X (2011) vs. X (2022)
School for Sex (1969)
Giles Wingate is in a pinch. Relieved of his sizable inheritance through a revolving door of gold-digging wives — including his former maid, who cunningly moves from housework to ho’work — he strikes upon a jolly good idea to replenish the coffers: opening a School for Sex.
Written, produced and erected — er, directed — by Pete Walker (For Men Only), this British bird-watcher takes place at the estate of Giles (Walker regular Derek Aylward), where he teaches young women how to use their built-in wiles to win, win and win, hearts be damned. Each libidinous learner among his initial class of four appears to be as horny as Times Square at rush hour.
Classes cover everything from bikini calisthenics to spotting the millionaire. Regardless of the syllabus, a peering, leering cop (Bob Andrews, The Soldier) practically on loan from Keystone is ever so eager to observe, what with being married to a woman whose shape isn’t curves, but an isosceles trapezoid. While clothing for the nubile pupils is often optional — and taken — School for Sex is rather chaste, being all about the look, not the act.
Nudity aside, Walker’s script sways more toward actual female empowerment (no, really!) and away from sleaze. This is crucial, because if Aylward and/or Giles weren’t likable, School for Sex wouldn’t be approachable, and Walker all but acknowledges this with his light touch. Both its sexiest woman and most valuable player is Thunderballer Rose Alba as the middle-aged countess-cum-headmistress. (Speaking of 007, the women’s costumes are credited to “Pussy Galore.”) Always clothed, yet never a wrist’s length further from a cocktail, Alba gives a strong comedic performance in a movie that doesn’t even ask her to. —Rod Lott
6:45 (2021)
When proposing marriage to the woman you love, be sure to make it memorable. Not most guys’ idea of memorable, which means in public so she feels enormous pressure to accept. And definitely not 6:45’s idea of memorable, which means she’s immediately gutted by a stranger with a box cutter.
Said unfortunate fate befalls Jules (Augie Duke, Necropolis: Legion), much to the horror of boyfriend/bystander Bobby (Michael Reed, Chupacabra Territory), who then gets his neck cranked a sharp 90˚ angle. The operative word of that sentence is “much,” because then Bobby wakes at the titular time in the B&B bed of their romantic weekend excursion and is forced to relive it over and over again, despite efforts to the contrary.
Playing like a downbeat Groundhog Day, this indie thriller from Dark Ride director Craig Singer is built upon a good-enough idea, although wholly unoriginal. Oddly, once the time loop takes effect, interest wanes and thrills give way to dramatics, with which everyone seems not as comfortable handling. Until then, however, I wanted to see where Singer would take it (although not as much as he made me want to see Asbury Park, the iconic New Jersey seaside city standing in for the lovers’ destination of Bog Grove).
6:45’s ultimate twist becomes conspicuous well before intended, which only reinforces its status as a clothes-free emperor — and one who hates playing by the rules, even within the malleability the genre affords. In other words, it’s as predictable as knowing which number a digital clock will display next. Worse, as if you didn’t process the revelation, Singer hits you over the head with it — and over and over again, much like a serial killer who couldn’t find his box cutter and had to settle for a hammer. —Rod Lott
Escape Room: Tournament of Champions (2021)
As seems apt for a second entry of a B-level franchise, Escape Room: Tournament of Champions begins in a “last week on …” style befitting of episodic TV. And immediately, the 2019 sleeper hit‘s two survivors, Zoey (Taylor Russell) and Ben (Logan Miller), track the coordinates of the Minos Corporation, the shady outfit behind the invitation-only attraction that tried to straight up murder them, to Manhattan.
Lest you worry your sequel steeps itself in a mudheap o’ mythology, fear not! Like its predecessor, Tournament of Champions is almost solely a series of for-keeps games with true life-or-death stakes. We get a few rounds of electric hangman in a subway car, a cityscape with acid rain, a faux beach that’s actually a giant hourglass and a bank lobby equipped with criss-crossing laser beams. (Regarding that last one, where are Catherine Zeta-Jones and Vincent Cassel when we need them most?)
Each scenario plays out like puzzle pages torn from a Final Destination-themed workbook. Returning writer/director Adam Robitel again has his stock characters somehow solve incredibly cryptic clues under incredibly stressful timelines, so prepare for a lot of this:
Person A: “Time’s running out, hurry!”
Person B: “I found something! What can this mean?”
Person A: “I dunno, but — oh, look your flop sweat dropped on it and revealed an image of a bird and you’re from Boston so maybe it means Larry Byrd of the Boston Celtics? And he spells his name with a ‘Y,’ right? And ‘Y’ is the 25th letter in the alphabet and-and-and is anyone here 25? No? Oh, snap, we’re surrounded by mirrors, so maybejustmaybe it’s really 52! Who here is — what, Jan, you? You’re 52? That’s it, that’s it! Caw-caw, Jan! Caw-caw like the wind!”
Had the movie not racked up a body count, I may not in such a forgiving mood over their deduction powers that take Sherlock Holmes to the nth degree. But it does; therefore, I am. —Rod Lott
Checkered Flag or Crash (1977)
A Filipino version of the Cannonball Run, the Manila 1000 is a three-day, off-road race involving everything from jeeps and dune buggies to stock cars and stocky Joe Don Baker (The Living Daylights) as driver Walkaway Madden. It also features motorcycles — or “motor-sickles,” if you wish to pronounce it as does race promoter Bo Cochran, played by Larry Hagman (TV’s Dallas) in a hat pilfered from Carmen Sandiego’s entry hall.
Before the start, in a setup soon to be swiped by Safari 3000, a plucky journalist from Stratus magazine (Susan Sarandon, the same year she did The Great Smokey Roadblock) pokes her nose around for a story, so Cochran forces Madden to let her ride shotgun. Dressed in a lumpy-butt jumpsuit that’s less Evel Knievel and more Elvis ’77, Madden is furious, like, “A yucky woman? Phooey!” so you just know they’ll bicker and bitch until they fall into something approximating love or lust. Worry not — we’re spared the sight of a Sarandon/Baker sammie.
Storywise, Checkered Flag or Crash actively works against itself, as if settling to let Harlan Sanders’ boot-scootin’ theme song do all the plotting: “Checkered flag or crash / Goin’ for the heavy green, gonna beat ’em / Checkered flag or crash / There ain’t no in between / So do me right, you damn machine.”
The slight variation from that outline arrives with news of an upcoming stretch of the route suddenly becoming impassable … so Cochran doubles the prize money. This should clear the way for director Alan Gibson (The Satanic Rites of Dracula) to turn in a film that feels faster and more dangerous, yet over and over again, he demonstrates how ill-suited he is for the job.
From Macon County Line’s Alan Vint to Playboy centerfold Daina House as a masked rider, Gibson has all the ingredients within reach to make a rip-roarin’, race-brained hicksploitation pic. Instead, he botches the recipe with confusing staging and editorial choices that are particularly flabbergasting for this subgenre — for instance, slowing down and removing frames from some of the more extreme-speed stunts, which is a technique one level above a photo flipbook.
Plus, with pacing akin to the driving skills of my late, not-so-great stepgrandmother — lay on the accelerator, let up, lay on the accelerator, let up, ad infinitum — you’re better off watching an autocentric film that wastes more gas than it wastes your time. —Rod Lott