What was the last movie you saw?

[J Riff]

Maneater 2006? - a little small-town kid who sleepwalks and his fanatically religious Mom live in a trailer in the woods, and a Tiger is on the loose, because - the kid sleepwalked out in front of a truck, see - it crashed and the striped Beast got out and did in the driver. The kid thinks he's pals with the Tiger, but it kills a few folks and the town is terrified... but bible-thumping Mom refuses to believe in any of it - she lets Junior wander where he chooses. Our MC Sheriff tries to hunt kitty down but it is far too cagy. A Brit tiger-hunter, born in India, shows up with his double-barrel shotgun, he has kilt Tigers in India etcetc. - so he sets up his tent. Then the national guard show up, and the Tiger takes a bunch of them out without breaking a sweat. We learn that Tigers hunt in both the day and the night. Spoilage>>> The Tiger shows up at the trailer, and Mom wanders out and is done in by Tigger, and our MC Sheriff ends up shooting at it - he hits the gas pumps and Ker-blooie! He and his wife adopt the little kid - happy ending! Except for the Tiger.

 

[dask]

Perhaps my favorite John Wayne movie. Great hummable Elmer Bernstein score with eye popping Lucien Ballard cinematography. George Kennedy perfect as the mean bad guy and Paul Fix always a pleasure.

 

[Droflet]

Extracation. Bloody, violent nonsense.

 

[olive]

I'm watching A Nightmare on Elm Street right now. The first one. Probably, I will get bored and skip here and there but till then, I'm thinking about watching a few.

 

[J Riff]

Ship of Monsters - 1960, Mexico, black and white, sub-titled.
Voice-over re: Atoms. the Universe, and men releasing the power of the atom and space missions etc. but then:
Oh you bet that lovely Venusian gals Gamma and Beta are going to be sent into space to collect male specimens. The last male has died out on Venus, and the gal's cool spaceship blasts off as the credits roll: Lalo Gonzalez "Pipporo" Ana Bertha 'Lepe' - Lorena Velaquez - La NAVE de los MONSTROS" and heyy, looks like the 'Monsters of the Galaxy' have names too > Uk, Utirr, Tagual, Tor and Zok!
On the ship, a very nifty robot informs the gals the left motor has lost two tons - the gals apparently already have some males captive on the ship... they must have done it during the very cool credits at the beginning... now more great ound FX, this ship is really super-cool, the gals are totally happy... but the motor! - 'I told you" says the robot, and the girls have to 'freeze the males' while they deal with it. But the males are monsters... kidnapped monsters I guess, and yes, they now have to crash-land on the Earth, which they identify as "Antarssis 135-sub-2 planetoid of the fourth order." That's us.. . and robot goes on to say that his masters decided it was not worth exploring because 'the creatures there don't know what they want, and enjoy destroying each other.'
Now we cut to a lone roving Mexican cowboy kind of character and we get our first song, set to cheery accordian music, wherein he wishes on a shooting star- actually the gal's ship - for a beautiful girl to come down from the sky. Yep.
Our MC is a real hotdog, he entertains a barrooom full of locals with crazy lies about his great prowess, until he rides off whistling to accordian polka music, and the gals spot him. They learn the language, goofy sound fx continue and our hombre is time-frozen a few times while they figure out what to do, which is: go back to the ship and plot. They also have to freeze the monster males in a clear block of something, and put them all in a cave till the ship is repaired. They need to talk to them though, so Tor the robot unfreezes them and these are top-kwality alien monsters, with mighty weird voices. They all have their own different names than the credits, and they are really pissed at being kidnapped, ... great action... now the gals show up at our nutty cowboys place, with the robot, pretending to be from the circus... hoo boy, the robot sings to the kid, and our MC has to explain what love is... he puts money in a jukebox, trad mexican accordian polka! It gets cornier as the robot makes rude remarks to the jukebox... now a cow name Lollabrijida. Now shock! as Beta is a vampire...she flies, and takes down a farmhand, which is the 'worst crime in the Galaxies' - her punishment is to be disintegrated in the morning. No way, she breaks loose and is going to start the vampire race on Earth - the Uranites! She unfreezes the monsters and they set out to destroy everyone on Earth. Cowboy comes home and finds his cow a skeleton, more shenanigans...
well, this one ends, finally, with a monster-battle, our MC wins and also wins the heart of Gamma, love triumphs, the robot sings... sheesh enough already. )

 

[Vince W]

Tomorrowland (2015). I loved this film in the cinema and I still love it. It's criminal that it didn't do better and should be given a chance by a wider audience. Especially considering the position we find ourselves in. The cast does an excellent job all around and there are many eggs for sci-fi fans throughout.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Town on Trial (1957)

British crime thriller starts with our killer, seen only as a pair of hands, hauled away by the cops. The detective on the case reads the murderer's confession to the transcriber, leading into a flashback without revealing the identity of the culprit. It seems that a curvaceous, scantily clad young blonde was drawing the attention of the men at an upper class athletic club. She gets strangled in a scene filmed from the point of view of the killer, anticipating a technique often used in much later slasher films. During the investigation, the detective on the case uncovers the various secrets of the town's upper class. A young woman who admired the first victim, and who runs with a wild crowd, is the next (and last) victim of the unseen strangler. There's some romance for the detective, and a suspenseful final scene worthy of an early Hitchcock. Not a bad little film, although the version I saw on YouTube had several of the scenes in the wrong order.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

American Nightmare (1983)

A Canadian giallo? Well, let's see. Razor murders by a killer wearing gloves? Check. (Although here they're transparent latex gloves rather than the traditional black leather.) Hero is an artist of some sort? Check. (Pianist) Drawn into his own investigation of the murders, with the help of a woman who will become his lover? Check. Gratuitous female nudity? Check. (Much of the story takes place at a strip club.) A deep, dark secret from the past? Check. Apparent killer revealed near the end, only to have the real one revealed later? Check. Female lead faces the killer near the end, only to have the hero arrive, sending the killer plunging to his death? Check.

Despite the title, the scene is Toronto. Pianist tries to locate his stripper/prostitute sister, not knowing that she was killed in the first scene. Her roommate (stripper but not prostitute) joins him in his quest when another roommate is killed. More killings follow. Unlike the bright colors and high fashion look of most gialli, this one has a gritty feeling. Lots of graffiti everywhere, lots of shots of adult theaters and bookstores, etc. Proof that our neighbors to the north can be as sleazy as Americans.

 

[BAYLOR]

The Mummy (1932) staring Boris Karloff as Imhotep the Mummy . Not so much a horror film, it's more about a man condemned to a living death in the name of love, trying get back the woman he lost . Given Imhotep's cruel circumstances , you can't help but feel sympathy and a certain sadness for him. The cast in this film is quite good and this is easily one of Boris Karloff's best performances . A great film.

 

[Jeffbert]

Perhaps my favorite John Wayne movie. Great hummable Elmer Bernstein score with eye popping Lucien Ballard cinematography. George Kennedy perfect as the mean bad guy and Paul Fix always a pleasure.

The radio local public station that plays classical music has a program called Music from Movies, a few weeks ago, E. Bernstein was the theme, & a clip from The Great Escape was followed by The Magnificent Seven. Wonderful music. Movies very watchable for that alone.

Meet The Baron (1933) musical comedy with Joe McGoo (Jimmy Durante) & Jack Pearl as servants of Baron Munchausen (Henry Kolker), who, while on a safari in Africa, are abandoned by him, only because he is short on ammunition, otherwise he would have killed them. He even wrote a farewell letter to that effect, which Peal's character, who later, assume Munchausen's identity, and lives off the fame of it, until exposed as a fraud.

So, the two go to all girls Cuddle College, whose dean (Edna May Oliver) wants to hear lectures from the great adventurer; which the fraud must avoid lest he be exposed. Ted Healy and his [3] Stooges are janitors, This is the only film I have seen with him as the lead in the group, and he takes the role that Moe would eventually have.

really a funny and entertaining film.


The Great Buster: A Celebration (2018) All to briefly covers Keaton's silent films, & moves into his rather sad talkie phase. I have seen many of his silent films, & had no idea how MGM's system made his films simply awful compared to when he had creative freedom. just about an hour in, it covers his death. Odd, but after that, it returns to his best silent films, showing the funniest clips.

 

[hitmouse]

The King of Kong (2007, on YouTube) is a fascinating and unintentionally hilarious documentary about the battle to become the world champion Donkey Kong player. It has a cast of unusual characters who were champion video arcade game nerds in the early 1980s, and who, by the early 2000s have really only partially grown up, and though balding and paunchy, still take the original arcade classics terribly terribly seriously.

One interesting thing to note is that Peter Dinklage's character in the film Pixels is none too subtly taken from one of the main characters in this doco.

 

[Jeffbert]

Night and the City (1950) Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark) is a conman and loser, who will do anything to earn a living, so long as is does not involve being someone else's employee. After numerous get rich schemes had failed, he, by chance meets an old school Greek wrestler known as Gregorius the Great (Stanislaus Zbyszko) and decides he can, with the help of investor's money, hold an old-style wresting match with Gregorius' approval, despite Gregorius' son, who controls London's pro-wrestling. as the main attraction.
Things happen, and the whole thing collapses, with, after Fabian's goading, Gregorius taking on The Strangler (Mike Mazurki) in a heated argument as to which style is better.

The ending is classic noir, but this was presented by Ben M, rather than Muller, as it was shown during TCM's anniversary. Also, I wanted to omit the spoiler of the ending. What's more, my synopsis could have been more detailed.



Wicked Woman (1953) Noir Alley again, a bit different for the genre, as the expected death or deaths of characters is omitted. A young woman, Billie Nash (Beverly Michaels) steps off a bus, and hires on at a bar that is owned by a married couple, who loath each other. The wife (Evelyn Scott) is an alcoholic, and works as management, book keeper, etc., the husband (Richard Egan), is the bartender. Apparently, they married for all the wrong reasons, etc. Soon enough, Nash seduces the bartender, and they plot to sell the bar, and move to Mexico, leaving his wife in the lurch. But, she lives in a boarding house, across the hall from the diminutive Charlie Borg (Percy Kelton, who in an episode of Get Smart, invents a silent explosive called Nitro Whisperin, and has both KAOS & CONTROL working against him ), who has eyes for her, and somehow, believes that, despite his lack of height, advanced age, and unattractive features, he can win her love. So, while doing some scheming together, Borg overhears the plot, and demands that the young blonde have dinner with him, which she is constantly delaying.

Finally, things fall apart for the scheme and just at the wrong time, the bartender catches the blond in a comprising position with Borg, who had burst into her room, and is physically insisting on that romantic dinner.

 

[Stenevor]

The King of Kong (2007, on YouTube) is a fascinating and unintentionally hilarious documentary about the battle to become the world champion Donkey Kong player. It has a cast of unusual characters who were champion video arcade game nerds in the early 1980s, and who, by the early 2000s have really only partially grown up, and though balding and paunchy, still take the original arcade classics terribly terribly seriously.

There's a sequel of sorts called Chasing Ghosts. I found it hard to find years ago but I see it's on Youtube now. It's nowhere near as good as King of Kong but you might be interested.

 

[J Riff]

It Came from Beneath the Sea 1955
Mainstream scifi of the 50s, Harryhausen OctoBeast is really the only attraction here. Some sub action and mystery as to what is down there, but then a giant octopus shows up in San Fran, and sends huge tentacles into the city... this thing is really big. We get a few soldiers with flamethrowers battling one of the tentacles, driving it back to the sea, where the sub and some divers manage to blow it up good, but we don't really get to see that, so this one coulda been a lot better.

 

[BAYLOR]

It Came from Beneath the Sea 1955
Mainstream scifi of the 50s, Harryhausen OctoBeast is really the only attraction here. Some sub action and mystery as to what is down there, but then a giant octopus shows up in San Fran, and sends huge tentacles into the city... this thing is really big. We get a few soldiers with flamethrowers battling one of the tentacles, driving it back to the sea, where the sub and some divers manage to blow it up good, but we don't really get to see that, so this one coulda been a lot better.

It's fun film. That giant Octopus only has six tentacles rather then the normal eight.

 

[Foxbat]

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. I’ve never liked the last ten minutes of this film and thought it was about as subtle as a brick thrown through a window. The rest of the movie is great

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Blood Sabbath (1972)

Despite the title, this ultra-low budget flick is more of a nutty fantasy film than a horror movie. A Vietnam vet, looking like he just stepped off his surfboard, is wandering around with his sleeping bag and guitar somewhere in the wilderness. This turns out to be Mexico, given the scene featuring a mariachi band. A woman in a hippie van drives by, squirts him with beer, and flashes him. A little bit later, a bunch of naked women attempt to have their way with him. He runs off and faints near a lake. A woman in a filmy white gown and a platinum blonde wig comes out of the water. This is Yyalah (yes, with the double y) and she's some kind of water nymph. ("You are of the land, I am of the sea" she tells him, even though she came out of a lake.) They fall in love but can't be together because she doesn't have a soul. The solution? Have the local queen of the witches take his soul, in place of the soul of a little girl, the way she does once a year. (That how she gets her unending supply of witches, it seems.) That works out for a while, in scenes of the two lovers straight out of a shampoo commercial. But then our hero drinks blood from a human sacrifice, which is a deal breaker with Yyalah. To get her back, he has to bring the queen the head of the local priest. (Apparently the priest and the queen had a "I won't interfere with you and you won't interfere with me" kind of deal, but he finally got fed up with the little girls being taken away each year.) Then things get weird. Add in Vietnam flashbacks and a double twist ending, a couple of soft country/rock/folk songs, the aforementioned mariachi band, and a weird electronic/percussion/jazz soundtrack, and you've got one oddball movie. Did I mention the fact that there is nearly constant full female nudity? Without that, this thing would be a soft PG at most, almost a G except for a little blood and a really fake severed head.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Asylum of Satan (1972)

Darn it, I should have combined this one with my review of Blood Sabbath and called the whole thing a Wacky Low Budget Satanist Hijinks Of 1972 Double Feature. Anyway, this one starts with a woman transferred from a normal hospital, where she's staying for "a rest" (do they really do that?), to the institution of the title. We first meet a creepy German-accented nurse, played by a man in drag. Pretty soon we meet the head of the place, played by the same actor. This is revealed near the end in a way that suggests it's supposed to be a shocking twist, but it's really, really obvious from the start. At dinner, our heroine meets with a blind woman, a mute man, and a woman in the wheelchair. All the other patients -- or are they? -- wear KKK-style white robes that completely cover them. In one of the film's first surreal moments, the German nurse comes in, raises her arms, and everybody disappears except our heroine. Other spooky, unexplained stuff happens, and the three disabled people are killed in strange ways. (I have to admit that I missed what happened to the mute man, or if it was shown at all. The woman in the wheelchair gets locked in a room, gas is sprayed into it, and a bunch of fake bugs crawl all over her. The blind woman has a deadly snake thrown at her while she's in a swimming pool.) Meanwhile, the heroine's boyfriend is rebuffed when he tries to visit her at the asylum. He manages to get a police detective to go to the place with him, but it turns out to be a mansion abandoned for decades, and the guy he thought was the doctor in charge is now an elderly caretaker. It all adds up to the heroine being offered to Satan, who is wearing the worst devil costume you've ever seen, as a virgin sacrifice. It might be a SPOILER to mention the fact that, despite an examination by the doctor, the woman isn't a virgin, which makes Satan very unhappy indeed. Then we get some incomprehensible twist endings. It's a very poorly made film, watchable only because of its eccentricity.

 

[Jeffbert]

It Came from Beneath the Sea 1955
Mainstream scifi of the 50s, Harryhausen OctoBeast is really the only attraction here. Some sub action and mystery as to what is down there, but then a giant octopus shows up in San Fran, and sends huge tentacles into the city... this thing is really big. We get a few soldiers with flamethrowers battling one of the tentacles, driving it back to the sea, where the sub and some divers manage to blow it up good, but we don't really get to see that, so this one coulda been a lot better.

THE SUCKERS ON THE THING'S TENTACLES were so big ("how big were they?") they were so big, that even the smallest ones could not stick to anything smaller than a bull elephant.

Likewise other 'big' sci-fi horror creatures, the T in TARANTULA was so big, its fangs were larger than the people it preyed upon. The BLACK SCORPION could have swallowed that guy alive, why bother stinging him?

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

So Young, So Bad (1950)

Women in Prison picture, notable for "introducing" three young performers who went on to become major stars. Takes place at a "correctional school" for girls. One is played by Rita Moreno (credited here as Rosita Moreno), arrested for vagrancy. In her case, that just means she's an emotionally disturbed chronic runaway, living in a fantasy world. Anne Francis was also arrested for vagrancy, but in her case there's an implication that this really means prostitution. Unlike the child-like Moreno, she's been around the block and more, has been married, had a baby that she gave up for adoption, and has clearly always used her body to get what she wants. Anne Jackson is one of a pair of girls arrested for theft. (The other is the not-so-famous Enid Pulver.) Jackson is as tough as nails, and completely dominates the quiet, passive Pulver. She also wears pants when the standard uniform is a shapeless dress. It's pretty clear that the two are supposed to be a classic butch/femme couple. Paul Henreid is the saintly new psychiatrist who arrives at the hellish place. The girls work ten hours a day digging potatoes and other brutal jobs, get punished by being sprayed with a fire hose, and so on. The sadistic matron even kills a pet rabbit Jackson and Pulver have hidden.

Henreid manages to institute some reforms, mainly because he agrees not to tell the authorities about the fire hose incident. The girls get to wear their own clothes, have better activities than brutally hard labor, and even get to have a dance with boys from a nearby trade school. (In another hint as to Jackson's orientation, she thinks putting on a pretty dress for the dance is "dopey," and refuses to dance with a boy who asks her.)

In the most shocking incident:

Spoiler

The matron forcibly cuts off Moreno's beautiful hair for not telling her who stole some perfume. This leads to her suicide. In the ensuing chaos, the other three escape. Francis goes to sign some adoption papers, but winds up accepting the baby. They go back to the place only so they can testify as to the fire hose incident and the reason for Moreno's suicide, getting Henreid out of trouble and getting the nasty folks in trouble.

It's not a bad film at all, although melodramatic at times, and featuring an irrelevant and sappy romance for Henreid. At times it looks like a film noir, or even a German Expressionism film. Parts of it are almost like a horror movie. That's probably because it seems that an uncredited Edgar Ulmer, cult director for things like The Black Cat and Detour, had a hand in it.