(aka Revenge of the Defenders, Daitetsujin Wan-Sebun. Literal Translation: Iron Robot 17) It was such an Eighties thing. Take a Japanese children’s TV series and distill all its weirdness into an hour and a half so you could sell it as a movie. Simple, right? Even when it is 35 half-hour episodes. Well, it’s actually […]
Read more "Brain 17 (1982)"(aka, Message from Outer Space, Space Ninja) One of the first cloned copies of Star Wars which came out after the release of the George Lucas classic was Message from Outer Space, a strange and colorful Japanese film whose most memorable element was its spaceship in the form of a square-rigged sailing vessel, complete with […]
Read more "Swords of the Space Ark (1981)"I’ve always loved animated science fiction films, particularly those which are set in outer space. Unfortunately, they are quite rare. Well, outside the world of Japanese anime, that is. Very few were made in the English-speaking world, but for some reason a number of quite interesting examples came out of Europe. Or it might be […]
Read more "Fiul Stelelor [The Son of the Stars] (1985)"Now how in the world did I end up watching all these Bigfoot movies? I mean, seriously. I just watched back to back a pair of grade-z Bigfoot movies from the Polonia Brothers (yeah, yeah, I know it’s just Mark now. And his son, Anthony), and now I watched one of those films which somehow […]
Read more "Harry and the Hendersons (1987)"It is very difficult to classify Strawberry Mansion. It has a science fictional setting, a very retro near future where the protagonist drives a first generation Corvair and works as a tax auditor, assessing how much people owe for their dreams. On the other hand, some would describe this as more of a fantasy, as […]
Read more "Strawberry Mansion (2021)"We’ve all had family outings like this: No one’s heard from Uncle Mark for a while — you know, the one who locked himself up in his country house and told everyone to stay away — so a family sets out to see what’s going on. Unfortunately, it proves to be a rather…awkward family reunion […]
Read more "Hatched (2021)"I think the word we want here is “pleasant.” Seriously. This is a nice little family film, about a boy getting sucked into some strange, otherworldly space outside of time. There he finds countless wrecked ships and aircraft, as well as a wide assortment of animals from all times and places. Including dinosaurs, naturally. Oh, […]
Read more "Dinosaur Island (2014)"Hoo boy. Durn them pesky Ruskies! They keep comin’ around and interrupting me when I’m trying to have a cold brewski! Worse than that, the Russians have invaded and crushed us easily, thanks to their army of Shark-Headed commandos. These were made for them by a brilliant German mad scientist. Yes, German. Don’t blame me, […]
Read more "Post Apocalyptic Commando Shark (2018)"Sometimes a film is worth noting not for how good or bad it is but for historical reasons. Take, for example, the curious case of “The Bishop of Battle“, one of the segments of an entertaining, if minor, horror Anthology from 1983, in which a very young looking Emilio Estevez plays J.J. Cooney, a young […]
Read more "Nightmares (1983) — Part two, “The Bishop of Battle”"Girl drowns while at a party, bright lights appear and save her, and the next thing you know she’s on the road with her old boyfriend trying to get somewhere…important. And that pretty much sums this one up. Mind you, the girl, Alex, is now telekinetic. And dangerously radioactive. Sean, her ex, is getting sicker […]
Read more "First Light [At First Light] (2018)"
rivets on the poster 