Hell Comes to Frogtown (1988)
A new breed of enemy has taken over the world... Sam Hell has come to take it back.
Hey eighties, it’s been a while. Have you been good? Oh what, you’ve got something staring a wrestler, frog mutants, and plenty of raunchy fun like only the eighties could give? Well, I mean, I don’t want to be rude so I guess we better watch it right? Oh, it’s not a bluray copy, so it’s probably going to be a little bit smoothed out by the player? That’s okay eighties, we’ll survive as long as this bone you brought me isn’t explosive. Tonight’s entry might not be super high class cinema - but heck, even the trailer I saw for it makes no claims at being such. Set your sensibilities aside and insert your Rowdy Roddy, tonight Hell Comes to Frogtown.
I know it’s been a long time since anyone has considered The Rock to be a wrestler, but wrestlers in movies go way back. Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, and probably the cult icon-iest of them all Roddy Piper. You know him from They Live the most probably, but he’s other movies like tonight’s entry as well. Boy oh boy, is this a movie. Look, before we even get into plot or effects or anything else, let’s break this down. This movie is my jam - movies like this have been my jam ever since I feel in love with dudes dressed in giant monster suits busting up obviously toy tanks with bad dubbing. Sure, this might stray into my more adult sensibilities than those ever have - as much as I love me some kaiju flicks, it’s not super common to have skin exposure floating about in them in suggestive ways. As such, this movie isn’t going to be for everyone - things might be put together surprisingly well, but there’s this level of B movie that permeates plenty of moments (and I don’t really mean in budget) that some people just can’t stand by. Me, a couple of nipples and some suggestive humor or situations don’t bug me - if anything it can be a bonus, if it’s not taken to the idiot levels that something like Scary Movie could be found to do. So yes, although the sexually charged premise and roughly one clear shot and some sheer-cloth lady tops are perfectly fine for me, understand that it is rated R for a reason, and that reason isn’t just frog violence - it’s getting 'rowdy.
Plot-wise it’s perhaps not mind blowing, but somewhat fun with how it does things. See, we have a “the world got nuked, they were dumb and nuked it again” plot that leaves the male-female population heavily skewed towards women, creates plenty of mutated bipedal sentient creatures that may or may not have once been human, and left a quite large portion of the populations infertile. What this sets up is that baby-making becomes this sort of important thing, and the government - run by women - is found to take control of things like that. When our main male lead is found to be incredibly fertile in the baby making department, they step in and his junk essentially becomes property of the government. When this is happening, the local mutant reservation decides to take some fertile ladies captive with no real reason given, and the Med Tech (the government) sends in a two woman rescue squad with their recently acquired baby-maker to support in the rescue (and the whole procreation thing, which when given as a side-ways plan really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but who am I to judge). Of course, complications and shenanigans arrive, and the actual rescue part of the story takes a while to get to while you go through the setup and three-person team interactions.
Now, if you haven’t gathered, there’s a lot of suggested sexual nature here. Yeah, there’s a couple “sexy dances” in there, and one lonely solder who exposes her lovely top-self to the camera - and yet, perhaps oddly, there’s actually a surprising lack of explicit content being shown on screen. It might be implied there’s some baby making going on off screen or after a cut, there’s plenty of referencing to it - I mean, heck, the plot revolves around finding fertile people to get breeding - yet you really don’t see a whole lot that one would consider offensive (assuming of course that it’s act that’s offensive, and not the talking or referencing of it, in which case you got me there). Of course, there’s some prime shirtless Rowdy Roddy in there for the ladies or dudes disposed that way - and a comedic cod-piece through most the movie. So really , on paper it’s very silly - heck, watching it in action is very silly, they aren’t lying about the comedy in the genre tag.
Now, where this all gets surprising is at the philosophically charged potential of the movie. Here we are in the hay-day of the extreme, and we have a movie that gives us a ruined world now run by women. These aren’t the super generic “help me men” women either - these are militaristic kick-your but Vasquez kind of women - well, alright, except the passives. Passives are pretty wet blanket. So you’ve got a bunch of strong women, you don’t nearly have as much sleeze skin-show as (at the very least I) expected from the premise with such an emphasis on breeding. Yeah, there are moments of “save the lady” - but funnily enough, at the same time the main lady lead is having a “save me” moment, the main dude is also having a “save me” moment and needs a lady to come to the rescue! I mean, I’ll be real - any bonus points it gains that any pro-ladies might have is probably immediately lost by any of the sexy dance scenes or the one scene of boobs hanging out, but whatever man, credit where credit is due. Of course, there’s always the whole racism angle you could look at with the interactions between the mutants and humans if you wanted - considering both treat the others like garbage, and the fact that the mutants are rounded up in reservations. Oh, and the little moments of “sexism” you could pick up on like the main dude not wanting to run around in a big pink battle-wagon. I mean, you could have a stinking field day diving into this if you really wanted to - but at the same time, I - who doesn’t think too hard into things - still can just sit back and enjoy the nonsense going on in the screen and not feel bothered by any of these things, and could almost even argue that all of that depth might not even be intentional and just a by product of my modern mind over-thinking stuff.
Less to overthink is the effects. Mixed bag, as the age might imply - The DVD doesn’t have too much degradation in it, far less than the trailer I found to get pictures from (I’m sorry, the pictures attached to the review are kind crap and don’t really do the movie any justice). Some things - like when people get shot - aren’t exactly the best looking effect. Other things, like the amphibian heads look great! Yes, I was surprised at just how much moved and articulated in the masks - but I was also somewhat disappointing in the at times terrible mouth-dubbing to go with the masks trying to talk. I won’t be too hard on it, a lot of movies with practical masks like that don’t have great lip syncing, but it’s particularly noticeable on the boss frog at one point. Costumes in turn also get to have fun here - on multiple fronts! We get plenty of the wastelander style get up - gas masks, chains, things cobbled together, a car howitzer and the pretty pink war machine. We also get some snazzy military themed outfits in our resident Vasquez of the movie, but also plenty of over-sexed garb like sheer silky looking getups on the passives, giant bomb-rigged cod piece, and frilly camouflaged undergarments. Oh, there’s also a dude that looks like an old timey cowboy miner in there, and a sexy dancing frog lady that I assume is sexy because I’ve got a similar feeling to Roddy’s character toward the situation but she seems to be a hit with all the other frogs. It doesn’t nearly feel as low budget as anything about the movie would imply, and I love that.
Audio is balanced well, and there’s a few songs that might stick with you. I mean, that’s not entirely true - there’s one song that’s a take on something we’ve probably all heard at some point that I can’t quite remember but I know I know the tune, something or someone marching home or the likes. Beyond that, the audio is fine albeit not quite as great as the effects. Acting is done decent enough - and really probably the largest part that feels sort of B movie. I mean, it’s not really bad, but it’s also not so great that it isn’t often comedic somewhat unintentionally. The lady lead who plays a very hard stuck-up scientist angle is the prime example there, but the “I don’t want to be a sex toy” despite breeding a crap ton of people man lead isn’t really too crazily far from her - except a lot of his moments are played intentionally for comedy. At best I would say charming, at worst I would say alright. Of course, there is a few times where frog voices won’t quite sync up to the mouths, but outside of that things sound pretty fine.
What a wild movie. The fact that the name is essentially exactly what the movie is about - the main guy is named Sam Hell, and he goes to Frogtown - is not lost on me. It’s goofy, it’s a bit raunchy, and it’s probably something that a lot of people would find things to complain about today. Still, I had some fun watching this, and who doesn’t want a boss fight between Rowdy Roddy and a big boss frog man? I mean, look, if you’ve read the rest of the review at this point this sum up isn’t going to do anything more - you already know if this is something to pop a beverage and slot in or not. If you’re like me, you’ll have fun - if your preferences skew a bit more “clean family friendly” then it’s not going to be for you. What it really goes to show you is that more movies need a Vasquez character, and shirtless dudes are apparently never going to go out of stock.