Massage Parlor Murders!

This is a great sleaze fest grind house style slasher whodunnit. It's almost like an American micro budget giallo film. The plot actually made much more sense than I expected. Tons of great nudity also. New York gritty vibe.

I was in the mood for a bit of 1970s sexploitation when I found this odd piece of sleaze. Some nut is brutally killing the hard-working ladies staffing the city's massage parlors. We're treated to a generous supply of boobage with occasional bits of bush. Those displays are linked by the inept efforts of two cops and a handful of scenes seemingly drawn from a hat. Among them are a few poorly written and acted domestic spats; a ludicrous romance; perhaps the longest pointless car chase ever filmed; and performances below the bar even for the era and genre, including corpses still visibly breathing and a long, sloppily framed and edited nude/topless pool scene, wasting a whole lotta nekkedness from a whole lotta extras who had nothing to do with the plot.

But from the midst of that mess arises a brilliant off-the-wall rant from Theodore Gottlieb, early in the metamorphosis into his legendary Brother Theodore persona. If you know the character, that bit alone makes this clunker worthwhile. If you don't, dip your toe in his unrivaled churning waters of rage, non-sequiturs and wisdom. You may hate the guy's shtick, but your cultural education has a gaping hole until you've seen him.

The math for this four-star rating represents1 for the skin and 2 for Theodore, boosting what would otherwise deserve a 1.

OH this keeps happening to me. I had never heard of this movie. It had just been rereleased in UHD so I thought I will check it out, afterall it must be ok of they wouldn't waste the resources releasing a primo version of it.

Wrong wrong wrong!!!

Having watched it I can only guess that there was somekind of contractual agreement that made it necessary for them to release this bunk.

Its boring.

And, unfortunately it doesn't circle around to be so bad that its good.

This is a complete time waster and now that I am writing this review I am questioning why I gave it 3 stars, so I'm going to change it to 1 :)

Massage Parlor Murders - 1973 ( This Film Rates a B+) How cheap and sleezy can a low budget thriller/mystery from the early 1970's be? Set in New York City with all the nostalgic sights and sounds you crave. A realistic look at the seedy sexual underbelly of American culture. A crazed latex glove wearing killer hunts naughty massage parlor girls. He visits various parlors and wastes no time killing the girls. Two detectives try to figure out who and why. There is plenty of poor police conduct, no dusting for fingerprints, isolating the crime scene after the murders, beating up suspects with no proof of guilt and getting involved with women who are involved in the case. The blood is minimal, and the kills are nothing spectacular but effective enough for this film. Poor acting at times, other times fairly decent and some downright laughable. A short mediocre script with too much chatter and filler scenes. There are some weird WTF moments, the chase scene that came straight out of the CHiPS television series, the peep show at the 46-minute mark, the painfully overlong swingers pool party or the fact that the detectives leave a murder scene without the arrival of back up. The soundtrack has a variety of music genres and fit the film in an odd sort of way. It would serve well on vinyl. Plenty of perky boobage and bare butts plus full-frontal nudity. Typical, predictable, crude and enjoyable.

The Massage Parlor Murders!. Exactly what it sounds like. Typical 1970s drive-in yarn from the 42nd St. grind house fare offering a LOT of medium local talent and a lack of budget for proper coverage of actors, AND dubbing.So many scenes are MOS, it suggests the problem of NOT having enough dough to re-shoot, or ADR. Still, these particular films from that segmented era of time bring forth some of the most fascinating artifacts. For starters, the mark of vintage NYC in the day when things couldn't have been for in-your-face blunt. There is certainly that. Also, it is commendable what some filmmakers can accomplish with such limited resources. There's plenty of ambiance and character (by character I mean NYC itself) to provide the common viewer with fascinating elements beside the random thrills.

What we have is, naturally, a homicidal nut , preying on the sleazy, lustful, and unfortunate looking women working Massage Parlors in the Times Square area. The premise alone could have been grounds for an ABC or CBS movie-of-the-week (MOW), however, the production company, big-wigs, whom-ever and however you wish to refer to them, needed a quota on nudity and cheap violence. Naturally, directors Chester Fox and Alex Stevens pad out the running time with said filler content to the point that it becomes predictable and boring. That's not always a bad thing, except that naked women with fake blood poured on their bodies hardly makes an impression.

Onto more positive aspects, we have a few great lead performances.George Spencer as lead Detective Rizotti. He's honest and straight-forward with a slight humor to him. Right out of a typical cop show of the times, thrust into the degrading and cheap sex and violence. As most films are time capsules, he is never-the-less entertaining and endearing in his own right. John Moser displays absolute charisma as side-kick Det. O'Mara. He has movie star looks, ferocious physical attributes, and a sensitive demeanor. A perfect leading man, who, baffling enough, only has an alleged "Dallas" episode as his following credit on this site! (?) It's a shame he didn't carry this one through as the head detective, and other higher budgeted projects like it. Then there's the always remarkable Sandra Peabody (nee Cassell) of original 'The Last House on the Left (1972') fame. It's assuredly criminal that she, herself, never rose above such tawdry affairs as this. She always displayed perfect commitment to pathos in every role she had in her short B-Movie career. Each performance finely tuned to fit not only the character, but the script and intentions themselves. Fans of her, and they are many, will be satisfied by this aspect alone, if nothing else.

The rest of the cast consist of obvious raw, inexperienced NY talent that bring forth endearing ambiance, which says a lot considering there isn't too much credibility among the rest of the production values amid the pedestrian circumstances. 'Massage Parlor Murders!' is none-the-less a film to be loved by it's adorning fans despite it's stance in a long line of sub par drive in fare which remains mediocre at best. Really, it's no higher than a Roger Corman picture from New World Pictures at that same time, yet all those films resonate positively and still hold up to this day. "Massage" and it's peer titles do not.