Howard Dayton Movies

Low-budget and cheap, the sci-fi adventure Space Raiders liberally raided Star Wars and the previous Roger Corman film Battle Beyond the Stars for scenes of special effects once, twice, three times, and more. The story, also cribbed from Star Wars is about a Col. Hawkins or "Hawk" (Vince Edwards) who has to defeat the "Company" and their massive robot ship in order to bring a young boy back to his home planet. A Star Wars bar scene has a space creature hooker looking great until she turns around and shows her face. Aside from the familiar content in this film, there are continuity gaps that make wounds miraculously jump from one side of the body to the other and do not connect the special effects in space with the space travelers inside the ships. Perhaps the title should have been "Spacy Raiders." ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A race horse goes berserk in its stable, trampling a jockey to death. Though it looks like a tragic accident, Quincy (Jack Klugman) suspects a murder has been committed--especially since he'd previously witnessed a heated argument between the victim and another jockey. In a typically unorthodox move, Quincy performs an autopsy on the "killer" horse, and in the process uncovers a crooked conspiracy involving the illegal application of amphetamines at the racetrack. Real-life jockey Chris McCarron appears in a supporting role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A teenager tries to win the girl of his dreams with the hottest van in town in this '70s sex comedy. Bobby (Stuart Goetz) has just graduated from high school, but he's too preoccupied with girls to think much about his future. Bobby hasn't had much luck with the ladies, and he's convinced it's because of his lack of cool wheels, so after months of slaving at a car wash owned by Andy (Danny DeVito), he blows the money he'd been saving for college on a down payment on his dream machine: a canary yellow custom Dodge van, a bachelor pad on wheels complete with mirrored ceiling, 8-track stereo, television monitors, and (natch) a waterbed. Bobby turns his attentions to class hottie Sally (Connie Lisa Marie), who happens to be dating ill-tempered bully Dugan (Steve Oliver), while his buddy Jack urges him to date the more available Sue (Marcie Barkin), who's friends with his girlfriend, Tina (Deborah White). Andy uses the car wash as a front for his bookmaking business, and when a few bets don't go his way, he asks Bobby to lend him some money. Bobby gives Andy the cash he'd earmarked for his next payment on the van, but when Andy can't pay him back, Bobby's new van may be soon be in the hands of the repo man. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

"Consider the possibilities," read the ads for Paul Mazursky's 1969 satirical comedy about what happens when the sexual revolution hits affluent bourgeois life. After a weekend of "beautiful" emotional honesty at an Esalen-type retreat, married wannabe hipsters Bob (Robert Culp) and Carol (Natalie Wood) return to their well-heeled Los Angeles life determined to apply the principles of free love and complete openness to their marriage. To the respective curiosity and repulsion of their married best friends, Ted (Elliott Gould) and Alice (Dyan Cannon), Bob and Carol have affairs that they happily reveal to everyone. Inspired by all that openness during the quartet's trip to Vegas, Ted admits an affair of his own, provoking the outraged Alice to demand that this new ethos be taken to its obvious conclusion: a mate-sharing foursome. Once they're bedded down and ready to go, however, they start to have second thoughts. Without sacrificing authenticity for comedy, first-time director Mazursky and co-writer/producer Larry Tucker delve into the confusion of the Eisenhower generation when faced with the temptations of the counterculture. Too old to be hippies and too young to be fogies, the would-be California swingers sincerely attempt to try on the lifestyle, but it never looks quite right. A then-controversial example of the New Permissiveness both onscreen and off, Bob & Carol debuted at the New York Film Festival to great praise, particularly for Gould and Cannon. Whether they wanted to laugh at their elders' faux looseness or see what their peers might be doing, audiences turned Bob & Carol into a substantial hit, and its observations about marriage and sex remain humorously sharp even if the encounter group jargon is past its vogue. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

Slipping along an ill-defined track between seriousness, subtle farce, and all-out slapstick, this sci-fi comedy-drama by director Irvin S. Yeaworth, Jr. (The Blob, 1958) would be entertaining enough for the moppet set and highly amusing in many spots for adults as well. What sets the ball rolling is that a tyrannosaurus rex, a brontosaurus, and a neolithic man are brought back to life from their prehistoric world. As desperate leaders of the modern world try their best to kill off the carnivorous tyrannosaurus rex, the caveman is receiving high-voltage culture shock from the "civilization" he encounters all around him. One sequence has him coming face to face with a woman in full make-up -- and both go screaming off in terror. Gregg Martell is the confused Neanderthal, Julio (Alan Roberts) is a boy who tries to make friends with the brontosaurus, and Mike Hacker (Fred Engelberg) is the requisite villain. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide