Author Archives: bandsaboutmovies

THE IMPORTANT CINEMA CLUB’S SUPER SCARY MOVIE CHALLENGE DAY 1: The Unbreakable Bunch (2024)

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October 1: A Scary Sports Film

“An Alien Force Came To Conquer – They Had No Idea This Bunch Was In Town.”

I think they made this movie for me.

Directors Luke Lantana, Harold McConnell and Robert Pralgo (who also made the documentary After Wrestling) and writers Nathan McMahan, Frank Tobin and Ray Lloyd (former WCW wrestler Glacier and one of the stars of this movie) have put together an alien invasion movie where only old pro wrestlers can save the day. In fact, Lloyd and Steve Luther Williams, who was also in WCW as Luther Biggs, wrote the story.

The cast includes Lloyd as Jock, the main hero; Luther as the wrestling Elvis Burnin’ Love (Biggs was also Disgraceland in TNA); Tonga “Haku/Meng” Fifita as King Tonga, Ernest “The Cat” Miller as Mack Brown and Larry Zybysko as The Legend. They head out on the Blood and Thunder Tour in an RV, trying to save money for a sober living facility. This brings them to meet old friends like Padge (Diamond Dallas Page), Rusty (David “Gangrel” Heath), Hammer (Stan “The Lariat” Hansen), AEW wrestler Anna Jay, NWA wrestler Kahagas, former member of Raven’s Flock Ron Reil (also The Yeti in WCW) and Alexander the Great (Nicholas Logan), a youngster who keeps bragging that he booked the Tokyo Dome.

We can argue if wrestling is a real sport, but this is the kind of movie where Meng sings a song about the Tokyo Dome, where a pizza-eating contest turns into a fistfight, and Stan Hansen randomly shows up, where green-eyed aliens are unstoppable, and where aging indy wrestlers can shrug off bullets. And not a one of them has a fanny pack filled with painkillers or a rat in each town. But why argue realism when this is a science fiction wrestling movie? I was kind of hoping that DDP would come back like Santo, pulling out a flamethrower out of his car and turning the battle when all is lost.

The end hints that these wrestlers also fought a skunk ape. Make that movie. Now.

Also, Missy Hyatt super randomly shows up in the final battle, and no one goes, “What the hell is Missy Hyatt doing here?”

Like pro wrestling itself, this is dumb yet entertaining. For all my years on the road, I never had to fight aliens, but I would hope Hansen and Missy would always be close by to help.

You can watch this on Tubi.

2025 Scarecrow Psychotronic Challenge Day 1: The Cry Baby Killer (1958)

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1. INTRODUCING…: A well-known actor’s first movie. Bonus points if it has an “introducing” credit.

“YESTERDAY a Teenage Rebel… TODAY a mad-dog slayer! ”

Jimmy Wallace (Jack Nicholson in his first movie ever) is in love with Carole (Carolyn Mitchell, soon to be the wife of Mickey Rooney; she was murdered by stuntman and actor Milos Milos (also the bodyguard for Alain Delon), who then shot himself. She and Milos had an affair while Rooney was travelling, and the police thought that Milos stabbed her after she wanted to end it.  While Rooney said, “I died when she did,” he quickly married Mitchell’s best friend, Marge Lane, which angers her new man, Manny (Brett Halsey) and his gang, who try to take him out. Jimmy grabs a gun, shoots one of them and goes on the run, taking a cook (Smoki Whitfield), a mother (Barbara Knudson) and her baby hostage to try and get out of the crime.

Directed by Joe Addis and written by Leo Gordon and Melvin Levy, this is one of the few movies thatRogerr Corman claimed he didn’t make a profit on. The TV rights helped, as did playing it as part of a double feature with Hot Car Girl.

According to an interview with co-star Ed Nelson, Nicholson was so mentally overwhelmed by starring in his film debut that he left the entertainment industry to find himself. I guess he did, right?

You can watch this on Tubi.

UNSUNG HORRORS HORROR GIVES BACK 2025: The Mummy’s Ghost (1944)

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Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and happy homes.

Today’s theme: Lon Chaney (Jr. or Sr.)

I do love a mummy movie. I really love Lon Chaney Jr. as Kharis, the Mummy. But Chaney went through a lot to play this role, telling Frederick C. Othman that “I sweat” and I can’t wick away. I itch and I can’t scratch.” He took out his anger by choking actor Frank Reicher out, according to director Reginald Le Borg.

Andoheb, a High Priest of Arkam, has summoned Yousef Bey (John Carradine) to the Temple of Arkam to pass on his duties. Meanwhile, Professor Matthew Norman (Frank Reicher) is trying to convince his students that the mummy Kharis is a real thing. One of his students, Tom Hervey (played by Robert Lowery, the second actor to portray Batman), barely listens. After all, he has a hot Egyptian girl, Amina Mansori (Ramsay Ames, actually Spanish; she got the role when “Venezuela Volcano” Acquanetta fell during a dizzy spell and landed head-first on rocks painted white that she assumed were fake). But when anyone even mentions Egypt, Amina starts to feel uneasy.

Yousef Bey starts brewing the nine tea leaves, Kharis returns, the professor gets choked and Amina somehow has a new birthmark after seeing the mummy. Kharis starts leaving mold all over his victims, and the body of Ananka falls into dust, as she’s reincarnated into Amina, as you probably already figured.

The actual problem arises when Bey decides that she’s so gorgeous that he wants him for herself. Kharis reacts by shoving him out a window and narrowly avoiding a mob, only to sink back into the swamp as both he and his bride age. Too bad for Tom, who was about to elope.

When you see Kharis tearing up the museum, know that that’s what it is. They didn’t put the necessary items into the set on time, and Chaney cut himself. That blood is all real! Hardway blood, as they say in wrestling.

Hayes Code be damned, the female heroine doesn’t survive and you can see her, well, nipples in one scene. I guess they snuck this one in!

As I mentioned earlier, I love all mommy movies. At least the Universal ones are somewhat tied together. Too bad Lon hated the wrap so much.

Bill Fleck’s Horror Behind the Scenes writes, “According to Christopher Lock, makeup master Jack P. Pierce’s current biographer, the Mummy’s make-up is by now a rubber mask fashioned by propman Ellis Berman. But before the mask is applied, Chaney is wrapped by John Bonner and Pierce in what studio publicity claims is “400 yards of gauze tape.”

Pierce then takes Chaney out into the California sunshine when possible, and applies dark paint to the wrappings in order to suggest the scorching the creature has lived through in previous films. Pierce then wraps up Chaney’s hand, so as to give the illusion that the Mummy’s fingers have been burned off — and puts that arm in what looks like a sling.

Finally, the rubber mask, blocking out Chaney’s eye is glued to the actor’s face —presumably by Fuller’s Mud — and this is also raked through his hair, and Pierce then applies cotton, spirit gum, liquid latex, and tissue on the mask to form a more realistic look. Lastly, greasepaint and powder are added.

It’s by far Chaney’s least favorite makeup.”

The good news is that his dog, Moose, got to visit the set. Moose was Bela Lugosi in werewolf form in The Wolf Man and became Chaney’s beloved pet.

You can download this from the Internet Archive.

CHILLER THEATER MONTH: Curse of the Aztec Mummy (1957)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Curse of the Aztec Mummy was on Chiller Theater on Saturday, October 8, 1966, at 11:20 p.m.

K. Gordon Murray seems like the perfect person — if Jerry Warren wasn’t going to do it — to bring this movie to the U.S. as The Curse of the Aztec Mummy. None of the voices seem like they fit the characters — which if you know the world of Murray’s films — makes perfect sense.

The evil gangster Dr. Krupp escapes from the police and hypnotizes Flor into telling him where the mummy’s tomb is. But didn’t the tomb and the mummy himself get blown up real good in the last movie? Why should we let common sense get in the way of things when there’s a masked wrestler named The Angel showing up to help the forces of good?

You know what Krupp gets for his trouble? Popoca comes back, kills every one of his men and then throws the baddy into a pit of snakes. Watching that, Flor and her leading man say, “Let’s get married.” That seems to make sense after you’ve seen an undead version of your past life lover kill everyone and everything just. to get a gold breastplate back.

You can watch this on Tubi.

UNSUNG HORRORS HORROR GIVES BACK 2025: Spider Baby (1967)

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Each October, the Unsung Horrors podcast does a month of themed movies. This year, they will once again be setting up a fundraiser to benefit Best Friends, which works to save the lives of cats and dogs across America, giving pets second chances and happy homes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Adam Hursey is a pharmacist specializing in health informatics by day, but his true passion is cinema. His current favorite films are Back to the Future, Stop Making Sense, and In the Mood for Love. He has written articles for Film East and The Physical Media Advocate, primarily examining older films through the lens of contemporary perspectives. He is usually found on Letterboxd, where he mainly writes about horror and exploitation films. You can follow him on Letterboxd or Instagram at ashursey.

Today’s theme: Lon Chaney (Jr. or Sr.)

The horror landscape in the mid to late 1960s was a bit fractured, in a sort of limbo, almost waiting for a subgenre to emerge. Hammer had a stranglehold on gothic tales of horror. Herschell Gordon Lewis was busy inventing the splatter film. Jose Mojica Marins brought his boogeyman creation of Coffin Joe to life in Brazil. Mario Bava had planted the initial seeds of giallo with Blood and Black Lace, waiting for Dario Argento to come in and reap the benefits a few years later. For mainstream America, everything changed in 1968 with the release of films like Rosemary’s Baby and Night of the Living Dead. But before those landmark films changed everything, most horror films were pulling from the past rather than pushing the genre forward. Spider Baby is an interesting representation of where horror stood in 1967.

Spider Baby was written, edited, and directed by Jack Hill. Out of the Roger Corman school of filmmakers, Hill would go on to direct some of the most famous exploitation films of the 1970s, including Coffy, Foxy Brown, and The Switchblade Sisters. Prior to Spider Baby, Hill (along with a personal favorite director of mine, Stephanie Rothman) directed the troubled production of Blood Bath (the very first film covered on the Unsung Horrors podcast). For Spider Baby, Hill seemingly pulled from what was popular in horror films at that time—an old, dark gothic house filled with a family who is not quite right, and cast an actor (in this case Lon Cheney Jr.) who might need a sort of comeback vehicle, similar to what Robert Aldrich did in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? and Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte. 

Inflicting the family with a fictional genetic condition called “Merrye Syndrome”, where the unfortunate inflicted begin to regress mentally after puberty, Spider Baby is infused with colorful characters where anything can happen. The “children” act in feral ways, particularly Virginia, who captures victims in a makeshift spider web before “biting” them with a pair of knives. Bruno (Cheney Jr.) has taken charge of the siblings as his wards, trying his best to protect them from themselves, and perhaps society from them. Everything changes though when some desperate distant relatives show up, hoping to claim a stake to the family’s inheritance.

While the film might mostly resemble a typical gothic nightmare (spiderwebs, skeletons, and subterranean pits in the basement abound), it also offers aspects not seen in a lot of horror movies at that time. There is definitely a comedic tone to the whole story. A character breaks the fourth wall to directly address the audience at the beginning and end of the story. Perhaps most striking to me was a meta moment where a character at the dinner table references The Wolf Man, Lon Cheney Jr.’s most iconic role.

I’m not sure if Spider Baby is going to be the most memorable film I watch this month, but it is a solid start for sure. 

I watched this one on Arrow Player, but it must be in the public domain, because it is streaming just about everywhere.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: Deliver Us From Evil (1975)

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The trailer for this movie claims that it’s “a movie that tells it like it is about blacks. The beautiful blacks. The evil blacks.”

It’s also a movie that’s preaching to its audience about ending the drugs and violence in black communities to the point that it moves from blacksploitation to Godsploitation. It starts with Chris Townes (Renny Roker and yes, he is related to Al) going shithouse in a room full of glass vases and getting sent to a psychiatric ward where he screams at people. When he gets out, he has to deal with the worst white people ever at work and back home with his landlord. Maybe he can get with Mindy (Marie O’Henry), a social worker who he has a crush on. Well, when he drives her home, his maniacal skills behind the wheel show her that yes, Chris is a dangerous human being to be avoided.

Chris needs to get with Mindy, so he decides to start being nice to the wheelchair-bound Little Joe (Danny Martin) to prove how nice a guy he is. But then it is revealed that Mindy is married, and Chris uses Little Joe to meet her friend Kim (Kandi Keath) because this movie flies through character, and at the same time, black on black crime is out of control to the point that it appears in this movie and is moralized over more than a day of Fox News.

But you know, I kind of love this as it ends with Chris looking directly at us, the audience, and demanding that a million black men march on Washington 18 years before that happened. And then this title comes up:

The tagline for this movie was “Our streets… nightmares! Our neighborhoods… execution chambers! Look what we’re doing to ourselves!” 

Director and writer Horace Jackson had some talent. Sure, this movie is all over the place, but there’s a scene where criminals beat up Mindy that is really artistic. And sadly, it could still be made today and be completely relevant. You could watch this and laugh at how silly and earnest it is, or you could look at it as a filmmaker using all of the tools that he had to get out a message that he believed in.

You can watch this on Tubi.

CHILLER THEATER MONTH: The Pharaoh’s Curse (1957)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The Pharaoh’s Curse was on Chiller Theater on Saturday, January 2, 1965, at 1 a.m., Saturday, May 6, 1967, at 11:20 p.m., and Saturday, April 6, 1968, at 1:00 a.m.

King Diamond once sang,

“Now, if you breaking the seals

And disturbing the peace

Then you’re startin’ up a curse

Bringin’ evil disease

Don’t touch, never ever steal

Unless you’re in for the kill

Or you’ll be hit by the curse of the Pharaohs

Yes, you’ll be hit and the curse is on you”

Maybe King wasn’t singing about off-brand mummy movies, but man, I love movies unconnected to the Universal Monster Mummy yet totally want to be in the same universe.

I am Sam and I am now obsessed with mummy movies.

Lee “Roll ‘Em” Sholem had so many credits, from Superman and Tarzan movies and shows to directing Criswell’s TV series and the movies Tobor the Great, Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki, Hell Ship Mutiny and probably a few thousand other things. Literally. There are so many urban legends about his work, like how Phyllis Coates got knocked out on an Adventures of Superman episode and he revived her and shot all her scenes for the day before her face swelled up. Or how he kept bringing the same attractive blonde to be the new Jane in the Tarzan movies, only to get turned down by producer Sol Lesser, only for that girl to end up being Marilyn Monroe. Who cares if these stories are true? What matters is that they are great stories.

But hey — we’re here for mummies.

Welcome to Egypt. Cradle of civilization. Also, the home of mummies. A bunch of scientists are digging where they shouldn’t, which means Captain Storm (Mark Dana) has to save them and maybe even pull a John Ashley with one of the wise guy’s wives, Sylvia (Diane Brewster, Miss Canfield on Leave It to Beaver). Or maybe he can get with local Simira (Ziva Rodann, who played Nefertiti on Batman and Venus de Viasa in Macumba Love).

How wild is it that this mummy — spoiler warning! — Is it really someone transformed into a mummy? And it drinks blood! It also lives without an arm, which is the best kind of mummy.

Shot in six days, one in Death Valley, this is the kind of movie that also has a cat monster and then sort of forgets it. I mean, it’s an hour long. Some people reviewing it expect it to make out with them or something. Perhaps you’ve never seen a 1950s generic mummy movie and were expecting a Criterion-level epic. I mean, it has the tomb of Pharaoh Ra-Antef to find, the disintegrating marriage of Sylvia and Robert Quentin (George N. Neise), and a possession film lurking inside the bandages of a mummy movie.

I mean, the poster says, “A blood-lusting mummy that kills for a cat-goddess!”

That’s good enough.

You can watch this on Tubi.

USA UP ALL NIGHT: The Unnameable (1988)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The Unnameable was on USA Up All Night on October 7, 1989.

Based on “The Unnamable” by H.P. Lovecraft, this movie was directed and written by Jean-Paul Ouellette. It begins in the Winthrop house, a place where a female demon is hiding, having already killed the owner.

Randolph Carter (Mark Kinsey Stephenson) is a Lovecraft character who shows up or is mentioned in seven of his stories: “The Statement of Randolph Carter,” “The Unnameable,” The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, “The Silver Key,” The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, “Through the Gates of the Silver Key” and “Out of the Aeons.” He’s joined by his friends, Howard Damon (Charles King ) and Joel Manton (Mark Parra). They decide to stay all night in the Winthrop house themselves, hoping they won’t meet his evil daughter, Alyda (Katrin Alexandre). As for Howard, he just wants to know Tanya Heller (Alexandra Durrell) better, a student who comes along to see what this house is all about.

The Necronomicon, living trees, Miskatonic University, a bloody decapitation, some quick nudity from Laura Albert…what else do you want from this movie? It looks great and has a nice mood to it. I’m all for Lovecraft movies being made on the cheap; it’s a genre in and of itself.

You can watch this on Tubi.

USA UP ALL NIGHT: Less Than Zero (1987)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Less Than Zero was on USA Up All Night on June 25, 1994.

Directed by Marek Kanievska, written by Harley Peyton and based on the book by Bret Easton Ellis, Less Than Zero exists in that world where five years seem to have passed between high school graduation and Thanksgiving break during the first year of college. Clay (Andrew McCarthy) comes home only to learn that his ex-girlfriend and now model, Blair (Jami Gertz), and friend Julian (Robert Downey Jr.) are addicted to drugs and sleeping with one another. Also: Julian is homeless and being harassed by Rip (James Spader) for the money he’s owed for his drug habit.

80s kids were scandalized to learn that Downey Jr.’s character would be turned out and pimped to rich men before dying of a heart attack. Yes, the idea that male prostitutes mainly were with other men — and women rarely paid for sex — was alien to us back then.

But the soundtrack! A Def Jam soundtrack with Aerosmith doing “Rockin’ Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu,” Danzig writing “Life Fades Away” for Roy Orbison, Poison covering KISS, LL Cool J’s “Going Back to Cali,” The Bangles covering “Hazy Shade of Winter,” Slayer blowing through “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,” Public Enemy’s “Bring the Noise” and Danzig and the Power and Fury Orchestra playing the theme song to this movie, which sounds a ton like “To Sir With Love.” It’s the first post-Samhain Danzig song, and Rick Rubin thought Eerie Von wasn’t good enough on bass, so George Drakoulias played. And while not on the soundtrack, The Cult’s “Lil Devil,” Run D.M.C.’s “Christmas In Hollis,” “Bump ‘n Grind” by David Lee Roth, “Fight Like a Brave” by Red Hot Chili Peppers and “Moonlight Drive” by The Doors are in the movie.

USA UP ALL NIGHT: Iron Eagle (1986)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Iron Eagle was on USA Up All Night on July 28, 1989.

The video store and cable era did not believe in “we have that at home.” It believed that if Top Gun was already rented or wasn’t on, we needed something just like it. That something was Iron Eagle, which came out the same year. Directed by Sidney J. Furie (The Entity), who co-wrote the script with Kevin Alyn Elders, the film features Doug Masters (Jason Gedrick) being rejected from flight school, just as his father, Colonel Ted Masters (Tim Thomerson), is shot down over Bilya. Bilya isn’t real, so we can hate everyone in it who has sentenced Doug’s father to die in three days.

Somehow, Doug and Col. Charles “Chappy” Sinclair (Louis Gossett Jr.) are able to steal two F-18 jets and make it to Bilya. That means that Doug — with a few days of training — must battle Ministry of Defense Colonel Akir Nakesh (David Suchet) to save his dad. He’s already learned how to napalm people, so he has that going for him.

Spoiler, but everyone makes it out alive. This is followed by Iron Eagle II, Aces: Iron Eagle III and Iron Eagle on the Attack, with Gossett being the only actor to appear in all of these movies. They were years ahead of that Top Gun sequel, huh? And that movie might have a great soundtrack, but this one features Kobra doing the theme song, Queen playing “One Vision” and Dio’s “Hide In the Rainbow.”