KRIS GILPIN'S IMHO DEPT: HG LEWIS CLOSE-OUT SALE PT. 1

HG Lewis Close-Out Sale! Part 1

By Kris Gilpin

Here are short reviews of several Lewis pix I've finally had the chance to see thanks to Something Weird Video and their sleazy and cheap Dvds (R.I.P Mike Vraney and Dave Friedman).

BOINNG:

The title can be taken two ways, I suppose. It's one of the prettier undies from the early Herschell era, as it's in color. Directed by "Lewis H. Gordon" and produced by "Davis Freeman" (David F. Friedman). The credits offer hand drawn nudes and names typed so small you cant read them (at least on tape). It begins with two silly-acting buddies who, after viewing a double bill of Lucky Pierre and Nature's Playmates (two previous Lewis/Friedman collaborations), decide to shoot a "nudie-cutie" (as Friedman calls them) of their own (the marquee for these nudist films offers a "free tube of suntan lotion" with each admission). One of these guys is Herschell leading man Tom (Blood Feast) Wood, here billed as Sweetwood. Shot in 1963, it was funny for me to see a store sign for S&H Green Stamps, which my family used back in Miami! The two guys drive a vanful of girls to what looks like some pseudo-mansion's front lawn, then film them with a hand-cranked camera as the script acts out a series of unfunny vignettes; of course, the men who paid to see these flicks nearly 30 years ago didn't give a shit about comedic relief, but why does so much soft-core--up to and including teenage Crown International flicks, and even some hard-core--feature embarrassing antics by grown men?

   Is sex and skin that embarrassing for filmmakers to deal with? Anyway, they hire a cameraman for their shoot, and by the end of the film I recognized the face and voice to be that of Herschell himself--or at least in the last two scenes (knowing these films, Lewis probably stepped in for the part with Friedman holding the real camera, after say, the original actor either walked or was fired). 

   There's lots of saxy and horn-y type music on the soundtrack, and one blonde and one brunette have great bodies; there's lots of nice skin on display here, as opposed to say, the tease of Scum of the Earth, but aside from the good epidermal delights on display, the movie gets kinda boring before the buddies finally finish their epic (Nature's Nudnicks). They then screen it for a distributor named Mr. Halitosis--will he buy it from them? What do you think? Worth a cheap purchase, this film is, if you're interested in cinematic 60's skin.

A TASTE OF BLOOD:

I saw this one a long time ago, then lost my notes. Yes, it's two full hours (!), Lewis' longest opus ever, and yes it gets a bit boring after awhile, and no there's very little blood dripping in it. Herschell has his much-publicized cameo with phony hair/mustache in funny "Cockney" (?!) accent. I saw something (a wing perhaps) hanging off of the camera in one early pan in the film. This businessman gets a package (sealed by wax) from his royal ancestors in London. It's two bottles of brandywine addressed to the Master of Corfax ("1888, wow, this should really be smooth)!" (An aside: I saw this at a Herschell fest full of typical older pretentious L.A. art-farts in semi-formal wear! This shitty city has high and low-scum)!

   Anywho, you know what the red stuff really is and after awhile the guy's hooked; this main actor tries but the rest of the cast sucks (for a change--ha ha)! He turns vampiric and the proceedings are melodramatic, with some laughs; he gives his girl the chills when they kiss and there are reams of dialogue. Tom Wood's on hand for his usual good Lewis support. More hokey gaffs as the bloodsucker shies away from the sight of a cross/locket; he also knocks over a pawn on his chess board after taking his third sip of vino, as a howl rings through the night (he laughs, then steps outside to hear it some more). Hilarious shot of a boat in a harbor for London, along with old stock shots. Our Dracula hypnotizes with a shiny light from his ring, then gets staked with a broken pool cue. The pace is slow and it's mostly made up of master shots, with few close-ups and much more story then gore, unfortunately (a definite Lewis liability)! One typically intense moment features the line "There's a flowerpot in the mirror and not you! The only intentional laff is some guys dragging around their "detective dog" ("which way do we go?;" "I don't know, ask the dog)!" The film drags its ass to its Big Ending, a close-up of the family emblem in a coffin: two dogs. Because of this flick's rarity though, it's worth a look of course for HGL' ophiles. Made in Miami.

JUST FOR THE HELL OF IT:

Herschell's "destruction epic". It starts with a long scene of shitty rock filler/music in a club (OK Kris I gotta step in, The band on stage were called The New York Square Library and had incredible garage rock fury-Crank, the editor).

Teenage garage mayhem not dipshit music!

   As we then follow a gang of "long-haired hoodlum youth with a bad 'tude. Mostly a silent movie with dipshit music, we see them light people's newspapers on fire as they're reading them (they don't notice for awhile, just slow I guess). They light paper on fire on a lady's lawn, spray her with a hose (she stands there and takes it; just slow I guess), and drive off as she says, "You damn kinds!"; they bug sweltered straights; toss a cop's helmet in the air; put cigarettes out in people's coffee; trash a ridiculously barren "restaurant" set and burn the owner's hand; bother a blind man; beat up a crippled accident victim; stick a young' un in a garbage can; tear clothes off a line and stomp them, etc. One of these guys is Ray Sager, the youthful Wizard of Gore hisself.

   A song on the soundtrack explains, "They're a bunch o' smelly, hairy apes; nowhere to go but down!" This thing probably scared a few really old, easily frightened farts in its day. The actors take long, dead pauses between dialogue, as they struggle to remember their lines (or wait for direction which never comes); and there's the longest silent montage (of harassment, in this case) which, stunningly, goes on and on forever (interspersed with bizarre, discolored close-ups of the kids laughing) since Larry Buchanan's It's Alive! 

the original Garbage Pail Kid

   There's a cheesy fisticuffs scene where the good guy splits his pants, and transitions are implied by shots of newspaper headlines telling of the gang's terrorisms; there papers are subsequently axed, set bonfire, have blood thrown on them, etc. This film's amusing in its dipshittiness today; it must have cost all of $10 to make. The plotless plot ends with the kids being taken away after they drug four girls at a wild party; they "rape" them (they're wearing their underwear) and rape a girl on the beach, then upset a putt-putt boat in the water. The camera's stiff, with lots of simple master shots and the sound's mostly terrible (when it's there of course). The lighting's often too dark and tinted, too, while we're talkin' bout it. This time, though, it all makes for a movie you can giggle at in its cheesiness. A couple blows up in the climax, after a bike chase and a final painted warning warns, "The end of the story, but not of violence." A brick then sails through a pane of glass.

Avenged

Avenged (Deadbeat, Getting Even, Tom Cats) Directed By Harry Kerwin, Starring Chris Mulky (1977). 

I've seen a lot of rape/revenge movies, this is one of the most repugnant misogynistic films to come along in awhile and that's really saying something. Like Gestapo's Last Orgy or A Serbian Film, it crawls its way into your psyche and once you've seen it, that's more than enough. 

   The strangest part of all is how they sold the film, just check out the pro-rape connotation this trailer for Tomcats (or Avenged) has. (LINK). That's none other than the "Real" Don Steele doing the voice work for the trailer of Rocknroll High School, Death Race 2000 and tons of other cult flicks. I don't usually get all up in arms about women being objectified, violently raped then murdered--but this film got under my skin. I mean it's still "only a movie" but an all around exploitive and repulsive one in an equal opportunity manor. For a rinky dink 70's grindhouse flick directed by Something Weird Video alumni Kerwin (whose brother was in all those classic H.G. Lewis staples) to bother me this much, it's very effective and worth seeking out. 

   Just don't say we didn't warn you, if you're a woman, there's nothing for you to enjoy (we don't even get the satisfaction of a climactic death for the redneck rapists). You might have to take 30 showers to feel clean again!

  

Bobby Brady over there is our Matthew (from I Spit on your Grave)

   The film has the production values of the spicy meatball Alka-seltzer commercial. Down at a greasy spoon, four hillbilly degenerates take turns viciously raping a poor waitress then murder her in cold blood.

   A swampy fat guy is the only witness (he was heavy breathing behind a large tree, one that doesn't even hide his girth) and he's so drunk he can't even read the plates on the rapers get- away car!

Wendy the waitresses' brother Cullin (Chris Mulky- later on Twin Peaks) and his girlfriend are distraught by the slaying and it turns out they are both related to the police captain, so there will certainly be some avenging later.

Sir, you're being arrested for severe flatulence

   

   This film tries to turn you off to sex forever, there's some pasty assed white people dropping trough, with a side of forced entry. During one "pleasant" scene the gang rapers cackle as the married guy in their group forces his wife to blow him in front of his pals! 

Later on the porky gentlemen witness is found and questioned at the station by non other then William Kerwin the captain from Blood feast (who's also the director's brother)!

Shit! not another one of those long hard ones.

  

If you like women being beaten and humiliated then murdered in some of the ugliest Miami Florida locations you'll eat up Avenged! Or maybe you felt The Ladies Club was tame and reserved, than this flick is your new best pal, I have to hand it to Code Red (whose output I'm not much of a fan of) they put out a nice double disc with extras that includes Kerwin's previous hixploitation film God's Bloody Acre.

WOOT WOOT! These Wise Potato chips are salty

   The same hillbillies are out serial raping every waitress in the boonies and worst of all never pocketing enough money in the register, but what do they expect from knock off Stuckey's or Waffle Houses, high class Cracker Barrel loot? These hicks are cut from the same toothless cloth as the slack jawed boys from I Spit on your Grave, but possibly worse!

   

Welcome to the South

   It turns out the crackers have a pretty smart lawyer and on a count of a technicality they all get off... so to speak! After the judge lets them go, Wendy's brother Cullin has a plan to exterminate the yokels (who pin him to a car door and smear their ice cream in his face)!

you made me drop my organic sea-salted caramel ice cream

   Every woman in this film is not only assaulted but treated as if they're human garbage it's extremely unpleasant. They really push the eye for an eye barometer as far as it will stretch.

   Culin, Wendy's brother is supposed to be a collegiate pacifist, but has guns in every kitchen drawer (I guess it's a Florida thing). He hunts all the bastards down one by one, but for some reason I never felt satisfied. I mean when it's Linda Blair or Charles Bronson I'm clapping my hands like a mongoloid, so what's wrong, why am I wrestling with my psyche? The film has this earthy down home quality and unpleasantness that makes it disturbing and yet still enjoyable.

  There's no fantasy element just primitive ugliness and it all ends like a bad cop show on a CHIPS style pause under the credits!

   I felt let down by the vengeance, but if a low budget revenge flick can force me to consider why I've enjoyed so many other rape/revenge fantasy action flicks, than it's an impressive piece of work.

DISGUSTINGLY MISOGYNISTIC, BUT HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! 

Be gentle and don't skimp on the Astroglide!

I'm fixing the place up for Gordon Ramsay

When you're in a sticky forced entry situation, always reach for Vaseline 

I lost my contact again

Plankton

Plankton (Creatures From The Abyss) Directed By Massimiliano Cerchi (or Al Passeri) Starring Sharon Twomey (1994).

There have been many films with an Italian crew and actors masquerading as "Americans" in Miami Florida. This seems like a whole subgenre in itself (along with Aladdin, Primal Rage, Devil Fish, Miami Golem and Raiders Of Atlantis), Plankton however, it so entertaining that it puts them all to shame! It's so out of left field, bat-shit crazy on so many levels that if you have to see one Miami-sploitation film involving over-sexed teens turning into fish and miraculously spawning human caviar, make sure its this one! This film is so 80's, it looks like the set designer from Liquid Sky and Earth Girls Are Easy got together and went hog wild. In actuality it's some douche named Eddie Reinhold (maybe Judge's brother), who never worked again!

3rd grader archeological etching

 
   A group of beach babes and dorky lunkheads get trapped in a storm and are forced to board a floating science experimental lab/gaudy Italian bachelor pad. They are being watched by a mutant creature (through a fish-eye lens, of course---guffaw, get it)? This crustacean has a whiplash action tongue that slaps around its victims!

Is this the Mermaid/ Bronie convention?

   The interior of the boat looks like a tinfoil covered hovel, flooded with neon lights designed by Pee Wee Herman or the production designer of Miami Vice on acid. A unibrowed character named Bobby (Michael Bon) is constantly horny and his pal Mike (Clay Rogers), a transgendered nerd, quickly becomes the only dependable heroic one, after the rest of them succumb to the disastrous effects of Billy Bass' second cousin Cleetus!

Pass The Duchie Frome Thee Left Hand Side Maan

   The teens find a half dead scientist with drool leaking out of his mouth who looks like Terry Kiser of Weekend At Bernies fame, only he's not a party animal like you'd imagine, he's a fish fornicator.

   After eating a badly cooked meal of trout, one curly haired blonde pukes up yellow vomit with undigested beetles crawling around in it. There's a sexy computer in the shower and a fish that sings two songs, one by Bobby McFerrin and another by The Talking Heads (not really)! Most of the weirdness comes from the random futuristic junk on the boat, that's never explained, but I'm glad it's there because it raises the bar into uncharted, can't believe what you're watching territory!

Gary Coleman's mutant fish Abraham on a cocaine rampage

   Another blonde named Julie (Ann Wolf), resembling a dime-store big budget action-era Sharon Stone, takes a shower as the computer tells her how to wash, in a lurid mechanical lady voice. 

The fish special effects are ridiculous, as the aquatic horndog turns into a lightning fast cartoon and the actors swat at it with bats.

Anally aquatic death sentence

   It pops out of the wall and attacks one poor girl's throat and later her face gets pulled under, while trying to wash. Mike the androgynous nerd says "Freud would have a field day" and confronts the "Weekend at Bernies" look-a-like scientist character about his sexual habits with fish!

Joey Silvera jailed for fish porn

   Bobby takes some of the contaminated plankton (which he thinks is spanish fly), as he humps the blonde, it transforms him into a hideous puking, sexual beast! His eyeball pops out and falls directly into Julie's mouth! Dorthy, the curly haired blonde from the beginning shows up later, then a giant sea creature pops out of her ass and attacks Mike the effeminate action hero. Plankton is completely insane, the effects are jaw droppingly hilarious, there's non-stop action and its on a sci-fi level of type over dubbed shenanigans.

Here let me upchuck this pork loin onto your plate

   None of the actors ever worked again accept Sharon Twomey, who coincidentally enough, ended up in A Fish Called Wanda (which is not an unofficial sequel to Plankton)! Be sure and check out the smug look the director Massimiliano Cerchi has on his face, he must be suffering from Claudio Fragasso syndrome, or an over-bloated unmerited sense of self confidence! Here's a great review from Facemelting Films .

Don't Miss it, It's a movie deserving of Midnight Movie Cult Status!

I want a newer drug

Yowl, I'm so fierce girlfriend!

There's a dwarf with a giant penis lightbulb next to me isn't there?