More Chan (Jackie, Not Charlie)

 

 (themoviedatabase,org)

SNAKE AND CRANE ARTS OF SHAOLIN-1978-8 Kung Fu masters create a new martial art called the 8 Steps of Snake and Crane. Yin-Fung (Jackie Chan) has the book the 8 masters wrote. He's looking for a man with a tattoo on his shoulder and he has lots of fights. The daughter of the leader of The Flying Tiger clan (Nora Miao) also wants it. 

There's a lot of characters who go in and out of the story and some great fights. Eventually Yin-Fung reveals all and gets his revenge. Directed by Chi-Hwa Chen who later made POLICE STORY (1985) with Chan.

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Joe Don Justice

(imdb)

FINAL JUSTICE-1985-2 Italian mobster brothers kill a sheriff and his deputy Geronimo (Joe Don Baker) chases them to the Mexican border. He kills one of them and captures Palermo (Ven-antino Venantini; CANNIBAL FEROX (1981)) who vows revenge. For some reason, Geronimo is assigned by Chief Wilson (Bill McKinney), to take Palermo back to Sicily to stand trial but through sabotage and violence Palermo escapes when the plane makes an emergency landing in Malta. Geronimo is ordered back to the US but instead he goes out on his own, shooting and disregarding orders. He's assisted by local Gina (Patrizia Pelligrino). Palermo's boss (Rosanno Brazzi) gives Palermo 24 hrs. to get rid of the American. 

Stupid low budget crime drama filmed entirely in Malta by producer/writer/director Greydon Clark (who plays the doomed sheriff). A US-Italy co-production. Baker (who died in May of 2025) starred in director Clark's JOYSTICKS in 1983. Rossano Brazzi (who directed and starred in THE CHRISTMAS THAT ALMOST WASN'T in 1966) was in Abel Ferrara's FEAR CITY the year before this.

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Chan Vs. Wooden Men

 

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SHAOLIN WOODEN MEN-1976-in a Shaolin temple, a guy everyone calls Little Mute (Jackie Chan), because he can't speak, gets in trouble a lot with the monks and meets a prisoner Fat Yu (Kang King) chained up in a cave who teaches him to fight. A nun (Ping-Yu Chang) also helps train him. He passes the test of the 36 Shaolin wooden men, a long corridor with giant wood men who continually punch, and leaves the temple. In the city, he meets a cafe owner (Hsin Chin) and his son (Kam Cheung) and daughter (Chun Lung). 

The Green Dragon gang kidnap her and Little Mute and the son go looking for her. They save Yu from being re-captured but split with him when they learn he’s a vicious killer. The story takes several turns with Little Mute having a showdown battle with his father's killer. Early Chan film directed Lo Wei.

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Cheap Western

 

 (themoviedb.org)

YOUNG JESSE JAMES-1960-After evil Northern troops hang his father, Jesse James (Russ Stricklyn) wants to join the rebel army to get revenge but Quantrill (Emile Meyer) doesn't want him. His brother Frank (Robert Dix) and cousin Cole Younger (Williard Parker) don't want him there either. But Quantrill has a change of heart and sends Jesse into a town in drag. He has a problem with Zack (Rex Holman) but he saves his life. 

This misguided junk makes heroes out of scum while still showing they are cold blooded murders. They talk about revisionism today! 

Merry Anders is Belle Starr and Norman Leavitt, William Mims and Tyler McVey have small roles. Co-screenwriter Orville Hampton worked a lot with director Edward L. Cahn and later mostly did TV work. Director William F. Claxton directed many episodes of TV's “Bonanza” and later made THE NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972).

 (pbs.org)

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Tiger's Back

 

 (imdb)

RETURN OF THE TIGER-1977-In Hong Kong, Chang Hung (Bruce Li) and his nameless partner (Angela Mao; ENTER THE DRAGON (1973)) want gangster Paul the Westerner (Paul L. Smith; in MIDNIGHT EXPRESS the next year) to close down his operations. Mr. Chen (Yi Chang),his right hand man, learns that Chang is here to avenge his father's death. Another mobster Mr. Sing (Fei Lung) wants Chang on his side. After many double crosses, Paul and Chang have a climactic fight. 

This sequel to EXIT THE DRAGON, ENTER THE TIGER was directed by that movie's producer, Jimmy Shaw, which Li and Chang co-starred in.

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Santo Vs. Nazis

 

 (imdb)

SANTO EN ANONIMO MORTAL-(ANONYMOUS DEATH THREAT)-1972-When a jeweler is fatally shot and real estate agent pushed off a roof, Inspector Ponce (Armando Silvertre) is stumped. They both received notes they were going to be killed. Mario Gaos (Xaiver Masse) is worried. He received a note too. His wife wants to call the police but Gaos decides the only person who can help him is Mexico's number one wrestling crime fighter, the one and only El Santo (himself). And no sooner is his name spoken than we see him in the squared circle in a pretty rough match. After the match, he is visited by Gaos. Santo promises to guard Gaos night and day with the help of his two cohorts Pablo (Georgio Casal) and Yvette (Tere Velazquez). At work, a window washer slips into Gaos' office. He and Yvette fight. A bomb the window washer discreetly left in Gaos' office explodes, killing him. The murderer gets away.

 Later Ponce and his assistant Rocha (Raymundo Capetello) share clues with Santo then visit a guy named Henkel (Ivan J. Rado) who claims to have received a death letter and is very evasive about his involvement in WW 2. At night Santo wrestles an ordinary looking grappler called "El Nazi" (Ignacio Gomez). In the audience, a guy wearing a swastika armband and toting a rifle tries to kill our hero (no one in the crowd seems to notice him) but he misses and kills the opponent. Afterwards, Gaos' widow, Ester (Sasha Montenegro) receives a phone call saying she must kill Santo. She tries to give him a poisoned drink but the police call to tell Santo that even though Gaos was blown up, he was also slowly being poisoned to death (?). Santo goes to a warehouse to meet Henkel and is attacked by 3 guys with swastika armbands. Santo gets the better of them. Of course, Henkel is actually Von Struber, a war criminal heading a neo-Nazi party (with Gaos' wife) who escaped justice and is getting revenge on the people who testified against him! 

This isn't bad for a non-horror Santo movie. It was directed by Aldo Monti, who as an actor played Dracula twice in two other Santo movies, SANTO IN THE TREASURE OF DRACULA (1969) and SANTO AND THE BLUE DEMON VS. DRACULA AND THE WOLFMAN (1973).

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Who Will Win?

 

 (imdb)

SHAOLIN VS. MANCHU-1984-The Manchus want to get rid of all the Shaolin monks. The Shaolin abbot puts a monk named Rocky (Man-Hoi Ling) in charge. When a prostitute is attacked by soldiers, Rocky saves her but later she says Rocky raped her. He's punished then literally thrown out of the monastery. It turns out Rocky's chief rival, Jouan is a spy for the Manchus who set Rocky up, then kills the abbot. After the Manchus fail to kill his accuser, Rocky takes her to live with his aunt and she spills the beans. The evil spy becomes the new abbot and has monks fighting each other. Mostly everyone gets killed (including a little kid) but Rocky gets revenge. The ending is a little weird probably due to bad editing and dubbing. 

Director Chiu-Jun Lee was also an actor. The DVD I saw also had the trailer which took me right back to the days when movies like this were the mainstay of the Harris theater on 42nd street in NYC.

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Still Another Sequel

 

 

 (themoviedb.org)

PUMPKINHEAD 4-BLOOD FEUD-2007-Stupid hillbillies, The Hatfields & The McCoys are feuding because of an incident with a car years before. When it turns out Jodie (Amy Manson), a Hatfield girl is having an affair with McCoy boy Ricky (Bradley Taylor), two Hatfield brothers (the Hatfields seem the scummier of the two) decide to break up the romance and wind up killing another McCoy daughter, Sarah (Maria Roman). Ricky visits the witch Haggis (Lynee Verell, reprising her role from Part 3) to have her summon the demon Pumpkinhead to get revenge despite the pleadings of the cursed Ed Harley (returning Lance Henriksen). 

Gory sfx, bad acting. Written and directed by Mike Hurst (HOUSE OF THE DEAD 2).

The Chinese Connection

 

(themoviedb.org)

FIST OF FURY-1972-Chen Zhen (Bruce Lee) seeks revenge for the death of his teacher. Within the first 20 minutes he beats a whole Japanese Bushido school. Unfortunately, the Japanese ransack Chen's school and beat everyone up. Chen is asked to leave Shanghai but instead becomes an elusive avenger, picking off the men responsible for his teacher's death. Suzuki (Riki Hashimoto), the evil Japanese master, wants Chen stopped. He hires a Russian strongman (Robert Baker; Lee's student and friend) but that doesn't work. Chen kills them all but not before most of his school is wiped out. 

Also with Lee's two THE BIG BOSS co-stars Maria Yi and James Tien and Nora Miao. In the US it was known as THE CHINESE CONNECTION and was once again written and directed by Lo Wei (who also appears as a police man). He and Lee didn't see eye to eye on everything and argued constantly. According to Jackie Chan who did some stunts for the film, he saw Lee and Wei nearly come to blows till Wei backed down. Raymond Chow again was the producer. 

FIST OF FURY was the highest grossing Hong Kong film ever, until it was topped by Lee's next film, THE WAY OF THE DRAGON.

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Voodoo Unto Others

 

 (themoviedb.org)

THE DISEMBODIED-1957-Dr. Carl Metz (John Wengraf) lives in the jungle with his younger, unhappy, bitchy native wife Tonda (Allison Hayes). Behind his back, she performs a type of voodoo to get rid of him. Enter two white men, Tom (Paul Burke) and Norm (Joe Marston), photo journalists with a wounded friend Joe (Robert Christopher). Tonda takes them to her husband but he can't save Joe. When they hear drums, the men decide to investigate despite the warnings from their native guide Gogi (Paul Thompson). They discover Tonda dancing erotically. She's the voodoo queen who uses servant Suba (Dean Fredericks: later the star of THE PHANTOM PLANET (1961)), a chicken and a doll to cure their friend Joe. Next day Suba is found with his heart cut out. Later Tonda tells Tom she's afraid of her husband and they embrace but a seemingly bewitched Joe attacks Tom. He says “kill the white man”. Tonda blames her husband but from the look on her face, she's probably lying. Tom confronts Metz at gunpoint and tells him to cure Joe. Tom is stopped but Metz suspects his wife. When Joe disappears, Metz warns Tom to leave. Tonda declares her love for Tom but he rejects her. He and Norm and Gogi plan to leave but they find Gogi dead, their jeep disabled and their guns missing. After Tonda stabs her husband and it's clear he's dying, Tom tries to trick Tonda into saving his life. It backfires but when Tonda is killed everything works out. 

This is just some standard jungle voodoo love triangle on a very low budget. Of course it's always nice to see Allison Hayes on any budget. This was director Walter Grauman's first job. He later went into TV (One of his early efforts was a color version of “Frankenstein” in 1957 with ex-boxer Primo Carnera as the monster!) and occasionally made a feature film (like LADY IN A CAGE (1964)). He also made some seldom seen entries into ABC's “Movie Of The Week” like THE OLD MAN WHO CRIED WOLF and CROWHAVEN FARM (both 1970).

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3 In One

 

(the moviedb.org)

BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR-1967-This Independent International production started out as a non-horror film called "Point of Terror", about a diamond heist directed by Al Adamson. Later Sam Sherman got a hold of it, added some murders and music and called it "Psycho A Go Go" and added John Carradine (also in HILLBILLYS IN A HAUNTED HOUSE the same year) as a mad doctor named Vanard who creates a crazed killer (Roy Morton) with an electronic brain. This version also played on TV (edited) as "The Man With The Synthetic Brain". 

Still not satisfied, Sherman added more scenes featuring Tommy Kirk, Kent Taylor and Regina Carroll. Now there's a lot of flashbacks to the original films with 2 cops (Kirk & Arne Warde) investigating murders by a green-faced zombie (Richard Smedley), the original monster from the second film now resurrected by his father (Taylor) to get revenge on Dr. V's daughter (Carroll). Director Adamson appears as one of the robbers in the original film. A strange, pretty unwatchable movie. 

“Directors never direct me. They just turn me loose.”-John Carradine

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Weird Anthology

 

 (themoviedb)

WILD TALES-2014-This is a bizarre black comedy anthology Argentine-Spanish co-production with a ensemble vast. A pre-credits story (“Pasternak”) deals with a plane load of passengers all connected by knowing the same man named Pasternak. In the second, “The Rats”, a waitress meets a customer, a loan shark, who drove her father to suicide. She doesn't know what to do but the cook has an idea. In the third “The Strongest”, a man with a flat tire is terrorized by a driver he insulted earlier. Their fight results in a sardonic ending.

 In “Little Bomb”, a demolition expert runs into problems when his car is towed. His wife wants a divorce, he's arrested then fired from his job. When he uses his expertise to get revenge, well things change. The next and most serious one, “The Proposal”, involves a prominent man who wants to pay his gardener to take the blame for his son's hit and run murder. Everything snowballs but this has too much of an abrupt ending. It ends with “Till Death Do Us Part”. At her wedding a bride finds out that her husband had an affair with one of the guests. It turns into a wedding no one will ever forget.

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Anna May Wong

 (imdb)

 

DAUGHTER OF THE DRAGON-1931-We learn that the evil Fu Manchu went crazy after the accidental deaths of his wife and son during the Boxer Rebellion. He wrongfully blamed Gen. Petrie (Holmes Herbert). Scotland Yard defeated him and he is dead. Now his daughter Ling Moy (Anna May Wong) is an “Oriental dancer”, not knowing who her father is. But it turns out Fu (Warner Oland) is not dead and in fact he kills Petrie with poison tobacco in front of his wife (Nella Walker) and son Ron (Bramwell Fletcher), Sir Basil (Lawrence Grant) and Ah Kee (Sessue Hayakawa). 

Kee shoots Fu but he gets away with help of the butler. He dies but when Ling learns that Fu is her father, she vows to kill Ron, the last Petrie. “I will be your son!”, she declares. Fu makes it seem like Sir Basil and the police kill him while he's in the act of killing Ling so Ling can get close to Ron, whose girlfriend Joan (Francis Dade) doesn't like the fact that Ron is sweet on Ling but Kee also professes his love for Ling. When Ling has a chance to kill Ron, she hesitates having now fallen in love with him but later shows her true self, holding Joan captive and threatening to pour acid on her. 

Sometimes clumsy but well-done mystery drama with a great finale. It's based on the novel “The Daughter of Fu Manchu” by Sax Rohmer. One of 13 films directed by actor Lloyd Corrigan between 1930 & 1937. His penultimate film was NIGHT KEY (1937) with Boris Karloff.

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Southern Wolf

 

 (imdb)

WOLFMAN-1979-A son, Colin Glasgow (co-producer Earl Owensby), is summoned to his father's death bed by his cousins (the father is actually stabbed to death). It seems Colin has inherited a curse and he turns into a werewolf when the moon is full. The curse was put on his family by an evil reverend. After a nightly rampage Colin is thrown in jail. The reverend plans on killing Colin's girlfriend but somehow Colin escapes, turns into a wolf and kills the the evil clergyman, unfortunately dying in the process. 

This low budget period piece, very reminiscent of an Andy Mulligan movie, has bad acting & sfx. Star Owensby in the '70's, seemed to have a reputation as a "redneck Roger Corman" based in North Carolina but most of his output didn't get passed the Mason-Dixon line. Director/writer Worth Keeter later worked on the American versions of TV's "Power Rangers" shows.

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Pre-Code Murder Mystery

 

 (imdb)

THE PHANTOM-1931-A mysterious killer, The Phantom escapes his death row prisoner cell by train and plane. He menaces a house full of people, with a DA (Wilfred Lucas) and his daughter Ruth (Allene Ray),he swore vengeance on. Some cliché police detectives search and there's a frightened pair of servants, a love triangle and the killer creeping around in a cape and top hat. Toward the end the scene changes to an insane asylum where a mad scientist wants to do an operation on Ruth. 

Very campy and crude, kind of hard to sit through. It stars cowboy actor Guinn “Big Boy” Williams. Director Allen James made many western serials and non-westerns like the original DICK TRACY (1937) and SOS COAST GUARD (1937) with Bela Lugosi.

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Never The Dragon Shall Meet

 

 (imdb)

NINJA DRAGON-1986-In Hong Kong, a businessman (Richard Harrison) seeks revenge on a group that killed his partner. Meanwhile two gangs are involved in a turf war. As usual with director Godfrey Ho, this movie has two story lines that never intersect. After the tragic ending of one story, the master ninja fights the red ninja (Paulo Tochi) to the death. Star Harrison played the same character in several other Ho paste up jobs.

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Hey Lady Ninja!

 

 (imdb)

THE CHALLENGE OF THE LADY NINJA-1983-In this Chinese martial arts story, set during the Japanese occupation of Shanghai, Wu (Hui Sang Yang) is the only woman ninja in her Japanese clan. She's a good fighter and a master of illusions. At one point, when trapped by 4 ninjas, she turns into a scantily clad dancer which mesmerizes her foes into dropping their swords, then she blows them up! Her sensei promotes her to full ninja but one student Kuroda (Kang Peng) objects because she's Chinese and China is at war with Japan. When she returns home to China she learns her father has been killed by her fiancee Ki, who is now working for the evil Japanese. She convinces 3 local women to help and they go after Ki's 4 bodyguards. There's a couple of twists to the story leading to a showdown between Wu and Kuroda. 

Crazy mixed up but entertaining martial arts movie from director Tso Nam Lee who made (DEADLY) LIFE OF NINJA the same year in Taiwan,

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Lon Clowns Around Again

 

 (imdb)

HE WHO GETS SLAPPED-1924-In Paris, scientist Paul Beaumont (Lon Chaney) proves his theories thanks in part to his wife Marie (Ruth King) and his rich benefactor The Baron (Marc McDermott) but the Baron steals not only Beaumont's discoveries but also his wife. Beaumont is disgraced and laughed at by an academy of old farts after The Baron calls him insane and slaps him. His wife insults and slaps him too. They are really an evil pair. 

Since his wife calls him a clown, he becomes one and 5 years later he's working at a circus as "He", a clown who makes the audience laugh by being slapped. Also there are daredevil rider Benzano (John Gilbert) who falls madly in love with Consuelo (Norma Shearer), the daughter of the shabby Count Mancini (Tully Marshall), who's to be his bareback rider. One night during his act, which despite having the audience in stitches, is rather cruel and morbid to me, “He” spies The Baron in the crowd. He also sees him talking to Consuelo, who He of course has now taken a shine to. Later, Benzano and Consuelo meet secretly. They are in love but Mancini convinces The Baron to marry her. When He declares his love for Consuelo she laughs thinking it a joke. He overhears the secret marriage proposal and sets up some deadly revenge. A scary clown with a globe shows up occasionally. 

This is another silent tragic revenge tale with Chaney once again giving his all in the sympathetic but vengeful lead role. Lead actress Shearer was married to MGM co-owner Irving Thalberg who co-produced the film with Swedish born director Victor Sjorstrom (THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE (1921)) who also co-adapted it from a Russian play. Co-star John Gilbert was on the verge of becoming one of the biggest stars of the silent era.

 (imdb)

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Thor!

 

 (imdb)

ZOMBIE NIGHTMARE-1987- After his father is killed by some punks when he was little, Tony Washington (Jon Mikl Thor) is a nice muscle-bound softball coach who lives with his mom, but he's run down and killed by some new punks. His mom hires a voodoo woman to exact revenge. Tony comes back as a ghoul and kills his killers. Things really take a downturn when stupid police captain Tom Churchman (Adam West) shows up to investigate and examine his cigar. Turns out he was involved in the murder of Tony's father.

Terrible talky trash from Canada with West giving a bad performance. 

Before this director John Bravman made porno movies under a pseudonym. Screenwriter John Fasano (who plays Tony's father) directed ROCK AND ROLL NIGHTMARE the same year which also featured Heavy Metal singer/body builder Jon Mikl Thor. 

I once saw Thor perform at a comic convention where he also bent metal with his teeth and blew up a hot water bottle until it burst! ZOMBIE NIGHTMARE was also the feature film debut for actress Tia Carrere.

"Ace of Spades" by Motorhead is played over the opening credits. 

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Bava

 

 (the moviedb.org)

BLACK SABBATH-1963-Three tales of terror are hosted by Boris Karloff in this Italian American co-production presented by AIP. 

The Drop of Water-A woman (Jacqueline Pierreux) is terrorized in her apartment after stealing a ring off a dead woman. Dripping water, weird lights and the dead woman seemingly back for revenge all help in the thief's demise. Credited as based on a story by Anton Chekov but he never wrote such a story.

The Telephone-A woman named Rosie (Michele Mercier) receives threatening phone calls from a man she thought was dead. Credited as a story by Tolstoy but not Leo, the author of “War and Peace” but a minor author Aleksei.

The Wurdaluk-A man (Mark Damon) stays with a family and awaits the return of their grandfather (Boris Karloff) who may now be a vampire. Based on a story by Guy de Maupassant. Usually said to be the only time King Karloff played a vampire.

Mario Bava directed this using lots of style and clever camera work. The original Italian version has a different story order, different music and alternate narration by Karloff. Plus an unusual ending for the vampire story. Bava made THE WHIP AND THE BODY the same year.

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