REEL WILD CINEMA (1996-1997) – This program is still beloved by us fans of Psychotronic movies and the So Bad It’s Good subculture. Reel Wild Cinema helped feed America’s growing appetite for bizarrely awful cinema, an appetite most recently whetted back then by Joel Hodgson’s Mystery Science Theater 3000.
If, like me, you also enjoyed The Incredibly Strange Film Show hosted by Jonathan Ross, Reel Wild Cinema blended elements from both shows plus all the Movie Host programs from the 1950s onward.
Reel Wild Cinema‘s 1-hour runtime wouldn’t let the creative team show and mock entire films like MST3K did, just tightly edited highlights from them, anticipating the videos of countless internet movie critics of the future. Reel Wild Cinema didn’t riff constantly on the bad movies being shown, just before and after commercial breaks like old-time Movie Host shows.
Similar to Jonathan Ross’ Incredibly Strange Film Show, Reel Wild Cinema also aired interviews with many cult figures from fringe cinema as well as campy trailers for vintage Golden Turkeys. Also like the Jonathan Ross show, Reel Wild Cinema featured an animated opening accompanied by catchy theme music.
The bad news is that Reel Wild Cinema was hosted by Sandra Bernhard. Luckily, this was back before she became completely unbearable and she’s kept under tight control on the program. You’ll believe an actual sane person is hosting the show!
THE RUNDOWN FOR EPISODE ONE (April 21st, 1996):
Title: Lunatics on the Loose
Truncated Films Shown:
CURSE OF THE AZTEC MUMMY (1959) – The movie that kicked off the Aztec Mummy craze in Mexican horror films. Attempts to recover an ancient treasure from an Aztec Tomb are opposed by the zombified (not mummified) form of an ancient Aztec warrior. I’ve reviewed this film series extensively in previous blog posts.
THE MONSTER OF CAMP SUNSHINE (1964) – A black & white flick from the Nudie Cutie subgenre. Scientists perfect a formula which turns rats incredibly violent and when those chemicals get mixed into the local water supply a nudist camp janitor drinks some.
He turns into an axe-wielding monster who preys on the nudists – who are NEVER nude if you know Nudie Cutie flicks. Eventually the “monster” faces anachronistic stock footage from war movies before the happy ending.
BLOODY PIT OF HORROR (1965) – This full-color European schlocker provided most of the footage for this episode of Reel Wild Cinema. Bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay, husband of Jayne Mansfield and father of Mariska Hargitay, plays a mad tycoon.
He owns a castle that was once the home of the Crimson Executioner, a long dead Medieval torturer who possesses Mickey’s character and makes him start killing a magazine crew and models on hand for a photo shoot.
*** TRAILERS – A look at the campy trailers for Scream of the Demon Lover (1970), Giant from the Unknown (1958) and The Crawling Thing from Planet 13 (1957).
Some sourpusses whine about how each of the movies examined on Reel Wild Cinema could be purchased from Frank Henenlotter’s Something Weird Video. Those killjoys complain that it makes the whole show a big advertisement but in my opinion the entertainment value eclipses that.
I’LL REVIEW THE OTHER EPISODES IN THE NEAR FUTURE.
FOR MORE FORGOTTEN TELEVISION CLICK HERE: https://glitternight.com/category/forgotten-television/
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Logged, thank you sir.