"Brad, you've got to pound me like a tough steak."
 
In a time when American youth need heroes (or so they keep telling us), teenage sleaze beasts should look no further than Fred Olen Ray. The astonishingly prolific filmmaker/author/wrestler has been grinding out low-budget horror and exploitation films since the late '70s (in fact, two of his earliest features, 1982's Scalps and 1979's The Alien Dead, have just been released in deluxe DVD editions by Fred's label, Retromedia), and thirty years later, he's still making '50s-style monster and nudie movies like Bikini Airways on the budget allotted for craft services on most mainstream productions. Why? Because he loves doing it, plain and simple, and his affection for bargain genre filmmaking is more than evident in his latest feature, Curse of the Erotic Tiki. The story is as dumb as a bag of wet cement - square chick Janet (Beverly Lynne) turns into a sexual wildcat when goofball boyfriend Brad (Eric Warren) unknowingly gives her a cursed tiki necklace - but the point of making a movie called Curse of the Erotic Tiki isn't to create challenging drama or original characters or crackling dialogue. No, the point is to show lots of tits and ass, and you can call Fred Mr. Postman, 'cause he delivers the goods here.
 
Granted, much of said bits have been inflated and resculpted by the finest of the San Fernando Valley medical community, so if you're a 'natural' man, your only oasis is Ms. Lynne's pert B-cups. The rest of the female cast - B-smut regular Nikki Fritz as a dragon lady in pursuit of the idol, and Stacy Burke and Cailey Taylor as Brad's horny co-workers at the Bikini-A-Go-Go store - are all sporting some impressive silicon buttresses, which get aired out every fifteen minutes or so to participate in some softcore fucking (the bump n' grind is on pair with your average Cinemax late-nighter). Oh, and in case you happen to step away from the tube in order to get some pretzels or take a leak, Fred has thoughtfully introduced a miraculous new gimmick - the "Hooter Horn", which sounds off every time one of the ladies drops her top. Pure genius, that, and the mark of a man who loves his job, without a doubt.
 
Extra points all around, really, but points-plus for: Fred's amusing introduction to the Hooter Horn; FOR regular Jay Richardson as the pipe-smoking narrator, who frequently breaks into the scene to offer educational movie-style psychobabble ("The sex impulse is like a fiery horse!"); clips from Teenage Zombies and Night of the Blood Beast (which, incidentally, are also available on DVD from Retromedia - nice plug, Fred); and the opening credits, which roll over an impressive bout of go-go-dancing by Stacy Burke (who's cute as a fucking button). Image's DVD includes the original trailer and an option to watch the movie without the Hooter Horn (I can't imagine why you'd do that, though). In these troubled times, isn't it reassuring to know that there are men like Fred Olen Ray who remain dedicated to the all-American pursuit of providing people with cheap, smutty and enjoyable movies? We salute you, sir.
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