LOVE LIES BLEEDING (2024) **

Kristen Stewart stars as Lou, a lesbian who works behind the register at a skeevy gym.  When she sees musclebound Jackie (Katy O’Brien) working out, it’s love at first sight.  Only thing standing in the way of their happiness is the fact that Jackie got all roided up and killed Lou’s asshole brother in-law (Dave Franco).  Naturally, it doesn’t take long before even more bodies start mounting up. 

Love Lies Bleeding is a wannabe neo-noir that never quite comes together.  The gymnasium setting is novel and the sequence where O’Brien hightails it to Vegas to enroll in a bodybuilding competition when she should be lying low from the cops is kind of fun.  However, the plot is often messy, and the various complications seem more arbitrary than anything. 

Maybe my expectations were to blame.  They don’t make too many LGBT neo-noirs nowadays and I guess I got my hopes up thinking this was gonna be the next Bound or something.  Instead, what we got is a frustrating experience.  The film is strangely inert and uninvolving, and when it does try to color outside the lines the results are unintentionally laughable.  I’m thinking specifically of the end scene where (SPOILERS obviously) Katy hulks out and turns into the 50 Foot Woman to protect K-Stew from her evil dad (Ed Harris).  Yes, I know it’s all a steroid-induced dream, but it serves as more of a question mark at the end of the film rather than an exclamation point. 

Sadly, there are very little sparks between the two lead actresses.  They engage in some brief lovemaking, but it’s nothing overly graphic or titillating.  Stewart could do this sort of thing in her sleep by now and she looks halfway tempted to hit the snooze button.  O’Brien does prove to have a unique screen presence about her though.  If anything, the film should act as a serviceable calling card for her for the next few years or so. 

CHECK MITCH OUT ON THE DTVC PODCAST!

I was once again fortunate to have the pleasure of being a guest on The DTVC Podcast.  Matt and I had a lengthy discussion about the quintessential Skinamax classic Animal Instincts.  And if you know me, once I start talking about Skinamax classics, I can’t stop!  Check it out here: DTVC Podcast 179, "Animal Instincts" by DTVC Podcast (spotify.com) 

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: DINOSAUR ISLAND (1994) ***

FORMAT:  DVD

Ross Hagen is babysitting a team of army washouts when their plane goes down near an uncharted island.  Lucky for them (and the audience), the place is populated with sexy cavewomen in loincloths.  They capture the soldiers and prepare them for a life of slavery.  However, when they see Richard Gabai’s happy face tattoo, they believe he’s a legendary hero sent by the gods to kill “The Great One” (AKA:  A Tyrannosaurus Rex).  

When the reigning kings of Skinamax, Jim Wynorski and Fred Olen Ray team up to make a T & A dinosaur picture, you know you’re in for something special.  Dinosaur Island is steeped in Sci-Fi clichés from the ‘50s but updated with copious amounts of nudity you’d expect from a Skinamax flick of the ‘90s.  There are also nods to King Kong, the works of Harryhausen, and old Hammer movies, which adds to the fun.  

Wynorski and Ray were of course cashing in on Jurassic Park.  They even stoop to reusing the dinosaur from Roger Corman’s Jurassic Park rip-off, Carnosaur for their showstopping monster.  Other times, the dinosaurs appear as a hand puppet who eats a G.I. Joe action figure or as old-fashioned stop-motion animation.  The anything-goes kitchen sink approach to the effects is one of the movie’s many charms.  

The best special effects though belong to the female cast.  Any movie that features Griffin Drew, Antonia Dorian, Michelle Bauer, Toni Naples, Nikki Fritz, Becky LeBeau, and Deborah Dutch as sexy cavewomen is certainly going to be recommended viewing for me.  Even if Dinosaur Island is far from perfect, it features a lot more T & A than that Spielberg flick, that’s for sure.

Dinosaur Island is little more than an excuse to show scenes of sexy cavegirls running around in skimpy loincloths, going skinny-dipping, soaking in hot spring baths, and getting into catfights.  For that and that alone, it gets the job done.  I just wish the jokes were funnier.  I mean some of the wordplay is right out of an Abbott and Costello movie and many of the gags are corny and strained (like the use of slide whistles and comic sound effects to punctuate various punchlines).

It may not be the definitive pairing of Wynorski and Ray’s talents, but with this much nudity, an abundance of cool dinosaurs, and a quick pace, it’s hard to complain.

The best joke comes when Gabai says, “Sticks and stones may break our bones, but names will never hurt us!”

The cavewomen reply, “We have sticks… and stones… let’s break some bones!”

BEVERLY HILLS COP: AXEL F (2024) **

After starring in the surprising heartfelt and funny Coming 2 America and the modern classic Dolemite is My Name, I was looking forward to seeing Eddie Murphy return to streaming, this time as the iconic Axel Foley in Beverly Hills Cop:  Axel F.  Sadly, this is well below the heights of those films.  Heck, it even suffers from comparison to the uneven Beverly Hills Cop sequels. 

This time out, Detroit cop Axel returns to Beverly Hills when his buddy Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) goes missing.  Axel reconnects with his estranged lawyer daughter (Taylour Paige), and together they uncover a plot involving dirty cops led by the shifty Captain Grant (Kevin Bacon). 

Axel F isn’t exactly bad.  It’s watchable and would probably play best as background noise.  There just doesn’t seem to be a lot of drive or heart here.  (The scenes of Axel bonding with his daughter curiously fall flat.)  That wouldn’t necessarily matter if it was funny (I honestly think Part 3 had more laughs) or if the action was solid.  However, it just seems like everybody is on autopilot.  (Save for Bacon, who at least looks like he’s having fun.)

That sadly includes Murphy.  That spark he brought to the other films is noticeably absent and his shtick is feeling awfully tired.  It just hits different seeing a middle-aged man doing funny voices to get what he wants.  In fact, the best scene in the film is when he stops his silly accent mid-sentence and says he’s too tired for this shit.  Yeah, Eddie.  We noticed. 

I guess for some folks, just seeing Murphy slipping back into the role after a thirty-year absence and interacting with his old cohorts John Ashton, Bronson Pinchot, and Reinhold again will be enough.  The nostalgic needle drops on the soundtrack will make you tap your toes and remind you of the good old days too.  Unfortunately, nostalgia is about all the film brings to the table. 

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: SCREAM QUEENS NAKED CHRISTMAS (1996) ** ½

FORMAT:  BLU-RAY

(Note:  This was a bonus feature on the Santa Claws Blu Ray.) 

Hey, remember that Scream Queens Christmas video Debbie Rochon was making in Santa Claws?  Well, apparently the film-within-the-film is a real movie!  And by “real movie”, I mean it’s a cheap looking hour-long excuse for a bunch of Scream Queens to don and then un-don their gay apparel for the camera.  Like Santa Claws, it shares the great song, “Scream Queen”.  And like Santa Claws, it has lots of skin on display.

The film is hosted by Santa Claws himself.  Mostly, he just introduces clips of each Scream Queen stripping for the camera.  One crimson-clad model disrobes while dancing in front of Christmas trees.  Then, she does another number while wrapped up with a giant red ribbon and bow before running a teddy bear all over her body while laying on a sled.  The next model does a striptease blindfolded.  This is followed by a saucy redhead in a sexy Santa suit who takes it off.  They saved the best for last as Debbie Rochon does a hot dance while in spangly red number. 

This is basically just extended model scenes from Santa Claws.  I imagine the filmmakers had so much B-Roll footage they decided they could actually make another movie from the material.  By using just enough clips from Santa Claws and newly shot scenes of Grant Kramer as Santa, they were able to get it to an hour.  It doesn’t help though that many of the scenes don’t have a whole lot of energy, feature too much slow motion, and/or are backed by corny Christmas tunes.  (The last ten minutes also relies too heavily on recycled footage.)

If you’re a fan of Debbie, it will be worth watching.  If you love Santa Claws, it’ll be an interesting companion piece.  Other than that, there’s enough nudity here to justify its existence, but it still somehow winds up being less than a sum of its parts. 

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: SANTA CLAWS (1996) ***

FORMAT:  BLU-RAY (REWATCH)

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on August 18th, 2007)

Debbie (Tromeo and Juliet) Rochon stars as a Scream Queen named Raven Quinn who is trying to balance her life as a horror film star with raising her kids and saving her failing marriage. She gets her neighbor (played by Grant Kramer) to babysit her kids while she goes and poses nude, but unfortunately for her, her neighbor is also a psychotic, obsessive fan who not only dresses like the killer from her latest movie, “The Black Claw”, but also dresses up like Santa and murders Scream Queens. (Who are shooting their latest film called “Scream Queen Christmas”.) Kramer uses a three-pronged garden hoe to do most of his killing and gift wraps the bodies of his victims before burying them in the snow.

It’s not really all that great but it has three things going for it that make it worth a look. First Debbie Rochon gives an excellent performance and does a sexy striptease. Second of all it’s a pretty decent Killer Santa movie, one of the best since the original Silent Night, Deadly Night. Third, it was written and directed by John A. Russo the man who co-wrote Night of the Living Dead and that film’s stars Karl Hardman, Marilyn Eastman and Bill Hinzman all appear in small roles. There are also lots of plugs for Scream Queens Magazine too. Too bad it suffers from a poor shot on video cinematography and looks like it had a budget of $1.98.

Rochon and Kramer were also in Russo’s ill-advised Night of the Living Dead: 30th Anniversary Edition in newly filmed scenes.

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: GODZILLA VS. KONG (2021) *** ½

FORMAT:  BLU-RAY (REWATCH)

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on March 31st, 2021)

It’s finally here.  The clash of the titans.  We’ve waited since 1962 for a rematch between the world’s two biggest movie monsters.  Lucky for us fans of Godzilla and King Kong, it doesn’t disappoint.  It’s not perfect.  In fact, it’s probably the third best of the four “Monsterverse” movies, but still one of the best films ever made that features either monster.

The 1998 Godzilla did not work because there was no subtext.  It was basically, “What if Jurassic Park was… BIGGER?”  In fact, the tagline, “Size Matters” was downright cringeworthy.  As if bigger always meant better.  The original 1954 Godzilla was a metaphor for the nuclear devastation of Japan in WWII.  There were no such metaphors in the 1998 movie.  The 2014 Godzilla however had the tragedy of 9/11 running through its veins and because of that, it hit a lot harder.  Even Kong:  Skull Island had a lot of Vietnam imagery in there to ground it in some sort of historical/cultural relevance. 

Even though it was made pre-COVID, much of Godzilla vs. Kong feels like a metaphor for the times we are living in now.  When we first see Kong, he is in isolation on a fake version of Skull Island, quarantined from the rest of the world.  It seems like a sweet deal at first because he can sleep in, let his beard grow out, shower when he wants, and just sort of hang out.  It’s only when Kong ventures out into the world does he realize, it ain’t safe out there. 

Despite the fact that Godzilla has top billing, Godzilla vs. Kong is more of a Kong movie.  The main focus is on the humans getting Kong to safety while Godzilla occasionally pops up to temporarily spoil their plans.  Eventually, the two square off in Hong Kong where the human villains… well… I won’t spoil it, but I’m sure you can probably guess what goes down. 

The film is as much of a throwback to the adventure novels of Jules Verne as it is a love letter to giant monster mashes.  The whole “Hollow Earth” subplot feels like a modern-day version of those old ‘70s flicks like At the Earth’s Core.  That old timey touch is sometimes at odds with some of the updated characters (an annoying conspiracy theorist podcaster is a major player), but it’s nothing that derails the movie.

Maybe the reason why the Godzilla plotline feels skimpy is because the Kong storyline is a lot more engaging.  The scenes with the little deaf girl (Kaylee Hottle), who can communicate with Kong work really well.  The stuff with Millie Bobby Brown and Brian Tyree Henry is a lot less fun.  Brown is kind of wasted here, which is a shame since she was one of the best parts of Godzilla:  King of the Monsters.  The human drama is always secondary in these things, and the film sometimes struggles with juggling the characters from the two franchises, but it’s hardly an issue when the monster mashing is top notch. 

The first battle occurs in the middle of the ocean.  It’s nothing too spectacular, but the scene where Kong socks Godzilla on the jaw will definitely have you cheering.  The rematch in Hong Kong is a thing of beauty though.  It’s one of the best monster mashes in recent memory.  There’s even a moment during the final brawl that manages to be a homage to Lethal Weapon 2, if you can believe it.  I never thought I’d see that in a kaiju movie, but that’s just another reason why this one is so much fun.