CHAMPAGNE FOR BREAKFAST (1980) **

Champagne (Leslie Bovee) has just been promoted to vice president of her advertising firm.  Now that she is in a place of power, she seeks to objectify men and use them for sex.  She hires an ex-boxer (John Leslie) to be her chauffeur and he takes her around so she can ball various lovers.  Predictably, he winds up falling in love with her.

I know this is just a dumb early ‘80s porn, but the out of date attitudes and rampant homophobia really bring it down.  I mean, it’s one thing for John Leslie’s character to pretend to be gay in order to get a job.  It’s another for him to sock a guy on the jaw for coming onto him.  The strangest scene occurs when banging a hot babe and she invites another woman into the bed.  When he sees her, he starts freaking out, calls them “lesbians”, and storms out of the room.  Man, what guy wouldn’t want two sexy girls at the same time?  He clearly has some issues.  (Either that, or the filmmakers do.)

Many of the sex scenes are lackluster too.  There’s one fuck scene that happens on a waterbed that doesn’t even have a money shot, just a close-up of stains on the sheets.  The best scene is when Leslie bangs Kay Parker on her desk and she gets so hot that she starts breaking everything in her office.  

At over 100 minutes, Champagne for Breakfast is just too long for its own good and has too many drawn out dialogue scenes that ultimately go nowhere.  It’s also really cheap looking too.  I mean you kind of expect to see crew members reflected in the car windows during outdoor scenes in these movies.  You don’t expect to see them walking around in the background during a bedroom fuck scene!  Jeez, even Ed Wood kept his crew out of his shots.

Champagne for Breakfast was also released in an edited R-rated version titled, Boss Lady.  I can’t imagine how it played without the XXX scenes.  With the hardcore scenes, the movie isn’t much.  Without them, it’s probably even less.

AKA:  Boss Lady.  AKA:  Talk Naughty to Me.

TAZA, SON OF COCHISE (1954) ** ½

Rock Hudson stars as Taza who inherits leadership of the Apache tribe from his father on his deathbed.  Tensions flare when several of his men break off and attack some white settlers.  To prevent further bloodshed, Taza agrees to move his people to a reservation and become a Calvary soldier to help police the reservation.  Trouble brews when Geronimo (Ian MacDonald) is taken prisoner and brought to the reservation where he begins talk of a revolt.

Directed by Douglas Sirk, Taza, Son of Cochise was made around the same time he and Rock were collaborating on their mawkish melodramas, Magnificent Obsession and All That Heaven Allows.   Although it’s probably looked down upon because it’s a B western, it does have some interesting aspects.  Even though Taza is seen as a traitor by his people for wearing a soldier’s uniform, he’s still not fully trusted by the whites for being a Native.  Because of that, Taza is stuck squarely in the middle as he strives for peace between both people.  You can see Sirk trying to wrestle with working in more adult subject matter into the material, although he’s only slightly successful at doing so.  

This isn’t Rock’s best performance by a long shot.  That’s mostly because he’s sorely miscast.  To make matters worse, he’s stuck speaking a lot of stilted Native American dialogue.  It is fun seeing This Island Earth’s Rex Reason as Rock’s hotheaded brother though.  It’s Barbara Rush who gives the best performance as Rock’s unrequited love who winds up betrothed to Reason against her will.  

If it wasn’t for the 3-D effects, this would’ve been a better than average, but forgettable programmer.  Thankfully, the 3-D is strong enough for me to give it a marginal recommendation.  Sirk doesn’t go overboard with the 3-D, waiting for just the right moment to spring it on the audience.  I also liked the way he kept a stick, tree, or hitching post in the foreground to make the depth-of-field effects pop.  In doing so, it gives you a good feel for the majestic plains and desert landscapes.  

The 3-D effects include:  

·         3-D Universal Logo

·         3-D Torch

·         3-D Spear

·         3-D Whip

·         3-D Arrow (multiple)

·         3-D Gun (multiple)

·         3-D Stone (multiple)

AKA:  Son of Cochise.  

MY LUCKY STARS (1985) ** ½

Detective Jackie Chan needs help cracking a case.  The bad guys seemingly know his every move, so he turns to his old gang, led by Sammo Hung (who also directed), who are now wanted criminals for help.  After they spend a LOT of time goofing off and perving on the lady cop sent to babysit them, they finally team up with Jackie to take the villains down.

My Lucky Stars is a sequel to Winners and Sinners, a movie I haven’t seen, but there’s enough exposition (perhaps too much of it) so you can kind of get an idea what happened.  It starts off like a Jackie Chan Police Story sequel before turning into a Sammo Hung comedy.  Unfortunately, the two only occasionally intersect.  The early scenes hold a lot of promise as the film kicks off with some amazing stunts, including a jaw-dropping car chase, a terrific fight at an amusement park, and an inexplicable Ninja attack. 

In fact, after the stellar opening scene, Jackie disappears for a good hour, popping up only briefly for a decent fight against the Ninjas.  The great Yuen Biao gets even less screen time as Chan’s partner, who almost immediately gets kidnapped by the bad guys.  Once the film primarily becomes the Sammo show, it goes downhill fast.  A lot of the humor is downright painful to sit through (like the toilet scene), and the part where the gang dress as Ninjas and take turns tying each other up to the sexy cop is especially dire.  

Things end on a high note with an electric finale set in a haunted house amusement park attraction.  The scenes of Chan fighting Ninjas and samurais, not to mention the zombies and ghosts inside the attraction, are great.  Hung is impressive as well when he’s allowed to fight instead of mugging for the camera with his dingbat friends.  If only he had Jackie around more often, My Lucky Stars could’ve been a classic.  As it is, it doesn’t shine as bright as it could’ve.

AKA:  Winners and Sinners 2:  My Lucky Stars.  AKA:  Tokyo Powerman.  AKA:  Lucky Stars Superior Shine.

THE RED NIGHTS OF THE GESTAPO (1977) ***

After Rudolf Hess flees Germany, his close friend, Colonel von Uhland (Ezio Miani) is ordered to be executed by the firing squad.  It all turns out to be a ruse by the Nazis, who want him to lure a group of disloyal party members into a trap.  Von Uhland discovers all their peculiar vices and sets up a meeting in a makeshift brothel where he plans to assassinate them.  He enlists the help of several sex-crazed women fresh from the loony bin to tempt the men by catering to their darkest fetishes, including S & M, lactation, and (REALLY) young girls.  

That’s just a rundown of the plot.  The REAL story is we get Nazi boot fucking, lesbianism, breastfeeding, gangbangs, rape by gunpoint (and I don’t mean rape “at” gunpoint, I mean rape BY gunpoint), S & M floorshows, champagne baths, and orgies. 

At 109 minutes, The Red Nights of the Gestapo is probably too long for its own good.  As wonderfully disgusting as the movie is, there are some definite lulls in between the filth.  No matter how many talky, badly dubbed dialogue scenes you have to sit through, it’s worth it once it starts delivering the icky goods.  I mean what else can you say about a film that contains a doctor who runs a nuthouse for nymphomaniac masochists who’ve been trained to harm themselves while in the throes of ecstasy… and that’s just merely a minor plot point?  I think my favorite moment though was when a woman dressed in drag as Hitler and touched herself while repeatedly screaming, “Heil!” 

In short, The Red Nights of the Gestapo is sicker than your average Naziploitation movie.  It’s also one of the kinkiest Naziploitation flicks I’ve ever seen.  That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the BEST, but there’s plenty of sleaze to go around.  It should be enough to make the most jaded exploitation fan sit up and take notice. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: DANCE OF THE DEAD (2008) ***

Zombie comedies are a dime a dozen.  Very few of them work either as a comedy or as horror film.  That’s why it’s nice to find a movie that manages to deliver on the gore and the laughs. On the surface, Dance of the Dead looks like your typical high school zombie comedy, and in many ways, it kind of is.  However, there’s a lot of spirit and even a little bit of heart (to go along with the severed heads and guts) here to make it stand out from the rest of the pack.

Toxic waste from the nearby power plant causes zombies rise from the grave on the night of the high school prom.  A group of students from different social circles band together for survival.  Eventually, the zombies crash the prom, and the only ones who can stop them are our troupe of misfits, nerds, and punk rockers. 

Dance of the Dead features some great gore and a few surprising moments.  This is one of a handful of movies that make a good case for fast zombies as the scenes of the undead corpses leaping from their graves at full sprint are very effective.  As much gore, blood, and guts get tossed around, I think my favorite moment was when the dissected frogs from science class come back to life.  The zombie love scene is pretty great too.

The zombies are seemingly modeled on the ones from Return of the Living Dead.  They run around, move kind of funky, and occasionally speak.  There are even some moments that borrow from Night of the Living Dead as well.  Hey, if you’ve got to steal from someone, steal from the best I always say.  Despite the one-note premise, director Gregg (Siren) Bishop keeps the movie brimming with zombie carnage and cranks out some genuinely funny zingers in the process.

The performances are solid across the board, which really helps.  Greyson Chadwick was the real standout for me as the Vice President of the student body who fights undead student bodies.  She hasn’t been in a whole lot since the film was released, which is a shame because she really shows a knack for believably playing a zombie slayer in a prom dress without making it feel like a cheap gag.  She has my vote come re-election time.

INVASION OF ALIEN BIKINI (2011) **

Young-gun (Young-geun Hong) is a virginal dork who rescues a beautiful woman named Monica (Eun-Jung Ha) from being accosted using his Kung Fu skills.  He takes her back to his place so she can recover and maybe play a little Jenga.  When Monica tries to seduce Young-gun, he resists.  Little does he know, she’s an alien who seeks a sperm donor to propagate her species.  Little does she know, the poor dope has taken a vow of celibacy and will not give into temptation, even under the most dire of circumstances. 

Invasion of Alien Bikini is an uneven mix of Korean craziness.  It sounds like it’s going to be a Sci-Fi sex movie, but it starts out like a lame romantic comedy before turning very dark.  The opening Kung Fu fighting scenes are amusing and get things started off on the right foot.  When it gets down to the sexy shenanigans, it’s more embarrassing than laugh-out-loud funny.  (Young-gun recites multiplication tables and sings the Korean national anthem to take his mind off getting an erection.)  Once you find out WHY Young-gun doesn’t want to get horizontal with Monica, things take a grim turn.  The Sci-Fi elements are kind of odd too (at one point, Monica’s spine comes out her back and attacks), and the twist at the end is more of a head-scratcher than anything.  The whiplash in tone doesn’t jibe and prevents the film from really working.

All this might not have been so bad if Ha got naked.  As it is, she spends a lot of time in her bra and panties, which is okay, I guess.  I know if she told me, “I need your sperm” repeatedly, I’d do what the lady said and not put up a fight like this idiot.

Overall, Invasion of Alien Bikini has its moments, but Species this is not. 

HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: SUMMER OF 84 (2018) * ½

Summer of 84 is Stranger Things meets Rear Window meets The ‘Burbs.  It’s a throwback to the days where kids rode bicycles throughout their neighborhoods instead of being constantly on their phone, used nudie books as masturbatory material instead of the internet, read the Weekly World News to get their paranoia fix instead of clickbait bullshit, and relied on milk cartons as lost children bulletins instead of Amber alerts.  It was also a time when serial killers worked their way into the national consciousness. 

That’s just a fancy way of introducing the plot.  Four dorky teenage friends suspect their neighbor of being a serial killer.  Well, that’s about it as far as the plot is concerned.  

Summer of 84 comes from the directing trio of Francois Simard, Anouk Whissell, and Yoann-Karl Whissell.  Their previous film, Turbo Kid was a pastiche of various movies, but it was a fun pastiche, filled with lots of energy, invention, and spirit.  This is just a pastiche. 

The film lumbers from predictable scene to predictable scene without any tension, drama, or momentum.  At all times it feels like an outline for a movie than the finished product.  Like the filmmakers told themselves they’d go back and fill in things like character development (the kids are all paper-thin stereotypes), red herrings (there is only one suspect and it’s obvious from the start he did it), and legitimate scares later on, but they somehow never got around to it.  

Which is weird, because it’s 108 minutes long, and yet, it feels like nothing ever happens.  It’s long on running time and short on substance.  I mean it seemingly just goes on forever.  Just when you think it’s over, it plods on for another twenty minutes.  Not only that, but it gets needlessly uglier as it goes along, and the finale is sure to leave a bad taste in your mouth.   

This is one summer to forget.