Month: October 2019

Per amore… per magia… (1967)

PER AMORE… PER MAGIA… (1967)
aka For Love… For Magic
Article 3858 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-27-2012
Posting Date: 3-7-2012
Directed by Duccio Tessari
Featuring Gianni Morandi, Rosemary Dexter, Mischa Auer
Country: Italy
What it is: Arabian Nights musical comedy

A young thief named Aladino comes by a magic lamp with a genie, and it changes his fortunes so he can meet a beautiful princess.

If I had known ahead of time I was about to watch an undubbed, unsubtitled Italian musical comedy version of the story of Aladdin with a rating of 4.9 on IMDB, I would have braced myself for the worst. Yet, oddly enough, the various elements actually seemed to make it balance out for me; because the movie was based on a familiar story, I was able to more or less follow it, and because it was a musical, it emphasized energy, movement, choreography, and singing, all of which can be enjoyed whether you understand the language of the movie or not. However, the best thing about it for me was how often it managed to find creative and witty ways to stage the various scenes; it was really nice to see a version of this story that did something different with the various plot points in the story (my favorite moment has Aladdin discovering the power of the lamp by trying to use it to scratch an itch on his back). There’s also some very odd touches here; it’s probably the only Arabian Nights story that features a talking penguin as a central character. So, despite that very weak rating on IMDB, I really found myself charmed and intrigued by the movie. Besides, I like Mischa Auer as well.

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The Stolen Voice (1915)

THE STOLEN VOICE (1915)
Article 3857 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-26-2012
Posting Date: 3-6-2012
Directed by Frank Hall Crane
Featuring Robert Warwick, Frances Nelson, George Majeroni
Country: USA
What it is: Romance / melodrama

When a society matron becomes enamored with an opera singer and his beautiful voice, her jealous lover uses hypnotic powers to strip the singer of his voice.

This one ended up on my “ones-that-got-away” list, and almost immediately upon its entry, I was pointed the way to an online copy of the movie at the George Eastman House website, thus allowing me to remove it from the list. The plot description certainly made it look like it was your standard romantic melodrama of the era, a sort of reverse take on the Svengali/Trilby story. As far as the fantastic content goes, the most interesting thing about it is that the evil doctor hypnotizes the singer from a distance rather than directly, pushing the hypnotism element even farther into the realms of fantasy. Still, what ended up really charming me about this movie were the plot developments after the singer loses his voice; he eventually makes his way into silent pictures, and a portion of the movie involves scenes of him acting in them, making this one of the first movies about movies, as well as giving us a movie-within-a-movie scene. I found this touch pretty fun, especially as it leads to one of the wittiest scenes of the movie; without giving away too much, let’s just say that one character’s demise in this movie is almost gleefully ironic. It’s these story surprises that really make this one a fun experience.

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Die Gansehirtin am Brunnen (1979)

DIE GANSEHIRTIN AM BRUNNEN (1979)
aka The Wishmaker
Article 3856 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-25-2012
Posting Date: 3-5-2012
Directed by Ursula Schmanger
Featuring Jaroslava Schallerova, David Schneider, Gunter Naumann
Country: East Germany
What it is: Fairy tale

A young man is aided by a witch in his hunt for an unhappy princess.

Here we have another German fairy tale, though this one is from the seventies and comes from East Germany rather than West Germany. Like the others that I’ve seen, this is a rather slow affair, but, even despite the fact that it was in German without dubbing or subtitles, I felt it more or less worked. Just on a visual sense, I felt it managed to capture a sense of gentle lyricism that makes it rather likable, and it keeps the special effects to a minimum, only using them when it was most effective. According to one of my sources, it was based on “The Goose Girl” by the Brothers Grimm, but upon reading a summary of that fairy tale, I find little relation between it and this; the short plot description in John Stanley’s “Creature Feature Movie Guide Strikes Again” is closer to what seems to be happening. The movie has a very low rating on IMDB, yet I don’t think it deserves it; however, I could see how its low action quotient might alienate some, while the very real possibility that it may have been badly dubbed would further damage it. If that’s the case, I may have been better off watching the undubbed version, despite the language barrier.

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Der gestiefelte Kater (1955)

DER GESTIEFELTE KATER (1955)
aka Puss ‘n Boots
Article 3855 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-23-2012
Posting Date: 3-4-2012
Directed by Herbert B. Fredersorf
Featuring Margitte Sonke, Harry Wustenhagen, Christa Oenicke
Country: West Germany
What it is: Fairy tale

A talking cat helps his down-and-out owner by helping him to win the love of a beautiful princess and to defeat an evil magician.

If I prefer the Mexican version of this fairy tale, at least one of the reasons is because that version was dubbed into English, whereas this one isn’t; the copy I found was in unsubtitled German, and though the story itself is familiar enough that I didn’t have a lot of problems following it, it is fairly talky. Which, come to think of it, is another thing I like better about the Mexican version; its wild, hyper-energetic and surreal take on it is more fun than this stodgy, slow gabfest. I suppose I should also point out that the cat costume in that movie is better than the one here; I wasn’t sure that furry thing hanging around was a cat until it went ‘meow’. Of course, there is the chance I might like this one more if it had been dubbed into English, but as of this point, I consider it another example of just how dull some of these German fairy tales of the fifties were.

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Private Parts (1972)

PRIVATE PARTS (1972)
Article 3854 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-22-2012
Posting Date: 3-3-2012
Directed by Paul Bartel
Featuring Ayn Ruymen, Lucille Benson, John Ventantonio
Country: USA
What it is: Very black comedy

A runaway teenage girl takes refuge in a hotel run by her aunt. Some of the residents of the hotel are very eccentric, and some have even deeper problems… including a photographer with some very strange sexual hangups. Unfortunately, the girl is a little too curious about sex herself. And there’s also a murderer on the premises…

This is definitely one of the sicker movies I’ve encountered for this series, but I find its sickness more along the lines of “weirdly fascinating” rather than “repellent”. I think what makes it work is that it gradually works up to some of its more outrageous revelations; the movie has a bizarre surprise around every corner. It’s directed by cult figure Paul Bartel, who is perhaps best known for giving us EATING RAOUL and DEATH RACE 2000. It’s definitely not for the kiddies and will probably best appeal to those with a taste for the twisted. My biggest problem with the movie is the final twist; it’s out of left field, and I’m still not sure whether the movie adequately prepares you for it. Perhaps the most curious detail in the movie is that one character blurts out the title of a Scorsese film two years before it was made, a fact that becomes even more curious when I discovered that the same title was also that of a an episode of “The Brady Bunch”. Sometimes I’m a little amazed at the directions some of these movies take me.

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The Severed Arm (1973)

THE SEVERED ARM (1973)
Article 3853 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-21-2012
Posting Date: 3-2-2012
Directed by Thomas S. Alderman
Featuring Deborah Walley, Paul Carr, David G. Cannon
Country: USA
What it is: Psycho killer revenge movie

When six men are trapped in a mine and are facing starvation, they draw lots to see who will give up a limb so they can eat. Minutes after the loser has his arm cut off, they are rescued, and lie about the reason the arm was amputated. The amputee swears revenge. Five years later, after the amputee is released from a mental hospital, someone begins cutting the arms off of the other men trapped in the mine…

This movie has a pretty poor reputation, and I’ll admit there are definite problems here; there are flaws in the script, the acting is merely functional at best, there’s some pretty stupid behavior going on (Why do some of the survivors try to rely on the help and advice of a relative of the alleged killer? Why does a man going to a mill in expectation that he will be attacked by the killer investigate the place while keeping all the lights off?), and the movie gives away its biggest plot twist by keeping the face of the killer in the shadows despite the fact that we meet the alleged killer in person fairly early in the story. Yet, I think there’s some decent things about this one. I like the basic premise, it does come up with some interesting suspense-generating ideas (I like the sequences where a man who may be attacked at any moment finds himself in an elevator that has a stop on every floor before he reaches his destination), and though the movie is a bit slow-moving, I never really found myself bored with it. So I’m calling this one a bit of a mixed bag, but I think overall it is worth a look.

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Play It Again, Sam (1972)

PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM (1972)
Article 3852 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-20-2012
Posting Date: 3-1-2012
Directed by Herbert Ross
Featuring Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Tony Roberts
Country: USA
What it is: Comedy

A neurotic, devastated by his recent divorce, tries to recover by with the help of his best friend and the ghost of Humphrey Bogart. However, he soon discovers that the woman he really loves is his best friend’s wife.

In some ways, I find the fantastic content pretty iffy in this movie; I don’t think it’s really the ghost of Humphrey Bogart that appears, but rather the main character’s projection of Bogart’s image. That being said, this is a fairly solid Woody Allen movie, not directed by him, but starring and having been written by him. I saw it many years ago when I was young, but I couldn’t appreciate it then; nowadays, it works a lot better for me because I can understand the appeal of his neurotic obsessions. Jerry Lacy does a nifty impersonation of Bogart, and Diane Keaton is quite appealing as the object of Allan’s affections (and I just realized when writing this that it was a handy for Allen to be playing a character named Allan, because I didn’t have to worry about the spelling). It’s not my favorite of Allen’s pre-ANNIE HALL movies (that would be LOVE AND DEATH), but it’s very good, and somewhat more focused than some of his more slapstick-oriented movies.

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Death Valley (1982)

DEATH VALLEY (1982)
Article 3851 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-19-2012
Posting Date: 2-29-2012
Directed by Dick Richards
Featuring Paul Le Mat, Catherine Hicks, Stephen McHattie
Country: USA
What it is: Psycho killer movie

A young child, on vacation in Death Valley with his divorced mother and her boyfriend, discovers a clue that may lead to the solution of a number of serial killings in the area. But the killer knows about the boy…

Peter Billingsley is most remembered as having played Ralphie in the holiday perennial, A CHRISTMAS STORY. I don’t know if this movie played any role in helping him get the part in that movie, but I could see how it might; Billingsley is so likable and natural here that his presence is probably the best thing about the movie; despite fifth billing, he is more or less the lead character. The other performances are acceptable, and this makes the movie watchable enough. However, the plot is incredibly weak, and relies so heavily on a series of incredible coincidences that it really becomes difficult to swallow. It doesn’t help that many characters act with real stupidity at several points of the story. This one is better watched for the performances than the story.

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The Intruder (1981)

THE INTRUDER (1981)
Article 3850 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-18-2012
Posting Date: 2-28-2012
Directed by David F. Eustace
Featuring Tony Fletcher, Pita Oliver, Gerard Jordan
Country: Canada
What it is: Mysticism

A tall, dark stranger arrives in a small town with the intent of putting on a presentation of some kind. How will it effect the members of the town, who deal with their daily sins, temptations and crimes, large and small?

IMDB classifies the movie as “horror”, but, despite the fact that the movie acts ominous on occasion, it really isn’t. It’s more of a fantasy, and if I had to pick a movie that might have served as a model for this one, it would be 7 FACES OF DR. LAO. Unfortunately, this one is more abstract and harder to pin down; when the key term for what the stranger brings to town involves the term “self-actualization”, you know you’re in a vague area that’s more likely to be navigated by psychologists and mystics rather than the general public. The first two-thirds of the movie is primarily concerned with setting up all of the various relationships and situations; we then have the stranger’s presentation, followed by the final part of the movie, where we see what impact the presentation has on those who attended it. As far as I can tell, the stranger’s gift is that he endows the characters with the focus to “be who they are going to be”, which is probably why not everyone has their personal problems solved. It’s interesting and offbeat, but it’s also somewhat unfocused and doesn’t make much sense on occasion; I have no idea what the whole business with the tree is about. Ultimately, I don’t think the movie really works, but I’ll give it some credit for trying something different.

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The Final Eye (1982)

THE FINAL EYE (1982)
aka Computercide
TV-Movie
Article 3849 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 2-17-2012
Posting Date: 2-27-2012
Directed by Robert Michael Lewis
Featuring Joe Cortese, Tom Clancy, Susan George
Country: USA
What it is: Science fiction mystery

In the future, the last remaining private eye undertakes an investigation for a woman who claims that a hospitalized man that is believed to be her father is actually not; he’s twenty years too young. In order to find the truth, he and the woman pretend to be married artists to infiltrate a private paradise community with a secret.

I can’t get a confirmation of this, but I’m willing to bet this was an intended pilot for a TV series; not only did it not result in a series, but this pilot sat on the shelf for five years before even getting shown on network TV. I’m not surprised. As a potential TV series, the premise is flimsy but not unworkable; however, the pilot itself is pretty weak. It’s not the acting, which is fairly decent, and it’s not the writing, which is passable; it’s the production itself that is at fault. It’s an action/suspense premise with little action and no suspense, at least partially because the whole movie takes a sort of wry comic tone that is at odds with any sense of tension; the movie seems to slowly lope from one not-quite-funny scene to another. It certainly doesn’t help that the theme music resembles the theme from the TV series “Get Smart”; if you’re going to try to conjure up something like that, you’d better be a lot funnier than this one is. In the end, the movie just never becomes more compelling than a half-smile is; as a series, it would have died on the vine. In the end, Donald Pleasence steals the movie if for no other reason than he’s Donald Pleasence, but let’s face it, it really didn’t take much.

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