Cabaret der Zombies

Sure, it's a stupid movie, but I found something oddly amusing about it. Some of the surrealistic imagery was actually pretty cool ... I found myself actually _admiring_ the bizarre dream sequence in this silly movie. If, for example, Dali had put that same sequence in a film, it would be declared brilliant. Actually, I found this to be, if nothing else, the most visually appealing movie ever to appear on MST3K. (Of course, this is probably unintentional - Ray Dennis Steckler was no Fellini.) It interested me enough to actually watch it _without_ Mike and the bots, if you could imagine that.

...Not exactly a masterpiece of film-making though. "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?" - Which fan of cult cinema and amusing camp stuff could possibly resist a title like this? No one, of course, especially since Ray Dennis Steckler's 1964 film has the reputation of being one of the most outrageously awful things ever brought to screen. A reputation which is not completely justified, in my opinion, as while "The Incredibly Strange Creatures..." is doubtlessly a 'bad classic', it is in no way as awful as some other contemporary bombs, such as "Eegah" (1962) or the incredibly tedious "Beast of Yucca Flats" (1961), which also appear on the bottom 100 list of the all-time worst on this site. "The Incredibly Strange Creatures..." is stupid, ridiculous and miserably acted beyond belief, no doubt, but, hey - at least it is entertaining (which really cannot be said about "Eegah" or "The Beastof Yucca Flats"). As a matter of fact, this film is incredibly entertaining for its unintentional fun-factor, even though it sometimes gets very tedious in-between. It doesn't compare to the crème de la crème of bad movies, such as Ed Wood's wonderful "Plan 9 From Outer Space", but at least the film manages to be far more entertaining than some other films which share its bad reputation.

The most mixed-up thing about the film are actually not any Zombies (?), but the incredibly confused plot itself. Most of the film is set on a carnival, where a gypsy fortune teller is vengeful for whatever reason. Then there's a young couple who get mixed up by her desire for vengeance. And there's the couple's rock'n'roller friend with greasy hair. And there's an exotic dancer who likes to drink... or something. The plot really doesn't make a lot of sense, and one can be prepared to have forgotten half of it an hour after watching the film, but, as said above, at least it entertains. Overall this is recommendable to fans of bad cinema and cult stuff as well as people who simply like a good laugh. People who only like the "Citizen Kane" type of cinema should avoid this like the plague. There's no doubt that "The Incredibly Strange Creatures..." is incredibly awful, but neither is there a doubt that it's amusing.

What can I say about the Incredibly Strange Creatures...I love this movie. I caught this movie on MST3K and was intrigued enough to find a copy of the movie to watch it without the call backs.

It's the story of lovable loser Jerry (played by director Ray Dennis Steckler, under the name Cash Flagg) who runs afoul of side show fortune teller Madame Estrella and her hirsute henchman Ortega, murder and mayhem ensue. During the course of this gripping "monster musical", you'll meet Jerry's unintelligible roommate Harold(who may be foreign or something), Jerry's helmet haired girlfriend, Angela, and ungainly dancer Marge (played by Steckler's one-time leading lady Carolyn Brandt, talentless stripper Carmelita, and other sketchy characters. The action is periodically interrupted by bizarre and vaguely unsettling musical numbers that add to this movie's nightmarish and surreal ambiance. If you enjoy Strange Creatures check out some of Steckler's other work, particularly The Thrill Killers and Rat Pfink a Boo Boo.

Favorite line:

Angela's mother: (Concerned over her daughter's relationship with Jerry.)

"He doesn't even come to the door for you." Angela: (In all seriousness) "He wouldn't be Jerry if he did."

Incredibly Strange, yes..... but is it alive? No, it's got some good points ("hallucinogenic hypnovision", which is detailed in a preface not seen in most U.S. video prints, turns out to involve ushers in monster masks, hardly the doctor's prescription for a happy trip) but overall dull and slack and looking exactly like five dollars. Still, it's a movie that shows Steckler's love for film, even if this somhow doesn't make up for LENGTHY semi-burlesque dance sequences and the absence of any real "zombies."

B-movie fans in the bay area have been treated over the last few years to Steckler's appearances at Will Viharo's "Thrillville Revue", and I'm happy to say that Steckler is a director who can sit in a theater and laugh at his movie with an audience (you just have to take my word for it that there are A LOT of directors who make bad films and take them VERY seriously... just listen to the director's commentary on the film "the Bone Yard" for an example). This is not his best effort (see "The Thrill Killers" for that), but it's pretty fun if you see it with popcorn and a bunch of drunk people. And heck, that's what movies are all about, isn't it?

I recommend this film for those of you who, like me, work out of the home and enjoy having warm, harmless, unimposing movies playing quietly in the background during the workday. Many critics have commented negatively about this movie's novel title, confusing plot (or lack thereof), queerly dated characters, unintelligible dialogue, garish color, inferior sound, etc. But in this connection, I can think of no other film that keeps on simultaneously garnering so much praise, while incurring an exactly proportionate censure, over precisely the same agreed "shortcomings." For example, some viewers balk that the film's dance numbers are both irrelevant and amateurish, therefore doubly unendurable. Others, like myself, find them so deliciously preposterous and unaccountably charming in their dated foolishness as to be worthy of repeated viewings. And this dualism just may be "Incredibly Weird. . ."s real strong suit. There's so much I could say in defense of this poorly-made film from a nicer, nostalgic time, when even Hollywood's low-rent district seemed sunny and safe- but much of it has already been said in these reviews, and very well at that. Let me confine my recommendation to this: if you're shopping to buy or rent a notoriously "bad" film, don't choose a jaded, overblown, written-by-committee, painfully self-conscious finger-wagger made c.1994 at a cost of over 50 million, and which was panned as a 1/2-star flop by every critic and moviegoer, yet managed to not only recoup its investment but launched three big-name careers in the process. No, friend, go with a stinker such as this fetid little endeavor, made on a shoestring, enlisting the dubious cooperation of an uninspired carnival sideshow troupe, and which best of all bears the boisterous but distinctive thumb-print of an overly-ambitious director/lead actor/ out-of-his-depth galoot like Ray Dennis Steckler. I couldn't explain it properly here in the space allowed, but "Incredibly Weird" seems to unintentionally exude a charmingly flatulent air biscuit of Americana; and if a film must have warts, this one has the ones that are best had. "Incredibly Weird . . ." - a pleasingly inept offering from the days when a film could be bizarre without giving in completely to the perverse, and could gain an audience with no visible means of sustaining one but its overwrought title and its hopelessly inept charm.