And Then This Happened... Sidehackers

Well it is getting close to Turkey day and that means heaping helpings of Mystery Science Theater 3000. If you aren't planning on watching any of this hilarious show this year, then maybe I can provide you with some bit sized tidbits to enjoy and riff on yourself.

First up is the biker/sports film Sidehackers. Yeah this movie is a mess, and has plenty of "did I just see that?" moments and characters. But this guy is one of the most annoying of the bunch. I'd describe what is actually happening here... but you know what, I think it might be more fun if you just caption it.

And then this happened...

Rocket Attack U.S.A. (1961) – MST3K Review

Summary:

The episode kicks off with another chapter of the serial thriller, The Phantom Creeps. When we left our heroes they were plummeting in an airplane thanks to the cute spider bomb used by Dr. Zorka (Bela Lugosi). Unfortunately the crash kills Zorka’s wife and this fans the flames of his rage to do evil deeds. His thuggish assistant Monk (Jack C. Smith) keeps putting the two of them in more peril and Zorka must use all his gadgets including his invisibly belt, walking bombs and his huge ugly robot to escape capture. The episode contains a shoot out and ends with a car containing the bland detective hurtling off a cliff thanks to Zorka’s ingenuity. Can the madman be stopped in time?

The feature films starts with the realization that Sputnik was just hurtled into space by those pesky Soviets. America is caught with its pants down. No working ICBMs, heck no working rockets at all! Much scrambling ensues to get something… anything up into the air. As our scientists flail around (and presumably The Right Stuff occurs off screen) a CIA agent is sent on a top-secret mission. His name is John White (John McKay) and his job is to sneak into Russia, contact an undercover cutie in Moscow named Tanya (Monica Davis). She’s “seeing” a Soviet general with information on the space program. White discovers that the Soviets are planning to launch a missile at New York! Now he must attempt to sabotage the missile and escape from Russia. But does he have a hope in hell of preventing Rocket Attack U.S.A.?

Movie Review:

No matter how hard you try Joel, you can't
climb out of the theater.

I covered the concept of the serial in my review of Jungle Goddess, which featured the first episode of The Phantom Creeps. Much like that episode this storyline seems thrown together. Lots of stuff happens, but the plot doesn’t really move forward. Everyone still think Zorka is crazy (gee I wonder why) and the cops are after him. We get lots of action in this episode. Planes explode, there is a shootout in Zorka’s mansion, and you even get a car crash. Lots of stuff happens, and it’s filmed in that speedy serial fashion, barely slowing down to let you take a breath.

Lugosi is hamming it up still, and it works great. His interaction with his assistant Monk is hilarious. Monk seems eager to help, but is just a bumbling guy. He nearly blows them all up. We also get to see the robot at work - because he opens a secret door and lumbers around some more. I was hoping to see him take out some of the cops, but not in this episode. You also learn that Monk can take seven or eight bullets, and he’s only stunned. And I thought the robot was tough!

As far as serials go, The Phantom Creeps continues to be breezy fun, with a lot of completely convenient and silly things happening to make the plot move forward, and Lugosi is around to keep it entertaining.

"The president called. He said you're the worst
scientist ever."

I’m just going to come out and say it; Rocket Attack U.S.A. is a very strange film, even for a cold war scare film. Because make no mistake about it, this movie is supposed to scare the crap out of you. Yeah it’s got a heroic spy, yeah it’s got sneaking behind enemy lines, and yeah it’s got a tepid romance. But what you really get from the film is the futility of everything. The U.S.A. is doomed in this film because the Soviets have better technology, and they don’t have a spy who is an ineffectual as Mr. White.

I’m afraid I have to go into spoiler territory here to really write about this film, so SPOILER ALERT!!!!!! The sabotage attempt fails spectacularly and the missile comes crashing down on New York. So at least you can say the film lives up to its title.

Joel tries to convince her to stop dancing.

What fascinates me about this movie is that is doesn’t take the patriotic “We can win no matter what!” mentality. It’s a pessimistic film, something you would not have seen ten years earlier. But by 1961 the film creators just weren’t seeing the rosy glow at the end of the fallout from WWIII. No, they wanted to scare viewers into taking some kind of action. I don’t know what that action could be, because based on what the film shows us, American scientists are morons and American spies are fools.

Rocket Attack U.S.A.  presents a government flailing around to get a working rocket into the air. They want to stall the Soviets into thinking we have some kind of ICBM ability. But time and again the tests fail. I was strongly reminded of the montage from The Right Stuff when the various test rockets fail in spectacular and silly ways. The budget to this film didn’t allow for that kind of visual, but lengthy dialogue scenes between scientists and government officials imply the failure.

Russian high command making a fateful decision.

Mirroring these sequences are similar scenes with Soviet high command talking about how they need to take the initiative and bomb the hell out of the Yanks! What is really interesting about these scenes is that they are performed in Russian. I was really surprised. This adds a layer of realism to the film, and was probably done to increase the scare factor. “Hear them talking folks? That is what it sounds like when they decide the fate of New York in Russian!” A voice over provides the translation and some color commentary to these scenes.

Since I brought him up, I should tell you a bit more about the voice over. It is constant. The whole film is aided by this domineering voice telling us the background to the events and even commenting on the action. It’s like watching a Centron film about the start of WWIII. In a way I can see how this was done to give Rocket Attack U.S.A. a documentary feel. But at the same time it gets to be ridiculous. The voice won’t stop talking and pointing out things that the visuals clearly show.

The scene that inspired "The Spy Who Love Me"?

But for me the real reason this movie brings the chuckles is the espionage story. Agent White is pretty much useless. His story doesn’t have much tension in it, and he pretty much walks into Moscow without any issues at all. While the Soviet high command scenes play out in Russian, the rest of the story unfolds with everyone speaking English with American accents – even the British operative. I’m guessing that means he speaks Russian or all the Russians speak English… still haven’t sorted that out.

Anyway, he manages to get into the least heavily guarded site in the entire Soviet Union, even though a top-secret rocket is preparing for launch from there. He’s able to sneak right up to the missile and plant his explosives. But he ends up getting detected at the last minute, runs away and then gets himself shot. The explosives are removed and detonated by a loyal soviet soldier in a suicide run (quite literally). So mission fail, end of the movie, right?

Who the hell are these people? Dead meat!

Oh no my friends. Because Rocket Attack U.S.A. is trying to scare you, the film switches back to the states. Where we are introduced to a whole set of new characters: a truck driver, his wife, a radio news broadcaster, his wife, a businessman and his lackey. We watch these people engage in everyday activities. The truck driver buys a tie to impress his wife. The news broadcaster reports about Russia entering peace talks. The businessman talks about how he’s raking in the cash because of the paranoia. Well, the conspiracy theory becomes reality as the rocket launches! There’s a panic and a random blind man saying “Help me” and the reporter reports and the bomb hits and a burning tie and… the end.

So yeah, that happens.

Rocket Attack U.S.A. is certainly a movie of its time. But it is also an interesting attempt at honest to goodness fear mongering. It’s fascinating to watch how the film attempts to manipulate the viewer, and by doing so goes in unexpected directions. I’ve never seen a film of this era where the CIA and the power of science in the United States are so impotent. Having the Russian high command talk entirely in Russian is clever and surprising. Even the “we are all dead meat” characters at the end of the movie are simultaneously ridiculous and yet it almost works. It is a unique film in a lot of ways. But it really isn’t a good one. The low budget hampers many scenes, especially the ones that play out in Russia. The acting is uniformly weak (and downright bad at times). Much the dialogue and voice over is unintentionally funny. It’s got a lot of elements that make it perfect for Joel and the bots.

Episode Review:

That is a flaming tie. It took the crew at MST3K
three viewings to figure that out.

Even though this episode comes near the beginning of season two of Mystery Science Theater 3000 it really reminds me of something we’d end up seeing in season six. It’s got that black and white grim attitude that permeated the later season with films like High School Big Shot, The Violent Years or the Coleman Francis Trilogy. Is this something Joel and his more casual riffing style can handle?

Well things get started off well with The Phantom Creeps. Once again the boys have a blast with imitating Lugosi and providing extra dialogue for the befuddled henchman Monk. When Joel sees the opening title he asks the bots, “Now is Creeps being used as a noun or a verb?” Good question, and one that is never answered. Later when the grumpy robot is wandering around the lab, Crow comments that “for a robot he has a flat butt.” He is certainly not as curvy as Gypsy. I also got a chuckle out of a scene where the invisible Lugosi picks up a tree branch and sneaks up on the detective. Joel says, “Walk invisibly and carry a big stick!”

One of these three is not wearing pants. Guess who?

But we also get a funny running joke that would carry over through the Comedy Central years. Near the end of the film the detective comes across Lugosi’s abandoned car. As he sneaks forward a random bit of voice over (and obviously not the actor) says in a voice that sounds like Ronald Reagan with a head cold, “The driver is either hiding or he’s dead.” The boys get a kick out of that random moment. From that day on, variants of that line would come up whenever anyone mentioned Ronald Reagan during the riffing. Usually Crow would say the line and follow it with “next on Death Valley Days”.

So The Phantom Creeps gave us a durable callback riff, what does Rocket Attack U.S.A. give us? Well the movie itself doesn’t move very fast, and that slow pace contrasts with the speed of the serial. As is the case, the boys do a solid job, but I wish they pumped up the energy just a bit more in the riff.

One element gives them plenty to work with. The endless voice over commenting on the action is perfect for them to just add additional lines or riff right back at. Some of the funniest parts are little one-liners or words the boys add to the end of the narrator’s lines.

CIA operative is spotted in about 14 seconds.
It's a new record.

I think the spy storyline provides the best riffs of the episode. As Mr. White’s plane taxies into a field in Russia Joel quips, “The White zone is for loading and unloading of spies only. No parking.” Later on Crow (who seems to get all the good lines this time) observes that the Russian missile “must be a stealth missile. It doesn’t cast a shadow.” And he’s absolutely right! Mr. White makes a rendezvous with Tanya in front of a ruined little building, Crow says, “I’m standing in front of a shotgun shack in another part of the world.” Fans of Talking Heads will chuckle at that reference.  When Tanya shows up, Mr. White asks her if the British agent gave her the TNT. Crow answers for her, “Well, he gave me the T and the N, but forgot the other T. I brought the A.”

The alien monolith observes the action.

The scene where White attempts to sabotage the missile provides a hilarious visual gag. There’s a block of concrete standing off to the side of the screen. The shot is lit with darkness surrounding the block and it appearing to loom over the other characters. It looks for all the world like the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey. This causes Joel and the bots to start singing atonally, just like the music during the scenes featuring the monolith in the famous film. They would return to this joke in later episodes and it always cracks me up.

As the film heads into the third act the music becomes very bombastic. Tom observes, “The music implies something exciting is about to happen.” Crow replies with “The end of the movie?” And when it is all said and done Crow observes that “I had no idea the end of the world would be so boring.” Ah my metal friend, you haven’t seen Birdemic: Shock and Terror yet, have you?

The host segments for Rocket Attack U.S.A. are an odd bunch. Most of them have a funny core idea, but end up running way too long. This movie must be really short. The episode starts with Joel giving Tom Servo a haircut. Now his round clear dome is a narrow cylinder. This was done to respond to some viewer feedback that Tom’s rounder head obscured too much of the action on screen. Keep in mind this was only season two of the show, so they were willing to give things like this a try. Tom’s haircut only lasted a couple episodes before it returned to the round shape.

The tin foil fashions also protect from fallout. 

For the invention exchange Joel creates an adding machine that prints results using candy. Perfect for tax season! The Mads combine the foosball table and water polo to make a water-foosball hybrid. It looks messy but fun. Check out the little players on the table, they are dressed like Dr. Forrester and Frank! At the first break Joel explains the cold war to the bots, and discuss the horrible puppetry fear of the Charlie McCarthy trials. Lambchop named names and Davey and Goliath served time. For the next break Joel and the bots play Civil Defense Quiz Show. The questions and answers are silly and a little bit preachy. When they boys return from the theater the next time, they find a Russian cosmonaut (played by Mike) waiting to speak to them. He has robots of his own and makes really bad jokes. This skit gets so ironic it nearly folds into itself. When the film ends, Joel and the bots are filled with outrage by the depressing film and yell at the Mads. This only pleases the evil scientists more.

Monk and Zorka doubt the veracity of this movie.

For me, Rocket Attack U.S.A. is an average episode. The serial is fun, but really nonsensical. The movie is fascinating in its construction, but as a film it is pretty dull and not effective. It works more as a curiosity. The riffing for both of these is pretty good. But I think that Rocket Attack U.S.A. was made for the more energetic and snarky riffing style of Mike and the bots. If they had tackled this one in Seasons Six or Seven it would have been gold.

Still this movie did provide us with one important piece of Mystery Science Theater 3000 history. It contains the first stinger. The stinger was a short segment from the film that was shown right after the end credits of the episode rolled. It was usually a bizarre moment or dubious line read that isolated from the film is even funnier. MST3K turned stingers into a comedic art form and there were plenty of great ones through the years. This one features the random blind man saying “Help me.” The stinger would go on to inspire others. I’ve seen both the Nostalgia Critic and Obscuras Lupa add stingers to the end of their reviews for one more laugh.

"Help me."

But even with the addition of the stinger I can only give this episode three burning ties out of five.

This episode is available on the Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection: Volume XXVII.

Sidehackers (1969) – MST3K Review

Summary:

Rommel (Ross Hagen) is one of the best sidehackers in the sport. And what is sidehacking? Well it’s hanging onto a sidecar frame on a motorcycle, while the motorcycle is racing on a dirt track. Rommel fixes bikes when he isn’t hanging off them and that is how he meets J.C. (Michael Pataki) a biker who performs at rodeos and carnivals. The two hit it off, especially when Paisley (Clair Polan) takes a liking to Rommel, even though she is J.C.’s girl.

But nothing doing, Rommel is in love with Rita (Diane McBain) and they spend hours wandering in fields and snuggling under trees. All this love ends up making Paisly mad, so she tells J.C. that Rommel attacked and abused her. J.C., not the most stable guy in the first place, goes off the deep end and savagely attacks and kills Rita. Rommel is shattered, but vows revenge – and that means gathering a group of anti-heroes and taking the fight to J.C. By this point in the film you’ll be wondering where all the Sidehackers went to.

Movie Review:

It's impossible to scrape of sidehacker with kung-fu
grip!

This movie is also known as Five the Hard Way, which I think has something to do with the finale of the film where Rommel and his four pals attack J.C.’s hideout. It goes along with a character named Crapout played with hillbilly verve by Hoke Howell. Using this title may keep all the fans of sidehacking from rushing the theaters in hope of seeing a film that finally treats the sport with respect. Unfortunately Sidehackers is not that film. It’s not a sports drama about an underdog sidehacker rising above the odds to win the day. No, instead the sidehacking is just some color to what is essentially a revenge story.

Well, kinda, the movie is pretty unfocused. It starts off appearing to be a film about sidehackers, and then detours into a melodrama about two lovers named Rita and Rommel. But J.C. appears and seems to have wandered in from another movie, possibly a friend of Banjo’s from Wild Rebels. Once J.C. really takes over, the movie ends up going down the exploitation counter-culture cinema that brought about films like The Girl with Gold Boots and The Hellcats.

There is probably a decent movie in here somewhere, but the mixing of all these storylines lessens the whole film and makes it flail around like motorcycle that lost it’s sidehacker.

Sessions presents, Rommel Live at the Acropolis!

Visually the film has a grainy low budget look, which actually helps some scenes work a little better. The footage of the sidehacking race is actually pretty good and edited in an exciting way. I can see why they may have hoped that changing the name to Sidehackers would bring some focus to these scenes. But other times the editing and cinematography just don’t cut the mustard. I can’t say much about the editing, because of a certain issue I’ll mention later in the review. But I can say that frequent flashbacks to material we had just seen a few minutes ago are pretty annoying. You also get the super-imposed images when Rommel is thinking about the good times he had with Rita. It reminds me of AM Gold compilation commercials you’d see on TV back in the 80s.

The sound in the movie is atrocious. Obviously they only had one boom mic and half the time it wasn’t close enough to the action. As a result a lot of the dialogue goes by without you hearing a thing. The music is typical for this type of film, but the theme song used during the love scenes is pretty silly.

What makes the film entertaining is the acting. Well, part of the acting anyway. Ross Hagan plays your typical tough guy with the heart of gold, and he isn’t bad in the part. The goofy hat he wears takes away a bit of his tough guy edge, but maybe it some was something all the sidehackers were wearing back in the day. McBain is pretty good as Rita. She certainly doesn’t deserve her violent end. Unfortunately both of our leads seem to be smokers, because they have some craggy voices and the bad sound has trouble with some of their more intimate dialogue.

J.C. and Cooch attempt to out yell each other, while
Paisley acts as the ref.

It is the villains that bring all the fun to Sidehackers. First there is Pataki as J.C. the completely insane, but poetic biker who decides that Rommel is his mortal enemy. From Pataki’s frothing at the mouth performance we can only deduce that J.C. is on some kind of drug (probably several). Pataki chews the scenery and gets more and more over the top as the film progresses. By the end he is practically drooling and ripping his hair out. He has some of the best line delivers in the film, especially when he is interacting with his right hand man Cooch (Michael Graham) or Paisley.

Cooch is no slacker when it comes to acting. When J.C. sends him to act as a double agent in Rommel’s gang, the whole exchange is filled with mugging, escalating volume and eye popping on both sides. But even better is the scenes where Cooch fears that Rommel’s buddies are on to him. I’m not sure what the actor was going for but it is sad to say he missed.

Finally there is our femme fatale, Paisley. She is actually the most grounded of the three, but she has her moments of over acting. Mostly she gets to looks sexy and slink around, then insult J.C. so he slaps her around again.

Crapout shows us his big stick.

I also have to mention Crapout, one of the most aptly named characters in Sidehackers. I’m guessing Howell was supposed to play an annoying country bumpkin who is also a biker, but man, does he just ramp up that stereotype meter to 11. Luckily he only appears in the final third of the film, but between his horrible jokes and mugging you begin to yearn for Paul Gilbert of Women of the Prehistoric Planet fame. Ok, maybe that’s going to far, but you get the idea.

Unfortunately, nothing really works in this movie. The sidehacking scenes are kinda interesting, only because I’ve never heard of the sport or seen it performed before. But the love story is tedious, and only around so the impact of Rita’s death can drive Rommel’s revenge. So it turns out that the revenge story is the focus of the whole film. But the execution doesn’t really make it worth your time to watch. I’m wondering if there is a whole subtext with characters named Rommel, Nero and Crapout as our heroes and a man with the same initials as Jesus Christ as the deranged rapist and killer. But that might be giving the film too much credit. Instead, Sidehakers serves as fodder for Joel and the Bots as the first of the 60s biker flick triad they tackled in Season Two.

Episode Review:

A sidehacker gets snuggly with his driver.

So here is an episode that includes a few firsts, and a few lessons for the folks behind Mystery Science Theater 3000. According to the writers, this was the film where they learned to screen the entire movie before giving Comedy Central the OK to pick up the rights for the show. Before this episode, they would watch a bit of the film to get an idea about it and then go forward. Well the crew only watched the first half or so of Sidehackers and saw the long love story scenes and the sidehacking and thought there was enough for them to work with, as well as providing a new genre for the writers to tackle.

When they sat down in the writing room to work on the first pass they were horrified by the increasing levels of violence and the disturbing rape and murder of Rita. It was obvious they would have to heavily edit the film to make an episode that was family friendly (something they prided themselves on). It would be less work to just pick a different movie and not use this one at all. Unfortunately, Comedy Central had spent the money and expected the crew to use it. Keep in mind, the show was popular enough to get a second season, but they didn’t have the clout yet to push back too much, so the writing team sat down and got to work.

Crapout, Nero and Rommel confront Cooch. I can't
believe I just wrote that sentence.

The result is a film that was heavily edited for content, something Best Brains was always loathe to do. They would edit for time, but in most cases they were able to keep all the key scenes in the film, and only snip a few moments here and there. For Sidehackers, whole plot points would have to be removed, and they would just have to work with it. While this didn’t render Sidehackers unintelligible, it did end up hurting the bad film even more, and created some really odd edits and moments in the final product. I have to say the fact that the writers were able to get some quality riffing out of this mess is impressive.

Cambot makes his first and only visual riff.

The movie opens with credits over footage of sidehackers racing around a dirt track. Tom notes that “They can’t be very good, they need training wheels.” When the film declares that it was filmed in Fantavision, Joel responds that he prefers “Orange Julius-vision.” When the motorcycles take a tight turn, the sidehackers have to lean close to the driver. During one of these moments, Crow blurts out “Hold me!” in a panicky voice.  The sidehacking scenes in general provide a ton of joke opportunities for the boys, making fun of color commentary, the sidehacker rigs and just about everything in sight. You also get the only time Cambot (the robot who is filming the whole experiment for the mad scientists) providing a visual riff.

This gulch is alive with the sound of Moog-sic.

Since you’ve got a character named Rommel in the film, the boys turn it into a running joke focusing on George C. Scott’s performance in Patton yelling, “Rommel you magnificent bastard! I read your book!” I found these pretty darn funny, and all three of the boys do a pretty good imitation of Scott’s take on Patton. They managed to work some of these in at the most unexpected moments. Another running joke takes place during the final third of the movie. Our heroes are sneaking around in a night raid of J.C.s camp, but it is all filmed as day for night – only with one of the worst filters I’ve ever seen. In fact there might not even be a filter, just a vain hope that other shots happening at the same time and obviously shot at night will convince the audience that the whole thing is taking place in the dark. The boys start arguing over if this is all happening at the same time, or if it really is night, or If there is a supernova illuminating everything. Your mileage may vary with those comments.

Sidehackers riffing moves in fits and starts for me. Sometimes you get some great lines. When J.C. slaps Paisley around after she implies he is lousy lover, he snarls the line, “But baby, what a great team we are!” to which Joel replies, “Like Punch and Judy.” Or during a long scene in a bar where the characters are negotiating hiring prices over a game of pool. Crow groans and says, “Since this film isn’t going anywhere, why don’t we all play pool!” But the long scenes of Rommel wandering around with Rita showing how in love they are, or the scenes with Rommel wandering around remembering Rita feel endless. There’s only so much riffing the boys can come up with and it ends up hurting the final product.

Joel and the bots model Rommel style head gear.

Because the movie was edited to hell, this episode actually has some pretty long host segments. They end up being a bit hit and miss for me as well. It starts off with Joel washing up the bots and getting them ready for the movie. He wants them to calm down and not utter another peep. Of course they start peeping and he loses it. For the invention exchange, Joel shows off his sentient slinky, Gretchen. She eats lint and does a funny impression of the 1960s. The mad scientists use Slinky technology to allow Dr. Forrester to be in two places at once. Looks painful. When we come back from the first movie segment, Joel and bots sing a song about sidehacking, which may or may not imply that you have to be stupid to take this sport on. At the next break, the boys try their hand at creating some sidehacking terminology to help color commentary. This gets crazier and more ridiculous but does go on a bit too long. I will give them props for working Electra-woman and Dyna-girl into the mix. When we come back to the boys they are dressed in Rommel’s stupid hat and trying to think of ways to imitate him. But whenever they mention Rita, the Moog music sting occurs and they break down in tears. It’s pretty silly, but then the skit keeps going when J.C. and Cooch show up (Mike and Frank dressed accordingly) and they berate Joel and the bots for not wanting to emulate J.C. When the movie ends the boys sing another song about how love pads the film. It is based on a riff they make during the long love sequence. The song is pretty funny, one of the best from Season Two.

Sidehackers does have its fans, and I have to say, I given this episode several viewings hoping to see the magic that others have caught. But honestly the whole thing never really works for me. The poor sound make catching the dialogue a real pain, the movie is a slog, and the riffing moves in patches. This is an early Season Two episode, and I think the boys got better as the season progressed. They would return to this genre with Wild Rebels and that riffing session was a lot better on all counts. But the best episode for these types of films would be The Girl with Gold Boots. I would recommend either of those films first, before tackling Sidehackers.

I give it two sidehackers out of five.

J.C. is disappointed with my rating.

This episode is available on the Mystery Science Theater 3000 Collection, Vol. 3

Wild Rebels (1967) - MST3K Review

Summary

Rod Tillman (Steve Alaimo) is a stock car driver that crashes… a lot. He ends up sucking so bad that he has to quit his job. As he’s wandering down the road to nowhere he runs into a trio of bikers. Jeeter (John Vella) is the leader of the pack and offers Rod an opportunity to score some easy cash if he works as their driver during a few heists.

At first Rod isn’t interested, even if the sultry skank Linda (Bobbie Byers) is all over him. But befuddled Lieutenant Dorn (Walter R. Philbin) approaches him. The Lieutenant tells Rod to accept the offer and help the cops catch the biker gang. Our hero agrees, but finds out that it’s not going to be easy. Banjo (Willie Pastrano) takes an immediate dislike to him. And Fats (Jeff Gillen) may not say much, but is more cunning than he lets on… at least the movie wants us to believe that. Will Rod be able to survive his adventure with The Wild Rebels?

Movie Review

Let's play a game, who do you think smells the worst?

The 60’s biker film was really a product of its time. This movie tries to capture the feeling of a rebellious counter culture, injecting sex, drugs and danger into one movie. The result is a mish mash of stupid characters doing stupid things and all of them ending up on the wrong side of stupid.

One of the big problems with Wild Rebels is that Rod just isn’t a hero; he’s a dork. When we meet him, he’s just crashed his stock car and it goes downhill from there. His antics at the club where he meets Jeeter’s gang are supposed to be cool, but he comes across more like a jerk and then a spaz when he dances. Once we see him in action as an undercover wheelman – well I don’t believe it for a minute and I’m not surprised that Banjo and Fats are suspicious.

Rod should really wear the helmet all the time.

The bikers are a piece of work. Jeeter is the leader because he seems to be able to string sentences together that involve words with three or more syllables. Banjo is rock stupid and angry. He’s supposed to be the dangerous one, but he’s easily befuddled by everything around him. Only his brute strength and rage make him the least bit scary. But I think he'd fall for the old, "Oh my God, what is that behind you?" trick. Fats is silent because of some kind of head trauma and the movie hints that he may be the smartest one, even if his mouth hangs open all the time and his eyes are glassy. Maybe it’s the drugs.

Linda in disguise as a "square". She even took a
shower to be more believable.

Linda is the femme fatale, but her seductive charms are immediately put in question when you realize that she sleeps with all three of the bikers. Ok, Banjo looks like he takes a shower once a month, and that’s only if he happens to fall into the cesspool next to the shack. She’s supposed to be appealing, and she almost is, but then you see the bikers start pawing at her and you shudder to think of what strange diseases she must have, or at the very least, a flea infestation.

But who is the dumbest character in Wild Rebels? My vote goes to Lieutenant Dorn. He goes on and on about how clever and smart the criminals are. Uh-huh. He automatically makes the idiot list because he’s outwitted by Banjo!

Banjo gets in touch with his inner Homo habilis.

Director William Grefe tries to make these moronic characters work in a typical heist story. He almost does it too. The core of the film could be entertaining on a basic level. If he had upped the intelligence of the bikers a bit and made Rod a little more likable this could have been a solid time waster. But the idiocy of the characters, and the stupidity of the script undermine his efforts. And believe me you can tell he’s trying. There are several attempts at interesting transitions from scene to scene. Some sequences look like they were thought out with some decent framing. He almost gets the racing action to work with its mix of stock footage and inserts of Rod driving.

But in the end Wild Rebels just never gels. You don’t believe these dolts could pull off a basic mugging much less a bank robbery. You don’t believe that Rod could deceive anyone, and you really don’t believe that Fats could run up all those stairs to get to the top of a lighthouse. The only rebels we need here are Joel and the bots!

Episode Review

Banjo won't ride unless Rod is wearing his helmet!

This film comes about half way through season two. It was also the middle episode of a trio of biker based films starting with Sidehackers and ending with The Hellcats. To be honest, this is my favorite of the three (although it has been years since I saw Hellcats I remember not being impressed by it).

For me, Wild Rebels is one of the stronger episodes of the season and I think the movie itself has a lot to do with it. There is just so much to work with here and Joel and bots seem to be having a lot of fun with it. Its less dower than The Sidehackers, but still filled with oily stupid characters that just beg to be mocked.

Most of the humor revolves around how dumb every one is. The bikers get riffed on mercilessly, with Banjo deservedly getting the focus of the humor. But “virgin goddess” Linda opens up a bunch of a jokes once she starts talking about doing all kinds of things “for kicks, baby!” Yes, you can predict the myriad of cereal references that Joel and the bots start throwing out there, but they get some surprisingly naughty lines in about her jumping from guy to guy.

Linda endures the song stylings of Mr. Alaimo.

The middle portion of the film slows down a bit as Rod attempts to get on Jeter's good side and some intrigue with the cops. These scenes are pretty talky, and the riffing suffers a bit. There is a funny moment where Rod attempts to serenade Linda, and that offers the perfect opportunity for Joel and bots to add their own lyrics.

However, the last quarter of Wild Rebels, from the bank heist to the shoot-out is full of great riffing. The chase sequence with its squealing tires as the cars drive through a swamp gives the guys lots of fodder. And when we hit the lighthouse the gloves come off and its pretty much non-stop comedy to the tragic conclusion.

Munchy Crunchy Wild Rebels Cereal! Bot tested
Mother approved!

The host segments aren’t too bad. Things start off with Gypsy being depressed, so Joel shuts down some of the higher functions of the ship so she can tell him about her problems. Looks like that might include the oxygen, as Joel takes a big breath before we go to commercial. When we come back, Gypsy is talking completely coherently and Joel is nodding, but looking a little blue. The mad scientists call and Gypsy takes back control of the ship. For the invention exchange the Mads create Hobby Hogs (instead of Hobby Horses). Joel takes the 3D chess from Star Trek and makes the 3D pizza. Then the movie starts. At the first break Joel explains how bikers could be intellectual. His visual aids are very silly. Up next is a hilarious commercial for the new cereal Wild Rebels the song is classic and the antics of the bots just make this the funniest host segment in the show. The next break has Joel singing to Gypsy and Crow and Tom arrive in full Banjo and Jeeter mode. The movie ends and Joel and bots party. The Mads are annoyed that the movie didn’t break them, but vow some real pain next time.

You don't want to know what fear smells like.

Easily the best of the biker flicks and one of the funnier episodes in an average season of the show. I give it four Banjos out of five.

This episode is available on the Mystery Science Theater Collection Volume 9.

Jungle Goddess (1948) – MST3K Review

Summary:

This episode explodes on the screen with the first episode of a serial called The Phantom Creeps. In it, Bela Lugosi is the deranged scientist Dr. Zorka. Because of his goofy last name, he is out to make all kinds of crazy inventions, including exploding spiders, invisibility belts and one of the strangest looking robots in cinema history. The plot for this episode introduces Zorka as he tries to convince folks that a) he isn’t crazy and b) his inventions are valuable. He fails at both, and of course goes on the rampage. He is able to convince people he is dead, and then starts his homegrown terrorism project. It all ends with a cliffhanger as our heroes attempt to escape a plummeting plane after an exploding spider takes out the pilot. Yeah read that sentence again and try to imagine it on a shoestring budget.

Jungle Goddess starts in deepest darkest Africa (on a back lot somewhere) where sleazy bush pilot Bob (Ralph Byrd) and his straight-laced partner Mike (George Reeves) are just scraping by. Bob comes across a news report that declares a huge reward for finding the missing heiress Greta Vanderhorn (Wanda McKay). The two decide to search for the missing lass, and eventually find her... and a whole heap of trouble.

Because this is a movie of it’s time, the (black) natives of the jungle found (white) Greta and believed she was a goddess from the sky. She rules over them all, but is about ready to head back to civilization thank you very much. Bob discovers the village is situated on a huge deposit of a radioactive element – and he sees dollar signs. But his trigger-happy nature gets everyone in trouble with the natives. Can the Jungle Goddess escape with her newfound friends?

Movie Review:

Behold Bela's goofy beard and goofier robot.

Time for another serial, this time from Universal back in 1939.  The Phantom Creeps features Bela Lugosi being Bela Lugosi. It’s got crazy inventions, amazing coincidences and character motives and actions that don’t make a lick of sense. But it’s got that breezy feel that most serials have. They are only there to entertain you, get you excited about the cliffhanger and make you want to come back for the next installment.

This is the first episode, so it’s a bit exposition heavy. Dr. Zorka shows off all his inventions, even perfecting the invisibility belt in front of us. His lab is full of secret passages and hidden doors. In addition to interacting with his inventions, we also get to see him attempt to convince his wife and a potential financial backer about the usefulness of his work. The dialogue here is very silly and overblown, offering plenty of laughs by itself.

Two sequences in The Phantom Creeps stand out as completely hilarious. The first is where Zorka fakes his own death. So many things need to happen for this plan to work – and guess what? They all fall into place. It’s so ridiculous, the only response is laughter. The other classic serial moment is when the exploding spider takes out the pilot and causes the plane to spiral out of control to its doom. The visuals involving the invisible belt, the little spider, the feeble explosion and then all the ridiculous dialogue from the heroes are great stuff.

A scene that inspired the film "Arachnophobia"?

Although Bela gets top billing for his scenery chewing skill, the real starts of the serial are the inventions. First is the awkward, huge headed robot. He lumbers about, with that bizarre expression on his face. Zorka keeps claiming how useful it is and basically all it does in this episode is wander around. Then you have the belt that renders you invisible, which is really more blurry or cloudy than anything else. But the supporting cast keeps saying how they can’t see anyone wearing belt, so it must work. Last but hardly least are the exploding spiders. These little puppets move very realistically, you know, if you have your eyes closed. Their sole purpose is to be dragged along by a string to where a disc is hidden. Upon contact with the disc – BOOM! Surprisingly, a similar tactic was used by the villain of the 1980s futuristic action flick called Runaway with Tom Selleck. But in that film, the spiders were metal robots. Here, they’re just goofy spider puppets.

The Phantom Creeps is exactly what it needs to be, a crazy blast of serial entertainment. It’s pacing is a bit bizarre, but I chalk that up to the fact that it is the first episode, and there is plot and character stuff that needs to be revealed. But of the three serial adventures MST3K tackled, it seems the least thought out. Both Radar Men from the Moon and The Undersea Kingdom felt a little more coherent.

Lucky for us, Jungle Goddess is coherent. Unluckily for us, it’s also boring as all heck. In many ways it resembles the flick Queen of the Amazons. The plots are similar, the budgets both look pretty sparse and the use of stock footage is pretty rampant. What makes this film a little better is George Reeves and Wanda McKay. They both put in a fine effort and elevate the film from a painfully bad to just plain dull.

I thought Superman didn't need a plane to fly.

It’s the pacing that’s the killer here. The movie takes its time doing anything. The opening scenes involving Bob and Mike discussing their financial situation and the plan to go after Greta seems to take forever. Equally slow is the search through the jungle to find the wreckage of Greta’s plane, and then the long escape scene that makes up the “exciting” finale. Director Lewis D. Collins just can’t keep things moving briskly or with any interest. Now Collins is one of those directors who could crank out the low budget films (kind of like Sam Newfield of Lost Continent and I Accuse My Parents fame). In 1944 alone he directed 12 movies, including the intriguingly named Raiders of the Ghost City. So I’m guessing that sometimes he’d just run out of steam on some of these projects.

The plot is so uninspired in Jungle Goddess that I can’t really blame him. To our eyes, the whole concept of the white woman ruling over the black tribe is pretty offensive. But back in 1948 I’m guessing it didn’t do much more than raise an eyebrow or two. Besides with the tagline: “TEMPTRESS… of 1000 untamed men! RULER… of a savage empire!”, well I think we all know what was being promoted here – stock footage!

Yes all the low budget jungle film tropes rear their ugly heads. Lots and lots of stock footage is used. Most of it awkwardly edited into shots in some of the least convincing ways possible. You get some really bad jungle sets (very similar to the ones used in Lost Continent). Then you get the “natives” who are all pretty embarrassing to watch. The worst is Wanama played by single named Armida. The only reason she’s the worst is because she is a Hispanic actress in blackface speaking in broken English.

"Wait a minute, I thought Weissmuller was in this flick."

But surely Jungle Goddess must have some kind of action or adventure, right? Yeah, well, most of the action is Bob and Mike getting into arguments that lead to fisticuffs. The finale with the whole village chasing Greta, Mike and Bob is rendered extremely dull by scene after scene of them running or walking through the same patch of jungle set. A scene of stock footage animals is inserted every once in a while so Bob can shoot at something. But all told, the action is pretty limited and thrill free.

This leaves the acting. As I mentioned Reeves isn’t bad as the straight arrow Mike. He’s earnest and brave, everything you want in an adventure hero. But you get the feeling that a guy like this would have ditched Bob pretty darn quick. Byrd turns Bob into a conniving, greedy, jerk with an itchy trigger finger. This guy is more than willing to sell his “friend” out to angry natives, kill anyone who gets in his way and generally behave like an ass. He’s actually the true villain of the film, which is saying something especially when you see how anyone of color is portrayed in the film.

McKay is actually pretty alluring as Jungle Goddess Greta. Her interaction with Reeves actually has a bit of chemistry to it. So when they team up about halfway through the film, it works pretty well. Still she is given some pretty horrid dialogue, and you get the feeling that she is playing a role for a woman who is a bit younger than she was.

As poor as the pacing is, there are some good things about the movie. It actually has some interesting noire style lighting in a few scenes. Some of the stock footage is fun to watch. Byrd starts chewing the scenery at the end, and makes it a bit more entertaining. But all in all, it makes me realize how good the assorted Tarzan movies were. Even something as weak as Tarzan Escapes was better than this movie. But was the film enough to provide solid riffing fodder for Joel and the bots?

Episode Review:  

Even the robot is working for the weekend.

In many ways this is a standard episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. It’s got a fun short, a goofy movie and some entertaining host segments. But nothing about it really stands out to make it really memorable.

As is often the case the short, The Phantom Creeps provides the most memorable laughs. But because this installment is a bit exposition heavy, it’s not quite as good as some of the stuff later on. Joel and bots have the most fun with the silly beard that Bela wears in the beginning of the episode and then with all his inventions. When Zorka puts on the invisible belt for a test run, it malfunctions and causes him to stagger around in agony. Joel quips, “Oh man, just a little issue with the four alarm chili.” Once Zorka gets it working and becomes a moving blur Tom says, “That’s a pretty good impression of Patrick Swayze.” This episode aired in 1990, so the movie Ghost made this a very current riff. But it’s the bigheaded robot that brings one most of the funniest moments. After Zorka makes a huge production about the robot, as the door slides open Crow says, “What’s the big deal? It’s s a big metal Richard Kiel.” This was before they all got to see Kiel’s tongue slopping up shaving cream in Eegah.

The pacing of The Jungle Goddess is what keeps the riffing from really taking off. This being a Season 2 episode (and an early one at that), the team hadn’t quite got the hang of really unleashing on slow moving targets. The riffs come along at a steady but slow pace. But there are some good ones in there.

Our heroes see the end of the jungle back lot. 

George Reeves is of course going to open up a bunch of Superman related jokes. When Mike first walks into the bar to talk to Bob, Joel asks, “Hey, seen my blue underwear. It’s got a big “S” on it.” Later when Mike and Bob end up in another fistfight, the boys wonder how Superman can be beaten by a mere mortal, and where Bob is hiding the kryptonite.

Bob’s trigger-happy jerkiness causes a bunch of jokes. When a native pops up from a bush and Bob blows the poor guy away Joel says, “Hope that’s an acceptable greeting.” Uh, yeah, not quite. During the finale as the white folk attempt to escape the natives, we keep seeing stock footage of animals. Tom riffs, “Hey Bob, there’s a living thing. Why don’t you swing into high and kill it!”.

Even the Jungle Goddess herself isn’t immune to the riffing. In fact she is the source of a running joke for the entire series. When Greta is talking with Mike about how homesick she is, she says, “I sure could go for a hamburger sammich and some French-fried potatoes.” The writers at MST3K picked up on that and it would pop up in other episodes, whenever hamburgers or fries were on the screen. It even plays a key role in one of the host segments for I Accuse My Parents. Later when Greta and Mike plot their escape, Greta says, “Obey my every command, no matter how strange.” Joel just sighs and says, “Oh wow…”

Joel Robinson is... The Jungle Goddess!

The host segments provide a mix of entertaining and kinda odd. The episode starts with Joel and the bots playing hide and seek – existentially. For the invention exchange, Joel creates a radio-controlled circular saw. Because the farther you are away from power tools the safer you are. It ends up with Joel in pain. The mad scientists put Dr. Forrester’s head on the end of the saxophone and Frank plays him… it… the thing. It’s really bizarre. At the first break Joel and bots make their own infomercial for The Phantom Creeps exploding spiders. This is a fun little sketch that keeps you chuckling the whole time. For the next break Joel explains the use of gobos to the bots. These are used to create the “binocular vision” we see in the film. This sketch goes on way too long with little payoff. The same goes for the next segment that has white imperialist jerks visit the Satellite and threaten to shoot everyone on board – except Joel, because he’s white. Yeah it’s a bit preachy. After the movie ends Joel and bots imagine the life of Mike and Greta back in the states in the form of a 50’s sitcom in the vein of I Love Lucy. It’s all very silly but provides a few chuckles  (and a few more Superman jokes).

In the end you get an average episode. The riffing is above average for the short and average for the film. Not bad for a lazy Sunday, but not one I reach for very often.

I give it 3 hamburger sammiches out of five.

This episode is available on DAP.