The Fall of the House of Usher (1966)
Article 5819 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 7-26-2020
Directed by Kim Mills
Featuring David Buck, Susannah York, Denholm Elliott
Country: UK
What it is: British TV Poe adaptation

When a friend’s sister mysteriously appears and then disappears from his home, a student makes a visit to his friend to find out what is going on. But will he find madness and death?

This is an episode of a British TV series known as “Mystery and Imagination”, and since I’ve covered several individual episodes of this series before, I see no reason to skip this one. I’ve already seen several versions of this Poe story; it seems particularly attractive to directors on the arty side of the street, with the 1928 Epstein version the most striking. The story usually needs to be expanded somewhat to fill a feature-length running time, and to some extent, I do have to credit the writer of this adaptation in the way he manages to make it a much more conventional horror story; in fact, the first third of this adaptation all takes place before the events in the original tale, and sets up a romantic triangle situation that drives the rest of the story. However, there is a cost, and it’s not one I particularly like to see; in making it more conventional, it jettisons the hypersensitivity of Roderick Usher, the story element that usually adds the touch of hushed dread that imbues the story. Not that the story element is missing; it’s in the dialogue. It’s just that Denholm Elliott’s performance negates the quality; it’s hard to take his claims of hypersensitivity seriously when he’s declaiming to the rafters. Still, one thing that really does impress here is the set design; the interiors of Usher’s house are memorably grotesque, and they may be the best thing about this adaptation. Nevertheless, I can’t quite warm up to this adaptation; without that sense of hushed dread, it just doesn’t feel right to me.

Fireside Reminiscences (1908)
Article 5655 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-21-2019
Directed by J. Searle Dawley and Edwin S. Porter
Featuring Miss Abbot, Miss Acton, Edward Boulden
Country: USA
What it is: Marital melodrama

A husband throws out his wife when he sees her embracing another man, unaware that the man she’s embracing is her brother. Three years later, the husband reminisces about his wife at the fireside.

This was apparently based on a popular song of the day. Originally, it looked like the fantastic content would consist of nothing more than of having seen visions of things in a fireplace (which would make it pretty marginal), but one of the visions does not appear to be a reminiscence, but a mystical revelation showing the husband where his wife is now, a circumstance which leads to a happy ending. Evaluating this one is tough, as the print is very badly damaged, and some of the scenes are in poor condition. Overall, though, the story is a little hard to swallow and is fairly slow-moving on occasion. It’s so-so, but nothing essential.

The Fairy of the Black Rocks (1907)
aka La fee des roches noires
Article 5647 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 3-11-2019
Directed by Segundo de Chomon
Featuring Julienne Mathieu
Country: France
What it is: Comic supernatural revenge

A ne’er-do-well (and yes, I love using antiquated terms like this) refuses to help an old woman with a bundle of sticks, unaware that she is actually a fairy capable of supernatural revenge.

Segundo de Chomon is my second favorite fantasist of the very early years of cinema. Though he obviously owed a great debt to the innovations of Melies, he was able to give his work an extra dose of surreal imagery that sets him apart. This is one of his works that most resembles Melies; the various visual tricks certainly recall similar moments from Melies, but the comic sense of this one is Chomon’s own touch. It’s also short and to the point at a time when Melies’s work was trying (not very successfully) to stretch out into longer works. This one is solid and entertaining.

Faust: apparition de Mephistopheles (1897)
Article 5636 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 2-21-2019
Director unknown
Cast unknown
Country: France
What it is: Lumiere tries Melies

Faust has a vision of a woman and is visited by Mephistopheles.

The Lumiere brothers mostly did documentary slice-of-life shorts; this appears to be an attempt to try a little Meliesian special effects wizardry. There are two trick moments. One involves a sliding cabinet door opening to reveal a woman (this appears to be a stage trick of some kind), while the other is more cinematic as it involves Mephistopheles magically appearing in the scene. Nice to see Lumieres trying to stretch out a bit, but you can tell their heart’s not in it; the presentation is stodgy and dull.

Flip (2004)
Article 5624 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 1-21-2019
Directed by Kirk Demarais
Featuring Landen Knowlton, Harrison Knowlton, Jamey Clayberg
Country: USA
What it is: Slice of life short

A monster kid from the sixties named Flip is given a dollar by his grandma for his birthday, with the admonition to “Spend it wisely!” He fantasizes what might happen if he buys any of several different items from the novelty page in his favorite horror comic book.

The first thing you may notice about this short is that it looks like a pretty low-budget affair. However, it won’t take you long to realize that it doesn’t matter; the script is so clever and so perceptive that it wins you over. It does an excellent job of seeing the situation from the boy’s perspective, and it’s done almost entirely without dialogue; the only talking that occurs is during a movie-within-a-movie sequence, and the imagined “spend it wisely” admonition popping up sporadically – everything else is conveyed visually. The fantastic content occurs throughout; two of the items he considers buying (a werewolf mask and a u-control monster) are full of horror content, and the movie within a movie is a horror film. It’s also utterly charming to see the main character’s journey from hope to disappointment, only to have a coda illustrate how the nostalgia of a shared experience can change everything. This is a fine short, and highly recommended.

The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made (2004)
Article 5618 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-31-2018
Directed by Brandon Christopher
Featuring Carlos Larkin
Country: USA
What it is: Documentary

A countdown of the fifty worst movies ever made.

Since the lion’s share of the listed movies belong to the fantastic genres, I see fit to review this made-for-video documentary. I don’t plan to contest the choices for the fifty movies themselves; nobody but the makers are going to be completely satisfied with the choices, especially when the list is ranked, and that’s simply the nature of this kind of thing. However, with fifty movies being covered in only sixty minutes, you’re only going to get about a minute and twelve seconds dedicated on average to each movie, and that’s hardly enough time for any real insight. Granted, some movies are given longer segments (such as PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE), but that just means that other titles will have even less time (the segments for TEENAGE ZOMBIES and THE ROBOT VS THE AZTEC MUMMY are almost over before they begin). Furthermore, there’s not much information here that I’ve not already found elsewhere. Still, there is a bit of fun in the countdown format, and there are a few movies I wasn’t familiar with or haven’t seen. So, for what it is, I guess it’s okay.

The Friendly Ghost (1945)
aka Casper: The Friendly Ghost
Article 5613 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-27-2018
Directed by Izzy Sparber
Featuring the voices of Frank Gallop, Jack Mercer, Mae Questel
Country: USA
What it is: Casper cartoon

Casper doesn’t want to scare people; he wants to make friends. But will people accept him even if he’s a ghost?

Oh, there’s a few laughs to be had here, usually involving the reactions of several characters to meeting a ghost. But let’s face it; some of these Casper cartoons are primarily tear-jerkers. As such, they can get pretty dark; even though we know he can’t be hurt, it is still pretty troubling to have the hero of your cartoon story attempt suicide. I remember seeing some of these as a kid, but I don’t remember how I felt about them. Nowadays I have to admit I don’t like them that much; they’re just a little too depressing, and the surrounding attempts at humor don’t sit well with me. And, of course, I’ll probably be covering a lot of them, because he is a ghost, after all.

Falling Hare (1943)
Article 5605 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-21-2018
Directed by Robert Clampett
Featuring the voices of Mel Blanc and Robert Clampett
Country: USA
What it is: Bugs Bunny wartime short

Bugs Bunny finds himself doing battle with a gremlin intent on destroying a military plane.

Here’s one of my favorite of Warner Brothers’ wartime Bugs Bunny cartoons. Outside of the usual cartoon fantastic content, we also get a supernatural character in the form of the destructive gremlin. Bugs is a bit out of his element here in that he’s the tormentee rather than the tormentor; it’s the gremlin that remains cool, calm, collected and in control. The gags come fast and furious, with my favorite being the reason the plane didn’t crash, though that one is followed up by one of those now obscure wartime references that you won’t get unless you know something about the era.

Fiddler on the Roof (1971)
Article 5595 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 12-11-2018
Directed by Norman Jewison
Featuring Topol, Norma Crane, Leonard Frey
Country: USA
What it is: Musical

In pre-revolutionary Russia, a Jewish milkman must contend with a changing world that challenges the traditions in which he believes.

I didn’t right away expect to be reviewing this one because I had forgotten that the movie does indeed have fantastic content; the fake nightmare that Tevye dreams up to convince his wife to change the marriage plans for their eldest daughter features corpses and ghosts risen from the dead. There’s also a somewhat more subtle touch of fantastic content here as well; the title character is an anthropomorphic metaphor rather than a real person, and he remains something of a mystical character. As for the movie itself, the story inhabits a special place in my world. Though I do some local acting, I’m not fond of musicals and don’t audition for them. There’s only one musical I would consider doing, and that’s the one this movie is based on. Why? Because for me, it’s the only musical I’ve seen that works on such a deep emotional level that it transcends the artifice of the form; the music deepens the emotional and thematic elements of the story in a way that I’ve not seen before or since. it may be a musical, but it inhabits a very real world indeed, and one that can be deeply tragic. Yet it’s Tevye’s emotional struggle to hold on to his faith while watching the traditions that define it fall apart that really make’s the movie so deeply satisfying to me. It’s hands down my favorite musical, and I’m glad the fantastic content allowed me a chance to review it here.

Fearless Harry (1926)
Article 5578 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 10-21-2018
Directed by Albert Herman
Featuring Earl McCarthy, Charlotte Merriam, John J. Richardson
Country: USA
What it is: Slapstick silent short

Can Hairbreadth Harry rescue Beautiful Belinda from the clutches of that villain Relentless Rudolph?

This was apparently the first of 11 shorts based on a comic strip that appeared to be a parody of the mellerdrammer genre – dashing hero, beautiful girl, slimy villain. Oddly enough, the fantastic content here isn’t the secret formula the villain is after, largely because the movie doesn’t specify in any way what the secret formula is for. Instead, the fantastic content is that the villain brings the girl to his hideout, a horror house, and the hero has to contend with things like a living mummy and live skeletons. For a fleeting second, I thought the black manservant was going to be spared having to act out the usual stereotypes of the era, but that changes once he encounters the skeleton. As for the rest of the movie, the villain yells “Curses!” a lot, and is easily funnier than the bland hero. I’d have to say that as far as silent shorts go, this is about average; I’ve seen better and I’ve seen worse.