C.B. HUSTLERS (1976) **

C.B. Hustlers is a sexploitation comedy that was cashing in on the trucker craze of the ‘70s.  It starts with a rash of scenes of truck stop hookers seducing truckers by saying pick-up lines like, “Can I check your dipstick?” before getting it on in the cab of their rig while mediocre country and western songs play on the soundtrack.  All of this is just fine and dandy until the various subplots get in the way of the fun.  Meanwhile, the cops (or “Smokeys”) are trying to catch them in the act and bust them, which leads to some underwhelming chase scenes and shenanigans.

The drawn-out, pointless scenes where not a whole lot happens are the big problem.  In particular, there’s one scene where a guy takes a long walk while a slow, ‘70s folk song plays that goes nowhere.  In fact, it seems like the only reason it was there was to pad things out to a releasable running time.  The bumbling reporter plotline is excruciating too, and the repetitive banjo and steel guitar music on the soundtrack will probably put you to sleep. 

Your fondness for the era and subject matter may influence your enjoyment of the film itself.  If you can’t get enough scenes of characters using unending trucker lingo, then this will be right up your alley.  However, whenever the plot isn’t focusing on the truck stop hookers luring their trucker tricks, it runs out of gas. 

Thank God Uschi Digard plays one of the titular hustlers, or this could’ve really been a chore to get through.  She gets all the best scenes.  My favorite one happens when she straddles a john, and the camera shows us his POV.  Let’s just say the view is heavenly. 

Director Stu Segall (who mostly worked in porn) also made the classic Drive-In Massacre the same year.  His porn background often shows as the softcore scenes are the only thing in the movie worth a damn.  If only there had been a stronger plot to keep the sex scenes strung together.  If that was the case, C.B. Hustlers could’ve really put the petal to the metal, good buddy.

AKA:  Secrets of Lady Truckers.

HELL FEST (2018) ***

A group of teenage friends go to an elaborate walk-through haunted house theme park called “Hell Fest” just before Halloween.  While making their way through the various themed portions of the park, they are stalked by a killer in a scary mask (it looks like the Aztec Mummy).  Naturally, they assume he’s one of the “scare actors” whose job it is to scare the paying guests.  The friends soon get more than they bargained for when he really starts picking them off one by one.

Hell Fest is significantly better than the similarly themed Haunt (which came out the year before) as both movies feature near-identical premises.  The difference is that here, it’s a killer quietly making his way around a theme park to stalk his victims instead of inside a self-contained haunted house that is ran by psychos.  Another difference is that the heroine in this one only goes to the haunted house to meet a boy whereas in Haunt, she was going to the haunted house to forget her stalker ex. 

Both films feature a scene where the heroine watches as the killer murders a random person in front of her, but she shrugs it off, thinking it was all part of the act.  (The scene in this one is less showy, but more effective.)  They also owe a small debt to Tobe Hooper’s The Funhouse, in which teens stayed after hours in an amusement park and were slayed by a deformed killer.  Neither movie is able to attain the fever pitch that Hooper brought to the material.  However, Hell Fest has a lot more fun with the premise than Haunt did, and even contains flashes of that old school ‘80s slasher movie magic. 

The body count is small, but the deaths are memorable.  The scene where the killer uses a strongman’s hammer to smash a dude’s head in and still manages to ring the bell is pretty funny.  (He should’ve at least won a kewpie doll for that.)  There’s also a pretty gnarly hypodermic needle kill that will make people who are sensitive to eye trauma squirm in their seat. 

So, if you’re trying to decide between Hell Fest and Haunt, there is no comparison.  Hell Fest is the clear winner.  It moves at a steady clip, has a couple of effective sequences, and features a cast of (mostly) likeable characters.  Haunt, on the other hand, isn’t even worth the price of admission.

AKA:  Horror Park.

BECOMING BOND (2017) **

George Lazenby is a fascinating pop culture footnote.  He was plucked from obscurity to replace Sean Connery in the James Bond series, quickly garnering a reputation for being difficult, stubborn, and independent.  He then passed on an opportunity of a lifetime to continue to portray the role in future installments.  Somebody could’ve made a terrific documentary on the subject.  Unfortunately, director Josh (Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar) Greenbaum isn’t that filmmaker.

It starts out well enough with George front and center telling us the story of his life.  As his tale unfolds, we hear his narration over recreations of his various life-shaping events.  Almost out of the gate, the movie falters.  It’s not that the recreations (which are mostly there for comedic effect) are bad (although they aren’t exactly “good”).  It’s just that they pale in comparison to the man himself.  When we see Lazenby speak, there’s always a touch of regret, embarrassment, or fondness for whatever subject he’s going on about.  There is none of that during the flashback sequences, which mostly play out like a cross between Unsolved Mysteries and Drunk History.  We can sort of buy the illusion when the characters are played by unknowns, but that goes out the window once recognizable faces such as Jeff Garlin, former Bond girl Jane Seymour, and Dana Carvey (who “plays” Johnny Carson, but merely trots out his old standby impression again) enter the mix in the third act.

Some of Greenbaum’s story decisions are baffling at best and embarrassing at worst.  Lazenby's lengthy diatribes about his early sexual conquests take up almost as much screen time as his quest to land the role of Bond, which is strange.  Heck, Greenbaum spends as much time on Lazenby’s bouts of diarrhea as he does on filming the iconic gun barrel scene.

Also, I think it would’ve been nice to see some of Lazenby’s life AFTER Bond.  I know, I know, it’s called “Becoming” Bond, but I would’ve liked to have heard him talk about all the Kung Fu movies and action quickies he made in the ‘70s and ‘80s.  Maybe they’re saving that for the sequel.

I can’t really review a movie for what it SHOULD have been.  However, I can tell you that Greenbaum could’ve made a decent film using either approach.  Having the two storytelling devices in the same movie (they occasionally overlap, which is kind of annoying) doesn’t quite work.  It’s a shame too because George deserves better. 

If another filmmaker wants to give George’s story a go, they have all the time in the world to do it. 

TOM AND JERRY (2021) **

The first sign you are in trouble with this reboot of the beloved cartoon duo comes before the opening titles even hit the screen.  Things start out surprisingly enough with the familiar opening chords of Lou Reed’s iconic “Walk on the Wild Side”.  I thought to myself, “Wow, that’s such a cool cut for a kid’s movie.  Maybe this will be…” and right then and there, it morphed into this shitty rap song that merely sampled the beat.  I hate it when they do that.  Just come up with your own shit.  Don’t rip off a classic.

Which is precisely what the whole movie is.  It only takes what it wants from the great Tom and Jerry cartoons of the past and uses it for its own means.  When Tom and Jerry are doing their thing, it’s tolerable, but when the film tries to do its own thing, it’s pretty awful. 

The plot has Tom chasing Jerry into a swanky New York hotel.  It is here where an out of work whippersnapper (Chloe Grace Moretz) grifts her way into a job.  To maintain her position, she must keep the place rodent-free, which means catching Jerry before the guests find out there is a mouse in the house.

Turning Tom and Jerry loose inside a hotel while C-rate guest stars pop in and out wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world if the script didn’t focus on the human characters and rely on them to prop up the story.  Nobody cares about Moretz trying to keep her job.  (There’s a reason why the humans were only shown from the knees down in the old cartoons.)  We just want to see Jerry beat the shit out of Tom for 101 minutes, thank you very much.  Which, thank God, still happens, although not as much as you’d like.  (Tom gets ran over by trucks, has doors slammed on his head, is bludgeoned by a baseball bat, and is electrocuted several times.)

It’s not all bad though.  I was relieved the filmmakers resisted the temptation to turn the characters into CGI monstrosities.  Keeping Tom and Jerry in their original hand-drawn animation form (albeit in a slightly airbrushed style) was a smart move.  I guess PETA would’ve had a shit-fit if a photorealistic CGI cat was repeatedly mutilated over and over again.  There’s even a couple scenes where Tom and Jerry drink alcohol, so it’s not completely neutered like some modern-day versions of old cartoons.  We also get a cameo by a familiar face that Tom and Jerry fans will no doubt enjoy seeing. 

All this, at the very least, makes it better than 1992’s Tom and Jerry:  The Movie, which was a total disgrace to the source material as the concerned parents, outraged by the duo’s decades of violence towards one another, demanded that they be FRIENDS for the bulk of the picture.  (They become friends in this one too, but it’s more like a temporary détente to help Moretz salvage her job.)  It doesn’t excuse the gratuitous human characters, which include Michael Pena as the hotel manager, Ken Jeong as the chef on the premises, and Colin Jost, who as Weekend Update anchors-turned-actors go, is no Dennis Miller.  Nor is it enough to save the movie, which only contains a handful of laughs.  It could’ve been way worse I suppose, but I think there’s a reason why a cat chasing a mouse works best in eight-minute shorts. 

AKA:  Tom and Jerry:  The Movie.

SHAKE, RATTLE AND ROCK! (1956) ***

A group of concerned adults carry out a crusade to ban rock n’ roll in their town.  (“We must put a stop to the vulgar, LEWD, rocking and rolling!”)  Mike “Touch” (Swamp Diamonds) Connors is the DJ who wants to open up a rock n’ roll club so the teeners have a place to rock out.  Naturally, the uptight adults want to have it shut down.  The kids also have to contend with a gangster (Paul Dubov) who wants to muscle in on Connors’ territory.  Connors’ solution is to hold a televised “trial” to show that rock n’ roll was really no different than the music from the old timers’ days.

Fats Domino appears on Connors’ show and does “Honey Chile”, “Ain’t That a Shame” (the definite highlight), and “I’m in Love Again”.  (Note how he’s never in the same shot with the teens.)  The rest of the musical acts are OK, but they just pale in comparison to Fats.

Shake, Rattle and Rock! would still be worth it just to see Fats perform, but it’s a really good teeny-bopper musical jukebox in its own right.  The plot is just sturdy enough to provide a clothesline for director Edward L. (The She-Creature) Cahn to hang a bunch of rock n’ roll numbers on, and the performances are solid too.  Connors makes for a likeable lead and the Marx Brothers’ usual foil, Margaret Dumont, is a hoot as the leader of the moral brigade.  It’s also amusing hearing Sterling Holloway, the familiar voice of Winnie the Pooh, as Connors’ right-hand man who speaks almost exclusively in slang and jive.  In the film’s funniest scene, he takes the witness stand and speaks so much jive, they have to use subtitles so you can understand him.  (You have to wonder if this is where Airplane! got the idea for the jive passengers scene.)

I was even surprised they were able to slip an interesting McCarthy parable in there with the musical numbers.  There’s a subplot where the kids are stirred up by the gangster, who incites a riot, causing the teens to smash up Dumont’s car.  Connors knows the kids who did it, but refuses to name names, knowing full well they were provoked into it.  His refusal to rat on the kids gives this an added layer of social commentary that most of these movies lack.  If you came to shake, rattle and rock during Shake, Rattle and Rock!, you certainly will, but you will also get something unexpected:  A genuinely good movie.

AKA:  Rock n’ Roll Club.

BLACKBELT 2: FATAL FORCE (1993) *** ½

Blackbelt 2:  Fatal Force is an unrelated sequel to the 1992 Don “The Dragon” Wilson flick, Blackbelt.  Although it has nothing to do with that movie, at least it continues the tradition of listing the star’s blackbelt credentials in front of his name in the opening credits.  In this case, “W.K.F. Kickboxing Champion Blake Bahner”.  Whether or not he really held that title or if the “W.K.F.” actually exists is up for debate.

Whatever his credentials are, I kind of like this Bahner guy.  He sorta resembles Marshall Teague auditioning for The Lou Ferrigno Story.  If you need someone to fill Don the Dragon’s shoes, it might as well be him.

The movie begins with a Nam flashback before switching over to the present day.  It’s here where we are introduced to our hero, the awesomely named “Brad Spyder” (Bahner).  His first action sequence had me pumping my fist and saying, “YES!” out loud twice.  The first time was when he was chasing a bad guy on his motorcycle and narrowly avoided colliding with a tractor trailer via the magic of editing.  The second time came when he dropkicked a baddie off a high rise. 

Later, Spyder learns that his partner fled Los Angeles and went to Honolulu when he received word his MIA POW brother has turned up in Hawaii.  Naturally, he winds up DOA, and Spyder has to go to Hawaii ASAP to avenge his death PDQ.  There, he tangles with some drug runners who have their claws in a local wealthy businessman. 

Oh, there was a third time I pumped my fist and said, “YES!”  That was when Vic Diaz showed up as the Yelling Captain who is displeased that Spyder is sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong.  I knew this movie was going to be great when I saw Cirio H. Santiago’s name in the credits. 

Blackbelt 2 is choppy as hell.  There are scenes set in Vietnam, scenes set in Hawaii, and scenes set in Hawaii that are made up to look like Vietnam.  We also get some footage from Santiago’s Silk in there to pad out the running time.  It’s as if producer Roger Corman pulled a Godfrey Ho and gave us two movies for the price of one.  That is to say, it’s awesome.

Not only that, but it features one of the greatest exploding bamboo guard tower scenes of all time.  In most of these movies, when a bamboo guard tower explodes, it explodes and that’s that.  In Blackbelt 2, when the bamboo guard tower explodes, the guard’s flaming corpse lands smack dab on a table where the other guards are playing cards.  Is this flick great, or what?

Sure, Blackbelt 2:  Fatal Force is patchy and disjointed, but it’s a lot of fun.  Whenever the sketchy editing threatens to get in the way of the film’s momentum, Bahner kicks a lot of people in the face to keep things on track.   Although it begins to spin its wheels in the late stages of the game, I can’t be disappointed since it ends in a scene where a grieving father flies a helicopter directly into the man who killed his daughter, causing it to explode.

I must confess.  I may have pumped my fist and said, “YES!” a fourth time during this scene.

TEEN LUST (1978) * ½

Teen Lust plays like a loose assemblage of subplots that only serve as an excuse to show off some ‘70s T & A.  I don’t think director James Hong (yes, THAT James Hong) is to blame for the patchwork nature of the film.  I think that falls on the producers. 

It’s my theory that the producers concocted four or five different subplots so that they could retitle and rerelease the movie several times, each time focusing on a different aspect of the plot in the trailers.  The fact that the film goes by five different titles is my smoking gun, but here’s the complete rundown.

Title #1:  High School Teasers:  There is a subplot involving the town slut De De (Lee Ann Barnes) trying to hook up with Terry (Perry Lang), who just so happens to be the boyfriend of goodie-two shoes Carol (Kristen Baker from Friday the 13^th Part 2).  I’m sure whoever cut the trailer could make it look like De De was the main character and put all of the footage of her sexual escapades in one two-minute reel.

Title #2:  Police Girls Academy:  This one focuses on the plot line where Carol and her gal pal Neely (Leslie Cederquist) get a summer job working as police trainees.  You could play up the police training sequences in the trailer and sell it as a Police Academy rip-off.  There’s even an icky sequence where Carol’s brother inadvertently picks her up.  Yuck.

Title #3:  The Girls Next Door:  Since Carol is a homely girl-next-door type, you could prominently feature her in the ads and sell it as a coming-of-age movie. 

Title #4:  Mom Never Told Me:  This is where things get weird.  There’s a subplot about Carol’s drunk mother (Dalene Young) trying to fix her up with a rich (but slow-witted) neighbor.  The mother sequences also include a subplot-within-a-subplot about her seducing the plumber (George “Buck” Flower).  There’s an even stranger subplot-within-a-subplot about Carol’s lecherously over-affectionate father (Stan Kamber) NOT being her father (so that makes his advances… OK?!?!) because… well… Mom Never Told Me.

Title #5:  Teen Lust:  With this preview, you can include the head-scratching scene where a gang of little kids jump Carol and try to rip her clothes off while the theme to the People’s Court plays?!?! 

Quite honestly, the police academy stuff works best.  However, there’s just too many weird subplots fighting for supremacy, and as a result, it all goes nowhere fast.  The bizarre family sitcom scenes are especially ill-fitting and the stuff with the philandering boyfriend trying to fend off the advances of the town slut are far from erotic.  None of it meshes. 

It’s particularly hard to take when it tries to get serious.  The mother is portrayed as a comic drunk most of the time, but halfway through, Carol stages a one-woman intervention that just doesn’t fit with the goofy shit elsewhere in the film.  Baker, bless her, thinks this is her shot at an Oscar and even says, “You’re tearing me apart!” like James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause!  I mean, how are we supposed to care about her mother when just moments earlier, she was dry humping Flower on the floor?  Or how about the scene where Carol finds out she’s adopted?  Baker just seems to be acting in an entirely different (and probably better) movie than everyone else.  (Where’s movie title #6 when you need it?)  You know it’s thrown up its hands and given up when the final two scenes are a pie fight and a wedding.

Flower and Hong were both in John Carpenter movies in the ‘80s, which makes me wonder if Carpenter’s seen this.

AKA:  High School Teasers.  AKA:  Police Girls Academy.  AKA:  The Girls Next Door.  AKA:  Mom Never Told Me.