The beginning of this movie takes on an Escape from New York feel, informing the audience that violence in American high schools is out of control. With most major cities being controlled by gangs, schools have shut down or become basically military camps.

Yes, Class of 1999 does something few movies have ever done. It takes a mostly realistic first movie and then goes completely off the rails, placing the sequel in a near-post apocalyptic future.

Seattle’s Kennedy High School is in the middle of a free fire zone, a place that the police don’t dare to intervene. So the Department of Education Defense (D.E.D.) and MegaTech head Dr. Bob Forrest (Stacy Keach, magnificent) have decided to use the school to test their new breed of teachers: Coach Bryles, Mr. Hardin and Ms. Connors (Pam Grier!). With delinquents being allowed back into the school, these android teachers are fully prepared and willing to use deadly force to keep horseplay to a minimum.

This is the story that hero Cody Culp (Bradley Gregg, Fire In the Sky) must conquer. Or at least survive. His love interest is played by Traci Lind, who was also in Fright Night Part 2. She retired from acting at a young age and made claims that was abused by her ex-boyfriend Dodi Fayed. Yes, the same man who died with Princess Di.

Between the Razorheads and Blackhearts gang war, robotic teachers unleashing flamethrowers and trying to protect his old friends, Cody has a lot of work on his hands. I mean, his kid brother Angel (Joshua John Miller, Homer from Near Dark) gets killed and there’s a letter in blood written on his trademark basketball.

Every single person in this movie is ridiculous and I say that in absolutely the kindest way. This movie is entertaining from the moment it starts. Punk rock future gang wars? A Terminator version of Pam Grier? Malcolm McDowell as a school principal? An albino mad scientist Stacy Keach? Yes. This movie has that and so much more.

You can watch this on Tubi.

The title of this movie translates as Direct Trip to Hell, which is probably a good description of 90 some-odd minutes of an evil uncle abusing his niece (Daniela Castro) while also being obsessed by death.

He’s also upset because she has feelings for his limo driver, which is kind of a queasy thing, but not as bad as the fact that he has a basement filled with dead people that he makes her hang out in and touch corpses.

The uncle believes that he will soon die, so he asks Castro to bury him in a shallow grave and to keep his body above ground for two days so that he doesn’t wake up in a grave. She refuses, so he locks her in that basement I mentioned above and all the corpses begin to come to life.

I fear that I’ve made this movie sound way more exciting than it is. Because trust me, it was so memorable that I had to job my memory by watching it again before writing this and it wasn’t any better the second time around.

You can watch this on YouTube.

Slaughter Night is a portmanteau written and directed by Gilberto de Anda. It features three stories that aren’t really connected, but the astounding ending of the last story more than makes up for that. I’d never seen a Mexican Bigfoot before and now that I have, I feel like my life is closer to finally nearing completion. Don’t feel sad. I feel fulfilled.

In the first story, a young actor wants to get ahead and learns that his elder rival uses black magic. So he kills the man and steals his book of spells, which seems like the worst idea ever. Or perhaps that’s the second story, where some punk rockers try to rob a family of vampires.

The last story, well, that’s why you’ll want to watch this. Mexican action movie star Mario Almada — who looks like someone’s dad and not who we in America would think of as someone who should be in those types of films and we really need to get over our prejudices in so many ways, but particularly against elder Mexican actors not being able to patear el culo.

Anyways, Mario plays a hunter who has been after a Yeti for his entire life, before having to join forces with El Squatcho and fight a bunch of thugs who are about to assault Mario’s annoying comedy relief wife. Much like the creature in Night of the Demon, this Bigfoot’s fight style is to knock people’s heads clean off. It’s everything I wanted this movie to be, but it takes a while to get there.

So this isn’t really a giallo. But then again, Near Dark really isn’t a gothic horror movie, but it does a damn good job of updating that genre too. That’s due to Kathryn Bigelow, the only woman to ever win a Best Director Academy Award.

From Point Break to Strange Days and the film that won her that honor, The Hurt Locker, she’s able to take the conventions of film, remix them and come up with her own unique take. She also doesn’t shy from the ballet of violence, either.

Back when Vestron Pictures tried to go legit, this movie was almost released under their auspices. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer got the rights and the film died in theaters.

Interestingly enough, Roger Ebert saw this movie as a sequel of sorts to Halloween, while remaking that it was more interesting than just another replaying of the Michael Myers formula because “the filmmakers have fleshed out the formula with intriguing characters and a few angry ideas.”

Ron Silver, one of cinema’s greatest assholes, plays Eugene Hunt, a mystery man who falls for rookie cop Megan Turner (Curtis) the moment she blows gigantic bloody holes into a young Tom Sizemore. He takes the criminal’s gun away, which in effect makes Turner a criminal instead of a cop, shooting an unarmed man with such deadly force over and over again.

Turner finds herself torn between Hunt and the man investigating her, Detective Nick Mann (Clancy Brown, the Kurgan in Highlander). It’s an intriguing idea, as nearly every male relationship in her life is abusive, from her father to even the way that Mann speaks to her upon their first meeting. She’s trying to achieve in a male-dominated field as well and the only positive relationship — with her friend Tracy (Elizabeth Pena) — is also brutally torn away.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Louise Fletcher plays her mother. And also doubly guilty if I didn’t remark that she is also in Exorcist II: The Heretic. But I digress.

The end of this film plays nearly as a parody of action movie cliches. There are no people in Times Square, usually the most crowded of spaces and each character has too many bullets in their guns. That said, we’ve come too far, Turner has given up too much and Hunt must pay in blood. So much blood.

Writer and director Damian Lee also did Ski School, which I assume preps you for making science fiction action movies starring two of Arnold’s pals, Jesse “The Body” Ventura and Sven-Ole Thorsen. Plus, best of all — no, actually best doesn’t apply here — Jim Belushi shows up.

Abraxas (Ventura) and Secundus (Thorsen) are Space Cops called Finders who live for thousands of years and use an Answer Box to scan and communicate in the field. It’s also a weapon, as if a subject doesn’t contain the Anti-Life Equation, they are disintegrated.

If you just read that and got angry that Jack Kirby’s concepts were ripped off for this movie, good news. For me, at least. Because I thought I was going crazy.

Secundus goes bad, because he wants to live forever and needs to figure out that Anti-Life Equation to do so. His plan? Knock up the first woman he finds by rubbing his hand over her belly. That woman is Sonia Murray (Marjorie Bransfield, who was married to Belushi at the time, so that explains that) and she has a baby named Tommy in seconds. But Tommy is going to grow up to be the Culminator and solve that equation. Abraxas is supposed to kill the child and the mother, but he’s too nice and let’s her live. Her parents get mad that she had a baby and toss her out into the streets, except that you know, she somehow got pregnant and had the child in the very same day.

Five years later, Tommy is a mute child with superpowers. Well, his one power is the ability to make bullies piss their pants. So I guess that’s a power. And his principal at school is Jim Belushi, who brings back his role of Rick Latimer because we all demanded that. You know, I give Jim a lot of guff and the dude voted for Obama and has a pop-up cannabis shop, so maybe he’s not as bad as I’ve been led to believe.

What is bad is Abraxas, a movie that is kinda sorta The Terminator with no time travel. You can watch it for free on Amazon Prime and Tubi. Or, if you need some help, the Rifftrax version is also on Amazon Prime and Tubi, too.

Rich Correll was Richard Rickover on Leave It to Beaver and helped Harold Lloyd preserve his film as a teen, a role he still works on. He’s directed tons of TV, like a hundred episodes of Hanna Montana. He also produced the Police Squad! TV series and worked with Police Academy‘s Paul Maslansky to make this somewhat forgotten 1990 teen comedy.

Ray Walston and Martin Mull are the grown-up good and bad guys in this story of a ski lodge being sold to make a mall, because in 1990 malls and avarice were things, not that they aren’t things right now.

George Lopez and Paul Feig — yes, the very same man who would make Freaks and Geeks and less famously, the 2016 Ghostbusters  — make early appearances.

This was released the same year as Ski School, which got a sequel, while this movie had none of its planned follow-ups.

There’s a wacky guy who has multiple faces thanks to a mask that allows him to continually talk to himself. That’s pretty much the highlight of this film. I’d like to say that these are a genre in and out of themselves, but seeing as how this is posted during a week of Police Academy-ripoffs, I can tell you that they are basically beach movies, which are the same thing as Porky’s movies, which are the same thing as Meatballs ripoffs, which are also all really Animal House ripoffs.

I still watch every single one of them.

In this sequel, Honey Wells (Ginger Lynn) and Didi (Linnea Quigley) are back to battle Spanish Fly, who is about to dose the city with, well, Spanish Fly.

Miss Thelma Louise Devonshire is back as well. She’s played by Jayne Hamil, who was in all of these movies but the third one. The actress would go on to write for The Nanny and Barbie Dreamhouse Adventures, which seems quite far from Vice Academy.

Teagan — yes, the very same Teagan who was Alienator — is in this as BimboCop, who Honey dislikes so much that she blows up the cyborg cop and goes to jail at the end of the movie, just in time for Didi to graduate and leave Vice Academy behind.

Rick Sloane directed this one again. If you haven’t seen these, imagine a 1980s VCA film with all the lead up to the sex and none of the actual sex. It’s the best we could do before the internet, when all we had was USA Up All Night.

You can watch this on Tubi or be brave and grab the Vinegar Syndrome box set.

Warren Beatty wanted to make this movie all the way back in 1975. In 1980, United Artists became interested in financing and distributing the movie, getting James Bond and Superman writer Tom Mankiewicz to start the script. However, the deal fell through when Chester Gould, creator of the comic strip, pushed for a heavy hand in financial and creative matters.

Spielberg and John Landis were considered to direct at one point at Universal, with Clint Eastwood, Harrison Ford, Richard Gere, Tom Selleck and Mel Gibson all considered for the starring role.

After the incident on the set of The Twilight Zone: The Movie, Landis left the project and Walter Hill came on with Joel Silver producing. They approached Beatty to be the star. Sets were even built, but Beatty had creative issues with Hill, who wanted a violent and realistic film. However, the star was a big fan of the comic strip and wanted a stylized version of a comic book, plus a $5 million dollar salary and 15% of the gross.

Beatty finally got a deal with Disney that enabled him to produce, direct and star in the film. Disney greenlit Dick Tracy in 1988 with the rules that Beatty — who was notorious for going overbudget — stay within a $25 million dollar budget.

That didn’t happen, as once filming started, costs went up to $46.5 million and an additional $48.1 million in advertising. The movie made back $162.7 million, so it did make back the investment.

This is one of the last American blockbusters to use no CGI. Instead, the design team of production designer Richard Sylbert, set decorator Rick Simpson, cinematographer Vittorio Storaro, visual effects supervisors Michael Lloyd and Harrison Ellenshaw, prosthetic makeup designers John Caglione, Jr. and Doug Drexler, and costume designer Milena Canonero used a combination of matte paintings and incredibly detailed makeup. They also limited themselves to just seven colors and never move the camera. Everything is in frame, as if it’s a comic book panel. Plus, it features some of the most elaborate scene paintings ever made.

That said — it’s the first movie to use digital audio.

As for the film itself, it’s nearly a spot the actor game just as much as it is a story. Tracy (Beatty) is up against “Big Boy” Caprice (Al Pacino), a crime boss who our hero has been after for years, as well as an army of all of Tracy’s bad guys from the strip.

Plus, there’s Breathless Mahoney (Madonna), who keeps coming between Tracy and his true love, the unironically named Tess Trueheart. Oh yeah — and then there’s The Kid, a child who no one wants and that Tracy starts taking care of.

If you love character actors, this movie is for you. There’ Seymour Cassel as Sam Catchem, Michael J. Pollard as Big Bailey, Charles Durning as the chief, Dick Van Dyke as the district attorney and even Kathy Bates as a court stenographer. Even Mary Woronov shows up as a child welfare agent!

The bad guys are Dustin Hoffman as Mumbles, William Forsythe as Flattop, Ed O’Ross as Itchy, Mandy Patinkin as 88 Keys, James Tolkan as Numbers, Henry Silva as Influence, Paul Sorvino as Lips Manlis, R.G. Armstrong as Pruneface, James Caan as Spud Spaldoni and there are quite literally so many other bad guys that I’ve forgotten over the years that Catherine O’Hara plays Texie Garcia.

There’s also The Blank, a mysterious villain who looks like something right out of Blood and Black Lace.

Disney had hoped that Dick Tracy would become a successful franchise, but its disappointing box office performance halted those plans. It made money — but not enough money for the effort.

As these things happen, lawsuits followed. Executive producers Art Linson and Floyd Mutrux sued Beatty shortly after the release of the film, as they claimed that they were owed profit participation.

Beatty was the person who had actually purchased the Dick Tracy film and television rights in 1985 from Tribune Media Services before taking the project to Disney. According to Beatty, in 2002, Tribune attempted to reclaim the rights and notified Disney. They just never told him or followed their agreement.

To lock up the rights even further, Beatty hired cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki and film critic Leonard Maltin to make the 2008 Dick Tracy TV Special for Turner Classic Movies. This bonkers effort features Beatty as Tracy in a retrospective interview with Maltin. That’s right — Beatty is in character for the entire special. When asked if Beatty will make a sequel, Dick Tracy tells Maltin to ask him himself.

Even stranger, this special has only aired once, as if it were a legal announcement. Well, that’s because it was.

I love this movie. It’s completely unlike any other film ever made and just looks so strange as a result. Beatty is also crazy — this has been confirmed by many people who worked on this, like Danny Elfman — but the results are so good.

Who does a Top Cop battle? Well, after he loses his partner, he goes up against a drug kingpin and his goons. There’s too much corruption. There’s too much strife. And way too many trans fat oils if this is what a top cop looked like in 1990.

Vic Malone, the top cop of the title, blows up eateries and saves women and pretty much gives his life for our entertainment, if home movies can be considered at such a high level. As the star, stunt coordinator, associate producer and special effects for this movie, Stephen P. Sides took on many roles. He did all of them probably as well as he could. Ah, Crown International, what magical BS you weave before my eyeballs giving these movies money and then somehow, decades later, they end up in my living room.

The director, Mark L. Maness, has the nickname of Chunky. He’s the kind of affable dude who wears a t-shirt under a blazer and is given to quotes like, “Dreams are the fabric from which we can weave our reality.”

If by fabric, you mean Cottonnelle, then yes, fabric.

Somehow, Leonard Maltin said that this was the best erotic thriller of 1990. So, if this movie teaches you anything, it’s that even Leonard Maltin can be swayed by blow, both in the occupation and the noun forms of the word.

Much like so many of the movies we’re watching this week, this is available on the Mill Creek Explosive Cinema set. If you’re feeling as sadomasochistic as me, it’s the best movie that I’ve ever seen set in Arkansas about drug-fighting cops with type 2 diabetes.