| |  |  | | WAR OF THE TURKEYS |  Cameron Mitchell was quite the actor and, while he doesn't exactly match John Carradine in terms of prolificness, he's right up there, with appearances many, many, many movies, including The Tomb, Haunts, Kill Squad, and Nightmare in Wax. But let's say you're in the video store, and you want to rent a Cameron Mitchell movie, and all they have is Kill Squad and Nightmare in Wax. Sure, you could rent Death in Venice or maybe The 400 Blows (or, if you're in Shlockbuster, The 400 Copies of Armageddon) but no, dang it, you want a Cameron Mitchell movie! But which one? Well, CST will help you choose. |
| | KILL SQUAD If you like non-stop intensity, atmospheric photography, and gut-wrenching emotional tension, then don't rent Kill Squad. But if you want to see some kung-fu action, pimps, and guys with 'fros, Kill Squad's your bag. But ignore that cartoon picture of the nurse being attacked by bikers on the cover -- it has nothing to do with the movie. And, though this may dissapoint, the warning about how KILL SQUAD contains scenes innappropriate for minors, etc' isn't really necessary either - though it's rated R, it's really not too bad. | | | the story A man is confined to a wheelchair and his wife is dead after a gang of black-clad ninjas break into his home and beat him silly. He's just about given up on life when his 'fro wearin' buddy convinces him that he's got to get revenge, so Wheelchair Man gives the order: "Assemble ... the SQUAD." (meaning his old Viet  Nam buddies). Next we meet the individual squad members as they use their kung-fu skills in their daily lives. First, 'Fro-Man's engineering staff isn't quite up to speed, so he shows 'em what's what with a little of the old karate chop motivational technique. Then, a gardener isn't paid for his work at a rich guy's house, so he shows the guy and his bodyguards a thing or two about jiujitsu. One of the kill squadders, a pimp, uses his skills to despatch another, badder pimp. One of them's a bouncer, one of them's a etc, etc, etc. Well, once all the intro scenes are tied up, the squad gets together to find out who messed up their leader, Wheelchair Man. They follow the trail back to Cameron Mitchell's house, but it turns out he's not the one they're looking for. Then they start getting killed off by a mysterious man in a ski mask, until only 'Fro-Man is left. Finally, in the final confrontation, 'Fro-Man makes the final revelation: the guy in the ski mask is Wheelchair Man, who was only faking the whole wheelchair thing. Seems that he hated his wife and wanted to get revenge on the squad for letting him step on a landmine or something back in Viet Nam, so he hired the guys to break into his own house and kill his wife. So 'Fro-Man, after kicking the guy to bits, walks off into the sunset, a just a little depressed after his most respected war buddy killed off all his friends. | | | the verdict This is pretty cheap and silly, but there's a lot of kung-fu action - and hey, you didn't rent Kill Squad to see  anything else, did you? The bits in which the squad members use kung-fu to solve all their everyday problems are alone worth the price of the rental. Wouldn't you rather kick the crap out of someone than, say, discuss the problem? "Two dollars for a candy bar? I don't think so. SLAM!" "You're going to wear THOSE EARRINGS? Not today, baby! THWACK!" Cameron Mitchell, as a false suspect, appears for a total of about five minutes. |
| | NIGHTMARE IN WAX is great for all you boredom fans. Yes, it's yet another wax museum story, with Cameron Mitchell starring as mad scientist Vince Renard. | | | the story Hollywood makeup man and latent evil super-genius Vince Renard is in love with a rising starlet, and nothing can get in the way of their beutifully happy romance. Nothing, that is, except a jealous, psychotic producer who sets Renard's face on fire. With his new, scarred face, Renard wallows in self-pity, rejects the  starlet, and then begins his evil mission: to freeze people alive indefinitely (he's developed a serum, you see), and hide them in the displays of his wax museum. Why not just kill them and burn or bury the bodies? Because the movie's called Nightmare in WAX, not Nightmare in INTELLIGENCE. Detectives on the case start to put things together -- it is rather odd that very life-like models of celebrities are showing up at the museum just as those same celebrities are mysteriously dissapearing. Eventually, Vince is cornered in his vat of molten wax, and as all his enemies laugh ... he wakes up. The whole movie was all just a dream. | | | | the verdict This is cheaper and sillier than Kill Squad, and it's also not very good. Mitchell's character is called Vince in a nod to Vincent Price's portrayal of a similar character in House of Wax, but all that 'homage' does is remind you how much of a crummy, cheap knockoff of House of Wax this is. The "it was all just a dream" ending is a surprise, but not a very interesting one; after about a half hour of watching Nightmare in Wax, you'd have to be crazy to care one way or the other. |
|  WINNER
Neither of these movies is really very good -- or very similar, for that matter, so it seems pointless to compare them. But since I've already written an entire article, I may as well tell you that if you're going to watch one of these movies, watch Kill Squad. You can learn all the cool lines like "Assemble ... the SQUAD" and learn how to use kung-fu skills to solve everyday problems like expensive cab fares, noisy people in the theatre, and ugly-looking bikers standing in your line of vision. Nightmare in Wax, on the other hand, is pretty dull and pointless. There's just not that much more juice left in the old "dead people/wax dummies" story, as it's already been used in Mystery in the Wax Museum and House of Wax, not to mention Bruce Willis' performance in The Siege. But, if you're one of the real Cameron Mitchell fans (both of them), then Nightmare in Wax has to be your choice, as he just sort of saunters through Kill Squad for a few minutes on his way to somewhere else, whereas in Nightmare in Wax, he's the number one star. |
| | A Message from Ronny Varno | | Now, I know moviemaking is a difficult, laborious process, and sometimes it's really amazing that any movies get made at all. My own movie FLESH FREAKS ain't exactly Lawrence of Arabia, and it was a super-pain to make. So I naturally don't want to unjustly disrespect any movie just to get material for an article or a few cheap laughs. So if you think I'm unfairly maligning a movie you really liked, then email me to set me straight. varno@macondo.org |
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