The Hellcats (1968)

Wow! Such a good movie.

Powerful

Perfect cast and a good story

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Well, at least the advertising's great-as is the original poster, which features a one-eyed blonde, swinging a motorcycle chain amid a bunch of female bikers who look like they're heading for Hell-hence the title. With the smash success of ''The Wild Angels'' ''The Born Losers'' and other counter-culture quickies, it must have seemed like a good idea at the time. Trouble is, ''The Hellcats'' has got to be one of the best cases for deceptive advertising ever foisted on the movie-going public. The first film about a female motorcycle gang, (so they said) it's almost nothing of the kind. The few female ''bikers'' in the film are so outnumbered by the males, they make no impression at all. Even worse, the ''script'' co-written by Robert F. Slatzer (yet another Hollywood lowlife who claimed he not only ''discovered'' Marilyn Monroe, but married her) and Tony Houston, is not only terrible, but unintelligible.And Slatzer, who also directed it, turned this mess into a ''novel'' which he probably ground out in the less than two weeks it took to film. ''Production Values'' are rock-bottom (even for a Biker movie) especially the stock library music, which sounds as if it belongs in a cheesy Mickey Spillane potboiler, or a Billy Graham film. In order to attract a young audience, a few forgettable rock numbers by a couple of equally forgettable bands are thrown in. One of them-''Somebody's Chyldren'' got their start playing background in Mae West's first rock and roll album-it was downhill from there for them. As for ''Davy Jones And The Dolphins''', there is a rumor that Jones went on to stardom as none other than David Bowie!.Talk about starting at the bottom. And, yes, there is a Title Song- THREE different versions, each one worse than the one that preceded it.All were featured on a ''soundtrack'' album from biker music specialist (and future Lieutenant Governor,) Mike Curb's ''Tower'' label..One of the musical numbers titled ''Mass Confusion'' (which sums up this thing so well, it should have been the movie's title) includes the lyrics: ''I can't take no more of this-no- no- no- no- no!'' A sentiment which probably sums up what audiences felt, if they made it that far. As for the ''background score'' it consists of library music composed back in the 1950s, where it was used for B movies and budget-deprived shows like ''The Adventures Of Superman''. And it's played at ear splitting levels through the film-probably to keep audiences awake (it didn't work-at least for me) I saw this years ago on a late night TV broadcast, and when I saw it on DVD years later, I could hardly remember ever having seen it previously. The ''Hellcats'' are a group of no-name ''actresses'' most of whom were making their film debut, and, probably unknown to them, their film farewell. Most prominent among them are Dee Duffy as the ''heroine'' who is out to avenge the murder of her Police-affiliated boyfriend who was investigating a gang of drug runners headed by Slatzer. and Sharyn Kinzie, as Sheila, leader of the ''Hellcats''. Duffy had previously appeared as a ''Slaygirl'' in a couple of ''Matt Helm'' movies, which starred Dean Martin. Kinzie was a newcomer, allegedly discovered while riding a motorcycle down Sunset Boulevard. Both are hard -faced unsympathetic and pretty long in the tooth for their parts. It's no wonder they were never heard from again. The only vaguely familiar names are Ross Hagen a Biker Movie staple by now,(playing the brother of the murdered man) Sonny West (once a bodyguard for Elvis Presley as the leader of a male cycle gang) and Gus Trikonis, who, aside from a role in the film ''West Side Story'' is best known as the ex-Mr. Goldie Hawn.Since the ''plot'' has been discussed elsewhere, just let it be said that aside from unintentional hilarity, this is strictly from hunger, and just when you think it can't possibly get any worse, on comes Slatzer himself, playing the role of the Villain, and speaking his lines right off cue cards.Strangely enough, James Gordon White who penned ''The Mini-Skirt Mob''(which also features Hagen) that same year, is'' credited'' with the original story for this one. And, while it's not exactly'' Quality Entertainment For The Discriminating Viewer'' either, at least ''Mob''more or less delivers what it promises. How did ''Hellcats fare upon release?. Well, as the critic for the San Francisco Chronicle put it, way back when,: ''The Cast is unknown, the direction is hack, the script is pathetic, and the acting stinks. It should play Outer Mongolia''. And that was probably as good as it got, review wise.A double-feature DVD which include ''The Hellcats'' and ''Chain Gang Women'' was released a while ago, and offers a decent transfer of both films-better, in fact, than the notorious MST3K version. But the upgraded image somehow makes ''The Hellcats'' look even worse. And, as for what ''MST3K'' did to it, the truth is this film is such an unintentional parody, a deliberate one is just redundant-and much less funny. The DVD's ''co-feature'' ''Chain Gang Women'' is (among other things) yet another example of blatantly false advertising. But, that's another story...

Army Sergeant Monte Chapman (stiffly played by Ross Hagen) returns from the Vietnam war and poses as a biker to get the goods on the no-count drug dealing Harley hounds who killed his undercover cop brother. His brother's fiancé Linda Martin (pretty blonde Dee Duffy) helps Monte out. Sound exciting? Well, it sure ain't. Still amusing and entertaining just the same? You bet. This flick is often downright mesmerizing in its mind-numbing badness. Boy, does this hilariously horrendous honey possesses all the right wrong stuff to rate highly as a real four star stinkeroonie: flat direction by Robert F. Slatzer, uniformly atrocious cardboard acting, grainy, ratty cinematography by Gil Hubbs (the queasy use of zoom-in close-ups are guaranteed to make you sick to your stomach), a plodding pace, dreadful dialogue (sample line: "Back off Six Pack -- it's too early and I'm too sober"), a hopelessly dated "groovy" 60's psychedelic rock soundtrack, sporadic outbursts of extremely mild violence, a stupefying surplus of tedious talk, a meandering narrative, and plenty of ridiculous filler (according to this film bikers love to drink all the time, dance like crazy while blasted out of their skulls, and make out as often as possible). The bikers themselves are a colorfully scruffy bunch; my two favorite cycle savages were Tony Lorea as drunken lecherous slob Six Pack and Eric Lidberg as severely addled acidhead Hiney. The motorcycle mamas are quite the collection of hotties as well, with ravishing redhead Sharyn Kinzie taking the grand beauty prize as the fiery Sheila. A genuinely good movie this most certainly isn't, but its nonetheless an oddly entrancing and enjoyable piece of jaw-dropping dismal junk.

For those of you who noticed all the people from Red Zone Cuba in this horrid piece of trash movie, that is because this thing was produced and funded by none other than the talentless Tony Cardoza, who funded and 'acted' in all of Coleman Francis's horrible movies, as well. I guess this is the only way that Tony got to be an actor was to pay for the movies to get made, since he had zero talent. He probably put it in the contracts that he got to play a part in the film if he produced it. Put him together with the hideous Gus Trikonis of Sidehackers fame(thus the appearance of Ross Hagen as the main character)to make a movie, and you have a disaster of major proportions in the making. The incomprehensible, drug addled plot is only the beginning of the film's problems. The film used is grainy and watered down looking, there isn't one appealing character in the whole movie, and there are scenes that make no sense and trail off altogether. Lots of them. They make up most of the movie, actually. All one can think is that the film crew, including the director, were buying drugs from the biker gang and taking fistfuls of them before they started shooting. You can watch this thing over and over again, and all you'll get is a headache. It still won't make any more sense than the first time you watched it. At least Sidehackers had the crazed but amusing JC, and Red Zone Cuba had a so-called 'plot' that left you howling with laughter. Hell cats has neither of these things. Or much of anything else, either, except for lots and LOTS of drugs, booze, and scenes of motorcycle riding and chicks in bikinis.

This movie is so bad it's actually funny! I watched it from start to finish and I have to say, I have no idea what the storyline was about. Very confusing! I loved the way we'd get 20 minutes of motorbike riding, especially when the bikes all just rode off the screen! Obviously everybody in the movie was meant to be stoned, but I strongly suspect the cast, the cameramen and the producers all were as well. Also the chain fight was the best. I have no idea what it was all about, but believe me, this one is SO terrible it's worth watching!Basically, as far as I can tell, the story of this film is that for some reason or other, two people have a grudge because their boyfriend/brother was killed, and they know it has something to do with a drug gang so they follow one around and everyone gets stoned, a few people end up in some police station for a while and at the end they all sort of run around and it finishes. Highlights include some random character being strangled and then totally forgotten about, a motorbike race where the race isn't seen, the chain fight (hooray!), and somebody falling off a motorbike into a ditch at about two miles an hour in a very unrealistic way! Special effects include the tendency for the motorbikes not to be seen as the camera is about a metre behind them. If you watch this movie without expecting it to have any sort of recognisable storyline, and not expecting it to be good, you should enjoy it a lot!