Slammer Girls

 

 (imdb)

GIRLS IN PRISON-1956-Prison pastor Rev. Fulton (Richard Denning) tries to help Ann Carson (Joan Taylor; EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS the same year)), in the slammer for a crime she didn't commit. She's in a cell with no nonsense Jenny (Adele Jurgens, in one of her last movie roles), nutty Dorothy (Phyllis Coates) and lesbian Melanee (Helen Gilbert). The matron (Jane Darwell; Ma Joad in THE GRAPES OF WRATH (1940)) seems pretty ineffectual but Fulton still wants to help. Old time actress Mae Marsh plays Grandma Edwards. Meanwhile, a bank robber (Lance Fuller) threatens Ann's con man father (Raymond Hatton) trying to find some still missing money everyone thinks Ann has. 

Typical 50's moral drama directed by Edward L. Cahn who also made THE SHE CREATURE (also with the acting challenged Fuller) and SHAKE, RATTLE AND ROCK! the same year, both penned by GIRLS screenwriter Lou Rusoff who also wrote IT CONQUERED THE WORLD for Roger Corman in '56. Denning, Jurgens and Hatton had all been in Corman's THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED the year before. Alex Gordon was one of the producers along with Samuel Z. Arkoff and James Nicholsen. Music by Roland Stein.

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Dig That Uranium

DIG THAT URANIUM-1955-This time the Boys buy a deed to a uranium mine from their friend Shifty Robertson (un-billed Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer) and head out to Arizona to dig. Of course the mine is a phony but they get help from an old prospector (Raymond Hatton; Pete the prospector in Corman's THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED the same year) to locate a real strike. A hotel manager (Harry Lauter) wants the mine and his two henchmen (Myron Healy, in his second BB adventure) and Tom Keene (using the name Richard Powers) cause trouble. At one point Sach (Huntz Hall) dreams he and Slip (Leo Gorcey in his penultimate role in the series) are gunslingers. Mary Beth Hughes (I ACCUSE MY PARENTS) is in the usual role of the bad guy's girl sent to entice the secret out of Sach. David Gorcey and Bennie Bartlett also appear. 


It's filled with Abbott & Costello and 3 Stooges like gags (Ellwood Ullman was one of the screenwriters) but fortunately little Louie (Bernard Gorcey) goes with them to provide some laughs. 


Unfortunately, it would be the elder Gorcey's last role. He would die from injuries received in a car accident soon after this was completed. Edward Bernds directed. 


Former cowboy star Keene would have his last screen role in 1959 in a little movie called PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE!


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Quick Audie

THE QUICK GUN-1964-A gun slinger named Clint Cooper (Audie Murphy) returns to his home town to warn the sheriff (James Best) that bank robbery Jud Spangler (Ted De Corsia in a good evil role) and his gang are targeting his town's bank. He has a inane bar fight with the father (Walter Sande)) and nephew (Rex Holman) of two brothers he killed. Nobody likes him because they think he has an ulterior motive even though he warned them and stays on to help fight the gang but when he kills the father and nephew in self defense the sheriff arrests him and locks him in jail leaving the town to fend off the hombres themselves! 
Later a cowardly preacher deputizes Cooper and he takes on the whole gang.

Frank Ferguson is the philosophical deputy and Merry Anders is his former girlfriend, now the sheriff's fiancé. It also features Frank Gerstle, Mort Mills, Raymond Hatton and William Fawcett and is based 
on a story "The Fastest Gun" which  '50's horror vet Robert Kent adapted. Director Sidney Salkow was coming to the end of his long career in TV and movies. Also in '64 he directed some scenes for the Italian lensed LAST MAN ON EARTH.

Audie Murphy was the most decorated hero of WW2. He came to Hollywood (on advice from James Cagney) and starred in a biography of his exploits TO HELL AND BACK. He made 44 movies in his career including John Huston's RED BADGE OF COURAGE but in the last 12 years of his life he made only westerns. He died at age 45 in a plane crash in 1971.

Co-star James Best starred in THE KILLER SHREWS in 1959 and went on to a successful career in TV (as actor and director). At the time of this writing there is a KILLER SHREWS sequel in the works!
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Three Again Rambling

I've always liked the ZATOICHI series featuring Shintaro Katsu as the blind swordsman- gambler-masseur who always finds trouble while helping the down trodden in Feudal Jaoan. Many of the storylines are essentially the same: Z comes to town and runs afoul of the local crime boss and his gang, he meets someone (usually a woman) in need and helps them, exposes crooked gambling, slaughters all the bad guys, leaves alone and disillusioned. It's Katsu's performance in the lead that makes the series however. He is gentle, soft spoken, humble and extremely deadly.






I'm not a fan of Robert Rodriguez. It's hard to like ONCE UPON A TIME IN MEXICO (2003) with it's meandering story, over the top violence and self indulgent "Tarantino inspired" direction. It completes the trilogy started with the far superior EL MARIACHI and is partially saved by Johnny Depp as the weird "3 armed" CIA agent but Antonio Banderas is laughable as the legendary hitman who whispers a lot and rarely shows any emotion. The interesting, wasted cast includes Reuben Blades, Wilhem Defoe, Mickey Rourke, Ceech Marin, Salma Hayek and Danny Trejo. Pedro Armendariz Jr. plays the corrupt "El Presidente".



BUFFALO STAMPEDE from 1933 is an early western effort from Henry Hathaway (his third movie) about the troubles brewing over the hunting of buffalo and the trading of their pelts. Randolph Scott, Buster Crabbe (who was the lead in TARZAN THE FEARLESS the same year) and Harry Carey are the bickering leads. Also with Raymond Hatton, Noah Berry, Judith Allen, Barton McLane and Monte Blue. It's based on a story by Zane Grey and also known as THE THUNDERING HERD.

Scott was in ISLAND OF LOST SOULS, MURDERS IN THE ZOO and SUPERNATURAL the same year. Hathaway would make THE TRAIL OF THE LONESOME PINE (the first Technicolor film shot outside of a studio) in 1936 (the same year Buster Crabbe debuted as Flash Gordon )and then better bigger budgeted Hollywood films.

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