My Top 25 Guilty Pleasure Movies

I like this movie.
That's right.
I said it.

While I initially dimissed this king of kings of all crappy movies because of it's reputation, I have since then actually developed an affection towards this film.
Sure,
it's probably lives up to it's rep as the worst movie ever made,
but it's not without it's charm.
There are plenty of bad movies out there that are just bad and then that's it. No more to add.
But this film,
there's an instinctual level to it,
in which it feels like that there came a day when all the film-gods gathered together and decided to inspire a woman's cashmere sweater wearing B-film (okay, okay.....D-film.... and that's being generous) "director" to make a movie that's so bad, it can almost remind us that a big part of the concept of film-making is to just have fun. To "escape" into the process of making a movie as much as in the viewing.



Okay, maybe not everyone will get any kind of positive response from watching this train wreck of falling backdrops & bad acting (really bad acting), but you don't even have to watch it. Just knowing that it's there is enough. As a reminder that we can not have a day without a night. We cannot have the good without the bad.
We cannot have an Apocalypse Now without a Plan 9 From Outer Space.
To reminds us just how good movies can be if some of 'em can be this bad.

And to it's credit, considering the time it was made,
some of the effects are kinda amazing.
I mean, I don't know how they did it, but they actually made some of the props in this film look like they were made out of actual cardboard.
And this was before CGI.
Like way before.

Where does one even begin to describe this movie?

I guess you could start by saying that if one could imagine the concept of a cyborg geisha that could transform into a wall-clinging half battletank in order to fight a multi-tiered pagoda that transforms into a giant daikaiju-style rubber-suited robot
and then
if one could imagine fried shrimp being used as a deadly assassin's weapon
and then,
threw in every kind of Dali-esque type of violent Asian outrageousness possible,
then you might be able to capture a vague resemblance of a description for this movie.

I still have a hard time believing that I actually saw this film and that it wasn't part of some 'shroom-induced nightmare.

I love ABBA.

And sayin' that does not make my hardcore pimp-ass any less hairier.
So, you know....
Shut up.

Anyone else remember this space-faring, ice-stealing, Urich-starring, not-so-classical sci-fi 80's film-fare?
Anyone...?



Anyone....?




...Bueller...?

Okay, I know he got razzed alot for this performance, but I liked it a lot. When I look at footage of Jimmy Hoffa, Jack looks & sounds in this film alot like the infamously corrupted union leader.
But since I'm not only in the minority with this opinion, I'll just end my thoughts on this now so that the attention of anyone who reads this will disappear as as silently and quickly as Hoffa's body.

For the first time ever, Godzilla, Minilla, Mothra, Rodan, Gorosaurus, Anguirus, Kumonga, Manda, Baragon, and Varan, all together in one movie, kicking all sorts of ass with their big, floppy rubber feet (or any other appendages of like-minded floppy purposes).
Okay, do I even hafta explain the charm and attraction that I or any other fan of massive monster movies have for the daikaiju films from the famous Toho Studios in Japan? Particularly the one that featurres the battle royal of all battle royales??



Yeh, I didn't think so.

The aliens are through klowning around (torturously kliche bad pun intended).
They're hungry for human flesh. Or in this case, human soup(?).
And so in order to satiate their appetites, they're taking out the big guns. Or in this case, the big balloon animals.

I remember this 'historical" disaster pic getting murdered by critics at the time of it's release.
But as a kid, I thought that as far as thriller escapist fares go, this movie, just like many of the other 70's diaster flicks of the time, was pretty bad-ass.
But, then again, this is coming from someone who, considering my age at the time, thought that stop-motion effects were the sh#t.

Boy.....



.... remember back when stop-motion was the sh#t?

  One of the things I've always liked about the Toho daikaiju was the ability of their creative department to incorporate really cool and unique themes into the middle of melee of the rubbery cheese that was running amok thru the cardboarded streets and buildings of Nippon.
  Mothra is probably my favorite example of what I mean here. Having a giant moth as part of the roster of expatriots to come outta  Monster Island would've been enough to distinguish from all the kaiju in this universe. But Toho wasn't satisfied with just that one distinction. They went an extra mile and introduced two tiny little fairy-like beauties who act almost as the fluttering cryptid's familiar, with the ability to communicate telepathically with the great godlike bug. And as if that wasn't enough, yet another dimension is added to the lore of Mothra in that the big butterflying beast is treated in almost every story as sort of a Phoenix-like enity. Every time it dies, it is soon ressurected not too long after as a giant egg, soon to hatch into a large larvae form (almost as equally formidable as it's adult moth stage).
  For me, it's the over-all mythological slant that accompanies this particular kaiju that sets it apart from it's floppy-footed counterparts and therefore makes it one of my more favorites of this far eastern-themed genre.

Ants.
Atomic radiation.
The process of mutation.
The desert.
You do the math.

The Earth's populace must come to grips with it tendency of abundantly accumulating and disposing it's garbage as The King of All Monsters takes on a giant shambling mountain of red-eyed sludge that terrorizes the island of Japan by transforming itself into a flying smog-billowing force of pollution incarnate.
Kinda makes you want to start recycling, huh?

A steel mill welder by day, a sexy dancer by night,
Alex (short for Alexandra) is on a mission to make her dreams come true.
With determination that's fierce, a boyfriend who's her boss , and a pit bull that likes to watch, she's out to prove that she's a maniac.
On the dance floor, that is.

Flashdance is an early 80's dance flick.
A bad early 80's dance flick.
Really bad.
But, boy,
that Jennifer Beals......



what a feeling.
She's definitely what you'd call a guilty pleasure.

I gotta be honest with you guys....
this is only on this list b'cuz after watching this movie as a little kid,
I used to fantasize about having a 50 Ft. tall woman attack our hometown just so's I could have an excuse to look up her dress without getting in trouble.

When you look at all the destruction and chaos that Zues & Co. release down on our humble planet just outta petty jealousy and pride, it really reveals the truth behind the old saying, "The gods must be crazy".
While I'm not usually a big fan of movie remakes,
for me, the original Clash, is an excellent example of a classic that would greatly benefit from today's special effects technology.
I'd really like to see a lot of these old stop-motion flicks of yesteryear get the updated treatment that many of us as children could only dream of back when these films were first released.
But even with that said,
it doesn't change the fact that, as cheeseball as they were,
most of these ultra-fantasy originals will always hold a special place in my heart, basically just b'cuz they were a part of my childhood.
:o)

  In their quest to "steal Christmas" with the use of dorky rayguns and cardboard robots, the present that The Martians will be unwrapping this particular yuletide year, will be a nice big ol' can of whoop-ass from none other than Santa hisself.
Because of their actions of festive felonies, when these otherworldly up-to-no-gooders landed on Earth, they also landed a spot for themselves near the top of the naughty list.
  As a result, this is a camp-infested Holiday claasic that has landed a pretty decent spot on this guilty list. 

It's bad enough when an innocent family of vacationing road-trippers find themselves in the midst of the carnage and blood of a hidden coven of cravenous, murderous vampires out in the middle of the desert,
but then on top of that, they also hafta face the threat of the snake-cradling Selma Hayek and her absolutely formidable and absolutely perfect puppies. I promise you, after watching her in this Tarantino/Rodriguez monster mash-up, it won't be her neck that will you be fantasizing about sucking. 
Count Dracula can only wish that his will-sapping gaze was this hypnotic.



Now those are my kind of creatures of the night.

Teri Hatcher and Charlize Theron.



Now those are my kind of cats in a fight.

Initially, this movie had all the makings of big hit: a then up and comer Michael Pare, a very young and incredibly sexy Diane Lane, a bad-ass Flock Of Seagulls lookin' William Dafoe, a serious role for Rick Moranis, a cool soundtrack, all capped off with a script and direction by Walter Hill, the guy responsible for The Warriors, Southern Comfort and 48 Hours. Oh, and Another 48 Hours. And the '85 version of Bewster's Millions. And Supernova.....
*groan*
So I guess the moral of this rock'n'roll fable is "Tonight.... is what it means to be young."

Before there was the Matrix,
there was TRON.
Okay,
so maybe there really isn't all that much as far as compelling story-line goes in this cyber-epic-fantasy. But, boy, those visuals were unlike anything we had seen before. The science of computer graphic effects were fully upon us and in a land not too far away, the force known as CGI was gestating to become the meat that would make the eyes of sci-fan's drool from here to the eternity of this genre's future.
Maybe I look upon this film with the nostalgic affection that held my young visual senses in a unblinking attention at the time, but it also represented of what was possible when man and modem meet.
I won't try to convince anyone out there that this is a great film on any level (especially since this was the same year the superior sci-fi world of Blade Runner was also released), but I do feel that it's a step in science fiction that was inevitable.
You are now entering the infinite possibilities of cyber-space. Not to mention the matrix of my own personal guilty pleasures.

A movie about a big giant glob of pink snot that only gets bigger and bigger as the storyline progresses.
Could somebody hand me over a city-sized piece of tissue, please?

There are a couple of reasons why I like this movie so much.
And they both have to do with Adrienne Barbeau.

Prince's ex-nasty girl, Vanity teams up with a dragon that can catch bullets with his teeth.
Sho-Nuff.

At first glance, this looked like a B-style action-flick that was just too goofy for me. But as I watched it, it became more like a movie that seem to sufficiently balance between the lines of well-crafted high-fantasy creditability and a comic-book-like story-line. And also at the same time, between epic wuxia style battle moves & cheesy yet energetically fun kung-fu camp.
And at the center, tying all these almost conflicting themes together are three high-flying colorful female warriors whose chemistry made it impossible for me not to fall in love with each one of them. This trio of hot Asian super-heroines who fight crime with such cool moves and kick-ass sultry outfits are so sexy, that it makes my pimp-ass want to do sumthin villainous just for the spanking.
Plus, I defy any one not to "loose their head" over the villianous Kau and his throwing "skull-cage" on a chain.



While I realize that this isn't really considered a maverick of this field,for me, the charisma between these well-rounded and distinct characters was enuff to hook me into this non-guilty guilty pleasure.

To be honest,
while the movies I've included on this list are worthy of mention as "favorites",
the truth is,
I really wouldn't pay to see any of 'em on the bigscreen.
With the exception of this film.
For me, The Room is the epitome of acting so SO bad, that it actually swings around to being not just good, but unforgettably classic.



It's a piece of cinematic crap-art that has been playing in theatres since it's initial release in 2003 and is still going. And the main reason for that is b'cuz it has developed a reputation as an audience-participating event.
It is now standard for movie-goers to quote or yell out responses to specific scenes,
or to even throw plastic spoons at the screen whenever a certain prop makes an appearance.
You will even spot a football being tossed back and forth from one side of the theater to the other during certain intervals.
In other words,
it's the straight person's answer to the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

And to be honest,
isn't it about time we got one?