cult film freak: April 2017

Written by James M. Tate / 4/30/2017 / No comments / crime , elke sommer , glenn ford , jazz score , neo noir , ricardo montalban , rita hayworth , sixties , tom reese , warner archives

GLENN FORD AND ELKE SOMMER POST-NOIR 'THE MONEY TRAP'

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Elke Sommer and Glenn Ford make an unlikely pair YEAR: 1965</u></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Seven years after what TAXI DRIVER writer and HARDCORE director Paul Schrader called the last Film Noir, Orson Welles's 1958 masterpiece TOUCH OF EVIL, the plot-line of cash-allured good guys, in this case low-rent cops... one who happens to live with a beautiful young lady with a yearly inheritance... was still used in b-movies...</span></span><br>
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And it takes former a-list actor Glenn Ford to make what could be an average, by-the-numbers programmer an intriguing glimpse into a planned heist of a crooked doctor's mansion wall-safe: a man who, in Ford's opinion, murdered a thief that broke in and... Well that's all part of the ingredients that makes THE MONEY TRAP a nice little page-turner with a touch of mystery, despite knowing whodunit from the get-go...
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crime, elke sommer, glenn ford, jazz score, neo noir, ricardo montalban, rita hayworth, sixties, tom reese, warner archives

GLENN FORD AND ELKE SOMMER POST-NOIR 'THE MONEY TRAP'

Elke Sommer and Glenn Ford make an unlikely pair YEAR: 1965 Seven years after what TAXI DRIVER writer and HARDCORE director Paul Schrade...

FOURTH CHRISTIE MYSTERY: EVIL UNDER THE SUN

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Part of the Opening Credit Paintings YEAR: 1982</u></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We'll take on the Agatha Christie cinematic four-pack in reverse, which began in 1974 and ended in 1982 (at least on the big screen), and the films are MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, DEATH ON THE NILE, THE MIRROR CRACK'D and starting out with the last and, going back in time when, as a kid of around twelve or thirteen, standing outside a the local double feature theater, seeing the poster for EVIL UNDER THE SUN was an eye-opener. Half-remembering an image of a (not knowing actor names) stout man standing partially in the water with a wine glass in his hand. It was sunny and tropical and this was the first time witnessing an unlikely leading man compared to an Eastwood or Stallone and, well, years have past and while a forty-something's memory often ends up serving nothing but time, and that poster cannot be found online and perhaps never existed, Agatha Christie's French (Belgium, actually) sleuth is a personal favorite, with a spark of the accidental clumsiness of Peter Falk's COLUMBO and always around when a murder takes place...</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Diana Rigg's character probably fearing Emily Hone will soon surpass her</u></td></tr>
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EVIL UNDER THE SUN is the third case with Hercule Poirot, and by far the best, second to Peter Ustinov's first time in the more adventurous and less contained DEATH ON THE NILE... and he was a replacement that really worked...<br />
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While Albert Finney is one of the all-time great actors, in MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS he seems to be doing an imitation of an imitation with a performance hindered by a cake of makeup and a phony (looking, anyway) mustache. Peter Ustinov is the best theatrical Perot because he doesn't seem to be acting at all. His quirkiness fits like a glove, and he's intense and affably endearing: Set in an island paradise, EVIL is a sort of Busman's Holiday for the Frenchman, and the actors surrounding are a perfectly odd lot including Maggie Smith, Roddy McDowell, Sylvia Miles, slowburn and meticulous teenage newcomer Emily Hone and the legendary James Mason. Like in NILE, there's a good looking younger couple, and the man, played by Nicholas Clay, is not only prettier than his girlfriend, but Diana Rigg, as the pivotal Arlena — a stage actress who may or may not agree to star in a production, is... well... it's very tricky writing a review of a Mystery film since just about anything can be a spoiler...<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>A patriotic cannon blasts daily at high noon SCORE: ****</u></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What sets EVIL UNDER THE SUN apart from its two predecessors is the tight, lean script wherein the characters are never stagy thanks to the gorgeous backdrop that's anything but in the background — to use a cliche term when describing geography, the surrounding is "like a character in itself," especially shots from the hotel down into the sunlit grounds leading out into the blue-green ocean. Other visual highlights include a patriotic cannon firing a loud shot at 12 noon daily, not only bringing together the eclectic band of possible suspects, each with an ironclad alibi, but it allows the unlikeliest of heroes a platform to splendidly <i>happen-upon </i>everything that "James Bond director" Guy Hamilton places within eyeshot and earshot for both Poirot and his audience. Making a second viewing not only recommended, but completely necessary.</span>

eighties, franchise, james mason, maggie smith, mystery, peter ustinov, sequel

FOURTH CHRISTIE MYSTERY: EVIL UNDER THE SUN

Part of the Opening Credit Paintings YEAR: 1982 We'll take on the Agatha Christie cinematic four-pack in reverse, which began in 197...

Written by James M. Tate / 4/21/2017 / No comments / creature , godzilla , island , king kong , monster , science-fiction , sixties

TOHO KONG TWO OF TWO: KING KONG ESCAPES & KONG CARTOON

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>King Kong battles Dr. Who's MetalliKong YEAR: 1967</u></td></tr>
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KING KONG ESCAPES is an exciting title but not entirely befitting the story at hand...<br>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>TRex on the Cartoon</u></td></tr>
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A live action progression of the Rankin & Bass cartoon, THE KING KONG SHOW, one of the first Japanese anime productions (that also included a miniature, inch-high secret service agent named TOM OF T.H.U.M.B). The KONG toon centered on a stalwart scientist, his moping teen daughter and a little boy who hangs with Kong like the mouse in the Grape Ape cartoon. When the cartoon was cancelled, ESCAPES, produced by Rankin and Bass, was possibly intended to continue under the Toho Films canvas: the geniuses that created and perpetuated Godzilla and a host of other classic monstrosities where Kong, despite being on Skull Island, or what's called Mondo Island, is a groundbreaking American representation in the creature-feature foray since, as everyone knows, he's based on a classic American film. When going up against Godzilla, he might as well be Uncle Sam.<br>

creature, godzilla, island, king kong, monster, science-fiction, sixties

TOHO KONG TWO OF TWO: KING KONG ESCAPES & KONG CARTOON

King Kong battles Dr. Who's MetalliKong YEAR: 1967 KING KONG ESCAPES is an exciting title but not entirely befitting the story at ha...

TOHO FILMS KONG ONE OF TWO: KING KONG VS GODZILLA

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u> Especially unique is the artwork at the bottomYEAR: 1962</u></td></tr>
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It was the 1960's, and Bob Dylan was right, "Everybody must get stoned..." King Kong on some kind of treasured berry juice, which sure beats those gas bombs director Carl Denham lobbed in the original 1933 classic....<br>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Insert Artwork</u></td></tr>
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And Skull Island, referred to as Kong Island, has a different kind of native: grooving to the same juicy drug, and after the giant ape saves their tribe by battling a slick and oozy octopus (which is paid homage to in the current KONG film), what was a somewhat dull forty minutes leads to a somewhat intriguing plot at hand... finally...<br>
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Kong's brought to Tokyo, and, possibly depending on which version, a group of American newscasters provide universal exposition for The English audience...<br>
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With the exception of an extremely quick shot of Godzilla screeching through a broken iceberg, he doesn't have much time on his own: it's all about the face-off/smackdown between monstrosities, or in this case, the anticipation of what the title gives away: KING KONG VS GODZILLA.<br>

action, adventure, creature, godzilla, king kong, monster, sixties