Girls In Gangs

  (wkipedia)

GIRL GANG-1954-4 girls rob a guy and steal his car. They take it to greasy drug pusher Joe (Timothy Farrell) who sells them joints except for one girl who wants a shot of heroin. Joe shows another girl how to shoot up and his heroin addicted lackey brings over a couple of "green horns". "Weeds today. Shots tomorrow". Later "the kids" have a pot party that leads to dancing and sex. One girl has sex with her employer and then Joe and his abortion doctor lackey Doc Bradford (Harry Keaton; also in Ed Woods' THE SINISTER URGE) blackmail him with a rape charge. Joe sets up a daylight robbery of a gas station. It doesn't go too well. One guy is shot and killed and one of the girls is wounded badly. She's dragged back to Joe's place where Doc attempts to remove the bullet. She dies. The remaining two girls have a cat fight. The police arrive and arrest everyone and Doc while trying to escape is shot in the back. 

Despite the drug injection scenes any seriousness is lost with all the dumb situations and dialogue trying to "out Wood" Ed Wood but Farrell's performance as the grouchy sleazy pusher Joe is worth watching! Director Robert C. Dertano made RACKET GIRLS (also with Farrell).

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It's Like Beat, Man

THE REBEL SET-1959-Mr. Tucker (Ed Platt), the too sure of himself phony hip owner of a beat club hires 3 losers to help him and his partner Sidney (Ned Glass) rob an armored car. Down on his luck actor Johnny (Gregg Palmer; ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU), law breaking spoiled rich kid George Leland (Don Sullivan) who's mother is a movie star and deadbeat writer Ray Miller (John Lupton; a busy TV actor at the time). His plan involves the fact that there is a 4 hour layover in Chicago while taking the train from LA to NY. They all agree and board a train. Johnny has no choice but to bring his wife Jeanne (Kathleen Crowley; in CURSE OF THE UNDEAD the same year) which doesn't go over well with the others. The robbery goes as planned and the trio re-board the train with Tucker now dressed as a priest. First Leland goes a little nuts and wants to keep the 5 mil to himself. Johnny knocks him out. Later Leland winds up shot in the head. Then Tucker kills Ray and throws his body off the train. Guilt ridden Johnny confesses to Jeanne that he helped in the robbery and plans to give himself up. He tells the police chief in charge (Robert Shayne) about the money but Tucker has already absconded with it. Johnny escapes the police and gives chase. He and Tucker have several fights and chases until Tucker is electrocuted leading to the macabre ironic ending featuring Leland’s mom. Gene Roth is also featured as the train conductor and I. Stanford Jolley is a beat poet. 

This is a moody kind of film norish little drama with a beatnik backdrop by director Gene Fowler Jr. a year after he made I MARRIED A MONSTER FROM OUTER SPACE. It was a big year for co-star Sullivan who was also in two ultra cool low budget horror classics :THE GIANT GILA MONSTER and THE MONSTER OF PIEDRAS BLANCAS. Oh yeah..and the not so cool TEENAGE ZOMBIES. You dig?

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8 or 10...Who's Counting?

10 VIOLENT WOMAN-1982-Ted V. Mikels, the creator of THE DOLL SQUAD and ASTRO-ZOMBIES, returns with his “woman in prison tale”. 

8 women are tired of working for a living so they rob a jewelry store of a million dollars in diamonds. They go to Las Vegas to sell the loot to Leo The Fence (director Mikels). He offers them cocaine in exchange for the diamonds but they don't accept it. One of the woman gets shot (and later dies) and another stomps Leo to death with her high heel. 

After running around in the dark and stealing a guy's clothes they go to a club to sell the coke. The heel stomping woman deals to two narcs and is shot dead. The others are arrested and sent to prison where their section is run by Miss Terry, sadistic lesbian and her hench-woman Madge (“a hypocritical religious old creep”) with a limp, wart and mustache. Once in a while Terry clashes with a social worker but usually abuses the inmates especially one woman (who refused her carnal come-ons) who she tortures with a riding crop and a wet towel while Madge prays loudly. Only the lone African American attendant seems to care. 

After a shower cat fight, the remaining girls escape and some of them become belly dancers for a Sheik (it was his diamonds they stole). 

This a goofy violent movie with some nudity and comedy (intentional and unintentional). The acting isn't the greatest (Mikels himself gives a good performance) but the worst part is most of the night scenes are too dark to see! 

Co-screenwriter James Gordon White wrote both THE INCREDIBLE TWO HEADED TRANSPLANT and THE THING WITH TWO BRAINS! It starts out with only eight women. By the time they get to jail they are only 6 but they meet 2 prisoners who help in their escape so I suppose in reality there were 10 women! Ted V. Mikels, probably the last of the old time '60's-'70's low budget filmmakers (contemporaries like Ray Dennis Steckler, Al Adamson and  Larry Buchanan are all gone) is still going strong at 84 and recently released ASTRO-ZOMBIES:M4.    

This was filmed in 1979 but only released in 1987 (I saw it in the now defunct Drake movie theater on Woodhaven Blvd in Queens, NY!)

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The Unholy 3

THE UNHOLY 3-1925-This was the first collaboration between actor Lon Chaney and director Tod Browning for MGM. (Their previous films had been for Universal). It's the story of three circus performers who decide to turn to crime. 

Their leader is Echo (Chaney), a ventriloquist who disguises himself as an old woman. Harry Earles (Hans in 1932's FREAKS, also directed by Browning) is Tweedledee, a sadistic little person who pretends to be a baby! Future Oscar winner Victor McLaglen is Hercules the strongman who's more subservient to Tweedle than Echo. They set up shop in a store that sells birds (where Echo's skills make the parrots talk a lot!). Mae Busch is Rosie, the con woman in on their act. 

It's unusual but cool the way Browning gets across the ventriloquism scam considering this is silent film!

By coincidence every time the store sells a bird, the residence they sell to is robbed. Unfortunately, things don't turn out so good. Tweedledee and Hercules don't like being "bossed" by Echo and Hector, the store manager falls for Rosie, making Echo jealous. When Echo is delayed in going out on a job the duo goes out on their own and a man is killed. They decide to pin the murder/robbery on Hector but Rosie doesn't like it. They tie her up and decide to lam it with a bound Rosie in tow and a mean looking ape that they just have to happen in the store (Echo wants to take it because it's stronger than Hercules). The gang hides out in a cabin while Hector is left to fend for himself against the trumped-up charges. Animosity grows in the hideout. 

Meanwhile Rosie tells Echo if he helps vindicate Hector, she will stay with him forever (in spite of the fact she's in love with Hector). He goes to the courtroom and after some ventriloquism tricks fail, he admits his guilt in front of the judge. While this is going on, back in the cabin Tweedledee overhears Hercules tell Rosie they could split the stolen loot 2 ways. The little guy releases the angry ape. It goes after the strongman who kills Tweedledee right before he's done in by the ape! Echo's confession exonerates both him and Hector and Echo releases Rosie from their bargain so she can be the one she loves. 

THE UNHOLY 3 once again proves Lon Chaney's prominence as the greatest silent screen actor of all time. Without the use of make-up, he conveys the tone of the story with facial expressions alone. It's an incredible sight to witness which once again makes the usual love triangle (a mainstay of so many Chaney films) plausible and heartfelt. The screenplay is by Waldemar Young (who wrote several other Chaney/Browning vehicles like THE BLACKBIRD, LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT and WEST OF ZANZIBAR). It's based on a story by Tod Robbins, who also wrote the story that became the infamous FREAKS.

So popular and successful MGM chose to remake this in 1930 as Chaney's first talkie (and ultimately his last film) although Browning did not direct it. 

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