They don’t call it “fall” for nothing. Thank God at least for home media which gives you respite from the madness. This month is there is great mix of classics like Picnic to rancid rarities like Massacre in Dinosaur Valley. From a terrific Friday the 13th box set to a steelbook of Motel Hell to a box set of Universal’s Inner Sanctum mysteries starring Lon Chaney. Jr. So, turn off the damn news and dive into any of these deranged treats.
Picnic (Sony) Joshua Logan’s evocative 1955 film version of William Inge’s hit Broadway play stars William Holden as Hal Carter, a drifter who shows up in a sleepy Kansas town during the big Labor Day picnic. His presence stirs up the passions of several woman including a repressed schoolteacher (Rosalind Russell), a bookish schoolgirl (Susan Strasberg); and her beautiful but unhappy sister (Kim Novak), who’s engaged to Hal’s good friend (Cliff Robertson). Gorgeous cinematography by James Wong Howe and George Dunning’s seductive score- including the “Moonglow” theme which underscores an unforgettable sensual dance by Holden and Novak under the soft glow of Chinese lanterns at the picnic- a scene that is burned into my brain for eternity.
Motel Hell (Shout! Factory) A 4k restoration and steelbook presentation of an enjoyably goofy horror film starring Rory Calhoun as the crazed owner of a motel whose guests end up ingredients in “Farmer Vincent’s Fritters.” He keeps a garden out back with victims buried up to their head who are fed nutrients to make them more succulent. And yes, it’s a comedy (of sorts). Watching Rory running around wearing an actual pig’s head as a mask and wielding a chainsaw had them howling on 42nd St. where it played- repeatedly.
Friday the 13th Box Set (Shout! Factory) A glorious release of the box set of all the Friday the 13th films. The set includes 4k scans from the original negatives; incredible extras; rare outtakes and deleted scenes; and the third in the series in actual 3d (if you have a 3D TV). It includes all 12 films on 16 discs. The surprisingly excellent 2009 reboot of the original film, directed by Marcus Nispel (who also surprised with his ferocious remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) is also part of this amazing box set.
The Elephant Man (Criterion) This stunning black & white film directed by David Lynch is about John Merrick (John Hurt), a hideously deformed man in Victorian England, befriended by a doctor (Anthony Hopkins) but also exploited in freak shows. A heartbreaker of a film. The cinematography by Freddie Francis is extraordinary and really gives atmosphere to this tragic tale. This a 4K restoration and comes with archival interviews with Lynch and Hurt, plus a 2001 documentary about the making-of-the-film: The Terrible Elephant Man Revealed.
Curse of the Undead (Kino) A vampire western starring Eric Fleming (Rawhide) about a hired gunslinger (Michael Pate– dressed all in black) who is really a bloodsucker. He walks in the daylight, however; complains that light hurts his eyes, but does sleep in a coffin and is mortally afraid of crosses. Kathleen Crowley plays a rancher who hires him and lives to regret it. This 1959 oddity, directed by Edward Dein (The Leech Woman), looks stunning on Blu-ray.
The Opposite Sex (Warner Archive) Clare Boothe Luce’s glorious cat-fest is given the all-star Metrocolor, CinemaScope treatment. June Allyson plays former songbird Kay, married to Broadway producer Steve Hilliard (Leslie Nielsen), who is playing footsy with sexy showgirl Crystal Allen (Joan Collins). Before long poor Kay is on the train bound for Reno where she hooks up with some gay divorcees (Ann Miller & Agnes Moorehead) and is even joined by her New York frenemy Sylvia Fowler (the sublime Dolores Gray). But pretty soon Kay is painting her claws with “Jungle Red” nail polish and going to battle for her ex in this lurid, trashy, hilariously vulgar musical. Kay’s young daughter is played by Sandy Descher, who played the little girl wandering in the desert at the beginning of the horror film- Them!
Picture Mommy Dead (Kino) Director Bert I. Gordon (The Spider/The War of the Colossal Beast) starred his own daughter Susan as the lead of this 1966 gothic psychological thriller about a girl who believes her father (Don Ameche) was responsible for her mother’s (Zsa Zsa Gabor) death in a fire years ago. She is freshly released from the nuthouse and returns home to the family mansion to a new stepmother (Martha Hyer), who was once her governess. She also begins hearing and seeing things that erode her sanity, like creepy dolls singing, “The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out. In your stomach and out your mouth…” Is she being driven mad? What do you think? The Blu-ray looks phenomenal and has a fun, witty commentary track by Howard S. Berger and Nathaniel Thompson.
That’s Entertainment! (Warner Archive) Three movie musical highlights compilations, with segments introduced by Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Liza Minnelli, Frank Sinatra, Debbie Reynolds and others. One stop shopping to see the extraordinary high points of splashy color MGM musicals like Singin’ in the Rain, The Band Wagon, Meet Me in St. Louis, An American in Paris, etc. What’s great about these compilations is that they also show material we’ve never seen before- like Ava Gardner actually singing in Showboat (she was unceremoniously dubbed by the Studio and after hearing her sing you’ll wonder what the hell they were thinking.) Or Judy Garland’s unseen filmed musical number from Annie Get Your Gun, which she was fired from. Just bliss.
Test Tube Babies (Kino) In Test Tube Babies (1948), this hygiene/exploitation film that champions “modern science” with helping a childless married couple. George is a workaholic junior architect, and his wife Cathy gets bored and invites her friends over for parties that turn into drunken brawls with wives stripping and rolling around on the floor. Fighting infertility, the couple go to a doctor (Timothy Farrell– who usually plays sleazebags in these films) and he suggests they try “artificial insemination,” and it leads them to happiness and the birth of two brats. Guilty Parents (1934) starts with the murder trial of poor Helen Mason, whose lawyer blames everything on her mother, who was too prim and proper to teach her daughter about the birds and the bees. Helen’s saga has got everything. She gets drunk and is stripped nude at a party. She runs off with a boy who gets in a shootout at a gas station. She ends up teaching young girls dance and is blackmailed into introducing the sweet students to gangsters and wealthy creeps. It all ends with Helen emptying a gun into a loathsome cad and standing trial for his murder. As the movie moralizes, “then they must pay the inevitable penalty for sex ignorance!”
Killdozer (Kino) A well-remembered, preposterous 1974 TV movie about a construction crew on a small island off the coast of Africa and a meteor that falls to earth and connects with a bulldozer (by way of a blue light) that goes on a killing spree. Beefy Clint Walker plays the crew manager who tries to protect his men from the rampaging machine. I love scenes where the massive bulldozer lays in wait behind bushes to surprise its victims. Carl Betz (dad on The Donna Reed Show) plays the sharp-tongued member of the construction crew who, when someone states “You can’t kill a machine,” replies, “Maybe we should appeal to its sense of decency and fair play?” Later he apologizes, “I’m sorry- pain makes me snide.”
Massacre in Dinosaur Valley (Severin) More crackpot Italian cannibal movie insanity. This one stars Michael Sopkiw (Devilfish) as a cocky paleontologist who hitches a ride on a plane filled with an archeologist and his sexy daughter; a Vietnam vet and his drunken blonde shrew of a wife; a photographer and two sexy fashion models. They crash land in a remote jungle and get attacked by cannibals. Then, after a daring escape, the survivors run into an evil brute (and his chained-up slaves) illegally excavating gems and get imprisoned again. There are no dinosaurs. But practically everything else you’d want in an exploitation film including plenty of gratuitous nudity, goofy action scenes and native gut-munching. There’s a fabulous extra with Michael Sopkiw who charts his curious journey from jailbird to Italian action star.
Cruel Jaws (Severin) Jaw-dropping and wonderfully ludicrous sharksploitation movie by Bruno Mattei (under the pseudonym William Snyder) about a killer shark attacking a Florida town dependent on a yearly regatta race for money. This movie throws in every cliché in the book and adds brain-melting additions like cute dolphins (Cookie & Daisy), the non-drama of a marine park going under financially, a crippled girl in a wheelchair, the good-looking mayor’s son who is such a bully you can’t wait him to become chum. With underwater shots lifted from other movies; cringe-worthy acting- it just doesn’t stop. The film comes into two versions- one a gorgeous restoration, the other from the blurry, uncensored Japanese version (which honestly doesn’t add much). Either way you will have a chomping good time.
Primitives (Severin) A 1978 Indonesian rip-off of Italian cannibal films starring Barry Prima (The Warrior), who heads deep into the jungle with other students studying primitive tribes. They get speared, chased and captured by cannibals. So much of this is familiar, with plenty of gross-out moments (the birth of a baby is particularly outrageous). Handsome Barry Prima spends most of the movie in his underwear, and there is a goofy friend wearing glasses that gets separated from the group and wanders the jungle encountering one horror after another. This is such an incredibly rare entry in that loathsome, cannibal sub-genre of films.
Inner Sanctum Mysteries (Mill Creek) The “Inner Sanctum Mysteries” were a series of low-budget hour-long thrillers from Universal Studios, usually starring Lon Chaney Jr., Evelyn Ankers (known as “the screamer”), Anne Gwynne, among others. The films open with a shot of a head floating in a crystal ball that creepily moans, “This is the Inner Sanctum! A strange, fantastic world controlled by a mass of living, pulsating flesh: the mind. It destroys. Distorts. Creates monsters. Commits murder! Yes, even you- without knowing- can commit murder!” Included in this great set are all the films in this series: Weird Woman (1944) based on Fritz Leiber’s supernatural classic Conjure Wife about witchcraft and black magic at a college campus. The Frozen Ghost (1945) starring Lon Chaney Jr. as a mentalist who is consumed by guilt when an audience member dies during his act and ends up working at a creepy wax museum. Calling Dr. Death (1943) Chaney Jr. plays a doctor/hypnotist who suspects he may be the cause of his wife’s mysterious murder. Strange Confession (1945) is about a scientist (Chaney Jr.) whose evil boss (J. Carrol Nash) takes credit for his experiments; covets his wife; and is responsible for the death of his son. This won’t end well! Dead Man’s Eyes (1944) stars Lon Chaney Jr. as an artist who is blinded when his fetching model (played by the beautiful, wooden Acquanetta) mistakenly switches his bottle of eyewash with acid. Or was in intentional?
The Ape (Kino) Boris Karloff plays a kindly but deranged scientist who is intent on curing a young woman of polio. He finds he needs fresh spinal fluid for his experiments and when he captures and kills an escaped gorilla from a circus he dresses up in the animal’s skin to hunt and murder new victims for their precious spinal fluid. This 1940 low budget horror film has been one of those “public domain” titles that has popped up in horrible, blurry DVDs for years. To hold in your hand a stunning, beautiful looking Blu-ray of this is hard to imagine. But here it is!
Death Wish 3 (Scorpion) Along with 10 to Midnight, this may be my favorite Charles Bronson film. It’s also directed by Michael Winner, who directed the first of Bronson’s vigilante action films- Death Wish. Bronson once again plays Paul Kersey, retuning to New York to visit a friend who lives in a tenement, only to find him murdered by a gang of thugs who rule the streets there. Martin Balsam plays a tenant who fills Kersey in on the living hell the elderly go through with this punk posse. The lead bad boy is Fraker (Gavan O’Herlihy), who has a strip shaved down the middle of his head (where a Mohawk should have stood). A young Alex Winter (from the Bill & Ted films) is one of the gang crew. Bronson decides to arm the tenants and booby-trap their windows. Eventually senior citizens are walking down the streets with bazookas, merrily gunning down the creeps. It gets pretty insane. This Blu-ray is superb- the movie looks crisp and colorful. One has to applaud the care given to loony wonders like this one.
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