Say Hi-De-Hi to Cab Calloway

Cab Calloway was one of the mosy dynamic and foundational figures of jazz in the 1930s to the 1950s. Today more people will recognize him as the old man who raised the Blues Brothers. 

If you want to recognize Cab, then show it off with this great design available at the link below. 

https://www.teepublic.com/t-shirt/62521170-cab-calloway?store_id=2969989 

Ten Wanted Men (1955): The Eleventh Guy is So Relieved

Synopsis: Saloon owner Wick Campbell (Richard Boone) is fed up with John Stewart (Randolph Scott) trying to bring law and order to their Western town. When Campbell’s ward Maria (Donna Martell), now the object of his sexual obsession, seeks refuge with Stewart’s handsome nephew, Campbell hires ten bloodthirsty gunman to wage war on the Stewarts and their allies.

Review: After watching Ride the High Country, I realized I had never seen any of the Westerns of Randolph Scott or Joel McCrae. I decided to dip my toe into Scott’s catalog with this title. Ten Wanted Men was an enjoyable film that kept the action moving at a good pace for its ninety minute runtime, but, if it weren't for Boone’s lecherous performance and a few other touches, I didn't feel like this one was anything that special. Scott wasn't that charismatic, and the script was easily plotted with little surprise in store for the viewer.

Lee Van Cleef and Dennis Weaver both show up in small roles, and Denver Pyle is supposedly in there if you can find him (I couldn’t). The high points really come up whenever Boone is being a creep or his chief henchman, played by Leo Gordon, is giving him a hard time for being unlucky with the ladies. Gordon also provides an interesting touch as his gunman sports gladiator style wristbands with his Western garb, a touch I had not seen done before.

Final Note: Jocelyn Brando, who plays Scott’s love interest, is the older sister of Marlon Brando, and was five years his senior. She passed away one year after her younger brother.

Rating: 5.5/10

Frankenstein 1970 (1958) Karloff of Future Past.

While there's little better in life than movies from the past that take a shot of what life will be like in the future, there's really nothing better than when they get brazen enough to tack the futuristic year at the end of their title. This traps the movie or TV show into a path where it can't escape feeling dated, and, quite often, this leads future viewers to see the work as nothing more than a campy projection, like how incredibly behind the times Disney's "Futureworld" looks next to the ’80s era exhibits at Epcot center. Today's film definitely falls into that trap, unless there's been a catalog with home nuclear reactors available for purchase in the past forty three years. However, it does hit on some things that were surely 70s, interest in the occult, rampant narcissism, the dominance of TV, and the fact that no matter what era it is Boris Karloff is the man. Some twenty seven years after Karloff portrayed the monster in James Whale's 1931 Frankenstein, he returned to the laboratory, but not with a bolted neck. Instead, he portrayed a descendant of the creature's creator in the 1958 film that imagines mad science at work twenty two years into the future. This is Frankenstein 1970.

The Bigger and Badder Halloween Top 13:#1- Gojira (1954)

Here we are, finally. It’s Halloween night, and after 31 posts in 31 days capped off with The Bigger and Badder Halloween Top 13, we've finally arrived at the end of the month and the countdown. While all the little kiddies are out trick and/or treating and ghouls, ghosts, and goblins come out to play, why not kick back for a while at The LBL with me and let’s get our giant monster obsession rockin’ one last time. Yesterday, I practically fell all over myself giving King Kong accolades for starting the popularity of the giant monster, but while the giant ape made some splash in 1933, it was during its 1952 release that it really caused major waves. One of those waves ended up lapping the shores of Japan, a country still reeling in the post-WWII era as they tried to find closure, purpose, and direction for their country. No other place in the world has known the true horrors and devastation of a directed, intentional nuclear blast save for Japan. So is it any wonder that the same year American filmmakers released their first nuclear powered monster movie with The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, that the Japanese did them one better and created a monster that was a walking nuclear incident with Gojira (and I don't mean Godzilla, King of the Monsters, but more on that later.) It is Halloween, and a discussion of Gojira could get pretty heavy, pretty quick, but I’m going to try to keep it on the lighter side. After all of these films in The B&B H13 about fear, of nature, of man, of nukes and science, Gojira is a film that certainly touches on a number of fears, but it is really a story of hope.

The Bigger and Badder Halloween Top 13 :#3: Them! (1954)

The 1950s were an era of us against them, but the ‘Them’ of today’s selection for the Bigger and Badder Halloween Top 13 is a foe for all seasons and eras. I’m talking about the bane of picnics, the scourge of lemonade stands, the menace of masticating mountain men, the common ant. Just like yesterday’s film featured a tiny worm grown to gargantuan proportions, today’s takes one of the smallest and most common (and most commonly stomped on) members of the insect family and turns the size tables on humankind  Naturally, it’s also our fault. When nature attacks in the nuclear age, you can always bet that the A-bomb is not too far behind. Strangely, it also has something else behind it that most major giant monster movies lack, studio support and a budget. Taking the mutant creature feature and giving it proper effects, a solid cast, an experienced director, and a script that makes sense and leads to exciting scenes, Hollywood crafted the crown jewel of American 1950s science fiction/horror features, the exclamatorily named classic, Them!

The Bigger and Badder Halloween Top 13: #5: Attack of the 50ft. Woman (1958)

For the second time on this list, I will be talking about an exclusively humanoid giant, but unlike the teens in Village of the Giants, this time it isn't played so much for laughs. In the eyes of a conservative nation, which America has steadily grown out of over the years, the rise of the Women’s Christian Temperance Organization in the 1870s-80s was nothing less than monstrous. While their purpose was to ban alcohol, something that few people would rally around now, one of their main reasons was to improve the home life of women who were abused, beaten, and neglected thanks to the rampant alcoholism which had spread like wildfire among the nation’s male population. To many, the members of that group, as well as the women’s suffragettes, were nothing less than monstrous. However, these two movements were the seed of what would grow to be the modern feminist movement, which came into its own nearly a hundred years later in the 1960’s. Despite winning the vote in the 1920s and powering the country through World War II, when the men came home, they still expected to find meek partners who bent to their husband’s will, but by the late 1950s the strain between the sexes was beginning to show even in idyllic middle America. So it comes as no surprise that a movie came along and exploited the fear of the powerful woman whose cause was just, if not her methods. Granted she was still dressed in an awfully titillating style, but Attack of the 50 Foot Woman offered up a giant woman in the place of a giant movement just waiting in the wings.

The Irrepressible Miss Stanwyck: Jeopardy (1953)

When I hear the word “jeopardy”, a few things comes to mind, but I’m guessing that director John Sturges didn’t have either the Trebeck hosted game show, the hit by the Greg Kihn Band, or the subsequent parody by Weird Al on his mind. More than likely because these things were not even invented yet because if they were it surely would have been all he could think of. If you haven’t guessed by now, today’s film is Jeopardy from 1953, and it is the inaugural post in the second new feature in August, The Irrepressible Miss Stanwyck. My love for Miss Stanwyck is deep and unabated by the passage of time. I love her tough gal characters, always with a soft, sensitive center, and no matter if she’s doing romance, action, drama, or comedy, Stanwyck always gave it her all. Sadly, in four years I’ve only got to take a look at two of her films here at The Lair, the Sam Fuller (also a feature holder for this month) weird Western 40 Guns and the Christmas flavored Remember the Night. So over the next few weeks, I hope you enjoy my look back at Babs. First up, a movie where Stanwyck would do anything for love, and yeah, I think she would do that. 

Throne of Blood (1957) Mifune Watches the Throne (Without Kanye's Help)

When I set out to present a month of movies with 'blood' drenched titles for National Blood Donation Month, I didn't consider it would also be an injection of films that have been on my mind to watch for sometime. A couple days back, I viewed my very first Jean Rollin movie Lips of Blood, and while today's director, Akira Kurosawa, was not unknown to me, I had seen as much as the next guy. That is if the next guy watched The Seven Samurai to see how The Magnificent Seven and Battle Beyond the Stars stack up as remakes. What I didn't know going into today's selection, 1957's Throne of Blood, was that it was a remake of sorts. It seems that at its core Kurosawa's movie has something to do with a play written by some joker called William Shakespeare. More on that later. Right now, I'm trying to get a damn spot out. So check out the synopsis and I'll be back to talk more on the double (double, toil and trouble).

Washizu (Toshiro Mifune) and Miki (Minoru Chiaki) are two warriors in the service of the Great Lord Tsuzuki who rules from his fortified castle in thick of the Spider Web forest. On their way to report to him, they encounter an evil spirit in the woods that foretells their future. The spirit says that Washizu is destined to rule of over Spider Web Castle while his friend Miki would become a great general and his son would someday sit on the throne. After Washizu relays this knowledge to his wife Asaji (Isizu Yamada), she seeks for him to take destiny in his own hands. When the Great Lord visits Washizu's garrison, Asaji drugs the leader's guards and convinces her husband to murder Tsuzuki. After Washizu forces the spirit's predictions to come true, he becomes Great Lord of Spider Web Castle, but he also begins to go helplessly mad in the face of his actions.

If you haven't surmised it from my wan attempts at humor at the end of the first paragraph of the synopsis, Throne of Blood is a version of Willie Shakespeare's MacBeth. While there are a number of liberties taken with the Bard of Avon's play, many hail Throne of Blood as the greatest film adaptation of the play, and it has even been reported that it was a favorite of literary great T.S. Elliot. Kurosawa's taut adaptation gains much of its strength from long, lingering shots of the actors which hammer home the emotional resonance of their actions. The greatest example comes when Washizu dispatches the Great Lord. While the warrior, spear in hand, goes to do the dirty deed, the camera doesn't follow him. Instead it lingers on Isizu Yamada's Asaji, the Lady Macbeth if you will, and the look of intense anticipation of the murder goes much further than seeing the act would have done. The film is chock full of moments like these that enhance what might otherwise be a familiar and common tale of the lust for power.

It's almost impossible to think about Kurosawa without thinking about his frequent leading man Toshiro Mifune. Over the course of their careers, they made sixteen films together in one of the most fruitful actor-director partnerships of all time. Throne of Blood was their tenth collaboration, and the two could not have been more in synch. They really had to be. In the final scene, Washizu is pelted with arrows, and Kurosawa used real archers with only Mifune's motions to remind the shooters which way he would move next. Now that is trust in your director. Mifune gives a powerhouse performance, but it really comes alive as Washizu unravels. The madness in his eyes seems clear as day, and it is a sight to behold. Just as stunning is the performance given by Isizu Yamada. She truly got to the heart of the treacherous nature of her character and proves that Asaji is no woman to cross. While all the actors give solid performances, the film belonged to Mifune and Yamada. A special mention should also go to Chieko Naniwa as the evil wood spirit. With only a couple intensely unnerving scenes, he imparted everything that comes after with a sense of dread that three witches around a cauldron could only dream of brewing up.

Kurosawa never did anything small, and Throne of Blood was no exception. Building his sets atop Mt. Fuji because, "it has precisely the stunted landscape that I wanted. And it is usually foggy. I had decided that I wanted lots of fog for this film.", he makes the setting just as compelling as the scenario. That may be why Throne of Blood is such as wonderful film. Top to bottom, it is a story in full with every shot, scene, and nuance bringing something into the film's events. There is no wasted time or filler. At a tight hundred minutes, Kurosawa tells Shakespeare's tale of the doomed Prince of Denmark with incredible precision,  an emotional depth, and a masterwork of film making. Now I must get back to this spot. Does anyone have any club soda? Will that take blood off a throne? Well, if I find out, you'll hear all about it when we reconvene here in a day or two as National Blood Donation Month continues!

Bugg Rating

It Came From TCM: Niagara (1953) Slowly I Turned, Step by Step

After a month long affair with Turner Classic Movies and their awesome horror programming in October, I thought I could kick the habit in November, but it seems like I'm more locked in than ever. With a steady stream of noir, comedy, horror, and the just plain obscure and weird, my DVR seems to constantly fill up with selections from the TCM vaults. So what better way to clear some of these up than by talking to you folks about them, so check back here each Wednesday in November for another classic film from the cable network. Usually in a given month, TCM puts the spotlight on a star or director, but occasionally they'll throw together a theme. This month is one of those occasions with each Monday and Wednesday night featuring films from famous blondes. Over the month the network will feature platinum classics from May West, Veronica Lake, Ursula Andress, Grace Kelly, Carol Lombard, and Jayne Mansfield. Naturally no celebration of Hollywood blondes would be complete without Marilyn Monroe, but tonight's film features a Marilyn many may not recognize. The ditsy sexpot of The Seven Year Itch and Some Like It Hot is nowhere to be found and instead Marilyn slips into the cool, crisp skin of a femme fatale for a trip to Niagara (1953).

Polly and Ray Cutler (Jean Peters and Max Showalter) arrive in Niagara Falls for a belated honeymoon only to find their cabin is still occupied by another couple, The Loomis', Rose and George (Marilyn Monroe and Joseph Cotton). Rose is blonde, beautiful, and overtly sexual, but her husband is an older man, jealous, and possibly mentally unstable. Accepting another cabin, the Cutlers try to settle in, but Polly finds herself drawn into George and Rose's world. After seeing Rose cheating on her husband and tending to George's hand when he cuts it in a fit of rage, Polly begins to feel sympathy for the blonde's put upon hubby. What neither of them suspects is that Rose is planning his demise. Rose's lover attacks George under the falls, but falls to his own death instead. Collecting the lover's shoes in instead of his own on the return trip, soon everyone, including Rose, thinks George is dead, and he's got a murder of his own on the mind.

If someone described this movie to me, visions of black and white scenes sharply filmed would dance in my head, but even though Niagara was filmed in color it doesn't get much more Noir than this. Thematically it fit right in with Film Noir. The film's events hinge on the sexual powers of one woman while another, more conservative, woman is pulled toward that shadowed world. There are also no easy answers, no heroes, and the bad guys get what bad guys have coming to them. Stylistically it also comes through. Though color inhabits every frame, there's a deft use of shadow and framing to set the tone for the film. Director Henny Hathaway perfectly translated the classic '40's Noir look of his films Kiss of Death, The Dark Corner, and Call Northside 777 and brought it into the color era. The transition from black and white to color was a challenge for many directors, but Hathaway was clearly up to the task. Several of the scenes I'd like to mention specifically come late in the film and would spoil the film, but there are some particular stunners where the melding of color into the shadows and light push the Noir form into full color fruition.

While Jean Peters and Max Showalter were the main characters of the film, Niagara clearly belongs to the less savory pairing of Cotton and Monroe. Peters seems like the literal 'girl next door' when compared to Monroe, but she holds her own and even shows off some sex appeal. (In her next film, Pickup on South Street, Peters would inhabit the dangerous female lead instead to great effect.) Showalter (Sixteen Candles, '10') seems like he has the least to do, and all that is expected of his character is to be a solid, stand-up guy. If Peters and Showalter represent middle America of the 1950's, then Cotton and Monroe must be the decadence of city life. Cotton gets to show off rage early in the film, but when he gets to go full psycho, he summons the same inner evil he channeled in Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt. I love to see Cotton in these kind of roles because he has the ability to turn on a dime. On the other hand, Monroe plays a character unlike any other I've seen from her. The film clearly relied on her sexuality, which was on full display. (I would say they don't make gals like that anymore, but they do, they just starve themselves instead of looking like a woman.) Niagara falls into Marilyn's career just as she was becoming known as a sex icon (Playboy would publish their first issue the same year), and for the next decade, Marilyn's looks were emphasized beyond her acting ability. For another role of this caliber from the blonde bombshell, I also suggest 1961's The Misfits co-starring Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift.  

Niagara doesn't rank as one of the all-time best Noir films, but it does make for an interesting late entry into the genre. The film's use of color, its meditations on sexuality going into the '50's, and solid performances from the villainous stars make it more than worth watching. It's easy to remember Marilyn Monroe in one way, and generally that way is in a white dress with air blowing up it, but Niagara proves that she could play more than the spaced out sexpot if given the chance. It also proves a good point about TCM. I've probably seen this title in the store more than a few times. I've noticed it's stars and made note of it, but the underwhelmingly bland title didn't inspire me to check it out. Turner Classic is the type of place where it's easy to give films a chance, and while Niagara didn't get me over the barrel, it did make me falls for it somewhat.(Plus I got to use a completely unrelated Three Stooges reference in the title. So my work here is done. )

Bugg Rating

The Halloween Top 13: The Devil Made Me Do It #2 -Night of the Demon (1957)

Getting down to the last two selections on The Halloween Top 13 means at this point the films I've left off my list are going to become more and more apparent. One such example is Night of the Demon (1988), a middling demonic entry that plays out like a goofy slasher, but given the choice I decided I was better off dropping the 'S'. (This is despite Netflix twice sending me the Linnea Quigley shocker instead of what I needed.) With the loss of one single letter, the title goes from referring to standard '80's schlock to one of the all time classics of horror cinema. Coming in at #2 on The Halloween Top 13: The Devil Made Me Do It, it's Jacques Tourneur's 1957 classic, Night of the Demon. Tapped to direct by producer Hal E. Chester, Tourneur brought the moody atmospherics of his Val Lewton films, The Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie, and summoned into the world the cinematic demon on which so many after would be modeled.

The film opens with Professor Harrington (Maurice Denham) promising Satanist Dr. Karswell (Niall MacGinnis) that he will call off his investigation into the doctor's activities providing the devil worshiper calls off "what he started". Karswell agrees, but ushers the professor quickly out of his house at the stroke of nine. When the professor arrives home, the winds begin to blow uncontrollably, and through the woods a ten foot tall demon, shrouded in smoke, begins to advance. Trying to escape, the professor's car knocks down a telephone pole and the escaping parapsychology expert is electrocuted on the power lines. The next day psychologist and professional skeptic John Holden (Dana Andrews) arrives in London intending to speak at a conference with Dr. Harrington examining the psychology of witches' covens and satanist sects, but instead he discovers his host has died. John soon is also threatened by Karswell, but Holden merely scoffed at the devil worshiper when asked to drop the investigation. John, aided by Harrington's niece (Peggy Cummings), continues looking into the Satanists and Dr. Harrington's mysterious death. The investigation eventually leads John to mystic cursed runes, a Satanic farmer named Hobart, and even Stonehenge. Along the way, he has to face t unseen assailants and even a cat that turns into a cheetah, but the biggest enemy might be himself. John makes the disturbing realization that the supernatural isn't a flight of fancy as he's always believed and that a demon from Hell is now on his trail.

Night of the Demon, released in America as Curse of the Demon (supposedly to avoid confusion with Night of the Iguana), is a high point of horror cinema of the 1950's. Jacques Tourneur, as far back as his 1942 feature debut Cat People, was able to command an exceptional use of mood and atmosphere on film. Night of the Demon does not lack for either. In particular, the scenes where Dana Andrews is pursued by an unseen force through the Satanist's house stand out as particular stunners.Using only light and shadow, the director makes the translucent threat contain a very real, opaque menace to Andrews' skeptical shrink's life. So effectively built is the tension built that when Andrews wrestles a cat turned cheetah, well, it doesn't seem like Andrews is only fighting a stuffed cheetah.

The same can be said of the demon. While the titular monster's design clearly influenced later movie demons, some dismiss its appearance and wonder what miniature maven Ray Harryhausen, who was offered the job but had to pass, would have done. Depending on the source of the story, Tourneur either added the manifestation of the demon at the beginning and end at behest of the studio or it was done without him. Its appearance is so stylishly handled I find it hard to believe the Maestro of Mood wasn't involved. While parts of the film may seem silly or dated to some viewers, Tourneur's stylistic influence of can be felt in the horror films of Mario Bava and Dario Argento, director Martin Scorsese places it among his favorite horror films, and it is impossible not to see the film's influence on Sam Raimi.

Dana Andrews said prunes gave him the runes, and passing them used lots of skills. Okay, so he didn't, but if you listen to the lyrics of "Science Fiction Double Feature" from Richard O'Brian's Rocky Horror Picture Show, you may think he did. Andrews did use lots of skills though, but they were more of the acting variety than the scatological. While I love Andrews in Laura and, one of my favorite movie titles ever, I Was a Communist for the FBI, there's something about his portrayal of the skeptic whose foundations are shattered that I adore. Sadly, the same can't be said of his co-star Peggy Cummins. The actress was pleasant, but never added much to her character. In 2006, at the age of eighty one years old, Cummins attended a screening of Night of the Demon in Hertfordshire, UK where she saw her best known film for the first time.

Niall MacGinnis, who plays the Satanist Karswell, is full of gleeful goateed menace, and he nearly steals the whole film from Andrews. His most effective scene comes when Andrews' character comes to his house only to find the devil worshiper dressed as a clown attending to the village children. The dichotomy of his appearance and presence are stunning. (I also wonder if his appearance was at all an inspiration for the creepy clown at Damien's birthday party in The Omen as the makeup was quite similar.) There's one last actor I must mention. I knew I recognized wild eyed Brian Wilde in his role as hypnotized Satanist Hobart, but I could not figure out from where. All I needed to do was add 20 years to his face, and there he was, Foggy from the long running British comedy The Last of the Summer Wine. 

While Night of the Demon is not the goriest, most explicit, or newest film on this list, it is still as effective and chilling now as it was in 1957. While shoddy effects might take away slightly, the mood Tourneur imbued will never ebb. I do want to warn folks that the film suffered several cuts over the years, and the careful viewer is advised to look out for a complete 96 minute running time instead of the cut version which runs only 83. (I believe the popular version that is out on DVD now actually contains them both.)This ensures you don't miss a frame of Tourneur's masterpiece. That brings us to the end of the penultimate review on The Halloween Top 13: The Devil Made Me Do It, and with only one more film left to go, I'm sure there are plenty of guesses as to what it might be. I'm also sure that quite a few of you are correct, but if you guessed Little Nicky then you could not be more wrong. I suppose you're just going to have to join me back here tomorrow, on Halloween, to find out what film made the top of the list! Until then don't forget to keep scrolling down to check out the devilish picks of my hellaciously good friend Fran Goria!

Bugg Rating 

I've been friends with Fran Goria for a number of years, and she's long been my main horror loving cohort. She's also been a vital part of The Lair over the years contributing to the now defunct series "Ladies Night" as well as her ongoing posts "For the Love of Price" so she should be no stranger to my readers. For the fourth year in a row, she's also contributing to The Halloween Top 13, and I could not be more thrilled!

Reader List- Fran Goria

The devil made me write a top 5 list of possession films, so here it is (Editor's note: I made her do this, but I'm not the devil.....or am I?)

1. The Masque of Red Death (1964) Vincent Price, need I say more?

2. Evil Dead  (1981) Okay, technically not devil possession, but possession none the less.

3. Night of the Demons (1988) I thoroughly enjoyed this film, especially the space-filling impromptu Bauhaus video.

4 The Exorcist (1973) Linda Blair gets possessed by the devil, and crazy shit ensues.

5 Reposessed (1990) Linda Blair gets possessed by the devil (again), and crazy shit ensues...plus Leslie

Nealson.

And, an honorable mention for Mad Love  (1935). Aside from the mad doctor, the pianists' hands were possessed by an executed seriel killer.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM FRAN GORIA!

The Return of Dracula (1958) The Bobbysoxer and the Bloodsucker

Hello loyal Lair-ers. Have you been missing your daily dose of B-U-Double G lately? Well, I must apologize. For the last couple of months I’ve found myself having to wrangle an agreement on the debt ceiling, tutor Michelle Bachmann on U.S. history, and break up Mark Anthony and J. Lo’s marriage. (Hey, no one who appeared in Anaconda should have to marry Latin Skeletor.) Needless to say I’ve been busy, but now it’s time to get back to it. In order to get my return going, I thought I would look at a film that returns a horror icon to an era he’s rarely been known to inhabit. By the late fifties, Lugosi’s Dracula and the string of sequels that followed felt ruthlessly old hat. What better way to update the bloodsucker than by bringing him right into the open arms of 1950’s America?

Arguably, the better way was to make a bloody, sexy, violent movie like Hammer’s 1958 film The Horror of Dracula, but 1958’s The Return of Dracula from Gramercy Studios eschewed all of that to outfit its Transylvanian count with a poofy hairdo and a collection of suits that would be at home on the set of Mad Men. The Return of Dracula begins as John Merriman (John Wengraf) leads a priest, and a group of hired men into a crypt where he believes Dracula sleeps. Upon opening the crypt, it turns out that Drac (Francis Lederer) has already buggered off, and after loading his coffin on train, the Count knocks off an artist named Bellack. Dracula completes the artists’ voyage by ship to the United States, and soon makes himself at home with “cousin” Cora (Greta Granstedt), her son Mickey, and her ravishing young daughter Rachel. (Norma Eberhardt). Nosy neighbor boy Tim (Ray Stricklyn) suspects there’s something amiss with Cousin Bellack, and when Rachel’s friend Jenny dies under mysterious circumstances, it’s not long before Merriman shows up with his eye on the vampire’s trail.

The Return of Dracula is a low budget film that plays out much more like a thriller than a horror film. In fact, if it wasn’t for the vampire element, it would strike very similar to Alfred Hitchcock’s 1943 film of evil in a small town Shadow of a Doubt. In that case, Joseph Cotton is a murderous Uncle Charlie come to hide out in a sleepy town, but his undoing comes in the guise of his all too smart niece played by Theresa Wright for whom he harbors a lecherous desire. Like Uncle Charlie, Dracula should have left the young gals alone, and he might have had a shot at blending into America unnoticed/ It’s somewhat baffling why Dracula would want to hide out with an average Middle American family. Sleeping all day is not exactly considered normal behavior after all. The Return of Dracula naturally doesn’t spend much time explaining itself; it’s more interested in having Lederer’s Count leer at Eberhardt. In a way it’s not spiritually unlike a pre-historic version of True Blood either. Sure Lederer is no Bill or Eric, but he does kind of look like a cross between Greg Proops, Luigi Pistilli, and Steve Martin in My Blue Heaven. That has to work for some ladies, right?

Director Paul Landres was a journeyman television director working on everything from Flipper and Adam-12 to Daniel Boone and Sky King, but amongst the few feature films he directed there is a pair of horror films with bite. The first, 1957’s The Vampire, concerned a scientist who turns himself into a bloodthirsty monster after ingesting an experimental drug made from vampire bat blood.  He followed that up with The Return of Dracula. In both cases Landres was working from a script by Pat Fielder who also penned 1957’s The Monster that Challenged the World and the 1981 made for TV disaster flick Goliath Awaits. Bringing Dracula into the modern era was an interesting move, one what would be recreated some fifteen years later by Hammer films in the middling Dracula 1972 A.D. (1972) and for laughs in the 1979 George Hamilton flick Love at First Bite as well as countless other times. Ultimately, The Return of Dracula is neither horrific nor thrilling enough to score on either front. It never moves beyond the promise of Dracula in the 50’s as I wished it would have. It needed drag (Drag-u-la?)  races, the Count at a sock hop, or at least Transylvania’s number one son sharing a malted with someone, but alas it was not meant to be.

Before I close this out, I would like to take a moment to talk about the two main actors because they are what really made the redeeming parts of Return of Dracula succeed. Francis Lederer is an actor that I was completely unfamiliar with before watching this film, and I think it’s a shame he spent much of his career playing small roles as baddies or spies. The Czech actor brings to Dracula a quiet menace, a lecherous quality without being a complete cad, and a gentle sophistication diametrically opposed to the bloodthirsty monster inside. While Lederer never landed another marquee role, he did play Dracula once more in a 1971 episode of Rod Serling’s Night Gallery, his last onscreen role. Costarring with Lederer as the object of his affections was actress Norma Eberhardt. The picture of 1950’s female innocence, Eberhardt also instilled his character with brains to match her beauty. While Norma never made much of a name for herself, she did also appear in an exploitation classic, the campy 1953 reform school film Problem Girls. 

The Return of Dracula did not hail the second coming of a horror icon (as Hammer films was busy doing on the other side of the pond), but it does hint at the future of the genre. Taking the vampire out of the gothic setting into a modern age is what I believe three fourths of present day entertainment is about after all. What The Return of Dracula lacks in plot development, it makes up for with interesting performances and a premise that almost makes good on its promise. While the Return of Dracula wasn’t all that great, I hope you think that the return of the ever lovin’ blue eye’d Bugg worked out better. This month will lead up to the third anniversary of The LBL, and I just can’t let a celebration like that go on without me can I? So check back tomorrow for another special post, and until then, it’s good to be back folks. See you soon.

Bugg Rating

GUEST POST- Hitch on the Hump: Rupert Pupkin Is a Saboteur

Hello folks and welcome to another wonderful Guest Post in my Hitch on the Hump series. Today's Hitchcocky goodness comes to us by way of the one and only Rupert Pupkin of the blog Rupert Pupkin Speaks and frequent guest host on The Gentlemen's Guide to Midnite Cinema. If you visit Rupert's site, then you're in store for lists and lists of great movies spanning all categories. Plus Rupert keeps me up to date on what's new and interesting on Netflix Instant Watch, and if you like to watch streaming like I do, it's a feature that can't be missed. Then on The Gentlemen's Guide, Rupert joins Big Willie and The Samurai as they talk about all the best and worst in cult and genre cinema. It's a show I never miss and neither should you. You also also shouldn't miss out on Rupert's thoughts on Saboteur. So don't try and pull a fast one and keep on reading....

Hitchcock made so many classics over his wonderful career, it's no surprise that the occasional film gets lost in the shuffle. For me Saboteur is one of those films. It's a film that is often remembered for one specific effects shot having to do with the Statue of Liberty, but it seems even that shot's inclusion in a plethora of 'best of' Hitch montages hasn't inspired enough people to go and seek the movie out. Falling in an interesting period on Hitch's timeline, the film came out in 1942, wedged betweenMr. and Mrs. Smith (A rare Hitch Screwball comedy) and one of his masterpieces(and his favorite) Shadow of the Doubt. It was also Hitch's first feature for Universal(where he did a lot of his best work). The film's climactic sequence on the famous U.S. monument predates (and most probably inspires) North by Northwest's standoff on Mount Rushmore by 17 years. There's even a moment in the last sequence that was borrowed(and lampooned) by the Coen Brothers in TheHudsucker Proxy.

Saboteur is a dark tale of high-reaching conspiracy and one that seems interestingly poignant especially today. Though it is just a shade above a straight propaganda film and it seems a bit steeped in the nationalism of the time(Pearl Harbor had been bombed just as they were getting started with pre-production), it still rings of true and classic Hitchcock. Star Robert Cummings(who would also appear in Dial 'M' For Murder more than a decade later) is a great everyman type, haplessly caught in a frame and thrust into a nerve-wracking tangled web. The lovely Priscilla Lane (Arsenic & Old Lace) who starred in some great John Garfield films previous to this ( Dust Be My Destiny, Four Daughters) stacks up well against other Hitchcock heroines and is very darned cute in my estimation. The film is a great suspenseful ride from it's alarming opening to the harrowing climax up top of lady liberty herself. It is almost always my overlooked Hitchcock pick to recommend to fans that may have missed it.

That wraps it up for this week's Hitch on the Hump Guest Post, but I'll be back this week with more Road to Horrorhound goodness, and Hitch on the Hump will return next week with special guest The Mike of From Midnight With Love.

Hitch on the Hump: The Wrong Man (1956)

One of the main features of so many Hitchcock movies is the “wrong man“. By that I mean the average Joe, Richard Haney in The 39 Steps or Jimmy Stewart in The Man Who Knew Too Much, gets pulled into a world of murder, spies or intrigue where he soon becomes a target like Cary Grant in North by Northwest. So it should come as no little surprise that when Hitch read a story of a real life “wrong man”, he would be attracted to the story. The article that caught the Master of Suspense’s eye appeared in a 1953 Life magazine written by journalist and crime fiction author Herbert Brean and detailed the false arrest of jazz musician Manny Balestrero and his eventual vindication. After fictionalizing so many “wrong men” adventures, it seemed natural to Hitchcock to get involved in bringing it to screen with his picture The Wrong Man.

Maxwell Anderson

Paramount, who held his contract, was not all that interested in the project, but it just so happened that Hitch still owed one more film to Warner Brothers. So after waiving his directing fee, Warners happily signed on the project. Not everyone was happy though. John Michael Hayes, the writer who had penned Hitch’s previous four films, had gone through quite a falling out with the director after demanding sole billing for 1956’s The Man Who Knew Too Much. When the director demanded Hayes work with slighted British scribe Angus MacPhail who had been taken off of Rear Window’s credits telling Hitchcock made it plain to Hayes that, “If you don’t come to Warner Brothers with me, I’ll never speak to you again.” Hayes declines, and Hitchcock made good on his promise. In his place, Hitch brought in playwright, poet, and occasional screenwriter Maxwell Anderson who had written the play on which 1948’s Joan of Arc with Ingrid Bergman was based as well as the script for the original stage version of The Bad Seed. (He would later pen a rejected version of Vertigo, entitled Listen, Darkling, from an adaptation of Narcejac’s novel D’Entre les Morts.) Together with producer Herbert Coleman, the writers were tasked with remaining as true to life as possible and even retraced the steps of their very real “wrong man” before producing the script which would become The Wrong Man.

Eschewing his usual cameo appearance, Hitchcock is the first person to appear in The Wrong Man, and coincidentally it was the first time the director spoke in any of his films. He appears here to assure the audience that the story they are about to see is indeed based on true events.  It is the story of Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda), a mild mannered bassist in a jazz combo and father to two little boys. Trying to make ends meet and get the dental work his wife (Vera Miles) needs done, he takes in her insurance policy to see what they could borrow against it. The clerks at the insurance company tell him, but they also phone the police and identify him as the man who held them up on three occasions. Manny is picked up by the police, and then continually misidentified as the hold up man by witnesses. Thrown into jail, he finally makes the astronomical bail, but then finds there is little way to prove his innocence. His wife Rose begins to crack under the strain and must be institutionalized as Manny begins to accept his fate as an innocent wrongly accused.

From all accounts, The Wrong Man stays very true to the story of Manny Balestrero even using some of the locations and actual people involved in the case. While it is fascinating that Hitchcock would so studiously bring this real story to the screen, it is also the film’s greatest hindrance. As Hitch would say later when interviewed by Francois Truffaut, “I was too concerned with veracity to take the sufficient dramatic license.” This concern for true to life events may have sprouted from Hitchcock’s admiration of the new Italian neo-realist films such as De Sica’s The Bicycle Thief. However while Hitchcock remained true as possible to the story, he still infused the film with his own particular brand of film fantasy with swooping fluid camera work where he allows the lens to tell the story more than the characters and their actions. He was assisted on grafting his style into this true to life tale by cinematographer Robert Burks, Hitchcock’s collaborator behind the camera from 1951’s Strangers on a Train to 1964’s Marnie, twelve films in total spanning a large chunk of Hitchcock’s catalog.

From the start, The Wrong Man was a film tailor made for Henry Fonda and Vera Miles. The forever-earnest Fonda had been on Hitchcock’s leading man list ever since he tried to cast him in Foreign Correspondent and Saboteur. Fonda gives a measured performance, nailing the material, but never really driving home the emotion. For his part, Fonda was very pleased with working for Hitchcock saying, “He was funny all the time. Hitch would come in and tell a funny story just before he would say ‘Roll ‘em’ into a serous scene.” Miles, however, became the subject of the Hitchcock treatment. Even before the production, he controlled all aspects of her wardrobe dressing her in whites, blacks, and grays because he felt Miles wore too much color and it did not favor her (this also contributed to his choice to film in black and white). He ran the actress through the emotional ringer while filming her character’s breakdown scenes, and it is said that the actress resented Hitchcock’s micro-management though her performance is thoroughly compelling.

While the true to life story was something of a departure for Hitchcock, The Wrong Man also marks a departure for Bernard Herrmann. Having seen the other seven films that Herrmann scored for Hitchcock, I have come to expect rich string arrangements and dynamic orchestral numbers. While there are some of the strings on display in The Wrong Man, Herrmann made a departure as a nod to the main character’s profession, jazzman. Throughout the film, there are nods to swing and bop deftly woven into the musical tapestry. These moments give The Wrong Man both a driving force and some much-needed tension, but also it makes it feel more personal. The story of Manny Balestrero begins with him playing jazz, so it really brings the film together to continue that thread throughout.

In Truffaut’s talk with Hitchcock about The Wrong Man, Hitchcock concludes that it is “among the indifferent Hitchcock’s”. Truffaut, somewhat disappointed, seems to want the director to defend his movie, but the Master of Suspense goes on to say, “Impossible, I don’t feel strongly about it.” While this was true in the aftermath of the film, certainly Hitch, willing to wave his directing fee, had strong feelings about it before the project was filmed. In many ways, this was an experimental film for Hitchcock, a director who was forever experimenting and innovating. I think it is quite telling that he followed up this film with Vertigo, a film that revels in impressionistic wonder. The Wrong Man is a film that firmly fits in Hitchcock’s catalog, and though it might be “indifferent” to the Master of Suspense, it’s a must for Hitchcock fans.

Bugg Rating