SHOTGUN (1989)

Directed by Addison Randall, U.S.A. The hilariously miscast Stuart Chapin and his beard star as maverick cop Ian “Shotgun” Jones in this cheap and nasty piece of craptastica which wrings every single cliche you can think of from the eighties action movie genre. The soundtrack, the hair, the clothes, the quips: everything simply oozes cheese, circa 1989. Every fifteen seconds or so, there’s something new to savour here: the dancing in the nightclub, the corridor in the police station full of extras bustling around, Chapin’s hysterical running, the A Team-style welding sequence. Awesome trash to watch again and again. 4/5.

ROLLS ROYCE BABY (1975)

Directed by Erwin C. Dietrich, Switzerland. Lina Romay stars as Lisa Romay, a movie star and model, who seems to spend most of her time masturbating. Lisa hires Erik (familiar genre face Eric Falk) as her chauffeur so she can be driven around the countryside in her vintage Rolls Royce and pick up hitchhikers to have sex with. This completely plotless offering is all about Lina, Lina, Lina and her naked body. That’s no bad thing, but the repetitive scenes of her grinding away with various strangers, coupled with the endlessly recycled music, ultimately has a numbing, rather than erotic, effect. 3/5.

THE RETURN OF DOCTOR FU MANCHU (1930)

Directed by Rowland V. Lee, U.S.A. The three Fu Manchu films starring Warner Oland (made between 1929 and 1931) necessarily invite comparison with 1932’s all-conquering THE MASK OF FU MANCHU. If this movie exemplifies the trilogy, then the Oland flicks come a far distant second to the fantastic Karloff-starring MASK. Even putting aside the appallingly bad comic relief and the imperfect acting, THE RETURN OF DOCTOR FU MANCHU suffers from a screenplay which can only be described as baby-like. One can’t get over the sheer silliness of it all. O.P. Heggie, the blind hermit from THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, appears as the stalwart Nayland Smith. 3/5.

OBSCENE DESIRE (1978)

Directed by Giulio Petroni, Italy/Spain. Cool title; terrible movie. The lovely Marisa Mell stars as Amanda, who’s just got married to Andrea (Chris Avram, doing his usual dodgy husband thing) and is taken to his country villa. Squashy-faced Lou Castel hovers around in the background. For the first hour or so, the viewer is treated to some typical giallo-style trappings, but then things lurch into more supernatural territory. We then get a badly-conceived, hurried mish-mash of bits from ROSEMARY’S BABY, THE OMEN, and THE EXORCIST, but it’s all done in a thoroughly incompetent, couldn’t-give-a-shit sort of a way. The ending is particularly half-arsed. 2/5.

GIRL OF THE PORT (1930)

Directed by Bert Glennon, U.S.A. It’s casual sexism and racism galore in this mesmerisingly weird melodramatic nonsense. Posh Englishman Jim (Reginald Sharman) is a First World War vet with a fire phobia who’s ended up in Fiji to drink himself to death. Nursing him back to health, and falling in love with him, is wise-cracking barmaid Josie (Sally O’Neil). But out to scupper the lovers’ plans is the dastardly McEwan (“you dirty hound!”), who wants revenge after being outed as (gosh!) a half-caste by Jim. Sharman’s acting is very much of the hyper-hammy Colin Clive-variety and O’Neil is that typical Pre-Code character: the self-sacrificing good-time girl with a heart of gold. 3/5.

WHERE EVIL LIVES (1991)

Directed by Richard L. Fox, Stephen A. Maier, and Kevin G. Nunan, U.S.A. This one will genuinely test your will to live, so keep those blades, pills, and nooses out of the way before watching. It’s one of those movies where you just think: “Why? Why did they bother? What were they thinking?” They should have just donated the budget to charity before filming started. Claude Akins narrates three horror stories (involving zombies, a vampire, and a witch) to a prospective house buyer. The stories are all complete failures and simply confirm that the film overall was made by people with shit for brains. Amateurish, distressingly bad, and not fun at all. 1/5.

WOMAN TIMES SEVEN (1967)

Directed by Vittorio De Sica, Italy/France/U.S.A. Shirley MacLaine stars in seven different roles in this tiresome anthology directed by one of the all-time great Italian neorealists, Vittorio De Sica. Quite how De Sica went from directing the stunning BICYCLE THIEVES in 1948 to, less than twenty years later, making twaddle like this is beyond me. The point of WOMAN TIMES SEVEN seems to be to present females as hate-filled, deceitful, and irrational. What a charming objective. It has that weird, self-satisfied tone which many lazy, star-filled sixties movies seem to have. MacLaine’s acting range goes all the way from shouty to a bit more shouty. 3/5.