OKATSU THE FUGITIVE (1969)

This third installment in the LEGENDS OF THE POISONOUS SEDUCTRESS series is a major disappointment after the excellence of its predecessor, QUICK-DRAW OKATSU . It's pretty much a remake of the previous film, even starring Junko Miyazono as a master swordswoman named Okatsu, but not the same character she played before (?); at the end of QUICK-DRAW OKATSU our heroine was a wanted fugitive, so wouldn't you expect a film entitled OKATSU THE FUGITIVE to be a direct sequel, especially since the film that came before it was a hit and the Japanese are not by any means sequel shy?

This new Okatsu is again the blade-proficient daughter of a swordsman, and when her father threatens to expose the vicious corruption of a local magistrate he's tortured in an attempt to get him to reveal the whereabouts of a written document of the magistrate's offenses. When he won't talk, his wife and daughter are hauled in by the bad guys and the wife is thrown to six hardened criminals for a bit of gang rape (which thankfully doesn't occur, but she does get alarmingly manhandled), and after that moment of extreme bad taste dad kills his wife and then himself. Unfortunately Okatsu then falls victim to the evil magistrate and is raped, then thrown into a basement dungeon. With the aid of her sleazy fiancee, she escapes — killing several swordsmen in the process — with the document hidden in her mother's elaborate (and very pointy) hairpin and sets out to avenge her parents, not realizing her fiancee is in league with the bad guys. After that the film becomes a lackluster and very much by the numbers samurai revenge flick that could have been written with little or no effort by anyone who's ever seen one of these things, and ends up a staggeringly generic item that will be forgotten about five minutes after the title that reads "The End." That's a real shame because the level of quality found in QUICK-DRAW OKATSU lead me to expect a hell of a lot more from all involved, and after this I can see why the series stalled out. TRUST YER BUNCHE!!!

THIS IS ENGLAND (2006)

My man Thomas Turgoose as Shaun, the anti-McLovin.

At the urging of my man in Eastbourne, Chris Weston, I checked out Shane Meadows's THIS IS ENGLAND and now I strongly urge you to see it for yourself.

The partly-autobiographical story takes place in England during the summer of 1983 and follows twelve-year-old Shaun (Thomas Turgoose), a miserable loner whose father was killed the previous year in the ongoing Falklands conflict. Living alone with his shockingly brain-dead mother, Shaun is mercilessly bullied by the older and larger kids at his school, and on the last day before the summer holidays he gets into a fight with an older kid who tormented him over his dad's death, and on the way home he ends up befriended by a gang of local skinheads. The skins are a far cry from the stereotypical neo-Nazis we've come to expect, and in no time flat Shaun looks to them for guidance and acceptance, swiftly adopting the suedehead haircut and braces & boots fashion uniform that mark him as part of the tribe. These older role models are actually quite a nice bunch of kids, and during his early days with them Shaun finds a happiness not felt since before his father's death, even landing the cute and sweet "Smell" (Rosamund Hanson, looking like a cross between a marmoset and a rummage sale) as his overage girlfriend.

But a spanner is thrown into the works when Combo (Stephen Graham), a thirty-two-year-old skin and former leader of the band, returns after a three-and-a-half year prison term, now filled with nationalistic fervor and a mission to turn his younger comrades into racist, Paki-bashing thugs for the National Front. When given a choice of following Combo, most of the skins opt out with no hard feelings, but Shaun stays, seduced by Combo's words about the pointlessness of the war in the Falklands. Thanks to his bitterness over his dad's death, Shaun is a perfect tabula rasa on which Combo can engrave his hateful leanings, and Shaun devolves into a pint-sized hate-monger, willingly accompanying Combo and his mates on missions of defacement and general shakedowns of the local Pakistani population. With the seriously unstable Combo as his new father figure, it's only a matter of time until things spin out of control and Shaun must make up his own mind as to exactly who, and what, he wants to be.

One of the things that always fascinated me about the original British skinhead youth movement was how it was formed with a heavy influence of black culture, especially when it came to the music they listened to. The inner city lower working class skins had a lot in common with their Jamaican immigrant neighbors and they knew it, the two existing together fairly well. But then the British white supremacists came along and many of the disenfranchised youth turned to them in search of something to believe in, spawning the Nazi skinhead, a group that exists to this day and is still exploited by their much smarter political role models and leaders. THIS IS ENGLAND deals with this in no uncertain terms, and before Combo returned there was even a black skinhead in Shaun's group of friends, a dapper lad named Milky (Andrew Shim), but despite Combo's kind and respectful treatment of him, Milky leaves rather than deal with Combo's rabid and, when considering Milky, contradictory nationalism. As the story progresses we learn much about Combo and what made him what he is, but the most revealing and tragic revelations about him come implicitly rather than explicitly during a moment of bonding with Milky while the two are stoned off their asses; it's an old-school skinhead love-fest until Combo loses control, an act that galvanizes Shaun's reality check and makes the viewer want to personally foot the bill for Combo's much-needed regimen of anger management and psychotherapy.

The film is stocked with wall-to-wall terrific performances and Thomas Turgoose's turn as Shaun is utterly natural and believable, our hearts breaking as we see him transform from a sad little boy into a vicious, hate-filled follower. And his relationship with Smell is in no way sleazy or offensive; the scene in which they share a kiss in the backyard shed is pretty torrid and would never fly in an American film, but it's clear that when it comes to sex Shaun is pretty clear-headed and wouldn't do anything he wasn't ready for, so his explorations with Smell remain within the PG-13 realm. Smell even goes so far as to tell Shaun that she'd never force him into anything he wasn't comfortable with, and is relieved to find that his opting out of sucking her tits had nothing to do with him not liking her, but was just due to him pacing his experiences with this kind and wonderful girl who he thinks is "lovely." It's really very sweet, and I was glad to see it handled with such good taste.

Stephen Graham's Combo is one of the more memorable antagonists in recent cinema, and despite his horrendous attitudes, he's too well-shaded to be considered an outright villain. I really can't say any more without giving away a major plot point regarding him, so I'll just stop right here.

Stephen Graham as Combo.

Bottom line, THIS IS ENGLAND is an excellent and involving film that, according to my friends in the UK, is an unflinchingly accurate depiction of a specific element of the country's youth back in the bleak days of the early 1980's. It has moments of great charm, but it's also pretty much a downer from frame one, so keep that in mind before renting it thinking it my be the British cousin of a John Hughes teener flick, because it sure as shit ain't that. And whatever you do, keep the subtitles on; I'm good with British accents, but the dialogue in this film was quite regional, and the subtitles helped immensely. TRUST YER BUNCHE!!!

ICE COLD IN ALEX (1958)

Captain Ansen (John Mills) and cohorts ponder the most hard-won cold brews ever.

I'm not all that keen on war movies as a genre, but when Garth Ennis recommends a particular film as one of the all-time best of its kind I feel inclined to give it a look. The film in question is the 1958 adaptation of Christopher Landon's chronicle of some of his experiences in World War II, ICE COLD IN ALEX, and I'm surprised to say that it comes from out of nowhere to establish itself as my favorite war movie.

The story is a model of simplicity: when the British base at Tobruk falls under siege by German forces, the personnel must evacuate and an ambulance (dubbed "Katy" by its original driver) driven by combat-fatigued borderline alcoholic Captain Ansen (John Mills) must make its way to safety after becoming separated from its unit. Also on board for the journey are MSM Tom Pugh (Harry Andrews), a pair of nurses (Sylvia Syms and Diane Clare) and an Afrikaans and German-speaking South African captain (Anthony Quayle) whom they find along the way. The direct route to their destination, Alexandria, is inaccessible since the bridge leading to it was demolished, so the ambulance must traverse a perilous course across over six-hundred miles of desert, where the characters must contend with heavily-armed Nazi patrols, treacherous mine fields, blistering heat, dwindling rations, fraying nerves and the suspicion that one of them may be a Nazi spy (gee, guess which one). When a bullet claims the life of one of the Brits, Ansen swears off drinking until they arrive safely in "Alex" and belly up to a bar that he knows that serves lager in glasses so cold that you can carve the ice off the surface with your fingernail. So, basically, the guy focuses on a beer as his motivator. There have been times when I could totally relate to that, and when you see what these characters go through you'll need a tall, frosty one yourself, especially after the episodes involving traversing a minefield and getting the overheating ambulance over a steep sand dune. That may not sound like much, but I swear you'll see what I mean.

What makes this movie so enjoyable to me is that it's a WWII flick totally devoid of the jingoistic action figure stereotypes that I so utterly loathe in many films of the genre, and is instead about a group of human beings that the viewer can relate to and root for whether you're into the whole war movie thing or not. Theirs is a journey through a crucible in which, for better or worse, the human spirit and will are tested to their utmost, and even the enemy are portrayed as people who happen to be soldiers and not just a bunch of stock goosestepping drones. And the Nazi spy proves to be not only sympathetic but also quite heroic, contributing hugely to helping in the mutual goal of crossing the desert and reaching Alexandria alive.

Everything about this film works and treats the viewer with intelligence, so I urge you to see it if you get the opportunity. It's not available on DVD in the States, but it is easily obtainable for those of you who wisely invested in an all-regions DVD player. TRUST YER BUNCHE and seek out this absolute classic.

MALENA (2000)

Monica Bellucci, as the beautiful and justly-melancholy Malèna Scordia, ignites the fancies of young Sicilian lads in WWII Italy.

NOTE: in a strange bit of serendipitous timing, this review of an Italian movie finds itself being posted on Columbus Day. Fuhgeddaboudit!

I love Italian women. I don't know where that fascination comes from, but I wear my appreciation on my sleeve and appreciate few of the Babes from the Boot the way I do Monica Bellucci. Just say it with me: Mon-ih-kuh Bail-oo-chee. It's a name that brings one's lips and tongue into full, sensual play and is a pleasure to speak, a name utterly befitting of one of, in my own humble opinion, the most beautiful women on this planet. A model turned thesp, Bellucci enthralls me to the point of Yer Bunche being willing to sit through two hours of her reciting the ingredients and nutritional information of side of a box of instant mashed potatoes, so it's a good thing that she sets her sights on projects of loftier content. Sure she was in those lousy sequels to THE MATRIX and the painfully mediocre BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA (1992), but I won't hold that against her as long as she keeps making decent slice-of-life melodramas and the occasional bit of silliness like SHOOT 'EM UP (2007).

Director Giuseppe Tornatore, the visionary behind the incredible CINEMA PARADISO, crafted MALENA as a coming of age tale set in Sicily that covers the period of Italy's involvement in WWII and follows 12-year-old Renato Amoroso (Giuseppe Sulfaro) as the percolating hormones of puberty hit him and his equally horny cronies like a sledge hammer. The object of their adolescent yearnings is Malèna Scordia (Monica Bellucci), their incredibly hot new Latin teacher who has just moved to their town with her husband, but when Italy enters the war her spouse leaves for service in the army. Now alone, Malèna endures the leers of the town's men and the not-so-quiet jealous whispers of the women, as well as the sleazy rumors and imaginings of both groups while Renato and his pals follow her around like a pack of hungry puppies. But while nearly every other male in town lusts after Malèna in various degrading ways, Renato's spying upon her reveals the sad and lonely truth behind the goddesslike beauty and lends him a unique perspective on her silent suffering. As the war progresses Malèna receives word that her husband has been killed in battle and her fortunes take a turn for the worse as the town's imaginings about her escalate, eventually resulting in her father (an ageing teacher at the local school) receiving a letter that paints her as a disgraceful slut who has slept with most of the town's men, after which he more or less disowns her. Her father is subsequently killed in a bombing raid and when her money runs out Malèna must become a whore in order to survive, bringing the town's imaginings to stark life. When the Germans arrive, Malèna dyes her hair blonde and begins servicing them, but throughout this spiraling cycle of misery Renato remains her most ardent admirer and worships her from afar, being the only witness to the truth of her existence and secretly avenging her abuse in small ways like pissing into the purse of a vicious gossip or spitting into the drink of a braggart at a men's club.

Renato's love for Malèna goes unexpressed, but some of his fantasies of her are seen in humorous bits that reflect his love of the movies, casting himself and Malèna in the romantic leads in his mind's eye, and when not thinking cinematically he pictures her in seductive situations and clad in sexy outfits or simply nothing at all. His horniness soon boils over into chronic masturbation and leads to some very funny sequences involving his family's horror at his behavior, culminating in his father's no nonsense declaration that his son "needs to fuck." Choosing the obvious solution to this problem, Renato's dad takes him to lose his virginity at a local whorehouse where the lad imagines his first woman to be his adored Malèna. As Renato becomes more of man with each passing day, Malèna's situation worsens and his role as her guardian angel takes a major turn when...

I'd better stop there.

This is not a "great" work of cinema by any means (some critics have even called it "slight"), but it struck a chord in me while watching it and reminded me of the painful years of early adolescence and the sheer frustration thereof with surprising clarity. While Malèna would seem to be the main focus of the story (and the marketing), her suffering and position as an earthily beautiful focus of desire serve to give Renato a sense of purpose that evolves into a clumsy form of the most sincere chivalry, and the viewer learns to love the boy for it. In short, I picked it up so I could sate my Bellucci cravings and ended up with a surprisingly realistic boy-lusts-after-older-woman story that allows the boy's yearnings for his madonna to go unfulfilled. Similar territory has been mined many times previous to MALENA, most notably in the American film SUMMER OF '42 (1971), but what lifts MALENA into the "better than average" category is a solid script, Tornatore's directorial eye and the excellent performance of Giuseppe Sulfaro as Renato. I was totally invested in his story, and thanks to his perspective Malèna's story become compelling and not just a collection of war widow "weepie" clichés. But in comparison with Renato, Malèna herself is less of a character than a lovely walking plot motivator; sure, we care for her as we witness her various struggles, but her real purpose is to be that unattainable goddess who arouses the first feelings of manhood in a callow youth, and Bellucci conveys this quite well in a role that is largely silent. It's Renato's show, so keep that in mind when checking this one out, fellow Bellucci worshippers.

My only real complaint about MALENA comes from knowledge gained after seeing it: the American version of the film heavily trims material deemed too the graphic nature of some scenes involving Renato's fantasies about having sex with Malèna, including the scene in the whorehouse that was apparently much more, er, interesting.

One of the sequences cruelly trimmed by those assholes at the MPAA.

Maybe there was some ludicrous concern that the scenes in question skirted dangerously close to "kiddie porn," which, judging from the rest of the movie, they wouldn't have been. The squeamish MPAA called for similar trimming of Luc Besson's excellent 1994 action masterpiece LEON (released here as THE PROFESSIONAL) involving the twelve-year-old Natalie Portman telling Jean Reneau in no certain terms of her intent to seduce him. That sequence was admittedly a bit disturbing, but that film was dealing with rather disturbing material in the first place so it was not inappropriate in the least, plus there was no trace of nudity and Reneau's character set her straight that it wasn't gonna happen (he'd developed a paternal relationship with the orphaned girl), so I guess the MPAA has issues with such stuff, even when handled tastefully, as was the case in MALENA. Buncha pussies.

URGH! A MUSIC WAR RETURNS TO THE (RELATIVELY) BIG SCREEN!!!

A few weeks ago I was over the moon because I finally had the opportunity to see one of the screen’s most spectacular achievements, BEN-HUR, projected on the big screen, but that event pales in comparison to an upcoming screening that I never, ever imagined I would witness. Still unavailable on non-bootleg DVD, 1981’s cult classic international concert documentary URGH! A MUSIC WAR is getting a rarer-than-tits-on-a-trout screening at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on November 29th, and if I have my way I’ll be dragging as many of my friends as possible. To those of us who came of age in the early 1980’s and had a taste for the results of the tail end of the punk rock movement and the early fruits of “new wave” music, URGH! A MUSIC WAR was kind of our generation’s answer to WOODSTOCK. A bizarre, somewhat obnoxious, gaudily colored answer that made one forget whatever the fuck the initial question was.

Clocking in at a very packed two hours, URGH! was the ultimate punk/new wave sampler film, highlighting some 32 bands, several of whom would later go on to achieve lasting fame. Using the pre-“Ghost In The Machine” Police as the “name” draw, the film quickly makes the viewer forget all about Sting and friends as it rolls out a cornucopia of bands that would make the uninitiated stop dead in their tracks and ask a heartfelt “What the fuck was that?” Since punk never really caught on as such in the States much of what was on display in the film was quite a shock, both musically and visually, and with the exception of a couple of performances the whole package is simply riveting.

The Police’s “Driven To Tears” sets the stage and then the film jumps all over the globe, taking the audience to venues ranging from huge stadiums to small, grimy clubs, and while the whole film is certainly worth your time, the following — in no particular order — are the performances that made me a rabid fan of this film for life:

"Back In Flesh"-Wall of Voodoo

If you thought their 1982 hit "Mexican Radio" was weirder than pistachio-flavored bat shit, then you are in no way ready to handle "Back In Flesh," a tune that sounds like a Devo cast-off. It's like something you'd hear if David Lynch had opted against filmmaking and had become the late night programming director of an independent radio station.

“Enola Gay”-Orchestral Maneouvres In the Dark

The most simultaneously fey and powerful song about nuclear horror ever, this isn't quite as good as the studio version but it's definitely engaging.

"I’m on Fire"-Chelsea

A buzzsaw blast of distinctly British punk at its best, and a vast improvement over the studio version of this tune. The singer, Gene October, seems so tightly wound that you half expect him to attack the audience without warning, diving into the crowd feet-first and wielding the mic stand like a Claymore.

"Ain’t This the Life"-Oingo Boingo

Electrifying proof of just how energetic and tight this band was when performing live, with the delightful added bonus of front man Danny Elfman — yes, that Danny Elfman — looking like the bastard son of the Joker.

"The Puppet"-Echo & the Bunnymen

Nasal as hell and featuring a terrific beat, how can you not like a song with the lyric “I practice my fall ‘cause practice makes perfect?”

"Foolish I Know"-Jools Holland

Squeeze’s keyboard jock, busting loose with a solo old-fashioned ditty that offers a complete one-eighty from the rest of the film’s musical stylings.

"Respectable Street"-XTC

One of this band’s finest songs, rendered with Andy Partridge’s customary nervous edge. The bouncy beat attached to this tale of nosy and snooty neighbors will have you fighting hard to stay in your seat rather than getting up and dancing like you're baked out of your mind (a state of mind I recommend for this film, BTW).

“Valium”-Invisible Sex

By far the goofiest act in the film — although there is a good case to be made for the Surf Punks — this cadre of silver-jumpsuited and bemasked loons caper about the stage wielding guitars crafted from what appears to be brown construction paper. Obscure beyond belief, I have never found mention of this group anywhere other than in conjunction with this documentary.

"Total Eclipse"-Klaus Nomi

Hands down the single most bizarre thing in the entire movie, this bit may be the moment when I realized I was watching a classic. Klaus Nomi was a weird little German dude who sang shattering classically-trained falsetto arias applied to old standards, and his music fell into the new wave classification by default because it was simply impossible to pigeonhole anywhere else. Resembling a middle-aged Astro Boy decked out in an angular plastic tuxedo, Nomi will leave your jaw on the ground with his sheer "what the fuck?"-ness. One of the first entertainers to perish from the scythe of AIDS, Nomi's death was a tragic waste of a true original, and his story is eloquently told in the excellent documentary THE NOMI SONG (2004).

"Where’s Captain Kirk?"-Athletico Spizz 80

This energetic ode to STAR TREK and the Enterprise crew is a shitload of fun, plus it teaches us the possibilities of Silly String as an offensive weapon.

"We Got the Beat"-The Go-Go’s

The most rockin' version of this song that you'll ever hear, this performance comes in about a year before the band's first album, "Beauty and the Beat," was released and gives us the sight of a far more punky and chunky Belinda Carlisle than the dangerously thin, well-groomed cover girl of the years that followed.

"Bleed for Me"-Dead Kennedys

From the days before their sense of humor sort of overtook their uncomfortable and in-your-face early efforts, this terrifying description of third world torture and murder is ominous and scary as hell, reminding one of just why this most intelligent of American punk bands was once considered dangerous by the U.S. government and unfairly expunged during a bullshit distribution of pornography charge.

"Bad Reputation"-Joan Jett and the Blackhearts

The definitive performance of the pre-"I Love Rock 'N' Roll" classic, with a young and chunky Joan belting it out for all she was worth, which was a lot.

"Model Worker"-Magazine

One of my favorite songs during my third year of college — aka the year when I spent as much time as possible doing bonghits and O.D.ing on untranslated Japanese cartoons — this is a terrific tune that actually features a lyric in which the word "hegemony" is not awkward in the least. You've got to give any song that can accomplish that feat extra points, and former Buzzcock Howard Devoto's vocals are far better than one could hope for in the punk arena of the time.

"Tear It Up"-The Cramps

Coming in at number two on my list of all-time favorite bands, the Cramps are not so much heard as they are experienced, and this performance captures their insane, no-frills psychobilly to great effect. Upon hearing this on the film's soundtrack back in 1981 I became a fan for life, later going on to buy all of their albums and see them live in concert more than any other group (up to the time of this writing, that is). This cover of Johnny Burnette's rockabilly classic must be seen to be believed, and you will stare in mesmerized anticipation as you wonder whether singer Lux Interior's dick will flop out of his way-too-tight pants. Guitarist Poison Ivy, the other mainstay throughout the band's many lineup changes, is also on hand, providing her ultra-sexy trademark disdainful sneer.

"Uncontrollable Urge"-Devo

Most people think I'm crazy when they find out Devo's my favorite band of all time, but I let those people slide because the only Devo the average listener has heard is stuff like "Whipit" and "Beautiful World," both of which are a lot more airplay/MTV accessible than the real meat of their edgy and once-unique work. This performance of "Uncontrollable Urge" is from just before the Akron spudboys hit it big, and it totally kicks ass. Friends of mine who hate Devo have seen this segment and unanimously agree it's excellent, and even hardcore Devo fans, including Yer Bunche, think this version blows away the one on the band's debut studio album. Thank the gods that this was captured for posterity!

"Nothing Means Nothing Anymore"-The Alley Cats

Working in the same territory as Vince Taylor & His Playboys' fifties classic "Brand New Cadillac" — better known to most rock fans via the Clash's excellent cover of it on "London Calling" — this guitar-driven tune gives off a real sense of foreboding. Too bad these guys didn't last long.

"Cheryl’s Going Home"-John Otway

One of the most anguished performances you'll ever see, this strange fusion of a rock tune and a spoken word/acted piece about a guy arriving too late at the train station to stop his girlfriend from leaving him is just plain great, and you will be riveted from the second Otway vocally explodes with "The thunder CRACKS against the night!"

"Homicide"-999

When I first saw this film and heard the opening lyric of "I believe...in homicide!" I nearly pissed myself while laughing my ass off. The tune rocks hard, but what makes this is the sheer energy emanating both from the band and the audience, and I defy you not to want to sing along.

"Beyond and Back"-X

One of the truly great Californian punk bands, X ruled for a million reasons, but you really have to give it up for their unique front woman, Exene Cervenka, a gal who simply did not give a flying fuck about appeasing audience members who expected women in rock groups to be sexy masturbation fantasies brought to life, or at the very least visually appealing (well, in the band's early days at least). Exene belts this one out with a yowl like a drunken, diseased cat and takes the stage with a hairdo so monumentally fucked-up that you'd swear she'd just boiled her own head. When all factors are weighed, her look comes off as a junkie version of the Wicked Witch of the West gene-spliced with Jayne County, only possessing an all-natural vagina (unlike Jayne).

"Sign of the Cross"-Skafish

The first album by Skafish was one of my favorites during high school for such lyrically biting and painful songs as "Joan Fan Club," "Disgracing the Family Name," "We'll See A Psychiatrist" and the excellent ode to unrequited love and the frustration thereof, "Obsessions of You," but nothing could have prepared me for the full-scale assault of lapsed Catholic absurdity that was "Sign of the Cross." Jim Skafish — my vote for the ugliest rock 'n' roll front man in history — stalks the stage, incense-burner merrily fuming, and exhorts the audience to join him in doing the "brand new dance craze" the Sign of the Cross, in which the dancer stands stiff as a board and holds out his arms in imitation of the crucified Jesus. Blasphemous as a motherfucker and funny as hell, this one's a real showstopper that's guaranteed to piss off the faithful in the audience.

“Two Little Boys”-Splodgenessabounds

A delightfully out of control cover of Rolf Harris' tale of childhood loyalty performed by the geniuses behind "Simon Templar" (a protest of Ian Ogilvy's portrayal of the Saint), "Blown Away Like A Fart In A Thunderstorm," "I've Got Lots Of Famous People Living Under the Floorboards," "Whiffy Smells," and the immortal "Michael Booth's Talking Bum."

There are a couple of quite good reggae numbers by UB40 and Steel Pulse and many more wacko bands, so I beg of you not to miss this ultra-rare screening at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Saturday, November 29th. I'll post a reminder shortly before then, but mark the date on your calendars immediately!

NOTE: all images respectfully cribbed from the excellent "Official/Unofficial" URGH! fan site.

ATTACK OF THE 50-FOOT WOMAN (1958)

It’s funny how one’s perceptions change as one gets older.

I first saw the infamous ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN (1958) when I was about ten years old, already aware of its status as one of the supposedly worst films ever made, and at the time I couldn’t help but agree. The dialogue and acting were ludicrous and overwrought even by 1950’s B-movie standards, several scenes meant to take place at night were clearly shot in broad daylight — a “technique” made immortal in Ed Wood’s masterpiece, PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE (1959) — the special effects were the polar opposite of anything resembling special, and the awesome gigantress depicted on the poster didn’t go on a city-destroying orgy of destruction. In short, everything that your average kid would find disappointing in a giant-monster-on-the-loose flick.

A blatant example of false advertising.

The film continues to be maligned to this day and in many ways deserves the derision so gleefully heaped upon it for nearly half a century, but having just seen it again last weekend for the first time in over thirty years I have to say that my adult tastes have caught up with its cheapjack charms. I fucking love bad movies, and in every way ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN stands as one of the more intriguing examples of the whole misbegotten genre.

Kind of a WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLFE? by way of THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN, the story revolves around boozy heiress Nancy (Allison Hayes) and her flagrant failure of a marriage to equally boozy adulterous douchebag Harry Archer (William Hudson), a nonchalant heel who’s only in it for access to the wife’s fortune. Apparently Nancy's had a history of psychological problems and has recently returned from a stint in the local rubber room, supposedly okay enough to function in society but still a bit nutso around the edges. Her shaky mental state isn't helped in the least by her constant 1950’s-style drunkenness, or her husband’s totally in-her-face affair with the town pump, the gloriously sleazy Honey Parker, played to fantastic bad-girl extremes by the too-hot-to-handle Yvette Vickers.

Honey and Harry, vile 1950's adulterers and gold-diggers of the lowest order.

Harry’s such a prick that he hangs out with Honey in an open booth at Tony’s — apparently the town’s only bar & grill — all the while guzzling from highball glasses brimming with scotch and engaging in public lip-locks that look like the two of them are trying to suck each other’s innards up their necks.

It’s pretty smarmy stuff for the fifties and is still rather torrid even by today’s standards, evoking the feel of cheap bus station pulp fiction paperbacks replete with tough guys getting it on in smoky hotel rooms with easy floozies (an ambiance augmented by a great score that knows when to turn on the swelter).

One night while driving aimlessly (and kind of bombed) about some back roads, Nancy encounters a spherical spacecraft that houses a bald giant who makes a grab for her.

Eat your heart out, ILM!

The famously phony fake hand jiggles and wobbles as it attempts to pick her up, causing Nancy to shriek, abandon her car, and haul ass straight into town. When she arrives she seeks out Harry, but he’s too busy getting a bit of stink-finger so he asks the sheriff’s deputy to cover for him, saying that he wasn’t at Tony’s. An hysterical Nancy then convinces the cops to drive her back to the site of her close encounter, but when they get to her abandoned car there’s no trace whatsoever of a five-story Telly Savalas. Pissed that the cops don’t believe her, Nancy returns home to find comfort in good old booze.

When Harry finally returns home Nancy confronts him about where the fuck he was when she was freaking out, but he simply pours himself a drink, lies about his whereabouts, and slips her a sedative. The drug acts swiftly, coupled as it is with about three stiff drinks, and in no time Nancy’s about to pass out. Harry carries her up the stairs and puts her to bed, undressing her and tucking her in while her altered state of consciousness allows the deep hurt that she feels to roll forth undisguised by anger or false bravado, revealing a wounded and vulnerable woman who admits that she desperately needs Harry. As she fades into unconsciousness, his name pathetically on her lips, he removes her lightbulb-sized diamond, the Star of India, from around her neck, fondles it like it was his own nutsack, and drops it into his pocket. He then calls a doctor to evaluate Nancy’s mental state, the first step in having her re-committed, thereby gaining control of her wealth. After that Harry hightails it back to the bar to face the wrath of his mistress, a fit of pique that immediately cools once she sees the Star of India. The two then plot Nancy’s downfall in earnest before practically fucking the shit out of each other in their favorite booth.

The next day Harry returns the diamond figuring it’ll be his soon enough, and Nancy’s fresh as a daisy (read “sober”), demanding Harry accompany her into the desert to find the giant. He reluctantly obliges, thinking she’s finally gone round the bend, but then they spot the giant’s sphere and pull up to investigate. Beside herself with joy over not being insane, Nancy whoops and hollers, thereby attracting the giant who hauls her into his craft. Harry, after taking a few potshots at the big guy, then turns tail and leaves his wife to her fate. When he returns to town he makes up some story about Nancy’s whereabouts and prepares to run off with Honey, but then Nancy throws a monkey wrench into the works but turning up dazed but alive. Traumatized, Nancy is in no time doped up and imprisoned in her room in a state of utter helplessness while under psychiatric care, in other words the perfect time for Harry to administer a fatal overdose (a tactic charmingly suggested by his floozy).

During all of this mishegoss, the sheriff and Nancy’s gay Lurch of a butler retrace her path and locate the spaceship. There they find the Star of India amidst a hodgepodge of dime store-acquired “futuristic” gizmos and deduce that the alien wasn’t after Nancy, just her enormous bling-bling to serve as a power source for his sphere. They also figure out that while on board the spaceship she was exposed to high doses of some unknown radiation, and since this is the 1950’s you know what that means…

Finally working up the nerve to poison Nancy, Harry climbs the stairs, hypodermic at the ready, when he opens the door and finds Nancy has turned into — what else? — a gigantic mutant.

NOTE: we’re supposed to believe she’s about fifty feet tall, as per the flick’s title, but her body still somehow fits into her bedroom. But that’s unimportant since we never see any part of her while indoors except for the huge rubber hand that once represented the giant spaceman, now free of hair so it looks more feminine.

Now drugged out of her mind and chained to her bed, Nancy languishes while her husband continues to sloppily cavort with Honey. Then she has the decency to awaken, flail her huge hand about the place while bellowing “HARRY!!!” and demolish her house.

Still screaming for her unfaithful husband, Nancy strides in all her bikini-clad glory into town, rips the roof off of Tony’s — which coincidentally causes chunks of masonry to topple and crush Honey — grabs Harry (or more accurately the actor walks into the giant rubber hand and wraps its fingers about himself), hauls an obviously mis-scaled doll of him through the ceiling, drops him to his death, and then commits suicide by grabbing some live power cables (the same way out chosen in WAR OF THE COLOSSAL BEAST). THE END.

If ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN sounds schlocky, it certainly is, but it only gets labeled as one of the all-time worst movies ever made for its admittedly horrendous special defects. The core story, space-giant notwithstanding, is a solid fifties B-picture about a fucked-up marriage, a heartless husband, and a wife’s pain over her spouse’s towering assholism. The three actors who bring life to the tawdry triangle give entertaining, professional performances in spite of a script that does everything short of shooting them in the head at point blank range to sabotage them, with Yvette Vickers owning the movie as a husband-stealing archetype.

Yvette Vickers, rockin' at the road house.

And the fifty-foot woman herself, Allison Hayes, was no slouch either, chewing the scenery as Nancy and having looks and attitude that remind me of Mariska Hargitay's earthy beauty with a touch of the porn-years Traci Lords poutiness.

I particularly like her in the scene where the looped Nancy pours her heart out to Harry and he feigns tenderness while undressing her. It’s a one-sided moment of tragic need where we see just how sad Nancy is, and how Harry couldn't possibly care less about her heartfelt entreaties for love. A small moment of realism in what is otherwise a soap opera with a couple of fantastic elements thrown in, the scene resonates to anyone who has ever been in a relationship where their lover is a taker who will just use them until they are all used up.

One-sided intimacy at its saddest.

It’s also a bit erotic, reminding me of the times I’ve returned home with a woman after some hard partying, and she wants nothing more than to go to sleep, trusting me to gently help her out of her clothes and usher her off to dreamland unmolested (we can always make osh-osh after she’s well-rested); the times that I’ve done this I quite enjoyed it, savoring the intimate trust of caring for someone who’s nearly helpless thanks to inebriation, and enjoying the slow, sensuous peeling off of clothing until all that’s left is curvy, womanly skin…

Sorry. I got a little distracted.

So now I see ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN in a totally new light, an understanding made possible by knowing all too well about alcoholic excesses and the agony of a broken heart. Sure it’s cheesy, but it’s a lot better than you’ve been led to believe.

TRUST YER BUNCHE!!!

BARBARELLA (1968)

Poster from the original theatrical release.

"What's that screaming? A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming..."
-Barbarella

The death of John Phillip Law last week, as well as ominous reports of a remake being in the works, got me to thinking about BARBARELLA for the first time in quite a while, and those thoughts were very pleasant indeed.

Back in the days when VCRs were not common to just about every household and DVD didn’t even exist, it wasn’t so easy to see certain cult films unless you were lucky enough to have a movie theater near you that ran such fare on a regular basis, and luckily for me I lived a town over from Norwalk, Connecticut’s legendary Sono Cinema (“Sono” being short for “South Norwalk”). Many a night of my high school and college years were spent in the dark there, experiencing classic and not-so-classic motion pictures on a dinky screen in a smallish setting that brought to mind the intimacy of a homemade, basement screening room, each celluloid treasure accented with often hilarious commentary from the audience and the inevitable contact high achieved from the simple act of breathing the theater's atmosphere. More often than not, the films were run as double or triple features, usually in genre groupings of horror films, rockumentaries — there was a particularly amusing evening featuring THE SONG REMAINS THE SAME that’s great fodder for a post of its own —, and sci-fi flicks, and the oft-run sci-fi sets were guaranteed to feature at least one of the following films: THE ROAD WARRIOR, A BOY AND HIS DOG, DEATH RACE 2000, and BARBARELLA, each with a loyal following that guaranteed a sizable crowd. Being a regular attendee of these shows I saw all of those films several times, but these days the only one I keep going back to when I need a “feel good” movie is BARBARELLA.
Barbarella, as seen in the 1962 source comics. Unfortunately, her romp with Diktor the robot doesn't make the transition to the movie.

One of the weirdest variations on Joseph Campbell’s heroic journey template and based on a 1962 French comic book by Jean-Claude Forest, the 1968 adaptation of BARBARELLA is very much a product of its time, being a campy and lysergic live-action cartoon, a WIZARD OF OZ-style quest story for grownups that revels in the “free love” ethos of the late 1960’s.

Jane Fonda as Barbarella: ready and waiting for her next close encounter.

A thirty-year-old and painfully hot Jane Fonda stars as Barbarella, a more-or-less space-cop of the year 40,000, on assignment to locate missing scientist Durand Durand (pronounced “Duran Duran,” and yes, it’s where the ‘80’s pop group got their name) on the mysterious and balls-out bizarre planet Lythion. But after crash-landing her cheesy-looking birdhouse/party balloon spaceship on the strange world, our heroine finds herself bounced from one crazy and perilous situation to another, running afoul of homicidal children, hollow soldiers made from leather, and a lesbian/dominatrix queen of a city that makes Mos Eisley seem wholesome in comparison.

Barbarella lost in Sogo, one of the sleaziest cities in sci-fi history.

Along the way she also discovers the joys of flesh-to-flesh sexual encounters, a form of contact lost centuries ago in favor of palm-to-palm transference/psychic melding with the aid of pills, and Barbarella takes to Osh-Osh like a duck to water, eagerly jumping at every chance to get her hump on with various available males.

Barbarella makes a new friend.

It’s the sex angle that really earned BARBARELLA its place in film history and in the hearts of moviegoers everywhere, but don’t think for a second that it’s pornographic or prurient in any way; Barbarella herself is a capable woman who happens to be an innocent whose elation upon her sexual awakening is a joyous thing that she’s happy to share as often as possible, and there’s something charmingly sweet about that. She’s definitely a male fantasy of a kindly and beautiful sex goddess, pure of soul and utterly unashamed of her frequent states of nudity and partial undress, rounded with a goofily cartoonish, wide-eyed quality that’s positively endearing, and I honestly can’t think of anyone other than Jane Fonda who could have made her work. People tend to make note of Fonda’s more serious work, but when she’s given a solid comedic role she always makes to most of it — even in the horrendous MONSTER-IN-LAW — and she’s seldom been funnier than in her played-totally-straight turn as Barbarella. But while there’s skin on display, there are no “pickle and donut” shots, making for one of the most sexuality-friendly films ever made. One never feels there’s “dirty” intent in the film — even though some overly-sensitive and PC souls might find the film a bit exploitative — but the fact that it’s Jane Fonda in the part, and clearly in on the joke, elevates the material above its Euro-nudie brethren. Sexy? Hell, yeah! Dirty? I've seen dirtier episodes of TWO AND A HALF MEN, and that show follows nearly forty years after BARBARELLA.

A disappointed Barbarella, just after burning out a torture device designed to kill its victims via orgasms. No, seriously.

The film’s attitude is tongue-in-cheek from the first frame to the last, with not a trace of seriousness in its head, coming off as a slightly risqué parody of the Buster Crabbe FLASH GORDON serials, and its sweet-faced, fun-filled vibe brings a smile to my face every time I see it. I enjoy all of the characters, and the movie is chock-a-block with memorable sequences featuring wild costumes and strange sets, kind of like the insane, knockabout LOST IN SPACE television series if it had somewhat of a budget and weren’t geared toward the kiddies, but had been crafted specifically for hippie stoners instead of merely being enjoyed by them. I mean, check out these images from Barbarella's dreamy-eyed zero-G striptease as the animated opening credits join her in her floating undulations (click on the images to enlarge):

BARBARELLA could almost be described as an underground comic book brought to life, only thankfully minus the off-putting misogynistic rape and violence found in many such works, and director Roger Vadim should be congratulated for making what could easily have been a complete mess work as well as it does, with the contributions of Fonda — whom he married during shooting — being impossible to overestimate. It’s by no means a “great” film, but it’s definitely worth checking out at least once and as anyone who’s seen it can tell you, it has a way of ensnaring you again and again if it turns up on cable. It’s a film that radiates positive feelings, and I’ll take as much of that as I can get.

Poster from the post-STAR WARS re-release, painted by famed fantasy illustrator Boris Vallejo. Question: why is Pygar the angel, the guy in the diaper with a gun, depicted without his wings?

The film was even re-released during the sci-fi craze brought on by STAR WARS (1977), with the stupid poster and promo title of BARBARELLA: QUEEN OF THE GALAXY (which is sadly how it's been known ever since), and re-rated from an R to a PG despite no trimming of its blessed nudity, and I wonder what it would get if reissued today; PG-13 movies have allowed for a certain amount of gore and violence, but that rating is rather stingy when it comes to skin, once more bolstering the idiotic theory that it's okay for the youth of this country to see scads of carnage and harm, but not tasteful depictions of sexuality. I say it's all a matter of context; I wouldn't want my kids to see porno because, with rare exceptions, it's not about a loving, sharing experience between individuals and focuses on closeups of genitalia that John Waters famously likened to "footage of open-heart surgery," but I wouldn't have a problem with them seeing BARBARELLA, especially provided that I was there to responsibly answer any questions they may have (I'd say it's most suitable for anyone ten and up, but that's just my opinion). And as for the announced remake, I'm very curious to see how a story like Barbarella's will be retooled to be acceptable in contemporary America's hypocritically sex-negative climate, especially when she'll most likely be played by one of those nauseating, under-nourished, factory-issued "starlets" with zero talent that currently infest the screen. Mark my words, even with the reported involvement of Robert (PLANET TERROR) Rodriguez at the helm, I have no faith in it. We're sadly past the peace-and-love sentiment of the sixties, much of it killed by post-Viet Nam-era cynicism and the rise of AIDS, so I don't see how a BARBARELLA remake can possibly work work now. Thank Zoad that the original's still out there.

Oh, and here's a bonus for you fellow Barbarella die-hards out there:

From the 1977 graphic novel BARBARELLA AND THE MOON CHILD, Barb and her son, Little Foxy. Hey, with all the "sharing" Barbarella got up to, a kid was inevitable.

And two designs by Jean-Claude Forest from the proposed 1980's Nelvana animated series that never got off the ground: