Magic Elevator Trick In "Kiss Me Deadly" (1955) (video)

 

Movies love to fool us...

...into thinking we're seeing what we aren't really seeing. 

In this scene, director Robert Aldrich uses the most basic trick imaginable in order to make us think detective Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) and his friend are waiting for an elevator.

When, in fact, there's no elevator there at all.

 

Video by Porfle Popnecker. I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

 

 

Magic Elevator Trick In "Kiss Me Deadly" (1955) (video)

A Trip Down Product Placement Row In "Moonraker" (1979) (video)

 

When you watch the 1979 Roger Moore/James Bond flick "Moonraker"...

Don't be surprised if you get thirsty for a particular soft drink.

Or have a craving for a certain cigarette.

Or find yourself motivated to spend money on various other products for some strange reason.

 

Video by Porfle Popnecker. I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

 

A Trip Down Product Placement Row In "Moonraker" (1979) (video)

Who Played The Classic Universal "Frankenstein" Monster? (1931-1948) (video)

Boris Karloff created the role of the Monster in 1931's "Frankenstein."

Karloff repeated the role in "Bride of Frankenstein" (1935)...
...and "Son of Frankenstein" in 1939.

"Ghost of Frankenstein" (1942) gave us a new Monster in Lon Chaney, Jr.

Bela Lugosi played the Monster in "Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man" (1943)...
...with the help of stand-ins such as Gil Perkins and Eddie Parker.

"House of Frankenstein" (1944) introduced Glenn Strange in the role.
Strange returned in "House of Dracula" (1945), the last serious entry in the series...
...and finally in the comedy, "Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein" (1948).

Karloff will always be generally considered as the best actor in the role.
Glenn Strange also made the character his own and is still highly popular.


I neither own nor claim any rights to this material.  Just having some fun with it.  Thanks for watching!

 

Who Played The Classic Universal "Frankenstein" Monster? (1931-1948) (video)

All The Glenn Strange Monster Scenes From "House Of Frankenstein" (1944) (video)

 

Actor/stuntman Glenn Strange made his debut as the Frankenstein Monster...

...in the 1944 Universal classic "House of Frankenstein." The character had previously been portrayed by Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney, Jr., and Bela Lugosi in the earlier films in the "Frankenstein" series.

As legend has it, Strange was visiting makeup maestro Jack Pierce's chair to get a fake scar for his current role, and Pierce, recognizing a great facial structure and physique when he saw it, notified execs that he had found their new Frankenstein Monster.

After playing the role in this and following movies ("House of Dracula", "Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein"), Glenn Strange's Monster became second only to that of Boris Karloff. In fact, when Karloff died many newspapers mistakenly used a photo of Strange in the obit.

Strange's craggy visage as the Monster continues to be popular in model kits, posters, action figures, and other elements of monster fandom.   

Video by Porfle Popnecker. I neither own nor claim any rights to this material. Just having some fun with it. Thanks for watching!

 

 

All The Glenn Strange Monster Scenes From "House Of Frankenstein" (1944) (video)

THE BLACK CAT/ THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 4/20/22



THE BLACK CAT (1966)



Stark, crisp black-and-white photography and a knack for embellishing Edgar Allan Poe's short story with a modern edge highlight THE BLACK CAT (Severin Films, 1966), a Dallas-based horror that transcends its low budget while still retaining that old bargain basement charm in a way somewhat reminiscent of CARNIVAL OF SOULS.

This time, a troubled young heir named Lou (Robert Frost), still holding a grudge against his dead father, eases his fractured psyche with alcohol and bad behavior while his faithful wife Diana (Robyn Baker) looks on in helpless despair.

Hoping to lessen his hostility, she gives him the gift of a black cat which he names Pluto. But the cat, who is a good judge of character, strikes out at Lou, who then cuts out the animal's eye in a fit of drunken rage.

 

Later, he tortures and then electocutes the cat, burning down his own uninsured mansion and ending up near-destitute.  Shock treatments and a stay in the psycho ward seem to get him back on the right track, but after returning home he reverts to his old drunken, violent ways and ends up committing a heinous act that readers of Poe will have anticipated since the first scene. 

Poe, thankfully, is well-served by this imaginative adaptation which pretty much hits all the main notes of his immortal short story while enriching it with interesting character studies and a few surprises. (I doubt if even Poe conceived of ending the story with a car chase.)

The brief use of gore is effective, with one shot of a hatchet lodged in someone's skull quite familiar to those of us who grew up reading Denis Gifford's "A Pictorial History of Horror Movies."

The acting is often rather unpolished but the enthusiasm of the cast makes up for this.  Frost is particularly intense and watchable in his portrayal of the slowly disintegrating Lou, while the lovely Baker elicits our sympathy.  Sadie French is effective as their concerned housekeeper Lillian.

Fans of another Texas-based production, Larry Buchanan's CURSE OF THE SWAMP CREATURE (also from 1966), should recognize that film's mad scientist, Jeff Alexander, as one of the two police detectives who visit Lou in his home in the final scenes. 

This is director Harold Hoffman's only directing credit, and he acquits himself well with a lean and briskly-paced effort.  Being a sucker for good black-and-white photography, I loved the look of the film.

 

One of the last existing 35mm prints is used here, with a few missing bits filled in from a more time-worn copy. The result is a mostly pristine picture with occasional defects, which, for me, only add to its nostalgic appeal.

The only problem I had with THE BLACK CAT is that, as a cat lover, I cringed at the apparent abuse of the cat in some scenes. I find such elements quite distressing, markedly lessening my appreciation of the movie.

That aside, THE BLACK CAT is the kind of low-budget 60s horror yarn that rises above its modest production values while still retaining an appealing low-rent ambience, a combination devoutly to be wished by conneisseurs of such delectably downbeat fare.



THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM (1967)



The second half of this double-feature would be a perfect choice for a festival of quintessential Halloween films.  THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM, aka "Blood Demon" (Severin Films, 1967), is like the most extreme carnival spook house you could imagine, and walking through it should easily supply you with double your daily dose of hokey horror.

This West German production takes place in the olden days of Europe and boasts a non-stop array of impressive found locations and lavish sets, especially when we get to Count Regula's dark, crumbling castle and all its subterranean passageways and chambers of horror.

The story begins with a flashback of the Count's public execution, a well-deserved one in that he has murdered twelve local girls in a quest for immortality which was thwarted by his inability to score the crucial thirteenth.

 

His punishment--to be drawn and quartered in the village square.  His final curse--to return and get revenge upon the descendants of the judge who condemned him and the woman who escaped his dungeon in order to report him to the police.

Flash forward thirty-five years, and we find those descendants drawn to the village by mysterious letters.  They are Roger Mont Elise (Lex Barker), a man searching for information about his own origin, and Baroness Lilian von Brabant (Karin Dor), who has been told that she has inherited the late Count's castle.

The two meet on the long coach ride to the castle and are smitten with one another even as the trip proves fraught with danger and growing terror.  With the saucy, gun-toting priest Father Fabian (Vladimir Medar) and Lilian's chipper servant Babette (Christiane Rücker), they arrive at the castle after an extended ordeal through a nightmarish forest filled with human body parts and hanging corpses.

 

Once there, the film lives up to its name with a castle whose creepy torch-lit tunnels lead from one chamber of horrors to another as each member of the group falls victim to Count Regula's wretched undead servant Anatol (Carl Lange) in a series of tortures from which each will barely escape. 

A worse-for-wear Christopher Lee finally makes his entrance as Count Regula about halfway through, setting into motion his plan to make Lilian the thirteenth victim in his bid for immortality. For this, her blood must be super-charged by terror, so she is placed into a pit of vipers while Roger suffers the threat of the slowly-descending pendulum blade (giving the film its tenuous connection to Poe) as the seconds to Regula's great regeneration tick inexorably away.

The cast is marvelous, including a distinguished Lex Barker (one of the many screen Tarzans) and Karin Dor of YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE fame at her most charming.  Medar is a delightful comedy-relief Fabian, and Christiane Rücker as Babette is likable as well. As for the two villains, Lange's loathsome Anatol is ample support to the sinister Lee as they indulge in all manner of evil and sadism.

Taken from two collector's 16mm prints of the film, Severin Films' copy is quite satisfactory despite switching frequently between faded color and black-and-white.  It also alternates between good condition and somewhat worn, but as I've said many times, I like a print that looks like it has been around the block a few times. 

THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM is a cornucopia of spook-house imagery that's quite graphically gory for 1967 while still comfortably old-fashioned in its execution. The florid script by Manfred R. Köhler (with just a pinch of Poe) tosses in everything but the kitchen sink in order to give us the creepy-crawlies, and the whole thing is lavishly, enjoyably over-the-top.


THE BLACK CAT/ THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM (Hemisphere Box of Horrors Exclusive) Special Features:
Blood Demon Trailer
Black Cat Trailer
English subtitles

THE BLACK CAT/ THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle