| Here's Some Super Rare Old Flicks |
[Oct. 2nd, 2006|11:59 pm] |
CULT CLASSICS
(20 MOVIES)
MILL CREEK ENTERTAINMENT
Available on E-Bay for about $10 plus shipping.
I thought I would post a (longish) review of this box set from Mill Creek, CULT CLASSICS. It's got 20 Movies, but chances are you've only even heard of about three of them before, never mind seeing them. Let's first talk about what type of movies these are. These are Exploitation Films, in the strict definition of the term. That doesn't mean B-movies, or monster movies, or Drive-In Theatre slasher flicks.
It means films that show sex, or violence, or drug use, but due to the restrictive motion picture codes of the day (usually 1930-1950), are forced to present these movies ostensibly as "educational" features. Sure, these films show prostitution, or girls lured into white slavery, or live human births, or hoochie-coochie dancers, or naked Native women, or people trapped in the hell of demon drug abuse, but we are only showing this to demonstrate the dangers to our children! "Parents, you must see this film!" Yeah, yeah, use the kids as an excuse to indulge in your own sick hangups. Still going on today...
Anyway, some of these films were even shown in a "roadshow" format. The producers would drive with the film reels from hick town to hick town, like the circus, rent out a theatre for a weekend, have an advance man who had plastered the town with posters the week before, and fill the town's little movie theatre for two days running. They would make the real money by selling "educational sex hygeine pamphlets" out in the lobby after the show, by a gal dressed in a nurse's uniform. Anyhow, I could go on here, and there's several books on the subject, which are all fascinating, about this vanished portion of American film history.
About this box set: I am so conflicted! I really love the concept, but it left me wanting to some degree. First of all, the films you've probably heard of are REEFER MADNESS, SEX MADNESS, COCAINE FIENDS, and MARIHUANA (aka WEED WITH ROOTS IN HELL). These films are available from various PD film vendors. The only repeat from another Mill Creek box is JOYLESS STREET with Greta Garbo, a silent film from 1925. A few of the other titles were available from Alpha Video, like CHAINED FOR LIFE (about Siamese twins The Hilton Sisters), and the all-dwarf Western/Musical THE TERROR OF TINY TOWN (I think winner of a Golden Turkey Award by the way).
But you also get mega rare titles like DELINQUENT DAUGHTERS, ESCORT GIRL, and SLAVES IN BONDAGE. How many times have you seen a copy of OOMOO-OOMOO, THE SHARK GOD??? I've only watched a couple of the titles all the way through, but I took a quick look at everything. I am torn. While the quality on some of the prints is nothing less than DIRE, and a pain to watch, due to the rarity of the titles, I felt compelled to grade on a curve. (Quality is no better than fair to good on the best looking prints.)
Some of these movies had a tiny amount of prints made, and we're probably lucky to be able to see them at all, in any condition. And forget about finding master negatives on these babies. So, for the price, and if you have an interest in old-time Exploitation rarities, I would recommend purchasing this box set. You get a lot of obscure material for the money. It's a good bet for film history buffs. Just keep in mind that you're going to be suffering with horrible technical quality through many of these titles. Acting is also pretty bad on most of them, but acting wasn't the point, the point was illicit thrills in an age when people didn't have televisions in their homes and Playboy Magazine didn't even exist yet. It was this or "French postcards."
Included:
1. Chained for Life
2. Child Bride
3. Cocaine Fiends
4. Delinquent Daughters
5. Escort Girl
6. Gambling with Souls
7. Joyless Street
8. Mad Youth
9. Marihuana
10. Marijuana Menace, The (aka Assassin of Youth)
11. Omoo-Omoo, The Shark God
12. Reefer Madness
13. Road to Ruin, The
14. Sex Madness
15. She Shoulda' Said "No"!
16. Slaves in Bondage
17. Ten Nights in a Barroom
(This 1931 film was the NINTH film version of this story - the first was in 1897!!)
18. Terror of Tiny Town, The
19. Test Tube Babies
20. Wild and The Wicked, The |
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| The 99 Cent Only Store Gives Up Its Riches |
[Sep. 24th, 2006|09:02 pm] |
Made another trip to the 99 Cents Only Store today. Finally, they're carrying East West DVDs. I was able to acquire all of the most recent martial arts releases (see entry below), except for Brave Archer 2 and 3, for some bizarre reason. If you look closely, they all have the same catalog number, KF-7002 (I guess the KF stands for Kung Fu), as well as the same UPC Code on all the titles. This saves the company a buttload of money, as it costs a few hundred bucks for each new UPC code assigned. This means that all the titles are considered part of an "assortment," and all the titles are shipped in one bulk order. If you look at the EastWest website, you'll see that this is the case: DVDs can only be ordered in large group assortments, not by individual titles.
They didn't have any releases from the other batch of movies, except for the four episodes of Four Star Playhouse shown, which I hadn't seen before anywhere. About a month or two ago, 99 had a collection of kids' titles from EastWest. They still had a bunch of those left over. I had obtained a few of those titles a month ago, including a collection of Ray Harryhausen shorts (fantastic!). Lots of animation including many titles in Spanish (like "Last of the Mohicans" and "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea." I think these were those Australian titles dubbed into Spanish? Anybody know? )
One I passed up the last time was this 1001 Nights, which I assumed to be cheap animation. But lo and behold, I look at the back cover and there's live action stills on there! I then found that the film is really this:
La Esclava Del Paraiso
An Italian made color fantasy from 1968! IMDB tells us that this is not an "Arabian Nights" tale exactly, but is similarly set in Moorish Spain, and provides some agreeable Saturday matinee type thrills, reminiscent of 50's Technicolor adventure fare. Sounds like my type of obscure release, so everyone look out for this one. Stars Luciana Paluzzi and Raf Vallone. How long before Mill Creek throws this on a box set? They also had some Mexi-flicks, but no Santo or monster movies.
99 also had some actual closeout titles, as opposed to DVDs made to sell for a buck. Note the K-Mart price tag for $4.99.
I fished out these two actual non-fake Anime titles in the "Power Stone" series. I know nothing about this series (or much about anime for that matter, I'm more of a kaiju guy) but it's ADV Films so it must be at least somewhat worthy. I also found "Great Animation" Volume 2 and 3, one of which supposedly has "Bambi Vs. Godzilla" on it, a stone classic. All in all, a pretty good trip to the 99. I'll have to check out some of the other locations as the stock does vary. Gotta find that Eve Plumb film. |
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