MZ's Movie Review Thread

[MinionZombie]

Hot Dog ... The Movie! (Peter Markle, 1984): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2020/12...84-review.html Coming atcha from the hedonistic era of 1980s sex comedies, Hot Dog … The Movie! is, simply put, a mix of gratuitous nudity and even more gratuitous skiing. On the crisp white slopes there will be saucy goings-on and searing competition between the boozing Americans and their devious European counterparts – but who will be victorious?...

[Moon Knight]

I'll be in the minority as usual but I really liked Season of the Witch. Wasn't great or mind-blowing, but I enjoyed it. It's just something about GAR's early work I just adore. Now, to be fair, I've never seen "There's Always Vanilla".

[MinionZombie]

I'll be in the minority as usual but I really liked Season of the Witch. Wasn't great or mind-blowing, but I enjoyed it. It's just something about GAR's early work I just adore. Now, to be fair, I've never seen "There's Always Vanilla". It's a good flick, Season of the Witch. Admittedly, I didn't get on with it when I first saw it - but I was also a teenage boy at the time - and Season of the Witch will never go down well with a teenage boy (although I immediately dug The Crazies). Fast forward *cough* some years *cough*, and I found so much to like about it. It does have that early Romero look with the vast array of set-ups, the experimental visuals, and the editing, but also in terms of its story I found much more to be interested in. It's like a time capsule of the era, as well, which added extra value. There's Always Vanilla ... you can certainly see the flaws ... it's kind of meandering and experimental (particularly as the script kept arriving in little bits or not at all), but again, it's a good time capsule of Pittsburgh at the beginning of the 1970s, and a look inside the TV advertising industry (i.e. what Romero & Co were doing to pay the bills). There's also some fun sequences dotted throughout, such as when the couple are getting to know each other and it's all edited together to just be questions and no answers. Sure, it's not one of Romero's highlights by any means, but there is a lot going on in there that works quite nicely, and there's even a bit of a sting in the tail.

[MinionZombie]

Day of the Warrior (Andy Sidaris, 1996): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/01...96-review.html Having sat out the previous two entries in the 'L.E.T.H.A.L. Ladies' franchise (handing the reigns over to his son), writer/director Andy Sidaris returns to wreak merry havoc across America as the buff dudes and buxom gals of 'The Agency' take on a mastermind smuggler, who just so happens to be a full-blown championship wrestler...

[MinionZombie]

Death Smiles On A Murderer (Aristide Massaccesi, 1973): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/02...-aristide.html Most commonly known as Joe D'Amato, the prolific director Aristide Massaccesi (Emmanuelle and The Last Cannibals) only attached his real name to just one of his cinematic endeavours, the turn-of-the-century ghoulishly Gothic supernatural giallo Death Smiles On A Murderer. The Italian giallo movement wasn't best known for rock solid plotting logic, but Massaccessi's film dives head first into a zone of storytelling that can only be described as utterly baffling. Prepare for copious plot holes, taboo subject matter, an ethereal sense of time, and Klaus Kinski 'doing science'...

[MinionZombie]

Return To Savage Beach (Andy Sidaris, 1998): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/03...y-sidaris.html Over the course of 13 years, writer/director Andy Sidaris (plus his son Christian) launched a dozen 'L.E.T.H.A.L. Ladies' movies into the world, and with 1998's Return to Savage Beach, an era of explosive RC toys and bared flesh came to a close. After so many movies over so many years, one might have expected the final entry to feel stale, even a little limp – but Sidaris bid adieu to the 20th Century with a bang, certainly a familiar one, but a bang nonetheless...

[MinionZombie]

Joysticks (Greydon Clark, 1983): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/04...83-review.html It's 1983. You're a filmmaker and wondering what's popular with the youth right now. Well, on the one hand you've got raunchy comedies like Porky's that have been doing boffo box office on small budgets, and on the other hand you've got the unbridled popularity of videogame arcades which has seen eager gamers queuing up en masse to blast invaders from space. So, what better thing to do that mash those two hands together and come up with Joysticks?!

[Neil]

Joysticks (Greydon Clark, 1983): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/04...83-review.html Oh my word! That looks bizarre! - - - Updated - - - Return To Savage Beach (Andy Sidaris, 1998): http://deadshed.blogspot.com/2021/03...y-sidaris.html He directed an episode of Gemini Man. Remember that scifi blast from the past (1970s)?

[MinionZombie]

Oh my word! That looks bizarre! - - - Updated - - - He directed an episode of Gemini Man. Remember that scifi blast from the past (1970s)? 1) Joysticks is quite good fun. It is pretty wacky in that great 1980s way. 2) Gemini Man? I'm not familiar with it. Apparently Sidaris was the pioneer of the so-called "honey shot" during live sporting events - basically, showing a pretty lady in the audience as a cut away during down times in the action.

[Neil]

1) Joysticks is quite good fun. It is pretty wacky in that great 1980s way. 2) Gemini Man? I'm not familiar with it. Apparently Sidaris was the pioneer of the so-called "honey shot" during live sporting events - basically, showing a pretty lady in the audience as a cut away during down times in the action. Where do you get access to all these 'gems' from? Are you buying DVDs or accessing them via streaming services etc? Gemini Man was a sort of Invisible Man type rehash TV series. Bit hazy now... Behold!

[shootemindehead]

I remember the 'Gemini Man' from repeats in the 80's. When we were kids we used to want cheap digital watches so we could play as the Gemini Man ourselves.

[MinionZombie]

Where do you get access to all these 'gems' from? Are you buying DVDs or accessing them via streaming services etc? Gemini Man was a sort of Invisible Man type rehash TV series. 1) Sometimes I stumble across stuff, or hear about movies through social media groups (e.g. there's a Grindhouse & 80s VHS Trash group that I follow which is excellent). With the Andy Sidaris 'LETHAL Ladies' series (consisting of 12 movies), I first heard about the second film in the series, which is also the most known - Hard Ticket To Hawaii. I kept seeing people posting screenshots and posters and I saw the entire 12 movie set was available on a 3-disc double-sided DVD set (mind you, the compression rates are horrible at times and they're old 4x3 prints digitised). I got that collection for £6, so 50p a movie - pretty darn good! Joysticks was again a film I heard about through film groups or references dropped here and there. Sometimes you find references in books or magazines, or things like Cinema Sewer by Robin Bougie, or sometimes just skimming around Amazon Prime (which has a great selection of exploitation movies). Things get referenced from one thing to another and well, Joysticks I found on YouTube. 2) I'd never heard of it before, so this one totally passed me by. I do remember an old US TV show about people who were very small ... ... Land of the Giants, maybe? I have vague memories of seeing repeats of that at random times very early on (like when I was 4, or something).

[JDP]

I do remember an old US TV show about people who were very small ... ... Land of the Giants, maybe? I have vague memories of seeing repeats of that at random times very early on (like when I was 4, or something). Very likely. That show was produced by the same people who made The Time Tunnel and Lost in Space (among several other) 60s-70s TV shows.

[shootemindehead]

I do remember an old US TV show about people who were very small ... ... Land of the Giants, maybe? I have vague memories of seeing repeats of that at random times very early on (like when I was 4, or something). 'Land of the Giants' was made in the 60's. It was broadcast on Channel 4 or BBC2 on Sundays in the late 80's/early 90's I think. Channel 4 used to show 'Lost in Space' too. There was a time when I suppose C4 or BBC2 got all these American TV shows from the 1960's for cheap and stuck them on in the Sunday afternoon slot.

[MinionZombie]

'Land of the Giants' was made in the 60's. It was broadcast on Channel 4 or BBC2 on Sundays in the late 80's/early 90's I think. Channel 4 used to show 'Lost in Space' too. There was a time when I suppose C4 or BBC2 got all these American TV shows from the 1960's for cheap and stuck them on in the Sunday afternoon slot. Aye, that'll be it then. Then, of course, in the early 1990s the likes of Thunderbirds and Stingray and Captain Scarlet started showing on BBC2 and I was the perfect age for that. I was obsessed. Me and my Dad even made my own Tracy Island using tips from Blue Peter.