RAMPAGE (2018) ***

The Rock plays a primatologist whose best friend is an albino ape named George.  When genetic material literally falls from the sky, George comes into contact with it and begins growing exponentially.  Pretty soon, a giant crocodile and a mutant wolf (who can also fly) begin stomping on Chicago and only The Rock can stop them.

Rampage is based on the old ‘80s video game, which of course was itself a throwback to King Kong vs. Godzilla (with a giant wolf thrown in for good measure).  As a fan of the game, I was a little dismayed that the monsters didn’t turn into naked humans when they were slain, but other than that, it’s a good enough interpretation.  The monsters climb buildings, eat people, and beat the crap out of each other.  If only it didn’t take so long to get around to the good stuff.

Like a Godzilla movie, you can’t judge Rampage for its sometimes-unnecessary dialogue scenes.  The cast infuses the film with a weird energy that prevents these scenes from getting too dull.  Jeffery Dean Morgan is a lot of fun as the shady government agent who’s a cowboy at heart.  Malin Akerman is a hoot as the evil corporate villain responsible for unleashing the monsters.  Resembling Cameron Diaz playing Cruella de Vil as an ‘80s yuppie, she chews the scenery as much as the monsters do.  (I also loved the fact that she kept the old Rampage arcade cabinet in her office.)

In addition to King Kong vs. Godzilla, the movie also slyly steals from Aliens (the scene where Joe Maganiello’s SWAT team gets taken down one by one by Ralph, the wolf), The Blob (the scene where George comes into contact with the serum), and Mission:  Impossible (the scene where The Rock escapes a crashing airplane).

The best moments come early on when The Rock cares for George.  The bond between the two is genuine and it gives the movie an unexpected emotional core.  It’s particularly funny when they bust each other’s balls via sign language.

The second act where Morgan mobilizes his men and the monsters make their way to Chicago is a bit pokey.  This stuff could’ve benefited from some tighter editing.  Once they reach the city, the gloves come off and the monster mashing is full of carnage, extensive destruction, and fun.

TAINTED (1998) ** ½

J.T. (Sean Farley, who also wrote the screenplay) is a video store manager who wants to see a midnight show of Blade Runner with his buddy Ryan (Greg James).  Their ride bails on them, so J.T. convinces his new employee, Alex (Dusan Chekvala) to give them a ride.  On the way to the theater, Alex’s car breaks down and he goes to his ex-girlfriend Adia (Tina Kapousis) for help.  They learn Alex is a vampire when some street thugs try to mug them.  He convinces them he’s just your average guy with no intention of harming humans unless they really deserve it.  When they arrive at Adia’s house, they discover her new boyfriend Slain (Jason Brouwer) is a vampire who’s scheming to taint the city’s blood supply with vampire blood.  The three friends then set out to stop him. 

As someone who’s seen a lot of low budget vampire horror comedies in their time, I can honestly say that you can do a lot worse than Tainted.  It’s very much a ‘90s time capsule, which makes it oddly endearing.  It was obviously influenced by Pulp Fiction, Clerks, and Swingers as the characters have long comic monologues filled with pop culture references and/or revolve around incidental sex and relationship humor.  Some of these monologues are long-winded and not especially funny.  Some are pointed, but too long and unpolished.  Many of them are right on the money and good for a few laughs.  While most of the actors are adept at delivering their monologues, Farley clearly saved the juiciest dialogue for himself.  He’s often very funny and his agitated delivery reminded me of Glenn Howerton from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.  

The problem is that Tainted clocks in at one-hundred-and-five minutes.  There’s no real reason for it to be that long.  This could’ve been a breezy eighty-minute movie if director Brian Evans had been disciplined enough to whittle down some of the lesser monologues and endless scenes of the characters walking.  As it is, it’s not bad as far as overlong Troma releases go. 

Oh, and those sexy vampire girls on the cover are nowhere to be found in the movie itself.

HOUSE OF SHADOWS (1976) * ½

An orphan (Leonor Manso) goes looking for a lost dog and follows it to a creepy old mansion where she witnesses a murder.  As it turns out, the woman she saw has already been dead for twenty years.  She slowly becomes obsessed with her and begins to suspect she's been possessed by the dead woman’s spirit.

Most of House of Shadows is devoted to long scenes of our heroine walking around dark corridors with a flashlight as she investigates weird noises or looks for lost dogs.  If you can’t already guess, this gets tedious quickly.  The laborious, narrated flashbacks are even duller and pretty much stops the movie on a dime every time Manso delves back into the past.  

At least director Richard Wullicher delivers a fairly atmospheric opening sequence.  The climax, though predictable, also has a healthy dose of gothic doom and gloom.  Too bad everything in between is such a dreary, slow-moving, slog.  We do get a nifty scene in which a guy in a wheelchair is placed on a train track, but these murder set-pieces are too few and far between to save the movie.

Manso makes for an OK leading lady.  She certainly fares better as the present-day incarnation of the character than as her ancestral counterpart.  (She looks a bit lost in her period garb.)  Yvonne (The Munsters) De Carlo gets to chew the scenery a bit as Manso’s ward, although not as much as you’d probably expect.  John (Psycho) Gavin is also around as the boring love interest who isn’t given very much to do.

CODE NAME VENGEANCE (1989) **

A young prince and his mother are kidnapped by a terrorist (James Ryan).  America wants to protect her interests in the prince’s nation, so Don Gordon sends mercenary prisoner Robert Ginty on a rescue mission.  Along the way, he picks up his old mentor (Cameron Mitchell) to join the team as his explosives expert and together, they set out to rescue the prince.

Code Name Vengeance was directed by David Winters without any real sense of style.  The action scenes are plentiful and lots of stuff goes boom.  However, the staging of these sequences leaves a lot to be desired.  The pacing is also slow and sluggish, especially in the middle section of the film.  The script is painfully predictable too and you can spot every single plot twist coming from a mile away.  (Seriously, would YOU trust a mission masterminded by Don Gordon?)

The cast has all seen better days, but they’re the only real reason to watch it.  Ginty isn’t bad, and he escapes the flick with his dignity more or less intact.  It’s just unfortunate that the quality of the movie is closer to Warrior of the Lost World than The Exterminator.  He does get a good love scene with Shannon Tweed, who plays a sexy helicopter pilot.  Tweed looks great topless, but honestly, the film really needed one or two more of these scenes to make it worthwhile.  Mitchell provides some spark as the crusty old mentor, although his mildly amusing antics aren’t nearly enough to salvage the picture.

Winters and Mitchell teamed up the next year for the hilarious Space Mutiny.

AKA:  Code Name Hellfire.

BAD ASSES (2014) ***

Danny Trejo returns as the elderly ass-kicker, Bad Ass.  This time, he’s out to avenge the death of his young boxing protegee who was killed by a bunch of drug dealers.  Aiding him in his quest is a crotchety old liquor store owner and former hockey player (Danny Glover) who, despite his advanced age can still throw down.

The first Bad Ass had a distinct Death Wish type of vibe in its second half and Bad Asses picks up the baton nicely.  This is a rather straightforward revenge picture that gives Trejo plenty of moments to shine.  My favorite bit was when he tortured a college drug pusher (played by Jonathan Lipnicki from Jerry Maguire!) by shoving an oscillating fan onto his nether regions and saying “Mazel Tov!”

The addition of Danny Glover was inspired and keeps this sequel from getting stale.  Some of the best scenes in the movie just contain the Two Dannys busting each other’s balls.  Glover has a lot of chemistry with Trejo and is often very funny.  Heck, he just about steals the whole movie from Trejo!  Glover without a doubt proves once again that he is definitely not getting too old for this shit.

The casting of the villain was inspired.  It’s been a while since I’ve seen Andrew Divoff in a major role, so it was good seeing him playing the slimy Argentinian villain.  I mean, come on, who wouldn’t want to see Danny Trejo square off against the Wishmaster?

Bad Asses also continues the tradition of using footage from another movie in its climax.  In this case, it’s Narrow Margin.  Most times when a film does this, it reeks of desperation, but somehow when the Bad Ass series does it, it comes off as weirdly endearing.

AKA:  Bad Ass 2:  Bad Asses.

SPACE GIRLS IN BEVERLY HILLS (2009) ½ *

Don’t let the title, cover, and the presence of Julie Strain make you think this is a Skinamax movie.  It’s more of a vanity project for Donna (Dinosaur Valley Girls) Spangler.  In addition to starring as Katana, the lead space girl, she also wrote the screenplay, produced and sings some crummy songs.  She isn’t a bad actress, but her script is lousy and full of unfunny jokes.

After a Star Wars-style opening crawl, the plot begins.  A trio of sexy space women led by Spangler are sent to Beverly Hills to find men to repopulate their alien race.  Meanwhile, a rich playboy (director Tim Colceri) goes trolling around the city looking for a hot date.  The space women crash land in his yard, and he takes them in.  Eventually, he and Spangler fall in love and helps her accomplish her mission.

It’s one thing to do a throwback to a ‘50s sci-fi movie.  However, if you’re going to do that, at least have special effects and sets that are on par with the good old days.  The CGI special effects and backgrounds are terrible, and the spaceship interiors are shoddy.

There’s really nothing here that a little nudity wouldn’t cure.  Sadly, none of the space girls (or earth girls for that matter) get naked.  For a movie where the characters constantly talk about sex and/or dress in skintight outfits, there’s no nudity, which sends the film right down the shitter.  When Colceri and Spangler finally hook up, they cut right to the cuddling and don’t even show them getting it on.  I mean, what can you say about a movie in which the hero gets a gratuitous shower scene and the leading lady doesn’t?  Imagine a Skinamax flick without the nudity and that’s about what you get with Space Girls in Beverly Hills.

It also doesn’t help that it takes the space girls almost an hour to get to Earth.  Just when you think it can’t get any worse, Spangler sings not one, but three crappy love songs. Julie Strain is the only name in the cast.  She’s only in the early scenes as the space queen who sends the girls on their mission.  After she disappears, so does the fun.

Colceri gets the best line of the movie when he says, “This is the snatch capital of the world!”

BAD ASS (2012) ***

The world needs more Mexploitation action flicks starring Danny Trejo beyond the Machete series.  Bad Ass fills that void nicely.  It sometimes feels like a throwback to an ‘80s Charles Bronson actioner with a decidedly Latin flavor (there’s often mariachi music on the soundtrack).  Other times, it feels like one of those ‘90s DTV thrillers that shamelessly recycle action scenes from other movies.  (It steals the bus chase from Red Heat for its climax.)  

The world also needs more geriatric-centered action movies.  I mean we cannot get by on Gran Torino and Bubba Ho-Tep alone.  That’s another reason why Bad Ass works so well.

At the center of everything is another great performance by Trejo.  He’s playing a character that’s older than himself, but there’s still enough of that badass swagger here that’s made him such a cinematic legend.  If you’re a fan of the man, you’ll won’t want to miss this one.

Trejo stars as an elderly Nam vet whose life seems to have slowly slipped by him.  One day, while riding a bus, he notices two skinheads harassing an old man and he interjects.  They provoke him, and he beats their ass in record time.  A passenger captures the fight on their phone and it quickly becomes an internet sensation.  People start looking up to him and he even earns the nickname “Bad Ass”.  When his friend is killed, Bad Ass soon realizes that the system doesn’t work, so he goes out on the street seeking his own brand of justice.

Sporting a beard, a baseball hat, and a fanny pack, Trejo is miles away from his usual screen persona.  At least on the outside.  Even though the dude is rocking the fanny pack, the movie never makes fun of him.  If anything, it is a reminder to respect your elders because they can surely kick your ass anytime they want.

The first half feels like it’s going to be more of a comedy.  Things switch gears in the second half when it becomes a decent Death Wish variation.  Director Craig Moss handles the switch seamlessly as there are plenty of laughs and legitimate badass moments to be had in both sections.

The supporting cast is solid.  Ron Perlman makes for a suitably evil villain as the crooked politician who ordered the hit on Trejo’s buddy.  Charles S. Dutton also puts in a good turn as Perlman’s enforcer.  The movie really belongs to Trejo though.  He’s a lot of fun to watch and I surely hope he continues making more of these (I plan on watching the sequels very soon) because the world needs more Mexican (and elderly) action heroes.