Thanks for the memories!

Sick Product of a Sick System

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Blistering performances.

I've always held Dennis Hopper in high regard as an actor but he must have literally been starving to take part in this picture. As Chino, the leader of the Black Souls biker gang, Hopper consistently goes over the top to the point of embarrassment, as demonstrated when he reacts to his brother Paul's (Jim Reader) death in the latter part of the story. It's actually quite hilarious if you get to see it.And knock me over with a feather, but I couldn't get over the idea of Casey Kasem as the mouth behind The Mouth, another Black Soul with maniacal tendencies. He mostly tag-teams with a character called Bones who isn't identified on the credits list, so at least that actor's name doesn't suffer the indignity of being identified with this flick. Actually, it got a little difficult to pinpoint the movie's genre at one point when the outlaw bikers rode into a love fest including hippies and flower children with a body painting in progress.Then knock me over double when one of my childhood fave's rides into view, good old Range Rider/Wild Bill Hickok himself, Jock Mahoney as a former Glory Stomper. The picture utilizes him to at least offer a semblance of normalcy to the proceedings when he advises Stomper Darryl (Jody McCrae) to leave the group and become a 'citizen'. But gee, if girlfriend Chris (Chris Noel) couldn't convince him, I don't know how Smiley would have. Just not in the cards.What makes the picture even more surreal if you watch for them, are the numerous continuity lapses between scenes when Darryl's facial bruises go away and reappear again, the same with Magoo's (Robert Tessier) right eye and the discoloration on Chris's forehead that's evident when she reunites with Darryl but is gone as soon as they kiss. At least the tear on her shirt remained intact for the entire picture, someone was paying attention to that one.Well I guess if you go for this stuff there's a lot here to keep one entertained. I can watch just about anything once, so at least now I can say I saw a Dennis Hopper motorcycle gang flick. A heck of a way to go though with a knife to the neck by a girlfriend's erratic knife throw. That was almost as gross as Clean Cut brother Paul spit-cleaning Chris's bloody lip. Eeeuuwwwww!

With the death of Casey Kasem having occurred about a week ago, I decided to check out some of his films on the internet starting with this one-his first live-action appearance playing a character and one he was associate producer on. He plays a member of a motorcycle gang named Mouth and while his beard didn't make it easy to recognize him, his voice was unmistakably his! Dennis Hopper is the leader of this gang who kidnaps a girlfriend (Chris Noel) of a rival gang member left for dead. Jody McCrea-son of legendary star Joel McCrea-is that rival gang member. Another Hollywood son that appears is Lindsay Crosby-offspring of Bing. He eventually killed himself in 1989. This movie was quite cheezy and cringe-inducing, especially whenever Ms. Noel nearly gets raped, but never boring, that's for sure! Oh, and Ms. Noel wasn't the only gorgeous blonde here, get a load of Astrid Warner when she strips to her bikini! As for Kasem, he's quite amusing whenever his familiar voice says such unintelligible lines! So on that note, The Glory Stompers is worth a look.

Dennis Hopper is lost to us now, so his film legacy should be presented and preserved to the best of the studio system's capability.That's why I'm shocked and saddened that The Glory Stompers has still not been released on DVD, even in the current climate of biker-schlock appreciation.The corporation or individual owning the film's rights should hasten to make it available to lovers of sixties films in general, and Dennis Hopper fans in particular.Is this terrible oversight related to the fact that MGM is up for sale, a situation which has prevented the production of more 007 worthlessness? And more importantly, kept CHiPs season 3 from being released on DVD? Where's Ted Turner when you need him? As Mr. Hopper might say in The Glory Stompers, "Like hey, YEAH, man, I mean, this is like, really important, OK?"

Ah, the life of a bikie is a difficult one, especially when you have to choose between gangs like the Glory Stompers and the Black Souls. The Stompers have Pony, young, blond, bronzed and muscly, but those teeth are just a bit too brilliant. The Black Souls have some really ugly members, but also Clean-Cut, who fills out his jeans nicely and wear some fiendishly cool shades. Whose side would you be on?