The Stabilizer
Compared to the appellations given to the protagonists of other 1980s action films, the Stabilizer sounds pretty benign. You’d think he was given that name only because the others were taken.
Author Archives: Todd
Dark Heroine Muk Lan-fa
Nothing celebrated speed, style and technology like the James Bond films, so it made sense for Cantonese filmmakers to adapt the conventions of those films to their audience.
Black Rose
Suddenly the room erupts in panic as a black clad, hooded female figure makes a dramatic appearance on the landing above the dance floor. It’s The Black Rose, a Robin Hood-like cat burglar who preys on the rich for the benefit of the city’s poor and downtrodden.
Mystery in Bermuda
For as formidable an assemblage of luchadore might as Santo, Blue and Mil to descend upon one small town there has to be some kind of secret agenda. And, indeed, there is
Clothilde: Queen of the French Swinging Mademoiselle
At the height of the Yeh Yeh Girl craze, literally dozens upon dozens of teenage girls filed through the recording studios of Western Europe and, from there, onto the airwaves. […]
Mummies of Guanajuato
One need only glance over the many titles in the lucha movie genre to see that there is a long history of enmity between Mexican wrestlers and mummies. This goes all the way back to 1964, when Elizabeth Campbell and Lorena Velazquez threw down against a pop-eyed, reconstituted Aztec warrior.
Seytan
The special thing about Turkish pulp films is how, even at their most plagiarized, they can serve as an example of just how unique a complete rip-off can be
Killing of Satan
I think that most people would think that a movie with so much overtly religious content would be evangelical in nature, yet The Killing of Satan simply uses that content as something upon which to hang an impressive array of unapologetically sleazy exploitation elements.
Three Golden Serpents
It’s just that it’s those movies, and Kendall’s portrayal within them of dick-both-public-and-private Joe Walker, that won him permanent residence in a very special secret space-age lair located deep within my heart.
Santo vs. Blue Demon in Atlantis
For me, though, I prefer to see Santo and Blue on the same team, despite — or perhaps even because of — the much documented ill will between them. It might just be that the fact that they would rather have been tearing one another’s heads off provides that element of friction so necessary to the chemistry of all great screen couples.
