Cemetery Man

We've been into horror flix for a good while now, but it wasn't until we made some super great friends at our super shitty job that we became the Highland Cinema you know and adore today. It wasn't that long ago (only a coupla years) when all our screenings were John Sayles and Woody Allen. It wasn't that long ago when we thought of our "Splatto Jacko" worship and MonsterVision pantomiming were little more than relics of our teenage past. But before we knew it we found ourselves with brand new compadres making the trek for every new blood encrusted zombie-fest we could get our hands on. Pretty soon the Fangoria convention was a necessity. Pretty soon Riki-Oh was on perpetual repeat. Before long we decided most of them other movies were fucking boring; the only thing worthwhile in this life was the brutal depiction of the epic Hobbesian struggle.

Cemetery Man is truly outstanding all by itself, but we loved it even more than you ever could just for reminding us of our own genesis.

Dave Attell -- Captain Miserable

Dave Attell's the best goddamn comedian of my cognizant life. Really, who else'll do a bit on couch fucking or drop a punchline about a crime-solving vagina? We like Captain Miserable less than Skanks for the Memories, but both are soooo much better than anything you're laughing at it's not even funny.

Sgt Kabukiman, NYPD

Classic Troma, they say. We liked this one okay we guess, but we really expected more badass and a lot less slapstick. Rick Gianasi gives great performance as a NY cop possessed by the kabuki spirit and we especially dug that Toxic Avenger inspired hero montage where he turned them crooks into California rolls.

The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things

Yep, nothing like a mother's love.

Get On the Bus

Okay, I take it back. Spike Lee did a few good movies. Kinda cool how the Million Men marched on my actual birthday and then Get On the Bus came out exactly one year later, again on my actual birthday. You may fondly remember how a bunch of us drove to that discount theater in town on opening night just to watch this movie before it left the cinema a week later. Maybe it's the ten years of nostalgia talking but we here still think The Bus is some quality storytelling with fantastic characters and top-notch actin'. Recommended for your weekend afternoon!

Sex -- The Annabel Chong Story

It surprised EVERYONE when I told them Sex -- The Annabel Chong Story was the most disturbing thing I'd ever seen.

But they haven't seen it.

See, most people think porno is pizza deliveries and mustaches, wah-wah guitars and zebra prints. They're wrong.

Annabel Chong made a name for herself by trying to fuck 300 men on camera in a single day. Her freak show adult cinema feat put her in television interviews the world 'round where she sat, a fidgeting speed casualty, peppering her ex post facto feminist theory rationalizations with nervous tics and uncomfortable laughs. Sex tells you the whole story behind the World's Biggest Gang Bang, how Chong didn't get any of the money promised her (a cool ten grand), how 10 hours of unshorn fingernails made her call it quits at 250, and how once the vid hit the shelves a Florida stripper set a new record and relegated Chong to the forgotten annals of extreme pornography.

What makes Sex more difficult than the rest of the depraved garbage we've shown at the Cinema is that this whole thing is real. Honest to God, one hundred percent live and in the flesh. Chong's interviews show her as a delusional, damaged, emotional wreck whose own college-informed interpretation of her career as a living exercise in gender role reversal is both pathetic and unconvincing. Equally unsettling is the film's footage of adult industry mavens, sleazebags of the highest sort only out to push the human body's limits while ignoring all notions of dignity and respect. Hey, they chose to do this, right? Jesus, gimme a break. This is bad stuff, people. There isn't enough therapy in the world to correct wrongs like this.

Wait, you still want to see this? Go ahead. Stomach this primer and be one your way. Godspeed.

Bamboozled

Spike Lee did one good movie. This isn't it.

I saw this right when I turned 20 and it made me feel so enlightened the way it had me thinking everything I'd ever enjoyed did nothing but perpetuate hateful stereotypes. The older I got and less undergraduate I became, the more I thought a second time around Bamboozled viewin' would annoy the living bejesus out of me. And sure, Spike approaches Mencia-like territory the way he dumbs down and then ad nauseumly reiterates the cultural commentary, but I was quite impressed that I didn't want to throw things at the tv like I thought I would. That the offensively simplistic satire is the point doesn't necessarily make it digestible or effective, but the whole thing was strikingly less painful than the me of 2007/nascent '08 expected it to be. Thankfully there's some real power toward the film's end and a couple of great performances by Cinema fave Tommy Davidson and co-leading man Savion Glover.

Helvetica

Helvetica doesn't fuck around. Capitalist, socialist, ironic, sophisticated, straight, round, cosmopolitan, Continental...you name it and it's right there. Just try and find me something that's that built to last. Go ahead, punk, try it.

And take those fucking serifs with you.