We try our hand at a video based review of the old favorite animated series, “Jonny Quest”. Join our host, Exejo Smith, and his take on “The Invisible Monster” episode.
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Early Pink Floyd Videos – Syd Barrett Leaves, Dave Gilmour Joins
This is a cool collection of videos which show an early Pink Floyd doing their numbers live and in the studio. The original creative spark of the band, Syd Barrett, was soon to depart. Drugs and possible mental issues led to his being replaced by David Gilmour. I love the promotional video with Syd playing acoustic guitar, “Jugband Blues”. Roger Waters and Rick Wright doubling on woodwinds for that section of the song pushes the boundaries of belief but very cool lighting is used in the video. Enjoy!!!
Phil Spector, Dead at 81 – Good Vibrations, Bad Vibrations
At one time, Phil Spector was one of the most innovative music producers in the world. He utilized an approach where he would hire a hire a group of musicians to carry out his musical ideas in the recording studio and literally create orchestras with multiple guitarists, keyboard players, percussionists, singers and what have you. The resultant thick sonic tapestry became known as The Wall of Sound. It was an influential technique that caught the ear of Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys. Wilson would pursue similar orchestrations of instruments using The Wrecking Crew, a group of accomplished players for hire, in his own recording sessions. Spector had employed The Wrecking Crew on a regular basis. Listen to the Beach Boys’ “Pet Sounds” collection and the singles “Good Vibrations” and “Heroes and Villains” for proof.
We give kudos to Spector for his many contributions to the recording industry but he had a dark side to his personality as well. There are many stories outlining his idiosyncrasies and obsessions. Spector was eventually convicted of murder for the shooting of his girlfriend. He died in prison of COVID related causes.
Spector produced The Ramones album, “End Of The Century” in 1979. I linked to their music video for “Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio?”
“The Horror Of Party Beach (1964) – The Mayhem Mash
I have mixed emotions about this twisted little horror film. I remember watching it as a kid and being terrified of many parts of it. There is a lingering memory of the mutated bullfrog chants of the human/aquatic monstrosities created from a ruptured barrel of hazardous radiation waste. The warped soundtrack music careening between creepily plodding to crazed, primitive synthesizer driven fury. Meanwhile, you’ve got a bunch of blood thirsty, shabbily costumed creatures marauding around in the dark looking for unsuspecting human victims.
I think I covered my eyes more than once during this mayhem. I probably covered my ears as well. This is a movie that was created for the teenage movie going crowd so there is a surf band performing on Party Beach thrown in for good measure. Surf music was very much in vogue at the time. This band isn’t very good.
It’s all a very low budget affair but very entertaining! Watching it these days, it still holds some of its charms. But new fears arise: leaking, cannisters of radioactive waste dumped in the ocean really don’t benefit anyone except the movies’ producers.
HAUNTS OF THE VERY RICH (1972) – Never Ending Hell on Earth
A cadre of well off individuals are transported by plane to what turns out to be anything but an island paradise. We soon learn that these folks are a troubled lot. We are eventually introduced to each character’s particular emotional baggage and then it is revealed that each may have met with a fatal accident.
Wait! We are apparently watching living, breathing people who are trying to figure out where they are stranded and why fate seems to be drawing a dark curtain over their circumstances. Are they in limbo?
In fact, their dilapidated island resort becomes a purgatory from which there is no escape.
Cast includes Lloyd Bridges as a hapless lothario, Ed Asner as a pissed off businessman and Cloris Leachman as Bridge’s latest love interest who find themselves wrapped in an unanswerable riddle.
Fine 1970’s TV movie fare.
“Detour” (1945) – Fate Sucks
Great thriller, clocking in at a whopping 68 minutes, I think. Poor sap, Al Roberts, played by Tom Neal, is hitchhiking across the U.S. from New York to California to join his girlfriend. Along the way, he gets picked up by a “Big Spender” Haskell, in a new vehicle who agrees to take him all the way to Los Angeles. The two exchange stories during their journey but Haskell mysteriously passes out en route and never regains consciousness. Roberts panics and buries the body out in the desert and assumes the dead man’s identity and drives off with his possessions. The police are NOT notified. The shit really hits the fan when Roberts picks up his own hitchhiker in the Mojave Desert. Turns out said lady, Vera, recognizes the car from her previous travels but not Roberts who is now driving the vehicle. She accuses Al of having nefarious aims and having done away with the car’s original owner, Haskell. A web of blackmail is then woven by Vera and intrigue builds upon intrigue….
Classic film with great dialogue and nice, low budget trappings. Definitely worth taking the viewing time for.
Black Christmas (1974) – Blueprint for Future Slasher Flicks
Bob Clark’s “Black Christmas” appeared many years before the onslaught of slasher films featuring idiosyncratic, stalking killers. This killer likes to freak out future victims by calling them on the phone and issuing gibberish about his foul intentions. There are many POV impressions from the killer’s vantage point. Victims are dispatched gruesomely and left in their lifeless, idle suspension to hang or sit undiscovered in the sorority house attic where some of the killer’s work unfolds. Many of these motifs we would see again in other films.
Plenty of quirky characters inhabit this world and there are a few characters who exhibit inner turmoil that may or may not be related to the serial killer on the loose but it is up to the viewer to decipher who is the most likely suspect. Keir Dullea of “2001: A Space Odyssey” plays a pianist who may be harboring dark secrets. Anybody who smashes a defenseless piano is certainly going to be under the microscope. John Saxon plays another low key, baffled cop who needs to find the killer fast before he strikes again.
Bob Clark directed a few other dark fantasies. Namely, “Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things” (zombies) and “Dead of Night” (reanimated corpse). And, “A Christmas Story”!
EDGE OF SANITY (1989) – HYBRID HORROR
Dr. Henry Jekyll has been experimenting with cocaine as a potential anesthetic drug. He over does it a bit with his experiment and his drug intake, and low and behold, manifests or converts into an evil alter ego, “Jack” Hyde, a crack pipe equipped, murderous psycho.
I subtitled this entry as Hybrid Horror. Let me explain myself. The grisly murders undertaken by Hyde resemble those of the infamous Jack The Ripper. This version of Mr. Hyde dispatches his victims in a manner similar to Ye Olde Jack: destructive, savage administration of a surgical knife to parts of the victim’s anatomy. So you have a mixing and combining of crazy, murderous behavior from two legendary figures from the past. The other hybrid I see is the appearance of actor Anthony (“PSYCHO”) Perkins who turns in another agitated, sweaty performance. He also dons eye liner and lipstick when channeling Jack Hyde. His look brings to mind Iggy Pop from the 1980’s! (See “TV EYE LIVE” album cover, as well as covers of the albums “LUST FOR LIFE”, “PARTY”, “SOLDIER”) Night Clubbing, indeed!
This will be of interest of those who have followed actor Anthony Perkins over the years. This role closely resembles his perverted “CRIMES OF PASSION” character Rev. Peter Shayne, a whacked out preacher pervert. Some things remain the same. Norman Bates rages!
Ex Machina (2014) – Trust Nothing
Science Fiction mind fuckage in the high mode. AI experiments run rampant in a secluded state of the art home/fortress/laboratory surrounded by some of the most grandeur examples of nature imaginable. In this fabulous environment, human and artificial intelligence interact and collide, deceiving each other along the way and providing a battleground for a survival of the fittest both mentally and physically. Not hard to imagine who comes out on top. Beautifully shot with some creepy footage of the initial AI experiments of brilliant programmer Nathan. It is his last creation, Ava, who takes on a very vibrant life of her own that far exceeds the expectations of all involved. (SEE ALSO: “Frankenstein”, “Games”, “Colossus: The Forbin Project”, “Demon Seed”)
“Horror of Dracula” (1958) – A Different (S)Take on Bram Stoker’s Novel, “Dracula”.
I have always enjoyed Hammer Films’ “Horror Of Dracula” starring Peter Cushing as Dr. Van Helsing, vampire authority, and Christopher Lee as the undead blood sucker, Dracula. I thought the movie was a very well done horror thriller. Lee is menacing and frightening as a very strong but cold parasitic beast bent on his own survival. Cushing is magnificent as the determined and brilliant expert on folklore and the Supernatural bent on ending the vampire’s reign of terror.
With the current pandemic raging on and being newly unemployed, I found time to finally finish Bram Stoker’s novel, “Dracula”. Now, comparing Hammers’ “Horror” with Stoker’s work, I found definite narrative differences. The Hammer film follows its own logic and twist on the story and is satisfying enough in its own right. Stoker’s work is of course The Source Material and being a 300 page novel having to be adapted by a scriptwriter for a 90 to 120 minute movie, many choice and not so choice bits are left out of the screen treatment for “Horror of Dracula”. I think these are two different visions sharing the same title character and some of the supporting players. Both versions are interesting and entertaining and it is worth investing time in reading the novel and getting a look at the original vision of author Stoker.
UNDER THE SKIN (2014) – Alien Invades
Very bizarre movie about an alien visitor to Scotland who assumes the form of actress Scarlett Johansson and proceeds to lure unwary men she picks up in her vehicle to their ultimate doom. Johansson lures them to her flat where they both disrobe with the promise of a sexual encounter but end up sinking into some unseen pool “holding tank” to be “consumed” later by the alien. These are some of the many arresting visuals which occur throughout this picture. I was reminded of Bowie’s “The Man Who Fell To Earth” with its tale of an alien who tries to assimilate into the human race but with tragic results. Johansson’s alien is less conventionally social and does try to adopt some of the rituals practiced by humans but cannot really make the connection. Her alien is finally victimized and destroyed by an all too human monster. Lovely outdoor scenes of Scotland abound and I came away from this movie feeling a little haunted.
A BUCKET OF BLOOD (1959) – ART CAN BE MURDER
This Roger Corman produced and directed film is a treat. There is a quasi-comical air about the proceedings as a lot of the action takes place in a Beat Generation inspired coffee house where poets and musicians alike share a performance stage, hang out and spout off in exaggerated artistic fashion. In the midst of this “Cool” cafe trundles waiter Walter Paisley, a loner who aspires to be creative and wants something more out of life than just busing tables for the rest of his life. Walter buys a packet of clay and tries his hand at sculpting in his seedy apartment. He becomes quickly frustrated when his efforts don’t yield anything worthwhile. To add to his frustration, the landlady’s cat has gotten itself stuck in his wall. Walter tries to create an opening in the wall for the cat to escape through but the knife he is using accidently impales and kills the cat. In order to hide his mistake, Walter decides to cover the cat’s body with his newly acquired clay complete with the protruding death knife. The result is better than he expected. Impressed by his own handiwork, Walter brings his new “sculpture” to his workplace to be shared and displayed and prove that he has artistic talent too. Walter’s work is immediately praised and allotted a degree of respect. His fans want to know what else Walter is working on and want to see it! The attention he receives is intoxicating. Walter will give the public what it wants!
Walter doesn’t have to wait long to be freshly inspired with a new sculpture as he is tailed home by an undercover cop who works the cafe looking for illicit drug activity. The cop thinks he sees Walter involved in a drug deal and follows Walter home one evening. One thing leads to another and in the ensuing altercation, the cop is killed and Walter covers his body with the clay in the apartment. The new work gets his fanbase even more excited for more works of genius from the former busboy turned Artiste. Walter has found his Muse: Murder.
Nice work by Corman to turn this movie from a satirical view of the Beats and their approach to Art into a rather unsettling essay about a quickly unravelling mind whose artist ruse is concealing a rabid, maladjusted psychopath. Probably Dick Miller’s best role.
Equinox (1970) – Ages of Evil
I had memories of watching this movie at a much younger age and decided to check it out again. Luckily, You Tube has the complete movie available for viewing. I must say that it is much better watching this time from what I previously remembered.
A geologist comes across a forbidden text which carries within it a demonic lineage and an evil spirit in human form is trying to recover said text at whatever cost. Friends of the geologist become involved in the struggle for ownership of what is probably the Book of Tobin and must deal with the evil machinations of the demon Asmodeous.
There are a lot of nice special effects in this film such as scenes of Purgatory, reality being literally and visually warped and stop motion animation of some the Infernal nightmare monsters of Hell by Jim Danforth and Daevid Allen.
Fantastic Saturday afternoon viewing fare!
The Cyclops (1957) – EYE-YI-YI!!!!
To be blunt about this mess of a film, save the 90 minutes of your time and skip this movie! This movie is very repetitive and follows a clueless group of four people trying to find a missing person who ended up lost in a valley that is highly irradiated. As a result of this radiation rich zone, animals have grown to enormous proportions. There are giant hawks, an enormous snake and a titanic lizard. Oh. There is also an unfortunate quasi-human who turns out to be the missing man who is now 20 or so feet tall and whose right eye is covered over by a curiously misaligned, through the course of this turkey, flap of skin. Yeah, not much happens in this film but scenes of characters tramping through the desert locale in search of an uncommunicative and grunting disfigured giant. Dreadful!