A gang who are nifty on BMX bikes inadvertently find the walkie talkies of a gang who are planning a heist. The gang target the kids. How did Brian Trenchard-Smith follow up his Ozploitation masterpiece, Turkey Shoot? By making a family film revolving around one of the biggest 80’s trends, naturally. BMX Bandits has aged …
Continue reading Marsupial March- 31 Days of Aussie Movies- Day 24- BMX Bandits (1983)
A group of actors meet regularly at a coffee shop and talk about auditions, affairs of the heart and life in general. Cappuccino is strange as it wants Australia to seem like big city America. It’s all taxi cabs, saxophones on the soundtrack and a glossy, polished veneer. Unfortunately, the actual material doesn’t live up …
Continue reading Marsupial March- 31 Days of Aussie Movies- Day 21- Cappuccino (1989)
Samantha has left a youth detention centre and is trying to go straight by getting her own flat and forging a career as a model. But even though she's doing well, she still feels unfulfilled and finds life on the outside very hard indeed. Hard Knocks is such an interesting slice of life. It was …
Continue reading Marsupial March- 31 Days of Aussie Movies- Day 20- Hard Knocks (1980)
A group of ex-hippies reunite. They go to the old house they used to live together in which is due to be demolished. But there’s a more sinister reason why they go back- one of their housemates killed himself and rather than going to the hippie-hating cops, they bury him in the basement. They’re going …
Continue reading Marsupial March- 31 Days of Aussie Movies- Day 19- Natural Causes (1985)
15 year old Sarah is deaf. This means that she feels isolated from her peers, family and everyone in the outside world. She has plenty of arguments with her family and comes across as a moody teen. She’s fallen foul of the in-crowd of mean girls at school. But what happens when the hottest jock …
Continue reading Marsupial March- 31 Days of Aussie Movies- Day 18- The Still Point (1986)
A runner, Laura, literally drops dead after winning a 200-meter race. Her sister, who is in the Navy, comes to town for the graduation ceremony in which her sister will be honoured. A killer then starts bumping off Laura's teammates. But who is this murderer and what is their motive? I still can't believe that …
1983's Silkwood concerns Karen Silkwood, a plucky trade unionist who works at Kerr-McGee nuclear facility making fuel rods for nuclear reactors. Shes concerned by managers falsifying safety reports, cutting corners and retouching photographs of fuel rods to hide shoddy work and starts to campaign for these concerns to be rectified for the people who work …
Continue reading Meathook Cinema Hall of Fame- Silkwood (1983)
Frank (Robert De Niro) and Molly (Meryl Streep) meet accidentally in a bookstore in New York whilst Christmas shopping. Months pass, and their paths cross again as they both travel into the city from their suburban neighbourhoods on the same train and so they strike up a conversation. They also find that there is a …
Continue reading Meathook Cinema Hall of Fame- Falling In Love (1984)
I was quite the A Nightmare on Elm Street fanboy back in the day. The film was *possibly* the video tape I rented the most in the 80's (although Supergirl and Watcher in the Woods came very close). The sequel was released with startling artwork by the genius artist Graham Humphries here in the UK, …
Continue reading Review- A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)
Nurse Mortley is back. This time, Social Services is placing homeless people in Shady Palms Clinic. Death Nurse 2 is just as good as the first film. It was filmed on a camcorder, just like the original, and the shenanigans and dialogue are just as John Watersesque. We even get some social commentary within this …
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