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Post by The Mad Plumber on Apr 27, 2011 19:28:17 GMT -5
With Netflix on my Nintendo, it's given me the opportunity to view some classics I have a hard time renting. Furthermore, I also get the opportunity to see some B-movie cheese. I want to start up this thread for users to discuss any recent B-movies they've stumbled upon or just talk about the genre in general.
She (1982) Sandahl Bergman stars as the titular She, a mortal woman who is worshipped like a goddess. She gets abducted by two peasant adventurers who need her help finding their abducted sister. While She initially tries to deceive the men into a trap, she becomes intrigued and joins the pair along with her lieutenant. The four come across various dangers such as flesh-eating vampires, telekinetic dictators, and self-replicating guardsmen.
If I was to describe the atmosphere of this movie, I would call it a combination of Hobgoblins and Alien from L.A., with just a touch of Escape 2000. This film is really cheap when it comes to sets. It conveniently sets itself up as some sort of post-apocalyptic world with the apocalypse having taken place in the 80s. Thus, settings include an abandoned factory, a well-furnished villa, and a bridge at a landfill. Watch for an arcade game being sold as an antique. "The shark still looks fake."
This was really plodding and boring, but I have to admit there were some very funny parts. For example, when our heroes battle the telekinetic Godan, the dictator uses his powers to throw people against walls. You have to see because it looks pretty funny. Also, don't worry: in spite of the confusing nature of the pronoun title, this film doesn't pull any Abbott and Costello style humor surrounding it.
Your reaction to "Starfish Guard" as I'll call him might vary. I call him the "Starfish Guard" because whenever you cut off one of his limbs, a new doppelganger is generated from each part. It's kind of a cool concept. Anyway, the reason this character might annoy some is because he is clearly channeling Robin Williams. Clearly. Actually, given what he was trying to do, I have to admit that the Starfish Guard segment of the film was funny.
Overall, though, this isn't a very amusing B-movie. I don't recommend watching it.
The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made (2004) This 60 minute documentary counts down 50 infamous B-movies.
The production quality of this feature is slightly better than a Blip or YouTube video, but that is hardly a great feat. With a 60 minute running time, this means that each B-movie is given an average of 72 seconds of coverage. Some of us probably feel that these movies deserve more discussion.
I was initially going to say that this video featured only science fiction and horror films. However, there are titles such as The Trial of Billy Jack and Ishtar in the mix. Perhaps a better criticism is that there are no 1990s or 2000s films in this countdown, and given my feelings about the 90s, I feel there must be an atrocious movie that deserved to be trashed.
MySTies will appreciate that a few MST3K films make the cut, and some will further appreciate that not every title in this countdown is a MST3K movie; there's little relevancy in reiterating what we already know. A MST3K does make #1, but it probably isn't the one you're thinking of.
It's not a great documentary, but I do recommend watching. It's nice to watch a video like this that isn't laden with cynical exclamations of "f***" and "s***".
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Post by TheNewMads on Apr 28, 2011 8:58:18 GMT -5
I really didn't care for "50 Worst Movies Ever Made," although it did lead me to "teenage zombies," a b-movie i quite love. as for "She," i haven't seen it but i find 80s low-budget movies a tougher sell than the older movies. there was something about the attitude toward low-budget movies in the time that they seemed to start making movies that didn't take themselves seriously, maybe it was that the "golden turkey" idea was starting to get popularized, maybe it was the direct-to-video phenomenon, but they started making movies bad deliberately, just playing it for laughs, and those movies i don't care for very much.
that said, i recently watched "not of this earth," the traci lords movie, not long ago, and it had the same cheesy shot-on-video look that 80s b-movies tend to have and the same shrugged-off writing and performances, but i still sorta liked it. i mean yes, for the obvious reasons, traci lords was quite a sight and she ain't shy, i'll tell ya, but she's also not a terrible actress, which surprised me. and it was a fairly good-natured movie. i also watched "there's nothing out there," which i think is from '91, and it was interesting enough to watch all the way through. it was sorta a pre-"Scream" "Scream," in that there's teens running around getting killed at an out of the way house, and one of them is a video store clerk or something and is a horror movie expert, and somehow realizes they're in a horror movie, so is constantly trying to advise people of the horror movie conventions so they don't split up, go in there with a knife, have the sex that leads to post-sex punishment murder, etc. not a good movie but good enough to watch all the way through, though all the gore, nudity and general exploitation helped.
last night i watched "The H-Man," a japanese flick from the 50s that was kinda a mashup between "The Blob" and "Dragnet." some guy dies during a drug sting and his body melts away, which leads to an unnecessarily complicated police procedural involving nightclub singers, rival drug gangs, etc., which all winds up being a shaggy dog because the premise of the movie is actually that oceanic nuclear testing has created a new post-human, the "H-man," who is actually a blob that's going around gobbling people up and absorbing them into the blob etc. there's a sorta interesting "lucky dragon #7" reference, at least it would be interesting if "Godzilla" hadn't already done it, but mostly it was a colossal bore, and i kinda drifted away from it after a while, though technically i watched to the end. it was by ishiro honda, the main director of the original series of "godzilla" films, so it was mostly interesting just to see a honda movie that wasn't a giant monster movie. it did have some great visual moments, and the melting man special effects looked pretty great for the time. but it was overlong and poorly written, in my opinion.
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Post by lazlo25 on Apr 28, 2011 10:34:59 GMT -5
Nightwing (1979)An eco-terror film about killer vampire bats who fly amok in New Mexico. It's better than It Lives By Night, but that's not saying much. There is an amusing scene where the bats fly in broad daylight, but the film has too much religion mumbo jumbo. Monster from a Prehistoric Planet (1967)The only monster movie ever made by Nikkatsu and it's easy to see why. It's a sloppy shoted kaiju flick that seems to be more of a Gorgo remake. You're in big trouble when you see an explorer on crack or something, judging by his stupid remarks. And dig that octopus in the monster's mouth! The Devil's Wedding Night (1973)An Italian made exploitation film. Here, Lady Dracula tries to find a new wife for the ol' count. Satan's not in this movie and there's no wedding night. There are a lot of topless chicks though.
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Post by TheNewMads on Apr 28, 2011 10:54:50 GMT -5
i actually remember when nightwing came out (i'm OLD!). they had these great promotional standalone 3D cardboard mockups, fancy versions of the movie poster, with lots of bats and A PAIR OF BLINKING RED EYES. i hassled my folks endlessly to let me see it but they wouldn't. i guess they'd had their fill of me dragging them to goofy movies after "moonraker."
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Post by Shep on Apr 30, 2011 7:32:24 GMT -5
I was initially going to say that this video featured only science fiction and horror films. However, there are titles such as Ishtar in the mix. "Ishtar" gets a bad rap imo. The first 20 minutes (with Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty writing those terrible songs) are hilarious. Sure, things fall apart after that but that opening alone is better than most films imo.
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Post by Crowfan on Apr 30, 2011 8:31:01 GMT -5
i actually remember when nightwing came out (i'm OLD!). they had these great promotional standalone 3D cardboard mockups, fancy versions of the movie poster, with lots of bats and A PAIR OF BLINKING RED EYES. i hassled my folks endlessly to let me see it but they wouldn't. i guess they'd had their fill of me dragging them to goofy movies after "moonraker." I'm also old enough to remember when Nightwing came out. It was a PG movie, because I remember my parents dropping me and a friend off to see it. We sat in the front row. Best parts of the movie were the ones with David Warner.
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Post by TheNewMads on Apr 30, 2011 11:44:33 GMT -5
i actually remember when nightwing came out (i'm OLD!). they had these great promotional standalone 3D cardboard mockups, fancy versions of the movie poster, with lots of bats and A PAIR OF BLINKING RED EYES. i hassled my folks endlessly to let me see it but they wouldn't. i guess they'd had their fill of me dragging them to goofy movies after "moonraker." I'm also old enough to remember when Nightwing came out. It was a PG movie, because I remember my parents dropping me and a friend off to see it. We sat in the front row. Best parts of the movie were the ones with David Warner. yeah, i looked nightwing up on imdb and noted with approval the presence of david warner. the same year he was in "time after time," which is pretty magnificent, man. one of my all-time favorites. a fairly big budget film but a bit of a b-movie nonetheless, in that it had probably one of the most preposterous premises of all time. to wit: it turns out HG wells and jack the ripper were actually friends, although HG didn't know jack the ripper was jack the ripper. also, HG wells was actually building a time machine, not just writing a book about it, jack the ripper steals it, travels in time to modern day 1979, and HG wells has to follow him and stop him before he kills again. totally ridiculous! how they ever pitched that concept so that the movie got funded, i'll never know. yet it's one of my all-time favorites and i love david warner in it, as a villain he's just... scurrilous, man. good stuff.
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Post by Crowfan on Apr 30, 2011 16:59:30 GMT -5
Yeah, Time After Time was pretty awesome too. And Prophecy, the Monster Movie, is another good B-movie of the time.
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Post by TheNewMads on May 1, 2011 10:56:47 GMT -5
Yeah, Time After Time was pretty awesome too. And Prophecy, the Monster Movie, is another good B-movie of the time. also dawn of the dead. stephen king compares prophesy to dawn of the dead in "danse macabre," a book any b-movie fan should read, particularly the "horror movie as junk food" chapter. 1979 was a banner year for cool movie cheese! nightwing appears to NOT be out on DVD, inexplicably.
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Post by TheNewMads on May 1, 2011 11:00:37 GMT -5
prophecy also has the best sleeping-bag kill in cinema history.
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Post by BJ on May 1, 2011 12:31:48 GMT -5
also dawn of the dead. stephen king compares prophesy to dawn of the dead in "danse macabre," a book any b-movie fan should read, particularly the "horror movie as junk food" chapter. Reading that made me wonder how much the budget was for Dawn. Even though they obviously saved money on actors and limited the set almost to one building, the production values were pretty good. I couldn't believe it when I saw Superman's $55m stacked up against the $650,000 Romero had to work with. Hell, the Wiz cost $24 million. Also, that clip from the Prophecy is hilarious. I have to see that movie. edit to add... It reminds me of the rising fastball kill in Revenge of the Creature.
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Post by Crowfan on May 1, 2011 14:16:51 GMT -5
Prophecy is out on DVD and it's a pretty funny movie. I'm a bit surprised that Nightwing isn't out on DVD, though. every now and then it's on one of those Showtime Channels, but haven't even seen it on cable for awhile now.
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Post by Crowfan on May 1, 2011 16:43:23 GMT -5
Concorde--Airport '79. Total piece of cheese starring pretty much everyone who was big in the 1970's, including Robert Wagner, David Warner, Alain Delon, and the king of disaster movies, George Kennedy. Unintentionally funny.
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Post by The Mad Plumber on May 1, 2011 20:56:12 GMT -5
Mars Needs Women (1967) Tommy Kirk plays the leader of a group of Martian scouts tasked with finding women to serve as breeding stock for their race. Kirk becomes enamored with a scientist played by Yvonne Craig. This film is an editing nightmare. I laughed at the teleportation effects which were nothing more than jump cuts. "Hey, I just teleported here! It's impressive!" Often, I was asking, "Where the hell is the foley effects?" There seemed to be a real absence of appropriate sound effects that would be in any professional film. The film started real slow and I was bored waiting for these titular Martians. I started humming the Starfighters theme when I saw all the fighter jet stock footage. By the way, say what you will about Starfighters, but at least they appeared to have filmed their own unique flying footage ... that manages to suck up 80% of the film. Certain elements of the film reminded me of Teenagers from Outer Space, and obviously Tommy Kirk's presence reminded me of Catalina Caper. Once we get into the abduction scheme of the film, it starts to parallel the stalking scenes from The Brain That Wouldn't Die. THEN when get into Tommy Kirk's subplot, the film becomes The Day the Earth Stood Still. Speaking of Kirk, he seemed really bored with his part. The guy got to kiss Batgirl! That was a childhood fantasy for me, man! Admittedly, it didn't seem as fun to participate in as Catalina Caper did. By the way, I have a game you can play for this film; it's called "Find Any Black Person". The film REALLY picks up when we got to the nightclub where one of our Martians was observing a dancer in a Jessica Rabbit dress. And just when the act was getting good as the dancer was unzipping her dress, the scene cut away!! Oh, no! To put it figuratively, the blimp crashed. A little later, we return to the nightclub where the dancer's act had significantly progressed. Yeah! But it ends too quickly. If someone were to write a riffing script for this, I would recommend watching it. It's disappointing, but it's a lemon that can be turned into lemonade. Starcrash (1978) Stella Star and Akton are two outlaws that receive pardons from the Emperor so that they can help find his missing son. Their mission will force them to cross paths with the evil ambitious Count Zarth Arn. This is an absolute gem and I feel so lucky to have found it. To put it simply, Starcrash is a cheap rip-off of Star Wars. We have a quirky droid, a black-clad dark lord, and even lightsabers. Also, to Starcrash's credit, we have a blistering ice world BEFORE 1980's release of The Empire Strikes Back. The spaceships are laughable, having clearly been constructed from artifacts such as empty Scotch tape dispensers, milk cartons, and leftover parts from model kits. Kit-bashing at its worst. The stop motion for the robots actually looks comparatively good, reminding me of animation from Clash of the Titans. And just in case you wanted some burger with your cheese, our long lost prince is played by David Hasselhoff. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. Shame on MST3K and Cinematic Titanic for passing this up! This is mandatory watching and I recommend it for everybody.
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Post by The Mad Plumber on May 15, 2011 22:38:52 GMT -5
Last time I looked it up, Prophecy is not available on the Nintendo. I'll keep an eye out. Pervert! (2005) A son returns to the blistering deserts of Arizona to help his father with his ranch. However, the son becomes enamored with his father's mistress (played by porn actress Mary Carey). Furthermore, a strange creature stalks the night. Here's one way to summarize this whole thing: it's a porn movie without any porn. This film is basically one long penis joke ... and I didn't find it funny. In fact, penis jokes rarely are funny. How poor and pedestrian is the quality of this picture? There was one scene where apparently a speck of dirt or debris fell on one of the camera lenses used during one scene. So, every time the shot went back to the one camera, I was constantly distracted by that speck of dirt! How amateur. If there's one thing to complement this film on, it's the use of claymation towards the end. And it doesn't even look like sloppy, amateur claymation. They look like they commissioned a fairly professional amount of animation. It's a pity that it's wasted on this film. Stay away from this. Stay far, far away from this. If you want to see Mary Carey naked, get a Mary Carey porno. This isn't worth it. Hercules (1983) Lou Ferrigno stars as our titular demigod. Hercules seeks to avenge his foster parents' deaths and find out the truth of his existence. Along the way, he'll battle various mechanical beasts and face a sorceress' many tests. Take a good listen to the music in this flick, MST3K fans. You might recognize it has having been recycled in Outlaw of Gor. Furthermore, you see stock footage lifted from various Hercules flicks and I think you'll see a set lifted from Hercules and the Captive Women. Lou Ferrigno doesn't make a bad Hercules, but I don't think he makes a good one either. Let's face it: Steve Reeves was the definitive Herc. This film was full of a lot of hysterical moments, such as tossing a bear into space and Herc leaping a fantastic height above two chariots. The actors playing the gods and goddesses look ridiculous. The women playing the sorceress and villainess actually look hot. And I saw a nipple! It was all worth it! This one is well recommended for laughs.
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