There are people that say there’s no such thing as a perfect movie. Those people have never seen Death Race 2000, a film that’s packed with pop culture references, ultraviolence, black humor, political commentary and great character moments.

After the “World Crash of ’79”, the United States government declares martial law. To keep the people happy, the Transcontinental Road Race is created. It’s a race across the country — ala Cannonball Run — except that drivers score points for killing people.

This is the twentieth race and each driver has their own character and themed car, including the mysterious champion Frankenstein (David Carradine, Kill Bill) who has been torn apart and rebuilt so many times, no one is sure what parts of him are real any longer; Machine Gun Joe (Sylvester Stallone, Rocky), a Chicago gangster who calls people mashed potato and will even drive over his own pit crew for points; Calamity Jane (Mary Woronov, Night of the Comet), a tough cowgirl; Nero the Hero (Martin Kove, Kreese from the Karate Kid!) and Matilda the Hun (Roberta Collins, Eaten Alive, Caged Heat), a Nazi. They each have a navigator who is also generally their sexual partner.

Covering the race is a parody of network news coverage — that would become even more true in today’s Fox News and CNN climate — which includes loudmouth Junior Bruce (Don Steele, Rockin’ Ricky Rialto from Gremlins), Harold, who is pretty much Howard Cosell and Grace Pander, the gossip columnist who refers to everyone as her close personal friend.

Meanwhile, Thomasina Paine, the great great great great and maybe even great-granddaughter of American Revolutionary Thomas Paine is sabotaging the race to rebel against the President. These revolutionaries have even placed Annie, Thomasina’s granddaughter, into the race as Frankenstein’s new navigator. That said — the government keeps covering up all of the deaths of the racers and blame it all on the French — who have already destroyed the country’s phone system — one of director Paul Bartel’s (Eating Raoul) favorite jokes. In fact, the film was packed with even more silliness before Roger Corman chopped out most of the strangeness that Bartel loved so much.

Everyone but Machine Gun Joe and Frankenstein are left in the race. Before the final day of the race, Annie learns that Frankenstein isn’t even the original man — he was a ward of the state who was raised from birth to compete in the Death Race. When he’s used up, another will take his place. And he’s closer to the spirit of the rebels than Annie would ever think — he plans on using his fake right hand to blow up the President. Of course, that was the plan. But Annie saves Frankenstein using this “hand” grenade in the final battle

Frankenstein is injured, so Annie takes his place and tries to stab the President. But her own grandmother shoots her, as she wants revenge thinking that the champion Death Racer had killed her granddaughter. And this all takes place after the President declares war on the French and appoints Frankenstein to lead his armies!

The real Frankenstein recovers and runs over the President to the roar of the crowd. He becomes President, marries Annie and runs over Junior Bruce as he puts an end to the Death Race.

This film may have been remade (and there are several sequels to that franchise) and Corman finally put out Death Race 2050, his own sequel to the film, in 2017. But do we need anything else when the original is so epic? It’s so much fun, punctuated by moments of sheer lunacy. Viva la Death Race 2000!

Ōkami no Monshō was a two-volume manga published in 1970 and then re-created in 2007. This film version — which wildly differs from its inspiration — hit Japanese screens in 1975 and stars Japanese actor, singer, film producer, film director, and martial artist (and the inspiration for a marijuana nickname) Shin’ichi “Sonny” Chiba. And it’s one of the wildest, strangest films I’ve ever seen.

Let me see if I can come close to summarizing the batshit insanity that is this movie: Akira Inugami (Sonny Chiba, of course), our hero, is the last survivor of a clan of werewolves. As a child, he watched his village and people get destroyed. Today, he uses his werewolf abilities to help him solve crimes — but never transform into a wolf.

His new case begins when a man is yelling in the street about being attacked by an invisible tiger that soon tears him apart. At the center of his investigation is Miki, who was abused by The Mobs, an evil rock band, and now only cares about heroin and killing everyone who hurt her. Now, a phantom government agency uses her to kill those they deem necessary of elimination.

Along the way to solving this mystery, Inugami will battle ninjas, the Yakuza, the Japanese CIA, assassins and more. It’s also worth noting that Wolfguy sleeps with more women in this movie than James Bond, but everyone he touches usually ends up dead. There’s one bonkers sex scene near the end with his true love, Taka, that has him remember sucking on his werewolf mother’s breast while doing the same to the woman he claims is his wife. Alright there, Wolfguy.

Sonny Chiba didn’t form the Japan Action Club for nothing. This group, created to develop and raise the level of martial arts techniques and sequences used in Japanese film and television, has him at its center. In this film, he has a multitude of battles and even gets thrown down a cliff and somehow front flips directly onto his feet, a stunt that completely astounded me.

Directed by Kazuhiko Yamaguchi (Sister Street Fighter) and written by Fumio Konami (Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion), this is the only Japanese werewolf that’s not a werewolf scored by Japanese jazz noise rock that sounds like Goblin featuring blood gushing FX that I have — and probably will ever — see. Imagine Wild Zero but played completely straight. I’ve also never seen a movie where the hero is able to control his intestines and pull them back into his body.

Imagine this: loud guitars, neon colors, dizzying camera angles, werewolf fistfights against ninjas and a love scene every fifteen minutes. This is a gloriously scuzzy, scummy, silly and majestic piece of film. It blew me away from start to finish and I can barely comprehend much of what I watched!

Credit for getting this movie back into the pop culture consciousness belongs to Arrow Video, which put out a gorgeously cleaned up release. You can grab that at Diabolik DVD. Even better, if you have Shudder, you can watch it now! It’s streaming and ready to blow your fucking mind.

When a movie starts with a fashion model dying during a back alley abortion and it being covered up as a drowning, all before the opening credits, you know that you’re in for something demented. When you realize that the film was written and directed by Andrea Bianchi, who brought us Burial Ground, you will either run screaming or sit down and pay attention.

The doctor who performed the operation is killed by a maniac in a motorcycle suit, but nobody at the Albatross Modeling Agency cares. All Carlo, the head photographer, cares about is using his modeling connections to pick up women. That’s how he meets Lucia (Femi Benussi, Hatchet for the Honeymoon), whom he takes from the steam room to the modeling agency.

Magda (Edwige Fenech looks better than I’ve ever seen her look in any movie) is jealous, so she surprises Carlo with some black lace, and they begin an affair. We then see a photo of the main agency members, like Mario, Magda, Carlo, Stefano, Dorris, Maurizio and his wife, and the owner of the studio, Gisella. There’s one other person in the photo—Evelyn, who we saw die in the beginning.

Mario heads home, and the killer shows up. When their helmet is removed, Mario knows the killer. But it’s too late. He’s dead now. The killer takes the photo so that they have a checklist of who to kill.

So then there’s Maurizio, who is cheating on his wife with a prostitute. He takes her on a crazy ride through the streets and then takes her back to his place, where he begs and threatens her life before she suddenly wants to have sex with him — because, you know, that’s how things worked in the 1970s — before he lasts all of a minute and starts embracing his blow up doll. Honestly, what the fuck? Of course, he’s killed right afterward. Good riddance.

Carlo later witnesses Gisella being murdered and even photographs the attack, but he’s hurt in a hit-and-run accident. While he’s recovering, Magda develops the film, but the killer ruins the negatives.

After killing Doris and Stefano, the murderer tries to kill Carlo and Magda, but the killer is knocked down the stairs. So who is it? New model Patrizia — Evelyn’s sister — blames him for her sister’s death. However, she dies before she can tell the police of his involvement.

The movie ends with Carlo playing around by mock choking Magda before initiating anal sex with her, as she tells him not to, in a scene meant as a comedy but lost in translation and the fact that forty-plus-year-old Giallo could never anticipate the #metoo movement.

The title of this film says it all. It’s the most nudity I’ve ever seen in a movie. And it’s one of the most lurid I’ve seen, too. I do not know if Bianchi intended this as a comedy, but it feels like one.

It’s almost incredible that a movie with this much nudity and mayhem moves at a glacial pace. It felt like the film’s first hour was the entire running time and contained wall-to-wall misogyny. I know, I know, that’s the majority of Giallo, but it feels so overwhelming and alien when seen with today’s eyes. I mean, should I be shocked that a movie called Strip Nude for Your Killer is so sexist? And why do I love it so much? Maybe it’s because Edwige Fenech makes me watch anything that she is in.

Films just show up in my YouTube subscriptions and I watch them, always hungry to discover something new. Imagine my surprise when I looked up and this film went from a giallo to a totally NSFW affair!

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x585zup

Dublin, 1902. As an acting troupe finishes their latest show, Count Marnack shows up and invites Evelyn and her friends — Cora, Rosalind, Penny and stagehand Samuel — to his castle. Once they get there, everyone but Samuel gets down — as we share a name I was displeased by this. But seriously, I was not expecting hardcore insert shots on YouTube. I figure they had a program to catch things like that (they caught a clip of a song in a trailer we used and took one of our podcast posts down and they let this go?)!

The secret is that the Count’s father and grandfather killed their brides with a ceremonial dagger. And the Count’s first wife went missing long ago. Soon, people start showing up with their heads missing. So whodunnit? The maid? The gardener? A ghost?

This film boasts some nice period costumes and settings, but it’s patently ridiculous. It wants to be a giallo but where those films are sexy, this is just plain rutting in the sheets. I feel like Jon Lovitz’s character Evelyn Quince from SNL’s Tales of Ribaldry. “No, no, no, no, we’ll have none of this! You’ve gone too far! You’ve ruined it for me!”

That said, I’ve never seen a movie go from pornography to an Agatha Christy style resolution within its running time. That said, the insert scenes weren’t in the original cut and were only added when the film was released in France as L’insatiable Samantha in 1977.

There’s nothing like the bond between a man and his dog. So many of the entries on this site are written in the middle of the night, as our dog likes to wake me up at 3 AM to go for a walk, then I can’t go back to sleep.

Vic (a very young Don Johnson, who any of child of the 80’s knows instantly) and Blood (voiced by Tim McIntire, who was George Jones in the 1981 TV movie Stand By Your Man) are a human and dog team traveling through the post-apocalyptic fallout after World War 4. Unlike the way my dog just barks and barks until I wake up, Blood can speak telepathically.

That telepathy comes at the expense of his ability to search for food, so the incredibly intelligent, human-hating mutt uses Vic to help him. Vic’s only hungers are food and sex. He’s pretty much a moron with no basic standards of ethics or morals. While the two have an antagonistic relationship, they realize that they need one another.

While watching old porn movies at a makeshift drive-in, Blood smells Quilla Julia Holmes, who comes from “Downunder,” a town inside an underground vault. Vic saves her from mutants and the two have sex, despite Blood’s dislike of her. She leads him to the city, where Blood refuses to enter.

Quilla June’s father, Lou Craddock (Jason Robards, Something Wicked This Way Comes) has sent her to the surface to recruit new blood for Topeka, a biosphere city beneath ruined Kansas. The Committee rules all, forcing its people to dress in 1930’s costumes. Vic has been brought here to be a stud, donating his sperm at the expense of the pleasure that he needs. And even worse — once he impregnates 35 women, he’ll be sent to the farm and never seen again.

Quilla Jane breaks Vic out as part of her plot to kill off The Committee and their android goon, Michael. That said — Vic wants no part of this plot, only to get back to his home above ground and his friend Blood. Michael kills Quilla Jane’s other rebellion members before Vic takes him out. Quilla proclaims her love for Vic and asks to return to the surface with him.

When they find Blood, he is starving and near death. Quilla Jane tells him to leave the dog to die and spend the rest of his life with her. Vic makes his mind up — killing her off camera, so that Blood can eat her. Vic states that she should have never followed him as Blood jokes that she didn’t have bad taste. They walk off into the sunset together.

A Boy and His Dog comes from a series of stories by Harlan Ellison, whose prodigious output is only rivaled by his cantankerous nature. Two of his scripts for TV’s The Outer Limits, Demon with a Glass Hand and Soldier, were so close to The Terminator that Ellison has an “acknowledgment to the works of Harlan Ellison” credit in Terminator: Genisys (and Ellison was supposedly paid for his inspiration, which you can learn about here). He also wrote what many consider the greatest episode of the original Star Trek, The City on the Edge of Forever.

Ellison tried to write the screenplay, but hit writer’s block. The final script was written by producer Alvy Moore (Hank Kimball from Green Acres, who also produced The Witchmaker and The Brotherhood of Satan and appears in this film as Dr. Moore) and director L. Q. Jones (an actor in movies like The Beast Within and The Wild Bunch who also wrote The Brotherhood of Satan), which Ellison was either somewhat happy with or totally upset with, depending on who tells the story. What is known is that he was unhappy with Blood’s final line: “Well, I’d certainly say she had marvelous judgement, Albert…if not particularly good taste.” The book ends differently, with Vic remembering a question that Quilla had asked of him: “Do you know what love is?” Vic finally remembers the answer: “Sure I know. A boy loves his dog.”

If you’ve ever played the video game Fallout, then you’ll be delighted to learn how much comes from this film.

Vic and Blood would have further adventures, even one tale where Ellison tried to off the pair due to either his dislike of the film’s ending or being sick of fans asking for more stories about the duo. There was nearly a sequel, A Girl and His Dog, which would have had Blood team up with a female warrior named Spike.

I discovered this film at Cult Action, where they described it as “one of the most ridiculous clones of The Exorcist of all time,” and after a month or more of watching films that were — shall we say — influenced by that film, this one lives up to the hype.

This one has tons of titles, like Exorcist 3: Cries and Shadows, The Possessor, Un Urlo Dalle Tenebre and Naked Exorcist. It lives up to those titles, trust me. Particularly the last one.

A nun learns that her brother, Piero, has become possessed due to a pendant he found and a mystery woman who he isn’t sure that he saw. Within minutes — no need for the build of the original here — Piero has chest pains, is flipping out on everyone and sometimes becomes the previously mentioned woman. His powers aren’t well defined, but you won’t care. Your jaw will be on the floor at the craziness that this film has in its grip.

Oh yeah. There was also a huge Satanic orgy in the house a few years ago. We know this because this scene is repeated throughout the movie. Luckily, the Exorcist (Richard Conte in his last film. Conte was going to play Don Corleone in The Godfather, but as the film increased in budget, A-list actors started competing for the part. He did end up playing one of the film’s villains, Don Barzini) is on hand to help save everyone.

If you watched The Exorcist and thought, “This would be so much better with b-roll footage of Rome and, oh by the way, could we make it a ton sleazier?” then yes, this film is exactly what you want. Franco Lo Cascio is the perfect director for this, as despite starting his career with 1975’s Mark of Zorro (starring George Hilton from All the Colors of the Dark as Zorro!), he’s worked mostly as Luca Damiano in the Italian porn industry.

For all the movies that Warner Brothers sued out of theaters, the fact that this one got through unscathed is a miracle. Then again, when we’re referring to movies about Satanic possession, perhaps that isn’t the best choice of words.

A warning: this film is not for the weak. If you were offended by The Exorcist, you’re in for it. If Amityville II: The Possession upset you, you are also in for it. If you’re looking for a film that doesn’t suddenly stop the narrative and starts showing b-roll footage of nightclubs, you are also in for it even more.

The Devil’s Rain! is a movie that could only have been made in 1975. It united old Hollywood royalty, television stars, the visionary director of The Abominable Dr. Phibes and the Church of Satan in the Mexican desert.

It is not a perfect movie. You can’t even say that it has plot holes, as that would require something of a coherent plot — a fact director Robert Fuest was all too aware of. On the sparkling commentary track that accompanies the new Blu-ray release from Severin (picked up from the Dark Sky DVD release), he speaks about discussions with the writers (Gabe Essoe, James Ashton and Gerald Hopman, whose only credit is co-producing Evilspeak, so one assumes that he is Satan) where they assured him that the script made perfect sense. While Fuest claims that he did what he could to clear up his issues with the film, a movie that effectively decimated his promising directorial career emerged.

But you know what? I embrace plot holes the way some critics hold dearly onto their Criterion collection films and back issues of Premiere. There’s no way I can be objective about The Devil’s Rain! The only box it doesn’t check for me is a disclaimer stating that it’s based on a true story.

The film begins with close-ups of Bosch’s painting The Garden of Earthly Delights, along with the wails of the damned as they gnash their teeth in Hell. Then, we’re dropped into the lives of the Preston family, who have suffered under a curse for hundreds of years.

Turns out that at some point in the 18th century, the family screwed over Jonathan Corbis (Ernest Borgnine, Escape from New York), a Satanist who was eventually burned at the stake. He had a book containing the souls of all he had damned, which was stolen by Martin Fyfe (William Shatner, who I don’t need to tell you anything else about). Before he dies, Corbis vows revenge on the Fyfe family, which changes its name to Preston. He’s been stealing them one by one, selling their souls to Satan and trapping them in the devil’s rain. They then become living wax figures with melting eyes and black robes.

That’s how we meet Steve Preston, the leader of the family, who has escaped Corbis to warn his wife  (Ida Lupino, an actress (and director) known for noir classics like The Bigamist and On Dangerous Ground. She often referred to herself as the poor man’s Bette Davis, as she was usually offered the parts that Davis had turned down. She refused those parts so many times that Warner Brothers suspended her, so she used that time to learn the craft of directing on set. As roles for her slowed, she became the second female director admitted to the Director’s Guild, following Dorothy Arzner, the sole woman director of Hollywood’s “Golden Age.”) and son, Mark (also Shatner). As the old man tells them to return the Book of Souls, he melts in the rain.

So what does Mark do? He takes the book directly to Corbis, challenging him to a battle of faith in the desert. That battle quickly turns into Mark trying to escape, but Corbis’ disciples are too much for him. He shows a cross to the priest, who transforms it into a snake before using a ritual to erase Mark’s memory in preparation for a major ceremony.

Oh, the 1970s — when your main character gets wiped out minutes into a movie because he has to leave town for a three-day Star Trek convention in New York. That really happened, and I have no idea if that was why Shatner went from hero to geek in such record time.

Mark’s older brother Tom (Tom Skerritt, Alien) and his wife, Julie, must save the day. Oh yeah — they also have Dr. Sam Richards (Eddie Albert from TV’s Green Acres) along for the ride, as he’s a psychic researcher.

Finding Corbis’ church, Mark watches the ceremony that converts his brother into a wax follower. Anton LaVey shows up under a hood, and Corbis turns into a goat, which is an event that sent me scrambling through our living room in a paroxysm of glee. The Severin release also contains interviews with the Church of Satan’s High Priest Peter H. Gilmore, High Priestess Peggy Nadramia and LaVey’s wife and biographer Blanche Barton, all of whom share anecdotes of the Black Pope’s time on the set (indeed, it seems to be a madcap time by studying the photos they show, with LaVey in a jaunty leather cap smiling like a child on Walpurgisnacht) and input on the film. He’s nearly caught but also discovers that the source of Corbis’ power is the devil’s rain, a glass bottle containing the souls that the priest has captured.

But wait — if he has the devil’s rain, why did he need the book? If he came back to life, why does he need revenge? Look — perhaps these questions will derail your enjoyment of The Devil’s Rain! But not me.

During the final battle — the film moves incredibly fast, making ninety minutes feel like half an hour — the devil’s rain is destroyed by Mark, who finds his lost humanity. Then, it starts to rain.

I love how the advertising for this film states that this is “absolutely the most incredible ending of any motion picture ever!” They aren’t lying. Corbis and his followers melt for nearly ten minutes of special effects, turning into piles of goop. It’s over the top and ridiculous and extraneous and totally awesome. I use This kind of scene to determine if I can be friends with someone. If you dismiss it, you’ll never share a beer with me.

Producer Sandy Howard (who also was responsible for Meteor, Blue Monkey and the A Man Called Horse series) based his whole ad campaign around the end of the film, so he took over the final cut to ensure that this sequence would last and last.

Tom and his wife — whose ESP is the sole reason we can see the flashbacks to know why Corbis is doing what he does — make it out alive, but as he embraces his wife, we see that he’s really hugging Ernest Borgnine! Where’s his wife? Trapped in the devil’s rain, in a scene that comes back at the end of the credits that is harrowing as she looks out into the darkness with no hope.

Is The Devil’s Rain! a good movie? Well, that depends on your perspective. Despite the flimsy plot, Fuest succeeds at delivering plenty of pure weirdness and gorgeous visuals. And there’s so much talent on the screen — I didn’t even mention that this is one of John Travolta’s first films and that Keenan Wynn (Piranha, Laserblast) shows up as the sheriff.

Plus, like all 70’s occult movies, plenty of legends are behind the film. Like Ernest Borgnine claiming that there were so many accidents on set that he’d never work on a Satanic fmovieagain. Or he was saying that the Mafia produced the film and that he was never paid. Cinefantastique magazine even wrote that Fuest had suffered a nervous breakdown during the making of the movie, a fact he disputes on the commentary track. And LaVey claimed that he did a special success ritual for Travolta.

PS – Here’s the link to a June 1975 Argosy interview with LaVey during the filming of The Devil’s Rain! where he discusses buying the panties of “MGM’s most famous stars- from Greer Garson to Liz Taylor – with the labels still on them,” being minimized on movie sets and Ernest Borgnine accepting an honorary priesthood.

Alvin Lee catches his wife in bed with a lover, breaks in and shoots both of them dead. Later, injured and near death, he begs for his daughter to see him one more time before he dies.

His daughter, 13-year-old Lila Lee (Cheryl Smith, Phantom of the Paradise, The Incredible Melting Man, Laserblast and short time member of The Runaways and drummer for Joan Jett) is the star of the church, where her voice and beauty draw attention — thanks to the peculiar beauty people from her hometown have, which is known as the “Astaroth Look” (inspired by the “Innsmouth look” from H.P. Lovecraft’s The Shadow over Innsmouth).

The Reverend (director Richard Blackburn, who co-wrote and appears in Eating Raoul, as well as appearing as the voice of Dr. Zaius in the Return to the Planet of the Apes cartoon and Stunt Rock) demands that his congregation stop talking about how her father is a gangster. She now belongs to the church and they know how to look after her. Interestingly, that church is on a soundstage that was once Mayberry for TV’s Andy Griffith Show.

That said — the letter leads her to find the town of Astaroth, despite dealing with a young couple who discuss how the Reverend obviously wants to have sex with her, a ticket taker offering her strange candy and a broken down bus ride that ends with a vampire attack.

Lemora is saved by Lila, the queen of the vampires, who is the one who wrote to her. She takes her to her ancient stone house and gives her a new dress. Sitting with he children, Lemora serves her wine — nah, its blood — and asks Lila to sing for the children. Lemora spins her in a dance, asking her to give her body to the music, before throwing her to the floor as a crash echoes through the house. Lemora then bathes her while asking her about her body and all of the boys that have to be after her.

Lila goes to her room and her father, now a vampire, attacks her. Lemora explains that over the last year that many of the people have become ugly and beast-like, therefore they need to be killed. Lemora sucks the vampire blood out of the wound Lila has, then reads her a bedtime story and brushes her hair.

Tomorrow, there will be a blood ceremony, which will make Lila and Lemora sisters, letting them share in power. “Will it be in a church? Baptist?” asks Lila. “No, more ancient,” answers Lemora.

As Lila explores the house, she finds the diary of a girl who was in her shoes in the past. Turns out that Lemora is the queen of the vampires, feeding on her adopted children. So Lila escapes through the town, just as the Reverend comes to save her.

The Reverend comes to save her, but not before a battle where most of the vampires are killed. As Lila’s father has become one of the monsters, she must kill him. Lila mourns, which leads to Lemora offering her a vampire’s kiss.

When the Reverend finally arrives, Lila reaches out to him, wanting to embrace and kiss him, something that he had resisted in the past. Now, she overcomes him and as they embrace, she bites into his neck as Lemora watches. We cut to Lila singing in church as the movie ends.

I’d compare this film — subtitled “A Child’s Tale of the Supernatural” with Valerie and Her Week of Wonders. It’s richly dark, both in lighting and subject matter. It feels more like a dream or a children’s fable than a movie and is worth multiple viewings. It’s such a shame that this movie has been lost and forgotten for so long!