I Don't Think He Ever Got Old

 

 (imdb)

YOUNG DILLINGER-1965-John Dillinger's (Nick Adams) girlfriend Elaine (Mary Ann Mobley) convinces him to rob her father so they can get married. John beats up the justice of the peace (Gene Roth) and they lam it. He's arrested later on. Elaine's father (Ted Knight) convinces him to plead guilty and not involve Elaine. Despite dad's promises, the judge (Walter Sande) gives John the maximum sentence. In jail, he meets Pretty Boy Floyd (Robert Conrad), Babyface Nelson (John Ashley) and Homer van Meter (Dan Terranova). They help John become a model prisoner so he can help them from the outside. When he's transferred to a state work farm, Elaine helps him escape. Outside, John meets Floyd's friend, mob boss Joe Rocco (Anthony Caruso) and gets beat up. He kills Rocco and his goons, then breaks his pals out of jail. Prof. Hoffman (Victor Buono) gets them an armored car to rob. That's fairly successful though John gets shot. He gets plastic surgery but the sleazy surgeon (John Hoyt) tries to rape Elaine. For some reason the surgery doesn't work so John drowns the doc. When the gang goes to the professor again he's being used by a federal agent (Reed Hadley) to set a trap. Joy Harmon plays Nelson's moll and Art Baker, Emile Meyer and Frank Gerstle are in it. 

Violent, mostly fictional crime drama directed by Terry Morse whose was mostly a film editor but did make some interesting movies like BRITISH INTELLIGENCE (1939) with Boris Karloff, TEAR GAS SQUAD (1940) co-starring George Reeves, 2 Sidney Toler Charlie Chan mysteries and was credited with the US filmed scenes in GODZILLA-KING OF MONSTERS (1956).

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Crime On a Budget

 

 (imdb)

THE WALKING TARGET-1960-Nick (Ron Foster; later in HOUSE OF THE DAMNED) gets out of jail after serving 5 years. The warden warns him he's a walking target because he knows where some hold up money is stashed. He meets girlfriend Suzy (Merry Anders; in THE HYPNOTIC EYE the same year) and friend Davy (Robert Christopher; in several Jerry Warren movies) but is still bitter over his jail time. A police Lt. (Harp McGuire) plans on arresting Nick when he goes for the loot.

 Of course, Suzy and Davy are lovers in cahoots to get all of the illicit dough. Meanwhile gangster businessman Arnie Huffman (familiar character actor Berry Kroeger) is also after the stolen loot. A flashback reveals how Nick convinced his honest hard working now dead friend Sammy (Norman Alden) to throw in with him despite the objections of his life Gail (Joan Evans; real life goddaughter of Joan Crawford). The swag is hidden in Gail's car and thanks to a homeless guy named Packy (William Fawcett) Nick learns Gail is in Arizona running a diner. After finding out about Davy & Suzy and upsetting Huffman's plan, Nick visits Gail. She is understandable angry at him even when he tells her she can have all the cash but she relents and lets him stay at her home. Later, he gets the money. Gail convinces him to give it back and go away with her. There's a shootout and a couple of people are killed. 

Screenwriter Stephen Kandel later became a TV producer/writer on “Mannix” and “MacGyver” and a few others. Director Edward L. Cahn directed this low budget thriller a year after making his last horror movie THE FOUR SKULLS OF JONATHAN DRAKE.

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William Whitney

 

THE CAT BURGLAR-1961-Jack Coley (Jack Hogan, later in the TV series “Combat!”) is a cat burglar who steals a suitcase with valuable papers from Nan Baker (June Kenney from EARTH VS. THE SPIDER). She gets help from a wino (Bruno VeSota) and a pawnbroker (Gene Roth) to get it back but an important notebook is missing. Since Jack threw away the plans he tries to forge a new copy. The guys who want the papers Reed (Gregg Palmer) and Leo (Will White) beat Jack up. Nan's boyfriend Alan (John Baer; NIGHT OF THE BLOOD BEAST) is mixed up in a spy ring. Everyone but Nan dies in the final shootout. 

A seldom seen little crime drama directed by veteran William Whitney who was doing lots of TV at this time but also made MASTER OF THE WORLD the same year. Actor Leo Gordon wrote it.

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The Dirty 8?

THE DEVIL'S 8-1969-Federal agent Faulker (Christopher George) helps 6 convicts break out of jail. He's assembling a small gang to bring down bottlegger Burl Long (Ralph Meeker). Murderer Frankie (Ross Hagen), mechanic Billie Joe (Tom Nardini), Bible reading Chandler (Larry Bishop), ace driver Henry (Robert DoQui), Sam (Joe Turkel), Sonny (Fabian) and Martin (Ron Rifkin) who's not a convict, just a rookie federal agent. They learn to fight, shoot and drive fast cars and they're all a bunch of assholes. Later when they are dealing with Long, Frank has sex with Cissy (Leslie Parrish) his ex-girlfriend now Long's mistress. The others do a lot of drinking and start a fight at a bar. Cliff Osmond is Long's assistant. Nice theme song. 

Bert Topper directed this DIRTY DOZEN influenced story for AIP. He later worked with Fabian again on SOUL HUSTLER.

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Teenage Gangs

THE REBEL BREED-1960-Police Lt. Brooks (Gerald Mohr) sends two rookie cops into a tough high school to infiltrate two gangs there. Frank Serano (Mark Damon) is posing as half Mexican-half African American and Don Walters (Douglas Hume) is a white guy. There's a black gang (the word Negro is used throughout the movie) called The Ebonies led by Satchel (Al Freeman Jr.), a Mexican gang The Caballeros and a white gang called The Royals. Almost immediately Frank gets beat up by The Cabs because Lola (Rita Moreno) the sister of gang leader Manuel (Richard Laurier) is assigned to a school project with him. Meanwhile she's making time with Jimmy (Don Eitner), a white guy (and Royal). Of course the real bad guy is Buck (Richard Rust), pot pushing leader of the racist white Royals who report to Mr. Elliot (Charles Franc). Manuel is a good gang leader though. He won't let his boys use grass. Later Buck accidentally kills Jimmy in a fight but makes it look like Manuel did it. He’s so bad he gives Satchel's little brother a joint to smoke. Many other things happen: Lola is pregnant, Buck finds out his slutty white girlfriend is actually black and the Royals paint Satchel white. Things come to a head at a pot party thrown by Buck that Lola joins trying to find evidence that Buck killed Jimmy. Frank infiltrates the party and Lola’s dad (Jay Novello) also shows up (he found out she’s preggers) to get harassed. Things really get out of hand when Muscles rats that Buck killed Jimmy and Frank and Don reveal their real jobs. Mr. Elliot appears with a gun. Thank god, the Cabs show up to help save the day. When Lt. Brooks gets there he lectures them (“When are you going to learn?!”). Love blooms for Lola and Frank. Everyone else is forgotten.

 I like the fact that THIS REBEL BREED lays most of the blame on the shoulders of the kids involved because they can't get along simply out of prejudice. The editing is a little sloppy but two directors are credited which could have something to do with it. The first Richard L. Bare had directed shorts and a few movies but was doing the TV western “Maverick” around the same time. He later directed all 166 episodes of the TV comedy “Green Acres”. One of his last films was the split screen slasher melodrama WICKED, WICKED. The second was William Rowland, a producer/director of low budget films (most of which I know nothing about...). Some mild “soft-core” sex scenes were added to the 1965 re-release of THE REBEL BREED and dubbed THE BLACK REBELS.

https://moviemeltdown.blogspot.com/2012/01/wicked-stuff.html

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Cavedog's Law

Hey! I like to watch old TV shows. For the last couple of months I've been watching a crime drama from the early '60's called BURKE'S LAW. It starred Gene Barry as a millionaire LA police captain who solved weird murders. The show was chocked filled with guest stars but despite a usually grisly murder the show was almost always played for laughs (except on a rare occasion). The reason I'm mentioning this is a couple of funny things I found associated with the show recently.

I was watching an episode ("Who Killed Molly" from 1964) where a character referred to Captain Burke as "Captain Kirk". That in itself isn't too strange. But also in that episode there was a character called Mrs. Tribble!

Kirk? Tribble?

Ok, so recently I was watching another, later episode ("Who Killed Merlin?" from 1964) and Paul Lynde (in his second dramatic role on the series) played a character named Dr. McCoy!!!

KIrk? Tribble? McCoy? Was this Gene Roddenberry's favorite show? Ok, I know Tribbles were created by David Gerrold but still....

Interestingly the role of Mrs. Tribble was played by Zasu Pitts in what turned out to be her last role...

Ok, tomorrow I'll have more TV stuff!

Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

THE FURY OF THE DRAGON-1976-This is a theatrical version of the short lived 1966 TV show that debuted the same year as the more popular “Batman”. It was released 10 years after it’s lone TV season to cash in on Bruce Lee’s “last film” THE GAME OF DEATH. Though the new credits made it seem like a Bruce Lee feature it’s just 4 TV episodes strung together featuring Van Williams as the masked crime fighter that everyone thinks is a villain. His sidekick and chauffeur is the Kung-Fu kicking Kato who tries to spice up the mundane action. The Hornet's real identity is newspaper publisher Bret Reid whose sideline is known only to the DA (Walter Barry) and his secretary.

The excitement challenged storylines include a kidnapping/blackmail plot on a visiting diplomat, crooked cops and a death ray. It’s not the corny tongue in cheek “take off” Batman was (there was a crossover episode) and lacked the villainous guests stars, which may be the reason it wasn’t a hit. The version I saw had Chinese sub-titles and featured trailers for Lee’s other movies at the beginning and his black and white screen test at the end. Van Williams appeared in other TV shows but made very few movies.

However in the 1993 Bruce Lee biopic DRAGON: THE BRUCE LEE STORY he portrayed the TV director of THE GREEN HORNET.

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Mad Dog -No Bite

MAD DOG COLL-1961-I've read that this low budget bio of the infamous gangster with the really cool name is inaccurate but what isn't?

It opens with scenes from the movie shown in negative over the credits after Coll (John Chandler in his film debut) machine guns the headstone on his father's grave! A stripper named Cleo (Kay Doubleday) narrates the story. Coll is an abused mamma's boy beaten up by other kids. He becomes a punk in a gang (with an "equalizer" monkey wrench). When a gang member says "You didn't have to hit him so hard", he replies "I'm practising to be a father". He organizes a real gang (with a young Jerry Orbach) and horns in on Dutch Schutz (Vincent Gardenia). Brooke Hayward plays his nominal love interest. Coll is a ruthless kill crazy thug who's trail is dogged by a Shakespeare reading detective (Telly Savalas). He kills some kids and a cop and during a kidnapping caper he rants about killing his father. He never really becomes the kingpin he dreams of being and at 23 he's gunned down in a drugstore. His last words are "...hate...I hate..."!

Director Burt Balaban also made MURDER INC and the seldom seen DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL rip-off STRANGER FROM VENUS.

Star Chandler had supporting roles in many films later on including PAT GARRETT AND BILLY THE KID, THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES, CHESTY ANDERSON,USN and PHANTASM 3. Hayward (the daughter of actress Margaret Sullavan) was married to Dennis Hopper at the time and late wrote the book "Haywire".



The real Mad Dog!

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