BEACH BABES FROM BEYOND (1993)

 You get a cavalcade of celebrity relatives in this feature from director David DeCoteau. Joe Estevez, Don Swayze, Joey Travolta and Jackie Stallone round out that quartet. You also get TV's Robin Burt Ward and scream queen Linnea Quigley who seems to be playing a character who's supposed to be a good deal older than she obviously is. Our main beach babes, and much of the rest of the cast, are comprised of porn stars and models with very minimal acting ability. The movie itself alternates between goofy beach party movie with some goofy ass music to softcore sex flick with every scene taking way longer than it has any right to. The boobs and butts are definitely top notch though.

 There is also an unrated more explicit version of this out there and a sequel that came out in 1995 called BEACH BABES 2: CAVE GIRL ISLAND minus all the z-list "stars" that looks even worse than it's predecessor if that's possible. 

SINNER'S BLOOD (1969)

  This is a very weird little biker flick. It starts out like a family drama until a couple of bikers are introduced eventually. There's a peeping tom, incest, preacher abuse and some homosexual antics, both of the male and female variety, that feature into this but it's not really all that exciting and I can't imagine this would be on anyone's top 10 biker movies list. It is an odd one though and the ending doesn't make any sense at all. 

 There is a porn movie from 1973 titled HARD RIDERS with Rene Bond which used footage from this. 

UNDERCOVER (1995)

  Fairly unremarkable softcore tale of a lady cop(Athena Massey) who goes undercover as a hooker in a whorehouse trying to find out who killed one of the ladies of the evening. Former porn director Gregory Dark directs this and you can really tell. Surprisingly Meg Foster is the madam and Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who would go on to play Negan on THE WALKING DEAD show, has a big role. AKA UNDERCOVER HEAT

PANIC (1982)

  I caught a trailer for this Italian horror flick at the drive-in recently during a weekend of zombie flicks so I naturally assumed it was a zombie movie. Turns out it's not really but is more of a mutated monster on the loose deal concerning a virus that turns a scientist into an ugly murderous freak. It's ok for what it is but I guess I was expecting more. It basically plays like a crappy European slasher film. David Warbeck from Fulci's The Beyond stars as Captain Kirk(no not that one!). 

Released on DVD with the slightly more memorable title of MONSTER OF BLOOD, though that makes it sound like one of those Filipino "Monster of Blood Island" movies.

HOLLYWOOD MEATCLEAVER MASSACRE (1976)

  You would think a movie most commonly known simply as MEATCLEAVER MASSACRE might actually contain someone getting killed with a meat-cleaver but don't count on that. There is a massacre though consisting of strangulation, bludgeoning and a kitchen knife, but no cleaver action, which sets the story into motion and then we focus on the sole survivor of said massacre getting his revenge from his hospital bed which kinda reminded me of that movie PATRICK(which wouldn't come out for a couple of years) though in this case he uses some kinda Satanic demon conjuring instead of just psychic powers like in that one. It's not very exciting. Christopher Lee pops up in the opening and closing to tell stories that vaguely relate to the main movie. Apparently the producers just bought some footage of him to get his mug on the poster.

 Released on video as REVENGE OF THE DEAD. 

DEVIL STORY (1986)

                                                    "Fuck the mummy!" 

 This is one of the wackier movies I've seen in a while. What we got here is a French horror flick that starts off like it's going to be a slasher gorefest(something along the lines of OGROFF also from France) featuring a mutant Nazi killer before it then turns into a fever-dream involving a possessed horse, a mummy(complete with bride), a black cat(that gets tossed around in various scenes) and an old murderous hag. Director Bernard Launois seems fairly incompetent with his repeated act of cutting to the same scenes over and over again but somehow he did manage to make 6 previous films before this one so I guess someone believed in him. Obviously this is for real hardcore aficionados of low-brow trash cinema only. 

PEEPING TOM (1960)

  This classic British film is kind of a proto-slasher flick but way classier than any slasher flick of the 80s. When it was originally released in England it was not considered classy at all though and was taken out of theaters after only 5 days. Our peeper here, Karlheinz Bohm always reminds me of Peter Lorre thanks to his accent. While nothing is really all that graphically shown this still works as a disturbing piece of cinematic history. 

 Shown on TV in the U.S. as FACE OF FEAR.

                                        Known in Italy as THE EYE THAT KILLS:

CEMETERY MAN (1994)

  This is one of those horror films that it seems like everyone I know, that's into such things, just loves and I can never really figure out why. Sure there's sex and violence and some pretty lame zombies show up intermittently but I guess the mixture of a faux-artsy-fartsy Italian gore film with a comedy just never sits right with me. It's probably also due to being such a fan of Italy's superior 70s and 80s horror junk that this one seems so pale and pointless by comparison. It seems to get praise for being intellectually deep which it isn't while also appealing to the gorehound which all the philosophical nonsense negates but apparently my view is in the minority so judge for yourself I guess.

CREEPOZOIDS (1987)

  This is a pretty monotonous exercise in tedium as a group of  people roam around an abandoned research facility with giant rats and an ALIEN-like creature(or a CREEPOZOID if you will) picks them off. Some gooey FX work. a creepy mutant killer baby and Linnea Quigley are the only real bright spots. Due to the small cast and infrequent action a lot of this seems like it could almost be a stage play(a really terrible one too!). 

 There was supposed to a sequel to this but luckily we were all spared of its existence. 

 10 years later Fred Olen Ray remade this as a shot-on-video thing called HYBRID which I would assume is even worse!

EVEN LAMBS HAVE TEETH (2015)

  I have extremely low expectations for any horror film made in the 2010s so this one at least slightly exceeded those. It starts off with 2 annoying gals which makes you want to turn this off after a few minutes but if you stick with it you do get a modern interpretation of the classic rape/revenge plot. The tone of the film is all over the place with brutal sexual assault(with no actual nudity or rape shown since we now live in strict puritanical times for some reason?) followed by stupid jokey-jokes complete with terrible music video montages. There's a rapist who wears a pighead mask that might remind you og MOTEL HELL and that's maybe the biggest problem with this movie is that it constantly reminds you of and references much better films from the past from DELIVERANCE to DEER HUNTER. Clearly the director, Terry Miles, has seen quite a few Quentin Tarantino movies. 

SNAKES ON A PLANE (2006)

               "I've had it with these motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane!"

  I know I'm almost 20 years behind everyone else who's seen this already but I had so much better stuff to watch first. This might have been a bit better if every snake didn't look like a cartoon CGI thing but then again maybe not. I'm more of a horror film fan and this is more of a thriller/action movie with some slithering killer snakes thrown in for a few gross-out thrills. OK for a one-time watch but pretty mediocre overall. 

CREATURES FROM THE ABYSS (1994)

                                  "Professor, how long have you been fucking fish?"

  Really stupid Italian horror flick about 5 people who decide to take a ride out into the ocean on a small raft and end up stranded on an experimental research ship that's full of mutant fish monsters. There's a lot of things that don't make sense in this but do make for a fun watch if you dig dumb trashy movies. For one thing the inside of the ship is designed more like some weird futuristic hotel where there's a talking clock, a smart-shower that talks sexy to you and a lamp that has it's bulb on the end of a lawn-gnome's large erection! Besides the interior decorations things aren't really ever fully explained, probably thanks to the shitty dubbing job. The only surviving scientist on the ship apparently enjoys fucking fish, but only if they're "old enough" whatever that means for a fish-fucker. Our main characters are also either annoying or just really dumb but if you can overlook that this one's good for a laugh and has some pretty crazy cheap-o FX work on display ranging from Claymation to what looks like cartoon monsters(no doubt this is due to the director being Italian FX artist Al Passeri). Originally titled PLANKTON. Known in Asia as PIRANHA 4 which is kind of fitting since some of these fish monsters look like piranha and fly around like the ones in PIRANHA II: THE SPAWNING.

HOT CATS IN GREEN HELL (1981)

  This Asian obscurity goes under a plethora of aliases including ANGELS WITH GOLDEN GUNS, TERROR IN A WOMEN'S PRISON, ANGER and my favorite VIRGIN APOCALYPSE. What we got here is one of those movies that seem to be 2 different movies spliced together(One of which I believe is a movie simply titled MARKING). One story we follow is a women-in-prison deal where various ladies are forced into a prostitution ring. The other plotline follows an Asian Charles Bronson-type cop who's trying to find the head of a criminal organization. There are some great scenes of him disco dancing and being hit one by a gay crime boss. In addition to all the girls with guns rebellion going on you get some male genital torture, Goblin's music from SUSPIRIA used to score a sex scene, a baby pig getting snuffed out for real(beware vegans!) and what appears to be 2 mummies fighting(mummy-fu?) to wrap it all up. 

THE BLACK CAT (1966)

  Being a fan of the legendary punk rock group The Angry Samoans, I knew this film as supplying the cover image on their 1980 album INSIDE MY BRAIN. Unfortunately this is quite a big spoiler as there aren't a whole lot of characters in this tale of a demented fellow who seems to be on a downward spiral due to a black cat that has come into his life and it depicts the gory demise of one of the main players. Luckily it's still a decent enough watch even if you know there's an axe murder going in. Loosely based on the old Edgar Allan Poe tale with some rockin tunes, animal abuse, a car chase and possibly a zombie cat thrown in for added thrills. 

                         On a 60s double feature with a Filipino horror:

Los Angeles punk rock!:

THE INCREDIBLE KUNG FU MASTER (1979)

  They shoulda probably called this THE 2 INCREDIBLE KUNG FU MASTERS since the plot revolves around a couple of teachers who start off as buddies but then due to jealousy open up rival martial arts schools. Sammo Hung plays another adept fighter who, as usual, likes to eat a lot. A mix of comedy and seriousness that never really works all that well. AKA KUNG FU MASTER NAMED DRUNK CAT and THE KUNG FU MASTER. Released on video as THEY CALL ME PHAT DRAGON.

Crappy old VHS cover:

RETURN OF THE FAT DRAGON (1993)

  This was originally titled KING SWINDLER which would explain why it's not really a sequel to Sammo Hung's ENTER THE FAT DRAGON. It is similar to that movie in that it is a comedy. This time though we get way less kung fu and way more scenes of annoying little kids. For almost a third of the film Sammo is sent to jail and we focus on these kids getting into hijinks which really gives this an Asian LITTLE RASCALS feel. There is some gross-out humour including snot-eating, fart-gags and a piss-filled balloon to the face so that's something. A bit too shmaltzy for anyone besides real hardcore Sammo fans. 

Fun fact: Stolen music from the horror flick TOURIST TRAP pops up when the 2 little kids are held hostage.

Sammo is called The Oriental Turtle but sadly never wears this Ninja Turtle outfit that appears in the posters:

FRENCH BLUE (1976)

  This starts off with what's billed as the world's first porno cartoon as a pre-credit sequence then once the movie starts we get a behind-the-scenes look at French director Lasse Braun trying to figure out the mechanics of what might the world's first double anal penetration put on the big screen. In between these scenes we get a bunch of shortened loops also directed by Mr. Braun. One particular gross loop is titled CAKE ORGY and it mixes an orgy with a food fight. Probably of interest nowadays as a historical artifact more than anything all that titillating. Also more comical than stimulating. AKA PENETRATION and LASSE BRAUN'S PENETRATION (these versions appear to remove the animated sequence at the beginning)  

                Playing here on a double bill with another porn/comedy from 1975:

PORNO MONDO: AN IN DEPTH STUDY OF PORNO FILMS (1971)

 A really dull pseudo-documentary about the very early days of hardcore adult films. They get a bunch of porn actors to portray different makers of these films and be interviewed about them while also cutting in a bunch of scenes of screwing and sucking. Rene Bond shows up as the writer of scripts(because classic porn is so well known for it's great storylines!) and sadly never even gets naked. The film is obviously espousing a viewpoint that is very strongly against censorship, so that's nice. Too bad they couldn't do it in a more entertaining manner.

         Playing with a porno from 1970 which I think was actually titled ERNIE'S JOINT?:

THE SIDEHACKERS (1969)

                                                  "C'mon, men aren't beautiful."

  I own this in a DVD set with a bunch of biker movies and even though there are a couple of scenes where our characters race motorbikes(motorbikes with sidecars hacked on!) it really is more of a rape/revenge movie. The things do go a little further than just rape and the revenge ends on a very nihilistic note. A movie that seems to be universally hated but I have watched it a few times now and I think I enjoy it more each time. It is famously featured on an episode of MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 but obviously that's a very edited version. AKA FIVE THE HARD WAY

                    Playing with another biker movie that's not all that much about bikers:

DEATH RIDERS (1976)

 There was a big fascination with stuntmen back in the 70s. No doubt this was spurred on by the popularity of Evel Knievel. As a documentary this is probably more interesting to me as a time capsule looking back at a crazy decade where it seemed like anything goes than anything else. Of course your propensity for nostalgia will determine how you rate this since it's not a particularly informative documentary but more of a slice of life for some folks with a unique occupation. AKA STAR SPANGLED BUMMER

SCREAM OF THE DEMON LOVER (1970)

 A lady scientist(Erna Schürer) shows up at the castle of a Baron(Carlos Quiney) who has a reputation for loving women and then murdering them. But is he the murderer or is there a darker secret to unveil? Well this is a gothic Eurotrash 70s flick so inevitably things will get a bit weird and sexy before it's done. A bit of a slow-moving one but if you enjoy these types of old dark castle flicks it's probably worth a look and there is a crap-faced monster involved. AKA ALTAR OF BLOOD, KILLERS OF THE CASTLE OF BLOOD and BLOOD CASTLE

 

                                  Known as THE CASTLE OF FRANKENSTEIN in Mexico!:

Original Italian title THE CASTLE WITH THE GATES OF FIRE:

Originally played in The U.S. on a double bill with this American vampire flick:

ONE SHOCKING MOMENT (1965)

                    "You're like the rest of the perverted bastards that call themselves men!

  Ted V. Mikels 3rd movie features a couple(Gary Kent and Lee Anna) who end up in swinging 60s Los Angeles. Not the most exciting sexploitation flick of that time but you do get the usual cheating, stripping and softcore thrills. There's a lesbian dominatrix character(Verne Martine) who enjoys abusing men that adds to the spiciness. AKA SUBURBAN AFFAIR

So shocking that you can watch the whole thing right on YouTube!:

MAU-MAU (1955)

  In true classic exploitation style this was marketed at the time like it was some nudie-cutie featuring romping nekked natives. In reality what you get is mostly just really dull newsreel footage and a blandly narrated documentary about a Kenyan tribe rising up against British colonial rule. It is mildly interesting in that it's basically the blueprint for what became mondo movies in the next decade. 

WEEKEND OF TERROR (1970)

  Robert Conrad and The Six Million Dollar Man himself(Lee Majors) kidnap 3 nuns and hold them hostage for a ransom. Pretty decent made-for TV movie from back when those things were still good. I feel like if you threw in a few sleazier elements this could have been a classic exploitation flick for drive-ins and grindhouses. 

BURNOUT (1979)

  Lots of scenes of cars drag racing fill out this slim tale of an aspiring driver(Mark Schneider) who argues with his dad(Bob Louden) a lot. There's not much I can say about this except watch it if you really like copious amounts of stock footage of race cars. Despite the sexy poster there's no sex in this one. Director Graham Meech-Burkestone would thankfully go on to do makeup on a few other films instead of directing anything else. 

A SCREAM IN THE STREETS (1973)

 Quite a bit of this sexploitation flick is taken up by long drawn-out sex scenes, which I guess is, if that's all you're looking for, a recommendation but it really breaks up whatever narrative momentum the movie is able to muster. While it's not quite hardcore there are a lot of limply hanging wieners on display. The plot that wraps around these sex bits concerns two cops on the hunt for a rapist/murderer who somehow escapes detection by dressing up as a very unconvincing lady. Clearly not the most trans-positive PC movie but that's the 70s for ya.  One weird recurring thing that happens in this is people getting hit with or running through glass and not getting a scratch on themselves. I guess people were just tougher back then. While not the worst softcore sex flick you could watch I can't help feel like it could've been edited a lot better. 

   

THE MONSTER OF THE OPERA (1964)

 I know director Renato Polselli mainly for that movie THE REINCARNATION OF ISABEL which is a pretty crazy Eurotrash flick. This is an earlier work of Mr. Renato but it still has some pretty wild elements. Clearly influenced by THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA but in this case instead of a phantom(was the original PHANTOM even really a phantom at all?) you get a vampire who likes to chain his female victims up in his secret chamber underneath an old haunted opera house for fun. You also get a really wacky scene of a bunch of girls dancing for their lives because apparently vampires can only get you if you stop moving?   There's also a sprinkling of lesbian overtones thrown in. While not everything makes a lot of sense it's still an enjoyable enough gothic trip. Released on DVD more precisely as VAMPIRE OF THE OPERA

Known in France as ORGY OF THE VAMPIRES:

BOWERY BOMBSHELL (1946)

  This is only the 3rd in The Bowery Boys series of films. Not my favorite in the series but pretty standard for The Boys. This time they get mixed up with some bank robbing gangsters and have to clear their name. There are impersonations of Edward G. Robinson and the old SCARFACE movie in this one and also a mad scientist that turns a guy into a walking bomb(hence the title). SPOOK BUSTERS is next and that was always one of my favs just for it's haunted house setting. 

BOWERY BOMBSHELL