Last night, as I usually do during the Easter/Passover season, I watched Cecil B. DeMille’s Biblical epic THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. It’s a movie buffs delight, an All-Star spectacle featuring three Oscar winners ( Charlton Heston ,Yul Brynner , Anne Baxter ), one who should’ve been (Edward G. Robinson ), and a literal cast of thousands! Something that’s always stood out to me is the number of horror movie stars that appear in various parts, a plethora of Hollywood practitioners from my favorite genre:
John Carradine as Aaron
Carradine’s credentials in horror films are well documented, and he deserves his spot in the pantheon of Monster Movie Greats. As Moses’s brother Aaron, Carradine has his best “straight” role since THE GRAPES OF WRATH.
Vincent Price as Baka
Our Man Vinnie plays the evil slave master Baka, who gets his just rewards at the hands of John Derek’s Joshua. Price was…
Today, I have very exciting news about something that has been going on behind-the-scenes for a while here at the Shattered Lens. Today, one of my humans — I call her the flame-haired one but you probably call her Lisa Marie — finally convinced Arleigh that it’s time to turn the Shattered Lens into the internet’s number one Twilight fan site!
The flame-haired one has been trying to convince Arleigh to do this since she first joined the site in 2009. Even though no one has really cared or thought about Twilight since 2012, the flame-haired one is convinced that she will be able to once again get everyone in America wondering if they’re “Team Edward” or “Team Jacob.” So, say goodbye to the all of our old reviews and features and get ready for endless polls, memes, and out-of-date gossip about whether Rob and KStew are still as close as Edward and Bella!
Congratulations, Flame-Haired One!
April Fools!
From the humans and the cat here at the Shattered Lens, happy April Fools Day! Please be kind with your jokes and remember that April Fools Day ends at midnight! Any pranks pulled after midnight will no longer funny and will instead just be annoying. Meh.
Deep in the Australian outback, a young child named Scotty goes missing. His grandfather, Jake (Bill Kerr), swears that a giant boar (“a razorback”) broke into his house and ran off with his grandson. The locals don’t think it was a boar. They don’t even think it was a dingo. Instead, they charge Jake with killing his grandson but, because there’s not evidence to convict him, Jake goes free.
Two years later, a nosy American reporter named Beth Winters (Judy Morris) mysteriously vanishes shortly after arriving in the Outback to do a story on how kangaroos are being hunted to the point of extinction. Women and children are vanishing in the Outback? This sounds like a job for Lee Majors but the best this movie can do is Gregory Harrison. Harrison plays Beth’s husband, Carl, who comes to Australia to search for her. At first, he thinks that she may have been kidnapped by the moronic Baker brothers (Chris Haywood and David Argue) but then he meets Jake and a comely pig expert named Sarah (Arkie Whiteley). Jake tells Carl about the razorback and later comes across Beth’s wedding ring in a pile of boar shit.
Razorback was probably pitched as being “Jaws meets Mad Max.” Just as in Jaws, the authorities refuse to accept that people are being eaten by a giant boar and it is up to an inexperienced American, an old timer, and a scientist to try to stop it. Also, like in Jaws, the boar is that star of the show even though it does not get much screen time. When the boar does appear, it bears a distinct resemblance to Motorhead’s War-Pig. Just as in Mad Max, every Australian in Razorback drives like a maniac. Whenever the Baker brothers tear across the screen in their truck, it’s easy to imagine Max Rockatansky and Goose in hot pursuit.
Along with the boar, the other star of the film is the Australian outback itself, which the film treats as almost being an alien landscape:
If Razorback makes the Australian outback look like an 80s new wave music video, that might be because it was directed by Russell Mulcahy, who started his career directing videos for Duran Duran. Before one boar attack, Duran Duran’s New Moon On Monday is even heard playing on a radio. (Ironically, New Moon On Monday was one of the few early Duran Duran videos that Mulcahy did not direct.) Both the boar and the film look great but all of the humans get overshadowed by the visuals. Not that it matters, since they’re only there to serve as razorback food.
Despite the strong visuals and the amazingly cool monster, Razorback got only lukewarm reviews when it was first released. Critics aside, it was a hit in Australia, where it won Australian Film awards for both editing and cinematography. (Cinematographer Dean Semler later won an Oscar for his work on Dances with Wolves.) It only found cult success in the United States. One admirer was Steven Spielberg, who reportedly called Mulcahy to ask how he achieved some the film’s visual effects. Two years after the release of Razorback, Mulcahy directed his best-known film, Highlander.
Flaws and all, Razorback is the best movie ever made about a wild boar eating people in Australia.
Any film condemned by the Catholic Legion of Decency can’t be all bad! STRANGE CARGO depicts a bunch of hardened, unrepentant criminals escaping a brutal French Guiana prison, with a prostitute in tow to boot, and is laced with plenty of lascivious sex and brutal violence. But that wasn’t all the self-appointed guardians of morality objected to… there was the character of Cambreau who, though the film doesn’t come right out and say it, supposedly represents none other than Jesus Christ himself!
One more time: Clark & Joan
Clark Gable and Joan Crawford , in their eighth and final film together, lead this pack of sinners through a sweltering jungle of lust, murder, and ultimately redemption. He’s a con named Verne, “a thief by profession”, whose several attempts at escape have proved unsuccessful. She’s Julie, a two-bit hooker plying her trade on the island. The pair, as always, crackle like…
“I am the future!” Peter Stegman (Timothy Van Patten) announced in the 1982 film, Class of 1984, and, in many ways, he was correct. Though it’s easy to be snarky about the fashion choices made by Stegman’s gang, Class of 1984‘s portrait of a school where teachers have taken to carrying guns to protect themselves is still relevant today.
One thing that set Class of 1984 apart from other exploitation films was that it acknowledged something that most people aren’t willing to admit. Sometimes, the worst people can create the most beautiful music. This is a point that was made quite literally in the scene below.
As the scene begins, the new music teacher — Andy Norman (Perry King) — is just trying to start his class when suddenly Stegman and his gang decide to drop in. At first, Andy tells them to go away but then, suddenly, Stegman sits down at a piano and starts to play.
Timothy Van Patten, who would later go on to become an award-winning television director, reportedly actually played every note heard in this scene. For a few brief seconds, Peter Stegman is revealed to be something more than just another high school psycho. When Stegman sits in front of that piano, he becomes an artist and, throughout the film, both Andy Norman and the audience occasionally wonder who Peter Stegman could have been under different circumstances.
Of course, ultimately, it doesn’t matter. Peter Stegman could have been a concert pianist but instead, he went down a different path. Over the course of the film, Stegman is responsible for not only Michael J. Fox getting stabbed but Roddy McDowall getting blown up. When Andy makes one final attempt to reach out to him, Stegman tries to cut his hand off. Now wonder Andy eventually allowed Stegman to plunge through that skylight.
But even as Stegman falls to his death and discovers that he’s not the future, it’s hard not to think about that beautiful piece of music that he played just a few days earlier and wonder about what could have been.
Ahh, spring is in the air, that magical time of year, when a young man’s fancy turns to thoughts of… baseball!! That’s right, Dear Readers, Opening Day is upon us once again, and what better way to celebrate the return of America’s National Pastime than taking a look back at KILL THE UMPIRE, a 1950 comedy conceived in the warped mind of former animator Frank Tashlin and directed by ex-Warners vet Lloyd Bacon.
Big lug William Bendix stars as Bill Johnson, an ex-major leaguer whose passion for the game keeps him from holding a regular job because he keeps playing hooky to go to the ballpark. Bill hates only one thing more than missing a game – umpires! But when his exasperated wife threatens to leave him, his ex-ump father-in-law suggests he go to umpire school to save his marriage. Bill balks at first, but then reluctantly agrees, not wishing…
The 1987 film Gor opens with a nerdy college professor (played by Urbano Barberini, of Demons and Opera fame) giving perhaps the worst lecture in the history of underwhelming lectures. The professor explains that there is a counter-earth, a place that he claims is known as Gor. Gor shares the same orbit as Earth but it’s linearly opposed to Earth, which apparently makes it impossible to see. However, the professor says that his father gave him a ring which can transport the user to Gor. The only problem is that the professor has not figured out how to use the ring.
The students all look incredibly bored with the lecture and I don’t blame them. Not only does the professor seem to be rambling but he doesn’t even offer up any visual aides. He could have at least utilized a powerpoint presentation or something. Instead, his only teaching aide is a whiteboard on which he’s written “counter-earth.” I have to wonder what their final exam is going to look like. “True or false. Your professor is a freaking loon.”
(I found myself wondering what university would possibly grant tenure to some guy who thinks he owns a magic ring but then I remembered Evergreen College.)
The professor’s name is Tarl Cabot and I think that’s a good deal of his problem right there. When you give a child a name like Tarl Cabot, you’re pretty much guaranteeing that he’s going to grow up believing that he has a magic ring that’ll transport him to another planet.
Of course, in Tarl’s case, it turns out that the ring does just that. After his teaching assistant dumps him so that she can go on a date with another professor, Tarl crashes his car and when he wakes up, he finds himself on Gor. Apparently, the ring only works if you crash your car or something.
As for Gor itself, it turns out to be kind of a dump. It’s a huge desert. Seriously, check out this counter-earth:
If Tarl wanted to see a desert, he could have just driven around Southern California and saved himself a lot of trouble.
Yes, there is trouble in Gor. No sooner has Tarl arrived then he’s being attacked by a bunch of barbarians on horseback. The barbarians are led by the evil Sarm (played by Oliver Reed). Much as with the case of Tarl Cabot, I think that once you name a child Sarm, you’ve pretty much guaranteed the way that his life is going to turn out. Anyway, Tarl somehow survives being attacked by the barbarians. He even manages to kill Sarm’s son, which leads to Sarm declaring that he wants Tarl dead.
Fortunately, Tarl is eventually rescued by another group of barbarians. This group is led by Talena (Rebecca Ferratti) and she wants Tarl to help her rescue her father from Sarm’s fortress. But how can Tarl help when he’s literally useless? Don’t worry! The good barbarians are willing to train Tarl. One montage later, Tarl is now a master swordsman. Now, all Tarl has to do is dress like a barbarian and then track down a little person who can serve as a guide to Sarm’s fortress!
And what a fortress it is! Sarm may be evil but he likes to make sure that both his guests and his slaves have a good time. Sarm welcomes Tarl to the fortress and even tries to recruit him over to his side. (So apparently, Sarm’s over that whole “you killed my son” thing.) Sarm understands that the best way to recruit Tarl is with a dance number! As Sarm laughs lustfully, the slaves put on a show. It’s somewhat out-of-place but at least it distracts from the rest of the film.
Anyway, there’s a lot of problems with Gor but the main one is that the place itself just doesn’t seem like it’s worth all the trouble. After spending years trying to figure out how to get to the planet, Tarl arrives and discovers that it’s basically the same desert that was used in almost every post-apocalyptic film made in the 80s and 90s. (In fact, judging from John Carter, it’s still being used today.) What I always wonder about this type of movie is 1) why is the other planet always full of humans who speak perfect English and 2) why do all of these planets feature a society that resembles that ancient Roman Empire? Apparently, swords and arrows are literally universal weapons because they’re used on every planet in the universe.
When I first saw that this film starred Urbano Barberini, I assumed that it was going to turn out to be an Italian production. (In the late 80s, there were several Italian films that featured barbarians fighting in post-apocalyptic landscapes.) However, it turns out that Gor was a South African production, co-produced by the legendary Harry Alan Towers and directed by an American named Firtz Kiersch. (Kiersch also directed the first film version of Children of the Corn.) That said, the film itself is so ineptly dubbed and the production values are so low-budget that it would still be easy to mistake Gor for a film directed by Bruno Mattei or Claudio Fragasso.
Because he’s so badly dubbed, it’s difficult to really judge Barberini’s performance as Tarl Cabot. At the very least, he looks good with a sword in his hand and he’s cute — if never quite believable — when he plays Tarl as a neurotic physicist. However, Barberini can’t really compete with Oliver Reed, who devours every inch of scenery that he can find. Reed bellows and laughs and appears to be drunk in almost every scene in which he appears but at least he seems to be having a good time. Reed is also required to wear a silly helmet in most of his scenes and I sincerely hope that he got to take it home with him.
Oliver Reed isn’t the only familiar face to pop up in Gor. There’s also Jack Palance. Palance only shows up for about two minutes and he looks rather confused as he discusses his plan to conquer the world. (Apparently, Palance returned in Gor‘s sequel.) For two minutes of screen time, Palance managed to score himself third billing in the opening credits of Gor, above even Oliver Reed! Way to go, Jack!
Anyway, Gor is a pretty stupid movie. I appreciated the random dance number but otherwise, it’s fairly dull and only occasionally enlivened by Oliver Reed’s refusal to go gently into that dark night. I’m going to guess that films like this were popular with filmgoers who saw themselves as real-life Tarl Cabots and who spent their spare time thinking, “Nobody will laugh at me once they see me with a sword!” I caught the film yesterday on Comet TV, which is quickly becoming one of my favorite channels for watching bad movies.
1971’s SHAFT, starring Richard Roundtree as “the black private dick that’s a sex machine to all the chicks”, is the movie that kicked off the whole 70’s Blaxploitation phenomenon. Sure, Mario Van Pebbles’ indie SWEET SWEETBACK’S BADASSSSS SONG was released three months earlier, but it’s X-rating kept younger audiences out of the theaters. SHAFT reached more people with it’s R rating, and the publicity machine of MGM behind it. In fact, John Shaft not only saved the day in the film, but helped save the financially strapped MGM from bankruptcy!
The opening sequence alone makes it worth watching, as the camera pans down the gritty mean streets of New York City (42nd Street, to be exact!) and that iconic funky theme song by Isaac…
“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”
— Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina (1878)
“Me and him are totally different.”
— Leo (Caleb Galati), brother of Wendel (Steven J. Mihaljevich), in The Misguided (2018)
Oh, poor Leo.
From the first minute that he appears on screen, Leo is a familiar type. He’s handsome He’s friendly, though there are always hints that he has secrets that he’s hiding. He’s ambitious but he’s not particularly driven. He seems like the type who is more likely to have a good plan than to understand how to actually pull it off. We’ve all known someone like Leo. Leo has just dropped out of college and he’s also just been kicked out of the place where he was staying.
What’s Leo to do? Sleep on the streets or maybe spend a few weeks living with his brother, Wendel? Looking at Wendel, it’s hard not to feel that you’ve stepped into a time portal and caught a glimpse of who Leo is going to be in another few years. When Wendel isn’t using drugs, he’s dealing them. Wendel is friendly, except for when he’s going out of his way to be menacing. Wendel is charismatic and even people who should know better are drawn to Wendel. And yet, it’s also hard not to suspect that Wendel might be a sociopath. Like Leo, Wendel will be a familiar character to most viewers. We’ve all known a Wendel.Along with having a place to stay, Wendel also has a car. The only problem is that it’s not actually his car. The car belongs to Wendel’s ex-girlfriend, Sanja (Jasmine Nibali). When Sanja and her sister, Vesna (Katherine Langford, who viewers may recognize from 13 Reasons Why) come by to get the car, they meet Leo. And soon, Sanja and Leo are a couple.
Of course, not everyone is happy about the idea of Sanja and Leo being together. Vesna is convinced that Leo is just as bad as his brother. Sanja’s father (Athan Bellos) is almost violently protective and is not happy to come home and find Leo relaxing in the family’s swimming pool. As for Wendel, he claims not to care but you get the feeling that he’s lying. That’s actually a feeling that you get a lot with Wendel. But Sanja doesn’t care what anyone else thinks. Soon, she and Leo are even talking about leaving Perth and moving to Melbourne together. It sounds like a nice plan but will Leo be able to escape from his older brother’s destructive influence?
At times, it feels as if The Misguided is a plotless film but that feeling is just as deceptive as one of Wendel’s stories. The film’s story plays out at a pace that is almost leisurely but always steady. Whether we’re watching Wendel’s passive aggressive interaction with his brother or the genuinely sweet scenes of Leo and Sanja exploring Perth, we’re always aware that Leo is ultimately going to have to choose whether to escape his brother or to remain forever in Wendel’s shadow. Shannon Alexander’s direction emphasizes gritty realism with a few stylistic flourishes. Occasionally, the film speeds up. A few scenes end with a freeze frame. At one point, the image flickers as if Wendel’s drug-addled consciousness has infected the film itself. In the style of early Godard, all of this suggests that we’re watching a world that has become unbalanced.
It’s also a well-acted movie. The characters all seem real and, as a result, you care about them even if they sometimes seem to be incapable of doing the right thing. Caleb Galati and Jasmine Nibali have a really nice chemistry. They’re a cute couple and you can’t help but hope that things work out well for them. The sibling relationship between Sanja and Vesna, with its mix of jealousy and sincere concern, felt real as well. I’m the youngest of four sisters. I could definitely relate. I also particularly liked the performance of Athan Bellos, who is so intense and overprotective as Sanja and Vesna’s father that he’s actually a bit scary at times.
And then there’s Steven J. Mihaljevich, who is force of destructive nature in the role of Wendel. Mihaljevich plays Wendel as the type of person who will smile even as he tells you absolutely the worst thing that he possibly could. At the same time, Mihaljevich is also charismatic enough that you believe that Sanja could have actually been attracted to him before meeting Leo. As played by Mihaljevich, Wendel is the bad influence that we’ve all known at some point in our life. Whenever Wendel talks to anyone, you’re never quite sure whether he’s going to laugh and kill them but you’re always intrigued enough to want to find out.
The Misguided will soon be available on Amazon, Google, Vimeo and iTunes.
Boston’s WLVI-TV 56 ran it’s ‘Creature Double Feature’ series from 1972 to 1983. Though fans remember it mostly for those fabulous giant monster movies starring Godzilla and friends, CDF occasionally featured some monsters of a different kind…
Roger Corman and Vincent Price had teamed to make five successful Edgar Allan Poe adaptations for American-International Pictures, beginning with 1960’s HOUSE OF USHER (there was a sixth, THE PREMATURE BURIAL, that starred Ray Milland rather than Price). Studio execs James Nicholson and Sam Arkoff, always on the lookout for ways to cut costs, joined forces with Britain’s Anglo-Amalgamated Productions (makers of the CARRY ON comedies) and shipped Corman and company to jolly ol’ England for the final two, THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH and THE TOMB OF LIGEIA. Both turned out to be high points in the Corman/Price/Poe series.
1964’s MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH is a sadistic, psychedelic nightmare of…
John Carradine as Aaron
Vincent Price as Baka 
