Tombstone

TOMBSTONE TERRITORY-Another TV western that ran from 1957 to 1960 . It took place in Tombstone, Arizona, "the town too tough to die" and was supposedly based on actual stories taken from The Epitaph, the real town newspaper. Pat Conway starred as the swaggering smirking sheriff Clay Hollister who has his hands full keeping law and order while occasionally feeling bad about killing someone. Robert Eastham played Harris Claibourne, the owner of the newspaper and narrator of each episode. The catchy theme song was composed and sung by Richard Backer. Most of the stories aren't too special but of course there are enough guest stars to keep it interesting. They include John Carradine, Lon Chaney Jr., John Anderson, Anthony Caruso, James Coburn, Jack Elam, Michael Landon, Leonard Nimoy, Angie Dickerson and Elisha Cook.

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Three Into One

RED LINE-2013-Survivors of a terrorist attack on a subway in LA try to find a way to escape but mostly fight with each other, emote personal stories and torture a guy the others think is a terrorist. It turns out one of them is. But who? (As in “who cares?”) It was directed by Robert Kirbyson and the only actor I really knew in the cast was John Billinsley.

PERFECT CREATURE-2006-This horror film about a human cop and a vampire cop teaming up to fight vampires in New Zealand. Dougray Scott (who almost played Wolverine in the original X-Men movie) is the vampire fuzz. It sucks..really...not good...

THE COOL ONES-1967-Unhip musical comedy about an eccentric English millionaire Tony Crumb (Roddy McDowell) who promotes a young female singer (Debbie Watson) and a washed up rock and roller(Gil Petersen). Phil Harris, Nita Talbot, Mrs. Miller and Glen Campbell are also in it as well bands like The Leaves and The Bantams. It's very dumb. Busy TV director Gene Nelson (also an actor) made this a couple of years after directing Elvis in HARUM SCARUM.

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Savage Shaw Brothers

THE SAVAGE FIVE-1974-Shaw Bros martial arts period piece (directed by Chen Chang) obviously inspired by The Magnificent Seven. When bandits take over a peaceful town three locals (David Chiang, Ti Lung and Chen Kuang-tai) and a thief (Danny Lee) band together to fight them. They do alright at first but then the bandits' boss arrives with a revolver and it's a little harder. Eventually they kill all the bandits but die in the process.

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More Shaw

ONE ARMED SWORDSMAN-1967-After his father is killed, Kang (Yu Wang) is taken in by a master swordsman and trains at his school. Years pass and he becomes the master's best student much to the chagrin of the other students including the master's daughter Pei (Yin-Tze Pan). In a fit of rage she chops off Kang's arm. He wanders away and is found by Xiao Man (Lisa Chiao Chiao) who nurses him back to health.. At first he's bitter but later he trains with his father's broken sword and goes about his business. Rival master swordsmen Smiling Face (Tang Ti) and Old Long Arm (Yeung Chi-hing) want to wipe out the master swordsman's school using a new weapon called a sword lock. When Pei is kidnapped, Kang saves her. This unfortunately causes some problems for Xiao Man and Kang but then he professes his love for her. Long Arm's forces attack the school and kill many of his students (one guy commits suicide). Just when things look bad Kang shows up (after killing Smiling Face with the help this dad's short sword) and kills Long Arm.. He goes back to Xiao Man leaving Pei angry and broken hearted. 

Thanks to veteran director Chang Chen it has excellent sword fights and some gore. Star Yu Wang was known in the US as Jimmy Wang. ONE ARMED SWORDSMAN was a box office winner for The Shaw Brothers and the first Hong Kong film to gross 1 million dollars! Followed by a great sequel RETURN OF THE ONE ARMED SWORDSMAN and a third unrelated entry THE NEW ONE ARMED SWORDSMAN. All three are highly recommended!

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Semi-Silent

THE IRON MASK-1929-This is a 1950's re-release of the famous (mostly) silent sequel to The Three Musketeers starring Douglas Fairbanks Sr as D'Artagnan. It features new music and narration by Douglas Fairbanks Jr. The two sound sequences are part of the original print. It features great camera work and stunts and the last scene (which also seems to be bidding good bye to the silent era) is memorable. Director Allan Dwan was already a seasoned pro in 1929 as he began his career in 1911! He and Fairbanks also contributed to the screenplay credited to Lotta Woods (who worked on previous films with Fairbanks).

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Inner Sanctum #4

THE FROZEN GHOST-1945-Radio hypnotist Gregor the Great (Lon Chaney) believes he killed a man through his hypnotism act. After much soul searching he comes to believe he's losing his mind so his  manager George (Milburn Stone) suggests he take a job helping Madame Monet (Tala Birell) at her wax museum. Naturally trouble brews between Monet and Greg's girlfriend Maura (Evelyn Ankers) and then between Rudi (Martin Kosleck), the weird sculptor and Gregor over the affections of Monet's niece Nina (Elena Verdugo; Chaney's romantic lead in HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN the year before). Later Monet disappears and Greg thinks he killed her. A cynical Shakespeare loving police captain Brant (Douglas Dumbrille) investigates and at one point says "I'm not paid to think". When Nina discovers her aunt's corpse in a wax display she's chased by a knife packing Rudi but comes to suspect Greg when she sees him with aunt's scarf. Soon it's revealed that George and Rudi are in league to drive Greg crazy. Fortunately Gregor and Brant devise a plan and arrive just in time to save Nina from being burned alive. 

This was the fourth of six “Inner Sanctum” miseries, I mean mysteries. It's ok but the story and direction are kind of slipshod. Harold Young had directed Chaney earlier in 1942's THE MUMMY'S TOMB and later made THE JUNGLE CAPTIVE (the last of the Paula Duree/ape woman series). A drunk at the beginning of the film is played (un-billed) by Arthur Hohl (Montgomery from ISLAND OF LOST SOULS).

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Corman Giant Size Monsters

DINOCROC VS. SUPERGATOR-2010-More made for TV giant reptilian junk courtesy of Roger Corman and the SyFy channel. A genetics lab working to grow bigger food sources is used by an evil industrialist Jason Drake (David Carradine; the only reason I checked this out) to create a giant crocodile and a giant alligator. A sheriff (John Callahan), his daughter deputy (Amy Holt), a hunter (Rib Hills) and an undercover FBI agent (James Burns) try to stop the scaly pair. Somehow the gang gets the two giganto-reptiles together and they fight each other until they are blown up. The fight is nothing but a computerized update of the famous overused stock footage from One Million Years BC. 

The director Jim Wynorski (under the pseudonym Rob Robertson) has been making mostly direct to video soft core nudie movie takeoffs (THE HILLS HAVE THIGHS, THE BREASTFORD WIVES) and cheesy giant reptile craziness under many fake names for years now and also co-wrote this using the name Jay Andrews (I don't really blame him...)

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Lost But Found

PRIVATE PROPERTY-1960-Two hoodlums, Duke (Corey Allen) and Boots (Warren Oates) use intimation and switchblade to get their way. Duke also rides Boots for still being a virgin. They take a shine to a Ann Carlisle (Kate Manx, the director's wife) who they spot at a gas station and force an old guy (Jerome Cowan) to follow her to her house. Fortunately for them the house next door is unoccupied and they squat there and spy on her and her husband Roger (Robert Wark). Duke's sick plan is to seduce Ann and then turn her over to Boots but it doesn't quite work out that way when Boots winds up doing the dead man's float in the swimming​ pool and Duke is shot to death by Ann. 

Though rather mild and irritating by today's standards, PRIVATE PPROPERTY caused a lot of controversy in its initial release and was condemned by The League Of Decency. It played very few venues and disappeared. So much so that it was thought to be a "lost" film until a print was discovered and restored around 2016. 

PRIVATE PROPERTY was the first movie directed (and written) by Leslie Stevens, a busy TV screenwriter at the time. He went back to TV after the failure of this feature before returning to the big screen in 1966 with INCUBUS, the supernatural Bergmanesque parable with dialogue in Esperanto and starring William Shatner. His last work is on the series THE OUTER LIMITS. Sadly, leading lady Manx committed suicide four years after this was made. Star Corey Allen had been in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE and other films and later became a successful TV director.

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Crime

THE LINEUP-1958-Strange little crime drama about 2 psychotic hitmen Dancer (Eli Wallach) and Julian (Robert Keith) trying to retrieve a cache of heroin from some innocent tourist with the help of their alcoholic driver (Richard Jaeckel). Meanwhile two cops (Warner Anderson and Emile Meyer) track him down. This film noir-ish crime film directed by Don Siegel and written by Stirling Stilliphant was actually based on a TV (and radio) series that ran from 1954 til 1960 and also features future Mr. Dysdale (on TV's THE BEVERLY HILLBILLES) Raymond Bailey and familiar character actor Vaughan Taylor as “The Man”. 

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Corman Quickie

THE CREATURE FROM THE HAUNTED SEA-1961-A crooked captain Renzo Capetto (Anthony Carbone trying to imitate Bogart) and his motley crew including his girlfriend Mary-Belle (Betsy Jones-Moreland), her dumb brother Happy Jack (Robert Bean) and Pete (Beach Dickerson), guy who makes animal noises (dubbed in) help two Cuban generals illegally transport a chest of money out of the country. A bunch of locals are also aboard though one of them is actually a government agent X-15 (Edward Wain aka future writer director Robert Towne). Capetto decides to do away with The Cubans and blame it on a monster he creates. Unfortunately for everyone a real monster shows up. 

There's lots of dumb comic dialogue (by Charles Griffith), slapstick and non-action in this hastily directed effort by Roger Corman (who has a cameo) and shot in Puerto Rico back to back with THE LAST WOMAN ON EARTH and BATTLE OF BLOOD ISLAND in around 5 days! One of my least favorites. It was planned to be a straight horror movie but changed by Corman at the last minute.

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Crawling

THE CRAWLING EYE-1958-In Trollenberg, American Alan Brooks (Forrest Tucker) meets The Pilgrim sisters Ann (Janet Munro) and Sara (Jennifer Jayne) when Ann seems to have some psychic connection with the nearby mountains where several villagers have disappeared (one was found decapitated). Alan visits Dr. Crevet (Warren Mitchell) experimenting with cosmic rays who tells him about a mysterious radioactive cloud. After Ann predicts the death of a climber, Alan leads a small group (including a reporter played by Lawrence Payne, later in VAMPIRE CIRCUS) up the mountains to investigate. Another climber who kills two other climbers seems to be possessed. Eventually the small village is terrorized by monsters that resemble giant brains with one eye and tentacles. An air force bomber arrives just in time to destroy the invaders.

An English production, THE CRAWLING EYE has a great script by Jimmy Sangster (who wrote HORROR OF DRACULA and THE REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN the same year) and good acting but director Quentin Lawrence has too much talk and not enough crawl for me. It's based on a BBC TV production and was known as THE TROLLENBERG TERROR in the UK.

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Senator Billy Jack

BILLY JACK GOES TO WASHINGTON-1977-In this whack job of a movie Billy Jack (Tom Laughlin) is given full pardon by a governor (Dick Gautier) and made a state senator after the incumbent (Kent Smith in his last role) dies. It's really just a phony ploy by a powerful industrialist (Sam Wanamaker) but of course it backfires and Senator Jack with the help of his wife (Laughlin's real life wife Delores Taylor) wants to build a children's camp on land designated for a nuclear power plant. Later Billy is framed by senator Paine (EG Marshall). He almost gives up but the words of Thomas Jefferson and a walk around DC change his mind. He creates a filibuster in Congress and almost dies. Later Paine admits he's a corrupt bastard and Jack and his unreal world live happily ever after. Since this movie is a mess the vice president of the US (Pat O'Brien) does a lot of narration. 

Director,/co-writer/co-producer/star Laughlin blamed the failure of the film on a government conspiracy. Another sequel THE RETURN OF BILLY JACK began filming in 1986 but was never finished.

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Bolt

THAT MAN BOLT-1973-A Karate expert/professional courier Jefferson Bolt (Fred Williamson) locked up in a Macao prison is hired/blackmailed by a mysterious English man named Griffiths (Byron Webster) to deliver 1 million dollars from Hong Kong. When he lands in Las Vegas some mobsters try to kill him, so after a car chase he gets help from another mobster Connie (Jack Ging). At a casino he meets singer Samantha Nightingale (Teresa Graves) and after they have sex she's killed in an attempt on Bolt's life. He hightails it to Hong Kong where things get a little confusing when an Asian assassin is hired by Javanese merchant banker Kumata (Masatoshi Nakamura) to kill Bolt. 

The acting, dialogue and fights are sub-par but it also features appearances by Karate and kickboxing champions like Mike Stone, Kenji Kazama, Emil Farkus and David Chow. 

THAT MAN BOLT has two credited directors. One Henry Levin made his directing debut in 1944 with semi-horror movie CRY OF THE WEREWOLF. In the 1970's he directed several Matt Helm movies. BOLT was one of his last features. The other was David Lowell Rich who started in TV around 1950 and continuing till the mid '60's when he made some feature films like EYE OF THE CAT and THE PLAINSMAN. He went back to TV making many TV movies and in the early '80's returned to some feature film work including THE CONCORDE-AIRPORT '69. 

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Head

HEAD-1968-Deranged out-dated psychedelic non-movie from the once popular TV pop band. Written by Jack Nicolson, who has a cameo and Bob Rafelson, who also directed, the whole thing is designed to make fun of their "pre-packaged" image. It's chaotic and off the wall (loyal fans of the show, if there were any left, might have been disappointed) but it does feature faded Hollywood star Victor Mature as the villain and appearances by Frank Zappa (pulling a donkey), Sonny Liston, Timothy Carey & Tiger Joe Marsh (not Tor Johnson). Nicolson and Rafelson's next project together would be FIVE EASY PIECES in 1970. 

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NYC Underground

NO MORE EXCUSES-1968-Lame amateurish "underground" film directed by and starring Robert Downey Sr as a Union Civil War soldier transported to NYC in the late '60's. While he wanders around Manhattan, the rest of this mess is men and women being interview about their reasons for going to "singles clubs", well known trickster Alan Abel explaining why he thinks domestic animals should wear clothes and a weird part with Don Calfa as stalker/rapist who breaks into a woman's apartment and forces himself on her. Later she seems to accept it and then frolics in bed with a chimpanzee. I've seen a lot of Downey's stuff (CHAFFED ELBOWS, GREASER'S PALACE, PUTNEY SWOPE) and this is his worst.

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Alaska

30 DAYS OF NIGHT-2007-In Barrow, Alaska the residents experience a period where there's 30 days of total night. Most leave but some stay including the sheriff (Josh Hartnett) and his estranged wife (Melissa George). Too bad for them because a bunch of ancient vampires lead by Marlow (Danny Huston) descend on the place. This senseless violent mean spirited mess is based on a comic book..oops..sorry graphic novel but it seems more influenced by 28 DAYS LATER than anything else. 

Director David Slade started off making music videos. His first film was HARD CANDY and later he made the 3^rd entry into the TWILIGHT series. After that he produced the TV shows HANNIBAL and AMERICAN GODS.

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England Makes Bad Horror Movies Too!

GHOST MACHINE-2009-More suckness from England. This time an evil spirit terrorizes some losers involved in a kind of virtual reality military training. Director Chris Hartwill worked on a couple of episodes of the TV show “Numbers” before making this. An American actor Sean Faris is the star.

Thanks for reading this short and unprofessional review about a movie I really had no use for and shouldn't have watched in the first place!

Silent House

SILENT HOUSE-2011-A father (Adam Trese) and his daughter Sarah (Elizabeth Olsen) try to restore their rundown old family house with the help of Peter (Eric Sheffer Stevens), the man's brother. After nothing much happens the girl starts to hear strange noises. And when her father goes to investigate he disappears. She starts to see visions of a little girl and is pursued by an unseen figure. Despite the real time premise and use of long unedited scenes there's not much going on in the confused plot leading up to an un-supernatural ending. 

Star Olsen was later in the 2014 remake of GODZILLA and plays The Scarlet Witch in several Marvel Comics related movies. This was made by the husband and wife team of Chris Kentis and Laura Lau who did the excellent and much better OPEN WATER and is actually a remake of LA CASA MUDA made in Uruguay in 2010.

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Back To Silents

SOULS FOR SALE-1923-"Moving picture" about a young woman Mem (Eleanor Boardman) who escapes her unhappy marriage to a murderous con-man by jumping off a train. She wanders around aimlessly but is rescued by an actor named Kolby (Frank Mayo) dressed as a sheikh when she passes out on a movie shoot. He takes a shine to her but a famous director Frank Claymore (Richard Dix) takes Mem under his wing and uses her in his epic circus tale when his famous star is injured. Mem is plagued by uncertainty about her talent to replace a big star but succeeds despite religiously bent parents who hate Hollywood and the return of her no good husband. The climax features hubby trying to kill the director with a giant wind machine while a fire rages on the circus set. 

SOULS FOR SALE is a kind of standard poor girl makes good love story drama with a guessable twist and good acting and production but what makes it a standout is the 'film within a film" setting where many silent screen stars and directors appear as themselves including Erich Von Stroheim directing a scene from GREED! Mae Busch, Snitz Edwards and William Haines are also in it. Star Boardman was very popular at the time (she made her last film in 1935) and starred in King Vidor's THE CROWD and TELL IT TO THE MARINES with Lon Chaney. 

Director/screen adapter Rupert Hughes was the uncle of Howard Hughes...

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The Wong and Only!

THE FATAL HOUR-1940-After his friend Dan Grady is killed, Captain Bill Street (Grant Withers) teams up with Asian sleuth Mr. Wong (Boris Karloff; didn't know he was Chinese, did ya?) to find the killer. Meanwhile female reporter Bobbie Logan (Marjorie Reynolds) returns from the previous Wong mystery and tries to help. This entry, the fourth of six King Karloff made for Monogram features a lot of sub-plots involving jade smuggling, a radio broadcast and suspects galore but not enough Karloff! As with all of them William Nigh directed and Scott Darling wrote it.

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Daring Drug Expose'

MARIHUANA-1936-More REEFER MADNESS influenced anti drug mania with two sleazy grass peddlers who recruit a woman (Harley Wood) to help them push weed after the boyfriend who impregnated her is killed in a drug smuggling operation. Later they kidnap her sister's child and hold her for ransom until she learns it's actually her child! Another badly acted morality tale from exploitation master Dwain Esper, the director of MANIAC and HOW TO UNDRESS IN FRONT OF YOUR HUSBAND.

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More Found Footage

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY-2007-Did you ever see one of those obviously phony "paranormal" or "poltergeist" videos on YouTube? Well this "found footage" ghost/horror story is just like one except it's longer and more boring! A couple (Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat) believe their house is haunted and decide to film the goings on. Most of it is talking, false scares, lights going on and off and strange noises. The wife seems to be possessed at times. Can't see how this could get a major release and spawn sequels! But it did! 

Director Oren Peli also made the equally disappointing THE CHERNOBYL DIARIES.

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Enter Fassbinder

LOVE IS COLDER THAN DEATH-1969-Rainer Werner Fassbinder's first film is a talky slow moving drama about hitman Bruno (future director Ulli Lommel) and friendship with Franz (writer/ director Fassbinder) who refused to join "the syndicate" and his hooker girlfriend (Hanna Schygulla, who went on to make many more films for Fassbinder). If you like grainy amateurish black and white films that look like they were filmed on the weekend when the actors weren't at their regular jobs then you might like this.

Are You Sure?

DILLINGER IS DEAD-1969-Bored industrialist (Michel Piccoli) comes home as usual to find his wife (Anita Pallenberg) in bed with a headache and his dinner cold. While preparing his own meal he stumbles across a mysterious package wrapped in newspaper. The newspaper bares a headline about the death of American gangster John Dillinger and the contents is a gun. While preparing his dinner he becomes intrigued with the gun, examining it, taking it apart and cleaning it. Even using it to enact suicide. Later after finishing his meal he paints the gun red, hangs it to dry and watches home movies. After having sex with his house maid (Anne Giradot) he retrieves the gun, puts a pillow over his wife's head and shoots her to death. He then goes and gets a job as a cook on a yacht. The End. 

This dark little film from Italy was directed by Marco Ferrari and caused quite a stir upon it's initial release. What you make of it is your own business. It was very rarely screened for along time but now many critics think it's Ferrari's best. No stranger to controversy, a few years later Ferrari made the infamous LE GRANDE BOUFFE (also with Piccoli).

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Clay

CLAY PIGEON-1971-Low budget Al Adamson like crime drama about a former 'Nam vet Joe Ryan (Tom Stern) turned drug taking slacker hippie used by a devious police detective Redford (Telly Savalas) to catch a grouchy drug dealer (Robert Vaughn who's nutty performance and crazy wardrobe make this mess worth watching!). He's assisted by henchman Simon (Ivan Dixon) who shoots Marlene Clark (who appears topless) in the head. Redford's equally grouchy police captain is played by John Marley. Burgess Meredith is an old hippie like junk dealer and Peter Lawford appears in one scene. 

Producer/writer/director Stern who's not much of an actor seems to be saying: cops are bad and drugs are good. He was in other movies and TV shows but this was his only directorial effort.

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Mean Mess

MEAN MOTHER-1974-Inane confused story about 2 Vietnam AWOLs (Singer Dobie Gray under the pseudonym Clifton Brown and Dennis Safren) trying to get to Canada. They separate and each becomes involved with gangsters, drugs and smuggling. It's pretty boring despite fights and shootouts. 

This was actually a European production shot in 1971 in Spain by Leon Klimovsky (who directed many great Paul Naschy movies in the '70's) called RUN FOR YOUR LIFE. Independent International picked it up and as usual producer Sam Sherman had paste up genius Al Adamson (under the name Albert Victor) shoot new scenes with American actors. It's a mess. Marilyn Joi and Luciana Paluzzi are also in it. Independent International released most of Adamson's notorious '70's horror and exploitation films.

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The Movie That Cried Wolf?

SHE-WOLF OF LONDON-1946-In jolly old (fake) England, heiress Phyllis (June Lockheart) is ready to marry her beau Barry (Don Porter) just as a series of murders plague the area, all credited. to a mysterious "she-wolf". While an inspector (Dennis Hoey; Lestrade in the Universal Sherlock Holmes series) and his assistant (Lloyd Corrigan) investigate, Phyllis comes to believe she is responsible for the murders due to a family curse. Her aunt Martha (Sara Hayden)), who'll lose her house if Phyllis marries, acts way too suspicious to be trusted and her daughter Carol (Jan Wiley) is always trying to sneak off to see her boyfriend Dwight (Martin Kosleck) who's attacked in a park.. Eventually it's revealed that it's all a plot by Martha to drive Phyllis insane but interference by their housekeeper (Elly Maylon) puts an end to it. 

Pretty standard Universal programmer by Jean Yarborough who made THE BRUTE MAN and HOUSE OF HORRORS (both starring Rondo Hatton) the same year although I was surprised by Corrigan's character's death. And there's no wolf!

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Condensed Serial

ROBINSON CRUSOE OF MYSTERY ISLAND-1936/1966-This 12 part serial was originally called ROBINSON CRUSOE OF CLIPPER ISLAND. 30 years after it was first released it was condensed in this short movie and sold to television!

Mala, a Polynesian federal agent (Mala) investigates the strange events on the mysterious Clipper Island after a dirigible blows up and its landing field is destroyed. Foreign spies working for the shadowy "HK" are to blame. They can make a volcano on the island erupt which upsets the natives but their newly returned queen Melani (Mamo Clark) tries to hold things together despite interference from Porotu (John Piccori), an androgynous local high priest. Mala gets in a lot of predicaments, dives into the ocean and is assisted by his St. Bernard Buck (playing himself) and his horse Rex (Rex the Wonder Horse). The acting is bad but not unusual for this kind of thing and Mala kinda sounds like he took acting lessons from Johnny Weissmuller. The funniest part though is the look of terror on the face of the co-pilot when the dirigible is starting to crash in the first scene!

Mala (AKA Ray Mala) was born in the Alaska territory and came to Hollywood at an early age. Besides making around 25 movie appearances, he also worked as a cinematographer. Unfortunately he died of heart failure at age 45 in 1952. One of the directors (Mack Wright) also directed RIDERS OF THE WHISPERING SKULL.

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Bloodhound?

DRACULA'S DOG-1997- In this strange horror movie some Romanian soldiers unearth a vampire tomb and Count Dracula's pet dog Zoltan escapes. The pooch also frees Veidt (Reggie Nalder), the count's human servant. He and the demon dog go to California to make a guy named Michael Drake (Michael Pataki) their "new master". While Mike and his family are on a camping trip Viedt has Zoltan terrorize the family by making their dogs (including a puppy) into dog-pires! Later an inspector (Jose Ferrer) shows up to help and he and Michael are attacked in their cabin. Somehow the inspector overpowers Veidt and kills him with a stake. Michael is attacked  by the pack but the inspector and 2 hunters save him. In the weird finale Michael reveals his cross to Zoltan and the dog falls off a cliff impaled on a fence. But the evil puppy lives! 

This crazy canine caper is more bizarre than bad. The screenplay was written by Frank Ray Perilli (also an actor) who also penned the soft core porno movie CINDERELLA (directed by DOG'S star Pataki) the same year. Albert Band (who produced CINDERELLA) directed.

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S Seven Times

SSSSSSS!-1973-A scientist working with snakes, Dr. Stoner (Strother Martin) hires college student David (Dirk Benidict) to help him with his experiments after his original helper "quit suddenly". When not experimenting with his reptilian pets Stoner gives exhibitions with a king cobra assisted by his daughter Kristina (Heather Menzies). Stoner of course has an ulterior motive in his hiring of the cheerful David. He wants to turn him into an intelligent king cobra!  While David and Kristina kind of fall in love, Stoner gets revenge on a college bully (Reb Brown) who killed his pet snake and a former colleague (Richard B. Schull) who discovers his secret. In the confused abrupt climax: Kristina discovers dad's former assistant is now a serpent man in a side show run by Tim O'Connor. David turns into a real snake. Stoner seems to want it to fight the real king cobra but he's bitten to death. The sheriff (Jack Ging) shoots the cobra. David-snake is killed by a mongoose. Kristina arrives too late to do anything and upon seeing her beloved mangled by the mongoose lets out a scream which is freeze framed for the final scene.

S X7 isn't bad and it's helped by the great character actor Strother Martin in the lead role. The story doesn't make a whole lot of sense especially when at one point Stoner warns his daughter not to have sex with David when it's already apparent they have. This little tidbit seems forgotten later. He doesn't elaborate on it so maybe Kristina may become a snake herself. We'll never know...

Director Bernard Kowalski used real venomous snakes which had the cast rather nervous. Probably the worst thing about the movie is the title!

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The 3 Mesquiteers

RIDERS OF WHISTLING SKULL-1937-In this strange western 3 cow pokes Stoney Brook (Robert Livingston), Tucson Smith (Ray “Crash” Corrigan) and Lullaby Joslin (Max Terhune) known collectively as "The Three Mesquiteers" help Betty Marsh (Mary Russell) locate her missing archaeologist father (John Van Pelt) who's disappeared while investigating a secret cave and a lost Indian tribe. After several battles with hostile Indians the group finds professor Marsh being held prisoner in the cave because he won't spill the beans about a hidden treasure to a half breed named Rutledge (Roger Williams). In the cave they seem to encounter a living mummy. Before Smith is "sacrificed" he's saved by his buddies who also cause an avalanche that destroys the bad guys. Lullaby also has dummy named Elmer. With all the talk about hieroglyphics, maps, lost tribes, it seems more like a forerunner of the much later JJ series than a western! 

This weird western was directed by Mack Wright who'd made THE SINGING COWBOY with Gene Autry and the bizarre serial ROBINSON CRUSOE OF CLIPPER ISLAND. He did more work as assistant or second unit director and was also an actor.

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Death Row

CELL 2455, DEATH ROW-1955-Little juvenile delinquent Whit Whitter (R. Wright Campbell) grows up to become a full fledged murdering thug (William Campbell; Wright's real older brother) gaining fame as the vicious "red light bandit", pistol whipping men and molesting women at local lover's lanes. The smug and unrepentant Witter is eventually arrested and sentenced to death. He wages a successful effort to win stays of execution on death row. It's based on the then well known book by death row denizen Caryl  Chessman (who was executed in 1960 for similar crimes; at the time he was the longest serving death row inmate) although the character's name is changed (Whittier was Chessman's middle name) and a disclaimer says the whole thing is a work of fiction. 

Less workman like than other outings by the prolific Fred Sears, it is unusual for a film at the time to spotlight such a slimy character in a kind of “justice story”. Today most lead characters in movies are slimy assholes you couldn't give two shits about and they are usually the heroes!

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Inner Sanctum

CALLING DR. DEATH-1943-First of the "Inner Sanctum" series from Universal with Lon Chaney (who starred in all of them) as Mark Steele, a successful doctor who uses hypnotism to cure patients. Unfortunately his success doesn't extend to his marriage with his bitchy philandering wife Maria (Ramsey Ames). When wifey goes away for the weekend sans hubby he goes after her. Later he wakes up in his office and can't remember where he's been. Maria winds up dead and a smug police inspector Gregg (J. Carroll Nash) suspects the doc even when they pick up Maria's boy toy Duvall (David Bruce) for the murder. Much of Chaney's dialogue is stream of consciousness over dubbing. He is sweet on his nurse Stella (Patricia Morison) and she helps him hypnotize himself but that doesn't really help. After a while he and nurse Stella declare their love but doc seems to be losing his mind. Is it guilt? However Steele uses his hypnotism to find the real killer in a surreal dream induced flashback (with some clever effects). 

CALLING DR. DEATH tries hard to be a psychological mystery and director Reginald Le Borg sort of succeeds but despite some nice dreamy touches and good acting the short running time has the story going along a little too quickly. The most memorable scene though might be the opening where “the spirit of the Inner Sanctum” introduces the story. It's an actor's head (David Hoffman) in a crystal ball talking in a weird voice. 

Screenwriter Edward Dein wrote many murder mysteries in the 1940's and later directed THE LEECH WOMAN, SHACKOUT ON 101 and CURSE OF THE UNDEAD. Director Le Borg directed the next two in the series and later worked with Chaney on the “all star” low budget horror film THE BLACK SLEEP.

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More Killer Babes

I was just watching the Outer Limits episode "Cold Hands, Warm Heart" with Bill Shatner as an astronaut returning from Venus who can't stay warm. The name of the space program he's with? Project Vulcan!

IT LIVES AGAIN-1978-In this crazed sequel a couple (Frederic Forrest and Kathleen Lloyd) are about to have a killer baby. Killer baby hunter Mr. Mallory (John Marley) plans to get rid of it but Frank Davis (John P Ryan; returning from the first film) breaks up the plan and forces them at gunpoint to let the wife have her baby at a secret clinic run by mad scientists R. Perry (Andrew Duggan) and Dr. Forest (Eddie Constantine!). They have another set of killer babes in the basement which they think they can control. Eventually the babies revolt, kill their captors and terrorize mom and dad. Dad finally kills his son and then tries to warn other couples. 

This is another quirky outing by written and directed by Larry Cohen, full of cool camera work, weird acting, choppy editing and some unintentional humor (I think!).

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Too Bad It Wasn't Car 54

THE CAR-1977-A driver-less car of death terrorizes a Utah community. The car indiscriminately kills various citizens including two bike riders, a French horn playing hitchhiker and the town sheriff (John Marley). Deputy Wade Parent (James Brolin) is left to figure out the mystery. The vicious vehicle attacks some grade school kids rehearsing for a parade. Their music teacher Lauren (Kathleen Lloyd) also Wade's girlfriend calls the evil auto a chicken. When the car won't enter a cemetery another deputy (Ronny Cox) surmises that it's some kind of entity but Wade doesn't believe him even after it kills Loren. Later Wade confronts the sinister sedan in his own garage. A wife beating redneck (RG Armstrong) provides explosives that spell a fiery and demonic end to the rampage. Terrible. 

Ok, I'm not going to speculate how Eliot Silverstein, the director of CAT BALLOU and A MAN CALLED HORSE wound up doing doing this low budget piece of junk but much of his later work was episodes of TV shows (like TALES FROM THE CRYPT) and TV movies. You figure it out!

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Robby The R Returns

THE INVISIBLE BOY-1957-A giant computer created by Dr. Merrinoe (Phillip Abbott) turns the scientist's son Timmie (Richard Eyer) invisible and plots to enslave the Earth with some rockets the US had ready to launch. The doc gets help from Robby The Robot who plants metal disks in the head of an army general (Harold J Stone) and some government scientists (including Robert H Harris and Than Wyenn). Eventually Robby and Timmie wind up on a rocketship. After they think the computer is finished it comes back and nearly succeeds in enslaving father and son but Robby saves the day and prevents the boy from being spanked by dad. The plot alternates from very dumb to very eerie. 

The actress who plays Timmie's mom is Diane Brewster who a few years later played the doomed Helen Kimble (in flashback scenes) on TV's THE FUGITIVE!

Director Herman Hoffman did mostly TV after this. The screenplay is by Cyril Hume who the year before wrote Robby the Robot's debut film FORBIDDEN PLANET. Eyer later played the genie in THE SEVENTH VOYAGE OF SINBAD. 

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“And Then They'll Come For You!”

HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL-1959-William Castle's "classic gimmick" ghost story stars Vincent Price as millionaire Frederick Loren who at the request of his cold hateful wife Annabelle (Carol Omart) challenges 6 strangers to stay all night in a supposedly haunted house where several murders have occurred. If they can do it they'll each receive 10 thousand dollars. The "guests" include a pilot (Richard Long), a secretary (Carolyn Craig), a psychiatrist (Alan Marshall), a newspaper columnist (Julie Mitchum) and  Watson Pritchard (Elisha Cook) the last person to have stayed in the house and survived. He talks a lot about ghosts and murders committed in the place but if you watched this as a little kid in the '60's like I did you'll never forget the scene where the Mrs. Slydes, the caretaker's wife (Leona Anderson) meets the secretary in a dark room. Her grimace popping out of the darkness probably sent some kids screaming from the room! A chandelier falls, there's a vat of acid in the basement, guns in mini-coffins and a twist ending with a skeleton that when shown in theaters in the '50's came out of the screen and passed over the audience. 

Director William Castle and star Vincent Price (screenwriter Robb White) also made the THE TINGLER the same year. 

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Swords

THE SENTIMENTAL SWORDSMAN-1977-Flying Dagger Lee (Ti Lung; later in John Woo's A BETTER TOMORROW and Sngmoo Lee's THE WARRIOR'S WAY) is a swordsman who's code of honor has cost to him a lot including giving up his fiance to a rival who saved his life. Now he wanders the countryside with his faithful servant while drowning his sorrows in wine. Along the way he befriends Ah Fei (Tung-Shing Yee) and becomes embroiled in many situations including being poisoned and coming into the possession of a golden vest. Later while looking for the elusive Plum Blossom Bandit he's framed for murder and is marked for death by  the 5 Poisons Kid. The plot is sometimes confusing but there's plenty of action and fights. It's based on a series of novels and spawned 2 sequels all directed by Yuen Chor (WEB OF DEATH).

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Revenge

THE THUNDERBOLT FIST (Pi li quan)-1972-In feudal times, a Japanese gang takes over a Chinese village. After a town elder beats their leader (James Nam) in a fight, the gang kills him. His son (Chuan Yuan) escapes and hides out with his uncle and trains with his female cousin (Shilh Szu; later in THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES). 10 years later, he's grown up to be a revenge seeking young man. He returns to his old village but his childhood rival spreads rumors that he's having an affair with a woman married to his friend. Later he is maimed and has to fight with one arm. After the villagers finally fight back he fights his Japanese rival in a bloody contest and wins. 

This Shaw Brothers production was directed by the Korean born Il-Ho Jang and was released a few months before the more famous KING BOXER (aka 5 FINGERS OF DEATH) which began the martial arts craze in the US....

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Dyn-o-mIte

THE DYNAMITE BROTHERS-1974-Larry Chin (Alan Tang) leaves Hong Kong to find his brother in LA. He's immediately attacked by 3 thugs ("Go back to China") hired by a corrupt police Captain Burke (Aldo Ray). Larry winds up handcuffed to a black criminal Stud Brown (Timothy Brown). They escape and run around like a low budget version of THE DEFIANT ONES. They beat up some hicks in a moving truck and finally get free and head to LA. Larry has flashbacks of his wife's death. The duo get saved by local gangster The Smiling Man (Don Oliver) from an attack by Razor J (Al Richardson), the henchman of big time time drug pusher Wei Chin (James Hong). Hmmm...Larry and Wei have the same last name...coincidence? 

 While Stud romances a mute prostitute Sarah (Carol Speed from THE BIG BIRD CAGE) Larry gets help from Betty Fong (Clare Nono) in tracking down his brother who he finds out is dead. However Larry is betrayed by Kung Fat (Richard Lee-Sung) and dropped in a pit with a rattlesnake. Meanwhile a gang war ensues with corrupt police, outrageously dressed guys with machine guns, explosions and a guy who yells really loud when he's shot and falls off a roof. While Stud has sex, Larry fights some guys in an alley. After Razor kills Burke and his wife Laura (Susan McIver) he goes after Sarah (he's too stupid to realize she can't talk). Stud and Larry arrive too late to save her but Stud gets revenge. Larry infiltrates Wei's lair and of course finds out the truth: Wei is Larry's brother and responsible for the death of Larry's wife. While The Smiling Man's minions beat up the gang Larry goes after his bro and makes his car go off a cliff. It ends with a freeze frame of the pair running away (to where I wonder?).

THE DYNAMITE BROTHERS was directed by Al Adamson in his usual hasty, episodic way. It's not very exciting but it has a lot of familiar faces to hold your interest a little while. Since this is an Independent International release it played in re-release for many years under numerous titles including STUD BROWN, DYNAMITE BROWN, BLACK BELT BROTHERS, etc. At the time this was made star Tang was a very popular star in Hong Kong. Co-star Brown was a former football player who earlier had a reoccurring role in the first season of TV's MASH. A few years later he had a role in Robert Altman's NASHVILLE. He'd work again with Adamson in 1976's BLACK HEAT.

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Rudy Returns!

THE HUMAN TORNADO-1976-If there's one movie worst than DOLOMITE it's this sequel with Rudy Ray Moore reprising his too hip foul mouthed rhyming jive talking moron. Only this time there's more intentionally comedy, racism and overall stupidity. I don't know who decided a sequel would be a good idea. I mean Moore isn't just a bad actor. He's no actor good or bad. He just seems to spit out lines, mispronouncing most words. The fight scenes are some of the worst ever filmed and this time they are "enhanced" by comic SFX.  It seems like Moore knew nothing about fighting and just made it up as he went along. The plot involves Dolomite and his band of Karate hookers (once again lead by Queen Bee) battling stupid white rednecks while Dolomite screws white women. He does a bit of his X-rated stand up routine at the beginning which is him mainly cursing and insulting audience members. He doesn't wear that many outrageous outfits this time out. 

The director Cliff Roquemore later made another outing with Moore, PETEY WHEATSTRAW.

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Total Dolemite Experience

DOLEMITE-1975-Perhaps in his day, rhyming comedian Rudy Ray Moore was cool. Nowadays, he's an unintentional laugh-riot at least in this his first movie. Moore plays the title character, a wrongly convicted jive talking pimp nut job who is let out of prison to help bring down gangster Willie Green (D'Urville Martin who also directed). He beats up white guys (the fight scenes are pathetic) and lives with several hookers and a madame named Queen Bee (Lady Reed). He wants revenge because of the death of his nephew. He does a rhyming routine about The Titanic for some drunken “fans” who can't afford to see him perform and gets information from a drug addict named Creeper (said to have been a real junkie). 

Two corrupt white cops dog his trail. Meanwhile an undercover FBI agent Blakeley (Jerry Jones; also the screenwriter) tries to help Dole. After performing at his own club, Dole enlists a bunch of Kung-Fu fighting whores to battle Green's gang. Even the cook in the club beats up a guy! Dolemite gets bloody vengeance on Green but the real bad guy behind it all is the corrupt weaselly white mayor (Hy Pike). The scenes of the FBI agents chasing down the mayor seem like part of a different movie. There's also a weird preacher and Moore saying things like “That's for fuckin' with me you no business born insecure motherfucker!”. Moore is also created with original adaptation.

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The Fix Is In

THE BASKETBALL FIX-1951-Alone in a bar, reporter Peter Ferreday (John Ireland) remembers how he helped high school basketball player Johnny Long (Marshall Thompson) get a scholarship with the help of coach Becker (Walter Sande). Mike Taft (William Bishop)), a sleazy bookmaker involves Johnny in a shaving points scheme. Johnny is in a money crunch taking care of his little brother and wants to buy an engagement ring for his girlfriend Pat (Vanessa Brown) (“Can you put glory in the bank?”). He gets in too deep, gets beat up and ruins his whole life. Nobody's learn a thing since....

This low budget film noirish quickie that's very serious and doesn't have a happy ending was directed by Felix E. Feist who a few years later made DONOVAN'S BRAIN and later moved to TV. A year earlier lead actress Vanessa Brown had played Jane to Lex Barker's Tarzan in TARZAN AND THE SLAVE GIRL.

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Country Western Horror Comedy

HILLBILLYS IN A HAUNTED HOUSE-1967-On their way to Nashville, country and western singers Woody (Ferlin Husky), Boots (Joi Lansing) and Jeepers (Don Bowman) spend the night in a haunted house, actually the hideout of some spies lead by Madame Wong (Linda Ho) with her bodyguard Max (Lon Chaney also in the much more enjoyable SPIDER BABY the same year), Gregor (Basil Rathbone) and Dr. Himmil (John Carradine). After Sonny James and his band visit and sing two songs, the group meets Wong and Max. She lets them spend the night and Merle Haggard shows up on their TV set to do a song (Max also makes a appearance). The spies think the yokels are from an organization called MOTHER and use their pet gorilla Anatole (George Barrows; the veteran man in an ape suit who'd “starred” in ROBOT MONSTER) to frighten them. Mother Agent #30 (Richard Webb) shows up and kills Anatole and Carradine. He and Max scuffle. They are all saved by the ghost of a Confederate war general. 

This crazy nonsense is a sequel to the previous year's LAS VEGAS HILLBILLIES which also featured Husky as Woody but has Mamie Van Doren in the Boots role and Jayne Mansefield. Veteran director Jean Yarbrough who had worked with Abbott and Costello and The Bowery Boys was directing episodes of TV's “Petticoat Junction” at the time.

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More Fulci Zombies!

CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD-1980-In Dunwich, a priest hangs himself in a graveyard while in New York at a seance a woman named Mary (Catriona MacColl) screams “The city of the dead!” then dies. A cop believes it all has to with drugs (“What are you on? Coke? Grass? Where's the stash? Down the toilet?”). Back in Dunwich, a weirdo named Bob (John Morghen aka Giovanni Lombardo Radice) starts to fool around with an inflatable love doll and finds a rotting corpse. Back in NY, Peter Bell (Christopher George), a news reporter goes to visit the seance place but is turned away by a cop. Back in Dunwich, some guys at a bar see the walls crack out and smoke comes out. One of the guys blames the strangeness on the priest who killed himself. Then Gerry (Carlo de Mejo), a psychiatrist is interrupted while asking his patient Sandra (Janet Agren) about her childhood. Back in NY, Jerry saves Mary (who's alive in her coffin now) from being buried alive (and almost kills her!). They meet with Theresa (Adelaide Aste), the woman who ran the seance and she tells Peter about “the book of Enoch” while Mary mentions Dunwich being the city of the dead and that the gates of hell are being opened again and if they aren't closed the dead will walk. 

Later Jerry's friend Emily (Antonella Interlenghi) meets Bob at a gas station and the dead priest shows up and rubs worms in her face. Then a man and woman making out in a car see the dead priest hanging around (literally). He makes the woman's eyes bleed and she upchucks worms and stuff that looks like intestines before someone rips the top of the guy's head off. Peter and Mary go to Dunwich while Bob is blamed for the murders. It seems for some reason that the priest's suicide is opening the gate to hell. At night a creepy coroner is attacked and Emily's little brother John John (Luca Paisner) sees a sinister apparition. Meanwhile Bob wanders around while Jerry and Sandra find the corpse of an old lady in Sandra's kitchen. Bob for some reason is hanging out in Emily's father's car and when the father sees them together he kills Bob by sticking his head into some kind of rotating drill. Peter and Mary meet Jerry and Sandra in a cemetery and they are attacked by a tornado of worms and maggots. Then Jerry gets a call from John John saying that Emily has killed their parents. The quartet hurry to find a solution before All Saints Day comes. Sandra takes John John home but is killed by a ghoul faced Emily. Bloody, gory faced zombies terrorize John John but he's saved by Jerry. It seems some of zombies are hallucinations. 

Zombies attack the local bar and kill and eat the bartender and his two lone customers. Meantime, now a trio Peter, Mary and Jerry investigate the priest's tomb and some underground tunnels where they meet a zombified Sandra who promptly kills Peter. Rats waste no time in eating his brain. Mary almost goes the “vomiting maggots” route but Jerry kills Sandra. After further snooping Mary and Jerry are trapped by the undead and the hanging priest. Just when Mary starts to bleed from the eyes, Jerry guts the priest with a wooden cross and he burns up (?). His minions burn too. Jerry and Mary are reunited with John John. But something is wrong. Mary screams as the scene breaks up.  

Although he had already made the notorious ZOMBIE (and several other successful projects), Italian director Lucio Fulci really hit his stride with this episodic baffling gory horror story. Though incomprehensible and slow going at times, Fulci packs stomach churning SFX, eerie apparitions and some good suspense scenes so the viewer only has time to wonder once or twice as to what's going on. The abrupt cheat ending seems to have evolved from the actually end scene having been destroyed accidentally while it was being developed. The producers would not allow Fulci to re-shoot so he kind of said “screw it”. Co-star Morghen was in several other Italian horror productions (CANNIBAL APOCALYPSE, CANNIBAL FEROX) where his character also came to a bad end. Director Fulci appears un-billed as a doctor. It also features journeyman actor Robert Sampson as the local sheriff and future director Michele Soavi.   

I saw this in a theater way back in 1980 under it's US edited title THE GATES OF HELL.

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