Riding Into Destiny

 

Fellow blogger Rachel at Hamlette's Soliloquy came up with this idea of siblings in film.  My first thought was "Hey! I have a sister. That's a sibling! What about doing one of her favorite films?".  But she pointed out that the theme of the event is actually "siblings in film". OK. So fortunately my sister's favorite film is Shane which features a pair of brothers, so I still get to fulfill my goal while staying true to the theme.

I haven't seen Shane in probably about 50 years. My vague recollection is watching it with family during a Thanksgiving holiday on TV.  I haven't seen it since then. But my memories of it are fairly accurate (for the most part anyway).  

To be honest, I thought Jack Palance (who was credited as "Walter Jack Palance") had more of a presence in the film than he actually does.  As the gunfighter hired by the bad guys to come to town to help out in the goal of driving off the homesteaders, Palance doesn't actually appear in the movie until almost an hour into the film.  And his screen time only amounts to about 20 or so minutes in the film, so maybe I should go back and re-watch some of the other movies I only vaguely remember from my childhood.

As far as the casting is concerned: Did you know that Alan Ladd was not the first choice to play the title role?  The first choice was going to be Montgomery Clift, but he proved to be unavailable.  And Jack Schaefer, the author of the original source novel is on record as saying that he didn't like Ladd in the role, calling him a "runt".  Schaefer has said he envisioned someone more like George Raft.  As portrayed on the screen by Ladd, I could see Clift in the role, but I think he would have been an entirely different character as portrayed by Raft. Perhaps he is more in keeping with the vision Schaefer had in the novel.

As far as Van Heflin in the father role, William Holden was one of the first hopes to play Joe Starrett, but like Clift, he was unavailable so Heflin got the role.  Jean Arthur rounded out the primary cast.  It was her final role on the big screen as she retired from film afterwards, although she came back for a couple of TV roles years later.

Some interesting tidbits: One, Ladd did not like guns, and was not very proficient with them.  According to what I read it took over 100 takes to get the scene right when Shane shoes little Joey how to use a gun.  Maybe it should have been the other way around... It is also evident supposedly of his deficiency when he has the gun battle at the end of the film.  Not that I noticed, but apparently he shot quite a bit off the mark when gunning down the bad guys then. Also, Palance had to be filmed several times to get a decent take when he was either mounting, dismounting or riding a horse because he and horses were not on good terms with each other. 

The story of Shane is pretty much a trope these days.  The lone gunman who rides in to town trying to escape a past and falls in with a beleaguered group in their battle against a superior force.  Not only is it a trope in the western genre, it can be seen in various other genres.  Of course, it's most prevalent in the western genre.  Pale Rider comes to mind. For that matter, several of Clint Eastwood's westerns fit the bill.  But also could be added Yojimbo, the Akira Kurosawa tribute to the trope featuring samurais instead of western cowboys.

Shane was well received when it came out.  Witness the numerous Academy Award nominations it got; Best Picture, Best Director (George Stevens), Best Supporting Actor (both Jack Palance and Brandon DeWilde), and Best Screenplay, all of which it lost to various people involved in a competing film, From Here to Eternity. The only one it won was for Best cinematography: Color, which it fortunately did not have to compete with From Here to Eternity, since that one was filmed in black and white (which by the way it won for that category.)

Shane is one of the films on  American Film Institute's best westerns list, only beat out by The Searchers and High Noon in that category. It is also in the top 50 of an overall list of all films.

Shane (1953):

OK, so the sibling aspect of this movie doesn't really become evident until later in the movie. Heads up.

Young Joey Starrett (Brandon deWilde) is out stalking a deer on his family farm. He is still too young, by his father's own words, to have ammunition, so he is only pretending to hunt the deer.  While out there he observes a lone rider coming in to the farm.

The lone rider (a typical western trope) turns out to be a man who calls himself Shane (Alan Ladd), (and another typical western trope, he is only known by one name, so "Shane" could conceivably be his first name, but he is frequently addresses as Mr. Shane).

Shane is only stopping off to ask permission to ride through the Starrett farm, but Joe Starrett (Van Heflin) is pressured by his wife, Marian (Jean Arthur) that the polite thing to do would be to ask the man to stay for dinner, since it's almost supper time.

After dinner, Shane is invited to spend the night.  In the morning, feeling like he must help to pay for the two meals, he starts attacking a tree stump that Starrett had been working on when he rode in.  Together they manage to make short work of it. (And why it only took a short while when Starrett had said he's been at it off and on ever since he moved on the homestead, I can't say.  Maybe it was almost done by that time already... Only one of a couple of plot details I took issue with in an otherwise great movie.)

Although it never really comes out in the movie it turns out that Shane has had a rather jaded past,  Apparently he was a gunslinger in his former life.  It's not clear whether he is on the run from his own past or if there may be some past trying to follow him. (Maybe it is more clear in the original source novel.  I never read it.)

The problem Starrett and his fellow homesteaders have is with a local cattle baron, Rufus Ryker (Emile Meyer) and his brother Morgan (John Dierkes).  (And there are the siblings..)  As another typical trope, the greedy Ryker brothers want all the land in the area, not just a portion of it.  And they have been waging a guerilla war of sorts with Starrett and the homesteaders.

Shane stays on as a ranch hand to help out Starrett.  But there may be some ulterior motive,  Perhaps Shane is doing it to make amends for his own jaded past.  He definitely is not averse to helping fight the battle of the two factions, for the side of good (or at least what we are prone to be led to believe is the side of good.)

The battle between the two gets more and more hostile, and, yes, the bad guys do tend to stretch a point in the lawless frontier to force the homesteaders to give u and move on.  But Starrett does his best to convince his neighbors that they have the right, and even the obligation to stay.

Eventually, since Shane seems to be someone with whom the Rykers might have a problem, they hire their own tough guy, Jack Wilson (Jack Palance).  And it's not even remotely concealed from either the audience or the homesteaders themselves what his background is.  He is a notorious gunslinger and even Shane recognizes his name, if not his face,

One of the homesteaders, "Stonewall" Torrey (so called because he is a Confederate veteran of the Civil War) is gunned down in the street (Elisha Cook, Jr, played him. He will be familiar a face even if you don't know his name.  He had prominent roles in dozens of films in his life.  Just click on that link and see how many of them YOU'VE seen...).

Things get even more hairy over the course of the film. Some of the Rykers' cohorts burn down one of the homesteader's farms and many of them are just about to give up.  In fact, if it weren't for the adamant Starrett trying to keep them from conceding the battle most of them would have left by now.  But Starrett is apparently a good talker.

The final confrontation comes when the Ryker brothers, knowing that the glue that's holding them together is Starrett, creates a ruse that will get Starrett into town where he will be ambushed.  And Shane tries to stop him, saying he can't win.  But it takes Shane knocking out Starrett and riding into town in his stead to keep Marian from becoming a widow and little Joey from losing a father.

Joey sees what Shane does to his father and tells Shane he hates him, but has a change of heart and follows him to town.  Of course, you know how it's all going to end, don't you?  If you don't, what have you been doing all your life while NOT watching movies? Or being indoctrinated with classic film culture?

I'll give you a hint:

"Shane! Shane! Come back!"

(The quote made the list of American Film Institute's 100 Years 100 Movie Quotes, so even if you've never even seen one frame of the film, it's highly likely you've heard the quote.)

The film has a bit of history behind it, if you are interested.  The battles being fought between the homesteaders and the cattle ranchers is based on the real events behind the Johnson County War fought in the early 1890's in Wyoming.  Among other films that dealt with this topic was Heaven's Gate (which has it's own reputation in Hollywood).  And if you like the theme (although it covers a different kind of conflict) you ought to check out Pale Rider, one of my favorite Clint Eastwood films. (And I'm surprised that up to now that hasn't been featured on The Midnite Drive-In... maybe soon.)

Well, folks time to saddle up and ride on.  And to that little boy in the back part of the lot yelling "Quiggy! Quiggy!  Come back!"  I'll be back... (Oh wait, that's a different movie altogether...

Quiggy

Blondes Have More Bad Vibes

 

 

 

 

 

This is my entry in the Hammer-Amicus Blogathon hosted by Realweegiemidget Reviews and Cinematic Catharsis.

 

 

 

 

The blonde woman has always been a fixation for the adult male. Blondes get all the good stuff in life, hence the phrase "Blondes have more fun."  But when it comes to film noir, the opposite can also be a standard trope.  Look at how many blondes are the source of a downfall for the main male character in classic noir films.  

Cora (Lana Turner) in The Postman Always Rings Twice? Blonde.  Phyllis (Barbara Stanwyck) in Double Indemnity? Blonde.  Elsa (Rita Hayworth) in The Lady from Shanghai? Blonde. (Note: Blonde was not always the actress' natural color, sometimes, but they were blonde in these roles.)

One could get the idea that blondes are bad news. And if you find yourself involved in the plot line of a film noir, it's probably a good idea to steer clear of any blonde women.  Not that that advice would be observed by most of the male protagonists in them.

Hammer films were no stranger to this trope during their period of producing noir style films.  Of course, most people who think of Hammer Films will naturally first come up with "Oh, yeah! Those people who made the Christopher Lee / Peter Cushing horror movies!" But that's not the entire output from Hammer Studios.

I won't rehash what I've already written once. If you want to see a little more see my post Hammer Films Does Film Noir .  Both of these films were released in the UK under different titles, hence the "a.k.a." after the titles below.

Bad Blonde (1953): (a.k.a. The Flanagan Boy)

The American title, Bad Blonde, is much more conducive to drawing in the crowd that wanted to see film noir.  The Flangan Boy??? What kind of viewing crowd would THAT draw?  Sounds more like a title for a melodrama than a gritty noir.  But American promoters knew better and renamed it.

The opening music is pretty much a noir type, however.  The music was done by Ivor Staney, who mostly did film noir type movies over his brief career.  

The movie starts at a carnival where a huckster named Sharkey (Sid James) is trying to entice amateurs to go one round of boxing with one of his boxing stars.  He has a ringer in the audience, but the ringer is tripped on his way to the ring and Johnny Flanagan (Tony Wright) steps up to take his place.

 

 

 

After Johnny takes down Sharkey's boxer, Sharkey realizes that Johnny is not entirely the "amateur" he promotes himself as.  In steps Charlie Sullivan (John Slater) who is Johnny's own promoter. 

 

 

 

Together, Johnny, Sharkey and Sullivan decide that making a full-fledged  fighter out of Johnny is a good idea.  They need a backer, however, so they take him to see Giuseppe Vecci ( Frederick Valk).  Giuseppe has a trophy wife, Lorna (Barbara Payton) {the "Bad Blonde" of the title.}  

 

 

 

Lorna has the hots for Johnny and has no scruples about seducing the young boy.  She initially puts up a front, at least in front of her husband. Johnny intimates that he doesn't want her watching him and she harrumphs with one of the best lines in the movie "Tellyour boy not to flatter himself.  I've seen better bodies hanging in a butcher shop."

But is it all just a front?  Not long after, Giuseppe, upset that his new boy and his wife aren't getting along, he invites Johnny to his birthday party, where Giuseppe gets rip-roaring drunk and stumbles around trying to dance with his  wife. Really he has two left feet (or is just too drunk to stand) he gets Johnny to dance with her.  Not long after, the gloves come off (and not just the boxing gloves.

A romance develops with Johnny and Lorna, and, as so often happens in noir film, they both decide they would be better off if Giuseppe wasn't around to hamper the affair. Well, at least Lorna does. Johnny, still a good fellow at heart, doesn't want anything to do with it.  Until Lorna informs him that she is pregnant.  She doesn't have to tell him who the father is.

So Johnny reluctantly agrees to help remove Giuseppe from the scene.  He hides aboard Giuseepe's fishing boat and when Giuseppe goes out to fish, Johnny manages to engineer a drowning.  Since everyone knows Giuseppe can't swim, it looks like an accident.

Of course, if that were all, Johnny and Lorna could life "happily" ever after.  Unfortunately, his mama shows up from Italy. And mama knows more than anyone would think, including the fact that Lorna is not really pregnant.

Johnny is distraught over the whole thing. And decides to cure his depression in that age-old solution that many come to (unfortunately).  But Sharkey and Charlie have their own way of getting revenge on Lorna,

This is a fairly straightforward remake of many film noir films that were made before it.  And not entirely better acted, at that.  It follows mostly along the same lines as The Postman Always Rings Twice. Although you can't blame Tony Wright for not being up to par with John Garfield, I think Barbara Payton could have given Lana Turner a run for her money.  Unfortunately alcoholism cut her career short.  She died at age 39 from heart failure brought on by her addiction.

 

 

 

Man Bait aka The Last Page (1952):

 

Man Bait had one of the most unbelievable subplots of any movie I have ever seen.  Maybe in the 1950's it might have been shocking and possibly scandalous to kiss a woman who was not your wife. Just kiss her... not even have any more intimate contact than that...  But the plot stems from just that one encounter.

Anyway, the plot revolves around a woman, Ruby (Diana Dors), who is probably the most irresponsible woman in London.  She works at a book store and is notoriously late for work every day. Her supervisor, Mr. Oliver (Raymond Huntley) reprimands her and even approaches the big boss, Mr. Harman (George Brent) to have a talk with her.

 

 

 

 

After the reprimand, a customer walks in to the shop and, while he thinks no one is looking, attempts to steal a rare book from a case on which he picks the lock.  Ruby spots Jeff (Peter Reynolds) and makes him put the book back.  But instead of reporting him, she accepts a date with him after work.

 

 

 

 

Later, Ruby ends up having to work late with Mr. Harman.  In a moment of contact with Ruby, Harman impulsively kisses Ruby.

 

 

 

Jeff is the unscrupulous sort, and, in case it wasn't obvious, is not averse to using any means to get money.  So when Ruby tells him that Mr. Harman kissed her, Jeff concocts a plan to extort money from Harman, or else have Ruby inform his wife of the indiscretion.

Of course, even with the blackmail, it's not enough.  Jeff sends a letter, purportedly from Ruby, to inform Harman's wife.  But his wife (Isabel Dean), an invalid, ends up dying while trying to burn the letter.  A confrontation occurs between Harman and Ruby and later, Jeff appears in the shop demanding all the money Ruby had extorted from Harman.  He also ends up inadvertently killing Ruby and stashes her in a crate of books being shipped.  

Harman discovers the body first as in on the run.  Suspicion immediately falls on Harman when the police discover the body later.  Harman enlists the help of his secretary (Marguerite Chapman) to find out the truth as to who killed Ruby.

Except for the unrealistic attempt at blackmail (surely a better path could have been written.), the intrigue involved in the discovery of the real culprit has some good film noir scenes, and overall it is a pretty good example of acting from the main cast members.  

I like the idea of setting the film in a bookstore.  There are a couple of problems with these scenes that do stand out, though.  This is not a chain store bookstore on the same business level as, say Barnes and Noble.  It's just a local bookstore, so having what looks like about 12 employees on duty does not seem all that believable from an economic standpoint.

The other thing is that Ruby seems to have a history of being late to work.  Are the employers that desperate for help that they can continue to let her stay?  She has obviously been doing it for some time, you see.  Even if I had a hot woman like Ruby as an employee I doubt I would have let her last as long as she seems to have been doing.

Overall, I would not give this film as high a rating as it has. (IMDb rates this one higher than the previous entry, Bad Blonde...)  I think Bad Blonde is a better picture.  But both are fairly good given that they are British attempts at a mostly American genre.

 

Well, the old Plymouth is up and running, so it's time to head home.

Drive safely, folks.

Quiggy

Ed Wood Haunts My Dreams (Still)

This is my second entry in the So Bad, It's Good Blogathon hosted by Taking Up Room

Note:  Way back at the beginning I inaugurated this blog with a tribute to Ed Wood.  If you have been reading ever since, maybe you've had time to get over that harrowing experience, so it's time to throw another Wood tribute at you.


Ed Wood, Jr. had a symbiotic relationship with Bela Lugosi.  Both needed something from the other, and although the relationship was friendly, both tended to use the other to achieve a personal goal.  As depicted in the Tim Burton loving biopic Ed Wood, Lugosi had fallen on hard times.  He was a morphine addict and could not get work in Hollywood, his metier of classic horror having fallen out of fashion.  Wood was a struggling wanna-be director, but he was not getting much success at getting jobs in his chosen profession.  When the two met it was a match made in heaven (or that oither place depending on how you feel about Wood, or Lugosi for that matter...)

In 1953, the two met and Wood saw his chance.  He had recently approached George Weiss, a purveyor of low-budget sleaze to direct a potential film about the life of Christine Jorgensen.  Jorgensen had had a sex-change operation that transformed her from a man, George Jorgensen, into Christine.  Plans for the movie about Jorgensen fell through when she threatened to sue if it was done.  Undeterred, Weiss hired Wood to write and direct a movie, already titled I Changed my Sex, just without any references to Jorgensen.

Instead, Wood decided to make his own story, about transvestitism (men who wear women's clothing).  Since Wood himself was an aficionado of doing the same, this turned the film into a more personal story.    He cast himself as the star of the film, under the credit of "Daniel Davis", and cast his new-found friend Lugosi as a guide through the film, a somewhat bizarre combination of mad scientist and god.

Because Weiss wanted a sex-change movie, and what Wood had originally created was just a film about transvestites, Wood added a second part to the movie which covered the story of a man who actually does have an operation, but the main focus of the movie was Wood's personal plea for compassion for those who are somewhat different from the norm.  It should be noted that the film is a victim of it's own time and ethos.  At the time a man dressing as a woman could get him arrested.  Whatever your view is about the transvestite is today, society has relaxed somewhat on their view of the phenomenon.  It is no longer illegal to dress up as a member of the opposite sex, and only one's personal view of the situation has any impact at all.

The message of acceptance is there, but because Wood was a rather inept, if not enthusiastic, director, the message is sometimes lost. Wood's ability to find ways to use stock footage from the vaults to somehow emphasize his story is one of the things that can both enhance and detract from the intended message.  (A rampaging horde of buffalo?  Omly Wood himself knows what that means...)

Glen or Glenda? (1953):

In the making of this film, which deals with a strange and curious subject, no punches have been pulled-- no easy way out has been taken. Many of the smaller parts are portrayed by persons who actually are, in real life, the character they portray on the screen. This is a picture of stark realism-- taking no sides -- but giving you the facts -- ALL the facts -- as they are today... YOU ARE SOCIETY -- JUDGE YE NOT...

The movie opens on the God/Scientist (Bela Lugosi) informing the audience that sometimes things are not always what they seem to be.  Or maybe he's just being cryptic.  You decide.

Man's constant groping of things unknown, drawing from the endless reaches of time, brings to light many startling things. Startling because they seem new...sudden...but most are not new to the signs of the ages. A life...is begun! People...all going somewhere. All with their own thoughts, their own ideas. All with their own personalities. One is wrong because he does right...one is right because he does wrong. Pull the strings! Dance to that, which one is created for. A new day is begun. A new life is begun. A life...is ended.

The opening is on a man dressed as a woman who lies dead, having committed suicide.  It turns that that he committed suicide because, try as he might, he couldn't resist the temptation to dress in women's clothes, despite the public outcry that such a behavior was abnormal.  (Remember, I said earlier at this time it could get you arrested if you did such things that were not considered fit for "normal" people to do.)  A police captain, Inspector warren (Lyle Talbot) approaches Dr. Alton (Timothy Farrell) to try to get some information on why any one would want to be in such an abnormal mental state.

Dr. Alton tells the inspector he has two cases in which he can illustrate the phenomena better for him.  The story of Glen (Edward D. Wood, Jr. under the screen name "Daniel Davis") constitutes most of the film.

Dr. Alton takes pains to establish that Glen is not a homosexual.  He is just a guy that derives pleasure from the feel of women's clothing on his body.  Some of this, it seems, may be attributed to a rather bizarre upbringing.  His mother wanted a daughter instead of a son, and there is some indication that Glen's father was rather in his attitude toward his son.  (Much like Wood's own childhood, if his background story is to be believed).  When Glen was a young boy he wanted to dress up as his sister for Halloween, but it didn't stop there.

Now Glen is in his thirties and on the verge of marrying his sweetheart, Barbara (Delores Fuller, who was actually Wood's significant other at the time).  Barbara doesn't know of Glen's predilection for wearing women's clothes, and Glen fears that he must actually tell her before she discovers the awful truth for herself.  He debates on whether or not to tell her before the marriage and risk having the plans for marriage come crashing down, or if he should wait until after the marriage, and thus risk alienating his new bride.  (In the parlance of the time, it's either damned if you do or damned if you don't.  There doesn't appear to be a third option where she accepts him for who he is.)

The Scientist appears again, heralding a segment of the movie in which Glen is haunted by all sorts of bizarre fetish inspired dreams.

Beware...beware! Beware of the big green dragon that sits on your doorstep. He eats little boys...puppy dog tails, and big, fat snails. Beware, take care....beware!

The dream sequence seems to have been added only to titillate the viewer, although it could easily be the inspired haunting of Glen wrestling with himself over his dilemma.   Eventually Glen does decide to come clean with Barbara.   Since this is a parable of Wood's own worries about his own transvestite tendencies and not a morality play, of course she accepts his predilection, although as she says, "Maybe we can work this out".

Since the movie was supposed to be about sex change, there is an additional sequence tacked on about Adam/Anne ("Tommy" Haynes).  Adam's story also somewhat parallels Wood's own story in that he, too. wore women's underwear while fighting in WWII, with the exception that when Adam gets out of the service he does have a sex-change operation and becomes Anne.


Yeah, so if you aren't ready for really bizarre, you aren't ready for Ed Wood.  I won't even get into the soft core porn he made after his career as a mainstream director fizzled out.


Drive home safely, folks.

Quiggy

Clothes Make the Man

This is my entry in the Richard Burton Blogathon hosted by Realweegiemidget Reviews

Richard Burton was one of the most iconic actors of his day.  He was a Shakespearean actor who performed in plays for many years, mostly in productions of plays written by William Shakespeare.  He was also a frequent also-ran in the Academy Awards , ranking only behind Peter O'Toole's 8 nominations without an award.  (He was nominated 7 times, including one for today's movie).

Arguably it could be said that Burton is more famous for his off-screen relationships than his actual catalogue of film roles.  He was married five times (although two of those times were to the same woman, Elizabeth Taylor, which maybe only counts as one time.  Or then again, it maybe counts for 20 times... depending on how you feel about Elizabeth Taylor...)

Burton's birth name was Richard Jenkins, Jr.  He was made a legal ward (as opposed to being adopted) by his schoolmaster, Phillip Burton, and legally changed his name to Burton.

The Robe (1953): 

In Imperial Rome, Centurion Marcellus Gallio (Richard Burton) returns from abroad.  He is feted as he enters the city and is greeted by Diana (Jean Simmons).  Diana was a childhood friend of Marcellus, and in their youth he had pledged to marry her when they were mere children.

Diana is now the ward of Emperor Tiberius (Ernest Thesiger), and Tiberius is planning to marry of Diana to his nephew, Caligula (Jay Robinson).

Although Marcellus is rather blase' about his commitment to Diana, he is less than enthused about having her be married to his political enemy, Caligula.  The two are bitter rivals, born out by the fact that Caligula intentionally outbids Marcellus for two slave girls that Marcellus wants.

In retaliation, Marcellus intentionally outbids Caligula for Demetrius (Victor Mature), a renegade Greek slave that Caligula only wants as meat for the gladiator ring.

To make matters even more contentious, Marcellus frees Demetrius.  Caligula pulls some strings to get his revenge and has Marcellus sent to the most despicable post in the Roman Empire; Jerusalem.  There, circumstances lead to Marcellus being responsible to see to the execution of a Jewish rebel named Jesus.

At the foot of the cross where Jesus is executed soldiers play dice and gamble on the garments.  Marcellus wins the robe, which he immediately regrets because he has an attack of mental anguish which he blames on the robe because he thinks it is cursed.  He gives it to Demetrius demanding that he burn it.  But Demetrius has an epiphany and refuses.  He also tells Marcellus he is no longer going to serve Marcellus because he will now serve the Master, Jesus.

For the middle part of the film, Marcellus continues to suffer from mental problems and determines that the only solution is to find Demetrius and the robe and have the robe destroyed.  In this effort he is given a commission by the emperor top not only find his cursed robe, but to also weed out the followers of this new sect, who have been calling themselves Christians.

Of course, this being ultimately a Christian film, it was bound to happen that Marcellus converts to Christianity.  He is recalled to Rome, where Tiberius has died and Caligula is now the emperor.  Caligula has Marcellus arrested for treason, since he is no longer fulfilling the mandate given him, and refuses to divulge the location of the Christians, especially the leader, Peter (Michael Rennie).

The Robe and a sequel which featured many of the same actors in the same roles, Demetrius and the Gladiators, come across as astounding epics.  Your opinion on them may be influenced by your opinion on the Christian theology, but both are very good well-acted dramas.  Burton, of course, is the standout performer in The Robe.  But Victor Mature carries his own and Jay Robinson as Caligula is a treat, even though he seems to be over-acting out his butt.  (He was a former Broadway stage actor, and these two films represent his first roles in Hollywood).

Drive home safely, folks

Quiggy

The Solar System on $5 a Day (Pt 3)

This is my third (and final) entry in the Outer Space on Film Blogathon hosted by Moon in Gemini

For three days, from April 13th -15th. we are going to take a tour of the solar system.  American International Pictures is our main guide to this tour. We will be visiting many of the planets in our solar system along with a brief jaunt to Earth's moon.  We hope you enjoy this respite from your daily humdrum life.

(This is a continuation of a thee part series.  You should read Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 first if you don't want to be slightly confused...)

On our travels through the solar system we have already paid a visit to Venus, Mars and Jupiter as well as a side trip to the Earth's Moon.  Our journey is just about to get exciting, as we have saved  the best for the last.  Join us now as we conclude our brief tour of our neighborhood.

Space Patrol, a British television series, is one of the film documentations of encounters with Saturn.  But Silent Running, a film from the 70's actually had a spaceship orbiting the planet.  Most other references to Saturn occur obliquely, such as the fact that the main character in the Star Trek episode, "Tomorrow is Yesterday", would eventually head a crew that was to be on the first Earth-Saturn probe.


Planet Outlaws (1953):

The hero Buck Rogers (Buster Crabbe) was a standup kind of guy who, through some drastic events, crashed his dirigible over the North Pole and was suspended in animation, along with hi pal Buddy (Jackie Moran), for 500 years.  When Buck and Buddy are found, they are taken captive by soldiers of an underground city.  Apparently initially they are thought to be spies for the ruthless dictator "Killer" Kane (Anthony Warde).

The tide turns quickly when the underground city's leader, Dr. Huer (C. Montague Shaw) finds out his captives are from the past.  Quickly Buck and Buddy become allies in trying to wrest power over the planet from Kane.  See, the city is impenetrable by Kane's forces outside the city (due to a secret entrance that only the city inhabitants know about, but at the same time they are almost virtual prisoners in their city as Kane's superior forces rule the skies.

Buck and Buddy volunteer to take a dangerous trip to go to Saturn and appeal to the residents of that planet to help in their ordeal.  But when Buck arrives, so do representatives of Kane's dominion.  And the Saturnites initially side with Kane's contingent.  (Why the Saturnites want to side with anybody who goes by the name of "Killer" is anybody's guess, but there it is.)

 Back on Earth Buck kidnaps the representative of Saturn and forces him to see video proof of Kane's true evil intentions.  Kane takes all his prisoners and makes them wear special helmets which reduce them to mindless automatons.   As such, the Saturn native eventually switches allegiances and sides with the good guys.

This movie was originally a 12 part serial, and the editing on it is a little stagnant in places, but it is a typical example of the gung-ho type of serial that was prevalent at the time.  Lots of fist fights and occasionally a few pistol shots, (but surprisingly very few ray guns except on the spaceships).  You take away the spaceships and the travel to another planet and it could just as easily have been a good guys vs. the mobsters movie.  Even so, it is pretty good, well worth a couple of viewings, and probably entertaining even for the youngsters in the family.

The planet Uranus, like it's predecessor in this blog entry, was also rarely seen in film. The aforementioned Space Patrol delved into the planet briefly.  And apparently it had been mined for a mineral needed by Doctor Who at some point, although the show never actually went to the planet.


Journey to the Seventh Planet (1962): 

The focus of this film is a trip to Uranus.  Our five man team of astronauts, which include Don (John Agar), who is the Captain of the team, along with Eric (Carl Ottosen), Karl (Peter Monch), Barry (Ove Sprague) and Svend (Louis Miehe-Renhard) arrive in orbit around Uranus. (BTW, if those names sound a little strange to you, it's because this film was originally made in Denmark).

The first thing that happens is some alien that is on the planet uses a sort of mind control, and while a voice tells them that it has been waiting for them and that it will use them to go to Earth to take over the Earth, time passes for them.  Although they think only seconds has passed, it is apparent they have been in some kind of suspended animation for several days, and they are completely unaware of the presence of  the alien.

When they disembark from the rocket, they find an Earth-like atmosphere and plant life.  One of them actually recognizes the area as being exactly the same as a place where he grew up.  While investigating further, the crew finds an old farm, which again is exactly like the one where he grew up.  Each also encounters the one woman he loves the most from back on Earth.

They run into some kind of mobile barrier, and when one of the crew members rashly sticks his arm through the barrier it is frozen solid.  Fortunately it heals quickly, and when the crew discusses what they should do, three of them are designated to check out what's beyond the barrier.  Decked out in spacesuits, they advance through it and find an entirely different  situation on the other side.

The alien, it turns out, is using their minds to create the things they fear the most.  Giant rat-like creatures and a huge tarantula attack them on different occasions.  They eventually cotton to the idea that there is an alien presence and just what it's goals are.  They realize their only chance of escape is to cross the barrier and find and kill the alien in it's lair or they will never be able to leave Uranus.

As cheesy as this movie sounds, it is by far the best movie of the entire weekend.  If you don't watch any of the others, you really shouldn't miss this one.  If it sounds vaguely familiar as a story, it seems to me at any rate to be somewhat based on a Ray Bradbury story "Mars is Heaven".  At least the elements of an alien force using the minds of the Earthlings to create a world they can relate to seem to mirror that story.  It ain't Casablanca, folks, but if you like your entertainment on the cheap side, it is well worth a look.




In conclusion, we had to miss out on our complete tour of the solar system.  Both Neptune and Pluto received some peripheral attention in the Doctor Who and Space Patrol TV series, but no real investigation of the planets has ever been recorded. Suffice to say both would be intriguing places to visit, but they will have to wait for more in depth surveillance before we make an attempt to land there at this point.  Your safety is paramount.

We will now return you safely to planet Earth.  Hope you enjoyed the trip.

Quiggy