Hey, Ya Big Baboon

 

 (imdb)

SHAKMA-1990-Terrible nonsense about dorks experimenting with apes (who obviously have more intelligence than humans). They get locked up with them and everyone starts to get killed. After Dr. Sorensen (Roddy McDowall) is killed, there's not much reason to watch this killer baboon horror junk except to laugh at all the situations where eventually everybody dies. 

The SFX are good though. Christopher Atkins, Amanda Wyss and Ari Meyers star. Filmed at Universal studios in Florida by two directors.

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It!

 

 (imdb)

IT! -1967-An assistant museum curator Pimm (Roddy McDowall) who lives with his "Mrs. Bates" like mom, is disappointed when he's passed over for head curator after the mysterious death of his boss who was left alone with an ancient statue. When the statue is brought to the museum it falls on an electrician and kills him. Pym is sweet on his dead boss's daughter, Ellen (Jill Haworth; THE MUTATIONS). An American museum guy Perkins (Paul Maxwell) deduces that the statue might be the original "Golem of Prague". Pimm gains control of the statue and uses it to kill and destroy. Later he has second thoughts and decides to do away with the monster but all his attempts fail. When the army gets involved their attempts fail too. They even nuke it. The ending is dumb. 

This is a fairly cheap and boring British horror movie written and directed by Herbert J. Leder, who'd made THE FROZEN DEAD the year before. Roddy McDowall would star in THE PLANET OF THE APES in 1968.

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High School Punks

 

 (subscene.com)

CLASS OF 1984-1982-New teacher Andy Norris (Perry King) runs afoul of a moronic gang leader Stegman (Timothy Van Patten) in a high school from hell (Abe Lincoln High). His gang includes Stefan Arngrim (TV's LAND OF THE GIANTS) and Lisa Langois (also in DEADLY EYES the same year). They terrorize the school with shakedowns, drugs and gang fights and have no respect for anyone. Norris butts heads with them despite warnings from a pathetic principal (David Garner) and an alcoholic bio teacher Corrigan (Roddy McDowall). The gang puts on masks and squirts Norris with blood, then beats him up and burns his car. When Norris' appeals to Stegman's equally moronic mother fail, he uses reverse psychology and wrecks Stegman's car. Corrigan freaks out when they kill his rabbits, and he threatens them with a gun then gets drunk and tries to run everyone over before dying in a fiery car crash (stand out performance). 

An ineffectual police officer (Al Waxman) is no help either. While Norris tries to whip the school band into shape, a nerdy student (Michael J. Fox) who is due to testify against the gang is stabbed during a lunchroom melee. It cumulates with the gang raping and kidnapping Morris' wife (Merrie Lyn Ross). He goes for revenge and despite taking a few lumps destroys the gang and saves his wife. Stegman winds up hanged to death over the concert hall.

There's a lot of violent action in this typical '80's revenge action story by director Mark L. Lester. Screenplay by Tom Holland (Lester says much of it was based on several real-life incidents he read about).

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Laserblast

 

 (wkipedia)

LASERBLAST-1978-Two lizard like (Dave Allen animated) aliens chase a green faced guy in the California desert. He has some kind of ray gun device on his arm that they want. After the credits, Billy (Kim Milford) is harassed by some hick pot smoking cops. Then he tries to visit his girlfriend Kathy (Cheryl Smith) but has an argument with her senile shell shocked grandpa The Colonel (Keenan Wynn). Worse of all, he's insulted by Eddie Deezen! Riding in the desert he finds the ray gun the aliens were after. A guy named Craig (Gianni Rossi) snoops around. A doctor (Roddy McDowall) examines Billy and is later killed. The lizard aliens get reprimanded by their boss. There's a dumb sheriff (Ron Masak) too. Billy turns into a green faced maniac and destroys a plane, a car, a hippie and some buildings. Before he can really do any destruction the aliens kill him and take the weapon leaving Kathy to mourn his passing. 

This low budget Charles Band Sci-Fi romp was directed by Michael Rae who did various work on other movies and may have directed one other movie (2005's ALIENS GONE WILD). 

LASERBLAST has become somewhat of a cult film, known for one scene where Billy blasts a STAR WARS billboard. Star Kim Milford was “Rocky” in the original stage production of THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW. He made other stage and film appearances but tragically died at age 37 after heart surgery in 1988. Lead actress Cheryl Smith, who died in 2007 at the age of 47 also appear in Cheech & Chong's UP IN SMOKE the same year.

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Mean Johnny

 

MEAN JOHNNY BARROWS-1975-Johnny Barrows (Fred Williamson) is dishonorably discharged from the army for hitting an officer. He arrives in LA and is mugged and beaten. Some racist cops arrest him thinking he's a drunk. A Sargent recognizes him as a college football player and war hero. After turning down a job offer from obvious gangster Mario Racconi (Stuart Whitman), he combs the city for a job but to no avail and sleeps in a doorway. Then he meets the Professor (Elliot Gould) and gets a job cleaning up in a gas station for the racist owner Richard (RG Armstrong). At a pow-wow mob boss Da Vince (Anthony Caruso) has his sons (Roddy McDowell and Mike Henry) kill Mario and his dad (Luther Adler) but Mario survives. When Richard cheats Johnny out of his pay Johnny tries to get it by force and is beaten up by white cops again and arrested. He gets out and Mario hires him to kill the Da Vince family. He kills both sons then has a terrible fight with an assassin who looks like Tiny Tim. Unfortunately Tony Da Vince and Mario's girlfriend Nancy (Jenny Sherman) were conspiring against both families so when Johnny tries to put the moves on her she shoots him but Johnny rigged a mine that she steps on and is blown up. 

This drawn out low budget crime drama is terrible with director/star Williamson  sleepwalking through most of the film and hardly involved in the mob family war till the last half hour.

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Angel Angel

 

ANGEL, ANGEL DOWN WE GO-1969-Wacky hippie drug mess about Tara (folksinger Holly Near), the dumpy headcase daughter of decadent gay father (Charles Aidman) and self obsessed ex-porno actress mom (Jennifer Jones) who winds up taking drugs and having sex with weirdo rock star Bogart (Jordan Christopher) and freaky friends Joe (Lou Rawls), Santoro (Roddy McDowall) and Davey Davidson (Anna Livia). Bogart seduces mom and after she dies skydiving he whips dad to death with a chain. 

This movie is not very good and it's a shame to see Academy Award winning actress Jennifer Jones in such a sleazy production, one of the last produced by the legendary Sam Katzman and released through AIP. It's the only directing credit for screenwriter Robert Thom (it's based on an unproduced play he wrote) who was no stranger to off beat films previously writing WILD IN THE STREETS and THE LEGEND OF LYlAH CLARE. He later wrote DEATHRACE 2000 and CRAZY MAMA. Star Christopher had been the lead singer in "The Wild Ones" who after he left the band recorded the original version of "Wild Thing". 

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Three Into One

RED LINE-2013-Survivors of a terrorist attack on a subway in LA try to find a way to escape but mostly fight with each other, emote personal stories and torture a guy the others think is a terrorist. It turns out one of them is. But who? (As in “who cares?”) It was directed by Robert Kirbyson and the only actor I really knew in the cast was John Billinsley.

PERFECT CREATURE-2006-This horror film about a human cop and a vampire cop teaming up to fight vampires in New Zealand. Dougray Scott (who almost played Wolverine in the original X-Men movie) is the vampire fuzz. It sucks..really...not good...

THE COOL ONES-1967-Unhip musical comedy about an eccentric English millionaire Tony Crumb (Roddy McDowell) who promotes a young female singer (Debbie Watson) and a washed up rock and roller(Gil Petersen). Phil Harris, Nita Talbot, Mrs. Miller and Glen Campbell are also in it as well bands like The Leaves and The Bantams. It's very dumb. Busy TV director Gene Nelson (also an actor) made this a couple of years after directing Elvis in HARUM SCARUM.

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"It's Hard to Kill a Horse With a Flute".

CIRCLE OF IRON-1978-A fighter named Cord (Jeff Cooper) fights in a weird tournament where the winner gets a chance to find "the book of enlightenment" held by someone named Zetan. He wins but is expelled for cheating by the games master (Roddy McDowall in strange headgear). He sets out to find the book anyway and helps a philosophy spouting blind flute player (David Carradine, similar to his Caine KUNG-FU character) who beats up three attackers in alley.

To find the book Cord must go through several trials. In the first he battles the leader (Carradine again) of a tribe of monkey men. Then in the film's most amusing scene he meets "man in oil" (Eli Wallach), a doctor who sits in a tub of oil to destroy his sexual urges. Cord then meets a barbarian leader Changsha (Carradine once more) who fights pro wrestler Earl Maynard and eventually provides Cord with his next trial. There he also meets Tara (Erica Greer) who tries to make Cord break his vow of chastity and gets crucified instead. In a dream he confronts Death (Carradine in his fourth role). Then he and the blind flute player have a few adventures. At the end Cord does meet Zetan (Christopher Lee) and finds out the secret of the book.
Carradine is great in his multiple roles (especially the blind flute player saying things like: "A fool is the twin of the wise") Antony De Longis is Morthond.

The Zen Buddhism inspired story was developed by Bruce Lee, James Coburn and Stirling Silliphant (who co-wrote the screenplay) as a vehicle for Lee (who died in 1973 ). Despite this it does seem influenced by the KUNG-FU TV show. Silliphant was a prolific TV writer who also penned the original CHILDREN OF THE DAMMED, THE SWARM and several Irwin Allen disaster movies.

Director Richard Moore was a cinematographer on films like WILD IN THE STREETS, MYRA BRECKENRIDGE and (later) ANNIE. CIRCLE is his only film as director. Co-scripter Stanley Mann also wrote DAMIEN: OMEN 2 and METEOR. It takes place in the Far East but was filmed in Israel.

"A fish saved my life once. I ate it".

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