Author: Geoff Arbuckle

I write and talk about movies. Find me over at Film Seizure where I talk about nostalgic movies on a weekly podcast as well as have a weekly show about monster movies. I also write about B-Movies at my site B-Movie Enema!

Xtro 3: Watch the Skies (1995)

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Welcome to another B-Movie Enema review where we always watch the skies.

That’s Xtro 3: Watch the Skies. Now, we’ve been here, haven’t we? Whether it is yet another Xtro flick that has nothing to do with the original, another ill-advised sequel, or a sequel made because money is needed to live in a world mostly dominated by capitalism, this is nothing new to us around here. Alright, so not that long ago, I reviewed Xtro 2: The Second Encounter and, woof… It was pretty bad.

Creator of the original Xtro, Harry Bromley Davenport couldn’t really get any other work. He did own the rights to the title Xtro and was able to leverage that to Welsh and Canadian producers. He thought he could take the Xtro series and turn it into an anthology series about alien encounters. The first sequel was not an enjoyable experience for the British director, Bromley Davenport. Jan-Michael Vincent was barely functional. The script was kind of dumb and complicated.

This second sequel would be somewhat better for the Briton in some ways and a little more dangerous in others.

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The Super Inframan (1975)

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KAPOW! EXPLOSIONS! PUNCHING MONSTERS! IT’S A NEW B-MOVIE ENEMA!

Welcome back, dear readers. This week, we have a bit of a treat. We’re going to look at 1975’s The Super Infra-Man! This comes to us from Hong Kong and is also known as just Infra-Man or literally translated from Cantonese as Chinese Superman. Now, you might think that literal translation means this is a Shaw Brothers Production ripoff of America’s avatar of DC Comics (no, Batman, not you), Superman, right?

Wellll… It actually isn’t. This is much more influenced by the Japanese TV shows that use tokusatsu. Tokusatsu is the term given to Japanese productions that are live-action AND use a great deal of special effects. The term had been part of Japanese theater dating back to the early 20th century. However, it went big time in the 50s. That’s when the mega superstar, world-famous Godzilla stomped into Tokyo and theaters all over the world. Eiji Tsuburaya was more or less the godfather of tokusatsu techniques. He designed many of Toho’s early monsters, including Godzilla. He then launched the television series Ultra Q, which borrowed costumes from Toho. That would later lead to the various Ultraman series. Ultraman then gave birth to another tokusatsu classic, Kamen Rider.

The Super Inframan is more inspired by those tokusatsu series than the fella in the blue tights and red boots.

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Queen Crab (2015)

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Welcome back to B-Movie Enema, Brett Piper!

We have some favorites here at B-Movie Enema Industries. Last week, I talked about one of the final films I’ve not yet covered on the site from Norman J. Warren. This week, it’s time to talk about another fave around here, Brett Piper. Waaaaay back in 2016, I looked at his 2000 flick Drainiac. That’s one that is kind of looked down on, but I like it for various reasons. I also looked at it for an episode of B-Movie Enema: The Series too. There is a bit of nostalgia for me on it, but I also fully understand it is not everyone’s cup of tea, all things considered.

Later, in 2019, I celebrated 150 reviews on the site with 1996’s They Bite. Now, this is one that is definitely much more of a wink-and-a-nod type of comedy exploitation horror for the Cinemax set. It’s about a porn production being menaced by an actual fish monster, and not the fish monster in their fish monster porno movie. But then I went back to Piper’s earliest efforts with 1985’s Battle for the Lost Planet and 1988’s Mutant War. Both of these are incredibly charming, and I love them for what they are. These sci-fi flicks both feature a lot of stop-motion animation which also revealed that Piper prefers the monster effects far more than making the movie the effects appear in. The latter film also has a villainous Cameron Mitchell, so you know we love that around here too.

We return to Piper’s love of creating stop-motion style monsters with this week’s movie, 2015’s Queen Crab.

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Her Private Hell (1968)

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Welcome to another review here at B-Movie Enema.

If you have been around this website for a while, you know that we’re fans of the works of British director Norman J. Warren. So much so, of the nine feature films he directed between 1968 and 1987, I’ve already covered two-thirds of them over the years. Well, it’s time to start getting into that final third I’ve not yet touched. While I’ve mostly covered his best known films in the horror genre, the last time out, I looked at 1979’s Spaced Out, a return for Warren into the world of the sexploitation circles.

Sexploitation was where Warren got his start. In 1967, our favorite director was 25 years old and already had two shorts under his belt, 1963’s Drinkin Time and 1965’s Fragment. As he would put it, he was desperate for a job, especially one on a feature film. Enter producer Bachoo Sen and arthouse cinema owner Richard Schulman. The two had just entered into a partnership to start making their own films. It just so happens that Schulman had been screening Warren’s Fragment at his cinema. They needed a director for their first film, and they approached Warren. Warren, as I mentioned, was desperate and had no idea what he would be asked to make, but a job was a job.

Norman J. Warren’s feature film career began with this week’s movie, Her Private Hell.

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Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead (2006)

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Welcome back to B-Movie Enema and the final week of Troma Month!

This month has been a fun one, hasn’t it? Whether it’s a love letter to Kaufman’s appreciation of William Shakespeare in the romance Tromeo and Juliet, or the earlier Tromaville kids run amok horror Class of Nuke ‘Em High, or the most Troma film of them all, Terror Firmer… It’s been a good time visiting these classics from the 80s and 90s master of gross-out comedy, horror, and comedy-horror, Lloyd Kaufman. But now, we bring things to a close with another dark comedy-horror from the man himself. However, this time, we have a bit of a twist.

This time we have a musical.

Yes, it’s Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead. This time around, Kaufman has a little uncredited help from one of the co-writers of the film, Gabriel Friedman. Friedman would go on to be a producer for specials for the cable channels E! and G4, as well as for online series like The IGN Show. In fact, he mostly worked on a lot of specials and behind-the-scenes stuff, including making-of documentaries for Troma films like Terror Firmer and Citizen Toxie. His writing credits are mostly for Troma films like this one, Make Your Own Damn Movie!, the aforementioned fourth Toxie flick, and Lloyd Kaufman’s most recent, #ShakespearesShitstorm.

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Terror Firmer (1999)

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Welcome back! It’s the third week of Troma Month here at B-Movie Enema and it’s time to go back, sorta, to the James Gunn well. This week, I’m gonna be talking about 1999’s Terror Firmer.

What do I mean about this sorta going back to the James Gunn well? That’s because, to a certain extent, Lloyd Kaufman, along with co-writers Douglas Buck and Patrick Cassidy, based this movie’s script, albeit loosely, on the 1998 book All I Need to Know about Filmmaking I Learned from the Toxic Avenger. That book was co-written by Kaufman and James Gunn.

I made the comment last week, in my review for Class of Nuke ‘Em High, that I kind of put Kaufman in the same camp as Roger Corman. Corman, back in the 50s and 60s, were cranking out cheap B-movies quickly. However, quickly those movies were, and however cheaply they were made, most (especially in today’s film culture) could not look at those movies and think they weren’t made professionally. Maybe the monster was kind of goofy, but you couldn’t argue that the cast was well-directed and doing their jobs professionally.

I bring up that commentary I made because Roger Corman wrote the introduction to the book this is sort of based on.

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Class of Nuke ‘Em High (1986)

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Welcome back to Troma Month here at B-Movie Enema!

Last week, it just so happened, the month started with a leadoff home run with Tromeo and Juliet, a movie that I believe, by the time we finish this month and I’ve increased my viewership of movies made internally by Troma, will be the best film ever released by the company. I know, I know… Toxie and what have you. There was just something special about Tromeo and Juliet that had my by the balls and shook me about until I cried out for my mommy to save me.

Wait…

Eh… anyway… This week, we’re going back to the 80s when Troma and their fictional hometown of Tromaville was in its infancy. We’re looking at 1986’s Class of Nuke ‘Em High. This horror/sci-fi/comedy was Lloyd Kaufman’s follow-up to his seminal 1984 classic The Toxic Avenger. This time, though, he wasn’t alone. Kaufman shared directing duties with Troma editor Richard W. Haines.

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Tromeo and Juliet (1996)

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It’s Troma Month here at B-Movie Enema!

Heck yeah, this is looooong overdue. I think the best thing I need to do to start things off here is to admit something. I don’t really have a great deal of history with Troma. I like Lloyd Kaufman. I like what he does to inspire new filmmakers. I like the general absurdity with the Troma films, particularly the ones that they create and make in-house. Sure, I’ve seen a handful of them. Of course, I’ve seen The Toxic Avenger. I grew up with Mother’s Day. Troma’s War? Yeah, I’ve seen it. But I had a little more experience seeing movies distributed by Troma as opposed to the movies they made themselves.

That said, Lloyd Kaufman’s personality is so larger than life that it feels like I’ve seen more from him than I have. So, this month, I wanna fix that. Let’s take a look at some of Troma’s catalog. I think I picked four pretty popular films from Kaufman specifically. We kick things off with his 1996 Shakespeare parody, Tromeo and Juliet.

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