Category: Reviews

Fright (1971)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle4 Comments

Welcome to another FRIGHTening review here at B-Movie Enema!

Quick! What was the first slasher film? The one that created the subgenre that would dominate the horror section of 80s video stores and late night cable TV? I bet you’re thinking Halloween. Or maybe you muttered to yourself, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” If you really wanted to flex some horror muscle or just simply sound like a smarty pants, you might have mentioned Black Christmas. Hell, I think I just heard someone shout Hitchcock’s Psycho.

I don’t know if there is any one real answer, but I want to enter 1971’s Fright into the conversation.

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Golden Needles (1974)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle1 Comment

This week’s B-Movie Enema is on the hunt for a legendary statue with needles, which, when stuck into an adult male in a very particular pattern, will turn that guy into a sexual Tyrannosaurus.

And it’s Joe Don Baker who is one of the men after it!

Yes, you read that right… Joe Don Baker is after the seven Golden Needles that will turn him into a sex machine (well, maybe not so much, but still…). If it wasn’t for a very specific appreciation for Baker, I might just have to barf. *Hurk*

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J.C. (1972)

Published on by Geoff ArbuckleLeave a comment

Happy Good Friday and Easter, my Enemaniacs.

Now, some people might celebrate Easter with a family get together. Normally, people are sitting around eating ham and enjoying the fresh spring that just sprung. Some years, it’s the fourth Sunday in March. In others, it could be as late as the fourth Sunday in April. Do not ask me why this is. It’s some weird old rule set like a thousand years ago. But either way, Good Friday (which, all things considered, doesn’t seem like it would be “Good,” but, again, don’t ask me) is the fabled day on which Jesus Christ was crucified. Easter, two days later on Sunday, is the day that Jesus rose and ascended to heaven.

I bet you’d think that because this is B-Movie Enema, I’m-a go with the whole “zombie Jesus” angle, right? Nope! I’m going bikers. Oh yes… 70s bikersploitation, baby! This week, I’m reviewing the 1972 action/drama J.C., directed by and starring William (Bill) F. McGaha.

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Afraid (2024)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle2 Comments

There’s a part of me wanting to ask ChatGPT to write this new B-Movie Enema review.

But I won’t do that, Enemaniacs! If there’s one thing I have, it’s my integ…rit..y? Sure, my integrity. I’m full of it. Anyway, this week, I’m reviewing 2024’s Afraid (or AfrAId) from director Chris Weitz. But before we talk about Weitz and his movie about artificial intelligence run amok, we should maybe say a few words about Jason Blum and Bumhouse Productions.

If I’m being honest, Blum is maybe the guy who deserves Roger Corman’s mantle of being a guy who knows how to make movies on the cheap, and quickly, knows when to spend a lot more money, and how to usually turn profits. He’s also had a stable of filmmakers who have gone on to do pretty great things after having success with a Blumhouse film. Jason Blum kind of knows that it doesn’t take hundreds of millions of dollars to make a movie that will drive people to the theater. Each year, he’ll make a few films for less than $10 million, a few (like Afraid) for a little more, and then when to spend a lot more. It’s been a very, very long time since the company released a movie that made less than its production budget.

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Zardoz (1974)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle1 Comment

Welcome back to B-Movie Enema, my lovely Eternals and Brutals, it’s motherfuckin’ Zardoz!

Man… Where to begin with this movie? I think it’s best to start with the director, John Boorman. Boorman is a rare breed in filmmaking. The British filmmaker got his first directing work on TV in the early 60s. In 1965, he got his first film to direct, Catch Us If You Can (Having a Wild Weekend on IMDb and in its American release). That was part of the in-rush of British Invasion pop bands going from vinyl to celluloid, as it starred The Dave Clark Five. Two years later, he made an American crime drama film, Point Blank, starring Lee Marvin. He followed that up with a war film and a drama before making his biggest splash.

In 1972, Boorman made one of the all-time great 70s thrillers, Deliverance. This was a film that starred an already established leading man, Jon Voight, and established Burt Reynolds as the man who would become THE box office star of the decade. It’s quotable, and one of those movies that even if you haven’t seen it, you know it. If for nothing else, the idea of an intimidating pair of “Dueling Banjos” when you are somewhere you aren’t so sure you want to be in the South came directly from Deliverance.

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Howard the Duck (1986)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle1 Comment

Oh boy, Enemaniacs… This week and next is gonna be a doozy at B-Movie Enema.

Near the end of 1973, the 19th issue of Marvel Comics’ anthology series Adventure into Fear, writer Steve Gerber introduced a new character that was a parody of what were once referred to as cartoon funny animals (what we would call anthropomorphic animals today). This character was cynical. He chomped cigars and was a bit ill-tempered. A little over a decade later, for some reason, largely unknown producer George Lucas… Wait… Let me double-check that. Oh… I meant to type “one of the most powerful producers, George Lucas.” My bad.

Sorry about that. But anyway, for whatever reason, one of the most powerful producers in Hollywood thought his follow-up to ending the phenomenon that was the Star Wars Trilogy should be a movie based on this character whose popularity might not exactly be as widespread outside the comic spinner racks. The movie proved to be one of the greatest missteps in film history. The movie was 1986’s Howard the Duck, directed by Willard Huyck and co-written by Gloria Katz.

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Frankenstein Unbound (1990)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle1 Comment

A new review from B-Movie Enema is bounding your way!

2025 was the year of Frankenstein. Guillermo del Toro’s long-awaited adaptation of Mary Shelley’s classic novel of a scientist who plays God and cobbles together a living thing from dead flesh finally saw the light of day. That del Toro adaptation was well-cast with Oscar Isaac playing Victor Frankenstein and Jacob Elordi doing amazing work as the Creature. It was gorgeously shot and designed. Seeing two perspectives to tell the full story was amazing. It was solidly in my Top 10 list for last year. I’m not alone in this praise. It was nominated for many Academy Awards.

Let’s also not forget that releasing to theaters today is Maggie Gyllenhaal’s reimagining of the themes of loneliness and monstrous love in Mary Shelley’s seminal work, The Bride! So, yeah, Dr. Frankenstein and his creation(s) are all over the place right now. Plus, speaking of awards, while I’m sure del Toro’s Frankenstein will be picking up at least two or three awards come next weekend, the Queen of this year’s awards season, Jessie Buckley, is celebrating her crowning achievement with another solid performance as the titular Bride. If you’re a monster kid like me, you’re eating well at the trough of Shelley’s work and the present-day adaptations.

However, it was the success of last year’s Frankenstein that got me thinking I should do something for Shelley’s creature – especially as Gyllenhaal’s feminist monster movie is hitting screens. Obviously, I’m not so sure about Guillermo’s masterpiece being what should be covered at a site like this, and I literally just watched The Bride! last night. So I needed to look elsewhere. I landed on the movie that had an eye-popping (no pun intended) box art at the video store. 1990’s Frankenstein Unbound isn’t just what we’re going to be talking about in this review, but it also serves as the final film in which the great Roger Corman was ever credited as director.

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Drive Me Crazy (1999)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle3 Comments

We’ve made it, my dear Enemaniacs. It’s the final week of Melissa Joan Hart Month at B-Movie Enema. And this is the headliner for sure.

1999’s Drive Me Crazy has a bit of a story behind it. Very clearly, this was Melissa Joan Hart’s movie. It was released by 20th Century Fox, but with 90s teen movies doing pretty well, and she doing pretty well on ABC’s Sabrina the Teenage Witch, it was impossible to think there wouldn’t at least be an attempt to get her into a movie. In a way, this was accomplished the year before when she made a brief, near cameo appearance in one of the most beloved cult classic teen flicks of the 90s, Can’t Hardly Wait. That was less an attempt to get her onto the big screen and more of a “Hey, we’ve got every young up-and-coming actor in this movie, and the Kid from Dick Tracy, so… Get the teenage witch girl!” thing.

No, Drive Me Crazy was specifically for Melissa to spread her wings a bit and give the movie thing a real try. While the movie had its struggles with critics, it wasn’t that big of a flop when it came to the box office. It cost about $8.5 million and brought in nearly $23 million. Not too bad in terms of the teen movies of the era. While nowhere near the box office darling as 1995’s Clueless or 1999’s She’s All That, Drive Me Crazy turned a profit where Can’t Hardly Wait and Empire Records, both beloved cult films, did not.

I think the problems came with the reviews, and one other very big confusion for audiences that came in the form of Britney Spears.

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