What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[DeadAlive]

Edmond
A brilliant performance from William H Macy makes this an engrossing drama as you see his decent into madness. Sadly the final third loses momentum and does get a little overly talky. An impressive support cast, many playing little more than cameos, actually becomes a little distracting at times rather than adding to the overall effect. (I almost didn't recognise Jeffrey Combs as the hotel clerk.) Minor quibbles aside this is a worthy effort from Stuart Gordon.

Stoner
It's not the first time for me to watch this film, but it is the first time for me to watch the HK version. Previously I'd only seen the dubbed International scan and pan print which actually runs around 10 minutes shorter. This is still a lot of fun and was originally conceived as the film that would team up Bruce Lee and George Lazenby. For me the highlight is still Angel Mao fighting Whang In-sik in the film's finale while Sammo Hung does everything in his power to make Lazenby look like he can actually do some martial arts. A lot of fun in that typically cheesy seventies way.

[Stephen@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Gigantor

COMING TO AMERICA
BEVERLY HILLS COP 1 and 2

What,no Beverly Hills Cop 3?

[re.form]

Originally Posted by Sargento

That really is a great little gem of a movie ... ooooh that sonar machine thing! Gave me creeps when I was a kid!

AB released a great print of the film in the UK

I'm a big fan of Manchester Morgue as well.

I watched Umberto Lenzi's 'Ghosthouse' & Hammers 'Scream of Fear' last night. Both brilliant.

[oaxaca]

Originally Posted by re.form

I'm a big fan of Manchester Morgue as well.

I watched Umberto Lenzi's 'Ghosthouse' & Hammers 'Scream of Fear' last night. Both brilliant.

Love Scream of Fear! its an excellent little thriller and not a very well known Hammer film. I've recently ordered the Blue Underground 'Nightmare City' disc, never having seen a Lenzi film before. I hear its a really fun zombie-fest. Have you seen that one?

[oaxaca]

Watching Abel Ferarra's film 'King of New York' tonight. Not seen it before but IMDB says its a modern and ultra-violent retelling of Robin Hood

[vincenzo]

Originally Posted by reaper72

Just falls in behind Fulci's City of the Living Dead.Just.

I rewatched both back to back recently and agree. City Of The Living Dead edges The Beyond.

[Gojirosan]

Originally Posted by DeadAlive

Edmond
A brilliant performance from William H Macy makes this an engrossing drama as you see his decent into madness. Sadly the final third loses momentum and does get a little overly talky. An impressive support cast, many playing little more than cameos, actually becomes a little distracting at times rather than adding to the overall effect. (I almost didn't recognise Jeffrey Combs as the hotel clerk.) Minor quibbles aside this is a worthy effort from Stuart Gordon.

Wanna see! Love me a bit of Stuart Gordon!


Er...so to speak!

[oaxaca]

Originally Posted by Gojirosan

Wanna see! Love me a bit of Stuart Gordon!


Er...so to speak!

Incredible film. Think 'falling down' (michael douglas) but edgier, more current and no-holds barred! (What do you expect with Stuart Gordon directing! )

[pedromonkey]

Originally Posted by reaper72

Yeah and when I was younger I had Action Forced which morphed into GI Joe-what they doing killing Storm Shadow?
As I say-bollocks!

Duke?-Duke nuke him!

Action Force is how i really remember it, they even changed the feem tune too. Fave character was shipwreck he was cooool.

[42ndStreetFreak]

"Helga: She Wolf of Spilberg"

http://www.beardyfreak.com/rvhelga.php

Ohhh…dear. Welcome to the stinky world of Eurociné once again.
Here they have blatantly ripped off the classic Naziploitation movie “Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS” (although avoiding any Nazi connection) and done it with all style you would expect from Eurociné...which is of course no style at all.

Even in the world of slip shod dub jobs on Euro trash the dub here stands out as one of the worst.
Nothing comes even close to matching the actor’s lip movements and once again it sounds like a bunch of psychotic mice recorded on a crinkled cassette tape.

Before we ship off to the prison we see that Helga has a personal showering assistant who rubs her bubbles for her before she gets down to a spot of clumsy screwing with her main guy, a thug named Hugo, who’s a hairy dude with a bad porn moustache all of which makes him look like Harry Reems crossed with a Mexican bandit.
The eroticism is of course cranked up big time by the music, which sounds like you’re stuck in a 70’s lift.

When we got to the ‘dreadful’ prison we find it’s actually just an old farm with a Doctor who selects prisoners for some ‘welcome to the farm‘ hay rape.
“Ahhh! No, leave me alone! Noooo”! cries the unfortunate victim in clipped English tones as we take no less than 3 different scenes to finally get her damn raincoat off!
When we finally do though it’s worth it as far as pleasant on the eye nudity goes…but not so welcome when it comes to the less than pleasant sonic assault on the eardrums (yet again!!) when the soundtrack to this ravishing is revealed to be nothing but an excited baboon falling into a drum kit.

Thankfully gratuitous nudity does rear its hairy head in various scenes (including an extended, ever essential, medical check-up) strategically placed to keep the audience awake.
Damn fine naked ladies too.
But quite frankly to have such beauty in this film is like putting a delicately sculptured icing sugar rose on top of a turd cake.
As far as being gratuitously beastly to women goes, “Helga” certainly joins the ranks of those Naziploitation films even if it’s not remotely as violent or generally twisted.

To be fair though the film does come actually come alive at one point, as far as delivering some true exploitation goes at least, during a ‘naked blonde girls gets flogged with a belt’ sequence that does get pretty raunchy due to the fact the whipping looks quite hard and is in fact leaving distinctive red lines on the poor suffering actress’s poor pale arse.
I’m sure the BBFC would still have a problem with this scene today.

The underrated Malisa Longa as "Helga" looks as good as ever and her ‘uniform’ of crimson silk top and tight, black silk trousers looks quite striking, if a little absurd.

But, away from these few grubby lumps of exploitation nutrition that are tossed at us, the movie is hampered not only by its technical ineptitude but by endlessly repeated sequences which are nothing but blatant padding and also gives you the hideous impression, , if you happened to have looked away for a minute, that the movie’s started all over again and that you’ll never be free of it!
And being stuck forever in the presence of a ceaselessly looped “Helga” would be a cruel fate indeed.

Nothing much at all happens as far as any real plot progression goes in fact until things suddenly pick up right at the end, where all of a sudden (in a burst of plinky plonky piano backed war movie stock footage and brief, badly done, original action scenes) an entire civil war suddenly comes to an end in a matter of minutes.

And if I thought the end of Eurociné’s “Elsa: Frauline SS” was an anticlimactic mess, then the freeze frame final shot in “Helga” puts it too shame.

So overall “Helga” is stuck with almost non-existent direction, hysterically random and awful library music, erratic editing , truly horrendous dubbing and a leaden pace.
We do have a certain ‘so bad it’s quite amusing’ charm to things and the constant nudity and occasional exploitation moment liven things up…but really sitting though this non-Nazi Naziploitation knock-off is a dreadful chore indeed.