the American Genre Film Archive is one of the finest institutions of its sort, existing "to preserve the legacy of genre movies through collection, conservation, and distribution.” But these aren’t your run-of-the-mill Roger Corman joints or mid-tier slashers: AGFA is about looking after the grittiest, most lo-fi, most neglected non-classics ever left to rust and rot in bombed-out projection booths across the country or languish in bargain basement VHS bins.
Doing their civic duty with the rest of the genre/horror community during these trying times, AGFA has just made its catalog free to indulge in on streaming app Tubi. Here are ten of the wildest, weirdest, and best films on offer to stream this weekend!
10 The Violent Years (1956)
The wild world of Edward D. Wood Jr. is filled with ridiculously entertaining, off-kilter gems that serve as a direct line to the cinema of John Waters. Case in point: The Violent Years. This picture tells the story of good-girl-gone-bad Paula Parkins (Jean Moorhead), a high school hellcat who lords over a pack of degenerate teen queens, each with a yen for petty theft and cold-blooded murder. The 1950s were rife with trashy B-movies masquerading as “social guidance” films, and The Violent Years is one of the best—using the era’s fears about juvenile delinquency as an excuse to serve up plenty of sex and violence liberally dressed in Wood’s ripest dialogue.
9 Godmonster of Indian Flats (1973)
There’s just something about a rubber monster stalking nearsighted boobs that inspires a certain joy that nothing else can replicate, and Godmonster of Indian Flats is primo creature feature nonsense. Directed by environmentalist/spiritualist/driveable sculpture (?) pioneer, Fredric Hobbs, the film is about a lumpy, eight-foot-tall sheep monster running amok in a desert locale. A product of the 1970s that looks at least a decade older, Hobbs’ embraces the spirit of the film’s wild west setting and does what he can with his ludicrously shitty beast (some sculptor!), but the result is, as genre author Stephen Thrower states, “simultaneously grotesque, pitiable, and hilarious.” For most films, those three words would be damning. For Godmonster of Indian Flats, they’re a ringing endorsement!
8 The Sword And The Claw (1975)
Cüneyt Arkin was a major Turkish star of the '70s and '80s, chopping and high kicking his way through a wide array of derivative yet energetic action films. Though he’s probably best known for his role in The Man Who Saved The World (ie Turkish Star Wars), The Sword And The Claw is easily his best onscreen turn. Arkin plays a duo role as a king who is murdered and his son who is raised by lions and spends the runtime avenging his father’s death, romancing maidens, and kicking ass. A simple plot description does little to capture the strange magic of the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink style of this Turkish marvel. Part Conan The Barbarian fantasy fluff, part Shaw Brothers chop-socky actioner, Part Three Stooges-style slapstick, The Sword And The Claw is a true case of seeing-is-believing.
7 The Legend of Big Foot (1976)
The Legend of Big Foot chronicles the search for everyone’s favorite North American myth in a faux documentary format. Narrated by actual cryptozoologist Ivan Marx, the film documents the last ten years in his life searching for the elusive Sasquatch. Though ostensibly directed by Harry Winer, the majority of the footage was indeed filmed by Marx, who also served as executive producer.
It has been claimed that Marx was the first to find “actual” Big Foot prints in the wild, and though many of his contemporaries consider the footage to be manipulated and little better than a hoax, The Legend of Big Foot has an aura of realism and is shadowy enough in origin to make anybody question just what exactly is lurking beyond the outskirts of human knowledge.
6 Effects (1980)
Packed with close collaborators of George Romero and made for peanuts, Effects is a captivating handmade nightmare that dissolves the boundary between creator and creation. The film stars special effects legend Tom Savini (Dawn of The Dead), Joe Pilato (Day of The Dead), and John Harrison (Tales From The Darkside: The Movie) as coke-addled filmmakers hard at work on a slasher flick, the shooting of which is beset with accidents that may not be so accidental. Not only is it a blast to see Romero’s pals in what was clearly a D.I.Y. experiment and labor of love, but there’s real thematic meat here for those willing to give it a taste. A meta-commentary on horror and a treatise on cinematic violence, Effects is also a sleazy and disturbing mystery in its own right.
5 Lady Street Fighter (1981)
Don’t get it twisted: this flick is no relative of the Sonny Chiba classic, though it definitely wants you to think so. Written/produced by and starring Renee Harmon (one of the few prolific female filmmakers in B-movie history), Lady Street Fighter is an outrageous trash-actioner. Harmon plays Linda, an exotic European beauty with mad karate skills whose hunt to find the men who murdered her twin sister brings her to the wilds of Los Angeles. With no-holds-barred fight sequences and a devastatingly fashionable leading lady, Lady Street Fighter is as fearsome as it is fun.
4 Blood Lake (1987)
There are bad slashers, and then there’s Blood Lake. A shot-on-video oddity from the halcyon days of 1987, this film stars a pack of nobodies on a weekend lakeside excursion filled with booze and babes. But, as expected, things take a turn for the horrific when a cowboy-booted killer starts picking off young people one by one.
Crafted by a group of real-life Oklahoman pals on an actual vacation, Blood Lake is the kind of lo-fi amateur effort most distributors wouldn’t bother to give a second look. But the folks at AGFA know a good thing when they see it, celebrating it as an oddly mesmerizing blend of ‘80s VHS garbage slasher and cinéma vérité “aesthetics.” Is Blood Lake a best-forgotten glorified home movie or a true-blue rough-hewn gem? Give it a chance, and either way, you won’t come out of the experience ambivalent.
3 Scary Movie (1991)
John Hawkes is best known for his roles in buzzy independent movies like Winter’s Bone (for which he received an Oscar nod), but few are aware of his debut in the horror genre. Daniel Erickson’s Scary Movie is a long-lost regional gem hailing from Austin, Texas. Hawkes stars as Warren, a nerdy scaredy cat attending a local spook house with some pals. Warren is determined to have a good time, but can’t get over his fear that a just-escaped lunatic from the nearby asylum may be lurking in the haunted house. A small-town valentine to the Halloween season, Scary Movie is a sleepy, lovable jaunt buoyed by a bug-eyed, pre-fame Hawkes.
2 Mary Jane’s Not A Virgin Anymore (1997)
Dubbed “the queen of underground cinema” by none other than Roger Ebert, the late Sarah Jacobson was one of the most important punk provocateurs of the ‘90s. Though her output was minuscule, her films captured the piss and vinegar of the riot grrrl ethos and left an indelible mark on no-budget filmmaking of the era. Her sole feature-length film, Mary Jane’s Not A Virgin Anymore is centered around a young woman tussling with puberty, sex, death, and friendship as viewed through an unvarnished lens.
Starring Lisa Gerstein and Beth Roman Allen of the band The Loudmouths (whose music is also featured), Mary Jane’s Not A Virgin Anymore is a hot loogie hocked forcefully in the face of Hollywood with all its polite and rosy coming-of-age dramas for teens.
1 Bad Black (2016)
Never heard of Wakaliwood? Also known as Ramon Film Productions, this studio based in Wakaliga, a slum in the Ugandan capital of Kampala, boasts a team of self-taught filmmakers that has produced dozens of whackadoo action films for less $200 each. Their most popular release, Bad Black (the winner of U.S. genre festival Fantastic Fest’s audience award) concerns a kindly doctor on a mission to snatch a family heirloom back from Uganda’s most diabolical gang. Stuffed with gunplay, goofy humor, elaborate motorcycle stunts and heaps of gonzo flamboyance, Bad Black is a masterpiece from Africa’s guerilla filmmaking capital.
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