I have been waiting to start this new category for a long time. Some boring but real technical issues have kept me from launching it but for now those issues are resolved. Using my Sony Acid 6 music software I am able to extract samples from films. I have played with this before to some degree but now it will be a regular feature. Probably will few samples per page from here on out. Sometimes I may spruce up a post with a sample or two, or I may do a post featuring samples from decent articles here. This first feature has some fine dialogs and monologues from the recent article on Zaat, The Neanderthal Man and Mesa of Lost Women. The sample from Zaat is part of the introduction. It went on even longer but I think the piece I posted gives you some clue as to the nature of the monologue. Next is Professor Grove’s hostile lecture to his peers at the Naturalist Society where he insults them with every breath and becomes infuriated when they ask to see a little proof regarding his incredulous claims. The last sample is certainly the most famous of the three and it is the opening narration by Lyle Talbot from Mesa of Lost Women. I was merciful and trimmed out the solo credit music but there is some in the background that lets you hear why it is regarded as possibly the most annoying soundtrack in all of film history. This did not, of course, stop Ed wood Jr. from loving it to death and using it in his film Jail Bait.

ZAAT INTRO

THE NEANDERTHAL MAN LECTURE

MESA OF LOST WOMEN INTRO

AUDIO FILES MAY BE NOT WORK FOR A WHILE. I AM RESOLVING THE ISSUE. PLEASE HANG LOOSE WHILE ALL FILES ARE MOVED TO MY HOSTING ACCOUNT AND THEN MOVED BACK TO INDIVIDUAL POSTS. IT WILL TAKE SOME TIME BUT IT WILL GET DONE EVENTUALLY. SORRY.

URANIUM WILLY 4 FEB 10

HUMONGOUS

1982/Director: Paul Lynch/Writer: William Gray

Cast: Janet Julian,  David Wallace, John Wildman, Janit Baldwin, Joy Boushel, Layne Coleman, Shay Garner

This is a Canadian slasher film from the 80’s that despite trying to be different in some ways is nothing special. Of course how different could a slasher film from the 80’s be from others of the same period? If you’re a fan of deformed slashers who stalk horny teenagers in the woods and kill them off one by one (and who the hell isn’t?) then this film will not a be total waste of time.  Some night scenes are shot way too darkly and I actually read how some fans of the film said that, in their opinion, that was done intentionally by director Paul Lynch (who also did the archetypical 80’s slasher flick Prom Night) to achieve some sort of desired effect. That’s is like saying you walk into in a room and see someone banging themselves in the head with a hammer and then say “hey stop hitting yourself in the head with that hammer!” and they reply with “but this is want I want to do”. The teenagers are all so stereotyped 80’s slasher fodder it is pointless to describe them in depth. There is a nude appearance by Joy Boushel who would later appear as Seth Brundle’s arm wrestling prize in The Fly, another Canadian horror film by David Cronenberg. The deformed creature, the result of his mother being raped, is not shown too much and the poster is pretty misleading I feel. The film is not that freaky really. For 80’s slasher/stalker fans only maybe. I was a little disappointed. Not campy enough to excuse the bad film making and acting but worth one watching at least.

ATOM AGE VAMPIRE (Seddok, l’erede di Satana)

1960)/Director: Anton Giulio Majano/Writers: Alberto Bevilacqua, Gino De Santis

Cast: Alberto Lupo, Susanne Loret, Sergio Fantoni, Franca Parisi

This film explores the theme of the obsessed and mad doctor trying to restore the face of a once beautiful woman that has been ravaged by some sort of accident. Like the French film Eyes without a Face (Yeux Sans Visage) the woman in this case has her face disfigured in a car accident and contemplates suicide before Prof. Alberto Levin takes her in as an experiment. The catch is that he expects her to fall madly in love him and she is not interested. A crucial element of the serum used to restore Jeanette’s face must be taken from the blood of women who have recently died. The doctor (who changes into some sort of monster on his nightly trolling) figures, rightfully, that the best way to get the element is extract from women he has just murdered. Makes sense to me. While the story is not too different from other ‘facial restoration’ films of the time the dark atmosphere and heavy mood of the Italian production make it something fans of atmospheric b/w European horror will not want to miss. Leaning towards the trash cinema end of the celluloid spectrum and what’s wrong with that? Over the top acting and corny dubbing add to the film’s cheesy charm.

ZAAT

1975/Director: Don Barton/Writers: Ron Kivett, Lee O. Larew

Cast: Marshall Grauer, Wade Popwell, Paul Galloway, Gerald Cruse

What separates the low budget independent horror far of the 60’s and 70’s with the so called indie stuff of today is just how serious the old guys tried to be and in the process made some unintentionally riotous films. The guys of today are trying, I feel, to make an ‘instant camp classic’ and they just make a camcordered mess. Zaat is no doubt a mess  but a reasonably watchable mess if you like this sort of thing. At least it was shot on film with a camera mounted steadily on a tripod. A madad scientist is bent on revenge and nothing less than the conquest of the Universe. Not the world mind you, but the entire Universe. And he will do this by the one sure fire method known to all those who have ventured into conquest of the entire Universe: he will transform himself into a giant catfish!  And he will also enlist the help of all his water dwelling friends. His spends his time walking around really slowly in an outrageous costume and bumping off people who scoffed at his theories as well as innocent girls who are soaking up sun near the river banks he swims around in. The suit is really goofy looking and the narration is up there with Women of Lost Mesa in terms of pomposity. The narration is  spiced up with ample mad doctor laughs and insane phrases indicting delusions of grandeur. The ‘action’ takes place in Florida and some of the dialog is more than dated, especially the scenes of a fat white bubba type calling a black scientist ‘boy’ over and over. Let this Z-grade gem speak for itself. Here is some of the opening narration’s dark prophecies: 

Sargassum, the weed of deceit. Sargassum fish — mighty hunter of the deep! What an inspiration you have been in my plot! Your life of hiding, waiting… stalking your prey. At just the right moment… ATTACK! [chuckles] I love you. I hope I’ll be a good imitator. And my friend, the shark. Cunning, swift… wretched humans, they’re afraid of you! I admire you. Soon, I’ll swim with you! They’ll be afraid! [chuckles] Oh, mighty scorpion, dangerous beast of the ocean with your powerful daggers, and your camouflage… you have little to fear from other fish. [laughs] They think I’m insane! THEY’RE the ones who are insane! Oh, my friends of the deep! This day, this very day, I’ll become one of YOU! My family! And together we’ll conquer the universe!

THE WILD WOMEN OF WONGO

1958/Directer: James L. Wolcott/Writer: Cedric Rutherford

Cast: Jean Hawkshaw, Mary Ann Webb, Cande Gerrard, Adrienne Bourbeau, Ed Fury

This is truly an incredible film. Incredible in the super cheesy sense and one that only schlock lovers, like myself, could tolerate. I am giving you fair warning here. The plot is fairly simple. The gods tried various experiments with the human race until arriving at the present state of affairs. One bad experiment was the civilization of Wongo and neighboring islands where beautiful women were paired up with ugly, rude guys and hunky, good looking guys were mated with fairly unattractive gals who also happened to pretty bitchy. The conclusion here seems to be that ugly people are also dumb and ill mannered. One day a good looking guy from another island than Wongo arrives in a canoe to warn the Wongonians about the impending invasion by ape men. The king of Wongo decides he will have to kill the studly beefcake the next day because is presence is making the lovely ladies of Wongo antsy. Te guy manages to escapes with the help of some of the Wongo lasses and after the apemen issue is settled and the men of Goona are captured by the Women of Wongo and by the end of the flick the ugly folk go off with the ugly and the sexy ones pair up with the other sexy ones. The moral being, I guess, that birds of a feather flock together or something. The while thing was shot on some little islands around Florida that look too well maintained to look like anything but some sort of resort or public park. You can almost picture some golf carts rolling by right outside camera range. Horrible acting and script with worse camera work and stick music that would turn up in 1959’s Plan 9 from Outer space (a much better film I promise you). A small role by body builder Ed Fury (Colossus and the Queen) and the Adrienne Bourbou credited in the film is NOT the same chesty Adrienne Barbeau who played in TV’s Maude and in horror films like The Fog, Swamp Thing and Creepshow.

All Necrofile selections are candidates for a more thorough article at a later point in time.

THE NEANDERTHAL MAN

1953/Director: Ewald André Dupont/Writers: Aubrey Wisberg,
Jack Pollexfen

Cast: Robert Shayne, Joyce Terry, Richard Crane, Doris Merrick, Beverly Garland, Robert Long, Tandra Quinn (as Jeanette Quinn)

I had heard about The Neanderthal Man for awhile and refrained from seeing it even after I had gotten it and burned it to disk a couple months back. I just figured it would be Z-movie fodder for a commentary here and nothing more. Well it is not only that but it was a pretty enjoyable slice of cheese. The acting is pretty bad but with some decent moments (Beverly Garland plays the waitress Nola), the monster makeup by Harry Thomas (Missile to the Moon, Frankenstein’s Daughter, The Mole Men, Killers from Space and some Ed Wood Jr. classic like Plan Nine from Outer Space and Night of the Ghouls and loads of TV shows including The Munsters) is some of the worst of the man’s career and yet is perfectly campy and likable, and the scientific explanations are golden. I have long been planning an ‘audio excerpt’ style posit here and have done a few experiments and I am sure that the lecture given by Professor Groves to his incredulous colleagues will wind up there eventually. The film was produced and written by the team of Aubrey Wiseberg and Jack Pollexfen who either separately or between them churned out, as writers and producers, some of the greatest horror/sci-fi B-movie classics of the 50’s and 60’s. True classics  like The Man from Planet X, Daughter of Dr. Jekyll, Captive Women, and The Atomic Brain (Monstrosity) and many more.

MORE NEANDERTHAL MAN HERE >>

FRANKENSTEIN: THE TRUE STORY

1973/Director: Jack Smight/Writers: Don Bachardy, Christopher Isherwood

Cast: Michael Sarrazin, James Mason, Leonard Whiting, David McCallum, Jane Seymour, Nicola Pagett, Agnes Moorehead, John Gielgud, Tom Baker

I was lucky enough to actually see this fine film when it first aired on NBC as a two part movie back in 1973. I had not been able to see it again until only recently when I got a hold of the restored and full length, about three hours or more I guess, Universal Presents Frankenstein: The True Story DVD version. I read that there was an edited VHS version that was based more on the shortened European version of the film but never saw it. Now while the title claims it to be the ‘true version’ I understand that a few liberties were made with the original Mary Shelley story, which I have never read, and we will touch on at least one of those later in the review. I guess to get the final word one may have to go visit Pierre’s Frankensteinia blog, which I did earlier when doing some research for this post but I actually did not find an article there on this most excellent Frankentstein film and hope one appears soon. If there is a post there I apologize in advance and if not beg that one be made someday. The same year that Frankenstein: The True Story came out another made for TV film was released that was written and produced by Dan Curtis that starred Robert Foxworth as Dr. Victor Frankenstein and Bo Svenson. I also saw that version though I would need to see it again to refresh my memory on the story but it too made some claims to being mostly true to the original story. I am not a Frankenstein movie scholar (I am no sort of movie scholar to be quite frank) but I know that 1974 saw the last of the Hammer Frankenstein films with the fairly decent Terence Fisher film Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell which I reviewed here some time ago. Throughout the sixties Hammer had taken the Frankenstein story and did several new things with it and whether those were always great is debatable but it did pump life back into the legend as it also did with Dracula. There is, in my opinion, visual influence on this film version by director Jack Smight from Hammer and even veteran Hammer make up artist Roy Ashton did the effective make up for the monster. After all the fantastic stories and interpretations by Hammer it seemed time to reign the monster back in and recreate him yet once again.

MORE FRANKENSTEIN: THE TRUE STORY HERE >>

MESA OF LOST WOMEN

1953/Directors: Ron Ormond and Herbert Tevos/Writer: Herbert Tevos

Cast: Jackie Coogan, Allan Nixon, Richard Travis, Lyle Talbot, Paula Hill, Robert Knapp, Tandra Quinn, Dolores Fuller, Angelo Rossitto

I will agree somewhat with what one reviewer said about Mesa of Lost Women in that it seems to be more fun to read about it and the myths and legends surrounding it than it is to actually watch. Even seasoned cheese lovers seem to have a hard time with this film. I as well have a hard time with it though I have seen it a few times. The film is pretty short, only about 70 minutes, so considering you watch it in two parts it is not that much time out of your life really. The part of this movie, for me, that really makes the experience difficult is the infamously bad film score, but more on that in a moment. The film is often said to look like something Ed Wood Jr. would have created but I am not sure. I have long felt Wood was cast as the worst film director f all time and when a bad film (and Mesa of Lost Women is a bad film) comes along it sometimes is said to look like something Ed Wood Jr. would have done. I have long felt that Wood was a better film maker than the film world in general gives him credit for. But that may be a topic for a special post some other day. Mesa of Lost W omen however does have some connections to Ed Wood Jr. in an indirect way and those tenuous connections have led to speculation that Wood was involved with the project in some way or that he and Ron Ormond worked together. Maybe we can have a quick look at some of those before moving on.

MORE MESA OF LOST WOMEN HERE >

TODAY’S CYBER-PUNK FREAKFEST:

TETSUO: THE IRON MAN

SEE TETSUO: THE IRON HERE >>

THE ORIGINAL DOUBLE FEATURE

THAT SHOCKED THE WORLD!

NIGHT OF THE BLOODY APES w/

FEAST OF FLESH

SEE THE HORROR FEATURES FROM SOUTH OF THE BORDER THAT CHANGED THE WORLD! NIGHT OF THE BLOODY APES with FEAST OF FLESH >>

Well I know last post I said I was going to wait awhile before launching a new beatcast but I worked last night and today on a remix of one of my earlier pieces I posted here called Short of Clothes with dialog samples from Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill! and some juvenile delinquent film with William Shatner whose name I totally forget now. I was never too happy with the earlier mix. I felt it was too flat and not heavy enough for my liking. I also was learning how to do the dialog samples then I feel I over did it. I always like the guitar riff and bass line I patched together with Sony Acid 6. Anyone who has worked with software like his may know what I am talking about. The riffs you hear did not come as a ready to use loop but I used the ‘chopper’ application and took out small section from longer loops and put them together and it came out okay. I cannot hear the ‘seams’ at all the way I could on some earlier experiments. On this new mix I added a thick techno drum loop to fill in the empty spaces and reworked some of the dialog samples, places them on the beat a little better and panning them left and right a little more in certain areas. Sounds cool on head phones. I also added some echo to some of the voice samples and not sure about it in all areas but the piece sounds better than before. To hear the original and compare just go to my podcast/beatcast page, in my sidebar, click on the hip looking banner, and check it out. I think this is much better. May be remixing another early piece called That’s All I Need! as I never liked the final result too much either but it has some potential.

SHORT OF CLOTHES – REMIX 02

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I have some Beatcast cast stuff to release finally. In a couple more posts there will be another Beatcast and soon one I am still working on and that I have yet to find any dialog samples for. These next two lack dialog samples and were early experiments that I thought I had lost actually. I found the MP3s on my PC and figured I would post them here before I really did screw up and lose them. This particular piece was a turning point for me my struggles with the Sony Acid 6 software. I lost the original editable files and so I cannot tweak anything. The same is true of the piece that will be coming in a few more posts. I do not want to do Beatcasts back to back.. It is tricky business saving the Sony Acid files properly. If you lose your editable file you are basically screwed and I lost all of my very early ones. Some of my recent songs I may re-edit and re-post shortly as I can use the software a bit better. Have gave up on Abode Audition and Sonar and Cubase. I may go back to those but I seem to be getting the feel for Sony Acid 6 and see no reason to addle my little brain more with those harder to use programs (but with totally cooler looking interfaces). The new piece I am working on is my best I think so far. That will be here in a couple weeks I guess. But I am not going to rush it too much like I did some past pieces when I was simply pushing myself to solve issues with the software. For now enjoy this sort of south of the border sounding piece made with all Sony loops and lots of splicing and editing. The Uranium Café Podcast will be returning soon as well in a shorter and more focused format. Just a lot of work to do this stuff and sometimes I just am not into it the struggle aspect. Sometimes though I am. Hosting issues are resolved for the time being as well and I have the song posted here with local hosting as well as from my account at edutblogs.tv. Hope you like it. It is one of my better pieces I feel. Crank it on up.

ONE NIGHT IN OLD EL PASO

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VALDEZ IS COMING

1971/Director: Edwin Sherin/Writers: Roland Kibbee, David Rayfiel

Cast: Burt Lancaster, Susan Clark, Frank Silvera, Jon Cypher, Richard Jordan, Barton Heyman, Hector Elizondo

I love a good western. I saw this at a cinema matinee actually when it first came out for like .35 cents if you can believe that. The film has the edgy violence a lot of action films had at the time and seems influenced not only by Sam Peckingpah but spaghetti western directors as well. In fact the film was shot in Spain using some of the same locales that Sergio Leone used for his westerns. Bob Valdez is played by Burt Lancaster and is a local constable who feels driven to collect a small amount of money to pay the widow of a man he was tricked into killing. The ruthless rancher Frank Tanner (Jon Cypher) will not hear of it and has Valdez essentially crucified. What tanner does not know is that the life weary and soft spoken Valdez was once a skilled tracker, marksman and Indian hunter and he is now pretty pissed off and is out to get even. Richard Jordan does good as the big mouth coward Davis and forgotten beauty Susan Clarke is Tanner’s wife Gay Erin who gets kidnapped by Valdez and is drug through the mountains and wilderness as Tanner’s posse pursue them and are picked off one by one with Valdez’s Sharps long rifle. All this over $100.

THE DEVIL DOLL

1964/Director: Lindsay Shonteff/Writers: Ronald Kinnoch, Frederick E. Smith

Cast: Bryant Haliday, William Sylvester, Yvonne Romain,     Sandra Dorne, Karel Stepanek, Francis De Wolff

Most ventriloquist movies, like Magic with Anthony Hopkins, have the dummy as the villain who drives the ventriloquist insane. In the not too bad Devil Doll the dummy is actually the victim and the ventriloquist the tormentor. The great Vorelli (Bryant Haliday) is not only a gifted ventriloquist but a master hypnotist as well who has earned some degree of success with a stage act. On top of all this he also dabbled in the black arts at one point in his life and learned how to transfer souls from a human body to his dummy, which he did n the case of his old assistant Hugo. A spat of murders is happening in London and American reporter Mark English (William Sylvester) soon suspects Vorelli though he always has an alibi. Vorelli becomes infatuated with rich girl Marianne Horn (Yvonne Romaine) and sets out to so some soul transferring with her but first needs to get rid of his clingy assistant and former lover Magda (Sandra Dorne). There are some spicy scenes of Dorn that revel more butt cheek than you were used to seeing in those times, especially from plump near middle aged gals. In the middle of this is the tormented dummy Hugo who has to do the bidding of Vorelli but has his revenge in the end of course. The movies is not great but, as I said, is not too bad. I saw the MST3K version and it was pretty funny. Not sure how it should stand up without the hilarious onrunning commentaries.

THE GRANNY

1995/Director: Luca Bercovici/Writers: Sam Bernard, Luca Bercovici

Cast: Stella Stevens, Shannon Whirry, Luca Bercovici, Brant von Hoffman

Granny stars former sex kitten Stella Stevens (The Nutty Professor) as an aging and rich woman whose family is hovering her like a bunch of vultures waiting to collect on her will. She is close to one of her granddaughters Kelly (Shannon Whirry) whom the rest of family ridicules and mocks. Kelly has tended compassionately to Granny in her last years and asks for and expects nothing in return. Which is good since that is what she gets later. Granny drinks an elixir of youth that was exposed to direct sunlight and thus goes bad. Rather than regaining her youth Granny turns into a demon that set abut exacting revenge on all her family members, including nice girl Kelly for some reason. The action and acting is pretty campy but this is a fun little piece of trash. The movie went to VHS pretty fast and there is ample nudity and violence to make up for the whacky script and direction. Everyone seems to playing it tongue in cheek.

WOMAN EATER

1958/Director: Charles Saunders/Writers: Brandon Fleming

Cast: George Coulouris, Robert MacKenzie, Norman Claridge, Marpessa Dawn, Jimmy Vaughn

Probably the horror sub-genre I have always had the hardest time with is the man-eating plant one. I had some of the same issues with this film but it is pretty good. The problem I have is the plant is usually immobile and some evil doctors has to continually lure victims to feed the plant. The doctor here is Dr. James Moran (George Colouris) who discovered a plant in South America that produces an elixir that will return the dead to life but the plant, naturally, must be fed a diet of beautiful girls to produce the proper serum which he finds in plentiful supply in a quit London suburb. The obligatory odd assistant is Tanga (Jimmy Vaughn) who plays bongo drums with a frenzied look on his face which hypnotizes the gals allowing the doctor to escort them to the tree of doom. Lots of complications after the doctors hires a new and attractive keeper he gets the hot for upsetting his former housekeeper and, we assume, lover. I wound up liking the film and my only complaint might be that the tree creature looks cool but in only on the screen for a total of about five minutes. Great to watch the socially inept and unattractive Dr. Moran pick up some female plant food in a pub with all the ease of a Casonova.

MOTHER OF TEARS (LA TERZA MADRE)

2007/Director: Dario Argento/Writers: Jace Anderson, Dario Argento

Cast: Asia Argento, Cristian Solimeno, Adam James, Moran Atias, Udo Keir, Jun Ichikawa

Mother of tears is supposed to be the final part of a Dario Argento trilogy that began with Supirira and then continued with Inferno. I have Inferno but have never watched it and hope it succeeds in tying the films to together as I see no connection to Suspiria in this film yet. Aregento struggles to make a single coherent film and I have doubts about his pulling off a trilogy story that spans three decades. Asia Argento plays an American studying art restoration in Rome. She and her and her friend decide to forget the boss’s rules and they open an ancient urn and then figure reading some ancient inscriptions in the dark would be nice as well. Of course this moves the plot along as a ridiculously fast pace and w are treated to demons and a brutal death in less than ten minutes into the film. Soon Rome is plunged into a crime and suicide wave and Sarah (Asia Argento) must work alone to save the world from some sort of apocalyptic nightmare that I never quite understood. Udo Keir has a brief role as a priest and the deaths are fairly explicit. A woman tosses her baby over the railing of a bridge in one strange scene that rated a replay or two. The usual Argento confusion for the most part but filmed nicely with enough good moments to get a recommendation from me it but it is mostly for Argento fans.

All Necrofile selections are candidates for a more thorough article at a later point in time.