green ginger wine two buck video review

THUNDERGROUND (Busted Up 2)

D: David Mitchell 1989

Okay, when was the last time you watched a movie that had Huckleberry Finn, hobos, bloodsports, buddies and boozing as its story line? While you’re thinking about that I’ll run this baby by you.

A B-Grade Chuck Norris type (Paul Coufus) jumps off a freight train and hits a hobo jungle stepping straight into a bare knuckle blue which he wins quite handily before teaming up with Casey, a hobo hustler who turns out to be a gal (Margaret Langrick from Harry & The Hendersons no less!). Chucky Jr don’t know shit about the hobo life, but Casey does, Casey can’t fight, Chucky Jr can. So the two team up. But it has to be in that buddy/not really buddy type scenario of course. So what we have is a 1940s hobo flick but its 1989. You get the feeling that director Mitchell who co-wrote the script originally had written this as a 40s flick but when he was offered the chance to adapt it to make this sequel he just went “sure, why not?” Trouble is that don’t quite gell. And anyway, there’s no mention of the previous movie anyway so why bother. Chucky Jr might still be the same character from the first Busted Up (which by the way I haven’t seen) but there’s no mention of his previous life or how he ended up on the bum anyway other than a sort of life sucks mini monologue that doesn’t answer any questions or matter. So what we have is a sequel that isn’t. Does that make sense? Ah who cares? Anyway, Chucky Jr and the gal go on the road heading down to New Orleans where “the Man” a legendary bare fist fighter is said to reside. So now it’s a buddies on the road, bickering and all that type of movie as well as a bloodsports flick and then Chucky Jr starts to show signs of serious booze addiction and the Gal starts reading Huck Finn and shit, we got it all then! Literature, fighting, boozing, getting of wisdom and I might add some absolutely stunning cinematography to boot! Who’d a thunk it? So the twosome head off to New Orleans and meet up with a slumming M. Emmet Walsh as a conman who offers them a blue with The Man but only after they can get some stake money together. He then offers Chucky Jr a fight against a big black son of a bitch called Mongo for a thousand clams in front of a bunch of rich decadent locals. All Chucky has to do is lose the fight. Which he does but only after being a stubborn son of a bitch himself and making Mongo earn the victory. M. Emmet cons them anyway and they walk away with a measly hunnerd bucks. (expenses and a small handgun) But at least they’ve got a fight against The Man now. Oh yeah, The Man is none other than Jesse Ventura!! Hope to hell he’s a better governor than he is an actor. Ventura meets them in a crypt and explains the rules. Basically there are none. It’s a fight to the death, no rules, no spectators, their $91 up against $9,000, survivor take all. Jesse has yet to lose of course. So then we get Chucky Jr and Jesse Ventura beating the crap out of each other in some swamp (the thunderground of the title apparently) until finally… well, I think you know the rest. Anyway Chucky Jr and the gal ride off into the sunset, well okay they jump a freight train, with their meagre winnings and goddamn it if they don’t kiss. Yuck!!!

This is such a weird hybrid that despite the bad acting, slow plot and inconsistencies, (bruises that come and go, the strange 40s/80s thing, the white clothes that stay clean despite them bumming it) I still enjoyed it. Hell, in the end I was smiling, until they kissed anyway. Of course it might have had something to do with the half bottle of Green Ginger Wine I’d consumed as well but its just such a bizarre mishmash of ideas that I couldn’t help myself. And like I said at the beginning, when was the last time you watched a movie that had Huckleberry Finn, hobos, bloodsports, buddies and boozing as its story line?

Another $2 VHS review

DEATH SHIP

D: Alvin Rakoff 1980

A mean spirited and bleak movie from the days of yore that I found on vhs for a lousy gold coin at some country market recently, Death Ship has always been one of those films that I remember watching in the grand days of videos, beer and stinky finger.

George Kennedy plays a crotchety sea captain of a luxury liner on his last voyage before forced retirement with Richard Crenna as the new captain in waiting who’s by his side learnin’ the ropes. While Cap Kennedy grumbles and farts we meet the rest of the cast. A coupla precocious kids that belong to Crenna, his wife, a horny crewman and his babe, the ship’s MC and bad comedian and an old lady who’s there, well, because you need victims basically. Anyway, while the horny crewman and his bit get it on and Cap K and Crenna and the brood sit at the Captain’s table, a dark and gloomy ship is bearing down on them, with wheels turning, engines pumpin’, orders flyin’ but no sign of a crew. The liner is in darkness, the gloomy ship daylight but hell, that sort of thing don’t matter in a b-grader like this anyway. Anyway, the ship rams the liner, things go haywire and then its daylight and surprise surprise the raft of survivors is… Crenna and his family, the horny crewman, his babe, the old lady and the comedian. You can almost see victim written on their foreheads. Cap Kennedy pops up out of the water miraculously and then so does the dark and gloomy ship. In fact how does a big fucking freighter sneak up on you and drop anchor without you noticing? Anyhoo, they all clamber on board although the cap and Crenna and horndog have to do it the hardway when the boat drops the ladder halfway through. And comedian immediately gets hooked upside down and dunked over board to either drown or get chopped up by the propellers as the boat ups anchor and takes off. Cap K starts hearing voices in German and seeing things, having flashbacks and generally looking dirty and wacked out. The rest of the survivors tumble around trying to find the crew, clean clothes, food and all that other survivor stuff while ignoring the fact that the ship is moving, the lights come on, an old rekkid player keeps playin’, the phone rings, the doors shut by themselves… it takes longer than you would think for Crenna to get that “what the fuck?” look on his face. And even then it takes horndog to point out that there’s no one running the ship before he catches on. The old lady eats some 40 year old humbugs that give her the worst case of acne you’ve ever seen. Cap K finishes her off thankfully cos she was way overacting. The ship dumps the life rafts on em and then Cap K shows up in a spankin’ new uniform and informs Crenna that Kennedy is still captain of the ship. Whoo hoo, Cap K has got himself a new command. The babe ends up trapped in a shower that covers her in blood before Cap K throws her overboard. This is a great scene with the gal spinning and screaming cut with one of the precocious kids getting spooked by the german music blaring out of the speakers… damn claustrophobic and very effective. In fact the whole flick is gritty, dirty and claustrophobic especially for a b-flick, there’s a real clammy uncomfortable feeling about this movie. Of course watching on a very old tape that’s worn out and dirty itself adds to the occasion.

But back to the story – Crenna and horndog follow the captain and stumble on a white supremist’s wet dream when they find a room full o’ nazi paraphernalia and soon realise that this ship was some sort of interrogation/torture boat, sailing around the Atlantic while the hold was full o’ folk to torture and kill. Horndog loses grip on reality in the film room when the movie just wont stop and ends up in a net full o’ bodies (which we had a flash of right at the beginning of their journey on the bucket o’ rust) and Crenna pulls himself together enough to stab Cap K who’s informed him the boat runs on blood and his family is its next meal. Grabbing his family he finds a freezer full of dead seamen (ex victims maybe?) and finds a raft and life jackets and hallelujah his family is saved. But of course not before Cap K takes a shot or two at him. Takes more than a kitchen knife to slow ol’ Cap down. In fact it takes the ship’s engine room to do it in a scene that’ll make you grimace even though you don’t actually see anything. Lots of people bag this film but hell, everytime I watch it I get the creeps. It’s dark, damp, nasty, mean spirited and bleak and I don’t care about the inconsistencies, the ship is used beautifully and to it’s fullest to make you shrink back and feel like you’re trapped too. It’s out on dvd but hell I just love the old worn out tape, it just seems right. This is a keeper.