The Last Shark (1981)

This Italian Jaws ripoff typically goes under a million different titles. Here are some of the alternate English titles The Last Jaws, Great White, Jaws Returns, Shark (Not to be confused with the Sam Fuller film of the same title). My reason for giving the alternate titles is to make it easier for you to dig up this movie. Its a must see.

Directed by Enzo G. Castellari (Keoma, The Inglorious Bastards) and staring James Franciscus (The Cat O' Nine Tails, Killer Fish) and Vic Morrow (Black Board Jungle, Twilight Zone : The Movie).

What we get is a over the top Italian take on Jaws. There for in my opinion its better then the original and way better then all the shitty sequels. Personally not being the biggest fan of Spielberg's film in the first place due to the fact that its mostly drama and lacks in gore and general shark-fu, I have shyed away from the Italian ripoffs for far to long. Big mistake!

First off we get a way bigger shark. This thing is fucking huge! Secondly these Italian sharks blast people from the water in what looks like giant explosions. Naturally the actors turn to dummy's when they are launched twenty feet into the air but when they come crashing down to the water they are mauled and usually partially eaten by the most hungry shark in cinematic history.

The best part is that this shark doesn't even seem to want to just feed itself. It seems to have a grudge against people and does its best to terrorize, and mangle anyone who gets to close to the water. In one of the best moments the shark bites a mans legs off who is hanging from a helicopter and then brings the chopper down into the water with it.

Castellari uses the perfect mix of stock footage (which surprisingly worked very well) with his own brand of special effects.

I think Joe Bob Briggs said it best when he said "Spielberg makes movies for mom not dad" I couldn't agree more and I'm sure Briggs would agree that Castellari makes bad-ass movies for pop and not mom.

Check this thing out to see Vic Morrow survive one more helicopter crash and go to war with the biggest, baddest shark of em all. The Last Shark has some truly funny moments that will have you scratching your head and wondering if your eyes are playing tricks on you. Then in the next moment offers up dismemberment and gore galore.

The Basketball Diaries (1995)

Leonardo Dicaprio takes on the role of infamous junkie, poet, writer, punk rocker Jim Carrol and gives an amazing performance of the true and tragic life that Jim lived. As the tagline says its The Death Of Innocence and death surrounds Jim as he journeys further and further into the dark depths of addiction.

I guess you could really take the quick way out of watching this thing by just playing Jim Carrol's record Catholic Boy. Most of the songs on the record explain the events which will take place in the film especially the song everyone knows and loves him for People Who Died. Its almost like listening to Lou Reed's Take A Walk On The Wild Side or watching Andy Warhol's Trash.

Being a fan of cult movies and exploitation cinema I have never been able to understand what it is that I like about Dicaprio. He plays in big budget Hollywood movies that I can't stand with few exceptions like Critters 3 : You Are What They Eat but there is just no denying that he is a talented actor. Its to bad he is casted in such bland movies for the mindless mainstream because what ever he does, he does it well. Remember him as the retard in that stupid fucking Grape movie?

Basketball Diaries sets itself aside from all that other shit. While its still a big budget mainstream movie it deals with a subject that most Americans would rather not think about. The fact that the youth is starting younger and younger with drug use and become young criminals. Dicaprio's character is so desperate in this film that he begs, steals, fights and even prostitutes himself out for a fix.

Some of the highlights that Basketball Diaries has to offer are homosexual gym teachers, priests who get off on beating young boys, a priest is blown away at close range by a shotgun, male and female prostitutes alike, gratuitous heroin use and other assorted narcotics as well, a kid jumps to his death from a city building, a old woman is punched, kicked and robed, flying vomit which lands on an angry construction workers head, religious conflict and a cameo from the real Jim Carrol.

Less humorous but in the same vein as Trainspotting. Fans of junkie films like Sid And Nancy are the true audience for this movie. Its as fun as a spike through the arm.

Critters 4 (1992)

Here it is the last and final film in the Critters series and what a fucking disappointment. I guess when you make a movie like this you know its time to call it quits. No need for a 5th apology film. Just give up!

This one takes up where the third film leaves off. Charlie is about to destroy the last two eggs when he is interrupted by his old bounty hunter friend. Charlie takes the remaining eggs to space with him where of course they hatch and wreak havoc one last time. The whole movie takes place in a spaceship and it is about as boring as it can be.

Brad Dourif (Childs Play, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest) shows up but doesn't manage to make the movie any more tolerable.

I'd say the only redeeming moment in the whole movie is a shower scene where we get some boobage and a soapy ass-crack from Angela Bassett. Not that Angela Bassett is anything all that special but that's how bad this movie really is.

The gratuitous nudity in Critters 2 added for extra points but the tits and ass in this movie is the only thing that kept me from turning it off completely.
Of course we get a some kills from razor-toothed fur-balls from space but nothing very memorable or overly gory. What else would you expect from a shitty 90's movie. The director never went on to do anything else and I guess we can be grateful for that.

Fans of the Critters series be warned. Stay away from this flick. The only excuse for owning this one is the fact that it is sold in the Critters boxset.

Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde (1941)

The director would become known for The Wizard Of Oz and Gone With The Wind but I respect him for his remake of the 1931 film about a mad scientist who creates a drug that separates the good and evil within him, giving them two separate identities known as Jekyll and Hyde.

Ingrid Bergman would go on to do Casablanca in the following year but she does what she does best in this one as well. Her tears spill from a broken heart in this movie as well but she cries even harder from the brutal beatings that she gets from Mr. Hyde.

In one of the films most memorable moments Mr. Hyde fantasizes about being pulled on a carriage but instead of horses doing the pulling a naked Bergman pulls him around as he whips her from atop the carriage. Its not long before Hyde's fantasy becomes a reality and Bergman's character is covered in bruises and scars from Hyde's cane which he uses as a weapon of choice.

Aside from beating the beautiful Bergman Hyde's idea of good pass time include hanging out at burlesque bars, getting into bar fights, spitting grape seeds in peoples faces, jumping through windows, kicking people down stairs and having in out with the police.

We get a sort of Wolf Man transformation scene each time our doctor takes his liquid drug and the makeup is pretty awesome. I have always related The Wolf Man to Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde for this reason and the fact that the two films share an emotional and scary tone at the same time. Then there is also the fact that the two characters lose control over their body, mind and soul.

Fans of Lon Channey Jr's. classic is bound to love this movie as well.

Invisible Agent (1942)

Almost ten years after the success of The Invisible Man, Universal Studios is still cranking them out. This H.G. Wells adaption shows that the Invisible Man can be of some service rather then a power mad psychopath. This time around he is an actual hero and he leaves for Nazi Germany as a secret agent and helps America win the war.

While Universals The Invisible Woman was an all out comedy and of course the first film was horror movie The Invisible Agent is a action/war film.

Our hero slaps the shit out of Nazi's, sets fire to their buildings, steals their women and drops bombs over their heads. We get a bunch of explosions and it makes for some high class entertainment.

The lead actress isn't all that attractive but is sexploited for some sex appeal. In one scene she undresses in front of a mirror while our invisible man watches. She of course falls in love with him after all he is an American and these Nazi's "Treat women like dogs". Instead of bandages our transparent man wears cream on his face so the blond babe gets to see what he looks like (sort of).

Perhaps one of the weirdest aspects of Invisible Agent is the character of Peter Lorre. This thing came out the same year Lorre did Casablanca but this time he is on the enemies side. Peter Lorre plays a Japanese soldier in Nazi Germany. Of course he doesn't look Asian at all but he does a pretty good job at being a creepy villain. In one of his best scenes he tries to cut a mans fingers off with a heavy machine used for slicing through news papers and he meets his fate in true Japanese style by dressing in white and committing Harakiri. He also does a bit of Kung Fu and chops Nazi's in the back of the neck with his hands.

Despite the fact that Peter Lorre has a strange voice to begin with it doesn't help when he is trying to sound like he is Asian. I personally feel that Boris Karloff did a better job in the Mr. Wong detective series.

I really love all of these Universal Studios invisible movies. While obviously preferring the original James Whale film I found Invisible Agent to be just as good as the true sequel The Invisible Man Returns. If you like these films the way that I do, be sure to check this one out for a good time full of Nazi-Ass-Kickin!

The Blood Spattered Bride (1972)

This Spanish vampire flick is completely under rated in my opinion. Personally not being a big fan of vampire movies this one is way up on the top of the list of vampiric tales for me. This along with Daughters Of Darkness which is very (almost to much) similar in plot and feel are amongst my favorite lesbian vampire films.

The Blood Spattered Bride was double billed with I Dismember Mama as A Frenzy Of Blood and left behind one of the weirdest trailers in cinematic history. Its a must see for any true horror-trailer-fanatic. While I Dismember Mama may be a guilty pleasure for some and a novelty for others The Blood Spattered Bride is actually a great film and the two couldn't be more different from each other.

Of course Quentin Tarantino would pay homage to this Spanish gem in Kill Bill for the scene where Uma Thurman catches a bullet in the head on her wedding day. Like I Dismember Mama, Kill Bill doesn't come close to the Blood Spattered Bride either but none the less its nice to see that someone out there pays some recognition to this flick aside from truly demented Euro Trash aficionados like yours truly.

The story tells of a newly wed couple who spend their honeymoon in a castle with a morbid history. The young bride loses her virginity to her older husband and starts to change emotionally. Her sexual fantasies/nightmares haunt her along with a vampire named Mircalla.

The bride is of course bitten and indulges in lesbian acts of pleasure while she is being conditioned to kill her husband. "He pierced your flesh to degrade you! He spat inside you to enslave you!" Its not long before we have some murder on display but the best scenes in the movie come in the form of nightmares and at times it is difficult to tell what is real and what is dream. We have a grizzly stabbing that leaves our bride spattered in blood (hence the title), A heart is ripped from a mans chest, another man has his throat slashed and then is shot in the face with a riffle, a 12 year old girl is shot in the head at close range in true Lucio (The Beyond) Fulci fashion and perhaps the most memorable and by far the strangest scene in the movie shows a man discovering a tube protruding from the sand on the beach. When he tries to dig around it he learns that it is the breathing tube from scuba gear. He digs more and finds the scuba gear is being worn by a beautiful naked blond. Naturally he takes her home for his wife to see. Who thinks this up? What an amazing scene in the bizarre. Nothing like this ever comes from the minds of American film makers. These odd moments really just add to the charm of The Blood Spattered Bride. We also have a few rape scenes, a decent amount of nudity and of course blood drinking. We also have Spanish actress Montserrat Julió who appears in a bunch of crazy stuff like Horror Rises From The Tomb, It Happened At Nightmare Inn, Doctor Jekyll And The Werewolf.

Fans of this movie might also want to check out Daughters Of Darkness and Vampyros Lesbos.

Bad Lieutenant (1992)

Two years after King Of New York Abel Ferrara throws The Bad Lieutenant at us. Personally preferring this film over King Of New York (which I am also a very big fan of) it is easy for me to go back and watch this one again and again.

Harvey Keitel is not a happy man in this movie. His character is about as low as you can get. Human life means nothing to him. Not his own or the suffering people from the New York City streets. He spends his time drinking excessively and doing lots of drugs with prostitutes. He shoots heroin, snorts cocaine, smokes crack & opium right in front of us. The audience cant help but wonder how long he will last and it seems inevitable that he will meet his fate soon. Not to mention that there is a crime lord who is out to blow him away due to the fact that he owes him a $120,000 for some bad bets on the world series. While Baseball is not my thing, cinema is and The Bad Lieutenant offers up crazy scenes of sex & violence.

A nun is gang raped by two young criminals. There is a $50,000 reward for the man who catches the scum who did it. Harvey has to make a decision whether or not he will follow through with the case and use the money to pay off the man who has a hit on him or continue going about his evil ways. His character also struggles with religion in general and in one of the most memorable scenes Keitel kneels before Jesus and calls him a "Rat-Fuck". Then in the next moment he prays for forgiveness. "Where were you? Forgive me. I did so many bad things".

The Bad Lieutenant has a very nihilistic ending that leaves the viewer thinking after its all done and over with in a very similar way to The King Of New York. Its almost as if Keitel excepts his fate and knows it is to late for him. So in a final act of goodness (or is it?) he lets the criminals go in hope that they will find a better life. His life for theirs in a sense.

Oh and in case you wanted to see Harvey Keitel naked one more time, watch for an incredibly awkward scene of swinging Keitel dick. It shouldn't disappoint you.

Bad Boy Bubby (1993)

Like art films? If you do, watch this fucking movie. Bad Boy Bubby is an incredible piece of work that makes you think. Its not a pretty picture! Then again it might be... It can be extremely dark with incest, murder, religion, and the cruelty of mankind but at the same time has some of the most beautiful characters that I have ever seen in any movie. Not beautiful in appearance but inner beauty.

The movie follows a man named Bubby who is really more of a child due to the fact that he was kept in a apartment for the first 30 some odd years of his life by his warped mother, where he knew nothing more then what she taught him. His shotty vision of reality changes when he kills his mother with saran wrap and ventures out into the real world. Lets just say the real world is a pretty strange place for Bubby. Perhaps even weirder then he appears to the average man on the street.

Bubby learns more with each person he meets and almost every scene in the movie is unforgettable. From the lighting to the cinematography, the brilliant writing to the intense acting Bad Boy Bubby is a must see for anyone who likes cinema of the bizarre.

There is no doubt that Bad Boy Bubby would offend a lot of people but then again it would only offend closed minded morons who should have never ventured into the world of Bad Boy Bubby. Films like Eraserhead are safe compared to Bad Boy Bubby. Although it is a movie from mars it still makes sense and while one can get many ideas from this movie the over all message is much more clear then you get from films like El Topo.

In one of my favorite scenes Bubby meets a scientist in a church. The scientist has this to say " It is our duty to think God out of existence. It is our duty to insult him. Fuck you, God! Strike me down if you dare, you tyrant, you non-existent fraud! It is the duty of all human beings to think God out of existence. Then we have a future. Because then  and only then  do we take full responsibility for who we are. And that's what you must do, Bubby: think God out of existence; take responsibility for who you are." While this might offend the average Christian I found it to be an amazing piece of dialogue that we can/should all relate to.

Bad Boy Bubby offers up some very strange nudity, incest, bodily wastes, man on man rape, multiple dead cats, multiple dead humans, religious cruelty and lots of strange music to change scene and mood.

If you are looking for something different, this is it! Watch it! Love it! Think about it! Or you could always just go to church. Then you will never have to think about anything for yourself. Especially a morbid tale of humanity like Bad Boy Bubby.
"If the poison doesn't get you, Christ will"

The Invisible Woman (1940)

Wow what a surprise this was. I wasn't expecting this at all. The Invisible Woman is not another sequel to The Invisible Man. However it seems that Universal Studio's needed to cash in on the 1933 classic as much as possible because this thing would come out the same year as the true follow up, The Invisible Man Returns. Well gender isn't the only thing changed in this story. Its a whole other feel to it. In fact its not even a horror movie. The Invisible Woman is a straight up comedy from beginning to end and never attempts even one scare.

Sure we get some scenes of violence and vengeance but its done in a slap-stick sort of way. Nobody is really harmed in this wacky flick. "I'm going to kick him in the pants" and kick him in the pants she does.

The story tells of a woman who volunteers to be the subject of a new scientific experiment with invisible results. Of course she doesn't offer herself up as the guinea pig because she cares about science but instead she wants to slap her boss around a bit who is a total prick. Well she does slap her boss around but finds herself in a bit of trouble when the mob wants to get their hands on the invisible machine.

Get ready for this, this is the best part... One of the mobsters is played by Shemp Howard. That's right, the one and only Three Stooges Shemp Howard. Shemp is awesome as always. One thing I found to be very strange was that one of the other actors tried to beat Shemps classic foot-work comedy in a scene where he gets the wobbly-knees. Why would you put Shemp in a movie and not have him do the ole knee-jerk? Other then Shemp, is Margaret Hamilton who most would remember best as the green-face Wicked Witch Of The West in The Wizard Of Oz which would be released only one year prior to this flick. Well Mrs. Hamilton's witchy face sticks out like a sore thumb in anything she is in and its nice to see her in this one along side some really funny actors.

Aside from the humor The Invisible Woman is obviously more sexy then the Claude Rains classic and its obvious that the film makers wanted to beat this into our brains. The fact that Claude Rains was running around nude raised a few brows upon its release. As ridiculous as that sounds it is true and it amazes me that the studio passed The Invisible Woman at all with the strict codes that were present at the time. We are constantly reminded that she is naked and although she is invisible they found a way to make it sort of sexy. In one scene our Invisible Woman puts on some wet stockings so we "can see her figure". She flaunts her legs about in a fashion that probably caused some erections amongst male theater goers.

I guess the times have changed but this thing is an interesting watch. Filled with goofy special effects, dumb humor, silly gags and of course its worth watching for the great Shemp Howard alone.

House Of Wax (1953)

This gimmicky 50's spectacle of 3-D stars Vincent Price in his typical villain role. This time as a bitter artist who runs a (yes you guessed it) wax museum or in this case a House Of Wax. He is on a murderous rampage with his henchmen Igor played by the great Charles Bronson.

3-D special effects is thrown in our face constantly as paddle balls come flying at the camera along with anything else you can think of. Heavy weaponry, wax figures, fists and human bodies alike.

Perhaps the strangest moment for me was when an intermission popped up on screen from the dvd. Weird huh?

Unfortunately I have never seen this thing in 3-D with the silly glasses and all. Its to bad because I really crave the headache that comes along with the old red & blues. Still House Of Wax is good ole fashioned fun and I am willing to bet money that it is better then the Paris Hilton remake.

Price does a good job here as a a horribly disfigured burn victim who gets his revenge upon society by killing people and coating their bodies in wax and adds them to his collection of human exhibits in his wax museum. His awful face is of course concealed behind a mask of wax but when killing time comes he roams the city streets in his Phantom Of The Opera get-up, complete with cape and hat.

Along side Vincent Price is a drunkard who will supply our mad-man with stiffs as long as a good stiff drink follows and of course Charles Bronson as a deaf mute.

Bronson (as expected) kicks plenty of ass. It takes a whole shit-load of cops to take him down and he doesn't mind getting a bit fisty with the law. Price also has a few impressive fight scenes and knocks out a cop or two before he meets his own fate in a vat of wax. Didn't Bronson kill a bad guy by kicking him into a pit of hot wax in one of the Death Wish movies? A bit of homage perhaps?

House Of Wax offers up a hanging, strangulation, melting was faces, a gag involving Charles Bronson's head amongst wax figures, fist fighting mayhem, and of course lots of 3-D. An important addition for Vincent Price collectors.

Fangs Of The Living Dead (1969)

The director that gave us The Tombs Of The Blind Dead series is to blame for this Spanish/Italian vampire bore. I'm afraid that Fangs Of The Blind Dead doesn't offer an inkling of the entertainment that the living-dead, Templar knights, Blind Dead flicks would have in store for us.

This schlocker would later be billed with two other films on a horror triple feature. With Revenge Of The Living Dead and Curse Of The Living Dead ahead of it. It made for one hell of a trailer that can be seen on Mad Rons Prevues From Hell and is sure to catch the attention of any true horror-trailer-fanatic.

Not personally being familiar with Revenge Of The Living Dead or Curse Of The Living Dead I can only hope for the sake of those at the triple feature that they are better then Fangs Of The Living Dead because Fangs is quite the snorer and anybody who made it to the third film was bound to sleep this one off. I had a hard enough time making it through this one by itself.

Fangs Of The Living Dead (from what I can remember) tells the oh so familiar tale of a woman who inherits a castle only to find that it is inhabited by a Peter Cushing looking fellow with a bad beard and a harem of attractive vampire babes. Unfortunately for us Fangs Of The Living Dead doesn't take the sleazy Jesus Franco route and offer up vampire lesbianism. In fact it doesn't even allow for any naked flesh. Some of these big-toothed beauties are looking pretty fine in the breast department and its a damn shame that we don't get a bit of tit. Nudity goes a long way and probably could have helped this thing move along at a nicer pace.

We get a few scenes in which a dark haired vampire is chained up and whipped by the Cushing look alike and some really bad dialogue but other then that and the busty babes the only other interesting moments shows a vampire melt-down. Skip the movie and check out the trailer for a much better time!

Monsterama Sci-Fi Late Night Creature Feature Show Vol. 1 (1996)

What we have here is another great trailer compilation from Something Weird Video. This one runs at two hours on the dot and focuses on 1950's monster flicks and sci-fi movies.

Heres the list of oddities and gems that Monsterama Sci-Fi Late Night Creature Feature Show Vol. 1 has to offer.

Monster Of Piedras Blancas
How To Make A Monster
Rocketship X-M
Destination Moon
The Thing
The Strange Door
Abbott & Costello Go To Mars
It Came From Outer Space
Robot Monster
Abbott & Costello Meet Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde
Killers From Space
Creature From The Black Lagoon
The Mad Magician
Abbott & Costello Meet The Mummy
Creature With The Atomic Brain
Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
X The Unknown
Tarantula
The Day The Earth Ended
Burn Witch Burn
Beast From 20,000 Fathoms
Time Machine
Rodan
Them
Revenge Of The Creature
When Worlds Collide
Attack Of The Crab Monster
The Day The Earth Stood Still
Black Friday
The WolfMan
Atomic Monster
Ghost Of Frankenstein
I Married A Witch
I Walked With A Zombie
Leopard Man
Frankenstein Vs. The Wolfman
Curse Of The Cat People
Son Of Dracula
House Of Frankenstein
The Body Snatchers
House Of Dracula
Beast With Five Fingers
Scared To Death
Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein
Abbott & Costello Meet The Killer
Mighty Joe Young
This Island Earth
It Came From Beneath The Sea
Astounding She Monster
Bela Lugosi Meets The Brooklyn Gorilla
The Giant Mantis
Beyond The Time Barrier
Phantom From Space
Invaders From Mars
War Of The Worlds
Creature Walks Among Us
It Conquered The World
Mole People
She Creature
The Man Who Turned To Stone
20 Million Miles To Earth
The 27th Day
The Monster That Challenged The World
From Hell It Came

Count em, 65 trailers of monster mayhem for your viewing pleasure. Bad-Ass! When is Volume 2 coming out?

Critters 3 (1991)

Okay so here we are, the third film in the Critters series. Personally being a fan of childish Gremlins-ripoff flicks and when I say childish I mean for children. The entire Critters series is rated {PG13}. The first is the softest of the lot. With only one or two deaths and no real gore or anything like that. Critters 2 on the other hand stepped up the bodycount a whole lot and added in way more violence and red stuff. It even offered up gratuitous nudity from a bare breasted blond bimbo but became way more silly and slap-happy in typical 80's fashion.

Now we step into the early 90's with Critters 3 and the comedy level is way down. However it was directed by a female so there is a couple of sappy moments involving family problems. Critters 3 also introduces Hollywood boy Leonardo DiCaprio in his first film. Good start kid to bad your only other good film would be Basketball Diaries. Despite DiCaprio's shitty filmography the guy is a good actor. Especially as a young kid. He was pretty good as the retard in that fuckin Gilbert Grape flick too. Anyway Critters 3 plays on a more serious level then the second film does or at least as serious as a monster flick about fur-balls from out of space  can be.

This time around the Critters attack a rat infested building full of poor folk. It kills off the films best character in the earlier moments and then terrorizes old folk, fat ladies and young kids. Charlie the bounty hunter shows up to kill some Critters and make an ass out of himself yet again. Charlie blows the shit out of the alien-fur-balls and even impales one with a metal antenna.

Being that Critters 3 is a 90's flick and the 90's generally sucked in every way possible, it is no surprise that the gore is held back that we gained in the second film. It doesn't dare to offer any naked flesh either but somehow it still manages to be fun in that children's monster flick kind of way.

Manos : The Hands Of Fate (1966)

Having read for years how horrible Manos : The Hands Of Fate truly is and having personal friends of mine who are equally deranged as myself warn that even the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version is barely watchable I knew it was only a matter of time before I took fate into my own hands and ventured down the supposed torturous road of Manos.

Personally being a fan of awful movies and "So bad its good" cinema I was rather pleased with the outcome of this journey into the bizarre. This is inadequate film making at its best/worst. The dub-over-voices add a element of freakish, weirdness that will leave you wondering if you are going insane. Its hard to follow whats happening with any normal mind frame and the characters are as out there as they get. The character of Torgo is by far the highlight of Manos. He is some sort of a cripple freak with lots of padding in the pants around the knees. I have never seen the MST3K version but I' sure they made the Torgo stuffs joke. I know I did! Torgo lives only to serve his satanic master (or defy him). He is also the most awkward character in cinematic history. He peeps through windows and touches girls hair. Its just a day in the life of Torgo.

We have this couple who spend day and night in their convertible making out in the desert. I don't think they have or ever will get passed first base. Its a day in the life of Manos youth. Then we get Manos six wives who all wear sheer togas. They are frozen in the day but they awake to wrestle at night. Then we get this retarded little girl who runs around chasing her dead puppy. We drift in and out of consciousness as this thing rolls on and by the films end you can be thankful that the nightmare is over but you can't help but miss Manos and his crazy-ass cape. Its a bad-ass cape!

Hands Of Fate is only for the toughest and most jaded of bad-film lovers. If you take this one on, be brave and just remember... Its only a movie. Only a movie. Only a movie.

Apocalypse Now (1979)

My earliest memories of Apocalypse Now goes back to the age of five. My father was working late and being a typical young boy from the 80's who was obsessed with guns, soldiers and war I stared at the television screen in both horror and amazement as Martin Sheen slowly crawled out of a swamp, covered in face-paint as lightning filled the locations sky. Once he makes it on to solid land it becomes apparent that he is holding a machete and is planing on doing some very wicked things. Suddenly my father walks in the front door and is quite pissed that my mother was in another room leaving me a bit neglected to watch Apocalypse Now.

My father threw a bit of a fit and changed the channel and those images that I witnessed that night have stuck with me all through my childhood. I knew that one day I would find out the name of the movie that my father wouldn't let me watch.

It wasn't until I was about twenty years old that I would watch Apocalypse Now in full. All through my teenage years I was rather obsessed with horror films and war films were a thing of the past. However once seeing this epic masterpiece in full I remember this sense of gratification what came over me once I saw Sheen in that swamp and the films climax hit me like a fucking train. Here is a film that is so striking in its atmosphere and mood that I felt this could possibly be the greatest movie ever made and for a horror buff I felt equally satisfied from the harrowing tale of madness. After all the last two words of the film is "The Horror". Isn't war the real horror-story in life? It certainly is awful and many more are affected by it then those who fall victim to a serial killer that is reenacted in the countless slasher films of the 80's that I was familiar with. This was something new and much horrific for me.

Directed by Francis Ford Coppola (Dementia 13, Rumble Fish). It tells the tale of a captain in the army, played by Martin Sheen, on a classified mission to kill an American decorated war-hero, gone insane, played by Marlon Brando. Insane isn't the word. Brando's character plays like a cross between a philosophical madman like Charles Manson and a patriotic victim of war. There is a sense of sadness to his character but the overwhelmingness of his barbaric brutality and insanity over comes in the end.

Aside from Brando and Sheen, Robert Duvall shows up for some light hearted laughs and very memorable lines. "Charlie don't surf". He blows the shit out of a section of Vietnam just so he and his boys can do some surfing. Dennis Hopper also shows up in a very typical role for him in the 70's. Its hard to tell if he is acting or just being himself here but I would almost bet money that he wrote his lines for himself or at least just winged it. Hopper's performance is brilliant as usual for this era and followers will not be disappointed.

Apocalypse Now is the greatest Vietnam film ever made. The cinematography is beyond amazing with transitions, fades and dissolves that can not be topped. There is a portion of the film where a character is on acid and while many films succeed in making the audience feel tripped-out this movie takes it to a whole other level. From this point on the rest of the film plays like a acid-trip and not a very pleasant one at that. I have not heard anything of a remake which is a bit of a surprise considering they love to remake and destroy everything they can possibly think of. This 70's classic is a trip into madness and the horrors of war. The film is untouchable and any attempt of a remake would make for nothing more then toilet paper.