Supernatural TV Pilot

 

 (imdb)

THE GHOST OF SIERRA DE COBRE-1964-Architect/psychic investigator Nelson Orlon (Martin Landau) is called in by Vivia Mandore (Diane Baker in Hitchcock's MARNIE and Castle's STRAITJACKET the same year), wife of Henry Mandore (Tim Simcox), a wealthy blind man who's getting strange phone calls from his dead mother. After Paulina sees a horrifying ghost, Orlon investigates. Their new housekeeper, the spooky Paulina (Dame Judith Anderson) hangs around and doesn't like Orlon because he called the ghost of her town a fake. Things are not as they seem. Leonard Stone as Mandore's business partner and Nellie Britt as another housekeeper are skeptical. 

Alternatively spooky and talky, this is a failed TV pilot turned into a full-length movie by writer Joseph Stefano (who did the screenplay for PYSCHO (1960) and many OUTER LIMITS episodes).  He took over directing (his only time as a director) when original director Robert Stevens fell ill. Future Academy Award winner Landau was in an episode of "The Twilight Zone" and "The Outer Limits" the same year. 

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Gunn

BLACK GUNN-1972-Gunn (Jim Brown) is the owner of a slick club whose brother Scotty (Herbert Jefferson Jr.) is involved with the Black Action Group, a radical faction run by Seth (Bernie Casey). He also has some stolen mob ledgers. A mob boss (Stephen McNally) puts Russ Capeli (Martin Landau) who fronts as a used car dealer in charge of getting the ledgers back. Psycho thug Krigley (Bruce Glover) and cohort Rico (William Campbell) beat up parking attendant/informer Sam Greene (MLB pitcher Vidal Blue). A congressman Carl Adams (Gary Conway) can't get a table at Gunn's club and his bigoted friend Winman (Keefe Brasselle) starts a fight and gets thrown out. Adams associate Toni (Luciana Paluzzi; THE GREEN SLIME) can't persuade Gunn. After Scotty is killed Gunn wants his killer who turns out to be Krigley. Gunn beats him up. He goes after Capeli but is captured and tortured. Fortunately the BAG Bros come to the rescue. 

The crazed ending features a bloody shootout, a car chase, explosions and Capeli being set on fire. It ends with Gunn being arrested. Deacon Jones plays himself and Timothy Brown is also in it. This all star blaxploitation crime drama by England born Robert Hartford-Davies who before coming to the US had directed CORRUPTION with Peter Cushing. He followed up GUNN with another blaxploitation movie (also made in the US) THE TAKE with Billy Dee Williams.

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Accept No Substitutes...

ALONE IN THE DARK-1982-Dr. Daniel Potter (Dwight Schultz) comes to work at a clinic for mental cases run by the eccentric pot smoking Dr. Leo Bain (Donald Pleasence). His star patients are Ronald Elster (Erland Van Lidth), a child molester, the paranoid Col. Hawkes (Jack Palance), ex-preacher Byron Sutcliff (Martin Landau), an arsonist and John Skaggs who strangles people when he gets a nose bleed. Hawkes believes Potter killed their former doctor and wants revenge (“There are no crazy people, doctor. We're all on vacation”). 

 At a club The Sic F*cks do “Chop Up Your Mother”. A blackout allows the nutty gang to escape. During a riot of stealing they get weapons. Skaggs leaves them but the rest go looking for Potter, whose sister meets a guy named Tom (Phillips Clark) at a “no nukes” rally and invites him to dinner at her brother's house. Tom helps fight off the loonies when they attack. Bain comes to help but Sutcliff cuts off his ear. (Bain is never seen again but I suppose he's killed) Despite helping the family (and killing Elster) Tom turns out to be “the bleeder” Skaggs but they kill him. 

When Hawkes closes in for the kill the electricity comes back on and a timely news report confirms the previous doctor is still alive. Hawkes evades the police, beats up a bouncer at a club and meets a weird woman while The Sic F*cks play. Hawkes pulls out his gun and points it at the woman. She just laughs. So does Hawkes. 

This was director Jack Sholder's first feature film and it's a great debut but after making NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 2: FREDDY'S REVENGE and THE HIDDEN he seemed to drift into TV movies. Both Palance and Landau went on to win Academy Awards.

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Outer Space TV

COSMIC PRINCESS-1982-Two episodes of the syndicated science fiction series SPACE:1999 edited in one full length movie. The series followed the inhabitants of an Earth space station on the moon and the adventures they have after the planet breaks away from its orbit hurling it into space. At the time it premiered on US TV it was a big deal but the sfx were terrible and it could be very boring. Martin Landau started as Commander John Koenig and his the real life wife Barbara Bain was the chief doctor, Helena Russell. Both had come to fame on the TV spy series MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE. Barry Morse (from THE FUGITIVE TV show) was in the first season but seemed to mysteriously disappear by the show's final episodes. They brought in a new character who's introduced here. It was the last project by Gary and Sylvia Anderson, creators of UFO and all the super marination stuff.

While searching for titanium the crew comes in contact with a nut named Mentor (Brian Blessed) who makes mindless slaves out of various aliens to fuel a machine that will restore his planet. 

His daughter Maya (Catherine Schell) can change into any animal. She first appears as a lion and thinks daddy is swell because she doesn't know about his evil scheme to enslave the crew. When she finds out she frees Koenig and his group and they destroy his plans and him. Maya is taken back to the ship to become a regular. In the second half Koenig and another guy are separate from the base when it goes through a space warp. Maya goes crazy and turns into a weird alien and menaces the base. Despite being the most expensive series produced by The Andersons this show is very bad on all counts. Charles Critchton and Peter Medak are the credited directors.

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9

9-2009-In a post-apocalyptic world where machines revolted against man and destroyed everything, little snitched together doll like beings (with  numbers on their backs) inhabit the gigantic ruins. One little renegade, 9 (voice of Elijah Wood) looks for answers and tries to save 2 (voice of Martin Landau) but he accidentally unleashes a machine called The Brain which seems to have been created by a Nazi like leader, The Chancellor. Recent Academy Award winner Christopher Plummer voices 1, the leader of the group who would rather stay in hiding than fight. Jennifer Connelly is 7 and Crispin Glover and John C. Reilly also lend their vocals talents. 


This is a cool animated Sci-Fi fantasy from debuting director Shane Acker who had previously done short films. 


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