Action

Mean Johnny Barrows (1976)

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meanjohnnyIn (and as) Mean Johnny Barrows, Fred Williamson (Black Caesar) plays a decorated Vietnam solider dishonorably discharged from the service for punching a soldier who made him step on a live land mine. Back in California, Unemployed Johnny Barrows can’t seem to find a job. I don’t think it helps that all he wears are jeans so poorly acid-washed that it looks like he peed in them.

Eventually he gets tied up with the mob, hired to be a hit man for $100 grand and a piece of land. One of his assignments is to take out gangster Tony Da Vince, played by Roddy McDowall. After watching the Planet of the Apes star attempt to act like an Italian mobster, I now know where Dana Carvey found the inspiration for his Pistachio Disguisey character in The Master of Disguise; McDowall is more convincing kissing the curvy mob moll — and that’s saying something.

meanjohnny1By the finale, Ambidextrous Johnny Barrows infiltrates a mob boss’ hideout with a shotgun in each hand. Minutes later, he’s defeating an opponent with a well-aimed Chinese star to the eye, making him Master Ninja Johnny Barrows.

Directed by Williamson himself, Mean Johnny Barrows also stars slumming white folk Stuart Whitman (Night of the Lepus) and that noted blaxploitation staple Elliot Gould (Ocean’s Eleven). The actioner ends as all actioners should: with the words “Dedicated to the veteran who traded his place on the front line for a place in the unemployment line – peace is hell” superimposed over a freeze frame of a honky bitch getting blown to smithereens. —Rod Lott

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Thriller

Left Behind (2001)

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leftbehindThe late, great critic Roger Ebert wrote, “A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it.” Meaning it isn’t the story that’s ultimately important in storytelling, but how it is told. For example, The Birth of a Nation is both riveting and disgustingly racist. Could Left Behind pull off the same trick? After all, I’m hardly the target audience.

What it is about: Based on Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins’ best-selling, 16-book series of fundamentalist thrillers, Left Behind concerns those who are “left behind” after the Christian Rapture. With all believers absent with leave, the Antichrist starts his ascension, and only a few brave souls understand the peril.

Having read the first book, I can say it fails Ebert’s axiom with honors. It’s a fear-mongering rant against the deadly horrors of secular humanism, a leaden tome of speechifying dullness incapable of creating even the mildest of tension or interest, mostly due to a complete lack of authorial talent. It’s so tedious it can’t even be enjoyed as camp. Can the movie succeed where the book failed?

leftbehind1How it is about it: Such a wingnut-fundamentalist film probably scared off potential stars, but placing faith (as it were) in the acting prowess of TV’s Mike Seaver? Kirk Cameron has all the heft of a vacuous teen idol whose 15 minutes ended 20 years ago.

Yes, it’s arguably unfair to tar him with the sheer awfulness of his Growing Pains sitcom fame, but boy, howdy, it’s both easy and entirely accurate. (What, Stephen Baldwin wasn’t available?) Beyond Cameron’s black hole of charisma, there’s a cast of D-list television actors and slumming Canadian talent. I’ve seen better acting in low-rent lawyer commercials.

Directing-wise? Same issue. Don’t blame the budget; Michael Tolkin’s brilliant 1991 film, The Rapture, posits a biblical apocalypse, yet still manages to be intellectually and emotionally thrilling on a budget less than that of your average TBS sitcom. No such luck here with one Vic Sarin: We’re talking Uwe Boll levels of incompetence. It’s monotonous, dreary and, cinematically speaking, ugly, flat and bland.

In the end, Left Behind is a preachy and insulting hunk of dull so awful it could only appeals to zealots, so unpleasant it may convince believers to leave the church. It’s an excruciatingly bad story, told in the least interesting manner possible.

And worse than all that? It’s as boring as sin. —Corey Redekop

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Sex

The Sinful Dwarf (1973)

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sinfuldwarfTalk about a housing crisis! In The Sinful Dwarf, lovely young female renters of a boardinghouse are locked away in a secret attic room, where they are stripped naked, drugged up and whored out. On the bright side, each woman gets her own dirty mattress.

Who’s the landlord of this hellhole? That’d be former showgirl Lila Lash (Clara Keller) and her pint-sized son, Olaf (Torben Bille). He’s the dwarf of the title, but to call him sinful is like calling Hitler mean: a major understatement. With a rapey grin, Olaf does a lot of the luring and administering doses of horse into the girls’ hungry veins via crooked, rusty needle.

sinfuldwarf1Given the vacant, narcotized stares of these sex slaves’ faces, one might assume no acting was taking place. Olaf is eager to add Mary Davis (Anne Sparrow) to the stable; she’s one-half of a newlywed British couple forced by financial difficulties to take temporary residence there. They certainly break in the bed, explicitly.

Shot in Denmark, The Sinful Dwarf marks the directorial debut and swan song for Vidal Raski, and it’s the only credit for several of its stars, including Keller and Sparrow. Ironically, Bille enjoyed a fairly healthy career afterward, despite the horrible things he does with a wooden cane.

Notoriously sleazy, The Sinful Dwarf is every bit as unpleasant and depraved as its rep promises. However, amid all its dehumanizing elements, the worst thing about the film is how dreadfully boring it is. —Rod Lott

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Horror

Theatre of Blood (1973)

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theatrebloodOn its surface, it may be easy to confuse Theatre of Blood for just another early ’70s British horror movie; a natural follow-up to star Vincent Price’s pair of Dr. Phibes films, in which an aggrieved maniac wreaks revenge on a group of people in a very specific and entertaining manner. But then as you watch, it quickly becomes clear that Theater plays by its own bizarre rules, making it an utterly unique, darkly comic horror classic.

Price stars as Edward Lionheart, a campy Shakespearian actor whose entire career has been ridiculed in print by London’s elitist circle of theatrical critics. When they deny him the annual acting trophy he’s convinced he deserves, he appears to commit suicide in front of them. But when they all start dying in murderous scenarios inspired by the plays of Lionheart’s beloved Bard, it’s clear that he’s not quite as deceased as he originally appeared.

theatreblood1You first know something is a bit off here when Diana Rigg (five years after TV’s The Avengers and looking amazing), playing Lionheart’s daughter, Edwina, first shows up in drag, complete with beard and enormous blond afro. Then there’s the film’s complete lack of a protagonist. Unable to bring themselves to make a critic a sympathetic hero, director Douglas Hickox and screenwriter Anthony Grenville-Bell instead allow Ian Hendry’s arrogant Peregrine Devlin to finally defeat Lionheart, but in such a way that makes the murderer seem more like a tragic hero than despicable villain.

But the real reason to watch Theatre of Blood is the opportunity to see Price sink his teeth into some of the best speeches Shakespeare ever wrote. Despite being given the excuse of playing an untalented “ham” actor, his performance leaves you wishing he had the opportunity to play those same roles in real life. Ultimately, this makes his character far more sympathetic than the assholes he slaughters throughout. —Allan Mott

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Reading Material

Zombi Mexicano

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zombimexicanoFans of outré horror cinema are urged to order Zombi Mexicano right freakin’ now — not just because it’s an excellent publication, but because author/designer Keith J. Rainville has printed only 250 of these babies, with no plans for a wider run.

In other words: You snooze, you lose, and the trade paperback represents 20 of my dollars that were as hard-earned as they were well-spent.

¿Comprende?

Zombi Mexicano is not a definitive text on Mexican zombie flicks, nor is it intended to be (although now I’m convinced he should embark on that project immediately). It is an overview on a franchise that Rainville believes has been ignored, and he’s right; even a cult-film enthusiast such as myself hadn’t heard of the “Guanajuato mummies” movies, not to mention their producer, Rogelio Agrasánchez Linaje.

zombimexicano2As Rainville writes, “Ever see a zombie use karate, then try to stomp a baby, all to the tune of a circus pipe organ?” I can’t say that I have, but I can say that I must.

Numbering roughly seven or so films, the series began with 1970’s The Mummies of Guanajuato, starring the “holy trinity of lucha-heroes: Santo, Blue Demon and Mil Mascaras.” Following in quick succession over the next five years were such sequels as Castle of the Mummies of Guanajuato, Mansion of the Seven Mummies and Macabre Legends of the Colonial Era.

I now need to see all of them.

Rainville runs through each with a spirited discussion that’s supplemented with scads and scads of crazy screen grabs, vintage posters and garish lobby cards. It’s laid out like a magazine, professionally and in eye-popping full color (except those instances where the source material was not).

The jam-packed 64-pager also contains an introductory essay that touches upon the movies you likely have heard of (i.e. the Aztec Mummy trilogy) and Mexico’s yesteryear comics featuring zombies and/or mummies.

So you don’t just have to take my near-worthless word for it, you can get a peek at Zombi Mexicano‘s insides here. Now go buy it, funky film fan, before that right is taken from you. I accept your thanks in advance. De nada. —Rod Lott

Buy it at From Parts Unknown.

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