Tag Archives: exploitation

The TSL’s Grindhouse: Prison Planet (dir by Armand Gazarian)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

(aka Prison Planet)

A few nights ago, I saw the no-budget 1992 sci-fi epic, Prison Planet, on television.

My immediate response after watching Prison Planet was to assume that I had just been dreaming because it was difficult for me to accept that anyone had actually made a movie this inept.  However, I then checked with the imdb and I discovered that Prison Planet not only exists but there were actually two sequels.  I was also surprised to discover that Prison Planet was an American production and not a poorly dubbed Bruno Mattei film.  Unfortunately, my attempts to google more information on the production of Prison Planet were hindered by the fact that every result I got was about Alex Jones.

Anyway, Prison Planet takes place in the far future.  2200, to be exact.  Earth is ruled by an evil dictator but that dictator’s power is being threatened by a rebel leader named Himshaw (Jack Wilcox).  When Himshaw is captured, he is promptly exiled to the planet where Earth sends all of its prisoners.  (Hence, the title.)  With Himsaw gone and perhaps dead, it now falls on Himshaw’s brother, Blaine (James Phillips) to leads the rebels.  However, instead of doing that, Blaine decides to go to the prison planet so he can discover whether or not his brother is still alive.  Blaine breaks into a government building and allows himself to be captured.

So now, Blaine has been exiled to the prison planet.  (The name of the prison planet, by the way, is Annakin.)  Blaine’s plan is to find Himshaw so that he can overthrow the dictator but, since there’s really no obvious way to get back to Earth after being dropped off on a prison planet, you have to kind of wonder whether Blaine really thought this through.  I’m assuming that he probably thought, “I’ll worry about that when I have to,” but it’s not like Earth is just the next town over or something.  It’s an entirely different planet.  You can’t just walk there.

On the prison planet, the prisoners are pretty much allowed to do whatever they want.  It’s a world ruled by an evil warlord, though there are small bands of nomads and rebels in the desert.  This is what the big scary warlord looks like:

Blaine decides that he’s going to 1) overthrow the warlord and 2) rescue the virgin that the warlord is planning on sacrificing.  (Or at least, I think that’s what the warlord was plotting to do with her.  It was kind of hard to keep up with what was going on, largely because Prison Planet seemed to be making stuff up as it went along.)

What’s odd is that, even though the film is taking place in 2200, everyone on the prison planet is driving around in cars from the 20th Century.  It’s kinda like Mad Max: Fury Road, except that it’s not very good.  But then again, who needs to worry about narrative logic when you’ve got stuff like this to deal with:

That’s the warlord, again.  You can tell why they made this dude the ruler of the planet.  He’s got a really big sword and a really thin mustache.  Plus, he doesn’t own a shirt.  He’s got the whole Conan thing going on.

And then there’s this other guy who keeps popping up, who wears a suit, a tie, and a hat.  He spends the whole movie scurrying between the warlord and Blaine and I have to admit that I’m still not sure what exactly his role was in the movie.  He spoke in a falsetto voice and everyone was constantly threatening to kill him.

Also, one of the warlord’s henchmen wears what appears to be wearing a Spanish conquistador’s helmet.  No one ever mentions that this is odd…

Anyway, I watched the whole film and I’m not really sure what I saw.  Blaine had to overthrow the warlord and find his possibly dead brother.  It was never really clear how these two things were connected.  It was a bad movie but strange enough to occasionally be watchable.

As for the two sequels, the imdb lists them both as being comedies.  I haven’t watched either one of them but that sounds about right.  The first Prison Planet is definitely not meant to be comedy but I still had a few good laughs while watching it.

Artwork of the Day: America 3000

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

America!

Back toe beginning?  Of just the country or of humanity itself?  Judging from this poster, it looks like both.  Are there any post-nuke adventures that aren’t outrageous?  It’s a legitimate question, I think.

Anyway, this is a poster for a film that came out in 1989.

Artwork of the Day: 101 Acts of Love

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The hour is late so I won’t say too much about this poster for this 1971 film.  According to the Grindhouse Database, this movie only has a 46 minute running time so it must have been 101 very quick acts of love.

I like the fact that the quote from “Dr. Ann Foster” doesn’t actually say anything about the movie, just the subject matter.  Why, it’s almost as if Dr Foster was just some randomly quoted person who, in all probability, never actually saw the movie!

Artwork of the Day: Terror From Under The House

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

This poster is for a 1971 film called Terror From Under The House.  I haven’t actually seen this film.  Normally, I would look at this poster and assume that it must be about a monster living in a basement but this is 70s exploitation that were talking about.  Just because its featured on the poster doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily going to be in the film.

Apparently, Terror From Under The House was just one of the many titles used by this film.  It’s also known as:

  1. Revenge
  2. Behind the Cellar Door
  3. After Jenny Died
  4. Inn of the Frightened People
  5. I ekdikisis (which means “The Revenge” in Greek)
  6. Il passo dell’assassino (which means “The Killer Steps” in Italian)
  7. Miedo sangriento (“Bloody Fear” in Spanish)
  8. Violence en Sous-Sol (“Violence in the Basement” in French)

The main thing that I noticed about this poster was that apparently, audiences were forced to accept the “Free Screaming Teeth of Terror” as proof that this movie was so frightening that watching it could lead to death.  I’m not sure what exactly that means but this film was rated PG so, honestly, how scary could it be?

Someday, I’ll watch it and let you know.

Artwork of the Day: The Bonnie Parker Story

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

 

This poster is for the 1958 film, The Bonnie Parker Story.  That’s right — this film predates the better known Bonnie and Clyde by about 9 years.  Dorothy Provine was cast in the title role and, judging from this poster, it looks like her Bonnie was even more dangerous than Faye Dunaway’s!  Apparently, in this film (which I haven’t seen yet), Clyde was renamed Guy.

(Bonnie and Guy doesn’t quite have the right ring to it, does it?)

Anyway, it’s a good poster, one that is direct and in your face.  That’s something I always appreciate about any film poster.  Plus, there’s that tag line!

Cigar smoking hellcat of the roaring twenties!

Hell yeah!  Now that’s a tag line!

Artwork of the Day: Pay or Die

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Hi everyone!  Usually, my sister — the Dazzling Erin Nicole — tracks down and selects the images that we feature in our Artwork of the Day feature.  However, Erin is taking the week off — and November 24th is not only the day after Thanksgiving but her birthday as well!, so be sure to wish her a happy one! — so, for the next few days, I’ll be selecting our artwork of the day! — Lisa Marie)

Look at those bricks fly!

Listen, I really can’t tell you a thing about whether or not Pay or Die is a good movie or not.  All I know is that the film was released in 1979, it was rated R, and this was the poster.  It’s a tremendously effective poster, though.  I don’t know if it’s a fair representation of what happens in the movie, of course.  But I hope it is.  I hope there’s at least one scene featuring two men and a woman kicking the Hell out of a brick wall.

Posters like this are actually a huge reason why I enjoy researching grindhouse films.  Just looking at it is enough to inspire you to create your own movie in your head.  Why are they kicking through the wall?  Why are they even working together?  Why is the movie called Pay or Die?  Do they own someone money?  Does someone owe them money?  Maybe they’re kicking through the wall of a bank.  The possibilities are endless!

I will say this, though.  If I ever did use my bare hands to smash through a brick wall, I’d probably try to make sure that my boobs were a little better protected when I did it.  Seriously, I imagine breaking through a wall, especially one made of bricks, is not as safe as they make it look in the movies.  Considering all of the kicking that appears to be involved, I would also probably not wear open-toed sandals while doing it either.  That just seems like common sense to me.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: I Don’t Want To Be Born (dir by Peter Sasdy)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

“I don’t want to be born!”

“That’s too bad, kid!  YOU’RE COMING OUT!”

Now, admittedly, that dialogue is never heard in the 1975 British horror film, I Don’t Want To Be Born.  However, if I had heard that particularly exchange in this film, I would not have been surprised.  That’s just the type of movie that I Don’t Want To Be Born is.  It’s a thoroughly ludicrous, totally ridiculous movie and what makes it all the more memorable is that it doesn’t seem to realize how silly it all is.  This is a batshit crazy movie that tells its story in the most serious way possible.  This damn film is almost somber, it’s so serious.

Lucy (played by Joan Collins) is a stripper who performs her act with a perverted dwarf named Hercules (George Claydon).  When Hercules tries to force himself on Lucy, he is tossed out of the club by Tommy (who is played by John Steiner, a good actor who somehow always turned up in movies like this one.)  After she and Tommy make love, Lucy is confronted by Hercules who curses her, telling her that she will have a baby “as big as I am small and possessed by the devil himself!”

Oh, Hercules, you weirdo.

9 months later, Lucy’s life has somehow completely changed.  She’s no longer a dancer.  Now, she’s married to a rich Italian named Gino (played by Ralph Bates, speaking in a bizarre accent).  When Lucy has her baby, it’s a long and difficult delivery.  The baby is huge!  Not only is he huge, but he also has a bad temper and unnaturally sharp nails.  The first time that Lucy holds him, he attacks her.  Whenever the baby is introduced to anyone new, he responds by biting them.  When Tommy drops by to take a look at the baby that might be his son, he ends up with a bloody nose!

But that’s not all this baby can do!  Anytime he’s left alone in a room, the room ends up getting destroyed.  Eventually, he apparently figures out how to climb trees and how efficiently slip a noose around the neck of anyone who walks underneath him.  And don’t think that you can escape this baby simply because you’re taller and faster.  One unfortunate person is decapitated, even though he’s standing at the time.  How did the baby reach his neck?  Who knows?

Does this baby need an exorcism?  Lucy’s sister-in-law, Sister Albana (Eileen Atkins), certainly believes that it does!  As Lucy thinks about whether the baby’s behavior is in any way odd, she glances over at the baby and — OH MY GOD!  The baby has Hercules’s face!

And it just keeps going from there.  Again, I feel the need to repeat that this film is meant to be taken very seriously.  The script may be full of awkward and clichéd dialogue but most of the cast attempts to act the Hell out of it.  Speaking of the cast, there’s a lot of familiar horror people in this one.  Along with John Steiner, there’s also Caroline Munro and Donald Pleasence.  Those three give performances that somehow manage to remain credible, perhaps because they had the experience necessary to understand what type of movie they were in.  But the rest of the cast … you feel bad for them because they’re just trying  so hard.

It’s a terrible movie but it’s so weird that I have to recommend that everyone see it once.  If for nothing else, see it for the scene where Hercules responds to an attempt to exorcise the baby by swaying drunkenly on the stage.  It’s weird and it’s hard for mere words to do it justice.

“No wonder this baby didn’t want to be born!”

That line is also nowhere to be found in this movie.  It’d be nice if it was, though.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Hard To Die (dir by Jim Wynorski)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

 

Do you remember how, a few days ago, I reviewed a silly little movie called Sorority House Massacre II?

Well, it turns out that there’s a sequel and it’s on YouTube!  Both films were directed by Jim Wynorski and featured pretty much the same cast, despite the fact that a few of them were playing new characters.  It was released under several different titles.  Hard To Die is the one that I’m going with for this review.  However, the film was also known as Tower of Terror, which makes sense when you consider that the majority of the film takes place in a hi-rise office building.  It was also apparently released in some places as Sorority House Massacre III, despite the fact that there’s no sorority house in the movie.

Actually, it’s debatable whether or not Hard To Die is actually a sequel.  It’s true that Orville Ketchum (Peter Spellos) does make another appearance.  In the first movie, Orville was the creepy neighbor.  In Hard To Die, he’s the janitor at the office building.  Orville tells the exact same story, with the exact same flashbacks, that he told in Sorority House Massacre II.  (Those flashbacks, of course, were lifted from a totally unrelated movie called Slumber Party Massacre.  There were apparently a lot of massacres in the 80s and 90s.)  The evil spirit of Hockstadder returns as well, though this time he comes flying out of a box that was accidentally delivered to the office building as opposed to a Ouija board.  And, of course, there’s an abundance of lingerie, awkward dialogue, and cheap gore effects.  (At one point, a bucket of fake blood is literally splashed on a wall.)  However, Hard To Die also tells almost exactly the same story of Sorority House Massacre II.  There are so few differences that I’m actually more tempted to say that Hard To Die is a remake of Sorority House Massacre II than a sequel.  The only problem with that theory is whether or not a second movie can be considered remake when the first movie literally came out the exact same year.

(One of the reasons that I love my work here at the TSL is that it allows me to obsess over minutia like this.)

Anyway, the main difference between Hard To Die and Sorority House Massacre III is that there’s no sorority house in Hard To Die.  Instead, Hard To Die takes place in a lingerie shop that just happens to be located on the 7th floor of a skyscraper.  The hard-working employees are spending the weekend doing inventory but it’s not going to well.  For one thing, the sprinklers accidentally go off so everyone decides to take off their wet clothes, put on skimpy lingerie, and order pizza.  Personally, I probably would have waited for the pizza to arrive before getting naked but then again, I’ve never worked retail or dated a pizza deliveryman.

The pizza does eventually arrive but no one gets to eat it because the deliveryperson gets set on fire and ends up falling several floors to her death.  That’s a waste of good pizza, which is kind of depressing.  Meanwhile, Orville keeps trying to warn everyone about Hockstadder but, instead, he keeps getting beaten up.  The end credits of Hard To Die promised that the next film would be called Orville In Orbit.  Apparently, it was never made but I do hope that Orville got a vacation after all of this.

Anyway, Hard To Die is an extremely silly movie but it’s just so sincere in its silliness that it feels somewhat churlish to be too critical of it.  If I had to choose whether to be in Sorority House Massacre II or Hard To Die, I would probably pick Hard To Die because, at least in that movie, I’d get to shoot a machine gun.  Hard To Die is so blatantly and unapologetically over the top that you can’t help but be amused by it all.

6 Trailers For Halloween

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome the final October edition of Lisa Marie’s Grindhouse and Exploitation Film Trailers!

I’ve enjoyed reviving this feature for October.  I’m not totally sure if I’ll continue it because, as I said way back at the start of the month, there are only so many trailers on YouTube and I don’t want to spend too much time repeating myself.  We’ll see!

These are trailers for 6 of my favorite horror films:

  1. Lisa and the Devil (1973)

From the great director, Mario Bava.  This film is like a cinematic dream.  Plus, the main character is named Lisa!

2. Suspiria (1977)

This trailer is creepy, though it really doesn’t do the film justice.  Check out my review here!

3. The Shining (1980)

This is one of the few films that scares me no matter how many times I watch it.

4. Near Dark (1987)

Vampires in Texas!  Hell yeah!

5. Two Orphan Vampires (1997)

From the brilliant Jean Rollin.

6. The Cabin In The Woods (2011)

I don’t care how many hipster douchebags disagree.  This movie is absolutely brilliant.

Happy Halloween!

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Sorority House Massacre II (dir by Jim Wynorski)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Some movies just force the viewer to ask, “What would you do?”

I mean, just consider what it would be like to be in the scenario that’s presented to us in the 1990 film, Sorority House Massacre II.  You’re a college student.  You’ve got your entire future ahead of you.  The president of your sorority has just purchased a new sorority house and she wants you and three others to spend the weekend helping her fix the place up.

You arrive at the house and you discover that it’s literally on the verge of collapsing.  There’s no electricity.  There’s no telephone.  (And remember, this is back when people just used landlines.)  There’s no hot water.  Soon after arriving, you’re informed that there’s two reasons why the house was being sold at such a cheap price.

First off, there’s the neighbor.  He’s a creepy, kinda pervy-looking guy named Orville Ketchum.  When Orville comes over to meet his new neighbors, he announces that he has the keys to the basement.  He reaches into his pants to retrieve them.  Ewwww!

Secondly, it turns out that the house isn’t just any deserted house.  It’s the old Hockstadder Place!  Years ago, Mr. Hockstadder killed his daughters before dying.  Orville witnessed the whole thing.  As he tells the story, you might notice that the flashbacks are lifted from a film called Slumber Party Massacre, despite the fact that you’re starring in Sorority House Massacre II.

Despite all of that, you still enter the house.  A storm is rolling in and, whenever you look out the window, you see the same lightning stock footage that has appeared in a countless number of cheap horror movies.

When you and your friends decide to explore the basement, you find a Ouija board.  You know that Ouija boards can be dangerous but everyone else wants to run upstairs and use it.  Someone suggests that maybe the board can be used to contact the spirit of Hockstadder.  After all, according to Orville, Hockstadder swore that his murderous spirit would never leave the house and would possess anyone who tried to move in.

At this point, you have two options.

Do you say, “Okay, obviously, it’s not a good idea to contact the spirit of a murderer — especially one that said he would possess anyone who tries to contact him — so I’m going to go ahead and leave now?”

or

Do you light some candles, strip down to your underwear in front of a bunch of open windows (despite the fact that weird old Orville is right across the street), sit on a filthy floor, and try to communicate with the spirit of a homicidal maniac?

The smart option would be the first one so, of course, the characters in Sorority House Massacre II do the exact opposite.  Then again, nobody in Sorority House Massacre II appears to be that smart.  For one thing, they’re all in their 30s and they have yet to graduate college.  Trust me, I wish I could have stayed in college forever but, at some point, you really do have to either graduate or drop out.  Tuition’s not cheap.

Anyway, Sorority House Massacre II is one of those movies that just amuses me to death.  There’s absolutely nothing subtle about it.  It’s such a blatant exploitation film that you can’t help but admire it for not pretending to be something that it isn’t.  (At the same time, it’s rather tame when compared to the movies that we’re used to today.  Whenever someone is killed, obviously fake blood is squirted on a wall.)  This may be a stupid movie but it’s very sincere in its stupidity and there’s something to be said for that.

Add to that, Peter Spellos is memorably weird as Orville.  The way he delivers his lines makes Orville into the neighbor that everyone would dread having next door.  In the end, though, it’s a good thing that Orville was there.

Finally, there is one surprisingly effective moment.  The movie starts with the “final girl” huddled in a dark room, begging the unseen killer to remember who they are.  The movie then flashes back to that morning, with the girls standing in front of the house.  The abrupt cut from darkness to the bright and sunny morning is surprisingly effective and feels almost dream-like.  Though one gets the feeling it was probably unintentional, it’s still works far better than you’d expect.