RADIO DAYS (1987)

Directed by Woody Allen, U.S.A. I’ve enjoyed lots of Woody Allen movies, but was a little underwhelmed by this one. A plotless, nostalgic recreation of the late thirties and early forties, the main strand of the film presents the family of our narrator, Joe. A secondary, unrelated, strand recounts the story of a wannabe radio star played by Mia Farrow. That’s more or less it. For the first time with an Allen movie, I was a little too aware of (and even annoyed by) those overly-familiar signatures: the affected dialogue, the physical gesturing, the signposted one-liners. Don’t start here if you’re new to Woody. 3/5.

NIGHT RIPPER! (1986)

Directed by Jeff Hathcock, U.S.A. I can only imagine the disappointment of the horror fans who rented this from their local video stores back in the eighties. The blurb on the box promises “a gore-splattered action thriller” with a “riveting, nerve-racking climax.” What you actually get is a pedestrian, shot-on-video yawnfest with a limp ending. (That wouldn’t have sounded quite so enticing, though, would it?) The plot supposedly revolves around a maniac who’s killing models, but actually this feels like an add-on to long sequences about our hero’s completely non-fascinating romantic travails. 2/5.

MESSALINA, MESSALINA (1977)

Directed by Bruno Corbucci, Italy. Made using the left-over sets from 1979’s CALIGULA (which was filmed in 1976 but got stuck in a convoluted post-production), this was actually released first and then was later marketed as a sequel to the Brass-Guccione epic. Whenever it came out and whatever title you see it under, it’s a tiresome mess. The story of Claudius’s famously promiscuous wife Messalina is reduced to an inept “sex comedy” with jokes about “weenies” and farting. There are boring, irrelevant tangents, one of which involves Tomas Milian. Avoid. 1/5.

THE SEX CALL (1977)

Directed by Tulio Demicheli, Mexico/Colombia/Spain/Dominican Republic. This is unlikely to be on anyone’s top ten list of favourite giallo movies, but it’s worth a watch if you’re in a tolerant mood. Like many other “yellows,” it takes its time contriving a highly specific set of events, in this case involving flashbacks to incestuous pasts, warnings from swivel-eyed psychics, and pesky love triangles. In fact, we’re nearly an hour into its eighty minute run-time before advertising exec Carlos (a perma-tanned George Hilton) gets round to murdering his wife. Still, the deeply seventies atmosphere keeps it watchable. 3/5.

I’M NOT FEELING MYSELF TONIGHT (1976)

Directed by Joseph McGrath, U.K. In our post-Weinstein, “Me Too” culture, watching a movie like this feels like discovering an alien artefact from another world. Jon Pigeon (Barry Andrews, the uninteresting hero from DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE) is a cleaner at a sex clinic who invents a machine which emits a high-frequency audio aphrodisiac. He uses it to seduce his boss’s secretary. It’s a movie bursting with what back in the seventies I suppose they called “harmless fun,” but that nowadays we’d call sexual harassment. Anyway, check out the tits on the birds! Lots of fantastic seventies locations and a good script by David McGillivray. 4/5.

HOBGOBLINS (1988)

Directed by Rick Sloane, U.S.A. The worst rip-off of GREMLINS ever, this takes the concept of failure to ecstatic depths. A security guard has to hunt down a group of furry little monsters after they escape from the vault in which they have been imprisoned for thirty years. After about forty minutes, I tried to put aside my irritation at the stupid plot and told myself to enjoy the movie as a goofy mess. But I couldn’t even do that: its badness is all-encompassing and immeasurable. Let me emphasise: this is not “so bad it’s good.” It’s just bad. Very, very bad. It made me hate GREMLINS for having inspired it. 1/5.

FORBIDDEN PASSION (1974)

Directed by Francisco Lara Polop, Spain. Here’s an extremely dull Ornella Muti vehicle which simply isn’t worth the effort. Nineteen year-old Muti stars as Manuela, who gets a job as secretary to high-flying architect Francesco (played by Philippe Leroy, aged forty-four but looking years older). Francesco falls in love with her, they start an affair, and various romantic complications ensue. There really isn’t anything at all of any interest about this movie, beyond a few sequences of Muti in a bikini. She looks good, but it’s no payoff for having to sit through the rest of this turgid nonsense. 1/5.

ELYSIA, VALLEY OF THE NUDE (1933)

Directed by Carl Harbaugh, U.S.A. I’m grimly fascinated by nudist films. It’s connected to the way they always espouse the purity and morality of stripping off, even though producers and distributors must have been aware that most viewers had no interest whatsoever in this “philosophy.” They wanted to see naked flesh. In this early offering from the sub-genre, a reporter researches a nudist camp for an article. It’s all very earnest and propagandistic, but lingering shots of the stunning Constance Allen suggest someone knew what would really draw the punters in. You can read more in Eric Schaefer’s excellent “Bold! Daring! Shocking! True!” 4/5.

KILLING OF THE FLESH (1983)

Directed by Cesare Canevari, Italy. Spaghetti sexploitation about a group of people (one of whom is Marc Porel in his final role) who gather at a hotel for the family patriarch’s funeral. Mourning, however, is the last thing on their minds, and soon it’s wall-to-wall nudity courtesy of absurdly beautiful women with terrible eighties hairstyles. About fifty-three minutes in, there’s a murder and suddenly we realise that all along this has been a half-assed giallo. Everyone now looks shifty, but the “climax” is anything but climactic, and the script just seems to fizzle out. Includes a beautifully cheesy, but highly evocative, musical score. 3/5.

PRIVATE CLUB (1974)

Directed by Max Pecas, France. Cabbie Marcel is taken to a high-class brothel where people get to live out their fantasies. While fucking various hookers, Marcel discovers that his beloved bride-to-be is also there. Gender politics being what they are, Marcel screwing prostitutes is no problem, but his fiancee’s presence is a deplorable abomination which calls for him to smack her around a bit. The film then completely degenerates into various stupid set-pieces involving people from the club. Marcel mopes around and all the characters spout cryptic, supposedly “deep,” dialogue. Monumentally dull, and very, very French. 1/5.