Foster on Film – Page 98 – The Film Criticism of Matthew M. Foster

Samson vs. the Vampire Women (1962)

Oct 061962

The vampire women rise after their two century nap to claim the daughter (María Duval) of a local scientist (Augusto Benedico) as their next queen. It is up to Samson (Santo), the masked wrestler and part-time crime fighter, to defeat the evil females and their three bulky henchmen.

To truly understand the wonders of Samson vs. the Vampire Women, you need to be able to buy into the Mexican masked wrestler movement. Can you? Well, I sure as hell can’t. What was wrong with the entire country of Mexico? This had to be one of the dumbest entertainment forms in human history, and this is from someone whose society has embraced both Jerry Lewis and American Idol. For forty years, people cheered as pudgy men in stylized masks faked fights in rings, and then defeated monsters in movies. It’s like American pro-wrestling, only dumber, and here, it is just mentally deficient NASCAR fans who follow WWE. In Mexico, everyone loved it, until the ’70s when the government realized it made the country look stupid and stopped funding it. And that pretty much wrapped it up for Santo (The Saint), who was the king of the “sport” and made over fifty films.

In Samson vs. the Vampire Women, Santo has become Samson for the English dubbed version because… Because… Who knows? Perhaps the distributor wanted to trick people into thinking this was an Italian sword and sandal epic. But his name doesn’t matter. He’s his normal shirtless, mask and cape-wearing self. He stays in that outfit at all times, when in the office, at a party, and speaking to the local vampire expert and scientist over a two-way television. His main wrestling opponents are over-sized, vampire males who all wear sleeveless black shirts and Halloween capes. One of them turns into a werewolf for a match, a previously unstated ability which is ignored after the man with a furry mask transforms into a rubber bat on a string. Is it beginning to sound silly? It only gets sillier, and yet, it isn’t a bad time.

The wrestling fights are as pathetic as you might imagine, but the sight of Santo (I mean Samson), striding into the scientist’s study or driving around town in his spandex and glitter, will make even depressed viewers chuckle. We’re deep into that fabled so-bad-it’s-good land here, and I was laughing more than I do with a majority of comedies. The over-the-top dubbing adds to the goofiness and is the way to hear the film; this is a case where the original dialog will decrease the fun.

There is more here than just things to snicker at. Roughly half the movie takes place in the vampires’ castle and feels like a different director was at the helm. Someone did their homework on 1930s horror and has the atmosphere perfect for an homage to those early films. It’s all cobwebs and coffins and slowly moving stone blocks. The vampires are ugly enough by any standard, and then they drink blood and…wow. Revitalized, these are some hot undead babes. Tandra (Ofelia Montesco), priestess of the vamps, is a stunningly good looking woman who understands the purpose of cleavage. Her queen, Zorina (Lorena Velázquez), is equally gorgeous, but prefers to take poses that exhibit her legs. The segments that involve the two of them and their beguiling sisters could have been used in a real horror film, and a sexy one at that.

The story is too ludicrous to dwell on, as is the inability of the vampires to notice when the sun is rising (or to buy curtains). Trying to follow what’s going on will only make your head hurt. This is a film to laugh at, drool over, and drink a lot of beers with.

Samson vs. the Vampire Women was chosen as the sixth season finale for MST3K. It is a funny episode, but not due to the chatting. The film itself is more humorous than any comments Mike and the robots make about it.

Foreign Language, Reviews, Vampires, Werewolves Tagged with: Two Reels

The Phantom of the Opera (1962)

Oct 041962

A new opera, composed by insufferable Lord Ambrose d’Arcy (Michael Gough), is disrupted by a masked “Phantom” (Herbert Lom) and his psychotic, mute dwarf (Ian Wilson). Opera company producer Harry Hunter (Edward de Souza) is less interested in the disruptions than in the star, Christine Charles (Heather Sears), but she has also caught the eye of The Phantom who has his own plans for her.

Any film of Gaston Leroux’s novel about a madman haunting an opera house is limited by the source material. It is a mixture of melodrama, romance, and monster story, and those elements don’t meld well. Lon Chaney’s silent version, which took the monster movie approach (a sympathetic monster to be sure, but then the best monsters are) has not been beaten, and it doesn’t overwhelm when Chaney is off screen.

This colorful Hammer Horror rendition, transplanted to London, is almost straight drama, with the romance played down and the monster angle abandoned entirely. The Phantom is a sympathetic and wronged man who folds when confronted, and Harry Hunter and Christine Charles are pleasant people tossed into a slightly difficult, but far from terrifying situation. There’s little that’s horrific, exploitative, or all that interesting. With a mercifully swift pace, there’s little time for the relationships to be anything but superficial. The Phantom hardly seems to care about Christine; he just wants the opera to sound good. This is the story stripped of all it’s grand, mythic qualities, which saves it from being pompous, but leaves the production a slight affair.

For a Hammer film (the company that made the Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing Frankenstein, Dracula, and Mummy movies), it is shockingly mainstream. The acting is good across the board, although no one stands out. The sets are twice as opulent as those in their other productions, and there are sufficient extras to make it look like a show is being performed by a complete company and people are coming to see it (many Hammer films have under populated villages). In place of the normal heaving bosoms there is opera—quite a lot of opera. Like the rest of the flick, the singing isn’t bad, but it isn’t particularly good either.

Supposedly written for Cary Grant (although there is disagreement on whether he was meant to play The Phantom or Hunter), an evil dwarf character was scripted to carry out the requisite murders, possibly to allow Grant to keep his audience-friendly persona. Of course that only makes sense if Grant was to be The Phantom. Whatever the case, the dwarf is a poor addition. He is never explained and has almost no personality. As the dwarf (he really isn’t all that short) does all the “evil” deeds, The Phantom is left as a passive light-weight.

The cameos supply the most energy to the piece, although that isn’t necessarily a good thing. Patrick Troughton, the second Doctor Who, appears as a rat catcher for a violent scene that doesn’t fit with the rest of the film. And a cab driver is played by Miles Malleson, an important actor in the Post-War British Comedy movement, who appeared in seventeen of its movies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets, The Importance of Being Earnest, The Naked Truth, Carlton-Browne of the F.O., and Heavens Above! He also wrote and starred in The Thief of Bagdad.

I didn’t dislike this rendition, but I found little reason to see it again. Hammer Horror completists may want to pick it up as it is included in the Hammer Horror Series DVD along with Brides of Dracula, Curse of the Werewolf, Paranoiac, Kiss of the Vampire, Nightmare, Night Creatures, and Evil of Frankenstein.

Other film versions include: Lon Chaney’s silent version The Phantom of the Opera (1925), which was re-release in a cut version in 1929, Claude Rains’s The Phantom of the Opera (1943), the short, Spanish language El Fantasma de la ópera, the Maximilian Schell/Jane Seymour made for TV The Phantom of the Opera (1983), the Robert Englund’s Slasher The Phantom of the Opera (1989), the stage-bound musical The Phantom of the Opera (1990), the TV mini-series The Phantom of the Opera (1990), and director Dario Argento’s Il Fantasma dell’opera (1998), and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical version.

Artists, Reviews Tagged with: Two Reels

Postman’s Knock (1962)

Oct 021962

A friendly and innocent country postman (Spike Milligan) is called to London where he easily surpasses his big city colleagues. Mistaken for a member of a powerful criminal organization by both the police and a lesser mob, he finds himself in the middle of a postal robbery while he romances a failed modern artist (Barbara Shelley).

There’s no question Postman’s Knock will put a smile on your face. Really. You’ll enjoy it. Trust me.

But it won’t be a big smile, and you won’t enjoy it all that much. And after it’s over, you won’t care that you saw it, or that you’re unlikely to see it again. Every plot point is obvious to even the most infrequent film goer, and every gag is recycled. A man gets hit on the head repeatedly. A chase goes round and round, passing the same people five or six times. An alarm clock malfunctions, as does an elevator. You’ve seen it before. Not that it isn’t pleasant. This is a gentle comedy that delivers on the very little it promises.

Spike Milligan gained fame as one of the members of The Goon Show, which he wrote and starred in with Peter Sellers. Postman’s Knock is simply a vehicle for Milligan with no other reason for existing. The focus cuts away from him on rare occasions for minute bits of plot or a slapstick joke, but Milligan dominates the film. Since he has a touch of charm and passable comic timing, it’s no hardship to be stuck with him for eighty-eight minutes.

The Post-War British Comedy movement was fading away by the beginning of the 1960s, and little of it is visible in Postman’s Knock. It is a very British picture (no one would confuse it for a Hollywood film), and it has the theme of the superiority of rural—one could say backwards—life over urban modernism that was prevalent in English films of the ’50s. But outside of those superficial similarities, only the presence of movement stalwart Miles Malleson, in a minor role, suggests a reason to set this next to The Green Man or Kind Hearts and Coronets.

Postman’s Knock is good, wholesome, forgettable fun for the family, if that’s what you’re looking for.

Barbara Shelley is best known for her roles in horror films, including Blood of the Vampire (1958), Village of the Damned (1960), Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966), and Quatermass and the Pit (1967), as well as the unhorrific Pride and Prejudice (1980).

Post-War British Comedy, Reviews Tagged with: Two Reels

King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)

Oct 021962

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A nuclear sub crashes into an iceberg, freeing Godzilla, who heads to Tokyo. Meanwhile, a buffoonish pharmaceutical executive sends two agents to a tropical island where they discover King Kong. When Kong drugs himself on narcotic berry juice, the nitwits decide to bring him back to Japan (just assuming that the drug will keep him unconscious) so that he can be used in advertising. Instead, the ape escapes, finds the big lizard, and it’s pro-wrestling time.

I try to ignore poor effects and makeup and judge each film for what it has to offer. I really do try. But sometimes, it isn’t possible. I could, under other circumstances, ignore how horrible the Godzilla suit is, looking like a gray Pillsbury Doughboy with a Cecil the Sea Sick Sea Serpent head stuck on top. Showing it under bright lights isn’t a clever idea, but it is passable from the side, and it would get worse in future films. In dim light I might have been able to forgive that the Black natives were all Japanese in black face wearing afro wigs. Some of the girls were quite cute in their native skirts after all.

But the guy in the plastic, inflexible monkey mask, with a fuzzy sweater and over-long arm extensions that leave the mitten-like hands immobile… No, that’s too much. There’s no way to ignore the ape costume.

The idea for this flick originally came from Willis O’Brien, a stop-motion artist on 1933’s King Kong, who wanted to bring Kong back in an impressive way. We can only sigh in relief that he died before this atrocity was unleashed.

We do get a bit more if you can look beyond the monkey mask. The human-side of things works better than in most Godzilla films. The characters are silly, but they also have personality. Memorable human characters are rare in the franchise, and if sometimes their antics can be a bit much, at least they aren’t boring. And we’ve got a theme. Toho was shifting hard to target children, so dark messages about nuclear weapons were out. The replacement was to satirize capitalism, which they also did in Mothra (1961) and Godzilla vs Mothra (1964). Since that’s not exactly a subject kids love, they did it with a good deal of broad humor. It works the best in this film, where advertising is the main topic.

King Kong vs. Godzilla is a significant film in the history of the atomic lizard. It was the first time he appeared in color (first time for the big ape as well). More significantly, it was his first action/comedy film. Godzilla stomps on fake tanks and exchanges punches with another giant while the humans fill in time and act as comic relief. It would be the pattern for the next fifteen years.

Purists complain that the dubbing and reediting for the U.S. release ruin the film. Nah. But it doesn’t do it any favors. The additions of U.N. news reports are unnecessary and shot with little cash or concern. The cuts remove much of the antics of the pharmaceutical employees, toning down the silliness, which might be a plus depending on your sense of humor. But the cuts also remove the theme and the editing is rough. Go with the Japanese version.

Foreign Language, Godzilla, Reviews Tagged with: Two Reels

The Day of the Triffids (1962)

Sep 271962

A meteor shower brings twin disasters: light that causes blindness in anyone who sees it, and carnivorous walking plants called triffids. Seaman Bill Masen (Howard Keel), hospitalized due to eye surgery, awakens to find civilization has fallen. Mason, along with Susan (Janina Faye), a sighted child he finds in a train crash, travel, searching for a way to rebuild society while avoiding triffids. Meanwhile, alcoholic scientist Tom Goodwin (Kieron Moore) and his wife Karen (Janette Scott), both still able to see, are trapped in a lighthouse surrounded by triffids.

And I really got hot when I saw Janette Scott
Fight a Triffid that spits poison and kills

If you don’t recognize that lyric, you’re likely to have missed two pivotal genre films, The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Day of the Triffids. The latter affected the development of both science fiction and horror. Stuck in the middle of the first end-of-the-world cycle, it influenced post-apocalyptic tales until The Road Warrior. But its with horror that it’s really made its mark. The Day of the Triffids is the first modern zombie film. That may seem odd, since there are no zombies in it, but the triffids are pretty good stand-ins. They move slowly, making them easy to avoid, but if a victim is caught, he is devoured. They can be chopped apart, but that doesn’t kill them. OK, they are plants rather than dead humans, but that distinction is less important than you might think. And if you really need the sight of a man, groaning, walking in random directions and reaching out to grab prey, The Day of the Triffids supplies that too with its second zombie parallel, the blind. The mob, grabbing for the sighted girl, could have been taken from a scene in Dawn of the Dead.

The similarities to Romero’s Dead movies are striking: Something, never explained, happens in the sky and the next day the world is filled with altered people and civilization crumbles. A few, normal folks try to escape, and eventually end up caught in a building with the monsters (zombies/triffids) waiting all around them. But it it isn’t Night of the Living Dead that is closest, but 28 Days Later, where the word plagiarism comes into play. I’ve seen many named remakes that have less resemblance to their sources than 28 Days Later does to The Day of the Triffids. The beginning, with the hero surviving because he’s in the hospital, and then his walk through the quiet streets of London, is a direct steal.

I’ve been focusing on the importance of The Day of the Triffids and how it is often copied. Luckily it is also good. It does force the viewer to endure a brief prologue where a narrator explains what a carnivorous plant is, and a painful epilogue where he returns, after thankfully being absent for ninety minutes, to let us know that humans once again “have a reason to give thanks,” but those moments can’t pull down the rest of the movie. The first third is particularly powerful, dominated by the effects of a world gone blind. Obviously things don’t go well, particularly when flying planes and running trains are involved.

Musical star Howard Keel (Kiss Me Kate) seems like an unlikely sci-fi/horror hero, but his large size, good looks, and deep, distinctive voice makes him more memorable than the normal genre actors. He plays Bill Masen just the right amount larger than life. There’s a feeling that the entire production is just slightly removed from the English stage. Unfortunately, the triffids aren’t much more realistic than you might expect from such a stage play, but the camera rarely lingers on them.

Keel carries the film’s plot, but Kieron Moore and Janette Scott (School for Scoundrels or How to Win Without Actually Cheating!) carry the emotion. Their characters only interact with each other, and for them, the triffids are a relief, since they bring only external pain. Scott, who is one of cinema’s great screamers, is particularly effective as a devoted and defeated wife, who can do nothing but endure her erratic husband.

What I find most surprising is the cruelty in The Day of the Triffids. There is little attempt to aid the blind. Masen walks by lost, frightened people in the street, and does nothing. He voices a philosophical position that they should be abandoned, and only one character objects, and she later apologizes for it. I can’t tell if the filmmakers wanted us to sympathize with this, or be frightened of it. Either way, it’s interesting.

The ending is often attacked by purists for departing from the book’s more uncertain conclusion. While the novel’s open ending would work well in a film (and did, popping up in multiple zombie flicks), the movie’s ironic take on what can stop unstoppable opponents is more entertaining.

Aliens, Featured Review, Post-Apocalyptic, Reviews Tagged with: Four Reels

Beauty and the Beast (1962)

Sep 271962

Lady Althea (Joyce Taylor) travels to greet her fiancée, Duke Eduardo (Mark Damon) only to find he has been cursed to turn into a beast at night. The Duke, with the help of Baron Orsini, Althea, and her father, must find a cure for his condition before Prince Bruno (Michael Pate) reveals the secret and takes the thrown.

This fantasy production’s greatest flaw is its title, as it prepares the viewer for the classic fairytale, to which this has only the slightest connection. This Beauty and the Beast is a werewolf story (minus the nasty killing part), placed in the middle ages, and constructed for family viewing. Eduardo is not an angry monster; he’s unchanged by day, and only takes on the physical attributes of a classic cinema werewolf (hair, fangs, claws, but still humanoid) at night. He is always in complete control and never does anything that isn’t noble. Except for an emphasis on love, and some torch-wielding townspeople, you won’t find much you recognize from any of the myriad versions of the folk story.

You will get a brightly colored, rather slow movie which couldn’t offend anyone. The acting is middle of the road, and the dialog is nothing your will remember after the credits. The sets—castles and fairytale streets—look fake, but are colorful and attractive. There’s a nice moral at the end for children, which may even touch adults who are in a non-cynical state of mind.

Producer Robert E. Kent, whose output was uneven at best, worked on this the same year as the more famous Jack the Giant Killer and it is easy to see the connection. The two could be considered companion pictures, having the same look, and aiming for the same audience.

While I may be pushing the G-rated nature of the movie, it isn’t all pabulum for kids. The assumption that the the duke may have sold his soul to Satan and now spends his nights practicing black masses introduces a welcome sinister edge. There’s also an attempted murder and a story of a man walled-up as a penalty for not bowing to the crown. There’s enough here to take this out of the children-only category. This isn’t Beauty and the Beast, but it is passable family entertainment.

Horror fans should note that the beast makeup was created by the legendary Jack P. Pierce. Decades earlier he had invented the look for the Universal monsters Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy, and The Wolf Man. The beast resembles The Wolf Man, though with a more questionable wig. Pierce is the most important makeup artist in the history of film, but his later years were not golden, and he ended his career working on B-movies and TV shows.

Back to Fantasy

Fantasy, Reviews, Werewolves Tagged with: Two Reels

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Jun 251962

Charismatic British Lieutenant T.E. Lawrence (Peter O’Toole) is meant to act as a liaison between Arabian Prince Faisal (Alec Guinness) and the British, but he pushes to do more. Uniting differing tribes, with leaders of differing personalities (Omar Sharif, Anthony Quinn), he leads the Arabs in battle against the Turks, getting more and more obsessed as he does so. As he loses himself, diplomats and generals (Jack Hawkins, Claude Rains) make other plans for the region.

I first saw Lawrence of Arabia as a kid, on a twenty-five inch broadcast TV in the early 1970s. Even in that situation I knew that this was a skillfully made film. I respected it for the expertise involved in making it, but I didn’t love it. It was, after all, just a film about a man, a real man caught up in historical events that may be connected to many modern problems, but were no longer directly relevant.

When I next saw it, my respect grew. Some scenes, like the mirage, seemed miracles of filmmaking. How could that have been filmed? And the meticulousness of the project amazed me. Everything in its place. Everything exactly as director David Lean wanted it to be. Still, I didn’t love it. That childhood viewpoint stuck with me.

Some movies aren’t for children.

Another viewing clued me in. It isn’t a film about a man. It’s about a god (or messiah if you prefer), and the message is clear: Gods are never a good thing, particularly for the god. This is a story which is always relevant. It amuses me that I could have missed this, but to be fair, I was a kid. Lean isn’t subtle about it. The movie is filled with religious iconography and worship of individuals who shouldn’t have been worshiped. The desert isn’t just a place, but a metaphysical landscape removed from normal reality, where giants dwell and fate works its way. Gods are driven by righteousness and passion, and those are not the way to run the real world.

“With Major Lawrence, mercy is a passion. With me, it is merely good manners. You may judge which motive is the more reliable.”

And with that shift, everything else fell into place, and now I love this film. It is riveting, from it’s first moment, through the match-blowing transition and that mirage scene, to the predestined end that awaits all mortal gods. It is cinematic art as it should be: beautiful, engaging, exciting, thoughtful. Every part is a masterpiece. The script is one of the best ever, with quotable line after line, yet all sounding real for the characters. And those characters are given depth by that script, and then brought to life by some of the best performances ever put to screen, led by Peter O’Toole. Then there is the music, the art design, and the incredible desert photography. It’s an exquisitely made motion picture. I’ve no idea how Lean pulled it off, how he held so many parts in his mind. It is the finest directed film of all time (and likely the finest shot and edited). Often I can see how a director shaped a film. With Lawrence of Arabia, I can’t. David Lean had help, the best help a filmmaker could have, from top cinematographer Freddie Young, editor Anne Coates, composer Maurice Jarre, new talent O’Toole, and the best of the old pros, Claude Rains and Alec Guiness. But that doesn’t explain it.

Three years later Peter O’Toole starred in Lord Jim, a film about a charismatic Brit, who travels to a troubled land in the East, where he “goes native,” leads and fights for the locals, and things don’t go well in the end. It was shot by Freddie Young and had overlapping personnel with Lawrence of Arabia in the costume, art, sound, special effects, makeup, and camera departments, as well as with the assistant directors and cast. It was based on a novel by Joseph Conrad, a novel that T.E. Lawerence “borrowed” from in writing Seven Pillars of Wisdom (which is the basis for Lawrence of Arabia). And the result is…fine. It’s not a bad film.

Now it isn’t surprising that a film connected to another film in many ways isn’t as good. But it is surprising that no one and nothing in it is great or even particularly good. These people did masterful work a few years earlier under the command of Lean, and here, with Richard Brooks at the helm, they are fine. Watching Lord Jim, I wouldn’t have guessed any of those involved could create truly great art. But they had, with Lawrence of Arabia. Yes, some would go on to do excellent work later, but never reach these heights again. The key was Lean. No one else could have made this film.

It won seven Oscars: Picture, Director, Cinematography, Editing, Art Direction, Sound, and Score, and received three additional nominations for Actor (O’Toole), Supporting Actor (Omar Sharif), and Adapted Screenplay. It should have won them all. Lawrence of Arabia is one of the 10 best films of all time, and if someone said it was the best, I wouldn’t say they were wrong.

Miscellaneous, Reviews Tagged with: Five Reels

The Exterminating Angel (1962)

Apr 151962

The upper-class guests at an after-opera dinner party find themselves making excuses not to leave when the party appears to be over. By morning it is clear that they cannot leave, either due to magic, miracle, curse, or weird psychological state. As days drag by, and thirst, hunger, and sickness engulf them, the guest become more savage moving from petty verbal attacks to assault.

Surrealist Luis Buñuel, perhaps most famous for his 1928 short film Un Chien Andalou (everyone remembers the eye being slit), was having a good decade. He’d long since shifted into semi-coherent narratives, though it wasn’t till the 1960s that he really found his way. His edgy Viridiana (1961) was banned in Spain as blasphemous and contradictory to the political order, but celebrated around the world, pretty much for the same reasons. With The Exterminating Angel, he reduces the personal angle and turns the social satire up to eleven. He jabs at the bourgeoisie, for their emptiness, their lack of empathy, their cruelty, their superstition and religion, their stubbornness and stupidity, and perhaps most of all, their inability to change a system so clearly unfair, or even see that it is. But this is Buñuel, so while he’s saying these people are terrible, he isn’t saying they are any worse than anyone else—all people are terrible—simply that they are benefiting from a system that assumes they have fine qualities that they lack.

While many of Buñuel’s punches are clear, the overall message is more general and fuzzy, which isn’t surprising for a surrealist. The Exterminating Angel isn’t a political treatise. It isn’t trying to make you think, but rather make you feel, and that feeling is that something is fundamentally wrong, and boy does he succeed. I was left without any idea what to do, but with an overwhelming sensation that something should be done. It would be an uncomfortable film if it wasn’t so darkly funny. Buñuel was none-too-keen to have anyone analyze his work. He was concerned (if he was “concerned” with anything) about the image. Well, The Exterminating Angel is filled with compelling images, and is a must-see classic.

Fantasy, Foreign Language, Reviews

Mothra (1961)

Dec 251961

A shipwreck reveals that an irradiated island has a surviving tribe that has juice that counters radiation poisoning. A scientific expedition to the island, financed by an evil businessman from the pushy country of Rolisica, discovers two twin fairies, who the businessmen kidnaps for use in a stage show. The native’s god, a giant caterpillar, heads to Japan to retrieve its priestesses.

Ishirô Honda had already created Godzilla and Rodan, and here he finishes the trinity of Japanese giant monsters. He was shifting what “monsters” were. Godzilla started as pure evil (or a representation of man’s stupidity and cruelty) while Rodan was an animal out of time and one could sympathized with him, but Mothra took it a further step. She’s the good guy, a protecting spirit, and soon Japan would be filled with films of good guy monsters, including a re-tooled Godzilla. Those later films would be purely for kids, but Mothra sits at the crossroads. Everything is more arch than in 1954’s Godzilla, with the villain sneering and using his evil laugh. And there is a kid in a notable role, but things haven’t drifted purely into the juvenile. Call it a family adventure film instead of a children’s flick.

As was true in all of the early daikaiju films, there’s a strong theme. While nuclear weapons are still pertinent, they are a secondary issue. The focus is on foreign governments throwing their weight around inside Japan and the Japanese government being so weak and obedient as to let it happen. Rolisica is a combination of the United States and the Soviet Union, two countries that just couldn’t keep their mitts off of Japan. Except for the evil businessman and his henchmen, Rolisicans are White. (in the non-dubbed version, the Rolisicans speak English). These foreigners do whatever they please inside Japan (and outside it as the island is not in Japanese waters and, depending on the subtitles, may be in Rolisican waters). The Rolisicans care nothing about what is happening until it effects them directly, and their only way of dealing with things is with newer and bigger weapons, which the Japanese government meekly goes along with installing. “Yankee (and Ruskee) go home” is not a subtle message, but I imagine it was a popular one in ’61 Japan.

While an early daikaiju movie, it looks better than most of what came later. The general cinematography is good, and the moth and slug puppets are shot with a care that they haven’t seen since. Mothra has never looked as good again. Sure, the special effects are primitive, but except for a few moments when the fairies are clearly swapped for dolls, Honda manages to keep it from becoming embarrassing, even fifty years later.

The plot and character material is fine, which puts it above many similar films (there are a lot of daikaiju films where the characters are painful and the plot is best ignored), but Mothra excels in the fantasy native bits. The island is King Kong on acid. The native dances, drum and vocal music, lush colors, and odd sets create a surrealistic wonderland. Yumi & Emi Itô (as the fairies) have lovely voices and their rendition of the “Mosura” song is haunting and memorable.

The American release does far less to damage the film than occurred with many of the Japanese films of the time. The dubbing isn’t bad and I wasn’t distracted by it. There are around 10 minutes of cuts, the worst being much of the fairies second performance. Otherwise, the only noticeable trims are to religious moments. For some reason the U.S. distributers didn’t like the Rolisicans praying, or the Japanese making the sign of the cross. This mystifies me, but slicing out these moments doesn’t harm anything. I’d recommend the Japanese cut over the U.S. one, but this isn’t a case like Godzilla, King of the Monsters. If only the American is available, that’s fine.

Mothra would return in Rebirth of Mothra I/II/III (1996/1997/1998). She’d play a secondary part in multiple Godzilla films: Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964), Ghidorah, the Three Headed Monster (1964), Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966), Destroy All Monsters (1968), Godzilla and Mothra : The Battle for Earth (1992), Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla (1994), Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001), Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. (2003), Godzilla: Final Wars (2004). She is scheduled to appear in the American-made Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019).

Foreign Language, Giant Monsters Tagged with: Three Reels

Valley of the Dragons (1961)

Nov 151961

French officer Hector Servadac (Cesare Danova) and Irish soldier of fortune Michael Denning (Sean McClory) are about to duel to the death when a comet sweeps them up. On it’s last trip around the sun the comet had picked up prehistoric animals, leaving the two modern men in a world of stock footage and hot cave-babes. They vow to stay together, but a mammoth has other ideas and knocks Hector into the river. He’s rescued by the hottest of the hot cave-babes (Playmate Joan Staley) and ends up in the shell tribe. Michael ends up with the rock tribe and his own hot cave-babe (Danielle De Metz). Both become important members of their tribe, due to their greater knowledge, but more due to introducing necking, which the cave-babes are very excited about.

Some films are stupid. Some films are far too dim to be stupid. Then there’s Valley of the Dragons, which has looped around so that stupidity is a virtue. You can’t get annoyed at something not making sense when nothing makes sense. And there are so many head-scratchers here. Why do our heroes throw away their clothing instead of adding furs on top? Why is the first thing Hector does when in a safe spot is shave? Why does the Frenchmen teach the hot cave-babe English instead of French, or instead attempting to learn her language? Where do they get fuses from? Where did the morlocks come from? Why does the title refer to dragons? And I’m ignoring everything about the comet as once we’re in the lost world, the film ignores it too.

The barest of concepts comes from Jules Verne’s novel, but that didn’t have cave people or dinosaurs. However sticking the name Verne on a movie poster could sell some tickets in 1961, or that was the hope. The story actually is derived from whatever could be used to stitch together stock footage. Over half the film is re-used segments from earlier pictures, mostly One Million B.C. (1940), but also from Rodan (1956).

Yes, seriously, Rodan.

So our dinosaurs are lizards with fins pasted on and there is a supersonic diakaiju flying around. Our lead actors only appear in close and medium shots, running about on a very thin sound stage. Wide shots are from One Million B.C. and have different actors; no doubt casting for the supporting roles in this film was based on if an actor was a close enough match to one in the older film. Valley of the Dragons had to be shot in B&W because One Million B.C. was, but I doubt the makers of this film minded using cheaper film stock. This isn’t the first film to pull this trick; at least ten other films have plundered One Million B.C., but this was the last.

So it’s all been done before and it is dumb as a rock, but then you don’t go watch a cavemen movie to advance your scholarly pursuits. It’s dumb, but it’s dumb fun, and outside of the animal cruelty in the reused footage (for which I’m comfortable blaming the earlier picture), it’s inoffensive.

Giant Monsters, Reviews, Science Fiction Tagged with: Two Reels

The Curse of the Werewolf (1961)

Oct 171961

A cruel Marquis tortures and imprisons a beggar. Many years later a beautiful servant is tossed in with the beggar who rapes her. She later kills the Marquis and escapes, and is taken in by Don Alfredo Carrido (Clifford Evans), where she gives birth and dies. The child is cursed, an evil spirit entering him a birth because of the rape, or being born on Christmas, or due to the murder, and becomes a werewolf child. Due to the love of his adopted parents, he overcomes his weakness of soul, at least until he goes out into the world as an adult (Oliver Reed) and runs into women. His attraction to his boss’s daughter (Catherine Feller) weakens him, but then he runs into loose women and that sends him over the edge, causing him to become a werewolf.

Hammer studios had covered Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Mummy, so turned to The Wolf Man, but it needed a new source (they didn’t have the rights to the classic Universal story). So they went with a novel about a werewolf in Paris, and removed all the politics that were the point of the book. Due to a possible boycott, Hammer executives canceled an inquisition feature they’d been planning, so moved the setting for this film to Spain to make use of the sets. And due to the upset of different censors, they changed how lycanthropy was passed on. It is never a good sign when your decisions are based on censors. The cruelty of the aristocrats is kept from the novel, but little else.

The Curse of the Werewolf is an oddly constructed film. For a ninety minute flick, there’s very little monster action. There’s lots of cruelty, just not much of it involves a werewolf. We get fifty minutes of back-story before the adult Leon appears, and no werewolf till over an hour, and then it is just shadows—we don’t see him in his full glory till near the end. Considering how good the makeup is, I’d have thought they’d have used it a great deal more. The wolf man is Hammer’s one outstanding monster design and he’s wasted.

But there’s other peculiarities that suggest a good number of pages of the screenplay were jettisoned. Multiple major characters vanish from the film. We never know what happens to the beggar. The game warden and his wife are given a great deal of time away from other main characters, and then they just stop existing. Characters are killed off in narration or simply forgotten.

Outside of those few minutes of the monster, this is a dour film. I don’t mind my werewolf films tragic, but there’s got to be a few moments of hope and light. Not here. Things are hopeless from the first moment to the last. It’s oppressive.

Like most of Hammer’s horror films, the theme is one of support for stogy, proper society. The opposite of what Ealing Studios was suggesting at the same time and also a retreat from the direction of British society. Hammer pushed for the older class system as well as gender roles that had slipped away during the war. Everyone should know their place and keep to it. If Leon had simply stuck to his place, and stayed away from women (Hammer really didn’t like women), then he’d have been fine.

If it wasn’t a werewolf film I’d say to skip it, but there are so few good films in the sub-genre that the bar is set a bit lower. The Curse of the Werewolf is nicely, if simply, shot, with rich colors, and the sets look as good as low budget sets are going to look. The actors are all good. Reed was still learning the craft, but he drips masculinity, and that counts for more than talent when playing a werewolf. That makes The Curse of the Werewolf good enough to catch on cable.

Horror, Reviews, Werewolves Tagged with: Two Reels

The Innocents (1961)

Oct 121961

In Victorian England, a wealthy man (Michael Redgrave) hires a repressed woman, Miss Gidden (Deborah Kerr), as the governess for his niece, Flora (Pamela Franklin), and nephew, Miles (Martin Stephens), giving her complete control as he never ventures to his country estate to see them. The children appear well behaved at first, but Miles has many of the mannerism of an adult, and Flora appears dreamy. Miss Gidden becomes convinced that the children are possessed by the ghosts of the ex-governess and her abusive boyfriend, the former valet. But are there ghosts, or is Miss Gidden losing her mind?

Based on one of the most famous ghost stories, Henry James’ 1898 novel, The Turn of the Screw, (and renamed for no sane reason), The Innocents is a movie you’re supposed to like, or so most critics will tell you, although few did when it came out. It is a ghost story that can be accepted as mainstream as there really are no ghosts. Written by James to illuminate the repression of Victorian society, by 1961, there was little need for such revelation, nor does the story’s brand of Freudian psychology have a lot to say about the current human condition (well, I’m sure there’s one psychologist out there still clinging to Freud, but then there are people who still believe the Earth is flat).

It takes a lot of work to even claim there is the possibility of a ghost in the film. The book may be ambiguous, but the movie isn’t. Only Miss Gidden, who becomes more and more hysterical, ever sees a ghost. The children have had a rough time. Abandoned by their uncle, they’ve had a beloved governess commit suicide as well as lived through the accidental death of the valet, who was teaching Miles about life. They also were witnesses to the governess and valet’s unhealthy emotional and sexual relationship. So, the kids are a bit messed up, but not unduly so. Miles attempts to emulate the man who was his surrogate father. So when Miss Gidden, who has trouble sleeping and comes from a religious family where no secrets were allowed as well as no sins, starts raving about ghosts, it’s pretty easy to see the spirits are in her head. As a psychological melodrama, it’s not a bad story.

But getting to that story is difficult. The first half creeps along, presenting obvious information over and over. The tenth or fifteenth time Miss Gidden says “the children are in danger,” I got the idea that she thought that the children were in danger. Likewise, by the fifth conversation where Miss Gidden tells the housekeeper that she saw a ghost and the housekeeper says to leave it alone, I got the idea that Miss Gidden thought she saw a ghost and the housekeeper thought it should be forgotten about. Rather than being a film aimed at the literate, this is pointed squarely at anyone who has the memory of a small house fern. If you forgot what Miss Gidden was thinking five minutes ago, fear not, it will be repeated.

The adaptation would have been better suited for the stage. The dialog (and delivery) is very theatrical, playing for the twentieth row. It is filled with those overly pompous, upper crust society lines that are charming on stage but ring false on film.

Housekeeper: “She died in wickedness, by her own hand.”

Miss Gidden: “Oh!”

Housekeeper: “I’m sorry miss, I should never have told you.”

No one ever spoke like that. Everyone also pauses dramatically after a line, to give you time to dwell on its importance.

As a tense drama of a woman falling apart and the lives she ruins (and more—is everyone clear on what actually happens to Miles?), The Innocents has a lot going for it, including excellent cinematography. But it is too self-important, too repetitious, and too simple, to be worth the time to watch.

Ghost Stories, Reviews

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