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A mad journey into the mind of the depraved!

A mad journey into the mind of the depraved!
Recommended for devolved primates only!

Saturday, August 30, 2014

JAWS (1975)


 So yeah, everyone and their grandma is familiar with this movie. It, along with STAR WARS, basically led to there being terrible big-budget summer blockbusters forever more and changed the way Hollywood modeled it's business plan and all that but one a way more positive note, for me anyway, it led to a bunch of awesome and ridiculous JAWS-rip-offs from Italy and elsewhere. Also I'm pretty sure it was responsible for the popularity of all the animals-run-amuck movies in general that happened throughout the rest of the 70's.
 I got a chance to watch the blu-ray(whatever that is?) version of this in a bar/theater last night while free 1975-style cans of Narragansett beer(just like ol' Quint drinks in the movie!) were given out for free. This might be the way to watch this movie(except preferably on film the way you're supposed to watch movies).
 I have friends who despise this film solely because it was directed by Steven Spielberg and while I can appreciate that hatred of mainstream cinema it's hard to find any actual fault with this as a movie. It's an awesome monster movie that's, of course, totally scientifically inaccurate, but who cares? Spielberg would go on to make some kiddie movies and become part of the system. I guess scaring people wasn't what he was into in the long run and that's too bad but thanks for this anyway Hollywood-man.
 There were 3 official sequels and countless rip-offs that are still being cranked out even today.


 

This movie always reminds me of MAD magazine since I read this before actually getting to see the film(in it's TV-censored version most likely):


Friday, August 29, 2014

KING BOXER (1972)


 Eyeballs roll! Historically this has to be one of the most important kung-fu movies, at least here in America, since it was released even before Bruce Lee's FISTS OF FURY. This, of course, helped set off the kung-fu craze which went on throughout the 70's. Looking at it from that aspect it's a pretty violent thing to see. Sure there were gorier things to come in later martial arts flicks but here you get the super bright red blood flowing pretty frequently and the standard fu-plot of a student getting revenge for his murdered teacher. Helped out by his glowing iron-fist technique Lo Lieh makes a pretty good "ordinary guy pushed too far"-sorta hero. A great start to a decade full of insane fight movies.
 Quentin Tarantino pays homage to this in KILL BILL by using the same synthesizer sting they use here(which was originally taken from the IRONSIDE TV program).  AKA FIVE FINGERS OF DEATH, INVINCIBLE BOXER and HAND OF DEATH




Super Chopsockey Double-Feature!:



Sunday, August 24, 2014

DELIRIUM (1987)



 I hate to spoil the endings of movies but it's hard to write about this film without saying my favorite thing about it is that a creepy obscene-phone-caller in a wheelchair turns out to be the hero. I don't know if that's ever happened before in all of cinematic history. If it did it was probably in one of those Japanese pinkie-violence films.
 Lamberto Bava may not be quite the director that his father Mario was but I find most of the stuff that I've seen of his is pretty entertaining on a slightly lower-tier of Eurotrash excellence. In this he has the good sense to fill the movie, right from the start, with tons of boobs, mostly from very busty star Serena Grandi but also from almost every other gal who shows up thanks to a nudie-magazine office being a main ingredient in the story. Daria 'DEEP RED' Nicolodi is spared this nudity clause but does a good job of being a potential murderer by acting a little bit creepy throughout her performance. George 'ANTHROPOHAGUS' Eastman shows up just to get naked and sexy and the killer sees people with giant eyeball faces which always reminds me of that band The Residents. While this is clearly no Argento-like classic and it does drag in spots the giallo aspects are OK and things are shot really beautifully so at least you always have something nice to look at. Another neat thing is the rocking 80's soundtrack during some action sequences which might give you a chuckle or two.
 AKA PHOTO OF GIOIA, PHOTOS OF JOY and GIOIA'S PHOTOGRAPH










Saturday, August 23, 2014

THE BROOD (1979)


 THE BROOD, directed by the great David Cronenberg, was never my favorite film of his because it dwelled so much in the land of drama. There are long psychological bits when characters cry about their past, the main couple Samantha Eggar and Art Hindle try to work out their marriage dilemma and this sort of thing. Luckily Cronenberg fills out the rest of the film with some truly unique bizarre elements including murderous dwarves/children/little deformed monsters, psychoplasmically-induced body-modifications and Eggar munching down on her newborn's fresh afterbirth that just popped out of a distended external-uterus growing out of her. Also you get the legendary Oliver Reed in a somewhat subdued state as the psychologist who sets all this strangeness into motion. I was lucky enough to view this on the big screen from a 35mm print last night and would say it's totally worth a watch or a re-watch for lovers of weirdness.
 When I was a teen I had a poster from Fangoria magazine depicting the little girl here, Cindy Hinds, getting grabbed through the wall by the little murdering munchkins and although I had not seen the movie itself at that point that was enough to freak me out. Not all that many horror flicks can weird you out from just one still image.



Weird European title:




Monday, August 11, 2014

THE GORILLA (1939)


 I don't know much about The Ritz Brothers but from what I can tell they're like an even more retarded and less funny version of The Three Stooges. They starred in a whole string of films throughout the 30's that I probably will never bother watching. If they're not annoying enough for you they also throw in a screaming hysterical woman(Patsy Kelly) which was apparently a popular thing to have in horror movies in the 30's. This one is only of interest because Bela Lugosi appears as a creepy butler. A guy with hairy hands called "The Gorilla" is going around killing people. Also there's a "real" gorilla(a guy in an old-timey gorilla suit of course) and a crazy convoluted mystery plot. The best thing about these old classics is that they're all usually around 60 minutes and in this one Lugosi gets to, at least in one scene, be a hero which is something you rarely see. In addition to Lugosi, Universal monster regular Lionel Atwill also appears.

 


Saturday, August 9, 2014

THE GESTAPO'S LAST ORGY (1977)


 Watching this after seeing THE NIGHT PORTER recently was an interesting exercise in taking the same basic premise and adding a bunch of sleazy, vile elements to it, turning artsploitation into pure trashy Nazisploitation. Comparing the two is like comparing night and day. As with most of the Eurotrash Nazi films this is basically a women-in-prison flick dressed up with swastikas. If you like more stylish cinema Night Porter is for you but if you dig intentionally offensive filth this one is the way to go. Luckily I can appreciate both approaches for different reasons. The laundry list of depravities that you get here include cannibalism, shit-eating, torture, bondage, baby-murder, Jew-murder, animals ripping women apart, acid baths and, of course, the titular orgy which consists of nazis running around raping and beating naked prisoners of war. 120 DAYS OF SODOM seems to also have been an influence for this spectacle. Recommended for sleaze-lovers only. AKA CALIGULA REINCARNATED AS HITLER and LAST ORGY OF THE THIRD REICH



The thing that probably offends me more than anything else in this movie is the horrendously screechy theme song!:



THE NIGHT PORTER (1974)


 It was kinda weird to watch this movie for the first time last night(in a theater on the allegedly only surviving 35mm print in existence) after having seen all the later nazisploitation flicks that came in the years to follow. This is definitely the inspiration for many of those sleaze-epics and one in particular, THE GESTAPO'S LAST ORGY, which is basically a loose-remake with the shock-elements turned up to 11. Compared to those ILSA and company movies this one is pretty subdued and more concerned with the themes of s & m and some allegorical ponderings on coping with World War II. There's even a little touch of CABARET in there with one musical bit. It's very much a beautifully shot art-film that veers more toward the strange and bizarre than the outright disgusting. Then again the idea of a Nazi and a Jewish concentration camp survivor falling in love will probably be seen as pretty offensive all on it's own by many people.  It might move a little slow and be a bit long for the average schlub but I found it a worthwhile viewing experience.

Thursday, August 7, 2014

DIAMOND NINJA FORCE (1988)


 Another one of the many ninja movies directed by Godfrey Ho for IFD films. Like most of the ones I've seen this stars Richard Harrison and inserts newly shot footage with him and some ninjas into older footage from another film. The original film is a Taiwanese movie about a witchy/ghost lady that haunts a family that has a little boy named Bobo. I have no idea what it was originally called but this footage gives some boobs, sex scenes, a part where maggots pour out of a faucet and lots of silly haunted house antics. The new footage has crappy ninja fight scenes and Richard harrison showing how bad-ass he is by talking on a Garfield phone. They try to fuse these two things together but as usual it's kind of obvious that we're watching two different films. Viewable by the insane or cinematic masochists only.
 The DVD I have of this has the title of GHOST NINJA for some reason but the movie has the DIAMOND NINJA FORCE credit.  






Wednesday, August 6, 2014

SAVAGE DAWN (1985)


 I never thought of Lance Henriksen as a bad-ass before. I mean I think he's a good actor and all but I guess I just always think of him as that shifty no-good android in the ALIEN films. So maybe I'm instantly prejudiced against a movie that tries to make him into an ass-kicking action hero. There's a few other problems besides this though. The main one is that this movie is really fucking stupid. It's about this gang of bikers led by William Forsythe who do lots of dumb things including inexplicably stealing a tank from an armory that seems to be guarded by only two people. They take over a town with the help of a crazy-ass Karen Black and have to deal with Lance and his old 'Nam buddy George Kennedy who's stuck in a motorized wheelchair thing. There's also a pervy reverend(Richard Lynch) and some lame tough guy cops that play part in all this. I can't really say this a good watch but at least the cast is pretty interesting. Hell even Sam Kinison shows up at one point as a super religious barber which is something to see.




Strangely the old VHS I have of this doesn't even list Lance Henriksen's name anywhere on it:


Saturday, August 2, 2014

SO SWEET, SO PERVERSE (1969)


 Umberto Lenzi, who would go on to make Italian crime movies in the 70's and cannibal films in the 80's, directed this early giallo flick. It's really only barely a giallo since the murder-mystery elements take a back seat to the dramatic twisted relationship story of our main characters, Jean-Louis Trintignant and Erika Blanc, for most of the movie. Also the body count in this one is really small. There are some cool twists that happen throughout but the ending seemed very disappointing to me. If only they threw in one more twist at the end I mighta dug it more. Also it's sorta reminiscent of the vastly superior 50's French art-film DIABOLIQUE and if a movie you're watching reminds you of something way better that's usually not a good thing. So I guess watch this only if you've already seen every other giallo and absolutely need to see them all.

Super groovy soundtrack by Riz Ortolani!:
 

CRAWLSPACE (1986)


 I first viewed this movie back in the VHS days when I was a teenage obsessed slasher-movie fan. Didn't care for it much back then since I probably didn't know anything about Klaus Kinski and it's not much of a gory slasher flick. Watching it again in a theater recently, with the director in attendance who regaled us with tales of Kinski's madness, this was a much better watch. Realistically it's not a great film but it does move along quickly enough and enough weird crap happens that there's no time to get very bored. Kinski plays a role he's well-suited for, the deranged son of a Nazi who's also a mad doctor and also runs a hotel and randomly kills people after peeping on them from the crawlspace(which seems huge and endless! how big is this place??). Oh and he also keeps a gal, who's tongue he's removed, in a cage in his attic so he has someone to talk to. Also in his spare time he plays Russian roulette with himself(which is probably not the best solo sport to engage in). This does raise the question of how he's stayed in business so long and stayed out of prison or even stayed alive but this isn't a very deep thinking kind of movie. You're just there to take a crazy ride with the master of insane actors and this does serve to showcase Mr. Kinski's unique insanity. Hearing from director, David Schmoeller, what a pain in the ass Kinski was to deal with it's a miracle this thing was ever even completed.