I had the ultimate pleasure to meet director Jack Hill in the early 2000s, when he was a at a local college campus showing a double feature that included Switchblade Sisters, a film that gained new prominence once Quentin Tarantino’s Rolling Thunder Pictures reissued it to theaters.

One of my favorite films since a rental in the early ’90s from a now long-gone video store in Oklahoma City, it was thrilling to see it on the (somewhat) big screen and even more thrilling to meet the soft-spoken man who made it, a film that he described as a modern (as modern as the ’70s can be, I suppose) take on Othello.

Switchblade Sisters tells the story of blonde Maggie (Joanne Nail, in short shorts and high-heeled boots), a streetwise teenager who, after a scuffle in a local burger bar, ends up in a girl gang called the Dagger Debs, led by Lace (Robbie Lee, who has always reminded me of a Depression-era youth). When her boyfriend, the leader of the Silver Daggers, dies, they become the Jezebels, the meanest bunch of teen troublemakers in town.

However, when high school sleaze Crabs (Chase Newhart, channeling his evil Eaglebauer) tries to take full control, the Jezebels team up with a Black militant squad led by Muff (Marlene Clark, who really should have had a spin-off flick) and take the dirty motherfucker and his boys down, by any means necessary, which, thankfully, includes plenty of machine guns.

A box-office dud upon release, Switchblade Sisters effectively killed Hill’s career, but, even watching it now, the amount of guts on display here proves that he was far ahead of his time, delivering a movie that would probably make at least good money at Redbox, capitalizing on all the things that have made movies in general great over the years: rowdy girl gangs, dark violence, black humor, Black nationalism and, I guess, Shakespeare.

Well, at least all the things I love in a movie. —Louis Fowler

Get it at Amazon.

At just 61 minutes — and not a minute more! — Maximum Impact appears built upon minimal effort. Shot on video in Ohio, the movie even makes a case against itself from the start with opening credits slowly unfolding atop more than three minutes of burning paper.

Huntsacker Industries insurance salesman Jerry Handley (Ken Jarosz) lives the life of Riley, what with a job, a pretty(-enough) fiancée named Jan (Jo Norcia) and an operational Ford Taurus; judging by the needless footage of him driving it — and smiling while doing so — he sure seems to be pleased. He’s traveling to a big corporate meeting held in a rather tight room, where he reconnects with his estranged best bud, Phil (Scott Emerman). Post-meeting, the dudes reconvene at a diner to reminiscence over chips and queso about that great time when they went skinny-dipping. Together. Just the two of them. At age 12. (Note this odd conversation takes place under a sign reading “Snacktacular!”)

Their bonding sesh is interrupted by a scar-faced, ponytailed Huntsacker heavy (Bill Morrison) who invites them to a company-paid prostitution party later than night at HQ. Phil accepts, not realizing he’s being set up to star in a snuff film. At least he gets a little bra-and-panty action with his reluctant scene partner, Tonya (Christine Morrison), before being murdered. Being suspicious and nosy, Jerry witnesses the whole thing going down through the cracked door. When the cameraman (Michael Cagnoli) steps out to meet the pizza deliveryman, Jerry steps in and flees with Tonya.

In doing his best to keep this total (but fairly curvy) stranger alive, Jerry fails at affording his future wife the same fate — oops! Jerry’s loss is the viewer’s gain — assuming said viewer hasn’t checked out by then — as he takes revenge with an armory’s worth of loaded weapons.

Maximum Impact is, as you’ve guessed, a mess — one acknowledged by its makers, who hide behind pseudonyms. Most notable among them is director Lance Randas, actually DIY diehard J.R. Bookwalter, whose second-made feature, Robot Ninja, can be seen on Jerry and Jan’s TV screen (as can the reflection of a crew member holding a blanket in a failed attempt to block incoming light for day-for-night deception). Bookwalter made the woefully underfunded Maximum Impact as best as one can with a paltry $2,500; nearly every penny is onscreen. After all, chips and queso aren’t free! Nor is makeup, and the scar on the Huntsacker muscle’s face looks just like the one my younger brother had applied at our 1980 elementary school fair for three whole tickets.

I’m thankful for each shortcoming on both sides of Bookwalter’s camcorder, because without them, Maximum Impact would be unwatchable. I’d say you could skip it entirely, but then you’d never hear this line of dialogue in your life: “His schlong fell off! Who knew?” —Rod Lott

Get it at Amazon.