Tag: seal of approval

Fascination

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★★★★
“An iconic low-budget combination of sex and violence.”

Mark (Lemaire), is a thief on the run from his collaborators after absconding with the loot. He takes refuge in a remote country manor, all but surrounded by water, which he believes to be deserted. Turns out he was almost right. The sole inhabitants are a pair of chambermaids, Eva (Lahaie) and Elizabeth (Mai), but despite his gun, they don’t seem quite as terrified of the intruder as one feels they should be, and tell him they are expecting some other female visitors later that evening. Elizabeth does take a shine to Mark, and tells him he should leave, but Eva uses her wiles to keep Mark there. The rest of his gang show up, and lay siege to the house, but Eva takes the loot out to them and single-handedly dispatches them, before returning to the manor. As night descends, the visitors finally arrive, and the noose tightens around Mark’s neck, as the truth about the get-together is revealed…

Watching porn stars try to act is often a painful experience, but renowned 70’s XXX starlet Lahaie is perfectly cast here. She plays a feral creature, driven entirely by instinct, and with no qualms about using sex or violence to achieve her aim, of keeping Mark in the house for the night. The sight of her stalking across the bridge which forms the castle’s sole entrance, wielding a blood-stained scythe almost the same size as the actress, is one that will stick with you. The film does betray its cheapness with some fairly crappy effects [you’re going to have someone hacked apart with a scythe, you should do better than some red gunk on the throat], but more than makes up for it with a parade of strong, confident and sensual female characters. Mark is by no means an idiot or a weakling, but from the moment he arrives in the house, it’s clear he’s completely beyond his depth, out-maneouvered at every turn by the women.

Indeed, right from the opening scene, where a group of elegant ladies sip blood in a slaughterhouse, there’s something off-center about proceedings, and Rollin maintains that sense throughout. While Rollin made several entries in the vampire genre, this is easily his most interesting take on the genre’s mythology – one which doesn’t actually mention the V-word at any point in the film. Lahaie and Mai deserve much of the credit for that.

Dir: Jean Rollin
Stars: Jean-Marie Lemaire, Brigitte Lahaie, Franka Mai, Fanny Magier

À l’interieur (Inside)

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★★★★½
“Some women will stop at nothing to have a baby. Whether it’s theirs or not.”

The ‘final girl’ is a well-worn concept in horror: the last survivor, typically the “good” girl, finally fights back against the assailant in the movie’s climax. It is isn’t normally enough to merit inclusion here, since it’s usually a relatively minor aspect of the film. Here, however, not only is it just about the entire film, the main theme – motherhood and the instincts it arouses – is entirely feminine. Aliens, and Ripley’s surrogate parenting of Newt, would be another example. And it’s also a rarity in the horror genre for both protagonist and antagonist to be female, but the threat here certainly deserves to be up there with Freddy, Michael, Jason and their cousins.

The action here does take place on a much smaller-scale, with the vast majority occurring in a semi-remote house. Sarah (Paradis – her older sister is Johnny Depp’s other half) is left alone on Christmas Eve, her husband having been killed a few months previously in a car accident. She’s about to give birth, but is more depressed by her current situation than delighted. There’s a knock on the door from a mysterious woman (Dalle); Sarah, suspicious, does not let her in, but it seems the woman knows Sarah and her history. The police are called but find no trace and leave. Later that night, the woman returns, and it’s soon clear she will go to – bold, underline please – any lengths to take Sarah’s baby.

Let me be perfectly clear: this is hardcore horror of the most unrelenting sort, completely unsuitable for those of a nervous disposition, and particularly pregnant women. In the 1980’s, Dalle was a sexpot, for her role in Betty Blue, but you can flush all memory of that down the toilet: here, she has a feral, near-demonic intensity, and god help anyone who is unfortunate enough to get in her way. Particularly the men, who are disposed of with complete dispassion and brutality; as the film goes on, her relationship with Sarah becomes complex, and more a case of, “I’m taking your baby, and we can do this the hard way or… Well, really, that’s all there is. Sorry.” Friends, family, even an entire patrol of cops – no-one can help Sarah. She’s completely on her own, and her fate is entirely in her own hands.

Somewhat inspired by the 2006 case of Tiffany Hall, who removed a foetus from her friend’s womb with scissors, the film escalates from a quiet opening, through tension, before exploding in a literal tidal-wave of gore, as the protagonist and antagonist battle each other. My sole complaint is a couple of incidents in the final act that seem to stretch belief, e.g. a character conveniently rising from the dead for another assault, though it’s a common complaint in this area. Otherwise, even though we are jaded fans of both genres covered here, this one will stick with us for a long time, and cements France’s place at the forefront of horror.

Dir: Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo
Star: Alysson Paradis, Béatrice Dalle

The Millennium Trilogy

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★★★½
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

I think we know the exact moment we fell in love with the character of Lisbeth Salander, the central character both in Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, and the Swedish films based on the books. It would be the scene in the first film where she goes back to see the man who had been sexually abusing her. Little did he know, on her last visit, she had recorded the whole event. This time, she knocks him out, ties her assailant up, forces him to watch the video and then engages in a spot of amateur tattoo work, leaving him with “I am a sadistic pig and a rapist” etched permanently across his torso. Yeah. You go, girl.

Salander is not your typical action heroine: she’s 5’4″, weighs maybe 90 lbs dripping wet, and anti-social to a degree that may be pathological. But she possesses a mind like a steel-trap, impressive computer hacking skills, a steely resolve and a zero-tolerance policy for anyone who abuses women [the Swedish title of the first book and film translates as “Men Who Hate Women”, and misogyny is something of a theme throughout the trilogy]. This was demonstrated very early: at the age of twelve, and fed up of seeing her father hurt her mother, she doused him in petrol and set him on fire. Like I said: “zero-tolerance”.

We first meet Lisbeth in Dragon Tattoo, using her skills to conduct surveillance on Mikael Blomkvist (Nyqvist), a journalist who has just lost a libel case and is facing prison as a result. As a result of her report, Blomkvist is hired by Henrik Vanger (Sven-Bertil Taube), to investigate the disappearance, forty years previously, of his niece Harriet, who was also Blomkvist’s babysitter. It has been nagging at Vanger ever since, and he feels his time is running out to find the truth. Reviewing the evidence, Blomkvist finds names and numbers in Harriet’s bible, but it’s Lisbeth, helping ‘remotely’, who cracks the code, revealing them to be verses from Leviticus about punishing sinners. The two gradually peel away the years to reveal the truth, a serial-killer whose crimes go back to just after the war – a truth that proves very uncomfortable for some in the Vanger family.

To some extent, Lisbeth is secondary to that plot, but she also has her own concerns to deal with. After the incident involving her father, she spent most of her youth under psychiatric observation. Even after release, she is still effectively ‘on probation’, under the control of various court-appointed guardians. The latest, a lawyer named Bjurman (Andersson) is a truly slimy jerk, who abuses his position to extract sexual favours from Lisbeth. After all, she’s just a little girl – what could she possibly do? See the opening paragraph for specifics there, if you’d forgotten.

Dir: Niels Arden Oplev
Star: Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace, Sven-Bertil Taube, Peter Andersson

★★★★
The Girl Who Played with Fire

It’s in the second film, Fire, that Lisbeth really comes into her own. After a period traveling the world, she returns to Sweden, and pays a visit to Bjurman, who has been looking into tattoo removal – she warns him off doing that, threatening him with his own gun. However, she leaves the gun behind, and Bjurman then uses it to frame Lisbeth for the murder of two crusading journalists, who were working on a story exposing sex traffickers, and those using the women they provide, for Blomkvist’s magazine. With both the police, and the real perpetrators – the criminal gang who control the traffic – trying to track her down, Lisbeth is forced underground. Fortunately, Blomkvist is able to help, as Lisbeth turns the table and goes after the shadowy “Zala” who leads the crime syndicate.

There’s a number of very interesting aspects to the film, such as how Blomkvist and Salander don’t meet until the final scene – I can’t think of many other film where the two central protagonists do that [Heat comes close]. But it’s most memorable for the unstoppable force which Salander has become, utterly fearless, whether it’s taking on a pair of bikers or going into the heart of enemy territory. Even when you think it’s all over for her, she crawls her way back in a way which would make The Bride applaud. It’s curious, yet somehow entirely fitting, to see her as an updated, adult version of another Scandinavian literary and cinematic icon: Pippi Longstocking. Except, to steal a line from Romy and Michelle, she’s like a Pippi who smokes and says “shit” a lot.

Salander’s personality is abrasive, and she clearly has difficulty relating to people or showing them anything even approximating affection: the closest she gets is a bewildered silence. I think the only time we saw her give a genuine smile was in the third film, when she received news that someone she hated had been killed. And yet, people like Blomkvist warm to Lisbeth, initially pitying the circumstances in which she finds herself, yet eventually seeing the human beneath the multiple layers of defensive ice. Fiercely loyal to her (very few, admittedly) friends, and as lethal as a boxful of well-shaken, peeved rattlesnakes to her enemies, the second film proves her to be smart, and as quick with her fists as her brain.

Dir: Daniel Alfredson
Star: Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace, Yasmine Garbi, Paolo Roberto

★★★½
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest

The third film, like the second, has Blomkvist and Salander apart for almost the entire movie; they meet only right at the end, in a way which is as low-key and unobtrusive as an Ikea coffee-table, yet somehow feels entirely appropriate. This time, their separation is because Salanger is in custody for attempted murder, following the events at the end of Fire. The secret group in authority, whose activities are in danger of being exposed, intend to avoid the embarrassment of a trial by getting Salander certified as insane, so she can be locked up as mentally incompetent. This brings her back to confront Dr. Peter Teleborian (Ahlbom), the man in charge of the institute where Lisbeth spent two years. However, Blomkvist asks his lawyer sister, Annika (Hallin), to take up the case. Can they reveal the truth before Lisbeth is committed to Teleborian’s sinister care one more?

While undeniably a good end to the trilogy, tying up the loose ends and dishing out justice in a solid, satisfying way, it seems a shame to have Lisbeth locked up for 95% of the film. This is much more a purely-investigative thriller than the first two, which were more action-oriented. Here, there’s a fight in a restaurant for Blomkvist, and Salander’s only action is an admittedly impressive battle in a warehouse against an unstoppable force. Much as at the end of the first movie, she doesn’t actually kill the opponent herself, though here, that would be more due to a lack of ammunition for her impromptu weapon. While a nice final act by which to remember Salander, it’s not representative of her more passive role in this entry.

The trilogy of books have sold more than 50 million copies worldwide, though sadly, Larsson didn’t see their success, as he died in 2004, before they were published. The success of the films, which have grossed a total of more than $210 million worldwide – a phenomenal sum for any non-English language series – has led to the inevitable Hollywood remake. Pause for eye-rolling here… Except, the American Tattoo does have David Fincher at the helm, so I’ll wait until seeing it – while, naturally, reserving the right to administer a good kicking in due course. The first pictures of Rooney Mara as Lisbeth (right), don’t exactly inspire confidence, as she looks more like some kind of coked-up fetish supermodel than anything else. Daniel Craig plays the role of Blomkvist, which would seem to make him a bit more glamourous too.

I guess we’ll see, but Fincher and Mara will certainly have their work cut out. I can’t help thinking of the lukewarm remake of another, highly-lauded Scandinavian movie, Let the Right One In, and the overall history of such things is not cause for optimism. But even in a worst case scenario, we’ll still have the books and Noomi Rapace’s steel-cold portrayal. Wikipedia says that when Larsson was 15 years old, “he witnessed the gang rape of a girl, which led to his lifelong abhorrence of violence and abuse against women. The author never forgave himself for failing to help the girl, whose name was Lisbeth,” even though much of his life was spent fighting oppression, in various forms. But with his creation of a new style of heroine, one appropriate for the 21st century, Larsson has, unwittingly, perhaps achieved redemption.

Dir: Daniel Alfredson
Star: Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace, Annika Hallin, Anders Ahlbom

Onechanbara: Zombie Bikini Squad

  By

★★★★
“Because nothing says post-apocalyptic zombie killer like a maribou-trimmed bikini and a cowboy hat.”

The Japanese title Onechanbara [variously Oneechanbara], is a portmanteau word, combining “onee-chan”, which means “big sister”, and “chanbara”, the term for sword-fighting movies. But, since this aspect would be lost on a Western audience, who can blame US distributors Tokyo Shock for adding the helpful subtitle, “Zombie Bikini Squad”. Y’know, in case the sleeve left doubts in this area. It’s based on a very popular series of Japanese video games, which consists of the heroines, in a variety of costumes, slicing and dicing their way through an apparently endless line of the living dead. With admirable faithfulness to the source material, the movie also consists of the heroines, in a variety of costumes, slicing and dicing their way through an apparently endless line of the living dead.

There’s Aya (Otugoro), the stoic sword-wielding one seen on the poster, and Reiko (Hashimoto), the leather-clad one with the infinite-ammo shotgun. Along with fat sidekick Katsuji (Waki), they’re looking for Aya’s sister, Saki – and also Dr. Sugita (Suwa), the mad scientist responsible for the zombie outbreak which has swept the world, setting sister nibbling on brother, daughter on mother, etc. On the way to their goal, they meet other survivors, a zombie version of GoGo Yubari from Kill Bill, and several million gallons of digital blood, including a good chunk sprayed onto the camera lens. Now, I’ve never played the game at all, so can only assume everything makes perfect sense in that universe. Still, as adaptations go, this seems to capture the inherent spirit of mindless slaughter admirably, with Aya’s power-up the most devastating video-game weapon since the Defender smart bomb. I just dated myself horribly, didn’t I?

Anyway. Is it any good? Not by objective standards, no. But it is a hell of a lot of fun, soundly kicking the ass of the last two Resident Evil movies there. While the characterization is, of necessity, composed of broad strokes, that’s forgivable, and it touches all the necessary zombie bases e.g. a character who gets nibbled and has to be put down as a result. An escalating series of encounters helps provide copious action, and despite the clear CGI, this is well-staged and edited, with the actresses doing a more than credible job. Besides, Chris’s snort of disbelief when Aya threw off her cloak to reveal the fur-trimmed bikini was priceless.

Dir: Yohei Fukuda
Star: Eri Otoguro, Tomohiro Waki, Taro Suwa, Manami Hashimoto

Double Dare

  By

★★★★½
“Zoë Bell, you’re our heroine. Never change.”

The day after watching this documentary, I was clearing out the shed in preparation for our house move. I twisted my back, and thought about giving up, but soldiered on until the job was done – because that’s what Zoë Bell would do. It’s now my life philosophy: WWZD? She’s the main focus here, from working as Lucy Lawless’s double on Xena in New Zealand, through an unsuccessful attempt to break in to Hollywood, and on to a second try, where she’s hired to stand-in for Uma Thurman in Kill Bill. Paralleling this, it looks at Jeannie Epper, a veteran stuntwoman who shadowed Lynda Carter in Wonder Woman. Now nearing her 60th birthday, Epper is still active and seeking work, fighting against the problems of being a female in an extremely male-dominated industry.

The thing that comes over is how delightfully un-Hollywood Bell is, innocent almost to the point of naivety – she’s blissfully unaware of the need, for example, to have head shots, and drops F-bombs with a marvellously casual air. The cameras are rolling when she gets the call telling her she’s got the Kill Bill job, and her obvious, genuine delight at the news, brought a huge grin to our faces, and is completely endearing. It’s to be hoped that Hollywood doesn’t change her in the slightest, and Zoë remains the same, down-to-earth, well-grounded person shown here, who is now even more solidly entrenched among our favourite contemporary action heroines.

I have some concerns there, based on Epper; her contemplation of plastic surgery and liposuction at her age is more sad than anything else, as is watching Jeannie working the phones, basically begging for work, even though she’s a legend in the business. There’s a good heart beating in there (Epper donated a kidney to a friend, for instance), but she has clearly been ground down by her decades in the film industry, and become a lot more cynical and battle-weary as a result. That’s no wonder, when you witness her struggles trying to get equal treatment for women at the annual awards ceremony. It’s a somewhat grim reality-check, warning of the potential perils ahead for Bell in her career.

But aside from the contrast in the two heroines, this is a fascinating study in a side of the business that doesn’t get anything like the recognition it deserves. As one comment I read elsewhere said, “If you liked Uma Thurman in Kill Bill, Zoë Bell is the reason why,” and that sums up the shadows in which stuntwomen work. This film shines a light into that darkness, and both Epper and Bell deserve enormous respect and admiration for putting their bodies on the line, in the name of our entertainment. And while I’m not really a big Tarantino fan, if he turns out to be responsible for bringing Bell to a wider audience, then it’s perhaps the biggest gift his career will have given us.

Dir: Amanda Micheli
Star: Jeannie Epper, Zoë Bell

Les Femmes de l’ombre

  By

★★★★
“Wartime derring-do with the Inglourious Bastardettes.”

It’s May 1944, and the imminent D-day landings by the Allies in France are imperiled, when a geologist, sent to check one of the beaches, is injured and ends up in hospital. A team of five Frenchwomen, from various backgrounds and led by Louise (Marceau), a trained sniper whose husband was recently killed by Ze Germans, is sent in to occupied territory to rescue the geologist before he is found by Colonel Heindrich (Bleibtreu), and forced to give up the location of the invasion, allowing the Germans to meet it head-on. However, that turns out to be just the start of their dangerous mission.

First off, the French title, which translates as “Women of the shadow”, is a good deal more evocative than the bland “Female Agents” one, and conveys much better the…well, shadowy nature of the enterprise. It feels somewhat of a cross between The Dirty Dozen and Inglourious Basterds, with the team cobbled together from irregular forces, such as Jeanne (Depardieu, Gerard’s daughter), a prostitute who faced the hangman’s noose for murdering her pimp, or Suzy (Gillain), who used to be Heindrich’s mistress. This could have led to caricature – the whore, the smart one, the devout Catholic – yet the film, largely avoids this. Even Heindrich is not a stereotypical Nazi, another aspect that reminded us of Basterds, though the Allied force here is far less brutal.

It’s a solid piece of action/drama, which managed to keep both of us awake, despite a session earlier in the evening at the “all you can eat” fish fry; normally, that requires 30,000 Volts to keep us from sliding into post-gluttony unconsciousness. I think Chris enjoyed the movie a little more: I was somewhat on the fence about giving it the seal, finding some of the plotting a little convoluted and occasionally implausible, but her endorsement of this as “great” provided sufficient impetus. Marceau is particularly good, exuding steely resolve to hold the team together, and Bleibtreu makes an excellent foil, coming across as equally smart and committed as Louise. Their conflict is the glue that binds the story together, and makes it one of the best efforts in the wartime heroine genre to date.

[Note: The film is loosely – very loosely – based on Lisé de Baissac, who did operate undercover in France during the second-half of the war. However, there’s little or no evidence of any mission that parallels the one depicted in the film. In the time leading up to D-day, she was doing reconnaissance work in Normandy, scouting out holding grounds for airborne troops.]

Dir: Jean-Paul Salomé
Star: Sophie Marceau, Julie Depardieu, Marie Gillain, Moritz Bleibtreu
a.k.a. Female Agents

Mutant Girls Squad

  By

★★★★
“X-Men, as directed by Peter Jackson. And not LotR Peter Jackson. Brain Dead Peter Jackson.”

It makes sense that this stems from a drunken agreement between the three co-directors at a film festival, because this is the sort of film you would only make under inebriated terms, and it’s probably true to say that drunk is the best way to watch this. That’s not a bad thing per se, just that its loopy sensibilities and over-the-top antics would seem to go particularly well with a few beers. Rin (Sugimoto) hits her sixteenth birthday not too happy, being bullied at school. However, the bullies have a surprise in store, as it turns out Rin is half-human, half-Hiiko, with her father being from a mutant race with extraordinary powers. They have largely been hiding from humanity, but are now fed up of being persecuted, and under the leadership of Kisaragi (Sakaguch), are about to declare total war on us. Rin, along with Yoshie (Morita) and Rei (Takayama), are to lead the strikeforce, though Rin is less convinced over the need to target all of mankind.

This is right up there with Brain Dead in terms of the goriest movie ever, with fountains of blood, real and digital painting the entire screen, including the lens, though rarely affecting our heroine’s sailor-suit school uniform. Which, one assumes, is part of the joke, for everything about this is so amazingly excessive, it’s impossible to take any of it seriously, even as it is played completely straight-faced. The talents, for instance, include a waitress whose breasts each sprout a sword and a cheerleader, concealing a chainsaw in a place power-tools are not normally located. No explanation for any of this is ever given. It just is, and you either buy into it or you don’t. Yet there’s also a moment or two of poignancy, as Rin struggles to decide whether to align herself with a human race which has largely rejected her, or her new “family,” weird and incredibly ultraviolent as they may be.

While the gore is certainly present in buckets, as we’ve seen, that isn’t enough by itself to make for entertainment, and the insane imagination on view here is equally impressive. This is particularly true at the end, when Kisaragi reveals his final form. Let’s just say, breasts that squirt acid milk is one of the lesser of his talents. This kind of lunatic invention makes the film work, and while you undeniably need a large tolerance for arterial spray, and some of the FX are rubbery, to say the least, it is thoroughly fun schlock, unlike anything produced by even the most warped Western company.

Dir: Noboru Iguchi, Yoshihiro Nishimura, and Tak Sakaguchi
Star: Yumi Sugimoto, Suzuka Morita, Yuko Takayama, Tak Sakaguchi

The Haunted World of El Superbeasto

  By

★★★★
“Suzi-X Marks The Spot.”

Rob Zombie has had an interesting career, to say the least. From the early days as the front-man of heavy-metal band White Zombie, through his own solo work [heavily influenced by B-movies], and then on into his movies. That started with the fairly-crap House of 1000 Corpses, then the better Devil Rejects, and then his remakes of the first two Halloween movies, which were ok, as remakes of horror classics go. And then there’s The Haunted World of El Superbeasto, an animated feature which I stumbled across on cable. Well, actually, Chris did: “I Tivo’d a movie for you,” she said. And, surprisingly, she stayed for the entire thing, and appeared to enjoy this animated feature. Which is odd, because it has much the same gleeful, excessive insanity as Bitch Slap, which she walked out on.

Based on a comic-book series, the focus is, at least, theoretically, El Superbeasto (Papa), a masked luchador and part-time exploitation film-director, whose opinion of his own talents is certainly not modest. Superbeasto gets involved with the the evil plans of Dr. Satan (Giamatti), who kidnaps foul-mouthed stripper Velvet Von Black (Dawson), because if he marries her, he’ll get all the powers of the devil. El Superbeasto and his sister Suzi X (Moon Zombie) have to stop Dr. Satan, before he can destroy the world. And it’s thanks to the latter that this film effortlessly slides into GWG territory. Imagine a soft(ish) porn version of those insurance ads with Erin Esurance kicking butt. Except, with far larger breasts, much more gore and a sidekick of a horny, transforming robot. Er, ok: not really like those insurance ads at all, then.

Zombie was responsible for the Werewolf Women of the SS faux-trailer in Grindhouse, and brings much the same gleeful approach to proceedings here. Indeed, we first see Suzi-X kidnapping the head of Hitler, which is kept alive in a jar (as in They Saved Hitler’s Brain), and then has to escape by fighting her way through a massive pack of Nazi zombies (that’d be from Shock Waves). Carnage ensues, as it pretty much does, any time Suzi-X is on the screen, which is a lot – she gets far more of the action than El Superbeasto does. Proceedings culminate in a lengthy, slo-mo catfight, entirely necessary to the plot, between her and Von Black, while the soundtrack cheerily informs us that “It’s OK to jerk off to cartoons – the Japanese do it every day – so rub one out for the USA…”

Yeah, the soundtrack. By comic due Hard ‘n’ Phirm, it’s certainly worthy of note, providing a sardonic commentary throughout. Witness the play-by-play as Suzi-X takes on the Nazi zombies, or as it bemoans the shameless ripoff of Carrie which is the finale. An appreciation of genre – particularly, horror movies – of the past eighty years or longer, will also help, as will as realizing this is not to be taken at all seriously. It’s definitely not for kids, or the easily offended: copious female nudity, violence, swearing and generally questionable attitudes. It reminded me of Ralph Bakshi cartoons, such as Fritz the Cat, just much more tongue-in-cheek.

If anything, it may be a little too hyper and frenetic. We ended up taking a break in the middle, and chilling out with coffee and muffins before returning for the second-half. Throwing together everything but the kitchen sink as far as style, content and approach goes, it remains a thoroughly entertaining piece of trash cinema. While the supposed hero is actually not very interesting, and largely unlikeable, Suzi-X is a fabulous action heroine, whom I’d enjoy seeing more of [not that there’s much you don’t see of her here, if you know what I mean, and I think you do…] Check out the clip below for some idea of what to expect.

Dir: Rob Zombie
Star (voice): Tom Papa, Sheri Moon Zombie, Paul Giamatti, Rosario Dawson

Hard Revenge Milly

  By

★★★★
“In which the ongoing problem of high blood-pressure in Japan apparently reaches epidemic proportions.”

In the near(ish) future, Japan has become a post-apocalyptic wasteland in which only the strong survive. Initially, that does not include Milly (Mizuno), who is tortured by the Jack brothers and their gang: her baby is set on fire, while she has her breasts sliced off and is left for dead. However, she survives, albeit in a partially-mechanical form, and has now devoted her life to revenge on those responsible. Her artificial enhancements include a shotgun leg, a sword up her sleeve and a chest that… Well, that has to be seen to be believed, let’s just leave it at that, shall we? That’s Hard Revenge Milly, the first of the two films on the Western release DVD.

The second, Hard Revenge Milly: Bloody Battle, has Milly being sought by some colleagues of the Jack brothers, led by Ikki (Tsujimoto), a flamboyantly gay psychopath with an attitude. “That’s why I hate bisexuals,” he says, after crushing one minion’s head into a wall for making a sexual advance on a female hostage. However, Milly now has a sidekick: Haru (Nagasawa), who wants Milly to help out with her own mission of revenge, tracking down whoever is responsible for the death of Haru’s lover. However, it turns out that her and Milly’s missions may be rather more directly aligned than initially seems the case.

If you enjoyed The Machine Girl, then this should be right up your arterial alley, as it has much the same gleeful, fire-hose approach to the carnage, at times literally painting the camera lens red. This isn’t quite as good, mostly because the pacing is off, especially in the first movie, which has too much of Milly wandering about an abandoned factory that serves as the main location. The low-budget is occasionally painfully obvious, particularly for one CGI decapitation which is less convincing than any latex head could ever be. The overall plot is also just a bit too close to Kill Bill for its own good,

The pacing is less of a problem in Bloody Battle, where the post-apocalyptic world is more fully drawn, and the production values seem to be significantly higher. The addition of Haru provides something of a mirror in which Milly can see herself – there’s an interesting question raised as to whether her revenge may be an artificial construct, and the villains are also given a bit more depth. However, you will not be watching these for subtle characterization, and Mizuno acquits herself admirably as an action actress in both installments, showing solid martial-arts and swordplay skills. While unquestionably not for the faint of heart, there’s energy and inventiveness to spare, and it’s certainly unlike anything coming out of the West.

Dir: Takanori Tsujimoto
Stars: Miki Mizuno, Nao Nagasawa, Mitsuki Koga, Kazuki Tsujimoto

The Smoking Gun Sisterhood, by Thad Brown

  By

★★★★
“Admiring and respectful celebrations of gun-packing women as kick-butt heroines, for readers of both genders who appreciate heroines of this type.”

Art by Rich Smedley

The rise of self-publishing has provided an opportunity for authors to distribute their product directly to the public – it’s no longer necessary to have a contract or even a publishing house. This is, frankly, a double-edged sword: just because you can write a book, doesn’t mean you should write a book. But it also offers a better chance to reach the public for niche publications like this, a short-story collection which falls squarely into our wheelhouse, featuring a wide range of action heroines [and at least one action villainess]. Some of the ten titles might help to give you a fairly good idea of what to expect: Biker Angel; Cops and Robbers; Sisters, Dark and Light.

It has a certain throwback ambiance, feeling at times like you’re reading a collection from the sixties than a modern publication. That’s not a criticism, just an observation, and might be partly because the sexual angles present in some stories are far more hinted at than explicit, and partly because there a square-jawed and certain morality present, largely without shades of grey. Brown has a nicely cinematic tone to his writing – it’s very easy to visualize proceedings in my mind’s eye as they unfolded, and the three entries mentioned above would all have potential as movies. My favorite was probably Sisters, Dark and Light, which pits an FBI agent against a kidnapper whose sadistic streak is frankly disturbing. I also enjoyed the two Capta and the Cop stories, set in the same universe, yet heading in opposite directions.

Perhaps my main criticism is a couple of the stories feel in need of expansion, almost like they were trailers more than features, albeit for movies that I’d still want to say. I did notice a few typos, though any regular readers here will know I’m hardly anyone to complain, and the packaging is too bland – it’s the kind of collection that is crying out for a pulp-styled illustration on the front. Otherwise, it certainly comes recommended to action heroine fans. There’s plenty of variety in scenarios, and even the least of the tales is still fun to read. I think the overall attitude of the stories is what makes them work: it’s the author who described them with the quote in the ‘brief’ section of the header. Having read the book, I’d say it’s perhaps a little po-faced (they’re more entertaining than that makes them sound!), but it’s not far from the mark. If you enjoy this site, I think you’ll get a kick out of these tales.

Update: August 2010. Thad tells me there is now a new edition, which has all the typos corrected, as well as having page numbers, a table of contents, and even has the messed-up line breaks in the preface fixed. He adds, “I wasn’t able to do a cover with a pulp-style illustration that you said it cried out for; I’d wanted to import Rich’s biker picture that inspired “Biker Angel,” but Lulu’s software just wouldn’t cooperate! I did install a different cover image, a smoking revolver on a russet -sort of dried-blood-colored-background, which I thought was pretty cool.”

Update: December 2013. After one regular publishing deal fell through, the last I heard from Thad was that the collection “has now been accepted for publication by Pro Se Productions” and “should be available for purchase in both paperback and e-book formats sometime around mid-2013.” Checking their site, no sign at this point.

Update: April 2014. A little delayed, but we’re delighted to announce the book is now available through Amazon. You may recognize the quote. :)

Update: November 2014. It’s now available in e-form on Kindle, for only $2.99!

[The opening of one of the stories, Cops and Robbers, can be found here, as a taster for the book.