HELL SQUAD (1986) *** ½

An ambassador’s son is all set to blow the whistle on the testing of a new “ultra-neutron bomb” when he is kidnapped by terrorists.  They demand the ambassador turn over plans for the bomb in exchange for his son.  That leaves only one thing to do:  Train a bunch of Vegas showgirls to become a team of commando assassins so they can go rescue him.

The showgirls are first tested on a desert obstacle course.  Once the strongest, baddest, and foxiest women are selected, they don crimson berets and khaki fatigues and head out to the undetermined Arabic country to kick some ass.  Once they get to their hotel, they learn there’s a water shortage.  That means they all must take bubble baths together.  BATHS.  PLURAL. 

Yes, folks, Hell Squad is the only movie I’ve ever seen where Vegas showgirls drive their jeeps through the desert, blow away a bunch of terrorists, and then head back to their hotel for a bubble bath together.  It is also the only movie I’ve seen where said Vegas showgirls drive a tank through an enemy camp, gun down a bunch of people, and then head back to their hotel for ANOTHER bubble bath together.

Things get a little shaky in the second half when the girls get lost in the desert and are unable to take any bubble baths.  However, the finale is really something else.  They snorkel to a castle that looks like it belongs at the bottom of a fishbowl, spear gun a couple of guys, liberate the kidnap victim and then set off an explosion so powerful it turns day into night.  Not to mention the completely out of left field Scooby-Doo ending.

While it was made in the mid ‘80s, everything about Hell Squad screams the ‘70s.  From the cinematography to the music to the wardrobe, the whole thing looks and feels like it was made a decade earlier.  In fact, it often looks like a failed pilot for a TV show with a little T & A tossed in there for good measure.  (The random fade-in and fade-outs would make perfect commercial breaks.)  It also has more visible boom mics (and visible panty lines) than you can shake a stick at.  None of this is a criticism by the way.  This movie is awesome.  (The bubble bath-less second half notwithstanding.)

AKA:  Commando Squad.  AKA:  Commando Girls.

GIANTESS BATTLE ATTACK! (2022) ***

Beverly Wood (Ivy Smith), everyone’s favorite 50 Foot Camgirl, gets sued into the Stone Age for the havoc she caused in the first movie.  Because of that, the only job she can get is breaking rocks in a quarry.  A sleazy fight promoter (Steve Altman) offers her a chance to make some serious money by fighting against his wrestler Anna Conda in a Pay Per View match called “War of the Girlgantuas”.  (A better title than Giantess Battle Attack!)  Meanwhile, in space, the planet “Buxomus” is home to giant women who participate in super-sized girl on girl gladiator games.  Searching for some new competition, the reigning champion, Spa-Zor (Kiersten Hall) goes to Earth to challenge Beverly, which leads to a three-way giantess royal rumble.

Giantess Battle Attack! is only fifty-nine minutes, but somehow, it’s still heavily padded with scenes from the first movie (and even some scenes from this one are repeated too).  The outer space stuff doesn’t work quite as well as the scenes that act as a direct continuation of Attack of the 50 Foot Camgirl.  (Although I did like the way Spa-Zor “destroyed” the world’s monuments.)  Even though it’s a bit spottier than its predecessor, there’s still some good stuff here. 

The final battle is particularly fun, especially when an oil well explodes and covers the colossal combatants in crude.  I think my favorite part though was when Beverly’s normal sized boyfriend goes “spelunking” in her underwear.  Returning director Jim Wynorski has a funny cameo too when he condemns the film for having too much sex. (It doesn’t.)  It’s also fun seeing a bunch of the familiar Wynorski regulars like Frankie Cullen, Lisa London, Becky LeBeau, Gail Thackray, and Deborah Dutch in the cast.  I think I might’ve enjoyed Attack of the 50 Foot Camgirl more, but I still had a good time with Giantess Battle Attack!  I mean it’s hard not to like any movie that manages to reference Kronos, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and Back to School in under an hour.

ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT CAMGIRL (2022) ***

2022 is looking to be the return of the fast turnaround sequel.  There haven’t been this many movies and their sequels being released within the same calendar year since the ‘40s.  There’s X and Pearl, Terror Train 1 and 2, and Attack of the 50 Foot Camgirl and its sequel, Giantess Battle Attack.  

Attack of the 50 Foot Camgirl is the long-awaited collaboration between producer Charles Band and director Jim Wynorski.  I can’t imagine why it took so long to get these two B-movie titans together, but it was worth the wait.  Giant babes in bikinis battling it out.  What’s not to like?  

Ivy Smith stars as a sexy, alcoholic vegan influencer/camgirl named Beverly Wood who’s so concerned about hits, likes, and endorsements that she doesn’t know her husband/manager (Eli Cirino) is banging her assistant Fuchsia (Christine Nguyen).  Her latest endorsement is for a new self-sustaining food product that could potentially cure world hunger.  It’s still in the testing stages, but that doesn’t stop Beverly from eating one of the hot dogs.  Before long, she grows to fifty feet tall, which helps her become bigger than ever before (both online and in real life).  Naturally, Fuchsia becomes jealous, eats the food too, and soon, we have brawling bikini behemoths.

Attack of the 50 Foot Camgirl is only sixty-two minutes, so it goes down smooth enough.  After sitting through so many needlessly overlong movies like Pups Alone and Terrifier 2, it was a nice change of pace to sit through something that practically flew by.  However, there was plenty of room for more sex and/or nude scenes.  To make matters worse, there are scenes that fade-in and out to where a sex scene should belong.  Heck, even the nude and shower scenes feel shorter than your average Wynorski film.  On the plus side, the effects are refreshingly old school (lots of cardboard model buildings get crushed) and help lend the movie considerable charm.  Bert I Gordon would be proud.  

Not all the jokes work (the on-screen hashtags aren’t very funny), but it helps that Ivy Smith has a likeable and bubbly presence.  Nguyen is fun too as her jealous assistant who also gets a shower scene.  Cirino is just OK as the villain, but he does have the best death scene I’ve seen in a long time.  I don’t want to spoil anything, but if I ever have my druthers, that’s exactly how I want to go out.  Wynorski regulars like Lisa London, Cindy Lucas, and Becky LeBeau also turn up in supporting roles.  

Smith gets the best line of the flick when she says, “It’s horny o’clock!”

CLERKS 3 (2022) *** ½

Randal (Jeff Anderson) receives a wake-up call when he suffers a heart attack on the job at the Quik Stop convenience store.  Approaching fifty and surviving a near-death experience, he decides to finally do something with his life.  He makes a vow to stop watching movies and start making them, starting with the story of his life, set at the Quik Stop.  Along for the ride is his best friend Dante (Brian O’Halloran) and everyone’s favorite stoners, Jay and Silent Bob (Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith).  

Of course, Kevin Smith suffered the same kind of heart attack in real life (dubbed “The Widowmaker”), which was the impetus for the movie.  Having Randal and Dante filming scenes from the first Clerks in the convenience store might seem like a lazy meta joke, but I think this was kind of a “What If” story for Smith, had he never found early success.  He might’ve still been making movies at the Quik Stop even if his career didn’t catch on.  Randal and Dante have always been his mouthpieces for pop culture musings and dick jokes in the past.  Now, the older and wiser (kinda) Smith is using them to speak from the heart (no pun intended), which is actually kind of touching.  

Smith has told many anecdotes of the making of Clerks over the years in interviews, commentaries, and one man shows, so seeing a thinly fictionalized version of them seems at first like a weak premise for a sequel.  However, Smith’s love of making movies shows through in scene after scene, and it’s fun seeing many of the original’s iconic scenes being remade.  (It would make a good double feature with Be Kind Rewind.)  I will say that the new dick jokes, Star Wars humor, and typical Clerks hijinks isn’t quite as laugh out loud funny (or as flagrantly foul) as some of the previous installments in the “View Askewniverse”.  However, the “audition” scene offers up some big laughs as it features a who’s who of celebrity cameos.  

Like most of Smith’s latter-day films, Clerks 3 works, largely because of the enormous goodwill the characters have built up over the past four decades.  Even when he goes a little heavy on the maudlin mushy stuff near the end, it works better than it probably should because we’ve grown to love these characters so much over the years.  While it may not live up to the heights of the first two films, it is nevertheless a fitting finale (possibly) to the trilogy.

PARTY DOLL A GO-GO! PART 2 (1991) ***

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HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: DARK GLASSES (2022) ***

Dark Glasses is horror maestro Dario Argento’s first film in a decade.  It might not rank among his best, but it serves as a strong reminder of what the master can do when financiers give him a movie camera.  Hopefully, he doesn’t wait so long to make another one.  

Things kick off with a great opening scene where an eclipse foretells impending doom.  A hooker named Diana (Ilenia Pastorelli) damages her eyes when she looks directly into the eclipse and has to wear sunglasses.  Meanwhile, a maniac is going around murdering prostitutes.  While chasing Diana, he causes an automobile accident that permanently blinds her, forcing her to wear the shades full time.  After the crash, Diana befriends a young boy (Xinyu Zhang) who was orphaned in the accident.  When the killer comes after her again, she uses to kid to help her stay one step ahead of the madman.

While Dark Glasses never quite kicks into fourth gear, it is nevertheless a solidly entertaining thriller.  Some may be disappointed that Argento doesn’t give the film his trademark visual splendor.  In the past, his lavish, colorful, stylish sequences were only there to compensate for a lack of plot.  This time, he doesn’t have to get crazy with the over-the-top kill sequences since the story is so sturdy to begin with.  

He still manages to do some interesting albeit subtle things with the camera.  When Pastorelli is alone, on the run, or in peril, the screen is usually dark, or objects/people in the background feel further away than they are.  It’s a good way to keep the audience as off guard as its heroine without resorting to the typical black screen or overuse of sound effects on the soundtrack.

Pastorelli’s performance also helps to anchor the film.  She cuts a captivating figure in skimpy outfits and sunglasses, and remains a tough and feisty heroine throughout.  She refuses to be a victim and stands up and fights, despite being robbed of her sight.  Her bond with the kid is sweet too.  They make for a good team, and the movie works mostly because you buy their friendship and her need to protect the kid at all costs, even though she is blind.  

It might be a little dry for an Argento flick, but he still delivers at least one solid strangulation/throat slicing.  This time around he seems to be favoring suspense over gore, and it works more often than not.  While the climax may not be as well-crafted as everything that came before, Dark Glasses has enough going for it to quality it as another winner from the maestro.

AKA:  Black Glasses.

PUPS ALONE (2021) *

In the next few weeks, I’ll be appearing as a guest on Matt’s Direct to Video Connoisseur podcast discussing this Christmas movie starring Dolph Lundgren.  In the past, we have discussed Santa’s Summer House, starring Action Movie Icons like Don “The Dragon” Wilson and Cynthia Rothrock, as well as the Dolph Lundgren flick Altitude.  This seemed like a perfect film to talk about since Dolph plays the villain in the flick, and it was made by Altitude’s director, Alex Merkin.  In fact, the film is filled with a who’s who of DTV talent (most of which are the voices of the dogs) like Danny Trejo, Malcolm McDowell, Keith David, and Eric Roberts.  Speaking of Roberts, this isn’t quite as bad as the Roberts-starring A Talking Cat, but man, it comes close.  

We discussed the film at great length, so look for the episode when it drops.  I’ll be sure to post a link here so you guys can check it out.  Until then, here’s a brief review to tide you over.

Christmas movies are a genre unto themselves now.  With Hallmark Channel and Freeform playing non-stop Christmas movies, the market is oversaturated already, but with the advent of streaming, the need for more Christmas-related content is growing.  That’s how movies like Pups Alone get made.  

I swear there are Christmas movie title generators at streaming services where they cut and paste Christmas related titles until they find one that seems halfway doable.  Such is the case with Pups Alone.  As you can tell by the title, it’s Home Alone, but with pups.  This isn’t the worst idea in the world for a kids Christmas movie, but as bad as you might expect it to be, it’s even worse than you could imagine.  You know you’re in trouble right away when the pups are full grown dogs, and not the little pups alluded to in the title.  

As a father, I sat through many of the Disney Air Bud spin-off “Buddies” movies.  Of that franchise, Super Buddies was by far the worst.  Since it was my daughter’s favorite, we had to watch it over and over again.  I am not lying when I say I have seen that movie as many times as Star Wars.  As bad as Super Buddies was, Pups Alone is even worse.  It makes Super Buddies look like Old Yeller by comparison.  

Robert (Tyler Hollinger), the inventor of a talking dog collar, moves into a gated community filled with other inventors who work as a sort of think tank for a pet toy conglomerate, owned by CEO Bill (Roberts).  While on a skiing trip, he leaves his dog Charlie (the voice of Jerry O’Connell) home alone.  Meanwhile, the evil Victor Von Manure (Dolph) plans to steal the Robert’s plans for the dog collar, so he hires two nitwits to break into the house.  Since the community is full of inventors, the neighbors’ dogs rig their master’s inventions up to become anti-theft devices.  This leads into the so-close-to-Home-Alone-there-might-be-a-lawsuit-brewing hijinks.  

I can’t imagine anyone under the age of five enjoying this.  Even as a fan of Dolph, Trejo, Roberts, McDowell, and company, this was 107 minutes of pure pain.  Scenes go on forever without laughs, set-ups, or payoffs.  Some end abruptly.  They try to compensate for the choppy narrative by using animated, pop-up book style vignettes in between the scenes, but it rarely works.  The premise is a sound one, but it takes forever to get to the talking dog vs. robbers shit as the first half is mercilessly weighted down with useless exposition, overlong and unfunny comedy scenes, and pointless subplots that go nowhere.  

The only scene worth a damn is when Dolph (woefully miscast in the kind of role Richard Kind or Jon Lovitz would play) kisses Eric Roberts’ ass at a dinner party.  The part where Roberts looks straight at the camera and says, “Let’s get drunk!” is the only laugh-out-loud moment in the entire thing.  I don’t know if he was talking to the cast and crew and they accidentally put it in the movie, or if it was in the script, but you might want to follow his advice as it’s the only way you’ll be able to survive this one in a single viewing.

Woof.

AKA:  Pups Alone:  A Christmas Peril.