JUNESPLOITATION Week Two (June 6-12)

6. Slashers!

SLEEPAWAY CAMP (1983)
Trailers: The Burning, Friday the 13th (1980)

(Rewatch) I have seen this a fafillion times and I always find something new to admire about it. On the surface, it looks like just another Friday the 13th knock-off, but it definitely stands apart and has so much magic (much of it I’m sure accidental). It’s known for its shocker ending, but it deserves to be looked at for much more than that. The kids at the camp are a rogues gallery of real kids, not twenty-something cover models. These characters are more memorable to me than the characters in almost any other slasher (which might not be saying much, but still). And the kills are pretty creative and mostly well done (excepting that raspberry bee sting). Maybe my favorite slasher that’s not Black Christmas.

7. Shannon Tweed!

NO CONTEST (1995)

Trailers: Miss Congeniality, Excessive Force

What if Die Hard was set at a beauty pageant instead of a holiday Christmas party? And instead of Bruce Willis’s NYC cop, our hero was Shannon Tweed as a former action movie star who puts her skills to unexpected use? Now, this is no Die Hard, but it’s surprisingly good for the knock-off that it is. Andrew Dice Clay makes for a surprisingly formidable villain — he’s nowhere near Hans Gruber, but maybe if he had more competent henchmen, he’d be closer. The movie even has a pivotal relationship between the good guy gal on the inside and the cop on the outside, communicating via walkies (I could have done without the last-minute romance, though). I liked the device of the armed wristbands that keep everyone in one place. And this is a great movie if you love kick-ass ladies who fight back (not just Ms. Tweed).

8. Cars!

FAST COMPANY (1979)

Trailers: The Fast and the Furious, Return to Macon County

I had no idea before putting my Junesploitation calendar together that David Cronenberg made a car movie (unless you count Crash). This came out the same year as his body horror classic The Brood and could not be more different from his more characteristic fare. This is less a car *chase* movie than it is a movie about race car drivers, and there’s a thread of doing what you love to do without being beholden to The Man. It reminded me a lot of Hal Needham’s Hooper, actually, and it was odd to see the normally badass John Saxon sort of in the Robert Klein role. This was the final film of exploitation legend Claudia Jennings, who tragically died in a car crash a few months after the movie’s release. It also has one of the most ridiculous villain comeuppances I've ever seen.

9. Monsters!

THE GREEN SLIME (1968)

Trailers: Matango, Dagora

It’s hard to believe the guy who directed this also directed Battle Royale, but here we are. Kicking off with the greatest theme song of all time, this movie is goofy as hell, with a plot straight out of a classic Star Trek episode. But I was actually kind of unnerved by the way these monsters multiplied and eventually overran the space station. Less so when one of them was clearly a guy in green tights with a paper mache slime suit over his head. I could have done without the love triangle plot, though I understand that only appears in the extended version that's on the Blu-ray. Solid cheesy 1960s monster movie.

10. Sex Comedy!

SEX WITH A SMILE (1976)

Trailers: Joysticks, The School Teacher

I picked this mainly for the cast, which boasts Edwige Fenech, Barbara Bouchet and Marty Feldman, among others. It’s an anthology film with five stories, all of which feature stunningly gorgeous women and homely or odd-looking men. Almost all of which feature major consent issues. I think my favorite was the one with the countess and her chauffeur ("Catch It While It's Hot"). Least favorite is the one with Barbara Bouchet ("One for the Money").

11. Free Space!

GLEN OR GLENDA (1953)

Trailers: Plan 9 from Outer Space, Jail Bait

I liked this a lot more than I expected to. It’s as technically inept as you’d expect from an Ed Wood movie, but there’s something genuinely radical about a movie that, in 1953, humanized cross-dressing and gender fluidity and actually discusses gender confirmation procedures (though they were called something else at the time). The style is rather innovative as well, and whatever Wood’s shortcomings as a filmmaker, I respect what he’s doing here.

12. Prison!

PENITENTIARY (1979)

Trailers: JD’s Revenge, Terminal Island

A hardcore version of Shawshank Redemption meets Rocky. The idea of granting a person serving a prison sentence early parole as a reward for winning a boxing tournament is ridiculous on its face, but it does make for some interesting stakes in this movie. Especially when you see how unbelievably rough life is for all of these prisoners. Some of the fight scenes in this are brutal (especially an early scene between Too Sweet and Half Dead), and this is one of those movies that you can practically smell because it looks so dingy and sweaty and unpleasant -- I mean, the bathroom sex scenes alone.... The movie also features the well-worn but always effective trope of corruption among prison guards and admin, which is a tale as old as time. In fact, it reminded me a lot of The Longest Yard, which I think it would pair well with.

JUNESPLOITATION Week One (June 1-5)

I did F This Movie's Junesploitation challenge for the second consecutive year and it was a blast. I didn't start writing about these until I'd already gotten going, so these are all post-dated. But I wanted to write about everything I saw, while breaking things up so there's not one post with all 30 entries. I also picked two trailers to preceded each of these films (like I did with the Summerfest movies), just to be extra nerdy.

So, if I may begin at the beginning...

1. Space!

MESSAGE FROM SPACE (1978)
Trailers: The Terrornauts, Starcrash

One of many Star Wars knock-offs to come out of the late 1970s/early 1980s, this one stands out for its Japanese flavor. Directed by Kenji Fukasaku, who would go on to direct the hugely influential BATTLE ROYALE (2001) — the movie everyone compared The Hunger Games to — this is worth watching for its style (especially the costumes and sets, which are pretty incredible considering the kind of budget this film must have had), and seeing the obvious attempts at Star Wars elements (for example, Beba 2, which is clearly this movie’s version of R2D2) is kind of interesting. In the end, though, I found it hard to follow because the story is kind of a mess and there are just too many characters. And that’s not even getting to the magical glowing walnuts.

2. Westerns!

ZACHARIAH (1971)

Trailers: 3 Supermen of the West, El Topo

(Rewatch) When I saw this before, it was the penultimate film of a 24-hour movie marathon and I wanted to see it again less bleary-eyed. It’s definitely a weird one, bleary-eyed or not. Starring John Rubinstein and a very young and pretty Don Johnson and featuring anachronistic modern music, this psychedelic "electric western" is trying its best to be philosophical but mostly feels like it was written in a huge haze of weed (not that there's anything particularly wrong with that, but it's a very distinctive vibe). A prime example of a movie that was made explicitly for the time it came out. There is a ton of purposefully anachronistic music to set a particular mood. And despite the title character’s interlude (and strange canary foreplay) with a prostitute, where we are assured of his sexual prowess, this movie is gay as a day in May. A fitting movie for Pride month, and not the last one on this list.

3. Kung Fu!

DIRTY HO (1979)

Trailers: Challenge of the Masters, Crippled Avengers

I got that big Shaw Brothers Blu-ray set months ago and spent much of April and May burning through it. This was the last one I hadn’t watched. Not my favorite (nothing will top CRIPPLED AVENGERS and FIVE DEADLY VENOMS), but still quite enjoyable. I love the clever ways Gordon Liu’s character fights while simultaneously hiding his skills. This movie is also pretty refreshing plot-wise, as it’s a rare Shaw Brothers film that isn’t about revenge. And after watching all those other movies so close together, it was actually a relief not to be watching yet another movie that revolved around rival martial arts schools and people literally killing each other over which style is better (I swear, that’s got to be the plot of at least half of the kung fu movies I’ve seen).

4. ‘90s Action!

AGAINST THE LAW (1997)

Trailers: Mercenary, Memories of Murder

This movie is not a western but its main character thinks he is in one. Richard Grieco (formerly of the original 21 JUMP STREET) plays a homeless drifter who believes he is an Old West-style gunfighter and is searching for a worthy adversary to prove how fast a draw he is. He sees a fitting opponent in a cop (played by Nick Mancuso) who's been in the news for killing a drug dealer in a shootout. And because he knows the power of television, he kidnaps a news reporter (played by Nancy Allen) to document the big showdown. This is very much a 90s, washed out neo-western and Grieco's character is kind of fascinating. Is he actually delusional or is he just trying to live out a fantasy life that he's seen in a bunch of movies?

5. Free Space!

WONDER WOMEN (1973)

Trailers: Policewomen, The World of Suzie Wong

I couldn’t find a decent print of this streaming, so I ended up watching the Rifftrax version, which gave me the amazing “shot a woman in the face” sequence. If you squint hard, this is a bit like a low-rent James Bond, if Bond was an insurance investigator played by Ross Hagen. The villain’s plot reminded me a lot of the more out-there Bond villain plots, and Nancy Kwan’s muscle is a team of hot chicks that are on their way to a pillow fight. The action is pretty quality for a film of this type, and the centerpiece is an amazing jitney chase that lasts at least 10 minutes. I only wish there were a better quality print out there to watch.

I'll be putting the rest of these up, a week at a time, as soon as I can. Click on the "junesploitation" tag on any of the posts to get to the rest.

SUMMERFEST '22: Lone Wolf and Cub (May 31-June 5)

I’d seen a few minutes of SHOGUN ASSASSIN, the sort of “greatest hits” movie cut together from these, but other than that this was my first trip through this saga. A huge influence on THE MANDALORIAN, these movies are very entertaining, particularly the father-child dynamic that inspired Space Dad and Green Baby. My only quibble is that I wish they didn’t feel the need with just about every one of them to include either rape or general objectification of women, even the ones who kick ass. I mean, I know these are exploitation films, but still.

Sword of Vengeance (1972)

Trailers: Tales of Ugetsu, Kagemusha

The one that starts it all and shows the audience what to expect going forward. The most iconic scene, of course, is the one in which Itto gives his infant son a choice between a ball and a sword — if he chooses the ball, Itto will send him to be with his mother in the afterlife; if he chooses the sword, he will join Itto as he becomes an assassin for hire. This was also memorable to me for featuring children singing a song about “dropping a hard turd.” I have to think this is some strange translation anomaly (is there a similar word in Japanese for “ball” or “stone”?), but the “turd” lyric kept showing up and making me laugh.

Baby Cart at the River Styx (1972)

Trailers: Throne of Blood, Ran

Lady assassins! This one makes the child, Daigoro, more of a character and we see how much like his father he is and how unsentimental Itto is about his son being in such dangerous situations. Daigoro’s efforts to help his father while he rests (bringing him water, food, etc.) are kind of amazing to watch. And the sequence where Daigoro is kidnapped and suspended over the well is such a great way of portraying what a team they are, despite Daigoro’s youth and seeming innocence.

Baby Cart to Hades (1972)

Trailers: Letter Never Sent, Shogun’s Shadow

This one gets more into the notion of honor/dishonor, especially with the character of Kanbei, who when we first meet him deals heavily with his three companions who rape a pair of women on the road. We see him again at the end of the film and hear his backstory and why he was dishonored years ago. We also see Itto endure torture on behalf of a woman who had been sold into prostitution. Itto is not a sentimental man, but he has a strong sense of honor and an impulse to defend the helpless.

Baby Cart in Peril (1972)

Trailers: Hidden Fortress, Zatoichi

The first one of these movies not to be directed by Kenji Misumi and you can see it in subtle ways, like the opening credit montage, which gives us some glimpses of the story so far. This is also the first movie to give Daigoro his own little side adventure. I like that we got more backstory on Itto’s bad blood with the Yagyu clan and what led to Itto being framed for treason and deciding to take the traveling assassin path to begin with. This movie features another badass female assassin, who disarms her prey by stripping down to the waist and distracting them with her … tattoos.

Baby Cart in the Land of Demons (1973)

Trailers: Three Outlaw Samurai, 13 Assassins

The last one to be directed by Misumi, this one has probably my favorite plot of the six films. I loved the device of the five messengers, who each give Itto a piece of the puzzle of the job they want him to do, and how it’s all complicated by another, seemingly conflicting mission. I just love how it is all resolved in a way that lets Itto complete his task and makes things right with the family he has to deal with. This movie gives Daigoro another side adventure, which leads to him being publicly flogged for keeping his word to a female pickpocket.

White Heaven in Hell (1974)

Trailers: Seven Samurai, Yojimbo

This one was just really cool, letting the story go to a supernatural place and giving Itto maybe his most formidable opponents yet. The story arc of the six films is not really resolved, ending as all the others do with Itto and Daigoro living to fight another day. But it finishes with definitely the most epic battle thus far, giving things a new setting in a snow-covered landscape. This one kind of annoyingly makes Daigoro into a bit of a cartoon, occasionally cutting to him after some brutal strike and having him make some “OMG” face. But it’s been amazing watching this little guy over six movies and how these stories have played with his assumed innocence.

 

SUMMERFEST '22: Musical Double Features IV

In anticipation of Baz Luhrmann's upcoming biopic about The King, I couldn't resist making one of these an Elvis double feature.

Jailhouse Rock (1957)

Trailers: Viva Las Vegas, King Creole

Most of Elvis’s movies are not great, but this one is charming enough and a good (if formulaic) story about the cost of doing the music business and choosing whether to leave people behind in order to get what you want. The jailhouse number is obviously iconic, and that’s the lasting impression I have of the movie and not much else). Would make an interesting double feature with Penitentiary (1979), which I'll be watching in a few weeks for Junesploitation and which also has a meaningful mentor relationship between fellow prison inmates.

Elvis (TV, 1979)

Trailers: Elvis (2022), Rocketman

Directed by John Carpenter and starring his soon-to-be frequent collaborator Kurt Russell, this is your standard made-for-TV biopic that waters a whole lot of stuff down and was made frankly too soon after Presley’s death to be objective in any way. I kind of liked the framing device of his comeback concert in Vegas, and the thread of his relationship with his mother and the memory of his lost brother is a nice emotional touch. I was frustrated, though, that there is not one mention of his life after that, notably his eventual heavy drug use (though maybe not a lot of that was public knowledge at the time?). Russell makes a compelling Elvis, though, and would play him again years later in 3000 Miles to Graceland.

JUNESPLOITATION '22: Musical Double Features III

Today's double is a pair of girl-punk movies.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains (1982)

Trailers: Satisfaction, Sing Street

Diane Lane was 17 when this was made (and Laura Dern 15), and everyone in this, down to the Stains’ copycat fans, feels painfully real. This reminded me a lot of THE LEGEND OF BILLIE JEAN (which I watched for last year’s Summerfest), particularly in the way that the Stains become a movement. I love that this isn’t a portrait of a band’s whole career (though we see a few snapshots of their eventual success in the movie’s final moments). This is about the initial phase, where they’re trying to define themselves. And I LOVE that, even though they have a crisis of authenticity at one of their shows, it’s too late for it to derail their momentum — they’re already on the radio and most people won’t care (or even know about) what happened at one gig.

We Are the Best! (2013)

Trailers: Her Smell, Prey for Rock & Roll

This was not quite what I expected but I ended up enjoying it quite a bit. Because the characters are so young, there’s a lot of screen time devoted to them just being kids. I feel like a lot of people have experiences like the story of this film. Two friends start a band, maybe add one or two people who actually know what they’re doing, ultimately write one or two songs, play one gig, and then perhaps it’s all over and they move on (the end of this film is ambiguous in terms of whether these characters ever play together again, but I imagine they drift apart and move on not long after the credits roll).

SUMMERFEST '22: Musical Double Features II

A couple of musicals with motorcycles for today. I would not have thought to put these two films together, so thanks to the Twitter user whose name I can't remember for putting it into my head.

Streets of Fire (1984) (rewatch)

Trailers: The Warriors, Slumber Party Massacre II

The plot here matters less than the style and the music. It’s wild to see Willem Dafoe this young (and this leather-clad). It also features maybe the least wimpy character I’ve ever seen Rick Moranis play. I find myself less and less interested in the doomed romance of Diane Lane and Michael Pare, though, the more I watch this. The mild dystopian elements and the all-night chase remind me a lot of The Warriors (1979), also directed by Walter Hill, which I loved. I live for this movie’s soundtrack, though, especially the two Jim Steinman songs.

Grease 2 (1982) (rewatch)

Trailers: Shock Treatment, Can’t Buy Me Love

Yep, I still prefer this to the original. The original has better songs, to be sure (though I love the songs in 2 as well), but the story here is much better, as are the gender dynamics. I love that the Sandy-equivalent Michael doesn’t change everything about himself at the 11th hour to appeal to Stephanie. He develops a skill (and a cycle) over the course of the whole film, in an effort to cultivate a shared interest between them. And he’s pretty much the same person as Cool Rider as he is as nice guy Michael. I also think this movie just looks better than its predecessor. The colors pop and it’s far less drab, and the director (having been a choreographer on the original) has a knack for filling the frame and making everything dynamic (though she almost always does so by throwing a dance number in the mix). Some of the shots are downright gorgeous (hello, motorcycle heaven!). 

SUMMERFEST '22: Musical Double Features I

For the past couple of summers I have set myself a ridiculous summer movie-watching schedule with a theme for each week and a movie for every day. This is generally a way to get me through the summer tedium until I take my end-of-summer vacation. I also tend to use it to get to a bunch of movies that have been on my to-watch list for ages, as well as rewatch some favorites. I also picked a couple of trailers to go with each movie because I am That Nerd.

Regardless of the calendar and solstices, I typically count Memorial Day weekend as the start of summer. So to kick things off, I'm filling this holiday weekend with some musical (or music-themed) double features. This and the next three days' posts were inspired by a tweet I saw where a theater was doing a double feature of Streets of Fire and Grease 2, which I decided I needed to do for myself (see tomorrow's post). It ended up being an excuse to scratch half a dozen movies off my to-watch list.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping (2016)

Trailers: Vox Lux, Stunt Rock

Great and hilarious mockumentary, in the style of Behind the Music (or whatever the modern equivalent would be). Written, directed and starring The Lonely Island (Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone), and featuring loads of their songs, created specifically for the film. Full of cameos from real life music industry personalities, lending everything a veneer of authenticity. This is first and foremost, though, a story of the importance of friendship and keeping your relationships intact through the ups and downs of success. I liked this more than I expected to.

Josie and the Pussycats (2001)

Trailers: Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Dreamgirls

This has been on my to-watch list for some time. Another story about a music group that follows the Behind the Music trajectory, but the cast and the writing make it great. I confess I enjoy the villain’s plot a bit more than the boilerplate stuff with the band. But it’s still a lot of fun. Nearly perfect, in fact. I say nearly because I kind of despised the gag with Carson Daly. There’s nothing wrong with him being in the film as himself, as he was at the time a ubiquitous presence on MTV. But teasing a romance between him and Tara Reid’s character (Reid being his RL girlfriend/fiancee at the time) was incredibly cringy and took me right out of the film for a few minutes.