PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Mummy's Boys 1936

Mummy's Boys 1936 Story by Jack Townley and Lew Lipton, screenplay by Jack Townley, Philip G Epstein and Charles E Roberts, directed by Fred Guiol with an assist from James Anderson.

A stupid rich guy believes that there's a curse on the stolen treasures from an Egyptian tomb. He wants to return the treasures so he hires Robert Woolsey and Bert Wheeler to help him. They are rather imbecilic ditch diggers with plenty of the usual quirks. Bert forgets things and needs a nap to revive himself, Robert is just a big lying braggart.  Willie Best joins the group on the expedition. I always like seeing Willie in a picture.

Strange things happen on the trip but they manage to get to the tomb. Despite the disappearance of their boss, the boy follow his instructions to dig into the tomb and put the treasures back. They manage to get caught by the evil guy and sealed in the tomb. There's plenty of running about and yelling. It's about average for the guys, a few laughs are always good.

Love Island 1952

Love Island 1952 Story by John E Gordon, screenplay by Daniel Kusell, directed by Bud Pollard. Eva Gabor plays a young native woman on the Island of Tuba Tara who falls for a US Navy Lieutenant who had to bail out when his plane went down. He has trouble from a local beau who plays dirty and rough. Nothing much special about it, I was just curious to see Eva in an early role. At this point in her career she had been acting since 1941 and was 32 years of age. You can see it on YouTube, in the link above.

The Fake 1953

The Fake 1953 Written by Bridget Boland and Patrick Kirwan, directed by Godfrey Grayson.

Dennis O'Keefe is an American Insurance agent tasked to guard Leonardo da Vinci's Madonna and Child painting as it travels to the Tate Gallery. There's a sneaky switch on the docks and the chase is on. While investigating Dennis stumbles onto the identity of the forger and that poor sap is murdered. Coleen Gray plays the forger's daughter and the romantic interest. It's pretty much average, nothing unusual stands out, but I did enjoy it. You can see it on YouTube.

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 636

Cowgirls Vs Pterodactyls 2021 Written and directed by Joshua Kennedy. I liked the idea of a trio of women fighting some pterodactyls to get the one lady's husband back, I wasn't as happy with the execution.

It's a period piece, set in the late 1800s, a schoolteacher and her husband are attacked in their home by flying dinosaurs. They steal her husband but the sheriff doesn't believe her and won't help. The schoolteacher enlists the aid of the owner of the local cat house and a drunken woman who killed a scumbag one time. They go after the critters, find them and seal them in a cave.

Along the way there's plenty of flying pterry action but it looks kind of low budget and sad. Nothing as exciting as the poster. I was glad enough to see it but I wouldn't need to see it again. It's on Amazon Prime, in the free movie with Prime, it's certainly not worth paying much more than that.

Battle In Space: The Armada Attacks 2021 A compilation of 5 unrelated space stories by different writers and directors. Too many to list. The framing story isn't that framing and the pieces are so unconnected, it makes for a film that loses my interest quickly. Give it a miss. I found it on AP.

Friday Night Movies 837

Pixels 2015 Story by Tim Herlihy, screenplay by Tim Herlihy and Timothy Dowling, directed by Chris Columbus. I have a box of DVDs waiting to be watched for the first time. Tonight I stuck my had in the box of discs and pulled out one at random. I couldn't find a good sized copy of the cover to the DVD via Google so grabbed the one on Amazon. The IMDb has posters of movies but they've changed their web page to only allow screen captures of the images posted to their page. Annoying, it now takes longer to grab an image. I noticed that the DVD was only $3.74 on Amazon and the Blu-ray a tenner. You can pick up a used copy for $1.96, costs more than double for shipping.

The movie opens in the 80s and the early arcade games were all the range among the kids. A trio of kids are competing in an arcade championship, they grow up to be the adults in the film Adam Sandler is a home-theater installer and Kevin James is the President of the United States. The arcade action was recorded and put in a capsule that was launched into space. It seems aliens have found the capsule and interpreted the recording as a call for war. Now it's on. The attackers come in the form of 80s arcade game images.

It's that connection to the arcade that pulls Adam into Kevin's world after a military base on Guam is attacked by the video game Galaga. They soon find a message from the Aliens telling them that this is the first challenge for the rights to the Earth. Adam gets a hand from Josh Gad and Peter Dinklage.

There's a bit of romance between Michelle Monaghan and Adam, Josh meets the love of his life, a character from a video game. There's plenty of giant arcade play as the attacks start happening. A giant Pac-Man roams the streets of New York. Eventually the Earth is saved and all is well enough.

It made me laugh occasionally and I was happy to have seen it. I'd want to watch it again someday. I keep meaning to watch all my favorite Adam Sandler movies in a marathon but there's so much I still haven't watched.

Tremors: Shrieker Island 2020 Written by Brian Brightly and Don Michael Paul, directed by John Michael Paul. This is the 7th Tremors film, JMP is the director of Tremors 5: Bloodlines and the 6th film Tremors: A Cold Day In Hell. I've not seen any of his other films except for Death Race 4: Beyond Anarchy. The rest don't seem to interest me much.

A billionaire hunting enthusiast has had four graboids grown and placed on his island. He's set up a hunting party for other rich assholes. Of course, those guys are in over their head and one by one his paying customers get chomped on by one of my favorite tunneling monsters. Also on the island are some seismic researchers, Caroline Langrishe is in charge and Jon Heder is the comic relief. Caroline is also the mother of Bert Gummer's son, Bert is of course played by Michael Gross, his son Travis is played by Jamie Kennedy in the 5th and 6th films.  Travis is in jail so Caroline sends Jon to round up his father. Bert's gone native and living in the wilderness. Still, he comes and takes on his old enemy.

The hunters do manage to mortally wound the graboid they encountered but it gets tougher and tougher to survive against the graboids and shriekers. The later have developed a new shriek that incapacitates the humans. Things look better once Bert arrives but soon enough the rich douche bag in charge has locked him up in an old bunker. Some people are so arrogant they deserve to get eaten by graboids. There's plenty of running and screaming. Just what you don't need with graboids around.

The movie looks great, during the day there are lush tropical forests and plenty of explosions, at night the scenes are lit with flames and explosions. Who ever was doing the flame effects was really good at their job. One by one the monsters are defeated, finally the last beast is left and it's a bitter sweet moment as Bert disappears into the flying dirt. Michael Gross has said he'd like to do another movie but he's 73 and it could be a couple more years before it happens and he might be too old to do the action stuff.  I enjoyed the movie and thought it was a nice addition to the series. Kind of wraps it up but still leaves a door open.

Silly Billies 1936

Silly Billies 1936 Story by Thomas Lennon and Fred Guiol, screenplay by Al Boasberg and Jack Townley, directed by Fred Guiol. A period peace with the fellows in the 1840s.

Robert Woolsey and Bert Wheeler are dentists, they set up in a town the day before all the citizens leave for the California gold rush in a wagon train. The guys overhear the local scumbag plot to wipe out the wagon train with the help of a neighboring tribe. The local scumbag is the wagon train's scout. He plans to leave the wagon train and let the tribe attack, once the new settlers are wiped out, they split the loot with the tribe.

Wheeler and Woolsey ride out to tell the wagon train but they get framed for the plot by an unfortunate slip of Woolsey's tongue. There's plenty of running about and cowboy movie stuff going on but they do save the citizens. There are jokes, some are fairly good, some not. Sadly the movie is often marred by the tired old racial stereotypes depicting Native Americans. It's the 22nd film the guys made together in 8 years, I'm including the shorts they made together, and they still have 3 more to go before Woolsey passes away in 1938.

Man With A Gun 1958

Man With A Gun 1958 Screenplay by Michael Winner, direction by Montgomery Tully. Part of The British Film series from Network.

Lee Patterson is an insurance investigator. He's looking into a fire at a nightclub owned by John Le Mesurier. Rona Anderson plays John's niece, Bill Nagy plays a singer's agent and Marne Maitland plays a gangster who's in the protection racket. I see most of these actors in episodes of British TV shows from the 50s and 60s, good competent performers. The story and script are a bit above average. It moves along OK, there's some rough stuff and a bit of romance. I found a copy on RareLust but there is a DVD that I might have to pick up the next time Network has a sale on the series. I'd watch this again.

The Rainmakers 1935

The Rainmakers 1935 Story by Albert Traynor and Fred Guiol, screenplay by Grant Garrett and Leslie Goodwins, directed by Fred Guiol.

Robert Woolsey is a rainmaker and Bert Wheeler is a farmer in the Midwest. Before Robert can help the locals by unleashing his rainmaking device a sand storm blows in. The farmers are mad and blame him. He escapes and takes refuge in Bert's house. The house blows away, the boys were safe in the root cellar, so Bert joins Robert in a trip to California for his next job.

The manager of the bank asked Robert to come see if he can make it rain, the fields are parched and the farmers could loose their crops and their farms if the dry spell won't break. The big rich farmer in the area is using the poor farmer's financial state to ram rod them into supporting a water system to pull water from a lake outside of town. He's making money either way, first by gouging the local farmer's by inflating the cost of the water system, and he stands to get some of their land real cheap if they can't come up with the money to buy into the project.

The bank manager has extended the bank's assets trying to help the farmers by not foreclosing on their loans. His daughter is played by Dorothy Lee and she's Bert's romantic interest here. Bert and Robert break a bunch of stuff before they blow up two locomotives in the big finale. It's fairly entertaining but the locomotives sequence goes on a bit too long. Still, I got a few good laughs out of it anyway. Only 4 more features to go.

 

 

The Nitwits 1935

The Nitwits 1935 Story by Stuart Palmer, screenplay by Fred Guiol and Al Boasberg, direction by George Stevens.

Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey work in a cigar stand in a building where a radio station operates. Bert really wants to write songs and Robert is a bit of an inventor. They get mixed up in a murder case with the usual chaotic results. Fred Keating, Betty Grable and Willie Best are in the cast. 

Not quite as much fun as some of their films and the black characters are quite stereotyped. Just barely average.