Month: April 2015

Ghost Catchers (1944)

GHOST CATCHERS (1944)
Article #490 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-18-2002
Posting date: 12-11-2002

Two nightclub entertainers come to the aid of two southern belles who find themselves staying in a haunted house.

Years ago I remember watching a documentary on the history of movies. In the section about comedies, they took a few minutes to talk about some of the lesser known comedy teams, including one that was thought of as second-rate Abbott and Costello wannabes, so much so that they made the comparison a gag in the clip they showed. I didn’t remember the names of the duo, but as this is my first full-length encounter with Olsen and Johnson, I suspect that these may be the ones I saw way back then. (NOTE: I have since had a confirmation that these indeed were the comedians in that clip.)

So how are they? On the down side, they really don’t have strongly delineated characters (which I think actually does make a difference in a comedy team; compare the Marxes with the Ritzes some time to see what I mean), and the percentage of really good individual gags is probably pretty low, but neither characters or individual gags seem to be the point here. Their strong point was an escalating frenzy of absurdity combined with a certain high energy presentation, and instead of the movie becoming hard to watch, it becomes hard to tear your eyes away, because you find it hard to believe what you’re seeing. And they do mention Abbott and Costello; they offer a comic critique on that duo’s HOLD THAT GHOST (which gives away the end of that movie and incidentally, hints at the ending of this one) that seems to be flaunting the idea that this movie was inspired by that one (compare the titles). This kind of gag takes a certain kind of chutzpah that I find delicious.

So what can I say? Despite the fact that there’s a tad too much music added to the mix, the movie won me over. Considering the movie is sitting with an 8.2 rating on IMDB at the moment, I know I’m not the only one. All in all, this one was one of the most pleasant surprises I’ve had in a long while.

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Blood Suckers (1972)

BLOOD SUCKERS (1972)
(a.k.a. INCENSE FOR THE DAMNED/DOCTORS WEAR SCARLET/FREEDOM SEEKERS)
Article #489 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-17-2002
Posting date: 12-10-2002

An English professor falls under the spell of a Greek vampiress.

The title for this movie on IMDB is INCENSE FOR THE DAMNED; the popular title is BLOOD SUCKERS (that’s what’s on the title of the DVD); another title is that of the book on which it is based, DOCTORS WEAR SCARLET; the title that actually appears on the screen is FREEDOM SEEKERS (!?). Confused? Wait till the movie starts. The movie attempts to connect the dots between Greek vampirism, sadomasochistic sex, impotence and British academia, and I suppose by the time you finish the movie, you just might see the connections, but you also most likely won’t bother; the movie is a confused mess that in no way prepares you for what is supposed to be its big moment: a speech the professor gives near the end of the movie. On the plus side, there are some nice Greek locations, an excellent if brief performance by Peter Cushing, and good performances by Patrick Macnee and Edward Woodward. Unfortunately, they don’t really make up for the overstylized confusion that reigns here.

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Bigfoot (1970)

BIGFOOT (1970)
Article #488 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-16-2002
Posting date: 12-9-2002

When a biker’s girlfriend is kidnapped by a sasquatch, he teams up with some traveling pedlars to rescue her.

This movie is quite bad. It’s badness may have even been intentional. It’s certainly gleefully so; when the woman strips out of her pilot’s outfit and she’s wearing a flimsy revealing negligee underneath, the movie doesn’t even attempt to explain; it makes no bones that it’s going for the cheesecake. It also doesn’t even bother to have anybody light the dynamite that causes the explosion in the final scene. Still, you can’t help but be a little impressed by a cast that includes Joi Lansing, John Carradine, Doodles Weaver, Chris Mitchum, Ken Maynard, and Lindsay Crosby. Half the soundtrack is made up of hillbilly music (the scenes with Carradine and John Mitchum); the other half consists of bongos (the scenes with the bikers). And, to top it all off, the movie is loaded with references to KING KONG that will leave you scratching your head; take special note of Carradine’s variation on the line “Twas beauty that killed the beast.” It’s got more than its share of dull, boring sequences, especially the endless scenes of the bikers tooling around, but I have to admit to finding this one a little irresistible. At least the movie doesn’t bother to try to argue that the creatures are real.

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1001 Arabian Nights (1959)

1001 ARABIAN NIGHTS (1959)
Article #487 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-15-2002
Posting date: 12-8-2002

An evil wazir tries to use a young lad to acquire a magic lamp with a genie, but fails to contend with the lads Uncle Abdul Azziz Magoo.

This UPA feature-length cartoon is your basic animated version of the Aladdin story with Mr. Magoo thrown in for good measure. It’s slight and not particularly hilarious, but I don’t think it’s trying to be; if it was any bigger, it might warp its charms. These include the stylish and bizarre backdrops (a UPA trademark) and the score, which is always slightly jazzy but never heavy-handedly so, which serves as a nice counterpoint to the visual style. Though it has songs, it never really becomes a musical; some of them are woven into the story so delicately you may not even notice you’re in the middle of one. All in all, though it can’t compete with Disney, it carves out its own unique little place in the animation pantheon.

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Primitive Man (1913)

PRIMITIVE MAN (1913)
Article #486 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-14-2002
Posting date: 12-7-2002

Caveman Weakhands must contend with his enemy Bruteforce and then forms a tribe to contend with the rival tribe led by a caveman named Monkeywalk.

Sound familiar? This movie was made a year after MAN’S GENESIS, and except for a change in the framing device (from an old man telling children the story to the dream of a man who belongs to a club), the first ten minutes is a replay of the footage of that earlier short. It then tells what happens afterwards, which adds twenty minutes to the running time; it’s largely the same story with bigger stakes, more characters, and a subplot about the happy couple trying to find a place to be alone and being interrupted by a snake, a slurpasaur (that’s what I think it is; the costume they slap on this poor gator makes him look like nothing I’ve ever seen) and a big model dinosaur that manages to bob up and down a little. You know, considering the story arc is essentially the first step of an arms race, this whole series of films could have gone on forever; however, since this film is roughly three times the length of the previous, I would hate to see the series continue that tradition; nobody would have the patience to sit through the fifth one.

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Man’s Genesis (1912)

MAN’S GENESIS (1912)
Article #485 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-13-2002
Posting date: 12-6-2002

Caveman Weakhand loses his girl Lillywhite to the bully Bruteforce, and must use his brain to win out.

The first caveman epic? I wouldn’t be surprised, though it is always hard to say with these early films, as there are many lost and unknown ones out there; it is currently the earliest one I’ve covered so far. D. W. Griffith’s short is fun and simple, but with only ten minutes of running time, there is once again not much one can say. Though I haven’t seen it yet, I’ve heard that footage from this was used in D. W. Griffith’s PRIMITIVE MAN, made the next year.

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The Exploits of Elaine (1914)

THE EXPLOITS OF ELAINE (1914)
Article #484 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-12-2002
Posting date: 12-5-2002

Elaine Dodge tries to find the murderer of her father, a villain known as The Clutching Hand (the murderer, not the father).

This is one of the earliest serials I’ve seen, though I can’t strictly say I’ve seen it; though all episodes are believed to exist, only about half are available, and I’ve seen only six of the fourteen episodes. This early serial really didn’t have cliffhangers as such; each episode is somewhat self-contained and tells a single story as well as fleshing out the overall arc; in many ways, it’s more like a TV series in its feel than a serial. It’s quite entertaining at that, with some science fiction concepts thrown into the mix.

One of the pitfalls of watching old serials, though, is that even if all the episodes exist, they may not all exist in the same language; I think that only two or three of these were in English; the rest were in a variety of different language, which left me scratching my head over more than just the identity of the villain.

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The Man From Beyond (1922)

THE MAN FROM BEYOND (1922)
Article #483 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-11-2002
Posting date: 12-4-2002

A man revived after being frozen in a block of ice for one hundred years believes a woman is the reincarnation of his lost love.

The selling factor of this rather forgettable movie is the presence of Harry Houdini in the lead role. Despite the presence of both suspended animation and reincarnation in the story line, the movie really doesn’t do much with them; at heart, it’s just a mundane little melodrama, with an escape sequence thrown in to take advantage of the presence of Houdini. The final sequence involving a waterfall isn’t too bad, but otherwise this is a fairly ho-hum affair.

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L’inhumaine (1924)

L’INHUMAINE (1924)
(a.k.a. THE INHUMAN WOMAN)
Article #482 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-10-2002
Posting date: 12-3-2002

An opera singer mocks a scientist who is obsessed with her, and he commits suicide, which is considered a scandal. However, everything is not quite what it seems…

This silent movie has a running length of a little more than two hours, and this is a fairly long time to watch a movie in which all the title cards are in a different language. Fortunately, the movie is a fascinating visual feast that keeps you watching even when you don’t quite know what’s going on, though I would love to see an English version some time to sort out the details. Fans of fantastic cinema may need to be patient; the movie clearly veers into science fiction before the end is reached, but not until the second half of the movie, and to say more would give away some truly unexpected plot twists. This is definitely one of the more intrguing movies I’ve seen of the ones for which I need a translation; I suspect this one may be a real classic. Further research is necessary.

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F.P.1 ANTWORTET NICHT (1932)

F.P.1 ANTWORTET NICHT (1932)
Article #481 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 7-9-2002
Posting date: 12-2-2002

A floating platform in the Atlantic Ocean finds itself the target of a saboteur.

This is the German version of the movie I covered a couple of days ago. Though it has a completely different cast as the English version (as does the French version), it is directed by the same man and for all practical reasons unfolds in the same way. This version is almost twenty-five minutes longer than the English version, which means either the English version I have is incomplete or it was given a somewhat condensed treatment; outside of a couple of short montages and some conversation scenes that seem to run longer, I really didn’t notice much different between the two versions. However, this one has Peter Lorre in the photographer role, which makes it of interest to fans of his. It might be interesting some time to sit down with both versions and do a scene-by-scene comparison.

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