Of all of the low budget horror movies that I have seen, I have to say that this is the best so far!! What a great surprise to discover that this was made a few hours away from my house! Shot in Victoria, BC, this is a tale of zombies (or decomposing cannibalistic cyborgs as one character puts it), vampire chicks, a mexican wrestler, head crushings, head sawings, flesh feasting, and an all around good time. Fresh off of watching this, I must say that I have not enjoyed a zombie flick this much since the first time I first saw "Return Of The Living Dead" and I can't believe that someone pulled off a flick this awesome on such a low budget in Canada. It just shows that spending some extra cash and taking time to plan your film in both pre-production and post-production can result in something great. It is clear to me that director Brian Clement took his time during pre-production to find some great actors, some prime locations, and to plan some great and gory effects with FX man Nick Sheehan. This time spent shows on the screen and should be a lesson to other independents who I think neglect the pre-production process. It was also clear that during the editing process, much time was also taken to acquire a great score by composer Justin Hagberg as well as spending a lot of time on sound editing. This step is often forgotten in the low-budget world and you would not believe the difference that zombie moaning, screaming, gunfire, and other sound effects make. On top of all of this, the script is extremely well-written and the actors deliver their lines like they are all pros who have been doing this for years. The plot entails zombies taking over a city while our two main characters Argenta (Claire Westby) and Shahrokh (Paul Pedrosa) try to stay alive with the aid of guns and their brains. They hook up with three gorgeous vampire chicks (Alison Therriault, Teresa Simon, and Chelsey Arentsen) before too long and soon thereafter a mexican wrestler named El Diablo (The Abominator) who says "Vampyros Lesbos" when he meets the vampire chicks. I cannot recommend this enough and persuade all horror fans and gorehounds to seek this out. Also note that Clement does not skimp out on the sex, nudity, or gore. It is all there and all to be enjoyed! There is a sequel out now as well as a new flick by Clement called "Binge And Purge".
Great Spanish western starring Franco Nero as the super-cool Django, a gunslinger who drags a coffin around wherever he goes. The film opens with Django rescuing a beautiful woman from some bad dudes and then continuing into the nearest town with woman and coffin in tow. Soon, Django finds himself in a new predicament when he pisses off the local asshole named Major Jackson by killing a bunch of his men. The rest of the film basically consists of Django pissing people off and then getting out of the bad situations that he gets himself into. I found this to be a highly entertaining and stylish spaghetti western that rivals the Eastwood man-with-no-name movies for coolness and cult status. Nero is perfect as our hero and the beautiful Loredana Nusciak is great as his tough yet tender sometimes sidekick. The mood of this film is always dirty and sometimes brutal and is seriously worth a look if you are a fan of westerns or tough guys. There is a lot of death in this movie and some especially graphic scenes including a "Reservoir Dogs"-like ear hacking (I guess Quentin was influenced by this one as well) and a disturbing hand mashing that is still making me cringe. A sequel was made more than 20 years later with Nero reprising his role.
Bobbie Jo And The Outlaw (1976)
So this is the infamous movie where Wonder Woman gets naked. Yes, I believe that everyone that I have mentioned this one to says "Well, it was ok but I remember that Lynda Carter is topless". Well, maybe in a few years that is all I will remember as well but if you are a true fan of 70's cinema, you should also remember that this is an easy to watch AIP bad people on the run film that is also starring 70's icon Marjoe Gortner. I have seen this compared to "Bonnie And Clyde" in a number of other reviews but the difference is that these people are not very sympathetic as Lynda's Bobbie Jo falls into and accepts her boyfriend Marjoe's outlaw ways pretty much without blinking an eye. Marjoe's character also could have been better as he is quite likeable in the first 20 minutes but by the end of the film you don't really care if he lives or dies. Along for the ride are Bobbie Jo's stripper sister (Merrie Lynn Ross who played teacher teacher's wife in "Class Of 1984"), Jesse Vint as her boyfriend Slick Callahan, and Brenda Balaski ("The Howling") as the fifth wheel. Although this is not a great movie, it has some 70's charm that still makes it better than most of today's schlock and former child evangelist Marjoe is also quite animated to watch. This was directed by Mark Lester who was also responsible for "Class Of 1984", "Roller Boogie", "Truck Stop Women", and much more.
I am a huge fan of Fred Olen Ray pictures but I felt like this one was missing the element of fun that makes his movies so good. "Fugitive Mind" had a decent story but was taking itself too seriously for me to enjoy as a Fred Ray b-movie. Michael Dudikoff ("American Ninja") stars as Robert Dean, a happily married working man who finds himself in a seemingly different world one day. He can't trust his wife, his friends don't know him, and the only person who can help is a girl he doesn't know who claims to love him. Don't worry, it all makes sense by the end. We are then shown a world of political corruption, mind control, and human cloning that I felt needed a better script to be interesting. The action sequences were not even very stimulating and there was no sex or violence at all to kind of spice things up. It's too bad because I have sort of lost track of Fred Ray's career since "Hybrid" and this certainly does not inspire me to seek out some of his other newer films. Thanks for the amazing run through the 80's and most of the 90's though as those will always be some of my most loved flicks. Look for a number of the usual Ray resurrections including Heather Langencamp ("A Nightmare On Elm Street") with the best performance of the film as the Robert's main ally, Gil Gerard ("Buck Rogers") as a detective with a silly cap that really bothered me for some reason, Judson Scott ("I The Jury") as the main henchman, Michele Greene ("L.A. Law") as Robert's wife, and David Hedison (Felix Leiter from "Live And Let Die").
This is everything a b-movie should be: a good story, decent action, cameos, cheesy lines, sexy girls, and above all else a lot of fun! I have been wanting to see this since I heard about it in the late 90's but it was not until a recent trip to Vegas that I stumbled across a low priced DVD of this and brought it home with me. I have to say that I am glad that I managed to scrape up $10 from the nickel slots because with this DVD, I feel like a still came home a winner. The beautiful (and recently married to Benjamin Bratt) Talisa Soto stars as Vampirella, a vampire girl from the planet Drakulon who comes to earth to avenge her people and to kick some ass in her uber-sexy costume. I must admit that I was a little skeptical of the casting when I heard that Soto was the lead but after seeing the movie, I felt like she was perfect for the part with her exotic looks and she takes the crown of sexiest superhero from Joan Severence's "Black Scorpion". I was also worried about Who lead singer Roger Daltrey playing Vlad the villain but he hammed it up and it worked out ok in the end. I don't know what was up with the silly hair extension and the really bad song in the club scene though. Look for a number of other famous faces in the cast including Richard Joseph Paul ("Oblivion") as a Van Helsing descendent, Brian Bloom (TV's "Bandit" from a few years back) as Vlad's right hand vamp, playboy playmate Corinna Harney as Vlad's babe, Angus Scrimm (The Tall Man from "Phantasm") as the high elder, John Landis (yes, the director) as an astronaut, John Terlesky ("Deathstalker 2") as another astronaut, and scream queens Antonia Dorian and Peggy Trentini as vampire girls.
Iceberg Slim is a name that has been tossed around a lot when it comes to black culture and pimping. I have heard Ice-T mention his name as well as a number of references in The Hughes Brothers' "American Pimp". I also know that he wrote the story of his life entitled "Pimp" that has been on my to-read list for some time. What I didn't know was that he wrote a book called "Trick Baby" based on the the life of one of his prison cellmates. "Trick Baby" is the story of a white man who was born by a black mother and a white father and thus assumed to be a trick baby. He goes under the name White Folks and is an amazing con man in 70's Philadelphia with the help of his friend/con man partner Blue Howard. The actors Kiel Martin and Mel Stewart ("Bride Of Re-Animator") play Folks and Blue and seeing these two in action is amazing. These guys can seem to talk themselves into and out of any situation and the speed of their thinking is incredible. The way that Folks can be bored at a party one minute and talking rich upper class people out of $90,000 the next is a talent that few people have. I can't even ask a girl for her freakin' phone number. Everything is going great until our two protagonists inadvertently cause one of their suckers to have a heart attack because of his loss. This becomes a major problem when said victim also happens to be affiliated with the mob and soon Folks and Blue have mobsters and cops on their ass while trying to pull off one last big scam. The way the tension builds as these guys get deeper and deeper in trouble is expertly paced and I am surprised that director Larry Yust did not go onto bigger and better things. Although this is technically a blaxploitation movie, it differs from most as it focuses on the hustling genius of these two con-men as opposed to the conventions that frequent most movies of the genre. There is enough action and 70's style to satisfy fans of the genre as well as enough intelligence to satisfy the more discerning viewer. I found this to be an excellent depiction of how con men work on the street level. Surprisingly, Universal recently re-released this gem on VHS (unfortunately not yet on DVD). How they decide what movies to re-release is definitely a mystery to me but someone was in a cool mood when they decided on this one. Lucky for us...
When I heard of director Ted Demme's death last year, I was suprised like everyone else that this young and talented director of films like "Blow" and "Beautiful Girls" was gone when he was just getting started. My sadness was recently deepened after I saw "Monument Ave." and realized what a truly great talent this guy was and when I think about what he could have done if his career had a chance to properly take shape. This is a story of the Irish crime scene in Boston and how it is all connected by family ties and honor resulting in a code of silence that is evident in most mob movies. The main character is Bobby (Denis Leary), a small time but connected thug who begins to have serious loyalty and ethical issues when his cousin is murdered by the local crime boss (Colm Meaney) after he supposedly talks too much while in prison. This was similar to movies like "State Of Grace" in that everyone knows everyone and family plays a big part but very original in terms of style. The editing (especially in the first half hour) was very cool with jump cuts and uses of silence speckled all over the place and giving the feeling of a very unique movie experience. This combined with an amazing cast made for a great picture. Look for Ian Hart ("Backbeat") as Bobby's fried Mouse, Famke Janssen ("Lord Of Illusions") as Bobby's girl Katy, Martin Sheen as a cop, and Jeanne Tripplehorn ("Basic Instinct") in a small role as Annie. There was also a nice surprise for me seeing former Afghan Whigs singer Greg Dulli as one of the crime bosses henchmen. Even though the plot can be seen as slightly familiar in retrospect, it would be impossible to make a totally original mob movie after we have seen so many by now anyways. The only way to attempt to do this is with style, surprise, and great directing of the actors which Demme achieves on all three fronts. It really is a drag that with the state of Hollywood today, we had to lose a major blossoming talent that actually had a vision of a movie when he made one as opposed to visions of dollar signs. Rest in peace, Ted, we will miss you.
The Great Smokey Roadblock (1976)
Sunday afternoon fun can be had with this light road movie starring Henry Fonda as an aging trucker who breaks out of the hospital to steal back his rig and make "one last great run" across the US. He soon picks up a hitchhiker played by Robert Englund ("A Nightmare On Elm Street") and a bunch of hookers led by Eileen Brennan ("Jeepers Creepers") and including Susan Sarandon in an early role. This did not have the action and car chase scenes that I was hoping for but it was fun enough for a mid-70's adventure. Also look for Gary Sandy (Andy from "WKRP") as asshole Charlie, John Byner ("Bizarre") as a banned radio DJ, and 70's character actor Dub Taylor as a country rednick sheriff. I didn't feel like Fonda was too into it when he was making this movie.
With the infestation of CGI-laden "nature run amok" movies to hit video stores as of late, this one was a nice surprise. Although there is some CG in this flick, it is bearable and does not detract from the viewing experience as it does in the majority of movies of this sort (see "Anaconda" or "Crocodile"). Thomas Calabro ("Melrose Place") stars as Ben Cahill, a recovering alcoholic doctor who takes a forced leave of absence when he is unable to perform in the ER. He decides to check out a house that he bought on a secluded island in Maine and begins to fix it up. Soon, our rich doctor gets in trouble with the local rednecks when he inadvertently insults one of said rednecks (John Savage) who happened to grow up in the house that Cahill recently acquired. The combination of disdain for outsiders and the fact that some doctor bought the childhood home of two of the lead rednecks spells trouble for our doctor. Now, I found this plot interesting enough but when we throw thousands of killer cockroach-like bugs into the mix, things really take off. Perhaps because many movies of this sort are total garbage, I was very surprised and pleased that this one was not. I felt that the suspense built nicely, the effects were decent (with plenty of real bugs), and overall it was a good little movie. Don't let all those bad experiences with movies of this sort scare you away, this was much better (and more fun) than most. The director, Ellory Elkayem, also directed the recently released "Eight Legged Freaks" about killer spiders.
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