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CORRUPTION-1968-Sleazy familiar horror tale features Peter Cushing as a famous surgeon engaged to a equally famous model (Sue Lloyd). Kate O’Mara plays her sister. At a weird swinging party Cushing has a fight with his wife’s photographer and a spotlight falls on her scarring her face. Cushing becomes obsessed with finding a cure and eventually he does when he transplants a gland from a deceased patient into her. It works for a while but when it finally fails the good doc surmises that he needs a gland from a living person. You know the rest of the story. He has to kill to get the gland but it still doesn’t last so he has to kill some more.
Eventually Cushing really loses it and cuts off a women’s head and puts in the freezer and then brutally kills a female houseguest (she was going to be a new victim anyway…). In a strange twist the dead houseguest’s husband and his “gang” show up and terrorize the couple for a few scenes. The whacked out ending features a laser going crazy and everyone dies but when the smoke clears Cushing is still alive and the movie starts all over again!!
I guess the ending was a dream since Cushing’s character mentions to his wife that he slept longer than he wanted to. Either that or he’s in hell reliving his life over…???
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THE IMMORTAL STORY-1968-Orson Welles’ first color film (and second to last directorial effort) is a beautifully shot and narrated story. Welles is very good as Charles Clay, a ruthless Portuguese businessman in 19th century Macao. Growing bored with life he decides to make a sailor’s legend come true by manipulating two people, an innocent sailor (Norman Eshley) and his ex-business partner’s daughter (Jeanne Moreau) into enacting it.
This is an underrated film that is sometimes overlooked but it contains some of Welles the director’s best work. Roger Coggio is Clays’ assistant who helps in the scheme. It's based on a novel by Isak Dinesen.
Moreau was in Truffaut’s THE BRIDE WORE BLACK the same year. Eshley showed up in the George Pal fantasy THE LOST CONTINENT a year later.
Originally made for French TV, it was later released in theaters slightly edited. A new restored version was shown on TCM. Not counting his unfinished projects, Welles would direct and complete only one more film the fascinating F FOR FAKE in 1974.
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GIGANTIC-2003-This is an interesting documentary on the band THE MIGHT BE GIANTS but it won't mean much unless you're a fan (which I am).
Concert footage is shown (a couple of songs in their entirety) and the two Johns (Flansburgh & Linnell) talk about their music and each other. They seem to like playing together! Interviews with people who've worked them (including Joe Franklin and Frank Black) are also included. Scenes from their rarely seen (nowdays anyway) videos are also shown. Some time is wasted having well known fans (I guess...) like Andy Richter, Harry Shearer and Michael McKean recite TMBG lyrics. The late Illinois senator Paul Simon introduces the film making me think at first I had the wrong tape in!
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