Tag: comedy

Vice Academy (1989)

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I like to think of this subgenre, particularly in the 1980s, an American tradition.  Certainly it was nothing new to either the United States or other countries before the decade or even to this very day, but there was something pretty special about the American landscape of both horror and comedy in the 1980s.  It was the decade of slashers and Porky’s ripoffs.  But, maybe more important, it all falls back onto an idea I’ve discussed numerous times before – you had to stock video store shelves and late night cable TV time slots.

That brings us to director Rick Sloane and this week’s screwball comedy, Vice Academy.

Sloane is probably best known for his sci-fi throwback/boner comedy/creature feature Hobgoblins.  I’ve covered that over at Film Seizure on an episode of my weekly Monster Mondays show.  That was a movie I’ve seen a few times when it first made its way to cable, and several times when it was literally eviscerated by the crew of the Satellite of Love on Mystery Science Theater 3000.  While I love that particular episode of MST3K, I’ve always enjoyed the quaint attempt at a Gremlins clone as well as the general quirkiness of the mixture of a lot of 80s tropes that are at play in the movie. Continue reading “Vice Academy (1989)” →

Escape from Tomorrow (2013)

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Disney.

With a single word, this mega company can conjure up many, many feelings.  For many, it’s animated features.  For some, it’s an iconic mouse.  Others think of family vacations when they were little or, once grown, special times they have with their little ones.  Some believe it’s everything wrong with the world.  Some, like director Randy Moore, apparently believes it is a person, place, and thing that is so fake and full of shit, he wants to be sure he makes a whole movie to drive home his disdain, and then go on a press tour to make sure people know he’s above all this Disney fakeness.

The movie was Escape from Tomorrow.  The gimmick is the guerrilla style filming inside both Disney World and Disneyland which is mostly what this movie has to stand on seven years on from its original release.  Why is filming inside Disney Parks such a gimmick to begin with?  Well, the place is absolutely crawling with intellectual property.  Disney is fierce about litigation when it comes to their shit.  There’s another reason why this movie was deemed risky, but I’ll get to that momentarily. Continue reading “Escape from Tomorrow (2013)” →

Up! (1976)

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We’ve come to the end of Russ Meyer Month here at B-Movie Enema.

Over the last several weeks, we’ve gone from Depression-era Missouri farms to a sexually liberated Canadian girl to go-go dancers with an axe to grind to wild Hollywood hippie parties.  So naturally there is only one place left to go…  Nazisploitation.  This week, it’s the 1976 soft-core sex comedy Up!

This is another of the Meyer-Ebert collaborations, much like with last week’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.   After that film and its success with audiences and some critics, Meyer tried his hand a couple more times with mainstream films, but both flopped.  He decided he needed to get back to boobs… er basics.  Back to basics.  He swore he’d never stray away from his formula again. Continue reading “Up! (1976)” →

Vixen! (1968)

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I love how Russ Meyer uses punctuation in his titles.

Welcome back to Russ Meyer Month here at B-Movie Enema.  This week, we’re going to venture into X-rated territory for the 1968 drama-satire-softcore porn exploitation classic Vixen!  We also travel north of the border to Canada for our story as well.

Vixen! might just be considered one of Meyer’s very best (though I have some commentary to add later).  The Los Angeles Times and the New York Times both gave high praise to this film despite its themes and obvious sexploitation nature.  However, again, it’s Roger Ebert who maybe says the best, most heartfelt comments calling this not just the “quintessential Meyer film” but that he also talks about how Meyer creates characters.  We should already be aware with Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! and Mudhoney that Meyer likes going over the top for his villains and various other stereotypical characters.  Ebert calls to the front that its Meyer’s talent in doing that that helps put people at ease seeing their first “skin-flick” and allows people to just have a good time – maybe the only thing Russ Meyer really wanted people to have. Continue reading “Vixen! (1968)” →

Virgin Hunters (aka Test Tube Teens from the Year 2000, 1994)

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David DeCoteau is back under one of his many pseudonyms, Ellen Cabot.  One year after Cabot/DeCoteau made the epic Beach Babes from Beyond, he teamed up again with Full Moon Features’ sexier production company subsidiary, Torchlight Entertainment, for another sex comedy.  That’s the topic of this week’s B-Movie Enema – Virgin Hunters!

Now, the title Virgin Hunters was the original name of the movie, however, there was a bit of an issue with the explicit nature of the title.  So, in order for Full Moon’s usual home video partner, Paramount Pictures, to release the film, the title would be changed to the more tongue-in-cheek Test Tube Teens from the Year 2000 and slightly less provocative poster and box art was utilized.

Interestingly, Virgin Hunters is now a franchise.  A second film was released in 2016 and a third in 2017.  You best fuckin’ believe I have those as well and will endeavor to complete the trilogy for you fine Enemaniacs here on the blog. Continue reading “Virgin Hunters (aka Test Tube Teens from the Year 2000, 1994)” →

Sexsquatch (2013)

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When you have a blog that discusses movies or possibly cultural turning points in the form of celluloid, eventually, it becomes an absolute truth of your life that you will discuss something like what I have this week – Sexsquatch.

I’m not entirely sure what to say about this movie.  Obviously, there is a Wikipedia page for it.  It’s widely known that the Sexsquatch Wikipedia page is largest and most extensive page in the history of Wikipedia.  However, I do also believe that the less you know about the biggest moneymaker in the history of film, grossing $47 billion against a $350 million budget, the better.

Now, of course any time a film breaks through and makes a cultural impact the size of Sexsquatch has, there will be haters.  There will be those who are detractors.  There will be contrarians.  There will be those who will try to be elitist in saying that your love of such a mainstream film makes you a farthead.  Possibly even a monkeydick.  They’ll even call you a fuckqueef. Continue reading “Sexsquatch (2013)” →

Return of the Killer Tomatoes (1988)

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I have something to admit…  Originally, I had Attack of the Killer Tomatoes slated for this week’s B-Movie Enema.  About 20 minutes into that movie, I quickly realized, there’s no way to do that movie in the fine tradition of this blog.  The reason was that everything about that movie that made it what it was, was in the jokes.

You had parodies of Jaws, Superman and Lois Lane, Japanese science fiction, bad dubbing on a Japanese character, tiny oneliners, lots and lots of visual jokes, a black man who was the master of disguise and often dressed as white guys convincing others he really was the person he was disguised as, and incompetency from government types and what have you.  It’s impossible to write about because it is entirely made up of those little moments that turned out to be greater than the whole.

So I made an executive decision to change to the sequel, Return of the Killer Tomatoes, and George Clooney’s magnificent mullet. Continue reading “Return of the Killer Tomatoes (1988)” →

Chillerama (2011)

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It’s been a bit since I did an anthology movie.  In fact, I’ve only ever done one in the past.  So let’s make up for that with a giant, nearly two full hours of kooky b-movie stories rolled into the horror comedy Chillerama from 2011!

The four segments contained within Chillerama are framed by a connecting story at a drive-in theater that is playing monster movies.  Then, each of those four segments is a parody and homage to a particular genre and style.  Additionally, each segment is directed by a different person – Adam Rifkin who directed mostly a split between family fare and boner comedies/thrillers, Tim Sullivan who was mostly known for producing movies like Detroit Rock City before making 2001 Maniacs with Robert Englund, Adam Green who made his mark with the Hatchet series of horror films, and Joe Lynch who is most recently known for directing Mayhem starring Steven Yeun and Samara Weaving.

Chillerama was the brainchild of Rifkin and Sullivan who met on Detroit Rock City and spitballed an idea for an anthology called Famous Monsters of Filmland – a title based on the Forrest J. Ackerman magazine that they grew up reading.  Continue reading “Chillerama (2011)” →