Depravity And The Occasional Naked Breast Take Center Stage in MASSAGE PARLOR MURDERS!
In today's high-tech world, many casual viewers of films and videos have little appreciation for what came before. Clearly, some of this is due to the fact that practically every television set has a billion channels of programming available at any given hour of the day (or night), so there's very little need - much less desire - to seek out some of the lesser titles of yesteryear, of which I've no doubt something like MASSAGE PARLOR MURDERS (aka MASSAGE PARLOR HOOKERS) is part and parcel of. Instead, folks will pop in some cheaply-produced direct to DVD release starring any number of forgettable performers and featuring any variation of plot they've seen hundreds of times before.
I'm certainly not making the case that MASSAGE PARLOR MURDERS is necessarily a better choice. It is, nonetheless, an apt portrait for storytelling plucked from a different time - a different culture with different storytelling expectations - and, for that reason alone, I'd argue it's worth at...
Essential!
I suppose the best way to describe this movie, would be as some sort of Grindhouse version of `The French Connection'. Not only is there a strong emphasis on the whole cop business and do we get treated to an extended car chase, both movies share the same kind of loose script structure. In typical seventies fashion, instead of a tightly written scenario based on cause and effect, `Massage Parlor Murders' offers almost random vignettes creating a wonderfully sprawling epic that clocks in at just under 80 minutes. In doing so, it has created a wonderful time capsule, which captures that seventies sensibility so well, with those instantly recognizable colors, the great music (which seems a cross between early Funkadelic and the Miles Davis of the period) and of course that truly awful and ubiquitous wallpaper. With a title like `Massage Parlor Murders!' you'd probably expect a straight horror movie, but probably the exclamation mark (which is there on the title card) should give you a...
Worth the Wait
MASSAGE PARLOR MURDERS has been all but buried since the 1970s, languishing in a vault somewhere. Fortunately, Vinegar Syndrome is the Tomb Raider of video labels. They have painstakingly tweaked and tweezed every molecule of the original camera negative to its original vibrancy. In fact, you may opt to watch the DVD in this combo-pack; the Blu-ray is almost TOO crystal clear.
MASSAGE PARLOR MURDERS has no CGI, explosions, or ex-Disney bimbos. So what do you get? A pursuit featuring half a dozen or more $300 cars crashing into each other. Luscious, REAL 70s honies in their finest eyeshadow. Countless minutes of Sandra (LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT) Peabody wandering around NYC with her cop boyfriend. Lots of dead massage parlor girls who have trouble not blinking while the camera is rolling. Brother Theodore in freak-out mode. A music editor with ADHD. And above all, an ending that redefines the word "overkill." I had very high expectations for this film. While it...
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