Black Snake (1973)

Black Snake (1973) is something of an oddity in the canon of Russ Meyer, lacking the out size breast fixation of the sex films that made his name and the budgets of his two films for Twentieth Century Fox, it boasts an historical setting and has pretensions of being 'issue based'.  In part an attempt to cash in on the early seventies Blaxploitation boom, Black Snake takes as its scenario a nineteenth century Caribbean slave revolt.  Unfortunately, Meyer seems to have no real feel for the subject, with both the historical details and context of the story shaky, (to say the least) and the injection of some clumsy humour, in a misguided attempt at satire, jars with the brutal violence on display.  The plot - young Englishman masquerades as new accountant to a plantation situated on a private island presided over by cruel aristocratic lady in order to discover the fate of her last husband, his brother - comes straight out of a nineteenth century melodrama, but proves inadequate as a vehicle to explore the issues surrounding slavery that the film clearly wants to make.  Indeed, it feels like a collision between two different films - one a mildly farcical Gothic mystery about the brother's disappearance, the other a violent drama about slavery, with neither storyline doing much to advance the other.  Disappointingly for Meyer fans, neither of the plot lines offers much in the way of sex.  Not that sex isn't ever present: the lady of the manor is the subject of multiple attempted sexual assaults, the hero gets to bed both her and a black slave girl, the overseer, when he isn't whipping slaves, seems sex obsessed, while the leader of the plantation's private army of black French colonial mercenaries is rampantly gay.  But despite all of this, there really isn't anything explicit or outrageous on offer.

The film's biggest problem with the film is its shaky grasp of history - it is set in 1835, yet pretty much ignores the fact that slavery had been abolished in most of the British Empire (the exceptions being those territories controlled by the British East India Company), despite referencing abolition in some early dialogue.  While it was true that former slaves weren't set free immediately, but rather had their slavery converted into 'apprenticeships eventually resulting in full emancipation', it marked a fundamental change in their situation,  They were now employees of a sort rather than property and had some legal protections.  So the whippings and brutality shown in the film would have been highly unlikely at the time the film is set, (not that conditions for workers of any kind at the time were brilliant).  The fact is that the movie simply doesn't reflect the actuality of the situation in British colonies at the time.  OK, I know that ultimately it is only an exploitation film, but by ignoring basic historical facts, Black Snake fumdamentally undermines the issues it claims to be exploring.  The British Carribean was, in reality, one of the last places you were likely to find a violent slave rebellion taking place in the 1830s.  It also doesn't help that none of the protagonists, on either side, are particularly sympathetic.  While the slaves' violent uprising is justified in light of the brutality meted out to them, their violent revenge is possibly even more brutal and guided by a demented religious fervour.  After all the more farcical shenanigans up at the 'big house' that preceded it, the sudden turn into murderous violence at the climax just feels jarring rather than shocking.

Despite all of this, Black Snake still has plenty of positives.  For one thing, it looks great - the Barbados locations are shot by cinematographer Arthur Ornitz to great effect, giving the film a far more expensive look than you'd expect for a low budget exploitation piece.  For another, the cast are actually pretty effective, despite the inadequacies of the script.  David Warbeck approaches the lead, for the most part, as if he were in a British sex comedy, while Anoushka Hempel, as the villainess plays her role to the hilt, spitting out racial epithets, ordering violent punishments and generally contemptuous of the whole male sex.  Veteran character actor Percy Herbert seems to be having the time of his life as her overseer, leering dementedly at women, attempting to force himself on Hempel and whipping every slave in sight, in an enjoyably over the top performance.  By contrast, Thomas Baptiste as the leader of the rebellion and Bernard Boston as the leader of the French mercenaries contribute somewhat more restrained performances, (it is to the latter's credit that his characterisation of the captain in no way plays to the gay stereotypes usually seen in seventies exploitation films).  While hugely entertaining, the performances of the main players nonetheless serve to emphasise the gulf between the ambitions of the two main storylines of the film.  Most of them perform as if they are in a sex comedy, or one of those bawdy British historical comedies of the sixties, like Tom Jones, which fits in with the mystery plot, but feel badly out of place in the slave rebellion plot.  

Not surprisingly, Black Snake wasn't a box office hit on its release.  Some of Meyer's excuses for its failure are more than mildly amusing.  In particular, he blamed the 'British' actors who, apparently, expected better on set facilities: 'tea and umbrellas and folding chairs'.  Leaving aside the fact that the two leads were actually from New Zealand, I wonder if Meyer had seen any of the films they had previously appeared in?  I don't think that either Warbeck or Hempel had ever appeared in a film with the budget for tea between takes, let alone umbrellas and folding chairs.  Likewise, Percy Herbert had spent his career toiling away in character roles in all manner of low budget movies and TV episodes.  In truth, as Meyer himself conceded, his approach to the material was simply wrong - he felt that he should have gone all out for the Gothic melodrama angle and produced something like Mandingo.  Indeed, the over heated Southern US setting of that film would have made far more sense in terms of the plot and brutality on show.  Even with such a setting, though, the central part of the plot, the slave uprising, would still be historically problematic.  While, understandably in view of a desire to appeal to the Blaxploitation audience, Meyer wanted to show black people empowering themselves and taking control of their own destinies, historically the abolition of slavery in both the UK and US was driven by wealthy whites and eventually achieved as the result of economic and political considerations.  Personally, I can't help but feel that Meyer would have been better off taking a full on bawdy British sex comedy approach to Black Snake, the setting and cast being more suited to such a take.  A sort of plantation 'Carry On'. But the question is, is Black Snake as made worth watching?  Well, yes - it is after all a Russ Meyer film starring David Warbeck, which is a combination nobody expected to see, plus, despite its problems, there's still a lot that's enjoyable about the film. Sections of it are amusing and the performances enjoyably over the top.  It is, however, far more like one of his studio pictures than his earlier work, so if you are expecting lots of anarchic big breasted fun, you might be disappointed.

As a coda, Anoushka Hempel, after marrying into a title, supposedly purchased the UK rights to both Black Snake and the Pete Walker film Tiffany Jones (1973) in order that her nude scenes in both couldn't be seem domestically.  Despite this, both films seem to have remained in circulation.  Moreover, I'm not sure why she would have been worried about Black Snake as Russ Meyer was so disappointed by the size of her breasts, he employed a bigger breasted body double for some of her nude scenes, so it i these 'stunt boobs' on view rather than hers. 

Little Shoppe of Horrors Issue 10/11

The cover of my somewhat battered copy of Little Shoppe of Horrors, Issue !0-11 from July 1990.  As I recall, I bought this new from 'Forbidden Planet', when I worked in London during the nineties.  Little Shoppe of Horrors was a Hammer fanzine - an extremely well-produced fanzine, with, as can be seen, professional standard covers. Each issue focuses on an individual movie, giving an in-depth analysis, interviews with key personnel, etc.  Consequently, issues were thick and packed full of fascinating detail.  I have to say that Little Shoppe of Horrors (on the basis of the two issues I own) is just about the most informative and exhaustively researched film publication I've ever come across.  As can be seen, this particular issue is focused on the 1963 Hammer film The Kiss of the Vampire, an interesting non-series vampire film originally written as a Dracula movie, Christopher Lee's unavailability dictating the change to an original, one-off vampire film.  (Lee's Dracula would eventually return Hammer in 1965's Dracula, Prince of Darkness).

In addition to the features on Kiss of the Vampire, this issue's 168 pages also include a fascinating article on Hammer's various unfilmed projects, an article covering Ray Harryhausen and Jim Danforth's stop motion animation work on One Million Years BC (1966) and When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (1970), respectively.  There's also a look at the music of Hammer films, a large number of interviews and quite a lot more.  Edited by Richard Klemenson, Little Shoppe of Horrors is still going strong and has expanded its scope beyond just Hammer films to include other classic British horror movies from the sixties and seventies.  (If you are interested, its web presence can be found here - all back issues are available for order as well as more recent editions.  here in the UK, more current issues are available via FAB Press).  I hasten to add that I have no connection with the publication, other than being a satisfied reader.  If you are interested in British horror movies, then Little Shoppe of Horrors is well worth a look.

'Guests of the Head-Shrinkers'

Another of my modest collection of Wide World issues.  This is the April 1964 edition of the British men;s adventure magazine which, at this point, was still using cover paintings.  Before the year was out, it would switch to photo covers for the remainder of its run, in attempt to look more contemporary.  The cover illustrates the cover story 'Guests of the Head Shrinkers'.  Tales of headhunters and cannibals were popular fare in Wide World during this period, with New Guinea and the Amazon basin (the main venues such stories) representing, by the sixties, perhaps the last parts of the globe still largely unexplored by white men.  

As the contents page shows, by this time the stories were no longer sorted by location, but rather by broad categories - 'adventure', 'sport', 'nature'. 

In common with most magazines, the back cover was given over to advertising, usually for products of a 'manly' type, often cars.  This edition's ad, though, focuses on heavy good vehicles, (made by Austin, a regular advertiser of their cars in Wide World), a slightly unusual subject for advertising in a men's adventure magazine.  But hey, 'Big Men Buy Austin', apparently!

 

The Valley of Gwangi (1969)

As I've mentioned many times before, I have a weakness for films featuring dinosaurs.  I have a particular weakness for those in which the dinosaurs are created with stop motion animation.  If they are featured living in some kind of 'lost world', even better.  The Valley of Gwangi (1969) ticks all of those boxes, plus, the dinosaurs are animated by Ray Harryhausen himself.  The film had its origins with an unrealised Willis O'Brien project, Valley of the Mists, which he had tried to get into production several times in the forties and fifties, with no success. The unique selling point of the project was that it combined cowboys with dinosaurs, something that The Valley of Gwangi delivers on, providing audiences with striking scenes of mounted cowboys lassoing dinosaurs.   Its tale of cowboys going south to an isolated 'forbidden valley' in Mexico where, it seems, various prehistoric animals have survived the extinction of their peers, with he aim of capturing one alive, for exhibition in the US, is generally well realised.  There are plenty of dinosaurs on display and lots of interaction between them and the actors in a series of decently staged action scenes.  It all builds up to a stirring climax in a border town, when the title dinosaur, 'Gwangi'(which appears to be a hybrid between a Tyrannosaur and an Allosaur), gets loose and goes on a rampage, winding up in a local cathedral.

While the film boasts both plenty of action and plenty of dinosaurs, which I recall enjoying a great deal when I first saw it as a kid in the seventies, a recent viewing of it left me feeling slightly disappointed.  The film's main problem is that it doesn't bring much that is new to the genre, its main contributions being the cowboys and the period setting.  No matter how well staged all of its set pieces are, they have an air of over familiarity about them.  Aside from the dinosaur roping, they all seem to be derived from sequences in earlier Willis O'Brien or Ray Harryhausen movies. (Although, in truth, even the lassoing scene has a precedent in O'Brien's Mighty Joe Young (1949), where the title ape gets similar treatment). The whole 'forbidden valley' set up is straight from The Lost World (1925), the use of the title monster as a sideshow attraction is from King Kong (1933) - even Gwangi's unveiling is reminiscent of Kong's unveiling in New York, the pterodactyl carrying off a woman is from One Million Years BC (1966), while the dinosaur-elephant fight late on in the movie is essentially a rerun of the fight between the Ymir and an elephant in Twenty Million Miles to Earth (1957).  

While derivative in content terms, The Valley of Gwangi is at least decently made, with some nicely shot Spanish locations standing in for Mexico, although, overall, it lacks the dynamism of earlier films featuring Harryhausen's work.  This might well be down to the choice of Jim O'Connolly as director, who was better known for working on the somewhat lower key 'Edgar Wallace' series of crime thrillers for Merton Park.  Perhaps the producers had been influenced by his more recent work on the more flamboyant Joan Crawford starring horror film Berserk! (1967), but he clearly had little affinity for the material in The Valley of Gwangi, with his direction sometimes feeling lacklustre and even disinterested.  A good cast, led by James Fransiscus and including genre veteran Richard Carlson, help carry the action along, with Laurence Naismith particularly memorable as the paleontologist dismayed by the crass commercial exploitation of the dinosaur.  As this is another of those films in which people discover a lost world and proceed to kill just about every prehistoric survival they encounter, the professor could at least rest assured that once Gwangi was killed, there weren't any more dinosaurs left to be exploited.  Released without much publicity, the film was something of a box office disappointment, but became a TV favourite in the seventies.

(As a side note, some of the dinosaur footage from the film turned up in an episode of Fantasy Island, when Mr Roarke was apparently able to create a whole lost world, including dinosaurs, in order to facilitate a couple of guests' fantasy).

Tired of Experts

'We've had enough of experts'.  Remember that Michael Gove soundbite from back in the days of the Brexit referendum?  Well, I've decided that I've had enough of 'experts', too.  Not the sort of experts that Gove was annoyed with, (basically any economist, politician or academic that warned of the damage that Brexit would do to the UK economy - who been proven right, actually, which, I guess, is why they are experts), but those 'experts' who seem to have proliferated since Brexit.  You know the ones I mean: the ones who seem to spend all their time on social media regaling us with their 'expertise' on, well, everything.  Remember when, during the pandemic, they were experts on immunology and viruses, before rapidly turning their 'talents' to conflict analysis when Russia invaded Ukraine, then did the same for the Israel-Gaza crisis before turning their attention to Yemen and the Houthi rebels?  Of course you do - if you have a social media account then you'll have endured them, too.  It's not just social media, though.  You Tube these days is just full of videos about the war in Ukraine, the Houthis, Gaza, vaccines, Brexit, electric vehicles, climate change - just about  any issue, really - all put out by people presenting themselves as 'experts'.  Some of those behind these quasi-news channels claim dubious justifications for their 'expertise': they are minor league academics, ex-military, etc, - or so they claim.  But hey, I have a Master's in International Studies and .- a long time ago - once worked for the MoD as an intelligence analyst.  Which, I think, trumps any of these self-styled experts' 'qualifications.  I don't, however, feel the need to set myself up as an on-line expert, (for one thing, I'm well aware that my 'expertise' on international affairs is pretty much historical and these days I have no more insight into current issues than anybody else who watches the news and reads the papers).

They're worse than the bar room bores they so closely resemble.  Except that, unlike them, the on-line 'experts' can't be escaped simply by going home or even just moving to another bar.  They feel like they are everywhere, their 'opinions' assaulting you as soon as you open up an internet browser.  Increasingly, they like to style themselves as 'citizen journalists' or 'content creators', despite the fact that they adhere to no known journalistic standards and their 'content' is frequently entirely derivative and lacking any kind of substance.  Obviously, their aims are two-fold: to push their dubious personal agendas while, hopefully, making money from their 'content'.  I was cheered to learn that the Twitter-based ones, at least, don't seem to be achieving the latter.  In the wake of some You Tube 'personality' claiming that they had made huge amounts of money from posting a video on Twitter, all manner of those right-wing, Trump supporting, Nazi enabling 'content creators' and 'citizen journalists' were calling 'foul', claiming that it couldn't be true as they never made anything from their shit.  Possibly because they don't produce anything that anyone would want to pay to see, or, in their warped minds, because the liberal establishment are somehow suppressing their work, (Elon Musk, apparently, is some kind of closet liberal, masquerading as a right-wing arsehole).  I have to say, my reaction to their gripes, as it is to just about everyone who thinks they can make a living out of posting stuff on-line, is to shout 'Just get a fucking proper job' at my screen.  If I had a pound for every time I've seen some 'content creator' put out a plea for their followers to help them out financially because they don't actually have a job, instead relying upon ad revenue, Patreon or just straightforward donations, then I'd be making a mint out of the web.

But to get back to my main point - these self-styled 'experts' are, of course, experts in nothing but self publicity and spinning bullshit.  Because they are, of course, the main purveyors of the idiotic conspiracy fantasies that so blight modern discourse.  (Yeah, you knew it from the outset - this really about my favourite hobby horse - the evils of conspiracy bollocks).  As they lack any real knowledge of any of the subjects they like to claim expertise on, they just recycle the same old ignorant and ill-informed bullshit in pursuit of their own particular agendas.  Who needs facts when you can spout opinions and hearsay instead, trying to give it authority and gravitas by spuriously claiming to be an 'expert'?  So yeah, I've had enough of 'experts'.  Mot specifically I've had enough of the inexpert type of experts who just spout partisan bollocks, hiding behind their misinterpretations of 'free speech' in order to justify their spreading of lies.  Let's get back to the days when to be an expert, you actually had to know something about your given field.

Blazing Magnum (1976)

Another of those films I caught back in the days when ITV used to show exploitation films in a late night slot, usually on a Thursday or Friday, I finally caught up with Blazing Magnum (1976) - also released in English as Strange Shadows in an Empty Room - again recently, courtesy of a DVD copy.  When I first saw it, I wasn't aware that it was actually an Italian made film - it had recognisable US actors in the lead roles and was clearly shot in Canada.  I just assumed that it was a Canadian Dirty Harry knock off, something backed up by its UK release title.  But, while the hero is indeed a tough city police detective and does, indeed, wield a magnum revolver, the film itself refuses to fit neatly into a single genre.  The alternative English language title hints at it being a giallo movie and it does contain some touches that might have come from such a film - the stalking of the blind woman springs to mind, here.  It also has sequences that might have come from a tough cop thriller - the opening, for instance, with the hero foiling a bank robbery and a lengthy (and extremely well staged) car chase around Ottawa.  Ultimately, though, all of these elements are merely trimmings to the main plot, which is, in effect, a who-done-it mystery, as the hero tries to find out who poisoned his younger sister.  Not that it is a genteel Agatha Christie-type who-done-it, as solving the case involves the main cop trawling through the city's sex shops and gay and transvestite scene - which embroils him in a memorable fight scene with a bunch of transvestites.  

The collision of these elements from different genres does give the film a somewhat uneven feel although, arguably, this, along with a main plot that constantly twists one way, then another, contributes to giving Blazing Magnum an enjoyably off-kilter sense of unpredictability.  Things frequently don't wind up in line with genre expectations: the car chase, for instance, doesn't end with the cop beating up or shooting the suspect, or with the latter dying in an exploding car, but instead with the main cop simply asking the suspect the questions he had intended to before the latter fled, before walking away.  Likewise, the fight with the transvestites is the result of a misunderstanding and their suspicion of the police.  Again, it culminates with the cop finally sitting down and talking with one of them to get his answers.  Most surprisingly of all, it doesn't end with some grossly homophobic comments on the cop's part.  But frustrating audience expectations seems to be one of the film's main intents - not in a negative way, but instead to keep them guessing as to the outcome not just of individual sequences, but the plot as a whole, mirroring the experience of the main character as all of his assumptions about his sister's life unravel in the course of his investigation.

Directed by Alberto De Martino, a specialist in knock offs of popular Hollywood hits, whose output included my favourite Italian  Bond knock off, OK Connery (1967), The Antichrist (1974) and The Pumaman (1980), is, on a technical level, very professionally put together, with excellent action sequences and its locations well employed.  It also manages a good degree of suspense in the stalking sequence and features an effective, dream-like, flashback sequence.  While the dialogue is never going to win awards, an above average cast for this sort of film does their best to breathe some life into it.  Stuart Whitman, a perennial 'not quite first rank star', makes for a surprisingly effective leading man, pulling off the tough guy cop business, while still giving the character a more reasonable and sensitive side.  Martin Landau is suitably shifty as the plot's main red herring, a doctor who is prime suspect for the sister's murder, while Gayle Hunnicutt and Tisa Farrow do the best they can in somewhat underwritten roles.  Exploitation fixture John Saxon turns up as Whitman's partner and delivers his usual professionalism, perfectly pitching his performance at the right level for this kind of movie.  There's no doubt that Blazing Magnum is a decidedly odd film, its cross genre nature meaning that it is neither fish nor foul, cop thriller or giallo, but its hybrid nature results in a curiously enjoyable and memorable film.  Well packaged and decently paced, it still makes for an entertaining watch.

One of Those Weeks

I've had one of those weeks.  One that culminated in me spending most of today in bed, exhausted.  The positive side of this was that I slept through Rishi Sunak's visit to Crapchester.  But getting back to my week, apart from the fact that it has been freezing cold - even when I was inside with the heating turned up, I felt cold - I had car troubles that prevented me from getting to a medical appointment, (the cold had killed my battery, already weakened by a malfunctioning glow plug), I had to plough through a mountain of forms in relation to my work pension, before going down with a cold.  But hey, the car now has a new battery, (and new glow plugs at some time soon), my appointment has been rescheduled (I was on hold for half an hour just to tell the surgery that I couldn't make the original appointment), my pension forms sent off and the cold now on the wane after a day in bed.  All of the hassle, however, left me not feeling in the mood to make a proper post today.  So, here I am, moaning about my week instead.  I'm rounding out the week watching a seventies Italian crime film, (in English with Dutch sub-titles).  It's one of those Italian films that features various British and American actors, in order to give it international appeal.  James Mason, as a government official, is currently meeting a shifty looking Stephen Boyd, for instance,  I can only assume that this was another of those continental films that Mason made for money, on the assumption that nobody in the English-speaking world would ever see it.  For his part, Boyd was entering that late stage of his career where he didn't seem to care what he appeared in, so long as he got paid.

It has long been the case, of course, that prominent actors have done lucrative work for foreign markets that they probably wouldn't have done in their home countries for fear that it would undermine their credibility or artistic integrity.  TV adverts were once looked down on by 'legitimate' actors, but they did pay well, so US and UK actors would often go to Japan to film ads for local TV there, safe in the knowledge that they would never be shown in the US or Europe.  It was the same for those foreign language exploitation films: a good payday that few, if any, people would see back home - even if they had English language releases, they'd most likely by-pass most critics.  But then, along came home video with its insatiable need for material to release and these films started to turn up in video stores.  With the advent of the internet, all those foreign language TV commercials also started to become globally available. There was nowhere for the stars who made them to hide.  Their secrets were out.  By that time, though, times had changed and there was less snobbery in the acting profession - by the seventies even Lord Olivier was appearing in Harold Robbins adaptations.  TV work was no longer taboo for the upper echelons of the profession - even TV commercials.  Nowadays we have various Hollywood stars happily picking up pay cheques for UK TV ads for everything from insurance to Warburtons bread.  We indeed live in strange times when Arnold Schwarzenegger appears with animated meerkats to sell price comparison services and Robert de Niro sells bagels.

SF Impulse

Another from my modest collection of vintage magazines, this is the September 1966 issue of SF Impulse.  Originally titled Science Fantasy, then Impulse, this UK paperback-format science fiction and fantasy magazine was a companion to the better known and better remembered New Worlds science fiction magazine.  Impulse/SF Impulse was originally marketed as an entirely new title, replacing the previous Science Fantasy.  But, despite starting a new volume and issue numbering scheme, it was clear to everyone that it was simply a continuation of the old magazine.  Despite its title, Science Fantasy never really focused on fantasy rather than science fiction, but rather tended to run longer stories than its companion New Worlds.  In its original incarnation, the magazine first appeared in 1950, under the editorship of John Gillings.  From the third issue, it came under the editorship if John Carnell, who also edited New Worlds.  After Carnell stood down from both magazines in 1964, he was succeeded by Michael Moorcock at New Worlds and Kyril Bonfiglioli at Science Fantasy.

While New Worlds became the centre of the science fiction 'New Wave', Bonfiglioli focused Science Fantasy/Impulse/SF Impulse on new writers.  Unfortunately, the title changes and new direction resulted in falling sales.  Bonfiglioli, an art dealer in his 'day job', left the magazine in 1966, (he apparently discovered a valuable Renaissance painting and sold it for a handsome profit) - this was the last issue he edited.  He was succeeded, in rapid succession, by Harry Harrison and Keith Roberts.  But the magazine lasted only a further five issues under the new editorship, ceasing publication in February 1967.  Officially, it was combined with New Worlds, but nothing of SF Impulse was actually carried over into its sister, which continued publication long enough to see out the sixties, thanks to an Arts council grant.  Nowadays, both Science Fantasy and SF Impulse are, in my experience, easier and less expensive to obtain, usually in decent condition, than New Worlds, particularly the post 1964 incarnations of both magazines. While Moorcock on to become a celebrated writer of science fiction and fantasy novels, Bonfiglioli found some success writing crime novels, one of which was eventually filmed with Johnny Depp, (Moredcai).

More From the Loons

It appears that I was wrong about the Houthis - they aren't, as I assumed, a bunch of alien brigands menacing mankind whose occupation of part of Yemen has resulted in military strikes by the earth's combined military forces.  I was alerted to my error when I saw the term 'Hamas and The Houthis' trending on Twitter, (yeah, I know, Twitter, but I still can't quite kick the habit) - it became clear to me tat they were actually a musical act of some kind, supporting the well known Middle Eastern singer Hamas.  I should imagine that they end their performances by blowing up the venue and slaughtering their audience.  Especially if they are performing in Jerusalem.  (I know, I'm a fascist.  Again).  The sad thing is that there probably are people out there who actually believe this sort of thing, such are the levels of sheer ignorance on display on social media.  (As ever, of course, one should add the proviso that those who use social media are a relatively small proportion of the population and their views aren't necessarily representative of the wider population.  Moreover, those who are most vociferous on social media are themselves a small proportion of social media users and don't necessarily represent the views of the majority).  I mean, just look at this latest Twitter nonsense about 'Disease X' - a bunch of idiots have completely (and deliberately) misconstrued reports about preparations being made, in light of the experiences of the Covid pandemic, to be able to more rapidly develop new vaccines to combat any future new viruses, (ie 'Disease X'), to instead to try and spread misinformation and panic about government conspiracies to unleash new diseases on the world.  Because, obviously, that's the way to 'control' us all even more.

Then we have that hairy loon Neil Oliver spouting shit about 'turbo cancer', a non-existent condition that only effects those who have been vaccinated.  (I have to say here that if not being vaccinated turns you into a raving idiot who looks as if they've been living in a cave for the past four years, like Neil Oliver, then I'll take every shot on offer).  Of course, nothing can beat the absolute toss that some of those QAnon/MAGA freaks in the States sign up to, one of my favourites being that a pizza parlour was somehow a front for a Satanic paedophile network providing underage sex slaves to the entire (Democratic) Washington establishment.  All on the basis of no evidence whatsoever.  It fascinates me how some people can buy into such obvious nonsense.  But then again, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, they also still believe that Trump is a patriotic, clean living, honest as the day is long American and not a lying, traitorous scumbag fraudster who molests women.  But getting back to that pizza business, I'm left wondering if they would believe conspiracies centered on other fast-food franchises.  Could they be convinced that MacDonald's are practicing human sacrifice and using human flesh in their burgers?  At the start of every working day each branch's High Priest, dressed as Ronald MacDonald, slaughters a child to ensure a good day's training?  Could it be that MacDonald's are behind illegal immigrants flooding across border from Mexico, sourcing the meat for its products from them?  Then there's Burger King.  Do they practice occult rituals designed to summon up Cthulu and the Old Ones?  Are their burgers being prepared by things with tentacles?  Sure, I know its all a bit tame compared to their fantasies about paedophilia and pizza, but you never know, these fruitcakes are scarily gullible.

Edge of Sanity (1989)

Robert Louis Stevenson's 'The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' has to be one of the most filmed horror stories in the history of cinema, rivaling Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' for the number of versions made.  Consequently, the story had become over familiar, with film makers increasingly desperate to come up with variations of the novel's main theme.  Indeed, it was over familiar by the time Hammer had their first stab at the story with The Two faces of Dr Jekyll (1960), which gives us a taciturn reclusive Jekyll who turns, not into a monster, but a handsome (but cruel) playboy.  Hammer followed it up in 1971 with another variation, Dr Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971), which introduced a gender twist into the transformation.  Other variations have included a blaxploitation version. Dr Black, Mr Hyde (1976) and Paul Naschy's Dr Jekyll and the Werewolf (1971), which sees the good doctor's Grandson using his serum to transform Naschy not only into his usual werewolf alter ego, but also Hyde-like sadist.  Which might make you think that, by the late eighties, the trope was completely played out - what other variations could film makers introduce in order to make any new adaptations distinctive and original?  Veteran schlockmeister Harry Alan Towers' solution was to pretty much abandon the original novella, save for the central concept and main characters, fashioning a new plot which sees Hyde become Jack the Ripper in a Victorian slasher movie.  Just to ensure that this would be a 'different' re-telling of the story, Gerard Kikoine, an admirer of Jesus Franco and director of erotica, took the director's chair.  The result was Edge of Sanity (1989).

As a satisfactory re-imagining of 'Jekyll and Hyde', Edge of Sanity falls well short, but nonetheless has many merits in its own right.  What is immediately striking about the film is its look and style.  Despite being set in what appears to be Victorian London, (although, in reality, it was mainly shot in Hungary and anachronisms in costumes and props abound), it's look has much in common with eighties pop videos - lots of back-lighting, strange camera angles, smooth tracking shots and close ups of the main characters' faces.  The sets, particularly Jekyll's lab, frequently have an impressionistic feel to them, their decor employing a limited palette of contrasting colours.  The overall result of director Kikoine's efforts is quite striking and gives the film a frantic and off-kilter feel.  The use of such a contemporary style helps emphasis the fact that, to those living then, the Victorian era was perceived as a time of modernity and scientific and technical progress.  The 'modernistic' theme is carried over into the action of the film, with Jekyll administering his serum not through a syringe or by quaffing it from a foaming beaker, but instead by smoking it in something that looks like a crack pipe.  The drug-like nature of this substance is made clear, as Jekyll's transformations into Hyde seem increasingly motivated by his need for another 'hit' of the drug and the subsequent 'high' it gives him in the form of Hyde's increasingly depraved experiences.  Moreover, later on in the film, as Hyde, he starts 'addicting' others to the substance via that crack pipe.  

Inevitably, bearing in mind the film's provenance, Hyde's particular sexual proclivities are driven by Jekyll's own deeply repressed sexual hang ups which, we see in an opening prologue, are born from a childhood incident which inextricably linked, in his mind, the sex, violent punishment, humiliation and voyeurism.  Crucially, the film departs from both the source novella and most other film versions, which present Hyde as being an expression of a primitive part of the personality so deeply sublimated that it never emerges consciously.  In Edge of Sanity, however, Hyde represents a part of the personality that is inextricably linked with the conscious mind, that is ever present, lurking only just below the surface, needing only the slightest catalyst to trigger it into being.  This is made explicit near the film's climax when Jekyll looks into a mirror and hallucinates the highlights of Hyde's depravities, but with Jekyll in place of Hyde, making clear that, in reality, there is no Hyde as a separate entity, it is all Jekyll.  Hyde is merely a persona through which Jekyll can enact his barely repressed fantasies of sex and violence.  Which, of course, puts a whole new light on the apparently saintly Dr Jekyll's work with the poor, most specifically with 'fallen women' - he might rationalise his motivation as being purely altruistic but, in truth, it is much darker.

Overall, Edge of Sanity lives up to its title as the film comes over as utterly bonkers, thanks, in no small part, to Anthony Perkins' performance as Jekyll and Hyde.  While he brings his trademark twitchiness and sense of awkwardness to Jekyll, his Hyde is completely insane: a leering, wild eyed and pasty faced sexual sadist, hell bent on taking the rest of the world with him on his demented ride.  He achieves the latter by forcing those who don't participate directly to watch, in an act of voyeuerism, thereby making them complicit.  After all, according to the film's own rationale, he is only enacting what they themselves really desire, but won't consciously admit to wanting.  Coming late in his career, (he would be dead within a couple of years), Perkins embraces his dual role with relish, cutting, slashing and raping his way through Victorian London.  The rest of the cast echo the theme of duality, with the actors playing the denizens of 'respectable' society giving relatively restrained performances, while those playing characters operating on the 'dark side' - madams, prostitutes, gigolos, etc - giving suitably outlandish playings of their characters.  

Edge of Sanity has endured a somewhat poor reputation, more often than not dismissed as cheap and tasteless exploitation.  More recent years, however, have seen it reappraised in some quarters.  Indeed, seen today, its good points are easier to see - the production design, lighting, stylish direction and enjoyably over-the-top performances give it the air of a far more expensive and classy production.  Its lapses, such as the evisceration of the source novella, are easier to forgive as, in retrospect, some of what it comes up with to replace this material is interesting and surprisingly thoughtful.  Of course, its main 'innovation', the conflation of Hyde with Jack the Ripper isn't really that original, Hammer's Dr Jekyll and Sister Hyde had pulled the same trick - although neither film's versions of the Ripper's murders bear any real resemblance to the events of the actual Whitechapel Murders.  Despite the art house look and psychological trappings of its script, Edge of Sanity never loses sight of the fact that it is an exploitation film, providing the viewer with gallons of gore, aces of bare female flesh and plenty of perversity.  What it lacks, though, is much in the way of suspense, tension or even simply pure shock sequences.  Its pace is too languid, matching its look, for it to work satisfactorily as a thriller.  That said, it is still a lot of fun, for Perkins' performance if nothing else, coming over like the bastard child of Ken Russell (prostitutes dressed as nuns is a recurring motif) and Jesus Franco. Edge of Sanity might not be particularly satisfactory as either an adaptation of 'Jekyll and Hyde' or as a Jack the Ripper thriller, but it remains a fascinating oddity that can be surprisingly rewarding to watch.

Attack of the Houthis

Apparently, we're retaliating against the Houthis.  They sound like they might be some alien tribe - space nomads who have been raiding the earth, abducting our women and molesting our cattle.  It is great that the West is finding ever more exotic enemies to fight with, rather than those boring and commonplace Iraqis, Russians, Libyans and Chinese.  The Houthis definitely sound as if they might have four arms and green skin and possibly ride around on strange alien beasts with six legs and big teeth.  Frankly, if they really have been going around disintegrating innocent earth people or stealing their brains or whatever else it is these aliens do, then they fully deserve to have the might of earth's military ranged against them.  It's all very well all those middle class virtue signallers going on about how we should 'Stop the War' and not kill alien larvae on social media, but they aren't the one who have had to suffer the alien attiacks.  Believe me, if they were the ones getting buggered by four armed aliens with barbed penises, they'd be singing a different tune.  But no, despite the aliens being the ones committing atrocities these 'peaceniks' are all waving their arms around and wailing about how we should just let the aliens invade and then resist them peacefully.  Yeah, keep resisting as they inject they're eggs into our till living bodies and use us as incubators, they're growing offspring slowly eating us alive, from the inside out.  

Still, while I might not be entirely clear as to who or what the Houthis are, exactly, you can guarantee that there are a horde of people out there on social media willing to educate me on the subject.  Not that they'd ever heard of the Houthis before last week themselves, but in spite of this, they are now experts on the subject and prepared to share their wisdom with the world.  Just like they did when they were instant experts on Covid, US elections, the war in Ukraine and the Gaza crisis.  That 'wisdom', inevitably, will be that the Western nations are all bastard oppressors, that the Houthis are entirely innocent, it's all Israel's fault and that if you support, or at the very least, don't denounce unreservedly, the current action against the Houthis, then you are a fascist.  Personally, I don't feel it necessary to have an opinion on every ongoing conflict currently going on in the world.  I just don't have enough facts about most of them to form an opinion.  But with regard to this business with the Houthis, I would point out that, whatever their grievances with the government of Yemen, (see, I have been paying attention to the news), I'm not entirely sure how harassing and hijacking international shipping is advancing their cause in this regard.  I'd also point out that surely the innocent civilian seamen crewing the merchant ships under threat have the right to expect some kind of protection from the nations under which their ships are registered and/or owned?  Just a thought.  OK, I know - I'm a fascist.

House of Horrors (1946)

For the sake of completeness, this is the trailer for House of Horrors (1946), the Universal B-movie that preceded The Brute Man (1946), which I looked at a while ago.  Although released first, thereby providing 'The Creeper' with his debut appearance, (although Rondo Hatton had played similar characters in other B-movies, most notably the 'Hoxton Creeper' in the 1944 Sherlock Holmes film Pearl of Death), there is nothing in either film to indicate which is meant to occur, chronologically, first.  The Brute Man is sometimes cited as being a prequel to House of Horrors, as it includes an origin story for 'The Creeper'.  This, however, is presented as a flashback, so the main action of the film could still occur after the previous film.  Moreover, the second film ends with 'The Creeper' being arrested, whereas the first opens with him crawling out the river.  Likewise, the first film ends with him being shot, yet at the beginning of the second, he is still at large.

Of course, Universal B-movie series were never big on continuity between entries.  Just look at the way the location for the events of the mummy movies shift around - they start in New England, but by the last film we're down in the Louisiana bayou, with the locals recounting the earlier events as if they had always happened down there.  Timelines also become confused in these series - both the mummy and the Frankenstein films sometimes like to ascribe the events of their immediate predecessors as having taken place several decades earlier, despite the fact that they had clearly taken place in what was then the present day.  But back to House of Horrors, despite being made on a shoestring budget, it still contrives to look slicker than its successor.  It also boasts the presence of Martin Kosleck, a character actor who specialised in playing creeps, here portraying a crazy sculptor who tries to use 'The Creeper' for his own nefarious purposes.  That said, it's still bargain basement stuff from the dying days of Universal's B-movie unit, (it was resurrected in the fifties, as the studio found that focusing on 'upmarket' pictures wasn't necessarily a guarantee of financial success).  It's exploitation of Rondo Hatton's acromegaly is also just as exploitative and tasteless as it was in The Brute Man.

'We Saved The Niagara's Gold'

Some recent reading matter.  This is one of the batch of twenty three issues of Wide World that I got cheaply on eBay last year, (they cover Feb to Dec 62 and all of 1964).  This is the September 1962 issue, which I've recently been reading.  A British men's magazine, Wide World, like its US equivalents, claimed that the adventure stories it published were all true.  Obviously, this is something I've always been sceptical about, especially as many of the stories seem either somewhat far fetched, or too generic.  To be fair to Wide World, a fair number of their stories are actually extracts or condensations of non-fiction books, giving them a degree of veracity.  This is certainly the case with regard to the cover story on this issue: 'We Saved Niagara's Gold'.  This is a lengthy extract from the biography of a renowned deep sea diver who had been involved in the recovery of gold bullion from the sunken liner SS Niagara during World War Two.  From the, fairly cursory, research I've done on the subject, the story seems to be pretty accurate in its details of the actual incident.  Even the striking cover painting has a basis in fact - the Niagara had been sunk by a German mine, one of a field laid by a German merchant raider, which the crew of the salvage ship also had to contend with, including one which, as illustrated had to be disentangled from the ship's anchor chain by a diver.

The rest of the stories in the issue are a typical mix of outdoors adventure stories, daring escapades and encounters with savage natives, from around the world.  (At this time, Wide World's contents list preceded story titles with their location - 'New Zealand - We Saved Niagara's Gold', for instance).  They include a Cold War story involving a train bound escape from East Germany, another Cold War related tale involving a British merchant ship's voyage behind the Iron Curtain to a remote Soviet port, an outdoors ranching story set in Canada (which is one of a series, all of which sound like apocryphal tall tales to me), an Aboriginal uprising in Australia, a tale of daring early aviators in the states, an historical story from South America, (which again reads like an apocryphal story) and a story of a daring airborne escape in Liberia.  A new feature for this issue was the addition of an editorial ahead of the stories, which effectively provides a digest of various relevant developments in the real world and updates on the adventures of previous contributors.  All-in-all a pretty typical issue of Wide World during this era.  The stories themselves also are written in a style typical of male-orientated fiction for this era - full of stiff upper lipped masculine heroes unshakably confident of the superiority of the white middle class male over foreign johnnies, natives and women.  It's all, by today's standards, quite amusing to encounter these attitudes, born of an Imperial glory that, even by the time they were written, had long ago faded into dust, frozen in time.   That said, the stories are often full of interesting detail and, the ones actually based on fact at least, often throw light on some now forgotten historical incidents.

Toomorrow (1970)

For many years Toomorrow (1970) was, in effect, a 'lost' film, pretty much unavailable to the public after having played for only seven days in London in 1970, (apart from an isolated screening in LA in 2000).  Much of the continued interest in the film, despite its unavailability, is the fact that it represents the feature film debut of Olivia Newton-John, (she had previously appeared in an Australian TV film musical).  But her appearance in Toomorrow isn't as the solo artist she was to become known as, but rather as the lead singer of the short-lived group 'Toomorrow'.  If you've never heard of the group, then that isn't surprising, as this self-titled film was supposed to be their debut.  Apart from the little seen film, the only other evidence of their existence is the movie's accompanying soundtrack LP and two singles which didn't much trouble the charts, also released in 1970.  'Toomorrow' were, like the 'Monkees', a manufactured pop group, created by Don Kirshner and while the 'Monkees' had been launched and publicised via an eponymous TV series, the plan was to launch 'Toomorrow' through this eponymous movie.  

Co-produced by Jame Bond co-producer Harry Saltzman and with a 'zany' style tapping into the UK youth culture of the late sixties, not to mention a then fashionable space based plot (the first moon landing had been in 1969 and the US space programme was still in full swing), on paper, at least, Toomorrow had all the ingredients to be a success.  To be fair, it wasn't withdrawn from cinemas because it was a critical, financial or popular failure, (it wasn't in cinemas long enough for audiences to be able to make up their minds as to its merits), but rather due to a legal dispute.  Not only had Kirshner reportedly fallen out with Saltzman over the direction of the project but, most crucially, neither director Val Guest nor other members of the production crew, been paid for their work on the film.  Guest consequently took out an injunction preventing the movie's further distribution until he and the crew had been paid.  He apparently never was, so the film stayed in the vaults until a DVD release was licensed by Guest's estate in 2012.

Having finally seen this version, the question is, of course, is Toomorrow actually any good?  The first thing to note is that the version released on DVD is of pretty low quality, looking as if it has been transferred from a video tape and it is in mono rather than stereo.  If you can get past the slightly fuzzy, low resolution, picture and the flat sound, though, the film does have some points of interest.  Like all movies of its era, it captures a snapshot of late sixties London youth culture, complete with student protests, although the protest that plays a central pat in the film's plot is of the peaceful type, involving sit ins and lots of marching around with placards, rather than the violent kind that gripped many campuses at this time.  We also get an intriguing look at the 'Roundhouse' venue and a very vivid portrayal of typical student accommodation of the time - the sort of grotty accommodation I remember my older sister living in when she moved to London in the early seventies: a decaying Edwardian town house crudely subdivided into tiny bedrooms with shared cooking and bathing facilities, with integral peeling paint and damp.  The students themselves, as is usual in such films, are all far too old to be at art college, (even Olivia Newton-John was in her early twenties), not to mention too clean cut.  'Toomorrow' themselves are carefully constructed to cover as wide a demographic as possible: the pretty Australian girl singer, the American guitarist, the, as we'd say nowadays, geeky British keyboard player and the black American drummer.  Just like 'The Monkees', they all use their real names as character names and all, despite their individual quirks, are essentially inoffensive.  Even the womanising guitarist, who's knocking off one of his lecturers as well as just about any other girl who crosses his path.

Also like 'The Monkees', 'Toomorrow' were intended to be a multimedia phenomena, their music embedded in a series of 'whacky' adventures of the sort that sixties and early seventies youth indulged in, (or so middle aged TV, music and film producers supposed).  Hence, the film Toomorrow has them involved with aliens.  Indeed, the film opens quite strikingly, with a pillar of light moving across London early in the morning, finally halting in the garden of a large house, where it is used by the occupant to 'beam up' to a flying saucer.  On arriving, the apparently human occupant takes off his skin, to reveal that, like the saucer's other occupants, he too is an alien.  Whereupon, we have the plot laid out for us, as it turns out the newly 'beamed up' alien is an observer who has been on earth for thousands of years, who wearily informs his compatriots that nothing has changed and that mankind has still made no worthwhile steps toward maturity.  He is, however, told that their race, the Alphoids, are becoming immune to the 'cosmic vibrations' which are essential for their existence, but that a new type of harmonic vibration has been detected on earth. Needless to say, it comes from the music of 'Toomorrow', most specifically from an electronic instrument made by that geeky keyboard player, called a 'tonaliser'.

With the plot this set up, the rest of the film involves the efforts of the aliens to abduct the band in order for them to play to the universe, interspersed with the band's own attempts to get to a pop festival at the 'Roundhouse', where they have been booked as a last minute replacement act, all the while being distracted by their various romantic entanglements and the ongoing student protest at their college.  While it is clear that the intent was for the film's action to evoke not just 'The Monkees' TV show, but also the earlier 'Beatles' films, most specifically Help!, in truth they reminded me more of some the early seventies children's TV series and Children's Film Foundation films that used to turn up on British TV.  In particular, much of it reminded me of The Double Deckers, albeit with an older cast.  That said, it is all well staged and the effects work is pretty good for this kind of film and era.  In particular, the scenes aboard the flying saucer are surprisingly effective, with some striking production design, while aliens themselves are surprisingly effective. Nonetheless, they feel jarring in comparison with the depictions of the band's regular antics, as if two different films have been awkwardly cut together.  It is all directed with the smooth professionalism one would expect from a veteran director like Guest, (who, while never a 'big name' or critically lauded director, had enjoyed successes across a wide range of genres, from Hammer films in the fifties -including the first two Quatermass adaptations - to spy thrillers in the sixties and even sex comedies in the seventies), who moves it all along at a good pace, juggling the various elements thrown up by his own script quite deftly.

Some of the plot elements do seem to come from left-field though, often giving the impression that their main function is to pad out the running time.  This is particularly true of the sub-plot involving 'Johnson', the alien in female form, (to whom all men look alike), that the observer sends to distract the keyboardist from his romantic complications with his ballerina girl friend, (but not before familiarising her with earth mating customs by taking her to see several sex movies that 'she' finds hilarious).  While these scenes are, undeniably, amusing, they are also pretty much superfluous.  'Johnson' is played Margaret Nolan, a familiar face to sixties and seventies audiences, appearing in a number of Carry On films, not to mention Goldfinger, invariably playing the sort of sexy blonde temptresses she parodies here.  She is one of a number of familiar faces whose performances enhance Toomorrow immensely:  Rot Dotrice is excellent as 'John Williams', the alien observer, gradually loosening up to embrace youth culture as the film progresses, while Imogen Hassell is the ballerina girl friend, Tracy Crisp - in contrast to her usual roles - is a music lecturer and Roy Marsden is unrecognisable as the alien Alpha.  Also to be seen amongst the student body are Diane Keane and Shakira Caine.  While the supporting cast are unusually strong, the film's biggest asset is undoubtedly Olivia Newton-John: beautiful, talented, sweet and likeable, she has magnetic screen presence.  Indeed, by comparison, the rest of the band are bland and easily forgettable, despite the script's attempts to give them distinct characters, (only drummer Karl Chambers, of the other three, went on to a successful musical career, working with the likes of Gladys Knight and other Philadelphia based acts; keyboardist Vic Cooper seems to have vanished without trace, while guitarist Benny Thomas later enjoyed some success as an actor in US daytime soap operas).

In the final analysis, while Toomorrow is an enjoyable enough film, its problem is that it is entirely inoffensive and has no real feel for the actual youth culture of its era.  Which is hardly surprising as, like many other 'youth' orientated pictures, it was made by middle aged men whose idea of 'modern' music was jazz, (supposedly 'turned on' young characters in seventies exploitation films frequently listen to jazz, hang out in jazz clubs and attend jazz festivals).  In fact, its attitude to actual youth culture becomes apparent early on when, confronted with his first look at 'Toomorrow', the observer cynically comments that they are far too clean looking to succeed.  Which is why it is questionable whether the group would ever have enjoyed musical success in the seventies, even if the film had been released properly - popular music was changing rapidly as the seventies dawned, with stuff like heavy rock, prog rock and glam rock gaining ground.  'Toomorrow;, on the basis of what we see and hear of them in the film, seemed just too inoffensive and middle of the road to make any real impact.  There's nothing really distinctive about them.  Which isn't surprising, as they were a manufacture band embedded in a film presenting a manufactured and sterilised version of sixties youth culture.   As I said, Toomorrow is enjoyable in its own way, but its constant juggling of different genres is not only distracting but also self defeating as it never feels satisfying as either a science fiction musical or a 'madcap' pop adventure along the lines of Help! or The Monkees TV series.

Right Wing Fantasy Island

Apparently Aaron Spelling's exasperated pitch to ABC for Fantasy Island, after several other series proposals had been rejected, was 'What do you want? An island that people can go to and all of their sexual fantasies will be realized?'  Which I'm assuming was also the pitch that those behind all those crazed conspiracy fantasies that currently pass for political discourse amongst the US right-wing made to the crackpots for their ultimate utterly ridiculous masturbatory fantasy.  And so 'Epstein Island' was born.  That mystical place where plane loads of liberals and celebrities are flown to in order that mysterious millionaire Mr Roarke, sorry Epstein, can make their most perverted sexual fantasies come true.  Perhaps Donald Trump was there acting as his sidekick Tattoo, shouting 'It's the plane!' before waddling over to Epstein to greet that week's tranche of guests.  (Because, of course, that's the only rational explanation as to how Trump's name appears on passenger lists for Epstein's private jet - he was merely an employee following orders).  Yes indeed, with that 'Epstein List', (actually simply a list of everyone mentioned in a court case related to Epstein, with no indication that any of them are actually guilty, let alone accused, of any wrong doing), which the right-wing nutters have been wanking themselves silly over on social media this past week, we know that they were all there partaking in underage orgies.  Even Stephen Hawking.  Now, to most rational human beings, the inclusion of his name on this so called 'list' is confirmation that the majority of the great and the good who were wooed by Epstein, were there to boost his ego by association and to help him try to spread his influence by offering to 'assist' them with various charitable, scientific or humanitarian projects.  

I mean, what the fuck do you thing Hawking would have been able to actually do in terms of sexual depravity?  Such a question doesn't deter the demented, of course, who all started screaming that he could have been a voyeur, getting his kicks from simply watching kiddies being sexually abused.  Obviously, bearing in mind that in Fantasy Island Mr Roarke was apparently able to perform supernatural miracles in order to allow his guests to fulfill their fantasies, even temporarily giving them superhuman powers in some cases, maybe Epstein was similarly able to temporarily restore Hawking to full health.  Or perhaps he was able to temporarily transfer his mind to the body of some strapping male porn star.  Then again, perhaps he was simply able to create a 'sex machine' which would do the deed while transmitting all the sensations directly into Hawking's mind - if it was successful, Hawking would doubtless have been doing 'donuts' in his electric wheelchair, while his electronic voice box blared like a ship's horn.  But, in reality, he was most likely simply the guest of a shady millionaire business man trying to gain influence.  As were the majority of the other people being linked with Epstein.  Not that I'm denying that Epstein was involved in criminal activity, including procuring girl, possibly underage, for some rich clients.  But, in reality, the likes of Epstein often spend a lot of time making out sure that they are seen to be associated with all manner of other politician, industrialists, businessmen and celebrities - not only is it a way to get access to influential people, it also generates great publicity.  Best of all, it provides a sort of insurance: while the contacts might be quite innocent, their association with Epstein means that if he runs into trouble over his shadier activities, they will likely be implicated too.  Which, in theory, would mean that they would move to head off any investigations before they became public.  At least that, I'm sure, is what Epstein hoped, but the real world rarely works that smoothly.

But hey, no matter how crazed all the 'Epstein Island' bunk might sound to the rational, it has got the right-wing freaks foaming at the mouth.  They love it because it all seems to play into their own fantasies that anyone who doesn't stand somewhere to the right of Adolf Hitler is a depraved murderer and peadophile.  It gives them licence, they think, to spin all kinds of wild allegations about public figures they don't like on the basis of no evidence whatsoever.  What fascinates me is just how depraved and warped some of the activities they ascribe others actually are - what kind of mind can come up with such fantasies?  Is this whole Epstein affair some kind of mass projection of the extreme right's own darkest and most repressed fantasies onto their enemies?  Are they just disappointed that they weren't the ones allegedly being invited to Epstein's version of Fantasy Island?

The Brute Man (1946)

Its opening credits might announce itself as a PRC movie, but there is no doubt that The Brute Man (1946) is really a Universal production, from the presence of Jean Yarborough in the director's chair and Ben Pivar producing, to the over familiar sets and Hans J Salter's musical score.  A quick follow up to House of Horrors (1946), the film was sold to PRC following Universal's decision to cease B-movie production, (the studio was also, reportedly, concerned to avoid charges that it was exploiting star Rondo Hatton, who died before the film could be released).  Whatever the official reasons for Universal washing its hands of The Brute Man, there's no doubt that it is a dismal film: depressing and downbeat, with no real heroes and a 'monster' whose brutality precludes any audience sympathy for him, despite the script's attempts to give him an origin story and a supposedly redeeming relationship with a blind girl, (who turns him into the cops, regardless).  It is easy to see why a studio desperately trying to create an new, upmarket, image wouldn't want to be associated with such a film. The Brute Man was the last of a cycle of Universal B-movies that sought to exploit Rondo Hatton's acromegaly, which, as it progressed, gave him an ever more misshapen appearance, distorting both his body and face.  Usually cast as the main villain's thuggish heavy, in films such as The Pearl of Death (1944), Jungle Captive (1945) and The Spider Woman Strikes Back (1945), his last two films saw him take on the mantle of lead 'monster', playing a brutish criminal known as 'The Creeper', whose favoured method of murder is to break his victims' backs.

There was a certain logic to Universal promoting a man suffering real-life disfigurement as its new monster at this time.  With real life horrors perpetrated by very human monsters during the 1940s, as World War Two raged, Universal's pantheon of fantasy monsters - Frankenstein's Monster, Wolfman, Dracula, Mummy and Invisible Man, seemed far less relevant and horrifying to audiences.  With their cycle of films effectively winding down in 1945, with House of Dracula, it doubtless seemed to Universal executives that replacing them with a very human monster of the kind that you might find lurking around contemporary cities, therefore easily relatable to for audiences, was a natural next step.  But it also represented very poor taste, something noted at the time by critics and audiences. Not that that would stop film makers from continuing to exploit the physically handicapped and sick for shock value in cheap horror films - just look at the way dwarves and midgets, for instance, continued to be portrayed as evil, simply because they were 'different', to recent times.  Of course, it certainly didn't help that the films featuring 'The Creeper' were desperately cheap and depressing affairs.  The main asset of both House of Horrors and The Brute Man is the creepy, noir-like atmosphere and 'late night' feel that director Jean Yarborough managed to bring to both.  But while the first film in this putative series, House of Horrors, was, by comparison, a relatively slick affair, The Brute Man, running at less than hour, feels perfunctory, giving the impression that it is made up of scenes and script fragments left over from its predecessor, roughly and arbitrarily assembled.  Unlike House of Horrors, which throws the audience straight into the plot and has 'The Creeper' being used as a pawn in someone else's schemes, The Brute Man puts him front and centre, bogging itself down in a turgid revenge story as he tries to kill those he holds responsible for his disfigurement.

The film does have its moments - the murder of a delivery boy, for instance, provides a jolting shock and top-billed Tom Neal has only a couple of scenes before being rather casually killed off - but they aren't enough to sustain it as a thriller.  The paucity of its plot is highlighted by the amount of padding, in the form of flashbacks and the whole blind girl sub-plot, the film requires to bulk out its running time.  The nearest thing to a sympathetic character the film can muster is the blind girl, (played by Jane Adams in probably the movie's best performance), although her decision to turn 'The Creeper' in feels abrupt and seems to require little in the way of moral qualms on her part.  The flashbacks explaining how 'The Creeper' came to become disfigured do nothing to recast him as a tragic victim - even as a young and handsome student he is a jealous jerk with a violent temper.  They also do nothing to make his victims seem sympathetic - they too, in their younger versions, come across as insufferably smug jerks who become even more insufferable as they grow older.  Not even the police can manage to provide any kind of moral lead, with the chief detectives seemingly disinterested in carrying out any investigations, instead just waiting for 'The Creeper' to strike again, in the hope of catching him.  As for 'The Creeper' himself, it is painful to watch a clearly ill Hatton, (who died shortly after filming was completed), stumbling through his role, struggling to speak his lines and barely able to perform the physical exertions the part required.  It just adds to the overall air of misery that hangs over The Brute Man and leaves you wondering how much worse any further sequels might have been, had the series not been cut mercifully short by Hatton's death.

The Student Teachers (1973)

Part of New World Pictures' early seventies cycle of sex comedies kicked off by their 'Nurse' films, The Student Teachers (1973) applies the same, successful, formula to the world of education.  Switching out trainee nurses for trainee teachers, the film follows the adventures of three new entrants to their profession, setting up three storylines which intersect at various points.  As with the 'Nurse' films, much of the plot involves the conflict caused by their attempts to pursue new, progressive, methods in the face of the staid conservatism of their profession's establishment.  One storyline involves student teacher Rachel (Susan Damante) and her attempts to run after school sex education classes, having found the official curriculum on the subject to be inadequate.  Another follows art teacher Tracy (Brook Mills) as she tries to persuade the school to accept photography as a legitimate art form to be taught, while Jody (Brenda Sutton) becomes involved in a community education project for drop out kid, employing a Vietnam vet turned hippie biker to help with teaching duties.  All, of course, find their efforts opposed by the authorities.  Rachel's sex education classes are condemned, particularly by the school's Coach, as being immoral and are blamed for a series of rapes of female students.  Tracy also doubles as a nude model for her art teacher boyfriend, (who is skeptical as to the artistic merits of photography), and finds her topless posing the subject of some voyeuristic secret photography on the part of one of her students,  Faced with a lack of finance for the community project, Jody sets up a drug deal that is part of an elaborate scheme to steal the local drug king pin's money in order to fund the project.

The mixing of sex, nudity and humour, with each story also taking in some darker turns before an upbeat resolution, was typical of the 'Nurse' franchise.  Indeed, it was the formula that producer Roger Corman insisted upon - the directors and writers of each individual film had considerable leeway in terms of style, content and plot, provided that they included three main storylines encompassing the aforementioned elements.  In the case of The Student Teachers, director and co-writer Johnathon Kaplan, (who would go on to enjoy critical and popular success with 'legitimate' films like The Accused (1988), Love Field (1992) and Brokedown Palace (1990)), juggles the stories quite deftly, managing their intersections in order to ensure that they don't feel disconnected.  Tracy's voyeuristic photography student proves instrumental in unmasking the rapist, the revelation of whose identity vindicates Rachel and clears her sex education classes of blame, for instance, while the climax of Jody's story - the fake drug deal - (which also serves as the movie's climax), involves all three main characters.  There's nothing particularly unexpected or wholly original in The Student Teachers, but it is very neatly put together and entertainingly executed, with generally likeable (if variable) performances from the cast and a decent pace.  Seen at this distance in time, the most striking thing about The Student Teachers is that significant elements of its storylines are once again relevant, with various aspects of sex education and even art history once again under attack in the US education system, particularly in Republican run states.  The identity of the rapist in the film should perhaps give pause for thought for those supporting such reactionary policies.

New Year, New Schlock

First post of a new year - there's a part of me that always feels that it should be something, well, significant. Some statement of intent for the year to come, perhaps? A laying out of plans for my 2024 agenda, maybe?  A list of resolutions or objectives?  The trouble is that, these days, I just don't make those sorts of long-range plans.  To be honest, I never have.  But I'm at an age now when the futility of doing such things is all too obvious - there are far too many variables and unknowns that can blow you off course.  Besides, I've always liked to have a degree of spontaneity in my life, to just see what happens rather than try to force events with excessive planning.  I find it much less stressful not to have plans and schedules to adhere to - just see what turns up, instead.  But here we are in a New Year, I suppose that I should say something about my plans for here, even if only for the immediate future.  Basically, it's more of the same: I've already racked up a number of schlock movie viewings over Christmas to provide material for posts, (I watched two today alone - science fiction musical Toomorrow (1970) and an obscure (here in the UK, at least) Terence Hill spaghetti western).  Doubtless, other things will grab my attention and create new minor obsessions for me - and material for this blog.  These could take any form: a new film genre, perhaps, or maybe some aspect of pop culture entirely new to me.  (There have actually been a number of such minor obsessions this past year, which I've refrained from inflicting upon this blog).  Who knows?

But talking of the New Year, I was watching the BBC coverage of the fireworks last night, when it occurred to me how London-centric it all was, (unless you were in Scotland, of course, in which case you got all that Hogmany bollocks instead).  After all, London couldn't have been the only place in England to have fireworks going off in celebration of the New Year, now could it?  I mean, the BBC seem very keen to shunt its news coverage off to Salford, so why can't they show someone else's firework display in the name of regionalism?  They could have come here, to Crapchester and televise ours.  Not that there was any kind of organised municipal display in the park, you understand (the local council is too cheap to organise such a thing).  But they could have sent a roving crew aroubd to catch people letting rockets off from their back gardens, stuffing bangers through their neighbours' letterboxes or sticking lit Roman Candles between their arse cheeks.  Still, if we had had an official display, I'm sure tat, like London's, it could have illustrated some notable occurrences in the the town's recent history, like that time Chicken Kong, the twelve foot tall mutant rooster and world's crappest giant monster, attacked the bus station and damaged the upholstery on the number twenty seven bus when he pecked at it.  Or some our noted bizarre murders, including a dead monk in a suitcase, a dismembered body in an oven and two buggerings to death with strap ons in a local brothel.  We might not have the 'London Eye' to engulf in flame and explosions for a finale, but we could always blow up the local sewage treatment plant and send flaming turds streaking across the sky.  I'm sure it would be very popular if televised by the BBC.