Johnny LaRue's Crane Shot

See Stewardesses Battle Kung Fu Killers

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 20:58:00 +0000

Shout Factory returns to Roger Corman's deep vault to create a sequel to last year's Lethal Ladies Collection. As with the first, this Roger Corman's Cult Classics 2-DVD set teams up three sexy adventures released during the 1970s by New World Pictures.

New World found much success with its unofficial “3 Girls” series. These low-budget adventures combined sex, action, and soap opera and always involved a trio of lovely professional women falling in love and getting into trouble. The series began with THE STUDENT NURSES and soon moved to teachers, stewardesses, and cover girl models. Producer Roger Corman earned a lot of money making this film over and over.

Directed in the Philippines by the prolific Cirio H. Santiago, FLY ME focuses on sexy stews Toby (Corman regular Pat Anderson, SUMMER SCHOOL TEACHERS), Sherry (Lyllah Torena, who is curiously unbilled), and Andrea (busy television actress Lenore Kasdorf), who work a round-trip flight from Los Angeles to Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Manila. Toby attempts a love affair with a nice doctor (Richard Young, INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE), which is made difficult by her overbearing Italian mother (Naomi Stevens, THE DORIS DAY SHOW). Andrea teams up with an undercover cop to find her missing boyfriend, while white slavers swoop in to kidnap nympho Sherry.

Amazingly, all three subplots manage to intersect at the end. As you can imagine, tone is a big problem in FLY ME, which must be the only film to combine a wacky comic-relief mother protecting her adult daughter’s virginity with a sleazy storyline involving drugging nude women and selling them into sex slavery. “See stewardesses battle kung fu killers!” shouted New World’s one-sheet. With a mere 72 minutes of screen time to play with, Santiago still manages to waste time with travelogue footage serving as padding and Stevens’ screeching comic antics instead of more stewardess kung fu fighting.

FLY ME’s credits are interesting. Howard Cohen (BARBARIAN QUEEN) wrote the screenplay, but replaced his name with that of New World staffer Miller Drake (SCREAMERS). Future director Joe Dante (PIRANHA) was the dialogue director, according to the main titles. Oscar winner Jonathan Demme (SILENCE OF THE LAMBS), who began his career directing Corman’s CAGED HEAT, receives an odd credit for “Film Director.” After the film was wrapped, Corman decided it needed more action and hired Demme to shoot fight sequences choreographed in Los Angeles by David Chow. Demme probably also filmed the opening scene with Anderson and cabbie Dick Miller.

Following the same “3 Girls” formula, director Santiago filmed COVER GIRL MODELS a couple of years later in Manila. FLY ME’s Howard Cohen also wrote COVER GIRL MODELS, which plays as a less sleazy, more action-filled remake with three sexy young women getting into scrapes in the Far East.

Mark (New World regular John Kramer), a mustachioed photographer for a women’s magazine, recruits a trio of lovely models for an overseas photo shoot. In addition to posing in skimpy bikinis, Claire (SIX-PACK ANNIE’s Lindsay Bloom) poses as a call girl to attract the attention of a movie mogul, Barbara (Pat Anderson from TNT JACKSON and FLY ME) becomes an unwitting courier of secret microfilm sewed into the hem of her dress, and bubbly neophyte Mandy (HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD redhead Tara Strohmeier) tries to learn the do’s and don’ts of both modeling and lovemaking from stud Mark.

You know what to expect from a Santiago movie: inept fight choreography, clumsy story construction, and plenty of breasts. None of the various subplots are presented very well, though the vulnerable Strohmeier uses her nonchalant sexiness and charm to steal scenes. Most hilarious are the bad guys’ regular attempts to kidnap Barbara, which are always thwarted by a mysterious Filipino with the widest collar of all time who always appears out of nowhere just in time to kung fu her assailants.

The beautiful women and entertainingly bad action sequences are enough to keep my eyes interested, though Santiago fills time with the girls posing for pictures or wandering around town just to stretch to a releasable 73 minutes. Mary Woronov (DEATH RACE 2000) plays Mark’s editor in the opening scene shot at the New World office, probably by second unit director Mel Damski (YELLOWBEARD).

“Do you mean we have to satisfy their animal heat?” Girlfights, nudity, revolt, racism, shower scenes, whippings, betrayal—sounds like one of New World’s classic women-in-prison vehicles, doesn’t it? And that’s really what THE ARENA is—a sleazy and violent WIP set amid the squalor and slavery of ancient Rome. Think THE BIG DOLL HOUSE meets SPARTACUS.

The stars of BLACK MAMA, WHITE MAMA, Pam Grier and Margaret Markov, reunite as Mamawi and Bodicia, slave girls forced to serve the decadent Roman upper-class during violent gladiator matches to the death. While the rulers wring their hands at the games’ dwindling box office, corpulent Timarchus (Daniele Vargas) hits upon the idea of female gladiators, enlisting the sexy slaves for armed fights to the death in the arena. If you’ve seen enough 1970s drive-in movies about beautiful female prisoners pushed to the limit by a cruel environment, you know a bloody revolt is in order. Various body parts fly as these sensual sword-slingers carve a gory swath to freedom, led by black mama Grier and white mama Markov.

Happily, THE ARENA offers more action than talk, a good thing considering the execrable dialogue penned by John and Joyce Corrington (THE OMEGA MAN), and director Steve Carver nicely serves up a few helpings of wet and oily female nudity (including both leads) to complement the gore. Carver also made BIG BAD MAMA and CAPONE for New World before moving up to major-studio exploitation like DRUM (also with Grier) and LONE WOLF MCQUADE.

Filming in Italy allowed Carver to use Francesco de Masi (THE INGLORIOUS BASTARDS) as his composer and Aristide Massaccesi as his cinematographer, much to the film’s benefit. Massaccesi, who had a directing career under the name Joe D’Amato, was often thought to have directed THE ARENA, due to Carver using Massaccesi’s name during production to foil Italian labor laws. Executive producer Roger Corman’s old HOUSE OF USHER star Mark Damon was the producer and ended up marrying Markov. Corman remade THE ARENA in 2001 using PLAYBOY Playmate Karen McDougal as the lead and the Corringtons’ original screenplay.

All three films are well-represented on DVD using 35mm prints: THE ARENA at 2.35:1 and FLY ME and COVER GIRL MODELS at 1.78:1. They look quite good, though FLY ME's battered and scratched 35mm print has been harvested of some of its nudity by a horny projectionist. THE ARENA contains two extra scenes that weren't in its 35mm source print, but have been ported over from a full-frame transfer for completist's sake. Trailers for FLY ME and THE ARENA are included. Steve Carver and moderator Katerina Leigh Waters provide an audio commentary about THE ARENA, which also receives its own 18-minute documentary featuring Carver, Corman, Mark Damon, and Margaret Markov.

The Impossible Mission of Laurence Heath

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 18:20:00 +0000

I've written several posts about MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE, but one of the most fascinating stories related to that television series comes from writer Stephen Bowie on his essential Classic TV History Blog. Patrick J. White, whose THE COMPLETE MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE DOSSIER is one of the best and most thorough books ever written about the production of a television series, neglected to tell this story, though it's possible he either didn't know about it or was afraid to bring it up in his interviews.

The story concerns Laurence Heath, a terrific writer responsible for some of MISSION's best teleplays, including the two-part "The Controllers" and "The Mercenaries," which ranks high among my favorite episodes. He was also MISSION's story consultant and, later, producer. He also fulfilled those functions on series like 21 BEACON STREET, BONANZA, THE MAGICIAN, DYNASTY, and MURDER, SHE WROTE.

In 1963, a year in which he managed a single teleplay for SAM BENEDICT, Heath murdered his wife. And, as Bowie notes, seven years later, Heath was producing MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE.

You can read Bowie's engrossing true-crime account here.

Lord Of Lust

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 22:25:00 +0000

One thing in writer Marc Olden's favor is that he creates terrific villains. And if there's one thing fans of adventure fiction know, it's that a hero is generally only as interesting as his adversary.

Of course, the Black Samurai is pretty darned interesting in his own right. Robert Sand, a black man who also happens to be the only Westerner to successfully complete Japanese samurai training, is truly his own man, but partners with former POTUS William Baron Clarke, a Southerner with immense wealth and power, to fight for justice against those who can't help themselves.

In Olden's THE DEADLY PEARL, Signet's fourth Black Samurai novel of 1974, Sand's target is Pearl, a nasty New York City pimp who traffics in underage girls--kidnapping them, addicting them to smack, and selling them overseas as sex slaves. Pearl is also a formidable warrior who trains daily with a professional fencer and fancies an elaborate sword cane as his choice of weapon.

Sand becomes involved to help a friend, Secret Service agent Gray Foster, whose 15-year-old daughter Rochelle is missing. It doesn't take the Black Samurai long to learn that Pearl has her. It's just a matter of getting to the man and getting him to talk. Which ain't easy, because Pearl is as smart as he is mean, and he's surrounded by an army--in particular, a giant martial artist named Chink.

Olden, who also wrote the Narc series, is a master of urban adventure fiction. His New York City is truly alive, festered with pushers and pimps so thick you can practically smell the evil. Robert Sand is a great character, but his supporting cast is also rich, and Olden's sense of time and place make you believe in the harsh reality of the novel's story.

I haven't yet read all the Black Samurai books, but I give the series my highest recommendation.

They Left Her No Choice

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 23:28:00 +0000

Gina Carano is for real.

The 27-year-old mixed martial artist and bit actress (BLOOD AND BONE) plays her first leading role in HAYWIRE, a low-budget trifle churned out by director Steven Soderbergh (OCEAN’S 11) in Ireland, Spain, and New Mexico. As an actress, the brunette easily holds her own opposite steely veterans like Michael Fassbender (INGLORIOUS BASTERDS) and Michael Douglas (WALL STREET), and as an action star, Carano has few peers of either the male or female variety.

As if acknowledging the wafer-thin nature of the plot dreamed up by screenwriter Lem Dobbs (THE LIMEY), Soderbergh tries to juice it up with non-linear storytelling with flashbacks, silent sequences, and shifts to black and white. He needn’t have, because HAYWIRE is at its best when Soderbergh (who, as usual, worked as his own cinematographer) plants the camera and lets his performers do their work.

Carano is cast as Mallory Kane, an ex-Marine now working as an operative for a private security company run by Kenneth (Ewan McGregor), her former lover. Although she has just returned from a mission in Barcelona rescuing a Chinese journalist, Kenneth goads Mallory into a quick weekend job in Dublin acting primarily as eye candy on the arm of MI-6 agent Paul (Fassbender). After poking around the edges of her assigned milk run, she quickly learns she has been led into a trap that has law enforcement on her back and unjustified murder charges on her head.

HAYWIRE is a revenge tale, pure and simple, and when Soderbergh keeps it simple, it really rocks. Eschewing contemporary trends of quick cutting and shaky handheld shots, Soderbergh knows there’s little he can do to make Carano look badass that she can’t do better. Choreographed by stunt ace J.J. Perry, the fight scenes are rough, brutal, and made devastatingly real by Carano. Even so, HAYWIRE’s best setpiece is a foot chase over Dublin rooftops and through a labyrinth of hotel hallways in which Carano is clearly doing her own stunts without help from the visual effects department. Dobbs could have laced the screenplay with a more liberal dose of humor, as Carano’s unexpected run-in with a deer provides a chuckle right when the film needs one.

As for Carano’s acting, she’s just fine. Frankly, she’s a better actor than Channing Tatum (21 JUMP STREET), here playing a fellow operative with whom she has a quick affair, and certainly more believable in her role than Tatum is in his. Stripped down to about ninety minutes and containing enough buff action to keep it from dragging, HAYWIRE is more pretentious than it should be, but a strong debut for Carano.

Here Come De Prince

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 21:42:00 +0000

Independent filmmaker Peter Perry spent the 1960s and much of the 1970s working as a director, writer, editor, and producer on various drive-in movies. Most of them belonged to the long-gone and little-heralded sexploitation genre, which consisted of low-budget movies made for adult audiences only. They were softcore pictures, which meant full frontal female nudity (and occasionally male too) and simulated sex. Even though no penetration was shown, the movies were still too graphic to receive an R rating (though the sexploitation genre peaked during the 1960s before such a rating existed).

Perry, who often hid behind the pseudonym A.P. Stootsberry, was a pioneer of the sexploitation genre, working on pictures like THE JOYS OF JEZEBEL, KISS ME QUICK!, and MY TALE IS HOT. The genre isn't one that I've cottoned to, as I become bored rather quickly during the lighthearted but lengthy sex scenes associated with it (for purposes of this discussion, I'm avoiding mention of "roughies," a grim subgenre that rests within the sexploitation genre).

However, I'll recommend a pair of Perry's pictures, which were very likely made back-to-back using the same costumes and sets. Both were heavily influenced by ROWAN & MARTIN'S LAUGH-IN, which debuted in 1968 and quickly became the most popular comedy show on television. Both also took stories from the public domain and put an amusing, sexy twist on them.

LAUGH-IN was clearly a major influence on Jim Macher, the screenwriter of Perry's THE SECRET SEX LIVES OF ROMEO AND JULIET. Shakespeare’s lauded lovers break the fourth wall, toss off witty bon mots, and get psychedelic between sexploits. Catchphrases like “Sock it to me” and “Here come de Prince” abound, and Perry often interrupts scenes for quick cutaways to Joke Wall-style gags.

The film, which Boxoffice International released to theaters and drive-ins in 1969, uses the conceit that it’s a 16th-century production of Shakespeare’s play performed before a group of hairy California hippies hilariously pretending to be drunken revelers. Cast members introduce themselves to the camera, many of them, like Perry, using pseudonyms. Macher follows the basic plot of ROMEO AND JULIET, but only as a loose throughline connecting the lengthy sex scenes. To Perry, sex is a lot of rubbing and moaning—nothing hardcore, but still X-rated (though Boxoffice International tended to send these quickies out unrated). Forman Shane (THE BUSHWHACKER) is Romeo, and Dee Lockwood (Maid Marian in THE EROTIC ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD) is Juliet.

SECRET SEX LIVES, like other period sex romps made by Perry, is rather sumptuous in its sets and costumes, which lends the sophomoric and sometimes smutty humor a touch of class it probably doesn’t deserve. A whipping scene is played for camp, as is Stuart Lancaster’s performance as Lord Capulet. Hell, Lancaster (MUDHONEY) even blows a line early on, and Perry, recognizing his film’s artificiality as a prime source of humor, left the blooper in. Long lovemaking scenes aren’t my cup of tea, but the enthusiastic cast and good-natured gagging make Perry’s picture one of the more entertaining of the sexploitation genre.

Perry and Macher followed up THE SECRET SEX LIVES OF ROMEO AND JULIET with another trashy period piece, 1970's THE NOTORIOUS CLEOPATRA. Despite the then-trendy breaking of the fourth wall a la LAUGH-IN, it isn't as funny as SECRET SEX LIVES and turns uncomfortably serious at the end. Perry and Boxoffice International head Harry Novak’s production is cheap and could have used exterior shooting to allow fresh air to infiltrate the heavy breathing (the battle scenes occur entirely off-camera). However, the sets and costumes are decent for an inexpensive sex film, and Perry doesn’t hesitate to move the camera or stage scenes theatrically to pump extra life into the, er, pumping.

Loray White, who once was married to Sammy Davis Jr. for ten minutes, stars as Cleopatra using the pseudonym “Sonora.” Many—probably most—cast and crew members used assumed names, including Perry (again billed as A.P. Stootsberry). Caesar, played by Jay Edwards as a fat, lazy, bored slob, sends his general, Marc Antony (Johnny Rocco), to bring him Cleopatra, the Queen of the Nile, so he can sleep with her. The logic of sending “the greatest lover in all of Rome” after her seems a tad stupid, especially when Caesar warns Antony to keep his mitts off her. He doesn’t, of course. In fact, he falls in love with Cleopatra, who begins scheming to replace Caesar on his throne.

The thin story is padded by several extended sex scenes, including a couple of orgies. Or more accurately, Macher wrote a few dialogue scenes to tie the sex scenes together. The score, credited to Vic Lance, is very good and includes original songs.

The acting, for the most part, is more professional than one might expect in sexploitation (the actors worked almost exclusively within the genre). The stacked Sonora/White is cast well and gets to show off her dancing prowess. Rocco’s impossibly deep voice bursting through his perpetually clenched teeth is good for campy laughs. Of course, none of the actors bother hiding their 1960s hairstyles and sideburns.

Judgment Eve

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 18:55:00 +0000

EVE OF JUDGMENT is the fourth paperback adaptation of the acclaimed 1960s television series THE DEFENDERS. For more on the series, which starred E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed as father-and-son attorneys, read my post on the novel ALL THE SILENT VOICES.

Like VOICES, EVE OF JUDGMENT is based on an episode. "Judgment Eve" was written by the show's creator, the brilliant Reginald Rose, and directed by David Greene. Not having seen the episode, I don't know how closely novelist Roger Fuller adheres to the source material, but I suspect some padding was involved.

EVE opens with a trial already concluded and the jury off to consider. Lawrence and Kenneth Preston are defending Frank Thorpe, a construction magnate with shady ties to the criminal underworld, of murdering his business rival, who may or may not have been carrying on an affair with Thorpe's wife.

The book, however, is not about the case, but about the jury. Fuller is trying to give the readers an insider's view of what happens when a jury is sequestered overnight. What do they think about? How do they react to having an unexpected stay in a hotel with a total stranger in the next room? How does the possibility of sentencing a man to the electric chair affect them?

Fuller lets us meet all twelve jurors, leaving the Prestons as supporting characters in their own book. In 1963, when Pocket Books published EVE OF JUDGMENT, the workings of a jury may have been something of a mystery, but there isn't much here to surprise you. The jurors aren't terribly interesting, and you may find yourself wondering more about Thorpe's guilt or innocence.

The mystery is solved to the reader's satisfaction, you'll be happy to know. The book is okay, nothing spectacular, and certainly nothing as hard-hitting as the TV series.

As an aside, "Judgment Eve" may be of interest today for a very early guest-starring bit by Gene Hackman as the jury room's guard.

Boxoffice: January 28, 1974

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 04:33:00 +0000

I'm Just Gonna Keep On Livin'

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 20:38:00 +0000

CLUELESS co-star Brittany Murphy had been dead almost a year by the time her final film finally hit video stores. She plays a banker named Mary, who takes the morning off work to accompany her boyfriend-of-four-months Kevin (Dean Cain, who appears to be eating well in his middle age) to the hospital, where he is to have routine outpatient knee surgery. To cut down on expensive extras, the hospital is said to be closing down for renovations, so most of the patients have been transferred elsewhere.

In a retread of DYING ROOM ONLY, THE VANISHING, BREAKDOWN, etc., Mary goes downstairs for coffee and returns to find Kevin gone with just his tattered paperback left behind. None of the nurses admits having seen or heard of Kevin, and there’s no record of his admittance in the hospital computer. The hospital administrator (Mimi Rogers, who has little to do), security chief (Scott Anthony Leet), psychiatrist (LAST PICTURE SHOW director Peter Bogdanovich), and police detective assigned to the case (Jay Pickett) all think Mary is crazy and that no boyfriend exists.

If they see Mary the way we see Murphy, their attitude is understandable. It may be unfair to discuss an actress’ appearance within the context of a film review, but it’s hard to avoid in the case of ABANDONED. Poor Brittany looks a mess with scraggly hair, sunken eyes, surgically enhanced lips, and massive weight loss, and the high-definition photography does her no favors. Her performance seems distracted by whatever demons she was wrestling near the end of her life, and it’s difficult to buy Mary as someone who wouldn’t fall apart at the first sign of emotional stress.

The movie isn’t much good. Tim Thomerson (TRANCERS) pops in for an early scene as a lonely old man who chats up Mary in the cafeteria, and you know the producers didn’t pay Thomerson’s day rate just for that. A plot thread involving Mary’s best friend from work goes frustratingly unresolved (actually, several do), and director Michael Feifer goes to so much trouble to avoid showing the title of Kevin’s paperback that it comes as zero surprise when it turns out to be a clue.

ABANDONED is dedicated to Murphy’s memory. One of her last lines is, “I’m just gonna keep on livin’. One day at a time.” Which will break your heart.

474

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 06:01:00 +0000

474. That's the number of movies I watched in 2011. That’s well below my all-time record of 588 in 2004, which I hope I never equal. It’s up somewhat from last year, though being unemployed for the entirety of 2011 had a large effect on my total. The number also doesn’t include all the television series on DVD I’ve been digging through this year, including THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, THE BOB NEWHART SHOW, THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, NICHOLS, MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE, as well as the current series I watch on the DVR.

Of the 474 movies I saw, I watched 255 of them for the first time. Here are my rules. As far as the count goes, only feature films count, no matter whether I saw them in a theater, DVD, VHS, or on TV.

• TV shows don't count, unless they were presented in a format resembling a feature film (for instance, the pilot episodes of MAN FROM ATLANTIS, which aired as full-length made-for-TV movies)
• Made-for-TV movies count
• Documentaries count
• I didn't count short subjects or feature-length making-of documentaries included as DVD extras
• Movie serials and TV miniseries count as one long feature
• Multiple viewings each count as a separate movie

These are my rules. Your mileage may vary.

DVD: 295
HDTV: 54
Theater: 32
TV: 10
Blu-ray: 40
VHS: 14
Netflix Instant Streaming: 29

First film of 2011: BEST IN SHOW
Last film of 2011: DRIVE (2011)

From the 1920s: 1 (THE UNKNOWN)
1930s: 1 (THE RIDERS OF THE WHISTLING SKULL)
1940s: 4 (HITLER’S CHILDREN, I ACCUSE MY PARENTS, BOWERY BUCKAROOS, BOMBA ON PANTHER ISLAND)
1950s: 30
1960s: 64
1970s: 120
1980s: 124
1990s: 62
2000–2010: 43
2011: 25

Genres:
Action/Adventure: 148
Comedy: 66
Crime Drama: 31
Documentary: 15
Drama: 21
Horror: 85
Mystery: 6
Science Fiction: 63
Thriller: 31
Western: 8

Countries of origin:
Argentina: 1 (HOUSE OF SHADOWS)
Australia: 5
Canada: 8
France: 2
Hong Kong: 7
Israel: 1 (TRUNK TO CAIRO)
Italy: 20
Japan: 16
Mexico: 4
Philippines: 10
Spain: 2
Thailand: 1 (H-BOMB)
United States of America: 384
Yugoslavia: 1 (PORTRAIT IN TERROR)

Even though I stopped going to theaters regularly a few years ago, I still managed to see 25 2011 releases, mostly on cable or on DVD. I saw only a handful of them theatrically: CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, HALL PASS (bored in Cheyenne, Wyoming), DRIVE, and THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO.

Most in one month:
January: 69
Least in one month:
April: 21

Films I saw more than once in 2011:
ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS
FIRECRACKER
THE LOST EMPIRE
MACHETE MAIDENS UNLEASHED!
PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE
STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (both times in a theater)
TNT JACKSON

The most films in any one 24-hour period:
14, when I attended Northwestern University's annual B-Fest January 28–29

Some sequels:
4: RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER
BEST OF THE BEST, BEST OF THE BEST II, and BEST OF THE BEST 4: WITHOUT WARNING
CLEOPATRA JONES and CLEOPATRA JONES AND THE CASINO OF GOLD
DEATH WISH 3, 4, and V
DYNAMITE JOHNSON: BIONIC BOY PART II
EXCESSIVE FORCE II: FORCE ON FORCE
THE EXORCIST 1–3
THE EXTERMINATOR and EXTERMINATOR 2
FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3
FRIGHT NIGHT and FRIGHT NIGHT PART 2
GHOSTBUSTERS II
THE GREAT ESCAPE II: THE UNTOLD STORY
HALLOWEEN II (1981)
HATCHET II
LAKE PLACID 2 and 3
MAN FROM ATLANTIS 1–4
A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 4: THE DREAM MASTER
POLICE ACADEMY 1–7
RELENTLESS 1–4
RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD PART II
SCREAM 4
STAR TREK 1–6 (all at Hollywood’s Egyptian Theater over four nights)
THE SUBSTITUTE 1–4
TRANCERS 1–5

The original and its remake(s):
AND SOON THE DARKNESS (1970) and AND SOON THE DARKNESS (2010)
THE FANTASTIC FOUR (1994) and FANTASTIC FOUR (2005)

5 Stars:
BURIED
CHAINED HEAT
DARK OF THE SUN
DEATH WISH 3
THE EXORCIST
FORBIDDEN WORLD
FREEBIE & THE BEAN
GONE WITH THE POPE
JFK
THE MAN FROM HONG KONG
NOT QUITE HOLLYWOOD: THE WILD, UNTOLD STORY OF OZPLOITATION!
PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE
RAW FORCE
STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN
STARCRASH
STUNT ROCK
THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE
THE THING (1982)
USED CARS

1 Star:
976-EVIL
AS TIME RUNS OUT
BAD CHARLESTON CHARLIE
BLOOD SISTERS
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
THE COSMIC MONSTER
THE CURSE
DANCE OF THE DAMNED
FALL DOWN DEAD
GOOD MORNING, KILLER
HOUSE OF SHADOWS
IT’S ALIVE! (1968)
JUNGLE HELL
LOOSE CANNONS
MAMA DRACULA
THE MAN (2005)
MEGA PYTHON VS. GATOROID
THE MIGHTY GORGA
MOTHER’S BOYS
NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ADAM & EVE
POLICE ACADEMY: MISSION TO MOSCOW
STAR HUNTER
STROKER ACE
UP FROM THE DEPTHS

Recent Direct-to-Video or Barely Released Films You Haven’t Heard Of, But You Should See:
BEST WORST MOVIE
BURIED (Ryan Reynolds)
BURN NOTICE: THE FALL OF SAM AXE
GONE WITH THE POPE
HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS: THE GODFATHER OF GORE
HUNTER PREY
METHOD TO THE MADNESS OF JERRY LEWIS
NOT QUITE HOLLYWOOD: THE WILD, UNTOLD STORY OF OZPLOITATION!
RUBBER
TUCKER & DALE VS EVIL
WHAT’S THE MATTER WITH KANSAS?

Bowery Boys movies:
CRASHING LAS VEGAS
BOWERY BUCKAROOS

Godzilla movies:
GOJIRA
GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS!
GODZILLA RAIDS AGAIN
GIGANTIS THE FIRE MONSTER
GHIDORAH THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER
GODZILLA VS THE THING
MOTHRA VS. GODZILLA
INVASION OF THE ASTRO-MONSTER
GODZILLA’S REVENGE
GODZILLA VS. MEGALON
GODZILLA 1985
TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA

MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. movies:
THE HELICOPTER SPIES
HOW TO STEAL THE WORLD
THE SPY IN THE GREEN HAT
THE KARATE KILLERS
ONE SPY TOO MANY
ONE OF OUR SPIES IS MISSING
TO TRAP A SPY
THE SPY WITH MY FACE

They Exist, and I Watched Them:
4 DOLLARS OF REVENGE
BLACKENSTEIN
BRUCE’S NINJA SECRET
DARNA VS THE PLANET WOMEN
DOGORA THE SPACE MONSTER
DR. BLACK MR. HYDE
DYNAMITE JOHNSON: BIONIC BOY PART II
EXCESSIVE FORCE II: FORCE ON FORCE
GONE WITH THE POPE
GUNS, GIRLS AND GANGSTERS
H.O.T.S.
HAVE ROCKET—WILL TRAVEL
HELLISH SPIDERS
MACHETE MAIDENS UNLEASHED!
MAMBA
MEGA PYTHON VS. GATOROID
MR. NO LEGS
MR. WALKIE TALKIE
THE NAME OF THE GAME IS KILL!
OTHELLO (THE BLACK COMMANDO)
PLEASE DON’T EAT MY MOTHER!
PREACHERMAN MEETS WIDDERWOMAN
SIX SHE’S AND A HE
SKIDOO
THE SPY WHO CAME
THUNDER OF GIGANTIC SERPENT

My Top Ten of 2011:
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO
CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER
DRIVE ANGRY
RUBBER
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
HERSCHELL GORDON LEWIS: THE GODFATHER OF GORE
MACHETE MAIDENS UNLEASHED!
BURN NOTICE: THE FALL OF SAM AXE
METHOD TO THE MADNESS OF JERRY LEWIS
THE CAPTAINS

My Bottom Five of 2011:
MEGA PYTHON VS. GATOROID
GOOD MORNING, KILLER
SCREAM 4
HALL PASS
BATTLE LOS ANGELES

How many movies did you watch this year?

P.S. John Charles at By John Charles answers the above question here and William Wilson at Video Junkie Strikes Back from the Grave here.

May The Source Be With You

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 17:08:00 +0000

It (sadly) never happens anymore, but television networks used to burn off their busted pilots during the summer. These were shows that the networks had paid for, but decided not to turn into a series. So, among a sea of reruns, movies, specials, and MONDAY NIGHT BASEBALL, it wouldn’t be that unusual to see one episode of a show that you would never see again. Since these were pilots the networks chose not to buy, it isn’t surprising that most of them weren’t very good, but, every once in awhile, you’d see something unusual.

On May 7, 1977, NBC filled a half-hour with a situation comedy pilot called QUARK. I don’t know what the ratings were for QUARK that night, but it undoubtedly wouldn’t have mattered to NBC anyway. They were just burning off inventory in a dead 30-minute time slot.

Eighteen days later, STAR WARS opened theatrically across the United States, and Hollywood would forever be changed. Among the more insignificant changes was QUARK’s status of busted pilot to regular series.

There is little doubt that QUARK never would have become a series if not for STAR WARS’ unprecedented box-office success. Science fiction had long been regarded as a dead genre, but after the summer of ‘77, sci-fi was everywhere--major studio blockbusters, low-budget independents, even TV shows. BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, which debuted on ABC in the fall of 1978, was the most obvious TV benefactor of STAR WARS’ success, but QUARK got there first.

“STAR TREK meets GET SMART” is a good way to describe QUARK. The pilot, as written by noted humorist Buck Henry (who also co-created GET SMART with Mel Brooks) and directed by 1776 helmer Peter H. Hunt, cast Richard Benjamin, a talented comic actor whose previous TV experience had been with wife Paula Prentiss in the critically acclaimed but low-rated sitcom HE & SHE, as Adam Quark, the commander of a small spaceship belonging to the United Galactic Sanitation Patrol. Yep, a garbage scow.

Among his crew were Gene/Jean, a “transmute” with both male and female chromosomes, portrayed by up-and-coming comic Tim Thomerson (TRANCERS); Betty and Betty (Cyb and Tricia Barnstable), a pair of sexy engineers, one of whom was a clone, although neither would cop to it; and Andy (Bobby Porter), a clunky-looking, cowardly robot that would turn on the crew in a second in order to save his metal hide.
When QUARK returned to NBC as a weekly series in February 1978, there was a new crew member: Ficus (Richard Kelton), the “Spock” of the cast, an unemotional plant (!) prone to pontification and long-winded explanations. The crew received its garbage pickup assignments from Quark’s boss, Otto Palindrome (heh), played by Conrad Janis (MORK & MINDY), and his boss, a giant floating cranium known only as The Head (Alan Caillou).

The pilot that aired in 1977 really isn’t very good. It’s less spoofy and less manic than the series that followed, despite its Buck Henry teleplay. Henry appears to have not been involved in the series, which received much acclaim from critics who adored its mixture of slapstick and wit. The writing staff obviously boned up on STAR TREK reruns, drawing many of their plots from that ‘60s series. In “The Old and the Beautiful,” Quark is stricken with a disease that prematurely ages him, much as the U.S.S. Enterprise crew did in the TREK episode “The Deadly Years.” TREK’s “Shore Leave” inspired “Goodbye, Palombus” (a spoof of Benjamin’s movie GOODBYE, COLUMBUS), where Quark and his crew investigate a paradise planet where whatever you wish for comes true.

The best episode is the first shot and aired after the pilot, “May the Source Be With You.” It ran one hour and managed to pack a bit of adventure into its comedy package. The universe is threatened by an evil race known as the Gorgon, and only Quark and his intergalactic garbagemen can stop them. Quark’s secret weapon is “The Source,” an omnipotent force that imbues him with mysterious powers. The problem is that the Source only works if Quark fully believes in it, but the Source’s absentmindedness and bumbling doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence.

The Head Gorgon was portrayed by the great Henry Silva, a charismatic actor who played hundreds of heavies in Hollywood, but I don’t recall him ever appearing in another sitcom. Projecting a perfect note of comic menace, Silva threatens the galaxy’s safety while wearing a silly helmet that may have gotten him the gig a year later as Killer Kane, Princess Ardala’s sinister chief of staff in BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY. “May the Source Be With You,” directed by veteran Hy Averback from a clever teleplay by Bruce Zacharias (REVENGE OF THE NERDS), is full of funny quips and nifty sight gags, as in the scene in which a blinded Quark must rely on the Source’s guidance to rescue Ficus from a pair of Gorgon torturers.

Another good episode is “All the Emperor’s Quasi-Norms,” a two-parter in which Ross Martin (THE WILD WILD WEST) guest-stars as Zargon the Malevolent, another evil dictator searching for a super-weapon with which to destroy the galaxy. His beautiful daughter (a pre-KNOTS LANDING Joan Van Ark) falls for Ficus, who schools her in an alien method of lovemaking (“Beebeebeebeeebeeeeebeeeee…”), and Gene and Andy disguise themselves as scientific lecturers.

The numbers weren’t there for QUARK, and NBC cancelled it after just nine episodes were shot. Except for occasional airings on the defunct Ha! cable network, which eventually merged with The Comedy Channel to form Comedy Central in the early 1990s, QUARK has not been seen on television since. However, the entire series is available on DVD, so sitcom fans shouldn’t pass up a chance to catch up with one of the 1970s’ most neglected series.

BJ And The Seven Lady Truckers

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 20:45:00 +0000

BJ and the Seven Lady Truckers
January 13, 1981
Writer: Michael Sloan
Director: Christian I. Nyby II

Because of the 1980 Writers Guild strike, BJ AND THE BEAR didn’t open its third season until January 1981—nine and a half months after its second-season finale. Like THE MISADVENTURES OF SHERIFF LOBO, BJ began the season with a major overhaul, adding a whopping eight new cast members and a new job for BJ (Greg Evigan). Only a big two-hour episode could contain all the new changes.

Now based in Los Angeles (saving the production crew from having to double L.A. for the Southern states), BJ McKay is trying to break into the independent trucking game in California. The trucking industry in that state is ruled with an iron fist by Trans Cal, a major company unopposed to using strongarm tactics to push out the competition, including stealing BJ’s truck as a warning and flattening BJ’s ‘Nam buddy Dave Chaffee (Neil Zevnik) in a hit-and-run.

To save Dave’s business, BJ recruits a team of sexy motorcycle stunt riders to haul a load from L.A. to San Francisco: fiery Callie (Linda McCullough), twin blondes Geri (Randi Brough) and Teri (Candi Brough), airhead Stacks (Judy Landers), con artist Samantha (Barbra Horan), surfer chick Cindy (Sherilyn Wolter), and black disc jockey Angie (Sheila DeWindt). Unfortunately, TransCal chairman Jason Willard (Jock Mahoney) has on his payroll corrupt Captain Rutherford T. Grant (Murray Hamilton), who uses the power of his office as head of a statewide crime-fighting task force to ruin BJ’s business.

With two hours of play with, writer Michael Sloan takes his time establishing the series’ new format and introducing us to Evigan’s new co-stars. Outside of the Brough twins and dumb blonde Landers, none of the other actresses are given much to work with outside of surface personality traits to help the audience tell them apart (outside of DeWindt, who’s merely identified by her skin color). Nyby stages a few decent chases and fights to keep the action moving right along, and Hamilton becomes BJ’s first fulltime villain, stepping into the shoes of previous actors like Claude Akins, Ed Lauter, and Richard Deacon who made occasional appearances as corrupt policemen giving McKay a hard time.

If NBC hadn’t been miserably mired in third place among the networks, it would not likely have renewed either BJ AND THE BEAR or LOBO for another season. Retooling both shows seems like a desperate attempt to retain viewers, but not even the promise of fourteen pert breasts every week could stop BJ from being cancelled in the spring.

The Girls With The Stolen Bodies

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:06:00 +0000

The Girls with the Stolen Bodies
January 6, 1981
Music: John Andrew Tartaglia
Story: Frank Lupo & Mark Jones
Teleplay: Mark Jones
Director: Dick Harwood

One problem with moving LOBO’s setting from rural Orly County to Atlanta is that it began to look like every other cop show on the air, especially because the series was filmed in Los Angeles. The opening of “The Girls with the Stolen Bodies” could have been from POLICE STORY. Two guys with shotguns rip off a liquor store. Lobo (Claude Akins) and Birdie (Brian Kerwin) are across the street having lunch when they hear shots. Like Starsky and Hutch, the two cops run to the rescue and apprehend the suspects—Birdie tackles one and Lobo shoots the other.

During the fracas, Perkins (Mills Watson) takes a round of buckshot in the tuchus and is admitted to Grady Memorial Hospital. While delivering a check to a corpse (don’t ask), he stumbles upon a sinister plot to induce comas in patients and harvest their organs. Yes, COMA is referenced, though not by name, as hospital administrator Smith (Richard Herd) fakes Perkins’ death and delivers his alleged ashes to Lobo and Perkins.

The second season’s second episode continues the formula set in the premiere. It still has lots of pretty girls in bikinis (guest star Sondra Currie is quite fetching) and slapstick, but the comedy is more subdued than in the first season, and the plot is more focused on its crime elements. Chief Carson (Nicolas Coster) and Hildy (Nell Carter) are still unreasonably hostile toward Lobo, though sexy cops Brandy (Tara Buckman) and Peaches (Amy Botwinick) are sympathetic.

Writer Mark Jones cut his teeth on Saturday morning fare like ARK II and THE ALL-NEW SUPER FRIENDS HOUR before transitioning into prime-time crime dramas. He later penned the horror film LEPRECHAUN, which was popular enough to spawn five sequels. THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY’s Dave Madden appears as a patient in the psychiatric ward where Smith has stashed Perkins.

A Crash Course In Terror

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 23:55:00 +0000

What began as a commercially minded UCLA student film project ended up on theater and drive-in screens across North America—probably a big surprise to the arthouse-oriented classmates of co-directors and co-editors Jeffrey Obrow and Stephen Carpenter.

The two pupils also co-wrote the screenplay with Stacey Giachino with Obrow producing and Carpenter as cinematographer. THE DORM THAT DRIPPED BLOOD was also the feature debut of composer Christopher Young (SPIDER-MAN 3) and actress Daphne Zuniga, who did another slasher movie (THE INITIATION) before hitting it big in THE SURE THING, SPACEBALLS, and TV’s MELROSE PLACE.

It’s unlikely anyone involved with this 16mm horror movie shot under the title DEATH DORM could have predicted its eventual success on the big screen and home video, even though it is a decent work of suspense. It’s about a group of college students left on campus during Christmas break to clean a dormitory marked for demolition and a mysterious killer who bumps off the cast in violent ways. The film doesn’t bring anything new to the table, but Carpenter and Obrow do nice work establishing a suspenseful tone and developing the mystery. Crude sound recording let down the stiff performers, who are at least likable.

However, because it’s nothing more than a simple meat-and-potatoes slasher, it’s hard to recommend. Obrow and Carpenter present a decent body count with impressive gore makeup by Matthew Mungle (BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA), but it comes with slack editing and few surprises. The killer’s identity is no big deal and his motivation weak. The directors and Giachino do furnish a wry downer of an ending, and if the rest of the film had contained some of its black comedy, it would have been better.

Originally seen in theaters as PRANKS—a clumsy title, seeing as there really are no pranks in the movie—the film was re-released as THE DORM THAT DRIPPED BLOOD, which is not only accurate and evocative, but also harkens back to a more innocent time of Saturday matinee chillers. The Synapse Blu-ray/DVD presents Carpenter and Obrow’s original cut with the DEATH DORM title before it was shorn of gore to receive an R rating. Mungle’s most notorious special effect is a power drill ripping into a skull, which got the film on Great Britain’s Video Nasties list.

The People, Yes

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 15:00:00 +0000

TRESPASS is a 1969 political thriller written by an author who wrote a lot of good ones.

Fletcher Knebel, whose outstanding novels SEVEN DAYS IN MAY and VANISHED were turned into motion pictures, wrote TRESPASS for Doubleday (the paperback was released by Pocket Books). It's dated today, thank goodness, but it well captures the contentious relationships between races in America during the Vietnam War era. The plot feels exaggerated, looking back on it forty years later, but I bet it raised a lot of arm hairs on white readers in 1969.

Wealthy Tim and Liz Crawford return to their lavish New Jersey estate, Fairhill, after a Saturday night party to discover it has been hijacked by a handful of black revolutionaries led by the intelligent Ben Steele. Knebel leaves the reader as isolated as the Crawfords, who have two small children at home, for the first five chapters, as we discover Steele's purpose, which is to force Crawford to turn over his land as restitution for Crawford's father earning his fortune on the backs of black laborers.

Eventually, we discover Fairhill isn't the only mansion overrun by armed black men. There are five others, and no less than the President of the United States is aware of the mass hostage-taking. The blacks are members of a radical organization called the Blacks of February Twenty-first (B.O.F.), and taking over these homes is just the B.O.F.'s first step in its overthrow of White America.

In addition to crafting a good deal of suspense, Knebel astutely examines race relations, carefully creating three-dimensional white and black characters, humanizing the villains and tarnishing the so-called good guys. TRESPASS is mostly told through the eyes of Steele and Crawford with occasional cuts to the White House, where the liberal President faces the most stressful weekend of his career.

I don't think TRESPASS is as intriguing as VANISHED or SEVEN DAYS IN MAY, but it's a real corker at its best moments and tells a relevant story of suspense without violence or sleaze.

Boxoffice: January 21, 1974

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 23:30:00 +0000

Let's Pop Some Tops

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 02:04:00 +0000

One of exploitation cinema’s most prolific filmmakers since the 1980s is the subject of this loving documentary. Jim Wynorski began his professional career working for Roger Corman in the marketing department of New World Pictures. He graduated to writing screenplays for Corman production like FORBIDDEN WORLD and SCREWBALLS and finally directed his first film, THE LOST EMPIRE, in 1984.

Since then, he has directed almost one hundred features, many of them softcore romps lensed in just a few days. POPATOPOLIS takes us behind the scenes of Wynorski’s 2005 opus THE WITCHES OF BREASTWICK, which appears to be amateurish trash far below the skill level of a director with more than two decades of experience. Of course, Wynorski’s zeal to shoot the entire feature in just three days on one basic location has more than a little to do with the film’s (lack of) quality.

As a backstage look at the making of a cheap softcore straight-to-cable flick, POPATOPOLIS is of interest, but as an examination of Wynorski’s career, not so much. You’ll learn little about the man’s personal life, except that he keeps DVDs and VHS tapes in his kitchen cupboards. About his directorial style, POPATOPOLIS director Clay Westervelt reveals that Wynorski is short-tempered, impatient, and a screamer on the set (which comes as no surprise to those who have seen Odette Springer’s documentary SOME NUDITY REQUIRED). Most of the talking head interviews are with the BREASTWICK cast and crew, which don’t give a well-rounded view of the man.

One exception is actress Julie K. Smith, who considers herself a Wynorski friend, but still finds herself often at war with him on the set. According to POPATOPOLIS, their clashes involve Smith’s desire for more time and more thought taken towards making the film better versus Wynorski’s desire to just get the damn thing done. Westervelt shows whose side he’s on by including a long scene of Smith stumbling over a simple line of dialogue, necessitating many takes while embarrassed cast and crew members look on.

Smith does bring up an important point that POPATOPOLIS touches on, but not as fully as it should. Which is that Wynorski, who did show ambition, a modicum of low-budget style, and a sense of humor in his early films, has sold out his desire to make quality films in order to pump out three-day sexploitation wonders using porn actresses and over-the-hill scream queens (many of BREASTWICK’s stars are around forty years old). Westervelt, who clearly worships the crusty Wynorski, is unwilling to delve more deeply into the filmmaker’s career choices, though that may have been a more interesting documentary.

Wynorski is—or, at least, was, earlier in his career—too talented to be churning out garbage like THE DEVIL WEARS NADA and THE BREASTFORD WIVES. So what happened? Did he lose the desire to make better movies? Is he just old and tired? Or does he really enjoy spending a weekend in the country filming THE WITCHES OF BREASTWICK. POPATOPOLIS never tells us.

Westervelt also chintzed out on the clips he chose to illustrate Wynorski’s resume. All look faded and grainy, as if taken from wrinkled old videocassettes, even though some of Wynorski’s films have recently been remastered and look great on DVD. Most tantalizing are the clips from THE LOST EMPIRE, which are presented in their original 2.35:1 theatrical ratio. Since the film, one of Wynorski’s best, is only available on a long-out-of-print pan-and-scan VHS tape from the 1980s, it’s a thrill to see widescreen footage, even though, like the rest of the clips, the video quality is tarnished.

It Hits With Slashing Fury

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 19:56:00 +0000

Big thanks go out to the anonymous Crane Shot reader who emailed me to say that this movie I wrote about more than three years ago was available on Netflix's streaming service. To the best of my knowledge, the 1958 melodrama MACHETE received no VHS or DVD release, though I imagine it played late at night in syndication back in the 1960s and 1970s.

Given its intriguing one-sheet and cast, I was curious to see MACHETE, and I'm glad I did. Kurt Neumann co-wrote, directed, and produced this ripe B-picture the same year he directed one of the best horror movies of the 1950s: THE FLY. When he died in August of 1958, MACHETE was the first of three Neumann films to be released posthumously. The guy worked a lot.

Emotions run high when Don Luis Montoya (DR. CYCLOPS himself, Albert Dekker) returns to his Puerto Rico sugar plantation with a new wife: platinum blond Jean (Mari Blanchard). They met on Montoya’s business trip to New York City and were married one week later. Montoya’s majordomo Bernardo (Juano Hernandez) is polite to Jean, but clearly skeptical concerning her motives. Housekeeper Rita (Ruth Cains) looks at her as a rival for the affections of Carlos (Carlos Rivas), Don Luis’ plantation master and adopted son.

Making his thoughts most plain is cousin Miguel (Lee Van Cleef), Luis’ only living blood relative, a snarling malcontent whom Montoya sends packing after he drunkenly attacks Carlos with a machete. Miguel is a real operator, though, and manages not only to talk his way back on to the plantation, but also into Carlos’ job after he convinces Luis that Carlos and Jean are having an affair.

The screenplay, co-written by Collier Young (JUNGLE JIM), is routine melodrama, but Neumann filmed MACHETE on an actual sugar plantation in Aguirre, Puerto Rico, which provides a visual edge. He and cinematographer Karl Struss (DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE) get a lot of local color out of the unusual exteriors to give the drama an extra note of realism. Scenes are connected by documentary-style footage of cane being harvested and transported.

Van Cleef is hilariously transparent as the conniving Miguel, who sure is good at making other people look stupid. Even after his earlier betrayals of Luis, he still manages to make not only his cousin, but also Jean and Carlos, believe he has their best interests at heart—even after making it obvious he wants the plantation for himself.

Neumann never gets a handle on Blanchard’s and Rivas’ characters, however. Jean’s chance run-in with a man she once knew back home teases us of her mysterious past, but this angle is dropped. We naturally assume—because of their quick courtship, Luis’ wealth, and the large age disparity between them—that her interest in Montoya is more avaricious than romantic in nature, but MACHETE never makes this clear, even after her (surprisingly easy) seduction of Carlos. Neumann’s ending indicates he believes Jean to be flawed, but I’m not certain the film merits that distinction. I think the fault lies mostly with Blanchard, who convinced me that Jean really did love Luis, no matter how the story played out, though I also think the afore-mentioned scene of Jean’s encounter did the actress no favors.

Despite its flaws, MACHETE is a potboiler of some interest. The actors are good, if appropriately overcooked, and the Puerto Rican locations give extra production value. The film was made independently under the production banner of J. Harold Odell (who also made the incredible THE FIEND OF DOPE ISLAND), and released through United Artists.

Random TV Title: Richie Brockelman, Private Eye

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 20:53:00 +0000

RICHIE BROCKELMAN, PRIVATE EYE was a very good crime drama that came and went with barely a peep in the spring of 1978. It could be quickly described as YOUNG JIM ROCKFORD, and it was created by ROCKFORD FILES executive producer Stephen J. Cannell and wunderkind Steven Bochco, who had already created and written for several dramas, but had not yet become "The Steven Bochco" of HILL STREET BLUES, L.A. LAW, and NYPD BLUE.

Brockelman first appeared in a 1976 TV-movie, THE MISSING TWENTY-FOUR HOURS, which was written by Cannell and Bochco and directed by Hy Averback (F TROOP). He was played by Dennis Dugan (NIGHT CALL NURSES), who was thirty years old, but looked 23. And that was the basic idea of the show--Brockelman was a private investigator whom nobody took seriously because he was so young.

Cannell liked the idea and the character (the ratings were okay, not great), so he brought Richie back for a two-hour ROCKFORD FILES called "The House on Willis Avenue." Cannell wrote it, and Averback again directed. Since Brockelman was written like a younger Jim Rockford--glib, quick-thinking, eager to avoid violence is possible--the character was a perfect fit in the Rockford universe, and Dugan and James Garner shared terrific chemistry.

"The House on Willis Avenue" also served as a second pilot of sorts, because RICHIE BROCKELMAN, PRIVATE EYE premiered on NBC just three weeks later as a spring replacement for THE ROCKFORD FILES. Ratings were pretty good in the ROCKFORD slot and also later during summer reruns, but apparently not quite good enough for NBC to bring RICHIE back for a second season.

Here's the opening from the fifth and final BROCKELMAN episode, "Escape from Caine Abel." It begins with a small bit of Brockelman welcoming Rockford back from his vacation, and you can see the chemistry between the two actors. Mike Post, Pete Carpenter, Stephen Geyer, and Herb Pederson wrote the Beach Boys-esque theme.

Although RICHIE BROCKELMAN, PRIVATE EYE was canceled after five episodes, Richie Brockelman appeared one more time. About a year after his series went off the air, Dugan guest-starred in another two-hour ROCKFORD FILES, "Never Send a Boy King to Do a Man's Job," about which I wrote here.

Dugan's ROCKFORD episodes are available on DVD, but the BROCKELMAN series, sadly, is not, nor is the original TV-movie.

They Call Him Hawk

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 14:42:00 +0000

If HAWK is remembered today, it's as the first television series to star Burt Reynolds in the leading role. Although Reynolds had been a regular on RIVERBOAT and GUNSMOKE, he did so as the sidekick to leading men Darren McGavin and James Arness, respectively. In 1966, series creator Allan Sloane (later an Emmy winner for writing TO ALL MY FRIENDS ON SHORE) cast Burt as John Hawk, a tough New York City cop with a twist: he was also a full-blooded Iroquois.

Making Hawk further unique were his status as an investigator for the District Attorney's office, rather than a member of the NYPD, and his preferred hours of work, which were after dark. This required a lot of night shooting, which probably played hell with HAWK's production budget, but certainly gave the series a distinctive atmosphere.

HAWK ran just 17 episodes in the fall of 1966, but that was long enough for Belmont to release one tie-in paperback, which was penned by Richard Hardwick. HAWK appears to be an original story by Hardwick, and has Hawk and his partner Dan Carter (played by Wayne Grice in the series) investigating the apparent murder of a wealthy playboy in a car explosion.

I say "apparent," because the intended victim, Jason Bellamy, is still alive, having agreed to lend his car to a friend, who was actually killed. Bellamy is the leader of a small group of committed revolutionaries preparing to overthrow the dictatorial regime of San Sebastian in Central America, which obviously leaves many possible suspects.

Hawk's ancestry is, of course, a subject for conversation among characters in the book, as it was in the series. On television in 1966, Indians were rarely shown doing anything more dignified than wearing war paint and battling lantern-jawed cowboys. Casting the handsome Reynolds, who really did have Native American blood, as not only a good guy, but a leader of men, was very progressive (and note how television has regressed in this regard in the 45 years since HAWK was telecast).

Hardwick crafts a solid if unspectacular mystery and captures Reynolds' voice well. I like the book's painted cover, which goes uncredited.

6 Ft. 2 In. Of Dynamite

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 00:08:00 +0000

Warner Brothers’ sequel to the smash CLEOPATRA JONES took advantage of its heroine’s status as a special government agent and sent Cleo globetrotting to the Far East. William Tennant, who produced the first movie, also scripted this tongue-in-cheek adventure that pits its six-foot-two antagonist against the deadly Dragon Lady (a game Stella Stevens), a master swordfighter who operates a gaudy casino in Macao. Chuck Bail, who did stunt work on CLEOPATRA JONES, was promoted to direct the sequel after helming Warners’ blaxploitation hit BLACK SAMSON.

To take advantage of the then-hot martial arts craze, Warners and Tennant brought in Run Run Shaw to co-finance and co-produce the picture, making CLEOPATRA JONES AND THE CASINO OF GOLD an unusual and highly entertaining mixture of kung fu, blaxploitation, and James Bond-style espionage. Tamara Dobson’s wardrobe and exotic makeup as Cleopatra Jones are even more outrageous, keeping in the tradition of sequels being bigger and more expensive, and director Bail’s experience controlling wild stunts is well suited for the film’s eye-catching mayhem.

Tennant wisely brought back the crowdpleasing Johnson brothers, played by Caro Kenyatta and Albert Popwell, and made them government agents investigating the heroin trade in Hong Kong. While undercover making a score with a Chinese dealer named Chen, the brothers are kidnapped by the Dragon Lady and taken back to her plush casino to enjoy themselves with her concubines until she can confirm their identities.

Arriving in Hong Kong to find her friends, Cleo demonstrates a disdain for authority by refusing to pay any attention to her contact Stanley (Norman Fell) and his penchant for writing reports and going by the book. While looking for Chen, Cleo hooks up with Mi Ling (Ni Tien, billed as Tanny in her first English-language production), a cheerful Chinese agent who helps her fight her way through the Hong Kong underground.

The problem with a bigger sequel is that Dobson tends to get lost within it. Probably due to the Shaw Brothers’ participation, Ni and the Chinese actors playing the rest of Mi Ling’s squad handle as much of the fighting as Dobson does. CASINO OF GOLD is a less personal adventure than Cleo’s drug-busting in the Los Angeles ghetto, as seen in CLEOPATRA JONES.

Yet, the sequel is still highly entertaining, packed with action and comic-book luridness, typified by the Dragon Lady’s sword-surrounded arena deathtrap. It sure is fun to watch the actors and lots of Chinese stuntmen busting up Johnson Tsao’s ornate casino set in the finale. Dominic Frontiere (FREEBIE AND THE BEAN) composed a score reminiscent of Lalo Schifrin’s work on ENTER THE DRAGON.

Ten Miles Of Bad Road

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 01:05:00 +0000

There has never been a film heroine quite like Cleopatra Jones. Standing six feet two inches in height, decked out in an exotic wardrobe and makeup more akin to a Parisian runway than a streetwise crimefighter, and embodied with confidence by sleek model Tamara Dobson, Cleopatra Jones was one of the most important female characters of the 1970s blaxploitation movement.

Brilliant, brave, and proudly black, Cleo zips around Los Angeles in a sweet customized Corvette Stingray that boldly advertises her job as a drug agent for the U.S. government. Her target is an L.A. queenpin named Mommy (Shelley Winters), who is way pissed about Cleo bombing her $30 million poppy field in Turkey. To get back at Cleo, Mommy engineers a series of ambushes that the agent deflects with her typically classy aplomb, as well as a police raid of a ghetto drug rehabilitation center run by Cleo’s man Reuben (Bernie Casey).

Jack Starrett (THE GRAVY TRAIN), an underrated director of action melodramas, handles the script’s more tender moments, such as a kissing scene told in dissolves, as skillfully as he stages the chases and shootouts. A car chase through the L.A. River is edited by Allan Jacobs (BLACULA) with some wit. The screenplay by actor Max Julian (THE MACK) and sitcom scribe Sheldon Keller is packed with comic-book flair that perfectly handled by Starrett and his flamboyant cast.

Winters chews not just the scenery but the soundstage catwalks too in an attempt to compete with Dobson’s shapely frame and outrageous clothes. Bedecked in a red wig and bellowing dialogue using her outdoor voice even indoors, Winters is a surprise as a dope-smuggling lesbian so soon after her Oscar-nominated turn in THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE. Paul Koslo (who worked with Starrett in THE LOSERS), John Alderman, and Joe Tornatore play Mommy’s comic sidekicks.

A fun mixture of humor and action, CLEOPATRA JONES was a major hit, paving the way for CLEOPATRA JONES AND THE CASINO OF GOLD two years later. Also with the gorgeous Brenda Sykes, Antonio Fargas, Esther Rolle (GOOD TIMES), Dan Frazer (KOJAK), Bill McKinney (as a redneck, natch), Lee Weaver, Michael Warren (HILL STREET BLUES), Hedley Mattingly, SOUL TRAIN host Don Cornelius, and Albert Popwell and Caro Kenyatta, hilarious as karate-kicking brothers.

Death In Lisbon

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 03:34:00 +0000

I don't know why it took me three years to read another Cabot Cain novel when I liked the first one so much. I don't have the second book in the series, so I jumped ahead to the third, ASSAULT ON LOVELESS, published by Avon in 1969.

I wrote a little bit about author Alan Caillou when he died in 2006. He must have been an interesting guy. Born in England, Caillou was a spy during World War II. He was also a policeman and a great white hunter before becoming a novelist in 1955. Not long after that, he began writing for movies and television, particularly THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E., acting, and performing voiceovers (I believe he dubbed Fred MacMurray's voice as Steve Douglas' Scottish cousin on MY THREE SONS). He played Inspector Lestrade in THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES on television, wrote one of THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN's pilot films, penned the immortal KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS and THE LOSERS, and adapted one of his Cabot Cain novels, ATTACK ON AGATHON, for the big screen.

Caillou's real-life experiences in the military and law enforcement deeply color his Cabot Cain novels, including ASSAULT ON LOVELESS. Cain is a bit too good to be true, standing 6-foot-7 and possessing incredible knowledge of almost any subject. An independent agent, Cain is called in by Interpol's Colonel Fenrick, an old friend, to chase a madman named Loveless, who possesses a deadly toxin and threatens to destroy the world with it. Or at least as much of it he can reach with the four ounces of toxin he has (which would still be a lot).

Of course, a woman is involved--in this case, Fenrick's niece Astrid--which leads to some nice banter between Cain and the older man. LOVELESS and the other Cain novels don't really fall into the men's action genre, since they're colorful espionage adventures similar to the Sam Durell books written by Edward Aarons and Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm series. Caillou's series isn't as well known, but it delivers pretty close to the same excitement and is worth picking up online or in a used bookstore.

Tom Selleck Vs. Exploding Robot Spiders

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 05:00:00 +0000

In RUNAWAY's not-so-distant future, many families use domestic robots to handle their common household chores. Occasionally, one of those robots goes awry. When it does, its owners call the Runaway Squad, a special branch of the police department that handles out-of-control robots.

Usually, these robots are harmless and can be easily handled by flipping a switch. So it’s unusual when officer Jack Ramsay (Tom Selleck, starring in MAGNUM, P.I. at the time) and his new partner Karen Thompson (supercute Cynthia Rhodes) arrive at a house where the family’s domestic robot has stabbed the wife to death and is holding a baby hostage with a .357 Magnum.

More robots are turning murderous, and Ramsay discovers they’ve been modified with a special chip developed by a nut named Luther (KISS’ Gene Simmons in his acting debut). Luther covers his tracks by bumping off his associates with exploding robot spiders and explosive bullets that can turn corners.

For a best-selling author, Crichton does not write a good screenplay. RUNAWAY is full of really dumb plotholes, and its futuristic premise doesn’t stand up very well. For instance, it isn’t explained very well why the police force would be responsible for handling malfunctioning household appliances. And if the robots screw up so much that a special police unit has to be created to deal with them, why would anybody want to own one?

Crichton is much better staging action sequences, which are put together with some pop. A freeway chase between Selleck in a car with a robot driver, a bunch of tiny explosive drones on wheels, and Rhodes driving another car and zapping the drones with a trunk laser is just dopey enough to be awesome.

Crichton and cinematographer John Alonzo (CHINATOWN) move the camera a lot to jazz up the pace, and Selleck takes his role just seriously enough to sell the far-fetched plot. An underrated performer (Thomas Magnum is one of television’s great dramatic characters), Selleck handles the drama and action chores like a pro, even when stalking a two-foot-tall corn detasseler that looks about as dangerous as a Roomba.

The huggable Rhodes (DIRTY DANCING), who soon after left acting to raise a family with pop singer Richard Marx, and a pre-CHEERS Alley gamely allow themselves to be rescued a few times. Bailey (POLICE ACADEMY) and Shaw (TNT JACKSON) are stuck in cop-cliché roles, but acquit themselves professionally. Simmons as the sneering heavy (“The templates, Ramsay!”) delivers the film’s most delicious performance, rightfully figuring going way over the top was appropriate for a villain controlling an army of robot spiders.

Tri-Star’s Christmas 1984 release was not a success, opening behind the debuting DUNE, STARMAN, and THE COTTON CLUB at the weekend box office. It grossed even less than Selleck’s earlier action films HIGH ROAD TO CHINA and LASSITER, but his next, the frothy comedy THREE MEN AND A BABY, was a bonafide smash.

Ben Murphy Rides With Death

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:43:00 +0000

When THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN became an instant ratings success for ABC in 1974, all three major television networks followed suit in attempts to do similar superhero-type programs. One such example is GEMINI MAN, which aired only five times on NBC in the fall of 1976 before it was cancelled. Eleven episodes were shot, and all were later aired in syndication and on the Sci-Fi Channel in the 1990s.

GEMINI MAN should have been better, considering the talented men who brought it to the screen. It was created for television by Leslie Stevens, who created the magnificent OUTER LIMITS of the early 1960s; Harve Bennett, who produced THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN and, later, the early STAR TREK movies; and a young Steven Bochco, who went on to create NYPD BLUE, L.A. LAW, and HILL STREET BLUES, among other classic dramas. Bochco and Bennett had just produced THE INVISIBLE MAN, a shortlived series for NBC in 1975 that was undoubtedly the inspiration for GEMINI MAN.

THE INVISIBLE MAN (starring MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. David McCallum) was cancelled in January 1976 after 13 weeks. In March of that year, NBC telecast GEMINI MAN, a 90-minute pilot that starred Ben Murphy (ALIAS SMITH AND JONES) as Sam Casey, an agent for a government thinktank called Intersect.

On an underwater mission, Casey is caught in an explosion and rendered invisible through mysterious radiation. A pretty doctor (played by Katherine Crawford) creates a super wristwatch that makes him visible again, but only when it is attached to his wrist. By pressing a button on the watch, Sam can make himself invisible again, but only for up to fifteen minutes during a 24-hour period. Under the watchful eye of gruff, middle-aged boss Leonard Driscoll (William Sylvester), Sam uses his invisibility powers to undertake secret missions for Intersect.

Frankly, THE INVISIBLE MAN had the exact same premise, and I wouldn’t be surprised if unused scripts for INVISIBLE MAN turned up as GEMINI MAN episodes, especially considering both were produced by Universal Television for NBC.

I have a weird attraction to stupid-looking robots, and GEMINI MAN delivers big time in its episode, “Minotaur,” one of the few episodes that were actually seen on NBC. Ross Martin (THE WILD WILD WEST) guest-stars as Carl Victor, a mad scientist and vengeful ex-employee of Intersect who builds a killer robot and demands $500 million from the U.S. Secretary of Defense or else he’ll use the robot, named “Minotaur,” to zap a skyscraper with its built-in laser and level it.

To prove he’s not kidding, Victor lures Sam to an abandoned warehouse and uses Minotaur to blow it up. Following Victor’s daughter (BLUE SUNSHINE’s Deborah Winters) to his secret laboratory, which appears to be located at Los Angeles’ Department of Water and Power (one of L.A.’s most ubiquitous low-budget film locations), Sam spends the episode dodging Minotaur’s laser blasts and sensor probes.

“Minotaur”’s story was co-written by Robert Bloch, a noted horror author whose book PSYCHO inspired Alfred Hitchcock’s classic 1960 motion picture. Staff producers Frank Telford (THE VIRGINIAN) and Robert F. O’Neill (QUINCY, M.E.) wrote the teleplay, and Alan J. Levi, who later replaced director Richard A. Colla during filming of the BATTLESTAR GALACTICA pilot for Universal, helmed the episode, which closely resembles a segment of THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN in terms of story, structure, look, and tone.

“Minotaur” is—let’s be honest—not really all that great, but it does have a clunky-looking robot that talks and shoots lasers. So what’s not to love?

By Any Other Name

noreply@blogger.com (Marty McKee) — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 18:02:00 +0000

Note: this post is one of a series of STAR TREK episode reviews originally written for the alt.tv.startrek.tos newsgroup. For more information, please read this post.

BY ANY OTHER NAME
Episode 51 of 80
February 23, 1968
Teleplay: D.C. Fontana and Jerome Bixby
Story: Jerome Bixby
Director: Marc Daniels

This routine third-season episode was—sort of—the first STAR TREK episode I remember seeing. In fact, I saw “By Any Other Name” before I saw the episode. What?

Well, when I was a kid, I had a toy movie camera—maybe a Fisher-Price toy or Viewmaster? You put a cartridge into the camera (the handle, I think), turned the crank, peered into the eyepiece, and you saw a movie. The STAR TREK cartridge ran maybe two or three minutes and was silent. It was this episode. I remember a shot of Captain Kirk rounding a corner in the Enterprise hallways and discovering little cubes lining the floor, Scotty standing over the self-destruct button, the Enterprise passing through the barrier, and a scene on the planet’s surface.

I wish I still had that toy, whatever it was.

In the episode, two members of the Kelvan Empire—human-looking Rojan (Warren Stevens) and Kelinda (Barbara Bouchet)—take over the Enterprise using devices on their belts that turns non-essential crewmembers into small solid cubes that can be easily crushed if Captain Kirk (William Shatner) gets out of line. Of course, Kirk manages to lower Kelinda’s defenses by teaching her the joy of making out, which makes Rojan jealous enough to fight Kirk (who, of course, kicks his ass). One of the most politically incorrect TREK episodes finds our Starfleet heroes resorting to getting the enemy drunk and seducing innocent young women to save their skins.

Very similar to a later episode, “Wink of an Eye,” in its execution and plot device of getting rid of the Enterprise’s background crew to cut production costs, “By Any Other Name” isn’t great and is mainly memorable because of Barbara Bouchet’s guest turn. Then 24 years old, the German-born starlet spent the 1970s acting in a wide range of European crime and horror flicks, including BLACK BELLY OF THE TARANTULA, THE MEAN MACHINE, CRY OF A PROSTITUTE, HOUSE OF A THOUSAND PLEASURES, and THE PARIS SEX MURDERS. She usually appeared nude in them, which no doubt made an impact at the box office. Whether or not she could act was usually irrelevant. In “By Any Other Name,” director Marc Daniels often films her from the rear to show off both her daring costume and her derriere.

Warren Stevens also had quite a few genre credits. He was, of course, a crewman in the classic FORBIDDEN PLANET and guested on LAND OF THE GIANTS, THE TIME TUNNEL, and nearly every other drama of the 1960s.

I like the shimmering visuals used to create the freeze effect. Unfortunately, Daniels doesn't always realize that the only way to convincingly portray humans frozen in motion is to always keep the camera moving, which helps disguise the actors’ tiny movements (nobody can stay absolutely still for a period of time). And what was so important to McCoy at the moment he was frozen? He had just heard that the Enterprise was to be invaded, and he suddenly turns to Spock as if to relate a great point. I would think a fight with Spock would be the last thing on his mind.

The references to past events in “Where No Man Has Gone Before” and “A Taste of Armageddon” were nice touches and unusual ones for episodic drama at the time. This was probably the idea of co-writer D.C. Fontana, who had been with the series from the beginning and would have been aware of the characters' history. The story was originated by Jerome Bixby, who scripted the 1958 sci-fi classic IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE, which is a direct antecedent of ALIEN. Watch it and you'll see.

Another nice but almost unnoticeable touch was Shatner as Kirk way in the background distracting one of the Kelvans, while Spock and Scott were up to their tricks in the engine room. It may have been a double for Shatner, but it sure looks like our Bill.

How come the Enterprise passed through the barrier this time without any of the crew members acquiring glowing eyes and turning into gods? Not a high enough ESP rating? (Again, the nod to “Where No Man Has Gone Before”)

There's an odd shot of Spock while he's playing chess with Rojan where he's speaking, but his lips aren't moving. Often, lines will be looped later and hidden in a long shot or over the shoulder, but this is a flat-out full-screen closeup. It's very strange. Surely, the editors had footage they could have cut away to.