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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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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Doggone Zombies

DOGHOUSE-2009-A bunch of English gobs take their friend to a remote village so he'll forget about his divorce. Unfortunately for them (and us) the town is occupied by man hating, flesh eating women due to some kind of virus (Project: Cathouse).

This SHAWN OF THE DEAD/DEAD ALIVE inspired gore comedy features a variety of female zombies (a hairdresser, old lady, bride, butcher, dominatrix, etc.) but much of the heavy accented English dialogue was lost on me. At one point three of them (they meet an army sgt. at the village) dress in drag to evade the zombies. Things get more serious and deadly when the flesh eaters mutate. The weirdest death involves a fat dead housewife squashing her victim.

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