Film Review: Fools’ Parade (dir by Andrew V. McLaglen)

Posted on March 17, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

1971’s Fools’ Parade opens in 1935.

Three men are released from the West Virginia state penitentiary and given a train ticket out of town by the prison captain, Council (George Kennedy). The men are a bank robber named Lee Cottrill (Strother Martin), a young man named Johnny Jesus (a young Kurt Russell), and a courtly older man named Mattie Appleyard (James Stewart). Despite his polite tone of voice and his folksy manner, Appleyard is actually the most notorious of the three men being released. Convicted of murdering two men, Appleyard has spent the past 40 years in prison. Both Appleyard and Cottrill are looking to go straight. Every day of his sentence, Appleyard worked and earned money. Along with a glass eye, Appleyard leaves prison with a check for $25,000 dollars. Appleyard plans to cash the money at the bank and then open a store with Cottrill.

Unfortunately, Appleyard has been released at the height of the Great Depression. The streets are full men desperately looking for work. People will do anything to feed their families or to make a little extra money. Salesman Roy K. Sizemore (William Window) transports guns and dynamite. Willis Hubbard (Robert Donner) works as a conductor on the train. Aging prostitute Cleo (Ann Baxter) offers to sell the virginity of her adopted daughter, Chanty (Katherine Cannon). Junior Killfong (Morgan Paull) sings on the radio and occasionally takes on deadlier work with his friend, Steve Mystic (Mike Kellin). As for Captain Council, he’s decided that he’s going to make his money by ambushing the train carrying the three men that he has just released from prison. After killing the men, Council will cash Appleyard’s check himself.

Of course, it doesn’t quite work out as simply as Council was hoping. Willis Hubbard has a crisis of conscience and lets Appleyard, Cottrill, and Johnny know what Council is planning. The three men narrowly make their escape but Council frames Appleyard for a murder that he didn’t commit. Now wanted once again, the three men must not only get the money but also clear their names. It won’t be easy because, as Hubbard explains, they may be free from the penitentiary but now, they’re trapped in “the prison of 1935.”

Fools’ Parade really took me by surprise. I watched it because it featured two of my favorite actors, James Stewart and Kurt Russell. And both Stewart and Russell give very good performances in the film. Stewart was always at his best when he got a chance to hint at the melancholy behind his folksiness and the young Kurt Russell plays Johnny with a sincerity that makes you automatically root for him. For that matter, the normally sinister Strother Martin is very likable as Lee Cottrill, a bank robber who is still struggling with the idea of going straight. But, beyond the actors, Fools’ Parade is a genuinely sad portrait of desperate people trying to survive. At one point, Sizemore and Cottrill watch as their train passes a camp of people who have been displaced by the Great Depression and it’s even implied that the villainous Council has some regret over what he’s become. (There’s a small but poignant scene in which Council and Cleo acknowledge the passage of time and, for a minute, the viewer realizes these two people were, at one time, maybe as idealistic and optimistic as Johnny.) It’s a well-acted film, one in which moments of humor are mixed with moments of true sadness. I may have picked the film for Jimmy and Kurt but, in the end, the film’s story and performances drew me in. The 63 year-old Stewart proved that he could still give a memorable performance and the 20 year-old Kurt Russell proved that he was a future star in the making. If you haven’t seen it, this is definitely a film to check out.

Film Review: The Jazz Singer (dir by Richard Fleischer)

Posted on January 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In the 1980 remake of The Jazz Singer, it only takes the film seven minutes to find an excuse to put Neil Diamond in blackface.

Of course, the film was a remake of the 1927 version of The Jazz Singer, which featured several scenes of Al Jolson performing in blackface. In fact, Al Jolson in blackface was such a key part of the film that it was even the image that was used to advertise the film when it was first released. Back in the 20s, Jolson said that wearing blackface was a way of honoring the black artists who created jazz. (As shocking as the image of Al Jolson wearing blackface is to modern sensibilities, Jolson was considered a strong advocate for civil rights and one of the few white singers to regularly appear on stage with black musicians.) Regardless of Jolson’s motives, less-progressively minded performers used blackface as a way to reinforce racial stereotypes and, to modern audiences, blackface is an abhorrent reminder of how black people were marginalized by a racist culture. You would think that, if there was any element of the original film that a remake would change, it would be the lead character performing in blackface.

But nope. Seven minutes into the remake, songwriter Jess Robin (Neil Diamond) puts on a fake afro and dons blackface so that he can perform on stage at a black club with the group that is performing his songs. The group’s name is the Four Brothers and, unfortunately, one of the Brothers was arrested the day of the performance. Jess performs with the group and the crowd loves it until they see his white hands. Ernie Hudson — yes, Ernie Hudson — stands up and yells, “That’s a white boy!” A riot breaks out. The police show up. Jess and the three remaining Brothers are arrested and taken to jail. Jess is eventually bailed out by his father, Cantor Rabinovitch (Laurence Olivier). The Cantor is shocked to discover that his son, Yussel Rabinovitch, has been performing under the name Jess Robin. He’s also stunned to learn that Yussel doesn’t want to be a cantor like his father. Instead, he wants to write and perform modern music. The Cantor tells Yussel that his voice is God’s instrument, not his own. Yussel returns home to his wife, Rivka (Caitlin Adams), and tries to put aside his dreams.

But when a recording artist named Keith Lennox (Paul Nicholas) wants to record one Yussel’s songs, Yussel flies out to Los Angeles. As Jess Robin, he is shocked to discover that Lennox wants to turn a ballad that he wrote into a hard rock number, Jess sings the song to show Lennox how it should sound. The arrogant Lennox is not impressed but his agent, Molly (Lucie Arnaz) is. Soon, Jess has a chance to become a star but what about the family he left behind in New York? “I have no son!” the Cantor wails when he learns about Jess’s new life in California.

I’ve often seen the 1980 version of The Jazz Singer referred to as being one of the worst films of all time. I watched it a few days ago and I wouldn’t go that far. It’s not really terrible as much as its just kind of bland. For someone who has had as long and successful a career as Neil Diamond, he gives a surprisingly charisma-free performance in the lead role. The most memorable thing about Diamond’s performance is that he refuses to maintain eye contact with any of the other performers, which makes Jess seem like kind of a sullen brat. It also doesn’t help that Diamond appears to be in his 40s in this film, playing a role that was clearly written for a much younger artist. Still, when it comes to bad acting, no one can beat a very miscast Laurence Olivier, delivering his lines with an overdone Yiddish accent and dramatically tearing at his clothes to indicate that Yussel is dead to him. Olivier was neither Jewish nor a New Yorker and that becomes very clear the more one watches this film. It takes a truly great actor to give a performance this bad. Diamond, at least, could point to the fact that he was a nonactor given a starring role in a major studio production. Olivier, on the other hand, really had no one to blame but himself.

Still, I have to admit that ending the film with a sparkly Neil Diamond performing America while Laurence Olivier nods in the audience was perhaps the best possible way to bring this film to a close. It’s a moment of beautiful kitsch. The Jazz Singer needed more of that.

October Hacks: Sleepaway Camp (dir by Robert Hiltzik)

Posted on October 24, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

So much attention has been devoted to dissecting and discussing the ending of 1983’s Sleepaway Camp, that I think people tend to overlook the bigger issue. This film is the biggest argument against summer camp over filmed.

Seriously, don’t send your kids to camp! Don’t get a job working at a camp! Don’t live anywhere near a camp! If someone tries to open a camp near your home, gather together a posse and run them out of town! If you discover an abandoned camp within one hundred miles of your home, set the place on fire! Camps are bad news. They attract bullies and tragedy and murder. If there’s anything that I’ve learned from watching the horror movies of the early 80s, it’s that summer camps mean trouble.

Consider the camp in Sleepaway Camp. Even before the murders start, the place comes across as being a prison camp. Seriously, I’ve seen a lot of summer camps in a lot of slasher films and it’s hard to think of any of them that look as shabby and dirty as the camp in Sleepaway Camp. None of the campers appear to be happy to be there. No one is allowed to leave. The campers are divided into two groups, the bullies who rule the place like mini-tyrants and the poor kids who spend the entire summer being beaten up and taunted. Not even the counselors are worth much. Counselor Meg (Katherine Kamhi) is best friends with the camp’s main mean girl, Judy (Karen Fields). Meg is the type who tosses a camper in the lake, just because Judy tells her to. Meanwhile, the owner of the camp is named Mel (Mike Kellin) and he’s just an old perv who doesn’t want to bothered with anyone’s problems. What type of horrific world is this?

And then, let’s consider some of the murders at the camp. The skeevy camp cook get scalded with boiling water. (It’s debatable whether the cook actually dies or not.) Kenny, one of the camp’s bullies, get drowned while playing a canoe-related prank. Another bully is stung to death by bees. That’s just three of the many deaths here and yet, the camp never closes. It never occurs to the camp’s owner to send anyone home. It never occurs to anyone that maybe they should send the campers to another camp. None of the deaths lead to an increased police presence nor does it lead to any changes with the camp’s schedule. None of the campers appear to be particularly upset by all the deaths. It’s a disturbing world.

Everyone who dies at the camp earlier picked on Angela (Felissa Rose), an introvert who ends up getting targeted by Judy. Angela’s cousin, Ricky (Jonathan Tiersten), is very protective of Angela and, as a result, he becomes the number one suspect. As the film’s ending reveals, the truth is something much different. The film ends with a justifiably famous shot and it does stick with you as the end credits role. It’s tempting to read a lot of meaning into the film’s ending but I imagine that’s giving the filmmakers a bit too much credit. The film was made for 1983 audiences who were looking for a shock, not 2023 cultural critics.

Even before that ending, though, Sleepaway Camp is a bit more creepy than the average 80s slasher film. The killer is relentless and ruthless and it’s disturbing that the victimized campers are played by performers who are close to the age of their victims as opposed to the usual 30 year-old who played teenagers in these type of films. The scene with the curling iron is something that I can only watching through the fingers that I’m holding in front of my eyes. It’s not a great film by any stretch of the imagination but it does definitely capture the feel of being at the worst summer camp imaginable (seriously, one can hear the flies buzzing and even smell the stale order of stopped-up plumbing) and it does stick with you after you watch it. It’s nothing to lose your head over, it’s just too bad no one told that to the campers.

Film Review: The Boston Strangler (dir by Richard Fleischer)

Posted on March 11, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Between June 14, 1962 and January 4, 1964, 13 women between the ages of 19 and 85 were murdered in the Boston area. It was felt that they had all been killed by the same man, a monster known as The Boston Strangler. Though the police investigated many suspects, they never made an arrest. (One should remember that this was before the time of DNA testing or criminal profiling. The term “serial killer” had not even been coined. Today, sad to say, we take the existence of serial killers for granted. In the 60s, it was still an exotic concept.)

In October of 1964, a man named Albert DeSalvo was arrested and charged with being “the Green Man,” a serial rapist who pretended to be a maintenance man in order to gain access to single women’s apartments. After he was charged with rape, detectives were surprised when DeSalvo confessed to being the Boston Strangler. When confessing to the murders, DeSalvo got a few minor details wrong but he also consistently included other details that the police hadn’t released to the general public. Even when put under hypnosis, DeSalvo’s recalled those previously unreleased details. Because DeSalvo was already going to get a life sentence on the rape charges and because there wasn’t any physical evidence that, in those pre-DNA, could have conclusively linked DeSalvo to the crimes, he was never actually charged with any of the murders. Still, with his confessions, the cases were considered to be closed.

In 1966, before DeSalvo was even sentenced for the Green Man rapes, Gerold Frank wrote The Boston Strangler, a book about the murders, the investigations, and DeSalvo’s confessions. It was one of the first true crime books and, in 1968, it was adapted into one of the first true crime films.

Directed by Richard Fleischer (whose filmography somehow includes not only this film but also Dr. Dolittle, Fantastic Voyage, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Conan The Destroyer, and Red Sonja), The Boston Strangler is really two films in one. The first half deals with the crimes and the police (represented by Henry Fonda, George Kennedy, Murray Hamilton, and James Brolin) investigation. This half of the film is pulpy and crudely effective, full of scenes of the cops rounding up every sex offender who they can find. There’s a scene where Henry Fonda talks to a prominent man in a gay bar that’s handled with about as much sensitivity as you could expect from a 1960s studio film. (On the one hand, the man is portrayed with respect and dignity and he’s even allowed to call out the patron saint of 1960s mainstream liberal piety, Henry Fonda, for being close-minded. On the other hand, everyone else in the bar is a stereotype and we’re meant to laugh at the idea that anyone could think that Henry Fonda could be gay.) Director Richard Fleischer makes good use of split screens, creating an effective atmosphere of paranoia. The scene where a woman tries to keep an obscene caller on the phone long enough for the police to trace his location made my skin crawl and served as a reminder that perverts predate social media. Another scene where a flamboyant psychic tries to help the police goes on for a bit too long but, at the same time, you’re happy for a little relief from crime scenes and terrified, elderly women discovering that their neighbors have been murdered.

The second half of the film features Tony Curtis as Albert DeSalvo. Curtis is effective as DeSalvo, playing him as being a self-loathing brute who is incapable of controlling his impulses. (Before committing one of his crimes, DeSalvo watches the funeral of John Kennedy, his face wracked with pain. Is the film suggesting that DeSalvo murdered to deal with the stress of life in America or is it suggesting that the hate that killed Kennedy was a symptom of the same sickness that drove DeSalvo? Or is the film just tossing in a then-recent event to get an easy emotional reaction from the audience?) As one might expect from a mainstream film made in 1968, The Boston Strangler takes something of a wishy washy approach to the question of whether DeSalvo’s crimes were due to sickness or evil. Yes, the film says, DeSalvo was bad but it’s still society’s fault for not realizing that he was bad. It’s the type of approach designed to keep both the law-and-order types and the criminal justice reformers happy but it ultimately feels a bit like a cop out. Still, the shots of DeSalvo isolated in his padding cell have an undeniable power and Curtis is both pathetic and frightening in the role. In its more effective moments, the second half of the film works as a profile of a man imprisoned both physically and mentally.

Watching the film today, it’s hard not to consider how different The Boston Strangler is from the serial killer films that would follow it. DeSalvo is not portrayed as being some sort of charming or interesting Hannibal Lecter or Dexter-type of killer. Instead, he’s a loser, a barely literate idiot who struggled to articulate even the simplest of thoughts. The cops aren’t rule-breakers or renegades. Instead, they’re doing their jobs the best that they can. Though the film ends with a title card saying that it’s important for society to make more of an effort to spot people like DeSalvo before they kill, The Boston Strangler has a surprising amount of faith in both the police and the law and it assumes that you feel the same way. It’s a film that takes it for granted the audience respects and trusts authority. It’s portrayal of the police is quite a contrast to the rebel cops who dominate pop culture today.

After the film came out, DeSalvo recanted his confessions and said that he had never killed anyone. He was subsequently murdered in prison in 1971, not due to his crimes but instead because he was independently selling drugs for prices cheaper than what had been agreed upon by the prison’s syndicate. After his death, many books were written proclaiming that DeSalvo was innocent and that the real Boston Strangler was still on the streets. Others theorized that the actual Strangler was DeSalvo’s cellmate and DeSalvo, knowing he was going to prison for life regardless, confessed in return for money being sent to his family. That said, in 2013, DNA evidence did appear to conclusively link DeSalvo to the murder of 19 year-old Mary Sullivan. Of course, that doesn’t mean that DeSalvo necessarily committed the other 12 murders. In fact, from what we’ve since learned about the pathology of serial killers, it would actually make more sense for the murders to have been committed by multiple killers as opposed to just one man.

Regardless of whether DeSalvo was guilty or not, The Boston Strangler is an uneven but ultimately effective journey into the heart of darkness.

Horror On TV: Suspense 2.5 “Dr. Violet” (dir by Robert Stevens)

Posted on October 23, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I think it’s fairly safe to say that wax museums are inherently creepy.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. If I see a wax museum off of the side of the road, I’m definitely going to visit it, if just so I can find the Hall of Presidents and give the finger to FDR. (It’s a long story.) But that said, wax museums are definitely not some place where you would want to get accidentally locked in.

Well, in tonight’s episode of Suspense, that’s exactly what happens to one unfortunate college student. AGCK!

This episode originally aired on October 4th, 1949 and it has a very impressive cast that will be familiar to anyone who has ever spent a few hours watching TCM: Anne Francis, Hume Cronyn, Ray Waltson, Evelyn Varden, and Mike Kellin are all featured.

Enjoy!

Spring Breakdown #1: Midnight Express (dir by Alan Parker)

Posted on March 11, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Since it’s currently Spring Break, I figured that I would spend the next two weeks reviewing films about people on vacation. Some of the films will be about good vacations. Some of the films will be about bad vacations. But, in the end, they’ll all be about celebrating those moments that make us yearn for the chance to get away from it all.

Take Midnight Express, for instance. This 1978 film (which was nominated for six Oscars and won two) tells the story of what happens when a carefree college student named Billy Hayes decides to spend his holiday in Turkey.

When the film begins, Billy Hayes (played by Brad Davis), is at an airport in Turkey. He’s preparing to return home to the United States. His girlfriend, Susan (Irene Miracle), informs him that Janis Joplin has just died. When Billy responds by making a joke, Susan accuses him of not taking anything seriously. What Susan doesn’t realize is that Billy actually has a lot on his mind. For one thing, he’s got several bricks of hashish taped around his waist. He purchased it from a cab driver and he’s planning on selling it to his friends back in the United States. Unfortunately, Billy’s not quite as clever as he thinks he is. Because of recent terrorist bombings, the Turkish police are searching everyone before they board their plane. Billy finds himself standing out in the middle of the runway with his hands up in the air, surrounded by gun-wielding Turkish policemen.

Billy finds himself stranded in a country that he doesn’t understand, being interrogated by men whose language he cannot speak. An enigmatic American (Bo Hopkins) shows up and assures Billy that he’ll be safe, as long as he identifies the taxi driver who sold him to the drugs. Billy does so but then makes the mistake of trying to flee from the police. In the end, it’s the American who captures him and, holding a gun to Billy’s head, tells him not to make another move.

Soon, Billy is an inmate at Sağmalcılar Prison. He’s beaten when he first arrives and it’s only days later that he’s able to walk and think clearly. He befriends some of the other prisoners, including a heroin addict named Max (John Hurt) and an idiot named Jimmy (Randy Quaid). Billy watches as the prisoners are tortured by the fearsome head guard (Paul L. Smith) and listens to the screams of inmates being raped behind closed doors. After being told that his original four-year sentence has been lengthened to a 30-year sentence, Billy starts to degenerate. When Susan visits, Billy end up pathetically masturbating in front of her. When another prisoner taunts Billy, Billy bites out the man’s tongue, an act that we see in both close up and slow motion. If Billy has any hope of regaining his humanity, he has to escape. He has to catch what Jimmy calls the “midnight express…..”

Midnight Express is a brutal and rather crude film. Though it may have been directed by a mainstream director (Alan Parker) and written by a future Oscar-winner (Oliver Stone), Midnight Express is a pure grindhouse film at heart. There’s not a subtle moment to be found in the film. The camera lingers over every act of sadism while Giorgio Moroder’s synth-based score pulsates in the background. When Billy grows more and more feral and brutal in his behavior, it’s hard not to be reminded of Lon Chaney, Jr. turning into The Wolf Man. The film may be incredibly heavy-handed but it’s nightmarishly effective, playing out with the intensity of a fever dream.

As for the cast, Brad Davis wasn’t particularly likable or sympathetic as Billy. On the one hand, he’s a victim of an unjust system, betrayed by his own country and tortured by another. On the other hand, Billy was an idiot who apparently thought no one would notice all that hash wrapped around his chest. That said, Davis’s unlikable screen presence actually worked to the film’s advantage. If you actually liked Billy, the film would be unbearable to watch. Before Davis was cast, Dennis Quaid and Mark Hamill were both considered for the role. If either of those actors has been cast, Midnight Express would be too intense and disturbing to watch. For instance, it would be depressing to watch Dennis Quaid rip a man’s tongue out of his mouth. You would be like, “No, Mr. Quaid, you’ll never recover your humanity!” But when Brad Davis does it, you’re just like, “Eh. It was bound to happen sometime.”

For more effective are John Hurt and Bo Hopkins. Hurt and Hopkins both have small roles but they both make a big impression, if just because they’re the only two characters in the film who aren’t either yelling or crying all of the time. While everyone else is constantly cursing their imprisonment, Hurt is quietly sardonic. As for Hopkins, we’re supposed to dislike him because he’s with the CIA and he sold out Billy. But honestly, no one made Billy tape all that hash to his chest. Finally, you’ve got Randy Quaid and Paul L. Smith, who both glower their way through the film. Smith is wonderfully evil while Randy Quaid is …. well, he’s Randy Quaid, the loudest American in Turkey.

Midnight Express was such a success at the box office that it caused an international incident. There’s not a single positive Turkish character to be found in the entire film and it’s impossible not to feel that the film is not only condemning Turkey’s drug policies but that it’s also condemning the entire country as well. The Turkish prisoners are portrayed as being just as bad as the guards and even Billy’s defense attorney comes across as being greedy and untrustworthy. Watching the film today can be an awkward experience. It’s undeniably effective but it’s impossible not to cringe at the way anyone who isn’t from the west is portrayed. In recent years, everyone from director Alan Parker to screenwriter Oliver Stone to the real-life Billy Hayes has apologized for the way that the Turkish people were portrayed in the film.

Despite the controversy, Midnight Express was a huge box office success and it was nominated for best picture. It lost to another controversial film about people imprisoned in Asia, The Deer Hunter.

Embracing the Melodrama Part II #55: The Tenth Level (dir by Charles S. Dubin)

Posted on May 3, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I first found out about the 1976 made-for-tv movie The Tenth Level while I was doing some research on the Milgram experiment. The Milgram experiment was a psychological experiment that was conducted, under the direction of Prof. Stanley Milgram, in 1961. Two test subjects were placed in two separate room. One test subject was known as the “Learner” and he was hooked up to a machine that could deliver electric shocks. The other subject was the “Teacher.” His job was to ask the Lerner questions and, whenever the Learner gave an incorrect answer, the Teacher was supposed to correct the error by pushing a button and delivering the electric shock. With each incorrect answer, the shock would get worse.

Of course, what the Teacher did not know was that the Lerner was an associate of Prof. Milgram’s and that pushing the button did not actually deliver a shock. The Lerner would intentionally give wrong answers and, after the Teacher pushed each subsequent button, the Lerner would groan in pain and eventually beg the Teacher to stop. The test was to see how long the Teacher would continue to push the buttons.

The study found that 65% of the Teachers, even when the Lerner stopped responding, continued to push the buttons until delivering the experiment’s final 450-volt shock. It was a surprising result, one that is often cited as proof that ordinary people will do terrible things if they’re ordered to do so by an authority figure.

The Tenth Level is loosely based on the Milgram experiment. Prof. Stephen Turner (William Shatner) is a psychology professor who conducts a similar experiment. Turner claims that he’s looking for insight into the nature of blind obedience but some of his colleagues are skeptical. His best friend (Ossie Davis) thinks that Turner is mostly trying to deal with the guilt of being a WASP who has never had to deal with discrimination. His ex-wife, Barbara (Lynn Carlin), thinks that the experiment is cruel and could potentially traumatize anyone who takes part in it. Turner, meanwhile, is fascinated by how random people react to being ordered to essentially murder someone.

Eventually, a good-natured carpenter/grad student, Dahlquist (Stephen Macht), volunteers. At first, Turner refuses to allow Dahlquist to take part because he’s previously met Dahlquist and Dahlquist is a friend of one of Tuner’s assistants. However, Dahlquist literally begs to be allowed to take part in the experiment and Turner relents.

Unfortunately, the pressure of administering shocks proves to be too much for Dahlquist and he has a 70s style freak-out, which essentially means that the screen changes colors and everything moves in slow motion as he smashes up the room. As a result of Dalquist’s violent reaction, Turner is called before a disciplinary committee and basically put on trial.

The Tenth Level is an interesting film. On the one hand, the subject matter is fascinating and, if nothing else, the film deserves some credit for trying to seriously explore the ethics of psychological experimentation. On the other hand, this is a film from 1976 that features William Shatner giving numerous monologues about the nature of man. And, let us not forget, this is William Shatner before he apparently developed a sense of humor about himself. That means that, in this film, we get the Shatner that inspired a thousand impersonations. We get the Shatner who speaks precisely and who enunciates every single syllable. And let’s not forget that Shatner is paired up with Ossie Davis, an actor who was never exactly subtle himself.

The end result is a film that is both thought-provoking and undeniably silly. This is a film that will make you think even while it inspires you to be totally snarky.

(Also of note, John Travolta supposedly makes his film debut in the Tenth Level. Apparently, he plays a student. I have yet to spot him.)

You can watch it below!

Embracing the Melodrama #25: The People Next Door (dir by David Greene)

Posted on July 5, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

For the past week, I’ve been reviewing — in chronological order — fifty of the most, for reasons good and bad, memorable film melodramas of all time. I started with a film from 1916 called Where Are My Children? and now, as we reach the halfway mark, we also reach the 70s. There were several reasons why I wanted to start the 70s with the 1970 drugs-in-the-suburbs melodrama, The People Next Door. First off, not many people seem to have heard of it and I always enjoy discovering and sharing previously obscure films. But, even more importantly, The People Next Door stars Eli Wallach, the great character actor who recently passed away at the age of 98. Needless to say, Wallach is great in The People Next Door but then again, when wasn’t Wallach great?

At first glance, the Masons appears to be your typical suburban family. Patriarch Arthur (Eli Wallach) may be a bit strict but he works hard to provide his family with a good life. Wife Gerrie (Julie Harris) may seem to be a bit nervous at times but she still works hard to maintain a perfect home. Son Artie (Stephen McHattie) may have long hippie hair and he does devote a lot of time to his band but otherwise, he seems to be a good kid. And then there’s 16 year-old Maxie (Deborah Winters), who is blonde and pretty and overall the ideal American girl. Even better the Masons live next door to the friendly Hoffmans, perfect David Hoffman (Hal Holbrook), his perfect wife Tina (Cloris Leachman), and their perfect teenage son, Sandy (Don Scardino).

But guess what?

Nobody’s perfect!

Arthur is actually a smug and overbearing bully whose constant bragging hides his own dissatisfaction with how his life has turned out. He is jealous of his son’s future and his over protectiveness of his daughter takes on a distinctly disturbing tone as the film progresses. Arthur is also having an affair with his secretary (Rue McClanahan).

Gerrie knows about Arthur’s affair but chooses to look the other way. She goes through her day in a haze of smoke provided by the cigarettes that she is constantly smoking. Like Arthur, she cannot understand her children. Unlike Arthur, she does realize that she doesn’t have all the answers.

Artie may be a good kid but he feels totally and thoroughly alienated from the rest of the family and, because of his long hair, he is the constant subject of Arthur’s abuse.

And then there’s Maxie, who everyone believes to be perfect and wholesome until one night when she’s discovered tripping on LSD. Arthur immediately assumes that Artie must have given his sister the drugs and kicks Artie out of the house. However, what Arthur doesn’t realize, is that Maxie is actually getting the drugs from clean-cut Sandy. Sandy doesn’t use himself but he has no problem with dealing.

To Arthur and Gerrie’s shock, Maxie tells them that she’s been using drugs for a while and she’s sexually active as well! When Arthur subsequently discovers Maxie snorting cocaine and living with a naked biker, it’s naturally time for everyone to get into family therapy. Unfortunately, the therapy doesn’t really help that much and soon, Maxie is again dropping acid and dancing naked on the front lawn…

As you can probably guess from the description above, The People Next Door is one of those families-in-crisis melodramas where everything that possibly can be wrong with a family is wrong with this family. It’s always easy to dismiss well-intentioned films like this and The People Next Door has its share over-the-top moments. But, at the same time, the film actually works better than most of the Suburban Hell melodramas of the early 70s.

That’s largely due to the performances, with Eli Wallach in particular giving an explosive performance as an all too plausible monster and Hal Holbrook and Cloris Leachman very believably bringing to life another family which turns out to be not quite as ideal as they first appear to be. And then there’s Deborah Winters, who starts out as being so mannered that you think she’s going to give a bad performance but then, as the film progresses, you realize that Maxie is the one giving the performance because that’s the only way she can survive her “perfect” family.

I first came across The People Next Door on YouTube and, considering how much I love exposing people to obscure films, I was really looking forward to sharing it with you on this site. But guess what? In the three weeks between me watching this film and me staring this post, The People Next Door was taken down from the site. I guess somebody is really dedicating to protecting the copyright on a film that hardly anybody in the world has actually heard of.

So, unfortunately, I can only share the trailer.

Watch it below!

Embracing The Melodrama #22: The Incident (dir by Larry Peerce)

Posted on July 4, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1967 film The Incident could just as easily have been called Train of Fools. Much like Ship of Fools, it’s an ensemble piece in which a group of people — all of whom represent different aspect of modern society — find themselves trapped in their chosen mode of transportation and forced to deal with intrusions from the outside world.

That intrusion comes in the form of two sociopaths who have decided to spend the entire ride tormenting their fellow passengers. The more dominant of the two is Joe (played by Tony Musante, who would later star in Dario Argento’s Bird With The Crystal Plumage), who the film hints might also be a pedophile. His partner is Artie (Martin Sheen), who is less intelligent than Joe but just as viscous. (And yes,even though he does a good job in the role, it is odd to see an intelligent and reportedly very nice actor like Martin Sheen playing a character who is both so evil and so stupid.)

Among the passengers:

Bill (Ed McMahon) and Helen (Diana Van Der Vills) are only on the train because Bill refused to pay the extra money to take a taxi back home. Now, they’re stuck on the train with their young daughter who, in one of the film’s more disturbing scenes, Joe starts to show an interest in.

Teenage Alice (Donna Mills) is on a date with the far more sexually experienced Tony (Victor Arnold). When Joe and Artie start to harass her, her date proves himself to be pretty much useless.

Douglas McCann (Gary Merrill) is a recovering alcoholic who, before Artie and Joe got on the train, was spending most of his time scornfully watching Kenneth (Robert Otis), a gay man who previously attempted to pick Doug up at the train station and who will eventually fall victim to one of Artie’s crueler jokes.

Muriel Purvis (Jan Sterling) resents her meek husband, Harry (Mike Kellin) and see the entire incident as another excuse to cast doubts upon his manhood.

Sam and Bertha Beckerman (played by Jack Gilford and Thelma Ritter) are an elderly Jewish couple who, over the course of a lifetime, have already had to deal with far too many bullies. Sam’s attempt to stand up to Joe and Artie results in both he and his wife being trapped on the train.

Arnold (Brock Peters) and Joan (Ruby Dee) are the only black people on the train. Arnold, at first, enjoys watching the white people fight among each other and even turns down a chance to get off the train because he finds it to be so entertaining. But finally, Joe turns on him as well.

And then there’s the two soldiers, streetwise Phil (Robert Bannard) and his best friend, Felix (Beau Bridges). Felix speaks with a soft Southern accent and has a broken arm.

And finally, there’s the bum. When we first see the bum (Henry Proach) he is asleep. He doesn’t even wake up when Joe and Artie attempt to set him on fire.

One-by-one, Joe and Artie attack and humiliate every single person on the train. The other passengers, for the most part, remain passive. Even when some try to stand up to Joe and Artie, their fellow passengers don’t offer to help. It’s only when one last passenger finally stands up to the two that the rest of them show any reaction at all and even then, it’s not necessarily the reaction that anyone was hoping for.

The Incident, which shows up on TCM occasionally, is a heavy-handed but effective look at what happens when good people choose to do nothing in the face of evil. Joe and Artie can be viewed as stand-ins for any number of distasteful groups or ideologies and both Tony Musante and Martin Sheen are believable as dangerous (if occasionally moronic) petty criminals. For that matter, the entire film is well-acted with the entire cast managing to bring life to characters that, in lesser hands, could have come across as being one-dimensional. The entire film basically takes place in that one subway car but fortunately, the harsh black-and-white cinematography and the continually roaming camera all come together to keep things visually interesting.

The Incident may not be a great film (it’s occasionally bit too stagey and, after watching the first 30 minutes, you’ll be able to guess how the movie is going to end) but it’s still one to keep an eye out for.