This is the tale of two soldiers from Bulbovia, an imaginary Eastern Euopean country that has sent men out to civilize uncharted territory. At least I think that’s what’s going on; the font on the subtitles was really hard to read. Anyway, the soldiers tramp around through the handicapped-inaccessible forest (one dude is in a wheelchair) collecting bug samples and arguing about which species will get named after whom. After hearing the “forest speak” to him, the wheelchair-bound soldier can suddenly walk, and that’s when this film moves from “some guys with a video camera having fun in the woods” to “experimental.” (note: “Experimental” means: no-budget, but occasionally trying to be meaningful and/or artsy)

This movie doesn’t really have a plot to speak of, but it is supposedly based on a surrealist novel called Froktog by Mulnar Typsthat; at least every review of this film mentions that. However, the only thing I can find on this book are references to it through this movie. So… I did some anagrams of “Mulnar Typsthat” thinking that it sounded totally like an anagram of something and came up with “Nasal spurt myth” and “Strut Thy Napalm.” If you re-arrange “Froktog Mulnar Typsthat” altogether, you get “Prank Tart Lofty Mugshot” and “Mostly to prank truth, fag” and “try to fathom slut prank, G” Ah-HAH!

Like any good surrealist movie, things just kind of happen. I’ll just mention some of them: there’s a duel with plucked, uncooked chickens, Sasquatch and what looks like Jesus wearing a Greek theater mask frolic about in meadows, the formerly-handicapped guy (played by Wiley Wiggins, who has an awesome name) starts licking the leaves on the trees and eating the twigs, there’s a guy who wakes up with bugs crawling out of his mouth and finds an abandoned machine shop, Sasquatch and Jesus throw eggs at everyone…

In the end, I actually enjoyed this bizarre piece of filmmaking– it at least had a sense of humor about itself, and I’m totally a sucker for made-up languages.

Anyway, this movie touches upon “deep” topics, such as nuclear annihilation. You don’t realize this until the very end, but the message is there. Nuclear holocasuts are bad. Don’t let yourselves blow each other up, kids! Otherwise, you’ll be forced to live in stone-age level nomadic bands, wearing nothing but butt-reavealing animal skins, bad wigs, and battling dinosaurs all day.

Yor (played by Reb Brown) is our protagonist. He looks like a really built Dana Carvey, complete with his blond, unkempt wig from Wayne’s World. He is the mighty hunter (though he’s not technically from the future, but whatever. Details!) who goes around accidentally getting each tribe of people annihilated by accident. He’s actually trying to help them, but in the battle, he ends up running away with his chick and her father, leaving the rest of the tribe to be swept away by rivers, eaten by dinosaurs, killed by laser blasts or whatever. Sometimes he just kicks their asses.

You see, Yor is on a quest for self-discovery. For as long as he can remember, he’s been wearing this medallion made of who-knows-what. In fact, people he meets are always asking him what it’s made of, and his answer is always a wistful “I wish I knew.” It looks a lot like a jumbo piece of gelt that one would win in a particularly high-stakes game of dreydel, but I don’t think society has evolved so far as to have invented dreydels quite yet on this planet.

Along the way, Yor and his posse keep getting attacked by these guys from the bad tribe. They dress in black furs and paint their faces purple. They also grunt a lot. However, Yor still manages to elude them (plus a couple of dinosaurs) and find the secret island that was once ruled by his people…

I won’t spoil the ending, but let’s just say it ‘s an epic battle of Good vs. an Evil guy who constantly spouts lengthy soliloquies to his robot army (he’s trying to breed the “Master Race” which is part genetically modified human and part robot). Note to guy: robots don’t have feelings, and probably don’t care about your trials and tribulations, and how hard it is being Overlord (that’s really his name).

Even though this movie has absolutely no cinematically redeeming qualities (although one of the guys from the Island of the Aryans is kinda cute), it is definitely fun to watch. if you’re looking for things to round out your “worst movie ever made, yet in a fun way” collection– this one is a must.

Along the way, he brings a scantilly-clad Teela, her dad, Gwildor the dwarf (they didn’t have the budget for that flying ghost thing in the cartoons, just Billy Barty–RIP). Their quest is to find the Cosmic Key, a glowing contraption that harmonizes the universe with its dulcet casio-tones.
The band of Eternians tracks the Cosmic Key to earth, where they meet Julie (Courtenay Cox, in between her acting debut in a Bruce Springsteen video and “Friends”) and Kevin (the future Tom Paris of Star Trek: Voyager). Hilarity and adventure ensue as Skeletor and his band of scary action-figures badly translated into real-live characters pursue them. There is even a poignant moment or two when Skeletor uses Julie’s weakness–her love of her parents who died in a plane crash– to get to her to betray her new oddly-clothed extra terrestrial friends.

The best moment is near the end, when Skeletor, clad in his Spencer-Gifts quality skeleton mask eloquently and dramatically delivers his Shakesperean last soliloquy:

People of Eternia! I stand before the Great Eye of the galaxy. Chosen by destiny by the powers of Greyskull! This inevitable moment will transpire before your eyes, even as He-Man himself bears witness to it. Now. I, Skeletor, am Master of the Universe! YES! Yes… I feel it, the power… fills me. Yes, I feel the universe within me! I am… I am a part of the cosmos! The power flows… Flows through me! Of what consequence are you now? This planet, these people. They are NOTHING to me! The universe is power! Real, unstoppable POWER! and I am that force! I am that power! KNEEL BEFORE YOUR MASTER! Fool! you are no longer my EQUAL! I am more than man! MORE THAN LIFE! I… am… a… GOD! Now. You… will… KNEEEEEL! KNEEEEL!

It brought tears to my eyes. Actually, this whole movie did.

Sir Laurence Olivier is in his most powerful role to date: as the Mighty Zeus himself! Watch as he and the rest of the gods of Olympus smite people and entire cities! Meanwhile Perseus, our hero, goes around killing and dismembering all sorts of mythological beasts, rescuing the princess, and making the world safe for Athenian democracy.

Featuring Bubo, the Olympian made robot owl and innovative, yet outdated special effects by stop-motion wizard Ray Harryhausen. With a pantheon of famous actors as well, such as Ursula Andress as Aphrodite, Burgess Meredith as the Old Guy, Claire Bloom as Hera, and Harry Hamlin as Perseus.

This is such an awesome movie; I can’t believe that more people don’t remember it. I have vivid recollections of watching this on Showtime when I was a kid (back then there was a box that sat on the TV, and you had to press a button to get Showtime…) The songs are disturbingly catchy and I can still hum them today. It’s also a blast seeing Michael Jackson with a real nose and everything!

This is a retelling of The Wizard of Oz with an All-Afro-American cast. There’s a buttload of 70′s stars like Diana Ross, Lena Horne, Richard Pryor, and Mabel King. And the greatest surprise of all… this movie was co-written by Cheesemaster Joel Schumacher, responsible for bringing such corny classics as Flatliners, The Lost Boys, Batman Forever, St Elmo’s Fire, and (brace yourself) THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING WOMAN into the world!!! Unbelievable!

I actually thought this movie was a very clever adaptation of L. Frank Baum’s book. The action takes place in a psychedelic, decaying New York– one that’s full of corruption, drugs, and violence. There are some priceless moments of cheese in this masterpiece, such as:

• When Dorothy gets spit into Oz by the cyclone, she crashes through a huge “OZ” neon sign.
• The munchkins are actually taggers who get turned into graffiti by the Wicked Witch of the East (Dorothy kills her when the neon sign lands on her.) They do an Alvin Aileyesque street dance number.
• When Dorothy & Co. encounter the Cowardly Lion outside the Public Library (he’s one of the two stone lions) the signs in the crosswalk say “DON’T EASE.”
• Our heroes go down into the subway, where they’re attacked by man-eating trashcans and a psychotic panhandler.
• Evillene, the Wicked Witch of the West, sits atop a giant toilet.
• The Wicked Witch of the West’s evil Flying Monkeys are really a tough biker gang.
• (I want a giant camera costume like the guy in the Emerald City!)

Our heroes have to “Ease on Down the Road” to the Emerald city, along the way encountering urban perils like drug use, muggers, slavery, and expressionist dance. They also have to endure the Tin Man’s (Nipsy Russell) occasional hysterical outbursts of “Teeny, Teeny!” while projectile tears squirt out of his face. When they eventually make it to the Emerald City, it’s a huge Studio 54-esque discotheque where the partygoers all dress in the same color, changing outfits every time the Great and Powerful Oz decides to change the lights. Every time the lights change, they have to sing a song about how great that color is. Uhm, right! It’s like the band Chic got together with Martha Stewart or something.

Filled with music co-written by Ashford and Simpson, Luther Vandross, and Quincy Jones, this movie is sure to make any self-respecting gen-X-er yearn for his or her childhood. And Diana Ross plays the part of Dorothy to spectacular dramatic effect, have periodic outbursts of face-twisting agony. In the words of my roommate Jed, “That’s why they call her a Diva, darling.” But what’s with that dress? Violet is definitely not her color.

What are you waiting for, a house to fall on you? Ease on down to the video store and rent The Wiz. Do it now! You’ve got to be seen, in Green! You’ve got to be dead, in Red! You’ve got the be rad, in Plaid…

This is one of my favorite Disney movies of all time. It’s a bit gory for a Disney flick (watch baby dragons chew on the dead princess’s corpse), but it’s still rated PG, so you can rent this one while babysitting! Peter McNichol stars as a wizard’s apprentice who sets out to save a town from a mean dragon. He finds a nice medieval transvestite girl and falls in love. There is a bad guy; we’re not quite sure what his point in trying to stop our hero is, other than the fact that he’s bad, but he provides the role of the antagonist, since this film doesn’t have the budget to show the dragon very often. Dragonslayer is chock-full-of cheesy special effects, heroic deeds, and chanting in Latin. This is one not to be missed.

It may be well worth it just to see “Excalibur” written in the shiny Excalibur font in the beginning of the movie! This is actually one of my favorite films, even though it looks like a big-budget 2+ hour Fleetwood Mac video. We see the birth of King Arthur, his early reigning years, and his death, all bathed in an odd greenish light, like he’s perpetually standing under a neon 24-hour dry- cleaning sign.

There are lots of drawn-out battle scenes involving guys in heavymetalesque suits of armor, and even a dismemberment or two. Lots of naked boobs, as well, if you’re into that sort of thing. With dialogue out of a D & D manual, this movie is sure to please! trivia: this was Liam Neeson’s first film. We also see that Captain Picard didn’t have any hair in 1981, either!

History nerds will love this one. There are at least 15 historical anachronisms in every scene, impress (or annoy) your friends by pointing them out! Sean Connery plays an aging King Arthur, who rules wisely and fairly etc. etc. And Richard Gere is that rogueish troublesome love-smitten knight, Sir Lancelot. He pouts and struts and lusts and has sporadic bouts of an English accent all for his married true love, Guenevere. If you love King Arthur tales, then rent Excalibur. Then rent Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And then Merlin. Then if you have time, maybe First Knight.

Tarl our hero gets to help a ragged group of rebels recover an ugly glowing rock that houses the “spirit of their village” from an ugly hairy dude named Starm. There’s also a warrior babe love interest and all that usual fantasy movie stuff. She gets to defy the oppressive nature of her society by wearing a leather bikini and randomly shooting an arrow every now and then.

This is definitely the movie for you if you enjoy watching badly orchestrated fight scenes. Also, if you enjoy movies with stupid-sounding made-up fantasy novel names, you’ll be pleased. All in all, not bad!