PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

The Naked Witch 1961

Larry Buchanan is a Texas film maker who works in the world of low-low-budgets. The Naked Witch is his third feature, it was shot in 1960, copyright 1961, released in 1964. Larry wrote and directed with Claude Alexander. Claude is also the producer. It cost 8 grand and made 80 grand in the box office and Larry got to make some more films.

A university student travels to Luckenbach Texas to study the Germans who live there. He stays at the inn, talks to people, looks around and accidentally releases a witch. The witch has some vengeance in mind, she was betrayed by the ancestor of the family that owns the inn. She kills a couple of the family before the student puts a stop to that.

There's not much story, it's lacklusterly told, and not that interesting to look at either. For a movie marketed as "an Adult picture" there's hardly any nudity and the witch's seductive dancing falls short. Some of the nudity is covered up with a black strip. Generally it just wasn't that exciting, I might never get around to it again, though I'll keep the Something Weird disc as it has another movie on it. I did like some of the Larry Buchanan commentary and there's a interview with Claude Alexander. There's some short of various quality and interest and quite a number of trailers.

OSS 117: Mission To Tokyo 1966

This time OSS 117 is in Tokyo for his spying. Some nasty bastard is attacking the American Naval bases with his secret weapon. He wants some cash or he'll attack the US again. OSS 117: Mission To Tokyo came out in 1966 and Frederick Stafford returns as OSS 117. Michel Boisrond is the new director and there are the usual gang of writers. There's the usual sort of running about and punching people. There's plenty of pretty girls and some of them get killed. Sad, huh. Oh well, that's the spy biz. Snoopin' today, in a dumpster tomorrow. I don't think the series ever gets to the level of the best of the James Bond series but they are watchable and a fair bit of fun. As with the others, I enjoyed the scenery in the countryside and in the city. One of the reasons I like some of the modern action thrillers like Taken, they travel to places I never would. In the OSS 117 it's like I've got a time machine back to the 1960s. US residents can pick up the Blu-ray set from Hamilton Books for 20 smackaroonies. That saves about 13 bucks over Amazon. For some reason Hamilton Books doesn't ship to the rest of the world. It is expensive, shipping to other countries, from the US, it seems cheaper to ship stuff from other countries to the US.

Married Too Young 1962

Married Too Young is a 1962 film with a bit of Ed Wood in it. He was asked by the producers to finish a script. He got no credit on the film but the IMDb lists him. The screenplay credit goes to Nat Tanchuck with George Moskov as the director. There's speculation that the Ed connection is bogus. It's the kind of story he might write, in fact he did. The Violent Years was a 1956 "young adults in trouble" picture by the same producers, Ed wrote TVY and The Sinister Urge for them.

That's Marianna Hill, she plays Marla, she's had a fairly good career from 1960 to 1988 but I can't remember ever hearing of her before. Harold Lloyd Jr plays Tommy Blaine and Jana Lund plays Helen Newton. They are the teen couple who elope and get married across the state line. They go to live with Helen's parents and you can imagine how much fun that would be for a young married couple. Tommy works in a garage and his boss tries to help him out with a raise. Tommy and Helen move out and have some bills for company. Tommy takes an offer from a shady pal of Marla's and joins him in the world of stolen automobiles. Tommy's not smart. Don't be like Tommy. Especially since they get rumbled on his first hot car delivery. Of course he's taken Helen along. They get shot at and the car drives off a cliff. Luckily the couple live and their parents have to go to court to get lectured on what shit parents they are. It's all pretty ludicrous. The version on the DVD is the movie version, there's also a TV version with a slight different ending, it's what's at the end of the movie at the link in the title above. It's no great shakes but it's better than average. 

The Violent Years is about a gang of bored teen girls who decide to dress up as boys and rob gas stations. It came out in 1956, Ed Wood wrote the script, William Morgan directed, it was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000. It's not that great, I kind of got bored with seeing it again. I've seen it on MST3K 3 or 4 times. It was nice to have a copy of the movie with out the guys yakkin' on.

Girl In Gold Boots 1968

I picked up the Ted V Mikels movie Girl In Gold Boots even though I had seen it before, it was episode 1002 of Mystery Science Theater 3000. Even though it's not that great a movie, the Alpha Video DVD has a commentary by Ted and I thought I've give that a whirl. Like his movie, the commentary turns out to be kind of poor. Ted forgets to talk much of the movie, too bad, I've seen him talking before and he might have some good stories to tell. Oh well, them's the breaks. While looking for an image of the poster I found that the movie had been released on DVD by Image Entertainment with a commentary by Ted. Alpha Video isn't a company that's known for extras so I'm guessing they just bought it along with the movie.

The story is about a waitress called Michelle who works in a roadside diner with her father, she decides to take off with a guy in a car with a gun named Buzz when her father gets too abusive. Michelle wants to go to LA and be a go-go dancer. They give a biker named Critter a lift to LA. Buzz has a sister who's a dancer in a shitty club. The manager is her boyfriend, he hires Michelle and Critter. Then he dumps the sister to groom Michelle. Buzz wants to get into the manager's drug biz, to prove he's criminal he brings manager man a big score. Stealing drugs from a jail cell. Things don't work out so well for the sister, she's off her head on drugs and booze. You need to be tough to be a go-go dancer in LA. It's looks bad for Michelle until Critter rescues her. The story was sort of familiar to other  downward spiral movies. At least there was some go-go dancing. The IMDb gives it a 2.2 and I gave it a three. Mostly that was for all the footage of the streets of LA and the trip to the Haunted House. Why Buzz, Michelle and Critter would stop at the Haunted House first thing when they arrive in LA is beyond me. Only in Ted's imagination is there sense there. It could be why almost 47% of the 3425 votes are a 1. That's some hate right there. On the other end of the voting spectrum, 525 votes were a 10. An odd imbalance. Not too sorry I bought it, it was a 3 buck clearance item and I had a coupon, but I wish the commentary had been a bit better.

Confessions Of An Opium Eater 1962

Confessions Of An Opium Eater is a 1962 Vincent Price film. It's got a script by Robert Hill, who loosely adapted Thomas De Quincey's book of the same name, the director is Albert Zugsmith. Albert produced twice as many films as he directed, of the 18 he directed I can't say I've seen any of them. Albert did produce Touch Of Evil and The Incredible Shrinking Man.

Vincent plays Gilbert De Quincey and he's somehow involved with a Tong. He lands in San Francisco and winds up in a Tong war over kidnapped women being sold for opium. There's a bit of action, some intrigue, a bit of torture, the usual stuff you might expect. Vincent has a bit of an opium trip at one point, not quite as deftly handled as it might have been. I liked the sets and costumes and it kept me interest to the end. A weird bit of cinema that entertained me.

All Neat In Black Stockings 1969

All Neat In Black Stockings is another in Network's The British Film series. I pick them randomly and hope for the best. Did all right with this one, the story was fairly good, it looked pretty good too.

The movie is based on a novel by Jane Gaskell, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Hugh Whitemore, Christopher Morahan is the director. I never read any of Jane's novels though I remember seeing her fantasy series all over the used bookstores. High has written quite a bit of TV and some movies, some of the titles are familiar but I can't say I've seen any of the productions. He's mostly written dramas in the UK so they're less likely to get to me. Kind of the same for the director, know of a few of his works but haven't seen anything.

Victor Henry plays Ginger and Jack Shepherd plays his mate Dwyer. They live next to each other in tiny one room flats and they're always sharing with each other. Especially the girls they bring home. Soon as we meet them there turning out the lights on their dates and switching rooms. Love 'em and leave 'em types.

That's all going well, until Ginger meets Susan George, she's playing a gal called Jill. Ginger is quite taken with her black fishnet stockings and he starts working to get with her. After he gets close to her, he thinks she's more special than the regular birds, he decides to wait a bit. Of course, his life style and some help from Dwyer, ruin that and poor Jill's got a bun in the oven.

It's all woolly thinking and poor decision making to the end. Most everyone is unhappy, except Dwyer, he doesn't give a shit about anyone. I had a few laughs, it's always fun to see someone dig themselves a hole. Good script for the most part, bit predictable. The characters help make up for anything lacking. It's a good reminder that others have screwed up their lives much worse than most of us have. Good to remember.

Alice In Acidland 1969

My current interest in seeing adaptations of Alice In Wonderland and the lack of sense in my noggin came together in Alice In Acidland. It's a 1969 anti-hippy movie written by Gertrude Steen and directed by Donn Greer under the name John Donne. Donn's is also the narrator. It's the kind of movie that needs a narrator, it has no recorded dialog. Sheri Jackson plays Alice Trenton, she provides some narration herself, and Alice's just started going to college. She meets some women and gets involved with their drug and sex parties. She has lesbian sex and takes some acid that destroys her mind. All in 55 minutes from Something Weird Video.

The DVD box is right, this is no fairy tale, though it's as heavy handed as the worst fairy tale. It's like the preceding anti-drug exploitation films like Reefer Madness and The Cocaine Fiends, not very truthful and full of fear. It's laughable in it's clumsiness. There's some nudity but it's not a sexy sort of film, kind of a challenging wank.

There's not much going on in the movie, Alice goes to a house for a pool party, then she's back for another indoor party. The last 10 minutes of the film are in color, depicting Alice's trip to madness. It's mostly slow zooms in and out of naked bodies with images dissolving and overlapping. It's all pretty dull.

Smoke And Flesh is a 1968 film  by Joe Mangine, he's the writer and director. It's a slightly better film than the other film on the disc. I do like that Something Weird fills up their discs with another movie or two, plus some extras.

That biker is a guy named Turk, we follow him in his efforts to score some weed for a party. There's some nice shots of New York. He gets his weed and heads home. Soon people arrive.

Everything is going great, especially in the corner where they are playing strip tease with slot car racers. Then the bikers come. Turk lets them in because they said they were invited by the woman who just entered. Turk believes them until the woman tells him of an altercation with one of the bikers. When the biker's get too annoying Turk slips some acid in the head guy's wine. He starts to have a bad trip, images from the guy's POV flash as they cut from a positive shot to a negative shot. Not quite as imaginative a trip as the Alice film in that regard. Anyway, the flashes send the bikers home and the party goes back to having fun. There's a bit of nudity here and there but nothing too naughty. It was fairly entertaining and I'd watch it again.

There's a collection of trailers in the extras and a short film called Aphrodisiac! The Sexual Secret Of Marijuana. I'd seen it before somewhere.It's a documentary on the sexual use of pot. There are man on the street interviews, some bit of history, and dramatizations of the sexual effects weed has on some people. There's hardcore footage here and John Holmes is one of the people that gets some of that sexual effect. It's kind of fun.

The Hang Up 1969

The Hang Up is the fifth of the films in the 2nd volume of Vinegar Syndrome's 5 Films 5 Years Blu-ray set. It came out in 1969 and John Hayes is the writer and director. I've seen his Grave Of The Vampire but nothing else on his IMDb listing is familiar. Tony Vorno plays a vice cop who busts a fake cop who's blackmailing gay men who pick up people to fuck. Tony's asked by an arrested politician to keep him out of the report but Tony, hard as fuck, says no. Soon after Tony rescues a young woman and takes her home. He falls for her but he's been set up by the politician, the girl is only 17 and he's got pictures of them having sex. It gets worse as the rest of the movie plays out. It's a decent film but a bit far fetched. I found Tony's fall laughable, he's such an asshole. I'd watch this one again but who knows when.

She 1965

I don't remember seeing the 1965 Hammer film She before. I recently picked up a 21 disc set of Hammer Films from the UK. Each movie is on it's own disc and the set was about 42 bucks. She was the first disc in the set so I watched that first. It's directed by Robert Daly and David T Chandler wrote the screenplay. It's adapted from H Rider Haggard's novel of the same name. I tried reading Haggard in the 70s but I didn't get too far. Many times I prefer a movie version of a book.

Ursula Andress plays She, that's her in the golden hat. Left to right are Bernard Cribbins, Peter Cushing and John Richardson is Leo. She's right hand priest, played by Christopher Lee, finds John to be the spitting image of Callicrates, the man She murdered 2000 years ago. She's immortal and she want to send John through a magical fire that is supposed to return Callicrates to life.

Poor John's mind will have to go and he thinks he should too. Peter and Bernard help him get out of the clutches of the ancient queen. It was an OK story, the sets and locations worked well, good actors, still only a 6 for me. I got bored of all the walking and camel riding, sometimes it seemed less than interesting. I did get to the end and was happy enough. I would watch it again, I plan to go though this box again someday. Glad I picked it up.

Blood Bath 1966

The most interesting film in the 4 film Blu-ray set of Blood Bath isn't one of the features but the Tim Lucas documentary that goes with them. It's the main extra in this 2 disc set and it really illustrates why I find Roger Corman so frustrating. Occasionally he's an entertaining film maker but sometimes he's so cheap it grates to the bone. Tim has spent a good bit of work researching Blood Bath and it's history, it's an admirable bit of film making. Not Blood Bath, Tim's documentary The Trouble With Titian Revisited. It's well worth seeing.

Operacija Ticijan is the Yugoslavian title for Operation: Titian, that's the film Roger Corman invested in back in 1963. According to Jack Hill in the documentary Roger had a habit of looking for unpaid films at developers and he'd buy them. I hadn't heard that before but I knew he had bought some Russian SF films and worked the special effect shots into new scenes shot in the US.

In Yugoslavia Roger put up $20K and transport for the 3 people he supplied, the Yugoslavians would feed and house them while they were working on the film. William Campbell and Patrick Magee were in front of the camera and Francis Ford Coppola was the script supervisor and English coach. They were there nearly 5 months, William said he had a great time, he meet his wife there.

The Yugoslavian producers had planned to film in English and Roger would get the US rights. What he got was a film that he didn't think he could sell to the US distributors. Money well spent, Roger. He reedited the film and changed the dialog a bit and sold it to TV as Portrait Of Terror.

In 1964 Jack Hill got hired by Roger to make something of the film. He turned a murder mystery involving a stolen painting into a vampire film called Blood Bath. He shot a lot of new footage and worked that into the film. It ran 62 minutes and never got released. Stephanie Rothman was then hired to shoot more footage and she eventually turned in a 69 minute film that played on a double feature with Queen Of Blood. QOB was another film Roger had bought from the Russians and edited in new footage. Additional footage was added to Blood Bath to pad it out to 80 minutes, it was sold to TV as Track Of The Vampire.

All four versions of the film are on the two discs. Operation: Titian was watchable but a bit dull, Portrait In Terror cut the travelogue like opening to the film and sped up the story. Blood Bath was entertaining enough, Track Of The Vampire was longer but weaker. I was starting to lose interest during the last film. As I said earlier I enjoyed the Tim Lucas look at the film history and would recommend that over the features. It's a nice package, there's a booklet of essays and a poster, but there's really nothing special about any of the movies.