Simon

SIMON-1980-Some brilliant but twisted geniuses (including Max Wright, William Finley and Wallace Shawn) manipulate the USA fixing TV ratings, creating diseases, doing bizarre research on cross breeding a man with a cockroach and talking about a Nixon substitute who came back from China. They get a lot of info from a computer named Doris (the voice of Louise Lasser) and are kind of like forerunners of modern day computer hackers. They decide to create “an alien” using eccentric college professor Simon Mendolssohn (Alan Arkin) as their guinea pig. Through drugs and a sensory deprivation tank and the help of a phony female doctor (Madeline Kahn) they manage to change him. After he becomes a media sensation with his ego driven demands for making a better world, the group try to destroy him but only wind up losing their intellect to a gas that makes them dumb, dispensed by an Army general (Fred Gwynne). Dr. Becker (Austin Pendleton) the head of the institute wants to kill Simon but he winds up trapped on a rocket-ship headed into space! Simon and his wife (Judy Graubart) run away and are taken in by a religious cult that worships TV. He starts his own pirate network and delivers a crazy philosophy (He's right about many things!). 

This is a great but overlooked black comedy criticizing TV and the obsession with junk culture co-written and directed by Marshall Brickman, a former head writer of THE TONIGHT SHOW who wrote several Woody Allen films (SLEEPER, ANNIE HALL, MANHATTAN) . Dick Cavett and David Susskind play themselves.

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Hammer Werewolf

THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF-1961-In Spain in the 1700's a beggar (Richard Wordsworth) is mocked and imprisoned by the local marquis (Anthony Dawson). He languishes for years in a dungeon with his only human contact being the jailer's mute daughter (Yvonne Romaine) who grows up before his eyes. When she rejects the now decrepit zombie look marquis he has her thrown in the same dungeon as the old beggar. He rapes her and later she kills the marquis (quite viciously). She runs away and is taken in my a kindly aristocrat Alfredo (Clifford Evans) and his maid. The girl gives birth to a baby boy but dies. Unfortunately the baby was born on Christmas and according to the maid an unwanted child born on the 25^th is an insult to God. When the boy named Leon is baptized thunder sounds and the holy water swirls. A few years later Leon has nightmares and fangs and seems to kill sheep at night although a wild dog is blamed. He grows into a man (Oliver Reed) and leaves home. He gets a job bottling wine and meets Christina (Catherine Feller). They fall in love but while out partying with a co-worker Leon turns into a scary werewolf (slightly reminiscent of THE WEREWOLF OF LONDON) and kills the co-worker and a hooker. He's arrested and put in jail where his cellmate becomes a future victim. As a wolf he breaks out, kills some more and the townsfolk go after him. He takes refuge in a church where “dad” shoots a silver bullet through his heart. 

 This Technicolor Hammer production released in the US though Universal International was directed by the great Terence Fisher and written by Anthony Hinds who teamed several times for Hammer. It's based on a novel by Guy Endore  

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Phillippines

BLACK MAMA WHITE MAMA-1973-In a Philippines jail “black mama” Lee Daniels (Pam Grier), a hooker and “white mama” Karen Brent (Margaret Markov), a revolutionary fight for survival and try to avoid the lesbian guards. When they are chained together and transferred to a maximum security prison Karen's guerrilla boyfriend and his pals try to rescue her. That fails but the women escape. Chained together they argue and fight. Karen wants to go back to her revolution while Lee wants to catch a boat and get away. They mug two nuns and put on their habits. They get a ride from a friendly drunken truck driver and steal his truck. A drug dealer (Vic Diaz) is also looking for Lee and some money she stole from him. A local police captain (Eddie Garcia) hires a local pool shooting pimp (Sid Haig) to find the girls too. Meanwhile the “female defiant ones” kill the blacksmith who could have unchained them and beat up an innocent guy and steal his boat. They are rescued by Karen's boyfriend (until then it seems like they are in two separate movies). An all out battle between the revolutionaries and the drug dealer's gang caps the finale where Karen is killed and Daniels escapes on a boat with the drug dealer's money (he's killed in the battle). 

AIP released this Philippines shot adventure movie in the US during the big boom period for this kind of production. It was directed by Eddie Romero who had previously made several notorious horror movies with John Ashley (including MAD DOCTOR OF BLOOD ISLAND) and THE TWILIGHT PEOPLE (also with Pam Grier). A few years after this was made co-star Margaret Markov retired from acting and married producer/actor Mark Damon.  

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Carry On

CARRY ON SCREAMING-1966-A boisterous but dumb detective Sgt. Bung (Harry Corbett) investigates the disappearance of a young woman (actually abducted by a monster). The woman's naive boyfriend Potter (Jim Dale; a "Carry On" regular who was in several recent "Harry Potter" movies) and Bung's stupid assistant Slobotham ("Carry On" regular Peter Butterworth) help out. They find the severed finger of the monster which eventually leads them to a castle where a “Vampira” looking woman Valeria Watt (Fanella Fielding) resides with her foppish brother Orlando (Kenneth Williams; a "Carry On" regular) turning woman into mannequins. Their monster servant is Oddbod (Tom Clegg), a square headed hairy dude with fangs (fairly scary for the juvenile story line). When an old scientist (Jon Pertwee) conducts an experiment with the finger it creates another Oddbod. Valeria seduces Bung and turns him into a werewolf but when he goes to terrorize his dumpy wife (Joan Sims) she gets the better of him. In typical English fashion Sobotham later disguises himself as a woman which leads Bung's wife into thinking he's having an affair. They all wind up in the castle being chased by the two Oddbods until Potter is turned into a werewolf and thrashes both monsters (obviously dummies when he throws them out a window). Orlando is killed by a mummy he accidentally revives. 

This horror-comedy by the “Carry On” troupe (number 12 in the series and the last for their long time studio Anglo-Amalgamated) is pretty dated and childish. Apparently they didn't know much about horror films. If it's suppose to be a take-off on a Hammer production then it's a real failure! 

 Director Gerald Thomas did most of the series.Vampire actress Fanella Fielding was a loudspeaker voice on the TV show "The Prisoner" the next year. Top billed Corbett later co-starred in the BBC series "Steptoe and Son" the basis for America's "Sanford and Son".

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Atwill

BEGGARS IN ERMINE-1934-Steel works industrialist Flint Dawson (Lionel Atwill) loves his work so much he always has lunch with his factory employees. He's against a merger so board director Jim Marley (Jameson Thomas) plots to do away with him. He has molten steel dropped on Dawson but it doesn't kill him, only leaving him cripple. Mrs. Dawson (Astrid Allwyn) was in on it too and she and Marley steal everything and go to England with Dawson's young daughter. 

In the hospital (where he smokes a pipe constantly) Dawson meets Marchant, a blind beggar (Henry B. Walthall) who he teams up with and forms an organization of beggars who's money he wisely invests to help them live. Years later Dawson's daughter (Betty Furness), who he's taken care of anonymously, is engaged to Marley's nephew (James Bush) after Mrs. Dawson committed suicide. Eventually through stock manipulations and help from the beggars Dawson gets his revenge (he kind of makes Marley commit suicide) and wins back his company. Very cheap Monogram picture worth seeing for Atwill. 

Russian born director Phil Rosen (a founding member of the American Society of Cinematographers) was a well regarded silent film director but in the sound era he worked mainly in cheap independent films. He made THE SPHINX another curious low budget film with Atwill the year before. Later he made PHANTOM OF CHINATOWN starring Keye Luke, SPOOKS RUN WILD with Lugosi and The East Side Kids and several Charlie Chan entries. He died in 1951. Screenwriter Tristram Tupper , who also wrote the non-horror Karloff vehicle NIGHT KEY, based his screenplay on a novel by Esther Lynd Day.  

Bud & Lou & The Noose

THE NOOSE HANGS HIGH-1948-Two inept window washers Ted (Bud Abbott) and Tubby (Lou Costello) visit a dentist to take care of Tubby's bad tooth. The nearsighted dentist (Murray Leonard) gives Tubby a pretty hard time but does pull the tooth and manages to crash Tubby  through the ceiling where his head winds up in the floor of a psychiatrist (Fritz Feld) who faints.

A mobster named Nick Craig (Joseph Calleia) mistakes the duo for messengers and dispatches them to pick up 50 thousand dollars from bookie Mr. Stewart (Ben Weldon) who plans to double cross them but Tubby hears them talking on an inter-com. To escape the two thugs sent after them Tubby comes up with a plan to have the money sent by mail but he gets the envelopes mixed up. They have to stay over night at Craig's office which leads to a variation on the team's "pack/un-pack" routine and also to hoodwink a dumb thug (Mike Mazurki) out of some money. Craig needs the 50 thousand dollars to pay off a debt to the mysterious Mr. McBride (Leon Errol). The money falls into the hands of Carol (Cathy Downs) the beleaguered assistant to a complaining old bag Mrs. Van Buren (Isabel Randolph).

The "boys" steal the mailing list and comb the city for the person who got the money. They find Carol but unfortunately she's spend most of loot. Carol suggests they bet what little money they have on a horse she  heard McBride is betting on (it's said he never loses). However unbeknown to them McBride changes his bet. Later Tubby meets McBride which leads to some funny moments together (including the "mudder-fodder" routine). The duo then figure the best place to be is in jail so they try to get arrested but no matter what they do they can't. They then decide to order a huge meal at an expensive restaurant and when they can't pay for it they'll go to jail. The "mustard" routine shows up. Fortunately McBride comes to their rescue just before Craig gives them "cement galoshes".

THE NOOSE HANGS HIGH is sometimes overlooked in the Abbott and Costello filmography. It was the team's first foray into independent production. They throw in several funny routines and having Leon Errol (who was also busy making his own short films at RKO) in the cast doesn't hurt. Luckily they hired Charles Barton to direct and having worked with A & C more than anyother director, he keeps everything tight and together. The team made two pictures for Universal the same year: the  so-so MEXICAN HAYRIDE and their classic ABBOTT & COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN (both directd by Barton!).

There's a whole slew of writers credited with the screenplay and story (not surprising on an A & C production) including their usual collaborator John Grant and Daniel Taradash who later wrote the screenplay for FROM HERE TO ENTERNITY. Female lead Cathy Downs years later played Mrs. Glen Manning in THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN.

There's small un-credited bits by many familair character actors: Elvia Allman, Ellen Corby, Jimmie Dodd (future composer of "The Mickey Mouse March"), James Flavin, Bess Flowers, Joe Kirk (Costello's brother in law), Minerva Urecal, Herb Vigran.

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Religious

THE BLOOD OF JESUS-1941-After a baptism ceremony Martha (Cathryn Caviness), a devout religious woman is accidentally shot by her “heathen” husband Razz (Spencer Williams). It's believed she won't survive and everyone prays for her. After she appears to die she is visited by an angel and her spirit leaves her body. The angel takes her on a tour of the spirit world where hooded figures walk around graves. The angel tells her to go to the crossroads to find her fate and almost immediately the devil (who laughs like a lunatic) sends a dapper guy named Judas to tempt her (“Ok Judas. Do your stuff”) and lead her off the road of righteousness with a nice dress and fancy shoes. He takes her to a nightclub in the city that features singers and some weird dancers. Unfortunately she becomes a prostitute but later runs away chased by some guys who think she stole a wallet. At the crossroads (a sign has “To Hell” pointing one way and “To Zion” pointing another) there's a flat bed truck with a jazz combo (the devil is the driver). Just when the men are about to stone Martha the Lord's thundering voice sends them running. A heavenly choir and the blood of Christ bring her back to the living and everyone sings (for some reason one guy faints). 

This “race film” was the brainchild of actor/director/writer Spencer Williams (who'd provided the screenplay for the notorious SON OF INGAGI a few years before). Said to have been made on a budget of $5,000 and I wouldn't doubt it as BLOOD's special effects are crude and the actors (most were amateurs) deliver their lines with little emotion. Yet there is something that makes this movie click (at least for me). Perhaps it's Williams' belief in his subject matter. Whatever the case it's a low budget winner in my book! 

 Williams directed 10 more films after this (at least one is lost) and after leaving the film business for a while played Andy TV's “The Amos and Andy Show” from 1951-1955. He died in 1969.

Final note: IMDB lists no date for death for one of the actors in BLOOD, that of Juanita Riley who plays one of Martha's friends. If still alive she'd be 99 at the time of this writing!

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Sea Hunt

SEA HUNT-1958-1961-I like to watch old TV shows just to see the guest stars, usually “stars” before they became famous. Sea Hunt is loaded with them. I was amazed to learn that 155 episodes were produced over a six year period. It was a popular show! 

Lloyd Bridges starred as Mike Nelson, an expert scuba diver who besides having solo adventures also helped out the government by being a commodore in the US naval auxiliary. He was also the only actual “regular” in the series cast although there were reoccurring characters played by Ross Elliot, Russ Conway and a few others. Oldest son Beau played the same character in two episodes. Mostly Nelson solved mysteries and fought cold war spies, hijackers and smugglers. He also found time to prevent murders and help third world countries try to acclimate themselves to their new found democracy. There are a few shows dealing with sea monsters and mermaids but in the end there was always a rational explanation. Some unusual stories involved the discovery of an underground marijuana farm, tainted fish that made people who ate them violent, the hunt for a deadly gas created by the Nazis and the training of “aquanettes”, female astronauts who one day planned to walk on Venus! Nelson was likable, clever and strong and the best in his business. Very little got by him. Besides thugs and spies he sometimes tangled with sharks and alligators and even an octopus. Every episode took Nelson under some type of body of water: ocean, lake, lagoon, the Everglades. One exception was the first episode with son Beau where Nelson saved his character from flooding in the sewer system! Younger son Jeff appears in one episode. 

It was a comic book too!

The show was syndicated by ZIV (Science Fiction Theater) but played in prime-time over CBS. Filmed mainly in Florida with some scenes done in The Bahamas, Ivan Tors was the executive producer and later seasons featured stunt diving by Ricou Browning (THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON). Bridges directed at least one episode himself. The show was still popular when it ended its run. Apparently syndicated shows running in prime time became less attractive to the networks. I've also read a story that the demise of the show was caused by Bridges quitting because he felt the stories were becoming to focused on on land espionage than underwater intrigue. 

Some guest stars: 

Leonard Nimoy-5 times         Robert Conrad-2 times      
Maris Wrixon                         Whit Bissel
Ross Martin-2 times               Ted Knight 

Laura Lawson-3 times            Joi Lansing        
King Moody-3 times              Myron Healy

John Marley-2 times              Robert Clarke                          
Morris Ankrum                      Brett Halsey

Larry Hagman                        Mari Blanchard                          
Gregg Palmer                         John Anderson

Steve Ritch                             Peter Breck

Bruce Dern                             George Becwar

Jack Nicolson                         Joyce Meadows

Victor Buono                          Ken Curtis

Paul Birch                              Thomas Henry
Robert Montgomery               Robert Quarry        

                                               

                         

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Final note: Mike Nelson's favorite TV show was "Dempsey of the Deep".

Bad Movie

SLAUGHTER-2008-Terrible shot on video nonsense about a pasty face guy named Harold (he looks like a cross between Teddy Roosevelt and the native assassin/servant in THE FOUR SKULLS OF JONATHAN DRAKE) who hires internet models, kills them and then posts the gory photos on his snuff website. Meanwhile a female PI uses a victim's computer to track him down. There's death by baseball bat, electrocution, razor and gun with a lot of nude bloody bodies. One woman blinks after being shot to death. Harold calls his website “The Slaughtered Sheep” but the PI refers to it several times as “The Slaughtered Lamb”. Later the ghosts of his victims rise out of his computer and kill him. Bad acting, direction and SFX. 

The director Anthony Doublin made a few other video horror films but was mostly a lighting technician on low budget horror movies and the TV series “Robot Chicken”. 

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Hammer

CRESCENDO-1970-Susan Roberts (Stephanie Powers) goes to France and lives in the house of a dead composer to do research on his life. The place is overseen by the composer's strange mother Daneille (Margaretta Scott from the 1936 version of THINGS TO COME) and her wheelchair bound son Georges (James Olsen; in THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN the next year), a drug addict who has nightmares about making love to a mannequin. Their maid (Kristen Lindholm) gives him drugs and has sex with him. Meanwhile the family butler Carter (Joss Ackland) hangs around and calls the maid a slut. Later she's stab to death while taking a nude swim. Georges has another dream that he and Susan are shot while having sex. They kind of fall in love but it becomes apparent he can walk. There's another big twist in the insane mother's plan to get an heir. At the end, Susan just runs away.

Although this oddball mystery almost seems like an above average made for TV movie, it was actually made (in England) by Hammer studios and played on a double bill with DRACULA AD 1972. The original script was written years before and was a project Michael Reeves planned to make before his untimely death. Producer James Carreras tried unsuccessfully to get Joan Crawford in the role of the mother and later had Jimmy Sangster re-write it. Director Alan Gibson also made DRACULA AD 1972 and many BBC programs. It's a decent psychological thriller but the ending is a little abrupt. However the biggest surprise to me was that Powers who has a brief topless scene was in the Disney production THE BOATNIKS the same year! 

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Charlie Chan!

DARK ALIBI-1946-Charlie Chan (Sidney Toler) is hired by June Hanley (Teala Loring, from BLACK MARKET BABIES the year before) to help clear her father of a robbery that has put him on death row. Most suspects reside in a local boarding house. The master detective assisted by son Tommy (Benson Fong) and chauffeur Birmingham Brown (Mantan Moreland, who despite being the victim of some racist humor steals every scene he's in). 

Tommy and Birmingham even manage to get locked up in jail where BB meets his brother Ben (Ben Carter) and they do their “unfinished sentence” routine (Moreland and Carter had been a team in Vaudeville). A private detective helps out and forged fingerprints figure into the frame up. As usual some familiar character actors appear: Milton Parsons, Tim Ryan, John Eldredge, Russell Hicks. 

The same year director Phil Karlson made BEHIND THE MASK starring Kane Richmond as The Shadow. In 1955 he made the film noir crime drama THE PHENIX CITY STORY, did some TV then in the '60's made THE SILENCERS and THE WRECKING CREW, both starring Dean Martin as Matt Helm. Two of his last movies (he died in 1985) were the WILLARD sequel BEN and WALKING TALL.

I've read screenwriter George Callahan (who penned many CC movies) later wrote the screenplay for THIS ISLAND EARTH but that film credits George O'Callahan so it would be someone else. I could find very little about either of them....

  

DARK ALIBI was number 40 of fourty seven movies made with the clever (fake) Chinese detective created by Earl Derr Biggers. It was followed by SHADOWS OVER CHINATOWN.

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Happy New Year!

THE PHYNX-1970-In this groovy film the US government is over seen by number one, a guy with a box on his head and a painted on face. His main operatives Bogey (Mike Kellin doing a terrible Bogart imitation) and Corrigan (Lou Antonio) recruit by force 4 slackers (Michael A. Miller, Ray Chippeway, Dennis Larden and Lonny Stevens) to become the rock band The Phynx and infiltrate the country of Albania which has kidnapped many prominent US celebrities (I'll list them later). They are trained for combat by Clint Walker (from TV"s "Cheyanne" western series) and Harold “Oddjob” Sakata and Richard Pryor is in the kitchen. They learn music from Trini Lopez. A freaky looking computer picks their name. They are inspected by Dick Clark and then recorded and promoted by the drugged out Philbaby (Larry Hankin in an obvious take-off on Phil Spector). His assistant is played by Ultra Violet. Then Ed Sullivan is forced to have them on his show! Later when the group becomes famous James Brown presents them with a gold record! After a lot of drawn out shit (including scenes with Sue Bernard from FASTER PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL!, Sherry DeBoer, later in THE VELVET VAMPIRE and Sally Struthers in her film debut) they go to Albania (where Michael Ansara is a army colonel) and rescue the celebrities (by sneaking them out in carts full of radishes...)

The kidnapped group is quite eclectic: Rudy Vallee, Johnny Weismuller, Maureen O'Sullivan, Patty Andrews, Col. Sanders, Leo Gorcey & Huntz Hall, Louis Heyward, Xavier Cugat, Andy Devine, The Lone Ranger (second series star John Hart) & Tonto (Jay Silverheels), Joe Louis, Butterfly McQueen, Pat O'Brien, Ruby Keeler and 1 or 2 (maybe three) others I forgot. George Tobias (in his last role), Joan Blondell, Martha Raye and Fritz Feld also have roles.

This Warner Bros/Seven Arts production was never released in the theaters (or barely) and rightfully so. It's a terrible conglomeration of satire, bad pop music and dumb acting wrapped around a plot influenced by The Monkees TV show. Hadn't the producers ever heard of SKIDOO? After years of obscurity it was finally released on DVD in 2012.

Amazingly the putrid songs the band plays were composed by Leiber & Stoller! One member of The Phynx, Dennis Larden had previously played (under a different name) in the band “Every Mother's Son” who had a one hit single “Come On Down To My Boat” in 1967.

Director Lee H. Katzin was an experienced TV director with only sporadic film credits (WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO AUNT ALICE?) and seemed to survive this ordeal going on to direct LE MANS and many made for TV movies.

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