Burning Question + Vault of Forgotten Movies: Martial Arts Edition

I am absolutely seeing this movie as soon as possible, I am only human after all.



However, something niggles at me.....this looks familiar. I enjoy a good martial arts movie...even paid to see that Mark Dacascos "Only the Strong" film where Capoeira was the art of choice, but this seems awfully familiar. Hmmmm.....(searches brain....neurons firing....accessing movie knowledge)....AH!



I knew I saw "Never Back Down" before. It was 1993 and it was called "Showdown", not this "American Karate Tiger", I have no idea where that retitling came from. Let's see here.....

Character: New Kid in Town--Brunette

Showdown: Kenn Scott playing Ken
Never Back Down: Sean Faris playing Jake

Charatcer: Arrogant Blond Asshole Jock

Showdown: Ken Mcleod (remember him...ahhhhhhhhhh)as Tom
Never Back Down: Cam Gigandet as Ryan

Character: Worthless female "love interest"

Showdown: Christine Taylor (Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!) as Julie
Never Back Down: Amber Heard as Baja

Character: Wise Black Mentor

Showdown: Billy Blanks (Tae-Bo!) as Billy
Never Back Down: Djimon Honsou as Jean

The plots may differ slightly, in "Showdown" the fights are because the new kid hits on the jock's girlfriend, while in "Never Back Down" I believe they just fight. "Showdown" is the perfect "B" martial arts movie. It's just a giant ball of cheese from beginning to end...it's nice to see that they do still make them like this. I thought the teen martial arts movie died out years ago. I highly doubt "Showdown" is out on DVD, but if it ever crosses your path, it's a fun way to spend 90 minutes. Beyond that, I don't remember too much about it....been over a decade since I've seen it. It might be in my unorganized VHS collection....I hope so. I need more Ken Mcleod.

The Vault of Forgotten Movies: Champagne for Caesar

And the vault creaks open.....

Ah! Champagne for Caesar. This is one of those gems that has gone unfairly noticed for too long. Directed by Richard Whorf in 1950 and Oscar nominated for its screenplay, it's a satire on the early days of television, specifically Game Shows and their sponsors. Yes, in the first hey-day of game shows (before the scandals), most shows were produced by a sponsor who provided the cash prizes for the winners. Ronald Colman (in one of his last roles) plays Beauregard Bottomley, an unemployed scholar who lives with his sister. He attempts to get a job at the Milady Soap company, but is turned down by the boss Burnbridge Waters (Vincent Price). Discovering that the company produces a game show, Bottomley has the idea to go on the show and win enough money to put the company out of business. Whether or not he will succeed is the rest of the film.

Simply put, I was amazed when I first sat down to watch the film. I never had associated Vincent Price with comedy before, and I'm still sad his talent for it wasn't used more often. He is absolutely hilarious as the company head, going off into a daze at a moment's notice and throwing a hissy fit as Bottomley keeps racking up money. Colman is fantastic as the world weary scholar, tossing of bon mots as if it was second nature. Celeste Holm is a scream as a vamp who works for Waters and is used to try to distract Bottomley from his goal. Even Mel Blanc is in the film, providing the voice for, of all things, Bottomley's alcoholic parrot Caesar. The film didn't do too well upon it's initial release, Television was still relatively new, so a satire of it probably went over a lot of people's heads. It 2008 now, and this film should languish any longer. It's been released on DVD, so go out and rent it today!

The Vault of Forgotten Movies

Due to my all consuming love of movies, (and I mean all consuming, I have 2 fishbowls full of all my movie stubs dating back to Working Girl, which is the first film I started saving stubs on) I feel it is my duty to share with (checking StatCounter.......) the 8 of you who have checked in so far and hopefully more people soon, some films that may have escaped general notice. For your entertainment, I will raise these films from the depths of obscurity and give them their brief shining moment on a blog that nearly nobody reads yet. They may range from films of actual quality to the bottom scrapers I usually fill my time with. If I can get at least one person to watch one of the films I'll mention in this series, my job will be a success! Let's start with one of my favorite bottom feeders.......

Girlfriend from Hell




The Devil is a woman! She is on the run and being pursued by God's "chaser", (who is an ex-lover coincidently). The chase drops her in the lap of an ongoing birthday party where shy Maggie is on a blind date with equally shy David. As the Devil inhabits Maggie's body the fun starts. First she proves that there is no one that she cannot offend, most especially her girlfriends when she takes their boyfriends upstairs for some killer sex. As the bodies pile up the chaser arrives. The plot reveals that the devil is pissed because she is jealous of her boyfriends over-enthusiastic flirting. Every woman in the film wants to pound our chaser into pulp as his obnoxiousness escalates. Also not to be messed with are the crop of Nuns with rocket launchers and semi-automatic weaponry. Quick trips in and out of deep space, bodies in the bathtub, and restaurants where the food attack the patrons. A must see, must rent, and must own for every happy couple. (From imdb.com, I even fixed up all the spelling errors and missing words there were!.)

That's a decent enough description, but this film is quite the fun 90 minutes. It falls into that so bad, it's actually kind of good as long as I don't have to think about it too much catagory. The first hour is fun enough, but then it takes quite a loony turn for the final 30 minutes. Plus it has Dana Ashbrook for all my fellow Twin Peaks fans! and Brad Zutaut who was in......well....he was in some other stuff....but I really never heard of those films (even I have some standards), except for Back to School, but I don't remember him in that, so really...Dana Ashbrook! Lack of names aside, it is a goofy way to kick back and enjoy some brain dead time. I believe some copies of it are still floating around somewhere, only on VHS though.

If you have any Vault films that you are passionate about, I'm happy to take suggestions and write them up in future installments.

And do let me know if you've actually seen Girlfriend from Hell, I'd like to know I'm not the only crazy out here.