The Devil's Sleep 1949 Original story by Danny Arnold and Richard S McMahan, directed by W Merle Connell. An exploitation movie about teens and drugs.
A new lady judge wants to keep the local teens from getting hooked on drugs. Local drug dealers try to use her daughter to blackmail the judge, hoping to keep her from doing her job. She's tougher than that and she's got some pals to help.
It's pretty darn hokey and not overly interesting. You can check it out on YouTube.
Black Friday 1940 Screenplay by Curt Siodmak and Eric Taylor, directed by Arthur Lubin. Lubin would later direct all 131 episodes of Mister Ed. Siodmak would return to this type of story a couple more times in his career with the novels Donovan's Brain in 1942 and Hauser's Memory in 1968. It's the fourth film in Volume 1 of the Universal Horror Collection, there are 6 volumes in the Shout Factory Blu-ray series, each film having it's own separate disc. The films look nice and each movie has a few extras.
Boris Karloff is a doctor who's on his way to the electric chair. He tells his story to a reporter before they flip the switch. Boris's professor friend is killed in a car accident, the driver is a gangster who's injured. Boris is the closest doctor and he takes advantage of the situation to preform an illegal operation. Boris uses a bit of the gangster's brain to revive the professor, the gangster dies and the professor lives.
Soon, it's a short movie, only 70 mins, the professor starts acting odd as the gangster's personality starts taking over his mind. The professor slips back and forth between personalities. Boris is worried about his friend but once he learns that the gangster has hidden a half a million smackaroonies he decides he needs that money for his research. When the gangster takes over he gets back into his life of crime and things go downhill pretty fast. Quite a few people die before Boris puts a bullet into him.
Originally Boris was to be the professor and Bela was going to be the doctor. That got changed when Boris wanted to play the doctor and Stanley Ridges was picked to play the professor. Lugosi was given the role of a gangster, he's hardly in the movie. Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi don't have any scenes with each other in the film. Constantine Nasr spends a fair bit of time talking about Lugosi's bad luck in getting work and Boris's good luck in getting work.
It's a fairly good movie but not as good as the other films in the set.
Audio Commentary With Filmmaker/Film Historian Constantine Nasr. Decent commentary with plenty of information on the changes in the studio and the script.
A Good Game: Karloff And Lugosi At Universal Part Four: Black Friday. A short featurette with comments from various film historians. Fairly good.
Inner Sanctum Mystery Radio Show: The Tell-Tale Heart Starring Boris Karloff. Didn't listen to this, I'd already heard it.
Theatrical Trailer and Still Gallery. Didn't bother with either.
Resident Evil Welcome To Racoon City 2021 Written and directed by Johannes Roberts. I'd seen Johannes 2011 TV movie Roadkill, I gave it a 4 on the IMDb. It's the only movie of his I've seen, the others on his IMDb page don't look that interesting.
This is a reboot of the story from the video game. In this new start we get a bit of backstory about Claire Redfield and her brother Chris. As children they were taken care of by the Umbrella Corp. The Umbrella orphanage is run by Dr Birkin, Claire ran away when he wanted to experiment on her, her brother stayed with Dr Birkin and as an adult he's a local cop. Claire has been gone from Racoon City for all these years and it's been 5 years since Chris heard from her.
Claire shows up on the worst night, the Umbrella Corp has nearly abandoned Racoon City since the place has become contaminated by their experiments. At 6 am they plan to blow the Umbrella Corp complex and cover up their crimes with a giant hole in the city. Claire wants to encourage her brother to leave the city but he's not listening and heads for the police station. Claire is attacked by the neighbors so she runs off with Chris's motorcycle. The police station is attacked by the zombies and the corporation has barricaded the town to contain the outbreak.
There's a lot of running and shooting, there are zombies everywhere. Most of the characters we meet are killed and turned to zombies. There's plenty of gore and CGI, most of it fairly decent. I enjoyed it enough to pick up the Blu-ray today at Target. I'll want to watch it again someday, mostly as an afterthought when watching the whole series again.
The Mad Doctor 1940 Early drafts of the film, titled The Monster and Destiny, were written by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur though they get no screen credit. The screenplay is by Howard J Green and it's directed by Tim Whelan.
Basil Rathbone is a doctor in a small town, he murders his wife for her money and leaves town a month later. A local doctor, played by Ralph Morgan, took Basil at his word that she died of pneumonia, he signed off on the death certificate without examining the body. He has suspicions but doesn't want to believe anything is wrong.
Basil moves to New York with his pal Martin Kosleck. Both men are wanted in Vienna for a double murder and Martin is loyal to Basil for saving him from the gallows. Their relationship is one of the more interesting in the film. Before Basil murdered his current wife he murdered another wife in Savanna.
In New York Basil sets up as a psychiatrist, he meets Ellen Drew, a rich single woman with what appears to be depression. She nearly jumps off a balcony and Basil saves her. He helps her with her problems and woes her at the same time. Ellen's ex-fiance, John Howard, learns of Basil's past and tries to save her from being murdered.
I liked a lot of the film, especially the rain soaked opening credits. Both films tonight had a rainy opening sequence. Basil and Martin are an interesting pair of psychopaths. Basil is dominant, Martin just isn't a thinker, he makes bad mistakes when left to his own devices. I almost wish it was developed more but wishing something was different in a film is a waste of time.
There's a good mystery and the investigation is fairly well handed, the romantic scenes between Basil and Ellen were much less interesting, they could use a bit of 1.5 speed. I'm getting old, I haven't got a much time to waste on twaddle like that. There were complaints of a lot of coincidences in the last act. It might be why Howard J Green isn't a better known screenwriter. Still, I had a more positive experience than a negative one and I'd watch the film again for the good bits.
You can see a fairly decent copy of the film on YouTube, see link above. There is a recently released DVD and Blu-ray from Kino Lorber. I'm putting it on my wish list in anticipation of an upcoming Kino sale. I'm curious about the commentary.
Hangover Square 1945 Based on the 1941 novel of the same name by Patrick Hamilton, screenplay by Barré Lyndon, directed by John Brahm. John had already directed quite a few films before this one., I've seen The Undying Monster and The Lodger, I enjoyed both, I also enjoyed his 1954 movie The Mad Magician. The rest of his films I haven't seen, I have seen some of his TV work on many of the popular 1950s and 1960s TV shows he directed.
That's George Sanders and Laird Cregar in the photo, Laird is composer George Harvey Bone, George is Dr Allan Middleton. George goes to the doctor after he's had a bout of amnesia brought on by loud discordant noise. We already know George has killed a shop owner and set the business on fire. George doesn't remember any of that. The police can't find any evidence against him and Dr Middleton says he should cut back on his work load. He suggests George get out of the house and mingle with the local common folk.
George has a bit of a relationship with the daughter of a conductor. On one of his meet the common man outings he meets a night club singer, played by Linda Darnell. She's the kind of woman who gets murdered in movies like this. She's totally selfish and she fools George into writing songs for her. She throws herself at him, while planning to marry a smarmy theatrical producer, and he's stupid enough to fall for it. The poor conductor's daughter is left out in the cold.
George continues to have blackouts. You can find out what happened to poor George by clicking the link above. I found the movie entertaining. The film is dark and moody and nicely filmed. There's a good score by Bernard Herrmann.
Sadly Laird Cregar died 2 months before the film was released. He only made a few films. Here he turned in a darn good performance despite some of his problems at the time of filming.
Return Of The Ape Man 1944 Screenplay by an uncredited Robert Charles, directed by Philip Rosen. Philip directed over 140 films in his long career, 1915 to 1951, and I've seen several from the 30s and the 40s. I thought I had seen this film but my Watched Movie list says no. It's one of nine pictures Bela Lugosi made for Monogram between 1941 and 1944. They were all pretty low budget.
Bela Lugosi and John Carradine are professors, they find a frozen caveman on an Arctic expedition and bring it home. Bela has developed a way to re-animate the dead, trouble is, you need some fresh brains to make it work. John doesn't go along with the idea of killing a peasant to bring the caveman back to life. Bela resents the thorn in his big science paw and kills John instead. The operation as a success and the caveman gets locked up in Bela's basement lab.
Bits of John inside the caveman brings out John's personality and he's not to happy to have been murdered for science. George Zucco plays the caveman at the start of the film and Frank Moran plays the caveman for the rest of the film. Producers said Zucco got sick. No matter. The caveman escapes and kills people and the control Bela expected to be able to assert over the caveman doesn't pan out as he hoped.
It's a dead average mad scientist picture and there's nothing too exciting about it other than decent performances from Bela and John. There's a bit of excitement when the caveman starts roaming around but there's much more yakkin' than action. It's got nothing to do with Lugosi's The Ape Man. You can check them both out on YouTube at the links provided.
Burma Convoy 1941 Original story and screenplay by Stanley Rubin and Roy Chanslor, directed by Noel M Smith.
A trucking story set on the dangerous Burma Road during the war. Charles Bickford plays the head truck driver. He's got to move the goods while dealing with spies and enemy attacks. There's a few punch up, some gun fights, an airplane attack and plenty of truck driving. Evelyn Ankers plays the romantic interest and she's joined by Frank Albertson, Cecil Kellaway, Willie Fung, Keye Luke, Turhan Bey and Truman Bradley.
Not overly interesting but watchable enough to get to the end. You can see it on YouTube, link in the usual place.
Another Noir film collection from Kino Lorber. Five old British films on two discs. The films look alright but they are arguably noir. The only one I had already seen was The Frightened Lady.
The Frightened Lady 1940 Based on a 1931 play by Edgar Wallace, screenplay by Edward Dryhurst and an uncredited Robert Stevenson, directed by George King.
Helen Haye is Lady Lebanon and the head of the Lebanon family, her son is Lord Lebanon and he's played by Marius Goring. They live in Marks Priory which Lady Lebanon has decided needs some renovations. Patrick Barr plays an architect named Richard Ferraby, he's come to look the place over. Penelope Dudley Moore plays a cousin called Isla Crane. Lady Lebanon wants Isla to marry her son but Isla isn't that keen and neither is his Lordship. Lady L is a strong believer in blood lines and not interested in polluting them with inferior blood.
When the chauffeur gets strangled the police come visiting. George Merritt plays the Detective Inspector and Ronald Shiner plays the Sergeant. Their first suspicion is that the husband of a local woman could be the murder, the wife and the chauffeur were having an affair and she intended to leave the husband for the chauffeur. Something suspicious puts their attention on the family's doctor but he soon turns up strangled.
The story gets more and more complicated as the police dig into the family history, eventually they figure out who done it. It's a fairly good thriller but hardly noir. There's a bit of humor and romance mixed in with the reminder that marrying close family members isn't that good an idea, even if it's keeping the bloodline pure. You can check it out on YouTube in the link above.
Brass Monkey 1948 Based on a play by Alec Coppel, he wrote the story for the film with Thornton Freeland, additional dialogue by William Freshman, Vernon Sylvaine and Robert Buckland, directed by Thornton Freeland. It's Carole Landis' 2nd last film, it was filmed in late 1947, but not released in the US until 1951. A troubled woman she committed suicide in 1948 at the age of 29.
Another one that's not noir, more a comedy crime musical set in the world of radio. Carole plays the fiance of a guy who's smuggling a brass monkey into the UK. Thinking the piece is of no value she gives it away. Turns out that some rich guy is willing to pay a large pile for the monkey and it's two pals. The crook at the heart of the transaction won't stop at murder in getting that third figure back. Herbert Lom and some other guy work for the crook and provide the rough stuff.
Terry-Thomas appears in a series of radio bits and sings a comedy song. There's a lot of music, especially in the last act when the radio show is going on. It's barely average to me. I wound up speeding through some of the musical numbers and the comedy bits had barely any laughs.
Third Time Lucky 1949 Written by Gerald Butler and directed by Gordon Perry. More an anti gambling melodrama than a noir film.
Glynis Johns plays a young woman who gets involved with a gambler that thinks she brings him luck. He takes her to gambling places and wins a bit of money. She slowly falls for him but he's stickily business. He does poorly when she's not there and winds up owing a lot of money. That gets him shot and as the movie opens we see Glynis telling the police what lead up to that.
I was bored through part of it and turned up the speed. Not a film I would bother with again.
Tall Headlines 1952 Based on a novel of the same name by Audrey Erskine Lindop, she wrote the screenplay with husband Dudley Leslie, directed by Terence Young. Terence would go on to direct Dr No, From Russia With Love and Thunderball. I've seen those more than once, most of his other work, not at all.
Totally a weepy miserable melodrama about a family nearly destroyed when their son gets charged for murder and executed. It goes on and on until there's a brief glimmer of hope in the last minute. The only thing I liked seeing was Sid James as a neighbor, sadly, he only pops in in that last minute. Not one I cared that much for.
Breakaway 1956 Original story by Manning O'Brine, screenplay by Norman Hudis, cinematography by Monty Berman, directed by Henry Cass. A nearly noir thriller in the same vein as The Saint or Tom's long running series about The Falcon. Some might remember him from three of Val Lewton's films, Cat People, I Walked With A Zombie and The Seventh Victim.
Tom plays a private eye who winds up in the middle of a smuggling operation gone south. The always entertaining Michael Balfour plays Tom's sidekick Barney and Honor Blackman plays the sister of a kidnapped woman called Diane.
The criminals want to use Diane as a bait to get a special formula for hardened steel. Diane's boyfriend Johnny was supposed to deliver the formula to his brother, when he stops on the road to see what's going on with a crashed car, he's beaten up and knocked out, the crooks take Diane.
Tom and Barney come along soon after the crooks bolt and Tom takes a sock on the chin for waking Johnny. Johnny bolts and Barney finds Diane's purse. Honor comes calling and things get more and more complicated.
I enjoyed it, it ties with The Frightened Lady for best of the set. There's a nice mix of mystery, action and humor. You can watch it on YouTube in the link above. It's one I would watch again.
London Blackout Murders 1943 Screenplay by Curt Siodmak, directed by George Sherman.
Mary MacLeod's home in London is bombed during WW2 and her parents are killed. She's given a room in a house above a tobacco shop. John Abbott is the owner of the shop, he's not got much product to sell. Still, he manages to keep busy, he's been sneaking out at night during the blackouts and killing people.
While we know what he's doing the Scotland Yard boys are coming up spare in the clue department. They know or suspect the victims are connected with the Nazis but have little or no proof. Mary accidentally sees the syringe hidden in a pipe and starts to wonder, the killings are reported to be done with an injection. Eventually John is caught out by an Inspector and tried. There's a bit of discussion about John doing it for the right reasons and it's a shame he has to go to the gallows. John's resigned, he did his duty and he's ready to pay the price.
It makes 59 mins seem longer but it's still an interesting movie. The moral tale of the murderer who killed for the right reasons but did it the wrong way. What a world! You can watch it on YouTube, the print looks OK but it's only 53:31 mins.
21 Days 1940 Written by Graham Greene and Basil Dean, directed by Basil Dean. Based on a short story and play called The First And The Last by John Galsworthy.
Laurence Olivier and Vivian Leigh are lovers and Leslie Banks is Laurence's brother. Vivian's foreign husband shows up looking to get some money and Laurence kills him in a fight. Laurence hides the corpse and tells Leslie what he done. Leslie is an attorney and in line for a judge post. He doesn't want a murdering brother cocking up his chance for a nice post. He wants Laurence to leave the country but he won't go.
A tramp is arrested for the murder and Laurence plans to give himself up after spending his last 3 weeks with Vivian. Lucky for him the tramp dies before Laurence turns himself in.
It's all rather a shade dishonest and a good reason to hate the posh knobs. It's kind of dull on top of the wishy washy morality. Not one I'd bother with again.
The Portrait Of Dorian Gray 1945 Based on the novel of the same name by Oscar Wilde, screenplay and direction by Albert Lewin.
I saw this picture back in 2006 but haven't seen it since. I recently got the DVD and decided tonight's the night to put it on. You probably know the story, man stays young while a painting of him ages. You can click the paintings for a larger size image. The picture on the left was painted by Henrique Medina and the one on the right was painted by Ivan Le Lorraine Albright. The Medina painting is shown in color in a brief scene in the B&W film. It's believed to be in a private collection. The Albright painting is in the collection of The Art Institute of Chicago. Ivan's identical twin Malvin was hired to paint the good Dorian painting but it wasn't used in the film. Ivan made changes to both the good and bad paintings while the film was being shot.
Hurd Hatfield lays Dorian. I knew nothing about Hurd, even though his IMDb listing says I've seen him in a few TV shows and movies. He worked steadily from 1944 until 1991, he passed away in 1998 at the age of 81. The other fellow is George Sanders playing Lord Henry Wotton. I'm more familiar with George's work and a big fan of him as The Saint and The Falcon. He's a bit of a rotter here and he convinces Dorian that a lifestyle of pleasure and hedonism is the way to go. Dorian's pretty shallow and he's easily swayed by Wotton. Dorian is generally a pretty piss poor example of a human being.
Dorian is having his portrait painted by artist Basil Hallward, he's played by Lowell Gilmore. That's him in the middle between Peter Lawford and Donna Reed. Donna is Gladys Gilmore, Basil's daughter and Peter is David Stone, a man in love with Donna. Their lives become a mess from being involved with Dorian. Gladys is a child when the painting is finished, about 18 years pass and she grows into a lovely young woman. Dorian looks the same but his painting is growing more and more grotesque from his naughty life style. Dorian asks her to marry him and she excepts. What's wrong with these people?
Angela Lansbury is Sibyl Vane, a singer in a small tavern in a rough part of London. Shortly after the portrait is finished Dorian sees her sing and returns over and over to the tavern. He proposes to her but Lord Wotton's influence causes Dorian to offer her a choice, sleep with him before marriage or get out. She walks but returns. The next day Dorian sends her a letter telling of his disappointment in her giving into him, he ends the relationship and includes a pile of cash. She commits suicide.
Time passes and Dorian becomes known as a bounder and his portrait has become as grotesque as he is inside. Gladys brother vows revenge but fails. Dorian becomes more and more evil. In the end he destroys himself.
It's a pretty darn good looking film, plenty of great sets, really good cast, everything about it is top notch. Might be the best film I've seen this year. Well worth a look.
Molly And The Ghost 1990 No writer is credited on the film or the IMDb. Don Jones is the director. I can see why the writer might have taken his name off the film, there's nothing much good about it. A horrible 16 year old runs away to LA and moves in with her older sister. She steals money and jewelry from her sister and tries to seduce her husband. Thrown out she hires a hit man but she's so stupid she mails him a picture of herself. He kills her and she become's a vengeful ghost. It's a pretty piss poor film and should be punched in the face. I started fast forwarding after a while.
The Mind Benders 1963 James Kennaway wrote the original screenplay and adapted that into his novel of the same name, Basil Dearden directed.
Professor Sharpey jumps from a moving train and a huge pile of money is found in his briefcase. He's suspected of selling secrets to foreign interests. Major Hall comes to investigate Sharpey and he finds he'd been involved with a project studying the effects of cold and isolation on men. That project has morphed into a study on sensory deprivation, Professor Sharpey had worked on the project with Dr Longman and Dr Tate, scientists at the University. Major Hall is played by John Clements, he's on the right, the guy on the left is Michael Bryant who played Dr Tate. Dirk Bogarde plays Dr Longman.
The Major finds that the process of cutting off the body from all sensation leaves the mind messed up and the person susceptible to easy manipulation. If this is the case it might be that Professor Sharpey could have been an easy mark for spies after being in the tank.
Longman had been in the tank for four hours and taken a leave. He's at home with his wife Oonagh and their four children when the Major comes to call. Longman believes that Sharpey could have been easily swayed by some spies. The Major talks a reluctant Longman into going back into the tank. They leave him in for 8 hours and he's pretty much a broken man.
As part of the experiment they tell Dirk his wife is a pain and he doesn't really love her. Dirk seems to recover but the seeds have been planted and his marriage breaks apart. That's Dirk with Mary Ure, who plays his wife Oonagh. Now the Major has to try to rectify is awful blunder.
That's Wendy Craig, it was one of her early film roles, she'd been in a few TV programs and would go onto star in the beloved series Butterflies. There's a few people in the cast that I knew, Terence Alexander, Roger Delgado, Edward Fox, Geoffrey Keene and Norman Bird. The good script gives them good material to work with. It's well filmed and directed. Everything about it is way above average. It's also a good reminder that human's are fragile. Well worth seeing. It's another film that turned out to be one of the best films I've seen this year. I have the Kino Lorber DVD and it looks nice. There's a commentary that I listened to part of, might get around to it again someday.