good bad movies
because some of the best movies are bad movies.
(No longer obsessive-compulsively ranked, as nobody got time for that)
(No longer obsessive-compulsively ranked, as nobody got time for that)
List activity
1.2K views
• 0 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
78 titles
- DirectorHung-Chuen LauStarsEddie ChanYung-Chang ChinPak-Kwong HoA woman becomes possessed and dies after a monster is released from an antique vase she had purchased. Twelve years later the monster is re-awakened. First he possesses the family's dog, before moving on to the woman's nephew.One of my favorite moviegoing experiences was seeing the great "Devil Fetus" at the Alamo Drafthouse. This tasteless Chinese shocker begins with a newly married woman buying an enchanted bottle, from which emerges a seductive evil spirit. After a number of too-long scenes of her canoodling with this gross genie, she is caught en flagrante by her hubbie, and both quickly perish. But though the woman is dead, within her grows the titular devil fetus, bearing the spirit of the genie, and it soon emerges to wreak havoc upon her grieving family.
So, why is it bad?
It's nasty, dude. "Mo Tai" is a movie that knows no bounds of good taste. Right off the bat, there are the sex scenes between the young woman and the incubus, which has claws and peeling purple flesh. A later scene finds another young couple making out on a balcony, and up comes the family dog, which starts lapping busily at her crotch, and is not prevented from doing so. Also, I don't know if you heard, but the movie is about a cannibalistic demon fetus.
And the effects? The movie culminates in a wizard's duel in which the full power of hokey 80's visual effects are brought to bear upon your defenseless eyeballs.
Why is it not so bad?
Huh. Well, the cons sound a lot like pros, if you ask me. - DirectorJ. Robert WagonerStarsRudy Ray MooreCarol SpeedJimmy LynchRudy Ray Moore's fourth in a series of cult favorites finds him playing an ex-cop called back into action to stop an angel dust producer. The angel dust hallucinations alone are well worth the price of admission!THE prototypical bad blaxploitation movie. Say you have a friend who wouldn't understand what "Black Dynamite" is parodying? Show him this first. If his brain is not broken by the experience (no guarantees), he'll be ready.
Why is it bad?
The, uh, acting? Producer/star Rudy Ray Moore first appears as a flamboyant DJ, demanding ceaselessly that dancer put their weight down and boogie ever harder. He starts off at 11, and he never brings the intensity down. His set is interrupted when his nephew, an up and coming basketball player played by "Brisco County Jr" star Julius Carry, overdoses on pcp. The supporting players by and large adopt the monotone and downcast gaze of unseasoned actors, and Moore's dynamicism blows them off the screen - DirectorDon CoscarelliStarsReggie BannisterA. Michael BaldwinBill ThornburyMike and Reggie continue to hunt the mysterious Tall Man, discovering along the way that the invasion has already begun.So, hold up. I don't really think that the Phantasm movies as bad, per se. As of this writing I'm eagerly awaiting part 5. Part I is a strange and striking work of otherworldly horror that Coscarelli put together for roughly the price of a song; it's rough, and the it-was-all-a-dream-or-was-it? ending is a cliche, but I'm omitting from this list; consider it good-good, not good-bad. Part I possesses an eerie dream logic; parts II and III take that unearthly quality, dial it to 11, and spike it with a winningly silly self-awareness.
- DirectorDon CoscarelliStarsJames Le GrosReggie BannisterAngus ScrimmMike, now released from a psychiatric hospital, meets with Reggie, and discover his dreams (the events of the original film) are real, and they both journey to find and stop the evil Tall Man from his grim work.
- DirectorMike HodgesStarsSam J. JonesMelody AndersonMax von SydowA football player and his friends travel to the planet Mongo and find themselves fighting the tyranny of Ming the Merciless to save Earth.Not really a bad movie so much as a movie that knows that it's camp, and plays the part to perfection.
- DirectorPanos CosmatosStarsEva BourneMichael J RogersScott HylandsDespite being under heavy sedation, a young woman tries to make her way out of the Arboria Institute, a secluded, quasifuturistic commune.
- DirectorNgai Choi LamStarsSiu-Wong FanMei Sheng FanKa-Kui HoRiki-Oh, a young man who has superhuman strength, is incarcerated in a private prison, where inmates are treated like slaves. He is forced to use his unstoppable form of martial arts to destroy the corrupt officials and their lackeys.Insanely gory wuxia madness
- DirectorRusty CundieffStarsClarence Williams IIICorbin BernsenJoe TorryA funeral director tells four strange tales of horror with an African American focus to three drug dealers he traps in his place of business.Is "Tales from the Hood" shooting for true profundity, or is it intentionallly a big goofy spectacle? It's hard to say: that so-bad-it's-good magic is hard to capture in a bottle, arising more often from painfully earnest intentions than from any above-it-all pranksterism (like those parodies of 50's scifi? dreadful). But there are just SO many bits here that couldn't have been imagined as being scary by, y'know, anyone, ever, and there are sundry bewilderments of a more fundamental sort as well. Take the segment that features one Crazy K, which begins as a barefaced ripoff, Clockwork Orange in the hood, then undermines what little point it might have been making by faking us out and going the route of "An Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge". There is no point and no moral to the story, just a big wtf. Accordingly it is the most earnest segment of the anthology that is the weakest, lacking as it is in this anarchic spirit. I'm thinking of the segment about the little boy and the monster, which is an unsubtle parable about child abuse. Even here, there's a bit of that wild magic, when the abusive stepdad, played by a cold-as-ice David Alan Grier (believe it), is reduced to rubber by the boy's lame superpowers. The other two segments are spectacular. Some white cops kill a black lawyer, who comes back as a magic zombie and kills them in ways that... Boy, there is not an adjective I know that will complete that sentence. Here's the play-by-play. Duane Whitaker pisses on his grave, so the zombie lawyer grabs him by the balls and pulls him screaming into the ground (a tribute to Peter Jackson's "Braindead", aight? everybody take a shot!). Michael Massee and Wings Hauser look on in horror as Whitaker meets his grisly end, and Hauser unloads his gun at the zombie lawyer's headstone for some reason before they beat a hasty retreat in their cop car. Somehow, though moving at a zombie shuffle, zombie lawyer catches up with the car and he pulls off Wings Hauser's head. Then he levitates some heroin needles and pins Michael Massee to a mural in a Jesus Christ pose. There is then a POV shot of a needle flying into Massee's mouth (clarification: not from the point of view of the needle, but from the point of view of Massee's uvula). Then Massee melts into paint and becomes part of the mural. Of course! It all makes so much sense! But hey, anybody: why is there a bottle of glowing green liquid inside the zombie lawyer when he gets ripped open? This was a little detail I didn't understand. As for the other segment, let me merely say this: I would watch a feature length movie starring Corbin Bernsen as a racist gubernatorial candidate menaced by little black claymation dolls. If all I can get is 20-minutes of that, then I can ask for no more. Hypothetical readers, as I type these words, tears of gratitude spill down my face. I am not kidding you. I would be remiss if I didn't give a shout-out to the great Clarence Williams III, who plays the hissing undertaker who relates these tales from the hood to three bored gangsters.
- DirectorTommy WiseauStarsTommy WiseauJuliette DanielleGreg SesteroIn San Francisco, an amiable banker's seemingly perfect life is turned upside down when his deceitful fiancée embarks on an affair with his best friend.A staggering work of heart-breaking delusion.
- DirectorClaudio FragassoStarsMichael Paul StephensonGeorge HardyMargo PreyA vacationing family discovers that the entire town they're visiting is inhabited by goblins, disguised as humans, who plan to eat them.
- DirectorMario BavaStarsJohn Phillip LawMarisa MellMichel PiccoliA master thief and his sensual lover pull off heist after heist, all while an envious coalition of cops and gangsters is gunning for them.When I was young (and a fool) I hated this movie. This lameness I must now recant. Diabolik is awesome. John Philip Law is a murderous thief who steals *beep* to appease his vain, greedy slut of a girlfriend. They live in a cave with de stijl decor and *beep* all the time on a bed covered in money. I know! The cop pursuing him is a worthless klutz of the first order, and Diabolik tries to kill him time and again, going so far as to blow up a train. Cut to the cop diving into a river. Awesomeness!
How could I have not liked this movie? Maybe it was just too soon after September 11th. - DirectorDon BartonArnold StevensStarsMarshall GrauerWade PopwellPaul GallowayA mad scientist transforms himself into an aquatic killer.Mesmerizingly awful Creature from the Black Lagoon riff in which a mad scientist (prone to voiceovers of such standards as "They say that I am insane? They are the one's who are insane!" after a long spiel about creating a new race of fish-people) uses radioactive aerosol to drive the fish of the everglades into an invasion of mainland Florida. Also, he changes himself into a man fish and schemes to create a comely woman fish with whom to mate. The human-fish dating scene is not exactly thriving, however, and his experiments to mutate screechy little blondes into blushing ichthyous brides tend to go horribly wrong. I think we can all relate. There's some nice underwater photography (mostly stock footage) and a weird weepy hippie folk song about sargasso weed and our fish brothers.
- DirectorNobuhiko ÔbayashiStarsKimiko IkegamiMiki JinboKumiko ÔbaA schoolgirl and six of her classmates travel to her aunt's country home, which turns out to be haunted.
- DirectorMenahem GolanStarsCatherine Mary StewartGeorge GilmourGrace KennedyIn 1994, a young couple enters the world of the music industry, and subsequently the world of drugs.A sleazy, stupid musical with horrible lyrics, this is a lot more fun than it has any right to be. The story concerns a pair of young musician lovers (their wretched tv audition song "Love, the Universal Melody" is easily the most boring, stupid song ever written) who are seduced by a demonic record company which offers them success in exchange for their very souls. At this crisis point they are separated tragically by the folly of womanhood; he realizes that the contract is a terrible Faustian bargain, but she wants to be on MTV (a story as old as that of Juliet and her Romeo). This scene gives us the upbeat title number, coaxing her to sign the contract (in reality eating an Edenic apple, which imparts not knowledge of good and evil but sequined clothes and bouffant hair). Oh, this song is a winner, with the improbable line "Its an natural, natural, natural desire/ to meet an actual, actual, actual vampiire." Embittered and left alone, the hero is seduced by the devil's henchwoman in a kaleidoscopic orgy wherein the henchwoman sings "I'm coming/Coming for you." At the end some fakeass Jesus figure leads all the hippies who don't watch MTV over the rainbow, and that's the end
- DirectorDanny BoyleStarsCameron DiazEwan McGregorHolly HunterUpon being fired, a desperate guy kidnaps a daughter of his former boss. Two angels are sent to Earth to check if love is possible in this case.
- DirectorHarold P. WarrenStarsTom NeymanJohn ReynoldsDiane AdelsonA family gets lost on the road and stumbles upon a hidden, underground, devil-worshiping cult led by the fearsome Master and his servant Torgo.
- DirectorWilliam GirdlerStarsChristopher GeorgeAndrew PrineRichard JaeckelAn eighteen-foot-tall grizzly bear terrorizes a state park, leaving it up to a Park Ranger to save the day.This "Jaws" clone trades Martha's Vineyard for the Rockies, and the Great White for the great bear. It is also one of director Girdler's blander offerings: hardly a good movie, but with all the stolen story beats it never strays too far from the point of reason. That is until the finale, where the bear is
SPOILER
obliterated with a rocket launcher.
I'll let that sink in. And maybe it won't; the logical mind tells you "Hmm, a rocket launcher? Just the sort of thing to kill a bear." You monster. Well, you don't get it, man. I submit to you that the rocket launcher is a violation of the unspoken compact between movie and audience. The rocket launcher isn't Chekov's rocket launcher, a logical element that has been satisfyingly set up and paid off. It's Girdler saying "Okay, the bear has killed enough. We have an hour and a half of footage. Time to end things." and the crew packing up and going home, except the editor, who splices in some stock explosion footage to show us that the bear blowed up real good. - DirectorWilliam GirdlerStarsCarol SpeedWilliam MarshallTerry CarterA marriage counselor becomes possessed by a demon of sexuality when her father-in-law, an archaeologist and an exorcist, accidentally frees it while in Africa.Hey, William Girdler again! This picture, which he did for American International, never reaches the delirious heights of his later films, but there are moments to enjoy. The scariest scene finds Abby being scanned by a 70's era MRI. Nothing happens, there isn't even any scary music, but no way am I going into a room with one of those things.
- DirectorWilliam GirdlerStarsTony CurtisSusan StrasbergMichael AnsaraA psychic's girlfriend finds out that a lump on her back is a growing reincarnation of a 400-year-old demonic Native American spirit.Why, look who it is! William Girdler!
Not only that, but this is the second time he ripped off The Exorcist! - DirectorWilliam GirdlerStarsChristopher GeorgeLeslie NielsenLynda Day GeorgeA battle for survival ensues after a group of hikers encounters a chemically imbalanced forest.It's Girdler --Girdler!-- Girdler again!
- DirectorLamberto BavaStarsMichael SopkiwValentine MonnierGianni GarkoA marine biologist, a dolphin trainer, a research scientist, and a local sheriff try to hunt down a large sea monster, a shark/octopus hybrid, that is devouring swimmers and fishermen off a south Florida coast.Probably my favorite episode of MST3K.
This is the patient-zero of Scifi Channel Original Movies, unless there is a previous European-made film in which eee-vil scientists attempt world domination by creating an unholy merging of shark and octopus. No doubt it is nigh unwatchable without the mst3k treatment. On that note excuse a bit of silly quoting. "Squad number two, come in, over!" "We done been et, over." "They'll be number two soon enough." "Get your flame throwers out, get your stick of Juicy Fruit." "Deploy the Country Time pink lemonade!" "I don't need Neil Young around anyhow." "Southern man, gonna eat your head..." Ah, but these all come from the climactic showdown. So here's another from near the beginning. "Just because you can edit doesn't mean you should." Words to live by, those. - DirectorCharles BandStarsTim ThomersonHelen HuntMichael StefaniA gruff bounty hunter travels back in time to 1980s Los Angeles to stop a twisted criminal who can transform people into zombie-like creatures.
- DirectorIshirô HondaStarsKenji SaharaYumi ShirakawaAkihiko HirataA mining engineer investigates the death of his fellow coworkers and discovers prehistoric nymphs emerging from the mines. As he heads deeper into the mines, he makes a more horrifying discovery in the form a prehistoric flying creature.
- DirectorWoo-sang ParkY.K. KimStarsY.K. KimVincent HirschJoseph DiamandA martial arts rock band goes up against a band of motorcycle ninjas who have tightened their grip on Florida's narcotics trade.Dragon Sound is a band composed of five orphan college boys of diverse backgrounds. They get a gig as house band at a nightclub, where they entertain crowds with songs about how they will always be friends. But there's trouble in paradise. One band mate's girlfriend has just joined the band, let's call her Yoko, and her brother is coming around the club with his biker gang to sell cocaine and beat up Yoko's boyfriend. Also, the band that worked at the club before Dragon Sound got the gig want their hides, and have taken this complaint to their neighborhood evil ninja dojo. "They're all black belts in tae kwon do. And they're bad," the rival band leader warns the sensei as he calls in the hit. Some of that tae kwon do has apparently rubbed off on the club owner, who is not a significant character but nonetheless gets a fight scene where he beats up his old house band when they resort to threats to get him to take them back. There follows a melee of clumsily choreographed fight scenes, where time and again a villainous biker or ninja will run toward a hero with a raised weapon, only to pause helpfully a foot or two away to give the hero a chance to kick them in the face. No place is safe for Dragon Sound (except I guess the beach, where they go to leer at girls in bikinis). Bikers accost them when they're driving their convertible through a trainyard. When the cops arrive on the scene after the combatants have gone, one cop says "We've got to get these gangs out of central Florida." Stay in northern or southern Florida where you belong, gangsters. But when Yoko's brother and his henchmen kidnap Dragon Sound's John-Oates-lookalike guitarist, Dragon Sound decides to go on the offensive, beating up the gang and killing Yoko's brother. Yoko is pretty understanding on this score, thankfully. The ninjas, however, are out for blood, and ambush Dragon Sound as the band is on the way to meet the estranged father of one of their members (yes, everyone else in the band seems a little hurt to learn that he's not actually an orphan).
- DirectorMichael RissiStarsJoe EstevezVivian SchillingGregg ThomsenFour teenagers are killed in a car accident. Two of the teenagers refuse to go with "The Grim Reaper" and a race between life and death ensues!
- DirectorTed V. MikelsStarsJody DanielsLeslie McRayTom PaceA young woman leaves her job as a waitress and travels to Los Angeles, where she strives to become the top star in the glamorous world of go-go dancing.A duller MST3K episode.
- DirectorChad BurnsStarsAndrew CheneyJohn Rhys-DaviesKara KillmerA British East India Trading Company assassin seeks to redeem his past by thwarting a plot against a young nation's hope for freedom.
- DirectorAlbert MagnoliStarsPrinceApollonia KoteroMorris DayA young musician, tormented by an abusive situation at home, must contend with a rival singer, a burgeoning romance, and his own dissatisfied band, as his star begins to rise.Prince onstage is a dynamo, electric, crooning double-entendres with a sultry wink one moment and shrieking with lovesick passion the next, leaping about like a gymnast while playing the guitar like a pro. Prince offstage is reserved, quiet, somewhat prickly, hardly as entertaining as the showman. As it was in life, so it is in "Purple Rain", which showcases some excellent performances by the Revolution (and the Time ain't bad, either), but flounders whenever the music takes a backseat. Apollonia, playing the love interest, is similarly stiff. The great Clarence Williams III, playing Prince's abusive father, smolders but isn't given much material, likely because a nonactor is bound to pale in comparison. The only performance that works onstage and off comes courtesy of rival musician Morris Day of the Time, a goofy preening huckster who, aided by a bumbling lackey, schemes to ruin Prince's career and steal Apollonia away.
- DirectorHarmony KorineStarsVanessa HudgensSelena GomezAshley BensonFour college girls hold up a restaurant in order to fund their spring break vacation. While partying, drinking, and taking drugs, they are arrested, only to be bailed out by a drug and arms dealer.A neon nightmare from Harmony Korine, writer of "Kids" and director of "Gummo", in which four bikini-clad coeds go on a crime spree to pay for the spring break vacation of their dreams. Hauled before a judge in their swimwear, our vapid Millennial antiheroes are bailed out by a Riffraff lookalike (Franco) who takes them under his wing. With this cornrowed impresario as their guide, they plumb the depths of the American Dream, pursuing happiness in the guise of theft, drugs, murder, and worst of all, the music of Skrillex.
I hesitate, in spite of the ludicrousness of the story and characters, to call this a bad movie. It sure as hell is an effective movie, gorgeously filmed and put together. Even as silly a spectacle as the girls dancing with shotguns and pink ski-masks as Franco plays Britney's song "Every Time" on a white Steinway in front of a Florida sunset is made achingly beautiful. As a film, there's an undeniable and seductive vision behind it, and - DirectorJim SharmanStarsTim CurrySusan SarandonBarry BostwickA newly-engaged couple have a breakdown in an isolated area and must seek shelter at the bizarre residence of Dr. Frank-n-Furter.An infectious musical pitched in camp and gleeful bad-taste (hey, not everybody likes meat loaf...ba-dum-tish). This is a film that is hard to separate from its fan base (those guys can be obnoxious; guys, there are other bad movies), and I've seen it more times than I would like, frankly. By the end its just so willfully ridiculous that its a little tiresome, with Curry climbing the RKO logo and the aliens with laser pointer guns. Sigh.
- DirectorRichard ElfmanStarsGene CunninghamMarie-Pascale ElfmanVirginia RoseThe bizarre and musical tale of a girl who travels to another dimension through the gateway found in her family's basement.
- DirectorDavid SchmoellerStarsKlaus KinskiTalia BalsamBarbara WhinneryA man who runs an apartment house for women is the demented son of a Nazi surgeon who has the house equipped with secret passageways, hidden rooms and torture and murder devices.Imagine its the mid-1980's. The Future Director of "Puppetmaster" and producer Charles Band (for those who don't recognize the name, imagine a hackier Roger Corman with a yen for tiny little monsters) have just done a *beep*-ton of blow, but that was probably the sort of thing they did every Thursday.
Charles Band: "David, we've signed Klaus Kinski to do a picture with you."
The Future Director of "Puppetmaster" is speechless. There are stars in his eyes: his film school daydreams have come to miraculous fruition. Kinski, a living legend of the cinema, in his little movie! Yes, things are coming up roses for the Future Director of "Puppetmaster".
CB: "Filming starts in a week. Now man up and snort this line."
Future Director of "Puppetmaster": "Charlie, this is fantastic. You are a prince among men. This could be our ticket to the big leagues. How did you get a star like Klaus Kinski to come work for us?"
Charles Band does not mention that this late in his career and probably at the height of a lifetime of craziness, Kinksi could probably be coerced to star in a picture with an offer of, I dunno, a dose of methadone and a piece of raw meat.
FDo"P": "I'm so nervous about filming. I haven't even seen the script yet."
CB: "Oh. Hey, David, the thing is... we really don't have a script."
Again the Future Director of "Puppetmaster" is speechless, as his film school daydreams suffer a meteroric rise and fall in the space of a minute. There is a sort of awkward silence for a bit. Charles Band snorts a few lines and gets really pumped. Finally...
FDo"P" (speaking in a scared-baby voice, like Tippi Hedren at the end of "Marnie". Hey man, you should go watch "Marnie" again, you know? Except this time, stooooonnned): "No script?"
CB: "Well, there was one. But it was about a mad Nazi scientist, posing as a mild-mannered landlord, raising an army of mutant midget Nazis. And with the puppeteers on strike... [What, you kids don't recall the Great Puppeteer Strike of 1984? Psshh. It was the beginning of the end for Sid and Marty Krofft, some say... Anywho...] Well, its just not viable for filming. You'll have to come up with something on the fly."
FDo"P" (again with the scared baby voice): "On the fly?"
CB: "David, stop this mishigas. Look on the bright side. You've got Klaus Kinski. What more can you need in a horror movie? Dress him up like a Nazi. Have him smear himself with lipstick and eyeliner like a drunken prozzie. He won't mind. Film him oogling his buxom female co-stars as they undress."
Both men are visibly disturbed by this last image.
FDo"P": "You think they'll really undress in front of Klaus Kinski?"
CB: "Of course they won't. You'll have to coax him into the crawlspace where they can't see him."
Thus inspiration hit like a lightning bolt. "Midget Nazis" was rechristened "Crawlspace". Charles Band and the Future Director of "Puppetmaster" furiously snorted some more coke and bounded into the air, bumping chests triumphantly, and a rainbow descended upon Charles Band's east LA penthouse (don't knock it, the rent is reasonable) and with it the fruits of prosperity. The end. - DirectorTommy WirkolaStarsJeremy RennerGemma ArtertonPeter StormareBrother/sister duo Hansel and Gretel are professional witch-hunters who help innocent villagers. One day they stumble upon a case that could hold the key to their past.It's the grim and gritty treatment Americans love so well taken perhaps to its furthest extreme. Having survived their childhood encounter with the cannibal witch, the titular siblings have embarked on a lifelong quest to kill witches, as you may have surmised from, again, the title. Hansel is now afflicted with a "sugar sickness" (Type II diabetes, y'all) which requires regular injections to treat (insulin. just call it insulin). I guess I don't really recall this one that well, so it probably wasn't that memorable. It's fun to sing "A Whole New World" during the flying scenes, I'll give it that.
- DirectorMark L. LesterStarsPerry KingMerrie Lynn RossTimothy Van PattenA new teacher at a troubled inner-city high school soon ends up clashing with a delinquent punk posse who run the institute with an iron fist.Lester's solid exploitation quickie dumbs down A Clockwork Orange. Or maybe it presages Stand and Deliver, but with the charismatic teacher going on a rampage at the end instead of teaching CALculus. McDowall's cynical teacher is a highlight.
- DirectorLee DemarbreStarsPhil CaracasMurielle VarhelyiMaria MoultonKung-Fu Action / Comedy / Horror / Musical about the second coming.
- DirectorKinji FukasakuStarsRobert HortonLuciana PaluzziRichard JaeckelAfter destroying a giant asteroid heading towards Earth, a group of scientists unknowingly bring back a strange green substance that soon mutates into a monster.This clunky space horror has a rockin' Hendrixesque theme song and little else to recommend it. The acting is dreadful, the leads make up an utterly unappealing love triangle, the effects are rather fake-looking.
- DirectorDon SharpStarsGeorge SandersBeryl ReidNicky HensonAn amiable, psychopathic leader of a violent teen motorbike gang is spurred by his mother, a Satan-worshiping spiritual medium, into committing suicide and returning to life as an "undead".Privileged biker prat returns from the dead and convinces his lame biker gang to kill themselves so that they too will return as unstoppable zombies. They agree to this with surprising gusto: "Well, what are we waiting for?" one cries, hopping on her hog and speeding off to collide with the first truck she sees. This is a typical instance of the stiffness and idiocy of "Psychomania". Some decent stunt-work and the occasional arresting image isn't enough to make it worth your while.
- DirectorJ. Lee ThompsonStarsMelissa Sue AndersonGlenn FordLawrence DaneAt the snobby Crawford Academy, Virginia's group of friends start to go missing years after horrible events that happened to her as a child around her birthday.There's some good giallo atmosphere to this psychobabbly slasher (dig the black gloves and the straight razor, for they are of the old school) but the plot is a series of red herrrings and once we get a bead on what is going on, the story grows all the more alarmingly senseless, with a final reveal that hinges on one of those Mission: Impossible style masks. Also, unrelated: would MacGuffin and the Red Herrings be a good name for a rock band? I'm thinking they would have to be surf-rock.
- DirectorGianfranco ParoliniStarsLee Van CleefWilliam BergerIgnazio SpallaA master gunfighter sides with a banjo-playing drifter and a Mexican tramp to foil the dignitaries of Daugherty, who want to use stolen army money to buy land that the railroad will cross.Not bottom of the barrel as far as spaghetti westerns go (that distinction shall forever belong to "Get Mean", in which a sweaty gunslinger takes on an army of Huns and Moors) but tedious; there are some fun action moments. But the prankish Sabata, more McGuyver than Man With No Name, is miscast with the cold and humorless Van Cleef in the role (assuming anyone would be good in so broad a role). Sabata solves every problem with a gun (Banjo being played off-tempo? Dice loaded at the craps table? Shoot the *beep* yet no one seems to realize that this is the mark of a psychopath. And all the long cons are more tiring than they are in Mamet's "Heist".
- DirectorRichard L. BareStarsDavid BaileyTiffany BollingRandolph RobertsA tongue-in-cheek psycho movie in "Duo-vision." The entire feature employs the split-screen technique used in parts of Brian De Palma's "Sisters" that same year. As a handyman at a seacoast hotel, Randolph Roberts wears a monster mask while he kills and dismembers women with blond hair. Tiffany Bolling is a singer, Scott Brady is a detective and Edd "Kookie" Burns is a lifeguard. The music is the original organ score for the silent film "Phantom of the Opera."I can't really recommend this at all, and my standards are admittedly masochistic. The split-screen gimmick is not used effectively; there is never any harmony between the two images, one screen always distracts from the other when ever anything is going on (often both sides of the screen simultaneously show us something boring, flat and unimportant, though, so it isn't hard to keep up). There is a measure of witless misogyny and some crappy '70's lounge songs.
- DirectorMichael HerzLloyd KaufmanStarsAndree MarandaMitch CohenJennifer BabtistTromaville has a monstrous new hero. The Toxic Avenger is born when meek mop boy Melvin falls into a vat of toxic waste. Now evildoers will have a lot to lose.
- DirectorFerdinando BaldiStarsTony AnthonyLloyd BattistaRaf BaldassarreA wisecracking gunfighter is seemingly hurled through time and space as he escorts a Spanish Princess back to her homeland while contending with barbarians, Moors, evil spirits, a raging bull, and a maniacal Shakespeare-quoting hunchback.
- DirectorGeoffrey WrightStarsVictoria HillLachy HulmeGary SweetA contemporary retelling of Shakespeare's "Macbeth" set in the ganglands of Melbourne.I'm sure your local community theatre does productions of Shakespeare set during the Civil War, or the sixties, or whatever. Here we find Macbeth reenacted by Australian coke dealers, and if you couldn't guess, I'll tell you that it's a setting that puts English-teacher hectoring about Shakespeare's universality out to the pasture. The dialog is not served well by all the mumbly Australian accents, and the cinematography is annoyingly flashy. There's nothing here that corrects for the basic wrongheadedness of the premise.
- DirectorGuerdon TruebloodStarsTiffany BollingBen PiazzaSusan SennettA nonverbal autistic boy stumbles upon a teenage heiress who has been kidnapped by a trio of young psychopaths, who are intent on extorting diamonds from her stepfather.
- DirectorTimur BekmambetovStarsAngelina JolieJames McAvoyMorgan FreemanA frustrated office worker discovers that he is the son of a professional assassin, and that he shares his father's superhuman killing abilities.Bekmambetov gives this fluff some fun, eye-bugging sequences, but the full scope of his endearingly weird sensibilities has not been fully translated.
- DirectorPhilippe MoraStarsRonny CoxBibi BeschPaul ClemensA young woman gets raped by a mysterious man-creature, and years later her son begins a horrific transformation into a similar beast.Ronny Cox' bastard son becomes a monstrous cicada-man. Until then I thought it was a werewolf movie
- DirectorNick MillardStarsPriscilla AldenMichael FloodJane LambertAn obese woman recently released from an insane asylum kills anyone who attempts to get her to stop eating.This exploitative shocker, better known by the name "Crazy Fat Ethel", concerns a dedicated glutton who doesn't take things lying down when her family attempts to curb her appetite; no, she picks up a cleaver and carves them up instead. It's an ugly little film.
- DirectorLarry CohenStarsFred WilliamsonJulius HarrisGloria HendryA gangster in Harlem must rescue his ex-wife, who has been kidnapped by the Mafia.I guess you have to ignore the ending of "Black Caeser" to make a sequel to it, but the contempt the filmmakers have for their audience only begins there. They even steal the climactic chase of the first film for the opening. Still, some great moments of crappy cinema are here to be had: impalement by beach umbrella, for one. Has some great songs, including Julius Harris' theme "Big Poppa". You know what? I recommend it.
- DirectorStuart GordonStarsLance HenriksenStephen LeeWilliam NorrisHorror film set in 1492 Toledo, Spain, depicting the cruel deeds of a monk named Torquemada, Grand Inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition.Really god-awful. I like a lot of stuff by Stuart Gordon. But this is really bad, just indescribable. Henriksen chews some mad scenery, but far more screen time goes to our stiff, pretty young leads. Also, Happy Gilmore's grandmother turns out to be a witch
- DirectorDon SchainStarsCheri CaffaroDuane TuckerHerbert KerrA rich society girl is recruited to go undercover and expose a drug/blackmail/prostitution ring in her small town.sleazy as hell
- DirectorUwe BollStarsJason StathamRon PerlmanRay LiottaA man named Farmer sets out to rescue his kidnapped wife and avenge the death of his son, two acts committed by the Krugs, a race of animal-warriors who are controlled by the evil Gallian.If a dungeon was under siege in this movie, I missed it. But some shattered impressions remain:
1- John Rhys-Davies is shaping up, no doubt on the Uwe Boll workout plan. This is good, as we can look forward to seeing him battling sabretooths and chupacabras in direct to video films for years to come.
2- The score, whether its trying to lighten the mood with shrieking bagpipes or remind us of how sad it is that Jason Statham is burying his son with a deafening string section, is like Howard Shore conducting for the Lord of the Rings on steroids. Filmmakers: do not put your score-writer on steroids!
3- Jason Statham is and will always be the Transporter, even in medieval times. Just as Burt Reynolds will always be the Bandit.
4- There were ninjas. I think we are all pro-ninja here.
5- Do not feed Ron Perlman chicken.
6- I think that there was some Tolkienesque WWII metaphor going on. I mean, the orcs setting themselves on fire and launching themselves from the catapults are obviously allegorically recalling the kamikaze pilots, right? - DirectorGeorge MihalkaStarsMichael ZelnikerCarl MarotteKaren StephenIt's a summer of fun for two teenaged boys who spend their time chasing two sisters, annoying a biker gang, and basically getting into typical sophomoric hijinks whenever they can.
- DirectorDavid LynchStarsKyle MacLachlanVirginia MadsenFrancesca AnnisA Duke's son leads desert warriors against the galactic emperor and his father's evil nemesis to free their desert world from the emperor's rule.
- DirectorRobert DykeStarsWalter KoenigBruce CampbellLeigh LombardiNASA finds remains of an ancient humanoid race on the Moon that left behind deadly robots."virus" ripped this movie off. Alien cyborgs on the moon plan to *beep* up the earth. But first they have to get through... uh... Ensign Chekhov. Bruce Campbell is squandered. But have you seen a sex scene on the moon before? That could've been the tagline.
- DirectorJohn WatersStarsKathleen TurnerSam WaterstonRicki LakeShe's the perfect all-American parent: a great cook and homemaker, a devoted recycler, and a woman who'll literally kill to keep her children happy.
- DirectorTobe HooperStarsMark McLachlanCaitlin MartinChris SolariEight college students board a houseboat for their spring vacation that promises to be the best of their young lives...how many will survive?sometimes, you're up late, and you turn on the television. This is the sort of *beep* that's playing, one of the unassuming products of an apparent american cottage industry: fake-as-*beep* horror movies about giant CGI animals. So you watch this atrocity, because you are a masochist and in a way, you hate yourself, for reasons various and sundry. And then, something amazing happens. The giant fake CGI crocodile in the movie you are watching shoots out of the water, straight up like a rocket. All pretense of reality is abandoned. Its a moment of triumph and joy, and you sit on the couch suddenly aware of how precious life is. Maybe you decide to quit using cocaine. Thank you Tobe Hooper. You've made life worth living again. that's worth a star and a half, right?
- DirectorJeffrey BloomStarsDavid HuffmanMarianna HillBurt YoungSomething is attacking and killing people on the beach. David and Mariana, old friends, search for clues where they played as kids to uncover the mysterious creature.
- DirectorNorberto BarbaStarsMario Van PeeblesWilliam SadlerBarry CorbinA robot soldier named Solo escapes after learning he will be deprogrammed and helps a village who are under attack by rebels.Van Peebles isn't all that great a lead, but there is some guilty fun to be had here. Sadler is a dependable heavy, and Adrien Brody is in this. Yes he is, and looking properly ashamed, he is. Does memory deceive, or does the android have a flashback where he asks to look "like Mike"?
- DirectorStephen HerekStarsDee WallaceM. Emmet WalshBilly Green BushA group of small but vicious alien creatures called Crites escape from an alien prison transport vessel and land near a small farm town on earth, pursued by two shape-shifting bounty hunters.
- DirectorHark TsuiStarsJean-Claude Van DammeDennis RodmanMickey RourkeAn international spy teams up with an arms dealer to escape from a penal colony and rescue his family from a terrorist.Mickey Rourke's villain gives this film a really entertaining spark, whether he's throwing hand grenades around in a maternity ward or being dispatched by a tiger and a land mine, simultaneously. Everything else is a sort of kinetic blur, so strange your mind can't process what you see. Rodman and Van Damme falling from a plane in a giant basketball? Computer genius monks? Ok, sure
- DirectorTobe HooperStarsKaren BlackHunter CarsonTimothy BottomsA boy tries to stop aliens who have taken over his town and are attempting to brainwash its inhabitants.
- DirectorGordon Parks Jr.StarsRon O'NealCarl LeeSheila FrazierThe daily routine of cocaine dealer Priest who wants to score one more super deal and retire.
- DirectorDario ArgentoStarsLeigh McCloskeyIrene MiracleEleonora GiorgiAn American student investigates the disappearance of his sister and the death of a friend, both connected from New York to Rome by an old alchemy book.
- DirectorMark GoldblattStarsTreat WilliamsJoe PiscopoLindsay FrostA cop is killed investigating a strange case of resurrected corpses. His partner and a pathologist resurrect him, but he only has a limited time before he starts to decompose, and he uses it to chase down the diabolical man who killed him.
- DirectorAnton HoldenStarsRobin LaneAlisha FontaineAnthony MassenaWayward, uninhibited young runaway Kim has fallen in with a bad crowd. She decides to flee them and head to the West Coast to reunite with her uptight, neurotic, estranged older sister Hilary so that she can collect some of the inheritance left behind by their deceased parents. However, evil drug dealer Maury and his flock follow Kim to Hilary's house.
- DirectorGreydon ClarkStarsJoe Don BakerRossano BrazziVenantino VenantiniMaverick deputy sheriff Thomas Jefferson Geronimo is tasked with escorting a mobster to Malta. When the prisoner escapes, Geronimo must capture him.
- DirectorRenny HarlinStarsSteven StraitSebastian StanToby HemingwayFour young men who belong to a New England supernatural legacy are forced to battle an elusive fifth power.
- DirectorTommy Lee WallaceStarsTom AtkinsStacey NelkinDan O'HerlihyKids all over America want Silver Shamrock masks for Halloween. Doctor Daniel Challis seeks to uncover a plot by Silver Shamrock owner Conal Cochran.Irish robots try to kill that guy from The Fog and rot the brains of children with subliminal messages on the tv. As with many a bad horror movie, you could write the whole script down on a cocktail napkin, but your standard horror plot madlib is scrambled a wee bit; too bad this off kilter character is never interesting or even funny.
- DirectorMike MarvinStarsCharlie SheenNick CassavetesSherilyn FennIn a small town in Arizona, a mysterious man/spirit descends from the sky and manifests in a sports car and targets a local violent road-racing gang of motor heads, headed by a ruthless bully who'll do anything to get what he wants.Sheen is a magic alien ghost robot with a super fast car who kills some generic 80's thugs in a heart-warming magic revenge spree. Nick Cassavetes was unfortunately not killed dead enough to spare the world his directorial incompetence. The star is only for Clint Howard. Clint, you're all right. Don't change a thing, Ice Cream Man
- DirectorEd HuntStarsLori LethinMelinda CordellJulie BrownThree children are born at the height of an eclipse of the sun. Ten years later, they begin to murder the people around them - even their family members.This is the bottom of the barrel of the killer-tyke genre, a genre itself at the bottom of the barrel of horror, which in turn is at the bottom of the barrrel of movies (which we all know are bread and circuses for commoners who want to see big robots and farting, though preferably both). As in fellow abysmal child-psycho team-up "The Devil Times Five" there is one set-piece that enlivens the proceedings: there it was the piranhas in the bathtub, and here it is the scene at the junkyard where one ankle-biter dons a white sheet and attempts to run down our heroine in an old car whilst his pint-sized comrade is down on his hands and knees pressing the gas pedal.
- DirectorGiulio ParadisiStarsMel FerrerGlenn FordLance HenriksenThe soul of a young girl with telekinetic powers and her mother become the prize in a battle between good ETs and evil ETs.one to look forward to
- DirectorJamie BradshawAleksandr DuleraynStarsEd StoppardLeelee SobieskiJeffrey TamborIn future Moscow, where corporate brands have created a disillusioned population, one man's effort to unlock the truth behind the conspiracy will lead to an epic battle with hidden forces that control the world.And another.
- DirectorJames NguyenStarsAlan BaghWhitney MooreTippi HedrenA horde of mutated birds descends upon the quiet town of Half Moon Bay, California. As the death toll rises, two citizens manage to fight back, but will they survive Birdemic?Ok, at the end are the ones I haven't seen yet.
- DirectorPatricia RiggenStarsJennifer GarnerKylie RogersMartin HendersonBased on the incredible true story of the Beam family.Another hilariously stupid evangelical feel-good flick? No, please. just one more might make me die laughing.
- DirectorNorman ApsteinStarsClint HowardJustin IsfeldAnndi McAfeePoor Gregory. After being released from the Wishing Well Sanatorium, all he wants to do is make the children happy. So Gregory reopens the old ice cream factory, and all the unappreciative brats are reprocessed into the flavor of the day.
- DirectorWilliam WitneyStarsTrina ParksLejeune RichardsonBettye SweetSyreena must investigate the disappearance of her mother, Cinderella. A series of wild complications follow.
- DirectorD'Urville MartinStarsRudy Ray MooreD'Urville MartinJerry JonesAfter he is released from jail, a pimp takes on the criminals and corrupt police officers who framed him in the first place.
- DirectorDuke MitchellStarsDuke MitchellLorenzo DardadoJim LoBiancoFamed nightclub performer Duke Mitchell is Paul, a paroled gangster with an unholy scheme: to kidnap the Pope and 'charge a dollar from every Catholic in the world' as the ransom. Shot in 1975, GONE WITH THE POPE was unfinished at the time of Duke Mitchell's death in 1981, and finally completed in 2009 from a rediscovered, unfinished print.