MALAYA (1949)

Sleep fucking city.  I love Jimmy Stewart and Spencer Tracy, but this movie has nothing going for it.  It took me four sittings just to get through it! 

Newspaper man Stewart is recruited by the US government to sneak into Malaya and smuggle out rubber to help the American war effort.  Stewart takes along buddy Spencer Tracy.  Tracy is a tough as nails dude who goes around non-stop talking shit and never worries about anything (example: he sneaks into a Japanese base at nighttime wearing a solid white suit and white hat).  Boring and predictable stuff happens and all the while I kept wondering to myself how this film even got made with such a high-caliber cast?!

Zero tension, discombobulated story, unneeded love aspect, stiff dialogue, quicksand pacing, unsatisfying beginning, middle and ending.  Outside of a feeling of boredom there is nothing notable about this film.  Skip it with a vengeance.

CHEERLEADER CAMP (1988)

[Update 07/25/2022: Need rewatch this film and redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

Great movie title, but if even a 1980's-era Betsy Russell in a cheerleader outfit can't salvage your film, then you're in some serious trouble.

Low-budget tale of multiple cheerleader squads at a cheerleader camp competing for some kind of best cheerleading squad or something.  I don't even know.  Despite a bunch of people walking around in the background, the main story is about a seven person team (five females, two males) and all of their personal squabbles, rivalries, etc.  Somewhere among all of this wasted energy there's a murderer killing people...in very boring ways.  Who could it be?  Who cares?

Low body count, very little blood, brief toplessness, zero gore, slow pace, shitty special effects, 80's fashions, lame humor that's not even close to being funny, boring dream sequences.

Outside of extreme boredom I cannot think of any reason to watch this snoozer. Which is sad because a slasher movie set in a cheerleader camp should be totally awesome!  Skip it.

BLACK ROSES (1988)

The rock band Black Roses is planning a concert in the small Footloose-style town of Mill Basin.  The parents are up in an uproar, so they chaperone their (thirty-year-old) teenagers to the show, but once the band starts playing some weak, cheesedick power ballet they decide these guys are such a group of raging pussies that they can't possibly be a murderous pack of demons out to turn their kids into sex-crazed serial killers.  They leave and literally one second after the door closes, the lights go out and BAM! the lead singer is wearing a leather leotard/onesie with fucking cheetah fur on his crotch! Fuck yeah!!! The band immediately charges into a pathetic 12th rate hair metal rocker that, I guess, is suppose to be evil.

Fast forward a little bit and the teenagers are killing their parents, murdering the high school principal, littering and even necking in public! Full-time poetry teacher/part-time Tom Selleck impersonator, Mr. Moorhouse, has had enough of this bullshit, so he kicks the lead singer in the round tables then lights the band on fire. It's awesome.

If you're looking for a serious horror movie then skip it, but if you want something you can laugh at then BLACK ROSES fits the bill. I laughed until my buttcheeks hurt. From an artistic viewpoint, the movie isn't bad either.  Straightforward story, pearl necklaces, glowing demon hand, quick pace, goofy songs, four topless scenes, demon getting kicked in the demon nuts, Julie Adams, a DAWN OF THE DEAD poster, a SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE poster, an Iron Maiden shirt, a GOLDEN NEEDLES poster, an INNER SPACE poster, a LIPPS & McCAIN poster, demon choking on a tennis ball, two Lamborghini's, a TRANSYLVANIA 6-5000 poster, fog machine, a Cro-Mags shirt, forum, forum, forum!

Recommended for fans of badass cheese horror.