Sach (Huntz Hall), Duke (Stanley Clements), and (what’s left of) The Bowery Boys catch a mouthy kid trying to steal their car. As it turns out, he’s a pampered TV star who wants to quit his show and live like a normal kid. Since he takes a shine to Sach and Duke, the head of the studio gives them jobs to help placate his temperamental star. The ( Read more... )

A rich guy falls in love with a folk singer who sings in a coffee house in Miami. In order to be near her, he buys the place. (He even grows a goatee to try to fit in.) Their relationship is threatened when he thinks she posed nude for a scandalous painting and begins acting like a pompous jackass ( Read more... )

Hacksaw Ridge tells the story of Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield), the first contentious objector to win a Medal of Honor. He enlists to become a medic in WWII, but due to his strong personal convictions refuses to touch a weapon. Doss is routinely punished by his drill sergeant (Vince Vaughn) and beaten by his fellow troops who want him to quit. ( Read more... )

The only director to really rival Alfred Hitchcock in terms of showmanship in the ’50s and ‘60s was William Castle. While Castle mostly made straight horror pictures during this time, Homicidal was his most blatant attempt to copy a Hitchcock-style thriller. It might not be Castle’s best film of the era, but it certainly remains one of the best ( Read more... )

House of Horrors is a spin-off of the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes movie, The Pearl of Death. It focuses on The Creeper, played by Rondo Hatton as he helps a disgraced sculptor named De Lange (Martin Kosleck) get revenge on his critics. In exchange for allowing him to sculpt his ghoulish features, The Creeper offers to kill any critic that has ( Read more... )

Hyapatia Lee stars as a DJ named Tasty Tastems who works at KNUT, a rock n’ roll radio station. When the station is in danger of losing its advertising revenue, the manager threatens to shut the place down if the ratings don’t improve. The DJs decide that since the station is in the toilet anyway, they should go out with a bang and switch things ( Read more... )

There are echoes of Kubrick, Polanski, and maybe even a touch of Cronenberg running through director Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise, based on the novel by J.G. (Crash) Ballard. It’s a nightmarish, post-apocalyptic allegory about class warfare and social division. Although it doesn’t quite click all of the time, I already have a feeling I’ll probably be ( Read more... )

Hyapatia Lee’s The Ribald Tales of Canterbury is my kind of porno flick. It’s from the golden age of the ‘80s; a time when things like plot, music, costumes, and humor were just as important as the sex. Not only did porn legend Hyapatia Lee star in the film, but she also adapted the screenplay from Geoffrey Chaucer’s most famous work. (I think ( Read more... )

Hooked is a rather ho-hum slice of ‘50s anti-drug propaganda. It’s earnest and well-meaning, but it also happens to be quite dull. Although I did enjoy the docudrama style (it basically plays like a long episode of Dragnet), it’s never really entertaining on its intended surface level, nor does it work as a Reefer Madness-style camp classic ( Read more... )

Hybrid is a hybrid of a post-apocalyptic action flick, monster movie and Skinamax film. I had high hopes for it since it was directed by Video Vacuum favorite Fred Olen Ray and co-executive produced by the one and only Jim Wynorski. Sadly, it just doesn’t make the cut ( Read more... )