BLOOD THIRST (1971)
Article #769 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-23-2003
Posting Date: 9-20-2003
Directed by Newt Arnold
Featuring Robert Winston, Yvonne Nielsen, Judy Dennis

A detective from New York is called in to investigate bizarre murders in the Philippines.

This US/Philippine co-production is a strange one, and a bit of an anomaly; it was apparently made in the mid sixties, but wasn’t released until 1971. It’s in black and white and runs about seventy-three minutes. I’m not quite sure what to make of it; it seems like an odd cross between the horror and spy genres, with the detective (who has the thickest lisp this side of Boris Karloff) tossing off comic one-liners (some of them not half bad), and talking to himself endlessly when not romancing women and interacting with an odd assortment of undercover cops. Nonetheless, the horror element is very real indeed, if somewhat confusing, and it involves a monster with a lumpy face and an Aztec cult. It’s all pretty cheap, and the plot stalls on occasion, but actually the thing had an intriguing little charm about it that helped pull me through. Nothing great, but a little better than you might expect, given its obscurity and somewhat bad reputation.

BLITHE SPIRIT (1945)
Article #768 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-22-2003
Posting Date: 9-19-2003
Directed by David Lean
Featuring Rex Harrison, Constance Cummings, Kay Hammond

A married couple invites a medium over to hold a seance, and she accidentally conjures forth the ghost of the husband’s first wife.

This is the ghost story as cynical romantic comedy. It’s also a fairly classic production, directed by David Lean and based fairly faithfully on the play by Noel Coward (I had a copy of the play handy and couldn’t help but notice that much of the dialogue is word-for-word). Margaret Rutherford steals the movie as the medium; she is dotty, hilarious and a joy to watch every moment she’s on the screen. The story definitely takes some interesting turns, especially towards the end, but quite frankly, this is one of those movies that has to catch me at the right moment for it to really engross me, and it wasn’t really the right moment this time out; I’m not particularly partial to British comedies of manners. Nonetheless, it has its fair share of atmosphere. Despite its sophistication, it still couldn’t help but to sneak in a few common ghost jokes, including a sequence where a cop sees a car being driven by no one, and a moment where someone who can’t see the ghost walks right through her.

THE BISHOP’S WIFE (1947)
Article #767 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-21-2003
Posting Date: 9-18-2003
Directed by Henry Koster
Featuring Cary Grant, Loretta Young, David Niven

A bishop’s obsession with building a cathedral ends up causing problems in his marriage, and an angel shows up to help.

Angels are not very high on my prioritized list of fantastical creatures I like to see in movies; they rank just below fairies and just above Care Bears. However, if there must be movies about angels, than I couldn’t ask for more than that the angel be played by Cary Grant, and that’s just what this movie provides. Movies like this have the potential to be sickeningly sweet, but the movie accomplishes two things very well; it makes the conflicts real, resonant and touching, and it treats the magic with the lightest and deftest of touches, much of this due to Grant’s performance, which is gentle, warm, effortlessly comic (he can elicit laughs with simple facial expressions without once resorting to mugging) and never heavy-handed. Amazingly, the movie was originally cast with the roles of Grant and David Niven reversed, which seems unthinkable watching this movie now. Loretta Young is truly lovely here, and all the performances shine, including smaller roles by Gladys Cooper, Monty Woolley, and James Gleason (whose specialty seems to be coming up with priceless reactions to fantastical events and strange characters).

BETWEEN TWO WORLDS (1944)
Article #766 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-20-2003
Posting Date: 9-17-2003
Directed by Edward A. Blatt
Featuring Paul Henreid, John Garfield, Sydney Greenstreet

Several people find themselves aboard an ocean liner with no crew, and heading for an unknown destination.

This was a remake of the 1930 movie OUTWARD BOUND, and it runs a solid thirty minutes longer than that one. Part of the reason was the updating of the story to take place in London during the blitz, and the addition of an extra character to the mix (a serviceman), which gave it more relevance for its time period. Though these changes do further deepen the themes of the original, it still doesn’t quite account for the extra length, and the first half of the movie moves a little slower than is strictly necessary. Nevertheless, if I had to choose between this one and the original, I think I would opt for this one, largely due to the presence of two of my favorite actors; Sydney Greenstreet is memorable as the Examiner, and Edmund Gwenn is great as Scrubby the Steward. The second half of the movie is just as powerful as that of the original movie; it is immensely moving, thoughtful, and fascinating to watch the ultimate fate of each character. The story remains one of the most engaging explorations of a possible afterlife that I have ever seen.

THE BEAST OF BORNEO (1934)
Article #765 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 4-19-2003
Posting Date: 9-16-2003
Directed by Harry Garson
Featuring John Preston, Mae Stuart, Eugene Sigaloff

A scientist experimenting with orangutans hires a guide to lead him to Borneo and capture a full-grown orang.

The ad that comes on the cover of this movie talks about horrible rejuvenation experiments involving gorilla glands; if the ad is indeed for this movie (there is apparently a 1944 movie of the same name), then it is an incredibly inaccurate ad. First of all, the movie deals with orangs rather than gorillas; second, the concept of rejuvenation was never mentioned. In fact, this movie skirts both science fiction and horror without ever really becoming either one of them; it is a marginal jungle movie, and not a particularly good one, either, as it never really works up much in the way of energy or suspense. It does have a few points of interest; the bad guy is named Boris Borodoff and has a Bela Lugosi accent; the baby orang Joe is apparently the greatest escape artist since Houdini, and if the sound that the orang makes is really what they sound like, then the jungle needs an emergency shipment of Ex-Lax pronto.

THE BAD SEED (1956)
Article #763 by Dave Sindelar
Date Viewed: 4-17-2003
Date Posted: 9-14-2003
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Featuring Nancy Kelly, Patty McCormack, Henry Jones

When a little boy drowns at a school picnic, the mother of one of his classmates discovers that her daughter is in possession of a medal that belonged to the boy. She begins to suspect her daughter of murder.

I’m not going to mince words here; I loathe this movie. These are the reasons why.

1) The script is overwritten. The movie is crowded with lines that sound more like they came off of a typewriter than out of a person’s mouth.

2) The little girl’s performance is problematic (and I’m being nice in using that word). She’s so obviously a manipulative psychopath that I find it impossible to believe that anybody would fall for her manipulative schemes, particularly anyone who knew her well.

3) The movie is enamored with its own themes. The basic theme that murderous personalities may be (in some cases) the result of heredity rather than environment is dwelled on endlessly and repeatedly, almost as if the writer felt it was the most brilliant theme ever devised and wanted to make sure nobody missed the message.

4) The deus ex machina ending is one of the most stupidly convenient in cinema history.

5) Practically everyone in the cast is acting way over the top; however, this may not be their fault. The movie was obviously shot to emulate the stage version of the story as much as possible, and I’ve once heard stage acting described as having to be loud enough to project subtlety to the back seats of the balcony. In a movie, this is not necessary; the camera renders this type of acting not only unnecessary, but annoying. As it is, this movie has people shouting at me almost nonstop for more than two hours.

…and finally,

6) It didn’t need to be this way. The story is a very good one at heart, and the actors are a very talented bunch. Had they been allowed to play it like a movie, and to tone down their performances to a level where they could express themselves in more conversational tones and more endurable volumes so we could appreciate the subtleties of the situations, this could have been a real humdinger of a movie. It would have worked; the actors were highly capable of pulling this off. I would have actually believed that these characters were real people; as it is, I’m constantly taken out of the moment by the fact that I’m watching “actors” in the process of “acting”, and this ruins the movie for me. In a sense, I can appreciate the audaciousness of trying to emulate a stage performance, but the end result is (IMHO) a disaster. Since the movie is sitting with a 7.2 rating on IMDB, I am fully aware that I am in the minority as far as this movie goes, and it always feels a little lonely to disagree with so many people, but to me, the movie is a botched affair.