Crime On a Budget

 

 (imdb)

THE WALKING TARGET-1960-Nick (Ron Foster; later in HOUSE OF THE DAMNED) gets out of jail after serving 5 years. The warden warns him he's a walking target because he knows where some hold up money is stashed. He meets girlfriend Suzy (Merry Anders; in THE HYPNOTIC EYE the same year) and friend Davy (Robert Christopher; in several Jerry Warren movies) but is still bitter over his jail time. A police Lt. (Harp McGuire) plans on arresting Nick when he goes for the loot.

 Of course, Suzy and Davy are lovers in cahoots to get all of the illicit dough. Meanwhile gangster businessman Arnie Huffman (familiar character actor Berry Kroeger) is also after the stolen loot. A flashback reveals how Nick convinced his honest hard working now dead friend Sammy (Norman Alden) to throw in with him despite the objections of his life Gail (Joan Evans; real life goddaughter of Joan Crawford). The swag is hidden in Gail's car and thanks to a homeless guy named Packy (William Fawcett) Nick learns Gail is in Arizona running a diner. After finding out about Davy & Suzy and upsetting Huffman's plan, Nick visits Gail. She is understandable angry at him even when he tells her she can have all the cash but she relents and lets him stay at her home. Later, he gets the money. Gail convinces him to give it back and go away with her. There's a shootout and a couple of people are killed. 

Screenwriter Stephen Kandel later became a TV producer/writer on “Mannix” and “MacGyver” and a few others. Director Edward L. Cahn directed this low budget thriller a year after making his last horror movie THE FOUR SKULLS OF JONATHAN DRAKE.

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Alligator

 

 (wikipedia)

ALLIGATOR-1980-12 years after a stupid father flushes a baby alligator down the toilet, body parts and dead dogs are found by police in the sewer system. Detective Madison (Robert Forster) and his jerky new partner Kelly (Perry Lang) investigate. When Kelly is killed, everyone including his chief (Michael Gazzo) thinks Madison is nuts and incompetent because his partner before Kelly was also killed. Snake expert Dr. Kendall (Robin Riker) isn't much help. 

The first victim is a pet shop owner (Sydney Lassick) who's illegally supplying dogs for experiments. After a sanctimonious reporter (Bart Baverman) is killed and some of his photos show an alligator, an all-out manhunt is launched. The giant lizard bites off the leg of a policeman. The mayor (Jack Carter) calls in Col. Brock (Henry Silva), a pompous big game hunter. Madison ties the mutant to Slade Industrial, run by old fart Mr. Slade (Dean Jagger) who had ties with the corrupt mayor. 

The best part is when the alligator crashes Slade's daughter's wedding. Sue Lyon (in her last movie) has a small role as a reporter as does Mike Mazurki. John Sayles wrote the clever script and Lewis Teague directed before he made bigger budgeted films like CUJO (1983), CAT'S EYE (1985) and THE JEWEL OF THE NILE (1985).

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Lon Clowns Around Again

 

 (imdb)

HE WHO GETS SLAPPED-1924-In Paris, scientist Paul Beaumont (Lon Chaney) proves his theories thanks in part to his wife Marie (Ruth King) and his rich benefactor The Baron (Marc McDermott) but the Baron steals not only Beaumont's discoveries but also his wife. Beaumont is disgraced and laughed at by an academy of old farts after The Baron calls him insane and slaps him. His wife insults and slaps him too. They are really an evil pair. 

Since his wife calls him a clown, he becomes one and 5 years later he's working at a circus as "He", a clown who makes the audience laugh by being slapped. Also there are daredevil rider Benzano (John Gilbert) who falls madly in love with Consuelo (Norma Shearer), the daughter of the shabby Count Mancini (Tully Marshall), who's to be his bareback rider. One night during his act, which despite having the audience in stitches, is rather cruel and morbid to me, “He” spies The Baron in the crowd. He also sees him talking to Consuelo, who He of course has now taken a shine to. Later, Benzano and Consuelo meet secretly. They are in love but Mancini convinces The Baron to marry her. When He declares his love for Consuelo she laughs thinking it a joke. He overhears the secret marriage proposal and sets up some deadly revenge. A scary clown with a globe shows up occasionally. 

This is another silent tragic revenge tale with Chaney once again giving his all in the sympathetic but vengeful lead role. Lead actress Shearer was married to MGM co-owner Irving Thalberg who co-produced the film with Swedish born director Victor Sjorstrom (THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE (1921)) who also co-adapted it from a Russian play. Co-star John Gilbert was on the verge of becoming one of the biggest stars of the silent era.

 (imdb)

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Argentina

 

 

 (imdb)

EL VAMPIRO NEGRO-1953-This is essentially an Argentine remake/adaptation of Fritz Lang's M with a timid man who is actually a child killer. There are some side stories about the prosecutor who's hunting him, who roughs up a lot of suspects and puts the moves on a night club dancer Rita who rejects his advances. (His wife is an invalid) He plans to have her daughter taken away but "the vampire" (as the killer is known) kidnaps the girl. He's eventually trapped in the sewers by the city's beggars. 

Director Ramon Vinoly Barretto was highly regarded in his home country but died suddenly in 1970 at age 54.

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Lives Up To It's Title!

 

 (imdb)

THE ABOMINATION-1986-This low budget horror movie starts off with all the bloody Andy Mulligan like gore, blood and dismemberment scenes shown all at once as a guy's nightmares. Then the guy Cody (Scott Davis) talks to a psychiatrist about how he had to kill a woman in a graveyard because "the abomination" is controlling him. He blames his mother because she watched Brother Fogg (Rex Morton), a TV evangelist. At night when Cody goes on a date, mom coughs up a tumor of some kind that's alive and later it crawls into Cody's mouth while he's asleep. He must be a sound sleeper! 

Next day Cody and his girlfriend go out drinking beer and drag racing in his pickup. Now a slimy creature lives under Cody's bed and makes him kill so the creature can have blood. Mom decides Cody needs an exorcism and goes to Brother Fogg (obviously a complete phony) and he agrees to do one. Later, in a very long scene, the creature takes over the kitchen, appearing in the cupboard, under the sink and in a washing machine and kills mom. After Fogg is eaten taking a dump, Cody dismembers another guy in a junkyard. He chases a woman in a graveyard and slits her throat. The gory (but still terrible) sfx get more disgusting as it goes on. In his kitchen he feeds body parts and entrails to Audrey....I mean to the abomination. His girlfriend comes by and kills him but the monster eats her. Mom's doc visits and becomes the new host while Cody (somehow still alive?) pleads his innocence over the closing credits. 

This is a low budget badly made little gore film that's fairly entertaining if you like senseless badly acted and directed puke films. Writer/director Bret McCormick directed one of the stories in TABLOID (1989) and made other mindless stuff.

 (imdb)

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Lewton/Karloff

 

 (TCM)

ISLE OF THE DEAD-1945-Another great Lewton/Karloff collaboration directed by Mark Robson. 

Hard-nosed and dedicated to his country Gen. Pherides (Karloff; also in THE BODY SNATCHER th same year)) and US reporter Oliver Davis (Mark Cramer) unintentionally visit the home of Swiss doctor Albercht (Jason Robards) who has a strange superstitious housekeeper (Helene Thimig) and some guests: diplomat St. Aubyn (future TV Batman butler Alan Napier), his wife Mary (Katherine Emery; later in THE MAZE (1953)), salesman Andrew Robbins (uncredited Skelton Knaggs) and the enigmatic Thea (Ellen Drew). Everything is ok until Robbins dies, and a doctor (Ernst Duetsch) says he has the plague. Pherides decides everyone must stay. The doctor says it should pass in a few days but Albrecht says it might be a wolf spirit disguised as a human. He and Pherides) make a wager, Albrecht will pray to Hermes for a cure and Pherides can put his faith in science.

 After St. Aubyn dies, his wife confesses to the doctor that she has a morbid obsession with being buried alive. He says he will do everything to make sure this will never happen. But then he dies. Somehow Davis and Thea fall in love. When Mary seems to die, Pherides blames Thea. They put Mary in a crate like coffin and of course she's not dead. Then the general falls ill. Mary escapes her tomb and now mad goes looking for people to kill. Her first victim is the housekeeper. Pherides thinks the killer is Thea. Mary stabs the general, then falls off a cliff. Pherides dies believing the evil spirit has been destroyed. 

Haunting thriller with Karloff leading a good cast. Ellen Drew later starred with Vincent Price in Sam Fuller's THE BARON OF ARIZONA (1950). Jason Robards was in BEDLAM with Karloff the next year.

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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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