The Slams

THE SLAMS-1973-"Why'd ya do Curtis? Ya know you can't mess with the man".  Jim Brown is Curtis Hook who's thrown in jail after a botched robbery. The mob has put a contract out on him because he took drugs and money from them in the robbery. "This shit is crazy" Hook declares after being attacked. 


Ted Cassidy (TV's lovable Lurch on THE ADDAMS FAMILY) is Glover, a sadistic inmate who pours molten metal on a squealer. Frank DeKova (TV's lovable Wild Eagle in F-TROOP) is Capiello, a very mean imprisoned gangster who wants Hook to work for him. Since Hook is sitting on a lot of stolen money everyone is on his case including a corrupt captain (Roland Bob Harris). Added to this he's in between a racial prison war. His girlfriend Iris (Judy Pace) tries to help Hook through Mr. Barney (Paul Harris), a pimp surrounded by several topless women who says what Hook really needs is a "good white Jewish lawyer"! It gets more far fetched as it progresses ending with Hook's big escape and he and Iris living happily ever after on their tainted money. 


This forgotten blaxplotation pic was made the same year as Brown's better known SLAUGHTER'S BIG RIP-OFF. Also with Quinn Redecker (also in SPIDER BABY) as the warden, Dick Miller in a small humorous role as a cab driver, Jan Merlin and John Lupton in one scene. 


Director Jonathan Kaplan made other features like TRUCK TURNER, OVER THE EDGE and HEART LIKE A WHEEL before going into TV (ER, LAW & ORDER). Gene Corman produced this MGM release.


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It's A Drag!

DRAG ME TO HELL-2009-After the commercial success of the Spider-Man series director Sam Raimi returns to EVIL DEAD territory. It was a big hit. 


Christine Brown, a loan officer at a bank (Alison Lohman) denies a  decrepit old woman an extension on the house she is going to be evicted from. The woman puts a curse on her. She spends the rest of the film trying to figure it out. There's a lot of slamming doors, 
laughing, a crazy nosebleed and even a talking goat. Lohman's character gets thrown around a lot but always gets up unharmed. A demon called a "lamia" is coming for her soul. She offers her pet 
kitten as a sacrifice but it doesn't seem to work. The ending is ridiculous. Also with David Paymer, Justin Long and Ted Raimi.


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Demon Seed

DEMON SEED-1977-Computer scientist Alex Harris (the underrated Fritz Weaver) seems obsessed with the computer system that runs his house much to the annoyance of his child psychologist wife Susan (Julie Christie) which puts a strain on their marriage. 


Alex's latest computer project is called Proteus IV which he hopes will help him eradicate diseases like leukemia (which killed The Harris' daughter). He tries to interest various scientists and backers ("Are the proper steps being taken to patent this?" "I have no idea".). A little kid patient throws a tantrum ("It's so god-damn boring here!"). Then when Proteus is allowed to "study man" he begins to disobey his maker's commands and refuses to help in an ocean mining project because it would be bad for the environment. He also takes a liking to Susan and declares that he wants her to have his child! He makes her a prisoner in the house and studies her. ("All that I need to understand, Mrs. Harris, is your body")  


Gerrit Graham plays a nerdy scientist who tries to help rescue Susan but is crushed to death by a giant sphere. Proteus takes cells from Susan and genetically alters them so she will bear his child (in 28 days) and "be whole". There are some interesting 2001 inspired visuals while Susan is studied/violated and Proteus' rational philosophizing voice (un-credited Robert Vaughan) is the real highlight. 


DS upset a lot of critics at the time with it's implications of rape and "computer sex". It's no classic being talky and depressing at times but does hold a certain fascination. Director Donald Cammel seems to walk a fine line but never lets the story descend into parody or unintentional comedy (which it surely could have)and despite some occasional over wrought acting by the stars it remains a serious, eerie Sci-Fi story, based on a novel by Dean Koontz. 


Scottish born Cammell, a former painter, was a screenwriter (THE TOUCHABLES) before making his director debut (co-directing with Nicolas Roeg) with PERFORMANCE in 1970. 10 years after DS he would make his next film WHITE OF THE EYE and in 1995 his last film THE WILD SIDE (which he had his name taken off of). He committed suicide in 1996. 


DS also marks the last role for character actor Berry Kroeger who's career began in the early '40's.


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9

9-2009-In a post-apocalyptic world where machines revolted against man and destroyed everything, little snitched together doll like beings (with  numbers on their backs) inhabit the gigantic ruins. One little renegade, 9 (voice of Elijah Wood) looks for answers and tries to save 2 (voice of Martin Landau) but he accidentally unleashes a machine called The Brain which seems to have been created by a Nazi like leader, The Chancellor. Recent Academy Award winner Christopher Plummer voices 1, the leader of the group who would rather stay in hiding than fight. Jennifer Connelly is 7 and Crispin Glover and John C. Reilly also lend their vocals talents. 


This is a cool animated Sci-Fi fantasy from debuting director Shane Acker who had previously done short films. 


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Horror House

HAUNTED HOUSE OF HORROR-1969-In this British production from Hammer rival Tigon, a group of mod young people in London get bored with their party and decide to go out in a deserted mansion in the countryside.

The group includes their nominal leader Chris (American Frankie Avalon), his girlfriend Sheila (Jill Haworth),two timing hipster Gary (Mark Wynter) and the women he's two timing with Dorothy (Carol Dilworth) and Sylvia (Gina Warwick). Creeping around outside is Inspector Bradley (Dennis Price), the older jilted lover of Sylvia's who still wants them to be a couple. When the group arrives, Richard (Julian Barnes) tells a story of why a ghost haunts the place but they can't decide whether to have coffee, booze, an orgy or a seance'. After Sylvia leaves, Gary is bloodily hacked to death. The murder seems to point at the Inspector (who the rest of the group is unaware of) but Chris convinces the others it could be one of them and they should dispose of the body.

 Hmmmm...?? Suspicious behavoir..no? 

Three days later the police are investigating and the group acts nervous and paranoid. When the inspector goes back to the old house he's killed.The group decides to go back and find clues 
themselves as to who might be the murderer and much time is spend with Chris and Richard debating why a person might kill until it's revealed that Richard is the killer (he's afraid of the dark) 
and poor Beach Blanket Frankie gets stabbed in the crotch! 

This dumb, talky run of the mill horror story was made by writer/director Michael Armstrong who one year later made the more infamous MARK OF THE DEVIL. Avalon had been in the Otto Preminger bomb SKIDOO the year before. Haworth had 
made her film debut in EXODUS and had been in the original Broadway cast of CABERET but by '69 her career was in decline. 

I've always read that the Price role was suppose to be played by Boris Karloff but he became ill (he died in Feb. of '69). Price was 54 at the time (he died in '73 at 58) and I found the older man/younger woman relationship a little strained but Karloff would have been 80 around that time! Obviously (I hope) the role had been re-written! 

Also known as HORROR HOUSE and THE DARK.

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Cosmic Monster (s)

COSMIC MONSTERS-1958-In a rural section of England a group of scientists are working with magnetic fields to alternate the molecular structure of metal. They are lead by the rather brilliant but  pompous Dr. Laird (Alec Mango). His more level headed American assistant is Gil Graham (Forrest Tucker). They both get upset when a French woman Michele (Gaby Andre')  takes the place of an injured co-worker. "But a woman? This is
preposterous. This is highly skilled work!". 

She turns out to be pretty much a genius and the only one who seems to feel something could go wrong. The nearby town  doesn't like them because the experiments mess up their TV broadcasts. After a "freak storm" where they seem to lose control of the magnetic machine, the mysterious Mr. Smith (Martin Benson) appears.Then a tramp with a scarred face kills a woman. It seems the doctors' magnetic experiments have caused harmful cosmic rays to bombard the Earth making insects like grasshoppers and centipedes into monsters. "It's those insects. They've mutated and they're hungry!". 

A bug loving little girl finds a big egg and Michele gets stuck in a spider's web. There's one fairly gory scene (for the time) where the killer insects munch on a dead soldier. Laird goes crazy in the finale threatening the whole Earth and Mr. Smith's real identity is revealed. A PLAN 9 type UFO shows up to help out. This British production's original title was THE WORLD OF PLANET X but in the US it was referred to as THE COSMIC MONSTERS, yet the title card reads COSMIC MONSTER... 

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Beware of The Following Image

BLACK FOREST-2012-In Germany, two geeks, a husband & wife, their baby and nanny and a doctor who has dreams about his dead wife take a "mid-summer's eve" tour. Ben Cross is Cazmar, their cheerful (and spooky) guide. He has them form a circle at a min-Stonehenge type place and a fairy appears. The the couple's baby disappears. 

They find a weird house and the nanny decides to take a nap. She's attacked and eaten by 7 dwarfs. Then a big bad wolf kills one of the geeks. Soon after the wife falls into a coma (like Sleeping Beauty). 

The remaining group meet Karin (Tinsel Korey) who resembles the doc's dead wife. She's actually in league with Cazmar because she was taken by "the people of the hill" (aka: the fair folk) when she was small. They are mad because people stopped believing in them long ago. Now they capture people (especially children) and take vengeance. Cross's performance is very wacky and almost saves this dumb tale. 

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Lupin!

ARSENE LUPIN-1932-Dueling Barrymores! Lionel is a French detective trying to catch the master jewel thief Arsene Lupin. John is the Duke of Charmerace who may actually be Lupin. There's some clever dialogue but the story is rather drawn out. Like many early talkies it suffers from being more like a filmed play. Also with Karen Morley, John Miljan, Tully Marshall and in un-credited roles Mischa Auer and Joe Sawyer.

The Lupin character was created by French author Maurice Leblanc (a contemporary of Arthur Conan Doyle)  in 1905. He wrote several Lupin stories that spawned sequels by other authors, films, a TV show and even an Anime series from Japan!


Director Jack Conway had directed many silent films and the "talkie" remake of THE UNHOLY THREE with Lon Chaney. He later made high profile films like A TALE OF TWO CITIES, VIVA VILLA and DRAGON SEED. 


The same year as AL both Barrymore brothers were featured in GRAND HOTEL and with their sister Ethel in RASPUTIN AND THE PRINCESS (the only film to feature all 3 siblings). 


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Soitanly!....NOT!

I recently read a piece of trash called BEYOND THE LAUGHTER: A DAUGHTER'S STORY OF CURLY'S POST THREE STOOGES YEARS written by a crazy person named Grace Garland. Really she must be crazy if she thinks people are going to believe this garbage fiction disguised as a real biography. 


Where can I start? Why did she pick Curly Howard, the lovable stooge as the target of her wackadoo fantasy? Except for providing fans with tons of laughs what did he ever do do to anyone to deserve such treatment. Ok, I'm sure he wasn't perfect. Who is? I can't imagine what Curly's living relatives think of this nonsense. 


Why does it suck? 


Here's some examples all according to Ms. Garland: Curly was not Jewish, he was Italian-Catholic and heavily involved with "the mob" who we later learn killed JFK. Even J. Edgar Hoover was his pal. Although he did work in the film industry he had no brothers and his real name was Larry Fine! Poor Larry! Even Mr. "Stooge In The Middle" Larry is dragged into this thing! It also turns out that Curly didn't die in 1952.  He lived into the '60's and knew who killed JFK. In fact on the day of his assassination the soon to be ex-president was looking for the ex-Stooge! (????) Oh yeah, Curly also wrote the book "The Godfather"! Mario Puzo's name was just a front! 


All of this is suppose to have been documented by Curly's daughter who's mom was married to Curly at one time but his family had their marriage annulled because she wasn't  Catholic. (Actually this is one point that is almost factually true. I have read that Curly's first marriage did end in an annulment...). Believe me, if you read one book this year BEYOND THE LAUGHTER: A DAUGHTER'S STORY OF CURLY'S POST THREE STOOGES YEARS isn't it!!

Official site:

http://www.threestooges.com/

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Because

BECAUSE THEY'RE YOUNG-1960-American Bandstand's Dick Clark (who died in April 2012 at 82)  is a new high school teacher. His students include a loving couple (Doug McClure & Roberta Shore; 5 years later they would both co-star on TV's THE VIRGINIAN) who want to get married, skinny Warren Beringer (who later became a pudgy TV character actor) who doesn't know his mom's a floozy, bad boy Riff Rimer (Michael Callan) and his ex-girl friend Anne (Tuesday Weld) who has a nagging mother. Chris Robinson (later the lead role in STANLEY) is a toughie who tries to cause trouble at a dance where James Darren and Duane Eddy (who also does the theme song) perform! 


Riff gets involved in a hold up staged by his butcher shop boss. Lying and misunderstandings (and a knife fight) follow but the man who made lip-synching fashionable on music shows straightens out everything in the end. 


Also with Victoria Shaw (who was Maria Van Braun in I AIM FOR THE STARS the same year) as Clark's love interest, Phillip Coolidge, Bess Flowers and John Zaremba. It's based on a novel called "Harrison High". 


The year before BTY director Paul Wendkos had directed the original GIDGET (and would also make its two sequels) but later devoted himself mostly to TV. 


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Jekyll & Hyde on TV

CLIMAX!-DR.JEKYLL & MR. HYDE-1955-This was a live TV broadcast (sponsored by Chrysler) with the adaptation by Gore Vidal based on Robert Louis Stevenson's classic story.

Michael Rennie stars as Dr. Jekyll who wants to find man's soul and thinks he can produce a "angel or devil" from the same person.

The story begins with Jekyll's best friend Mr. Utterson (Cedric Hardwicke) killing the notorious Mr. Hyde in Jekyll's lab. Utterson then finds the doctor's journal (left casually on a table to be read after his death) and the rest of the story is told in flashback showing how Jeykll's ceaseless experimenting produces "the devil" Hyde and begins his dual personality, dedicated doctor by day, evil deviant by night. Rennie pulls off the dual role very well and time elapsed footage is used during most of the transformation scenes (not bad considering the drawbacks). Like most early TV productions it suffers from bad lighting and sparse production values (look for a hand that mysteriously appears near a curtain) but has some cool camera angles.

Mary Sinclair (a popular TV actress at the time) is "the girl" Hyde takes a fancy to. John Hoyt (with
an English accent) is Jekyll's servant Poole and Lowell Gilmore is his friend Lanyon  who says "Where's my tea? I came here for tea not a black mass".

 Director Allen Reisner did 19 other epsiodes of CLIMAX! and became very proflific in TV. Rennie starredin 8 other episodes and Hardwicke 5 others. The version I saw had the original commercials with
host William Lunigan hawking Chrysler cars.

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Ghost Rider

GHOST RIDER-2007-This adaptation of the Marvel comic isn't very good. It takes forever to get started and when it finally does it's pretty incoherent. 

Nicolas Cage (who I've been told took his last name from comic book hero Luke Cage) is Johnny Blaze, a daredevil motorcycle stuntman who sells his soul to the devil (Peter Fonda, sounding a lot like David Carradine) to save his father who dies anyway. Eventually his head turns into flaming skull and he fights crime and three evil riders. Not learning from the mistakes of Ang Lee's THE HULK, some genius thought it would be good to bring in Sam Elliot to growl out the legend. Eva Mendes is equally unfortunate as Blaze's reporter/long lost love. 

This was not director/screenwriter Mark Steven Johnson's first encounter with a Marvel superhero. He'd previously messed up...I mean made DAREDEVIL with Ben Affleck. Still the movie did well enough to spawn a sequel in 2011, GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE.

The real deal!

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Two Harbors

TWO HARBORS-2005-This well done black and white independent film is about a guy named Vic (Alex Cole) who sells "space action figures" at a flea market in Minnesota. In his spare time he searches the skies for aliens. He meets a quiet, innocent bookseller named Cassie (Catherine E. Johnson) and comes to believe she is a link to contacting the aliens. This poignant and witty story (written and directed by James Vcluek) ends in tragedy however. 


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2000 Maniacs

2000 MANIACS-1964-Herschel Gordon Lewis' second installment of his infamous "blood trilogy" after BLOOD FEAST is a bit of a letdown. It's a kind of gory version of BRIGADOON without singing. Maybe Lewis blew it. He could have created the first gore musical! 


Anyway, the ghost town of Pleasant Valley (I wonder if this all happened on a Sunday..??) appears 100 years after the beginning of the Civil War. It's full of a bunch of redneck hicks who also happen to be cannibal murderers out for revenge for the slaughter of their village during the war. They kidnap/trick 6 couples (including BF leads Thomas Wood/Rooney Kerwin and former Playboy centerfold Connie Mason) from the North and plan to use them in their centennial. Four are killed in various HG Lewis fashion. One woman has her arm chopped off. A guy is pulled apart by horses. Another guy is put in a barrel with nails and rolled down a hill. Another woman is crushed by a boulder. That's about it. Mostly it's yokels laughing and saying "yankee" a lot. 


2000 MANIACS was filmed in Florida, where previously BLOOD FEAST was also made but while BF had extreme gore and humor (some of it unintentional) at least it was entertaining and moved along at a good pace. This drags and the hillbilly ranting becomes annoying. 


Ben Moore (who's also in Lewis' MOONSHINE MOUNTAIN) plays an ax toting lunatic.  I love the cool theme song (written and sung by HG) though called "The South's Gonna Rise Again". 


It was remade in 2005 as 2001 MANIACS with Robert Englund in the lead. 


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Zotz!

ZOTZ!-1962-This is fun black & white comedy from “gimmick director” William Castle (he made MR. SARDONICUS the year before).

A mild mannered professor (Tom Poston) comes in possession of an ancient coin that gives him special powers. When he says the word “zotz” things go in slow motion. When he points his finger at a person they feel intense pain. When he combines them they cause death! He makes most of his friends think he’s crazy and fails to make a US general (Fred Clark) believe him. He’s eventually captured by communists (a henchman is played by Mike Mazurki) but battles his way out and becomes a hero.

Jim Backus plays another professor and rival for the affections a female prof. (Julia Meade). The dean of the college where they teach is played by Cecil Kellaway and his wife is Margaret Dumont! (in her second to last film) 50’s-60’s TV comedian Louis Nye has a cameo. Poston was later in another Castle film, a remake of THE OLD DARK HOUSE.

When I was little kids used to go around pointing their index finger and saying “zotz” a lot. You were of course suppose to slow down when they did that but since I didn’t see this film till years later I was never really in on the joke! It’s based on a novel by a guy who wrote scripts for TV’s VICTORY AT SEA!

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In The Money

IN THE MONEY-1958-In the last installment of the the Bowery Boys series (which started as the Dead End Kids in 1937), Sach (Huntz Hall) is hired by some diamond smugglers to escort a dog on an ocean liner to England. It's a lot of talk and a lot of Sach acting goofy while Duke (Stanley Clements) tries to figure it all out. Eddie LeRoy as Blinky and of course David Gorcey as Chuck are along for the last ride. The three of them become stowaways while Sach is "romanced" by the smuggler's moll, Babs (Patricia Donohue). A running gag for a while is that the dog's name is Gloria but when Sach says things like "I have to give Gloria a bath" the others think he's talking about Babs. They land in England (not really) and spend some time worrying about Gloria when she gets sick. Somehow Sach winds up on an apartment ledge! 


Dick Elliot reprises his (un-billed) role as Mike who owns the "joint" the gang hangs out in. Snub Pollard, Ralph Gamble and Norma Varden also have un-billed roles. Once again most of it seems like s drawn out TV sitcom or short. English actor Paul Cavanagh is Inspector Sanders who is trailing the bad guys. 


Huntz Hall would go on to appear in several other films and many TV shows. His standout role would be portraying Jesse Lansky in Ken Russell's bizarre bio-pic VALENTINO. Stanley Clements (from Long Island, NY) would also make various TV appearances (many un-billed) and died at 55 in 1981. According to IMDB David Gorcey made only one more film and became a minister. He died at 63 in 1894. 


ITM was directed once again by William "One Shot" Beaudine who found time to direct episodes of BROKEN ARROW and THE NAKED CITY around the same time. BB screenwriting vet Ellwood Ullman co-wrote this last one with Al Martin, who wrote the screenplay for INVASION OF THE SAUCER MEN the same year. 


OK, it's over...for now. There are a few I missed. Bowery Boys movies are hard to see these days. They used to be a mainstay of weekend comedy when I was a kid in the '60's but are seldom  talked about these days...


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