Movie Review: Super Infra-Man

Alright, tonight I am watching Super Infra-Man from 1975. It's a Chinese  Ultra-Man/Kamen Rider type movie. If you ever wondered where they got the idea for Rita Repulsa of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers this is it. Princess Dragon Mom is a mix of Rita and Scorpina.  Dragon Moms lair scenes with monsters volunteering to fight the human is exactly like the Rita scenes. This is just good fun! Definitely not as good as Ultra-Man. It Is a good homage to the Japanese Tokutatsu of the era. The Shaw Bros. got a lot of help from many Japanese creators. 
         
Don't get me wrong it is bad, but at the same time it's fun and oh so campy! Now Infra-Man himself is a definite amalgam of Ultra-Man and Kamen Rider!  The stories pretty basic, you have this horde of monsters that invade Earth led by Princess Dragon Mom. A group of scientists decide to create a superhero, Infra-Man. They genetically engineer him, what you get is a hero who looks like Kaman Rider with the same colors and powers of Ultra-Man. He can grow to gigantic sizes and battle giant monsters! And, battles he does! 

Now the big difference between Infra-Man and his Japanese counterparts is, Infra-Man has 
decent Kung-Fu action! 

Movie Review: Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead (2011)

Since I'm not into sports outside of pro football, I could find nothing to watch the other night as every fucking channel in the free world is broadcasting the NCAA basketball championship (March madness, indeed). To the Netflix cue! I put movies on my waiting list for different reasons: I like the actors, the premise, it’s simply horror, or a classic I’ve never seen before. But the movie I’m reviewing today had Cinema Head Cheese written ALL over it.

Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead comes to us via Japan. Helmed by former porn director Noboru Iguchi (this IS my shocked face), ZA begins with a young girl suffering from unbearable stomach pains. Her father/doctor tries to help her as best he can by punching a zombie in the stomach until it throws up some wriggly stuff into her mouth.

Wow, the Japanese really ARE different.

Movie Review: Undertaker (2014, Synapse Films)

With Michigan's first ever Zombie Convention this past weekend, I had a great opportunity to view a Japanese horror movie that won't be released in the U.S. until sometime in 2014 and coming from Synapse Films. The people at Cinema Head Cheese may not know of my love for all Asian horror but what better way to find out than to have me review this flick?

Undertaker is 70 minutes of an interesting, sad, and unique Japanese spin on the zombie sub-genre of horror. It begins with a group of children being evacuated out of an apartment building. It seems the area is to be designated a quarantine zone and they need to get the kids out before it's too late. I guess the adults are expendable.

Ryouichi gets in the van, leaving his mother behind in the dark apartment. We never see her but from her gasping words it's clear she's already doomed. As he settles in for the long ride, his friend, Megumi, naps in the seat in front of him, feverishly whispering for someone to kill her. Uh oh.

Movie Review: Message from Space (1978)

To be honest, I only watched this film because I was looking for movies with Hiroyuki Sanada on Netflix streaming. Since I had already seen Twilight Samurai (excellent film, btw), the only other choice was Message from Space. And considering he was only 18 when the movie came out, I'm guessing he was trying to get some movie experience under his belt (after playing "fighter" in Shogun Samurai, another film that came out the same year). Doesn't really matter as I was entertained, mostly, by this cheesy sci-fi Star Wars rip off. It's one of those great films from the 70s where half the cast is American, speaking English, and the other half is Japanese, speaking Japanese but dubbed in English. Distracting in a way but it adds to the fun factor. Sort of.

The most annoying thing about this flick is the narrator, though, who has to tell us half of what's going on because they either couldn't afford to film it or they thought the audience would be too stupid to figure it out.

Gelusia (aka tree hugging hippies) is conquered by Gavana (not hippies so they're automatically assholes) a race of silver faced fighters who love war and conquering. Gelusia refused to submit and most of them are killed off. The King sends eight magic seeds out into the universe, which basically look like radioactive walnuts, to find warriors to fight for and save what remains of Gelusia. The King's daughter, Emeralida, and a Gelusian fighter, Urocco, will follow the seeds, pick up the chosen warriors, and return. And they follow in a literal ship, like a clipper with the big masts and giant sails. Like maybe Jack Sparrow should be heading up this mission.

Well, the Gavanians can't have that so they attack the ship. They don't stop it but they screw it up enough that it ends up being a wreck of a floater. But that's okay. We're about to meet a few of the chosen warriors as they stumble upon the Gelusian ship.