From the makers of King Kong the following year, 1932’s The Most Dangerous Game is one of the most influential and imitated movies in history, and for good reason: It’s a splendid, Prohibition-era adventure with a concept that transcends time. And that concept is that, unequivocally, rich people are assholes.

Based on Richard Connell’s excellent 1924 short story of the same name, the RKO Radio Picture begins with a ship capsizing in shark-infested waters. The only survivor, Bob (Joel McCrea, Alfred Hitchcock’s Foreign Correspondent), washes ashore on an island and arrives at the only home around, belonging to one Count Zaroff (Leslie Banks, Hitch’s The Man Who Knew Too Much of 1934). As if the host’s name isn’t scary enough, his door knocker is a demon holding a woman. In life, we call such things “a red flag.”

Zaroff is crazy, all right. Having lost his love of life, the man has resorted to big-game hunting, but hunting humans. Bob and another “guest,” the alluring Eve (Fay Wray, King Kong), are to be his latest prey. If they can survive from midnight to sunrise in the jungle, Zaroff will give them keys to the boathouse so they may float their way to freedom.

Bob and Eve believe staying alive is a swell idea, so they build traps in the hopes of turning the tables. And therein lies the fun. Utilizing a mix of backlot sets and rear-projection tricks, co-directors Irving Pichel and Ernest B. Schoedsack pull off an exciting exercise exploring man’s inhumanity to man, via swamps and caves and dogs, and waterfalls for those dogs to tumble down. It’s not politically correct; it’s not meant to be. —Rod Lott

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On 9/11, I remember thinking how different things might have been if someone like Jackie Chan or Jet Li had been aboard United flight 93. Certainly those guys could’ve, would’ve kicked the crap out of the hijackers, and thus, saved the day. At least that’s how it works in the movies; real life doesn’t follow a script.

The same kind of thesis is at work in JCVD, a film that has no right to be as good as it is. With the former Timecop and Universal Soldier Jean-Claude Van Damme playing himself, it asks, “What would happen if Van Damme found himself in the middle of a bank robbery? A couple of kicks and it’d all be over, right?”

Director/co-writer Mabrouk El Mechri (The Cold Light of Day) answers, “Nope! You wish!”

In fact, after popping into the place to pick up a wire transfer, Van Damme is not only held captive as one of the hostages, but is assumed mistakenly by the authorities (stationed at a video store across the street) to be the mastermind. And “mastermind” is too kind of word for the true criminals; as with real life, they’re unpolished and unplanned. One of them looks eerily like John Cazale in Dog Day Afternoon, an obvious influence.

The highlight of the English/French co-production, partly improvised, isn’t concerned with the robbery at all. It’s the most meta moment of a meta work: a six-minute soliloquy of sorts, in which Van Damme speaks directly to us — in one unbroken shot — about his failures in life. He’s an internationally known movie star who appears to have it “all,” but “all” includes battles with drugs and ex-wives, the latest over custody of his daughter. It is stunning to see him deliver a honest-to-God performance, and he’s excellent.

Sounds grim, but JCVD is not without good humor, either. As an impressed captor relays to a hostage, “He’s the one who brought [John Woo] to the U.S. Without him, he’d still be filming pigeons in Hong Kong.” Without El Mechri, Van Damme still would be waiting for a chance to actually act. —Rod Lott

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That buzz you hear is The Swarm, disaster mogul Irwin Allen’s speculative epic about killer bees. As far as that subject goes, this one runs a distant second to 1991’s coming-of-age dramedy My Girl (Macaulay Culkin, nooooo!), but with Allen at the rare helm (he functioned not as director, but as producer for the influential The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure, practically birthing his own subgenre), this notorious turkey doesn’t disappoint in delivering all-star cheese.

A swirling mass of millions of African bees swoop down to sting a bunch of people to death. The insects first do some damage at a military base, then take down a few helicopters and disrupt a family picnic before moving on to more fertile ground, like a schoolyard busy with first-graders just itchin’ to get it.

Michael Caine (who later saw true disaster in Jaws: The Revenge) fronts as Brad Crane, the stuffy scientist who knows all about the stingers. His partner in the effort, (Katharine Ross, The Stepford Wives), mostly just sits there and looks gorgeous. And what a supporting cast: Richard Widmark, a wheelchair-bound Henry Fonda, Olivia de Havilland, a corpse-hugging Slim Pickens, Lee Grant, a pregnant Patty Duke Astin and big ol’ Ben Johnson. Of the celebrity deaths, I most enjoyed seeing Richard Chamberlain’s.

Caine and company throw everything at the bees in an attempt to appease their anger — firebombs, poison pellets, Fred MacMurray — but nothing quite works. Finally, something does, and only then do we get this incredible, full-screen, closing-credits disclaimer: “The African killer bee portrayed in this film bears absolutely no relationship to the industrious, hard-working American honey bee to which we are indebted for pollinating vital crops that feed our nation.”

So, wait: Was Allen was afraid of offending bees? —Rod Lott

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Saddled with writer’s block, novelist Howard Hansen (Ted Prior, Sledgehammer) makes his way into a Chinese curio shop, where he plunks down big bucks on a jar containing a one-eyed brain monster floating in icky water. Naturally, this wise purchase helps him to concentrate so he can finish knocking out his latest book.

It also makes him want to have sex with his secretary, Carol, played by 1981 Playboy Playmate of the Year Shannon Tweed. (Hey, jar monster or no monster, especially after watching her exercise scene in a half-shirt.) One might conclude that Howard is … how you say? … Possessed by the Night.

Every time the jar bubbles, somebody gets horny or murderous — sometimes both. During one particularly heated round of intercourse, Howard and Carol start slapping the crap out of each other. The boom mike makes its way into the frame once.

Who knows what mystical powers lie within this creature in the jar? The end hints at an evil Chinese curse, as if director Fred Olen Ray (Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers) knew all you wanted out of his film wasn’t story resolution, but tits. Touché, Fred, touché.

Also starring in this watchable weirdo thriller are Sandahl Bergman, Chad McQueen and Henry Silva, because, well, “directed by Fred Olen Ray.” —Rod Lott

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Jason Trost — The FP‘s writer, director and star (and probably caterer) — had an interesting idea for a follow-up: What if you mashed up Saw with superheroes? Well, you might get something like All Superheroes Must Die (also called Vs., a title I don’t like any better). Unfortunately, what you don’t get is a good movie.

Four superheroes (Charge, Cutthroat, Shadow and The Wall) wake up in a seemingly deserted town, stripped of their powers, and are forced to play a deadly game concocted by their arch-nemesis, Rickshaw. The game, one that they’re destined to lose, involves running from one building to another and overcoming various challenges with the lives of various innocent civilians on the line. If they refuse to play or try to leave, Rickshaw threatens to blow up the entire town.

Operating on a budget of what looks like a hundred dollars and change, Trost gives it an admirable go, but the movie becomes bogged down in too many plot holes (how did Rickshaw manage to capture them in the first place?), too many unanswered questions (their superpowers are never explained), too many eye-rolling scenes (the characters have a knack for heart-to-heart conversations while their time is clearly running out) and too many seams showing (in both their costumes and the “special effects,” as in explosions being shown by an off-camera stagehand tossing bits of wood and handfuls of dirt into frame).

That’s not to say that I hated everything about All Superheroes Must Die, like:
• There’s an interesting scene in which Charge (Trost) decides to sacrifice a few civilians for the sake of his teammates. 
• As Rickshaw, James Remar (48 Hrs.) has a terrific time chewing the scenery and showing that he can out-act the rest of the cast — and all while just sitting behind a desk. 
• Cutthroat’s hot sister somehow manages to look sexy while tied up and strapped to a bomb. —Slade Grayson

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