My friends, in the world of Film Review, there are specials, yes there are. But sometimes those specials are SO special the word Special just isn't enough. That's when we know we got us a Super Special. Without further ado...
The B Movie Super Special of 2008!
First up, a Chiller Double Feature.
THE ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU has a great title, it sounds like a Doc Savage story and it's an okay flick for what it is. Some fortune hunters are after some diamonds that are lost in a shipwreck off the coast( the voodoo coast to be precise) of Africa. As these things go, the diamonds are guarded by the zombie sailors who were cursed by the natives they originally stole the diamonds from. Everybody seems to know about the zombies, who occasionally wander into the road and get hit by cars or stumble into a nearby plantation house. Busty Alison Hayes plays one of the adventurer's woman to inject some sex appeal into the mix. You gotta love Hayes, she automatically makes these little pictures better. Well her and her great rack. The zombies are the real kind, walking dead guys who appear to often be like a nuisance the locals have come to accept. They can't be killed and don't like fire but largely keep to themselves in a cave unless someone comes for the diamonds. There's some deep sea diving zombie attacks and some mumbo jumbo about what they want before the mostly predictable conclusion. The ending doesn't make much sense but who cares? It's goofy and cheap but entertaining enough in a pulp fashion.
THE PHANTOM FROM 10,000 LEAGUES however,while goofy and cheap, is less fun. But what a cool poster! The goofy looking sea dragon is mildly terrorizing a certain cove. You pretty much have to be in a rowboat and react real slowly to be in danger. The government sends out some guys to investigate as victims of the monster have radiation burns when they wash ashore. There's the scientist dabbling in areas best left undabbled, his hot daughter, the heroic radiation mutation specialist and it turns out, a couple of spies. The spies work for an unnamed country but as this is the fifties, I bet it's a red one. The dragon himself is really not too important and is played by some unlucky guy in a suit. He sorta wrestles people in the underwater scenes, but he swims about as good as a guy in a clunky dragon suit can. The hot daughter provides a little skin, but no nudity. Basically, your fifties Roger Corman style sexuality, she comes out of the shower in a towel or is at the beach. It turns out a uranium deposit is responsible for the mutant dragon but there's also talk of death ray making, your basic cold war scifi plot gimmicks. At some point a turtle is made into a larger turtle through radiation. Sadly, the sympathetic janitor is left to clean up the mutant turtle. It could've been ten minutes shorter and been fine. It all ends in a low budget Godzilla fashion as the scientist tries to right his wrong and everybody stands on the beach, looking out at the water and lamenting all the dabbling. The score was by Ronald Stein. I really don't think anyone or anything goes anywhere near 10,000 leagues.
next up...
THE MAN WHO TURNED TO STONE
Well actually, several men and a woman. Victor Jory ( Lamont Cranston from THE SHADOW serial) plays a two hundred year old scientist who along with some "old " friends stays young by draining the life forces off of young women. To make it almost lurid he and his pals run a young woman's prison. It's fairly typical of like pictures from Columbia at the time as it's short and cheap but it's interesting enough in a b-movie pulp horror way. As the semi-immortals run out of lifeforce they become hard as stone and their heartbeats are loud enough to be heard by anyone around them. They don't really look stone but more like slightly cadaverous ghouls, similar to 1940's zombies. After a bunch of young girl have "heart attacks", a crusading female social worker becomes suspicious and investigates with the help of a doctor. To up the fright factor one of the stone men is a hulking, mute brute named Eric that occasionally carries off a broad to drain. There's a mixture of girls in the prison, ranging from the brassy loudmouth to the innocent girl who was at the wrong place at the wrong time. Really, it's kind of a shame it wasn't a poverty row production or done pre-code so that the many exploitable elements could've been used with greater sleaze. It could've also worked as a mid-60's Jesus Franco movie with it's mad science and woman's prison. But for what it is, it's okay enough. I caught it on TCM and it's likely to pop again this Halloween, probably at around 3:30 am.
followed by...
THE UNDYING MONSTER
I caught THE UNDYING MONSTER on TCM but it has since been released with two other cool John Brahm flicks from the forties, THE LODGER and HANGOVER SQUARE. I really like these B pictures because they're short and are often pretty cool. At just over an hour it beats the hell outta watching some craptacular reality show. This one plays a lot like a cross between THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES and THE WOLFMAN. At an isolated gloomy English manor, a girl is killed out on the moors. There's an old local legend of a blood thirsty monster stalking the Hammond family. Scotland Yard sends out their man to investigate, a guy who sounds completely American for some reason. He is joined by a woman assistant, who provides some comedy relief. Turns out the Hammonds have been having beast troubles since a distant relative returned from the crusades. It doesn't take Bob the detective (or you) to figure out what's up but it moves real quick and has that crisp British mystery feel. The real star of the show is the amazing sets, both interior and exterior. They really look like top notch Universal Horror cycle stuff. The manor itself seems cavernous and gloomy, full of dark corners and stained glass with hidden rooms and mausoleums. The exteriors are straight up gothic horror with dead trees and high rocky cliffs. There's even a mastiff in front of a big fireplace. The ending doesn't really make a lot of sense but that's okay because it's not the kind of picture you are supposed to think too hard on. Just enjoy the crisp black and white photography and the gothic atmosphere.
and...
THE DEVIL COMMANDS
THE DEVIL COMMANDS, directed by Edward Dmytryk, stars Boris Karloff as a sad widower looking for a way to talk to his wife in the great beyond. Turns out, it's just not worth the fucking trouble and requires too many corpses to be cost effective. The Devil himself does little commanding, well none that I saw but it is a cool title. Karloff invents a way to harness the brain waves or some such shit of the dead by opening a portal of sorts with the help of a phoney ( I know, they're all phoney but for the plot to go forward just go with it) spiritualist. The spiritualist wants to get rich after Karloff exposed her scam so she agrees to help him and she turns out to be less than nice. The highlight for me was the contraption that Karloff builds to harness the energy off of some corpses he stole. The corpses all wear very clunky diving suit type outfits and they actually sit up a bit as the void is opened up. It's very cool looking and seemed like the kind of thing that would pop up in a Del Toro picture now. The picture as a whole is pretty entertaining but I was expecting a bit of some satanic action. Still, it's a cool look at some old pseudoscience and as always Karloff sells it.
and lastly...
DR. RENAULT'S SECRET
I know Dr. Renault's secret, it's making a small indentation in the center of the hamburger patty to keep it from turning into a baseball of ground meat. Seriously, try it next time you grill burgers, it'll keep 'em flat. But I only half kid, DR.RENAULT'S SECRET is about the danger of crafting your own handyman out of an ape because what you end up with is something like a slightly more simian Benecio del Toro. Gorillanaut fave George Zucco as Dr. Renault has fashioned Noel (J. Carrol Naish) into a man/monkey that unfortunately falls in love with Renault's daughter. The daughter is supposed to marry an American doctor which causes Noel to become a murdering, jealous monkey man. When I was a freshman in college, I had a girlfriend in high school who had a dog like that. He wouldn't let me near or on her. So, I killed him. Which is what Noel does. He kills some dickish Frenchmen here and there especially if they make fun of his monkey dance. Naish does a good job of being pitiful, he really wants to be an ape again. People tend to assume that this is a rip off of THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU but it is actually the third screen version of Gaston Leroux's serial novel "Balaoo". The first was the awesomely titled BALAOO : THE DEMON BABOON and the second was THE WIZARD. It turns out to be a pretty good B horror movie with some good sets and a nicely done conclusion which ends sadly for the poor monkey man.
nap time boys and girls.
