tales from the city.

1970s/80s New York.

plan your escape.

box of delights.

I've posted classic VHS cover art on many occasions but never any classic VHS boxes so here goes.

Enjoy.

sweet charity.

No idea who's been sending stuff to my local charity shop recently but it's suddenly become an Aladdin's cave of tat filled delights.

Boxes of He-Man and Turtles toys, first editions of the American Pinnacle Doctor Who novelizations for a quid and huge piles of 'top quality' DVD's starting at 25p each.

Just yesterday I picked up a sealed copy of the Singing Ringing Tree, the crazily entitled Vanessa Hudgens CD 'V', anther copy of the Bud Spence and Terrence Hill classic All The Way Boys (this time on the fine South African Impact DVD label - gotta catch 'em all), the French Doctor Who series 1 boxset and a bag of 70's/80's British comedy DVD's in cardboard sleeves that you usually find in Sunday papers.

Hudgens: with her cash you'd think she
could afford a matching bra and pants.

Sorting thru' the expected episodes of On The Buses, Hi-De-Hi and the like (which incidentally only cost a small donation seeing as they can't be resold) I was surprised (and a little aroused if I'm honest) to find not only a copy of the fantastic (and terribly underrated) Carry On Emmannuelle but also the Barry (cats face) Stokes starrer The Ups and Downs of a Handyman, a film I'd not seen since I sneakily watched it at a school chums house about 35 years ago and whose reputation seemed to be based more on the fact that Bob Todd had an on screen nervous breakdown whilst filming more than anything else.

So, would it live up to those hazy, Thunderbird fueled memories of spankings, huge bristols and hairy man-ass?

The movie I mean, not what happened when my mates parents came home.

Anyway, for those of you who haven't had the pleasure.....

Ups and Downs of a Handyman (AKA Confessions of a Handyman, Confessions of an Odd-Job Man and The Happy Housewives. 1975)
Dir: John Sealey.
Cast: Barry Stokes, Penny Meredith, Valerie Leon, Sue Lloyd, Chic Murray, Bob Todd, Ava Cadell and the brilliantly named Gay Soper.

Helmet haired, horse cocked newlywed Bob (Stokes) and his buxom blonde bird Margaretta (ex Hills Angel and star of the Pete Walker classic The Flesh and Blood Show Meredith) have decided to start their married life in the quietly quaint little haven that is Chipping Sodbury.

Enjoying a wee bit of do it yourself (shelf building and the like, not furious masturbation obviously) our hero sets up shop as the local handyman.

Cue loads of hilarious gags about the size of his tool - meaning his penis - whilst being asked by various 70's dollybirds to 'check their plumbing' - as in touch their vaginas.

Yup, welcome to the Hell that was 1970's British cinema, where behind every door there was a frustrated and bored housewife in a nylon babydoll nightie and furry heeled slippers (usually played by Liz Fraser, or in this case ex Hammer hottie Valerie Leon), a sexy schoolgirl with pigtails and NHS specs (Ava Cadell, former page 3 poppet, Hollywood star and currently a leading authority on Tantric sex), maybe an uptight twinset and pearls wearing school teacher (usually played by mole lipped Crossroads legend Sue Lloyd) or even the bored daughter of the local magistrate with an IQ of a housebrick but the body of a strip queen.

Oh, and the fashion sense of a clap ridden whore.

She might be enjoying the eggy chest now
but just wait till the mooth shite-in begins.

And if that wasn't entertainment enough, it seems that poor Bob is a bit fick himself, seeing as he never catches on to the fact that the small job that needs doing isn't, in fact putting up a spice-rack but ultimately involves his sticking his cock into the customer in question.

You have to feel for a guy who turns up to fix a broken tap, only to find the lady of the house stark bollock naked (apart from a huge rainforest like 70's bush), clutching a dry Martini in one hand and one of her ample breasts in the other lying on a bed winking at him whilst he mistakenly sees this as she's got something in her eye.

Yes, the script is that funny.

Luckily for us writer/director John Sealey and his partner in crime Derrick Slater (who later gave up writing in order to thrill us with his performance as an unnamed security guard in the classic Tom Baker Doctor Who story, The Seeds of Doom) had realized that it takes more than Barry Stokes bouncing arse to make a movie great, so decided to add a few eccentric British stereotypes to the fold in order to up the comedy ante.

"Why what a lovely shiny helmet you have".

Enter top Scots funnyman (not literally mind, he's been dead for years) Chic Murray as the clumsy PC Nick 'Nick' Knowles and balding bumbler Bob Todd as the spank happy Squire Bullsworthy.

Rumour has it that Todd - of whom it was widely known enjoyed the pleasures of corporal punishment in private - was so close to the edge as far as his mental state was concerned, that every day the director would send a car to pick him up from the local hospital where he was being treated just pop him in on set with a nude young actress and let him slap her arse until they had enough footage for that scene.

Which, frankly is nice work if you can get it.

But it's stuff like this that effectively sounded the death knell for the British film industry, whereas our American cousins had the likes of John Holmes and Ginger Lynn Allen strutting their stuff in grindhouse sexploitation epics we had to put up with bald manbreasted old men appearing all naked and pink like big wobbly perverted jellies and in some cases, like in many of the Dave Sullivan produced sex comedies burst into song and dance routines at the most inopportune moments.

A bit like having your Granddad walk in on you just as you're about to shoot your load over a picture of Caroline Munro when you were 11.

Possibly.

Your dad and your girlfriend last night.

To add insult to an already mentally scarred audience the film was later re-released as Confessions of a Handyman (and later still as Confessions of an Odd-Job Man), in an attempt to con poor viewers into thinking that it was an entry in the fantastic "Confessions Of ..." series starring Lord Robin of Askwith and written by Roger Moore Bond scribe Christopher Wood under the pen name Timothy Lea.

Avoid like a dose of crabs, unless the thought of Gay Soper (who voiced the classic kids teevee show The Flumps) getting taken from behind by the guy from Prey tickles your fancy.

Hmmm, just me then.

snail of the century.

So I've obviously given up on that whole let's review every film set in 2019 thing for now (tho' it's not like anyone was reading it) and decided to just (re) watch whatever random movie I find when tidying the boys bedroom.

Enjoy.

Aenigma (AKA Daemonia, Internado diabolico, L’enigme. 1987).
Dir: Lucio Fulci.
Cast: Jared Martin, Lara Naszinski, Ulli Reinthaler, Sophie d'Aulan, Jennifer Naud, Milijana Zirojevic, Ricardo Acerbi and Lijlijana Blagojevic.

"I may have a fat ass, but if you slap it one more time, I’ll slap your face!"

Pug eyed Cherie Blair alike Kathy (Zirojevic - bless you) is the friendless class freak at the bizarrely European Saint Mary’s College in Boston.

With her scary Lego hair, permanently surprised expression and ickle thin legs Kathy spends her days dreaming about the studly gym teacher Fred Vernon (slick quiffed sex god Acerbi) who -surprisingly - one day actually asks lil ms. mousy out on a date.

A date to the 'dancing' no less.

Stunned by this turn of events - and forgetting that she's in a horror movie - Kathy excitedly gets ready for the night of her life with the knight of her dreams (to the funky sound of the Euro-pop hit 'Head over Heels' by top popster Douglas Meakin no less) unaware of what is about to occur.

"(Pop) eyed son!"

After a night of funky frugging Fred offers to take Kathy home but on the way
pulls his Jeep over on a secluded wooded path, where he almost immediately - well it is a short film -  starts to work his manly magic on Kathy, whispering sweet nothings and working the poor lass into a wild unbridled frenzy of naughty thoughts and sweaty thighs.

Unbeknown to Kathy tho' the couple are surrounded by her evil classmates, their cars parked just out of sight and all tuned into the secret two way radio in Fred's car.

What a rotter.

Giggling happily to themselves as Kathy's breathing gets deeper and Fred's dialogue gets far cheesier than you would think possible, the band of baddies flash their headlights with a whoop just as Kathy thinks she's about to do the dirty with the vile Vernon.

Understandably humiliated (and a wee bit affronted by the turn of events) she leaps from the car and legs it back to the college with her cruel classmates in hot pursuit.

Chased onto a main road unlucky Kathy is hit by an oncoming motorist, bouncing across the bonnet and ending up comatose and in intensive care.

Ouch.

"Tubes in mah mooth!"

Confusingly cutting back to the school for no other reason than to introduce us to our lead actress for the evening, new girl Eva Gordon (Naszinsky; star of A Blade in the Dark and cousin of Nastassja Kinski no less) a button nosed blonde who has just arrived at Saint Mary's and is ready to settle in for a hard term of studying.

Or as she puts it "...a successful year means making out with as many boys as possible”.

Saucy minx.

But there's something very strange about Eva and not just the fact that the film keeps abruptly cutting to shots of Kathy as the new girl does something really normal like walking up some stairs but bizarre stuff like her not knowing where she was born, being unable to convincingly walk and talk at the same time and finding random lighters hidden in her underwear drawer.

Spooky biscuits.

Luckily for Eva her roommate Jenny (lantern jawed Reinthaler from Zombi 3 or is that Zombi 4?) thinks nothing of it and welcomes the new girl into the local bitch squad whilst Eva sets her lustful sights on Fred and his kick flared, stay-press jeans.

"Then I saw her face...now I'm a mad Eva!"

Being a Fulci film tho' it's not long before some totally bizarre (but gorgeously shot) shit starts 'going down' as the youngsters say - Fred is the first to fall foul to the strangeness when, after an argument about buckets with hairy Mary the college janitor (and mother of Kathy) he's choked to death by his own reflection.

And that's even before he's had a chance to even think about touching Eva's hemline, poor sod.

Him that is, not her.

The local police led by what looks like a council estate Zane Lowe (alongside director Fulci in a cameo) decide that he died of a heart attack and leave it at that.

"Can you show me where he touched you on this picture son?"

Bizarrely, everything on campus continues as normal, the girls bitch, smoke and wear frighteningly short hotpants whilst the Super Nanny like headmistress Ms. Jones (Scrabble triple word scoring Blagojevic) wanders around the corridors in a disappointingly non-lesbian like manner unaware that there's a pretty good chance that Kathy's spirit has returned for revenge.

Could she be controlling Eva?

Maybe.

And thusly the weirdness continues, only coming to a head when Eva viciously beats Jenny with a stuffed Giraffe before collapsing onto her bed in a sweatily unconscious state whilst pulling what can only be termed her best cum face.

Which is nice.

Enter (roughly and from behind whilst engaged in a crafty reacharound) the sexy neurologist cum crime fighter and ex Blow Monkeys frontman Doctor Robert (pubed headed US teevee heart throb and star of Fantastic Journey and that 80's War of The Worlds series Martin) who appears to be the only character in the movie with any idea that something maybe, oh so slightly amiss.

You see he's noticed that there are rather alarming changes in Kathy's brainwaves during (and after) each mysterious death.

Mysterious brainwaves aren't the only thing of interest to the Lothario Doc tho' as he also seems keen on sampling a wee bit of underage totty, Eva being a case in point.

Dr. Robert: diggin' your scene.

No surprises then that before long Dr. Robert has entered (shit, I've already done that joke, just imagine it again but without the reachround bit) a full blow affair with Eva with tasteful sexy scenes intercut with Kathy making the hospital machines bleep loudly as her old classmates start dying in even more bizarre ways – including naked sex-based suffocation by snails and being hugged to death by a paper mache statue of Brian Blessed.

Obviously Eva is the main suspect.

Snails in mah...well snails everywhere really.

Whilst all this deadly death is occurring, Dr. Robert begins to suffer from nightmarish dreams where the glisteningly ample arsed Eva and himself indulge in sweaty sex that culminate in her biting off his nipples and tongue to a sub Goblin rock soundtrack courtesy of Carlo Maria Cordio, the man behind the soundtracks of Troll 2 and Shocking Dark.

But nobodies perfect.

Suffice to say that Rob is fairly relieved when Eva's folk decide to take her out of school and lock her up in a mental asylum, for one thing it means he can now starting shagging the class whore Grace (the slightly stocky Naud) without fear of losing his nips, bladder control etc and for another it means he can spend much more valuable screen time wandering aimlessly in and out of Kathy's room whilst tutting at the monitors.

Everyone's a winner then.

Tunnel or funnel?

Until that is late one night when Eva escapes from Shady Nook with the idea of being re-united with her true love.

Oh and to maybe commit some more murders.....

Fulci's little seen - and scarily little loved - psycho-babbling B-movie opus Aenigma, whilst not being his best works is at once totally bonkers and infinitely watchable; from the aforementioned slug scene (featuring as it does some fantastically kinky shots of said shelled beasties sliming across an erect nipple) to the scary Tom Cruise poster adorning the wall of Grace's room via the bizarre (and budget helping) use of the same beheading scene to show the whole college campus being murdered to quite possibly cinema's sweatiest and most unnecessary greased arse sex ever filmed there's so much here to enjoy.

The cast - in the main a mix of Italian and Yugoslavian actors - play everything straight and to the point, not only playing the whole thing deadly serious but also managing to convince us that they're actually in the good old US of A and not the city of Pristina in Yugoslavia where it was (probably) shot*.

I mean almost everyone on screen sports a St. Mary’s Boston T-shirt at some point whilst the girls’ dormitory rooms are choc full of posters featuring everything from an American flag (with a bald eagle on it obviously), Snoopy, Yoda and even Tom Cruise.

This poster seems to be a favourite of everyone involved tho' as it appears on screen almost as often as Jared Martin's arse.

Tom Cruise, the most effectual
Tom Cruise, whose intellectual
Close friends get to call him T.C.
Providing they don't mention Scientology!

Obviously influenced by Carrie and (at least visually) by Argento's Inferno, Fulci delivers his trademark oppressive atmosphere, over the top gore and saucy sleaze which makes up for the inane dialogue and muddy plotting that plagues the production at times but let's be honest as none of the negatives really matter seeing as Aenigma is - like the great man himself - a joy from start to finish.

And if that's not enough to convince you then just imagine - like I do - that the opening lyrics were actually written in tribute to Fulci himself:

“Put on your make-up, your eyes are blue enough, tonight is special for you... You’re true...” .

















































*I'm taking a wild geographical stab here seeing as Yugoslavia doesn't actually exist anymore** and more importantly I can't be arsed looking it up.

**A wee bit like your parents love for you doesn't.

tokyo a go-go.

For no other reason than they're fab - here's some pics of Tokyo in the 1950s.

Enjoy.

ziggy gorefest.

Just found out from a Twitter friend that this is getting a rare airing on Italian channel Iris tonight so thought I'd give it a quick rewatch.

Enjoy.

The Spider Labyrinth (AKA Il nido del ragno, The Spider's Nest. 1988).
Dir: Gianfranco Giagni.
Cast: Roland Wybenga, Paola Rinaldi, Margareta von Krauss, Claudia Muzi, William Berger and Stéphane Audran.

The studly and incredibly tidy bearded Professor Alan Whitmore (Wybenga, the poor man's Jason Patric) is rudely awakened - but not by the dustmen - from a terrifying dream where his younger (tho' no less attractive) self is trapped in a cupboard with a huge rubber spider by the tweet tweet of his fairly groove-some trim-phone.

Don't you just hate it when that happens?

Bizarre dreams are the least of Alan's worries tho' seeing as his superiors - and a priest - from the local community college where he works teaching illiterate no-hopes painting and decorating have summoned him to an important meeting.

Hopefully he's not been touching up the sixth formers (again) or this could be a completely different kinda movie.

Luckily for Whitmore the meeting is less about his touchy-feely way with the students and more to do with his college, the mysterious Doctor Ray Kuhn.

It appears that Doctor Kuhn, who is currently working of something very clever yet strangely mysterious in Budapest, has failed to respond to anyone's phone calls and more importantly when anyone writes to him asking for an update on his work he sharply replies that the dog has eaten his notes.

Curious.

Geoff Priest and his pals want Whitmore to investigate.

Specs appeal.

Stopping only to grab a change of underwear and his pyjamas, Whitmore books himself onto the first available flight to the fun filled city of Budapest (Often described as the 'Little Paris of Middle Europe' fact fans) where, on arrival  he's met at the airport (yes it does have one, I checked) by the Doctor's sexy librarian styled, pixie-like assistant (and resident square jawed saucy strumpet) Genevieve Weiss (the star of pop wank U2's "All I want is you" video, Rinaldi).

Unfortunately for Whitmore (and us) there's no time for any of that sexy stuff because he has an urgent date with the dotty Doctor Kuhn at his spooky tenement flat as soon as touches down.

But luckily not cloth.

Grabbing his luggage our hero jumps into Genevieve's car and the pair zoom off toward the unknown.

Well I say unknown but it's actually a house mere minutes away.

I just wanted to make it sound more exciting.

Sorry.

Well, the lights are on.

Arriving at the Doctor's house (and left in the lurch by Genevieve who's gone home to style her eyebrows or something) Whitmore is greeted by Kuhn's manly wife Helga (Audran, best remembered as Pauline de la Rochelle in Poor Little Rich Girl: The Barbara Hutton Story) who takes him to the Doctors study.

Tho' not in her full lipped German mouth.

Well not yet.

Anyway, back at the plot where it seems that Kuhn has gone a wee bit mental, seeing as he's taken to standing half dressed (and half cut) in his study spouting on about alternative gods and webs of deceit to anyone who's unlucky enough to be in earshot.

Which in this case is a very confused Alan, who really just wants the Docs notes so he can fuck off back to the States and his own bed.

"Ahm sorry hen, ah pished masel'!"

Anyway, after what seems like hours of meaningless chat the Doc reaches into his pants and whips out of small diary which he excitedly thrusts into Alan's hands whilst whispering "don't tell the missis!" but before Alan can question this bizarre turn of events a black tennis ball smashes thru the window causing Kuhn to wet himself before scuttling off to cry in the corner.

Slightly perturbed and maybe a little aroused, Alan decides to clear his head by returning to his hotel for a slap up meal and a quick game of footsie under the table with Genevieve before retiring for the night.

Unfortunately his plans are foiled by the appearance - from behind a desk - of the harsh faced old ginger woman (whose chat is as inappropriate as her skirt length) that runs the hotel.

Oh yes, that and the fact that halfway thru' dinner news reaches Alan that Kuhn has hung himself.

Worse of all tho' is the fact that he doesn't even get dessert.

"I can see your house from here Peter!"

Upon hearing the terrible news (about the hanging, not that the cheesecake is off) Alan rushes back to the Docs house only to be accosted by a fish breathed tramp (Berger from War and Remembrance) who drunkenly warns him to leave Budapest before it's too late and he too becomes embroiled in the local web of badness.

Hmmmm....I wonder if all these mentions of webs mean anything?

From this point in things go from bad to very bad via a whole myriad of badness for poor Alan, who is first questioned (rudely) by a fat policeman, his stories of spooky tennis balls mocked before his passport is confiscated 'for safe keeping'.

Or so the local coppers can have a laugh at his photo, one or the other.

Humiliated - and still dreaming of pudding - Alan sulkily returns to his hotel to sit in the dark and smoke fags in a brooding in a manner usually reserved for angsty teens.

All this sulkiness is soon forgotten tho' when he notices Genevieve in all her square shouldered glory dancing naked in her apartment, which just happens to be directly opposite his room.

Alan quickly rings room service for some tissues and a Pot Noodle.

How do you solve a problem like Maria?
Stab her in the face obviously.

Wiping the single tear from his milky eye Alan crawls sheepishly into bed only to have his rest disturbed by a soft knocking at the door.

No it's not the dessert trolley but the hotel maid Maria (Muzi, whose IMDB entry features the keywords adultery, dancing, aerial-bombing and teenage boy for all you fact fans out there) who has come - but not literally - to warn Alan to go home now before he becomes trapped like a fly on a spiders web.

The chat (and anything else that may or may not happen when hotel maids turn up at your room at three in the morning) is cut short by Madam Ginger, who shoos Maria away before bidding Alan good night.
Surprisingly tho' she doesn't warn him about the screams he'll hear later as poor Maria is stabbed to death by what looks like Bonnie Langford - with pegs for teeth - on PCP.

If she had it would have saved him the uncomfortable chat he ends up having with her later about dead babies as he's searching the hotel for the source of the aforementioned screams.

Don't worry, it all makes sense (kinda) when you watch it.

Well On The Buses took a turn for the sinister...

Hounded by the police, hassled by a tramp and with only the nude dance fixated Genevieve to help, Alan begins to investigate the mystery surrounding the strange town and the locals obsession with all things arachnid.

Oh and to discover why there seems to be a bizarre amount of sticky tennis balls flying about the place.

But as is always the way in these movies, time is running out for our hero.

Probably.

"Laugh now!"

It's difficult to review Gianfranco Giagni's one and only foray into horror cinema without giving too much away because quite frankly Spider's Labyrinth is one of the most bonkers films to come out of Italy in the last thirty years, partly due to the fact that it appears to be written in a kinda free form style usually reserved for ear-splitting modern jazz but mainly because everything in the movie is played absolutely and earnestly straight.

Which was probably really difficult for the camp as pants Roland Wybenga so fair play to him.

Childish innuendo aside, who exactly is this wunderkind Gianfranco Giagni and where did him come from?

Born in 1952, this former music critic began his cinematic journey as an assistant to Mauro Bolognini's on set of his 1976 hit L'Héritage (AKA L'eredità Ferramonti),the film even won some awards and stuff but seeing as it doesn't feature Paola Rinaldi dancing naked I haven't seen it.

Jumping forward to 1981 (if you want a full resume you should really try a site that gives a fuck) Giagni created the frankly fantastically monikered music showcase Mr. Fantasy - hosted by magnificent Carlo Massarini - for RAI television, breaking into directing good and proper producing music vid's for the likes of saucy singing strumpet Loredana Berté and overseeing episodes of the erotically charged series based on the Guido Crepax comic masterpiece Valentina before moving onto music videos and finally giving us the magnificent Spider's Labyrinth.

I own this and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

Which makes it all the more upsetting when you realise he dropped from view just as quickly as he appeared, resurfacing in 1993 with a documentary about Orson Welles love affair (not in a biblical sense) with Italy entitled Rosabella: Orson Welles in Italy.
That must have taken weeks to come up with.

Paola Rinaldi today:
You still would.
Twice.

Back to the film at hand tho' where Giagni, not afraid to pilfer from the best, takes a plot that is pure Lovecraft and filters it thru the classic Giallo template created by Mario Bava before adding a dash of Argento styling to create a movie that in many ways surpasses the sum of it's parts to become a classic in it's own right.

Plus it's got a big stop motion monster in it.

What's not to love?

It does beg the question tho', why has hardly anyone been able to see it?

If I was Giagni I'd be traveling around the world banging on folks doors demanding that watch it.

Or at least asking someone very nicely to give it a proper DVD release, the only way of currently viewing the movie is as a DVD rip of the ancient Japanese VHS edition complete with hard-coded subtitles.

Which I guess makes it educational as well as entertaining.

Your hair's not the only thing you let down...

And just think, if enough of us demand to see it Giagni might make a sequel which at the very least means that we can finally rid ourselves of the crushing disappointment we felt on viewing his dull as dishwater adaptation of Nino Filasto's novel Three days in the life of Councillor Scalzi.

Filmed as the much snappier Nella terra di nessuno (Nobody's Heart/In No-Man's Land take your pick), its only real claim to fame is a scene where Italy's very own Kate Winslet, the horse-like Maya Sansa breast feeds a doll.

It did occur to me after emailing him a copy of this review and a letter begging for a Bluray release of The Spider Labyrinth and receiving no reply that maybe he's trying to distance himself from his horror past.

Which would be a shame if true.

All I can say is get emailing Giagni as soon as you've finished here, his rehabilitation into the hallowed hall of horror highs begins NOW!