What Beckoning Ghost?
Starring Judith Evelyn and Tom Helmore. Directed by Ida Lupino
Air date 9 -18-1961 See it here soon ! MonsterGirlCategory: Classic TV
The Incredible DokTor Markesan-[Essay on Boris Karloff’s Thriller]
A sign reads “NO TRESPASSING ~VIOLATORS WILL BE SHOT ON SIGHT~DokTor Konrad Markesan”
The Incredible DokTor Markesan aired Feb 26 1962 perhaps the most creepy of all the Thriller stories, originally appeared in Weird Tales Magazine and was taken from a story written by August Derleth and Mark Schorer, and adapted by Donald S Sanford and directed by Robert Florey. The rotting corpse makeup by Jack Barron actually predates Romero’s 1968 Night Of The Living Dead, which I feel only made both effectively more creepy by the B&W film.
Mort Stevens’s score begins as gravely contemplative and daydreamy single notes on the piano beckon us into this episode, then begins the darker, deeper cello strings foreboding and ominous. As the piano resolves into more somber chords, the young Fred Bancroft and his new bride Molly drive up to the entrance of Oakmoor. What has happened to the broad green lawns and the servants in starched white uniforms? They proceed to enter the house, the door having been strangely left unlocked. Seemingly vacant, Oakmoor is crocheted in cobwebs, from years of neglect. There is no electricity. Fred lights a candelabra and the couple continue to search for Fred’s Uncle Konrad. As they start to ascend the staircase, suddenly a door creaks open, the music sways from ominous to severe, and a sallow, blank, expressionless, Konrad Markesan steps out of the shadows. Uncle Konrad stares up at them, ashen, emotionless, his right hand poised in a state of rigor, he stares off, silent. Fred trying to ingratiate himself awkwardly, remains smiling, excruciatingly strained in the midst of his Uncle’s peculiarly inhospitable behavior. Molly acutely more aware of his uncle’s bizarre presence stands there obviously horrified and uncomfortable while Fred still flounders to make a connection with his relative. Molly chirps out a “Hello” and from the moment Fred holds out his hand to shake his Uncle’s, Markesan turns away and says “Come with me” and proceeds to leave the grand hallway.
Continue reading “The Incredible DokTor Markesan-[Essay on Boris Karloff’s Thriller]”
MonsterGirl’s Sunday Nite Snack: We’re Having a Heat Wave! so here’s-The Twilight Zone’s ‘The Midnight Sun’
THE MIDNIGHT SUN
Release date -Nov. 17, 1961 Episode directed by Anton Leader, written by Rod Serling and starring Lois Nettleton as Norma and Betty Garde as Mrs. Bronson.
When the Earth falls out of orbit, two women try to cope with increasingly oppressive heat in a nearly abandoned city.
Stay cool! – MonsterGirl
As sure as my name is MonsterGirl, this is a Boris Karloff Thriller! “The Storm”
An underrated episode of Boris Karloff’s Thriller in brief! even for me, that is…
The Storm -Release date Jan. 22nd, 1962
Directed by Herschel Daugherty adapted for television by writer William D. Gordon from a short story by crime novelist MacIntoch Malmar. Which was later adapted for television, again directed by Hershel Daugherty in an updated film called The Victim 1972Â starring the wonderful Elizabeth Montgomery and the always acerbic Eileen Heckart.
Starring Nancy Kelly as Janet Willsom (The Bad Seed 1956) The classic American horror-thriller film directed by Mervyn LeRoy won Kelly an Oscar for Best Actress that year as psychotic Rhoda Penmark’s (Patty McCormack) mother, Christine Penmark.
Walter Kerr of the New York Herald Tribune wrote of her "Tony Award-winning stage performance:
“Though Miss Kelly has done attractive work on Broadway before, she has never really prepared us for the brilliance of the present portrait” (Walter Kerr-New York Times, January 14, 1995).
The Bad Seed 1956 also stars Eileen Heckart and the quintessentially cranky Henry Jones)
The evil Rhoda strokes her mother. Scarier than clowns….!
The Storm also stars James Griffith as Ed Brandies the quirky lecherous and intrusive cab driver. David McLean as Ben T. Willsom and Jean Carroll as the voice of phone operator Drucie. Not to be forgotten, the beautifully sleek and ever-present Baba the black cat and real star of this episode…
Nancy Kelly plays Janet Willsom, a woman besieged by noises and bad weather, while isolated in her home, waiting for her husband Ben to arrive home in during a raging storm. Kept alerted and accompanied by her faithful black cat Baba, Janet must first fend off the nauseating advances of the cabbie who brings her home and wants to practically move in on her, while her husband is away on business.
When I originally posted this feature I had made a reference to Hitchcock in the post concerning the body of the dead girl in the trunk. The focus is on her lifeless finger, with the large diamond ring dangling as limp as a soggy carrot.
The Storm, in general, contains striking elements of a good old-fashioned Hitchcock thriller! As well as the framing of one hell of a good stage play!
I hadn’t been asked to join in the BEST HITCHCOCK MOVIE (THAT HITCHCOCK NEVER MADE)Â yet. So here it is once again, with a few little tidbits thrown in so that it can take its place in the wonderful blogathon that’s going on between July 7 -July 13!
The use of a strong woman, alone in a situation where there is a person unknown stalking her. Plenty of red herrings thrown in to divert our attention, and one hell of a dead body stuffed in a trunk, that we the audience are privy to, but not the feature’s protagonist, Janet Willsom.
Janet Willsom, finds herself in the midst of one single night’s journey of survival, trying to stay one step ahead of a murderer and also delay an uncomfortable bit of evidence, that could turn her entire world upside down.
From its small taut moments of built-in suspense, until the eventual climax, ‘The Storm’ plays out truly like any good Hitchcock ‘Woman in Peril’ such as Dial M For Murder 1954 Starring Grace Kelly and Ray Milland.
 Suspicion 1941
The episode opens with a mysterious pair of man’s trousers assailing a beautiful blonde in the midst of the rainstorm. She is strangled and stuffed in a trunk in the cellar, as we are strategically shown the emphasis on a shiny diamond ring on her lifeless finger sticking out of the trunk. A very Hitchockian moment…
Is Janet now being stalked by the same mad killer? What’s behind every noise and flash of light and sweep of shadow?
I love this episode because it creates a perfectly creepy environment of isolation. Very much lit as a faithful crime drama Film Noir, the shear simplicity of each moment, each little task Janet undergoes to create normalcy and safety in her surroundings, what would usually be merely ordinary banal gestures become tautly drawn-out maneuvers in a darkly ominous, tweaked and dangerous landscape.
Invoking more of a sense of terror because of its bared-down realism, than a manufactured horror. As suggested by David Schow‘s wonderful commentary of this episode on the recently released DVD box set, the atmosphere of the isolated ‘woman in peril‘ who must fend off whatever is lurking, reminds us of Audrey Hepburn in Wait Until Dark 1967
This is also a faithful psychological Film Noir piece, utilizing the very best in Nancy Kelly as the dame in danger and James Griffith as the lasciviously intrusive cab driver Ed whose quirky character is either a raving maniac or just a red herring to throw us off the scent of the true murderer.
Continue reading “As sure as my name is MonsterGirl, this is a Boris Karloff Thriller! “The Storm””
Ida Lupino: The Iron Maiden of Prison Noir: Part One ‘Women’s Prison’ (1955)
Ida Lupino: Actress/Director – The Iron Maiden of Prison Noir
“State’s prison, all prisons look alike from outside, but inside each has a different character. In this one"¦ caged men"¦ separated only by a thick wall. From caged women"¦
The system is wrong but it goes on and on and on"¦”
WOMEN’S PRISON 1955
Directed by Lewis Seller, and written Crane Wilbur, (He Walked By Night 1948, The Bat 1959, House of Wax 1953) with the screenplay and story by Jack DeWitt.
Ida Lupino plays Amelia van Zandt the sadistic borderline, psychotic Warden/Matron of a co-ed women’s prison. She is a total institutionalist, exerting strict regulations, with no gray area for sentimentalism. For van Zandt it’s about the cold hard road to rehabilitation… her way… the hard way.
Lupino has described herself as “the poor man’s Bette Davis.” Ida Lupino moved to Hollywood from England, after filming I Lived with You starring the beautiful Ivor Novello. (The Lodger 1927). She started to make some noise as the hard-edged dame in the 40s, starring in 2 powerful Noir films They Drive by Night (1940) and High Sierra (1941), both starring opposite one of my all-time favorites, Humphrey Bogart.
She starred in two other memorable films which are great contributions to classic Film Noir, Road House 1948 and On Dangerous Ground 1952. For more info about Ida Lupino, the actress, and how she got started as a prolific director of film and television you can read more about her here.
Lupino, while a uniquely beautiful woman, has a face that can convey heartlessness, a hollow shell of a woman, and a militant spinster. ‘The Iron Maiden’, is what I’ve dubbed Lupino for these two particular interchangeable roles.
Women’s Prison is swathed with an ensemble of various Noir Femmes as the rough and weathered inmates. Jan Sterling, Audrey Totter, and Hugo Haas regular Cleo Moore.
There’s also the wonderful Juanita Moore, Vivian Marshall, Mae Clarke, Gertrude Micheal as Chief Matron Sturgess, and one of my favorites, Phyllis Thaxter as the ‘nice girl’ thrust into a ‘bad situation’ who almost loses her mind from the claustrophobic and oppressive iron grip van Zandt keeps on her and the rabid choke hold she keeps on the jugulars of the other female inmates.
And don’t let Thaxter’s role fool you, I’ve seen her play ruthless psychotics in her own right on Boris Karloff’s Thriller episode air date Nov. 6th, 1961Â The Last of The Sommervilles as the conniving sociopath Ursula Sommerville. Interesting connection…Ida Lupino not only wrote the script for the episode but directed it as well!
Although a gritty Noir ‘women in prison film…Â could easily sway into the campy territory, Lewis Seller’s Women’s Prison stays very steady on a course of lensing the social implications of a corrupt and brutal institution that extols credit for keeping the female riff-raff out of the community while perpetuating the hard line, and struggle that many of these women face on the outside. Beating them down, and objectifying them as sexless social misfits who need to be kept away from ‘men’ and out of a ‘decent’ society.
Amelia van Zandt is the hyper-exemplification of what can happen when too much power is given agency and allowed to culminate into a destructive force. van Zandt is the linchpin of brute force, and the submission required in order to control a group or perpetuate an ideal. The fact that she is female illustrates that it does not only have to be a patriarchal institution that can break a women’s spirit. It is here that elements of class and social capital come into focus and play a role in predetermining their fate.
Lupino’s character is similar to Hume Cronyn’s sadistic and unempathetic Capt. Munsey in Jule’s Dassin’s Brilliant Brute Force 1947:
In a way, van Zandt is just another ‘Boogeyman‘ created by an institution that dehumanizes its individuals.
Women’s Prison illustrates what happens when absolute control is given to a person or persons and that control goes unchecked, allowing their private or misguided motivations, mental health, ability to lead, and quite simply the lack of understanding about the human equation to dictate the terms of the human condition in/of an isolated/insulated environment.
Continue reading “Ida Lupino: The Iron Maiden of Prison Noir: Part One ‘Women’s Prison’ (1955)”
The Film Score Freak recognizes The Outer Limits: The Forms of Things Unknown & Jo Gabriel’s Mistress of Time
The Outer Limits: The Forms of Things Unknown
Season One Episode 32 Air date May 4th, 1964
Directed by Gerd Oswald and written by Joseph Stefano
Two women decide the only way out of an abusive relationship with a sadistic blackmailer is to poison him. In the midst of fleeing, they come upon an isolated house with an odd old caretaker and a solitary young man who dabbles with clocks, time travel, and raising the dead.
The dreamy David McCallum plays Tone Hobart, the man who can tinker with time, space, and soul revival. Vera Miles plays the self-assured Kasha, Barbara Rush is the slightly neurotic Leonora, Cedric Hardwicke is Colus, the stoic manservant and Scott Marlowe is the fiendish Andre. From one of the truly timeless series, with the advent of a social consciousness, The Outer Limits, is one of my favorite television series of all time!
As I’ve been known to write about Boris Karloff’s Thriller, I do plan on covering a few of my most treasured episodes in-depth and certainly with my usual long-winded overview and images of the original The Outer Limits!
For now… I couldn’t resist adding my musical voice to a ‘moment in time’ of one of the most poetic and haunting stories in the series. Here are edited scenes from The Forms of Things Unknown mashed up with my song ‘The Mistress of Time’ off my album The Amber Sessions.
Eternally Yours – Jo Gabriel – MonsterGirl
Coming soon to The Last Drive-In “Ida Lupino:The Iron Maiden – “Women’s Prison (1955) & Women in Chains (1972)
Who doesn’t love a good teeth grinding ‘Women in Prison’ movie! I know I can’t resist. And so I thought I’d pay a little tribute to two fabulous guilty pleasures of mine starring actress/director Ida Lupino!
The incredible Ida Lupino
I’ll go further in depth as to Ida Lupino’s extraordinary contributions to film and television when I do the full post!
The first film Women’s Prison 1955 is a taut Prison Film Noir piece starring the ineffable Ida Lupino who gives a stunning portrayal of a brutally sadistic prison warden Amelia van Zandt who holds sway over these chained women, slowly exposing herself to be a psychotic, as she institutes her savage brand of rehabilitation!
The film stars Jan Sterling as Brenda Martin
Phyllis Thaxter (One of my favorite character actresses)as Helene Jensen a nice girl in prison on the verge of an irreversible nervous breakdown!
Juanita Moore as Polly Jones
Mae Clarke as Matron Saunders
and Lupino’s real life husband Howard Duff as the sympathetic Dr. Crane and Warren Stevens as Glen Burton the man who can’t keep his mitts off his fellow inmate wife!
“Sensational scandal rocks women’s prison!“
Women’s Prison (1955)
Then once again…now in that glorious made for tv color!!!!!!
Lupino reprises her role as the equally brutal Claire Tyson in THE ABC MOVIE OF THE WEEK !!!!!!!
The film stars 70s tv and drama staples Lois Nettleton , Jessica Walter, and Belinda Montgomery
Lois Nettleton plays parole officer Sally Porter who goes undercover to expose prison brutality at the hands of the vicious matron Clair Tyson! The film also stars Neile Adams, Hazel Medina, Kathy Cannon, BarBara Luna and the great Lucille Benson.
Women in Chains (1972) tv movie
Also coming here at the Drive-In Part 2 of Screaming Mimi and MonsterGirl Asks Film Scholar Aviva Briefel
A trailer a day keeps the Boogeyman away! ABC Movie of the Week special promo
If you’re like me and remember fondly looking forward to the offerings of The ABC Movie of the Week, which was a feast of great 70s directors, writers, film stars and character actors. Stories of mystery, suspense and often the supernatural. Even a few ground breaking stories that featured taboo narratives for it’s day. Here’s a little taste of yesterday…!
ABC Movie of the Week featuring clips from
Run Simon Run 1970
Women In Chains 1972
Ida Lupino revising her role as yet another psychotic iron maiden warden of a women’s prison!
And No One Could Save Her 1973
The Longest Night 1972
Duel 1971
Snatched 1973
Howard Duff and Christopher George in 1973s Snatched
Divorce His Divorce Hers 1973
Happy Trailers MonsterGirl
Sure as my name is MonsterGirl, This is a Boris Karloff’s Thriller ” Rose’s Last Summer”
Yet another underrated Karloff Thriller episode in brief. Yes, I know, I”m long-winded, and if you had to wait for me to do the whole transcription for some of these wonderful shows and films, I’d never write anything. I am trying to be disciplined here. Less photo work, less rambling on, and more to the gist of the story!
But don’t get too comfy with my brevity, The long-winded MonsterGirl lurks around the corner to sweep you up with 2 part series and photo galleries that could fill an entire album. That’s just how I roll, and I truly hope most of you take me as I am…!
Rose’s Last Summer -release date October 11 1960
“They Called Me “Bad Girl” – Rose French
Karloff begins his opening soliloquy…
“Rose French. in the blur of memory…the face grows dim…but do you remember the name….20 years ago…Rose French, the remarkable Rose French. As a servant girl, or as a princess. She was a quicksilver star in celluloid heaven. If a woman could sell her soul to achieve such fame, what wouldn’t she do to get it back? Poor Rose, that was all she wanted, to relive the past. And those who loved her, Frank Clyde for instance could do nothing to stop her, but the comeback trail could lead to strange and sinister places. To a lonely garden. And to a night of terror!
It could even lead to the face of a painted doll…but the comeback trail is a journey without maps…as sure as my name is Boris Karloff…Poor Rose French and her last desperate summer…That’s the name of our story ROSE’S LAST SUMMER. Our principal players are Ms. Mary Astor, Mr. Lin McCarthy, and Miss Helen Quintal …
Let me assure you this is a THRILLER!”
Starring Mary Astor as Rose French/Mrs. Horace Goodfield/Helen Quintal. This teleplay would poetically mirror Astor’s personal journey as a Hollywood movie star whose life took a different direction, one mixed with alcohol and scandal.
Lin McCarthy as Frank Clyde, Jack Livesey as Haley Dalloway, Hardie Albright as Willet Goodfield, Dorothy Green as Ethel Goodfield
In the beginning scenes of Roses Last Summer we see a weary yet unrestrained drunk, an uninhibited woman who looks like she’s got a mad on at the world, stumbling outside a night crawlers bar. She’s having an argument with the bar owner who apparently has thrown her out of his establishment. After spouting a few barbs at the place, she takes off her shoe and throws it through the glass window with neon letters that spell BAR.
She then stumbles in front of a moving truck which strikes her down in the street. A crowd gathers around her unconscious body. Someone picks up a snapshot of her from her handbag and announces, that this is no ordinary lush, this is the once famous but now aged star of the silver screen Rose French. An intense and curious man in the throng of street faces begins looking suspiciously at poor Rose splayed out on the asphalt.
But this is just the beginning of the story.
A Trailer a day keeps the Boogeyman away! Don’t Be Afraid of The Dark 1973
This is one of my all time favorite Movie of the Week offerings from the 70s starring Kim Darby who inherits a family house with husband Jim Hutton and becomes taunted by little demons who live in the darkness and want her to stay with them forever! Directed by John Newland
“Something like this little ferocious animal grabbed at my dress”
“We want you…we want you…we want you…we want you…”
Happy Trailers! MonsterGirl