Category: Italian Cinema

Strike Commando (1987)

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Strike Commando VHS CoverFrequently when I’m at one of those Strike Commando conventions they hold a couple of times a year, I hear other fans debating which was their favorite Rebbo moment. For some it was when he fought the big Russian to the death. For others, it was when he fought the big Russian to the death a second time.

Still, you have your holdouts that maintain it was when Rebbo (Yor, the Hunter from The Future‘s Reb Brown) burst forth from the water in super slo-mo, screaming and big gun blazing. There’s also a school of thought that when Rebbo was running along the rice fields in super slo-mo, screaming while rockets and bombs exploded around him was perhaps the finest display of Rebbo mayhem in his 100 minute long tour of duty. Continue reading “Strike Commando (1987)” →

Kerim, Son of the Sheik (1962)

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If you love guys riding around the desert on horses with their scimitars in the air, this Italian sword and sandal epic with a Middle Eastern paint job will surely put a minaret in your thwab!

There’s stampedes to maraud and burn an oasis, there’s messengers bringing tragic news from afar, there’s ambushes, counter-ambushes, attacks on a desert palace (as well as a retreat when the dang palace gate gets closed), and most pleasingly of all, riding around for some nice hot dusty vengeance by a pumped up dude decked out in an Arabian ninja costume! Continue reading “Kerim, Son of the Sheik (1962)” →

The Great Alligator (1979)

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Director Sergio Martino is an old hand at these types of movies (Italian trash), having been behind 2019: After The Fall Of New York and Mountain Of The Cannibal God as well as forays into the giallo, spaghetti western, and Eurocrime arenas. And having worked extensively with the likes of Daniel Greene in flicks like After the Condor and Beyond Kilimanjaro, Across the River of Blood, if anyone could take a plastic alligator named Kruna and make an entertaining film out of it, it would be Sergio. Continue reading “The Great Alligator (1979)” →

Bloody Pit of Horror (1965)

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Mickey Hargitay was a body builder who starred in Hercules vs. the Hydra, Delirium, and a couple of other Italian schlock flicks, but the most impressive item on his resume is that he was once the husband of Jayne Mansfield.

He puts all that vital experience to use in Bloody Pit Of Horror as a guy that runs around shirtless in red tights, torturing and killing the folks who just wanted to use his castle to do some cheesecake photo shoots for a horror anthology they were working on.

There is a distinctly awesome vibe going on in this film and it has something to do with the fact that the well-oiled Hargitay runs around in his way too snug tights, his little red hood, and his large black belt, all the while complaining about how everyone is “corrupting the harmony of my perfect body.” This is the sort of thing you rarely get in horror films, even Italian ones! Continue reading “Bloody Pit of Horror (1965)” →

Hunters of the Golden Cobra (1982)

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If you recall the magical doodads Indiana Jones was after in his various adventures, they all had some kind of superpower that was supposed to awe us. The Lost Ark melted dudes who stared at it, the Holy Grail was like a fountain of youth and really kick ass dose of Neosporin and nobody remembers anything about the Temple of Doom or that crystal skull.

For my money though, the most fearsome of these jungle Maltese Falcons infused with voodoo magic juice isn’t one those top of the line cinema treasures, but one of its economy-class import imitators, the Golden Cobra! And you know why? Because anyone with a home theater can identify with what happens to our heroes in this film! Continue reading “Hunters of the Golden Cobra (1982)” →

Deep Red (1975)

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Deep Red echoes Daro Argento’s earlier (and not as good) The Bird With The Crystal Plumage with its tale of a foreigner in Rome witnessing and getting himself mixed up in a murder (and getting everyone around him killed along the way). Don’t let the fact that this feels like an instance of a director remaking his own movie deter you from checking it out because Argento is able to play up his strengths (kinetic camera work, sudden vicious violence, a sense of isolation) and jettison all the barnacles that slow his other pictures down (pointless red herrings, lazy plotting, all the self-referential crap that helped to sink Tenebre). Continue reading “Deep Red (1975)” →

City of the Living Dead (1980)

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I remember back in the early 1980s when this movie played the local drive-in under the title of The Gates of Hell for something like three straight months and accompanied by the greatest poster ever. Watching it again all these years later, I still found this to be an enjoyable ride with a pleasingly ample supply of gooey special effects. Plus the DVD cover mimics the incredible poster and whenever I doubted the movie was indeed awesome, I just looked at the front of the DVD to remind myself that it was! Continue reading “City of the Living Dead (1980)” →