"Joe Bob's Drive-In" for 2/25/96
cutline: Six whiny miserable married people having kinky sex and talking about it way too much is a formula for erotic thriller success, in Hubbie nominee "Married People, Single Sex 2."
By Joe Bob Briggs
Drive-In Movie Critic of Grapevine, Texas
Voting in the 1996 Drive-In Academy Awards continues apace, except I don't really know what "apace" means. Anyhow, you still have time to vote. The only requirements are that you have seen at least 60 of the grade-B exploitation releases of the year, and the reason it's so many is that we know you're gonna lie about it and we figure that'll bring the true figure down to about 40.
Withal, herewith, and hereafter, behold the nominees in another five categories for the coveted 1996 Hubby.
BEST EROTIC THRILLER
"Friend of the Family," the story of a dysfunctional Malibu family that solves all its problems after an oversexed good-time girl named Elke shows up and starts getting intimate with Mom, Dad, Sis and Junior.
"Intimate Deception," the story of a scruffy frustrated painter who keeps having these nightmares about the young burglar he blew away three months ago, then rents out a room in his beach house to an oversexed bombshell who teaches him the real meaning of Aardvarkus Suburbicus.
"Married People, Single Sex 2: For Better or Worse," the Stare-at-My-Navel-and-White-a-Lot Dysfunctional Sex Tapeabout three miserable couples who get together by the pool and talk about how happy they are, their kids, settling down, and, of course, ORGIES.
"Nightfire," the 37,000th Shannon Tweed erotic thriller of the decade, about a couple of rough-sex swingers who have car trouble and get stranded at Shannon's ranch for the weekend, where she's trying to patch up her marriage with slimeball John Laughlin, who likes to get nekkid and play with a pistol in the hot tub.
"Private Lessons: Another Story," the moving story of the search for the sexiest bikini model in Miami.
BEST SCI-FI FLICK
"Cyberstalker": "Basic Instinct" meets "Tron" in Newt Gingrich's worst nightmare, the story of a nerdy geeky cyber-surfing femme fatale who loves her computer so much that she has sex with it and becomes half-woman, half-computer, then goes around town killing whoever doesn't have the proper respect for really cool software.
"Mind Ripper," the old science-experiment-goes-wacko plot, with a bunch of biology geeks living in an abandoned nuke site out in the desert, being chased by a bald-headed brain-eating bodybuilder with a nine-inch tongue that has a shark tooth on the end of it.
"Oblivion," a cowboys-and-aliens cross between "Gunsmoke," "Attack of the Crab Monsters," and the night-club scene of "Star Wars" about a one-eyed lizard-skin alien who lands his spaceship on a desert planet, loads up on Killer Draconium, and kills the town marshall of the little town of Oblivion.
"Shatter Dead," the story of a post-plague world where nobody can die anymore. As soon as their insides are drained of blood, they become walking talking zombies with no desires except to hang out on the streets like homeless people and listen to a Preacher Man tell em what to do.
"Space Freaks From the Planet Mutoid," in which Denis Adam Zervos saves the world from nuclear destruction by singing EIGHT soft-rock songs about peace and love--songs so powerful that they destroy a ten-foot purple-faced space alien creature who goes around New York City encouraging people to mug one another.
BEST KUNG FU FLICK
"The Expert": When Jeff Speakman's sister gets wasted by a sex-pervert computer-geek serial killer, and The System decides to put him in a mental hospital instead of frying him to death, like God intended, Speakman takes on the entire Death Row population of the state of Tennessee.
"Jungleground," futuristic kung-fu damsel-in-distress epic starring Roddy Piper as a cop who journeys into an urban "no man's land" and is captured by roller-blading punk religious leaders with automatic weapons who decide to use him as a human guinea pig in the run-real-fast-and-we-might-not-kill-you game.
"Ring of Fire III": Don "The Dragon" Wilson returns as the mild-mannered doctor who heals by day, kills by night, and takes on the Italian Mafia AND the Russian Mafia while rescuing his real-life son, Jonathon Wilson, from vicious rednecks, biker gangs and KGB hitmen, while falling in love with Desert-Storm-veteran-turned-forest-ranger Bobbie Phillips, while uttering the minimum amount of dialogue.
"Sgt. Kabukiman, N.Y.P.D.," the sensitive story of a New York cop who goes to the kabuki theatre on the wrong night and ends up being inhabited by the soul of a samurai warrior in kabuki makeup and a kimono while automatic weapons fire erupts on the stage.
"Street Angels," the goofball action satire about a wisecracking El Lay cop who quits the force so he can recruit a team of depraved prison babes to hit the streets and take out the punks who are terrorizing the innocent.
BEST ACTOR
Danny Bonaduce, "America's Deadliest Home Video," as the video nerd who falls in love with the gun moll on a cross-country killing spree.
Robert Davi, "The Dangerous," as a motorcycle-riding lone wolf who speaks Japanese and understands the emotions of killer ninjas, so the police chief brings him out of retirement and turns him loose with several assault weapons in a cemetery full of drug goons.
Matt McCoy, "Hard Bounty," as the Eastwood-type bounty hunter who likes to make the sign of the knock-kneed woolly walrus with Kelly LeBrock when he's hanging around the dusty little town of No Trees.
George Saunders, "Intimate Deception," as the haunted artist surrounded by nekkid women who can't understand why he gets so much sex in one movie; and "Street Angels," as the wisecracking cop who makes long speeches about the fighting abilities of fish.
Chris Young, "Deep Down," as the nerdy young unemployed heavy-metal guitar-playing lock-picker who lives across the courtyard and likes to spy on Tanya Roberts when she swims in the nude.
BEST SLEAZEBALL
Jack Bannon, "To the Limit," as the freebasing tattooed S&M freak who runs the CIA.
Jr. Bourne, "Jungleground," as the Viking-loving punk Nazi who says "I want you to bring me back his ring finger, please."
Jeffrey Combs, "Cyberstalker," the creepola heroin-shooting comic-book writer who turns a computer geek into his sex slave by WITHHOLDING THE NEXT ISSUE UNTIL SHE BEGS FOR IT.
Matthew McConnaughey, "Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre," as the metal-legged chest-slicing man of the house who says "Why are my batteries not charged?"
George Segal, "Deep Down," as Tanya Roberts' numbskull violent alcoholic hubbie with an automatic machine-gun collection, who blows a guy away because he chews with his mouth full.
Send them ballots to P.O. Box 2002, Dallas, TX 75221, or Fax them to 213-462-5982, or e-mail them to 76702.1435@compuserve.com.
FIND THAT FLICK
This week's mind-bender comes from . . .
Larry Cywin of Russellville, Kentucky: "I'm trying to find the title of a movie I saw way back when, in the late sixties. It was Japanese, and there were aliens that looked like starfish, but walked upright and had a big eye in the center. I can't recall if they were invading the earth or what, but they were all over the place. This movie was the type that independent stations (like WFLD in Chicago was back then) would play. So I guess it was low-grade fifties stuff. Sorry I don't remember more about the flick. There's been a lot of beverage of choice since then."
We Have a Winner!
In the October 30 column, Marian Broussard of Irving, Texas, wrote: "My co-workers are trying to remember a movie. I have attached the office banter from our electronic bulletin board. [Duane: I have been trying to remember the name of this movie for about five years. I saw it about 10 to 15 years ago. The movie made reference to the book of Revelation (no, it wasn't an 'Omen' movie). In the beginning of the show, a boy kills his mom (with his dad's approval). There was a reference to the thirteen-headed dragon (it was a company, possibly oil). A black leader got killed by someone turning on a helicopter and the blade chopped his skull open. Someone got killed by an access gate that closed on him. If you've ever seen a movie that sorta sounds like this, let me know. . . . Burleigh: Excellent movie! The name of the movie, I believe, is 'Dawn of the Dead' or 'Dawn of the Living Dead.' I don't seem to remember your first two memories. If this was the same movie, the black man was a zombie who was climbing on a pile of crates and his head hit the blades. I think the other man was in the mall when the gate hit him. . . . Duane: Sorry, wrong answer. Not Dawn of the Dead. The guy who got his head chopped off, as much as I can remember, was a politician or the sort. He was waving to a crowd of people when someone turned on the helicopter and it chopped his cranium. This was a serious movie. It scared the hell out of me. (I was young, so it may not be that scary.)]"
We received five correct answers, so our winner was chosen by drawing. And she is . . .
Evelyn Leeper of Matawan, N.J.: "'Holocaust 2000' (a.k.a. 'The Chosen'--not to be confused with the other 'The Chosen,' which was based on a Chaim Potok novel). It was made in 1978 and was notable for (among other things) the 'full backal nudity' of its star, Kirk Douglas. Directed by Alberto De Martino, it starred Kirk Douglas and Simon Ward, and was about how all the events described in the book of Revelation would come true. I liked it, but when it was over, I turned around to discover that everyone else in the theatre had left somewhere in the middle!"
Additional information came from our four runners-up . . .
Raisin Blowme of Buffalo, N.Y.: "Douglas comes to realize that the fruit of his loins, Simon Ward, is rotten to the core and is in fact none other than the antichrist his own bad self. By mismanaging their seven nuclear power plants (atomic fuel for all manner of heavy-handed, seven-headed Hydra images) he hopes to bring about the end of the world as we know it and really jack up our utility bills in the process. Sergio Leone's main musica man, Ennio Morricone, provides a soundtrack for the apocalypse.
Bill W. Dalton of Santa Ana, Calif.: "A mediocre rip-off of 'The Omen,' itself only a fair clone of 'Rosemary's Baby,' the movie started The-Devil-Made-Me-Do-It trend in the seventies. Kirk Douglas plays a wealthy industrialist who is building a nuclear power plant in some Third World country. His son, Simon Ward, is actually the Son of Satan, who intends to use mankind's own technology to destroy mankind, by causing a nuclear disaster when the plant is completed. Anyone who opposes the nuclear project, or stands in the way of its completion, is ruthlessly killed. This is what happens to the guy hit by the helicopter blade. As I recall, he was the military dictator or general who was going to stop the project for his own reasons, and as he steps out of his chopper Ward causes the still-whirling blades to dip low and one of them takes the top of his head off, in a rather gruesome scene."
Tim Murphy of South El Monte, Calif.: "Alberto DeMartino also helmed the genre films 'The Blancheville Monster,' 'The Tempter' and 'Operation Kid Brother.' The flick also stars Agostina ('Scream of the Demon Lover,' 'Night of the Devils') Belli, and Anthony Quayle. The many-headed dragon Duane remembers is a hallucination Douglas has while looking at an offshore atomic power plant with seven, not thirteen (as I remember), towers or supports."
Also answering correctly was Bill Martell of Studio City, Calif.
© 1996 Joe Bob Briggs All Rights Reserved