Cleavagefield
Cleavagefield
2009
Directed by Jim Wynorski (as Salvadore Ross)
Yes, this is an erotic parody of Cloverfield, and it follows most of the plot to the nines. It is complete with random shots of other days, and most of the film is a first person hand held camera. Since the film isn’t entirely taking itself seriously, there are a few instances of breaking the fourth wall. The film occasionally breaks into shots of Tom’s visit to Hawaii where there are two blonde girls (Davina Murphy and Dallas Lowe) that just ended up being annoying, so I fast forwarded through those parts.
Cleavagefield is a humor movie, so don’t expect cool monster sequences and military fights. Expect naked chicks and a monster strolling along every once in a while. The origin of the film is interesting, it started out as a joke on the Retromedia Message Boards and people got interested. Thus, the joke became reality. It was originally joked under the title Chestyfield, for those of you who are interested. At this time there is scant information about the cast online, and due to the fact I am not as knowledgeable about some of these actresses as I should be, I don’t know what other names some of them are probably better known as (Brandee Schaefer in particular) I tried, that is all I can say.
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Categories: Movies, Ugly Tags: Amy Ried, Brandee Schaefer, Dallas Lowe, Davina Murphy, Frankie Cullen, Jim Wynorski, kaiju, Lesbians, Lucia Santos, Rebecca Love, softcore
The Furious Buddha’s Palm
The Furious Buddha’s Palm
aka 如來神掌怒碎萬劍門
1965
HKMDB Link
Directed by Ling Yun
Welcome to another adventure down 1960s Cantonese cinema lane! There are no subtitles, of course, unless you count the Chinese subtitles. But we don’t need no stinking subtitles! The character names are translated by my wife. They may not perfect, but all information about the film is in Chinese so this is the best you will get in English.
This is the 5th film in the Buddha’s Palm series, takes up right after the previous films (Buddha’s Palm 1-4.) For an overview of the Buddha’s Palm series, read this article I wrote that accompanies this review. That’s what happens when I get efficient and do research on the films, they spawn additional articles. The film is only sold in a vcd boxed set, but my wife’s parents managed to get a copy from a Chinatown video store that was selling off stock, thus they have this one but none of the other ones. Don’t ask me why, I have no idea. I should try to acquire the set, photos on the internet show that Buddha’s Palm (Part 2) has robot-looking guys, a bird character, and a guy with metallic paint on his face. There is not much other information on the other three parts so I don’t know if they have cool visuals as well.
One highlight of the film is it has both of the teen queen sensations of 1960s Cantonese cinema, Connie Chan Po-Chu and Josephine Siao Fong-Fong. We also have Sek Kin as his usual role as being the villain. This is a Cantonese film in the 1960s, mind you! The rest of the regular players from 1960s Cantonese cinema are present, many of which popped up in How the Ape Girl Stole the Lotus Lamp or Lady Black Cat. Since the last go-round with 1960′s Cantonese cinema, Sek Kin has passed on. He will not be forgotten, nor will this be the last thing he shows up on TarsTarkas.NET in (considering he made hundreds of films, we could be reviewing his films until the end of time!)
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Categories: Bad, Movies Tags: bug drum torture, Connie Chan Po-Chu, Hong Kong, Josephine Siao Fong-Fong, Ling Yun, mad monkey time, martial arts, Sek Kin, Walter Tso Tat-Wah, Yu So-chau
James Band 007
James Band 007
1980
Directed by ???
James Bond ripoffs seem to exists in every culture’s movie repartee. Some countries churn out dozens of them, especially during the boom years of the 1960s and 1970s. So it is only fitting the comedians get in on the act. Spy spoof films also seem to show up in every country. Spy films are a genre ripe for spoofing, because they are usually freaking ridiculous on their lonesome. James Bond even approached self-parody with cheesy ridiculous entries like Moonraker. So it comes to no surprise that we have a Thai James Bond spoof. The surprise is the film has survived to the point of hitting VCD, which pretty much means we will have at least a low-res version of it forever. Hooray for low-grade film archiving.
Now, I originally got this film off the eThaicd website as a whim, looking for something to fill the order up enough. I didn’t expect this to be anything special, I didn’t even expect it to be a comedy. I was surprised when I opened the package and looked through my vcds, just to notice that the cover to this one included a tiny C-3PO and R2-D2 at the bottom of the film poster. I expected that I would scan in the VCD cover, make a joke about how I liked those droids and couldn’t wait to see them, then get all mad when they never showed up. But the movie punked me. Because…C-3PO and R2-D2 are in this movie! Seriously! Sure, generic Thai knockoffs, but it is them and that is who they are supposed to be! It is one of the most awesome movie discovery I have made. Of course, I included clips of the droids in action. Just stay put. I did some research on the cast, since the only thing written in English about James Band 007 is the order page on the eThaicd website.
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Categories: Movies, Ugly Tags: Lor Tok, Pipop Pupinyo, Thai, Thep Tienchai, totally not Star Wars, We don't need no stinking subtitles
Mendam Berahi
Mendam Berahi
2002
Directed and written by Z. Lokman
Malaysian Charlie’s Angels! Yes, the Charlie’s Angels concept is so universal is seems to exist in every country on the planet. I bet there is even a Tongon Angels somewhere. This time the Angels go searching for lost treasure, which ends up with bloody gunbattles. And a little girl cries while singing. But who cares, gun battles! Chicks kicking butt! Malaysian women you’ve never heard of that Google won’t tell you anything about! It’s all here, and more!
“It just so happens that Mendam Berahi is an action flick and that the good guys are us girls. As soon as we started filming, people were already going, ‘Oh, it’s the Malaysian version of Charlie’s Angels.’ Okay, so that’s good for marketing, but it was targeted from the beginning as a pure action film.” Shaleen Cheah stated, in an argument that might hold water if Madam X didn’t refer to the girls specifically as Angels in the film.
The VCD jumps from widescreen to very widescreen, so black bars will lower and raise between shots, sometimes back and forth in the same scene. Due to the lack of information in English about Malay stars, I couldn’t provide much interesting facts, and you will have to make do with what I could pull off of gossip sites. I am not learning Malay just to do one review, especially since there are about a dozen other languages that I need to learn first. The credits give the country of origin of the players who aren’t from Malaysia, so it would say “Tracy Trinita (Indonesia)”, as opposed to Tracy Trinita (Paraguay), I guess.
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Categories: Movies, Ugly Tags: Datuk Jalaluddin Hasan, Eizlan Yusof, Malaysia, Nurul Jasmin Deo, Rita Rudaini, Shaleen Cheah, Tracy Trinita, Women who kick butt, Z. Lokman
Antoo Fighter
Antoo Fighter
2008SinemaMalasysia Link
Directed by Azizi Chunk
What we got here is sort of Malaysian Ghostbusters, but they use stick weapons instead of proton packs. Instead of busting ghosts we’re fighting monsters and demons. The mood is humorous, not taken too seriously, sort of like the actual Ghostbusters. With people running around in wacky costumes fighting monsters, the film can’t not be entertaining, double negative or not. Good fun. What other film let’s you see a giant Monsters Inc. character battle a giant robot? Take that, Iron Man!
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Categories: Movies, Ugly Tags: Amran Tompel, Awie, Azizi Chunk, Bront Palarae, CGI trainwreck, cool robots, ghosts, Hada Hidzir, Hantu demon, Harun Salim Bachik, Hopping Vampires, long black haired ghosts, Malaysia, Nasrizal Ngasri, Pontianaks, Radhi, Scha, Shoffi Jikan
