Breakout From Oppression (1973)

Goodness, this film was boring! I am sure that part of the blame has to go to the horrible dubbing and the fullscreen presentation. Nevertheless, the story was stupid and tiresome.

After an unnecessary scene of our hero (Gordon Liu) beating up some soldiers, he ends up in a town where he sees some men running out of a house. When he enters the house, he is witness to a scene of a massacre. There are two dead young women and a man. Eventually an old blind lady comes out of hiding to falsely accuse Liu of being the murderer. He tells her that he is innocent and makes it a point to find out who did this heinous act.

We are then introduced to a labor boss who is in conflict with this employees. They are about to come to blows over money (I think) but the boss promises that all will be resolved in three days. Liu offers his services to the boss and ends up beating up the workers. He eventually recognizes them as the men he saw running from the house of the murder, but it seems that he is beating up for no other reason than the boss wants them silenced. It's really hard to figure out who is good and who is bad. In fact, it just seems like everyone is a baddie in this film, Liu included.

Alternate Titles: Sha Chu Chong Wei, Deadly Strike

Available: Netflix, Amazon

District B13 (2004)

Impressive stunts rule the day in this semi futuristic action film.

A ghetto area of France is now a crime-ridden city with its own rules after a stone wall was put up around the section. It is run by Taha (Bibi Naceri) and his troops of heavily armed thugs. After Leito, played by parkour artist David Belle, has stolen a shipment of drugs from him, Taha holds his sister Lola (Dany Verissimo) prisoner by keep her addicted to heroine. Leito eventually teams up with Damien (Cyril Raffaelli), a super cop who has to retrieve and defuse a "clean bomb" after it was stolen by Taha the Drug Lord.

Available: Netflix, Amazon

The Invisible Ray (1936)

Dr. Janos Rukh (Boris Karloff) is an ambitious scientist who is doing experiments with rays of light from the Andromeda Galaxy. Through these studies, he discovers that a meteorite had crashed into Africa millions of years ago. With a team of other scientists that include Dr. Felix Benet (Bela Lugosi), Rukh travels to the dark continent to find the asteroid. He finally does pinpoint the location of the meteor and uses it to create a ray that can not only heal blindness, but melt rock into a pile of ooze. Unfortunately, exposure to this substance, now called Radium X, has also caused him to be poisoned which results in him not only glowing, but becoming deadly to touch. It has also caused him to go mad and he proceeds to target the other researchers believing that they are thieves that profited from his discoveries.

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Bunny And The Bull (2009)

This surreal film is written and directed by Paul King, the director of The Mighty Boosh TV series. The story concerns Stephen (Edward Hogg), a recluse for the past year whose days are precisely-timed routines. One day his pattern is disrupted by unforeseen circumstances and he is forced to remember the past events that lead him to this point. He reminisces about the trip he took through Europe with his friend Bunny (Simon Farnaby), a party guy who likes to drink and pick up women. In the course of the trip they come across many interesting people including an unforgettable hobo (Julian Barratt) who likes to drink dog milk. They also meet Eloise, a young Spanish woman (Verónica Echegui) who hitches a ride with them back to Spain. Always the gambler, Bunny bets that he can fight a bull, and gets lessons from Eloise's brother (Noel Fielding). However, this may be one wager that he can't win.

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Odd Couple (1979)

Two old masters get together once a year to fight each other to see who is the best. There is The King Of The Sword (Sammo Hung) and The King Of The Spear (Chia Yung Liu), each an expert in his weapon of choice. The only problem is that they are both so good at what they do, that they always end up in a draw with neither one winning. The duo decide that they will each train a student in the martial arts and have those two fight each other to determine the victor. Naturally, the two students are the same actors without the old-age make-up. These pupils train hard for a year and are ready to fight when the time comes. Unfortunately, an old rival (Kar Yan Leung) of the two old men shows up and decides to get his revenge on them for the harm they caused him in the past.

Alternate Titles: Bo Ming Chan Dao Duo Ming Qiang, Eternal Conflict

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Hercules And The Masked Rider (1963)

Even though his name is in the title, this really isn't a Hercules film. From what I gathered, it is a Goliath film. And Alan Steel "stars" as that character. The thing is, he's not really in the movie very much and he's a minor character at that.

The story starts off with Don Ramiro (Arturo Dominici) and his soldiers chasing peasants across the countryside. A young newlywed couple struggle to make it across the river and cross the border into the kingdom of a benevolent ruler. They make it but there is a confrontation between Ramiro and the king. The king then agrees to let his daughter Blanca (José Greci) marry Ramiro so that there can be peace between the kingdoms.

Blanca is in love with her cousin Don Juan (Mimmo Palmara), however. And when he is caught in her chambers he is banished from the kingdom. He runs into a band of gypsies lead by a beautiful red-headed woman. Together with the gypsies, Don Juan plans on getting rid of the evil Don Ramiro who is plaguing the land with his sinister ways.  

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Kung Fu Panda (2008)

This is an animated film from Dreamworks studios starring Jack Black as Po, a fat panda that dreams of being a Kung Fu master. His father wants him to continue in the noodle restaurant business, but Po has fantasies of joining the Furious Five. He actually gets his chance when the wise Oogway has to choose someone to be The Dragon Master. It seems that the evil Tai Lung (Ian McShane) has escaped from prison and is going to exact his revenge on his former teacher Shifu (Dustin Hoffman); only the Dragon Master can defeat him when he learns the secret from the sacred scroll. The Furious Five martial arts masters are quite resentful that this overweight loser is the chosen one, but as it always occurs in Kung Fu movies, things happen for a reason.

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Action In Arabia (1944)

George Sanders plays American reporter Michael Gordon who has just arrived in Damascus. He's on his way home with another reporter when they notice an Arabian princess meeting a suspicious Frenchman at the airport. Later, Gordon's friend turns up dead after trailing the Frenchman. When Gordon voices his concerns about this man, he is told not to poke around in things that do not concern him. He becomes even more distressed when Eric Latimer (Alan Napier) seems to be involved. Whenever Latimer turns up somewhere, the Nazis are never far behind. Acting very much like the future James Bond, Gordon investigates on his own to uncover a Nazi plot of epic proportions.

Available: Amazon

Two Graves To Kung Fu (1973)

A trio of thugs working for an evil boss (Chen Hung Lieh) arrive at a village and commission the town stonecutter to make a headstone for Master Chien (Kien Shih), the local teacher. After successfully killing Chien, they frame his best student (Lau Kar Wing) with murder. The boss then bribes a local policeman (Ma Jian Tang) to hire the three hoods into the police force. After that, the criminals have free reign of the village, arresting and killing rich merchants under the pretext of them being bandits. Our hero must find a way to get out of jail and rid the town of these bullies.

Alternate Titles: The Inheritor Of Kung Fu

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Santo In The Wax Museum (1963)

This film is basically a remake of (or heavily borrowed from) House of Wax (or Mystery of the Wax Museum), with the inclusion of scenes of Mexican wrestling.

It seems that people have been disappearing after they visit Dr. Karol's (Claudio Brook) wax museum. To clear his name, Karol hires Santo help investigate the kidnappings. In between wrestling matches, Santo tries to find out who Karol's enemies may be as a possibility as to who may be framing him. But the sister of one of missing people has her boyfriend research Karol and they find some mighty suspicious information about him. Can Santo save the damsel in distress in time or is he just too busy fighting in the ring?

Alternate Titles:  Santo En El Museo De Cera, Samson In The Wax Museum

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Ice People (2008)

This documentary follows a small team of Antarctic researchers as they discover fossils and other geological clues to what the surrounding area was like a million years ago. The small scientific group of explorers include two professors and two graduate students and is headed by Allan Ashworth and Adam Lewis of North Dakota State University. We also get a quick glimpse of life at McMurdo Station as the staff there talk about their life at the bottom of the world.

Available: Netflix, Amazon

The Ming Patriots (1976)

Bruce Li stars as a Chinese escort for the former Princess of the Ming Dynasty and her teacher. After the death of their leader, they must escape the city with the last will and crowned jewels of the former ruler before the new Ching king catches them. They try to get help from Li's sister who works at an inn run by an old rival of Li's. Unfortunately, this former friend would happily give up Li and the princess for a cut of the action. Our heroes end up hiding the treasure inside a dead pig that they send down the river. However, the Chings catch up to the Ming Patriots on the banks of the river for a showdown.

Alternate Titles: Zhong Yuan Biao Ju, Revenge Of The Patriots, Bruce Lee's Big Secret, Dragon Reincarnate

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Stage Fright (1950)

This Hitchcock film starts off with a flashback told by Jonathan Cooper (Richard Todd) to his friend Eve (Jane Wyman). It seems that he is being pursued by the cops because they believe that he killed the husband of his lover, actress Charlotte Inwood (Marlene Dietrich). Eve is very much in love with Jonathan and helps him to hide. She brings him to her father's (Alastair Sim) fishing hut. Although her dad advises her against it, Eve goes back to town and starts to investigate the crime herself. She tries to get Detective Inspector Smith (Michael Wilding) to suspect Charlotte, hoping that he will see who the true murderer is. But could she is wrong in her suspicions?

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Bad Day To Go Fishing (2009)

This film from Uruguay is about a shifty promoter and his washed-up, former champion strongman. Gary Piquer is Prince Orsini, a scam artist who books fights for German wrestler Jacob van Oppen (Jouko Ahola). Jacob was at one time a titleholder but is now older and in poor health. Orsini sets up the fights in each of the South American towns they visit so that the challenger could not possibly win the $1000 purse. Things start to go bad for him in the present town when his challenger is arrested for being drunk and disorderly. Then a young woman insists that Jacob fight her fiancee, a young healthy Turk. Orisini tries to worm his way out of the fight, but Jacob insists on fighting not realizing that they have been scamming audiences all along.

Alternate Titles: Mal Día Para Pescar

Available: Netflix, Amazon

Kelly's Heros (1970)

Definitely not your typical WWII movie.

Clint Eastwood stars as Pvt. Kelly. His platoon is fighting the war post D-Day in the farmlands of France. He has the fortune to capture a colonel of German intelligence from whom he learns that there is a fortune of gold bars in a bank in Clermont, 30 miles inside enemy lines. Kelly decides that he is going to get that gold and recruits the rest of his unit to help him. It doesn't take much for them to convince Sgt. Big Joe (Telly Savalas) to go along with this insane caper. Kelly also gets the help of some experts including supply Sergeant Crapgame (Don Rickles) and crazy beatnik Oddball (Donald Sutherland) who has three Sherman tanks at his disposal. When Major General Colt (Carroll O'Connor) finds out about a company of American soldiers who have made it far into enemy territory, he heads out there himself to award them medals, not realizing what their real incentive is.

Available: Amazon, Netflix