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A JOHN WAYNE WESTERN
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DEAD ON ARRIVAL
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3 NINJAS DEMO TAPE
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FAST CARS AND BEAUTIFUL WOMEN - SUBMITTED BY RYAN GELATIN
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ALTERED STATE
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SATURDAY MORNING CARTOONS GREATEST HITS WITH DREW BARRYMORE
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THE WIZARD OF SPEED AND TIME - SUBMITTED BY GEMIE FORD
REVIEW OF THE WIZARD OF SPEED AND TIME - FROM BADMOVIES.ORG
What if your whole life was a special effect? I don't mean fake, I mean things happening around you which would dumbfound the casual observer. Anger causing light to flash across your eyes, objects bounding into the air at the beckoning of a finger, and any number of other unexpected occurrences. Such is the life of Mike Jittlov.
People familiar with the original "Wizard of Speed and Time" short know to expect energy. Insane and completely unpredictable energy; the sort of thing that makes women with short hair kicking and punching seem lazy in comparison. That short is probably the most fun you can pack into five minutes without succumbing to the White Witch and her delicious Turkish Delight. Plus, unlike the eldritch confection, it is unlikely to result in the slaying of lions or breaking of stone tables. You can see some excerpts from the short (and others) contained in this feature film, but the ending is actually a remake.
So what is the movie about? It's the ordeals suffered by Jittlov during his quest to break into film. We get the idea that a hateful bureaucracy has grown up around America's entertainment industry. Obviously the main character, also the writer and director, has had unpleasant experiences with the guild masters. At times the message gets a little on the preachy side, like people constantly wanting to see union credentials.
Mike finally finds a partially open door when Straeker sees his work. The two executives are putting together a special about effects and one of the Wizard's energetic pieces would be perfect. That's what the good suit thinks anyway. Harry is another issue, he despises anyone without the proper pedigree and only agrees when a gentleman's wager is tabled on the outcome by Straeker. With enough at stake to purchase a nice car (for us working class people) the evil producer's goal shifts from making an enjoyable presentation to ruining Jittlov's efforts.
Creating anything costs money and, having been denied an advance funding account, the two friends hold a garage sale to raise funds for the short. Even the wondrous bicycle that Mike built is sold off. Sorry to see that piece of machinery go; not only did it have the best ball bearings ever made, it had a great anti-theft system. Crooks grabbing the handlebars would find themselves the generous recipients of paralyzing electric current. No amps, but enough volts to make you do the funky chicken.
The friends hurdle obstacle after obstacle and are joined by the irrepressible Cindy after Mike meets her jogging. I mean that she was the one jogging; he was sitting on a bench acting himself, which is to say eccentric. Harvey drops by during the process and is greatly impressed by the work completed, but freaks out after seeing the studio. All those dancing tripods and shining film cans are being animated in the Wizard's garage! It causes a major spectacle when the toys, sensing evil, attack the fleeing jerk.
One point comes to mind here: who cares how something is made so long as the result is good? Beyond "necessary evils" of course. Grinding up kittens to use in your film stock is reprehensible, even if the result is fantastic. Not that "Citizen Kane" contains any kitty meal... ...though there is that one scene with the mysterious whisker shaped defect. No, the film is honestly made - even if the electricity used falls into a gray area. Is it a bad thing when the city runs power lines under your lawn and attaching alligator clips to the flowers will power a studio full of lights?
Harvey becomes desperate to stop "The Wizard of Speed and Time" from being completed; so much that he pays a pair of inept thugs to kidnap the man. They up the ante after stealing a police car, but didn't count on it being a K-9 unit. Okay, two goofballs with a very PO'd German shepherd in the back seat. They appease the working dog with prodigious amounts of fast food burritos. That's a mistake, because the pooch is twice as disagreeable upon waking from its post-digestive holocaust slumber. Needless to say, don't feed stuff like that to a dog with extensive training in biting the heck out of people.
Who can stop that Wizard of Speed and Time? Certainly not a producer and his minions; everything is going to be just fine. The good guy will win the girl and bad people get their just desserts. And it all happens so fast!
Little things make this movie fun, like seeing the table where so many of the effects were created and even Jittlov working on them. The little cleaning robot that looks like a backhoe or something (heck, it's made of Lego, who knows what it is) was a nice touch. I want one
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TERMINAL FORCE
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CIRCUITRY MAN 2 - SUBMITTED BY GEMIE FORD
REVIEW OF CIRCUITRY MAN 2 - FROM THEONELINER.COM
Released in 1994, certified UK-18. Reviewed on 22 Apr 2003 by Scott Morris
Vernon Wells you may remember as the unwittingly hilarious Bennett from Commando. Here, having seemingly eaten a whale in the intervening time he assumes the role of Plughead, a cyborg type fellow who is inexplicably addicted to other people's pain, extracting said feeling by use of some low-tech torture machines and then laughing maniacally. In a seemingly unrelated plot strand, he has created a chip which when plugged into a common or garden human extends their life by ten years.
Clearly this cannot be allowed to continue, so government agent Kyle enlists the help of Danner, the Circuitry Man to stop what turns out to be an evil plan to control the minds of humans everywhere. In a seemingly unrelated plot strand, two bumbling cops fly around randomly in a prototype land speeder thing in search of something, presumably. In a seemingly unrelated plot strand Plughead bribes and blackmails Traci Lords to continue making the life-extending chips. In a seemingly unrelated plot strand two convicts escape from their captors and stumble off towards Plughead's Brazilian lair. They all join up at the end so at least they can stagger around unrelatedly in the same shot. Meanwhile, a falling safe crushes a guard. No, seriously. Can this movie overcome abysmal acting, a script that isn't even worthy of ridicule, and special effects that Ed Wood would wrinkle his nose in disgust over to become greater than the sum of it's parts?
No, it's bloody awful.
I prefer to think of this more as an elaborate practical joke than a film, or at least an experiment into how bad a film can get before the celluloid it's printed on gets too embarrassed and self-ignites. It's rare that there is absolutely nothing positive to say about a movie, but this is truly a benchmark in awfulness. It isn't even fun to dissect and poke fun at, unlike Cyber Tracker.
I hope everyone involved in this movie feels ashamed and dirty. This is the cinematic equivalent of a sharp kick in the balls but with more pain and less swelling, although the scars remain for so much longer. This film will haunt the viewer for years after the credits roll, taunting them with it's ludicrous, ill-defined plot and almost indescribable stench of abject failure to do anything right. The Holocaust was less upsetting than this film.
Were I in the business of passing quantifiable judgements, this would make me give up. As I'm not, it can only get a big fat 0/5 Tippymarks which is so much more than it deserves. I'm going to kill myself now. Death is the only true release from this nightmare.
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THE GREATEST ADVENTURE OF THE BIBLE : THE EASTER STORY
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KILLER ALIEN
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TIDAL WAVE : NO ESCAPE - SUBMITTED BY GEMIE FORD
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BRAIN OF BLOOD
REVIEW OF BRAIN OF BLOOD - FROM ESPLATTER.COM
A masterpiece of incredibly inept filmmaking, "Brain of Blood" opens up with what is obviously a postcard of a Middle Eastern palace (the people shown in the image are frozen in time), to show us a dying Arab leader. His followers decide to transplant the dictator's brain into a new body—that of a hulking monster! His body, wrapped in tinfoil, is transported to a doctor (Williams) in the U.S.
Stunningly bad acting, hilarious stock horror movie music, a midget medical assistant (who torments women in a dungeon during his spare time) and unbelievable special effects make this an almost-classic that has to be seen to be believed.
The inept, oat-meal-like monster make-up effects are also a riot. Despite the almost total lack of prosthetic technology, the film managed to pull off a mildly gruesome brain transplant scene. Not as funny as some of Adamson's other works—or most of the material cranked out by Herschell Gordon Lewis ("Blood Feast"). But it's nonetheless a great bad-movie.
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MACHISMO
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VHS MOVIE REVIEW : THE NEST (1987)
First, a word of warning: If the sight of cockroaches (lots of 'em) makes you queasy, it's best if you avoid this film. It's almost tourist season and the island town of Northport is having a deadly insect problem, thanks to some unscrupulous experiments being performed there by biotech firm Intech, under the watchful eye of local bigshot, Mayor Elias Johnson (Robert Lansing). Sheriff Richard Tarbell (Franc Luz; GHOST TOWN - 1988) is starting to get some strange reports, like a dog being slaughtered and stripped of it's flesh and all the books in the local library having the glue in their bindings eaten away in one night. It becomes apparent that a mutant strain of cockroaches are to blame, but why are they loose on this island? Complicating matters for Richard is the sudden arrival of Mayor Johnson's daughter, Elizabeth (Lisa Langlois; DEADLY EYES - 1982), who use to be engaged to Richard before she left the island unannounced a couple of years earlier after the death of her mother. Intech sends scientist Dr. Morgan Hubbard (Terri Treas; THE TERROR WITHIN - 1989) to do an autopsy on the dead dog, but Richard smells a rat after watching Mayor Johnson and Dr. Hubbard working so closely together, like they have handled this same type of situation previously. He's right, of course, as Intech is fully aware of the cockroach problem because they are responsible for the infestation. With the arrival of his daughter on the island and her life threatened by the onslaught of roaches, Mayor Johnson has a sudden change of heart and wants to evacuate everyone off the island, but Dr. Hubbard talks him out of it, telling him she can rid the island of the cockroaches in twenty-four hours using a new poison. He shouldn't have listened to her. It's not long before the flesh-hungry roaches begin devouring the occupants of the island, beginning with Shakey Jake (Jack Collins), the father of Richard's new girlfriend, Lillian (Nancy Morgan), who runs the local diner. Elizabeth stupidly treks out alone on a nostalgic trip through the island's cave system, but she is nearly eaten alive by a swarm of cockroaches after discovering some huge roach cocoons and timebombs (with the Intech logo on them!) in the caves. Richard resigns his post as sheriff when Mayor Johnson orders him to stay away from the caves and it's not long before the entire island is overrun with killer cockroaches. As we will soon find out, these are no ordinary cockroaches. They assimilate everything they eat and their goal is to mate with the human species, producing the first human/roach hybrid. Imagine how difficult it will be to exterminate this new species. They're going to need one big-assed can of Raid (but I guess those timebombs in the caves will do in a pinch)! This creepy and effective low-budget horror film from Roger Corman's Concorde Pictures (it's probably their best 80's horror flick) is full of goosebump-inducing scenes of cockroaches attacking, crawling and swarming over humans. For anyone who has ever had a roach problem, this film should hit right where it hurts. While I never had to deal with an infestation as bad as in this film, I once had a problem with those cagey buggers in my apartment after pulling some boxes out of a storage locker and bringing them home, accidentally setting loose about thirty cockroaches. These fuckers were so big, they scared the shit out of my cats and were nearly impossible to kill. To prove my point, I caught one and put it in an empty mayonnaise jar. The damned thing lived for over two months with no food, water or air. I finally had to call an exterminator to get rid of the pests before they reproduced and overran my apartment. THE NEST plays on these fears and does it with a good amount of atmosphere, not to mention some pretty good gore set-pieces, including Robert Lansing's (SCALPEL - 1976; EMPIRE OF THE ANTS - 1977) transformation into an uber-roach. My favorite scene has nothing to do with gore, though. It's when Richard finds Lillian frozen to death in her diner's freezer. Her only escape from the onslaught of roaches was to hide in her freezer, yet she still paid for it with her life. If watching someone unwittingly drinking a cup of coffee with a roach in it or chewing into a juicy steak covered with the little (and not-so-little) insects makes you squeamish, I would advise that you stay away from this film. But, if you like gory horror flicks and are not bothered by the sight of creepy crawlers creeping and crawling over a cast of brave actors, this film should be a treat. Directed efficiently by Terence Winkless (BLOODFIST - 1989; RAGE AND HONOR - 1992) and scripted by Robert King (SILK 2 - 1989; PHANTOM OF THE MALL: ERIC'S REVENGE - 1988). Also starring Stephen Davies, Diana Bellamy, Jeff Winkless, Steve Tannen and Heidi Helmer. Other films containing hordes of killer cockroaches includes DAMNATION ALLEY (1977), CREEPSHOW (1982), THEY NEST (2000), THEY CRAWL (2001) and the comedy JOE'S APARTMENT (1996). Originally released on VHS by MGM/UA Home Video and later released on VHS & DVD by New Horizons Home Video. Rated R. { text from critcononline.com }
VHS MOVIE REVIEW : NEW YEAR'S EVIL (1980)
Radio personality Diane Sullivan (Roz Kelly), who uses the on-air moniker "Blaze", is hosting a live televised punk rock New Year's Eve music countdown in L.A., when she gets a call from someone named "Evil" (he uses a voice-disguising gadget) who tells her that he is going to kill someone at the strike of midnight on each of the U.S. time zones. Blaze asks Lt. Clayton (Chris Wallace) to protect her and he sets up a phone tap. Meanwhile, someone has killed Blaze's assistant before the show and her son Derek (Grant Cramer) is having bad headaches. As the clock strikes midnight in New York (EST), Evil (disguised as an orderly) kills a nurse at the Crawford Sanitarium and records the murder on a cassette tape. He then calls Blaze, plays the tape and tells her he will kill again in an hour, when the clock strikes twelve in Chicago (CST). Evil slaps on a fake moustache and a polyester suit and goes to a disco. He picks up two women and tells them that they are going to a "party at Erik Estrada's pad". He stops at a liquor store, sends one girl inside for champagne and suffocates the other girl with a plastic bag over her head and kills the other girl in a dumpster as the clock hits midnight in Chicago. He records both murders and calls Blaze, telling her he will be killing again when the clock strikes twelve in Aspen, Colorado (MST). Dressed as a priest, Evil has a close call with a pack of bikers at a drive-in (where a trailer for Cannon Film's BLOOD FEAST/BLOOD BATH double feature is playing) and steals a car with a half-naked teenage girl in the back. She manages to get away and he chases her into a stadium, but a cop intervenes before he is able to kill her. Back at the studio, Derek is walking around in the shadows with a red stocking over his face, looking like some perverted rapist. Evil knocks out a cop, steals his uniform and enters the heavily-guarded studio. It's at this time we find out that Evil is actually Blaze's husband Richard (Kip Niven) and what his motivations for the killings were. He was an ex-patient at the Crawford Sanitarium and he's not too happy about the way she's treating their son (truth be told, she is a pretty shitty mother). I know it makes no sense, but that's the best explanation you're gonna get. In the finale, as Richard sets up his wife to take a big fall (he takes one instead), we learn that old saying, "Like Father, Like Son" couldn't be truer. Directed without much verve by Emmett Alston (DEMONWARP - 1988), this film could pass for a TV movie if it weren't for the infrequent gore and nudity. It's also kind of hard to root for Blaze when Roz Kelly plays her as such an insufferable, uncaring manipulative bitch. At the end of the film, you kind of hope Richard does her in. When he puts a chain around her neck and handcuffs her to the undercarriage of an elevator and sends her for a ride up and down the shaft, you'll hope she ends up crushed when she reaches the basement. Unfortunately, it doesn't happen, but there's still hope as the film fades to black (seems we all forgot that Hawaii has a separate time zone, too). Not very bloody or exciting, scripter Leonard Neubauer does throw in a few funny lines, such as when one of the disco chicks says to the other as she is spouting the benefits of transcendental meditation to Richard while they are in the car: 'Whatever comes into your head comes right out your mouth!" It's hard to believe that, for a four hour live show, only two bands would play ("Shadow" and "Made In Japan") and their playlist would consist of five songs total (and not very good songs at that). Even if it were a free show, I would demand something back. NEW YEAR'S EVIL is a pretty poor slasher flick that copies some of Harry Manfredini's cues from FRIDAY THE 13TH, made the same year. Emmett Alston would also later go on to write the screenplay for the much-superior HUNTER'S BLOOD (1987). Watch that instead. Produced by Cannon Films founders Yoram Globus and Menahem Golan. Also starring Louisa Moritz, Jed Mills, Taaffe O'Connell, Teri Copley and John Alderman. Originally released on VHS by Paragon Video and later by Cannon Video (through Warner Bros). No legal DVD release in the States yet. Rated R. { text from critcononline.com }
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