Only now does it occur to me... CLEOPATRA JONES (1973)

Only now does it occur to me.... that Shelley Winters' name––writ in the 'CLEOPATRA JONES font' and projected against a Tatooine-esque Turkish landscape––might have inspired the iconic STAR WARS main title.

This was 1973, a full two years before STAR WARS went into production, and while font designer Suzy Rice has explained her influences, isn't it possible that some subliminal memory of seeing Shelley Winters' name so stylishly depicted could have played a small role in one of the most recognizable movie fonts ever made? I'm gonna go ahead and say yes, because it makes me happy.

A few quick thoughts on CLEOPATRA JONES and why it's worth your time: Tamara Dobson (CHAINED HEAT, NORMAN... IS THAT YOU?) is Cleopatra Jones, a fabulous, kung fu-savvy, dirtbike enthusiast, stunt-driver, crack shot DEA Agent who is introduced to us while overseeing an air strike on poppy fields in Turkey.


 It's a special breed of film that begins with exploding flowers.

Later, we learn she has a ridiculous customized Corvette Stingray (see also: Mark Hamill's in CORVETTE SUMMER) with low-key U.S. Government vanity plates

and a specially-built hydraulic roof that automatically lifts up when she opens her door so that her afro remains unmussed.

Her boyfriend is the sensitive community organizer Bernie Casey (THE RUNNING MAN, THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH),

pictured here, as he should be, in an amazing glamour headshot that happens to be decorating Cleo's wicked bachelorette pad/lounge.

Her nemesis is Shelley Winters as the drug kingpin, "Mommy" (to whom the aforementioned Turkish poppy fields belonged), a raging, racist, lesbian who wears a different wig in every scene and delivers a high-hag horror-worthy performance, chewing not merely the scenery, but entire tableaux, co-stars and all.

And yes, on the far right, that is perennial 1970s/Charles Bronson-baddie, Paul Koslo,

whose own, humble, scenery-chewing skills cannot compete with the mistress.

Elsewhere, we have Cleopatra Jones laying down some JCVD-style, high-kicking smack 

on Bruce Glover-lookalike and DELIVERANCE rapist Bill McKinney...

...we have one of the finest comebacks in film history from character actor legend Antonio Fargas (FOXY BROWN, SHAFT) who, when asked if he is willing to cross Shelley Winters' "Mommy" responds:




...and finally, I must tip my hat to a film that not only has the balls to make Shelley Winters its lead villain in a performance that might prompt even Divine to advise "maybe you should tone it down a notch," but also is bold enough to end with a show-stopping kung fu battle/fistfight between Shelley and Tamara Dobson.

Amen.

Commercial Review: KING COBRA MALT LIQUOR AD- PART 1 (1985, Fred Williamson)

Stars 5 of 5. 

Running Time: 30 seconds.

Notable Cast or Crew: Fred Williamson aka "The Hammer" (1990: BRONX WARRIORS, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, VIGILANTE, THE NEW BARBARIANS, ORIGINAL GANGSTAS, BLACK CAESAR). 

Well, I suppose I have a tradition to maintain of publishing beverage reviews every St. Paddy's day (past reviews include DAD'S OLD FASHIONED BLUE CREAM SODA, BLUE DIAMOND BEER, CHAMPAGNE COLA, and IRISH POTCHEEN), and while I missed out on it yesterday, this year, I'll continue my examinations of mind-altering celebrity beverage hucksterage, á la James Mason's Thunderbird Wine ad, Ice Cube's St. Ides Malt Liquor Jingle, or Rutger Hauer's partnership with Guinness. So I present to you now: Fred Williamson's King Cobra malt liquor ad. Fred Williamson has lived many lives– a football star (for the Oakland Raiders and the Kansas City Chiefs), a bit player in classics (M*A*S*H), a TV love interest (JULIA), 70's American blaxploitation star (HAMMER, BLACK CAESAR, HELL UP IN HARLEM), Western and Spaghetti Western star (THE SOUL OF BLACK CHARLEY), a writer and director (MR. MEAN, NO WAY BACK), Italo-plagiaristic trash star (THE INGLOURIOUS BASTARDS, 1990: BRONX WARRIORS, THE NEW BARBARIANS), William Lustig hero (VIGILANTE), and 90's comeback genre film actor (ORIGINAL GANGSTAS, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN). He was also the star of a series of King Cobra ads. For those who have never experienced the malty, manly bite of King Cobra, it's one of the more easily attainable forty-ounce malt liquors, produced by Anheuser Busch, and available at grotty convenience stores and grungy bodegas everywhere with the intent of brightening hobos' days by dulling their senses and polluting their bladders. 

  

Our journey begins on Same Old Malt Liquor Street, a monochrome byway that most of us are acquainted with, and altogether too well. Some of us spend out entire lives there, never knowing that a better path could await us, if only we'd open our minds.

  

Then, Fred Williamson crashes the party- The Hammer himself. 

 

"If you've only ever experienced harsh malt liquor taste– it's time to change!" With a mystical touch from The Hammer, accompanied by a whooshing sci-fi sound effect, we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto, we're on– 

 

...KING COBRA BOULEVARD. It's electrifying. Color washes over us like a cleansing hand of God. Suddenly everything seems so clear. Fred Williamson walks by, and the others follow. They know not why they follow, but some primeval organ, long forgotten by man and etched upon their spinal columns, compels them to follow when a prophet is in their midst. "King Cobra's the only malt liquor that's so good when the taste grabs you, it's a different breed- that's quality." Now would probably be a good time to mention that whenever The Hammer expounds upon the benefits of upgrading to King Cobra, he is accompanied and punctuated by a heavenly chorus who sings: "Kiiiing Co-Bra!" Regardless, Williamson begins to amass a veritable army of disciples who leap for joy and spin and dance and pirouette in unison, driven into a righteous frenzy by the divine right to better malt liquor that The Hammer is offering them. He's like the Jean Bodin of malt liquor! 

 

 

I was just thinking of the Pied Piper of Hamelin but I can't remember why. Anyway, the swarm of King Cobra-acolytes prances ever-forward, and then in silhouette–

   

"King Cobra is cold malt liquor satisfaction with a smooth taste." The destination is revealed to be one swingin' party being hosted at, ostensibly, Fred Williamson's apartment. An exceptionally foamy can of The 'Cob is opened. What, did they shake that up beforehand? Or did it come from the handbag of one of these twirling ladies?

   

"So when you pop the top, what's the clue?" 'So when you pop the top, what's the clue?' is the question posed to us by The Hammer. What does it mean? Is the clue...foam? How is foam a clue? And in general, why are we talking about a clue? I was not aware that a mystery of some kind was involv– ah, I get it! I see what you did there, Fred. Divine mystery. As explored in the 'Mystery Plays' from the Middle Ages, which are quite obviously being referenced here. Clearly, The Cobra was the snake whose temptations caused Adam and Eve to be expelled from Eden. But now King Cobra is in charge, inviting us back to Eden, where the rockingist forty-ounce party of all time shall now commence! There's a new daddy in town, and he has been crowned KING! But back to the riddle– "So when you pop the top, what's the clue?" It's soon answered by a boisterous partygoer who sings her reply in verse: 

 

"Don't let the smoooooth taste foooool ya!" And she's right! Don't let the smooth taste fool you into thinking that this advertisment is only about malt liquor, because the taste is not smooth! It's an aside to the initiated, so that they may begin pondering the next step of their King Cobra devotionals. Also, I like that guy in back with the 'stache.

  

Williamson then returns with additional wisdom:

   

"Anheuser-Busch...to give cold malt liquor satisfaction. ...Don't let the smooth taste fool ya..." He places an unusual emphasis on fool, as if there is something of greater importance being said between the lines, which, of course, there is. The commercial comes to a close, and today's lesson is ended. Soon afterward, Fred starred in a trilogy of films made by Italians looking to cash in on the 'success' of Cannon Film's COBRA, starring Sylvester Stallone. They were: COBRA NERO (BLACK COBRA), THE BLACK COBRA 2, and THE BLACK COBRA 3: THE MANILA CONNECTION. Coincidence? Regardless, don't let the five stars fool ya....KIIIIIING CO-BRA! -Sean Gill

Film Review: TRUCK TURNER (1974, Jonathan Kaplan)

Stars: 5 of 5.
Running Time: 91 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Isaac Hayes (ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK, I'M GONNA GIT YOU SUCKA), Yaphet Kotto (BLUE COLLAR, ALIEN, FREDDY'S DEAD, BONE), Scatman Crothers (THE SHINING, FRIDAY FOSTER), Dick Miller (GREMLINS, BUCKET OF BLOOD), Alan Weeks (SHAFT, BLACK BELT JONES), Nichelle Nichols ('Uhura' on STAR TREK), Charles Cyphers (DEATH WISH II, HALLOWEEN, THE FOG), Matthew Beard ('Stymie' from THE LITTLE RASCALS!). Music by Isaac Hayes.
Tag-lines: "Black, bold, and bloody mean!"
Best one-liner: "Anybody ask you what happened, tell 'em you been hit by a truck: Mac 'Truck' Turner!"

If Jack Hill's COFFY is Queen of the Blaxploitation flick, then TRUCK TURNER is King. Originally designed as a Robert Mitchum (!), and then a James Coburn (!!) vehicle, one thing led to another and American International modified it to fit the mold of their other, 'urban' successes like SLAUGHTER, BLACK CAESAR, HELL UP IN HARLEM, et al. It becomes a wild sprint from start to finish- outrageous fashions, hostile language, splurting bullet wounds, and sassy, sassy tambourines.

Isaac Hayes IS "Mac 'Truck' Turner."

What he lacks in acting chops, he makes up for in sheer badassery and wanton cheekiness. The film begins with a very 'Philip Marlowe'-style scene (suddenly the Mitchum connection makes a little more sense). Our charmingly disreputable hero wakes up in his ramshackle L.A. apartment. His cat trots around, playfully. He moves to put on a shirt. It's the place where Marlowe would say something witty and sardonic about the previous night's exploits. Instead, we have: "Francis, I forgot to feed you last night. I'm sorry about that––YOU PISSED ON MY SHIRT! My last goddamned shirt! You punkass son of a bitch! Get your ass offa here!" And he tosses the cat off the bureau.

"You punkass sonofabitch!"

Whew. I think it's safe to say that in the alternate universe where I control the outcome of the Oscars, this would've at least won Best Screenplay. We got an obligatory women's prison scene; Scatman Crothers as a semi-retired pimp who enjoys Créme de Menthes while reclining on wicker furniture on a well-manicured lawn:

a pimp's funeral that involves a procession of increasingly ludicrous costumes (a sequined eye-patch! a rainbow clown wig!):



the most pleasantly surprising hospital scene until BREAKIN' 2: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO:

The sharp-eyed viewer will note that Yaphet Kotto has taken a toddler hostage, then in a display of gratuitous violence knocks over a porter and a wheelchair-using man– just for the hell of it!

and an oddly transcendent death scene that makes me wonder if Terrence Malick was on set for a day. Then, there's car chases that put films with ten times the budget to shame:

nearly as much beer consumption as WHITE LINE FEVER:

and...Dick fuckin' Miller!

Joe Dante would be proud.

But the real stars may be our villains: Yaphet Kotto (BONE) and Nichelle Nichols ('Uhura' on STAR TREK) deliver bold performances that perfectly alternate between nuanced and over the top. Yaphet, always a treasure, is pimped out in... well, a pimp outfit:

and matter-of-factly delivering brutal disparagements, punches to the guts, and at one point, actually spitting in OUR face!

Put-tooey!

Nichols rolls in wearing an iridescent white super-flared polyspandex pantsuit with a bikini top:

making exclamations like "THIS AIN'T SEARS ROEBUCK, NIGGAH!" and otherwise distancing herself from the calming presence of STAR TREK's Uhura by delivering brilliant monologues such as the following:
"Your ass belongs to me, I tell you what you can and can't do with it. Do you understand what I'm saying to you? Shut up! Now all you whores sit down, I wanna talk to you. Anybody thinking about leaving here is gonna find my left foot square up their ass, do you understand me? Shut up, ya chunky whore. I'm talking to you!...


...Those two bitches that left they better learn to sell pussy in Iceland because if I ever see them again, I'm gonna cut their fucking throats. Hey! We are a family. And that's what we're gonna stay. Now I got important business out there today. So when I call you I want you to shake yo asses proper, ya hear? HUH! Now get out there and make it look good. And Raquel, take that fucking jacket off!"

Sheer genius. And for those who are still skeptical- I offer these two sublime clips which I've entitled, A. "Naw I'm indestructible!" and B. "What about me?" –"What about you?":


A.


B.



Clearly, this movie deserves five stars.

-Sean Gill

Junta Juleil's Summer '10 Movie Series
1. HELL IN THE PACIFIC (1968, John Boorman)
2. KUFFS (1992, Bruce A. Evans)
3. THE OUTFIT (1973, John Flynn)

4. FOR Y'UR HEIGHT ONLY (1981, Eddie Nicart)

5. A*P*E (1976, Paul Leder)

6. BLIND FURY (1989, Philip Noyce)
7. HIS KIND OF WOMAN (1951, John Farrow)
8. HIGH SCHOOL U.S.A. (1983, Rod Amateau)
9. DR. JEKYLL AND MS. HYDE (1995, David Price)
10. MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL (1997, Clint Eastwood)
11. 1990: BRONX WARRIORS (1982, Enzo G. Castellari)
12. FALLING DOWN (1993, Joel Schumacher)
13. TOURIST TRAP (1979, David Schmoeller)
14. THE THREE MUSKETEERS (1973, Richard Lester)
15. BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA (1986, John Carpenter)
16. TOP GUN (1986, Tony Scott)
17. 48 HRS. (1982, Walter Hill)
18. ONCE UPON A TIME IN MEXICO (2003, Robert Rodriguez)
19. TALES OF THE CITY (1993, Alastair Reid)
20. WHITE LINE FEVER (1975, Jonathan Kaplan)
21. 99 AND 44/100% DEAD (1974, John Frankenheimer)
22. LET'S KILL UNCLE, BEFORE UNCLE KILLS US (1966, William Castle)
23. TRUCK TURNER (1974, Jonathan Kaplan)
24. ...

Film Review: POOR PRETTY EDDIE (1975, Chris Robinson & David Worth)

Stars: 4.3 of 5.
Running Time: 92 minutes.
Notable Cast or Crew: Shelley Winters, Slim Pickens, Leslie Uggams (Tony award winner, also acted in ROOTS, SUGAR HILL), Michael Christian (THE GREAT GUNDOWN, HARD KNOCKS), Dub Taylor (MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON, BACK TO THE FUTURE PART III), Ted Cassidy (Lurch on THE ADDAMS FAMILY). Written by sometime CHARLIE'S ANGELS, LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE, and BONANZA scribe B.W. Sandefur.
Tag-line: "All He Wanted Was A Friend."
Best one-liner: "Did he bite you on the titties?"
AKA: BLACK VENGEANCE, HEARTBREAK MOTEL, REDNECK COUNTY RAPE.

Directed by David Worth (KICKBOXER, SHARK ATTACK 3- yes, that SHARK ATTACK 3, also the cinematographer here) & Chris Robinson (THUNDER COUNTY, CHARCOAL BLACK); and marketed as a hicksploitation/blaxploitation revenge flick (REDNECK COUNTY RAPE!), one might assume that they'll know exactly what sort of film to expect. Well, unless you guessed "an utterly bizarre mashup of 60's Euro-arthouse aesthetics (from Bergman to Antonioni) in the milieu of then-recent horror flicks (by the likes of Craven and Hooper) that also happens to be loosely based on the revolutionary 1957 Jean Genet play, THE BALCONY," then you'd be wrong.

Because POOR PRETTY EDDIE is all of those things... and more. Perhaps a better title would have been something like LAST HOUSE AT MARIENBAD ON THE LEFT. (And as an even weirder side note, Shelley Winters also starred in the official 1963 film adaptation of THE BALCONY!)

But, first, let's see if we can hash out a general idea of the plot. On an anonymous, dreamlike football field (I could definitely see this film as being an inspiration for David Lynch), Liz Wetherly (Leslie Uggams) sings the national anthem,

then embarks- via montage- on a road trip/vacation through the seedy back roads of the American South. Out in the wilderness, a gargantuan wheel turns and squeaks and groans, its purpose unknown. Uggams' car dies and she ends up at "Bertha's Oasis," a rat-trap, dead-end dive, run by Bertha (Shelley Winters) who has a propensity for gazing longingly at old Hollywood 8X10s and dressing like a drag queen.

Her kept man and resident Elvis impersonator Eddie (Michael Christian) has eyes for the marooned pop star, and after a few mind-boggling encounters, rapes her repeatedly. She reports the assaults to Sheriff Slim Pickens, whose responses are to

A. Suggestively ask if she'd like to bite a tomato, B., draw dirty pictures on the police report, and C., inquire "Did he bite you on the titties?" and, if he did, could he see the bite marks please if it's not too much trouble.

Then a whirlwind of events ensue, including, but not limited to: a kangaroo court held at a VFW hall and presided over by a man in a Pabst Blue Ribbon T-shirt:


a (literal) shotgun wedding, Slim Pickens beating his full grown son at the (red, plastic, checkerboard tablecloth-covered) dinner table, and Ted Cassidy fed his own dog (as screaming ladies are draped in dog hide) just to bump him down a notch.

OH MY DOG

Yes, this movie is insane, and yes, I think it's terrific.

For a movie which could have easily centered its focus around the staging of rape scenes, POOR PRETTY EDDIE is far more interested in the power dynamics between its characters and the aesthetic delivery of said ideas. The existing relationship between Bertha and Eddie at the film's start is quite fascinating: Bertha is the matriarch of this community- at least until the foundations of her own self-esteem slowly begin to crack.

She's also an insatiable starfucker stuck in a town populated by about two dozen yokels, so she has to make do with what she's got- apparently she's made it her life's work to transform the young, impressionable Eddie into something approximating 'Elvis.'

Perhaps it's this learned, overinflated sense of celebrity and self-importance which leads him to believe that the famous, metropolitan, and most importantly stranded Liz Wetherly will want to drop everything and settle down with a backwoods boy who likes to play dress-up. Of course, in this isolated, middle-of-nowhere sphere, if you want something and you're capable of taking it, and you think you can get away with it- well, then, the world is your filthy oyster.

The rape scene itself is extremely stylized- shot in grainy, slowed-frame-rate slow motion (with distorted, drawn-out audio), we simply see two human forms struggling with one another across a gridwork of bright oranges and deep blues.

This is crosscut with a bevy of Southerners (led by Ted 'Lurch' Cassidy laciviously gazing upon dogs having sex with one another in the mud. And this is by no means the strangest occurrence of vaguely psychedelic cross-cutting in the film. (Upbeat, Karen Carpenter-style pop music and disorienting wide-angle shots often accompany these juxtapositions as well.)

Wait- more whipping in psychedelic montages? What is this- GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE?

We then enter a hazy world of make-believe, where a camera snapping photos can become a gun, blasting away- an instrument of impossible revenge.



But these are short-lived. POOR PRETTY EDDIE will not indulge your rape-followed-by-revenge fantasies. Something emerges which is a little closer to Stockholm Syndrome, but it's dipped in alienation and deep-fried in violent slowmo dream logic- it's like we're peering through a window and seeing a glimpse of Sam Peckinpah's flickering nightmares. I am aware that this review appears to be making less and less sense as it goes along, but that's simply the state of mind to which POOR PRETTY EDDIE lends itself. "Their cookie jar done been removed and the cookies taken care of..." says a local who's apparently referring to the act of rape. Slim Pickens schlerps on a tomato, Shelley Winters takes a drag of her smoke from an impossibly long cigarette holder, there's a nauseating makeout session, somebody says "What's that juicy pickininny doin' in my cabin?," there's a Baltimore reference (was John Waters somehow involved?...I would believe it), there's homage to Tennessee Williams, Shelley blurts out "I need some more vodka," the wedding march is played out of tune on a fiddle, there's a final coup de grace of absolute and utter brutality, and then the movie simply... ENDS. Maybe the print I saw was edited, but it just ends. No credits, no distributors, no nothin'. Cut. Blackness. And somehow that is the perfect finale to a movie whose simultaneously low and high brow batshit craziness approaches a sort of twisted avant-garde backwoods perfection. Amen.

-Sean Gill