Marie of the Isles (1960)

~ monsterhunter ~ 1 Comment

When the French teamed up with the Italians in 1959 to make a pirate movie for release the next year, one could be forgiven if the viewer was antsy that such a pairing might result in the sort of new wave pirate movie fans of Italian swashbuckling tales wouldn’t recognize, much less enjoy.

Would all the action take place in a guy’s flat with improvised dialogue between three characters moaning about the pointlessness of the human condition while unconventional filming techniques were used to show not only contempt for cinematic tradition, but also for the audience itself? Continue reading “Marie of the Isles (1960)” →

Scream and Scream Again (1970)

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Scream and Scream Again PosterFollowing the aimless The Oblong Box that almost teamed up Vincent Price and Christopher Lee, director Gordon Hessler was at it again later that same year when he signed up not only Price and Lee, but also Peter Cushing to appear together in this off-beat Cold War horror movie that’s more successful than The Oblong Box was in spite of (or perhaps because of!) it being more confusing.

You get the whole “bait and switch” feeling that you had with The Oblong Box, since once again Lee and Price only share one scene together and Cushing is only in the movie for five minutes and doesn’t get to appear with either one of the other two, but with car chases, amputations, a serial killer on the loose, and a plot to take over the world, it doesn’t leave as bad a taste in your mouth like it did with The Oblong Box. Continue reading “Scream and Scream Again (1970)” →

The Legend of Lylah Clare (1968)

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I’m still not sure what I was supposed to take away from this movie. Was it the necessity to have hand railings attached to large staircases? Or maybe it was that having a starlet who is portraying another starlet who had a fear of heights, shouldn’t be allowed to do her own circus trapeze stunts. Most likely though it was that audiences who decided half a century ago that the movie was a flop, did so for a number of very good reasons. Reasons like the silly emphasis on staircase and trapeze accidents. Continue reading “The Legend of Lylah Clare (1968)” →

Hotel (1967)

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With a reservation for over two hours and the very fate of the title character itself on the line, Hotel is surely that sweeping epic of what happens at check in, check out and all points in between! And with the historic St. Gregory located in the heart of New Orleans, all manner of steamy, controversial, and mysterious goings on are surely happening within its elegant halls and suites!

Your comment card though will likely note that while the hotel and its staff looked and acted professional (how could it not with the handsome movie star Rod Taylor of  The Birds and The Time Machine in charge?), your stay at the ritzy inn was marked mostly by boredom in between bouts of being creeped out by the maniacal smile that hotel thief Karl Malden constantly wore while standing around staring at sleeping people as he stole their money. Continue reading “Hotel (1967)” →