Saturday, April 30, 2016

THE BUBBLE - Arch Oboler - "Fantastic Invasion Of Planet Earth" (1966)

I've got something grilled up medium rare for tonight's Saturday Night Special, and as a bonus, it's in "Space-Vision, A Step Beyond 3D!"

It's called "The Bubble" and it escaped into the general public in 1966!

The Bubble" is basically a weird freakin' one man extended "Twilight Zone" episode, and that one man is:
Mr. Arch (Light's Out) Oboler!

"The Bubble" has a very small interactive cast! Despite how strange and odd it might be, you have to think that Arch knew exactly what he was doing!

The three main cast members are Michael, 123 episodes of "Mod Squad" as Pete Cochran, Cole, Deborah (GIDGET) Walley, and singer, songwriter Johnny Desmond, who sang with both the Glenn Miller, and the Gene Krupa orchestras! "The Bubble" might not be the greatest movie in the world, but, without a doubt, it sure had one Helluva pop culture cast!

So what the Hell happened? Their small aircraft went down in an uncharted area during a storm, and though the area is inhabited, the residents seem incapable of direct communication!

The residents are all like a bunch of robots, but it takes our stalwart trio forever to think anything is wrong, even though they can never communicate with the locals, who all just keep repeating their individual mantras over and over again, ad nauseum! 

  Here's the kicker! "The Bubble" is in 3D, so there are lots of shots in your face that have no purpose other than to show off the "Space Vision" 3D technology!

 Like here, where a tray of beer bottles floats around mysteriously! Arch never bothers to try and explain why things like this are happening, you just have to accept it!

It's a great little town, and give Arch some credit here! Rent a carnival ride for nickels on the dime, and put it in the middle of main street, and you have unquestionable weirdness!

Most of the town looks like pieces of abandoned movie sets (That I'm sure Arch was able to get his hands on for a pittance)!

 
"The Bubble" was also released as "Fantastic Invasion Of Planet Earth," and if this is not the most deceiving poster of all time, then I don't know what is! It ain't in space, it's not fantastic, and there sure as Hell aren't any flying saucers like that in this movie, except every once in a while, some hovering object extracts somebody or something through a hole in the top of the dome, or dishes out a fiery death! This poster is possibly the worst example of false advertising in the history of film making! "A Sci-Fi experience that will blow your mind?" "A Spaced Odyssey?" Somebody was smoking something!!

This is the big alien listening/feeding booth that the locals go into to get their zombie fix!

Johnny messes with the hot seat in the big pod and that's when the eerie "floating masks" ala "Terror In The Haunted House" come into play!

It's all too weird so the trio accompanied by Johnny's new girlfriend, the hypnotized dance hall girl, decide to pack it in and head out of town! It won't take long for them to find out that there is no way out! Johnny is a ladies man and a lover, so you just have to wonder what their sex life was like!

It's hard to sleep when you're some kind of zombie/robot/freak! Deborah has no choice except to keep on nursing her newborn child!

They stick something in your face every chance they get!

Damn! We're trapped in some kind of humongous bubble, and there is no explanation as to why!!
WTF!??

Mike's character is taken all the way to the edge, and beyond! At one point he even wants to kill their baby just to save it's life!

Digging for God only knows how long, and how deep, Mike finally finds an opening underneath the bubble's wall, and as Arch would expect me to do, that's just where I'm going to leave it!
If you've got an Amazon Prime account, "The Bubble" streams for free right here! 
Lights Out Ya'll!!

Friday, April 29, 2016

BLOOD SUCKERS / Lucinda Films, Titan International Productions - 1970

Here's a wild vampire tale all about a group of friends searching for a young English Oxford student who has disappeared while researching his book in Greece, they are shocked to find that wherever he has been in the area, certain unsolved murders have taken place. They find him under the spell of a beautiful vampire, and, believing they have killed her, the group return home, unaware that their friend is now a blood sucker. Alternate titles are INCENSE FOR THE DAMNED and FREEDOM SEEKER.

I have a sound clip for your approval, sooooo, you can push the big red 'GO' button located there by our blood sucking machine, NOW, Rufus The Gnat!.. Here's... BLOOD SUCKERS!

Talented Richard Fountain has left England to pursue his studies, you can hear his little bio intro in the sound clip...

Richard has hooked up with a mysterious woman and things are getting a little weird for him.

She doses him up with her special drugs, and, well, he's hooked big time!

Here's a scene of two lovers making out while two topless chicks watch with pleasure...

Remember these semi transparent plastic masks?.. I do, except, my nose never quite fit right.

In Greece, this donkey is considered an off road, four wheel drive, all terrain vehicle!

Richard gets bitten pretty good before his friends can pull the vampire lady off his neck!

Patrick Macnee plays good friend, Derek Longbow, during the search for Richard, he gets stuck on the side of a cliff. Unfortunately, he falls to his death, heard at the end of the sound clip.

I love this shot. I could spend hours in this museum just browsing the many displays.

They get Richard back to England. Peter plays Dr. Goodrich, father of Richard's fiancée, Penelope. He calls out Peter at a ceremony because.. well, you know, he's s freakin' vampire!

Then, they get to Penelope a little too late and Richard has done the deed!

There's only one way out of this movie!!.. Eegah!! is here tomorrow to keep The Dungeon Express a-chuggin' on down the long, stormy track!

Wednesday, April 27, 2016

SALVARE LA FACCIA - Benedetto Ghiglia/Rossano Brazzi - "Psychout For Murder" (1969)

Welcome to a new feature in The Dungeon called Eurotrash/Giallo Wednesday! I'll be planning on doing this on a regular basis in the future, at least once a year!

 Watching "Psychout For Murder" is kind of like getting a colonoscopy! You don't know what to expect at first, then the next thing you know it's over, and you don't know what happened. It wasn't a bad thing, but then again, it's not something you want to do again real soon!
Why the English title is "Psychout For Murder," I have no clue, but that's what suckered me into watching it!

 Is it sex, is it love, or "is it just confusion?" It's up to you to figure it out!

 It seems that leg belonged to a member of a high society big business family member, and there she was, with a common person! Shame, Shame!!

 Although this is an Italian movie, the star, Adrienne Larussa as the persecuted Licia, is an American actress who spent a lot of time on the sets of soap operas with names like "General Hospital," and "Days Of Our Lives!" She was also in the David Bowie film, "The Man Who Fell To Earth!"

 I like sub-titles! Some times, like right here, they explain a lot!

So they ship Licia off to the funny farm!

Can they cure her of being a depraved sex addict?

 I think these toys explain the whole story!

 She learned her lessons well, and now she has crazy down to perfection!

 Great gas station shot circa 1969!

 I read about comparisons of Adrienne Larussa to Soledad Miranda, and that's something that probably can't be denied!

Things are starting to slow down some, so it must be time to bring on the band! You'd probably have to ask composer Benedetto (Secret Agent Super Dragon) Ghiglia who these cool cats were, but I don't think that's gonna happen since he passed on back in 2012 at the age of 90!
 Here's what it sounds like when this party is going on! 

 Classy Rossano Brazzi is Licia's oh so upstanding, but hyper hypocritical Dad!
Rossano also wrote and directed this film, and it was produced by his younger brother Oscar Brazzi! It's just a family affair all the way around!

 Licia decides to put on a little poolside performance for her sleazy brother-in-law!

 Now THAT is a cool record player!

 One more long hallway, and I'm outta here!

See what can happen? They took a nice girl, and turned her into a monster!
Politics as usual!

Monster Music

Monster Music
AAARRGGHHH!!!! Ya'll Come On Back Now, Y'Hear??