Point of Terror contains so many songs performed in full, it veers dangerously close to being a musical. That performer is Tony Trelos (star/writer/producer Peter Carpenter, Blood Mania), a groovy-esque nightclub singer who fancies himself quite the Tom Jones. Unfortunately, since he headlines at the Lobster House, he’s far more, say, John C. Reilly.

Tony senses that sweet smell of success when he meets giant-haired/giant-breasted record exec Andrea Hillard (Nazi she-wolf Ilsa herself, Dyanne Thorne) and they begin an affair, much to the gritted-teeth disdain of Andrea’s handicapped hubby (Joel Marston, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan).

Other than an admittedly pretty-hot pool rendezvous between Tony and Andrea, the movie’s best scene finds her throwing a lawn chair at her wheelchair-bound spouse as he confronts her about her vow-busting style of “talent relations.” As she mimics the motions of a matador, director Alex Nicol (The Screaming Skull) puts ambient sounds from a public bullfight on the soundtrack and — kind of a spoiler, but really more a reason to watch — as Mr. Hillard accidentally rolls into the pool to a chlorinated death, Andrea whispers, “Olé.”

Olé indeed. Thorne is quite the delicious femme fatale, and Point of Terror could use more of her camp-flavored spice to liven up its soap-opera script. The film is an R-rated soap opera, mind you — Nicol turns a sex-on-the-beach scene into a onscreen checkerboard — but full of melodramatics nonetheless. (It is, after all, an ego vehicle for Carpenter, who overestimated his value as a leading man and sadly died two years before Point got around to being released.) The “twist” ending intends to shock, yet instead will leave you thinking it copped out. It did. —Rod Lott

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Time and time again, the movies prove that drivers for any given state’s Department of Corrections are the worst. Fifteen years before the best example of this — The Fugitive’s “bus, meet train” incident — Blackout boasted an utterly avoidable crash of the DoC’s prisoner-transport wagon, thereby loosing a few hardened criminals onto the Big Apple’s darkened streets.

Inspired by NYC’s real-life citywide blackout of July 13, 1977, this Canadian-made thriller largely confines itself to an apartment high rise, in which the felons — led by a deceptively clean-cut Robert Carradine (Revenge of the Nerds) — go floor to floor, robbing, raping and setting fire to priceless Picassos during the 12-hour electricity outage. And only an out-of-shape, off-duty cop played by Jim Mitchum (Monstroid) can stop them!

Even before the crime spree begins, a lot is going on within the building: for starters, a Greek wedding, an African-American birth, a man on life support and Ray Milland gritting his teeth in yet another of his late-career Angry Old Man roles (see: Frogs). Meanwhile, over at utilities provider Con Edison, cigar-chomping technicians scream at a primitive, wall-sized city grid as if they are jammed in the friggin’ middle of The Taking of Pelham One Two Three.

They’re not — and I’m being kind by including the ’98 made-for-TV version starring Edward James Olmos in that apples-to-crabapples comparison. The dormant Blackout is not unwatchable; it’s just a wasted opportunity, as director Eddy Matalon (Cathy’s Curse) overall fails to take advantage of the possibilities offered by his unique setting. The exception is the parking-garage chase between Mitchum and Carradine, but that’s the film’s next-to-last scene — a little too late to start figuring things out. —Rod Lott

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Who is killing the skanky strippers of the miserably dank Rock Bottom strip club? Middle-aged hottie cop Cody Sheehan (Kay Lenz, 1986’s House) goes undercover to find out. During her investigation and to her surprise, she realizes she likes removing her clothes before the lustful gaze of strangers. (Not to my surprise, I liked her removing her clothes, too.)

When she first performs, it’s both demeaning and laughable, yet Sheehan is egged on by her earring-wearing detective partner (a barely emoting Greg Evigan, DeepStar Six). And kicking off the final decade of his long career, Norman Fell (Mr. Roper of TV’s Three’s Company) is the cigar-chewing club owner who demands his dancers stay topless for a full 30 seconds — a stand-in for executive producer Roger Corman, perhaps?

Coming from Corman, the movie should be more fun. Despite an intriguing (if purely exploitative) premise, Stripped to Kill begins with several strikes against it, not the least of which is being visually hampered. As with virtually all of Corman’s Concorde output, Stripped is shot flat and murky — not the finest choice for a film taking place mostly at night, especially one built upon copious nudity.

Under actress-turned-director Katt Shea Ruben (for example, going from Hollywood Hot Tubs to Poison Ivy), Kill slows to a near-crawl, partially because every character but Sheehan is repellent. Even the film holds contempt for them; the strippers’ dressing room is marked “SLUTS.” Lenz, long a terrific actress, deserved a better showcase; to her credit, she acts as if it were all the same. —Rod Lott

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Boobies. In a word, that’s What the Peeper Saw.

In the British pervo-chiller, the Peeping Tom in question is named Marcus (Mark Lester, Oliver!), a 12-year-old just home from boarding school, presumably due to a chickenpox outbreak. This gives Marcus an opportunity to finally meet his hot stepmother, Elise (Britt Ekland, The Man with the Golden Gun), and perhaps even bond with her, since Dad is stuck in Paris. As the saying goes, while the cat’s away, the mice will feel up New Mom.

To be honest, she doesn’t exactly discourage the “attention,” either. In fact, the day after Marcus reaches from his bubble bath to cop a clothed feel, Elise practically rushes to towel him off as he emerges from the pool. That’s nothing compared to the movie’s most infamous scene, in which Elise strips nude for the tween in exchange for information. (For all the unsimulated squeezes she endures in an hour and a half, poor Britt deserved hazard pay.)

But, hey, S-E-X is only part of Peeper’s picture. Its real thrills — benign they may be — stem from Elise’s increasing suspicion that Marcus may have murdered his own mother years ago, which means she may be next. And thus unfolds a tale of mistrust, jealousy, voyeurism and pussycat torture.

And it’s not like Elise hinders the kid’s psychopathic tendencies, either: “Hello, genius. What are you reading? De Sade?” she cracks. “Did you love your mother?”

Bottom line: Elise may have been born without maternal instincts, but Marcus is, unquestionably, one odd duck. So is this flick, co-written and co-directed by Andrea Bianchi, who, believe it or not, went even more unnerving in the department of incestuous overtones with 1981’s Burial Ground: The Nights of Terror. If you’ve seen that slice of zombie sleaze, you know The Scene. (And if you don’t, you owe yourself a nip of rectification.)

For all its bizarre themes and, um, touches, What the Peeper Saw barely qualifies for one viewing. Bianchi and cohort James Kelley (The Beast in the Cellar) appear to have written themselves into such a corner, they decided the best route for a wrap-up was to go off the rails. En route to the end credits, they deliver an utterly baffling ending that, while leaving questions floating, at least retains the film’s oh-so-sour disposition. —Rod Lott

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Jane Harris (Lauren Tewes, best known as Julie, Your Cruise Director on TV’s The Love Boat) is your stereotypical big-haired anchor for the local news in Miami, except for her bad habit of cutting off her male counterpart and going off-script to editorialize about the serial rapist/killer terrorizing the city. As she tells her boyfriend, “This rapist thing is really getting to me!”

And how. Spotting a suspicious fat guy (John DiSanti, The Presidio) changing clothes in their twin-tower apartment building’s parking garage, Jane assumes he’s the hosiery-headed culprit, starts sniffing around his business and eventually gives him the Rear Window treatment.

Eyes of a Stranger, as if you needed telling, is no Rear Window. Nor is it supposed to be. Ken Wiederhorn, director of the Nazi-zombie chiller Shock Waves (clips of which can be seen on the tubes of a couple of characters), knows he’s making a B-level psycho-thriller — no more, no less — and thus makes Eyes watchable. For all its genericness, it’s almost comfort food in how utterly every-step-predictable it plays, right down to each victim’s teasing display of nudity and other elements watered-down from the era’s slashers.

That he gets a good performance from Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Machinist), however, as Jane’s blind and deaf sister, seems accidental. That’s all her. —Rod Lott

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