Suddenly Last Summer (1959) Part I -The Devouring Mother, the Oedipal Son & the Hysterical Woman

“I know it’s a hideous story but it’s a true story of our time and the world we live in”- Catherine Holly

SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER (1959)

Suddenly, Last Summer was a one-act play by Tennessee Williams. It opened off-Broadway on January 7, 1958. It was part of a double bill with another one-act play of Williams’ called Something Unspoken. Suddenly, Last Summer is considered one of Williams’ starkest and most poetic works, and I tend to agree.

Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz (All About Eve 1950, A Letter to Three Wives 1949) based on Tennessee William’s play with additional work on the screenplay by Gore Vidal.

While writing this post, I discovered the same story surfacing about the working atmosphere on the set of the film, concerning the tensions between film stars Katharine Hepburn as well as Liz Taylor toward Mankiewicz’s abominable treatment of actor Monty Clift who had been struggling on the set with alcohol and drug use due to a car accident that disfigured his face. The actors had grown increasingly disgusted with the director’s blatant homophobic abuse of Clift who was openly gay.

joseph-l.-mankiewicz-06 — Film director-*Joseph L. Mankiewicz.*

Dr Cukrowicz and Cathy — **Dr. Cukrowicz talks with Catherine at the convent.**

ElizabethTalyor-MontgomeryClift-PlaceInTheSun-1950-ParamountLot — **Liz and Monty on the set of Place In The Sun 1950**

Apparently, this tension culminated in a moment of rebellion by Ms. Hepburn, who waited til the final scene was shot, and then proceeded to spit in Mankiewicz’s face. I have to say, that while Hepburn is not on my list of actors that I idolize nor whose film career I follow closely, I commend her intrepid defense, and would have expected more of a face slap with a long white linen glove. I am saddened by the revelation, if it is accurate that Mankiewicz was a homophobe. I just finished watching his film, Letter to Three Wives 1949 with 3 of my best-loved actresses Ann Southern, Jeanne Crain, and Linda Darnell. Not to mention his contribution to All About Eve 1950. It’s often hard to separate the person from the work, and while I will always admire his work as a director, it does taint the waters to think that Mankiewicz could be a Neanderthal in his thinking.

letter-to-three-wives-sothern-darnell-crain — Letter to Three Wives (1949) starring *Ann Southern*, *Linda Darnell*, and *Jeanne Crain.*

anne baxter, bette davis, marilyn monroe & george sanders - all about eve 1950 — **All About Eve 1950.**

***Joseph L. Mankiewicz* on the set of Suddenly Last Summer with *Elizabeth Taylor.***

Producer Sam Spiegel submitted Gore Vidal’s screenplay to the MPAA’s review board before production began, the board having expressed objections to the story’s subject matter. Spiegel wanted to let Joseph Mankiewicz shoot the film as it was intended. Although the board first refused to approve the film, they gave the go-ahead, after a few minor changes were made. Thus, the word homosexual never materialized at any time in the film.

The movie supposedly differs from the stage version, using added scenes, and characters. Also adding a few subplots. Due to the strict Hollywood Production Codes that were enforced, they had to cut out any explicit references to homosexuality.

Elizabeth Taylor conjures the psychically injured Catherine Holly with a volatile poignancy, Katharine Hepburn icy and filled with misconstructions about the relationship with her son Sebastian, emerges from her gilded elevator like a throne, as Mrs.Violet Venable. Both stars were up for Academy Awards for Best Actress in A Leading Role that year, but both lost to Simone Signoret for her role in Room at The Top (1959).

Continue reading “Suddenly Last Summer (1959) Part I -The Devouring Mother, the Oedipal Son & the Hysterical Woman” →

From The Vault: Valley of the Dolls (1967) “Boobies, boobies, boobies. Nothin’ but boobies. Who needs ’em?”

Valley of The Dolls 1967

Directed by Mark Robson, produced by David Weisbart and Helen Deutsch, with a screenplay by Dorothy Kingsley and Harlan Ellison. Cinematography by William H. Daniels (CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF 1957, IN LIKE FLINT 1967).

Film editing by Dorothy Spencer (STAGECOACH 1939, TO BE OR NOT TO BE 1942, LIFEBOAT 1944 and CLEOPATRA 1963) Set Direction by Raphael Bretton (HUSH HUSH SWEET CHARLOTTE 1964 and THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE 1972) and Walter M Scott. (THE SOUND OF MUSIC 1965 and BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID 1969) Art Design by Richard Day (ON THE WATERFRONT 1954, A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE 1951 and THE GRAPES OF WRATH 1940) and Jack Martin Smith (BATMAN 1966 and PLANET OF THE APES 1968) and wardrobe by Travilla.

With all that creative talent on board, you can call the film trashy, but it sure has a lot of style!

Starring Barbara Parkins (THE MEPHISTO WALTZ 1971 never looking more beautiful in my opinion. One of my favorite horror films of the 70s, I plan on doing a long winded overview of it this Winter 2012.)

parkins_zone — **The incredible Barbara Parkins…and her killer boots!**

as Anne Welles, Patty Duke as Neely O’Hara, Sharon Tate as Jennifer North, Susan Hayward as Helen Lawson, Paul Burke as Lyon Burke, Toni Scotti as Tony Polar, Lee Grant as Miriam Polar, Martin Milner as Mel Anderson, Alexander Davion as Neely’s 2nd husband the bisexual Ted Casablanca, Naomi Stevens as Miss Steinberg and Robert H Harris as Henry Bellamy.

From the moment the utter fabulousness of this tawdry pulp icon of the 60s starts rolling on screen with Barbara Parkin’s heavenly visage gazing out the train window, and Dionne Warwick starts confessing the movie’s theme song with her soulful voice… I get verklempt.

Doll a euphemism for little colored pills of varying types of barbiturates… ‘uppers’ and ‘downers.’

It is based on the best-selling explosively trashy novel by Jacqueline Susann and directed by, of all people, Mark Robson. (THE SEVENTH VICTIM 1943, THE GHOST SHIP 1943, ISLE OF THE DEAD 1945, and well his telltale progression into melodrama land with PEYTON PLACE 1957 and eventually into darker territories with DADDY’S GONE A- HUNTING 1969)

Growing up as a little girl in the ’60s, there wasn’t a coffee table or bookshelf that I didn’t see a copy of Valley of the Dolls sitting atop next to a hardcover of a best-selling self-help book by Dr. Thomas A. Harris’, I’m Okay You’re Okay which was first published in 1967, the year Valley of The Dolls was released.

There was certainly a copy of it in my own house and I remember seeing the film either during its theatrical release or later on the huge Magnavox cabinet tv with only three dials. At first, I was struck by the incredible score from composer John Williams and songs by Andre Previn and lyrics by Dory Previn. And then I fell under the spell of the badness and the beautifulness of it all…

Standing out is its vivid colors of the 60s film processing, the vogue style couture, flashy set design, and mod art direction. Populated by the campy, over-the-top acting in all the right places, of course, by the entire cast, it makes for one hell of a ride through the tunnel of tragic love in high-dramaville. As cliche after libidinous, compulsive, and histrionic cliche prance across the screen as a story of meandering disassembled desire by the needful women and their male companions.

It’s campy and tawdry and melodramatic trash, and that’s a GOOD THING for us junkies of melodramatic trashy & campy flicks from the 1940s -1960s.

Continue reading “From The Vault: Valley of the Dolls (1967) “Boobies, boobies, boobies. Nothin’ but boobies. Who needs ’em?”” →

Pascal Laugier’s “Martyrs” (2005) The Cult of Transfiguration: From Shelley’s Electrical Secrets of Heaven, Prometheus, The Esoteric Sect of Death Trippers, Seeking Beyond the Dead

SPOILER ALERT: While I don’t give a full synopsis, I do discuss details of the film…

Martyr

A martyr (Greek : Î¼Î¬ÏÏ„Ï…Ï‚, mÃ¡rtys, “witness”; stem Î¼Î¬ÏÏ„Ï…Ï-, mÃ¡rtyr-) is somebody who suffers persecution and death for refusing to renounce …

Mysticism (Â pronunciationÂ (helpÂ·info); from the Greek Î¼Ï…ÏƒÏ„Î¹ÎºÏŒÏ‚, mystikos, meaning ‘an initiate’) is the knowledge of, and especially the personal experience of, states of consciousness, or levels of being, or aspects of reality, beyond normal human perception, sometimes including experience of and communion with a supreme being.

MARTYRS (2008)

Directed by Pascal Laugier (House of Voices 2004, The Tall Man 2012) stars the unreal Morjana Alaoui as Anna, MylÃ¨ne JampanoÃ¯ as Lucie and Catherine Begin as Mademoiselle.

Fifteen years after Lucie escapes a horrific abduction in which she is subjected to prolonged torture and deprivation, she goes on a mission of revenge on the couple who brutally held her captive. She calls upon her faithful friend from the orphanage, Anna, who was also a victim of child abuse and utterly worships Lucie, to help her clean up after the massacre at the seemingly upper-class home.

Lucie slowly devolves into madness, as she cannot exorcise the demon who has been haunting her, a nightmarish and violent phantom born out of Lucie’s guilt for having left another little girl at the mercy of their abductors. If you enter into watching Martyrs thinking that it’s a straight out of the French New Wave of Torture Porn films, you’ll miss a transformative piece of filmmaking.

From the time Colin Clive utters “It’s alive, It’s alive” in James Whale’s seminal classic Frankenstein 1931, the tone is set. Whale’s campier adaptation from Mary Shelley’s more meditative novel, is still self-possessed of science, the origin of being human, the question of ‘a’ God’s role in this existence, and ultimately, reflectively, ‘man’s’ (I loathe using normative masculine case ugh.) relationship to himself, his creator and the universe that bore him.

martyrs-morjana-alaoui11 — **Anna in chains**

martyrs-06-470-75 — **12-year-old Lucie in chains**

Frankenstein is an existential science-fiction fantasy with multiple layers and questions that can not be answered in 70 minutes on camera. But the images, the spirit of the story, and the characters can serve to evoke these primal questions and fears that have been built into our natures as human subjects.

Martyrs 6 — **Anna with her head shaved appears as a Joan of Arc figure.**

Now, if you abstract Shelley’s allegory and invert the narrative to where the matter of science does not seek out the mysteries of life in terms of how to create it from “the electrical secrets of heaven“ and an infinity of atoms, harness it, control it, thereby becoming god-like yourself …momentarily.

The film’s antagonists are a group of clandestine, ultra-wealthy, suggestive of high up in government, perhaps even royalty, seemingly above the law and untouchable, apparently with a hierarchy of leaders of advanced age. They are consumed with Mysticism or Spiritualism, (not to be confused with spirituality) a modernized form of a movement that was pervasive around the end of the 19th century and continuing around the early 1900s, and which this cabal, assumes a very clinical, anthropologically scientific approach.

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky Theosophical Movement — **Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and The Theosophical Movement -table rappings, etc.**

SilverBelle_Spirit_Booth — **Silver Belle Spirit Booth**

The film’s narrative uses science vs. religion (although the act of faith in their mission becomes emblematic itself of fanaticism and religious avidity) because it bares an almost anthropological approach; a modern form of ’empirical’ torture, a method of collecting data. The end result is the creation of a theoretical equation, that asserts, if you dehumanize, brutalize, and cause the body enough pain, the subject’s psyche and physical being has nowhere else to go but toward an elevated sense of euphoria, to become Transfigured, like that of Christ on the cross, or Saint Joan de Arc.

Mother Joan of The Angels 1960 — **Mother Joan of the Angels 1960 Directed by Jerzy Kawalerowicz**

flavia-the-heretic — **Flavia The Heretic Nun (1974)** is also doomed to be flayed alive.

The subjects of their research also, at this point, become objects. An anonymous and beautiful little girl becomes, at first, a helpless victim, then a monstrous ‘thing’, and then is exalted to a heroic saint and visionary figure.

Their methods, while equally brutal, stand in contrast with the motivations of the Medieval scourge of inflicting pain that was for the sole purpose of punishing, eliminating your enemies, relishing in sadism, barbarism, suffering, and bloodshed, merely to bringing about death slowly.

Transfiguration |transËŒfigyÉ™ËˆrÄSHÉ™n|
noun
a complete change of form or appearance into a more beautiful or spiritual state: in this light the junk undergoes a transfiguration; it shines.
"¢ (the Transfiguration) Christ’s appearance in radiant glory to three of his disciples (Matthew 17:2, Mark 9:2"“3, Luke 9:28"“36).

Ken Russells The Devils — In contrast to the angelic martyred figure, *Vanessa Redgrave* plays a devil-possessed, sexually repressed nun. Directed by Ken Russell and based on Huxley’s Devils of Loudon. Power-hungry Cardinal Richelieu seeks to bring down the group of nuns and take control of France.

This Cult of Transfiguration uses pain, deprivation, and ultimately a carefully constructed clinical form of torture which for them is the road in which to search for the ‘secrets of life.’ But unlike Shelley’s Dr. Frankenstein who sought to create life on this earthly plane, Mademoiselle’s quest is to reach past this plane to the other side… of the veil, the borderland, that thing we call ‘life after death’, the exalted state of being, where we go after we literally ‘shed our skin.’

The head of this Cult ofÂ Transfiguration, Mademoiselle, isÂ archetypalÂ of Nazi experimenters. As a French filmmaker, PascalÂ understands the deeply scarred history of WWII and the profound ramifications that the Nazi’s presence left.Â She is like the embodiment of the Nazi doctors who often used human subjects for ‘medical research.’

Dr. Herta Nazi — **The infamous Dr. Herta Oberheuser, a Nazi physician who experimented on numerous children.**

The cult finds that young girls are the most inherently geared to becoming Martyrs, so they set out abducting their ‘specimens’, subjecting them to the most brutal, yet very clinical, torture in order to bring their human subjects to the state of grace and transformation.Â Then, right before their deaths, they can communicate what they see in the ‘ether world.’

martyrs-the secrets revealed ?mademoiselle — **Anna whispers to Mademoiselle… what if anything has she revealed? What has she seen… through her transfiguration?**

I use the word clinical to describe the conditions, the beatings, and the gruesome and ultra ‘extreme’ pain they subject the girls too. This clinical torture diverges from the grittier serial killer film, where the interaction is often personal, self-satisfying, and subjective, sublimating the victim’s pain, and devouring it like a cannibal to feed their blood lust.

This cult shows no sign of emotion at all. They do not become aroused or responsive. They do, however, possess an eerily quiet fixation on their victims, as they start to enter Martyrdom. It is then they become, revered much again like a Saint, an icon, an object. But that is only when the experiment has been perceived to have worked. None of their subjects, except for Anna, utters a word before death. At the end of the film, we are left not knowing what Anna whispers to Mademoiselle.

Right after receiving the cryptic message from Anna, Mademoiselle locks herself in her room. She, too, strips away all her superficial layers, her amber-colored lenses, her head scarf, and almost all her earthly signifiers, Like Anna’s flayed body, Mademoiselle prepares herself for the other world. She only tells the man in black awaiting the news of what Anna has shared, “keep doubting” and then puts the revolver in her mouth and blows her brains out.

Viewers are left to conjecture what Anna has shared. Was it that she met Lucie on the other side and found such peace everlasting? Did she meet ‘god’? Did she experience an ecstasy beyond description? It is better not to know because that would disallow Laugier’s point. That WE cannot ever know. And if we spend our days here on this earth using other people to gain that knowledge, we’ll have not only missed the point, but we’ll become monsters ourselves. Seeking out figures to crucify on behalf of a manufactured faith, damned to uncertainty and taking victims along with us…

As Mademoiselle tells Anna “We’ve created more victims than Martyrs.”

I fear that’s how it’s been in history with human subjects and animals alike in such cases where science becomes a monstrous mechanism for knowledge, or when religion sacrifices innocent blood in the name of an ambiguous morality relying on its faith.

It’s the clinical brutality that makes the film all the more disturbing. But when I say disturbing, I do not imply that this is a film that wants to disturb you in only a visceral way. As the protagonist, Anna suffers and ultimately does become transformed, but I found myself becoming altered by the film’s end. And still days after, I have been feeling and processing what I saw on screen.

A good horror film can take an utterly monstrous, abjectly frightening, nightmarish, and at times grotesque situation, and transform itself into a thing of beauty. I truly believe that Martyrs is a horrifically beautiful film.

Georges Franju Eyes Without A Face 1959 — Georges Franju’s Eyes Without A Face 1960 comes to mind, the darkly bleak yet mesmerizing, haunting and yes, a clinical setting where a daughter’s dedicated father, a medical doctor abducts young women and skins them in order to give his beloved little girl a new face.

When a film can be so horrific that it taps into our primal fears and what Kristeva calls abjection (a hell of a read if you’re interested), anything that makes us feel something plucking at the core of our senses, perhaps not quite know what it is, but truly alters us somehow. Then when it manages to transcend the horrifying aspects of its story the visceral reactions we experience and goes on to cause an odd symbiosis with the images and the story.. .then to me… it becomes a work of art.

I’ve had that experience with Franju’s Eyes Without A Face (1960), The Exorcist (1973), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Serrador’s The House That Screamed (1969), Rosemary’s Baby (1969), Night of The Living Dead (1968) Let’s Scare Jessica To Death (1971) Lemora: A Child’s Tale of the Supernatural (1973) and Play Misty For Me (1971)Â and in recent years, with Clive Barker’s Candyman 1992, Lucky Mckee’s May (2002), Ty West’s House of The Devil (2009) and Dante Tomaselli’s Horror (2002).

Martyrs evoke themes and images from Clive Barker’s Hellraiser, (1987) the hellish underworld society of Cenobites, that seek out and cause pain to acquire the ultimate exquisite pleasure.

But in Martyrs the exquisite release is that of the knowing… what is on the other side of this world. And it is THIS world that is HELL…

Their Leotards are so Mod-ern! The Outer and Inner Space Femme

Alraune Brigitte Helm — **Daughter of Destiny 1928 Brigitte Helm-Alraune**

anne-francis and Robby — **Anne Francis Forbidden Planet 1956**

AnneFrancis — **Anne Francis-Forbidden Planet 1956**

catwomenfrommoon — **Cat Women of the Moon**

Fire Maidens 2 — **Fire Maidens of Outer Space 1956**

FireMaidens of Outer Space — **Fire Maidens of Outer Space 1956**

metropolis_dancing-maria — **Metropolis 1927 dancing Maria Brigitte Helm**

phantom_planet_u_03 — **The Phantom Planet 1961**

plan9FromOuterSpace — **Plan 9 From Outer Space 1959**

Things to come copy — **Things to Come 1936**

things to come — **Things To Come 1936**

She-Monster2 — **The Astounding She Monster**

planetoffemaleinvaders-1956 — **Â Planet of Female Invaders -Mexican sci-fi!**

santovmartianinvasion-1966 — **Santos vs the women martian invasion 1966**

MonsterGirl from Planet Earth , present day!

The Devil’s in The Details: 36 film flavors of a devilsh nature!

HÃ¤xan (1926)

1-Eye of The Devil (1966)

David Niven is the Marquis Philippe de Montfaucon who is called back to his castle Bellenac because the dry season is destroying his vineyards. He reluctantly lets his wife (Deborah Kerr) and children join him. de Montfaucon has a superstitious secret, as the people surrounding him hold pagan rituals, for his legacy is connected to a great sacrifice…also stars Sharon Tate, Donald Pleasance, and David Hemmings. Directed by J. Lee Thompson.

2-The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941)

A 19th Century New Hampshire farmer who makes a compact with the Devil for economic success enlists Daniel Webster to extract him from his contract. Stars Edward Arnold, Walter Houston as you know who, and Jane Darwell. Directed by William Dieterle

3-The Devil’s Partner (1961)

An old man sells his soul to the devil and turns into a young man. He then uses witchcraft and black magic to win a woman from his rival. Stars Ed Nelson, Edgar Buchanan, Jean Allison, and Richard Crane.

4-The Devil’s Hand (1962)

A man is haunted by visions of a beautiful woman. When he finally meets her, he winds up involved in a satanic cult. Stars Robert Alda and Linda Christian.

5-The Devil’s Hand aka Carnival of Sinners (1943)

Roland Brissot bought a nickel a talisman that gives him love, fame, and wealth. The talisman is a cut left hand..directed by Maurice Tourneur

6-The Devil’s Daughter (1939)

Sylvia Walton returns from Harlem to take over a Jamaican plantation from her vindictive half-sister, amid the growing sound of drums. Stars Nina Mae McKinney, Jack Carter, and Ida James.

7-The Devil’s Daughter (1973)

A young girl whose mother had sold her soul to Satan when she was born is told by Satan that she must marry a fellow demon. Directed by Jeannot Szwarc and starring Shelley Winters and Belinda Montgomery. The 70s made for tv movie!

8-Race With The Devil (1975)

Two couples vacationing together in an R.V. from Texas to Colorado are terrorized after they witness a murder during a Satanic ritual. Starring Peter Fonda, Warren Oates, Loretta Swit, Lara Parker, and R.G. Armstrong.

9-The Devil’s Rain (1975)

A bunch of Satanists in the American rural landscape have terrible powers which enable them to melt their victims. However one of the children of an earlier victim vows to destroy them. Stars Ernest Borgnine, Ida Lupino, William Shatner and Eddie Albert. Directed by Robert Fuest.

10-The Devil’s Wedding Night (1973)

Lady Dracula uses Dracula’s ring to lure beautiful girls to her castle, where she murders them so she can bathe in their blood. Starring Mark Damon and Rosalba Neri.

11-The Devil Rides Out (1968)

Christopher Lee is Nicholas the Duc de Richleau who travels to England to visit a friend and discovers a satanic cult! Also stars Charles Gray and is directed by Terence Fisher.

12-To The Devil, A Daughter (1976)

An American occult novelist battles to save the soul of a young girl from a group of Satanists, led by an excommunicated priest, who plans on using her as the representative of the Devil on Earth. Stars Christopher Lee, Richard Widmark, Honor Blackman, Denholm Elliot and Nastassja Kinski.

13-The Devil and Miss Sarah (1971)

A notorious outlaw being escorted to prison by a homesteader and his wife turns out to have satanic powers. He uses them on the man’s wife to try to possess her and help him escape. ABC movie of the week starring Janice Rule and Gene Barry.

14-The Doctor and The Devils (1985)

Grave robbers supply a doctor with bodies. Based on Burke and Hare. Directed by Freddie Francis and starred Timothy Dalton, Jonathan Pryce, Julian Sands, and Twiggy.

15-The Devil’s Backbone (2001)

a 12-year-old whose father has died in the Spanish Civil War arrives at an ominous boy’s orphanage he discovers the school is haunted and has many dark secrets that he must uncover. Guillermo del Toro’s hauntingly beautiful film.

16-Dust Devil (1992)

A woman on the run from her abusive husband encounters a mysterious hitchhiker. Stars Robert John Burke, Chelsea Field, and Zakes Mokae.

17-The Devil Doll (1936)

An escaped Devil’s Island convict uses miniaturized humans to wreak vengeance on those that framed him. Story by Tod Browning and uncredited for his directing it stars Lionel Barrymore as Paul Lavond/Madame Mandilip, and Maureen O’Sullivan as the daughter he is cheated of.

18-Sinthia: The Devil’s Doll (1970)

Cynthia Kyle murders her parents while having sex. Eights years later she is plagued with nightmares! Directed by Ray Dennis Steckler

19-Devil Doll (1964)

An evil hypnotist/ventriloquist plots to gain an heiress’ millions.Â

20-Devil Dog- The Hound of Hell (1978)

A dog that is a minion of Satan terrorizes a suburban family. Oh well, not one of Curtis Harrington’s shining moments. Stars Richard Crenna Yvette Mimieux and Kim Richards. Another ABC Movie of the Week from the 70s!

21-The Devil’s Own 1966 aka The Witches

Following a horrifying experience with the occult in Africa, a schoolteacher moves to a small English village, only to discover that black magic resides there as well. Stars Joan Fontaine, Kay Walsh, and Alec McCowen.

22-The Devil and Max Devlin (1981)

When Max dies in an accident, he winds up in hell. But the devil Barney makes him an offer: if he can get three innocent youths to sell him their souls, Max can go back to earth. Stars Bill Cosby as Barney Satin and Elliot Gould as Max Devlin.

23-She Devil (1957)

A GORGEOUS DEMON! They created an inhuman being who destroyed everything she touched! The woman they couldn’t kill! Directed by Kurt Neumann and starring Mari Blanchard and Albert Dekker.

24-Blood of The Man Devil (1965) aka House of the Black Death

Two brothers, both of whom are warlocks, use their powers and the covens of witches to battle over the family fortune. Stars Lon Chaney Jr., John Carradine, and Andrea King.

25-Devils of Darkness (1965)

A secret vampire cult, which has its headquarters beneath the town cemetery, searches for victims for its human sacrifice rituals. Stars William Sylvester and Carole Gray. Directed by Lance Comfort.

26-Night of The Devils 1972

The patriarch of a wealthy family fears that he will show up one day in vampire form. Should this happen, he warns his family not to let him back in his house, no matter how much he begs them. Stars Giani Garko and Agostina Belli.

27-Devil’s Possessed (1974)

An evil ruler uses witchcraft and evil spirits to keep his subjects in line, but his reign of terror prompts the people to revolt. Stars Paul Naschy and Norma Sebre

28-She Devil’s on Wheels 1968

An all-female motorcycle gang, called ‘The Maneaters’ holds motorcycle races, as well as terrorize the residents of a small Florida town, and clashes off against an all-male rival gang of hot-riders. Directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis.

29-The Devils (1971)

In 17th-century France, Father Urbain Grandier seeks to protect the city of Loudun from the corrupt establishment of Cardinal Richelieu. Hysteria occurs within the city when he is accused of witchcraft by a sexually repressed nun. Ken Russell’s vigorous take on the true story of The Devils of Loudun. Starring Vanessa Redgrave and Oliver Reed.

30-The Devil Has Seven Faces 1971

Euro-Exploitation thriller starring Carroll Baker, George Hilton, and Stephen Boyd. It’s got Carroll Baker nuf said!

31-Devil In Miss Jones 1973

Adult/Fantasy about Miss Justine Jones who is tired of her life and commits suicide. Will she end up in Heaven or Hell? Starring Georgina Spelvin as Justine Jones. Directed by Gerard Damiano.

32-The House of The Devil (2009)

Ti West directs this contemporary horror flick that looks like it was truly made In the 1980s. College student Samantha Hughes (Jocelyn Donahue)takes a strange babysitting job that coincides with a full lunar eclipse. She slowly realizes her clients Tom Noonan and Mary Woronov plan to use her in a satanic ritual.

33-The Devil’s Messenger (1961)

In this feature version of the Swedish TV series “13 Demon Street,” a 50,000-year-old woman is found frozen in an ice field, and a man’s death is foretold in dreams. Narrated by Lon Chaney Jr.

34-The Devil’s Widow aka Tam Lin (1970)

Based on an ancient Scottish folk song, an older woman uses witchcraft to keep her young jet-set friends. Directed by Roddy McDowall starring the amazing Ava Gardner, Ian McShane, Stephanie Beacham, and Cyril Cusack.

35-Diablolique (1955)

The wife of a cruel headmaster and his mistress conspire to kill him, but after the murder is committed, his body disappears, and strange events begin to plague the two women. Henri-Georges Cluzot’s macabre masterpiece starring Simone Signoret, Vera Cluzot, and Paul Meurisse.

36-LISA AND THE DEVIL (1974)

Elke Sommer is Lisa a tourist in an ancient city, who stumbles onto an old mansion and soon becomes the victim of a diabolical evil. Also starring Telly Savalas as Leandro a devil! and Alida Vali as the countess. Directed by the master of Gothic horror-Mario Bava.

The Devil made me do this post!-MonsterGirl !

Monday Morning Mondo: Angel Angel Down We Go (1969) “My childhood was perfect. Paradise… lost. When you’re a fairy princess everyone dies on schedule, beautifully.”

“Why should Bogart Peter Stuyvesant go to war and kill strangers, when the pickings are better in his own bedroom?”

ANGEL ANGEL DOWN WE GO (1969) aka CULT OF THE DAMNED

Written and Directed by Robert Thom who is perhaps best known for his Wild In The Streets 1969. For me, the film that really struck a chord was his configuration of childhood abuse in , The Witch Who Came From The Sea 1976 while a little fractured, and slightly queasy in its linear storytelling, was a startling, unsettling, imaginary, and often disturbing piece of work, much thanks to Millie Perkins’ performance.

Consider that Thom also wrote the scripts for Bloody Mama 1970, Crazy Mama 1975, and Death Race 2000 (1975). Angel Angel Down We Go is perhaps a psychedelic take on the Rasputin archetype with a modern conflation of the Svengali mystique.

200px-G._Rasputin — **RASPUTIN-**Mad Monk, Religious Pilgrim, Elder, Psychic, or Faith Healer?

jordan-christopher-01 — Stick an unkempt beard on him, a shabby coat…the dark piercing eyes say it all…Egomaniac!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The film opens with Tara Nicole revealing to us, through Tara’s childlike imaginings, her childhood, and the mythical parentage by the outre wealthy Steeles, they are as Demi-Gods from Mount Olympus. We see her musings in flashback and via graphic collage work that depicts her life as it was, as it is now, and as it will be.

CapturFiles_8 — Astrid Steele, ex-stag film actress, cigarette girl, and all-around whore to the masses. “Whoever said they slept with me, didn’t!”

CapturFiles_4 copy — Willie Steele, a closet homosexual and absent father.

CapturFiles_19 — Gazing into her mirror Tara Nicole Steele. the richest girl in the world recalls her childhood…

Tara Nicole recites a glorified fantasy completely contrary to what her life truly is. She is being sarcastic, she is teasing us with the truth. She is the cultivation of a female monster, whose lack of nurturing, and exposure to abuse and mistreatment has manifested something abhorrent to the world, but mostly to herself, a self-loathing, loveless thing, vulnerable to the dark prince in Bogart Peter Stuyvesant, who will come to the palace and awaken her sleeping rage.

On the surface, A perverse, grotesque fairy tale, about an over-weight heiress whose parents are hypocrites and superficial, living in a psychologically toxic battlefield of emotional turmoil, self-serving, repressed, and angry enough to create a bitter, ugly, and lonely world for their only child, a life Tara cannot live up to, nor can she satisfy the expectations put upon her nor fit into this artificial world.

Enter chaos, enter entropy, enter Bogart Peter Stuyvesant. Tara meets him at her coming out ball, a party was thrown by her mother Astrid, not to celebrate her glorious daughter’s coming of age, but as a showcase for Astrid’s bejeweled necklace that ‘Marie Antoinette wore at her beheading’. An opulent bauble, a shiny thing, a symbol of the empty and idle collectors, wealthy Americans become with their plunder of the poor masses. So the film will inform you over and over again.

A lysergic cinematic (ACID CINEMA) tale about a tragic fat princess who refers to herself as ‘Virgin Americanis.’ Until she sees Bogart gyrating his pelvis in skin-tight leather hip huggers on stage, she nearly swoons at the sight of his crotch. He is singing the film’s theme song, “Angel Angel Down We Go”. The theme is the Fall of The American Empire. The fall of the Steele family, the American Imperialist hypocrites who languish in their wealth, and self-hating misery. Hallucinogenics for the now generation, and booze and pills are still the drug of choice for the breed of uptight Americans.

Is there anti-fat sentiment in the film or is it as offensive as it intends to be so? As Tara represents the spoiled ‘fat’ and languid American Bourgeoisie when Roddy McDowall paws at Tara on the bed and spews out “God is America FAT!” while pawing her like a piece of meat.

CapturFiles_68 — “Only the poor know what’s really real. America doesn’t know. America’s FAT baby, good and FAT!… Oh God is America FAT… and Bogart Peter Stuyvesant love’s his country-he’s a patriot!”

Continue reading “Monday Morning Mondo: Angel Angel Down We Go (1969) “My childhood was perfect. Paradise… lost. When you’re a fairy princess everyone dies on schedule, beautifully.”” →

From The Vault: Female on The Beach (1955)

“A lone female on the beach is a kind of a target – a bait, you might say.”

FEMALE ON THE BEACH 1955

The immortal Joan Crawford is Lynn Markham, a widow who longs to be left alone at her beach house, where the previous tenant, Eloise Crandall (Judith Evelyn), had fallen to her death. Lynn’s neighbor turns out to be the gorgeous male specimen in the form of Jeff Chandler, playing Drummond Hall (Drummy), who might have had something to do with Eloise’s fatal fall off the porch. Of course, Drummy starts to move in on Lynn. Along for the ride are the marvelous duo of Natalie Schafer and Cecil Kellaway, who play Drummy’s crafty aunt and uncle, Osbert and Queenie Sorenson. And then there are the frequent visitations by realtor Amy Rawlinson, played by the always effervescent Jan Sterling, who is, of course, gaga over Drummy, the slick and sleazy gigolo with a rough past. Directed by Joseph Pevney (prolific in great television series spanning the 1960s-80s, not to mention the taut psycho-sexual drama THE STRANGE DOOR 1951, and PLAYGIRL 1956 starring the bigger than life – Shelley Winters.

The film is filled with the right amount of 50s kitsch and camp and delicious vulgarity under the sensationalized surface. It is an obscure Crawford goodie that enthusiasts of the actress and genre should add to their ‘must-see’ list!

Lynn: " I have a nasty imagination, and I'd like to be left alone with it!" — Lynn: ” I have a nasty imagination, and I’d like to be left alone with it!”

Lynn: “You must go with the house… like plumbing.”

Chandler and Crawford — **“I don’t hate women, I just hate the way they are.”**

JanSterling Female on The Beach — Amy Rawlinson was played by the always-effervescent Jan Sterling.

There are thousands of films in my collection. This is just one of them! See it for yourself!-MonsterGirl

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 PrisonÂ 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!

Phyliss Thaxter Thriller — Thaxter is the cunning Ursula with Martita Hunt as the eccentric Celia Summerville.

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 toÂ Hume Cronyn’s sadistic and unempathetic Capt. Munsey in Jule’s Dassin’s Brilliant Brute Force 1947:

File created with CoreGraphics — Is that a lead pipe Captain Munsey or are you just REALLY happy to see me?

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)” →

A trailer a day keeps the Boogeyman away! Blood and Roses (1960)

BLOOD AND ROSES 1960

Et mourir de plaisir (To Die of Pleasure)

European Director/ProvocateurÂ Roger Vadim (And God Created Woman 1956, Barbarella 1968, Spirits of The Dead 1968, Pretty Maids All In A Row 1971) adapts Sheridan Le Fanu’s tale of sensuality, jealous Obsession, and Vampirism.

The Gorgeous Annette Vadim is ‘Carmilla’ Karnstein who is jealous of her cousin Leopoldo de Karnstein’s (Mel Ferrer) upcoming engagement to the beautiful Georgia Monteverdi (Elsa Martinelli).

Carmilla’s fixation manifests itself in the form of a female ancestor who is a vampire, which possesses her thus beginning a siege of terror at the family estate, culminating in a surreal and stunning bloodbath.

Stumbling onto the ancestral tomb! Is it real or imagined?

This is a beautiful cinematic horror film… a surreal journey that is at times told in dream-like sequences that are utter visual feasts for the Gothic soul. Blood and Roses has some of the most memorable imagery, and tastefully lensed eroticism, especially for ‘Lesbian Vampire’ aficionados. One of my favorite classic Euro horror films of the 1960s.

“To Die of Pleasure”

Happy Trailers- MonsterGirl

A trailer a day keeps the Boogeyman away! Blonde Pick Up or Racket Girls (1951)

BLONDE PICK UP or RACKET GIRLS 1951

“WOMEN GAMBLED HONOR – MEN PROMISED LOVE”

Directed by Robert C. Dertano (Gun Girls 1957, Girl Gang 1954) Also known as Pin Down Girls!

Timothy Farrell (The Devil’s Sleep 1949,Jail Bait 1954)plays Umberto ScalliÂ a gangster who manages women wrestlers as a front for his bookmaking, drug, and prostitution rackets.. Introducing…Â Peaches Page! ???