Tag Archives: John Carradine

IT CAME FROM THE READER-SUGGESTED QUEUE: SHINBONE ALLEY (1970)

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DIRECTED BY: John David Wilson

FEATURING THE VOICES OF: , Eddie Bracken, Alan Reed, John Carradine

PLOT: A poet/newspaper man resurrected as a cockroach tells a  number of stories about his friend, a cat with loose morals and a knack for picking the wrong mates, and the many times he tries to pull her out of trouble.

Still from shinbone Alley (1970)

COMMENTS: Animation, frustrated aficionados will tell you, is not a genre, it’s a medium. Just because the twin monoliths of Walt Disney and Saturday morning television built their empire on a commitment to entertaining grade schoolers with moving drawings, we should not assume that cartoons are only for kids. But parents and studio executives never seem to get the message. There’s plenty of of evidence of this blindness — just count up the number of traumatized children who were exposed to the original Watership Down — and a leading piece of evidence should be the tagline that marketing wizards devised for Shinbone Alley: “It’s sophisticated enough for kids, simple enough for adults!” Because if anything cries out to be seen by all audiences, it’s the story of a sexually promiscuous cat who takes up with a series of abusive partners, as told by the suicidal cockroach who loves her.

The idea of a creating musical based on the “archy and mehitabel” stories of Don Marquis was unusually persistent. The tales were enormously popular in their day (the titular cockroach and cat are among the literary figures immortalized on the bronze screen that fronts the monumental Brooklyn Public Library), but they didn’t get paired up with song-and-dance until a concept album in 1954, penned by Joe Darion (who would gain acclaim as the book writer for Man of La Mancha) and composer George Kleinsinger (whose best known composition is probably Tubby the Tuba) and starring Bracken and Channing in the title roles. The script would get a punch-up from Mel Brooks before making its way to Broadway for a six-week run in 1957, now starring Bracken alongside the dangerously seductive Eartha Kitt as Mehitabel. (So now you know: Andrew Lloyd Webber did not provide the first dancing cats on the Great White Way.) Undaunted by the flop, a shortened version of the show found its way to television in 1960 (featuring Bracken and Tammy Grimes as the titular feline) before arising once more a decade later as an animated feature with the original stars in tow. So with all that effort, there must be something in the adaptation that was demanding to be seen.

I’m still trying to figure out what that is. Shinbone Alley is a collection of scenes in which our heroes go through a sad and troubling cycle: Mehitabel searches for fame, free love, and good times, ignoring Archy’s pleas to clean up her act; her latest beau turns out to be apathetic at best, cruel at worst; Archy has to bail her out of her latest predicament; Mehitabel becomes furious with Archy for trying to kill her buzz; Archy becomes deeply depressed; Mehitabel realizes that Archy is probably the best friend she has; the pair celebrates their friendship, and we go around again. It’s possible that this dysfunction once played for laughs and has just aged poorly, but it’s hard to see who might have enjoyed seeing one of the lead characters getting threatened by a big bully, stolen from by a charlatan actor, and ultimately knocked up by both and then saddled with a litter that she promptly abandons to be nearly drowned in a storm. Is that the part that’s sophisticated enough for kids, or is it the other lead character constantly threatening to kill himself?

Shinbone Alley is actually a well-animated film, and director Wilson has fun shifting from the ugliness of the alley to colorful flights of fancy like pop art representations of Archy’s free-verse musings, or especially the extended scene in which Archy plots revolution in the distinctive style of George Herriman, the “Krazy Kat” creator who illustrated many of Marquis’ stories. But the other elements are a drag. The score is utterly unmemorable; the most notable song is the pals-forever number “Flotsam and Jetsam,” which at least relates to the characters. Other tunes barely connect to anything in the story at all, such as Big Bill’s ode to the alley and his own violent nature (sung by Reed in the same voice he used for Fred Flintstone), or the reminiscence of Tyrone T. Tattersall (“sung” by Carradine) of his early days in the theater. At one point, we even get Shakespeare delivered in the style of beat poetry. It’s as though Darion and Brooks, both of them Tony-winning book writers, can’t think of a single reason for their characters to break into song, so no reason becomes reason enough.

Ultimately, the film seems to take its inspiration from Mehitabel herself. She never seems to learn from her setbacks, bouncing back with the repeated watchcry, “Toujours gai!” So it goes with Shinbone Alley. What worked in Marquis’ newspaper columns never translated to stage or screen, but here we are, giving it another go. The peculiar mix of perky animation and grim subject matter is is certainly weird, but not half as weird as the certainty its creators held that this was a story that must be told.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

Shinbone Alley, you see, is a singular strange animated movie, trapped in the film marketplace of the early 1970s with absolutely nowhere to go, certainly no naturally-occurring audience… Weird stuff for a kids’ movie (I am, if nothing else, 100% confident that this was the first American animated feature in which one of the main characters has sex, gets pregnant, and gives birth, all out of wedlock, during the overall course of the narrative), and there’s something irresistibly jarring in that mismatch between the dopey simplicity of the film’s comedy and the thorny, mean streets filthiness of its plot, not to mention the sullen existentialism of archy’s overall arc, and the generally moody songs…”– Tim Brayton, Alternate Ending

(This movie was nominated for review by Brad. Suggest a weird movie of your own here.) 

APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: FRANKENSTEIN ISLAND (1981)

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Beware

DIRECTED BY:

FEATURING: , Steve Brodie, Cameron Mitchell, Katherine Victor, (?)

PLOT: A crew of hot air balloon travelers land on a remote desert island and encounter the great-grand-daughter of Dr. Frankenstein presiding over an assortment of natives and other random people.

Still from Frankenstein Island (1981)

WHY IT MIGHT MAKE THE LIST: An extreme low-budget B-movie director of legendarily bad productions, Jerry Warren is no stranger to our pages here. Frankenstein Island stands out as his only color film, a movie he made after a 15-year hiatus, and his final film. In spite of all that, it manages to out-crazy everything else he ever done, not to mention being the most deranged film with the name “Frankenstein” in its title, a major feat in itself.

COMMENTS: Move over, Plan 9 From Outer Space, Manos: The Hands Of Fate, and even The Room:  we have a new contender for “so bad it’s hilarious!” If Frankenstein Island (1981) isn’t a candidate for “worst movie ever made,” that’s only because it’s too crammed full of jaw-droppingly bonkers scenes to be not-entertaining. As is typical for a Jerry Warren experience, count on muddled story structure, random stock footage inserted into the plot, extreme budget sets, abrupt day-night transitions, wooden acting, and new lows in filmmaking incompetence all around. What follows is a stalwart attempt to convey what’s going on, to the best of my ability; please be advised that in-movie continuity errors and contradictions make some details hard to pin down.

Four men and a dog fly in a pair of hot air balloons on a little-explained recon errand (later said to be a balloon race). They end up on a desert island because they ran out of stock balloon footage, and start exploring on a quest to build a raft to escape—despite leaning on a rubber dingy while discussing this plan. In due order, they encounter (1) a tribe of Amazon natives in leopard-print bikinis, (2) a cult of zombie-like/robot-like men in black shirts, who kidnap natives and get up to other mischief, (3) a mad prisoner in a cell who raves in Edgar Allan Poe references, (4) a jolly drunk in an eye-patch who can not stop laughing and acts as the men’s guide, while guffawing “HAR HAR HAR HAAAAAR,” and finally (5) a woman, Sheila (previously referred to as “Xira”), wearing a pile of wigs, who claims to be the great-grand-daughter of the original Dr. Frankenstein. Her invalid husband Dr. Von Helsing is there too. Sheila Frankenstein carries on some kind of mad science research in a suspiciously modern and well-furnished mansion and laboratory on an island where everybody else lives in shanties. The black-shirt thugs are her minions, the natives were there when she got there, she’s on a quest to cure Continue reading APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: FRANKENSTEIN ISLAND (1981)

BILLY THE KID VERSUS DRACULA AND JESSE JAMES MEETS FRANKENSTEIN’S DAUGHTER (1966)

In 1966, William “One-Shot” Beaudine produced two western-horror hybrids, which were rare for the period. True to Beaudine’s M.O., they were also two of the year’s worst movies.

Billy the Kid Versus Dracula is the better known of the two, primarily because it stars as the vampire. Carradine had a pragmatic approach to film acting: if you paid him a good salary, he gave a good performance. If you gave him a cheap salary, he gave a cheap performance. What meager budget this film had must have all gone to paying Carradine, because he’s easily the best thing about it—which is not to say he’s good. He’s not, but he’s entertaining, giving what looks like a fifty-dollar, bug-eyed, ham performance that hardly compares to his work in The Grapes of Wrath, Stagecoach, etc.

Still from Billy the Kid Versus Dracula (1966)Dracula has left Transylvania and is traveling out West via stagecoach. He puts the bite on Folgers Coffee lady Virginian Christine and an Indian girl, turns into a bat (with clearly visible strings), and then takes on the identity of Jack Underhill so he can vampirize pretty Betty (Melinda Plowman). Unfortunately for Drac, Betty is engaged to wholesome hombre (?!) Billy the Kid (Chuck Courtney).

Christine, under Drac’s control, is no Dwight Frye, but she’s almost as much fun here as she was selling coffee. Plowman is pure decor, and she doesn’t seem to affect Courtney, who’s a dreadfully neutered Billy. Without Carradine’s repeated barking, hypnotizing, and wired bat flights to liven up the many dull stretches, the film wouldn’t even qualify in a bad lover movie list. Well into alcoholism, Carradine looks flamboyantly dead already. His showdown with Billy is in a silver mine, and although bullets pass right through Drac, he gets conked out by the butt of a pistol. Of course, he doesn’t get to actually slaughter anyone.

Baron Frankenstein’s granddaughter, Maria (Narda Onyx) lives out West, too, in Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter. She has a lab and wants to make a new monster.

Meanwhile Jesse James (John Lupton) and his wounded henchman Hank (Cal Bolder) need a doctor. The local Mexican girl Juanita (Estelita, milking all the south-of-the-border cliches ) warns them against taking Hank to Lady Frankenstein: “These Frankensteins are bad people. My people will return when the last Frankenstein is gone.” The law on his heels, Jesse doesn’t listen, but wonders if Juanita is onto something when Maria takes him into a library with no books. Hmmm. Jesse kisses Juanita. Juanita is now in love and runs to the sheriff to save Jesse from those Frankensteins, even thought she knows Jesse is wanted and will be hung—but Juanita will wait for him (?!?) Lo and behold, Maria, wearing  what looks like a pride flag motorcycle helmet, transforms Hank into Igor, shouting “I am in command. You will obey! Kill, kill!” Well, apparently he could have used a better brain, or a touch of tenderness, because he kills Maria.

Still from Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter (1966)Onyx is a campy hoot, and again a bad performance enlivens Beaudine’s listless direction and a moronic script by Carl Hittleman. Although neither film is trashy or charming enough, the titles, and a couple of cheez whiz performances, may be enough to convince you to add it to a seasonal party playlist. Or, perhaps not.

BELA LUGOSI AND THE MONOGRAM NINE, PART TWO (1942-1944)

Read the introduction to the Monogram Nine.

Bowery at Midnight (1942), directed by , is a surprisingly dour crime melodrama, with a dash of horror (no doubt mandated by ‘s casting). It borrows heavily from another Lugosi vehicle, Dark Eyes of London (1939), although the earlier movie was from an Edgar Wallace story. Bowery At Midnight is comparatively muddled. As in Dark Eyes, Lugosi again sort of plays dual roles, and does some actual acting. The explanation of why his professor character needs a second identity (he uses a soup kitchen as a front to recruit gang members) is nonsensical, however, as is his need to keep zombies in the basement (?!?) Despite its muddled narrative, this, along with Black Dragons, may be the strangest of the Monogram Nine. It has pacing issues, but Lugosi’s performance and the ending, which is still jolting even today, almost make up for the film’s numerous flaws. It has quite a cult reputation, which is perhaps why fans have a trio of options to purchase superior editions from Roan, Troma, or the Retromedia Blu-Ray edition.

Still from The Ape Man (1943)Those who think Bela Lugosi reached the nadir of dignity working with may want to check him out with glued-on whiskers, hunched over, grunting like a monkey, and scratching his arm pit in 1943’s The Ape Man. It’s directed by William “One Shot” Beaudine who got his name because—you guessed it—he almost never did a second take. The plot rips off an earlier Monogram property, 1940’s The Ape (with ). That one at least had a decent central performance, despite its ludicrous plot. Ape Man, however, may be Lugosi’s most humiliating hour, with the actor looking more like an Amish preacher than an ape man, whining about his condition as he scrunches in a corner, needing spinal fluid. It’s poorly lit and, despite its obvious intent to be a parody, its dreadfully dull. It’s so bad that the white-bread heroes ( and Louise Curry) are actually a relief from the tedium. If they, and the film’s strained humor, are enough to interest you, it’s in the public domain, so there’s YouTube or some inexpensive DVD editions (none of which are remastered).

Ghosts on the Loose (1943, directed by Beaudine) is Lugosi’s second—and thankfully final—team-up with the Bowery Boys. As in The Ape Man, the film is poorly lit. Beaudine seems to have stuck the camera in the middle of room, yelled “action,” and left for lunch. The (very) minimal charm and energy of Spooks Run Wild is completely absent here, and Lugosi has nothing to do. He was lucky. Ava Gardner (of all people) embarrasses herself far more in this utterly dismal excrement. This is easily the worst of the lot, something even the most forgiving defenders of the Monogram Nine unanimously agree on. The Roan Group did what they could with the DVD.

By contrast, Voodoo Man (1944, again directed by Beaudine) is a hoot, with a trio of horror stars in Lugosi, George Zucco, and . Girls are disappearing from Zucco’s gas station. Yes, you read that right. Carradine is the imbecile abductor working for Dr. Lugosi, whose wife has been a zombie for 22 years. His scientific skills having failed him, Lugosi becomes a Voodoo Man, abducting pretty girls in an effort to transfer their souls into his wife. Darn it, none of the girls have worked so far. Yes, its a ludicrous reworking of The Corpse Vanishes, only this time we have a horror writer (Todd Andrews) whose bride-to-be gets abducted. A clearly stoned Carradine beats a drum, Lugosi and Zucco sport wacky robes, and Andrews wonders if the shenanigans would make a good movie starring Bela Lugosi. Its tongue firmly in cheek, Voodoo Man sizzles in its ridiculousness. Lugosi is good here, leading a colorful cast who seem to be enjoying themselves. It’s contagious. We should be grateful to Olive Films for not subscribing to the film’s reputation as bad cinema, because they remaster it like it’s a neglected masterpiece. This is my personal favorite of the Nine.

Return of the Ape Man (1944, directed by ) is not a sequel to The Ape Man. According to the credits, it also stars Lugosi, Zucco, and Carradine, but Zucco became ill and was replaced by Frank Moran. Lugosi and Carradine thaw out a Neanderthal  man and want to give him a brain transplant. Lugosi intends to use a wino, but things do not go right, and Carradine is toast. The result is a murdering caveman who plays the piano. Oh, and he hates blow torches, too. Lugosi echoes the film in being goofy and entertaining as hell. Some, probably people who used to pull the wings off butterflies, cite this as the worst of the Nine. Ignore them. Olive films did. My advice: buy the Blu-Ray of this and Voodoo Man and throw one hell of a bad movie party.

1944 DRIVE-IN DOUBLE FEATURE: THE CORPSE VANISHES AND VOODOO MAN

This is the introductory entry in a new series covering movies that originally played in drive-in-cinema double bills across the country.

One of the first drive-in theaters premiered in Camden, New Jersey in 1933. The venue’s popularity reached its zenith from the 1950s to the early 1980s.  Still, the 1940s was also a robust decade for the drive-in, which specialized in low budget B-films, especially horror and science fiction. The setting was also unique in that drive-ins continued to screen films from the 30 and 40s all the way until the late 70s. For a more extended discussion, see my article Cinema Under The Stars.

Coming Attraction! Black Dragons!

“Suicide or murder in the shadow of a nation’s capitol? The screen’s master of horror, has the answer to this mysterious death. Lugosi as the madman on a mission of vengeance, vengeance  against 6 men who plot the destruction of a nation at war.”

Coming Attraction…

“Ominous footsteps in the night foreshadow terrifying death. By Day… A Man Of Honor. By Night… A Beast Of Horror. Bela Lugosi. The Invisible Ghost.

It’s Showtime!

Brides are dying at the altar, and somebody’s responsible. Before being forever robbed of the opportunity to lose her virginity, each bride was given an mysterious orchid—with a scent. Whoever heard of an orchid with a scent? Maybe it’s a clue. Another clue might be that the same undertaker shows up at every crime scene—and he looks just like Dracula. Odd, too, that all of the brides’ corpses vanish! Luana Walters steals the entire film as the spunky reporter giving Lois Lane a run for her money.

Promotional still for The Corpse Vanishes (1942)Bela’s got a bitch of a wife, too (Elizabeth Russell, from Cat People). She hates aging but, somehow, the blood of virgin brides acts like botox for her. Bela, being a mad doctor, injects it. He’s got a pair of henchman, too: Frank Moran (who’s kind of a precursor to ‘s hulking brute in Bride of the Monster) and dwarf (from Freaks).

The movie has an imbecilic charm, but it never quite reaches the sap level of PRC’s The Devil Bat (1940) or Lugosi’s work with .

“Show starts in 10 minutes! We will now have an intermission time before starting our next show!”

“Get the item that adds to your personal comfort. Cigarettes? Here they are! Get the kind you prefer and enjoy them thoroughly; all the most popular brands.”

“Ice cream bars! It’s the handy way to enjoy smooth, rich, creamy ice cream. Get some!”

“Crisp, flavorful fish sandwiches. Gold and brown and crunchy outside and tender and juicy inside for a snack or a meal. ”

“It’s Showtime!”

Still from Voodoo Man (1944)1944 babes are disappearing along Laurel Road after stopping at Nicholas’ gas station. Nicholas (George Zucco) is in cahoots with the henchmen Toby () and Grego (Pat McKee) who in turn work for crazy doc Marlow (Bela). Doc has a wife who has been a zombie for twenty plus years and he believes, if he gets the right girl, that a voodoo ceremony will unzombify his beloved. Toby and Grego are, ahem, a tad feebleminded, which makes Doc’s job harder. There’s a also a pesky fiancee and some really cool voodoo robes. There isn’t scare one, but it’s a tacky variation of The Corpse Vanishes and has the good sense to be even more senseless.

Although The Corpse Vanishes ( directed by Wallace Fox) was made in 1942, it was double billed two years later for the drive-in-circuit with Voodoo Man (directed by ). Both movies are part of Lugosi’s infamous “Monogram Nine.” For the unenlightened, this was a poverty row horror series produced by Sam Katzmann, starring the already faded Dracula actor in some of the most inept movies made. Voodoo Man is the last of the infamous Monogram Nine.

“Please remember to replace the speaker on the mast when you leave the theater. Thanks for being with us this evening. We hope that in some small way we have been able to add to your comfort, pleasure, and relaxation.”

Both films are available on a Legends double feature DVD with vintage drive-in ads, trailers, and countdowns. Olive Films has recently released Voodoo Man on Blu-ray in a pristine transfer.