PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Science Fiction Sunday 830

The Doombolt Chase Series 1 1978 Written by Don Houghton, directed by Robert Fuest and Peter Graham Scott. A 6 episode series from ITV that's only vaguely science fiction. It's mostly a teen adventure story involving the British Navy.

Commander David Wheeler re-directed his Navy ship to run down a small boat. It didn't appear to be occupied but they don't stop to check. Wheeler gives no explanation to the Navy and is court-martialed. Wheeler's son Richard doesn't get any explanation from him. Richard decides to investigate with the help from friends Pete and Lucy. Pete is a junior seaman and was on the bridge when the incident happened.

They stumble on some baddies who are lead by a scientist. He worked on the Navy's beam weapon project but quit about a year ago. He's improved the beam weapon and plans to blow up a giant supertanker if they don't give him £5 million. The teens help thwart the plan. At the end it's revealed that Commander Wheeler was court-martialed as part of a plan to smoke out the baddies.

It's mostly entertaining, there's a lot of running through fields. Helps pad out the 6 eps, I guess. I probably wouldn't watch it again.

Friday Night Movies 1030

Hellboy: The Crooked Man 2024 Based on The Crooked Man by Mike Mignola, screenplay by Christopher Golden, Mike Mignola and Brian Taylor, directed by Brian Taylor. The comic was written by Mignola and illustrated by Richard Corben. It's an entertaining story and Richard's art is great.

Hellboy, Bobbie Jo Song and another agent are guarding a box in a box car. Inside the box is a size changing supernatural spider. It gets agitated and busts out of the box, Hellboy gives it a beating and the car bounces off the track. The spider escapes and Hellboy and Bobbie Jo give chase. The other agent didn't make it. They find themselves in a small community in the Appalachian Mountains and get involved with the locals. Turns out the place is filled with witches and pals of the devil. Things don't go so well after that.

Hellboy and Bobbie Jo pal up with a young man called Tom Ferrell and a witch called Cora Fisher, they hang out in Cora's house. A bad witch called Effie Kolb comes by with Tom's father, she'd turned him into a horse and ridden him around for years. Transformed back into a man, the father soon dies. Tom wants to bury him in consecrated ground at a nearby church. The trouble that area is home to The Crooked Man, an agent of the Devil. Hellboy battles the evil man and that's quite enjoyable.

I found the whole film entertaining and one of the best adaptions of the Mignola comics. More than any of the live action films that preceded this. We watched the 4K from Australia which some say is the better transfer. The film had a budget of $20 mill but only made $2 mill at the box office. Critics dumped on the film and the public didn't watch it. Too bad for them. I was happy to watch it and I'll want to watch it again so I'll order the Blu-ray.

Blood Suckers 1971 Based on the novel Doctors Wear Scarlet by Simon Raven, screenplay by Julian More, directed by Robert Hartford-Davis. The film has had a lot of titles over it's life, it's a mess of trickery. I've seen three other Hartford-Davis films: The Sandwich Man, Gonks Go Beat and The Black Torment. I thought they were better than this one. I have another, Corruption with Peter Cushing. I should remind myself to watch that some time soon. The film is part of the Cushing Curiosities box set from Severin.

Richard is a young don at a fictional Oxford college. He'd gone to Greece to study, he's late in returning and no one's heard from him. His friends travel to Greece, among them his possible fiancee Penelope. They find he's fallen in with a bad crowd who have wild parties, take drugs and have sex orgies. During the 10 min long psychedelic sex orgy a woman is stabbed repeatedly and dumped in some bushes.

Chriseis is the head of the bad crowd, she's the worst sort of person, her hobbies include wild dancing and murdering. She's got some hold over Richard. We also find out Richard is impotent, he can't participate in the orgy. Sad. Richard had come to Greece hoping to find his manhood. He didn't get his end away, he got turned into a vampire instead.

Chriseis has taken Richard to a castle where she plans to kill another woman. Richard's friends chase after and rescue him from Chriseis. They return him to the UK where he's supposed to marry Penelope and graduate. He botches both of those plans when he calls Penelope's father a thief who's come to steal your souls at the graduation ceremony, a bit later he kills Penelope by chomping on her neck. The friends chase Richard over the college roofs until he falls off the building. Lucky for Richard he impales himself on the big iron spike of a convenient fence. Richard's pals return to Greece to stake Chriseis.

It's a mess of a film, apparently it ran out of money and many things weren't filmed. This version has the most material of any past version and it's only 87 mins. The commentary by Jonathan Rigby and Kevin Lyons fills in a lot of detail behind the scenes. They speculate that the 10 min orgy is edited for maximum length to pad out the film. I sort of enjoyed the film but can't believe I'll get back to it soon. There's plenty of nice scenery when they are in Greece. Saturday morning I'm listening to the commentary and mostly enjoying that. There are some info filled interviews that I liked.

The Thick-Walled Room 1956

The Thick-Walled Room 1956 Screenplay by Kōbō Abe, directed by Masaki Kobayashi. A Japanese film about war criminals in prison. Part of Criterion's Eclipse series of DVDs. Another drama.

The movie is about a few of the men in Sugamo Prison for their war crimes after WW2. The story is based on the actual diaries of real Japanese soldiers who were jailed after the was, the diaries were published in 1953. The film was filmed the same year but not released until 1956.

It's a very talky film as the men sit in prison. There's plenty of time for reflection on their cruelty and plenty of guilt to go around. One guy beat a man, Yamashita shot an Indonesian civilian under orders from his superior Hamada, another stabbed a prisoner with a bayonet and he felt so guilty he hung himself in his cell.

Hamada never got put into prison, he's into profiteering and Yamashita's mother and sister are victims of one of his scams. Yamashita is let out to go to his mother's funeral. He plans to kill Hamada but changes his mind when he visits the man and finds him a coward. He returns to prison.

It's mostly chatty and bleak. It was interesting enough to get to the end but it's another one I won't be returning to very soon.

I Will Buy You 1956

I Will Buy You 1956 Based on the novel by Minoru Ōno, screenplay by Zenzō Matsuyama, directed by Masaki Kobayashi. I normally would not watch a sports drama but it's included in this four pack of Kobayashi films from Criterion's Eclipse line of DVDs.

Kishimoto is a talent scout for the Tokyo Flowers baseball club. He's trying to hire a young guy called Kurita for his team. There's competition from two other teams. That's pretty much all that's goingon, the film is nearly endless conversations negotiating the deal. The price goes up and up before Kurita gets signed by one of the teams.

It's rather decidedly dull for someone not at all interested in sports. The Japanese cultural style is slightly interesting but it's not much different to what goes on in the west, the gifts and salaries are probably smaller then those from teams in the US. It's doubtful I'd ever get around to watching it. There are no extras.

Flow 2024

Flow 2024 Written by Gints Zilbalodis and Matīss Kaža, directed by Gints Zilbalodis. Gints did a lot of other jobs on the production, music, editing, cinematography and producing. A Latvian, Belgian and French animated film about a flood.

A black cat is the star of the movie, we don't ever see any humans. A huge flood covers the area where the cat lives. He survives by working with other animals: some dogs, a lemur, a capybara and a secretary bird. The cat spends a lot of time in the water.

It's a great looking film and there's something going on most of the time. It's very enjoyable and something I would watch over again.

Midnight Sun Series 1 2016

Midnight Sun Series 1 2016 Created and directed by Måns Mårlind and  Björn Stein, screenplay by Måns Mårlind. A Swedish French police procedural set in Kiruna, Sweden's northern most town.

A French national is killed near the town and a French detective comes to help with the investigation. Kahina is from Paris and she's got a major amount of personal baggage. She works with Anders, a deputy police prosecutor. He's got a good bunch of personal baggage too. Everyone's in the town and surrounding area has a lot of personal baggage. The whole show is one long luggagefest.

Two more bodies pop up. Local citizens are attacked and our cops are constantly getting knocked around and out. One of them is the third victim. Clues are slow to come but they start to put the case together. Increased knowledge brings more danger, there's a decent body count, it's rather more brutal and vengeful than most of the cop shows I prefer. On the plus side, there's plenty of nice scenery and helicopter rides.

There's only the one series, I doubt I'll need to watch it again anytime.

Science Fiction Sunday 829

Retina 2017 Written and directed by Carlos Ferrer.

A science fiction film about mind control and terrorism. There's usually little going on, vague images, quick cuts and lots of people staring into the middle distance. I didn't think it was that interesting to wade through all that to get some sort of pay off at the end. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

Sadly for me the most interesting thing about the movie are the IMDb votes. It got a 3.8 on the IMDb and that's with 32.2% of the votes being a 10. Half the votes are in the 8-10 range. That's good vote jacking. If you switch to the votes for other countries, the votes mostly skew to the bottom of the range. It gets a 2.4 in Australia but that's with a dozen votes. I gave it a 3, mostly for the editing and the decent CGI in places.

Mission Backup Earth 2013 Written and directed by Alexander Pfander. Originally the movie was a web series.

The sun is going out and some people form a plan to save some humans by building generation ships to spread humans among the stars. Sadly they picked the worst humans for the project. It's 129 mins and it was a struggle to keep my interest. I probably should quit watching these bad SF films.

Friday Night Movies 1029

Tender Dracula 1974 Written by Justin Lenoir, directed by Pierre Grunstein. A French film set in the world of TV production. We watched the Blu-ray from Severn, it's part of the Cushing Curiosities Blu-ray box set.

Peter Cushing is a horror TV show star, he wants to quit horror and make romantic content. His producer sends 2 scriptwriters and 2 women to talk Peter into keeping on with the horror show. Peter greets them and offers them a place to stay. There's a few odd characters in the castle Peter lives in and plenty of odd stuff happens. As the movie plods on it becomes harder and harder to believe what's really happening and what's imagined. It doesn't help to know that.

The movie might be a comedy but the jokes are few and often weak. Peter's character is rather insane and he likes to yell at people. Peter treats his wife poorly, she used to be married to Peter's Igor, a poor lumbering mute who's treated poorly. The scriptwriters try to talk Peter into staying with the horror program but Peter's not buying it. The two ladies seem to loose their clothes pretty regularly.

It could be more fun if the jokes were stronger. I didn't dislike the film but I'm not sold on it. I'm listening to the commentary, hoping that I might learn why it's what it is. So far, no go. They do have a bit of info on the production. We'll see if the interview with the director yields anything.

Fright 1972 Written by Tudor Gates, directed by Peter Collinson. Gates wrote a few movies I've seen: Twins Of Evil, Lust For A Vampire, The Vampire Lovers, Barbarella and Danger: Diabolik. Collinson directed a good lot of films, some I've seen: The Italian Job, Innocent Bystanders and Ten Little Indians.

A couple goes off to dinner with a friend, they leave the babysitter, Susan George, in charge of their 3 year old son. Susan's boyfriend comes to visit. She thought she had seen him at the window but we'll find out that wasn't true. The couple have a secret, the wife's ex-husband is in a mental institution for murder. She doesn't know that he's escaped and gone to visit his wife. Poor Susan's stuck in the house with the madman murderer. She screams all the time and that was making me pretty annoyed.

Other than for the noisy Susan, I would have enjoyed the movie more but it was pokey and kind of familiar. I didn't hate it but it wouldn't make me buy the BR. I would take too long to get back to it. Those Susan George screams were annoying, I'm not rushing back to that.

The Agatha Christie Hour 1982

The Agatha Christie Hour 1982

A series of 10 episodes that are based on Agatha Christie stories. Adapted and directed by a gang of film makers. There are dozens and dozens of actors, some I knew, some I did not.

The stories are a mixture, there are some that are more serious and some that had a nice sense of humor. I liked most of the stories, the more serious were less engaging. I'd watch about a half dozen again, the others I'd probably speed through or skip. I found a used DVD online for 15 bucks. Fifty smackaroonies new on Amazon.

Science Fiction Sunday 828

The Rig Series 2 Written by David Macpherson, Matthew Jacobs, Morgan and Meg Staller, directed by John Stricklland and Alex Holmes. I watched it on Amazon Prime.

I'd seen the first series but hadn't cared enough to want to revisit. I skimmed my way through the second series and wasn't impressed with that either. More trouble on the Rig with baddies from the corporation trying to control the situation for profit and the ancient creature they call the Ancestor knocking them about. Greedy corporate characters are the worst of the two. Lots of running about and lots of yakking.

Like the first one I wouldn't bother with this series again. It looks from the ending, it reminds me of a big ass open door, the producers hope for a third series. It's only been out for a few days, we'll see if they announce a third series or not.