William Asher was credited by many as inventing the TV sitcom. He brought Our Miss Brooks from radio to TV, directed 100 out of 179 episodes of I Love Lucy, produced and directed Bewitched (which starred his second wife Elizabeth Montgomery) and also had episodes of Make Room for Daddy, The Twilight Zone, The Patty Duke Show, Gidget, The Dukes of Hazzard and Alice on his resume. He even planned JFK’s inauguration ceremony along with Frank Sinatra.

He was also one of the leading beach party directors, with Beach Party, Muscle Beach, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, Beach Blanket Bingo and Bikini Beach to his credit. Of this time in his life, he would say, “The scripts of the Beach Party films were sheer nonsense, but they were fun and positive. When kids see the films now, they can get some idea of what the ’60s were like. The whole thing was a dream, of course. But it was a nice dream.”

I tell you all this to set you up for one of the strangest films I’ve ever seen — imagine what that entails — and one that has stuck with me for years: Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker.

Originally, Michael Miller (Jackson County Jail) was set to direct this film. Still, he was replaced by Asher (he had also recently lost the job on The Eyes of Laura Mars to Irvin Kershner). He did direct the opening, however.

And what an opening it is!

Years ago, Billy (Jimmy McNichol, brother of Kristy, who is shirtless pretty much for the entire film) was sent to stay with his aunt Cheryl (Susan Tyrell, owning this movie like no one has ever owned a movie before). However, not only did their brakes give out, but a giant log beheads Billy’s dad, and the car goes off a cliff, where we see a photo of young Billy floating out into the water as the car explodes, floating, all of that, in the very first scene of the movie!

Now, Billy is a high school senior living with his aunt. He has a dream of playing basketball on a scholarship at the University of Denver, but Cheryl is having none of it. His school life isn’t much better, as his teammate Eddie (Bill Paxton!) is jealous of his closeness to their coach Tom Landers (Steve Eastin, Field of Dreams). But there’s a bright silver lining: the school’s newspaper photographer, Julia (Julia Duffy from TV’s Newhart), is into him.

On Billy’s seventeenth birthday, his aunt changes her mind about the scholarship just in time for her to put the moves on TV repairman Phil Brody (William Caskey Swaim, Friday the 13th: A New Beginning), who rebuffs her, only to then pull down his pants and tell her to “work it.” She flips out and attacks him, so he shoves her down. She retaliates with a kitchen knife as Billy watches from outside the window, as blood sprays all over his birthday balloons.

Cheryl hysterically tells the police that Phil tried to rape her. But his blood is all over Billy and so are the kid’s prints on the knife. That brings in Joe Carlson (a brutal Bo Svenson), whose homophobic mindset deduces that Billy’s coach Tom was his love and that Billy killed Phil — who was Tom’s lover — as part of a love triangle gone wrong. He thinks Cheryl is just covering up for her nephew when the truth is anything but that.

What follows is Cheryl going bonkers, doing all manner of things like drugging Billy’s milk so that his basketball tryout goes wrong and shearing her hair into an unmanageable chunk of a hairstyle. Oh yeah — she also treats her nephew way too lovingly, to the point that it’s uncomfortable. And then she goes completely insane when she catches Billy in bed with his new girlfriend.

Of course, by the end of the film, she’s nearly murdered that girlfriend twice, stabbed a noisy neighbor, killed a cop, and we discover that she’s really Billy’s mom and his birth father’s body is mummified in the basement while his head floats in a jar of formaldehyde.

Even after their final confrontation, Billy must deal with Joe the cop and his bigoted ways. To say that this movie builds to a fever pitch is an understatement. And I really don’t want to give all that much more away. Yes — even with those spoilers above, there’s so much more to explore here.

Nearly all of the major creative forces of this film came from places of personal pain. Asher lived through the Depression, losing his father before he was even a teenager. His mother (stage actress Lillian Bonner) became an alcoholic, so he escaped by way of the Army Signal Corps at the age of 15.

Screenwriter Alan Jay Glueckman (his script Russkies was made into a film directed by Halloween II and Halloween: Resurrection director Rick Rosenthal, plus he wrote two home invasion made for TV movies, The Fear Inside and Facemade-for-TVlus, his short film Pickup was the first film appearance of Glenn Close) continually wondered about who his birth parents were and had a tumultuous relationship with his adoptive ones due to their refusal to accept his homosexuality.

And Susan Tyrell, the heart of this film, was born into show business. Her father was a top agent at the William Morris Agency, representing Loretta Young and Carole Lombard. Yet she always described her proper upbringing as miserable, due to her demanding British mother, a socialite and member of the diplomatic corps in China and the Philippines during the 1930s and 1940s.

By her teenage years, Tyrell had cut off contact with her mother, of whom she would say, “The last thing my mother said to me was, “SuSu, your life is a celebration of everything that is cheap and tawdry.” I’ve always liked and I’ve always tried to live up to it.”

She stayed in contact with her father, who was able to use his connections to get her a bit part in a touring play with Art Carney, as well as have Look magazine follow the show. He’d die a few months later from a bee sting.

Even her Playbill obituary says that she specialized in roles like “whores, lushes and sexpots.” Perhaps her most famous role was in John Huston’s Fat City, which earned her an Academy Award nomination. She was also part of the Warhol Factory scene and appeared in numerous films. She appeared in various roles, including the Queen of the Sixth Dimension in Forbidden Zone, Solly in Angel and Avenging Angel, the miniature Midge Montana, wife to Kris Kristofferson’s ringmaster in Big Top Pee-Wee, and Ramona Ricketts, the grandmother to Johnny Depp in Cry-Baby.

What I’m saying is, this is a movie made by people who actually lived.

This movie has it all — malignant motherhood, a modern-day retelling of Oedipus, an inversion of a modern-day girl trope where Billy becomes the victim and Julia the helpful savior, and — strangely enough for a film made in 1981 — the homosexual characters are the positive characters in the story and not the monsters. In fact, Billy may be homosexual himself, if you chose to read the movie that way.

Of course, the movie was pretty much dead on arrival, thanks to a disastrous test screening and a new title, Night Warning, that says nothing about what the audience is about to see. It’s also a movie so strange that it seems to occupy its own universe, unlike any other film before or since. I can see why the general public wouldn’t enjoy it. In England, it made the infamous Category 2 video nasty list.

Basically, what I’m saying is rush out, find this and watch it. Now.

I’ve often said that I prefer Zombi 2 to Dawn of the Dead — at least if I am looking for a more fun movie — because it skips the political allegory and gets right to the zombie splatter that I really want to see.

Burial Ground (also known as Le Notti del terrore, Nights of Terror, Zombi Horror, The Zombie Dead and most confusingly, Zombi 3) raises you that lack of Romero’s restraint and storytelling, doubles down by ripping off Fulci’s work which is in itself a ripoff (but a masterful one) and piles on the sleaze. No, really. This is a film that is ready to outright offend everyone.

The film starts with a professor accidentally unleashing an evil curse that reanimates the dead. He’s instantly killed. Meanwhile, three “jet-set couples” (I’ve heard them referred to this way several times and it always makes me laugh) and a creepy man child named Michael (who was played by Pietro Barzocchini, who was 25-years-old at the time…more on that soon) arrive at a nearby mansion, invited by the professor. We catch Evelyn (Mariangela Giordano, The Sect) stealing lingerie that she found in the mansion, to which her boyfriend James replies, “You look just like a little whore, but I like that in a girl.” At that point, that creepy manchild of hers, Michael, comes in and freaks out while his mom absentmindedly just stands there, nude.

It doesn’t take long before the dead attack. A maid is decapitated with a scythe because these living dead can use tools. Why are they more evolved than Romero or Fulci zombies? We never learn.

The zombies break into the mansion and attack everyone. This leads to that young creep, Michael, becoming totally shell-shocked. Evelyn, his mother, attempts to confront him, so he becomes to fondle her breasts. As he kisses her, he tries to get his hand between her legs. She slaps him as he runs away, shouting, “What’s wrong? I’m your son!” He runs right into one of the party guests, Leslie, who is now a zombie. Like a Fulci librarian, he stares at her as she makes her way toward him.

At this point, everyone reasons that they should just let the zombies into the house, because they are slow and it will allow them to escape. Sure. That always works. Evelyn goes to find her son, who has been killed by Leslie. She flips out and smashes Leslie’s head against a tub, screaming as loudly as possible, all the while.

Everyone runs toward a monastery, where the film decides to become a Blind Dead film. The zombie monks chase everyone to a workshop where they kill Mark with power tools. Creepy Michael has now become an even creepier zombie. Evelyn has lost her mind and thinks it’s a miracle, so she bares her breasts for her son to suck on. He replies by eating her breast off in graphic detail.

Finally, Janet is menaced by multiple zombie hands as the film ends with the Profecy of the Black Spider. Yes, that’s how they spell prophecy. “The earth shall tremble, graves shall open, they shall come among the living as messengers of death, and there shall be the nigths of terror.” And yes, they also spelled nights incorrectly.

Director Andrea Bianchi isn’t one for subtlety, which is evident in films like Strip Nude for Your Killer and Confessions of a Frustrated Housewife on his IMDB credits. Suppose you’re looking for unrepentant gore (Fulci’s through-the-door eye gouge is repeated here with a window). In that case, consider the bad special effects (the latex zombie heads are near Troll 2 in their quality), the playing with guts and gore ala Blood Feast, and the total lack of storyline or sense. Then I’d advise you to watch this one.

This movie is ridiculous, but man, I love it. It’s the kind of film you can say, “But yeah, did you see Burial Ground? That one is totally insane.” And I love Berto Pisano’s atonal, goofy soundtrack that blares any time the zombies show up. But if you’re looking for a movie with any class, well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Here’s a drink to enjoy during this movie.

This Cocktail Smells of Death

• 1/2 oz. vodka
• 1/2 oz. rum
• 1/2 oz. apple schnapps
• 1/2 oz. blue curacao
• 1/2 oz. Chambord
• 1/2 oz. blueberry vodka
• 1/2 oz. orange juice
• 2 oz. cranberry juice
• Frozen blueberries

1. Fill a glass a quarter of the way with frozen blueberries.
2. Combine all ingredients in a shaker and mix with ice, then pour over blueberries.

William Allen Castleman directed Johnny Firecloud and The Erotic Adventures of Zorro, as well as composed the music for The Swinging Cheerleaders, The Adult Version of Jekyll & Hide, the 1974 The Wrestler, The Big Bird Cage, Trader Hornee, The Ecstasies of Women, Thar She Blows!, Space Thing, Nude Django, The Lustful Turk, The Acid Eaters, Ski on the Wild Side, She Freak, The Defilers, The Devil’s Mistress, Starlet!, Trader Hornee, ‘Gator Bait and At the End of the Rainbow. He also produced 7 Into Snowy and Chorus Call, so he was busy.

Written by Alvin L. Fast, who also wrote Moonshine Girls, Tom, Eaten Alive, Black Shampoo, Satan’s Cheerleaders and Angels’ Brigade, Bummer is about a rock band called The Group who are, well, out getting groupies. Their bass player, Butts (Dennis Burkley), goes nutzoid and starts killing people. First, he throws two of the girls in a shower and slaps them while calling them pigs. But you know, he owns the touring van. The limit comes when he kills people, starting with a groupie and the lead singer Duke (Kipp Whitman) before the other band aids get their revenge.

One of those girls is Carol Speed from Abby! Other ladies include Connie Strickland (The Centerfold Girls), who plays Barbara, the girlfriend of drummer Gary (David Buchanan); Dolly, who is Diane Lee Hart from The Pom-Pom Girls and Morely, The Group’s manager, who is Leslie McRay (Cleopatra in Death Race 2000).

Shot by Gary Graver, which makes this way better than it should be. It also has one of the most misogynistic taglines ever: ““You don’t have to rape a groupie… You just have to ask!”

David F. Friedman, the other producer, and Bob Cresse show up as cops at the end. As Herman Traeger, Friedman produced Ilsa and he was behind much of the soft core — and some hardcore — exploitation that made up the best of the form. Cresse wrote and produced most of those and shows up in them, often as a love camp commandant or as Granny Good in House On Bare Mountain. Cresse had a reputation for being tough, often carrying guns and with two bodyguards on his payroll. His career ended when he was walking his dog and saw two men beating a woman on Hollywood Boulevard. He pulled out a gun and ordered the men to stop. One of them said he was a cop and shot Cresse before killing his dog. The hospital stay that followed — he had no health insurance — ruined him.

You can watch this on Tubi.

Originally a South Korean movie called Amelika bangmungaeg (also called Visitor of America), this was released in the U.S. by Aquarius Releasing with new dubbing, an incredibly insane poster of Bruce Lee emerging from a grave to defend a half nude woman and battle a flying bat baby as well as a new beginning filmed in the U.S. where lighting strikes the grave of Bruce Lee, who soon emerges, ready to fight. In an amazing display of absolute lunacy, that’s it. No more Bruce Lee.

No, instead, we follow Wong Han (Jun Chong, a judo master who used the name Bruce K. L. Lea; he’s the founder of the World United Martial Arts Organization (WUMAO); has trained Lorenzo Lamas, Sam J. Jones, Phillip and Simon Rhee, and Heather Graham; he also shows up in L.A. Street Fighters, Silent Assassins and Street Soldiers) as he makes his way to America to try and learn who killed his brother Han Ji-Hyeok.

Also, it appears that Wong’s brother died by jumping off his apartment building and is being incinerated in the furnace of the same building, which ends with Wong scooping up all the burned bones and placing them around his neck, along with a photo of the deceased and wandering the streets looking for answers. He’s then attacked by a man in black, whom he defeats and kills, which leads to his arrest.

Wong is bailed out by a wealthy man named Scott Lee and asked to find a woman named Susan (Deborah Dutch, Deep Jaws, 976-EVIL II), who ends up being a waitress. Lee’s decision to hire him is a mystery, given that he’s shown no ability to find the killers of his brother, so there’s no precedent for his detective skills. Anyways, he decides to help Susan and teaches her martial arts so quickly that she can fight nearly as well as he in mere days. She soon informs our hero that she learned from her job in Lee’s Turkish bathhouse that five men were involved in the death of his brother: the black man Wong has already battled, as well as a white man, a Japanese fighter, a Mexican and a cowboy. Given that there are about 4 million people in Los Angeles, finding them will be challenging. Then again, he didn’t see the killers yet and did find Susan, so he’s batting .500, which would get you in the hall of fame.

Then, our hero goes to a Christmas parade. Why? So the people there can look directly at the camera, and the filmmakers could shoot this without permits. Our hero is a peculiar individual who refuses to sleep in Susan’s house due to moral reasons. Consequently, she purchases an RV for him to sleep in outside her house.

Anyway, the cowboy is the last one standing, having killed the other killers before Wong, which means our hero and he will have to battle one-on-one. He fights like a pro wrestler, which I can appreciate, and then we learn that maybe Wong’s brother is still alive, as nearly everyone else dies. Yes, our hero can’t even protect the woman who helps him, choosing to do a fancy flying kick instead of just disarming the bad guy.

Directed by Lee Doo-yong and written by Hong Ji-Un, this movie is really something else. It’s not goo,d and yet I loved every moment. I kept thinking about the trailer and the poster and how they had to have led people to say, “Bruce Lee versus the black angel of death? How can I not watch this?”

You can watch this on Tubi.