Spook Stooges

 

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SPOOKS!-1953-In this 3 Stooges (Moe, Larry & Shemp) short (originally shown in 3-D; one of two they made in '53) the trio are detectives trying to rescue a young woman Bea Bopper (Norma Randall) from the clutches of two mad scientists Dr. Jekyll (Phillip Van Zandt) and Mr. Hyde (Tom Kennedy) who want to put her brain into a gorilla (Steve Calvert). 

Naturally pies play a role in the story and a lot of things are thrust at the screen (a hypo, a bat, Larry's face, Moe's eye poking fingers, a knife, etc.). However, the strangest effect is the bat that looks like Shemp! (5 years before THE FLY!) It's pretty hilarious. 

The Stooges made all of their 190 (!) short films for Columbia Pictures from 1934-1959. This is said to be one of quickest made as the studio wanted to cash in on the 3-D fad. Jules White directed and/or produced the lion share of the trio's shorts. Screenwriter Felix Adler was an experienced gag man who also wrote for Laurel & Hardy and Abbott & Costello.

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Dr. Death and Mr. Howard

DOCTOR DEATH, SEEKER OF SOULS-1973-Fred Sanders (Barry Coe) tries to find a way to bring his wife Laura (Jo Morrow) back from the dead. After consulting a phony medium and meeting a bug eyed old man and the society of the dead, he meets a woman named Tana (QUEEN OF BLOOD'S Florence Marley) who takes him to see Dr. Death (John Considine) who she says can bring back the dead. During a demonstration the doctor he and his assistant Thor (Leon Askin) saw a scarred woman in half (like a magic act) then bring her soul back in another body. Sanders remains unconvinced but after seeing his wife’s apparition and hearing her voice, he agrees to have the doctor bring her back. The doctor then relates how he got the power (in sepia flashback) 1,000 years before (I think his voice changes too). He decides to kill Tana and use her soul but when he attempts the soul transfer it doesn't work. Sanders’ wife refuses it and Sanders decides it's better that way but the doctor has other plans. He and Thor go around killing innocent women, trying to transfer their souls into Mrs. Sanders body. To no avail. Meanwhile Sanders romances his secretary Sandy (Cheryl Miller). When the doctor is stabbed his blood gushes out and disintegrates his attacker. After deciding that the secretary has the strong soul he needs, doc decides to bleed her to death!  The predictable ending has the doctor's soul in Mrs. Sanders body and plotting revenge. 

This movie is very boring in spots and very stupid in others. Considine is ok in the over the top main role spouting a lot of platitudes about singular soul transfer but the rest of the cast isn’t very good. The real reason to see this is for the appearance of Moe Howard as a member of the doctor’s audience! He seems to flub one of his lines. 

This was director Eddie Saeta only full length film however he was assistant director on many films going back to the late 1930's. Former actor Sal Ponti wrote the screenplay. Co-star Barry Coe was in lots of TV show episodes and LOVE ME TENDER (with Elvis). A year after this John Considine made another low budget horror film THE THIRSTY DEAD. His father John W. Considine Jr. was a producer in the 1930's and '40's. His most famous was MAD LOVE in 1935.

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Fungus Among Us!

SPACE MASTER-X-7-1958-A scientist with marital problems (Paul Frees, better know for this vocal narrations than his on screen acting) gets some “space fungus” off a US probe (The Space Master) and brings it home to experiment on. Unfortunately while he’s doing this he keeps getting interrupted by his ex-wife (Lyn Thomas) who wants custody of their child. Eventually the fungus kills him and escapes but the government seems to contain it until they learn the wife had been in the house too. Bill Williams (who was in a TV series DATE WITH THE ANGELS at the time) is in charge of finding her.

Along the way he meets Moe Howard playing a helpful cab driver (“Ya know she had eyebrows like you pull out with pliers”) and Thomas B. Henry is a professor.

It's like a low budget science fiction version of Elia Kazan's PANIC IN THE STREETS in a way because once the fungus is contained it's really just a hunt for the infected woman. I thought the story could have been better since the screenwriters were George Worthington Yates (EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS, THEM!) and Daniel Mainwaring (INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS).

Director Edward Bernds made many 3 Stooges shorts (and later acouple of the "new" Stooges movies), the underrated Sci-Fi WORLD WITHOUT END and Bowery Boys comedies. He died in 2000 at 94!

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