COMANCHE BLANCO - William Shatner - "White Comanche" (1968)

It's a Shaturday Night Special in The Dungeon, because if you thought "The Intruder" was strange, just wait until you see The Shat in "White Comanche!"
On top of everything else, the music in "White Comanche" is not like anything you're ever likely to hear in a cowboy movie now or ever again, and was written by French composer Jean Ledrut! Listen to this short segment, and let me know if you disagree!

 "Comanche Blanco" or "White Comanche" is a Spanish film made in 1968 that stars William Shatner in the role of two brothers that are half white and half Comanche. One leans one way, the other goes to the other side! It's also well known as "Rio Hondo!" Here's the whole story in one sentence!
 They don't like each other!

Ladies and Gentlemen, without further adieu, here's William Shatner again in another one of his underappreciated but amazing accomplishments!

This is The Shat as gunslinger Johnny Moon!

 This is The Shat as Johnny's brother Notah Moon, an unmercilessness killer, and the leader of a small group of Indians that are more like an 1800's biker gang than a tribe!

 They could have just done it up right and ended it right here, but Johnny tells Notah to meet him in four days in a little town called Rio Hondo, and they can settle their differences once and for all! Notah's girlfriend is pretty Perla ("Espionage In Tangiers!") Cristal as White Fawn.

 You gotta admit that Bill makes a damn fine lookin' cowboy!

 As an Indian, not so much! 

Curiously enough, Notah never puts on a shirt at any time in the movie, but he does like to eat Peyote, which was interesting, but of no consequence. Unlike a lot of films that feature the same person as more than one character, the only scenes that the two brothers appear in together, one of them is off in the distance and is an unrecognizable stunt man!

The small but mighty core cast includes Joseph (Citizen Kane, Soylent Green) Cotten and Rosanna (Kiss Me Monster) Yanni! Sure, it might not be their finest moments, but this is a cowboy movie, what do you expect? I was raised on a steady diet of western movies and TV shows, and "White Comanche" isn't all that bad, believe me!

 I read somewhere that they called "White Comanche" one of the worst 100 movies ever made! Whoever said that has evidently not watched as many bad movies as me, because this really doesn't deserve that rating!

 "White Comanche" has some classic looking shots like this that make it easy to watch!

 On a Dungeon Pop Culture Scale of one to ten, having William Shatner and Rosanna Yanni in  a scene like this together is at least a nine and a half!

This shot of Bill and Joe is so cool, it doesn't even look real!

 Rosanna Yanni just might be Wesen! She's not really that good looking, and she's not that great of an actress, but she's got something red-blooded guys just have got to have!

 If there is a genre of film making called "Early Spanish Western Giallo" then "White Comanche" is a leader in the field! I think it's either five or six guys who get shot right between the eyes like this!

 They break the cardinal rule when an innocent kid gets killed in the crossfire of a shootout!

 I had to watch this sequence four or five times in a row. That guy back there gets shot and topples over that bale of hay head over heels! It's pretty slapstick!

 Aw, Damn! He's back!

 Just like Adam Cramer, Notah has to deliver a sermon to his followers to get them all fired up to take over!

For the final duel between the twin brothers, they both go shirtless, so you'll just have to guess who wins!

 Jeez, life without William Shatner would go on, but it sure wouldn't be the same!

LA CASA DE LAS MIL MUÑECAS - Carlos Camilleri - Don Black & Mark London - Cliff Bennett & The Rebel Rousers - "House Of 1000 Dolls" (1967)

"House Of A Thousand Dolls" has too many bonus Dungeon elements in it for me to say anything bad about it! It's NOT the best movie ever made, but any fan of the genre or the characters involved should go on and jump in head first! So, as The Routers would say in 1962, "Let's Go!"

Just like these tourists, this freakin' movie was driving me nuts, and here's the reason why! When I was getting ready to write this, I was looking at the stills, and one of them was for the music credits, and a song called "House of a 1000 Dolls" performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers! Well, since I'm a recently converted apostle, expounder, and supporter of the Cliff Bennett experience, I couldn't figure out what was going on because I couldn't remember hearing a real song during the movie, so I went back and watched the whole thing again, and no song! So I was like WTF?! I went to IMDB, to see if anyone wrote about it and where the song was, and there was a review where a gal had written that the song wasn't on the VHS tape, and I guessed the copy I have has the same problem, so then I went on a search for the song by itself, and finally came up with this, I hope you dig it: "House of a 1000 Dolls" by the amazing Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers!

"House Of 1000 Dolls" has an amazing cast that includes Dungeon regular Maria Rohm as Diane! I don't know why, but I get Maria and Rosanna Yanni mixed up for some reason! I think it's the Jess Franco connection!

Next up is Dungeon Hero George "Jerry Cotton" Nader as Stephen Armstrong!

Welcome to Tangiers! Here's the bad news, this is one of the good guys!

Everybody knows good guys finish last, dead last in this case!!

The story revolves around Vincent Price as Hypnotist Felix Manderville, and Martha Hyer as his lovely assistant Rebecca! They work for the Mob and in their act, they disappear young women from around the world, and turn them into sex slaves in a high dollar brothel in Tangiers! You know, regular every day stuff!!

To get into the exclusive club, you have to have one of these stupid little dolls as kind of a pass key!!

Once inside the club, the patrons get a two-way mirror's view of the international bevy of beauties, aka, The Dolls!!

Look familiar? José Jaspe is the pimp/bodyguard/enforcer Ahmed! I'm sure you've seen him in one his other 121 roles in flicks like "Póker De Ases," or "A Stroke Of A 1000 Millions."

In Tangiers, they still celebrate the traditional annual event known as "The Ritualistic Burning of the Buick!"

The Dolls are a feisty bunch, and I'm not sure if this is her or not, but one of them, Caroline Coons, has become a very successful artiste, and at one time managed The Clash, and took photos used on Clash and Police records!

Every film like this has to have the seemingly incompetent police officer, and this one trying to hassle George Nader is Wolfgang Kieling as Inspector Emil! Wolfgang had a great career in German film, and in one of his few forays into Hollywood, he was Hermann Gromek in Hitchcock's "Torn Curtain!"

Two of the Dolls try a valiant escape to no avail except recapture and torture!

Martha Hyer's not a name you normally associate with the term psychotronic, but when you realize she was in everything from "Abbott & Costello Go To Mars," or "Pyro...The Thing Without A Face," to Bikini Beach," "First Men In The Moon," and "Picture Mommy Dead," you might want to give it another thought!

I just like this shot of Vincent Price, and this is still the anniversary of what would have been his 100th birthday as of the 27th of the last May!

You gotta know things are going to start getting ugly when they try and disappear George Nader's wife Marie, as played by Ann Smyrner! The Danish beauty had roles in some great Dungeon classics like "Journey To The 7th Planet, "Reptilicus," and "Kommissar X - Drei Gelbe Katzen!"

"The Queen of Hearts she made some tarts all on a summer's day; The Knave of Hearts he stole the tarts and took them clean away. The King of Hearts called for the tarts and beat the Knave full sore. The Knave of Hearts brought back the tarts and vowed he'd steal no more." - Lewis Carroll

I think this would be the only film that Vincent Price and George Nader appeared in together! That fact by itself is enough reason to seek out this movie!

Classic portrait of George Nader!!

Marie and Diane watch in horror as information is extracted from one of the other Dolls! Besides Caroline Coons, the gals fleshing out the cast and credited simply as "and the Dolls" are Andrea"The Cups Of San Sebastian"Lascelles, Ursula"Il Vostro Super Agente Flit"Janis, Karin"LSD Flesh Of Devil"Skarreso, Loli Munoz, Marisol, Jill Echols, Monique Aimé, Sandra Petrelli, Lara Lenti, and Francoise Fontages who never appeared in other films, and finally Kitty Swan who was in some real zingers like "Barbarella," "Deadlier Than The Male," and "Wild, Wild Planet!"

While George sorts it all out, I almost forgot that besides the killer theme song that was written by Don Black and Mark London and performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, the rest of the music in the film was by Modernist composer Carlos Camilleri who only had one other composing credit, "Sax Rohmer's The Castle Of Fu Manchu." Carlos went on to be the Professor of Composition at the Toronto Conservatory of Music, and ended his career as a Professor of Music at Malta University!

You know we don't normally do videos, but the first time I saw this, over at René Claude's blog Pour15 Minutes D'amour, I was blown away. To do a Beatles' cover "live" with horns, and knock it out, well, it's something everybody should see and hear at least once! Ladies and Gentlemen, Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers!!!!

LA MARCA DEL HOMBRE-LOBO - Ángel Arteaga - "The Vampire Of Dr. Dracula" (1968)

What the Hell? A movie called "Frankenstein's Bloody Terror" but it's really about werewolves and vampires?? I just think that writer and star, the late Paul Naschy, just liked to try and confuse the viewer, so that when you think, what the F is going on, you're not surprised that, you don't know, but also that maybe you don't even possibly care! Sweet concept! And when I found out there were alternate titles "The Vampire Of Dr. Dracula" or "The Wolfman Of Count Dracula," it cracked me up!! If not Paul, somebody was working it!!!

The art designer for the American version of this film was Creepy/Eerie comics artiste supremo Gray Morrow in a rare film outing!

Here's a damn fine reason for paying more attention to the credits; these two gents are the fathers of the two respective main players, besides Paul Naschy, of course, and even with the IMDB's help, I don't know who the heck they are, but let's have a bloody toast anyway!! To The Kids!!!!

Boy Howdy! Here's a mouthful for you, Dyanik Zurakowska as Countess Janice von Aarenberg and Manuel Manzaneque as Rudolph Weissmann! With names like that, they just might deserve what's going to happen to them, in fact, I'll admit it, they do deserve it!!

Enter our hero, Paul Naschy, as the venerable sleazeball Count Waldemar Daninsky! The music at the party by composer Ángel Arteaga is like weirdsville!!

Janice, here's the wine you wanted! Waldemar has cut in and Rudy is essentially cut out of the picture!

Here are the Happy Dads again, this time with a vintage Volkswagen. They have an inkling, but are pretty much in the dark as to how Waldemar is slowly replacing Rudy in Janice's life.

Classic picture of Paul Naschy. As you probably know, Paul just passed away last November, after having a career than included at least 95 films, most of them horror roles, and a lot of them pretty damn strange!

Now here's a woman after your heart, Nascha the Gypsy tramp, played by Rosanna Yanni, who the last time we saw her, was hanging out with Janine Reynaud in the Jess Franco flick, "Küß Mich, Monster!" In the top photo, she's helping push the wagon out of the mud, now that's my kind of gal!!

Here's a great lobby card featuring Rosanna!!

But I didn't say that Nascha was smart, her boyfriend Gyogyo and her unleash the Devil all in the name of getting drunk and having fun!! Yeehah!!! You ought to be more careful, kids!!

Yet another classic shot of Paul!

So the guys all get together, and instead of drinking beer and playing poker or watching football, they wear funny hats and then go hunting for werewolves!!! Paul doesn't wear a funny hat because he wrote the story, and it might mess up his hair!!

Because he wasn't wearing a hat, Waldemar got bit by the unleashed werewolf, and the results are predictable!

Paul Naschy always seems to really throw himself into his roles, and I wouldn't be the least surprised if some of the actors actually got hurt when he goes on one of his rampages! He's a wild man, literally!!!

Because Janice loves Waldemar, and Rudy loves Janice, he is willing to try and help her get Waldemar some help, and so they get ahold of some specialists in the field of helping werewolves!!

So now we're introduced to Julián Ugarte as Dr. Janos Mikhelov, and his spouse Aurora de Alba as Wandessa Mikhelov, who don't look the least bit freakin' suspicious!!

Aurora was in a couple of Zombie flicks too, and Julián has been in some interesting titled flicks like "The Vampire's Niece," "Blood Pie" and "They're Coming To Get You!"

Needless to say, they might be specialists in their field, but they're not much help!!

Unless you consider turning the people who were calling out for help into vampires!!

The Mikhelov's have taken over the whole movie now, and Waldemar, even though he's a werewolf, is the only one who can help! He's the hapless victim, and the hopeless killer, and as it turns out, he's going to have to be the hero too! But once again, what do you expect?? He wrote this confounded story!!

I've taken all I can, and I can't takes no more!!

Rudy, Janice, and their helpless fathers get one last shot!!!

Vampire bastard Dr. Janos tries to take off with Janice one last time!!

Waldemar finally breaks out, and in one last final triumph, kicks vampire ass all over the place!!

Don't forget to take a peek at the new link on the sidebar to "The House Of Black Wax" if you're interested in more weirdness!