A group of strippers, two hookers, a bouncer, and a pimp run in to a strip club after hours. The start of a funny joke? It’s the premise for “Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!” a surprisingly well made and entertaining horror comedy considering the miniscule budget that it works on from the minute one. Notice how the strip club is the same exterior as the ice rink from the prologue. But who cares? “Zombies! Zombies! Zombies!” is a classic grind house throwback that features a group of mismatched survivors and malcontents going up against an endless horde of the walking dead.
Tag Archives: Grindhouse
The Untamed Tura: A Tribute
“One of the things that I always said, and it was one of my father’s favorite sayings, ‘Always be good to the people on the way up, because you’re going to meet them on the way down.’ I have always lived by that philosophy. The one thing you’ve got to remember is that you just never accept defeat. Remember to never let life get you down, because there is always something new to learn tomorrow. Life is to be lived, and lived well.” – Tura Satana
Earlier this year, Cinema Crazed had the privilege to read Author Shade Rupe’s compendium of interviews entitled “Dark Stars Rising.” It’s a lengthy tome comprised of unedited uncut interviews with some of the biggest and not so biggest cult icons in history, all of whom were fairly deserving of their own lengthy tome. Among the interviews in the book, one of the interviews was from Ms. Tura Satana. Of course, since “Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!” is one of our favorite cult films ever made, and undoubtedly one of our favorite films of all time, Satana’s interview was the first we turned to.
2069: A Sex Odyssey [Ach jodel mir noch einen – Stosstrupp Venus bläst zum Angriff] (1974)
There is a planet of hot women out there. They want sperm. And they’re coming to Earth for some men who have sperm. Unfortunately where they’re from men are rare, and their race may wither and die without man seed. There’s your plot for “2069” a sex comedy that’s about as stupid but arousing as all of the other porn parodies of the sixties and seventies. True, I refer to it as a porn parody primarily because of its title, but in reality it’s not even a slight spoof on Kubrick’s classic film. It merely borrows the title for the excuse to implement the 69 and is a pretty tame softcore porn and sex comedy that sets down on a group of alien women who happen down on Earth to abduct and sex up a bunch of hapless men to revive their society. What confounds me is how was their planet originally able to reproduce without men around? And are these women hoarding sperm for their planet or are they hoping to become pregnant on their own?
I Spit On Your Grave: Unrated (2010)
Was this remake entirely necessary? Actually no. Especially when you consider Meir Zarchi’s 1978 revenge film continues to be a widely revered, and critically reviled piece of volatile grindhouse cinema that not only set the stages for future revenge films, but was already remade subsequent its theatrical release where we saw no end of women on a rampage revenge films in the late seventies in to the eighties. “I Spit on Your Grave” is still one of the most heavily discussed and angrily debated cult masterpieces to this day inspiring hatred and praise from many film buffs and to this day inspires pure vitriol from iconic film critic Roger Ebert who despises Zarchi’s film so passionately, he banishes anyone who enjoyed it.
The Hills Run Red (2008)
If you’re willing to ignore the obligatory self-aware jabs at slasher films in the first half hour that derails the story for a good portion of the prologue, “The Hills Run Red” is actually quite an entertaining slasher film, and one that dabbles in that classic formula of teens wanting to uncover a legend and meeting pure evil and chaos face to face. If you keep knocking on the devil’s door, eventually he’s going to answer, and two aspiring filmmakers learn that lesson when they team up to find the mythical grindhouse flick “The Hills Run Red” a controversial gory film in the vein of Ruggero Deodato’s classic that mysteriously went missing along with its director and co-stars.
Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama (1988)
Spider: It’s too bad we had to kill her. I really liked the outfit she had on.
Full Moon’s 1988 cult film is something of a hideous movie that will make many cringe, roll their eyes, and have fun just the same. Admittedly “Sorority Babes” has something of a nostalgic value as I can still fondly remember watching it on late night cable in the nineties trying to figure out what in god’s name this movie was. Finally being able to grab a copy, I now know why “Sorority Babes” isn’t going in to the film registry any time soon. Obviously, it’s not a good film, but it surely is a film that’s so bad it’s really damn good.
Hard Ride to Hell (2010)
A slew of young Canadian actors (all of whom I recognize for the wrong reasons) star in a cheap throwback to the seventies satanic horror exploitation films that has the potential to be a very excellent horror flick but is instead cheap C grade hokum worthy of the dregs of the SyFy Channel here in America. In fact I can predict its initial run on DVD to end with an edited commercial interrupted premiere on said cable channel. “Hard Ride to Hell” is a movie with a great idea but an all too convoluted plot that begins with hapless young travelers on a road to nowhere who find themselves in a world of over-complicated and rather dull trouble involving Satan, bikers, satanic bikers, and a sprig of Robert Rodriguez just to tap the familiarity of horror fans.