Munch

 

 (imdb)

MUNCHIES-1987-An anthropologist Simon Watterman (Harvey Korman) and his son Paul (Charlie Stratton) find a strange creature in a cave in South America. They name it Arnold and bring it back to the US. While Simon and his girlfriend Cindy have sex, Watterman’s brother Cecil (also Korman) kidnaps the creature with the help of his dim-witted stepson. Arnold splits into 4 separate creatures and they drive a car, smoke pot, drink beer and use a rifle. 

Obviously inspired by GREMLINS and GHOULIES, producer Roger Corman gave this assignment to first time director Tina Hirsch because she had edited GREMLINS. Although she continued to edited movies, she directed only one more after this lame comedy rip-off.

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Beach Follow Up

 

 (imdb)

WILD ON THE BEACH-1965-Adam (Frankie Randall) and Lee (Sherry Jackson) both rent the same beach house. Oodles of funny things happen in this pretty unfunny rip-off of AIP's Beach movies. Sonny & Cher, The Astronauts and Sandy Nelson provide the music and Russ Bender as a college professor/record producer even croons a tune! Booth Colman is a college dean and Justin Smith is his bumbling assistant.

This was Maury Dexter's follow up to SURF PARTY and it was co-written by his usual screenwriter Harry Spauding. Lead Frankie Randall hosted a summer replacement show for Dean Martin and his cover of The Who's “I Can See For Miles” is featured on “Golden Throats: The Great American Sing Off” from Rhino records.

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Low Budget Slaves

 

 (imdb)

SLAVE GIRLS FROM BEYOND INFINITY-1987-On a distant planet, some survivors of spaceship crash (Elizabeth Kaitan, Cindy Beal, Brinke Stevens and lone male Cal Horner) are rescued by smooth talking Zed (Don Scribner) who lives in a castle with a bunch of robot servants. After not much happens, the story turns into a "The Most Dangerous Game” rip-off with Zed hunting the bikini clad trio in a phony forest. 

Typical '80's "tease" film, promising a lot and delivering nothing. Writer/director Ken Dixon also made THE EROTIC ADVENTURES OF ROBINSON CURSOE (1976). His first film was the interesting short SHADOW HOUSE made in 1973. Richard Band was an executive producer.

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Bad Imitation

 

 (themoviedb.com)

THOR: END OF DAYS-2020-In this Marvel comics knock off, Norse god/superhero Thor (Max Aria) battles his arch nemesis Loki (Mike Milian) for the fate of the world or something like that. The acting, script and sfx are terrible. By Odin, this sucks! 

Writer/director Mike Shapiro had previously made GOD OF THUNDER (2015) which also featured Aria in the lead role, so I guess this is a sequel.

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Im Waiting for The Asylum Apocalypse

 

 (tmdb)

ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE-2011-This typical Asylum rip off of DAY OF THE DEAD and 28 DAYS LATER features gory CGI sfx while characters scream at each other in between running and killing zombies. They even thrown Ving Rhames in one of the lead roles (He was in the big budgeted DAY OF THE DEAD (2008)). Avoid this "SyFy channel" presentation directed by Nick Lyon.

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Monstrous Rip-Off

 

 (foundfootagecritic.com)

MONSTER-2008-Two sisters decided to do a documentary on global warming and go to Japan to film it. They don't know Japanese and they certainly don't know anything about filmmaking. Disaster strikes in the form of an underground monster barely seen. It's mostly characters running and yelling. Occasionally, they meet someone who speaks English. 

This is a found footage rip-off of CLOVERFIELD with a little BLAIR WITCH thrown in which figures because it was made by The Asylum. Director Eric Forsberg may have made a sequel.

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Another Rip Off

 

 (imdb)

LORDS OF THE DEEP-1989-Low budget "Alien underwater" trash co-produced by Roger Corman (who makes a cameo). An undersea exploration team is terrorized by an extraterrestrial life form. Kind of nutty Commander Dobler (Bradford Dillman) wants to destroy the creature they pick up but biologist Claire (Priscilla Barnes) has other ideas and seems to be getting communications from the aliens. This is the only feature film (so far at least) directed by Mary Ann Fisher who previously produced ANDRIOD (1982) for Corman.

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Ape vs. Rip-Off

 

 (imdb)

APE VS. MONSTER-2021-A baby monkey lost in a space experiment returns as a giant ape. An African-America scientist Linda (Arianna Scott) and a Russian agent (Katie Sereika) investigate with a wimpy white guy (Shane Hartigan) when a gigantic lizard also shows up. Linda wants to save the ape but the army wants to destroy it. Eric Roberts is the head of National Security. The acting and dialogue is pretty bad. Later Linda's estranged father (Rudy Bentz) (who of course is white) shows up to help. An alien spaceship seems to be controlling them. Both monsters show up in DC to duke it out the same year as Kong vs Godzilla. 

What a coincidence! The Asylum strikes again! 

The director Bunny Bravo later made THE ADVENTURES OF DANIEL LUSKO...er...sorry. That should be the director Daniel Lusko later made THE ADVENTURES OF BUNNY BRAVO....

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Exterminate...

 

EXTERMINATORS FROM THE YEAR 3000-1983-In this Road Warrior rip off, after the ozone layer is destroyed, post apocalyptic survivors search for water while a bald headed nut called Crazy Bull (Fred Harris) and his assistant Shadow (Beryl Cunningham) lead a gang of outlaws also searching for H20. A young bionic boy Tommy (Luca Venantini) looking for his dad attaches himself to Mad Max wannabe Alien (Robert Jannuchi).They meet ex-astronaut Papillon (Luciano Pigozzi) who fixes Tommy's arm. Later they are joined by Alien's ex-girlfriend Trash (Alicia Moro) in a hunt for water. 

Badly made in Italy nonsense directed by Giuliano Camimino (THE CASE OF THE BLOODY IRIS).

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Killer Shark Shit

 

 (wikipedia)

TINTORERA: KILLER SHARK-1977-In Mexico a series of shark attacks don't seem to bother anyone. Jaws inspired nonsense that goes down hill after an English woman (Fiona Lewis) is killed. Susan George shows up to party with Hugo Stiglitz, Jennifer Ashley (later in CHAINED HEAT) and Carlos East (a regular in the director's movies) but who cares? Sharks attack, people are killed. Really terrible Mexico production. Director Rene Cordona Jr. later made the all star exploitation movie GUYANA: CULT OF THE DAMNED.

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Rim Shit

 

ATLANTIC RIM-2013-Stupid confusing shit from The Asylum is a blatant rip off of PACIFIC RIM but on a much lower budget. Graham Greene is the cliche spouting commander. Red (David Chokachi) is the asshole best pilot who proves if he got killed no one would care. He's assisted by Tracy (Jackie Moore) and Jim (Treach). 

This nonsense was released to cash in on the success of PACIFIC RIM, a stunt The Asylum as tried before. It's also  known as FROM THE SEA. The director Jared Cohn has made other stuff.

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Filmed in Louisiana

THE RIG-2010-Talky laughable nonsense about an underwater creature terrorizing an oil rig during a storm. The head of the rig (William Forsthye; who had the good sense to be killed 30 minutes into this) has his daughter (Serah D'Laine) and her bf (Stacey Hinnen) working there too. The rest is the slacker crew being slaughtered. Some directors just can't get out of the ALIEN/THE THING retread. Gory murders don't make a good film. 

Director Peter Atencio later made KEANU which actually played in theaters! 

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Kiddie Stuff

CODY THE ROBOSAPIEN-A nerdy scientist (David Eigenberg) creates a kid like robot for search and rescue missions but his evil partner (Kim Coates) wants to sell it as a weapon to a foreign power. After the bot is injured escaping, a genius kid named Henry (Bobby Coleman) who has a mean older sister (Holliston Coleman) and an uncaring mother (Penelope Ann Miller) kind of fixes Cody up. Henry takes him to school where Cody break dances, plays basketball and helps Henry woo a girl he likes. Cody flies too and he and Henry have several dangerous adventures in his ET/Disney inspired children's story filmed in New Orleans. I guess kids might like it....

Apparently the main character is based on “biomorphic robot” created by the Hong Kong based company WowWee. It was written and co-produced by Avi Arad who co-produced many of the early Marvel Comics movie adaptations including the first Spider-Man trilogy directed by Sam Raimi. Another producer Steven Paul had directed stuff like ENTERNITY (1990) and SLAPSTICK (1982). Director Sean McNamara directed a lot of kids TV shows.

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American Actors In Italy

 

 

THE VISITOR-1979-At an Atlanta Hawks basketball game a little girl named Katy (Paige Connor) seems to make an opposing player lose the game. She's a snot-nosed brat and after having sex her mother Barbara (Joanne Nail) confesses to her boyfriend Raymond (Lance Henriksen who was in OMEN 2 the year before) that she's afraid of her daughter. It turns out Raymond actually works for a cabal led by Dr. Walker (Mel Ferrer) who says the mother carries the genes of “Sateen”. They want the boyfriend to impregnate mom so Katy will have a brother. For some reason Katy gets a revolver for a birthday present and she accidentally shoots mom who winds up paralyzed. A character who may be Jesus Christ (Franco Nero) sends a visitor (John Huston) to check up on Katy. And a weird housekeeper (Shelly Winters, no stranger to horror and exploitation) also hangs around. Meanwhile a detective (Glen Ford who had played Pa Kent in the SUPERMAN movie the year before) investigates until he is killed. Later after Raymond and Katy kill Barbara the visitor sends a flock of birds to kill Raymond and Katy is whisked away to a heavenly place where (now bald) she joins other hairless children under the protection of the Christ like figure.

This Italian/US co-production THE OMEN inspired tale was filmed in and around Rome by Guilio Paradisi (a former actor) under the more American sounding Michael J. Paradise. It's no paradise when viewing this disjointed, badly dubbed horror tale despite the name cast. It could be the US version was badly cut and dubbed making the story fairly incoherent. For example director Sam Peckinpah appears in one scene as a doctor named Collins (Katy and Barbara's last name). It seems in the uncut version it's explained that the doctor is actually Barbara's ex-husband but here it's reduced to a weird cameo by an American director (Peckinpah would make this last movie THE OSTERMAN WEEKEND a few years later). Actor/director Mel Ferrer was in several European horror films around this time and the same year as THE VISITOR was in added US scenes for an Italian horror film SCREAMERS.

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More Rambling....

JACK HUNTER AND THE LOST TREASURE OF UGARIT-2008-Ivan Sergei  portrays the title character a terrible Indiana Jones clone. It's full of bad acting and direction wrapped around an idiotic derivative plot. It was filmed in Turkey (I'll avoid the pun...). I've read it was actually some kind of mini-series (?). It was directed by Terry Cunningham (if he was related to Richie it might explain why he's allowed to direct movies but of course that can't be true...)....That leaves us with RED FACTION: ORIGINS-2011-more S.F. nonsense that takes place on the planet Mars in 2145. It's an un-fantastic allegory where the Martians have to fight to be free from the evil Earth force. Robert "I used to have a career" Patrick stars as a guy who led the revolution. Kate Vernon is "The Matriarch" (mostly appearing as a hologram) and there's a lot of black and white flashbacks. Hmmm..X-MEN: ORIGINS...RED FACTION: ORIGINS...I hope this isn't the start of something! The story is by Charles Band vet Danny Bilson. TV director Michael Nankin made it...
 I watched a good film recently too! DUEL ON GANRYU ISLAND, the third part of Hiroshi Inagaki's excellent "Samurai Trilogy" (1954-56) starring the great Toshiro Mifune as Musashi Miyamoto, a wandering misfit who becomes Japan's greatest "fencer". At the time Kurosawa was making some of the greatest movies of all time with Mifune (they collaborated on "The Seven Samurai" the same year as Part 1) but as Kurosawa worked exclusively in black and white at the time, all three of Inagaki's films are in color which really adds to the beauty of the story...THE KID WITH THE GOLDEN ARM is a 1979 Shaw Bros. production directed by Cheh Chang. It's chock full of violence, great fights and characters named Iron Feet, Golden Arms and Short Axe. It features the usual "Venoms" cast....I also saw two other martial arts movies recently THE REVENGER-(aka SHAOLIN REVENGER)-1980 and  KUNG-FU OF THE EIGHT DRUNKARDS but I'm sure everyone's tired of me writing about such things!

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RIP Robert W. Kaelin-1918-2014

Massacre Mitchell Style

DUKE MITCHELL'S MASSACRE MAFIA STYLE-(aka THE EXECUTIONER)-1978-If you've ever seen the very bizarre BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA, you'll remember the comedy team of Mitchell & Petrillo who did a take-off on the the popular team of Martin & Lewis.

Well the Dean Martin clone of the duo Duke Mitchell produced, wrote and directed this THE GODFATHER rip-off but apparently he only had beer money to finance it. The acting, direction and editing are all terrible. Mitchell plays Mimi Micelli who narrates his story which begins in Sicily where he grows up after his father has been deported by the US. Mimi returns to the states later and hooks up with his old friend Jolly (Vic Caesar). They kidnap a mob boss Chucky Tripoli (Louis Zito) and hold him for ransom (they send his severed finger through the mail as proof). After crashing Chucky's son's wedding and he and Tripoli decide to team up. Mimi swears a lot, spouts racist slurs, smokes and kills with a shotgun. He forms The Sons of Sicily Defense League but their spokesman is shot dead on live TV. A gangster named Bones (Fred Otash) who's fed up with Mimi's antics beats him up and makes him go into the movie business! Mimi and Solly go to a black pimp called Super Spook (Jimmy Williams) to get some girls for their movie. After they insult him he says "you guys have been been watching too many Humphrey Bogart movies". (he's actually right in a way) When he declines their offer they crucify him on a church cross.

There's killing, some gore and an explosion at a funeral that kills all the mourners! Mimi's ridiculous speech at the end includes a swipe at THE GODFATHER movie and novel. His bloody death involves a shotgun hidden in a loaf of bread.

It's called LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON when the credits are shown at the end. Mitchell also wrote the movie and sings the end theme. He made one other movie GONE WITH THE POPE (which he started filming before MASSACRE) but died (in 1981) before it was finished. It was rescued from obscurity by Grindhouse Releasing (co-founder by Sage Stallone who died in 2012), Buck Flower (who has a very small role) was the only other cast member I knew.

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Rip-Off

THE DEVIL WITHIN HER-1975-Former exotic dancer Lucy Carlesi (Joan Collins) gives birth to a rather large and strong baby (at least that's what the doctor's say; it looks like any normal baby). Weird things happen almost immediately. Baby scratches mommy and later bites their housekeeper. Her Italian husband Geno (Ralph Bates with an accent) hires a nanny but the baby pushes her into a pond and she dies! Lucy reveals a strange story to her girlfriend (Caroline Munro) about the last time she danced and how a dwarf actor "cursed" her ("You will have a baby as big as I am small! A monster!"). She believes her baby is possessed and even sees the dwarf's face in place of her son's. Their doctor (Donald Pleasance) doesn't believe it but when he visits he's decapitated. Dad winds up dead by hanging and his body is stuffed in a drain pipe. Dad's sister, a nun (Elleen Atkins) suspects no good and eventually performs an exorcism but by then everyone is dead! John Steiner is also in it as a Cockney club owner. Much of it doesn't make sense and there's some unintentional humor and it all seems to be inspired by THE EXORCIST, IT'S ALIVE and ROSEMARY'S BABY. 

Director Peter Sasdy did better with previous efforts like TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA, COUNTESS DRACULA and HANDS OF THE RIPPER. For some reason it has recently been re-titled SHARON'S BABY.

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Exorsnore

EXORCISMUS-2010-In England Emma (Sophie Vavasseur from RESIDENT EVIL: APOCALYPSE), a teenage girl acts weirdly. She cuts herself, almost drowns her little brother and levitates in front of her mom and dad. When she goes to a psychiatrist he dies of a heart attack. She seems to be possessed so they bring in their uncle, a priest (Stephen Billington; also in RESIDENT EVIL) to perform an exorcism. He's haunted by flashbacks of botched one he once did. While tied to a chair she curses a lot (“fuckin' priest”), has spasms, her eyes turn white and she tries to strangle dad (with her legs). Her pin cushioned faced boyfriend tells her she's just being manipulated but she causes a car crash that nearly kills him (she sees his face covered with cockroaches). 

Later after killing her brother and driving mom crazy, she learns that things might not be what they seem. Despite it's twists in the finale (which goes on too long) this is just another EXORCIST take-off. This English language Spanish production filmed in England was directed by Manuel Carballo and written by David Munoz (THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE). 

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Creature

CREATURE-2011-Three obnoxious couples heading for New Orleans take a detour and wind up being terrorized by some insane hillbillies while a swamp creature (who was once a man) prowls around killing. It's later revealed that one of the guys on the road trip is actually part of clan and is leading the others to a spot so the inbred crackers can perform a blood sacrifice. This is sort of a rip-off of Rob Zombie's HOUSE OF 1000 CORPSES and in the movie's only highlight Sid Haig plays a character similar to his "Capt. Spauding" in 1000!

There's nudity and gore but there's also a lot of yelling and the ending is ridiculous. It's the only movie (so far) directed by Fred Andrews, a TV production designer.

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Let's Go Navy

LET'S GO NAVY-1951-In this outing Slip (Leo Gorcey) and Sach (Huntz Huntz) are robbed at gun point of some money they planned to give to charity. Since the two robbers (Tom Neal and Richard Benedict) were dressed as sailors "the boys" decide to join the navy and find them! Allen Jenkins is their CPO who is thrown overboard several times because of Sach's idiocy. Jonathan Hale is the captain. There's a lot of Abbott & Costello type gags including giving the captain a bar of soap instead of cheese and shell game routine (featuring Frank Jenks). When they land on a tropical island someone named Charlita shows up as Princess Papoola. She was in BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA the next year. Billy Benedict is Whitey, Buddy Gorman is Butch and David Gorcey is Chuck.

Unfortunately there's not enough Louie Dumbrosky (Bernard Gorcey). Directed by William Beaudine. This is the only credit for screenwriter Max Adams (!). This would be Buddy Gorman's last appearance as Butch. Bennie Barlett would rejoin the gang for the next entry. Leo Gorcey's manager Jan Grippo also exited as producer after this one.

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