Sometimes it seems there are so many movies out there that people don’t know about that it feels like a shame to waste a Forgotten Film article on just one movie. So let’s sacrifice an iota of quality in exchange for quantity and spread the love over four movies. While not all of them are the best pieces of cinematic work out there, they are certainly entertaining, which gives them a whole bundle of cultural currency.
The first film on our docket is the brilliantly titled 1969 non-classic “The Astro-Zombies.” Other than inspiring a wonderful song by the Misfits, the film is a deliriously awful synthesis of bad movie clichés, which never belonged together in the first place.
By somehow combining sexploitation, espionage, zombies, science fiction and hot pants, the film’s plot is as twisted as it is incomprehensible. But how can you find fault in a film that stars both John Carradine and Tura Satana? The best (read: only) version of this is the 1995 Image Entertainment DVD release, which has great cover art and little else. It can be purchased at fine budget racks everywhere — a fun time well spent with inebriated friends.
Next up, the slightly higher quality (but hardly any more stomachable) 1981 Italian horror film “Quella Villa Accanto al Cimitero” (“House by the Cemetery”). Directed by horror auteur Lucio Fulci, the film is almost a standard haunted house film, minus the sense of logic. The film concerns
a family that moves into an old, creepy house where strange things start happening.
Full of dark atmosphere, humorous-to-blood-curling special effects and a wickedly nihilistic ending, the film contains the distinctive mark of its director. While not his best work — it’s hard to beat “Zombie” or “The Beyond” — the film has enough mindless joys in it to make it a worthwhile experience. For those not willing to shell out for the “Lucio Fulci Collection” version of the film (packaged with “The Beyond”), there are a couple of cheap editions available, specifically the Diamond
Entertainment edition. The transfer
is adequate, and the retail price
is about what most people would
actually want to spend.

Now let’s take another step up the quality ladder and look at the 1974 student film “Dark Star,” from director John Carpenter and writer Dan O’Bannon. The film has comically stilted acting and special effects that are almost hypnotically transparent, but it gets by entirely on its irresistible premise. It concerns the adventures of a crew of astronauts assigned to traverse the galaxy blowing up “unstable planets” with gigantic smart bombs.
The problem is that one of the bombs gets a little too smart and begins to have a severe existential crisis in the middle of its mission, leading to a hilarious scene in which one crew member goes outside the ship and convinces the bomb it doesn’t really exist, meaning it can’t actually explode. Full of loose, smart humor and often comically absurd dialogue, the film is the pure essence of the phrase “spaced out.” The VCI Entertainment DVD is the only one available, and the only one necessary. It contains both the original film as well as an extended (needlessly in my opinion) theatrical cut with 15 minutes of extra footage.
Finally, we have a film by the master of cheap filmmaking himself, Roger Corman. 1960’s “House of Usher” (also known as “Fall of the House of Usher” or “The Mysterious House of Usher”) does not look like your standard Roger Corman film. For one, it has production values. For another, it actually looks like a competently created movie.
As part of the director’s Edgar Allen Poe cycle, the film adapts the story of a brother and sister living in a rotting old house, terrified half to death by the “tainted” family history. It stars Vincent Price in a wonderfully twitchy performance and actually manages to create a rather chilling gothic atmosphere from beginning to end.
The MGM “Midnite Movies” DVD of the film is a great transfer and, like the rest of these films, can be purchased for a pittance.