Carpocalypse Now: WATER WARS (2011)

The late, great Cirio H. Santiago sadly passed away while making another post-apocalyptic actioner. Honestly, if you have to go, I think that is a great way to do it. Some fantasize about going out in bed with a hooker, but to each his own.

Unfortunately for the film that meant that Santiago had only five days of shooting completed (which come to think of it is probably about a third of his shooting schedule). Long time financier Roger Corman turned to the man who, for better or for worse, is now known for making softcore DTV quickies in a matter of days, Jim Wynorski. Regardless of your views on the merits or lack there of, of DINOCROCK VS. SUPERGATOR (2010) or THE BREASTFORD WIVES (2007), Wynorski's early work boarders on genius. Films like the amazing THE LOST EMPIRE (1985) and CHOPPING MALL (1986) will always have a place of honor in our video shelves. On the other hand, his directing style couldn't be more in contrast with Santiago's. With little money and resources Jim Wynorski shot extra scenes and used stock footage from Santiago’s previous wasteland outings including STRYKER (1983), RAIDERS OF THE SUN (1992) and WHEELS OF FIRE (1985).

A post-nuke bikini babe Skye (Playboy Playmate Athena Lundberg), who dresses like she is from a dinosaur island, falls into the clutches of an evil overlord Bane (Michael Madsen, sounding like he’s been gargling thumbtacks and vinegar) who flaunts his evility by wearing a black leather coat in the middle of the desert wastes. He also forces his henchmen to dress like ninjas which must lead to a lot of sick days being used due to heat stroke. Bane's goal in life is not to stop The Batman as you would expect, but to hoard the world’s rapidly diminishing water supply so that he will be the most powerful man in the wastes. He will have crops and the unwashed masses will be subjugated to his will. I say "unwashed masses", but they are actually quite clean. There must be an old Purell manufacturing facility near by.

Another member of the tribe, Kenna (Playboy Playmates Monica Leigh) sets out to find someone stup- err, I mean tough enough to help her rescue Skye and get them back to their village safely. Bane even goes so far as to tie up Skye and torture her by making her watch him use a circular shop saw on some random dude. Is he betting that since she is girly, she will be so grossed out that she'll spill the beans? We may never know. After getting in a bar brawl in which her top conveniently falls open, she meets Slade (Kevin Stapleton), a neo-cowboy who just likes to drink and watch other people get killed. Clearly written for John Terlesky, Stapleton plays the reluctant savior with a deadpan delivery that makes him seem more somnambulistic than sarcastic.

Once Slade has been talked into it, he rounds up his team, a dirty half-dozen, and sets out to extract Skye. Once accomplished they head back to the village where Kenna, who apparently has had access to a lot of plastic surgery in the wastes, rewards the pasty dough-boy Slade, who should never ever have been allowed to get naked, with some jungle love by a waterfall. Of course this all leads to a showdown with Bane who is set to invade the village to secure the water for himself.

In 1983’s STRYKER it was actually kind of impressively forward thinking to figure that water would be a major commodity in a post-apocalyptic society. That idea, while now rather obvious, has been carried through-out Santiago’s wasteland epics, so it is good to see it in his final film. As of now it has still gone unofficially unreleased on video anywhere in the world. The reasons for this are as obscure as the movie itself, even Wynorski has been tight lipped on the subject, but knowing Roger Corman it couldn't be for anything other than legal reasons.

Wynorski clearly didn't have two pesos to rub together, but he does put what little he has on the screen. The climactic battle between the villagers and Bane's forces is almost all new footage and sports a full-blown firefight with plenty of automatic weapons and things that go boom. The real problem, aside from the decision to do the shakey-cam and hyper zoom thing, is that some of the footage from Santiago’s past classics seem randomly thrown in with characters and dialogue that have no connection to the story. I’m not sure whether Wynorski was trying to make us believe that these characters, who look completely different, are the same as the ones in the new footage, or whether he was aiming for a random action cut-away. Some of the clips go on way too long and should have been trimmed down or eliminated. The different filmstock and print quality is a jarring contrast to the digital video of the new footage and as much as I hate to say it, I think the movie would have been more enjoyable without it. Out of the running time of just over 81 minutes at least 20 minutes is old footage. Seems like if Corman could have thrown just a few more bucks into it, we'd have solid VOD fodder.

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Newsploitation: BLOODFIST makes the list

September 1989 was apparently a prime month to unleash flicks about people being kicked in the face.  A few weeks back we celebrated the 25th anniversary for Jean-Claude Van Damme’s KICKBOXER (1989) and this week we bestow another silver anniversary (world title?) on BLOODFIST (1989), the Roger Corman produced film that looked to stake its claim in the box office bloodsport.  Not only did this film launch the last major star (of the direct-to-video era) for Corman, it also served as the impetus for what would become the most sequelized American martial arts series.

Roger Corman will always be known as much for his films as his ability to spot good actors and give them their big break in show business.  As the legend has it, Corman first spotted Don “The Dragon” Wilson, a kickboxing champion, in a profile in a martial arts magazine.  After a very successful kickboxing career that begin in the mid-70s, Florida native Wilson moved to California in the mid-80s to pursue acting, but only had a La Choy commercial and GENERAL HOSPTIAL gig (as Thug #1) to his name by the time Corman came calling.  With the aforementioned BLOODSPORT and KICKBOXER giving a resuscitating punch to the martial arts genre, Corman, never to miss out on trend he could bank on, quickly signed Wilson to a several picture deal.  The first of these pictures would be the perfectly titled BLOODFIST.

Corman’s innate ability to spot talent also extended behind the camera and he gave Concorde’s very first in-house martial arts film to the steady hand of Terence H. Winkless.  The director had previously turned in the horror film THE NEST (1988), easily cinema’s best killer cockroach movie (high praise!) and a personal fave here at Video Junkie. According to an interview Winkless did with our buddy Marty McKee, Corman approached him with the project and gave him ten days of prep time before flying off to the Philippines for production under the watchful eye of Cirio Santiago in December 1988.  Yes, ten days, less time than it takes for Tom Cruise to decide on which lifts to wear. When given the opportunity, Winkless didn’t blink (ah, boo yourself!) and he headed overseas for three months.

BLOODFIST tells the story of Jake Raye (Wilson), a retired kickboxer who is drawn to Manila after his half-brother turns up dead.  Adhering to the martial arts movie formula, the cops (including Vic Diaz) are ineffectual and Jake soon begins investigating on his own.  He soon finds out his brother was participating in a tournament of deadly combat called Ta Chang.  Naturally, he must enter the contest under the tutelage of Kwong (Joe Mari Avellana), his sibling’s old trainer, to find the killer. While checking off every martial arts cliché in the book (this is, after all, a Corman cash in), BLOODFIST actually plays with several conventions and features a few twists not commonly seen in this type of movie.  Director Winkless actually gets a lot of bang for his buck, portraying the exotic locales for all of their “stranger in a strange land” worth and even getting some nice crane and helicopter shots.  His biggest coup is undoubtedly surrounding Wilson with a legit army of fighters.  The film features several real fighters including Dutch kickboxer Rob Kaman and future star and workout guru Billy Blanks.  With each fighter introduced in the opening credits with their fighting style and international championships, it gives the film an air of legitimacy where it counts the most.  As it stands, Wilson is still the best kickboxer to ever grace the screen as a leading man.  And for a beginner, The Dragon acquits himself well.  While his high kicks will always outshine his acting ability, he is affable and believable in the role.

Corman got the film into theaters on September 22, 1989 at just 54 theaters.  To give some perspective, the weekend’s top release BLACK RAIN (1989) opened on 1,600+ screens. While the initial haul was only $89,132, the film proved to have drawing power as it went across the country over the next three months, suckering…uh, I mean, drawing in spin kick-desiring martial arts fans.  Its highest release point was on a mere 77 screens in mid-November (no doubt to celebrate my birthday) and by the end of December it had hauled in $1,770,082.  Not a blockbuster number by any figure, but it proved to be Concorde’s biggest release that year.  Yes, it did better than LORDS OF THE DEEP (1989).  It was also Concorde’s highest grossing theatrical release before being dethroned by BODY CHEMISTRY (1990) in March 1990.

Not surprisingly, Corman announced the sequel BLOODFIST II in mid-December, while the first film was still punching up dollars around the country.  It went into production in February 1990, just as BLOODFIST was hitting video via MGM/UA.  The sequel would hit theaters just over a year after the first film on October 12, 1990 and would pull in a slightly smaller haul of $1,292,323.  It is the only film in the series that continues the Jake Raye storyline as starting with BLOOFIST III: FORCED TO FIGHT (1992) the series featured Wilson as a new character in each entry.  The third film was also the last to see a theatrical release. Beginning with BLOODFIST IV: DIE TRYING (1992) Wilson would be starring exclusively in the direct-to-video market.  All together, Corman and Wilson would make 13 films from 1989-1999.  Eight of those were BLOODFIST films, with the non-Wilson sequel/remake BLOODFIST 2050 (2005) starring Matt Mullins being the ninth and final entry.  We thought about reviewing all of them here to celebrate this anniversary, but only an insane man would do that.  That said – check out Marty McKee’s rundown of all the films at his site here.

The greatest BLOODFIST poster ever:

A selection of BLOODFIST worldwide VHS covers:

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Deadly Farce: STONE COLD 2: HEART OF STONE (1997)

I can't explain why, but for some reason I have a real soft spot for football players turned actors. Jim Brown was a record-setting fullback who lead the league in rushing eight times then made some of the best action movies of the '70s. It seems that if the player is a record breaker, the better the movies. That's my theory anyway.

Brian Bosworth, in 1987, was the highest paid rookie in the history of the NFL at $11 million (as opposed to Sam Bradford of the Saint Louis Rams weighing in 2010 at $76 million). In 1988, like most football players that move into acting, he suffered a career-ending injury that forced him to retire. His screen debut was in the Craig R. Baxley directed STONE COLD (1991), which not only delivered insane action, but put together a solid supporting cast of William Forsythe, Sam Elliot and Lance Henricksen (back when he was cool). No football player could topline this movie and not come out looking good. Even Ray Rice could walk away from STONE COLD smelling like an entire flower stand. Unfortunately The Boz wasn't as careful picking out scripts as he was picking out teams in the draft (yes, he pulled an Eli Manning while Eli was still in diapers) and subsequently his acting career fell on hard times. He also sued the NFL to use his college numbers. No ego there. Come to think of it, maybe he was just a pain in the ass to work with.

HEART OF STONE, also known as BACK IN BUSINESS, is later era Brian Bosworth flick (like his gridiron career, his movie career was short too). It sure seems like a slick action outing at first. A fast-talkin’ brotha named Little Train (Guy Torry) desperately tries to warn undercover fed Tony Dunbar (Joe Torry) about a big heroin deal going down between mob boss David Ashby (Alan Scarfe) and dirty fed Emery Ryker (Brion James), before being thrown down an elevator shaft. Now Dunbar sets out to settle the score.

What? Oh yeah, Bosworth is the star. After the opening couple of minutes which make the film seem like a brainless but fun action movie, we are introduced to The Boz. 

Meet ex-cop Joe Elkhart (Boz). He’s a mechanic that likes to listen to a talk radio psychology program and discusses self-help with his overtly Jewish boss who rips off clichés like “Jews know from suffering!” just in case the dimmer bulbs in the audience don’t get it from his stagy Yiddish accent. While cheerfully dealing with his inner demons (by buying his ex-wife an expensive wedding present)  he decides to seek out his former partner Dunbar. Dunbar is now living the life, quaffing Dom and smoking cigars (that he does not keep in a humidor – poser!). Elkhart meets Dunbar to play a pick-up game of hoops on the street. This is pretty much presented in real time and at one point I started thinking that I was watching a sequel to WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP (1992). Not only is the sequence unfathomably long, but the filmmakers decided that it would be a great idea if Boz showed up unprepared and was talked into stripping down to his boxers because he doesn’t have any proper shorts. No, I’m not making this up and have the screenshots to prove it.

After the b-ball game, Dunbar takes him out on his yacht and tells him that his life of opulence is merely his guise in an undercover operation to set up Ashby. Once on the docks they meet Dunbar’s neurotic female mechanic who is also into therapy and bonds with the Boz instantly by telling him that she is exploring her masculine side and that they should sleep together first, but not in a sexual way because “fucking can be so fucking disappointing”. Jeezus lady, did I go out with you in high school?

A full 30 minutes of buddy-buddy later, Dunbar gets his plan in gear by getting in a shoot-out in the police evidence locker with some balaclava-wearing hoods in cop uniforms, Dunbar steals a couple of keys of smack in the fray in order to set up a deal with Ashby, who in spite of being a big-time crime boss, always comes to make small-time deals in person. If anyone in this movie is in need of self help, it’s this guy. I mean seriously, you need to get over those trust issues pal so that you can manage by delegation.

One of Ashby’s goons makes Dunbar for a fed and a really well executed fire-fight breaks out (finally!). For no immediately apparent reason, Ryker shows up on a harbor dock and has his partner bust out a giant surface to surface rocket launcher to blow up Dunbar’s boat. Hey, these guys aren’t CIA, they haven’t been trained in clandestine ops. Fuck it, we’ll just blow up the boat with an anti-tank weapon in broad daylight in a public place. This makes about as much sense as a later scene in which Dunbar and Elkhart get back together after the fiasco and are jumped by two corrupt feds, who the guys shoot to death in the back yard of Elkhart’s ex-wife’s lavish house in the middle of a posh residential area at night! Not only do the neighbors not call the police, but Dunbar and Elkhart don’t even bother to vacate the premises until after they’ve gotten hammered on beer while cracking jokes from lawn chairs that overlook the corpses in the pool. No, really. Dunbar quips things like “fat-ass floater”. I dunno, maybe that would get a laugh in Ferguson.

Hey, don’t get me wrong, I can, have and will sit through dialogue that's about as sharp as a bowl of jello, but if you throw me some explosions, shoot-outs, fights or chase scenes on regular intervals you won't lose my vote. I’m not hard to please. Hell, I’ve watched damn near every Cannon movie made in the ‘80s and I can’t even count the number of Godfrey Ho flicks I’ve sat through, Obviously, I'm not a picky man. This all gets us back to the main plot of the movie in which Elkhart and Dunbar dress up in a tux and an Arab outfit so they can go to an auction and outbid Ashby on a rare Shelby that Ryker has packed full of heroin. It has to be the most convoluted drug deal in the history of crime and it is every bit as entertaining as it sounds, complete with Dunbar keepin' it real by talking pidgeon Arabic and offending pretentious white people.

Of course two words should have tipped me off to the movie's potential for badness: Philippe Mora. A name that roughly translates from the French as “cinematic mess”. I haven’t seen all of Mora’s films, but I’ve seen enough to know that his name is a bad sign unless it is followed by the name “Sybil Danning”. While the film looks great and is shot 2.35, the script, by first and last timers Ed Decatur and Ash Staley, seems to think that it is a 48 HOURS-ish buddy comedy first and foremost with long stretches of unfunny dialogue that the actors are desperately trying to rise above. Adding insult to injury, Brion James is woefully under-utilized, perhaps due to his diminishing health (in one scene he is clearly having trouble walking) as a straight-forward suit and tie bad guy who really only has a handful of short scenes. The interesting thing is that the German DVD features some extra shots of violence inserted from a workprint. These help boost the main action sequence, but do little to help out the movie as a whole. Obviously Mora was short on cash (as usual), but with some better editing and maybe cutting some of the locations to divert funds to additional action scenes, this one would never stand up to STONE COLD, but could have been a decent outing for The Boz. 

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Fangs for Nothing: NIGHT OF THE CHUPACABRAS (2011)

In the realm of legendary creatures such as vampires, werewolves and even monsters that may or may not be in possession of a soul, composed of body parts salvaged from executed prisoners, they all tend to date back into the days when stories were used to frighten children and explain away inconveniences like serial murders. Hell, even Bigfoot dates back to the 17^th century, probably earlier as it was perhaps an imported version of the mythical Yeti of the Himalayas. So where is a monster for our generation? We don’t want hand me downs! This is the “me” generation, and we demand our own ridiculous superstition! In 1995 that wish was granted by Puerto Rican farmers who were looking for an explanation of why their livestock was being found drained of blood from two wounds. It only made sense that a bipedal, spiny lizard that has the face borrowed from CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, was sucking the blood out of goats. Yep, no other explanation. Soon the sightings of chupacabras were being reported in South America, Mexico and, of course, Texas because they need another reason to be elitists.

So now that we have our very own monster for our generation, how should we exploit it? Well, by making crappy home movies, that’s how! The first, to my knowledge was EL CHUPACABRA (2003), a DTV effort set in Los Angeles, that one viewer described as “89 minutes of mental violation” and BLOODTHIRST: LEGEND OF THE CHUPACABRA (2003). Following that in 2005, we had another DTV effort, CHUPACABRA TERROR (2005) which featured John Rhys-Davies in a role that won’t surprise you, and then we have the Brazilian SOV film NIGHT OF THE CHUPACABRAS. I was thinking that we may finally see something entertaining done with the creature that has become the butt of jokes on every prime-time animated show ever, but then I discovered it is from the “creative” team that brought us BLACK MANGUE (aka MUD ZOMBIES; 2008). Oh jeezus, what have I gotten myself into?

Set in the rural parts of Brazil, a barking dog wakes up a farmer (Markus Konká) who discovers his goat dead, he is certain it was killed by the devil and sets his dog loose on it, as dogs are well known for their power to stop corporeal manifestations of fallen angels who are the embodiment of all evil and who have nothing better to do than to kill a goats in the middle of nowhere.

After his city-slicker son Douglas (Joel Caetano) and his pregnant fiancée Maria-Alicia (Mayra Alarcón) come to visit, we get to meet his slightly deranged family, the Silvas, who have been feuding with the neighboring family, the Cavallos. While the father rambles about the devil, Douglas’ brothers decide to disobey their father’s wishes and bury only the dog, saving the goat to sell to the local tavern. Well, I say “tavern”, but it is simply a shack with some rickety tables that makes The Slaughtered Lamb look like Le Cirque. All of this inaction is accompanied by the flattest dialogue imaginable that appears to have come from asking 100 middle-schoolers what their favorite cuss words were. At least MUD ZOMBIES left you utterly confused by the lengthy passages of nonsensical dialogue. At least then, if you were so inclined, you could contemplate the possible meaning behind the rambling verbiage. Here it's pretty obvious that there is none.

After an inconceivably long scene of the brothers haggling with the owner, the Silva brothers silently drink in the tavern. Suddenly the Cavallo brothers take the other table and start drinking. Uhhh, yeah, it was about that exciting in the movie too, except they used a bunch of close-ups and dramatic music to heighten the tedium. Of course since the goat has been rotting for a day and has been bitten by the still unseen chupacabra, when everyone eats it, they suddenly transform into giant mutant chupacabrae and go on a rampage that… Oh no, sorry, that’s what I really wanted to happen. What does in fact happen is that the Cavallos commence to projectile vomiting streams of green liquid that is obviously not coming out of their mouths, but from the side of their heads. If you are the kind of person that thinks several long minutes of cheap vomit gags are hysterically funny, this your movie. Naturally the Cavallos use this as an excuse to start a brawl which literally takes up the next 70 minutes of the 100 minute movie. Two things here. One, I thought this movie was supposed to be about chupacabras and two, why in christ’s name does your low-rent SOV movie need to be just shy of two hours long? Just because you don't have to pay for filmstock, doesn't mean you should produce Oliver Krekel-esque epics.

The four-minute long brawl spills out of the tavern into the jungle and finally ends up back at the Cavallo house where the groups of brothers get into an extended shoot-out that leaves most of them dead and half of the audience asleep. To break up the monotony of the toy-gun fire-fight, the Cavallo women are suddenly attacked by a chupacabra! I know, who’d have thunk it? There must be a shortage of goats in the area. The fire-fight is particularly tedious due to the fact that the filmmakers didn't bother with foley work. The guns sound like they are powered by bang snaps and even the pop of the squibs are left in. Clearly nobody is really paying attention or they are trying to play it off as an intentionally "bad movie". Near the end of the shootings the Cavallos are sorting out what weapons they have left and one says "I've got a shotgun with two shells," even though he is clearly wearing a bandolier that has at least a dozen in it! Did he accidentally grab his Spencer's Gifts costume bandolier on his way out of the house?

When only a few people are left alive, we get another non-sequitur scene in which Douglas, bloody and wounded, is captured by a giggling lunatic who practices black magic and cannibalism to keep a youthful appearance. No really. Then suddenly he’s dead and it’s back to the fighting! Finally in the last 10 minutes the chupacabra joins in the death-struggle between the last two members of the families. Oh and there is a stinger ending that makes no sense in the context of what we have seen already. The real shame of this is that director Rodrigo Aragão actually sports a few nice camera angles this time out, but for the most part directs completely flat except when he's giggling the camera around during fight scenes. He also has a couple of cool latex effects that, once again, he completely obscures with darkness and a camera that can't stay still. An odd and annoying contrast to the rest of the movie.

If you have seen MUD ZOMBIES, then you will be pleasantly surprised by the upgrade in production values. This is not to say that they are particularly good, but MUD ZOMBIES was barely a notch above your garden variety German back-yard zombie video. That sense of good will rapidly diminishes when you see that Aragão does a 180 from his so-dark-you-can’t-see-anything cinematography of ZOMBIES and opts for a completely flood-lit approach that not only makes the digital medium look bad, but results in everything looking cheap and fake. Then again, nothing will help those embarrassing cap-gun-esque shoot outs. Worst of all, when they do finally bring out the chupacabra, this bright lighting highlights the flaws in what is a great looking latex costume for a low-rent SOV movie. With some more dramatic lighting, a shorter running time and oh, I don’t know, a script that made the monster the central focus, this could have been a real sleeper.

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The Gweilo Dojo: ALLEY CAT (1984)

Even with all the damn movies we watch, there is still a ton of ground left untouched.  Case in point: the ‘80s trash actioner ALLEY CAT.  I (William) had never heard of the damn thing until Scorpion Releasing announced it for a DVD release.  Not I (Thomas) was familiar with the poster and VHS back in the day, but he was too busy renting DEATHSTALKER (1983) over and over to give this a look.  So a special thanks to our buddy Erok at Theater of Guts for getting in my ear and recommending this wild flick.

The film focuses on Belinda “Billie” Clark (Karin Mani), a karate hottie who lives with her grandparents.  She earns that description quickly as the first three minutes shows her topless and then beating the crap out of some guys trying to steal the wheels off her car. Apparently this angers the guys she emasculated so much that they go to complain to their gang leader, William “Scarface” Krug (Michael Wayne).  When underling Tom complains she was a karate “tiger,” Krug says, “When I get done with that tiger, she’ll be nothing more than an alley cat.”  Hmmm, a film where a guy named Tom has a boss named William?  I could get into this.  Krug and his crew decide the best course of action for revenge is to beat up Billie’s grandparents.  They do this in rather quick fashion, resulting in granddad and grandma being beaten and stabbed while walking home with groceries at night.  Oh, by the way, this all takes place in the first ten minutes of the film.

While looking for her grandparents at the hospital, Billie opens a door into the face of police officer Johnny (Robert Torti).  In a film this cheap, that can only mean one thing – love interest! Soon they are dating and she informs him that grandpa spotted the guy who assaulted them in police mug shot photos.  Alas, the cops don’t care.  To work out her frustration, Billie goes jogging at night but only after grandpa insists she take his gun along. Amazingly, she stumbles upon two guys attempting to rape a woman in the park.  Even more amazingly, these are the same two guys who tried to steal her tires.  Now either this lady is cosmically entwined with these dudes or the crime element is really small (and highly recidivist) in Los Angeles.  Of course, she puts an end to the attack with some karate chops and bullet ballet.  The cops leisurely arrive (“What the hell took you cops so long to get here? Do you know we’ve been waiting almost two hours?”) and they are Johnny and his corrupt older partner, who decides Billie is in the wrong and arrests her for firing her weapon within city limits without a permit.

After being bailed out, Billie decides to combat the stress of this bureaucratic red tape by…going jogging at night in the park again!  Even Charles Bronson knew never to go back to the park.  So guess who she runs into?  Yep, another rapist.  She must be in Echo Park (haha, get it?). Anyway, she lets this guy meet her fists and feet of fury.  Perhaps she had some pent up anger due to her upcoming court date.  It is warranted as Judge Taylor (Jay Walker) gives her a $500 fine and one year probation for preventing that rape.  He also warns her that if he ever sees her in his court again, she’ll be in big trouble.  To blow off some steam, Billie and Johnny head to a local dojo to throw each other around.  They then head back to his pad where he woos her with champagne served in regular old drinking glasses.  What?  The fancy McDonalds glasses were dirty?  Meanwhile, Krug breaks into the apartment of the intended rape target and intimidates her into not testifying against his pals. With the star witness unavailable, the defense attorney asks for the rape charges to be dropped and his defendants will agree to lesser charges of public intoxication.  They end up getting a $250 fine and thirty days in jail… suspended!  This sends Billie, who has just decided to show up and watch the trail with Johnny, into a rage and Judge Taylor sentences her to thirty days in jail.  Hey, he said don’t show up in her court again, right?

While in the county poke, Billie learns the hard way that these are tough broads. How?  She gets shoved during a volleyball match.  My God, the horror, the horror. This gives us the film’s best line as Billie’s new “friend” Sam yells, “You did that on purpose. That’s a foul!”  It seems Sam has ulterior motives, which are clearly stated in the requisite women-in-prison shower scene where she tells Billie she has nice hair and lets her use her shampoo.  Billie puts an end to these unwanted advances that night by punching Sam out and telling her to not do that again.  Out in the free world, Johnny is campaigning for Judge Taylor to release Billie because her granddad has like thirty days to live, but he deems her “an incorrigible.”  What is this?  1929?  So Johnny resorts to blackmail and tells the judge he has a file on his “kinky” habits.  Yay!  Our incorrigible is back on the streets and celebrates as she only knows how.  Yes, by going jogging in the park at night!  Naturally she is accosted by two rapists.  Well, one rapist hopeful and his chunky friend who has a hard enough time keeping up on foot.  She nullifies the nuts of the would-be rapist and sends his seemingly innocent friend down a hill and then screams, “Don’t mess with girls in the park!  That’s not nice!”  His muffled reply is, “Shit.  Crazy bitch.” Anyway, it seems Billie is enjoying this kicking dudes business.  After Johnny interrogates a hooker with ties to Krug to find the gang’s address, Billie heads out to get her ultimate revenge.

ALLEY CAT is definitely one of the more straightforward entries in the vigilante subgenre. It is like DEATH WISH (1974) minus the brains. The film doesn’t bother with the elaborate nuances like plot dynamics or character arcs. You get the basic outline very early on and it is very simple – Billie is good and nearly everyone else is bad.  The film is pretty segmented so that it almost seems like a series of vignettes or an old cliffhanger serial slapped together.  “See what mess will Billie get herself into this week!”  This cobbled together cheapness also results in major plot points being given by voice over.  For example, we don’t learn that grandma passed away until we see Billie and grandpa in the back of a car and Billie on the soundtrack talking about the unseen funeral. Even better, some stuff just gets completely forgotten.  Are you still wondering if grandpa lived or died?  Me too as the filmmakers never let us know.

ALLEY CAT appears to be the brainchild of writer and producer Robert E. Waters. He put an ad in Variety for casting the film (under its original title DRAGONFLY) in November 1980, where it was described as “modern action adventure” to begin filming in January 1981.  The film must have run into some trouble somewhere along the line, given that it lists three directors in the end credits; when it was shot and advertised in Variety, only Edward Victor (aka Ed Palmos) was listed as director.  Regardless of behind-the-scenes chaos, the filmmakers ended up with an enjoyable as hell product.  Lead actress Karin Mani is kind of a like a sexier Kate Jackson.  Or, as Tom said, Kate Jackson as re-imagined by Hugh Hefner. She is quite capable for her role, showing some real prowess when it comes to her kicks. Matching her high kicks with hysterics is lead baddie Michael Wayne, which may or may not be a pseudonym since this is his lone credit.  Looking like a cross between John Philip Law and AMERICAN PICKERS’ Mike Wolfe, Wayne appears to have abandoned Stanislavsky and drawn from the time honored bug-eyed, over-the-top psycho category of acting.

Of course, in a film as deliciously cheesy and trashy as this one, it only serves to make things better.  You also have to love stuff like Billie getting all prettied up in this glittery one suit…only to show up at some dive bar to kick a guy in the face.  Did she need to get all dress up for that? Or how they establish the gang as bad guys by having them drive over a homemade soccer goal some kids are using. It was definitely the right formula at the time as the film made distributor Film Ventures International some money.  A box office notation in the March 27, 1984 issue of Variety notes, “ALLEY CAT snares decent $101,000 in opening round at 17 locations, including $11,000 at Hollywood Pacific 3.”  Just knowing that Billie was able to punch and kick money out of wallets like that back in the day pleases me.  Of course, it probably pleased FVI head Edward Montoro more as he disappeared with all the cash later that year.  If Billie ever found him, she’d give him a real ass kicking.

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Newsploitation: Kickboxing the Box Office

Today’s box office birthday is for a film now considered a martial arts semi-classic – Jean-Claude Van Damme’s KICKBOXER, which was released in the U.S. on September 8, 1989.  Deep in martial arts clichés and histrionics, KICKBOXER tells the story of Kurt Sloane (Van Damme), a young martial artist who seeks to avenge the in-ring paralysis of his brother, Eric (Dennis Alexio, a real life kickboxing champ).  The executioner of his kin is the evil Tong Po (Michel Qissi) and to learn how to defeat him Kurt must endure the punishing training of Xian Chow (Dennis Chow) in the jungles of Thailand.  It all culminates with a showdown where the contestants have broken glass glued to their hand wraps.  You know, just like in real life.

KICKBOXER was the third theatrical headlining vehicle for the Belgian Van Damme (born Jean-Claude Van Varenberg).  After co-starring in villainous roles in NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER (1986) and BLACK EAGLE (1988), Van Damme caught on with the release of BLOODSPORT (1988) in February 1988.  What was essentially a throw away release for Cannon (its widest theater count topped off at 124 theaters) ended up making them $11.8 million dollars at the box office.  They quickly threw him into another starring vehicle and we got Van Damme in Albert Pyun’s CYBORG (1989). That came out in April 1989 and made just over $10 million, so Van Damme was now a proven box office commodity.  KICKBOXER proved his growing popularity even more when it debuted at number 3 at the box office that following September in 973 theaters (by comparison, the number 1 film UNCLE BUCK, in theaters for a month already, was still in 1,800 theaters).  It grossed just over $4 million its first weekend and went onto pull in $14.6 million.

KICKBOXER is one of those films that has a special place in my heart as Van Damme was one of the first action heroes whose entire career I got to see unfold theatrically (“Yeah, until STREET FIGHTER came out,” says Tom).  Bronson was way before my time; Norris a bit too early for me too; I missed Stallone’s first two ROCKY films and FIRST BLOOD theatrically; and Schwarzenegger’s first CONAN only got to my eyes on VHS.  Starting with BLOODSPORT, I got to see Van Damme’s progression on the big screen and watch as he went from little guy to international superstar.  Each subsequent theatrical release after KICKBOXER saw his box office standing kick higher and higher – DEATH WARRANT ($16.8 million) to LIONHEART ($24 million) to DOUBLE IMPACT ($30 million) to UNIVERSAL SOLIDER ($36 million).  It would peak with TIMECOP ($44 million).  As Van Damme would later admit, he was full of himself (and cocaine) and flatly rejected a huge deal with Universal Pictures at the time.  Instead he went his own way and things were never the same.

Not surprisingly, Van Damme didn’t sign on when KICKBOXER 2 (1991) was announced. Rather than be an in-name-only sequel, this follow up from Albert Pyun continued the Sloane/Tong Po feud with a heretofore never known third Sloane brother, David (Sasha Mitchell).  Writer David Goyer (I hear he went on to do some other things) cleverly opens his sequel with a Van Damme double being offed by Tong Po. Mitchell headlined two more sequels, while the fifth film featured up-and-coming Mark Dacascos.

While I haven’t seen the film since the theater, KICKBOXER still holds some name power as plans for a remake have been off and on for the last 5 years.  The latest incarnation was announced earlier this year with Hong Kong director Stephen Fung attached.  Names such as former UFC fighter Georges St. Pierre, Tony Jaa, Dave Baustita and VJ fave Scott Adkins have been attached to the project.  Here’s hoping they might get to work in Van Damme in a role somewhere.  If that happened, we’d totally do this dance.

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