1985 Grindhouse Nights in Munich's Stachus Kinocenter PART III: 9th Nov

1. How Sleep the Brave (UK 1982)

Kino 1 22:30  Dschungel der Apokalypse (Djungle of the Apocalypse)

So I entered here. The movie was quiet prominently advertised when it came out, so I was surprised to see it here and was happy about the bargain I got, seeing it with a bunch of other movies. Well it's about american soldiers in vietnam and one by one they die on perilous missions. I was bored. Oh so bored. OK my young mind had only seen war movies in TV and of course Apocalypse now. This one here had been hailed as very brutal and tense. There is nothing like that here. A year later, hen they had a VHS network system going on my nightshift job and the collegues would throw in the cheapest movies to rent, this one would come up quite regularly and everytime I switched of an grabbed a book... Maybe I thought it was "Jäger der Apokalypse".... a completely different movie.... 

Verdict: The worst verdict: Mediocre!

2. Vengeance Is a Dish Served Cold (ITA 1972)

Kino 1 00:15 Drei Amen für den Satan  (Three Amen for the Satan)

So here we enter Spaghetti Western (or as the german would say: Italo-Western) territory. Sadly with one of the last and least.You got Ivan Rassimov as nameless stranger stand-in and a bit of Kinski I think, but this has no soul and no reason to exist. I did not like it. No.

Verdict: Cheap, lame and even Kinski is desinterested.

3. Safari Rally

)

Kino 1 00:15 Rallye des Todes (Rally of Death)

Ohh, we have "Little Joe never once gave it away" Joe Dallesandro here fighting for love and against his brother to win the trophy of an african rally. "6000 km of Fear" is the original title. I'd rather go with 80 minutes of boredom. Nice cars, the plot is bad, the stunts are ridiculous. A complete miss. Not even bad enough.

Verdict: A complete miss.

4. Savana Violenta (ITA 1977)

Kino 2 22:15 Mondo Diavolo (Diablocal World)

This comes in at the chronological and financial tail-end of the Mondo Movies. To my knowledge it did not get an english release. But fear not, you have missed nothing. This is worse than the average TV-documentary on tribal live at that time. And I had been soooo excited.... my first MONDO MOVIE. But the only extreme scene I remember was a man splitting his tongue (snake-like) in half in an act of body modification. Well then. You've been warned. On the right side you see the original theatrical german film poster. I mean look at it, this is actually better than the movie. Believe me.

Verdict: The only thing that was tortured here was the film stock.

5. Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (USA 1976)

Kino 2 23:15 Ilsa, die Haremswächterin der Scheichs

Do I need to tell about this one. Do I need to tell you what this movie does to a young impressionable brain like mine?? No. I don't think so. Until then, I did not think that I could be entertained by something like THIS. Obviously (for good reasons), Ilsa's first adventures in Poland are completely banned here in Germany. But when she does the same thing for the "evil" arabs, it's obvously ok.  BTW, although "Ilsa, She-Wolf...." was nott shown in Germany a german-language version as "Ilsa, die Hündin von Liebeslager 7" (The bitch of lovecamp 7) ran very successfully in Switzerland where our neutral neighbours  obviously  ware highly interested to find out what exactly had been going on in Germany in WWII. The first two movies made enough money for smut-peddler E.C. Dietrich to make his own (semi-official) sequel...

VERDICT: Never had seen so much silkone in one movie before!!!

6. Ilsa, Tigress of Siberia (CAN 1977)

Kino 2 00:45  Ilsa, die Tigerin

Ilsa is back in her natural habitat (WIP-CAMP) for the last time and it's for the Russkis in a Gulag, proving that capable employees are hard to find and that HRM sometimes does work and that she ALWAYS is a sight to behold. But sadly, instead of a rehash of 1 and 2 (which would be perfectly ok), we get a stupid James Bond video-surveillance plot. This is so boring. I was sure then that the version I saw must have been heavily cut. I mean, it had to be, hadn't it? But no, the unuct versions I later saw are basically as shitty as the one I wittnessed. Skip it and go for installment 3 (Greta/Ilsa, the wicked warden) instead, where Jess Franco, eager to re-establish his mastership in seedy WIP films will bury her six feet deep in an unnamed south-american jungle. 

VERDICT: Completely and utterly worthless (in a bad way)

7. Tiger Jungle (aka Black Belt Fury) (TW 1976)

Kino 3: 22:00 Die Pranke des gelben Tigers (The Prangs of the Yellow Tiger)

No-one knows this taiwanese Kung-Fu movie. Wonder why. Way back then I did not care much for Kung-Fu films so I did not bother myself with going into Kino 3. Given the artwork and what little I found on this film I still don't care.


Verdict: As somebody in IMDB wrote: "For Wen Chiang Lung's (ed: the director) completists only, if there are any."

8. The Cobra (HK 1981)

Kino 3: 23:30 Im Würgegriff der Roten Cobra (In the Stranglehold of the Red Cobra) Interestingly there is the similarly titled "In the Stranglehold of the Yellow Snake" - with both "The Red Cobra" and "The Yellow Snake" being German Krimis from the 1960s.

The usual tale of a kung-fu guy who witnesses the killing of his dojomaster by the Red Cobra gang, flees with his wife somewhere else (rescuing master's little daughter) and gets in trouble with a local gang. Exactly. The Red Cobra. He goes rampage and we got a boss-fight between him and the killer of his master. Run-of the mill potboiler who shows some nerve depicting violence against women and small children and being basically carefree about, well, klling other people. I've been not able to watch this movie, as it is still banned in Germany (and was at that time!!).  And there is, to my knowledge no international version out there. 

9. Dance of the Drunk Mantis (HK 1979)

Kino 4: 01:15 Der Knochenbrecher schlägt wieder zu (The Bonebreaker strikes again)

German Dub Version: In the epic struggle between the "North" and the "South" about which style of fighting is the right one, thing get a little bit out of hand. There is only one guy who can re-establish order: The Drunken Master. English Dub Version: Returning after training Freddy Wong, the Drunk Master is attacked by the newly-adopted son of his wife. You decide.

It is sequel time for "Drunken Master", but without Jackie Chan and without huge box-office results. A rather dull affair, that actually ends in a cliff-hanger!!

Verdict: Half as much fun than with Jacky Chan.

10. Sex Rally (FR 1974)

Kino 4: 22:00 Grand Prix im Bett (Grand Prix in the Bed)/ Le Rallye des joyeus (The Rally of Pleasures)

This is a completeley forgettable very softcore sex comedy, made cheaply by the french. It is neither funny nor sexy nor are there any sights male/female/landscape/cars to see. Well of course it is about some count who puts out a price money for the winner of a rally. The teams try to fool each other and of course more of the times the find themselves in spicy situations. Skin time is very, very rare in this movie, basically cheating us and it is obvous that the talent of everyone in this movie is very limited to nonexistent.

I fast forwarded through the print that I could find, thankful that I had not wasted any of my pretious youth on that one.

Verdict: Utter rubbish in every regard.

11. Eros in the Office or Office Girls or Office Sex or Sex in the Office (GER 1971)

Kino 4: 00:30 Erotik im Beruf (Eroticism at Work)

 

1971 must have been THE year for director Ernst Hofebauer. Riding on the success of his first "Schoolgirl Report" the previous year, he directed no less than 5 valuable time-capsules of life in Germany in the 70is. And this is all true. I know. I've been there. I' So after "Schoolgirl Report 2" we get "Vacation Report (what the travel guides do not tell us)" and "Girls at the Gynaecologist", "The new hot report: what men cannot believe" and of course this documentary about "Eroticism on the Job (what the HRM does not tell us)". Just to give you some information. ALL of these films made twice to ten times more money on the german box office than Argento's most successful film "The Cat o' Nine Tails" ---. In typical Mondo-Style... .eh.... Report Style, actual scenes and interviews are cut together with staged sex scenes. Hofebauer claims to have interviewed actual politicians and union members for this movie, which was the lowest-grossing of his 71 output. And it shows. Much less entertaining than "Girls at the Gynaecologist". Really. 

Verdict: It made twice as much money as "cat". So what do you expect? (hey, that's a BAR)

12. Insatiable Alicia and the Marquis (SPAIN??? SWISS??? FRANCE?????? 1983)

Kino 4: 02:00 El marques, la menor y el travesti (The Marquis, the Minor and the Transvestite)/ Ein Sommer voller Liebe (A Summer full of Love)

Man, researching this one was really hard. I had to dive into the archives of the official swiss cinematheque to verify that it is the movie that I watched. "Summer full of Love" ain't "Summer full of Vice/A debauched Sumer" made by the same guy in the same year and it ain't "A Summer in the Country" made by the same production company with Brigitte Lahaie (who, btw. is still wating for her lifetime-achievement Academy Award). Linking them together is the obscure spaniard Jaime Jesús Balcázar who started off writing "The Castle of Dr. Fu Manchu" and then went all in for EC Dietrichs swiss ELITE-FILMs. You know now where this goes. I am very sure that if I watch all three movies in a row, the story, the house and most of actors will be the same. A yes, it's about some burgoise on vacation doing it with their slaves... eh servants ... maids... eh.. .butlers.. .. you know. I'm pretty sure the house belongs to one of the producers, he got paid, money has been laundered. It's a quiet life in the country. ... sadly it's 1983, so we cannot expect 2 Jess Franco films made on the same set too.... what a shame. It's actually softcore. Though I won't guarantee that there isn't a hc version out there somewhere too.

Main actress Choncha Valero looks strikingly special and is in her prime. She had previously starred in those great spanish opii "A Virgin for Caligula" and "Depravity" - and I do not make these titles up.  

Verdict: Films made for oblivion.