"Movies To Watch And Have Intelligent Conversations About"

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AVP: ALIEN VS PREDATOR
starring Lance Henrikson, Sanaa Lathan, directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, Color, , 2004
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Film Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

No. Whatever. I don’t care.

Those were the three thoughts that careened around my head as I sat watching this noisy, live-action cartoon for ten-year-olds.

First off, yeah, it’s a crappy movie. Second of all, it’s not such a BAD crappy movie, if you know what I mean? Not that I’m going to add it to my Top Ten list at the end of the year, or anything like that. As I said: “Whatever. I don’t care.”

I had free passes to see this, because I was adamant from the start that I wouldn’t pay to watch this. So the night of the preview-showing, my girlfriend and I went to the theater but by the time we got there, two whole shows were completely sold out. I guess a lot of other people wanted to see it but didn’t want to have to pay for the experience either, like me. So cool, I could dig that. Besides, the girl at the counter said we could come back and use the passes any time after that. Super sweet.

So that night, all my friends that were at the free preview-showing called me and told me shitty they thought the flick was. I mean, they were IRATE. I haven’t heard such vehemence and indignation since … well, since a few weeks before the movie opened and we all found out it was effing PG-13! (Yeah, PG-13 … an Alien/Predator movie, whose predecessors were ALL rated R! Man, have studios gotten weak. I guess that almighty allowance-money from all those ten-year-olds really does pull the strings.)

Anyway, I didn’t hear one positive thing about it. Not that I expected to. In fact, the derision I heard was pretty much what I was planning on hearing. It didn’t deter me. Since I held in my paws A FREE PASS I just … well, you know … DIDN’T CARE.

Finally, two days later, I sat down and let it hit me. And due to the overwhelming amount of negativity flung at me about the flick over the past couple of days, I went into ready to have myself a Mystery Science Theater-good time. And that I did. My brother, and our girlfriends had a hell of a time poking fun at this turkey. So much so that I actually started thinking, Hell, this isn’t so bad. I’ve seen worse.

As I walked out of the theater, I composed two lists of movies: ones that are WORSE than AVP and ones that are BETTER.

WORSE:
House of the Dead, Orgy of the Dead, Alien Resurrection (well, it’s better than the last HALF of Alien Resurrection), Matrix Revolutions AND Matrix Reloaded (ouch, but I really hated those movies), Malibu’s Most Wanted, Clueless and Island Of Dr. Moreau.

BETTER:
Pretty much everything else I’ve seen over the past couple of years. (Although I did actually kinda enjoy it a bit more than I did Van Helsing. But I’ll be damned if I could really tell you why.)

So what else can I say? I probably haven’t told you anything in this review at all. I’m sure I’ve left you going, Well, ok Ryan but why is it bad? Trust me, it just is. Bad in that way that Dungeons And Dragons or Battlefield Earth are bad. Still fun, if you’re in the right (ten-year-old) frame of mind, but if you think too hard about it, or have too many high hopes, then you’ll be nothing but pissed off and disappointed. Trust me. DON’T EXPECT ANYTHING FROM THIS WHEN YOU GO TO SEE IT. Just see it. And then laugh. And then go see something else. This ISN’T the showdown you’ve been waiting years for. It’s just a bag of buttery popcorn ready to be ingested and then forgot about a week later.

Notice I didn’t say anything about the plot, either. Do you care? No, and you won’t when you see it, either.

When you go to see it, tell ‘em I said to let you in free. If they refuse, well … pay ‘em, I guess.

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and is the star of RVAVP.)

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THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU
starring Val Kilmer, Marlon Brando, Strange Dwarf Guy, directed by John Frankenheimer, Color, , 1996
Distributed by New Line Cinema
DVD Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

Upon hearing about the death of Hollywood legend Marlon Brando I thought it might be nice to write a little piece on his career for No Fi. Then, every magazine and their brother did just that, so I said “Fine, I’ll just do it my own way!”

And with that, I decided to honor the memory of this influential, eccentric actor by reviewing one of the strangest (and stupidest) films he ever made, The Island of Dr. Moreau! I’m sure, in some bizarre way, he would be honored. Or at least get a good chuckle out of it.

It’s safe to say that Brando will NOT be remembered for this movie, that this movie will be remembered for him. He’s so intensely bizarre, absurd and, well, ridiculous that whenever he’s not onscreen, the movie just ceases to exist.

Yeah, it’s that shitty. I’m sure you’ve either seen it or heard about it, and I’m sure what you’ve heard is universal disdain and derision. And it’s all justified. In fact, I cannot think of a movie made in the last ten years, that actually saw a theatrical release and actually featured a big name cast, that’s worse than this one. Seriously. The Avengers, no. Battlefield Earth, not even close. This is just plain sucky bad in the most offensive of ways possible – BORING, BORING, BORING. And sucky. Did I mention sucky? And shitty?

A poor old sap (David Thewlis) is rescued from a lifeboat and dragged off to a tropical island where he discovers that an insanely obese, maniacally brilliant megalomaniacal mad scientist (Brando) is splicing the genes of humans with animals. Eventually the animals revolt. And shoot guns. And … I don’t know.

What can I say? I love the book by H.G. Welles that this is based on, and I’ve actually never seen the other two versions of this story, but this is just a complete mental spite-fuck. Really, that’s the only way I can describe it.

See, the thing is, back in ’95 or so when I heard this was being made, I was excited because I loved the book and thought modern filmmakers could probably make a sweet movie out of it. Plus, it was being helmed by Richard Stanley, who’s SF flick Hardware I really loved. Anyway, I began reading in the pages of Fangoria about all the troubles the film was beset with, including Stanley being shitcanned and replaced by Frankenheimer. Right then I got a bad feeling for it. I continued to follow the horror stories about the production (Val Kilmer being a primadonna, Brando being difficult, Rob Morrow walking off set and being replaced by Thewlis, etc etc.) and I just never really felt like seeing it once it hit theaters.

I heard how campy Brando was, playing piano with some strange dwarf-thing, and his grotesque costumes and makeup … but even that wasn’t enough to get me to buy a ticket. Years passed and the movie became the stuff of jokes. Eventually I started telling myself that someday I would rent it and watch it, and that maybe, with several years hindsight, it might actually emerge as a campy little treat.

Well, when Brando passed away I figured now or never. So here I am, and I just can’t get over it. Time healed nothing. Time gave nothing. What I didn’t want to see then has simply become something I wish I hadn’t seen now.

There are highlights, of course. With my predilection for bad cinema it’s hard not find some fun things here and there. After all, it was on this very site I gave Queen Kong a good review (to which I’ve received much chiding). Anyway, there’s some really bad CG FX, some terrible acting, a very strange scene involving a bunch of mouse-men, and really, could David Thewlis look any more bored? And How high was Val Kilmer while filming this? And why the hell is Fairuza Balk trying so hard? Doesn’t she realize she’s traipsing through manure?

And then there’s Brando and his midget minion. This is the best thing going for this movie, and it’s a shame the rest of the movie blows so bad cuz with Brando’s over the top characterization, this is could’ve been some great camp. But all we’re left with are a few scenes where Brando dominates the screen with strange monologues, and some of the hammiest acting this side of Vincent Price (and that’s a compliment, folks.) Two scenes in particular stand out: 1) he’s playing piano while his midget minion plays a smaller piano. This tiny actor deserves to be in way more movies cuz he’s SWEET! And creepy, too. 2) A scene where Brando is trying to keep a bunch of insurrectionist animal-men from killing him by trying to teach them music. Holy shit is this scene a hoot and a holler. Those two scenes, and the mouse-men on the boat … Genius!

Other than that, though, it’s nothing. Just a bunch of boring scenes where people stand around and look like they’d rather be somewhere else. The action scenes are void of inertia, the drama is ham-fisted and dull, and even the extremely rare moments where campiness emerges, it’s over before you know it.

Dub all the Brando scenes, and the mouse-men scene together onto a loop-tape and play it in the background at parties. It’ll be about ten minutes of pure lunacy, the kind that goes great with beer.

Otherwise, hate this movie at all costs.

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and loves him some strange dwarf things)

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MY SCIENCE PROJECT
starring John Stockwell, Fisher Stevens, Dennis Hopper, directed by Jonathan R. Betuel, Color, , 1985
Distributed by Buena Vista
DVD Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

I recall being kinda hyped about this movie as a kid way back ’85. And I remember that when I finally got around to seeing it, on video, I was … well … a little underwhelmed. I remember thinking that sure had been a great trailer, but the movie itself just lacked any punch or flavor.

Now, almost 20 years later, after re-watching it, I feel pretty much the same as I did before. I tried to get into it with a sense of nostalgia, channeling my inner 1985-self, in hopes of gleaning from it some kind of superficial entertainment. But no. Didn’t happen.

It starts out promising, with the kind of set up I usually flip for: a UFO crashes in the desert, military types abscond to some super-secret base with it, decide they can’t handle it and therefore they must “get rid of it.” Flash forward 30 years and some hapless shop-class genius can’t seem to come up with anything for his science project, so he takes his date to an old army junkyard in the hopes of finding a an engine or something that he can rebuild and pass off as his project. He accidentally falls into a pit containing top secret junk and finds a piece of the old UFO.

Strange things, of course, begin to happen. The gizmo saps the electricity out of anything it comes in contact with and eventually reveals itself to be a portal between time and space. Chaos and calamity ensues.

Characters and creatures out of the history books, plus some mutants from “after the Apocalypse” appear in the school and it’s up to our hero and his goofy friend to save existence as we know it.

Nothing happens in this movie. It just sits there, going nowhere, for so long, that by the time the time-space portal has ripped wide open there’s only about 20 minutes of the movie left. They get attacked by a caveman and a T-Rex, but other than that, I checked out long ago. The movie had promise as an enjoyable timewaster, and it does possess a certain charm that only ‘80s SF family films do, but it’s so flaccid that by the time the credits roll, you’ll have trouble really remembering anything that went on, or whether any of the characters were interesting, or what their names even where, and what all those crazy blue ILM, Poltergeist--ian, Big Trouble In Little China-ian lights were doing fizzing all over the place. Something to do with rips in time and space, or whatever. Who cares.

And I usually like Fisher Stevens, who plays the hero’s friend/sidekick, but he bugged the snot out of me in this movie. A year or so later he would redeem himself with his foolishly un-PC, dumb-but-I-hate-to-admit-it-kinda-funny portrayal as the Indian scientist sidekick to Steve Guttenberg in Short Circuit. (“Oh, golly gosh, I am liking what I am seeing,” or whatever the hell it is he says.) Anyway, here he gets all the lame wisecracks, all the cocky, I-always-look-like-I’m-chewing-a-wad-of-gum facial expressions. I wanted to punch him. But the Guttenberg thing makes up for it, so I’m letting it go.

And poor Dennis Hopper. He doesn’t get anything to do here other than spout off hoary ‘60s hippie jokes that I’m sure were stale even back in ’85. This movie came out the year before his comeback year of 1986, where he appeared in the triple-whammy Blue Velvet, Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2 and Hoosiers, great films all. There’s a mildly amusing Easy Rider joke towards the end of the movie.

I know some folks who do like this movie a lot, so who knows. I was bored. Maybe it’s just me. But I’ll take The Philadelphia Experiment or Buckaroo Bonzai any day over this somnambulistic turkey.

I for some reason thought this movie had more of a “nrrd” quotient, but the only nerd in this one actually starts off the movie as a bully, of sorts. He liked the girl that our hero likes, so he pays some jocks to screw with his car. But the heroes of this movie are the shop-class geeks. And I figure that guys in the ‘80s who wore red ballcaps, torn up tee-shirts and blue jeans and had tools stuffed in their pockets are kinda nerdy in their own right. They just talked tougher and got more chicks. But, really, walking around all day with a wrench in your back pocket is like walking around with a bunch of pens and a calculator in your breast pocket, isn’t it?

Or am I stretching it? Ok then fine, it has the words SCIENCE PROJECT in the title. That’s plenty nerdy right there!

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and will send you a love letter...)

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REVENGE OF THE NERDS
starring Anthony Edwards, Robert Carradine, Julie Montgomery, directed by Jeff Kanew, Color, , 1984
Distributed by New Line Cinema
DVD Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

Growing up as a preteen in the ‘80s meant that there were three movies you HAD to see: Porky’s, Hardbodies, and Revenge of the Nerds. This was the trifecta of teen sex comedy for anyone who was obsessed with movies before 1986, cuz after that, well, they just didn’t make ‘em like this anymore.

Nerds was then, and still is, my kind of brainless movie. The triumph of the downtrodden misfit over the pituitary strongman. The smart and imaginative yet socially awkward and physically underdeveloped (like I was, and still am, maybe) getting to sleep with the hot cheerleader babe on the moon. Guess what? My current girlfriend USED to be a cheerleader … so HA! Fantasies do come true, folks, just like this flick taught us. And although we have yet to find a moon room in a fun house to get it on in … we did “have a little fun” before watching the Attack of the Clones DVD extras, so I guess that’s kinda close?

You know the plot of this movie by now, or else you should. Many like it came before and many like it followed since. A pair of nerdy high school grads arrive on college only to be besieged by the campus jocks, who throw them out of their dorms after burning down their own frat house (“Fireball! Fireball!” set to the tune of TALKING HEADS’ “Burning Down the House,” one of the first of MANY brilliantly inspired moments.)

After volleying pranks at one another the nerds finally get their due in a climax that’s as classic as anything in ‘80s cinema. QUEEN’s cheesy glam rock anthems have never been put to better use (unless you count Highlander, Flash Gordon or Wayne’s World – which I do. Except for Highlander.)

To me this movie was the first time I ever saw full frontal female nudity. Back then the nudity seemed to go forever. Now it’s over and done with WAY too quickly. Remember when they made sex comedies with actual nudity in them? And actually rated them R? I know … what happened? Where did all the horndogs in Hollywood go?

Booger is still funny (only I think Curtis Armstrong was even funnier a couple of years later in Better off Dead), and I want to track down that shirt he’s wearing that says “Gimme head till I’m dead.” (That’s right up there with Style’s “What are you looking at dick-nose” shirt in Teen Wolf). John Goodman is actually THIN! The pot-smoking Thriller scene is GENIUS! (“Wonder joints!”) And Bernie Casey’s in it, for crying out loud! Plus, 58 percent of all the people on campus are women, and that’s 7,107.32 boobs!

My favorite line is either, “That nerd saw me naked!” or “Why, does she have a penis?” But if there’s one real overriding philosophy in this movie, it’s something that I’ve always known to be true, but unfortunately haven’t always been able to put into practice:

BETTY: “Are all nerds as good as you?”
LOUIS: “Yeah.”
BETTY: “Why?”
LOUIS: “Cuz all jocks think about is sports. All nerds think about is sex.”

Damn straight, ladies. Remember that. Although I don’t think anyone has really thought jocks were much good for anything since around, well, 1986. But there’s probably a few stragglers out there. Get with the times! THE GEEKS SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH … as if they haven’t already.

And if NONE of that convinces you that this is a mini-masterpiece, then try this: This is probably the only place you can go nowadays to hear someone say “We’ve got bush,” and mean it as a good thing.

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and speaks for all of us on this.)

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• •• Reviews From July - August 2004 •• •

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Colossus: the Forbin Project
starring Eric Braeden, Susan Clark, directed by Joseph Sargent, Color, , 1970
Distributed by Universal Pictures
Film Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

God bless 1970’s SF flicks and God bless Cold War paranoia! When they meet it’s a happy movie geek!

Colussus has to be one of the best damn SF movies I have ever seen. I had often seen the box sitting on the shelves and the video store, or stills from it in various books, but had never picked it up and actually watched it. Now I have and I wonder how I ever got along without it.

A brilliant man named Dr. Charles Forbin creates a super computer to control all of America’s defenses. Shortly after debuting this super electronic bodyguard to the country, Colussus discovers that the Russians have built a supercomputer also.

No big deal … until the two computers start conversing, and they realize that these pesky humans are really necessary.

This is when the action heats up, but it’s action of the cerebral kind. You’d think that a movie about a scientist talking to a computer would be boring, but oh man, would you ever be wrong! This movie’s so damn tense that I get chills just thinking about it.

This was an obvious inspiration for Wargames, that other great Cold War computer flick. And maybe it even inspired Electric Dreams. You remember Electric Dreams? Come on, I know you do.

I can’t really such much more because I love this one so much I don’t want to ruin anything or disgust you with my hyperbole. If you find it at the video store, check it out, especially if you dig on 70s SF flicks. If they don’t have it at the video store, tell ‘em Ryan Lies said they better get it! Now!

Short review for a kick ass movie. Gotta love it.

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and talks to computers with his fingers.)

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The Day After Tomorrow
starring Jake Gyllenhal, Dennis Quaid, directed by Roland Emmerich, Color, , 2004
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Film Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

I didn’t expect much going into this one, even after seeing the super-cool trailer. While I found the images of millions of birds fleeing over the city, or New York drowning in a massive tidal-wave completely stunning and eerie, once I saw who the director was, I automatically knew what to expect. In a bad way.

Truth is, I gave up on Roland Emmerich movies after Stargate and Independence Day got me all hot & bothered in their trailers and then left me cold & indifferent in theaters. Which is, oddly enough, how I was able to superficially enjoy his stupid, insipid Godzilla “reimagining” (well, the monster parts, anyway – the “plot” parts were pretty much unwatchable.) Not saying I thought it was a good flick, I’m just saying I was able to check out and enjoy it easier because at this point if it said Emmerich on it, I just didn’t care.

And while we’re on this digression here, I’ll admit I liked The Patriot, his follow-up to Godzilla. It’s a pretty darn good flick. Watching Mel Gibson go apeshit on those sanctimonious Red Coats was fun. And that cannonball-decapitation … SWEET!

But anyway...The trailers for Emmerich’s movies promise so much, but unlike Spielberg, Cameron, or even Irwin Allen, he doesn’t have the talent as a writer or director to really pull me in. He’s too reliant on the way-past-its-time novelty fun of CG FX and cliché-ridden drama to do anything with the “characters” that populate his disaster/SF scenarios. He can paint a pretty picture with his camera and a few billion pixels, but beneath it all, it’s just paint-by-numbers. His movies are so vapid that to call them “fluff” would be to imply they actually contain some kind of content. Not so. (Save for The Patriot, but from this point on, I’m not counting that one.)

This time around, Emmerich constructs a story inspired by theories about global warming and what it will do to Mother Earth when things heat up too much. Ice caps melt, tidal-waves flood NYC, tornados wipe out LA … etc etc. For the first hour, this movie’s not all that bad, if you ignore the character development that gets in the way of the destruction. I’ll admit, some of the images creeped me out. But once New York is flooded and the ocean water begins to freeze, things just get real boring … fast. See, there’s this “story” being told amongst all the carnage and mayhem, some lame, seen-it-a-hundred-times tripe about a father going to rescue his son. Cuz, well, see, prior to the storm of the millennium, said father and son didn’t get along very well, so this catastrophic act of God gives them a chance to reconcile, plus save what little vestiges of humanity there are left in this new world.

Yeah, whatever. While I completely appreciate filmmakers trying to incorporate riveting human drama into an epic, sci-fi framework, Emmerich just can’t pull it off. I felt no pathos or urgency for these people. They were just figures moving through special FX, occasionally spouting lines about “survival” and “humanity” and “what is the meaning of life.” All noble topics and concerns, don’t get me wrong. But in incompetent hands, these subjects are just plain boring.

Let Spielberg or Cameron do a flick like this and I’m sure it would kick total ass. But next time I see old Roland’s name attached to something like this, I’m gonna care even less that I already do.

On a side note, this movie was “inspired” by a book called The Coming Global Superstorm by Art Bell and Whitley Strieber, two people I admire greatly. I listen to Art Bell’s radio show religiously. If you’re not familiar with it, I highly recommend it. Just google Art Bell and find a station near you. On his show you will hear more about the subjects addressed in The Day After Tomorrow (among MANY other things), only this time you’ll find them interesting.

There have been about a billion and a half Emanuelle films made since Sylvia Kristel first steamed up the screens in the 1974, but supposedly this particular “chapter” in the “saga” has been one of the most notorious and sought-after titles.

I don’t get it, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t like it. In fact, this movie held a certain inexpressible, sleazy charm over me. Maybe I was just so impressed by the fact there used to be a day and age when these kinds of movies played big screen in actual theaters, instead of being shot on video and rushed into Best Buy days after they’re completed. Or, you know, I really thought the actress who played Emanuelle (Laura Gemser) was pretty effing hot. Or maybe I was just sleepy and didn’t really care.

Anyway, I wasn’t allowed to watch anything stronger than PG-13 when I was younger, so I often got my exploitation film fix at my buddy’s house, cuz he had cable and his parents didn’t monitor what we watched. We spent many a Friday night sifting through grainy, violent police thrillers, blood soaked slasher flicks and Animal House rip-off boob-a-thons … which would eventually lead to the REAL goods: Cinemax After Dark. Softcore epics with gauzy soft-focus cameras lingering over poorly-dubbed, simulated sex in exotic locations. Melody In Love, Liz, Lady Chatterly’s Lover … and about a billion and a half Emanuelle movies (even back then there seemed to be a never-ending stock of these “epics.”)

I got my hands on REAL porn several years later (and I actually “got” with a girl) and these flicks just didn’t cut it any more. Hardly watchable in the first place, they were saved by taunting our young minds with flesh and gentle moaning amongst sun-dappled palm trees. Now you go back and watch them and you just fast forward (even past the sex stuff, cuz brothers and sisters, it’s just somnambulistic at best.)

Which brings me to Emanuelle In America. This one got its reputation because not only did it have lots of staged rutting, it also featured a subplot involving snuff films. So, tangentially, it had some appeal to horror/cult fans. And, admittedly, the snuff parts are the only time this movie really gets interesting.

Emanuelle is a beautiful, fearless investigative journalist who goes on libidinous adventures all around the globe. On one such adventure she uncovers evidence of a snuff film ring and takes it upon herself to expose the truth. And boy is this stuff brutal! Even I was moderately shocked by the snuff footage. I know it’s fake, but damn if it doesn’t fool you for just a minute there! What these filmmakers accomplish wouldn’t look out of place on Ogrish or Rotten dot coms (or hell, even CNN nowadays.)

Not saying I was necessarily entertained by it, but it at least brought the movie to life, albeit briefly. See, there’s the problem: the actual “plot” doesn’t even get going until about an hour and twenty minutes in, give or take. Once the snuff ring is discovered, the movie speeds to a quick wrap-up and conclusion and then sends your out the door with an insipid denouement. So really, the snuff stuff encompasses about thirty minutes of the movie, if that. The rest is all Emanuelle walking around pretty places watching pretty people play doctor.

Along the way you’ll see a woman “playing” with her horse, sex in a church, some tepid softcore sex AND some tepid HARDCORE sex (yeah, yeah, they actually show penetration, big deal) … accompanied by a great, funky kinky score that’s better than the movie it’s incorporated into. And then there’s the half hour of brutal torture and death.

Maybe I shouldn’t have said above that I liked the movie. Maybe what I mean is, I appreciate it PARTS of it for what it is and therefore feel it deserves a place in my collection of cult/exploitation films … but only as a curiosity really.

If you dig this stuff, and a lot of movie geeks do, then by all means, this DVD is the bee’s knees. An interview with the late director Joe D’Amato (who also made the stunningly awful yet brilliantly hilarious Troll 2), an audio interview with Gemser and a text essay called the Unofficial Emanuelle Phenomenon, which I actually read all the way through and was quite enlightened by.

Even if you’re just casually interested, like me, then this isn’t the worst DVD you could have. God knows I’ve watched and bought (and still own) worse. It hasn’t its moments, and the soundtrack, which is featured on the menu pages, is pretty good stuff. I would actually buy it on CD if I ever found it.

So again I find myself unable to really tell you which way to go, one way or the other. It’s one of those movies that has its own place and time and following so who am I to say. I’m just telling you my impressions, which are, at best, indifferent

So here's something that was sent to Quin which ended up in my hands and it's not very suprising that Quin wasn't very excited about it.

If you want to get all fancy you can say that Night Of The Cat was a modern (for 1993) take on the Cat People story. If you want to be honest, this is litle more than a fetish video for those people who find cats with human female anotomy erotic. The plot consists of the lead actress crawling around the floor nude in painted on cat make-up while stalking her roommate who, in the end, turns out to be a cat-woman too. The film ends with both nude women rolling around the floor with each other. The end. Umm... What the hell? Where was the story, the horror, the pathos? Well, crap.Oh, that's it..CRAP. Yes, yes, this is fine crap. I don't think it was really a film for us though. The end result of this video comes off as a Playboy Playmate video.

One thing that was interesting is that this film came from the creators of Draculina Magazine. I've never looked through that magazine, which I took to be a B-Movie actress magazine, but I've seen it at music stores and conventions. I dunno. I'm being too nice to this film already. Seriously, this is a weird weird video. The cat make-up is really bad and I found this funny website by the director of the film who, besides showing off his great typing skills, says that we was inspired to paint this nude woman after going to see cats with his daughter. See for yourself. Weird weird world we live in. Still this might make for funny background viewing

I've seen this one in video stores and since it has a really bad cover, I never gave it a second thought until I happened upon the film's website and actually watched the entire film there. Of course this wasn't the greatest way of watching the film since it was so tiny in the realplayer screen. So when I got this to review, I was happy that I would get a chance to watch it on a television screen.

Even in Realplayer, I liked this film and it looks even better (as if I even need to say) on DVD. This is a goofy take on the old Frankenstein story obviously, with the twist being that a record company hires a doctor to piece together a rock star that they can control from "rejuvenated" body parts taken from the most famous rock stars of the last 40 years. When Dr Frank Stein's assistant Iggy accidently destroys Jim Morrisson's penis and replaces it with Liberace's "lil piano player" wackiness and sexual frustration ensue after the success of their new monster which all lead to a series of murders when the rock and roll monster can't bring himself to have sex with women.

I don't want to tell you too much about this film as it is an independent production and a simple story pretty much. What I will say is that it is a much better movie than you would think from looking at the cover. The story is goofy and filled with all sorts of "gay" and penis jokes, but the actors and their characters are pretty likable (especially the actors playing Frank, "King" and Iggy...that's like half the cast!). The camerawork is nice and the writing and direction are much better than the average straight to video, make that DVD, flick. I actually would like to see what these people do next. Hopefully it'll be even better. One warning though to fans of Passion Of The Christ... Christ does have an appearance in this film, but you may not not like him in the priest scene. The DVD includes some nice extras like commentary and trailers. Get this one for a night when you'd normally just be sitting around watching TV.

(Chris Beyond is the creator of No-Fi "Magazine" and its servant as well.)

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Shaun Of The Dead
starring Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Kate Ashfield, directed by Edgar Wright, Color, , 2004
Distributed by Rogue Pictures
Film Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

This is, by far, the super coolest, bad-assiest movie of the year! Not only is it the best horror film of 2004, or the best comedy of 2004, it’s the best horror-comedy in just about forever! Great comedic horror films are few and far between (Evil Dead 2, Ghostbusters, The Raven, Return of the Living Dead, Friday the 13th Part 5: the New Beginning) but this one earns its place right up among the best of ‘em.

A huge hit in the UK, this flick has yet to hit American shores, save for a scattered few festival showings and, of course, the bootleg market, but when this one does make it here, see it as soon as you can. We need to flock to this movie and give Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright our money. They deserve it.

Shaun tells the story of a down on his luck, but wholly well-intentioned dolt named, well, Shaun. He’s having the requisite trouble at work, with his roommates (one funny but slovenly, the other a serious stick in the mud – and, naturally, both hate each other) and his lovely but despondent girlfriend (who loves him but is tired of his forgetfulness and immaturity.) And, if that wasn’t enough for one poor sap to deal with, there just do happens to be a plague of zombies overtaking his quiet little town.

At first, Shaun is oblivious to the encroachment of undead, lending the film some of its funniest moments (it’s amazing how similar drunk people and zombies really are), but once he and his roommate Ed are attacked he dons the role of reluctant hero, rushing to save his mom, his estranged girlfriend, and the entire city!

There’s plenty of gooey gore along the way along with enough piss-your-pants jokes that you almost miss stuff cuz you’re laughing so damn hard. Look for several in-jokes that play wonderful homage to past zombie classics like Night of the Living Dead and Evil Dead (yeah, yeah I know, I don’t actually consider Evil Dead a “zombie” movie, either, but whatever. I’m letting these guys get away with it.)

The script is pure genius. The way they slowly build the zombie attack is brilliant! As the story begins and unfolds, we just catch glimpses of images on passing television sets, or out of focus behind characters going about their business on the sidewalk. At one point we see an army convoy speed by but Shaun is too preoccupied by his own consternation to really notice.

But what really sells the flick is the fact that the main characters are so well drawn that you can’t help but fall for ‘em, and emotionally involve yourself in their plight. Some of the supporting characters aren’t as fleshed out, but they don’t really need to be. The focus here is on Shaun, and his roommate Ed. And I can’t think of two other characters in recent memory that were more fun to spend my time with. The performances and dialogue are just pitch-perfect (even in the lesser sculpted characters). Look for a cameo by Paltrow-beau and COLDPLAY frontman Chris Martin.

This movie hits barely a false note, and manages to balance its comedic and horrific moments nearly perfectly. And both work splendidly. Just when you catch your breath from laughing something truly freaky or gory happens, and vice versa.

See this one as soon as you can. And if you happen to see it for free your first time around (like I did) please, please, please rush to the theater and throw some money at these guys the next time you see it (as I plan to do, at least a couple times.)

This is the movie horror fans, and more specifically zombie fans have been waiting for: a spoof that pokes fun without condescending to its source material, and actually manages to be just as scary as its source material at the same time. No easy feat, that.

I can’t wait to see what these blokes come up with next.

(Ryan Lies is a No-Fi Staffwriter and fights zombies with the best of them.)

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Trick Or Treat
starring Marc Price, Lisa Orgolini, Gene Simmons, Ozzy, directed by Charles Martin Smith, Color, , 1986
Distributed by Platinum Disc Corp
DVD Reviewed By: Ryan Lies

I just now finally got around to watching this movie, but the POSTER for this one has been glued to my mind’s eye for nearly two decades now. Who of us that came of (geek) age in 80’s could forget the fine piece of exploitive, marketing art that heralded this teen demon-possession flick? The screaming heavy metal dude, rocking out on his guitar, surrounded by the flaming eyes and mouth of a smiling jack-o-lantern! And that tag line that read “What are you afraid of? It’s only rock & roll.”

Super cool, man. I remember being in 7th grade and seeing the ad for this one on television and thinking that it looked like it might be the greatest movie ever made. Back then I was WAY into hair bands, especially POISON, and this movie tapped right into that. Then, when I saw the poster I was completely enamored.

Ironically, I never actually got around to ever seeing the movie. My parents wouldn’t let me see this kind of stuff when I was young, so if I wasn’t able to see it at a friend-with-cable’s house, or sneak a VHS tape home from said friend, then I just never got to see it. (Unless it ran on network TV, with all the good stuff edited out, but what network would run this puppy?)

So the years went on and on and I never got the satanic image of that wailing heavy metal man and his chortling, flaming pumpkin out of my head, even though the urgency to watch the actual flick waned and waned. So now, almost twenty years later … well, thank God for bargain-bin DVDs!

Some friend of mine snatched this up for about three bucks at a Target, didn’t want it, and decided to give it to me. So now I finally get around to watching it. And what’s the verdict?

Awesome! Now, it’s probably only great because it’s an 80s relic. It’s heavy metal proselytizing and leather-n-chains rebellion chic doesn’t quite inspire fist-pumping the way it might’ve in 1986 (or, as it would’ve to a dorky 7th grader like I was), so you have to go into it with a sense of nostalgia.

The plot’s pretty simple (and actually would’ve fit right in with last month’s Revenge issue – damn me to hell …) Eddie, a shat-upon rock ‘n’ roll nerd (played by Marc Price, whom most of you know as Skippy from Family Ties AND the star of Killer Tomatoes Eat France!), receives the last known recording of his idol, Ozzy-wannabe Sammi Curr, who recently perished in a hotel fire. When the record is played backwards it gives Eddie instructions on how to exact revenge on those who would do him wrong. Eddie goes along for the ride at first, but once things start to “heat up,” he begins to realize that this may be more than he bargained for.

The flick moves along at a brisk pace and Sammi Curr is a completely ridiculous villain. He’s first seen on TV biting the head off of a snake and dousing himself in the blood. It’s obvious that this film was playing on the hyperbolized and now-laughably erroneous heavy metal hysteria and stereotypes of the mid-80’s (backwards masking, Ozzy’s theatrical hijinks, Satanic possession, etc.) and that’s pretty much what makes this such a hoot. Not much new here, it’s pretty standard teen horror fare. But director Charles Martin Smith (the be-spectacled uber-nerd of such favorites as Starman, The Untouchables and American Graffiti) injects enough sick humor and flair into the goings-on that it never gets boring.

Gene Simmons and Ozzy Osbourne supply neat little cameos, and some now-forgotten metal band called FASTWAY delivers some good cheesy tunes for the soundtrack. And there’s one death scene involving a crispy corpse that’s worth the price of admission. The DVD has nothing on it, but who cares? It’s only 3 bucks. Strangely enough it doesn’t feature any of the original artwork, which is a shame cuz that poster’s one of the classics. Maybe Anchor Bay will get their hands on this and give it a better treatment. Also, as an added oddity, the back of the DVD features behind-the-scenes makeup and FX production stills and two scenes from the movie.
Kids nowadays might zone out, but any of us born before 1979 should find this a pleasant kick in the head. Hell, it might even make you get out those old Ratt and Whitesnake tapes, throw on some lipstick and black lace and party like grunge never happened!

As AUTOGRAPH said, “Turn up … the RADIO!!!”