DIE! DIE! MY DARLING! (1965)
aka Fanatic
Article 2713 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 10-7-2008
Posting Date: 1-16-2009
Directed by Silvio Narizzano
Featuring Tallulah Bankhead, Stefanie Powers, Peter Vaughan
Country: UK

An American woman agrees to visit the mother of her deceased fiance, unaware that his mother is a religious fanatic. The mother, appalled at the worldliness of her son’s intended, holds her prisoner with the intent of forcing her to reform.

This is another of Hammer’s entries in the “horror hag” cycle that became popular in the sixties, in which aging Hollywood actresses were given top billing in horror movies. I don’t find this one as fun or as interesting as the two Bette Davis ones they did (THE NANNY and THE ANNIVERSARY), though it’s not a bad movie. It goes into the category of what I call “frustration horror”, in which most of the running time seems to be concerned with abortive attempts of a heroine to escape danger, and after a while you get frustrated because you know the movie has been set up so that there’s no way she is going to escape until the end of the movie (that is, if she escapes at all). This was Tallulah Bankhead’s last on-screen movie role (she would do voice work on THE DAYDREAMER). Unfortunately, I found her performance to be too mannered and theatrical for her to be really effective here; it’s okay when she’s terrorizing the heroine, but when the movie starts digging into her psyche and tries to garner some sympathy for her, her performance gets in the way. I think it works best at the beginning before the heroine is made a prisoner; it has a nice sense of humor up to that point. It’s also another opportunity to catch Donald Sutherland in an early character role, that of a dimwitted handyman.

THE DEVIL’S MISTRESS (1966)
Article 2712 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 10-6-2008
Posting Date: 1-15-2009
Directed by Orville Wanzer
Featuring Joan Stapleton, Robert Gregory, Wes Moreland
Country: USA

Four outlaws come upon a cabin in Apache territory and are fed by a mysterious old man and a mute woman. Two of the outlaws kill the man and rape the woman, and then take her along with them. Then, one by one, the outlaws begin to die in mysterious ways…

This low-budget horror western reminds me in some ways of MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE, but I wouldn’t take that comparison to heart; I think this movie is much better. It’s not a lost classic, mind you, but it manages to make positive use of its extreme low budget; there’s something about the turgid pacing, the dearth of action, the static presentation, and the lack of music, when placed against some of the splendid western settings and in the context of a horror story that has a fair amount of subtlety and ambiguity that gives the movie a haunting feel. I will give the movie credit for not outstaying its welcome; it runs just a little over sixty minutes, and it disposes of the outlaws in just the right order; it gets rid of the sadistic outlaw with the annoying laugh just at the point when I was getting sick of him, and the outlaws die in the reverse order in which they were responsible for the murder/rape at the beginning of the movie. In fact, you’ll be hoping that the naive innocent may be spared in the final reel, but you’ll also be nagged by the realization that, even if he didn’t take part in the brutality, he nonetheless did nothing to prevent it. My biggest problem with the movie is that it decides to make the horror quite blatant at the end of the movie; the movie would have worked much better overall if it had found an ending that allowed it to retain its eerie ambiguity. This is the sole film credit for director/writer Orville Wanzer, and I find myself wishing he had made another one; whatever its flaws, it managed to capture something unique.

DESTROY ALL MONSTERS (1968)
aka Kaiju soshingeki
Article 2711 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 10-5-2008
Posting Date: 1-14-2009
Directed by Ishiro Honda
Featuring Akira Kubo, Jun Tazaki, Yukiko Kobayashi
Country: Japan

A mysterious force invades an island known as Monsterland, where all of the Earth’s monsters are being held for safekeeping. Soon, it becomes clear that the monsters have been taken over by aliens, and are invading the cities of the Earth.

For years, this was my Holy Grail of Japanese Giant Monster movies; I’d long known of its existence, but for some reason it never popped up on TV in my area. It was only after I had already seen most of the other Godzilla movies that I managed to find a copy of this one on home video… and was underwhelmed. For me, the big disappointment was that the movie adopted the overly familiar plot line of having space aliens take over the monsters and force them to do their bidding; I’d already seen that plotline in several of the other movies of the series, and, even though I know this one predated most of them, it was still a letdown. Watching it now, it still feels like a letdown; until the final battle, the monsters are used sparingly and in unsatisfying snippets, and most of the movie is focused on the muddled and uninteresting hunt for the hiding place of the aliens. Still, I can’t fault the movie entirely; with the final battle, the movie finally delivers on its promise, and we get a true battle royale of Earth’s monsters against the extraterrestrial monster Ghidorah. Even Minya gets a smoke ring attack before it all winds down. I do think it’s a bit of a shame that we only get the caterpillar version of Mothra, but that’s personal preference on my part. And even though I think the movie could have been a lot better, I’m still glad it’s around, and I certainly prefer it to GODZILLA: FINAL WARS.

THE DOCTOR’S SECRET (1910)
aka Hydrotherapie fantastique
Article 2695 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 9-13-2008
Posting Date: 12-29-2008
Directed by Georges Melies
Featuring Georges Melies
Country: France

A doctor uses radical new methods to help a patient deal with his obesity problem.

Here’s a weight-loss plan that takes less than one day and involves no dieting or exercise. First, allow the doctor pull the obesity out of you with a huge syringe. Then let him attach you to a machine that will suck even more obesity out of you. Then he’ll put you in a tub with a paddle machine that will… do something, anyway. Then he’ll set you under the pummel machine which will pummel you (remember, this is all for your own good). Finally, he’ll attach you to a sauna which will overheat and blow your body to pieces, which the doctor will neatly put back together. You will then be your old, slim self.

You know, all of a sudden, dieting and exercise don’t sound so bad.

IL DEMONIO (1963)
aka The Demon
Article 2671 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 8-20-2008
Posting Date: 12-5-2008
Directed by Brunello Rondi
Featuing Daliah Lavi, Frank Wolff, Anna Maria Aveta
Country: France/Italy

A woman is believed to be a witch by local villagers. Is she a witch? Is she possessed by the devil? Or is it possible that she might simply be mad?

Given the fact that this movie has a 5.2 rating on IMDB, I’m under the impression that the movie has only a lukewarm reputation. And given the fact that I watched an unsubtitled version of the movie (it’s been dubbed into another language, but not into English), there’s no doubt that any evaluation I give may well be quite flawed. I found myself rather fascinated by this one, though anyone expecting a straightforward horror movie may walk away disappointed. To me, the movie seemed ambiguous; though the woman may indeed be a witch, I felt that she was more sinned against than sinning, seeing how she’s beaten, raped, humiliated, and has other indignities heaped upon her on a regular basis. Daliah Lavi gives a great, if very strange, performance here, and shows an almost contortionistic flexibility on occasion, especially during an exorcism sequence. There are memorable scenes here, such as the aforesaid exorcism sequence, and a scene where the woman braves a barrier of barbed wire so that she can embrace a tree. I wasn’t surprised by the ending; given all that went before, it seemed inevitable. All in all, I found it a very sad movie, and I hope that I can find a subtitled version at some time so I can appreciate it better.

THE DEATH SCOUTS (1977)
Movie-length episode of “The Man from Atlantis”
Article 2661 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 7-28-2008
Posting Date: 11-25-2008
Directed by Marc Daniels
Featuring Patrick Duffy, Kenneth Tigar, Tiffany Bolling
Country: USA

Mark Harris, the Man from Atlantis, discovers a spaceship at the bottom of the ocean whose inhabitants resemble him. Will he discover the truth of his origins, or will the aliens prove hostile?

The first few episodes of the TV series “The Man From Atlantis” were feature-length TV movies, hence the inclusion of this episode here; it is not two episodes of the series strung together. I’m not familiar with the series as a whole, but from what I see here, I’d have to say the ideas and the sincerity outstrip the writing and the acting; there are moments here where the dialogue and the line deliveries are truly awful. It works best underwater; I don’t know if Patrick Duffy did his own swimming in the series, but it’s highly effective, since it feels more like the swimming of a creature native to the water. It’s also nice to have underwater scenes between people where everyone isn’t obscured by masks; you have no trouble telling what is happening in the underwater scenes. Overall, I haven’t really decided how I feel about the series, but the other three movie-length episodes will eventually be covered by me, and perhaps then I’ll have more of a feel for it.

DEATH IS A NUMBER (1951)
Article 2622 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 6-9-2008
Posting Date: 10-17-2008
Directed by Robert Henryson
Featuring Terence Alexander, Lesley Osmond, Denis Webb
Country: UK

An advocate of numerology tells us the story of a friend of his who was cursed by the presence of the number 9 in his life, a consequence thsy will bring about his death.

You know, sometimes I feel like objecting to a movie purely in terms of its failing to make effective use of the medium of cinema. Though all of the blather about numerology is as scary as Count Floyd, there’s a certain amount of creativity to some of the low-budget special effects, and some of the events in the middle section of the movie (in which ghosts and a strange window play a part) have a certain eerie charm. Unfortunately, most of the movie is told via tiresome narration, so much so that it often feels like you’re not watching a movie, but having somebody tell you the story (though with an ulterior motive of explaining numerology to you). This one might have been a much better movie had it tried to tell its story visually, dump the narration, stick to the ghost section of the story in the middle, and remove the numerology undercurrent. As it is, it feels more like the first draft of a movie that still needed a lot of work. Still, at only fifty minutes, it doesn’t really wear out its welcome.

I DIAVOLI DI SPARTIVENTO (1963)
aka The Devils of Spartivento, Weapons of Vengeance
Article 2599 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 5-17-2008
Posting Date: 9-24-2008
Directed by Leopoldo Savano
Featuring John Drew Barrymore, Scilla Gabel, Giacomo Rossi-Stuart
Country: Italy/France

Rebels battle evil tyrants, or true Prince against pretender to the throne; I’m not sure which.

The vague plot description above is just my way of saying that I’m watching this one in unsubtitled Italian, and the precise plot details are lost to me. Nonetheless, it does involve a group of rebels with a charismatic leader doing battle with the forces of an evil lord. It’s basically a period swashbuckler piece, and the fantastic content is that the rebels enter an ostensibly haunted forest and encounter a follower of Da Vinci, who is trying to bring his scientific ideas to life, so in the course of the movie we have a series of anachronistic inventions (including a device that can launch multiple arrows, a fire-spitting tank of sorts, a poison gas, and several flying machines). When these items show up, the movie is a lot more fun to fans of fantastic cinema and the fact that the plot details are unknown doesn’t matter so much. It’s quite similar to THE CRIMSON PIRATE, even to the point of having a Nick Cravat-like sidekick (doesn’t talk, uses sign language) appear. It’s entertaining enough in a sword-and-sandal style, though it doesn’t really belong to that genre.

LE DIRIGEABLE FANTASTIQUE (1906)
aka Inventor Crazybrains and His Wonderful Airship
Article 2576 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-24-2008
Posting Date: 9-1-2008
Directed by Georges Melies
Cast unknown
Country: France

Inventor Crazybrains invents a wonderful airship. However, he has a bad dream that makes him rethink the value of his invention…

Poor Inventor Crazybrains! He certainly doesn’t deserve to be held down by flying fairy women while tumbling imps vandalize his laboratory. Still, he does get to see his airship in action, though he’s probably as confused as I am as to why flying fairy women keep appearing in it and flying off. Sure, he’s probably distraught about the fireball that destroys his creation, but I think the real reason he abandons his calling is those damned tumbling imps; it seems any hero of Georges Melies’s has to contend with them after a while. Well, at least the cranky guy in Saturn didn’t get on his case about this one. Another strange and amusing short from Melies.

DR. SEX (1964)
Article 2561 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-9-2008
Posting Date: 8-17-2008
Directed by Ted V. Mikels
Featuring Victor Izay, Julia Calda, Max Joseph
Country: USA

Three psychiatrists discuss their most interesting patients, all of whose stories involve naked woman. One turns into a poodle; one is addicted to mannequins, one is an exhibitionist, and one lives in a house haunted by naked women.

This is a nudie.

The primary purpose of a nudie is to show as many naked people as you can on the screen, preferably well-built women.

The primary problem in making a nudie is making sure you have as many naked women as possible while still avoiding the cinematic no-no of the time of showing full frontal nudity.

In nudies, plot, humor, social relevance, creative direction and passable acting are all of no consequence; as long as you get the naked bodies on the screen, you’ve served your purpose. Which is not to say you can’t try adding those things; it’s just that those who would be interested in seeing the movie could care less.

So, did this movie achieve its high artistic goals? Well, there’s lots of naked women in it, so I’ll leave that up to you.

By the way, co-writer Wayne Rogers would gain fame as Trapper John on the TV series “M*A*S*H”, and director and co-writer Ted V. Mikels would go on to give us THE CORPSE GRINDERS, ASTRO-ZOMBIES and BLOOD ORGY OF THE SHE-DEVILS.

Another one down. Time to move on.