Guilty Pleasures / Anamorphic (1.85:1) and Standard (1.33:1) / color / 71 minutes / 81 minutes

Filmmaker Ray Dennis Steckler has to be either the laziest guy in the business or a genius who just doesn’t give a damn.

When he’s interviewed about his craft he speaks of Antonioni, documentary film, and waxes nostalgic about drive-ins and grindhouses. Stecker, who taught film-making at UNLV, and is best known for his musical, INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES THAT STOPPED LIVING AND BECAME MIXED-UP ZOMBIES, obviously knows his stuff. But when he makes movies, he does it on the cheap, and they aren’t often that good, even by the lowest of standards.

Steckler’s films are ugly, brash and poorly made. They defy conventions of proper film-making, yet there is something endearing lurking behind it all — something that makes me want to pick up a cheap camera and hit the streets with a small, dedicated crew and make a good bad movie.

No doubt that’s exactly how Steckler made THE HOLLYWOOD STRANGLER MEETS THE SKID ROW SLASHER and its sequel, THE LAS VEGAS SERIAL KILLER.

STRANGLER is probably the superior of the two films because it offers an intriguing dichotomy between its two parallel killers: grimy Frenchman Pierre Agostino as the unnamed Strangler and the darkly attractive Carolyn Brandt as the Slasher.

The Strangler’s hang-up is that he can’t experience sexual satisfaction unless he’s squeezing the life out of a victim — in this case, a near endless supply of photography models/prostitutes hired out of the pages of sex circulars and newspapers. He uses the act of photography to gain arousal, then finishes the deed with murder. Then he goes home, pets his dogs and pigeons, drinks liquor and repeats. Over and over.

Brandt’s character is the lonely proprietor of a used book store in the sleaziest area of Sunset Strip. Her problem is also sexual in nature; perhaps she’s a victim of sexual abuse herself. She takes issue with the drunks that come and go near her shop, then enacts switchblade justice in the back alleys.

The dual killers operate in the same neighborhood. The Strangler sees Brandt as “different” from the topless whores and flirts that he murders. He believes she could even fall in love with him. Conversely, the Slasher sees Agostino and perhaps understands his weakness.

For nearly 90 minutes, Steckler offers up copious nudity and a high body count, with both Brandt and Agostino knocking off their share of victims, before finally confronting each other. What happens next is hardly a surprise considering the film’s soul-sucking repetition, and therein lies the film’s major problem. The same thing happens over and over and over with no character development. It’s just one strangulation after another with an overdubbed Agostino muttering “Die garbage!” again and again.

STRANGLER wasn’t shot with synchronous sound, so everything is dubbed. Steckler himself has said he always envisioned the film as a silent work, interspersed with diegetic street noise. It definitely could have worked within that constraint. What else works? The location. Steckler’s use of the filthy streets of Santa Monica, rife with sex shops, peep shows and winos, is brilliant documentary film-making that captures the grime of the era.

LAS VEGAS SERIAL KILLER follows the same model as STRANGLER, minus Brandt and her fabulous gams. Instead, we get two scumbags who crawl out of a trashy motel and slither into Las Vegas for a weekend of debauchery. The duo spend most of their time gawking at tourists, cruising the strip, visiting attractions and looking for victims to mug.

Agostino returns to reprise his role as the sexually challenged photographer (if you’ve seen STRANGLER, you’ll know that a sequel was probably impossible, but hell, it’s the movies). This time around, Agostino’s character has a name, Jonathan Klick, and we learn he was jailed six years earlier for his killing spree. Via a legal loophole, he’s getting out and heading to Las Vegas. Agostino looks older, but still wears the crusty denim leisure suit he sported in STRANGLER!

Klick visits a strip club where he ogles a few busty women, obtains a Nikon, then begins strangling women again. Meanwhile the scumbag duo steal purses from tourists and wander in and out of buffets and casinos looking for action.

Like STRANGLER, the scumbags will eventually cross fateful paths with Klick, resulting in a surprisingly nihilistic ending (However, there may still be room for another sequel… Mr. Steckler, make it a trilogy please!)

VEGAS isn’t as violent as STRANGLER, but it’s still a nice piece of sleaze cinema. The film succeeds the same way STRANGLER did, in preserving the historical record of the era during which it was made. The Vegas Strip and Fremont Street circa 1987, are incredibly different from the family-friendly atmosphere of today’s Sin City. It’s actually a treat seeing the old billboards advertising Wayne Newton and David Copperfield, and the gaudy facades of The Sands, Barbary Coast and Binion’s. Steckler’s camera lovingly gazes upon them all.

Keep an ear out for the hilarious banter between the two purse snatchers. They visit a rodeo (What IS it with rodeos in Steckler movies?), stare at women, go to an airplane show — all the while offering wonderfully banal commentary.

Steckler’s style in both movies hearkens back to the pre-porn “roughies” of the 1960s. Think Doris Wishman, perhaps not as polished, but with that same weird non-synch sound and stream-of-conscious scripting.

Both pictures are presented by Guilty Pleasures, which is an arm of Media Blasters. They look decent, although VEGAS is a full-frame transfer. Each disc contains an insightful commentary track from Steckler, interview featurettes and trailers. The VEGAS disc contains two of Steckler’s “lost” films, FACE OF EVIL and SLASHED. STRANGLER includes a Joe Bob Briggs commentary and intro as well.

Both pictures get three stars from me: “That’s Choice!” Check out a trailer for THE HOLLYWOOD STRANGLER MEETS THE SKID ROW SLASHER below!