LADY BLOODFIGHT (2017) ***

Amy Johnston is the real deal.  She’s been a stunt double in many comic book movies, but with her starring role in Lady Bloodfight she proves she is ready for the big time.  In addition to her considerable martial arts skills, she has a likeable screen presence.  The film itself is worthy of her talents.  It’s a strong enough vehicle to make you want to see her kicking ass again real soon.

It’s essentially an all-women version of Bloodsport.  Johnston is a tough American woman who goes to Hong Kong to find out what happened to her father years ago.  Inevitably, she gets roped into fighting in a Kumite tournament, the very same one her father died participating in.  

The story is an old hat, but writer Bey (The Medallion) Logan and director Chris (Kiss of the Dragon) Nahon hit all the right notes in a competent and entertaining fashion.  I particularly liked the training montage in which Johnston uses a large bell as a punching bag.  I guess the message is that she has to ring the bell literally in order to ring her opponent’s bell figuratively.  

The fights are well-choreographed and efficiently edited.  There are only a couple of instances where the camera is a bit too shaky or too close to the action.  Nahon is smart enough to keep the camera back when Johnston does her spin and flip kicks so you can see them in their full glory.

Much of Logan’s script is straightforward and predictable.  However, the film has fun playing with some of the expected conventions of the fighting tournament genre.  For instance, when her teacher abandons her, it’s the villain who winds up giving Johnston a big pep talk before a crucial match.

Although her character is a bit one-note, Johnston still does a terrific job.  The fact that she can take a thinly-written character and make you care about her speaks volumes to her talent.  The scene where she confronts the thieves who stole her purse is particularly well done.  She doesn’t want the money back, only her last remaining photo of her father.  Johnston is so good in this scene that from then on, we’re totally with her on her journey.  Not only was I was rooting for her character, I will be rooting for her as an actress as well.  I for one think she’s destined to breakout and become a star.

CREATURE OF DESTRUCTION (1967) * ½

Creature of Destruction was the last of four made-for-TV remakes of AIP movies Larry Buchanan directed in the ‘60s.  It’s his version of The She-Creature.  If you’re a fan of that picture, you might enjoy seeing the way Buchanan restages some of its most memorable scenes.  Fans of cheesy monster flicks will get a kick out of the awful green-skinned, bug-eyed lizard monster, although it will probably make you yearn for Paul Blaisdell’s original She-Creature creation.

Les (The Slime People) Tremayne has the Chester Morris role of the hypnotist whose stage act concludes with him predicting murder.  When his predictions come true, a huckster (Neil Fletcher) tries to promote his act and milk it for all its worth.  A skeptic (Aron Kincaid) is roped into the act, which revolves around Tremayne doing a lot of past-lives hypnotism on his assistant (Pat Delaney).  He sees that she is being held against her will and he tries to free her from Tremayne’s clutches.

Creature of Destruction copies The She-Creature nearly scene for scene during some stretches.  The biggest difference is that it features a gratuitous (though not-bad) rock band who are very much a time capsule.  (They even sing a song about Batman!)  Their performances, along with the endless shots of teens dancing, help to pad out the running time.  

From a technical standpoint, the movie is all over the map.  The cinematography is great, and Buchanan’s use of color is sometimes eye-popping.  The sound is another story as there are some scenes in which the dialogue is poorly dubbed.  Tremayne is a bit miscast as the psychic, but he’s fun to watch.  Aron Kincaid is pretty horrible though as the romantic lead.  If you thought Lance Fuller was boring in The She-Creature, wait till you get a load of this guy.  Delaney is quite fetching as the lovely Doreena, although she spends most of the movie in a trance.

The silly songs and stupid monster can only take this thing so far.  For most of the running time, it’s a chore to sit through.  The scenes of Tremayne negotiating his contract are especially dull.  By the time he starts putting Delaney into a deep sleep, you’re liable to follow her.

THE CREMATORS (1972) *

If you thought director Harry Essex’s Octaman was bad, wait till you get a load of The Cremators.  It makes that film look like The Creature from the Black Lagoon by comparison.  Oh, did you know Essex also wrote Creature from the Black Lagoon?  He certainly was a better writer than director, that’s for sure.

The monster in Octaman was silly to be sure, but the monster in The Cremators takes the cake.  It’s nothing more than a glowing beach ball that rolls over its victims, turning them into a pile of human-shaped ash.  You won’t fucking believe it.

Still, that shit is a hell of a lot more entertaining than anything else in the movie.  The scenes that don’t involve the alien beach ball are unbearable.  Much of it is devoted to some scientist guy futzing around in his cheap-looking lab that looks suspiciously like the director’s living room where the most notable “scientific” instrument is a fish tank.   

The funniest part is the overly bombastic score by Albert (The Amazing Colossal Man) Glasser.  Every little scene is punctuated by BOM-BOM-BAH-DAH-DAH in an effort to make the most trivial events on screen seem larger than life.  The results are often hilarious.

“Star” Marvin Howard looks and acts like a wax figure of Roddy McDowall.  I’m sorry, that’s an insult not only to Roddy McDowall, but to wax as well.  At least leading lady Maria De Aragon went on to better things.  Would you believe she later played Greedo in Star Wars?  You can’t make this shit up.  

BRAWL IN CELL BLOCK 99 (2017) ****

I was a fan of S. Craig Zahler’s Bone Tomahawk, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the awesomeness that is Brawl in Cell Block 99.  I love it when a director shows me something I haven’t seen before.  In this case, it’s Vince Vaughn being a total badass.  As much as I like Vaughn, he never really struck me as the badass type.  Cocky and likeable, sure, but not a hulking, scary, bringer-of-death.  Now that I have seen him in this, I am perfectly okay with the idea of Vaughn playing Jason in the next Friday the 13^th movie.

Zahler is a novelist, and he approaches his films as he would a book.  Structurally, they’re very similar.  He also spends a lot of time on establishing his characters and developing their relationships before turning the screws to them.  While some may find the first half of Brawl in Cell Block 99 slow, it’s here where Zahler is allowing the meat to marinate.  The last half hour is when he fires up the grill, and it is a gloriously bloody, insanely gory buffet of brutality.  (Imagine if Sam Peckinpah and Herschell Gordon Lewis had a baby out of wedlock.)  Without the character-driven first half, the movie would’ve come off as a nasty, but effective piece of exploitation filmmaking.  With it, the film is elevated to high art.

I will avoid plot specifics, as some of the plot turns are deliciously disgusting and downright wrong.  Not matter how pulpy it gets, you’re emotionally invested, thanks to Vaughn’s performance.  Vaughn is a revelation.  I can’t stress this enough.  Halfway through, you kind of forget it’s him.  Shaved completely bald and stomping around the place like a freight train on two legs, Vaughn has transformed himself into a beast of a man.  Even though he’s a physical monster, his moral compass is so strong that you are with him every step of the way… or I should say, every stomp of the way.  Every time he puts a boot down on some miserable bastard’s head, it’s cause for celebration.

The eclectic supporting cast is equally fine.  Jennifer Carpenter is excellent as Vaughn’s pregnant wife.  At first glance, her role is a thankless one, but she proves to be more resilient and savvy than what she appears to be.  

My jaw dropped when Udo Kier showed up.  I totally wasn’t expecting him at the party.  The wonderful thing is, Zahler knows exactly how to use Udo.  How many movies have you seen where the director thoroughly wastes Kier?  Not Zahler.  He gives Udo what might be his Udo-iest role yet.

Then there’s Don Johnson.  Holy Hell.  He gives what is probably the most sinister performance in a movie rife with sinister performances.  How come it seems like only Tarantino, Rodriguez, and Zahler are giving him roles like this?  As much as I liked his work on Miami Vice, I have to say he’s never been better.

By all means see this movie.  This is truly something special.  Everyone involved is at the peak of their powers.  I just read that Zahler’s next movie features much of the same cast AND Mel Gibson.  I don’t know about you, but I can’t fucking wait to see what he has up his sleeve.  (Not only that, but he’s apparently written the next Puppet Master movie too!)

HOSTILES (2017) ****

Hostiles is simply one of the best westerns to come along in many a moon.  It’s a downbeat, gritty, depressing, and handsomely mounted film that is expertly acted by its impressive cast.  Not only is it a picture about the savagery that lies in any man, regardless of skin color, it’s also about the inherent good in them.  It’s strongest theme though is that redemption is possible for the most brutal of men, even if they don’t exactly go out looking for it.

Christian Bale stars as an Army captain who is given orders to take an imprisoned sickly Cheyenne chief (Wes Studi) home to his reservation to die as a free man.  Bale is less than thrilled with this assignment since the chief killed many of his officers and friends.  Still, he is bound by duty to follow orders.  On the trail, they cross paths with a frontier woman (Rosamund Pike) whose entire family were slaughtered by Apaches.  They take pity on her, stay with her for a while and offer their time and company.  They eventually take her with them on the trail where they are soon menaced by the Apaches, who are still out for blood.

Bale and Pike give devastating performances.  Both are working without a net here and push themselves as far as an actor can go to convey sorrow, anger, and loss.  How they were overlooked at awards time is a mystery.  

Hostiles is a grim, unrelenting, and fascinating film.  It shows that both the Native Americans and the white man were heroic, but also capable of great evil as well.  Because of that, it’s an honest and unflinching take on the Old West.  Director Scott (Out of the Furnace) Cooper paints his characters with the finest of brushstrokes.  No one is completely innocent, nor are they wholly guilty.  Everyone’s done deeds in the past they aren’t proud of.  It’s what they do next that matters most.  I think that’s a theme that will stand the test of time.  This movie will do likewise.

WHITE LOTUS TRIO (1989) **

Three knuckleheads rob some gangsters in an attempt to support their very pregnant wives.  The triads find out they’ve been ripped off and murder the husbands in cold blood.  The wives then vow that their unborn children will avenge their fathers’ deaths.  Eighteen years later, they reunite and set out to do just that.

White Lotus Trio offers up an odd mix of comedy that isn’t very funny and action that is rather lackluster.  I guess there is one memorable scene in which a woman tries to suffocate a guy with her bosom.  Since she’s nowhere near as busty as Chesty Morgan, the guy was never in any danger.  The subtitles are a constant source of amusement though as the dialogue is often misspelled and/or mistranslated.  (For instance, the word “whip” is replaced with “wipe”.)  Or in some cases, the dialogue just don’t make any sense.  (“Are you a dump?")  

This isn’t really much to hang an entire movie around, I’m afraid.  It also takes a long time for the children to finally join forces and go on their quest for revenge.  I did like the scene where one of our heroes prays in front of a Cobra poster though.

Gordon Liu shows up as the detective who’s investigating the deaths of the gangsters.  He’s frankly, wasted as his role is rather small.  Even if the film gave him something worthy of his talents to do, I’m still not sure he could’ve saved it singlehandedly.

AKA:  Avenging Trio.

SHAOLIN QUICK DRAW (1987) **

Like most Joseph Lai productions, this is just two films edited into one.  He took an old movie (Fury of Storm) and added new unrelated footage of Richard Harrison and Stuart Smith as warring Ninjas.  The new stuff is rather hilarious too.  It’s so funny that it makes you wish Lai had gotten rid of Fury of Storm completely and made a flick entirely about Harrison and Smith.

Most of the movie revolves around a guy named Antonio.  We first see him dressed as a priest and dragging an enormous cross along a railroad track.  The train stops for him, but it’s all just a diversion so his buddies can steal a golden statue.  Antonio’s crooked cohorts double-cross him and leave him for dead.  Luckily for him, a Kung Fu expert named Dragon comes along and nurses Antonio back to health, setting the stage for him to try to recover the gold.

The footage from Fury in Storm is ho-hum at best.  Then again, it’s hard to tell, thanks to the haphazard way Lai re-edited it.  The back and forth between Antonio and Dragon is uninvolving, but there’s still enough action here to keep you marginally invested.  Unfortunately, there’s too much of this crap and not enough of Joseph Lai’s nutty Ninja inserts.

The opening is priceless.  Smith gets out of jail and is met by two disciples who kneel before him begging for forgiveness.

Smith:  How many of you are left? 

Ninja #1:  Just us.  

Smith:  Shit!  

Harrison is awkwardly edited in about a half hour into the picture, minus his trademark moustache and wearing a red bandana that says “Ninja” on it.  That is to say, he looks awesome.  He warns Antonio of the Ninjas and… That’s it!  That’s the last we see of him or Smith, for that matter.  Their appearances are fleeting, but thank goodness they were there because without them, Shaolin Quick Draw would’ve been totally forgettable.

AKA:  Ninja Avengers.  AKA:  Ninja Operation 6:  Champion on Fire.  AKA:  Ninja:  Champion on Fire.