Tag: spoof

Sheroes

  By

★★★
“Zeroes to sheroes.”

Twenty minutes into this, I was certain I had made a terrible mistake. These four young women were among the most grating and unpleasant characters I’d seen in a movie. I’m talking actively awful: crass, shallow and entitled. They head off to Thailand for a girls’ getaway on a private jet owned by the father of Diamond (Luss), a film producer. By the time they land, check out their mansion and enjoy the local sights, I was ready to set up the guillotines. Then there’s a luggage mix-up, leaving them with a large quantity of Thai cartel coke, and one of their number is kidnapped, in order to coerce them into returning the goods.

Which is where something unexpected happened. The film became… Well, “good” might be a stretch – plausibility is not the script’s strong suit. But it became considerably more entertaining, that’s for certain. Diamond turns out to have hidden depths, and coaches skater girl Ryder (Day) and actress Ezra (Fuhrman) on what they’re going to do to get their friend Daisy (Skai Jackson) back. They have some help from the mysterious Jasper (Kesy), but they’re mostly reliant on their own skills, at least until the very end. It also nods to other films in an occasionally meta way. For instance, Diamond coaches Ezra to deliver Liam Neeson’s classic Taken speech to the kidnappers. It’s particularly funny, because that was written by Luc Besson, and Luss is best known as the star of Anna… directed by Besson.

She is really the glue that holds the film together for the bulk of the running-time, coming over as both smart and capable, and I’d watch her in a franchise. You do have to suspend disbelief in quite a few places, e.g. the trio are capable of using a 3D printer to create a mask which Ezra uses to impersonate someone. [It was a stretch in Mission: Impossible, with all the resources of the IMF] Or Ryder being capable of taking down a trained mixed martial-arts fighter, who’s probably a hundred pounds heavier. Then there’s the final battle, where they take out an entire camp of Thai drug-runners. Yeah: this whole film might as well be titled “I’m so sure…”

Yet, I was able to put that aside, and found myself, surprisingly, being adequately entertained. There’s a lot of value wrung out from the exotic locations, while the cinematography is crisp and well-executed. And let’s be honest, the heroines are easy on the eye and spent more time than is strictly necessary in bikinis. The R-rating seems largely a result of bad language and drug use. I’d like to have seen it embraced in the action elements as well, which could have been more hard-hitting. But as a frothy concoction, this feels as if it is going down a similar line as something like DOA: Dead or Alive. Not quite as good – yet considering how very low my opinion was at the beginning, recovering to a three-star rating is impressive. 

Dir: Jordan Gertner
Star: Sasha Luss, Isabelle Fuhrman, Wallis Day, Jack Kesy

El Monstro del Mar!

  By

★★★
“Catch of the day.”

I could have sworn I’ve seen this before, but a search of the reviews suggest otherwise! This is an Australian pastiche of a couple of different things. Perhaps the most obvious influence is Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, in that it’s the road misadventures of a trio of delinquent women – two brunettes and a blonde. The leader, Beretta (Scarlet) looks something like a cross between Tura Satana and Bettie Page. We’re less than ten minutes in before their psychopathic nature is revealed, in the brutal killing of two men who stop to offer them roadside assistance – I did like the way the film, shot in black-and-white to that point, explodes into full colour when the violence starts.

They turn out to be hitwomen, hiding out in a beachfront house after completing their latest job, where they cross paths with – further nods to Pussycat – a grumpy old misogynist in a wheelchair, and an innocent young girl, Hannah (Capri). But where it diverges significantly from the Russ Meyer classic is… Well, as you’d expect from the title, the presence of a sea-monster, whose hunger has been impacting the town for decades (including Hannah’s parents).. Yeah, I don’t remember one of them in Pussycat. Then again, that did take place in the desert. It doesn’t actually get any screen time until the half-way point, and the film is quite chat-heavy to that point, save one blood-drenched flashback sequence.

While it’s undeniably a low-budget creature across the board, the atmosphere, assisted by some good use of filters and colour in general, has a Lovecraftian feel to it that was unexpected and well executed. In the second half, there is an increasingly gloomy and oppressive feeling, as the trio stumble across a series of body parts, eventually losing one of their own to the monster, while Hannah rebels against her grandfather. Inevitably, it all ends in the surviving duo taking the fight to the monster and its many tentacles, assisted by Hannah, after they learn the truth about what has been going on. It’s a very moist battle, with body fluids flying on both sides, though I was a bit disappointed we never get to appreciate the full scope of the beast.

It does make for a rather awkward combination, with the two halves of the movie never quite meshing. I kept expecting the fact they were hitwomen would show relevance, but it never amounts to anything: they could simply have been tourists on a seaside vacation. The same goes for the apparent wild swings in era; the cars at the start look sixties vintage, but have very eighties cassette players in them. and any period feel is all but discarded on arrival by the water. However, even if the elements here never go together as you feel they should, they work well enough on their own. If you’re in the mood for a genre fondue, which throws everything into the same pot, you could do worse. Scarlet may not quite be Tura Satana, but then – nobody is.

Dir: Stuart Simpson
Star: Nelli Scarlet, Kyrie Capri, Karli Madden, Kate Watts

Marie-Chantal contre le Docteur Kha

  By

★★
“As if Stanley Kubrick had directed a Carry On film.”

I’d probably better start of by explaining the above tagline, Chabrol was one of the leading lights of the French ‘New Wave’ cinema, alongside the likes of Truffaut and Godard: I’ve enjoyed the films of his I’ve seen, mostly later works such as L’Enfer or La Fille coupée en deux. But in the mid-60’s, he basically sold out, churning out a number of light spy spoofs. Regarding another of his works around this time, he said, “I really wanted to get the full extent of the drivel. They were drivel, so OK, lets get into it up to our necks.” It’s easy to see what he meant, for Marie-Chantal is undeniable drivel, though lacks the necessary enthusiasm to overcome those limitations. Through a chance encounter on a train, the titular heroine (Laforet) is given a piece of jewellery by a stranger. That makes her the target for spies from Russia and America, as she travels from the Alps to Morocco, and also the minions of evil overlord Dr. Kha (Tamiroff), for it holds the secret to a weapon of potential global destruction, that everyone wants to acquire.

I was hoping for something along the same lines as Modesty Blaise – preferably the books rather than the wan cinematic adaptation which would appear the following year – but this struggled even to reach the low standards of the latter. Marie-Chantal isn’t as dumb as she appears, but for someone who is supposedly a third Dan in martial-arts, she doesn’t exactly put those skills into practice often. Indeed, there’s only one scene which would even qualify as a fight, and it’s more of the Honey West kind. You just get the feeling that Chabrol is not remotely interested in the action side of the genre, only the tropes. Some of the characters are endearingly quirky, not the least of whom is Kha, who can predict what everyone is going to do – except, of course, the mercurial Marie-Chantal. That’s perhaps because she’s not a secret agent, rather someone who just stumbled into the field by accident [this aspect reminded me somewhat of Robert Scheckley’s The Game of X, which was one of my favourite books as a teenager]; as a result, she doesn’t so much not play by the rules, as simply not know them.

It’s lightly-amusing, with some good photography and a nice 60’s sense of style; between the era and its Frenchness, you won’t be surprised to hear that everyone smokes like chimneys, which seems particularly taboo by modern standards. But there simply isn’t enough going on to make this more than marginally entertaining, and the Italian poster image on the right is an early example of false advertising. The ending leaves it open to a sequel which never materialized, so it seems that even the audience of the time were less than impressed, and it can’t be said to have improved with age. Still, commercial cinema’s loss is la nouvelle vague’s gain, I suppose.

Dir: Claude Chabrol
Star: Marie Laforet, Francisco Rabal, Serge Reggiani, Akim Tamiroff

Gladiatress

  By

★★★½
“Not at all what you’d expect.”

I could hear Chris’s eyes rolling when the title came up – I can’t blame her, as the viewing immediately followed Virgin Commandos, whose mere name sent her scurrying off to Facebook poker. This, however, was not the soft-porn flick she anticipated. Instead, it’s a comedy, somewhat spoofing Gladiator, but its closest cousin is likely Carry On Cleo. That said, it’s undeniably gynocentric, with the three heroines about the only competent characters on either side.

It’s set in 55 BC, when Caesar (Vibert) made his first push into Britain. Resistance is led by warrior princess Dwyfuc (Mackichan), but when she is captured by the Romans, it’s up to little sister Worthaboutapig (Phillips) to rescue her. To do so, she must first enlist the support of their estranged sister, the even more warrior-like princess Smirgut the Fierce (Allen). After venturing across the channel (mistaking France for Rome), the trio are re-united only to have to fight undefeated Goth Schlaffwaffe in the arena. And even if they win, there’s still the little matter of the Roman armies, massing for another invasion attempt.

They were also the creators of UK sketch series Smack the Pony, and this is a similar mix of the mundane and surreal. While you do definitely need a particular sense of humour to appreciate this – if you don’t, this could well seem the worst film ever – it hit enough spots for us. Much of it is simply playing against type and expectations, e.g. Smirgut, who really looks like she could kick your ass (above right), and growls as a means of communication – then launches into a discourse on discovering Worthaboutapig is actually happy with her new life as a Roman slave.

The action is undeniably limited, being played more for laughs than excitement – the much-fabled ‘Celtic Kick’, turns out to be not quite what you think. Of course, this being British humour, there are also fart and willie jokes, but works because the characters have foibles and quirks to render them human. Smirgut has lost her inner warrior since motherhood; Dwyfuc is thoroughly unimpressed by the men available to her, and Worthaboutapig has long-standing self-esteem issues – unsurprisingly, really, given her name. The results are heroines who are likeable, as well as being brave and resourceful. I found the results very refreshing, with better-drawn characters than many bigger budget movies. That was definitely not what we expected from this.

Dir: Brian Grant
Star: Sally Phillips, Fiona Allen, Doon Mackichan, Ronan Vibert

D.E.B.S.

  By

★★
“Teenage lesbians! With guns! How could they go wrong? Well…read on.”

As Kim Possible proves, there’s certainly scope for a high-school action heroine who has to save the world from evil. Unfortunately, here, the potential largely gurgles down the plughole, in favour of a smug, self-satisfied romantic comedy, that manages to be as bland as a film about teenage lesbians could be. Amy Bradshaw (Foster) gets a perfect score on the test hidden within the SAT, and is recruited into a spy academy; there, with her classmates (Good, Ritchie and the always amusing Devon Aoki), she carries out secret missions, wears plaid skirts and agonises over her relationship with her boyfriend.

So far, so good. Then, by unlikely plotting, she meets and falls for evil mastermind, Lucy Diamond (Brewster), and decides to quit school for Lucy. But does the road of true love ever run smooth? This, unfortunately, is where the film goes off the rails entirely. While I’ve no problems with homosexual love stories – okay, especially where the protagonists are cute and female – Robinson abandons wit for a series of cliches, causing nothing but slow boredom. Originally a ten-minute short, it doesn’t appear any additional ideas went into the script, meaning it’s good for about ten minutes of fun. Logic is all but non-existent, even in the “ironic” D.E.B.S. world: for example, the teachers can teleport around, but at the end, are unable to get past a locked door.

The action isn’t too bad initially, with a sprightly shootout in a restaurant. However, that’s your lot, save the “daring” lesbian angle. Though, being mainstream cinema, it’s just a couple of clothes-on kisses, and bad, unconvincing romance is no fun, regardless of a character’s orientation. This aspect is so po-faced and politically correct – it is, clearly, supposed to be taken Very Seriously – that proceedings come to a grinding halt, while what appears to be the director’s iPod on shuffle plays as a witless soundtrack. Look! An Erasure song! How appropriate! ‘Cos, y’know, they’re gay. Kill me. Kill me now. Then bring me a copy of Naked Killer.

Dir: Angela Robinson
Star: Sara Foster, Jordana Brewster, Meagan Good, Jill Ritchie

Kim Possible: A Sitch in Time

  By

★★★★
“Somewhere between Alias, Buffy and The Powerpuff Girls lurks Kim…”

“I’m working with a man named Monkey Fist. My evil career is so in the toilet!” Thus complains one villain in the first Kim Possible movie, a relentless barrage of sight gags and dry humour likely to amuse those of any age, whether regular viewers or not. We probably fall into the latter category, having a natural aversion to the Disney Channel [if you’ve seen the Lilo & Stich series, you’ll understand], but KP is a show likely to pause our channel surfing. Kim is a teenage girl who spends more time saving the world from a range of bizarre bad guys and gals, than the usual pursuits involving the bathroom, phone or mall (if our daughter is anything to go by). Her parents are remarkably cool about these extra-curricular activities. In this edition, the bad guys team up to grab a time-travel device and alter the future so they can rule the world. It’s up to Kim and friends to restore things. [Should mention the title is as given, “sitch” being Kim-speak for situation, as in “What’s the sitch?”]

It does remain a Disney show, hence the irritating musical interludes and, while the action is fast and furious, no-one ever gets hurt – though the sequence where a naked mole-rat comes out of a kid’s trousers is frankly freaky. But assisted by a stellar supporting cast (Elliott Gould, Michael Dorn, Dakota Fanning, Michael Clarke Duncan, Vivica A. Fox and – slightly less stellar – Freddie Prinze Jr.), this is a great parody of the whole genre: as one character says, “Time travel – it’s a cornucopia of disturbing concepts.” The tongue-in-cheek self-awareness is a delight, both heroes and villains having a refreshingly world-weary attitude, cheerfully admitting the paradoxes inherent in the story. Even an evil, golfing, kilt-wearing Scot comes over as endearing rather than insulting – Mike Myers, please note. The expected fluff blends with some surprisingly dark moments, such as the “Re-education Center” which seems right out of 1984. This is what the Tomb Raider movies should have been like.

Dir: Steve Loter
Star: Christy Carlson Romano, Will Friedle, Richard Gilliland, Nicole Sullivan

Bikini Bandits: Freeze, Motherfu***rs!

  By

★★½
“More is less. Much less.”

Bandits started as a hugely popular short – confusingly, titled Episode 7 – on Atomfilms.com. Its success led Grasse to churn out a number of extremely loosely-connected ‘sequels’ (also on this DVD), as well as 50-minute feature (sold separately) The Bikini Bandits Experience, featuring the late Dee Dee Ramone and Corey Feldman. The basic idea is grand, and is established in the original short, where bikini-clad, gun-toting babes rob a convenience store (which stocks some beautifully surreal imaginary products, not the least of which is ‘Beef Flaps’), kidnap a clerk, and lasciviously kill him. It is politically incorrect on almost every conceivable level, and on its own, is an undeniable guilty pleasure of the highest level.

Unfortunately, the rest of the series is no more than a sequence of tired rehashes, shuffling the Bandits into other settings (the desert, an Amish community, 1776), and there is no sense of development, progression or innovation at all. What was initially trashy fun becomes pointless through repetition – the final entry, Bikini Bandits Under the Big Top is just woeful. Grasse’s lurid directional style, which also packed a wallop for the first five-minute chunk, is one-note to the point of inducing a headache – I dread to think what the long version of Experience would do. It may be unique, but it’s still sad to see such a fine concept flushed down the tubes so relentlessly. And yes, that’s exactly how the title appears on the sleeve.

Dir: Steve Grasse
Star: Heather McDonnell, Heather-Victoria Ray, Cynthia Diaz, Betty San Luis

Fathom

  By

★★★
“Credits includes “Parachute jump suits for Miss Welch by…” ‘Nuff said.”

Released five years before Jennifer Garner was even born, there are some odd similarities between this 1960’s time-capsule and Alias:

  • A girl is plucked to work as a secret agent…
  • …for a group that may not be all it seems…
  • …and is tasked with a perilous mission…
  • …which involves exotic gadgets…
  • …not to mention running around a lot…
  • …in a variety of interesting costumes.

Hmmm.

After an excruciating opening sequence, with what feels like a real-time jump from 30,000 feet, parachuting dental hygienist (!) Fathom Harvill (!!) is recruited by HADES to find a lost nuclear detonator. Which might not be nuclear, or a detonator, and which two other interested parties are also keen to find. The latter aspect is where the film is most entertaining, twisting and turning in its second half like a frantically fruggin’ go-go dancer. There’s also entertainment to be had in seeing a very young Richard Briers: I kept expecting Penelope Keith to peer over the bushes.

Chronologically between Modesty Blaise (with whom it shares a composer and Clive Revill) and Barbarella, its attitude fits there too. To modern eyes, Fathom is very passive, doing little except run; a little karate would have helped. It’s all hugely Sixties, wouldn’t stand the slightest scrutiny, and wobbles precariously near camp – as you’d expect from the original Batman director. The music is excruciatingly easy-listening: at one point, Welch halts it by taking the needle off a record, and I hoped that’d be a running gag. I was disappointed, but just can’t bring myself to dislike any movie with explosive ear-rings.

Dir: Leslie H. Martinson
Star: Racquel Welch, Tony Franciosa, Ronald Fraser, Richard Briers