Jackpot 1960 Story by John Sherman, screenplay by Montgomery Tully and Maurice J Wilson, directed by Montgomery Tully. A British crime film with William Hartnell.
An ex-con tries to get back with his wife but she's not interested. He gets involved in a robbery of a nightclub. William Hartnell plays the police Superintendent that goes after the crooks. Eddie Bryne plays the nightclub owner, he's a nasty guy who's after the crooks too.
It's a good solid film that doesn't waste time on much. It's not really much above average and there's nothing outstanding. Still, watchable and entertaining. I'd watch it again.
Samurai Wolf 1966 Written by Hideo Gosha and Kei Tasaka, directed by Hideo Gosha. The movie is packed in a recent Blu-ray with Samurai Wolf 2. Gosha has directed a good number of movies. I've only seen the 1971 Yakuza film The Wolves and that was fairly good. It's a modern day story and nothing to do with the Samurai Wolf series.
A ronin who calls himself Wolf gets caught up in a fight between the blind lady who runs the postal station and the local baddie. The blind lady has to move 30,000 pieces of gold from her station to the next station. The local baddie and the horrible woman who runs the brothel want that money. Many die before the story ends.
It's very similar type of story like you'd find in Zatoichi movies. Isao Natsuyagi is OK as the Wolf and the rest of the cast is fine. There's plenty of fights and a stack of bodies when the movie is done. Plenty of vacancies for new baddies the day after the movie. The score is heavily influenced by Italian Western music, it's rather noisy. Over all I liked the movie. Looking forward to the second Wolf movie.
Monster Party 2018 Written and directed by Chris Von Hoffman.
Casper, Iris and Dodge are three house robbers who steal from the rich. Casper is in dire need of $100,000 to pay off his father's gambling debts or the baddie will light his dad on fire. The trio decide to rob a mansion posing as replacement catering staff for a fancy dinner party. They figure out where the safe is and create a plan of action.
Things don't go so well once they start the plan. Turns out the house is filled with psychopaths and murders celebrating their not murdering anyone in a while. Like addicts who haven't had a drink or taken some drugs the urge is still inside. The urge takes over and poor Dodge is the first to go. The fight for survival is on and Casper turns out a dab hand with a katana. It's touch and go for Casper but he has some help from the daughter of their host.
It starts off a bit pokey and I didn't care that much for the trio of robbers. It picks up once the house guests start showing their true colors. I wound up enjoying it more than I thought I would. I did enjoy the movie's sense of humor but I don't think I'll pick up the Blu-ray.
Two Wives At One Wedding 1961 Written by Brian Clemens and Eldon Howard and directed by Montgomery Tully, produced by The Danzigers.
Tom is getting married, imagine his surprise when a woman shows up on his wedding day claiming to be his wife. They had meet and had an affair when Tom was in hospital in France during WW2. She claims they were married but he has no recollection of it, she'd want £10,000 for a divorce. Tom goes on the defensive and tries to find out if she's telling him the truth.
I thought it's wasn't much more than average but I got through it. The story is weak but the cast is fairly decent with Gordon Jackson playing Tom. There's a copy on YouTube you want watch. Link in the usual place.
Death Whistles The Blues 1964 Story and screenplay by Luis de Diego and Jesús Franco, directed by Jesús Franco. A Spanish crime film set in Cuba, Jamaica and New Orleans. It appears on a two movie DVD from Severn films. The film was made in 1962 but not released to theaters for two years.
Castro and Julius are truck drivers, little do they know they've been set up by their partner Vogel, he's sent them on a trip with a truck filled with weapons for some rebels. Here come the police, Julius is killed and there goes Castro off to jail. Vogel marries the wife of Julius. Time passes, Castro is out and looking for a bit of revenge. Castro finds that Julius isn't dead, he'd been shipped off another prison. Released, he's gone back to playing in a jazz band.
Castro lucks out and makes friends with a couple of arm wrestling fishermen in a bar. They help Castro in his fight with Vogel, they've become tired of Vogel's stranglehold on the local fish business. Julius gets run down, Castro suspects Vogel had it done but he has no evidence. Castro doesn't tell anything to the cops, even after he gets beat up pretty bad. Vogel has a connection to a night club, the movie spends a lot of time there, there are a few songs sung by a singer. There's the usual underworld characters you'd expect to see is such a place, petty crooks, seedy gun men, corrupt politicians and prostitutes.
It's a nice looking film with a good score and musical numbers. The story is entertainingly told and there's a good cast to bring it to life. I enjoyed it more than any other Jesús Franco film I've seen. I'll want to watch it again someday.
Rififi In The City 1963 Novel by Charles Exbrayat, screenplay by Jesús Franco Gorzalo Sebastián and Juan Cobos, directed by Jesús Franco. A Spanish film set in Central America.
A local police detective is obsessed with arresting Leprince, a crooked local politician. Leprince has his fingers in all sorts of vice including a nightclub. A lot of the film is set in the nightclub, plenty of yakking with the occasional musical numbers. An informer claims to have proof but he disappears. A while later he turns up dead at the police detective's house. Someone starts murdering Leprince's cronies one by one. The bodies pile up in this one.
I enjoyed it but didn't think it was entertaining as the first movie in the Severin DVD. It has a good story and a good score. The musical numbers are rather typical nightclub songs. I got bored with about half of them in each movie and fast forwarded to the talking bits. The film looks good and it's one I would watch again someday.
Billy goes to Ibiza in Spain to "write" on his mother's dime. He's not a writer, he's more a beatnik, he spends his days hanging out on the beach and at the local cafes, drinking coffee and beer, smoking cigarettes and cheap weed. Billy stays at the house of a local drug dealer called Eric. Billy meets and marries a German girl, they move to Barcelona where the marriage fails after Billy gets cut off by his mom.
Billy runs back to Ibiza to stay at Eric's again. Eric thinks the layabouts need to start contributing a bit of cash to the upkeep of his casa. One of the women suggests robbing an older man she used to date. She was with him when he was robbed before and he didn't put up a fight. Eric wants Billy and another lad to do the job but Billy is scared and doesn't want to do it. Eric brow beats him into getting the rob on and off they go. Of course things don't go so well. These aren't competent young men.
As a film it's below average but interesting as a bit of social history. I can say the same for a segment of the film near the end. Billy is on the run, he's gotten back to Barcelna, he sees two cops down the street and ducks in Antonio Gaudi's Casa Mila to hide. There's a short scene of him outside, inside and on top of the building. I'm such a big Gaudi fan I decided to keep a copy of the film in case I wanted to see that segment again. You can see the film over at YouTube. You might have an interest.
Murder At The Vanities 1934 Play written by Earl Carroll and Rufus King, screenplay by Carey Wilson, Joseph Gollomb, Sam Hellman (dialogue) and an uncredited Jack Cunningham, directed by Mitchell Leisen.
The Earl Carroll Vanities were a series of Broadway revues that appeared between 1923 and 1940. The main draw was the big lavish production numbers with dozens of showgirls dancing and singing. There were other acts featuring singers, dancers and white comics in blackface. Real black entertainers had jobs too, Duke Ellington appears in the movie just like he would have appeared in the revue.
Jack Oakie is the backstage manager at the Earl Carroll Revue, he's on his own, Earl is out of town, and he's worried about failing. Carl, the main singer, is going to marry Ann after the show, she's his partner in the show. Carl's old girlfriend is upset but his mother is happy, she's the seamstress on the show but that's a secret. Things percolate as the story progresses.
That's one of the cactus ladies in the Sweet Marijuana song. That song got a lot of flack and not for the nearly naked lady. It was the weed itself that people were complaining about, there was even comment at the League of Nations. Paramount was supposed to cut the song from the film but lucky for us Paramount didn't and we can see it today. That lovely ladies is about to have blood dripped on her by the first victim of the movie. It's pre-code so it's a bit more risque than it will be for another 30 years.
There's a good cast beside Jack Oakie: Carl Bisson is the main singer suspect, Victor McLaglen is the homicide detective, Kitty Carlisle is Carl's main partner in the revue, she's the gal he's going to marry. Gertrude Michael is the ex-girlfriend and Jessie Ralph is Carl's secret mom with a bad past. There's over 100 showgirls, they're often scantily clad.
The murders ramp up and there's plenty of running about between musical numbers. The show is known for the debut of Cocktails For Two. I didn't know it was from the movie but I was familiar with the song from 60s and 70s TV variety shows. People are still singing it today. Eventually the music is over, the murderer confesses and everyone leaves the theater.
I thought it was fairly entertaining but I wasn't that keen on some of the musical numbers. I watched the Kino Lorber Blu-ray and then listened to the commentary by film histories Arthur Slide. He had plenty of info and presented it well. I'll probably give it another watch sometime down the line.
Eight Men To Kill 1962 Written by Tatsuo Honda and Kôji Takada, directed by Shigehiro Ozawa. The third in the Bounty Hunter series with Wakayama Tomisaburo. The three film Blu-ray box set is from Radiance.
Shikoro Ichibei takes on the job of getting a huge stock of gold back from some bandits. He's got til the day of the eclipse and that's only 4 days away. He chases down the members of the gang only to find them empty handed, someone else in the gang has taken the gold. No honor amongst those thieves. There are a good number of sword fights and plenty of horse riding, bodies dot the landscape.
Ichibei barely survives the mission but he gets there in the end. Most everyone else is dead. A constant reminder of the short and dangerous life in feudal Japan. All in all a good trilogy with plenty of action and stabbing. Highly recommended.
Neon City 1991 Written by Ann Lewis Hamilton (as Buck Finch), Jeff Begun and Monte Markham, directed by Monte Markham. A Canadian post apocalypse film that was filmed in Utah.
Bounty hunter Micheal Ironside captures Vanity in the out lands, she turns out to be a valuable captive, big reward offered for her capture. At the local town they tell him he has to take her to Neon City, that's where the warrant was issued, that's where the reward credits are payed out. It's a few days away but he'll go, he wants his credits. The local officer has Micheal's jeep blown up. That officer hates Michael and that forces Michael to take the stagecoach transport to Neon City. The movie is Hamilton's update of John Ford's Stagecoach. Instead of native braves the passengers have to fight off the local mutant raiders. They've been damaged by the residual radiation in the out land.
There's some action scenes and a bit of dull time before the action picks up again. They get to Neon City where Michael has to kill one of the passengers for murdering another. He lies to the authorities when he tells them Vanity died on the road. Michael and Vanity leave Neon City with Lyle Alzado.
It's pretty much average, nothing too new or exciting. Richard Sanders as the comic relief machine reminds one how sad it is when the apocalypse wipes out all the really talented entertainers. That's why I'm saving DVDs. Hope I can get some electricity and a working DVD player.
School For Sex 1969 Produced, written and directed by Pete Walker. The second film in the Kino Lorber Blu-ray with For Men Only.
Lord Wingate sets up a finishing school for bad girls. He teaches them ways to scam money from rich men. He'll take a cut from their spoils. The first girls come from a local prison. The scheme works for a while, then comes tumbling down.
There's plenty of jokes, some of them dumb and some less so. I don't remember laughing at a gag but some scenes made me laugh. There's plenty of dumb writing and goofy scenes as the girls get trained up in swindling. Sadly, at their best these girls aren't up to the girls from St Trinian's.
I liked it better than For Men Only but it's still below average. Pete Walker has said he thought it was a terrible film. I might watch it again someday but mostly to see Nosher Powell again. Some might remember him from Eat The Rich, The Comic Strip or The Sweeney.
The version on the disc is the regular UK version, there are a number of extra scenes that have more nudity what were for areas that were more permissive of nudity. They might have allowed more nudity in the US, I don't know for sure. It made good box office in the US, around $2.5 million, that's nearly $18 million today.
Black Gravel 1961 Screenplay by Helmut Käutner and Walter Ulbrich, directed by Helmut Käutner. A West German film that was shot in Berlin at the Tempelhof Studios and at the Hahn Air Base near Lautzenhausen.
It's years after the war and the citizens are still suffering from a bad economy. The plan to build a huge American Military Base for thousands of service men is seen as both trouble and economic potential. The base provides plenty of work and the locals set up small businesses to earn a crust. There's a good black market in goods and one guy takes a chance selling gravel on the black market. His activities cause the death of a woman, he tries to cover it up but that doesn't work for long. He gets an unhappy ending.
I like a good gritty story about stupid criminals who come to a sticky end. It's a good bit over average and one I'd watch again. I got the Blu-ray from Kino Lorber at one of their sales. The picture looks good and there's a decent commentary.
Dark Intruder 1965 Written by Barré Lyndon, directed by Harvey Hart. Lyndon's real name was Alfred Edgar, he was a British guy who moved to Hollywood in 1940. He wrote a good number of films but I've only seen a handful. I did like Hangover Square, Man In The Attic and The Man Who Could Cheat Death. Harvey Hart directed several movies but he was mostly a TV director. He worked on a lot of shows, mostly just one episode. You might have seen his work on The Wild Wild West, Seaway, Ben Casey, Star Trek, T.H.E. Cat, Peyton Place, The Mod Squad, Mannix, The Starlost and a lot more. Hart directed 5 episodes of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour. Dark Intruder was made as the pilot of a series called The Black Cloak. It was to replace The Alfred Hitchcock Hour as it was coming to an end. The Black Cloak didn't sell so the TV movie was padded out to 59 mins and released as a film. It was part of a double bill with William Castle's I Saw What You Did.
Leslie Nielsen plays a playboy and supernatural investigator in 1890 San Francisco. He gets involved in a strange murder case involving friends of his. Mark Richman plays the friend who's having some issues before his wedding. There's also someone murdering people, the killer leaves a statue as a calling card. The statue changes a bit after every killing, revealing more of the Sumerian demon each time.
I thought it was a fun bit of business. It has a nice supernatural story with a decent monster. It's short but there's a fair bit of story. I bought the BLU-Ray at the Kino Lorber sale that's just ending, I was glad I did. I'll watch it again someday and I'll also try to listen to the commentary some time.
Secret Of The Incas 1954 Based on The Legend Of The Incas by Sydney Boehm, screenplay by Sydney Boehm and Ranald MacDougall, directed by Jerry Hopper. An American adventure film that was set and filmed in Peru. The film spends a good bit of time at Machu Picchu. The scenery looks nice.
Charlton Heston plays American Harry Steele, a shady guide who lives in Cusco, Peru. He hopes to make a big score with a fabulous Inca treasure. Nicole Maurey is a Romanian defector who's on the run from Romanian officials. Lucky for Charlton the Romanian guy chasing her has a small plane, just the thing for Charlton to steal and fly to Machu Picchu so he can gather up the treasure and escape to the US.
Things don't work out too well for Charlton, local thug Thomas Mitchell makes himself a partner in the heist. Thomas was a tired old man who had a belly full of failure when he horns in on Charlton. Things get worse for him before the movie ends. When they get to Machu Picchu they meet Robert Young and some other scientists who are digging in the same tomb Charlton wants a crack at.
The Wikipedia and the IMDb have people saying the movie was an inspiration for Indiana Jones character. He wears a costume that could have inspired Indy but the character is not very much like Indy. He's a bit of a cheat who's mostly in it for himself. You can check out his fate, link in the title. You might enjoy it, especially if you like 50s adventure films. It's nice when they have a good budget and can film on location. I was glad to have picked up the Kino-Lorber DVD. I liked it and hope to watch it again sometime.
Russ Meyer's Vixen 1968 Written by Russ Meyer and Anthony James Ryan, directed and produced by Russ Meyer.
I didn't find much to like about Vixen, she's a racist. The movie is about her and her husband Tom. They run a resort in the Canadian wilderness. People visit, Vixen screws them, they leave. She even has sex with her brother.
Sadly the film is dull and uninteresting. The script is poor and so are the actors. The sex scenes aren't sexy. Even the attempted sky jacking is dull. I wouldn't want to watch it again.