Monthly Archives: July 2023

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: The Bermuda Depths (1978)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The Bermuda Depths was on the CBS Late Movie on October 7, 1983, May 30, 1984 and April 18 and July 11, 1985.

When Rankin/Bass and Tsuburaya Productions, two powerhouses in the film industry, join forces, they create something truly unique. Their collaborations are always a bit off the beaten path, but none are quite as intriguing as this one. This film, with its ghost girl, childhood trauma, and the iconic kaiju turtle, is a testament to their innovative spirit.

It was written by William Overgard, who created the comic strips Steve Roper and Mike Nomad and Rudy and wrote scripts for several collaborative films like The Last Dinosaur, The Ivory Ape and The Bushido Blade. He also wrote episodes of ThunderCats and Silver Hawks. He also worked with Arthur Rankin Jr.* on this story.

Directed by Tsugunobu “Tom” Kotani, the mastermind behind all these bizarre American/Japanese films, this one takes the cake in terms of its outlandishness. When I say weird, I mean it’s the kind of film that will leave you scratching your head, but in the best possible way.

Magnus Dens (Leigh McCloskey, who was in Inferno and now paints art based on occult, alchemical and esoteric themes) is asleep on an island when he is woken up by Jennie (Connie Sellecca) who claims to know him. He’s been dreaming of his childhood and she may be the girl he remembers from it, the love of his life who watched a turtle hatch on the beach with him and craved J+M into its shell before she rode that giant turtle into the sea and disappeared forever. This happened on the very same night that a monster emerged from the cave beneath his house and killed his father!

Our hero also has a job working alongside another childhood friend, Eric (Carl Weathers), for marine biologist Dr. Paulis (Burl Ives!). Paulis informs him that Jennie doesn’t exist and is the name of a legend in which a beautiful but vain woman was saved from a storm by a mysterious god and given eternal life at the cost of never again being able to live on land.

With a harpoon-shooting bazooka known as Horror, women with glowing green eyes, the mid-movie appearance of a giant turtle wiping out most of the cast, and a total downer ending, this movie was made for me. The ending alone is enough to make you wonder how it all wraps up. I can’t even imagine what people thought of it when it ran on ABC on January 27, 1978.

*Rankin loved Bermuda so much that he moved there after making this.

You can download this from the Internet Archive.

TUBI ORIGINAL: The Lurking Fear (2023)

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First, outside of some names, this is not the H.P. Lovecraft novel or the Full Moon movie The Lurking Fear*. Instead, it’s the tale of a small town that has lured in a reality show to see the Martense, a therapy hospital that was ground zero for a tortured-filled existence for the mentally ill and criminally insane.

As the crew films Andrew Seville (Robert Davi), he reveals the past of the Martense, which was built by Dr. Oliver Martense, who had heterochromia iridium, which gave him two different colored eyes. He believed that bodily fluids and their magnetic properties could be used to heal people from their mental illnesses. Some would have called the way he treated his patients barbaric, however.

Now, as the crew enters the closed-down asylum, they’re about to deal not only with how frightening the place is but the fact that it may contain actual demons.

As the reality crew and their Hollywood big-shot director sit outside, Officer Hansen (Michael Madsen) comes to kick them out. However, they have permission to be there from his boss, Sheriff Nassar (Christopher Mormando), who arrives there with Officer Quade (Gianni Capaldi). The crew — which includes Mike (Jonathan Camp), Marlene (Laticia Rolle), Molly (Skye Stracke) and Mike’s fiancee Crystal (Elisabetta Fantone) — gets trapped inside the asylum with Seville, who may not be the most trustworthy person.

Directed and written by Darren Dalton (who was in Red Dawn and The Outsiders before becoming a director; he’s also written The Day That Time Forgot and The Day the Earth Stopped) and Robert Killings (who wrote the movie American Fright Fest and appears in this movie as David), The Lurking Fear sets up a lot of suspense as to what’s happening that gets revealed by its closed captioning, as it says “monster makes noises” which let me know that hey — there are monsters and people haven’t lost their minds.

Some of those monsters are all little kids with different colored eyes, so that means that Dr. Oliver Martense was sleeping with his patients and has created an entire family inside this place that has lived since the patients went insane and ate everyone. Seville is also behind all of it, orchestrating the deaths of the crew. Davi is having the time of his life making this movie, devouring the scenery and asking for seconds.

And then Madsen takes over for him because they were brothers! What!?! This also ends with Crystal watching babies be born and their umbilical cords get bitten as everything gets so dark that we don’t know if we’re watching the strange mutant kids eating afterbirth or the baby. Or the mother? Man, this went all art movie at the end and super slow motion, which doesn’t match the rest of the film, but hey, Madsen isn’t even listed on the movie’s IMDB, so who can say with this thing? It feels like it has something to say about money, small towns, and Hollywood, but it eventually ends. That’s a bold choice.

*The Lovecraft story also inspired Bleeders.

You can watch this on Tubi.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Killdozer (1974)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Killdozer was on the CBS Late Movie on January 13, 1976; March 17, 1977 and January 19, 1978.

Originally airing on February 2, 1974, on ABC, this Theodore Spurgeon adaptation presents a unique premise that answers the question we’ve all been asking: “Who would win in a fight to the death—a man or a bulldozer?” Sure, a mysterious meteorite is behind it all, but this one is all about machine-on-man violence.

 

This one boasts a stellar cast including Clint Walker (The Phynx, as well as TV movies like Snowbeast and Scream of the Wolf), James Wainwright (TV’s Beyond Westworld), Carl Betz (Donna Reed’s TV husband), Neville Brand (Eyes of the Night and Without Warning), James A. Watson Jr. and Vega$ star Robert Urich. They all face off against an alien aura-possessed Caterpillar D9 bulldozer that takes them out individually.

The story and movie were so popular that Marvel Comics published an adaptation in Worlds Unknown #6, which was released the same year as the film.

Thanks to Conan O’Brien, this film has become a punchline and the name of a somewhat famous band. But beyond these pop culture references, Killdozer is a product of its time—a 1970s TV movie on a low budget—that has managed to entertain and intrigue audiences, earning it a place in the pantheon of cult classics.

UPDATE: This cult classic is now available on Blu-ray and DVD from Kino Lorber, offering a new generation of viewers the chance to experience it in high definition.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Murder On the Moon (1989)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Murder On the Moon was on the CBS Late Movie on June 29, 1990.

Directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg and written by Carla Jean Wagner, this is also known as Murder By Moonlight.

After nearly launching a nuclear war, America and Russia decided to work together to colonize the moon. But when several NASA astronauts are found dead, Dennis Huff (Gerald McRaney!) sends Lieutenant Maggie Bartok (Brigitte Nielsen) while Russian drafts Major Sorokin Kirilenko (Julian Sands) to figure out who the killer is.

Can these mismatched space detectives solve the case, compare haircuts and fall in love?

Michael Lindsay-Hogg had a wild career and life. His wife hinted when he was old enough to understand that his father may have been Orson Welles. A DNA test was inconclusive, but Gloria Vanderbilt confirmed the fact for him. He was a director on the British music show Ready Steady Go!, which led to him making clips that later would be known as music videos for the Beatles (“Paperback Writer,” “Hey Jude,” “Revolution,” and “Rain”) and the Rolling Stones (“2000 Light Years from Home,” “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and “Child of the Moon). He also directed The Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus and The Beatles’ Get Back, where the Apple rooftop performance comes from and the footage Peter Jackson used for his documentary.

In the 70s, he had great success with Brideshead Revisited and Nasty Habits. In the 80s, he made Simon and Garfunkel’s The Concert in Central Park, Neil Young’s Neil Young in Berlin and Graceland: The African Concert with Paul Simon. And as the 90s came, he made TV movies like Ivana Trump’s For Love Alone.

This has an interesting cast, including Brian Cox, David Yip (Wu Han from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) and Ricco Ross (Private Frost from Aliens). There’s also a completely out-of-left-field trans element that is just as wild in 2023 as it had to be back in 1989.

Sources

Michael Lindsay-Hogg – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Lindsay-Hogg

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Kolchak: The Night Stalker: Primal Scream (1975)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: This episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker was on the CBS Late Movie on September 28, 1979, November 13, 1987 and March 25, 1988.

Experimental biologist Jules Copenik is killed by something so savage that it rips his arm out of the socket. As he worked for the Oceanic International Oil Corporation, that’s big news and draws in Carl Kolchak. This time, he’s fighting with authority again — Captain Maurice Molnar (John Marley) — but that doesn’t stop Carl from meeting PR hack Thomas J. Kitzmiller (Pat Harrington Jr.) and learning more about the research that Copenik was involved with.

Copenik and his co-worker, Doctor Helen Lynch (Katherine Woodville), have been studying Arctic samples that have trapped and preserved single-cell life forms. Carl asks to speak to her, but he is told she was in a car accident and couldn’t speak to anyone.

A photographer named Ron Gurney (Craig R. Baxley) is killed by an ape-like creature currently kept captive. Carl learns the news from his enemy, Ron Updyke (Jack Grinnage) and wonders if he’s part of the conspiracy that permanently destroys his stories. Then the monster escapes, and Carl gets a photo, just in time for Molnar to smash his camera. The ape-man also murders Jeannie Bell from The Muthers and TNT Jackson!

Carl turns to a high school biology teacher, Jack Burton (Jamie Farr), who claims he’s never seen a print like the one Kolchak has of the creature. That means Carl will have to find the beast deep below what was once Chicago Stadium.

One of the victims, William Pratt, is named after Boris Karloff. It’s Karloff’s real name. One wonders, between the DNA being brought back from the Arctic and a character named Jack Burton, if John Carpenter saw this episode.

Director Robert Scheerer also made Ants! while writer David Chase would go on to create the Sopranos, and Bill S. Ballinger wrote the “Firefall” episode of Kolchak and “The Ghost of Potter’s Field” for Ghost Story.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: The Power (1968)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The Power was on the CBS Late Movie on April 7, August 1, 1972 and February 4, 1976.

The last film by director Byron Haskin*, who also made War of the Worlds with this film’s producer George Pal, The Power was written by John Gay and based on the book of the same name by Frank M. Robinson. Robinson was also the speechwriter for Harvey Milk and his designated successor, but he didn’t take office after the politician was killed. Another of his books — The Glass Inferno, co-written with Thomas N. Scortia — was combined with Richard Martin Stern’s The Tower and filmed as The Towering Inferno.

The Committee on Human Endurance has been researching the ability to survive pain and physical stress for the space program. Dr. Henry Hallson (Arthur O’Connell) has been screening committee members—biologist Dr. Jim Tanner (George Hamilton), geneticist Dr. Margery Lansing (Suzanne Pleshette), physicist Dr. Carl Melnicker (Nehemiah Persoff), biologist Dr. Talbot Scott (Earl Holliman), Dr. Norman Van Zandt (Richard Carlson) and government liaison Arthur Nordlund (Michael Rennie)—to see who has the best survival ability.

He brings out a psi wheel and claims that someone on the committee has superhuman telekinesis, but the exercise doesn’t prove who it is. He’s soon killed by whoever has the power, and his widow Sally Hallson (Yvonne De Carlo) tells Tanner that a note was left with the name Adam Hart. That was the name of her husband’s childhood friend, whom no one else would know but him.

Tanner becomes the prime suspect when it looks like he lied about his background. He starts to hallucinate and then nearly dies as a result of a psychic attack. Whoever Adam Hart is, he wants him dead. He goes to the man’s hometown and learns that Hart has controlled people there for decades.

This had already been adapted in 1956 as an episode of an hour-long installment of Studio One.

*According to Haskin, the studio was so anxious to be finished with Pal that they ruined this film, casting it with the wrong actors, keeping the budget low and skipping out on many special effects.

You can watch this on Tubi.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Red Flag: The Ultimate Game (1981)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Red Flag: The Ultimate Game was on the CBS Late Movie on November 2, 1984.

Major Phil Clark (William Devane) and Major Jay Rivers (Barry Bostwick) share a unique bond. Having flown together in Vietnam, they were later assigned to the elite Red Flag Air Force Fighter Weapons School at Nellis AFB, Nevada. Clark, with his loud and self-confident demeanor, is a stark contrast to the quiet Rivers. Their friendship, however, is strong. But when Rivers begins to outshine his mentor, Clark, the dynamics of their relationship are put to the test. Can they maintain their friendship?

Chuck Yeager was the advisor on this, and you get some great F-4 Phantoms in flight. However, a substantial part of the film delves into the on-the-ground relationship drama between Rivers and his wife Marie, played by Joan Van Ark. This aspect of the film adds emotional depth and character development, making it more than just a military action movie.

The IMDB trivia page for this and the goofs are filled with deep military knowledge, so if you want to know what medals Devane has or why some parts are wrong, well, some servicemen are happy to help.

Red Flag: The Ultimate Game was directed by Don Taylor, a seasoned filmmaker known for his work on Stalag 17, Ride the Wild Surf, Escape from the Planet of the Apes, The Final Countdown, The Island of Dr. Moreau and Damian: Omen II. The script was written by T.S. Cook, who also penned the screenplay for the acclaimed film The China Syndrome. With such a talented creative team, you can expect a compelling and well-crafted film.

You can watch this on YouTube.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Kolchak: The Night Stalker: Mr. R.I.N.G. (1975)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: This episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker aired on the CBS Late Movie on July 13, 1979; July 31, 1981 and January 29, 1988.

“I don’t know when exactly I was in this office last. In some ways it seems like I never left. But, no, that’s not right. For at least a few days I was away, far away, in the hands of men with no faces and no names. They broke me down, broke my story down, telling me how it hadn’t happened the way I claimed. At least that’s what I think they did between injections. Memories fade fast enough without chemical help. But if I don’t tell this story now, I don’t think I ever will. Now… what was that date?”

That’s the words of Kolchak that start this episode, one that’s perhaps the closest to the show inspired by Kolchak: The Night Stalker, The X-Files.

Mr. R.I.N.G. (Craig R. Baxley) is a robot that we see kill one of his creators, leaving behind his widow (Julie Adams). The other person who made him, Dr. Leslie Dwyer (Corinne Camacho), has survived. She tells Carl that Mr. R.I.N.G. wants to be human — indeed, he makes his own face out of mortician’s wax — and yet he can’t stop wiping out human life, throwing around stuntmen as only a monster of the week on Kolchak can.

R.I.N.G. stands for Robomatic Internalized Nerve Ganglia, and the automaton doesn’t want to kill unless threatened. That said, it’s been threatened several times, and even when it wants to give up peacefully, that doesn’t happen. Man is more warlike than the machine it created to wage battles. The problem is that Dr. Dwyer has Mr. R.I.N.G.’s human characteristics and feelings, but studying the readings of St. Thomas Aquinas and Aristotle’s Ethics and finding out you’re a weapon can mess up any robot.

Do you know who made Mr. R.I.N.G.? The Tyrell Institute. One imagines that somewhere, Philip K. Dick is laughing. Well, halfway, as his book Do Androids Dream of Electronic Sheep? doesn’t mention Tyrell, but the movie made from the book, Blade Runner, does.

This episode was directed by Gene Levitt, the creator of Fantasy Island and the director of The Phantom of Hollywood. It was written by L. Ford Neale and John Huff, who also wrote The Hunter’s Moon together.

Night Gallery Season 3 Episode 7: You Can Come Up Now, Mrs. Millikan/Smile, Please (1972)

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Well, here’s a Night Gallery in season 3 with two stories, which can only mean that one of them is from Jack Laird and, you know…

That said, “You Can Come Up Now, Mrs. Millikan” has some excellent stunt casting.

Henry Millikan (Ozzie Nelson) is an inventor who always has his creations explode right in his face. That happened again before his biggest competition, Dr. Burgess (Michael Lerner). Then, his wife Helena (Harriet Nelson, the wife of Ozzie and, of course, the co-star of Ozzie and Harriet) agrees to help him with his latest invention. She took some poison, and once she dies, he’s going to bring her back to life. As always, the invention doesn’t work, so Henry takes his own life. But the truth is, it did work. And, like always, Helena is running a little late.

Directed by John Badham and written by Rod Serling, based on “The Secret of the Vault” by J. Wesley Rosenquest, this is a playful Night Gallery that doesn’t feel like it came from Serling, but you can remain surprised.

“Smile, Please” is directed and written by Jack Laird. Cesare Danova and Lindsay Wagner excitedly hurry down a staircase, with her excited to be the first person to take a photo of a vampire. If you didn’t guess that the man is a vampire, you don’t know Jack Laird’s work on Night Gallery. The less said, the better.

CBS LATE MOVIE MONTH: Baron Blood (1972)

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Baron Blood was on the CBS Late Movie on June 23, 1976.

There’s an urban legend called The Well to Hell, which claims that you can hear Hell through a hole in the earth, and there have even been audio recordings posted as proof. Those recordings have been revealed to be the soundtrack to this film. That should tell you what you’re getting into.

Peter Kleist arrives from America to take a break and study his family’s history. His uncle Karl allows him to stay at his large mansion and refuses to discuss their ancestor, Baron Otto Bon Kleist, better known as Baron Blood for the torture and murder he inflicted on the village. His foremost crime was burning a witch named Elizabeth Holly at the stake as she cursed him to rise from the dead again and again, knowing no rest, so that she could take her revenge on him over and over again. The Baron’s castle is being remodeled for tourists, so Peter asks his uncle to take him there.

At the castle, Peter meets Eva (Elke Sommer, Lisa and the Devil), who works with Dortmund, a businessman who is fixing the castle. She is there to ensure that Blood’s castle retains its original beauty. Eva comes to Karl’s house for a meal, where we learn that Baron Blood has been seen in the woods near the castle. And Peter has found an ancient spell that will awaken the spirit of the Baron. Karl warns him of dabbling in the occult, and seeing as we’re only a few minutes into the movie, we know he won’t listen.

Of course Peter and Eva go to the bell tower and read the spell at midnight. The bell tolls two, not twelve, symbolic of the time of day that Blood’s victims rose and killed him. Eva begs Peter to reverse the spell, but a gust of wind blows the spell into a fireplace as the Baron emerges from his grave.

The Baron is born with the same wounds he died from, wounds even a doctor cannot heal. He then goes on a killing spree, starting with the doctor and a gravedigger, then hanging Dortmund and smooshing the castle’s caretaker inside a spiked coffin.

The next day, Alfred Becker (Joseph Cotton, The Abominable Dr. Phibes), a disabled millionaire in a wheelchair, purchases the castle. He seems decent, so Eva stays on long enough to have the Baron attack her again. She quits her job and moves to the city, only for the black-clad Baron to follow her, chasing her through the foggy streets in a pure Bava scene. She escapes to Karl’s home and luckily, he finally believes that the Baron is still alive.

A local medium helps them to bring back Elizabeth Holly, who gives them a magic amulet and the knowledge that because Peter and Eva brought the Baron back, only they can destroy him. The moment they leave, the Baron kills the psychic.

The Baron also chases Karl’s young daughter. She then realizes that the Baron and Becker are the same man, as their eyes burn like fire. When they confront the man who uses a wheelchair with this revelation, he denies it and shows them his castle, which now has dummies impaled on stakes as decorations. As they debate what to do next, he rises from his wheelchair and knocks all of them out, taking them to his torture chamber.

Eva learns that when her Blood and the amulet unite, the Baron’s victims all return from the dead. They rise and tear him apart limb by limb as Peter, Eva and Karl escape. As the film ends, we hear Elizabeth Holly’s laughter.

Critically, this is not considered one of Bava’s best. However, I found plenty to like, including the Baron’s quite frightening design. And how can any movie that features Elke Sommer running through the fog be bad?