Sleazoid Express: A Mind-Twisting Tour Through the Grindhouse Cinema of Times Square

...get out and stay out! Sleazoid Express is one of the best chronicles of films they don't teach or even talk about in regular film discussion. What Clifford and Landis do over 300-odd pages is two fold: provide a ground-eye view of the chaotic horror of the old Times Square and realistically discuss a film culture that remains ignored in refined film history. Although they provide an artificial classification for each theater (one theater seemed only to play one kind of film while another was faithful to another genre- most histories of the Deuce never ascribe such fidelity beyond films which "got butts in seats"), their classification works as a prelude to the descriptions of the most graphic and unusual pictures you'll come across outside a college town video shop. Can't find info on Wes Craven's early efforts or the beginnings of New Line Cinema? You've got it here. And you get it all without the false nostalgia and hubris infused by ditzy "respectable" critics hired to write liner notes on the latest DVD. This book is the grime under the fingernails of film history. You'll read about people you've never heard of (Andy Milligan and Roger Watkins) and get an honest (not written by studio interns) portrait of your favorite hacks. Sleazoid Express is the perfect antidote to sanitized film history- it's alive and lives for a time and place, long since dead.

This book is fantastic for anyone who is into exploitation, eurosleaze, blood horror, and mondo movies. I had recently become more interested in such movies before reading the book, and now I'm certainly glad I have it handy for my explorations into the bizarre. The short biographies of the actors and directors give an additional layer of insight into how, and why, these movies were made. There are extensive descriptions of movies peppered with factoids of the directors and actors that really make the movies come alive when you see them before or after reading the passage. My only criticism of the book is that there is not as much emphasis on the "story" of the author seeing these movies and the grindhouses he frequented. Although there, this book does not read like a nonfictional narrative of the author's explorations, which I was expecting from some of the book's descriptions. It is very much a guidebook, with the chapters organized by genre, director, series, and/or time period rather than according to the author's experiences or a novel-like structure. Although the book wasn't written or structured in the way I expected, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and am loaning it to some of my friends who are also interested in these movies. And I know I will continue to refer to it whenever I have an urge to search out a whacky and uniquely offensive movie gem.

Luckily for those of us not fortunate enough to have lived anywhere within shouting distance of New York's notorious 42nd Street grindhouses, we can live vicariously through the single-minded devotion paid to the subject by authors Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford. "Sleazoid Express," named after the magazine founded by Landis in 1980, takes an unflinching, disturbing, and downright fascinating look at the mildewed, downtrodden, and often filthy theaters in Times Square whose stock in trade was screening sub-B films, the pond scum yin to Hollywood's yang. Demonstrating an encyclopedic expertise on the subject as well as an unbelievably rich prose style, the authors manage to accomplish the seemingly impossible - make gore epics, women-in-prison films, shockumentaries, race-hate movies, roughies, rough trade, Orientalia, and Eurosleaze seem almost savory. Although sections of this book may make you feel unclean and, like the films it so joyously celebrates, is probably best enjoyed with a bongful of dope and a quart of warm, stale beer, it may also send you on a quest for viewing material for your next church social. All of this is a fancy way of saying "I love it!" Best thing I've read in ages...

Landis and Cifford have written an abosrbing reference guide that brings every aspect of the now-forgotten Times Square sleaze factory to life, and the authors' recollections, reviews, and photos are nothing short of fascinating. Some of the films listed are hard to find, if not lost, but the authors' reverence and wit make this journey one for both previous fans, along with those who wonder what the hell was going on in the Deuce during the Sixties and Seventies. One of the best books ever written about exploitation cinema, further benefitted by the author's priceless insight into the (sometimes terrifying) environment in which these masterworks were shown.

This is an excellent, fun, amazing book. It describes in details life inside all the grindhouse cinemas in Times Square and it describes the type of movies shown in each theater. The descriptions of the kinds of shady things going on inside the movie theaters is truly surreal, and the movies the authors describe in detail are not far behind.If you miss the era of "Ilsa", Pam Grier movies and Mondo flicks, you will love this book.