Mad Mission 2 (1983)

For our 1,000th review it has to be the greatest film we ever saw on VHS...

Mad Mission 2 (also known as Aces Go Places 2) is an extraordinary film. A completely madcap series of stunts and amazing situations held together by a vague sub-plot of diamond theft and gangland revenge. 

King Kong (Samuel Hui) is a jewel thief / graphic designer. After he stole diamonds in the first film, the US mafia hire Filthy Harry (Joe Dimmick), in full Clint Eastwood cosplay gear, to deal with the situation.

That involves sending a robot to kill King Kong, then chasing him with multiple Jaguars and motorbikes across Hong Kong in a mass crashathon. For help, he calls on his friend in the police Albert (Karl Maka), not that he is that much help. The antics end with a final showdown with Filthy Harry's forces: another robot, another car chase with Jaguars (the number of cars wrecked in this car is astonishing) and finally Filthy Harry himself in his missile firing golden Rolls Royce...

An incredibly film, it is sort of film you would get if you gave a bunch of 10 year old boys unlimited budget and complete carte blanche. Some of the HK humour and antics are a bit dated but the sheer energy and craziness of the action makes this film well worthwhile. Many times i hired this from the video shop in the 1980s, it never failed to entertain me.

Jack the Giant Killer (1962)

A pleasing if rather goofy fantasy tale. Evil and rather camp wizard Pendragon (Torin Thatcher) has been defeated but unbeknownst to the King of Cornwall (Dayton Lummis), the evil wizard plots his revenge. Pendragon targets the lovely Princess Elaine (Judi Meredith) and sends a giant to capture her. However, the wizard is defeated by the heroic farmer boy Jack (Kerwin Matthews) who is rewarded by the King.

Pendragon isn't giving up yet though, he sends his forces of darkness to capture Elaine. Jack travels to Pendragon's island with his friends Sigurd (Barry Kelley), Peter (Roger Mobley) and his imp in a bottle (Don Beddoe)! With the imp's help Jack faces the evil of Pendragon once again...

A fun film. The characters are rather pantomine-esque with their costumes and cackling, the monsters average claymation and the special effects at times a bit dodgy. However, despite the obviousness and the lack of depth of any characters, this is a fine film. A straight forward fairy tale fantasy adventure.

Tex Rides with the Boy Scouts (1937)

A reasonable if unexceptional western. A gang has stolen a million dollars worth of gold. Tex (Tex Ritter) and his two partners (Horace Murphy and Snub Pollard) are looking for the gang when they discover a suspicious looking gold mining operation in a small town. The mine is owned by Dorman (Forrest Taylor) and his goons are seen selling gold nuggets in town.

Tex tricks Dorman into making a move and, with the help of some boy scouts (who actually would not be around until the twentieth century but anyway bear with the film), the gang is rounded up and they all head home happily for tea. 

A standard 1930s western with plenty of horse riding, sixgun shooting, fighting and some fine songs sung by Tex too. Norma (Marjorie Reynolds) is the love interest for Tex. 

White Cargo (1973)

A sometimes funny, oftentimes terrible comedy. However, it does showcase two future superstars in their early careers. Albert (David Jason) is a nobody with an overactive imagination where he fantasies about being a secret agent (so basically this is kind of a British Walter Mitty film). 

When Albert receives a flyer inviting him to a seedy gentleman's club he gets drawn (by accident) into a criminal scheme involving the sale of women to Arabs. Stella (Imogen Hassell) is an undercover policewoman (though Albert doesn't know it until the end) who is investigating the gang led by Fox (Raymond Cross) with the considerable presence of Harry (David Prowse) as muscle.

With two inept civil servants (Hugh Lloyd and Tim Barrett) following on, Albert discovers the hide out of the gang though his attempt to foil them doesn't work (it works fine in his head though in practice is a complete failure). However, at the docks he has another chance to save everyone, including himself before he is sold to the Arabs as well and become a eunuch!

A silly limited film like so many British comedies of the period, and very much of it's time with vaguely saucy antics and some dated attitudes. While not a brilliant film, it does have it's moments and is a decent watch. It offers a great view of Britain in the early 1970s, a simpler and less complicated time. It is also a film where you get to see the future Darth Vader beat up the future Del Boy!

Devil Girl from Mars (1954)

Despite the interesting sounding premise: a Martian woman in a black leather outfit arrives looking for men, this is a slow and plodding science-fiction film. Escaped convict Simpson (Peter Reynolds) turns up at a remote Scottish hotel where guests are few and far between but include scientist Professor Hennessey (Joseph Tomelty) and reporter Carter (Hugh McDermott) who are looking for a meteorite. Prestwick (Hazel Court) is also present though mostly just to look pretty. Just at the moment Simpson is recognised a UFO lands in the back garden! What are the chances eh?

Nyah (Patricia Laffan) descends the ramp in her kinky leather outfit and declares that she is looking for men to take back to Mars to help rebuild the population. As she landed at a Scottish hotel populated by stoic 1950s British people and not a high school full of horny boys she has trouble finding willing males. Much slow plodding plot proceeds as the Earthlings are powerless before Nyah's powers and her ridiculously clunky robot...

This is not a long film but it feels it because of the slowness of the plot. The budget was low and the special effects poor, though pretty much standard for their time. Nyah and her outfit are superb and give the film enough camp and cheese to get you through the slow moments (of which there are quite a few!)

Contamination (1980)

A genuine "video nasty" from the 1980s and you can see why as it had plenty of exploding abdomens. A freighter arrives at New York with a dead crew, and they have died in an incredibly gruesome manner. The police discover some mysterious green eggs, one proceeds to explode covering the cops in goo... the cops then die horribly by giving their innards some air.

Colonel Stella Holmes (Louise Marleau) is investigating for the US government, enlisting the help of police man (and only survivor of the earlier gore fest) Tony Aris (Marino Masé). After some experiments in the lab (including blowing up a rat) they think the eggs and the goo have an extraterrestrial origin... from Mars to be exact. Holmes tracks down ex-astronaut Hubbard (Ian McCulloch) who went off the rails following his mission. He indeed did see the eggs on Mars though his fellow astronaut Hamilton (Siegfried Rauch) denied there was anything there. Pity he died in a plane crash... or did he?

Complete nonsense of course, obviously influenced by Alien though not a complete rip-off. A fun film if approached in the right way, and that right way is to have a laugh at the ridiculous alien monster and exploding bellies. Entertaining rubbish. The film was apparently funded by Columbian drug barons, perfect!

Dinosaurus! (1960)

On a tropical island paradise, which the white men are blowing up and bulldozing of course, Betty (Kristina Hanson) discovers two monsters underwater just off the beach. The monsters are frozen and have been released from the depths by the explosions. Bart (Ward Ramsey) orders the two beasts bought up to the surface, they are dinosaurs! A tyrannosaurus and a brontosaurus to be exact (well an apatosaurus really but this isn't a film to come to for palaeontological accuracy to be honest).

However, a storm overnight cuts the island off from the mainland and the dinosaurs are coming to life. Crooked local overlord Hacker (Fred Engelberg) discovers that a neanderthal was also released from the depths, he seeks to sell the neanderthal to become rich. Once the dinosaurs are active and causing havoc, Bart orders everyone to an old fortress. 

Unfortunately the local annoying kid Julio (Alan Roberts) has run off and is having an adventure with the neanderthal and the brontosaurus. Bart has to save Julio and stop the crooked plans of Hacker and avoid becoming a tyrannosaurus' lunch...

Not a terrible stop-motion monster film, the addition of the neanderthal gives the film some comedy when he is scared of a toilet flushing! Although not very original this is straight forward and enjoyable monster action.