LET’S GET PHYSICAL: FASCINATION (1979) ***

FORMAT:  BLU-RAY

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on June 9th, 2014)

A dude that looks like the lead singer for Men Without Hats swindles some gold from some unsavory characters and holes up at a seemingly uninhabited chateau. Luckily for the audience, Brigitte Lahaie and Franca Mai are lurking about the premises. After Brigitte gets it on with the Men Without Hats dude, she offs the thieves who were looking to kill him. Before long, a gaggle of hot women are hanging around the chateau looking to put the bite on him. Franca eventually starts getting attached to our dopey hero and decides to save him from the bloodthirsty babes.

Fascination is one of director Jean Rollin’s best. It’s an atmospheric and sexy horror flick filled with art and class and tits and ass. And while it’s not exactly a vampire flick, the way Rollin teases the women’s true identity and motives is a lot of fun.

There are some rough passages along the way, sure. And the flick feels a lot longer than the 81 minute running time too. But whenever the flick is working, it’s a thing of beauty.

Speaking of beauty, Brigitte Lahaie is the big reason the film works as well as it does. She is simply breathtaking in this flick and is enchanting as the sexy seductress. Fewer women in motion picture history have looked hotter wielding a scythe while wearing nothing more than a cape than Lahaie. Seriously, if that is what Death looks like, I’ll gladly meet the reaper.

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: JAWS (1975) ****

FORMAT:  4K UHD

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on May 20th, 2015)

Jaws has always been one of my favorite movies as far back as I can remember. Sadly, I wasn’t old enough to see it during its original theatrical run (although I did see both Jaws 3-D and Jaws the Revenge). The other night, as part of our local theater’s “Classic Movie Mondays”, I was able to finally see it on the big screen as God and Spielberg intended, and boy what a difference it makes.

Whenever I watched Jaws in the past, it was on a modestly sized television screen. Seeing the shark for the first time on the big screen is a revelation. I mean when the shark pops out of the water for the first time, you’re more or less seeing him at actual size. The opening shark attack scene was simply breathtaking on the big screen. Heck, just hearing John Williams’ iconic score coming out of those giant speakers was enough to get the goosebumps going and the hairs standing on the back of your neck.

It also helped that the film was playing to a packed house. Even though most of the people were clearly fans of the movie, they were jumping out of their seats and screaming at all the right parts. The scene where the severed leg of the hapless boater slowly floats to the bottom of the ocean had everyone hooting and hollering. When Chief Brody (Roy Scheider) uttered the immortal line, “Smile, you son of a bitch!” the audience erupted into an applause the likes I’ve never heard.

When the film is on dry land, Jaws is a terrific Killer Shark movie. Murray Hamilton is great as the asshole mayor who wants to keep the beaches open on the fourth of July, despite the fact there’s a giant shark just off the coast eating swimmers left and right. How many other Killer Animal flicks used this same stock character? Too many to count, but Hamilton essays the role expertly, and when he finally learns his lesson, we can’t help but feel a bit sorry for him.

When the action moves out to the open water, Jaws becomes something more. It becomes a mythic tale of Man vs. Nature that has no equal. Moby Dick is for pussies. The Old Man and the Sea is for wussies. Jaws is where it’s at.

As played by Robert Shaw, Quint is one of the greatest characters in all of cinema. The old crusty sea captain is distrustful of Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) because he’s rich and he uses all sorts of newfangled shark technology. However, when Quint’s seasoned, antiquated ways of shark hunting prove futile, he grudgingly turns to Hooper for help. Of course, this shark is so lethal that Hooper’s fancy equipment doesn’t last very long either, but it’s the fact that Quint looks to Hooper for help (out of desperation as well as respect) shows how his character grows throughout the film.

The centerpiece has nothing to do with the shark. It’s just Quint, Brody, and Hooper sitting around the boat, drinking, singing, and showing off their scars. This is the single greatest male bonding scene in screen history. Not to mention the fact that Quint’s speech about the USS Indianapolis is one of the most stirring monologues ever captured on film.

In the end, Quint fights the shark kicking and screaming (literally). When he dies, his loss is sorely felt. Hooper barely survives his run-in with the shark and quickly swims off for safety. It’s then up to Brody to dig down deep and man up to fight the shark.

Quint is the man of yesterday, still stuck in his old shark hunting ways. Hooper is the man of tomorrow with all of his expensive shark hunting gadgets. Brody is Mr. Right Now. He doesn’t know stern from bow. He has to take Dramamine to go onboard the boat. He is an everyman, a family man, an average Joe who is plagued with doubt and fear. However, when the chips are down, it is Brody who is the hero.

Armed with only his wits, a canister of compressed air, and a rifle, he takes on the beast as the ship slowly sinks into the sea. This scene is so rife with tension, and when he finally does take the sucker down… well… it’s just one of the most perfect moments you’ll ever experience on a movie screen. Quite simply, Jaws is one of The Greatest Movies in the History of the Human Race.

QUICK THOUGHTS:  

That original review was my reaction to seeing Jaws on the big screen.  Seeing it at home on a large flat screen TV in 4K is the next best thing.  (All that’s missing is hearing the audience’s reactions to the film’s most iconic moments.)  Other than that, it’s Jaws.  What more needs to be said?

4K UHD NOTES:

The 4k transfer of Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece is excellent.  The picture is razor sharp while still retaining the soft-focus majesty of Bill Butler’s cinematography.  The nighttime scenes are appropriately dark, yet crisp and full of detail (particularly the underwater scenes), and the daytime sequences look bright and picturesque.  In short, every self-respecting film lover with a 4K player needs this one in their collection. 

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: THE BLACK REBELS (1960) **

FORMAT:  VHS

Racial gang violence is escalating on the streets.  The police’s solution is to send a half black/half Mexican cop (Mark Damon in black/brownface) and a white cop (Douglas Hume) to high school to infiltrate the gangs.  Damon starts studying Rita Moreno a little too much and her hotheaded brother, the leader of the Chicano gang takes offense.  Soon, the fuzz learns that outside forces maybe be instigating the racially motivated gang war for their own interests.  Problems arise when Rita gets pregnant. 

The set-up, which plays sort of like a forerunner to 21 Jump Street is sound, but things bog down soon after.  Originally released as This Rebel Breed, producer William Rowland added new spicy scenes and rereleased it under various titles including this one.  It’s interesting in that it makes an earnest stab to tackle sensitive subject matter in an understanding way.  However, the messaging is sort of undermined by the T & A that’s been crudely shoehorned into the narrative.  Ironically, it’s these nudie scenes that are the most memorable parts. 

The Black Rebels is flawed and sometimes dull, but it’s worth a look for the cast.  This was made just before Rita Moreno hit it big with West Side Story, and it’s obvious she was destined for better things.  Damon is a bit bland, but he does his best with what he was given.  I also enjoyed Kenny (the “Eeny Meeny Miney Mo” guy from I Was a Teenage Werewolf) Miller as a wimpy gang member.   Also be on the lookout for Dyan Cannon in an early role as a party girl appropriately named “Wiggles”.  I wonder if either actress were aware of the version with all the nudie inserts.  I’m sure they would’ve been mortified if they saw it. 

Co-director Richard L. Bare went on to make the Duo-Vision wonder, Wicked Wicked. 

AKA:  This Rebel Breed.  AKA:  Lola’s Mistake.  AKA:  Three Shades of Love.

ORDERED TO LOVE (1963) **

During WWII, German scientists perform “Lebensborn” experiments to ensure the production of “genetically superior” offspring.  They find a bunch of ready and willing Nazi babes who are all too eager to help the cause, examine them thoroughly, and then get them ready for breeding.  Naturally, the women’s enthusiasm for the project diminishes when they learn “science” will choose their partners.  Klaus (Joachim Hansen) is a Nazi soldier who is sick of the Reich’s barbarism who escapes, assumes the identity of a dead official, and winds up in the breeding clinic.  His cover is blown when the head Fraulein (Maria Perschy from The Castle of Fu Manchu) learns he’s a phony.  Fortunately for Klaus, she has the hots for him, and together, they plan to escape. 

Ordered to Love is a forerunner of the Naziploitation genre.  While the set-up is ripe with enough possibilities that it would make Ilsa herself raise an eyebrow, it was made much too early in the cycle to deliver on any of its promises.  The film almost skates by on the strength of its lurid premise alone.  Alas, it just isn’t dramatically sound enough to make for a compelling war picture.  The hero’s plight is fairly standard stuff, and the scenes of the giggling girls slowly realizing the camp isn’t going to be a love fest lacks punch.  The slapdash use of stock footage is sometimes jarring too.  It also doesn’t help that the romantic sequences are set at a soap opera level.  A Nazi soap opera, but still. 

Despite these many drawbacks, Ordered to Love remains watchable throughout.  That’s mostly because you’re hoping for some nasty Nazi action, which unfortunately never comes.  Ultimately, the quack science sequences feature a lot of babbling about genetic gobbledygook and the examination scenes only result in the sight of one Fraulein’s bare back.  On the plus side, it moves at a reasonable clip and the performances are at the very least, earnest (especially Perschy). 

AKA:  Lebensborn.  AKA:  Fountain of Life.  AKA:  Women Ordered to Love.

THE KILLER (2024) * ½

Any remake of The Killer (even one directed by the original film’s director, John Woo) was doomed to fail, if only because it would inevitably suffer from comparison to the original classic.  The Killer was the film that raised the bar for action films, not only as spectacle, but as art.  As much as I tried to divorce myself from the first film, it just wasn’t happening.  Maybe it would’ve helped if this one wasn’t so mindbogglingly awful.  

The bare bones of the story are the same.  A killer accidentally blinds a lounge singer while on a job.  They then have to dodge a crafty cop looking to bring them down. 

The big difference is that this killer is a woman (Nathalie Emmanuel).  I guess they thought this would appeal to the PC crowd, but it’s just another instance of change for change’s sake.  It doesn’t help that she isn’t a remotely interesting character either as the dumbed down script underlines and italicizes all her motives.  (She only kills people who deserve it because… you know… God forbid the audience might side with a killer who might be morally ambiguous.)  It also doesn’t help that you never buy Emmanuel in the role.  If you were going to remake The Killer with a female lead, get a badass in there like Charlize Theron or Michelle Yeoh.  If I was casting this thing, the twelfth billed costar of the last couple of Fast and Furious movies wouldn’t even have been in my top 100 candidates.  I don’t think she could carry a bag of groceries, let alone an action movie, let alone a remake of one of the greatest action movies of all time. 

Then again who could possibly fill Chow Yun Fat’s shoes?  When you watch him in the OG Killer you are watching THE BADDEST MOTHERFUCKER TO EVER LIVE.  So yeah, I don’t envy anyone who has to follow his lead.  However, the film needed someone with some kind of screen presence to carry the movie.  Or at least looks the part.  (Try to count all the times she flinches while firing her gun.)

Then, there’s Diana Silvers as the lounge singer.  Woof.  Man.  She sounds like someone who just went through a massive dental procedure that tried to do amateur karaoke with a mouth full of Novocain.  Her absolute butchering of “Live for Today” is a crime against not only music, but sound in general.  The Grass Roots should fucking sue.  I guess it would be one thing if she was just a bad singer, but she’s a bad actress to boot.  I’ve seen better performances in Tubi Originals. 

Another change is the setting.  Now it takes place in Paris.  You know.  For reasons. 

The most infuriating difference is that the Shakespearean ending of the original has been changed.  (Read: RUINED.)

If anyone other than Woo directed this, it would’ve been easy to shrug off.  However, his participation makes the whole ordeal even that much inexplicable.   The action ranges from mediocre to pedestrian, and the callbacks to the original just underline just how misguided this whole enterprise was. 

You know you’re in trouble when charisma vacuum Sam Worthington gives the best performance of the movie. 

I dunno man.  Maybe Tarantino is right.  Maybe directing is a young man’s game.  Maybe Wood should’ve quite while he was ahead.

THE SINGLE GIRLS (1974) **

Before Claudia Jennings cemented her title as Queen of the Drive-In in Ferd and Beverly Sebastian’s immortal classic, Gator Bait, she starred in the decidedly less than classic The Single Girls for the couple. 

Claudia and some friends go to a “liberated” resort where a groovy doctor helps vacationers lose their inhibitions and partake in some “group” therapy, if you know what I mean.  (Or, SEX, if you don’t know what I mean.)  Too bad Claudia’s stuffed shirt ex has followed her along to ruin the fun.  Speaking of ruining the fun, there’s also a killer lurking about the grounds who is slowly (huge emphasis on the word “slowly”) picking off the hedonistic vacationers one by one. 

The Single Girls is an uneven mix of hippie dippy sexploitation and prototypical slasher movie.  The fact that it was retitled Bloody Friday and rereleased years later on video as a Friday the 13th knockoff is telling.  Don’t worry though, because there’s still a decent amount of skin on display.  It’s just that the film has a tendency to swap genres as much as the couples swap partners.

This could have worked if the script was tight, but ultimately The Single Girls just never quite gets its affairs in order.  It doesn’t work as sexploitation because there’s too much stalling and not enough balling, and it fails as a slasher flick as there’s too much gabbing and not enough stabbing.  The finale is pretty weak too. 

Claudia is the reason to watch it.  She gives a fine performance, even if she doesn’t have quite as many nude scenes as I was expecting.  We also get fine support from Albert (the Dirty Harry series) Popwell as the “soul brother” of the group and Robyn (Blazing Saddles) Hilton as one of the tourists. 

AKA:  Private School.  AKA:  Bloody Friday.

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: STRANGLER OF THE SWAMP (1946) ** ½

FORMAT:  DVD

Years ago, angry villagers formed a lynch mob and hung an innocent man who worked as the ferryman in the swamp.  Before he died, he placed a curse on the men and their descendants.  Now, his ghost roams the swamps strangling the relatives of those responsible for his death.  Meanwhile, a pretty young gal takes up the job of ferrywoman and begins a romance with a strapping young man.  Naturally, thanks to long-buried family secrets, it doesn’t take long for the ghost to ruin their newfound bliss. 

Strangler of the Swamp is well regarded in some circles.  It was released by PRC, who were known for their “poverty row” horror cheapies.  While it certainly looks more polished and is more atmospheric than your typical PRC horror quickie, it’s still far from perfect. 

The biggest problem is with the landslide of exposition that kicks off the film.  It would’ve worked much better if we actually saw the hanging that initiated the curse of the strangler instead of hearing everyone in town talk about it on and on.  The love story scenes are strictly standard fare too, and the religious-tinged “love conquers all” ending is quite hokey. 

That said, Strangler of the Swamp is certainly one cool looking flick.  The swamp locations are atmospheric (it often looks like a Universal horror flick) and give the film a personality that most PRC flicks lacked.  The effects of the ghost (played by Charles Middleton, best known for playing Ming the Merciless in the Flash Gordon serials) are surprisingly well done too, and the shots of him lurking in the fog are surprisingly effective.  The running time clocks in at just under an hour and the pacing is relatively brisk, which certainly helps.  It all results in a mixed bag, but a moderately entertaining one.