PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Friday Night Movies 1015

China O'Brien 1990 Story by Sandra Weintraub, screenplay and direction by Robert Clouse. We watched the Vinegar Syndrome 4K/Blu-ray set.

Cynthia Rothrock plays China O'Brien, she's a cop who quit the force after killing a kid who was threatening the police with a machine gun. She goes home to visit her father in a small town that's being taken over by a criminal gang. Her father is the sheriff and he's fighting a losing battle. After he's killed by the crooks China decides to run for sheriff. There's plenty of fighting, shooting and explosions as the criminals make their grab for the town.

Lucky for China and her new friends the criminals are pretty poor at that. Richard Norton and Keith Cooke are her new pals. They're both decent at martial arts, laying some beat downs on the baddies. Sadly most of the stunt men seem to struggle at lumbering. Back in the 90s when Jackie Chan was trying to gain a hold in the US market he complained that the US stunt men were way too slow. Jackie was throwing 2-3 punches before the US stuntmen could react. That's the problem here, the US stuntmen aren't up to her speed. China and her pals clean up the town with some dubious policing methods.

Golden Harvest backed the film despite it being set in Park City Utah, they wanted to help make Cynthia more famous in the US. I'm not sure how much it helped for the movie to go direct to video and not get played in theaters. I thought I had seen this before but it's not on my watched movie list. After seeing it I doubt I need to see it again.

My Grandfather Is A Vampire 1992 Written by Michael Heath and directed by David Blyth. A New Zealand film with Al Lewis as a vampire grandfather.

A kid travels from California to New Zealand to visit his grandpa only to find he's rather sickly. They have some adventures and a bit of fun but grandpa gets sicker and dies. Surprisingly grandpa rises from the dead and that causes a whole lot of trouble. It eventually get resolved and there's a sort of happy ending.

It's kind of amusing, Al Lewis is fun but over all it's only average. I'm not going to buy it, I doubt I'll have the time to watch it again.

Spiritually A Cop 1991

Spiritually A Cop 1991 Written and directed by Wai Shum. A Chinese action comedy about a ghost and the police.

Fong Lui wanted to be a cop but the police force says he's too short. He gets killed near the start of the movie and a ghost pops out of his body. Stanley Sui-Fong Fung plays the head cop of the precinct, his main desire is to get married and go on his honeymoon. Hoi Mang plays a visiting monk who is the only one who can detect the ghost. He helps Fong get used to being a ghost. The ghost is a misogynist, he doesn't think women should be on the force. The monk helps him get past this too. Yukari Ôsnima plays one of the female cops in the precinct.

There's plenty of fights and some gun battles, most of the fights are fairly good. There are plenty of gags, not all the gags are great, misogyny comments aside, but a good number of jokes landed. It's pretty average but I enjoyed it anyway. I might watch it again.

Bloody Beast 1994

Bloody Beast 1994 Written by Jimmy Leung Chi-ming and directed by Richard Yeung Kuen. A Chinese movie about a serial killer psychopath. I'd first seen this movie back in 1997, it was on VHS and rented from one of the many Asian video stores in the area. I watched 2-300 films, I even copied some but I didn't keep the tapes when better copies came along on DVD.

A creepy guy stays home and cooks for his father and sister. He doesn't work, he spends his days mopping around the house or creeping about the small town. He spies on the local women and out of the blue he attacks a woman and her two children. He kills the kids and rapes the mother before killing here.

The rest of the movie is spent watching him murder more people and watching the poorly trained mainland police try to figure out who he is so they can arrest him. They do catch him, part of the movie is told in flashback as he confesses. Creepy guy keeps insisting that they kill him after he confesses and over the end credits you can hear a gunshot.

It's a bit below average, the creepy guy does well portraying a monster but he's no Simon Yam or Anthony Wong. The rest of the cast is fair for the most part. Nothing really exceptional or new. You can check it out on Dailymotion, link above. Not for everyone.

 

Angry Ranger 1991

Angry Ranger 1991 Written by Kam Cheong Chan and directed by Lung-Wei Wang. A Chinese action film produced by Jackie Chan with fight choreography by the Jackie Chan Stent Team.

Peter is home from a stint in prison for fighting. He finds some of the people he knew in the neighborhood are worse villains than they were before he went to prison. He shows interest in a lady who is the wife of a gang leader. Things head downhill after that.

Peter renews old acquaintances, his brother has a car repair shop, a younger friend has a magazine stand. Peter gets a job in a fish market but he can't stop crossing the local gangs in one way or another. Most of his activity leads to a fight, there's plenty of those.

Peter never seems to think he should leave that woman alone, she gets beaten repeatedly by her husband but she's too afraid to leave him. Peter's brother, his young friend and the fish shop owners are all beaten for knowing Peter, intimidation is a common thug practice. Things end with a big fiery battle and plenty of people are hurt and a few are on fire. There's a rather vague ending for Peter and the young woman either. They survive but the police show up just before the credits role. We never find out if he went to jail or was given a medal for burning up some criminals.

I liked the movie, it's got some good action and a bit of humor. It's a good reminder not to fight with gangsters, Peter just doesn't seem to be able to restrain himself. I do find it sad that the local police aren't ridding the streets of the gangster element. No one cares about the poor locals and I'm guessing gangster bribes are too good to give up.

Friday Night Movies 999

Death Machine 1995 Written and directed by Stephen Norrington. We watched the director's cut from the Kino Lorber Blu-ray. It's got three versions of the movie on two disks. Norrington only directed four films, this was the first, followed by Blade, The Last Minute and The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen. I've liked the 3 films of his that I've seen, TLM is the one I haven't seen. He hasn't directed any films since 2003 but has occasionally worked in special effects. He has no credits on the IMDb after 2016.

Ely Pouget is head of Chaank Armaments Corp, Brad Dourif is a designer, Richard Brake and William Hootkins are executives. The Corp's enhanced solder glitches and kills some people in a diner. The story is out and the public isn't happy. The corp tries some damage control. Ely wants full public disclosure but the board says no. She wants Brad fired but the board says no.

Ely has an encounter with Brad about the project in Vault 10 and Brad threatens her. He's a major loony but fun to watch. Things get worse between them and Brad sends his killer robot from Vault 10 after her. Soon the robot is clanking around the building, slaughtering the staff. Some Eco-warriors break into the building, they become Ely's reluctant partners battling the robot and trying to escape. Ely locks Brad in Vault 10 with his robot. Hardly anybody gets out alive.

It's got plenty of great robot action, lots of clanky noise, good sets and models, plenty of gun shooting and explosions. I enjoyed it and I will order the Blu-ray for myself. I want to see the other versions of the film and I'm curious about the Norrington commentaries. The Blu-ray is only 15 bucks on Amazon. Seems a bargain.

The Lady And The Monster 1944 Based on the novel Donovan's Brain by Curt Siodmak, screenplay by Dane Lussier and Frederick Kohner, directed by George Sherman. He watched the new Kino Lorber Republic Horror Collection Blu-ray. It's got four 1940s films on two Blu-rays with plenty of commentaries.

 

Erich von Stroheim is Professor Franz Mueller, he's a mad scientist with his own laboratory in a fake looking castle in the middle of the Arizona desert. Erich believes he can keep a human brain alive out of the body. Mueller is asked by the local rangers if he can help a man who was in a plane crash. When the man dies Mueller takes advantage and removes the brain. They find out the dead man is a millionaire business man called Donovan. Richard Arlen and Vera Ralston are Erich's assistants, Patrick and Janice. The pair have a thing going on but Mueller also has feelings for Janice, he tries his best to disrupt the relationship.

Donovan's brain seems to be sending messages to a tired Patrick and Mueller encourages him to make contact with the brain. Patrick does, Donovan slowly takes over Patrick's brain, turning him into a slave. Donovan's lawyer is investigating the death, he finds the brain in the lab with documents about the experiment. Donovan had hid all his money, he sends Patrick on a mission to recover it. Things come to a head when Mueller tries to kill Patrick. The house keeper shoots him dead  and Donovan's brain gets dashed to the floor. Patrick goes to jail for monkeying with a dead man's brain and Janice promises to wait for him.

I mostly enjoyed the movie but it sure dragged at times, I was drifting off for a while there and there were complaints about the pace. A New York Times review, at the time of release, called it "a mite too lethargic." They aren't wrong. I seem to remember that the 1953 Donovan's Brain film was a better picture but it's been ages since I've seen it. I'll have to watch it and see. I'm looking forward to the commentaries on the film.

Naked Killer 1992

Naked Killer 1992 Written by Wong Jing and directed by Clarence Fok Yiu-leung.

Simon Yam is a cop who's just back to work, he was on leave for accidentally killing his own brother. He's still affected by the incident, he throws up when he pulls his gun and his willie won't work.

Chingmy Yau is a crazy woman who attacks a man and stabs him in the genitals. Simon tries to arrest her but fails, later she shows up at the cop shop with a big lie. She's not framing Simon but praising him. Sadly he falls for her. With her in his mind, his willie works.

Chingmy gets recruited by a bisexual hit woman who has a team of assassins under her. Literally. They go about killing sex perverts and rapists. Simon keeps looking for Chingmy. There are a big number of murders and fight scenes. Another pair of  hit women show up. They want to kill off Chingmy and her boss. Simon and Chingmy reconnect but it's too late for them. The movie ends tragically with a big boom.

I thought it was fun, there are some good action scenes. It moves fairly quickly and there's a good bit of nudity and sex. I tried the dub track and that was pretty poor, much better to watch it with the Chinese soundtrack and subtitles. There's some interviews on the DVD, they were OK.

Friday Night Movies 978

Magic Cop 1990 Written by Sam Chi-leung and Tsang Kan-cheung, directed by Stephen Tung. A Hong Kong horror comedy informally known as Mr Vampire 5. We watched the 88 Films Blu-ray and it looks pretty darn good.

Lam Ching-Ying stars as a cop who lives on a small island. He's well trained in Chinese magic. A woman on the island asks him if he'll help transport her dead daughter back home from Hong Kong. In HK Lam finds out that the daughter has died more than a week before the incident in the restaurant. She'd been reanimated by Japanese magic and used in smuggling.

There's plenty of action as Lam fights the monsters and the Japanese magician. The stunts are fun to watch. There's a good bit of comedy and the jokes are mostly fairly good. The jokes with the local cops that get assigned to work with Lam are a bit weak but kind of typical of HK humor. The effects are mostly practical with occasional bits of animation to jazz things up.

I had forgotten most of the story from the last time I saw it, years ago, and it was entertaining and fun to watch. I'm pretty sure I have  DVD from years ago but all the movies are packed up and I can't check. Worth a look for those inclined.

Vesper 2022 Written by Kristina Buožytė, Brian Clark and Bruno Samper, directed by Kristina Buožytė and Bruno Samper. A co-production from Lithuania, France and Belgium.

Vesper is a 14 year old girl who lives in the forest. The world has had some sort of biological disaster. The ones who caused the disaster are hold up in Citadel cities, helping themselves but keeping the remaining random population outside the Citadel under their thumb.

Vesper lives with her father in a run-down shack. Vesper has some education and she works to keep him alive after he'd been paralyzed while working for the Citadel. The only help he was given is a flying robot head that he can use communicate to with Vesper. One day a ship from the Citadel crashes and Vesper's whole world is smashed.

It's a dark future with only a bit of hope. It's a long film, 114 mins, and it moves along pretty slowly. Despite that I enjoyed much of it but haven't decided to bother with the Blu-ray. I'd take a download but haven't seen any in the usual places.

Cannibal Mercenary 1983

Cannibal Mercenary 1983 Written by George Lam and directed by Hong Lu Wang. A Thai picture.

A cop called Wilson takes a team into the Vietnam jungle to find a war criminal who heads a tribe of cannibals. They don't have a very good trip, just about everyone dies. There's plenty of action, with jungle fighting, some torture and a bit of cannibalism.

I didn't think it was more than average, it's like an Italian cannibal film but not as well made.

I found a copy on YouTube but it's gone already. I found another that has a fun trailer for Cobra Thunderbolt, that looks like it might be better than what I just watched. At least there was a jet pack, there's no jet pack in Cannibal Mercenary. There's also a trailer for a Thai film called Mercenary, it looks like it's a bit of an Apocalypse Now rip off.

Friday Night Movies 939

Left For Dead 2007 Written by Chad Leslie and directed by Albert Pyun. Am American Argentine production that was filmed in Argentina in 12 days. Albert won the Best Director award at the 2007 Costa del Sol Fantasy Film Festival.

A horror western with a demon gunfighter. Victoria Maurette plays Clementine, she's looking for a man called Sentenza, he deserted her and their baby. She meets a gang of whores who murdered all the people in a town. The head of the whores is looking for Sentenza also, he left her daughter pregnant and ran off.

They find Sentenza in the ghost town of Amnesty which is home to the dead soul of slain preacher Mobius Lockhardt. He made a pack with the devil to remain among the living. He can't leave the town and he can't die.

The whores get picked off one by one. There's a fair bit of action but the jittercam, jump cuts and freeze frames became annoying right quick. The characters were mostly entertaining, the lesser characters disappeared quickly, it's only an 84 min movie, no time to waste.

It's got a low score, a 3.2, on the IMDb but I thought it was more like a 5. That score would improve if there wasn't all the camera and editing trickery. That IMDb score is buoyed up by 54.5% of the votes being a 9 or a 10. I'm not sure who's voting, don't care. Don't think I'll bother with the DVD, maybe if I find it on clearance sometime.

Accion Mutante 1992 Written by Jorge Guerricaechevarría and Álex de la Iglesia, directed by Álex de la Iglesia. It's Álex's first film. A Spanish French production.

In a post-apocalyptic future the world is ruled by the rich and beautiful. A group of disable people, calling themselves mutants, plan to take down the rulers. Sadly, the mutants are mentally disabled and cannot formulate a plan that they can follow through. The kidnapping the movie opens with fails because they suffocate the victim.

The next kidnapping victim manages to survive in a complicated plot that I wouldn't even attempt to cover. It's a chaotic film with weird stuff going on all the time. The mutant group falls apart from the inside and nearly everyone dies.

I'd seen this 22 years ago but couldn't remember a thing about it. It's noisy, colorful, violent, funny and worth a look for some. Not everyone is going to like this one. We watched the new Severin Blu-ray release and it looks nice enough. The movie was pretty low budget, nice that the film elements survived. Doubt I'm going to add this to my collection.

Friday Night Movies 933

The Grave 1996 Story by Peter Glatzer, screenplay by Jonas Pate and Josh Pate, directed by Jonas Pate.

A couple of bottom feeder criminals in prison hear a story about a grave with a treasure buried in it. They escape and one of them gets shot stealing clothes from a hillbilly's clothes line. The pair hitch a ride and the guy gives them his truck so he can report it stolen for the insurance. It was a poor truck I would hardly think he'd get anything for it.

The guys seek medical help from a guy they know who is a mortician. He can't help much at all, the wounded guy dies but not before giving up the story about the grave. The mortician and his two even stupider friends decide to dig up the loot themselves. The other escaped convict shows up only to be killed by the mortician's pal. They don't find any treasure in the grave except a ring the dead guy was wearing. They  bury the convict in the grave.

Things get more complicated when a prison guard who knows about the grave murders one of the mortician's pals. Equally disruptive is the second escaped convict's ex-girlfriend. Most everyone dies.

I enjoyed it but wouldn't seek out a copy for me. Doubtful I would get around to it again. There are better stupid criminal movies out there.

Skeleton Man 2004 Written by Frederick Bailey and directed by Johnny Martin. Made for TV horror film with Michael Rooker and Casper Van Dien. It aired on the Sci Fi Channel.

An archaeologist digs up an Indian burial ground. He takes the skull of a native called the movie calls Skeleton Man. SM pops into existence through a portal and kills the archaeologist and anyone else who enters the wooded area his grave was found in. Some soldiers dies while on maneuvers and the military sends in Micheal, Casper and a few other folks for Skeleton Man to kill. Most everyone dies before Michael blows up a chemical plant.

The explosion might have killed the Skeleton Man but it seems unlikely as he appears again in the end credits. I'm unsure if that's what they meant, it's not clear. Nothing much is clear in the movie, it's just an excuse to kill people off. It's a slasher film with skeleton on a horse. It would have been better if the horse was doing all the killing. A good story would also have helped. Not one I'm going to need to see again.