PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Friday Night Movies 513

In Argentina our first feature was called La venganza del sexo but here in the US it goes by The Curious Dr Humpp. It's a 1967 film and it's surprisingly packed with bare naked boobs and butts. As the movie opens an ugly man like creature shambles about kidnapping people. He brings them to Dr Humpp who lives in a big mansion. The Doc pumps the victims full of drugs to control their minds. He then gives them an aphrodisiac and they hump like bunnies. He's got a big collection of people, some hippies, a couple of lesbians and pair of couples that he keeps going and going and going. When they've been at it for a while Dr Humpp extracts some fluid from them. He needs whatever it is to keep himself alive. He'd been experimented on by a scientist that now resides in Humpp's lab. He's directing Humpp in his experiments. He can't physically help because of his handicap. You'll have to guess what the handicap is or watch the movie at the link above.

  

That's the Doc on the upper left and his henchman on the upper right. The other picture on the left is of the hero and heroine. He's a reporter and she's a stripper. She's kidnapped and the reporter joins up with the cops to look for her. The reporter gets kidnapped by Dr Humpp and has to figure out how to get away and save the other victims. It's mostly an entertaining movie. There's a typical 1950's horror plot with the mad scientist, his disfigured henchman, and their naughty plans. The cops and the reporter save the girl and things have a fairly happy ending. In fact the film is filled with happy endings. Glad to have seen it but I wouldn't bother picking one up.

The Fly was our second feature, it's the original 1958 film with Vincent Price, and we watched the BluRay. The movie was written by James Clavell and directed by Kurt Neumann. Clavell would go on to write some best selling novels that I never read. He also wrote and directed films, you might have seen The Great Escape or To Sir With Love. Neumann directed some Tarzan films, Rocketship X-M, Kronos and the 1958 Machete.

Vincent plays a businessman with an electronics company in Montreal. His brother, David Hedison under the name Al Hedison, is a scientist who works in his basement lab. David's wife, played by Patricia Owens, comes over to Vincent's house with a harrowing tale. She's murdered David, stamped his head and arm flat in a hydraulic press. Vincent calls the police and they send an Inspector, played by Herbert Marshall, who can't believe the story Patricia tells. Who would? Even when the truth comes out, they have to lie to the rest of the world.

It's an entertaining film that I've seen several times over the years. I have a DVD with the sequel that I should get out. There's a third sequel that is ok but not as good as the first movie. The 1986 Cronenberg film isn't one that I found I liked to re-watch all that much.

The Glass Wall 1953

The Glass Wall is a 1953 film, starring Vittorio Gassman and  Gloria Grahame, that's part of the same DVD set as Bad For Each Other. It's a 2 disc, 4 movie set called Bad Girls Of Film Noir. So far the girls aren't very bad and Bad For Each Other is hardly noir. I got this disc at the library and have the second disc in the set on the way. For unknown reasons the library will put some multi disc sets out as separate DVDs to borrow and other multi disc sets are available complete. It doesn't matter if it's a film set or a TV set. It's one of these things that I'm sort of curious about but really don't want to know why because that information would spoil the mystery. The Glass Wall is written by Ivan Tors and Maxwell Shane. Tors produced and Shane directed. Tors would go on to produce a lot of TV programs and Shane wrote a lot of low-budget pictures. Some of them might be good but I don't remember seeing any of them.

 I've never been a fan of Gassman, not for any negative reason, I just don't have any interest in his US film, because they are mostly dramas, and haven't seen hardly anything of his Italian work. He's pretty good here. Gloria Grahame can be seen in several good films including It's a Wonderful Life and Song Of The Thin Man.

Vittorio plays a Hungarian who has stowed away on a ship to America. He wants to come to America but they won't let him in because he broke the law getting here. He claims that he qualifies for entry under an exception for those who helped Allied soldiers during the war. He was in a concentration camp and after he escaped he helped a US paratrooper hide from the Germans. All he knows about the man is that his name is Tom and he's a clarinet player who lives in New York City. It's not good enough for the authorities and they plan to send him back. He escapes and has an adventure in New York City.

Vittorio helps Gloria escape from the police when she tries to steal a coat from a coat rack in a café. She lets him rest in her room in a rooming house. The landlady wants her back rent and Vittorio gives her the last of his money. When he goes to leave he falls and Gloria takes him back inside. The landlady, snooping on the stairs, sees and later her drunken stupid son comes by to cause trouble. Vittorio knocks him out and they escape. All through the night the pair run about NYC looking for Tom. The police are also looking for Vittorio and they dog his every step. There had been an article on Vittorio's deportation in the paper and that helps out in the end.

There's a pretty engaging story, some good actors and plenty of 1950's street life in New York. It's a nice tight story that moves along pretty speedily. It more than makes up for the rather familiar Bad For Each Other. I'll be getting along to those other two movies as soon as the library coughs them up.

Bad For Each Other 1953

 

Bad for Each Other is a 1953 film Charlton Heston, Dianne Foster and Lizabeth Scott. I saw it as part of a double feature with The Glass Wall from a DVD set of Noir films. It's directed by Irving Rapper and it's written by Irving Wallace and Horace McCoy. Rapper directed a good number of films that I have heard about, like Now, Voyager 1942, The Glass Menagerie 1950 and The Christine Jorgensen Story 1970. I don't recognize much by Wallace but I did see the 3 episodes of Have Gun, Will Travel. McCoy is better know, especially the novel They Shoot Horses, Don't They.

Charlton returns to Coalville Pennsylvania after being away for ten years in the military. His brother died in a mine accident before the movie starts. He learns his brother, the mine safety engineer, had been on the take and caused the accident. He tells the wealthy mine owner he wants to pay his brothers debts and the mine owner tries to talk him out of it. Charlton meets the rich spoilt daughter of the mine owner. She's trouble and he wants some. He quits the army to go into medical practice with the local doctor to the rich in nearby Pittsburg. He prescribes sugar pills and charm. The rich ladies eat it up. Eventually he learns he should be doctoring for the people and he moves back to Coalville. It's kind of formulaic and not very noir but still fairly enjoyable. There's a link to the movie in the title above. Here's a bit from the Wikipedia.

The plot of the 1938 film, The Citadel, was reshuffled and simplified for Bad for Each Other. In The Citadel, Robert Donat plays a doctor who forgoes treating miners in Wales in order to become a highly paid society doctor in London. The mine-rescue sequence in Bad for Each Other is near-identical to the equivalent sequence in The Citadel.

What I Read In July 2014

Eight novels for the month is about average for me of late. I hope to eventually retire and read the shit out of everything in my house. My mom's been retired for a good number of years and she still knocks out a couple of hundred books a year. Nothing much that I would read but there you go.

   

The Scarecrow Of Oz by L Frank Baum has some new characters in Cap'n Bill and Trot. They journey to Oz where they meet some strange people and Scarecrow. They join together to overthrow cruel King Krewl of Jinxland. Cap'n Bill and Trot had previously appeared in two other novels by Baum, The Sea Fairies and Sky Island. It was entertaining enough. I got a laugh or two. I've got a few novels to finish before I see if I can find the way too heavy collection of the complete run of L Frank Oz novels a new home. I keep this massive book in my desk at work because steel is the only thing that will hold it up for me to read.

Septimus Heap 7 - Fyre by Angie Sage is the 7th book and the last of the series. There's a whole lot of trouble in the kingdom and lots of things need to be set right. Sage's writing moves along nicely and there's usually something interesting happening all the time.  I've really enjoyed the series and would recommend them quite highly. There's plenty of great characters but Septimus stands out.

The Sisters Grimm 8 - The Inside Story by Michael Buckley finds Sabrina, Daphne, and Puck running about in the Book of Everafter. It's a place where fairy tales are stored and enchanted characters can change their destinies. They chase the Master through stories changing stuff to save their baby brother. The Editor, and his gang of chompy Revisers, threaten the children if they don't stick to what's written. By threaten I mean eaten. The trio chase their quarry and meet Alice, Mowgli, Jack the Giant Killer, Hansel and Gretel, the Headless Horseman, and others. I'm ready for the next one.

   

Of Giants And Ice - The Ever Afters by Shelby Bach is about a teen girl named Rory Landon She gets to attend the Ever Afters school program. It's a secret group that finds kids with magical abilities and gives them dangerous things to do. Everyone has some fun except for the giants, dragons and evil folk who all get their asses kicked. It was fun enough but not going to be a keeper. I got it from a library sale for under a buck so I'm not going to be out much. I haven't looked to see if there are more in the series but having this written down might remind me to do so in a year or two. Since I started using the local library to get books I have been going back and looking around for book series that I started and hadn't gotten very far on. A lot of times you can't find a used copy and a new copy just isn't worth it for a lot of books.

The Return Of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs is the Whitman version of the novel. Tarzan is in the US when the book starts. He had fallen for Jane but she had already promised to marry Tarzan's cousin Clayton. Tarzan has a bit of an adventure, he becomes a special agent for a Count and later the Chief of the Waziri. Clayton has a bad time, freeing Jane to hook up with the ape man. Clayton also reveals he had tricked Tarzan out of his inheritance. I read the original novel back in the 1970s and enjoyed it but I'd stopped at the fourth in the series. Somewhere in the house I have a box of Tarzan novels that have Richard Powers covers. I should read those, scan the covers, and get rid of the books.

The Sisters Grimm 9 - the Council Of Mirrors by Michael Buckley features the final battle between the Grimm family and the Master. I bet you can figure out who wins that fight. It's a nice wrap up of the series. I'd probably want to re-read this series sometime in the future. I see the library has the audio books. I should give a listen to them in the car now that I have a CD player in there.

 

Star Trek - The Three Minute Universe by Barbara Paul was one of the better Star Trek novels. The Sackers are a race of beings that make people sick to be around them. They smell awful and their have loose bags of transparent skin with bugs crawling underneath it. They kill everyone on a planet to steal a device that rips a hole in space which opens a door to another universe. Nothing good can come of this and the Enterprise crew has to go put a stop to this. I liked the book all the way through but I'm not going to keep it. I wouldn't bother re-reading it so no worries.

The Giant Slayer by Iain Lawrence is about a bunch of kids in a polio ward that tell stories that reveals a lot about them. There's a bit of fantasy element in their stories but nothing in the world of the characters. I don't need that allegorical stuff. Not something that I should have bothered with, it's not going to be a keeper.

Not a bad bunch of novels for the most part. I'm really only keeping two of them and those Whitman's might hit the road sometime in the future. You can't keep everything forever. Unless you build your coffin out of books. Nicely biodegradable.

Collectible Minifigs Series 13

Series 13 of the Minfigures came out about the beginning of January. I hadn't been paying much attention to their arrival until I found a box at Target. I had seen advance pictures and I wouldn't mind a Hot Dog guy and the Unicorn girl. The first package I picked up at Target was the Hot Dog Guy. I made a trip to the LEGO store a few days later and picked up a bunch more. Somehow I missed the Lady Cyclops even though I had found one and put it in the stack of keepers. I returned a week later and couldn't find one. Third time lucky and last friday I filled all the slots in the set. As usual there are 16 new figures of a fairly good variety. It would be nice not to get a sport figure but it's extra nice to get 2 costume figures. The set is a bit shy on accessories, only the snake and the saw stand out.

That's the whole set in a big gulp.

Classic King has a pearl gold crown and a sword, and a nice cape in a couple of colors. I only got the one, I alreayd have a few other kings in my stock. Good beard on that guy though and a nice mustache on the Sheriff. I got a couple of him for the mustashe and not so much for his gun and wanted poster. I really thought the Unicorn Girl was the cutest figure of the set. I was feeling my way to through the bin at the LEGO Store looking for the figures I wanted and a lot of people came by wanting to find that figure. They weren't having much luck the days I got there. I got three of her.

I got 5 of the Snake Charmer, mostly for the snake and the turban. Costume has limited use. Kind of the same for the Goblin. I wound up with 2 when I picked a couple of bags at random. The bag will come in handy but I already have too many of the big old sword. The Paleontologist lady is nice. I have a lot of the small bone already but the little fossil is neat. Nice costume too. I might get a couple more since I only have the one.

 

I got one each of the Alien Trooper and the Egyptian Warrior. I do like the shield printing and both guys are nicely costumed. It would be nice to have a series of ancient Egyptian figures. I got a couple of the Carpenter. He has a nice printed board and a saw. He also has a helmet with hair peaking out of it.

I got 5 of the Evil Wizard because he looks pretty darn cool. The cape comes in two parts and has nice printing. That figure is the easiest figure to feel in the package bacause of the big sloped brick used for the bottom of the figure.

 

I got a single of the Fencer, nice but uninteresting. The Samurai lady is ok. There's a bit of simple printing for the torso that I liked. I have plenty of samurai swords. I got too many of the Disco Diva, 3, I could have stopped with one. Maybe I can use the roller skates one day. It doesn't really matter, I can always trade or sell him in the future.

 

Hot Dog Man was worth getting a couple of them. The Lady Cyclops and the Galaxy were only worth getting a single of each. There's not much going for either of them.

I'm already seeing advance pictures of the next series. It looks like a few of them will be worth picking up. I was talking to one of the guys in TwinLUG about the series and he figured that $3.99 a figure was his price point. He's boycotting them. I'm nearly there myself and probably would stop if they went higher. That or be more selective and only pick up the ones I liked the best. Based on that criterion I might have only picked up three from this series.

Science Fiction Sunday 321

Mindwarp is the second part of the season long story arc called The Trial Of A Timelord. It's the 23rd season and the 4 part story first aired March 4-26 1986. Colin Baker is the 6th Doctor and Nicola Bryant plays Peri Brown for the last time. It's directed by Ron Jones and written by Philip Martin.

The trial continues with another story from the Doctor's life. This one finds the Tardis on Thoros Beta where the amphibious creatures called the Mentors live. We had seen Sil in an episode the season before. The nicest thing you could say about him is that he's a greedy little prick. He's helping his leader Kiv put his brain in a  new body. Brian Blessed plays one of the test subjects that Kiv's doctor has in his lab. He gets out and there's the usual running about and getting caught. The Doctor appears to be a traitor but he's got a plan to find out what Kiv and Sil are up to.

Kiv's doctor wants to put Kiv's brain in Peri's head. He does and she dies when Brian blasts her to kill Kiv. In the commentary Nicola Bryant talks about wanting to have a nice big scene for the end of her character but I didn't think it was much of one. Eric Saward makes a comment in the making of featurette that he thought this was one of the best episodes of the season. I sure don't think the same as him. It's all pretty stupid. Not a story I was much interested in for some reason.

Commentary with Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant and Philip Martin. There's a making of, a Then and Now on the locations, some deleted and extended scenes, trails and continuity, info track and the photo gallery. There's a 2 minute clip from the commentary of episode 14 in the story that tells that Peri is still alive and living with Brian's character. Nicola hadn't ever seen the series after she had left and she was kind of disappointed to hear that she was alive. There's a clip from a Children In Need special and a short Doctor Who Parody with Lenny Henry as the Doctor.

Friday Night Movies 512

Our first feature is The Vengeance Of Fu Manchu, the 3rd film with Christopher Lee playing the evil Chinese villain Fu Manchu. It's a 1967 British German film that was partially filmed at the Shaw Brothers Studio in Hong Kong. It certainly meant more actual Asians in the film than when they were filmed in England. Douglas Wilmer plays Nayland Smith and Howard Marion-Crawford plays Dr Petrie. Fu Manchu survived the last film and he's holed up in his castle in a remote part of China. His plan is to surgically turn a hypnotized Asian guy into a copy of Nayland Smith. He kidnaps Smith and leaves the copy which has been programmed to murder. Smith is locked up, put on trial and sentenced to death. Fu will kill the real Smith, now in his clutches, when the hanging of the copy happens. Luckily for Smith he's got some pals who come to rescue him. There's some fun stuff with lots of running around and some action. Fu is a real good villain, and the Shaw Brothers studio helps add a nice bit of production value. The story isn't the greatest but the characters all help carry it along. I enjoyed it well enough and I'd watch it, and the series, again.

I got Odd Thomas from the library on a whim. I didn't know anything about it. It's based on the first book of the Odd Thomas series by Dean Koontz. I haven't read any Koontz since he was a science fiction writer in the 1970s. I wrote him a fan letter back then and he wrote back telling me he was going to stop writing SF and write thrillers instead. He figured to make more money. I never read anything of his since. I'm just not much of a thriller reader but his books are highly popular. The movie is directed, written and co-produced by Stephen Sommers. Odd is a guy with the ability to see dead people. Distressed ghosts come to him for help and he chases down their killers. There are some other invisible creatures called broachs that feed on death. They usually don't appear unless there's going to be some large event ending in carnage. Odd has a dream about a bunch of people in red bowling shirts getting shot at an event of some sort. He spends the movie trying to figure out what's happening and who's responsible. It didn't make any money, the opening box office was a half million bucks on a $27,000,000 cost. It got slammed by the critics but the fans seemed to have come to like it better than them. It scores a 6.8 on the IMDb and half that from the critics on Rotten Tomatoes. I'm somewhere in the middle, I found it interesting enough while it was playing out. I liked the story and the characters though I'm not thinking I need a copy. I wasn't too happy with part of the ending but that's probably Dean's fault as it's in the book too. It makes me think I did the right thing in not reading any of Dean's books but the ending does leave Odd the ability to move along and help ghosts in other places. Odd's story continues in the 6 novel sequels but based on the poor box office I doubt that we will see them turned into films. The final book in the series just came out about 2 weeks ago. I read the synopsis of the other books and the story just gets sadder and sadder but Odd does save a lot of people.

40091 Thanksgiving Turkey

The Lego Store has 40091 Thanksgiving Turkey on sale for $4.99 which is half price. That makes those 125 parts about 4 cents each. Not too bad. There hasn't been much by way of clearance this year. Even though the stores had a poor christmas last year LEGO sold well and there wasn't much left to mark down. I did get a bunch of the Creator Forest Animals set at Target and parted all those out. I have stopped at the LEGO store 3 times in the last couple of weeks to pick up a set of the Collectible Minifigures Series 13 and I noticed that the little turkey set was on clearance. I have picked up a couple each time I was there.

Bring LEGO® fun to your Thanksgiving celebrations!

Add LEGO® fun to your holiday celebrations with the Thanksgiving Turkey! Place the Pilgrim hat on the Turkey’s head for a traditional touch. Spread the tail feathers or move them up and down. Pose the wings and feet and adjust the mouth for cheeky expressions. Makes a great seasonal gift for all LEGO fans.

• Features posable tail feathers, wings, mouth and feet
• Includes a Pilgrim hat
• Spread the tail feathers or move them up and down
• Adjust the mouth for different expressions
• Place the Pilgrim hat on the Turkey’s head
• Makes a great seasonal gift for all LEGO® fans
• Measures over 4” (12cm) high, 4” (10cm) wide and 4” (10cm) deep

   

I thought it made a nice little turkey but I wasn't interested in that. I liked the mix of parts and colors. I just parted out the sets and put all the nice parts in stock. There a good bit of reddish brown and many of them are slopes. There are 14 cheese slopes in 4 colors and 5 of the 1x2 brick with two studs on the side. I like those and stock pile them. They come in handy a lot. There's 4 of those 1x2 curved piece and 2 in light blay. The 2x2 round tile has 1 in black and 2 in light blay. The rest of the parts are common enough but useable. Sometimes you need a lot of one part to make something.

Diana Rigg - Minikillers

Here's the second. The IMDb lists this as from 1969. It's German, color and twice as long as the B&W short. It's got a bit more plot and Diana in a bikini. The quality of the image is poor but watchable. Here's are links to the two parts.

Part 1

Part 2

Diana Rigg - The Diadem

 

This is a German silent short film that features Diana Rigg. It's styled after The Avengers with Diana running about and occasionally fighting some guys. There's a bit of sneaking around but not much plot. It's just under 13 minutes and kind of dull. The image is poor but watchable. It's mostly for the novelty value that anyone would want to watch it.