Punk Rock aka Teenage Runaways

I love 70’s/early 80’s pornography. It’s just awesome, seeing this stuff being filmed on 16/35mm stock gives it a real air of authenticity. Not that there’s anything wrong with watching the newer gonzo stuff, but the gonzo stuff is more for private moments. These I can actually share with a girlfriend and give her the excuse that we’re watching something artistic…. That is, if I had a girlfriend. Plus, there’s a real air of sleaze to the proceedings, not to mention really nice, bouncy breasts and more body hair tan a chipmunk and women with more hair on their vaginas than I do on my hair. It’s excellent. This film involves a private dick named Jimmy Dillinger (Wade Nichols) who gets himself framed and his young lover kidnapped. So he goes after her in the grimy streets of New York, and gets himself mixed up with the oh-so-dangerous punk rock scene, which is there solely to kidnap young girls, get hooked on drugs and sell them into white slavery. Weird, I was a part of the PR punk (and metal) scene for the longest time and I never heard of any white slavery rings. Yes, this movie isn’t exactly made to be an exact account of the punk rock scene in New York. In fact, there are no punk rock bands on the movie. There is one called The Squirrels who wear platform shoes and look like members of the Bay City Rollers. And the music? Forget it. The cast in the film is pretty good. Wade Nichols is surprisingly funny and realistic, and his NY accent is cool. We also get Robert Kerman (from Cannibal Holocaust) playing a police detective who really hates our hero Dillinger. And last but not least, I’d like to talk about the cute Jean Sanders, who plays Nan. She’s cute and very young looking, and her fucking talents are excellent. Hell, the best sex scenes in the movie are the ones that involve her, the others are pretty forgettable (even the pinball one). This is her only credit on IMDB, which is sad because I would love to see her fucking in other movies. This film was directed by the great Carter Stevens, who made such classics as Bizarre Styles and my personal favorite, Teenage Twins (featuring real twin sisters, yum!). This is a pretty damn good, funny porno film with a lot of great sex and a surprisingly good script. Make sure you hunt down the 77 minute porno version, you won’t be disappointed.

A drunken sea captain (Timothy Buttons) loses a boat (and a couple of crew members) to a gigantic sea snake, who we find out at the beginning of the film that it was created by a nuclear explosion. Or was it woken up from the deep? Who knows, they don’t explain. So he’s accused of drinking on the job, but another person witnesses the snake (Taryn Power), so he decides to unite with her by making her escape from a mental hospital. With the help of some dinosaur expert played by Ray Milland, they decide to go on a manhunt to kill the giant serpent.
I don’t know about this movie, man. It’s given me something of a bad taste in my mouth, but I can’t say I completely hate it either. It was directed by Amando De Ossorio, a really talented filmmaker from Spain who made the great Blind Dead films and The Lorelei’s Grasp, which I love as well even though so many people say it’s crap. But this movie… I dunno. I guess I was hoping for something very atmospheric like the previously mentioned films, but nope, not in here. We get a Japanese-style monster movie, but it’s script doesn’t really make sense. I already mentioned the dubious origins of the sea monster, but the thing that really peeves me about the story is that it has the most ludicrous coincidences in the history of cinema. Our ‘hero’ is accused of driving a ship while drunk and sentenced to jail, but he goes walking scott-free right after his sentencing. This is a dubbed version, did I miss something? Then he helps the nutty girl escape, right in front of a horny orderly who recognizes the girl only after she’s inside an elevator. Then they return to a hospital (!) to talk to another survivor. You’d think there’d be security ready to see two excons hanging around, but I guess not.
Now, the film has a very talented task. Timothy Buttons is a great actor who appeared in the great Last Picture Show, and Ray Milland has appeared in hundreds of films, many of them classics like The Lost Weekend, Dial M For Murder and The Thing With Two Heads, although sadly his behavior is similar to his character in The Lost Weekend, slurring and almost falling over thanks to what looks like an over-use of the sauce. But the best performance is given by the Sea Serpent itself, a sock puppet modified by special makeup that makes Reptilicus look like the beast from Cloverfield. So those are my two cents on this, De Ossorio’s weird bastard child. I didn’t love it, I didn’t hate it, but it’s still a lot of fun…. If you’re high.

The Alien Factor

When I first started this blog in 2009, one of the first films I reviewed was a documentary on the life of backyard filmmaker Don Dohler from Baltimore, a guy who made no-budget monster movies until his death from cancer. That documentary meant a lot to me, since I was a big fan of Dohler and his flicks, especially his earlier ones. I decided to finally give him his dues and review my favorite movie of his, the underappreciated classic known as The Alien Factor. Our story involves a trio of aliens, two bad and one good, who crash-land on a small town and cause havoc wherever they go. It’s up to the police department, and a mysterious scientist, to help them stop the evil aliens and get to the bottom of what’s going on. That’s the whole movie in a nutshell, ladies and gents, and it’s more than enough. The script is an obvious tribute to the 50’s monster movies that Dohler loved so much, with your law-abiding heroes and police officer heroes, supporting characters from all over the town and of course, the aliens themselves. The three aliens are different but they’re very interesting. The first one, the good one, is just a guy wearing some kind of monster suit and jeans. It looks pretty cool. The second one is the giant, a dude wearing another cool monster suit but with legs so long it’s obvious he’s wearing some stilts. Every time I see him I giggle, although I also worry since it looks like he’s about to fall at any minute. The third one is stop-motion, a creature that looks like the gecko from the Geico commercials, only full of steroids. Now, to be fair, the movie isn’t a perfect one. The acting is atrocious for the most part, and Tom Griffith makes the most unconvincing hero in film history (although he got worse in the ‘sequel’, NightBeast). Also, the effects aren’t that convincing, particularly the stop-motion one which looks like a dissolve effect. Still, they look great, and this movie has more heart and energy than any big budget science fiction piece of shit any day. I’ll take this movie over 2001 A Space Odyssey and Transformers any day of the week. All hail Don Dohler!

Curse of the Vampires

The Philippines is not a place known for creating high cinematic art. Hell, every movie I’ve seen from there is an exploitation film, and for the most part, they’re the ‘so-bad-they’re-awesome’ kind. From low-rent monster movies to women in prison films, they seem to jump in on every genre, and I guess gothic horror is no exception. Taking it’s cues from the Hammer films, the story involves the Escodero family in Mexico, a family that is cursed with vampirism, particularly the mother. When the eldest son Eduardo (Eddie Garcia) gets himself infected, he decides to turn everyone in the house, including her sister, into vampires. Now it’s up to the ghost of Eduardo’s sister, Daniel Castillo (Romeo Vasquez) to destroy the curse. Only problem is, he’s a ghost! Yep, the plot sounds pretty ludicrous, doesn’t it? I mean, just when you realize you’re watching a Philippine movie that’s set in Mexico during the 1800’s, you already start feeling suspicious. But to my surprise, this is a very good, and very interesting old school kind of horror film. The best part of the film are the sets, which are very well designed and will remind everyone of the Roger Corman Poe films, particularly the later ones like The Terror and Tomb of Ligeia. The concept is also interesting, with a ghost fighting the undead, bringing a level or originality to the already tired vampire subgenre. There are a lot of interesting themes, like the honor of family, and the conflict between Catholicism and medicine, nothing new to vampire films I know, but still very interesting to watch. Now, this movie is not without it’s flaws. I can’t say anything about the acting because the version I’ve seen is dubbed, very badly I might add. I can still see that the acting is not very good, particularly Eddie Garcia who doesn’t make for a very convincing evil vampire. Christopher Lee he isn’t. Also, I know this probably shouldn’t bother me so much, but a lot of the cast members are Philippine women in blackface. All I could think of was “Minstrel show!” every time they showed up and it really took me out of the film. In the end, however, this is a very interesting, if flawed, gothic horror film and still comes with my recommendations.

Dynamite Brothers

Stud (Timothy Brown from MASH, of all places) and Larry Chin (Alan Tang) are a black guy and a Chinese guy that are paired together through a series of bad misunderstandings, mainly a Chinese crime syndicate (led by James Hong, from Big Trouble In Little China), a bunch of black criminals, and a corrupt cop (played by Aldo Ray) in one mish-mash of kung fu and blaxploitation that is so pointless it must be seen to be believed. Yes, this is the story of the Dynamite Brothers, also known among MST3K and Cinematic Titanic fans as East Meets Watts. I hate Al Adamson’s films. I’m just going to start off the review with that little bit of phrase. I’m pretty sure the guy was cool when you got to know him, but his movies are abominable. If you’ve ever seen his productions, you know what I mean. First the constant re-editing of Psycho A Go Go into Bloody Pit Of Horror into the Fiend with the Atom Brain and then to Fiend With The Electronic Brain, I mean how many versions of the same movie are you going to make? He also gave us Dracula Vs. Frankenstein, which has the worst Dracula in the history of film (and he has an afro). His movies are like 50’s cornball horror made in the 70’s for no reason or point other than to be outdated for the drive-ins. And hey, he made a fortune! This is one of the few movies of his I’ve seen that seem to be ‘current’, and by current I mean that they were made during the appropriate time. Like I said before, it mixes two popular types of films, with blaxploitation and martial arts. The problem is that the movie has no way of pulling it off in a competent manner. The movie begins as a new version of The Defiant Ones, with the two men going around handcuffed, jumping from one red pick-up truck to the next. Yes, there’s a lot of running around time used for padding in this movie, so get used to it. There are a lot of action scenes as well, but these go half and half. The traditional stuff is badly staged and so badly lit you can’t really tell what the hell is going on. However, the action stuff, performed by Bruce Lee’s action stunt team, is pretty damn good. Alan Tang is no stranger to kung fu flicks, and even looks a bit like Bruce Lee. But sadly, it’s not enough to salvage this film. It’s better than most of the Al Adamson films, and if you get drunk with a bunch of friends, you might get a kick out of it, but other than that, you’d be better off just watching a jackass video.

Syngenor

A company named Norton Cyberdine (yeah really original name there, dudes) have created the ultimate super soldier, the Syngenor (Synthetic Genetic Organsm), a creature that is perfect for surviving in desert enviroments. Sadly, these ‘ultimate soldiers’ are still uncontrolable, and when one of them escapes, things get pretty hairy for the company. Soon people start getting killed, and the people in the company start dying in violent ways, and not just from the beasts. It’s up to a reporter (Mitchell Lawrence) and a hot chick (Starr Andreff) to get to the bottom of it. This film was meant as a sequel to the 1980 William Malone film, Scared To Death, since it features the same monster. In truth, other than the monster, it has nothing to do with the original. It’s more of a cliched action/scifi monster film, with very little originality to be had. The acting, for the most part, is just terrible. It’s as cliched as it gets. The only exception is David Gale (Re-Animator, The Brain) who plays the boss of the building where these creatures are being created. For the first half of the film, he’s just an unstable, uncomfortable dude who keeps injecting himself with some green shit ala Re-Animator. But when the second half breaks in, the dude turns into a true psychopath, shouting and acting like a crazy buffoon, trying to protect the Syngenors. Gale really over-acts but seems to be having a ton of fun in the process. It reminds me of a crazy Vincent Price performance, only nuttier. The creature effects are also pretty good. They look like a more humanoid-like Gillman, but hey it’s not as good or as memorable as the Universal fishman. You’ll never be fooled as it being a man in a costume. They drink spinal fluid, which is kind of cool. What I was very disappointed about is that the film just doesn’t have the energy, nor the gore, of either Re-Animator or The Brain. I guess when I saw David Gale, I expected this film to be very crazy, but it just wasn’t. In fact, it gets kind of boring. There are sequences that are completely ripped off from Aliens, with a group of soldiers going after the Syngenors (In the worst soldier costumes in history). And the ending is just insane, with the Syngenor/girl hybrid and David Gale going to it like they're in love. Sadly it all ends in crap. So yes, the monsters and David Gale are all great, but this movie just isn’t. The script is weak, the pace is slow and there’s very little to recommend, other than the previously mentioned. Watch it with a buddy. Or drunk.
By the way, the Syngenor's only weakness is water. Do you think M. Night Shamalama-ding-dong saw this while writing Signs? I think he did. This is better than Signs though, sad but true.

Shockheaded

Noble (Jason Mauer) is a private investigator that is hired by a weirdo-looking pale man to look for a particular girl who has been appearing in weird, secret signal pornographic videos that have been appearing on secret signals across television. As Noble investigates, he gets himself involved with a weird pornographic company, sex clubs, and slowly becomes obsessed with the girl in the video (played by the beautiful and talented Debbie Rochon). Soon, he will know the secret that plagues the video, and his nightmares, and it ain’t gonna be pretty.
This movie was written and directed by Eric Thornett, one of the most interesting filmmakers in the indie horror scene right now, and this is probably his most interesting film. It’s a part of the ‘snuff’ subgenre of cinema, a kind of horror movie that was first begun by Peeping Tom in 1960 by Michael Powell. The script is clever and has a lot of surreal mystery. You really never know what the hell is going on for a lot of the film, almost like you have walked into a different world. It’s obvious that Thornett is a big fan of Cronenberg, as the plot has elements of Videodrome (the secret snuff channel), and David Lynch as well, particularly lost Highway, like the creepy pale guy and the white-masked slasher looking dude. Hey I don’t blame him, these are the best films by both directors and it’s great to see the influence. The movie also plays a little like Angel Heart, particularly with the way the main actor behaves. Sadly this movie isn’t without it’s flaws. With it’s creepy, film noir vibe also comes a very slow pace, and this wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t for the fact that the film needs some serious editing, especially after the reveal of the ‘snuff’ angle. After that particular revelation, you just don’t care about anything that happens next. Nothing has the impact, nor the strength. The acting isn’t very good either, although in her defense, Debbie Rochon delivers as usual, proving once again that she’s the best actress in indie horror today. I would love to work with her someday. So in conclusion, this is a pretty damn good film, especially considering it’s budgets. It proudly wears it’s influences on it’s sleeve, and has the potential to be creepy. I look forward to see more of Thornett’s work in the future

An American Hippie In Israel

Mike (Asher Tzarfati) is an American hippie, going around, bumming about the world trying to escape his nightmares from his time in Vietnam. He gets a ride from a pretty girl who wants to be a hippie, and soon they get together with other hippies to have a crazy commune. Sadly this commune doesn’t last long, as a duo of killer mimes in suits shoot the hippies down in a hail of gunfire. Mike, his girl and another couple survive, and together decide to go to an island where they can live their ‘totally free’ lifestyle. They get there and have paradise for the first night, but soon things go from bad to insane, and in less than a day the hippies begin to try to kill each other and act like cannibals. I first heard of this ‘masterpiece’ in 2002 when a trailer was included in the Grindhouse Releasing DVD of I Drink Your Blood. From the get-go, me and my friends were obsessed by it. It looked like such a wacko picture, like something that was too insane to be believed. I was finally able to hunt down a copy, and everything I believed was completely true. This is a grindhouse exploitation film that was produced in Israel, of all places. The screenplay obviously tries to make something in the veins of Easy Rider, trying to create a portrait of why the hippie lifestyle is destined to fail. The problem is, this film was made in 1972, so it’s outdated by two years before it even got the chance! So the film takes itself way too seriously, and this creates a wave of hilarity that it’s almost hard to believe. Even with its ‘message’, the movie doesn’t make a lick of sense. The previously-mentioned killer mimes are apparently a part of Mike The Hippie’s past, but we don’t really elaborate on it. I guess they’re supposed to be the angels of death or something, but who the fuck knows. Then there’s this weird dream sequence where our hero is running up a mountain with a giant hammer and starts smashing what look like humans with cassettes for heads, playing chess in a globe-shaped table. What the fuck? As you can imagine, nothing of this is explained, it’s just there to be weird and ‘psychedelic’. The third act, in the island, starts off normal, but gets nuttier by the second. For starters we get the fakest-looking sharks in the history of cinema. Even Bruno Mattei would spit at these things. Then there’s the sequence where Mike argues with his hippie friend, but nothing happens because the other guy can’t speak English. By the end they start behaving like animals and screaming and drooling, and I just gave up on this thing. It’s completely ludicrous but if you want a laugh, you should seek this out.

The Wind In The Willows

Ah, the Wind in the Willows, a classic children’s story first told by author Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. The most famous incarnation came from the late 40’s thanks to the Walt Disney Company, who released a double-feature film with The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow. But few people remember this animated film from the early 80’s, produced by Thames Television and using the process of stop-motion animation. Now, I never saw this film when I was a child, but I did see the long-running animated series, which was also in stop-motion, because they used to play it on PBS once a week.
The story is known to all who have read the book: It revolves around four friends: Mole, Rat, Badger, and the eccentric and wild Mr. Toad, who spends his time going from one obsession to another. When Toad gets himself arrested for stealing a motorboat (no kidding!), and the country weasels (who look like 50’s juvenile delinquents) crash on Toad Manor, Mr. Toad’s country estate. Toad is able to escape prison by dressing as a washing woman, and together the four friends go and have a fight with the weasels to take Toad Hall back. Yep, the story is very faithful to the original book, with its themes of English society permeating over to the countryside, from the point of view of the animals. The voice casting is great, particularly David Jason who plays Mr. Toad, and laughs just like Pee Wee Herman. But the main draw to the film is, of course, the stop-motion animation. It’s just awesome, being able to make the characters interesting to look at, while keeping a fantasy vibe intact. The best sequences involve the Weasels, particularly the three main scenes. When Mole gets lost in the woods, and later when they attack Badger in Toad Manor, the Weasels are made out to be really scary creatures, and they behave in an almost inhuman fashion. The way these movies are cut, with quick edits and claustrophobic close-ups and tilted shots, give the sequences real suspense and terror, and they’re pretty intense for a children’s film. The third sequence involves the third act itself, where our four animal friends fight against the weasels in Toad Manor. The animation is flawless, being as frantic and energetic as a cartoon, only with the stop-motion, it’s given a whole new dimension in awesomeness. Sadly, and this is going to piss off the arthouse types, I actually like the Disney version more. Not that this is a bad film by any means, it’s quite excellent. The problem is, I’ve never thought that the story lent itself to the long film format, I believe it works better as a short. The Disney film has great pacing, and sadly this movie does not, sometimes feeling like you’re being dragged on. The story of Wind In The Willows has been told and retold many times in film, sometimes even using live-action actors instead of animals. How boring. This is one of the best, and I recommend it for it’s great music, great voice acting and top-notch animation. I wish I had toys of these four characters.

RIP Jamie Gillis

Good night, you dark prince of porn, you!

For those who are uneducated, Jamie Gillis was simply the best actor in the history of classic pornography. He starred in such classics as Water Power (as the enema bandit!), Private Afternoons of Pamela Mann, The Defiance Of Good, The Story Of Joanna, The Opening Of Misty Beethoven (a personal favorite!), Barbara Broadcast, The Ecstasy Girls, Neon Nights, Dracula Sucks, Ultra Flesh, and the illegal-to-own New Wave Hookers, alongside the then underage Traci Lords. The man always gave great performances, from scary to funny, and was always entertaining to watch.

His last film was the underrated zombie comedy Die You Zombie Bastards. He will always be fondly remembered by fans of trash cinema and classic porn.

Rolling Thunder

William DeVane plays Charles Rane, a Vietnam veteran who has spent the last years of his life being tortured every day in a prison in the jungles of Hanoi. But all that’s over, since he’s returning home with his friend Johnny (Tommy Lee Jones) and returning to his girl and son. But Charles finds civilian life hard to return to, being unable to get some sleep, showing little emotion, and worst of all, his girl has fallen in love with another man. All he cares about is his son, and even that is taken away from him when a group of robbers enter his home and torture and mutilate him over a suitcase of silver dollars he was awarded for his services. The robbers kill his family and leave him for dead, but he recuperates pretty quickly, even if he has to use a hook for a hand now. But that’s not the end of it for Charlie, as now he’s going on a manhunt, to capture the men who killed his girl and son, a manhunt that takes him to El Paso, Texas. Joined by his friend Johnny, they’re going to make them suckers pay in a very bloody way.

This film was written by Paul Schraeder, the same man who gave us the excellent script for my favorite movie, Taxi Driver, and would direct films like Hardcore. You can see in this film many of the themes that would pop up around Taxi Driver, from the protagonist who’s a disgruntled, insomniac Vietnam vet and his quest for vigilante justice, to the way he views his world around him as ugly and rotten. William DeVane is no Robert Deniro, but he’s still a pretty good actor and is able to make the character of Charlie as a very realistic Vietnam veteran. Many people might see this movie and think he’s being wooden and uncharismatic, but that’s the point. As the son of a Vietnam vet and grandson of a WWII vet, I can tell you that war kills emotions, and DeVane’s lack of display of them works perfect for his character. Tommy Lee Jones is also great in this film, even in this being one of his early roles. He’s also the quiet type, but he really comes alive during the ending’s vengeance sequence, as he smiles and giggles at the process of going into battle. I also have to give credit to the beautiful Linda Haynes, who is able to carry the role of the girl who loves Charlie very well. She’s really the emotional heart of the movie, considering how much macho stuff is going on. It’s too bad she retired in 1980 to become a legal secretary, she had a lot of talent and it’s on full display here.

Sadly, this film has ssome flaws that I have to address, mainly the character of Cliff (Lawrason Driscoll). He’s the cop who wants to marry Charlie’s old girl. Just by what he did, you don’t like the fucker one bit, and the fact that screen time is taken out to force us to watch this guy hunt down Charlie and then get shot down by the same people Charlie is trying to kill makes you wonder what the fucking point was with that subplot. Thankfully the rest of the film is damn near flawless. John Flynn, who is famous for doing great thrillers like The Outfit, does a great job and the end sequence, where our two leads go into vengeance mode with shotguns into a hotel, is fucking awesome. You REALLY want tos ee these guys get it. I can’t help but think again to Taxi Driver, which has a similar ending, and while I don’t consider this to be as good as Taxi Driver, it’s still pretty up there. Hell, even Quentin Tarantino agrees with me, he named one of his distribution companies after it. So check this movie out, it has everything a revenge thriller should have, and it’s a near-perfect film.

Red Dawn

In a futuristic modern day American South, the god-damn commie governments of Russia and Cuba join forces and actually invade the United States. Yep, the Cold War happened, and they start shooting everyone in sight. But while all the battles are going on, a group of high school students are able to escape into the woods. With help from older people living in the country and remembering the survivalist training given to them by their parents, brothers Jed (SWAYZE) and Matt (Charlie Sheen) teach the others how to survive and fight back against the evil commie governments. Sadly, like all wars, there will be casualties.

Wow, what a movie. This is one of my favorite movies of all time. I’ve been watching it again and again every since I first had it on VHS back in the early 90’s. It’s just so damn cool! For starters, let’s talk about the cast. We have a lot of young talent from the early 80’s in this one, and they all more than do their share of good acting. Swayze is great as the leader, Charlie Sheen is surprisingly restrained and non-psychotic, and C. Thomas Howell actually plays the most disturbed and mentally deranged psychopath in the movie. I mean, it’s not like he goes crazy in an obvious way, but after drinking deer blood, he turns into a truly soulless mercenary, and even has what can be called either the most badass or the stupidest death in the entire movie. But my favorite performance comes from Lea Thompson, who plays a traumatized young girl who learns to become a badass. I think she’s a very underrated actress and it’s sad that she’s mostly known for goofy comedies like Howard The Duck or The Beverly Hillbillies. She should be as big as Nicole Kidman. We also get some really cool cameos from people like Harry Dean Stanton, Powers Boothe and Ben Johnson.

I give most of the credit to why this movie is so bad to director John Milius, who also directed Conan The Barbarian, although I prefer this one. Milius shows his obvious knowledge of film language and history and showcases a lot of sequences that seem like tributes to more classic films. The skylines will remind everyone of the films of John Ford, and the sequences on horseback will remind you of David Lean’s film Lawrence of Arabia. I also like that he’s able to give the Russians a more human aspect, instead of making them generic evil characters without redeeming qualities like Steven Speilberg would have done. This is just a great action movie, with a lot of great scenes, great acting, and a great script. One of the best.

Planet of the Dinosaurs

A group of astronauts dressed in different multi-colored spandex jumpsuits crash-land on a strange and desolate planet. They go around and try to find something to help them survive, and soon find out that they’re not as alone as they probably hoped. Nope, there are dinosaurs all over the place, and they are all pissed off. Wow, where to start about this movie? It’s either the worst or the funniest dinosaur movie in the history of time, and that’s saying much since I like Prehisteria. Let’s start off with the script. It’s corny as hell and takes itself too seriously, not to mention it’s plagued with these long sequences where the characters start longing about returning to Earth. The acting is atrocious, and the actors look more like 70’s porn stars who wandered into the wrong movie. One of the actors is shirtless throughout, and a lot of them don’t leave much to the imagination thanks to their tight spandex suits. And the weirdest part of all? The soundtrack. It seems like it was either written and performed by some experimental prog-rock band like Emerson, Lake & Palmer, or it was recorded off an old video game from a Calico computer.

But there is one mayor saving grace: the dinosaurs. They don’t show up as much as I wished, but when they do, they’re in complete stop-motion glory. It’s like a stop motion gift from the gods, thanks that they break for the monotony of the ‘heroes’ talking bullshit and walking around aimlessly. We get stegosaurs, that triceratops with only one horn, I dunno it’s name, dilophosaurus and of course, the mighty T-Rex. These animals kill our heroes and every time it happens, it’s hilarious. So yes, this movie really sucks, but it’s pretty hilarious in how much it sucks and it does feature cool dinosaur effects. Recommended with a bunch of friends and a hell of a lot of beer.

The Planet Of The Dinosaurs Drinking Game! Take a shot when:
-the group walks around aimlessly
-A dinosaur shows up
-A dinosaur eats someone
-the characters are building thankless chores
-the shirtless guy flexes

The Little Shop Of Horrors

Seymour is a geeky loser who works for a flower shop named Mushnik’s Shop, where he pines away hoping to fall in love with the girl of her dreams, Audrey. His dream includes creating a new kind of plant, a plant that can not only talk, but has a big taste for human flesh and blood. Soon Seymour sees himself selling his soul and committing crimes for the devil plant. Will he be able to destroy the creature, or will it destroy him first?
It’s a little sad that this movie has now been almost completely overshadowed by it’s 80’s musical comedy, which is now as big a part of the culture as Ghostbusters or other mayor 80’s films. But in all it’s defense, this movie is a very good comedy film, even if it is low budget. The actors are all great. Jonathan Haze is great as the geeky Seymour and Jackie Joseph (who was later in Gremlins) is very pretty and is less annoying than the actress that appeared in the musical remake. I also prefer the actor who played Mushnik, Mel Welles, just because he looks like every time he talks, he looks like he’s about to have a heart attack. We also get a lot of good cameos, the most memorable of course is Jack Nicholson as a masochistic client in the dentist’s office, who really loves getting dental torture. His character would later appear in the guise of Bill Murray in the remake. This one also has a very funny cameo by Dick Miller, who is a Corman and Joe Dante regular, as a guy who eats flowers.
Roger Corman once boasted that he was able to make this movie in three days. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but if it shows on something, it’s on the plant itself, the gigantic Audrey II. Because of the budget, the creature is definitely a letdown. It doesn’t have any of the personality or evil attitude of the creature in the 80’s remake, but it’s forgivable because of it being a different time and, to be honest, an independent production. The script is still solid as hell, it’s simply very funny, has great acting, and has a pretty good Dragnet parody (and I love me some Dragnet). This movie comes very well recommended, especially if you’ve only seen the remake.