I feel like I’ve reached that moment when I have no idea who the kids are listening to which is fine because I’m 51 and pop music is no longer for me. Yet even I know who Lizzo, Lil Nas X and Kendrick Lamar are. I don’t like any of their music, but I can respect the fact that at least the first two have made it pretty far in pop culture despite her being plus sized and him being an out country artist who flirts with Satanic imagery. As for Lamar, it seems like more of the same. But hey — this is a movie blog not me commenting on music.

This seemingly is the perfect movie for grandparents or older aunts to watch so that they have something to talk about with their grandchildren, nieces and nephews whenever things get quiet. “I heard that Lizzo plays the flute” and “Kendrick Lamar is from Compton, just like NWA” would be good starts to the next music talk you have and then they’ll tell you they’ve moved on to something else but in the circle of life, soon they will become old and struggle to know who the next big thing is and require a documentary like this.

I thank Tubi for this public service.

You can watch this on Tubi.

It took more than thirty years, but Coffin Joe was finally able to complete his story that began in At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul and This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse. Creator and star José Mojica Marins felt that since he compromised on the sending of the second film, he was cursed. Now, he could finally tell the story.

After being released from a mental ward, Coffin Joe is taken care of by his most loyal servant Bruno (Rui Rezende), who along with four fanatics has been waiting for the return of the master. Of course, his order is simple: bring the perfect woman and continue the blood.

There are so many women and so little time. Like eugenist Dr. Hilda (Cléo De Páris), who is drugged and hallucinates that Coffin Joe is feeding her one of her ass cheeks. Or a young gypsy woman named Elena (Nara Sakarê) who willingly gives herself to him.

But all is not snakes and spiders in Brazil. Coronel Claudiomiro Pontes (Jece Valadão), a police captain blinded by Coffin Joe when he escaped his fate at the end of This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse — young Joe is played by superfan Raymond Castile — and Father Eugênio (Milhem Cortaz), a priest who is the son of Dr. Rudolfo from At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul, have joined forced to destroy the undertaker forever.

Coffin Joe is also dealing with the ghosts of his many victims, including Terezinha and Lenita from At Midnight I’ll Take Your Sou and Laura from This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse. He’s also been cursed by Elena’s witch aunts, which turns the opportunity to make love to Elena into a trip through a gigantic intestine into a meeting with the Mystifier (José Celso Martinez Corrêa), who shows Coffin Joe purgatory and Hell, as well as a vision of his death.

As the police close in, Joe escapes through the woods and into an amusement park where he kills the cop but is impaled through the heart by the priest. He’s convinced that he’s killed Coffin Joe, but you can’t kill an idea. His shadow comes loose from his body to chase the priest while Elena mounts the dying body of our, well, hero and his hands, trembling in the throes of death, hold her breasts.

Coffin Joe’s funeral should be sad, but as we see the women throw roses at his grave, so many of them have continued the blood and are filled with his heirs. The gravestone is shattered by lightning and multiple faces of Coffin Joe appear within it.

For being seventy years old. José Mojica Marins in no way took it easy in this. It’s the bloodiest of all the films and the most complete. Not the best — I really think This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse is incredible — but I had a total blast watching it. It’s a return that is in no way unwelcome or one that feels like it doesn’t belong.

Arrow Video’s limited edition collection of the movies of Coffin Joe makes the blind see and the dead walk again. Embodiment of Evil has commentary with producer Paulo Sacramento and co-screenwriter Dennison Ramalho in Portuguese with English subtitles, plus extras like a new interview with Dennison Ramalho, footage of Marins at the film’s premiere, an interview in which Ramalho pays tribute to Marins, official Making Of and experimental Making Of featurettes and multiple featurettes with commentary by Marins. You can get this set from MVD.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Today’s movie is brought to you by AC Nicholas, who has graciously become a Big B&S’er, a monthly supporter of the site and got to pick an entire week of movies. His idea this time was for a series on movies that started as one film and were dubbed into something else.

Would you like to have me write about the movies of your choice? It’s simple!

1. Go to our Ko-Fi site and donate. There’s no set amount and I won’t tell you what to do. In fact, if you just keep reading for free, we can still be friends.
2. Join as a monthly member for just $1. That makes you a Little B&S’er.
3. As a Medium B&S’er at just $3 a month, if you pick a movie or a director, I’ll write about them for you. In fact, I’ll do one for each month you subscribe and even dedicate the post to you.
4. For $5 a month, you basically get some major power. As a Big B&S’er, I’ll write an entire week on any subject you’d like. How awesome would that be? In fact, I’ll do it for every month you’re a member. Do you think any of your other movie sites will do that for you?

Bambi (Eva Arnez) is a female karate fighter and pro wrestler who no longer loves combat. Barney (Barry Prima) is a martial artist who helps her find the eye of the tiger again. That’s needed because she needs to raise money for an operation to save the life of her brother.

Or maybe not, because 1982’s Jopi Burnama-directed Perempuan Bergairah (Passionate Woman) was remixed by Troma’s Charles Kaufman. If your idea of the height of humor is repeated bathroom jokes, you’ll love this. I must admit that I did laugh when a woman yelled when Bambi wins a fight, “Come see me tonight, I have a vibrator!” and Bambi replies,”Mine has all five speeds!”

Now for the real description of the original from IMDB: “Renny Basuki (Eva Arnaz) is a young woman and a former judo champion who, after her father’s demise, tries to look after her impoverished family. When her younger brother is diagnosed with a deadly disease, she is desperate to afford his surgery costs. One day, Indra (Prima), a professional wrestling manager, offers Renny and her friend Mia (Diana Suarkom) a place in his female wrestling troupe. They agree but Renny’s mother disapproves her wrestling career.”

As much as I love how much pro wrestling this has, not to mention a snake in the bath scene that shot for shot rips off A Nightmare On Elm Street plus a man’s face being erased by acid and someone else getting blown up with explosive throwing stars and then brass knuckles being used to punch someone’s eyeball out of their head, I am not a fan of Barry Prime being made into Elvis.

Then again, because of this movie, I hunted down the original.

Troma also made Ferocious Female Freedom Fighters Part 2 from another movie with Arnaz in it, Barang Terlarang (Violent Killer).

You can watch this on Tubi.

Dr. Hamílton (Jorge Peres) is a psychiatrist who is having nightmares in which Coffin Joe is taking his wife. He seeks help from filmmaker Jose Mojica Marins, who assures him that he created Coffin Joe, who doesn’t really exist.

There are only 35 minutes of new footage in this movie with the rest coming from censored scenes from past films including Awakening of the Beast, This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse, The Bloody Exorcism of Coffin Joe and The Strange World of Coffin Joe.

By this point, even though it’s mentioned several times in this movie that Coffin Joe was not real, he has become real. He has become more than an idea and is Brazil’s national boogeyman. He exists in our imagination as real as an actual living being. Kind of like, oh you know, Freddy Kreuger, who took a similar path 16 years later.

It’s also a great way to get out all the strangest stuff that couldn’t be seen in the past. Sure, it’s barely connected, but if you’re looking for a Coffin Joe mixtape to put on with some fuzzed out music for a party, well, this is it.

Arrow Video’s limited edition collection of the movies of Coffin Joe stares into your eyes. Hallucinations of a Deranged Mind has commentary from Marins, editor Nilcemar Leyart, Paulo Duarte and Carlos Primati in Portuguese with English subtitles, You can get this set from MVD.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Today’s movie is brought to you by AC Nicholas, who has graciously become a Big B&S’er, a monthly supporter of the site and got to pick an entire week of movies. His idea this time was for a series on movies that started as one film and were dubbed into something else.

Would you like to have me write about the movies of your choice? It’s simple!

1. Go to our Ko-Fi site and donate. There’s no set amount and I won’t tell you what to do. In fact, if you just keep reading for free, we can still be friends.
2. Join as a monthly member for just $1. That makes you a Little B&S’er.
3. As a Medium B&S’er at just $3 a month, if you pick a movie or a director, I’ll write about them for you. In fact, I’ll do one for each month you subscribe and even dedicate the post to you.
4. For $5 a month, you basically get some major power. As a Big B&S’er, I’ll write an entire week on any subject you’d like. How awesome would that be? In fact, I’ll do it for every month you’re a member. Do you think any of your other movie sites will do that for you?

The Naked Monster started in 1984 when director Ted Newsom was bet that he couldn’t make a movie for $2,500. He released the original version, Attack of the B-Movie Monster, on VHS a year later. To make it, he “hauled out the old scripts, took gags and lines and did a 25-page script which condensed things to manageable size. That version of the project was designed as a half-hour short that could be shot in about four weekends (plus the time for effects). On that basis, I asked Wayne Berwick to direct Attack of the B-Movie Monster, since I was producing and had drawn the storyboards for both the live action and effects shots.”

In 2005, a new version was made for DVD. If you watched a lot of old 1950s monster movies, you will understand so many of the references. A sheriff (R.G. Wilson), his scientist girlfriend (Brinke Stevens) and a visiting government agent (John Goodwin) discover that the Creaturesaurus erectus is back and destroying California. To help, they call upon Colonel Patrick Hendry (Kenneth Tobey, playing the same role from the original The Thing From Another World), as well as monster experts that include Clete Ferguson (John Agar from Revenge of the Creature), Major Allison (Robert Clarke from Beyond the Time Barrier), Dr. Carrington (Robert O. Cornthwaite, also reprising his The Thing from Another World part), Professor Bradshaw (Robert Shayne from Indestructible Man) and Officer Kelton (Paul Marco from Plan 9 from Outer Space). There are also appearances by Linnea Quigley, Michelle Bauer and Forrest J. Ackerman.

I would advise just understanding that this is a ZAZ Brothers style send-up of 50s monster movies and allow yourself to enjoy the rapid fire jokes and silliness. Not every one lands, but those that do are pretty good.

You can watch this on YouTube.

Directed and co-written (with Rubens Francisco Luchetti) by Jose Mojica Marins — the alter ego of Coffin Joe — Hellish Flesh is the tale of Dr. George Medeiros (Marins) and his wife Rachel (Luely Figueiró). He’s quite the scientist. But he’s neglecting his gorgeous bride over the need for science, so she hooks up with his best friend Oliver (Oswaldo De Souza). Together, they come up with a plan to kill him and take his money. Step one is throwing acid in his face. Step two is spending all his money. Yet he didn’t die during step one, so you better believe that he will come for revenge. Except that when he does come home, he doesn’t seem upset at all. As for Oliver, well, after spending most of his friend’s money, he got stabbed by another lover, leaving Rachel alone.

This is a movie filled with screaming and while strange, it doesn’t enter into the world of the Coffin Joe films. He doesn’t descend a staircase of naked women or go to Hell and learn that he is Satan. But still, it’s a movie where an acid-deformed scientist works on his revenge and even when making a morality story, Marins still can’t make a normal movie.

Arrow Video’s limited edition collection of the movies of Coffin Joe should be owned by every child. Hellish Flesh has extras including an interview with Andrew Leavold on Marins’ place in 60s and 70s Marginal Cinema and a new video essay by Kat Ellinger. You can get this set from MVD.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Today’s movie is brought to you by AC Nicholas, who has graciously become a Big B&S’er, a monthly supporter of the site and got to pick an entire week of movies. His idea this time was for a series on movies that started as one film and were dubbed into something else.

Would you like to have me write about the movies of your choice? It’s simple!

1. Go to our Ko-Fi site and donate. There’s no set amount and I won’t tell you what to do. In fact, if you just keep reading for free, we can still be friends.
2. Join as a monthly member for just $1. That makes you a Little B&S’er.
3. As a Medium B&S’er at just $3 a month, if you pick a movie or a director, I’ll write about them for you. In fact, I’ll do one for each month you subscribe and even dedicate the post to you.
4. For $5 a month, you basically get some major power. As a Big B&S’er, I’ll write an entire week on any subject you’d like. How awesome would that be? In fact, I’ll do it for every month you’re a member. Do you think any of your other movie sites will do that for you?

The Lightning Bug — voice by DJ Machine Gun Kelly, not the Cleveland waste of time rapper but the host of seven weekly programs who also shows up in The Fifth Floor, Roller Boogie and Voyage of the Rock Aliens — is taking over the world with sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll and five different costumes. Five costumes? That’s because this movie uses footage from Undersea Kingdom, The Fighting Devil Dogs, Mysterious Doctor Satan, Adventures of Captain Marvel, Spy Smasher, Captain America, The Masked Marvel, The Crimson Ghost — someone alert Glenn — as well as The Black Widow and Zombies of the Stratosphere.

Also known as The Day the Earth Got Stoned and The Second World War, this has Firesign Theater members Peter Bergman as The Chief and Philip Proctor as Agent Barton. They explain what’s going on as the J-Men battle evil. Yes, thrill to the adventures of Yank Smellfinger,  James Armhole, Buzz Cufflink, Agents Spike, Claire and Lance, Rocket Jock (Commando Cody from Radar Men from the Moon), the Lone Star (Captain America), the Caped Madman (Captain Marvel), Spy Swatter (Spy Smasher), Sleeve Coat, Juicy Withers and Admiral Balzy, who work with the FCC (Federal Culture Control) to battle the evil army of MUSAC (Military Underground Sugared Airwaves Command).

Even if it seems like the J-Men have died, don’t worry. They get out of everything by the end of the movie.

Using music by Budgie, The Tubes, Head East, Billy Preston and Badazz, this movie became a cult favorite thanks to how many times it was shown on USA’s Night Flight. It was directed by Richard Patterson, who made a Western film like this in 1976 titled Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch. He also made documentaries on Charlie Chaplin and the Marx Brothers. It was written by Bergman and Proctor.

You can watch it on Tubi.

Dr. Valerie Cross (Louise Linton, who was in the 2015 remake of Cabin Fever) is one of those people who seemingly does it all. She’s a professor of literature and psychology at Berkeley. The author of two children’s books and two novels about an antihero serial killer named Jason Manson with a third — and a $3 million offer just to write it — on the way. She used to be the lover of her agent Leonard (William Baldwin, once the villain of an American giallo in Sliver, now just content to be the big name in the credits) but after disappearing for two months took up with David (Pierson Fode), the owner of a gym where everyone — Hannah (Christy St. John), Thomas (Quinton Guyton), Tori (Michelle Jubilee Gonzalez) and Angela (Jackie Moore) — are all investigating the Harbinger serial killer.

David seems creepy — he claims he doesn’t have to breathe — and Valerie seems fragile, but things get even stranger when Angela hangs herself after claiming she knows who the killer is. It seems like she suspects David, who she’s also sleeping with — David and Valerie don’t believe in the archaic institution of marriage — and she also has a boyfriend Matthew (David Wachs) who was planning on scamming her to pay back Ian (William McNamara).

As Valerie goes to a cabin in Tahoe — and everyone else at Mixtape Fitness, their gym, quits due to their fear of the killer — she nearly dies when the brakes fail. This brings her into the orbit of Sophia (Joana Metrass), a restaurant owner whose husband died in his sleep. And now Matthew has moved in next door to start scamming them.

Everyone is beautiful but everyone is crazy. If this were the 90s, we’d call this an erotic thriller. If it was the 70s, it would be a giallo. In 2023, it’s a Tubi original.

Directed by Brian Skiba and written by Sean Crayne, this finds Valerie and David being the suspects in the murder of Angela while more girls go missing. Matthew believes that everything that Valerie is writing about in her books is actually the true things that David tells her, proving that he’s the Harbinger. Matthew starts blackmailing them, asking for Bitcoin.

David starts wiping out everyone while they swim and rock climb all while Valerie sighs and hangs out with Sophia at ladies night. She nearly warned Thomas in time, but then David shows up when he starts his car and it blows up real good.

Man, Sophia has a lot of questions, getting out that Vanessa and David met on the Isle of Bondi when she was writing a children’s book. She was kidnapped and nearly murdered and then David saved her, which became the premise for her first Jason Manson book. Let’s take a break for a second here. She’s a best-selling writer and no one was like, “You named your serial killer character Jason Manson. A little on the nose?”

While our female protagonist is flirting with Sophia at the bar and dealing with the blackmailer, David is busy, knifing women. When she gets home, David accuses her of being the person blackmailing them. They argue, she shoves him and he hits his head, bleeding all over the kitchen. As she cleans up, the cops call to tell her that all of her gym team are dead.

Cut to Leo as Valerie calls him for advice on David’s injury. He brings his own doctor (James Moses Black) instead of dealing with a girl who just wrote a book, Confessions of a Cult. David gets stitched up and has a concussion. Also: David is such a sociopath that he chews he pills instead of swallowing them.

David then relates the story of how he had a dog named Luna as a child and instead of giving it back to its rightful owner, he set it on fire and watched it burn. He then tells Valerie that he will never hurt her and kisses her in a way that says, “I am going to set you on fire.”

While all this is happening, Valerie gets with Sophia as Leo comes with the contract for the book deal. Slicing limes for tequila turns into David stabbing Matthew but missing and killing Leo. He’s such a great serial killer that he leaves blood all over the place, then someone knocks out Valerie and duct tapes her arms behind her back. And oh yeah, Sophia did kill her husband.

Nobody in this seems human. Where is the Gregory Dark of today that can make these erotic thrillers and have tension, heat and an actual story? People just arrive, drop exposition or more mystery, and then either have PG-rated makeout scenes or get killed.

Anyhow…

Valerie finds Sophia being hung, just like how Angela got killed. Matt is behind it all and David is poisoned by the tequila that knocked everyone out. Meanwhile, Matt is getting his bitcoin and then Valeria reveals that she and David killed Angela. Somehow, David is able to throw everyone into a rowboat and take them all out onto Lake Tahoe, then toss them overboard with cinderblocks tied to them. How strong is this guy?

David wakes up and everyone goes into the water and we get the closed captioned description “muffled bubbles” which makes me laugh out loud. Val is saved at the last minute by Sophia as David and Matt go down together. Of course, David lives, Jason Manson is dead and the Harbinger is gone as well. There will be a new Jason Manson novel and Sophia is her new inspiration. Val is going to Rome and she invites David to win her back.

Oh man, what a goofy movie. Pretty people doing dumb things and having unsexy sex is a better genre when it has fog, neon and sax solos, as the 90s proved to us all.

You can watch this on Tubi.