Made in 1998, just after FACE/OFF, Woo's first American smash hit, BLACKJACK stars Dolph as Jack Devlin, a former U.S. Marshal turned private bodyguard. When his friend Tim (Williamson in a supporting role) is shot while protecting a gorgeous supermodel from a psycho stalker, Devlin comes out of retirement to take over Tim's job and hopefully notch some vigilante justice.

Good grief, could this guy have any more gimmicks? Writer Peter Lance must have been desperate to come up with all this nonsense. Any two of these would be enough for most TV shows, but for crying out loud.

* Due to an accident in which he was attacked with a flash grenade, Dolph has developed a phobia to the color white. When he sees something white, he freaks. Amazingly, the villain figures this out.
* Dolph uses playing cards as an edged weapon. Whether they're specially sharpened cards, we aren't told.
* Dolph's friends are killed in an accident, and their precocious 9-year-old daughter Casey (Murphy) comes to live with him. She has an IQ of 165.
* Dolph has a, er, friend or something named Thomas (Rubinek). He's Italian, has only one eye, cooks Dolph's meals, apparently lives in Dolph's luxury apartment, and gets very jealous when Dolph talks about women. Could Lundgren have been playing TV's first gay action hero?
* Because of his white-o-phobia, Dolph is seeing a shrink (Vernon). She's a sexy woman who smokes cigars and has an obvious attraction to him. He calls her whenever he's busy and needs someone to pick Casey up at school. And she does it.

At least the action scenes are badass. The first one finds Dolph killing about twenty dudes invading the mansion where Casey and her parents live. The highlight finds Dolph leaping off the balcony of the exploding house, landing on a trampoline, bouncing in the air, turning, shooting two pistols at a bunch of bad guys, and bouncing into the pool. Later, he has a big fight with the main heavy in a milk factory. What a coincidence, considering that whole white thing.

At a heavy 112 minutes, BLACKJACK is too long to have been a TV-movie, so much footage must have been added later. It doesn't need the padding and would play better with several scenes missing. BLACKJACK isn't a success, but the novelty of Dolph Lundgren in a John Woo movie is of some interest. It's too bad they haven't worked again since, but if Woo keeps making bombs like WINDTALKERS, he'll be swimming in the pool of direct-to-video soon, which is Dolph's stomping ground.

BLACULA (1972)--Directed by William Crain. Stars William Marshall, Thalmus Rasulala, Denise Nicholas, Vonetta McGee, Gordon Pinsent, Charles Macauley. The most famous mixture of horror and blaxploitation benefits heavily from a catchy title and William Marshall’s marvelous, dignified performance as 18th-century African prince Mamuwalde. 150 years after he was cursed by Count Dracula (Macauley) and imprisoned in the Count’s catacombs, two stereotypically swishy interior decorators inadvertently bring Mamuwalde to Los Angeles and free him from his coffin. Between neck-bitings and frantic chase scenes, Mamuwalde meets the reincarnation of his long-dead wife (McGee in a dual role), transforms into an (animated) bat, and is successfully stalked by suave scientist Rasulala and skeptical cop Pinsent.

Crain was extremely young when he directed BLACULA and certainly one of the few black directors working in the horror genre. His inexperience shows in the pacing and some clunky camera placements, but he really got a huge break from Marshall, who dominates the picture with his regal bearing and sympathetic performance. Likewise, the handsome Rasulala is a formidable foe, and I think it’s an interesting touch that his character catches on to the reality of a real live vampire stalking L.A. long before most movie heroes would in the same situation.

AIP made good coin with this low-budget meller that spawned a sequel, SCREAM, BLACULA, SCREAM, a year later and inspired imitators like BLACKENSTEIN and DR. BLACK AND MR. HYDE. Ketty Lester, Elisha Cook Jr. (as a coroner with a hook hand), and Ji-Tu Cumbuka (as a character named Big Skillet!) also star. Gene Page composed the funky score, and the Hues Corporation (which later went to #1 with “Rock the Boat”) perform. Interesting animated titles by Sandy Dvore. Samuel Z. Arkoff was the executive producer. Produced by Joseph T. Naar, who later gave us STARSKY & HUTCH.

BLADE (1998)--Directed by Stephen Norrington. Stars Wesley Snipes, Kris Kristofferson, Stephen Dorff. OK comic-book movie based upon characters created by Marv Wolfman (who sued New Line over use of his creation) and Gene Colan for Marvel in the early '70s. Snipes is Blade, a taciturn vampire hunter who teams up with his mentor Whistler (Kristofferson) to battle the bloodsuckers. Blade is half-vampire himself, since his mother was bitten by one just prior to giving birth. Dorff is the main bad guy, who rebels against the vampire establishment (!), which seems to consist of Euro-trash guys in fancy suits sitting around a large conference room taking their time about dominating the world. Snipes looks the part and delivers in the action department, but character development is not the films strong suit. Theres' plenty of blood and martial-arts battles for gorehounds, but I thought many of the CGI effects were lame. Also with Udo Kier, Donal Logue and Traci Lords.

BLADE II (2002)--Directed by Guillermo Del Toro.  Stars Wesley Snipes, Kris Kristofferson, Leonor Varela, Ron Perlman, Norman Reedus.  The rare sequel that eclipses the original, BLADE II is an energetic and surprisingly bloody comic book movie from the Spanish director of THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE and MIMIC.  Two years after his mentor Whistler (Kristofferson) was kidnapped (we thought he was killed in BLADE, but, hey, comic book fans know that if you don't actually find a body...), vampire hunter Blade (Snipes) has found a new partner-teenaged slacker/computer expert Scud (Reedus).  Blade is a rare human/vampire hybrid, born just minutes after his mother was bitten by a vamp (she died in childbirth).  This means he has all the powers and strength of a vampire, but none of the weakness (sunlight doesn't affect him, for instance).  After rescuing Whistler in an effective pre-credit sequence, which does an excellent job of recapping the first film and establishing the main characters, Blade discovers his new mission:  to team up with his enemies to vanquish a new breed of vampire called the Reapers.  Forging an uneasy alliance with vampire "princess" Nyssa (Varela) and the "Bloodpack", a specially trained commando unit of vampires created specifically to destroy Blade, our shades-wearing hero and his mismatched sidekicks plunge into the seedy Prague nightlife, bickering with each other and using up a lot of bullets.

BLADE II is a lot of fun.  It's loud, violent, very stylish, and filled with almost wall-to-wall fight scenes.  It's also a great test of Snipes' charisma-Blade takes "strong and silent type" to new heights, but Snipes manages to lighten the mood with a few one-liners, and he really is a terrific "poser", looking like he stepped right out of a Marvel Comics panel.  The fight choreography is fast and furious, although much of it is too "videogame-y" (Del Toro often substitutes CGI "fighters" in place of actors and stuntmen).  Kristofferson practically steals the film as the grizzled old wisecracker he usually plays at this point in his career, and Perlman both looks and talks tough as the Bloodpack's leader.  Also with Donnie Yen, Thomas Kretchmann, Luke Goss and Das Crawford.  Marco Beltrami's score is loud, if not stylish, but the bad metal songs that populate the soundtrack often drown it out.  The exotic, Chilean-born Varela (CLEOPATRA) promoted the film with a stirring cover feature in MAXIM.  Snipes receives an executive producer credit, as do legendary Marvel publisher Stan Lee and Marvel Films' exec Avi Arad.  Writer Marv Wolfman, who sued New Line Cinema and Marvel over ownership of the character after the first movie came out (he lost), created the character of Blade in the pages of Marvel's TOMB OF DRACULA comic.  TOD artist Gene Colan also receives a "based on characters created by" credit, although Wolfman claimed he was Blade's sole creator.  I'd just as soon see a TOD movie than a BLADE III.

BLADE RUNNER (1982)--Directed by Ridley Scott.  Stars Harrison Ford, Sean Young, Rutger Hauer.  I didn’t think much of the original version when I saw it on home video in 1984, and now that I’ve seen the more recent “Director’s Cut,” which removes Ford’s confusing, dull narration (among other changes), I can’t really say I’m any more impressed.  Syd Mead’s production design is obviously sublime, and I like the visual effects and the look of the futuristic vehicles, but Hampton Fancher and David Webb Peoples’ nothing story (complete with obvious plotholes) can’t be overlooked so easily.  BLADE RUNNER is easily one of the most influential films of its era.  Its portrayal of Los Angeles in the year 2019 as an overcrowded, dark, dreary, rainy city filled with art-deco architecture and a seedy populace set the precedent for dozens of future-set SF movies.  I can’t get past some of the stiff performances, particularly Young’s robotic (pardon the pun) spin as a “replicant” garbed like Veronica Lake, or the turgid pacing.  Ford plays a “blade runner” (the term is unexplained), a bounty hunter who tracks down renegade androids (called “replicants”), this time a nasty bunch led by Roy Batty (a good Hauer).  Also with Brion James, Edward James Olmos, Daryl Hannah, Joanna Cassidy, William Sanderson, M. Emmet Walsh and Joe Turkel.  Music by Vangelis.  I liked the novel Fancher and Peoples adapted, Philip K. Dick’s DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?, when I read it in high school.

THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT (1999)--Directed by Daniel Myrick & Eduardo Sanchez. Stars Heather Donahue, Michael Williams, Joshua Leonard. Actor Darren McGavin once said, of his classic (though short-lived) '70s TV series KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER: "It's...frightening if the lights suddenly go out in the house and something starts scratching at the door and you don't know what the hell it is. You open the door and there's nothing there. You shut the door and pretty soon it starts again. Now that's scary." Although the conventions of network television forced McGavin to water down the horror elements of KOLCHAK, I've never forgotten that quote, even twenty years after I first read it.

I've thought about it a lot recently, with Hollywood kicking out one shallow and dull special effects extravaganza after another. Just because one has the technology to do or show something using visual or CGI effects doesn't mean one should. One of the most terrifying films ever made features absolutely zero special effects, no gore (except for one minor, though effective, shot), no happy ending, and breaks nearly every standard Hollywood rule for commercial filmmaking. It's not giving away anything to say there's no happy ending, as THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT opens with a card stating: "In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland while shooting a documentary. A year later their footage was found."

After this ominous initiation, we are introduced to our main characters: bossy, self-assured director Heather (Donahue), laconic hippie cameraman Josh (Leonard) and average-guy soundman Mike (Williams). Setting off to Burkittsville to film a documentary about an urban legend known as the Blair Witch, who has allegedly murdered dozens of people (including children) in the Maryland woods for centuries, the young filmmakers dawdle around town for a while, interviewing the locals, filming the graves of some of the Blair Witchs victims, and even mocking some of the scary stories. The terror really begins to mount when they hike into the woods for a couple of days to shoot footage. But they run across some really creepy rock monuments and twig figures. Then they begin to hear strange noises at night. And someone (or something) coats their supplies with some weird slime. And something happens to their map, and they get lost. And begin to fight with one another. And get colder and hungrier and more frightened. Until the truly haunting final shot.

Much of the films impact can be attributed to its strange method of shooting. The actors (whose characters have the same names) shot all the footage themselves using a 16mm film camera and a color camcorder, so all the footage we see is from the first-person perspective. Donahue, Williams and Leonard improvised their dialogue while camping out for real for eight days and nights, while writer-directors Myrick and Sanchez set traps for them at night, and left notes for them in baskets telling them which direction to hike next. The actors deliver strong performances, with Donahue in particular a name I wouldn't mind hearing bandied about around Academy Award nomination time. A scene in which she films what amounts to a goodbye to her mother is perhaps the most heart-wrenching you've ever seen.

THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT is an original, striking and soon-to-be-classic horror film, which grows on me more and more as I think about it. The audience with whom I saw it sat transfixed from beginning to end; it seemed as though you could hear their collective heartbeats during the climax. Even as I sit here writing this review, I'm a little nervous about noises outside, and may not sleep well tonight. When is the last time a horror movie affected you this way?

BLAME IT ON RIO (1984)--Directed by Stanley Donen. Stars Michael Caine, Joseph Bologna, Michelle Johnson, Demi Moore, Valerie Harper. The first slapstick farce about statutory rape. Caine and Bologna are best pals who take their teenaged daughters (Johnson, Moore) on vacation with them. Johnson seduces Caine, which makes for many so-called wacky situations. Pretty uncomfortable to watch, despite some eye-popping topless scenes involving Johnson and Moore. A remake of a French film. Script by Charlie Peters. From the director of SINGING IN THE RAIN!

BLAST (2005)—Directed by Anthony Hickox.  Stars Eddie Griffin, Breckin Meyer, Vivica A. Fox, Vinnie Jones.  Whose idea was it to cast skinny funnyman Griffin and charisma-challenged TV actor Meyer in a buddy action movie?  Probably the same person who hired DIE HARD scribe Steven de Souza to pen a duplicate of that classic action flick, but set on an oil rig off the Pacific coast.  Tugboat captain Dixon (Griffin) is the odd man out when an armed gang led by environmental terrorist Kittridge (Jones) invades the rig and locks all the hostages, including Dixon’s adopted white son, down below.  While FBI agent Reed (Fox) negotiates from the mainland, Dixon ends up roaming around the rig, making wisecracks and cracking bad guys in the face, and teaming up with Jamal (Meyer), a cyberthief originally in cahoots with Kittridge.  Hickox’s jittery camera captures all the gunfire and goofing off, but the director is greatly let down by his visual effects crew (when will filmmakers learn that crummy CGI is not going to make your $20 million movie look like a $120 million movie?), de Souza’s derivative screenplay, and the wimpy leads, who are never believable performing the stunts and fights (even though Griffin was very good parodying this type of material in UNDERCOVER BROTHER).  MY NAME IS EARL hottie Nadine Velazquez, Shaggy, Tiny Lister and Hannes Jaenicke (the latter two are dubbed) also star.  Filmed in South Africa.

BLASTFIGHTER (1984)—Directed by Lamberto Bava.  Stars Michael Sopkiw, Valentina Forte, George Eastman, Stefano Mingardo.  I was as surprised as you to discover this Italian production is not science fiction, but a FIRST BLOOD ripoff shot in the Georgia woods.  It’s a typically crazy spaghetti actioner filled with weird dialogue and outrageous stunts.  Ex-cop Tiger Sharp (American model Sopkiw) returns to his rural hometown after serving eight years for killing his wife’s murderer.  He wants to be left alone, but poachers led by the punk younger brother (Mingardo) of his childhood pal Eastman keep messing with him, including slitting the throat of his pet doe.  When Eastman opts to take Mingardo’s side after his brother’s bloodlust escalates to killing humans, Tiger goes batshit on every redneck in town, blowing them away with his special gun that fires bullets, rockets, darts, grenades…pretty much anything you can think of, this baby shoots.  In no way dull, BLASTFIGHTER is best watched with a group of friends eager to laugh at the movie’s absurdities.

BLAZING SADDLES (1974)--Directed by Mel Brooks. Stars Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Harvey Korman, Mel Brooks, Madeline Kahn. Along with YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN, which came out the same year, Brooks's best film. The residents of a small Western village are shocked to find their new sheriff (Little) is a black man. Little teams up with dipsomaniac ex-gunfighter Wilder to stop the evil plans of Hedley Lamarr (Korman). The jokes and sight gags come one after the other, and most are right on target. One of the few Brooks films in which the scatological humor is funny and not just plain offensive. It's too bad Brooks couldn't think of an ending; the picture falls apart with the arrival of Dom DeLuise. Also with John Hillerman, Alex Karras and Slim Pickens.

BLAZING STEWARDESSES (1975)—Directed by Al Adamson.  Stars Yvonne DeCarlo, Bob Livingston, Don “Red” Barry, Connie Hoffman, Regina Carrol, Marilyn Joi, Harry Ritz, Jimmy Ritz, Geoffrey Land.  I wonder what fans of Adamson and producer Sam Sherman’s sex comedy NAUGHTY STEWARDESSES thought when they paid to see the sequel, and, instead of another raunchy romp with lots of nudity, got this old-fashioned homage to ‘30s B-westerns.  The sexy stews, played by Hoffman and Joi (reprising their NAUGHTY roles) and Adamson’s wife Carrol, barely figure into this mishmash, which finds rancher Livingston (also in NAUGHTY) defending his spread from hooded bandits on horseback who keep hijacking the trucks carrying his gambling equipment.  Meanwhile, the geriatric Ritz Brothers perform a few wheezy comedy routines from their old Universal pictures, and Livingston figures into a romantic triangle with madam DeCarlo and his sinister foreman (Barry). 

Middle-aged guys might have gotten a kick out of the picture at the time, despite its relative lack of sex and nudity, because it does capture the spirit of those old movies, right down to the use of Gordon Zahler’s stock music tracks and former Republic stuntman Dave Sharpe (DAREDEVILS OF THE RED CIRCLE) directing the second unit.  It’s not, however, a very good movie overall with the comedy startlingly unfunny and the action not particularly brisk, outside of a couple of sharp fights and stunts directed by Sharpe.  Carrol’s performance is quite awful—she apparently viewed her character as being retarded, judging from her acting choices—but Joi and Hoffman are likable in their briefer-than-you-would-like roles.  Adamson shot on a real dude ranch near Palm Springs, California.

BLIND DATE (1987)--Directed by Blake Edwards. Stars Bruce Willis, Kim Basinger, John Larroquette. Willis is set up on a blind date with the beautiful Basinger. He is warned ahead of time not to get her drunk. He does, and it turns into a night he won't soon forget. No one directs this type of slapstick the way Edwards can. His films are usually either pretty hilarious or pretty awful. This one is pretty funny. Larroquette is great as Basinger's jealous boyfriend.

BLIND FURY (1989)--Directed by Philip Noyce.  Stars Rutger Hauer, Brandon Call, Terry O'Quinn, Meg Foster.  Australian director Noyce does an uncredited American swipe of Zatoichi, a blind samurai who appeared in dozens of Japanese films and TV shows beginning in 1963.  Columbia Tri-Star's version casts Hauer as Nick Parker, who lost his sight in Vietnam and learned martial arts as a way of boosting his surviving senses.  Armed with a sword cane and a sardonic sense of humor, Parker arrives in Florida in search of his old 'Nam buddy Frank Devereaux.  He meets Frank's ex-wife (Foster) and son (Call), who explain that Frank is now living in Las Vegas.  What they don't know is that Frank, a chemist, has been kidnapped by the mob and forced to create a new form of designer drug.  To ensure his cooperation, some goons arrive at Foster's house and kill her in an attempt to kidnap Call.  It's up to Parker to make sure the boy remains alive on their cross-country journey to Vegas to rescue his father.  Loaded with plenty of action and comedy, BLIND FURY is great fun, propelled by Hauer's easy-going heroics and Noyce's sense of humor.  Noble Willingham, Nick Cassevetes, Randall "Tex" Cobb, Lisa Blount, Rick Overton and Sho Kosugi propel the supporting cast, along with J. Peter Robinson's jaunty score.  Noyce did PATRIOT GAMES next.

BLIND HORIZON (2004)—Directed by Michael Haussman. Stars Val Kilmer, Neve Campbell, Sam Shepard, Noble Willingham. Poor Frank (Kilmer). He wakes up in a Black Point, New Mexico hospital with a bullet graze on his forehead and no memory of who he is or how he could have gotten shot and at the bottom of a desert cliff. His only possession: a business card with the word “Rhombus” and an overseas telephone number. Oh, and a vague memory of an impending assassination attempt against the President of the United States. Haussman, better known for making music videos, tries to direct the hell out of this dusty dreck to compensate for a lack of suspense and a solid payoff. It plods along from scene to scene with little urgency or sense of purpose. An intriguing dynamic between Shepard as the local sheriff and Willingham (who died shortly after making this) as his long-time deputy who’s running against him for election isn’t developed as much as I would have liked either. Also with Gil Bellows, Amy Smart, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Rhee, and Faye Dunaway.

BLIND RAGE (1978)--Directed by Efren C. Pinon.  Stars Leo Fong, D'Urville Martin, Fred Williamson, Tony Ferrer, Leila Hermosa, Charlie Davao.  Five blind guys rob a bank.  Well, why not?  Hood Johnny Duran (Davao) masterminds a plot to steal $15 million of U.S. government money from a Manila bank vault.  Surmising that blind men would never be suspected of a bank heist, he recruits five blind men, including a magician, a martial artist and rapist Martin (DOLEMITE), and beautiful teacher Sally (Hermosa) to train them.  For some reason, Williamson appears in the final reel as Los Angeles private detective Jesse Crowder, a character he played in several other films, including DEATH JOURNEY.  Hermosa is good to look at, and the novelty of seeing blind bank robbers is mildly amusing, but this is one sloppily written and directed film.  It claims to have been filmed all over the world, including Mexico and Hong Kong, but L.A. and the Philippines were likely the only actual filming locations.  From the director of NINJA NIGHTMARE.

BLINDMAN (1971)--Directed by Ferdinando Baldi.  Stars Tony Anthony, Ringo Starr.  BLINDMAN is one of the stranger "spaghetti westerns" I've seen. Basically an Italian swipe of the long-running series of Japanese films about the blind swordsman Zatoichi (still being made with Takeshi Kitano in the role), BLINDMAN is an Italian-made, American-financed western filmed in Spain that stars U.S. actor Anthony as a blind gunfighter and British rock star Starr as a Mexican bandito. Some melting pot.

Anthony was born in West Virginia, but wrote, produced and starred in several Italian westerns during the '60s and '70s. As "Blindman", he's contracted to escort fifty mail-order brides to some miners in Texas, but his partners waylay him and sell the women to a nasty Mexican named Domingo (Lloyd Battista, another American actor who's still active in films and TV). After blowing up the bastardos, Blindman heads to Mexico to find Domingo and get his women back by kidnapping the bandit's brother Candy (Starr), a vicious rapist with a liking for a prostitute named Pilar (Agneta Eckemyr, a Swede), and holding him for ransom.

As directed by Ferdinando Baldi, BLINDMAN features several doublecrosses, a ton of beatings and explosions, plenty of gunfire, and a heapin' helping of brutality and misogyny. Anthony, also a co-producer and co-writer, seems to be going for a comic vibe, but with the mass slaughter and gangraping, it's hard to see what's so funny. Even the hero gets into the act, stripping Domingo's sister naked and tying her to a stake in the desert. Most of the women appear naked, and a mass shower scene looks like something from a women-in-prison flick. That said, I liked the film. It certainly isn't dull, tackling the violence and masochism with a lot of energy.

Released around the world beginning in 1971 and hitting U.S. theaters in 1972, BLINDMAN reportedly did quite well at the box office internationally, presumably due to the grungy subject matter and the presence of Beatle Starr (who mumbles his way through an unconvincing Mexican accent, but otherwise is quite credible). It was produced by ABKCO Films, which was owned by Allen Klein, the notorious manager of the Beatles after Brian Epstein's death and a figure instrumental in the group's 1970 breakup.

Anthony was still making spaghetti westerns over a decade later, when COMIN' AT YA! kicked off the short-lived 3D craze of the early 1980's, which included films like JAWS 3-D, AMITYVILLE 3-D and SPACEHUNTER: ADVENTURES IN THE FORBIDDEN ZONE.  But not Ringo, who had moved on to great works of art like CAVEMAN and GIVE MY REGARDS TO BROAD STREET.

THE BLOB (1958)--Directed by Irvin S. Yeaworth, Jr. Stars Steve McQueen, Aneta Corsaut. Best known for featuring a 27-year-old Steve McQueen in his first lead role, this science-fiction low-budgeter does provide a few campy laughs as the title gelatinous creature creeps through a small town, destroying everything in its path. McQueen and Corsaut are the young couple with the mission of warning the good townspeople, but, being teenagers, are disbelieved by the stern adults. The scene of the blob attacking a movie theater is pretty effective. The theme song (written by Burt Bacharach!) is hilarious. McQueen was starring in WANTED: DEAD OR ALIVE on television at the time. THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN and big-screen stardom was just two years away.

THE BLOB (1988)--Directed by Chuck Russell. Stars Kevin Dillon, Shawnee Smith, Donovan Leitch, Candy Clark. Colorful remake of the Steve McQueen classic about a gelatinous blob that devours a small Midwestern town. Dillon has the McQueen role. He later played John Densmore in THE DOORS. More intense than the original, but still fun. Leitch is the son of '60s folk-rocker Donovan. With Erika Eleniak, Julie McCullough and Art LaFleur. From the director of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 3: DREAM WARRIORS.

BLOOD AND BLACK LACE (1964)--Directed by Mario Bava.  Stars Cameron Mitchell, Eva Bartok.  Often credited with being the first slasher movie, BLOOD AND BLACK LACE is a nifty Italian thriller carefully crafted by legendary horror director Bava.  Someone wearing black gloves and a slouch hat is murdering beautiful fashion models.  Bava and his writers provide no shortage of red herrings, including the married couple that owns the salon played by Mitchell (who did not dub his own voice for the American version) and Bartok.  If you're looking for plot twists or characterization, you won't find a lot here, since B&BL does anticipate the '80s slasher cycle by being more interesting in the stylish murders than anything else.  The performers do provide solid characters to root for, however, but the film's strength is its colorful cinematography, lush score and vicious murders, carefully composed by Bava, a former cameraman.  Also with Mary Arden, Thomas Reiner, Luciano Pigozzi, Ariana Gorini and Harriet White Medin.  Music by Carlo Rustichelli.

BLOOD AND BONE (2009)—Directed by Ben Ramsey. Stars Michael Jai White, Eamonn Walker, Julian Sands, Dante Basco, Bob Sapp. Like other direct-to-video action stars before him, such as Jean-Claude Van Damme, Don “The Dragon” Wilson, and Cynthia Rothrock, White (SPAWN) enters the magical world of underground bare-knuckles fighting. Bone (White), just out of the joint, teams up with motormouthed manager Pinball (Basco) and works his way up the ranks, where he catches the attention of urbane hood James (Walker of OZ and KINGS). James wants Bone to fight for him, but the tight-lipped ex-con has different ambitions. Cheap-looking, unsophisticated fare very much enlived by the energetic fight scenes, which are skillfully shot by director Ramsey and performed extremely well by White, who is every much as good an actor and screen presence as he is a martial artist. Besides the performances by White and Walker and the exceptional fight sequences, there isn’t much to BLOOD AND BONE, but it’s enough to raise the curiosity of action fans looking to get back to the basics. Also with Michele Belegrin, Nona Gaye, Dick Anthony Williams, Kimbo Slice, Gina Carano, Bob Wall, and Matt Mullins (BLOODFIST 2050). GRINDHOUSE’s Zoe Bell did some stunts.

BLOOD AND LACE (1971)--Directed by Philip Gilbert.  Stars Gloria Grahame, Melody Patterson, Len Lesser, Vic Tayback, Milton Selzer.  It’s been called the “sickest PG movie ever made,” and while this low-low-budget AIP shocker does contain elements of pedophilia, incest, torture, rape, murder and child abuse, it’s not entirely inconsistent with other PG rulings of the era (think BILLY JACK or JAWS).  “Not yet 21” Ellie (Patterson, formerly on F TROOP) is sent to an orphanage run by Mrs. Deere (Grahame) after her notoriously loose mother is murdered in bed by a hammer-wielding maniac.  Independent and a little messed up by her mother’s killing, during which the assailant also burned down the house, Ellie immediately locks horns with the ultra-strict Mrs. Deere, who orders her drunken handyman Tom (Lesser) to hunt down and murder kids who attempt to run away.  They freeze the corpses in the cellar and bring them up to the “infirmary” whenever social worker Mullins (Selzer) drops by to count heads.  Also in the mix is middle-aged bachelor Calvin Carruthers (Tayback), the town’s only police detective who’s working Ellie’s mom’s murder case.  Gilbert apparently never made another movie, but he does a good job with Gil Lasky’s sleazy script and no money, particularly the opening scene, which is reminiscent of HALLOWEEN.  Lesser and Tayback used to play comic heavies on THE MONKEES, and probably enjoyed playing bigger roles and receiving their own title cards on a feature.  Also with sexy Terry Messina and a young Dennis Christopher.

BLOOD BATH (1966)--Directed by Jack Hill and Stephanie Rothman.  Stars William Campbell, Marissa Mathes, Sandra Knight.  Roger Corman was the executive producer of this atmospheric independent horror movie with a convoluted production history.  He bought a Yugoslavian thriller called PORTRAIT IN TERROR that starred British actor Patrick Magee and Campbell.  Corman didn’t want to release it as is, so he hired Hill to direct a new movie using PORTRAIT IN TERROR for stock footage, and brought back Campbell to play a character different from his original.  Corman didn’t like the result, fired Hill, and hired Rothman to direct even more footage and change the plot again.  This time, Campbell’s character went from being a crazed sculptor to a vampire.  However, Corman didn’t bring Campbell back this time, so Rothman was forced to use a double for him.

The result of three different directors and three disparate storylines is a surprisingly decent thriller starring Campbell as Antonio Sordi, a murderous artist who seduces young models and boils them in wax.  He also believes he’s the reincarnation of a vampire, and imagines beautiful Daisy to be the reincarnation of an old flame.  After he kills her, her sister Donna (Knight, Jack Nicholson’s wife) shows up to investigate.  The film is set in Malibu, which looks nothing like the classic Eastern European settings in the original Yugoslavian footage, and Campbell doesn’t even attempt to make Sordi “Italian”.

The whole thing is only 62 minutes long, and probably played at the bottom of a double bill.  More Rothman footage was added later to stretch the running time to 80 minutes and make it more palatable to television syndicators.  The TV cut was titled TRACK OF THE VAMPIRE, and, believe it or not, PORTRAIT IN TERROR also had some late-night TV airplay.  You can imagine how confused 3:00am audiences must have been.  Knight appears only in Rothman’s footage, while Campbell, Sid Haig (THE BIG BIRD CAGE) and Karl Schanzer (SPIDER BABY) were in Hill’s original cut.  Biff Elliot, Linda Saunders from PETTICOAT JUNCTION and Jonathan Haze make appearances too.  Ronald Stein scored it.  Both Hill (THE BIG DOLL HOUSE) and Rothman (THE STUDENT TEACHERS) went on to make more movies for Corman.

BLOOD BEACH (1981)--Directed by Jeffrey Bloom. Stars John Saxon, Marianna Hill, Burt Young, Otis Young. This dull horror film seems like a throwback to the monster movies of the 1950s. Something is mutilating and killing people on a Santa Monica beach, and it's up to cops Saxon and Young to find out what. The monster castrates one guy! You only see the creature for a few seconds at the end, and it's pretty disappointing. You gotta like the title though...

BLOOD, BOOBS & BEAST (2007)—Directed by John Paul Kinhart.  Stars Don Dohler.  Dohler was a Baltimore-based filmmaker who gained a cult following based on his 1977 backyard cheapie THE ALIEN FACTOR, which he managed to somehow sell to television (after a very brief theatrical run), despite its obvious lack of production values and professional actors.  More people, primarily young ones (like myself), probably saw THE ALIEN FACTOR on television over the years than saw the rest of Dohler’s movies combined.  After a few more crude but strangely charming science fiction/horror movies filmed in Maryland using a lot of friends and family as cast and crew, including NIGHTBEAST and BLOOD MASSACRE, Dohler gave up filmmaking, but returned in the 2000s with a series of depressingly crummy-looking shot-on-video horror flicks directed by his business partner, an ex-cop named Joe Ripple.

Kinhart does a nice job profiling Dohler, who seems to have been a pleasant guy who enjoyed making films the old-fashioned way, but blanched at the gore and nudity he was often required by distributors to insert into them.  Kinhart interviews Dohler’s family (the most touching scenes involve the filmmaker’s caring for his mentally retarded sister), actors from his films (including George Stover, of course), and his fans, including two idiots wearing a bunch of silly hats who recite dialogue from Dohler movies.  Much of the running time is behind-the-scenes footage from Dohler and Ripple’s last film, DEAD HUNT, which looks awful.  Knowing that Dohler passed away from cancer in late 2006, just before this affectionate documentary was released, casts a melancholy spell on it, but it’s a respectable profile of an interesting and unsung cult director.  Makeup artists Tom Savini (DAWN OF THE DEAD) and Tom Sullivan (THE EVIL DEAD), Troma’s Lloyd Kaufman and LOST creator J.J. Abrams provide salutes.

BLOOD DEBTS (1983)--Directed by Teddy Page.  Stars Richard Harrison, Mike Monty.  Intentionally or not, Cannon's DEATH WISH 4: THE CRACKDOWN plays like a remake of this ridiculous shot-in-the-Philippines revenge flick.  Former peplum hero Harrison (GLADIATORS 7) plays Mark (just Mark apparently; even the bad guys call him Mark), a "former Vietnam veteran" who becomes distraught when his daughter and her fiancé are gunned down by hunters (!) in his own spacious backyard.  Why they are hunting on Harrison's property with automatic rifles and why they decide to kill his family, I don't know, but I'm glad they do, because it leads to a wildly funny opening that involves gratuitous slow-motion, silly dubbing and a wimpy hunter who's tired of killing.

Somehow Mark discovers who the killers are (we never learn how).  He tracks them down and kills them one at a time.  A sinister guy named Bill (yep, just Bill), played by Monty, and his chief lackey learn Mark's identity and take photos of him wasting a rapist in the park.  This unknown American city, played not very convincingly by Manila or another Filipino community, has a lot of crime and apparently only four policemen, who sit around the station house deciding whether or not to arrest the vigilante that's doing a better job of crime prevention than they are.  Eventually, Bill kidnaps Mark's wife and blackmails him into murdering a few more people for him.  Bill claims the victims are criminals who escaped prosecution, but, unbeknownst to Mark, they're actually members of a rival mob gang.  With them out of the way, Bill's syndicate will have no competition in the local drug and prostitution trade.

The storyline actually plays much more disjointedly and illogically than I was able to recap.  Although nothing about BLOOD DEBTS makes much sense, it's never dull for a moment.  The body count is quite high, and when someone isn't getting blown up or blown away, there's always a terrible performance, bare breast, cheap set or ubiquitous warm-up jacket worn by Harrison to keep you intrigued.  I was captivated at seeing the same stretch of wooded land serve as a golf course, a park, Mark's backyard and Bill's estate.  Packed with violence and seasoned with a knuckleheaded pinch of simplistic politics, BLOOD DEBTS is a must-see for fans of pathetic cinema.  It is, of course, not good at any level of filmmaking, except as unintentionally hilarious entertainment, right down to its absurd but memorable final shot.

Harrison was approaching the end of his leading-man career, although not soon enough.  After scores of westerns, spy films and sword-and-sandal fantasies in Italy during the 1960s and '70s, Harrison ended up appearing in several action movies for Silver Star in the Philippines and IFP's notorious NINJA series made by Hong Kong director Godfrey Ho.  These titles, such as NINJA TERMINATOR and NINJA THUNDERBOLT, often consisted of footage featuring Harrison that was shot for a different feature combined with a previously unfinished or unreleased film, which usually resulted in a schizophrenic and oddly intoxicating viewing experience.  The Utah-born actor retired after reportedly becoming frustrated with IFP's shoddy product and business practices and returned to live in the United States.

BLOOD FREAK (1972)--Directed by Steve Hawkes & Brad Grinter.  Stars Steve Hawkes, Heather Hughes, Dana Cullivan.  One thing about watching terrible movies is that, occasionally, you get to see something so bizarre, so amazing, so absurdly wonderful, that it's nigh impossible to describe.  BLOOD FREAK, a no-budget wonder shot in Florida, is exactly that, a Christian anti-drug gore/monster movie that fails at every level, particularly technical.

Put together any list of the Top Ten Crappy Movies Ever, and BLOOD FREAK will undoubtedly be on it.  The acting, music, sound, photography, dialogue and special effects are beyond awful, and its combination of Bible-thumping morality and bloody horror make for a fascinating experience.  It opens with an on-screen narrator (Grinter) seated in front of a tacky plywood wall, wearing a sleazy silk shirt and smoking a cigarette.  In the best tradition of Ed Wood and Criswell, he spends about a minute spouting nonsense about "catalysts" and introducing us to Herschel (Hawkes), a muscular motorcycle-riding square with huge Elvis hair and sideburns.  While riding along the interstate, Herschel picks up pretty Angel (Cullivan), a born-again Christian who takes him back to the swanky pad she shares with her bad-girl sister Ann (Hughes), who's having a pot party.  When Herschel turns down Ann's offer of a toke, she calls him a "dumb bastard" and plots revenge by teaming up with a drug dealer named Guy and getting Herschel addicted to marijuana.

Angel and Ann's kind father agrees to let Herschel live with them and gives him a job at his turkey farm (where they sell turkey poop!).  While doing chores around the pool, Herschel is seduced by Ann's bikini-clad body and, to prove that "I'm no coward", he takes a hit of her joint.  He find that he likes pot--so much so that, a few scenes later, he's suffering from some serious DT's, spazzing and crawling all over the house until Guy can show up with a soothing joint to ease Herschel's grass jones.

Meanwhile, the turkey farm is some sort of front for scientific experiments, and the two doctors in charge ask Herschel if he'd like to earn some extra bread by eating the tainted turkey.  He sits down with a knife and fork and polishes off the whole thing, which sends him into more spastic antics before transforming him into a horrifying half-man/half-turkey.  Yes, it's true.  Herschel still has his body, but he now sports the head of a giant turkey.  He can no longer speak, just gobble, and when he shows up in his lover Ann's room, he writes her a note explaining who he is, while her only thoughts are about what their children might look like.

Not only has Herschel transformed into a gobbling turkey monster, but he also thirsts for human blood, which he gets by roaming around the swamps, killing people, turning them upside down, and jamming them in the jugular vein, catching their gushing blood in his hands and cupping it into his mouth.  Lots of screaming, gore and, of course, gobbling populate this section of the movie, highlighted by Herschel sawing a dope dealer's leg off to drink the blood pouring out of it.  The squeamish have no reason to look away, because how seriously can you take an actor in a plaster turkey head attempting to slurp blood through his beak while inane gobbling sounds dot the soundtrack?

Herschel is eventually redeemed through the power of Christ, and there's a strange mixed-message happy ending, as he ends up with pot-loving Ann, rather than Angel.  The highlight is probably the final narration, in which the oily middle-aged sleazebag smokes and pontificates about polluting your body with foreign substances, just before breaking down in an (intentional?) smoker's coughing attack.

Considering that Hawkes and Grinter's previous filmmaking experience was in sex films, including one set in a nudist colony with many middle-aged men and women completely naked, I don't know how sincere they are with their Christian message.  Perhaps they thought an anti-marijuana creed would be commercial fare in 1972 (I don't know why), but even if it was, the amount of misinformation about drugs presented in BLOOD FREAK would taint it as For Laughs Only.  Even without a killer turkey-man.  Hawkes also played a Tarzan ripoff in several Spanish pictures.  He runs a wild animal sanctuary in Florida and made the national news in 2004 when one of his tigers escaped and was killed by police.

BLOOD GAMES (1990)—Directed by Tanya Rosenberg.  Stars Laura Albert, Luke Shay, Lisa Zambrano, George “Buck” Flower, Gregory Scott Cummings, Ross Hagen.  SOUTHERN COMFORT meets RACE WITH THE DEVIL in this feminist revenge flick that plays better than expected.  Healthy doses of violence and nudity propel the flimsy story, which pits a sexy female sandlot baseball team, coached by Midnight (Hagen), against the beer-guzzling, sore-losing rednecks they beat 17-2.  Afterwards, tempers flare, girls are molested, some people are killed—including the son of the town boss (Shay, who has kind of a Luke Askew thing going)—and the chase is on, first over the road, and then on foot through the forest.

I’d be willing to bet “Tanya Rosenberg” is a pseudonym for a male director and probably an experienced one.  The gratuitous T&A shots and a somewhat graphic rape scene don’t play like something a woman would do, and the professional production values and occasional arty flairs look like a director who made more than the one film credited to Rosenberg on the Internet Movie Database.  The fine score by Greg Turner helps maintain suspense, as knives, rifles, crossbow bolts and baseball bats cause damage to various male and female body parts.  The implausible resilience of one lunky redneck, first seen in a hilariously dumb “Hooray” T-shirt, is entertaining. 

On the downside, it’s difficult to tell the heroines apart, as they’re given zero personality and barely names.  Star Albert is certainly striking and, really, the only actress who looks as though she can play baseball.  The story holes are typical of a screenplay with five credited writers, but, all in all, BLOOD GAMES is a reasonably effective chase thriller that would play nicely on a double bill with the B-star-studded HUNTER’S BLOOD.

BLOOD OF DRACULA’S CASTLE (1969)--Directed by Al Adamson.  Stars Alex D’Arcy, Paula Raymond, John Carradine, Gene O’Shane, Barbara Bishop, Ray Young.  For once, this is an Adamson film that’s actually coherent and not completely unwatchable.  It’s not very good, of course, but I did sit through all 84 minutes without getting sleepy.  Adamson took advantage of an actual stone castle built in California in the 1920’s.  A wiseass fashion photographer (O’Shane) inherits it from his uncle and takes his model girlfriend (Bishop) to look it over, intending to move into it when they get married.  The present tenants, however, the middle-aged Count Dracula (D’Arcy) and his wife (Raymond), don’t want to leave.  Life is good for them as long as butler George (Carradine) and retarded hulk Mango (Young) continue snatching beautiful young women and chaining them in the cellar to use as a bloody buffet.  The veteran actors ham it up and are fun to watch, even though it might have been a kick to see Carradine reprise his HOUSE OF DRACULA role.  Robert Dix, Vicki Volante, John “Bud” Cardos and Kent Osborne are in it too.  TV prints had Dix’s character transforming into a werewolf.

THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU (1968)--Directed by Jess Franco.  Stars Christopher Lee, Richard Greene, Tsai Chin, Howard Marion-Crawford, Ricardo Palacios, George Gotz.  Writer/producer Harry Alan Towers took the FU MANCHU franchise in a different direction with the fourth film, bringing in Spanish stylist Franco to heap up the sex and sadism quotient.  Based this time in Brazil, Fu Manchu (Lee) infects ten sexy women with an exotic snake poison and sends them out to kiss his enemies.  Their "kiss of death" affects its victims immediately, bringing on blindness and eventual death.  Scotland Yard's Sir Nayland Smith (Greene) is Fu Manchu's first victim, leading his sidekick Dr. Petrie (Marion-Crawford) to team up with a German adventurer (Gotz) and invade their enemy's underground lair.  Greene, taking over from Nigel Green and Douglas Wilmer, is more square-jawed, but less animated than his predecessors, although he spends most of the running time lying on a stretcher.  For some reason, Franco relinquishes too much screen time to Sancho Lopez, a South American bandit played hammily by Palacios.  Franco introduces a few topless shots to the pulp thrills this time, but BLOOD is too slowly paced to be of much interest.  Also with Maria Rohm and Shirley Eaton in scenes snatched from Franco's THE GIRL FROM RIO.

BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR (1972)--Directed by Al Adamson.  Stars John Carradine, Kent Taylor, Roy Morton, Tommy Kirk, Regina Carrol.  Here we go again.  It's hard to imagine an Adamson film any less coherent than this one, which is pieced together from at least two and maybe even three previous feature films, as well as new footage featuring Kirk and Taylor.  What was originally a straight heist movie called PSYCHO-A-GO-GO was turned into a horror movie starring John Carradine called FIEND WITH THE ELECTRONIC BRAIN, which eventually begat BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR, for which neither Carradine nor Morton--the star of PSYCHO-A-GO-GO who shot his scenes around 1965--worked.

BLOOD WARRIORS (1993)--Directed by Sam Firstenberg.  Stars David Bradley, Frank Zagarino, Jennifer Campbell.  The director of entertaining Cannon chopsocky like AMERICAN NINJA and AVENGING FORCE strikes out with this dull action movie shot in Jakarta.  Bradley, who also contributed to the screenplay, plays Wes Healy, an ex-Marine and ex-con released from prison to visit his old buddy Keith Stone (Zagarino), now a major businessman based in Jakarta.  Make that "major druglord".  Keith wants Wes to join his organization and be his right-hand man.  Wes says no, although he does say yes to the comely advances of Keith's foxy sis Karen (Campbell).  Upset by Wes' rebuff, Keith, who fosters incestuous feelings towards Karen, kidnaps her to his palatial private island, where he tries to kill Wes several times, but fails in the tradition of lame bad guys everywhere.

This movie fails just about everywhere.  The characterizations are muddled, the acting is poor, the production values are cheap (although Jakarta is an interesting location), and the martial arts battles are ho-hum.  Much of the blame must fall on Bradley for both his dull script and wooden performance, but Zagarino fails to flesh out his snarling baddie, and Campbell, who looks stunning in her underwear, is a vapid love interest.  Let's just say both stars lack the charisma of AMERICAN NINJA leads Michael Dudikoff and Steve James, and leave it at that.  Music by Jim West.

BLOOD WORK (2002)--Directed by Clint Eastwood.  Stars Clint Eastwood, Jeff Daniels, Wanda DeJesus, Anjelica Huston.  Clint directed, produced and stars in this solid if unspectacular crime drama based on a novel by Michael Connelly.  Terry McCaleb (Eastwood) was a hotshot FBI profiler before he was felled by a heart attack while chasing on foot a serial killer known as the Code Killer--so dubbed, because of the cryptic messages written in blood he left for McCaleb at each murder scene.  Two years later, McCaleb is back on his feet--but not in the Bureau--after receiving a heart transplant two months before.  Retired and taking it easy on his boat, which is parked right next to that of beer-guzzling slacker Buddy (Daniels), McCaleb is prodded into investigating the murder of a young Mexican woman by her sister Graciella (DeJesus).  Mindful of his ginger health, McCaleb is hesitant to get involved until Graciella tells him that the heart keeping him alive used to belong to her sister.  Despite the fiery objections of his physician (Huston), Terry begins looking into the killing.  When he discovers another murder with an identical M.O., he again becomes haunted with the Code Killer, the one prey he never caught...and who may still be out there.

One thing you have to admire about Eastwood is that he makes no concession to demographics or trends, casting good, solid veteran performers who may be unfamiliar to the WB crowd, but fit their roles like a glove, and shunning flashy directorial and editing gimmicks.  BLOOD WORK may seem leisurely paced, but I didn't mind the laidback manner in which Clint lets his story unfold.  With plenty of time to establish his characters and play out the mystery, Eastwood has crafted a smart detective drama (if implausible and not as clever as it would like) for audiences with patience enough to appreciate it.  McCaleb may also be the most vulnerable character of Eastwood's career, constantly touching his chest to remind himself of the borrowed time he's living on and nodding gently whenever his friends tell him how bad he looks.  In DeJesus, he's found a sexy, strong middle-aged romantic interest who makes the most of what must be the best film role of her distinguished career.  He may be 72, but he can still convincingly kick ass too, whether he's stalking a car with a shotgun or chasing a killer through a dark hideout.  If Clint never again makes an action movie, he may not have gone out with a bang, but BLOOD WORK is no whimper either.  Also with Paul Rodriguez, Dylan Walsh, Tina Lifford, Mason Lucero, Glenn Morshower and Dina Eastwood.  Lennie Niehaus scores another Eastwood production.

BLOODFIST (1989)--Directed by Terence H. Winkless.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Billy Blanks, Kris Aguilar, Rob Kaman.  Light heavyweight kickboxing champion Wilson starred in eight BLOODFIST movies in seven years for producer Roger Corman's Concorde/New Horizons.  The first was also his debut as a leading man, after brief supporting parts in SAY ANYTHING and BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY.  He plays Jake Raye, a Los Angeles gym owner who travels to Manila to claim his half-brother Michael's corpse.  Jake's only clue is a swath of red polyester found clutched in Michael's hand, cloth torn from his killer's robe.  It belongs to a member of the Red Fist, a secret society of kickboxers who fight underground for the amusement of wealthy gamblers.  The only way for Jake to get inside the Red Fist to identify the murderer is to compete in the ultimate round robin--a series of championship matches in which only one man, the eventual winner, will be left standing.

Writer Robert King (VERTICAL LIMIT) isn't much on creating believable human relationships or crisp dialogue, but is that really what a movie titled BLOODFIST needs?  He and director Winkless (THE NEST) know how to space the fight scenes so that no more than, oh, seven or eight minutes ever go by without somebody punching, gouging or kicking somebody else.  So it's a good thing Winkless cast his movie with an eye towards realism.  Wilson, Blanks, Aguilar and Kaman all are the Real Deal; in fact, the opening credits list their trophies along with their names.  The half-Asian Wilson is a competent if not particularly interesting leading man.  He seems a bit slight for an action star, but his real-life accomplishments obviously speak otherwise, and he handles himself well in the many fight scenes (although he is doubled for stunts like jumping off of buildings).  Joe Mari Avellana is good as Jake's trainer, while Vic Diaz, who has probably appeared in more Corman pictures than any other actor, plays a Manila cop.  Also with Riley Bowman, Michael Shaner, Ned Hourani and Kenneth Peerless.  Music by Sasha Matson (RIVER OF DEATH).  Wilson returned as Jake Raye in BLOODFIST II, but the other six sequels are in name only.  I imagine they were made individually and then tagged with the BLOODFIST moniker after production.  Winkless penned the original draft of THE HOWLING, before Joe Dante was hired to direct it and John Sayles to rewrite the script.

BLOODFIST II (1990)--Directed by Andy Blumenthal.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Joe Mari Avellana, Maurice Smith, Rina Reyes, Robert Marius.  Two years after the accidental death of an opponent spurred him to retire, undefeated light heavyweight kickboxing champion Jake Raye (Wilson) receives a phone call from his good friend and former trainer Vinnie (Smith), who's in trouble and needs Jake to fly to Manila to help him out of a jam.  He's barely off the plane before he is lured by beautiful Mariella (Reyes) to an abandoned warehouse, where he is waylaid and abducted to Paradise, a private island owned by megalomaniac Su (Avellana).  Su has arranged a modern-day but just as corrupt version of ancient Roman gladiator battles, and has kidnapped professional fighters--boxing, karate, kickboxing and other martial-arts champions--from all over the world to compete in his games for the enjoyment of his wealthy friends.  Jake and his companions are to be pitted against Su's private army, which have been artificially enhanced with a new super-steroid developed by German mad scientist Dieter (Marius).

Readers of BLACKBELT and THE DEADLY HANDS OF KUNG FU magazines should get a real (ahem) kick out of BLOODFIST II, which offers a lot of fighting.  I doubt more than 5 or 6 minutes ever pass without Wilson or one of his friends getting into a battle with somebody, usually using their bare hands and feet, but sometimes grabbing a handy knife, staff, spear or sword.  Since much of the cast, including "The Dragon" (Wilson's homage to Bruce Lee extends to scripter Catherine Cyran's swiping of ENTER THE DRAGON's storyline), are actual martial-arts champions, the frequent fight scenes have an air of authenticity about them that help ground the comic-book plot in some sort of reality.  Not that you should take BLOODFIST II seriously, especially with Marius' diabolically campy performance screaming for attention, but for 84 minutes of straight-on martial-arts action, it fits the bill quite well.  Cyran didn't seem especially proud of it or her other screenplays for Roger Corman's Concorde when she was interviewed in SOME NUDITY REQUIRED.  Blumenthal, who handles the brisk pace and Wilson's thespic limitations rather well, doesn't seem to have directed another film.  Also with Timothy Baker, Rick Hill, Archie Ramirez, James Warring and Manny Sampson.  Music by Nigel Holton.  Corman handled the production duties personally.  BLOODFIST III, which abandoned the Jake Raye character, but kept Wilson as its leading man, came two years later.  Wes Craven and Stephen Tobolowsky are oddly created as "advisors."

BLOODFIST III: FORCED TO FIGHT (1992)--Directed by Oley Sassone.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Richard Roundtree, Rick Dean, Gregory McKinney.  After two BLOODFIST films set and shot in the Philippines, producer Roger Corman tossed out the previous formula and cast kickboxing champion Wilson in a prison picture affixed with the BLOODFIST name.  It's more than likely that director Sassone made a movie called FORCED TO FIGHT (the closing credits bear this out, by the way), and Corman added the BLOODFIST part to the title after the fact.  I don't think the film needs whatever promotional push was gained by making it part of the presumably lucrative BLOODFIST franchise, since it stands up pretty well on its own and is, in fact, better than the two previous entries.

Inmate Jimmy Boland (Wilson) quickly finds himself in hot water when he kills a brutal rapist and murderer named Luther in self-defense.  That his assailant was black makes the situation even worse for the half-Asian Boland in a concrete-surrounded world where racism is a way of life.  Out for revenge is Blue (McKinney), a buddy of Luther's whose drug trade is greatly diminished by the death of his supplier.  Boland also makes the shit list of white supremacist Wheelhead (Dean), who offers to accept Boland into his gang's ranks, despite Jimmy's Asian heritage, but feels disrespected when his offer is rebuffed.  Alone and awaiting a shiv in his back at any time, Boland finds a friend in Stark (Roundtree), a jailhouse lawyer of intelligence and quiet dignity whose age and skill against the appeals courts have earned him a reputation among the prisoners as an elder statesman of sorts.

What's most surprising about BLOODFIST III is the multi-layered screenplay by Allison Burnett (AUTUMN IN NEW YORK) and Charles Mattera, which attempts to address the issue of race in an exploitation-film setting while simultaneously creating characters that have slightly more depth than most Corman movies.  I don't want to give the impression that this is an art film, but there's more happening below the surface than any movie titled BLOODFIST III has the right to have.  The actors appear to have realized this, since even Wilson, never renowned for his dramatic skills or presence, appears more assured than usual.  Corman regular Dean also manages to add charm and even a shade of likableness to his Aryan brute, and Roundtree is outstanding, serving as mentor, priest, father figure and voice of reason to his fellow inmates, especially the black prisoners, whom he regards as victims of a White society.

Lest you start thinking BLOODFIST III slacks in the action department, let me assure you that Sassone has crafted a good number of fights and martial-arts battles choreographed by Paul Maslak, who worked on several other Wilson films as a writer, producer and stuntman.  As with the other BLOODFIST films, care was taken to provide "The Dragon" with worthy opponents, many of whom, like Peter "Sugarfoot" Cunningham, were authentic martial-arts champions.  While the fight scenes are about as good as they should be, it's the extra care and intelligence in other parts of the production that give BLOODFIST III its real meat.  The prisoners watch Jeanne Bell's notorious topless kung-fu scene from TNT JACKSON.  Also with Richard Paul (CARTER COUNTRY), Tony DiBenedetto, Charles Boswell and Paul Cardone.  Music by Nigel Holton.  Sassone later directed the still-unreleased THE FANTASTIC FOUR for Corman; his sister, Catya Sassoon, starred with Wilson in BLOODFIST IV.

BLOODFIST IV: DIE TRYING (1992)--Directed by Paul Ziller.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Amanda Wyss, Kale Browne.  By this point, executive producer Roger Corman had given up any pretext that the BLOODFIST movies should have any more in common than having World Lightweight Kickboxing Champion Wilson star in them.  This time, the friendly fighter plays Danny Holt, an L.A. repo man who accidentally repossesses the wrong BMW, this one belonging to a foreign agent named Weiss (soap actor Browne) who was carrying a box of chocolates in the front seat.  Danny delivers the candy to a female friend, not knowing that it camouflages nuclear warhead triggers that are being sold to a Middle Eastern country.  The body count is quite high, as Weiss and his goons murder everyone at Danny's car lot in an effort to retrieve the MacGuffin, and when they don't find it, chase him around the city, leaving more bodies in their wake.  Of course, the cops and the FBI believe Danny to be responsible for the spree killings; the only one who believes in his innocence is a total stranger, Shannon (Wyss).

Nobody, especially the colorless Wilson, can add much zest to this routine and quite cheap DTV martial-arts flick.  Ziller, who would later work with the Dragon again on MOVING TARGET, writes and directs with little flair, moving his characters from point A to point B with little visual flair or excitement.  Even the fight scenes, which were partially staged by Wilson, are of little interest.  Character actors James Tolkan (BACK TO THE FUTURE) as an intense FBI agent and Liz Torres (THE JOHN LARROQUETTE SHOW) as a heavy-eating detective impart as much impact as they can, but Ziller's slight material lets them down.  The striking Cat Sassoon, blessed with a hard body and exotically unusual features, plays an early story twist quite well and certainly makes her presence felt in the climax.  Still, BLOODFIST IV is quite a disappointment on the heels of the surprisingly solid BLOODFIST III.  Look for a longhaired Gary Daniels as one of Weiss' goons.  David and Eric Wurst drum up another quickie musical score.  Coming up next:  BLOODFIST V.  Can't you feel the anticipation?

BLOODFIST V: HUMAN TARGET (1993)--Directed by Jeff Yonis.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Denice Duff, Steve James.  Martial-arts buffs may relish this opportunity to see exploitation stars Wilson and James fighting each other.  The fine actor and stuntman James died of pancreatic cancer the year this was released, and while it isn't among his best credits, BLOODFIST V isn't the worst way to go out either.

Wilson is drabber than ever as an amnesiac who wakes up in the hospital and discovers a lot of people want to kill him.  He's rescued from the hospital by a prostitute named Candy (Duff) claiming to be his wife, who takes him to see her pimp (James).  From there, he encounters a friendly jewelry store clerk who places a $5000 bracelet on his tab, Chinese terrorists, renegade National Security Agency operatives, stolen plutonium and plenty of arm-breaking, face-kicking martial-arts battles.

To say much more about Yonis' twisty script would reveal too much, but suffice to say that many of the story elements I just listed turn out to be something else entirely, leaving us about as confused as Wilson.  Really, there are too many plot twists that don't hold water, and by the time the good guys have become the bad guys--again--you begin to feel that Yonis has gone too far.  Still, the pace is fast enough, Duff is attractive and holds her own in a fight, and there's more action--mild as it is--than in the last couple of BLOODFIST films.  Look for NYPD BLUE's Sharon Lawrence in her first film and SWITCHBLADE SISTERS gangsta Don Stark, currently on THAT '70s SHOW.  Also with Yuji Okumoto.  Music by David and Eric Wurst.  Some of executive producer Roger Corman's sets are uglier and cheaper than ever.  From the director of the HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP remake.

BLOODFIST VI: GROUND ZERO (1994)--Directed by Rick Jacobson.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Jonathan Fuller, Robin Curtis, Cat Sassoon.  Here's DIE HARD in a missile silo.  Bearing no resemblance to any of the first five BLOODFIST movies, Numero Seis stars Wilson as an Army courier who stumbles upon terrorist Fuller's plan to hijack a nuclear missile base and hold the world's largest cities for ransom.  Sgt. Nick Corrigan (Wilson) doesn't appear to be a highly respected soldier--his dispatcher calls him an idiot over the radio--but he reveals a few hidden talents when he is trapped inside the base with only Fuller's motley band of machine-gun-toting sycophants for company.  Since we already know Wilson is a real-life world kickboxing champion, no points for guessing that Corrigan is an ex-Secret Forces commando who was demoted for disobeying a direct order to abandon his men in a combat zone.

GROUND ZERO might be the cheapest BLOODFIST film yet.  Executive producer Roger Corman's excuse for a base is a guard booth set up next to what looks like a radio station transmitter, and the massive underground facility is really a couple of corridors and some rooms lined with chintzy electronics.  The fight scenes aren't up to Wilson's usual standards; not that he's Jackie Chan or anything, but the action isn't as fast or as brutal as it should be.  Jacobson demonstrates few directing chops, but he could have used a better cast--Fuller is over-the-top awful, but at least he shows some energy.  Curtis (Kirstie Alley's replacement in STAR TREK III) is dead wood as Wilson's outside contact, and Sassoon's best scene is a topless one.  Former L.A. Dodger Steve Garvey oddly appears as a brave Army major who gets to make out with a nearly nude Sassoon.  Also with Bert Remsen, Marcus Aurelius, Wynn Irwin and Leonard O. Turner.  Sassoon also fought the Dragon in BLOODFIST IV.  Wilson and Jacobson worked together four times in three years, including BLOODFIST VIII.

BLOODFIST VII: MANHUNT (1995)--Directed by Jonathan Winfrey.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Jillian McWhirter, Steven Williams.  The Dragon goes on the run in this decent direct-to-video thriller from the writers of Wilson's previous BLOODFIST entry.  Jim Trudell (Wilson) is framed for the murder of a police officer after he picks up--and is stranded by--a mysterious woman (the dependable McWhirter) in a biker bar.  Brendan Broderick and Rob Kerchner's story doesn't advance much further than that; as the subtitle implies, BLOODFIST VII is action all the way, staging car and foot chases all over the Los Angeles area.  It's unlikely Wilson has ever done more running than he does in this picture, leading police pursuers through Hollywood, Venice Beach and even the tried-and-true Los Angeles River basin.

While running from hard-nosed LAPD captain Doyle (Williams), Trudell discovers that the detectives he killed in self-defense were corrupt and providing protection for a gang of auto thieves.  The screenplay throws a couple of okay twists into the mix, but nothing particularly groundbreaking.  Winfrey uses Roger Corman's low budget to his best advantage, shooting on some interesting Venice locations and keeping the pace from flagging (he also cameos as an FBI agent).  While Wilson comes across as a nice guy as usual, his fight scenes suffer from routine choreography and fail to rouse much enthusiasm.  BLOODFIST VII is competent enough, I suppose, but when you compare it to the wild excitement of the PM Entertainment smashfests that fellow martial-arts champ Gary Daniels was starring in at the same time (coincidentally, Jillian McWhirter appeared in a couple of them too), Corman's New Horizons flicks are little better than timewasters.  Also with Mindy Seeger, Cyril O'Reilly, Rick Dean, Stephen Davies and Jonathan Penner.  Decent score by Elliot Anders and producer Mike Elliott.  Jim Wynorski receives a credit for "background extras".

BLOODFIST VIII: TRAINED TO KILL (1996)--Directed by Rick Jacobson.  Stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, John Patrick White, Jillian McWhirter, Warren Burton, Donnie Hair.  This retread of TARGET and TRUE LIES was originally the 8th in Concorde/New Horizons' BLOODFIST series, all starring Wilson, but usually as different characters.  This time, he's high school teacher Rick Cowan, a single father of incorrigible 16-year-old Chris (White).  When a gang of assassins invades the Cowan home, forcing Rick to dispatch them in high-kicking style, Chris is exposed to the past he never knew his father had.  Turns out Rick is actually George Macready (!), an ex-CIA agent who must reteam with his old partner Danielle (McWhirter) and boss Michael Powell (Burton) to discover who's trying to kill him.  "Mac" and Chris, with Danielle alongside, travel to Ireland, where they hope to find some answers.

Besides the interesting choice of Ireland as a location, there isn't much to recommend.  None of the performers, including McWhirter, who has done much better work in similar DTV action movies, manage any color, humor or nuance from Alex Simon's paint-by-numbers screenplay, and the movie really suffers from the lack of a strong villain.  The father-son stuff has also been done better elsewhere.  And would ya believe it if I told you Powell's sidekick is named Emeric Pressburger (Hair)?  Also with Conor Nolan, Richard Farrell and John McHugh.  Roger Corman was executive producer.  From the director of BLOODFIST VI.  Also known as HARD WAY OUT.  Music by John Faulkner.

BLOODFIST 2050 (2005)—Directed by Cirio H. Santiago.  Stars Matt Mullins, Joe Sabatino, Beverly Lynne, Glen Meadows.  Roger Corman.  Cirio Santiago.  Kickboxers.  Post-apocalyptic setting.  Revenge plot.  Tons of violence and nudity.  It feels like 1984 all over again.  New Concorde’s BLOODFIST 2050 is the first of the nine-picture series to not star Don “The Dragon” Wilson.  This time, “five-time world martial arts champion” Mullins steps in to star in a loose remake of the original BLOODFIST.  Alex Danko (Mullins) arrives in seedy Los Angeles, where his brother was jumped and beaten to death in an alley outside a strip joint.  You pretty much know the rest--young kickboxer investigates murder of kickboxing champion brother, goes undercover, usual training sequences, has sex with hot stripper, lots of random fight scenes in and out of the ring.  The credits play over a futuristic car chase out of one of Cirio Santiago's '80s ROAD WARRIOR knockoffs, then that's the last we ever see of that part of 2050 society.  Once the credits end and Danko gets to L.A., society seems pretty normal, except there is an inordinately large Filipino population.  There is also a surprising amount of nudity in this movie, completely gratuitous, much of it provided by Lynne as Mullins’ blond love interest.  A lot of stock footage appears from previous Corman films; I think a pre-silicone Maria Ford appears as a stripper.  Beverly Lynne and the guy who plays Danko's comic-relief fighter sidekick (Meadows) are married softcore porn stars in real life. And it's good to see Joe Mari Avellana still appearing in and wearing several hats in these cheapjack productions (he also designed the crummy sets).

BLOODMATCH (1991)—Directed by Albert Pyun.  Stars Thom Mathews, Hope Marie Carlton.  Knowing it was directed by Pyun, I should have expected BLOODMATCH to be awful, but Big Al once again manages to exceed all expectations.  The video box promises a tale of a kickboxer fighting four other kickboxers to the death in a search to find his brother's killer. What we get instead is a very dull, talky and visually staid picture which could well have been shot in a week on one L.A. block. Every performance is terrible, and the fight scenes, when they come, are limp and suspenseless, even though they were choreographed by Benny "The Jet" Urquidez (who provides one of those terrible acting jobs). Mathews (FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VI) and hot Hope Marie Carlton (HARD TICKET TO HAWAII) are the prime offenders. BLOODMATCH is so bad that, 15 minutes after it was over, I took the tape outside and dropped it in the garbage can.

BLOODSPORT (1987)--Directed by Newt Arnold.  Stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, Donald Gibb, Bolo Yeung, Leah Ayres, Forest Whitaker, Norman Burton.  Loosely based on the true story of Frank Dux, an American martial artist who became the first Westerner to win a secret fighting competition called the Kumite, although some historians believe Dux's tale to be a bit of a tall one.  Belgian ballet dancer Van Damme, in his first leading-man assignment, plays Dux, an Army captain who apparently goes AWOL to sneak into Hong Kong to compete.  There he befriends a fellow contestant, oafish American Ray Jackson (Gibb), and Janice (Ayres), a beautiful journalist trying to write a story on the Kumite.  He also makes the acquaintance of Chong Li (Yeung), a vicious psychopath who enjoys maiming and killing his opponents and who also happens to be the defending Kumite champion.  BLOODSPORT and Van Damme's follow-up, KICKBOXER, led to a great number of in-name-only sequels and ripoffs, including Roger Corman's BLOODFIST series, all eight of which starred Don "The Dragon" Wilson.  Arnold, who directed few films, keeps the pace moving well enough, staging, with the help of Dux, who served as the film's fight coordinator and Van Damme's trainer, several well-executed action scenes using a variety of fighting styles.  The supporting cast, which includes Burton and Whitaker as government agents sent to Hong Kong to bring Frank home, is fine, although only the memorable Yeung receives much of a showcase in this Cannon film.  Producer Mark DiSalle and cinematographer David Worth co-directed KICKBOXER.  Music by Paul Hertzog.  The cheesy rock anthems crooned horribly by Stan Bush are damned amusing.  I blame ROCKY III for them.

BLOODSPORT II (1996)--Directed by Alan Mehrez.  Stars Daniel Bernhardt, James Hong, Pat Morita, Ong Soo Han.  Swiss-born Van Damme-clone Bernhardt made his film debut in this worthy sequel shot on location in Bangkok.  Thief Alex Cardo (Bernhardt) is busted shortly after stealing a priceless katana sword from wealthy Mr. Leung (Morita) and sentenced to a harsh Thai prison.  Alex is pretty good with his feet and fists, but he gets even better when he begins training with Sun (Hong), a legendary martial artist with the secret Iron Hand that can crush the bones of any opponent.  Eventually, Alex's skills are so good that he is released from prison to compete in the secret kumite tournament, where he must eventually battle Demon (Han), the vicious prison guard who used to beat and torture him.  Jeff Schechter's script is blah, and Bernhardt is a lifeless lead, but Mehrez does the right thing in the fight department, staging several brutal martial-arts battles that are nearly as exciting as those in the original film.  While Bernhardt and Han don't hold a candle to the performances delivered by Jean-Claude Van Damme and Bolo Yeung in BLOODSPORT, they're at least functional and don't get in the way of the bone-crunching action.  Donald Gibb (REVENGE OF THE NERDS) returns from the first film, but seemingly as another character.  Also with Lori Lyn Dickerson, Lisa McCullough and Philip Tan.  Music by Steve Edwards.

THE BLOODSTAINED SHADOW (1978)--Directed by Antonio Bido.  Stars Lino Capolicchio, Craig Hill, Stefania Casini.  A watchable but not particularly interesting nor colorful giallo.  Stefano (Capolicchio), a young college professor, returns to his boyhood home near Venice to visit his brother Don Paolo (Hill), the local priest.  Shortly thereafter, a series of brutal murders begin; the targets include a pedophile, an abortionist and a blackmailer.  How do the killings connect to the murder of an innocent young girl fifteen years earlier, and why is the murderer sending threatening notes to Paolo?  The mystery plays out as a procedural, rather than a horror film, resulting in a predictable but exciting climax.  It's hard to judge the performances through the English dubbing on Anchor Bay's DVD, but SHADOW comes across as a solid, tight package that should provide some interest to mystery lovers.  Music by Stelvio Cipriani and Goblin.

THE BLOODY AVENGER--See KNELL, THE BLOODY AVENGER.

BLOODY BIRTHDAY (1980)--Directed by Ed Hunt. Stars Lori Lethin, Susan Strasberg, Jose Ferrer, K.C. Martel. Julie Brown. Reportedly filmed in 1980 but not released theatrically until 1986, this teen slasher flick is neither scary nor overly gory, yet it's never dull, despite (or more likely because of) its tasteless premise, dopey screenplay and distracting star cameos.

Three babies--two boys and a girl--are born simultaneously during a solar eclipse in a small California town. Ten years later, on the occasion of their tenth birthday, the three--spoiled blond Debbie, quiet Steven and bespectacled genius Curtis--begin a killing spree whose victims include promiscuous teens in a cemetery, their strict teacher, Debbie's cop father and her frequently nude big sister. An older teen, Joyce (Lethin), who's into astrology, discovers the killers' identities, which leads to a showdown between her and her younger brother (Martel) and the Bad Seeds in Debbie's alarm-equipped house.

Many post-Columbine audiences would be stunned by such scenes as Curtis shooting his teacher to death at school or Steven braining the sheriff with a baseball bat, but the performances by the adolescent assassins are actually quite good, and go a long way towards the enjoyment of BLOODY BIRTHDAY, as does the frequently nude presence (as Debbie's sister) of future MTV star Just Say Julie Brown, whose completely gratuitous naked dance scene goes on for a good three minutes or so, and is well worth the movie's rental price. Methods of death include strangulation, shooting, an arrow through the head, and, while not particularly believable, Joyce's attack in an auto junkyard by a hooded driver in a beat-up car is pretty entertaining.

Also contributing to the movie's loopy nature is the introduction of seemingly important characters (like the doctor who delivered the babies, a teaching mentor for Joyce and Joyce's college-student boyfriend Paul) who show up for a short scene or two, then are never mentioned again. Strasberg (as frigid teacher Miss Davis) has about five minutes of screen time, and Ferrer (as The Doctor) maybe two--why they consented to appear in this at all is beyond me, but they certainly should have known better.

Pretty entertaining if you don't think about it too hard, with some creepy performances by the killer kids, plenty of nudity and violence, and some familiar faces including Joe Penny, Michael Dudikoff, Brown, William Boyett, Bert Kramer, Ellen Geer and Ward Costello. The brutal babes are played by Andy Freeman, Elizabeth Hoy and Billy Jayne, who (still) acts sometimes as Billy Jacoby. The score by Arlon Ober, while not containing the sort of identifiable themes that contributed to the success of HALLOWEEN or FRIDAY THE 13TH, is decent enough and properly suspenseful. From the director of STARSHIP INVASIONS.

BLOODY PIT OF HORROR (1965)--Directed by Massimo Pupillo (as Max Hunter). Stars Mickey Hargitay, Walter Brandi. Sick Italian exploitation film starring Jayne Mansfield's bodybuilder husband as the Crimson Executioner, a nut who believes himself to be the reincarnation of a 17th century sadist in a mask and red tights. He kidnaps models posing for sexy photos in an old castle, and tortures and kills them. The dubbing is terrible, but this weird film is never boring. Hargitay was a hero of Arnold Schwarzenegger, and his and Jayne's actress daughter Mariska became a regular as a sex crimes detective on NBC's LAW & ORDER: SPECIAL VICTIMS UNIT.

BLOW OUT (1981)--Directed by Brian DePalma. Stars John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgow, Dennis Franz. Travolta has his best film role as a movie sound-effects man who witnesses an auto accident while out recording nature sounds one night. The car plunges into the water; Travolta rescues a woman passenger (Allen), but the driver, a man, is killed. At the hospital, he finds out that the man was a Presidential candidate and his aides want the incident hushed up. The plot grows even more labyrinthine from there, as Travolta and Allen find themselves stalked by a killer played menacingly by Lithgow. Inspired by both Antonioni's BLOW-UP and lingering paranoia over the Kennedy assassination, this thriller stands as one of DePalma's best. Prepare yourself for the stunning ending. Travolta never got a role this good again. Score by Pino Donaggio.

BLOWBACK (2000)--Directed by Mark L. Lester.  Stars Mario Van Peebles, James Remar, Sharisse Baker, David Groh.  Despite a few cribs from SILENCE OF THE LAMBS and SEVEN, the patron saints of serial-killer movies, 2000’S BLOWBACK is a direct-to-video thriller lensed in San Diego that stands on its own as an effective movie.  The writing isn’t good, but the main performances and the action sequences are.  BLOWBACK was directed by Mark L. Lester, who graduated from well-remembered drive-in flicks like TRUCK STOP WOMEN and ROLLER BOOGIE to major studio actioners like FIRESTARTER and COMMANDO before falling back into low-budget exploitation movies.

BLOWN AWAY (1992)--Directed by Brenton Spencer. Stars Corey Haim, Corey Feldman, Nicole Eggert. The teen-idol stars are miscast in this erotic thriller, but you might want to see it for the many scenes of former BAYWATCH blonde Eggert naked. She does it with Haim on a staircase, in front of a fireplace, in bed... Feldman plays a psycho.

BLOWN AWAY (1994)--Directed by Stephen Hopkins. Stars Jeff Bridges, Tommy Lee Jones, Lloyd Bridges. Underrated thriller set in Boston that had the misfortune of coming out just after the blockbuster SPEED. Jones is a psycho IRA terrorist bomber out for revenge against bomb-squad cop Bridges. Also with Forest Whitaker and Suzy Amis.

BLUE CITY (1986)--Directed by Michelle Manning.  Stars Judd Nelson, Ally Sheedy, Paul Winfield, Scott Wilson, David Caruso, Anita Morris.  I can’t believe that any novel by Ross Macdonald could be as awful as Paramount’s film adaptation of BLUE CITY.  Manning, who worked behind the scenes on John Hughes’ Brat Pack movies, somehow got the nod to direct this dud of a mystery set in the Florida Keys.

Billy Turner (Nelson) returns to his coastal hometown after five years bumming around the country and learns his father, the wealthy town mayor, has been murdered.  With the new police chief (Winfield) seemingly uninterested in closing the case, Billy decides to find the killer himself, beginning with his golddigging stepmother (Morris) and the new town boss, Perry Kerch (Wilson).

Manning’s direction is artless and passionless, but she receives no favors from either the script department or the casting directors.  An 82-minute running time and credits for “additional” cinematographers and editors suggest a troubled production, but the script by the usually reliable Lukas Heller (THE DIRTY DOZEN) and producer Walter Hill (48 HRS.) sank this one before shooting ever began by the looks of it.

BLUE CITY’s worst aspect is Judd Nelson, never a good actor and certainly rarely a likable one.  His Billy is such a jackass that one is more likely to sympathize with the hoods he’s terrorizing, rather than him…and he’s supposed to be the hero.  He insults everyone he meets, even his friends, gets beaten up several times, and is stupid enough to fall for the simplest traps and most obvious red herrings.  You’ll have the movie figured out long before Billy does.

On the bright side, as tiny as it is, are Caruso (before he got his teeth fixed), very good as Billy’s partner in getting into trouble, and Ry Cooder’s brooding guitar score.  No one else in the cast distinguishes himself at all, not even the sleepwalking Winfield or the hammy Wilson, and certainly not the somnambulant Sheedy as the “girl.”

Unfortunately, Legend Films’ DVD of the Paramount release is completely bare-bones—not even a trailer—though it would have been nice to learn something about the production of BLUE CITY.  My guess is that Hill reshot some of it—likely the squib-filled climactic shootout—but maybe we’ll never know.  After a couple of minor television shows, Manning never directed again, but she did become a prominent Paramount executive.

BLUE CRUSH (2002)--Directed by John Stockwell.  Stars Kate Bosworth, Michelle Rodriguez, Sanoe Lake, Mika Boorem.  BLUE CRUSH is a T&A flick with no "T" and very little "A".  25 years ago, it would have carried the Crown International Pictures banner and slid into drive-ins, where it would have played to stoned teenagers looking for anarchy, thrills, humor and flashes of skin.  Today, there are no drive-ins, and Hollywood studios are too uptight to deliver politically incorrect humor and nudity, hoping instead to lull them into submissiveness with overwhelming special effects and crass bodily-function humor that isn't born from the characters, but rather focus groups and test marketing.  I guess teens still get stoned, but it won't make Universal's new surfer-chick flick any easier to take.

Not much is duller than exploitation movies without the courage of its own convictions, and BLUE CRUSH, at heart, must be one.  It certainly isn't about its story, which is thin enough to spread on a cracker.  Or its characters, which are obnoxious and unlikable, at least the ones developed enough to have a personality.  It could be about surfing, but who cares about surfing?  Nobody makes movies about curling or jai alai or lumberjack competitors for a reason.  Well, surfers care about surfing, but that's a pretty narrow audience for director John Stockwell (CRAZY/BEAUTIFUL) to play to.  Is it about showing off the beautiful bodies of its cast?  If it is, then do it.  Don't misunderstand-there are a lot of bikini-clad babes in BLUE CRUSH, but are horny teenagers really satisfied with the sizzle and no steak?  Any random issue of MAXIM provides more skin.

So if it isn't about its plot or its characters or surfing or T&A, then what is BLUE CRUSH about?  Simply, it's about three sexy, self-indulgent surfer chicks who moonlight as hotel maids at a swanky Hawaii establishment.  Anne Marie (18-year-old Kate Bosworth) is a former teen surf champ who left the competitive circuit after bumping her head on a rock during a contest and now suffers from frequent flashbacks to said harrowing event.  Back in training for the prestigious Pipe Masters by leaving herself pep-talk messages on the bathroom mirror and running along the ocean floor carrying a big rock (!), Anne Marie finds further support with housemates Eden (Latina Michelle Rodriguez) and Lena (native Kauaian Sanoe Lake).  Slackers in nearly every sense of the word, our three heroines are irresponsible whiners who hypocritically complain about Anne Marie's 14-year-old sister Penny's (Mika Boorem) late nights, while admitting their own behavior at that age was even worse.  It says something about BLUE CRUSH's timidity that Penny's main vices seem to be cutting school and smoking (although we never see her do either), while the more likely scenario of underage sex is chickenheartedly ignored.

With just days before the Pipe Masters, Anne Marie's training routine is rocked by her head-over-heels romance with cocky NFL quarterback Matt (Matthew Davis).  When did the Hunky Quarterback become the "good guy" in teen movies?  Haven't Stockwell and his co-writer Lizzy Weiss ever seen ANIMAL HOUSE?  We don't want to see our plucky, wrong-side-of-the-tracks heroine make it with the star quarterback.  Of course, we also don't want her to get back together with her jerky surfer-dude ex.  Perhaps Stockwell doesn't care either, since the romance element is just as predictable as the "be-all-that-you-can-be" dialogue and the buildup to the Big Game.

Where BLUE CRUSH goes right is in its surfing footage, and there's a lot of it, courtesy of cinematographer David Hennings and several real-life surfing champions (who look considerably more, uh, craggy than apple-cheeked Kate Bosworth) who apparently do their own "stunts".  To quote Walter Cronkite, "you are there", as the camera darts inside the pipe, splashes through the whitecaps and even rises above the towering waves for a breathtaking point of view.  These Big Kahunas demonstrate once again that Mother Nature can be a real bitch when she wants to be in some of the most impressive surfing footage ever shot for a non-documentary.  Where Stockwell wipes out are the glaringly obvious shots in which he has used digital technology to awkward place Bosworth's face over a stunt double's, taking you right out of what little momentum the story has generated and plopping you into a round of SURF RAIDER: THE GAME.

Too bad Stockwell didn't explore the rest of the Islands as much as he did the beaches.  Casting Sanoe Lake and other native Hawaiians in supporting roles was a nice touch, but none get much screen time or sympathetic characters to play ("You flew here.  We grew here!" is one of their sweetest affronts to mainlanders or "haoles").  It's too bad, because there are some decent actors here, including newcomer Lake, looking for characters to play and normal-sounding dialogue to say.  Rodriguez steals every scene she's in, although she's ridden that "Latin spitfire" train long enough.  Bosworth has a touch of charm and a refreshingly natural look that would probably benefit a better movie, but can't vault her over the whiny script.  For a film that wants to be the ROCKY of the "hang ten" crowd, BLUE CRUSH is all wet.

THE BLUE LIGHTNING (1986)—Directed by Lee Philips.  Stars Sam Elliott, Robert Culp, Rebecca Gilling.  CBS sent Philips and company all the way to New South Wales, Australia to shoot this TV adventure, although, aside from some real aborigines used as supporting cast, they could just as well have filmed in California.  Wisecracking mercenary Elliott is sent to Australia to retrieve a valuable opal being held by an IRA terrorist (Culp) who commands a private army from an underground bunker in the desert.  Culp struggles with his accent, while Elliott deftly handles the western drawl he always uses.  Philips directs the bang-bang stuff well enough; in fact, there’s more action than you may expect from a TV-movie, including a car chase, an airplane chase and a semi that plows into a parked plane.  Former actor Philips played an evil double of Culp’s Kelly Robinson on an I SPY episode.

BLUE MONKEY (1987)—Directed by William Fruet.  Stars Steve Railsback, Susan Anspach, John Vernon, Joe Flaherty, Robin Duke.  BLUE MONKEY has no monkey, blue or otherwise, in it.  I didn't find this comic Canadian monster movie very interesting.  It's basically ALIEN: a giant insect stalks the halls of a hospital housing cop Railsback, doctor Anspach, administrator Vernon (in an unusually sympathetic role), expectant parents Flaherty and Duke, some drunken old ladies and a bunch of obnoxious kids.  The special effects, consisting mostly of a guy in a praying mantis suit, aren’t too bad, though it’s a good thing the movie is played for humor.  William Fruet, who gave us the superior SEARCH AND DESTROY and DEATH WEEKEND, directed.

BLUE SKIES AGAIN (1983)--Directed by Richard Michaels. Stars Harry Hamlin, Robin Barto, Mimi Rogers, Dana Elcar, Kenneth McMillan. OK drama about the first woman minor-league baseball player. Barto, an actress I never heard of before or since, is pretty good. Hamlin is a macho player having an affair with general manager Rogers. Clichd as sports movies go, but an amiable time-waster. HBO used to run this movie 65 times a month.

BLUE STEEL (1990)--Directed by Kathryn Bigelow. Stars Jamie Lee Curtis, Ron Silver, Clancy Brown, Elizabeth Pena. Rookie policewoman Curtis shoots and kills an armed robber on her first night on the streets. While on suspension, she begins an affair with a commodities broker played by Silver. There's also a serial killer on the loose who's blowing away his victims using bullets with Jamie Lee's name engraved on them. The audience puts two and two together, but Curtis doesn't until it's almost too late. Good performances, especially by Silver, and an exciting visual style by Bigelow. Also with Philip Bosco and Louise Fletcher as Jamie Lee's parents. Executive producer: Oliver Stone.

BLUE SUNSHINE (1977)--Directed by Jeff Lieberman. Stars Zalman King, Deborah Winters, Mark Goddard. An underrated cult thriller from the writer/director of another underrated movie about killer earthworms called SQUIRM. This one is more ambitious, and contains elements of horror, science fiction, mystery, government conspiracy thrillers and the counterculture. King is Jerry "Zippy" Zipkin, a thirtysomething slacker who is accused of slaughtering a houseful of friends during a late-night party. He discovers a number of similar killings, and realizes that the murderers all had something in common: in college, they had used an experimental dose of LSD called Blue Sunshine, which was mixed by a graduate student now running for U.S. Senator (Goddard of LOST IN SPACE). Due to some sort of late-blooming side effect, the users begin losing their hair, flipping out, and engaging in murder sprees ten years later. Although King's method acting is sometimes unintentionally hilarious, he makes for a likable (if unusual) hero, and Lieberman delivers some shocks in between subtle digs at the counterculture of the '60s. Also with Robert Walden, Charles Siebert, Stefan Gierasch and Alice Ghostley.

BLUE THUNDER (1983)--Directed by John Badham. Stars Roy Scheider, Malcolm McDowell, Daniel Stern, Candy Clark, Warren Oates. Exciting adventure about the "Blue Thunder", a super-helicopter ostensibly developed for police use during the Los Angeles Olympic Games, but really to be used as a secret government weapon. Scheider is a maverick helicopter cop teamed with rookie Stern. When Scheider uncovers archfoe McDowell's evil plot, the chases, stunts and action begin. Implausible as all hell, but you won't care a whit. The great Oates' last role was as Scheider's irritable commanding officer. Written by Dan O'Bannon and Don Jakoby (ALIEN). Music by Arthur B. Rubinstein. "Catch ya later..."

BLUE, WHITE AND PERFECT (1942)—Directed by Herbert I. Leeds.  Stars Lloyd Nolan, Mary Beth Hughes, George Reeves, Henry Victor, Helene Reynolds.  Nolan returns as private eye Michael Shayne, who swindles $1000 from his fiancé (Hughes) and boards a ship to Honolulu in pursuit of an enemy agent (Victor) carrying a cache of stolen diamonds.  An okay mixture of humor and mystery, BLUE, WHITE AND PERFECT is most notable for the casting of handsome Reeves as an Irish/Chilean bon vivant who competes with Shayne for the affections of vixenish Helen Shaw (Reynolds).  Nolan, while nothing like Brett Halliday’s Shayne, is an avuncular hero who keeps the brief adventure moving at a nice clip.  While it’s a B-pic, Fox provided the Shayne series with a decent amount of money and production value that makes the movies look better than similar programmers at other studios.

THE BLUES BROTHERS (1980)--Directed by John Landis. Stars Dan Ackroyd, John Belushi and a zillion cameos. Great music, so-so plot. Ackroyd and Belushi expand a SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE sketch to 130 minutes by tossing in car crashes, musical numbers, cameo appearances by everyone from Steven Spielberg to Steve Lawrence--in fact, everything but the kitchen sink. Every Chicagoan I know considers this to be on the same plateau as CITIZEN KANE, but I think it's highly overrated. Landis is fine at directing stunt work, but he's never had a flair for wit or comic timing; however, there are enough good scenes to make THE BLUES BROTHERS worth recommending (the "Rawhide" scene at a redneck bar; Charles Napier's performance; the R&B performances by Cab Calloway, Aretha Franklin and other greats).

BOB & CAROL & TED & ALICE (1969)--Directed by Paul Mazursky. Stars Robert Culp, Natalie Wood, Elliott Gould, Dyan Cannon. Funny but extremely dated comedy about the sex lives of two upper-middle class Southern California couples, one older and liberal, the other young and conservative. After hip Culp and Wood spend a weekend "getting in touch" with their feelings at a weekend seminar, they proceed to drive their friends (Gould and Cannon) crazy with their ideas of infidelity, pot smoking, and even wife-swapping. Like EASY RIDER, it's an interesting statement of the sixties that may not be of interest to contemporary viewers. From the director of DOWN AND OUT IN BEVERLY HILLS.

BOBBIE JO AND THE OUTLAW (1976)—Directed by Mark L. Lester.  Stars Marjoe Gortner, Lynda Carter, Jesse Vint, Gene Drew.  If you’ve sought out this American International drive-in flick, it’s likely because you heard that TV’s Wonder Woman goes topless in it.  Well, she does, and it makes watching this violent BONNIE & CLYDE ripoff worthwhile.  Carter, who filmed this just after making the WONDER WOMAN pilot, plays Bobbie Jo, a small-town waitress looking for thrills who hooks up with Lyle Wheeler (Gortner), a fast-draw artist and small-time thief who graduates to bank robbery and murder with Bobbie Jo as part of his small gang of amateurs.  This was actually junk actor Gortner’s first leading role in a feature after some television parts and an earlier career as an evangelist.  He was only slightly more experienced before a camera than Carter, who demonstrates the breezy personality and stunning physicality that earned her television stardom.  It’s good for her that she nailed that elusive Big Break—the lead on a successful TV series—that eluded so many other young women who slogged through breast- and bullet-oriented exploitation movies of the 1970s.  Lester’s film is entertaining with some good stunts, but is really only worth watching for Lynda.  Casting a stronger actor than Drew as Bobbie Jo and Lyle’s antagonist—a corrupt sheriff—would have improved the movie—something along the lines of Vic Morrow in DIRTY MARY CRAZY LARRY.  Also with Belinda Belaski (who also performs topless), Merrie Lynn Ross, Gerrit Graham and James Gammon.  Music by Barry deVorzon.  Filmed in New Mexico by the director of TRUCK STOP WOMEN and COMMANDO.

BODIES, REST & MOTION (1993)--Directed by Michael Steinberg. Stars Phoebe Cates, Bridget Fonda, Tim Roth, Eric Stoltz. Stagy drama about the dreams and ambitions of four "twentysomethings" living in a small town in Arizona. Performances are fine, but the screenplay is a little pretentious at times and the characters come off as being one-dimensional and a little irritating. Produced by Stoltz. Look for Bridget's daddy Peter in a cameo as a motorcycle rider.

BODY CHEMISTRY III: POINT OF SEDUCTION (1994)--Directed by Jim Wynorski. Stars Andrew Stevens, Shari Shattuck, Morgan Fairchild. Boring erotic thriller featuring not enough nudity by blond Shattuck and none at all by '80s bombshell Fairchild. Stevens is a TV producer cheating on wife Fairchild with nympho murderess Shattuck. The cast of well-known faces includes Robert Forster, Stella Stevens, Delia Sheppard and Becky LeBeau. Andrew Stevens produced as well as starred. Scripter Jackson Barr also wrote the first two BODY CHEMISTRY movies.

BODY DOUBLE (1984)--Directed by Brian DePalma. Stars Craig Wasson, Melanie Griffith, Gregg Henry, Deborah Shelton. Another Hitchcock-inspired thriller by DePalma, this one has so many twists and turns that you'll be kept guessing right up until the final reel. Wasson is a claustrophobic actor who is asked to housesit for an actor friend and occupies his evenings spying on his female neighbor, who likes to dance in the nude. Eventually he finds himself framed for the woman's murder and involved with a baby-voiced blond porno actress played by Griffith. Film received much controversy at the time because of the method of Shelton's murder (by a drill held by the killer between his legs). Griffith's best performance. Also with Dennis Franz, Brinke Stevens, Barbara Crampton and a number of real-life porn actresses. Music by Pino Donaggio; soundtrack features "Relax" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

BODY HEAT (1981)--Directed by Lawrence Kasdan. Stars William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Richard Crenna, Ted Danson, Mickey Rourke. Kasdan's directorial debut is a DOUBLE INDEMNITY-inspired thriller about a conniving wife (Turner) and her dullard lover (Hurt) in a conspiracy to murder her rich husband (Crenna). Turner is both menacing and sexy in her first movie. Was noteworthy at the time for its erotic love scenes. Hard to believe Kasdan also wrote THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK.

BODY OF EVIDENCE (1992)--Directed by Uli Edel. Stars Madonna, Willem Dafoe, Anne Archer. Awful BASIC INSTINCT ripoff starring Madonna as a lover of kinky sex who may or may not have killed her millionaire boyfriend. Dafoe as her stupid lawyer falls in lust with her, and they have sex on the hood of a car covered with broken glass. The excellent supporting cast, including Joe Mantegna, Julianne Moore, Frank Langella and Jurgen Prochnow, should be embarrassed. Has Madonna ever starred in a good movie?

BODY OF INFLUENCE (1993)--Directed by Gregory Hippolyte. Stars Shannon Whirry, Nick Cassavetes, Richard Roundtree. Boring erotic thriller starring frequently bare-breasted Whirry as a seductress who blackmails a sleazy psychiatrist (played by John Cassavetes son Nick). Plenty of sex and nudity, but not too much sense. Its sad to see one of the coolest icons of the '70s (Roundtree) wasting his time in nonsense like this. Also with Sandahl Bergman, Tiffany Million and Patrick Swayze's ugly brother Don.

BODY SNATCHERS (1993)--Directed by Abel Ferrara. Stars Gabrielle Anwar, Meg Tilly, Terry Kinney. Third remake of Jack Finney's classic sci-fi novel has been updated for the '90s, but bears much resemblance to the same year's THE PUPPET MASTERS, which was based, not on Finney's novel, but on a Robert A. Heinlein book by that name. Ferrara sets his tale of pod breeding on a military installation, and makes his main character a teenage girl (Anwar), who moves onto the base with her scientist father and her stepmother. The military, with its conformity in dress and manner and its blind acceptance of authority without question, is the perfect setting for this horror tale of aliens who kidnap people like us and replace them with emotionless duplicates created in pods. Ferrara and scripter Nicholas St. John create some gooey effects and a few scenes of suspense and mood, but the film doesn't capture the sheer terror of Don Siegel's 1956 original or the satire of Philip Kaufman's 1978 remake. With Billy Wirth, R. Lee Ermey, Christine Elise and Forest Whitaker. From the director of BAD LIEUTENANT.

THE BODYGUARD (1976)--Directed by Simon Nuchtern.  Stars Sonny Chiba, Judy Lee.  Terry Levene's Aquarius Releasing made some money off this Japanese import in the late 1970's by adding some new footage (directed by Nuchtern, the only helmer to receive a screen credit) shot in New York that has nothing to do with Chiba.  Chiba plays Chiba, a drug-hating vigilante who hires himself out to protect anyone willing to testify against the drug dealers invading Tokyo.  Lee volunteers, and Chiba's quest becomes a personal one when his sister is mistaken for Lee, beaten, stripped naked and left in the street.  Clunky camerawork and uneven pacing mar this violent potboiler, which presents several brutal fight scenes in which Sonny punches through walls and tears off an opponent's arm. 

BOILING POINT (1993)--Directed by James B. Harris. Stars Wesley Snipes, Dennis Hopper, Viggo Mortensen. Hopper gives still another of his patented psycho performances as a killer hunted by federal agent Snipes. Routine actioner from the director of COP is based upon a novel written by Gerald Petrievich. With Lolita Davidovich, Tony LoBianco, Valerie Perrine and Dan Hedaya.

BOLERO (1984)--Directed by John Derek. Stars Bo Derek, George Kennedy and...ah, who cares? Depending upon your tastes, one of the worst or one of the funniest movies you'll ever see. Bo is a virgin looking for the ultimate in sexual ecstasy. No, she doesn't find it with George Kennedy (wouldn't THAT be a great concept?). Look for the scenes of Bo's lover licking honey off her naked body, a nude Bo riding a horse bareback, and Bo's lover being gored in the cohones by a bull. Don't miss it!

THE BONE COLLECTOR (1999)--Directed by Phillip Noyce. Stars Denzel Washington, Angelina Jolie, Queen Latifah, Michael Rooker, Ed ONeill, Luis Guzman. Standard police procedural slightly enlivened by the presence of two enormously charismatic leads. Washington is Lincoln Rhyme, a brilliant NYPD criminologist and author who, for the past four years, has been paralyzed from the shoulders down (except for one convenient mouse-clicking finger) following an accident during one of his investigations. Bedridden in the spacious apartment which he shares with live-in nurse Thelma (Latifah), he has lost much of his humanity--cutting himself off from his family and friends--and, in fact, has made plans with a doctor for self-termination, preferring death to an eventual life as a vegetable. His life becomes sparked, however, when a grisly new case falls into his lap: the body of a prominent businessman is found buried near a railroad track with the skin ripped from one of his fingers, his wife's wedding ring placed upon it, and a number of other strange clues left at the crime scene. The young policewoman responding to the call, the impossibly beautiful Amelia Donaghy (Jolie), has the foresight to maintain the crime scene before the clues could be destroyed. Rhyme decides she's prime detective material, and demands that she be added to the task force investigating the killing, which also includes good-natured detective Paulie Sellitto (O'Neill) and lab tech Eddie (Guzman). A second victim turns up in a basement scalded to death by steam; another is eaten alive by rats. The horribly disfigured bodies are photographed by Noyce and cinematographer Dean Semler in such a way that will remind you of another ghastly serial-killer movie, SEVEN (to which THE BONE COLLECTOR immodestly attempts to compare itself in its print ads).

Credibility is not exactly the strong suit of Jeremy Iacone's screenplay (based upon the book by Jeffery Deaver); the killer goes to amazing lengths to leave the sort of complex clues that would make Arthur Conan Doyle shake his head, and the reasoning that Washington uses to pull the meanings of these arcane messages out of his rear end are pretty hilarious. Anyone who has ever seen more than one episode of LAW & ORDER will realize that Washington's idea of running an investigation bears no resemblance to reality whatsoever, especially the way he demands that Amelia enter the crime scenes first--with no backup--the idea being that he doesn't want anyone else trampling any evidence that may be left behind, but, in reality, it's just Noyce's way of building suspense by sending an innocent young woman into potential danger armed with nothing but evidence-gathering equipment and a flashlight. The revelation of the sadistic, allegedly clever killer's identity during the WAIT UNTIL DARK-like climax, like in KISS THE GIRLS (another box-office hit based upon a popular novel featuring two smooth leads, an inventive serial killer and an equally unbelievable script), comes from out of absolutely nowhere. Any mystery reader knows the author has to play fair--he has to sprinkle a few clues here and there to give us the opportunity to guess who-dun-it. Here, Noyce and Iacone seem to have just placed the names of the supporting characters into a hat, pulled one out, and exclaimed, "Okay, he's our killer!" Without the opportunity to solve the mystery alongside Washington, it's harder to get wrapped up in it, and we're reduced to the hilarity of seeing him jump to ludicrous conclusions, which, since it's a movie and he's the hero, turn out to be correct.

Washington confirms that he's one of the greatest movie stars of his generation. Working entirely from a bed, without the benefit of body language, he's completely convincing in his role (even when the mechanical script isn't), adding a deeper layer of poignancy. Jolie, who eschews makeup in favor of a more natural look here, is still too beautiful to be entirely believable in her role, but smoothly manages to capture the mentor-protg relationship with Washington (think Denzel as Nero Wolfe and Angelina as a curvier Archie Goodwin). Latifah, O'Neill and Guzman deliver decent support; Rooker does less well (not his fault) in a poorly drawn red-herring role as a clichd, thickheaded superior officer whose only task in the screenplay is to be stupid.

Also with Mike McGlone, Leland Orser, John Benjamin Hickey, Bobby Cannavale, Gary Swanson (VICE SQUAD) and a cameo by director Noyce as a customer in a used-book store. Routine score by Craig Armstrong (composing his first major film) has the stings, booms and thunder we expect of a Hollywood thriller these days. O'Neill made his film debut in DELIVERANCE, which starred Jolie's father Jon Voight. From the director of PATRIOT GAMES and THE SAINT.

BONE DRY (2007)—Directed by Brett A. Hart.  Stars Luke Goss, Lance Henriksen.  Although it suffers from a severe case of First-Time Director Syndrome, BONE DRY is a high-concept thriller that takes advantage of its meager budget by shooting nearly everything on location in and around the Mojave Desert.  Eddie (Goss), on his way home to his wife and kids, is waylaid by a mysterious man calling himself Jimmy (Henriksen) who strands him in the middle of the desert armed only with a compass and a walkie-talkie.  Using a high-powered rifle to punctuate his commands, Jimmy forces Eddie to march north across the sand, refusing to provide any clues to his identity or his mission.  Clearly influenced by Steven Spielberg’s DUEL, BONE DRY is basically a two-man show that doesn’t quite have enough oomph to hold up the whole time (I would have taken ten minutes out).  The mystery pays off pretty well with a good twist, and Henriksen is fantastic (as usual).  Goss is a liability; I never believed this guy spent days in the desert, and he seems to accept his situation surprisingly well.  Certainly, he's not a strong enough actor to face off against Lance Henriksen, but how many DTV-level stars are?  Dee Wallace Stone and Tiny Lister appear briefly.

THE BONEYARD (1991)—Directed by James Cummins.  Stars Ed Nelson, Deborah Rose, Phyllis Diller, Norman Fell.  If you’re tired of seeing pretty teenagers getting killed in cheap horror movies, this one might be for you.  If you’re the type of horror fan who would get a big kick out of an animatronic 8-foot Phyllis Diller zombie, this one is definitely for you.  An overweight psychic (Rose), two cops, a hippie mortician (Fell), a young woman who attempted suicide, and Phyllis Diller (sans fright wig) are trapped in the basement of a rundown soon-to-be-demolished morgue, where they are chased by three zombie children.  THE BONEYARD is something of a sleeper.  It takes awhile to get going, but it really rips once it does.  The zombie makeup is outstanding, and the actors wearing it, be they little people or actual children, do a great job selling it.  It will be obvious by the time you get to the climax that THE BONEYARD is not to be taken completely seriously, though the goofy monsters that chase the cast at the end shouldn’t come as a surprise if you’ve been paying attention.  Old pro Nelson as a cop named Jersey Callum (a role originally intended for Clu Gulager, who also would have been great) finds just the perfect thickness of ham to match Cummins’ screenplay, making this North Carolina creature feature a fun flick.

BONNIE'S KIDS (1973)--Directed by Arthur Marks.  Stars Tiffany Bolling, Steve Sandor, Robin Mattson, Scott Brady, Alex Rocco, Timothy Brown, Leo Gordon.  The "kids" of the late Bonnie are two gorgeous young women, 24-year-old Ellie (Bolling) and her 16-year-old sister Myra (Mattson), who live with their mean, drunken pedophile stepfather Charlie (Gordon) in a small town where they drive the men crazy by wearing their skirts too high and undressing in front of open windows.  Unfortunately for Charlie, we don't even make it to the opening credits before Ellie pops a couple of shotgun blasts in his chest while he's attempting to rape her sister.  Hiding the body in the basement, the two head to El Lay to look up their rich uncle Ben Seeman (Brady).  Although they haven't seen Ben in years, he offers to put them up at his spacious ranch, where trampy Myra puts the make on both the studly stable boy and Ben's horny young wife.  Meanwhile, complications ensue when Ellie, on an errand run for Uncle Ben, finds herself and a dim bulb private eye (Sandor) the targets of two hitmen (Rocco, Brown).

Surprisingly for a film of this vintage and genre, the violence and sex quotients are relatively low (although both Bolling and Mattson appear topless).  However, the sleaze factor runs high indeed with hardly a likable character in the entire film.  The men are perverted, mercenary and brutal; the women selfish, manipulative and pathetic.  Marks' screenplay is an odd duck, splitting up the two sisters for much of the film and cutting back and forth between their separate attempts to screw over anybody who gets between them and what they want.  It also introduces several characters, like a small town sheriff and a tacky traveling gun salesman, who serve little purpose, while forcing already firmly established characters to later act completely out of character (such as Sandor's affable P.I., who gets smarter as the film moves along).  These faults didn't bother me much, however, since the professional cast handles the grimy dialogue and plot twists just fine, and Marks' clean direction and suitably cheesy locations ensure a steady pace.  What may be most interesting today are the performances by Rocco and Brown as the white/black hitman team, whose cool demeanor and easy camaraderie may remind you of John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson in PULP FICTION.

Also with Max Showalter (who was known as Casey Adams when he appeared in dozens of films and TV shows during the '50s, including NIAGARA), Lenore Stevens, Glen Stensel and a young, longhaired Sharon Gless as a coffee shop waitress.  Mattson also performed a nude scene a year later in CANDY STRIPE NURSES; she eventually shed her drive-in career to become a popular soap opera star (ALL MY CHILDREN).  Brown was a former NFL running back who played Spearchucker Jones on the first season of M*A*S*H and then starred in several blaxploitation movies.  Rocco appeared the same year in Marks' DETROIT 9000, a favorite of Tarantino's.

BOOBY TRAP (1970)—Directed by Dwayne Avery. Stars Carl Monson, Angela Carnon, Buck Kartalian, Christopher Geoffries. Monson, who went on to direct the better known SCREAM IN THE STREETS and PLEASE DON’T EAT MY MOTHER for producer Harry Novak, is awful as Jack Brennan, a psycho Vietnam vet who buys a bunch of claymores from an old Marine buddy and plans to blow up hippies at a rock festival at Vasquez Rocks. That’s basically the plot, but writer/director Avery can’t stretch it to feature length, so he throws in several other stories about a Sansabelt-wearing Marine investigator on Brennan’s trail, Brennan’s barmaid ex-wife Taffy (Carnon) and her guitarist fiancé (Geoffries), and a sleazy bar owner and his flunky (Kartalian, the star of PLEASE DON’T EAT MY MOTHER).

I would have preferred more emphasis on the thriller elements and less on the softcore sex, but that’s not how Harry Novak rolls. Avery made several Novak films as both a director and a cinematographer, even working with Monson on SCREAM IN THE STREETS. The main title music, which plays over second-unit shots of Monson driving his RV through Las Vegas, is very well done. In fact, the whole score by Vic Lance, which includes a lot of space-age sounds, is cool. Avery works hard to make BOOBY TRAP look like a real movie with arty photography and editing, and it actually works pretty well. I’m sure BOOBY TRAP was also released in a more extreme cut not represented on Something Weird Video’s DVD (with Monson’s THE TAKERS).

THE BOOGENS (1982)--Directed by James L. Conway.  Stars Rebecca Balding, Fred McCarren.  The folks who gave us those Sunn Classics “docudramas” like IN SEARCH OF NOAH’S ARK and THE LINCOLN CONSPIRACY delivered this straightforward monster movie that’s predictable but watchable.  The plot is simple enough:  100 years after the Army shut down a prosperous mine near Silver City, California that was the setting of a series of unexplained murders, a four-man crew reopens it, and guess what?  Yep, more killings commence.  The “boogens” are goofy-looking amphibians with tentacles and big teeth.  It takes them awhile to start ripping apart the cast, but it’s fun when they do.  Give director Conway and his writers credit for not making his young protagonists obnoxious and dumb like they are in most horror movies.  This foursome, anchored by Balding (SILENT SCREAM), are likable kids, while veterans Med Flory and John Crawford provide an older balance.  You’ll recognize Anne-Marie Martin from THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME and SLEDGE HAMMER!; she later married Michael Crichton and co-wrote TWISTER.

BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997)--Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Stars Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds, Julianne Moore. This well-directed epic detailing the '70s porno scene is over two-and-a-half hours long. It gives Burt Reynolds his best role in almost two decades, and establishes Anderson, who also wrote the screenplay and co-produced, as a filmmaker to watch out for. Former rap star and model Marky Mark is surprisingly good as a teenage dropout who falls in with a group of adult filmmakers in the late 1970s. Calling himself Dirk Diggler, he follows the tried-and-true movie formula of life in Hollywood (clawing his way to the top before drugs, ego and self-destruction knock him back to the bottom of the ladder). Reynolds is a porn director named Jack Horner, who may be making filler for American grindhouses, but has the integrity to give his films the best acting and production values possible. He also heads his own extended family, which includes a number of actors and production crew who seem to inhabit his expensive house at all hours. While borrowing stylistically from a number of filmmakers (especially Martin Scorsese; the opening Steadicam shot echoes the extended nightclub sequence from GOODFELLAS), Anderson's sense of detail is astonishing in terms of wardrobe, sets, and music--it looks as if it was actually filmed during the time period it depicts. The outstanding cast also includes Moore as porn actress/mother figure Amber Waves; Heather Graham as Rollergirl, who performs sex scenes wearing roller skates; William H. Macy as harried assistant director Little Bill; Don Cheadle as Buck, who considers his porn roles as just another acting job while saving up to buy his own hi-fi store; and John C. Reilly as another porn star, Reed Rothchild. Also with Alfred Molina, Joanna Gleason, John Doe, Jack Riley (from THE BOB NEWHART SHOW!) and Robert Ridgely (who died before the film was released) as Reynolds's moneyman. Despite the subject matter, the amount of sex and nudity is less than you would expect. Soundtrack includes period hits by Electric Light Orchestra, the Emotions, Three Dog Night, Eric Burdon and War and others; score by Michael Penn. Film is dedicated to Ridgely and to the late ABC voiceover legend Ernie Anderson, father of the director.

BOOMERANG (1993)--Directed by Reginald Hudlin. Stars Eddie Murphy, Robin Givens, Halle Berry, David Alan Grier. Eddie-as-Cary Grant. Incredibly unfunny comedy featuring Murphy as a love-'em-and-leave-'em type who must choose between good girl Berry or bad girl Givens. An ego trip for Murphy as every character in the movie spends an amazing amount of screen time discussing how handsome, intelligent, sophisticated, virile or brilliant Murphy's character is supposed to be. He just comes off as being an arrogant jerk. Grier is funny as one of Eddie's pals, and Berry is gorgeous. Also with embarrassing cameos by Geoffrey Holder, Grace Jones and Eartha Kitt.

THE BORDER (1980)--Directed by Tony Richardson. Stars Jack Nicholson, Harvey Keitel, Valerie Perrine, Warren Oates. Nicholson is very good as a cynical U.S. border patrolman who uncovers a baby-selling ring involving illegal aliens and discovers his long-buried conscience along the way. Interesting look at U.S./Mexico border practices with some good supporting performances. Music by Ry Cooder.

BORDERLINE (1980)--Directed by Jerrold Freedman. Stars Charles Bronson, Bruno Kirby, Ed Harris, Wilford Brimley, Michael Lerner. Better-than-average Bronson actioner starring Big Charlie as a border patrol officer after the illegal alien smugglers that killed his partner. Lots of violent killings ensue. Harris's first film. Director Freedman has also written a few mystery novels.

BORN AMERICAN (1986)--Directed by Renny Harlin. Stars Mike Norris, David Coburn, Steve Durham. Three American college students on vacation in Lapland (!) decide to sneak across the Russian border on a lark. They get caught and are sent to a Soviet prison, where they are tortured. They plan an escape into the Arctic tundra. Also with Albert Salmi and Thalmus Rasulala. Future DIE HARD 2 and CLIFFHANGER helmsman Harlin directed this right-wing nonsense. Norris is Chuck's son. Filmed in Finland. Also banned in Finland.

BORN INNOCENT (1974)--Directed by Donald Wrye.  Stars Linda Blair, Joanna Miles, Allyn Ann McLerie.  Exploitation fans looking for more thrills on par with other Linda Blair WIPs like CHAINED HEAT will likely be disappointed.  BORN INNOCENT is an excellent, downbeat drama about 14-year-old Christine Parker (Blair), a seven-time runaway whose parents relinquish custody to the state of New Mexico, which sentences her to a reform school.  Wrye and writer Gerald DiPego take a semi-documentary approach to the material, shooting on location and, except for Fred Karlin's thoughtful theme, mostly eschewing background music.  A notorious scene in which Blair is gang-raped with a toilet plunger was deleted from later television airings, but was present in the version I saw.  Steps are taken to not portray teachers and administrators as one-dimensional heavies, and Miles as a concerned teacher and McLerie as a harried housemother do a nice job showing the tireless frustration that goes into helping girls who often don't want to be helped.  Blair starred in two more classic made-for-TV movies around the same time, SARAH T.--PORTRAIT OF A TEENAGE ALCOHOLIC and SWEET HOSTAGE with Martin Sheen.  Also with Richard Jaeckel, Kim Hunter, Sandra Ego, Nora Heflin and Mitch Vogel (BONANZA).

THE BORN LOSERS (1967)--Directed by Tom Laughlin (as T.C. Frank). Stars Tom Laughlin, Jeremy Slate, Elizabeth James, William Wellman Jr. In this exploitation film financed and released by American-International Pictures, Laughlin introduces his Billy Jack character--a mystical, half-Indian, karate-chopping former Green Beret he would play in three additional films. Billy Jack is forced to kick in some heads when his sleepy California town is terrorized by a scruffy biker gang led by D.C. (Slate). The gang members boast such charming sobriquets as Crabs, Cueball, Gangrene and Child (after Jesus Child). Billy comes to the aid of college student Vicky (James, looking fetching clad in a white scarf, bikini and go-go boots) when the gang rapes and then harasses her so she won't testify against them. Laughlin's directing style is fairly crude, but there is a certain charm to his film. It certainly caught on with audiences, making tons of money for AIP and spawning the sequels BILLY JACK, THE TRIAL OF BILLY JACK and (the unreleased) BILLY JACK GOES TO WASHINGTON. Laughlin also directed, wrote and co-produced using pseudonyms. Also with Robert Tessier, Jeff Cooper, Stuart Lancaster, Jack Starrett (playing basically the same redneck deputy he portrayed in FIRST BLOOD nearly 15 years later) and Jane Russell as the stripper mom of a rape victim. Laughlin's wife Delores Taylor and daughter Teresa appear in uncredited bits.

BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY (1989)--Directed by Oliver Stone. Stars Tom Cruise, Kyra Sedgwick, Raymond J. Barry, Frank Whaley. True story of Vietnam War vet Ron Kovic, who transformed from right-wing war supporter to paraplegic liberal shunned by the country he fought so hard to protect. Cruise is stunning as Kovic, and Barry gives a touching performance as Kovic's small-town father. Well-directed by Stone, this epic film is better than PLATOON because it's more personal, focusing on one man in a realistic situation, rather than a group of men in a more surreal setting. Willem Dafoe has a small but good role as another bitter war vet who meets up with Kovic in Mexico. Winner of two Academy Awards (Best Director and Editing); nominated for Picture, Actor (Cruise should have won instead of Daniel Day-Lewis), Screenplay and three others.

THE BORROWER (1990)--Directed by John McNaughton. Stars Rae Dawn Chong, Don Gordon, Neil Giuntoli. McNaughton's follow-up to his shocking HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER was another low-budget horror film that had trouble getting distribution. Cannon finally put it out after a year or so on the shelf, but it's too much like THE HIDDEN to be of great interest. A PREDATOR-looking alien murderer is sentenced to life on Earth as a human. His captor tells him that if his human body is damaged, he'll have to seek another. Of course, thanks to a redneck poacher and his burnout son, it only takes a few minutes for him to need a replacement. He does it by tearing the heads off of his victims and plopping them down on his own bloody neck stump. Not only does his body adapt to the skin color and body type of the head he's appropriated, but also no one seems to give more than a cursory glance to this odd-looking person strolling down the busy sidewalks caked in blood. Chong and Gordon play the Chicago detectives investigating the grisly slayings. For some reason, McNaughton and screenwriters Richard Fire (who co-wrote HENRY) and Mason Nage waste screen time on an unrelated subplot involving a serial rapist (Giuntoli). Gordon (BULLITT) doesn't appear to have made a film since, and Chong is fine as his sensitive partner. Tom Towles (HENRY) and Antonio Fargas (STARSKY & HUTCH) do nice work in supporting roles, and there's also Larry Pennell, Pam Gordon, Bentley Mitchum, HENRY's Tracy Arnold and a young and hot-looking Madchen Amick.

THE BOSS (1973)--Directed by Fernando di Leo.  Stars Henry Silva, Gianni Garko, Richard Conte, Antonia Santilli.  A violent Italian mob thriller that cooks only when Silva is on screen.  Henry is a total badass as a cold assassin who uses a rocket launcher to wipe out a dozen gangsters in a screening room.  The victims’ “family” strikes back by kidnapping Don Daniello’s sexy daughter Rina (Santilli).  Silva’s boss (Conte) orders the hitman to rescue the girl, which he does, only to take her back to his place for tons of sex, despite the fact that neither likes the other very much.  Still, Santilli looks great naked, so I don’t blame Henry.  While police inspector Garko attempts to find Silva, the two warring mobs cross and doublecross each other to the point where Silva decides the time might be right to take over both families.  None of the other characters or actors is as interesting as Silva, who is cold, mean and highly charismatic, whether he’s punching, smacking or shooting someone.

BOSS NIGGER (1975)—Directed by Jack Arnold.  Stars Fred Williamson, D’Urville Martin, William Smith, Barbara Leigh, R.G. Armstrong, Carmen Hayworth, Don “Red” Barry, Carmen Zapata, Bruce Gordon, Ben Zeller.  It’s hard to imagine a time when you could drive past a movie theater and see the words “BOSS NIGGER” on the marquee—and referring to a PG-rated film, no less.  Fred Williamson, who wrote, produced and starred in the film, admits the title was intended to be exploitative and draw attention to his likable but low-budget western.  Since he had already starred in THE LEGEND OF NIGGER CHARLEY and THE SOUL OF NIGGER CHARLEY, which were blaxploitation hits for Paramount, it clearly didn’t take the former football star known as The Hammer long to figure out how marketing could affect his box office grosses as much as, if not more than, the film’s actual quality.

BOSS NIGGER, which opens with an incredibly funky theme song performed by a singer credited only as Terrible Tom, could almost be another NIGGER CHARLEY sequel, as it again stars Fred as a big, handsome western hero, ready to bust up and shoot it out with anyone black, white or purple who gets in his way, and sidekick D’Urville Martin as his comic sidekick (this was the sixth film the two men made together; they went on to do three more).  This time, the Hammer is Boss, a bounty hunter who rides into a very white small town and installs himself as sheriff, which upsets the racist townspeople, many of whom had never seen a black man before.  Boss and Amos (Martin, later the director and co-star of the trash classic DOLEMITE) have really come to claim the huge reward on Jed Clayton (William Smith), whose vicious gang has the entire town, including the corrupt mayor (R.G. Armstrong), cowering in fear.

Almost as surprising as the film’s title is its choice of director.  Jack Arnold made his name at Universal-International during the 1950s, where he directed many science fiction films that became classics, such as CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE and TARANTULA.  Once non-genre fans look past the campy titles, they usually discover that Arnold’s films were generally quite good, and their success ensured him a long career behind the camera.

However, by the time BOSS NIGGER rolled around, Arnold had been almost exclusively a television director, helming episodes of IT TAKES A THIEF, GILLIGAN’S ISLAND, PETER GUNN, THE BRADY BUNCH and LOVE, AMERICAN STYLE.  He had previously collaborated on the unfortunately little-seen private-eye actioner BLACK EYE with Williamson, which is how Arnold came to also direct BOSS NIGGER.

What is obvious about the film is its short budget and shooting schedule.  Almost every shot is a master or medium shot, which unfortunately hurts the supporting characters that are rarely given close-ups to help establish their characters.  Noted character actor Bruce Gordon (THE UNTOUCHABLES), who plays a shopkeeper, is one who suffers this fate, as is Ben Zeller, who has a pivotal role as a blacksmith, but would be hard to identify without his blond beard.

Arnold does a good job keeping the film afloat, and its real weakness is Williamson’s screenplay, which is full of holes and surprising shifts in tone that the movie doesn’t earn.  The performances are very good—Williamson’s sense of humor about himself was always a great contrast with his good friend and blaxploitation rival, Jim Brown—with the chemistry between the Hammer and Martin filling in a lot of blanks about their characters and what they mean to one another.  Smith, who had been Williamson’s foe in HAMMER and had just made BLACK SAMSON for Warner Brothers, is just about the only actor who could believably go toe-to-toe physically with big Fred and make it look real.

Kit Parker Films has given BOSS NIGGER a welcome DVD release, the only mild caveat being that it has been retitled—on the box art and the menus only—BOSS, which is probably the title it was actually filmed as anyway.  I don’t believe BOSS NIGGER got a VHS release in the U.S., and a previous and possibly unauthorized DVD was severely cropped and censored, notably the word “nigger” being snipped out of the dialogue and the title song.  The Kit Parker DVD has been approved by Williamson, who has added a brief statement to the film that stipulates, yes, the “N-word,” as he puts it, is thrown around a lot, but you’ll notice that everyone who calls me one regrets it later.

Kit Parker’s print is complete and uncut in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio and with the original Dimension Films logo at the beginning.  Considering the movie’s rarity and inexpensive production, the print looks quite fine with appropriate audio.  Williamson sits down for a lengthy interview, much of which is devoted to his football career, which I haven’t seen him discuss much.  Associate producer Myrl Schreibman (PARTS—THE CLONUS HORROR) talks about the movie in a separate interview, and also heads a short tribute to Jack Arnold, who was Schreibman’s mentor (the two met while Arnold was producing Robert Wagner’s IT TAKES A THIEF television series).  The original BOSS NIGGER trailer is also included.

BOSS NIGGER isn’t top-tier Fred Williamson, but it’s better than most of the programmers the filmmaking pioneer directed himself.  It’s lively and witty with a good cast.  Besides the frequent racial epithets, it lacks profanity, sex and bloodshed, which feels like an appropriate decision.  While it obviously has something to say about race, it’s ultimately an old-fashioned western about good guys and bad guys.  And it has that great music, which was also released on a soundtrack album.  I wonder how many of those are floating around out there.

THE BOSTON STRANGLER (1968)--Directed by Richard Fleischer. Stars Tony Curtis, Henry Fonda, George Kennedy, Murray Hamilton. Curtis took a chance in breaking away from his usual roles in fluff comedies to portray Albert DeSalvo, a seemingly ordinary plumber and family man who was also a serial killer. His performance is great, and he should have been Oscar-nominated. The scene where he confesses to police detective Fonda is incredible; Curtis could act when he got the chance. Director Fleischer uses an unusual but effective technique: multiple split-screens, which enable the viewer to see things from both Curtis's and his victim's point-of-view at the same time. The supporting cast includes Sally Kellerman, Hurd Hatfield, James Brolin, William Hickey and William Marshall The real-life DeSalvo was never convicted in court, and was killed in prison.

BOTTLE ROCKET (1996)--Directed by Wes Anderson.  Stars Luke Wilson, Owen Wilson, James Caan.  Anderson began his acclaimed feature directing career with this quirky comedy that he co-wrote with star Owen Wilson.  Young suburbanite Anthony (Luke Wilson) exits a mental hospital and is immediately drawn into his friend Dignan's (Owen Wilson) scheme to become criminals and impress his former boss, Mr. Henry (Caan), whom Dignan believes to be a local gangster.  Typical of Anderson's odd brand of comedy and boasting a unique visual style, BOTTLE ROCKET has its fans, but I find it hard to warm up to Anderson's films.  Owen has perhaps never been better as an actor--he's not playing "Owen Wilson" for once--much of the dialogue is very funny, and Anthony's relationship with a Mexican motel maid is sweet.  My second favorite Anderson film, behind THE LIFE AQUATIC.  Also with Robert Musgrave, Lumi Cavazos, Kumar Pallana and Jim Ponds.  The Rolling Stones' "2000 Man" from THEIR SATANIC MAJESTIES REQUEST is featured.

BOUNTY HUNTERS (1996)--Directed by George Erschbamer.  Stars Michael Dudikoff, Lisa Howard, Benjamin Ratner.  Dudikoff (AMERICAN NINJA) is "Jersey" Bellini.  Howard (EARTH: FINAL CONFLICT) is B.B. Berringer.  Together, they're bounty hunters who reluctantly team up to protect a prostitute targeted by oily mobster Ratner.  She was found in the trunk of a Rolls Royce that was stolen by the hunters' prey, a small-time thief who jumped $50,000 bail.  Turns out the Rolls belonged to Ratner, whose goons were taking her out to be whacked when the car was stolen.  While the action is about on the same level as a syndicated TV action show, the performances by Dudikoff and Howard are quite lively and appealing.  Dudikoff plays Jersey as sort of a poor man's Jack Burton (Kurt Russell's character in BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA), a childish doofus who can still handle himself in a tight situation.  His love/hate relationship with Howard works very well, since it's obvious that their fights are done with affection and are never mean-spirited or out of character.  Of course, it goes without saying that each can hold his/her own in a kickboxing battle, of which BOUNTY HUNTERS has many (as well as chases and explosions and gun battles and...).  Not to make it sound better than it actually is, but the charming leads give this Canadian-lensed and -financed actioner a slight edge over its DTV brethren.  Also with Erin Fitzgerald, Peter LaCroix and Freddy Andreiuci.  From the director of the SNAKE EATER trilogy.

BOUNTY HUNTERS 2: HARDBALL (1997)--Directed by George Erschbamer.  Stars Michael Dudikoff, Lisa Howard, Tony Curtis, Peter Bacic.  First there was THE GODFATHER, PART II.  Then THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK.  And now there's BOUNTY HUNTERS 2, the latest sequel to outshine its original.  OK, BH2 is definitely on a different level than those blockbusters, but its action scenes and pacing are enough to vault it past the first BH adventure.  This time, Jersey (Dudikoff) and B.B.'s (Howard) status as domicile-sharing lovers is endangered by a Mob contract on Jersey's life that causes their house to be bombed.  Carlos (Bacic), a wannabe Godfather, hopes to impress his boss, Wald (Curtis), by engineering the assassination of the bounty hunter, Jersey, who foiled a jewel heist.  Although their partnership is initially threatened, Dudikoff and Howard create appealing enough characters to let you know that they do love each other, and it's interesting to see romantic leads who would rather kick somebody in the face than kiss each other.  If they did a BOUNTY HUNTERS TV series, I'd probably watch it.  Curtis, whose wardrobe never changes, probably shot all of his scenes in a single day.  Also with Pablo Coffey, L. Harvey Gold, April Telek and other Canadian supporting players.  BH2 also contains two of the most hilarious instances of blatantly inappropriate, gratuitous nudity I've ever seen.

THE BOURNE IDENTITY (2002)--Directed by Doug Liman.  Stars Matt Damon, Franka Potente, Chris Cooper.  This loose adaptation of Robert Ludlum's 1980 novel casts Damon as a young man who is discovered by Spanish fishermen floating face-up in the ocean, unconscious and with a couple of bullets in him.  Fished out and nursed back to health, he realizes that he doesn't remember anything that happened before his rescue--not even his own name.  A Swiss bank account number found surgically implanted under his skin leads him to Zurich, where he discovers a safe deposit box with a passport with his picture and the name "Jason Bourne", as well as a gun and several million dollars in various currencies.  Teaming up with innocent student Marie (Potente), Bourne finds himself on the run from killers--for no reason he can comprehend--including an assassin hired by his own boss, CIA exec Conklin (Cooper).

While it's nice to see a summer blockbuster aimed at an audience with higher than a sixth-grade reading level for once, BOURNE is no more than a mild attempt at espionage thrills.  Tony Gilroy and William Blake Herron's changes to Ludlum's original story only complicate matters, and Damon, who's fine in the dramatic scenes, is grossly miscast as a master killer.  In an attempt to make Damon look somewhat plausible as a tough guy, Liman (SWINGERS) uses trick editing to speed up the action, which only draws more attention to Damon's deficiencies as an action star.  The idea of the CIA hunting one of its own is not exactly the most original dramatic concept, and BOURNE's most unusual aspect may be the appearance of teen star Julia Stiles, who's unbilled, plays a character with little screen time and no real dramatic purpose, and must have gotten the job by dating one of the above-the-line talent.  Also with Clive Owen, Brian Cox and Josh Hamilton.  Decent score by John Powell.  Filmed on location in Greece, Italy, France and the Czech Republic.  Richard Chamberlain and Jaclyn Smith starred in a 1988 TV miniseries version that was more faithful to Ludlum's book.

BOWERY BATTALION (1951)—Directed by William Beaudine. Stars Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bernard Gorcey, Donald MacBride, Virginia Hewitt, Buddy Gorman, David Gorcey. Another Bowery Boys six-day wonder for Monogram. Sach (Hall) mistakes a fake air raid over Manhattan for the real thing and convinces Whitey (Benedict), Chuck (David Gorcey), and Butch (Gorman) to join the Army with him. When Slip (Leo Gorcey) goes to the recruiting office to bail the boys out, the recruiter tricks him into joining up too. Meanwhile, the Pentagon recruits Louie (Bernard Gorcey), who invented a hydrogen ray during World War I, into the service to smoke out some foreign spies. Of course, they all end up on the same base with predictably loony results. See the Bowery Boys slapstick their way through the obstacle course and bungle guard duty. Takes a jab at the Francis the Talking Mule movies and breaks the fourth wall in an amusing coda. MacBride is good as the boys’ apoplectic drill sergeant. Check out the awful optical effects during the air raid sequence.

THE BOWERY BOYS MEET THE MONSTERS (1954)--Directed by Edward Bernds.  Stars Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bernard Gorcey, John Dehner, Lloyd Corrigan.  Although it appears to recycle bits from Abbott & Costello and Three Stooges reels (director Bernds and writer Elwood Ullman also worked with the Stooges), this funny little cheapie (which is strangely the only Bowery Boys movie with the words "Bowery Boys" in the title) is propelled by its energetic stars, Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall, who were original Dead End Kids in the 1930s.  Running just 65 minutes, THE BOWERY BOYS MEET THE MONSTERS finds series regulars Slip Mahoney (Leo Gorcey) and Sach Jones (Hall) spending the night at the home of an eccentric Charles Addams-esque family, where they encounter a gorilla, a sexy female vampire, a pair of mad scientists, a man-eating plant, a Lurch-like butler with a meat cleaver and a silly-looking robot named Gorog.  One scientist wants to transplant Sach's head onto his robot, so it'll have the ability to "think" (though, considering Sach's IQ, it would be better off with wires and tubes), while the other (played by popular deep-voiced radio and television actor Dehner) wants to plop Slip's head onto the monkey.  As usual, the other Boys, played here by Benny Bartlett and Leo’s brother David Gorcey, are merely background players with nary a line.  Bernds keeps it moving quickly (appropriately for what was probably a six- or seven-day schedule). Also with Ellen Corby, Paul Wexler and Laura Mason.