Sunday

Two new releases:

A  couple of minor releases from last week's haul at Blockbuster.

Machined is a horror/splatter wannabe that was made with an ultra-low budget, and a strange conception of lighting. Do you remember how indoor home movies were made back in the fifties and sixties? Basically, some very intense track lighting would be directed on the subject to be photographed.  If the room itself was quite dark, the film would look like a harshly-lit person or persons standing in front of a black background. This film cultivates (I guess it was intentional) that same look with digital video, using unlit rooms and spotlight-style lighting. Hey, when you have no money, you have to improvise to give a film any unique pizzazz.

The story is about a fat, bald, hairy mechanic who lives in a cluttered garage in a remote desert. His name is Motor Man Dan, and he's a collector of serial murderer memorabilia. Hey, his mom threw out his baseball cards. Having raised the collection to its practical limit, he dreams of the ultimate acquisition  -  an actual serial murderer. Realizing that he can't just obtain one, and being a technophile, he decides to make one instead. He kidnaps an accident victim and "repairs" him with machine parts. Other machines make the victim into Dan's robo-killer. Assuming you buy into that, you can deduce how Dan uses his new toy. Well, he collects serial killer memorabilia, after all, and this guy is not yet a serial killer, so he had better get crackin' ...

This is a very poor film in many ways, as you might expect from the description and the zero budget, and yet it accomplishes a lot of what it hopes for. Although the pace sometimes slows to a crawl, it is creepy and disgusting, and might leave you feeling that you have to vomit. And I don't mean in the same sense that Glitter makes you want to vomit. It's genuinely nas-tay. The guy who plays Motor Man Dan is a truly gross individual. Think of the once-famous wrestler George "The Animal" Steele. A gruesome atmosphere is created by the flickering lights in otherwise stygian darkness, the clutter, the ominous rusted-out technology, and the ubiquitous buzzing and crackling of electrical shorts.

Surprisingly, the violence isn't very explicit. You'd think the premise would lead to a gorehound's delight, but basically the victims get bound and then stabbed from behind. There is some messy bleeding, but no exposed internal organs, not much shown on camera. (Budget constraints, I guess.)

If the writer/director had had a few bucks at his disposal, he might have created a creepy cult classic like Saw. As it is, it's a macabre curiosity.

 

Nessa Hawkins

 

Don't Tell is an Italian film which was one of the nominees for last year's Oscar for the Best Foreign-Language Picture. It tells the story of a woman who is suddenly overcome with trepidation when her significant other starts to talk about having a bambino. She starts having nightmares about herself as a child ....

The essence of the film consists of her need to understand what caused her sudden psychological breakdown. The general theme of the film is to present the sorts of effects of child abuse which can linger into adulthood. I would have given you a "spoiler" warning about writing that except that there is no mystery for the audience, only for the character. Even though I speak no Italian, I could figure out from her very first nightmare that she was molested by her father when she was a girl. She, on the other hand, has repressed that memory, and spends the entire film trying to discover what we already know.

Although the film has some soap opera undertones and even a gratuitous lesbian sub-plot, there's no sensationalism. The film is sensitive, classy and mature. It's also beautifully photographed, but frankly, that Oscar nomination is difficult to understand. The Academy has many procedures to review in the next few years, and the nominating process for these foreign films should be, in my opinion, at the very top of the list.  You would think that there had to be hundreds of better choices than this. It is rated a dreary 52 at Metacritic, and RT reports that it received only 29% positive reviews - and it was only reviewed by the most serious critics. The film is scored 6.9 at IMDB and only two demographic groups score it higher than 7.1: females under 18, and females over 45. Does that sound like Oscar territory to you? The reviewers noted that this is basically an Oxygen or Lifetime movie, except with better production values and people speaking in Italian. There's nothing very negative to be said about it, but there's really nothing very special or very cinematic about it either, especially given the fact that the audience is not allowed to solve the mystery along with her, and thus spends the entire movie waiting for her to figure out the obvious.

 

Giovanna Mezzogiorno

 

OTHER CRAP:

It's August 20th, and You're on Notice ...




Today's note: Velveteeth? Hey, if ya can't stand da teet', stay outta da bitches.




Welcome to Velveteeth - oral prosthetic designed to "soften the blow"

Man shoots firefighters for not helping cat

"A judge refused Thursday to dismiss a lawsuit that claimed the Angels discriminated against men by giving tote bags to only women during a Mother's Day baseball game."

Eyeful of breast-feeding mom sparks outrage
  • "These readers weren't complaining about a sexually explicit cover, but rather one of a baby nursing, on a wholesome parenting magazine yet another sign that Americans are squeamish over the sight of a nursing breast, even as breast-feeding itself gains greater support from the government and medical community."
  • My own personal opinion: I thought it was discreet, a very sweet picture, and totally appropriate.

A Philippines judge who said he consulted three mystic dwarves has failed to convince the Supreme Court to allow him to keep his job.

Philo Farnsworth: You may not know him, but he invented TV

The World Strip Poker Championship is underway

You know all that stuff YouTube won't let you post? Meet PornoTube

Letterman: "Top Ten Things Overheard Outside 'Snakes On a Plane'"
  • "What's it about?"

An Indian businessman born with two normal, fully-developed, functioning penises wants one of them removed

The trailer for Queens, a Spanish rom-com about gay marriage.
  • "'Queens' is an hilarious, touching and contemporary ensemble comedy that finds five headstrong mothers coping with the personal family conflicts surrounding the impending marriages of their gay sons. As these five very different women deal with their own desires, prejudices and history they attempt to survive the weekend as sex, anger, bigotry and love hilariously clash in this ultimate wedding film about the strength of love and the importance of family."

President Congratulates National Counterterrorism Center Staffers for Making America a Safer Police State (WHITEHOUSE.ORG)

Daily Box Office for Friday, August 18
  • Snakes on a Plane tops a weak day. The box for the top twelve was below 30 million, about 20% below last Friday.
  • Most films were about at expected levels, but Snakes did only $6 million. Experts speculated that it would do $25-30m for the weekend. (Although those were guesses because there is really nothing to compare it to.) Apparently it's not the kind of film which can carry a weekend.

Funny video: The Super(ficial)Friends

Truly "other crap" ... Las Vegas city officials have made it illegal to sleep within 500 feet of shit.
  • The best part of the story: they admit it was a mistake, and here's how they plan to fix it: "City Attorney Brad Jerbic says the council will consider a revised version of the ordinance that shortens the distance between sleeper and deposits." ... "OK, make it 400 feet. Problem solved."
  • Wanted: Johnny "The Garrote" Mancini, for murder, arson, and sleeping 274 feet from doo-doo.
  • Those Vegas cops must have some mighty long and accurate measuring devices.
  • Does it count if you're sleeping and somebody else in the house forgets to flush?
  • So if the police want to arrest you, all they have to do is "plant" some poop near your sleeping quarters?
  • Seriously, are you kidding me?" asked Lee Rowland, public advocate for the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada. "I don't know how on earth a police officer would determine whether someone has knowingly set up shop next to" urine or feces." Another ordinance making it illegal to feed homeless people in parks passed July 19.

It's art, says the naked woman who'll hug a dead pig on stage. (With a GREAT picture from the UK's Daily Mail.) And it's all taxpayer-funded, so if you're near Cornwall, stop by to see what your taxes are being used for.

Police: Dad accused of DUI said his 4-year-old was at the wheel

Man trapped waist-deep in chocolate
  • OK, who remembers the Smothers Brothers reference? He did, in fact, get rescued by the fire department!

Fish N' Flush, the toilet tank aquarium

American Memory from the Library of Congress

Walt Handelsman animated editorial: N.S.A. Wiretapping

 

 

Movie Reviews:

Yellow asterisk: funny (maybe). White asterisk: expanded format. Blue asterisk: not mine. No asterisk: it probably sucks.

 

Wilbur and the Baby Factory (1970)

Wilbur is a USC grad student, a playboy, and owner of a protest clinic. He gets his draft notice, but is given a choice of participating in a non-violent government project that does not involve killing or going to Vietnam.  He passes his physical, completes his training, and then learns that his job will be to father 2,000 babies in two years, but he's not to speak to any of the women he has sex with. It seems that a group of scientists has decided to solve the overpopulation problem by making nearly everyone sterile, then scientifically breeding only excellent specimens. For some reason or another, the scheme is being financed by a dying man with a "penis the size of an average peanut."

Wilbur and the Baby Factory was produced by the softcore legend Harry Novak, and is labeled a comedy at IMDb, but I would call it more of a political satire, or even a sci-fi film.  I was expecting humor, and didn't get any, nor any capable acting, nor story coherence.  5 voters at IMDb score it a bottom-feeding 1.5. I am inclined to agree. Its only redemption is that it is photographed well, thus rescuing it from the dreaded F on our scale. Call it a D.

Shelley Mynatt, as one of his office workers, shows a breast having going away sex with him.
 Larisa Schubert shows breasts and buns testing his physical prowess.
 Several women show full frontal and rear nudity in the "impregnation room."
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

Dann reports on Lady Terminator:

The tagline says it all for this 1988 cult horror flick made in Indonesia: "She Mates...Then She Terminates".

Tania is a anthropological student who is researching the long-dead Queen of the South Seas. During a diving expedition, she is possessed by the spirit of the queen, and surfaces wanting two things: sex and revenge.

She goes on a bloody rampage to find a necklace that has the power to complete her restoration. The necklace is in the possession of a local singer who knows nothing about its history.

Lady Terminator kills everything in sight. She can't be killed herself, and she expends thousands of rounds of ammo on anything that moves, so what's a local hero-type cop to do? Watch the movie and see.

Barbara Anne Constable unknown

 

 

 

 

 

What can you say about a movie that died?  Oh, that's not fair.  Aroused (1966) is not half-bad.  And that's not true...it is half-bad but that means its also half-good and so you wind up paying a price for some entertainment. 

Story starts with a professional gal, played by Marlene Stevens, servicing a client who acts as though he's out on a date.  Treat a hooker like a lady, I suppose.  At her bedroom window is another fella who has a problem with prostitutes...something about his mommy or some such nonsense.  So what does the poor lad do?  He spends his free time peeping on them as they work their craft.  This is something like a vegetarian who hangs out at a steak restaurant watching 'em fry up some dead cow.  Deranged guy kills off Marlene's character, after which he ... uh, well ... has her do in death what she'd done so well in life.  End Scene 1.

Marlene's lesbian lover comes home, finds a guy hovering over the body of her roomie and gets about this close to sticking a knife in him.  A few side notes: 1) This gal is one strange lesbian because she will do a guy for fun later in the movie; 2) The actress playing her is credited as Djanine Lenon, but IMDb says her real name is Janine Lenon...but this is the only movie she ever did, according to them, so how did they know what her real name was?  And since it was the only movie for which she was credited, why not use the name in that one, lonely endeavor?  3) The guy she almost knifes plays a cop who is as big a fuck-up as John Travolta's character in Pulp Fiction.  Not that he blows the head off some guy named Marvin ... no he does things that are way worse.  First he sets up another hooker as bait without providing her with adequate protection.  That woman, played by the gorgeous Fleurette Carter, bites the dust.  Then he screws the hooker played by Djanine after he's sent his wife home with a guy he barely knows and who, as it turns out, is the deranged prostitute killer.  In The Big Apple you do not send a gal home with anyone who is not related to you or her.

Not to worry. The young wife (played by Joanna Mills) survives, then a host of working women get their revenge by removing the bad guy's offending masculinity. Yikes!  A suppose if a guy's gonna eat fried chicken, he's a-gonna get greasy. 

What about the nekkidness?

  • You see Marlene topless in bed, topless in the mirror of her bathroom (no, Doris Wishman did not make this movie) and finally in a triple-B shower performance.  The third, furry B is unintentional and occurs in only a frame or two.  You will find it in the middle frame of her last collage.  Marlene was a real cutie who shoulda done about two dozen more movies.

  • Djanine is topless in a post-coital scene.  Her expression changes as she realizes her cop-lover is a dumbshit. Djanine was also more than sorta attractive ... reminds of me a 70's actress whose name I cannot remember.  She, too, should have had a very long career.

  • Joanna Mills, who plays the wife, gives up some bum and exactly three frames of one nip. I got them all.   Joanna did make several more movies and did a couple of guest shots on TV.  It seems from Aroused and the other of her movies that has been capped ... The Love Merchant ... that she preferred to give up very little on camera.

  • And then there is Fleurette.  Her topless and bloodied body makes an appearance but the "blood" looks so amateurish ... as if she had let a chocolate ice cream cone melt all over her...that I didn't mind doing a couple of caps. 


So there you have it.  No one I know would watch this puppy more than once but lots of people I know would find it worth 75 minutes on a cold night when the cable was down and the streets were frozen over. 
 

Film clips:

Marlene Stevens

Djanine Lenon

Joanna Mills

Fleurette Carter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LC is back from he future again:

 

Allie Smith in Cup of My Blood
Daniella Heidner-Krueger in Cup of My Blood
Janina Gavankar in Cup Of My Blood
Terrina Reese in Cup Of My Blood
   
Danielle Urgas in Synchronicity, Season 1, Episode 2
   
Denice Duff in Dr Rage
   
Elizabeth Hopley in The Last Hangman
   
Florinda Bolkan in La Settima Donna
Sherry Buchanan in La Settima Donna
   
Jennifer Hill in Ice Queen
   
Jessica Gower in  Blade, The Series, Season 1, Episode 8
   
Lorin Becker in Triple Threat
   
Vanessa Ferlito in Shadowboxer
Maria Soccor in Shadowboxer
Scoop's note. This is an extremely controversial scene, because it features an erect, or at least semi-erect,  condom-covered penis from a very buff Stephen Dorff. This is not a sex film, but a legitimate movie starring Helen Mirren and Cuba Gooding, Here's a zipped .avi of the scene, if you are interested.
   
Nikki Reed in Mini's First Time
Svetlana Metkina in Mini's First Time
   
Paz De La Huerta in  Fierce People

 

 

 

'Caps and comments by The Gimp:

When Nextdoor Nikki stripped for Springer a couple of weeks ago I remembered that another teen web model did the Full Monty, plus some, in one adult movie.  She calls herself Sexy Teen Sandy on her website.  Sandra Larosa was the name she used in Who's That Girl?  This first batch of caps is mostly preliminaries, although numbers 16 and 17 show Sandy slurping the love straw. The real action is yet to come.


 

 

 

 

 

Lindsay Lohan. No shenanigans this time, just a day at the beach in a bikini. Look at that weird skin! This woman should NOT ever be in the sun. My dad had the same kind of freckles everywhere on his body. Fortunately for me, I didn't inherit a single freckle.