Aloha yall,
Tex Hula
Every Monday I find and watch a movie I've never heard of before. Here's the latest batch:
BLOODY MALLORY (2002)
When a group of ghouls start harassing and impregnating nuns in a french village church, a team of elite badass supernatural hunters are called in. Their leader is the title's Mallory who's literally haunted by the demon ghost of her husband. Her teamates are: Vena Cava, an American transvestite demolitions expert. Talking Tina, a 10 year old telepath that can possess animals, or really dumb humans. There's also a guy, he dies on this first mission and I didn't catch his name.
After their mission in the church ends horribly, the group is assigned to a new mission: find whoever just abducted the newly appointed Pope. To find his location first Mallory consults with her dead husband, he points her to the Necronomicon, from there she finds numbers which match coordinates to locations where supernatural events have occured. Marking the spots on a map, it does that movie thing where the spots form a pentagram, pinpointing an exact location.
Mallory heads to said location to find a European village that has been completly wiped off the pentagram dotted map. Inspecting closer she finds a portal leading to a hell world where the vilage and villagers have been transported.
It's now a bizarro world version of what it once was. Silhouettes of demons having sex with humans can be seen from windows of apartments. A couple of spouses are having an argument because one decided to eat the children. A demon kid is chasing other children through the streets with an electric carving knife. The local gas station sells humans like cattle.
Eventually Mallory and her crew find the Pope in the booby-trapped underground caves under the village of the damned. They also discover the hidden identity of their big baddie: Abaddon, he's a fallen angel who wants to call in his brethren of former angels and eradicate mankind from the planet and start anew. To get to him, Mallory and company will have to get past his army of ghouls, and his twin sister bodyguards, a vampire and another telepathic body swapper.
I had to check to see if this was based on a comic or graphic novel, it's not but it really seems like it. BLOODY MALLORY is a French film with tons of influences that were popular at the time. Most notably the BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER series, (now owned by Disney). It's also full of over the top goofy action much like films that were coming out of Asia around this time, films like the zombie actioner VERSUS. I happen to be a sucker for this type of action. My only complaint is I wish they would've cranked up the action a gore a few more notches.
BLOODY MALLORY has a been-there-done-that plot, but a cast of interesting characters. It's a fun, fast watch that rarely drags.
KNIGHTS OF THE CITY (1986)
Thoughts before watching: It's about time I had a New World Pictures movie on random movie day. I've already had a Cannon movie, (ALADDIN). Roger Corman's New World movies were a staple in the VHS rental time of my youth. In 1997 most of New World's catalog of films were purchsed by 20th Century Fox. Now a portion of New World's content is owned by:
The Royals are a part-time street gang, part-time rock/pop group called The Royal Rockers, led by lead singer Troy. (Leon Isaac Kennedy star of the PENITENTIARY trilogy.) They also look like they spend a fortune on fashion accessories like spiked belts, gold chains, and fingerless gloves. Their rival gang The Mechanics doesn't have the musical talent or fashion sense, but what they do have is a cool base in an abandonded tugboat, and the local police in their pocket. After a gangfight with The Mechanics, The Royals are taken to jail where they're treated to a performance by The Fat Boys and Kurtis Blow, and everyone in jail starts breakdancing. Director Dominic Orlando is a veteran of music videos and had previously directed The Fat Boy's Jailhouse Rap video where one of The Fat Boys goes to jail for eating a ton of food at Burger King and not being able to pay when they bring him his check. (Sorry, Burger King doesn't work that way.)
Luckily, the head of a local record company, Mr. Delamo happens to be in the next cell. He likes what he hears and passes his business card to Troy who wasn't even performing, he was just an onlooker. The next day The Royals go to the record company with a demo tape and give it to the company's talent scout Brooke, (Janine Turner, NORTHERN EXPOSURE), who also happens to be Mr. Delamo's daughter. She likes their music, but has no way to get in contact with the band. So naturally, she holds a talent competition in their neighborhood with the winner to recieve a recording contract.
The Royal Rockers enter the competition, but first they hire a choreographer to help teach them some new dance moves, and we get a dance training montage.
Meanwhile, Troy's ex-girlfriend Jasmine has entered the competition against him out of spite.
At the talent show, (hosted by Smokey Robinson), we get to see The Royal Rockers performing for the first and only time in the movie. Troy is the lead singer in a Michael Jackson jacket, they have a rock guitarist, keyboards, and breakdancers. If they had someone on violin, and an Asian guy dressed as a Native American banging a gong they would be a perfect copy of the Lambda Lambda Lamda band. (REVENGE OF THE NERDS: now owned by Disney.) And of course they win.
But there's trouble brewing, The Mechanics are at their tugboat hideout plotting revenge.
I really want an abandoned tugboat hideout.
KNIGHTS OF THE CITY wants to be a struggling musician story like PURPLE RAIN, it's biggest problem though, there's not much of a struggle. Success is pretty much handed to them. There only obstacle is the talent competition, and even that never feels like there's a chance they could lose. Their only competition is Toy's ex-girlfriend who we have no idea what she does musically, and also these guys:
There's also a romantic sub-plot between Troy and Brooke. They do the rich girl dating the guy from the wrong side of the tracks thing, but they don't put any effort into it, and by the end of the movie they aren't together so it's pointless.
Also they try to do some fish out of water comedy with The Royals going to places like the record company, or a fancy dinner party, and they act like unsophisticated goofs, but they just come off as obnoxious assholes. During the dinner scene, one of The Royals picks an hors d'oeuvre off of a tray using a switchblade. They really needed a rich old man in this scene that looks on in shock and his monocle falls out of his eye into his soup.
Everything about this movie just feels half-assed. It's not a good musicians struggling to get off the street movie. It's not a good gang movie. Hell, SHORT CIRCUIT 2 had a more realistic gang. (Los Locos will kick your balls into outer spaaace!)
It does make for a good slice of 80's nostalgia, but there are better movies for 80's hip-hop culture. Try BEAT STREET, WILD STYLE, or KRUSH GROOVE instead.
MACHO MAN (1985)
MACHO MAN is actually the tale of two macho men, one is Danny Wagner, (Rene Weller), a German boxing champ on and off-screen, and Andreas Arnold, Germany's karate champ only on-screen, but a karate pro off-screen.
It opens with the Macho-est of opening credits. We get a montage of guys boxing, boobs in a shower, karate guys breaking cinder blocks with their fists, a doctor examining x-rays (?), hot ladies, white guys dancing, and more karate.
Danny Wagner leaves his boxing practice to find a trio of men holding a screaming girl trying to inject her with heroin. Naturally, being a Macho Man he kicks the living shit out of them, and offers her a ride home. During the ride the damsel, Sandra, tells him that the heroin dealers are upset with her because she helped a friend kick her smack habit now they want to make her an addict for compensation. (Sorry, drug dealers don't work that way.) When he gets her safely to her place he invites her out to a night at the disco. German Macho Men love the disco.
Danny and Andreas just happen to stroll into the same bank, at the same time. It just so happens to be the same time some hoodlums decide to rob the bank. Danny and Andreas find time to make a deposit of their feet into the ass of these criminals. Even Andrea's karate partner sitting outside, Markus, with his perfectly quaffed white man afro and moustache combo, gets in on the action by taking out the getaway driver.
The next day, Andreas gets injured in karate practice and has to go to the local doctor. His nurse just so happens to be Sandra. Andreas invites her out to a boxing match and afterwards, of course disco. During the boxing match, Danny spots Andreas with Sandra and is seething with jealousy. At this point it looked like there was going to be a love triangle angle, but a rich girl named Lisa shows up to take karate lessons and becomes Andrea's girlfriend.
Next night at the disco, where both guys have taken their girls to watch breakdancers, they challenge each other to a fight. Danny has the power of boxing and the moustache. Andreas has the power of karate and the mullet.
After a five minute training montage Danny calls Andreas and invites him to coffee. He explains there are no hard feelings and they should have a good match, and then team up to kick the shit out of the local Drug lord. The two bitter rivals become best friends. They have their Martha moment. Restless nations can now sleep in peace. The Macho Men have become BFFs.
During their fight, in front of a packed crowd of thirty people in what looks like an office building, they're interrupted by a random guy. Drug lord guy has been spotted in the neighborhood. They call off the fight and a team of boxers and karate guys head out to the local drug hangout/tiki bar to deliver some ass kicking justice. But right before they storm the bar, in a scene that almost made me do a spit-take, they group together and synchronize their watches.
They bust in, and an epic bar brawl ensues. Unfortunately, Drug lord escapes and the next day he kidnaps Sandra and Lisa. Now it's up to the Macho Men to rescue their girls and go to the disco.
They never finish the fight to determine who es muy Macho, During the last ten minutes I started suspecting they would do a ROCKY III freeze-frame ending right as they were throwing their first punches. I was wrong, they didn't, but they did end with an 80's action series feeze-frame.
I had a great time with this film. Things start off a little slow, but the last half hour is action packed with Macho Men beating the hell out of the neighborhood drug dealers. Aside from the boxing scenes, the fighting almost looks like real punches are being thrown. During a karate demonstration, it looks like a couple of the guys holding the boards to be chopped get nailed in the face, by feet and by boards.
If you're a fan of cheesy 80's action, I recommend this one. MACHO MAN puts the cheese back in machismo.
Afterthoughts: MACHO MAN must've been a cult film in Germany. Looking into it I found out it surprisingly has a sequel that was successfully crowdfunded in 2017.
Rene Weller is back as Danny Wagner. Peter Althof is back as Andreas Arnold, looking a little like Dolph Lundgren there. The moustache has been shaven, the mullet has been cut, but the Macho Men are back, and they're pissed.
I really wanted this to be my next Monday movie. I searched everywhere for a copy, but I can't find a copy with English subs. I will be constantly on the lookout for a copy.
FIGHT CLUB: MEMBERS ONLY (2006)
Thoughts before watching: I wanted to watch a Bollywood movie, and when I found out this existed I had to get a copy.
I actually missed my first Monday since doing these write-ups because of searching for MACHO MAN 2, and waiting for this one to arrive via mail.
Forget all that nihilism and anarchy bullshit. What FIGHT CLUB really needed was a scene where Edward Norton and Helena Bonham Carter sang a duet in the mountains on top of a giant stack of logs.
FIGHT CLUB: MEMBERS ONLY is about four lifelong friends Vicky the leader, Karan a gym trainer, Somil a guy with no distinct personality traits, and Dinku an alcoholic. Dinku starts off as a contender for most irritating comic relief on film. Luckily by the twenty minute mark he dials it way down.
The guys go to the local club and break into a Hindi hip-hop musical number. As they're leaving a fight begins brewing between two guys who want to fight but don't have a place to do it. This gives Vicky a "great" idea. The next morning he pitches it to the guys. They rent a warehouse for people who are looking for a place to settle their differences and fight, and they charge them a fee. A place called, "Fight Club." Since the guys have all recently lost their jobs, they decide to help out by searching the city looking for people about to have fights and then inviting them to come to their warehouse and pay to fight.
They officially begin their Fight Club, of course, by going over the rules. The first few fights are "comedy" matches. A nerdy guy is fighting a giant guy and wins by tickling him into submission. A grown man brings a little kid to fight, and the kid wins by kicking the guy in the balls. I am Jack's complete lack of laughter.
Eventually, Fight club has to move from the warehouse to an abandoned swimming pool due to police. At first i was wondering why the pool was filled ankle deep with water. Then I realized the director really likes shots of slow motion kicks trailing water beads.
A little past the hour mark of this movie's whopping runtime of two hours and twenty two minutes, it drops the Fight Club plot completly and becomes a seperate movie entirely. Two movies for the price of one. More like two shitty movies I have to suffer through instead of one.
So, during the Fight Club plot a college student named Mohit brings a guy in for a fight and beats him so badly Vicky has to pull him off. This causes Mohit to start a fight with Vicky. They're interrupted by a police raid but Mohit vows revenge. Shortly after Mohits over-protective, reformed legendary gang-member brother, Anna comes to visit after being released from prison, and takes him on a vacation to Delhi.
Meanwhile, Somil's Uncle who runs a nightclub in Delhi is killed by local drug dealers who want the bar for themselves. So the guys head to Delhi to run the club, because that's what Uncle would've wanted.
Mohit has joined up with Anna's former gang, who happen to be the same guys that killed the Uncle. They're pissed because the guys have taken over the nightclub. So they get Mohit drunk and set him loose on the club, he causes a scene and starts a fight with Vicky who beats him until new bouncer Sameer drags Mohit off and dumps him in the woods. The drug dealers kill Mohit framing the guys causing Anna to seek revenge. The gang kidnaps the guys and Sameer, and take them to an abandoned constuction site so Anna can avenge his brother.
There's also a romantic sub-plot involving Vicky, and Mandar's sister who he daydreams of a musical duet on top of logs. Another romance between Mandar and a pop singer who does a musical number at the nightclub causing Mandar to daydream of a duet in the tropics.
There's a ton of genres here: musical, action, romance, slapstick comedy, crime drama, a none of it gels. But nothing as jarring as how the first and second halves of the film are completely seperate movies. The first half is a goofy comedy. The second is a crime drama. I have a suspicion that a producer wanted to make a FIGHT CLUB rip-off, so the writer took one of their existing screenplays and added the Fight Club plot at the begining. This is just a guess, but a really plausible one.
I really wanted a fun Bollywood FIGHT CLUB rip-off. What I got was an all over the place, way too long mess.
But I'm not done with FIGHT CLUB yet.
FIGHT CLUB: THE VIDEO GAME (2004)
Thoughts before playing: While I was waiting for FIGHT CLUB: MEMBERS ONLY to arrive in the mail I stumbled across this at the local thrift shop. It was my density, um destiny. I know it's probably bad, but it's a PvP fighter, and that's my jam. There's also a chance it could be bad and still fun to play. STAR WARS: MASTERS OF TERAS KASI was a bad fighting game that my friends and I had a blast with.
I'll be playing this on the original Xbox. I only have one controller so it'll be against CPU only.
If Tyler Durden walked into my living room and saw me playing this game he would beat the living shit out of me. You know what? I wouldn't blame him.
I started with story mode which has you playing an average guy on his first night at Fight Club. I named my guy Butthole, yeah I have a third grade mentality. Butthole goes from his first fight, to the inner circle of Fight Club, to a member of Project: Mayhem. Events of the movie are retold from Butthole's perspective.
Even for the time this game came out, the cutscenes have horrendous CGI. The biggest clue that this game was rushed to shelves unfinished is that the cutscenes go from animated to slideshow pictures of still shots frequently.
Of course none of the main actors had any part of this, their likenesses couldn't be used so most of the cast look nothing like their movie counterparts.
Gameplay is infuriatingly bad. Hit detection is way off. Sometimes Butthole's leg would magically pass through the CPU player, only for them to pull the same kick right after and knock you down. The controls aren't fast and fluid like a SOUL CALIBER, they're slow and stiff like a SHAQ-FU.
The FIGHT CLUB license is the only thing that makes this game remotely interesting, and that novelty wears off quick.
There are a couple of bright spots for this game. Bob "Bitch-Tits" Paulsen is a playable character. Meatloaf even lends his voice and likeness to the game. The few times I played Vs. mode this was my favorite character. And yes, they're spectacular double-D's.
Another is the game goes into x-ray mode to let you see bones in arms and legs breaking. I know it's been done in MORTAL KOMBAT, but as far as I know this might be the first game to do that.
After playing story mode you unlock Fred Durst (ugh) as a playable character. I wanted to know who the other characters were so I checked online, and one of them is Abraham Lincoln. I thought this was completley random until I remembered Tyler and Jack having a conversation about what historical figure they would fight. Tyler chose Lincoln. I doubt the gamemakers wanted to stir up controversy by including Jack's pick, Gandhi. But how awesome would it be to have a fighting game where the most peaceful, vegan on the planet fought a guy named Meatloaf?
After these two bastardazations, could anything worse happen to FIGHT CLUB?
Yep.
Mahalo pardners,
Tex Hula
