Reviews

Even though I nearly walked out of the theater in sheer frustration when I first beheld the astonishing idiocy of this "only true" sequel, my loyalty to the series these film-makers told all Halloween fans to pretend no longer exists compelled me to take another look with fresh eyes. What they saw was a movie even stupider than I remember, but my revisit did allow me to pinpoint precisely why this obtuse wasted opportunity is such a crushing disappointment.

The big selling point here is the return of Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, who escaped Michael Myers during his original 1978 Halloween night rampage. Nevermind that Curtis has already reprised the role in 3 previous sequels, and her character was definitively killed off in the 2002 installment- -none of those movies happened now because H2018 director David Gordon Green said so, remember?

But here's the thing: if everything after the first Halloween is erased, then Laurie is not a woman who has been tormented for 40 years by a merciless supernatural Shape impervious to death who repeatedly resurfaces without warning to terrorize her and everyone in her family; she's just someone who once had a chance fleeting encounter with a serial killer that was promptly arrested and institutionalized and has never seen the light of day since.

Consider the recent flurry of coverage on the Golden State Killer, whose malevolent shadow crossed the paths of over 100 people; many of his surviving victims have come forward to articulate enduring far more horrific atrocities than those perpetuated by the fictional Michael Myers, and while their souls are enduringly marked by those appalling events which occurred in their youth, all of them have gone on to build otherwise reasonable lives for themselves, refusing to allow their lone encounter with a monster paralyze them with fear forever- -and they did so while their scourge remained unidentified and at large and still conceivably an active threat, not safely locked away with no chance of release.

None of them turned their homes into gated survivalist compounds equipped with basement death traps and spent decades stockpiling an arsenal of weaponry, all in anticipation that one day their tormentor would return for a final confrontation. Yet the Laurie Strode we're supposed to root for here is an admitted paranoiac basket case who devoted her entire life to doing exactly that, all based on what amounts to a few harrowing hours when she was a teenager; she's not the noble heroine we've been cheering on since 1978, she's a pathetic drunken recluse who exists in eternal mortal terror of a sixty year-old mental patient she hasn't had any contact with for four decades.

That's not to mention the numerous other times this film trips over its own amended lore, such as when the most obnoxious character in the movie unveils the historic Shape cowl to Michael and declares, "this is part of you!" Dude, no it's not; if none of the other sequels took place, that piece of rubber is not a pivotal talisman, it's just some $3 mask that Michael stole from a hardware store in 1978 and wore that one night- -likely chosen at random because it was the day of Halloween so the shop only had a few options left in stock.

Even stripped of these existential issues, this is a wretched mess of a film brimming with more inane elements than I have room to list here, most notably a sudden third-act swerve which ranks as one of the lamest and most nonsensical plot twists I have ever seen in any movie, ever. The teenaged ensemble is uniformly vapid and annoying, even by disposable victim standards, yet we're still forced to spend long segments of the already padded running time following their mindless subplots. The adults aren't much better either, except for a steely Sheriff who delivers perhaps the only pragmatic line in the film when Laurie announces that she has been praying every night for Michael to escape custody: "Well, that was a dumb thing to pray for." The one consistently intelligent and enjoyable character here is an elementary school-aged kid, who helps liven things up during the movie's sole truly effective suspense sequence but sadly never materializes again after the movie spirals back into a deluge of nonsense five minutes later.

There have been plenty of weak Halloween flicks, but this abysmal entry marks the absolute nadir of the entire franchise. And if you've ever heard me rant about how execrable Rob Zombie's contributions to the series are, you'll know that's saying a lot.

Featuring a threadbare plot that seldom makes sense, a cast of actors who seem to have forgotten to read the script before shooting their scenes, and some of the least convincing karate ever committed to film, this incomprehensible bargain basement action flick might very well be unwatchable if it wasn't so rife with unintentional humor. Lucky for us, there's oodles of the latter, so what Death Machines lacks in white-knuckle thrills it more than makes up for with its deluge of sheer giggle-inducing lunacy.

Though the title refers to a trio of assassins who spend the movie lumbering from one quarry to the next, the central villain here is unlikely underworld crime boss Madame Lee (Mari Hanjo), whose already massive beehive wig seems to swell even larger from one scene to the next, and whose basic inability to form complete sentences renders at least half of her dialogue completely unintelligible. It's a good thing we don't ever need her to clarify her nefarious plot, since she doesn't have much of one to speak of. The general idea is that she has concocted some sort of mind control serum which transforms her three hand-picked Death Machines into mute and mindless killers who are impervious to bullets and will carry out her orders without question, then sets these lethal mandroids into motion against her enemies.

The silliness abounds from the opening montage, during which Madame Lee carefully chooses her three subjects by observing them in combat. After a lengthy kung-fu exchange, one of the future Death Machines simply pulls out a gun and shoots his opponent to death at point blank range, which sort of negates the entire purpose of the demonstration. Elsewhere, the squad's results are equally successful, and their methods are equally unsubtle. They engage one of their disposable and nebulously-designated victims by driving a truck into the restaurant where he's eating, wait until another target boards his helicopter and level it with a bazooka instead of just offing the dude when he's all alone on the ground, and massacre an entire karate class for the sole purpose of taking out the instructor.

While each of these vignettes technically qualifies as an action sequence, their clumsy execution instead renders them some of the funniest parts of the movie. Swords that don't come within four feet of striking anyone somehow produce mass casualties and end up sheathed in blood, while other foes are felled by knock-out punches that are visibly swung well above their heads, so on most of the occasions these untrained performers engage each other on the screen they look like they're trying their hardest not to accidentally hit each other.

Since most of what happens in Death Machines is utterly extraneous, watching the film unfold creates the sneaking impression that the producers filmed everything they had scripted, then scrambled to concoct various random things for their cast to do once they realized they had only logged about a third of a feature-length offering. That's really the only way to explain the presence of a restaurant owner who eats up several of the movie's lean 90 minutes bragging about how good his spaghetti is. Furthering that effect, the film also introduces a grizzled detective to track the eponymous killers, though he doesn't make much of an effort to actually hunt them down and most of his screen time is instead spent getting yelled at by his Lieutenant for falling behind on his paperwork and not attending some mandatory civics class.

An even larger chunk of real estate is devoted to the recovery of Frank, the lone survivor of the afore-mentioned karate school slaughter, who struggles to adapt to a whole new way of life after having his hand amputated in the skirmish. As the spree's only living witness, Frank is immediately tagged for a follow-up attempt on his life to stop him from aiding the police; however, he mostly keeps himself busy plotting revenge against the slayers who butchered his dojo buddies. Frank also mopes a lot, which his nurse evidently thinks is super hot, because she is shoehorned into the ensemble for a romantic subplot with him. After a decidedly awkward tableau that suggests the duo engaged in some highly unsatisfactory sex, they adjourn to the bar where Frank works, at which point a wild brawl promptly breaks out, ostensibly because there hasn't been a proper fight scene in several minutes. Despite his abiding commitment to martial arts, Frank gets summarily beat down by a drunken codger who looks to be in his 70's, a head-scratching turn of events that doesn't go very far in establishing him as a credible foil for the invincible Death Machines. This turns out to be a moot point anyway, since the vengeance half the film is squandered setting up doesn't actually take place; Frank never has a second encounter with Madame Lee's assassins and instead spends the climax battling her.

I could go on and on. There's also a tacked-on biker rumble at a mom and pop diner that one of the DMs gets into for no apparent purpose, which occurs following an extended diversion involving him being captured by the police and escaping custody, none of which has any bearing whatsoever on the story. Not to mention the fate which befalls a father-of-the-year-candidate bank manager who refuses Lee's demand that he quit his post even after he's informed that her minions have kidnapped his daughter and will inflict all manner of horrific carnal debasements upon the poor young lass if he doesn't comply (his response, essentially: "well, daughters come and go, but do you know how HARD I worked to get this job?!").

Suffice to say, Death Machines is an incompetent mess. But thankfully it's the kind of incompetent mess that is a giddy blast to behold for anyone who fancies themselves a connoisseur of ridiculously awful cinema. Once you factor in the awesomely schlocky Radio Shack synthesizer score, what we have here is a certified classic that fans of this particular subgenre should not sleep on.

Although the nifty but obvious twist at the end overtly announces the instant potential for a sequel, that augured follow-up never did arrive. What a shame; hell, I'd watch an entire franchise of these.

Contrary to all of the scathing reviews I read, the worst thing about The Sidehackers isn't the senseless title, the numerous extraneous scenes that pad the running time, or the schmaltzy execution of the romantic subplot. The biggest drawback here is that there's actually a pretty decent movie buried in this slog that could have been extracted and polished into something worthwhile in more capable hands.

Whether you're viewing this caper under its original heading or the one that better matches the poster illustration, neither has much to do with what actually occurs in this flick. "Five the Hard Way" is the name of the song which runs during the opening credits, but that's as close as that moniker comes to squaring with the narrative. The amended Sidehackers masthead seems to be an attempt to cash in on a brief two-man motorsports fad, though this isn't much more illuminating given that the story's central protagonist Rommel is only one man and thus requires no pluralization for his sidehacking activities. Besides, while he does indeed participate in the indicated competitive pursuit, he does so by piloting a motorcycle rather than the distinctive eponymous accessory, which makes his best friend-slash-wingman Luke the only actual sidehacker we meet here; since there's only one Luke, also, no matter how you break down the title it just doesn't make a lot of sense.

Further muddying this affair, the sidehacking ultimately has almost nothing to do with the plot, other than providing an opportunity to fill fifteen minutes with tedious footage of dirtbike races which are presented in such a confusing manner that it never becomes clear who, if anyone, wins. Rommel and Luke are evidently the circuit's star hackers, but this isn't really important, either. The more crucial aspect of their kinship is that Luke is the happily married exemplar who serves as Rommel's sounding board while he prepares to settle down with his fiancée, Rita. The latter couple's amorous bliss is established via an extended tableau of them frolicking in a meadow, during which the dialogue they exchange is so painfully saccharine that most viewers will find themselves wondering if writer Tony Houston ever actually had a conversation with a woman before he knocked out this screenplay.

The real story begins when we meet J.C., who is introduced as a curt and supercilious stunt rider of some sort, even though if memory serves we never once see him operate a vehicle in the entire film. While delivering his cycle to Rommel and Luke's garage for them to fine-tune it, J.C. becomes far more fascinated than we are with the concept of sidehacking, and his ardor is further piqued when he accepts Rommel's invitation to watch their next race. A brief friendship blossoms, culminating with J.C. attempting to convince Rommel to leave Rita behind and hit the road with him and his entourage. However, the more time all concerned spend in J.C.'s company, the clearer it becomes that his brash eccentricity is actually dangerous volatility; once he starts dropping N-bombs and smacking around his beleaguered gal-pal Paisley, the villain of the piece emerges in earnest. Worse, our hero faces another conflict in the form of the latter scheming abusee, who decides she's ready for a bit more stability in a partner and begins maximizing every opportunity she has to try to seduce Rommel.

But when her would-be new-daddy rejects her one too many times, Paisley resorts to some wickedness of her own, tearing her clothes to stage a sexual assault and telling J.C. that Rommel forced himself on her. Suddenly, the Sidehackers becomes an entirely different film, and the frivolous tone of its first act becomes even more befuddling, when J.C. and his goons storm Rommel's cabin, savagely beat him, then rape and murder Rita. The story quickly pivots to a bleak revenge tale, albeit one consistent with the meandering pace already set forth: Rommel decides to seek retaliation by killing J.C., but not before he has a long conversation with Luke about the immorality of vengeance, and then has basically the exact same conversation again with a previously un-introduced artist friend whose only contribution to the movie is that single drawn out and wholly superfluous scene he appears in.

Additional time is squandered on Rommel's struggles to come up with some cash to enlist the help of a musclebound meathead and a guffawing yokel to augment his punishment crew, and then some more with a handful of light-hearted passages which show the group cementing their tenuous alliance. But finally, after a long and winding track getting there, The Sidehackers eventually pays off. The last twenty minutes essay the final desert confrontation between Rommel's squad and the lamming J.C., who has helpfully bolstered his circle with several shooter-toting extras to multiply the film's body count and lend the closing action sequences increased gravitas. Despite the inept handling of the set-up, this concluding segment is surprisingly satisfying, loaded with gunplay and juicy blood squibs and punctuated with an exclamation point of an ending that might not win over a ton of fans but nevertheless serves up a memorable denouement.

Sure enough, the best moments in this outing could likely be whittled down to an episodic short, but The Sidehackers is nowhere near as worthless as its reputation suggests. While the pace is indubitably slow, that leisurely approach allows for a gradual and effective immersion into J.C.'s madness, and even though actor Mike Pataki doesn't look particularly menacing his deeds compensate for his stature. Ross Hagen's Rommel is a somewhat bland rugged everyman, yet that also works in the movie's favor, lending a sense of increased realism to the rough and gritty climactic combat. The horrific violence inflicted upon sweet, ingenuous Rita is more implied than explicit, presented via an unsettling montage of quick cuts rather than an exploitatively graphic rape vignette. And despite not fully reconciling the transformation an otherwise ordinary person would have to undergo to transition from wanting to kill the man who murdered his fiancée to actually setting forth on that mission (the only real soul-searching Rommel does here is essentially relegated to him standing in various locations gazing pensively off-camera), at least some effort is made to segue the protagonist from pathos to payback.

Make no mistake, this picture is indeed a mess. But it's a mess that mostly cleans itself up before the departing credits roll, making any cries of "worst movie ever" a stretch at best. Sweeping judgements like that are better made with a sense of perspective; in this case, I viewed the film as part of a Mill Creek box set which features four titles per DVD, and both of the movies on the flip side of this particular disc were at least ten times lousier than The Sidehackers. This missed opportunity may only have 30 strong minutes to speak of, but I've sat through plenty of flicks that don't even offer that much.

Though the adventures of the sailors in this caper unfold over the course of the weekend indicated in the title, this bare bones offering seems to have been written and produced in even less time than that. This quick and economical approach was precisely the driving force behind Crown International's massive roster of b-flicks, a library that encompasses minor classics to unwatchable duds and everything in between, but in the case of Weekend Pass less is definitely less.

The story is built more on a scenario than an actual plot, following a quartet of Navy lads fresh out of basic training as they trek to Los Angeles for one last splurge of hedonistic freedom before reporting for duty. The first half of the movie essentially doubles as a tour of 1980's LA as the group drives aimlessly from one site to the next, hitting Sunset Boulevard, then a strip club, then the beach, and just to make sure the flick packs in as many requisite decade cliches as possible, the squad also takes an aerobics class and spends some time in south central gang turf.

There is a vague attempt made to infuse this otherwise banal road trip with some sex comedy tropes, but the film falls well short there by failing to deliver any legitimately funny moments--an especially egregious oversight in this case, given that a healthy chunk of the movie actually takes place inside a comedy club where the late great Phil Hartman serves as MC; yet, sadly, nothing especially humorous happens there, either. There's also no sex, so aside from a few bursts of gratuitous nudity, much of the action plays out like a generic PG teen rom-com.

Still, while this result may frustrate viewers expecting a healthy dose of raunch, it does serve to present the four leads as likeable scamps rather than horny dirtbags. Likewise, the gals they end up paired with are a refreshing change of pace from the new-wave strippers, naked masseuses, and vapid showbiz predators they initially lust after. The result is four couples you end up sincerely rooting for, which is a surprising outcome in a film that is otherwise built on tedium rather than engagement.

That satisfying finale isn't enough, though. The cocktail napkin plot requires lots of padding to flesh out into a feature-length film, so the few noteworthy aspects here are swallowed in a sea of filler. Director Lawrence Bassoff (who would go on to helm the last, and worst, Crown International release, Hunk) may have been hamstrung by working from a script that was ostensibly only 15 pages long, but that doesn't excuse his lazy mismanagement of the run-time. The strip club scene, which is there merely to set up a semi-comical exchange with one of the dancers, eats up twenty minutes of the film and features three complete performances. Ditto with the afore-mentioned sequence in the comedy club, where one of the sailors finally gets a chance to achieve his dream of doing stand-up... but not until after we sit through 15 minutes of painfully unfunny material from a slew of performers who otherwise have nothing to do with the movie. Certainly, a flick of this caliber isn't likely to draw the next Scorcese, but given how much emphasis is placed upon the bond between our principal Navy brothers during the conclusion, Weekend Pass would have been far better served by allowing its leads more onscreen camaraderie instead of squandering so much time on the film's unmemorable ancillary players and dead-end diversions.

In more capable hands, this movie could have maximized the potential of its endearing cast by giving them some genuinely humorous material to work with. Unfortunately, most of what ultimately ended up on the screen here is a slog to get through. And, while this certainly isn't the the shoddiest entry in the Crown International catalog, it stands as a largely forgettable jaunt that is easily overshadowed by any number of like-minded flicks of its era. Even if you have a whole weekend to spare, there are a lot better ways to fill it than this.

The set-up for this light-hearted romp isn't exceptionally complicated: the manager of a limo company whose drivers are all stodgy old men is grudgingly forced to allow an esoteric new wave babe a chance to join their ranks, so he sets about to do everything in his power to make sure she fails miserably. Yet wrapping up the requisite wacky mid-'80s nudie hijinks in a fresh and unconventional plot is a big plus in this case, and My Chauffeur ends up being one of the more memorable offerings of its flavor and vintage.

The film's most abundant strength is that it's truly funny, and frequently so. Since the laughs arrive with such generous consistency, the movie maintains a lasting charm throughout rather than serving up a couple of decent gags and settling for being a nice try. Of course, central to that is the spirited performance by Deborah Foreman, who would handily steal the show even if she wasn't already the tale's leading lady. Add in some welcome support from Howard Hesseman, E.G. Marshall, a slew of familiar character actors, and the debuts of Penn & Teller in one extended notable sequence, and the result is a flick that doesn't necessarily demand inclusion in the decade's comedy canon, but comes admirably close nonetheless.

Most of the slapstick elements are handled with gusto by the limo-riding bit players, with Foreman acting as the sassy straight-(wo)man who inevitably gets chastised by her grumpy boss for the misdeeds of her passengers ("but she was worth 20,000 points" is one of her sharpest zingers, though I won't spoil the set-up by explaining it, and that particular vignette is so wtf bizarre it defies description, anyway). Naturally, she proves to be wildly popular among her clientele and thus an asset to the company, so watching her gradually win her co-workers over like she wins us over from the start imbues the film with bursts of surprisingly sincere heart to go with its keen comedic soul.

Though most of the action is dominated by the encounters between Foreman's delightfully-rendered Casey Meadows and the unruly fares her plotting dispatcher throws her way to scare her off the job, the amorous subplot which blooms between her and one particularly difficult client is just as pleasant to watch unfold. Since the two share a palpable natural chemistry and Casey is so comprehensibly endearing, it's easy to root the pair on all the way through the denouement, where once again the movie exceeds expectations by adding an additional layer to the twist the viewer has been conditioned to anticipate since the opening moments (while also affording Foreman the opportunity to deliver the best line in the movie for good measure).

My Chauffeur isn't a perfect film, but it is a whole lot of fun, delivering enough raunch and skin to please that sector of the audience while also allowing its adorable star and the likeable auxiliary characters around her to elevate the material beyond the obvious. What could have easily been just another entertaining but interchangeable sex farce is shaped into something far more impressive in these hands, and this outing doesn't merely work as an amusing diversion, a cavalcade of breasts, and a serviceable rom-com, it also works as a satisfying, well-made flick. And if nothing else, there are way worse ways to spend 95 minutes than hanging out with Deborah Foreman.

This equal opportunity '80s nugget flips the coin on any number of "horny dudes road trip to the beach to party and score" movies by instead focusing on a trio of attractive ladies in pretty much that same scenario. Shy and bookish Sarah invites her wild best friends Ducky and Ginger to her uncle's waterfront cottage for a summer of fun in the sun, and a slew of politically incorrect debauchery promptly ensues. Ducky and Ginger are eager to take their clothes off whenever the opportunity presents itself and (ahem) socialize with as many guys as humanly possible, but Sarah only has eyes for Scott, the sensitive bohemian guitar-playing hitchhiker who tags along with the gals after they give him a lift. It's all fairly standard stuff, but thanks to a cast of likable characters and a number of effective laughs, The Beach Girls ends up being a notable standout amongst a cluttered field of similar offerings.

Right from the opening montage, amusing sight gags like a nun in full habit regalia waxing up her boogie board to hit the waves suggest that this comedy might actually have some of that in it. The action is also peppered with recurring bits like an omnipresent handyman who thinks he's gone to voyeur heaven when the house becomes essentially filled with naked partygoers but instead spends the movie being alternately electrocuted and knocked down staircases, as well as the hijinks of a beach dog with a penchant for fetching the bikini tops off of unsuspecting sunbathers. In addition to the standard pratfalls, The Beach Girls also introduces a handful of comical absurdist elements like an inept karate-practicing limo driver and (hey, why not) a left-field subplot about an overzealous coast guard crew pursuing a band of marijuana-smuggling pirates, complete with eye patches.

Even the ribald one-liners land more often than not, such as when one of our leads has to disentangle the nude bodies of an amorous couple making out on the couch to locate the remote control; after finally digging it out from underneath their conjoined mass, she holds up the bulky device and asks, "didn't you feel that?", to which the lass on the sofa replies, "oh, I thought it was him." The humor is all strictly low-brow, but the producers of this outing clearly understood their intended audience, and the fact that this flick seems to be poking fun at itself half the time only adds to its charm.

Of course, the good times can't last forever. Soon, Sarah's uncle arrives to discover the raging fiesta and some of his uppity neighbors begin objecting to the bacchanalian happenings in their peaceful neighborhood. Meanwhile, Sarah herself faces an identity crisis as she tries to shed her demure disposition to keep up with Ducky and Ginger's prodigious consumption of boys and booze. All the story threads work themselves out about the way you'd expect, and nobody really learns any significant life lessons to speak of, but anyone who attends this bash with The Beach Girls looking for heady twists is totally missing the point.

Ultimately, this is a movie that delivers exactly what it advertises: a whole lot of gratuitous nudity and a consistent slew of memorable antics in a genuinely funny 90-minute package. I'm not sure if The Beach Girls qualifies as the "best" entry in the 1980's sex farce catalog, but its highly attractive cast, winningly goofy music, and inspired gonzo climax certainly make a strong case for that designation, and any cinephile who fancies themselves a connoisseur of this inimitable genre should consider this an immediate must see. Your payoff won't be quite as rewarding as that of the frolicking revelers who actually get to partake in the shenanigans here, but experiencing this gala second hand is still loads of fun.

It's hard to know what to make of The Pom Pom Girls. Though the producers of this flick clearly knew what they were doing when they cooked up that moniker to lure in their target young male audience, the title has very little to do with the movie they actually made. There are indeed cheerleaders in this film, but most of them are essentially used for set dressing while the bulk of the proceedings fixate upon the shenanigans carried out by two of the football players they're on hand to cheer for. Obviously crafted on a grindhouse budget and with that mindset, The Pom Pom Girls further confounds expectations by eschewing the anticipated exploitation elements to devote most of its run-time to a series of tepid vignettes that aren't connected with any real story to speak of, then abruptly swerving into a fairly straight teen drama in the the third act (reportedly, 80 seconds of nudity and language were excised from the original R-rated cut to earn the film a wider PG release, which is the version that most commonly circulates now). The end result is a movie that is roughly half decent and half pointless, which makes delivering a firm recommendation somewhat of a challenge.

The centerpieces of the action here are Johnny and Jesse, two best friends gearing up for their upcoming high school gridiron season. They spend most of this caper wandering from one misadventure to the next with little rhyme or reason: driving around, eating burgers at the local hangout, making out with various girls, defacing the cars at their rival school, having food fights, urinating out of their classroom windows, then stealing a fire truck and nearly murdering the town Sheriff with it (you know, normal teenage stuff). Though presented in a light-hearted way, their antics are more hm-amusing than sincerely ha-ha-humorous, which leaves the comedy quotient here severely lacking. The tenor of the film shifts for the better when the duo finally couples up with Laurie and Sally, the main Pom Pom Girls they've been casually chasing from the start. Suddenly, actual storylines begin taking shape: Johnny contends with the increasingly volatile machinations of his gal's jealous ex-boyfriend, as Jesse struggles to kick his habit of bedding a bevy of lasses in the back of his van and commit to just one while also butting heads with the team's despotic coach. From this point forward, PPG remains a far cry from the nuanced character studies in Dazed And Confused, but the narrative at least finds some sense of purpose and the last 30 minutes are a vast improvement because of it.

It's interesting to see a pre-Revenge Of The Nerds Robert Carradine tackle the leading man role, particularly because his Johnny is pretty much the same soon-to-be iconic goofball minus the glasses and few braincells. Only here, that mien results in him being a popular football player who's impressively successful with the ladies (who knew a change of clothes and a pair of spectacles could make a young man's social fortunes plummet so drastically?). TV cop show stalwart Michael Mullins does a capable job of bringing Jesse to life, while the spotlit Jennifer Ashley and Lisa Reeves are both attractive and likeable enough to distinguish themselves as the clear stand-outs among their fellow Pom Poms.

However, the most engrossing elements in this effort are an accidental product of its era. This is a thoroughly '70s film, and since it's singularly focused on youth culture a lot of the best aspects of that decade play prominent roles. The small town where the action takes place is straight out of a simpler time, while notable features like the bustling carhop, roads with no traffic, and wide open plots of waterfront sand without another beachgoer in sight offer glimpses of a world which sadly does not exist anymore. The classic cars and vintage clothes are all authentic in a way that no modern period piece could ever faithfully duplicate, and even without the benefit of a purse large enough to license popular contemporary songs for the soundtrack, all of the needfully obscure music used in the film sets the tone very well.

In the end, you can't sincerely fault The Pom Pom Girls for not being what it appears to be, since what it really is has more than enough charms to justify the 85-minutes you'll spend with it. If you're so inclined, give it a look for the beautiful girls, good tunes, and a vivid snapshot of high school in the 1970's. Anyone likely to be interested in a B-grade relic like this has undoubtedly invested much more energy for a much more meager payoff than that.

Spying the luminaries in the Jocks cast roster, it's tempting to imagine that this must be an elite breed of the adolescent coitus comedy promised by its poster artwork. It's not; Christopher Lee and Richard Roundtree reportedly only appeared in this film as a favor to director Steve Carver, and nothing that happens in this movie bears any relation to the image on that selfsame poster. Regardless, Jocks does feature a few time-capsule nuggets which disqualify it from being a complete waste of time. It's just a shame that a filmmaker with such talented friends couldn't find a better use for them than this.

The plot traces the journey of a group of hard-partying misfit tennis players who travel to Las Vegas to compete in a tournament that they must win in order to stop their school from cutting their funding and disbanding the team. Hijinks ensue, they hit some bars and meet some girls, conflicts arise and are surmounted, etc. In that sense, Jocks almost comes across as a real movie. Unfortunately, whether you enjoy tennis or not, it's not a sport that lends itself particularly well to an against-all-odds athletics story, which leaves only the comedy and the genre's lewder elements to supply the bulk of the thrills. Since the quantity of the latter is so paltry here, Jocks doesn't really qualify as a sex comedy, and with only a handful of chuckle-worthy moments to speak of, it barely qualifies as a comedy at all.

On the plus side, the Sin City setting adds immeasurably to the film's appeal, capturing the storied mecca in all of the delightfully divey glory of its bygone years. Viewers who never experienced Vegas before it was transformed into a high-tech adult Disneyland will barely recognize the place as it appears on the screen here. Most of the landmarks that defined the town in the '80s don't even exist anymore, so all of the establishing shots and backgrounds are rich with a nostalgia that's often more engaging than what's actually taking place in the movie.

Most of the characters are presented as one-note archetypes which exclude any real connection to them (Tex says "y'all" and wears a cowboy hat, yuppie Jeff is too square to party and has an ex-fiancée improbably named Muffy, Jheri-curled Andy hits on every girl he meets and is a good dancer, etc). Don Gibb from Revenge Of The Nerds is on hand to stretch his acting chops by essentially playing Ogre again, and much effort is expended trying and failing to make the rebranded "Ripper" this outing's equivalent break-out character. But the gang's centerpiece is the team's star player, "The Kid", who Scott Strader manages to infuse with enough charisma to make him mostly likeable even though he's basically a d-bag. Still, even though the film lingers its focus on this core squad, the supporting cast is far more memorable and enjoyable to watch. Lee and Roundtree would be welcome presences even if they were just reading out of a phone book, veteran pinch-hitter Trinidad Silva steals any scene he appears in, and a young and gorgeous Mariska Hargitay is a joy to behold whenever she's on the screen.

Jocks isn't strictly bottom of the barrel, but with so many promising elements in play that never reach their potential, the film is ultimately interesting for what it could have been rather than for what it actually is. 1980's completists will have a decent time, but for anyone curious why fans of the era still hold movies like this close to their hearts, there is a long list of titles that will provide much better answers than this one does.

The 1980's were a virtual golden age for low budget teen sex comedies, a reliably successful genre whose purveyors cranked out new titles throughout the decade with such frenzied regularity that many video stores gave these movies their own dedicated section. Cavegirl is fairly prototypical aside from its admittedly novel concept, neither the worst nor the best of its species, but it's still a good time despite its sophomoric execution making something like Hardbodies look like a masterpiece by comparison.

The action centers around a hopeless high school egghead named Rex (played by an actor who looks to be in his late 20's, naturally) who encounters some nebulously defined magic crystals during a field trip to a mine and somehow gets transported back in time to the dawn of homo erectus. There, he meets the titular Cavegirl, a gorgeous neolithic nymphette named Eva, and proceeds to spend the rest of the movie awkwardly lusting after her and teaching her to say the word "boobs".

The bulk of the hijinks here are more amusing than truly funny, but this flick is still fairly endearing in its own quirky way. The introduction meant to establish Rex as a lovable loser is done away with in the first ten minutes, which mostly consist of his classmates punking him with a series of pranks like dropping firecrackers on him while he's sitting on the toilet and leading him into the girls' locker room to be chased by a group of topless women wielding tennis rackets. Oddly, other than those gals, there only seems to be five other students at Rex's school and their entire purpose for attending seems to be to torment him. Even odder, Rex doesn't seem particularly put-off by their shenanigans-though one gag results in the entire backside of his trousers being torn off, he's wearing fresh pants in the next scene, which suggests he's so resigned to their oafish antics that he plans ahead by bringing an extra pair of jeans to class just in case.

The story hits its stride once Rex reaches the "Stone Age" (although the "Stone Age" looks suspiciously like the California mountains). Once we meet Eva (played by the stunning Cindy Ann Thompson), it isn't hard to gather why her presence was flagged as the focal point of the film. Amidst a series of pratfalls, flatulence vignettes, and Rex's thwarted attempts to score with his prehistoric princess, he gradually integrates himself into her furry-loinclothed family and becomes one of their rock-dwelling tribe. There's also a fleeting subplot about Eva and her squad being kidnapped by cannibals and Rex conquering his geeky skittishness to come to their rescue, but since that entire thread is introduced and resolved within the span of exactly five minutes, it's rendered more of a skit than a legitimate conflict.

But hey, taking a caper like Cavegirl seriously is missing the point. Those with a healthy appetite for '80s nostalgia will have plenty to chew on here. The whole production is so evocative of its era it practically serves as a postcard, and a smattering of choice synth-rock numbers by bands so obscure they aren't even identified in the credits are almost worth the movie alone. Rex turns out to be a likeable goofball, Eva is a delight to behold every time she's on the screen, and despite the horny-adolescent mindset of the humor their clumsy courtship unfolds with a genuine sweetness that makes it difficult not to root them on.

There are certainly raunchier and funnier entries in this crowded canon, yet Cavegirl has enough appealing attributes to make it worth a $2.99 rental-which is precisely the result the producers were counting on when it was released. Today, it serves as both an enjoyable reminder of a simpler time and an untaxing way to turn off your brain for 80 minutes. And as far as I'm concerned, that result is equally worthy.

I put off watching this flick for a long time due to the glut of scathing reviews available online, but finally doing so served as a great reminder not to believe everything on the internet. Brain Twisters is surely a middle of the road offering, but an engaging concept and some creative visual flourishes elevate it slightly ahead of the pack, and the net result justifies its 90-minute investment.

Many of the vilifications I read were centered around the film's dearth of graphic violence or nudity, the expectations for which are likely a product of this outing being most readily accessible as part of various b-movie multipacks put out by companies like Mill Creek. Fair enough-anyone sitting down for Brain Twisters expecting a bounty of grindhouse trappings is bound to be disappointed. However, this is simply not that kind of film. The tone and production values here are more in line with the brand of fare that was being cranked out for original movies on the USA Network in the early '90s, and it's easy to imagine this project was originally slated for a similar arena but received a promotion to direct-to-video status when it turned out better than average. While it's true Brain Twisters rarely dips its toes beyond PG-13 territory, skewering a movie for not infusing exploitation elements into a story that doesn't necessarily call for them and works well enough on its own terms seems a bit short-sighted to me. I have hundreds of films in my library that feature explicit gore and nudity, and I have hundreds more that do not--this just happens to one of the latter, which I don't consider a knock against it.

Although a number of the most unfair criticisms I read blasted the acting, everyone involved actually does a decent job with the material, especially considering the caliber of actors available for a modest production like this. There's even some choice dialogue and interplay between Terry Londeree's surprisingly nuanced evil scientist Rothman and Joe Lombardo's everyman hero cop which reveals that whoever wrote this thing rubbed a few braincells together while doing it. Very few of the cast members graduated to substantial bodies of work, but their characters are fairly well fleshed out and anyone who's invested any time in the world of craptastic cinema showcased in budget DVD collections like the ones you're likely to find Brain Twisters on has definitely seen worse thespianism than this.

The film is dry at times, yet while the computer graphics involved in the titular malevolent experiments are now dated, they're still impressive and disorienting enough to make the lofty concept fly. Subsequent parallels like a well-crafted scene in a drive thru car wash and shimmering soap bubbles in a bathtub serve as novel augmentations to the technological imagery in the tale, and since these callbacks are used as triggers for the film's unsuspecting test subject victims, the central concept ends up unfolding with plausible panache.

Brain Twisters isn't the best hidden gem you'll find in the genre's public domain ether-it probably isn't even the best movie about cabalistic brainwashing computer developers in that field. Nevertheless, any cries of "worst movie ever" are at the very least hyperbolic (you don't need to look any further than the flick that shares the same disc with Brain Twisters in the Mill Creek set I viewed it from to find a movie approximately 80 times dumber), if not the myopic ramblings of disgruntled viewers who clearly haven't watched enough truly awful films to render an informed opinion. I have willingly subjected myself to more unwatchable movies than my sanity will allow me to admit, and this solid thriller that features a nifty score, a passable measure of suspense, and a flawed but interesting idea does not belong anywhere near that category.

Watch it for what it is and enjoy the humble payoff. Or you can grumble about there not being enough slit throats and copulation throughout, but that's a waste of time... if Brain Twisters is in your vicinity, chances are you have between 49 and 199 other movies in the same box set that might better suit your needs.

It's probably fitting that a story about reanimating the dead has been resurrected so many times throughout cinematic history. This umpteenth reimagining of Mary Shelley's eternal classic certainly doesn't improve on the masterful blueprint Universal laid out in the 1930's, but when you see what does unfold on the screen here, it's easy to gather that the filmmakers had wholly different intentions for this flick. Lady Frankenstein is neither the best nor the worst incarnation of Shelley's monstrous parable, though it is an undeniably entertaining ride.

Skipping over the usual extrapolations and jumping right into a grave-robbing scene to open the film, this Italian number is clearly focused on highlighting the more ghoulish aspects of the story. The first half essentially dispenses with the entirety of James Whale's original opus in a lean 40 minutes, the only significant additions being a determined inspector focused on catching the scoundrel who's been busily pilfering cemeteries to supply Dr. Frankenstein bodies for his experiments, and obviously the arrival of the eponymous Lady Frankenstein, the scientist's buxom daughter who returns home after establishing herself as a surgeon in her own right in medical school. The rest you know. Of course the good Dr. makes a creature, of course he is undone by his perversions of nature (but only after delivering the decidedly fantastic line "on Earth, man is God"), and of course his creation escapes. This leads us into the film's second chapter, which is where this offering veers from the template to assert its own kinky vision, which luckily for us consists of a mutilated abomination rampaging across the countryside leaving a trail of nudity and gore in its wake.

The astonishingly attractive Rosalba Neri handily steals the show as the titular heiress to her father's legacy, and her machinations throughout the movie establish her as a sultry and cunning villain. The plan she sets into motion as the monster terrorizes the region puts a novel twist on the established formula, so the simple gimmick of changing the gender of the lead character is far from the only fresh idea the film infuses into the Frankenstein mythos. Her excellent performance alone make this flick worth watching, particularly as her design plays itself out during the affair's second act, which packs in a lot more iniquitous scheming and spicy action than the comparatively staid introduction.

The picture is also, somewhat surprisingly, extremely well-made. The production values are high, the script is sharp, everyone in the principal cast tackles their parts with the gusto of established stage actors, and both the lavish sets and costumes are augmented by a keen Hammer-esque attention to detail. Regrettably, the makeup for this disfigured incarnation of the classic monster isn't nearly as impressive. Though serviceable given the limitations of the budget and the era, the creature prosthetics look unavoidably clunky in their numerous close-ups, a drawback that is underscored often throughout the film since so much of the mayhem takes place in broad daylight.

The main thing that hampers Lady Frankenstein from elevating itself in the ranks of its superior predecessors is its rather sober delivery. Despite its numerous positive qualities, the movie does drag on at times and isn't as overall fun as it reasonably should be given its gonzo body count and madcap storyline. The stuffy nature of the early lab scenes and their unavoidable seen-it-before familiarity add up to a relatively slow opening, and even when the action begins in earnest, the entire middle sequence is centered around a repetitive cycle of the creature lumbering from place to place to kill canoodling lovers, hapless fishermen, a mom and dad who appear to know nothing about self-defense, and unsavory criminals, slaying pretty much everyone he comes across with little or no rhyme or reason.

The ending also falters in places. Notwithstanding a horde of torch-wielding villagers setting fire to everything in sight and the nifty twist which befalls our maleficent Lady, the final confrontation the conflict has been building toward just sort of comes and goes without much fanfare. Worse, the film abruptly ends during one of its most powerful scenes without so much as a credit sequence, so the payoff for this otherwise intriguing turn of events is severely minimized. To be fair, all of this may be due to the truncation of Lady Frankenstein for its public domain distribution in the US. The original German cut is reportedly 15 minutes longer; given how perfunctorily a few key plot points are glossed over here, this missing footage may indeed have strengthened some of the weaker aspects and made the film feel more complete.

Nevertheless, as it stands, Lady Frankenstein is an enjoyable romp no matter where you see it. I doubt Mary Shelley could have ever imagined her concept would eventually spawn an adaptation this lascivious and wild, but given the depths of eccentric imagination exhibited in her original composition, I think she might be proud.

Since Us is a tale that studies the dualism of opposites (good and evil, light and dark, above and below, etc.), it is perhaps fitting that the film itself grapples with its own intrinsic counterpoints. On one hand, Jordan Peele's second horror feature is a stylish production that boasts some stellar acting, an intriguing concept, and a large handful of genuinely unsettling set-pieces. However, the landscape on the other side of Us's coin is rather blurry, a grab-bag of fantastic ideas that don't ever coalesce into a satisfying whole, a narrative that often fails to adhere to its own internal logic, and a formulaic resolution that lands with a dull thud. Us is at times a very good film, but also a very frustrating one, because both the undeniable talent of its architect and its strongest visceral moments hint at an elusive greatness that the final product never quite achieves.

You already know the plot: a vacationing family whose matriarch is still haunted by a mysterious childhood trauma encounters a quartet of malevolent doppelgangers ("it's Us...") who stalk and torment them until these ordinary people are forced fight back against extraordinary foes. It's the same basic set-up used in any number of "home invasion" thrillers, though Peele tweaks the blueprint enough to put his own unique stamp on the happenings. At first, this is sufficient. Getting to know the Wilsons while the film's creepy subtleties slowly assert themselves drives an engaging opening act, and the initial assault upon their cottage is more harrowing than anything you'll find in the cheap-jump-scare realms of contemporary horror. Yet when Us begins delving into the deeper significance of its macabre scenario, the movie quickly sheds its mask of reality-borne terror and morphs into something far more unviable and far less remarkable.

A comparable film like The Strangers offered up the simplest and most chilling explanation for its cycle of torture and violence: "because you were home." Us presents a much loftier concept, but sacrifices much of its potency to do so. Our fundamental fear of the unknown has been utilized as a powerful tool in countless genre offerings; a bit of ambiguity would have served this one very well, especially since Peele supplies enough solid jolts here to let them speak for themselves. Regrettably, Us instead goes to great and disruptive lengths to explain itself, at one point completely derailing the climax so the principal antihero can deliver a 10-minute monologue which sheds light into every dark corner the film has introduced along the way, outlining the ins and outs of the nefarious scenario like an old James Bond villain's obligatory confession of their masterplan. This reveal opens a slew of plot-holes and brings what should be the most exciting sequence of the picture to a screeching halt, and while the ensuing final battle is staged with stunning visual panache, the payoff ends up being rather minimal after such an interminable detour to get there. Whittling away all of this needless explication would have benefitted the bloated running time and made Us a much leaner and meaner killing machine--ditto with the abundant implants of humor, which aren't unexpected given Peele's comedic lineage, but add nothing to the movie besides trivial distractions from its mission statement.

Ironically, for all of its long-winded elucidations, Us makes less sense the more you ponder it. The overarching device crumbles under scrutiny, the "twist" is so obvious and futile that is doesn't even qualify for that designation, and the amplified dread we are ostensibly supposed to feel upon being transported into the shoes of a normal family in peril is negated by an omnipresent comic-book sensibility. When traumatized children are cracking one-liners moments after brutally and gorily executing beings who look exactly like their loved ones, whatever tenuous sense of "this could happen to anyone" Us is grasping for pretty much flies out the window.

The film has plenty of high-points, the most notable being a charismatic two-role performance by Lupita Nyong'o, who handily steals the show. Peele's gradual introduction of the morbid phantasmagorias that shape the on-screen mythology ensures that the tension level remains elevated as the story unfolds, even if that momentum evaporates once his characters begin ruining the mystery by clarifying everything that's happening. Genre fans will enjoy the sly cultural references peppered in along the way, and the grislier bits of the flick are handled in gleefully vigorous fashion. There are some truly memorable segments in Us that will ensure viewers will be thinking about it long after the credits roll. Nevertheless, like Peele's similarly uneven and similarly over-hyped Get Out, this spiritual sequel is merely okay.

Jordan Peele is an extremely gifted writer who has also demonstrated that he has the directorial acumen to put some excellent things on the screen. I have no doubt he is capable of making an altogether superb horror film. Unfortunately, I'm still waiting.