Month: October 2020

The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985)

THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO (1985)
Article 5039 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 1-4-2016
Directed by Woody Allen
Featuring Mia Farrow, Jeff Daniels, Danny Aiello
Country: USA
What it is: Fantasy

During the depression, a neglected and abused housewife seeks solace by going to the movies. After seeing a particular movie several times, one of the characters takes notice of her and comes out of the screen to be her lover and to live in the real world.

According to the trivia section of IMDB, Woody Allen was asked why the movie didn’t have a happy ending. Allen replied that the ending it had “was” the happy ending. If this doesn’t make sense at first, it’s important to keep in mind that the movie is about our love for the movies themselves, and not necessarily for specific actors or characters. It borrows a concept developed by Buster Keaton for SHERLOCK, JR. and uses it brilliantly for both comic and poignant effects. It’s no surprise that he chose the time of the Great Depression as his setting; it was perhaps the time in history when the movies were at there most vital at keeping up the spirits of the average American. The scenes where the characters on the movie screen try to deal with the departure of one their own and there conversations with some of the audience members are some of the funniest lines written by Allen, and the script is one of the most focused of the ones I’ve encountered. The cast does fine work throughout, particularly Jeff Daniels in a dual role. I don’t know if this is Allen’s best movie, but I’m willing to bet that this may be the best movie of his that I’m going to cover for this series.

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Las luchadoras vs el robot asesino (1969)

LAS LUCHADORAS VS EL ROBOT ASESINO (1969)
aka The Wrestling Women versus the Murderous Robot
Article 5038 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 1-3-2016
Directed by Rene Cardona
Featuring Joaquin Cordero, Regina Torne, Hector Lechuga
Country: Mexico
What it is: More Mexican wrestling antics

A mad scientist uses a robot to kidnap other scientists in order to force them to work on a project to turn people into human robots. Can the wrestling women and their police boyfriends stop him?

I found this one on YouTube without English dubbing or subtitles, so I had to get a few of the plot details from other sources. That’s not to say that the movie would have been impenetrable without those sources; if you’ve seen other movies from the wrestling women series, you know what to expect and this one doesn’t vary the formula a whole lot. In fact, it’s at least partially a remake of the first one in the series, DOCTOR OF DOOM. The wrestling women are different in this one (no Gloria Venus or the Golden Rubi), and the new ones aren’t quite as memorable. They still have police boyfriends, and one of them is still broad comic relief. The movie mostly consists of the scientist sending out the robot to kidnap/kill someone, and the robot goes out and kills/kidnaps someone. Nevertheless, this is about as entertaining as the series ever got. Oddly enough, this one is devoid of the musical numbers or nightclub scenes that were common to the form. Incidentally, the doctor also keeps a monster with an ugly face in a cage in the cellar, and this creature features prominently in the two dumbest scenes in the movie. In the first, a female nurse tempts the monster by hitching up her skirt and adjusting her stockings in front of him, then she unlocks the cage and turns her back on the monster. The second one has the scientist ordering the monster to break the chain holding him in the cage, which the creature easily does. This leads to the question – why lock up a creature with a chain that you know it can break?

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Blind Date (1984)

BLIND DATE (1984)
Article 5037 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 1-2-2016
Directed by Nico Mastorakis
Featuring Joseph Bottoms, Kirstie Alley, James Daughton
Country: USA / Greece
What it is: Giallo of sorts

A man has an accident and goes blind, though there appears to be nothing physically wrong with him. A scientist fits him with a device that will allow him to use computer technology that will allow him to see within certain limits. When he stumbles across a serial killer, he finds his life in danger and must try to bring him to justice.

After I watched this movie, I went back and read the reviews of the other Nico Mastorakis movies I’ve seen, and if I see a pattern, it’s that they usually have an interesting central concept or gimmick, but for some reason it never quite gestates into a compelling movie. Also, there’s usually a lot of great Greek scenery to enjoy. In this one, however, he’s less interested in Greek landscapes and is more interested in pulchritude; the movie is full of women in skimpy outfits; some appear topless as well. I know many people consider this a plus, but it’s also such an easy directorial choice that it doesn’t impress me. The gimmick about a man using an artificial device that works like sonar to allow him to see is a clever concept, but I must admit to being disappointed with the way the movie handles the concept visually, and I’m not sure the gimmick is really necessary to a story that boils down to a man facing off with a serial killer. Still, I do feel that one of my major problems with the movie is that I never feel a shred of suspense; though intellectually I know how I’m supposed to feel in certain scenes, I never actually feel it, and at least part of the reason here is that I don’t really like or care for the main character. It also doesn’t help that the script seems quite contrived at time, and the climax just plain doesn’t work for me. In short, the movie never really sucks me into its story; it remains distant and remote. I found this one quite disappointing.

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The Private Eyes (1980)

THE PRIVATE EYES (1980)
Article 5036 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 1-1-2016
Directed by Lang Elliott
Featuring Tim Conway, Don Knotts, Trisha Noble
Country: USA
What it is: Old dark house comedy

Two American detectives in England investigate the murder of a couple who lived in an old, spooky mansion.

For a handful of movies during the seventies and eighties, Don Knotts and Tim Conway became something of a comedy team; their most famous pairing was probably THE APPLE DUMPLING GANG. I’m fond of both these comedians, but, to be honest, I hadn’t seen a movie up to this point that made good use of Conway, and Knotts’ best movie work seemed to be long behind him when this was made. So I’ll be honest; I went into this one expecting the worst; a family-friendly “old dark house” pastiche starring a pair of fading comedians seemed to me to be an act of desperation. Well, I’m glad to admit that I was wrong; this was actually a decent comedy, and it got more laughs from me than I ever thought it would. Much of the credit has to go to Conway and Knotts; they may be in over-familiar comic territory, but they never get desperate, overact or mug, and remain firmly confident in their abilities to mine what comic ore they can from the premise. Granted, they get a lot of help from a series of running jokes, including ones involving Wookalars, candles, pigeons, and mangled rhymed messages. It would probably have been rated a “G” if it hadn’t been for a handful of slightly risque jokes, but it’s pretty clean compared to what passes for movie comedy nowadays. The “old dark house” cliches are here in spades, with a series of murders, disappearing bodies, secret passages, and a torture chamber. All in all, I found this a very likable comedy. And, for a bonus, it does fully enter the realm of the fantastic in its final moments.

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Cyclotrode ‘X’ (1966)

CYCLOTRODE ‘X’ (1966)
Article 5035 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-31-2015
Directed by Fred C. Brannon and William Witney
Featuring Charles Quigley, Linda Stirling, Clayton Moore
Country: USA
What it is: Feature version of serial THE CRIMSON GHOST

An evil villain known as the Crimson Ghost tries to get his hands on a super-weapon known as the cyclotrode.

Here’s another one I’ve finally rescued from my “ones that got away” list; though I’d seen many of the feature versions of serials over the years, this one remained very elusive. I also found them rather frustrating to write about; I found myself repeatedly going on and on about how what was designed to be seen and enjoyed in twenty-minute chunks became dull when edited together into a full-length movie. I haven’t really changed my mind on this belief (and this one does little to belie it), but I find it useful to remind myself that they weren’t designed to be “good movies”; they were designed to take a form of product (the action serial) that wasn’t really salable as such and to convert them into a form that could be sold to TV. In short, they were retooling product. I think the feature versions of serials pretty much disappeared when home video came on the market; the original serials could be sold as such and the feature versions became quaint redundancies. This one popped up on YouTube, and I must admit to being a bit surprised, but I’m glad to have had a chance to see it. Now let’s hope the same thing can happen to a few of those other feature versions that I was never able to find. They may be unnecessary, but for a completist like me, I’ll be happy to see them around.

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Lulu (1962)

LULU (1962)
Article 5034 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-30-2015
Directed by Rolf Thiele
Featuring Nadja Tiller, O.E. Hasse, Hildegard Knef
Country: Austria
What it is: Drama

A sexy but irresponsible woman uses her allure on a number of lovers who are destroyed by her attentions.

For those who haven’t figured it out from the title and the plot description, this is a remake of G.W. Pabst’s silent classic, PANDORA’S BOX. It’s a fairly good movie; there’s some creative cinematography, especially in the early scenes of the movie, and Nadja Tiller gives a good performance as the femme fatale of the title. However, it does pale in comparison to the original film, at least partially because it doesn’t achieve the brilliant heights of both Pabst’s direction and Louise Brooks’ performance from the earlier film. Still, there are some striking scenes of decadence at work here, and Hildegard Knef is memorable as a countess who is herself in love with Lulu, but whose attentions are not returned. Again, the fantastic content is rather minimal; like the original movie, this one only gets through the genre door via the fact that the plot involves Jack the Ripper in the final moments, adding a touch of horror to the proceedings.

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Journey Back to Oz (1972)

JOURNEY BACK TO OZ (1972)
Article 5033 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-29-2015
Directed by Hal Sutherland
Featuring the voices of Liza Minnelli, Milton Berle, Margaret Hamilton
Country: USA
What it is: Animated sequel to a classic

Another cyclone whisks Dorothy back to Oz, where she discovers a plot by the wicked witch Mombi to dethrone the Scarecrow at the Emerald City.

No, I didn’t expect this animated sequel to THE WIZARD OF OZ to match the quality of the original. It does, however, surpass the other musical animated sequel to the original that I’ve encountered, RETURN TO OZ from 1964, which serves as a better yardstick for comparison. For one thing, it chooses to base its story on another of L. Frank Baum’s Oz books (“The Marvelous Land of Oz”) rather than jury-rigging a plot that does little more than rehash the original. It also has better songs than that one does; in fact, a few of these songs recall the spirit and jauntiness of those of the original movie, which means they got much closer than I thought they would. The movie does have a few direct associations with the original movie. Dorothy is voiced by Judy Garland’s daughter, Liza Minnelli, and former wicked witch Margaret Hamilton provides a voice as well, cast against type as Aunt Em here. The movie is not great, but it’s not too bad overall, and it even achieves a memorable sense of weirdness with a scene involve ambulatory trees in a haunted forest chopping at each other with a golden axe, which for some reason transforms them into giggling tree matrons. There’s quite a bit of star power in the voices here; along with those listed above, we have Mickey Rooney, Danny Thomas, Herschel Bernardi, Paul Lynde, Ethel Merman, and (to round out things a bit) Mel Blanc and Larry Storch.

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2069 A.D. (1969)

2069 A.D. (1969)
aka 2069 A.D. – A Sensation Odyssey
Article 5032 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-28-2015
Directed by Sam Kopetzky
Featuring Harvey Shain, Barbara Lynn, Sharon Matt
Country: USA
What it is: Compendium of human friction experiments

In the year 2319, a man guilty of violence is punished by being sent back into time to learn about love and violence in past ages in the hope it will cure him. He is given a time ring that will allow him to travel through the ages; it also has the power to remove extraneous clothing with the snap of a finger. He goes back in time and participates in human friction experiments.

Here’s another one that ended up on my “ones that got away” list but which I was finally able to see, though since the movie originally ran seventy-five minutes and the copy I saw ran only one hour, I’d say there’s some footage missing. The opening where the man is sentenced actually takes itself seriously enough that I found myself wondering if the movie was actually going to have something to say other than to be a string of human friction experiments (please note that this is a euphemism). Alas, when the ring inexplicably changes hands after the first experiment, it becomes clear that nothing beyond the obvious is going to be explored. After a while I found myself very annoyed at the scenes where people act confused when they’ve traveled through time instead of just going ahead and getting engaged in the next experiment.

Yes, I’ve groused before at having to watch sexploitation as part of my series (including 2069 – A SEX ODYSSEY, with which this movie shouldn’t be confused), and it’s not really because I’m prudish or above the pleasures of this type of movie. It’s more due to the fact that I rarely know how to evaluate them or what to write about them. About the only way I could think of rating them is by using the number of times it encourages the viewer to play the home version of the game, but who wants a tally of that? And, on a side note, the year of 2069 is never visited.

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Vous pigez? (1955)

VOUS PIGEZ? (1955)
aka The Diamond Machine
Article 5031 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-27-2015
Directed by Pierre Chevalier
Featuring Eddie Constantine, Maria Frau, Francoise Perrot
Country: France / Italy
What it is: Lemmy Caution movie

Lemmy Caution is on the trail of a kidnapped scientist who has developed a machine that can manufacture diamonds.

The only copy I’ve been able to find of this movie was in French without English subtitles, so any elaborate plot description or detailed critical evaluation would be beyond me. I can, however, say a few things. This was one of Eddie Contstantine’s many “Lemmy Caution” movies, and it appears to be a somewhat light-hearted spy movie. The fantastic content consists of a machine that manufactures diamonds, but the machine doesn’t appear until about the last ten minutes of the movie. Or, perhaps I should say, “a” machine appears, as it doesn’t really do what the movie says it should do, so it may be a decoy of sorts. Most of the movie seems to be concerned with spies good and bad trying to get their hands on the plans for the machine, so I can say this much; if the machine is real, it serves as little more than a Gizmo Maguffin in a spy story. I like Eddie Constantine, and the movie looks rather fun, but it also doesn’t look like anything special. The most interesting moment visually is when a party scene with dancing on a boat is juxtaposed with a fight scene taking place below the decks.

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Phobia (1980)

PHOBIA (1980)
Article 5030 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-26-2015
Directed by John Huston
Featuring Paul Michael Glaser, Susan Hogan, John Calicos
Country: Canada / USA
What it is: Horror mystery

A psychiatrist experiments with “implosion therapy”, a technique where phobics are made to deal with their fears by being immersed in situations that trigger the fear. Because the technique is experimental, his patients are volunteer convicts. However, the volunteers are being murdered in ways inspired by their phobias…

This movie has a very low rating of 3.6 on IMDB at the time of this writing, and I myself am not sure I would rate it that low; whatever the flaws of the movie, it did pique my curiosity in certain ways that kept me watching. This is not to say that the movie doesn’t have problems; in fact, some of them are pretty deep. For one thing, I’m not sure what director John Huston is really trying for here. If it’s horror, then the movie is pretty weak tea; it’s almost bloodless and not very scary, and the R rating is probably more for a single nude sequence than for any horror content. It does seem rather unpleasant (especially when the psychiatrist inundates a woman who is afraid of men with images of women being assaulted), but unpleasant isn’t the same thing as scary. If it’s trying to be a mystery, then it fumbles things early on. When the police investigate the first murder, their theories so completely ignore the “elephant in the room” that the scene practically screams out the identity of the killer at that point. If anything keeps you watching the movie, it’s the hope of discovering the motive; at least, that’s what interested me the most about this one. That being said, I found most of the major characters unlikable; the doctor’s therapy seems cruel, the police are mean-spirited thugs (their interrogation of one of the prisoners is an ugly scene), and it’s hard to warm up to the mostly undeveloped characters who make up the doctor’s various love interests. That leaves the prisoners/volunteers as the most sympathetic characters, and since they’re not developed more deeply than their respective phobias, you’re not expecting any of them to make it through the end of the movie. Except for the opening montage, most of the movie’s direction feels pretty ordinary and bland; it’s really hard to believe this came from the same director who gave us THE MALTESE FALCON, THE TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE, and THE AFRICAN QUEEN. Which perhaps may be why the rating IS so low on IMDB.

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