The Eric Roberts Collection: Beyond The Trophy (dir by Daniel J. Gillin)


Does this plot sound familiar?

There’s a gang war brewing.  An undercover cop is sent into one of the gangs and ends up falling in love.  Another cop is involved in the undercover operation but he’s actually working for one of the mob bosses.  And then there’s a Russian mob boss who keeps complicating things.  The whole thing plays out with a lot of scenes of people pointing guns at each other and randomly shouting before gunfire erupts.  No one can trust.  There’s plenty of twists.  There’s narration from one of the mob bosses.  The plot is actually pretty confusing as one person after another turns out to be working for someone else.  The whole thing leads to so many betrayals that it almost become comical in its indulgence.

The Departed, you say?

No, this isn’t a Scorsese film.  Instead, this is 2012’s Beyond The Trophy, which  has a plot that borrows a lot from The Departed.  Then again, the film actually borrows a lot from every other mobster film that’s ever been made.  Most gangster films aren’t really about the activities of real-life gangsters as much as they’re about recreating the classic film scenes that the director enjoyed while growing up.  As a result, we get a few Scorsese-style freeze frames to go along with the narration.  We get plenty of Tarantino-style stand-offs.  We got the Russian mob because every film has to have the Russian mob nowadays.

We also get Michael Madsen and Eric Roberts.  Roberts plays Sgt. Bachman and his role is small.  He smiles while barking out orders and he looks after his daughter, another undercover cop named Chastity (Brooke Newton).  Roberts doesn’t get to do much and I’m not sure how many big city police departments are run by people with long hair but he’s Eric Roberts.  You can’t help but love him.  As for Madsen, he narrates in his trademark threatening whisper.  Madsen is one of those actors who was born to play tough guys so he’s credible as a mob boss, even if he doesn’t really put much effort into the film.  You can usually tell whether or not Madsen is invested in a film by whether or not he bothers to wash his hair.  For the most part, his hair look pretty oily in this film.

The majority of the film revolves around Stephen Cloud and Michael Masini as the two cops and they both give credible-enough performances.  Because the script is basically just a recreation of scenes from other mob films, neither one really gets a chance to surprise us.  The one member of the cast who actually does manage to break free and make an impression is Robert Miano, who makes his Vegas mob boss into a somewhat sympathetic figure.

File this one under standard mafia nonsense.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

  1. Star 80 (1983)
  2. Runaway Train (1985)
  3. Blood Red (1989)
  4. The Ambulance (1990)
  5. The Lost Capone (1990)
  6. Love, Cheat, & Steal (1993)
  7. Voyage (1993)
  8. Love Is A Gun (1994)
  9. Sensation (1994)
  10. Dark Angel (1996)
  11. Doctor Who (1996)
  12. Most Wanted (1997)
  13. Mercy Streets (2000)
  14. Wolves of Wall Street (2002)
  15. Mr. Brightside (2004)
  16. Six: The Mark Unleased (2004)
  17. Hey You (2006)
  18. Amazing Racer (2009)
  19. In The Blink of an Eye (2009)
  20. Enemies Among Us (2010)
  21. The Expendables (2010) 
  22. Sharktopus (2010)
  23. The Dead Want Women (2012)
  24. Deadline (2012)
  25. The Mark (2012)
  26. Miss Atomic Bomb (2012)
  27. Bonnie And Clyde: Justified (2013)
  28. Lovelace (2013)
  29. The Mark: Redemption (2013)
  30. Self-Storage (2013)
  31. A Talking Cat!?! (2013)
  32. This Is Our Time (2013)
  33. Inherent Vice (2014)
  34. Road to the Open (2014)
  35. Rumors of War (2014)
  36. Amityville Death House (2015)
  37. A Fatal Obsession (2015)
  38. Stalked By My Doctor (2015)
  39. Enemy Within (2016)
  40. Joker’s Poltergeist (2016)
  41. Prayer Never Fails (2016)
  42. Stalked By My Doctor: The Return (2016)
  43. The Wrong Roommate (2016)
  44. Dark Image (2017)
  45. Black Wake (2018)
  46. Frank and Ava (2018)
  47. Stalked By My Doctor: Patient’s Revenge (2018)
  48. Clinton Island (2019)
  49. Monster Island (2019)
  50. The Reliant (2019)
  51. The Savant (2019)
  52. Seven Deadly Sins (2019)
  53. Stalked By My Doctor: A Sleepwalker’s Nightmare (2019)
  54. The Wrong Mommy (2019)
  55. Exodus of a Prodigal Son (2020)
  56. Free Lunch Express (2020)
  57. Her Deadly Groom (2020)
  58. Top Gunner (2020)
  59. Deadly Nightshade (2021)
  60. The Elevator (2021)
  61. Just What The Doctor Ordered (2021)
  62. Killer Advice (2021)
  63. The Poltergeist Diaries (2021)
  64. The Rebels of PT-218 (2021)
  65. A Town Called Parable (2021)
  66. Bleach (2022)
  67. My Dinner With Eric (2022)
  68. Aftermath (2024)
  69. The Wrong Life Coach (2024)
  70. When It Rains In L.A. (2025)

Cruella’s Castle (2010, directed by Fred Olen Ray)


Dr. Bikini Jones (Christine Nguyen) is a world-famous adventurer and archeologist who is willing to brave any danger and sleep with any security guard or spy in her hunt for treasure.  She has just recovered a golden idol that contains a code that will lead to the Temple of Eros and a tiara that, when worn, makes the wearer the Empress of Moronica.

Evilla Cruella (Heather Vandeven) may have born in Hoboken but her family came from Mornica and she is determined to be Queen of the Morons.  She sends her lover Drago (Frankie Cullen) and her other lover, Carol (Rebecca Love), to steal the idol.  Working with CIA agent Mark X (Tony Marino), Bikini must keep Cruella from being the first to find the Temple of Eros.  It won’t be easy because the Temple itself is guarded by a hungry dinosaur!

Cruella’s Castle started life as an 82-minute softcore film called Bikni Jones and The Temple of Eros.  When the film moved to streaming, it was edited to remove all of the explicit sex and most of the nudity and renamed Cruella’s Castle.  (Without the sex and boobs, Cruella’s Castle is only 40 minutes long.)  I imagine many would say that the editing took the main reason why anyone would want to watch this movie in the first place but, even in edited form, Cruella’s Castle has got enough double entendrees and intentionally dumb jokes to be entertaining.  The dinosaur is surprisingly effective, considering that the budget for this movie was undoubtedly not high and Christine Nguyen has so much energy and enthusiasm as Bikini Jones that it’s hard not to mourn that she hasn’t had any more adventures.  This is a typical Fred Olen Ray joint, dumb but inoffensive and even a little fun if you’re in the right mood.

Late Night Cable Horror: Scared Topless (2013, dir. Jim Wynorski)


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I think director Jim Wynorski just recycled a title here because he also directed The Bare Wench Project 2: Scared Topless in 2001. I really don’t need to see that because it probably has the girls bath in snot. No joke, there’s something like that here.

The movie opens with a lady in a one piece bathing suit seductively washing an old car while ~1930’s jazz plays.

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Note that it’s in HD, widescreen, and color because your mind is about to be blown. First we see a hand reach out to a blonde who is sitting on a bench behind the car. She doesn’t come to him so he goes to the girl in the bathing suit.

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That’s a WWII uniform. Then they proceed to have sex. That’s when it suddenly cuts to some people sitting on a coach watching them on TV. By the way, this guy looks happy, doesn’t he?

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Maybe he was just informed that this was not only one of those where the girls look into the camera, but also was just told about the ectoplasm scene later in the movie.

Anyways, now Professor Rand (Michael Swan) informs us that we were watching Hollywood couple Gayle Evelyn and Peter Sherwood. Them screwing by a pool was the last time they were seen in front of a camera. And then.

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Yep. Now we’ve mixed the 1940’s with the 1920’s. Oh, and nobody corrects her. However, she does go on to say she “didn’t even know sex existed back then.”

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Thank you, Frankie Cullen. Thank you for showing us what our face is going to look like just about anytime anyone in this movie opens their mouth to say something. Now we find out that Sherwood rose to fame in the 1930’s. At this point, I don’t care. 1920s, 1930s, and the 1940s are the same decade as far as this movie is concerned. Now we get some story about how they both died. It really doesn’t matter. All you need to know is he died in a plane crash and she locked herself up in a mansion all alone.

This is apparently an advanced psychokinesis class. Now it’s off to the haunted house where they are going to spend a couple of nights. This is also where we finally get that title card at the start of this review. Also, Jim Wynorski used the pseudonym Harold Blueberry for this movie.

But before we go we need to have two sex scenes. This one guy goes at it with his girlfriend, who we learn is the skeptic of the bunch. It’s because he’s from the Show Me state. You know…New Jersey!

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After that is over with, Cullen and one of the other girls go and visit a psychic. By that, I mean they have a threesome with her. But not before Frankie Cullen gives use these lines.

Cullen: “I don’t know about you, doll, but if she appears to me, don’t go grabbing for the trousers flying out the front door.”
Girl: “Why?”
Cullen: “Cause I’ll be in ’em. Any horny ghost shows up, I’m gone.”

Now we arrive at the mansion. We meet a girl who is supposed to be the great granddaughter of that blonde sitting on the bench at the beginning of the movie who was named Dawn Cummings. Dawn was Gayle Evelyn’s best friend. Apparently, she was also the one filming that video. We also learn that one of the girls is into the paranormal stuff cause her dad was a magician.

Now the three girls go and have a shower together. Cause of course they do. It’s actually a humorous scene because the one girl has breasts bigger than the shortest girl’s head. She’s on one side of the short girl and another girl taller than her is on the other.

Anyways, after washing each other with Oil Of Olay soap, the psychic from earlier and her sidekick show up. And of course they proceed to go at it with mister Show Me state. Oh, I’m sorry, they read his palm. When they go to kiss his palm, music that sounds like it’s from Friday the 13th plays for a few seconds. Funny since Michael Swan who plays the Professor was in Part VI.

Now we finally get some paranormal activity.

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That’s Gayle Evelyn who shows up in one of the girl’s rooms. Of course they have sex. Then this happens.

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I’d say that’s the scariest thing in this movie, but that would be the ectoplasm scene. Now the possessed blonde goes and visits Frankie Cullen. After noting that her lingerie is “fun for the whole family.” He has sex with Gayle Evelyn through her new body. They keep changing the girls out during the scene.

After the Professor makes it clear that he bought this special thing that can contact the dead from an old fakir, not an old fucker, things start to come to a head. Luckily, Show Me state brought holy water with him that he never uses in this movie. The house shakes and so that’s when the Professor says they need to follow him to see if this manifestation leads them to Gayle Evelyn. Cue Frankie Cullen.

Cullen: “Um, I may have already been there, done that.”
Professor: “How do you mean?”
Cullen: “Well, earlier this afternoon, I may have had a close encounter with the spirit world.”
Professor: “You mean you felt her presence?”
Cullen: “That’s not all I felt.”

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Oh, Frankie, you kill me. But not as much as the next scene.

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The girl’s get together and after some ectoplasm drips on the one girl, they all bathe in it naked. You know, just like that scene in Ghostbusters (1984). This scene is disgusting. Let’s move on.

Of course that means to another sex scene. Show Me state goes into a room where an old radio is playing when the ghost of Dawn Cummings shows up. After informing her that she is the “ghostest with the mostest”, they have sex.

Running into Cullen and the Professor, he tells them that while he didn’t speak to Gayle he did get a “mouthful from her friend Dawn”. This whole conversation amounts to the dead couple needing to be reunited, which happens in short order. Then just when we think the movie is over a man steps out of the shadows.

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That’s the dead father who was a magician. He returns to tell his daughter to “believe in magic, sweet heart. Just believe.” A sentimental ending to a movie that had five girls bathe in what was clearly meant to look like sperm. I can’t say I expected to see that.

This one wasn’t bad. Well, except for some of the music. This is one that uses that Johnny Wet Pants song. I really hate that song and a couple of the others that I have heard in other late night cable movies.

Val’s Movie Roundup #24: Late Night Cable Edition


I guess after watching Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life this had to be the next roundup. Also it’s been 21 of these things since I last spotlighted this genre of movies. I know how that kid could have been cured of his addiction. Watching these four movies.

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Passionate Intentions (2015) – This one wasn’t even in IMDb when I watched it. They’re still processing my submission as I am writing this. This movie is one of those that has the absolute bare minimum plot, and the rest is just sex. It’s about a couple. The girl is about to inherit some money and it comes between them for awhile. Really, who cares. However, while the acting is bad, the plot doesn’t exist, and the sex is boring, it’s actually rather pretty. Here’s two shots.

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The movie may be bad, but at least it was well shot. That’s way more than can be said for some of these. Sadly, they didn’t get someone as good for the sound cause that’s a little off.

Oh, and if somebody knows, then tell me what was with this guy and these dog tags. There are two sex scenes with him where he is wearing them. I don’t remember any explanation given. Is this some fetish I’m not aware of?

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Sexual Wishlist (2014) – Just like Passionate Intentions, this movie has the as little plot as possible and as much sex as possible thing going on. This time it’s a divorce and an argument over who gets a couple of things that keeps them having sex with other people. But this movie has two things Passionate Intentions didn’t have.

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Frankie Cullen

Christie Stevens

Christie Stevens

I’ve seen Frankie Cullen in several of these movies now and he is almost too good for them. I know he has done a few, but he really should be doing B-Movies rather than these. He has enough acting talent for it. His presence usually lifts the movie up.

Unfortunately, Christie Stevens does the opposite. She gives the worst performances I have seen in any of these movies. Her line readings make Ryan O’Neal in Tough Guys Don’t Dance (1987) seem amazing.

At least her lines in Intergalactic Swingers (2013) were so cheesy that it really didn’t matter, but here she is wretched.

Also, some how this movie and Passionate Intentions were shot by the same person, Lex Lynne Smith, but the difference in quality is almost night and day.

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Pleasure Or Pain (2013) – Now that director Zalman King is no longer with us, they seem to be slapping his name onto anything he did. He’s the one who brought us the Red Shoe Diaries. You know, the TV show and movie series that David Duchovny narrated. I always found it funny that you could watch him on network television in the evening, then tune into late night cable and watch him there too. But to the movie.

This is Fifty Shades of Grey if that movie could have actually shown anything. Seriously, that almost tells you exactly what to expect here. Cut out the pointless relationship BS, horrible attempts at characters, and the stupid negotiation scenes and replace it all with arty eroticism. That’s Pleasure Or Pain in a nutshell.

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As you can see, clearly what was missing from Fifty Shades of Grey was a miniature boat. That’s our Christian Grey.

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That’s our Anastasia Steele narrating the story from what appears to be a radio broadcast booth. I’m not sure if they ever explain exactly where she was and it really doesn’t make any difference.

The two meet, get married, and then it’s just erotic scenes from then on. However, while the settings and exact situations may change, it goes to a certain point and never further. Just like Fifty Shades of Grey did. Both go only so far, then dance around there, but don’t actually do anything. King really tried to get arty with this. There’s one scene that both made me think of Jodorowsky’s The Holy Mountain (1973) and what must have been going on at One Eyed Jacks when Lynch wasn’t there filming Twin Peaks.

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It’s the best of the four films here, but you will get sick of the erotic stuff. There’s really just so so much of it. I was already hurting by the mid point of the movie wanting the thing over with.

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Monster of the Nudist Colony (2013) – Now we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel. Take a whiff of those fingernails because that smell is Monster of the Nudist Colony. Not even Frankie Cullen could save this one.

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There’s an ape loose at a nudist colony where all people do is have sex. For some reason Cullen, a detective, is sent to investigate. And investigate he doesn’t. The movie is just some of the worst shot on video sex I have seen since Sexually Bugged! (2014). In fact, I’m quite sure that it’s the same crew. I even recognize some of the music, which by the way, is the worst music ever. And it has lyrics. One of them keeps repeating that he’s “Johnny Wet Pants”.

While everyone is having sex, the ape kidnaps and ties up a couple of the girls like Fay Wray or something. Just like the kid in Cyber Seduction is cured by jumping in a pool, two girls dancing naked while tied to poles turns the ape back into a man. Cause of course it does!

This really is the worst kind of these late night cable movies. It’s one of those where the girls look into the camera looking for approval like they’re a cat that’s just brought a dead rat to their owner.

Steer clear of this one.

What Lisa Marie Watched Last Night: Shark Week (dir. by Christopher Ray)


Last night, I watched a little film called Shark Week on the SyFy channel.

Frankie Cullen in Shark Week

Why Was I Watching It?

I was watching for a few reasons.  Number one, it was on the SyFy Network and that’s always a good sign.  Number two, it’s the latest film to be produced by the folks at the Asylum and that’s usually another good sign that the film, if nothing else, is going to be an interesting viewing experience.  Finally, some of the wittiest people on twitter were live tweeting this film and they were tolerant enough not to block me when I decided not to join in.

What’s It About?

It’s Saw Meets Jaws!

So, there’s this evil millionaire guy named Tiberon (played by Patrick Bergin) and he apparently owns a private island just south of the Florida keys and he’s a little bit upset because his son is dead and there’s 8 people that he holds responsible for the death.  Those 8 people all have individual names but, to be honest, they’re all pretty interchangeable and I found it easier just to refer to them all by nicknames like Blue Shirt, Tattoo Girl, Skinny Vin Diesel, Ugly Katy Perry, and my personal favorite character in the entire film, Psuedo Arquette (who was played by Frankie Cullen).

Tiberon and his assistant Elena (played by Yancy Butler) kidnap our 8 victims and dump them on an island where they’re forced to fight for their right to live while having to deal with several shark-related booby traps.  Why?  I assume because the evil guy is named Tiberon (and yes, that’s how he spells it, according to the imdb).  Just imagine if the guy was named Kittens.  It would have been a totally different movie. 

What Worked?

Speaking of the imdb, one reviewer over on that site has already declared that Shark Week is the worst film ever made.  To him, I say, “Calm down, your judgmental toadsucker.”  Shark Week is a low-budget film with a bunch of hammy acting and obviously cheap special effects.  It’s also a lot of fun.  Shark Week, like the best SyFy offerings, is a film that’s been specifically designed to inspire you to talk back to your TV.  Shark Week is not a film that you watch alone while jotting down critical observations in your Hello Kitty notebook.  Shark Week is a movie that you watch with a bunch of friends and you have a good time while doing so.  Shark Week doesn’t take itself seriously and neither should you.

Plus, I absolutely adored Frankie Cullen, who played a character named Frankie.  I, however, referred to him as Pseudo Arquette throughout the entire film because he really does look like a less goofy, more manly version of David Arquette.  I mentioned on twitter that I thought Pseudo Arquette was the cutest guy on the island.  “Sweetie, he’s a porn star,” someone tweeted back, referring to the fact that, outside of Shark Week, Cullen’s filmography is made up of movies like Celebrity Sex Tape, The Breastford Wives, The Devil Wears Nada, and Busty Coeds Vs. Lusty Cheerleaders.  Well, no matter.  I still loved my Psuedo Arquette.

Speaking of which, if I ever take up a second career as a super-powered crime fighter, I hope that the newspapers call me, “Busty CoEd.”  As in, “Thank you, Busty CoEd, you saved our town!  YAY!”

What Didn’t Work?

The title was a bit of a problem because the film appeared to take place over the course of just two or three days.  Certainly, they weren’t on that island for an entire week.  Add to that, we were using the #SharkWeek hashtag on twitter to talk about the film while we were watching it and, as a result, we had to deal with other people making  random comments like, “I can’t wait for #SharkWeek to start on the Discovery Channel!”  Seriously, it got a little annoying after a while.

“Oh my God!  Just Like Me!” Moments

Much like Tattoo Girl and Ugly Katy Perry, I’m scared of sharks, too.  That’s one of the many reasons why I always stay in the shallow end of the pool. 

Lessons Learned

Two lessons learned: First off, you can literally do anything as long as you’re in international waters.  Secondly, baby sharks are seriously cute.