They're Not That Wild

WILD ONES ON WHEELS-1962-Duke Walker (Sidney Mason) is let out of prison after serving his time for a bank robbery where the money was never recovered. Criminal gangster King Tut (Edmund Tontini) and his gang, Pompey (Mike Cannon), Jick (Jonathan Karle) and Preacher Man (Ray Dennis Steckler) want the money so they stake out the diner where his girlfriend Hazel (Francine York) works. Eventually they trap Duke and Hazel when they go on a camping trip and meet up with Bill (Robert Blair), Hazel's lover while Duke was away. They beat Duke up but he refuses to tell. After Pompey and Jick have a "chicken run" and Jick is killed, Duke is stabbed to death. The rest of the story is the gang, convinced Hazel knows where the money is, trying to make her lead them to it with Bill trying to protect her. They eventually find the money but have a falling out and Bill turns out to actually be an insurance investigator working with the police! 

Director Rudolph Cusumano made his only other movie, SECRET FILE : HOLLYWOOD the same year. Ray Dennis Steckler directed and acted in WILD GUITAR, also in 1962.

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Everything's Archie!

WILD GUITAR-1962-Arch Hall Jr. stars as Bud Eagle, a Rock-A-Billy yokel who comes to LA and is exploited by agent Mike McCauley (William Watters AKA Arch Hall Sr.). Director Ray Dennis Steckler plays Steak, McCauley’s strong-arm thug. He meets (former amateur ice skater) Nancy Czar and performs on a TV show and becomes a big star. After being cajoled and blackmail (and unsuccessfully seduced by a hooker) Bud and his brother sent things straight. 

WILD GUITAR is a pretty wacky little movie made in the pre-Beatles era of teenage rock and roll. The music is ok but Arch’s hair is really out of control. This was the first feature directed by co-star Steckler. EEGAH! was made the same year by the father and son team. Arch Jr. would star in the eerie THE SADIST the next year.



THE SADIST-1963-If you’ve only seen Arch Hall Jr. in EEGAH! or WILD GUITAR you owe it to yourself to see him in this movie as a deranged psycho! As he proclaims before the credits roll: “I have been hurt by others. And I will hurt them. I will make them suffer like I have suffered”.

Three schoolteachers on their way to a baseball game have car trouble. They pull into a dilapidated gas station for help. Ed (Richard Alden) and Doris (Helen Hovey) are the two youngish sweethearts to be types. Carl (Don Russell) is the older guy. Their quick stop for a new water hose becomes a nightmare when they are confronted by loony thug Charlie Tibbs (Hall Jr.) and his imbecile girlfriend Judy (Marilyn Manning also in EEGAH!). He’s a mass murderer on the run and wants the teach-mobile fixed so he and his moll can make a quick getaway. Fortunately Ed takes practically the whole film to fix the damn thing. However Charlie manages to taunt the trio every chance he gets. He pistol whips Carl and then shoots him in cold blood after drinking a coke. There’s a good deal of suspense and a few interesting plot twists. Hall is really slimy in the lead and quite surprising after the goody teenage roles he had been playing.

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Don't Be Fooled By The Cover!

CURSE OF THE EVIL SPIRIT-1971 -This is director Ray Dennis Steckler’s THE CHOOPER before he added about 40 minutes of meaningless rodeo footage because the original was too short. It’s also known as BLOOD SHACK and tells the story of a rundown shack haunted by “The Chooper” a vengeful Indian spirit who kills anyone who enters.

The story opens with a cool, acoustic rock-a-billy song courtesy of co-star/co-writer Ron Haydock (in his last movie). Then we meet ranch hand Daniel (Jason Wayne in his first and last film role) who warns two little girls (The Steckler’s own kids, Linda & Laura) to stay away from the shack or The Chooper will get them. He tells the same thing to a young (and seemingly stoned) hitchhiker but she stays anyway and gets killed by a mysterious killer in black brandishing a long knife in a very dark scene.



We then learn the story of a famous actress named Carolyn Brandt who as luck would have it is actually played by Steckler’s then wife Carolyn Brandt! She inherits the rundown, barren place from her uncle and goes to live there after “some bad experiences in the film business making horror films”! We are also introduced to “the ranch” foreman Tim (Haydock looking some what Ed Nortonish). After Brandt and Daniel discuss two of Steckler’s real movies she goes for a walk and meets the two little girls (they’re pretty good actresses ! ) who discuss The Chooper again. They seem to pop out of nowhere several times during the story to play with a chair or get into mischief. More narration and walking ensues. Tim shows up drinking a coke, wanting to buy the ranch. Then Carolyn wanders around at night.

Next day comes some of the infamous rodeo footage. The hitchhiker’s husband comes looking for his wife and boom The Chooper strikes again! Daniel runs around like Norman Bates cleaning up after the deaths and yelling things like “ Oh my god, I warned you! I told you The Chooper would get you!”. Carolyn talks to the kids again and whammo! Off we go to the rodeo! Tim shows up still trying to buy the ranch. A fat sheriff comes by and is killed by The Chooper in a dive off the roof attack. Meanwhile Carolyn takes the kids on an endless ride with Peanuts The Pony! More narration follows and on and on . Tim and Daniel have a fist fight that kills a few minutes and breaks up the monotony while the kids dig in the dirt. Then it’s back to the rodeo! Dudes bust their broncos while a not too bad James Bondish type guitar song (“Dream Your Dreams”) plays. Finally The Chooper’s real identity is revealed in the not so exciting climax and a rather blasé Brandt leaves. THE END!

This is not Steckler’s worst movie. It’s close but THE HOLLYWOOD KILLER MEETS THE SKID ROW SLASHER (1979) had even more talk and less action. It’s tedious for sure and the sound, editing and acting are sub-standard but like most Steckler projects it has some unexplainable appeal.

And Steckler is not a bad director! Scenes when The Chooper attacks are actually quite startling in a way. In the first murder he appears out of the darkness yelling. The second (in broad daylight) he cuts across the camera out of nowhere. It gets your attention! The best parts for me were the weird American Indian influenced title paintings and the music.

Co-star Ron Haydock had an “Ed Wood” type career writing lurid pulp novels,, editing a Sci-Fi magazine and acting in other movies by his friend Steckler (who also co-wrote, edited and photographed “Curse”) that was marred by mental illness. He was killed in 1977 at the age of 37. There is a great compilation album of his fun Gene Vincent inspired bop called “99 Chicks”.

Steckler made a lot of adults only movies (usually under a pseudonym) around this time. His next “real movie” was the aforementioned THKMTSRS. It’s kind of sequel THE LAS VEGAS SERIAL KILLER appeared in 1986. His last outing WARCAT (1987) was completed by TV Mikels.

Sad to report Ray Dennis Steckler died in January 2009.

"It is hard enough to remember my opinions without also remembering my reasons for them"-Nietzsche

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Incredible!

THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BECAME MIXED UP ZOMBIES!!?-1964-Low budget but fun nonsense from Ray Dennis Steckler.

Madame Estrella (Brett O’Hara), a fortune teller with a wart on her face, throws acid into the faces of some male customers and keeps them locked in a cage. Her very strange chain smoking servant Ortega (Jack Brady) helps out. So does her sister. Marge. An alcoholic dancer (Carolyn Brandt; at the time the director’s wife) goes to visit Estrella and accidentally discovers her secret so Estrella hypnotizes deadbeat Jerry (Cash Flagg; the director himself using his famous pseudonym) to kill her. The sight of Jerry in hooded sweat shirt with budging eyes is very crazed. After the killing Jerry has a weird dream with dancing girls. He later imagines his girlfriend to be Marge and tries to kill her. Estrella has Jerry kill one more person then splashes him with acid and intends to put him with the rest of her “collection”. Unfortunately for her, the disfigured ones break out and kill her, Ortega and her sister. They then interrupt a big dance number and kill some dancers. The police intervene and kill the monster-zombie-victims. Jerry runs out to the ocean, climbs some rocks and is shot down by the police leaving his girlfriend and roommate (Atlas King in bee hive hairdo) to mourn him. Titus Moede (who later co-starred in Steckler’s BAT FINK A BOO-BOO) has a small role.

TISCWSLABMUZ is referred to as something like a good bad movie. It’s very silly and badly acted (Most of Atlas King’s dialogue is lost under his accent) but like all Ray Steckler’s movies it’s likable and fun despite it’s goofy flaws. And Steckler/Flagg makes a great psycho killer (though not as good as in his next film THE THRILL KILLERS). This was his second feature after WILD GUITAR in 1962.

The cinematography is by Joseph V. Mascelli who later directed THE ATOMIC BRAIN but 2 camera operators went on to bigger things: Laszlo Kovacs and Vilmos Zsigmund. Co-Screenwriter Robert Silliphant is credited with the story for a much worse film, THE CREEPING TERROR!



Mr. Flagg!


"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits"-Einstein

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