Recent Viewings, Part 2

[Dr. Whom]

Corman simply purchased it, added "Massacre" to the title, and gave it a wider release under his New World Pictures banner in '86.

The genius of Corman summed up in one sentence

[lester1/2jr]

Kristy (2014) - passably entertaining horror movie. a girl stays at school over thanksgiving break for some reason and is stalked by guys wearing masks made of tin foil led by a meth looking chick in a hooded sweatshirt. There are much better variations of this out there, but this has that bland anonymously made quality that netflix seems to like for their instant offerings.

2.5 /5

[RCMerchant]

MAGGIE (2015)
Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as the father of a girl who is infected with a virus that slowly turns people into zombies. If your expecting the typical Arnold action movie-nope. A slow moving, thoughtful movie about how a father has to deal with the slow death of his daughter.

[pennywise37]

your prolly right he prolly did Distribute it he has done that to a lot of things such as 'The Story of O" (1975) one of the funniest things about that film was Christopher Lee was offered the film and he said O" NO nice eh? i haven't seen that one to be honest,  there's another film Corman bought i cannot remember the name of but it was a HUGE hit in the states and it was a Foreign film that i believe it was in (1971) where he gave the director who i forget who it was

a huge release i mean he put his films in drive-ins!  opening night he had a crap load of roses ordered to hand to each woman walking in the door for promotion now that's just freaking Genius. anyways. he did all this cause he's a fan of Foreign movies and he saw a market here in the states.

anyways i watched 'The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 (2015) and i liked it far better than part 1. yeah he reminded me of trump and so did that one chick that took over from him at the end.  the only difference was that Trump doesn't drop bombs on any children, tear gas yes but not bombs .

thankfully and hopefully never. anyways 10/10.  i've been a Donald Sutherland since i was a kid and i'd say my favorite film of his is the masterpiece Animal House (1978) best line in the entire movie well it's my favorite one anyways. i've been working on a novel for the past 3 years, how's it coming along? it's a piece of sh*t.

i just love that line and yeah there are more but that's my favorite

[lester1/2jr]

The Movie Murderer (1970) - made for TV mystery/ detective type thing about an arsonist who keeps burning down film studio archives. Starring pre mustache Tom Selleck and some old guy we're probably supposed to know.

As the future Magnum and his Dad figure try and figure things out, we get a profile of the arsonist himself as he struggles with the nature of his job and tries to get into the pants of the lady owner of the hotel he's staying at. Unfortunately for him he has some stiff competition: The professor from Gilligan's Island! He's a happy go lucky bachelor also staying at the Inn. Not only does he not like the guy moving in on his territory, he thinks our villains cover as a "salesman" is full of s**t, which of course it is.

It's not amazing but I enjoyed it. 1970 was kind of an in between year culturally speaking. aspects resemble the 60's but also the 70's. duh!

4/5 great title too obviously

[Dr. Whom]

Russian Ark (2002)

Another triumph of style over substance. Visually stunning, but to me disappointing. Another example of the 'let's do a bunch of cool scenes and hope they somehow turn into a movie' approach. Great set pieces, but less than the sum of its parts.

[indianasmith]

TUSK (2015)  What a bizarre, mind-bending film this was!  An American podcaster travels to Canada to do an interview and winds up finding this old sailor who promises to regale him with tales of a lifetime of adventure.  However, instead, the geezer drugs him, cuts off his legs, and tries to surgically convert him into a walrus.  I remember renting this movie at Hastings the year the store closed for good; it was bizarre then and it's bizarre now.  Great performances, and a trippy soundtrack.  5/5

[FatFreddysCat]

"The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films" (2014)
Israeli-made documentary about the legendary filmmaking team Menahem Golan and his cousin Yoram Globus, who pretty much invented Israel's movie industry in the '60s, then came to America in the '70s with plans to take the '80s by storm by cranking out lots of crowd pleasing, low budget movies featuring Ninjas, Chuck Norris, and Charles Bronson.
Yoram Globus' current company produced this flick, so it's more personal and less snarky than Mark Hartley's "Electric Boogaloo" Cannon documentary, which was released the same year (and which focused mainly on the Cannon catalog's penchant for boobs, blood, and explosions).
Take note, Golan and Globus speak Hebrew during most of their interview segments in this one, but as long as you don't mind sub-titles, "Go-Go Boys" is an enjoyable look at two outsiders' adventures in the movie business.

[lester1/2jr]

^ I saw the other documentary. very demented story

[Rev. Powell]

THE ENDLESS (2017): After receiving a videotape, a pair of brothers return to the UFO cult they grew up in looking for answers, but only find the mysteries deepening. A bit ragged and obviously low-budget, but full of high stakes and thoughtful surprises (including characters from the directing team's previous movie). 3.5/5.

[indianasmith]

Weekend double feature:
SLEEPAWAY CAMP 3: TEENAGE WASTELAND  Pamela Springsteen is back as Angela, the transgender serial killer who murders her way through the entire population of a summer camp for troubled teens.  This is a silly, unrealistic slasher film that doesn't take itself too seriously; the campers and counselors are pretty much all overacted caricatures and Angela is her usual wisecracking, judgmental self.  Not as disturbing as the first film or as gory as the second, but not a bad conclusion to the franchise.  4/5

CHRISTMAS BIKINI BLOODBATH  was a freebie on Amazon Prime, and it was about as bad as it sounds.  Lots of girls in bikinis, girls out of bikinis, cheesy kills, and fake gore, without much plot to get in the way.  I had a hard time staying awake.  3/5

[Rev. Powell]

AMULET (2020): Tomas, a bright but haunted ex-soldier who's now homeless, accepts an arrangement working as a live-in handyman for a lonely woman and her mother, who is slowly and painfully dying in her attic apartment. Slow to start, though there are enough mysteries about the old woman and Tomas' past to keep you watching; sags a bit in the second act, but builds to a wicked ending. I'm shocked to see this at 4.4 on IMDB; I can see some folks thinking it's too slow, but that's a ridiculously poor score. Me, I give it 3.5/5.

[FatFreddysCat]

I found a YouTube channel over the weekend full of those irresistibly schlocky made-for-TV thriller movies from the '70s and '80s so I'm probably gonna go down a serious rabbit hole with these over the next few weeks, haha. Started the binge with:

"Death Car on the Freeway" (1979)
A crusading TV news reporter (Shelley "Charlie's Angels" Hack) makes it her mission to stop a psycho killer who's been running women off the L.A. freeways with his souped up van. Lots of cars crash and stuff blows up along the way.
Fun junk directed by Hal "Smokey and the Bandit" Needham and featuring a supporting cast that includes such familiar faces as Frank Gorshin, Dinah Shore, George Hamilton, Peter Graves, and Sid Haig.
They don't make 'em like this anymore!

[Gabriel Knight]

TRIANGLE (2009)

A group of friends suffer a yachting accident and take refuge on a cruise drifting on the open sea, but quickly realize they were better off on the upturned yacht.

An interesting concept, although much better explored in THE TWILIGHT ZONE like a million years ago. Basically, a group of friends get stuck in an abandoned ship and one of them discovers she's in some kind of time loop. The girl acts like she's on drugs or something, it's pretty bad, and the insane amount of plot holes made this, at least for me, a rather bad experience. Discussing these flaws would basically spoil the whole twist of the movie, which is pretty much the only reason to watch this failed attempt at horror / mystery.

I guess it's a good time killer, that's for sure. 6/10  

[FatFreddysCat]

"Warrior Queen" (1987)
In ancient times, a beautiful emissary from Rome (Sybil Danning) arrives in Pompeii, where she is wined and dined by the sleazy Emperor (Donald Pleasance), watches some gladiator battles, and then helps a bunch of female slaves escape when the city is hit by a volcanic eruption.

...that's pretty much all that happens in this virtually plotless, ultra-cheap swords & sandals flick, which moves at a snail's pace despite being only around 70 minutes long. There's plenty of T&A of course, and lots of lousy acting and cheap gore.

Strangely, even though she's supposedly the "Warrior Queen," Sybil's character doesn't do very much warrior-ing. She spends most of the movie standing around, looking bored, and has about three lines of dialogue in total.

I'd also love to know how the hell they roped Donald Pleasance into this thing -- did he lose a bet? He looks like he's drunk as a skunk the entire time.

After a while, I felt like I was watching a porn movie with all the porn parts cut out. According to IMDb, director Chuck Vincent did do a fair share of adult films, so who knows, maybe that was actually the case.

Final analysis: AVOID.