As anyone who read ol’ muttonchops Isaac Asimov knows, precious little of his classic I, Robot collection made into the Will Smith sci-fi blockbuster of the same name. Anyone hoping for a semi-faithful adaptation should either keep waiting or hunt down Isaac Asimov’s Robots. Frankly, since the latter option is a “VCR Mystery Game,” you may be better off letting time idle. 

The Eastman Kodak production stars Stephen Rowe (Cyber-Tracker 2) as New York City ace police detective Elijah Baley, a head shorter than everyone else. He’s partnered with a walking, talking, trash can-looking robot named Sammy (Richard Levine, Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2) to solve the attempted murder of a Spacertown roboticist (John Henry Cox, Bridge of Spies) in 24 hours or less.

As Baley stumbles upon vital clues to crack the case, he addresses the camera about evidence he’s submitting, prompting viewers to draw a card from the game’s deck. Or something like that. Watching the bush-league acting of Robots for its 45 minutes is rough enough; I can’t imagine having to play the accompanying game, too. What I can imagine is children so bored, they begged to go do homework instead.

One of Asimov’s celebrated Three Laws of Robotics is do no harm to humans, which the mere of existence of Isaac Asimov’s Robots contradicts. The drab whodunit looks as cheap as the video on which it was shot, seemingly made on Sesame Street sets. It plays like TV’s Alien Nation were retooled as a sitcom, but mistakenly beamed for broadcast minus a laugh track. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.

Driving one stormy night, university professor Cass Anderson (Minka Kelly, 2011’s The Roommate) passes a car on the roadside. Behind the wheel, a woman appears asleep, so Cass continues toward home. The next morning, she learns the woman was not only dead, but murdered!

Soon after, strange figures appear in and outside the mega mansion in which Cass and her husband (Dermot Mulroney, Scream IV) live. She receives mysterious phone calls ridden with static. Worse, she seems not to remember things that others in her immediate circle — like her best friend (Maggie Grace, The Hurricane Heist) — do. 

Guilt? Haunting? Something else? 

At its foundation, Blackwater Lane is built on the reliable structure of Gothic fiction: the hysterical woman with creaky mansion to match. This house, so big it practically has a moat, is in a remodeling phase (no word if that includes yellow wallpaper), so plastic tarps make the place feel anything but homey. Donning an array of cozy turtlenecks and high-thread nightgowns, Kelly wears the imperiled-wife role well. She’s a better actress than she’s given credit for. Now that she’s aged out of the ingenue phase of her career — you know, back when she was the stuff of lad mags like Stuff — perhaps others can see that. 

Although it’s based closely on The Breakdown, a 2017 novel by B.A. Paris, Blackwater Lane reminds me of other movies — specifically, of Psychosis, a Charisma Carpenter vehicle with similar themes, and generally, made-for-cable thrillers of the early ’90s. That latter group is not necessarily a bad thing when its members include Frank Darabont’s Buried Alive, Mick Garris’ Psycho IV: The Beginning, Tobe Hooper’s I’m Dangerous Tonight and Phedon Papamichael’s (who?) Sketch Artist — high-gloss pulp trash one and all, each watchable, of course. 

The major problem is this mystery from Jeff Celentano (1998’s Gunshy) is a half-hour too long for a solution not just so easily sussed out by Act 2’s dawn, but teased obliviously ad nauseam thereafter, underestimating viewers’ intelligence. On the page, its machinations likely aren’t the giveaways that the visual medium can’t help but highlight. Then again, I haven’t read the book. Maybe bromidic dialogue like “Well, it’s a mistake. She’s mistaken!” comes straight from the source? —Rod Lott

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If you weren’t alive and aware of your surroundings in the late 1970s, you can’t comprehend the level of popularity and pervasiveness the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamen gripped on our culture. It’d be impressive for anyone, but it’s extraordinary for a dude who’d spent the previous 3,000 years as a pile of dust. 

Among the cashing-inners: NBC, broadcasting The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb, a horror-tinged, mystery-minded work of fiction somehow based on Barry Wynne nonfiction book. A dapper Robin Ellis (TV’s original Poldark) headlines the made-for-telly movie as real-life tomb raider Howard Carter, whose bowtie looms larger than the bottom half of his face. Carter endears himself at the start by asking a local boy his name and, apparently not liking all the consonants and weird accents, tells the kid dismissively, “I’ll just call you ‘Fishbait.’”

In the sands of Egypt, archeologist Carter and his crew unearth an artifact that warns of death for anyone who dares disturb the king’s sleep. Near immediately, “accidents” befall others: a scorpion attack, a snakebite, an earthquake, the snapping of a biddy’s parasol in two! Say, how do you expect that biplane with a skull-and-crossbones decal will fare? 

The “mystery” at play is whether is the harm — fatal or not — is proof of a true supernatural curse or the work of a corrupt dealer played by Raymond Burr (Godzilla 1985) in brownface and various color sashes. Only everybody watching knows for sure! 

Eva Marie Saint (North by Northwest) is on hand to lend Oscar-minted credibility to the project, but her role as Carter’s love interest is thankless. Somehow they also recruited the venerated Paul Scofield (Quiz Show) to deliver narration, which only adds to — rather than offsets — the telepic’s old-fashioned fussiness. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.

Although Rampo Edogawa, Japan’s answer to Edgar Allan Poe, had seen his material adapted for the screen dozens of times in his life, he died just a few years before the Golden Age kicked off. We’re talking Blind Beast, Horrors of Malformed Men and, coming first, Black Lizard, all within a year and a half. Talk about a trifecta!

One of the legendary Seven Samurai, Isao Kimura headlines this crazy crime tale as Akechi, a private detective with a lot going on. While investigating the disappearance of a corpse from a med school lab, he’s hired by the jeweler Iwasa (Jun Usami, The Vampire Doll) to protect his daughter, Sanae (Kikko Matsuoka, The Living Skeleton), at the secret go-go club where she works.

As Akechi is told, Iwasa’s been warned Sanae will be kidnapped by the mysterious Black Lizard, perhaps to get at his invaluable Star of Egypt diamond. A chloroformed rag or two later, Akechi fails his duties. Unknown to our dick, but not to our minds, is the Black Lizard’s true identity: the woman who runs the club.

Given the Black Lizard’s hunchbacked henchman, a snake-throwing henchwoman and a Sax Rohmer-ready hideout, it’s not like the movie lacks in audience appeal. But here’s where things get really interesting, because she was really a he — Akihiro Miwa, arguably Japan’s most celebrated drag queen.

For today’s viewers (who may recognize Miwa’s voice as Princess Mononoke’s Wolf Goddess), the actor’s true gender is no secret; it’s obvious as soon as his female character appears. Yet the more the Black Lizard is set up not only as Akechi’s foil, but as his potential paramour, the more I kept anticipating a proto-Crying Game reveal. To the progressive credit of director Kinji Fukasaku (Battle Royale), it never arrives!

Equal parts cigarette smoke and champagne effervescence, and buoyed by a score by Isao Tomita — yes, that Tomita! — Black Lizard is a real Pop Art blast from the Far East. Both informed by and showing up American pulp fiction, Fukasaku’s confection has style to burn and then some. —Rod Lott

Get it at dvdrparty.

Drawing proportionate influence from the Italian giallo and the American Batman TV series of ’68, Sexy Cat is a Spanish murder mystery. And it’s loco.

The “beautiful mass murderess” Sexy Cat is set to leap from the comics to the small screen. Pissed his creator’s credit has been stolen by Bob Kane Paul Karpis (Beni Deus, Santo vs. Doctor Death), gin-soaked illustrator Graham (Fabián Conde, Murder in a Blue World) hires two-bit P.I. Mike Cash (Gérman Cobos, Desperate Mission) to help protect his copyright claim.

Graham should’ve hired a bodyguard instead, because he gets a knife blade dragged across his neck after Cash leaves. It’s just the first of many homicidal acts committed by someone dressed as the supervillain Sexy Cat. (Party mask and all, Sexy Cat looks a lot like the Marvel character Black Cat, then six years away from debuting in The Amazing Spider-Man’s pages). Other production-involved victims of Sexy Cat meet their doom via snake bite, plastic-bag asphyxiation and — finally! — razor-sharp kitty claws.

Considering the ultimate spice level of the content, the movie’s title is a tease (but, in hindsight, a no-brainer for Julio Pérez Tabernero, the eventual director of Hot Panties). Nonetheless, Sexy Cat is almost as much fun to watch as it is to say. Although the film isn’t much of a mystery — Sexy Cat’s true identity is easy to surmise, with time to spare — Tabernero gives his shaggy story an edge with such visual touches as a POV shot from inside the aforementioned Ziploc bag.

Also aiding in AV appeal: actresses Lone Fleming (Vampus Horror Tales) and Gloria Osuna (A Few Dollars for Django), Pop Art comics-style credits and a properly fizzy Carmelo Bernaola score. —Rod Lott