Walt at Random

Mr. Robinson Crusoe, 1932, b&w. A. Edward Sutherland (dir.), Douglas Fairbanks, William Farnum, Maria Alba. 1:16 [1:10].

What to say? A yachtsman with his buddies in the South Pacific bets his friends he can swim to an uninhabited island with nothing but his clothes and a toothbrush and not only survive but thrive. Improbably (to put it mildly), this apparent engineering genius shortly manages to have a “penthouse” of sorts—and when a headhunter from a neighboring island threatens him, not only bests the headhunter, but with two radio tubes around the headhunter’s neck builds himself a radio that brings in San Francisco and other stations;

Did I say improbable? Maybe implausible.

Meanwhile, the companions are doing “sporting” things like shooting a lion in Sumatra—such manly fun! And a young woman on the very-much-inhabited nearby island flees because she’s been betrothed to a man she doesn’t care for, rows off and winds up…well, you can guess.

Oh, and the friend who made the bet doesn’t want to lose, so he hires the tribe on the nearby island to scare the yachtsman and tie him up (they make it very realistic, having him tied up like a skewered pig over an open flame—but the pet monkey turns on the radio, scaring away the tribe, and the woman unties him. And so on…

On one hand, Douglas Fairbanks (Sr.) clearly had the time of his life making this movie—which he also wrote under a pseudonym and produced. And his engineering does result in some amusing sight gags, implausible as it is. On the other…it’s racist as hell. If you can ignore that, it’s probably worth $1, but I can’t.

The Capture, 1950, b&w. John Sturges (dir.), Lew Ayres, Teresa Wright, Victor Jory. 1:31.

When you shoot a man, it’s probably not a good idea to marry his widow. Although, as it turns out, that’s not quite the story of this pretty decent flick, set in Mexico, and involving a convenient “great circle theory” of wounded arms.

The story, in brief: An American oil man in Mexico attempts to deal with the theft of the company payroll—and apparent death of all but one guard—by going after the apparent thief. He finds a person and, when the person fails to surrender with both hands in the air (because he’s been wounded in one arm and can’t move it), shoots to wound, but badly enough that the suspect dies of internal bleeding. And his guilt seems a bit questionable as the loot’s nowhere to be found.

The oil man’s fed up; his fiancée drops him; he quits and gets on a train—the same train carrying the corpse back home. He winds up working on the widow’s ranch, eventually figuring out that the couple weren’t really in love, and marrying her…and then, as he finds more information, feeling obliged to find the actual thief.

One thing leads to another, and there’s a dead oil man (the actual thief), with our hero the obvious suspect—although it’s pretty clear self-defense, he apparently never thinks of dealing with the police. In the process of escaping…he gets wounded in the same arm so he can’t lift it. He winds up spending the night recounting the story to a priest. At the last minute, thanks to his wife, he’s able to lift that other arm and surrender…and we’re somehow to believe all will live happily ever after.

Yeah, OK, so the plot’s more than a stretch, the last 20 minutes make no sense whatsoever, and the relationships involved are a touch strange—but Ayres and the rest do a good job, and in the end it was a pretty decent movie. $1.50.

Who Killed Doc Robbin?, 1948, color. Bernard Carr (dir.), “Curley and His Gang” and others. 0:55 (0:52).

A thrilling story of atomic espionage, animal experimentation, jurisprudence and an intrepid band of youngsters…well, no. It’s an atrocious little flick involving a fix-it man who’s developing Incredible Atomic Weapons as a sideline, an evil doctor who fakes his own death, a “haunted mansion” that only has electricity when it’s convenient, a justice system in which the first suspect is immediately brought to trial, as is the second suspect, with apparently no consideration of investigation.

What it really is, is a cheapo, badly acted, casually racist version of an “our gang” style set of kids, this one including two ethnic stereotypes for easy laughs…and it’s not worth a cent, color or not. (Really? A black kid falls into a magic washing machine and a chimp dons the ironed clothes that emerge? And then the other kids assume this is the black kid?) No real laughs, no coherent plot, just kids running around and fainting and screaming a lot. Just awful. (I do appreciate one IMDB review: “this film runs a short 55 minutes but I could have sworn it ran a few hours longer.”) Free on Amazon Prime, but the price is too high. $0.

Desperate Cargo, 1941, b&w. William Beaudine (dir.), Ralph yByrd, Carol Hughes, Jack Mulhall, Julie Duncan. 1:07 [1:02]

This is really more of a romantic comedy with a “mystery” thrown in. Two showgirls stuck in the Caribbean get a Broadway job offer and get set to fly home—but, while waiting for the delayed Caribbean Cruiser (a two-deck seaplane with multiple compartments), they get another telegram that the show’s closed. One of them has been dating a newsman—currently on the same island but promised a big job in the Orient if he makes it back in time—and there’s also the future purser for the seaplane involved.

The mystery part is a gang of four planning to rob the seaplane and then burn it to get away. One of the gang tries to hit on the showgirl who’s not dating the newsman (and is attracted to the purser). A fight ensues.

Anyway: lots of action, accusations of gold-digging, various entanglements, and a midair robbery. In the end, of course, it all winds up well, with the newsman and one showgirl engaged and the purser—who’s now a hero, since he foiled the robbery—firmly attached to the other. It’s all fairly cute, and I’d give it $1.50, but the print’s choppy and for a couple of minutes it’s out of registration, so I’ll say $1.25.

The Devil’s Party, 1938, b&w. Ray McCarey (dir.), Victor McLaglen, William Gargan, Paul Kelly, Beatrice Roberts. 1:05.

Four semi-tough kids in Hell’s Kitchen have a club/gang of sorts, with a girl who keeps trying to join. At one point, the group—with the girl along—decide to steal some fruit from a warehouse, and the ruse used to distract the workers sets the warehouse on fire. The kid who set the fire won’t rat out the others and winds up in reform school.

Fast-forward to much later. The reformed kid now runs a Broadway night club with an illicit casino on the side. The girl is now a singer at the club. Two of the other boys—brothers—are now cops in NYPD’s “Emergency Squad” and the last one’s a priest. The group gets together once a year to remember old times (they still have the handmade gang sign); this year, it’s in the private rooms of the club owner.

Meanwhile, the club owner had sent two of his pet thugs to encourage one customer to make good on a gambling loss, and the thugs overdo it to the point of killing the customer, then dropping a sign off the roof to make it look like an accident. Naturally, the cops are sent to check out the scene—and one of them sees that the sign’s supporting rods were cleanly cut, suggesting murder, but the detectives say it was an accident. One thing leads to another, and the cop gets pushed off the roof of the building by the thugs—just another accident.

Lots more plot, as the thugs decide to enlarge their sphere of operations and, in the process, get rid of both the other cop and the club owner. Anyway, with all parties involved, the club owner—who, not unreasonably, considers himself responsible for the first two deaths—winds up dead in the process of protecting the others. Oddly enough, there’s a happy ending of sorts.

It was better than I expected, fast moving, well played, and maybe worth $1.50.

Damon and Pythias (orig. Il tiranno di Siracusa), 1961, color. Curtis Bernhardt (dir.), Guy Williams, Don Burnett, Ilaria Occhini. 1:39.

The plot summary on the sleeve and the one on IMDB cover roughly the last third of the film, and maybe that’s OK. For the first part: the head of the Pythagorean group in Athens has died, and his logical successor is trying to teach the Pythagorean philosophy in Syracuse—and in hiding since the dictator Dionysus regards Pythagoreanism as dangerous, with its friendship and nonviolent ideals. So Pythias goes off to find him and bring him back, and in doing so is first robbed and then aided by Damon, a rogue. Meanwhile, Pythias’ pregnant wife has gone into terminal decline since he’s gone. After lots of adventures, the successor manages to make it to freedom—but Pythias is captured.

From there, the plot actually mostly follows the legend of Damon and Pythias. It’s about friendship, philosophy, and lots of other stuff. It’s reasonably well-done, remarkably free of gratuitous killings, and relatively low on the sort of spectacle that dominates most of these movies. (If you’re a costume enthusiast: almost all the men wear very short tunics, while all the women wear floor-length clothes.) I’d give it $1.00.

Fury of Hercules (orig. La furia di Ercole), 1961, color. Gianfranco Parolini (dir.), Brad Harris, Luisella Boni, Mara Berni, Serge Gainsbourg. 1:37.

A bit more typical. This time, Hercules visits Arpad, one of his old haunts while on an extended journey and finds that his friend the king has died. His daughter, now queen, is trying to build impenetrable walls around Arpad using slave labor—and things are mostly run by the evil Menistus who hopes to kill her and take over as dictators.

Lots of action, all fairly coherent, culminating in a huge revolt combining slaves and rebels. Brad Harris is impressive, and as Hercules he’s even more so. Another one with no cheesecake and even more beefcake, as Hercules’ oversize chest is mostly exposed. Serge Gainsbourg is appropriately sneering and evil as Menistus.

I was somewhat thrown out of the action during the big extravaganza the queen throws in Hercules’ honor. For background music, authenticity doesn’t matter—but when entertainers are dancing to music, it seems a bit odd for the primary instrument to be a piano. The print’s decent, except that the first five or ten minutes suffer from red shift (that is, most colors are shades of red). All things considered, a pretty decent flick; by the relaxed standards used for this set, I’ll say $1.50.

Caesar the Conqueror (orig. Giulio Cesare, il conquistatore delle Gallie), 1962, color. Tanio Boccia (dor.), Cameron Mitchell, Rik Battaglia, Dominique Wilms, Ivica Pajer, Raffaella Carra. 1:44 [1:38]

Instead of mythology, we get history (or at least one portrayal of it), with Julius Caesar (Mitchell) in 54 BC wanting to invade Britain but beset by a rebellious Gaul, led by Vercingetorix (Battaglia). There are also scenes in the Senate (mostly wanting Caesar to show up in person to justify his expenditures), and a fair amount of stuff on Caesar as a person—including an odd extended scene where he’s dictating to three young scribes, apparently dictating two different letters and his treatise on Gaul being divided into three parts, and doing so simultaneously.

And, of course, there are lots of battle scenes with enormous casts of extras, horses, and arrows. Lots of bloodshed, much of it right there on the screen—and, by the way, a double-betrayal, as the third of Gaul’s tribes that Caesar believed he had bribed to support him choose to attack him instead. There’s also a somewhat complicated love story, involving Caesar’s ward Publia (Carra), who’s pledged to one soldier, then used by Caesar to marry a commander to assure his support, then captured by Vercingetorix…and eventually reunited with the soldier.

The bad: lots of red-shift problems, with much of the movie being in various shades of white and red; extreme pan-and-scan, with speaking characters sometimes invisible on one side or the other; occasionally choppy print. The good: a bit more vividly realistic view of battle, with hundreds of people dying badly; pretty good acting on Mitchell’s part and elsewhere; a bit more nuance than one might expect. (If you read the IMDB reviews, be aware that one negative review says this was a French production. As the original title and most of the cast names may indicate, it was typical of these movies in being an Italian production, this time with most outdoor scenes filmed in Serbia.) Overall, given the print problems, it comes down to $1.25.

Son of Samson (orig. Maciste nella valle dei Re, that is, Maciste in the Valley of the Kings). 1960, color. Carlo Campogalliani (dir.), Mark Forest, Chelo Alonse, Vira Silenti. 1:29.

The basic plot line: In the fifth century BC, the Persians are marauding and essentially controlling Egypt, with Pharaoh Armiteo I a weak ruler essentially in the thralls of his young, beautiful, wicked wife Queen Smedes. His son, Kenamun, goes out wandering and encounters Maciste (who says that means “Son of the Rock” although some call him Son of Samson), a phenomenally strong and always shirtless man. Kenamun sees a lion about to attack Maciste and shoots the lion with an arrow—and then Maciste wrestles a second lion into submission or death (unclear). So they’ve saved each others’ lives. Previously, Kenamun had met and fallen for a young woman in a village and vowed to return to her one day.

That’s the start. Lots of marauding Persians, killing the men of a village and enslaving the women; oodles of “blood.” Maciste frees the enslaved women of one village (yes, the same one). Smedes has Armiteo assassinated. Kenamun returns to Memphis…and the evil grand visir has a forgetfulness necklace that causes Kenamun to forget everything and marry Smedes.

Lots more plot. Much Egyptian scenery, including the pyramids. Decent production values. Some humor. A dance/seduction that’s a cross between a Dance of the Single Veil and a vigorous belly dance. All ends well, albeit only after a bunch more deaths. Apparently Mark Forest was actually bodybuilder Lpu Degni.

Widescreeen (very widescreen, 2.35:1), and if your TV can do the expansion, the print’s good enough that it didn’t look bad expanded to fill the width (not the height) of a widescreen TV. Generally good print. Fairly satisfying, almost worth $1.75, but I’ll say—by the relaxed standards for this set–$1.50.

Hmm. The reviews for Disc 50 appeared on July 3, 2018–one year and 23 days ago. (The discs got out of order in the 60-disc box.) But the, the reviews for a disc from the Warriors set appeared in late July, 2018, so it looks as though it’s taken me a bit less than a year to review these four movies–actually two movies some time during the fall of 2018, and two movies within the last month.

At this rate, I should be done with discs 49-54 by 2023 or 2027…let’s just say that it’s unlike that I’ll complete C&I publication of these old reviews of either collection (or the Spaghetti Westerns collection not yet begun). Too many books to read, too much other stuff to watch, too many walks to take…and from January through June, for a while longer I hope, too much OA investigation to do. Oh, and the new and deproved WP is a nuisance, and no longer seems to accept direct posting from Word. In fact, I’m finding it damnably difficult to cut & paste into the new and improved WordPress… But here’s what I have…

The Beloved Rogue, 1927, b&w. Alan Crosland (dir.), John Barrymore, Conrad Veidt, Marceline Day. 1:39.

I find this one a little difficult to review and rate, and I grant that the dollar value I assign may be faulty as a result. The problem here is that this is a silent movie (there’s a classical music soundtrack that’s not in any way related to the action), and given that I’m not much of a lip-reader, I felt there was a lot I was missing in between title slides.

I guess this is supposed to be historical (but based on a drama with no historical backing), with John Barrymore as François Villon, it comes off as half farce, half near-tragedy, with Barrymore more successful as a clown (and wall-climber). Most of the poems shown on screen struck me as doggerel. Barrymore comes off as a great ham, and that may be intentional.

The print is generally pretty good, but I found it less than entrancing. That may be me. I couldn’t give it more than $1.00.

Submarine Alert, 1943, b&w. Frank McDonald (dir.), Richard Arlen, Wendy Barrie. 1:06.

While it’s a wartime propaganda film, as evidenced by the closing speech, it’s also a pretty decent little spy thriller. The basic plot: all the tankers taking fuel to the fleet are being torpedoed by subs shortly after they leave port—and when the FBI figures out that they must be getting radio tipoffs and starts trying to locate the transmitter, they find that it’s in a different location every night.

So, I guess figuring out that a miniaturized 1943 transmitter is going to break down a lot, they see to it that key radio engineers are fired, figuring that one of them will be recruited to make replacement parts.

There’s lots more, including a little girl needing an operation, a young woman who gets close to the prime candidate for recruitment (a recent immigrant from—gasp—Germany) and is working for the FBI—and clumsy in leaving around a very obviously unique handbag, so he’s on to her. Oh, and using a loudspeaker and overhead light as a makeshift transmitter.

Light on stereotypes, fairly well-acted, lots of plot, lots of action. Incidentally, a few of the IMDB reviews are loony (e.g. one that turns steam into poison gas and more than one saying the firings were because of suspected disloyalty), which isn’t that unusual. Not great but maybe $1.25.

Captain Scarface, 1953, b&w. Paul Guilfoyle (dir.), Barton MacLaine, Virginia Gray, Leif Erickson. 1:12 [1:10]

Here’s the thing: for various reasons, I wound up watching Disc 50 before Disc 49—and I see that I began watching Disc 50 considerably more than a year ago. And Submarine Alert most likely more than six months ago. So don’t be surprised by various discontinuities and changes in rating scale, just as you shouldn’t be surprised if this massive collection isn’t finished before Cites & Insights is.

The sleeve summary is absolutely wrong. It says Captain “Scarface” Trednor uncovers a plot by foreign agents to destroy the Panama Canal (by detonating an atomic bomb on a cargo ship in Gatun Locks) and “decides to fight for what’s right.” In fact, Captain Tred is the leader of the foreign agents who have replaced one ship with another; it’s Sam Wilton, a guy who’s a little too romantic for his own good and needs to get back to the U.S., who saves the day. Anyway, it involves replacing one (torpedoed) ship with another, a crew from several countries (apparently) that’s entirely Russian spies eager to undertake a suicide mission in order to inconvenience Western shipping, a nuclear scientist who’s been cooped up in a Russian—well, not a prison—and is one of only two people who know how to detonate the bomb that’s hidden on this ship, his daughter, and…well, it’s silly but it moves right along.

It’s not a terrible movie. It’s not a great movie by any means, but it’s not terrible. The print’s decent. I’ll give it $1.00.

Under the Red Robe, 1937, b&w. Victor Sjöström (dir.), Conrad Veidt, Raymond Massey, Annabella, Romney Brent. 1:20.

I wonder how many movies and TV shows have been set in the era of Cardinal Richelieu? Well, here’s another, with the estimable Raymond Massey in the red robe—but the star is Conrad Veidt, the notorious dueler and gambler Gil de Berault, sentenced to hanging for disobeying Richelieu’s edict against duels—but open to pardon if he captures the rebellious Duke de Foix. (The IMDB record consistently uses “Fiox,” but the signs on the screen unmistakably say “Foix,” and there is, in fact, a Foix in France.)

The most interesting character is the sidekick foisted on Berault by the Cardinal, an expert pickpocket who adds a mild comic touch. There’s Annabella as the duke’s sister (who Berault mistakenly assumes is the duke’s wife), who of course falls in love with Berault. Lots of talk, some action, much discussion of honor and a happy ending of sorts. Decent, but nothing special—another $1.00.

50 Movie Warriors, Disc 4

Colossus and the Amazon Queen (orig. La regina delle Amazzoni), color, 1960. Vittorio Sala (dir.), Dorian Gray, Rod Taylor, Gianni Maria Canale, Ed Fury. 1:30 [1:24]

There’s no Colossus, but there is Glauco (Ed Fury), strongest man in Greece as judged by an all-out battle royale that begins this mostly-humorous outing. Rod Taylor plays Pirro, conniving friend of Glauco who helps get them into and back out of trouble through a series of…well, escapades…involving the Queendom of the Amazons, where some men who arrive are married for one night then enslaved in bear-guarded mines while others seem to carry on as marketeers. Dorian Gray as Antiope is a continuing “Egyptian” inventor. There are holes in the plot, and some sequences seem to be missing endings, but this is mostly just peculiar good fun.

I guess the plot doesn’t much matter. A lot of sight gags, good scenery, slapstick, and mostly just fun. Music distinctly unlike a typical movie of this genre. If you treat this as a Serious Sword & Sorcery film it’s atrocious—but it’s really hard to do that. Not great, but $1.25.

Duel of Champions (orig. Orazi e Curiazi), 1961, color. Ferdinando Baldi & Terence Young (dirs..), Alan Ladd, Franca Bettoia, Franco Fabrizi, Robert Keith. 1:45 [1:29].

Maybe I’m getting soft in my old age, but I found this one richer and more subtle than I expected—specifically, more of a family-conflict plot and less pure action. It’s not a gladiatorial epic; it’s something quite different.

The setting: Rome and Alba have been fighting an exhausting war, as shown in the clumsy battle royale at the start and the successful ambushing of the 4^th Legion, on its way to beef up the Romans. “Exhausting” in this case means that the resources of both city-states are pretty much exhausted—and, after some significant plot (the would-be future king has supposedly fled during the ambush; his wife, daughter of the king, is then immediately wed to the next future king—but the original future king was captured, escaped, and has been recuperating), both kings agree to see what their joint gods would have them do.

The sibyl proclaims that the war should be decided by three brothers from each city fighting a duel in one month’s time: to the winner goes the war. But the only plausible set of Roman brothers includes the recuperated one, who’s been denounced by his father for (supposedly) fleeing the battle and decides to go live peaceably outside the war zone. Lots of discussion ensues; at the last minute, he shows up to the fight. (The original title refers to the families: the Roman Orazis and the Alban Curiazis.) Without giving away plot turns, it’s fair to say that Our Hero not only triumphs (by himself) but takes steps to see that the two cities live in peace.

To my taste, this was a good family-conflict drama with some action thrown in. The sound track’s poor at times, but the print’s pretty decent. You’re only seeing part of the widescreen picture, but the pan-and-scan was competently done. [I see why many IMDB reviews are negative: as a traditional sword-and-sandals movie, it’s not great.] I could see watching it again (unlikely though that is), so by the relaxed standards of these flicks, I’ll give it $1.75.

Hero of Rome (orig. Il colosso di Roma), 1964, color. Giorgio Ferroni (dir.), Gordon Scott, Gabriella Pallotta, Massimo Serato. 1:30 [1:27]

The Romans have ousted and exiled evil king Tarquin, becoming a republic—and, of course, the king wants Rome back, allying with Etruscans to do battle. Enter a strongman hero (Mucius), following which all sorts of betrayal and battles ensue. There’s a happy ending.

I don’t think the plot deserves more. There are elements that aren’t followed up, but mostly there are strong men, treacherous men, beautiful women, lots of scenery, and battles galore. I should note one thing about Mucius’ typical one-huge-man-defeats-ten-warriors bouts: he does a lot of tossing people over his shoulder, and sometimes it’s just a leetle too obvious that the other person has set up the stunt, unless appropriate fighting style was to place your foot on top of your opponent’s outstretched hand. Decent pan & scan. Not great, not terrible: $1.00.

Thor and the Amazon Women (orig. Le gladiatrici), 1963, color. Antonio Leonviola (dir. & screenplay), Susy Andersen, Joe Robinson, Harry Baird, Janine Hendy. 1:35 [1:26]

On one hand, there’s some interesting scenery. On the other…

Really vicious misogyny, not just saying that a violent female dictatorship is bad but—explicitly, several times—that women should never lead a government. Of the two blacks in the movie, one is the vicious Amazon queen; the other, who seems to be more muscular than Thor, is mostly a comic figure. All men are slaves…except for the men who are guards. The gladiatrices (that’s how they say it) don’t so much engage in battles as in bloodbaths, and despite the fact that they are also essentially slaves, they’re loyal to the queen (until they aren’t)..

Oh, and it’s a terrible pan&scan: at times, both actors in a scene are off to the sides and either invisible or barely visible. For that matter, the big “fight” between 100 trained gladiatrices and Thor turns out to be a tug-of-war, “settled” because the flames between the two sides burn through the rope.

If I didn’t look at what’s being said in the flick, it might be worth $0.75; as it is, at best $0.25.

 

Where’s Disc 49? (I have readers with memories going back that far?) The box got out of order…

The St. Louis Bank Robbery, 1959, b&w. Charles Guggenheim and John Stix (dirs.), Steve McQueen. 1:29.

The sleeve calls this “The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery” and has it in color, filmed in 1959, 84 minutes long. The movie, however, is “The St. Louis Bank Robbery,” black and white, 89 minutes long. It’s a pan-and-scan version of a widescreen movie. (Apparently it was also released with “Great” in the title.)

One thing it surely is not is Great. In fact, if not for double-speeding, I’m not sure I could have made it through this dark, dismal and deeply boring flick. I suppose you could call it a psychological thriller, and I suppose it’s interesting that, in the seven minutes or so of actual action, the police actually involved in the robbery played themselves.

Otherwise…it seems like most of it takes place in a bar that always has the same odd music or a diner always, always playing a single stupid song. Dull, boring, annoying, and the only semi-likable character gets killed for absolutely no good reason. I feel as though I’m generous in giving this turkey $0.50.

Jail Bait, 1954, b&w. Edward J. Wood,Jr. (dir., prod. & writer), Lyle Talbot, Dolores Fuller, Herbert Rawlinson, Steve Reeves. 1:11.

Time to pick up the old flicks after a mere 15-week interruption…

Mea culpa: If I’d paid more attention to the opening credits, I would have realized what I was in for. And if I hadn’t been tired and distracted by Absolutely Not Worrying about an upcoming biopsy, I would have stopped watching this after ten minutes of incompetent dialogue, acting and direction and a thoroughly offensive (and unfunny) blackface routine. But I didn’t…

The poster at IMDB.com has a flag “Danger! These girls are hot!—but it’s not that kind of jailbait. Nope. This sorry little picture features a sorry young man (in an era when all the men, including the police, wore snappy suits and all the women wore gowns), son of an internationally famous plastic surgeon, who’s involved with a murderous low-life criminal and Pays the Price.

Despite the partly-good cast, there’s nothing positive to say about the acting or the dialogue. As usual, cop handguns have infinite numbers of bullets—all wasted firing at a car, and of course nobody thinks about writing down the license plate. The police mostly just sit around waiting for the solution to a police killing to fall into their laps. There’s a plot twist toward the end that you should see coming a mile away—and that only works because nobody dealt with fingerprints in 1954, apparently (or wrote down license plate numbers in hot pursuit).

IMDB’s rating is 3.3 out of 10. I think that’s generous. But looking at the IMDB listing, I see something that explains a lot about the picture: Written, produced and directed by Edward J. Wood, Jr., and the production, directing and writing are all below par even for Wood’s course. Three police departments cooperated in making this flick; I can’t imagine why. Plan 9 from Outer Space is entertainingly bad; this is just bad.

My review price is only for completist fans of Lyle Talbot, Edward J. Wood, Jr., Dolores Fuller or Steve Reeves—and even then, I’m being generous at $0.25.

Dangerous Passage, 1944, b&w. William Berke (dir.), Robert Lowery, Phyllis Brooks, Charles Arnt, Jack La Rue. 1:00.

This one’s better than it needed to be, as a low-budget hour-long “B” flick. A young American oil man stuck in South America learns that he’s inherited $200,000 (at the time, a small fortune). He gets the necessary credentials to claim the money in Galveston from a seedy, strange and thoroughly rotten local attorney, who tells him to sail north on one good ship—and, of course, immediately sends a henchman to bump him off.

That fails, and the guy goes north on an awful old steamer with one beautiful woman as the other passenger. Lots of murder attempts, questions as to who’s aligned with whom, and of course the two seems to fall in love immediately. Turns out there’s insurance fraud involved, with this tramp steamer intentionally wrecked as the latest act. Of course thins turn out OK. Interesting plot. Not great, but not terrible: $0.75.

Bulldog Courage, 1935, b&w. Sam Newfield (dir.), Tim McCoy, Joan Woodbury, Paul Fix. 1:00 [1:01]

It’s a Western, not a mystery, and it’s not too bad—if you don’t mind that it ends at least five or ten minutes before it should. Briefly, Slim Braddock as “the Phantom” has been robbing stagecoaches because the local banker robbed him of his mining claim. (“The Phantom” never wears a mask or shoots people…) He gets shot…and we jump to years later when Tim Braddock seeks revenge.

From there, we have robbers robbing robbers, interconnected gold mines, a potential love interest and a wiseacre detonation expert, apparently from Brooklyn, in a really bad suit. A great scene where Braddock imitates Bailey—very well.

Not a very good print (some missing syllables and words), but it’s clever enough that, if they’d finished the film, it might even have been worth $1. As it is, no more than $0.75.

Tarzan and the Green Goddess, 1938, b&w. Edward Kull (dir.), Bruce Bennett (credited as “Herman Brix”) as Tarzan, Ula Holt, Frank Baker. 1:12 [1:01]

At the full length cited on the sleeve, this mess might have been a mediocre, badly-acted, poorly-written pseudo-Tarzan flick—but as it is, it’s an incoherent set of excerpts from such a flick.

The estimable Lord Greystoke is having a gypsy-themed party at his ancestral estate, and folks are asking what happened to the Green Goddess. So an old hag (this flick is just full of stereotypes, among them that Guatemala is entirely removed from “civilization”) consults her crystal ball and tells the flashback (so guaranteed Happy Ending). It involves that super-powerful ancient Mayan explosive formula, many times as powerful as anything known today, which explains why the Mayan Empire rules the Americas. It’s hidden in a statue dedicated to salad dressing (we always see the statue wrapped, which presumably saved a buck or two of modeling), and is in the Lost City, and Tarzan/Greystoke and friends go after it, and so do villains and… Then there’s that Special Yell, which he does only after killing a lion or something; it’s up to the rest of the flick, which is to say awful.

This is a special Guatemala, with African animals. Never mind…

Sigh. I guess the impeccably dressed Greystoke spins around to achieve his preferred loin-cloth attire. When he’s not fondling simians, he’s doing that vine-and-tree thing, then jumping down into a large group of people—which generally means he gets captured. But, of course, it all works out—although we never see how.

Now that I’ve written this, I go to IMDB.com—and, oh look, it’s an edited version of a 1935 serial, “The New Adventures of Tarzan.” For that matter, it’s the second edited version, so maybe you had to see both to have it make any sense at all. Supposedly Edgar Rice Burroughs produced the serial and chose the star.

Culturally offensive, but that hardly matters since it doesn’t even make much sense, with huge continuity gaps and all. If you like Guatemalan scenery and steamboats in black-and-white, maybe $0.25; otherwise, I’ll give it a big $0.

Hercules Against the Moon Men (orig. Maciste e la regina di Samar or Maciste and Queen Samar), 1964, color. Giacomo Gentilomo (dir.), Sergio Ciani (“Alan Steel”), Jany Clair, Anna Maria Polani, Nando Tamberlani. 1:30 [1:27].

The city-kingdom of Samar is ruled by an evil (if beautiful) queen and under the domination of creatures in the Mountain of Death, who require a sacrifice of many of Samar’s young men and women on each full moon—a process that requires a remarkably large army and would seem to undermine the survival of Samar. (Most of the creatures are slow-moving stiff giants made of stonelike slabs, but there’s a top man who’s clearly a human with a funny mask and Princess Selene, a beautiful woman who must be brought back to life and power by the blood of the queen’s sister so that Jupiter can align with Mars and…well, never mind, it’s even more confusing than the Age of Aquarius.)

A senior adviser says enough is enough and asks for Hercules’ help (against the wishes of the queen, who attempts to kill him on the way into town). Lots of stuff happens from then on, culminating in a pointless and lengthy sandstorm, Hercules once again winning through unlimited strength, and a happy ending of sorts.

The so-called plot is incoherent, and the revolt never seems to take any shape. What this is, is mostly HercPorn: lots of closeups of well-oiled arms, legs and chest of this person who can lift and move anything. A mediocre print, crudely panned-and-scanned from what must be a widescreen original. I double-speeded through some of it, which helped (true double-speed, sl all the dialog and the really poor music.) Mostly for fans of Alan Steel’s acting ability muscles. Maybe the dialogue made more sense in Italian (or Greek?). Notably, this is really a Maciste movie, not a Hercules flick. (The French title, Maciste Against the Men of Stone, makes considerably more sense—although the plot’s still, well…) Generously, $0.75.

The Giants of Thessaly (I giganti della Tessaglia), color, 1960. Riccardo Freda (dir.), Roland Carey, Ziva Rodann, Alberto Farnese. 1:38 (1:28)

Title or no title, this is Jason and the Argonauts and the search for the Golden Fleece. As such, it involves gods, an island full of beautiful witches and talking sheep and stones, despair at sea, treachery at home, lots of beefcake (and beautiful women modestly dressed), and a lot of plot—and yet I found myself double-timing through a lengthy dance number and Jason’s seemingly interminable climb to retrieve the fleece. There’s only one giant (Cyclops) and he’s one-eyed and nowhere near Thessaly. It’s amazing how, after wandering aimlessly and seemingly lost for months, the Argo manages to return to Thessaly so rapidly and directly once the Golden Fleece is in hand, but… This was filmed three years before Ray Harryhausen’s Jason and the Argonauts, for what that’s worth.

It’s wide-screen (16×9), but you’ll have to zoom to get that and the resolution isn’t all that great. Still, good color, and it’s all reasonably well done. Not a classic, but worth $1.25.

Ali Baba and the Seven Saracens (orig. Simbad contro i sette saraceni, color, 1964. Emimmo Salvi (dir. & story), Gordon Mitchell, Bruno Piergentili, Bella Cortez, Carla Calo, Franco Doria. 1:34 [1:20].

I would say this flick has continuity problems, but that assumes continuity. Some scenes seem out of order; others just betray really cheap production—e.g., “midnight” scenes that are in broad daylight and a solar eclipse that only occurs over the palace grounds, not a few hundred feet away. When Simbad or Ali Baba or whoever is rescued (momentarily) by princess/harem member Fatima, he pushes her away and, about 30 seconds later, they proclaim their eternal love for one another. The best acting may be from the little person (Doria)who scurries around in secret passages—and the worst may be the deranged harem guard.

The plot has to do with Omar, a brutal lord who wants control of eight territories and to sit on the Golden Throne, but to do that requires winning a death match with one representative from each of the other seven tribes—the Seven Saracens, I guess. Ali Baba has a knack for being captured, and much of the plot doesn’t really work. No relationship to either the Sinbad or the Ali Baba of literature, of course. But never mind…

A reasonably decent eight-way battle (accepting that these people only use swords to hack at each other: although some of them wear what seem to be modern pants, shirts and boots or shoes, nobody’s ever heard of swordsmanship). A little unusual in that the American actor is the villain (although several actors used Americanized names for the film). Apparently only released in the U.S. as an 80-minute movie for TV, and not really even up to American-International’s standards. Very generously, $0.75.

The Giant of Marathon (orig. La battaglia di Maratona), color, 1959. Jacques Tourneur (dir.), Steve Reeves, Mylène Demongeot, Sergio Fantoni, Daniele Vargas, Gianni Loti. 1:30 [1:24]

Phillipides, medalist at the Olympics, new commander of the Sacred Guard and farmer at heart, saves the day for Athens against Persia, thanks to a sudden pact with Sparta and despite the treasonous acts of Athenian aristocrat Teocrito. Steve Reeves! Lots of action and scenery! Wide-screen (you’ll have to zoom), and a good enough print that it’s quite watchable. Good continuity, very good photography, excellent battle scenes, decent acting.

The sleeve description makes it seem as though it’s all about the battles, but about half the movie is about instant love lost, regained, lost again and…well, of course there’s a happy ending. By the standards of these flicks, $1.50.

With four movies to a disc, how does Mill Creek get 50 movies on 12 discs—or, in this case, 250 on 60? By having the occasional disc with more, usually shorter, movies. Like this one, with six relatively short mysteries.

Rogue’s Gallery, 1944, b&w. Albert Herman (dir.), Robin Raymond, Frank Jenks, H.B. Warner, Ray Walker, Bob Homans. 1:00 [0:58]

The title makes no sense at all, but this is a wacky little story of the wisecracking woman reporter (the smartest one in the flick) and her slightly dim photographer sidekick as they encounter a wonderful (and wonderfully dangerous) invention and a couple of murders.

The plot moves quickly and maybe isn’t worth recounting. (The invention allows you to listen to anybody, anywhere, if you know the “unique frequency” their location has. It has one very prominent vacuum tube. Hey, it was 1944.) There’s also a corpse that keeps getting moved and a couple of car chases. That the cameraman had the bad guy’s picture all along and didn’t realize it may not be too important, since all the action seems to take place in one night. Fast-moving and pretty enjoyable. That Frank Jenks (the sidekick) gets first billing over Robin Raymond is typical Hollywood sexism: she’s the star player. Given its length, I’ll say $1.25.

The Black Raven, 1943, b&w. Sam Newfield (dir.), George Zucco, Wanta McKay, Noel Madison, Robert Livingston, Glenn Strange, Byron Foulger. 1:01 [0:59]

It was a dark and stormy night…

That’s the weather and the mood of this movie, which is so dark that the action’s invisible much of the time (the print doesn’t help). The action takes place in The Black Raven, a hotel near the Canadian border whose host (Amos Bradford, also known as the Black Raven) makes a few extra bucks by smuggling criminals across the border—and probably through other means. As the picture begins, his old partner in crime (busted out of prison with ten years left to serve) shows up and, in the usual manner of Movie Bad Guys With Scores To Settle, stands there talking at him instead of using that gun—so that when his tall, oafish assistant Andy, the comic relief of the movie, walks in, Bradford can wrestle the gun away and tie the guy up in his office. He gets out at some point.

I’m probably missing some of the plot, but basically the bridge across the border is washed out, as are other ways across, so the guy turning people back directs them to the Black Raven. Thus, in addition to a wanted criminal mastermind awaiting the cross-border smuggle, we have a bank clerk who’s embezzled $50,000; a young couple planning to get married in Canada because her father, a crooked politician, opposes the marriage; the father in question; and eventually a sheriff. (I may have missed someone.) The politician winds up dead; the bumbling sheriff immediately assumes that the young man must have done it; and, as time goes on, we get [I think] three more deaths.

Between the dark print and the muddled plot, I can’t see much to recommend this. Charitably, $0.50.

Seven Doors to Death, 1944, b&w. Elmer Clifton (dir.), Chick Chandler, June Clyde, George Meeker. 1:04 [1:00]

While this flick also suffers from goings-on-in-the-dark print problems, the main problem is that it’s 100 minutes of plot in a 60-minute film. It starts out with a sequence that never quite makes sense, and I’m not sure I ever did figure out the full cast of characters and who did what to whom when why…

The title’s easy enough. Most of the film takes place in an odd community of seven shops (and apartments for the shopkeepers?) arranged around a courtyard. There’s a photographer, a milliner (the heroine, who also may or may not be heir to the whole operation), a furrier/taxidermist (primary villain) and…well, others. There’s a jewelry heist, two murders, a disappearing corpse, and an interesting gimmick. Oh, and the wisecracking…architect, apparently, with a jalopy named Genevieve. He winds up with the beautiful milliner. Cops are also involved. There’s even a dance number.

It’s not terrible, but it’s not all that great either. Maybe $0.75.

Five Minutes to Live, 1961, b&w. Bill Karn (dir.), Johnny Cash, Donald Woods, Cay Forester, Vic Tayback, Ron (Ronnie) Howard, Merle Travis. 1:20 [1:14]

An unusual cast and an improbable bank-robbery plot, adding up to an OK movie. The cast features Johnny Cash as a gun-happy thief with a sadistic streak (he’s only too happy to shoot his girlfriend, but he’d rather not shoot kids) and Ronnie Howard (later Ron, but this is at Opie age), along with Vic Tayback as the hardbitten criminal mastermind whose plot really doesn’t work out very well. (At least he’s alive at the end, albeit in the hands of the cops: Cash doesn’t fare as well.) Merle Travis has a brief role as a bowling alley owner (and plays a guitar solo on the theme song and guitar through much of the soundtrack).

A lot hangs on a banker who was about ready to run off with his girlfriend and divorce his wife, but in the end turns out to love his wife after all. Maybe. I’d spell out the rest of the plot, but why bother? (The title, which is also a Johnny Cash song over the titles, alludes to a key plot point: if Cash, holding a gun on the wife, doesn’t get called every five minutes she gets it—except that it doesn’t quite work out that way.) Clearly a low-budget flick, so-so print, but some interesting acting (esp. Cay Forester, the wife and hostage, a little over the top—and why not, since she also wrote the screenplay?). All in all, not memorable, but not bad. $1.25.

Lady Gangster, 1942, b&w. Robert Florey (dir.), Faye Emerson, Julie Bishop, Frank Wilcox. 1:02.

The basic plot is that a would-be actress, in the same rooming house as three would-be bank robbers, facilitates the robbery…and is sent to prison. She’s also an old friend of a sort-of crusading radio station owner. After lots of scenes in a women’s prison (which seems to let inmates wear the clothes they arrived with), she escapes to help apprehend the others (although she’d actually hidden the $40K loot anyway). Somehow, despite multiple killings and her unquestionable involvement, it has a Cute Ending with Probable Nuptials. Apparently, a young Jackie Gleason was one of the robbers.

Even charitably, and mostly for Faye Emerson fans, make it $0.75.

The Sphinx, 1933, b&w. Phil Rosen (dir.), Lionel Atwill, Sheila Terry, Theodore Newton, Paul Hurst. 1:04 [1:02]

This time, it’s a wisecracking male reporter—with a society/features writer girlfriend who he wants to marry. He works the crime beat, and the crime’s a stockbroker strangled in his office, as were three other stockbrokers previously. There’s a witness of sorts, a janitor who sees a guy come out of the office, ask him for a light and ask him the time.

The murderer, obviously—except that he’s a deaf-mute, as tests by both defendant’s and state’s doctors attest. The woman thinks he’s also a Great Man, a benefactor to charities, and starts going to his mansion to interview hum (sometimes with the help of an assistant/interpreter, sometimes with the use of a notepad.

I won’t go through the rest of the plot, but it has to do with identical twins and secret chambers and piano playing. Oh, and the old suicide-through-poison-ring bit.

A bit low on plausibility—the killer’s excuse is that the other stockbrokers disagreed with him on a deal, but he’s been doing the deaf/dumb routine for years and obviously expected to be caught eventually (otherwise why the poison ring?). Still, not bad. $1.00.

Two Gladiators (orig I due gladiatori), 1964, color. Mario Caiano (dir.), Richard Harrison, Moira Orfei, Alberto Farnese, Mimmo Palmara. 1:40 (1:33)

A mix of good and bad. Good: It’s widescreen (but not Enhanced for DVD, so your player has to do the zooming). Bad: It’s sort-of color: reds, blacks, occasionally a bit of blue-green, but rarely a full spectrum. Good: lots of mass swordfights. Bad: Really badly done swordfights with three heroes overcoming ridiculous odds on a regular basis.

It’s about the twin sons of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, one supposedly dead at birth but actually, well, supposed to have been killed but we all know how that goes. The supposed only son, Commodus, engages in gladiatorial matches (really?) until he learns of his father’s death, at which point he becomes emperor and looks to rival Caligula for evil. As you might expect, the other son (Lucius) wins out in the end (in the arena, with the two sons both dressed alike and wearing identical helmets, making it effectively impossible to tell them apart). Who knew that a hundred peasants armed mostly with torches could defeat whole hordes of Roman centurions?

Not terrible. $1.

Ursus in the Land of Fire (orig. Ursus nella terra di fuoco), color, 1963. Giorgio Simonelli (dir.), Ed Fury, Luciana Gilli, Adriano Micantoni, Claudia Mori. 1:27.

This flick falls into that special category of Paper Bag Flicks—one where it’s fortunate that man-size paper bags didn’t exist in the times being portrayed, since Ed Fury certainly could not have acted his way out of one. He can, however, defeat (and usually kill) any number of enemies at once, except when it suits the “plot” for him to be captured. (Apparently reviewers like the fact that he smiles more than most Hercules-style heroes, but to me he comes off as insipid. Diana is pretty good.)Another problem: this was a wide-screen picture (very wide screen, 2.35:1) converted to TV size by, apparently, just taking the center of the print: the credits are unreadable and during certain conversations you can only see part of the heroine’s face.

The plot? The sleeve has it wrong, at least in part: Ursus, leader of a village of peaceful shepherds on one side of a lake, doesn’t battle monsters except for the human kind. The setup is that a more military tribe lives on the other side of the lake and its evil general claims that for any shepherd to cross the lake is punishable by death. The beautiful Princess Diana, out riding near the lake, has her horse spooked by a rattlesnake; the horse throws her into the lake—and she seems unable to swim but can call for help. (Noteworthy because in two later scenes she’s a champion swimmer in the same lake.) Ursus, wandering nearby (half-naked as usual), saves her…and is, of course, then arrested and accused of trying to seize power (Diana was unconscious at the time, apparently fainting as soon as he’s saved her). Anyway…he escapes, but the not-so-bad king is convinced by the evil general (aided by Diana’s evil female cousin, who vouches for the general’s story) to let him go after Ursus and, what the heck, set the village to flames, kill all the women and children and take the men as slaves.

Beyond that, the general kills the king and seizes the throne, with Diana somehow fleeing (and meeting upwith Ursus, the two of course instantly falling in love) and the cousin marrying the general. But the people hate him, so he arranges a tournament to win their love. It’s an interesting tournament: any challenger in danger of beating the general/king’s champion gets an arrow in the back from the sidelines. Ursus shows up disguised, wins the competition against absurd odds and is immediately enslaved to help turn one honking big gristmill.

More stuff and nonsense having to do with the Land of Fire, a volcanic region with its own priesthood that the general defiled. The climax involves, in addition to more feats of strength and One Good Man Against Any Number of Bad Ones fights, the mountain’s revenge for that defilement and the people finally rising up against their evil ruler. I’ve skipped lots of plot, but all ends happily. Lots of action, zero plausibility, volcano erupting, a painfully bad actor as hero and, well, I’ll give it $1.

Cleopatra’s Daughter (orig. Il sepolcro dei re), 1960, color. Fernando Cerchio (dir.), Debra Paget, Ettore Manni, Erno Crisa. 1:49 (1:29).

The perils of Shila, daughter of Cleopatra, captured and forced into a dynastic marriage with Pharaoh Nemarat—under the vengeful eye of his mother and with the court physician desirous of Shila. That’s about as coherent as the “plot” gets, and the Big Dramatic Action seems mostly limited to a grave robbery and peculiar partial revolt. Let’s see: there’s also a poisoning, induced deathlike coma, several stabbings (rarely quite sure who’s stabbed or doing the stabbing)…and mostly lots of moping around.

The good? Halfway-decent print, although you’re getting just the center of a very widescreen “Ultrascope” movie. (That is: 1.33:1 of a 2.35:1 flick.) The bad? Pretty much everything else. Maybe the missing 20 minutes would help. This came off as a mediocre soap opera, but more confused, and with a few minutes of dramatic special effects. $0.50.

David and Goliath (orig. David e Golia), 1960, color. Ferdinando Baldi and Richard Pottier (dirs.), Orson Welles, Ivica Pajer, Eleojora Rossi Drago, Massimo Serato. 1:53 [1:32]

Orson Welles? Really? Yes, albeit an old, overly-large, shambling version of Welles as King Saul, the voice is intact. (Welles directed his own scenes—and he’s in quite a few.) Otherwise, this story, “freely adapted from the Bible” (as the credits say) is to some extent a typical tale of betrayal (Abner wants King Saul’s throne and is scheming with one of Saul’s daughters to get it), heroism (David, because David) and lots of action—except that in this case nearly all the action is in the last 15 minutes.

Slow and talky, but great scenery and a pretty decent print. If you can buy the premise that the Philistine army, ten times the size of the Isrealite guards, would actually give up (after its king breaks his promise to fall back if David slays Goliath, because what good Evil King wouldn’t immediately renege on a promise?) just because the king is slain…well, never mind. The extra 21 minutes would probably help. As pans & scans of very widescreen flicks go, this one isn’t terrible. All things considered, $1.25.

In the past, you could expect about one old-movie-on-DVD post every four to six weeks, and a disc from this endless (OK, 60 disc/250 movie) collection every two or three months. Now…well, the post for Disc 46 was in December 2015 and the most recent post was April 2016. With no further ado, then…

The Swap (orig. Sam’s Song), 1969, color. Jordan Leondopoulos (dir,), Robert De Niro, Jarred Mickey, Jennifer Warren, Sybil Danning, Terrayne Crawford. 1:29 [1:21]

Guy gets out of prison, goes looking for his brother’s murderer, gets warned off by a cop, keeps looking, finds out his brother was making pornos, keeps looking, eventually finds and shoots the killer…getting shot himself in the process.

Put that way, it doesn’t sound that great…and the movie’s nothing special. Maybe the missing eight minutes (which must have had the footage that got an R rating) made all the difference? A young (and, honestly, not very interesting) De Niro stars…or doesn’t. Ah, looking at the IMDB listing and reviews makes it a bit more interesting: De Niro’s the director, and what I saw is a 1979 thing that remakes his 1969 Sam’s Song into a different movie. Still not compelling or very good. Charitably, for De Niro completists, $0.75.

Night of the Sharks (orig. La notte degli squali), 1988, color. Tonino Ricci (dir.), Treat Williams, Janet Agren, Antonio Fargas. 1:27.

Let’s see. I watched this on December 15, 2016. Apparently I watched the previous movie on April 2, 2016. At this rate, I’ll be done with the remainder of this set and the other two megapacks on hand in…about 75 years. Guess I’ll have to pick up the pace. One can only hope that most of the rest aren’t quite as lame as this one is.

Plot? Such as it is: the brother of a laid-back diver had been bugging telephone calls between a crook and the President for years, and has cut a CD with the Greatest Hits: he wants a big payoff to return the disc. He then mails the original to his beach-bum brother (the flick was filmed in the Dominican Republic, so let’s assume it’s set there). From then on, we have occasional spurts of action and lots of underwater and above-water footage, all of it in the daytime, involving this really mean shark who really, really wants our hero. There’s more, of course, but it’s all pretty lame: poorly directed, not very well shot, badly “written.” Oh: I suppose this is the R version, as there’s about 15 seconds of topless women at a swimming pool who are totally unrelated to the plot. Hey, it’s bad Italian cinema. Very charitably, $0.75.

We Interrupt These Mini-Reviews for a Message

My wife asked a reasonable question, given that book reading, OA research, etc., etc. conspired to leave more than half a year between viewing movies that weren’t any good: Why? Thinking about it…I’m raising my standards. If after fifteen or twenty minutes the flick doesn’t seem likely to be at least at the $1 level, I’ll stop and do one of the “not viewed” write-ups. That should help. Now, back to the flicks.

Beyond Justice, color, 1992. Duccio Tessari (dir.), Rutger Hauer, Carol Alt, Omar Sharif, Elliott Gould. 1:53 [1:46]

A wealthy young businesswoman’s son (sort of a rotten kid, kept in private school only through her frequent donations) is kidnapped by her ex-husband (his father), the son of a Moroccan Emir. There’s some nonsense with silver boxes planted in both their houses—all of which leads up to The Situation: the Emir wants the grandson to become the next Emir (Omar Sharif), since his son is too Westernized or something.

Meanwhile…the mother (Carol Alt, with Elliott Gould as her lawyer who also wants to marry her) hires a mercenary (Rutger Hauer) to find and rescue the son—and insists on accompanying them. After which we get lots of intrigue, lots of shooting, an enormous amount of Moroccan desert scenery, a feuding desert tribe that gets involved at the last minute—and an ending that leaves me wondering why the whole bloody mess was necessary in the first place, as the still-alive Emir gives his grandson the choice of how to proceed and he goes with his mother. (The father’s kaput.) Oh, and the mother falls for the handsome mercenary.

Great cast (but Gould’s completely wasted). Great scenery. Ennio Morricone score. Bizarre and ultimately pointless plot. There must have been dialogue and direction, but…. I watched the last half of it double-speed, which kept it moving. Not a great movie by a long shot, but possibly worth $1.

Cold Blood (orig. Das Amulett des Todes), color, 1975. Günter Vaessen (dir), Rutger Hauer, Vera Tschechowa, Horst Frank. 1:20 [says 1:30 on sleeve, actual runtime 1:14]

The original title makes a little more sense, but not a lot. The “plot”? A young woman has gone off to a country house—where she has the key oh-so-cleverly hidden by leaving it on the sill over the door, because nobody would ever think to look there. Anyway, she takes a shower, hears shots, and see that three men have been chasing another man who’s headed for her house…and shoot him, while seeing her.

So they’re going to take her with them so she won’t call the police and can bind up the guy’s wounds. Of course, she drives her car with The Boss of the little gang and the guy who’s been shot (Hauer). Of course, The Boss either falls asleep or has been stabbed and she easily eludes the other car, gets the guy worked on by a doctor, and goes with him to a semi-deserted country estate…where, equally of course, she jumps into bed with him (after a display of nudity which pleases one of the gang watching with binoculars—because, of course, they’ve found where she’s driven to and she disrobes in front of an open window).

What can I say? The explicit sex scene is the most complicated acting in the flick and makes no more sense than anything else. Of course she’d jump in bed with a guy she’s never met but who’s endangered her life and is probably a criminal because…well, Rutger Hauer, I guess. $0.50 if you’re a Hauer or Tschechowa fan, $0.25 otherwise.