The Hellcats

I watched this travesty of a movie on MST3K and I can tell you, even Joel and the robots can't save this mess of a movie. The movie starts with a little blurt of a plot about an undercover police officer who gets killed. The killed officer's brother and wife decide to infiltrate a biker gang to find who killed the officer. This all takes about 15 minutes to set up. The next hour will be filled by terrible "motorcycle riding" scenes (definate filler) a pointless booze, drug, orgy type thing, a stupid booze, drug, orgy picnic, a motorcycle race (where you don't get to see the race, just the spectators), a fight scene that may well have been choreagraphed by a retarded todler and finally a teensy bit of resolution for the "plot". The only thing I could think about during this movie is how much I wanted some of the copious amounts of booze they were inhaling, it would have made the movie hurt less.

It's worth watching if you feel like getting very drunk and laughing, but for just straight watching it's no Space Mutiny or Gamera.

"No, I can't take a chance... ....I'm losing my baby!!"

Just an example of the splendid music you will hear in this one. Obviously, a low budget clunker, Hellcats gives viewers the ability to perceive the world through drug addled, alcohol fueled eyes. Like a nightmare, Ross "chili peppers still burn my gut" Hagen does his best work almost rivaling his role as Rommel...and that's NOT a compliment!

Not much plot or story, acting needed here. Just pay the actors in booze and narcotics, add jovial characters like Six Pack, Cyclops, Hiney ("Hiney cubed it again") and you have further brain cell eradication. Watch the performances here...you can't act this dazed and confused folks...they really got ripped for this one and we got a camera, HEY, let's film it!

I really thought Wild Rebels was bad, Ross Hagen will have you wishing for Steve Alaimo anytime. However, there's more madcap fun in this one than in Sidehackers (ugh!). Don't miss the music and dancing!

"NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!!" <--- actual song from Hellcats

Before watching the MST3K version, I prepared myself to watch the original trailer and uncut version on the same DVD. The movie proper is meandering concerning plot, dialogue, and especially action scenes especially when a bike race is only heard while we're seeing close-up after close-up of what seems like bored spectators. There's also a couple of drunken/stoned orgy scenes that was probably the main reason for The Hellcats existence. You see some excitement at the end but by that time you'll simply be glad when it's all over. So unless you're curious about these late '60s drive-in fare, I wouldn't recommend this movie. Just the MST3K version will do for me which I'm going to review next...

This incredibly shoddy 60's biker flick is a real mess. It features Ross Hagen as a man who infiltrates a bike gang called The Hellcats in order to find out who killed his brother. The plot has about as much focus as the blurry camera-work. It's all over the place. Random events sometimes happen for no discernible reason, for example, the scene where the artist and his model are attacked by bikers doesn't seem to have any relevance to anything. On the other hand, when a potentially half-interesting moment is about to happen, it's not shown at all; like when the bike race between to two gang leaders happens off-screen, wow the excitement. The scenes with The Hellcats are pretty sloppy in general and often just seem to consist of them muntering around while the psychedelic pop of the never-popular Davey Jones and the Dolphins plays endlessly in the background. The theme tune may nefariously make its way into your subconscious, so please beware. Despite the presence of authentic looking bikers, this is not exactly convincing stuff. When Ross Hagen first meets The Hellcats, he wins their respect by defeating their leader by simply pushing him over. I'm not certain that manoeuvre would've worked with The Hell's Angels to be perfectly honest but hey this is the movies eh? Our gang do incorporate some harder initiation rituals however, such as the strange limb stretching procedure so fair play but, sadly, they also have a member who goes around annoyingly playing a bugle at every given opportunity, so less respect on that score.

At the end of the day this film is all over the place. The camera-work is out-of-focus and badly framed, with peoples heads often off-screen. The acting is really terrible. The story is badly put together. And the action scenes are terribly presented (you would be forgiven for not even noticing when The Hellcat leader is shot, it's so shoddily done). Overall, it wasn't all that entertaining and can only be described as a truly Z-Grade counter-culture clunker.

The folks behind "MST3K" must love the fact that there are so many bad movies, as it gives them material for their show. "The Hellcats" is one such movie. This muddled story about a biker gang getting revenge for someone's murder is about as coherent as lava is cold. The movie's whole purpose seems to be showing off buxom women wearing tight clothes. The dance numbers are meaningless, the motorcycle-riding scenes drag on for too long, and the dialog is incomprehensible. Oh, and there's also some blonde women whose reason for existence is to wear bikinis. So, it only makes sense that Joel, Servo and Crow had a great time mocking this movie, as they did with another Ross Hagen movie ("The Sidehackers"). Dreadful.