EDITOR’S NOTE: Seeing as how this week belongs to Mark Lester, who am I to deny bringing back this article, originally from August 9, 2019, all about trucks, the mob and Claudia Jennings?

Why would I be awake at 2:51 AM on a school night watching a movie called Truck Stop Women — as well as Road Angels — when I could just as easily be in bed? Well, some would say it’s a devotion to our readers who demand to know more about mid-70’s truck driving action films. But we all. know it’s because this movie has Claudia Jennings in it and that name is enough to make me say, “Well, I’ll at least watch this for a few minutes.” Before you know it, the sun is coming up and I’ve spent all of my beauty sleep hours watching the dearly departed Ms. Jennings skate roller derby or fight the syndicate or play post-apocalyptic games with David Carradine. Tonight is no different.

What can you say about a movie that starts with two gangsters assassinating a naked couple in a bathtub? You roped me in again, Mark Lester, director of Commando, Firestarter, Class of 1984, Bobbi Joe and the Outlaw, Roller Boogie and so many other movies that have also kept me awake late into the small hours.

Anna (Lieux Dressler, Grave of the Vampire) runs a brothel for truckers — yes, there was once a thing and I bet there probably still is — in New Mexico. He daughter Rose (Jennings) is one of her girls (so is Uschi Digard!) but she’s tired of her mom running her life and dreams of more money, so she starts working with the Eastern Mafia — led by Smith (John Martino, Paulie Gatto from The Godfather) and Rusty (Speed Stearns, Eat My Dust!)  — to take over the racket.

Oddly enough, $15,000 of this film’s budget came from politician Phil Gramm. There were some articles that made a big stink about it being an adult film, but it’s honestly softcore at best.

Look, any movie where Claudia Jennings yells, “Would Jackie Onassis eat chicken fried steak!?” is going to be one that I end up watching. Whether or not you have the same bad taste as me will determine whether or not you should watch this movie.

Does it help if I tell you that the entire movie stops dead for a montage of an 18 wheeler going across the entire country to the tune of “I’m a Truck,” sung from the POV of the truck itself? Because wow, that totally happens. Hey — Dennis Fimple is in it, so maybe you really should stay up all night. I know that I did.

You can watch this on Tubi and Amazon Prime.

Thanks again to my friend Hoss for finding this one — early Mark Lester is not easy at all to track down!

Lester was able to get a bunch of stunt drivers — Dusty Russell, Buddy Love, Gene Drew, Dutch Schnitzer, Speed Stearns, Ed Ryan, Big Tim Welch and Dan Carter — and instead of making just a clip collection of stunts, he created a narrative around all the car damage.

Lester told The Pink Smoke, “I was at the Sacramento River on vacation, just river rafting. I ran into a group of guys there who looked like Hell’s Angels. And I said ‘What do you do?’ They said “We’re the Circus of Death.” They traveled the circuit putting on shows. So I went to some of those and just thought, “Wow.” Originally I wanted to make it as a documentary, then I realized “I know all the real people, I’ll just write a narrative around it.””

He also called this movie a post-Vietnam parable, with gladiators in cars. Kind of like Knightriders, except eight years earlier and no one holds Lester in the same esteem as George Romero. Well, you know. Except me.

I really dug the rambling nature of this film, as well as the open ending. If you can find it, take the time to enjoy it.

Las Vegas cab driver Jerry Logan (Andrew McCarthy) discovers a stolen million dollars. Before he gets to use it, he’s hunted down by a relentless and cold-blooded assassin (Scott Glen).

How brutal is Glen? He boils McCarthy’s feet so he can’t run away, but he still gets to a hospital in time and falls for his nurse (Janet Gunn, The Quest). As for the boiled feet, you should know better to get into a cab driven by John Glover. I kid — I love that guy and he brings something great to every role, whether it’s Daniel Clamp in Gremlins 2 or A.J. in Ed and His Dead Mother.

Wayne Newton is in this, which makes sense, as he didn’t have to leave Vegas.

Those who watch the credits — hello, I’ve sat in sparse theaters with you — will notice that Alfred Sole did the production design for this movie. Yes, that’s the very same Alfred Sole that made Alice, Sweet Alice.

You can watch this on YouTube.

Sooner or later, Mark Lester and Eric Roberts would have to unite and bring their dual direct to video magic to bear. This would be one of those times and it would not be the last.

Here, Eric is former mob hitman Tony Lazorka, who has become John Dugan in witness protection after he refuses to kill someone. He’s in witness protection which is more like witless protection. And the mob is back on his trail, which is how these things always go. Where’s Arnold ready to erase people these days?

Roberts gets screwed over by a hacker, who we know is a computer wizard because he rides a skateboard and is a general malcontent. He’s played by Esteban Powell, who was in Dazed and Confused and Powder before this. He cannot have been more annoying than he was in this movie and I didn’t want his poor father (Eric Poppick, who always plays nosy neighbors and put-upon doctors; witness Single White Female and Problem Child) to ever find him again. Having the mob kill you would be a better fate than enduring one day with this keyboard kid.

C. Thomas Howell plays a fed, Farrah Forke makes an appearance and plenty of people only I would get excited about are in this, like Damian Chapa (dude, the guys IMDB bio is bonkers; he name drops growing up in a bar across from Larry Flynt’s first Hustler club, then talks about how The James Dean Foundation picked him over Leo for a biopic before they were all murdered, yet he neglects to mention that he played Ken in Street Fighter), Pittsburgh native Lindsay Taylor and Joe Viterelli, who was in the aforementioned Eraser and was a dependable mob character actor, appearing as Jelly in the two Analyze This movies, as well as Mobsters, Bullets Over Broadway and Mafia!

You can watch this on Tubi.

EDITOR’S NOTE: As we celebrate a week of Mark Lester’s films, let’s go back to June 12, 2019 when we shared this epic of skating. 

I’m here to tell you that in my small hometown that the Ellport Roller Rink was the biggest deal when I was seven years old in 1979.

While dead today, this was the front of the Ellport Roller Rink.

I bet you can guess that your author spent more time playing that Gorgar machine than skating.

Most Friday nights and plenty of birthday parties were spent there, rolling around the track that seemed huge as a child but was probably impossibly small were I to see it today. That’s why if someone watches 1979’s Roller Boogie they probably will laugh at its charming anachronisms and wonder if this could have ever been the real world. It was. I am here to tell you, on some small level, when I was a chubby seven-year-old, my birthday party was my parent’s approximation of this film. Also: I got a Rodan doll, so I’ll say that that was my best birthday ever.

Roller Boogie concerns Terry Barkley, rich girl classical flutist (this makes the third movie in a row I’ve watched where Linda Blair’s family just ignores her) and Bobby James (real-life roller skating champion Jim Bray), the man who she hires to train her to be a skater. Also, Terry drives perhaps the greatest car I’ve seen in a film, an Excalibur Phaeton. Luckily, IMDB informed me that it’s actually an Excalibur SSK, which ended up being an overpriced, hard to drive kit car cover version of a Mercedes SSK that cost way more than it should have.

They’re from different sides of the track, the rollerskating track that is. Both of their respective sets of friends and family make fun of them for falling in love as they’re obviously not made for one another.

Sadly, Jammers, the club where everyone skates, is about to be sold to the mafia to pay off a debt. This means that a fancy party gets ruined and a bunch of rollerskaters have a massive chase sequence. Then there’s a Boogie Contest before Terry goes to New York to be the queen of the flute and Bobby goes to the Roller Skate Olympics.

This is the kind of movie where a DJ leans into a mic and says, “It’s time to play you some of that new sound.” Where people lift on Venice Beach. Where more time is given to people leaping on their skates over barrels than character development. Where Linda Blair wears skimpy outfits and bikinis in the film that’s amazingly her last studio film, yet she continues to act today. Impossibly, it looks gorgeous, which I contribute to the talent of Dean Cundy, the director of photography whose magic helped make Halloween stand out so much.

Roller Boogie was written by Barry Schneider, who also wrote two movies based on hit songs, Harper Valley P.T.A. and Take This Job and Shove It, as well as Ruby, Deadly Force and Class of 1984. Irwin Yablans, who produced Halloween and Tourist Trap, helped create the story and also produced. And director Mark Lester would go on to helm Class of 1984, Class of 1999, Commando and Firestarter.

This movie was a success at the box office and a sequel — Acapulco Roller Boogie — was proposed before disco died. If you’re still in the mood for roller skating movies, however, I can also recommend Skatetown, U.S.A., which features Scott Baio and Patrick Swayze on wheels with Flip Wilson, Maureen McCormick, Ron Palillo and Ruth Buzzi providing the laughs and the love.

This movie came at a crossroads in Blair’s life. She had to fly to Florida right after filming ending to face cocaine possession charges and thought that this film would remove her from being typecast for intense horror fare. However, the very next year, she’d star in Hell Night.

PS: Becca has an eagle eye for movie locations. Terry’s house was also used in the music video for The Cars’ “Magic” and the movie Blind Date.

You can get it from Olive Films.

Dennis Fimple played many roles. Many here would know him as Grandpa Hugo in House of 1000 Corpses or saw him in Creature from Black Lake. Here, he’s Bob Haldeman, just one of the many White House members caught up in this satire of Watergate, directed by Mark Lester.

It’s also the only movie I can find with Steve Friedman in it. He plays a really bad Nixon in it, who talks to stuffed dogs and has the worst prosthetic nose ever. But that said, Grandpa Al Lewis plays Judge Sirica, who is called Judge Cirrhosis here.

White House Madness was written by Sebastian, who was really Milton Miron. He managed the Cockettes drag queens at San Francisco’s Palace Theater and also made the movie Tricia’s Wedding, which is about, well, Tricia Nixon’s wedding.

The money for this movie came from Republican Senator Phil Gramm, who had invested $7,500 of his money to make what he thought was going to be a beauty contest satire. Instead, his money was used to make this.

White House Madness was released on DVD by Lucky 13 Collectibles, who also put out Acapulco Gold, Evil Laugh and Slaughterhouse in the mid-2010’s. I couldn’t find this anywhere, so shout out to my friend Hoss for hunting this down. Mark Lester week is better for your fine work.

EDITOR’S NOTE: We originally ran this review on May 12, 2020. It’s a great reminder that Mark Lester is still making movies. This was written by Paul Andolina. You can see more of his writing on Wrestling with Film and Is the Dad Alive?

Dragons of Camelot is not the type of movie I’d normally seek out. I have no interest in Arthurian Legends but the moment you put in a wrestler in a movie about King Arthur I am obligated to see it. In this case, that wrestler is NWA Power’s Thom Latimer.

Dragons of Camelot is a 2014 film directed by Mark Lester, the same guy that directed Class of 1984 and Class of 1999. It is about King Arthur’s evil sister, the sorceress Morgana, who seeks to control Camelot after Arthur’s death by the way of Dragons. Galahad is sent by King Arthur on his death bed to find Lancelot who is the only one worthy of wielding the legendary sword Excalibur.

Galahad comes across a band of thieves on his way to find Lancelot but they turn out to be Knights of the Round Table, one of them, Sir Bors, is played by Thom Latimer. They join up on their quest to find Lancelot and to reforge Excalibur which was destroyed by Morgana. Along the way they fight Morgana’s evil knights and not one but three dragons.

I wasn’t expecting to enjoy this movie a bit, mainly because it’s subject matter didn’t interest me. However, apart from some iffy acting from some of the characters, it was a decent sword and sorcery outing. I was really impressed by the dragons, they did a good job with their inclusion and even though they were digital creations they looked pretty cool. My favorite part of the entire movie is when they blow off a dragon’s head by shooting a flame arrow into its open mouth while it is inhaling to create its fire breath.

Thom Latimer looks like he could take any number of knights on in this film. He did a good job at being Sir Bors and I think he’s one of the few stand out parts of the film. I found it sort of odd that he threw his axe at the dragon like a goofball. The only other gripe I have with Sir Bors is that he is only in about half of the film. He gets taken out like a chump which was disappointing.

If you like sword and sorcery, you may find some enjoyment in this film but I think for most people it may be a skippable title. You can watch this on Amazon Prime if you subscribe to that service.