Month: August 2017

Rashomon (1950)

RASHOMON (1950)
Article 2132 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-16-2007
Posting Date: 6-14-2007
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
Featuring Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyo, Masayuki Mori

Three men gather at the Rashomon gate during a rainstorm and relate the conflicting testimonies of the participants of the murder of a Samurai and the rape of his wife which occurred in the nearby woods.

I am a huge fan of the work of Akira Kurosawa, who I consider one of the finest directors of all time. I find it highly regrettable that I will be covering only a smidgen of his work for this series, as he rarely ventured into the cinema of the fantastic, and of the only three that I anticipate covering, two are quite marginal indeed. I’m also a little disappointed that one of those three is this one; not that I feel it doesn’t deserve its acclaim (it would merit it just by telling this incredibly complex story in the first place), but because I don’t fondly dote on it in the same way that I do on THE SEVEN SAMURAI, THE HIDDEN FORTRESS or YOJIMBO, just to name a few of his other classics. The basic concept is brilliant; we hear four substantially different tellings of what happens in the aftermath of the capture of the samurai and the rape of his wife. One is from the bandit’s point of view, another is from the wife’s point of view, the third is from the point of view of the dead samurai (who tells his story through a medium, which provides the fantastic content to the story), and the fourth from a witness who never testified and whose story is, as far as it goes, probably the most accurate. It is the vast differences between the stories that makes it fascinating; for example, the samurai dies at the hands of three different people in the course of the four stories. It’s the performances that stick in my mind the most from this one, particularly from Toshiro Mifune (whose character is quite different depending on whose story is being told) and Takashi Shimura as the woodsman who discovers the body of the samurai and has secrets of his own. It’s a profound story, and the movie is definitely a triumph, but I think one of the reasons it isn’t one of my favorites is that I had more enjoyment performing in a stage version of the play. I played the character known in the movie as the Commoner, though in the play he is called the Wigmaker, who makes his living by selling wigs he made from the hair of the dead around the Rashomon gate. When I think of this story, it is for that version that my fondness lies.

 

1 CommentLeave a comment

The Satan Bug (1965)

THE SATAN BUG (1965)
Article 2131 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-15-2007
Posting Date: 6-13-2007
Directed by John Sturges
Featuring George Maharis, Richard Basehart, Anne Francis

Two deadly viruses are stolen from a top secret government lab. The person behind the theft is believed to be an eccentric millionaire. A security agent (who was originally fired from the project because of insubordination) is called in to help find and retrieve the viruses before the world is destroyed.

This slick and exciting thriller does have its problems; the story is a little sluggish on occasion and certain elements of the mystery will fool no one (though I’m not so sure they were meant to). Still, it has a good story and a fun cast with lots of familiar names and faces, include Dana Andrews as a general, Simon Oakland as a government agent, Frank Sutton (who I remember as Sergeant Carter form “Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.”) and Ed Asner as two henchmen, and Russ Bender and James Doohan in small roles. The fantastic element consists of the two viruses, at least one of which is used during the proceedings. All in all, it’s a fairly solid thriller, though the ending is a little weaker than it should be.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

Pajama Party (1964)

PAJAMA PARTY (1964)
Article 2130 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-14-2007
Posting Date: 6-12-2007
Directed by Don Weis
Featuring Tommy Kirk, Annette Funicello, Elsa Lanchester

A martian arrives on earth as the vanguard of an invasion. Meanwhile, a con man has set his sights on finding the hidden fortune of the dotty old woman next door, and he enlists an American Indian and his Swedish bombshell sidekick to help him. Meanwhile, teens party on the beach, and a motorcycle gang vows revenge on a muscular teen in a crazy broad-billed red baseball cap lovingly called Big Lunk. Hilarity ensues.

This movie is dumb, but it’s a beach party movie; what do you expect? I’ve always liked the way that these movies found places for older actors and actresses to take part in them, and this one features Elsa Lanchester, Dorothy Lamour, Don Rickles, and Buster Keaton. I’m always a bit embarrassed to see the kind of shtick that was handed to the latter near the end of his life; he was capable of being funny without the help of silly costumes or goofy characters, but that’s pretty much what they gave him. His best moment is a perfume feud he has with a saleslady because it relies on comic timing rather than goofy dialogue. I’ve heard that MARS NEEDS WOMEN (which also features Tommy Kirk as a Martian) was partially based off of this; this one, which is fairly energetic, is certainly much better than that one. The movie also features a young Teri Garr, Frankia Avalon in a cameo (you’ll know who he is), and the usual cast of beach partiers.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

The Night My Number Came Up (1955)

THE NIGHT MY NUMBER CAME UP (1955)
Article 2129 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-13-2007
Posting Date: 6-11-2007
Directed by Leslie Norman
Featuring Michael Redgrave, Sheila Sim, Alexander Knox

A man relates to a group of people a dream of his in which some of them are involved in a plane accident. The people begin to get nervous when the details of the dream start coming true in a flight to Tokyo.

I really have to give credit to this neat little thriller; it takes one of the hoariest of foreshadowing plot devices (the precognitive dream) and breathes new life into it. What makes this one special is that it is deeply concerned with how knowledge of the dream affects the behavior of those that have it. The cast is uniformly excellent, with special praise going to Alexander Knox as the man who feels most nervous about the dream coming true. The various reactions of the characters to the knowledge helps make it interesting; there are those who don’t know, those who don’t believe but still are hedging their bets, and those who do believe, and those who see it as a joke. A party scene on the ground after the first leg of the trip is especially memorable, as the departure of two characters makes it seem as if the dream won’t come true only to have two new characters enter that make it seem all the more likely; take note of the song being sung when Knox’s character discovers this. It’s a wonderful and suspenseful movie, with a great ending line. Highly recommended.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

Hollywood Meat Cleaver Massacre (1977)

HOLLYWOOD MEAT CLEAVER MASSACRE (1977)
aka MEATCLEAVER MASSACRE
Article 2128 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-12-2007
Posting Date: 6-10-2007
Directed by Evan Lee
Featuring Christopher Lee(!), Larry Justin, J. Arthur Craig

Four students on a drunken binge break into the home of a professor of the occult, kill his family and leave him paralyzed for life. However, the professor is able to conjure up a demon to seek revenge.

If there’s any one thing I can say about this movie, it’s that it surprised me – instead of the psycho killer movie I was expecting, it turns out to have more of an occult bent then I expected. It also wasn’t near as bad as I expected it would be, but that’s no recommendation; it’s still fairly awful. The story itself is straightforward enough, but the movie engages in arty dream sequences, one gratuitous nude scene, lots of dull stretches where nothing is happening, and the occasional surprising touch of intentional and unexpected humor that may be the best thing about the film; if I have a favorite moment here, it’s when one of the students is distracted from committing suicide by something very mundane.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this movie is the presence of Christopher Lee, whose presence provided two things that the movie needed; it padded out the running time and added some star power to the movie. Actually, he only appears in beginning and ending bumpers, and, if the reports are true, he made these scenes for another producer, who then sold the footage to the makers of this movie. The other surprising presence is of Ed Wood as a photographer in the movie; it looks like he was associated with stinkers right to the end. As a result, this is the only time Ed Wood and Christopher Lee ever worked together, albeit inadvertently. And please take note that one cast member here is named Robert Clark, not Robert Clarke.

 

1 CommentLeave a comment

Night Life (1989)

NIGHT LIFE (1989)
Article 2127 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-11-2007
Posting Date: 6-9-2007
Directed by David Acomba
Featuring Scott Grimes, John Astin, Cheryl Pollak

A student who works in a mortuary to raise money for college is tormented by the other teens in his class. When four of his detractors die in an auto accident, they are resurrected by being struck by lightning, and they set out to kill the student.

Thanks to a late additions section in the John Stanley guide I’m using as one of my sources, I find myself once again taking an unexpected leap in time to the late eighties. I think this one is supposed to be a horror comedy. I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be horror, what with zombies and gross-out scenes. I’m not so sure about the comedy part; it has several scenes which strike me as if they’re supposed to be funny, but they fall so flat in this regard that I’m not sure whether they were intended that way or not (a scene involving a practical joke with a fat woman’s corpse is a particularly noteworthy example of promised laughs not manifesting themselves). The horror falls fairly flat as well; there’s not a single jolt or surprise in the movie. Scott Grimes is likable enough in the lead role, but after a while watching him get dumped on repeatedly gets fairly depressing. The scenes of corpse preparation are intentionally gross, but I don’t think they’re as fun or funny as they were intended to be. For me, the most interesting thing about the movie is the presence of a few odd faces; John Astin (“The Addams Family”) is a bad-tempered undertaker, Anthony Geary (“General Hospital”) is a seedy race car driver, and Phil Proctor (of The Firesign Theater) plays a visitor to the mortuary. Also, I want to take a moment at this point in the proceedings to mention something; I’ve only seen a very small handful of movies from this era so far, but I’m officially tired of what seems to be one of the most common causes of death in horror movies of the eighties – the 180-degree neck twist. I’ve seen it too often already, and I have a feeling that I’ve only just begun.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

Latitude Zero (1969)

LATITUDE ZERO (1969)
aka IDO ZERO DAISAKUSEN
Article 2126 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-10-2007
Posting Date: 6-8-2007
Directed by Ishiro Honda
Featuring Joseph Cotten, Cesar Romero, Akira Takarada

Three people stranded on the ocean floor in a bathysphere are rescued by residents of an underground kingdom called Latitude Zero. They are fighting the evil mad scientist, Dr. Malic.

For some reason, this Toho science fiction movie has eluded me for years; now, after having seen it, I’m afraid I have to consider myself somewhat fortunate in this regard. Dubbing is not a real problem with this one, what with most of the major cast members (Cotten, Romero and Jaeckel) speaking their lines in English to begin with, but I think the story is rather slow-moving and weak, Joseph Cotten seems lost and a little bored (though Cesar Romero is trying to put his best foot forward) and the music is listless and puny (from the usually reliable Akira Ifukube). There’s a bit of campy fun, though, what with Romero insisting on surgically creating a monster (a lion with the wings of a condor and the brain of a woman) right in front of his unwilling captives who are forced to watch by evil bat-men, but these sequences come fairly late in the film. The monster costumes look like monster costumes (especially the rats and the lions). It almost looks like they were hoping to build a TV series off of it. As far as I’m concerned, this is one of Toho’s weakest efforts in the realm of Science Fiction.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

The Birds (1963)

THE BIRDS (1963)
Article 2125 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-9-2007
Posting Date: 6-7-2007
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Featuring Tippi Hedren, Rod Taylor, Jessica Tandy

A rich playgirl goes to Bodega Bay to play a practical joke on a lawyer she met in a pet store. Their lives are interrupted when birds in the area beginning attacking people.

When it comes to his forays into genre territory, Hitchcock’s PSYCHO seems to be the one that garners most of the attention and acclaim. Though that movie certainly deserves it, I prefer this one, his foray into the “nature gone wild” subgenre, and a truly harrowing film in its own right. With this viewing, I couldn’t help but notice how well he develops the characters and situations during the first half of the movie, despite the fact that they don’t really have much to do with the bird attacks which are the central elements to the plot. Actually, this contributes quite a bit to the madness; the bird attacks take on the feel of an interruption of our normal lives as any big disaster does. I also notice how Hitchcock is able to build tension even in scenes that don’t overtly require it; for example, there’s some real tension in the scene with the man in the elevator, even though his only purpose is to pass on information to Tippi Hedren’s character. I also find that the movie (especially in the final scenes) has a strong similarity to NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (boarded up house, character in shock, etc.), and I wonder if Romero was influenced by this one. And even though there is some controversy about the ending of the movie (some people are disappointed by it because it promises an event that doesn’t happen), I find it perfect; I’ve always felt that the reason the promised event doesn’t happen is because it doesn’t need to happen, and the final scene, more than any other moment I’ve seen in the movies, leaves me with the feeling that I’m staring right into the face of the apocalypse. Great performances from all abound, with 88-year old Ethel Griffies nearly stealing the movie as an ornithologist.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima (1952)

THE MIRACLE OF OUR LADY OF FATIMA (1952)
Article 2124 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-8-2007
Posting Date: 6-6-2007
Directed by John Brahm
Featuring Susan Whitney, Sherry Jackson, Carl Milletaire

Three young children encounter a vision of a lovely lady in a cloud just outside of Fatima. People gather from all around when it is rumored that the children have seen the Virgin Mary.

During the forties, movies with religious themes became very common, and one of the surprising things I discovered was that most of them were quite good, thanks mostly due to the excellence of the scripts, which took the trouble to develop memorable characters to undergo these experiences. The trend continued into the fifties, but the quality went downhill; characters lost their dimension, and the stories become simplistic. To illustrate my point, compare this movie with THE SONG OF BERNADETTE from a decade earlier; whereas that movie gave us a startling array of memorable and complex characters, this one settles for far less. Yes, Gilbert Roland’s likable but cynical hero (he protects the children even if he doesn’t believe in their vision) is fun, but he’s pretty much meant to serve one dramatic purpose which you should see coming long before the movie ends. The villainous administrator is far too close to being Snidely Whiplash for a movie that purports to be realistic, and of the three children, the two young ones are differentiated only by their sexes, while the older one’s main function is to tug on our heartstrings by having people be mean to her so she can break into tears every ten minutes or so. If THE SONG OF BERNADETTE was true drama, this is very much simple melodrama. Still, some of the spectacle is good, I like the fact that the vision is never clearly seen, and Max Steiner’s score is lovely. The acting in the crowd scenes is fairly lame. The director of this one also gave us THE LODGER and HANGOVER SQUARE, and personally, I prefer his work when he’s dealing with serial killers.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment

The Beast That Killed Women (1965)

THE BEAST THAT KILLED WOMEN (1965)
Article 2123 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-7-2007
Posting Date: 6-5-2007
Directed by Barry Mahon
Featuring Juliet Anderson, Janet Banzet, Darlene Bennett

A gorilla is on the loose in a nudist camp. Mayhem and bouncing abound.

For some reason the original review I wrote of this one vanished from the source I kept it. In some cases when this happen, I watch the movie again and write a new review. Sometimes, I just go by memory and write a new review. I’ve chosen the latter in this case; I remember it just enough that I find little reason to bother watching it again.

I recall that the cast in the movie was said to consist of “the most beautiful nudists in Florida”; these may not be the exact words, but I’m pretty sure that’s the gist of it. I’ll have to take their word for it; I don’t have firsthand knowledge of the nudists in Florida to make any disagreement. Still, the very fact that they announced the cast this way should be enough to tell you that this is essentially a nudie, and the Beast (a man in a crummy ape suit) is disposable. Barry Mahon himself appears in the movie; if he’s one of the nudists, I don’t want to know. Perhaps the most impressive thing is how you can have a cast mostly of naked people and still manage to avoid full frontal nudity, but the trick is simple; if the person is totally nude, they have their back to you; if they’re wearing some sort of underwear, they’re facing you. Of course, a well-positioned camera is essential as well, and shrubbery proves quite useful. I’m tempted to dismiss the movie by saying that there’s nothing worthwhile to see here, but somehow, that isn’t quite what I mean.

 

0 CommentsLeave a comment