PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Bring Me The Vampire 1963

Bring Me The Vampire 1963 Story by Mario Garcia Camberos, screenplay by Alfredo Ruanova, directed by Alfredo B Crevenna and Alberto Mariscal.

Seven people are beneficiaries of a man's will, they must stay in a house for a certain period of time or loose millions of pesos. They are scared by the crazy brother of the dead man, he's mad because he thinks the money should have gone to him, he's also supposed to be a murderer and possibly a vampire. There's a spooky housekeeper and a creepy lawyer.

During the first night some of the inheritors are killed off. There's plenty of running about and yelling, some ghostly apparitions and way too many goofy characters. Of the 7 inheritors, three seem to be channeling Bud Abbott. Sadly their jokes are kind of flat. There's so many people in the house that they're all bumping into each other in some scenes.

Even though it's from 1963 the movie seems like something made in the 1930s or 1940s. I watched a copy on YouTube, link above, and enjoyed the chaos. I didn't enjoy the dubbing much. There's nothing new here but it was interesting to see a Mexican horror comedy. I don't see that many of them. Not for everyone, some might get a kick out of it.

Science Fiction Sunday 679

Doctor Who 0070 The Time Warrior Four part story that aired December 12 1973 to January 5 1974. Written by Robert Holmes and directed by Alan Bromly.

A Sontaran crash lands in the UK in the middle ages, he convinces a scummy rascal with a castle into letting him stay there to repair his ship. He'll give the scummy rascal some better weapons for his soldiers. The Sontaran uses a device to send himself forward to the modern day. He kidnaps scientists and steals their equipment to help with the repairs. Back in the middle ages the Sontaran hypnotizes the scientist into working on his ship.

The scummy rascal has been robbing his neighbors, sadly most of their soldiers are off fighting for the king. The local lords have little by way of manpower for defense. Lucky for them the Doctor and Sarah Jane arrive to help. Despite some false starts they manage to get that job done.

When I watched it years ago I liked the story and still do. I was bummed to find that the UK DVD I had bought has skipping problems on the LG player. I have yet to test it in other DVD or Blu-ray. I did order a copy of the US disc. I figured I might as well, if I wait until I watch the series again I might not find a copy that easily. Eventually the whole batch will be replaced by the Blu-rays. They started releasing them at a quick pace but seem to have slowed down. It's never good to count on any media releases continuing over time. So many reprint schemes fall apart. I couldn't count how many I've seen fail over the decades. Not that I would bother.

Update: I got the US version on DVD and found that they are now releasing discs on DVDR. Not happy to see that but it happens quite a bit. The disc skipped in the exact same place as the UK DVD. That's a real manufactured DVD not a DVDR. I had tested the UK DVD in the all region Blu-ray player, after I had posted this, and it played fine. I tested the US version in the same Blu-ray player and it played just fine. Since it does the same exact skips I can only assume that it must be a mastering issue that the LG player I use on my PC has trouble dealing with.

I prefer watching the discs on my PC so I can take advantage of the variable playback speed when using VLC Player. I used to have a DVD player that had a 1.5 speed option with sound that is lacking on the DVD and Blu-ray players I have now. VLC also skips the junk ads and trailers that play when a DVD is loaded, VLC skips right to the main menu. Definitely going to add a Blu-ray player to my next PC, VLC will play Blu-rays. 

Doctor Who 0071 Invasion Of The Dinosaurs Six part story that aired January 12 to February 16 1974. Written by Malcolm Hulke and directed by Paddy Russell.

The Doctor and Sarah Jane return to London to find the city deserted but for some soldiers. They get arrested for looting but Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart gets them back to Unit. The Doctor thinks someone is monkeying with time and of course he's right. Some nut jobs want to roll back time on the Earth and make the planet a paradise for the couple of hundred people they've fooled into following them. The people have been told that they are on a spaceship headed for a nice clean new planet. They are foolish people.

The nut jobs have built a control center and fake spaceship below some government offices, an MP and an Army General are in league with a couple of mad scientists. They've sadly fooled Captain Yates into following along. The Doctor and Unit get investigating but they are being sabotaged by Yates and the General. Sarah Jane snoops around and is nearly killed by a T-Rex. Though the Doctor foils most of the baddies plans there's still a fair bit of catch and release going one. That's one way to pad out a story in a six parter.

I enjoyed the story even though the dinosaur models weren't too good. I posted more pictures in the 2013 blog post and linked it in the title. There's only three more stories with Jon Pertwee, I'll miss him but I'm also looking forward to seeing Tom Baker take over.

Sister Boniface Mysteries Series 1

Sister Boniface Mysteries Series 1 Created by Jude Tindall. Written by Jude Tindall, Dominique Moloney, Kitty Percy, Kit Lambert and Oliver Frampton. Directed by Paul Gibson, Merlyn Rice, Ian Barber and John Maidens.

I binged the first 6 episodes of this spin off of Father Brown. It's a Brit Box original and there are 4 more episodes coming through March 8. Mark Williams puts in a bit of cameo in one episode but doesn't do any actual sleuthing. The series is set in the early 1960s and the re-creation is mostly pretty good. Nice costumes and props.

Lorna Watson played Sister Boniface in a single episode in series 1 of Father Brown, she returns to the character for this 10 episode series. Sister Boniface is a scientist nun, she has a PHD in forensic science, and she uses her talents to help the police in the town of Great Slaughter. Sister Boniface is a member of St. Vincent's Convent. She's young at heart and she rides a scooter with a side car. 

There's a variety of murders and Sister Boniface trails along with DI Sam Gillespie, played by Max Brown, and Constable Peggy Bottom, played by Ami Metcalf. The first episode they are joined by DS Felix Livingstone, played by Jerry Iwu, who's from Bermuda. He's expecting to work at Scotland Yard and he's nearly 100 miles from London when he gets off the train. Sister Boniface picks him up from the station and they jump right into a murder. He plans to leave as soon as they get it sorted out at the Met, when they do he finds he's been re-assigned to the police force in Great Slaughter. All those characters are quite likeable.

Like Father Brown, the show has a good sense of humor. The stories are breezy, have some heart and a bit of social commentary. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series. I probably will buy the DVD if such a thing comes out.

Friday Night Movies 879

Ghostbusters Afterlife 2021 Written by Gil Kenan and Jason Reitman, directed by Jason Reitman.

Egon Spengler lives as a recluse on a farm in a small town in Oklahoma. Small towns in Alberta are used for filming. Egon goes up against a spirit from the Ivo Shandor mine nearby. It's a good reminder that everyone needs to be watching the rich, not because they're comically creating portals to evil in another dimension, they're creating much human misery in their greed grab.

Egon dies battling the spirits and his daughter Callie inherits the farm. Lucky for her, she's just been evicted from her apartment. Mom takes her two kids, Phoebe and Trevor to Oklahoma only to find there's no cash, just the farm and some debt. Callie's been estranged from her reclusive father for years and years. Her children don't know anything about him.

Egon's ghost helps reveal some of his Ghostbuster past and Paul Rudd, a local teacher and seismologist, brings the rest to Phoebe and Trevor via the internet. Egon's got the Ghostbuster car in his barn and it pretty much starts up ready to go fight the supernatural. The first attempt to catch a ghost goes badly, there's much rushing around and considerable collateral damage to the town.

Undaunted, Phoebe and her growing gang soldier on in the battle against evil. They discover the Shandor mine and the evidence that Egon had been working to keep the maelstrom of evil in the shaft. Eventually they trap Gozer and meet the original Ghostbusters.

It's a nice looking film with all sorts of flashy special effects, some family melodrama and a few laughs. I enjoyed it though I was a bit slow to get involved during the first act. I bought the Blu-ray and will want to watch it again. I should have a marathon of the three films and the 2016 reboot. It's been several years since I watched the first two films.

King Solomon's Mines 1950 Screenplay by Helen Deutsch, directed by Compton Bennett and Andrew Marton. According to the Wikipedia Bennet was replaced by Marton because he was ill but there are rumors that Bennet had a falling out with cast members.

Stewart Granger is Alan Quatermain, Deborah Kerr is a rich woman looking for her husband, Richard Carlson is Deborah's brother. Deborah offers Stewart £5000 for taking her on the expedition, that's about £684,587.82 in today's cash. His normal fee is £200. Reluctantly he takes Deborah and Richard on.

There's plenty of trekking through the African countryside. Much of the film was filmed on location. Some of the scenery is rather nice. The underground scenes were filmed in Carlsbad Caverns. They encounter quite a few wild animals and some danger. Along the way they lose some of their bearers and pick up Umbopo. His part as the son of a murdered king is somewhat reduced in the film when compared to the novel or the 1937 film we watched a couple of weeks ago.

Weeks and weeks pass before they get to the Watusi tribe and Umbopo fights the king. A romance develops between Stewart and Deborah, lucky for them her hubby is already dead in the mine. Unlike the book or the 1937 movie they escape without any uncut diamonds. At least they have their lives.

I'm sure I'd seen this before but not in decades. I enjoyed it but not quite as much as the 1937 version. The Technicolor is alright. I picked up the DVD and I hope to watch it again sometime.

The Tomorrow War 2021

The Tomorrow War 2021 Written by Zach Dean and directed by Chris McKay. Chris is the director of The LEGO Batman Movie, this is his 3rd movie.

Chris Platt is a biology teacher, he used to be a Green Beret. While watching the World Cup soldiers from the future appear and ask for people to come help fight alien monsters that are killing the humans in great numbers. There aren't enough volunteers, survival rate of a one week deployment is less than 30%, so a draft is initiated. Chris gets picked, the basic training is shortened to here's your gun, point that bit at the incredibly hard to kill aliens.

Chris meets his daughter in the future, it turns out she's one of the officers in charge. Besides the father and daughter melodrama there's some father and son melodrama with Chris and his father, played by J K Simmonds. It bogs down the story and pushes the run time to 138 mins.There's plenty of action, people are always shooting machine guns that rarely get reloaded. The slaughter is mostly happening to the humans, the aliens are both bug like and lizard like. They're heavily armored but they have soft spots in the neck and belly areas.

Chris manages to survive but the time machine is broken after he gets home. Luckily for the humans they figure out where the aliens came from, Russia, and they go there and blow up the spaceship that landed a thousand years ago. Chris finally gets home with his dad trailing him.

It's entertaining enough but a bit too slow for me. I gave it a 6 on the IMDb. I saw it on Amazon Prime and doubt I'd need to see it again.

Amarcord 1973

Amarcord 1973 Written by Federico Fellini and Tonino Guerra, directed by Federico Fellini.

Somehow I wound up with a copy of Amarcord, I don't remember where I got it, it's not something I would ordinarily buy. It's been in my To Be Watched pile for years. Trying to downsize that pile, get the DVDs filed away in one of the Watched Movie piles.

It's Fellini's look at his home town during the time before WWII. He pokes fun at the Fascists, the Catholic Church and the local citizens. He harps on their sexuality a good bit. Reminds me that I'm not at all fond of any of those groups. Why am I watching this. Lucky for me I have 1.5 speed on my VLC Player.

There's little or nothing in the movie I was that interested in other than the large snow fall. It was snowing when I watched it. I'm not that fond of snow either. I'll file it away until the day comes when I decide to purge my DVDs. Or someone else throws them all out.

Beyond White Space 2018

Beyond White Space 2018 Written by Ryan Colucci and Clay McLeod Chapman, directed by Ken Locsmandi. It's a US Hungarian production, I can't find much about that mix, as in, who done what. I did read that the director is an effects guy, He's worked on a lot of stuff since 1995, I've seen a good bit of it without knowing who he was. The writers have mostly written short films.

The script takes a lot of inspiration from Moby Dick and Chinese dragons. The ship in the movie is used to harvest space bugs for cash. On their latest trip they encounter a giant space creature. They had a good haul this trip but that was stolen by some space pirates. The captain  convinces the crew that they should go hunting for the giant space creature. They don't know that he was offered a huge pile of cash by some crooks for it, nor that it killed his dad. 

There's plenty of spaceships and space, some fist fights and some space battles, a giant monster and plenty of melodrama. The Captain and his brother are at odds, the couple humping in the cargo bay find out they're having a kid, there's an old space rat, a pretty cook and an introverted space mechanic. This trip the crew is joined by an inspector who brings her own emotional baggage. There's plenty going on, at 93 mins there's hardly any time to deal with any of it. 

I still enjoyed a good bit of it. I thought it was about average, nearly worth a 5 on the IMDb. I watched it on Amazon Prime, it might be other places. I wouldn't need to see it again.

The Invisible Ray 1936

The Invisible Ray 1936 Story by Howard Higgin and Douglas Hodges, screenplay by John Colton, directed by Lambert Hillyer. The third of the films in the Universal Horror Collection. Each film gets it's own Blu-ray disc, some with new 2K transfers, one or two commentaries, and a featurette or two. I haven't seen this film as many times as I had The Black Cat and The Raven. It's the third of 8 films that Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi made together, 7 of them were for Universal. At about this time Universal is having money troubles that eventually resulted in the Laemmles being ousted as heads of the studio. Horror wasn't making as much money as it had and some markets, like the UK, were refusing to show horror films. A lot of this is covered in the commentaries on these films. I'm sure there's a good book to read about the Universal Horror films but I haven't gotten one. I know Tom Weaver, he does the commentary on this film, has one.

Boris Karloff is a scientist, he calls some other scientists to his house to see his telescope. It can photographs images of Earth's past by looking far into space. He shows them that a meteor hit the Earth a long time ago, he wants to go to Africa to get that meteor. He does and it's his downfall.

The meteor contains Radium X and Boris gets a sample. Boris is exposed to the radiation of Radium X, he was careful, he has a nice fancy suit, but he got exposed.

His body starts to glow and his touch can kill. Bela Lugosi plays a scientist doctor who comes along on the trip. He comes up with a serum that can help Boris main alive and rid him of his dangerous touch. He has to keep taking it or he'll burst into flames.

Boris's life takes a tumble in every way and he becomes a murderous psychopath. It's only a mother's love that can redeem him. He was redeemed so well, all that was left was a pile of ash on the street.

I thought it was alright but not as good as The Black Cat or The Raven. Looks like I gave it a 6 on the IMDb sometime in the past. Did you know you can download your votes from the IMDb. Helps as a memory aid. The movie did fairly well at the BO but it lost money because they ran really far over budget. With Universal's money issues and the company under new management there was a halt on making horror films that weren't Frankenstein related for over a year. Eventually they'd get back to it.

Extras:

Audio Commentary With Authors/Film Historians Tom Weaver And Randall Larson. Weaver does the main commentary and Larson comes in near the end with a 10 minute piece of composer Franz Waxman.

A Good Game: Karloff And Lugosi At Universal Part Three: The Invisible Ray. A bit more info on the film, the actors and the studio. Karloff seems to be more appreciated at the studio, he typically makes twice what Bela does for the same picture. Karloff got $10,000 for The Raven, that's about $210,000 today. Boris was said to be a penny pincher but he lived well and he died with a couple of mill in the bank. By 1937 Bela was on welfare, his money spent on lavish living as fast as he made it.

Re-Release Theatrical Trailer  and Still Gallery. Didn't look at either.

Science Fiction Sunday 678

Doctor Who 0068 Planet Of The Daleks Six part story that aired April 7 to May 12 1973. Written by Terry Nation and directed by David Maloney.

I'm still thinking that the story is about average for the series. The Doctor and Jo run about an alien planet where the Daleks have some Daleks in cold storage. He'll make sure they stay in storage, at least until a new story comes along.

Doctor Who 0069 The Green Death Six part that aired May 19 to June 6 1973. Written by Robert Sloman and an uncredited Barry Letts, directed by Michael E Briant.

The Doctor and Jo wind up in Wales where they battle with the evil head of the corporation. Turns out their computer has taken over the company and turned the company officers into it's slaves. The computer wants to take over the world but it's just ambitious not smart. Jo falls for the hippy scientist and leaves the series. Nice for her, next week the Doctor gets a new companion.

Friday Night Movies 878

Resident Evil Welcome To Racoon City 2021 Written and directed by Johannes Roberts. I'd seen Johannes 2011 TV movie Roadkill, I gave it a 4 on the IMDb. It's the only movie of his I've seen, the others on his IMDb page don't look that interesting.

This is a reboot of the story from the video game. In this new start we get a bit of backstory about Claire Redfield and her brother Chris. As children they were taken care of by the Umbrella Corp. The Umbrella orphanage is run by Dr Birkin, Claire ran away when he wanted to experiment on her, her brother stayed with Dr Birkin and as an adult he's a local cop. Claire has been gone from Racoon City for all these years and it's been 5 years since Chris heard from her.

Claire shows up on the worst night, the Umbrella Corp has nearly abandoned Racoon City since the place has become contaminated by their experiments. At 6 am they plan to blow the Umbrella Corp complex and cover up their crimes with a giant hole in the city. Claire wants to encourage her brother to leave the city but he's not listening and heads for the police station. Claire is attacked by the neighbors so she runs off with Chris's motorcycle. The police station is attacked by the zombies and the corporation has barricaded the town to contain the outbreak.

There's a lot of running and shooting, there are zombies everywhere. Most of the characters we meet are killed and turned to zombies. There's plenty of gore and CGI, most of it fairly decent. I enjoyed it enough to pick up the Blu-ray today at Target. I'll want to watch it again someday, mostly as an afterthought when watching the whole series again.

The Mad Doctor 1940 Early drafts of the film, titled The Monster and Destiny, were written by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur though they get no screen credit. The screenplay is by Howard J Green and it's directed by Tim Whelan.

Basil Rathbone is a doctor in a small town, he murders his wife for her money and leaves town a month later. A local doctor, played by Ralph Morgan, took Basil at his word that she died of pneumonia, he signed off on the death certificate without examining the body. He has suspicions but doesn't want to believe anything is wrong.

Basil moves to New York with his pal Martin Kosleck. Both men are wanted in Vienna for a double murder and Martin is loyal to Basil for saving him from the gallows. Their relationship is one of the more interesting in the film. Before Basil murdered his current wife he murdered another wife in Savanna.

In New York Basil sets up as a psychiatrist, he meets Ellen Drew, a rich single woman with what appears to be depression. She nearly jumps off a balcony and Basil saves her. He helps her with her problems and woes her at the same time. Ellen's ex-fiance, John Howard, learns of Basil's past and tries to save her from being murdered.

I liked a lot of the film, especially the rain soaked opening credits. Both films tonight had a rainy opening sequence. Basil and Martin are an interesting pair of psychopaths. Basil is dominant, Martin just isn't a thinker, he makes bad mistakes when left to his own devices. I almost wish it was developed more but wishing something was different in a film is a waste of time.

There's a good mystery and the investigation is fairly well handed, the romantic scenes between Basil and Ellen were much less interesting, they could use a bit of 1.5 speed. I'm getting old, I haven't got a much time to waste on twaddle like that. There were complaints of a lot of coincidences in the last act. It might be why Howard J Green isn't a better known screenwriter. Still, I had a more positive experience than a negative one and I'd watch the film again for the good bits.

You can see a fairly decent copy of the film on YouTube, see link above. There is a recently released DVD and Blu-ray from Kino Lorber. I'm putting it on my wish list in anticipation of an upcoming Kino sale. I'm curious about the commentary.