Archive for August, 2017

The Mutilator aka Fall Break (1984)

Posted: 29/08/2017 in Trash movies
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This film is many in a line of trash horror films. When I first read the synopsis I laughed, six teenagers going on their summer vacation. Cliche? If you are a fan of rubbish horror films then you’ll love this. so, after watching this, In my perfect world, the name Buddy Cooper would be mentioned in the same breath as other ‘so-bad-it’s-good’ geniuses like Ed Wood and Herschell Gordon Lewis. And here is why:

Like many slashers, The Mutilator begins with a fever-dreamy prologue that finds an idyllic family scene: little Ed Jr.(played by director’s son Trace Cooper) has just polished off his father’s gun collection while his mother prepares a cake for the patriarch’s birthday. When Junior gets a curious with one of the shotguns, he ends up accidentally blowing his mom away, much to his father’s dismay. Not wanting to ruin birthday celebration Ed Sr. (played by Jack Chatham) sits down next to his dead wife and has a drink with her while looking at birthday message written by his son.

Birthday and funeral at same expense

Cut takes us some 10 years forward where now older Ed Jr. (played by Matt Mitler) is discussing with his college friends what to do during fall break. Seems that they have nothing in plan when suddenly Ed receives a call from his father. Ed Sr. wants him to close up their beach condo because of incoming winter.At first, Ed Jr. didn’t want to do that since his father treated him like retard for his whole life. Hm I wonder why? The only wrong thing he did is managing to shoot his own mother from a shotgun which had safety on. So what? Big deal! Anyway, friends saw an opportunity for having a wild 4-days beach party so they convinced Ed to take them with him. So they set on the road and opening credits appear followed by some cheesy cheerful ’80s song.

Fail break

When they finally arrived to the house they found a real mess. At first they thought that someone had broken in but Ed dismissed that with explanation that his dad sometimes comes there with his drinking buddies. House itself is full of junk – beer bottles, Ed Sr.’s hunting trophies (he hunted everything but people), knives, spears, hooks and even a mask of Mayan god Chaac (I checked it, it really exists but I still find that name funny). And a picture of dead guy Ed Sr. ran over with his boat. Why would anyone keep a picture from a accident scene of guy he accidentally killed is beyond me. Anyway, little do they know that someone is hiding in their garage. And that someone is none other than Ed Sr. who keeps dreaming about killing his own son in various ways. But first he needs to take care of his friends. So, the following night he decides to take an action.

She surely can’t sink with these balloons

First he kills Linda (played by Frances Raines) and then,using her underwear as a bait, he lured Mike (played by Morey Lampley) into his hideout where killer slashed him with motorboat. Mike is one real horny dumb moron.

The rest of the crew started searching for Mike and Linda on the beach but they got afraid of possibility of lighting striking them down (no, seriously) so they returned back to the condo to play Monopoly. Real party indeed. Meanwhile, Ed Sr. just seems to be warming up. Some cop (played by Ben Moore) came to the beach to check out things and Ed Sr. first impaled his face with lever and then decapitated him with an axe. The whole scene looked like head was made of plaster cast and the killer only needed to push it off the body. See for yourself:

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5yoyn9

The gang decided that Monopoly was too boring (oh tell me about that) so they decided to play another game. Rules are simple: Who gets to be “it” gets to stay in the house with the lights turned off while all other are drinking beer outside. That person needs to hide him or herself. Then the crew from the outside start searching for hidden person. Whoever finds gets to lay down next to the person who had been hiding. Procedure is repeated until only one person remains lurking outside around the house. Seems to me like a perfect game to get you killed. This whole thing is just Ed’s “master” plan to score Pam (played by Ruth Martinez) who is apparently still a virgin and constantly rejects young Ed’s attempts to deflower her. Anyway, poor Ralph (played by Bill Hitchcock), who is main clown in the group, was the first victim of this game. Ed Sr. impaled him with pitchforks and stuck him to the doors. Ha try to make a fun out of this one, smart-ass!

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5yozap

Ralph’s girlfriend Sue (played by Connie Rogers) went panicking so all remaining 3 of them started a search for him. Ed was so thrilled when he found piece of female underwear that he woke up the killer from his slumber. Poor man couldn’t even get a rest after so much hard work at killing department. And as it always happens in such cheesy slashers searching party got split up. Ed Sr. took this opportunity to kidnap Sue, take her to the garage, fish her pussy with the huge fishing hook and then finish her off with an axe. Wow what a overkill.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5yozsz

Ed Jr. and Pam eventually find bodies in garage where they confront the killer. Wussy Ed Jr. was so freaked out that Pam had to rescue him instead of vice versa. She stabs his father with a pocket knife and transports Ed Jr. to the cars. Of course, his father just rises from the dead and attacks them. During the struggle he clings onto the rear of the car so Pam takes the opportunity to drive into the wall and cuts him in half. Funny thing is that only in that moment Ed Jr. realized who the murderer is, as he proclaimed with the crying voice “It’s my daddy”. But even being cut in half couldn’t stop Ed Sr. from making another mess. While his upper half was laying on the ground, some cop approached him and Ed Sr. used his remaining strength to cut off cop’s leg with an axe and then die with sinister laughter on his face. I really don’t see how it is possible that half of body possesses such strength to cut off someone’s leg using only one arm. But hey, this is ’80s slasher. As for his son and Pam they ended up in the hospital. It remains unclear if Ed Jr. managed to score her eventually.

Conclusion: Buddy Cooper’s “The Mutilator” is just another almost decent slasher film. Of course the acting is completely awful and the film is extremely predictable and  unoriginal, but the gore effects made by Mark Shostrom are excellent. There is a bloody decapitation, a pretty good pitch forking and death by motorboat. Acting is so bad it’s good. The characters begin to get on your nerves eventually with their pole up their backside style acting, and you begin to wish for them to get killed. Which eventually happens. I think what makes this one stand out from other slashers is how little it stands out from other slashers. It sticks to the very basics of the formula without much imagination or surprises. The tweaks that it does have are noticeable but so simple that I’m not sure if it’s lazy or brilliantly subtle. But I am a negative individual so I am going to lean toward the first one.

And for all of you who enjoy cheesy ’80s soundtrack here is a treat for you:

Jungle Heat aka Rimba Panas (1988)

Posted: 24/08/2017 in Trash movies
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While going down the rabbit hole of Peter O’Brian  Indonesian flicks we stumbled into a bit of anomaly. In the Jungle Heat O’Brian isn’t an invincible agent, super- cop or even a deranged Villain- here he is a bit of an grizzled and disillusioned adventurer. So, we get a bit of Rambo and a bit of Indiana Jones for the same price- I can’t complain!

 

Welcome to the jungle Mr. O’Brian!

The movie starts with a pair of explorers (one extremely resembling Radovan the Third) extremely concerned. Their colleague Steve stole some diamonds from the tribe and that incites a horrible conflict. Explorers end up pretty much wiping out the fair share of the tribe with firearms but the numbers were just too much and they fell too.

 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5y233y

Now, Radovan‘s wife dies but his child  survived the whole ordeal.  I guess initially the plan was to sacrifice the kid to appease the gods  but the divine intervention happens (old school hand drawn lighting– I miss stuff like this today) and they end up declaring a blond child their new goddess. Didn’t expect that did you?

We cut to a girl celebrating her birthday in a rough biker joint, and as someone who’s living next to such establishment I don’t recommend celebrating your birthday in a place like that.  Girl called Lola is planing  an expedition to get the treasure from the Tribe, it seems she’s the only one with the diary/ partial map of the place. Of course as those things happen some biker tries to cop a feel and everything evolves into a completely insane brawl. As always Peter O’Brian does some of the best brawling too!

 

While they sort things out- O’ Brien asks for a 60% cut–  we see, now grown up blonde “goddess” running around half- naked without a care in the world. It seems her godess status means she never actually has to do doesn’t do anything, she just spends her days happily strolling around and playing with animals (like she’s in some kind of Disney movie).

Peter changed his mind and came no negotiate. So, he is going to the Jungle after all! Unfortunately finally when it seems they reached the agreement the bad guys decide to kidnap Lola and get the treasure for themselves! O’Brien and John go after them,  and in the car chase that ensues we see just how manic can O’Brian get (hint- really, really manic).

 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5y259s

Peter finally caught up to them in the train station but then they bad guys start shooting up civilians and force him to finally give up. Too bad.

Criminals lead by a Frenchman turn out to be extremely cruel to Lola by forcing her to swim behind the boat while alligators are gathering around her. Man, I don’t remember seeing such cruelty towards women on film in a long, long time. Unfortunately it turns out that they are not really lucky with the whole Jungle thing, Cannibalistic tribe attack them and after a brief exchange they all end up captured (well, those who didn’t die).  Thankfully Peter shows up to finally save Lola (she doesn’t seem to be all that grateful by the way).

Yes, this cute baby leopard wouldn’t really hurt anyone, but hell – it beats some CGI animals we see in the modern films!

Chief discovers the appeal of firearm, killing one of his tribesman in the process. Now, Frenchman sees the opportunity and teaches the Cheif how to shoot, even demonstrating it on his partner( he never liked him anyway). So, guns prove to be a great way of bonding for people of such different cultures (it turns no mater how different  we all are on the outside, we all really love killing).

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5y2ajk

After crazy stunt that ended with them falling down the waterfall the three of them end up captured by the Mazizi’s tribe and their whole fate is now clings on their ability to magicaly heal the boy with a deadly fever. When all seemed lost O’Brian pulled out his flask and washed the kid’s forehead with alcohol. Ah, the alcohol beverage- the great equalizer!

Everything ends in nice celebration and sparks start flying between O’Brien and Mazizi, even thou we still don’t know where her loyalty stands. wanting Mazizi for himself he does the only logical thing, challenges O’Brian to a fight, with everything including fake slow mo!

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5y2cgd

So, now all that is left is the wedding ritual, that takes place in you guessed in- secret cave with a giant red diamond! So the treasure is real!  But their happiness doesn’t last long because the evil Francman attacks with the other, cannibalistic tribe! Also, why is the evil tribe the one with much darker complexion? Is this on purpose? Also, Indonesian cinematography  never shied away from killing kids and it this movie they reaffirm that- by killing practically all the kids in the village. No mater how ridiculous the scenes are they are still shocking for someone who mostly watches American and European films.

It turns out the evil man who brought the Canibals is none other than the warrior O’Brian defeated.  While man are fighting it out in the cave the Frenchman decides to go directly after the diamond but activates secret magic alarm and the whole things explodes. Our heroes on the other hand menage to escape, if only barely.

Verdict:  Jungle Heat doesn’t quite have the crazy, over the top level of  action of Rambu or The Stabilizer and  parts of it are a bit draggin’ (the two consecutive love scenes toward the end) but there is some unexpected  funny stuff  with animals and  the tribal duel over Mazizi is almost worth the price of admission alone!

Lady Dragon 2 aka Angel of Fury (1993)

Posted: 14/08/2017 in Trash movies
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Once primed to be the female equivalent of Bruce Lee or Jean-Claude van Damme, Cynthia now seems more like the female Chuck Norris–the legs are powerful but the charisma muscles are weak. When you pair up that with Billy Drago who plays a role of demented villain you get a hilarious fighting movie. And who would thought of such thing? Good people from Imperial Entertainment, of course.

Susan Morgan (played by Cynthia Rothrock) has a happy life: she has a career as a successful female boxer, and her husband Sonny (played by George Rudy) is a soccer star who plays for Jakarta. Enough with fairy tales now! The action in this movie begins immediately, with Diego (played by Billy Drago) and his gang stealing a valuable bag of diamonds from the “Mob”. They are all wearing silver hockey masks and Diego has one of those Hi-Man haircuts. It is almost immediately notable that Diego is one evil, psychotic son of a bitch. “Mob” is Italian (no surprise there) who is delivering his role so hilariously that we had to re-watch it several times. Sadly, his role was too short since Diego and his gang killed him with paintball guns (seriously, see for yourself below) before leaving his place with diamonds.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wyvdt

 

On their way back they hid diamonds in one of Sonny’s suitcases in order to avoid being detected at airport. Then they followed Susan and Sonny right to their home in Jakarta. There they raped Susan and tortured Sonny in order to tell them where are diamonds now. Sonny apparently doesn’t know anything about diamonds so they broke his leg thus ending his soccer career too early. Then they made him watch Diego raping his wife again. Now I don’t understand who would want to have any intercourse with Cynthia Rothrock, let alone rape her twice. Anyway, Diego would rape her if there wasn’t for their maid Sari (played by Bella Esperance) who came with a shotgun and scared off the intruders. But diamonds remain uncovered. Later in movie Sonny admits to Susan that he hid diamond because he thought it was gift from Gods. He wanted to feed his people with them. And he hid them in the most impossible place of them all – a drawer in his work desk! Who would have thought of looking there?

Who would DO such a nasty thing

Diego and his gang don’t want to leave empty handed so they come back to Sonny’s house finding him sleeping with gun in his wheelchair. More torturing occurs resulting in death of soccer player (officially, it was suicide). After his funeral Susan decides to take justice into her own hands. She dresses up as
prostitute and kills one of Diego’s informers in some back alley. The next morning Captain Anton  played by Adisoerya Abdi) informs Susan that he had arrested a possible suspect and that he needs her to confirm his identity. It was Diego all right. But Susan didn’t confirm that. Probably because she wanted to kill him herself. What a devilish plan.

No, it’s just wrong

Diego keeps calling Susan and coming into her house whenever he wants. Susan changes her appearance again and takes down one of his gang members. How? Well, she lured him into the lift and started strangling him with a belt. Not minding being strangled the thug still continues grabbing her ass. At least he died with boner. The next night Diego decides to pay her a visit. He and his right hand Reb (played by Sam Jones; best known for his role of Flash Gordon) broke into her house playing games with her. Thinking that Diego is sitting in her late husband’s wheelchair Susan shoots it with a shotgun just to discover that in her late husband’s wheelchair was indeed her late husband. Yup Diego dug out his corpse and placed it on it’s throne. Ha villains strike back!

No use, it’s still Cynthia

Morons from police only now remembered to offer Susan a protection. No use of it now. Susan decides to return the favor. She kidnaps Reb who manages to escape from the car. More martial arts commence resulting in Reb ending up being squashed by enormous container. He laughs his manic laugh right up until he becomes a pancake. Only at that time did Diego notice that Reb took too long in toilet. Meh probably constipation.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wywhv

 

Now the twist! Remember Sari? Well it turns out that she is in cahoots with Diego who promised to take her to South America after all is over. What a dumb slut. Sari lures Susan into an abandoned building where Diego was waiting for them. Susan manages to kick the gun off Sari’s hands. This enraged Diego who tried to run over Susan but ended up running over Sari instead. Hm no need to point out a poetic justice here.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wz0eh

 

Now the final showdown. At a steel mill as it was the custom in ’90s movies. A lot of deranged fight takes place here with a lots of turnovers. Diego tried to rape her once more but she stabbed his dick with a knife. Eventually, Susan kicks Diego in stomach who explodes after that for no apparent reason (as if it could be any). After revenge was complete Susan decides to leave Indonesia for good and focus on her kickboxing career. And Sonny did eventually achieve his plan. Some poor Indonesian kid found diamonds while tending his grave. He served the greater purpose.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wyzco

 

Conclusion: Needlessly nasty, LADY DRAGON 2 does little to elevate Rothrock to full Kung Fu Queendom. Clearly her best career interests are not served by appearing in poorly shot, ineptly written vehicles that employ standard “Go Get ’em, Girl” plot lines. Not only are the revenge elements tiresome, but the film’s main selling point–Rothrock’s martial arts exhibitions–are listlessly choreographed and dully directed. Without exciting action sequences that pack a wallop, a martial arts movie has no point. Here the stuntmen seem to be standing still awaiting Lady Dragon’s every kick. The only thing worth watching in this movie is disturbed role of Billy Drago as a main villain. But even him failed to convince me at moments. But nevertheless he plays the character really well and you just love to hate him. Other than him only Sam Jones was decent in his role of deviant, evil, sadistic sidekick.

Angel of Fury aka Triple Cross (1992)

Posted: 10/08/2017 in Trash movies
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Though Cinthia Rothrock is most recognizable because of her classic Hong Kong movies (often with Richard Norton) and later a solid string of American Martial Arts B- movies (lots of those in the 90’s) she actually had roles in more than a couple of Indonesian flicks in the beginning of her storied career and as we all know- there’s not quite like an Indonesian action movie!

Now, one of the main selling points of this movie (for us) is without a doubt Peter O’Brian (The Intruder/ Rambu, The Stabilizer). To the best of my knowledge this is a man who who was offered a part in an Indonesian action movie (before that was hip) due to his uncanny resemblance to one Sylvester Stallone (the fact that one of his movies is called Rambu is a dead giveaway) and he said “Hell yeah!” and never looked back .To top it off in  this movie he plays a deranged villain Bolt and his foil is non other than “Lady Dragon” herself Cintia Rotrock and with that combo like that- you can do no wrong.

 

Bolt (O’Brian) is brutally torturing a man (at one point his goon, an  Asian Mr. T taking off some of his fingers with a meat chopper)  and at  the same time showing off his impressive physique. The poor man holds on before they threaten his young daughter and then he finally breaks down and gives Bolt the information. Information about what you ask? You’ll find out in a just a second.

Nancy Bolan (Cyntia Rothrock) is a head of security at HTI and she’s arriving to Indonesia as a courier carrying a mysterious silver briefcase. Not even ten seconds after she arrives at the station in a typical Asian fashion she and her colleague get attacked by a bunch of goons  and after a hell of a fight they manage to take off in a speed boat. It seemed that they are finally safe but situation evolves into a gunfight at see and after defeating the goons and things finally look safe Rothrock gets drugged and passes out.

Now, the men holding her turn out to be working for her-  ex- boyfriend! It turns out the said boyfriend faked his own death and waited three years all in effort to finally catch the Bolt– man he has a bone to pick with this dude! Rothrock on the other hand doesn’t seem to mind and the two of them continue where the left off with their romance.

The day after on the company meeting we finally learn the whole story. Rothrock is using three couriers (including herself) to carry a super- computer to the state, two being distraction and one being the actual real deal .Ironically no one knows where the real one is (at least as far as I can see). We also learn why is the criminal targeting them called Bolt, it’s because he is “The Terrorist Who Strikes Like Lightning“ (I just love that).

And then we have the fantastically ridiculous “Mission Impossible” scene where the black dude from the meeting takes off the mask- and it was Bolt all along! Considering they didn’t really have a budget for anything resembling a mask you see the scene from the back of the car.

Slika?

So, here we go again, everyone is waiting for the briefcase to come via boat but Nancy  secretly changed the plan and the real briefcase is actually coming to the airport via helicopter. Actually some blond Brad Pitt looking dude is carrying it. Unfortunately, Bolt is already onto them. He intercepts the car of her boss and goes straight to the airport where shootout ensues and the blond boy gets it.  The shootout is one of my favorite things in this movie because it literally makes no sense, most of the actors seem like they never seen firearm before and everything ends up exploding for one reason or another.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wkook

Now,  in the middle of all the craziness she’s going out shopping with her friend and her daughter. Unfortunately ‘s man tried to kidnap her and end up taking a little girl (her friend’s daughter). She viciously goes after them (on a motorbike) and after some nearly impossible stunts she stops them end… they freakin’ kill the child- in slow motion! Man, nothing is sacred for the Indonesian filmmakers!

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5wkr8l

Confusingly after the traumatic death of a child Nancy goes on a romantic evening with her boyfriend and they have a strange sex scene  with spliced footage of them kissing on the docks (these people are not sure how love scenes are supposed to work). After she wakes up tomorrow morning she immediately gets kidnapped and  ends up being tortured by Bolt and his Asian Mr. T henchmen.

HTI arranges a trade, briefcase (the final one) for Nancy but of course her boyfriend crashes a meeting (literally- via jeep trough the wall) and a complete Martial Art/ Gun- Fu madness ensues with briefcase changing hands like a hot potato.

Bolt gets completely unhinged and starts destroying everything on his way and his showdown with Rothrock is truly of EPIC proportions. Unfortunately, it gets interrupted by her boyfriend (who seems to have made a habit of that) but then- he wants briefcase all for himself! She goes after him and the fight ends up in the helicopter- she conveniently strangles him with his own tie (you should take a lesson and never get in a fight in a business suit).

Verdict: Now,  this movie has completely impossible fight scenes, bizarre editing choices and people who for the life of them can’t hold a gun properly. Production values are severely lacking (you’re sure to start laughing at some of the chases, explosions and gun battles) and that lack especially shows in the sound department (to the best of my knowledge Rothrock is the only actor that isn’t dubbed in the whole movie) but I challenge you to watch Angel of Fury and not have fun.

 

Complete Killcount by Cinthia, number 11 is especially impressive!

Trivia: We also have a bit of news to cap things off. Fantastic Mr. O’Brian is supposedly eying  his comeback to the film industry after lengthy time away he spent teaching English and being a life coach. He’s been offered a role of  a British General Cameron, commander at the Battle of Gate Pa–  whenever this comes true or not one thing is for sure- everything this man does will be on out “must see” list!

Goldsen4          Just look at this face!