Late Night Cable Horror Review: Paranormal Sexperiments (2016, dir. Terrance Ryker)


The movie opens up with a shot of a house from Erotic Vampires Of Beverly Hills (2015) and College Coeds vs. Zombie Housewives (2015).

Erotic Vampires Of Beverly Hills (2015, dir. Dean McKendrick)

College Coeds vs. Zombie Housewives (2015, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Inside, we meet Cosgrove (Robert Donavan). He starts off the film talking to a painting of Erika Jordan who plays Lady Dracovich. He tells her that she thought she would live forever, but that death got her anyways. He seems to imply that he had something to do with her death.

Of course within seconds of him walking away, she appears on the stairs to make a threat, and start the opening credits.

Now it’s time to meet our main character. That would be Cindy, played by Blair Williams. She’s visiting Madame Zola, played Kira Noir.

After saying some stuff, Zola presses a remote control, and releases some special effects.

I think the ghosts are at the bottom of the screen, and not on the ceiling, Cindy.

It’s pretty funny. She will look almost every direction except where we see the ghosts.

Cindy wants to know her future. Zola lays it on pretty thick. All you need to know is that she has a glowing ball, a remote control for effects, and she recently “repossessed” the powers of the psychic world that allow her to know all.

In order to help Cindy, Zola needs to know what Cindy’s fears are. Those would be the following:

  1. Enclosed spaces
  2. Open spaces
  3. Hot food
  4. Cold food
  5. Gluten-free food
  6. Children
  7. Vampires
  8. Birds
  9. Cornucopias

I’d like to think that’s Kira Noir wondering why they couldn’t get Jacqui Holland to play this role. Holland appears to have gone back to making B-movie horror films.

So, let me get this straight about Cindy’s fears.

  1. She’s afraid of where almost every scene in this movie will take place.
  2. She’s afraid of the very few times she will be outside.
  3. She can’t eat…
  4. She can’t eat the cakes that show up later.
  5. I’m assuming the cake is gluten-free.
  6. So are the filmmakers, which is why there is always legal info at the end of the credits concerning the age of the actors.
  7. Vampires don’t live here anymore. McKendrick made sure to clean them out after Erotic Vampires Of Beverly Hills.
  8. Who isn’t afraid that the placeholder on IMDb for a remake of The Birds is going to turn into a real movie?
  9. I guess she’s afraid of the ending of the movie then.

I’m being harsh on Blair. She isn’t the best at the bimbo routine, nor the evil one, but she pulls off both well-enough for this movie. I don’t have any real complaints about her performance.

After a few more lines of dialog, they have sex. It makes sense because…I have no idea.

Now we follow Blair home to find out that rent is due.

And by home, I of course mean the room from The Love Machine (2016) and Model For Murder (2015).

The Love Machine (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

We also meet Cindy’s roommate Sara (Morgan Lee). The last time I saw her was in a small role in the movie Carnal Wishes (2015).

Carnal Wishes (2015, dir. Jon Taylor)

As you can see, she finds it a bit ridiculous that with rent due, Blair went and saw Madame Zola, regardless of Cindy’s assurances that she got her money’s worth. Oh, and their landlord’s name is Mr. Catwhistle. I just thought I’d mention that.

They get a knock on the door. It’s Cosgrove. He’s here to deliver nonsense.

Dracovich wasn’t liked in life, so she left instructions that the first person who pushed the “like” button on her My Spacebook page would inherit her estate. Yes, they really say “My Spacebook.” It’s no dumber than Degrassi’s Facerange. The news causes them to make a stupid joke.

As you might have already guessed because you’ve seen this plot in a million other movies before, there is a catch. They need to protect a book, or they lose the estate.

They aren’t allowed to read it either.

Now it’s time to meet Professor Gordon. He’s played by Andrew Espinoza Long.

Cindy wants some leave from her class to deal with this estate business, which is fine by him. During this, he is having some trouble with Carter Cruise under the desk. I’m just going to assume she dropped a pencil down there, and was to embarrassed to popup while Cindy was still there.

Why is she wearing a graduation cap and gown? I don’t know. Here’s a shot of Long’s chest to distract you.

It’s like I caught him in the middle of posing for a perfume ad. They had sex of course in case you were confused as to why he is half-naked.

Blair pays a visit to Madame Zola so she can give her an ominous warning, which is ignored, and followed by Blair and Sara going to the Dracovich estate. We see that same overhead shot from Erotic Vampires Of Beverly Hills as they enter the house.

Erotic Vampires Of Beverly Hills (2015, dir. Dean McKendrick)

They head upstairs. On their way up, Sara looks at the portrait, and we find out that she would have sex with Dracovich if she were alive. Naturally, Cindy touches the painting, becomes possessed by Dracovich…

and they have sex. Some people smash a champagne bottle to christen something new. Others have a sex scene, so that they can poke fun at the woman always keeping her heels on by having Cindy barefoot while Sara leaves her sneakers on.

If you’re thinking this seems like a lot of sex so far, then you’d be right. This is only a half-hour into the movie, and there’s already been three scenes. There’s a lot in this one.

Cosgrove shows up at the house. His Dracovich sense must have been tingling.

This is as good a time as any to bring up that the best scenes in this movie are with Donavan. He does a good job. I like it when they get in an established actor to be in these. Even if by “established”, I mean he was in Trancers 6 (2002).

Trancers 6 (2002, dir. Jay Woelfel)

Trancers 6 (2002, dir. Jay Woelfel)

The actual reason he is at the house is because he needs Cindy–who is still possessed–to sign some papers.

We find out that Dracovich was a sexual predator. If you were a man, then she’d turn you into her servant. If you were a woman, then she’d turn you into her slave. And I’m sure if you were gender-fluid, then she’d turn you into a synonym for servant or slave.

Talking, talking, Cosgrove probably pushed her off the stairs to kill her, Dracovich leaves Cindy’s body, Cindy is wondering why she thinks she’s been licked all over, and we are back at professor Gordon’s office.

Cathy (Carter Cruise) brings in a cake.

Close enough to “Happy homecoming.”

These two plan to go over to the Dracovich house because they don’t have any other sets to loot.

Kira Noir takes a shower so that we know that while Blair will never change clothes during this movie, at least Madame Zola is clean.

She gets a threatening call from Dracovich telling her to stay away. She knows that it’s Lady Dracovich because she hung up on her. I’m not kidding.

Back home, it’s time for a Ouija board to make a cameo appearance.

I’m sorry. I mean a Witchboard, as they call it. I haven’t seen the Witchboard movies yet, but the third one has the subtitle of “The Possession”, so it fits.

The letter thing moves, and that’s the cue for Gordon and Cathy to come in to present them with the cake.

Gordon goes off with Blair to talk about the mystery surrounding when exactly during this scene Dracovich possessed her again. All that I saw was the camera angle change. This turns on Gordon, and they proceed to have sex.

I couldn’t be less interested in this scene. Yes, the sex scenes do little for me except to allow me to not have to take as many screenshots since I can’t show those parts. But the reason this scene is particularly uninteresting to me is that once you’ve seen Long go at it with three cheerleaders in this same room, than this is really boring.

College Coeds vs. Zombie Housewives (2015, dir. Dean McKendrick)

If there’s only one sex scene I remember from any of these movies that I’ve reviewed, it’s that one.

Cathy is looking exactly where anyone would for valuables–the kitchen cabinets.

The cake opens up on her to reveal a reference to the Art PA’s pseudonym.

Now Dracovich decides to make a personal appearance. She tells Cathy that she can’t have the book unless Cathy distracts her.

Notice that the clock says it is 3:16 in the afternoon. Part way into the distraction, it will be 4:17. Is that how long they were actually going at it?

You can also see someone reflected in the oven.

I hope Erika Jordan got hazard pay. It looks like at any moment she could have hit the back of her head on the corner of the countertop.

Sara now goes around the house looking for people, and Cosgrove shows up.

At the same time, Cathy wakes up on the floor. She finds the book on the counter. She opens it so that she can become possessed.

Cosgrove comes in and takes the book before going to chew out the painting of Dracovich. We find out here that he did kill her. According to him, Dracovich can come back to life if she has a male sacrifice. He thinks there are only women here, so it won’t be an issue. He hears a woman moan, which tells him Dracovich is up to something. I’m not sure why. In this movie, that could mean some of the girls are celebrating the opening of a door.

Since there is very little time left in the movie, he is right, and finds Professor Gordon tied up on a bed having an orgy. Madame Zola shows up seemingly just to join the party. Sara jumps in too.

Off to the side of the bed, we can see Dracovich appearing to orchestrate the action.

This place really reminds me of one of the rooms in David DeCoteau’s house.

Cosgrove waits around for awhile so that we can watch before he ends the scene by opening the book. They all get zapped, but I can only show you Dracovich.

Cindy tells him he did a good job stopping Dracovich. But she wonders why he felt the need to do it so fast considering how quickly he was able to dispatch her.

It makes perfect sense, Cindy. He set the house on fire.

End of movie.

This isn’t a bad one of these movies. There is too much sex and the plot is barely existent. However, Donavan is good. It was nice to see Carter Cruise again in a role that wasn’t a complete ditz. Long was funny as usual. There were some humorous lines that I couldn’t show you because I forgot to turn on subtitles. They kept having Blair Williams say words that are almost what she means to say. There’s a little bit between her and Morgan Lee about Dracovich and Malkovich–vich is vich?

Ultimately, this one is only worth it if you are just looking for sex. There isn’t a whole lot more to it.

A Movie A Day #204: Tank (1984, directed by Marvin Chomsky)


If you had just moved to a small town in Georgia and your teenage son was framed for marijuana possession and sentenced to years of hard labor, what would you do?

Would you hire a good lawyer and file appeal after appeal?

Would you go to the media and let them know that the corrupt sheriff and his evil deputy are running a prostitution ring and the only reason your son is in prison is because you dared to call them out on their corruption?

Or would you get in a World War II-era Sherman tank and drive it across Georgia, becoming a folk hero in the process?

If you are Sgt. Zack Carey (James Garner), you take the third option.  Sgt. Carey is only a few months from retirement but he is willing to throw that all away to break his son (C. Thomas Howell) out of prison and expose the truth about Sheriff Buelton (G.D. Spradlin) and Deputy Euclid Baker (James Cromwell, playing a redneck).  Helping Sgt. Carey out are a prostitute (Jenilee Harrison), Carey’s wife (Shirley Jones), and the citizens of Georgia, who lines the road to cheer the tank as it heads for the Georgia/Kentucky border.  It’s just like the O.J. Bronco chase, with James Garner in the role of A.C. Cowlings.

The main thing that Tank has going for it is that tank.  Who has not fantasized about driving across the country in a tank and blowing up police cars along the way?  James Garner is cool, too, even if he is playing a role that would be better suited for someone like Burt Reynolds.  Tank really is Smoky and the Bandit with a tank in the place of that trans am.  Personally, I would rather have the trans am but Tank is still entertaining.  Dumb but entertaining.

One final note, a piece of political trivia: According to the end credits, the governor of Georgia was played by Wallace Willkinson.  At first, I assumed this was the same Wallace Wilkinson who later served as governor of Kentucky.  It’ not.  It turns out that two men shared the same name.  It’s just a coincidence that one played a governor while the other actually became a governor.

Gothic Art: Alfred Hitchcock’s REBECCA (United Artists 1940)


gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

REBECCA is unquestionably a cinematic masterpiece. I remember watching it for the first time in a high school film class, enthralled as much by its technical aspects as the story itself. This was Alfred Hitchcock’s  first American film, though with a decidedly British flavor, and his only to win the Best Picture Oscar. There’s a lot of film noir shadings to this adaptation of Daphne DuMaurier’s  Gothic novel, as well as that distinctive Hitchcock Touch.

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again”, begins Joan Fontaine’s narration, as the camera pans down a dark road overgrown with brush and weeds, fog rolling in all around, as we come up on the once majestic castle called Manderley, now lying in ruins. This first shot was all done with miniatures, another wonderful example of Hitchcock’s innovative use of the camera, looking and feeling totally believable (take that, CGI!). Flashbacks bring us to when Fontaine’s character, who’s…

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A Movie A Day #203: Heartbreak Ridge (1986, directed by Clint Eastwood)


The year is 1983 and things are looking bad for the Second Marine Division of the U.S. Marine Corps.  The officers are almost all college graduates like Major Powers (Everett McGill) and Lt. Ring (Boyd Gaines), men who have never served in combat but who are convinced that they know what it means to be a Marine in the 80s.  Convinced that they will never have to actually fight in a war, the latest batch of recruits is growing soft and weak.  All of the slackers have been put in the Recon Platoon, where they are so undisciplined that they think that wannabe rock star Cpl. Jones (Mario Van Peebles) is a good Marine.  MARIO VAN PEEBLES!

They haven’t met Sgt. Highway yet.

Gunnery Sgt. Thomas Highway (Clint Eastwood) has seen combat, in both Korea and Vietnam.  He drinks too much.  He fights too much.  He has chased away his wife (Marsha Mason), despite his attempts to understand her by reading Cosmo and Ladies Home Journal.  Major Powers may think that Highway is a relic but Highway knows better than to worry about what a college boy thinks.  The Recon Platoon may think that they can defy him but that haven’t seen Highway throw a punch yet.  Everyone may think it’s a waste of time to learn how to fight but little do they know that America is about to invade Grenada.

Heartbreak Ridge is all about Clint Eastwood.  Without Clint Eastwood, it would just be another basic training film.  With Clint Eastwood, it is a minor masterpiece and a tribute to America’s fighting spirit.  In 1986, no one was better at glaring at a young punk or glowering at a clueless superior officer than Clint Eastwood.  Even the running joke of Highway reading women’s magazines works because it is impossible not to laugh at Clint Eastwood intently studying an issue of Cosmo.   Clint may have been 56 when he directed and starred in Heartbreak Ridge but he was still believable beating up men who were less than half his age.  (Mario Van Peebles thinks he’s going to be able to stand up to Clint Eastwood?  Get outta here!)  There is never any question that Highway is going to able to whip everyone into shape.  The only question is how many terse one-liners are going to be delivered in the process.   By the time Highway and his platoon reach Grenada, everyone is ready to watch Clint put the communists in their place and Clint does not disappoint.

Reportedly, the U.S. Marine Corps. initially supported Heartbreak Ridge but, in case of life imitating art, disowned the finished picture, feeling that the film’s portrayal of The Corps was inaccurate and the sergeant’s “training” methods were too old-fashioned to actually be effective.

Thomas Highway would disagree.

One final note: Bo Svenson has a small role as the man trying to steal Marsha Mason away from Clint.  If you have ever wanted to see Dirty Harry and Buford Pusser fight over the Goodbye Girl, here’s your chance.

A Movie A Day #202: Broken Bars (1995, directed by Tom Neuwirth)


The streets are being flooded with lousy, synthetic heroin.  Could the source be somewhere inside of Trabuco Federal Prison?  That is what Nick Slater (Ben Maccabee) has been assigned to find out.  Nick is a tough cop but now he is going undercover, pretending to be a tough but incarcerated bank robber.  Nick  discovers that Trabuco is like no other prison out there.  For one thing, Wings Hauser is the warden.  Warden Pitt is a smirking Aryan who forces his prisoners to box for his amusement and who enforces discipline with a CIA-style torture chamber.  (Because the Warden is a boxing fanatic who likes to reward his best fighters, he also regularly brings prostitutes into the prison, which allows the film to reach its quota of B-movie nudity.)  Even worse, Warden Pitt and the head of the Aryan Brotherhood, Jigsaw (Paulo Tocha) are working together.  Only Nick can end Warden Pitt’s reign of terror but he will have to survive prison first.  Fortunately, Ben knows how to throw a punch and deliver kick and he is going to have to do a lot of both if he is going to make it out alive.

Broken Bars is a dumb but entertaining movie, with plenty of action and Wings Hauser villainy.  Ben Maccabee’s a credible 90s style action hero.  He may not be as good an actor as Dolph Lundgren or as fast as Jean-Claude Van Damme but, by the end of Broken Bars, there is no doubt that he could easily knock out Steven Seagal.  It’s no surprise that the best thing about the movie is Wings Hauser.  As anyone who ever watched late night Cinemax in the 90s knows, Wings Hauser was usually the best thing about any movie that he appeared in.  As a character, Warden Pitt is demented even by the standards of Wings Hauser and Hauser obviously had a ball screaming his lines.  B-movie stalwart Joe Estevez also shows up, playing a good guy for once.

Joe Estevez and Wings Hauser in the same movie?  Who cares if it’s any good?  Hauser and Estevez together is just another way of saying, “Must see.”

Rockin’ in the Film World #11: HAVING A WILD WEEKEND (Warner Brothers 1965)


gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

For those of you who weren’t around during the heyday of the 60’s British Invasion, The Dave Clark Five were second only to The Beatles in popularity. The group came hot on the heels of The Fab Four, appearing on Ed Sullivan for two straight weeks, and had a solid string of hits from 1964 to 1967: “Glad All Over”, “Bits & Pieces”, “Because”, “Any Way You Want It”, “Over & Over”. Yes, they were BIG, folks!  Propelled by Clark’s up-front drumming and lead singer Mike Smith’s growling vocals, The Dave Clark Five had the teenyboppers screaming in the aisles, and since A HARD DAY’S NIGHT was a smashing success, a movie starring the boys was the next logical step.

Director John Boorman

HAVING A WILD WEEKEND begins like it’s going to be a clone of that film, then turns into something completely different thanks to first-time director John Boorman, who would later give…

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Late Night Cable Movie Review: The Love Machine (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)


It’s been awhile since I wrote a review of a feature film. Let’s see if I can still get through one of these. How hard can it be? It’s a Dean McKendrick movie.

If you’re gonna watch this, then I hope you have seen McKendrick’s The Deadly Pickup (2016) and Model For Murder (2016) since this is basically a third film in what could be an unofficial trilogy.

The movie begins, and we see what looks like an amplifier with two voltage gauges, a pressure gauge stuck on top, and something that shoots a beam out of it, which I’m sure comes from another one of McKendrick’s films.

Much like this set, which is where Sarah Hunter’s character from Model For Murder was killed.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

In this film, Carter Cruise is playing Bair. She is in a session with psychologist, Dr. Stephanie Bradshaw (Jennifer Korbin). Bradshaw asks her what she does when she sees an attractive man. She wants to know what her first thoughts are. Those first thoughts are of stock footage from The Deadly Pickup.

The opening kill.

And Rick!

You remember Rick, right? He’s the guy who got pricked with her poisonousness ring, yet still managed to stumble from the car where they had sex…

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

so that he could die somewhere else.

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Then he came back in Model For Murder as a photographer.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

There’s also a flashback to Charlie who had to be rescued from Cruise by Deputy Randall.

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Don’t worry, Deputy Randall, who was promoted to detective in Model For Murder, makes a return in this film. Like Cruise, he is playing a different character. However, unlike Cruise, he is played by Billy Snow via the pseudonym of Alan Long. Makes sense to use the name of an actor from 1975’s Pick-up.

After the reused footage, the doctor turns up the dial on the machine, then asks her again what she wants to do with the attractive man.

Perfect! I can’t say the same about these opening credits though. This dance number with Erika Jordan goes on just short of forever.

It only exists so she can give a lap dance to one of our main characters, Don (Justin Berti), in order to introduce us to him.

It also gives me an excuse to wonder what led her from working as a detective to dancing at this club.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Also, Don has gone from managing models to sadly having to visit this strip club.

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

After a shot of a street somewhere, we cut to the bedroom where Erika Jordan and Billy Snow had sex in Model For Murder.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

This is where we meet Don’s wife, Jane (Alice Haig). They are having trouble with their marriage. He wants to try couples therapy, but she is reluctant, so he leaves to sleep on the couch, which judging by the paint on the walls, is probably in the same building as the room from earlier.

Meanwhile, at the $20 Oil Change…

Don strikes up a conversation with his friend John (Michael Hopkins) concerning his marriage problems.

I know I said something similar when I talked about Model For Murder, but welcome back to the world of the living, Josh. You might remember Michael Hopkins as Carter Cruise’s first victim in The Deadly Pickup. Or you don’t, because you have a life, haven’t seen all three movies, and certainly haven’t paid this much attention to them.

We also get the return of Sheriff Bates…

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

except this time Michael Gaglio owns this $20 Oil Change.

And I got this humorous shot of Justin Berti.

It doesn’t have to do with anything. I just thought I’d share it with you.

John suggests a therapist that worked for him and his wife, Angie.

Then we get what looks like a new set.

Sure, it appears to have been decorated by the same people who did the police station in The Deadly Pickup, but I couldn’t find it anywhere else.

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Inside, the doctor gets the story from Don and Jane about their troubles while they sit on the couch that Rick had sex on in Model For Murder.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

Of course she’s an ideal candidate to be zapped by that machine. The questions ultimately lead the doctor to asking Jane about her sexual fantasies. This time we don’t get stock footage. It’s just another reused set. She dreams of sunbathing on the set of the sexual encounter with a murder victim her husband told police about in Model For Murder.

Model For Murder (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

And of course there’s a pool boy (Robbie Caroll). You may remember him as the police officer who arrested Katie Morgan at the beginning of Vixens From Venus (2016).

Vixens From Venus (2016, dir. Sal V. Miers)

Much like Jordan, his career seems to be on the downswing. He was once a police officer, and now he’s been reduced to being a pool boy.

This is the first sex scene of the movie. I would love to have heard the conversation on the other end of this that Jane was having with the doctor.

While this scene happens, we are treated to a few minutes of a soundalike of Take Five by The Dave Brubeck Quartet.

The session went well, and a follow-up appointment is set.

Now we get to find out what the outcome of these treatments is when we get to meet John’s wife, Angie (Pepper XO).

A call comes in from the therapist who tells Angie that “it’s time.” That means it’s time to have sex on Brian and Traci’s bed from The Deadly Pickup.

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

The Deadly Pickup (2016, dir. Dean McKendrick)

It also means that it’s time for John to die from a corkscrew to the chest.

The next morning, Jane tells Don that she thinks the treatments are going well, and Don goes off to work to have the bad news broken to him about his friend being killed. But before Don receives the bad news, we get to see that the $20 Oil Change has an SBC payphone in 2016.

Gaglio breaks the news to Don, which leads the film to immediately cut to two people having sex on a leopard-print bed. I have no idea who they are.

She gets a call from the doctor, and he’s dead.

Now Jane meets Jeff (Billy Snow). If he looks worried here…

it’s because of who his wife is.

Jane goes in for another treatment. While she is under the control of the machine, the doctor forces herself upon Jane. No joke. They really could have left this scene out–no matter how short it is.

Don now breaks the news to Jane about John’s death so that we know the two of them have a reason to start being suspicious of the doctor. That’s not important though, because the scene that I was waiting for, finally happens.

Breezy finally gets her revenge on Deputy Randall. Does the rest of the film really matter now?

Okay, fine. Jane is lying in bed when she has a dream of Christine Nguyen doing a shower scene. I’m not kidding. They randomly inserted a shower scene by having Jane dream about one out of the blue for no apparent reason.

With the death of Billy Snow, Don is convinced things are fishy with the doctor, and he tries to talk Jane out of seeing her. It doesn’t work.

Then they have another shower scene. I have to give them some credit. They do end it with pertinent information to the plot. Jane remembers the doctor’s “Kill him” line.

Don does some intense research online about the doctor.

Long story short, something bad happened to her, so she’s taking revenge on other people.

Don now races to save his wife from this monster. Unfortunately, Don’s an idiot, and Jane zaps him with the machine, leading to a sex scene. However, since we are at the end of the film, when Jane pulls a gun to shoot him, he takes it away from her.

The doctor comes in, and I kind of love Don because he doesn’t hesitate for second. She pulls a knife, and he shoots her.

A quick shot at the machine, and Jane is free from its power. A couple lines of dialog are exchanged, then the movie abruptly ends.

So, that’s The Love Machine.

For the people watching for entertainment value, it doesn’t have much to offer other than getting to see Carter Cruise do in Billy Snow.

For people watching for the sex, it doesn’t have much either. There are a couple of sex scenes, and two shower scenes shoehorned into the movie. The one scene of girl-on-girl is kind of disturbing seeing as the doctor does sexually assault her. Then the movie adds confusion since that encounter is what appears to trigger her to have a dream about a woman taking a shower. Yet, it’s never followed up on.

I almost would have preferred the doctor to win in the end by taking Jane away with her. Sure, it would have been dark, but it would have been something memorable about this movie.

I can’t recommend this one.

A Movie A Day #201: L.A. Bounty (1989, directed by Worth Keeter)


Sybil Danning vs. Wings Hauser?  What could go wrong with that?

Cavanaugh (Wings Hauser) is an insane drug dealer who is also an artist.  When he is not coming up with elaborate ways to kill people, Cavanaugh can be found painting in his warehouse and talking to himself.  Cavanaugh spends a lot of time talking.  Ruger (Sybil Danning) is a former cop turned bounty hunter.  In the tradition of Clint Eastwood, Ruger rarely speaks.  Ruger has good reason to hate Cavanaugh.  When she was a cop, Cavanaugh killed her partner.  Now that Cavanaugh has kidnapped a local politician, Ruger is the obvious choice to track down Cavanaugh, get revenge for her partner, and save the next mayor of Los Angeles.

A typical low-budget late 80s action film, L.A. Bounty is distinguished by the contrast between the ferocious overacting of Wings Hauser and the underacting of Sybil Danning.  This was one of Danning’s final starring roles before she retired from the movies.  (She has recently returned, with cameos in two Rob Zombie productions.)  It is interesting to see Danning in the type of role that would typically go to either Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson, or maybe even Chuck Norris.  According to the imdb trivia section for L.A. Bounty, Danning only has 31 lines in the entire movie, which is more than I can remember her saying.  Danning, however, is such a strong physical presence that she does not have to say anything to make her point or show how tough she is.  Hauser, on the other hand, never stops talking, moving, and laughing.  This is one of Hauser’s craziest performances, which is saying something.  From scene to scene, Hauser’s performance is so consistently bizarre that it keeps things entertaining.

L.A. Bounty may not be anything spectacular but fans of Danning and Hauser will not be disappointed.

Film Review: Patty Hearst (dir by Paul Schrader)


The 1988 film, Patty Hearst, is based on a fascinating true story.

In 1974, newspaper heiress Patty Hearst was a 19 year-old student at Berkeley who was kidnapped from her apartment by a group of self-styled leftist revolutionaries known as the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA).  The SLA was led by a charismatic escaped prisoner who called himself Field Marshal Cinque and who announced — via messages that Hearst read into a tape recorder — that Hearst was being held hostage in the name of social justice.  The police and FBI spent several months unsuccessfully searching for Hearst until one day, the SLA released an audio tape in which Hearst announced that she had now joined the SLA and would now be known as Tania.  Hearst was soon robbing banks and went from being a hostage to a wanted criminal.  When she was arrested in 1975, Hearst claimed to have been brainwashed by the SLA and people still debate whether she was a sincere revolutionary, a calculating criminal, or a victim.

(From what I’ve read about the Hearst kidnapping, I guess the modern day equivalent would be if Kendall Jenner disappeared and then resurfaced in Portland, setting cars on fire with Antifa.)

What can said for sure is that, after being arrested and convicted of bank robbery, Patty Hearst was sentenced to 7 years in prison.  Hearst served less than three years before her sentence was commuted by President Jimmy Carter.  Twenty years later, another President — Bill Clinton — gave her a full pardon.  Needless to say, the rest of the SLA did not receive a pardon or, for that matter, even a commutation.  The majority of them, including Field Marshal Cinque, died in a fiery explosion that came at the climax of a gun battle with police.  The rest were arrested, convicted, and ended up serving their full sentences.  Of course, while the majority of the SLA came from middle and upper middle class backgrounds, only one of them was the heir to a fortune.  When she was arrested, Patty may have given her career as being an “urban guerilla,” but ultimately, she was the granddaughter of William Randolph Hearst.

(Regardless of whether you believe Patty Hearst was brainwashed or not, it’s an undeniable fact that it’s easier to be a revolutionary when you know you won’t face any serious consequences if the revolution eventually fails.  If the members of the SLA were around today, they could just spend their time on twitter, retweeting John Fugelsang’s thoughts on Jesus.  But, in 1974, there was no twitter…)

Based on Every Secret Thing, Hearst’s own account of her kidnapping and subsequent life as a fugitive, Patty Hearst opens with the heiress (played by Natasha Richardson) being kidnapped and held prisoner by the SLA.  For the first fourth of the film, we see everything exclusively through Patty’s eyes.  She spends her days locked in a dark closet that’s so tiny that she can barely stand.  Whenever the door is opened, shafts a bright light flood both the closet and the screen, blinding not only Patty but the audience as well.  At first, Patty cannot even see the faces of the people who have kidnapped her.  All she knows are their voices.  Whenever that door opens, neither Patty nor the viewer knows whether she’s going to fed, berated, comforted, or raped.  All four of them happen to her, several times over the course of her time in that closet.  It’s harrowing to watch, all the more so because Natasha Richardson gives such an empathetic and bravely vulnerable performance as Patty.  When Patty is finally allowed to leave that closet, the audience is almost thankful as she is.  And, when Patty gets out of the closet, the look of the film changes as well.  It goes from being darkly lit to almost garishly colorful.  Patty’s entire world has changed.

The first part of the film is so powerful that it’s not surprising that the rest of Patty Hearst suffers by comparison.  Once Patty gets out of the closet and declares her allegiance to the revolution, she becomes a bit of a dead-eyed zombie and the focus naturally shifts to the rest of the SLA.  Ving Rhames gives a powerful performance as Cinque, the head of the SLA.  Cinque may be a passionate revolutionary but he also has a dangerous messianic streak.  Even worse, the film suggests, is Cinque’s lieutenant, Teko (William Forsythe).  Teko claims to be a revolutionary but ultimately reveals himself to be as much of a misogynist as those who he claims to oppose.  (Today, Teko would probably be one of those guys arguing that it’s okay for him to use the C word because he’s an “ally.”)  Whereas Cinque has no doubt about his revolutionary commitment, Teko always seem to be trying to prove something to everyone, especially himself.

Ultimately, Patty becomes almost a bystander to her own story.  For a time, she is the most famous bystander in the country.  Though the film is sympathetic to Patty, Natasha Richardson plays her with just a hint of ambiguity.  Ultimately, Patty comes across as someone desperately searching for an identity.  Since she is not sure who she ultimately is, it’s easy for Patty to become an “urban guerilla” and it’s just as easy for to her go back to being an heiress.  By the end of the film, it’s obvious that Patty is just as confused by her life as everyone else.

Patty Hearst was directed by Paul Schrader, who is best known for writing the scripts for such films as Taxi Driver and Rolling Thunder.  (Among Schrader’s other directorial credits: Blue Collar, Hardcore, American Gigolo, Cat People, and The Canyons.  Needless to say, he’s had an interesting career.)  In many ways, Patty Hearst is probably more relevant today than it was first released.  Considering that our culture is currently dominated by people pretending to be revolutionaries and celebrities famous solely for being famous, Patty Hearst feels rather prophetic.

Watching this film and experiencing Patty’s transformation from vapid heiress to brainwashed political activist to briefly notorious celebrity, I realized that we now live in a world of Patty Hearsts.

A Movie A Day #200: A Breed Apart (1984, directed by Philippe Mora)


Sometimes, the story behind a movie is more interesting than the movie itself.

Rutger Hauer stars in A Breed Apart, playing an eccentric environmentalist named Jim Malden.  Malden loves nature but he hates people, with the exception of a local storekeeper named Stella (Kathleen Turner) and her young son.  The local fishermen (one of whom is played by Hauer’s Blade Runner co-star, Brion James) may hate him but they are no match for Malden’s guerilla tactics.  Recently, a new breed of bald eagle has been discovered and Malden is determined to protect it.  At the top of a cliff, there is a nest full of eagle eggs and Malden will not let anyone near them.

Rich collector J.J. Whittier (Donald Pleasence) is determined to get those eggs for himself.  In order to deal with Malden, Whittier hires famous rock climber, Mike Walker (Powers Boothe).  Disguising himself as a nature photographer, Walker attempts to befriend Malden so that he can get to the eggs.  Even as Malden shows Walker why it is important to protect the environment, Walker falls in love with Stella.

With a cast like this, A Breed Apart should have been far more interesting than it was.  It provides a rare chance to see both Rutger Hauer and Powers Boothe playing heroes but neither seemed to really be into their roles.  Kathleen Turner was sexy but saddled with a terrible accent while Donald Pleasence seemed to be in a different movie.  When I watched A Breed Apart last night, I thought it seemed like a very disjointed movie.  For instance, the movie abruptly jumped from Stella and Walker first meeting to the end of their first date.  There was a random scene of Malden putting on war paint, while remembering the sound of helicopters.  War paint combined with helicopters in an 80s movie usually means that someone is having a Vietnam War flashback but Malden’s military background is never mentioned again.  Even Walker’s conversion to Malden’s cause and rejection of Whittier’s money seemed to happen offscreen.

According to Wikipedia, It turns out that there was a reason for all that.  A Breed Apart was filmed in North Carolina.  After principal filming was completed, four reels of film were sent back to Los Angeles.  However, only three reels ever arrived in California.  One reel disappeared and has never been found.  The footage that actually did make it to Los Angeles was reorganized and edited to try to disguise the fact that a huge part of the movie was missing.

It didn’t work.

(ADDENDUM 9/4/2017: Originally, both myself and a lot of other reviewers, were under the impression that one reel of film went missing and, as a result, the film had to be reedited to make up for the missing footage.  This story is presented as fact on Wikipedia, which is where I and I assume a lot of other people originally got it.  The lesson here is not to use an online encyclopedia that anyone can edit for a primary or even a credible source.  In the comments below, Director Philippe Mora has let me know that there was no lost reel and that, instead, there are several different cuts of the film kicking around, some of which are incomplete and some of which are ok.  Since Mora actually worked on the film, he is a far more credible source than an anonymous Wikipedia article.  I apologize to Mr. Mora for the mistake.)