Naked Obsession

November 28, 2014, 12:00 am

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Naked Obsession Directed By Dan Golden, Starring William Katt (1990).

I don't care much for William Katt or The Greatest American Hero TV show, but when I read that in Gore Gazette, Rick Sullivan referred to this as one of the scuzziest Sleaze-a-Thons of the year I figured it was worth a shot.

Franklin (Katt) a dumb politician on the path to being elected mayor has nightmares that he's shot to death. The only place I could find to stream this was on a porn site for some odd reason! This was put out by Roger Corman's Concorde production company, same as The Nest, but the "bug fest" was alot better than this putrid Skin-A-Max throwaway garbage-fest!

Katt cruises around in the ghetto, then gets car jacked and has a vision of Jesus. Although it's not Jesus but an aggressive wino played by Rick Dean who leads him to a stripclub, where they play shitty music that I can only describe as adult contemporary Quiet Riot!
Dean acts in a lot of low radar B-movie cable bullshit that I'm not familiar with but he's perfect in this role.

I can't believe I tried to top Rod Stewart's semen swallowing record!

One blonde waitress who looks like Bobbi Brown, the girl in the Warrant "Cherry Pie" video takes a liking to Franklin (Katt). She dances to a fake ZZ Top number on stage and thrusts her lady parts in about 5 dudes faces. This probably played on softcore after hours cable stations in its 90's heyday, before internet porn ruined everything.

The Jesus bum (Dean) is all smiles and bosses the politician around, he also steals his wallet and burns it.

When the Franklin (Katt) gets home, he fantasizes that his wife (played by Wendy MacDonald, who's pretty hot) does a striptease on the dinner table, in reality however she's very prudish. 

He's got a monkey on his back in the form of strippers and even hangs out with the bum again. What is he doing, I can't figure out why he's obsessed with this new lifestyle and hanging out with a smelly wino!? At one point, the homeless guy stares at a stripper's bare vagina and says that it "reminds me of mom", pretty gross if you ask me!

Don't sweat it bro! White trash jesus had your back during this review

The sound dropped out on the porn site I watched this on-- which was annoying then a few days went by and it came back, so this is one of the most stressful reviews I've done in awhile! I had to force myself to finish the rest after much pep talk and convincing to get back to the computer, so more people don't have to suffer through this dreck! I know ToG readers appreciate the effort! I should also mention there's a huge "category III water mark" in the corner, which is stupid because Cat III movies are strictly from the Hong Kong rating system, in Naked Obsession, there are no Asians in sight.

If you wanted to see the guy who almost played Luke Skywalker have a simulated orgasm, then hang onto your light sabers, because this disgusting flick has got you covered!

He picks up a blonde stripper played by Maria Ford, her ribs unfortunately are bigger than her tits and they get into some rough auto erotic asphyxiation sex. Why is that form of sex so popular when many have died from it? Ford has acted in a lot of made for Cable trash and is yet another starlet who's overuse of Botex has given her a rubbery face (just Google some recent pictures of her).

When Katt and Ford's characters fuck, the musical grunts they play sound like the Studio Canal noises.

This movie makes its little statement about sex addiction which I think doesn't exist, but the habitual way this politician revisits the strippers makes it plausible.

In the trailer they make a big deal about San Francisco 49r's Roger Craig running back starring in the film, he pretend fights the Jesus bum and ties him to a pipe in an alley.

The bum has supernatural powers and can give heart attacks with his mind, perhaps he's a Cronenberg-esque"Scanner-bum".

Hey Everybody I'm Roger Craig from the San Francisco 49rs!

Franklin's secretary played by Elena Sahagun does a strip tease in a hood and white mask, while a Busch beer sign hangs in the balance, it turns out she's killing people for him. 
The bum always seems to come to the rescue at the last minute, I wonder if his character inspired the Cohen brothers Sam Elliot one in the Big Lebowski, he seems omnipotent and knows what's going to happen before anyone else, it's pure speculation though.

Busch Beer the most "Avant Guard" of all the cheap american lagers

This is the kind of movie that you might've seen on at the time on late night cable and wondered if it held up, we here at ToG have the same affliction and it's safe to say this one doesn't work and is not worth revisiting. It's very sleazy, but too brainless to have a purpose and ends on an ambiguous note. Definitely skip it! 

TOTALLY UNSATISFYING! THE CINEMATIC EQUIVALENT TO DRINKING A CAFFEINE FREE CAN OF BLUE RASPBERRY 4 LOKO.

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Massacre in Dinosaur Valley

December 1, 2014, 12:00 am

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  -Reviewed by Skunkape-

Directed by Michele Massimo Tarantini 1985

 Let us begin with the star of this epic jungle romp, Michael Sopkiw. The Model turned actor starred in four Italian productions and this was his last. I’m not going to lie, I do have a bit of a man crush on Sopkiw, but there are always certain dudes in film we love to watch in macho action films. Harrison Ford representing the A list, Bruce Campbell for the B list and Michael Sopkiw for the Z. Massacre in Dinosaur Valley has been marketed as an Indiana Jones style adventure film and a cannibal film, it was even given the title Cannibal Ferox II in some countries but I assure you no animals were harmed in the making of this film. It does a good job of blending the elements of an adventure film and the Italian cannibal films we love so much. Well, it has it all really! Like quick sand, piranhas, white slave traders, a sadistic lesbian, it also showcases beautiful women naked throughout.  If you haven’t seen it, you should probably just close this review and go buy it right now!

Three's Company in the Jungle

The sexy Eva (Suzane Carvalho) rides into a small village with her father. Her dad is a professor and author of many books on anthropology. They are there to explore the forbidden valley of the Dinosaurs. The Professor (Leonidas Bayer) charters a flight along with an ex Vietnam vet and his drunk wife, whose always giving him a “hard” time about not being able to get it up. Also on board, two gorgeous models and their photographer for some sleaze ball magazine. The plane is fully booked, so how does bone finder Kevin Hall (Sopkiw) from the Boston Institute of Paleontology manage to get on board?  He overhears the captain mention that their stop in the valley of the dinosaurs is a protected preserve and an illegal destination so he uses that to blackmail the pilot for a seat on the floor.

"Let me on the plane...please!"

"I'm "Dog" the bone hunter"

Why is this valley such a big deal? Well because many who go there never return. Rumor has it that there is a curse. Is the curse of this sacred valley real? I’m convinced it is! As soon as they even get near the location the plane gets all screwy and the pilot loses all control, I’m sure it has nothing to do with the pilot's drinking. The plane crashes as we witness a toy model being thrown around in someone’s backyard. OK, maybe the crash effects aren’t quite that bad but the inside of the plane looks like it has Ed Wood written all over it. The plane is wrecked and sadly lives are lost including the professor, a model, and the pilot.  The Vietnam vet and former Captain, John Heinz (Milton Rodriguez) takes over immediately after the crash. He boasts that he knows jungle survival and willkeep everyone safe. He exclaims something like, “…all jungles are the same, what’s the difference? We’re just replacing Gooks with Indianos.” (Indianos is Italian for Indian) He unsympathetically rushes those with dead loved ones to stop mourning and Eva watches her father breath his last breath and die.  Now the fun begins!

"Before I die, will my daughter get my sky miles?"

"I feel like I'm being watched."

 Captain Heinz is clearly the alpha male here and Kevin tucks his tail under his legs, for now. Heinz takes the survivors down a trail that follows a river. When they start to hear animal noises Kevin warns them that these are the sounds of the Aquara (Aquara? not a real tribe) Indians surrounding them. The photographer sadly falls prey to piranha and loses his leg. When he makes too much noise, Heinz stabs him through the back to shut him up. Kevin attacks Heinz for his heinous act but unfortunately gets knocked down a water slide of rocks separating him from the group. Don’t worry though he’s OK and he even manages to barely get away from a hungry crocodile looking for some lunch.(oh crikey) The Captain and his wife get attacked by the natives and shortly after Eva and Belinda, (Susan Hahn) the model  get captured. Betty Heinz, (Marta Anderson) the vet's wife falls victim to quicksand. This attack becomes one war the ex-soldier can’t come out of alive, he’s hit with about 5 or 6 arrows and pinned up against a tree. The chief stabs him in the chest and pulls out a piece of his entrails for a little snack. A little while later Kevin rescues the ladies from the cannibals. He disrupts a ceremony in which a shaman wearing a triceratops headdress is using Eva and Belinda in a barbaric ritual . Kevin hijacks one of the tribe's canoes, so the cannibals set up a giant net further down the river and with three shotgun shells left Kevin shoots the net and he hits the Indian’s chief causing them to retreat back to their camp.

Tricera-TopHat!

Pull my finger!

"Made you look!"

 You might think the worst is over, nope. While takinga breather and admiring some fossilized foot prints an evil miner and slave trader shows up named China. (Carlos Imperial) He takes them as hostages tying up Kevin in a pig pen and he rapes Eva. China's evil lesbian sidekick has relations with Belinda because she promises that she can help her escape. However, no more than ten feet away from her cell China shoots her the back multiple times. How will Kevin escape and save Eva from this fat bastard?! You’ll just to spend a day or two in the valley and see for yourself.

"Sorry just mud water to drink, no wheat grass juice."

"This hog's gonna bite my hog!"

"Give us some damn privacy, now!"

 There is a massacre and a valley of the dinosaurs so this is one title that lives up to its name. Just don't expect any actually living Dinos. It’s a jungle adventure only hindered by it’s budget. The director Michele Massimo Tarantini aka Michael E. Lemick was thinking big and keeps the pace moving at full throttle and when it does slow down it’s only because it’s being padded out with naked women.

Can’t recommend enough

10/10 on the CULT-O-METER

 Professor Pedro Ibanezis is dead but his books live on, don't forget to read,
"Dynamics of Evolution"
"Paleozoic Etymology"
"On the Trail of the Last Dinosaurs"

And  watch our Tribute Video! The Professor would have wanted it that way.

Massacre in Jurassic Valley

Hunter's Blood

December 2, 2014, 12:00 am

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Hunters Blood Directed By Robert C. Hughes, Starring Clu Gulager (1986).

This film is packed to the rafters with cult celebrities. We've got Bruce Glover (Crispin's pop with a scary albino eyeball), Clu Gulager (ROTLD), Sam Bottoms (Apocalypse Now), Billy Drago (Freeway, Invasion USA) and even Joey Travolta! You need a Poseidon Adventure style cast to keep a Deliverance style hixploitation afloat, right? Shelley Winters already starred in Poor Pretty Eddie, one of the best ones, so it makes sense that she'd sit this one out. Billy Bob Thornton apparently was in the background somewhere, on IMDB this is his first screen credit on a film. I didn't see him, but there's a very dark bar scene that he may have been present for. This film has a noodling guitar theme by John D'Andrea that sounds as if the composer was fucking around at the guitar store and recorded it while he was there, saving the production company a huge chunk of change in the process. 

   It begins with David Rand (Sam Bottoms, whose brother I fondly remember as a George W. Bush impersonator in "That's My Bush"). While in the middle of a filthy shower session with his girlfriend played by Kim Delaney (NYPD Blue, Body Parts), he gets interrupted by his "city slicker" buddies who are all keyed up for a hunting trip.

We've got hunting sores and boners

   Uncle Al (Ken Swofford) picks everybody up in his red Ford Bronco and they head out into hillbilly country to bag some deer. Al says really gay stuff like "I'm gonna ream your butt", and other ass-related antidotes-- he's actually my favorite character in the entire film. Joey Travolta (who I remember as the spaceman goofus with a chimp on his shoulder from Amazon Women on the Moon) plays Al, a comic relief with amateur wilderness experience. The first sign of trouble occurs once they reach a redneck bar. They all seem thrilled to chuckle at some slack jawed yokels while driving through the scary hills of Arkansas.     

I'm doing an Elizabeth Banks Wet Hot American Summer impression, now pucker up!

   Al pisses off two scary hicks with BBQ sauce smeared on their faces and overalls. They know what they're in for when they see a sign that says "No Colords (sic)" and all they have is Bud in the can. The lollipop sucking bartender floozy makes a fuss that they want beer nuts and calls them "nutlovers" and "cocksuckers".

What kind of organic ale do I have on tap, you say?

   Dave and his pals start up some shit with the rednecks and seem to be asking for trouble. Don't they know they're in a Deliverance ripoff? It's kind of funny how the first hillbillies they encounter in the bar look like a bizarro version of Dave and the boys. It gets a lot worse for them later as they venture deeper into inbred territory.

Try some of Ted Nugent's Conservative headcheese

    Once the night creeps in and the hunters gather around a campfire, it gets pretty terrifying when a group of aggressive bloodthirsty crackers show up once they fall asleep. Talk about a rude awakening! Bruce Glover cackles like a idiotic witch and Billy Drago pisses on one of the yankees. Their bearded leader is Lee de Broux, an actor I've only seen in Robocop. He's the guy who Clarence Boddicker confronts in the coke warehouse and rudely dips his fingers into his wine. 

I've dealt with shit head punks like you before in ROTLD

   Things get scary and primitive at the same time, it's funny how a lot of the men all talk about their peckers for some homoerotic reason. There's just something queer about the wilderness I guess. Clu Gulager who plays Dave's father is pretty bad ass and isn't afraid of these hicks, who all threaten to rape him and his friends. The mongoloids who are seen chopping up deer heads and offal scatter after two game wardens show up. It gets really nasty after the two cops are skinned alive by the redneck maniacs and tacked to a tree (the make-up effects by Mike Spatola, whose work included Little Monsters and Bud The Chud are pretty convincing).

I'm so cold, can I borrow some flesh?

      Everybody sort of freaks out and are convinced that they'll be next. Travolta looses his cool the most and Uncle Al slaps some sense back into him, its a tender moment that you don't usually get in an exploitation flick. Dave's dumb girlfriend even drives out to the woods to meet up with them with out his knowledge and almost gets brutally raped.

Dick Cheney strikes again

   Clu Gulager gets shot and wounded and they all panic, it gets really intense toward the last 30 minutes. Dave becomes the unhinged hero and starts slaying each hillbilly one by one. He starts by jabbing the first guy in the throat with a huge knife. One character named Purty Boy gets his face completely blasted off till its caved in! Another character named Washpot (Mickey Jones from V and Total Recall) gets deer antlers plunged into his back, OUCH! The gore quotient starts tipping the scales at the end and the revenge is pretty satisfying. The ending is kind of dicey and can be interpreted a few ways, they seem to escape, but leave on a train owned by Razorback Meats (the hick's company). That means they could've ended up in the clutches of more insane hillbillies or just escaped unharmed, thats where it ends and there was never a sequel. All in all, Hunter's Blood is an effective Hixploitation that delivers the goods!    

I'm from the Southern Hospitality commitee!

Billy Drago was born William Burrows, good thing he changed it

   The script by Emmett Watson is surprisingly well written (or maybe it's the performances that extenuated it). Watson wrote some clunkers like 9 Deaths of the Ninja and New Years Evil. I enjoyed both of those films despite the weak spots in the Sho Kosugi vehicle and the lame ass non ending in New Years Evil. This film is available from J4HI.COM on a "Hunting Humans" double feature with Bridge to Nowhere from New Zealand. 

ORDER HERE

Monster Shark aka Devil Fish

December 9, 2014, 12:00 am

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 -Reviewed by Skunkape-

Directed by Lamberto Bava 1984

A quick personal note. Really I promise it'll be quick. I had just seen Demons for the first time and therefor was now familiar with the name of Lamberto Bava. The next summer I was on vacation with the folks in North Carolina bored out of my mind. I went to the local video store, then imagine the joy of seeing a Jaws rip off showcased in the VidMark Big Box, and it being directed by Lamberto Bava. The night was anything but pleasant. I've resented that viewing experience my entire life. I've finally had the courage to watch the film again but this time I watched the alternate version titled Monster Shark. It still sucks, but being the Michael Sopkiw megafan I've now become, it was a lot more fun and I already had low expectations.

If you like Deviled eggs you'll love Devil Fish!

The film starts with a chopper flying over the ocean, then it pulls a man with his legs chewed off out of the water. You know I'm really sick of these movie monsters being so wasteful! If you're a hungry monster, you could at least eat more than just the legs, that's a whole torso wasted. Don't these monsters know kids are starving in Ethiopia.

"You can't see from this angle that my butt's missing too."

 Monster Shark is Michael Sopkiw's third starring role. He plays Peter, a studly genius who makes radio and computer technology for a pair of marine biologists. He'll probably even fix your TV too! One of these scientists is a British beer drinking know it all and the other is a praying mantis.(she's really skinny) The thin but hot dolphin training love interest is a real dickens, Dr. Stella Dickens that is! We first meet her while she's training a dolphin named Donald, I wonder if the in the Italian version it's Donatello? Dr. Stella is played by french actress Valentine Monnier. She was Sopkiw's gal pal in 2019 After the Fall of New York and their chemistry on screen got her this role as well. 

Life Aquatic with Peter Zissou

"Every time I swim it's literally Skinny Dipping."

"This new Don Johnson album rocks!"

 Monster Shark maybe a Jaws rip off (as the fish's theme definitely suggests) but this shark squid mutant isn't scaring tourists away or shutting down any annual festivals. He's actual even more of a menace with his tentacles than his teeth but Tentacles is another title that was already taken. This sharktopus was man made. There's another troublemaker in this film besides the fish, Dr. Davis Barker, a money hungry scientist from West Ocean International (W.O.I.) created it as a weapon to sell to the highest bidder. Not only that but he's sleeping with the head of W.O.I.'s wife, Professor Donald West. To protect his investment Dr. Davis has hired thug named Miller and he's running around knocking off anyone whose digging for clues putting Peter, Stella, and the rest of the marine team in danger. They discover that the super fish can regenerate it's cells. Which means if they blow it up all it's pieces will make hundreds of little devil fish. Peter uses a device to recreate the fish's own sound in order to lure into shallow water. The Coast Guard and local police will be waiting for the devil fish with gasoline and blow torches. Will Dr. Davis's mob squad snuff out Peter and will the Police be able to burn the monster until not one regenerating cell is left? Who Cares!  :)

WOI vey

"I'm Dr. Davis Frankenfish"

"I can't find my swim trunks."

Next on the Sci-Fi Channel it's Sharktopus vs. Ravioli-Saurus

Devil Fish aka Monster Sharkis a monster turd no doubt. I think the project may have been an excuse for Italy’s bad boys of film to take a trip to Florida.  When Italians go to Florida they have way too much fun hanging out at the beaches and they don’t spend enough time making good films. Two Italian/ South Florida movies are Ruggero Deodato’s Raiders of Atlantis (many will disagree with me that this film doesn't suck) and Alberto De Martino's Miami Golem, both great ideas with potential but guilty of sucking. Director Lamberto Bava has made some classics but directing this crap under the name John Old Jr. is one of his epic failures. The Assistant director is none other than hack master Bruno Mattei aka Gilbert Roussel. The Story is by Martin Dolman (Sergio Martino’s director aka for 2019 After the Fall of NY) , Lewis Coates (Lugi Cozzi’s director aka for Contamination and Dean Lewis.(Dean Lewis? A Mystery Italian?) The actual screenplay was penned by four different writers including Dardano “Zombie” Saccchetti. Composer Fabio Frizzi aka Antony Barrymore does the score, which isn’t horrible, it’s actual quite good but it just doesn’t really fit this film. Funny that he scored Blastfighter under the name Andrew Barrymore and in the credits for this one he’s Antony.  One Conspiracy theory is that Frizzi had a split personality and wanted to start a company run bytwo talented brothers that will score film’s known as the Super Barrymore Bros.  

Floridians are the Pollo of the Sea

 

Devil Fish the video game by Commodore 64

If you thought that I wasn’t going to mention the MST3K version of Devil Fish you thought wrong! It’s one of my favorite episodes and serves this movie right. The only major differences between the two are that scenes are arranged in a different order and there’s a fair amount of nudity in the uncut version. My only issue with the riffing is that Mike and the bots repeatably peg Sopkiw as a European when he was born in Connecticut, USA.

MOVIE SIGN!

4 /10 on the CULT-O-METER

Almost fun, for Sopkiw fanatics only

Stick with the MST3K version you know that’s 10 of out 10!


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Monster Shark or Devil Fish?

At Theater of Guts we call it
BeelzeTuna 

 

Full Contact

December 15, 2014, 12:00 am

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Full Contact Directed By Ringo Lam, Starring Chow Yun-Fat (1992).

This epic Ringo Lam flick doesn't give you a chance to catch your breath as you are assaulted by constant frenetic cartoonish action and ultra violence! This is a film I'd been wanting to review for a long time, but other obligations just got in the way. It's the best movie that Simon Yam has ever appeared in, he plays The Judge, a flashy over stylized flamboyantly homosexual gangster who opens the film by callously stabbing a female in the chest. Yam wears a lot of zebra print and has tons of hankies, it's as if he works on the side as a magician. In the opening scene, Judge and his gang of punk looking cohorts take over a ritzy antique shop. This film is a good way to convince someone who's on the fence about HK action films and should be mandatory viewing for anyone wanting to see a top notch entry in the genre. 

Stop or I'll shoot you with these Ebola bullets!

This is the only film where I've enjoyed the English dub as well as the foreign language version both are totally shameless. Anthony Wong plays Sam, a spineless twerp who gets involved with loan sharks, who stick his head in a car door and threaten to murder him. Here he still resembles his trade mark scumbag character from Ebola Syndrome, but this time does nothing as repulsive. He truly evolves during the course of the film and has lots of range as an actor. Some call Ringo's style "John Woo lite", fuck that shit, there's nothing light about this film!

Chow Yun-Fat is Godfrey, a super badass biker who must bail his pal out from under the thumb of a few petty gangsters hanging out in a rainy garage. The fight choreography looks bone crunchingly authentic. Yun-fat wields a lightning quick butterfly knife and washes his enemies blood in the rain water. The rock music sounds like bad Sammi Hagar novelty songs and fits perfectly.

Chow played Steve Martin's character in an Asian production of Little Shop of Horrors

Godfrey takes what I can only describe as a hallway bath with a bucket of water and waxes poetic with his petite stripper fiance Mona played by Ann Bridgewater. He bites her arm and says teeth marks are better than a marriage certificate, which is an odd line if you ask me! 

Wong's character seems to have a good heart in the beginning and only deals with those loan sharks in order to pay for his mom's funeral in Thailand. 

I'm happy to report that non of the homophobic antics seen in Pantyhose Hero (reviewed here) show up in this film and Yam's portrayal of a gay character isn't offensive. Godfrey teams up with The Judge's crew and they form a shaky alliance, both relying on the notion of "keep your enemies closer", which doesn't bode well for either group. 

Did you just queef, it smells like Starkist?

There's a really skanky tart in the group played by Bonnie Fu, who always wants people to check out her crotch. I remember the English dialogue being slightly more filthy when she talks. Just after masturbating in a moving vehicle, she tosses a grenade at a random motorist and blows half the bridge off. She's the most offensively over-sexualized character it's a tad nauseating.  
I like seeing Yam and Wong in the same car, they've appeared in many films we've reviewed at ToG and their careers are always trying to upstage each other. In my book Wong outshines Yam's career for grossout Cat III movies. The car stunts are on a Mad Max level of questionable safety and put your nerves on edge.

Chow and Yam get into a savage knife fight. Judge (Yam) who complains that his hair got mussed, licks the knife after it slices thru Godfrey's tender fingers. Sam is a spineless wimp and betrays his cousin for fear that The Judge and his pals will retaliate. He blasts him in the chest and leaves him to die, just after mowing down an innocent family and firebombing their house! Godfrey barely makes it out alive and escapes on a speedboat with an adorable Boston Terrier in tow.

Apocalypse Now reenacted with cute dogs

After missing a few fingers, he regains his strength and well being during an empowering, but cheesy montage. He hangs out with his dog on a motorbike and trains by shooting glass bottles. He also stitches himself back together Rambo style.

Sam has completely lost his mind and transforms into a cold blooded gangster with a sweet new Perm! He seems reborn a hardened criminal and proves it by blowing a meaty sized crevice into an old acquaintance's throat in a bar. Judge really gets off on violent explosions and eats his hotdog like a weirdo, without the bun.

"Aqua-Wong My Friend"by Jethro Tull

There are some wacky musical dance numbers that raise the molten level of hot bubbling cheese in Full Contact, but it's all part of the delightfully campy atmosphere.

Sam (Wong) knows that Godfrey is out for revenge and is shaking like a chicken shit loser.

Godfrey misses his old flame Mona who's shacked up with Sam now, because she assumed he died in a fire. They remain civil to eat other, but Sam cannot be trusted and Godfrey has fantasies of murdering him.

There's so much firepower and empty clips in this film, that it never gets dull. This came out the same year as Reservoir Dogs (which Tarantino borrowed the main plot from Ringo Lam's City on Fire). 

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

During a really graphic sex scene between Sam and the tart (Bonnie Fu), the dialogue switches to English. I'm assuming that clip was excised from the Foreign version, which is odd to me because usually they save the more extreme shit for the original. There's a really bloody ambush that involves ice blocks and someone being thrown off a ledge, hung by the neck! 

Godfrey doesn't give a fuck and flaunts his gutsiness by ordering a Perrier at the gangster's hideout. Their mouths all drop because they assumed he died. 

 Ringo Lam borrows from Argento and shows the perspective of the bullet fly out of the chamber and enter the brain of a victim. This same shot would later resurface in the Kill Bill animated sequence.

When Godfrey makes a deal with the Judge, he tells him to wash his butt, which reminds me of that Red Foxx comedy album "Wash That Ass!".

There's an incredible motorcycle shoot out toward the end, as Chow blasts thru gangsters faces while smoking a cigarette the entire time.

As he sends a fatal bullet sailing through Judge's throat he tells him to go beat off in hell, which may be the first and last time you'll ever hear a line like that!

Come any closer and I'll butterfly your testicles!

Almost all of the directors titles are featured in the Deep Red catalog like The Adventurers, City on Fire, Prison on Fire, Twin Dragons and Burning Paradise. None of them have been covered yet, so we've got our work cut out for us. Lam's Americanized career would be less embarrassing than his other HK action mogul counterparts like Ronny Yu, Tsui Hark and John Woo of course, but still kind of disappointing. It all went down the drain with Maximum Risk a Van Damme dud, although its not fair to lump Ringo in with other Asian directors out to make a fast buck and he's even returned to the forum (working with Simon Yam again) on Wild City coming out next year, so don't write him off just yet! This film is available to stream at most sites like Fandor, check it out!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! 

Abar: The Black Superman

December 17, 2014, 12:00 am

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Abar, The Black Superman ( In Your Face) Directed By Frank Packard, Starring Tobar Mayo (1977). 

I first heard of this film by way of Psychotronic Video, one of my most treasured source books. After Fangoria went hardcore mainstream, I gave up on them and discovered the Michael Weldon publication then never looked back. They made it sound so bizarre, that I had to check it out. I rented it in Berkeley at Reel Video, a long lost cult video store on tape under the Xenon Films title of "In Your Face". The cover is a real beauty, it's got a chubby angry guy who sort of looks like Abdullah The Butcher making a crazy face while a 2 Live Crew looking babe attached to his arm makes a duck face.

At the time there were a lot of these Dolemite videos and they all had a similar image only this time it wasn't Rudy Ray Moore, but some miscellaneous dude that never appears in the film (the cover is pretty brilliant though--I couldn't resist!)

The Bad Bunch got me thinking about this film, they are both poorly filmed and centered around a racist environment and use Martin Luther King to illustrate a point. This film however, as inept at it may seem, is much better than the Greydon Clark one in my opinion. 

Dr Kinkade (J. Walter Smith), An African American scientist and his family move on up to one of the most disgustingly racist white suburbs. The film gets all the semantics out of the way by immediately establishing how fucked up the white folks are because they see black people moving in and assume that they must be the help!

It's even more frightening to me that this attitude continues to exist even today in America disguised as Patriotism when its really Nationalism or Nativism. Mabel (Dee Turguand) a vile bigot goes apeshit, once she realizes blacks have polluted her white neighborhood and this film came out in the free wheeling multiculturalism era of 1977! This film bangs you over the head with the racist message that certain white people refuse to accept an educated rich African American, it's pure exploitation (I guess whitesploitation could work, but that's feeling sorry for these low life scumfucks)! 

You don't wanna know what she's saying here

Nazis start picketing Dr. K's lawn and white businessman enter his house and try to buy them out. The Dr. mentions that he's had to move three times in a month and won't budge! I admire his conviction and detest every white face I see in this film. Abar really does its job in making you feel embarrassed by white folk's idiotic behavior. I wonder what people thought at the time they filmed this? This movie is very political and even makes you think that this type of rampant ignorance still exists (I mean, just look at the all white Republican controlled congress). 

The social commentary is razor sharp and elevates whatever cheap shoddy elements they patched this film together with. John Abar (Tobar Mayo) shows up with his group "the black front of unity" and tries to convince the doc that he should move back to the ghetto and not make a spectacle out of himself. Mayo is the only actor in the film with any other screen credits like Killer of Sheep and Escape From New York.

It's ABAR Not Babar, do I look like a honky elephant to you?

Abar and his bikers are sort of like the  guardian angels accept not useless and follow Malcolm X's motto instead of non-violent resistance.

The Doc has an ace up his sleeve, because he has a secret formula that can transform anyone into a super crime fighter! Two crackers in denim outfits whistle Dixie and try to hurt the doctor, but Abar swoops in and punches them out. Dr Kinkade's family are suffering for their fathers principles but he has conviction and stands his ground. The interior of their house has a lot of red walls for some reason. The Doctor approaches Abar, while he preaches on the street to his flock in the ghetto, this is where he convinces him to undergo experimental injections. Mabel the racist bitch faints just before calling Dr. K's son a "pickaninny" and who's there to help out but the only capable doctor in the vicinity. I think he should've let her slip into a coma but his devotion to the hippocratic oath is commendable.

Dr. K's brother shows up in the most ridiculous way possible, by sneaking around in a Halloween mask in the dead of night! This idiot almost gets choked out by Abar, who seems to have moved in the guest room.

You know you could've rung the door bell ya dumb ass!

After awhile it gets quiet, but  you still expect the white people to do something fucked up-- I mean this movie really taps into that old notion "don't trust whitey" they are the monstrous villains of this film.

Dr Kinkade's poor son gets run over by some shit head attempting to blow up the doctors house with dynamite. After the death, they both discuss Dr. King's life and commitment to non-violent protest. The doctor berates him, using psychology to coerce Abar into taking the injection that will make him indestructible (they prove how it works by shooting a rabbit a bunch of times and it still lives), no animals were harmed thankfully. 

A bunch of racist cops go all "Rodney King (or Michael Brown R.I.P.)" on Abar and blow him away, luckily he took the super serum and strikes back with a vengeance!  

This mealworms could use some Crystal Hotsauce

He uses his powers to change the ghetto by first stopping graffiti, then wino's booze transforms into milk, people eat worms and other random events happen as he stares into the camera and strange wind noises are heard. Although I wonder if he's really using his powers for good? At any rate the last few minutes get really wacky and we also learn that Mabel is holding on to a secret connected to her hatred of black people (and it doesn't justify her reprehensible behavior). Abar is a clunky blaxploitation flick with an uplifting message that overshadows the technical difficulties, definitely check it out!

Blastfighter

December 19, 2014, 12:00 am

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 -Reviewed by Skunkape- 

 "Remember those two old bucks up above the falls, who were buttin' each other until they locked horns and they couldn't get loose...they died that way."

-the words of Jake "Tiger" Sharp to his old rival Tom

"Can't we all just get along?"

Directed by Lamberto Bava 1984

 Blastfighter aka "Mustache vs Beard!" At least that's what I call it! Well, not really. It stars Michael Sopkiw who is sporting the stash and the bearded one is none other than George Eastman. (Drop an Eastman movie title in the comment section where he doesn't have a beard! Can you?) The two previously worked together in Martino's2019 After the Fall of New York and are back in this Lamberto Bava genre mash up. I think ultimately Blastfighter is an action movie at heart but throw in all the exploitation elements that Italian cinema is known for and the results are mind blowing.

"Say hello to my big friend."

Sopkiw is Jake "Tiger" Sharp, an ex cop who got in way over his head. The film begins with the heart pumping sounds of Fabio Frizzi's theme as Tiger is released from prison after serving eight years. While on the force he witnessed one of his fellow officers gunned down in cold blood by some goon. Unfortunately that goon was on a corrupt politician's pay roll and heads to Tiger's place to kill him. Tiger isn't at home but his wife is and the deviant brutally stabs her in the neck. With the politician's protection and no where to turn Tiger makes the decision to have his revenge and blows the criminal away. Now out of prison, a close friend of his from the police force gives him the ultimate weapon so he can blow this politician straight to hell. Tiger seeks him out looks through the scope but can't do it. He decides revenge will not put him at ease and heads to his old home town out in the country to live out his life peacefully, but this is where the real problems begin.

"I killed your wife, nanny nanny, boo boo!"

 While he's driving we hear Tommie Baby's country cover of "Evening Star", originally composed by Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb! As soon as he gets into town and stops off for a few groceries the locals stare at him with unapproved. Not only that, but banjo boy Billy Redden from "Deliverance" is even there making a cameo. Tiger or Tige for short goes up to his cabin of solitude and with his new 'blastfighter' of a weapon goes on a little hunt. Three other assholes cross his path and shoot a deer but won't put it out of its misery. Tiger saves its fawn and takes it up to his house to take care of it. He drives the animal into town to purchase a baby bottle. When he comes back to his car the locals have cut the deer's throat. This means war and he easily kicks redneck ass. This puts him back in the local slammer but he's bailed out by an old friend, Tom.(Eastman) The two men who once were best buddies had a falling out and Tom lays down the law for Tige. The reason the hunters never actually killed the deer while hunting is that an Asian poacher uses the half dead animals to make medicines. He pays good money to these yokels and Tom is in on the cut aside from running a lucrative saw mill. One of those three hunters from earlier is Tom's little brother Wally, and he makes it his official duty to make Tiger's life miserable, even going as far to sabotage his brakes. For his actions Tiger strikes back, pushing Wally's hunting truck down a hill.This pisses off Wally and his barefooted overall wearing friends even more.(Hell, they deserved it!)

Dueling Groceries

Who killed Bambi?

Buck Lo Mein

A strange pretty lady shows up at Tiger's place and for some reason and won't identify herself. We find out later that she is Tiger's daughter Connie and she wants to be part of his life. Connie is played by Valentin Forte who also hooked up with Ruggero Deodato (in more ways than one) for the films Cut and Run and Body Count. Tige tries to push Connie away feeling sorry for himself, exclaiming that he's not a good father and a failure at life. He gets some more support when his cop buddy from earlier shows up, the one who gave him the gun and a friend of Connie's who's a park ranger in training.Pete the ranger is played by none other than Michele "The Church" Soavi. Tiger now comes to his senses and decides it's time to leave and start fresh with his family and friends, but it's too late. Tom's prick brother rolls barrels of fire down the mountain setting their transportation on fire. All the rednecks from town have come together to kill Tiger and his friends and they do kill Tige's cop buddy and Pete the wannabe ranger. They almost even rape Connie.Tiger's had enough and with his massive weapon he goes on a hunt of his own, the hunt for an entire town of redneck pricks!

"I like turtles"

It's the Blue Collar Comedy Tour

This movie works very well as a revenge film. Bava pulls all the strings to make the viewer pissed and keeps you rooting for Tiger all the way. The dialogue is pretty dopey throughout but I did find a few tender moments and some real chemistry between Tiger and Connie as the father and daughter.
You won't want to miss the finale when Jake "Tiger" Sharp goes head to head with fifty plus rednecks and has a final showdown with George "Big Ape" Eastman!


A little First Blood, a little Deliverance, with maybe a touch of Bambi, this all-star cast is directed to perfection by Lamberto Bava.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
10/10 ON THE CULT-O-METER

Follow Theater of Guts @FilmGuts
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#Sopkiw 

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Lone Wolf and Cub Series Roundup

December 25, 2014, 12:00 am

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LONE WOLF AND CUB

By Crankenstein and Goat Scrote.

     Lone Wolf and Cub, "the greatest team in the history of mass slaughter", slice and dice through bamboo and bone with a razor-sharp Dotanuki sword. They have chosen to wander the earth as demons, sworn to kill for a price. Ogami Itto carries his 3-year-old son Daigoro in a weaponized baby carriage forging a legendary trail of butchery and existentialism.

     There are six incredibly bloody movies in the “Lone Wolf and Cub” series, aka the “Baby Cart” series, aka Kozure Ōkami (“Wolf With Child in Tow”). In the Deep Red catalog they were available separately under various confusing titles like “Lightning Swords of Death” (which is a dubbed edited version of Part 3).
    The films are based on the manga of the same name(s) written by Kazuo Koike with outstanding art by Goseki Kojima. The manga author wrote most of the movies as well and gets story credit on all of them, with Tsutomu Nakamura co-writing on the final two films. There are other movies based on the manga and even a couple of TV shows.

     Director Kenji Misumi helmed four of the films and also directed both the “Zatoichi” and more demented “Hanzo the Razor” series. Buichi Saito steps in to direct the fourth film, and Yoshiyuki Kuroda the sixth. Eiichi Kusumoto is responsible for the fight choreography for the series. The stoic Ogami Itto is played by Tomisaburo Wakayama and his son Daigoro by Akihiro Tomikawa. Daigoro's gestures and confused look never come off like an annoying "child actor", he's very natural and does an incredible job. Yagyū Retsudo, the Lone Wolf’s mortal enemy, is portrayed by various actors throughout the series.

Wait, I thought you said no real weapons around kids, where's my agent!

     The six “Lone Wolf and Cub” (LWC) films were compressed into the five-movie “Shogun Assassin” series, all awfully dubbed with ridiculous swishing blade noises added in! In the 80s and 90s in the US you could only find the dubbed truncated abomination “Shogun Assassin”, which is 12 minutes of the first movie and about half of the second movie squished together into a new story. The movie still managed to attain cult status and go on to be showcased in “Kill Bill 2” (2004). These movies are that good. You can butcher them like one of the Lone Wolf’s victims, and they will still keep kicking your mind right in the face like armless ninjas.

It's only some minor edits, we'll be up kicking ass again in no time.

    In the overviews of each of the movies, we've tried to leave major plot points unspoiled as much as possible. Body count numbers are courtesy of allouttabubblegum. Every one of these movies is exceptionally bloody and there are severed limbs by the bushelful. All six movies are highly recommended, and the 2nd and 4th movies are our favorites of the series.

     Crank Comments: I reviewed parts 1, 2, and 3. I avoided “Shogun Assassin” like the plague. LWC 1 and 2 were not only beheaded for grindhouse audiences to easily digest but neutered and appallingly dubbed by some cringeworthy talent (like Sandra Bernhard and Lamont Johnson). I do have fond memories of seeing the poster in various early 80's video stores, moving toward the horror section to rent "Zombie" for the 20th time. I’m not opposed to bad dubbing, but it feels wrong to me that this particular piece of chopsocky re-edited bullshit is so widely acclaimed even though it’s actually robbing us of so much of the original movies! I admit I have the rottencotton “Shogun Assassin” t-shirt, because it’s the only availably merch connected to one of my favorite Japanese series. I can watch the Baby Cart movies repeatedly, they never get old to me!

     Goat Notes: A series of six samurai movies churned out in the space of 2 years, featuring a pre-kindergarten child actor? I used to walk past the LWC series back in the VHS age, browsing for martial arts movies, and turn up my nose. I envisioned a cheap, sanitized Kurosawa knockoff aimed at little kids. I never suspected what I was overlooking. I watched all six and reviewed #4 - #6. These movies are not at all what I expected, they are some of the most blood-soaked films I've ever seen. Every one of them is beautiful, ultra-violent, and viciously entertaining!

PART 1

Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Kowokashi udekashi tsukamatsuru

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Child and Expertise for Rent”

Gore Score: 10/10

Body Count: 62

Retsudo Yagyu, professional meanie.

It sure doesn't look like gold.

     “LWC: Sword of Vengeance” is the first in the series. I decided to review each sequel individually since I'm obviously not a fan of the mixtape version of the “Baby Cart” films. In the Deep Red catalog, the first film easily gets a 10 out of 10 on the gore score and according to Chas "will make you howl with unabashed glee". This film doles out geysers of crimson splatter. Arteries spray like garden hoses. That samurai sword is sharp, and limbs get separated and bounced off the walls. The erratic but tranquil score by Hideaki Sakurai really sets the tone effectively. “Sword of Vengeance” is just a superior film on all levels.

Somebody get me a band-aid, I got a thousand ouchies!

     Ogami Itto is the Shogun’s Decapitator. His job is to assist a person who's committing seppuku (ritual suicide by self-disembowelment), one of the most honorable deaths in Japanese culture. He is framed by Yagyu Retsudo of the Shadow clan as part of a bid to seize more power. Itto’s wife and the rest of the Ogami household are slain, except for his son, and Itto is accused of plotting to kill the Shogun. They show how corrupt the authority he works for is, so that we can admire his conviction to quit and walk the barren lands in the form of a demon ronin, slaying any target for the price of 500 gold pieces. 

Tough love.

Choose death!

     Enemy clans make things difficult for father and son, who travel wheeling a stroller armed with an array of secret deadly weapons. The narrative swings back and forth like a pendulum as we find that the killer who decapitates a child in the opening scene has a conscience after all. There is a lot of honor and symbolism in the cultural mythology of this film and kind gestures are not overlooked. There's a brilliant scene at a sauna riddled with the most hideous scumbag rapists and criminals where Ogami Itto takes a situation of shame and turns it into glorious beauty.

     There's another brilliant scene with a bouncy ball and a sword stuck in the floor, where Daigoro is required to choose his destiny: An immediate merciful death at the hands of his father; Or to “live at the crossroads of Hell” and leave piles of mutilated corpses in his wake. We know Daigoro chooses the sword, otherwise he would be in the afterlife with his slain mother.

PART 2

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Sanzu no kawa no ubaguruma

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Baby Cart of the River of Sanzu”

Body Count: 37
Gore Score 10/10

     During the second film we're waist-deep in the blood trail left by Ogami and son. A new foe, Sayaka, and her band of face-shredding Shadow clanswomen find out Itto beheaded one of their allies (in the first film) and they want vengeance. They show their prowess to a foolish ninja by whittling him down into doggy bag sized chunks.

Oh crap, I'm pissing blood!

     This sequel gets intense fast as father and son battle female assassins at every turn. Little Daigoro almost gets his tiny head ripped off by a frisbee straw hat containing razorblades. Sayaka does an amazing trick and nearly stabs Itto in the throat. He almost has her until she pops out of outfit like a Holly Hobby doll and disappears backwards into the brush.

The Citizen Kane of wall paper decoratives

     To impress a group of samurai, Itto sails that famed sword of his across the room to instantly kill a silent hidden intruder. This is one of my favorite moments in cinema history!

     Smiling women pull knives out of big Daikon radishes to stab at the baby cart, narrowly missing the kid's neck! Even though the bodycount is the lowest in the series, there is tons of grisly violence. There's an incredible showdown at the finale. The stern killer poses in the sand dunes and awaits the arrival of his enemies, three brothers known as The Gods of Death armed with iron claws, flying clubs, and chainmail fists.

     Does Ogami even slightly flinch or sweat a drop? FUCK NO!

     The last "death god" gets very poetic about his neck wound before his jugular bursts and red poster paint soaks the dirt. This film sets the pattern for father and son to travel down the road at the end, to journey to the next adventure.

PART 3

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Shinikazeni mukau ubaguruma

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Baby Cart Against the Winds of Death”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 2: Lightning Swords of Death”

Body Count: 72

Gore Score 10/10

     Unlike most sequels, these were shot during a short time period, so the characters haven't aged much even though we're three movies in. This film has a great crooning theme song at the end with lyrics, one of my favorites of the series.

Trepanation gone disastrously wrong.

Itto loves disco.

     “Hades” starts off on the river with the Yagyu clan lurking, waiting to strike again. A new group of lazy perverted samurai (known as Watari Kashi) show up and attack a woman with blacked-out teeth, but are soon set straight by Kanbei, a samurai who earns Ogami's respect. He faces Ogami in the forest and demands a fight. Before they go to war, Ogami mentions that he and his son live as demons prepared to venture to the netherworld and this inspires Kanbei, the insecure warlord.
     In one scene a prostitute bites off the tongue of her pimp, and he dies from the wound almost instantly! 

Some goons known as the Boohatchimono show up to collect the murderous prostitute, but Ogami and son find a kinship with her. The Boohatchimono are outcasts with no shame or justice, so they may be worse then the Yagyus. Speaking of the Yagyus, they show up later in droves during an epic horse battle between one man and child armed with a machine-gun baby stroller!

     Ogami faces an endurance test, spun around upside down in a basket while being drowned and beaten by the group of outcasts. He does this to make that prostitute he protected, feel something of value, this is clearly his style, to let himself be tortured to save a woman's integrity.

     This time, unlike in Sword of Vengeance, it doesn't work to his benefit, in fact the water torture scene was more of a temporary setback, than what comes later. This bit of unnecessary humiliation leads to a job and a new target for him to slay. The moments with Diagoro communicating with nature are some of the best scenes. 

     The actor that plays the long haired gunman with rat-like features plays an entirely different character in the first film. The pacing is a little slow toward the middle, but stick it out because the ending goes completely insane and that's when the body count really starts to rack up! The gun battle at the end has severed heads and a rain of shredded toes and feet, so make sure you stay awake for the final scenes!

PART 4

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril (1972)

     Kozure Ōkami: Oya no kokoro ko no kokoro

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: The Heart of a Parent, the Heart of a Child”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 3: Slashing Blades of Carnage”

Body Count: 84

Gore Score 8/10

     This is a fantastic movie. It’s fast paced, gory, and fun as heck. This was my first exposure to the LWC series and it whetted my appetite for more. Like a lot of the LWC movies I suspect there are lots of cultural references I don’t get, yet the story is still accessible and the emotional underpinnings are universal. The fight scenes are creative and frenetic and every aspect of the movie comes together in near-perfection.

A winning strategy.

I am soooooooo scared.

    This fourth entry opens with battle, blood, and boobs, and pretty much continues that way. The half-naked killer wears tattoos on her breasts and back designed to startle her foes. She makes mincemeat of a group of attackers to show us right away what a badass she is.

It's all fun and games...

     The Lone Wolf, Itto, accepts the commission to kill Oyuki, the breasty lady with the tattoos and swords. Oyuki is a swordswoman who served Lord Owari and then deserted for reasons unknown. Itto slices apart crowds of enemies on the hunt for her, uncovers an old foe who is supposed to be dead, and strikes a blow against the clan which betrayed him, all while keeping the Cub alive.

Come at me, bro.

     Things only get more complicated when he finds his quarry and discovers Oyuki to be far more honorable than the people who hired him to hunt her. At the climax Itto purees his way through an entire army using his famed Sui-O sword technique until he's facing Retsudo Yagyu himself. Many, many limbs are lost along the way. Moral of the story: Don’t piss off the deadliest man in the world.

Titty clutching tat

I said NO WIRE HANGERS

Gonorrhea flare-up

...she's really obsessed with my cawk.

PART 5

Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in the Land of Demons (1973)

     Kozure Ōkami: Meifumado

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Land of Demons”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 4: Five Fistfuls of Gold”

Body Count: 80

Gore Score 7/10

     This is not as furiously-paced as part 4 but the movie is still brutal and bloody. Five deadly messengers test Itto’s strength. Each one carries 100 gold pieces, 1/5 of the payment for a very special job. One of the men calmly delivers a message while he slowly burns alive!

     The abbot of Sofuku (ha!) temple has double-cross the Kuroda clan. This revered man is actually the head of a secret order of ninja spies, allies of Itto’s mortal enemies the Yagyu. Itto is contracted to kill the abbot and return the documents to Lord Kuroda. It turns out the abbot has wizardy holy-man powers and Itto can’t or won’t draw his sword to cut him down.

I accidentally swam into your sword, bro.

      A servant of the Kuroda clan arrives with a new job, piggybacking on the first job. The completion of the first assassination will put Itto in place to execute his second set of targets: An entire family, including a 5 year old child. It’s merciless but the reasons make sense in the context of the difficult situation.

     Retsudo Yagyu is still around making trouble as an ally of the abbot. He wear an eye patch after his last fight with Itto. Itto manages to pull some serious special-ops shit to complete his mission, and then fights an army wearing nothing but his underwear. The crimson really starts to spray when fights a second army at the end, and he really lives up to that whole Decapitator thing.

This helmet is way too tight.

All demons are issued Sam Elliot mustaches in Hell, you didn't know?

PART 6

Lone Wolf and Cub: White Heaven in Hell

     Kozure Ōkami: Jigoku e ikuzo! Daigoro

     “Wolf with Child in Tow: Now We Go to Hell, Daigoro!”

     aka “Shogun Assassin 5: Cold Road to Hell”

Body Count: 155+ kills!!!

Gore Score- Infinity

     The series racks up its highest body count yet with a satisfyingly slaughter-happy final entry. Young Daigoro manages an impressive number of kills with babycart gadgets, but it’s only a fraction of the host of enemies swept aside by Itto’s ruthless blade.

The size of Itto's scrotum demoralizes his foes.

Santa is furious with you.

My special weapon is Brillo Pad hair.

     Itto is declared a wanted criminal by the Shogunate. A manhunt begins and old enemies converge on LWC looking for revenge. There are assassins everywhere, using every trick and technique in their personal arsenals. An evil wizard of the Spider Demon clan stalks and taunts the duo, brutally slaying every person who shows LWC kindness on the road. Later the wizard rapes his own sister in front of their father, series arch-nemesis Retsudo Yagyu! Dysfunctional doesn't even begin to cover it.

I call this move Snoopy Snowcone style

     Three half-living killers, strengthened by martial-arts sorcery, are sent by the one-armed ronin Gunbei (a survivor from the fourth film). They fight in perfect unison, and do not fall even after being riddle with gunfire.

Itto explores bondage

     An army of Yagyu clan warriors surrounds LWC, led by Retsudo, who has a lot of anger issues at the moment. Itto battles an army of skiing ninjas, cuts one of them in half and uses the baby cart as a sled to kick butt. Retsudo has made his own combat sled armed with heavy artillery, and they battle their way down the mountainside.

Gandalf was a pussy.

I'll never be a sex symbol

     This wild movie ends this cycle of the epic revenge tale but doesn’t wrap up the overall story. The original manga series comes to a startling yet almost inevitable conclusion. My ultimate fantasy version of this movie series would have ended the same way, but in any case these are really entertaining movies and I wish they had made more.

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Crankenstein's Best Of The Year

December 29, 2014, 12:00 am

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≪ Previous: Lone Wolf and Cub Series Roundup

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Since we started this blog way back in 2012, I realized that I've never done a "best of" for the year. It was mainly because I was concentrating on tackling everything related to the world of Deep Red and basically forgot about it. In this day and age of instant gratification and amnesia I buried the blog with more info than the average attention span could keep up with. So let's look back and reflect on some of my most favorite moments on the site, think of this as the Denny's sampler platter of ToG, a deep fried selection of some of the most unhealthy, brain melting, artery clogging flicks in the VHS bootleg catalog. Here are some of my favorites from last year and a a few choice cuts from before since we've never done a "Best Of". This is by no means a definitive list, so sit back and enjoy some of my favorites over the years. Thanks to all my hard working contributors and thanks for reading, more flicks to come next year. Click on each link to read the posts.

10. BrainWash 
This is one of the greatest films about corporate training seminars.

9. The Beast In Heat 
This Video Nasty was extremely unpleasant to watch but there was enough chuckles in this review for me to remember it fondly, I mean what's more hilarious then a mongoloid Ernest Borgnine chowing down on pubes?

8. Emanuelle In America
One of Skunkape's finest moments (of many, I'm probably his number one fan). I just couldn't do this site without his help and encouragement! Don't forget to check out the parody trailer, which is genius in my mind.

7.  The Rape After
This is one of the most harrowing, depressing Cat III films I've sat through with my jaw on the floor. It was also incredible and so fucked up that I had a blast watching it! (is there something wrong with me? Nah!)

6.  Mosquito The Rapist 
This one by Goat Scrote is another I've enjoyed re-reading. The film really got under his skin and caused me to bust out laughing! Neither I or Skunkape could've done it this amount of justice, I'm such an admirer of Goat's style of writing which I consider to be nothing short of amazing and I consider myself lucky to have him as a contributor.

5. Interview With Buddy Giovinazzo
Skunkape and I went totally ballistic when we got the chance to speak to Buddy G. over a three way call on Skype. Buddy lives in Berlin so we both had to get up super early to catch him at the right time and we were both sort of pissed off when this Youtube video didn't get that much attention. So to drum up alittle more publicity for it, I'm putting it on the countdown to remind people about this film makers genius work. We both saw "No Way Home" together when it came to an independent theater in Florida and were ravenous fans of Combat Shock and Circus 200's music (which we were fortunate to have rare mp3 files of, not available anywhere). So give it another look and if you like it  please tell others.

4. Kris Gilpin's interview with Frank Doubleday
 I feel honored that Mr. Gilpin has elected me as his transcriber and graciously sent me his rare articles and reviews. His fictional work under the nom de plume Eliot P. Ness is legendary. Just check out Gilpin's interview with the reclusive early John Carpenter star for yourself to see what I mean.

3. Mad Foxes
The first time I saw this repulsive oddball biker flick at a time when Skunkape and I were giving each other movie challenges thru Netflix (non instant when they actually bought weird Dvds that eventually wiped out mom and pop video stores and made everything worse). I couldn't believe some of the images I witnessed in that film, so fucking insane! A real piece of comedy gold for jaded weirdos only!

2. Fight For Your Life
This film is so gawd awful and has the power to eat through your subconscious like mind draino. Babies are held at gunpoint, little kids are smashed with rocks and the air is thick with racism. It wants you to scream at your TV in agony about how many chances the black family being held hostage has to escape but decides to turn the other cheek, arghhhhh I'm furious just thinking about it! Graham Rae did a stellar job reviewing this, I convinced him to under take it and then he got me to write John Waters in an attempt to see if he'd do commentary (I'm not even sure why we came up with that idea, but I did manage to get a signed postcard by one of my all time favorite directors, so it was worth it! Thanks again Graham and I hope you'll contribute another review soon.

1. Dangerous Encounters Of The 1st Kind
I have no idea how this wound up number 1 but I always go back to it from time to time. It really affected me, even though I've seen better films by Tsui Hark the subtext of using animal cruelty to send a message it just wrong and is a reoccurring thorn in my side about exploitation films in general, so I think it's important for gore fans to know that ToG doesn't celebrate this type of cheap shot, I tend to condemn film makers who take this shock route. The film is ahead of its time with its message that the youth continues to be a scapegoat for the previous generations flaws and no one is held accountable.
My intent was to not bombard you with more information but to encourage readers to go back and revisit what we've put out before and we hope you appreciate the effort and revisit. In a few days we'll return to our regularly scheduled posts.

2019 After the Fall of New York

December 30, 2014, 10:37 pm

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-Reviewed by Skunkape-

Directed by Sergio Martino 198

2019 is Italy’s answer the the success of John Carpenters’ Escape from New York. It’s directed by Sergio “Mountain of the Cannibal God” Martino. Martino didn’t just take the job for quick buck, he brings his A game thus making a movie that in my opinion may be inferior but just as entertaining as JC’s Escape. This is actor Michael Sopkiw’s first film playing Parsifal aka “Fake” Plisskin.

"oops, forgot my eye patch."

SNL news with Dennis Miller!

The Earth is total wasteland all because of  E.U.R.A.K (the Euro Afro Asian Unity) monarchy who dropped a nuclear weapon destroying almost all humanity. Which begs the question where were the Eurak’s when the bomb was dropped? The Eurak’s have set up their base in New York City where they rule and look for ways to procreate. You see when they nuked everything the radiation was so bad that not one human is fertile. When we meet our hero he’s competing in some kind of death race 2000 I guess you could say! As winner, the mutants of the Nevada dessert cheer and chant his name. Then a freaky robotic clown announces that he has won his own sex slave. He takes her on his futuristic motorcycle into the dystopian wasteland. Instead of getting down and dirty he sets her free, whichis what you do if you love something, right? Parsifal then gets abducted by a spaceship and brought to Alaska. That’s where the Rebel Federation has set up their base. It's very Hoth like, but there are no Taun Tauns or Wampas to be found, just cheap looking models that wouldn’t fool your 3 year old brother.

The Alaska play set, Spaceship not included.

Among the Rebel Federation is the dreamy Edmund Purdom playing the President of the Pan American Confederacy. I say dreamy Edmund Purdom because Theater of Gut’s President and head writer Crankenstein just loves this guy (he’s smitten). It’s more of an inside joke actually but he seriously wouldn’t shut up about Purdom after watching Pieces for a whole week. So now that the rebels have Parsifal, President Purdom gives him an offer he can’t refuse. The mission is to sneak into NYC undetected and find the one fertile female before the Eurak’s do. In return for his services he is offered a seat on a spacecraft that will head to another planet, where life can start over contamination free. This plan will only work of course if he gets the girl. However, they don’t send him alone, two very special helpers are assigned to aid him. Bronx (Paolo Maria Scalondro) is the navigator, he is an ex resident of the city and knows his way around. Ratchet (Romano Puppo) is extra muscle and has lots of special skills to kick butt.

Along the way they encounter the Rat Eater King and his merry rat eaters. From that group they take in Giana, (Valentine Monnier). Also helping them is a little person appropriately named Shorty who is key in helping them locate the girl they seek. Another key player is Big Ape (George Eastman), they meet him hanging out with whole group of half man, half monkey men. Eastman was reluctant to play the role because of the makeup he had to wear but after the movie came out was glad he did, and I am too. Who else could’ve played that role?

Little People, Nuked Worldthereality show

"You think I should trim my eyebrows?"

After the Fall of NY on Broadway!

2019 is one of those post-nuke science fiction Italian movies that really delivers. Martino never lets the film drag. The sets are cheap but fun and interesting as our heroes navigate through the remains of NYC. It also contains some nice stunt work with lots of explosions and even a little gore here and there. Oliver Onions provides a mostly electronic score. Actually the credits say “with original music by Oliver Onions”, because we also get some music stolen from Margeriti’s Yor Hunter from the Future as a bonus.  There is also a poor mutant bum (James Sampson) that plays the trumpet over the opening credits but Martino didn’t pay him. He only lives off the gratuity of tourists.

"Welcome to the 2019 McDonalds."

My Big Fat Post Nuke Apocalypse Wedding

"I'm Issac Hayes' stunt double."

"Ratz off 2 Ya!"

"Don't cry just because Warwick Davis got the role of Willow 2: Lost in NYC."

Follow Theater of Guts @FilmGuts
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#Sopkiw 

Trailer Coming Soon!

"Tell Crankenstein, I Love him too!"

Horror Hospital

October 30, 2014, 11:09 pm

≫ Next: He Likes To Bite (or Bite Of Love)

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Horror Hospital (Dr. Bloodbath, Frankenstein Horror Klinik, Computer Killers) Directed By Anthony Balch, starring Michael Gough (1973).
 
If you're looking for a ghoulishly fun British horror film, this is a must see! Not even five minutes goes by before we get a motorized decapitation Rolls Royce with a handy dandy head catching basket. This film is in league with cryptic Brit favorites like Theatre of Blood, Dr. Phibes and the work of Peter Walker. 

Michael Gough and his dwarf pal Frederick (Skip Martin) are perturbed that two patients with blood soaked bandages on their scalps attempted to escape. They pay for their insolence with their lopped off heads. I remember seeing the image of the two victims on the cover of a zine in middle school called Demonique in the Fantaco catalog. 
    

They went alittle crazy with the condiments

      
   Jason Jones (Robin Askwith, who looks like they cloned Brian Jones) decides to take a vacation away from the music scene after a glam band steals one of his tunes. His ripped off song "Mark of Death" by Mystic is a pretty hilarious and sounds like Eric Burdon trying to imitate Alice Cooper. Askwith was also in Horror On Snape Island before this, which I've yet to see but remember fondly from the "Mad Ron's Prevues from Hell" tape.
     

Gingivitis I hardly knew yee

   Mr. Pollack (played by Ealing comedian Dennis Price) is a gay rotten toothed travel agent for Hairy Holidays. After checking out Jason's bulge he watches as the mop-toped yob sets off on a train. Jason meets a cute girl named Judy (Phoebe Shaw) who's timid at first, but he eases her mind by saying "Listen honey, I'm not gonna rape you". Yeah that's a reassuring opener, which I guess worked in 1973 because she trusts him and they become a couple. They check into a drafty health clinic where they are greeted by Fred the dwarf from the beginning who's unusually chipper and wears a yarmulke. Skip Martin, who was also in Vampire Circus, brings most of the black comedy to the film. 

This corn beef bloody better be kosher

   At dinner time, the couple (who are getting friskier by the minute) see a table full of pale teens with head wounds, there are glasses of green Kool-aid in front of them. 
I'm beginning to think Hairy Holidays is a scam to commit hippies to an insane asylum or worse!

Coloring books were often used to fool Hippies into impromptu lobotomies

   Dr. Storm (Michael Gough) shows up at the hotel and his midget servant keeps telling everyone to brush their teeth, he's an advocate for tooth wellness, not brain health. Storm has a grayish complexion, wears black leather gloves and travels in a wheelchair.
   
   There are two motorcycle henchmen who reminded me of the axe hacking maniac biker gang from The Undertaker and his Pals. They beat the piss out of Jason in the forest which really taps into that fantasy you might have in wanting to see one of those 60's era Rolling Stones jerks get what's coming to them.
 

Oh wait, you didn't drown, is Hendrix still alive too?

   This movie hates hippies and Dr. Storm uses the travel agency to lobotomize the teenagers.
He's kind of like Phil Spector and anyone that deserts him gets slaughtered, even those who were loyal to him. At the end he explains how he worked for Pavlov and after Stalin installed new adolescent runts, that was the last straw and the reason he hates the younger generation. His form of retaliation was to create a lobotomized human zoo. They tried this concept in Barn of the Naked Dead with unappealing results. It gets even weirder as we find out Dr. Storm is a mutant creature made out of melted wax and is seen fornicating with different girls. 
      

It's embarrassing but you're right we both have the same hair stylist

 

   The director Anthony Balch is a counterculture fixture who hung out with Burroughs and Kenneth Anger, later on he distributed some of the most highly regarded cult flms like Haxan, Supervixens and The Corpse Grinders (which was on a double bill with Horror Hospital). He never made another film and sadly died of stomach cancer in 1980, he was an extremely talented director. The score is great and uses stock music from the De Wolfe catalog to great effect, I guess I'm a sucker for library music as someone who is obsessed with all the Romero tracks from Dawn and Creepshow. This film is a total blast and a must see for people who are on the fence about British horror, it may just convert them.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

I gotta run this over to the set of Brain Damage

Hold on! I'm indecent!

Mutant 69 which I guess you could call a 74

He Likes To Bite (or Bite Of Love)

January 5, 2015, 12:00 am

≫ Next: Murder Obsession (1981)

≪ Previous: Horror Hospital

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He Likes to Bite Directed by Stephen Shin, Starring George Lam Chi-Cheung (1990). 

This Dickson Poon production (Haw Haw, very difficult not to snicker at that name) was entitled "He Likes to Bite" in the Deep Red catalog. I sent the feelers out into Facebook land and Jack Jensen (of Backyard Asia blog fame) and a few others in the Monster! zine crew helped me track down this HK vampire Darkman clone. It's nothing like the Sam Raimi pre-Spiderman superhero film at all however, let's clear that up right away. 

warning: this film causes explosive diarrhea

A vampire named Duke Lee has a wild mane of grey hair and a mustache, he is woken up from his coffin by his Renfield type servant, who also has strange grey hair, which looks like Donald Trump. Duke who's played by George Lam Chi-Cheung appeared in Banana Cop and also composed the music for this and something called Disco Bumpkins (man what a great title)! The servant brings his master a giant dinner tray containing a dead white girl. He rejects the cannibal feast, remarking that he doesn't bite humans. This Dracula is not like Bela Lugosi and drinks wine, he rides around in style with a horse and carriage. A girl named Anna is at her brother's party, which has dancing girls doing the "Can Can". He just got out of the hospital and wants to live it up. I know Rosmund Kwan Chi-Lam, the actress who plays Anna from Armour Of God, she's pretty good at playing a clueless idiot in this film. 

Duuuuuhhhhhh!!!!

Bite is very cutesy for a Deep Red pick, but watchable. Duke is captivated by Anna and they waltz around the dance floor, only her reflection registers in the mirror, since he's one of the undead. This Dracula clone looks more like a cheese ball magician and has a silly hair style. Anna's brother who's in a wheel chair attached to a plasma bag, does some dangerous knife tricks. One example involves a kid holding a plumb in his mouth as he tosses a sharp blade at the tyke's face (Duke interferes just in the nick of time, thankfully). The brother is played by Shaw Brothers veteran actor Norman Chu Sui-Keung, he's appeared in some of the best of that studios output, like Seeding of a Ghost and Black Magic. Sometimes English dialogue is spoken in the background by a bevy of British blondes.

A SWAT team busts in and threatens to beat on the vampire, he retaliates with some ridiculous stop motion flying effects. The little boy gets caught in the scuffle, accidentally flying out the window and lands on the ground (even though the vampire does try to help him). Duke is the most courteous and friendly vampire, he seems to care about these people--man, what a sell-out! Anna even calls him a magician and I wonder if she's so dopey that she doesn't notice he's an immortal bloodsucker. She gets even stupider because Anna wants him to bring her asshole brother back to life after he dies in an accident.

They show the Duke's array of yarn barn wigs, even though he has hair, he feels the need to wear an assortment of cheesy ones.

He then requests a bloody mary (I guess that's a subtle joke,not very funny). 

When she flashes a cross at him, he says "Why don't you believe in Buddhism instead?" This is some gentle comedy folks, not the typical raunchy and delightfully offensive, seen in most HK flicks from the catalog. Anna's brother is a serious fuckhead and has his henchmen grab the plumb eating kid  from the beginning played by Cheng Pak-Lam, in order to steal his blood for a transplant.

Don't fuck with THE WONGS!

Duke is a kind vampire and flies away with the poor drained kid (who's getting paler by the minute). The premise of twenty douchebags on motorcycles gunning for a 5 year old kid's blood is far fetched even for a weirdo hong kong film; at least to me, but that's what happens here! Anna is just as brainless as her brother and after noticing that he is a heroin trafficker she goes "Hey I'm going to the police" and is quickly apprehended by more hentchmen (who all wear white suits for some reason). 

Duke apparently is a broke assed count and doesn't have a castle, his coffin is down in Anna's brothers basement. I like the vampire and the kid's relationship, that's the most heartwarming aspect of the film. 

I need more polygrip, my dentures are slipping!

The vampire folklore is all over the place in this film, when they hit him with a bunch of floodlights to replicate the sun, it weakens him, which makes no sense!

The Duke bites the kid in order to save his life but majorly fucks up by also biting the evil brother character. He's totally irresponsible with his fangs and should have them revoked (if there were such a thing)! 

There's some maudlin Chinese pop, during a scene with Anna and Duke, this montage, attempts to give them some shared chemistry but it comes off like terrible karaoke and doesn't succeed in giving them any kind of bond.
  

The brother even chains up the Reinfield character with an ankle ball and forces him to cook them dinner. Anna watches a scene from Fright Night in a videostore window, where they only seem to have laserdiscs, pretty rad!

Tell Indy not to pick the fancy cup, that's the wrong grail!

Bite Of Love is pretty clunky and not that great, if you're a Hong Kong vampire completist than you probably need to see it. Other than that obligation, just skip it and see something with more bite (Ahem excuse the pun)! I can't figure out why this one is featured in the catalog, but there are a couple of questionable titles like a Dutch drama called Abwarts (or Out of Order) with Rene Soutendijk, who Chas calls an international sex goddess.

Don't watch it this sucks worse than Bite of Love!

Nuke baby!

   

Murder Obsession (1981)

November 3, 2014, 12:00 am

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Murder Obsession (1981, aka Murder Syndrome, aka Satan’s Altar, aka The Wailing, aka Fear, aka Follia Omicida)
Directed by Riccardo Freda, written by Antonio Cesare Corti, Riccardo Freda, Fabio Piccioni.

 Review By Goat Scrote

     It’s got mystery and death and sleaze but it may be slightly dishonest to call this movie a “thriller” since it’s really pretty boring. On the bright side there’s more than the usual amount of soft-core Euro-sex and a whole lot of exposed breasts. The special effects are about on the same level as a school play so that was kind of funny. Paper mache is a ludicrously ineffective yet shrewdly economical way to do gore effects, so I'm guessing budget was a big factor here. And scares? Don’t be silly, I’m pretty sure this is more about the boobies than the blood.

OUCH! Watch out for titty splinters

     The version I saw seems to have been patched together from mismatched prints, with most of it dubbed in English and other portions reverting to the original dialogue. Even without subtitles it’s an easy plot to follow for sophisticated professional reviewers like us, but it might be a little daunting for the general public. Let’s see… A bunch of victims-to-be stay at an isolated location and start getting killed off one by one. Hmm, not so daunting.

     Is it the crazy film star with a history of homicide, or is something even more sinister and twisted going on? What the hell, throw in some sleazy sex and black magic sandwiched between the mammaries and we got us a flicker-show here.

      The movie starts off with a fellow dressed like a gay leather bar clone from the 70s (Stefano Patrizi) attacking a beautiful woman (Laura Gemser, of the “Emanuelle” series). He tears off her clothes while he strangles her. It turns out to be a movie set and the guy just got a little carried away with his method acting. I bet Pacino and Hoffman have almost killed people bunches of times on-set.

     Michael, the crazed actor, goes on a trip to go see his mother Glenda (Anita Strindberg) and brings his girl, Debbie (Silvia Dionisio) out to his Ma’s big estate out in the middle of nowhere. The creepy caretaker Oliver (John Richardson) shows them to their rooms in the dark mansion. Mother comes to Michael’s room and kisses him just a little too passionately. Mom acts like a jealous girlfriend when she meets Debbie.

She's calculating the measurements for the Troll 2 costumes in her head

     Later a group of Michael’s moviemaking friends show up for the weekend to provide a roster of shallow disposable victims. Overnight there’s an invisible ghostly intruder.  Lots of gothic ghost-story images appear but the supernatural elements are just sort of a vague mish-mash throughout the movie. I’d call it “surreal” but a more precise description in this case is “doesn’t make too much goddamned sense”.

that purple bedspread just screams surrealistic GIALLO!

     Debbie is nearly drowned during her bath by a gloved assailant. The soundtrack turns into the worst John Cage impression ever, like someone beating the bujeezus out of a piano keyboard with a baseball bat. I am really bored, but there’s another hour to go, but things are about to get slightly better for a while.

     Debbie has a dream of being stalked by monsters while her breasts flop around under her flimsy robe. Fake bats and bleeding paper mache skulls show up. Her whole “scary dream” is definitely the best part of the movie. Debbie ends up in some weird ritual bondage situation where (surprise) she’s stripped to the waist by gooey-faced monsters dressed like monks. They slaughter a chicken and make her drink its blood as part of a black magic ritual. A giant spider-puppet appears and starts feeling her up rather lewdly. Yeah, I’d say that’s a good place to wake yourself up, Debbie.

NO! Debbie stay asleep it's just getting good!

     Later Michael reveals to his friends that when he was a child he murdered his father to protect his mother from being beaten. There’s been an attempted homicide and  Michael is acting pretty weird but everybody seems pretty cool with that. Beryl, the actress whom he tried to kill during filming lets Michael feel her up and they have sex out in the forest. Meanwhile the photographer of the group takes pictures from the bushes.

The real truth about Bosley hair transplants

     When Michael wakes up after the sex picnic, his co-star has been slashed to death with a pocket knife. The peeping photographer is dispatched with a hatchet before he can call the police, Later one of the other friends decides to develop the film in the abandoned camera to see if there are any clues. Fortunately, the mansion has a fully-equipped darkroom in the attic. Unfortunately, there is a killer in the house who absolutely doesn’t want those photos revealed.

Pervy the magical rape spider

     Michael believes that he is killing people without knowing it, but his mother insists that Oliver is actually responsible. There are shocking revelations about Michael and his family. Several different versions of the backstory are told before the end. Oliver the groundskeeper commits suicide. Thankfully he has the presence of mind to leave behind a tape recording which finally fills in the truth.

My parents forced me into this movie

     The upshot is that mom is super-evil and way into black magic. She killed her husband then immediately started warping her son’s mind to believe he was responsible. Poor Oliver became her ensorcelled nookie slave. Mom thinks her husband’s soul has transmigrated into the son’s body, and she tries to get it on with Michael. He flees downstairs to the black-magic S&M dungeon from Debbie’s dream, but mom follows and stabs him. Debbie shows up in the basement, and finds son splayed across mother’s lap, bleeding and crying out for help. It’s a feel-good ending, really. Motherhood triumphs over all obstacles!

Mistress of the Apes

January 12, 2015, 12:00 am

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≪ Previous: Murder Obsession (1981)

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Mistress of the Apes Directed By Larry Buchanan, Starring Jenny Neuman (1979).

Sometimes I feel as if I'm punishing myself by watching a film like this; wasn't this just on Dick Cheney's enhanced interrogation list of legally appropriate torture along with rectal feeding? 

It opens with a quote that reminds you that our lineage can be traced back to Africa, it's always a good sign when Larry Buchanan, the self proclaimed "Schlockmeister" and Kris Gilpin's close personal friend reminds us of something serious in a rubber ape movie, aye?

My only point of reference for Buchanan or the "Buchmeister" is his epic trash heap Creature of Destruction, which I reviewed for the Weng's Chop "Beach Party Issue", along with Beachball and I kind of hated it. I'm willing to pour a nice tumbler of whiskey and forget all about that unfortunate mishap and give Larry another shot, don't fuck up this time buddy!

Stealing our music? That's just fucked up Larry!

So, Ahem, anyway back to the review. Meanwhile in the jungle . . . Wait, I'm hearing some familiar library stock music from a certain flesh eating ghoul movie from Pittsburgh. Some morons looking for goody headache powder most likely, break into the drug supply of a busy hospital. The Romero stock music continues to play as a blonde falls off a gurney in slow-motion. The idiotic robbers shoot cops and then it cross fades into the important storyline information which has a lot to do with the island of the silly named Book-a-boo. Next, we have a saucy Teri Garr type posing for cheesecake photos with a fat galoot named David Thurston, who looks kind of like a 60'S mod style Dennis Burkley (of Sanford and Mask: the Rocky Dennis one fame).

This Cal is Bachelor Pad Cal

Paul and the blonde from the hospital show up with  suspiciously blurry slides that show a scary ape-man! Or a Pithocene to be exact (according to the script) and my fuzzy memory of an Anthropology class I took at CCSF. 

AHAHA YOU DUMB HUMAN, NO PITHOCENE'S EXIST!

They all agree to fly out to Ooga-Booga island to capture the missing link, a totally reasonable excuse for a vacation right?   

Mr. Thurston is kind of a dick toward the locals who he already knows and they are out doing jobs for him. Dennis' wife looks like Martine Beswick, but Oops it's actually Barbara Leigh, who a year before was in the Andy Sidaris film Sevano's Seven and Boss Nigger, she also played Vampirella. She actually stopped acting after this flick, I'm sure it had nothing to do with the self loathing, this movie probably brought on to her fragile psyche. 

I can't read does it say Martine Beswick?

As for this critic, I'm having a blast, this film is so horrible that it's a soothing train wreck. Sometimes the ape creature will peek through some leaves, he kind of looks like a Planet from the Apes reject. 

Jenny Neuman, the hospital blonde, shows her boobs for a few minutes, she slightly resembles Candice Rialson and was on the V TV Series and Hell Night (which I thought sucked).

I don't get the symbolism?

There's a gibberish sounding Native language that is not really offensive, just lazy research. 

I like how all the adventurers dress like Panama Jack fashion models and look totally stupid. They shoot at a topless female humanoid monkey to establish further what shitheads these hunters are.

I learned how to roofie chicks from Russ Meyer

Holy Cameos! Stuart "Russ Meyer bit player" Lancaster shows up as a warring poacher. Dave mentions that they found something as valuable as "The Peking Man" and won't let anything stand in his way. After dark, A black girl goes swimming naked while being surrounded by tons of Alligators, they spare her life, but the ape man doesn't and she gets killed by his axe.

Dave invites Stuart and his tiny sidekick to rape his wife by saying 'Hey it's cool we're all family". I didn't expect this film to take such a random Deliverance style detour, but I can't say I object! Jenny gets naked again and ends up humping the monkey man, then also finds a nude baby that she throws in front of her chest, so no one can enjoy the view!

Yes I do expect to receive a hefty sum from the Tim Burton divorce settlement!

The apemen (that's right plural), finally show up an hour into the film and they play her funky theme song that goes "She's an ape lady, etc, etc!" The song is very catchy and after hearing it, you might have to do a "Neti Pot ear cleanse" to eradicate it from your subconscious! The hominids remind me of Helena Bonham Carter/ Michael Jackson from Tim Burton's abysmal Planet of the Apes remake. Mistress is very talky, but a total laugh riot, that is, if you have the patience for dumb movies! The most shocking part for me was during the credits when I saw that Greg Cannom and Rob Bottin handled the effects, how far they've advanced in the special effects world! I guess at the time they were the crack team of Ape creature creators and hopefully Rick Baker sent them migraine medicine while they were on the set. Bottin's talents would return later on for Tanya's Island, another monkey turd featured in the catalog.

MONUMENTALLY SPAZZTIC, FOR THOSE BANANA EATERS OUT THERE!

YAY! It's over, now hopefully we won't get paid in smokeable banana peels!

Demonia

January 14, 2015, 12:00 am

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Demonia Directed By Lucio Fulci, Starring Meg Register (1990).

There are certain Fulci movies, I've completely avoided seeing up until now, Demonia is one of them. Whenever I hear the title, I immediately think of that Misfits song "Demonomania", which I misinterpreted the lyrics as "Demonomania, my mother was a man". I've not read anything venturing into this one, but when I first heard of it in Deep Red Alert #1, Chas seemed impressed and remarked how Fulci is back in top form or something to that effect. So here we go,a mid 90's Italian horror flick involving Catholics, possession and bug-eyed nuns puking green stuff, all set, lets go!

I should've avoided Pee Soup Andersons!

I certainly recognize the theme music that the maggot maestro speaks over from my Fulci best of CD, so that's getting me amped up for some debauchery. You can't really call this a "Nunsploitation" film because it does have nuns, sure, but non of the usual things associated with that subgenre. The script is really half baked and could stand a few revisions--I mean when the lead actress transforms into one of the cloistered ghouls featured on the box cover, there's no real explanation, what gives?
   

In the opening scene, a gaggle of nuns are viciously crucified as a Lauren Hutton type blonde (Meg Register) passes out at a seance ala-Catriona Macoll (Gates of Hell style). When she comes to, she is met by her professor played by Bret Halsey, he warns her not to fuck around with black magic and that she'll be getting extra homework for disobeying his advice (well not quite, but you get the idea). 

There are some "Beyond" elements floating around the ether of this film, but this is in no way related to that superior film. Liza (recognize that name?) is on an expedition with her teacher Paul (Halsey) on an archeological dig. A rotund mayor type named Buscemi stirs up a little trouble, I wonder if he'll show up later, because that name is just too funny for me to not mention.

I'm thinking so hard right now

Al Cliver shows up (sans his dubbed voice, which seems almost as if he forgot his pants)! He mentions how the villagers will never let them continue with the dig and sees them as outsiders gutting their monastery and culture. One gaunt actor named Lino Salemme (who I've seen in Sweet House of Horrors, a film so stupid, that I'd like to forget it), tries to warn fake Lauren Hutton again, but its no use. She get her pickaxe out and starts cracking monastery walls. I like how the actors in the film are more freaked out and scared than the viewer is, this kind of illogical balance can only work in a Fulci flick.

I brought Herpes to Sicily!

Cliver's death is very strange, a ghost with a harpoon gun shoots him in the chest and he immediately goes down. Liza has some uneventful and silly dreams (Yawn, this movie is started to get boring). For this Pastaland effort, there's a serious lack of gore, what's the deal--I did notice in the beginning credits that a different effects guy than Giannetto De Rossi is handling them, so let's all blame him. To be fair, Franco Giannini (The Last Emperor, Ratman) was out of his element on this one.
Salemme looks as if Stallone and John Morghen mated, that character's death scene is hilarious, when his giant tongue gets nailed to the floor, he looks like an Italian Garbage Pail Kid! I've got to mention the jangly campfire/ pirate music, which is worse than any Jimmy Buffett song, BLECCCHH!

Oh yeah, that's totally going on a sandwich

Two winos fall onto a pit of spikes, so far, after some tedious bullshit that was thee highlight. Fulci looks very skinny in his cameo, its kind of sad because he died a few years later. A very homely villager explains to the blonde archeologist that the nuns made a pact with Satan (I'm guessing that's why they have what looks like the Blue Oyster Cult insignia on their foreheads). During a flashback, a nun throws a baby onto a barbecue and kills it. Fulci as the detective, kind of lingers around in his cameo, sort of like that tub of Ricotta cheese that you bought too much of for stuffed shells or lasagna and it stays at the back of the fridge for months. The best effect in the film shows maniacal cats pulling out a woman's eyeballs. Demonia has many flaws, but considering how shitty 90's Fulci flicks were (excluding Cat in the Brain of course), its more fun than you'd imagine.

SKIP IT UNLESS YOU LIKE TEPID SCARES AND HAVE A NUN FETISH, MORE LIKE DEMONO (demon plus mono)!

Those dudes from Labyrinth popped out my eyes

I baked these delicious macaroons with just a hint of seasalt

Heh, Oh man I'm so high

maybe the goofiest thing I've seen in a Fulci film

Oh Shit I forgot my voice in the car!

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Flesheater

January 27, 2015, 12:00 am

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≪ Previous: Demonia

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Flesheater (Zombie Nosh, Revenge of the living dead) Directed By Bill Hinzman, Starring Bill Hinzman (1988).

If you were Bill Hinzman, the man who played the first Romero zombie ever to appear on screen, would you simply retire as a Wal-Mart greeter for the rest of your days or would you reanimate that claim to fame for 1988, when the world was begging for a gore soaked, sex infused zombie movie helmed by the original somnambulist who cracked open Russ Streiner's skull, a fatal concussion heard round the world; you'd do the second one right? Well, I know William Wilson over at The Video Junkies blog and I are ecstatic that he decided to make this film! Prepare to get your ears blasted by overly amped beer snapping and tractor partying (the foley is extremely loud, once it pours in). At first I thought I might've found the version with drunken commentary, but my ears just needed adjusting to this amount of partaayyy-ing! My eyes were bleeding from seeing this amount of denim on these forest punkers out for a good time on a Halloween hayride. If John Russo (another NOTLD alum, soiled your appreciation for guys associated with Romero with the dreadful Midnight, let this movie restore your faith in zombie filmdom.

Did you dudes get your Denim at Bugleboys or Dungeree Dons?

The credit sequence mantra about "flesh and blood turning all evil" shows up on the tomb stone of writer director, actor Bill Hinzman. His crummy grave looks like something that was just fired up in the kiln at the local elementary school. Hinzman still looks great with his silver hair and bloody maw, after biting a chunk out of an unfortunate hillbilly, the victim immediately rises from the dead. The audio clips a lot and it seems like they recorded it MOS (Italian Neorealism influence)?

Kids in this town have nowhere to turn to for fun and have sex in barns and drink on tractors (wherever this movie takes place, I'm guessing Pittsburgh, remind me to never go there). Bill the zombie gets creative with his weapons and uses a pitchfork on one dude, then plunges his fist beneath an ugly girl's ribcage and pulls out her guts! Fuck Yeah!! He makes a "Ahhhh" sound like he just enjoyed a refreshing Shasta!

It's OK, your just having a Denim hangover, lets get you some B12 and orange slices!

The denim punks want to party some more and drink beer, so they look for firewood, are they homeless? Shouldn't someone suggest a house they can all drink at, with the heater on? The bearded hick (or victim from the opening scene) is out infecting other John Deere riding goons, so more zombies should be arriving. One of the party punks gets her neck chewed on by Bill and they take her to a hospital (wait no they don't, they all suggest "Farmhouse")!  Huh? People do funny things in FLESHEATER, is that a bad thing, No! It's incredibly entertaining, I wish people would do the wrong thing all the time it would make films vastly more entertaining!

If you were Robert Frost in this situation, which path would you choose?

All the kids, who want to board up a farmhouse for protection against the living dead are Caucasion, there are no Black kids, so I guess these punkers are fucked! We all know (from the original NOTLD and Return Of The Living Dead) that black people have the intrinsic knowledge to defeat hordes of dead people out to consume guts. 

Goddamn, how am I gonna chew through all that Denim?

Of course all the zombies immediately break through the windows and attack! One of my favorite dumb teens is Julie, she incessantly asks idiotic questions (when someone gets their head blasted, she goes "did he die?") and reacts like "Eeek, I'm acting like I'm scared"!

The 911 operator looks like she's hanging out in the office of Barbizon modeling school waiting for her headshots to be developed. A Mary Steenburgen look-a-like with a very hairy bush, takes a shower (so if you ever fantasized about the Clifford, Back to the future 3 actress, Flesheater's got ya covered)!

Oh yeah, that's where I left my keys!

Bill the zombie is not above eating suburban kids and breaking up families on Halloween night, which is pretty fucked up! I mean, people are already busy x-raying candy, they don't want to have to deal with actual zombies coming to the door!In reality, it's pretty funny that the little girl he snacks on is Hinzman's real daughter Heidi.

 Even though this film is pretty late to the living dead party, it does a good job of being really entertaining and original in it's own way. It's basically the first and last Nightsploitation, done by the only man who could do that kind of exploitation justice. I might even consider it the last pure zombie flick, before all the remakes and the stupid "Walking Dull".

The fact that an original person from the film that started it all gives it a lot of credibility, despite a couple of hiccups. One sheriff character gets so bitten up that he looks like a walking meatloaf and still moves. The film then reverts to its media roots as the news anchors start reporting the same kind of dialogue you've heard in the Romero original.

not attractive enough for Foxsnews

A whole new crop of teens at a costume party show up, there's a drunk dracula (or Druncula), a guy in a chicken outfit and some sexy witches. Having sex by a bale of hay must be a Pittsburgh thing, because it happens a second time! One dopey cheerleader (who doesn't even remember her boyfriends name) humps him on some straw in a barn. All the characters at the house party have weird fake drunk lisps. There's a really cool hand through the chest gag and one zombie bites Drac's nose off! Hunters start popping up, once the media alerts the police that the plague is in full swing (some of them wear Iron City Beer hats).

Something's up with this remake of The Shining

 I like that Vincent Survinski, the posse gunman from the original NOTLD shows up again playing the same role (he also was the production manager on The Crazies). The ending is not political as it was in the original, but it's just as infuriating (that is if you liked the dopey couple from the beginning and wanted them to live)! According to IMDB, Hinzman appeared in his zombie make-up for Goodfellas Pizza commercials, he seemed to have a great sense of humor and sadly passed away in 2012.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED, AN ALL AROUND BLAST OF A GUTBUSTER!

BUY HERE

Also don't forget to buy the Rotten Cotton shirt

Vince Vince (the Pittsburgh version of Weng Weng)

NO REFUNDS!

Wetlands

February 1, 2015, 12:00 am

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≪ Previous: Flesheater

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Wetlands Directed By David Wnendt, Carla Juri (2013). 

This film currently streaming on Netflix shocked and nauseated me and that's pretty hard to achieve! Just imagine if Diablo Cody or Miranda July were perverted mentally unhinged exhibitionists and attempted to do their own version of Human Centipede. It was adapted from the partially autobiographic account of Charlotte Roche. Just in the first few paragraphs that I'd read of the book, my impression was that she should've just called it "Butthole: a memoir". I mean the word is written at least twenty times in a row and that's in the first couple of pages. I find perverted and controversial material very compelling and this film, which has a very adorable little German actress named Carla Juri is titillating as well as vile. I had the same reaction when I watched "Rad Girls" an all female Canadian version of Jackass on MTV. Pretty girls sticking things up their orifices, eating pubic hair and fingering their anuses is not usually seen depicted outside of hardcore porn, it's all about the "context" and it goes out of its way to be raunchy and shocking.    

pick a winner!

 This revolting film, unsuspectingly sandwiched on instant between Lillyhammer and Orange is the New Black has a minefield of female yuckiness going for it (period face painting anyone?) it gave me the heebies jeebies more than one occasion. Scenes depicting a German skater girl smearing her lower extremities on a scabies ridden toilet seat and accidentally popping her anus with a razor was enough to make me want to throw up, but of course I didn't and it only compelled me to stick it out further to see what other events might cause me to regret turning this on. 

then you must love those San Francisco pay toilet/ drug dens

I immensely enjoyed Wetlands however, it's challenging, well made and forced me to question why am I so grossed out by simple natural bodily fluids and functions when they just happen to come from a cute female. The film is thought provoking and pushes all kinds of double standard buttons about feminine hygiene. For the gross out factor alone, I think it would fit along with Singapore Sling (which has a similar looking protagonist) and maybe Ebola Syndrome, had a women taken over in the Anthony Wong role. Is it worth all the trauma your face muscles will suffer from all the over cringing, possibly! I've never seen this much shocking imagery outside of a category III and this isn't even a horror film! The drawback of instant streaming is that you must judge everything by the image (you have to go out of your way to even check to see who directed it). The cover of this film looks like it might star Miranda July, I hope some unsuspecting conservative prude gets all wrapped up in the story line and than freaks out, sort of like what happened when a parent rented Pink Flamingos after they found out it was by the same director of the PG family friendly Hairspray. This is just wishful thinking, in today's instant gratification there's noway this would ever happen sadly.

when does Ricki Lake or John Travolta start dancing?

A similar thing about blindly picking a random digital videobox happened to me the first time Dark Horse by Todd Solonz magically appeared on instant without warning. This is a director who's work I mostly enjoy and the cover of an 80's gold name plate on a hairy chest didn't really make me want to click the start button, but had I not, I sorely would've missed out on one of the best comedies to come along in awhile. 

 Wetlands is not a comedy however, it's an endurance test of repulsion, like a pornographic horny garbage pail kid it chugs along continually sickening everything in its wake. The star of the film is an adorable little curly haired runt and it fucks with your libido because she's very cute, but does things that trigger my gag reflex! I don't recommend eating while you view this, a scene which made me want to puke shows a cum-covered pizza, complete with a coagulating opera of graphic en masse masturbation. I've got to hand it to David Wnent, the director and cinematographer Jakub Bejnarowicz, they really pulled together what should fall flat on its face into something vibrant, effective and visually compelling.
   

Guy Fieri's Sperm sample pizza anyone?

 There were many storyline flaws for me however, for one-- there's no explanation as to why Helen Memel (Juri), the main character is plagued by constant hemorrhoid trauma. Her parents are two of the worst humans I've seen in awhile, the mother is a cold and clinical disciplinarian and the father is vacant and stupid (he gives his daughter a hemorrhoid balloon that the surgeon mentions will cause her more anal trauma). The love and friendship interests are forced and one dimensional, considering her best friend is a girl who once pooped on her boyfriend's chest and is immediately rejected when she reveals to Hellen that she is pregnant. The main character is an attention hog and reminded me of this HBO documentary I vaguely remember, about a woman who has a mental illness/ hospital fetish. She would intentionally make herself sick with by inflicting wounds in the hospital or cause toxic shock, so that she could milk the system and receive the constant medical attention she craved. Half the film takes place in a hospital after Helen gets anal surgery. The chemistry between her makeshift bedside attendant and later on boyfriend is nonexistent. If you want to see a seriously gruesome, nice looking oddity then by all means throw this one on, the most shocking thing to me, was that I found this on Netflix, who seriously lack in quality cult entertainment, which is why I prefer Fandor. 

WATCH IT ON NF BEFORE THEY FIND OUT AND YANK IT!      

GET ME SOME PREPARATION H!

Fatal Love

February 6, 2015, 12:00 am

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Fatal Love (Wei quing) Directed By Lo Gin, Starring Nga Lun (1993).

The soundtrack pulsates with the nauseating beat of hospital clicking noises and the loud thud of a heartbeat (No, Don't cue the Don Johnson song just yet)! Breasts are unwillingly squeezed, a scream is bleated out and self defense classes are taken in a flashback, as we see how the attractive female protagonist ended up half dead in a hospital bed. A mousey girl who plays a Streetfighter arcade game, frames another innocent female by planting drugs in her locker. This offense results in her expulsion from the academy and she gets majorly pissed. The bitchy girl's mother played by Maria Cordero, offers to cook a "celebration egg" for her daughter and knows that Debbie has a bad reputation as a notorious liar.   

the celebration egg was also featured in Defending Your Life

Debbie is played by Ellen Chan Nga-Lun of The Wizards Curseand The Eternal Evil of Asia, two films a lot better then this tepid mess. The jaunty keyboard/saxophone music was very nauseating to me. There are two officers that school her in the ways of being an undercover cop, one is chubby with a short face, the other has a long face and giant ears. The subs fly at the screen so fast, that I had to rewind them a lot and the quick cutting makes it seem as if they left some major story elements on the cutting room floor (I was confused as to what was happening). What garbled mishmash I can piece together is that she must find a gangster named Fun Tin (Michael Wong Man-Tak) and either arrest or assassinate him. According to the synopsis on Imdb, after being thrown out of the police academy, she takes a job as an undercover spy to take down a murderous business tycoon.

Oh Hell no, I won't put out my cigarette

 Debbie lies to her mom and says she's becoming a karaoke singer, nice cover up right? That's gotta be one of the worst story ever, but her dumb mother buys it! She immediately impresses a philanthropist named Fun Tin on the golf course and he checks out her butt in those tight pants. They go to a French restaurant and he tries to impress her with his ordering skills (man, this is pretty tame for a Cat III film that Chas described as "knocking your dick in the dirt", he was talking about the ending though . . .we shall see if said painful scenario will pan out).

Hong Kong Caddy Shack

They waste a lot of time, establishing their idiotic relationship which includes lots of exercising and dinners (wake me up when something interesting happens)! I like how she has a Bart Simpson alarm clock though, that was cool. She catches him engaged in some very kinky sex that includes a boxcutter, cigarette burns, it's mildly disturbing and also some foreshadowing for the finale. OK, so I'm willing to give this film the benefit of the doubt, perhaps it will get better. Fun Tin likes to collect guns and show them off, he carries an illegal hollow point bullet that we'll hopefully see do some rip roaring damage later (it doesn't).

Shorty and Long Face coming soon to the cast of Brooklyn Nine-Nine on FOX

Miss Chan is weary of this psycho and asks him if he enjoys hunting and he basically retorts with, "man is the most enjoyable animal to kill". There's nothing more frustrating than white on white subs, and Fatal Love has enough that you miss out on certain plot points. Luckily there's not much going on.

Fun plays a round of Street Fighter with a random girl and rapes her in a dark room, then it gets worse as he chops her up with a broken bottle and films it. The fanciful music is really annoying and threatens to take you out of the film.

All of a sudden the film takes a turn in the La Femme Nikita direction and Miss Chan is ordered to take out this psycho druglord. I hope it makes a u-turn and steers into gore town, I'm hoping that ending will deliver. For the second half of the film, he calls himself Fuk Tin (I'm thinking the subtitle people were smoking dope and couldn't type)! 
    

nothing worse than inferior Yam!

Tin should've been played by Simon Yam, he's a hybrid of his gangster character from The Naked Killer and Dr. Lamb with less interesting results (and for readers who didn't check out my Dr. Lambcritique, I pretty much despised it). The characters in this film are interchangeable and at times I thought the two females were the same person and I never do that! After reading the synopsis however I realized they are the same person in disguise, Doh! They add a dumpy Aunt character who's incredibly annoying. I hope that it hasn't come to the point where ToG has fully scraped all the chum from the bottom of the Deep Red bootleg catalog, but this one is really tedious and not worth checking out. 

With 23 minutes to go, Fuk kidnaps a random woman and douses her with gasoline--what is the point? The violence that finally surfaces is gratuitous and has no connection to the plot, which makes it completely ineffective and useless. Fuk Tin tricks Chan into falling in love with him (hence the title) and snapping soon after. After they have slow erotic sex (Yawn), he ties her up and rams a giant funnel down her throat. They cut away as he pours an assortment of liquids (two whole bottles of Scotch) and cereal down her throat. She timidly vomits a little bit (when she should look like Daniella Doria from Fulci's Gates of Hell). There's also another film under the same title with Molly Ringwald, try not to get them confused. 

Here's my Pee Wee Herman mad dog tooth brushing impression

SKIP IT! NOT WORTH SEEING!

Emanuelle Around The World

February 16, 2015, 12:00 am

≫ Next: Entrails of a Virgin

≪ Previous: Fatal Love

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Emanuelle Around The World (Confessions of Emanuelle, Emanuelle Versus Violence Against Women) Starring Laura Gemser, Directed By Joe D'Amato (1977).

Before any credits role, the viewer is treated to one of many ugly 70's hump sessions, but then again we are waist deep in yet another D'Amato/ Gemser sex fantasy depraved thrill-rides known as the Emanuelle series (the extra "M" is left off to distance itself from the inferior "White Brit Silvia Krystal one"). 

Pretty much anything goes in these films, snuff, cannibals, this one includes a banana sex scene that's haunted me ever since I saw it at the mentally fragile age of 9. 

It begins with Gemser balling in the back of a moving van in San Francisco. It was especially exciting for me to see Emanuelle fuck her way around Frisco because I recognize most of the locations they show (I lived in Oakland for 10 years and I even worked at Alcatraz for a spell). None of the majestic city has really been paved over since the 70's, when this film originally came out. Even people in the city by the Bay know about the world famous tart and set her up in a glitzy hotel. Gemser is very attractive and looks a lot like Padma Lakshmi from TV's reality cooking charade "Top Chef". She bumps into Ivan Rasimov (who most cannibal film enthusiasts know as the cult leader in Eaten Alive and the blonde punching bag from Man from Deep River). 

what shampoo is that, Charlie the Tuna # 5?

This film has my absolute favorite rock song by Nico Fidenco, with it's retarded lyrics about "Needing a special light to take a Picture of Love". Emanuelle's philosophy as a journalist is that she screws her way around the world (hence the title) and yet remains free from the entrapments of "love and commitment" all in the name of equality and liberation of course. This is the secret to her success as a traveling journalist (although she must have a scorching case of gonorrhea). 

I need some more change for the homework hotline

I love the fluorescent warehouse location her slimy boss resides at, in Emanuelle in America and in this one, it was super funny when she bails on her job and takes a vacation, basically telling him to fuck off. Nick Alexander, Al Cliver's disembodied voice shows up this time dubbing a bearded hippie who tells her about a love cult (hopefully it's not of the Mike Myers"Love Guru" variety). Brigitte Petronio, the blonde actress who gets sliced and diced with a straight razor in House on the Edge of the Park by David Hess shows up to fondle the Indonesian temptress. She looks kind of like Cindy Brady with tits and mentions that she was almost gang raped by a Middle Eastern slavery syndicate. 

I hope Hess didn't sneak his way onto the set to finish the razor job

Then later, what do you know, but Mr. Anthropophagus hisself shows up, George Eastman! He watches as some of the grossest dong suckling and bone smuggling happens with multiple partners (Bleccchhhhhh)! This film just goes to show, how ugly human sex can get, you may want to keep a Howard Scott Up-Chuck Cup ready under your chin! Eastman is supposed to be Indian (and is dubbed by a guy who sounds like Apu), but looks more like a B-rate Jesus impersonator.

Clean up on all the aisles

As they show Gemser being graphically penetrated, her spread open genitals turn into a Caucasian women's private parts (I'm guessing she wouldn't go the full nine for D'Amato, And I must commend her for this act of dignity). The Indian cult leader goes on about the caste system and how Kama Sutra is important or something. He even bones Emanuelle, who's about as hard to persuade to engage in casual sex as unscrewing a jar of already loosened pickles! 

Let's both pat our heads and rub our bellies at the same time

Just like in Erotic Nights, when Georgey boy has sex, they never show penetration, because it's probably in his "never nude contract clause". I like how she uses the same spy camera journalism watch from Emanuelle in America to get some snap shots (or ahem. . . "snatch shots"). It gets real ugly once she unveils a Middle Eastern sex slave ring that starts off with dumb girls in Rome being picked up and used. Then the plot goes into how Emanuelle wants to empower these women and try to undermine the sex slave trade by hooking up with the victimized girls. 

Rolls Royce driving hot shots lead the girls into a rape trap. One thug who looks kind of like a smoother faced Billy Drago sicks his henchmen on a blonde and they viciously rape her (this point of the film starts to get really dark)!

Billy Drago, post face lift

One of the scariest one-eyed lowlives with a burnt face and a neck brace shows up and picks a girl to engage in forced entry with just like he's choosing a crustacean from the tank at Red Lobster. That repulsive display just sort of ends abruptly and then she hooks up with some other nameless dude. 

     

Cripes!! What are you up to now Stephen Collins from TV's 7th Heaven?

Now in Hong Kong, she encounters a seriously frightening individual named Chang who has a dungeon with women he tortures and hysterically laughs at in the bowels of his Chinese restaurant. Some of these scenes are straight out of a 50's Mort Kuntsler pulp mag as the Asian fellow maniacally cackles then puts a snake into a women's vagina and forces a German Shepard to have sex with a tied up and scared female (this part was very depressing to me)!  

Pinch me, I'm so happy I must be dreaming!

During the last 20 minutes, Joltin' Joe actually makes a cameo appearance as one of the Mid East investors. One floppy haired butt chinned Saudi business man has a threesome with Emanuelle and a blonde, offering his oil up in return.

Joey "Baggadonuts" D'Amato in da house

There's so much depraved sleaze constantly flowing throughout this film that its hard to discern which is the most appalling scene (I guess you could flip a coin and choose). The last five minutes are seriously disturbing as a naked girl is raped by five homeless guys and even Emanuelle is sexually assaulted. She just shrugs it off and jet sets away with Rasimov onto another sequel. I'm thoroughly fascinated by these films, they are disgusting, offensive, ugly, exploitive and completely fascinating. There's no way you can recommended these to a novice though, you certainly have to brace yourself when you view an Emanuelle film or a Joe D'Amato one in general.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED FOR SICKOS ONLY!

experiencing erectile disfunction? Use a banana!

I specifically requested organically roasted hipster brew!

Entrails of a Virgin

February 19, 2015, 12:00 am

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≪ Previous: Emanuelle Around The World

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Entrails Of A Virgin  Directed By Kazuo "Gaira" Komizu, starring Saeko Kizuki (1986)

Two years ago, I mentioned this director when I reviewed his dull and nearly bloodless Battlegirl. I hoped for better action with a more coherent storyline, but all I got was an aimless, confusing fetish slasher film with more gore (which was the good part and no guts as advertised, which burned me up)! That being said, this film is entertaining for sure and makes fun of slasher movies with a clever plot twist toward the end.

I've heard about this one for a long time but have never actually sat down and watched it, thankfully Fandor bought the Synapse version and is streaming it. It's in the Pink genre of Japanese S&M films, but it's nothing like quality depraved trash that's in the vein of Star Of David: Hunting for Beautiful Girls or School of the Holy Beast. I've heard a theory, that the film maker was intentionally over the top and outlandishly hammy, which to me sounds like a cover-up. I mean sure, Samurai Cop and The Room can pretend all they want that they knew what they were doing the whole time, but there's serious noway that they were self aware! There are some wildly grotesque images in GUTS, like a woman masturbating with a severed arm and tree-fellatio (which should've made its way into Evil Dead 2 as a form of rape retaliation).

I followed a leprechaun over to a pot of gold and found this lethargic Asian stripper instead

  This film came out in the days of underground trading, hardly anyone saw it during its initial run and often in the 90's the Japanese tape arrived without subtitles. Entrails, just like Guinea Pig (which at the time, you could only order from Chas Balun) was only available on a second generation dub with those irritating japanese characters at the bottom. Video lunatics had to suffer through tons of migraines in order to be disgusted or sometimes bored by what was flickering on the cathode ray. GUTS is basically a slasher film with gratuitous penis shots and actual hardcore sex (with optical fog over the pubic hair parts). It's also a tale of model exploitation in the demanding world of a photo shoot.

I love the imported taste of white trash American swill

This film gets the shock out early with an adorable girl's crotch thrusting into the screen as each model is introduced on film, they show them engaged in optically blurred sex. Some women's private parts are shown as long as they hold their hands over where its approved by the Japanese censorship board, this film is extremely gynecological sandwiched in by some perverts and Friday the 13th goes to Osaka type elements, it's very strange but not all that great.

Foggy sex is the safest kind

It reminds me of some of the weird and disturbing Japanese films that Skunkape would tape me from Todd Tjersland's Threat Theatre catalog, which were half gross porns and extreme horror (one scat film called THE JAPANESE COMEDY TORTURE HOUR had two people dressed like turtles, I guess you might say it's 2 Turtles One Cup years before that viral video stunned the world).

that other VHS catalog

 I definitely do not fondly remember those kinds of tape trading days and glad that we no longer have to deal with shitty-o in the age of high grade quality trash. I love how I can stream this on Fandor along with Arthouse Criterion films in pristine condition, it makes it almost respectable.

The model shoot is taken next to a cardboard rainbow backdrop and seems like it will wind up in a porno mag. More awkward blurred out sex happens as the gang drink Bud and talk about how Indians shared cocaine. There's a lot of useless dialogue that's really superfluous and kinda dumb.

Out in the creepy forest, a mud man pops up from beneath the leaves and hurls a body at their window. The crew seems to be broke, their sleazy manager refuses to spring for a hotel and they shack up in a rickety cabin. They actually blame it on the thick fog, which makes it too difficult to drive. One extremely repugnant character with a mustache and clunky glasses can't wait to

screw the various models--unbeknownst to the girls of course.

no one wants your happiness

A male and female participate in underwear wrestling to appease the group, which ends in the girl pissing herself full on into the camera. So for those with yellow fever and a pee fetish, this movie's got both fixes covered, Oh boy! BARF! This event pisses off one photographer, who tells his coworkers to fuck off and he even leaves the house, maybe he forgot the scary mud man is still lurking outside.

He should've kept his feelings to himself, because just stepping outside ends with him getting brained by a meat tenderizing mallet that pops his eyeball out!

Asian Randy from Pee Wee's Playhouse

The set up for the film is vaguely patterned on all those American slasher movies that were cluttering up the horror genre at the time. There's a killer outside and all the characters are horn dogs, the film maker is poking fun at it, but the major flaw is that it's not very amusing and it doesn't get really insane till the last few minutes, which to be is a sign of a great film. GUTS however, is to busy trying to titillate and be an effective gore film and it can't successfully pull off both.

There's a pile driver blowjob scene, which didn't surprise me, I mean I've seen Rick Flair pull that move on Super Fly Snuka numerous times!

Footlong, who ordered the Footlong!

The mud man pulls his pecker out and after assaulting a girl, in a coitus silhouette (to avoid the optical foggy of their genitals), he then decapitates her--classy move right?

The mustachioed fellow with the glasses gets impaled by a javelin, which was cool he was my least favorite character.

The craziest part of GUTS has a woman blowing a tree and then making out with a bloody severed head, she loses control in a sexual frenzy, which I'm guessing is a statement against the behavior of teens in American horror films, or they just wanted to show the most bat-shit crazy naked gyrating they could accomplish for the screen.

I always go to the morgue for sex toys, is that weird?

The last 20 mins get all Nekromantik Japanese style as this crazy bitch starts humping all the dead victims and even masturbates with a chopped off severed hand.The mud man shows up and pulls out her guts by reaching into her birth canal, but she definitely ain't no virgin!

I thought it was clever how the last living female victim in most slasher movies is the pure one whose kept her virginity, but in this film the killer actually impregnates her. Just imagine if Jason Voorhees instead of planting an axe in the final victim's head, drops his maggoty pants and does the deed, now that would shock everyone!
I feel as if I made this film sound better than it actually is, it's not, but I can't stop you from watching this dopey flick and I'm not even going to try, it's so conveniently available to stream on Fandor that you might as well.

This is one of those great provocative titles that might be better than the film itself. Napalm Death's old drummer Mick Harris, Bill Laswell and John Zorn"supergroup" Painkiller, named their first album after this film. Komizu's unrelated sequel Entrails of a Beautiful Women should be reviewed next in a few months, so stay tuned for more greasy guts.

AVAILABLE ON FANDOR