We've hit a milestone in our quest to watch every movie in our 250-movie box set from Mill Creek, as we recently finished off the Nightmare Worlds portion (which is also available as a standalone box set of the same name). Thus, we thought we ought to celebrate the occasion, and commemorate some of the wonderful, dire, memorable, and thoroughly forgettable moments we've enjoyed, thanks to our friends at Mill Creek.
Without further ado, our nominees!
Actual Best Movie Award:
Nominees:
Counterblast
Frozen Alive
Idaho Transfer
Prisoners of the Lost Universe
Terror at the Red Wolf Inn
Winner:
Terror at the Red Wolf Inn
Commentary:
There were several worthy candidates in this prestigious category, and were it not for the weak denouement, Idaho Transfer could easily have taken the honors. But of these five films, Terror at the Red Wolf Inn is the only one to maintain its tone, tension, and interest up until the very end. To quote a wise young woman, "All in all, I'd say it's...not bad." Or even, y'know, good.
Actual Worst Movie Award:
Nominees:
The Day the Sky Exploded
The Doomsday Machine
The End of the World
House of the Living Dead
UFO: Target Earth
Winner:
House of the Living Dead
Commentary:
Some very, very, VERY stiff competition in this category, but there was something just so uniquely offensive about the sheer laziness of House of the Living Dead. It proved to be a movie utterly without redeeming qualities, save perhaps for some nice location shooting in South Africa, and that just ain't enough. Our runner-up award would probably go to The End of the World, whose murky joylessness can scarcely be exaggerated.
So-Bad-It's-Good Award:
Nominees:
Alien Species
The Nightmare Never Ends
Panic
Star Odyssey
Warriors of the Wasteland
Winner:
The Nightmare Never Ends
Commentary:
Casual connoisseurs of bad cinema, or those with picky friends, might fare better with Alien Species or Warriors of the Wasteland. But for sheer unintentional laughs, you can't beat the one-two punch of Faith Clift's bad acting and Richard Moll's toupee. Appalling, astonishing stuff.
Ye Olde Filmes:
Nominees:
The Lost World
Maciste in Hell
The Mistress of Atlantis
Winner:
Maciste in Hell
Commentary:
Frolicking demons with pitchforks and sulfur
Sultry young succubi grooms would annul for
Overweight heroes fight devils with wings
These are a few of my favorite things.
Most Watchable Serial Edited Down To Feature Length:
Nominees:
The Lost City
The Phantom Creeps
Purple Death from Outer Space
Radio Ranch
Shadow of Chinatown
Winner:
Radio Ranch
Commentary:
Hard not to root for The Lost City here, but its sheer length (very little has been removed) and thoroughgoing racism take it out of the running. Radio Ranch is great fun, suitable for all ages and ethnicities, and doesn't seem to lose much at all in the editing process.
The Third-Act Letdown Award:
Nominees:All the Kind Strangers
The Disappearance of Flight 412
The Manster
Piranha, Piranha
The Return of Dr. Mabuse
Winner:
The Manster
Commentary:
Unlike our other candidates, The Manster genuinely impressed us in the first two-thirds of the movie, particularly Peter Dyneley's performance as Drunky Washupovich. Its mediocre finale may not be the worst of all these nominees, but it certainly constitutes the biggest disappointment.
Special Awards For Special Campers:
Watch It With Grandma Award:
It's hardly a horror movie, but Robot Pilot supplies old-timey laughs for the false-teeth set. Heck, even if Grandma's a midget, I think it'll still fly.
Watch It With Your Born-Again Sister's Kids Award:
Afraid the wee ones will be corrupted by the panty shots in Idaho Transfer? Then dish up some gee-whiz fun for your homeschooled nieces and nephews with Menace From Outer Space. Watch them thrill to the spacefaring adventures of Rocky Jones! Keep them blissfully unaware of the tawdry fates of several castmembers!
The Poochie Died On The Way Back To His Home Planet Award:
So what the hell happened to that second segment in House of the Dead, anyway?
The Casual Cruelty To Fat People Award:
Need some motivation to stay on that diet? Give Ring of Terror a spin, and feel the shame come pouring in.
The Casual Cruelty To Animals Award:
Somewhere in Purgatory, a bevy of indignant chickens await the makers of This Is Not A Test. They're sharpening their beaks even now.
The Cinematic Blueballs Award:
I don't think it took us that long to figure out that Good Against Evil was a failed TV pilot, but we at least hoped for some sort of resolution. No dice.
The WTF-Is-Going-On Award:
We owe it to Paul Naschy to watch another one of his films. He's an acclaimed horror star, but an incomprehensible disaster like Fury of the Wolf Man can hardly do him justice.
The Paul Bentzen Fan Club 2-For-1 Special:
Think what you want of The Alpha Incident and They. But love 'em or hate 'em, whenever he's onscreen, Paul Bentzen is the force that through the Spring Green fuse drives. We look forward to watching the rest of his oeuvre.
The Overrated Soundtrack Award:
Many have raved about Goblin's score to Contamination aka Alien Contamination; it didn't rub us the wrong way, but neither were we impressed. I guess we just don't get it, if there's an "it" to get.
The Not All Nudity Is Sexy Award:
In the number and explicitness of its sex scenes, Werewolf Woman exceeds the competition by a wide margin...but the movie is permeated with a creepy, dead-eyed mania that eradicates any potential for eroticism. Even the horniest, most desperate teenage boy would find it hard to be titillated by this one.
The Hear That Plot Twist A-Comin' (Because We Sure Can't See It) Award:
Oh, How Awful About Allan, you gave up your secret too easily. Or maybe we reached for it too soon. Either way, you were eventually exposed to the light, but we were ten steps ahead of you, caught in the crossfire of yawning and boredom. Speaking of which:
The Wore Out Your Welcome Award:
We genuinely enjoyed the first Starman movie we watched, Atomic Rulers of the World. By the third, Evil Brain from Outer Space, we just wanted him and his big package to get lost. (In fairness, Ken Utsui felt much the same.)
The Plutonium Ruby Laser Research Scholarship Award:
Nice to see some familiar faces from Zontar in Night Fright.
The "We Should've Just Watched The Nightmare Never Ends Again" Award:
Once you've seen a movie featuring the reincarnation of Satan himself, Eternal Evil's tamer premise just can't pack the same punch.
The Murky On-Screen And In Our Memories Too Award:
We don't really remember Beast Of The Yellow Night, except as a miasma of foggy shots, cryptic plot elements, and Tagalog. Maybe that's for the best?
The "Prom Night Dumpster Baby" Neglected Film Award:
K. saw Embryo before we started this project, and so we skipped it. Its fanny needs a blanket, and somebody to spank it. (EDIT: And now it's got one!)
AWOL Award (tie):
On the Nightmare Worlds portion of our 250-movie box set, Death Warmed Up was replaced by Fire Monster Vs. The Son Of Hercules, and Unknown World by The Cold Room. (Fortunately, both of those movies show up elsewhere in the box.)
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Lost in the Woods: or, the peripatetic angora sweater
This afternoon we had a long telephone conversation earlier in the day, and asked the question: does the world really need another blog entry about the films of Edward D. Wood Jr.?
Well, here at the Umbrellahead Review, our answer is a resounding "Maybe!" Especially since, with one exception, we're mostly covering his lesser-known films today. So if your mind's in a muddle -- like a thick fog -- then clarity awaits:
Crossroad Avenger: The Tuscon Kid (1953)
Grade: C-
Glen or Glenda (1953)
Grade: C- (C+ without the added exploitation footage)
Jail Bait (1954)
Grade: F
Night of the Ghouls (1959)
Grade: B-
Crossroads of Laredo (1948, completed 1996)
Grade: F
Most people know Ed for his horror films, but he started out in Westerns, most of which seem to have Crossroads in the title. Of the two mentioned here, Crossroads Avenger is by far the more watchable, and gets bonus points for its unusual premise: the hero is an insurance investigator! Gee, I wonder why that pilot failed, eh? Otherwise it's mostly by-the-numbers, neither egregiously bad nor particularly good throughout its 20-odd minutes. We enjoyed Harvey B. Dunn as Zeke, the wheezy old prospector (or whatever he was supposed to be).
Crossroads of Laredo, on the other hand, is pretty much unwatchable. Originally filmed in 1948, the soundtrack was either lost or never recorded, and so it gathered dust for almost 50 years. When Ed's movies came back into fashion, the producer (Crawford John Thomas) wisely saw an opportunity, and so we have this "restoration", with voice-over narration and music added by Dolores Fuller and company, which comes as a bonus on the Haunted World of Edward D. Wood Jr. DVD.
It was a nice idea, but the problem is, there's just about nothing to the original footage, which just seems like a series of half-realized sketches that, as one IMDB reviewer put it, might have passed for a movie in 1918. There may be a way to wring a viable film out of it nevertheless, but Fuller's additions -- cheesy synthesized music, hopelessly banal commentary, and Elvis Presley Jr. -- don't exactly improve matters. The result is 23 minutes of sheer tedium, relieved only by our bittersweet reflections on canine longevity.
We don't really need to say anything about Glen or Glenda, do we? Except maybe that P. enjoyed it a lot more this time around...but it still drags like hell in the second half. Getting rid of the spliced-in exploitation footage would help (poor Béla!), but even without that, it's 10 minutes too long. Still, it's a hard movie not to like, and it's kind of sui generis anyway, or ne plus ultra, or some other expression in a foreign language that makes us sound pretentious.
Not so for Jail Bait, which is Ed's attempt at film noir (more or less), but fails disastrously in almost every respect: the thuddingly obvious plot, the threadbare acting, the obnoxious soundtrack...even the title (which refers to a gun, of all things) is a fraud! Pour a glass out for Herbert Rawlinson, who died the day after shooting was completed -- which is easy to believe: the poor guy sounds short of breath in every scene. He deserved a better end to his career than this piece of dreck.
By any objective standard, Night of the Ghouls is also dreck, but it's a million times more fun -- and since it doesn't feature Béla Lugosi at the end of his rope, it's the only "Kelton trilogy" movie whose bathos comes 100% guilt-free. Here, the fallen star is Kenne Duncan, who plays a mysterious psychic named...uh...Dr. Acula. Yeah. In his nefarious schemes, he's aided and abetted by a hideously disfigured Tor Johnson, among others.
As always in Ed's movies, the third act drags a bit, but the first 30 minutes or so offers the biggest laughs of any Wood film, hands-down: the séance sequence is downright mind-blowing. This is a must-see for anyone who likes to laugh at things. And you like to laugh at things, don't you?
Well, here at the Umbrellahead Review, our answer is a resounding "Maybe!" Especially since, with one exception, we're mostly covering his lesser-known films today. So if your mind's in a muddle -- like a thick fog -- then clarity awaits:
Crossroad Avenger: The Tuscon Kid (1953)
Grade: C-
Glen or Glenda (1953)
Grade: C- (C+ without the added exploitation footage)
Jail Bait (1954)
Grade: F
Night of the Ghouls (1959)
Grade: B-
Crossroads of Laredo (1948, completed 1996)
Grade: F
Most people know Ed for his horror films, but he started out in Westerns, most of which seem to have Crossroads in the title. Of the two mentioned here, Crossroads Avenger is by far the more watchable, and gets bonus points for its unusual premise: the hero is an insurance investigator! Gee, I wonder why that pilot failed, eh? Otherwise it's mostly by-the-numbers, neither egregiously bad nor particularly good throughout its 20-odd minutes. We enjoyed Harvey B. Dunn as Zeke, the wheezy old prospector (or whatever he was supposed to be).
Crossroads of Laredo, on the other hand, is pretty much unwatchable. Originally filmed in 1948, the soundtrack was either lost or never recorded, and so it gathered dust for almost 50 years. When Ed's movies came back into fashion, the producer (Crawford John Thomas) wisely saw an opportunity, and so we have this "restoration", with voice-over narration and music added by Dolores Fuller and company, which comes as a bonus on the Haunted World of Edward D. Wood Jr. DVD.
It was a nice idea, but the problem is, there's just about nothing to the original footage, which just seems like a series of half-realized sketches that, as one IMDB reviewer put it, might have passed for a movie in 1918. There may be a way to wring a viable film out of it nevertheless, but Fuller's additions -- cheesy synthesized music, hopelessly banal commentary, and Elvis Presley Jr. -- don't exactly improve matters. The result is 23 minutes of sheer tedium, relieved only by our bittersweet reflections on canine longevity.
We don't really need to say anything about Glen or Glenda, do we? Except maybe that P. enjoyed it a lot more this time around...but it still drags like hell in the second half. Getting rid of the spliced-in exploitation footage would help (poor Béla!), but even without that, it's 10 minutes too long. Still, it's a hard movie not to like, and it's kind of sui generis anyway, or ne plus ultra, or some other expression in a foreign language that makes us sound pretentious.
Not so for Jail Bait, which is Ed's attempt at film noir (more or less), but fails disastrously in almost every respect: the thuddingly obvious plot, the threadbare acting, the obnoxious soundtrack...even the title (which refers to a gun, of all things) is a fraud! Pour a glass out for Herbert Rawlinson, who died the day after shooting was completed -- which is easy to believe: the poor guy sounds short of breath in every scene. He deserved a better end to his career than this piece of dreck.
By any objective standard, Night of the Ghouls is also dreck, but it's a million times more fun -- and since it doesn't feature Béla Lugosi at the end of his rope, it's the only "Kelton trilogy" movie whose bathos comes 100% guilt-free. Here, the fallen star is Kenne Duncan, who plays a mysterious psychic named...uh...Dr. Acula. Yeah. In his nefarious schemes, he's aided and abetted by a hideously disfigured Tor Johnson, among others.
As always in Ed's movies, the third act drags a bit, but the first 30 minutes or so offers the biggest laughs of any Wood film, hands-down: the séance sequence is downright mind-blowing. This is a must-see for anyone who likes to laugh at things. And you like to laugh at things, don't you?
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Here comes the choo choo
Obligatory theme: train tracks!
The Return of Dr. Mabuse (Im Stahlnetz des Dr. Mabuse)
Grade: C
Well, it's murder on the sauerkraut express for this 1961 entry in the Dr. Mabuse "series." Fritz Lang directed the first three, over a period of nearly 40 years(!); this movie follows Lang's last effort, and is the first in a string of Mabuse films shot in the '60s. (The last [or is it?] appearance of the evil doctor is in the 1989 remake-ish Docteur M. -- looks like the actor who plays Mabuse in Return even has a part!)
Somewhat interesting history aside, the film wasn't all that impressive. It starts promisingly enough with a whole lot of those German-style shadows and a woman torched to death by a passing flamethrower (pretty gruesome stuff, that), but soon all the stock characters start showing up: police inspector on a personal mission, female reporter sticking her nose where it doesn't belong, handsome FBI guy who might possibly be a double agent (or some third guy named Bob), sinister warden with extra sinister facial hair -- even the brilliant-scientist-held-prisoner who happens to be the female lead's dad!
Perhaps that's all a bit uncharitable, because the film had us guessing right up to the end about the identity of the mysterious Mabuse. Perhaps we wouldn't be guessing if we had seen the previous films (though we later learned this Mabuse fellow is supposed to be a master of disguise, which kinda makes the question of who the actor is a moot point). Even if we had seen the Lang "originals", I still think the ending (back on the train tracks, even!) would have been a bit of a letdown. Ah, well -- the film has its charms, but not a real standout in our book.
Terror at the Red Wolf Inn (aka Terror House)
Grade: B
Much like Snowbeast, They, and (K's personal favorite) Idaho Transfer, this one has nuance and charm that put it (severed) head and shoulders above most of the uninspired box schlock we've had to muddle through.
Sweet, lonely, and a bit dense (but endearingly so), college student Regina hops a plane to the bucolic Red Wolf Inn after having "won" a trip from some mysterious letter. Along with the other guests -- a couple of sweetly airheaded young ladies ("Hi, I'm a model!" declares Pamela) -- Regina sits down with the inn's proprietors and their man-child of a grandson, Baby John, for a meal of epic proportions. And boy, do these folks know their meat.
As the models disappear one by one, it doesn't take long to figure out why the old folks don't want Regina near their meat locker -- but this turns out to be so much more than just another hack-em-to-bits cannibal flick. There's a thread of dark humor tinged (drenched, really) with the absurd, such that we could be walking along the beach -- dum-de-dum-de-dum -- and WHAM! the most bizarre romantic overture/sharkicide that we've seen to date.
Other bonuses include the music ("Pomp and Circumstance" rarely gets a chance shine outside of commencement ceremonies, and will be forever in our minds associated with delicious "filet") and the quality of the acting (Linda Gillen, as Regina, is particularly well-suited for her role). We wish we could have seen the "uncut" version, which apparently contains an additional 12 minutes of delicious, fleshy fun; however, if it's all you can get, the 78 minute version is still well worth watching.
(Almost forgot -- the train tracks show up during a late-in-the-film escape scene. . . we won't be jerks and spoil the rest.)
The Return of Dr. Mabuse (Im Stahlnetz des Dr. Mabuse)
Grade: C
Well, it's murder on the sauerkraut express for this 1961 entry in the Dr. Mabuse "series." Fritz Lang directed the first three, over a period of nearly 40 years(!); this movie follows Lang's last effort, and is the first in a string of Mabuse films shot in the '60s. (The last [or is it?] appearance of the evil doctor is in the 1989 remake-ish Docteur M. -- looks like the actor who plays Mabuse in Return even has a part!)
Somewhat interesting history aside, the film wasn't all that impressive. It starts promisingly enough with a whole lot of those German-style shadows and a woman torched to death by a passing flamethrower (pretty gruesome stuff, that), but soon all the stock characters start showing up: police inspector on a personal mission, female reporter sticking her nose where it doesn't belong, handsome FBI guy who might possibly be a double agent (or some third guy named Bob), sinister warden with extra sinister facial hair -- even the brilliant-scientist-held-prisoner who happens to be the female lead's dad!
Perhaps that's all a bit uncharitable, because the film had us guessing right up to the end about the identity of the mysterious Mabuse. Perhaps we wouldn't be guessing if we had seen the previous films (though we later learned this Mabuse fellow is supposed to be a master of disguise, which kinda makes the question of who the actor is a moot point). Even if we had seen the Lang "originals", I still think the ending (back on the train tracks, even!) would have been a bit of a letdown. Ah, well -- the film has its charms, but not a real standout in our book.
Terror at the Red Wolf Inn (aka Terror House)
Grade: B
Much like Snowbeast, They, and (K's personal favorite) Idaho Transfer, this one has nuance and charm that put it (severed) head and shoulders above most of the uninspired box schlock we've had to muddle through.
Sweet, lonely, and a bit dense (but endearingly so), college student Regina hops a plane to the bucolic Red Wolf Inn after having "won" a trip from some mysterious letter. Along with the other guests -- a couple of sweetly airheaded young ladies ("Hi, I'm a model!" declares Pamela) -- Regina sits down with the inn's proprietors and their man-child of a grandson, Baby John, for a meal of epic proportions. And boy, do these folks know their meat.
As the models disappear one by one, it doesn't take long to figure out why the old folks don't want Regina near their meat locker -- but this turns out to be so much more than just another hack-em-to-bits cannibal flick. There's a thread of dark humor tinged (drenched, really) with the absurd, such that we could be walking along the beach -- dum-de-dum-de-dum -- and WHAM! the most bizarre romantic overture/sharkicide that we've seen to date.
Other bonuses include the music ("Pomp and Circumstance" rarely gets a chance shine outside of commencement ceremonies, and will be forever in our minds associated with delicious "filet") and the quality of the acting (Linda Gillen, as Regina, is particularly well-suited for her role). We wish we could have seen the "uncut" version, which apparently contains an additional 12 minutes of delicious, fleshy fun; however, if it's all you can get, the 78 minute version is still well worth watching.
(Almost forgot -- the train tracks show up during a late-in-the-film escape scene. . . we won't be jerks and spoil the rest.)
Friday, March 19, 2010
A bundle of brides for Bela
"Starring Béla Lugosi!"
White Zombie (1932)
Grade: C+
The Corpse Vanishes (1942)
Grade: D
Bride of the Monster (1955)
Grade: D+
There's no real sense in having a separate entry for each of these three movies, since they all have much the same plot: Béla abducts a young woman for nefarious purposes. In this, he's helped by one or more mindless servants, whom he repeatedly maltreats. He then subjects the young woman to some sort of outré medical procedure, but in the end, she's rescued when Béla's much-abused servants take their revenge.
This makes it rather difficult to keep them straight in one's head: did the spunky female reporter crash into that tree in The Corpse Vanishes, or was it Bride of the Monster? Did White Zombie have both poison flowers and hypnotic gazes from Béla, or was that only The Corpse Vanishes? Why can't any of them get a decent male lead? And most importantly, which of these three movies had the most absurd plethora of coneboobs?
In fairness, White Zombie is really in a separate class from the other two, and a far more memorable film. Yes, the acting is stagy, the plot is silly at best, and plenty of other faults besides. But the imagery is at times genuinely inspired, as in the tavern scene in which the protagonist, drinking his sorrows away, has a hallucination of his bride. Instead of filling the set with drunken Euro-Haitian revelers, the other patrons are depicted as shadows against a translucent backdrop, like Javanese puppets. The net effect is striking in a quasi-Expressionist sort of way, and makes for yet another example of how economic necessity (there wasn't enough in the budget for extras) can be the mother of invention. There are also a few choice moments for connoisseurs of strange sounds, particularly the grotesque, damaged saxophone timbre that serves as background for the zombie mill scene. A good choice for fans of the pre-Code aesthetic: and as a bonus, it's not nearly as racist as you'd expect!
The Corpse Vanishes, on the other hand, is essentially a mishmosh of clichés and stock characters. Luana Walters is the requisite Girl Friday, and she and Béla are the only actors who have much of anything to sink their teeth into, though her delivery owes as much to Dorothy Gale as Rosalind Russell. Meanwhile, Rosalind's sister-in-law Elizabeth plays the insufferable shrieking invalid harpy, leaving you to wonder: Béla's stealing virgins for this? Really? And yes, it has coneboobs galore.
Enough ink has been spilled over Ed Wood's films, and we're not foolish enough to think we have much to add. By most metrics, Bride of the Monster is the worst movie of the three, and Tim Burton's Ed Wood makes it seem of a piece with the incompetencies of Plan 9 From Outer Space. But Bride's most obvious faults are really the product of limited funding: if the octopus had a working motor, and a few other budget elements had been in place, it'd hardly seem any worse than a lot of the 1950s B-pictures we've seen, and better than quite a few. It does, however, suffer from the same case of acute talkitis that plagues Wood's other movies, and while that's not such a bad thing when Béla's doing the talking, it's mostly a snooze otherwise.
White Zombie (1932)
Grade: C+
The Corpse Vanishes (1942)
Grade: D
Bride of the Monster (1955)
Grade: D+
There's no real sense in having a separate entry for each of these three movies, since they all have much the same plot: Béla abducts a young woman for nefarious purposes. In this, he's helped by one or more mindless servants, whom he repeatedly maltreats. He then subjects the young woman to some sort of outré medical procedure, but in the end, she's rescued when Béla's much-abused servants take their revenge.
This makes it rather difficult to keep them straight in one's head: did the spunky female reporter crash into that tree in The Corpse Vanishes, or was it Bride of the Monster? Did White Zombie have both poison flowers and hypnotic gazes from Béla, or was that only The Corpse Vanishes? Why can't any of them get a decent male lead? And most importantly, which of these three movies had the most absurd plethora of coneboobs?
In fairness, White Zombie is really in a separate class from the other two, and a far more memorable film. Yes, the acting is stagy, the plot is silly at best, and plenty of other faults besides. But the imagery is at times genuinely inspired, as in the tavern scene in which the protagonist, drinking his sorrows away, has a hallucination of his bride. Instead of filling the set with drunken Euro-Haitian revelers, the other patrons are depicted as shadows against a translucent backdrop, like Javanese puppets. The net effect is striking in a quasi-Expressionist sort of way, and makes for yet another example of how economic necessity (there wasn't enough in the budget for extras) can be the mother of invention. There are also a few choice moments for connoisseurs of strange sounds, particularly the grotesque, damaged saxophone timbre that serves as background for the zombie mill scene. A good choice for fans of the pre-Code aesthetic: and as a bonus, it's not nearly as racist as you'd expect!
The Corpse Vanishes, on the other hand, is essentially a mishmosh of clichés and stock characters. Luana Walters is the requisite Girl Friday, and she and Béla are the only actors who have much of anything to sink their teeth into, though her delivery owes as much to Dorothy Gale as Rosalind Russell. Meanwhile, Rosalind's sister-in-law Elizabeth plays the insufferable shrieking invalid harpy, leaving you to wonder: Béla's stealing virgins for this? Really? And yes, it has coneboobs galore.
Enough ink has been spilled over Ed Wood's films, and we're not foolish enough to think we have much to add. By most metrics, Bride of the Monster is the worst movie of the three, and Tim Burton's Ed Wood makes it seem of a piece with the incompetencies of Plan 9 From Outer Space. But Bride's most obvious faults are really the product of limited funding: if the octopus had a working motor, and a few other budget elements had been in place, it'd hardly seem any worse than a lot of the 1950s B-pictures we've seen, and better than quite a few. It does, however, suffer from the same case of acute talkitis that plagues Wood's other movies, and while that's not such a bad thing when Béla's doing the talking, it's mostly a snooze otherwise.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
That reminds me . . .
Sometimes writing a blog web journal review site can feel (to K, at least) a bit like being a cut-rate modern-day journalist: taking bits of this guy's blog, that guy's imdb review, and maybe some of that other guy's forum post*, cobbling it all together with a bit of wit, whimsy, and inside jokery, then hoping for the world there's a willing audience. Perhaps the makers of our next two action-adventure films were feelin' it too, because gosh darn it, we just kept thinking, "Haven't we seen this somewhere before?"
*and yes, they're all guys -- chicks, it seems, are too preoccupied with knitting1, baking2, and being fabulous mommies3 to pay any attention to the B-moviesphere.
1 K is guilty
2 K is also guilty
3 no
Space Odyssey (Sette uomini d'oro nello spazio) (1979)
(aka Captive Planet, aka Star Odyssey, aka Metallica [?!] )
Grade: C-
Holy spaghetti space western! Taking its cues from a certain blockbuster of the time, this oddly-translated title throws together a motley crew of would-be heroes to help save humans from enslavement by an evil alien henchman who looks for all the world like a cross between the Hellraiser guy, Alan Rickman, and a crocodile handbag. The two tin can C3PO wannabes spend most of film arguing (in the most sickly sweet way possible) about their aborted suicide pact, or else channelling the Star Trek model of compassion and tolerance toward "lower" life forms (in this case, a suspiciously trashcan-shaped droid). There's the space outlaws working for the side of good, of course, and a futuristic dead ringer of our favorite Commando Mengele** gypsy acrobat.
Add in some ridiculous stock footage of explosions and African exploitation (in glorious grainy black-and-white, of course), and heck, you've got half the films we've reviewed so far. In many ways, it was reminiscent of an even better Star Wars rip-off, P.'s beloved Battle Beyond the Stars. However, the film's one standout feature (for us, at least) is the most ridiculous, head-scratching, time-to-lay-off-the-Sambuca editing mistake we've seen to date. (Curiously, it doesn't seem to be mentioned by many other reviewers, or is misidentified as a plot hole. Perhaps a corrected version exists, and we just happened to get lucky.) A seriously flawed, but strangely compelling effort.
P.S. -- To all those crafty people who are suddenly into everything mustache -- especially these folks -- I say please, please just stop. It's creepy. But, if you choose not to yield to good taste, be sure take some cues from this film's who has the gayest mustache? contest, where everyone is a winner!
**aka Angel of Death. P. mentioned this one in the previous post as well, but it seems we never actually reviewed it. Humph. If you have to choose one acrobat-related Nazi hunter film, make it this one.
Prisoners of the Lost Universe (1983)
Objective Grade: C+
K's Hedging Grade: B/B-
What a fun surprise! Essentially a medieval adventure tale shakily framed by the whole parallel universe device, this has The Princess Bride written all over it (William Goldman, perhaps you deserve royalties; Rob Reiner, perhaps you owe some). The princess in this case is the obligatorily spunky female reporter played by Kay Lenz, who seems to get drooled over by all the other reviewers (for explanation, see footnote to the introduction, above), but who we simply file away with the other interesting faces we've encountered. Rounding out the crew are the midget, the giant, the noble green dude from the forest, and of course our hapless hero, made not so hapless by dint of his being a Kendo champion (aren't they always).
Speaking of stock characters, reprising his role as "evil guy" for the nth time is our Battle Beyond the Stars favorite, John Saxon. As warlord Kleel he takes a shine to our poor man's Kim Basinger, and if the word inconceivable means anything to you, you can pretty much guess how the rest of the film goes.
Just to make sure we know we're in some parallel dimension (instead of, say, the South African*** hinterland), we're treated to a number of "exotic" foam rubber plants scattered through the landscape, à la Star Trek, though they only seemed to bother with the effect during the first few "new universe" scenes. Kudos to the sound guys too, for making sure the Wile E. Coyote falling-of-the-cliff descending whistle finds new life in inappropriate places.
Yes, I did say this was a fun surprise, and I mean it. Hey, the characters are pretty one-dimensional, and it all wraps up just a bit too neatly, but a film like this is a welcome reprieve from some of the dreck we've had to slog through on this set. A perfect home-sick-in-bed type of thing, if you know what I mean.
***where it was indeed filmed; ostensibly set in California, sharp-eyed viewers will see that something isn't quite right during Carrie and Dan's first, ahem, run-in. Oh, and turns out one of the bit players in this was also in our other favorite South African film, House of the Living Dead.
*and yes, they're all guys -- chicks, it seems, are too preoccupied with knitting1, baking2, and being fabulous mommies3 to pay any attention to the B-moviesphere.
1 K is guilty
2 K is also guilty
3 no
Space Odyssey (Sette uomini d'oro nello spazio) (1979)
(aka Captive Planet, aka Star Odyssey, aka Metallica [?!] )
Grade: C-
Holy spaghetti space western! Taking its cues from a certain blockbuster of the time, this oddly-translated title throws together a motley crew of would-be heroes to help save humans from enslavement by an evil alien henchman who looks for all the world like a cross between the Hellraiser guy, Alan Rickman, and a crocodile handbag. The two tin can C3PO wannabes spend most of film arguing (in the most sickly sweet way possible) about their aborted suicide pact, or else channelling the Star Trek model of compassion and tolerance toward "lower" life forms (in this case, a suspiciously trashcan-shaped droid). There's the space outlaws working for the side of good, of course, and a futuristic dead ringer of our favorite Commando Mengele** gypsy acrobat.
Add in some ridiculous stock footage of explosions and African exploitation (in glorious grainy black-and-white, of course), and heck, you've got half the films we've reviewed so far. In many ways, it was reminiscent of an even better Star Wars rip-off, P.'s beloved Battle Beyond the Stars. However, the film's one standout feature (for us, at least) is the most ridiculous, head-scratching, time-to-lay-off-the-Sambuca editing mistake we've seen to date. (Curiously, it doesn't seem to be mentioned by many other reviewers, or is misidentified as a plot hole. Perhaps a corrected version exists, and we just happened to get lucky.) A seriously flawed, but strangely compelling effort.
P.S. -- To all those crafty people who are suddenly into everything mustache -- especially these folks -- I say please, please just stop. It's creepy. But, if you choose not to yield to good taste, be sure take some cues from this film's who has the gayest mustache? contest, where everyone is a winner!
**aka Angel of Death. P. mentioned this one in the previous post as well, but it seems we never actually reviewed it. Humph. If you have to choose one acrobat-related Nazi hunter film, make it this one.
Prisoners of the Lost Universe (1983)
Objective Grade: C+
K's Hedging Grade: B/B-
What a fun surprise! Essentially a medieval adventure tale shakily framed by the whole parallel universe device, this has The Princess Bride written all over it (William Goldman, perhaps you deserve royalties; Rob Reiner, perhaps you owe some). The princess in this case is the obligatorily spunky female reporter played by Kay Lenz, who seems to get drooled over by all the other reviewers (for explanation, see footnote to the introduction, above), but who we simply file away with the other interesting faces we've encountered. Rounding out the crew are the midget, the giant, the noble green dude from the forest, and of course our hapless hero, made not so hapless by dint of his being a Kendo champion (aren't they always).
Speaking of stock characters, reprising his role as "evil guy" for the nth time is our Battle Beyond the Stars favorite, John Saxon. As warlord Kleel he takes a shine to our poor man's Kim Basinger, and if the word inconceivable means anything to you, you can pretty much guess how the rest of the film goes.
Just to make sure we know we're in some parallel dimension (instead of, say, the South African*** hinterland), we're treated to a number of "exotic" foam rubber plants scattered through the landscape, à la Star Trek, though they only seemed to bother with the effect during the first few "new universe" scenes. Kudos to the sound guys too, for making sure the Wile E. Coyote falling-of-the-cliff descending whistle finds new life in inappropriate places.
Yes, I did say this was a fun surprise, and I mean it. Hey, the characters are pretty one-dimensional, and it all wraps up just a bit too neatly, but a film like this is a welcome reprieve from some of the dreck we've had to slog through on this set. A perfect home-sick-in-bed type of thing, if you know what I mean.
***where it was indeed filmed; ostensibly set in California, sharp-eyed viewers will see that something isn't quite right during Carrie and Dan's first, ahem, run-in. Oh, and turns out one of the bit players in this was also in our other favorite South African film, House of the Living Dead.
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