BOB KICK, THE MISCHIEVOUS KID (1903)
aka Bob Kick, l’enfant terrible
Article 4049 by Dave Sindelar
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies
Country: France
What it is: Trick short

Bob Kick drinks a bottle of booze and has hallucinations. He then jumps through a hoop and vanishes.

When you’re watching a silent three minute short, you don’t really expect much in the way of a plot. Still, this one seems rather random and pointless, with the first part setting up a situation that then plays no role in the second part of the movie. As a trick short, it all seems rather routine; Melies had already done the same tricks before, and this one adds nothing new. This isn’t one of the better examples of Melies’s oeuvre.

BURY ME AN ANGEL (1972)
Article 4046 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 10-1-2012
Directed by Barbara Peeters
Featuring Dixie Peabody, Terry Mace, Clyde Ventura
Country: USA
What it is: Biker flick

A young woman vows vengeance when her brother is killed by an unknown gunman.

You can thank “The Motion Picture Guide” for having steered me towards this biker flick; for some reason beyond my understanding, they misclassified it as horror. I fully expected there to be no fantastic content to it, as none of my other sources list it. However, there is some; at one point in the proceedings, the characters encounter a witch who does appear to have some mystical powers; she can hold her hand in a fire and not get burned. The movie itself is mostly notable for having been directed by a woman and featuring a strong central female character, which was definitely a rarity for a biker flick. It also tries to have some meaningful psychological underpinnings. Unfortunately, the movie is a misfire; it’s badly written, poorly acted, and more than a little bit silly, especially during the scenes where it’s supposed to be serious. Nevertheless, the movie does appear to have a certain cult following, at least partially for its colorful ad line, “A howling hellcat humping a hot steel hog on a roaring rampage of revenge!”, which is certainly an awesome arrangement of artful alliteration. Still, in terms of its fantastic content, it’s marginal.

THE BLASPHEMER (1921)
Article 4041 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-26-2012
Directed by O.E. Goebel
Featuring George Howard, Augusta Anderson, Irving Cummings
Country: USA
What it is: Christian morality tale

A stock market tycoon, intoxicated by his financial success, rejects God and claims that he himself is the agent of his own fate. However, he soon finds out that he is not quite as much the master of his fate as he thought…

I went into this Christian movie (produced by the Catholic Art Association) under the assumption that the fantastic content would involve some overt Christian miracles, but, as it turns out, the hand of God here mostly seems to work in the realm of melodramatic and unlikely plot twists; it would have been possible to tell the same basic story with all of overt Christianity removed, and it would have fit just fine into the “fall and reformation of a scoundrel” genre. The movie might have moved along quicker as well; the copy on Amazon Instant Video runs an hour and 48 minutes, and at least part of the reason it gets boring on occasion is that it will bring the action to a screeching halt so that it can deliver some messages. Hardly anything happens during the first half of the movie, and the flat, dull direction does little to hold the interest. However, the worst problem I had with the copy I saw wasn’t the fault of the original filmmakers at all; the musical soundtrack is one of those that feels as if it was carelessly slapped on without care or appropriateness, so you end up (for example) with sprightly happy music during a scene where a woman is being kidnapped by an Oriental white slavery racket. Even a weak silent movie deserves better care than that.

Still, since the movie lacks the overt miracles I was expecting, the question becomes whether it really qualifies for this project in terms of its fantastic content. It depends somewhat on how you interpret one scene; the tycoon-turned-derelict sees the martyrdom of a saint reenacted in a painting that comes to life. Is he imagining it or actually seeing it? The movie isn’t quite clear in that regard, so I suspect that this movie is at best only marginally fantastic. It’s probably best classified as a drama.

THE BLACK IMP (1905)
aka Le diable noir
Article 4040 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-25-2012
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies
Country: France
What it is: Tumbling imps in haunted hotel rooms

A traveler tries to settle in for the night in a room at the inn, unaware that the place is already home to a mischievous black demon who doesn’t care to share.

This short combines a couple of Melies’s favorite subjects; namely, that rooms at inns are hotbeds of paranormal activity and that all the troubles in our lives can be attributed to evil tumbling imps. There’s some fun to be had with this one, especially when the traveler finds himself being chased around the room by multiplying chairs. This is probably one of Melies’s funniest shorts.

THE BIG SWALLOW (1901)
Article 4039 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-23-2012
Directed by James Williamson
Featuring Sam Dalton
Country: UK
What it is: Shocking!

A passerby takes drastic measures to keep from being filmed.

Is it the birth of the cannibal film? Is it a suggested strategy for people who want to know how to deal with paparazzi? Or is it just a pretty silly idea for a silent short? I will say this much for it; it does use one of the most interesting close-ups in film history. And even if the movie does deal with the subject of cannibalism, the big question on my mind is whether the main character will be able to digest the camera with ease. This one is pretty surreal when all is said is done.

BETTY BOOP’S CRAZY INVENTIONS (1933)
Cartoon
Article 4038 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-22-2012
Directed by Dave Fleischer
Featuring the voice of Mae Questel
Country: USA
What it is: Animated comedy

Betty Boop serves as a hostess in a tentful of new inventions. All goes well until a self-threading sewing machine goes on a rampage.

Except in her very early incarnations (where she was a dog), the presence of Betty Boop in a cartoon does not necessarily make it fantastically themed; she is, after all, a human being, albeit one with a rather odd shape. However, the cartoon also features anthropomorphic dog Bimbo, as well as several other non-human animated characters. Furthermore, the inventions move it into the realm of science fiction. This isn’t the series at its most inspired, but it works well enough to get by, with most of the humor involving the ways the various inventions work, such as the stain-removing machine that works by leaving a big hole in the fabric where the stain occurred.

BEAR FEAT (1949)
Cartoon
Article 4036 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-19-2012
Directed by Chuck Jones
Featuring the voices of Bea Benederet, Billy Bletcher, Stan Freberg
Country: USA
What it is: Three bears cartoon

When Papa Bear gets the idea to train the family to become a trick bear act for the circus, he finds he has contend with his overeager and destructive son, Baby Bear.

The addition of the Walt Lee guide to my sources for my movie hunt lists has opened up the floodgates to a form that heretofore I’ve only flirted with for this project – the cartoon. The reason for this is that most of my other sources restrict themselves to feature-length films, and the only other source that really aspires to completeness (the Don Willis guides) restricts itself to Horror and Science Fiction, thereby skipping the primary fantastic genre (Fantasy) to which cartoons belong. As a lover of animation, I’m not going to complain.

This is one of the Three Bears cartoons made by Chuck Jones in the late forties/early fifties, featuring the furiously angry Papa Bear, the game but whiny Mama Bear, and the oversized walking disaster area Baby Bear. It’s one of those series that really didn’t use Mel Blanc all that much. This is pretty typical of the series, with Papa Bear suffering all sorts of indignities and accidents caused by a combination of his own bad temper and Baby Bear’s penchant for leaving destruction in his wake. My favorite moment here is a gag involving a somersault act into an easy chair; it’s one of those gags that takes its own sweet time making its way to a great punch line.

THE BALLET-MASTER’S DREAM (1903)
aka Le reve du maitre de ballet
Article 4034 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-17-2012
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies, Zizi Papillon
Country: France
What it is: Trick short

A ballet master, frustrated in his attempts to work out a dance step, retires for the night. He is assailed by a dream of a ballerina performing in the netherworld.

Here’s another of Melies’s more minor entries. It’s pretty light on the special effects sequences, and seems more interested in the dance sequences themselves. Melies plays the ballet-master, and he shows that he himself is pretty light on his feet on occasion. I suppose that’s not really surprising; given the numerous occasions dancing girls appear in his shorts, he must have had an affection for the form.

THE BACHELOR’S PARADISE (1901)
aka Chez la sorciere
Article 4033 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 9-16-2012
Directed by Georges Melies
Cast unknown
Country: France
What is it: Trick short

A man pays a witch to provide him with a beautiful woman. After taking his choice from a magically-conjured assortment, he proceeds to romance her. However, witches are notorious pranksters, and…

When dealing with witches, always read the fine print and get a money back guarantee, or else you’ll make an ass of yourself… or the witch will. This is the type of short Melies could have made in his sleep by this time. It’s mildly amusing, but far from his best work.

BOOGEYMAN II (1983)
Article 4015 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 8-27-2012
Directed by Bruce Starr and Ulli Lommel
Featuring Suzanna Love, Ulli Lommel, Shannah Hall
Country: USA
What it is: Sequel

A woman who suffered possession by an evil mirror goes to stay with a friend in Hollywood who is married to a movie director. When she tells her story, the movie director is urged by various people to make a movie about it. But a shard of the mirror still exists…. and it doesn’t want a movie made about it.

To start with, I’m going to point out that a good fifty percent of this movie consists of footage from the original THE BOOGEYMAN. When this movie popped up on my list, I quickly found out that a DVD release of this movie was not to be trusted; apparently, it featured new footage of Ulli Lommel telling the police about the events in the first two movies, cuts twenty minutes of the new footage added for this sequel, and substitutes even more footage from the original movie. I therefore held off on trying to net the DVD version of this one, and opted for one of the original VHS recordings of the movie. Yet, I can’t help but feel a bit nagged by the sense that fighting for the integrity of seeing the original version of this sequel seemed something of a silly cause for me, especially as I have little love for the movie to which it is a sequel. Still, though I think this sequel comes across as cynically motivated, the DVD re-edit seems even more cynical.

Now, to the movie. If it has any advantage over the original movie, it’s that it’s a bit more coherent. But that’s only because the mirror seems to have an agenda in this one, where in the original, it just killed anyone around. On the other hand, the murders are sillier and even more poorly staged than in the original, the script is agonizingly bad, and the acting is phoned in; I’m not surprised that the writer was given no credit. I gave Ulli Lommel a co-directing credit above because IMDB did (with the comment that he was uncredited), though I don’t know if it was solely for the fact that half of the movie is from the original, which he did direct. The credited director is Bruce Starr, and it’s is sole directorial credit, and I assume that he’s responsible for the dreariness of the new scenes.

I’d dismiss the movie utterly if it weren’t for one thing; I’m a little intrigued that Lommel is playing a film director in this one who is ambivalent about selling out to do a horror film. If the trivia section in IMDB is true, Lommel could have had a bigger budget for this movie, but he didn’t want to work for a bigger studio and wanted to make it as an independent film, hence the re-used footage and the cost cutting. For some reason, this leaves me wondering just how much Lommel’s character was a reflection of what he was really thinking and feeling at the time. It’s all speculation, of course, but for me, that was easily the most interesting element in this otherwise worthless sequel.