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Ladies of the Chorus (1948)
Gaybees Oughta ScoreUs
'Ladies Of The Chorus' is objectively a dreadful film, in all technical departments. The camerawork, editing, lighting, direction etc is all at a basic level of 'fundamental' that I'd never seen before in a celluloid film from a big studio.
But then I realised, this was a 'second feature'. To be shown before or after the main event. And it all began to make sense.
Ladies Of The Chorus is fantastic entertainment. It's fast-moving, non-pontificating, and the brisk 'plot' so much as it is establishes and then wraps itself up in under an hour with a predictable but nice twist.
And yes, Marilyn's really good in it.
Wrong Way (1972)
However
This is utter rubbish, but... it does have a certain fascination. I can't begin to comprehend what was going through the cast and crew's minds when they set out to so-called 'film' this desert rape-a-thon with hilariously dubbed-in post-production dialogue.
It is so incompetent on every technical level that it makes 'Love Camp 7' look like a basically acceptable cinematic effort. And that takes a lot.
However, there is something I have to mention. Lots of other reviewers have referenced here about the amount of male nudity, and yes there is tons of it. But, whereas they usually describe grotesque pot-bellied men, a couple of the male cast members do actually have quite reasonable physiques, including nice butts which you get to see a lot of. Hence the two stars.
Ken Park (2002)
Hebe Philia
Let's not beat around the bush. Larry Clark likes filming skinny, geeky young skater boys nude and doing sex stuff.
That this man isn't on some list of dangerous people is incredible. I don't want to think about what kind of stuff he puts his young actors through behind the camera.
This is complete, utter, hand-held camera trash with no plot, characterisation or any other pretence at making a narrative film. It's literally just Larry Clark master baiting whilst directing young male actors to take their clothes off and do sexual things. You can sense through the screen how regretful he his that he has to use over 18's.
Pánico en el Transiberiano (1972)
Handsomely Fascinating
Horror Express is a real curio. Not merely because of the trans-European cast and crew and how difficult that must have made the production.
It's unique plot, that a what is essentially a 'Bigfoot' gets unthawed then goes on a rampage on train across Siberia, is rather genius and certainly I've not seen replicated.
Then having Telly Savalas as a gun-toting gangster on top of all the drama before the train does a 'Cassandra Crossing' is just ingenious. He's there because this film was made in tandem with the Spaghetti Western 'Pancho Villa' made at the same time. That's where the train comes from.
Cushing's deadpan delivery of his lines, especially whilst trepanning a victim, is hilarious. As is Lee trying to play it straight although often seeming on the verge of laughing.
It is, however, hermetically creepy and effective in the sense of being in one locale you can't get out of, and diabolical things happening. In that sense it's very effectively shot and edited.
9 Songs (2004)
Tripe
Utter trash that Winterbottom made purely so he could master bait over the actors getting it on on set.
We're supposed to infer some artistic meaning between the two protagonists attending concerts by 'hip' bands, and them having real sex.
There isn't an interpretation to be made. Winterbottom wanted to be able to film an actor with a big dong doing rude things to a female. That's it.
Production values? There are none. Everything is hand-held shakycam. Probably from Winterbottom's male crew master baiting over what they were filming.
This is ineffable garbage. It's not remotely in any way shape or form a 'film'.
The Other Side of the Underneath (1972)
The blatant side of utter rubbish
This is my second attempt at doing a review.
Okay, this is a supposedly 'avant garde' film, and if you think of Derek Jarman's early features as 'avant garde', consider them like John Waters but without intentional comedy.
This is absolutely laughable rubbish, and having read that it's likely everyone involved was imbibing and ingesting certain substances, that certainly comes across on the waste of celluloid. It's literally just people doing 'free form' freakouts, that are meant to be expressive and deep and meaningful. Unfortunately this just means that there's a ton of nuddy women and an extremely graphic sequence that lasts forever involving some digits.
The main thing I took from this was concern for the number of children that happened to get in the way of the front of the camera, and thus evidently involved in the production of all the drug-taking and goodness knows what milieu.
We're supposed to be grateful that this 'artiste' had her work preserved because her life 'tragically' ended a few years later as she was a drunk. No, this is utter rubbish and whatever 'arts council' or similarly trendy project that threw the confetti money at her to make this has not changed in the subsequent 50 years.
I've got to add. Her attitude towards women is plainly poisonous. Simultaneously seeing them as sexual objects then wanting them to destroy each other. What a disgusting individual.
Lisa, Lisa (1977)
Briefly sharp
Let's get this out of the way, Axe is WEIRD. But in I think, in final analysis, a good way.
It's a piece of regional film-making. I'm not sure what state it's set or filmed in, but the dislocatory sense of remoteness and sunrays are extremely effective. Hardly any of the film's barely more than an hour takes place at night, and when it does it takes you by surprise as you're so used to the sun-baked langourousness of everything.
Nothing is as it should be. The 'villains' dont' behave like gansters are supposed to. 'Lisa' alternately comes across as a Linda Blair-aged child actor but then a cold calculated killer. The catatonic 'grandpa' looks like he's in his 40s and is rather handsome.
It's very abstract and delibarately so. A frequent criticism levelled at it is that it's filled with 'filler' to attain it's barely an hour's running time. However the inventive filming, editing and cross-cutting completely belies that.
Is it a genuine video nasty? Absolutely not. However, the dispassionate way in which violence is prolonged and sadistically presented does give some clue as to why it might have been regarded as problematic.
Midnight Express (1978)
Oh dear, someone grabbed his bum in the shower
Pathetic homophobic trash by a repressed closeted director.
Guy has drugs on him and gets thrown in prison. GOOD. Everyone who does drugs deserves that.
Oh we can't have him doing gay for pay in prison can we. Let's show that in the most homophobic terms, with an actor who was gay and died of AIDS.
Elsewhere digusting depravity, letting him fondle Irene Miracle's tit through the window etc.
This 'director' directs every piece of crap he does like he's directing a 30 second fish finger commercial. All glossy, inconsequential imagery that debases anything 'serious' the script is supposed to be trying to say.
Utter stupid trash.
Martyrs (2008)
Boring tripe
Good grief the adulation heaped upon this load of rubbish.
Okay, the house invasion bit is well enough shot and edited, hence the two stars.
But seriously, then an hour of screaming because some girl gets her skin taken off. Ho hum.
This whole 'French Extreme' horror cinema was already exhausted by the time the three films that made it - this, some zombie/human experiment film I can't recall the name of, plus the incredibly superior in all regards Inside. Inside is genuinely terrifying, disturbing and upsetting, whereas this is just 'cool' shakycam nonsense for the first half then boring Hostel-style glossy gore for the second.
Tommy (1975)
Ultra HD 4K whatever ASAP please
Even by Ken Russell's own standards, Tommy is the most insanely audiovisual cinematic experienence ever. Notice I said insanely as opposed to insane, it's an important difference.
Tommy is ADHD on film. Every single shot is composed with such artistry, such attention to mise-en-scene, even if it lasts a second. Russell was never allowed huge budgets and the level of detail he pulls off here, with regard to location, set decoration, props etc is unbelievable but majestic to behold. I'm astounded by the level of scripting and storyboarding that must have gone into this for even the briefest of shots.
Oh yeah the music. I'm not a Who fan but it's amazing put to film and married with this mind-blowing level of imagery and editing.
Put this masterpiece on LOUD and just sink into it.
Pulse (1988)
Electric Shocker! (sorry if anyone's already used that)
Wow, Pulse, what a great underrated shocker from the 80s.
Unlike rubbish like Amityville Horror, with tricks like blood coming out of walls and all that nonsense, the thing that makes Pulse work is that it's BELIEVABLE.
The tension is built so masterfully, with occasional quick inserts of close-ups of electricy/tech stuff doing it's thing (and sometimes as is the case, undoing it's thing). It reminds me of Dario Argento's close-ups of things like locking mechanisms in Inferno. Each gradual development is logical and explainable in a world outside this being a horror film, but this is a horror film and so it escalates with an expert incremental factor. The camerwork, especially the micro stuff, is unbelievable.
Oh yeah you want plot without spoilers. Boy has to and live with stepparent, they have trouble bonding, then all the horror Sugar Honey Iced Tea happens. Joey Lawrence in an early role acts his socks off and you really believe and invest in him as a central character, as opposed to an annoying kid actor in so many other horror films.
It's a brilliant horror film. I felt a sense of dread and creeping tension increasing all the way through, without any jump scares or gore. I can't think of many films that do that with at least one or the other. There is one truly horrific scene though that probably explains why the BBFC has rated the Blu-Ray '18'.
Shampoo (1975)
Sham POOP
Complete and utter self-congratulatory tripe predicated on Beatty's supposed 'sexiness'. He looks like a ferret that's recently got out from being trapped in a vacuum cleaner.
This film is vile. It's supposed to be 'edgy' and 'daring' and 'adult' in 'new innovating ways'. That basically means some eff words and lots of boobs and flashes of pubis. Even California is shot like an ugly place that only people who wish to catch STDs would lounge around in.
Quite besides the fact that there is no such thing as a straight male stud 'hairdresser', Beatty is a complete dufus that can't even do comedy without cheese.
The female ensemble that lent themselves to this vanity vomit must surely have regretted it the rest of their careers.
Love Camp 7 (1969)
THE actual worst film ever made
This literally is just an excuse for simulating the rape of women by fat ugly hairy unattractive, trousered male cast members.
That's it, plus unsimulated whipping. The 'plot' hardly needs dignifying by anyone looking it up here. As it unfolds between literal carboard backdrops for 'mise en scene' before they can get back to the business at hand, via ungainly and vertiginously leering camerawork.
If that's you're bag then go for it. Just know that you are a sick pervert.
The one 'video nasty' that truly deserves it's UK ban to this day. I really hope every fat, slobby, slavering basturd that was involved in the making of this protozoaic sludge died the most agonising, undignified, lonely, prolonged death possible.
The Fabulous Dorseys (1947)
Fatuous Nobodys
Dreadful tripe.
Prosaically filmed nonsense about brothers learning to concatinate instruments to make a caterwauling sound. Utterly basic in every techincal department, and if you don't like jazz, then, interminably discordant.
It invariably looks poo because it was so awful it had to be independently produced. Therefore you get various PD incarnations of it on DVD. But even this half-decent British DD release can't compensate for the cheapness and literal scissor editing.
Ends extremely disconcertingly with a shot of the 'mother' grinning, worthy of Laura Palmer's 'Missing Twin Peaks' grin at the fan.
Lisa e il diavolo (1973)
Nightmare on Film
After Bay Of Blood, Lisa and The Devil is my next-favourite Bava film, albeit so different in tone.
The 'girl getting lost' sequence is completely haunting and thence grabs you in. By the time characters are ensconced in fog or then creeping down arcanely-lit corridors, it's enthralling and eiedetic.
I could write an essay about the history of the film getting 'lost' and 'replaced' with a tacky remixed version 'House Of Exorcism' (which in itself is ironically still an OK watch).
Thank goodness we have the original, masterly, painterly version to savour. And ALIDA VALLI. Even Sommer is great here in a dramatic role.
Steel (1945)
Superlative historic 'look at life'
Steel is an enrapturing short subject, mercifully rescued from obscurity and restored to its original 3-strip Technicolor glory by the BFI.
It documents the process and production of steel from the mining of the minerals to the molding of the final product. Shot in steel mills, foundries, furnaces and the like, it's incredibly fascinating to see the level of detail that goes into something we all take for granted.
As a film, it's very well shot and very cleverly edited, with attention to rhythm in sequences of industrial pounding and mechanics. I bet David Lynch would have loved this if he's seen it. The colours are something else, evoking their own drama with each stage of the process like the best conventional Techinicolor films of the time did.
The narrator does his job in that typical 40s received pronunciation stoic style, making one long for a return for these sorts of standards to modern TV and film instead of the crudity and commonness we get nowadays.
A fascinating gem.
I comete (2021)
A Corsican Nightmare
Inarticulate characters swear, drink and smoke on Corsica watched by a static camera. It's meant to be some serious art piece 'tableaux' loosely tied together with a predictably PC platonic relationship between an observant old woman and a younger man. Imagine an Eric Rhomer piece full of modern-day crudity and you're about there.
Except... the film has an obvious 'centrepiece'. This consists of a fully naked young blonde curvaceous woman showing off to an 'OnlyFans' type webcam on a secluded beach. In unflinching detail for what seems like 10 minutes, she full-frontally masturbates - FOR REAL (fully shaven of course), starting off by inserting one of those stupid pink 'LoveSense' vibrating things that they all use on Cam sites these days, and then frigging and writhing away whilst the male voyeur talks dirty. And what do we get in counterpoint to this? A few brief shots of a male masturbating, from the side so his 'erection' could well be a prosthetic.
It's completely out of kilter with the rest of the characters' profane but otherwise generally inoffensive, uninteresting musings and dramas. Still, I suppose to construct and get funding for a two-hour 'art' film just so you can get your jollies by filming an attractive young actress debasing herself is quite audacious. Did the parents of the many minors, and also the old woman actress, know that this content was going to be slipped into the film? And in France this 'film' is rated 12.
Last Summer (1969)
I Know What You Did
Four 'teenagers' (ie actors in at least their mid-20s) wander around the beach in as little clothes as possible, until they're allowed by the then-new ratings system to strip off at the end, and thus ensues probably the most offensively pre-meditated rape scene ever committed to celluloid. And to think 'Last House On The Left' got into such trouble just a few years later with a considerably more realistic and sympathetic treatment of that theme.
It signifies nothing on Director Perry's part other than 'Woohoo, let's go for it'.
Tripe, aside from anyone willing to skip through the plot bits for the views of Richard Thomas's basted, pasted-on beach shorts body.
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)
I feel bad only giving a 7...
...but when you call your film 'The Texas Chain Saw Massacre', and spend nearly 40 minutes not having anything to do with massacre of any sort, it kind of shows and slows. Dead armadillos, albeit beautifully shot, and Southern psychos cutting their fingers don't really fan out intrigue and suspense.
That said, the film is consistently beautifully shot. The rural atmosphere is pellucid, you can almost feel the languorous heat through the screen. Anyone who says you can't make 16mm look good is frankly an idiot.
Once we get into 'the house' however - and sadly, it takes William Vain who is rather tasty to be offed first - holy hell. We get a relentless third act of psychopathy, screaming and dissonance that barely lets up and is just a sustained assault on the visual and aural senses. Without a drop of bloodshed, I might add.
Tobe Hooper infamously thought he could get a 'PG' for TCM, on the grounds there is no profanity, nudity and practically no gore. To be fair, I would be inclined to agree with him that these days, this would be a perfect 'scary film' to induct 12-year olds to (in the UK, 12 is our lowest age rating). Thinking back to when I was that age, they would enjoy the 'spooky' atmosphere of it whilst the more adult-attuned cerebral terrorisation would go over their heads.
To sum up, it's a film of two halves. A boring but beautiful first half, then a sustained exercise in the vicarious effect of tormented screaming for the second. And as cheap a method as that sounds, it still works very bloody well.
Sweet Movie (1974)
Far from sweet, but surprisingly OK on a second look
Let's cut to the chase. No-one is going to come across 'Sweet Movie' by now unless they've been put on the trail by 'grossest movie ever' etc content.
And it is. All human imperfection is here.
Notice I didn't say depravity? Because now, in the 21st century, with the absolute dissolute violent, profane, CGI-ADHD-shot garbage catering exclusively to the non-existent attention-span set, there is no longer depravity.
There's only one sequence in this film that will never be topped for depravity in the modern era. It depicts the nearest it can get to not crossing the line that I'm sure if you're reading this you already know what I'm referring to.
Elsewhere, ALL the previous taboos 'broken' by this film have long since been subsumed into the mainstream, in one guise or another.
So what does watching it actually feel like? Well, as quotidian as it sounds, 'episodic'. It literally flits between two barely-linear 'storylines' on the grounds of essentially having to complete a feature film where one of the two main actresses wouldn't co-operate any longer.
What's it trying to say? Who the hell knows. In a way it's no longer important, since the political and cultural 'statement' epoch that it was conceived in is now long a thing of the past, and so its terms of reference now are was it necessary?
If you take the 'art' argument then that's a no-brainer. It certainly is a constructive work of cinema, the very nature of filming and aesthetically displaying the abhorrent simply to push the boundaries of the medium is an objective in itself. But is it 'simply' for that? No.
You'll have to ask Makavejev.
Anyway, if you're a fan of offbeat, surreal, extreme cinema, it's worth a watch once, then a second time to try and be more rational about it. Forget the diegetics, and it's just a celluloid experience, that looks pretty damn good on all technical fronts, even when the actual events depicted are far from visually pleasing.
...E tu vivrai nel terrore! L'aldilà (1981)
Far Beyond the Video Nasty List
I'm with those that proclaim The Beyond to be Fulci's best genre film. I think Zombie Flesh-Eaters is an equal contender, in the film-making stakes, though they are narratively so disparate that I have to class them as separate entities.
What works well:
The widescreen photography is stunning. Depicting past, present or 'unknown', it's put to spectacular use. The set design, transitions and colour contrasts are almost constantly sensitive. The great emphasis on physically ugly 'muck' in one scene, beautiful mise-en-scene in the next.
For even those who grew up first seeing the film on pan-and-scan VHS, the shot of Liza 'encountering' Emily on the Causeway is one of the greatest enigmatic shots in all of cinema. It is also juxtaposed so cleverly and meaningfully with Joe the Plumber's eye-gouging, subsequently meeting a 'blind' character.
Most of the gore. There are a couple of ropey effects shots, especially revealed more so in HD, but it doesn't detract from the film's charm by which time the first of them (Joe's eye-gouging), has already been solidified when it occurs. The compelling atmosphere is already built.
Catriona MacColl. She gives the arguably best of her three Fulci performances here, and makes a very sympathetic heroine who sadly meets her most tragic end in the Fulci trilogy.
David Warbeck. He is so cheeky, handsome, ironically 'playing it straight' (given he was gay), and the subtleties of his own-added humour are there for the eagle-eyed.
The dislocation. Without giving away the ending, The Beyond is all about reality vs conscience constantly blurring and intermingling. The film is extremely clever in presenting its narrative 'as is', when such disorientating moments occur, so as to make us question whether we are the ones who are perceiving these 'wrong' things wrongly. Fantasy sequences are evidently fantastical, but even in the film's quieter and more subdued moments, a non-sequitur will be thrown in here or there, sometimes almost imperceptibly.
It's very much like having one of those 'vivid' dreams where the rules of physics don't apply, and you know you're not asleep but not quite awake either.
What doesn't work well?
Not very much.
As stated, it does have some ropey effects shots that could potentially take an unseasoned viewer out of the atmosphere. Then there's the perennial dubbing dilemma for those who can't suspend disbelief. Finally, it doesn't make any sense. That's not a criticism for me, but for so many approaching the film not realising what they're getting into, and so attuned by today's film and TV rubbish to expect completely linear storytelling, they'll likely switch off straight away.
Overall, The Beyond is a very-near masterwork that would earn its director a place in canon.
Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977)
Dreadful Tripe
I came across this whilst rationalising my collection of VHS recordings.
Good grief is this bad.
Endless scenes of Diane Keaton embarrassingly naked, for 'art'.
Foul language, drug use, grungy milieu.
Non-existent character exploration, just scenes filmed 'as is' around the sex and drugs episodes.
A terrible film, and one which contributed to the 'liberated' cinema of graphic sex, drugs and language we have today.
Yes, the 'ending' is well-shot technically. But it is happening to a character with no redeeming features, save a few perfunctory short scenes of her doing her day job as a special ed teacher. The sad thing is that whilst visually shocking, it's an effort to care.
The Beast in the Cellar (1971)
Interesting Beast
Sometimes a film just captivates your imagination. I first saw The Beast In The Cellar when I recorded it off late-night British TV, in 1992. I've since watched it in it's Odeon DVD incarnation, and it still resonates.
It may not be shocking, surprising or horrific, but I just 'enjoy' this film. The interplay between Beryl Reid, who was only 51 at the time but playing much older, and Flora Robson, represents the ending era of traditional British actresses in traditional British films.
This film has spectacular photography. The credits shot of a crepuscular sunset is unsurpassed, combined with the evocatively non-lyrical theme. It is the best shot of a sunset over British countryside that I have ever seen.
The story is admittedly weak once we find out that the sisters know what they know. However, their resolve to try and keep up their 'secret' is humanistic and done well.
The 'inserts' of gore are very brief and very effectively vivid. I think for once it doesn't harm a film.
The finale of 'the monster' coming up the stairs for the sisters, largely done in 'Nosferatu' style until a last shot, is very creepy.
In short, this isn't a great film, and impatient 'Netflix' viewers will find there's a lot of talk and little 'action'. However, the drama confined to the house between the two sisters is fascinating in itself; uncovering the mystery of the dynamics between them almost becomes the thing to 'solve' rather than the 'Beast' issue.
A film I could watch again and again, albeit leave a few years between each viewing.