Non-Horror Exploitation: Hammerhead (1987)

Hammerhead (yeah I know it strangely enough just says Hammer on the left but the movie IS called Hammerhead) is one of Enzo G. Castellari's more unknown action movies. That's a shame because this really is a highly entertaining movie by the Italian maestro of the B-movie. This time Castellari put his mind on Miami Vice, Scarface and Beverly Hills Cop, and mixed it together to make his own movie: Hammerhead.

Police officer Hammer is called up by a frightened old friend who asks for his help. When they meet his friend tells him there are murderers after him. Before he can tell him more he is in fact murdered. Just before he dies he manages to give Hammer a key. Hammer starts his own investigation that leads him deep into the drug scene of Jamaica and soon finds himself chased by crooks looking for the key.

Daniel Greene, who is 'known' for his role as cyborg Paco in Sergio Martino's Hands of Steel, got the lead in this movie portraying Hammer (nicknamed Hammerhead). Greene did a fine job as the quiet cyborg but has a harder time portraying the poplair, charismatic detective. Luckily he does do a good job in the many action scenes. Greene's partner is Jose, played by Jorge Gil, who brings a lot of life to the movie and does a good job portraying what can only be described as Tony Montana's not so serious nephew.

Hammerhead pretty much ticks all the boxes in things you wanna see in an action flick. The chase scenes are spectaculair and the fighting sequences overall are filmed very effectively. Of course there can't be 93 minutes of straight action. There is even a sentimental little plotline about Hammer's ex-girlfriend and his daughter. These are the moments that the movie tends to get pretty bad, especially due to the frighteningly bad acting of Hammer's daughter. Fortunately the last 30/40 minutes of the movie completely make up for it. That's the moment where the movie goes completely out of control. What follows is non-stop action which is shown very explicitly. There is one magnificent scene that features a bad guy, Hammer's face and a circular saw. I won't spoil too much, but it's a straight classic in the history of the action genre. 

Hammerhead definitely goes straight to my list of my favorite 80's action movies. Brilliant car stunts, a beautiful woman, good fighting sequences and explicit action. That's wat we want and that's what we get!

Castellari--> You deserve this one!

 

Shiryo no Wana (A.K.A. Evil Dead Trap) (1988)

Evil Dead Trap actually was one of the first Japanese horror movies I ever saw. Where a lot of Japanese horror movies choose an over the top gory spectacle including blood fountains Evil Dead Trap is a more traditional slasher.

Nami hosts a late night home video program. She receives a tape which appears to be a real snuff film. She and her crew investigate the location where she meets a man looking for his brother who warns her to stay away. As she gets closer to the truth, she and her friends are subjected to a brutal nightmare.

The brutal tone of the movie is pretty much set immediately. Only 5 minutes in Nami watches the terrible snuff film that was presented to her. The gore in this sequence leaves nothing to the imagination. A tied up woman is carved with a knife in full close-up. The worse is yet to come though. After that the knife pierces her eye in full close-up causing eye fluid to burst out. Yup, director Toshiharu Ikeda sure knows how to catch your attention. Nami, frightened but intrigued by the video, quickly gathers her filming crew and heads to the place where the video was filmed (in the video was a complete segment with directions how to get to the place where the killing took part) to investigate whether the video was real or if it just was a prank. When they arrive it doesn't take long for strange things to happen. This all is supported by an amazing score that seems to return every 5 minutes. Tomohiko Kira, who composed the score, strangely enough only composed music for four other movies, of which three were directed by Ikeda. I have yet to see these movies but with the score he produced in this movie you'd put the guy in the same line as terrific composers like Fabio Frizzi, Claudio Simonetti (or the whole Goblin group if you like), John Carpenter and Riz Ortolani.


The killer that roams around in the foggy area where our tv-crew is investigating isn't any less than a brilliant appearance. Wearing a dark green raincoat and his face covered with a camouflaged mask it kinda reminded me of the killer in The Prowler (1981). The kills are great. I already mentioned the snuff video killing which was amazing but that's not the only blood that flows around in this movie. All the kill scenes are worth mentioning so lets sum it up. A girl's body gets spiked by multiple big metal pins, a man is stabbed with a knife in the back of his head while raping a girl, a girl is strangled with a big piece of aluminium wire while she gets dragged over the top of the car by the wire around her neck and last but not least a woman's head is pretty much sliced in half by a big hatchet. Gorehounds, look up this movie!

Unfortunately there are some badly done things as well, which shouldn't come as a surprise as Evil Dead Trap is a B-Movie, a good one, but still a B-Movie. For example, a girl's hand is sliced open by the killer. Painful, I get that, but in stead of running away she takes a good amount of time to slowly open her hand, look at it and then dramatically fall to the ground. Another thing that bothered me a bit was the fact that the movie just lasts a little bit too long. It could, and in my opinion should, have stopped at around 90 minutes but Ikeda decides to add another 15 minutes in which the movie goes totally over the top including a murdering fetus.

Evil Dead Trap is certainly one to check out. It's got a magnificent music score, a scary killer and some amazing death scenes. The movie definitely has got some flaws but I take them for granted as most things about this Japanese slasher flick are just fucking awesome!

Demoni 2... L'Incubo Ritorna (A.K.A. Demons 2) (1986)

After the succes of his Demoni (1985) Lamberto Bava quickly decided to cash in some more on the demons and a year later Demoni 2 was released. Mainly made by the same crew, and even some of the cast that played in the first movie, Demoni 2 kind of repeats the first movie in terms of the plot but not in terms of quality.

A documentary is shown on TV of group of teens who investigate the legendary forbidden zone, in which a Demon infestation once took place. When finding a lifeless corpse of a demon, one of the teens causes the resurrection of it, and the demon makes it's way into the nearby world by TV-broadcast... An unlucky girl, having her birthday-party at that time, gets possessed by the demon while watching the documentary and soon the entire building in which she lives turns into a living nightmare.... 

It takes about 40 minutes for the movie to find some pace. Not entirely coincidental that's also about the same point in the movie that Bobby Rhodes, who brilliantly portrayed a pimp in the first movie and is equally as good in this one as a gym instructor, starts getting more screentime. The rest of the cast consists of the, back then, good looking Nancy Brilli and an only 11-year old Asia Argento, debuting in a feature film. 

At pretty much every single thing Demoni 2 takes a step back in comparison with Demoni (1985). The demons look less spectaculair, the gore level is drastically reduced and the setting is less impressive. Especially the latter point is a disappointment. The movie theatre that the first movie took place in had a perfect vibe and was a great setting for a movie like Demons. The apartment building that Demons 2 takes place in lacks the fantastic vibe of the theatre and Bava doesn't get half as much out of the setting as he did in the first movie. One thing that did stay on the same good level as Demons (1985) is the soundtrack, this time provided by Simon Boswell. True, Boswell isn't Claudio Simonetti but he does produce an excellent score in this movie supported by some great rock songs.

Great scenes like the scene where 2 persons are locked in an elevator and pry open the door only to see dozens of crazy demons run past them are often followed up by just plain bad scenes like the one where a small gremlin-like creature attacks a pregnant lady. Not only is that a bad scene, it's also drawn out way to long while other scenes in this movie are often cut short which leaves a strange feeling you're watching a badly edited movie with unfinished scenes.

Demoni 2 certainly isn't an Italian horror treasure like Demoni (1985) was. The plot and the way it's elaborated just feels very lazy. On the other hand it's still cool to see some demons chase their victims while a typical 80's score is playing. Thereby comes that Bobby Rhodes is once again doing so well that he adds a lot of color to the movie. Demoni 2 is not great but it's just entertaining enough to earn 3,5* out of 5*.

Non-Horror Exploitation: Warlords of the 21st Century (1982)

Post-apocalyptic films set in the near future were hot stuff in the 80's. It's almost as if the people in the 80's were afraid of what would come in the future. Either that or they just loved a good post-apocalyptic action movie every now and then. Luckily that's exactly what Warlords of the 21st Century (also known as Battletruck) is.

Survivors of the oil-wars are terrorised by Straker and his gang. Straker travels through the wasteland with an enormous armored truck which strikes fear into the hearts of the survivors. When a girl named Corlie escapes from Straker's camp Straker is determined to do anything to get her back. Corlie though is now protected by a mysterious motorcyclist named Hunter. Hunter isn't afraid of Straker and his truck and believes there is always a way to fight back.

You can describe Warlords of the 21st Century by one word: Cool! Just like in post-apocalyptic/sci-fi movies like Escape From New York and Mad Max the badguys are dressed strangely and are mad as hell. Their leader is an evil mind named Kramer, who is very decently portrayed by James Wainwright. As seen in the plot Kramer travels in a huge truck that you can only describe as bad-ass to the max.

Warlords of the 21st Century is shot in New-Zealand. As we all know the landscape of New-Zealand lends itself perfectly for various movies. This time there are no hobbits wandering around, this time we get futuristic looking vehicles and it's cool as fuck. Many aerial shots are shown during race and/or chase scenes, and with good reason. Seeing a huge 18 wheeler drive full speed on dirt roads next to huge cliffs is impressive to say the least.

Sure te story is slightly standard. We've got the typical loner who has to save the sweet girl out of the hands of the evil. But who gives a rat's ass, it's a perfect outlet to show some good ol' fashioned action. And that's exactly what we get, including a stunning last 10/15 minutes.

It's not the most original movie you'll ever see but it has all the ingredients a genre-fan like me wants to see in a movie like this.
- Post-Apocalyptic wasteland? Check!
- Life saving, mysterious loner? Check!
- Cool villain? Check!
- Bad-ass huge armored truck? Check!

The only real criteria you could give is that the movie perhaps should have lasted 10 minutes shorter. +-90 minutes was a bit too much in my opinion.

Fun Facts (source: IMDB)

The top speed of the battletruck was 65 km per hour; it was the largest motorized film prop ever built in New Zealand. 

Director/co-writer Harley Cokeliss came up with the story when he was living in Los Angeles in 1975. He was inspired by the mid-'70s oil shortage and the size of the huge oil trucks transporting gasoline to various stations in the Los Angeles area. 

L'Ultimo Squalo (A.K.A. The Last Shark) (1981)

One of the many masters of the Italian B-Film, Enzo G. Castellari, has surprised me yet again with how far the Italians went in the 80's when it comes to ripping off Hollywood. This time ''Jaws'' was their victim, producing an almost equal movie when it comes to the storyline but not when it comes to quality.

Port Harbor is a quiet, nice little town getting ready for a competition between windsurfers. Suddenly a gigantic great white spoils the party by killing multiple people. Mayor Wells doesn't want an economic breakdown of the town and orders the festivities to continue, but will soon regret it.....

L'Ultimo Squalo, also know as The Last Shark, Great White and The Last Jaws, starts off as cheesy as it can get. A typical 80's douchebag performs some tricks on his surfboard while one of the cheesiest songs I've ever heard is played in the background. I was yearning for the shark to kill all these douches after 5 minutes already.

The cast obviously is all but special. The characters and actors performing them are pretty much all boring as hell, with the exception of one guy----> Vic Morrow. Morrow plays the role of rough sharkhunter Ron Hamer, a character that's almost identical to Jaws' Quin, and does very well. Robert Shaw and Vic Morrow even slightly look like each other. The latter one died a horrifying death a year after The Last Shark's release. While filming for John Landis' part of the movie The Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983) a helicopter went too close to a detonated explosion on set. The tail of the chopper exploded causing the chopper the crash onto the set where it decapitated Vic Morrow and child actor Myca Dinh Le and crushed another child actor called Renee Shin-Yi Chen. A story that saddens you even more when you see the footage of the crash.

Back to the movie, that strangely enough is quite boring. There is some boring dialogue, under water shots that aren't really clear and some atrocious stock-footage where Castellari thinks we can't see the difference between a dolphin and a gigantic great white... The best parts of the movie are obviously the ones where the, fake, shark is present in full glory. Every now and then he like to point his head out of the water and roar. True it's cheesy, but it's the good kind of cheesyness. 

There are one or two scenes that really stand out. One being the ''Helicopter scene'' where the shark manages to pull someone out of the chopper, bite his legs off and then just drags the whole helicopter under water. Another good scene, probably my favorite, is the part where a part of a pier comes loos and drifts to the open sea with multiple people on it. These people are then hunted by the shark with no where to go.

L'Ultimo Squalo isn't all trash, but it's less entertaining that what I had hoped for. The great white itself is freaking epic but I would have liked to see him a bit more during the movie. Overall I just thought the pace of the movie was to slow. Castellari produces some legitimate good scenes not to mention the excellent soundtrack by Guido and Maurizio De Angelis. I just would have liked it all a bit more exciting. Perhaps I'll find that in Bruno Mattei's 1995 Jaws rip-off ''Cruel Jaws'', which I've heard used shark scenes from this movie.

Fun Facts (Source: IMDB)

Shortly before the film's release, Universal Pictures filed suit against the producers, claiming the film was too similar to Jaws (1975), and the Australian distributors, for breach of copyright regarding Peter Benchley's book "Jaws". Universal won an injunction, and the film was pulled from theaters. 

The video was released in Japan as "Jaws Returns", a supposed "sequel" to Jaws (1975). The box cover art contains the same Jaws font and logo used on all promotional materials for the Steven Spielberg film.  

Released in Spain as if it was the third part of Jaws (1975). 

Director Enzo G. Castellari thought about making a sequel, appropriately titled "L'ultimo Squalo 2". But because of the mechanical shark being damaged after shooting, the sequel was never made. 

Apocalypse Domani (A.K.A. Cannibal Apocalypse) (1980)

Apocalypse Domani is a film made by Antonio Margheriti, who is a pretty big name when it comes to 70's/80's Italian horror flicks. In 1980 he decided to make a cannibal movie. But unlike guys like Ruggero Deodato or Umberto Lenzi, Margheriti decided to make his cannibal film in a large city instead of the jungle. 

Two Vietnam veterans are freed out of the hands of the Vietcong. When they return to civilization they discover that their experiences as prisoners of war have led to a insatiable urge for human flesh.

So instead of the jungle we get the city. Sure it's original but that doesn't necessarily make it a good move. I always liked the jungle vibe in a cannibal movie and sadly there is none in Cannibal Apocalypse. The first part of the movie is actually pretty boring. Uninteresting dialogue and unimposing shoot-outs is pretty much what we get. Luckily John Saxon and Giovanni Lombardo Radice (why choose a alias like John Morghen when your real name is Giovanni Lombardo Radice!?) are two very entertaining actors who know what it takes to rightly fill in a character in a b-movie. Especially Lombardo Radice is in form as a mad, flesh eating, Vietnam vet.

Cannibal Apocalypse finally gets more fun when Saxon joins the club of cannibals, which is after about 50 minutes. From that moment on the action starts getting more entertaining, although it still isn't great. Another thing is that Tony King starts getting more screentime and does very well. He's really great to watch as another completely lunatic, cannibalistic vietnam veteran, who also seems to have the tourette syndrome. 

Even though we're not in the jungle the animal cruelty hasn't completely disappeared. It IS minimalized but it's still there. This time it comes in the form of a two second shot of two rats who are set on fire by a flamethrower while still alive. The shot is about as useless as it sounds and adds absolutely nothing to the film.

Overall Cannibal Apocalypse certainly did not turn out to be what I hoped it would be. It has nice acting from b-movie heroes like John Saxon and Giovanni Lombardo Radice and some decent gore effects but that's about it. An opportunity missed in my opinion.