CHAMBER OF HORRORS (1966)
Article #650 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 12-25-2002
Posting Date: 5-20-2003

A strangler escapes the police by cutting off his own hand, and then seeks revenge with a variety of implements that replace his missing hand.

This movie is most famous for using two gimmicks; the Fear Flasher and the Horror Horn. These devices manifest themselves at certain times during the movie to warn the audience to close their eyes so they won’t witness the horrifying scenes that subsequently appear. Well, unless there are more complete prints than the one I’ve seen, there’s precious little during those scenes from which sensitive viewers need shield their eyes; in fact, these gimmicks are particularly useless. What the movie really needs are couple of other gimmicks; the Beer Flasher will start flashing whenever there is ample time for you to run to the refrigerator to get something to drink, and the Snorer Horn will warn you whenever there is a scene that will leave you in grave danger of falling asleep. Unfortunately, these two warning signals would be going off perpetually. Apparently, this was originally made for TV, but was deemed too gruesome to broadcast. I suspect it was a pilot for a tentative series (the final moment of the movie ends with the type of cliffhanger you’d expect from “Lost in Space”) that was padded out to feature length, which is why the movie drags and contains scenes that seem redundant. It gives hints of having been more interesting in concept (proprieters of a wax museum solve real-life mysteries) than it turns out to be in practice; the only time it shows much energy is during a fight scene near the end. This one is primarily for fans of ballyhoo.

CALL OF THE SAVAGE (1935)
(Serial)
Article #640 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 12-15-2002
Posting Date: 5-10-2003

A jungle boy attempts to help a princess of the lost kingdom of Mu return to her world. Unfortunately, he is the target of fortune hunters because the bracelet he wears has half the formula of a cure for infantile paralysis.

The jungle boy is named Jan, which not only rhymes with Tarzan but reads like Jane with an “e” removed. His pet chimp is called Chicma (kind of like Cheetah). Therefore, I feel safe enough in assuming that we’re dealing with a Tarzan clone of sorts, and considering that he swings through the jungle on vines, that seems apt. He doesn’t have a jungle yell, but he does grin a lot, if that counts, and he speaks in stilted English. All in all, this serial* is kind of a cross between THE NEW ADVENTURES OF TARZAN and THE LOST CITY; unfortunately, it’s not up to the level of either of these. Part of the problem is that once it establishes the characters and the basic plot direction early on in the second episode, it spends the next eight episodes wandering aimlessly from cliffhanger to cliffhanger before any serious attempt is made to have our characters head to the lost kingdom of Mu; about the only plot point in this part of the serial is the recovery of one amnesiac character’s memory. The power struggle in Mu is the most interesting part of the story; however, since they don’t reach it until chapter 11, this whole sequence is rushed; they should have reached the kingdom earlier in the serial and spent more time here than the endless series of jungle perils. Plenty of animal stock footage is used to pad out the episodes; at least there is a fairly wide array of animal life on parade to hold the attention. On the plus side, the cliffhangers don’t cheat as much as some other serials; in fact, I was surprised at how they didn’t cheat in certain scenarios where it seemed certain that they would. Nonetheless, a goodly portion of this serial is a slog. Jan is played by a young Noah Beery, Jr.

* Incidentally, when I first wrote this review, I mistakenly spelled this word “Cereal”, which just goes to show you should never write a review when you’re hungry.

CIRCUS OF HORRORS (1960)
Article #625 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/30/2002
Posting date: 4/25/2003

A plastic surgeon on the run from the law uses a circus as a front to continue his research.

Having endured at least one similarly themed movie in the past (BERSERK), I didn’t really expect a lot from this one. I was pleasantly surprised; what a world of difference a good script can make in this type of movie. The characters have a lot more dimension than I usually expect from a movie like this, and there are unexpected touches that are, if not totally necessary, at least indicative of a certain complexity in the conception of the story (my favorite: a poignant moment involving a clown after one of the murders). The movie feels a little like a cross between Hammer and Italian horror; it’s British origin and its blood recall the former, and the sadism of the story recalls the latter. I enjoyed this much more than I expected, though a few of the special effects aren’t quite up to par.

THE CHESS PLAYER (1927)
Article #534 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 9-1-2002
Posting date: 1-24-2003

When an eighteenth-century rebellion of Poles against their Russian captors fails, the leader of the rebellion finds himself under the protection of an inventor who tries to smuggle him out of the country concealed in a chess-playing automaton.

This combination of historical epic and period science fiction is epic in length; in runs just over two hours. Fortunately, it is a lot of fun, with plenty of spectacle, an interesting assortment of characters in interesting relationships, and some wonderful plot twists. There are some far-fetched coincidences in the story (particularly, the true parentage of the hero’s foster sister), but this is a minor quibble indeed and doesn’t really interfere with the fun. For science fiction fans, the best moment comes near the end, where the inventor’s many automatons play a crucial role in the proceedings.

THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (1961)
Article #519 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-16-2002
Posting date: 1-9-2003

A woman who was raped by a mad beggar gives birth to a boy who turns out to be a werewolf.

The first time I saw this Hammer take on lycanthropy I felt the movie spent far too much time on backstory; this time around, I changed my mind. The backstory is, in fact, the most interesting part of the movie; it’s quite fascinating to follow all the events that actually lead up to the more standard werewolfery in the second half of the movie. And since one of the problems I regularly have with Hammer films is that they usually have more running time than story, the time spent on backstory on this one actually fills out the time very well. The fact that the curse is passed on in a very novel way also makes the movie quite interesting, and I do think this is one of Hammer’s best horror movies, filled with memorable character parts (including Richard Wordsworth, the tormented astronaut of THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT as the beggar) and good performances. I’m not particularly fond of Oliver Reed here, as I do feel he’s a little over the top on occasion, but there’s no doubt he brings the required intensity to the role.

THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957)
Article #518 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-15-2002
Posting date: 1-8-2003

Frankenstein constructs a creature and brings it to life, but has trouble keeping it under control.

This was the movie that kicked off Hammer’s new style of horror, with more blood and sex and in color. It established the horror careers of all involved, including Terence Fisher, Peter Cushing, and Christopher Lee. Despite it’s reputation as a classic, I never quite feel satisfied with it; I always feel like I’ve been served what looks like a sumptuous feast but ends up leaving me hungry for something, and I’m never quite sure what is missing. I think it might be that I never emerge from having watched the movie with a sense that it had anything really interesting to say other than that they’ve added color, blood and sex to the mix. Maybe I’m expecting too much, but I would like to be able to quote at least one memorable bit of dialogue from the movie; as it is, the thing that I remember most, other than the great moment when Christopher Lee removes his bandages, is how annoyed I am with the Robert Urquhart character; he seems to only exist to make perpetual pronouncements on how evil Frankenstein’s work is, and a number of times he appears in a scene for no other reason than so he can make those pronouncements; he is a truly tiresome and repetitive character, and practically ruins the movie for me. It’s not so much a problem with his performance; he does the best that he can with it, as do Cushing and Lee in their roles, but I really wish more work had been put into the dialogue.

THE CREEPING TERROR (1964)
Article #517 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-14-2002
Posting date: 1-7-2003

Strange creatures from outer space terrorize Lake Tahoe.

There are actually a couple of decent and novel ideas in this story, though they don’t appear until near the end; specifically, I like the nature of the creatures and what their mission is on this planet. I also kind of like the way it ends without a total victory on either side. Unfortunately, this is one of the most unwatchably incompetent movies around, with its poor acting (what you can make of it, anyway), awful direction, and its notorious soundtrack problems. For those of you not familiar with the latter, the vocal soundtrack for this movie was lost, and to compensate for this, endless narration was employed to compensate for this problem, and it is a very poor substitute. Not that the movie would improve immeasurably with its original soundtrack; it would still be a pretty bad movie, even though certain sequences would gain quite a bit, particular a sequence near the end which actually has the potential to be exciting. Mostly, it’s a series of monster attacks, and though the monster is interesting in concept, it is badly constructed and so slow-moving (“creeping” is the accurate word in the title) that these scenes are endless and unbelievable, as it requires people to sit there screaming in place for several moments in order for the monster to have any chance to catch them. It’s not my choice for the worst movie I’ve ever seen, but it’s definitely in the running.

THE CREATION OF THE HUMANOIDS (1962)
Article #516 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-13-2002
Posting date: 1-6-2003

This is a portrayal of a post-apocalyptic society in which a decimated and no-longer-fruitful human population must contend with the rise of humanoid robots, derogatorily referred to as “clickers.”

This was Andy Warhol’s favorite movie, and though I can’t pretend to know what was going through his mind, I think I see why it might have been. There aren’t very many familiar names in the credits, but I recognize make-up artist Jack Pierce, Don Megowan (who played the Gill Man in his last incarnation in THE CREATURE WALKS AMONG US) and Dudley Manlove, who played Eros in PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. There are a wealth of different ways to look at this movie; it is stiff, badly shot and acted, almost devoid of action, talky and endless, and many people consider it awful. However, the talk is fascinating and is cram-packed with ideas, something you’re much more likely to find on the literary end of science fiction rather than the cinematic end. I’ve heard that the plot may have been lifted from Karel Capek’s play “R.U.R.”, the work where the word “robot” was used for the first time, and I hope to be able to read the play sometime to find out if the movie lifts its ideas from this work as well. I find the movie fascinating when I’m in the right frame of mind, but it can also definitely be a hard, frustrating slog. it also has a final line that is either absolutely fascinating or pointlessly gimmicky, depending on your outlook; I love it, as it seems to imply that the whole movie was an educational historical reenactment being shown to students in a future school, many of which were badly acted and poorly shot to begin with, so it might give an explanation as to why the movie is the way it is.

P.S. I have had a chance to scan a script of “R.U.R.” since I wrote this review, and as far as I can tell, the story in that play is totally different from this movie.

THE COSMIC MONSTERS (1957)
(a.k.a. THE STRANGE WORLD OF PLANET X)
Article #514 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-11-2002
Posting date: 1-4-2003

A scientist experimenting with metals and magnetic fields ends up creating environmental problems with his work.

A casual reader might look at the titles and think the movie is about monsters from outer space, and though outer space does play a role in the proceedings, he’d be wrong. This movie was, like it’s theatrical companion piece THE CRAWLING EYE, modeled after the Quatermass movies; though none of the movies that took this approach ever actually equalled their models, it did make the movies much more interesting than they could have been. In this case, the science is interesting enough to keep the story moving along until the monsters show up (it is at least partly a big bug movie), and even after that, it doesn’t throw out everything it set up in the first half for the sole purpose of concentrating on thrills. And even though the direction is very dull at times, the story and the fairly decent performances from all concerned do keep the viewer’s attention. Not a great movie, but a mildly diverting one for all that.

THE COMEDY OF TERRORS (1964)
Article #513 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 8-10-2002
Posting date: 1-3-2003

An undertaker supplements his income by proactively creating his own clients.

This horror comedy borrows more than just its title from Shakespeare; in fact, the whole script is written in blank verse, a somewhat audacious conceit in the twentieth century, much less in the script for a horror comedy. Even if you aren’t very familiar with blank verse, you might be able to notice a lilt to the dialogue that is like nothing else you’ve heard before in this type of movie. Vincent Price and Basil Rathbone seem to be particularly at home with this, plus Rathbone gets to quote endlessly from “MacBeth” throughout the movie. Aside from that, this fun horror comedy reunites Price, Peter Lorre, and Boris Karloff from THE RAVEN; Price and Lorre have the major roles, while Karloff has been consigned to a smaller role, that of Joyce Jameson’s decrepit father; however, as small roles go, this one is choice, and Karloff steals practically every scene he’s in, particularly during his eulogy, which may be Karloff’s finest moment of comic acting. Richard Matheson deserves kudos for the script, and Jacque Tourneur’s fine direction is also an asset. The movie also features a cameo by former comedy star Joe E. Brown, who also has had a little experience with Shakespeare; he appeared in the 1935 movie version of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”.