So, alert reader Mark writes:
Have you thought about a short list of movies that deserved MST treatment but never got it? I was thinking about this over the weekend since I caught part of the 1973 stinker “The Neptune Factor.” The discussion would include a short list (3 to 5), and why it would make a good episode.
Give me time and I could list 50, but I’ll just pick the first three that come to mind.
I would pick:
A*P*E — a big stupid Korean monster movie.
Blood Freak — rivals Red Zone Cuba as the worst movie ever made. I almost hate to inflict it on them. Almost.
And, just to pick one bigger budget title: Mysterious Island, a weird and wonderful of tale of giant bugs and chickens and on a desert isle.
What would you pick?
) to help our users cope with "trolls" and other commenters whom they find annoying. Go to our
Oops! Anyway, there’s your Starfish Hitler.
I watched Beastmaster for the first time on Telemundo just recently. I don’t think that it was in a foreign language made it any less incomprehesible. I can’t believe it wasn’t Golan-Globus. Tanya Roberts is great eye candy though.
NoOneOfConsequence says:
July 5, 2010 at 6:49 pm
Ooh, how about The Sword and the Sorcerer? Or is the projectile-firing, triple-bladed sword too over the top? Seriously, has Richard Lynch ever been in a good film?
That’s the one! I knew there was one movie that I wanted to suggest but I could not remember the title. :grin:
That was too funny. Starfish Hitler doesn’t need riffing. I needed a good giggle. Thanks
I second Day of the Animals…wonderful for Leslie Nielson’s great scream or roar when he goes completly berserk…
And no mention of Navy vs the Night Monsters..? Maybe because it’s impossible to find now.
How’s about Gingerdead Man? It’s like if Chucky and the Pillsbury Dough Boy had a red-hot affair that resulted in a murderous pastry voiced by Gary Busey? Plus, it’s got Charles Band stink all over it!
The obvious choice is From Hell It Came. Un B Leevabul. There’s enough real movie here, combined with a vicious, snarling tree stump, to produce some world-class, red-hot riffing action.
There’s a whole genre of jawdroppers that I DON’T think would be that much fun, because they really do fall in the category, “SHHH! I need to hear this!”
-Blood Freak
-Night of Horror. There may be one or two of you out there who haven’t had The Experience. Whatever it takes, dumpling. The. Worst.
-Santa Claus and the Ice Cream Bunny
Deep Hurting? OMG there’s no other choice-Inchon. No one would survive. Maybe do it as a three-parter, cut with lots of skits featuring the return of Nummy Muffin Kookul Budder, to keep the self-immolation rate to a minimum.
without reading too many of the above written:
1. Detroit 9000, its hokey, and its from the hometown
2. Condor Man (70’s made for tv goodness)
3. any late bela lugosi/pre ed wood works
4. The last man on earth (john caradine)
5. Evil Brain from Outer Space
#51 – How can you say that? I loved “Eraserhead”. That’s one of my all-time favorite movies. You wouldn’t have suggested it if you’d ever actually paid attention to the movie.
And besides…the format isn’t write. The movie is trying to be the way it is: totally demented. Any attempt to riff it would be so correct that it wouldn’t be funny, and it’s really hard to go through that movie with comedy.
Anyway…my nomination would be “The Cosmic Man”. I mean, it’s not a very bad movie. It’s a clear rip-off of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” but it’s not bad. The only reason I’m suggesting it is because it’s incredibly BORING. I was only able to watch it once.
hey #37, The Stuff! that would be all kinds of awesome. Six Pack,Rhinestone,so many..
I haven’t read what everybody else wrote, but my pick would be, “The Monster that Challenged the World”. Giant snails vs the navy.
Earthquake would be a great choice. I would love to hear comments on the following scenes and story lines:
1. Ava Gardner as Lorne Greene’s DAUGHTER!!
2. The plastic cows in the truck that falls off the overpass.
3. Richard “Shaft” Roundtree wiping out on his first go in the loop. I laugh myself stupid everytime I think about that.
4. George Kennedy punching the County cop.
5. Walter Mathauu as a drunk in the bar. (The best performance in the movie)
6. The part where the elevator cables snap, causing the car to plumment down, and you see a pile of bodies and they SPLASH RED PAINT ON THE CAMERA!!
7. The idiot who goes into his house to shut off the gas with a LIT cigarette in his mouth. KABOOM!!!!
8. The guy who drowns in an elevator.
9. The brawling pool players in the bar.
10. Finally the funniest scene, where that guy is hanging from a bar outside the office building, he falls into a skylight onto a clearly visible AIR MATTRESS.
Tarantula (with John Agar), From Hell It Came (giant trees attacking villagers), The brain from Planet Arous (also with John Agar), Gappa: The Triphibian Monster.
I suggest threads that take YouTube clips from these movies and invite posters to write their own riffs on them. Then posters could vote on the best riffs and you could do whole movies like that. I remember when SciFi had that Riffit thing on their site. That was a blast and that was back in the dial-up days. You couldn’t riff on the dialogue at all.
I’d love more eighties tv shows and movies, those cracked me up the most with their horrendous concepts. Just imagine them taking on Webster, or Breakin and Breakin 2. I think there was an episode of webster where Alex Karras had to perform a football maneuver to get webster out of a hidden dungeon in their home?!?
Great choices all around..if I may double dip I thought of some more…
Valley of the Gwangi.
Zardoz -the only time Neil suprassed brother Sean according to Joel and the Bots…
Slugs
Night of the Comet
Good call. Yes on THEY SAVED HITLER’S BRAIN and SSSSSSSSS. Would have loved to see their take on Irwin Allen– particularly THE SWARM.
#210- You loved “Eraserhead”, well thats your problem, I’ve paid attention to the movie, and its was crap! MST3K could get through it and make it a comedy, they did it for Hamlet. Anyway I think The Sadist would be a good one to riff, Arch Hall Jr at his best.
#206: The Navy vs. the Night Monsters will be less impossible to find now that it has come out on DVD.
Since Rifftrax has proven that you can riff on good movies and still be funny, I’d like to suggest one of my all-time favorites: THE ABOMINABLE DOCTOR PHIBES. Between Vincent Price’s performance as the title character and all the bizarre deaths, there would be tons to go on. (I can only imagine what they’d say about the frog mask and the unicorn.)
Mechagamera, Castlemonster-thanks for the data and links. Neptune man glad you got a laugh out of it.
BTW Neptune Man, STARFISH HITLER always does his shoping at the Hitler Dept Store.
If there is a cult or club out there for Starfish Hitler let us know. Hate groups need not reply.
Insect Man #47 says:
July 5, 2010 at 12:04 pm
Hey John Paradox (#165) I have Cape Canaveral Monsters on DVD, taped off a local channel a few years ago.
Ooooh.. that’s especially personal to me, as I grew up about 40 miles south of the Cape, and the ‘caves’ in the movie are totally unrealistic. Most of FL is barely above the water level.
J/P=?
I also have to throw in the first Ator movie: “Ator the Fighting Eagle” if only for the classic exchange of dialogue.
Ator: I love you.
Sunya: And I love you.
Ator: Why can’t we marry?
Sunya: Ator, we are brother and sister.
Ator: I’ll talk with our father.
A friend of mine also mentions the movie “Ninja Empire” when discussions like this come up.
Definitely agree with some of the suggestions that 61 (OnenuttyTanuki) gave.
I saw Attack of the Supermonsters (which is a very bad blend of anime, scale model cities, and dinosaur puppets) as part of Mystery Anime Theater 3000 (a fan version of MST3K) at Otakon 2002, and I felt that the film would have been perfect for the actual MST3K TV show (although the people riffing the film did have plenty of good jokes of their own, including a couple of cracks of the Otakon of the previous year, which took place around the same time there were sewer explosions in Baltimore).
As for the “Star Man/Space Giant” films, I saw part of one of them this past weekend on the Chiller Drive-In, and I made to make a few riffs while watching the film (i. e. singing the Super Mario “invincibilty music” when Star Man first appears).
Ok, I have done my best to scan EVERY entry so far before I present my list. Two that came up that I agree with: “Beastmaster” and “Frogs”.
Two that I did not see:
“Alienator”: a 1980’s ripoff of “Terminator” featuring Ross Hagen (Rommel from “Sidehackers”), John Phillip Law (“Diabolik” himself and Commander Kalgan in “Space Mutiny”), and a female body builder as the “Alienator”. Oh yeah, Jan Michael Vincent is in it too.
“The Manster”: This may be the Alternate title to “The Thing With Two Heads”, a Japanese stinker featuring a guy who grows a second head, maybe. Pretty bad, though, as I can remember.
Sorry, Ray Harryhausen fans (of which I am definitely one): “Son of Kong”, released the same year as “King Kong” to capitalize on the popularity of the King, with truly terrible results, and which may have actually began the long and sordid tradition of most sequels being (to quote Dr. Clayton Forrester) “stinky cinematic suppositories”.
My co-worker Kevin mentioned “Night Breed”, a Clive Barker film from 1990 that he says blows chunks (I’ve never seen it).
Finally, two movies they could not do on MST3K (because they would have to edit them heavily, and two more sequels), but which Rifftrax could do, would be the sequels to “Friday the 13th” and “Halloween” (the original sequels, the true second installments of the respective franchises)- increased the blood and body count, but that’s about it.
Thank you to everyone who has reminded me of some great memories from my youth (e.g. “Attack of the Crab Monsters”, “The Navy vs. the Night Monsters”, “War of the Gargantuas”, and many others. Thanks for reading- see ya!
I think the Brains should have done an Elvis movie. The one that comes to mind is Clambake, although there were plenty of others to choose from.
I just remembered I totally got my reference wrong for “Son of Kong”- that was Willis O’Brien, not Ray Harryhausen doing the stop motion effects, and I am ashamed of myself for that mistake (it is the equivalent of a sports caster saying Michael Jordan played for the Boston Celtics)- sorry about that. However, it does not negate my main point that the movie itself is a turd, as much as I love “King Kong” (and the original “Mighty Joe Young” also!).
#140- They couldn’t possibly do “Silent Running”. That was one of the shows major inspirations. It would be almost like they were riffing on themselves.
Also: I have always be sort of intrigued by the idea of riffing a silent movie. It would be like another of their inspirations “Fractured Flickers”. It would be interesting…
Anything by David Heaveaner. He writes, directs, produces, stars and as an added bonus sings his own songs in the credits. Some great ones that come to mind:
Deadly Reactor- sort of a Clint Eastwood man with no name who saves an amish community after a nuclear war.
Twisted Justice- rogue cop who uses a real gun on criminals in a gun control America. Co-stars Erik Estrada.
Did anyone else see Fugitive from the Empire? (Later prefixed with “The Archer:”.) It was a made-for-TV movie that was supposed to be the pilot for a series in ’81. It features the Heartbow, a sentient bow that chooses its user (apparently killing the unworthy) and shoots exploding arrows… not to mention George Kennedy in what must have been his darkest hour.
Now brought to you by the magic of YouTube! :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa8Tlel7BPw
Heck, with proper editing every installment of the Friday the 13th series could be done. Toning them down properly would of course make them pretty darn boring and repetitive (far more than they already are, with people at least getting bloodily killed sometimes to enliven things), but it could be done.
All these Jaws-ripoffs mentioned made me remember Orca: The Killer Whale. Nothing like seeing Richard Harris getting stalked by a vengeful killer whale after he killed its pregnant mate (in a rather gruesome scene that would probably be cut). Charlotte Rampling is in it too, plus Bo Derek has her leg bitten off by the whale!
Certainly THE GIANT CLAW is a serious contender. GIGANTIS THE FIRE MONSTER (the American release version) is another one. Two of the goofiest films ever made, and both are perfectly delightful!
Deep Star Six and Leviathan.
I believe that was actually “Highlander 2: The Quickening”… which also deserves to be on this list.
Or under it. :P
NoOneOfConsequence says: I believe that was actually “Highlander 2: The Quickening”… which also deserves to be on this list.
Or under it. :P
No way. Sean Connery is the only reason to ever watch Highlander 2.
mikek, are you saying that Highlander 2 doesn’t deserve to be on the list, or that Joel and TB didn’t have it as the low point of Sean’s career on their chart?
I’m not saying he wasn’t the high point of the film. He totally was. :)
Oh my the list of stinkers for MST3K, CT & Rifftrax to riff on is ENDLESS isn’t it? :smile:
A few thangs to mention before I suggest a few more:
a. To whoever suggested anybody from MST3K riff on “Battlefield Earth” – it’s already been done just check Rifftrax.com
b. It’s too bad some of the stinkers I’d like to see anybody from MST3K riff on are already comedies. For ex.: “Pluto Jones” & “Leonard Pt. 6” were both big box office bombs in America (and Eddie Murphy’s and Bill Cosby’s careers fwiw) but thy’re comedies. Also how many people here would actually like to see & hear anybody from MST3K riff on “comedy” films from “comedy” actors like Rob Schneider, Adam Sandler and Pauly Shore??? :roll:
Now back to my other suggestions:
1. “Charro!” – Not the Hispanic flamenco guitar goddess known for “Coochi Coochi” but a film starring Elvis Presley as an Native Amer. Indian. I remember in one of the MST3K Newsletters from the 1990’s that they were supposed to riff on this but never did. Anybody else remember that?
2. “Delgo” – Animated feature starring the voices of Freddie Prinze Jr., Anne Bancroft and others. This is supposedly THE BIGGEST box office turkey in US history and I’m a little surprised that Rifftrax never got around but if anybody can do this film justice it’s the MST3K gang.
3. “Town & Country” – Featuring Warren Beatty & Annette Benning. Supposedly this is another BIG US Box Office turkey. I also think that Kevin mentioned how truly AWFUL this was in his “At The Movies” book.
4. “Heaven’s Gate” – If you’re gonna do “Inchon” why not the this other classic muddled masterpiece from the early 1980’s?
5. “Sextette” &/or “Myra Breckinridge” – Both might be a too sexual for the MST3K audience but both are classic turkeys in their own right.
6. “Don’t Worry We’ll Think Of A Title” &/or “Boy Did I Get A Wrong Number!” – According to Leonard Maltin these are the worst of the worst from the 1960’s. Anybody here wanna back him up? (I’ve never seen them obviously.)
7. “Spice World” – The Spice Girls’ modern updating of “A Hard Day’s Night” or their magnum opus du crap.
8. Films involving Bob Dylan – Yes even legends can make crap and supposedly “Masked & Anonymous” and “Renaldo & Clara” are the near definition of “pretentious crap.” He also did a song for some action flick called “Band Of The Hand” – anybody remember that one?
9. Sly Stallone’s “Rambo” series (and maybe “Cobra”?) and from Mel Gibson – “What Women Want” and maybe the entire “Mad Max” (or “Lethal Weapon”?) series? (I was going to mention “The Passion Of The Christ” but I don’t think the MSTies or their audience really wanna go there. I certainly don’t.)
10. & now A REAL CHALLENGE for the MSTies – a few films from the catalog of director Sally Potter:
a. Orlando
b. The Man Who Cried
c. The Tango Lesson
d. Rage
And fwiw I’ll second the nominations for “Zardoz” and “Two Of A Kind” (but I’m surprised nobody has mentioned “Xanadu” yet.)
How about Barbarella (1968) starring Jane Fonda? That movie was incredibly silly.
I like Barbarella also. Made me think of the Tarzan movie with Bo Derek, Miles Okeeffe & Richard Harris. Would love to see Miles involved somehow since he seems to be a great sport about his Ator infamy via MST3K.
NoOneOfConsequence says:
July 6, 2010 at 4:48 pm
mikek, are you saying that Highlander 2 doesn’t deserve to be on the list, or that Joel and TB didn’t have it as the low point of Sean’s career on their chart?
I’m not saying he wasn’t the high point of the film. He totally was. :)
Highlander 2 doesn’t deserve to be cited as the low point of Sean Connery’s career; that honor goes to The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
Highlander 2 does deserve to be on the list, it’s a good cheesy movie. The reworked special edition of Highlander 2 does make the movie watchable, although it’s never totally redeemed.
Highlander: Endgame is the worst of the Highlander movie series.
I haven’t seen The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, but it did look like it would be a new low for everyone involved. Had Joel and TB made their chart comparing Sean and Neil’s lives after 2003, I’m sure that it would have been another dip below Neil’s line. :)
Totally agreed on Highlander: Endgame. At the point where they just repeat a whole scene in the final swordfight and hope the audience doesn’t notice I was like, “Oh, now come on, that’s just lazy.” And that was a long way from being the worst thing about that movie.
They just didn’t care.
About Lenoard Part 6. MST3K favorite Joe Don Baker has a supporting role!
Here’s my list (and if any of these were done by MST3K and I just haven’t seen that episode, please ‘scuse!;)
Billy the Kid vs. Dracula
Voyage into Space (aka Johnny Sokko and his flying Robot)
The Giant Claw
Gigli
KillDozer
Invisible Invaders
Gamera vs. Monster X
Evil Brain from OuterSpace
The Brainiac
Dinosaurus
Reptilicus
Jaws the Revenge
It’s Alive
Blood Beast Terror
Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy (yes, that is a real movie)
Samson (El Santo) in the Wax Museum
Doctor of Doom
Best of Hollow Mountain
Brain from Planet Auros
Howard the Duck
Battlefield Earth
Son of the Mask
Howard says:
GIGANTIS THE FIRE MONSTER (the American release version) is another one.
I have both versions, the Japanese (Godzilla Raids Again) and the American, and the JP version is far better, even though I had major problems trying to read the subtitles (yellow on B/W doesn’t show up that well). The American version also has a commentary about how it was so ‘chopped up’ (Stock Footage!) and the Big G is renamed.. especially the scene with the ‘scientists’ discussing the Monsters.. totally idiotic.
BTW.. I will have quite a bit to say about upcoming SQUIRM.. I watched both the MST3K version (Monday) and ‘regular’ version with the Director’s Commentary.. more to come.
cambot talks (#229): “Also: I have always be sort of intrigued by the idea of riffing a silent movie.”
I saw the original “Nosferatu” in a theater once. I’d seen it before and liked it, but I was just in kind of a silly mood, and was riffing away in my head. I’d love to see them tackle a good, lively silent like “The Lost World” or, well, “Nosferatu.” (They did several films as it was that were very short on dialogue, like “Manos.”)
“Rabid”, starring Marilyn Chambers.
In the tradition of episodes like “Riding With Death”, smash together a couple episodes of a TV series like “Charmed”.
The silent film idea is interesting; how about “Birth of a Nation”, with its overtly racist tone?
Thanks for reading- see ya!
“6. “Don’t Worry We’ll Think Of A Title” &/or “Boy Did I Get A Wrong Number!” – According to Leonard Maltin these are the worst of the worst from the 1960?s. Anybody here wanna back him up? (I’ve never seen them obviously.)”
.
Though I can’t speak for “Don’t Worry……”, as I’ve never seen it, I can tell you with absolute certainty, “Chris” (#238), that the 1966 Bob Hope film, “Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number!“, is by NO means, “the worst of the worst from the 1960’s” !
Yes, it is VERY typical Bob Hope “shtick” from later in his career, that just isn’t very good……….but it doesn’t even begin to come close to being anywhere near the worst film of the decade (whatever that may be) !
And therein lies the problem with Leonard Maltin, and his series of “Movie Guide” book reviews…….. they just aren’t very reliable.
If he actually saw EVERY single one of the movies that are listed in “his” books, and personally wrote EVERY single word of each of “his” reviews (including assessing the various “star” ratings for each), I might be more inclined to believe what is in them……..but the fact is, he hasn’t, he doesn’t, and therefore, I don’t.
I can’t recall right now exactly which MST episode it was (Laserblast ?????), but I always enjoyed the banter exchanged between Mike and the ‘bots during the closing credits of the movie, where they mention specific (relatively good) movies that Maltin deemed “worse” (or just as good as) the movie they had just seen.
Oh, and by the way, you include some very interesting choices in your original post…….thanks !
.
Definitely Battlefield Earth. It is such a black hole of bad they should try sucking out all the oil outta the Gulf with a copy.
I may get some flak for this, but The Man Who Fell to Earth just didn’t do it for me. When they finally aired it on cable, I remember sitting at home, waiting. And then, being let down. I’d like to see the crew riff it.
I was sure I had seen someone mention Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ but now I can’t find it. Anyway, I watched it for the first time on Youtube recently and I have to disagree. It’s far too grim for riffing, but it got me thinking, there have been some incredibly cheesy religious films that are ripe for riffing. Some suggestions are those Biblical films made by different churches in the 50s. The threadbare amateur production, wooden acting, and overly earnest didacticness that make such wonderful stories like the Parting of the Red Sea seem as exciting as cleaning up a neighborhood park, seem ripe for riffing and I don’t think they would offend quite as many people.
Other ones are Thief in the Night, a early 70s Rapture scenario melodrama, and also Abaddon, which is based on one of the Left Behind books from about 10 years ago.