Cannibal Apocalypse (1980)

Giovanni Lambardo Radice and John Saxon are Vietman vets that bring back a contagious virus that turn people into cannibals when bitten. 

 Cannibal Apocalypse is a 1980  horror film directed by Antonio Margheriti, written by Margheriti and Dardano Sacchetti, and starring John Saxon. 

It starts off in Vietnam where John Saxon gets bitten by P.O.W. John Morghen who has been infected with some sort of cannibal virus. A few decades later in Atlanta, Georgia, Saxon wakes up from a nightmare flashback of what actually happened back in 'Nam. Saxon then receives a call from Morghen asking him if he wants to go out for a drink but Saxon refuses remembering the incident in 'Nam. Morghen has turned into a cannibal and is soon on the run after biting into a woman's neck. He barricades himself in a department store and shoots some dudes with a shotgun. The cannibal virus spreads and soon Saxon joins veterans Morghen and Tony King along with some others to wreak some havoc.

 We all know who John Saxon is.  He was in Enter The Dragon with Bruce Lee.  He was Nancy's dad in Nightmare On Elm Street.  And he even showed up in an episode of Wonder Woman.  And apparently he was not too pleased about being in this film. He has spoken out about the film many times. Not sure why with some the shitty films he's been in, but for some reason this one burns his ass. It's actually not a horrible film. At times it is kind of corny and it has the stupidest biker gang in the history of films but it's not horrendous.  To Saxon's credit he does deliver some silly lines with a straight face.

Oops

The film has some cannibals but it falls short of any apocalypse.  It also includes a rather strange scene of a young teenager trying to bang John Saxon.  He goes down on her alright by biting and taking a chunk out of her. I'll give credit to director Antonio Margheriti for trying something different but this film didn't overwhelm me. Apparently Quinton Tarantino loves the film and my taste usually falls in line with his.  In this case it really didn't.

The music is rather cheesy and there are more action scenes than straight horror.  But there are several stand out gore scenes, the most memorable being when Morghen's stomach is blown away by shotgun blasts. Other gore highlights, courtesy of FX wizard, Giannetto De Rossi (Zombie, The Beyond, Living Dead at Manchester Morgue) include - a girl having her breast torn away and eaten, a doctor having his tongue bitten out then spat next to his dying body, a garage mechanic having his thigh sliced like a slab of beef.   If you're a fan of John Saxon or cannibal film maybe this is your cup of tea but it feel flat to me.  I keep going...but..but..but.  Though this is supposed to be an 'extreme gore classic,' it's pretty tame by today's standards.

Damn I'm hungry....

 KB

Quotes:

Captain McCoy: Charlie can you hear me?
Charlie Bukowski: I can hear you. Shitface.

[seeing a cannibal policeman bite a woman's breast]
Captain McCoy: Oh, my God! Put that down, son!

Nothing like an awkward scene of a 16 year trying to seduce a 40 year old man.

Body 19 (2007)

 

Chon is suffering from nightmares. He tries not to sleep because he's scared of a girl that he sees each night in his dreams. In the dreams, the girl screams for help before she is cruelly killed. Ae, Chon's sister is worried about the illusion that Chon sees in his dreams, so she introduces him to a psychiatrist. Chon tries to prove that what he sees is not just the illusion. Finally, Chon is right when some clues in his nightmares lead him to a morgue number 19. And now, the story of the dead body inside the morgue is gradually 

Body is a Thai horror-thriller film. It is produced by GTH, the same production company that made the hit Thai horror film, Shutter. Body is directed by Paween Purijitpanya and co-written by Chukiat Sakweerakul.

I was very impressed with the Thai film Shutter and consider it one of the better Asian horror movies that I've seen.  The same company has now brought us Body 19 and it's damn good.  Like the best movies in Asian horror, this film is at times difficult to understand. But that's also why I love them.  You need to watch the movie several times to catch things that you missed or that didn't stand out on the first viewing.   When you see it again, it becomes "Oh shit...this makes sense now."

Body has parallels to an actual murder case in Thailand, in which a physician was convicted and given the death penalty in the dismemberment of his estranged wife. It's a stunning film visually for the most part.  The one scene that truly stands out is from the museum where the butterflies come alive. But then in other places there is an obvious use of CGI which stands out a bit too much.  The camera tends to take different directions often showing us views that induce paranoia and voyeurism.  But this film doesn't rely on the effects.  It's the story and suspense that make it really stand out.  But isn't that the case with all good movies.  I really don't want to go into too many details of the film because it has a twist and the enjoyable part of these great Asian horror films is not knowing what's coming next. The mystery all leads back to a corpse that is behind door No 19 in the hospital morgue,

The film stars Pae Arak Amornsupasiri as Chonlasit (Chon),  Pang Ornjira Lamwilai as Ae, Kritteera Inpornwijit as Usa, Patharawarin Timkul as Dararai.  The acting is fair for the most part.  However, I felt Pae did a great job as Chon. His slow realization that he may be crazy was excellent.

I'm still here....FIND ME

 It’s a long film….running to 1hour and 58 minutes which could drag for some viewers.  The film does have a slow pace at times.  Small trims could have been made here or there, but not without making the story seemed rushed.  The long running time allows us to journey into the slow descent of madness that Dae sinks into. Asian horror fans will dig this movie....others with small attention spans will probably not. I loved it and my opinion is usually correct.

KB
Trivia
The original title was 'Body number 19', for the international English title, 'number 19' was dropped. This takes much of the meaning out of the title, since the meaning of the body in drawer #19 was the whole climax of the film.

Was in its release year the biggest hit in theaters in Thailand.

About halfway through, we see a woman in a zoologic museum, where many of the animals suddenly show little sings of life (an eye blinking, a tongue slipping from a beak, etc), and gradually the size of the animals increase, from a little snake to a full grown elephant. After that, suddenly a huge dinosaur skeleton is shown. In an Q&A during the International Film Festival Rotterdam, the director of the movie said this was a homage to Steven Spielberg (whom the director is a big fan of), who can, according to the director, make dead animals live again using his imagination.

Body 19

Curse Of The Swamp Creature (1966)

 Deep in the rural swamps of Texas the insane Dr. Simond Trent is conducting experiments on the local swamp people in an attempt to discover the secret of evolution. When a party of oil surveyors comes upon his isolated laboratory he decides to take the final step and turn one of them into a grotesque amphibious creature.

Curse of the Swamp Creature is a 1966 American film directed by Larry Buchanan.  It is a movie where Buchanan proved that he was a master of suspense and horror much like Hitchcock.  Naw...I'm just kidding.  This is one of the worst movies ever created.  The only reason to watch this movie is for the huge amount of laughs you will get.  Much like "Plan 9 From Outer Space" this film is so bad it's good. The performances are bad...alligators hanging out in swimming pools...people doing voodoo dances to curse the mad doctor....a deaf mute girl pushes a guy into the water and somehow it becomes quicksand.  I could go on and on.  Oh and the film also has John Agar...who obviously was intoxicated when he agreed to sign on for this film.

The only view you get of the creature until the final 3 minutes of the film.

The story is as follows.....a group heads into the swamp looking for oil.  They trek through deep marsh after the boat can no longer go on.  They eventually stumble on a mad doctor's house and he's experimenting with creating a man-phibian.  Somehow the doctor has a manicured lawn, swimming pools and a mansion deep in the swamp.  And he finally succeeds in creating his creature, who appears for a couple minutes to wrap up the film and jumps in the pool to get eaten by alligators.  True terror.  And somehow this goofy doctor has a smoking hot wife.  He must have a pecker the size of a large cucumber.

The face of horror.

This movie won't be for everybody.  In fact, it won't be for 95% of Earth's population.  But for those that love shitty movies that are so horrifically bad this is a gold mine.

KB

Son, you're close to being alligator food.

 Quotes:
Tom: Doctor, I was thinking... just the work that you've done with the crocodiles and taking them back along the evolutionary path and making them into fish would be enough to win you world acclaim.
Dr. Simond Trent: Yes, but acclaim... that's nothing. To create life, to move it up and down the evolutionary path... that's something. Something I don't you quite appreciate, Tom.

Dr. Simond Trent: You’re ready. Awake! The sound of my voice is your master!  Get up! Get up! The world awaits you as my first citizen!

Dr. Simond Trent:  Well, Tom – at last you’re going to make a contribution to science! Everyone has his place in the field of research. Tom? Tom, are you listening? Nod your head if you are! You'’e doing fine -–fine! You’re strong. You can stay under water indefinitely. You’re almost bulletproof! I’m envious of you, Tom! Hmm? Are you hungry? How clumsy of me! Let me get you a snack! [He hands ‘Tom’ a turtle] Here, boy! Here!

Dr. Simond Trent:  You’re ready to come off the preserver, and make your debut – my beautiful, indestructible fishman!

Scientist:  How can you look for oil without equipment – seismographs, drilling equipment?
Geologist:  Well – it’s not easy.

I can see everything clearly through these glasses.

Cat In The Brain (1990)

Dr. Lucio Fulci is a director of splatterfilms. He stages a gestapo-orgy like it was any other movie scene. But he is influenced by these things more than he likes. He is hunted by bloody visions day by day. Is Fulci still normal? He asks a psychatrist. He doesn't know that the psychatrist has much bigger problems than Fulci himself. The psychatrist uses Fulci's visions for brutal murders in real life -  Matthias Luehr IMDB

Are you ready for a cavalcade of craziness and chaos?  Just one insane scene after another?  This is the film for you then dear friend.  Lucio Fulci plays himself and after years of making horror movies, he thinks he's going insane.  Basically he starts seeing the craziest shit you can imagine. He goes and sees a shrink who hypnotizes him into thinking he's committing terrible murders when in fact it's the doctor that's getting off on butchering people.  That's the film.  It's as if Fulci decided that he was going to take every crazy death scene he had stored in his mind and somehow get them in a film.  He did....it's just one violent sequence after another and it's very entertaining.  Don't get me wrong....it's a mess.....but an entertaining mess. 

 Fulci throws an insane amount of violence into this film and it surpasses any other film he's ever made.  Just some fun decapitation, child murder, cannibalism and some heads getting chainsawed off.  Oh did I mention the Nazi Orgy. But in reality, I think this was a personal statement film for Fulci and was an attack against censorship. 

The acting in the film is awful.  Fulci is no actor himself but he's actually the best one in the film.  The budget is of course almost non existent but as usual Lucio works around that and creates his demented artistry.  Also after seeing the movie, I don't think it's a stretch to say that Wes Craven stole this idea of a "film within a film within a film" for "New Nightmare".   Granted, I think Craven's film is much better overall...but hey...Fulci deserves some credit for the idea at least.

The shrink needs a fucking shrink.

This is a Fulci film.  If you're a fan....you'll love it.  If you're not...you will think it's trash.  I like Fulci and I approve this message.  The film is way underrated by most horror fans. 

Kevin Booker

Bitch, I said cook dinner.....

Trivia:

This film was refused a video classification in 1999 by the British Board of Film Classification, but was finally passed uncut with an '18' rating in mid-2003.

Many events in the film are based on Lucio Fulci's experiences as a filmmaker. 

The original script was 49 pages long and contained no dialogue. It consisted of descriptions of bodily mutilations/imagery and sound effects that would compliment them on screen.

How about a little Nazi Orgy fun?

A Girl Called Tigress (1973)

Right off the top let me say that Polly Shang Kuan may be the best female fighter in Kung Fu cinema. If not the best, she's certainly in the top 5. Major ass is kicked in this film. She did not get training from the Peking Opera like many of the other female martial arts stars but over the years she got a black belt in taekwando, karate and judo. Kuan could play both a silly female role or a serious role.  In this film she was a serious ass kicker.

Kuan plays a spunky girl looking for her sister. (Also played by Kuan)  She gets into numerous fights with the minions of the local crime boss and makes a friend with a guy (Kam Kong) and when he realizes she's a little short on cash, he puts her up in the local hotel. She eventually finds her sister who is shacking up with the crime boss and they pull a switch since they're twins. The boss discovers the switch and the fighting commences.

I'll whip your ass boy.

The fighting in this film is very good.  It seems to be more karate instead of Chinese Kung Fu.  Kuan has good kicks and an excellent presence whenever she's onscreen...with both her acting and fighting.  Kam is rather weak in the film and wasn't nearly as impressive fighting or kicking. His moves are sometimes clumsy and seem to be lacking in power.  But the best fighter is villain Yasuaki Kurata.  The only problem is he doesn't fight enough. But it's obvious in his fights that he has the better technique and is much more graceful than the rest of the cast.  The blame for some of the short comings could probably be blamed on the action director.  They can easily make or break a martial arts film.

These gentleman are about to get their ass kicked by a woman.

 One surprise for me was Pink Floyd being ripped off and used in the soundtrack.  The chances that they were paid royalties are zero to none.  Sort of strange to see ass kicking and Pink Floyd popping up in the same vehicle.

Overall, this is an average martial arts film but it is an enjoyable experience if you're a fan of the genre. It's a treat to see Polly Kuan kicking so much ass and there are worse ways to spend 80 minutes.

Kevin Booker

Know your role woman...

A Fist Full Of Talons (1983)

Qing I-ming (Billy Chong) joins up with Ding Wei-zhong (Pai Yin) to ward off a final rebellion against the newly-established Chinese Republic. Ding is carrying highly important documents to the government when he is attacked by two men in league with the counterrevolutionaries. When Ding's stolen horse ends up on the block in the marketplace, Qing I-ming notices the animal and assumes that Ding is in trouble. Inspired by his new girlfriend Eagle Woman Ma (Liu Hao-i), Qing is ready for action.

Billy Chong....he was supposed to be the next big action star.  But alas, it never happened.  This however, was easily his best film. When he first appears on screen, he's washing a horse and comments on the horse's huge cock.  Needless to say, I wasn't sure what direction this film was going in at that point. Is this a martial arts film or gay horse porn?  Thankfully there were no more comments on horse genitalia throughout the rest of the movie.

Talons was directed by Sun Chung, who previously had worked with Shaw Brothers Studios.  He has several well known films in the kung fu genre, "Avenging Eagle" and "Human Lanterns".  It also has the legendary Robert Tai orchestrating wire-assisted fight sequences and the fighting mastery of "5 Deadly Venoms" action director Robert Tai.  Even though most releases of this film on DVD absolutely blow in picture quality, this is a pretty damn good kung fu flick.

When I get this coat off, I'm whipping your ass son.

Hwang In-shik’s performance as the lead villain (Ni Sin) is disappointing.  He had masterful performances in "Hapkido" and "When TaeKwondo Strikes", but doesn't really show up in this film until the final climatic fight.  This was also his last major film appearance.

The film has several unusual characters such as a crazy mother fucker called "Little Bandit". Mr. Bandit ends up getting his ass handed to him by the Manchus and somehow makes it back to warn Ding and Yi Min.  Ding then proclaims what a great hero Little Bandit was and gives a mind numbing speech about it. The film copies Sergio Leone's A Fist Full of Dollars in title but it is in fact also a reference to Eagle Woman Ma and her pet eagles.  Chong's character at one point is set up in an arranged marriage with her and when he jets out, she chases after him the whole movie. She even aids in his battle in the climactic fight by sending her eagles to peck out the eyes of the villain.  And in the final shot, which is unforgettable, her eagle is ripped in half by Ni Sin just as Yi Min gives him a kick to the skull.  It's one of those "Holy Shit" moments.

The Climax of the film....not the horse.

 Overall this film has plenty of fights and cool stunt work. The actors are all good fighters and fans of old school kung fu movies will enjoy it. And once again...when he rips that eagle in half....Holy Shit.

Kevin Booker

The 36 Crazy Fists (1977)

A young man decides to learn Kung Fu to avenge the death of his father, a peaceful shopkeeper who was murdered by Manchurian gangsters for not paying protection money. At first he is rejected by his teachers because he is weak, but through persistence, and some help from other students and a mysterious drunk, he learns the skills he needs to avenge his father. - page8701 - IMDB

First off let me tell you right up front....you may see Jackie Chan's name blasted all over the DVD covers for this film but he's not in it. According to Jackie, he was furious about them using his name, but there was little he could do at the time.  He was instead the stunt coordinator. The prints of this film are awful. I'm not sure if there's a remastered version out there somewhere...but most of the releases in the USA are poor quality and look there were recorded right off a TV.  It's also known as : "Bloodpact," & "The Master and the Boxer,"  It is not the fault of director Hua Chen that his movie was pirated and deviously marketed.  The film actually is not that bad.

Leung Siu Hung stars as a young man who is trying to learn kung fu for revenge.  He not only has one teacher...home boy has two.  He must be a super quick learner because he masters shit in a week's time. It has some of the typical marital arts themes....old drunk master, bumbling sidekicks and the girl who sticks her nose into everything. Although the girl does get topless which is not common in such films.

I came here to drink wine and kick ass....and I'm all out of wine

The film has a few good fights such as Fung Hak-on using a chain rope and the climax fight against the white haired villain.  When a guy has white hair in a martial arts film he can kick major ass. It also has a lot of comedy.  Personally, I'm not a big fan of the comical martial arts films. I'm usually rolling my eyes and not laughing very much.  On the other hand, if you're a fan of these older martial arts films then you will probably enjoy it.  As a professional student of kung fu films, I say it's only average.  If I could see a remastered, uncut film I could be persuaded to change my mind.  But this version didn't have me kicking for joy.

Kevin Booker

Jackie coordinating with what appears to be a cigarette in his mouth...now that's bad ass.