Murdercycle (1999)

Murdercycle, you have a great poster going for you and the absolutely insipid idea that aliens would come to Earth in the form of black leather wearing motorcycle riders, just like Galactica ’80, a show that only I am cursed to remember.

That’s when the military — along with a female doctor who can read minds — decides to head off to the desert to protect valuable alien intel that the Murdercycle wants back for its home planet.

So yeah. There are some conspiracy theories, some military cosplay and some Area 51 type shenanigans. It’s a very made for video rental kind of movie, so if you miss that era, this is here to reward you. It’s a small reward though, so be warned.

Director Thomas L. Callaway was the cinematographer for Action U.S.A.Slumber Party Massacre II, both Rage of Honor movies and something called Megachurch Murder that I feel like I have to seek out.

Credit for that awesome poster art goes to Charles Band, who was planning on using it from a movie called Battle Bikers. That artwork was never used, so it went to this movie.

Your ears aren’t playing tricks on you when it comes to the character names. They’re all Marvel Comics people, including Ditko, Wood, Adams, Coletta and Sinnott amongst others.

You can watch this on Tubi.

Drive-In Friday: Slobs vs. Snobs Comedy Night

As Robert Freese pointed out in his “Exploring: 80s Comedies” featurette for B&S About Movies, the late ’70s one-two punch of National Lampoon’s Animal House (1978) and Meatballs (1979) opened up a cottage industry of comedies featuring snobs vs. slobs, lovable losers, and harmless, misguided man-children behaving badly — with Caddyshack solidifying the genre to carry us through the rest of ’80s . . . and beyond with the likes of American Pie and all of its subsequent knockoffs.

Sadly, for every Easy Money and Revenge of the Nerds . . . well, as Freese points out, there’s was a LOT more swings and misses than hits in the ’80s . . . and we’re scrapin’ the grease pits and threadin’ the reels with four of ’em.

You’ve been warned.

Movie 1: Joysticks (1983)

Oh, man. Movie tough guy Joe Don Baker as a curmudgeonly businessman who wants to shut down the local video arcade? Greydon Clark, who directed The Uninvited, Without Warning, and Wacko, and acted in Satan’s Sadists is behind the beeps n’ boops? Nicholas Josef von Sternberg, the guy who lensed Petey Wheatstraw and Mistress of the Apes, sat behind the camera?

I’m all in.

This movie was such a big deal that Midway allowed the image of Pac-Man to be used, as well as their new game Satan’s Hollow, and the as-yet-unreleased Super Pac-Man during the big showdown at the movie’s end.

What the . . . did I just program both a Greydon Clark and a Nicholas Josef von Sternberg Drive-In Friday tribute nights?

Movie 2: My Chauffeur (1986)

Sigh . . . Deborah Foreman, as Sam pointed out in his review, is our favorite 1980s comedy girl that caused our hearts to weep in the frames of Real Genius, Valley Girl, and April Fools Day. And she was always reliable and dependable on screen. How she never broke though to the A-List in major Hollywood films as the next “Meg Ryan” with her plucky Carole Lombard crossed with early Shirley MacLaine vibe is anyone’s guess.

Well, movies like this certainly didn’t help.

The “golf course” in this one is replaced by the Brentwood Limousine Service run by Howard “Dr. Johnny Fever” Hesseman and owned by E.G Marshall from Creepshow. And, of course, love blooms between Foreman’s commoner driver and E.G’s son played by Sam “Flash Gordon” Jones — on his way to the late ’80s post-apoc slop that is Driving Force and the early ’90s Basic Instinct wannabe that is Night Rhythms.

What the . . . did I just program a Sam Jones Drive-In Friday night?

Intermission! Let’s Eat! You need a Chilly Dilly!

Back to the show!

Movie 3: Hamburger: The Motion Picture (1986)

Not to be confused with Hot Dog: The Movie starring David Naughton (yep, the Dr. Pepper “Making It” from Meatballs American Werewolf guy). And not to be confused for being an actual movie. And no, you’re not confused: writer and director Mike Marvin — yes, the guy who concocted one of the most F’up car flicks ever, The Wraith — is behind both fast food oddities.

So, if you think that any movie that needs to suffix itself with a colon and remind you that it’s a “motion picture” and a “movie” has to be good . . . think again. But, as Sam pointed out in his more complete review: when you’re in a small town with one duplex theater and one quad drive-in back in the ol’ pre-cable TV days with no Internet streaming, you ended up seeing suffix n’ colon’d movies for lack of anything else to do during the summer.

So, if you ever wanted to see a movie where — I am safe enough in my masculinity to admit — the very hot Leigh McCloskey from Dario Argento’s Inferno can’t seem to stop being a hornburger horndog and hooking up with ALL of the girls on campus, this is your movie. And Leigh keeps getting kicked out of schools as result. And his reputation is so bad, Faber College won’t even have him. So he ends up at Buster Burger University run by Dick Butkus in the John Vernon role.

Dude, let’s get the hell out of here and head on down to the Delta House . . . to escape the “The Movie” marathon at the local theater also showing California Girls: The Motion Picture and The Kentucky Fried Movie.

Movie 4: Golfballs! (1999)

We dug up this way-late-to-the-course direct-to-video oddity during our “Police Academy Week” tribute because, well, you think you’re getting a Caddyshack redux, but your really getting a Police Academy rip sans cops and lots of golfballs boobs.

No, it’s not “alright,” when you blatantly steal a whole lot from Caddyshack (right down to a camouflaged Bill Murray clone) and add lots of gratuitous boobs from the likes of Playboy and Howard Stern’s perpetual radio guest Amy Lynn Baxter and adult film star Jennifer Steele. And there’s jokes about blue (golf) balls and bent “wood,” a farting Chihuahua, cussing grannies, and more golf double entendres about “sticks” and “balls,” vaudevillian spit-takes, shower scenes, and public urination.

Maybe if they added a colon and reminded us this was a “motion picture” it would have helped? Nah.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

SLASHER MONTH: Witchouse (1999)

Witchouse is the kind of movie that I’d compromise with any girl I dated in 1999. The video store was closing, she wouldn’t watch a foreign film and it seemed like something close enough to what she wanted and that I could stomach. It is a film of, there’s that word again, compromise.

It’s directed by David DeCoteau, whose movies are either somewhat inspired silliness like Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama or beefcake disguised as horror like Bigfoot vs. D.B. Cooper or holiday movies. And oh yeah — A Talking Cat!?!

May Day 1998. Elizabeth Lafay — no relation to Abigail — has brought together the descendants of those that stopped her murderous Aunt Lilith by burning her at the stake three hundred years ago for a murderous party.

One of the party-goers is Janet, who is played by Charlie Sheen’s ex-wife (and friend to Paris Hilton) Brooke Mueller.

Filmed back to back with Retro Puppet Master, this is a Full Moon kind of movie, if you know what I’m saying and I think you do. That also means that there are two more in the series, if there wasn’t enough witch or house or witchouse here for you. It’s also kind of, sort of another installment of Night of the Demons if you were hoping for a third installment, filled with stock characters including one Linnea Quigley-ish lady who carries a guitar everywhere she goes so that we know she loves to rock and roll.

You can watch this on Tubi.

SLASHER MONTH: Retro Puppet Master (1999)

The seventh film in the Puppet Master series, this is a prequel to 1991’s Puppet Master III: Toulon’s Revenge. It’s written by Charles Band, Benjamin Carr and David Schmoeller with direction provided by David DeCoteau.And no, your eyes do not deceive you. Playing the young Toulon is Gregory Sestero, Mark from The Room.

This begins with Toulon and his puppets on the run, hiding an in an Inn near Switzerland. Blade finds the wooden head of an old puppet named Cyclops, which leads to Toulon telling the puppets about his past his love Elsa and first puppets, which all goes back to 1902 Egypt.

The puppets’ ability to become alive all are thanks to Afzel, a 3,000-year-old Egyptian sorcerer, who stole the secret from the Egyptian god Sutekh. Now, three mummies that follow the teachings of this god are following him around the world. Afzel comes into the lives of Toulon and Elsa, showing them the secret.

The retro puppets include Blade, Pinhead, Tunneler (called Drill Sergeant), Six-Shooter, Doctor Death and Cyclops. We also get to see the surviving puppets from the third film, who are Blade, Pinhead, Leech Woman, Jester, Tunneler and Six-Shooter.

An ironic twist to the casting of this film was that James Franco and Sestero were both up for the same role. Years later, Franco would make the book Sestero wrote, The Disaster Artist, into a movie.

SLASHER MONTH: Shan Gou (1999)

Nearly two decades after the slasher boom, Hong Kong decided to get in on the action with Bowie Lau’s The Deadly Camp. Unlike the spate of new wave slashers and their need to decry the past, this one simply shows that everyone involved is a fan of 1981-ish slashers. I can relate.

Look, any movie that starts with a young couple getting killed in the woods with a chainsaw is going to make me happy. I’m a very simple man with very simple tastes. Give me a maniac with his face all wrapped up with bandages, ship in some annoying kids and let God sort them out.

If you hoped that The Final Terror had a sequel, but moved the action to somewhere in the Far East, I have great news for you. This is also a film where a character actually says, “It’s true, we met a lunatic when we pissed yesterday!”, a line that makes me piss my pants, too. Who says we can’t communicate with the rest of the world and all reach a mutual understanding?

This has a rich body count of fifteen people, which is pretty high for a slasher. Supposedly, it’s a remake of the 1980 Hong Kong film San Gou (The Beasts). There is some modern tech here, but it does absolutely nothing against a family of killers who have no issue with killing every single person they come close to.

It doesn’t break any new ground, but if you’re missing the days when a new slasher came out nearly every weekend, it’s there and waiting to be watched.

You can watch this on YouTube.

Mr. Rock ‘n’ Roll: The Alan Freed Story (1999)

Based on John A. Jackson’s book Big Beat Heat: Alan Freed and the Early Years of Rock & Roll, this is the warts and all story of Alan Freed, who may have invented rock and roll — or at least popularized it — but lived fast and certainly anything but scandal free.

Director Andy Wolk was behind the 2002 film The Christmas Shoes, a movie that I am forced to watch every year. I am still upset that this year, I will have to watch it yet again.

Judd Nelson plays Freed, who rose from small stations in New Castle, PA and Youngstown, OH (WKST and WKBN, which I grew up on) to making history coining the term “Rock and Roll” on Cleveland’s WJW. So if you’re ever wondering why the heart of rock and roll is in Cleveland, Huey Lewis wasn’t just writing a line that rhymed with “believe them.” His wife Jackie McCoy is played by Mädchen Amick from Twin Peaks and Sleepwalkers.

For all the actors playing musical stars in this, Bobby Rydell and Fabian Forte are both in this. Honestly, the fact that I don’t have a Fabian Letterboxd list is a major oversight. And oh yeah — a later love interest is Paula Abdul.

The payola scandal and alcoholism that ruined Freed’s life is touched on, but you get the idea that he loves rock and roll so much that none of that — much less his wife and kids — got in the way of putting on a show for the kids.

Look at that — three versions of Alan Freed — a 70’s movie, his version of the story and the TV movie — all in one day.

You can watch it on Tubi.

Gemini (1999)

Tarō Hirai is better known as his pen name, Edogawa Ranpo (taken from Edgar Allan Poe). Writing often of the Boy Detectives Club and their leader Kogoro Akechi, he brought his love for Western detective fiction and melded it with traditional Japanese legend.

Shinya Tsukamoto is best known for his stop-motion cyberpunk body freakouts Tetsuo: The Iron Man, Tetsuo II: Body Hammer and Tetsuo: The Bullet Man.

So imagine — a director mostly known for his modern takes on man’s inhumanity to man going back in time to Japan’s Meiji era for a story loosely based on Ranpo’s work that ties closely to the same themes he’s explored in our time and the near future.

Dr. Daitokuji Yukio (Masahiro Motoki, once an idol singer and now a serious actor) seemingly has it all. After a military career, he has taken over his father’s practice and has a gorgeous wife named Rin (Ryo, GoemonAlive).

However, she has no memory of her past. That’s the least of his worries as in short order, both of his parents are killed by a mysterious stranger and his wife shuns him after he treats the rich instead of the poor during a plague. Yes, these same issues still were with us in 1910 Japan.

That strange man (Motoki in a dual role) ends up being his long-lost twin Sutekichi, who throws Yukio into a well and takes over his life. The true secret? Rin was once his and now, he has her back. The once-proud and rich doctor must now crawl from the muck to claim what was once his.

This is one strange movie and I say that in the best of ways. Here’s one small example: no one has eyebrows. Everyone wore makeup to conceal them, which lends the movie an odd look.

You can get this from Mondo Macabro, who were nice enough to send us the blu ray for review. It comes complete with a 17-minute feature, Tsukamoto Shinya ga Ranpo suru, detailing the creation of this movie. It was made by Takeshi Miike, so if you’re a fan of his work, that’s just another great reason to make this purchase.

Me & Will (1999)

So, did you know . . . sandwiched between the ‘60s original and Phil Pitzer’s 2012 revisiting, Easy Rider: The Ride Back, there was another unofficial “sequel” to Easy Rider, which concentrates on a search for the famed Captain America chopper that appeared in Easy Rider? Never heard of it? It’s okay. No one did.

Be it an unintentional sequel or a loose remake—with a Thelma and Louise twist—of the counter-culture classic Easy Rider, there’s definitely a dash of another late 60’s cinematic classic, Midnight Cowboy, in these engine revs written and directed by its stars, Sherri Rose and Melissa Behr. (Another Easy Rider-inspired biker-epic, the better known Roadside Prophets, made in the early 90’s with John Doe, the bassist and singer from X, and a Beastie Boy, may even come to mind as the story unfolds.)

Told from the point of view of Jane (the “me”), a hard-living aspiring writer, she meets an equally burnt-out artist-cum-party girl named Will in an L.A. drug rehab clinic. After watching a late-night showing of Easy Rider on TV, Jane (Sherri Rose, American Rickshaw) and Will (Melissa Behr, aka “Doll Chick” from Bad Channels and its sequel, Dollman vs. Demonic Toys) decide to make like Wyatt and Billy and break out of rehab to embark on a trip to find the legendary chopper ridden by Peter Fonda—which is rumored to still exist in the city of Willsall, Montana.

As the road trip unfolds, Jane and Will meet the usual cross section of bikers, hippies, burnt-out garage mechanics, psycho waitresses, abused women, and abusive cops—as well as the rock bands Space Age Playboys (yes! Kory Clarke and Warrior Soul!) and Keanu Reeves’s band Dogstar. (I played Dogstar on the radio and went to their shows back in the ’90s; they were a solid indie, alt-rock band and not the “actor-gimmick” they were smarmy-labeled.)

What helps this lost bikers-searching-for-their-souls flick is the cast featuring those actors we care about at B&S About Movies: Seymour Cassel (Trees Lounge), M. Emmet Walsh (Escape from the Planet of the Apes), Steve Railsback (Lifeforce), and Grace Zabriskie (Galaxy of Terror). (Oh, shite: she was also George’s mother-in-law on Seinfeld. Sorry, Sam.) And keep your eyes open for Johnny Whitworth (Empire Records), William E. Wirth (The Lost Boys), and Tracy Lords (Shock ’em Dead).

Oh, and Jane’s boyfriend, Fast Eddie, is Patrick Dempsey (the ’80s cable comedy-classic Can’t Buy Me Love and “McDreamy” from TV’s Grey’s Anatomy). Of course, when Grey’s Anatomy became a ratings juggernaut—and as with Katherine Hegyl’s equally unknown 2006’s Zyzzyx Road—the DVD reissues of Me & Will feature Dempsey front and center—with Rose and Behr kicked to the curb.

In addition to the ‘Playboys and Dogstar appearing on the soundtrack, there’s music by Dwight Yoakam, Josh Clayton, formerly from School of Fish (remembered for their ’90s hit, “Three Strange Days”), in addition to classic tracks by the Doors and a solo-bound Mick Jagger. Matt Sorum of the Cult/Guns n’ Roses scored the film—with a guitar-style that almost leaves it feeling like a Tangerine Dream-scored film (Thief comes to mind, IMO), sans the synths and moogs.

To dismiss Me & Will as a vanity-driven “female Easy Rider” and to be alpha-male ruffled by its “female empowerment” message is a chauvinistic disservice to Sherri Rose and Melissa Behr’s efforts to dissuade the film from disintegrating into a hail of bullets of a gone-wrong crime caper, ala the somewhat similar Don Johnson and Mickey Rourke buddy-biker action flick, Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man (1991).

Me & Will is a gallant effort; a heart-felt, solid indie-film and Rose and Behr certainly deserved better than their exploitation resumes allow. And kudos to Columbia Pictures giving their blessings and not having the proceedings degrade into the legalese haze of Phil Pitzer’s not-as-bad-as-they-say Easy Rider homage. You can watch Me & Will as a free-with-ads stream on TubiTv or without ads on You Tube.

So, as with Phil Pitzer’s Easy Rider: The Ride Black: Me & Will is an alright effort. So do Sherri Rose and Melissa Behr a solid and support indie film by streaming the ad-stream version on TubiTV, will ya? Other films starring Sherri we’ve reviewed for you to check out include Cy Warrior, Relentless Justice, and Summer Job.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Easy Rider: The Ride Back (2012)

So . . . did you you know Easy Rider was followed forty years later by an unofficial sequel? It’s okay. No one does. . . .

The existential subtext and counterculture viewpoints (somewhat) of the original are lost . . . somewhere on a dusty, Baja road in this “sequel” (also working as a prequel) that explores the family history of Peter Fonda’s character Wyatt “Captain America” Williams through the eyes of his older brother, Morgan: a pot-distributing, Vietnam war deserter and custom jewelry-designer (specializing in Maltese crosses; not for the reasons you think, the eventual reveal is a clever trick-of-the-script) living in luxurious solitude on the Pacific coast of Mexico.

The drama and struggles center around Morgan’s cycle-lovin’ family friend, West Coast (Jeff Fahey of The Lawnmower Man, Psycho III), Williams sister Shane (Sheree J. Wilson of TV’s Dallas and as Alex Cahill on Walker, Texas Ranger; she also produces), and her wealthy-hubby (Michael Nouri of Flashdance) as it flashes to and fro from the 1940s to the present, concerned with Wyatt’s brother, Morgan (Phil Pitzer) visiting his dying, disapproving father. So, along with West as his “Billy,” Morgan mounts Wyatt’s Captain American chopper, which he recovered back in ’69 and restored, slaps on his brother’s old leathers, and takes a “ride back” to bury those family demons.

Of course, when it comes to making a sequel, the smart bet is to file legal actions against Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider, the producers of the original through their Raybert Productions (the force behind The Monkees TV series), to block them from reclaiming their expired film rights. And don’t bring back any of the original’s cast or crew. And cavet those emptor for the ol’ home video bait n’ switch: courtesy of the flashing-back-and-forth, Fahey, Wilson, and Nouri are the marquee-stars, but only here as supporting characters. This show belongs to Phil Pitzer and Chris Engen (as the young, troubled third-brother Virgil; who despite his bigger role, is bumped off the marquee).

So goes this vanity-vision by producer and screenwriter Phil Pitzer, a former lawyer who, with a desire to enter the film industry with a bang, manipulated legal loopholes to get sequel rights. His co-writer and director, Dustin Rikert, fared better: his names pops up as a producer and director on a slew of telefilms broadcast on the Hallmark, Lifetime, and Syfy channels. Their Easy Rider part deux was initially completed in 2009 and appears in filmpedias with that release date; however, by the time it went through the festival circuits and film markets for distribution, it was formally released in 2012.

So, is Easy Rider: The Ride Back the most-unwanted-not-a-sequel since the days of Halloween III: Season of the Witch (which I really like) or House II: The Second Story (which I didn’t) or House III: The Horror Show (which I did, because well, it’s a friggin’ Lance Henriksen and Brion James movie)? And is stuffy ol’ Leonard Maltin—who hates everything the B&S About Movies crew likes—justified in calling the Pitzer’s effort “a staggeringly bad, cash-in bomb,” solely based on Pitzer’s clandestine legal maneuvers?

Eh, well . . . to Pitzer’s credit: He does, as you can see, resemble Fonda, so it lends to the credibility that he’s Wyatt’s brother, as well as “being” Wyatt in flashbacks that lend to the film-to-film continuity. All of the bikes (especially Wyatt’s chopper reproduction) and time-period designs (props, costumes, cars, etc.) are correct, the Korean war sequences are well-shot, and the cinematography by Brian Lataille (videos for Incubus and Linkin Park), while not up to the László Kovács-standard in the original, is pretty solid. And yes, as with any indie, flick: there’s a few strained thepsin’ moments. So, while it’s not exactly Easy Rider, Pitzer’s effort is not a Tommy Wiseau (or Neal Breen) biker joint as some threaders and reviews claim. No, it’s definitely not The Room on wheels” as some have said.

While the flashbacks and bike-riding interludes of Morgan’s and West Coast’s contemplations (most in voice overs as majestic “post-card moments” unfold) about life, e.g., homelessness and hunger, ecology, the meaning of patriotism and true freedom, make the film seem a bit longer than its 90-minute running time, Pitzer nonetheless crafted well-rounded characters for his actors to sink their thespin’ teeth into. He also developed a compelling “history” for an initially ambiguous, metaphorical-drifting character. So kudos to Pitzer for giving a structured “focus” to a film that was admittedly an “out of focus,” scriptless-improv in the first place (that Fonda and Hopper openly admitted in interviews).

And besides: I always enjoy seeing senior actors (e.g., the recently-released Nana’s Secret Recipe) given meaty roles and, to that end: Newell Alexander (who’s career goes back to the ’70s TV series Barnaby Jones and Battlestar Galactica ’79, The Kentucky Fried Movie; he also appeared in Walker, Texas Ranger with Sheree) and Ron Howard’s pop, Rance (The Andy Griffith Show, Grand Theft Auto, and Cotton Candy) are both excellent in their roles as Poppa Williams and his ol’ hog-riding Korean War war buddy, so much so, you’d like to see more of them in the film.

All in all, despite Leonard Maltin and the Internet hoards of war, Easy Rider: The Ride Back it’s not as Wiseauian bad as they’ll lead you to believe. (The same arguement we had with our review of Jeremy Saville’s radio dramedy, Loqueesha). And for those who have stated Phil Pitzer “thankfully, has never made another movie” and “hasn’t made another movie since”: Phil produced the upcoming Cannes Without a Plan (2021), the third writing-directing effort from Julie Simone Robb (NBC-TV’s Homicide: Life on the Street) that also stars Pitzer’s The Ride Back cast member, Jodie Fisher (of Charles Band’s Blood Dolls).

Courtesy of a new distribution deal with retro-imprint Kino Loeber, Easy Rider: The Ride Back is available worldwide as 2019-issued Blu and DVD and VOD stream on Amazon Prime and You Tube Movies. Yeah, you’ll find that errant You Tube freebie (you know you look there and TubiTV first before you buy), but do Phil Pitzer a solid and support indie film, will ya? Pay for it, okay?

Like Kowalski said in Vanishing Point: “Fuck the man!” Keep on making movies, Phil. You’re alright, kid. . . .

So, did you know . . . sandwiched between the ‘60s original and Phil Pitzer’s 2012 revisiting, Easy Rider: The Ride Back, there was another unofficial “sequel,” which concentrates on a search for the famed Captain America chopper that appeared in Easy Rider? Never heard of it? It’s okay. No one did. Join us at 3 pm for more tales from the fast and the furious . . . with Me & Will.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

The Existential and the Furious: Part 3: Vanishing Point (1971)

Author’s Note: Yeah, we know you’ve seen them before and know them well. But we’ve got some movie “Easter Eggs” in these reviews. Thanks for revisiting the classics with the B&S gang, where we coddle the obscure and the forgotten films of the VHS, UHF, and Drive-In yesteryears.

This 20th Century Fox tale reminds a lot of Elektra Glide in Blue, United Artists’ 1973 existential road flick entry about a disgraced biker-cop (Robert Blake) produced-directed by James William Guercio, who managed and performed with the Beach Boys and produced several albums for ’70s pop-meisters Chicago (who appear in the film). We also had Vanishing Point on the short list for “Radio Week,”* thanks to Cleavon Little’s blind DJ. While it was bumped for that week—but it’s prime fodder for “Fast and Furious Week.” Thank god for Dodge Chargers. . . .

Kowalski (Barry Newman) is a Vietnam veteran, disgraced ex-cop and former professional road racer of motorcycles and stock cars. To cope with his personal demons, he lives on the open road as a driver for a car delivery service. Before heading out on his next assignment—transporting a supercharged 1970 Dodge Challenger from Denver to San Francisco—he scores a hit of speed and makes a bet with his drug-pusher that he can make the trip in 15 hours.

As the police follow in hot pursuit, Kowalski becomes a folk hero to the roadside eccentrics and Vietnam-war worn masses, thanks to the on-air updates of the cross country chase by a blind DJ “Supersoul” (Cleavon “The Prince of Darkness” Little of FM) on KOW, an 50,000-watt R&B/Soul station broadcasting across Nevada, Utah and parts of Colorado and California. (Little’s engineer—an unaccredited role—is John Amos of TVs Good Times, but youngins know him for his work in Die Hard 2: Die Harder and Coming to America.) (And, is it just me, or is Outside Ozona a slasher version of Vanishing Point? That’s not critical insult, but a kudos.)

Yeah, we love this movie, but this movie also really wants to be the next Easy Rider, with its replacement of Steppenwolf by way of the equally biker-acceptable Mountain with “Mississippi Queen,” along with the counterculture band Delaney, Bonnie & Friends (see the history of Eric Clapton and Fleetwood Mac), who also appear in the film as a singing group at a religious revival caravan.

There’s no online streams, but Blus, DVDs, and used VHS-tapes are available on Amazon to watch Vanishing Point. . . .

So, we teased you about the two “sequels” to Easy Rider . . . but did you know their was a remake to Vanishing Point? It’s okay. No one does. Join us tomorrow, August 7 at 6 pm, for more tales of the fast and the furious . . . and the vanishing . . . with Vanishing Point ’97.

How much is this film loved? It has die-cast cars!

Get ’em at Greenlight Collectibles!

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.