Monday, February 25, 2008

THE BLOB - DEMENTIA - "In The Theatre"

So, when John Parker couldn't do anything with his film "Dementia" and producer Jack Harris got his hands on it, and couldn't really get anything out of it either, even after the changes, somebody finally got some good from the film when Jack Harris decided to use "Dementia" or "Daughter Of Horror" as it would be known in it's new incarnation, with chopped scenes of chopped hands and added narration by the ever spooky Ed McMahon, as the film that would be playing when "The Blob" oozes into the theatre! 
 
The music is probably by George Antheil, but the names of Ernest Gold and Shorty Rogers also come into play. Nobody came to see "Daughter Of Horror" when it finally came out, but this theatre is packed and the people are laughing out loud, they're roaring and guffawing like they're watching a "Francis The Talking Mule" or an "Abbott & Costello" movie, and this movie is not even close to being a comedy. 
 
The insanity, the laughter and taunts in "Dementia" are like the plague, and easily passed on to the uninformed participants who are also about to fall into their own whirlpool of despair and madness! 
 The kids leave the theatre and go outside, and in the front of the theatre there's a poster for the movie that's playing with a picture of Robby The Robot from "Forbidden Planet" and it says something about a vampire in the title on the poster. See, you just can't trust these people making movies, they try and trick you all the time! 
 
They've been tricking us for years!! 
 
The music from "The Blob" shifts from the movie theatre and the music from "Dementia" to the kids trying to spread the warning. Oops, too bad they came to a pad with a bunch of drunk party-goers listening to some swinging music by composer Jack Carmichael and then a place where the barkeep tells them... 
 
"We get monsters in here all the time" before shifting back to the theatre to finish up! Obviously, you need to get both films, but everyone should own copies anyway!! 
 
The music from "Dementia" is brilliant, like a supercharged nightmare, and it was perfect the way they recycled it in "The Blob"!! And, how many more inside jokes are there anyway???

5 comments:

Uncle Gustav said...

We need Shorty Rogers' "Wig City"!!!

Eegah!! and Tabonga! said...

Not to worry, my friend, we've still got three more songs from "Dementia" to post, including "Wig City!"

Greg Goodsell said...

This was an especially clever use of a film-within-a-film and obscure film references long before Quentin Tarrantino!

Uncle Gustav said...

Whew!

Meanwhile, I don't know if you ever read it, but I wrote something about Dementia a while back:

http://home.comcast.net/~flickhead/Dementia.html

Anonymous said...

"The Vampire and the Robot" poster would have been for "Mother Riley Meets the Vampire" (1952), hence the reason Bela Lugosi was featured on the marquee..

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