TENTACLES (1977)

I enjoy JAWS ripoffs as much as the next person, but despite the presence of big names like Henry Fonda, Shelley Winters, John Huston and Bo Hopkins TENTACLES might be the worse I've ever seen. Hell, even THE LAST SHARK was better and more action-packed.

The film opens with a mother playing with her baby near the ocean. A friend comes by so the mother literally runs 50 yards away to talk to her. One quick edit later and the baby is gone! Oh, the horror!!! Soon after, some dude disappears and the cops start wondering what the is going on?! Maybe it has something to do with that high frequency horseshit they're using in the underwater construction job going on nearby.

Made in California with Italian backing and an Italian crew/supporting cast, this movie looks cheap as fuck. All of the scenes with Henry Fonda are close-ups with him just talking on a phone or standing in a backyard. The Huston scenes aren't much better. There's never any good shots of the octopus. And what was up with the random freeze frames?! It was annoying as hell and made zero sense.

Not painfully bad, but I can't think of any reason for you to watch it...outside of the roaring octopus scene and Shelley Winters' ramblings. That's another thing that pissed me off: Shelley Winters didn't have any scenes with the creature. That would have been movie gold! Shelley Winters rolling around in the water wrapped up in the tentacles of a roaring giant octopus.

Zero nudity, zero quality special effects, zero suspense. Skip it or just watch it with friends to laugh at.

[Update: I just read an interview with Bo Hopkins in Shock Cinema that the filmmakers actually made a million dollar mechanical octopus...but it sank into the ocean.  Also, the reason all of Henry Fonda's scenes have him sitting around doing nothing is because he'd just had a pacemaker installed.]

HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO (1944)

HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO is one of the funniest screwball ensemble comedies of all time. It's also one of the best cinematic examples of the "snowball effect" where a small action has consequences that get bigger and bigger until it's nearly out of control.

Eddie Bracken grew up in a small town in the shadow of his late father who was a great war hero who died in the field of battle the day Eddie was born. Eddie's wanted nothing more in his life than to join the Marines. When he gets old enough he joins, but is then 4-F'd for "chronic hay fever". That was over a year ago and ever since he's been working in a shipyard too embarrassed to return home or even tell his mother. One night he's drowning his sorrows in a bar when in walk 6 broke Marines on leave. He buys them a round of drinks and a conversation strikes up. Before you know it the Marines have concocted a plan to get him home to his mother: dress him up as a war hero and escort him home, then after a few days they leave and he returns to civilian life...that's not the best plan ever, but their hearts are bigger than their brains. The next day in the sober sunlight their plan doesn't sound so great when the train arrives in town and not only is Eddie's mother there, but the entire town and not one but four marching bands all playing different songs at once! And that's just the start of the snowball! By the end of the day the town's folk are marching up and down the street with signs and torches loudly singing songs about how they want Eddie to be the new mayor! They also burned the mortgage note on his mother's house and are taking donations to erect a statue of him in the town square. To complicate matters even worse his ex-girlfriend (who still loves him) is now engaged to the current mayor's son. From beginning to end the entire thing is just a frenzy of people running around like mad, talking and shouting over each other. It's hilarious and even at moments very touching.

All of the films Preston Sturges wrote and directed between 1941 and 1944 were masterpieces. Most of the credit goes to Sturges and his amazing scripts, but we can't forget Sturges regular actors who appeared in all of his films during this period (very useful chart here). Of his 38 regulars 22 starred in this film.

I can't recommend this movie enough. I've seen it dozens of times and one of the things I like to do now to keep it fresh is pick out one actor and just watch them the entire time whether they're speaking or not. I think the best to watch is Ella Raines, mainly because she's beautiful, but also because her reactions all of the crazy stuff stuff going on around her is priceless. One question I do have that I doubt will ever get answered is: during Mayor Noble's speech at the train station if you watch Ella's character she's holding a bouquet of "del-fuminimums". During the madness she turns a few times and each time the tip of the flowers rubs Franklin Pandborn's face. Was that planned or did it just happen? Either way Franklin plays it smooth and his facial expressions are amusing.

Every time Eddie sneezes I can't help but think of "Spots! Spots!" from THE MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK.

THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE (FIRST SEQUENCE) (2009)

Accomplished surgeon, who happens to also be as crazy as a shithouse rat, has a fantasy to create an ass-to-mouth conjoined triplet out of three adults. He succeeds. The End.

Excellent idea for a movie, actually it's fucking fantastic!!! Too bad writer/director Tom Six is only mildly talented. When I die and go to Heaven maybe Jesus will convince Stanley Kubrick, David Cronenberg, Chris Cunningham, Pier Pasolini or an GOZU-era Miike to remake it for me. Until then I just have to hope that the sequel is better and not as weak and watered-down as the original. I mean, c'mon, if you're going to make a movie about such a perverse subject matter you might as well go all the way. That's what the audience wants to see, but they never get to! Instead there's a small build-up with very little tension, an unneeded chase sequence, the non-graphic surgery, the non-graphic revealing of the silly-looking centipede, a little about the training of the centipede (my favorite part) and then the standard horror movie ending.

There was zero tension, it wasn't shocking or disturbing and the entire thing just felt goofy and cheaply done. Also it never shows the centipede fully healed. That's what I wanted to see goddamn it! And it never pissed, what's up with that?. What would have been an interesting twist is if the centipede's brains completely broke and it started to enjoy itself. That would have been interesting. Also why was there a dude in the centipede? I would have rather seen three attractive females.

There were so many ways this movie could have been cool, but it wasn't. Not even close. It's all hype and in the end hugely disappointing. The best part of the movie ended up being the guy who played the mad doctor. He was great and looked truly disturbed.

Here's an idea for Part 2...what if there are two doctors and one of them wants to be the A unit of the centipede! He also has a fetish where he gets off on females vomiting into his asshole, so to satisfy this perverse desire he (in the head centipede position) eats really disgusting food that will give him bad gas and diarrhea. Now that's a story!!! P.S. he also has a crotchless dressing and pops boners and masturbates furiously while the B unit pukes into his butthole.

Part 2 - The Human Centipede II (Full Sequence) (2011)
Part 3 - The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence) (2015)

I understand A and B have dressing on for healing purposes, but why does C wear underwear? She should be completely nude. Also, I don't know about you, but my butthole isn't at the base of my spine.