Embassy (1972)

Embassy (1972) is a far more typical Gordon Hessler movie than The Last Shot You Hear (1970), which I looked at recently.  Whereas that film was static and slow moving, Embassy is a far freer flowing film, with a good pace and plenty of well staged action scenes and interesting dialogue.  Interestingly, the two films have a link other than Hessler's direction - Embassy was co-scripted, from a Stephen Coulter novel - by William Fairchild, whose play, 'The Sound of Murder', The Last Shot You Hear was based upon.  Embassy also boasts a decent cast, headlined by Richard Roundtree who, thanks to success of Shaft (1971), was very much in vogue at the time.  Ray Milland, Max von Sydow, Chuck Connors and Broderick Crawford also feature prominently.   It also has a relatively exotic location in Beirut, (back in the late sixties and early seventies, the then not-so-war-torn Lebanon provided locations for a number of spy thrillers and action films), which Hessler uses to good advantage, staging several chase sequences on its streets, contrasting the cosmopolitan nature of its main thoroughfares with the run down side streets and back alleys as his camera follows the action through both.  The film's main setting, though, is the US embassy in Beirut, (the source novel, apparently, was set in Paris), with the bulk of its running time taking place within its walls or precincts.  The script is very sleekly structured, rarely allowing any deviations from its main plot, which it pursues relentlessly, with a minimum of distractions for love interests or other sub-plots.

The plot itself is fairly straightforward for an espionage thriller: a high level Soviet defector, von Sydow, pursued by the KGB, seeks shelter in the US embassy in Beirut.  There CIA officer Roundtree conflicts with his superior as to whether the information von Sydow holds is valuable enough to risk a diplomatic incident over by giving him asylum.  While Roundtree wins the support of the ambassador (Milland), a KGB agent disguised as a US air force officer (Connors) is, despite the efforts of embassy security chief Broderick, already penetrating the embassy.  While Connors is detained, it isn't before he has seriously wounded von Sydow, with the rest of the plot concerned with Roundtree's efforts to keep von Sydow alive and somehow get him out of the embassy to the airport and a US military transport, while Connors makes repeated attempts to escape and finish his job.  A complicating factor arises from the fact that Connors has killed a local Lebanese embassy official and the local police, knowing only that von Sydow has entered the building, believe that he is the culprit and are waiting for him to emerge in order to arrest him.  As this is a seventies movie, it is, of course, shot through with cynicism, with Roundtree's character disillusioned with the realpolitik of the world's of intelligence and diplomacy.  He hopes that, by helping von Sydow's character defect to the west, he can restore some of his faith in the idea that he is on the 'right' side and that the west are the 'good guys' in the Cold War.  Again, being a seventies movie, it inevitably ends with a cynical twist.

To Hessler's credit, he never allows the sub-text of Roundtree's moral disillusionment to detract from the action: it serves its purpose as character motivation, but never overwhelms the plot.  Instead, he keeps the action moving from one set piece to another, with restless camera work making even static dialogue scenes feel dynamic.  Performances are uniformly good, with von Sydow's defector, constantly frustrated by the bureaucracy and paranoia he finds in the embassy, particularly memorable.  Connors also makes an impression as the utterly relentless and ruthless KGB assassin, never betraying a trace of compassion, let alone emotion.  While not being a top rank thriller, Embassy is an efficient, well made movie with an intelligent that doesn't drag and packs a lot into ninety minutes.

Monster Markets

Those Trump tariffs, eh?  Who'd have thought that slapping massive and arbitrarily calculated tariffs on each and every one of your trading partners would trigger massive stock market crashes around the globe?  Apparently, the Japanese reckon that the Tokyo exchanges have seen their biggest losses since the last time Godzilla attacked Japan.  Obviously, the rest of the world is contemplating the appropriate retaliatory action to take against the US, with Japan considering unleashing its monsters against the US West Coast.  As I understand it, this will be a staged process, with them starting off with a single giant monster, one of the lesser ones with Angorus, perhaps, sent to destroy San Diego.  If that doesn't result in a lifting of tariffs, then they are prepared to escalate, sending Godzilla and Mothra against LA, with Gidorah, Gigan and Mecha-Godzilla held ready to target San Francisco if that doesn't work.  If the Americans remain stubborn, then the Japanese are prepared to spread the monster chaos across the whole US, starting with sending Rodan to crap on Chicago and Detroit.  Ultimately, Hedorah could be sent against New York, with Ebirah already positioned off of the East Coast to disrupt incoming shipping.  The Japanese government are confident that this constitutes a potentially far more rewarding strategy than imposing counter tariffs, which the US would respond to with counter counter tariffs.  But you can't counter a monster attack in kind.  Or can you?

With all those 'tech bros' on side, could the Trump administration find a way to counter a Japanese monster attack by enlarging the president himself to giant size, in order to slug it out with the likes of Godzilla?  Perhaps they could try feeding him irradiated burgers in an attempt to mutate him to giant size, or just invent an enlarging machine, a bit like a matter transmitter, except that it reassembles the subject's molecules on a huge scale.  I mean, if Elon Musk truly is the genius he claims to be, this surely shouldn't be beyond his capabilities, should it?  But would a single giant Trump be enough to beat off hordes of giant Japanese monsters?  After all, despite being giant sized, he wouldn't have powers like Godzilla's radioactive breath, for instance.  Although, of course, if he farted in the wrong direction, he could take out the whole of Orange County.  But it would surely be prudent to also create a giant Pete Hegseth, say, to drunkenly brawl with Jet Jaguar, or a giant J D Vance to stand on the sidelines and egg giant Trump on to punch King Kong when he isn't looking.  While this could be a viable defensive strategy for the Trump administration, I can't help but feel that, even giant sized, a demented old man and his band of two faced, abusive hangers on simply wouldn't be a match for the whole pantheon of Japanese Kaiju. 

Death Mask (1998)

A low budget straight-to-video horror movie featuring the once in a lifetime pairing of James Best and Linnea Quigley, Death Mask (1998) is, surprisingly, quite entertaining.  Best, nowadays primarily remembered for playing Sheriff Roscoe P Coltrane in The Dukes of Hazzard, had, prior to that, enjoyed a number of appearances in B-movies, most notably as the lead in The Killer Shrews.  With Death Mask, which he also wrote, he goes back to his origins in a cheap and cheerful production that works in a number of popular backwoods horror tropes: carnivals, freaks, sadistic clowns and swamp witches.  The story, by the standards of the genre, is reasonably original.  Best plays a carnival side show player who carves masks from wood.  Disfigured as a child by his father, a cruel carnival clown, by pushing his face into a fire, Best's character doesn't just carve masks, he also wears a latex mask to cover his burns.  Unfortunately, his masks are no longer selling and he comes into conflict with his asshole of a boss, who threatens to drop him from the carnival.  A despondent Best strikes up a friendship with Quigley's dancer (who is involved with his boss, but unaware that the latter is cheating on her), who takes him to see a swamp witch.  The witch gives him a piece of wood from a 'hanging tree'.  Best carves a mask from it which, when he puts it on, drives anyone who looks into its eyes to kill themselves and others.  The first victim being a female carnival worker who, having inadvertently looked into the mask's eyes, runs in terror, headlong into a carnival ride, which decapitates her.  Despite Quigley's urgings to destroy the mask and the witch explaining that the mask's 'evil' wood is channelling all of his sublimated hate and resentment into a destructive psychic aura, Best succumbs to temptation and goes on a mini-rampage with the mask, destroying those he believes have wronged him.  These include a local prostitute who rejected him because of scars, the carnival owner and some other randoms who insult him.  Needless to say, it doesn't end well.

For what it is, Death Mask is reasonably well produced and director Steve Latshaw - a veteran of this sort of movie - moves it all along at a decent pace.  A large part of the action takes place after dark and this, combined with the cramped trailers and booths of the carnival, give it the sort of claustrophobic and oppressive atmosphere appropriate to the subject matter.  The mask itself is reasonably well realised, although the video effects used for when it possesses Best and projects its evil are pretty cheesy, (although back in 1998 they probably seemed quite sophisticated for a cheap direct-to-video production).  Best's script is actually pretty good, recognising the ludicrousness of its subject matter with some black humour and provides the main players with some decent dialogue.  Best himself gives a good performance as the downbeat carnival mask carver, never falling over in self pity whilst still eliciting audience sympathy and even when on a rampage, remaining likeable.  Linnea Quigley also gets to a do lot more than simply take her clothes off - her usual function in low budget horror movies - actually getting to play a sympathetic character integral to the plot.  (Don't worry, though, she still takes her clothes off for a number of entirely gratuitous shower scenes).  At the end of the day, Death Mask is simply a cheap horror film, but has a number of aspects which lift it above average, featuring some decent acting performances, dialogue that actually sounds like normal speech and a half-way decent central concept.  I must admit that I was pleasantly surprised by Death Mask when I stumbled across it, with no expectations, on an obscure streaming channel.  Worth looking up, particularly if you are a fan of Best ot Quigley.

Unnecessary Remakes

For some reason last weekend I watched that remake of Assault on Precinct 13 (2005).  Why?  I really don't know.  I suppose it was mainly down to the fact that Tubi has been shoving it in my face the past few weeks, every time I opened their Roku app.  So I finally gave in, hoping that they might stop pushing to me now.  This latest viewing did nothing to change my feelings toward it from the last time I saw it, at least a decade ago (probably more).  It falls into that burgeoning cinematic category of 'unnecessary remake', doing nothing to improve upon the original, let alone find a new perspective on the source material.  It's not that it's a bad movie in itself - it's actually well made, with a good cast and some well-staged action sequences.  But whereas the John Carpenter original was a lean, minimalist movie, made on a shoestring with a largely unknown cast, yet delivering brilliantly in terms of suspense and action, the remake is plot heavy, with an over-complicated story line, weighted down by too much backstory for its characters (of which there are too many) and no real suspense.  While the essentially faceless gang attackers of the original are menacing because of the fact that we never really know who they are and know none of them as individuals, the remake's team of corrupt police officers are just too real and identifiable to be really scary.  I've no doubt that the makers of this remake thought that they were being really radical by upending audience expectations by making the villains cops, swapping the races of the two main protagonists and giving the cop hero of the first film's name to the criminal, in reality it just weakens the whole premise.  Moreover, making the criminal who ends up in the station's cells the actual target of the attackers, rather than just someone caught up in the fight by happenstance, takes away a crucial element - the sense of randomness that underlines the original.  There is no complicated conspiracy, everything that happens is the result of a series of random coincidences.

The fact is that the remake of Assault on Precinct 13 would have been a perfectly decent film if it had been released as an entity in its own right, rather than being marketed as a remake of a beloved cult movie.  Which is the same way I've always felt about another 'unnecessary remake', the Colin Farrell version of Total Recall.  While vastly inferior, not mention vastly less imaginative, to the Schwarzenegger original, it is still an enjoyable enough science fiction action film, which, if it hadn't been released as a remake, would probably have performed better, as it wouldn't have drawn unflattering comparisons with the original.  At least, though, it had some relationship to the first film, being based on the same Philip K Dick short story, 'We Can Remember it for You Wholesale'.  Its mistake was in taking the title and too many plot elements from the first adaptation, rather than trying to reinterpret the original source to make something different, but with the same basic premise.  But in both of these cases, if the new films hadn't have invoked the titles of the older movies, then they wouldn't have been able to try and exploit their reputations to try and boost their own popularity, the makers and distributors doubtless hoping to build on an established audience for the originals also.  As with so much in the creative world these days, it's all about exploiting intellectual properties owned already owned by studios and publishers.  It is seen as easier than creating something completely new - just keep reworking the old stuff that proved popular before.  As well as remakes, this manifests as the various 'sequels' which invoke the title of a successful property, despite being only loosely connected, or the spin offs, often in the form of TV series, which are ground out endlessly, diluting whatever made the original popular even further.  In truth, there's nothing new in any of this: back in its 'Golden Age', Hollywood happily ground out B-movie series, often inspired by a successful A feature, but with lower budgets and lesser stars.  The model eventually proved unsustainable, as B-movies became uneconomic to produce and audiences tired of paying to see these cheapskate productions in the cinema, when they could see similar stuff at home for free on their TV sets.  At what point the current version becomes unsustainable and what will supercede it, I have no idea.  But it is inevitable.

An Abrupt Ending

I was watching The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942) again this evening and it reminded me of just how abrupt the endings to these old forties horror movies could be.  In this case, the monster goes berserk, the castle catches fire and collapses, burying him and Dr Frankenstein under the rubble before the obligatory mob of villagers with blazing torches shouting 'Kill the monster' can get to them, we get a quick shot of Frankenstein's daughter embracing the hero who has just saved her from the fire, then the credits roll.  Accompanied by a surprisingly jaunty piece of music, in view of what had preceded it.  Contrast this with the preceding film in the series - Son of Frankenstein (1939) (the titular character being the older brother of the son of Frankenstein in Ghost) - where, after the monster's demise in a sulphur pit and Bela Lugosi's Ygor being filled full of lead, we get a reasonably lengthy final scene with Frankenstein and his family catching the train out of the village, but not before giving a speech to by the now grateful villagers and police inspector, who are there to wave him off.  Here, the jaunty music over the credits seems justified as we've just witnessed a happy ending, rather than the somewhat nihilistic denouement to Ghost.

Abrupt endings, of course, were pretty much de rigeur for B-movies, due to low budgets or simply the fact that they usually had to pack their plot into a running time of just over an hour, leaving them little time for scenes that didn't move the story along.  Significantly, Ghost of Frankenstein marks the point at which Universal's Frankenstein series ceased to be A-features.  From now on, the pictures would be churned out annually, in contrast to the first three, which had appeared, widely spaced, over an eight year period.  Whereas Son of Frankenstein had a running time of around ninety minutes, the longest of the subsequent movies was seventy five minutes.  The lowering of their budgets was reflected in an increased use of recycled sets, music and stock footage.  They also combined Frankenstein's monster with other members of Universal's monster menagerie in scenarios that frantically scrambled through their running times to abrupt and apocalyptic endings that, nonetheless, always left some room for a sequel.  (The various writers' showed a commendable fidelity to the continuity of prior entries in the series).  

Of course, Ghost of Frankenstein wasn't quite a B-movie, but rather a 'second feature' that could either headline a double bill of such films in B-circuit cinemas, or act as support to a bigger feature on the A-circuit.  The studio certainly felt it prestigious enough to star Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Frankenstein's second son, perhaps to compensate for the fact that, for the first time, Karloff wasn't playing the monster.  Instead, their new horror star, Lon Chaney Jr, who had scored a hit in the title role of The Wolfman (1941) the previous year, took on the role (for the only time in the series).  Bela Lugosi, as Ygor, was retained from the previous film to help give the cast a weighty feel.  Nevertheless, the production values are noticeably lower than in the preceding films and the script thinner.  But it all felt a bit stodgy - the subsequent three films might have been closer to true B-movies, with even lower production values and budgets, but they were also a lot more fun, while still retaining those abrupt endings.

The Last Shot You Hear (1970)

My quest to catch up with obscure low budget films which used to turn up on the late night TV schedules when I was I kid continues with The Last Shot You Hear (1970).  This one was a regular part of ITV's post News at Ten schedule in the seventies.  I never saw it then, being too young to be allowed up that late, but the title always intrigued me.  By the time I was old enough to stay up that late watching TV, it had seemingly vanished from the schedules, never to return.  Information on the film also seemed scant, with many reference works seeming to think that it was in black and white, which seemed odd for a film from 1970, while others credited it as being a colour production.  None were very complimentary about it, noting that the film had actually been shot in 1967, but not released in the US until 1969 and the UK in 1970.  I finally managed to catch it the other day - the version I saw was in colour, as were all of its TV screenings, a black and white print had, however, been released to US cinemas (in 1969).  The Last Shot You Hear was based on a stage play - William Fairchild's 'The Sound of Murder' - and very much looks it, with lots of talky indoor scenes and a very static feel.  The play was first produced in 1958 and the film feels very much as if it belongs in that era rather than the sixties.  Despite the addition of some exterior scenes, the film's production feels very 'stagey', with the lighting in interior scenes seemingly always directly overhead and a lack of any fluid camera movements.  

The plot itself reinforces the feel of a time warped stage production, featuring one of those elaborate murder plots which rely on carefully timed phone calls and the like to establish alibis.  Inevitably, it all goes awry, with vanishing bodies and secret tape recordings of the main characters hatching their plot.  The whole thing goes through a number of entirely predictable plot twists before a final, equally unsurprising 'shock' denouement.  There is some attempt to update the play's scenario: whereas in the play the main antagonist is a children's author who won't release his wife from their loveless marriage for fear of a divorce damaging his image and sales, in the film he is the successful author of a series of books and newspaper columns on maintaining perfect relationships.  In both versions, the wife plots with her lover to kill him.  Unfortunately for them a third party, the author's secretary, overhears and records their plot, using the tape to blackmail them after the author has, seemingly, been murdered, with the secretary claiming to have subsequently hidden the body.  There's nothing here that the average audience wouldn't have seen countless times before, but usually better produced.

The film's limited budget is painfully apparent, with poor colour, which looks so weak that it might as well have been monochrome and minimal production values.  The film lacks any real stars, the closest it gets being American actor Hugh Marlowe, best remembered for playing the lead in fifties science fiction movies like Earth Vs the Flying Saucers as the author, in his last film appearance.  It has to be said that he does a pretty good job in making his character thoroughly dislikable, a selfish, egotistical domestic tyrant who treats his wife abominably.  The rest of the cast is made up of familiar British TV and B-movie faces, including Patricia Haines, Zena Walker, William Dysart and Thorley Walters, all of whom give decent performances in the face of an unyielding script.  Most startlingly, though, the film is directed by Gordon Hessler and it is hard to believe that this is the same man who would shortly direct Scream and Scream Again (1969), a visually far more interesting film, with lots of action, fluid camerawork, interesting angles and decor.  Indeed, Hessler was a director noted for his distinctive visual style, (most notably seen in the quartet of films he made for AIP between 1969 and 1971), incorporating lots of camera movement, so the static nature The Last Shot You Hear is quite jarring.  Sadly, he never seemed to quite fulfil his potential, eventually ending up directing TV movies in the US.

The film was the last to be produced by Robert Lippert's company for Twentieth Century Fox, an association which had produced some two hundred low-budget features, many, like this one, produced in the UK in association with British producer Jack Parsons.  The Last Shot You Hear is far from a lost classic, but watching it has at least scratched an itch that has been bothering me since I was a child.