross.

Things get weirder when Bill and Bob end up stranded on the other side of the island by themselves, one immobilized by old injuries and the other blind as a bat without his glasses.  Madge, who planned the whole thing to force the two men to work out their differences (and "grow") materializes from out of nowhere like Glinda the Good Witch and heals Bob's knee with a laying on of the hands.  Ohhh-kay... 

Much of the "humor" in this part of the movie comes from Dody trying to fix daughter Lisa up with anything in pants, which, unfortunately, includes Rick Hurst.  This leads to Rick dressing in drag at one point in order to avoid Dody.  Watching this scene is like seeing the entire concept of comedy suddenly take a huge dump. Later, Rick actually hits on Adrienne while he's in full "mom" makeup and muu-muu, and she accepts.  Concept of reality now fully and horribly subverted, thank you very much.

Things hit rock bottom when Rick takes a comedy-relief break to bare his soul to Adrienne with one of those desperate "tears of a clown" speeches that's puppy-dog pathetic.  ("You see, I was always the class clown...the bumbler, the fumbler...girls laughed at me...")  More sensitive viewers may not survive this scene. If you do, you might actually make it to the end of the movie alive.

TV veteran Earl Bellamy, who actually did direct episodes of "Fantasy Island" and "The Love Boat" among many, many other things, does his best with what he has to work with here, which isn't much.  Meanwhile, the photography often renders even the genuine tropical locations murky and mundane. 

Performance-wise, Bob Seagren does his best to murder the art of "acting" but in this crime he has several accomplices.  Even the better actors in the bunch are stymied by ditzy dialogue in a story whose multiple plotlines compete to be the stupidest.  It's telling that the person who seems to fit most comfortably into this frothy concoction of crud is Dody Goodman, playing the dumbest character in the whole movie. 

Everything climaxes (I wish) with the big Valentine Costume Ball, where the couples are coupled once and for all.  Naturally, Dody shows up in a ridiculous chicken suit that she made herself.  Rick Hurst, as a wand'ring minstrel or whatever, continues to push the boundaries of unfunny right up till the bitter end. 

Naughty Dominique eats one of Madge's special love confections and gets high as a kite, leading me to believe that there's a tad more LSD than "magic" in Madge's recipe.  And just in case everybody's "fun quotient" has yet to be adequately met, Howard Duff shows up.  It's truly a magical evening!  (Ehh...)

As hard as I've tried to describe it, this movie simply defies description.  Although I will say that it's smarmy, cloying, cutesy, banal, schmaltzy, senseless, silly,  dunderheaded, inane, inept, indigestible, and incredibly stupid. The script, the acting, the casting, all technical aspects of the production--everything about it is stunningly, stupefyingly awful.  

Without a doubt, VALENTINE MAGIC ON LOVE ISLAND is one of the all-time most horrendously horrible things ever concocted for public viewing. An absolute cringe-inducing joy to watch.  Fascinatingly bad.  I love, adore, and cherish this movie.  I've seen it at least twenty times.

Watch the full movie on Youtube

Watch the original promo on Youtube

"Love Island" Theme
Music by Peter Matz/Lyrics by Norman Gimbel

VALENTINE MAGIC ON LOVE ISLAND (1980) -- Movie Review by Porfle

THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 Originally posted 8/20/2018

 

When actor-turned-filmmaker Del Tenney made a deal to direct some drive-in fodder for the teen crowd, one of the all-time trash classics he fooled around and came up with was the delirious THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH (1964).

Though made in the 60s, it contains surefire elements from the biggest teen hits of the 50s--rock and roll, monsters, hot rods, teen angst, and bad comedy--and mixes them with then-current stuff like bikini beach scenes and even a good deal of H. G. Lewis-style gore a la "Blood Feast."

Done in an amateurish yet freewheeling, dumb-fun style that packs in as much of the above elements as it will hold and, unlike many grade-Z flicks, doesn't let up for a minute, the result is a movie that's often funny, creepy, and refreshingly entertaining in spite of itself.

The very first minute of the film features drag racing and motorcycles--courtesy of an actual local bike gang--along with the first of six goofy rock and roll songs by the Del-Aires (in what was billed as "the first horror monster musical.")

We see Hank (John Scott) arguing with his girlfriend Tina (Marilyn Clarke) as they pull into the parking lot of the local beach, where Tina is intent on living it up while Hank insists they begin to act their age. The beach party sequence is real "poor man's" Frankie and Annette stuff, filmed in dreary black and white on a beach in Connecticut and interspersed with some of the worst comedy dialogue exchanges ever.

Meanwhile, fast-chick Tina goes nuts, bumping and grinding to "The Zombie Stomp" with a greasy-haired biker amidst the bikini-clad onlookers and prompting Hank to release his violent side as a big poorly-choreographed fight breaks out.

When Tina runs off into the ocean to escape Hank's disdain, she's attacked and ripped to pieces (and splattered liberally with Bosco chocolate syrup) by a horrific amphibian creature that has recently been created when some radioactive waste carelessly dumped into the water got mixed up with the sodden bodies of recently-drowned sailors.

These monsters (they grow in number with every scene) are real lulus of bad creature design, looking like poor relations of the Black Lagoon creature with ping-pong-ball eyes and what appear to be big bundles of hot dogs sticking out of their mouths.  But just the fact that such relatively elaborate costumes were made for this low-budget flick is impressive.

The rest of THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH becomes a series of monster attacks in the nearby small town with Dr. Gavin (Allan Laurel), his apprentice Hank, and his daughter Elaine (Alice Lyon), now Hank's prospective girlfriend after the untimely death of Tina, applying all their scientific skills to helping the local cops find a way to track down and destroy the creature menace.

This allows Tenney and company to stage a progression of delightful creature carnage sequences which include an all-girl slumber party massacre, three girls on their way to New York getting tragically sidetracked (the wisecracking blonde in this segment is actually quite funny), and a couple of drunks stumbling their way into the path of the monsters.  (One of the drunks is actor Wayne Tippit of "JFK" and "Nurse Betty", perhaps the only recognizable face in the film.) These scenes include not only lots of fake blood but some nicely-done gore makeup.

While all this is going on, we're treated to the high-jinx of Dr. Gavin's matronly black maid Eulabelle (Eulabelle Moore--yes, that was her real name) going around fretting "It's the voodoo, that's what it is!", and an increasingly ridiculous scientific investigation that results in the good guys hurling handfuls of sodium at the finny fiends.  (The resulting fish-fry pyrotechnics are pretty well done.)

The Severin Blu-ray itself is a 2k scan from the original negative and, needless to say, looks way, way better than I've ever seen it before. (And probably way more uncut, too.)

Severin, as usual, comes through with the bonus features as well, including archival footage of Del Tenney himself discussing his career in general and this film in particular.  "Return to Party Beach" is an informative retrospective documentary, while another featurette offers two of the Del-Aires with an interview and a live performance of "The Zombie Stomp."  In "Shock and Roll", filmaker Tim Sullivan discusses rock and roll horror movies.  The film's trailer is also included.

There are a lot of "so bad it's good" movies out there, with some of them being only passably entertaining with brief moments of fun amidst long stretches of boredom.  THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH, on the other hand, has a kind of magically bad quality that makes it total, almost giddy fun from start to finish.  This one's got everything and lots of it, and watching it makes me feel like a kid at the drive-in again.


Buy Blu-ray or DVD from Severin Films

THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

THE NEANDERTHAL MAN -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 10/19/09

 

 

(CAUTION: The part where I sorta give away the ending might be considered a "spoiler.")

My videotapes, mostly recorded on SLP so I could cram more stuff onto them, are a real mixed bag. Recently, I was watching one that features two great classics--THE SAND PEBBLES and SEVEN SAMURAI--followed by THE NEANDERTHAL MAN (1953). Talk about taking a nosedive from the sublime to the ridiculous! And yet, this is one of my favorite schlock films from the 50s.

Robert Shayne, who was Inspector Henderson on TV's "The Adventures of Superman", plays Professor Clifford Groves, a scientist who is obsessed with proving that primitive man was superior to modern man, not only physically but mentally as well. And when I say "obsessed", I mean googly-eyed, profusely-sweaty obsessed. When he addresses a group of fellow scientists early in the film to expound upon his theories to their chuckling derision, he's already in full-on whacko mode. He practically chases his scoffing peers out of the room as he rants, "Tuck your fears between your legs and run from new truths! Small men! Small views! You want proof, do you? Well, I'll give you proof! I'll show you such proof that no men have ever had!"

Meanwhile, in the High Sierra mountains of California, the local folk have been reporting a huge sabertooth tiger roaming the woods. Game warden George Oakes (Robert Long) is skeptical until he's driving down the road one night and it leaps onto his hood. Up to this point we've seen only stock footage of a regular tiger (in one shot, his leash is clearly visible), but here we're given a close-up, and it's a doozy--it looks like a big plush-doll tiger head with long fangs glued on. Really, it's just totally laughable. But it's enough to scare the dickens out of poor old George and send him to Los Angeles to seek help from a zoological expert named Dr. Ross Harkness (Richard Crane, TV's "Rocky Jones, Space Ranger"), who, after some initial skepticism of his own, agrees to come check out the situation. (And with a name like "Dr. Ross Harkness", we can safely guess that this doughy, Vitalis-haired stiff is going to be the film's heroic character.) A couple of convenient story twists later, and he's actually staying in Professor Groves' house during his investigation.

But where did this prehistoric beast come from? In an earlier scene, we saw something escape from the lab of Professor Groves, who lives in the mountains with his daughter Jan (Joyce Terry, who sorta resembles a serious Gracie Allen). He's been developing a reverse-evolution serum that will cause the subject to regress to its primitive state, and we discover that the sabertooth tiger is really a kitty cat that he has injected with the serum. With this in mind, you just know that the good professor is going to use it on himself sooner or later. The only question is, will this make him scarier than he already is?

In one of the least believable aspects of the script, we find that this creep actually has a fiancée named Ruth Marshall (Doris Merrick). She's a fairly decent-looking dame, so God only knows why she's remotely interested in marrying a goofball like Professor Groves. "I want you--the man I once knew! The good companion, the cheerful friend!" she whines, practically grovelling as she begs him to give up his all-consuming research and go back to being Mr. Fun Guy again. "What is this unhappy work that has absorbed you so much, that is undermining your nervous system and making you such an intolerable sorehead?" (You just don't get fascinating dialogue like this in good movies.) At one point she ruffles his hair, and he finishes out the scene with a feather-duster hairstyle which, coupled with his dour, persimmony expression, looks wonderfully comical.

But the old sorehead throws her out of his lab, because it's time at last for him to inject himself with the serum and turn into a monster. This sequence is fascinating because it uses the same technique seen in classics such as DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE (1932) and WEREWOLF OF LONDON--instead of just lap-dissolving from one stage of makeup to the next, as in the Lon Chaney "Wolf Man" movies, we see makeup that is already applied to Shayne's face become slowly visible as the lighting is gradually altered. This makes for some pretty convincing transforming in a couple of shots.

Unfortunately, the makeups that he is transforming into look so dumb that they cause him to resemble a hairy, bucktoothed Clint Howard. The final stage of his transformation is a stiff, crummy-looking gorilla mask with too much eyeliner. And for some reason, he also sports a head of curly ringlets that would make Shirley Temple jealous.

Well, it's rampage time, and the Neanderthal Man horns in on a romantic photography session deep in the woods, where some guy is snapping pictures of Beverly Garland, who plays Nola Mason, the waitress at Webb's Cafe, in a one-piece bathing suit. I love Beverly Garland--she was a fine actress who brightened many a low-rent monster flick with her lovely and talented presence--but here, she's replaced by a stand-in in the bathing suit shots. We can clearly see that it isn't her posing provocatively for the camera, which is just plain weird. Anyway, the Neanderthal Man shows up, kills the guy with the camera, and carries Beverly off into the woods to have his Neanderthal way with her. Which, you might imagine, does not include dinner and a movie.

The monster returns to the lab and reverts back into Professor Groves. But just like Dr. Jekyll before him, he finds the lure of the beast too strong and begins to transform without the benefit of the serum. After that, he runs around in the woods some more and kills a couple of other guys until finally our hero Dr. Harkness is able to use his incredible intellect to figure out a way to stop him.

One of the most remarkable things about THE NEANDERTHAL MAN is how similar is its idea of genetic memory being retained in the brain of Man to the theories of William Hurt's "Eddie Jessup" in the much later ALTERED STATES. Both characters espouse the same theories and use drugs to revert to their devolved states, transforming themselves into primitive man-beasts that go on a rampage. I don't know if ALTERED STATES' screenwriter Paddy Chayevsky ever saw this movie, but the similarities are pretty strong.

Another noteworthy element of this movie is the pulse-pounding musical score by Albert Glasser (THE CYCLOPS, INDESTRUCTIBLE MAN, THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN, EARTH VS. THE SPIDER). Glasser was just plain awesome--I don't know how he did it, but he could write music that, in its all-out, almost artless intensity, could simply scare the crap out of me when I was a kid, and still retains its ability to give me the creeps. Glasser wielded the studio orchestra like a blunt instrument, using blaring brass and pounding kettle drums to bludgeon the viewer with a sense of unreasoning fear. He goes full-tilt even in scenes such as Professor Groves simply entering his lab, filling the viewer with an unrelenting sense of unease that is sustained throughout the entire movie.

This almost palpable musical background also underlies another memorable sequence, in which Dr. Harkness discovers that Professor Groves has been experimenting on his deaf-mute housegirl, Celia, when he uncovers a series of photographs detailing her transformation. In yet another seeming inspiration for a later film, the sequence in which Harkness leafs through the photographs serves as a veritable blueprint for the scene in SE7EN in which "Sloth" victim Victor's photographic record of deterioration is discovered by Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman's cop characters.

All of which adds up to a pretty interesting monster flick, though admittedly it's also cheap, tawdry, and often inept. Directed by Ewald André Dupont, whose career began with silent films in 1918 and undoubtedly saw better days, THE NEANDERTHAL MAN is a lot of fun to watch, and, come to think of it, that's all it really needs to be. Whether you watch it on its own terms or simply to make fun of it, it's still an entertaining film. And at the end, Dr. Harkness gets to solemnly recite one of those classic, self-important soliloquies so common to films of this type:

"We mustn't think of him too harshly. The things he did--and they were terrible--all of us are capable of doing when we give free play to the basis which is a part of everyone. He tampered with things beyond his province...beyond what any man should do. And if it was madness...well...those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad." Oh, yeah! Gotta love it.

Buy it at Amazon.com

THE NEANDERTHAL MAN -- Movie Review by Porfle

ONE MORE SHOT -- DVD Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 6/12/19

 

It's hard to explain why I look forward to these Retro Afrika DVD restorations from Indiepix so much.  They're no-budget, totally amateurish productions that imitate Hollywood films on a home movie level, and are often hilariously bad.

But they're often so bad they're good, which is why movies such as ONE MORE SHOT (1984) are so perversely entertaining to me. Granted, those who demand that their viewing material actually be "good" or at least "competent" might well be expected to run the other way as fast as they can. But they'd be missing out on the fun.

Made specifically for black South African audiences who were denied entrance to mainstream theaters during Apartheid, these films are simple, earnest efforts to entertain using practically non-existent resources.

Just seeing how the filmmakers and their players struggle to overcome such drawbacks to produce something worth running through a projector for paying audiences is interesting in itself. And I find it fascinating to see what they were able to come up with.

This time, burly bad guy Tap Tap gets out of prison with one desire: to get revenge on famed kickboxer Johnny Tough, whose testimony sent him up the river. Tap Tap goes to sinister (but in an amusing way) nightclub owner and human trafficker Fly for help, so Fly has the daughter of Johnny's lawyer kidnapped to force him to divulge the location of Johnny's secluded ranch where he trains with his Asian martial arts buddy Chan.

Fly sends three strongmen out to Johnny's ranch, setting up the first in a series of action scenes that have to be seen to be disbelieved.  This is the kind of stuff that kids do in the front yard after watching a kung-fu movie, consisting of a lot flailing hands and feet punctuated by loud "thwack!" sound effects.  Johnny's biggest talent is doing backflips, which don't really help in a fight but look pretty good in slow-motion.

The big finale takes place at Fly's country estate where he's conducting a transaction with a visiting shiek who's in the market to purchase several young kidnapped women.  Johnny and Chan take on all the guards in various slap-fight vignettes, showcasing some of the worst fight choreography ever, until finally it's just between them and the main bad guys.

Technically, ONE MORE SHOT is a mess, even more so than the previous Retro Afrika films I've seen, with more meandering sequences to pad the 59-minute running time such as an opening duo doing incredibly limp breakdancing in Fly's club for eight minutes before the plot even starts. 

Johnny and Chan's training sequence offers another musical montage, as does a long helicopter ride with Fly and the Arab shiek out to the country estate, all accompanied by bad 80s-era techno (including a title song).

As usual, all of this ineptitude is both endearing and strangely compelling as all involved work to put a watchable movie together. When the plot finally gets a head of steam going, the fight scenes (interspersed with shots of Fly displaying his female wares to the shiek) come one right after another.

The cast do their best and are fun to watch. They're much more racially mixed this time--most films in the series have almost all-black casts with the occasional white actor, but this time it's a pretty even mix. 

The clumsy dialogue is all in English this time, another rarity, but with subtitles to help us with the heavy accents.  Two talented Retro Afrika faves, leading man Innocent "Popo" Gamede and comedy star Hector Methanda (ISIBOSHWA, UMBANGO, RICH GIRL) are sorely missed. 

As I've often emphasized, films such as ONE MORE SHOT can be a real hoot, but only if you're inclined to appreciate them for what they are--simple, charmingly amateurish attempts to create entertainment practically out of thin air.  If you're open to that, then this should be yet another chance to have some really offbeat film-watching fun.



Buy it at Amazon.com

Format: NTSC
Language: English (with subtitles)
Region: All Regions
Number of discs: 1
Studio: Indiepix Films
DVD Release Date: June 11, 2019
Run Time: 59 minutes
Bonus: Trailer

ONE MORE SHOT -- DVD Review by Porfle

Visible Clapper Blooper in "Manos: The Hands Of Fate" (1966) (video)

Many would consider this entire movie to be a blooper.

But even in a film of this dubious quality...

...a visible clapper is a bit much.

Originally posted on 9/16/18
I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

Visible Clapper Blooper in "Manos: The Hands Of Fate" (1966) (video)

WILD GUITAR -- Movie Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 1/25/17

 

Sometimes you just plain fall in love with a movie for no apparent reason, until you really start to think about it and the reasons begin to surface like gas bubbles in a swamp.  Watching WILD GUITAR (1962) again for the umpteenth time, courtesy of my beautiful one-dollar Digiview DVD, all those gassy little bubbles are popping in my head and making me pleasantly delirious.

More than anything, it's Arch Hall, Jr.'s film.  In fact, it's probably his best non-psycho role (his best and only psycho role being in 1963's THE SADIST).  In EEGAH! Arch played a typical teenager caught up in a prehistoric love triangle with his girlfriend and a giant caveman (Richard Kiel) in between buzzing around in his dune buggy and seranading us with his wonderfully awful original songs. 

Here, Arch is all of those things again (minus the caveman) only now the story's as meaty as a side of beef slathered in barbecue sauce.  As aspiring-but-naive rocker from Hicksville, Bud Eagle, Arch rides into Hollywood on his motorcycle and immediately meets wannabe-actress Vicki, who takes him along when she appears as a dancer on a local rock-and-roll TV show.

 

Vicki does her version of The Twist, which involves her jerkily gyrating to generic rock-and-roll racket while making spasmodic smiley faces to denote how intensely she's gettin' down.  But when the next act fails to show up, the frantic director shoves Bud onstage with his guitar, and, one twangy little tune later, he's an instant star getting mobbed by the frenzied and clearly entertainment-starved audience.

What follows is a surprisingly cynical, almost downbeat expose' of the music business.  The starstruck Bud is offered the world by a bloated, cigar-chomping bastard named Mike (Arch Hall, Sr. under the pseudonym "William Watters") only to be quickly disillusioned by how manipulative and phony the whole thing turns out to be.

Bud cuts best-selling records and does public appearances but the money all seems to go into money-hungry manager Mike's pockets.  Not only that, but his personal life is severely curtailed--he's even forbidden from pursuing budding love interest Vickie while being watched over by Mike's slimy toady, Steak (director Ray Dennis Steckler acting as "Cash Flagg").

The rest of the story plays out in seriocomic fashion with Bud being kidnapped for ransom by three overtly farcical characters and then conspiring with them to turn it all against his tyrannical keepers.  The comedy consists of a lot of pleasantly dumb dialogue and mugging, but the film always maintains its serious side--especially when one of Mike's washed-up former stars shows up and clues Bud in on what a disposable property he really is.

Unlike many low, low budgeted films of this nature, WILD GUITAR has no slow spots and no padding since the script (co-written by Arch Hall, Sr. as "Nicholas Merriwether") is packed with incident, moving briskly from one interesting scene to another with barely any time to dawdle. 

Bud's come-up includes an eye-opening encounter with teenaged "fan club" presidents who are paid by Mike to like him and a harrowing experience with an overripe sex bomb thrown his way to make him forget Vickie (who, inevitably, catches them together and gets the wrong idea).

 

Arch Hall, Jr. carries the film with the totally unintentional charm of a big, goofy kid eager to please, both in character and as a young actor doing his best in the role (and wanting to please his enterprising pop, no doubt) and apparently enjoying himself. 

With a huge blond ducktail that's like a caricature of itself and that pudgy, utterly guileless face, Arch pretty much becomes happy-go-lucky hick Bud Eagle, an impression made even stronger by the fact that he's performing his own tepid but endearing songs in his own inimitable style. 

One of them, "Vickie", is a holdover from EEGAH!, only this time he actually has someone with that name to perform it for.  As Vickie Wills, blond semi-cutie Nancy Czar has an equally goofy charm and proves to be a pretty good ice skater when (shades of ROCKY) Vickie and Bud have a skating date in her uncle's deserted ice rink. 

And then there's "Cash Flagg" (nee Ray Dennis Steckler) as Steak, sliming things up and giving the film it's nastiest edge.  As director, Ray comes through with some nice low-rent noir here and there--even with his limited talents, he could deliver a watchable enough flick back when low-budget movies were a lot harder to make. (He even had future Oscar winner Vilmos "William" Zsigmond as second-unit photographer.)

That said, one of the most charming and enjoyable aspects of WILD GUITAR is the sheer silliness of its musical sequences.  The endearingly game Arch Hall, Jr. plucks and croons his way through those priceless schlock-a-billy ditties of his as Steckler's camera flits around giving us silly closeups of the grinning, head-bobbing bandmembers to show us how crazy and way-out it all is.

In the film's big finale, a tuxedo-clad Bud performs to a swimsuited gaggle of overaged kids (and helps invent the music video) on one of the ugliest beaches in film history as Vickie gyrates by his side, love having conquered all.  

I love the lack of ironic self-awareness in both Arch Hall, Jr.'s earnest performance and Steckler's direction.  Both also lack quite the level of clueless ineptitude one is led to expect by most accounts.  While cheap, even slapdash at times, WILD GUITAR is as disarmingly straightforward and sincere as Bud Eagle himself, and, for me, as much fun as any bottom-of-the-bill B-movie that ever played drive-ins in the South or public-domain DVD budget bins at Walmart. 


Full Movie on YouTube

WILD GUITAR -- Movie Review by Porfle