Lance Kerwin, God rest his soul, was the master of losing his virginity on prime-time TV: first on a controversial episode of the celebrated James at 15 series, then again in the rightly uncelebrated telepic Side Show. (Did he ball a vampire in Tobe Hooper’s Salem’s Lot? My memory’s not what it used to be.)

With an open mouth forever stuck on flabbergasted mode, Kerwin plays Nick, a 16-year-old runaway and puppeteer with a killer Jimmy Durante impression right down to the last “ha-cha-cha-cha.” Back when those were marketable skills, that’s enough to earn him a spot in the traveling circus. In the freak show tent of the traveling circus, that is, but a job’s a job — and then some, with the fringe benefit of seduction by the luscious, post-Scorchy (and grown adult) Connie Stevens!

Directed by actor William Conrad after his long run on Cannon, Side Show offers little for viewers to grasp between the murder occurring in the final stretch and Nick’s intro (via Red Buttons, When Time Ran Out …) to his co-workers: the tall lady, the fat lady, the snake lady, the tattooed lady, the sword swallower, the man with no face and a little-people couple with the last name Tiny. With respect to the latter, the movie’s big conflict is whether Nick can finagle a reunion with their normal-sized son so the Tinys can meet their granddaughter. Can your nerves stand it?

Pay no attention to the entirely misleading VHS box art that sells this particularly low-wattage melodramatic number as some kind of slasher. Its horrors are, at best, the clowns, trained chimps and Stevens’ soon-abandoned Hungarian accent. Still, in concept, Side Show gives producers Sid and Marty Krofft their version of Freaks. Just don’t expect the brothers to employ their usual brand of Saturday-psychedelia disturbia, ladies and gentlemen — neither the encephalitic H.R. Pufnstuf nor the monstrosities of D.C. Follies. —Rod Lott

I am very fearful of today’s punk youths, mostly because they will strangle me with their tight jeans, swollen lip rings and stylishly tousled hair, taking me down without a moment of regret or misunderstood bloodshed. As a matter of fact, their rakish behavior makes one yearn for the semi-tuff kids in 1979’s well-acted, oversexed and non-complex teen drama, Over the Edge.

Besides tucking their shirttails, smoking in designated areas, and knowing the proper word for “urination,” the lower-level, white-trash kids of Edge take down the entire high school system with only some bottle rockets, some dirt bikes and, of course, total pubescent angst.

As the title crawl tells — against some serious power-chord action, natch — kids under 15 are horrible miscreants and this primo story is based on this nonexistent fact. We’re introduced to the suburb of New Grenada and their unofficial teen leader, Richie (Matt Dillon), and his buddy, Carl (Michael Kramer).

They and their friends brag about small-time vandalism, attempted date rapes and other minor crimes, not to mention going to see Kiss in their Dynasty disco era (wowza!) at the well-to-do youth center. For the most part, for youth of the 1970s, they’re pretty civil, a little douchey and most vaguely docile.

But when the community center is temporarily closed by some rootin’-tootin’ Texas land developers, do Richie and the gang try to save it by learning breakdancing? No, they go and tear apart a police car. Eventually, they come across a gun and things really get bad when Richie is shot by the cops. So, of course, Carl and his friends come together to take down not only the cops, but also their parents, teachers and teacher’s pets — the whole damn system, man!

Like The Warriors or Rock ’n’ Roll High School,  Over the Edge is an antisocial wish-fulfillment fantasy directed by Jonathan Kaplan, one of Roger Corman’s enfants terribles. With the total power of hard rock, hard times and hard crime, Kaplan does a commendable job here, with most kids tired of the Afterschool Special themes normally crammed down their throats.

The scenes of Greeley, Colorado — a hop, skip and jump from my former home, Fort Collins — and other nearby locales are pretty staid with washed-out suburban colors, but it beats, say, Los Angeles and other California dreams. Even better, the soundtrack featuring the Ramones, Cheap Trick and early Van Halen — I want my ’70s stereophonic headphones now! Turn it up, man!

Over the Edge is a late ’70s picture of classic teen alienation and vintage youth rebellion, with the teenagers waving their stolen shotguns in a true celebration of fist-pumping uprising and personal dirtball freedom.

So take a swig of this 50/50 as I blow up this car … but, please don’t do any of this if my parents are home! *gulp* —Louis Fowler

Get it at Amazon.

When I was a kid and didn’t know any better, I was enthralled with Texas-area, Texas-born wrestlers the Von Erichs and their contribution to the (fake) sport of pro wrestling. Back in the day, you could actually believe in their superheroic leaps and bounds, no matter how trashily presented.

In our small town in Blooming Grove, my father would buy The Dallas Morning News on Sundays, when the sports section had posters on the last page, giving us prime opportunities for experiencing the Saturday night fights, all without pay-per-view. To hell with the WWF!

I had switched to watching Saturday Night Live and its comical ephemera around ’86 or ’87, around the time the brawny Von Erich brothers had some “trouble” in the extreme sense of the word. They and, for the most part, wrestling became a Lone Star-sized blip on the cathode tube, never to be seen again.

Now, some 40 years later, The Iron Claw brings those memories flooding back.

The biopic sets us sometime in the early 1980s, with the thudding boom of the small-time wrestling Von Erich family. The depressive Kevin (a very buff Zac Efron) leads his equally fit brothers to total takedown victories in the ring — only for all it to be taken by cruel fate, which comes for each of them in the saddest way possible.

Besides sparring with the family’s own demons, their dad is former wrester/then-current WCCW owner Fritz (Holt McCallany). Emotionally abusive, he grinds his sons into the dirt, saying their shortcomings are for their “own good.”

While I knew about the Von Erichs’ mythical stories when their dynasty ruled, I wasn’t privy to much of what’s detailed in the film. From drunken amputations to shame-based suicides, it’s a truly sad story that director Sean Durkin peacefully delivers.

As shown in the epilogue, Kevin was able to break through and turn his life around; for that, I am happier. While some people need to know the whole story, warts and all, The Iron Claw does the legend justice. Even better, I don’t need to watch wrestling again to know it. —Louis Fowler

Get it at Amazon.

General Lee’s Pawn Shop inconspicuously stands beneath an overpass — an appropriate site for such an off-the-radar film. Since its quiet release direct to video, I’d paid it no mind because the title and poster led me to expect a reality show. Instead, Wayne Kramer’s Pawn Shop Chronicles is a crime anthology of three crisscrossing stories à la Pulp Fiction. Similarities end there.

Each tale is named after the pawned item in question. The constant? Shop owner Vincent D’Onofrio, of course.

In “The Shotgun,” Paul Walker (Kramer’s Running Scared) and Kevin Rankin (2018’s Skyscraper) play neo-Nazi, meth-smokin’, trailer-park hillbillies who rob a drug dealer. “The Ring” leads a stockbroker (Matt Dillon, The House That Jack Built) to rescue his long-missing, kidnapped wife (Pell James, Zodiac). Finally, a down-on-his-luck Elvis impersonator (Brendan Fraser, The Mummy trilogy) pulls into town to perform at the fair, only to be forced to give up “The Medallion” around his neck.

Kramer’s filmmaking style runs hot and cold with me. Pawn Shop Chronicles showcases both, plus the lukewarm in between, by virtue of its omnibus status noncommittal to a single genre. (Tellingly, this is the only movie the director hasn’t also written.) As a comedy — and not a politically correct one — “The Shotgun” works pretty well, thanks to Walker and Rankin’s tweaker act: “Is that my Styx CD in your pants?” And “The Ring” takes an unexpected turn into horror — Sadako-free, mind you — with Dillon encountering a most extreme example of Stockholm syndrome.

But “The Medallion”? With a burst of magical realism that doesn’t quite jive, it bites off more than it can chew, yet keeps on yapping with its mouth wide open. Its dueling barbershops and all-nude choir overdo the quirk at the sacrifice of a point. It’s not Fraser’s fault, though; God bless him, the big ol’ lovable goofball gives the part everything he can.

Also appearing throughout are Chi McBride, Elijah Wood, Thomas Jane, Norman Reedus, DJ Qualls, Lukas Haas and a bumper sticker reading, “At least Jesus didn’t write Battlefield Earth.” Amen. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.

Scott Bateman’s premise for 5000 Space Aliens is simple: 5,000 alien life forms walk among us. For your awareness and safety, this movie shows you what each of them looks like, at just one second per, because prolonged exposure is dangerous.

For the next 83.3 minutes (with the 3 repeating; I did the math), your eyes and ears are subjected to the kind of experimental work you don’t often see outside of film school. Luckily, this one is worth the sensory overload.

Instead of merely presenting static photographs, Bateman — perhaps best known for remaking 1960’s Italian trash classic Atom Age Vampire as an animated film — has constructed intricate, moving collages. Some have famous faces (POS evangelist Robert Tilton, who pops up more than once); others bear nonsensical phrases (“wooly coarse things”) or even a can of red kidney beans. Nearly every “alien” begs for a push of the pause button.

This could — would — get old quickly, if not for the kickin’ instrumental score, also Bateman’s, stringing you along. The more upbeat, the better the hold on your attention. Perhaps intoxicants level that playing field? You tell me.

This visual album is RIYL Koyaanisqatsi, but longed for more people and a less sleepy soundtrack. It’s a vibe. —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.