Hell Comes to Frogtown (1987)

... aka: Apocalisse a Frogtown - La città delle rane (Apocalypse in Frogtown: The City of Frogs)
... aka: Ein erbarmungsloser Jäger (The Relentless Hunter)
... aka: Hunter, The
... aka: Sam Hell
... aka: Sam Hell ist: Der Jäger (Sam Hell Is: The Hunter)
... aka: Transmutations

Directed by:
Donald G. Jackson
R.J. Kizer

Ruddy-skinned, kilt-wearing former professional wrestler "Rowdy" Roddy Piper previously showcased charisma, likability and surprisingly competent acting chops in the 1986 wrestling comedy Body Slam, which opened the door for leading roles in both this and John Carpenter's higher profile wide release They Live (1988). He would be gainfully employed in a steady stream of direct-to-video action flicks and TV guest spots in between his wrestling and wrestler commentary stints from here on out. Piper is teamed up here with former professional dancer turned actress Sandahl Bergman, who'd made a name for herself starring alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger as the courageous Valeria in the R-rated sword-and-sorcery hit Conan the Barbarian (1982). That led to starring roles in two other big budget fantasy-adventures; She (1983) and Red Sonja (1985), which hoped to turn the physically fit Bergman into a female action star. However, both films were critical failures and commercial disappointments, which then landed her in lower-budgeted films such as this one. Still, she and Piper are an agreeable duo and play off each other quite well here. Their back-and-forth bickering as a means to release sexual tension (which eventually develops into a romance, of course!) is one of the main reasons this ends up being fairly enjoyable.

Sam Hell (Piper) is a scavenger, thief, smart ass and wanted fugitive on post-apocalyptic Earth ten years after nuclear war has reduced the planet to dust and debris, turned some of the populace into frog-faced mutants and rendered much of the non-mutant population infertile. Sam has been falsely accused of sexual assault by a disgruntled former lover and is just about to get his groin carved up with a broken bottle by sadistic border patrol agent Devlin (William Smith) when he's bailed out by Med Tech representatives Patton (Eyde Byrde) and the uptight Spangle (Bergman), whose job it is to help repopulate the planet. As it turns out, Sam's carrying a much-needed "loaded weapon" and has left behind a string of pregnant women everywhere he's gone. He's just the type of guy Med Tech needs to help locate and impregnate any remaining fertile women living in the desert wastelands. Since he's already familiar with that territory, his private parts are put into a locked, government issued chastity belt (!) and he's forced to sign a contract with Med Tech. Otherwise it's back to being interrogated by Devlin and his bottle.

Sam, who is kept in check by an "electronic stinger" found on his codpiece, along with Spangle and tough corporal escort Centinella (the very sexy Cec Verrell), are then sent on a trip through the desert. Their mission? Rescue a bunch of non-mutant fertile women who've been kidnapped and are being held hostage by some of the frog-people, led by one Commander Toty (Brian Frank). The titular location is somewhat like a Native American reservation. Except, you know, with mutants. Thanks to the provisional government passed "Mutant Isolation Act," all frog-people are forced to live separately from, and are forbidden from breeding with, non-mutants.

Strangely enough, some of the best moments this film has to offer take place before the mutants even factor in. The travelers first stumble across a runaway girl (Suzanne Solari), who's dirty and in a state of shock. She's given an injection of an aphrodisiac drug called "ovidal" to make her horny and then Spangle dryly orders Sam to "facilitate procreation." Our usually macho hero then talks about needing the right atmosphere and complains he's "not a machine you can just turn on and off when you want to!" Further explaining, "Well maybe you outta try making love to a complete stranger in the middle of a hostile mutant territory!"

With Sam posing as a slave dealer and Spangle posing as his slave, the duo venture into Frogtown where they meet a variety of frog-people on their way to freeing the (pacifist) female slaves. There's Arabella (Kristi Somers), a frog spy posing as a stripper who hopes to get Sam in the sack... a scenario having Sam reaching for his own sack to put over her head. Eye patch-wearing frog slaver / torture master Bull (Nicholas Worth) tries to do "exploratory surgery" with a chainsaw, while human uranium prospector Lonnie O'Toole aka Looney Tunes (Rory Calhoun) offers to lend our heroes a helping hand. And, of course, there's the evil Commander Toty, who is reduced to having Bergman do the seductive "Dance of the Three Snakes" to try to get a rise out of his three penises (!) so he can procreate with her.

While some of the above moments offer mild amusement (I mean, how could latex frog mutant people offer anything but?), the action scenes in the second half fail to generate much in the way of excitement and, once the premise is established, it slogs along toward a predictable conclusion. Using a large, ruined steel mill as Frogtown was a good, cost-saving idea but they should have tried to hire a few more extras to fill the "town" out because, as is, it appears that fewer than a dozen frog-people actually live there. On the plus side, the costumes are OK and Steve Wang and his crew did a good job making the frog masks and animatronics. The film is at its best, however, during its less showy, dialogue-driven moments between the two stars, which is often amusingly and charmingly scripted by writer Randall Frakes. And, trust me, that's slightly off-putting in a film where the mutant frog people should obviously be the highlight!

Why Jackson decided to forego competent B movies like this for his later brand of "Zen Filmmaking" (shooting things on video, not using scripts and having the actors improvise their way through things) probably all boils down to lack of demand for decent budgeted films of this type moving into the 90s and thus lack of opportunity on his part. Jackson apparently had no interest in evolving with the times, cashing in on popular trends or trying to invent some of his own and seemed content making no budget videos that very few people wanted to watch. While this early effort is certainly not an 'A' film, it does prove that Jackson at least tried at one point in his career. Either that or co-director Kizer, an NYU Film School graduate who started out editing for Roger Corman and now works as a respected / award-winning sound editor in Hollywood, actually had more control over the production than he did.

Originally this was planned as a direct-to-video release to be shot on 16mm on a 150K budget. However, it ended up being shot on 35mm on a budget of 1.5 million dollars with hopes of showing it in theaters (Kizer was brought on by New World because they didn't trust Jackson with such a high budget). While this likely didn't play on many big screens, it was widely distributed on home video and became a late night cable favorite. It was also enough of a success to prompt the sequel Frogtown II in 1992. The later Toad Warrior (1996), starring and co-directed by frequent Jackson collaborator Scott Shaw, isn't an official sequel. The later releases Max Hell Frog Warrior (2002), Max Hell in Frogtown (2008) and Max Hell Frog Warrior: A Zen Rough Cut (2015) are simply re-edits of Toad Warrior.

Ernest D. Farino did the typically cool opening credits and Fred Olen Ray is thanked at the end. Frogtown was given VHS releases through New World and Starmaker, made its U.S. DVD debut in 2001 on the Anchor Bay label, was paired with Def-Con 4 (1985) for the 2011 Image release and finally made its U.S. Blu-ray debut through Vinegar Syndrome in 2019. There were earlier BR releases from Arrow Video in the UK and Wicked-Vision Media in Germany.

★★1/2

Alien Factor, The (1978)

Directed by:
Don Dohler

Ernest D. Farino's opening title sequences always give films like these a professional feel... a feel the rest of the films rarely (if ever) live up to. This is one of those cases. Filmed in 1976 and 1977 on 16mm (with some bits shot on Super 8 in Michigan), this was the starting point for Baltimore-based director Don Dohler, an alien-obsessed fella who had a clear affection for 50s sci-fi flicks but next to no money to make his own films with. But, hey, that never stopped the guy, so good for him. Things begin like many other vintage monster flick begins; with a young couple parked in the woods being attacked in their car by a man-in-a-suit lizard alien thingy. It kills the guy and puts the girl - Mary Jane (Eleanor Herman) - into a deep state of shock. Mustachioed Sheriff Jack Cinder (Tom Griffith), his Deputy Pete (Richard Geiwitz), nosy reporter Edie Martin (Mary Mertens) and others are on the case. They initially think the victim has been killed by a bear or a bobcat, but coroner Dr. Ruth Sherman (Anne Frith) and her nephew Steven (John Waters movie regular George Stover) uncover otherwise during an autopsy when they realize that the victim's body is filled with a toxic poison.

Another couple hanging out near the same area have a similar alien encounter except this time it's a different being... and it's wearing blue jeans! After stumbling upon its spaceship, the woman flees, gets run over by a drunken motorcyclist and is then healed by the more benign alien. So yeah, there are two aliens lurking the woods. Wait, or is that three? Another poor guy gets attacked by some sparkly red lights that cover his body and rapidly age him until he's a decaying corpse. Er, maybe four? In a sequence that lasts about ten grueling minutes, another man visits a bar, watches a band perform an entire song, goes home, reads a book, hears a noise and finally comes face-to-face with a very tall and furry alien thingy wearing platform boots (!) hiding out in his basement, which claws him to death. Four locals armed with shotguns head out into the woods against the sheriff's wishes and end up meeting that lizard monster from the opening sequence again, who kills them all save for one woman who screams. Apparently these creatures hate high-pitched noises.

Eventually, astronomer Benjamin Zachary (Don Leifert) shows up claiming to have spotted a meteorite falling right outside of town a few days earlier. Benjamin behaves strangely and clearly telegraphs early on via hokey dialogue that he's not quite who he claims he is. Accompanied by the town's greedy Mayor Bert Wicker (Richard Dyszel aka Washington D.C. area Creature Features host Count Gore DeVol), who wants to build an entertainment complex and is more concerned with bad press than anything else, Ben goes into the forest, discovers a spaceship and a wounded, dying alien (in a hilarious white fright wig) who communicates telephatically with him. It informs him it was transporting three zoological specimens when its ship crashed there and all the creatures escaped into the woods. Benjamin gets the approval of the mayor to stalk and eliminate these aliens or else they'll have to call the army in to help.

Extremely cheap-looking, amateurishly acted, poorly edited and filled with continuity errors, awful dialogue and cheesy sfx, this isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea. For others, however, it's going to be a fun and charming no budget creature feature. I'm a little in the middle. I can clearly recognize that it's not a 'good' movie. The first half is extremely confusing if you've not seen it before and there are long, dull stretches where people walk around and such, but I do get some genuine enjoyment out of this each time I watch it. There's plenty of alien action and four distinct alien designs; a shellac insectoid "Inferbyce" covered with varnish, a hairy Yeti-esque "Zagatile" (the tall one... which is hilarious and completely awesome), a lizard "Leemoid" (which was designed and stop-motion animated by Farino) and the nice alien being, which isn't really given a name.

Despite what some sources claim, METAMORPHOSIS: THE ALIEN FACTOR (1990) is not a sequel to this, but an unofficial sequel to THE DEADLY SPAWN (1983). Dohler (who also appears in a small role here; along with his kids Greg and Kim) basically remade it as NIGHT BEAST (1982) and wouldn't make the actual sequel; THE ALIEN FACTOR 2: THE ALIEN RAMPAGE (2001), until nearly 25 years later. Most of the cast members - including future director Tony Malanowski (1982's THE CURSE OF THE SCREAMING DEAD) - were the director's friends and family members.

Ernie Farino sculping his 'Leemoid.'

The Retromedia DVD comes with many special features, including a blooper reel, a deleted scene, stills galleries and a commentary track from co-star Stover.

★★