EDITOR’S NOTE: Pandemonium was on USA Up All Night on January 14 and April 30, 1989; March 2 and September 28 and 29, 1990; March 22 and April 7, 1991.

There was a time, let’s call it 1983, when we couldn’t just sit down and instantly find any single movie from anywhere in the world and at any point in time. You might think that that would have been a dreary existence, but it was actually kind of awesome. You were at the mercy of the HBO Guide, whatever was on TV that day and whatever new releases were in your video store. Now, it’s all very robotic.

Pandemonium is exactly one of those movies, a film that would just show up on HBO to my delight and one that I’d often stare at on the video shelves. Did it belong in horror? Did it belong in comedy? What kind of maniacs would make this?

Alfred Sole, that’s who. It’s the last movie he’d direct. If anyone knew what slashers were — and had the timing to make fun of their conventions — the director of Alice, Sweet Alice was more than up to the task.

Welcome to It Had To Be, Indiana. It’s a place where football is king, and Blue Grange (Tab Hunter!) wins the 1963 National Championship before he goes on to professional glory. As the game ends, Bambi the cheerleader (Candy Azzara, who played Rodney’s wife in Easy Money and was almost Carol — she was in the second failed pilot — on All In the Family) tries to win his heart before the rest of the cheerleaders kick her out. Seconds later, they’re all skewered together by a javelin.

Almost two decades pass, and the cheerleading camp remains closed due to this tragedy, but Bambi comes back to town to start it back up. I just love how the words EXPOSITION and STILL MORE EXPOSITION flash on the screen while she explains her backstory to Pepe (David Landers, who was Squiggy on Laverne and Shirley) and his mother, Salt.

As each student arrives at the school, they’re labeled VICTIM #1, #2, #3, and so on. The first is Candy (Carol Kane!), who is basically Carrie as she gets into a fight with her mother about dirty pillows at the bus station.

Then there’s VICTIM #2: Glenn Dandy (Judge Reinhold), who comes from a strange family made up of Kaye Ballard (who was in Spike Jonze’s traveling group of musicians and would use her catchphrase “Good luck with your MOUTH!” on shows like The Patty Duke Show and The Perry Como Show) and Donald O’Connor from Singin’ In the Rain. And VICTIM #3: Mandy, whose dad (James MacKrell, who played Lew Landers in both Gremlins and The Howling) introduces her as if he were Bert Parks (look for Victoria Carroll from Nightmare In Wax as her mom).

VICTIM #4 is Sandy (Debralee Scott, Cathy Shumway from Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, a show that probably will elicit blank stares from, well, anyone), who gets a ride from Ronald Reagan. And then there’s Andy and Randy, VICTIMS #4 and #5, played by Mile Chapin (Richie from The Funhouse) and Marc McClure (Jimmy Olson himself!).

“Candy, Mandy, Sandy, Andy and Randy,” they all shout.

“And me, Glen.” Everyone stares at Glen.

“Glen Dandy!” This line makes me laugh like a maniac. Look, I was 11 when I first saw this.

After meeting all of these folks, we get to know Sgt. Reginald Cooper (Tommy Smothers), a Mountie who is in the U.S. for some reason. He’s on the trail of a convict named Jarrett (Richard Romans, who provided voices for Heavy Metal), who killed his family with a drill and turned them into bookshelves. Perhaps he can meet up with The Breather from Student Bodies, and they can discuss bookends. Anyways, he’s escaped and Warden June (Eve Arden, Our Miss Brooks and Principal McGee from Grease) has no idea where he’s gone.

This is where I should mention that Johnson, Cooper’s assistant, is played by Paul Reubens in an almost proto-Pee-Wee Herman mode. In fact, much of the cast are Groundlings, so you get appearances by a young Phil Hartman and John Paragon as a prisoner.

The movie turns into a slasher as the killer makes his way to campus, and Cooper falls in love with Candy. Glenn gets blown up on a trampoline. Mandy is trying to brush her teeth for hours when she gets drilled.

But it’s not Jarrett or another killer named Fletcher or even Dr. Fuller from the mental hospital that’s behind it all. The real killer is still at large, with Bambi getting drowned in a tub full of milk and cookies. Randy, Andy and Sandy are killed after a game of strip poker. And now the killer is after Candy, revealing that he’s…

Well, don’t you want to watch this for yourself?

Other notables that show up are Alix Elias (Coach Steroid from Rock ‘n Roll High School), Pat Ast (Edna from Reform School Girls), Don McLeod (T.C. Quist from The Howling), Edie McClurg (who was in, well, any role that needed a funny redhead mom in the 1980’s) and former pro wrestler Lenny Montana (who was most famously Luca Brasi in The Godfather).

Will you like it? Well, I know some people who love Full Moon High and Wacko, while I dislike those films. And I’ve read plenty of folks online who have negatively compared this film to those. But this is just so much better, in my eyes. Sole has a great eye for a gag and some innovative camera movements. And despite the racism of the Japanese Airlines scene, having Godzilla as a stewardess who uses atomic breath to warm up coffee is still hilarious to me.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Sword and the Sorcerer was on USA Up All Night on April 29, 1994 and May 9, 1997.

King Cromwell (Richard Lynch, Bad Dreams, God Told Me To) has come the whole way to Tomb Island to find Xusia (Richard Moll, contractually obligated to be in all 1980’s sword and sorcery movies, although a bad reaction to the contacts needed for his makeup caused Moll to only physically appear in the opening scene), a dead sorcerer who holds the key to defeating King Richard.

But Cromwell realizes that Xusia will turn against him, so he stabs the demonic magician and chases him off a cliff. He doesn’t need him any longer — he’s destroyed all of his enemy’s army. Prince Talon arrives just in time to watch his father die, but doesn’t lose his family’s sword, a triple-bladed number that shoots blades. He’s going to need it to avenge the deaths of his mother and father.

Eleven years later, Talon (now played by Lee Horsely, TV’s Matt Houston) leads a group of mercenaries back to the country of his birth, ready to get his revenge. And oh yeah — Xusia is still around.

Cromwell attacks the city of Edhan, taking Prince Mikah (Simon MacCorkingdale, Jaws 3D) captive and nearly getting his sister Alana too, before she is saved by Talon, who also agrees to rescue her brother if he can have her for one night.  Of course, as soon as our hero leaves, Alana gets taken by Cromwell.

Talon rescues Mikah, but is captured by Cromwell, who forces Alana to marry him. He invites the four neighboring kings to the ceremony, where he crucifies Talon (obviously Conan the Barbarian was an influence). But our hero is insanely strong, and he pulls himself off the crucifix as Mikah and his soldiers attack the castle (one of them, Phillip, is Reb Brown from Yor, Hunter from the Future).

Cromwell takes Alana to the castle’s dungeons, where his second-in-command, Machelli, reveals himself to be Xusia. Talon uses his sword to defeat him, then bests Cromwell in mortal combat. Finally, a giant snake attacks Alana, but Talon saves her and defeats Xusia again.

Talon might be the rightful heir, but he gives his crown to Mikah, then gets what he really wants: Alana. After a night of what we can only imagine is some solid cocksmanship (and perhaps a marital aid that works just like his sword), he and his men do a collective group walk of shame as they head out looking for a new adventure.

The end of the film promises “Watch for Talon’s Next Adventure Tales of an Ancient Empire,” but a sequel would not appear until 2012.

Despite being rated R, the cheapo toy company Fleetwood released both miniature figures and a replica sword from the film!

EDITOR’S NOTE: Joy of Sex was on USA Up All Night on June 17, 1994; February 11 and October 27, 1995 and February 17 and April 12, 1996.

Did everybody’s parents have a copy of Dr. Alex Comfort’s The Joy of Sex? What a frightening book that was, what with its Chris Foss (Flash Gordon, Guardians of the Galaxy, Jodorowsky’s Dune) illustrations of incredibly hairy flower children engaging in all manner of marital congress.

Paramount Pictures thought that with the name of the book, they’d have a big movie, too. They spent all kinds of money to get the right and then paid Charles Grodin — who was told the movie could be about anything — to write the script. So he wrote a script about writing the script. That movie was eventually made as Movers & Shakers.

Next, John Hughes was to write a script that Penny Marshall would have directed and John Belushi would have starred in, but then Belushi died. That would have been a National Lampoon movie, and the studio tried to keep their name on the film before the publisher, Matty Simmons, made a huge deal of the Lampoon having nothing to do with the film.

Finally, Paramount was running out of time, with just four months left on its option. They went to TV producer Frank Konigsberg, who said, “They knew that in television you do things quickly. We threw together a script. They wanted me to use director Martha Coolidge, who’d just made Valley Girl. It was a job. We just had to get it done. I didn’t think it was a successful movie at all. It was awful. Martha hated it. I hated it.”

As for Coolidge, she would say, “Paramount insisted on topless girls running down the hall because they thought the formula demanded it, and it was totally gratuitous. I hated putting them in for no reason and argued against it. But when the film was previewed, the audience, particularly young women and girls, hated the nudity, so Paramount then asked me to cut as much of it out as I could!”

She described that experience as miserable, telling her official site, “We were under constant pressure and scrutiny to do the impossible, we had eight days of prep, 20 days to shoot, and my A.D. quit because he was so angry.”

By the end, she applied for an Alan Smithee credit for her directing. However, her name stayed on. She’d follow it up with Real Genius, which I hope was a more rewarding experience (It was — despite turning it down twice, once it was rewritten, she came around to the film and really got into it after producer Brian Grazer told her, “Making a movie should be fun!” She said that he ended up being “supportive, great to be around and knowledgeable about comedy and film production.”).

As for the movie, it’s all about high school senior Leslie Hindenberg (Judy from Revenge of the Nerds, who left acting to practice Zen Buddhism), who gets a mole checked and learns she only has six months to live. That leaves her with one goal in life: to lose her virginity.

There’s a good cast with Cameron Dye (Valley Girl, Out of the Dark) as the love interest and Christopher Lloyd as Leslie’s gym teacher dad, plus Colleen Camp, Ernie Hudson, Darren Dalton and Canadian scream queen Lisa Langlois (Happy Birthday to Me, Deadly Eyes).

But otherwise, if you were expecting something better, this isn’t it. I don’t blame Coolidge for this film’s failure.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Barbarella was on USA Up All Night on January 23 and October 9, 1993 and November 19, 1994.

Shot directly after Mario Bava’s Danger: Diabolik, this Roger Vadim-directed movie is based on the comic book of the same name by Jean-Claude Forest. The film stars Vadim’s then-wife Jane Fonda as Barbarella, a United Earth agent sent to find scientist Durand Durand, who has created a weapon that could destroy humanity.

Vadim was hired to direct this film after producer Dino De Laurentiis purchased the rights. This led to Vadim looking to cast several actresses in the title role, including Virna Lisi, Brigitte Bardot (that’s who the character was originally based on) and Sophia Loren before ending up picking his wife.

In case you’re wondering why this movie is such a mess, Charles B. Griffith was the last writer to work on it, saying that he had done uncredited work on the script after fifteen other writers — including Terry Southern — worked on the movie.

This film is packed with fashion, amazing sets — you can credit Bava’s film for some of that, and great characters, like John Phillip Law (who used the break in shooting to be in the aforementioned Danger: Diabolik) as Pygar the angel, Anita Pallenberg (Performance) as the Black Queen, Milo O’Shea as Durand-Durand, Marcel Marceau in a rare speaking role as Professor Ping, David Hemmings (Deep Red) as Dildano and even cameos from Fabio Testi and Antonio Sabato (who was originally to play the role that Hemmings ended up doing).

So yeah. This is a gorgeous film that makes no sense whatsoever. Is that such a bad thing? I first watched this as a child on HBO and I think when the part came in which the birds tear apart Barbarella’s clothes, my parents decided that it was time for me to go to bed. I was hooked on movies that were seen as being wrong for me to watch and Italian-shot films.

A sequel was planned with producer Robert Evans called Barbarella Goes Down, but it never happened. Nor did a 1990 remake, a Robert Rodriguez idea or a potential project with Nicolas Winding Refn, who moved on to other projects, saying, “…certain things are better left untouched. You don’t need to remake everything.”