Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

We here at the FCU exist in almost complete anonymity.  There are reasons for this, possibly because we suck at what we do, but we all know that this isn’t close to remotely possible since we’re awesome.  No sir, we here at the FCU are fairly single-minded in focus.  We don’t have news stories, we don’t do interviews, we don’t have give-aways and the site is almost completely devoid of any kind of advertising.  This place exists only to talk about movies, and the overwhelming majority of these movies on this site are movies that the overwhelming majority of people on the Planet Earth have never heard of.  Sure, there’s a review of ‘The Avengers on this site, but there are 12,000 reviews of The Avengers to choose from, and nobody is really coming here to read what we think about that.  This brings us to today’s movie ‘Alien Private Eye’ from 1987.  Seen by pretty much nobody, heard of by pretty much nobody, and reviewed by pretty much nobody.  Even the people that made it have forgotten about it.  Why is this?  Because it’s AWFUL!!!  But this is where we live, and to be honest with you, we kind of like the neighborhood.

Nikki Fastinetti, in his only listed role, is Lemro.  We open with Lemro in his completely 80’s white slick suit, replete with a pimp hat with a white stripe, a suit so 80’s that even Michael Jackson wouldn’t have worn it, pimp walking down the street like J.T. in Saturday Night Fever.  Suddenly a blond beauty rushes past him, pursued by some bad dudes.  They have her in bad way but Lemro shows up with his mad kung fu skills and saves her life. 

Grateful, Rene (Brenda Winston) goes back to Lemro’s crib, where Lemro turns on his stereo, while spinning, and starts dancing.  Lemro really likes to dance.  They go to the club and dance some more.  Lemro has this woman mesmerized by his moves, until the bad dudes bust up in the club to get something they really want from this woman.  He kicks their asses, takes Rene back to his house where they get down to the sexing… with Lemro still wearing his pimp hat.  I was thinking he was just a playa like that, but when Rene took off his hat and saw his pointy ears, she was shocked.  Not shocked enough to

stop the stroke, because apparently Lemro is really good at above the neck love making, but she was shocked enough to skate out of there in the morning.  Yup, Lemro is an alien from the Planet Stits, and he’s also a Private Eye on the Planet Earth.  Because he likes to meet people.  It’s complicated.

But what do they want from this woman?  Apparently she has one half of a black disk that originally came from Lemro’s planet.  Also looking for this are a couple of folks from back home in Elektra (Leanne Lee) and Scama (John Alexander).  Scama tells Lemro it’s a thermo nuclear device, but Lemro has his doubts about both of his fellow planet-mates sincerity.

This now leads us to the movies heavy, the completely awesome character of Kilgore (Cliff Aduddell).  Kilgore also wants the black disk, but not because it’s thermo nuclear, but because it’s the catalyst for a killer drug he’s producing called Soma, the most addictive drug ever.  Just so you know, the Thermonuclear thing was way cooler than the drug angle.  Regardless, Kilgore is running low on Soma and he’s needs the disk for his plan to take over the drug trade, but not if Lemro has anything to say about it, plus Lemro’s in love.  Thing is Rene wants to get to know him better before she commits.  Sure, she’s already screwed him, but it was the eighties. 

A showdown looms, with the fate of the world… not really… and true love… kind of… in the balance.  Awesomeness will ensue.

How transcendent was ‘Alien Private Eye’, arguably one of the ten worst movies ever made?  Endlessly transcendent.  Eventually we learned that Kilgore is like a Nazi or something, since he has a picture of Hitler on the wall of his office, but his best friend was a Black guy.  That kind of makes Kilgore the worst Nazi ever.  Admittedly he ended up killing the brother, but that was due to the man’s sudden rush of a conscience, and had nothing to do with his race.  Also, watch Kilgore push the papers off his desk in anger after discovering his half of the disk was gone.  I was just wondering what were those papers since Kilgore didn’t look like a ‘paperwork’ kind of guy in between the raping, injecting and murdering.  He also prayed to Hitler to help him after he did this.  Hitler the deity is a new one for me.  Then there was actor John Alexander channeling the ghost of Peter Lorre with his vocal intonations.  Another great thing about this movie was Lemro’s wardrobe as he wore some of the weirdest eighties stuff that the eighties had offer.  Not to mention his hair which was an unholy hybrid of a gerri curl / afro / mullet.  And lest we forget Kilgore’s secret weapon, his acid spitting gold tooth.  Note to self… when designing secret weapons, make sure they don’t involve placing reservoirs of acid in my mouth. 

But while ‘Alien Private Eye’ is a movie that keeps giving and giving and giving, it is still a horrible movie.  Mad love for Nikki Fastinetti, who looks like he could pass for Richard Greico’s older brother… that’s a compliment, honest… he’s also Greico’s less talented brother.  That being said, next to Cliff Aduddell’s Kilgore he was looking a like Al Pacino by comparison.  Kilgore all by his lonesome makes this movie worth watching.  Overall, acting is not a strong point in this film.  Nor is dialog.  Or logic.  Or Action.  Or Plot.  Or cinematography.  This could’ve been a byproduct of the lousy VHS print of this movie I saw, but if director Vic Rubenfeld, going by the lone moniker of ‘Viktor’ in this, wanted to shine an extra light on a scene or two, I wouldn’t have been mad at him.

All that being said, if you can get ahold of this movie, then do it.  Immediately.  I’d let you siphon off of my copy but the film starts with this threatening disclaimer describing all the mean things the company, which I’m sure has to be out of business by now, would do to me if I let anybody watch it.  Even for free.  But get this movie, put it on for your girlfriend or boyfriend, and if they get up and leave before it’s over… then they are not for you.  Unless you got up and left first.  Then you might be soulmates .  ‘Alien Private Eye’…  incompetent, lousy, poor, terrible, but 100% of rock solid awesome. 

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