MY GIANT DVD SALE

Posted on April 30, 2008

My blog will be back soon, I promise, again. In the meantime, I am selling a boatload of dvds. All dvds are official releases, region 1 unless otherwise marked. The rules are as follows: $5 each unless otherwise marked. Certain dvds are labeled as “free” meaning if you buy something, you may select one (1) of the “free” dvds to be included as a show of appreciation for your purchase. Shipping, regardless of how many you buy, is $7.00. Packages will ship USPS priority with delivery confirmation. Payment through paypal only. Make your selections, then email srock@addictrecords.com I will then send a return email with availability and total. I will try to update this list as the sale goes on by removing sold titles, but that may not happen. Funds acquired through this sale will go to help recoup from the massive financial loss of REGRET™ Instruction Manual, which is still available here by clicking the Buy It Now button on the page. No homo.

THE LIST

DEFIANCE (1979)

Posted on March 7, 2008

Theme Song: Several by Gerard McMahon including Bad Times, Hot Town Streets, Take It Down The Middle, Double Shot, I Will Stay With You, and perhaps the best of them all, and what I would consider the theme song Let The Light Shine In The Morning.

Interesting Dated References: Scavenging in the sewer pipes, taking matters into your own hand, being a seaman.

Best Line: Uttered to a bartender by Jan Michael Vincent in reference to New York city — “I hate this place. I can’t even breathe here.”

Social Context: I mean, sure, there was a lot of relevant social context going on back when the movie was made, such as crime was pretty rampant and a lot of people were feeling frustrated and wanted to take matters into their own hands. Now there is no crime and we are all totally safe, so it just seems comical.

Summary: I don’t think any of you lonely, single men reading this blog would argue the fact that the late 70s represent the best time in the world ever. So many things were at their glorious peak in the late 70s: AC/DC’s creative output, cocaine use, and my parents’ marriage. I think somehow those all relate to each other, but I’m not positive. Another thing that was at a creative peak throughout the late 70s was the Loner-Revenge genre of filmmaking. From Death Wish to First Blood to Walking Tall, the list goes on and on. Not only does that list go on and on, but the list of bastardized amalgamations of the above mentioned films went on and on. I have visited films like this before, some better than others, and I’m sure I’ll visit this genre again. Usually they involve Vietnam veterans, so imagine my surprise when I realized the main protagonist of Defiance was not a Vietnam veteran. Imagine my continued surprise when Jerry Bruckheimer showed up in the credits as a producer. I was not so surprised I would actually not attempt to offer any additional insight into what other movies he produced back in the day.

Moving on with things, the always stellar Jan Michael Vincent is a seaman who gets docked for fighting and is forced to rent a shitty apartment in New York. Then Danny Aiello chases a kid who stole his giant fish. I know it sounds confusing but that’s really what happens. After Danny Aiello gets his fish back, he has a little verbal exchange with Vincent. As luck would have it, later that night Aiello is having an awesome party with his friends. They are listening to original music made for and inspired by the film Defiance, which sounds like a really bad impression of Born To Run-era Springsteen. Vincent lives next door and is trying to learn Spanish so he can get back to being a seaman. Of course, this music disturbs him and he asks Aiello’s conveniently multi-ethnic circle of friends to turn it down. They refuse because they are rocking out so hard and drinking Schlitz tall-boys. They must like to have pent-up soft-serve diarrhea. Vincent makes them shut up by repeatedly throwing a basketball at the wall. Apparently the tall-boys of Schlitz looked so appetizing Vincent buys himself a 6-pack the next day.

He makes small talk with a local shop owner (Art Carney, not that it really matters because it’s a really small role) and then a “gang” comes in and steals stuff. The shop owner explains to Vincent these guys are ruining the neighborhood. He also explains their name is the “Savage Souls,” which is supposed to incite fear, but is really just funny. I think their logo even has a skull in it. Skulls mean people are tough. I guess that makes everyone tough because everyone has a skull except for maybe that one guy I saw on Discovery Health. He is not tough at all.

Later on, Vincent is walking through the subway and is mugged by this same gang. Apparently this gang is really into Bedazzler™-ing the fuck out of their jeans. I mean, every single member is all Bedazzler™-ed to high heaven. So after he gets mugged, he crawls back to the apartment building and the allegedly hot girl who lives upstairs finds him. I don’t really think she’s that good looking, but perhaps they were just aiming low with the casting. So in the morning she talks with him before he goes to work and we are able to see…

…her awesome Kris Kristofferson poster located in the upper left of the frame. If anyone knows where this is from, speak the fuck up. It might be from one of his albums, but I’m not sure. What’s interesting here is Kristofferson and Vincent have starred together before, but by 1979 Kristofferson had far exceeded Vincent. I bet it really pissed him off that the poster was part of the set decoration.

So yeah, Vincent befriends a kid who lives in the building. This kid happens to live with a retired old boxer who is semi-retarded and named “Whacko” who is played by the guy that was Luca Brasi in The Godfather. He hangs out with them by large sewer drains and goes to a porno movie with them. Then he asks the chick out on a date and takes her bowling. They have sex that night. Everything seems to be running very smooth for Vincent. The next day he gets in a fight with the Savage Souls while they are harassing Whacko. Then he gets drunk with Danny Aiello at some type of bar/men’s club that looks like the most depressing place on earth (not to be confused with that time I lived in my mom’s basement). Later on, the Savage Souls rob a bingo tournament that looks like it’s being held in a basement apartment. After the cops show up, none of the apartment dwellers initially want to file a complaint against the gang, but eventually the store owner decides he will speak up.

A day or so later, the gang shows up at the shop to beat up the owner in all their Bedazzler™-ed glory. Vincent takes action and attacks the gang with a stick. He cuts off one of the members’ ponytail. He also kicks their boom box.

Later when Vincent is showering, the gang breaks into his place and tells him he is a dead man. Vincent doesn’t even really try to cover up his genitals, or anything. Granted you don’t see them on camera, but you can tell he’s standing there naked and only half-assed trying to cover up. Maybe he’s packing some serious junk and trying to intimidate them. After that, Vincent gets his assignment for a new ship and tells the chick he is leaving. Then he says his goodbyes to the kid and Whacko. He also gives a dramatic speech to Aiello about how he “doesn’t belong here.” That night Whacko tries to fight the gang dressed in his old boxing garb, complete with velvet robe. In the morning Vincent sees the kid running down the street as he gets into a cab. He jumps out and sees that Whacko is dead. Allegedly this is the climax of the movie, but it’s kind of just boring. Aiello and Vincent man up and go after the gangs’ cars while Hot Town Streets blares away. Then they agree to meet up later at “the shaft.”

Aiello returns to the most depressing bar ever and tries to rally his friends to join in the fight. There’s not even any music playing at this bar, just a bunch of dudes sitting around drinking Schlitz tall-boys at a Formica countertop. Things reach a dramatic conclusion when the Bedazzler™-ed Souls show up to fight the makeshift apartment gang. Eventually the apartment dwellers start throwing bottles and shit at the Souls and corner them. It looks like a bad precursor to the Beat It video. Aiello gets shot and Vincent gives the gang leader a chase. Fisticuffs and falling down stairs ensues. Eventually Vincent kicks the guy’s ass and the cops arrest all the bad guys. Then Vincent hugs the kid and the chick, and the credits roll. I understand you may have trouble comprehending all of this as the entire plot is mind-blowing. I mean, the loner wins, can you believe it? And even Danny Aiello survives his gunshot wound.

Defiance directed by John Flynn who explored similar territory in Rolling Thunder. Apparently he just wanted to keep exploring the same themes or something. Then he went on to direct Stallone in Lock Up. Totally jealous of his career. The writer of Defiance promptly went on to write Quicksilver and then practically fell off the face of the earth.

Poster and Box Art: The poster for this movie is like a lot of the other revenge films of the era. High contrast image? Check. Main protagonist holding some type of weapon all alone? Check. Whatever, it is what it is.

Availability: Shit, Defiance is actually a fairly valuable VHS collectors item. If you want to shell out $20, go for it.

FIGHTING BACK (1982)

Posted on March 7, 2008

Theme Song: Somehow the makers of Fighting Back were able to resist temptation and did not have an empowering rock ballad composed for the soundtrack. There wasn’t really any music at all.

Interesting Dated References: Lowenbrau. Lots of images of Philly in the early 80s that may be nostalgic for some, but for the average reader who never has left the midwest, they don’t really matter.

Best Line: There isn’t much good dialogue going on in this film, and that’s a pretty sad statement. I mean, when you consider it had all the makings of cheesy dialogue, to not be able to find anything worth noticing is pretty depressing and probably indicative of the major downturn this blog has taken in the last few months. I mean come on, 3 weeks between updates?

Social Context: Yeah, I mean, there’s a social context to all of the movies in this genre. Community activism, safety on the streets, getting kids off drugs, stopping your daughter from becoming a stripper Е the list goes on and on. But are these issues presented in a realistic way? Fuck no. Let’s not forget this is an exploitation genre and that’s all it will ever be. Johnny paycheck will never make a stand like the protagonists in these types of movies because it’s not plausible in the real world. But hey, he can watch these movies and think “I should do something like that.” Then he can go back to eating dinner and thinking about working in the warehouse tomorrow. See also: Guardian Angels.

Summary: Fighting Back is yet another revenge genre film that drapes itself in the guise of being a little more community-oriented. Our hero, played by Tom Skerritt, doesn’t go off half-cocked and take on a gang (or at least not a first). Rather, he takes efforts to start a community organization complete with storefront and logo. It’s like Ghostbusters, but with real people. They even have embroidered patches made.

The movie starts out with some random news people compiling actual news footage that is violent. I don’t recall ever seeing some of this footage and I’ve seen The Killing of America, so that statement is supposed to mean something. Next we flash to Skerritt and his ridiculously stereotyped Italian family who is celebrating someone’s departure for Denver. It’s some uncle or something who’s leaving. Then they get right into the action. Skerritt is driving his very 1980s car around a bunch of other 1980s cars, when he sees a pimp beating up a woman. His loud mouth wife (Patti Lupone) gets out and yells at them. This of course results in a car chase. For some reason, Skerritt thinks the smart thing to do is drive to his house with the pimp-mobile chasing him. I’m pretty sure the rules have always stated if you are being chased by someone who is going to try to kill you, drive to the home of someone you hate and act like it’s your own.

So the pimps rear-end Skerritt and push his car up onto the lawn. His wife gets out of the car and immediately has a miscarriage. Skerritt pulls a gun and the pimps just drive away. That same night, Skerritt is shown working at his deli and he sends his mom and son out into the night to walk home alone and, of course, they walk into a pharmacy that is being robbed. The thieves rough up the kid, the pharmacist, and cut the old mom’s finger off. The police take forever to show up and Skerritt, whom I apparently never noticed has pretty bad teeth, yells a lot at police. This guy is really getting in my craw. He keeps putting his family in potentially dangerous situations and then when something bad happens he complains a lot. What an asshole. He reminds me of a lot of the complainers I work with. Actually, he reminds me of an off-color joke that involves a different ethnicity than my own. Speaking of my ethnicity, this movie is really shoving the Italian stereotypes down the viewer’s throat. All the Italians, including Skerritt, are constantly seen holding large cheese wheels or sausages. Ridiculous.

Okay, so getting back on track, one of the pimp guys gets out of jail for crashing into Skerritt’s car, and his wife throws a fit about wanting to move. Did I mention this movie was filmed in South Philly? Did I mention Philly is a giant shithole? Well it is. The set decoration budget for this movie was probably zero because the streets of Philly already looked shitty enough. If anyone cares, the guy playing Skerritt’s best friend is played by Michael Sarrazin who was in The Reincarnation of Peter Proud. Personally I don’t care.

So yeah, suddenly, and this is actually pretty awesome, there’s like 10 inches of snow everywhere. Skerritt and Peter Proud drive around the streets in their really sharp 70s cars and don’t seem to give a fuck about sliding or anything. While out and about, they see the pimp’s car and go into a bar to try to fight him. In the bar there is every ethnicity except honky, so I guess the director was trying to imply they shouldn’t be there. Skerritt gets thrown out and then almost immediately convinces his neighbors to join him in his fight against crime by forming a community organization. And then all of a sudden they’ve got a fucking building, a logo, a sign, embroidered patches, all that shit. What the fuck? I mean, it takes time and money to get all that shit produced. I guess since Skerritt is portraying an Italian we are supposed to assume the mob financed it or something.

My Ghostbusters analogy was a joke, but they even go so far as to get a car just like the Ecto-1. Maybe I’ve discovered that Ghostbusters was an actual parody of this movie.

So the new community group’s first order of business is to go down to the shady bar and act all tough with their new vests and freshly embroidered patches. The bartender gives Skerritt a beer that is more than 2/3’s head and everyone, including Skerritt, ignore this minor detail.

Then a fight breaks out between the locals and the local community gang. Apparently the gang’s plan involves going to bars and getting into massive brawls. If this makes them a community defense organization, doesn’t that make all of your white trash cousins eligible for consideration as community advocates? After the bar fight they interrupt a guy for trying to burn down a factory. Going along with all the racial stereotypes going on in this movie, I bet the arsonist is a Greek guy trying to do a little insurance fraud. That makes the most sense. There are actually a few good stunts happening here, as the activist group tries to take out the failed Greek business owner.

Meanwhile, Patti Lupone returns home to find their house broken into and ransacked. Lupone freaks out and calls the People’s Neighborhood Patrol Hotline. Did I mention that is the community organization’s name? Well it is. And Jesus Christ, they have a hotline set up, too? These people really went all out. She also finds the family dog dead in the shower. This is a plot device used to incite emotion from women viewers who are having a hard time relating to the realistic revenge plot. Then Skerritt and Peter Proud discuss crime in the area and we see the news reporters talk about wanting to interview him.

Suddenly, Yaphet fucking Kotto shows up. Apparently he’s a dance instructor and a writer and for some reason Skerritt and another man were in his studio discussing crime. Kotto calls Skerritt out for being a fucking dickface who blames everyone else for his problems. Then he cuts the argument short by demanding everyone dance. What tact! What a technique! Jesus Christ. This is getting really odd.

We immediately flash to the next scene, which is some broad wearing an 80s high cut thong screaming in the street over a dead body about how the same pimp from the beginning of the movie “shot her old man.” Of course Skerritt shows up, recklessly hits a few others cars, and attempts to chase the pimp. In the morning he takes a break from making “pasta” to walk his son to school. He is them bombarded in his deli by a bunch of elderly Italian stereotypes who congratulate him for “giving them back the streets.” They demand Italian food and the news reporter asks for an interview.

Meanwhile, some politicians discuss if this new community organization is above the law. Get a load of this guy’s mustache. No really, take it all in. He’s the Police Commissioner. They decide to bring Skerritt in to tell him to tone it down a bit. You know who should tone it down? The Police Commissioners mustache, that’s who. The next day Skerritt’s 90 year old mother is violently raped in a very, very graphic scene that is borderline soft-core pornography. Oh wait, that doesn’t happen at all. I was just making sure you were paying attention.

So then the movie slows down a lot as Skerritt fields all type of political nominations and considers running for office. Then Skerritt realizes his son “Mario” (yes Mario) is on heroin. The kid is like 12, but, whatever, he’s all zonked out of his head at dinner. So Skerritt tracks the dealer down and yells at him. Then he proceeds to meet with a bigger drug dealer, and a few minutes later he has a meeting with a mob boss. Then he goes back to fight the drug dealer.

Apparently the drug dealer is into LARPing because he whips out some type of battle axe. And yes, this fight is taking place at a fried chicken restaurant. Skerritt knocks the guy out and then pays for a bucket of chicken to go. So yeah, then Peter Proud provides a bunch of drama by telling Skerritt his organization is becoming a police problem. Things are really starting to drag here.

Kotto shows up again and presents Skerritt with the guys who cut off his mother’s finger. Kotto gets all black activist and tells Skerritt off again. I don’t know, it’s like the filmmakers were really trying to stretch things out at this point. Then the black pimp stereotype from the beginning of the movie and his gang ambush Skerritt and crew in the park. Peter Proud gets shot and killed and when Skerritt finds his body, a bunch of violins start playing. Then there are more violins and horns at the funeral. Everyone encourages Skerritt to run for office or some boring shit. Then he rallies more of his troops for some type of showdown. They bring a bunch of bats and wrenches, and shit, and go beat up thugs in the park. The pimp escapes but the community successfully reclaims the park. Then everyone gets all happy and paints over graffiti and other stupid montage shit. Somehow Skerritt drops a grenade on the pimp guy’s car after he leaves a strip club. Then he is elected as councilmen and everyone celebrates. The closing scene is a bunch of kids playing in the park that was preciously overrun with thugs. Okay, great. Don’t you just feel empowered? I’m going to empower myself right out of a job if I don’t go to bed soon.

Fighting Back was given enough of a green light that it was produced by Dino de Laurentiis, so it must have had something other than Skerritt’s extremely ugly teeth going for it. Also of note is that director Lewis Teague heralded some fairly well known work in the 80s: Lady In Red (the first movie I remember seeing a full female bush in when I watched it late at night sometime in the mid-80s), Cujo, Jewel of The Nile, and Cat’s Eye.

Poster and Box Art: The poster for Fighting Back falls right inline with Death Wish and other posters of the time that were starting to use highly contrasted or stochastic photographs on colored backgrounds. This technique would continue to be seen for the rest of fucking time. Still, despite the overuse of this formula, it still stands up. Hey, if it ain’t broke. Also of note is the custom type treatment on the actual “Fighting Back” type. Nice.

I also found this confusing foreign poster that makes absolutely no goddamn sense. Looks like someone got a little crazy with the photograph and airbrush montage nonsense.

Availability: For some reason the movie is available on VHS under the name Fighting Back: Death Vengeance and can be had for the low price of like $2.00.

DEATH VALLEY (1982)

Posted on February 14, 2008

DEATH VALLEY (1982)
Theme Song: No

Interesting Dated References: The kid from A Christmas Story before he became a comedy power house as seen on the new hilarious Vince Vaughn comedy tour movie. I heard his jokes all go like this: “Hey do you guys remember A Christmas Story? Well that was me, I’m that guy! Isn’t that hilarious!?! Aren’t I hilarious!?! That was me!?! Get it!?! That was me then, and now I’m here!”

Best Line: Delivered by the dad as he explains divorce to his son — “I’m not the man she wanted me to be, and she’s not the woman I fell in love with.”

Social Context: Seriously, none. I mean, right at the beginning there is like 5 minutes where they analyze the affect that divorce can have on a young child, and then suddenly any element of that sort vanishes. Then at the end there’s some stuff where the writer was probably trying to win over his step-son so he put in a bunch of crap about “learning to love your step-dad.” But even that didn’t last very long. I’m not sure why those elements were even added. I guess it was an effort to add some relevancy to this pointless film. I shouldn’t even call it a film.

Summary: It must suck to direct a movie featuring a capable child character in a lead role who a few years later goes on to star in hugely successful movie where they are forever remembered as that character. It instantly ruins your movie and any such chances at fame. Instead it relegates it to the “before they were famous” category. Such is the case with Death Valley, which stars…

Ralphie from A Christmas Story, two years before that movie came out. I’ll admit, it’s really hard to watch this without constantly thinking of A Christmas Story. I mean, I keep trying to imagine it’s just some random kid so I can enjoy the movie, but I can’t because he’s just so goddamned Ralphie. But yeah, I guess we better try and get through this and take it seriously.

So Ralphie plays a character named Billy. In the opening scene we see him shopping with his dad, going to an art museum, etc. Then we learn that dad doesn’t live at home and the parents are divorced. Shit, when my parents got divorced and I had to hang out with my dad, all we did was watch TV in his room (my grandma’s basement) and eat Arby’s. He never once took me to an art museum. Anyway, Billy says goodbye to his dad and then leaves with his mother for a trip to Death Valley to visit her hometown and apparently the guy she’s been banging. Once there, Billy acts all possessive of his mother, and they take a trip to an abandoned mine. On the way there, Billy sees an ominous 57 Chevy following them.

Then we flash to a scene of some young adults “partying” at one of the abandoned mine sites. I know they’re partying because they are drinking Olympia. At this point I’d like to remind anyone who still has access to Olympia that I will pay good money to have 12-packs mailed to me. I used to be able to get it in Wisconsin, but I can’t anymore. Assholes. So one of the partying young adults who happens to be wearing a tube top goes to make sandwiches in their RV.

Then her boyfriend walks in during a very erotic cucumber cutting scene, which results in the removal of said tube-top. As you’ll notice in the picture above, there is a fifth hand reaching for the knife. The two young adults are then slaughtered without much gore or boobage. This just happens to be the same goldmine Billy and his mom and soon-to-be-new-step dad stumble upon. Since Billy is an asshole, he wanders into the RV. His soon-to-be-step dad interrupts his exploration before he finds the bodies, though. Step dads are always trying to ruin fun.

Who the fuck orders orange juice with Chili? Well, apparently Billy’s mom does, as is revealed when they all go out to eat. Billy orders a hamburger and keeps looking at a necklace he stole from the RV. He notices the waiter is wearing a similar necklace and gets all spooked. Seriously though, who the fuck orders chili as a main course for dinner? And then who the fuck gets a nice satisfying glass of orange juice to accompany the chili? What the fuck. Then Billy sees the spooky 57 Chevy again. I’m going to go ahead and call it now: Billy’s dad from New York is the killer. We’ll see if I’m wrong. As the family leaves the diner they encounter a crash scene featuring sheriff Wilford Brimley. The RV is all burned to shit and Ralphie offers up the necklace he stole and talks about the mysterious 57 Chevy. Later, Wilford talks with another cop who alludes to the fact that the people in the RV were “cut up just like the ones last year” and that “he’s at it again.” I guess this is supposed to add mystery, but I’ve already established that the dad is the killer.

The family goes to a ghost town and Wilford Brimley goes to talk to the waiter at the waiter’s house, which I think he refers to as “The Peterson Place.” During their conversation, Wilford alludes to the waiter’s brother and some other stupid subplot shit no one cares about. Then he catches a pick axe in his chest as he leaves with the waiter. At this point the filmmakers want you to believe the waiter is in cahoots with the killer, but I’m still convinced it’s the dad. Okay, get this, Billy wanders around an “Old West” museum and plays with some mannequins, one of whom he refers to as “Black Bart.” That’s just like in fucking A Christmas Story. What the fuck. I was really trying to forget he was Ralphie and now there’s direct precursors to A Christmas Story. Later on, step dad tries to have “the step dad talk” with Billy/Ralphie. You know the one: They say they respect your dad and they’re not trying to replace them, but they love your mother and want to make her happy. I’m sure you’ve been through it. It’s hilarious. A grown man having to say that shit to a kid. Man, that never gets old.

So Billy’s mom and new dad go out and leave him with a fat chick babysitter stereotype who can’t stop eating. When she goes out for food, she gets her throat slashed by - err, the mysterious unknown killer. The killer than reaches into the fat, dead babysitter’s pocket (and past her rolls of fat) to steal the room key. We then see the killer is the waiter from the restaurant. Billy locks himself in the bathroom and attempts to outsmart the killer by making steam with hot water and filling a shower cap with powder and aftershave and shampoo and shit. Apparently they only were able to do one take on this scene, because when the killer enters and Billy tries to throw the shower cap at his head, it clearly misses and Billy just sort of fumbles with it. The killer then overreacts like he’s blinded, or some shit. So Billy runs and hides in the killer’s car. Eventually (one minute) the killer tires of trying to find Billy and gets in his car.

Oh, and all this time his parents were at a bar where they overheard about more killings. They then rush home and find Billy gone. They go to The Peterson place for some reason and find Billy, a dead Wilford Brimley, and the waiter guy with his shotgun. Somehow the family is inside the house and the waiter is outside where he proceeds to throw parts of a car (hubcaps, grill, fender) through the windows. The waiter runs in the house, shoots at them, and then I assume he is killed by the step dad. They then walk away (car was ruined with shotgun) and head to “the tourist castle down the road” looking for shelter. Then, I don’t know, they call the cops, a car arrives, the step dad sees the dead waiter inside the car and is then attacked my some other mysterious guy wielding a knife and a really stiff arm with a little to no control over how far his arm arc swings and no ability to control it once in motion. Billy runs out into the desert and then his mom and step dad hit the guy with a car and kill him.

The movie ends when Billy hugs his mom. Then he hugs his step dad, which is something like only two people in the world have ever done. Usually you just awkwardly say, “Hey,” and sort of stare at the ground or something. Anyway, freeze frame, credits role, and no real explanation for anything is given. In fact, the body count wasn’t even that high. I can’t really figure out why this movie was even made. The box boasts how the entire movie was filmed “in the desert,” but really you didn’t see much of the desert, just a bunch of tourist shops and a fake-ass ghost town. I mean, the movie wasn’t good, but it wasn’t really terrible. It was just… meh. I haven’t felt this indifferent about something since September 11th.

Poster and Box Art: Did you ever get really lonely and face fuck one of those sex dolls? i haven’t, but i was just wondering if you had and if it felt realistic. I’ve heard it depends on which kind you get and how much money you spend. I’m not really sure why I’m talking about this. oh wait, that’s why: because this poster looks like a fucking ad for a sex doll, compete with guy wielding a switchblade at it.

Availability: Unfortunately unavailable at this time. But hopefully with the new resurgence of Peter Billingsley’s career thanks to Vince Vaughn, we’ll be seeing a full reissue of this wonderful piece of cinema.

DEATHDREAM (1974)

Posted on February 14, 2008

DEATHDREAM (1975)
Theme Song: Not in the budget.

Interesting Dated References: Being friendly to your mailman.

Best Line: Yelled by John Marley as he points his finger at his wife after she says some accusatory shit — “You know why I’m drunk! … You know!” Then he pushes his daughter out of the way and tells her to “mind her own goddamn business.”

Social Context: Of course this goes with the age old idea that “war changes a man” and then when soldiers return home they aren’t the same people. Because the public demanded it, this idea is taken to it’s special effect-laden zombie edge. Soldiers should just stop being such pussies. Especially the one’s from the newer wars which aren’t even real wars but more like strategic games. Now as Budman will tell you, Vietnam, that was a real mans war.

Summary: Just because you own some wooded land, a few fireworks, and a fog machine doesn’t mean you can film a scene for a movie and try to make people think it is Vietnam. But apparently the makers of Deathdream don’t follow that rule. In the opening scene of this movie they try to fool us into thinking they filmed in the jungles of vietnam which just happen to have a lot of maple trees. Luckily I am very smart and figured out that it was not Vietnam at all, but some shitty property in Wisconsin or something. I am very smart when it comes to things like that and it’s the reason why I was awarded this blog.

So we see a soldier (Andy) get killed, then we see his family get the notice that he’s dead, then we see a truck driver pick up a soldier hitchhiker, and then we see Andy arrive home late at night. he acts all detached and creepy and his hair is annoyingly perfect. His family disregards all this and instead laugh a lot as they try to get him to talk. Andy isn’t much for conversation though and just delivers brief replies to their questions.

The next day the truck driver that picked up Andy is found dead. I should note that Tom Savini did all the special effects for this movie. It was his first real job I think. As a result, I will try to photograph all the examples for all the fat nerds. Meanwhile, Andy and his family picnic with the mailman and Andy just sits there all quiet and zombie-like. Later that evening mom and dad argue about what a weirdo Andy is being.

Check out this fucking kitchen. Jesus christ that’s a lot of color. this movie is clearly running on a budget of $100. And all the sets are really crowded. Whatever house they filmed in has a hot water heater in the kitchen. I don’t think that’s up to code. So later that night Andy leaves the house and walks around a graveyard and stares in some chicks window. The next day some neighbor kids come to visit him.

So he kills the family dog in front of them. This makes Andy’s dad upset, so he goes to one of those 70s bars. By that I mean wood paneling, large mirrors, gawdy light fixtures, and of course a formica countertop-bar.

While at the bar Charlie invites the doctor home to take a look at Andy. After the visit the doctor starts to piece together that Andy may have killed the trucker and he tells Charlie. Later that night the doctor is in his office preparing to call the police, only Andy has cut the line! Remember that? So what are they going to do nowadays when killers are supposed to “cut the line.” I mean, I guess the modern day equivalent to that could be that the killer chases the person to an area with bad cell phone coverage. That might be plausible.

So then Andy kills the doctor and shoots up the doctors blood which apparently makes him so high he nods out. the next day Andy’s sister and her boyfriend decide to surprise Andy and his old girlfriend with a surprise double date. During the date Andy acts all cold and distant to his old girlfriend because she looks like my high school art teacher. That would cause any man to act distant. Meanwhile Charlie lies to the cops to try to throw them off Andy’s path. Whatever, so the deouble date goes to the drive-in where Andy’s head starts leaking puss so he attacks and kills his ex girlfriend, chases his sister, kills her boyfriend with an electrical cord, and runs over some other guy. When he returns home his mother is all delusional and tries to comfort him.

Andy is a full fledged zombie at this point and the make up looks really good. Clearly this is where Savini ironed out what his typical zombie technique would be. Charlie tries to shoot Andy but can’t, so he goes into his own bedroom and shoots himself. True gangster. All the while, the cops are closing in on the house. When they arrive mom escapes with Andy and the cops give chase. oddly enough all the police sirens seem to have been added in after the fact and sound like a really fake keyboard/oscillator doing an imitation of a police siren. Andy makes his mom drive him to the cemetery where he crawls into the grave he had picked out for himself. This reminds me of myself last year when I was all fucked up and was going to die. Anyway, just like how Andy half assed died in the war, he olny half ass burries himself. This is probably because he was in the military which is filled with a bunch of jocks that do everything half assed. These are the same type of people who join the electrical union. Then the movie ends.

There’s so much confusing stuff going on in this movie. First of all, how does John Marley wind up in something like this. But i guess if you look at the timing, it was the same year as The Godfather, so he may have been taking a lot of work at the time. Also, Marley played screen-husband to Lynne Carlin once before in Cassavetes Faces. That really only made it more awkward for me. Second, if this was Tom Savini’s first movie, it speaks volumes about his talent. The zombie soldier looks exactly like a zombie in Savini’s best work. Truely a great talent. Third, why the fuck did Bob Clark direct this stuff and then wind up doing A Christmas Story. I also have to mention that the writer did that Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things movie which I thought sucked. This film shouldn’t be grouped in with that type of schlock. Deathdream really can stand up on its own. I don’t know, more in depth nerd reviews can be found here, here, and here. And yes, Bob Clark has since directed Baby Geniuses. Oh, and way better screen caps can be found here. Marley is a man’s man by the way.

Poster and Box Art: I didn’t mention it above because I’m feeling a little rusty at this, but Deathdream was one of those movies that was marketed under 75 different names. They include The Night Andy Came Home, The Veteran, Whispers, and Dead of Night. That being said, the above poster is great, but it makes the movie look more like some type of spy/heist film. So when it came time for Gorgon to release a video version, you know they went all out and hired that stoner hessian kid from your gym class to draw the cover:

Fucking awesome. Again, would make a great metal album cover. I mean, a lot of these posters are really looking like the production team hired some guy to do rough sketches but then just when ahead and used the drafts for cover art. Hilarious.

Here’s a little newspaper ad from when it was marketed as Dead of Night. And here are some of the random foreign posters I could find:

Availability: There is a lovely totally remastered DVD available. You should buy it, I think you’ll be very pleased.

THE REINCARNATION OF PETER PROUD (1975)

Posted on December 12, 2007

Theme Song: I mean, what can I say. Lots and lots of variations on the riff from Superstar by The Carpenters and lots and lots of really, really bad synth stabs.

Interesting Dated References: Calling the telephone operator in order to ask her for the listing of a television channel. Pronouncing “Gandhi” like “candy.” Microfilm being a useful technology. Airports with green and brown interiors.

Best Line: “You’re a delicious man and I love you.” “A very unprofessional shiver just ran up my spine.”

Social Context: Well, in 1975 this didn’t have a social context so much as it had a social relevance. people were just getting into reincarnation and other such new age shitty belief systems. Luckily cocaine came along and made most people forget about these belief systems before they got too carried away. You can still find people into this shit if you live in California or some other state where people go to run away from reality.

Summary: Whenever a movie opens with a guy swimming naked and apologizing to Margot Kidder for saying stupid things when he was drunk, I automatically think I’m watching another movie about my life. It always seems to happen that way. Then when Margot Kidder beats the naked man with a paddle and he has enough time to react to the blow and cover his genitals for the underwater camera shot, that’s when I realize this isn’t about my life because I never seem to have time to cover my genitals when being attacked by Margot Kidder. Imagine if you were swimming naked and someone attacked you with a large wooden paddle. Would the first reaction be covering your genitals? I mean, I’m really self-conscious, but I still wouldn’t have the wherewithal to cover my genitals. As we watch the nude man sink to his death, it is suddenly revealed this is in fact a dream some guy named “Peter” is having.

Peter is a teacher and his girlfriend is naked a lot. Peter keeps having flashbacks about some guy scoring with a lot of chicks, one of whom is Margot Kidder. He feels a pain in the same spot as the guy who was hit with the paddle, yet his doctor, who looks like Paul Reubens, sees nothing wrong with him. And another thing, the entire motif of the soundtrack is some type of spaced-out chord progression rip off of “Superstar” by The Carpenters. It’s like “Superstar” via one of those shitty Tangerine Dream soundtracks. Did I ever tell you how terrible are those Tangerine Dream soundtracks? I will as soon as I encounter one. Ok, back to the plot. Peter’s psychologist recommends some “dream specialist” on the campus who may be able to help him, and Peter decides to meet with the specialist and be analyzed in this “dream machine” thing. Peter tells his frequently nude girlfriend all of this while in bed. Oh and get this, there are totally different bed sheets on the bed than there were in the beginning. This is very nice to see. Usually movies don’t address the problem with people not changing their bed sheets. it seems this movie was eager to encourage people to change their sheets.

The Doctor explains to Peter he’s not dreaming at all because nothing was registering on the “dream machine.” So they conclude they must be hallucinations, or something. After that Peter goes to an occult bookshop where Dolemite is leading some type of seminar on Satanism. Apparently Peter has already decided he’s been reincarnated because at dinner with his now-not-as-frequently-nude girlfriend he explains all of this to her. Here’s a picture of the doctor because I can’t find anything else of whichh to take pictures:

The doctor then suggests hypnosis to try to get to the bottom of the dreams and after Peter inexplicably feigns skepticism about hypnosis, he goes under.

After that, Peter decides to drive his hot girlfriend all over Massachusetts so he can attempt to figure out which town his past life is from. After she leaves he finally finds the town, where he then sets up shop in a hotel and goes about investigating his previous death. There are tons of nice exterior and interior shots of Massachusetts in the 70s if you’re into that type of thing. So yeah, annoying synth stabs, lots of driving around looking and stuff, and finally Peter finds his old home. The neighbor girl tells him the old lady who lives there has been away for years, but that she knows a secret way in.

It gets a little confusing because the neighbor girl (Suzy) has legs like a football player/your mom, but is wearing short-ass daisy dukes. Once in the house, Peter just wanders around as Suzy tries to get laid by lying seductively on furniture with her gigantic legs.

Holy fuck are these synthesizer noises getting annoying. I can’t think of anything more annoying in a soundtrack than flutes and synthesizers grouped together. Anyway, eventually he tracks down a girl at some country club who is the daughter of the dead guy he once was. I know, convoluted and confusing, all the more so that he appears to be flirting with her. Shit, they agree to a date and Peter comes face-to-face with the mother of the woman he is taking on the date who is also the lady his former self used to fuck. Kinky. Margot Kidder is wearing some shitty make-up and a gray wig to make her look older. After Peter leaves with the chick he’s trying to fuck/his daughter we see Margot Kidder slamming Smirnoff vodka.

The courtship continues and Margot Kidder gets increasingly vindictive and puts on worse and worse old person make-up. Eventually Peter meets his mother in the old folks home while he is on a date with his daughter who is actually a girl he is trying to fuck. The daughter is so proud of how Peter handles himself she tells Margot Kidder who gets all salty about it. Oh, and I should mention the girl Peter is dating who is also his daughter from a past life is played by Jennifer O’Neill of Summer of ‘42 fame. He tries to resist kissing her, but there’s no way he would be able to actually resist. I mean, she’s all 70s-hot. Curiosity would have naturally gotten the best of him. Sure enough, they go to Make-Out Point and he hooks that shit up. No more annoying stabbing synthesizers, either, it’s all swooning violins and shit now. The only stabbing going on in this movie now is… well, never mind. So this must be the one movie where O’Neill does not show her cans. Probably because of the father/daughter overtones. After they make it, they go back home for some coffee. Man, there’s no way Peter could explain himself now. What a dumbass. If I was him I would just split town. Or I would just keep banging Jennifer O’Neill and never go back to my other life or tell anyone about anything about reincarnation ever.

Sure enough, though, the dream doctor guy shows back up and tries to get Peter to come forward to the media with all his discoveries. Peter claims he doesn’t want to for “personal reasons.” I guess personal reasons mean getting to have sex with Jennifer O’Neill.

He even turns down swimming with her so he can take a nap and let Margot Kidder witness him having one of his dreams. I am totally bewildered as to how this has happened, but for some reason this movie has both kept me interested in the plot and made me mildly excited to see the conclusion. I can’t even fucking believe they are dragging this out for 105 minutes. Clearly this could have been a nice hour-long made-for-TV movie. I mean, seriously, this movie really has nothing going for it, yet I seem to be enjoying myself. Until…

Holy wait, what the fuck! Margot Kidder’s boobs and home plate? Not only that, but we’re supposed to believe she’s like 55-60 years old in this movie, so that means we’re also seeing old boobs and old home plate. I’m so confused. I can’t look at her sexually to begin with, let alone when she’s supposed to be a 55-60-year-old woman. They interspersed this bathtub nudity with a flashback of her getting raped by her husband (is that even possible?) who is now reincarnated as Peter Proud. Okay wait, now it just got a little more uncomfortable as she appears to be masturbating while thinking about getting sex forced upon her by her husband. After she climaxes, she starts crying. That I can relate to. Boy could I tell stories. Oh yeah, during that bizarre sequence we learn she killed her husband because he was cheating on her while she was pregnant, or something. Was Margot Kidder the one they found wandering around someone’s backyard all high and half naked in the 90s? Or was that Lynda Carter? And how the fuck do you have Margot Kidder naked in your movie and not Jennifer O’Neill? Where’s the logic in that? I’ve got a list of things I want to see before my life ends, but Margot Kidder nude masturbating in a bathtub was not on that list.

So in the final act, Peter decides to not come forward with his past life. All he needs to do to totally erase it from his mind is to visit the place where he died. I guess I forgot to mention the plot point that as he visited each place, more and more memories went away. He also has decided to marry O’Neill since he will have forgotten all about that time when he was her dad. Like a fucking idiot he goes swimming right out to the place his former self died. Kidder shows up, but this time instead of a row boat and an oar, she has a motorboat and a gun. She of course kills him and the movie ends. I’m not sure why I enjoyed this movie.

Poster and Box Art: Pictured at the beginning of this review is the 1980’s videocassette cover for this movie. For some shitty whimsical airbrush job, those are actually pretty good likeness’ to the stars in the movie. Although they automatically are disqualified for using the international symbol for mystery: a guy standing in a foggy doorway. Back in the 70s though, the movie was released to theaters with this poster:

Oh I can think of an audience that would be attracted to this movie poster. However, this audience isn’t the same crew that I would think had the desire to see Margot Kidder’s giant home plate. For some reason this image was used in all the 70s advertising for this movie. I think the guy that played the guy that was murdered was like a famous Playgirl model or something so I guess it was such a big deal that they had someone paint the image, add more muscles, and then tried to convince heterosexual males to come see the movie. it really seems like a bad idea and explains why they gave it the airbrushing in the 80s. Also of note on the poster, they really seem to be playing up the book, so it must have been pretty popular. Interestingly enough, in the beginning of the movie there’s a really cool title card:

That I can’t find used in any advertising material for this fucking movie! And it’s totally awesome, and they just like, never used it for anything but the first few seconds of the movie. It makes no goddamn sense! Oh, and again, this is when movie titles had a poster and a logo.

Availability: For some reason, more than likely Margot Kidder and her giant bush and masturbation scene, dealers are charging a lot for this on VHS. No dvd.

THE LIBERATION OF L.B. JONES (1969)

Posted on December 12, 2007

Theme Song: Holy shit. Elmer Bernstein does a really good funk-jazz-soundtrack fusion thing here. I mean, it seems ripe for mega-hip-hop-producer sampling, but they never dig deeper than what they hear their one nerd friend talk about. Those dudes are the laziest people in the world. I mean come the fuck on, what the hell happened to rap music?

Interesting Dated References: Racial tensions.

Best Line: “To hell with the white man.” “Maybe you heard about the nifgger undertaker who wants a divorce.” (That last one sounds like the start of a joke my Uncle will probably tell me at Christmas dinner.)

Social Context: There’s tons of it here, but it all applies to the 60s and the south, and I’m just a white kid from the midwest who grew up in the 80s/90s so I shouldn’t even try to act like I understand what issues are being addressed. That’s more respectful than trying to talk about it and act like I can relate like some more liberal bleeding-heart types would do.

Summary: The Liberation of L. B. Jones is a very confusing movie for a few reasons. First of all, it was an exploitation/blaxploitation movie a few years ahead of its time. Secondly, it was filmed on what are obviously Hollywood sets in a very Hollywood environment, thereby giving it the feel of a bad play. Thirdly, it was one of the last movies directed by a man who was viewed as a Hollywood filmmaker. As a result of all this, it was treated like a boring Hollywood movie by everyone who saw it and was later disregarded by many in the exploitation/blaxploitation circles. If you changed any one of these factors, The Liberation of L. B. Jones would be regarded as one of the classics in the aforementioned genres, right up there with In The Heat of The Night. I guess to sum it up in a way that makes sense, The Liberation of L. B. Jones has a cheesy 1960s feel with what is clearly a very 1970s story line, at least as far as movie making goes.

The movie begins with a young Yaphett Kotto jumping off of a train with nothing but a cigar box containing a gun inside, and he is immediately harassed by two police officers. They ask him a few questions and then send him on his way. Then out of nowhere comes the awesome Elmer Bernstein soundtrack. At the train station we see a well-to-do Lee Cobb greeting his nephew (Lee Majors) and his wife (Barbara Hershey). Cobb is a wealthy southern lawyer whose name is, get this, Oman Hedgepath. People’s names suck now, don’t they? Mike, John, Tyler, Xander. Fuck that shit. Give me a room full of Oman’s any day. The nephew is fresh from law school and is going to study under his uncle. I can’t believe how slim Kotto looks. He buys some groceries from a guy and gets in an argument after the grocer sees the gun. It pops off without incident, though, and he moves on. There are a whole lot of racial overtones going on as well.

Back at the law offices, the two whites are getting situated when in walks L.B. Jones who is played by Roscoe Lee Browne. Jones wants to get divorced from his hot-ass wife because she has committed adultery. The combination of Cobb and Browne work really work well together. Two old professionals having it out. Goddammit, won’t you listen to me? I’m telling you these fake-ass sets ruined this movie for the general public! My anger is then subsided by more funky Elmer Bernstein soundtrack. In the next scene we see Kotto finally arrive at his home, which is also a restaurant/bar. When Kotto confronts his mom it becomes apparent he’s been away for a long time. Back at the law offices the nephew convinces Cobb to take the divorce case L.B. Jones presented.

L.B. is the town undertaker and owns a successful business. Apparently this is a matter of resentment amongst a lot of the town whites. His wife is also a 22-year-old tramp who is having an affair with a white cop and she’s flaunting it quite freely in his face. And if anyone can make sense of this dance scene, be my guest. So yeah, we get some more background about Kotto who was away for 13 years, and how he’s come back to take revenge on someone. His mom and the dancing guy try to dissuade him from doing so. The incident that spurred this revenge streak is never clarified, though.

Meanwhile, L.B. negotiates with his wife about why she hired a lawyer to contest the divorce. She berates him and tells him how her cop lover is twice the man he’ll ever be. Browne, who plays L.B., does an excellent and understated job with his character. I’m telling you, it’s the shitty sets (seen above) that ruined this movie. Let me explain the main conflict going on here: L.B. wants the divorce because his wife is having an affair with a white cop. If people find out the white cop is having the affair with the black woman, it will cause trouble for the cop. Therefore, Cobb is trying to dissuade him from going to trial with the divorce in order to save everyone some trouble in a town where racial tensions seem to already be at a boiling point. L.B. will not heed advice and demands the case proceed. After L.B. leaves, Cobb explains to his nephew he once fell in love with a black woman, even came to see her as “a real person.” This is supposed to add a layer of tension to the plot, but the monologue comes off a little heavy-handed. The gist of it is that Cobb feels he has no right to call out the cop (Willie Joe) when he did the same thing. Apparently everyone in this town bangs black chicks but thinks it’s some cardinal sin rather than very erotic, like it is these days.

So yeah, a bunch more racial tension. Cobb tires to talk some sense into Willie Joe the cop in order to terminate the affair. The nephew tries to convince Cobb he can “change things in this town,” and shit like that. The main point here is no one is willing to confront the racism stuff. Willie Joe then goes to confront his lover because she won’t go along with the divorce. He beats her up and threatens her with a gun. She tells him she’s pregnant by him, though, which I guess explains why she wants to stay married to the wealthy undertaker. I know I’m summing all of this up really quickly because I’m too busy trying to find funny pictures to take, but all of this stuff is the main conflict of the story line. Then the Random Dancing Girl strikes again. Only this time it’s for L.B. and he keeps hallucinating it’s his ex-wife. Then the cops are shown raping a black woman because she wants her husband out of jail. Again, really heavy stuff, but the overwhelming 60s cheesiness of the film is a little off-putting. Man, I’m sure you guys are going to complain that the blog was too serious and analytical this week, but I assure you I’ll be back to reviewing shitty Troma movies soon. Stick with me. We’ve got 6.5 years left until I’m done.

Willie Joe tries to confront L.B. about the divorce case and “reason” with him. Kotto is semi-involved because his mother is friends with L.B. Willie Joe hollers a bunch at L.B., but he’s really hard to understand. Basically he tries to warn L.B. to drop the case. Also, Kotto is stalking this farmer guy.

Isn’t he handsome? I really think Kotto made the mistake of doing too much 80s schlock and everyone forgot what a good actor he was. Well I suggest everyone revisit his early work. The farmer he is hunting must be the man who wronged him. As he stalks him, he takes aim but does not fire his gun. This shows him he has moved on from the incident, or something meaningful. It makes sense, but I’m not going to try to summarize it. Kotto feels vindicated and no longer desires to kill the man who wronged him. As the court date comes up, the cops do their best to blackmail (no pun intended) L.B. by arresting his friends, etc. I’m sorry for that “no pun intended” remark, but I couldn’t resist.

Unfortunately, the redneck cops eventually get the best of L.B., and on the eve of the court date they pull him over and chase him into a junkyard. This is a very well done scene in which L.B. realizes he can’t run from the whites anymore and has to confront them. All the cowardice and complacency he exhibited earlier evaporates as he just walks out in front of the cops after hiding for a spell. The cops, because they are rednecks, shoot him because he refuses to call off the divorce. This scene is actually really nice and I did not do it justice because I have trouble taking things seriously, especially when I realize a Betamax movie is a really well done social diatribe about racism in America and I am drunk on a $95 bottle of scotch.

L.B. is then found hanging in the junkyard and Kotto covers up his body in a well-shot emotional scene. Kotto mumbles to himself about how, “When the time came I didn’t do nothing.” I assume he’s referring to when he was going to kill the white retired cop who wronged him. Cobb then gets a call that L.B. is dead and suddenly becomes a race activist as he stops the cops from wrongly convicting L.B.’s friend as the killer.

And for some reason the cops show Cobb the taser they used to get the false confessions. This leads to Willie Joe (played by Anthony Zerbe) giving a rather good performance. I think he was Dog Boy in Cool Hand Luke, and therefore I have a soft spot for him. But since Cobb himself feels guilty for loving what he calls a “negro woman,” he lets Willie Joe go. There’s no real logic to this and it actually lessens the impact of the movie, but whatever, like I said at the beginning, this movie is flawed.

This corruption affects everyone. The nephew sees the corruption and decides to split town. And Kotto then becomes revitalized and decides to finally take revenge on the retired cop who beat him up as a youngster, since he has now seen justice is never served.

Just when you think the gun is finally going to come into play, Kotto sort of pushes him into a hay bailer. Not only is that pretty graphic for the end of an early exploitation/blaxploitation film, but it’s also pretty graphic for 1969:

They even show the dummy body being pulled in and everything. Then, in the extremely awesome closing scene, we see the nephew and his wife leaving on the same train as Kotto. Once the camera zooms in on Kotto, the closing choir music is replaced by the sound of the hay bailer chugging away. I know it doesn’t sound that great, but it was pretty awesome.

So yeah, this was directed by William Wyler who has a ton of movies under his belt, including: Roman Holiday, The Big Country, Ben-Hur, Funny Girl, etc. This was one of his last efforts. Unfortunately, it was mishandled and has now wound up on my blog where I try to act like I respect things but really I don’t.

Poster and Box Art: SO the above poster is pretty boring. In fact it looks terrible. The soft pastel coloring and stuff just do nothing for me. However, you will notice the totally awesome logo-type and image accompanying at the bottom. See, this is when movies featured not only a poster, but a logo with an awesome icon/image. These logo/icon/images were then used on all one color printed materials and small newspaper ads because back in the day photos looked like shit when they were reduced too small. As a result, there’s all these awesome icon things that you find on posters back in the day. This one is pretty risque too, since the corpse of L.B. hanging on a hook could easily be mistaken for a man hanging by a rope. Anyway, the above poster was obviously aimed to cater to women.

This one on the other hand seems aimed at racists and people who liked the color magenta. Maybe that’s the same audience, I’m not sure, I haven’t gotten my newsletter in a while. This poster is way stronger than the first one though.

This one seems aimed at wife beaters, but again, they are really showcasing the awesome logo-type and icon image on the right. It’s stuff like this that really makes me hate computers and the way everything is shiny these days.

This Spanish/Italian poster really seems to be capitalizing on something, but I’m not sure what. Without a doubt this poster would not have flown in America.

And look here, someone had to go in and do a nice painting of the photo for another poster. That’s awesome. Can you imagine a time when a photo was less desirable than a nice hand rendered painting? That would be awsome. Now they just say “Oh you got a photo, can we make it look shinier in Photoshops?” Fuck now. And you guessed it…

As always the polish/german poster fucking rules. It rules so much I just bought it on the world wide web. I know it’s been awhile since I posted a polish poster, but it’s been awhile since I reviewed a movie that got one.

Not only that, but this movie has 2 polish posters. This one is even better. Weird fist-hat-cop-thing. Look at that shit! Jesus.

Availability: Used VHS for ridiculous prices.

CITY OF THE WALKING DEAD (1980)

Posted on December 2, 2007

Theme Song: Some decent funky bass-line stuff and a nice soundtrack overall. Performed by Stelvio Cipriani.

Interesting Dated References: Lots of late-70s interior and exteriors. You can’t ask for much more dated references than that. Also included are wood grain, the color “burnt sienna,” gigantic telephones, and some type of large fax machine that was the size of a copier. Also of note is the fact the box for the movie clarifies “In Current Theatrical Release.” I’m not sure what that means, but I’ve never really seen it before.

Best Line: Said by a man with a perm — “The shaft has a lot of air.”

Social Context: A bunch of liberal agenda shit I cover in the summary.

Summary: There’s a fucking guy in this movie name Ubo Bologna. I just had to get that off my chest. And wait a minute… too much hilarity for typing right now. Okay, I’m back. Okay, how do I explain this in a rational manner. There’s a town, and within that town is some type of radiation leak that only affects a single plane in the air. A bunch of reporters, including our main character who I think is this Mel Ferrer guy billed in the credits, wind up at the airport. The plane lands and police and military surround it. After a few minutes the plane door opens and a bunch of people emerge who are now zombies that can not only run fast, but also know how to use weapons. Now their weapons seem to be stolen from a bunch of bikers as they only wield large knives and a bunch of chains. These zombies also appear to have their faces covered in burnt ground beef. They proceed to attack all the military while the reporters watch.

Burnt ground beef. So Ferrer escapes with his cameraman. After that, the camera pans all over the ground showing the dead military personnel.

Then suddenly we are on the set of some disco-dancing-aerobics commercial. Hot! Ferrer interrupts the commercial with his special newscast about the zombie attack. He is shut off by unscrupulous bosses who tell him not to inform the public. Then there’s a bunch of political dialogue about how the government has no right to interfere with the freedom of the press and Ferrer quits his job. My washing machine is making a bunch of goddamn noise like I put a pair of shoes in it, but I am not drunk and I clearly do not remember doing so. Ferrer then tries to contact his wife who works at the hospital. She is already at work so he just hangs up. And now it’s time for nudity.

I don’t know whose breast this is or who the old man is, but as the lovemaking starts, a phone rings and I suppose we’re about to find out who these people are. Turns out the guy making time with the chick is some important military guy.

Now that I think about it, this may actually be Mel Ferrer. Yeah, I’m almost certain that’s him. He was on Falcon Crest or Dallas or some shit. I don’t know what I was thinking saying that reporter guy was Mel Ferrer. Once I finish this review I should go back through and straighten these character identifications out, but I will probably forget. I wish there was a way to remind myself to do so.

Then it’s time for more of the disco-dancing-aerobics program back at the television studio! Hooray! This scene goes on about three minutes too long before the zombies with weapons invade the sets. There are weird slow motion shots of them killing women with clubs and a lot of blood squirting around. For some reason there’s a graphic shot of a zombie cutting off a woman’s nipple as well. I would try to take a picture of it, but it sounds a lot better than it looks. Some other dork took the effort to digitize part of this scene, which I then stole and uploaded and acted like I did it myself. The Reporter Guy, whom I no longer will identify as Mel Ferrer but just as Reporter Guy, is still at the studio despite having just quit. I guess when he quits he sticks around and says goodbye and gathers up his stuff unlike most other people I’ve seen quit who just start crying and run out of the building as quickly as possible. In order to defend himself, Reporter Guy throws a TV at two of the zombies. The TV then instantly ignites in flames because apparently it was one of those old televisions that you had to fill with gas in order for it to work. The Reporter Guy is so confident in his ability to escape the zombies he doesn’t even close doors behind himself. I’m also noticing the zombies only seem to be able to run fast when they are wielding weapons, all other times they just sort of stumble around.

So Reporter Guy escapes and heads to the hospital to rescue his wife. Meanwhile, the big brass analyzes a body and tries to figure out a method of attack. This includes Mr. Ferrer squinting a lot, as a guy with a mustache talks a lot about radiation. The mustachioed gentleman explains that zombies must be shot in the head and the zombies must be stopped from feeding on fresh blood, which they need to replace their bad blood. Oh, and as expected, people who get bitten by zombies will then turn into zombies. The whole nuclear spin on things is pretty interesting and seemed to be just coming into vogue at the time this film was made. Ferrer then calls the chick he was banging and tells her to lock all her doors.

Man, these zombies are even smart enough to cut phone lines. Ferrer the Army General tries to notify his daughter to take shelter. She and her mustachioed lover disregard the army escort and try to sneak out for the weekend, or some romantic shit. They escape, but the army escort and some chick with boobs do not.

Again, burnt ground beef. So back to Reporter Guy who is trying to get to his wife at the hospital as the whole emergency breaks out. Oh, and back at the military base, there’s a full scale zombie riot going on. Do I need to remind you the zombies are wielding things like axes, machetes, pocket knives, garden pruners, etc.? Yeah, it’s a little confusing, but I guess pretty interesting. All the top brass decide to disregard the government’s recommendation and declare a state of emergency. This is done with all kinds of liberal anti-government talk, as well. And yeah, meanwhile, Reporter Guy is hanging out at the hospital waiting for his wife. Somehow amid all the chaos he finds her and they flee. There are also a lot of nurses getting their blouses ripped open and exposing their breasts.

The next morning Reporter Guy and his wife are driving around. Somehow she had time to totally redo her hair and make it look all nice. At the military base the general guy still can’t find his daughter and her mustachioed boyfriend. Then there’s some more liberal dialogue about how mankind is constantly seeking greater things and it will lead to our destruction. How eye-opening! So the boyfriend guy, who is now named Bob, and his red sweater try to rationalize with the military guy’s daughter about what they should do. After hearing there is a state of emergency they try to figure out if they should go back to town or not. They are then met by another couple who are already zombies. The zombies use a harpoon gun to kill them. Yes, a harpoon gun. Clearly they are pulling out all the stops. Ferrer’s girlfriend, who has been holed up since he called her, lets a neighbor in. They try to hide in a cellar and the neighbor is then killed.

She gets her eye cut out. After they cut her eye out, the zombies stab her boobs a bunch of times. There seems to be a lot of boob stuff going on which either means the directors had some type of symbolism going on about breasts being the source of life, or they were just looking for an excuse to put a bunch of boobs in the movie in order to increase viewers. I’ll go with the latter.

Reporter Guy and his wife find some gas station diner place to hide at. And jesus christ, there are more speeches about how modern conveniences (electricity, city life, machines, etc.) have led to this downfall. There’s clearly an agenda with this script. I hate it when they try to infuse these agendas into zombie movies in an effort to justify all the gore. I’m glad this tendency passed, or at least they got more subtle so we wouldn’t noticed as we watch these shitty movies while half drunk and on blood pressure medication. Not that I’m describing what I’m doing right now. Oh, and most of these monologues are being delivered by Reporter Guy’s wife. They talk about running away and how there’s nowhere else to go. Then there are some overhead helicopter shots of all the zombies and even a dog as the military guys fly around.

Ferrer is in one of the helicopters and he tries to relay some information despite there already being a police state in action. Reporter Guy and his wife take refuge in a church, but are then attacked by a preacher with, you guessed it, burnt ground beef on his face. Back at the military base the guy with the mustache says they have some type of gas to fight the zombies, but for some reason the plan isn’t put into action. Ferrer continues to maverick around on his own in a helicopter, looking for the chick he was banging. Eventually he finds and shoots her. Elsewhere, Reporter Guy and his wife find an amusement park and a machine gun and go on a zombie killing spree. After the gun runs out of bullets, Reporter Guy throws it at one of the zombies. Apparently since it is a gun, when you throw it, it will take flight at the same speed as a gun and will knock you down just like a bullet. Then they climb a rollercoaster and throw grenades at the zombies. And he finds another gun and shoots some more. Then there are some more heads exploding, and as they climb a rope, Reporter Guy’s wife falls off. This leads to a pretty well done and entertaining “body falling through rollercoaster scaffolding” sequence.

Did I mention that Reporter Guy is totally looking like a less chubby Zach Galifianakis at this point? Well, he does. Oh, and then Reporter Guy wakes up and realizes it’s all a dream. As he gets out of bed to do the exact same thing he did at the beginning of the movie, it’s revealed it’s all about to happen again. Since they want the viewer to relive the experience, I stop the movie and watch it all again and at the end of the movie Reporter Guy wakes up and realizes it’s all a dream. As he gets out of bed to do the exact same thing he did at the beginning of the movie, it’s revealed it’s all about to happen again. Since they want the viewer to relive the experience, I stop the movie and watch it all again. At the end of the movie Reporter Guy wakes up and realizes it’s all a dream. As he gets out of bed to do the exact same thing he did at the beginning of the movie, it’s revealed it’s all about to happen again. Since they want the viewer to relive the experience, I stop the movie and watch it all again. Oh wait, no I don’t. Fuck this shit. Then the credits roll. To clarify, I still think Mel Ferrer was the military guy not Reporter Guy.

City of The Walking Dead is not a bad movie. Although extremely dated and foreign, it’s still good zombie entertainment. It has good special effects, a good enough story, acting, and camera work. This is quality entertainment, albeit second- or possibly even third-rate fare. I should point out that this was directed by well noted Italian director Umberto Lenzi and was originally released as Nightmare City.

Poster and Box Art: The poster for this movie has everything you need: cars crashing, people running, a helicopter, an ominous hand, and explosion, and even a woman in peril. There’s tons of poster variations for this movie, most under the Nightmare City title.

I think this is an alternate American poster. It really tries to jam everything into one image. i mean, this would make an excellent heavy metal album cover that your older brother had to sneak into the house, but as a movie poster it just looks a little too “in your face.” Like I said, there’s a billion different variations on the above. A few examples:

Availability: It is available under the title Nightmare City. I think it’s a good print and everything, but no bonus features.

CASTLE OF THE WALKING DEAD (1967)

Posted on December 2, 2007

Theme Song: None

Interesting Dated References: England being a source of movie entertainment. Castles being scary. Scary things in general being scary.

Best Line: None

Social Context: This movie again attempts to analyze why the British suck at making horror movies. It makes a strong case for why they are not good at it, but they could have saved some time and instead simply written on a piece of paper, “The British suck at making horror movies.” That would have saved all of us a little time.

Summary: I wonder how many more times in the history of this blog I’m going to say the following sentence: Oh man, not another shitty British horror movie starring Christopher Lee set in England back in the day.” I really hope it’s not as often as I’ve been saying “Fuck. Another one of those shitty Troma movies.” For some reason it seems like both of those genres have the same type of fan base. You know, people who are nice enough, but they would be a lot better if they didn’t try to act as if they like obscure shit and would just go with the flow. For example, instead of trying hard to act like you enjoy shitty slapstick 80s horror movies, just be honest and admit you only like them because in 8th grade you thought they were obscure and cool to like. But yet, you refused to throw away your Toxic Avenger shirt because you didn’t want to look like an ass. Now you are forced to buy Troma DVDs all the time and you don’t even know why. You’d be better off collecting STDs, and lord knows you aren’t making any progress doing that.

People are stupid, and the things they like and hold dear are stupid. Much like Troma movies, these shitty old British horror movies are giant piles of shit. They were never good. They were never innovative. They were never even average. People who think they are “classics” or “groundbreaking” have the same sense of logic as people who think old paintings are good. Just because something is old doesn’t make it good. Old art, old books, old movies. All that shit sucks. The only exception is rock music from the 70s. All the rest of that shit sucks. The 60s? Yeah, kiss my ass. That decade blew. The only good thing about the 50s was women knew their place, and everything else before that sucked because you had to send telegrams and shit. Basically every movie made before 1965 sucks shit. I dare you to name one good movie made back then. Yeah, you can’t. Neither can I. It’s like generation after generation of shitty media and then The Wild Bunch, Faces and Cool Hand Luke came out and everyone snapped out of it and was like, “Oh ok, I get it. Shit’s on now.” So yeah, anyone who is says, “Oh I love those old British Horror classics starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing,” is a fucking loser. For real.

So far the plot of this movie involves some old count being killed for killing women, then it flashes forward like 30 years and some rich pompous doofus gets invited to the castle the count lived in. Along the way he stumbles upon a woman who is also going to the castle. Then the music gets abnormally funky as they approach the castle. Then there are a bunch of choppy edits. This review sounds just like the review for And Now The Screaming Starts…, but without the shitty animatronic hand, which was the only thing making that one interesting. So the driver of the carriage starts to trip balls as he goes through the forest, and he thinks he sees a bunch of people hanging in the woods. This would be cool, and I would have taken a picture, if it weren’t for the fact they were clearly a bunch of shitty British dummies. Then the driver dies and the dude and the chick and a few others are stranded. Isn’t this just fascinating? Then there’s a spooky graveyard followed by a spooky cave. I’m sorry, I’m really being an asshole about this, aren’t I? I understand there may be some readers who are seriously into these old British horror movies. I apologize.

So everyone eventually arrives at the castle. The woman who was picked up is suddenly transformed into some type of heiress and she shows the British guy and his priest-friend around. There are gigantic Hieronymus Bosch paintings on the wall, and all types of old castle furniture and shit, as well. There are also snakes and stuff. Eventually the woman snaps out of her trance and the British guy and his priest-friend try to free her and the other girl who I guess was with them. Medieval torture stuff ensues, as well as walking around caves with torches. They stumble around these fucking caves and act all confused for like 30 fucking minutes. Insanity.

Then the servant guy (who sort of looks like Robert Blake right after he walked out of his trial) gets everyone in a room and starts to resurrect the count guy.

I guess at this point I should mention his name was Count Regula. That kind of sounds like the name of a rapper — “Count Regula in the house, yo! My rhymes and the caliber of women I have sex with is mad Regula.” Once Regula is resurrected, he divulges his plan to kill the guy and the girl because they are relatives of the people who sentenced him to be killed.

Can you believe this makeup job? I did myself up with better zombie/vampire makeup for the last five Halloweens. These old movies really didn’t try too hard. Apparently they thought shitty soundtracks would make you scared. Or perhaps they thought bad edits would do the same thing, but they don’t. The relatives are then tortured in some type of cave meth lab.

Even my jokes are getting fucking as long and drawn out as this movie. The Brit guy is getting tortured by a pendulum. Yeah, a pendulum. That mainstay of the genre. Who the fuck is really that scared of a pendulum? I mean, in a way isn’t it kind of exciting? Like, you know what’s coming, all you have to do is sit there and wait for it to happen. I’d think it would be rather liberating, much like being on death row would be. I’m talking about actual death row not Death Row Records, just in case you thought I was still in my Count Regula personality. While the Brit guy waits for the pendulum to kill him, the chick tries to save him by running through the caves and encounters the following scary things: vultures, tarantulas, rats, wind, a drawbridge, a scary door, more wind, snakes, wind with gusts of leaves, and finally a few more snakes. And all this fucking time the pendulum is still swinging. And just when it’s about to hit, he somehow gets it to cut only his ropes! Fucking bullshit. Don’t you think the pendulum engineers would have considered this and made it descend at a rate more than a sixteenth of an inch each pass over? Like, what about a more liberal descent. Maybe one inch? What the fuck.

So Brit guy escapes and Count Regula hangs out in his meth lab. He declares he’s making acid, but not like the hey-I’m-in-art-school-lets-do-acid type of acid, but the acid that burns your face and stuff. Oh, fucking hell. Brit guy uses a cross medallion to defeat Count Regula. He gets all prolific and declares the cross “his own pendulum.” So all the bad guys die, and the good guys escape, and the priest gives this super expressionistic laugh:

This is actually pretty funny and somehow saved the movie for me. Not in the respect I’d watch it again, but more from the standpoint it made me chuckle and not want to die as much. Then the credits roll. Oh wait, there are no fucking credits. That’s great. This is such a bastardized film they cut off all the credits except for the name of the movie at the beginning, which was presented in an 80s computer font, so you know this shit’s mad retitled.

If you really want to learn about shitty old British horror movies, go talk to someone who cares, like at this website.

Poster and Box Art: This movie has terrible box art. In fact the betamax box just has a barely colorized version of the photo displayed above. But instead of a bunch of German words it just says “Castle of The Walking Dead.” How exciting. I looked around for a bit trying to find other German posters for the 20 different movie titles this movie had but I couldn’t find a single one. I should also mention that I didn’t try very hard. Here is the DVD cover which is pretty brazen in its claim of the movie being an “original euroshocker”:

Availability: Like most shitty 1960’s British horror movies, this too is available on DVD. I don’t know why and it irritates me to no end. meanwhile movies like Tick… Tick… Tick… and Believe In Me just sit around in some vault rotting away.

PERFECT STRANGERS (1984)

Posted on November 20, 2007

Theme Song: The bewildering “I’m a Shadow (On The Walls of The City)” written and performed by Michael Minard.

Interesting Dated References: Pretending you don’t see anything when there is a crime being committed. This differs from the modern day standard of filming the crime with your cell phone and then uploading the movie file to “Internet 2.0.” Also equally as dated is The Estranged Husband referring to himself as “a commercial artist.”

Best Line: Addressed to a two year old boy by a 35-year-old man while giving the child a bath — ” … because sometimes friends have secrets. There are things that Mommy doesn’t need to know. Mommy shouldn’t know. Sometimes grown-ups and Kids can have secrets, too, but you gotta be able to trust them. The police must never find out. Never.”

Social Context: There’s no social context here, just some bad “thriller” action. I guess there is something to be said for yet another good 70s B-Movie director being forced into doing bad 80s schlock. Larry Cohen wrote some classic 70s stuff: El Condor, God Told Me To, Hell Up In Harlem, It’s Alive, and a few others. Why in the 80s he was reduced to doing shit like this and the Maniac Cop trilogy we’ll never know. My guess would be a $3,000-a-week PCP habit.

Summary: The entire plot of this movie is ri-goddamn-diculous. Seriously. Scrawny Hitman stabs a man in alley. Small boy witnesses crime. Hitman then stalks boy but falls in love with mother. Not only that, but it says it’s a “thriller” on the box and also claims to cost $79.95. Ah, the good old days. Okay, so the murder happens, The Kid sees, the killer sees The Kid, the killer gets yelled at for leaving a witness by his mob boss, and The Kid and his Mom go about their business, which includes having The Mom partake in some bizarre feminist dialogue with her friend in what appears to be an old thrift store, but could possibly be the magic shop from Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure. I was just getting ready to pan this movie off when things start to take a turn for the absurd.

First off, the feminist shop owner babbles on about the meeting and some convention occurring that weekend. She is like a pro-gun feminist who wants to kill men. The Mom character sort of brushes her off, but agrees to attend the weekend meeting. Then we’re back to the Mob Hitman whom it turns out is actually a graffiti artist who spray-paints his silhouette on walls all over the city.

Way ahead of his time. This must be the movie that influenced that Rage Against The Machine album cover or that spoiled-child-artist Bansky guy. Who would have thought that Perfect Strangers would have such a legacy. Oh yeah, and finally it gets really absurd when there’s an awesome theme song (see link above). I mean, I’m fucking bombarded here. Let’s not forget that after he finishes his graffiti art that he throws his spray can in the river. You know, so there’s no evidence. And the whole time he makes “street art” this terrible song about a shadow is playing. Get it? Because he’s spray painting a shadow. Fucking far-out.

I have to complain about something else that’s going on here, though. Now granted the smooth jazz soundtrack of Taxi Driver was very fitting and sounded really good within the film, but unfortunately what happened afterward was terrible and ruined a great deal of shitty movies of the early 80s. All filmmakers got it in their head that if they were going to film in New York, they had to have a similar, but more third-rate version of the Taxi Driver soundtrack. It’s fucking miserable, let me tell you.

So after some mildly intrusive stalking, The Hitman finally makes contact with the mother who is apparently a slut because she’s all open to his advances and even indicates she noticed him stalking her. This never happens in real life. I mean, girls notice you stalking them, but they are never open to my, err, your advances. Absurd, I tell you. This movie is absurd.

And look at this insane mafioso comb-over. Christ. So The Hitman’s mob bosses tell him to befriend The Mom and then make The Kid have an accident. The mob boss also makes a bizarre reference to ‘Nam and The Hitman killing a bunch of Kids he dropped bombs on.

Oh wonderful. The Mom is handing out flyers at her pointless and all-for-naught feminist rally when The Kid is Kidnapped. As she runs around looking for him, the music switches from bad-Taxi-Driver-style sax solos to full on The Never Ending Story synths. But then it turns out that it’s The Kid’s Estranged dad and The Mom chases him down and they argue on the street while everyone stands around and tries to figure out how two such bad actors got a scene together. Then The Mom invites The Hitman to a rape convention.

No not that kind of a rape convention, a “Stop Rape” convention. How dare you have such terrible thoughts. Fucking-A. This rape convention is the insane. They are doing some type of chant like “2-4-6-8, (something-something) we won’t be raped,” and they are holding up signs that read, “Porn is Woman Hate.” And best of all, The Hitman joins right in with The Kid on his shoulders. Seriously, this shit is straight-up confusing. There isn’t even any real character development. It’s just absurd situation after absurd situation. Then, on only their second date and after leaving the rape convention, The Hitman scores with The Mom. I bet she’s one of those feminists who think she’s in control of her body and sleeps with guys a lot. Yeah, good morals. Eww, there’s even a really non-sexy nude sex scene later on. I’m really not getting into this, at all. The Hitman is also so smart he leaves his convertible top down. This, of course, results in The Estranged Husband urinating in his car.

Fucking hilarious. The Estranged Husband hires a private dick to find out dirt on The Mom’s mysterious new boyfriend, and several times makes reference to the fact he (The Estranged Husband) is a commercial artist. Then he convinces The Mom to go out to eat, where she explains their marriage didn’t work out because he treated her like “one of his sketches.” They’re really beating this point into the ground. And this scene where the two are at dinner lasts for-fucking-ever! Didn’t I used to take pictures of the screen when I was watching movies? I guess that was when good stuff was happening. Now nothing is really going on. Somehow The Hitman brings The Kid to his awesome 80s apartment and apparently falls in love with The Kid (this is after giving him a bath earlier in the movie). Then The Mob Guys show up and The Hitman hides The Kid because he knows they are there to kill The Kid. Oh wait, while The Hitman is distracting The Mob Guys, The Kid does a hilarious impression of me hanging out with my dad in 1984:

Yeah, isn’t that cute? Isn’t that darling? Wouldn’t it be funny to pay your son a nickel every time he brought you a beer? Yeah, that would just be hilarious. Let’s do it! For years on end! Okay, so The Hitman is a pansy and can’t kill The Kid. The cops are harassing The Mom, and The Kid keeps playing with knives. Things start to get not as absurd until we meet:

Carl. Carl is played by that guy from the sitcom Coach with the blonde hair and hoarse voice. What the fuck, for real. He roughs up The Hitman a bit. This upsets The Hitman and he tries to convince The Mom to move away, only she can’t because now she’s being hassled by the cops to admit to seeing something. This frustrates The Hitman so much he tires to make The Kid fall off of a swing. This is interrupted by The Estranged Father and a fight amongst the playground equipment ensues. The Hitman wins and then flees. The Estranged Husband gets an “I’ve been beat up” make-up job that you and I could do in your bathroom with five dollars. The next day The Mom leaves The Kid unattended on some type of makeshift carousel mounted to the back of a pick-up truck, which The Hitman then steals. The director actually takes advantage of this absurd situation and films from inside the carousel as The Kid spins around in traffic. I’m not making this up. Then there’s some type of showdown in some type of abandoned factory involving some type of feminist gang, and The Hitman dies.

Poster and Box Art: The box art for this movie is hilarious in that it features some muscular dude and some blonde woman with short hair who are both absent from the actual film. God bless it. On the positive side of things, it is a well-illustrated cover that could have been much more terrible.

Availability: Perfect Strangers is available on DVD but I cannot tell you why. Meanwhile awesome 70s movies rot away in obscurity. Also of note is the fact that the sitcom adaptation of the film is also available on DVD.