SPIDER BABY (1968)

Okay, so I went on kind of a Jack Hill marathon. This one is from 1968, and it’s completely different from everything else I’ve seen from him. All of his other movies I’ve seen are big, fun action movies with women in the lead. This is a horror-comedy that’s like if the TV show The Addams Family was a LOT more disturbing. It’s about a family that’s afflicted with Merrye’s Syndrome, a condition that causes its victims to act more like kids the older they get, until they get so old that they – and get this – “devolve to a pre-human cannibal state.” Yep. You never see people eating people, though. Mostly you see these two sisters who are completely nuts and act like little girls (one likes to “play spider” and trap people in her “web”, and then kill them!), their brother (Sid Haig again! You’d never recognize him!), and Lon Chaney Jr. in one of his last parts. He’s great! A bunch of intruders come into their home to try and get in on the family’s money, and a lot of wacky stuff happens that I don’t want to spoil. All of the acting is great, the dialogue is hilarious, and it’s all creepily filmed in black-and-white. What a movie!

THE BIG BIRD CAGE (1972)

I do not know how I managed to get away with seeing this. COFFY and FOXY BROWN have enough nudity in them to push the already pretty lenient limits around my house, but sometimes being friendly with the comic book store manager is worth it. My dad was pretty shocked when he found out I’d watched this, but he figured that as long as I’d seen it, nothing he could do would make me unsee it, so we had to have a big long talk about it. Yes, dad, I know that it’s not serious. Yes, dad, I know that they’re kind of making fun of the clichés in “Women In Prison” flicks. But it still kicked ass. Just like FOXY and COFFY, this was directed by Jack Hill, whose filmography is full of GREATNESS. Pam Grier gets herself arrested and teams up with a woman on the inside to bust all the women out of prison. Pam’s boyfriend – the always amazing Sid Haig, who is fall-over funny in this! – is a revolutionary who works from the outside to help with the escape. There’s lots of over-the-top violence, really in-bad-taste gay jokes (it was ’72, though, so I can let it slide), LOTS of nudity…and Anitra Ford, who I need to learn more about. Because she’s crazy hot! It’s not as much fun as FOXY or COFFY, but it’s still good.

FOXY BROWN (1974)

Pam is back, and once again takes on a drug ring. This should have been a sequel, since Pam is playing pretty much the same part. She’s not a nurse in this one, but when her boyfriend (who’s a government agent) gets shot down by some drug dealers, she takes to the streets once again to find the people responsible and delivery a little Foxy Justice. Wha-pow! This one is even better than COFFY, and that’s just about impossible. Antonio Fargas plays Foxy’s brother Link, and he’s AMAZING. Sid Haig (who was in COFFY) is back in this one, again playing a bad guy. He’s always cool. You can’t go wrong with this one!

COFFY (1973)

I know that women kick ass. I’ve seen it up close. But you don’t see it enough in movies, and you never see any woman kick as much ass while looking as good as Pam Grier. You can take your Angelina Jolies and keep ‘em, as far as I care. In this movie, Pam plays the title role, and she’s a nurse whose sister gets addicted to heroin. So she becomes a one-woman anti-drug squad. She gets set up by her boyfriend, her best friend gets beaten into a coma, and she comes out on top by taking down every mobster, crook and dirty cop in Los Angeles. Pam is a goddess.