Angela Lansbury Weekend

Oh, all right, I'm a lazy sumbitch-- and I sometimes watch movies that aren't SF.

Even worse--I've been lost in estate questions and actual work (not that I have much of the latter) and I just got lazy. I'm finishing an Angela Lansbury Weekend. It wasn't designed that way intentionally;I got season five of Murder, She Wrote recently and watched a few episodes the end of this last week. Saturday, we found a cheapo DVD at Half-Price Books with two movies, Please Kill Me and A Life at Stake, both starring Angela Lansbury—that seemed interesting. I just finished watching the movies so it turned into a Angela Lansbury weekend.

The DVD is from Alpha and includes extras like cartoons and TV commercials (that I haven’t watched). The quality of Please Kill Me is terrible—missing frames, scratches, dropped dialog, poor audio—that makes it hard to watch. It really is a pretty good movie—Raymond Burr plays Craig Carlson, a lawyer who has fallen in love with his best friend Joe Leeds’ (Dick Furan) wife Myra (Lansbury). Craig tells Joe; Joe is flummoxed and says he needs a couple of days to think about it. After those few days, he goes to Myra, enters the bedroom and closes the door. The camera stays on the door—we hear a shot.

Joe is dead, shot by Myra. She says it was in self-defense. Myra is arrested and Craig defends her, confessing that he is the "other man" in his summation. It’s a fun movie.

The second feature, A Life at Stake, is better quality—not perfectly crystal clear but decent. This time, Edward (Keith Andes) is a home builder whose business was destroyed by a previous partner. A lawyer goes to him with an offer—a woman, Doris Hillman (Angela Lansbury), has arranged with her husband Gus (Douglas Dumbrille) to fund a new company. The new business will have Edward building homes and Doris selling them. Doris furiously flirts with Edward.

We first see Lansbury in a bathing suit looking sexy; she’s almost always bare shouldered in nice gowns. She’s sultry and seductive—it seems a bit odd after years of watching Jessica Fletcher—but she’s a damn good actress—and pretty sexy a that age.

More details later.

Life and Death in Texas

Apologies for the week-long absence.

My wife's dad died, a thunderstorm last week knocked out our power for three days and then we had another big thunderstorm last night. Bumps and business and the various and sundry stresses of family matters kept us busy.

I wrote a few thousand words in notes but I didn't have anything to post on this particular blog.

I really don't have anything to post right now, at least not in terms of a long review, but I will make a few notes about one of my favorite movies.

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension from 1984 is wonderful--silly and satiric and a lot of fun.

Peter Weller is great and carefully understated as the title character, a physicist/ neurosurgeon/ inventor/ musician/ comic book hero who starts the movie helping Dr. Sidney Zwybel (Jeff Goldblum) in a brain operation before Buckaroo tests his new Jet Car and breaks the dimensional barrier, briefly entering the eighth dimension. The news of Buckaroo's success triggers a series of events that threaten life on Earth and leads to Buckaroo and his assistants, the Hong Kong Kaviliers, trying to save the planet.

The cast is marvelous-- after Weller and Goldblum, we also have John Lithgow as Dr. Emilio Lizardo/ John Wharfin, a loony Italian physicist under control of the evil Red Lectroid alien from Planet 10 by way of the Eighth Dimension; Ellen Barkin is Penny Priddy, a beautiful blonde who is suicidal until Buckaroo turns her life around, Christopher Lloyd as alien John Bigboote ("It's Big-bou-tay, not Big-bootie!" he shouts), Dan Hedayi and Vincent Schiavelli as his alien assistants. On Buckaroo's side are Clancy Brown as Rawhide, Robert Ito as Professor Hikita, Bill Henderson as Blue Blazer Regular Casper Lindley, Billy Vera as Blue Blazer Pinky Carruthers . Carl Lumbly is John Parker, a Black Lectroid.

I won't post a full-tilt review right now. All I'm doing this morning is a brief comment-- I'll do more later.

The fact is that I love this movie. The casting is perfect and the performances are wonderful, the script is delightfully goofy, the pacing is excellent, the effects surprisingly good for a movie made in the early 80's and the music is (mostly) fine.

This is one of the very few movies that I can't think of any improvements to suggest-- how could you make it better?

The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms

Since we posted about the inferior remake of this picture last night, why not post a review of this movie as well? It's certainly not a great movie but it is much better than The Giant Behemoth and it is generally pretty good for the genre. I like it. It is a special B movie.

The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms

1953

Warner Bros.

79 min.

Starring

Paul Christian Prof. Tom Nesbitt

Paula Raymond Lee Hunter

Cecil Kellaway Prof. Thurgood Elson

Kenneth Tobey Col. Jack Evans

With

Donald Woods Capt. Phil Jackson

Jack Pennick Jacob Bowman

Lee Van Cleef Cpl. Stone

Steve Brodie Sgt. Loomis

Ross Elliott George Ritchie

Ray Hyke Sgt. Willistead

Michael Fox ER Doctor

Alvin Greenman 1^st Radar Man

Frank Ferguson Dr. Morton

King Donovan Dr. Ingersoll

Screenplay by Lou Morheim and Fred Freiberger

Suggested by the Saturday Evening Post story by Ray Bradbury

Photographed by Jack Russell ASC

Associate Producer Bernard W. Burton

Technical Effects Created by Ray Harryhausen

Music by David Buttolph

Produced by Hal Chester and Jack Dietz

Directed by Eugene Lourie

*

After an atomic test in the Arctic, two scientists go out to check monitoring instruments; they split up to get done quickly because of high radiation readings. George Ritchie (Ross Elliott) sees something terrifying—a giant dinosaur—he backs away and falls into a pit. The other scientist, Prof. Nesbitt (Christian) finds him but the monster appears before he can save his comrade; the monster causes an avalanche that buries Ritchie. Sgt. Loomis and Sgt. Willistead rescue Nesbitt and take him back to base, where he raves about the monster.

*

This is actually a very good movie. It probably suffers from the fact that it resembles two later movies directed by Lourie, The Giant Behemoth and Gorgo; both those movies had special effects inferior to Ray Harryhausen’s work on The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms. I suspect that these movies blend in viewer’s minds and that some of the shortcomings of the later movies are unintentionally attributed to the earlier picture.

The Giant Behemoth (aka Behemoth the Sea Monster) from 1959 seems to be a remake of Beast. Behemoth is the movie that features the same footage of an obviously tiny plastic toy car being squashed at least three times; it doesn’t happen in Beast—but the two movies are so similar, it isn’t surprising that effects and events from the two blend.

I read someplace (but can’t find the link at the moment) that Behemoth was originally planned to be something more like X-the Unknown but producers told Lourie that Behemoth had to have a dinosaur-like monster so it ended up being a virtual remake.

This is a movie of firsts. It is the first movie at least loosely based on a story by Ray Bradbury; he published a story called “The Foghorn” in Saturday Evening Post in 1951. It was the first picture that Ray Harryhausen had complete control over the special effects. It is generally considered to be the first picture that had an atomic origin for the monster.

Harryhausen’s effects are excellent; the interface between live action and animation is occasionally clunky—there are a couple of places where the timing isn’t perfect—but it is generally very good. The monster is wonderfully realized; the creature actually acts, not through facial expression but through motion and sound. Harryhausen has said that his goal is to make the monster believable; he succeeds well with this critter.

The script and the performances are decent—there’s nothing really exceptional except perhaps Paula Raymond, whose performance is actually quite good, keeping her character understated and under control even when other women of the era would’ve been bordering on hysteria when Elson dies.

Paul Christian is okay—nothing to write home about, but decent (his real name was Paul Hubschmid—born in Switzerland and acted almost always in Europe; this was one of his few American roles). Cecil Kellaway is fine, and fun—but we expect that of him. The thing that tells me that we don’t have the best script or direction is Kenneth Tobey—he was one of the high points of The Thing from Another World two years earlier, but in this picture, he’s just doing his job. He does a fine job, no doubt about that; it’s just that not enough is asked of him this time.

At any rate, this is a good picture—not a great picture, but a very good one. If you are a fan of sci-fi movies, this one is worth your time if for no other reason than the Harryhausen effects.

Another thing to consider—this movie came out a year before Gojira—the original Japanese version of Godzilla. I wonder to what extent this movie inspired the Japanese filmmakers? Hmm—more on that later.

Details (Spoilers Galore)

In Hartley Hospital back in New York, Nesbitt is interviewed by a psychiatrist, Dr. Ingersoll (King Donovan). Col. Evans (Tobey) investigated the area and found no trace of a monster—not even footprints—so everyone assumes Nesbitt was hallucinating.

A few days later, Nesbitt finds an article in the paper:

Sea Serpent Reported Off Grand Banks

St. Pierre, Nova Scotia—Seaman Jacob Bowman, lone survivor of the fishing ketch Fortune which sank off the Grand Banks yesterday, declared the tragedy was caused by a giant sea serpent.

Nesbitt shows it to his nurse; she says it’s right where it belongs—on the comic page.

Nesbitt leaves the hospital to visit paleontologist Dr. Elson (Kellaway), hoping that the scientist will believe him; he is, of course, disappointed. Elson’s assistant Lee Hunter (Paula Raymond) isn’t so sure.

Nesbitt’s doctor is surprised that his little outside trip a week before didn’t make him sick; they hear a radio report of another ship sinking due to a sea serpent.

Nesbitt returns to work at the Atomic Energy Commission; Lee Hunter is there to see him. She’s decided that she believes him—she asks him to her place to look at drawings of dinosaurs to see if any resemble what he saw. After digging through hundreds of drawings, he identifies one. Lee says that if two independent observers picked the same drawing, that might be enough to convince the skeptics. Nesbitt calls Capt. Lemay, the survivor of the second sinking—Lemay hangs up on him. Lee suggests that Nesbitt go to Canada; maybe he can convince him if he talks to the captain in person.

Nesbitt flies to Marquette and is told that the captain left just a couple of hours earlier. He goes to St. Pierre to talk to the survivor of the first sinking. Jacob Bowman (Jack Pennick) doesn’t want to have anything to do with the visitor until Nesbitt tells him that he’s seen the monster, too. He takes Jacob to New York; Jacob picks the same drawing that Nesbitt did.

Elson says that they’ve identified a rhedosaurus and says that the only traces of that creature were found in Hudson Submarine Canyon, 150 miles out in the ocean.

Nesbitt calls Col. Evans; Elson tells the colonel that he thinks Nesbitt is onto something. Evans reluctantly agrees to talk to a friend in the Coast Guard, to find out if there have been other strange sightings.

A lighthouse at night—two keepers discuss old ballads while one plays a squeezebox. The rhedosaurus comes out of the water, approaches the lighthouse, then grabs it and knocks it down. We see the rhedosaurus roaring beside the wrecked lighthouse.

Col. Evans visits his Coast Guard friend Capt. Phil Jackson (Donald Woods); Jackson thinks that it’s a joke but he agrees to help his friend.

Nesbitt and Lee are at a ballet when a note comes; they leave and meet Col. Evans and Prof. Elson at Jackson’s office—he has news of the lighthouse and reports that a few buildings were found destroyed—and a farmer crushed—on the Massachusetts coast.

Elson wants a diving bell so he can go down and take a look. Jackson is reluctant but he and Evans finally agree.

Elson goes down in the diving bell with one crewman; he reports a slight disagreement between two of the local inhabitants—a shark attacks an octopus. While he is watching this, the rhedosaurus appears. He reports that it is incredible; he’s busy describing it to Lee when the signal stops. They start to pull up the bell—but there is no diving bell.

Headline from New York Dispatch:

FAMED SCIENTIST LOST IN SEA TRAGEDY

Mystery Surrounds Cause of Disaster

New York, N.Y.—Office of the 3^rd Naval District today released a report that Dr. Thurgood Elson, Dean of the University Paleontology Department, was lost during a diving operation 150 miles at sea, in the region known as the Hudson Submarine Canyon. All queries as to the details of Dr. Elson’s death met with official silence, but there are rumors that dramatic circumstances surround the disappearance of the famous scientist.

The crew of the vessel from which the large Navy diving bell carrying Dr. Elson was lowered into the ocean has not been granted liberty since returning to port, and efforts to question them have been restricted.

At the museum, Lee laments that Elson’s death was so futile; Nesbitt tells her that he went down in that bell because that was his job. She says that Elson said the same thing before he went down.

The rhedosaurus rises from the ocean at the wharfs, causing longshoremen to run in panic. The panic grows as the beast marches through the city. A lone policeman walks up and empties his service revolver at the monster to no effect; he’s preparing to reload when the rhedosaurus reaches down and picks him up; with a deft flick of the neck, it swallows him. Another officer gets on a call box and calls for help.

Police from the 16^th precinct load into several cars and a paddy wagon and rush to the scene; they fire rifles and shotguns at the monster with little effect—it doesn’t seem to like the gunfire but it isn’t injured. It crashes through a building, burying people on the opposite side under rubble.

New York is a city under siege; a radio reporter notes that, “Times Square, the heart of New York City, has stopped beating”. He then details areas of the city that have been evacuated.

Newspaper headline:

MONSTER DEATH TOLL MOUNTS!

180 Known Dead

1500 Injured

DAMAGE ESTIMATED AT $300,000,000

The paper features a drawing of the monster amid a field of rubble.

An ER doctor reviews the many patients suffering from an infection, some with fever of 105 degrees; he says he’s afraid—deathly afraid.

The monster has been sighted; Col. Evans, Nesbitt, Lee and a group of soldiers are on the roof of a building. Evans orders light artillary to fire right between the eyes. Lee says that the skull is at least eight inches thick. After the first shot fails, Evans calls for bazookas—again, to no avail. The National Guard has strung up electric fencing; the beast touches it and recoils. Another bazooka shot hits the rhedosaurus in the neck; it is wounded. All the emergency lights fail and the monster gets away.

A soldier finds a large puddle of dinosaur blood; squads of soldiers follow the blood trail. Soon the soldiers are falling—one reports in and Evans tells him to get the men to the hospital.

The ER doctor calls Evans; he says, “The monster is a giant germ carrier of a horrible, virulent disease; contact with the monster’s blood can be fatal. If you use shell fire, who knows how far the air will spread the disease?”

Evans says they should have used flamethrowers but Nesbitt notes that the smoke would have carried the disease. They get a report—the monster has come ashore at Manhattan Beach.

Nesbitt says, “There’s only one way to beat him—radioactive isotope. Shoot it into him and destroy all that diseased tissue”.

Army trucks full of soldiers invade the amusement park; the rhedosaurus is at a large wooden roller coaster. A truck arrives, carrying the isotope in a heavy wheeled container. Cpl. Stone (Lee Van Cleef) is Evans best sharpshooter; he says he “picked his teeth” with a grenade launcher. He and Nesbitt put on radiation suits and go to the base of the roller coaster; Stone says that he can’t hit him from here. They put on their hoods, remove the top of the rolling container and take a smaller lead box with the isotope to the coaster. They ride to a high point and stop; Nesbitt removes the isotope warhead from the smaller box and loads it on the rifle. Stone aims and fires; the monster screams and thrashes about, shaking the coaster. The car they rode in rolls away, toward the monster, so they begin to walk down the opposite way. The runaway cars crash where the monster has destroyed the track; there are barrels of a flammable substance on the ground below. The crash triggers a fire and the old wooden coaster immediately begins to burn. Nesbitt and Stone climb down the side of the coaster as the monster continues to struggle, now completely surrounded by fire. It crashes through the burning timber but is weak and disoriented; it collapses with the burning coaster behind it.

Unusually for a monster movie, we don’t end with the embrace of the hero and his girl; we end on a shot of the monster face down and the burning roller coaster framing it. We do get that “embrace” shot, but then we go back to the rhedosaurus.

*

From IMDB:

The large skeleton in Prof. Elson’s museum is the one from Bringing Up Baby; it was in storage at RKO.

The producers asked Bradbury to read the script of their new picture; Bradbury noted that it bore some resemblance to a story he’d published two years earlier. The next day he got a telegram offering to buy the rights to the story.

*

Not from IMDB:

In the special features on the DVD, Harryhausen says that he and producer Jack Dietz were discussing the design of the dinosaur when Dietz brought in the old issue of Saturday Evening Post with an illustration of a dinosaur attacking a lighthouse; Harryhausen said they had to call his friend Bradbury.

We never find out for a fact if the Bradbury story inspired the screenplay or if Harryhausen inserted the lighthouse scene from a story by his friend.

*

Good science—the Mesozoic age did include the period 100 million years ago, the term and the time frame Elson suggests.

Bad science—Nesbitt asks about Galileo: “He said the world was round and he was forced to recant”. Huh?

*

Nesbitt’s address is 14 Bedford Pl. NY. He enters the hospital on October 14; his first interview with the psychiatrist is on his 14^th day in the hospital.

His phone number is Circle 4-4771.

The Monolith Monsters

Universal-International

78 minutes

1957

Cast:

Dave Miller Grant Williams

Cathy Barrett Lola Albright

Martin Cochrane Les Tremayne

Prof. Arthur Flanders Trevor Bardette

Ben Gilbert Phil Harvey

Chief Dan Corey William Flaherty

Dr. Steve Hendricks Harry Jackson

Dr. Reynolds Richard Cutting

Ginny Simpson Linda Scheley

Highway Patrolman Dean Cromer

Joe Higgins Steve Darrell

Screenplay by Norman Jolley and Robert M. Fresco

Story by Jack Arnold and Robert M. Fresco

Director of Photography Ellis W. Carter, ASC

Art Direction Alexander Golitzen, Robert E. Smith

Set Decorations Russell A. Gausman, William Tapp

Sound Leslie I. Carey, Frank Wilkinson

Film Editor Patrick McCormack

Gowns Marilyn Sotto

Make-Up Bud Westmore

Assistant Director Joseph E. Kenny

Special Photography Clifford Stine ASC

Music Supervision Joseph Gershenson

Produced by Howard Christie

Directed by John Sherwood

*

The picture begins with narration over stock footage:

From time immemorial, the earth has been bombarded by objects from outer space; bits and pieces of the universe piercing our atmosphere in an invasion that never ends.

Meteors, the shooting stars on which so many earthly wishes have been born.

Of the thousands that plummet toward us, the greater part are destroyed in a fiery flash as the strike the layers of air that encircle us; only a small percentage survive. Most of these fall into the water, which covers 2/3 of our world.

But from time to time, from the beginning of time, a very few meteors have struck the crust of the earth and formed craters

Craters of all sizes, sought after and pored over by scientists of all nations, for the priceless knowledge buried in them

In every moment of every day they come

From planets belonging to stars whose dying light is too far away to be seen—from infinity they come—meteors.

Another strange calling card from the limitless reaches of space, its substance unknown, its secrets unexplored—the meteor lies dormant in the night, waiting.

The fiery crash of the meteor from It Came from Outer Space is featured at the end of the narration.

*

Dave Miller (Grant Williams) is chief geologist in San Angelo, California. His assistant, Ben (Phil Harvey), finds a field of strange black stones on Old San Angelo Road; he takes one back to the office to study. Martin Cochrane (Les Tremayne), the editor of the town newspaper, visits Ben while the assistant geologist is studying the rock. Martin says there are some things out of place in the desert; “For example, out at the salt flats there used to be an ocean. That ocean knew that the middle of a desert was a silly place to be so it dried up and went away.” He then notes that he’s the same—San Angelo doesn’t need a newspaper when there’s never any news. Ben tells him that he may be about to make some world shattering discovery—Martin can write award winning articles about it.

*

This is one of my favorites from the fifties.

Grant Williams is good as usual, earnest and intense; Lola Albright is fine as Cathy Barrett. Les Tremayne delivers his usual quality performance and Trevor Bardette is wonderful as Professor Flanders.

William Shallert as the weatherman provides the only comedy relief—the picture is otherwise unrelenting.

The movie is nicely designed; unusually for a picture of this era, night scenes are actually shot at night. The scene at the wrecked Simpson house, when Ginny slowly appears from the shadows, is properly eerie.

*

I don’t understand why this movie isn’t more popular; it’s one of my all-time favorites. It’s well written and nicely paced—once it gets going, it never lets up. The acting is good—there’s not a lot of subtlety in the performances but there isn’t time for it. The music is strident and energetic—perfect for the picture. And the special effects are surprisingly good for a movie from the fifties—of course the choice of monster (rocks) makes it easier to do the effects convincingly than if they’d chosen bugs or lizards.

A great director like Hitchcock understood the vital importance of pacing—once you start, every frame of film must be necessary. In North by Northwest, Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is kidnapped less than five minutes into the movie—and the movie rushes on from that point. While a movie like The Monolith Monsters certainly isn’t the equal of a Hitchcock picture, it does show a respect for the urgent pacing—like I said, it never lets up.

*

Spoilerville, California

Wind gusts during the night, knocking over a flask of distilled water—it spills on the rock. Ben gets out of bed to check on the noise; he sees the rock—smoking and growing.

Dave gets back the next morning; he finds the lab behind the office trashed—dozens of the black rocks litter the floor. He finds Ben—cold and hard as a rock—dead.

Dave’s girlfriend, Cathy Barrett (Albright), is a teacher; she takes her class on a field trip to the nearby desert. One of her students, Ginny Simpson (Linda Scheley), picks up one of the mysterious rocks and takes it home. Her mother insists that she leave the dirty old rock outside so Ginny decides to wash it in the tub outside.

That evening, the town doctor E.J. Reynolds (Richard Cutting) has finished his autopsy of Ben but he doesn’t have an answer—it’s as if Ben turned to stone. Dave pulls out a fragment of the rock from his office; Martin Cochran recognizes it but says that there was only one piece yesterday—now there must be hundreds of pounds scattered across the lab. And Cathy says that Ginny took a piece home from the field trip.

Dave, Cathy and Corey drive out to the Simpson home and find it in shambles, surrounded by thousands of black fragments. They find Ginny alive, in shock—and Ginny’s parents, dead. Dave and Cathy rush Ginny to town.

Strange black rocks are mysteriously multiplying—and killing people.

Dr. Reynolds calls Dave a few hours later—Ginny’s hand has turned to stone. Reynolds wants Ginny rushed to the California Medical Research Institute in Los Angeles; he’s contacted a young specialist, Dr. Steve Hendricks (Harry Jackson). Reynolds says it’s her one chance to survive.

Dave and Cathy drive to LA. Hendricks shows them an x-ray that shows her pectoral muscles are paralyzed. He says he doesn’t know what to do yet; Cathy demands that he do something. Dave calms her and pulls the rock out of his pocket. He says he’s going to take it to his old professor in the morning. Hendricks says to get him out of bed—right now.

Dave and Professor Arthur Flanders (Trevor Bardette) examine the rock and determine that it is all silicates—Dave complains that it’s completely unknown. Flanders suggests the reason may be because it has been unknown—maybe it’s a meteor. Cathy comes in—she says that Hendricks has said that Ginny has eight hours.

Flanders and Dave drive back to San Angelo. At the Simpson house, Flanders notes the radical difference in soil near the wreckage and farther away.

Back at Dave’s lab, he, Flanders, Dr. Reynolds and Chief Corey discuss their meager findings, the main thing being the lack of silicates in the soil from near wreckage. It appears that, somehow, the meteor fragments drain all of the silicates from whatever they touch—from soil or from—people? Dr. Reynolds explains that silicon is present in the human body; science isn’t certain what it does. There is a theory that it is involved in the flexibility of the skin. Dave suggests that the absence of silicon in the body might lead to—the body turning to stone.

Dave and Flanders are running tests, trying to determine what catalyst is involved in making the meteor grow. They’ve been at it for hours; Flanders hits a piece and a chip falls into the sink. We hear thunder outside. Flanders apologizes, saying that he must be getting tired; Dave says that it’s just his strong coffee and prepares a fresh pot. After he dumps the old coffee in the sink, he returns to the sink—the chip has grown to a crystal taller than the depth of the sink. They realize it’s just water—as long as there is water, they grow; when there is no more water, they stop growing. Dave then hears the rain. They drive back out the Old San Angelo Road to the location of the meteorite fragments—Flanders tells Dave to stop, to turn off the engine. They hear a rumble—they get out and see giant crystals towering perhaps 100 feet. When the crystals reach a certain height, they fall over and shatter, scattering chunks for hundreds of feet.

Back in town, Dave calls the weather service; William Shallert tells them that it will stop raining soon and there is no additional rain forecast for 48 hours.

Dr. Hendricks has found a cure for Ginny; she’s out of danger. Cathy tries to call Dave and is told that the lines are down. She’s nearly hysterical; Hendricks says he has another way. He calls the Highway Patrol; they send a car to San Angelo and set up communicate by radio. Hendricks tells Dave his formula; Dave hopes that if the formula saved Ginny, it might also stop the rocks.

Everyone thinks they have breathing room now that the rain has stopped until a rancher drives in; he says that the rocks destroyed his house and barn more than a half-hour after the rain stopped. Corey wants to call for an evacuation but the phones are dead and power lines are down—how can he tell 1500 people that it’s time to move? Cochrane says that he can take care of it; he calls a boy, one of his delivery boys, and tells him to get every kid in town with a bike. He then has his workers print up an official evacuation order and has the kids distribute it.

An ambulance arrives from LA with Dr. Hendricks, Cathy and Ginny; it carries a portable iron lung to help other citizens that have touched the Monoliths.

Flanders and Dave are working to find out what ingredient or combination of ingredients from Dr. Hendricks formula can stop the Monoliths—with no luck. Cathy arrives and offers her help. Dave finally realizes that they have tried all the ingredients in Hendricks formula except the saline solution he used to suspend the other ingredients. They try plain salt water—the rock stops growing. They try again—it really works.

Now the problem is figuring out how to spread enough salt to stop the Monoliths; the giant rocks are following an old stream bed down toward the town. Dave says they need to dynamite the dam at the nearby reservior—part of a $6 million irrigation project paid for by farmers to the north. If they blow the dam, the water will rush across the salt flats and then into the path of the advancing Monoliths; the newly created river will be wide enough to stop the Monoliths in their tracks.

The only remaining problem is getting permission for this rather extreme solution. The governor is supposed to be flying to San Angelo to examine the situation but no one can get in touch with him. Dave takes the responsibility and orders the dam blown—and it works.

Chief Corey says that he’s finally heard from the governor’s office; the governor had an unscheduled meeting with the state geologist—that’s why no one could find him. But what did he say? He said, “Don’t blow up the dam—unless you’re absolutely certain it’ll work”. Corey drags out the pause painfully, and Cochrane acts like he’s going to slug the Chief.

The picture occasionally does a good job of showing the scientific method—Dave and Professor Flanders experiment long hours, trying to find a method of controlling the multiplication of the rocks before they overrun the town.

Of course, it isn’t all good science—at one point Flanders suggests that the stones may be meteorites—pure silicates like a stony iron meteorite—oops. At another point, Dr. Hendricks suggests that Ginny must be in an iron lung because the pectoral muscles are paralyzed—a little problem of physiology there.

*

A blooper—when Flanders scoops up two handfuls of dirt, he has the pale, lifeless soil in his left hand, but when we see a closeup of his hands, the pale dirt is in his right palm.

Why Stop Now?

I need to a little more work on The Giant Claw review, and I'm not satisfied with the review of The Giant Spider Invasion, so I think I'll put up a review of one of my favorite movies, The Monolith Monsters.

It's great fun.

The Giant Behemoth

The Giant Behemoth

Allied Artists

1959

90 min

Starring

Gene Evans

Andre Morell

John Turner

Featuring

Leigh Madison

Jack McGowran

Maurice Kaufmann

Henry Vidon

Leonard Sachs

A David Diamond Production

Directed by Eugene Lourie

Screenplay by Eugene Lourie

Special Effects Designed and Created by

Jack Rabin

Irving Block

Louis DeWitt

Willis O’Brien

Pete Petterson

Steve Karnes (Gene Evans) is a marine biologist from La Jolla, California; he’s speaking at a Conference on Atomic Research in London. Karnes is fiercely denouncing our handling of radioactive materials; “Gentlemen, we are witnessing a biological chain reaction—a geometric progression of deadly menace.” (Watch Evans in reverse on the DVD at 1X speed—it is a glorious set of ugly faces.)

*

This isn’t a particularly good movie—it’s not terrible but it’s not really good. It seems to be a remake of The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, also directed by Lourie in 1953. That movie was the first that Ray Harryhausen had complete control of special effects. This movie doesn’t have particularly good effects despite the talent—Rabin, Block, DeWitt, Petterson and O’Brien all had done excellent work before but that talent doesn’t show on the screen this time.

I read somewhere that this was originally planned as a movie more in the vein of X-The Unknown but the studio ordered Lourie to include a giant dinosaur so the picture turned into a remake of the earlier picture. Some of the effects are good but others are repeated (see below) and there is the incongruity of prop plane sound effects as a jet takes off—I wonder if some of the bad things in the movie were little bits of revenge.

It has some gruesome moments for the time. I would suggest that it’s only for the sci-fi movie fan who pursues a complete collection; if you only want the better sci-fi pictures, try Beast from 20,000 Fathoms instead.

*

Details (Spoilers Galore):

A fisherman Thomas Trevethan (Henry Vidon) and his daughter Jean (Leigh Madison) land their boat in a cove in Cornwall; he gives a big whitefish to his daughter, tells her to take it to the house and says he will take the rest of his catch to the village. She replies, “So you can go by the pub and brag to all your cronies?” He tells her to be on her way—and as soon as she’s out of sight, a bright light shines in his face, a loud sound cycles—the old man puts his hands in front of his face and screams.

After dark, Jean hears the door—but no Dad, it’s just the wind. She declares that he’ll be drunk as a lord and heads to the pub. At the pub she finds John (John Turner); he says that he hasn’t seen her father since morning—and that he couldn’t have come through town with whitefish or the whole world would know of it. He sees her concern and goes out with her to search.

(Nice use of hand held on Turner as he searches the beach)

John finds Tom with his face badly burned—but he’s still breathing. John asks him what happened; “From the sea—burning like fire.”

“What was it?”

“Behemoth,” Tom says as he dies.

The vicar makes heavy use of the Book of Job in the funeral—14:1 and 40:15.

After the funeral, Jean doesn’t want to go home so she and John walk on the beach; they come upon thousands of dead fish. John finds a strange pulsating blob, wonders what it is and touches it—his hand is badly burned.

Back in London, Karnes is waiting for a plane reservation; he sits to watch TV while the hotel clerk tries to get him a seat on an airplane. He hears that the fishing industry has come to a complete standstill—thousands of dead fish and no explanation. The newsreader finishes by noting that a sea monster has been sighted in Scotland—evidence that all the Scotch whisky has not been sent to America. He cancels his reservation and calls Professor Bickford.

Bickford tells him that the Cornwall business is more serious than the news has it—a man has been found dead—dead of strange burns.

Karnes declares that he is going to Cornwall; Bickford says that he’s chairman of a committee on the subject—they can be there at eleven the next morning.

They walk along the quay—fishermen line the railing; they say that no one dares to go out after what happened to Trevethan. One fisherman says that he saw lights a few days earlier—no one else has seen anything unusual. No one has been fishing for five days.

John takes Karnes and Bickford to see Dr. Morris. They ask the cause of death—he says first, second and third degrees and shock. Bickford asks what type of burns—he’s never seen them before, then says to wait a minute—he cuts off the bandage on John’s hand. Karnes says that John’s burns look like what he saw from atomic tests in the Pacific. Bickford tells Dr. Morris to send John to a clinic in London.

John takes Karnes and Bickford to the beach in the cove where he got burned; the two scientists test for radiation—with a crowd of villagers watching. They don’t find any radiation (Karnes pronounces algae as “al-ghe”.) Jean comes along; they ask her if her father said anything—she tells them about the Behemoth.

Back at Dr. Morris’ office, Bickford prepares to return to London; Karnes asks him to get reports from all his stations on the coast to check for radiation.

In the lab in London, Karnes meets Ned Lee, a scientist for the AEC. Tests so far have found no evidence of radiation. Karnes dissects several fish to examine the internal organs for signs of radioactivity using a method called “radio autograph”—after removal of the meat on both sides of the fish, he places the organs and bones on a glass plate for 20 seconds. The radiation from the fish exposes the plate. They check the plates after they’re developed; the 14th plate shows signs of radioactivity all through the fish.

Bickford calls the head of the fisheries department, intending to stop all fish at the ports; he says if radioactive fish got to market, it would be disastrous. Karnes wants to go to Plymouth, where the fish was caught.

The skipper of trawler Molly G takes Karnes to the fishing grounds; after a false start, the Geiger counter starts going crazy. Karnes sees something through binoculars and they pursue but the thing outruns them.

The steam ship Valkerie was found beached, horribly damaged. The Coast Guard calls Molly G and has Karnes returned to port; he inspects the wreckage and then goes to London.

(34:40—jet landing with sound of a prop plane)

He and Bickford visit an admiral; Bickford says that his lab has determined that the mysterious substance that irradiated the condemned fish appears to come from the stomach lining of an unknown species—he now agrees with Karnes Behemoth theory. The admiral orders an alert to all coastal areas and contact with other nations.

A farm house—the family having dinner. The dog barks, so father and son go out to see what the problem is. They see a whirl of intense bright lights—and they die.

A police car stops at a house, a constable rushes in and gives Bickford photos—photos of a dinosaur-like footprint twice the size of a car.

They go to Professor Samson, expert in paleontology; he looks at the picture and declares that the creature that made that print must have been 150 to 200 feet long. He’s excited when he’s told that it isn’t a fossil print—the creature was last sighted the previous night in Kent. He says that it must be headed for the Thames—they always go to fresh water to die. He also says that the creatures are electric. When he’s told that the creature is also radioactive, he says, slowly, that he supposes that it will have to be killed.

Karnes suggests that the creature’s electric charge projects the radiation. Bickford calls for closing off the Thames but the admiral insists that they already have sufficient control of that body of water.

Sampson and the pilot of a helicopter see something under water but Control can’t find anything on radar. They descend to try to get pictures but the chopper is destroyed.

(45:20—Dr Sampson in helicopter; 47:45 different type of copter destroyed.)

(49:10—beginning of ferry scene—ferry is John Benn.)

Our critter emerges from the Thames, growling and biting the ferry—it tries to capsize the boat. (Cars falling from the ferry are clearly models, plopping into the water, while people going overboard make big splashes.)

A doll floats on the water; a dead man rolls over to reveal radiation burns on his face.

A radio report notes, “36 dead and more than 50 missing.”

The military are mobilized (or should I say “mobilised”?). They order evacuations and set up defense positions.

The admiral suggests bombing; Bickford argues that would create a million bits of radiation-- “Why the whole city would be poisoned for God knows how long!”

Karnes notes that the creature is already dying from radiation poisoning but he can’t estimate how long until it is dead.

Bickford suggests that they give the beast more radiation—somehow fire a shell containing pure radium into the creature. Karnes says that a torpedo is the best bet; the admiral orders a minisub.

The creature finally comes ashore, roaring and destroying all in it’s path.

(1:01—first time the little toy car gets smushed; 1:02:18 is the second time—from another standpoint; 1:02:39 is the third time, from the original view but pulled back)

The creature uses its electro-radiation to start burning people—there are some fairly gruesome scenes at this point.

The attack on the city goes on for about seven minutes screen time—pretty long to listen to the canned screams.

As the government prepares a radioactive torpedo, the creature crashes through two sets of high tension lines, ultimately causing a fuel storage tank to explode, triggering a major fire.

(1:12:15—more footage of helo A, this time searching for the critter.)

The torpedo is ready and a detector has been attached to the sub—its called “Solartron” (huh?). Helicopter PB7 detects the critter at map reference L8R17; the sub departs.

The critter is swimming, broadcasting radiation and bouncing the sub around—then it bites the sub. There are water leaks on the sub but it is still maneuverable so they make another attack run. They fire the torpedo and the creature obligingly turns to face the oncoming torpedo with open mouth—there is an explosion.

The sub surfaces and returns to base (with stock footage of a damaged sub).

Everyone is relieved that the threat is ended; Bickford gets in his car, starts it up—he and Karnes hear the news. “Mountains of dead fish have washed on shore in America.”

As Dr. Sam Beckett would’ve said, “Oh, boy”.

*

All in all, The Giant Behemoth isn’t that bad a picture, but it could have been much better. The scenery chewing and mugging of Gene Evans is sometimes amusing, the early scenes of dead fish are well done and the bold and gruesome effects are effective. Unfortunately the obviously tiny budget hurt many of the effects, as mentioned above. I’m going to have to read up on this movie to find out what happened behind the scenes—were things like the wrong sound effects used intentionally? It would be fun to know.

I don’t rate movies with stars or anything like that. It seems to me that you would have to establish a group of rating systems—serious movies, fun movies, so-good-they’re-bad movies and so on—that would make the whole thing so complicated you’d end up spending more time determining what classification a movie fit than you would spend enjoying the picture.

So I’m not going to give this a rating. I’ll just say that it is entertaining—if occasionally groan-inducing—and altogether worth it for fans of sci-fi.

(Oh, all right—I will rate it a little. I would watch this five times before I would watch Armageddon one more time.)

Carumba!

I checked this computer and was astonished to find that I don't have a review of The Giant Gila Monster on it-- those reviews are on the (currently) dead machine. Carumba!

I found reviews of The Giant Behemoth, The Giant Claw and The Giant Spider Invasion, but no Gila Monster. Great Caesar's Boats!

I have a nice 500GB external hard drive to use to get files from the (not really completely dead) machine but-- oh, the laziness strikes again-- I haven't gotten around to moving those files. Doh!

Oh, well-- I guess I'll post The Giant Behemoth review instead, just to post something. I hate saying that I'm going to do something and then not doing it.

I can't decide whether to watch Gila Monster again to do a new review or to wait until I can recover the currently lost review-- more on that decision later.

On Being Lazy

I never intended to do multiple posts every day on this blog, but I did intend to do something at least every other day-- and here I have let a whole week go by with nothing. I actually had a job last week-- that took some preparation, then a long drive, then some actual work, a drive back home and the production of a report. It certainly didn't take the whole week, though--I was just lazy.

At any rate, since The Giant Gila Monster was mentioned in last week's post, I think I'll put up a review of that movie in a little bit.

(Oh, I did find out on that long drive that Toyota is pretty accurate with mileage figures for the 2007 RAV-4-- they claim 28mpg highway and I got 28.3. With gas prices these days, I'm grateful for that.)

The Giant Gila Monster and the Real World

It just struck me tonight, watching this movie again, how incredible the distance is from this movie to today. Chase’s little sister Missy has polio; the scene where she first wears her leg braces leads into the execrable song “Laugh, Children, Laugh”. That painful song makes you block the significance of the scene from your mind.

Some reviewers of the movie concentrate on Old Man Harris, the drunk, not realizing that he is comedy relief—they’re distressed that his drunken driving is not taken more seriously.

But here’s the thing—Missy had polio. When was the last time you heard of anyone suffering from polio? After the Salk vaccine in the fifties and the Sabin vaccine in the early sixties, the disease virtually disappeared.

Today we worry about vaccinations causing harm because it’s been so long since we had a true epidemic. Parents opt out of needed vaccinations and end up allowing their children to get sick. So far it’s measles and mumps and chicken pox hitting some areas, not the really serious illnesses like polio.

The headlines and the poorly researched articles posted in papers these days lead to a potentially serious problem. A tiny amount of mercury (emphasis on tiny) was included in some vaccines as a preservative in the past. A study or two showed a correlation between the mercury containing vaccine and autism—no causation, only a correlation. That correlation was reported in a press release and went into the media—parents became concerned and refused vaccines for their children. And that has led to some problems with disease spreading more than it should.

In the world at the time of Gila Monster, parents wouldn’t have dreamed of declining vaccines for their children—the monsters of serious disease were striking all around them.

It is, sadly, only because of the success of vaccinations that people now view vaccination with suspicion—that and the idiocy of a few people more interested in getting their names in the paper with wild theories than with facts.

The Third Man

The Third Man

1959-1965

TV Series

Michael Rennie

Jonathan Harris

This was a joint British-American production. Rennie starred as Harry Lime, a business tycoon and private eye; he has a shadowy past that included spying during World War II and some art theft. His preferred drink is a whiskey sour with orange peel.

Jonathan Harris played Bradford Whitman, Lime’s assistant. Harris, of course, was Dr. Smith on Lost in Space. (Doing a little research into the show brought on one of those Tex Avery Patented Jaw-Dropping-Moments—Jonathan Harris was born and raised in the Bronx! According to IMDB, Harris studied British movies to learn the accent that he used throughout his career.)

The 26-minute episodes are generally taut and well written; Rennie is always controlled and debonair—his perpetually bemused expression fits the character perfectly. Harris plays Brad more seriously than he would play his next job; Brad is a nervous sort, with the same clipped diction that Dr. Smith would feature, but there is none of the over-the-top silliness of that character.

We forget that we used to get drama in a half-hour format—it’s been decades since TV offered that sort of thing. It might be interesting to see the format again—some modern shows might benefit from less padding.

*

There are ten episodes in this two-disk set from Timeless Media Group. The price was right at $4.99—I would’ve paid more.

Quality is very good—clear with only a few minor scratches and dist specks from time to time. I noticed one spot where we miss a frame or two. There is a TMG logo throughout which is a bit tiresome.

You see the opening sequence only once, before the episode selection screen; each episode begins with the episode title and goes right into the story. Some episodes have closing credits but others don’t—I don’t know why.

I don’t know if these are the ten best of the total of 78 episodes, but I would like to see more.

Racket Squad

Racket Squad

1951-1953

TV

Reed Hadley stars as Captain Braddock of the Racket Squad, tracking down con artists. The show concentrates on scams rather than violent crime.

This is another release from Timeless Media Group. It’s a two-disc set with ten episodes. There are a few defects but the quality is again pretty good. (At least it doesn’t have the TMG logo floating in the bottom right corner like some other sets.)

Guest stars in this set include Hugh Beaumont as a bad guy and Frances Bavier (Aunt Bee) as a potential victim of a scam.

The series ran three seasons from 1951 to 1953, for a total of 98 episodes. The first season was only 13 episodes; the second season was 50 (!) episodes and the third was 35.

Hugh Beaumont shows up in a couple of episodes, once as a crook and once as a victim. Frances Bavier-- Aunt Bea on Andy Griffith-- is a victim in one episode.

It's pretty good-- some scratches and problems with the video but still pretty good; and the stories are not bad, either.

Another Blog

I've been thinking about creating another blog on the subject of old movies-- the fine old Thin Man pictures, the Bogart movies, and the old TV shows that focused on mysteries. I haven't worked out a name yet-- I'm toying with What's That Man Doing in My Drawers?, after the line from Nora in The Thin Man. I haven't decided yet.

The next post or two will be about old mystery series-- TV rather than movies.

The Mole People

This picture is not upcoming on TCM but it is fun. It's on The Classic Sci-Fi Ultimate Collection (volume one). It's not the best picture in the set-- it's actually about four of five-- but it is worth a look if you are a fan of the genre.

The Mole People

1956

Universal International

John Agar

Cynthia Patrick

Hugh

Alan Napier

Nestor Paiva

Phil Chambers

Rodd Redwing

Robin Hughes

Written by Laszlo Gorog

Produced by William Alland

Directed by Virgil Vogel

*
The picture begins with a four and a half minute lecture from Dr. Frank Baxter, an English professor at USC. I think he’s the same fellow who did a lot of the educational films we saw in school when I was a kid—he did so many of those I wonder if he had time to do any teaching.

He’s discussing the suggestions by some people about what lies beneath our feet—is the Earth hollow? He cites three crackpot theories before introducing the movie, carefully pointing out that “this is a fiction—science fiction—it’s a fable”.

This is pretty good movie—not a great one, but better than many others. For those of a certain generation, it’s fun to see Hugh Beaumont in a different role. Genre favorites John Agar and Nestor Paiva are good as usual. The story is decent, if a bit clichéd; the biggest problem is the goofy costumes and props—if you can ignore those, you can enjoy the picture.

Alan Napier plays the High Priest—he’s unrecognizable under the white makeup, the long whiskers and silly hat—but it’s the same actor who played Alfred, the butler, on the TV Batman. Napier was quoted as saying that he never read comics so he didn’t know anything about Batman; when his agent told him he had a good chance to get the role, he asked what a Batman was. When his agent told him that it could mean $100,000, Napier replied, “I’m going to be Batman’s butler.”

*

Land of the Spoilers

A group of archeologists is working a dig in Asia; they discover a stone tablet. Dr. Roger Bentley (John Agar) says that the language is Sumerian; he translates a warning that anyone who tampers with the belongings of Sharu, King of Kings, is doomed. Lafarge (Nestor Paiva), Dr. Paul Stewart (Phil Chambers) and Jud Bellamin (Hugh Beaumont) are with him in the tent discussing the tablet when an earthquake hits. It’s not very severe, but it does knock over the camp table on which the tablet rests—the tablet breaks in two. Jud wonders if the Goddess of Istar is expressing displeasure at their moving of the tablet; Lafarge replies that the tablet warned doom to anyone who maliciously took the tablet, and they’re certainly not malicious—just innocent archeologists.

The next morning a native boy brings them an oil lamp in the shape of a boat. They read additional markings—Sharu had a boat built, got his family, his slaves and his animals onto it; they ride out a great flood and land on the mountains of snow. Bentley decides they need to climb the nearby mountain Cuetara.

With Nazar, their guide, the begin the ascent. They arrive on the Cuetara Plateau the second day and are met with an avalanche—they take cover in a cave. After it passes, they find the arm of a marble statue in the snow.

They climb to the summit and find a temple entrance, obviously very old. Stewart is walking around, away from the others—the ground gives way and he falls. The others scramble to the hole—they can’t see the bottom, so they get their gear, drop ropes and rappel down.

After they’ve descended more than 200 feet, Bentley drives another piton into the rock and continues down. He sees the body of Stewart and goes down. Jud follows, then Lafarge. Nazar is preparing to make the final descent when he notices the piton is loose; he hammers it in—and causes a cave-in. A rock strikes him on the head and he falls. The cave-in buries him and closes off the shaft they’d come down.

Bentley, Jud and Lafarge explore, searching for another way out. The find an ancient underground city. They decide to rest—they’ve been on their feet for over 15 hours—so they stretch out on what looks like coarse black sand. Ugly creatures come up from the sand and snatch them underground.

They awaken in a cave. A door opens and two albino guards take them to another, newer underground temple, where they’re presented to the king and his high priest. The high priest asks who they are. Bentley explains that they’re friends who come from the surface. The priest scoffs—above in only heaven, where we once lived. If you are evil spirits, you must be destroyed—and if you are mortals, we cannot feed you, so you must be destroyed.

Guards lead them off to die in the Fire of Istar, but Bentley and Jud decide to fight. They overpower the first few guards and run for a tunnel. Lafarge trails behind; he falls and calls out for help. Bentley turns and shines his flashlight just as the guards are about to kill Lafarge—the light hurts their eyes. They turn and run. The chase reverses direction and the invaders now pursue the guards. They return to the king’s chamber; the flashlight chases the king and the high priest from the room.

Lafarge panics and runs down another tunnel. Bentley and Jud follow; they find a chamber where the Beasts of the Dark are enslaved. One of the Beasts gets away and chases them; it kills Lafarge before Bentley can drive it off with the light.

Bentley and Jud emerge from the tunnel—back where they came from. The priest and the king come out behind them—it is obvious that Bentley and Jud are indeed from Ishtar, for they have the light of Ishtar in their cylinder.

At a banquet to honor the visitors, a slave girl drops a platter of mushrooms (the primary source of food for the underground people); the king orders her whipped. Bentley stops the punishment—the king gives ownership of the woman to Bentley. Her name is Adad (according to the closing credits). She’s not albino and is considered below the ruling class. Bentley tells her that she’s free but she stays with him.

Even as the king promises that the outsiders will be treated well, the high priest begins a campaign among other priests to steal the burning light cylinder and get rid of the visitors.

Bentley and Jud interfere with the rulers several times; finally they are drugged and awaken tied up. The high priest plans to sacrifice them in the Fire of Ishtar. The high priest finally has the burning light cylinder—he feels invulnerable.

Adad goes to the Beasts of the Dark for help. After Bentley and Jud are forced into the chamber of the Fire of Ishtar, the Beasts begin to emerge from the sands around the temple and attack. The high priest tells the king not to worry—after all, he has the cylinder of burning light. Of course, by now the batteries are dead—the flashlight does nothing.

The battle is a rout as the Beasts whip the king’s guards. Adad tries to open the door to the Fire of Ishtar chamber but she can’t; the Beasts see what she’s trying so they force the door. She goes inside, into the sunlight streaming down from above. Bentley comes up to her and embraces her.

Bentley, Adad and Jud return to the surface, find their equipment and get fitted up for the snowy conditions. Another quake hits—Adad runs back toward the temple and is crushed when a column falls and rolls over her.

The end.

*

It’s an abrupt and not totally satisfying end but he story was done—why waste money (which was in short supply on movies such as this) on any more?

Dr. Roger Bentley-- John Agar

Adad-- Cynthia Patrick

Dr. Jud Bellamin-- Hugh Beaumont

Elinu -- Alan Napier

Etienne Lafarge -- Nestor Paiva

Dr Paul Stuart-- Phil Chambers

Nazar-- Rod Redwing

First Officer-- Robin Hughes

It Came from Beneath the Sea

Friday at 8 PM EDT we have It Came From Beneath the Sea on TCM.

Here's a brief review.

It Came From Beneath the Sea

1955

78 minutes

Columbia

Produced by Charles H. Schneer

Directed by Robert Gordon

This is another good sci-fi picture from Sam Katzman and Columbia with the added benefit of Ray Harryhausen’s marvelous effects.

Cmdr. Matthews (Kenneth Tobey) is captain of the US Navy’s newest atomic submarine, out on its shakedown cruise, when something strange appears on sonar. A giant object chases the sub and then stops the sub for several minutes; radiation detectors onboard go wild—reactor room reports no radiation leak inside the boat—the radiation is coming from outside. The sub escapes and surfaces; divers find a strange substance on the bow planes. The substance is taken back to base in Hawaii.

*

Katzman made some wonderful pictures for Columbia, along with a few turkeys (The Giant Claw, for example); this falls in the former category, thanks to the effects by Ray Harryhausen.

*

Kenneth Tobey and Faith Domergue are excellent as usual, even though the script (by George Wothing Yates and Hal Smith) is a bit clunky with their potential romance. As my wife correctly noted, why are they going swimming in waters off a beach on which people have disappeared, in waters with no fish? The reason, of course, is to get Domergue in a bathing suit—not that I’m complaining.

If memory serves me, Ray Harryhausen once said that he’d only animated six tentacles on the octopus because of budget constraints. I noticed on the face of the DVD that the critter has ten tentacles. I wondered if it was really a sextopus or a decapus or just a Hollywoodapus.

*

Proceed only if you’ve seen the picture.

Dr. John Carter (Donald Curtis) and Dr. Leslie Joyce (Faith Domergue) are brought in to study the substance. It takes ten days but they finally determine what it is—a small part of an obviously giant octopus.

The government official’s initial skepticism quickly fades after survivors of a sunken tanker describe the creature (in a long scene that displays Domergue’s sultry charms).

Matthews and Joyce go to the Oregon coast, where a family disappeared, to investigate. It’s here that we have our first on-screen victim, a sheriff’s deputy named Bill—and the story kicks into high gear.

We finally get to the attack on San Francisco, a marvelous Harryhausen sequence.

*

The picture generally has good usage of stock footage, although the selection of a B-47 as the plane to carry Cmdr. Matthews and Dr. Leslie Joyce to Oregon seems a bit off unless our characters were riding in the bomb bay; that plane was strictly three seats—pilot, navigator and bombardier.

*

This a fun movie--enjoy.

I don't mean to suggest that the suspension was due to my political comments, by the way-- it could well be that it was related to the movie review. When I noted that political comments have expiration dates, that meant that I couldn't post political comment on a site that left me sitting for five or six days before what I wrote finally got published.

Isn't one of the important things about blogging the immediacy of the postings?

Hmmm

I started this blog last week, posted a couple of political notes and then a review of a movie. The blog was then suspended for five days because it may have violated terms of agreement.
Tonight it's back and I can post-- should I trust in that? I don't know.

The thing is that I don't what terms of agreement I may or may not have violated-- it would be nice to know, particularly since political comments have a specific freshness date.

I suppose I'll make a few more posts, just to see what happens.

I don't think I'll put my best stuff up yet though.

Ugh!

I can see from the last post that my planned method-- creating stuff in MS Word and then doing a cut and past to get it over here-- isn't going to work. The formating went to hell-- and when I tried to fix it by editing the post, I got no joy. So I got work to do.


But we'll get there.

The Thing From Another World

The Thing from Another World

Winchester Pictures

RKO release

1951

87 minutes

Nikki Margaret Sheridan

Hendry Kenneth Tobey

Carrington Robert Cornthwaite

Scotty Douglas Spencer

Eddie Dykes James Young

Bob Dewey Martin

Lt. Ken Erickson Robert Nichols

Cpl. Barnes William Self

Dr. Stern Eduard Franz

Mrs. Chapman Sally Creighton

The Thing James Arness

Music by Dimitri Tiomkin

Screenplay by Charles Lederer

Based on the story “Who Goes There?” by John W. Campbell Jr.

Produced by Howard Hawks

Directed by Christian Nyby

*

Captain Pat Hendry (Tobey), a C-47 pilot stationed in Anchorage, is called by the base commander General Fogerty. Dr. Carrington, leader of Polar Expedition 6, has reported the crash of an aircraft nearby and has requested an aircraft and means to investigate. Hendry, his crew and Ned Scott, a newspaperman visiting Anchorage trying to dig up a story, fly to the base to assist in the investigation. With scientists and sled dogs on board, they fly to the crash site and discover something unusual—the crashed craft melted the ice and sank before the ice refroze—and the craft is round! “We finally found one!” They’ve found a flying saucer!

*

The Thing is a wonderful picture—great writing, great acting, great direction, great sets, terrific music—it’s hard to think of any way you could improve it.

Kenneth Tobey is perfect as Captain Hendry—generally easy-going but capable of being quietly commanding, showing great respect and affection for his crew—it’s a wonderful performance. Margaret Sheridan is delightful as Carrington’s secretary and Hendry’s love interest—she has a stronger role than women in most sci-fi pictures of the era. She’s strictly business in dealing with her work—even in the scene where she gets squeamish, she backs up a tiny bit and asks Carrington if he will need her any more; she’s clearly relieved when he dismisses her—but she never screams a single time. And she’s downright sultry as she teases Hendry with a drink and a kiss.

Robert Cornthwaite plays the arrogant Dr. Carrington perfectly from his first scene, where he makes Hendry wait while he finishes what he’s working on—it’s obvious that what he thinks is important outweighs what others think. He also says, “I dislike being vague”, almost sighing at the line (more on Carrington below).

Douglas Spencer, as reporter Ned Scott, gets some of the best lines in a movie full of good lines and provides a little comedy relief—but comedy relief unlike the buffoonish relief in so many movies. When Carrington describes the attributes of the amputated alien arm, Scotty stops him and says, “Please, Doctor, I have to ask—it sounds like you’re describing some sort of super carrot.”

Carrington confirms Scott’s suggestion; Scotty then says, “Dr Carrington, you’re a man who won the Nobel Prize; you’ve received every kind of international kudo a scientist can attain. If you were for sale, I could get a million bucks for you from any foreign government. I’m not, therefore, going to stick my neck out and say you’re stuffed absolutely clean full of wild blueberry muffins—but I promise my readers are gonna think so.”

Dewey Martin is Bob, the crew chief, infinitely creative and resourceful; he frequently approaches Hendry and softly says, “Captain, I have a suggestion.” The suggestions are always good and Hendry always accepts them—and Bob always compliments Hendry on another good idea.

*

The script is a delight, with great dialog and good suspense. The music is very good, too—the movie is one of the first to use a theremin in the score.

*

The special effects are surprisingly good for the time, in part because of the smart decision not to show any of the space ship other than a fin. The monster suit is nothing to write home about but it is better than a lot of other movies. The most noteworthy effects scene is the one where the Air Force crew sets fire to X. These days, we’ve seen plenty of scenes with people on fire, so it may not be all that impressive, but James Cameron, in TCM’s special Watch the Skies!, says that it was the first full-body flame suit, and the first shot with no other lighting than the flames on the stunt man. I haven’t researched that claim—if it’s true, it’s amazing. Even if Cameron’s story isn’t true, the scene is still incredible. And it does appear that there’s no other lighting (to my un-film-educated eye).

Why We're Here

The purpose of this blog is supposed to be old movies-- usually sci-fi movies. My irritation at a political story boiled over to the point that I posted something off-topic last night. I'll try to keep that from happening again--I plan to put up another blog for politics.

We will get started doing what we planned now with a review of the movie that provided the name of this blog.