As I select my robes of state for the evening festivities at the Duke of DVD's palace (the preparations have been intense--they've been hauling tuns of wine and mead up there for weeks, a herd of fatted boars was possessed by a legion of demons earlier this week and sent squealing over a cliff into the Duchy's largest stew-pot, and the screams from the Duke's dungeon as his torturers practice their piñata swings have been downright encouraging), I must apologize to my parishioners for the downfall in new content at the end of the year. But do YOU feel like working?
At any rate, 2010 promises to be another banner year for Mad Mad Mad Mad Movies, so once the hangovers are over and the streamers (organic and otherwise) stripped from the ceilings of the Duke's Orgy Chamber and Crisco Silo, look forward to more reviews, more features, more photos, and more MADNESS.
And thanks once again to all our followers, commenters, and silent lurkers. I can't say we wouldn't be doing this without you (if we had to tap our reviews in code through the grates of the Bastille, the Duke and I would still be entertained), but you definitely make it more fun.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Bunnies,
The Vicar
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Goodbye Awful Aughts, Hello Terrific Teens!
Friday, December 25, 2009
MERRY XMAS FROM MMMMMOVIES!
The Duke and the Vicar would like to wish their subjects and parishioners a very merry Xmas, happy Hanukkah, super Kwanzaa, Wonderful Winter Solstice, fantastic Festivus, and Atheistic Another Day. May your presents be what you wanted, and may all your vampires be lesbian.
Please enjoy this exploding head as our gift to you.
Bunnies,
The Vicar and the Duke
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Black Sunday (1960): Bava's Awesomeness, Let Me Show You It
My dear friends, it is I, the Duke of DVD, and as most of you probably already know, my love for Italian horror is only eclipsed by my love for poncy hats. No one, I'm sure you'll all agree, puts the "Italia" in Italian horror like the great Mario Bava, a cinematographer turned director whose first film is our subject of discussion today. Every single gothic horror movie made after 1960 owes its lifeblood to this cinematic epic, and to complete a viewing is to sit in stunned awe, basking in the glory that is one of horror's pillars.
I must provide a warning here, however: This movie contains lots of talk about burning witches, outfitting witch faces with spiked masks, and the ill treatment of witches in general. If you or one of your loved ones are currently in the employ of Satan, you might find this content objectionable. We at MMMMad Movies apologize in advance and wish to remind you that sometimes art has to be cruel to be kind.
With that out of the way, let us explore, shall we?
Black Sunday opens with a spectacular witch trial. I say "trial" but what I really mean is a good ol' fashioned witch burning. A group of hooded, torch-bearing folks listen to a local noble as he denounces a raven-haired beauty tied to a pole. Lets get this out of the way:Barbara Steele is stunning. STUNNING, I say! We soon find out that it is her own brother that is condemning her for Satanic practices, along with her cohort, who is already dead via "Mask of Satan"ing.
An early publicity still from a Sunn O))) concert.
The witch is a princess, it turns out, named Asa Vajda. She spits a curse back at her brother, crying out: "You will never escape my hunger, nor that of Satan!" From my understanding, Satan prefers gluten-free products due to an allergy. He also likes his witches saucy, and Steele is muy caliente, to be sure.
Basically, the "Mask of Satan" is an iron mask wrought to resemble the Vicar's visage as he rolls out of bed in the mornings after a particularly epic bender. The inside of the mask is studded with 3-inch long spikes. Luckily for us, Bava pulls no punches and we get to see the Mask applied. First, it is fitted onto the struggling witch's face and then a large, shirtless executioner-type dude wielding a mallet the size of a tree trunk walks up and hammers it onto her face, causing instant death.
"Miss, please be still, this Avon Age-Defying Mask(tm) has to be properly applied."
Just to be double sure, the princess is dragged over to a large pyre. As soon as torches are touched to the wood, though, a mysterious downpour occurs, causing the superstitious villagers to flee, the fools! Don't they realize what they are doing?! You can't leave a witch unburned! At any rate, they are at least wise enough to bury her in the family crypt inside a sarcophagus that has a window in the lid, where her masked corpse is forced to stare at a stone cross fashioned out of the top of the coffin lid. At least they get something right!
We then jump 200 years into the future. The stately Doctor Kruvajan (Andrea Checchi) and his assistant Doctor Andre (played by the dashingly handsome John Richardson) are traveling via horse-drawn coach to a lecture. Their alcoholic driver is highly nervous and is attempting to cross the foul land as fast as he can. Suddenly, they all pay for his haste when the carriage gets stuck on a fallen tree! The two doctors decide to investigate their surroundings while the driver works to free the vehicle.
"Boris, you fucking clod, hurry up and call AAA."
Soon they hear a mournful howl, which appears to be coming from the ruins of an old church. Going to investigate, they discover that the howling is the work of some old pipe organ pipes. Knocking them down, the older Dr. Kruvajan shows he's not afraid of no ghost. They see an open door leading down into the sub-level of the ruins, so they investigate further. Naturally, it's the crypt of the witch!
"Look Andre, with this handy window we can watch the maggots feast. Andre? Where are you going?"
The two of them gaze through the glass on the coffin, talking with each other about the customs of how this witch was treated, clucking their tongues at the barbarity of it all. Dr. Andre leaves his elder as he goes back to check on the driver's progress with the coach. As soon as he's gone, Dr. Kruvajan is assaulted by a bat the size of a bull mastiff! Beating it with his cane, he fends it off before finally shooting it. It falls on the sarcophagus, where a final blow from the Doctor's cane busts the stone cross on top of the lid. Oh dear...
Mario Bava Presents: The World's Dustiest Bat
Pieces of the cross fall and break the glass window, to boot. The doctor reaches inside the coffin to retrieve a painted triptych he sees inside, cutting himself on the glass in the process. Stupidly, the doctor also unmasks the corpse, his curiosity getting the best of him I guess. Something tells me this sequence of events is about to cause people problems. In fact, this might be best expressed with a Bava tribute haiku:
Busted cross breaks glass
Cut hand drips blood in eye-hole
Satan's bride rises!
The doctor, not realizing his grave error (ba-dump--The Vicar), leaves. Outside, the two doctors meet the local princess, the beautiful Katia (also played by Barbara Steele). She's out walking the dogs. The young doc Andre is smitten instantly, as are we all. After a brief conversation, the doctors are on their way, and young Andre leans out of the window to watch Katia fade into the distance. We then cut back into the interior of the stone sarcophagus and see that bubbling blood and maggots are swarming in the empty eye sockets of the now-unmasked witch!
The Cursed Cemetery: Satanic Grotto and Dog-Run
Next we see Katia at home, playing the piano as her brother stands by polishing a hunting rifle. Nearby her father sits before a roaring fire. A suddenly howling in the distance frightens them all, and her father realizes that a painting of the Princess Asa has changed to incorporate more evil. It turns out these are direct descendants, naturally, of the burned witch and her partner, whose painting also hangs in the family room. I normally don't question people's decoration decisions, but whaaaaa?!
"My god, Duke, that'll never fit in my... uh, let's try anyway."
The father tells us all a story about how exactly one century to the day after Princess Asa was buried, a descendant of hers that resembled her died horribly. And now, one century after that, Katia (who also resembles her, natch) is in grave danger. This is a cause for concern by all, obviously.
We then cut to a rowdy tavern, where the good doc and his protege are enjoying the local vodka. A young girl is being ordered by her innkeeper mother to go milk the cow (in the dead of night, wtf?). Obviously the girl is reticent so her mother turns to the elder Dr. Kruvajan and asks for his opinion. Turns out the girl is afraid because the barn is next to a cemetery (!). The doctor reassures the girl, saying the line that will no doubt come back to haunt him: "We shouldn't be afraid of the dead."
While the girl is milking the cow, who is obviously cranky at being woken up for a midnight udder-tug, a deep fog rolls into the graveyard. We see the witch issue the command "RISE!" and up comes her masked Satanic partner, who rips off his mask with his graveyard-mud-soaked gloves and heads off into the woods, oddly enough not pausing to kill the milk maid.
"Oh, hi, uh, is this the tryouts for Man in the Iron Mask 2: Get Maskier?"
Instead, he heads straight to the castle and tries to kill the king (at least I assume he's king), but fails when at the last second the king produces a cruciform, driving the ghostly Satan worshiper away with the power of JAYZUS. Knowing that the king is protected, the Satanic minion goes after Dr. Kruvajan instead, rumbling up out of nowhere in a badass black carriage.
This is pretty much the most awesome shot in any movie, ever, that doesn't feature Paul Naschy.
He whisks the doctor away to the castle and leads him through a secret passage behind the fireplace which leads down into the crypt, which is underneath the church ruins nearby. The witch, still manipulating things from within her stone sarcophagus, finally begins to rise as the doctor tries to flee, in vain. The stone shatters, and the witch is free!
She immediately hypnotizes the good doctor, forcing him to walk over and give her a lingering kiss. I'm afraid I wouldn't have needed any hypnosis. Meanwhile, the king is sweaty with fever, writhing in bed. The good Katia and the prince try to care for him, all to no avail. Suddenly, the doctor comes in, walking like a zombie (no doubt still numb from making out with a 200 year old heretic), and asks the youngsters to leave so that he may care for the king. As soon as they are gone, he gives him the stare of death, literally.
Meanwhile, the Satanic assistant collaborates with his newly awakened mistress. The plan, as it were, is to bring the young Katia down to yon crypt so that the witch can suck the life from her. Elsewhere, Dr. Andre is waking up from too much vodka to find the professor is gone. He learns from the innkeeper that the good doc went to the castle to care for the ailing king. Andre sallies forth into the dawn!
As Andre is passing by on horse on his way to the castle, he sees the young milk maid washing clothes in a fetid river. After he goes on his merry way after receiving directions from her, she notices a pox-ridden body floating near the shore. It's Boris, the hapless coach driver! Poor Boris, done in by Satanic forces no doubt!
Andre arrives at the castle, only to run into the zombified Doc, who speaks cryptically until Andre pulls the triptych from his bag, causing the doctor to flee in a panic. Andre and the young brother scour the castle, eventually finding the secret passage behind the fireplace. Going down to investigate, they discover the witch, freed from her tomb, now apparently breathing and regaining life! Andre runs off to find the local priest, leaving the brother alone with the witch.
"Here, let me help you with this top button..."
He's not alone for long, however, when suddenly the Satanic minion arrives and a rousing bout of fisticuffs ensues, culminating in the brother getting tossed into a handy trapdoor pit, complete with spikes at the bottom. Meanwhile, Andre with priest in tow head to the graveyard and find the opened grave, and the Mask of Satan that the minion tossed aside. Choice line from the priest: "Sometimes Satan, in his capacity for evil, plays tricks with the dead!"
"Thank you for the birthday card, but why is it addressed to Father Grizzly Adams?"
In another nearby grave they find the body of the poor doctor Kruvajan and drive a spike into his eye-socket, presumably preventing any further reanimation. The two then race back to the castle as the Satanic minion drags Katia down to the crypt. The witch visibly drains her life, causing the witch's own face to look fantastic while ravaging the face of poor young Katia. Bava uses some killer camera work here, in one frame showing both people played by Steele at the same time. Amazingly groundbreaking stuff.
"Hmm, you know, I could make out with myself..."
Andre arrives just in the nick of time, but the Satanic minion is having no interruptions. Fisticuffs ensue yet again, the two going at it like a couple of prize pugilists. The trapdoor pit once again comes into play, but before the minion can shove Andre into it, a not-so-dead brother comes flying up out of the pit, high enough to grab the minion and pull him down to his doom. The brother then expires in Andre's arms, the poor thing was just tuckered out.
Back in the village, a posse is roused, presumed by me to be heading to Broadway, but no! They instead head to the castle, torches in hand. The witch is once again dragged off toward a hastily-erected pyre. Andre, though, is in mourning. They were too late to save poor Katia, whom he is in lust with. As the flames begin to flicker around the witch, it seems all is not lost yet. Katia breathes!
Just a good ol' fashioned witch burnin' and weenie roast.
In the end, dispatching the witch with the purifying fire of JAYZUS cured everyone's ills. Note to self: Applying a Mask of Satan is not enough; burn any and all witches. Andre and Katia kiss. Fin.
I would try to talk about Bava's opus here but I fear I would run out of superlatives. Suffice it to say that this movie, shot entirely in black & white, is beyond beautiful. It holds up just as well today as it did in 1960, and is simply stunning. Bava uses composition like no other, and his work in this film is still being felt today.
The acting is fantastic as well, and no person does it better than Barbara Steele. Playing two roles, each completely different from the other, she shines like a star. Every single scene she's in the eye just gravitates to her, and Bava's camera obviously loved her. The others as well, especially Andre, carry out their roles with enthusiasm and skill. The crew was definitely firing on all cylinders, that's for sure.
The special effects, also, were superb. From the opening application by mallet of the Mask of Satan to the nail being driven into Dr. Krujavan's eye socket, everything was wrought in disgusting detail, and the camera wouldn't let us flinch away. Bava basically holds your head in a vise-like grip, forcing you with his unyielding, grave-cold hands to watch what he wants you to watch. We love this, oh yes we do.
In the end, how can I give this film anything else than the highest of honors: 3+ Thumbs Up. Any reader of his blog who doesn't have this film in their collection is truly missing a gem.
Friday, December 18, 2009
The Nightmare Never Ends (1980): or, Ridin' on the Night Train
Riding on the Night Train to Terror, Part I!
Early in the history of MMMMMovies, I reviewed a little-known anthology flick Night Train to Terror (1985). That movie, notorious among 80s video trash connoisseurs and Mill Creek Enthusiasts, is a gloriously inept hodge-podge of three full-length movies whittled down to 30-minute chunks and slapped in a frame story that has God and Satan taking a cross-country train ride to review problematic "cases" while a group of would-be new wave punks in the dining car sing one of the most insidiously catchy 80s pop tunes that's ever got stuck in my head. (Seriously.) I assumed at the time that the butchered features, while certainly not the work of master filmmakers, would have to be better films at their full running times, since the stitched-together leftovers were not so much a challenge to the viewer's ability to follow them as a direct assault on the very idea of coherent storytelling.
But now I've seen 1980's The Nightmare Never Ends (aka Cataclysm), the full version of the third boxcar on that infamous night train, and let me tell you parishioners, I was wrong. Or rather I was right, but not in the way I thought. No, not that way at all.
Allow me to elucidate.
"Reed" Richard Moll puzzles over how to expunge this film from his resume.
A movie that had me grinning like a grade-A eedjit all the way through, and turning off the DVD with a song in my heart. That's what.
As we open, Nobel Prize-winning author James Hansen (Richard Moll, easily the most talented thespian in the film--yes, you read that right) and his surgeon wife Claire (Faith Clift) are on their way to Vegas, presumably to escape the nightmares Claire's been having--nightmares that seem to consist entirely of stock footage of underwater volcanic vents. (Hey, everyone's got a phobia.) Escape proves impossible when Claire is singled out by a stage-show clairvoyant who looks like Marty Feldman's younger brother and falls into a trance at the merest suggestion.
"It's pronounced EYE-GOR."
Suddenly we're in the apartment of the aged and extremely disoriented Mr. Weiss (character actor and Hollywood Blacklist victim Marc Lawrence), who gets all palsied and excited when he catches a TV interview (broadcast live from the intermission of the New York Ballet--do they do that?) with prettyboy rich-kid Olivier (Robert Bristol, clearly Sean Cassidy's evil twin), who is the spitting image of the Nazi Officer who killed Weiss's parents at Auschwitz, and not coincidentally the big beautiful baddie from Claire's dream. As it turns out Weiss is not just a confused old man, but a NAZI HUNTER, and he's sure he's found his man, despite the fact that the quarry hasn't aged a day since 1944.
Doddering and incomprehensible, Weiss calls in his neighbor Lieutenant Stern (Mitchell), a loose-cannon cop with a bad attitude. ("I'm only the police in the 5th Precinct--the rest of the world, I don't give a damn!") Still, to calm the old man Stern takes him to the ballet theater before the final curtain, where they see Olivier exit and follow him back to his opulent mansion, The Round House. (Not, unfortunately, The Road House.) Despite many raucous protestations, Stern just can't convince Weiss that the boy in the house is the same Nazi Bastard from Weiss's own childhood. I mean, he can't, can he?
"Hotsy totsy, I'm a Nazi!"
Meanwhile, back in Plot A, we learn that James got his Nobel Prize for his research into THE DEATH OF GOD--seriously--and has just published his prize-winning manuscript for popular consumption. This involves book signings, interviews, and his very own TV special in which he plans to "shatter the myth" of religion. Surprisingly, no one seems too upset by all this, except for one woman at the local Waldenbooks, who calls him a fiend in a whisper before walking out. Everyone else seems to accept his Divine Obituary as the un-Gospel Truth. Everyone except Claire, that is, who we further learn is a devout Catholic.
So Weiss gets out his antique Luger and goes to kill him a Nazi, but is surprised in the house by a demon of some sort jumping out from behind a curtain--it happens kind of fast. Anyway, he's dead now, a new 666 tattoo to go with his concentration camp numbers, and guilt-wracked Mitchell swears to find out who did it and why. Olivier--who is actually THE DEVIL (<--Spoiler), wants to fund Hansen's further "research," since they're fighting on the same side. Meanwhile, Rasputin-like defrocked priest Papini (Maurice Grandmaison) is trying to convince Claire and that the devil wants her soul, and only she can stop him.
When I lay it all out like that, it sounds like a fairly straightforward story, doesn't it? Well friends, that's a testament to my consummate writing skills, because this movie is absolutely NUTS. 
Yes, that's the edge of the sets. IN FRAME.
First of all, the acting. Faith Clift as Claire is called upon to carry at least one third of the movie; I don't know which of the three directors she was sleeping with, but I hope she was good in that arena, as she literally could not be more awful here. Delivering every line as if she were the stagefright-stricken relative of a used car salesman pressed into service for a public access commercial, Clift is an absolute vaccuum of talent. In fact, she's SO bad, she's absolutely hysterical to watch! It's like her performance sucks so hard it turns itself inside out and becomes a glee-inducing work of art. The truly terrible lines she's given to say only paradoxically help matters.
Also turning in a performance that's so horrendous it's awesome is Cameron Mitchell, no stranger to such a phenomenon. His line readings are so haphazard and pause-strewn, I'm nearly convinced that Mitchell improvised them all, with a gut full of cheap bourbon and only the most rudimentary idea of what the scene was supposed to accomplish.
Richard Moll gives the best performance in the movie, faint praise indeed. He really gets into his blasphemous TV special monologue especially, delivering arguments against the existence of God that sound like they came from a gaming messageboard OT thread as if they were the most profound, earth-shattering revelations ever. Added joy comes from the fact that Moll and everyone else in the cast seem to be purposefully drawing out every line, speaking in a slow-motion cadence that is as perplexing as it is entertaining. You'd think it would get old, but for me it never did.
Cameron Mitchell searches in vain for his dignity.
It would take me hours to catalog all the incidental crazee in the plot, so instead I've decided to present some of my favorites in bullet-list form:
Cam: "To you, I'm a cockroach."
Olivier: "Worse. A PIECE. OF. CRAP."
Cam: "Be careful Mr. Olivier--don't step on me, or you'll never get rid of the smell!"
Belial Got Back
Or don't. I know full well this kind of thing is not for everyone, but for me, it was a brainfuckling trip through Wackyland, and that's a trip I'm always up for taking. Bad on almost every level, it was just what I needed to get me through a boring, uneventful evening. Much as I want to give it three thumbs, I'll split the difference between my experience and that of normal people and peg it at 2 thumbs. Not for every taste, but if it sounds like yours, it should leave you licking your lips.
A few more images from The Nightmare Never Ends:
The Devil Meets the Hardy Boys
Slaughtering the Bull
Surgical Kill-Face
"What a country!"
Hood Ornament
Devilectomy
"Oh, Vicar!"
Poetry Friday: Ave Maria by Frank O'Hara
Found this poem, and it seemed appropriate to the site. Take heed, my parishioners, and enjoy.
Ave Maria
Mothers of America
let your kids go to the movies
get them out of the house so they won't
know what you're up to
it's true that fresh air is good for the body
but what about the soul
that grows in darkness, embossed by
silvery images
and when you grow old as grow old you
must
they won't hate you
they won't criticize you they won't know
they'll be in some glamorous
country
they first saw on a Saturday afternoon or
playing hookey
they may even be grateful to you
for their first sexual experience
which only cost you a quarter
and didn't upset the peaceful
home
they will know where candy bars come
from
and gratuitous bags of popcorn
as gratuitous as leaving the movie before
it's over
with a pleasant stranger whose apartment
is in the Heaven on
Earth Bldg
near the Williamsburg Bridge
oh mothers you will have made
the little
tykes
so happy because if nobody does pick
them up in the movies
they won't know the difference
and if somebody does it'll be
sheer gravy
and they'll have been truly entertained
either way
instead of hanging around the yard
or up in their room hating you
prematurely since you won't have done
anything horribly mean
yet
except keeping them from life's darker joys
it's unforgivable the latter
so don't blame me if you won't take this
advice
and the family breaks up
and your children grow old and blind in
front of a TV set
seeing
movies you wouldn't let them see when
they were young
--Frank O'Hara
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
All the Kind Strangers (1974): or, Ignore Your Better Nature
Horror movies have a lot to teach us. Not just folklore, myths, and legends, but practical stuff, things you can apply to your everyday life. For instance, they teach us you should never be part of a group of people who plan an elaborate prank to embarrass the weirdo in your town/class/camp, since such plans always tragically backfire and lead to your clique's bloody deaths. They teach us that when you're getting threatening calls from a mouth-breathing psycho, they're always coming from INSIDE THE HOUSE. They teach us that whenever you hear a strange noise at night or see a meteor crash nearby, it's NEVER a good idea to go investigate.
But perhaps the biggest, most overwhelming lesson that modern horror movies have to teach us, the one that they come back to again and again as if they can't emphasize the point enough, is this: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished. Or, as I like to phrase it, "Being nice to other people is for suckers."
That's definitely the take-away lesson from Burt Kennedy's 1974 made-for-TV movie All the Kind Strangers. That, and never make a DVD cover without watching the movie first.
Photojournalist Jimmy Wheeler (the inimitable and un-mustachioed Stacy Keach) is on a cross-country road trip from New York to California, looking for new subjects on which to turn his lens. On a country road five miles from the nearest town he espies a tow-headed waif slogging along the side of the road, toting a bag of groceries almost as big as he is. Loosing the compassion and kindness in his big, beefy heart, Wheeler pulls over and offers the kid a ride to his backwoods home.
"Come on kid, work it! Give it to me!"
The kid's name is Gilbert, and he's happy to accept the ride, pointing the Keachmobile down a bumpy dirt road into the deep dark heart of hillbilly darkness. Wheeler is more worried about the possible damage to his brand-new, SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLAR car occassioned by passing through a shallow creek than he is about the kid's vague, elusive answers to pleasantries about his parents, a materialism and lack of curiosity he'll soon come to regret.
They roll up to the family farmhouse just as a thunderstorm is rolling in, and in gratitude for the ride Gilbert invites Wheeler to stay to supper. Keach declines, ready to get back out on that open road, but the kid is insistent that he come in and meet the family. Said family consists of six other children ranging in age from 5 to 18, the most notable being 15-year-old sharpshooter John (teen heartthrob Robby Benson, who seems to equate "hick accent" with "tardspeech"), 16-year-old Martha (Arlene Farber) , who is mute, pubescent, and horny, and oldest brother Peter (John Savage of The Deer Hunter and Godfather Part III fame), an intense, glowering teen who rules the rest of the family with an iron fist.
"We ARE saying 'cheese'."
"Help...I'm out of buttermilk!"
Director Kennedy does a good job of generating a lot of ominous suspense in the early going here, aided by excellent performances from Keach and Savage. Every word from young Peter's mouth is tinged with barely concealed menace, and as the difficulties of his situation become more and more apparent, Keach vaccilates between fear and outrage, using his Mean Daddy voice to intimidate the kids as much as he can while trying to figure a way out of this mess. Also worth noting is the evocative score by Ronald Frangipane, which effectively juxtaposes country-fried folk tunes with dissonant, Kronos Quartet-style stings to create an oppressive, dangerous-feeling atmosphere. Some nice directorial flourishes (such as hand-held pov shots during Keach's escape attempt) and creepy, shadowy lighting in the old house at night also help matters.
Also interesting, though not developed as much as I personally would have liked, is the tension between Peter and his oldest siblings, John and Martha. The mute sister is clearly in the throes of silent teenage passion, and imprints on Keach as more than a daddy figure, IYKWIM. Her longing gazes over dinner and clear jealousy of Keach's bonding with Eggar are well drawn, and Arlene Farber is to be lauded for creating such a complete, complex character with only facial expressions and body language. And while Benson's performance is a bit clunky and Gomer Pyle-ish for my tastes, his idolization of his older brother and desire to become the man of the house as well ring true.
"Mind if I call you Sugar, Daddy?"
Still, there are a few cool scenes scattered here and there--for instance when Martha sneaks one of Gilbert's pet rattlesnakes into Carol Ann's room in hopes of removing her as sexual competition. Also suitably tense is a 12 Angry Men-style "vote" the children hold to decide whether to keep their new parents or get rid of them and go hunting for newer ones.
Stacy Keach is great here, as he often was--he plays Wheeler as a basically selfish person who's clearly congratulating himself on doing such a nice thing for a kid, only to get angry and confrontational when his kindness is rewarded with kidnapping and imprisonment. The real force in the flick though is Savage, whose steely expression and quietly menacing line deliveries make him a believably deadly villain. Eggar doesn't really bring much to her role here, though, and Robby Benson's "aw shucks" performance is mostly embarrassing (though not as embarrassing as his plaintive vocals on the movie's folksy theme song, which plays over a montage of Peter stalking angrily through the cornfield). The dogs, however, deliver a knockout performance. Them's some scary mutts.
"Not tonight, John-boy. I got a headache."
And remember folks--let that little fucker walk home. It's good for him, and better for you.
"No, I don't have a moustache in this flick. Why on earth would I want to grow a moustache?"
Monday, December 14, 2009
The House on Skull Mountain (1974): or, Voodoo House Party
Rich old woman Pauline Christophe (Mary J. Todd McKenzie) seems to have everything a woman could want: a palatial estate, devoted and attentive servants, and the respect of her community engendered by her fabulous wealth and rumored occult powers. However, like many landed aristocracy, as she nears the appointed hour of her death she begins to think about the important things that are missing from her life--namely, family. Therefore, from her deathbed, she sends out four letters to her remaining living relatives, summoning them to her mansion for a chance at reconnection and an opportunity to pass the torch, and presumably all her glorious riches. However, before her grandchildren--none of whom has ever met any of the others--arrive on a stormswept summer afternoon, Pauline kicks the old bucket, clutching a voodoo doll in her gnarled, wrinkled fist. Of course almost immediately Strange Things start happening around the Cristophe estate.
Stop me if you've heard this one.
It may not tread any new ground, but here's a movie that hits its marks with competence and enthusiasm if not overwhelming skill. Featuring some well-done voodoo sequences, a couple of strong performances, and enough nonsensical supernatural happenings to keep you from getting bored, 1974's The House on Skull Mountain does manage to divert and entertain for its hour-and-twenty-minute running time. And really, what more could you ask for from a voodoo epic starring Carter Country's Victor French?
The first of the family to arrive at Christophe Manor is Lorena Christophe (the elegant and lovely Janee Michelle)--or rather, she would have been the first to arrive, had her loud-mouthed, jive-talkin', fast-drivin' cousin Phillipe Willette (Mike Evans, better known as the straitlaced spawn of George and Weezy Jefferson) not nearly run her off the treacherous mountain road in his pimped-out land yacht. Understandably shaken by her brush with automotive cataclysm, Lorena pulls over to the shoulder of the road...
...gets out of the car, takes a few deep breaths...
...and then looks out through the clear, sunlit summer afternoon sky to get a look at her destination, which looks...well, a little like THIS:
He-Man's Summer House
Welcome, Matte
Say what you will about this movie, but when it promises a house on Skull Mountain, it FUCKING DELIVERS.
Lorena gets to the house in time to attend the last half of Grandma Christophe's funeral, attended only by the old lady's servants Louette (Ella Woods) and Thomas (Jean Durand). Here we get a little voodoo lore for no extra charge, as the servants have scattered shards of broken mirror on the grave "to keep the evil spirits away." It doesn't seem to work, though, as Louette sees a crow drop a chicken-foot totem on the coffin, which bursts into flames! I don't know from voodoo omens, but it's clearly meant to be a not-so-good one here.
Inside, Lorena spars with Phillippe over his near-vehicular homicide, though her righteous indignation does not prevent him from putting the moves on his much classier cousin. Nor his OTHER much classier cousin, Harriet (Xernona Clayton, who arrives safely despite having a vision of Hooded Death on her plane trip), nor serving girl Louette--here's a brother who believes in keeping all options open. One Christophe is still missing, and stately Mr. Leroux (Senator Leroy Johnson, the first African American to be elected to the Georgia General Assembly since the end of the Reconstruction era--thanks imdb!) insists they wait for him to arrive before reading the will.
"Whattaya think? Too much, right?"
Photographic proof of the existence of the Lightning Worm
Man, I just love that.
After some racial tension between Phillippe and Andrew (that neither of the much more sophisticated female cousins take part in), they all turn in for the night, and of course that's when the voodoo vengeance starts in earnest. Drunken Phillippe is lured to his death in a vacant elevator shaft, and Andrew finds a chicken-foot totem beside his corpse. The next day Lenora and Andrew go out on the town (Atlanta, I think, though I don't know of any famous skull-like rock formations in that general area) for a falling-in-love montage and an appropriately heartfelt love song. Back at the house, Harriet sees more visions and finally falls prey to a venomous snake in the old lady's rocking chair. Another chicken-foot calling card is found at the scene.
Don't go thinking this is some kind of pre-Clue whodunnit, however--we the audience know from early on that the bad mojo in the Christophe House is being delivered courtesy butler Thomas, a voodoo priest of great power who was (I think) enslaved by the more-powerful Pauline Christophe while she was alive. Now seeking vengeance on her heirs (not to mention an undivided chunk of the estate), Thomas is bumping them all off with his evil black magic. Can Dr. Cunningham's university training stand between Thomas and his evil goals?
"Don't worry, Sheriff--I'll handle-it handle-it."
With at least two relatively famous TV personalities in the cast and a cinematic style that would be right at home in a two-camera sit-com of the era, The House on Skull Mountain feels like it'd be right at home as a Very Special Episode of The Jeffersons or Good Times. (You know, like the evil-Tiki Hawaiian episode of The Brady Bunch, only a lot funkier.)
Still, there are a few things that lift it from the "meh" to the "actually pretty okay." Despite a largely static camera, one-time director Honthaner does give us a couple of nice transitions based on skull imagery, including a rather effective overlay of a death's head on a living (?) character's face near the end. And late in the proceedings there's a voodoo ceremony/human sacrifice that is actually well filmed and choreographed, a few suggestive snake scenes (sometimes a bulging python is just a bulging python, but not here), and a double-astral projection for no reason that nonetheless made me smile.
It's symbolic, of course
Benson: The Untold Story
"WHAAAAT?"
"Okay, son...show me how funky and strong is your fight."
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