Hey Moe!

 

 (imdb)

BATTLE OF BLOOD ISLAND-1960-During WW2, Moe (Richard Devon) and Ken (Ron Gans) are the only survivors of the army's assault on Blood Island. Ken is badly wounded and moans a lot. They try and survive while avoiding the Japanese camp nearby. They gradually grow on each others nerves. Basically this is a 2 person drama which is a little talky for me but succeeds despite it's low budget constraints. 

Executive producer Roger Corman appears as a soldier at the end. It's based on story by Phillip Roth called “Expect The Vandals”. Director Paul Rapp made only one of other movie HIGH SCHOOL BIG SHOT in 1959. Star Richard Devon, a Corman veteran was a busy TV actor at the time. Co-Star Ron Gans became a voice actor.

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Sign The Book

 

 (imdb)

THE UNDEAD-1957-After a sinister intro by The Devil (Richard Devon), a weird guy named Quintas Ratcliff (Val Dufour) returns from Tibet to confront his former teacher with his regression experiments. Quintas regresses hooker Diana (Pamela Duncan) to a past life in some medieval time when persecution of witches was trending. She finds herself a condemned witch named Elaine, locked in a dungeon awaiting execution. She escapes but is accidentally locked in a coffin (with a corpse played by Paul Blaisdell) by feeble gravedigger Smolen (Mel Welles). Meanwhile Pendragon (Richard Garland) searches for proof of Elaine's innocence. A woman named Livia (Allison Hayes) pretends to care but is really a witch with imp companion (Bobby Barty) who's after Pendragon's heart. 

(Metaphorically speaking…).

 After Smolen frees Elaine from the coffin she meets Maud (Dorothy Neumann), a kind of witch who hides Elaine and tells Pendragon. Maud then challenges Livia. Bruno VeSota plays a pub owner who's decapitated. When Quintas realizes he's changed the past he goes back to try and fix things up. Livia convinces Pendragon the only way to help Elaine is to make a pact with the devil but Qunitas now a knight who somehow the devil knows dissuades Pendragon from signing. But if Elaine doesn't die by dawn all her future lives will cease to be. Will she submit to the executioner's axe? And what of Quintas? Will he make it back to the present? Dick Miller appears in one scene as a leper. 

This is a great low budget AIP production directed of course by Roger Corman with a lot of flair and imagination. There's some nice SFX and spooky settings. Screenwriters Charles Griffin and Mark Hanna also collaborated on Corman's best sci-fi/horror film NOT OF THIS EARTH the same year. Corman also made ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS in '57, written by Griffin and and starring Garland and Duncan.

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I Was A Teenage Dracula

 

 (imdb)

BLOOD OF DRACULA-1957-Nancy (Sandra Harrison), a trouble teenager is dropped off at Sherwood, a prep school, by her stupid father (Thomas B. Henry) and his new gold digging bride (Jean Dean). With her headstrong attitude she runs afoul of Myra (Gail Ganley) and her secret society. Myra also assists a mad woman teacher scientist Mrs. Branding (Louise Lewis) who wants to save the world from itself and says "We live in a world ruled by men for men" when her thesis is rejected. She decides to use Nancy in her incomprehensible experiments. The girls have a party crashed by three boys where a dork (Jerry Blaine) sings a song called "Puppy Love". Under Branding's subliminal hypnosis Nancy turns into a scary fanged vampire. She kills several people. Lt. Dunlap (Malcohm Atterbury) doesn't believe it when one of his officers (Richard Devon) says it's a vampire. Nancy's boyfriend comes to rescue her but all she can think about is his neck. In the climax she kills the doctor and falls on a stake and dies while her boyfriend cries and Myra regrets not telling about Branding's weird experiments.

This AIP teenage drive-in horror was produced by Herman Cohen who held the same capacity on I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF and I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN. Both those movies had been written by BLOOD's screenwriter Aben Kandel (who would work with Cohen later on when the producer relocated to England). Director Herbert Strock had also made TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN. BLOOD OF DRACULA is ok as AIP teen oriented horror films go. The vampire is creepy but I kind of felt sorry for the Nancy character, a troubled kid no one seems to care about except her boyfriend who shows up to help her, only to see her die. Should have been called “I Was a Female Dracula”.

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Corman, Cabot, Devon and Miller

WAR OF THE SATELLITES-1958- After 10 failed manned missions to the Sigma Barrier, Dr. Pol Van Ponder (Richard Devon) decides to take number 11 up himself. His assistants Dave Boyer (Dick Miller) and Sybil Carrington (Susan Cabot) plan to go with him. His scientist friend Hotch (Robert Shayne) supports him but Jason ibn Akad (Michael Fox), LeMoine (Bruno VeSota) and others don't. Just when it looks like the project will be shut down, it's announced Van Ponder is killed in a car accident. No sooner is this declared and the doctor shows up! However it's no miracle. He’s been taken over by an alien being (who caused the crash). Now he can split into two people and  repair his hand after it’s charred by a blow torch. He also can’t deter the efforts to send more rockets into space so the aliens make their presence known and create natural disasters around the world (stock footage). The alien as doctor declares an end to the project but when he sends Boyer to deliver the news, Boyer instead convinces the UN reps that Earth should fight the aliens. This makes the possessed doctor not happy. Boyer becomes suspicious when he notices some bruises on Devon arms. They all go into space and Boyer tries to convince the crew of the truth while Van Ponder acts weird and kills. It's said this sci-fi space film (perhaps director Roger Corman’s weakest '50's effort) was rushed into production after the 1957 Sputnik launch. There's not much action but it's nice to see usual supporting actors Miller & Devon in the lead roles. And I love those reclining space.chairs! 

With the death of Miller in late 2018 I believe the last living cast member of WOTS is Corman who has a small role as a rocket operator. Strangely this was the only movie Miller made in 1958! He starred in A BUCKET OF BLOOD the next year. Cabot starred in THE WASP WOMAN the next year. They had both been in CARNIVAL ROCK for Corman in 1957. She and Richard Devon were in Corman's MACHINE GUN KELLY the same year as WOTS.

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