Author Archives: bandsaboutmovies

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: Ben (1972)

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I knew the song “Ben” better than Ben the movie, but now, I know both.

Remember when Willard Stiles was killed by Ben and all the rats when he finally tried to kill them? Well, you get to see it again when this movie starts and we follow Ben until he meets Danny Garrison (Lee Harcourt Montgomery, Burnt Offerings), a lonely boy with a heart condition. They become best friends — until now, Danny only has his mother, Beth (Rosemary Murphy) and sister, Eve (Meredith Baxter) — and Danny does fun stuff like write songs for them, put on marionette shows for their amusement and create a train ride for them.

Rats are rats, however, and they go nuts, attacking food trucks, grocery stores, and people, all while they help Danny get over bullies, loneliness and probably dying soon.

Directed by Phil Karlson (The Wrecking Crew, Walking Tall) and written by Gilbert Ralston (the creator of The Wild, Wild West), this has an ending where you will care about a rat more than you thought was possible. Seriously, I got weepy. Over a rat. A rat that got to ride in a train, dammit, not I’m crying again.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: Behind Locked Doors (1968)

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Also known as Any Body…Any Way, this movie was exactly what I wanted it to be: fucking weird.

When Terry Wilson (Joyce Danner) and Ann Henderson (Eve Reeves) go to the middle of nowhere for a barn party, Ann is nearly raped but saved by the middle-aged, British and oh-so-strange Mr. Bradley (Daniel Garth). They ditch the party and Ann’s man, but then run out of gas because otherwise we wouldn’t have a movie.

In the middle of nowhere, they walk up to a house — on the suggestion of a drifter (Ivan Agar, Laughing Crow from Shriek of the Mutilated) who is more than he seems — that just so happens to belong to Mr. Bradley and his sister Ida (Irene Lawrence). They have no phone and their car isn’t working either, so they stay for dinner and a bed for the evening. Ida needs the company. She’s been there for two years, ever since her mortician brother retired.

So why are there bars on the windows? Why did their door lock behind them? Why are the closest filled with women’s clothing of all sizes? Why would Terry pick this exact and terrifying time to finally get sapphic with her office buddy?

The Bradleys wake them up and let them know that they’re in control and must play their demented games with them or end up like all the embalmed bodies in the basement. Mr. Bradley just wants to discover the perfect way to make love, so if he has to tie up women and then kill them, that’s how his laboratory of libido operates.

I mean, this is a movie that starts with fifteen minutes of go go dancing in a barn — I played in a band that practiced in a barn and it’s hard to sing when all you can smell is shit, so I can’t even imagine go go dancing while smelling cow feces — and ends with that same barn and Ann going off with the guy who tried to rape her and Terry finding another young lady to enjoy a game of flats with. Yes, I used a 17th-century term — lesbian sex was thought to look like two playing cards rubbing together — in this article. I bring you quality euphemisms, my friend.

Did you not see Harry Novak’s signature hanging above this? Behind Locked Doors was directed and co-written by Charles Romine, who would go on to make Mysteries of the Gods. In contrast, producer and uncredited co-writer Stanley H. Brassloff made one of the most upsetting softcore movies, Toys Are Not for Children.

This movie looks way better than it should, with great lighting, bright colors, and a room full of gorgeous and dead women — or are they? — posed seductively, along with an off-the-rails room destroying catfight and an ending that blew my mind, as deceased denizens of the strange mansion come back for one last dance with brother and sister into the inferno. This is the kind of movie that makes you stay for all that barn dancing, and you wonder, “When does it get weird? Sam promised me it would get there,” and when it does, you’ll text me and say, “I can’t believe that this is a real movie.” Well, it is, pal. It sure is.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: The Bees (1978)

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Alfredo Zacarías made Demonoid, and we should thank him for that. He also took advantage of the sheer terror that ensued when the Africanized honey bee was on its way to America. Initially used in Brazil to increase honey production, 26 swarms escaped quarantine in 1957 and spread throughout South America, incredibly defensive and angry bees that supposedly can chase a person for a mile. These bees have killed a thousand people, with many of their victims being stung over and over again. Just imagine six-year-old me watching this on the news every night as we were told repeatedly how close these bees were to us and how doomed we all were.

I also blame the exploitation film industry, which seized upon this and made so many killer bee movies, as they had all the news doing their advertising work for them. There was the 1974 TV movie Killer Bees, The Swarm and this movie, ads filled with just bee after bee, and I’d watch when I was outside, sure today was the day I’d be stung to death.

Jack Hill went uncredited on this as a writer, as he was supposed to direct it, but life didn’t work out that way. It’s the story of South American killer bees who haven’t just been smuggled into the country for experiments, but have also mutated into even smarter than your average bee and use that to kill humans.

It all happens when Dr. Miller (Claudio Brook) is trying to crossbreed the aggressive bees with a much calmer species to make more honey. A local tries to break in and steal the bees, which leads to his angry family and friends burning down Miller’s house, and the bees escaping. Meanwhile, Miller’s wife Sandra (Angel Tompkins) takes the queen to her uncle Dr. Sigmund Hummel (John Carradine, of course) and Dr. John Norman (John Saxon), who have the same goals as her husband, except there’s a honey spy ring trying to make more money off the bees and that means murder.

There’s a scene where Carradine falls to his doom, and I won’t lie—I watched it nine times, and with each rewatch, I loved this movie even more. Also, John Saxon speaks to stock footage of the UN.

You can watch this on Tubi.

WEIRD WEDNESDAY: The Baron (1977)

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Jason (Calvin Lockhart) is trying to make his auteur — or vanity — project, a movie about Baron Wolfgang von Trips. But the studio wants to buy the project and replace him as director and actor. And then the connection to the studio dies, leaving Jason holding the. bill for the mob who was really paying for this. They send Joey (Richard Lynch) to collect the money as Jason gets hired by The Cokeman (Charles McGregor) to service Old Hollywood actress Joan Blondell, who is playing Mama Lou. As you can expect, his girl Caroline (Marlene Clark) can’t understand. Neither can I. That’s Ganja herself! What are you doing, Jason?

Somehow, in the middle of all this, Gil Scott-Heron did the music.

Also, Calvin Lockhart said, “There’s no stopping what can’t be stopped, no killing what can’t be killed,” in Predator 2.

Director Phillip Fenty also wrote Super Fly, and co-wrote this with his wife Linda and  Nelson Lyon (the writer/director of The Telephone Book!?!). It’s something—a movie past the blacksploitation timeline but with elements of it, Lynch chewing the scenery, dropping sexist, racist and just plain evil dialogue on everyone.

You can watch this on YouTube.

JUNESPLOITATION: Sugar Hill (1974)

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June 4: Junesploitation’s topic of the day — as suggested by F This Movie— is Blaxploitation!

After Blacula and Scream, AIP had already combined Blaxploitation and horror. Now, Diana “Sugar” Hill (Marki Bey) is using zombies to get revenge on mob boss Morgan (Robert Quarry in his last film for the studio) for the death of her man, nightclub owner Langston (Larry D. Johnson). She goes to Mama Maitresse (Zara Cully) and together, they call on the Lord of the Dead, Baron Samedi (Don Pedro Colley), for his assistance.

Unlike the post-Romero zombies, this is calling back to the zombies of movies made in the 1930s. The preserved bodies of slaves brought to the United States from Guinea, they only cost Sugar her soul to get the vengeance she needs. By that, I mean feeding bad guys to pigs and saying, “I hope they like white trash.”

This is the only film directed by Paul Maslansky, who also produced Castle of the Living Dead, Death Line, The She Beast, Damnation Alley, Race With the Devil and, perhaps most importantly, the Police Academy movies. Writer Tim Kelly also scripted Black Fist and Cry of the Banshee.

There weren’t enough mixes like this, but there’s also Blackenstein, Abby, Ganja and Hess, JD’s Revenge, Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde, Petey Wheatstraw, Bones, Def by Temptation, Hood of Horror, Black Devil Doll from Hell, Tales from the QuadeaD Zone, Killjoy and the Tales from the Hood series.

JUNESPLOITATION: Circle of Iron (1978)

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June 3: Junesploitation’s topic of the day — as suggested by F This Movie— is David Carradine!

This movie is fantastic bullshit.

Bruce Lee originally was to write and appear in this, saying in the intro he wrote, “The story illustrates a great difference between Oriental and Western thinking. This average Westerner would be intrigued by someone’s ability to catch flies with chopsticks, and would probably say that has nothing to do with how good he is in combat. But the Oriental would realize that a man who has attained such complete mastery of an art reveals his presence of mind in every action…True mastery transcends any particular art.”

Working with James Coburn and screenwriter Stirling Silliphant, Lee didn’t just want to make the first Western movie about martial arts. He tried to make a movie that would introduce audiences to the philosophy behind martial arts; more than fighting, more about mastering the self.

Coburn and Lee eventually got frustrated by one another—small stuff, like Coburn getting a better hotel room and treatment than Lee, be like water indeed, or Lee nonstop humming pop songs until Coburn screamed at him—and Lee went to Hong Kong to make Fist of Fury, become a star and die.

Lee had intended his movie — you know, the same one that would teach Eastern theories of the martial world — to have  Thai, Cantonese, Arabic and Japanese dialogue, explicit Tantric sex and scenes of genital destruction.

A few years later, Stanley Mann rewrote it, added comedy and brought on board a bunch of the finest all-white actors—some of whom could do martial arts. And that’s how we got this movie, which is ridiculous in all the best ways.

Cord (Jeff Cooper, who played Kaliman in a few Mexican movies) is a fighter who is undisciplined and kicked out of the temple by Roddy McDowall. Yet he still wants to find The Book of Knowledge, which is held by Zetan (Christopher Lee). The man sent on the quest instead of him, Morthond (Anthony De Longis, Blade from Masters of the Universe), has been nearly killed — and demands help to die with honor — and it seems like a fool’s errand. Then Cord meets the mysterious Blind Man (David Carradine) and starts his own quest.

Carradine also plays Death, a Monkey Man and Chang Sha, who uses his wife Tara (Erica Creer) to seduce our protagonist before leaving him behind and her crucified. Cord also runs into Eli Wallach, who has been sitting in a pot of boiling oil for a decade in the hopes that his penis falls off. I did not make that up.

Also known as The Silent Flute, this has director Richard Moore (his only full-length, but he shot the underwater footage for Thunderball and was the cinematographer on The Wild Angels, Devil’s Angels, Myra Breckinridge, The Stone Killer and Annie) making a mix of a king fu movie and a Zen koan that feels more Holy Mountain than Enter the Dragon.

The flute Carradine plays in this is the same one from Kill Bill: Volume 2.

So yes, this movie is complete bullshit but it’s wonderful bullshit. None of the people other than Carradine seem to know how to do martial arts, and I couldn’t care less. With Lee, this would have been a classic, perhaps, but as it stands, it’s this majestic attempt at something, a movie with dialogue like this:

Blind Man: A fish saved my life once.

Cord: How?

Blind Man: I ate him.

The sound of one hand clapping? You’re watching it.

You can watch this on Tubi.

SEVERIN BLU RAY RELEASE: High Tension: Four Films by Lamberto Bava

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Severin has a fantastic new release coming. Let me quote them here:

“In the late ‘80s, Lamberto Bava agreed to direct a four-part anthology series for Italian TV under the title High Tension. But when executives saw the completed features’ extreme themes and graphic violence, their broadcast was blocked for nearly a decade and they have only existed as grey market bootlegs since. Severin Films now presents their Official Worldwide Blu-ray Premiere: Tomas Arana stars as a horror director stalked by evil forces in The Prince of Terror, written by Dardano Sacchetti and featuring grisly FX by Sergio Stivaletti. In The Man Who Wouldn’t Die, adapted from a short story by poliziotteschi novelist Giorgio Scerbanenco, the survivor of a home invasion seeks vengeance. Daria Nicolodi stars in School of Fear, which is about a student academy with a dark secret. And in the giallo shocker Eye Witness, Barbara Cupisti stars as a blind woman who sees a murder. All four films are scanned in 2K from the original camera negatives with Italian and first-time ever English tracks, plus over 5 hours of Special Features and a Soundtrack CD curated by Simon Boswell featuring music from High Tension, The Mask of Satan, Demons 2, Delirium and more.”

The Prince of Terror: I’ve made a real 180 on Lamberto Bava. Maybe it’s because the first of his movies that I watched was Devilfish. I should have really started with Macabre, A Blade In the Dark or any of his TV movies and then I’d feel a lot different. And years ago, I unfairly compared him with his father instead of allowing him to be judged on his own merit.

I am sorry, John Old Jr.

This movie pulls the Body Double fake out as soon as it starts, as you get the jump scare of a woman — Magda (Marina Viro) — escaping an RV only to see her boyfriend drown in a swamp and become an inflated zombie and begin stalking her through a swamp.

This isn’t happening.

Instead, it’s the set of director Vincent Omen’s (Tomas Arana, The Church) latest movie. He hates the script from his longtime writer, Paul Hilary (David Brandon, who was the director in Stage Fright, so dumb that he let his cast stay in the theater where a killing machine was hiding), so he gets him fired before heading out to play golf. While he’s hitting the front 9, he’s interviewed by a reporter (Virginia Bryant, The Barbarians) who asks him about the rumors that he’s much older than 37 and his public perception as the “Prince of Darkness.”

He holds up one of his golf balls, which has 666 on it. Obviously, he’s into this persona.

After he finishes playing, he goes home to his wife Betty (Carole Andre, Yor Hunter from the Future), daughter Susan (Joyce Pitti) and dog Demon. Yes, he is definitely into this demonic side. That evening, he and his lovely spouse are supposed to join his producer (Pascal Druant) and Magda for dinner. And then, golf balls explode into their home, sinister phone calls start and end only when the phone lines are severed, and their cute little dog is killed—by having his fur removed, and then he’s just thrown in the garbage—because this is an Italian movie. Then, a bald killer with a huge knife (Ulisse Miniverni) appears.

By the end of the movie, Omen gets shot, his wife gets her leg ensnared in a bear trap and his daughter gets buried alive in the basement. Plus, the toilet flushes blood and the security guard is replaced with a robot. It’s an all-over-the-place plan from Paul, the writer, and actor Eddie Felson– the bald monster — who both want to get back at Vincent.

Special effects maestro Sergio Stivaletti got a workout here, as when Vincent gets his revenge, he starts attacking people with golf balls, including one that blows up a man’s wrist and another that goes Fulci and blows up an eyeball. There’s also a good Simon Boswell score.

I wonder how much of this story was writer Dardano Sacchetti getting his scripting revenge on former friend and co-creator Lucio Fulci. That scene where he’s accused of stealing ideas and it becomes obvious that Omen has no ideas of his own, as well as a bloody script emerging from a toilet, seems to lead one to feel that way. It’s fun in a TV movie way—I love this era of Italian TV movie horror—but it certainly doesn’t aspire to the heights that Fulci reached.

Extras on the Severin release include commentary by Mondo Digital‘s Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth, author Of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years Of Italian Giallo Films and interviews with Bava.

The Man Who Wouldn’t Die: This was originally going to air in 1989. Due to concerns about the violence of these films, it didn’t play on Italian TV again until 2007. The other three aired in 1999.

Written by Gianfranco Clerici (Strange Shadows in an Empty Room) based on a short story by Giorgio Scerbanenco, this is about a gang of five burglars that art dealer Madame Janaud (Martine Brochard, Murder Obsession) hires to steal art from a rich man’s villa. Led by Fabrizio (Keith Van Hoven, Demons 3), the thieves (including Lino Salemme, who did coke out of a Coke can in Demons and Stefano Molinari, the demon in the movie on the TV in Demons 2) tie up the man of the house and his wife, then take everything they can get their hands on so that Janaud can sell them to art collector Mr. Miraz (Jacques Sernas).

The problem is that one of the gang, Giannetto (Gino Concari) screws over the gang and cuts up the most expensive thing they take, Renoir’s “After the Bath.” He hides in the villa’s garage and returns for it later.

That would be bad enough, but Giannetto attacks the husband and then assaults his tied-up wife while the man watches. He gets enraged and kicks the offensive moron in the head and kills him. Fabrizio kills both the husband and wife, then wraps the body of Giannetto in a carpet. The gang argues about what to do, so instead of killing him, they strip him and dump him in the woods. Somehow, he survives and comes back to life in the hospital. He wants revenge, but he’ll be lucky to stay alive, as a giallo killer starts to murder all of the gang, with one’s face getting smashed, another being done in by toilet—head smashing and drowning, and a smooshed head for the last crook.

This was originally to be made by Lamberto’s father, Mario, who had been working on a script with Rafael Azcona and Alessandro Parenzo. It’s not Lamberto’s best work, but the kills are very well filmed and the Simon Boswell score is good.

Extras include interviews with Bava and Dardano Sacchetti.

School of Fear: Directed by Lamberto Bava and written by Dardano Sacchetti (who wrote nearly every Italian movie that you love), Roberto Gandus (Macabre, Madhouse) and Giorgio Stegani (Cannibal Holocaust), School of Fear is part of the second series of TV movies that Bava was hired to make.

If you have children, let me remind you never to allow them to attend European educational facilities like the Swiss Richard Wagner Academy for Girls, the Tanz Akademie or the Giacomo Stuz private school. I mean, a child drowns at the beginning of this movie, and that’s moments into it.

Diana Berti (Alessandra Acciai) arrives at the school and instantly encounters problems. There’s a deformed child in the shadows, her skirts are too short for the school’s leader (Dario Nicolodi), and oh yeah, she has past traumas that the school keeps bringing to the fore. You know what isn’t helping? The last teacher in her role died by going through a plate glass window, and they never fixed all that broken glass.

The real problem, as always, is the children. They play some secret game that the last teacher — the one who took a header through a closed window — was already worried about after she learned just how frightening it can be from one of her students.

This game takes them into the abandoned parts of the school, which are haunting for adults, much less little ones. These kids, however, are borderline monsters, able to hack into video signals, showing an image of her impaled on the front gate just like the last teacher and using Diana’s past sexual assault to remind her that no one will ever believe her when she tries to expose how horrible they behave.

They’re right.

The children are from the upper crust, the school has too good a reputation, and after all, look how sweet these young men and women are as they sing in the choir. Surely they couldn’t have done all this. Even her police inspector love interest, Mark Anselmi (Jean Hebert), thinks she’s being ridiculous about it all.

This movie is absolutely worth watching. It features a classroom of kids tearfully tearing to pieces the morality and art of Pier Paolo Pasolini while a child who looks like a dwarf in a red jacket runs wild on the grounds.

Extras include interviews with Bava, Roberto Gandus and Simon Boswell.

Eye Witness: Elisa (Barbara Cupisti) and Karl (Giuseppe Pianviti) are in a department store at closing time, waiting until no one is watching so that she can steal a shirt. She’s stuck there alone as Karl runs out to get their car and while the store is closed, she sees a secretary get killed by her manager (Alessio Orano)

Or, well, she doesn’t.

Because Elisa is blind.

Directed by Lamberto Bava with a script by Giorgio Stegani and Massimo De Rita, this is a made-for-TV giallo in which police commissioner Marra (Stefano Davanzati) investigates the suspects, who include the secretary’s lover (Francesco Casale), as well as Elisa and Karl. At the same time, the manager thinks that Elisa knows who he is because he believes she can sense him.

There are moments here, when it isn’t trying to be Wait Until Dark, when the film aspires toward the giallo of the past. I love the idea of a rehabilitation center for people with disabilities that tries to get them to expand their abilities. And of course t, he manager tracks Elisa in the hopes of killing her in a scene with echoes of Tenebre and “Blind Alleys” from Tales from the Crypt mixed with some incredible POV shots and great editing.

Unlike most giallo, we know the killer from the beginning. But that’s fine. The tension here comes from how close the killer gets to our heroine. And yes, as always, the cops are the absolute worst. Defund the giallo police, I always say.

Extras include commentary by Mondo Digital‘s Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth, author Of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years Of Italian Giallo Films and interviews with Bava and Barbara Cupisti.

You can preorder it now from Severin.

One Million Babes BC (2024)

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No matter what happens in the rest of the world, you can rely on Mark Polonia to keep making movies with awesome posters, great titles and moments where dinosaurs fart, stock animation and footage is used, and eventually, a dinosaur poops all over someone. You might wonder, “Will these cavewomen have sex with one another?” No. There’s no time for that, as we need to be inside a cave made of plastic tarps and brown paper, decorated with marker artwork.

I will not have it any other way. Other people might look at a Polonia movie and get angry, wondering who would want to watch a microbudget movie with dumb jokes and a plot that makes 70 minutes feel like weeks, but just leave the rest of us alone. The world is a rough place; people barely can get along these days, and if I want to sit in my basement and just screen movies like this and wonder what Polonia will make next, I feel like I’m making my part of the world better.

As for the IMDB user who wrote, “Despite the title One Million BC, no babes appear in the film,” you don’t have to be so rude.

You can watch this on Tubi.

JUNESPLOITATION: Devil’s Kiss (1976)

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June 2: Junesploitation’s topic of the day — as suggested by F This Movie— is Zombies! 

Director and writer Jordi Gigó wrote Exorcismo and wrote and directed Porno Girls, L’espectre de Justine and, well, that’s it. Other than this movie.

Countess Claire Grandier (Silvia Solar, Danger!! Death Ray, Cannibal Terror, Eyeball) and telepathic Professor Gruber (Olivier Mathot) have bought a castle, a place where they can ride horses, have lavish dinners, make sweet love and, you know, get a dwarf (Ronnie Harp) to help them create the living dead. But when they’re not doing that, they’re using the castle for fashion shows, which is how we get a bevy of Eurocult ladies to show up, turn on, tune out and get nude. Man, the fake eyelashes budget on this…

Also, the Countess hates the castle owner, Duke of Haussemont (José Nieto), whom she blames for killing her husband, taking her money and forcing her into a life of zombie making and model murdering. Yet he lets them stay in the castle as ghostbusters when they’re the ones making the ghosts or zombies.

The castle looks excellent, the flashbacks feel like a silent movie, it’s more Frankenstein than Romero, there’s full frontal nudity, poor zombie makeup, a Jess Franco feel and by that I mean this movie is beyond horny and wants you to know that, the Book of Astarov, Satanic rites, a movie that feels like an Electric Wizard song and appearances by María Silva (Curse of the Devil) and Evelyne Scott (Shining Sex), a strong undercurrent of anything can happens next and lots of fog. Some people would hate this. Those people are jerks.

The original title — La perversa caricia de Satán (Satan’s Perverse Caress or The Wicked Caresses of Satan) — is precisely why I watched this.

Murder, She Wrote S1 E17: Footnote to Murder (1985)

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Jessica sets out to clear the name of a friend who is a prime suspect in a murder case.

Season 1, Episode 17: Footnote to Murder (March 10, 1985)

Tonight on Murder, She Wrote…

Being friends with Jessica Fletcher is like shaking hands with death itself.

Who’s in it, outside of Angela Lansbury, and were they in any exploitation movies?

Vincent Baggetta plays Frank Lapinski. You may know him from his other two appearances on this show, as well as playing cops on Days of Our Lives, Renegade, the TV movie Shakedown On Sunset Strip and T.J. Hooker.

Debbie Delancey? That’s Martin Balsam’s daughter Talia, who was also in Mad Men, The Kindred, The Supernaturals, Crawlspace and The Initiation of Sarah. She was also married to George Clooney once.

Tiffany Harrow is played by Morgan Brittany, who was Baby June in Gypsy, as well as Katherine Wentworth on Dallas and appeared in Sundown: The Vampire In Retreat, Death Car On the Freeway, The Initiation of Sarah — making this a reunion, kinda — and was Mary in Sunn Classics’ In Search of Historic Jesus. You may ask, “Why does the Virgin Mary have to be so hot?” Because Sunn Classics knew that despite their movies being G-rated four-walled family movies, they still needed something for daddy. She also did stunts for Fighting Back and The Happy Hooker Goes Hollywood. I also love this credit on her IMDB. Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer James Bond Style Speedboat Commercial. You can see it here. Who knew PBR could be so fancy?

Lucinda Lark is played by Constance Forslund, who was in the remake of Village of the Damned, Uncommon Valor and took over the role of Ginger for The Harlem Globetrotters On Gilligan’s Island.

A.D.A. Mel Comstock? That’s Pat Harrington, forever Schneider from One Day at a Time. He would be in four episodes of this show. He was also the voice of The Atom and Speedy on the Aquaman 1960s cartoon!

Kenneth Mars is Helmsley Post. Speaking of voice work, he was Triton in The Little Mermaid and Grandpa Longneck in The Land Before Time. He was also the mayor in Police Academy 6: City Under Siege and appeared in the Bruce Willis cartoon—yes, he had his own cartoon in 1996—Bruno the Kid: The Animated Movie.

This time, the law is Lt Meyer, played by Ron Masak. Masak would become a regular on the series after season 5, playing Sheriff Mort Metzger.

Diana Muldaur plays Alexis Post. Did I cast this episode? She has also starred in The Swimmer, Imps*, Maneaters Are Loose! and Chosen Survivors.

Hey! It’s Mr. Brady! Robert Reed plays Adrian Winslow. If you only know him from being a TV dad, hunt down his TV movies like SST: Death Flight, Secret Night Caller, Pray for the Wildcats and Haunts of the Very Rich.

Paul Sand as Horace Lynchfield, the presumed killer.

In the more minor roles, there’s John C. Bechner (Dr. Molinaro from Gremlins) as an eye doctor, John Brandon as Ernie, Mark Harrison as an assistant DA, William McDonald as a bailiff, Michael Kearns as a reporter, Nancy Marlow listed as a lady, Bigg Yeager as a cop, Lana Schwab as a clerk, and Larry Carr, Bart Greene, Sam Haggin, Shirley Lang, Richard Niehaus, Norman Palmer, Kimberly L. Ryusaki and Roger Trantham as background characters.

What happens?

Jessica is in New York City to get a Gotham Book Award for being a crime writer. She hangs out with another writer, Horace, a downer, and Kenneth Mars, a jerk. Does Jessica have better writer friends? Are all writers total losers? Hey — don’t answer that so soon.

Horace is getting drunk, another would-be writer named Debbie Delancey keeps trying to get Jessica to read her story, and people just seem to hate one another in New York City (say that like Lazlo from What We Do In the Shadows). She has to break up a fight between some of the writers and wakes up with Hemsley’s umbrella, so she goes to return it. When she gets there, he’s dead, and Downer Horace’s umbrella is stuck in the guy’s chest.

This is where Jessica should just go home.

Of course, this is where she starts to solve the murder.

Somehow, Horace was in bed with Lucinda Lark — can you believe it? — and has an alibi. Lucinda wrote a book called Women Unleashed so we can only assume that she pegged the butt out of Horace. Or hope.

Who did it?

Debbie, who got the famous author to look at her book, was surprised when he tried to show her more than she wanted. Whoops. His death is an accident.

Who made it?

Director Peter Crane worked on nine episodes of the show and episodes of Moonlighting, Darkroom, Knight Rider and Voyagers! The Script was written by Robert E. Swanson, who assembled 87 scripts for it.

Does Jessica get some?

You would think that with her waking up with a man’s umbrella, the answer would be yes. But no. She also doesn’t dress up or act drunk, despite actually drinking.

Was it any good?

I like it when Jessica stays home, but she should get out every once in a while.

Any trivia?

Helmsley Post, the manly writer of war books, and Adrian Winslow, the nonmanly writer of historical novels, are supposed to be writers who hate one another, like Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal. Get it? Post? Mailer?

John C. Becher and Lansbury were in the original Broadway cast of Mame together.

Give me a reasonable quote:

Horace Lynchfield: Now, what I need is some cigarettes and a stiff drink. Let’s get out of here, okay?

Jessica Fletcher: Oh! At the risk of sounding like a nag, Horace, you’re gonna have to do something about your drinking.

Horace Lynchfield: Are you saying to cut back? That would be like depriving a race car of its gasoline.

What’s next?

A great episode is on the way. Jessica is forced to take refuge from a storm at a remote diner when one of the passengers is found stabbed in his seat on a bus to Boston.