I kicked off my Independence Day weekend by watching Full Moon’s new Blu-ray of BAD CHANNELS (1992), whose cover I recognized from video stores back in the day: an amorphous alien looms over test tube-like cylinders with tiny women trapped inside them. The screenplay is “based on idea by Charles Band,” so I have to assume, having done no research on this matter, that his idea was the poster. That would be a vintage exploitation move. And sure enough, the film, directed by Ted Nicolaou (TERRORVISION), works its way single-mindedly toward that one image. You do get tiny miniaturized women trapped in alien test tubes. But you also get rock videos, so bizarre they must be seen to be believed, with music by Blue Oyster Cult (not 70’s BOC, unfortunately), and a plot involving a DJ held hostage by said alien. It’s actually kind of charming! And even funny (on purpose, sometimes)! This is pure nostalgia for those of us raised on USA Up All Night and 90’s direct-to-video movies.
With the 4th being my birthday, I decided to kick it off by treating it like Halloween, and just lie on the couch and watch movies (accompanied by my indulgent son). I started with a double feature of two Kino Blu-rays, THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE (1979) and KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS (1977). The former requires some explanation for those not Gen X. You see, we didn’t have the History Channel or the Travel Channel to indulge paranormal conspiracy theories; instead you had Leonard Nimoy hosting the TV show IN SEARCH OF… which covered all kinds of UFO and Bigfoot tales, with some spoon-bending mixed in, or you were headed to the drive-in to see Sunn Classic “documentaries” like IN SEARCH OF NOAH’S ARK (1976) and IN SEARCH OF HISTORIC JESUS (1979). Watching BERMUDA TRIANGLE these days, one can only be struck at how high quality some of the reenactments are. Christopher Columbus sighting UFOs off the bow off his ship? It’s kinda neat! An extended recounting of a legendary air force disappearance? Small screen reenactments look much cheaper by comparison. Our on-camera host begins the doc with a map outlining the Bermuda Triangle, and he sticks a little boat here, a little plane there. At the end of the film, the triangle is so crammed with ships and aircraft that it plays as pitch-perfect parody. It’s a sign of how delirious the film gets as it goes on. Atlantis death rays? Sure, here are shots of Atlantis crumbling – from another movie – followed by a shot of said death ray trapped between rocks at the bottom of the ocean and blowing up model ships. The Philadelphia Experiment, itself the subject of its own non-documentary feature, also gets lots of airtime here, along with theories about whirlpools and interdimensional vortexes. The only lesson? Travel to these waters and you will die (explode, probably).
And what is there to say about KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS except that William Shatner lets himself get covered with live tarantulas? Shatner was a sport. He always deserved more credit as an actor than he got – he was gung-ho, especially in his 70’s output (check out his film IMPULSE, in which he plays a psychopath, if you don’t believe me). In another fine scene, the small desert town in which KINGDOM is set becomes overrun by tarantulas while people run screaming through the street and a voice coming from a loudspeaker tries to reassure everyone to calmly evacuate. My 8-year-old son: “That’s probably a spider talking.”
My son’s become a Marx Brothers fan, so in the afternoon we watched one none of us had seen before, ROOM SERVICE (1938). It’s a weird one, positively sedate compared to earlier Marx Bros. movies. Taking place almost entirely within a hotel (often just in a single hotel room), it feels much more like a stage farce…which, no surprise, it was – and not written for the Marx Bros. at all. We’re going to be checking out some of their other lesser-seen (and lesser-regarded) films next, having already exhausted the classics. Hopefully he’s still a fan at the end of this journey.
Finally, Sunday night my wife and I checked out A24’s DEATH OF A UNICORN (2025) starring Jenna Ortega, Paul Rudd, Will Poulter, Téa Leoni (yes!), Richard E. Grant (also yes!), Anthony Carrigan (from BARRY!), Jessica Hynes (from SPACED!), and Sunita Mani (from GLOW!). So it’s a stacked cast for comedy fans. The film itself plays best, I suspect, if you know absolutely nothing about it. But it is right there in the title… The first half of the film is razor-sharp satire with some truly hilarious lines. The second half moves firmly into horror-comedy territory, with rampaging unicorns goring the rich and vain in horrible ways. And the ending is kind of sweet. I felt like it needed a few more comedic surprises to really click – for such an oddball premise, it does become fairly predictable as it falls into slasher-movie mode (imagine what the Daniels could have done with this), but it is the only killer unicorn horror movie you’re likely to ever see.
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