Tag: exploitation

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle1 Comment

“This is my happening, and it freaks me out!”

Welcome back to B-Movie Enema’s Russ Meyer Month.  We’ve finally gotten to the back end of the month and his 70s features.  It also brings us to two features Meyer did with famous Chicago movie critic Roger Ebert.  First up, it’s the one the duo is most famous for – Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.

Meyer and Ebert cranked out a treatment that came to 127 pages in about a week and a half.  Ebert completed the screenplay in three weeks.  It was intended to be a straight sequel to the 1967 film Valley of the Dolls.  Now, here’s where we start in on the rabbit hole that leads to Meyer and Ebert coming in. Continue reading “Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)” →

Vixen! (1968)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle3 Comments

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)” →

Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle2 Comments

Last week, Russ Meyer Month started at B-Movie Enema with Mudhoney, a nice little tawdry tale in the American Plains during the Depression.  This week, we pick up a movie that is one of Meyer’s best known – Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

As I mused there, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! is a fairly well known movie.  There are two movies in Meyer’s filmography that probably get the most attention in terms of being trivia answers, but for different reasons.  There’s this one that we’re talking about this week for its fun title.  The other will be covered in two weeks because of who wrote it.

Curiously, though, as popular as Pussycat is, it was an unusual box office dud for Meyer.  Most of his films did fairly well.  There was a built-in audience at drive-ins full of horny guys wanting to see big breasted chicks.  You’d think none of these movies would fail, but this one did.  It wasn’t until later that it gained a cult status. Continue reading “Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)” →

Mudhoney (1965)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle2 Comments

Russ Meyer…

The name usually conjures up images of sleazy things happening with buxom beauties and just about everything that someone might call “exploitation” when it comes to 60s and 70s cinema.  While it may seem like his movies are full of that sleaze, many note that his films were important in terms of female empowerment and showing women who aren’t just sexually free, but generally more powerful than the men in his films.  That said, he would also place his female characters in ordeals that they would have to prove their strength and their ability to overcome the obstacles that they face in his movies.  It’s probably true that his films were subversive in many ways that would eventually strike at the heart of a rising feminist movement.

All that and more will be discussed over the course of the next five weeks as B-Movie Enema tackles Russ Meyer Month!  We begin with 1965’s Mudhoney… Continue reading “Mudhoney (1965)” →

The Great Texas Dynamite Chase (1976)

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Not that long ago, I covered the movie The Single Girls which starred Claudia Jennings.  Our lovely leading lady is back in a fun little action/exploitation/heist movie this week!

The Great Texas Dynamite Chase comes to us from director Michael Pressman.  Pressman is hardly a schlock auteur.  He would go on to make the cult classic Boulevard Nights which has been selected to be preserved by the Library of Congress as well as working with comedy heavyweights like Dan Aykroyd (Doctor Detroit) and Richard Pryor (Some Kind of Hero).  He’s more recently gone into television directing having done episodes of some Law and Order shows, Blue Bloods, and winning Emmys for Picket Fences.

My point is, this is hardly a flash in the pan kind of filmmaker.  And of course, The Great Texas Dynamite Chase would also be released by Roger Corman’s New World Pictures.  However, it should be of note that this is an exploitation movie that comes with fairly decent reviews.  This was praised for being exciting and sexy enough for the drive-in crowd while still being tongue-in-cheek with its comedy to attract the older audiences.  I suspect it played better to the Texas and southwest crowd, but found an audience over the years and is truly an exploitation gem.

Continue reading “The Great Texas Dynamite Chase (1976)” →

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)” →

Felicity (1978)

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Oh, and you thought I was done with Severin Films releases that are connected in some way to the French book/movie/character Emmanuelle…

Well, we’re not.  This week’s feature, Felicity, features a young girl, played by the lovely Glory Annen, who is a sheltered Catholic school girl who indulges in erotic novels… as well as a lesbian love affair.  You might remember Annen in another late 70s film in which she was indulging in a lesbian affair that I’ve already covered – Norman J. Warren’s Prey.  In that, she was the kept orphan of her parents’ housekeeper who ran afoul of an alien who was more fox than man.

I find Annen particularly interesting.  If you check out that previous article on Prey, I touch upon her involvement with a man who was possibly involved in some pretty deep criminal shit in the horse racing industry.  Since her death in 2017, her various notes and documents compiled about her relationship with Ivan Allan have begun the editing process to create exposés and a series of books detailing that alleged criminality of Allan.  Continue reading “Felicity (1978)” →

Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals (1977)

Published on by Geoff Arbuckle3 Comments

Oh boy…  That Emanuelle girl is back, and guess what, Enemaniacs…  She’s more erotic and exotic than ever!

That’s how they advertised Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals on posters and various other ads.  That does beg the question of exactly how erotic she can be if there are cannibals and shit running about.  Trust me, folks, I have seen some Italian cannibal flicks and they tend not to be especially sexy.  In fact, they tend to be, like, super duper gross.

So leave it to Joe D’Amato to come in and see what he can do.  First thing’s first, he brings Laura Gemser along as a photojournalist who finds a woman in a loony bin who isn’t just a cannibal herself, but has Amazonian tattoos all over her skin.  That’s a plus…  Not the tatted up cannibal broad, but Laura Gemser.  She’s always welcome here at B-Movie Enema. Continue reading “Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals (1977)” →