Paper or Plastic? (2008)

This was a surprisingly compelling documentary about a yearly competition that I had no idea even existed. It follows 8 very different grocery store clerks on their individual journeys from various humble beginnings to the National Championship of Grocery Bagging in Las Vegas. It's a nice little gem of a movie. There were times where I just laughed at how ridiculous it all was, but when the grand finale came around I was totally enthralled.

Psycho Sleepover (2008)

This is an ultra low budget Slasher Comedy (a blending of genres that I'm not a big fan of) that was at times fun and entertaining, but that I'm willing to bet disappointed 95% of the audience that saw it during AFF. Here's the way I viewed the movie, yeah it's not a real "film" and yeah it's not "well made," but I'm guarantee if your best friend shot this exact same movie just for fun and never intending on showing it to anyone outside of their living room, you would think it was pretty awesome. Don't get me wrong, it's still bad, but it's not worth beating up because as Ian MacKaye yelled: at least it's "fucking trying, what the fuck have you done?"

Trailer:

The Boogens (1981)

This Taft International production centers around an old mine shaft that runs underneath a small rural town in Colorado. Deep within the shaft live the Boogens, vicious turtle-like creatures with sharp teeth. After the shaft is blown wide open at the onset of the film freeing the little nasties, it's takes the movie a full hour to produce even the first sight of one Boogen. That's a lot of stalling or in this case tension building mixed with a lot of goofy 80's acting. Our heroes in the film are a pair of girls, their boyfriends who are part of the local mining crew, and an incredible Poodle named Tiger. Seriously though, the dog gives the best performance in the entire movie.

Despite not having a lot of action up front, the film manages to avoid being boring and provides a pretty solid payoff.

Among my favorite moments/details in the movie:

--The opening credits with it's silly "Newspaper Exposition."

--The foreman's one simple rule: “Don't Fuck Around”

--The film's main horndog announcing to the group that he was in fact "Hormone Man"

--The phrase "Doggie Electric Chair"

--The music that accompanied the Creepy Old Man, not to mention his amazingly scared uttering of the line: "The Boogens!!"

--The Unicorn Apron.

--The story of the First Girl Paperboy!

--One of our female protagonists singing “She'll be Coming Around the Mountain” in the Shower.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains (1981)

So I really enjoyed Music Monday's rare 35mm screening of "Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains," it's a true cinema anomaly. The film was produced by Paramount Pictures and shot on location in Pennsylvania, L.A., and Canada in an attempt to cash in on the burgeoning popularity of Punk Rock. It tells a story that is now a familiar cliche, but at the time I'd be willing to bet that it wasn't. Since Punk had been in full swing for sometime though, screenwriter Nancy Dowd managed to articulate the fundamental contradictions of the genre while still staying true to what made the initial movement so interesting.

Young all-female band, the Stains, spawn from a small town, led by Corinne "Third Degree" Burns (16 year old Diane Lane) and also feature a young Laura Dern and Marin Kanter. The trio's sound is simplistic, amateurish, and honest, not unlike the Shaggs. After Corinne gains some unwanted publicity from a local newscast, the band sneaks aboard a tour bus of a cocaine-fueled-band of has-beens called The Metal Corpses, fronted by Lou Corpse (played extremely accurately by Fee Waybill). His performance reminded me a lot of the lead singer of this band.

Once aboard the bus thanks to the driver, a Rastafarian named Lawnboy, the Stains negotiate a opening slot in front of The Looters, a young British Punk band fronted by Billy (played by a young Ray Winstone). The Looters are also made up of Steve Jones and Paul Cook of the Sex Pistols, and Paul Simenon of The Clash. The film follows the unlikely rise of the Stains, from rebellious teen runaways to gimmicky Pop act, and the whole thing is fueled by the outrageous antics of Corinne. Along the way, her jaded outlook on life is challenged in the ways of love and success.

The movie is interesting for many reasons. For starters, it feels like a made-for-tv production (very "after school special"), but at the same time, it has slightly grimy edges to it involving Corinne's transparent clothing and her relationship with Billy. The film has a strange and awkward honesty to it that's not unlike the Stains themselves, but then the natural and obvious ending to the film is replaced by a tacked on "happy" ending that COMPLETELY UNDERMINES THAT HONESTY, NOT TO MENTION THE ENTIRE REST OF THE FILM. The ending was changed after test audience found it to be unsatisfactory. It's interesting though because they didn't omit the original ending, they just added to it, so if you watch on home video, take my advice and stop the dvd after the bus drives away.

So yeah here's the soundtrack to the movie:

Ladies and Gentlemen....The Fabulous Stains (Original Soundtrack)

1. All Washed Up [Rock] - Lawn Boy
2. Professionals - The Looters
3. Roadmap Of My Tears - The Metal Corpses
4. La La La - The Looters
5. Curfew - Lawn Boy
6. Waste Of Time - The Stains
7. All Washed Up [Reggae] - Lawn Boy
8. Professionals - The Stains
9. Don't Blow It All Away - The Looters
10. Conned Again - The Looters
11. Professionals [Video Version] - The Fabulous Stains

Plus, Here's an 7" and a couple other tracks by Black Randy and the Metrosquad who make small appearance in the film.


Black Randy the Metrosquad - Idi Amin 7"
"I Slept in an Arcade" (mp3)
"Give it up or Turn it Loose" (mp3)

Redneck (1973)

“Redneck" was not the Southern-set rural Hicksploitation flick that I thought it was going to be, but rather an Italian-made crime-gone-awry film starring Franco Nero and Telly Savalas as Mosquito and Memphis respectively. The two of them play jewel store robbers who in process of getting away (via an outrageously crazy car chase sequence) accidentally kidnap a young boy named Lennox (Mark Lester of “Oliver” fame). Lennox is an effeminate lad who is in disparate need of a father figure, so much so that he projects that need onto Mosquito. Nero's performance is one of confusion, repressed anger, and despair.

Telly's Memphis on the other hand is in a different world entirely; he's a hayseed chewing, spiritual singing caricature that has more in common with Robert Downey Jr's performance in “Tropic Thunder” than with any 'redneck' I've ever met. He shoots a kid, assaults a prostitute, and kills a German family in the middle of their picnic, and all the while hysterically maintains his innocence to God, claiming repeatedly that it wasn't his fault, and that they made him do it.

By the end of the film Franco Nero is completely fucked up, shivering in the snow, covered in filth and blood, and forced to wear a woman's Tiger-skin jacket. Lennox and him are reduced to dragging a wounded Memphis through the woods and across the snow in an attempt to reach the border. All the while, Memphis suffers near-death hysteria as his crotch is covered in blood, and the police zero in on them. This movie is so crazy that the final gun battle involves a person being shot by bullet that causes them to perform a cartwheel before quietly exiting this world.

Overall, "Redneck" is a surprisingly good Thriller that's really worth checking out for Savalas' bizarro performance.

Splatter Farm (1987)

It was a little over a year ago now that Lars upped the ante on the Weird Wednesday & Terror Thursday series by unleashing “Black Devil Doll from Hell” on to an unsuspecting audience. I say that because I remember thinking after that experience that the gateway of possibilities had officially been opened. There was no longer an unwritten rule that maintained that only “legitimate” movies would be screened. Weekly audiences were now no longer safe from the results of full-blown incompetent amateurs shooting movies on VHS camcorders and editing them with VCR's. The door was opened and homemade movies found an audience that they were never meant to find, a theater going audience.

The “Black Devil Doll” crowd had their brains melted that night by the sheer uncomfortableness of it all. It was like the entire theater was being forced to watch their parents have sex while listening to brutally loud Casio tones. Though only a mere 70 minutes long, the film seemed to make time grind to a slow-motion halt with every thrust and smoky exhale from that dreaded Devil Doll. To put it another way, it was legitimately awesome.

This past January, Zack over at Terror Thursday followed up the triumphant “Devil Doll” screening with Chester Turner's second and final film, “Tales from the Quadead Zone.” Again shot on VHS, it proved to be an even more odd experience than “Devil Doll,” because it allowed the objective audience member to actually pinpoint the improvements Turner made as a filmmaker. While still completely amateurish, you could see how in it's own way, it was a vastly different level of movie-making.

All of this brings us to the recent Terror Thursday presentation of “Splatter Farm.” The 1987 shock-a-thon is truly a testament to the human spirit, of both the filmmaker's and the audience. Two twin teenage brothers, Mark and John Polina (for whom this screening was a memorial for), play Alan and Joseph. When we meet the two brothers, they are on the way to their Aunt Lacey's (Marion Costly in a performance for the ages) farm for the Summer.

When they arrive, they are greeted by Aunt Lacey and her handy man/son, Jeremy (Todd Smith giving arguably the best performance in the movie). When not working around the farm, Jeremy kills people (and horses) and uses their corpses for sex. That's just the beginning of what "Splatter Farm" has in store those brave enough to press "play."

Alan and Joseph are pretty slow when it comes to figuring out that there's something really wrong with life on the farm, but I guess that's how the plot is perpetuated. There's an impressive visual effect (seriously) about 25-30 minute into the movie in which one of the twins suffers horrendously while trying to take a dump. Seriously, really really gross.

It's not until lonely Aunt Lacey drugs and rapes one of the boys and the other one finds some human remains in the woods that the full scope of what Jeremy's been up to is revealed, but by that time it's too late for everyone including the audience; the grand finale begins.

The ending of this movie is pretty awe-inspiring. There is "the line" and there is "stepping over the line," and then there's "erasing the line, but not before fistin' it and rubbing shit all over it's face." That's pretty much what "Splatter Farm" does, and then some. It is truly a barometer of good taste, but not in the way you would think.

A lot of the time when I watch old exploitation films I try to imagine what the people outside the frame look like. I sometimes think about the time period that film was made and what the people who made it were really like. "Splatter Farm" is all of the things that I've said, but it is also a time capsule. The people in it weren't designed to look like they lived in 1987, they lived in 1987! This is where they lived and this was how they spent their time. They were friends and family, and in a strange way, "Splatter Farm" is the coolest home movie a family could have.

Anguish (1987) with Zelda Rubenstein LIVE!!!!

HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!! THIS ONE CATAPULTS INTO MY ALL-TIME TOP 10 THEATER-GOING EXPERIENCES WITH EASE.

I seriously don't know where to begin with this Terror Thursday classic. It was the second part of a double-feature of Zelda Rubenstein movies, the first part being "Teen Witch." I was at the "Teen Witch" screening, but since I fell asleep during it, I chose not to review it.

I had no idea what "Anguish" was about when I walked into the theater that night, and I'm so glad that I got to experience it completely cold. I'm even more pleased though that I got to view it in pretty much the best possible manner that I can think of, with maybe one exception that I won't go into right now.

Having an enthusiastic sold-out crowd fawning over the film's diminutive star, a Horror cinema legend, and one of the most adorable creatures to ever walk the earth, Zelda Rubinstein, only amplified the surrealism of not only the film, but the night as well. When Terror Thursday host, Zack Carlson, explained to the crowd that Zelda and him had taken to calling each other Big Z and Little Z, and then from somewhere in the audience Zelda's squeaky voice eked out "I love you Big Z," my heart exploded from unrivaled sweetness.

The film, made by Spanish director, Bigas Luna, opens with a scene of uncomfortable despair as John (Michael Lerner), the meek optometrist and son of Alice (Rubinstein), tries frantically to retrieve his pet bird from behind a standing closet. As we watch the bird flap it wings, wedged between the furniture and the wall, we sense that something awful is about to happen. The feeling of entrapment that the bird experiences is merely foreshadowing of what other characters in the film will feel later on, and maybe even some of the audience members in our theater.

John is a perpetually nervous and bad optometrist. He is also a severe momma's boy. When he suffers a humiliation at work from a customer that threatens to cost him his job, his "extra perceptive" mother hypnotizes him to enact revenge on the customer. His payback is brutal and stomach-churning. When it's all said and done is when the real fun begins. To say anymore would ruin the fun. I know the film has been available for 20 years, but there's got to be some magic left in the world, so I will end my synopisis here.

"Anguish" is really quite remarkable; it's a Slasher film, a Dark Comedy, a Thriller, and above all else, a movie-going-experience. In this age of home theaters and creatively lazy multiplexes, it difficult to go to movies and have significantly different experiences from week to week. Rarely does a movie offer something that's completely different from everything else, and although the central devise in "Anguish" has been reused into cliche, it's arguable that it's never been done as well as it is here. At one point in the film, the audience simultaneously marveled at a solitary shot, so simple, yet so completely uncommon, that we had no choice, but to laugh with awe.

Sometimes people will tell you a joke that they think is really clever even if it's not. "Anguish" is so clever that you never suspect that you are being told the joke.

On a side note, the most fascinating piece of information that Zelda offered about this gem was that it was that the entire production crew was made up of 5 people and that it was the best production that she had ever been apart of.

Tarzana, the Wild Girl (1969)

Rich Englishmen, Sir Donovan, had long believed his daughter had perished in a plane crash in Africa along with his wife and family, but when strange reports arrive over 15 years later of a local tribe crowning a white woman their queen (known as Tarzana), he sends a rescue expedition to Nairobi on the slim chance his daughter survived.

This Italian production finds Safari expect, Glen Shipper (resembling an older, taller Aaron Eckhart) accompanying Sir Donovan's representatives, Doris (Franca Polesello), and the sinister Groder (Franco Ressel, resembling a younger, thinner, Alan Rickman) in search of Tarzana.

They bring along a team of helpers including the tribal dancer/trail-leader, Kamala, grizzled hunter, Lars, lecherous villain, Fred, and Shipper's driver who is a fat black man with a machete, who dresses exactly like Gilligan from “Gilligan's Island.” Along the way, the expedition wanders through a cave that looks strangely like the same one from “The Boogens.” They also find the 15 year old plane wreckage and they ward off stock footage of a lion that magically turns into a “dead” stuffed lion on a sound-stage.

The real star of the film is Tarzana (Femi Benussi) herself, or more specifically, Tarzana's breasts. Much of the film consists of Tarzana walking around completely topless, wearing nothing but a jungle g-string, while posing on a sound-stage with an elephant, a baby lion (or was it a tiger?), and a particularly human-sounding monkey. Every once in a while she pauses to let out a bellowing toneless yell to summon various animals to her aide. To help give you an idea of how obsessed the movie is with Tarzana's breasts, in the climatic sequence at the end where Doris is appealing to Tarzana to come with her and Glen, she actually appeals to Tarzana's breasts by removing her own shirt and comparing her breasts to Tarzana's: "Look, we're the same.

That's pretty much everything you need to know about "Tarzana, the Wild Girl," an unremarkable movie that was a sometimes boring, yet ultimately enjoyable Weird Wednesday.

The Shape of Things to Come (1979)

So I can safely say that this unfaithful H.G. Wells adaptation was a pretty unmemorable Weird Wednesday, especially considering that it screened a mere month ago, and sitting here now, I'm struggling to recall what I thought about it. I guess what I'm saying is bear with me on this one.

The plot, as provided by imdb.com goes something like this:

Planet Earth is a devastated wasteland, and what's left of humanity has colonized the Moon in domed cities. Humanity's continued survival depends on an anti-radiation drug only available on planet Delta Three, which has been taken over by Omus (Jack Palance), a brilliant but mad mechanic who places no value on human life. Omus wants to come to the Moon to rule and intends to attack it by ramming robot-controlled spaceships into the domes. Dr. John Caball, his son Jason, Jason's friend, Kim, and a robot named Sparks embark on Caball's space battlecruiser on an unauthorized mission to Delta Three to stop Omus.


Now let me just say that reading this synopsis now, I guess I can see how a plot could be strung together by the scenes I saw, but at the time (perhaps it was my tired mental state, but I never fell asleep once during this one) I swear my mind was not processing a plot, but merely absorbing scene after scene.

That being said, the most painful problems with the film are obvious from the get-go; the lumbering pace, the low production value (for a Sci-Fi film at least), and a completely flat script are among the film's worst crimes. The absolute worst though, without a doubt, is the complete under-use of the incomparable Jack Palance. He shows up briefly early on and you're primed for some damn fine scene-chewing, and then there's nothing for an hour or so. He shows up in the last 25 minutes or so to unload some pure cinematic insanity, but it's too little, too late.

It wasn't a total loss though, there were some pretty laughable moments here and there, among my favorites:

--Jack Palance giant floating/rotating holographic head. His incredible overacting, arm gesturing, and his delivery of the line: “Where's your humanism now doctor!?!” You can also tell how evil he is by how many times he laughs out of pure amazement and delight with what he's doing.

--The hallucinogenic space travel sequence (something that seems to be a standard in 70's Sci-Fi films) that's capped with the line: “What the Hell was that about?”

--The ridiculous "robots." Sparks actually seems more human than most of the humans in the film.



--The crazy space-gladiator weapons.

--There's a group of kids in the movie that are supposed to be mutants, or fallout victims, or orphans or something. I don't know, but half of them have on awful blond wigs. The other half have either naturally blond hair or just naturally dark hair. I'm pretty sure that the idea here was that they would all have blond wigs, but the filmmakers didn't have enough to go around so some ended up with them and some didn't. The only reason I think this is because one of the kids wearing a blond wig was Asian.

To be fair to this one, I know there were a lot of other funny bits, but I just can't remember them. I leave you with this, did you know that Jack Palance's birth name was Volodymir Ivanovich Palahniuk? Me neither.



"The Shape of Things to Come" screened 10/8/08 at the midnight and was presented by Weird Wednesday.

All the Sins of Sodom (1968)

This was the second part of the Joe Sarno double feature, and it's a film that was thought to have been lost for 30 years. Apparently, the negatives were discovered recently and this digital transfer was made, and then screened to a sold out Weird Wednesday audience. There's something humbling about watching a film that hasn't been seen by anyone else in 30 years, or in some cases, ever. It was definitely more of what I'm used to from Sarno, exceptionally photographed Black & White sequences with iconic imagery, somewhat choppy editing, and performances that range from vibrant to cardboard.


The plot centers around a big city photographer looking to catch his big break in the world of model photography. Throughout the film he has a handful of muses, some innocent and coy, at least one of them is pure evil (well, sort of), but they all give themselves over to the photographer, both in front of the camera and behind it. When the photographer gets what he wants from both his innocent and evil muses, at what cost will he have to pay?


To be honest, I was completely conscience during this movie, but because of the slow pace and limited plot, it's hard for me to recall specific details that stood out to me. I remember thinking that the evil muse was not really my type, but that she was so wonderfully filmed that I understood why she was the catalyst in the movie. I also remember thinking that the male lead, the photographer, was not up to the challenge of acting against the female cast. His exclamations of frustration to his model; “No, no, it's not evil enough,” induced more laughter in the theater than understanding. I remember the goofy faces the elevator operator made in the background of his shots, which I think is funny now, since he's the only male in the movie that got a film credit on IMDB.


After the movie, I went out into the lobby and met Joe Sarno. I watched his trembling hand scribble out an inscription on my copy of “The Love Merchant.” The young man next to him asked Sarno if he remembered that picture, and he replied with fondness for it. I wonder what that night at the Alamo was like Sarno? I remember during the screening of “Abigail Lesley,” looking down the row of seats and seeing Joe's face as he watched the screen. I wonder what it was like to watch it in theater with an audience, after all these years?


The inscription on my dvd said: “Hey Popkoff! Enjoy the Sex! - Joe Sarno.”


Here's is a bit of one of the Q & A's from that night:



“All the Sins of Sodom” screened at midnight on 10/1/08 at the Alamo Ritz and was presented by Weird Wednesday.

Abigail Leslie is back in Town (1975)

Well, well, well...in the nearly 4 years that I've been attending Weird Wednesday, there have been 3 directors that have punctuated my weekly cinema exploration: Al Adamson, Andy Milligan, & Joe Sarno. Adamson was sort of an everyman's director, who took whatever material he could get his hands on and did what he could with it, with varying degrees of success. Regardless of the subject matter though, an Adamson movie was always an "Adamson" movie. Milligan on the other hand was a shoestring budget auteur whose productions were mostly period pieces complete with hand-sewn costumes, reused sets, and loads of dialogue, mostly of the bickering and bitching variety. He was also a huge asshole apparently; whose real-life final act mirrored the best possible twist in any of his productions.

That brings us to Joe Sarno, a psychology major, whose Sex films, especially in the 60's, were more concerned with the character's motives than with their sexual actions. Known in some circles these days as "the Ingmar Bergman of sex films," his movies combined starkly-photographed, envelope-pushing scenes of titillation with suburban settings, and complex, yet compelling Soap Opera-esque performances. He's especially known for providing strong female characters in a genre where the opposite was usually the case. Most of his films that I have seen, with the exception of "Swedish Wildcats," were black & white Dramas that carried the ambiance of Film Noir into the world of Skin Flicks, and along the way mixed in occult themes, corruption, and paranoia.

This screening of "Abigail Leslie" was part of a Weird Wednesday double feature along with "All the Sins of Sodom," and was presented with Joe Sarno (now 87 years old) Live and in Person. If I had to guess, I would venture to say that this film was made either shortly before or shortly after his transition from Soft-core to Hardcore, due mostly to the excess of full frontal nudity, which was definitely more than any other Sarno film I've seen at the Alamo.

The only reason I note that is because I had invited two of my younger friends to the show, one of them 18 and the other 19 year olds, and neither one had any idea what they were in for. I imagine they were shocked and quite confused by the thought-provoking Q & A and mature analysis that followed the screening. One of them quite perfectly described the movie as "a housewife porno, but with 'real' housewives."

The story centers on Priscilla (Rebecca Brooke, giving an uncommonly strong performance in a Sex film), content yet bored housewife whose marriage was thrown into peril some years earlier by her friend and town jezebel, Abigail Leslie (Jennifer Jordan). After Abigail's betrayal, her own marriage fell apart and she left the town of Baypoint.

The film begins with the news of "that hot-pants-bitch," Abigail Leslie being back in town. Upon hearing the news, Priscilla attempts to play it cool, but retreats as fast as she can to the beach. There, she reflects back on the events that fill her with such dread. In a flashback we see Priscilla and her friend, Tracy (played by Susan Sloan), catching Abigail in bed with Priscilla's husband, Gordon. The line delivery by Tracy is the perfect contrast to Priscilla's horrified expression; "They say 'a kettle of hot water helps in times like these.'" It's at this point that the audience is introduced to Abigail's dead eyes and smoky detached voice.

Every Monday and Wednesday Priscilla goes to the beach where she meets up with Chester, a nice-guy handyman who has the eyes for Priscilla, but the two of them are too shy to take their rendezvous one step further. Meanwhile Abigail returns to the local boat yard (where most of the film takes place) and meets up with some of the other local housewives. It's not very long before Priscilla's husband hears the news and sets up a secret meeting of his own with Abigail.

Priscilla suspects as much of her husband, and feels sorrow, frustration, and confusion about her crumbling marriage, even though everyone around her, including her naughty aunt Drucilla and her beau, Bo (played by Sonny Landham of "Predator" and "48 Hours" fame), urge her to enjoy the freedom that comes with an open marriage.

Meanwhile, Abigail begins the seduction not only of every man in town, but of every woman too. I remember during the first 45 minutes of the film thinking that it was all so scandalous. The enjoyment derived from it was on par with the kind you get from hearing juicy gossip. Abigail's line delivery and philosophies in particular made me chuckle and gasp throughout. When asked why cheerleaders look more pretty today, Abigail responds "Oh, they eat better and fuck more." When she seduces one of the ladies, she says "give me your tongue damn it, give it to me!"

So much of the first half of the film is filled with seedy conversations and sleazy seductions, and all the while I felt that Abigail was concocting a plot for revenge. As the film progressed it became more and more clear that her plot was not so much vengeance as was forgiveness, well, forgiveness through a LOT of sex. Virtually the entire second half of the film is filled with sex scenes. As a result, it felt like the plot and characters eventually were crushed under the weight of all that sex screen time. Of course, I'm the kind of guy that gets bored with sex scenes after a while.

At any rate, this movie was pretty awesome, even if the first half was better than the second.


"Abigail Leslie is back in Town" was screened on 10/1/08 at 9:30 and was presented by Weird Wednesday.

Turkey Shoot a.k.a. Escape 2000 (1982)

This was the final film screened during the Not Quite Hollywood series, and I watched it the night of the Bill Murray Experience. As a result of trying to the watch the documentary, “Not Quite Hollywood,” earlier in the evening, I ended up seeing many clips from this movie, and to be honest, I was foaming at the mouth, waiting for midnight to roll around.

The film is another work directed by Brian Trenchard-Smith and is set in the “near future” of 1995. It's a dystopian future at that, complete with a police-state concentration camp, and everything. At the beginning of the film, three new prisoners (one guy and two girls) are rounded up and shown the inner workings of the camp by the evil and sadistic head guard, Ritter (Roger Ward, giving the film's stand-out performance). Ritter is a maniacal monster and wonderful villain. The scene where he slaps a young female inmate till she's lying a pool of her own blood is intense, disturbing, yet strangely hilarious.

On the flip side, Steve Railsback's performance as Paul, the male lead, left a lot to be desired for me. He just seemed like a jerky dude. As the story progresses, we find out that our three leads are the next in line to take part in the camp's most cruel and unusual of punishments: they are to be hunted for sport. Their reward, if they survive, is that they get their freedom. The hunters, in this case, are Thatcher, the head of the camp, Ritter, and his cronies, including a freakish-wolfman-like-ogre, who rides around with him in a dune buggy. There is also a woman (played by Carmen Duncan) on the prowl with an arsenal of exploding arrows. While the hunters hunt, the prey, led by Railsback, fight back and attempt to bring forth a revolution.

As fate would have it, seeing the clips from this movie earlier in the evening turned out to work against the film for me. In other words, those sequences of sex and violence in “Not Quite Hollywood” proved to be the best “Turkey Shoot” had to offer. Seeing those moments in a montage ended up to setting my expectations entirely too high. As a result, whose to say what my response to “Turkey Shoot” would have been if I hadn't seen those clips? Judging from my friends who were with me (none of which saw “Not Quite Hollywood”), it might have been the same. All in all, this film was kind of disappointing, and was a slightly below average “Terror Thursday,” not that great, but with a few truly inspired and entertaining moments. Most of which were either provided by the creative gore effects, or most likely, the truckload of pyro that was used in this thing.

“Turkey Shoot” screened at midnight at the Alamo Ritz on 9/25/08 and was presented by Terror Thursday.