Your 2018 Junesploitation Primer

by Patrick Bromley

Everything you need for the most insane month of the year!

Tomorrow kicks off our sixth annual Junesploitation, our month-long celebration of exploitation and genre movies. I'm so excited I can barely sleep!

This year more than any other year, I'm going to have to work extra hard to get in as much Junesploitation viewing as I would like because it's a crazy month for a bunch of reasons. That means I'm depending on living vicariously through so many of you! My favorite part of this whole month is always getting to see what other people are watching for the first time and how it does or does not affect them. So if you're participating, please let us know what you're watching!

Many of you have already made your lists and even published them in some cases, which is awesome. The level of excitement we see online for this goofy made-up holiday is genuinely awesome and makes the whole thing so much more fun. If you aren't yet sure what you want to watch -- or you aren't sure what certain categories mean (there was some debate about "Heavy Metal," but it just means movies in which heavy metal music plays a role) -- this primer should hopefully help you explore the weird and wonderful world of exploitation movies.

As mentioned in the original Junesploitation announcement, there are a ton of streaming services from which to choose titles: Shudder, Full Moon Streaming, Exploitation.TV, Brown Sugar, Shout! Factory TV, plus free sites that have large libraries like TubiTV, as well as the usual Netflix (which is pretty worthless for anything but Netflix-produced content these days, though some newer horror films can be found there), Hulu and Amazon Prime Instant Video, a true GOLD MINE with hundreds of kung fu, horror and exploitation films available in their library. Also check out Shaw Brothers Universe, which is a great resource to tell you where hundreds of amazing kung fu films are available to stream. The Grindhouse Cinema Database offers hundreds of titles broken up by genre, so that one's good if you're ever feeling stuck on a certain category.

Probably the best place to look for recommendations (if you need them; again, many of you appear to already have your lists in place) is in the reviews posted during the last five Junesploitations, which can be found here, here, here, here and here.

As always, we're providing a collection of links (below) that will take you to some recommendations of titles from each day's category. If you're new to Junesploitation, please remember that you do not need to watch a movie off of any of these lists (except for the ones with a finite number of titles like Scream Factory or John Saxon). These are just here to give you some ideas, but you're free to pick any movie you want that you feel fits into a given category.

Remember, the whole point is it have an awesome time and watch a lot of movies, so be sure to make it fun for yourself and watch what you want to watch.

Friday, June 1 - Revenge!
Saturday, June 2 - Zombies!
Sunday, June 3 - Scream Factory!
Monday, June 4 - '80s Comedy!
Tuesday, June 5 - Blaxploitation!
Wednesday, June 6 - John Saxon!
Thursday, June 7 - Free Space!
Friday, June 8 - '80s Action!
Saturday, June 9 - Italian Horror!
Sunday, June 10 - Westerns!
Monday, June 11 - Cars!
Tuesday, June 12 - Beach!
Wednesday, June 13 - Empire Pictures!
Thursday, June 14 - Monsters!
Friday, June 15 - Free Space!
Saturday, June 16 - Kung fu!
Sunday, June 17 - Fulci! (Lucio Fulci Birthday Tribute)
Monday, June 18 - High School!
Tuesday, June 19 - Demons and Ghosts!
Wednesday, June 20 - Sci-Fi!
Thursday, June 21 - Free space!
Friday, June 22 - Slashers!
Saturday, June 23 - Cops!
Sunday, June 24 - Heavy Metal!
Monday, June 25 - Roger Corman!
Tuesday, June 26 - Lethal Ladies!
Wednesday, June 27 - Canuxploitation!
Thursday, June 28 - Free Space!
Friday, June 29 - Mosploitation! (Mustache-sploitation [Pure Cinema Tribute])
Saturday, June 30 - '80s Horror!