THE KILLERS - The First Made-For-TV Movie (1964)

 

Tonight's Saturday Night Special is loaded, and I'm going to take the silencer off the muzzle!
I told you last Wednesday that this was the first official made-for-TV movie, but it never reached it's intended destination because it was deemed to be way too violent for 1964 TV, and so they went ahead and released it to the theaters instead! Not only the first, this might also be the best made-for-TV movie too!

It's called "The Killers,"

 and I'll tell you what, this really ain't that bad of a film!

It's masterfully written..........................

.............and it has a killer cast indeed!

 Lee Marvin and his apprentice pal, Dungeon Super Hero Clu Gulager are hit men, and their first stop is a home for the blind!

All the employees are also blind, and Lee ends up decking this receptionist!

Yeah, I think beating up defenseless blind women is not even acceptable by today's rotten standards, much less a movie made-for-TV in 1964!

These two guys are just badass! They're mean cold-blooded killers, and they've come to do a job!

On the train ride after the hit, they try to figure out why the guy they hit named Johnny North didn't resist, but just took it! There has to be something else going on, and the smell of money is in the air!

I'm a little colourblind, so I see things different than most people, so I don't know about you, but I love the colours in this shot!

This is a killer portrait of Lee Marvin!!
Lee Marvin was Detective Lt. Frank Ballingerin in 117 episodes of "M Squad" from 1957 to 1960! He was in in two "Twilight Zone" episodes, "Steel," and "The Grave."  He was Liberty Valance, and he was one of "The Dirty Dozen!"

Now it's time to go back and piece this story together in a series of flashbacks! John Cassavetes is the guy who just got killed, race car driver with a sordid future named Johnny North, and his career is about to go South in a hurry! John was serious about his work, from acting in "Rosemary's Baby" to writing, directing and producing "Faces." Shamefully, John only made it to age 59 taken down by cirrhosis of the liver!

Angie (Police Woman) Dickinson is a race car driver groupie pursuing him!

The beautiful Nancy Wilson performs a dreamy song written by Hank Mancini!

I love Nancy for all the music she recorded with pianist extraordinaire George Shearing!

None other than Ronald Reagan is Angie's sugar daddy!

Three years later, Ronald Reagan would become the Governor of California, and then would go on to be the President Of The United States in 1981!
And in the "Talk About Freakin' Weird Department," President John F. Kennedy was assassinated during the time period that "The Killers" was made, which for obvious reasons slowed down production! I was in High School when Kennedy was killed, and I distinctly remember that all that was on TV for a week or more was news etc, and it was really a bummer, so on the weekend, I went to the movies to see a double feature matinee, and when it was over, I stayed and watched the first movie again, knowing there was nothing going to be on TV when I got back home but bad new. Just for the record, it cost 20 cents to go to the movies back then, and the country was in turmoil!

I think this kind of interrogation led to the demise of the individual steam bath!
Norman Fell had 167 acting credits to his name, but he will probably always be remembered most for being grumpy landlord Stanley Roper on the hit TV show "Three's Company!"

While not exactly a ménage à trois, this threesome are still dependent on one another if they want to get this job done! It's all about the money!

Wow, that's a really complicated plan! Maybe they got the six year old Ron Jr. to draw it out for them!

You have to admit, Ronnie looks pretty spiffy as a fake Sheriff!

Too violent for TV? First they smack her around, and then they almost throw Angie out a third story window!

Dark and Gritty by anybody's standards........

The ending of "The Killers" isn't any happier than the beginning!

This Indian poster I found at "The Evening Class" blog did a good job of encapsulated "The Killers" into only three photos! Check out that site for more international posters from this movie and a Helluva lot more!
 

 "The Killers" was a remake of the same story from 1946 called "The Killers" that starred Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner! They were both also released under the title, "Ernest Hemingway's The Killers!" The 1964 version is kind of rare, and the best deal I could find was here, where you can get DVD's of both the 1946 and the 1964 versions for about 20 bucks! That's actually a pretty killer deal!

THE HIDDEN - Jack Sholder "It's Only Human On The Outside" (1987)

Tonight's Wild-Ass Wednesday presentation is simply called:

"THE HIDDEN."

"The Hidden" was made in 1987 and directed by a pretty cool cat named Jack Sholder!

It's an interesting story that stars future "Twin Peaks" Agent Cooper, Kyle MacLachlan as an F.B.I. agent named Lloyd Gallagher who comes from outer space and is on the trail of a very vicious and rogue creature who has the ability to move from one human host body to another fairly effortlessly!

This is the first human incarnation of this creature that you're introduced to. He's played by Chris Mulkey, who has been working hard for decades, and has something like 10 movies scheduled for release in 2017. He was also Hank Jennings in "Twin Peaks!" He just robbed a bank for a handful of money, and shot a bunch of innocent people!

He takes off in the first big chase scene of the movie, and it looks like he might just hit the "Vanishing Point!"

But instead, the crazy mofo breaks on through to the other side because it seems that this monster from another planet is not only a sadistic bastard, he's also a masochist!

Long time favourite of mine, Clu Gulager is Lt. Ed Flynn of the L.A.P.D. Besides being one of the best cowboy actors of the 50's and 60's, Clu had some fun films later in his career like "The Return Of The Living Dead," and "Tapeheads!"

The creature needs a new host body since the last one got pretty well mangled in that fiery crash!

So he takes over the body of the other guy in the hospital room with him!

This host body is played  by William Boyett who was in way too many cool films and TV shows to even get started on, like "Space Patrol," "Forbidden Planet," "Francis In The Haunted House," "The Rocketeer," and "Star Trek: The Next Generation!"

The creature likes music so he has stopped off at the record store and gets caught stealing cassette tapes! This is 1987, so there are probably some Lord Litter tapes in his pocket! Click on that link, and you might agree!

The creature also has a penchant for expensive fast cars like Ferraris!

The creature didn't like the song that was playing on the record player, so he made it stop playing! I don't know why he didn't like it, because "The Hidden" has a pretty solid 80's rock soundtrack that includes bands like The Truth, The Lords Of The New Church, Hunters And Collectors, and Concrete Blonde!

First rule of thumb, don't get a host body with a bad heart! Lloyd Gallagher has a real good idea who the next host body is!

The creature likes his new attachments!

Besides being a host body in this movie, Claudia Christian was Lt. Cmdr. Susan Ivanova in 88 episodes of "Babylon 5," and she also is in a handful of productions coming out this year!

If you want some weird shots, you can't go wrong with a mannequin store!

The creature is almost virtually indestructible, and is quite versatile in it's knowledge of weaponry!

She jumped off a building to avoid capture, and now we find out that the creature can also use non-humans as host bodies too!

No humans were able to get near the body, but the creature has abandoned it somehow! Agent Gallagher is beside himself!

 Michael Nouri is the hard working cop who gets stuck with Agent Gallagher! Another one still working today, with films coming out this year, in 1979 Michael had the lead role on a 10 episode TV show called "The Curse Of  Dracula!"

Before computers, this is what a police station looked like!

Danny Trejo makes his fourth appearance on the big screen for 10 seconds as a loud mouth prisoner who is shut up by the creature!

The creature keeps moving up the chain of command and ends up inside a Senator! Nobody but Agent Gallagher noticed any difference, so before he makes it to President, Agent Gallagher decides to take some real action..........

..........and fries the rotten sumbitch!

Will the creature live on to be in yet another film.......???

Well, it probably wasn't such a good idea, but yes indeed, "The Hidden II" came out six years later in 1993!

FROM A WHISPER TO A SCREAM / Conquest Productions, Manson International - 1987

It's more March Madness as we present this flick about the uncle of an executed murderess who relates four horror stories to a reporter about an elderly man who pursues romance with a younger woman all the way to the grave, a wounded man on the run is rescued by a backwoods hermit with the secret to eternal life, a glass-eating carny pays the ultimate price for pursuing love with a normie and Civil War soldiers are held captive by a household of orphans with strange intentions. Original title is THE OFFSPRING.

We've got a little sound clip from this flick for your approval, sooooo, you can push the big red 'GO' button over by our hoarse screaming mimi, NOW, Rufus The Gnat!.. Here's a taste of... FROM A WHISPER TO A SCREAM!

It starts with a reporter, Beth Chandler, played by Susan (FORBIDDEN ZONE) Tyrrell, questioning Julian White (Vincent Price) about the weird history of his hometown, Oldfield.

In the first story we get to peek in on some interesting goings-on taking place at the home of Stanley Burnside (Clu Gulager) as he pampers the demanding women in his life.

Boy, that ice pick on the floor sure looks like it could really shut this crazy bitch up!

Stanley makes the best of the situation by enjoying a Winston and a Budweiser. Don't worry, Stanley soon gets paid back in spades, no winners here!

The second story has this fool going trough the belongings of the old black hermit that saved him from dying in the swamp. Dude's interested in obtaining eternal life!

But, he gets caught and chopped into little pieces by the hermit!

Sometimes there's a big drawback to having eternal life!!

The next story is about what happens at the carnival stays at the carnival! Check it out, there's Angelo Rossitto as the barker in his very last acting role!

Anyway, when the glass eater decides to have a love affair with a girl outside the carnival, well, things don't turn out quite as planned!

Then, the last story stars Dungeon Hero, Cameron Mitchell, as a soldier who has a surreal experience after he and others are held captive by a house of orphans. This tale would remind you of a story from THE TWILIGHT ZONE.

Anyway again, Beth is loony as a the people she just learned about and Julian gets a knife in the throat for all his work! Join us again tomorrow for more March Madness...