Teenage Caveman (2002)

Larry Clark (Kids) gives us a futuristic tale that bears little resemblance to Roger Corman’s 1958 Teenage Caveman. The world has been ravaged by disease and the survivors live a crude existence in caves, shunning technology and being told that, “God is coming and he’s pissed”. A group of teens abandon their tribe and discover the ruins of a city with two survivors living a hedonistic lifestyle complete with everything the teens have ever read about (mostly in Penthouse). But these two aren’t what they seem. Clark loves filming naked young people having sex, and he does it again here, until deciding he wants to make an eighties style splatter film complete with a Toxic Avenger looking monster. That would be okay if the film made sense, but it doesn’t, including cave dwellers knowing how to operate computers and fire guns. Still, if you want trash, it doesn’t come much trashier than this.

This has nothing to do with the movie, but I thought you might enjoy this "historically accurate" picture of cavewomen

Teenage Hooker Became Killing Machine in Daehakroh (2000)

A Korean movie where the title says it all. An odd film, with an odd soundtrack, and an even odder ending.

Outpost (2008)

There has never been a more vile and vicious villain in the movies, or real life, than the Nazis. The Bunker meets Shock Waves meets Dog Soldiers as a team of mercenaries search for WW2 German technology in an old bunker. Inside they find a strange, deranged survivor, and then find themselves fighting for their lives as the results of the experiments reappear. This is a tense, suspenseful, violent film that has, thankfully, a satisfying ending.

Nazi zombies or zombie Nazis, either makes for great viewing.

Post-apocalyptic futures

The world economy is collapsing, the polar ice caps are melting, Madonna is undertaking another tour, and New Kids On The Block have a new album. Satan has truly taken human form and is now walking the Earth. The end is nigh, but perhaps, not nigh enough. And that makes us wonder, what are our possible futures?

Hell Comes To Frogtown (1987)
In a ravaged, future earth, Roddy Piper (a Canadian Scottish wrestler) is potent, and the government wants him to impregnate some fertile women held captive by frog people. Girls and guns and people in bad masks. It is as gloriously mad as it sounds.

A Boy And His Dog (1974)
Vic (Don Johnson from Miami Vice in pre-pastel colours) roams the future wasteland with his telepathic dog Blood (the always versatile Tiger from the Brady Bunch) looking for food and women. This prediction of the world, courtesy of Harlan Ellison, would be later recycled for Mad Max. An interesting premise with a killer ending.

1990 The Bronx Warriors (1982)
New York’s Northernmost borough, the Bronx, is a gang controlled No Man’s Land ( not a bad prediction as far as these things go ) where Hammer (Vic Morrow) is sent to rescue a poor little rich girl. Kind of like the Born Losers meets Escape From New York, but funnier... and Italian.

Southland Tales (2006)

Long, confusing, self-indulgent, and dull post-apocalyptic, time travel story by the writer and director of Donny Darko, Richard Kelly. Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson,as an amnesiac movie star,and Sarah Michelle Gellar,as a self promoting porn star,can do nothing to save this film. Bring on the end of the world we say, it will undoubtedly be less painful than sitting through this again.

George A Romero

Dead and Deader (2006)

This is just what I was looking for, a break from serious, and lame, zombie movies. US soldier Dean Cain (Lois and Clark) is shipped home from combat in a body bag, but wakes up during his autopsy. His body may be dead, but his mind is alive. That can’t be said for the rest of his troops who have also come back from the dead and are looking for flesh. Plenty of blood, action, and jokes. This is the best zombie comedy (zomcom) since Return Of The Living Dead.

9 Songs

Rambo (aka Rambo IV)

It’s a fukken bloodbath.

The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior

This is the prequel to The Scorpion King, which was prequel to The Mummy Returns, which was a sequel to The Mummy. It is also direct to video and lacks the budget to afford an ex-wrestler (eg Dwayne ‘the Rock’ Johnson who was The Scorpion King) and, instead, relies on the UFC to supply someone cheaper as the big bad.

The story follows pretty boy Mathayus (Michael Copon from Power Rangers: Time Force) as he trains and plots to avenge the death of his father at the hands of Sargon (Randy Couture and his cauliflower ears). Helping him are the equally pretty Layla (Karen David) and a very knowledgeable Greek poet, Aristophanes (Simon Quarterman). The trio also manage to pick up a disposable band of mercenaries and a travelling Chinese acrobat. The story is based around Greek myths and reminded me of Jason and the Argonauts. The group fight a Minotaur (a guy in a rubber suit worthy of the Power Rangers), travel to the Underworld, fight the evil goddess Astarte, steal the Sword of Damocles, and finally fight a giant, invisible CGI scorpion (I kid you not).

This film is terrible, but noone in it seems to care, and I didn’t either. It was a lot more fun to watch than most other serious adventure films. And a lot more fun than pretentious bore quests like Lord of The Rings. The best line comes from Aristophanes in the DVD extras – “By the testicles of Zeus, it’s a giant scorpion”.

Travel Advice

The Department of Foreign Affairs is a bit slack when it comes to useful travel advice. Do they warn you about the hazards of walking the forests of Transylvania? Backpacking in Croatia? No, no they don’t.

Forget Rough Guides (who wants to travel roughly?) and forget Lonely Planet (if you’re lonely, there’s a reason buddy), we take all our travel advice from the movies. All we really need to know about Europe we learnt from Eurotrip and Hostel ... Here’s what else we have learnt.

TURISTAS (2006)
Brazil has beautiful beaches, beautiful women, and people who want to cut out your organs to sell on the black-market. It’s a completely by-the-numbers film that plays better as a travel warning for tourists than a horror film.

WRESTLEMANIAC (2006) (EL MASCARADO MASSACRE)
Mexico was so desperate to win an Olympic gold medal in wrestling, its surgeons pieced together a super wrestler (Rey Mysterio Sr). El Mascarado went insane and preys on visitors to his ghost town, in this case a bunch of Americans there to shoot a porno (why else?) What’s not to love about a psychotic masked wrestler who keeps the faces of his victims on the walls?

WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE (2007)
Apparently there are cannibals in the mountains of New Guinea. This is yet another movie based on footage from the characters’ video camera and, like the others, is dreadful in every way (except for Sandy Gardiner in a bikini). I could make a better film on my mobile phone, and have...although my girlfriend at the time was less than impressed when she found it.

BIG BAD WOLF (2006)
Cabins in the forests of America are never safe (Evil Dead, Cabin Fever, etc). This time, six horny teens are attacked by a werewolf. With a surprising lack of cliches and a clever script, this is a different kind of werewolf – one who suggests cast members go “back to the cabin for a spot of bestiality”.

Librarian 2: Return to King Solomon’s Mines

It’s possible that Librarian 2 is even better than the original. Noah Wyle is not just a librarian for the Metropolitan Public Library, he also recovers lost historical and magical artefacts for the head librarian (Bob Newhart). This time, Wyle is teamed with Gabrielle Anwar, who is better than him in every way, to search for King Solomon’s Mines. This is the film that Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull wants to be. It’s made for TV and shows that you don't need a big budget to make a good film. What you do need is a good script, a talented cast, and a sense of fun.

Clint Eastwood

Missionary Man

Dolph Lundgren goes all Clint Eastwood as a nameless stranger who rides in town (but on a motorcycle not a horse) with a gun and a bible to deal out justice. If you haven’t seen Pale Rider, or any similar themed movie, then you might enjoy this Dolph directed, Dolph written, Dolph starring film, although I doubt it. I was bored. Throwing in some Native Americans and their social issues does little to add to the film’s interest level. I used to like Dolph, but when he was hunky...

Diamond Dogs

Dolph Lundgren plays an ex-Green Beret Captain who now lives in Inner Mongolia because the liquor is cheap, the laws are loose, and the women are willing. That might be great for him but for us, the film is cheap, the logic is loose, and the fight scenes are appalling. The fight scenes here are almost as bad as Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible 2 or Matt Damon in the Bourne Ultimatum. It’s particularly sad because, unlike those other actors, Dolph can fight. This whole film is bad, woefully bad, and yet I couldn’t stop watching it.

Dolph used to be good fun in films, maybe not as He-Man in Masters of the Universe, but certainly as the evil Russian in Rocky IV or the evil Russian in Red Scorpion. Of course the role of Russian action star has since been taken over by Russia’s Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin. But Dolph was even good when not playing an evil Russian in Dark Angel, The Punisher, Showdown in Little Tokyo, Universal Soldier, and The Minion. Dolph is perhaps the greatest Swedish export ever, even greater than IKEA. It’s sad that he has been reduced to making films that aren’t worthy of his presence. As you can see from the pictures, Dolph has come a long way in his career.

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th Dimension

In 1984 I first saw Buckaroo Banzai and found it manic and confusing and totally amazing (I think the title prepares you for that sort of film). Buckaroo Banzai was a modern day Doc Savage. I had to watch the film again before I could fully understand it. It became a cult film, and rightly so. Crazy ideas, great sets, props and direction, and a brilliant cast – Peter Weller, John Lithgow (preparing for his role in Third Rock From the Sun), Jeff Goldblum, Ellen Barkin, and Christopher Lloyd (preparing for his role in Back to the Future).

Banzai (Weller) uses his Oscillation Overthruster (not to be confused with a Flux Capacitor) to break through to the 8th dimension. When Lord John Whorfin (Lithgow, who seems to have been instructed to overact as much as possible) hears this he plans to return himself and the rest of the Red Lectroids (quite a collection of actors later known for playing oddballs), who have been banished to New Jersey since 1938, back to Planet 10 to try, once again, to take control. The Black Lectroids (who look and sound like they are from Jamaica) appear in space and threaten to start World War 3 if the Red Lectroids aren’t stopped. It’s up to Buckaroo Banzai and the Hong Kong Cavaliers to save the day.

In 2008 the film didn’t seem as manic or complex, but it is still brilliant piece of work and has the most amazing eighties fashion. It’s a bit like music from that era, what seemed crazy then seems not so crazy now, but the fashion is still wild. There should have been a sequel, or a series films, to provide the thinking person an alternative to Indiana Jones. They do tease a sequel at the end of the movie, Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League, but it, sadly, never happened.

Casper