film – The Indie Film Cafe Movie Reviews!

Episode 174: Hard Ticket to Hawaii (1987)

October 29, 2025 The MooCow

Hey everyone… Jonathan Moody back again to discuss another movie and maybe one that is not as awesome as my last one. One that is a bit more troubled. I am talking about the 1987 Andy Sidaris film, “Hard Ticket to Hawaii”. And man this one doesn’t disappoint in the badness department, lol! We did this new episode through zoom with Paul Presenza, myself, and special guest Lacy Lou who I hope in Season 9 we can bring her back! She was such a fun person to chat with! Even though this is not her type of movie haha!

So like I said this is an Andy Sidaris movie and if you have seen one Andy Sidaris movie you pretty much have seen them all, they are basically the same formulaic film. Unlike Savage Beach which we reviewed in Season 5 with Cayt Feinics, this one is a whole lot worse! That one was pretty mid for a Sidaris film whereas Hard Ticket To Hawaii is so over the top and outrageous it really becomes so much worse!

Hardened, professional government agents…yeah

Here’s the plot by IMDB:

In Hawaii, an undercover DEA Agent and her civilian friend stumble upon a drug trafficking operation, and have to enlist the help of their colleagues/friends to go after the vicious drug kingpin.

Yep, that’s pretty much the plot in a nutshell. What they forgot to mention are the millions and millions of boobs you see in the film. So many boobs its not even funny. After a while you’re kind of immune to the boobs: and poor Lacy had to watch it all. We didn’t do that to be mean, but I knew of all my friends she could handle it.

The cast was made up of Sidaris regulars including: Dona Spier (Doin’ Time, Dragnet), Hope Marie Carlton (Blood Match, Nightmare on Elm Street 4), Cynthia Brimhall (High Roller: The Stu Ungar Story, Every Breath), Ronn Moss (The Bold and the beautiful, Bolt), and a few others. The cast pretty much did the same as they usually do in most of the Sidaris films. Even Andy himself shows up as Whitey the TV Director. The acting wasn’t the highest grade acting but hey I don’t think we expected anything extraordinary.

Ummm, I don’t think that’s the way you’re supposed to use a Walkman…

The funny thing is this is one of those times we actually did a movie another review page had covered. Red Letter Media had done this film before but we had decided we also needed to do it. It was just too bad not to pass up. If you listen to the podcast there are certain scenes from the film that cracked us up to no end. We were laughing just discussing it, which I think was great! I don’t know if that was Andy’s hope for the movie but certainly was our highest expectation. You can’t call this movie not entertaining. And I actually do also recommend that Red Letter Media episode. I hope Rifftrax or someone like this covered it too.

It’s sad that movies like this – low independent action movies with explosions – don’t exist as much. Or if the explosion are there, it’s definitely CGI these days, which sucks. Andy, who is no longer with us, would probably be sad that there aren’t films like this being made these days. I would love to see someone try to do this again. Even though the Stink Score was pretty high for this one it wasn’t nearly as bad as some of the other action flicks we’ve seen. Some of those are not nearly as entertaining. But this one was more put together.

NOW I see why this moovie was made!! :=8O

Well speaking of the Stinkometer score we are down to that point right now, and I’m kind of shocked to be honest. Savage Beach got a 14.5 but this one got a stink score of 26. That’s over 10 more stink points. I gave it a 9. Paul gave it a 9.5. And Lacy being the sweetheart that she is gave it a 7.5., which is a Stinky Average of 8.7! A 26 on the Ladder of Stink that puts it up there with Miami Connection, Disaster Wars, and The Wild World of Batwoman! Actually Hard Ticket To Hawaii suits that perfectly.

All in all though not too bad of an episode, a fun one if you love schlock indie action flicks. And if you do you will probably get a load of fun for this one. However, once again there is a lot of nudity in the movie – if that’s something you really don’t want to see I totally get it. But then again if you watch any Sidaris film you’ll pretty much see the same thing, minus not as many snakes. But a lot of Hawaii! And on that note I’m going to let the Moo Cow take it away and tell you guys how you may be able to find all of the stuff for this film. And I’ll be back after his next two movies he discusses. Take it away, Moo Cow…

Moo everyone – and let’s just mention that this cow had a massive 80’s crush on Cynthia Brimhall… ;=8)

So, trailerage we has right HERE. Along with the ‘haunting’ theme song. You can watch it for free on Tubi. Udderwise go to Uncle Amazon to get your DVD, Blu Ray, and special Director’s Cut versions of the film. You can also get this and just about all of Andy Sidaris’s films at the Malibu Bay Films website – check it out! You can also find Hard Ticket in the re-sale market at Ebay. You can get the 1987 poster at Amazon too, and also Ebay! And man on man you definitely want THIS TEE SHIRT if you are a fan of this moovie! And of course, if you want your moorning cup of Joe with a lil Hard Target action, check out Tee Public! There are some fun reviews of the film at Addicted Coffee Writer, Geeky Hobbies, and RamboRalph, as well as the aforementioned Red Letter Media. Bulletproof Action sums up the 5 reasons why you should be watching this flick! And finally, Action Flick Chick.com shows some love too.

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Episode 173: Mad Cow (2010)

September 25, 2025 The MooCow

Holy COW! Its a Mad Cow!!! :=8O

Well, its the 2010 South African wackadoodle horror flick called Mad Cow, which is the latest episode on the Indie Film Cafe‘s season 7 in which Moody, the MooCow, and long-suffering Just Jenn had to sit through and chew the cud on – check it out and see if any cow pies got milked!
;=8)

Soooo, it appears that a mad scientist (is there any udder kind?) creates a half-man, half -cow creature, you know, as you do, which then goes on a kill-crazy rampage with a chainsaw in a hunting lodge in the South African bush. Welllll, creates an extra in a silly cow mascot suit with a chainsaw. Same thingy.
;=8)

So Troma, always the mark of quality low budget madness, brought this over to the US, and thank so much goodness for that because Mad Cow is just a wacky, silly romp that just has to make you smile watching a murderous kill-crazy cow wackin’ all the humans, even when the jokes are obvious and stilted – and ye gods, can Tanya van Graan (Charlize, the vegetarian waitress) get an sexier? She got the whole herd’s fuzzy ol’ tails a-waggin’ whenever she appeared on screen – and she got voted FHM’s Sexiest Woman in 2007 in South Africa! I mean, RIGHT??

Well, according to the IMDB, the moovie came about when:
“UK writer/director Michael Wright (Dark Side, Boulevard Noir) and South African producer/director Michael J. Rix (Tengers, The Game of My Life) struck the deal with producers Jason Rogan and Doug Marschke to make the one of a kind horror/comedy and bring it back to Cannes 2010 under the banner Funny How Films. ‘We loved the Mad Cow concept and knew we wanted to do this film. Mad cow is the perfect film for Cannes because, in addition to being wildly entertaining, it reminds us all that underneath the hilariously funny lies something perverted and deranged,’ said Rogan in an interview. The film was made in less than a year and had its world premiere at Cannes on May 17, 2010.”

Supposedly, Michael Wright, who also wrote the screenplay, cowposed the first draft in an actual barn, so as to reflect the point of view of a cow more accurately. Again, as you do. Well, if yer fan of Scary Movie, Naked Gun, Shaun of the Dead, or those kinds of over the top, none-too-subtle comedies, with a bit of ridiculous horror on the side, then this just might be yer slab of beef! Craig Brown plays Daisy the crazed cow creature, Angus Douglas plays Harry Balls (note: this is a hint on the kind of moovie we’re talkin’ about there…), and Greg Viljoen plays Vince Chopper – but if yer like the MooCow, all eyes are on lovely Tanya van Graan, at least when Daisy’s not on screen… ;=8)

I mean, do folks wear a lot of Mexican sombreros in South Africa??

Well the votes are in, and it looks like this flick isn’t too much of a cow flop! Just Jenn and Paul the MooCow gave out 6’s, while Moody was just not very amoosed by the whole thing, and went with an 8.5, giving Mad Cow a total Stink Score of 22.5, that’s a Stinky Average of 7.5! On the Ladder of Stink this moovie ranks with the likes of Crater Lake Monster, Won Ton Ton, MonsTURD, Attack of the Killer Chickens, and Cornman – all MooCow suggested moovies, by the way; what can I say, we has the touch… ;=8)

Check out the trailer HERE. You can watch if for freebies on Youtube and on Tubi. Its also streaming at Troma NOW, which we recommend to toss Uncle Lloyd a few bucks to keep the Troma flag flying! You can buy the DVD at WallyWorld Troma, and Amazon, at re-sale at EBAY and DVRs at MVD and Dread Pirate. There is no blu ray as of yet, but we can live in hope. Grab the digital poster at Cinematerial.com , IMPAwards, and SciFiMovies.com, where you can get both of them! Also there is the movie’s own website made by the producers where you can download production stills. Its not the moovie, but TeePublic has this adorable mad cow tee shirt that you just has to have! There are reviews of the film at Film Blitz, HorrorNews.com, and Horror Society.

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Episode 172: Zombie Pirates (2014)

September 9, 2025 The MooCow

Hey everyone… Jonathan Moody back again to discuss another one of the awesome movies we did for Indie Film Cafe. This is continuing Season 7. And we just recorded Season 9 so we gotta catch up! Whose fault is that? Yep, mine! Anyhoo… it doesn’t matter cause here we are. We are going to be discussing the 2014 film Zombie Pirates, a movie that I had seen years ago and absolutely enjoyed so I felt like this was the perfect movie for Paul Presenza and special guest Nicole H Sixx. This was her first episode (but not only… she did come back for one more movie. Maybe we can get her again for Season 9!)

To begin with this is a Steve Sessions movie. Steve is a really fun filmmaker with a creative streak. One of the ones we will be doing in the studio at some point of his is called Dead Clowns; Dead Clowns and Zombie Pirates are actually kind of similar in ways – I mean to be honest if you like Zombies and you like Pirates, Zombie Pirates might just be for you. I mean it’s really that simple. It reminds me a lot of John Carpenter’s The Fog but a bit of a different story.

Yarrrrrr!! Where’s the poop deck, I’ve a load of treasure to deposit into Davy Jones’ locker…

So let’s get in to it… what is Zombie Pirates about.

From IMDB:
“A dangerous young woman offers up human sacrifices to a ghost ship of the dead in return for an ancient treasure. When she comes up one sacrifice short, her zombie masters exact their bloody revenge in this gory tribute to Spain’s popular Blind Dead Euro Horror Series.”

That pretty much explains it. The story isn’t really hard to follow. There’s a couple other characters including the sacrifices that you get to follow but really it’s about the woman and the zombie pirates.

Who plays the woman… well that would be the incredible Sarah French. She’s known for the movies like: Blind, Bearry, and Bridge of the Doomed. We love her here at Indie Film Cafe. Even though she’s probably not happy a lot of times with some of the choices we pick for her for Indie Film Cafe reviews. Another actor I really enjoyed in this is J.C. Pennylegion…. How freaking cool is that name! His other credit is Steve Session’s film, “Aberrations”. And we can’t forget Eric Spudic. He plays the main pirate… Captain Lassard. And he’s also a great friend; he use to come to my house in California and watch indie films with me… sometimes Steve Session movies.

You got a lil somethin’…between yer teeth, there….yeah…

This is the part where I would generally tell about all the people involved in the film but honestly there wasn’t much behind the scenes I could see. Steve Sessions directed, wrote, shot, edited and composed. It was also produced by Sarah French and Eric Spudic. And executive produced by Fred Olen Ray (Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, Scalps, The Alien Dead) as part of his Retromedia Entertainment company! So cool to see Fred’s name pop up on any of our indie films we choose! His company even did the opening titles. Having his name on your production really helps.

I really enjoyed watching this film. The one thing I really love is movies set either on the beach or on the high seas. I love pirate movies of all kinds and I love beachside movies. I don’t know why considering I’d never want to be a pirate for real but I would love to make a pirate movie. Or just be around that lifestyle. Like I said you could tell this was very much inspired by movies like The Fog. Which both have a lighthouse. Another thing I enjoy seeing in movies are lighthouses. One day I will be sure to put one in one of my flicks.

However as much as I enjoy movies like this there were problems and we discuss the problems in the show so please be sure to check out this latest episode if you haven’t already and see what everyone thought. But here is the Stinkometer if you want to skip ahead:

So for this Stinkometer score I did give it a 6: I still highly enjoy the film and will watch it. There are a lot of movies I’ve given a 6 too that I will still be excited to watch over and over again, and show other people too. Paul gave it a 6.5. He still enjoyed it and he loves Steve Sessions films just as much as I do. He was happy to watch this one. And Nicole was the nicest on the scores. Even though she agreed with the problems she still thought it should be lowered and gave it a 4. Giving it a nice 16.5. That’s pretty low for Indie Film Cafe. That score puts it up there with Knights Of The City. Not very surprising. But I am happy it got a pretty low score. That’s what it deserved.

Well there ya have it. Finally the second episode of the season in the can! We’ll be back with more coming very soon. Paul will be next to discuss his first film of 2007. Until then though Paul will tell you all how you can find this movie and anything else he’d add… Take it away, MooCow…

Moo everyone! Well, you can check out the trailer HERE. And if yer low on doubloons you can catch it for free on TUBI. You can also stream it on PRIME. You can buy the DVD from Uncle Amazon, WallyWorld, and from the re-sale market on EBAY. You can download a digital version of the poster from Movieposterdb.com. There doesn’t seem to be any udder merch out there, but you can check out moovie reviews for the film at Adam the Movie God, Movies and Mania, and Exploitation Retrospect, as well as video reviews at Fright Bounce, Villain News, and Goof Podcast.

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Episode 171: Dead and Rotting (2002)

July 29, 2025July 29, 2025 The MooCow

Hey everyone welcome to Season 7… It’s your buddy Jonathan Moody to kick things off! The first episode of the new season we did through Zoom. I think we were still having problems getting people to the studio. A problem we still have. In this episode we reviewed the film, “Dead & Rotting” a JR Bookwalter produced film from 2002. Jonathan was able to get Paul for every episode of this season – don’t count that exactly for Season 8. However, we did have one of the best guests we’ve ever had which was Spooky Madison. Since this NEW episode though she has been extremely busy and we are very fortunate we got her when we could.

What is “Dead & Rotting” about you may ask. Let’s see how IMDB describes it:
Three prankster buddies release the wrath of an aged witch, Abigail, when they unwittingly become accomplices to the murder of her son. Scheming in anger, the witch seduces the three friends and then uses the men’s own ill-born spawn to destroy them. Death and rot are left in the wake…
Okay that pretty much sums it up.

Yeah, I got careless with the raspberry jam, so sue me, who cares, I’m dead!

The film was written by David P Barton and Doug Snauffer, and directed by Barton. This is the only film that David directed but he’s done make up fx for movies such as Starship Troopers, The Usual Suspects, Apocalypto and Face/Off. Doug has written other films such as Witchouse 2: Blood Coven, The Vault, Fiendish Fables, and Shriekshow.

As for the cast… we have some really fun genre names in this cast including: Stephen O’Mahoney (Roswell, Murdercycle, Mega Scorpions), Tom Hoover (Polymorph, Chickboxer, Galaxy of Dinosaurs), Debbie Rochon (Slime City Massacre, Exhumed, Model Hunger), Trent Haaga (Terror Firmer, Killjoy 2, Dr. Horror’s Erotic House of Idiots), and Jeff Dylan Graham (Fell, Zombiegeddon, Home Sick). Plus many more actors in the cast. I enjoyed the acting overall.

“Wanna see my definition of ‘disarming’, keep on grabbing…”

Warning though: there is a scene involving the death of an animal, but it’s really what sets the stage for the rest of the movie. Without it most of what happens wouldn’t have happened. But for an animal lover like myself it was very sad. Maybe this goes to show people don’t mess with a witch’s pet cause they might be more than just their pet. That’s all I’ll say about that. I don’t really wanna spoil anything because it’s a movie I believe everyone should go out and watch online.

David P. Barton is not a bad filmmaker by any means and especially for his first film he did a pretty good job. I know there were a few complaints we had, and a lot of that usually has to do with the writing. In my opinion, you’re only as good as the script on the page. We’ve def seen worse but we have also def seen a lot better. If you know us our biggest problems are can we see it and can we hear it. If those two aspects are being questioned we start to go higher on the Stinkometer.

Speaking of which, here are the scores that we gave…

I gave it a 4 because I really did enjoy it. It’s a movie I put on from time to time just because I’m a fan of everyone involved in the production. And to me it’s one of those movies that I can put on and it will inspire me to want to go out and make something. Paul gave it a 5. He found the movie to be more meh. Not horrible but he def saw the potential in it to be better, especially with the group. And Spooky well she gave it the highest stink rating… 5.5. She thought it was a bit stinkier than we did but not nearly as bad as I think she was expecting – especially after I’ve shown her one that was sooooo bad. This one was at least more competent. The total Stink Score was 14.5, which is a Stinky Average of 4.8. Not too shabby for the first episode of Season 7. That puts it up with Ghost House, Savage Beach, and Fire City: End of Days. Which pretty much makes sense.

Well that’s it for this one. I’ll be the next one as well since it was another one of my picks.. Zombie Pirates! We’ll see how well that did. Next up though Paul will take you through how to find this flick… Take it away, MooCow!

Moo! We’re back for Season 7!
:=8D
Well, we gotst trailerage for Dead and Rotting right HERE. You can watch it for freeee on the Tube of You at Horror Central! It is also on Tubi, so go check it out there! Want the physical media – who doesn’t?? Well Uncle Amazon has a Special Edition DVD! And you can still get the regular dvd version there too. No Blu Ray as of yet, unforch. In the re-sale market you can find it on Ebay and also at The Beat Goes On.com. Wildside Press has a two-fer DVD with Stiches which looks like a keeper! That version is on Amazon too. Its also featured on the Advantage Collection 10 moovie cowllection dvd, as well as the Blood Soaked Cinema 12 moovie dvd, so check those out too! No merch that I cud find, but there are a number of reviews to check out, including Flipside Movie Emporium, Silver Emulsion.com, and the Full Moon Band Blogspot. A video review is on the Dollar Bin of Doom section of Miserable Hair People at Youtube, and the Robjoenfriendsshow.

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Episode 168: Survival (2006)

April 30, 2025April 30, 2025 The MooCow

Jonathan Moody here back again. This time talking about a movie I was almost in. But I’m getting ahead of myself and will talk about that in a bit before then I wanna mention this was MY last episode of Season 6 and even though this season was a bit chaotic and crazy it was fun to try and pick a movie that no one had either seen or even heard about. So of course I like to torture poor Paul and even poor Joe Turek for some of these final episodes of the season. Joe has been a staple of our show since Season 2. We especially love having him come toward the end when things get a bit worse.

Speaking of worse… the movie we reviewed was called, “Survival”. I remember when they were in pre-production for it. This was back in the MySpace days when I was working at a very famous theme park at the time. The filmmaker Joe Francis (Not the Girls Gone Wild guy) had a MySpace Page for it with updates on what was going on with it. I had been friends with Joe since back in the day of being on the View Askew Web board. He even started his podcast and that helped launch my first podcast, “The Independent Corner” on Blog Talk Radio. Joe was the guy that got me in to B movies by telling me about the book, “Make Your Own Damn Movie” by Lloyd Kaufman. And that really helped get me in to the indie film-making spirit.

Joe one day asked me to be in Survival. He said he wrote a character for me to play as the host of this party that was happening. I originally said sure. Then I couldn’t get the time off from the amusement park job plus I really didn’t want to drive down and do it. This was before acting became more of something I really enjoy doing. Executive Producer Coleman Lannum took my part and he didn’t just play my character he played the character with my name… Jon Moody in it.

I’m not going to lie and say this was a great movie because I know the people: there were a lot of flaws. A lot of which are discussed in the movie and stuff I didn’t even think about when I first watched it. I use to have the movie on a disc that Joe himself sent to me which I was over at a friend’s house showing it to him and it somehow got lost. So this new copy is actually the real deal that you can buy on Amazon. I don’t think the movie will ever come on Blu Ray but I wouldn’t mind buying it if it did.

Ok, I’m not really sure what’s going on, but if you drink this hooch it will get better…

The film had a great cast in it like Vanelle, James Furey, Matt McClure, Ian C. King, Don Prentiss, and Including Filmmaker/Actor Adam Minarovich (we did his film Ankle Biters and have Wiseguys VS Zombies on the list for upcoming B Movies to review) makes a brief cameo in the party scene. Adam and Producer Kevin Woods had worked together for a few films; Kevin Woods was the producer of the film and co writer. He helped Joe with as much as he could. The director of photography was Joe Hamann.

I remember hearing that things were very chaotic on set and you can kind of tell with how nonsensical some of the choices they made for it were. The special effects were done by Ricky Lee Leonard who I had become friends with after this movie got made. He’s a really good special fx guy. If anything you could say some of the FX were the best parts but some of it still looked ridiculous. I just think that Joe had bigger plans thang what his budget may have allowed. But I applaud him for going out and making a movie and getting it done. Joe also has a film he did called, “The Texas Frightmare Massacre” but that one is even harder to find. If anyone has a copy of it please email it to us.

Yeah, here we are, just suvivaling. Pretty much. Yep…

Okay well the scores are in and here they are… I gave it a 9. Paul and Joe both gave it an 8.5 bringing the stink score to be a 26. That’s pretty stinky but could have been hell of a lot worse. That ties it up on the ladder of stink with Disaster Wars and Miami Connection. Not a bad triple feature if you ask me!

Anyway, that’s about it. Sorry it took so long but Paul has two more to do and we are done with Season 6 mooooving on to Season 7. Thank you all for the patience and Season 6 has been a roller coaster. We can’t wait to catch you guys up! Until next one take it away Moo Cow…

Well, this flick is so obscure and crappy that there is no trailer for it, but I did find a section of some of the moost boring mooments, cowplete with a pesky Russian overtalker right HERE. You can see the whole thing for free, if you really want to, on the Tube of You. I believe that is from Producer Kevin Woods channel. You can get the DVD pretty cheap at Amazon, but there is no blu ray of this that I know of. And that is pretty mooch that, folks, no schwag, no tee shirts, no posters, pretty much zippo – the only udder thing the MooCow cud find was a review of the film on Inside Movies Galore, so you can check that out.