Hello Friends. Sometimes it is hard to know just how bad a movie is going to be. You want it to be tee hee bad, not shi tee bad. I have ordained myself a seeker of the good bad to deliver to you a weekly movie that will forever be stained into your memory. Sci-fi, Horror, Drama, Comedy, Travolta...it's all here. Please feel free to comment and let me know what you think of the feature. I hope you enjoy the reviews and that I can be of no help to you whatsoever when wasting two hours of your life. Be sure to check every Monday to see if I have done my job of wasting a bit more of my life. Your pal, Pawl

The Norseman

The Norseman, or Noorzmun, as Lee Majors pronounces it, is arguably and without question in my mind one of the most spectacular examples of crappiest acting I have ever witnessed. Hooray. It is different then a John Travolta or Plan 9 from outer space acting in that it takes on a level of awkwardness that leaves you begging for a sequel. Some have even called this the worst movie ever made. They just aren't trying. Who funded this? Well it is a Faucett/Majors release. I thought it might be fitting to reduce this movie down to a list. Here are the top 5 best/worst things about this movie. Number 1. Deacon Jones is an African American Viking that wears the tongue of one of his enemies around his neck. That could be thought of as 1 and 2 but there are too many scenes to be considered in the top 5. Number 2. The mustache of Thorvald (Lee Majors). This glorious 1970's cookie duster transcends time and spreads Norse cred throughout the Vineland. Of course the Noorzmun had wonderfully groomed facial hair and many times they would actually glue beards on. Number 3. The Caucasian Native Americans with great

white teeth and matching loin cloths. At one point during a flaccid battle you can actually see wigs that have fallen off. Whenever they show them in a group there is a loop reel of a constant woo wooing overdubbed. Number 4. The overuse of slow motion running of our out of shape Norsemen on the beach, in battle, or just jumping off the boat. It gives you a chance to get a good look at their Halloween costumes. This leads us to Number 5. Their wonderful Halloween costumes. When they are creeping up on the Natives or even turning their heads, you can hear the banging of aluminum against aluminum masked as iron. And now a bonus number 6. The Wizard that accompanies them on their quest. It is said no one has ever seen the Wizards face,... except for us in every scene.

Narrated by Thorvald's 12 year old brother Eric, the premise of this film is that Thorvald must rescue their Father, King of the Norsemen, from the Indian encampment. From there on the movie is a motivational speech then a battle, then a speech, then a battle, then guys hit with arrows doing belly rolls off the ship, I counted 7, speech, then rescue, then end. There are some people who say that at one point you can see someone wearing a wrist watch. I haven't scrutinized this that close and don't know if I have the capacity to fully watch this again anytime soon though I love it so. If you have a chance to see it make sure you have some sleeping pills so you can match the pace. Truly truly one star.

Worst Acting on Earth-Thank Goodness

Opening Credit, Losing a pal.

Riki oh: The story of Ricky

Goodness, where can one begin. Should I start with the thug that gets a wooden toy stuck in his eye, the 400 pound prisoner that gets a hole punched through his guts, the intestine strangling scene with Oscar the tattooed weightlifting knife wielding prisoner, or the supernatural steroid fella who gets his comeuppance in the industrial sized meat grinder. Riki Oh was originally a manga which later adapted to an anime series and live-action film created by Masahiko Takajo and Saruwatari Tetsuya. It is best not to read too deep into the story as it is most likely not translated correctly. The overdub itself enhances the movies hilarity with it's grunts and ohs. One may think, well I don't really go for gratuitous violence, yet there is so much cartoon violence in this masterpiece that you simply become anxious to see what bizarre homemade effect is next. The best part of all this movie review mish mosh is the fact you can youtube clips of all this fine cinema. so look at the selections it offers for this ketchup bath. Instead of just explaining the story I thought it might be most helpful to give a chronological bullet by bullet series of events. Truly the only important parts of the movie.

• 2001: The future. Ricky arrives at the private franchised prison.
• The innocent old man who builds a wooden toy train for his son is ambushed in the bathroom. Ricky trips the main thug onto the toy causing said toy to plunge into thugs eye.-eye blood. Splatter.
• 400 pound prisoner Zorro is sent for revenge in showers. Ricky punches a hole through Zorro's stomach. -gutsy splatter.
• Ricky crushes thug's fingers while he himself has a nail through his own.
• Tattooed muscle ravaged Oscar takes a machete to the side of a snitches face. Yikes.
• Oscar, leader of the Gang of Four, fights Ricky in the yard. begin sub bullets here.
• Oscar blinds Ricky with glass shavings -eye blood.
• Ricky gets arm split open -arm blood.
• Ricky knocks Oscars eye out -more eye blood.
• Oscar cuts own stomach open and strangles Ricky with own intestine -intestie blood.
• Ricky clobbers Oscars skull with high tech punch.-x-ray effect.
• Gang of four (now three) show up and big guy crushes defenseless prisoners skull. There are several youtubes of this. Seen on The Daily Show with Craig Kilborn
• Gang of four slice mute younger brother of Oscar's lower jaw off. Jaw dropping. Then they mutilate his body. As funny as it sounds.
• Spooky Warden shows up and pokes a prisoners eye out with his cane -eye blood.
• Ricky tears big guy Gang of Four's jaw off. Jaw dropping part 2.
• Ricky is beaten with a pipe and has razorblades shoved in his mouth.
• Ricky spits razors in wardens face.
• Ricky knocks the top of a snitches head off that ratted out his buddy.
• Funny prison riot. A lot of fun voice overs.
• The warden puts a prisoners arm in an over sized industrial meat grinder then feeds the arm to his kid.
• The warden doubles in size in some paranormal trick that turns him into a muscle packing monster to fight Ricky.
• Greatest ending ever. The warden is short work for Ricky as Ricky pushes him in the meat grinder by his head. Blood bath is an understatement.
• Ricky punches huge hole in prison wall and walks off into the sunset.

The whole movie contains flashbacks of Ricky and his girlfriend running through meadows and giggling but since there is no eye blood in these scenes it is not worth elaborating. If you can ever get a chance to see this movie you must!
Riki Oh: The story of Ricky is surely of 5 star Onestarcinema quality. I can watch this one over and over and over again with any set of pals or simply alone with a good libation and bowl of walnuts.

The Devils' Rain

First of all with the powerhouse acting of, Tom Skerritt, William Shatner, Eddie Albert, John Travolta and Ernest Borgnine Who cares what the movies about. Nonetheless it is about Satan. The movie starts with the credits riding over Hieronymus_Bosch which would only leave you to believe you're in for a treat. Of course too many treats are not always a good thing. Here's the deal. In this corner we have the Preston family, come on down. Lead by william Shatner and Tom Skerrit. They are battling the forces of the Korbus family come on down, lead by Ernest Borgnine who plays an evil servant to Satan. For 300 years The Prestons have had in their possession a book that contains the names of all those who have given their souls to the big daddy Devil. Borgnine wants it and for some reason in all those years he has been unable to swap it from them. One must think that would be one large book, but it doesn't seem to be too heavy to lug around for Shatner. This movie is actually quite boring at times but the failed acting of Eddie Albert and ol' Billy Shatner makes for a good chuckle. There are flashbacks 300 years that show the pilgrims Shat and Borg verbally battling over souls of the Prestons and...blah blah. The best part of the movie is when Borgnine turns in to a horned goat-man. It is pretty sweet. Also the ending when Shat breaks open the Devil bottle freeing the souls and creating the Devils rain which melts all the worshippers in a waxy gooey slimy orgy of writhing bubbles and pus. This is the only time we see John Travolta and he is melting, though he is given headlining status. The melting lasts a long time. In fact I pooed, made a sandwich and bowl of chips, and wrote this review while the agony unfolded. Spoiler alert...The Devil survives in an insignificant character. A woman who is Tom Skerrits' squeeze. This movie could have been a half hour tops. It was worth it though to see Borg as a goat and any thing with Billy Shatness is worth price of admission.

The Devils' Brain Drain Rain

First Spaceship on Venus

Absolute classic by Director Kurt Maetzig. This 1960 East German film is one of the landmark space adventures that many have looked to as inspiration. The DVD I have, despite being all packaged nicely, has obviously been copied many times and probably videotaped off a sheet so it has a choppy dark washy crackling texture. I assume I am still getting a nice flavor for the sets and effects though. I love the sci-fi movies that start with the first 10 minutes narrated by a radio personality telling you about the advancements of modern man and his far reaching atomic abilities while hyping up the unbelievable mind tingling events that are about to unfold. This film starts in the distant future of 1984 as an international community of scientists stumble on what would be the black box of a spaceship while irrigating the Gobi dessert. They set off on the task of translating it but to limited success. They conclude that the message is from Venus and the only way to truly answer is to send up a spaceship on an atomic quest of mind dazzling preportions. The best of the best is assembled to make the journey as they spend a great deal of time showing the mundane perspective of space travel albeit with ass-kicking rocket computers and an endless display of astral gadgets. They encounter the contractual asteroid field every space adventure has and it of course knocks out something on the outside requiring the nail biting space walk to repair it. The funny thing about this movie is how nice everyone is to each other in a cosmic feel good help thy neighbor of every color and gender. It's nice. So the conflict. It starts as they approach Venus and discover the black box translation further decoded is actually the plans to conquer and occupy Earth by the Venutians. Our heros all agree to continue to Venus where they find a poisonous gassy and unfriendly environment. When they finally land and explore we are introduced to some great visuals of a trippy landscape and a dead Venusian civilization. Spoiler alert.

Trailer

The Wild Women of Wongo-1958

Directed by James L. Wolcott. With Jean Hawkshaw, Mary Ann Webb, Cande Gerrard and Adrienne Bourbeau. Main characters with the names Omoo, Ahtee, Wana and Mona,...Mona? You know there will be extra marshmallows in the Lucky Charms. All other characters are simply Women or Men of Wongo. I hesitated at first if I would be able to stay conscious through this whole spectacle but after ten washed out minutes whoa! look out! I gathered that the plot is something like this. Mother Nature and Father Time (their words not mine), make a mistake and put a whole gaggle of hot chicks on an island with a bunch of thick headed goons, while across the ocean is another tribe of oiled up fancy boys with hideous girlie mates. while somewhere in between there are Ape men willing to destroy all. It all starts with a bunch of "look we're sultry primitive lasses all sitting around on the beach weaving palm leaves and putting pottery everywhere." Suddenly an oiled up stud comes rowing in on the tide to warn the Wongo King of the ape men advancing on their island and wishes for them to return back to handsome man island with him to to help stop a fore mentioned ape men. The Wongo king decides to sleep on it. Of course the Women of Wongo, being the sexies, have never seen such a dashing slab of meat and fall over themselves to gain his attention. The Wongo king decides to kill said meat. While attempting to stop this from happening the Women of Wongo are banished by the King for knocking over a sacred stick. They can return only when they sacrifice a...blahblahblah, so they float to the island of studs and have a very nice Wongo on Wongo cat fight (see clip) that is actually thus far the only real action thus far. Realizing they are on this new island the women capture the men for marital sacrifices, or something. The ugly stupid women on the island in the meantime are angry and ugly but then somehow magically discover the Wongo Men (the brutish dolts) who have sailed to this island after being decimated by the ape men. If only they had listened. with a lot of running around borderline ala keystone cops it ends with all the couples paired off with their respective aesthetic catches, and they all give us a knowing wink to send us off to ponder what we may have just seen. a literal wink. They are winking at the audience one by one. Christ! Absolute ONE STAR. I will watch this again someday but in the company of unsuspecting victims, and you may just say that The Women of Wongo was The Women of Wrighto. Gong!

The Wild Women of Wongo

The Phantom Planet-1961

Directed by William Marshall. With Dean Fredericks, Coleen Gray, Anthony Dexter. Wow! The DVD box sure is exciting if not deceiving. Full color brutal alien action. The movie itself is in black and white and absent of an alien for the first half of the movie. When the alien does appear it reminds me of a Freakie from Freakies Cereal. Our adventure starts with a pair of stylish space patrollers at the mercy of a wobbly asteroid on a collision course with their ship, wait that's no asteroid it is a planet. They are destroyed. A second ship is launched from Earth's moon base and is captained with our hero Commander Chapman and his guy pal. After a bout with the flying tin foil nuggets, the poor expendable sidekick is launched into outer space while invoking the Lord's prayer. Commander Chapman is then forced to land on the Phantom Planet (asteroid) only to find the gravity being what it is has shrunken him down to the size of a Ken doll inside his suit . Lucky for him there are inhabitants. The Rehtons. There is a King, his small subjects and hot chicks that make Chapman part of they're scene after a jury (of hotties) decides he is to be free, but only as a Rehtonite forever. This is done to protect their secrets of gravity. A lot of gibberish and confusing theories later we find that a jealous Rehtonite who loves the King's daughter whom the daughter naturally has fallen in love with the blond battleship Chapman, wants to kick Chapman's ass in a duel. Well Chapman actually is in love with a hot mute über brunette. The duel ensues in a battle to the death and Chapman who gains the upper hand doesn't crush the jilted local because he is more of a lover than a killer, so... The duelists strike up a truce to get Chapman off the planet by figuring out how to enlarge him and shoot him off into space. At this point is when the aliens figure in. The aliens, named Solorites, are at war with the nomadic planet and attack. The Rehtons have captured one of the Solarites, but of course escapes and jumps on the mute who screams alerting Chapman to come to her rescue. Chapman is able to knock the alien on a disintegration pad thus freeing the mute of her silence. She declares her love and wishes for him to stay. My theory is is that she probably should have kept her mouth shut. For the good of the Rehton's secret civilization Chapman decides to leave in the most ridiculous of ways. He is enlarged perfectly back into his suit and rescued by another ship of lovers who fly the groggy Chapman (why he's groggy I am not sure) back to the moon base. Will he keep his pie hole shut or will he spill it convincing his pals into believing him? The corn ball hits the fan at the end as the Narrator says "This is not the end,...but the beginning!" Wha? beginning? I would have to say that there probably were a lot of script changes happening during the filming of this and at times it becomes a bit tedious to pay attention to. I had to ultimately watch it at work, because the more comfortable I was the more I tended to fall asleep. All in all it is definitely one star quality. Not a must see but funny enough to rip on from beginning to end.

The Phantom Planet-Our Heros beating up the poor defenseless Solarite

They Came From Beyond Space

Directed by Freddie Francis, Written by Milton Subotsky, and based on a book The Gods must Hate Kansas by Joseph Millard. Starring Robert Hutton, Jennifer Jayne and Zia Mohyeddin. Now that we got that out of the way... The movie poster for this is without doubt one of the most deceptive posters I have ever seen. There is nothing remotely similar to the slick alien action as suggested. Here's the deal. At first it has the feel of a classic British television show like The Avengers or The Prisoner with it's muted wild color and upbeat spy music. I could only hope that the backdrop location for this flick at one time had Benny Hill running around in it. The premise is that an asteroid shower descends in a field in a rural English village. Top scientists get a close look and are body snatched and brain swapped for an alien race. Our hero Professor Forrest is not susceptible to their powers as a previous car accident has left him with a metal plate in his head. Lucky bastard. The intruders get a million pound loan via mind control from a bank which in 1967 was big poundege back then. They use the money to buy the tools and supplies needed to erect a stylin' sci-fi outpost and to barricade themselves inside a foggy marsh area near the village. Our valiant Professor will stop at nothing to find out what shenanigans are afoot. Plus a side note, he is in love with the redhead scientist who fell prey to their abducting ways. The village becomes infected with a plague that turns their faces spotty red and that wipes them all out. Except for the Professor of course. Plate? After many attempts to penetrate the electric fence where secrets are beckoning him he is witness to a rocket that is launched out of these foggiest of marshes. He is clever enough to get in yet is captured. Lots of nice little sci-fi sets and lights in these scenes. He is told of the whole plan by a loose lipped alien who is inhabiting one of his science pals. He escapes and counter kidnaps his science girlfriend and takes her to the home of the one remaining science pal that is not infected to try to convince him of the peril that befalls the village. Convinced, his friend lets him melt down his prized silver horse show award trophies to make a ridiculous helmet to prevent the sinister invaders mind control. As it so happens the said invaders were the ones that whipped a plague on the populous to discourage interference from the outside world only then to put them in rockets and blast them to moon, revive them and proceed to enslave them forcing them to build a grand rocket to shoot the aliens back into space towards their home planet so that they may finally die in peace. Whew! In all it could easily be thought of as a bit boring. If you know you have something better to do which you do you may need to watch this in doses however, the old theory that a good proper English accent raises the credibility scale works with this one. A lonely star for this film.

They Came From Beyond Space

The War of the Gargantuas

Where should I start. I bought the collectors edition from Toho Studios so I could emerse myself scene by scene for days. I saw this one originally as a kid with my brother Mott-ly. He was a fan of the Godzilla-Toho schtick as well. The movie starts with a classic giant squid attacking a japanese fishing boat in a violent storm. So you may say, well there's my movie right there. Oh no! my young impressionable but gullible lambs. That meat is yet to be served.

Ouch!