Movies

Kyuketsuki Gokemidoro [Goke - Bodysnatcher From Hell] - (1968) Terrifically colorful low-budget Alien Vampire thriller. After a UFO causes an airliner to crash land in what looks just like the old quarry, an alien brain parasite turns its hosts into vampires. At least half of the action is just the jerks and psychos - including a political candidate and his flunky, a sadistic psychiatrist, an American war widow, a teenage Mad Bomber, and an International Assassin, like you get on most flights - in the airplane squabbling among themselves. For god's sake if you are going to have alien brain parasites crawling into people's skulls why do you need neck-biting vampires? In spite of all the strife, activity and strong anti-war message it ended up being a bit tedious. 6/10

Television

The global mediaweb has recently made it possible for me to enjoy unusual television programs as well as movies, and these are some I have recently viewed:

Steptoe and Son (1962) The British source of America's Sanford and Son, depicting the conflicted relationship of a father and son running a tatty salvage yard. Really quite enjoyable - I watched an entire season, which consists of far fewer episodes than a U.S. season.

Dad's Army (1968) Having repeatedly encountered references to this as a classic British TV comedy for many years, I enjoyed a few episodes, but I think it requires a more purely British mindset and cultural immersion to fully appreciate these comic adventures of an inept volunteer militia during the Second World War.

Beyond Westworld (1980) If the Rampaging Android films Westworld and Futureworld left you longing for more Rampaging Android action, Beyond Westworld appeared for a few brief flat episodes to slake your thirst. Inexpensive, primitive, and often outright laughable, it features robots who look just like people, controlled by a Mad Genius who wants to create a perfect world ruled by unemotional mechanisms, leaving us free to enjoy Utopia. The crazy bastard! Four episodes were broadcast, one is enough to watch.

33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee (1969) As Donna said, this is their White Album - each Monkee is given an individual showcase just before the group permanently fragments. Much more focus away from the Monkees than I expected, with prominent place given to blues-rock performers Julie Driscoll and Brian Auger as a sort of satanic allegorical duo of Devil and Muse, and a number of other outstanding soul, blues and rock artists. It's obvious that everyone associated with this production was on drugs. Contains the astounding visual spectacle of a pyramid of pianos being simultaneously played by Fats Domino, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and Brian Auger. There is a nostalgia sequence of '50s hits, and a final extended trippy freakout that seems designed to punish any unstoned viewer.

Mary's Incredible Dream (1976) Mary Tyler Moore's version of 33 1/3 Revolutions. I know she wasn't on drugs so I can't imagine what provoked this bizarre musico/biblical allegory of the fall and redemption of humanity. Ben Vereen as the adversary, and The Manhattan Transfer as chorus. Mary's nostalgia goes back to the '30s with a series of elaborate production numbers and surreal settings. Her costume for one bawdy-house style number is a startling green glitter kinky-fascist ensemble with military trim and thigh-boots. Quite imaginative, colorful, and baffling.

I also watched a few episodes of the more recent The Sarah Silverman Program, to see what the deal was there. I figured out that it was a case of "saying something outrageously inappropriate is the same as a joke." Relatively amusing for a short time until I understood that.

Movies

De Noorderlingen (1992) Quirky Dutch film. Like many Quirky films there is a neutral character (in this case a child) who acts as observer of the peculiarities of an isolated community. In this case the community consists of one finished block of modern housing in the middle of nowhere, a fragment of a discontinued housing project. Bizarre, unfortunate and tragic events occur in strange circumstances and environments. Then it ends. If you like this sort of thing, this is the sort of thing you will like. Kept my interest. 5/10

The Hour-Glass Sanatorium (1973) Quirky Polish film. My friend Tim Maloney sent me this because it most adequately simulates a dream. I agree - it is the most perfectly dreamlike of any film I have yet seen. As such there was no need to try to follow what was happening, and I felt I could wake up at any time, so after about an hour and a half I did. I think you could put this on loop and not even notice. Good if you like this kind of movie. Didn't keep my interest but was intriguing to see. 5/10

Movies

Goin' Coconuts (1978) The Donny and Marie Osmond movie. I never thought anything would make me want Donny and Marie to sing more, but the rest of this movie did. Only a few musical numbers, but they are the high point of a story that I think Donny and Marie wrote themselves, and simply ad-libbed without a script - it's that poor. Herb Adelman is Sid the Manager - I've seen him make some pretty bad material look good, but this was too much even for him. Directed by Howard Morris, one of the pioneering TV comedians of Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, and familiar TV voice and face for decades thereafter - and he shouldn't have done it. When the kids are performing, they are great, and they do some pretty challenging things without faking it - Donny did know all the lyrics to Hawaiian War Chant, and the dance too. When they are trying to keep the villains from getting the necklace that's the key to mystery, it's awful. What the hell did I expect? 3/10

Movies

Poligamy (2009) Hungarian romantic fantasy: an aspiring screenwriter who finds the prospect of parenthood and marriage with his long-time girlfriend oppressive, wakes up in a redecorated apartment with a strange woman, and he is the only one who notices anything different. This happens every day until he learns his lesson. I picked this because I like to try to see something relatively normal from other countries, and I thought it would be something Donna and I could watch together. What I always forget is that, being of a melancholic temperament, I choose things I think will make me feel better, while she - sanguine or choleric or whatever - prefers things that tend to make me feel worse; disturbing unsettling things with no clear resolution that just leave me wishing I had stayed in bed. So I thought this was cute and pleasant, a good window into an idealized daily life in modern Budapest; she seemed to think it was too light, and lacking in substance. Sometimes things are just for fun, to find some pleasure and enjoyment in life. 7/10

Movies

The Abbott & Costello project moves into 1942/3 with Ride 'Em Cowboy, Rio Rita, Pardon My Sarong, Who Dunnit, and It Ain't Hay. After their appearance in pre-war militaristic propaganda, their films after the war began steer as much as possible into pure escapism, with only marginal war topics, such as the Nazi spy ring in in Rio Rita, and an occasional gag referring to Made In Japan, or shortages of such commodities as rubber. Ride 'Em, Rio Rita, and Who Dunnit (a radio show murder mystery) are more versions of the same movie, with A&C doing comedy relief for the central boy/girl plot. The weakness of this concept is that the plot must be carried by people who are not good enough to merit star billing, and it gets so weak at times that I just gave up on Rio Rita halfway through. Pardon My Sarong is a Gilligan's Island story, with the boy/girl crap pushed into the corner and the boys more integrated into the story, and It Ain't Hay is a perfunctory adaptation of a Damon Runyon story in which the boys at last take the primary roles. What I look for in these, other than the comedy routines, is an indication of the social issues of the day. In Ride 'Em Cowboy, the existence of African Americans is suddenly acknowledged, with Ella Fitzgerald's role as Ruby the singing maid, with a couple of musical numbers and prominent placement in many shots. In 1941's In the Navy, we have the disturbing experience of seeing the Andrews Sisters performing "Gimme Some Skin," a boogie-woogie jive number with Patty singing in a stereotypical style about "how they do it in Harlem," with not one actual or potential Harlemite in the crowd, the band, or the entire movie. As Donna said when I described it to her, "We will take your music, make it less interesting, and then pretend you don't exist." Though they must appear only as servants or entertainers, African Americans are at least allowed to exist in Ride 'Em and Rio Rita. Pardon My Sarong has its own weird racial issues, with islanders being represented as a type of white person, and played primarily by whites - when played by blacks they are cannibals and savages. Finally, in It Ain't Hay, the musical portion is pushed to the end of the movie with a short revue featuring the Four Step Brothers in zoot suits - not chef's hats and waiter's coats for once. I attribute the changing racial representation to war issues - both as an attempt to appeal to an audience which began to gain some degree of power and money through military service and increasing wartime industry, and, out of fear, to placate an abused minority which was being appealed to via racialist propaganda as a tool to weaken US power.

Mary Wickes in Who Dunnit - MURDER?!?!?

Movies

This Abbott and Costello thing is already turning out to be much harder work than the Norman Wisdom and Morecambe & Wise projects. In Hold That Ghost they come into possession of an Old Dark House with a gangster's fortune hidden in it. The Andrews Sisters and Ted Lewis appear at the beginning and end of the film, with no connection to the story. Lewis's archaic music-hall schtick is hard to get. Joan Davis as Lou's girl-foil really peps things up. I had seen Buck Privates enough times so I skipped it, but endured the rest of the trilogy, In the Navy and Keep 'em Flying. These films are factory-made variety revues, a boy meets girl formula with songs. A&C are reduced to comedy relief in their own films, which are intense militaristic propaganda. Large production numbers portray military life as joyful and heroic. High budget, but not very good as movies. Navy was more enjoyable thanks to a couple of good money-counting bits, and the bizarre Hawaiian Style number by the Andrewses - bongo belts, fringe blouses and Hawaiian Chant, boogie woogie style. Flying was not, to my mind, improved by Martha Raye as twins.

Patty Andrews hamming it up in a Bongo Belt

Movies

One Night in the Tropics (1940) Idiotic "Love Insurance" farce, with forgettable Jerome Kern songs and Abbott and Costello crudely shoe-horned in. Expensive sets look so fresh and unrealistic you can almost smell the paint; there may not be lighting fixtures but there is always plenty of elaborate illumination with decorative shadows but nothing casting them, and everything else is equally convincing. If you can put yourself into that sort of total fantasy mindset it may be watchable but for me it was a real chore to sit through, especially as I have always found the protagonists, Robert Cummings and Allan Jones, rather hard to take. Mary Bolland as the love interest's numerologist aunt is the best character - even William Frawley is kind of lousy. This is Abbott and Costello's first feature film appearance, a simple cash-in on their radio popularity. I am watching their films looking for lesser-known routines and this has some good ones, which I will call Two Tens for a Five, A Dollar a Day For a Year, and I Don't Like Mustard. And it isn't even one night either because they are in the tropics for days and days. 4/10

Movies

Mio figlio Nerone (1956) Roman history as black comedy. Alberto Sordi plays Nero like Curly Howard, but the star of the movie is Gloria Swanson as his mother Agrippina. I resented the subtitles for forcing me to look away from her magnetic power. She's the only real actor in the film; Vittorio De Sica does a good comic turn as Seneca, and Brigitte Bardot is cute and sometimes alluring as Poppaea but not worth re-naming the movie for - the title for the English-speaking market was Nero's Mistress to cash in on Bardotmania. The story plays wittily upon the well-known Italian mother-son bond, with much of the action being the mutual foiling of each other's schemes while feigning devotion. It's Swanson's movie all the way, and is bright, colorful and entirely fun. 8/10

Not dead yet - not by a long shot.

Movies

Aachi and Ssipak (2006) Korean animated SF action comedy. Deliberately, excessively violent and offensive, which I normally dislike, and yet I found myself enjoying the excess from start to finish. In this horrible future, human excreta is the global energy source. Infants have a chip inserted in their recta at birth to record their contribution to society, and every time you poop you are rewarded with a highly addictive laxative popsicle, which has become a prime object of exchange, and which has made some people into miniature blue mutants who can eat nothing else, but have lost the ability to excrete. Such obligatory action cliches as the subterranean mine car rollercoaster and dangling over an abyss are made into savage mockeries. Brilliantly stupid, and stylishly deranged. 9/10

Movies

The Crooked Circle (1932) Primitive spooky crime farce. The eponymous band of hooded conspirators have sworn to kill the head of the amateur detective Sphinx Club, in an Old Dark House with a ghost violinist when the clock strikes thirteen. Zasu Pitts and James Gleason provide real laughs as ninny maid and nitwit policeman. Secret panels galore. Who keeps an open can of glue right next to a human skeleton, and what must be the inevitable result? Silly archaic fun. 6/10

Movies

Cargo (2009) Grimy Swiss space thriller - protagonist signs on as doctor on a cargo ship carrying construction materials to Station 42 in order to make money to join her sister on the colony world Rhea. Of course nothing is what it seems; not cargo, crew or destination. The first two thirds plays like a German-language rehash of Alien, with lots of creeping with flashlights slowly down oddly-shaped hallways of a dirty dripping half-broken spaceship, and everything is made insanely ominous by continuous booming, clanging and hissing noises. However, it won me over at last by the sophistication of its conception and execution in the last third. Not a great SF film, but it eventually becomes a pretty good one. 7/10

Movies

At That Time (1943) Outstanding German melodrama. Zarah Leander is a woman who was seen leaving a hotel room where a dead man was found minutes later. The investigation leads to numerous men who tell in flashback the story of her life of noble sacrifice; losing her marriage, career and romance for the sake of others - every time she does what she knows is right she pays a terrible price. Leander is every bit the equal of Joan Crawford or Susan Hayward, and this story might have been as good a vehicle for Bette Davis. Production values are a bit quirky - lavish sets one moment, rear-projection street scenes the next; sometimes flat, other times stylishly lit, but she comes through it all as an excellent dramatic actress. This is pure escapism with locales glamorous, seedily exotic, or grimly lit with the shadow of prison bars. A pleasure to watch. 9/10

Zarah Leander

Movies

Everything's On Ice (1939) Offbeat low-budget showcase for the talents of seven-year-old ice skater Irene Dare. Irritating comic actor Roscoe Karns is the greedy mooching spendthrift uncle whose grandiose schemes threaten to ruin everything, Edgar Kennedy is the level-headed father who must save the day. Dare is not a particularly appealing child or skilled actress; she is kept out of the story line entirely except as a background/gimmick and her skate-dancing numbers are rather bizarrely staged. I got it here, and if the embedded player works for you, go to 51 minutes and you will see all that is really worth seeing, the deranged polar bear vocal quartet and baby penguin number which is the weird pinnacle of the film. 4/10

Movies

Their Own Desire (1929) Norma Shearer in a Modern Melodrama: she vows never to take any man seriously after father Lewis Stone breaks up the family for The Other Woman. Young sheik Robert Taylor puts the rush on her and it's only after they fall for each other that she finds out whose son he happens to be. Complications ensue. Shearer is luscious and vivacious and definitely worth seeing, though some of her chirpy dialog is pretty forced; Taylor is pretty - pretty obnoxious. Kind of a clunky plot but it's just before the Crash, when the travails of polo playing socialites were still escapist fun and there's lots of nice stuff to look at, primarily Norma. Gowns by Adrian are light, tight and airy, just revealing enough and often backless (and bra-less). Nothing to write home about, but easy on the eyes and not challenging for the brain. 6/10

Shearer and Taylor dancing up a storm.

Movies

Phantom of Chinatown (1940) Formulaic mystery, but of a certain historic and cultural interest. A revamp of Karloff's creaky "Mr. Wong of Chinatown" series, showing a move away from the earlier Yellow Peril motifs and toward a more positive depiction of the Chinese - this was in keeping with the politics at the time, with strengthening ties to China balancing increased tension with Japan. This film gave Keye Luke his only starring role, as young Jimmy Wong, and provided a substantial and intelligent role for actress Lotus Long, with romantic insinuations in the end. The story is unremarkable, and the acting is a bit uneven, but having an ethnic main character played by an ethnic actor was a momentary positive step forward. Other characters are more ethnic but portrayed in a fairly positive light, and Wong's Chinese cook provides comedy relief without being excessively degrading or cartoonish. 5/10

Lotus Long and Keye Luke discuss the case.

Movies

The Slime People (1963) Monster-suit movie has some unique ideas - it skips the usual slow invasion lead-up and gives you the suit in the opening shot; scaly subterranean beast-men driven up from their abode by nuclear testing have used a solidifying fog to make a dome over L.A. to change the climate to suit their needs. Sadly, it becomes incredibly tedious in its relatively short run-time, with much of the walking and running around obscured by smoke machines and foggy overlays. The script is pretty eccentric, and there are only a couple of actors in the film, the rest being untalented amateurs - old-timer Les Tremayne goes over the top as a local eccentric but doesn't last very long. Much credit is due the creators of the three pretty darn good monster suits, but they and the location shots of a meat market are the best part of the movie. 3/10

Movies

Naked You Die (1968) Directed by Antonio Margheriti, a lite thriller pioneering many of the cliches of the giallo genre. Black-gloved strangler on the loose in exclusive girls' school in an odd Anglo-Italian world. Lime pit on premises. Michael Rennie makes a distinguished but undemanding appearance as the police inspector. Donna joined me for this one, and fell asleep during the extremely slow first quarter, but we had fun playing whodunnit with the blatantly obvious clues and seeing how it all came together in the end. It seemed like it was meant to be a teenage date movie, with little gruesomeness, few real thrills and no naughty bits. Kind of fun in a silly, stupid way, with lots of bright colors and moving shapes. 6/10

Movies

Prince of Space (1959) Inexpensive, primitive children's SF adventure from Japan. Bad guys from space, model spaceships wobbling on wires, goofy dubbing, silly and fun. 6/10

The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002) Apparently they spent 100 million dollars on this Eddie Murphy SF adventure, and 20 million to promote it, and got back 7 million in the theatres and 24 from rentals. If I can still add right that makes an 89 million dollar loss. I wanted to see how that could happen and I did. What happened was it is actually lousy. It's like they pulled a crummy action movie script out of the trash and puked dollars on it. (The good news is it appears to have ended the screenwriter's career.) Bad guy wants to buy good guy's night club, good guy won't sell, bad guy's goons blow up night club and kill good guy's friend, good guy goes after bad guy. ON THE MOON. Those were some really expensive looking sets they were blowing up. See Moon Zero Two or Leonard Part 6 instead. 1/10