The Essentials: TGWD-Style!

Hey, kids:

On one of my favorite websites, badmovies.org, there was a thread in their forums asking you to name your "essential" bad movies - that is, bad films that you feel are absolutely important for every person who wants to get started in the world of "b-movies". Must-sees, as it were.

I think it's important for everyone to broaden their horizons, experience new sensations and view things they never have before. So for that small percentage of you viewers of this blog who have not yet dipped into the pool of "b", allow me to bring you gently into the shallow end, and start you out with 10 important bad movies that every beginner should watch, own, possess, experience, what-have-you.

These are in no particular order, so you can watch them in any order and they will still benefit your mind, soul and well-being equally. Here we go:

1. They Saved Hitler's Brain (1966) - Every collection should have a good old "what if?" speculative exploitation film. In this one (as if you didn't know) Nazi scientists in post WWII South America have kept alive the head of...oh, take a wild guess. This is, in fact, an older film with framing material filmed before and after to make it a flashback-type story of "what almost happened". There is ineptness of story, of acting, of special effects and especially of overall tact in this film, so it makes a good starting point for any serious "b" watcher.

2. The Choirboys (1977) - A bad adaptation of a good book makes for interesting viewing, if not necessarily better than reading the source material, at least good referencing. Joseph Wambaugh wrote interesting books in his career, "The Choirboys" being one of them, but this movie, directed by none other than Robert (The Dirty Dozen, Emperor of the North) Aldrich, and starring a veritable who's who of mid-'70s 'average guy' actors, it also had the standing record for rampant racism, misogyny, misplaced violence, death and nihilism. Oh, and it's a comedy.

3. War of the Gargantuas (1966) - Monster movies are a welcome addition, even when they're 3rd generation stories with dubbed dialogue and has-been Americans headlining them. Russ Tamblyn is an American scientist in Japan who, with his team of doctors, tracks down two gigantic, mossy monsters who threaten to destroy Tokyo and all the surrounding property. It's basically guys in rubber monster costumes stomping around miniature sets while other actors look off-camera in terror. It IS a lot of fun to watch, and entertaining in a Saturday Afternoon TV Classic kind of way. And you'll find yourself researching all you can find about Kipp Hamilton afterward, too. Go ahead, in fact; then find this movie.

4. Dracula 3000 (2004) - They say nowadays they just don't make the same caliber of bad film they used to. What it takes, it seems, is to add a space theme to a tried-and-true formula. In this case, a Dracula movie. And with actors the likes of Casper Van Dien, Coolio, Tiny Lister, Udo Kier and Erika Eleniak, the cheese is through the roof and makes the viewing of all the familiar terror movie conceits far more entertaining (in an extremely bad sort of way). And as far as the first view of this movie's Dracula character goes...well, just wait until the ending for the movie to "redeem" itself.

5. Invasion U.S.A. (1985) - Over-the-top violent action, all-American bravado, venomously evil Russian bad guys and Chuck Norris - it MUST be the '80s! This is one of those films that leaves the viewer slack-jawed, disoriented and amazed at just how manipulative an art form movies can be. That you know Chuck Norris is going to come out in the end with a mountain of dead bad guys at his feet isn't news; but the implausibility of his heroic actions, his ability to materialize out of nowhere, the arsenal of endless weapons he has at hand and Chuck's ability to do things that would make Superman shake his head and say, "No way!" - now THAT is news. No wonder his cult spreads far and wide...Invasion U.S.A. most certainly had to have helped.

6. Starcrash (1979) - Foreign adaptations of familiar American movies are a must-have. Turkey is a good source (as I have mentioned here more than once...) and so is Italy, on the basis of Starcrash, their entry in the late-'70s Star Wars sweepstakes. And directed as it is by Lugio Cozzi, you will witness multi-colored stars, many scantily-clad women, Joe Spinnell at his most over-acting-est, the worst stop-motion effects ever committed to a large-scale spectacle and David Hasselhoff (pre-"Baywatch" and even pre-"Knight Rider" for that matter). And Caroline Munro. Mmmm...Caroline Munro.

7. Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959) - It is a general rule for every bad movie watcher that they have at least one Edward D. Wood movie in their collection (I have two. Nyah.), and Plan 9 is his most famous, rightly so. The poorest special effects, the chintziest sets, the clunkiest dialogue, the bad movie trifecta of Tor Johnson/Bela Lugosi/Vampira and one of the absolute worst scientific explanations of alien technology ever committed to film. Their stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!

8. Inchon! (1982) - Now talk about a holy grail; this is a film not only funded by Moonies and so over-budgeted and clandestinely paid-for that it could never make back its (undisclosed) budget. After all, it was able to get none other than Sir Laurence Olivier to play General Douglas MacArthur - not that it helped the film as a whole any, but still: Laurence Olivier! Large-scale action abounds, as does Ben Gazzara, Jacqueline Bisset, Richard Roundtree, David Janssen and The Little Angels (Reverend Sun Myung Moon's troupe of child singers), all sharing the screen and the blame, along with scenes of unbelievable war film cliches that you never knew you remembered but are reintroduced to time and again herein. Yes, I've seen it and plan to see it again very soon. Just look for it; you'll find it if you look hard enough. I did.

9. Rat Pfink A Boo Boo (1966) - Bad ripoffs of television fads sometimes make for entertaining "b" flicks. Even if they are as bad as your average Ray Dennis Steckler movie. You know; the guy who made The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies, only here, Ray made a film to cash in on the "Batman" craze with music, fight scenes kind of like if Jackie Chan was a narcoleptic and a great scene with none other than Kogar the Swinging Ape. This is definitely a necessity. Even when director Steckler has been quoted as saying about Rat Pfink "To this day, I don't know why I did it", you know you're witnessing greatness. FIGHT CRIME!

10. Supersonic Man (1979) - Speaking of foreign ripoffs of popular American films, Superman: The Movie made a lot of foreign superheroes spring up after the fact, including Italy's own Supersonic Man (named Kronos in the original Italian-language version), who saves the world from the evil scheming of Doctor Gulik (none other than bad film standby Cameron Mitchell - Google his name; it's a stunning list of achievements). Most people, once having seen this film, will remember most vividly the plywood steamroller and the stereotypical Italian bad guys as Gulik's henchmen, including more sight gags and pratfalls than any typical Superman entry (well, maybe not as many as Superman III) and even a comic relief drunk for good measure. It's bad, but in a good way - heck, it was directed by Juan Piquer Simon, the same man who did Pod People, for crying out loud! What did you expect???

There's quite an eclectic selection for you to go and seek out yourself. And that's not all, I also have:

THE RUNNERS-UP:

11. The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)
12. At Long Last Love (1975)
13. Skidoo (1968)
14. Dunyayi Kurtaran Adam (The Man Who Saves The World, Turkish Star Wars) (1982)
15. Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny (1972)
16. Pinocchio In Outer Space (1965)
17. Jekyll & Hyde...Together Again (1982)
18. Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981)
19. Nukie (1987)
20. The Message (Mohammad: Messenger of God) (1978)

Go look up those titles and see what is so essential about them. You'll be glad you did!

And now you know; and knowing is half the battle!

Dope out.

-TGWD