Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation! (2008)

Director: Mark Hartley

Starring: Tons of Aussies...and Quentin Tarantino's ginormous forehead!

More Info: IMDB

Tagline: Finally an Aussie film packed full of boobs, pubes, tubes ... and a bit of kung fu.

Plot: The story of "Ozploitation" movies - a time when Australian cinema showed an explosion of sex, violence, horror and action. Includes anecdotes, lessons in maverick film making and a genuine love of Australian movies. It moves through Aussie genre cinema of the 70s and early 80s - claiming it's an unjustly forgotten cinematic era.

My Rating: 9/10

Would I watch it again? 3 times and counting...


My love for exploitation knows no boundary and a documentary on exploitation trumps just about anything else out there. NQH delivers a fascinating story of Australia's film industry boom from 1969 to the early 80s and covers a tremendous amount of films, nearly all of which look incredibly appetizing.


It starts off with their first wave of films and how the industry kicked off with comedies filled with sex and gross-out humor, covering censorship and nudity. This section is fun but it's only the beginning and a great set-up for what comes next.


The middle third is titled, "Comatose Killers and Outback Chillers", with insight on lots of unique horror films and thrillers. Lots of fun.




The final third, "High Octane Disasters and Kung Fu Masters" is the real meat & potatoes of the doc that is guaranteed to tickle your short & curlys. TONS of explosions and absolutely jaw-dropping stunts.




This is one of the best docs I've seen on films and easily the best on genre cinema. There are interviews with directors, actors, screenwriters, critics (who continue to bash these films more than 30 years after first reviewing them) and their seemingly biggest fan, Quentin Tarantino. While I really dig his movies and I can appreciate his enthusiasm, Tarantino can be one of the most annoying mongoloids in the industry. Fortunately his love of Australian genre films comes across as nothing but unabashed adoration from a genuine fan. He's more restrained than usual or maybe the director pulled a masterful editing job.





While I find the first third fun, it's the final two thirds that are a real treat to watch. The entire film is hysterical and it's really akin to a great roller coaster ride. There's never a dull moment and even if this type of cinema is not your bag, you will have the uncanny urge to want to see many of these films they discuss. For me, I wanna see every last one of 'em. I first saw this doc a year or so ago and it's got me jazzed enough to do just that, for better or worse. So far, in my stack of 200 or so DVDs sitting here waiting for me to write about, there are a bunch that were watchedas a result of this film and I'm a better human being for it...really. If you see just one Australian exploitation film it needs to be the balls-out, insanely fun TURKEY SHOOT (1982)!

Here's a complete list of films covered in NOT QUITE HOLLYWOOD (from the wikipedia page):

Foreign/Negative Portrayal of Australia

01) REVIEW - TRAILER - Age of Consent (1969)
02) REVIEW - TRAILER - Ned Kelly (1970)
03) REVIEW - TRAILER - Wake in Fright (1971)
04) REVIEW - TRAILER - Walkabout (1971)

Sex/Crude Humor
05) REVIEW - TRAILER - The Naked Bunyip (1970)
06) REVIEW - TRAILER - Stork (1971)
07) REVIEW - TRAILER - The Adventures of Barry McKenzie (1972)
08) REVIEW - TRAILER - Barry McKenzie Holds His Own (1974)
09) REVIEW - TRAILER - Number 96 (TV) (1972-1977)
10) REVIEW - TRAILER - Alvin Purple (1973)
11) REVIEW - TRAILER - Alvin Rides Again (1974)
12) REVIEW - TRAILER - Eliza Fraser (1976)
13) REVIEW - TRAILER - Australia After Dark (1975)
14) REVIEW - TRAILER - The ABC of Love and Sex Australia Style (1978)
15) REVIEW - TRAILER - Felicity (1978)
16) REVIEW - TRAILER - The True Story of Eskimo Nell (1974)
17) REVIEW - TRAILER - Hoodwink (1981)
18) REVIEW - TRAILER - Centrespread (1981)
19) REVIEW - TRAILER - Fantasm (1976)
20) REVIEW - TRAILER - Fantasm Comes Again (1977)
21) REVIEW - TRAILER - Pacific Banana (1980)

Scary/Buckets of Blood
22) REVIEW - TRAILER - Inn of the Damned (1974)
23) REVIEW - TRAILER - Night of Fear (1972)
24) REVIEW - TRAILER - Lady Stay Dead (1982)
25) REVIEW - TRAILER - Brothers (1982)
26) REVIEW - TRAILER - Patrick (1976)
27) REVIEW - TRAILER - Long Weekend (1978)
28) REVIEW - TRAILER - Snapshot (aka Day After Halloween) (1979)
29) REVIEW - TRAILER - Thirst (1979)
30) REVIEW - TRAILER - Harlequin (1980)
31) REVIEW - TRAILER - The Survivor (1980)
32) REVIEW - TRAILER - Roadgames (1981)
33) REVIEW - TRAILER - Nightmares (1980)
34) REVIEW - TRAILER - Howling III: The Marsupials (1987)
35) REVIEW - TRAILER - Razorback (1984)
36) REVIEW - TRAILER - Dark Age (1985)
37) REVIEW - TRAILER - Next of Kin (1981)
38) REVIEW - TRAILER - Blood Moon (1990)

Hard Core Action
39) REVIEW - TRAILER - Stone (1974)
40) REVIEW - TRAILER - Mad Dog Morgan (1976)
41) REVIEW - TRAILER - The Man from Hong Kong (1975)
42) REVIEW - TRAILER - Death Cheaters (1976)
43) REVIEW - TRAILER - Stunt Rock (1978)
44) REVIEW - TRAILER - Mad Max (1979)
45) REVIEW - TRAILER - Chain Reaction (1979)
46) REVIEW - TRAILER - Midnight Spares (1982)
47) REVIEW - TRAILER - Race for the Yankee Zephyr (1981)
48) REVIEW - TRAILER - Turkey Shoot (1981)
49) REVIEW - TRAILER - BMX Bandits (1983)
50) REVIEW - TRAILER - Fair Game (1985)
51) REVIEW - TRAILER - Sky Pirates (1986)
52) REVIEW - TRAILER - The Return of Captain Invincible (1982)
53) REVIEW - TRAILER - Dead End Drive-In (1985)

The Current Wave
54) REVIEW - TRAILER - Wolf Creek (2004)
55) REVIEW - TRAILER - Undead (2003)
56) REVIEW - TRAILER - Storm Warning (2007)
57) REVIEW - TRAILER - Rogue (2007)

Eolomea (1972)

Director: Herrmann Zschoche

Starring: East Germans

More Info: IMDB

Plot: After eight space cargo ships disappear and transmissions from an orbit station abruptly end, the space council and head scientist decide to halt travel to the mysterious region. Suspicion falls on a professor who was once part of the sidelined Eolomea project.

My Rating: 6.5/10

Would I watch it again? Yeah


I loves me outer space sci-fi, especially from the late 60s and 70s. It's the look, perspective and ideas that draw me in. Now we (USA) weren't the only ones making them. The UK churned out a few (JOURNEY TO THE FAR SIDE OF THE SUN (1969), 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968)), with the latter changing the game entirely. Kubrick's 2001: ASO made sci-fi something serious, something that didn't rely on giant monsters (I'm looking at you, Japan) or alien invasions. By the end of 1969 we had truly gone where no man had gone before...to the moon, Alice!


We won, the Russians lost. but that didn't stop them from making interesting sci-fi films.



The budgets were slack, compared to Hollywood, but the ideas were not. EOLOMEA is half talky and half cool outer space stuff. Half the film is on Earth with the space council and government hashing out what to do (with a little conspiracy thrown in to mix it up a bit) and the other half deals with the day-to-day lonely business of living and working in space.


So we've got a situation where 160 cosmonaut scientists and their ships/space station go missing. Vanished. Where did they go? Should we try and find them? That's the debate. Space travel is halted until a solution can be found.


Dan is stuck on an asteroid or moon or something far from Earth. He ignores the band and flies to and boards a space station that appears to be abandoned. It's not and it's got some of our "lost" cosmonauts. Ultimately he joins them on their secret quest to find the mythical Utopian planet of Eolomea. Does it exist? No one knows.


I really like model work and there's plenty of it here. Sure it can look hokey but there's an effort to make something interesting in a time where CGI wasn't even a concept. I can appreciate that.

Docking Bay 97 perhaps? Hmmmmmmm.

The interiors of the ships and whatnot are lived in, much what you'd expect, and there are attempts at realism missing in a lot of space films of the day. I expect 2001: ASO had a HUGE influence on this.

I can do without the ridiculously silly robot. I guess it's the Hollywood influence.

It's less than an hour and a half and there's enough space stuff to keep the average space junkie like myself glued to the screen. And when it's discussion time in committees and with colleagues, it's interesting and valid points are made. I probably could do without so many flashbacks with Dan and his girl, showing us how much he misses his idyllic life on Earth...I get it, I get it. But then it's an East German sci-fi flick from '72 and that in and of itself makes it more than just a curiosity. For me, it's a must-see.

The Public Enemy (1931)

Director: William A Wellman

Starring: James Cagney, Jean Harlow, Joan Blondell

More Info: IMDB

Plot: A young hoodlum rises up through the ranks of the Chicago underworld, even as a gangster's accidental death threatens to spark a bloody mob war.

My Rating: 9.5/10

Would I watch it again? You bet your face full of grapefruit!









It KILLS me how few pictures I have watched in the past couple of years that star my favorite actor, James Cagney. He's absolutely amazing in everything he does. You can't not watch him when he's on screen. He's always doing something (little things he always called, "business"). His facial expressions, the rapid fire speech, everything. THE PUBLIC ENEMY is the perfect introduction for anyone who's never experienced this badass motherfucker in action.




Back in my teens I watched LITTLE CAESAR (1931) with Edward G. Robinson (another all-time favorite of mine) and then THE PUBLIC ENEMY, having heard such great things about both films. It was the beginning of a long and beautiful relationship with my love for 30s (and beyond) gangster pictures and Robinson & Cagney. LITTLE CAESAR was good but TPE was even better. If you've seen DRACULA (1931) with Lugosi and then FRANKENSTEIN (1931) with Karloff you know what I mean. The former pictures are good albeit stagy and somewhat static. The latter are both outstanding and set the standard for their type of film from that day forward.

I would say Cagney is in rare form here but then he's always this good in just about every picture of his I've seen. He's a badass throughout that doesn't take any lip from anyone and he certainly knows how to charm the stockings off the hotties! Take this scene...

GWEN: I'm not accustomed to riding with, uh, strangers.

TOM: We're not going to be strangers.

So that's how you pick up chicks. It's been officially added to my playbook.

If there's one image or clip you've seen of TPE, it's this one.









My favorite scene is when Tom and Matt happen upon Putty Nose, the low life hood that screwed them over in their youth. It's been a lot of years and Tom always wanted his revenge. He's about to satiate it. They follow him back to his flat. Putty makes nervous small talk ('cause he knows he's about to breathe his last) and makes his way to the piano where he plays a little tune he used to play for them all those years ago...

(singing) "Tell me how long...do I have to wait...

or can I get you now, or must I hesitate...

Lizzie Jones, big and fat,

slipped on the ice

and broke her (BAM!)" BAM!

Tom, with a snap in his step, calls for Matt (who's clearly struck by his viciousness) to go get the girls as if nothing happened. It's one of the most chilling and effective kills I've ever seen...and you don't even see it. It's fucking badass and it's very easy to see where Joe Pesci pulled his inspiration for his character in GOODFELLAS (whose name was Tommy, btw).

Immediately following the funeral for their good pal, Nails Nathan, who was killed when his horse threw him, Tom and Matt pay the horse a visit. After asking the horse's keeper how much it's worth, they pay the man and head for the stall to put two plugs in it.




And then there's a nice funny little scene where Tom procures some pistols...

TOM: "How do ya load that?"

CLERK: "Foist, ya blreak it. Then ya stick the cartlridges in the holes"

TOM: "Uh, huh. Can I see?"

"Like that?" (as he inserts a few bullets)

CLERK: "It'll hold six."

TOM: "Oh, this'll be enough."

TOM: "Stick 'em up!"

Classic. And here's yet another example of how effective "not seeing" a murder makes it more violent. Tom's going to interrupt a meeting of the gang that he's at war with. They've killed a few too many of his friends. He follows them into their place and starts throwing lead around. We never see anything except the outcome...seconds later, Tom emerges and he's been injured. All we heard were gunshots and some agonizing screams. That's it.





The ending, which I won't spoil even though I'm dying to show the most harrowing image of the picture, is shocking and downright frightening. It still creeps me out. It ain't pretty. THE PUBLIC ENEMY is nothing short of an amazing cinematic achievement. If there's one 1930s gangster picture you need to see, it's this one. And then you need to see Cagney in another powerhouse performance with an ending even more gut wrenching than this one in ANGELS WITH DIRTY FACES (1938). These two films stand tallest among the great gangster films of all time.