Bitch Slap to show at TIFF

It looks as if Bitch Slap will be showing at Toronto International Film Festival.

Mix three bad girls, one desert, a ruthless crime lord, 1,473 exotic weapons, $206 million in stolen diamonds and more cleavage than you can shake a stick at, and you'll get Bitch Slap – a rip-roaring, sexy mashup of the audacious sexploitation films of the sixties and seventies. Like Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! injected with a lethal cocktail of estrogen, pheromones and steroids, Bitch Slap hits hard with machine gun battles, corny jokes, knock-‘em-out fisticuffs and even a refreshing slow-motion water fight.

When three busty babes arrive at a desert hideaway to steal over $200 million from a ruthless underworld kingpin, things quickly spiral out of control. Hel (Erin Cummings), the caper’s mastermind, is a corporate bombshell with a taste for vengeance. Trixie (Julia Voth) is the bait, a gorgeous stripper with a heart of gold and a dress to match, irresistible to men and women alike. Camero (Ameríca Olivo) is the drug-running, man-hating psycho killer who trusts nobody but herself. Allegiances are switched, truths are revealed, criminals are unmasked (and undressed) and nothing is quite what it seems as the fate of the world is precariously balanced between this trio of smouldering, sexy femmes fatales.

Bitch Slap knows never to take itself too seriously. Thanks to its tongue-in-cheek script, the film flips around tired sexual stereotypes and clichés. Director Rick Jacobson wrote and produced this latest feature with partner Eric Gruendemann, with whom he first worked on the cult TV sensations Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. The three strong-willed actresses are also to be credited for Bitch Slap’s wild thrills. They were put through their paces by action director Zoe Bell, Uma Thurman’s stunt double for Kill Bill who starred in Death Proof and can be seen at this year’s Festival as a roller derby hellcat in Drew Barrymore’s Whip It!

The cast tossed aside any prim, ladylike mannerisms for a tough rumble in the dirt, and it’s clear they’re having a grand time whooping it up in this femme-tastic fight fantasy. Bitch Slap is full of clever nods to the down-and-dirty sexploitation classics, but these saucy minxes are no copycats – they’re prepared to grab the old genre by the balls, drag it, kick it, crush it and mix it all up.

HOME

Friday the 13th, 2009 - Movie Review

Director: Marcus Nispel
Starring: Jared Padalecki, Danielle Panabaker, Amanda Righetti, Travis Van Winkle, Aaron Yoo, Derek Mears, Nana Visitor, America Olivo
Running Time:
Score: 5 / 10

This review by Babubhaut.

The scariest part of the new remake Friday the 13th … that's right, getting into your car and realizing that the eternity was only 90 minutes. All jokes aside, what I learned from the newest installment in one of horror's never-ending franchises is that you do not mess with Jason Voorhees's weed. The guy has a nice little crop growing over there at Camp Crystal Lake, and he protects it with his machete and burlap bag covered grotesque mug. Honestly, the first few deaths can all be attributable to people trying to cut in on the drug trade, but don't worry, that story thread is soon abandoned and we get back to the gratuitous nudity, impressive death scenes where you actually get to see things impaled into people's heads numerous times, and a lot of running and screaming away from the big guy. I apologize for being so tongue-in-cheek here, because the film really wasn't that tragic. I'll admit that the original bored me to tears and I enjoyed Freddy Vs Jason, (probably because I love me some Kruger), and this one had some laughs—that's right, the laughs worked—and some decent moments as far as the genre goes. Still, though, that banned Nike commercial with the out of shape Jason is by far the best adaptation of the myth, or was that more Texas Chainsaw? What the film gets right: playing a Santogold track during a sex scene, so I could at least enjoy a good tune. Okay, I'll be serious now … I really enjoyed the beginning, no joke. It all starts with the revelation that concludes the original film. Here is young Jason's mother coming upon the last camp counselor that neglected him, allowing his drowning in the lake. She has killed everyone else and is about to complete her revenge when her inevitable demise occurs—all while the boy watches on. Was he really dead? Did he rise from purgatory to avenge himself and his mother? Who cares; he's there, he's sad, and he decides to spend the next twenty years bulking up like a professional wrestler, earning all his merit badges, (I mean look at those perfect knots collecting dust on his cabin's wall), and honing his archery skills with deadly precision. But that's not all for the prologue to the tale, no, we also get to watch a horny quintet visit the secluded area and be ravished sexually by each other and violently by the homicidal maniac. This is where it may hurt me being such a cinema fan; I knew it was still the prologue since none of the "stars" were yet in attendance. Everyone else in the theatre seemed to not know this and clapped when the title finally made its way on screen about twenty minutes in.

Why did that short sequence work, besides having everything you need in a successful slasher film—namely gore, Jonathan Sadowski's fantastic comic relief, a very not so shy America Olivo, and the discovery of Jason's creepily realized lair? It did because everyone was expendable, no stars had to survive until the end because they are collecting a paycheck and our country's short attention spans need a recognizable face to fork over their hard-earned cash. This is what true genre success needs, absolute anonymity and the unknown of who may survive, if anyone. Unfortunately, after those twenty minutes, we are treated to your regular run-of-the-mill/get your frights mediocrity. Rich kids galore with Daddy's boy prick versus brooding leading man looking for his sister, (who had been taking care of their cancer stricken mother, cue the sensitivity tears), and the obligatory machismo rearing its head like only spoiled brats can show. You want them all to die, and for the most part they do, but it is just so obvious and cliché; the only enjoyment you'll get will be wondering what horrific fatality can be coming next.

I lied, that's not the only enjoyment; there is always Aaron Yoo. The guy truly is gold in everything I've seen him in. Ultimately here for comic relief, I actually hoped he might somehow survive all the carnage. He and Arlen Escarpeta are great together, (love the exchange concerning the bong), and I found them so much more endearing then Travis Van Winkle's Trent, whom you want to kill yourself, and our leads Jared Padalecki and Danielle Panabaker. It appears that "Supernatural" isn't paying enough these days with both stars seeking shelter in horror remakes, (co-star Jensen Ackles just graced the silver screen in My Bloody Valentine 3D). Padalecki is okay; the film doesn't ask too much from him and he isn't one to try and do more than he should. Panabaker, on the other hand, is a very interesting choice to be cast here. Known mostly as a mousy, nerdy girl in Empire Falls and Sky High, she is all of a sudden the "girlfriend" of mister Joe Cool Popular Trent and a total departure from the big-bosomed blonde bimbos her group consists of. Inspired casting? Sure, maybe. Does she shine and carry the film into a credible stratosphere? No.

When all is said and done, if you enjoy slasher films for what they usually promise—blood, camp, nudity, and more blood—you'll probably have a good time. It's all been done before, the turning of old classics that had a shred of subtlety and nuance into quasi-snuff films. However, since I wasn't a big fan of the original, I appreciated what director Marcus Nispel attempted. Rather than a remake, he instead opens the film with a distilled version of the 1980 original, (even captioning the first scene as 1980 before getting to the "present day"), and makes his own piece to add to the legacy of the hockey mask. More Jason XI than Jason I Redux, it could have been a lot worse. But then again, I could have stayed home and not been any worse for wear.

Discuss in the Forum

Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen - It may feature human looking robots with long tongues?!

I saw mention of this over at io9. Apparantly Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen will have a new kind of Transformer - one along the lines of Terminator and the Cylons. That's right True Believer, this one looks human.

It looks like the character of Alice (Isabel Lucas- Home and Away), a girl who Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) meets in college, is actually something called a Pretender (which is a Transformer who hides inside a human shell).

In the case of Alice, the shell will be an attractive human woman while the inner robot is best described as a hybrid of the Frenzy robot design from the first movie. The Pretender Transformer will have an arm that transforms into an energy weapon, a long tongue, and a scanning tentacle.

Then there is this PhillyFilmGirl set video from the Princeton filming that may go some way to confirming this. Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox and Ramon Rodriguez run away, and then Isabel stalks towards them. There's a crowd of screaming students who run past Isabel — so they're not running from her, but from something else, something which doesn't scare her.

Just looking at the cast list over on IMDB I see there is a character to be played by America Olivo (Bitch Slap) simply called Frisbee Girl. That just struck me as funny and probably does exactly what the name says.

Home / Forum / Guestbook

New Bitch Slap trailer and interview with the 3 leading ladies

Been a while since I mentioned this film on the site so here is the new trailer for the movie, Bitch Slap. It may well be a big pile of rubbish but it does look like a lot of fun in a Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! Russ Meyer kind of vibe. As well as the three female leads mentioned below it also stars the mighty Kevin Sorbo and Lucy Lawless along with their respective partners from the old Hercules and Xena TV shows (they can all be seen here). I posted a load of character posters a while back if you care to take a look at them. Zoe Bell's character poster of Rawhide came out a bit later and can be seen here. It's directed by Rick Jacobson.

At its core, ‘Bitch Slap’ follows three bad girls (a down-and-out stripper, a drug-running killer and a corporate powerbroker) as they arrive at a remote desert hideaway to extort and steal $200 Million in diamonds from a ruthless underworld kingpin. Things quickly spin out of control as allegiances change, truths are revealed, other criminals arrive for the score, the fate of the world hangs in the balance and they are forced to confront a villain much worse than they ever expected… themselves. It’s the ultimate morality tale as, one by one, they realize the whole she-bang was a set-up and one of them may not even be human…”

John Campea of The Movie Blog interviewed the three female leads America Olivo (Camero), Julia Voth (Trixie) and Erin Cummings (Hel). The second part of the interview mentions Zoe Bell and an 8 minute fight scene between two of the leads. Here is the interview (it's in two parts)

How do you like them apples? Will it be up for an Oscar...no, but will you be going to see it or rent it if it goes direct to DVD? What do you think will happen in the plot? There is mention somebody may not be human in it - so what do you think they will be?

HOME / FORUM.