The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966)

THE GHOST IN THE INVISIBLE BIKINI (1966)
Article 3220 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-12-2010
Posting Date: 6-8-2010
Directed by Don Weis
Featuring Tommy Kirk, Deborah Walley, Aron Kincaid
Country: USA
What it is: Beach Party horror comedy

A deceased con man has a chance to go to heaven if he does a good deed, but his spirit is unable to leave his crypt. He recruits an old circus partner to help make sure that the heirs to his fortune are not bilked out of it by a crooked lawyer. Then beach partiers show up.

A cross between a Beach Party movie and a horror comedy isn’t really a bad idea, and, due to the presence of Boris Karloff, Basil Rathbone and George Barrows in a gorilla suit, I found myself really hoping that this movie would pull itself together. Alas, this was the movie that killed the Beach Party series. The absence of both Frankie and Annette is noticeable, the antics of Harvey Lembeck have an air of desperation, and by the end of the movie it all degenerates into loud, frantic confusion. And you’d think that a Beach Party movie would have at least one scene at a beach, but not so. In a sense, it’s pretty sad; the series really didn’t need to go out with this sickening a thud.

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Gamera vs Zigra (1971)

GAMERA VS ZIGRA (1971)
aka Gamera tai Shinkai kaiju Jigura
Article 3219 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-11-2010
Posting Date: 6-7-2010
Directed by Noriaki Yuasa
Featuring Koji Fujiyama, Daigo Inoue, Reiko Kasahara
Country: Japan
What it is: Giant Japanese monster mayhem

An invader from the planet Zigra threatens to destroy the Earth with earthquakes of unimaginable magnitude. The invader has also enslaved an Earth woman and sent her on a mission to kill two children. Will Gamera be able to save the children and the world?

Save for the concocted-from-previous-movies-hodgepodge of GAMERA – SUPER MONSTER, this is the last movie of the original Gamera series. As the series progressed, it directed itself to younger and younger audiences; here it seems positively infantile, what with its bratty children who seem to always know the correct thing to do and its condescending attitude (when told that Zigra comes from a planet 40 light years away, someone comments that “even if you went at the speed of light, it would take you 40 years to get here”). Plot errors and contradictions abound; for one, is the woman who was kidnapped an actress or a geologist? Older audiences will most likely prefer to ogle Eiko Yanami (if I have the correct name) as she parades around in alien garb, a bikini, or a miniskirt. Zigra isn’t near as much fun as Gaos or Guiron, and the plot is often slow and cumbersome. To its credit, at least it doesn’t pad itself out with footage from previous Gamera movies, but this is still the weakest of the series. Most memorable moment: Gamera plays Zigra like a xylophone.

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El Supersabio (1948)

EL SUPERSABIO (1948)
Article 3218 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-10-2010
Posting Date: 6-6-2010
Directed by Miguel M. Delgado
Featuring Cantinflas, Perla Aguiar, Carlos Martinez Baena
Country: Mexico
What it is: Comedy with science fiction gimmick

A renowned scientist is working on a formula to transform seawater into gasoline, while his assistant is working on a formula to preserve roses. When the scientist dies unexpectedly (right after he finds the solution to his assistant’s rose preservation problem), the assistant becomes the target of a rapacious oil company who thinks he has the gasoline formula.

I got most of the plot description here from the Phil Hardy book, though I did change the occasional detail based on what I saw in the movie. I wouldn’t have figured out the plot myself, as the copy I found on YouTube was in unsubtitled Spanish, and, being a dialogue-heavy movie, was very difficult to follow. It looks amusing enough at times, but it’s really impossible for me to make a judgment call on this one. I couldn’t help but notice one thing, though; when Cantinflas disguises himself in a fake beard, he has an uncanny resemblance to Ross Martin disguised in a fake beard.

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Flesh Gordon (1974)

FLESH GORDON (1974)
Article 3217 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-9-2010
Posting Date: 6-5-2010
Directed by Michael Benvenite and Howard Ziehm
Featuring Jason Williams, Suzanne Fields and Joseph Hudgins
Country: USA
What it is: Science fiction serial porno parody

Flesh Gordon, Dale Ardor and Dr. Flexi Jerkoff fly to the planet Porno to defeat the evil Emperor Wang.

The movie opens with a crawl in which the filmmakers acknowledge the great influence the serials and superheroes of the thirties had on this movie. This is a pretty odd touch for a porno parody, but it’s a telling moment. If this movie works, it’s because it actually seems that the makers of this movie had seen, enjoyed, and been influenced by their target; the plot of the movie does parallel the plot of the Universal serial. On top of that, a few other movies appear to have had an influence as well; there are moments here that will conjure up memories of THE SEVENTH VOYAGE OF SINBAD and KING KONG. It even throws in a cliffhanger, stops the movie for an intermission, and resolves it in part two with the classic “bail-out” solution that was all too common in the form. Even the design of the robots harkens back to THE UNDERSEA KINGDOM and THE PHANTOM EMPIRE. Throw in some fine stop-motion animation from Jim Danforth and a cameo by John Hoyt and you have that rarity of rarities; a porno parody that is genuinely amusing. Only in the seventies could something like this come out.

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Paradisio (1961)

PARADISIO (1961)
Article 3216 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-8-2010
Posting Date: 6-4-2010
Directed by H. Haile Chace
Featuring Arthur Howard, Eva Wagner, 20 international beauties
Country: UK
What it is: Comic science fiction nudie thriller travelogue

A British professor witnesses the death of his friend Professor Kropotkin. However, he comes by Kropotkin’s last invention – spectacles that can see through clothing. He tries to deliver them to a colleague, but discovers spies are also after the glasses. In the meantime, he checks out how well they work.

Let’s face it; the movie is basically an excuse to look at nude women in 3D. The science fiction element is the glasses themselves, the comedy is tepid, the travelogue is just that, and the thriller (which includes a chase scene by gondola) is thrill-less. To its credit, it occasionally uses the central gimmick in clever ways; for one, it proves essential in helping him figure out Laura Hinkle is a Russian spy. My favorite touch is early on when he uses the glasses for the first time; if you can tear your eyes away from the shepherdess, take a look at the sheep. Inconsequential, but harmless.

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Kyuketsu-ga (1956)

KYUKETSU-GA (1956)
aka The Vampire Moth, Bloodthirsty Moth
Article 3215 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-7-2010
Posting Date: 6-3-2010
Directed by Nobuo Nakagawa
Featuring Ryo Ikebe, Asami Kuji, Ichiro Arishima
Country: Japan
What it is: Japanese horror-mystery

Models are being killed by a werewolf-like creature. Detectives investigate.

Since my print of this is in unsubtitled Japanese, I’m not really sure what’s going on most of the time. I do know this; it’s part of a series of movies about Kosuke Kindaichi, a detective who investigates mysteries with supernatural elements which, in the end, prove to have non-supernatural explanations. Still, the horror elements are here; the killer wears a scary mask with jagged teeth, and some of the scenes have a definite eerie quality to them. There’s a number of striking scenes here; my favorites include the discovery of a corpse on a raised platform, and a dance scene in which all we see are six pairs of legs when there are only five dancers; the latter has to be seen to be believed. Apparently, part of the plot involves a blackmail scheme of some sort involving dress designs, as far as I can tell. Until I can see a version of this one with subtitles, I doubt I can say anything more about it.

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Quatermass and the Pit (1967)

QUATERMASS AND THE PIT (1967)
aka Five Million Years to Earth
Article 3214 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-6-2010
Posting Date: 6-2-2010
Directed by Roy Ward Baker
Featuring James Donald, Andrew Keir, Barbara Shelley
Country: UK
What it is: Ambitions science fiction epic

A subway tunnel dig unearths the skeletons of prehistoric men, followed by a strange object that is initially thought to be a bomb. However, upon examination, it turns out to be much more ominous…

This was Hammer’s adaptation of the third of Nigel Kneale’s Quatermass teleplays, possibly one of the most ambitious stories ever in terms of its scope, as it deals with life and culture on other planets, the rise of life on this one, and the root of our cultural nightmares of demons and devils. If there’s any problem with trying to adapt this into a movie, it may be that the story is a bit too complex to be encompassed in its running time; though you can follow the story, you do sense that much has been left unexplained that was given more time in the TV version of the story. Still, it’s a fascinating watch, and the performances from all are excellent, with Andrew Keir taking top honors as Professor Bernard Quatermass. I’ve not seen the fourth Quatermass story, but it’s highly doubtful that it could be any more ambitious than this one is. Despite a few minor flaws, this is certainly one of Hammer’s finest moments.

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Sir Arne’s Treasure (1919)

SIR ARNE’S TREASURE (1919)
aka Herr Arnes pengar
Article 3213 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-5-2010
Posting Date: 6-1-2010
Directed by Mauritz Stiller
Featuring Mary Johnson, Richard Lund, Axel Nilsson
Country: Sweden
What it is: Tragic drama

Three escaped conspirators murder a vicar and his family and make off with the vicar’s treasure, a chest of silver coins that is reputed to be cursed. However, due to the bitterly cold winter, they are unable to make their escape to Scotland, and are forced to stay in the village of the vicar in disguise. However, when one of the conspirators falls in love with a girl who turns out to be the only survivor of the slaughter at the vicarage, he finds himself torn by remorse.

This is a very effective Swedish silent film about guilt, sacrifice and redemption. It’s been recently restored, though it appears that it’s still about sixteen minutes short of its original running time; I suspect the missing footage has to do with the actually robbery of the vicarage. It’s quite entertaining, if a bit of a downer, but that’s in the realm of what you’d expect from a Swedish movie. The fantastic content is there, if not readily apparent. There’s the curse concerning the treasure, to begin with. There’s also some precognition in the scene where the vicar’s wife see’s visions of their murderers-to-be sharpening the knives. There’s also the ghost of a girl who appears on occasion; it is she who leads the sole survivor to the discovery that the murderers are still present in the village. And then there’s the implication that the reason the ice is frozen in the outlet (which prevents the ship from sailing to Scotland) is a divine message that the killers must be caught and punished.

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Excalibur (1981)

EXCALIBUR (1981)
Article 3212 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-4-2010
Posting Date: 5-31-2010
Directed by John Boorman
Featuring Nigel Terry, Helen Mirren, Nicholas Clay
Country: USA/UK
What it is: Retelling of the King Arthur legend.

The story of the birth, rise, and reign of King Arthur is recounted.

When I first saw this movie many years ago, I considered it an exercise in scenery-chewing. Watching it now, I’ve learned to appreciate that in this movie at least, the scenery was built to be chewed. Or, to put it another way, I remember one review of this movie saying that it made other movies look “puny” by comparison, and that is true. It’s big, busy, loud and aggressive, sometimes too much so; there are moments where it’s more exhausting than exhilirating. Nevertheless, the story is focused and extremely well told. I’m so glad they decided to tell the story of the legend instead of trying to capture what must have happened in real life; I want my Merlin to be a wizard, not merely a trusted adviser and/or a comic buffoon, and that’s what this movie gives us. Special kudos to Nicol Williamson as Merlin here; though he’s one of the biggest scenery-chewers, his Merlin is the most fascinating character in the story, and you’ll be quite sad when circumstances cause him to depart the story for a lengthy period of time. This may be the finest straight movie about King Arthur made, and please notice that I left myself a little out for when the Monty Python version rolls around.

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The Entity (1981)

THE ENTITY (1981)
Article 3211 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-3-2010
Posting Date: 5-30-2010
Directed by Sidney J. Furie
Featuring Barbara Hershey, Ron Silver, David Labiosa
Country: USA
What it is: Supernatural thriller

A woman is being assaulted and raped repeatedly by an invisible demon. She seeks help from both psychiatry and parapsychology.

According to the end crawl, this movie is a fictionalized account of a true story. This means that the movie in and of itself can’t be considered a true story, and one would have to know the true story (whatever it is) to compare with the movie to know what supposedly happened and what has been made up. For what it’s worth, the movie does at least one thing to give it a sense of verisimilitude; true events don’t wrap themselves into tidy, neat little packages, and neither does this movie. Unfortunately, as a result, the movie isn’t quite satisfying since there are a number of things that are never really resolved. Still, the movie does feature a strong performance from Barbara Hershey, and it shows some good insight and intelligence at times. And, given the subject matter, it’s probably about as tasteful as it could be without wimping out altogether. It would have helped had it been a bit shorter than its two hour five minute running time.

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