The Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Monsters

This is a very bad film, though as far as bad movies go, there are still worse--though not much worse! The Lemon Grove Kids film is definitely one of the most amateurish and dopey films I have ever seen and it looks like a home movie, though because it doesn't take itself too seriously, I couldn't completely hate it.

The Kids are a very bad knockoff of the Bowery Boys--though it begs you to wonder why anyone would want to do this in the first place?! One of the "actors" is Cash Flagg as a Huntz Hall-like idiot. According to Flagg's impersonation, all you need to do is wear a baseball cap, make stupid faces and walk around like an idiot. The film's knockoff of Leo Gorcy wasn't much better. Like some of the silliest Bowery Boys films, this one has monsters, a rival gang, etc. but is squarely placed in the 1960s with the music and fashions.

The bottom line is that with terrible music, rotten dubbing, horribly exaggerated action and slapstick sound effects, this film is a dud on every level and would probably appeal only to small children and bad movie fans. All others approach at your own risk.

FYI--Cash Flagg is the stage name for Ray Dennis Steckler. He also appeared in such great films as "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?" and was equally pitiful there. Also, there is a homage to the previous film RAT PFINK A BOO BOO--look for it after the gorilla appears.

The trilogy of short films by Ray Dennis Steckler (aka Cash Flagg) were released as a feature titled "the lemon grove kids" the 3 shorts shot on the road he lived at the time (lemon grove)with his family and friends are still as fresh and vibrant as they were nearly 40 yrs ago. The first short "The lemon grove kids meet the green grasshopper and the vampire lady from outer space" revolves around a spooky old house and the disappearence of some of the lemon grove kids themselves, the old man who lives there is suspected but he is being controlled by the evil vampire lady who is out to take over the world. The second short is about a race between local hoods and the lemon grove posse and the chance of them being movie stars (the lemon grove kids go hollywood) and the final short is the Lemon grove kids. A small little review isnt enough time to do justice to this mans work, but check out "Wild Guitar","Ratfink a Boo-Boo","The Thrill Killers","Blood Shack","super Cool" to name but a few.

Most of Ray Dennis Steckler's films are so energetic that even if they aren't very good (which is usually the case), they manage to entertain on that same odd level Edward D. Wood, Jr. established a few years before. That being said, "The Lemon Grove Kids" is a surprisingly entertaining anthology (three episodes) aimed at a young audience, but I must say I found a lot of it amusing myself (and I'm 22); Steckler has a real repoire with his actors, as they bumble about in traditional Scooby-Doo fashion, as they encounter space aliens, mummies, and kidnappers (they don't show any signs of humiliation at the sheer wackiness of the material). The first episode has the Lemon Grove Kids cleaning up an eccentric old man's ("Red Zone Cuba" auter Coleman Francis!) house, only to find it's been invaded by a grasshopper alien and a Vampira look-alike (played by Carolyn Brandt!); the second episode has the Kids cleaning the mansion (also used in "The Thrill Killers") of a washed-up Hollywood starlet (Brandt again), who is accosted by a dim-witted duo looking to score a ransom; and the third (and weakest) episode has two rival gangs competing in a cross-country (but more like cross-town) marathon. In general, this is moderately entertaining stuff for kids of any age (sure beats "Barney"), and makes me wonder why Mr. Steckler didn't do more of this type of thing.

5.5/10

Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Monsters (1965)

** (out of 4)

If you like the weird and bizarre then this film will be just for you, although I think most people are really going to hate every second of it unless they're familiar with The Bowery Boys. Director Ray Dennis Steckler made three shorts and edited them together (although each still has its own credits) for this feature that's a homage to The Bowery Boys. In this film, the Lemon Grove Kids end up doing battles against burglars, vampires, an insect monster and there's even a mummy that shows up at one point. For the life of me I can't see how this film didn't come under some sort of legal dispute especially when you consider that Leo Gorcey went over The Beatles for his likeness being on their Sgt. Peppers album. It's really hard to judge a film like this and you could spend days talking about all its faults but I'm really not going to do that. This here was clearly a project of love because it's just Steckler and his friends having some fun by impersonating a group of characters that I'm sure they all loved. Steckler plays the Huntz Hall look-a-like and for the most part I thought he was fine in the role. In fact, I'd say the majority of the cast were good enough for what this film was calling for even though none of them came close to the real people but that's to be expected. I thought the final short, the one in Hollywood, was the weakest but the first two were mildly entertaining as long as you went into them not expecting too much. The insect monster was obviously very cheap but it was fun in a kid's movie type of way. This film is mainly going to appeal to fans of The Bowery Boys and monster movie die-hards who will also enjoy seeing director Coleman Francis (THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS) in a small role.

Positively the most memorable movie-going experience of my life. Procter's Theater in Troy, NY...probably around 1968 or 1969. My sister took me to see this movie on a Saturday...billed as including a special guest appearance by real live monsters.

I don't recall much about the first two shorts. But the last...when the Lemon Grove Kids and Cash Flagg enter into a cornfield or dense weeds...they are met by lightning crashes and a MUMMY!

At that moment...a spotlight hits the side of the Procter's stage and a guy in a Mummy suit staggers out. His arms are raised up and he heads for the aisles.

The audience flipped. I remember everybody leaping out of their seats and running down the aisles terrified. I ran too...but sister nabbed me before I could get too far. Things settled down. The mummy disappeared. And we sat back to watch the rest of the show. I have no memory of what came after.

But that memory of the mummy on the stage was indelible. I was around five or six when I saw it.

Years later in Washington, DC I came across an old video of the movie from the late great Georgetown Video Vault (this was around 1992) and I laughed it up with my wife over Lemon Grove Kids and Ray Dennis Steckler. Oh...if we only had that kind of movie experience again!