TODAY I WATCHED (Movies, TV Shows) 2020

Well I was watching Fox and The Simpsons but this "Duncanville" show is the new "Bless The Harts"; as soon as it comes on I change the channel. Off to XFL for 30 minutes.

"Cannibal Ferox" (aka "Make Them Die Slowly," 1981)

A New York anthropologist and her team must form an alliance with a pair of cocaine smugglers in order to escape from a tribe of pissed-off, flesh-eating primitives deep in the Amazon jungle.
Murder, mayhem, mutilations, castrations, and (unfortunately real) scenes of animal cruelty abound in this notorious sleaze fest from Umberto "Nightmare City" Lenzi that was supposedly "Banned in 31 Countries," if the film's posters were to be believed.
I felt like I needed a shower after watching this flick.

Blazing thru Trailer Park Boys. No idea how I missed this show as it has been on for quite a while. Finally up to season 12.

Sonic the Hedgehog.
A solid "A." Simply awesome. Can't wait to see it in the theater again this weekend.

Fat Freddy wrote:

"Cannibal Ferox" (aka "Make Them Die Slowly," 1981)

A New York anthropologist and her team must form an alliance with a pair of cocaine smugglers in order to escape from a tribe of pissed-off, flesh-eating primitives deep in the Amazon jungle.
Murder, mayhem, mutilations, castrations, and (unfortunately real) scenes of animal cruelty abound in this notorious sleaze fest from Umberto "Nightmare City" Lenzi that was supposedly "Banned in 31 Countries," if the film's posters were to be believed.
I felt like I needed a shower after watching this flick.

Even though I'm an avowed gorehound I've never seen that gore classic and refuse to do so due to the animal cruelty.

EDIT: BTW it's the same reason I've never seen "Men Behind The Sun" although I've always wanted to.

tohostudios wrote:

Even though I'm an avowed gorehound I've never seen that gore classic and refuse to do so due to the animal cruelty.

I wasn't really planning on ever seeing it, either, to be honest, for the same reason ... but it popped up when I was scrolling through the monthly new additions to TUBI and I was like "holy s**t," I just couldn't help myself, haha.

I hemmed and hawed about it for a little while but finally figured what the hell, I've already seen Cannibal Holocaust (the Big Kahuna of the sub genre), Eaten Alive, and Mountain of the Cannibal God, so Ferox was just another one off the list.  

I never understood why showing real animal cruelty was a staple of the Italian cannibal genre. Cannibal Holocaust and Eaten Alive had a couple of scenes of it as well. I guess it was kinda like the "black metal" musicians of the early 90s, all trying to out-do each other at being more grim and evil than the other guy. They'd never get away with that kind of crap in this day and age, of course.

According to Ferox's IMDb page, Giovanni Radice (one of the lead actors) refused to kill a wild pig for one scene. The director (Umberto Lenzi) argued with him and told him "Robert DeNiro would do it," and Giovanni replied, "Robert DeNiro would kick your ass all the way back to Rome!" His stunt double ended up doing the scene.

The Walking Dead
Forensic Files II

tohostudios wrote:

Even though I'm an avowed gorehound I've never seen that gore classic and refuse to do so due to the animal cruelty.

Same. I loved Nightmare City, but no interest in watching this particular Lenzi outing.

Unrelated to Italian cinema, but my recent movie watching has been catching up on 2019 movies. So far, I have watched in the past week or so:

-Parasite
-*Dr. Sleep (though I Dr. Slept through half of it--I was enjoying it but I was tired as shit and it is long!)
-Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
-Knives Out

Loved them all*.

I have 'Fighting with Family' and 'Rambo' on deck to watch soon.

Quote :

Same. I loved Nightmare City, but no interest in watching this particular Lenzi outing.

Nightmare City is one of my favorite "so bad it's good" movies. It doesn't make a lick of sense but it barrels along at such a frenzied pace that you don't have time to think about it till later

Better Call Saul, Season 5 episode 3 (last night).

"My Bloody Valentine" (1981)

A small town's Valentine's Day dance is threatened by a pickaxe-wielding nut job in a miner's outfit, who may have a connection to a series of murders from 20 years ago.
"MBV" makes the most of its unique setting (those mines are scary as hell) and has a bigger mean streak than most of its contemporaries, which results in one of the better holiday-themed slashers from the early 80s.

Smackdown

"Daybreakers" (2009)

Stylish sci-fi/horror set in the year 2019 (ha!), where a viral plague has turned most of the world's population into vampires. As the number of "real" humans dwindle, creating a global vampire-food shortage, a scientist (Ethan Hawke) discovers a cure for the bloodsuckers' condition... but he soon learns that some vamps in positions of power (headed by a wonderfully evil Sam Neill) aren't quite ready to give it up.
This is at least the 3rd or 4th time I've seen this underrated flick, and it's a cool, gory, action packed ride every time. Recommended!

Fat Freddy wrote:

"My Bloody Valentine" (1981)

A small town's Valentine's Day dance is threatened by a pickaxe-wielding nut job in a miner's outfit, who may have a connection to a series of murders from 20 years ago.
"MBV" makes the most of its unique setting (those mines are scary as hell) and has a bigger mean streak than most of its contemporaries, which results in one of the better holiday-themed slashers from the early 80s.

I just watched that last week and I agree, it is a good movie.

007 wrote:

I just watched that last week and I agree, it is a good movie.

Yep, I've seen it a few times over the years, it still holds up pretty well.

The remake from ten years or so ago is pretty good too, which is rare. Haha

Pet Sematary (2019)



Ugh. This one came and went in the theaters and I can see why. Lapses in logic, plot points brought up then dropped and forgotten, and a crap ending. John Lithgow was the best part of the film.

After Porn Ends 2. A documentary on what some famous former porn stars lives are like now that they're no longer in the adult film industry.

Demon Seed (1977)



An AI super computer entraps it's creator's wife in their smart home as a means to artificially impregnate her and give the computer humanity in this rather bizarre film based on a Dean Koontz novel. Not a horrible watch but props to Koontz for predicting some "futuristic" technology and Julie Christie for showing off her nice body a couple times.

Overlord (2018)



A WWII commando unit is sent into France to destroy a communications tower prior to D-Day. They find that the Nazis are also experimenting on the locals in the hopes of creating indestructible super soldiers. Effective flick that's half war film, half sci fi/horror film.

"Airplane II: The Sequel!" (1982)

Ted Striker and Elaine are back, and this time they've got to stop the first-ever commercial space shuttle flight from crashing into the sun. ("The sun? What is it?" "it's a large fiery ball of gases in the center of our universe, but that's not important right now.")
William Shatner almost makes up for the lack of Leslie Nielsen with his scene-stealing performance as the ultra-uptight lunar base commander, Buck Murdock.
I know it's just a retread of the first movie, but I still enjoy this one just as much as the original.

I watched something on Amazon Prime called "The 50 Best Horror Movies You've Never Seen"

Oh puhleeeeze!!!!!  Out of the entire 50 in the list there was exactly ONE I haven't seen, something called "Valentine".  Other than that it was stuff like Reanimator (seriously? what horror movie fan hasn't seen that a million times), "May", "Hard Candy", "Brain Dead"....etc.

The one thing watching this ultra-lame list DID make me do was start re-watching "Hard Candy" which I've owned for years.  It's still a hard watch because the subject matter is just soooooo disturbing.

tohostudios wrote:

I watched something on Amazon Prime called "The 50 Best Horror Movies You've Never Seen"

Oh puhleeeeze!!!!!  Out of the entire 50 in the list there was exactly ONE I haven't seen, something called "Valentine".  Other than that it was stuff like Reanimator (seriously? what horror movie fan hasn't seen that a million times), "May", "Hard Candy", "Brain Dead"....etc.

I watched that a year or so ago and had the same reaction, like "Seen it.. .seen it...seen that too... oh, come ON, who HASN'T seen that??" I think by the end there were only 3 or 4 I hadn't seen.

Embryo (1976)



Rock Hudson stars as a scientist who accidentally hits and kills a pregnant doberman pinscher. He's able to keep one of the puppies alive and gestates it outside the womb, using experimetal medicine and growth hormones. The dog grows into an adult within a day and turns out to be exceptionally intelligent. He decides to try it on a human being, and with the help of a friend, obtains a human fetus from a suicide victim. The fetus grows into the beautiful Barbara Carrera, complete with a total recall of she has learned. But as things often happen in these movies, things turn bad for both Carrera and the dog. An interesting film. Too bad the copy I watched was in pretty bad shape, rather blurry and dark in some spots. Looks like it was transferred over from an old VHS copy.

One good thing about this work-from-home order due to the Corona virus -- I can set up shop on a snack table in my living room in front of the TV and have a lil' movie marathon while working... if this keeps up for more than a few days I'm gonna put a serious dent in my various watch lists, haha.

"Black Dynamite" (2009)

A tough as nails kung-fu badass from the 'hood seeks vengeance when mobsters kill his brother in this dead-on parody of /homage to the blaxploitation flicks of the '70s -- it was even filmed in 16mm rather than 35mm to give it that proper, grainy, grindhouse look. Michael Jai White is hysterical as the title hero, who's pretty much a combination of Shaft, Jim Kelly, Fred Williamson, and Dolemite as he whoops bad guy ass all the way from the ghetto to the White House. An action packed hoot.

"Things Are Tough All Over" (1982)

Cheech and Chong play dual roles in this wacky road movie --as their standard stoner characters and also as a pair of Arab mobsters. The stoners are hired to drive a car full of the Mobsters' laundered money from Chicago to Vegas. Naturally they lose the cash well before they reach their destination, and spend the rest of the movie on the run from the pissed off bad guys. Not C&C's best flick, but it's fast moving and silly enough for a few good laughs.

"Stripped to Kill II: Live Girls" (1989)

In this extremely low-budget sequel to the '87 cult hit, someone is murdering strippers at a run down gentlemens' club. One of the dancers is having dreams about the deaths, which makes her the main suspect, but a police officer isn't convinced that she's the killer.
Nobody in this flick can act, the story is a muddle and none of the girls are particularly hot, either. The original "S.T.K." was a classic slice of entertainingly sleazy crap, unfortunately this one is just crap.
AVOID.

The Day(2012)-A small group of survivors roam a post apocalyptic landscape when one of the members becomes sick. They seek shelter in an abandoned house to get out of the weather when they discover that the house is a trap used by a gang of cannibals to catch their prey. The group soon finds themselves fighting for their lives against the cannibals who outnumber them and are determined to make them their next kill. Fairly standard doomsday fare here which has been done many times before. The usual mix of expected action and gore(done mostly with CGI sadly). Not a total dud, but not a new classic either. 2 out of 5.

The Work-From-Home Film Festival continues:
"Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage" (2010)

I've been meaning to revisit Sam Dunn's endlessly entertaining documentary on Canada's favorite power trio since Neil Peart's passing earlier this year. This is at least the 3rd time I've seen it, and once again it's a fun trip through the band's long and mostly proud history via extensive interviews, vintage clips and photos. I think this may be my favorite "rock doc" ever at this point.

"Shock Treatment" (1981)

In this ultra-bizarre pseudo-follow up to "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," a now-unhappily-married Brad and Janet take part in a TV game show that lands Brad in a mental hospital, and leaves Janet to be groomed by a scheming fast food magnate and TV preacher to be the Next Big Celebrity Thing. All of this is played out on live TV in front of their friends and neighbors in a television station that no one seems to want to leave.
...so yeah, this obscure flick is even weirder than its predecessor, which is really sayin' something if you've ever seen "RHPS."  A few of the musical numbers are kinda cool in that early '80s new-wave-y sort of way, and if you think about it, this movie actually predicted the rise of reality TV, but overall it never quite comes together. It's watchable as a curiosity item for "Rocky Horror" fans, but even they might find it to be a bit of a slog.