WE WANT OUR MUMMY (1939)
Article #580 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 10-16-2002
Posting date: 3-11-2003

The Three Stooges agree to find the mummy of Ruten Tuten.

Step 1) Take the Wheeler and Woolsey comedy, MUMMY’S BOYS

Step 2) Double the number of gags (this step is fairly easy).

Step 3) Compress the movie to a quarter of its length.

Step 4) Take out Wheeler and Woolsey; substitute Moe, Larry, and Curly.

Step 5) Mix well.

Result: A vast improvement.

Lesson to be learned: If you’re gonna be stoopid, at least don’t plod; you’ll be doing us all a favor.

Side note: The mummy in this movie looks more like Nosferatu than any other mummy I’ve seen.

WEST OF ZANZIBAR (1928)
Article #428 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 5-17-2002
Posting date: 10-10-2002

A magician’s legs become paralyzed when he is hurt in a fight with a man running away with his wife. When the wife shows up later dead in a church with a child, he vows to use the child to get revenge on the man who injured him.

After THE UNKNOWN, this is my favorite of Lon Chaney’s collaborations with Tod Browning. Once again, it’s more lurid melodrama than actual horror; the most horrific element of the plot is having one of the characters disguised as an evil spirit to scare African natives into dropping the ivory tusks they are transporting. However, the story itself is so depraved and the African setting exudes such a sinister dark atmosphere that it becomes a horror movie in spirit if not in plot. Once again, I find it hard to take my eyes off of Chaney, whose ability to evoke both deep horror and intense pity is as strong as ever. This was remade only a few years later with Walter Huston in the Chaney role as KONGO.

WEIRD WOMAN (1944)
Article #420 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 5-9-2002
Posting date: 10-2-2002

This is the third of the Inner Sanctum series that I’ve covered. Based on a novel by Fritz Lieber, it hones a lot closer to real supernatural horror than do the other movies in the series, and there’s not a single hypnosis subplot to be found. It even manages to approach some of that Val Lewton ambiguity of I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE. Unfortunately, it falls somewhat short of that movie, with a script that gets awfully silly at times, particularly during the native dance sequence that looks like it belongs in a nightclub; in fact, this kind of scene is rarely effective because they always look carefully choreographed rather than spontaneously and passionately religious. At least the story is fairly good this time; another version of the story would be made several years later as BURN, WITCH, BURN. Lon Chaney Jr. is on hand, as well as Evelyn Ankers (in a rare villain role), Anne Gwynne, Ralph Morgan, and Lewton regular Elisabeth Russell.

THE WARRIOR EMPRESS (1960)
Article #328 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 2-6-2002
Posting date: 6-23-2002

A rebel leader falls in love with Sappho, a poetess who is also a priestess and niece to the evil king of the kingdom.

For the first several minutes, the sword and sandal cliches come thick and fast, but then it eventually turns into an action-oriented soap opera of sorts. The odd thing about this one is that there is no Hercules character; the character Kerwin Matthews plays is the equivalent of one of those rebel leaders Hercules would be helping out in other movies. In fact, there are several interesting aspects of this movie; the bad guys are more complex and human than they usually are, especially the king, who seems more ineffectual than evil, and surrenders near the end of the movie with a surprising degree of grace. Tina Louise plays Sappho of Lesbos; I was amused that the place where she was staying as a priestess was a fortress next to the ocean surrounded by a moat. It was described as being an island within an island, and if anybody should know about spending a lot of time on an island, it should be her. And yes, there is a lesbian subplot, plus costumes that are daring even for this genre of movies. And anyone who can figure out which of the characters is the “Warrior Empress” of the title is more alert than me.

WOMAN IN THE MOON (1929)
(a.k.a. FRAU IM MOND)
Article #323 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 2-1-2002
Posting date: 6-18-2002

A trip to the moon is financed by people who believe gold is to be found there that will help them corner the gold market.

This is lesser Fritz Lang, but nonetheless I consider it an important film in the history of science fiction; the plot is fairly disposable, but the detail that went into the science fiction aspects of the story is quite impressive. I suspect this movie may have had an influence on some of the early space flight movies of the fifties; at one point or another I saw traces of DESTINATION MOON, ROCKETSHIP X-M and CONQUEST OF SPACE. This wasn’t the first trip to the moon (Melies’ did that), but it was the first one I know of that actually tried to be somewhat scientifically accurate, and despite some obvious flaws (atmosphere on the moon), it’s quite impressive. It certainly is the first movie to use the countdown in a rocket launch, and that seems to be what it is most remembered for anymore, but there’s really a lot of other interesting things about it.

WEIRD TALES (1919)
(a.k.a. UNHEIMLICHE GESCHICHTEN/TALES OF THE UNCANNY)
Article #322 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-31-2002
Posting date: 6-17-2002

Several tales of horror are told.

This silent anthology features Conrad Veidt and was directed by Richard Oswald. It’s fairly entertaining, with my favorite of the stories being the first because I didn’t expect the ending at all. The third should be instantly recognizable to Poe fans; I don’t immediately recognize the others, but I suspect they are all from well-known horror stories. Some of the imagery in the linking story (in an antiquarian bookshop) is quite interesting, too. A pleasant, if not earth-shaking silent movie.

WHAT A CARVE UP! (1962)
(a.k.a. NO PLACE LIKE HOMICIDE)
Article #318 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-27-2002
Posting date: 6-13-2002

A man who corrects grammatical errors in horror books discovers that he is one of the heirs to a fortune, and goes to the creepy estate for the reading of the will.

According to the IMDB, Frank King wrote both a play and a novel called The Ghoul; this was based on the novel, while the 1934 movie THE GHOUL was based on the play. I’m somewhat curious as to whether the play and the novel had the same story, because outside of the fact that we have a man who is not really dead in the story, there isn’t a whole lot of similarity between the two movies. For horror fans, we have Dennis Price, Michael Gough, and Donald Pleasence to round out the cast, but despite some nice atmosphere and the odd amusing moment, this comic horror movie just kind of limps along from one scene to the next. My favorite moments are the revelation of what the nurse (Shirley Eaton) receives in the will, and one murder that takes place while two characters are playing the organ (no, not Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, but Chopsticks).

THE WOLF MAN (1941)
Article #315 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-24-2002
Posting date: 6-10-2002

A man is bitten by a wolf which he then kills, only to discover that he was fighting a werewolf and that he himself will become one.

Despite this movie’s status as one of the Universal horror classics, I don’t really put it on the same par with their front line of classics (the James Whale movies, THE MUMMY, THE BLACK CAT, etc.), as I’m always a little bit disappointed by it. One of the problems I have with the movie is that, though it adds a lot of detail to the proceedings, the details don’t really add a whole lot to the story as such. I think it would have been better if they had downplayed the romance part of the story, and really beefed up the relationship with Talbot and his father, which is potentially the most compelling non-fantastic aspect of this movie; plus, it would have given more for Claude Rains to sink his teeth into. Still, you can tell quite a bit of care went into this movie; Universal obviously still saw their horror product as important at this point. It also has a nice cast, with the aforementioned Rains, Lon Chaney Jr., Evelyn Ankers, Ralph Bellamy, Bela Lugosi (in the small but memorable role as Bela the gypsy), and the one who steals the movie, Maria Ouspenskaya, whose Maleva the gypsy woman is one of the great characters in horror cinema history.

THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939)
Article #314 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-23-2002
Posting date: 6-9-2002

What, you really want a plot description of this one?

If there was a list of the most instantly familiar movies ever made, I’m sure this one would be on the list. I came from the generation that grew up when it would show up once a year on network TV around Easter, and it was a tradition to sit down and watch the movie. Any review or commentary I could make would be superfluous, so I’ve decided to make my comments refer to other movies as much as possible. The scene where Dorothy looks out the window of the house when it is in the grip of the tornado and sees the various people go by almost feels like one of the shorts by Melies. Also, does anyone think that the talking trees have more than just a passing resemblance to the Tabanga from FROM HELL IT CAME? Or that the tin man at one point walks with the stiff-legged gait reminiscent of that attributed to the monster in FRANKENSTEIN? Or that the witch suffers the same fate as THE INCREDIBLE MELTING MAN (only without the helpful janitor)? And even though Judy Garland is no Vincent Price, she does all right with “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” (a reference to DR. PHIBES RISES AGAIN).

And one straight comment; I think the flying monkey sequence is one of the greatest fantasy sequences of all time.

WHITE ZOMBIE (1932)
Article #303 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-12-2002
Posting date: 5-29-2002

A man wishes to win an engaged woman for his own, so he hooks up with an evil plantation owner, who sets up a scheme to fake her death and revive her once the fiance has departed. However, the plantation owner, who has a crew of zombies, has ideas of his own.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I really need a good copy of this one; I’ve heard that it can make all the difference in the world. As it is, I have to admit that this time that I watched it, I was able to understand its appeal a lot more, especially after seeing some of the other movies of the Halperin brothers. On top of some absolutely unforgettable scenes (particularly the zombie falling into the mill which, being manned by zombies, just keeps running), it also has quite a few that are stiff and static, and watching a so-so copy of the movie only enhances the dullness of these scenes. I do enjoy Lugosi’s performance quite a bit, and some of the zombies are quite memorable, and I like the use of sound throughout, though I consider the music somewhat variable. However, I plan to reserve judgment until I can see a good copy of the movie.