REPULSION - Chico Hamilton - Gábor Szabó - Roman Polanski - Catherine Deneuve (1965)

Okay, you didn't ask for it, so you're damn sure gonna get it! Tonight's Saturday Night Special comes from the deep, dank, and dark torture room of The Dungeon, and is rightfully titled "REPULSION!"

"REPULSION!"  It just has a happy ring to it, don't you agree? It's also a masterful mess of rancid eye candy chock full of talent from controversial Director Roman Polanski to beautiful diminutive starlet Catherine Deneuve! And to think, this movie is just a small footnote in what could also be known as "The Strange Life Of Roman Polanski!"

IF you like movies about beautiful but insane women, then "REPULSION" is the movie for you! Catherine Deneuve puts in a nail biting and almost solo performance as crazy Carol! I'm guessing that about 71 1/2% of the film is just Catherine, and with Polanski at the helm, I would imagine there are stories to be told about the making of this film!

"REPULSION" offers the viewer lots of questions, and not a lot of answers!

I'm talkin' about questions like why this still is sepia toned and why shouldn't every beautiful girl in the world have a perfect life even if they're nuttier than a fruitcake!

This is Carol's Sister Helen as played by Yvonne (THE MUMMY) Furneaux, and Ian (TALES FROM THE CRYPT) Hendry, as her asshole boyfriend Michael! Helen and Michael are going on a little trip and they're leaving Carol behind to take care of the apartment!

Well, I don't know, everything seems okay, Carol's going to listen to some music created by two classic cats in the world of jazz, percussionist Chico Hamilton, and guitarist Gábor Szabó! It makes for a very fine blend!

Then, everything goes South for Carol as quickly as a flea's fart, and it gets darker, and darker! She loses her job at the beauty salon, and her whole life turns into one big brown material highway!

In two separate scenes this trio of street urchin spoon folk musicians take command of the shot! I'm sure I'm supposed to read deep meaning into this, but since I don't know what meaning deep is, it's lost on me except for the fact that it's pretty weird! Even weirder, I'm pretty sure that the spoon player with his back to you is Roman Polanski himself!

John (A Study In Terror) Fraser as Colin, is a real dumb ass, and his drinking buddies are even more annoying, even to him! For some unexplained reason, he thinks that he is Carol's boyfriend, but she doesn't see it that way because for whatever reason, she is genuinely lost in the ozone!

Every so often in Carol's life, something cracks, a street or a wall, and the cracks just keep getting bigger! Now I'm no Aristotle, so I'm not even going to suggest that I know what the Hell is going on, but I really think if you distill it down to it's purest form, it's as simple as the fact that Carol is completely and totally, screaming yellow zonkers!!! Like Gonzo!!

This just might be the best shot ever of somebody watching wrasslin' on the tube!!

Carol is not eating, damn sure not cleaning, and she's not sleeping much either! The rabbit her Sister was going to cook before she left is still sitting out and starting to stink, and Carol is sinking farther and further from reality!

Even though they never really had a relationship, Colin is so worried about Carol, he breaks down the door to her flat, and then acts like they are just having a lover's quarrel as one of Carol's neighbors peers in through the open door!

Colin is oblivious to the fact that Carol is completely gone; maybe the fact that she hasn't uttered a word to him lately should have tipped him off! He was either so lovestruck or so completely stupid that I guess he deserves to get his brains beat in with a candlestick! Dumbass never saw it coming!

Jeez, what next? The landlord shows up, and demands to be let it!

To any normal person, Carol is obviously mad as a hatter, but to the landlord, she is sexy as Hell, and he offers her free rent if she will just give him some special attention!

The bathtub is getting pretty full of bloody dead bodies!

Other than the fact that Carol was raped by her Sister's boyfriend Michael, there are no excuses given for Carol's state of mental distress! She's just a freakin' train wreck!

When Helen and Michael arrive back home, the whole apartment is in disarray, it doesn't smell very good either and Carol...................

The neighbors all show up to view that one last WTF happened here moment! Four years later Roman Polanski's life would change forever when his beautiful wife Sharon Tate was slaughtered by the Manson clan! The weirdest thing is, I'll bet they never even knew this movie existed!

~ THE FANTASTIC UNIVERSAL MONSTER RUN From 1953-60 ~

It's Fantastic Friday with Tabonga, here at The Dungeon!.. I've been thinking about this post for awhile, showcasing the Universal Monster Run from 1953-60. I am not including the Abbott and Costello movies because they're comedies or MAN OF A THOUSAND FACES, a drama. Nope, just the monster flicks in the order of their release! There are 16 of them, so, sit back and enjoy the eye candy, because, Universal had some of the best posters.

IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE - 1953 / First, there's this classic sci-fi story featuring the cyclops Xenomorph monster! It's interesting to notice how many of the actors were reused in other productions.

CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON - 1954 / This is the most famous fifties Universal monster, without a doubt! The Creature was designed by Miss Millicent Patrick, who also created the Xenomorph and Metaluna Mutant... Wow, what a lady!!

REVENGE OF THE CREATURE - 1955 / John Agar came onboard for this one, the Creature was back with a vengence! Clint Eastwood has a small part as John's lab assistant.

CULT OF THE COBRA - 1955 / Here's one I think Eegah!! saw at the show back then, Faith Domergue plays the mysterious Cobra Lady.

THIS ISLAND EARTH - 1955 / This was Universal's only color production during the making of these movies, taking an exhaustive 2-1/2 years to complete!

TARANTULA - 1955 / Agar is back in the best of the fifties giant bug flicks! Saw this one with THE WEREWOLF, potent stuff for a kid back then!

THE CREATURE WALKS AMONG US - 1956 / Morrow and Reason are back for more with The Creature, where, they try to change him into a more human kind of monster! Rarely seen flick, Amazon has only 3 copies available on DVD.

THE MOLE PEOPLE - 1956 / Another great Universal monster, this time the masks were designed by Jack Kevan, who also worked on THE WIZARD OF OZ, MAN OF A THOUSAND FACES and MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS.

THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN - 1957 / I saw this one at the theater, what I remember most was Grant Williams in the radio active fog at the beginning and feeling totally lost at the end.

THE DEADLY MANTIS - 1957 / Another movie I saw with my neighbors at the show, lots of amazing stuff to remember about this big bug flick. The bus attacked by the Mantis in the fog happened just 75 miles from where we were, in Fresno, kind of a shout out to us.

THE LAND UNKNOWN - 1957 / Saw this one too, it was very claustrophobic! Jock Mahoney and Shawn Smith step in for this prehistoric, fog ridden adventure.

THE MONOLITH MONSTERS - 1957 / This was the fourth Universal Monster Movie I saw in 1957 at the age of 9, my dad took me to see it, he loved science fiction. The Monolith Monsters were absolutely amazing when they were growing!!

THE THING THAT COULDN'T DIE - 1958 / Saw this one, very low budget by Universal standards. It was okay, best part was the head in the hat box.

MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS - 1958 / This little horror flick kicked royal butt! Luckily, I got to also catch this one at the movies, my favorite part was with the giant dragonfly!

CURSE OF THE UNDEAD - 1959 / Saw this vampire western at the time, don't remember much about it. Universal seemed to be losing power with its horror and science fiction films.

THE LEECH WOMAN - 1960 / Well, here's the last movie on my list, Grant Williams is brought back to finish off a great run of amazing movies from the Universal studios!

Catch us again tomorrow when Eegah!! will be up to no good as usual!

A 077, SFIDA AI KILLERS - Carlo Savini - "077, Killers Are Challenged" (1966)

Just like riding on the "Psychotron," the thrills never stop down here in The Dungeon, so without further adieu, it's time for another rousing round of our Wednesday Number Seven Spy Guy Series, so B.Y.O.B. and let's get this partito rolling with this little jewel from 1966 called "077, Killers Are Challenged!"

 I've still got two more spy movies here to watch with the word 'Seven' in the title, but I thought I was done with 077 after tonight, but after a quick search, I soon realized I still need to track down a couple of more titles like "077, Dalla Francia Senza Amore"(Operation Snafu) from 1961, and "Agente 077 Dall'oriente Con Furore"(From the Orient with Fury) from 1965, and the Jess Franco "Agent 077 Opération Jamaïque" from 1964, and possibly even an Indian movie from 1968 called "Golden Eyes Secret Agent 077!!" Wow!

Tonight's version of 077 is played by Richard Harrison as C.I.A. agent Bob Fleming! We last saw Richard in "Fantabulous, Inc," but his career has run the gamut of almost every manly genre imaginable! His first ever movie was "Kronos" where he played a pilot, and he was in a bunch of Spaghetti Western and Sword and Sandal flicks in the 60's, and them reemerged in the 80's in a buttload of Ninja movies, and even as last year was in something called "Fallen Angel!"

Since I just made it up, you probably don't remember the olde legend about how if you see your shadow on a tombstone, you're most likely the next person to die! Well, it's true, luckily it wasn't our hero!

So if you get right down to it, I'm willing to say that "077, Killers Are Challenged" is not the best of the lot of 077 flicks I've seen so far, but DAMN, it's got a fine bunch of gals in it that's pretty hard to beat! Off the bat, here's two Dungeon faves, on the left is the magnificent Mitsouko, and on the right is the Harvest Holidays Queen of The Dungeon, Janine Reynaud! So I could stop right here because, what more could you want, and what else do you need to know?  Two thumbs up!!

Yeah, there's other stuff too, like this guy needed a new identity, and a new face!

In Morocco, it appears you can get high legally! No, they're not in a plane!

It's a spy movie, right? You have to have a shot like this!

This is a fun part where this slick cat thinks he's cool enough to pull something over on Bob Fleming!

Bob Fleming wasn't born yesterday jerkoff!  Baldy waits for the mini-bomb he slipped into Bob Fleming's coat pocket to go off, but he finds out too late that Bob replanted it back on him!!

Here's another short but interesting take on the club scene with music supplied by Maestro Carlo Savina that starts out with a belly dancer, and then without warning......

.....The music turns to cinematic Italian Rock N Roll, and all the kids and the belly dancer start dancing in a less than traditional style! Here's a little sample to better illustrate what I'm trying to say with a lead-in of Savina scat that was so popular at the time!

Bob Fleming is cool! He can get totally schnockered, and still do his job!

I honestly didn't know that the doorknobs in Morocco are in the middle of the door!

Naturally Bob Fleming comes in contact with various dastardly characters who don't know how to play fair and fight clean! I mean, in a nutshell, isn't that exactly what's wrong with the world today?

Button pushing time!! I find moronic comedy relief characters like this cab driver as played by Giovanni Di Benedetto to be totally useless in quasi-serious movies! I can't tell you how many great Edgar Wallace movies I almost stopped watching because of Eddie Arent's characters. It's like putting Jerry Lewis in a James Bond movie! (The funny Jerry, NOT the serious Jerry)! It's not Giovanni's fault, and this isn't all that bad, but what the Hell, just have another fight scene!

You didn't think I was raving about the women in this movie just because of Mitsouko and Janine did you? Here's the wicked Wandisa (Miss Eurooppaa Metsästämässä) Guida! Dyn-O-Mite!!

One more time, there's going to be a test later, from left to right, repeat after me, Janine, Mitsouko, and Wandisa!! Three words that if you're depressed enough, just might save your soul some day!!!

It's a personal problem that I probably should have dealt with years ago, but I've really got a thing about patterns, hence, this is my favourite shot in this movie! The only thing that would have made it more perfect would have been a wildly patterned carpet on the floor!

I asked for a fight scene instead of the stupid cabbie scene, but what do you get but more unneeded slapstick comedy, this time delivered by a midget who gets involved in the melee, and a drunk who is oblivious to the whole fight going on around him! Why, why, why? I'll never get it!

I'll not let the midget idiocy bring me down because there is still one more beauty in this film, with exactly 13 acting credits to her name that include "Thor And The Amazon Women" and "Black Sabbath," the elegant Susy Andersen! Is it just me, or is she freakin' beautiful? "A 077, Sfida Ai Killers" is worth watching for her if nothing else, and in fact, that's exactly what I'm going to do! (But I will be fast forwarding through a few scenes!) Wanna see it? Where else you gonna find it? Cult Action! That's right!