Erictd Reviews

The Saucy Aussie (1963)

Much of a muchness

[10 August 2001]

The limitations of this drama are apparent to anyone after the first five minutes. The protagonist, a psuedo-post-modern artist from New Reno, makes a show of boredom, the boredom of the outback sands. Day after day, he shows us the same footage of the same sand dunes, shifting, ever shifting. Sand dunes. Oh yes. Myth of the dream...this shows the grim reality!

The audience is left wanting more as Rossi stumbles onto the scene - a nouveau Hitler? Perhaps. Just because he develops a tawdry love affair with Mr Georgiou (at St Pauls) is no excuse for what ensues, a poor substitute for Simon's anger and agression. If this were a real film, Nick would drive home inebriated.

Don't waste your time on this flick. There is only one word - pork.

Sally Marshall Is Not an Alien (1999)

A brilliant but wholly unoriginal film.

[1/10 · 10 August 2000]

The parallels between this film and "Captain Walrus" (an independant film shown at the Team Projection Film Festival in 1994) are so blindingly obvious that any praise for "Sally Marshall Is Not An Alien" must be viewed with the knowledge that it is riding on the success of another work.

In Captain Walrus, two young boys (Geoff and Roger, played by Dean Turner and Brett Allen respectively) examine the bizarre behaviour of their new neighbour Britney (played by Louise Farley). As the two boys watch through their telescope, they observe the repeated visits of a man in uniform who they call Captain Walrus (played by Peter Sargent). However, the emphasis in Captain Walrus is on the pointless and somewhat power-hungry actions of the neighbour Britney, and less on the friendship between the two boys.

A critical success at the film festival, the plot of Captain Walrus has obviously been appropriated and rehashed in order to give the Australian Film Community another notch on the belt with regards to children's product. Although Sally Marshall is not an Alien is a fine film, and a credit to its producers, its inauthenticity leaves something to be deserved.

2020 Texas Gladiators (1983)

If you like this sort of thing...

[7 March 1999]

I found Texas Gladiators (the english version) to be an excellent source of entertainment, but only because it was a piece of purile rubbish. The fact it was made in 1982 only heightens my abhoration of the costumes, which if the words "typical 80's bad guy" do not sum up I don't know what does.

From big things like the absence of a script and/or plot to the little things like labeling a 44-gallon drum with the word "DINAMITE", this film (if we can call it such) made me glad one of my friends paid the rental fee.

Luckily we rented this video in the frame of mind of looking for the worst movie we could find, and I believe we attained that goal in renting Texas Gladiators.