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3B
Theater Proudly Presents: |
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The
25
Most
Gloriously |
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Stupefying
Moments |
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in
B-Cinema
History. |
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The
Brazenly Brilliant. The
Wonderfully Inept. |
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The
Inexcusably Stupid. |
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Here
are this particular critic's list
of the most gonzoid scenes ever
committed to film. |
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| Director
Hal Needham didn't fare very well
when Burt Reynolds was absent from
his films. Take a look at The
Villain if you don't believe me,
or this film, for further proof.
Needing Reynolds, car stunts, and a
brawl for box-office success, in Megaforce
Needham has Barry Bostwick's hair
and blue bandana, hydrogen-peroxide
rockets with questionable
trajectories, and a rousing
synthesizer soundtrack. Wanting to
make a throw back film from his
youth, Needham wanted clear-cut good
guys who only shot the gun out of
the bad guy's hand -- so think GI
Joe only with day-glo colors
instead of khaki. This film is
endearingly awful as a special-cadre
of giddy Solid Gold dancers,
led by Bostwick, travel the world,
righting wrongs, with armored
motorcycles and dune buggies. And
then the film officially breaks an
already at critical mass goofy-meter
with Stupefying Moment #10 as
Bostwick kisses his thumb and barely
makes the last plane out by kicking
in the turbo-thrusters on his bike.
You will believe a motorcycle can
fly. |
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I'm
shocked. Shocked! to say this hasn't
been reviewed yet either. Man, I
suck... |
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| I'm
usually the first person to defend
the special-effects in these old
monster movies from the '50s and
'60s. These budget strapped epics
did the best they could with what
they had -- sometimes with
spectacular, if not modest, results.
However, there is one movie monster
who all I need do is look at to
bring on hysterical fits of
laughter. That creature is the
giant, anti-matter buzzard
marionette with the Larry Fine
haircut from The Giant Claw.
I mean -- just look at that thing!
Words fail me as the stuffed bird is
twirled around on wires, trying to
stimulate flight, but in all
fairness, in the monster's
close-ups, the puppet head is
actually quite effective with the
flaring nostrils and moving eyes.
But, in the end, it's just too dang
goofy-looking that all menace -- and
credibility, is lost resulting in Stupefying
Moment #9. This is a warning to
all you young producers out there
who sub-contract out your effects
work to foreign countries and don't
see any dailies until it's far, far
too late. |
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| If
there is one thing worse than a bad
horror flick, it's a pretentiously
bad horror flick that's
trying way too hard to be an art
house film. One of the late John
Candy's earliest film roles, this is
the tale of a botched kidnapping
gone horribly wrong. While someone
in a clown suit stalks them all, the
other kidnappers squabble -- and
lock each other up in an electrified
chicken coop -- until the victim
turns the tables and seduces John's
hapless character into bed. And if
you thought the man assaulted by the
teen vixens scene in The
Violent Years was a
brain-bender, it's infinitely worse,
here, because we actually get to see
Stupefying Moment #8. Another
fine treat from our Canadian friends
-- Canuxploitation at it's best, or
worst, depending on how you look at
these things. I know how I'll look
at this film from now on -- the
other way. |
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No.
No. A thousands times, no! |
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The
Giant Spider Invasion |
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In
One End and Out the Other |
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| What
a great carnival ride this would
make! Crawl into the maw of the Creeping
Terror, slosh around in the
digestive track loop-de-loops, and
then get pooped out the ass end of
the Giant Spider. The
Creeping Terror is infamous for
two things: One, the production's
sound equipment fell in a lake and
they couldn't afford to replace it,
which is why almost the entire film
is nothing but narration, and two,
the inexplicable ability of this
large, shambling monster to
constantly sneak up on people, and
then those people helpfully crawl
into it's mouth -- which is either a
damning indictment on us as a
species, or the Terror emits
some kind of brain-numbing pheromone
that the film forgot to talk about
-- results in one half of Moment
#7. The other half of comes
courtesy of the other film, and it's
not included in the MST3k
cut, with the spectacular shots of
the Giant Spider pooping out
the gooey remains of it's victims.
Y-U-C-K. |
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This
would make a great double-dip
review. |
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| It
doesn't take Freud to unravel the
subconscious subtext of all these
giant monkey movies where a
fifty-foot simian runs off with a
five-foot-ish girl to know something
very Id-ish is going on. I mean --
take a look at the '76 remake of King
Kong, and watch as the natives
push that huge, greased-up phallic
log through the vaginal, reedy
glory-hole to seal the gate. Yeah.
I wonder what that's supposed
to mean? Wink. Wink. Nudge.
Nudge. Say no more. Dude,
that's just sick. However,
for Moment #6, you can leave
the psychology text books at home as
the A*P*E let's us know how
he really feels with one simple
gesture. |
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And
the Worst is Yet to Come. |
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