PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Science Fiction Sunday 779

The Brain Eaters 1958 Loosely based on The Puppet Masters by Robert A Heinlein (uncredited), written by Gordon Urquhart, directed by Bruno VeSota. Roger Corman was approached by VeSota, he helped him raise money and distribute the film through AIP. The budget was $26,000 and the film was shot in 6 days. Heinlein had no idea they'd stolen some of his plot until the movie came out. Here's a bit from the Wikipedia.

After its release, science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein sued for plagiarism, asking for damages of $150,000, claiming that The Brain Eaters was based on his 1951 novel The Puppet Masters. Corman insisted that he was unfamiliar with Heinlein's work, both while reading the script and during the film's production. He did, however, see the obvious comparisons once he'd read the novel, so Corman settled out of court for $5,000 and acceded to Heinlein's demand that he receive no screen credit, as the author found the film "wanting". The lawsuit that resulted halted actor John Payne's intention of producing a film based on Heinlein's novel.

A strange cone appears near a small Illinois town. Small creatures take over some humans in order to establish a base for an invasion. Not of creatures from outer space like the local human's first thought but creatures from deep underground. The creature had been there for millions of years. Some locals team up with a Senator and his aid to fight the creatures.

I've seen this a few times over the years but it's been a while. It's only average but despite the low budget and lack of production values the film provides entertainment.

The Brain From Planet Arous 1957 Written by Ray Buffum, directed by Nathan H Juran under the name Nathan Hertz. Nathan was unhappy with the final film and used that pseudonym.

An evil brain shaped creature has come from Arous to take over the Earth. He picks John Agar to host his body. A second brain from Arous shows up and joins with John's fiance, her dog and her father to fight the monster within John.

At another that's barely climbs above average but is still entertaining. It's well referenced in other media and has become a bit of a cult film. It was the inspiration for the Zontar episode of Second City Television.

Friday Night Movies 969

Arsène Lupin Vs Arsène Lupin 1962 Screenplay by Georges Neveux, François Chavane and Édouard Molinaro, directed by Édouard Molinaro. This is the third film in the Lupin collection from Kino Lorber. It's a good trio of films but the set lacks any interesting extras.

 

Poor André Laroche has died, there's a big funeral, attended by many. The local magistrates wife tells her son François that she had an affair with Laroche, the result was a son. She also drops the bombshell that Laroche was Arsène Lupin.

A lawyer asks François to stop by for a message from Laroche, when he does he finds out there's a second son and he's supposed to find him. The magistrate finds out François is a petty thief, stealing small items from the homes of people who have invited the family to visit. There's also a sub plot involving a cache of jewels belonging to the dethroned royal family of Poldavia. The two sons eventually meet and help out the Poldavians.

 

I thought it was pretty entertaining, there's action and danger, a bit of romance and a good amount of comedy. It's a nice trio of films that I know I will want to watch again sometime.

The 30 Foot Bride Of Candy Rock 1959 I watched this a few weeks back. Here's that post.

Destination Space 1959

Destination Space 1959 Written by Rip Van Ronkel and directed by Joseph Pevney. A TV movie that was a joint production from Paramount Pictures and CBS. I don't recall ever seeing it before. According to the Wikipedia it was a possible pilot for a TV series. It was passed over for the Men In Space series.

Harry Townes is the director of the US Space Program and in charge of the US Space Station. A meteor strike damages the station and interrupts a launch. The US senate wants to cut costs and he's got to keep them coughing up the cash. Edward C Pratt is an observer come to the station to check things out. A few other things go wrong but most everyone is OK.

The film uses some good amount of stock footage from the 1955 Paramount film Conquest Of Space. It's nothing to write home about, it's a bit dry, I still managed to get through it. I saw it on YouTube. You might like it. There's also an Alpha DVD available too.

The 30-Foot Bride of Candy Rock 1959

The 30-Foot Bride of Candy Rock 1959 Written by Rowland Barber and Arthur Ross, directed by Sidney Miller. It was Lou Costello's only film without Bud Abbott. It was filmed in 1958 and released in August 1959, sadly 5 months after Lou died. This was on the Internet Archive briefly, it's gone now. I see that the film was released in February 2023 at part of a 4 movie Blu-ray from Mill Creek with 20 Million Miles From Earth, Creature With The Atomic Brain and It Came From Beneath The Sea. Those are mostly decent SF films, I've seen the other three films already and have them all on DVD. I'll put that on my Amazon Wishlist.

Lou is a small town garbage collector and inventor. Dorothy Provine is Lou's romantic interest and the niece of the local rich guy. Gale Gordon play's her uncle, he's owns most of the business in the town and plans to run for governor. He's also against his niece marrying the local garbage man. He won't even let Lou join the local businessman's club. Dorothy's got to sneak out of the house to see Lou. On a trip out to the desert Dorothy grows 30 feet tall.

The rest of the movie is dealing with a large lady. There's plenty of running about, noise and physical gags, all the sort of stuff you'd already came to expect from an Abbott and Costello feature. Just no Bud.

I hadn't seen it before despite trying to see all Lou's films. I'd watch it again when I get that Blu-ray.

Update: I got the Blu-ray and have watched all the films and listened to the commentaries. Well, worth the purchase.

Captive Women 1952

Captive Women 1952 Written by Jack Pollexfen and Audrey Wisberg, directed by Stuart Gilmore. An early post-apocalypse film that was released in the UK under the name 3000 AD which was also one of the original options for the US title. It was rereleased in 1956 as 1000 Years From Now. Stuart was mostly an editor, he directed 5 films, this is the last, and followed that with a handful of TV episodes. His editing career continued on until 1971 when he died. His last edit job was on The Andromeda Strain. I've seen quite a bit of his work.

The movie is set 1000 years in the future, there's been a nuclear war and the human race has suffered. Most of them died and survivors have been eking out a living as best they can. The locals are divided into three main groups, the Norms, the Upriver People and the Mutates. None of them are pals. The Mutates are disfigured due to radiation. They follow the Christian Bible, the Norms don't.

The Norms live across the river from the Mutates and even though they live in a tunnel from before the end times, they don't know about another tunnel that runs under the river. The Mutates use the tunnel to escape when raiding their neighbors. The Upriver People are short on women and they want to conquer the Norms and get their women. All three tribes have people who are secretly plotting against their own tribes. All that creates a lot of tension in the land and the son of the chief of the Norms is tired of the killing. He saves the life of a Mutate man and that helps him later on.

It's a short movie, barely 64 mins, and it's well packed with story. I enjoyed it. It's not a great film, in fact, it's a bit goofy, which I don't mind. In it's favor, it moves quickly and there's usually something going on. I liked the tunnel sets, they were effectively used and well shot. The cast does a good job for the most part, no real big names, Robert Clarke, Margaret Field, Gloria Saunders and Ron Randell are the leads. One of my favorite character actors, William Schallert, is one of the Mutates. There's a link above, you can see it on YouTube. Some might enjoy it.

Friday Night Movies 854

Flight To Mars 1951 Screenplay by Arthur Strawn, directed by Lesley Selander. We watched the recent Blu-ray from The Film Detective. This was previously released on a DVD by Image as part of the Wade Williams Collection. He's a cinema owner who owns the rights to several SF films from the 1950s.

We watched the Wade Williams DVD back in 2008, FNM157, and at that time the movie scored a 4.6 on the IMDb, the current rating is a 5.2. The new Blu-ray has quite a nice looking copy of the film, a commentary and a couple of short documentaries.

Arthur Franz, John Litel, Richard Gaines, Virginia Huston and Cameron Mitchell are the crew of a spacecraft headed to Mars. Arthur is an engineer, Virginia is his assistant, John and Richard are scientists, Cameron is a newspaper reporter. The interior of the ship was used in the film Rocketship X-M. and the suits the Martians wear on the surface were from Destination Moon.

 

The ship's landing gear is damaged by meteors and they decide to proceed to Mars knowing that they might not take off again. They're meet by Martians who have colorful clothing and speak English from listing to radio broadcasts from Earth. They seem friendly but we soon find they have a secret need for the Earth. The source of the Martians power is a mineral called Corium and that's going to run out soon.

 

There are two thoughts in the Martian government, ask for help or take what they want. The later group takes control and they vote to seize the ship when it is ready, make copies, then attack the Earth and take what they need. The humans learn of the plot and escape with the ship and a couple of Martians. That's when the movie ends.

There's a decent yarn there, a dangerous space trip, a crash landing, some Martian political machinations with a side of double crossing, a bit of action and a little too much romantic melodrama. It's a bit slow at times and 50s interplanetary dating leaves something to be desired.

Despite it's minor shortcomings I still enjoyed it. It's already an improvement over some of it's predecessors like Rocketship X-M. I doubt I'll buy the Blu-ray I already have the Image DVD. I hope to watch it over again someday.

She Devil 1957 Based on the Stanley G Weinbaum story The Adaptive Ultimate, screenplay by Kurt Neumann and Carroll Young, directed by Kurt Neumann. Kurt was German and he came to Hollywood in the early 1930s to make German versions of American films. He soon started directing American low budget films for various studios like RKO and Hal Roach. He worked for Sol Lesser and directed 4 Tarzan films. His contribution to SF cinema history is rather interesting, in 1950 he directed Rocketship X-M, in 1957 he directed Kronos, and following year The Fly. I've always found all three entertaining and re-watchable. Sadly he passed away in 1958 at age 50.

Jack Kelly is a doctor who's invented a curative serum that works on animals. He's given the opportunity to try it on Mari Blanchard, a dying TB patient of Albert Dekker's. The serum works a treat and Mari is up and about in no time. She's staying at Albert's big fancy house, Jack also lives there.

The serum has an effect on Mari's personality, she becomes more outgoing and aggressive. In a high end dress shop she beats a man, takes his $700, and hides in a changing room. The police come and search the store with only one entrance.  Mari's black hair turns blonde in a nice filter effect, she switches dresses, waltzing out to the shop sales floor she buys some dresses and lingerie before making her escape. Her blonde hair completely fools the people in the shop but the picture in the newspaper of her cast off dress makes Jack and Albert suspicious. When confronted she admits it and asks what are they going to do about it. They do nothing.

Soon her aggression turns to murder. During a party at Albert's house a rich guy has been making passes at her despite his wife being right there watching from the stairs. Mari doesn't care about the poor wife either, she does care about his cash flow, aiming to get some. Alone with the wife Mari's hair had turns black, soon the wife is dead, and the police come. The only witness to Mari running off says it was a woman with black hair and Mari's hair has turned back to blonde. Shortly after she marries the rich guy. Poor Jack had become smitten with Mari, despite her being a murdering scumbag, and he mopes around Albert's house.

Mari soon tires of the rich guy and kills him. She shows up at Albert's where the two men knock her out and reverse the effects of the serum. She wakes up from the surgery just in time to die. Hopefully the two doctor's chucked their serum in the trash.

I hadn't seen it before and was pleasantly surprised. Mari plays a delightfully evil creature who gets hers in the end. Who doesn't like that? You can see a copy on YouTube in the link above. You might enjoy it too.

Jerry Warren Collection 4

I made my own 4th collection of Jerry Warren masterpieces, movies that weren't included in the 3 volume series that was issued by VCI. These are all films I found on YouTube for the most part. Some are chopped up foreign films and some are all shot in the US by Warren, except for the stock footage he tosses into everything. It's like his salt, add a bit of flavor, that sort of thing. I'd seen most of them in the past, might have even blogged about them. Now that I've burned them onto a disc I can put it away with the other 3 volumes and forget about them.

Face Of The Screaming Werewolf 1964 Jerry hacks two Mexican movies to death and tries to revive them for the American market by linking their scenes with the poorly written and directed scenes he'd done himself. Consistently Jerry shows that he has no talent as a filmmaker.

Lon Chaney Jr appeared as a werewolf in the 1960 Mexican horror movie La Casa del Terror, his scenes are mostly what survives Jerry clown style editing. The other movie is La Momia Azteca, a 1957 Mexican mummy movie. It was the first of a trilogy of mummy films from Cinematográfica Calderón SA. The other two are The Curse Of The Aztec Mummy and The Robert Vs The Aztec Mummy. They were shot back to back and all three were released in 1957. There's a good DVD set of all three original Mexican films with English subtitles and  decent prints. Jerry had already chopped LMA apart in 1963 and released it in the US with new footage he'd written and directed.

Not surprisingly the movie makes little sense at times. It gets pretty harshly savaged in reviews and rightly so. Jerry is one of those filmmakers that is needing a savage beating with the de-fleshed skull of Paul Naschy. A fantasy of mine.

Frankenstein Island 1981 Jerry Warren wrote and directed. It didn't do well and Jerry though he hadn't made a modern enough picture. He cut it for a TV version and added some explosions. Yeah, that will disguise what shit job you did Jerry.

Some balloonists crash land on an island at sea. The place is under control of the Frankenstein family. Granddaughter Sheila captures the group and plans to turn them into zombies of a sort. One of the group is a doctor and Sheila brainwashes him to helping her keep her 200 year old husband alive. John Carradine plays the long dead, but spiritually alive, Dr Frankenstein. He communicates through Sheila's husband and appears as a floating head in a few scenes. They use the same short shot and change the dialog from scene to scene.

Goofy dialog made me laugh but the film isn't much by way of a comedy, it's just second rate.

Invasion Of The Animal People 1959 I already did a big post about the film's different versions.

Teenage Zombies 1959 Written and directed by Jerry Warren. It was filmed in 1956 and the IMDb Trivia pages says it may have been released briefly in 1957. The title and some of the score was ripped off from Kronos.

Katherine Victor is a mad scientist who's got here very own island. She's got a deal with the local sheriff to send vagrants and hobos as subjects for her experimentation. Some teens stumble on her set up and bring her project to turn Americans into zombies to an end. It's typical of Warren's inability to write dialog and make movies. Another stinker from Jerry.

Terror Of The Blood Hunters 1962 Written and directed by Jerry Warren. One of the lot that I hadn't already seen.

A subversive writer is sent to prison on Devil's Island where he gets to paint the Commandant's daughter. She wants to help him escape and take her with him. They bring his pal from the ship that brought him to the island and trek through the jungle to freedom. Griffith Park in LA stands in for the jungle with the aid of some stock footage. Pretty ambitious a project for Jerry, it's a slight bit better than most of his films, but as usual it comes up below average.

The Incredible Petrified World 1959 Written by John W Steiner and directed by Jerry Warren. It was filmed and completed in 1957 but it took until 1959 and 1960 to get released.

John Carradine is a professor who sends 4 people into the ocean in a diving bell. It gets disconnected and disappears. The crew find themselves still alive in a subterranean cavern. They meet a shipwrecked sailor  who's been there for 14 years. A rescue mission is sent to look for the castaways and eventually they are rescued. It's a dull thing, not enough monsters or terror for my liking.

Science Fiction Sunday 615

Mutator 1989 Lynn Rose Higgins and Gerald A Rose wrote the story, Lynn wrote the screenplay, it was directed by John R Bowey. The only actors I recognized were Brion James and Embeth Davidtz. I'm certainly a Brion fan.

It's pretty standard fare in the mutated monster genre but not that clever or well made. Brion goes to work as a security guard in the HQ of a large corporation. He meets the guys and learns that there had been a big escape in the summer, none of the mutated cats have been seen since. One of the guards believes they are still out there but the other two aren't believing him. The viewers had already seen what happened to the guy that Brion's replacing in the opening credits, a guard is stalked and slashed in the face by some unseen beast.

Since it's Brion's first day all hell breaks loose. Luckily the guard room has a big arsenal of guns. Brion's trapped in the building with 3 guards, the head of the company, and three animal rights activists who have broken in to release animals. One of the activists is the head honcho's daughter. It's all one from column A and two from column B here. I did have a laugh or two but that isn't enough to get it to above average. There's a copy on YouTube, link in title, but it's missing the opening credits segment that shows the guy that Brion replaces getting attacked. The copy I have from YouTube is a few months old and it's complete but it's also gone. Who would give two hoots about that movie to have it taken down?

The Rocket Man 1954 Story by George W George and George F Slavin, screenplay by Lenny Bruce and Jack Henley, directed by Oscar Rudolph.

Spring Byington is Justice Amelia Brown and Charles Coburn is Mayor Ed Johnson, they live in a the small town of Carlisle. George "Foghorn" Winslow plays an orphan boy called Timmy. When the movie opens he's with all the boys watching a special presentation by Captain Talray and the Outer Spacers. They're actors from a TV show, they put on a bit of a show, they've got a rocket prop with them, it smokes. At the end of the show they hand out toys to the kids. Timmy wants a ray guy but there were only two planes left. A spaceman materializes in a puff of smoke and no one notices. All of  sudden there's a ray gun in the empty box.

Timmy goes off with his ray gun and saves a boys life by halting a speeding car before it runs over a kid who's fallen in the road. Driving the car is Emory Parnell, he's Big Bill Watkins, a crooked politician from the area. Amelia tosses him into jail for ten days. For some reason he wants the orphanage that Timmy lives in. He gets one of his lawyers, John Agar, to put in a bid for him. John meets the lovely June Brown, played by Anne Francis, and falls like a ton of bricks. He turns against Big Bill.

With the help of the magical ray gun, most everything goes against Big Bill and that made me laugh a few times. It's a bit corny, hokey and a bit old fashion but it's was entertaining and I liked all the characters. I happy to see it and would recommend it to most anyone. There's a so-so copy on YouTube in 3 parts. The version I downloaded was all one file but it seems it's not there anymore. The 3 part copy has been up for 2 years, go figure. Part one, two, three.

Science Fiction Sunday 611

Creatures From The Abyss 1994 Original title Plankton. Written by Richard Bauman and directed by Al Passeri.

Stupid college students take a dinghy out for a spin but they didn't pack the spare gas can. Stranded they come across and board a small yacht. It's got a lab for experimenting on fish in it. One of the experiments is alive and it's already killed most of the crew. What a predicament! How are they going to survive?

It's got more than enough annoying scenes with the college students, a bit of nudity and plenty of mutated fish monsters. Good reminder to stay off the sea for me. You can find out how those college students did by checking the link above. I didn't think it was great or anything, better than a lot of Italian SF films, still below average. I wouldn't need to go buy the DVD or anything. This is the second time I've seen it, that should be enough.

The Strange World Of Planet X 1958 British film that was marketed in the US under the title Cosmic Monsters. Rene Ray wrote the 6 episodes of the 1956 TV series, she also wrote the 1957 novelization this film was based on. Rene was an actor who started working in 1929 and retired 30 years later. I've only seen 4 of her nearly 50 films. The screenplay was by Paul Ryder and the director was Gilbert Gunn.

Forrest Tucker is working for Alec Mango, a scientist who's obsessed with his new invention. It bombards metal with magnetic fields. It's such a powerful machine that the magnetic fields bother the TVs in the near by town. Forrest has his suspicions that the fields are dangerous but his worries fall on the Alec's deaf ears. He's not going to let any insignificant troubles like that stop his work. Alex is a real dirt bag, he'll kill for his work.

Something is lurking in the woods, several people are attacked and a couple of women are killed. Luckily they get some help from a foreigner. Gaby André plays a French computer expert who's come to replace a man who was hurt. She joins with Forrest in thinking things aren't alright in the lab. Martin Benson plays the mysterious Smith, another foreigner who's come to help.

All in all it was fairly good, about average, mostly worth seeing, maybe not worth seeing more than a couple of times.

Creepy Creature Double Feature Volume 1

Creepy Creature Double Feature Volume 1 is another VCI release from the Kit Parker film library. He's got a good number of films in that collection but these aren't some of the better ones. They're both passable as entertainment and there's two of them on one disc.

Monster From The Ocean Floor 1954 The first film produced by Roger Corman, screenplay by Bill Danch, directed by Wyott Ordung. Bill would go on to write a huge number of TV episodes and animated shorts. He wrote 20 episodes of the 1967 Spider-Man series and 58 episodes of the animated Sabrina The Teenage Witch series. Wyott only directed one other film, the 1956 Chuck Conners film Walk The Dark Street. He's responsible for penning that 50s SF classic Robot Monster. He didn't have a long career.

Lucky for us Monster From The Ocean Floor is a bit better than Robot Monster. Anne Kimbell plays a young woman vacationing in a tiny Mexican sea side village. While swimming she's nearly run down by marine biologist Stuart Wade and his mini submarine. An abalone diver disappears and Anne sees something huge in the sea. Stuart doesn't quite believe her, suspecting a large octopus or something like that. Little do the two of them know that the local legend of a sea monster is real. The local witch woman plots to sacrifice Anne to the thing they believe to be a god, she enlists the help of local fisherman Pablo, played by Wyott Ordung, to lure Anne to the monster. Eventually things are sorted out and there's a happy ending. Well, except for the few people who got eaten.

It's a fairly decent movie, well enough made for the little cash spent on it, sadly it fails on the monster. Film historian Tom Weaver interviews Roger Corman about the film and talks about the film in audio extras. That was as entertaining as the film in some ways. Glad to have a copy and be able to watch it again someday.

Serpent Island 1954 Produced by Bert I Gordon, written and directed by Tom Gries. Rosalind Hayes hires men to help her find some gold that her great-grandfather had hidden in Haiti. Sonny Tufts plays a marine engineer who's been living as a beach bum. He's the one who figures out that the gold isn't on Haiti but another island in the area. They find the gold but it turns out to be the property of a voodoo cult and guarded by a big ass boa constrictor.

The script is weak, the acting average or below, the film watchable but it's not as entertaining as MFTOF. I'd still watch it again but it's going to be a while before that happens.