DAMSELVIS, DAUGHTER OF HELVIS (1994) *

Black Jesus (Adimu Ajanaku) lets loose his flock of biker gang disciples upon the Earth.  One of the badass babes has a brawl with a young, bullied girl named Damselvis (Sherry Lynn Garris), who is saved when the ghost of her father, rock singer Helvis (Brady Debussey) miraculously appears.  He then gives her a spangly jumpsuit and a motorcycle so she can stop Black Jesus and his evil minions once and for all. 

I’m all for weirdness for weirdness’ sake.  I also have a high tolerance for no-budget shot on video oddities.  And I can usually make time in my busy schedule for anything that’s only an hour long.  However, my big reaction to this hour-long weirdness for weirdness’ sake no-budget shot on video oddity is HUH?!?

It’s unfortunate too because having a lead character who is sort of like a sexy gender swapped mash-up of Elvis Presley and Evel Knievel should work.  It just… doesn’t.  It’s not just that the whole thing is so amateurish.  It’s just that nothing ever really happens, and when something finally happens, the flick still just sort of sits there like a stone.  The film’s impenetrable lore makes zero sense too (Damselvis is somehow able to resurrect dead cars?), the random solarized scenes are pointless, and the limited action scenes are pretty weak. 

In fact, the whole thing would’ve been pretty worthless if it hadn’t been for some gratuitous nudity, random lesbian scenes, and that one part where our heroine takes a leak in a field.  At only sixty-two minutes, it still drags like a sumbitch and feels at least three times that length.  If anything, it’s the only movie I can think of in which a Black Jesus turns into a werewolf, so it’s got that going for it, I guess.  

Writer/director John Michael McCarthy later went on to make Superstarlet A.D.

MAXXXINE (2024) ** ½

Pearl was one of the best horror movies to come out the chute in the last decade.  Because of that, I was really looking forward to this, the third entry in director Ti West’s trilogy.  While it’s by far the weakest entry in the series, there’s enough good stuff here to make for a marginal recommendation. 

It’s Hollywood in 1985, and former porn star Maxxxine (Mia Goth) just got her big break with a lead role in a horror movie.  Too bad a sleazy detective (Kevin Bacon) is blackmailing her about her involvement in the incident that occurred in the first film, X.  There’s also some business about a religious cult who are busy killing off her friends.  And as the cherry on top, The Night Stalker is on the loose.  It’s up to Maxxxine to make sure none of these bozos get in the way of her shot at fame. 

As you can probably tell, Maxxxine is overstuffed with ideas.  The early scenes set in Hollywood Boulevard have a cool Vice Squad/Avenging Angel vibe to them.  (The scene where Maxxxine gets the drop on a would-be rapist is the disgusting highlight.)  I also loved all the scenes involving Bacon.  He turns the scenery in every scene he’s in into an all-you-can-eat buffet.  Goth and Bacon also participate in a fun cat and mouse stalking scene set on the Universal backlot that culminates in a visit to the Bates Motel. 

While most of this is entertaining, the movie started to lose me once it entered the third act.  The stuff with the religious cult seemed a bit on the nose and the final hour lacks the punch of the first half-hour or so.  It also loses points for wasting Elizabeth Debicki in a thinly written role of a bitchy director.  Luckily, Goth and Bacon keep you watching even when the wheels are threatening to fall off. 

LONGLEGS (2024) * ½

I was not a fan of writer/director Osgood Perkins’ The Blackcoat’s Daughter or Gretel and Hansel.  However, I decided to give this one a chance because the marketing was pretty effective, and it co-stars Nicolas Cage (whose appearance was absent and/or obscured in the promotional materials) as a creepy serial killer.  While it’s marginally better than his other films, Longlegs remains a frustrating experience to say the least. 

 

Maika Monroe (who looks like a bargain bin version of Brie Larson) is a “half-psychic” FBI agent trying to solve a rash of murders where seemingly average families up and kill each other.  While on the case, she receives cryptogram messages from a killer named Longlegs (Cage) that brings her closer to unraveling the mystery.  Does a traumatic incident from her past hold the key to cracking the case?  What do you think?

Longlegs is one of those slow burn movies where nothing much happens for long periods of time and when it finally does, the jump scare is accompanied by an annoying music sting on the soundtrack.  Sadly, that’s about the only maneuver in Perkins’ playbook.  If you’re gonna pull a slow burn, you gotta make with the burn.  Otherwise, all you get is SLOW.  

It’s also overstuffed with half-baked ideas that never really work (like the inclusion of creepy killer dolls).  At times, it seems like Perkins is just throwing ideas out to see what sticks.  Sad to say, nothing ever does. 

The most disappointing aspect of the movie is Cage himself.  He kind of looks like Tiny Tim playing the Joker.  That description sounds promising, but we ultimately see too much of him down the homestretch as his appearances were much more effective in small doses.  Also, how can you take a world class hottie like Alicia Witt and turn her into a plain Jane nun?  That’s probably the scariest part of the whole flick. 

STONEHEARST ASYLUM (2014) ***

A gothic horror movie based on an Edgar Allan Poe story, produced by Mel Gibson, directed by Brad Anderson, and packed to the gills with terrific actors?  How come I’m just now hearing about it? 

At the turn of the century (you know I’m old when I refer to 1899 as “the turn of the century”), a young idealistic doctor (Jim Sturgess) comes to work at a creepy asylum in the middle of nowhere.  He soon learns the head quack (Ben Kingsley) has an unorthodox manner of treating patients.  Instead of curing them of their delusions, he encourages them.  Jim also finds it funny that all the patients happen to come from money and have only been put away because they’re an embarrassment to their families.  He soon falls for a sexy patient, and since she’s played by Kate Beckinsale, we can’t blame him.  Eventually he learns that… GASP!  The lunatics are running the asylum! 

That last bit isn’t really a spoiler since it happens in the first act.  (Heck, Sturgess even says “the lunatics are running the asylum” when he learns the truth.)  However, the suspense comes from how long Sturgess can play along with the kooky doctor until he figures a way to escape without being found out by the other inmates. 

Overall, this is a mostly sturdy mix of wry humor and old school gothic horror.  It’s PG-13, so there’s nothing overly horrific here.  (It also uses its one allotted F-bomb extremely well.)  If there is a flaw, it’s that it runs on a bit long, and the final twist wasn’t completely necessary.  Nevertheless, it’s a handsomely mounted and well-acted affair. 

Kingsley looks like he’s having a blast chewing the scenery.  David Thewlis is likewise having fun as his smarmy assistant, Mickey Finn.  (Yes, THE Mickey Finn!)  Beckinsale is fetching as the object of Sturgess’ affection and Michael Caine has some nice moments as the former head doctor who is now imprisoned by the cuckoo Kingsley.  Sturgess is a bit of a stuffed shirt in the lead, but that helps to contrast the antics of the inmates. 

AKA:  Eliza Graves.  AKA:  Hysteria.  AKA:  The Asylum.

NATTY KNOCKS (2023) **

A former B-movie actress named Natty Knocks (Joey Bothwell) returns to her hometown and ekes out a living as a hooker.  The local ladies don’t take kindly to her banging all the menfolk, so they burn her alive like a witch.  Forty-five years later she becomes a local legend, and kids make a sort of “Bloody Mary” game out of her grisly story.  When two teens play the Natty Knocks game, they witness a crazed cop (Bill Moseley) killing a woman.  Of course, no one believes them, and they set out to solve the murder themselves. 

I had high hopes for this one given the cast and director.  It was kind of like a homecoming for director Dwight H. Little as he had previously worked with the film’s stars Danielle Harris, Robert Englund, and Jason James Richter before.  Too bad the script is such a mess, which pretty much nullifies the efforts of the cast. 

The backstory of the title character is cumbersome, but it might’ve worked if the I Saw What You Did-style plot device with the prying teenagers was effective.  Although Moseley has one or two memorable moments (like when he’s hiding under a bedsheet), he kind of gets lost in the shuffle at some points of the film.  (Heck, he doesn’t even speak until the halfway mark.) 

At least he has something worthwhile to do.  Poor Englund is around just long enough to provide an exposition dump before getting killed off.  Harris is similarly wasted in the stereotypical single mother role. 

The biggest stumbling block is the introduction of the supernatural elements in the second half.  The film was already mired with a lot of subplots, and it didn’t really need a bunch of ghost shit bogging it down even further.  If the script stuck with either the Natty Knocks ghost story or the teenage prankster plot line, it could’ve been worthwhile.  Cramming both stories into one didn’t do the movie any favors.

In short, when Natty Knocks, don’t answer. 

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: THE COCAINE FIENDS (1935) ***

FORMAT:  DVD (REWATCH)

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on August 17th, 2007)

A sweet young girl named Jane (Lois January) gets seduced by a drug pushing thug named Nick (Noel Madison) who gives her “headache powders” which is actually cocaine. Nick (notice how all the pushers in these old drug movies are always called Nick) brings her to “the big city” and gets her hooked on coke. He keeps her locked up in a hotel room with another hooker and takes her out to schoolyards to push the stuff on kids. Nick also makes her push the dope at the “Dead Rat Café”. Her brother Eddie (Dean Benton) comes to the city looking for her and also becomes a “hophead” and his new fiancée is reduced to prostitution so he can get his fix. Eddie ends up in an opium den and Jane (now calling herself “Lil, the discarded gangster’s moll!”) tries to help him.

This ‘30s drug scare film is more serious and believable (and depressing) than most and is closer in tone to Marihuana than Reefer Madness. Although too much time is spent on the musical acts at the Dead Rat Café, this is probably the most realistic depiction of addiction seen on the screen at that time. The print is pretty jumpy and scratchy but shouldn’t detract from your enjoyment.

AKA: The Pace That Kills.

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: CHAINED FOR LIFE (1952) ** ½

FORMAT:  DVD (REWATCH)

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on August 17th, 2007)

The Siamese Hilton twins Daisy and Violet from Freaks return to the screen nearly 20 years later in this film loosely based on their own lives. Their real-life story was much more dramatic than this fluff, but Freaks fans will want to check this, their only other film appearance, out.

They star as “The Hamilton Sisters”, Dorothy and Vivian who are on trial for murder! They’re questioned by the prosecutor and tell their life story in flashbacks. They once starred in a vaudeville show where their manager schemed to have Dorothy married to a sharpshooter for publicity. Dorothy actually falls in love with him though and predictably gets her heart broken by the no-good louse. In the end though, it’s Vivian who pulls the trigger! The film leaves us with the question should Dorothy also be punished for Vivian’s crime since they’re Siamese twins?

The film’s best scene is a fantasy sequence in which Dorothy imagines that she becomes separated from Vivian and gets to frolic around with her new love. The effects in this scene are pretty low-grade (Vivian is either hidden behind a tree or a sheet and Dorothy’s obvious stand in is only photographed from far away), but the scene remains oddly effective. There’s as an odd but interesting scene where the sisters go to a helpful blind preacher for guidance, and he talks a lot of gobbledygook about “God’s mysterious ways.” The Hilton sisters are pretty good and do several numbers, but other acts (plate jugglers, accordionists, bicyclists, etc.) take up too much time though. It’s not as exploitative as you might expect, but it suffers from comparison to Freaks. The Hiltons died penniless fifteen years later.