Moral preaching against gambling dens and boxing stock footage. What more could you want? How about a movie worth watching. You won't

Gambling with Souls is an exploitation film that hides behind the guise of being an anti-gambling film. Still, it's hard for a film to claim that showing a curvaceous woman in her bra and panties spread out over a couch is for teaching impressionable film-goers a lesson.

The film is about Mae Miller, a young woman who is put down by her friends for wearing the same dress again. Mae's friend Molly introduces her to a gambling den where Mae wins like crazy. Of course her winning streak is anything but on the level and she soon finds herself losing more and more money until she is $10,000 in the red. Of course as often happens in films like this Mae is lead further astray until she is a full blown prostitute.

Remember folks, wanting nice dresses leads to gambling with leads to nightclub life which leads to prostitution, bankruptcy, scandal and jail. One of us is going to jail and it's not going to be me! *Ahem* Yeah, avoid this movie. It's such a shame that this film still exists and all but a handful of Theda Bara's films are gone forever.

In short, a waste of your time and mine.

This film was part of a collection I partially reviewed a while back.

Labels: 31 days of film, Bad Movies, Crap

The 1950's were, in many ways, the "Golden Era" of monster movies. Dinosaurs like "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms" and Godzilla made their appearances along with other animals like the giant octopus of "It Came From Beneath the Sea." Eventually the people in Hollywood would to run out of things to use as giant monsters.

The Monolith Monsters is about some rocks that grow big and turn people to stone. Yes, you read that right. This film is about monster rocks. You have to wonder who came up with that brilliant idea and how the boardroom reacted to his idea about "monster rocks."

The plot is basically about some rocks which fall to the earth as meteorites. When they are exposed to water they grow rapidly absorbing the silicon from every source: wood, trees and even people. As you may expect this causes panic and scientists have to figure out how to stop it.

I'd like to describe the film in more detail but there really isn't anything else to say. Quite frankly, the film was dull and pointless. There were too many scenes of pasty white people jabbering about nonsense. These scenes usually don't kill a monster movie as you really only care about the beasts themselves and yet, it's hard to get excited over paper mache crystals moving slowly towards a city.

Skip this one.

To read the rest of the reviews of the films on this disc, check out my partial earlier review as well as my review of The Incredible Shrinking Man, earlier this week.

Labels: 31 days of film, Bad Movies, Crap, sci-fi

You know a movie is trash when you can barely stay awake watching it. From 1949 with a budget of $10 is this cheap piece of crap known as Omoo Omoo the Shark God.

This film was made before things like plot were deemed necessary. Much of the film is just stock footage of animals along with white people pretending to be ethnic look on from shots cut away.

Okay, so there is a plot. A sea captain steals some black pearls from an idol in Tahiti and he and his crew are cursed. That curse is so strong that it goes straight through the TV to us the unfortunate viewers. Really it plays out like a bad episode of Ramar of the Jungle.

Skip it; I wish I had. If you want a watchable bad movie that takes place in the jungle watch Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla.

By the way, this was part of a collection I partially reviewed a while back.

Labels: 31 days of film, Bad Movies, Crap

Yesterday I decided that after watching a great film by a legendary and celebrated director I decided it might be a good idea to go to the proverbial opposite end of the film spectrum. I wanted to see a movie that was so well known for being terrible that it has achieved almost cult-like status. Yet even after sitting though Child Brides, Manos: Hands of Fate and Titanic even I was still unprepared for the horrors I was about to face in the Ed Wood classic, Glen or Glenda.

Glen or Glenda started out as a cheap film made to cash in on the sex change of George/Christine Jorgensen. Director Ed Wood, himself a transvestite, decided to take the film in a completely different direction to talk about transvestism. He even played the main character of Glen(da) under the pseudonym of Daniel Davis. He even hired one of his heroes Bela Lugosi (now down on his luck and heavily addicted to morphine) to play a scientist. Lyle Talbot makes an appearance leading me to think that he either loved working or had no pride in what films he made.

This film is, in many ways the true testament of the talents of Mr. Edward D. Wood Jr. He should have kept those talents to himself as this film is almost totally incoherent. The film is told in a series of flashbacks by a doctor to a police inspector who wants to know what would lead a local transvestite to commit suicide. We are told of the story of Glen who, after being neglected by his father and mother, decides to become a girl. After this tale is over the story of Alan/Ann is told and the real Jorgensen exploitation begins.

Wood's "talents" as a director are further showcased by his refusal to use any symbolism that makes sense to anyone who hasn't been sniffing glue. Many surrealistic and symbolic images appear at totally inappropriate times (e.g Satan being at Glen's wedding) that it feels as though Ed just opened a textbook of film techniques and just decided to use whichever one he found whether they made sense to use or not.*

Several points in the film are interrupted by Lugosi rambling on about "puppy dog tales and big ugly snails" or simply with inappropriate lightning or stock footage if, for nothing else, just to extend the length of the film. One particularly awful scene is when a serious conversation is cut short by stock footage of a buffalo stampede!

Glen or Glenda certainly is an enigma. On the one hand the film is so terrible that no one would ever watch it as a serious movie. Many parts of the film left me openly disturbed, creeped out and just feeling rather uncomfortable. Yet I have not laughed as hard and and long at a film in ages.

If laughter is the best medicine, I truly hope that it means that the therapy required after watching this film will be lessened.

Do not watch this movie unless you have a twisted sense of humor or you are extremely curious. If you do decide to watch it, be sure to watch it with friends. The pain is less when shared with others.

* Ironically this is the same technique that Quentin Tarrantino uses. ^

Labels: 31 days of film, Bad Movies, Bela Lugosi, Crap

Wow, I have seen some disturbing things in my day but this one takes the cake.

Pinocchio like many other fairy tales is known to most modern audiences not by their original work but instead by their Disney interpretation. Therefore when we are presented with something a bit more true to the book we may tend to prefer the Disney sterilized version and shun those more true to the book.

This film is actually an Italian production and appears to have been dubbed by the same people who did Gamera vs. Zigra, that is to say the dubbing is rather putrid and the film is a strain on the ears. It, like the original book, is incredibly depressing as the social commentary is quite clear. It also is a bit weird as I never really expected to see Pinocchio lynched Spaghetti Western style.

If you want to watch something downright weird or want to try your hands at your own MSTing then by all means, spend a dollar on this. Just don't buy it for your kids.

Labels: Animation, Bad Movies, Crap

There is a saying over at Rifftrax that it is not Mystery Science Theater 3000 2.0. While that may be true of Rifftrax, The Film Crew is certainly MST3k through and through. Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett were, in my opinion, the best trio to go through the hallway and into the theater so putting them together to riff movies should be instant comedic gold, right? Well ...

The film is putrid, plain and simple. Like most bad movies MST3K did it appears to be trying to make some sort of story but we never seem to find out what that is. Basically all I could figure out was a guy who sold junk falls for a stripper (who, by the way, is played by Rue McClanahan of TV's The Golden Girls) and he decides to go in on an armored car heist that a guy just offers him out of the blue.

The Film Crew does a decent job with this one given what they had to work with. Their commentary is superb although I did notice that they have now taken to adding in more racy jokes and seem to take advantage of the lack of censorship on DVD.

If I was to give a weakness to this it would be the single host segment. Many of the MST3K movies were so putrid and boring that even with the commentary it was nice to have a break. They include just one segment which, honestly, I didn't find too funny.

So while it's not a revival of Mike and the Bots and there are no Mads they do have a rather silly character via telephone of their boss, Bob Honcho. While people will, rightfully so, compare and contrast it to MST3K, after 8 years it's nice to see some new material and I can't wait for more.

Labels: Bad Movies, Comedy, MST3K

Cult Classics

Budget DVD company Mill Creek Entertainment releases a set of 20 obscure and exploitation films from the 30s to the 50s. These films were released back in the days when they wanted to show such taboo topics as drug use and sex on the screen yet they had to do it under the guise of showing the moral problems of their time.

Disc 1:

The Marijuana Menace: Also known as Assassin of Youth this 1937 snoozefest is a film made in the mold of Reefer Madness, although a lot less funny. What didn't help was the print appeared to be covered with hardened mud at some points and faded completely at others making the film a strain on the eyes to watch. Of course the near constant film breaks which just end scenes early don't help matters either.

What's interesting is how so much of the film was about other vices than marijuana and most of the film seemed to be about framing an innocent girl to cheat her out of her inheritance and an old gossiping crow spreading the rumors of the town while a Will Rogers knockoff defends the poor accused girl.

Reefer Madness: Here is perhaps the most famous exploitation film of all time. and yet it's the one I didn't watch it. Thats because there is a much better release out there by Legend Films with a quite funny commentary by Michael J. Nelson of MST3K. Don't buy this set if you want this film, get that release.

Marihuana: More exploitation about Marijuana. I think they already convinced me not to smoke pot already.

Child Bride: I heard once in an interview with Michael J. Nelson and Kevin Murphy of MST3K fame. They hinted at movies they felt were too terrible for the show such as one they described as starring a cast of local hicks about child brides. The description of that could only be this film, and after watching it I can see why they wouldn't touch it.

This exploitation film made supposedly to educate the public about child marriage in perhaps the most tasteless way possible.

Delinquent Daughters: Now here's a trash film warning about the dangers of juvenile delinquency. We have the typical good girl gone bad when she got in the wrong crowd scenario. The weirdest part of the film is this chubby cop who seems to show up everywhere as sort of the conscience of the film.

Note that the film has practically no detail left and any night scenes are about as good as watching a radio drama.

Disc 2:

The Cocaine Fiends: Apparently in the Thirties you could tell someone cocaine was a headache powder and people would gleefully snort it up their nose without a second thought. Two siblings leave their little country home and mother and go to the big city to get high on cocaine and gain fame and fortune. This one has it all: dope, cheap slums, violence, prostitution, pregnancy, suicide and more.

What's interesting is that near the end the film is padded with some vaudeville type acts. This is the only part of the film that is even close to being watchable and given that the experience of watching this film is like watching shadow puppets through cheese cloth it's still a strain on your sanity.

Chained for Life: Okay, I confess I never finished this one. This is the semi-autobiographical film about the famous Hilton twins who were born conjoined at birth. Apparently they had a pretty wild life but I was too bored to watch it all. I know that's not very professional of me but oh well.

Escort Girl: Now here is what I call total exploitation if I ever saw it before. It is supposed to be a warning about escorts going out of the bounds of the law and how they are run by old women and shady men with mustaches who talk in the typical accent of 40s gangsters.

Joyless Street: Somewhat out of place on the disc is this silent film starring Greta Garbo. In this, her first starring film, she plays a young girl living in post WWI Austria whose family has hit on hard times and thus must do what she can to find work to help her family.

This film wasn't bad, for an obviously very heavily edited film with an unrelated music track. I'd like to see it uncut sometime if such a print exists.

Test Tube Babies: No, not In vitro fertilisation but artificial insemination. This film warns that married couples will descend into sin, stripping and booze parties if they don't have children. The problem is, the man in this film is sterile and it's up to the then taboo subject of artificial insemination to the rescue! Of all the films I've seen in this set, this one so far was the worst.

Disc 3:

Terror of Tiny Town: Talk about exploitation! Here is a rather cheaply thrown together western about a bad guy rustling cattle from two families to pit them against one another. SO it's up to the good guy to the rescue to sort it out, get the bad guy and win the girl.

Oh, did I mention everyone in the film is a "midget?"

As exploitive and silly as it seems, this film features a cast of nothing but vertically-challenged (to be PC) people who act out the rather pointless and bland western. I give props to the actors who if given sets more to their size rather than the obviously oversized ones might have done a decent job of this film. Still, it's not awful, just really weird.

Sex Madness:

Slaves in Bondage: A dull movie about girls being forced into prostitution with the bad guys using a nail salon as a cover. The movie interestingly portrays the girls as seemingly willing and able to be prostitutes and yet the film insists they are "saved" at the end. Oh well, such were the 40s.

The Wild and the Wicked:

The Road to Ruin:

Disc 4:

Omoo-Omoo, The Shark God: See the review I did during my 31 Days of Film experiment.

Ten Nights in a Barroom: See the review I did during my 31 Days of Film experiment.

Mad Youth: See the review I did during my 31 Days of Film experiment.

Gambling with Souls: See the review I did during my 31 Days of Film experiment.

She Shoulda' Said No!:

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs

My Dream Girl:

Here is a movie I had heard about for a few years as being exceptionally terrible and should be avoided. For some masochistic reason when people tell me these things I want to seek out that film just to see how awful it is. This was the case with Protégé de la Rose Noire and was the case here. However unlike that film which was so inept that nothing could save it, this film was more boring than anything else.

What was cool was seeing Richard Ng again. His minor role in My Wife is 18 seemed in many ways like a tease of his former glory and while he doesn't play the zany guy he once did during his Lucky Star days, he did handle his role quite well and I would really like to see him do more.

Labels: Bad Movies, Comedy, Hong Kong, Romance

Chase Step by Step / The Super Gang: Again I make a trip to the dollar store and get a few more public domain kung fu films.

Chase Step by Step, despite what the generic description on the back says is not about a kickboxer seeking revenge. It is actually about a couple of circus performers who are assigned to protect a shipment of gold. Unfortunately while the fights are mildly entertaining the film ultimately fails at being anything close to be worth your time.

The Super Gang: Now here's a piece of crap if I ever saw one. I know some out there go nuts for every Bruceploitation film ever made but I for one am not one of them. Personally I found this film quite boring and at times a strain to keep awake. Not really what I was looking for tonight.

To sum it all up, this disc rots.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD, Hong Kong

Shaolin Deadly Kicks: Yet another typical kung fu movie of good guys and bad guys. After a gang of thieves break up their treasure map into eight pieces and scatter. A lawman goes to hunt them down one at a time to get the pieces. This film, based on that plot description, could be a western but instead, it's a kung fu movie.

I seem to be a total sucker for dollar DVDs with Kung Fu movies. I tend to pick up anything that appears to have some sort of period kung fu to it. A lot lately have been stinkers but this one wasn't that bad, although the plot was a bit boring at times. In fact if I had been director, I would've ended the film after about an hour.

Still, for a dollar kung fu movie it's not that bad.

Labels: Bad Movies, Dollar DVD, Hong Kong, Kung Fu

Robotrix: Legendary Collection: Here is a film that I bought on recommendation from a friend. Of course the fact that he also has suggested I watch Ebola Syndrome should have been a tip off that something wasn't kosher.

What we have here in a Category III science fiction / action film about a police woman who dies in the line of fire and comes back as a cyborg. The premise sounds interesting but at the same time what we end up getting is 93 minutes of pure HK exploitation.

I would like to give something positive about the film and I will say that beyond the nudity and the rather boring plot that the fights were at least interesting.

I think I paid $5 for it and I can't see it being worth much more.

Labels: Bad Movies, Hong Kong

Black Dragons: Bela Lugosi stars as a mad doctor intent on killing people who wronged him. Of course, the twist to this is that these people are not just any old people but they are Japanese men he made, somehow, to look like doughy white guys. The film is filled with plot holes and the whole film makes absolutely no sense with a "terrible shocker" at the end which I won't give away.

Black Dragons was one of Bela Lugosi's "Poverty Row" pictures. He made this film, like many others, during a low period in his life when he was addicted to morphine to treat the terrible Sciatica which left him constantly in pain. Yet throughout all this, Lugosi's charm and film presence shines through and he certainly gave his all, even for crap like this.

One side note, the film also stars a young Clayton Moore. If you ever wanted to see the Lone Ranger without his mask, here's your chance.

Labels: Bad Movies, Bela Lugosi, Cult Films, Dollar DVD

The Cosmos Conqueror: Over the last few months, I've been searching for the newest batch of IFD releases from Digiview. After finding two recently, they ended up at the top of the pile and I am so not disappointed.

This film, like the others has a rather thin plot. Aliens are again attacking the Earth. Lucky for us three kids got command of another alien robot, the "Robot King." Unlike the others, I did not detect any direct copyright infringement in the mech or character designs.

This one was definitely above average and I am more than satisfied with the last couple. Now I just need to find the other three.

Labels: Anime, Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

Captain of Cosmos: They're BAA-ACK! Yes, just when you thought it was safe to visit the dollar bin, more Korean anime ripoffs come our way via Joseph Lai and the good people at Digiview.

In this release we see ripoffs from the Gundam universe in the form of character designs. Our hero in this film, Captain Leo of the Cosmos Warriors, bears a striking resemblance to Char when he has his helmet on and with it off, he looks just like Amuro. Now if that's not enough to get Gundam fans' heads spinning, they should know that the female lead alternates between Sayla and Kycilia Zabi depending on whether her helmet is on or not. The similarities stop there, I'm afraid as despite what the cover art shows, there are no Gundams or giant robots in the film at all.

The story in this was rather weak with an alien queen kidnapping humans to rebuild her destroyed planet and the Cosmos Warriors coming to the rescue. The evil queen has her army of robots and green centaurs apparently can fight but cannot think or build like the humans can. Forcing humans into slave labor the evil queen ends up capturing our heroes and the predictable happens.

What I will congratulate the Koreans on with this is that the plot actually seemed to be somewhat coherent as opposed to some others like Space Thunder Kids which flat out made no sense. I can't say I was enthralled with this DVD but I did get a good chuckle or two and it kept me awake.

I'm going to go out on a limb and recommend this one. Unfortunately I had to pick up my copy online at eBay since my local Wal*Marts have yet to pick them up for sale. Hopefully someone gets them in soon, or I can find the rest on eBay.

Labels: Anime, Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

Rage of the Masters: From the dollar bin comes this rather bland Jimmy Wang Yu film. The plot is rather bland with a brother and sister seeking revenge and enlisting a great kickboxer to help them. Of course, the problem lies in the fact that he has promised his mother that he won't fight.

The film progresses through some dull scenes which, I confess, I did not watch with my full attention. The saving grace is the last half hour which has some pretty cool kick boxing and martial arts scenes.

It's crappy chop socky for a dollar so if that's your thing, go for it. If you really like it, there's a widescreen version available under the title, "The Destroyer."

I think the reason I haven't watched so many films lately lies from the fact that I regularly watch crap and this is just more of it. I've seen so many kung fu movies over the years that it's almost getting to be a genre that I can't watch anymore, at least not without some sort of comedy or class to save it.

Labels: Bad Movies, Dollar DVD, Hong Kong, Kung Fu

Silver Hermit From Shaolin Temple: Continuing with the weirdness, I decided to watch a classic chop sockey film. Unfortunately all I found in the dollar dvd bin was this movie.

Silver Hermit is a pacifistic martial artist who, along with three others, is invited to a contest to fight to win the hand of a young woman and thus inherit a prestigious martial arts school. Unfortunately for him two of them end up dead with one barely surviving. Of course he gets the blame and has to clear his name.

The film is rather dull at times, although the martial arts is pretty good. The problem stems mostly from the video presentation which is, as usual, pan and scanned plus horrendously dubbed. To top it off the film goes black at times and when you can see the picture, it's like watching it through a coffee filter.

I guess the only saving grace of the film was getting to cheer the opening credits when Joseph Lai's name came up. Yes, the same man who brought to you a monkey punching a snake! Unfortunately I still have yet to find the rest of his animated films even though I have heard they have been released.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD, Hong Kong, Kung Fu

Sailor Suit and Machine Gun: This movie illustrates why I should never buy a movie based on its title. Sure this movie did have a girl in a sailor suit and indeed there were machine guns, but there was also a lot of bland boring bits which made the film completely boring.

The film is about a guy girl who, after recently being orphaned, finds out her father ran a gang and she is now the new head of things. While this is a decent enough setup, it just never went anywhere that I wouldve taken it. I was expecting some form of satire due to the absurdity of a young girl running a big gang but it ends up being one big boring drama which I admit I found myself dozing through.

Skip it.

Labels: Bad Movies, Japanese, Live Action

Legend of the Eight Samurai: If there ever was a movie that Mystery Science Theater missed, it was this one. It has all the elements of a good MST movie. First it has incredibly cheesy dubbing. Secondly it has over the top sets and characters. Most of all it appears to be a film made by people who had absolutely no idea what in the hell they were doing.

This movie is about a princess whose family was wiped out by a crazy woman and a samurai who bears a resemblance to a bad Elvis impersonator and their legions of bad guys. Apparently 100 years before the movie a princess married a dog (or something) and she ended up shooting out these glowing crystals which would give rise to the eight samurai who would be able to save her.

On the bright side, this film does have Sonny Chiba, some generally laugh out loud unintentionally funny moments. The music is also pretty nifty and it does have that aura of late 70s early 80s when Japanese pop-culture was really at its strangest.

Still, when I give up on a movie half way through, that's usually a sign that the film is crap. Save your dollar.

Labels: Bad Movies, Dollar DVD, Japanese

Hercules Against the Moon Men: Take one crazy bit of Greek mythology and add in an Italian crew, mix in some crazy dubbing and a bit of science fiction and you end up with, well, a mess.

As I remember hearing somewhere, Italian cinema ran on fads and the "sword and sandal" fan ran for quite some time with many crappy films being exported all over the world. Of course, after this fad died down the more fondly remembered "Spaghetti Western" boom would begin.

Anyways, there's not much worth saying about this film except it is dull and uninteresting. Check out the MST3K version as it is at least watchable.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

Bruce Lee: The Man, The Myth / Prisoner of Five Boulders: EastWest, our favorite dollar DVD company released yet another disc of kung fu movies of questionable legality. We get an interesting mix here but nothing special.

Bruce Lee: The Man, The Myth is a highly fictionalized account of his life and death starring Bruce Li. The film is rather dull and I found myself dozing off quite a bit.

Prisoner of Five boulders is another of the Mainland Chinese features that somehow got in the hands of some pranksters with a dubbing studio. The origin of the dubs on this is somewhat of a mystery but it is quite obvious they tried to follow in the footsteps of Woody Allen with his famous, "What's Up Tiger Lily?" and the old Pete Smith comedies. The problem is, this dub made me smirk a bit but it had no quotable lines and outside of hearing the emperor sing "Like a Virgin" I can't really remember anything happening in the film that was particularly funny.

When you spend a dollar on crap, you should expect nothing more.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD, Kung Fu

My Lucky Star: It's a Feng Shui battle of the ages with Tony Leung and Miriam Yeung battling a numerologist, Chapman To and Teresa Caprio in a battle of luck vs. luck. This movie also generated another battle for me, namely to stay awake.

Miriam Yeung stars as a girl with extraordinary bad luck. This is, as the amusing prologue tells us, due to the breaking of her family luck by one of the ancestors of Tony Leung. Tony plays a feng shui expert who gets large amounts of money for his services and decides to help Miriam. It turns out, however, that her bad luck is not solely due to her family history but it is aided by a grudge that her stepmother has even enlisted the services of a numerologist. It all gets weird from there and there's not much that I can figure out.

This film was supposed to be silly and fluffy. It ended up rather stupid and annoying. Pass on this one if you can.

Labels: Bad Movies, Comedy, Hong Kong

The Attractive One: Here we have a romantic comedy starring some bankable stars from Hong Kong to basically look cute and say some cute things and then we all walk away happy. It should be standard fluff from Hong Kong where I expect mediocrity and accept it with open arms. Somehow in the normal scheme of things, something went awry in that we have one of the most boring pictures in a while.

Instead of concentrating on the terrible I feel it my duty to at least point out some of the merits of this film and I suppose eye candy is the first I should mention. Joey Yung Tso-Yi is cute enough although Yumiko Cheng Hei-Yi is perhaps a bit more desirable to the eyes. Also Lau Ching Wan is at least fun to watch although he is nowhere near his usual entertaining self.

So yeah, this film might entertain someone but that person probably enjoys a lot
of other activities too boring for the average person.

Labels: Bad Movies, Comedy, Hong Kong, Romance

Protégé de la Rose Noire: Ever see a film so inept and so stupid that you can hardly stand it? Despite hearing numerous poor reviews and knowing how the central actors, Ekin Cheng and Twins Gil and Charlene, being particularly poor actors. Perhaps I am still giving them all credit for Twins Effect or perhaps the brutal sting of My Wife is 18 has not yet wore off. Either way, I dropped the cash on this piece of junk.

I guess I should comment on the good before I totally trash it. Some of the singing was amusing and the Drunken Master parody made me smirk a bit. I suppose that Ekin Cheng dressed ike Robin (from Batman) was supposed to be funny but it was more weird and bizarre than entertaining. However I found myself fast forwarding through most of it which is not something you really should ever do with a movie.

Labels: Bad Movies, Crap, Hong Kong

Since my internet went out last night, I went and watched a couple DVDs, although I only finished one. So this was watched yesterday, not today.

Gettysburg: Three Days Of Destiny: The Civil War was a war which took place from 1861 until 1865. It was a war which changed the lives of everyone involved and affects the lives of those who came after. Some are inspired enough to write books and study it. Other people love to show their commitment by going to the battlefields and reenacting the events. Others like to make movies. This last one is fine if you are Ronald F. Maxwell. When you are a hobbiest or a reenactor, please conside yourself officially out of your league.

I admire that these guys tried to make a movie. I also admire the fact that they take history so seriously. What is unfortunate is the fact that they have no acting skills whatsoever and it is this which makes this film unwatchable. I literally gave up after the first fifteen minutes. It's not putrid; it's just boring.

Labels: Bad Movies, Civil War

Drive In Double Feature: Prince of Space + Invasion of the Neptune Men: Did you ever have a DVD release you anticipated so much and when you finally got it, you were immensely disappointed? That was, I'm afraid, the case with this. It had great promise and yet failed due to a mishandling of the source material.

The films are familiar to MST3K fans everywhere. They are basically two of the many films that popped up in Japan as a response to the Starman films. While they are indeed watchable if you like that sort of campy action, the films were presented in a fake widescreen format they were never intended to be shown in. In the case of both films, they chopped the top and bottom off to make a fake widescreen print. The saddest to come out of this was Neptune Men which was shot as a 2.35:1 "scope" film and was reduced to pan & scan and then chopped. Oh well, at least I have my Japanese laserdisc for that one, but Prince of Space is not available anywhere.

Labels: Bad Movies, Japanese, sci-fi

Jack Frost: During the days of the Cold War very little traveled between the US and Russia outside of threats of mutually assured destruction and the like. With Communism reigning and Lenin and Stalin sticking with the belief that "Religion is opium to the people" made strides to erase Christmas (and Christianity) from the USSR. To do this, they used the character of Father Frost, a sort of Russian Santa, and moved his day of giving presents to the religiously neutral December 31st. And so as Americans were watching their Christmas movies, the Russians were watching their movie on Father Frost day.

The Russians got cheated. While we in America got such classics as Miracle on 34th Street, the Communists got this train wreck. While one may argue that we got turkeys like Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, this film makes that look like a masterpiece.

So what is so bad about it? Well for one the story makes absolutely no sense at all. There is a cute girl named Nastenka who is being tormented by her stepmother and stepsister. She meets the braggart Ivan who, after forgetting to thank a mushroom man, gets turned into a bear and has to do a good deed. If all that sounds bizarre, it gets worse. There's a witch who lives in a house which has chicken feet and a group of dwarfs who sit in the forest pulling petals from flowers and robbing people. Of course we mustn't forget Grandfather Frost, our title character.

Actually, I would like to forget him and especially forget this film. I had seen it on Mystery Science Theater and bought it for a buck for that reason. I hadn't seen the episode in years but now that I've seen it without them, I don't know that I do anymore.

I see that Amazon has a more expensive version available. Either this thing is public domain or EastWest could be in trouble, which is no surprise. I can't imagine anyone besides me paying a dollar for it let alone 17! Avoid this film unless you are a masochist for bad movies.

Note: I got some of the information on Father Frost from various sources online. Most notable are: Wikipedia, Time and Sacred Texts

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

The Splendor of Youth: Whenever I feel down and out and I need a pick me up, I can usually count on an M. P. & G. I film to cheer me up. However, from the moment this film started, I could tell that something was different.

While the standard M. P. & G. I. film was a light hearted modern musical, this film is a heavy melodrama. Now some melodrama can at least be entertaining like Father Takes a Bride but this one felt more like a cross between a Greek tragedy and Sex Madness.

The plot is about a girl, Miss Han, who moves in with her friend Danni so she can continue her studies. Danni's mother seems eager to get her into the parties but Danni insists over and over that she not be a part of it. Of course the parties are a front for it being a sort of club where the girls of the family are essentially sold to various men. In the end we are given a stern lesson on morality and the good guys do walk away but with some serious scars.

Perhaps this film was intended to be a sort of moral play for the audience of its time to be wary and avoid such shady activity and to not let your reputation be damaged by getting in with the wrong crowd. I suppose had I watched it as a sort of moral play, I may have seen it in a different light but for now, I can't recommend this film to anyone.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cathay, Hong Kong

Dinosaur Island / Globehunters: It came again from the Bargain Bin! More accurately the clearance bin from Wal*Mart where I picked up this double feature cartoon DVD brought to us from the folks at DIC.

Dinosaur Island was the main bit of interest for me on this disc. This direct-to-DVD movie is about four teenagers who are supposed to be in a sort of Survivor television show and end up crashing on a mesa covered with dinosaurs. The Lost World angle is strong and thus in some ways its hard to separate it from the classic story. In the end, however, it falls up short on the enjoyment scale and its runtime of 80 minutes is pretty much the maximum they could've done, although the ending did seem a bit rushed.

All in all, it's mediocre but not bad.

Globehunters on the other hand was rather boring and I gave up watching after about 15 minutes.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cartoons, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

The White Gorilla/Bela Lugosi Meets A Brooklyn Gorilla: More dollar DVD goodness from PC Treasures. This Target find features what can best be describe, as my Dad put it, a unique film. I had a better term for it: CRAP!

The White Gorilla has Ray "Crash" Corrigan starring in a film which is essentially a narrated silent film. When Crash tells the story of what happened to him, he basically makes it appear that he was a coward who watched the hero rescue the girl time and time again. This was because clips of him peeking out of a bush were clumsily edited into stock footage from a 1927 serial Perils of the Jungle. Despite 18 years between the two films the people who made White Gorilla thought we wouldn't notice or care, I suppose.

Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla is another story. That film is a blast! Too bad the print on this DVD is unwatchable. Pick up the Alpha Video release like I have or the Digiview release which my brother bought for $1 and enjoys quite a bit. An interesting bit of trivia has this film under the name "The Boys from Brooklyn" so if you collect different prints of Public Domain films, there you go.

Sadly, I have absolutely no reason to recommend this disc at all. Save your dollar or buy some Snickers bars or something.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, Dollar DVD

Devil Doll: Of all the DVDs that have been on my backlog for years this one is probably the disc that bothered me the most. Devil Doll has sat there on my shelf for almost four years. I guess the reason it stayed there was my love for the MST3K film and how for some reason I knew I would laugh my way through this over the top British horror movie. Of course, that is what happened; I laughed and I laughed. Still, I do love this movie for all its cheesiness and do recommend the MST3K version first but this one stands well on its own.

The DVD features two versions of the film and I believe each had footage the other didn't. In the "continental version" which I assume was for general European (non UK) release, there was a topless dancer in Varelli's act. Not much to get excited over, though. She's not exactly Louise English.

Ah, ham! I love it. I also love that my backlog is now 181!

Labels: Bad Movies, Horror

Assignment: Outer Space: Back in the 50s until about the 70s, cheap foreign sci-fi films somehow made their way to the US in the form of dubbed features that were released either to theaters for the drive-in or rundown theater circuit. According to the imdb, this film was released as a triple bill to theaters with First Spaceship on Venus and The Mysterians. This one is closer to the crap of First Spaceship as opposed to the watchable film of The Mysterians.

This film has a rather infamous scene in it where a spaceship crashes and stock footage of an explosion is inserted rather clumsily in that it plainly shows a car blowing up on a street. Apparently the cheesy special effects department ran out of models to explode. Of course, I wouldn't expect much from a director who has such credits as "Cannibal Apocalypse" under his belt.

By the way, I think Paul Frees was doing some of the voices but I was falling asleep (dare I say, 'spacing out') during most of the movie.

To end this otherwise dull and depressing blog post on a high note, I will give a sort of fond memoir for Alpha Video. I remember when my brother and I first found them at DVDEmpire for $3.60 and we bought a ton of them. It was as if they couldn't get any cheaper. Yet the dollar DVDs came and they have all but disappeared from store shelves. Ironically when I got this one at the dollar store, it was a "cut out" as if it was a real DVD release. They are still around and all and even have some exclusive titles, you just don't see them in the bins at FYE and such anymore. Honestly though, the only thing Alpha ever had going for them was their covers. They at least tried where others do not.

Labels: Bad Movies, Cheap DVDs, sci-fi