PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Fat Slags 2004

Fat Slags 2004 Written by William Osborne and directed by Ed Bye. A British comedy based on the Fat Slags comic from Viz. You might recognize Ed Bye, he's been directing British comedy for decades, The Young Ones, Filthy, Rich And Catflap, The Two Ronnies, Red Dwarf, Bottom and plenty more funny programs and films. Ed has been married to Ruby Wax since the late 80s.

Sandra and Tracey are the two plus size women in the poster. Fiona Allen plays Sandra and Sophie Thompson plays Tracey. When we meet them they're getting bollixed by their foreman for their poor work habits. They are crude, self absorbed, vile and dim as a ten watt lamp. While their foreman is talking to them the factory blows up because Sandra left her cutting torch burning. Now they have to find new jobs. Lucky for them they get a letter inviting them to appear on a talk show in London. Off they go.

Jerry O'Connell plays a billionaire called Sean, he takes a flower pot to the head and becomes insane. He sees the gals on the talk show and takes a liking to them. Sean's lawyer is called Victor, he's played by Anthony Head. Victor gets the job of finding the gals and bringing them to Sean. A fashion designer is paid to make a range of clothes based on the gals look, generally they prefer brightly colored track suits stretched to the limit by flab. Because it's in the script the country goes mental over the fashion look and the gals become popular, especially after exposing their breasts on TV.

Geri Halliwell plays Sean's assistant Paige, she tries gaining some weight to be more like the gals. Tracey and Sandra fight over Sean, Tracey goes on a date with him after knocking Sandra out. Tracey accidentally bites Sean's dick off when his limo crashes to avoid running over some nuns in the road. The gals get locked up after their fight kills the General Secretary of the United Free World. They get tossed into the Tower Of London. Sean gets hit on the head and comes to his senses. The gals are trashed and dumped. They head home to their boyfriends and show off their boobs while dancing at the pub. Life is back to normal for these idiots.

There's a ton of other actors I didn't mention, until now, James Dreyfus, Naomi Campbell, Angus Deayton, Hugh Dennis, Lederere, Rick Gervais, John Thompson and Dolph Lundgren. They were the ones I knew of, mostly cameos and small parts, there were still more small parts.

The film was panned by the critics and it scores a 1.9 on the IMDb, justifiably I thought. It has 4000 votes. I joined the 53% who gave it a 1. I couldn't take the chance that giving it a 2 might bring the score up a bit. Lots of people gave it a 10, 27%, reminding me people are bat shit crazy. I would guess some votes could have been bought.

I didn't care for the main characters much at all. They certainly wouldn't be the sort of people I would want to spend any time with. The jokes are tired old dogs, I wasn't even cracking a smile. Graham Dury, the comic's creator said he 'was so appalled by the film, he threatened to stop drawing the strips'. We'd be all better off had he never drawn it. I've just never cottoned to the VIZ style. The film got listed as one of the worst British films ever made. You can see it on YouTube, link above. There are animated versions of the gals too but I couldn't bring myself to watch them.

Science Fiction Sunday 846

Quatermass TV Serial 1979 Written by Nigel Kneale, directed by Piers Haggard. Verity Lambert was the Executive producer. A four part TV serial that aired in October and November 1979 on ITV. The producers created a 100 movie version called The Quatermass Conclusion for the US and other countries. John Mills stars as Bernard Quatermass.

Set in a troubled future with massive urban collapse in the worlds largest cities. Quatermass has retired to a small town in Scotland. He's come to London to appear on a TV show only to get attacked near the studio. A man called Joe Kapp helps run the baddies off. He's an astronomer who was scheduled to appear on the same show. He has a radio telescope. The show is about the joint American and Russian space program. Two ships are to dock but something happens and they are destroyed.

Joe takes Quatermass back to his home which is next to his radio telescope. They encounter the Planet People, hippy like young people who believe that space aliens will take them to another planet for a better life. Turns out space aliens are taking them but not to another planet. A bright beam of light turns them into ash. Over time Quatermass figures out that it's aliens and they're harvesting humans for something, much like humans harvest musk deer for their musk.

Quatermass assembles a team of scientists to figure out how to fight the alien. He's going to set off a 35 kiloton nuclear weapon. He's going to attract the alien's attention by faking a gathering of young people. Quatermass and Joe are going to manually set off the nuke. As the trap is set the Planet People arrive, among them is Quatermass's grand daughter. Joe is killed and Quatermass has a heart attack, his grand daughter helps him set off the bomb. The Earth survives and so far no alien attacks. Maybe they are gone. Who knows.

I saw the movie version back in the 80s and hadn't watched it since. It's my least favorite of the Quatermass stories. The 204 min TV version is fairly well done but show going and rather depressing. Originally the BBC had the production but let it go after reasoning the budget was too much for them and the story too depressing. ITV got it and it didn't pull in the punters as they hoped. I'm thinking I wouldn't bother with it again. You can see both the serial and the movie version on Dailymotion.

Father Brown 1954

Father Brown 1954 Based on The Blue Cross by G K Chesterton, screenplay by Thelma Schnee, Maurice Rapf and Robert Hamer, directed by Robert Hamer. The film was released in the US under the title The Detective. The movie was produced by Paul F Moss, the husband of Thelma Schnee. The picture was released on June 8 and Moss died 5 days later. Thelma had given birth to a daughter on June 5 1954. Alex Guinness plays Father Brown and Peter Finch plays Gustav Flambeau.

Father Brown is caught stuffing a safe with cash, he was putting the money back to help a parishioner, played by Sidney James, the police don't believe him and pop him in the nick. The Bishop comes to confirm who he is and the police let him out. He gets a telling off by the Bishop, played by Cecil Parker, who then informs him he's to loan his church's 1200 year old cross to a meeting in Rome. The police, in the form of Inspector Valentine, played by Bernard Lee, want to ship the cross with guards to keep it from being stolen by famous thief Gustav Flambeau. Father Brown refuses their help, stating he'll carry the cross in a nondescript parcel, hiding in plain site as it were.

Father Brown makes it to Paris before Flambeau, disguised as a priest, steals the cross. He leaves Father Brown tied up in a catacomb. Now Father Brown is in hot water with the church hierarchy. He tries to lure Flambeau out with a fancy silver chess set belonging to his friend Lady Warren, played by Joan Greenwood, but the thief proves to be slippery and runs off with the set. When Father Brown and Lady Warren return to her house they find Flambeau there with the chess set. Sidney James's character is now Lady Warren's chauffeur. Valentine turns up and Father Brown helps him escape.

Now Father Brown is in trouble with the church and the police, he runs off to Paris to try to find Flambeau and get the cross back. He follows the few clues he has and successfully locates Flambeau. He wants hm to repent and return everything he stole. That almost works, the police show up and recover the goods but the thief escapes. Days later Flambeau turns up at Father Brown's church during the sermon.

It's an entertaining movie with a good script and cast. Besides the few mentioned I knew Ernest Clarke, Sam Kydd, John Horsley, Jack McNaughton and Eugene Deckers. I found it on the Internet Archive, link above. I'll definitely want to watch it again sometime.

Murder In Eden 1961

Murder In Eden 1961 Based on a story by John Haggerty, screenplay by H E Burden, directed by Max Varnel. A British art forgery crime film that was filmed in Ireland. 

An art expert tells a gallery owner that the painting of Eve is a fake. Shortly after he's run down by a big car. A French reporter sticks her nose in everywhere. A policeman on the art forgery squad takes a liking to her but it's a doomed relationship. There's plenty of driving about and chatting.

Not a good film, the script is weak, the jokes are tired, I gave it a generous 5. I did like some of the Irish scenery.

Science Fiction Sunday 845

Quatermass II 1957 Based on the 1955 TV serial Quatermass II by Nigel Kneale, screenplay by Nigel Kneale and Val Guest, directed by Val Guest. I've seen this several times over the years as well as multiple viewings of the TV serial. I posted about it back in 2015 and included a link to the TV serials for both movies on the Internet Archive. The Quatermass series was produced and released by Hammer Productions.

Aliens are invading Britain, Quatermass finds out about it when he stops to help a couple in a car who have had an accident. The aliens are arriving in small stone meteors, then they burst open near a human they take over that human and turn it into an unwilling slave. The aliens have built a giant facility in Winnerden Flats. Quatermass arranges a trip there and finds out things don't add up. The scene the burnt man made an impression on me when I saw it

The nearby townies get riled up when the guards for the project invade the local pub and kill a newspaper reporter who was calling a story into the paper. The reporter was played by one of my favorite actors, Sid James. The locals rise and attack the plant. There's a ferocious battle as the townies take over a control room. Quatermass figures how to sabotage the system. One of the townies fires a rocket at the big dome and it blows up. Giant creatures are revealed and eventually burnt to a crisp. Quatermass's rocket is launched to destroy the alien's secret base in space.

It's my favorite of the Quatermass films, there's a nice mix of science, investigating and action. I upgraded to the Blu-ray to get all the extras. Now to find time to watch all those too. Also mentioned on that post is a Edward Everett Horton film called The Body Disappears. A comedy invisible man movie that can be found on the Internet Archive. Worth a look. I'm downloading a upgrade to the copy I taped off of TCM.

Quatermass And The Pit 1967 Based on the BBC TV serial by Nigel Kneale, screenplay by Nigel Kneale, directed by Roy Ward Baker. A Hammer film that I've seen several times. I blogged about this film and the first two adaptations in 2010. Here's a blog post about the TV versions of Quatermass II and Quatermass And The Pit from 2010.

Quatermass winds up helping determine what the strange object found while rebuilding the underground station at Hobb's End is all about. Turns out to be another alien invasion. The artifact is from 5,000,000 years ago but it's still active. Over the millions of years it's affected the locals and it was the same at Hobb's End, people have been driven mad by the psychic energy.

They open the artifact and find desiccated bug people, dead for 5 million years. The artifact is their ship and it's what's active. Eventually Quatermass destroys the active bit of the ship and the world is saved once again. Yay.

I also bought the Blu-ray of this film for the extras. Time, yada, yada.

Kill Me Tomorrow 1957

Kill Me Tomorrow 1957 Story by Robert Falconer, written by Robert Falconer and Manning O'Brine, directed by Terence Fisher. A British film with Pat O'Brien, Lois Maxwell and George Coulouris. Tommy Steele sings Rebel Rock.

Pat O'Brien plays a reporter who's been fired, hard up for cash he returns to the newspaper to see if he can get his old job back. He's surprised to find his boss dead in his office. Then he's offered money to take the wrap by the killer. He takes the offer and then spends the rest of the movie trying to get out of his predicament. He gets some help from Lois Maxwell and Robert Brown, they're both reporters on the same paper with Pat. George Coulouris is the baddie, he owns a nightclub, it's where Tommy Steele sings. He has a diamond smuggling ring on the side. 

It was enjoyable, about average, entertaining cast, decent script. Pat was hired to try to get more American bums on seats. He was getting a bit long in the tooth but he still did an OK job. I'd probably watch it again, it's going to be a while, so many movies yet to watch first.

Friday Night Movies 1041

Shadowzone 1990 Written and directed by J S Cardone. A Full Moon production.

Captain Hickcock visits the Shadowzone Project to investigate the death of a test subject. The company is small, they work in a rundown and nearly abandoned underground lab from the 1960s. The place is awash with leaky steam pipes. You'd think it would be damper there. There are only a handful on staff with two test subjects running. The project is researching extended deep sleep or EDS. There's hope that the research will be applicable to the space program.

It's a small cast with James Hong as the head scientist Dr Van Fleet, David Beecroft as Captain Hickcock, Louise Fletcher as Van Fleet's second in command Dr Erhardt, Frederick Flynn as maintenance man Tommy, Shawn Weatherly as Dr Kidwell, Lu Leonard as the cook Mrs Cutter and Miguel A Núñez as the tech guy Wiley. There are the sleepers, a male and a female who's main job is to be fully nude in a glass tube. No reason that I could see but there you are. Maureen Flaherty and Robbie Rives play those characters. Robbie blew up pretty quickly, it was his only movie. Maureen lasted 10 years as an actress, she's got 19 credits on the IMDb. Most of the movies she was in were bit parts, possibly involving nudity, one can't be sure.

In a test for Captain Hickcock the male test subject's head has a sudden rapid unscheduled disassembly, leaving the glass encased test chamber totally obscured from the inside. Parts of the old electrical system are damaged causing the power to drift in and out. Things aren't looking good for the Shadowzone Project. It only gets worse, the sleep tests have given the sleepers some sort of connection to another dimension. A being arrives and the computer calls it John Doe. It's not a friendly being and Dr Van Fleet is the first of the crew to get killed off screen. It's cheaper to record a yell than stage a death scene. There's the usual running about, problem solving and more off screen deaths. Sadly John Doe can't stay there, it needs to go back to it's own dimension or die. There's a bit more mayhem before Hickcock helps the female test subject out of her chamber.

It's pretty average but somewhat entertaining. Not something I'd bother buying at this point. The films runs 88 mins, there's a 101 minute version of the film on Amazon Prime. I took a look but it sure is dark and fuzzy. I haven't thought of watching more than the first few mins I did watch. The Blu-ray looks much better.

Brimstone & Treacle 1982 Written by Dennis Potter and directed by Richard Loncraine. Potter wrote a play that was meant for the BBC TV series Play For Today in 1976, it remained untransmitted until 1987, when the ban was lifted by the BBC. By then the 1982 film had been made and released. We watched the new Vinegar Syndrome Blu-Ray that's just come out.

Sting plays a creepy young man who preys on strangers, he pretends he knows them, tricking them with vague statements, given the opportunity he steals from them and runs away. He encounters Denholm Elliot on the street and pretends to faint. While he's talking to Denholm Sting steals his wallet. He pretends he knows Denholm through his daughter but doesn't know she's been in a coma for three years. Sting's quick on his feet and lies so easily but Denholm is suspicious and runs off after offering to get his car and give Sting a ride. 

Denholm doesn't know Sting's got his wallet, he's surprised when the young man turns up at his home that evening with the wallet. Everything is there but the 80£ he had. Once in the house Sting's determined to stay a while. Things are rather messed up in the place, the living room has been given over to Pattie. She requires constant watching and care. Joan Plowright plays Denholm's wife and Suzanna Hamilton plays the daughter Pattie. Three years ago she got hit by a car and has been bed ridden ever since, she's active and noisy at times, quiet at others, but there's no communication going on. Poor Joan is stuck home all the time and Denholm treats her rather poorly.

Sting pretends he had once asked the daughter to marry him, she turned him down, telling him to wait for a few years. He's very helpful but things get odd quickly. His sly antics eventually lead Sting to having sex with Pattie. There's a fight when the parents respond to her screams in the middle of the night. Sting runs away, escaping through the window, smashing the glass to bits. Pattie recovers and immediately remembers catching Denholm having sex with his secretary on the floor of his office. It's what drove her out of the office and into the arms of an oncoming cab. Some how the paralysis has been lifted. We leave the family and the yelling to join Sting on the street up to his old game.

Dennis Potter is one of those writers that I like despite his writing dramas. I first heard of him from the film adaptation of Pennies From Heaven. That's the American movie with Steve Martin, the BBC 6 episode production stars Bob Hoskins in the same roll. The 6 part BBC production The Singing Detective followed with Michael Gambon playing a version of Potter himself. Potter had a pretty bad bought of Psoriatic arthritis, it required hospitalization at times. The main character in TSD has it and pain has given him hallucinations in the form of musical numbers. There's plenty of singing and dancing going on. Potter lived with his condition for 30 years, he died at age 59 in 1994 from Pancreatic Cancer. His wife died of breast cancer just a few days before he died. He left something valuable behind.

The Painted Smile 1962

The Painted Smile 1962 Based on an original idea by Brock Williams, screenplay by Pip and Jane Baker, directed by Lance Comfort. A British crime film about a dead body.

Liz Smith plays Jo Lake, she's not the brightest gal in the neighborhood. She's a con artist who's active in the local area with her partner. Her partner gets murdered by a Soho crime boss. Tom is interested in Jo and he's stupid, someone she can work with, especially after Tom puts his fingerprints on the murder weapon. It's a short put to getting Tom to help hide the body. Things don't go so well for Tom when the police pull his car over for erratic driving. He was too drunk to drive well but not drunk enough to run away. He hides with Liz until the murderer gets hold of them. What a pickle they're in.

It's barely average but it's still some what entertaining. I liked Kenneth Graham as the baddie. Liz has some acting chops, she's not just fun in her underwear. There's plenty of yakkin' and some running about. There's even a car chase. It's less than an hour and you can see it on YouTube.

Rag Doll 1961

Rag Doll 1961 Written by Derry Quinn and Brock Williams, directed by Lance Comfort. A British film about a country girl who runs away to the big city. It was released as Young, Willing and Eager in Canada and the US the following year. Lance died in 1966 but he made 36 films and a bit of TV. I've seen some of them, liking particularly his last film Devils Of Darkness. Be My Guest, Man In The Dark, Sing And Swing, Tomorrow At Ten, Murder Can Be Deadly, The Ugly Duckling, Make Mine A Million, Temptation Harbor and Pit Of Darkness all got a 6 or 7 from me. Lance directed 7 episodes of the 1958 Ivanhoe TV series with Roger Moore. It was a favorite in our house when it was new.

Carol's only 17, she lives with her drunken stepfather in his pub. Christina Gregg plays Carol and Patrick Magee plays Flynn. He's a grabby sort, our Flynn, he puts his hands on her a few times, some of his customers are the same. Carol doesn't care much for it and runs off to the glittery life of Soho in London. Carol is befriended by a lady called Auntie who gives her a room and helps her get a job in a coffee bar run by Mort. Auntie is played by Hermione Baddeley and Mort is played by Kenneth Griffith. Mort falls for Carol but he's a bit old for her, she's got her eyes on a young handsome singer called Joe. Jess Conrad plays Joe, turns out Joe's got a evening job on the rob. Joe goes for Carol and gets her knocked up right quick. That's when she discovers he's part of a crooked gang who do robberies. When Joe finds out Carol's pregnant he plans one more job to fund an escape to Canada for his family. The robbery doesn't go so well leaving Carol to raise her baby on her own. Maybe Auntie will help.

I thought it was fairly average but it did remind me, once again, not to get involved with criminals. Good advice for the country girls out there. There's a fair amount of interesting street activity going on and some nice driving through the countryside. Jess Conrad sings a song called Why Am I Living with the uncredited help of the Dave Clark Five. I enjoyed the movie more than the song but I'd watch it again sometime.

Your Money Or Your Wife 1960

Your Money Or Your Wife 1960 Based on the play Count Your Blessings by Ronald Jeans, screenplay by Ronald Jeans and directed by Anthony Simmons. A British film about inheritance and divorce.

Donald Sinden and Peggy Cummings are married and in debt. They rent rooms to tenants who are behind on their rent. Peggy's aunt leaves them some money but it's doled out monthly. There's a bit that gets them thinking of divorce, they can access a large chuck of the inheritance if they split. Trouble with that is getting grounds for divorce. It leads to some comic bits.

Despite the script being a bit dull and weak jokes it's generally fun to watch. Richard Wattis is the actor that stands out among the cast. Barbara Steele pops up for a few scenes.