Rare Flix: BloodTide

An obscure flick in need of a visual upgrade.  Today's film is BloodTide, a fairly-forgotten film from 1982 with an odd, ensemble Cast.  The film comes to us from the man behind Island of Death and the Writer of Scarecrows.  It features the Stars of The Karate Kid (made 2 years later), Conan the Barbarian and Zoltan...Hound of Dracula.  Again- kind of a mixed bag there.  The film clearly features the same location as Island, which is, well, an Island in Greece.  That's Nico for you.  In the film, a young couple goes looking for the man's sister and finds her on a tiny island.  They also discover that the place is very secretive and is clearly hiding something.  It has a sort of Lovecraft vibe to it, but not too much is really done with it.  Can this random Cast come together to make a memorable film?  To find out, read on...

As the Credits roll, our young couple head to the Island.  Kove's missing sister is supposed to be there, but there's no reason that they can't have fun on the way.

One thing that is hard to get past is the piss-poor VHS-quality Rip on the DVD.  This is especially notable early on in this scene with bad lighting to begin with.  Just...just try to look at this.

Movin on...the pair find the sister, but she is a bit...well, out of it.  She has 'gone native' just a bit.

The pair meet another couple- a ditzy blonde and...Darth Vader('s voice)!

James Earl Jones plays a treasure seeker that is looking for some gold coins in the nearby water.

The secretive town- shown to be involved in some sort of ritual in the beginning- finally cracks down on them and says that they can't leave.  They are led by Jose Ferrer, because that is someone who totally looks Greek.

Can it be racist if a Greek guy wrote it?  Maybe just a little.

After getting a tease of some footage of the mysterious creature, we get...P.O.V. footage of it, blood in the water and her hand as she dies.

Oh, you tease- you Jaws-ripping off tease.

After some random, fairly-dull build up, the sister gets back to her work of uncovering some ancient art.  She finds proof that they have been worshipping some sort of sea monster.  I'd make that face too.

Later on, the two remaining ladies- the girlfriend and the sister- are set up to be sacrificed.  Kove and Jones show up to save them, but the latter is attacked by the beast.

Enjoy the only shot of the creature's 'head' in the film.  It took about 10 tries to get this millisecond sighting for you.  Enjoy, Internet.

In a noble (or dumb) moment, Jones sets off some dynamite he has with him to kill the beast (and himself).

In the aftermath, Kove leaves with the two ladies and dumps the coins back into the sea.  The End.

A lot of promise, but not a lot of results.  This movie is a real shame to watch- it could have been great.  The plot has a secretive Cult, a sea monster and hot babes on an island.  What could go wrong?  Well, there is pretty much no monster.  In theory, it is out there.  It apparently kills two people (three if you count Jones), but you never see it.  I almost wonder if this was just a matter of Budget.  We get all of the build-up, but no real pay-off.  I will see if I can find some answers on this one.  In defense of the film, the Acting is good and I liked the overall atmosphere.  As you watch the film waiting for the monster, it is enjoyable.  It is nothing special, but far better some dreck I have seen.  It is still nothing all that special.  As a wannabe Film Historian, it is neat to see a pre-Karate Kid Martin Kove and Jones playing a normal role in the same year he was Thulsa Doom in Conan the Barbarian.  As a fan of good movies, it is just kind of sad to see what made it into the film and what didn't.  In fact, let me highlight just how this film has been treated in the ensuing years.  This is a picture of the DVD itself in all of its allegedly-gold 'glory.'  Just...wow.

Next up, I tackle a film classic and proof that not all Remakes suck.  Go to sleep, lose your soul, join the evil collective.  Stay tuned...

Grapple Crap: Shadow Warriors

I blame you for this, Ted Turner!  As part of his deal to jump to WCW, Terry 'Hulk' Hogan was given other TV/Movie Deals on the Turner Networks.  It's because of this we got such things as Thunder in Paradise and the Shadow Warriors films.  Speaking of which, here is one of them.  The pair of films were made for TNT back in 1999.  Joy.  The film is about Hogan leading a group of Mercenaries that help out the common man a la The A-Team.  People sure do love to copy that show/film, don't they?  Who's on Hogan's team?  You've got Carl Weathers.  The man who beat Rocky, lost to Rocky and then got killed by a Predator.  A mixed track record for sure.  Oh and he was in an Asylum film.  Who's working with Action Jackson and The Hulkster?  We've also got Shannon Tweed, who hasn't been in a film I've reviewed in about three years.  Where does the time go?  The film's plot involves an Arms Dealer, a missile and lots of shooting.  If Hostel is 'Torture Porn,' then Shadow Warriors is 'Mass Gunfire Porn.'  If you like violence with zero consequences, this is your film.  If you like Hogan's toupee, then this is your film.  If you like bad '90s films, then this is DEFINITELY your film!  To find out more, read on...

Hogan's character is bothered by some sort of past trauma.  This is how he expresses that emotion.

Okay, this is how he expresses 90% of his emotions, but you get the idea.

Hogan and company are hired to rescue this girl from a vaguely-European guy who's hosting a fancy dinner party on a Mountain.  Those Downton Abbey bitches are going to get a cap in their ass!

The gang make a prolonged escape via a Tram and some rope ladders leading down to the ground.  It's the low-budget, low-excitement version of the 'Rope Line Escape' from The Expendables 2.

After they rescue the girl, this plot thread never comes up again.  Yeah, you just watched one-third of the film acting as filler.

The *real* plot begins when Hogan recognizes a man on a Wanted Poster as a supposedly-dead Arms Dealer.

We are eventually treated to a flashback hinted at earlier.  Basically, Hogan's men were killed by him and Hogan himself was poisoned.  He remembers the man's cold eyes and is convinced that they are the same.

While the others go to investigate whether this could be true or not (and meet Martin Kove), Hulk goes off on his own.  He decides to handle it the American way: he shows up with twin Assault Rifles and starts shooting terrorists in the face!

Important to note: Hulk never once dodges a shot or seeks cover.  In spite of that, he's not even grazed by a single bullet.  Wow.

He's eventually caught and injected with a poison that will kill him...in 72 hours.  Yeah, the villain didn't think this one through.

Hulk doesn't stay to get treated.  He joins his group to try to stop the Arms Dealer from unleashing the same toxin via a missile on the general populace.  Oh and the place targeted is where Tweed's daughter is.  Of course it is.

Hogan battles his way to the bad guys and tries to get the Arms Dealer.  Before he can do that, however, he must do battle with his main henchmen.

The man: future-Jason Ken Kirzinger (doing his best Kool-Aid Man here).  Bonus points for having Hogan do the 'Seagal Neck Snap' on him.

While Hogan pursues the villain, the rest of the team stops the threat.  Weathers and Tweed disable the bomb, while their fourth (barely-worth-mentioning) member finishes the other gang members off.  Oh and Martin Kove is flying around shooting people with a Magnum.

For the big finish, Hulk is cured, the villain is dead and they stop the missile.  They also rigged the place to explode, setting them up for this cliche.  It's oh so silly here.  The End.

It's exactly what you think it would be.  What can I say about this film?  It's a late-90s Action film built as a Starring Vehicle for Hulk Hogan.  It co-Stars Shannon Tweed and Carl Weathers.  Did you expect it to turn out to be great?  No.  The film is appropriately-stupid and features everything that you'd expect.  The worst thing that could happen is that the film could be so generic that nothing is interesting about it.  It isn't.  Even if you pay no attention to the barely-there plot, you get silly action scenes, lots of fake gunfire and tons of fake fight scenes.  It is fairly-forgettable 90s trash as a whole.  If you like this kind of stuff, it is pretty fun.  Incidentally, the other film has Billy Drago as the Villain and Billy Blanks as his Henchman.  Naturally, I didn't get THAT one.  As a bonus from the film though, it features a young Emmanuelle Vaugier (the same year as The Fear: Halloween Night)...

Next up, a Cult Classic that I finally got around to re-watching.  With it getting a nod in Saints Row IV, the time is right to go Live with this one.  Stay tuned...

Alien Week: Alien Lockdown

Stop me if you've heard this one...or will hear it again later this week.  Today's film is Alien Lockdown, a film so generic that I could re-use segments of old reviews in place of a new one.  I mean, I won't...but I could.  The plot involves an alien breaking loose in a lab and some Marines coming in to kill it.  They try to cover up how paper-thin this is, but to pretty much no avail.  Any 'flourish' they add just feels tacked-on and sometimes silly.  On the plus side, Martin Kove is hear to ham up the whole affair and add a little color.  On the negative side, just about everything else.  I found myself so apathetic towards the film that I started to read a book while watching it.  I'd get alerted by every musical sting or yell, but that was about it.  Even so, I watched it, so you have to read this.  Don't you try to skip me, mister/missy!  To find out what you already know, read on...

In a long, silly opening scene, a narrator talks about a meteor that crashed into the Earth.  It was fought over for generations- even being carted around like the Ten Commandments- before ending up in some rock where a guy finds it.

What impact does this have on the plot?  Pretty much none.  No, really.

Buried in a mountain (next to Arvin Sloane from Alias, no doubt), there is a government lab.  In it, a scientist explains that he used the gem to help create a super-invincible killing machine as a 'nuclear deterrent.'  Seconds later, it starts killing everyone.

Seriously, is this a parody of this kind of movie?

A young lady is sent in to 'clean the mess up.'  Her Boss is Martin Kove.  Yeah, that means that he's barely in this movie.  Boo.

I should also note that this Marine is doing this, but it's *big shock* her last mission.  It should end well, I think.

The woman and her group of commandos enter the building to survey the damage.  Hope you like the color green.  Somewhere, Hal Jordan is crying tears of joy.

Gee, I wonder if this guy is up to no good.  All he did was make an nigh invincible alien, splice his DNA into it and then run away like an evil guy.  It all checks out.

You rarely see the alien in this movie, so I'm doing you a favor with this shot.  Then again, am I?

Not content to just have this awkward mix of Predator/Alien, they also have it be able to create a bunch of little aliens.  Why did the Scientist put this in his 'nuclear deterrent' again?

Who will win- killer with an inexplicable conscience or this generic alien thing?

Do I really have to answer that?

Yes, despite this being 'her last mission,' she doesn't suffer an heroic death.  She, instead, flies off into the sunset with the one good Scientist.  The End.

So yeah, that was a movie.  I wish I had more to say, but I really don't.  This kind of like the Mad Libs of movies...if everyone tended to fill in the same options for every blank Noun and Verb.  There's nothing new here.  There's nothing exciting here.  It just exists and it ends without any fanfare.  Could you imagine how infuriating that could be?

Next up, Marc Dacascos is a good alien and must battle Billy Zane, who is an evil alien.  There's no way that this premise could fail!  Stay tuned...

Strange Killers: Glass Trap

When one film about ants won't work, there's always another.  I was planning to review Ants, giving Strange Killers Week a bit of '70s mojo.  That wasn't to be, but fortunately, I had a back-up.  Naturally, my back-up was a Direct-to-Video film starring C. Thomas Howell.  I just love my life.  Glass Trap is actually a film that I considered renting at one point for a review.  However, I used a rarely-accessed feature on Netflix to discourage- the trailer to the film.  It looked like shit.  Many months later, I needed a movie to do and this one...exists.  The film's premise is simple: people trapped in a building with giant ants.  Get it?  Got it?  Good. To find out just how silly this silly-sounding movie is, read on...

Basically, this movie is all about putting a bunch of people in a building.  Two of them are characters right out of The Devil Wears Prada.  While this film predates the movie version (by 2 years), it does come a year after the book.  It's not subtle!

Howell, meanwhile, plays a Janitor with a back-story.  It's not important, but it is apparently important that he has one.  Moving on...

This man is a Fashion Photographer and these are his models.  They appear, act funny and then disappear for nearly an hour.  Good writing, huh?

The ants are a sight to behold.  They alternate between cheap puppets...

...and lame CG effects.  On the plus side, it is a nice skyline...to put lame CG effects in front of.

About an hour in, the FBI and company call in a big name to take out the monsters.  What C-List actor is up to the task?  I'll give you a hint- sweep the leg!

Yes, Martin Kove has not yet grown that silly mustache and put on that vest.  He does, however, nearly cop a feel on this teen actress during a scene though.  Good times...

In The End, the ants are killed off by a mild explosion of gas in the building.  Well, that and this CG effect.  Kove's character gets off scott-free for leaving people to die.  Good lesson, movie.  The End.

Ants deserve better than this.  What good things can I say about this movie?  It wasn't a complete waste of time, I suppose.  It wasn't directed by David DeCoteau- granted.  It didn't give me cancer.  That's something.  In all seriousness, this movie is a fairly average and sub-par.  The acting is not completely-terrible, unless you count the guy trying way too hard to talk like a cliche Fashion Photographer.  Seriously- he was bad.  Granted, his character was not going to turn out to be 'Othello' or anything, but he was extra-cheesy.  Aside from that, Howell was his usual, dull self.  On the plus side, he didn't appear to be on a hunger strike or dying of Colon Cancer like he has in the last few years.  Seriously, is he alright?  It's easy to see how sick Stephen J. Cannell was in Ice Spiders.  Getting past that, the movie is so unfocused and just tries to fill time with about thirty different characters.  On top of the leads, you get Kove, a Sheriff, Kove's assistant, the guy who owns the Plant Nursery, the Security Guard, one guy's daughter and the lead government agent.  How many Producers' cousins were involved in this movie?!?  If you like this kind of schlock, this movie is cheesy gold.  If not, continue not knowing that this movie exists.  Take us away, Very Dutch Angle...

Next up, I begin my selection of Project Terrible films for this round.  First up, a movie that's totally not a famous Japanese movie- no sir!  Stay tuned...

Werewolf Week: War Wolves

Either make an art film or make a werewolf movie!  You could argue that many good Directors- i.e. John Landis, Joe Dante- can mix in other aspects like humor and satire into a werewolf movie with success.  However, crappy Directors- i.e. Michael Worth- cannot.  Today's film is War Wolves, a movie I watched nearly a year or so ago and gave up on.  Why?  Well, it's pretty damn boring, especially when you consider it's a film about soldiers turned into werewolves who are hunted by former soldiers.  Worth- who also stars- manages to suck all of the energy out of this idea, but tries to cover it with artsy crap.  I'll get into more of that later, but I'd rather talk about the 'stars' of the film.  No doubt to help funding, the movie features a bunch of C-List actors who at one point were quite famous.  Adrienne Barbeau, John Saxon, Martin Kove, Art LaFleur and Tim Thomerson are all here, albeit in fairly-small roles.  Their appearances here are usually the best parts of the film, although it's not saying much.  To see why it took me two tries to endure this movie, read on...

To really sink things in, this movie begins with a quote from the Bible.  There's nothing wrong with the quote, but it's used in such a pretentious way here!

After a little 'get to know them' filler, the group of soldiers go into a village and get attacked by Werewolves.  Did I say Werewolves?  They're basically just Rage-Virus Zombies, but I guess that's close enough for the movie.

In one of her few scenes, Barbeau plays a Counselor helping our hero/Director deal with his PTSD.  The fact that he's slowly turning into a Lycanthrope doesn't help.  Oh yeah, she is obsessed with conspiracy theories, aliens and Bigfoot.  Sigh.

Our hero ends up in the sights of two former soldiers (Thomerson and Saxon) who are trying to stop all of the people turned that day.  They're missing the pack of three female Werewolves, but let's focus all of our screen time on the Director instead!

In the scene that really killed me, one of the lady Werewolves is run over and her body taken to a bar.  She's naked, but the film never gives you the slightest glimpse of her, even when she's killing everyone along with her pack.  Why make this scene then?!?

We get a Trancers reunion of sort when Art LaFleur shows up as one of the people in the support group.  Him and Tim share only one quick scene together, rendering his whole part- entirely-pointless.

All of this- eventually- builds up to a finale of sorts back at the Church where the counseling group meets.  Thanks, TV Movie budget!  Speaking of which...

Yeah, these make-up jobs are hysterical!  Why can't they be in the movie more often?  Because you might actually enjoy it- duh!

In The End, a bunch of people die and our hero embraces his animal side...or something.  All I know is that John Saxon narrates while they show us two Wolves leave across the desert.  Hurray?  Boo?  The End.

Wake me up when someone transforms!  The plot of this movie is one that should work.  As you may have inferred from my intro, it does not.  The movie put me to sleep at least twice.  Who needs Ambien when you have...a Werewolf movie?  How surprising is that?!?  This movie features no real Werewolf action, terrible pacing and just continuous bouts of randomness.  For example, Tim's character is always making Lists- what a weirdo- and making small-talk with people.  Throw in the bizarre scenes of the counseling group, Barbeau's conspiracy theories and you've got some weird-ass shit.  The thing is that none of these things are really funny, no matter how insistent they are.  This all serves to fill up time that could be used for real action and character development.  This movie is just dull and pointless.  Is there a message?  Maybe, but good luck digging it out. Is there any actual transformation?  No.  For all my complaints about Howling V's lack of on-screen action, we at least got flashes of a full suit.  This movie- a bunch of people with silly noses on.  What a shame!

Up next, November comes to an end with a three-part look at the works of Russell Mulcahy.  First up, an HBO version of Cape Fear, only with gaping plot holes, Jesse Ventura and, of course, sword-fighting.  Stay tuned...