Babes in Toyland (1934)

BABES IN TOYLAND (1934)
(a.k.a. MARCH OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERS)
Article #681 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-25-2003
Posting Date: 6-24-2003
Directed by Gus Meins and Charley Rogers
Featuring Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy and Charlotte Henry

Ollie Dee and Stannie Dum try to save Little Bo-Peep from having to marry the evil Barnaby.

Arrrghhh! The copy I have on tape is the #*&@%$ colorized version! And the recent DVD release? Also the colorized version! It’s enough to make you tear your own moustache out with frustration!

Still, even colorized, I found it a good antidote to the 1961 version I covered recently; the music has been scaled down quite a bit, and in its place we have the antics of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, the most charming, assured, and precise practitioners of slapstick comedy that ever lived. They rarely ventured into the realm of fantastic cinema, so I relish the chance to cover one of their movies. They’re in fine form here, fitting in well with the story-book plot here while stealing the show completely. There’s a good sense of whimsy throughout and a strong energy. Plus, the final sequence in which the boogeymen attack is scarier and more savage then you might expect. And is that John George I see as Barnaby’s minions? Indeed, it is, according to IMDB. I was also sure I spotted Angelo Rossitto as one of the ghostly dwarves that put the romantic leads to sleep, and it probably was; he also played the 2nd little pig. One special effect that puzzled me at first was how they did the mouse that hangs around with the cat and the fiddle; after watching closely, I’m guessing that’s a monkey in a mouse costume.

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The Gladiator (1938)

THE GLADIATOR (1938)
Article #680 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-24-2003
Posting Date: 6-23-2003
Directed by Edward Sedgwick
Featuring Joe E. Brown, Man Mountain Dean, Jean Travis

A man returning to college is talked into joining the football team, but is nothing but the brunt of jokes until he is given a drug that makes him super strong.

I’ve seen Joe E. Brown in several other movies, and I’ve always liked his rubbery-faced, big-mouthed charm. This is the first of his comedy vehicles that I’ve seen, and sadly, I didn’t think it was all that funny; in fact, the funniest line is given to his boss when he’s told who his replacement will be at the children’s hospital. Nevertheless, even though I was disappointed by the comic aspects of this movie, I still quite liked Brown’s performance. For one thing, he was very good at handling the sentimental side of things, giving them a light, honest touch to keep them from being too sickly sweet while remaining very strongly affecting. He also avoids desperation in his comic bits, and generally avoids mugging, which is actually quite a feat considering how easy it would be for him to engage in it with that face of his. Thus, it’s the warmth and sincerity that make this work.

Incidentally, Man Mountain Dean would be one of the wrestlers who would take on Mighty Joe Young in the movie of the same name; I ended up being somewhat amused that the first reference to him in this movie was a verbal joke concerning him and a monkey.

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The Curse of the Wraydons (1946)

THE CURSE OF THE WRAYDONS (1946)
Article #679 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-23-2003
Posting date: 6-22-2003
Directed by Victor M. Gover
Featuring Tod Slaughter, Bruce Seton, Andrew Laurence

When a soldier is taken into custody for starting a duel, he escapes, and then finds out that he is being framed for a series of murders.

The curse is insanity, by the way, which explains why many people end up believing the accusations that our hero is guilty of murder; however, we in the audience know better, because this is a Tod Slaughter movie, and therefore there should be little doubt as to who the real villain is. It’s also about Spring-Heeled Jack, and though I don’t know (pardon the expression) jack about Spring-Heeled Jack, I would have thought that a movie about him would have him as the villain. No, it’s the good guy who has that nickname; Tod Slaughter is called the Chief (though he does have another name, but that would be giving away too much). The movie has a fairly involved plot, and it takes a goodly amount of time setting it up, and there are a lot of static, talky scenes without Tod, but be patient; when Tod comes on, he chews the scenery in his patented style, and the script gives him a fair amount of great lines. It’s all pure melodrama of the type they don’t really make anymore, but at least we have these old ones we can go back to and enjoy.

Still, I can’t help but wish that would get at least one special effect of Spring-Heeled Jack doing his jumping thing, even a cheap one. Alas, it is only talked about.

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The Artist’s Dilemma (1901)

THE ARTIST’S DILEMMA (1901)
Article #678 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-22-2003
Posting date: 6-21-2003
Directed by Edwin S. Porter

Yes, this artist has a dilemma, all right; whether to paint the beautiful woman who has emerged from his clock or contend with the evil clown that has also emerged from his clock. Fortunately, the clown is a master painter himself; he does a portrait of the beautiful woman that is so life-like it comes out of the painting. From here on out, complications ensue; at any rate, they ensue as much as this two minute movie will allow them to. All in all, just another exercise in pseudo-Melies trick photography; Melies himself had trouble with evil clowns in THE MAN WITH THE RUBBER HEAD. But then, we all know that clowns are really evil, don’t we?

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Alphaville (1965)

ALPHAVILLE (1965)
(a.k.a. ALPHAVILLE, A STRANGE ADVENTURE OF LEMMY CAUTION)
Article #677 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-21-2003
Posting date: 6-20-2003

A secret agent infiltrates the planet/city of Alphaville.

It’s French New Wave cinema, a type of movie that has always remained somewhat alien to me. Yes, there’s some fascinating visual moments, but there’s a part of me that just wants to dismiss the whole thing as self-indulgent twaddle. What prevents me from doing so, though, is an element that caught me off guard; the movie has a sense of humor at times, and it actually made me laugh on occasion. Not that the movie is a comedy; it isn’t. But maybe the movie shouldn’t be taken quite as seriously as the camera angles, cinematic tricks and poetry would lead you to believe. There are comic book touches here, as well as hard-boiled detective motifs, 1984-like dystopian visions, and some very nice black and white photography. Eddie Constantine has one of the craggiest faces in existence, and the movie also features familiar faces in Akim Tamiroff and Howard Vernon. I don’t quite understand it myself, and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who was averse to this arty sort of thing, nor am I sure that repeated viewing will really prove beneficial to me, but there was just enough here to give me the idea that I might just give it another shot one of these days.

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Among the Living (1941)

AMONG THE LIVING (1941)
Article #676 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-20-2003
Posting date: 6-19-2003

A businessman discovers that his supposedly dead twin brother is not only alive, but insane.

This thriller is anchored by a great performance in a dual role by Albert Dekker; he does particularly well with Paul, the insane brother, a childlike man who has been isolated from the world for 25 years, and then finds himself loose in it; he is unpredictable, both sympathetic and scary, and he easily steals the movie. It’s no coincidence that the movie is strongest during its first two-thirds, when the focus is very much on the insane brother. The last third of the movie is less so; the focus turns upon a reward for the man’s capture, and a vigilante mob forms to find and possibly execute him; this part of the movie is less convincing, relies a little too much on coincidence, and ultimately disappoints; I get the sense that the writers really didn’t know what to do with the situation they set up. Still, Dekker’s performance makes this definitely worth catching. The movie also features Harry Carey, Susan Hayward (another great performance), and Frances Farmer.

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Zeta One (1969)

ZETA ONE (1969)
(a.k.a. THE LOVE FACTOR)
Article #675 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-19-2003
Posting date: 6-18-2003

Spies investigate a man who is trying to destroy a planet of women.

There are many naked and topless women in this movie. I’m getting this comment out of the way because I highly suspect that this is most likely the movie’s primary appeal. It’s certainly not the story, which sits there idly for almost twenty minutes at the beginning while the spy flirts with a female visitor and ends up playing strip poker with her; it’s obvious in this case that the plot is the filler, not the strip poker. Despite the superspy approach, there’s really not much in the way of action or violence; even the scene where the bad guys torture one of the women for information seems rather toothless in this regard. Even the alien women who attack in the last part of the movie defeat their enemies by gesturing at them, which causes them to fall down. To sum up, it’s better than ORGY OF THE DEAD (though not as funny), classier than DRACULA: THE DIRTY OLD MAN, and less pretentious than RAPE OF THE VAMPIRE, though it’s probably as stupid as any one of them. The most noteworthy moments in this movie (that don’t involve nudity) are the world’s fastest revolving door and the world’s rudest elevator.

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The Batman (1943)

THE BATMAN (1943)
Article #674 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-18-2003
Posting date: 6-17-2003

Batman and Robin do battle with the evil spy from Japan, Prince Daka.

David Letterman once had a top ten list of Batman’s top ten peeves. The last one went roughly, “People who call him THE Batman; it’s just Batman, damnit!” This may be a big fuss over nothing, but even I have to admit that I flinch when I hear him called “The Batman,” and I’m no Batman purist. I do a lot of flinching during this serial.

In fact, it reminds me of CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT more than any other incarnation of Batman, and seeing how this is also by Columbia (as was CM), that’s probably why. I don’t know what Batman was like in the comics in the forties, but I can’t help but be a bit disappointed to see Batman being driven around in a perfectly normal car by Alfred the butler (no Batmobile), and I can’t help but feel a little dubious about the fact that the Batcave consists of little more than a few fake bats and an office desk. The most prominent gadget in the serial is a radium gun, and that’s an item of the bad guys rather than Batman’s. Worst of all, though, is that Prince Daka has none of the compelling fun of a real Batman villain; he’s nothing more than a run-of-the-mill serial bad guy, and even J. Carrol Naish seems bored playing him (though he does have a fine moment when he’s feeding his gators and begins to get ideas of what else to feed them). The anti-Japanese racism was a product of its time, but it does render the serial somewhat unfit for impressionable children. It’s my belief Batman has been handled much better on many other occasions.

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The Yesterday Machine (1963)

THE YESTERDAY MACHINE (1963)
Article #673 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 1-17-2003
Posting date: 6-16-2003

When a modern-day teenager is shot by civil war soldiers and his girlfriend disappears into thin air, the police and a reporter investigate.

The first half of this cheaply-made Southern science fiction thriller is a little better than you might expect; it’s talky and static, but the talk was interesting enough that it held my attention. The acting during this half hovers somewhere between wooden and subtle; it’s certainly a lot more low-key than you might expect. The second half is another matter; all the female characters start becoming hysterical at every opportunity, and we meet a Nazi mad scientist who wavers back and forth between endless pseudo-science blather about relativity, time and space, and maniacal speeches defending Hitler; for those looking for a camp experience, this is where it can be found. Yes, it’s pretty bad, but not as bad as it could have been, and it does hold my attention. What I like most about it, though, is that it’s still around; this is one of those Southern movies that is all but forgotten nowadays, but has somehow survived the passage of time to remain with us. It was definitely forgotten at one point; the Walt Lee book doesn’t mention it at all. Take it as a curio and you might just enjoy it.

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The World of the Vampires (1960)

THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (1960)
Article #672 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 1-16-2003
Posting Date: 6-15-2003

A vampire swears to destroy the only three remaining members of the Colman family.

This Mexican vampire-fest gets a little dullish at times when certain scenes drag on too long, but this is offset by some very interesting variations on the vampire legend. The vampire keeps a horde of sub-human vampires AND a horde of beautiful women as his followers, and the movie takes a very different direction in how to defeat vampires, with music instead of the usual crosses and stakes. It also has some entertainingly moody cavern sets. It also finally puts to rest an old wives tale; if you really want to know what causes hair to grow on the back of your hands, the answer is here.

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