By Dennis Harvey

EVERY DAY MOVIES become a little more McDonaldized, offering the same few variations on one burger the world round. And every day natural contrarians and other people of taste grow more nostalgic for the good-bad old days, when at least trash had personality. For some of us, this cultural crisis means less time spent at the multiplex, more time spent searching for yesteryear's more aromatic crapsterpieces. Why, just last week in Memphis, where there's not much else to do beyond Graceland, I was diving for video store sale-offs and came up with something called Hot Summer in Barefoot County ('70s Southern T&A), the self-explanatory Chesty Anderson U.S. Navy ("Nobody Exposes the Big Guns Like She Does!"), two – count 'em – two Klaus Kinski obscurities (Twice a Judas, His Name Was King), and Pulsebeat – a rare example of that ultimate '80s animal, the aerobics-musical melodrama. Will these movies make my melancholy existence more bearable? Sweet Jesus yeah, admittedly just as briefly as any drug you can name, but probably with less physiological damage.

Some people take the existential hellscapes of Mr. Deeds and Hayden Christensen far more seriously, however. They actually try to do something about it, to create a living past in which it's all drive-in second feature, all sleazeploitation, all the time. A fair number of them have had their efforts screened locally at various micro-festivals run by Jeff Ross, whose San Francisco Independent Film Festival is now showing indie features year-round for your cocktail-lubricated enjoyment at semi-Tenderloiny Jezebels Joint. And a fair number of those efforts have been by Memphis-based John Michael McCarthy, who professes to be the kahuna (his term, not mine) of BigBroadGuerillaMonster, which professes to be today's leading purveyor of exploitation movies. Is there a market left for old-school exploitation movies? Of course not. Yet just as Peter Pan once bade wee audiences to resuscitate Tinkerbell, I'm pretty willing to clap my hands and say I believe anyhow.

What's up with this guy? He's a once and future alt-comics illustrator who has graduated to movies with the same graphic (all interpretations of that word are relevant) intensity. He appears to be stuck, aesthetically at least, in the 1966 time warp where big hair, breasts, guitars, and garage riffs still hold sway over future love beads, prog rock, Reaganomics, and Mobyhood. In terms of pure style, you can't argue with the man's taste. In terms of cinematic art, he's made some of the most committedly irrelevant hymns to another era's wack-off je ne sais quoi that anyone has bothered to obsess toward realization so far. JMM, we salute you.

Tonight, S.F. Indie's Microcinema plays McCarthy's 2000 B&W epic Superstarlet A.D., an homage to all things cine-Amazonian, from Queen of Outer Space through Russ Meyer to The Rocky Horror Picture Show. It's a postapocalyptic tale of "nudie-cutie" feminist Armageddon, with warring girl gangs (nearly all men have expired) defined by their hair color. Nominal protagonist Naomi (Gina Velour) has a quest that involves searching for her late grandmother's burlesque reel. Meanwhile, the queen of "Femphis" (starlet Kerine Elkins) battles for supremacy with bodacious rivals. Incoherent, lax in storytelling clarity, Superstarlet still entrances with its utter fidelity to '60s bottom-feeding cinematic style. The dialogue is post-synced, often in faux-Swedish accented English (Swedes were the sexploitative It back then – so blond! so nubile! so presumably "European" in sexual mores!). Surf rock instrumentals underscore the thrift-shop cool of crude FX and narrative fuzz. A.D. gives good vibe but only partly realizes the intended mondo-trasho aesthetic.

Coming closer to constant subcultural climax is McCarthy's 1997 The Sore Losers, a lurid color ode to all things Cramps-ish. Lanky sideburned protagonist Blackie (Jack Oblivian of retro Seeds-y band the Oblivians) is a space alien deposited back on planet Earth after a 42-year hoosegow stay for failing to fulfill his original mission. Which was killing 12 beatniks – bohemianism being a major offense to ordinarily violent, crass human society. He couldn't find quite enough of 'em in the '50s South. But now, given the task of killing hippies (the current era's most offending populace) beneath a present-day Mason-Dixon line, he has a surfeit of potential victims. (Phish fans: Don't protest, just move away from the scene, slowly.)

However, Blackie's program is seriously imperiled by the overeager support of Pacer-driving Glamazon Kerine (Elkins again). She'd prefer to kill indiscriminately and damn the governing "Invisible Wavelength" 's strictures on how, when, and how many to off. A wistful romance betwixt flunkie Mike (Mike Maker) and carny motorcycle thrillstress Goliatha (D'Lana Tunnel) further complicates the tragifarcial progress.