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Private Notes
I'm submitting Eegah for your judgment, but I already suspect you'll return a verdict of guilty and demand the cat-o-nine-tails for all! The severity of this crime against humanity is not diminished by the presence of Indulgent Parent Syndrome. Eegah stars Arch Hall Junior and was directed by Arch Hall Senior under a non-de-blame. When he created this vehicle for the talents of his son, he overlooked one vital piece of information: Arch Hall Junior had no talents whatsoever. Nor did Arch Senior learn his lesson from this film - he kept trying to foist Arch Junior onto an unwilling world.
This superhero send-up produced and directed by my old friend Bill Winckler, features three of cult cinema's - ahem - biggest stars. Big, busty Chastity Knott must use her amazing new abilities as a super-stacked costumed crime fighter to stop villainous bikini-bar owner Al Purplewood and his sexy, murderous strippers, played with relish by Haji, Mimma Mariucci, and Sheri Dawn Thomas. Kitten Natividad, Raven De La Croix, and Haji all hail from the production house of director Russ Meyer, in such classics as Faster Pussycat Kill Kill (1965), Motor Psycho (1965), Beneath The Valley Of The Ultra-Vixens (1979), and Up! (1976) - definitely not to be confused with the recent Pixar production.
A rather bland and cosmologically incorrect title that could have been applied to any one of scores of science fiction films of the era, it was made in Britain in 1967 and is adapted from a 1964 novel entitled The Gods Hate Kansas. As well they might, for those wacky gods hate a lot of their own creations - but I wonder what they think of plagiarists? This is so obviously a rip-off...I mean unacknowledged remake of the 1955 classic Quatermass II as to be worthy of Roger Corman. In short, this film is about as original as Disney's The Lion King.
I present for your enjoyment, for the first time on Australian television - be it terrestrial, cable, hand-woven, or digital - Night Of The Living Dead: Reanimated, compiled and produced by my good friend Mike Schneider. It's a kick-in-the-arts, you might say - if you've taken enough barbiturates - told through a variety of fine arts and animation techniques. Traditional animation, CGI, stop-motion, oil painting, watercolor, ink, even sock puppets, Furbies, Lego and Barbie dolls - all synced up to the original audio track. This is certainly the most imaginative idea I've ever seen when it comes to re-creating Night Of The Living Dead - or any film for that matter.
The curiosity from the nether regions of the Public Domain that I'm presenting for your entertainment this week is The Corpse Vanishes, an above-average film from the poverty row studio Monogram, made in 1942 and starring my favourite Hungarian ham, Bela Lugosi, who plays a mad botanist whose wife needs regular injections of the precious bodily fluids of young ladies to stay young and healthy - somewhat like the needs of Ingrid Pitt in Countess Dracula.
Three renegade scientists have genetically engineered a half-man half-fish abomination, but they're not resting on their laurels, either. They've just reanimated Frankenstein's long-dead monster, too! The horror begins when the amphibious beast claims its first victims, killing a few bikini babes who only wanted to use his beach to take some cheesecake photos. With a cast of dozens including porn star Ron Jeremy, Russ Meyer's bosom buddy Raven De La Croix, The Munster's Butch Patrick, Star Trek author David Gerrold, and Troma CEO Lloyd Kaufman!
It might help to endure the movie if you turn it into a drinking game, and count the number of science fiction cliches: The alien planet populated by creatures who look just like us; Meteor storms the instant the astronauts venture outside their spaceship; The tractor beam; The love triangle; Attacked by aggressive aliens; The alien monster who carries the pretty young lady away (despite being a completely different species), just to name too many. Well, are we all sitting comfortably? Then take your protein pill and put your helmet on as we prepare to blast off for The Phantom Planet!
Made in 1966 for about forty thousand dollars, filmed in Italy and set in contemporary Transylvania, The She-Beast is an early work from promising young English director Michael Reeves - who wrote it under the name Michael Byron - and it features the very lovely and talented Barbara Steele. Two good reasons to watch the film and overlook its low budget and dubbing problems. Its only real fault is that a role that I would have been perfect for went to...someone else.
I believe you'll be pleased with this week's offering, which is the 1920 version of Robert Louis Stevenson's much-filmed story The Strange Case Of Doctor Jekyll And Mister Hyde, starring my good friend John Barrymore. This is the best of many versions made during the silent era, and most of the talkie adaptations. In my own humble, subjective (yet always accurate) opinion, only the 1931 version starring Frederic March is better than this one. If you haven't seen that version you should seek it out, but not before you see this one. To walk away before the end would be unforgivable, a terrible insult to John Barrymore, and he wasn't one to endure badly behaved audiences.
If you're looking for a serious movie, you may find yourself wanting to bitch-slap me for subjecting you to The Vampire Happening, so all you armchair critics out there should know right now this is not a serious horror drama, but a light-hearted comedy. The reviews I read were extremely misleading, making it sound like some sort of Euro-Trash sexploitation title. Well, it’s not. The Vampire Happening is a sexy horror comedy. It’s also very much a period piece, which is a polite way to say it hasn’t aged very well.
I'm honoured to have your company again, although this week's film might make you think otherwise. The Russian film Planet Of Storms (1962) is a high-quality science fiction film with state-of-the-art special effects. Unfortunately, the American rights were purchased by Roger Corman, who promptly violated it three times to make Queen Of Blood (1966), Voyage To The Planet Of Prehistoric Women (1968) and this week's pastiche, Voyage To The Prehistoric Planet (1965). How could the ethical man who made The Intruder (1962) and The Masque Of The Red Death (1964) do such a damnable act? Well, I happen to know that while he was very busy making other films, his evil robot double negotiated with these Russians.
The Wild Women Of Wongo was made by a cast and crew of unknowns who stayed that way. It was filmed in Florida and set on a tropical island circa 8,000 BC. The occupants are tragically primitive in some ways, yet surprisingly modern in others, which is a generous way of saying 'anachronisms abound'. What passes for a plot in this movie is a silly social engineering experiment conducted by Mother Nature and Father Time. Many people regard these two entities as being very wise, but according to the evidence in this film of this film, they are both idiots, unfit to be guiding our precious lives or having anything to do with the creation of screenplays. At least the Wild Women themselves are very watchable. Not for their great acting abilities or for providing profound insights into the human condition, but for reasons that will soon become apparent.
Actually it was made in 1959 but common sense prevailed for the next three years. The story-line concerns a Mad Scientist, one of thousands to be found across world cinema. That's surely more than there are in the real world. At least in reality, Mad Scientists make it easy for us to spot them by helpfully identifying themselves as Creationists. But tonight's madman of science is doing the wrong type of creating. You guessed it! He's trying to play God, so it can hardly be called a spoiler when I tell you he's going to be punished for his presumption. This movie has the same message as the Tower Of Babel story: Stay in your place or God will smack you hard!
