PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Eye Of The Devil 1967

Eye Of The Devil 1967 Based on the novel The Day Of The Arrow by Robin Estridge, screenplay by Robin Estridge and Dennis Murphy, direction by J Lee Thompson. J Lee has directed a few films I recognize but I haven't seen that many of them. The Guns Of Navarone, Cape Fear, Taras Bulba, John Goldfarb Please Come Home, The Chairman, Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes, Battle For The Planet Of The Apes and The Reincarnation Of Peter Proud. A lot of big studio thrillers and action films. This is a big studio horror film, think Rosemary's Baby, for those that don't like horror films too much.

David Niven is a owner of a vineyard in France. He lives in Paris and the vineyard is in the countryside. There grapes have been poor for three years in a row. David is called back to the Château. The lady in thepicture above is Sharon Tate, she's a witch who lives on the estate. David Hemmings plays her brother, he's a mental case with a bow and arrow.

Deborah Kerr plays David's wife, she's been left at home with the kids, David did not want her coming there. She can't stay home, she's a nervous type, she bring the children a day or so later. The first thing that happens is she's shot at by David Hemmings.

Sharon slinks about and Deborah really dislikes her, she wants David to toss them off the estate but he won't and won't explain why. We know he's got some sort of connection with them but it's a while before the whole story comes out. Turns out the estate needs a blood sacrifice to make the grapes grow strong. David's the man for the job and that's pretty much how it ends.

The movies B&W and looks nice. Sadly there's nothing nice about a family that uses witchcraft to stay afloat, especially one where the head of the family is the target for sacrifice. If you're going to be evil you'd think you'd sacrifice someone else. Once I found out how stupid the plan was I would in contempt of the family and the story. Poor marks from me. I doubt that I would watch it again.

The Interrupted Journey 1949

The Interrupted Journey 1949 Original story and screenplay by Michael Pertwee, direction by Daniel Birt.I didn't recognize any of the other dozen films Birt's directed but I have seen the 4 episodes he directed of The Adventures Of Robin Hood. That's a favorite series of mine.

Michael is both actor and writer, he's brother to Jon Pertwee and cousin of Bill Pertwee. His father Roland was an actor, same with his nephews Daniel and Sean. Michael only has three acting credits but over a hundred writing credits. You might have sen some of his movies, Too Many Crooks, Make Mine Mink, The Mouse On The Moon, Strange Bedfellows and A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum. He wrote for several popular shows and many I haven't seen. I've seen episodes of his on The Invisible Man, Danger Man, Adventures In Paradise, Secret Agent, The World Of Wooster and The Saint. 

A guy is running off with his mistress, they are on a train when he gets it in his head that he shouldn't do it. He also thinks he sees his mistress's hubby on the train and doesn't a confrontation. The train slows down near enough to his home that he pulls the emergency cord and jumps off the train when it stops. He walks to his house only to hear an huge noise, another train has hit the stopped train. All sorts of people are dead, including his mistress, and dozens injured. The train police investigate and find his name in the mistress's pocket.

He tells his wife he was there but left and she says she'll stand behind him. The train inspector hounds him but the news on the accident puts the blame on a faulty signal. No matter it turns out that the mistress was shot dead before the crash, they suspect our idiot, he says it wasn't him but they find the gun what did the deed in his pond. We'd seen a man throw it in there but the train inspector hasn't. The guy does some more investigating which leads him to the dead woman's husband, supposedly found dead in the wreck, and the hubby kills him.

When the guy wakes up it's all been a dream. Imagine my disappointment! He leaves the train the same way and returns home to his wife. This time there's no crash. I'm not much of a fame of dream fantasy and this one was the one of the more contrived ones. Other's seem to like it more than me but that's the way that rolls. I probably wouldn't bother watching it again. It's on YouTube, click the link above and watch.

Science Fiction Sunday 606

Interpreters: A C & Earth Chronicle Quantum 1 2019 Written and directed by Michael Ryan. A movie as clumsy as it's title. It has an interesting plot, aliens have secretly come to Earth and are stealing souls from certain humans for snacks. Some humans are working with them and are totally fine with selling out the rest of humanity for a cash payout. An ex-black ops guy helps the local sheriff with  murders in a small town, thus uncovering everything. It looks fairly good but the prob is the 119 min running time. It just pokes along at times and nothing much happens, lucky I had the right arrow key to help move things along. At least some of the worst sell out humans get theirs in the end. It's not something I would need to see again.

Invasion Planet Earth 2019 Director Simon Cox wrote the screenplay with Simon Bovey. Aliens attack the Earth, capture humans, and take them to their ship. Turns out they're the good guys. It was terrorists who bombed the US and then the bombs started to blast and blast all over the world. The aliens are there to pick up any survivors they can. Trouble is it takes a long while to get to the core concept and the images they show you are often unclear. We follow some people around and much of what they see and hear is all in their heads but they don't tell us that for a while. I don't mind thinking about what a movie says, I just don't care to try to figure things out without any info to go on. Another one I wouldn't bother with again. Both are on Amazon Prime.

Friday Night Movies 807

Death Force 1978 Story by Cirio H Santiago and Robert E Waters, screenplay by Howard R Cohen, direction by Cirio H Santiago. Also know as Vengeance Is Mine.

James Iglehart is a Vietnam vet who turns crook, he's part of a three man gang that does a big deal with a crook in the Philippines. The three men cruise off in their boat. Little does James know that his pals are planning his murder for his cut of the $50K payout they just got. James is stabbed, his throat is cut and he's tossed overboard. He's not dead when his body washes up on an island where two old Japanese soldiers have been living since WW2. They save his life and he trains in the way of the samurai. He gets lessons in fighting with a katana. Eventually he's rescued and he returns to LA to get him some vengeance.

There's plenty of mixed quality action. Lots of men get stabbed and slashed when James attacks the gang that his two old partners have set up. They've been running roughshod over the local crooks and taking over their biz, the police can't seem to get anything on them. One cop helps James track down the pair.

It's about average for a Santiago movie, it's lacking much by way of production values, and stunt talent. At 110 minutes it's way too long, they could easily have trimmed a whole lot out of it. I might not bother watching it again. You can see it on YouTube at the link in the title. You might get a laugh.

The Monster Walks 1932 Screenplay by Robert Ellis and direction by Frank R Strayer.

A rich guy dies, he leaves all his money and a big old house to his daughter. He provides a place in the house for his invalid brother and a poor stipend for his house keeper. If the daughter dies all the money and house to the brother. Soon as the will is read the plotting begins. The daughter has help from her fiance but there are serious attempts on her life.

It's pretty standard old dark house stuff, the unusual story element is the big old ape locked up in the basement. The creature has it in for the daughter but he's securely chained in his cage. A hairy hand comes out of the wall behind the daughter's bed and tries to strange her. Luckily she woke up as it was groping for her. The house is said to have secret passages running through it but the invalid brother insists that they've all been sealed up.

It's touch and go for the daughter. There's plenty of running about and noise. The cast includes Misha Auer as the housekeeper's son. He turns out to be the brother's son as well. It's all been a secret and Misha feels he was cheated out of some inheritance.

One of my favorite character actors, Willie Best, plays the scared chauffeur Exodus, he's billed in the credits as Sleep n' Eat. He was credited under that name for 6 movies, he was uncredited for many more than that, he did receive credit for 77 of the 124 films he made. Sadly a drug arrest ended his film career but he continued to work in TV. He died at age 45 in 1962.

All in all I enjoyed it well enough but it's barely average. Still, I'd watch it again. It's only 57 mins and it passes quickly.

The Unholy Wife 1957

The Unholy Wife 1957 Story by William Durkee, screenplay by Jonathan Latimer, direction by John Farrow. Jonathan wrote a good number of screenplays between 1937 and 1972 including Topper Returns, The Glass Key, Night Has A Thousand Eyes, The Big Clock and Whistling In Dixie. He also wrote 32 episodes of Perry Mason. John was Mia's father, his other credits include 29 scripts, he directed 49 films. The film he directed before this one was Around The World In 80 Days. I've not seen many of his movies.

 

The Unholy Wife was about the last movie that RKO made. It was filmed in 1956 and a few months into 1957 the company had ceased film making. Diana Dors signed to make I Married A Woman with George Gobel and while they were shooting that in early 1956 they signed her up for two more films. The Unholy Wife was filmed in the fall of 1956 and the third film was dropped when RKO closed up. Diana sued RKO for defamation of character, she sued for $1.25 mil and settled out of court for $200,000. She was 26 when she made the picture. She worked both in the UK and the US and she was married to Richard Dawson of Hogan's Heroes fame in the 60s.

Diana plays Rod Steiger's wife, he's a vintner in Napa Valley, Beulah Bondi is Rod's mom, they all live in a nice big house. Mom is a nervous wreck and when we first meet her she's upset. She thinks that someone was prowling around the house and called the cops. Diana has little sympathy for her and she's mad the mom called the cops. They come and they don't find anyone near by, Diana tells them that Beulah is often hearing things and upset over little.

Diana isn't happy with her situation in most ways. She's got Tom Tryon as a bit on the side but she doesn't want to give up her nice life style. She schemes to kill her husband and marry Tom later. The plan goes all to hell when she kills his best friend. She tells Rod that she killed someone before and the police will find out and deport her and her son. Rod takes the blame, saying it was an accident, and goes to court with everyone thinking he has a good chance of getting off. Their concoction doesn't go down very well and Rod is sent to prison.

Things unravel further when Beulah dies of poison, Dian gets blamed, even though she didn't do it. She confesses to the shooting of Rod's pal and heads for the gas chamber. Rod is free to enjoy his grape fields with Diana's son. The son was the real reason he married her, he couldn't have children because of a war wound, he didn't like Diana that much but wanted a son. It's a helluva price to pay for a son but at least he's out of prison.

What a household, huh. Easily the sort of thing you'd want to watch on TV and not experience first hand. It's still a fairly decent film, I gave it a 6 on the IMDb, with a good cast that also includes Tol Avery, Marie Windsor, Joe De Santis and Arthur Franz.

I found a copy on YouTube but it disappeared right away. Oddly, a copy showed up on Rarelust that you can download. There's no DVD available, other than as a bootleg. Here's a couple more posters and the paperback cover.

British Cinema Collection Volume 2

 

Our Girl Friday 1953 Re-titled The Adventures Of Sadie in the US. Based on the 1932 novel The Cautious Amorist by Norman Lindsay, screenplay and direction by Noel Langley. The book was banned in Australia from 1933 to 1953 for indecency and blasphemy. Lindsay is Australian and he also wrote The Age Of Consent. I've not read any of his books. All five films are in the British Cinema Collection Volume 2.

 

Joan Collins gets shipwrecked on a desert island with George Cole, Kenneth More and Robertson Hare. There's plenty of comical sexual tension between the men but not enough jokes. Joan runs around in a bikini for much of the movie. Nothing much else happens.

It's about average and watchable enough. I turned the speed up a bit once it had been on a short while. It kind of drags it's ass around the beach at too leisurely a pace for me.

Dentist In The Chair 1960 Based on Matthew Finch's book of the same name, screenplay by Val Guest, additional scenes by Bob Monkhouse and George Wadmore, direction by Don Caffey.

Kenneth Conner plays a thief, he breaks into a store only to find he's nicked some dental gear. Don't ask how that happened, Kenneth is embarrassed enough as it is. His girlfriend is nagging him to get rid of the swag so he heads over to the dental school to unload the stuff on the students. Bob Monkhouse and Ronnie Stevens play the two students who help him flog the stuff. The arrival of the police puts the wind up their bottoms and panic ensures. They try to get the sold items back so they can be returned and things start to go as wrong as you'd expect. Still, it mostly works out well enough at the end.

Peggy Cummins plays the pretty dental student and romantic interest, Eric Barker plays the Dean, the rest of the cast were unknown to me. They all did a good job but the script is kind of predictable. It's trying to make it self like the Doctor film series or a Carry On film but it's not quite there. I got through it and I'd still watch it again someday.

The Runaway Bus! 1954 Written, produced and directed by Val Guest. Val had a long career starting in 1943 with the Arthur Askey film Miss London Ltd. He directed 14 films for Hammer Studios including  The Men Of Sherwood Forest, The Quatermass Xperiment, Quatermass 2 and The Abominable Snowman. That is one ugly poster above. In later posters Frankie would get top billing over Margaret.

Heavy fog is hindering the planes leaving the terminal but several passengers are clamoring for a ride to another less fogbound air terminal. Frankie Howard is the driver of the emergency relief bus. Petula Clark is a stewardess assigned to herding the passengers and Terence Alexander is a pilot along for the ride.

Margaret Rutherford is a pushy passenger and most annoying. Frankie has a tough time finding the road, let alone finding their way to Blackbushe Terminal. He gets a bigger surprise when he finds out that someone has stowed stolen gold on the bus and they're on the bus. Who could it be? You can find out by clicking the link in the title and watching the movie on YouTube.

I've seen this a couple of times and I've enjoyed it each time I've seen it. There's some entertaining twists and turns, some fun gags and plenty of Frankie. He's certainly a favorite of mine, from way back when I was a kid watching him on TV.

Carry On Admiral 1957 Based on a stage play called Off The Record by Ian Hay and Stephen King-Hall, Val Guest wrote the screenplay and directed. It's called The Ship Was Loaded in the US. Not a Carry On film despite the title. They would start the Carry On series the following year with Carry On Sergeant.

David Tomlinson and Brian Reese are pals, David is the private secretary with the Admiralty and Brian is to headed to sea as the Captain of his first command. They get drunk the night before Brian ships out. During the evening they switch rooms and in the morning they are too hung over to understand the drivers who have come to take them to their jobs. Ronald Shiner plays Salty, a skipper of a small craft, and Peggy Cummins plays the romantic interest.

David wakes up at sea and to save his career he pretends to be Brian. It's a wonder that the ship survived. Brian works to get back to his ship but is faced with several obstacles. It's a slim excuse that no one would believe but it has some fun jokes and silly stuff going on so I laughed instead of thinking too much about it. I'd watch it again sometime.

Time Of His Life 1955 Leslie Hiscott is the director and screenplay writer, he wrote the original story with Brock Williams. Leslie directed 69 films in his career, this is his second last. I can't say any are familiar except the 1937 film The Triumph Of Sherlock Holmes.

Richard Hearne is a prisoner who is getting released, he's reluctant to leave the place after so many happy but it's the law and he's got to go. Ellen Pollock [lays his daughter, he's all posh and the head of a society for the rehabilitation of ex-convicts. When daddy shows up she's really unhappy but decides to hid him in the attic while she has a function for the society.

Ellen plays to ship him off to Australia but things don't go as panned. Richard helps Ellen's children work though some stuff and they help turn their mother's head around. The film ends on an even happier note when Richard gets his wish to return to the slammer.  It made me laugh out loud a couple of times. Hearne is pretty good at the physical comedy and the verbal jokes aren't too bad either.

The Candy Snatchers 1973

The Candy Snatchers 1973 Director Guerdon Trueblood co-wrote the screenplay with Bryan Gindoff. Those are some scummy kidnappers on the poster, they kidnap a school girl named Candy and proceed to do all the stupid things they can. They bury the girl in a field with a pipe for air. They screw up the ransom with daddy. They dig up the girl and one of them wants to send daddy an ear. They buy an ear from a guy at the morgue to try to scare the dad. It doesn't work, he's not much interested in paying out the ransom, if the girl dies before she's 21 her trust fund goes to him. The nicer of the two guys tells Candy he'll help her stay alive but the other two want to kill her and move on. The trio is pretty stupid and none of them are going to get out alive. Trouble is will poor Candy get out of the hole they've put her back into? You can find out on YouTube in the link above. It's about average for me.

Red Dwarf - The Promised Land 2020

Red Dwarf - The Promised Land 2020 Screenplay by Doug Naylor, additional material by Richard Naylor, directed by Doug Naylor. Chris Barrie, Craig Charles, Danny John-Jules, Robert Llewellyn and Norman Lovett are back for the 13th series of Red Dwarf. It's been 32 years since they started and 3 years since the last series.

The boys from the Dwarf have settled into a bit of a rut. Lister and the Cat find the original boot up disc of the original Holly and have a go getting that up and running. Holly takes a quick assessment of their situation and decides to decommission the ship and the hologram.

He'd given them a week to get their stuff together before blowing the ship to pieces but they being who they are quickly turn that into 7 minutes. They escape in Starbug and run into some of the cats that were spawned by the Cat.

 

The cat race live on 5 spaceships and they've been taken over by the guy on the right. He's the king of the cats and he's a bit of an annoying prick. He's banned the worshiping of Cloister and the other three on the left are going to be spaced for their beliefs. They escape in a ship and soon cross the path of just the guy they were seeking, their God. 

The rest of the movie is giddy romp through space with the evil cat king dogging their asses. There's a good number of jokes and may of them work well, I laughed out loud quite a bit. They have a number of scrapes and there's some soul searching too. Nice looking production with good sets, props and costumes. The space scenes look good. The actors were all on the money and I think it was money well spent, at least for me. I got the UK edition,, it was just a bit over half the price of the US, post included. There's a making of, some deleted scenes, some reactions of the live audience and a few smegups by the cast. 

Friday Night Movies 806

The House On Skull Mountain 1974 Screenplay by Mildred Pares, direction by Ron Honthaner. The two films tonight are packed together in one of MGM's Midnight Movies Double Feature sets. I like the series for the most part but the few remaining ones I haven't seen are the ones that have some of the least interesting films to me.

The story is about the 4 relatives of Pauline Christophe, played by Mary J Todd McKenzie, who are called to her home for a reading of her will. Victor French, Janee Michelle, Mike Evans and Xernona Clayton play the 4 relatives. On their way to the house each of them was scared by a skull image that appeared before their eyes. The house is filled with voodoo stuff and for good reason, Pauline and her staff are part of a voodoo cult.

Mike is the first to die, soon the sheriff is a familiar figure at their door. It does on for a while and eventually the baddies are defeated. It's kind of weak in dialog and effects but I got to the end without giving up. It's only average and I might skip watching it again. At least for a while.

The Mephisto Waltz 1971 Based on the novel by Fred Mustard Stewart, screenplay by Ben Maddow, direction by Paul Wendkos.

Alan Alda and Jacqueline Bisset are a couple, he was pianist but he gave it up for musical journalism. He goes to interview famous pianist Curd Jürgens and the man seems to like Alan. A friendship develops but Jacqueline isn't too keen on Curd and his daughter Barbara Perkins. She has reason to dislike them, they are soul sucking evil pricks.

The only reason Curd wants to be pals with Alan is he wants to steal his body with the help of a magical spell. He does and we spend the rest of the long movie watching Jacqueline make one bad decision after another. She sells her soul to the Devil at one point, made me laugh.

It's horror from people who don't care for horror very much. It's long and it dragged and dragged and dragged. Nothing much here to make me want to watch it again.

Rocket's Galore 1958

Rocket's Galore 1958 Based on a Compton MacKenzie novel, screenplay by Monja Danischewsky, direction by Michael Relph. It was called Mad Little Island in the US.

The government has decided that the next likely location for a missile base is the island of Todday in the Hebrides. They send Donald Sinden along to negotiate with the locals. They aren't too keen on the idea of losing their homes and a revolution starts. There's a good bit of collateral damage going on.

Jeannie Carson is a local woman whom Donald takes a liking to but his job gets in the way of their romance. A test missile from a nearby land location crashes on the island and the military scientists are stopped from retrieving it when the locals claim it's on private property. It's burned on the site but that doesn't seem to be the end of the plan to build the site.

The local priest comes up with an plan and the island is saved. It's pretty silly stuff but most of the jokes work well enough for me to have a laugh or two. Roland Culver takes over the part of Captain Waggett as Basil Radford past away 3 years after the first movie was made. A few of the actors from the first movie are back but some play different parts. Ronnie Corbett has a small part and John Laurie is there briefly.

Some compare it to Bill Forsyth's 1983 movie Local Hero and it does share a few similarities. There's someone wanting their land and there's an Eco-friendly ending. The big different is the people of Todday want to stay in their homes, the people in Ferness have dollar signs in their eyes and they can't wait to be rich. Rocket's Galore ends on a happier note but Local Hero is much funnier. You can watch Rocket's Galore on YouTube.