Forbidden World

Hey gang! Back again! Aren't you thrilled to your very core? So apparently I need to widen the variety of cheesy movies, so we are taking in a Corman produced flick. Imagine Alien if it had wall to wall nudity, sex and less than satisfactory editing? Chuck in some Jim Wynorksi penmanship, SFX exploitation gore and monster creation and we have a recipe that is a few alternative titles. This is Forbidden World a.k.a. Mutant a.k.a. Subject 20

What is that, Galaxia in the background?

In the not-too-distant future, (where have I heard that? Huh.)at a research center in the far and remote desert moon of Xarbia (sounds like a floor wax), a crack research team has created an artificial life-form they have dubbed "Subject 20". They weren't really good at naming things.

The concept behind this creation, this Proto B is to end galactic hunger! Which admittedly that is kind of awesome. HOWEVER!.. Subject 20 takes on a life of its own,undergoes extensive mutations and proceeds to snatch up all the lab animals before undergoing further metamorphose.

Fortunately we've got professional troubleshooter Mike Colby (Jesse Vint of Centennial, Hometown U.S.A., Belle Starr, On the Line, Another Chance, Dark Angel, The Temp, Dreamers and Monkey Love) and his droid SAM-104 (Don Olivera of Android and Forbidden World) are on the case and know their cheese. Colby? See what I did there? Oh fine. Please yourselves.

Escape From..the steam vents.

Not sure why Dr. Glaser (June Chadwick of The Last Horror Film, This Is Spinal Tap, Magnum, PI., V, The A-Team, Riptide, Jumpin' Jack Flash, Headhunter and Going to Extremes) and lab assistant Tracy (Dawn Dunlap of Liar's Moon, Forbidden World, Night Shift and Heartbreaker) needed to shower and canoodle other than nudity clause but I am certain it was integral to the plot. Possibly. Maybe. Hell I don't know.

My biggest concern was the state of Dr. Cal Timbergen's (Fox Harris of Hammett, Human Highway, My Favorite Year, Repo Man, Sid and Nancy, Armed Response, Straight to Hell, Walker, Warlords, Terror Eyes and Alienator) lab coat looking like an extra in Evil Dead 2. Seriously it is spattered with fluids the crux of the film. It's called fluff and fold, dude!

Some film facts now but first, a slight warning. For the photophobic fans, there is some strobing lights in throughout the film, it kind of hurt my eyes so anyone seizure prone might want to skip the flick.

Previously, on The Mandalorian...

Shockingly enough the same film sets for Galaxy of Terror also were used for Battle Beyond the Stars and our own Mutant here. Hey if you can light it differently and get a new blocking on the preexisting work, I say do it! Hell, I'm in favor of us repositioning the set and making the corridors appear the same. Saving on the budget.

The Mutant a.k.a. Subject 20 is just enough of a change up that Giger wouldn't have sued for intellectual property rights. It looks different enough that people wouldn't lose their minds. Well that's not true. Probably a gaggle of hardcore Ripley Scott fans easily aggravated about that but again, pleasing everyone is more of a BeeGees vibe. Always be Zeppelin instead.

Director/editor Allan Holzman (Forbidden World, Out of Control, Programmed to Kill, Intimate Stranger, Sounds of Memphis, My Marilyn, The Art of Directin: Frank Capra, The Art of Directing: John Huston and The Art of Directing: David Lean) also used existing footage of Battle Beyond the Stars for filler and expansive star battle.

Writer Tim Curnen (Forbidden World, Ghost Warrior and Supreme Warrior) and Writer/Director/Producer/Actor Jim Wynorski (Chopping Mall, Big Bad Momma II, Not of This Earth, The Return of Swamp Thing, Sorority House Massacre II, Dinosaur Island, Demolition High, Raptor, Cheerleader Massacre, Vampire in Vegas and Sharkansas Women's Prison Massacre) co-wrote this little space opera and honestly, I had fun with it. Sure there's a touch of camp to it, yes there is a fair degree of sex and nudity but this was going to happen.

What feels like a hybrid of Alien, Leviathan and Emannuelle in Space, this film has its entertaining moments. I was just laughing at seeing the use of clipboards, RCA TV screens as viewing monitors and ultimately this is a splatter fest Sci-Fi Horror film.

It just happens to have a substantial amount of nudity in it. Go figure. All in all, it's not going to please everyone but for those feeling there's a few plot holes, there's tits. So much so I could not find a single trailer that didn't flash cans on the screen. Go look it up yerselves, pervs. This here is a more PG-13 kind of blog.

Clipboards...OF THE FUTURE!!!

Rotten Reelz Reviews Video Review# 1: Camel Spiders

Hey Folks.  Bug Hunt has been dragging, I know.  Editing this video review took much longer than I anticipated and well here is the end results of Jake and Shawn of Rotten Ramblin' On poking fun at Camel Spiders.   So check it out!  Comment! Critique!  Say just about anything!!!

Our heroes! Thwarting big bugs!!

Forgotten Fantasy: Amazons

How do my readers! A fine greetings for the week as we pull up some obscure Sci-Fi Fantasy titles. Yeah I know in my heart there is a better than 60% chance of topless and full frontal nudity but I wanted to see if any of these B movie sword and sorcery flicks would be entertaining. Remember Beastmaster was dubbed a B movie and most folks enjoyed that...in spite of the accidental poisoning of the tiger.  Moving on, we speak of tales and saga of a tribe of vicious warrior women as they are froth with danger, sorcery, rival tribes and unknown consequences. This is Amazons a.k.a. Amazon and the Tribe of Amazons.

Strut girl, strut.

Guided by producer/director Alejandro Sessa (Amazons, Stormquest, Deathstalker, The Warrior and the Sorceress, Barbarian Queen, Cocaine Wars and Wizards of the Lost Kingdom) our title card sequence opens with some synthesizer scoring worthy of Goblin brought to us by composer Oscar Cardozo Ocampo (I Did Kill Facundo, El gordo catastrofe, Cerro Cora, From the Abyss, Deathstalker, Funny Dirty Little War, Amazons, Stormquest, Babilonia and Two to Tango) and produced by none other than Roger Corman, I know I am in for a whirlwind. We open to a woodland/desert area and it looks like they took over a national park but in fact is Bueno Aires in Argentina. We have soldiers in dubious leather/chain-mail with spears and shields roaming about this kingdom and evening katas with deer skinned draped females making me think this lost tribe is easier to find than the synopsis on the DVD suggested. Also my print is clearly a badly translated VHS copy to DVD so not feeling good about this already.

I have a rock in my bikini and your knees are on fire.

The ladies work out with pole arms and staves when then it becomes a shaolin monk style training as they smash hanging clay pots that clearly have not been fired and allowed to harden. Love the stock sound of thunderclouds in a clear night sky. We have a dark robed sorcerer king attempting to be all empowering but lacking the Sir Christopher Lee height, basso voice and creeper Dracula stare, King Kalungo (Joseph Whipp of Escape from Alcatraz, General Hospital, A Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream) threatens the harmony of the land, the elder warns the young warriors without the Sword of Azundati (Magical MacGuffin or plot device) all is lost to combat against Kalungo's magics and his vile army. Just then cheesy post-production lighting strikes happen in random intervals allowing the pyrotechnics to blow up their mild squibs...uh I mean evil sorcery is clearly at work here!

Aren't you glad you used Dial? Don't you wish all the Dark Ages did?

With the main village under attack it is the king's command that the Spirit Stone (yet another MacGuffin of magical content) be removed from the city for safe keeping by Tashinge (Danitza Kingsley of Amazons, No Man's Land, South of Reno, Jack's Back and Where Sleeping Dogs Lie), warrior woman general of the Amazons and spokes model of leather brassier. With the Spirit Stone in tow, Tashinge leads her warriors out of the city. Kalungo appeases his demon master Baliguri (Francisco Cocuzza of Night of the Pencils, Amazons, Two to Tango, Play Murder for Me, The Plague and Ever Changing Waters) who appears in the form of a balding man of 5'8". Residing hairline! The work of the dark master!!! Thank the gods for no wavering bikini lines. Well aside from this being a female protagonist tale there is plenty of male sexist pigdom in it. Convenient bathing times, a shape-shifting lioness and so on. Warriors Dyala (Mindi Miller of Hell Up in Harlem, Body Double, Deadly Embrace, Return Fire, Caged Fury and Batman Returns)and Tashi (Penelope Reed of Amazons, The New Mike Hammer, Gung Ho, Far Out Man and Hollywood Boulevard II) must journey to the high mountains through the were lands (land of creatures and demons) to gain the Sword of Azundati to defeat Kalungo.

Okay the fight/sword choreography was clear that they did not hire the late Bob Anderson(most sought-out swordsmaster/fight choreographer and stunt coordinator from The Master Ballantre, Crossed Swords, Casino Royale, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Superman II, Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Highlander, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and The Revenant) but Arturo Neal (Barbarian Queen, The Warrior and the Sorceress, Stormquest, Highlander II: The Quickening, Two to Tango and Corrupt Police) understood enough from the equivalency of the SCA's quarterstaff, broadsword and pole arm combat. The cinematography on the other hand was lacking a stabilizer for more than 40 percent of the film, I got the feeling some of these cameramen were hanging off cliff edges getting aerial shots, some cherry picker shots vs using a crane angle, loads of mount the tripod in the grass and hope the trained horses don't bump into it. That is if the cameras could ever stay in focus.

Robert Duvall??!!  No wait. Nah it isn't.

The stop motion transformation of the lioness to human was a bit hokey with stock footage as well, the lightning strikes were...a bit painful and the grappling,fist fights looked too staged so no real aid on set but standard first aid my guess. Most of the sets looked like cardboard, Styrofoam and less than believable and despite all of this, you have a tale of two women putting aside their family squabbles in order to save their kingdom, matriarch and the people they have sworn to protect. The nudity isn't overwhelming and surprisingly tastefully shot. Funny that is were I expected the shaking of cameras. Yeah I was kidding. Implied rape scenes seem to be a Post Apocalpyse and Sci-Fi Fantasy need. Ugh. Half of the time these fur clad bikinis are actually less tasteful then 1,000,000 Years B.C.

Oh look boys, a nude scene...kinda.

Return of The Cult Classics: Attack of the Crab Monsters

Welcome one and all back to the page. For those of you who read over last week's Italian Exploitation Week...let's just say I do not want to have to give further examples of such for a bit. No more requests for that for a few, please. This time around I thought it would be fun to dust off these particular films and give them a view. I speak of..THE RETURN OF CULT CLASSICS!!!!

That being said I checking out films that have been requested or some that have been deemed too obscure for the readers of younger ilk and will spark memories for those of you that are 40+. Today's cinema treat hails from an old friend of ours on Rotten Reelz Reviews, Roger Corman and you cannot get more cult than the man with the nose for talent. Howabout a movie with atomic mutations? Tough, that is the film of the day. Lump it. This is Attack of the Crab Monsters.

Get me, I'm attacking the credits.

A gathering of scientists are off exploring a remote island (Santa Catalina Island in the Channel Islands in Cali) to observe, record and document the effects of nuclear weapons testing on the island's fauna and flora. Well this is the fifties, so bound the be radioactive giant monsters one would think. Trolled in via boat and seaplane, our team of fact finders is lead by Dr.Karl Weigand (Leslie Bradley of The Crimson Pirate, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Tarzan and the Trappers and Teenage Cave Man). His team consists of: geologist James Carson (Richard H Cutting of Magnificent Obsession, South Pacific, The Monolith Monsters, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Wagon Train and The Green Hornet),biologists Jules Deveroux (Mel Welles of Abbot and Costello Meet the Mummy, The Little Shop of Horrors, Wolfen, Chopping Mall, Lazer Tag Academy, Commando Squad and Invasion Earth: The Aliens Are Here) Martha Hunter (Pamela Duncan of The Ring, Fireside Theater, Dragonfly Squadron, Return from the Sea, The Undead, Blondie and My Gun is Quick) Dale Drewer (Richard Garland of Dragnet, Friendly Persuasion, Attack of the Crab Monsters, The Undead, My Gun is Quick, Lassie, 26 Men and Cheyenne) and technician/handyman Hank Chapman (Russell Johnson of This Island Earth, Lux Video Theatre, Badman's Country, Black Saddle, Gilgan's Island, Gunsmoke and The Horror at 37,000 Feet)

Staaaaaay..on those results, dear.

No sooner have they landed on the island that earthquakes start sheering the island down and one of the sailors falls in the water and he dies. Shocker. Dale and Martha go for a dip behind the rocks when Martha hears a voice from the distance sounding like an old colleague. One believed to be dead from the previous expedition. She and Dale explore a cave (That is the fricking Bronson Caves of Bronson Canyon of Griffith Park!!!) to find two energy based, giant crabs that seem to have the intelligence of their former friend.

Folks, back in the boat. This is Dinosaur Island.

Yup, crabs that hunger for brains and assimilation. Giant Zombie Borgs...that are crabs. Immune to conventional firearms (because every expedition needs guns and rifles) our plucky collective have to thing fast on how to handle these creatures before there is no more island from them to hatch a scheme to leave. What if the crabs mate? Will their brood be able to get to the mainland, scuttling from the bottom of the ocean?

Interesting side note is this film was released to the drive-ins as a double feature along with the original Not of This Earth. VHS, LaserDisc, DVD and even Blu-Ray have done the very same thing. Well DVD usually lumps the two movies in with some other Corman flicks but those are the less than official releases. Standard Black & White 35 mm, this film had a budget of 70,000 and the effects for the creatures are really not bad for the time period. The print was so bad I had to take screen captures from one of the many trailers I found on Youtube.

Actor/Producer Beach Dickerson was the crab operator and it was said that Jack Nicholson was bored being nothing more than a gaffer at the time also was a crab wrangler as well. One could say The Irishman has come along way since that. You gotta feel for Corman not being able to afford have Jack back on the sets. Many of you MST3K fans will recognize Richard Garland as Pendragon and Pamela Duncan as Diane/Helene from Season 8 of the title, The Undead. STAAAAAAAYYY!!!!!

I still feel a sonic screwdriver made of coconuts is the answer.

Jim Wynorski Week: The Wasp Woman

Welcome back everyone and we are into another Jim Wynorski film. As said yesterday, I have not given a fair shake to the director/writer/producer/actor so I will attempt my objectivity. Today we get take a gander at a remake of Roger Corman's metamorph character of an aging woman unable to struggle against the ravages of age, desperate for a change. This is The Wasp Woman.

This suit itches.  Big time.

A model who as built up her own cosmetics firm and always model the advertisement but now she has reached the ripe era of her forties. Janice Starlin (Jennifer Rubin of A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, Bad Dreams, The Doors, The Crush, Full Eclipse, Saints and Sinners, Screamers, Last Lives, Fatal Conflict and Amazons and Gladiators) at her wit's end with her investors insistent for her to step aside in view of a much younger model as the face of the company. Desperate to maintain her status she seeks the services of a scientist Dr. Eric Zinthrop (Daniel J. Travanti of General Hospital, Hill Street Blues, Missing Persons, Just Cause, Poltergeist: The Legacy, Boss and NCIS: Los Angeles) has an experimental treatment that he claims can turn back the clock.

My boobs and I are here to see you.

 

 Familiar face from Janice's assistant Mary (Melissa Brasselle of Sorceress, Body Chemistry 4: Full Exposure, Raptor, Cheerleader Massacre, Treasure Hunt, The Curse of the Komodo and Vampire in Vegas) and her board of directors John (John Henry Richardson of Evil Spawn, Terror Night, Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Out of Time, Alienator, Cybernator, Vice Academy 3, The Wasp Woman, Vice Academy 4, Victim of Desires and Treasure Hunt) and Arthur (Gerrit Graham of Cannonball!, Demon Seed, Used Cars, The Annihilators, Chopping Mall, Police Academy 6: City Under Siege and C.H.U.D. II- Bud the Chud) so that got a bit of a snicker out of me seeing Bud the CHUD in a suit. The suits want to bring in a bubbly blonde Caitlin (Maria Ford of Masque of the Red Death, The Haunting of Morella, Slumber Party Massacre III, Mind Twister, Deathstalker IV: Match of Titans and Perfect Fit) to be the new face and Janice clamps her face with a polite smile. Dr. Zinthrop states his formula has not been perfected to the level of human trials yet but Janice threatens to pull his funding if he doesn't.

Just the tip, sweetie. Just the tip.

 

Cut to a few days later and her age has slimmed down (less age make-up) and Janice is stunning once more. Fresh faced and her energy levels are that of a twenty year old. The board confused but impressed as she proceeds to work her way through the photographer, makeup guy and the board have been taught a lethal lesson. She proceeds to morph into a wasp herself.

Will the mutation go more rampant??? Can anyone stop Janice??? Why doesn't the LAPD have a special weapons division??




Okay let's talk about the practical effects in the film. The old lady make up showed through a bit so I was a bit annoyed with that but let's dig down and love on the body suit they built for Jennifer Rubin. Illustrator/sculptor/model builder Greg Aronowitz (Meet the Applegates, Spaced Invaders, Dinosaurs, Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, Critters 4 and Forever Young) made an impressive suit with compound eyes, a functioning mouth and a full body Wasp Queen creature and okay the body suit looks a bit lopsided due to the enormous head on it but the murderous wasp has cleavage on display that gave me a great laugh.

Yes this is an B-grade sci-fi exploitation, sexploitation kind of movie but you had that pretty well figured with this going into the film. Dialogue feels as though they hardly changed anything from the original 1960 screenplay but alter the lingo a bit but the same tongue-in-cheek gags are there. It operates on a fairly fast pace and not sure why we needed that much nudity or sex scenes but again I am not in charge. I had a blast sniggering and cackling my way through this but I do get why people defend it and view it as a good bad movie. I almost commented on IMDB in Dinosaur Island's defense but that was clarifying the difference between CGI and Stop motion.

Oh my, the girls are up there.

Random Goofy: Camel Spiders

Gee a film starring Soul Man and Leo from Charmed. Not sure my heart can take this excitement.

This is Camel Spiders.

Protect Vasquez Rocks for future Trek projects, men!

Fortunately like many directors do, Jim Wynorski has more than a few actors and actresses in his stable so reoccuring actresses in question are Melissa Brasselle (Sorceress, Body Chemistry 4: Full Exposure, Raptor, Cheerleader Massacre, Treasure Hunt, The Curse of the Komodo and Vampire in Vegas), GiGi Erneta (She's No Angel, Burning Desires, Project Viper, Cheerleader Massacre, The Insatiable, Dusk and Vampire in Vegas) Diana Terranova (Tomcats, Comic Book Villains, A.I. Assault, Hell Ride, The Hills Have Thighs, MILF, Piranhaconda, Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! And The Walking Dead in the Hood) Corey Landis (That '70s Show, Chrysalis, Lost in the Woods, Dinocroc vs Supergator, Changing Hands, Dracula Reborn, Sharkansas Women's Prison Massacre and Nessie & Me) and...Greg?

I think it is communicating with me...or laying eggs.

Greg the Peg or Kurt Yaeger, former X-games athlete that had his leg amputated and came back to X-games still doing flips on a bike and did an 86 floor run up to the Empire State Building in 20 minutes and 19 seconds!

Say what you will about Wynorski's track record and whether or not he is producing/writing and/or directing, the guy has an audience that hold his works aloft to the gods. Being a protege of Roger Corman, this doesn't surprise me that he knows the equation that sexy girls sell to man children everywhere.  Hell I know I sat through Dinosaur Island for the plot and CLEARLY had nothing to do with the scantily clad females.   That flick was by Wynorski and Fred Olen Ray.

Alright boys fan out and let's get this Johnny Rico guy.

Okay so the jist of this story is this:

Captain Sturges (Brian Krause of Sleepwalkers, Naked Souls, Mind Games, Charmed, Return to Cabin by the Lake, In the Blink of an Eye, Warbirds, L.A. Noire, Toolbox Murders 2, Alien Rising and Reach for the Stars) and his men are pinned down by vaguely Middle Eastern insurgents at Vasquez Rocks? Oh sorry somewhere in the Middle East that just looks like Vasquez Rocks as they cannot get back to their hummer...that somehow more than 15 guys traveled in. Crammed in there like sardines I guess. With infinite ammo cheat code on either side, the gunfight rages on. I have not seen them reload once and all the insurgents' hands are very white. A further note is they are packing 9mm Taurus pistols and M4s. Not Desert Eagles or say...maybe a few AK-47s or even the AK-108s? Well gun wrangler SNAFU aside, the helpless soldiers witness Mother Nature tired of the crap and a swarm of camel spiders come in and start reeking havoc as they wipe out the competition. For only the sake of not being around those caves, Sturges and his men survive.

As if by fate, a few of the spider or solifugids as the species is known as stow away in one of the dead soldier's body bag to be transported to the states with him.

Green screened in a 1970 AM General truck. I think its those concrete patch trucks but I am not certain, Sturges and Sgt Underwood (Melissa Brasselle) transporting enough M4s to make most militas thrilled and the fallen corporal that was head shot and contaminated with spiders galore. Plot device car chase causes yet another SNAFU (Situation Normal All F**ked Up) as the collision is inevitable. So before Father Mulligan can call for a do-over, the spiders get loose and into town. I am a teensy bit irked that that coffin even fell out of the truck. Military lashing of any cargo especially human cargo would have been knotted and tied down something fierce but must allow for suspense of disbelief. Bad Jake.  Local Sheriff of Cedar Creek (C. Thomas Howell of The Outsiders, Red Dawn, The Hitcher, A Tiger's Tale, That Night, Gettysburg, Kindred: The Embraced, Night of the Wolf, Net Games, Flatline, Torchwood and Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox) gives aid to our intrepid military as best as he can.

Clem Feeney and Ponyboy Curtis have a pow-wow and what's best to be done with about the truck when the critters pull the old Shenghai Suprise on them. Oh.. that doesn't mean what I thought it meant. I mean a fast one.

Well before Robert can call in the rest of the Wolverines all hell breaks loose. And what film of creature feature wouldn't be complete without reckless teens drinking and trying to get into each other's pants? Does seem to be the motif since the sixties but filmed more in the seventies.

As the spider mania builds up, it forces Sturges to break out the hardware. Hope they are on infinite ammo settings too because there is a lot of these skuttlers.

Can the town be saved? What of the dippy teens? Does anyone care what I am writing right now?

Okay here we go. The CGI spiders actually look good in some scenes but not finished in others and the size ranges from what the solifugids really are to then about 3 feet long. The dialogue is what you come to expect from a creature feature which consists of one liners, obvious observations and a few minor bits of swearing. 

Dig this, Wynorski fans. No nudity. Seriously, there is not an ounce of giggly jiggly at all and this is mostly plot driven. I was impressed and a bit disappointed. Hey still have that pig streak. Sorry. The acting was fair and I always have to give credit to any actor that can manage to recapture the idea of playing against something that is only in your imagination. The story stays on track and keeps the pace going without a lot of lag but plenty of gags.

Stock Wilhelm scream goes far in my book so bravo for that. I lost some of you. Okay character actor/humorous musician Sheb Wooley recorded about 6 different screams for the 1951 film The Distant Drums. These screams were for men getting shot, falling off cliffs, horses and attacked by a gator. Sheb is best known for Purple People Eater.

Charmed huh?  Before my time, son.  Sorry.