Angels Brigade (1979)

So here’s a bad idea for a movie—make a sexy action thriller about curvy babes who team up to battle drug dealers, cast it with beauties who can’t act, reconfigure the piece as a comedy even though nobody involved with the project knows how to construct or deliver a joke, and produce the movie as a PG-rated release, thereby eliminating possibilities for lurid content. Such is the sad state of affairs in Angel’s Brigade, a stunningly awful escapist romp from schlock-cinema stalwart Greydon Clark, who produced, co-wrote, and directed this shameless riff on Charlie’s Angels. Presented very much like a cartoon, with comical supporting characters, goofy optical transitions, and stylized uniforms for the heroines, the movie feels wrong from its first frames. To the accompaniment of a messy score that includes everything from disco to orchestral music, teenager Bobby Wilson (Mike Gugliotta) rips off small-time dealer Sticks (Darby Hinton), provoking the ire of Sticks’ boss, Mike Farrell (Jack Palance). Bobby gets his ass kicked, and word of the beating reaches his older sister, Michelle Wilson (Susan Kiger), an up-and-coming pop singer. Hold on tight, because here’s where it gets weird. Bobby’s schoolteacher, April Thomas (Jacqueline Cole), approaches Michelle with a plan to attack and destroy a drug-processing plant, which should be no problem because—yes, this is really the reason she gives—Michelle has a song on the pop charts. The duo then recruits five more ladies, including a karate expert and a stunt driver, for their commando mission. Michelle’s income—again, from one pop song—pays for the whole enterprise. Overnight, the ladies become highly skilled soldiers in matching skintight jumpsuits. Clark tries for a light touch throughout most of the picture (watch for appearances by Gilligan’s Island costars Jim Backus and Alan Hale), then inexplicably ditches the jokes for “serious” scenes featuring villains played by Palance and Peter Lawford. The tone is all over the place, and the acting by the leading ladies is ghastly. Plus, it’s not as if Clark meant to deter the male gaze, because he frequently puts the curvaceous women into lingerie and low-cut gowns and swimsuits. There’s virtually nothing so disheartening as sleaze without the courage of its convictions, because what’s the point? Also known as Angels Revenge and Seven from Heaven, this dud is to be avoided by everyone except those who thrive on schadefreude.

Angels Brigade: LAME

One More Time (1970)

The easygoing entertainers comprising the Rat Pack appeared in lighthearted movies throughout the ’60s, whether separately or together—with the most notable Rat Pack flick being the original Ocean’s Eleven (1960), which features the whole gang. Among the lesser examples of Rat Pack cinema is a pair of frothy comedies costarring energetic showman Sammy Davis Jr. and suave British actor Peter Lawford. The first of these pictures, Salt and Pepper (1968), introduced fun-loving London nightclub operators Charles Salt (Sammy Davis Jr.) and Christopher Pepper (Lawford). Directed by future superstar Richard Donner, Salt and Pepper did well enough to warrant a sequel, One More Time, which probably should’ve been titled One Time Too Many. Whatever charm was present in the original film is absent from the sequel, which compensates for the absence of a real story by bludgeoning viewers with outlandish situations and unfunny jokes. Davis works hard to sell physical-comedy shtick and Lawford delivers urbane charm, but the whole enterprise is so drab, pointless, and silly that star power isn’t reason enough to watch. Plus, because One More Time was directed by comedy legend Jerry Lewis as a particularly fallow point in his creative life, the movie’s gags feel tired even before Lewis milks the gags with irritating embellishments and repetition. For instance, Salt dresses up in a Little Lord Fauntleroy costume and fills his nostrils with snuff—then goes through what seems like an eternity of facial contortions before sneezing so powerfully he knocks over everyone in a crowded ballroom. This is Lewis’ comedy at its worst, simultaneously infantile and overwrought. As for the movie’s narrative, One More Time is nominally about Pepper investigating the murder of his twin brother, but it also concerns diamond smuggling, mistaken identity, and other random nonsense. (How random? At one point, Salt enters a hidden chamber in a castle, only to discover a mad-scientist laboratory occupied by Dracula and Dr. Frankenstein, played in cameos by Hammer Films stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing.) Lewis periodically stops the movie cold so Davis can perform musical numbers, and the director goes for cheap laughs with a fourth-wall-breaking gag at the end. In sum, One More Time isn’t worth your time—unless you’re a hardcore fan of the leading players.

One More Time: LAME

The Phantom of Hollywood (1974)

As the title suggests, this enjoyable TV movie relocates the gimmick of Gaston Leroux’s classic 1908 novel The Phantom of the Opera to a decaying Hollywood backlot: A physically and psychologically scarred madman haunts the abandoned dream factory, killing anyone who invades his domain. What makes The Phantom of Hollywood fun to watch is the verisimilitude of the location. The picture was shot in the old Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer backlot just before demolition, so viewers get to witness the last days of showbiz landmark. Seeing once-beautiful facades overrun with rust and weeds is so poignant that it’s easy to empathize with the nutjob who considers the backlot hallowed ground. That said, The Phantom of Hollywood’s narrative, credited to George Schenck and Robert Thorn, is perfunctory at best: When a fictional studio decides to sell its long-unused backlot, the Phantom (who wears in a medieval costume and wields old-school weapons like a bow and arrow) starts whacking interlopers, so the studio has to smoke out the psycho. Feeling trapped, the Phantom kidnaps the studio head’s daughter (Skye Aubrey), causing her boyfriend, PR man Ray Burns (Peter Haskell), to rush to the rescue. Not much in The Phantom of Hollywood will surprise (or really frighten) most viewers, but the picture benefits from brevity, delivering a steady stream of melodrama and thrills over the course of 74 fast-moving minutes. And though the incredible location is the real star of the picture, reliable actors including Broderick Crawford, John Ireland, and Peter Lawford lend authority. As the Phantom (and also in a secondary role), journeyman actor Jack Cassidy has a field day spewing Shakespearean quotes and other overwrought dialogue—in fact, he sounds rather like Claude Rains, who played Leroux’s original Phantom in Universal’s 1943 monster-movie take on the tale. There’s also creepy irony to Cassidy playing a burn victim; the actor, perhaps best known as the real-life father of ’70s teen idols David and Shaun Cassidy, died in an apartment fire two years after The Phantom of Hollywood was broadcast. (Available at WarnerArchive.com)

The Phantom of Hollywood: FUNKY