MILLIGAN MARCH

The past few months have brought us celebrations of cult directors such as Doris Wishman, Ray Dennis Steckler, and Jess Franco.  Now it’s Andy Milligan’s turn to have an entire month devoted to him.  Throughout the month of March, I’ll be diving into Severin’s The Dungeon of Andy Milligan Blu-ray box set.  As with the other director columns, if I come to a movie I have already reviewed, I will repost the old review and include a few notes I made during this latest rewatch.  If I previously wrote a small capsule review on a particular film, there’s probably a good chance I will go ahead and write a brand new one just for this column.  But enough of my yacking.  The Dungeon awaits!

TUBI CONTINUED… HELLCAT’S REVENGE 2: DEAD MANS HAND (2019) ** ½

Badass biker babe Kat (Lisa Neeld) returns to her home turf and is immediately framed for murder by the new she-boss of the town, Rosie (Donna Hamblin).  Kat gets thrown into a hellhole prison where the guards and inmates have it out for her.  Meanwhile, on the outside, Kat’s presumed dead boyfriend, Snake (writer/director Len Kabasinski) reappears on the scene to reclaim his territory.  He then makes an uneasy alliance with his former flame and helps break Kat out of the slammer so they both can get revenge on the ruthless Rosie.  

Hellcat’s Revenge 2:  Dead Mans Hand is less a biker movie and more of a Women in Prison picture.  It’s a strong pivot from the original and is an improvement in just about every regard.  I mean, if you make a Biker Babe movie where your Biker Babe never rides a motorcycle, you kind of have to find a more suitable vehicle for her.  No pun intended.  (Kabasinski does ride a motorcycle this time out, albeit briefly.)  

Kabasiniski proves to be a capable director when working with a sturdy script.  He is particularly well-suited for low budget action, as is evident by the strong opening fight club sequence.  He also does a fine job checking off the assorted Women in Prison cliches such as prison yard fights, corrupt warden speeches, brutal guard beatdowns, pervert doctor groping, cafeteria brawls, prison riots, escape attempts, and of course, shower scenes.  

The only real drawback is that once Kat busts out of prison, the fun kind of dries up.  Like the original, the action and editing in the finale is a bit choppy and rushed.  If only the action in the end was as strong as the stuff that preceded it, Dead Mans Hand could’ve easily eked by with a *** rating.  At least Neeld and Debbie Dutch (who plays a different character in this one) both have nude scenes, which is a bonus.

TUBI CONTINUED… HELLCAT’S REVENGE (2017) **

I’m always on the lookout for the next great badass biker babe movie.  Well, after watching Hellcat’s Revenge, I guess I’m still looking.  

When the leader of the all-female motorcycle gang, The Hellcats is murdered, the newly elected leader, Kat (Lisa Neeld), hits the streets looking for the killer.  After busting a few heads, she is devastated to learn her main squeeze Snake (writer/director Len Kabasinski) may be behind the murder.  

Hellcat’s Revenge is one of those Good News/Bad News types of movies.  For everything it does right, it inevitably makes a misstep (or two) to immediately erase whatever goodwill it’s just earned.  The plot is basic, but that’s all it needs to be.  The babes are more badass than beautiful, but that lends a touch of realism, I guess.  The assorted shootouts and fight scenes are OK, but the finale is really choppy.  There’s not a lot of nudity, but just enough to ensure you don’t get bored.  And even when you do start to get a little bored, the scant running time (seventy-nine minutes) helps, and the pacing is relatively brisk.  

For all its merits, Hellcat’s Revenge has the dubious distinction of being the only female biker movie (at least that I’ve seen) in which NO ONE rides a motorcycle.  There are scenes where Neeld gets on a motorcycle.  There are scenes where Neeld gets off a motorcycle.  However, there are no scenes of her or ANY of the other cast members (male or female) actually riding the bikes.  Heck, there aren’t even shots of stunt doubles riding the bikes.  What the Hell?!?

It's a shame too because Neeld certainly looks the part.  I hadn’t heard of her before, but she isn’t bad in the lead.  Deborah Dutch, the B Movie Queen from all those Jim Wynorski movies, was the only name I recognized in the cast.  She has a good scene where runs around a strip club twirling her tassels, but neither she nor Neeld get naked.  (That’s OK because plenty of assorted strippers do.)

Kabasinski was also responsible for the not-bad Swamp Zombies duology.  

A sequel followed two years later.  

TUBI CONTINUED: THE DEMON LOVER (1977) **

If Shot on Video horror movies were a thing when The Demon Lover was made, it would’ve definitely been a Shot on Video horror movie.  In fact, it often feels like a Shot on Video horror movie that was accidentally shot on film with a real camera.  The acting is amateurish, the nighttime scenes are hard to make out, the sound is crummy, and the monster is really silly.  

A devil worshipper named Laval (Christmas Robbins) tries to bully follower Pamela (Kyra Nash) into getting naked for his latest Satanic ceremony.  Pamela balks at the idea and she and her boyfriend (played by Howard the Duck co-creator Val Mayerik!) leave the coven.  In a show of solidarity, the other followers walk out on Laval too.  It's Laval who will have the last laugh when he summons a demon and orders it to kill all the former cult members who shunned him.  

I have to admit, the first half-hour or so of The Demon Lover was so bad that I started considering giving up this watching-one-movie-a-day-on-Tubi project and begin doing something meaningful with my life like charity work or joining the Peace Corps or entering the seminary.  Fortunately, once the goofy-ass demon is summoned and it starts killing everyone, I dropped all those silly notions and started to semi-enjoy myself.  These sequences are appropriately bloody, and at least give the film a reason to exist.  There’s an especially great sequence where the demon interrupts three girls in the midst of a whipped cream fight that almost singlehandedly made the whole thing worthwhile.

Now this didn’t necessarily make up for all the dreary scenes of Renaissance Fair wannabes dressing up like Anton LeVay.  In fact, they are downright brutal.  I mean, the first act is so bad that it makes The Deathmaster look like Rosemary’s Baby in comparison.  Oh, and no one loves a demon, and a demon doesn’t love anyone, so I have to deduct points for that too.

At least you get to see Leatherface himself, Gunnar Hansen, in only his second role as a soft-spoken professor of the occult who says, “Practitioners of evil aren’t exactly found in the Yellow Pages!”

Co-director Donald G. Jackson went on to have a wildly inconsistent career, making everything from classics like Hell Comes to Frogtown to the abysmal Rollergator.  

AKA:  Demon Master.  AKA:  Demon Tower.  AKA:  Master of Evil.  AKA:  The Devil Master.  

TUBI CONTINUED… KING KONG, MIGHTY JOE YOUNG, AND FRIENDS (1990) ***

Fans of King Kong and other giant screen apes, gorillas, and ape-men rejoice!  Have I got a trailer compilation for you.  At little over an hour, King Kong, Mighty Joe Young, and Friends (although it’s listed on Tubi as King Kong and Friends:  Gorillas, Dinosaurs, and Fantasy Creatures) is a fun collection of Hollywood monkey business through the decades.  I’m sure you guessed there would be previews for such classics as King Kong, Son of Kong, Mighty Joe Young, and King Kong vs. Godzilla, but we also get the cool trailer for the underrated King Kong Escapes as well.  Heck, even vaguely related, sorta-apes like Robot Monster are well-represented.   

Unlike most trailer compilations, this has the added attraction of vintage newsreel footage, old promotional featurettes, classic commercials, and select scenes from a few different movies that help to increase the fun factor.  My favorite part was the old Volkswagen commercial featuring an excellent stop-motion King Kong.  As far as the clips portion of the program goes, it’s a mixed bag.  I mean, did we need TWO scenes from Jack the Giant Killer?  (Especially when the stop-motion monsters are kind of crappy.)  The good news is the scene from Rocketship (the condensed feature length version of the old Flash Gordon serial) where Flash goes toe to toe with an ugly gorilla is really cool.  

While there are some pokey stretches, for the most part, King Kong, Mighty Joe Young, and Friends is an agreeable and breezy way to kill an hour.  When the killer apes (of both the stop-motion and men-in-suit variety) aren’t front and center, there’s plenty of giant lizards (of both the men-in-suit and regular-reptiles-photographed-to-make-them-look-like-giants variety), dinosaurs, or stars of Bert I. Gordon movies around to keep you entertained.  Trailer compilation hounds and monster movie enthusiasts are sure to go ape over it.   

AKA:  King Kong and Friends:  Gorillas, Dinosaurs, and Fantasy Creatures.

The complete trailer line-up is as follows:  Vintage monster promo reel, King Kong (1933), Son of Kong, Mighty Joe Young (1949), King Kong Volkswagen commercial, King Kong vs. Godzilla, King Kong Escapes, Konga, The Magic Sword (scene) Jack the Giant Killer (scene), Jack the Giant Killer (another scene), Unknown Island (scene), Journey to the Beginning of Time, The Lost World (1961), Earth vs. the Spider, The Giant Gila Monster, Valley of the Dragons, 20 Million Miles to Earth, The Land Unknown, Robot Monster, The Cyclops, Rocketship (scene), Gorilla at Large, The Ape Man (scene), White Pongo, Godzilla, King of the Monsters, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Planet of Dinosaurs (scenes), Planet of Dinosaurs (another scene), Planet of Dinosaurs (yet another scene), and Planet of the Apes (promotional featurette).  

TUBI CONTINUED… MAIL ORDER MURDER: THE STORY OF W.A.V.E. PRODUCTIONS (2020) ***

Mail Order Murder:  The Story of W.A.V.E. Productions is a fun and breezy documentary about the New Jersey-based video company that specializes in low (or sometimes, no) budget shot-on-video horror movies.  After making a splash in the early days of the SOV boom, director and owner Gary Whitson supplemented their catalogue by offering custom made horror movies where fans could write in and see their various horror fetishes played out before their very eyes.  Even though paying customers had input (sometimes more, sometimes less) on the productions, Whitson’s no-budget ingenuity ensured that every film he produced had a distinct touch that only a W.A.V.E. movie could offer.

Directors William Hellfire (who himself is a bit of a maverick in the SOV horror market) and Ross Snyder begin the film with a brief overview of the SOV horror phenomenon of the ‘80s and ‘90s (which itself would make for a fascinating documentary), before focusing on the eccentric, one-of-a-kind W.A.V.E. Productions.  The clips are sometimes jaw-dropping in just how bad (but admittedly entertaining) they are.  Most look about as close to a snuff movie as you could get without actually killing anybody.  

Whitson is interviewed and seems like an “Aw, shucks” kind of guy.  He certainly doesn’t seem like the type that would make movies about strangling, bondage, torture, asphyxiation, death by quicksand, and murder.  Frequent W.A.V.E. actresses, who have quite a following in their own right, such as Tina Krause, Deana Demko, and Pamela Sutch are also interviewed.  They all seem quite pleased with their small place in the footnote of cinema history.  We also hear from fans and fellow filmmakers, who seem perplexed, but in awe of the W.A.V.E. aesthetic (or lack thereof). 

Mail Order Murder serves as a good primer for fans.  It’s a fine history lesson on the birth and growth of the company and it’s totally worthwhile just for the interviews with all the W.A.V.E. starlets.  I just wish it delved a little deeper into what makes Gary tick instead of just propping him up as an unsung hero of underground DIY cinema.  I mean, he totally is.  It’s just that for a documentary on movies so dirty, I was hoping for more dirt (or quicksand).

TUBI CONTINUED… FEMALE MERCENARIES 2: THE MAD DOCTOR OF ZOMBIE ISLAND (2008) **

I saw this listed on Tubi as Mad Doctor of Zombie Island, which sounded promising enough.  After sitting through a long prologue about a giant meteor crashing into the Earth (it looks like a wad of aluminum foil), two chicks getting into a Kung Fu battle, and a scene featuring the slowest death via quicksand in screen history, I was kind of flummoxed.  At about the ten-minute mark, the title “Female Mercenaries 2:  The Mad Doctor of Zombie Island” appeared, and it started to make sense why it didn’t make sense:  It was a sequel to a movie I had never heard of, let alone seen.  

Ten more minutes went by, and I was hopelessly lost again.  Characters come and go.  They die, only to reappear as clones.  I was starting to pull my hair out.  

Fortunately, at about the twenty-minute mark, the movie revealed its true purpose:  Gratuitous nude scenes, strangulations, catfights, and bondage.  If the filmmakers had cut the useless first two reels and gotten right to the good stuff, this might’ve skated by with ** ½.  Maybe.  All I know is that things got markedly better the less the actresses wore.  

Anyway, the “plot” has a mad doctor (who I assume died in the first movie) cloning herself on her secret island so she can continue her diabolical experiments.  Every time one of her prisoners dies, she clones them.  Sometimes she turns them into werewolves?!?  After she turns a couple of guys into zombies, their girlfriends team up to storm the island and get revenge.  

No wonder this was so weird.  It was one of those W.A.V.E. Productions where you can basically write your own fetish video and they film it for you.  I guess all the catfights and bondage stuff was OK, but I certainly don’t have a fetish for longwinded prologues and incomprehensible plots.  (Not that you would watch something like this for the plot, but oh well.)  All that stuff got in the way of the fun.  It didn’t help that the sound was bad, and a lot of the dialogue was muffled.  Still, the overly dramatic death scenes were good for a laugh or two.  I also enjoyed the long, lingering shots of the actresses’ butts when they’re lying on the floor dead.  

I’ve been meaning to check out the W.A.V.E. documentary, Mail Order Murder.  I see it’s on Tubi.  I guess I know what tomorrow’s movie is going to be. 

AKA:  Mad Doctor of Zombie Island.