More Buchanan

IN THE YEAR 2889-1967-Instead of music during the opening credits we get several mushroom cloud explosions and a voice reading Scriptures. After we find out this direct for TV remake of Roger Corman’s DAY THE WORLD ENDED was directed by Larry Buchanan everything falls into place.  

Capt.John Ramsey (Neil Fletcher; also in CREATURE OF DESTRUCTION) and his daughter Joanna (Chara Doherty) await the arrival of Larry, her fiance after the bombs have dropped. Dad says she should give up hope but she refuses and when there's a knock at the front door she's elated to think Larry did make it. Despite dad’s warning she opens the door. Surprise! It’s not Larry but a scarred victim of radiation poisoning. And according to Pop’s Geiger counter he should be dead! A minute later a guy named Steve (Paul Petersen; in better days the teen star of TV's THE DONNA REED SHOW) shows up and says the radioactive guy is his brother Granger (Max W. Anderson).  Then thug Mickey (Hugh Feagin) and his girl friend Jada (Quinn O'Hara) show up. Steve catches drunk rancher Henderson (Billy Thurman) peeping on Jada. John lays down the law and Jo thinks she hears someone calling her. Granger needs fresh meat and goes out at night hunting game. John says he’s a mutant and should be destroyed.

 A few weeks later (?), Steven and Joanna are falling in love and Granger is setting traps to catch wild game. However he’s scared off by an even uglier mutant who eats the rabbit Granger had planned for his din-din. Pop says as long as it doesn't rain for a while they should be ok. The girls go for a swim in what dad calls a “spring fed pool”. It looks like a regular cement pool and has a diving board! The ugly mutant prowls around. 

This nearly scene for scene (with most of the original dialogue) remake gets boring really fast and the makeup is horrible. Thurman’s original role (played by Raymond Hatton) was a prospector with a pet donkey. Here he’s an alcoholic bootlegger. I guess this version couldn't afford a real donkey. 

Despite some cast listings Jules Verne is not in this movie. The title was appropriated from a Verne short story that AIP had the rights to but never made and had the title under copy-right. This is one of four AIP movies remade for the com-pany that were released di-rectly to TV. Buchanan directed them all plus the “originals” MARS NEEDS WOMEN, CURSE OF THE SWAMP CREATURE and IT'S ALIVE!

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The original: https://moviemeltdown.blogspot.com/2009/07/this-is-very-long.html

Zager & Evans: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izQB2-Kmiic

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Another Quickie By Corman

THE LAST WOMAN ON EARTH-1960-In Puerto Rico Harold Gern (Anthony Carbone) hides out with his unhappy wife Evelyn (Betsy Jones-Moreland) because he’s been indicated. At a cock fight they are joined by his lawyer Martin Joyce (Edward Wain better known as Robert Towne who also wrote the screenplay). After they go scuba diving they find it hard to breathe. Then they discover their boat driver dead. 

They head back to town and see lots of dead bodies. It becomes apparent that the trio has survived the apocalypse. They hightail it to a secluded villa near a beach and tensions rise due to the two men one woman situation. There's a lot of talk in this 3 day wonder producer/ director Roger Corman made quickly after wrapping CREATURE FROM THE HAUNTED SEA (also with Cardone) and THE BATTLE OF BLOOD ISLAND. Strange tragic yet hopeful ending. 

Music by Ronald Stein. It was released on a double bill with THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS. Most copies are in black and white but a faded color version exists at The Internet Archive.

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A Turkey After Thanksgiving!

SIX HUNDRED AND SIXTY SIX-1972-Endlessly talky sci-fi bore-fest about some scientists in an underground military base after WW3. Characters play pinball, pool and chess. One guy goes crazy shoots a guard and has a heart attack and dies. The computer talks about “the beast”. It seems the leader (voice of Malachi Throne) they thought would save the world is really the anti-Christ. 

Joe Turkel and Robert Crawford are in it. Although the IMDB lists only this film for director Tim Doades it seems he may have directed a few religious films backed by church groups which may have also been the case with SIX HUNDRED AND SIXTY SIX. There's not much info about it and it may also be known as 666: MARK OF THE BEAST.

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We're Doomed!

DOOMSDAY MACHINE-1972-In 1975 it's discovered that Red China has a "doomsday machine" are going to use it to destroy the world! Around the same time, Project Astra, a manned spaceship to Venus has it's own problems. At the last minute three of the male astronauts are replaced by women which for some reason doesn't fit in well with the other guys. Grant Williams (THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN) and TV actor Denny Miller are the two grouchy commanders and singer/dancer Bobby Van is the comedy relief. The philosophical older leader is played by Henry Wilcoxon who was Marc Anthony in Cecil B. DeMille's CLEOPATRA in 1931. Obviously things weren't going so well for the old guy if he had to be in this junk! TV actress Ruta Lee is the super serious doctor Turner and Mala Powers (OUTRAGE) is the Russian major Bronski. Lorri Scott is the flirty Lt. Carlson.

After the Earth is destroyed it becomes apparent that sending the women along was not for pure scientific purposes. It's up to the crew to make it to Venus and carry on the human lifeline! But radioactivity from the destroyed Earth threaten to sterilize the men! While most of the crew talk procreation Grant suddenly can't control his hormones and attacks Lt. Carlson. They wind up getting vaporized. Nothing much else happens until two of the space travelers almost get to Venus but are warned by the collective Venus psyche that because of the "destructive ways of earthlings" they are not allowed to land. The voice seems to suggest other adventures await the two but their spaceship seems to blow up. The End.


THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE first started filming in 1967 under the title ARMAGEDDON 1975 by director Herbert J. Leder (FIEND WITHOUT A FACE) but ran out of money and was never finished.

For some reason Harry Hope (who produced some Al Adamson movies) and Lee "Roll 'Em" Sholem (SUPERMAN AND THE MOLE MEN) saw a need to do it. They filmed an ending without any of the original cast or sets and finished and released it in 1972. The cheesy effects are some of the most ridiculous ever and their ship changes size and color several times. The spaceship scenes were shot on a very cheap set with multi-colored lighting. Stock footage from WIZARD OF MARS (directed by David Hewitt who had a hand in this) is thrown in.

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You'll Wish The Mayans Were Right...

2012-2009-This big budgeted Hollywood science fiction disaster film fails in almost every category. It's plot is similar to several low budget cheapies that occasionally run on SYFY channel.

A writer Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) tries to help his ex-wife (Amanda Peet), his two children and her new husband (Thomas McCarthy) when global destruction of apocalyptic proportions starts destroying the Earth. Danny Glover is the stupid president of our evil government and  Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 YEARS A SLAVE) is a geologist called in to help but winds up butting heads with asshole chief of staff Oliver Platt. Thandie Newton (THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS) is the president's daughter who steals the Mona Lisa. All the major heads of various countries get together to embark on space arks. After many narrow escapes,  Jackson and company hook up with a Russian billionaire who has a huge plane ("It's Russian") that can take them to China where according to a map provided by conspiracy theorist/DJ Charlie Frost (Woody Harrelson) they can find safety.

Scenes show the destruction of Hawaii, the Effiel Tower, the Washington monument and Christ of The Andes which figures since director Roland Emmerich known for such swollen budget catastrophes like THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW and the US version of GODZILLA also made this. The movie he made before 2012 also had a year as its title (10,000 BC). The SFX run from very good to very poor (especially considering the budget).

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The Last Man

THE LAST MAN ON EARTH-1964-Despite it's low budget drawbacks and some bad dubbing this first version of Richard Matheson's novel “I Am Legend” is pretty good. It inspired George Romero and John Russo on NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. 

In 1965, three years after a mysterious plague turned the world populace into undead vampire like creatures, Dr. Robert Morgan (Vincent Price) is the title character, a scientist who is immune to the disease. He spends his days scouring the city looking for the secret hideout where the creatures are staying and when he finds any stragglers he drives wooden stakes through their hearts. At night he holds up in his house where a gang of the un-dead try to break in while their “leader” (Giacomo Rossi-Stuart; later in SNOW DEVILS) ( a former living friend of the doctor's) intones “Morgan, come out Morgan!”). They have decidedly vampire like weaknesses too. They only came out after sun down, don't like mirrors, garlic or crosses! 

Flashbacks reveal how things started with Morgan a once happy scientist with a wife and small daughter watching while the plague spreads throughout the world killing everyone around him with corpses (some still living) thrown into a huge burning pit. After his daughter is thrown there he vows not to let his wife go the same way and when she dies, he buries her, only to have a visit from her a few nights later! Back in the present Morgan finds a living dog and makes it his pet but the animal has the virus too and he has to “stake it”. Soon after he meets a mysterious woman (Franca Bettoia) named Ruth who suspiciously shows up and is allergic to garlic. It turns out she's a spy from a reorganized society that has found a temporary cure for the virus! But the group views Morgan as a “monster” and a “legend in the city” because many of the “vampires” he killed were actually part of the group. Ruth was dispatched to keep Morgan at bay so the group can come and kill him at night. “Your new society sounds charming”. Couldn't they have just sent a postcard saying: “Please stop”? 

After giving Ruth a transfusion of his own blood and curing her completely Morgan eludes the group (they seem to bring their women and children along on the hunt) for a short time but he's eventually shot and speared in a church after intoning “You're freaks. I'm a man. The last man”.

LMOE was produced by Robert Lippert and  Samuel Arkoff and filmed in Rome Italy (the film is supposed to take place in Los Angeles) and proved a drawback. As Price himself said “if there's one city on the face of the Earth that looks less like LA it's Rome”! Also the climatic chase scene finale is badly directed, very choppy and dark. Morgan somehow out runs his would be killers who are driving trucks and though they are only a few feet beyond him while chasing him up some stairs they never use their guns! 

Still scenes of the deserted streets littered with abandoned cars and corpses are well staged and the whole film has a eerie claustrophobic feel. The original Italian director is Ublado Ragona. The US version is credited to busy TV director Sidney Salkow (who worked with Price the same year on TWICE TOLD TALES). 

Price gives his all to the role evoking lots of sympathy but never going overboard. By today's standards he's probably miscast (so was Will Smith in the 2007 (second) remake) but who else would have starred in THE LAST MAN ON EARTH in 1964?! He made THE TOMB OF LIGEIA and THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH the same year. 

Richard Matheson co-wrote the screenplay under the pseudonym Logan Swanson (he didn't care for the results of the film). He'd co-written THE COMEDY OF TERRORS (which co-starred Price) the year before.

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Day The Day The Movie Re-make Ended....

THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL-2008-This movie really sucks! Anyone associated with this piece of shit should not be allowed to even make a movie again (except James Hong, one of the last character actors left in Hollywood who has one scene).

Since she won an Oscar Jennifer Connelly is becoming a female Orson Welles.

Keanu Reeves is perfect and idiotic as the alien who comes to destroy Earth. He lacks any of the class Michael Rennie brought to the original role but then what the hell am I saying? Audiences today don’t even realize this is a remake (which it is not anyway…). Please do me a favor and don’t watch this piece of crap (and if you do don’t tell me how wonderful and rewarding it is by watching it, ok?).

Wooo, John Cleese has the Sam Jaffe role! Maybe he and Keanu should have done something with a dead parrot instead!

Director Scott Derrickson had previously made such gems as HELLRAISER:INFERNO and THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE. Oh yeah Will Smith’s son and Kathy Bates are also in it!

Sorry for the rant..thanks for reading it though!





　



　

This Is Very Long!

DAY THE WORLD ENDED-1956–My two favorite Roger Corman Sci-Fi movies of the ‘50’s are NOT OF THIS EARTH and this one whose “story begins with The End”. Jim Maddison (Paul Burich; NOTE’s alien) has a house in a valley fortified against a H-Bomb drop. He and his daughter Louise (Lori Nelson) await the arrival of her fiancée. He never gets there but 5 others do. A geologist named Rick (Richard Denning), Tony, a gun toting thug (Mike “Touch” Connors) and his abused stripper “moll” Ruby (Adele Jurgens), a prospector (Jonathan Hale) and his donkey Diablo (no credit listed) and the radiation scarred Radek (Paul Dubov).

Trouble starts almost immediately when Tony takes a liking to Louise. This makes Rudy jealous. Tony plans to make Louise his “Eve” and eliminate everyone else. He and Rudy spit vicious dialogue at each other. Jim and Rick discuss “The Matsuo Project” and look at sketches of animals with fangs and claws. Jim thinks the women should bear children as soon as possible. The prospector bemoans his lost gold strike, makes moonshine and talks to his mule. When Louise goes swimming she hears “something” calling her name…

Meanwhile, Radek makes nightly rounds out in the woods eating contaminated animal meat. He has some great eerie dialogue, telling Rick about ‘the wonderful things going on” above the radiation line and declaring, “I have an enemy. He wants to kill me”.

The enemy turns out to be an armor-plated mutant with claws and a third eye! After Tony kills Ruby and throws her (very phony) body over a cliff, Radek decides make a meal out of Diablo but never gets to munch as he’s killed by his “enemy”. Heartbroken, the prospector decides to go get his gold and is killed by the radiation. Unfortunately Jim tries to save him and gets infected.

Through what seems to be a telepathic link the mutant monster gets Louise in a trance and kidnaps her as it begins to rain. Rick goes after her. When Jim discovers the rain is not contaminated Tony figures it’s time to make his move. Meanwhile Rick and Louise encounter the monster but the rainfall kills it. Tony zeros in his gun on Rick but Jim shoots and kills him (the look on Connors' face when he dies is priceless).

Jim dies but not before offering some philosophical wisdom and Rick and Louise go off to become the new Adam and Eve (although Jim hears some voices on the radio before he shoots Tony).

DTWE is a great claustrophobic little sci-fi film. Although a few parts are unintentionally funny Corman keeps it fairly serious and creepy. The mutant as played by it’s creator AIP SFX specialist Paul Blaisdell is cool but a little bit “rubbery” as all of his monsters tended to be but hell, this was the ‘50s! It’s also interesting to note that the monster was probably Louise’s now mutated fiancée, which would sort of explain his telepathic link to her.

Another unusual touch occurs near the beginning when all the survivors are assembled and Jim reads them the riot act. He mentions that “the women” will sleep in Louise’s room and “the men” will sleep in his room. Tony’s reaction, a glance at Ruby, says he's pissed.

Since this was an American International Picture many of the cast and crew made numerous appearances together in other projects around the same time. Paul Burich was in another interesting AIP cheapie in 1956, THE BEAST WITH A MILLION EYES. He delivers much of his dialogue stiffly but seriously. My favorite line is what he says about Tony: “I know his kind. Spawned in bilge water”. Richard Denning may have seemed a little old to play the heroic love interest lead but after all this was “the end of the world”. How choosy could you be! DTWE was one of two Roger Corman movies Denning made in 1956. The other was THE OKLAHOMA WOMAN (also written by DAY’s scripter Lou Rusoff). He also starred in Edward L. Cahn’s GIRLS IN PRISON with Adele Jurgens. It too was written by Rusoff. Denning’s other well known Sci-Fi films include CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN, TARGET: EARTH, THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON and UNKNOWN ISLAND.

Lori Nelson herself was terrorized by “The Gill Man” in THE REVENGE OF THE CREATURE. Her other AIP movies include HOT ROD GIRL and UNTAMED YOUTH. Adele Jergens known for playing hard-boiled “floozy” types made only two more pictures then retired. Her husband was Glenn Langan, The Amazing Colossal Man himself! Mike “Touch” Connors was actually an AIP movie vet but would go on to TV stardom in the shows TIGHTROPE and MANNIX. He was also in THE OKLAHOMA WOMAN as well as SHAKE RATTLE AND ROCK (with Jonathan Hale & Paul Dubov) and THE 10 COMMANMENTS in 1956! AIP veteran player Jonathan Haze appears briefly as a hungry radiation victim that Radek winds up eating!

DAY THE WORLD ENDED was one of a bunch of movies remade in the early ‘60’s by the recently departed Larry Buchanan for AIP-TV. That version used the same plot and some of the dialogue and featured former teen idol Paul Peterson (from THE DONNA REED SHOW) in the Richard Denning role.

A made for HBO movie starring Randy Quaid is a remake in name only!

Hey! Look What I Found!

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Panic!

PANIC IN THE YEAR ZERO!-1962-Ray Milland (who also directed) goes on vacation with his family just as a nuclear bomb is dropped on LA. He decides the best thing to do is to head for the hills (literally!). He lectures his wife (Jean Hagen) about how he doesn’t want to be part of the breakdown of society and vows to return when order is restored. He likes to order his son (pre-Beach Party Teen idol Frankie Avalon) around and he steals some guns from a dealer (ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS hero Richard Garland) when he runs out of money. In a scene that’s quite ironic today Ray punches out a gas station attendant who has the unmitigated gall to charge 3 dollars a gallon for gas! Along the way they meet greasy thug Richard Balakyan and his two punks. They also pick up Joan Freeman and live in a cave for a while. When his daughter (Mary Mitchel; she was later in SPIDER BABY) is raped he seeks revenge.



Despite the minimal cast and unbelievable plot twists it’s more low budget entertainment from AIP. Also with Willis Bouchey, Rex Holman, Oz Whitehead and Russ Bender.

Academy Award winner Milland also starred in THE PREMATURE BURIAL for Roger Corman the same year and would star in Corman’s X-THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES the next!


"It’s only when the tide goes out that you learn who’s been swimming naked"-Warren Buffett

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