It's going to be the best January and February ever! Celebrate Black History Month with BLACK CAESAR and don't forget to bring your sweetie to CRY OF A PROSTITUTE on Valentine's week.
POOR PRETTY EDDIE
JAN 6, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. CHRIS ROBINSON, 1975, 35MM, 92 MIN, R
Everyone who sees this stunning, brain-scraping masterpiece is amazed by it. It tells the story of Liz Weatherly, a famous African American singer played by Leslie Uggams, who sets out on a drive through Georgia to get away from it all. When her car breaks down in a rural area she gets a room at the only hotel in the area. The innkeeper, played by maniacal method actress Shelley Winters, keeps a tenuous hold on her much younger, handsome but evil country singer boyfriend Eddie. Within five minutes of her arrival, he's making advances to Liz and things go way downhill from there. When Liz tries to escape, her way is blocked and the local populace turns from creepy to unbearably horrifying. Directed by Chris Robinson and David Worth but the real MVP is editor Frank Mazzola (who also edited PERFORMANCE and DEMON SEED). He should have won at least an Oscar, and maybe even the Nobel Prize. With Slim Pickens, Dub Taylor and Ted (Lurch) Cassidy. One of the best movies of the '70s or ever. A truly unforgettable experience. AKA REDNECK COUNTY RAPE! (Lars)
KILL SQUAD
JAN 13, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. PATRICK DONAHUE, 1982, 35MM, 85 MIN, R
"12 Hands. 12 Feet. 12 Reasons To Die!" OK, so no prizes for originality in this movie about a group of veterans who get the old platoon back together to come to the aid of their sarge, who's been scammed out of all his money and crippled by bad guy Cameron Mitchell. It's one of the basic templates for shitty action movies. But the whole thing is so cheap and strange that it powers ahead of the pack and becomes really good and even oddly exciting. One of my favorite things about KILL SQUAD is that everybody knows martial arts - a little. They're all probably like green belts, but they're so happy to be in a karate movie that the whole thing has a kind of 'kids playing in the back yard' enthusiasm. So gather up all your friends; the black guy, the Asian guy, the muscleman, the other black guy and the guy with the beard; and come get some KILL SQUAD. (Lars)
LORD LOVE A DUCK
JAN 20, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. GEORGE AXELROD, 1966, 35MM, 105 MIN, NR
A quick glance at the marketing materials for LORD LOVE A DUCK would probably give the impression of another teen-appeal 60's beach party movie, but a closer look at the tagline, "An Act Of Pure Aggression" is sure to leave viewers confused. And sure enough, there's far more here than meets the eye. I'll just dive in. Roddy McDowall plays a sort of genie or guardian angel named Mollymauk, after a type of extinct bird. He magically appears to beautiful, mixed up cheerleader Tuesday Weld and offers to grant her wishes. They all come true - for instance she is cast in a movie called BIKINI WIDOW and lands the man of her dreams, but then they take a bad twist like the fingers on a monkey's paw. Along the way, every aspect of modern American society circa 1965 is bitterly ridiculed. And while such sitting targets as psychoanalysis, bikini beach movies and car culture weren't exactly sacred cows even then, the machine-gun quality of the satire and the churning bile underneath the humor is notable. Writer/director George Axelrod described it as "a non-optimistic get well card. LORD LOVE A DUCK is against teenagers, their parents, movies, cars, school and several hundred other things." The cast is brilliant, with Tuesday Weld in particular giving the performance of a lifetime. Also with Lola Albright and the great Ruth Gordon. (Lars)
LUNCH WAGON
JAN 27, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. ERNEST PINTOFF, 1980, 35MM, 88 MIN, R
In 1980, fun was still a living, breathing thing - Sigh. This movie is the proof. When a trio of ridiculously attractive young women inherit a food cart they find themselves in a clash with a rival mob-controlled roach coach that's a front for gold thieves. LUNCH WAGON is a wild, cheap, anarchic explosion of pure fun. Roseanne Katon (THE MUTHERS) stars with her fellow Playboy playmate Pamela Jean Bryant and statuesque amazon Candy Moore (the model for the Cars' "Candy-O" album cover) as the lovable small business owners who prevail against the bumbling gangsters. The whole movie has the vivacious silliness of a silent Mack Sennett comedy; some gags work, some don't, but they keep flying at you and the good-natured vulgarity of the humor will win you over. Featuring the band Missing Persons (you'll get to hear their song "Mental Hopscotch" a LOT). The director was an Academy Award winner! So it must be good, right? Be there! (Lars)
BLACK CAESAR
FEB 3, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. LARRY COHEN, 1973, 35MM, 87 MIN, R
When writer/director Larry Cohen and star Fred Williamson set out to make a blaxploitation gangster movie they could scarcely have known how successful the fusion of genres would be. The fused figure of mobster and black avenger has become a cultural touchstone and echoes of BLACK CAESAR still resonate loudly today, especially in the indulgent crime fantasies of gangster rap. But even today, Fred Williamson's character Tommy Gibbs stands tall as the coolest mob boss of them all. BLACK CAESAR is a classical tragedy played out on the streets of Harlem, with Williamson bringing the swagger of James Cagney to the story of a kid with a chip on his shoulder who rises to the top of the heap to take the reins of his neighborhood crime syndicate, only to reach just a little bit too far. Williamson exudes pride and swagger - he has the magnetism of a great screen star - and he's a good enough actor to bring off the sufferings of a man who could rule the world but can't convince his mother to take his ill-gotten money. With a ridiculously brilliant score by James Brown, including the theme song "Down & Out In New York City". If you miss this, you're dumber than you look. (Lars)
CRY OF A PROSTITUTE
FEB 10, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. ANDREA BIANCHI, 1974, 35MM, 97 MIN, R
American tough guy Henry Silva carved out quite a career in Italian crime films. His inscrutable, masklike face could suggest a gamut of emotions from rage to merciless psychosis. Here he adds another portrait to his gallery of unstoppable super killers as Tony Aniante, a Sicilian thug trained in the efficient crime methods of the U.S. mafia. When rogue mobsters develop a new technique of smuggling heroin in the bodies of dead children, Silva is brought in by the syndicate to clean up. He insinuates himself into the households of two rival Sicilian capos, then waits for is opportunity. By the time the blood finally stops flowing, both families are crippled and Silva reveals his true motivation. If you think the plot has very little to do with crying prostitutes, you're correct. The title refers to the wife of one of the bosses, a former streetwalker from the Bronx played by the beautiful Barbara Bouchet. Her brutal mistreatment at the hands of Silva pretty much destroys any audience sympathy for him, but he doesn't seem to mind. He still kills everyone in sight and looks cooler than Chet Baker smoking menthol cigarettes in a red Ferrari. From the director of BURIAL GROUND, STRIP NUDE FOR YOUR KILLER and MALABIMBA: THE MALICIOUS WHORE. (Lars)
TERMINAL ISLAND
FEB 17, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. STEPHANIE ROTHMAN, 1973, 35MM, 88 MIN, R
"Where society dumps its human garbage!" At some indistinct point in the very near future, which looks suspiciously like the early '70s, America has outlawed capital punishment. So murderers are sent to a blockaded island to fend for themselves. A new Darwinian social order asserts itself and the few women on the island have a pretty rough go of it - until they decide to fight back. This is very likely the first women-in-prison movie directed by a woman, but it's hardly a chick-flick. Stephanie Rothman, like so many other talented people in the movie business, was given her start in films by the great Roger Corman, who certainly deserves a statue in Hollywood, albeit an inexpensive one. Her films, while every bit as sweaty and violent as those of her male counterparts, always contain fascinating touches of feminine insight. Featuring the glistening naked torsos of Phyllis Davis, Barbara Leigh and Marta "Lost In Space" Kristen. Plus, look for Tom Selleck as a coke-snorting doctor. (Lars)
DELINQUENT SCHOOLGIRLS
FEB 24, MIDNIGHT, $1, DIR. GREG CORATINO, 1975, 35MM, 89 MIN, R
Not just politically incorrect and inexpedient, this movie is wrong. We won't attempt any grand pronouncements about its great sociohistorical merit. There are no excuses offered. It's a movie about three violently insane criminals who escape from an asylum and take refuge in what turns out to be a reform school for girls. The three psychos, a failed nightclub impressionist, a muscular baseball player and a comically mincing homosexual, are funny in a "so unfunny it's funny" way and the actresses playing the students vary from somewhat competent to obvious cue-card readers. It's one of those movies that makes audiences ask afterwards, "was that a real movie?" Strange, stupid, oddly amusing, really a one of a kind piece. The three convicts are played by busy actor Michael Pataki, pioneering black stuntman Bob Minor and Stephen Stucker, the funny gay guy from the AIRPLANE movies. AKA CARNAL MADNESS, BAD GIRLS, THE SIZZLERS and SCRUBBERS 2. (Lars)
Oh, and just so you can get "Mental Hopscotch" stuck in your head even before you see LUNCH WAGON, here it is:
