THE FAT MAN - "Radio's Great Detective...Now The Screen's Super Sleuth" (1951)

 This week's Saturday Night Special is an interesting film on multiple levels, one being that it was directed by future horror gimmick-meister William Castle!

 The gimmick here is that the lead role is really a fat man, a character created by Dashiell Hammett, the author of "The Maltese Falcon."

"Let's see, who shall I kill today?"

The poor unsuspecting dentist is then murdered........

.....And unceremoniously dumped out the window!

All because of some stupid dental records!

So, now we have to backtrack to find out what's going on!

The joke was making chefs look like surgeons in the middle of some serious operation!

Jayne (Undercurrent) Meadows is Jane Adams. She worked for the Doctor when he was alive.

Jayne was married to the extremely funny Steve Allen and was older sister to actress Audrey (Alice Kramden) Meadows.

J. Scott Smart is "The Fat Man," Detective Brad Runyon. He played the role on radio for five years before they decided to make it into a movie.

"The Fat Man" has a great cast that includes Rock Hudson as Roy Clark, a down and out guy who needs some dental work real bad!

A couple days later, he's rolling in the dough, and a few more days after that, he comes up missing!

"The Fat Man's" rather strange partner is Clinton Sundberg as Bill Norton!

The stunning Julie London has the role of Pat Boyd, Roy Clark's future wife!

Actually my favorite part of the whole movie is this scene where "The Fat Man" asks Pat Boyd if she'd like to dance, and the big guy goes out and cuts a mean rug! He's pretty light on his feet!

It wasn't exactly love at first sight for Pat and Roy!

 

But they warm up to each other pretty fast, and the next thing you know......

.........They get married, and he disppears!

The million dollar caper includes heisting an armored car, and making off with the daily receipts from the track!

Sure guys you don't look the least bit suspicious!

The world famous clown Emmett Kelly plays a clown named Deets using a different makeup from his normal routine!

Yeah, it's a little slow in places, and at times, it feels real odd, and then you remember,

Oh, Yeah, William Castle!

VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA - "The Mummy" (1967)

Welcome back to The Saturday Night Special Mummy Madness Cavalcade in The Dungeon!

 This was Season 03, Episode 20 of "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea," and  for obvious reasons, it was called

"The Mummy."

 The basic premise is they need to deliver this Mummy-filled sarcophagus back to somewhere in the Middle East ASAP to avert a War! 

But the Mummy has other ideas!

 No Master, no burning Tanna leaves, this Mummy is an independent contractor! I'm not quite sure why he wants to spoil this party, that element was never quite explained! He's just on a destructive tear, and is Hellbent on not getting delivered to back where he came from! Maybe he's a wanted man!

 Looking pretty cool right about here, William Kelley is the man behind the bandages!

What an interesting guy! William had only five acting credits, including this one, and in the 40's, he was the man in the skeleton costume in two "Three Stooges" episodes, and he was also the man who played The Ghost in William Castle's "13 Ghosts!"

 It still looks pretty silly to see a Mummy aboard the Seaview! In this scene, he's looking for the latrine!

 So just like Vampires, writers make up their own set of rules when writing Mummy stories!

 This Mummy is really strong, and these two guys are complete idiots for trying to grapple with it. I love this shot because the guy in the back looks like he's getting a face full of something!

 That didn't work out too well!

 One of this Mummy's powers is making guys he fought with totally forget what happened! I have no idea how or why he has this power, but he does!

 He has also taken over the Captain's will somehow too, and while the Mummy is rummaging and rampaging around, the Captain is doing all kinds of destruction to the Seaview too, but nobody knows who is doing it!

 This part's cute! 

The Mummy is hiding from Kowalski like in a kid's game of hide and seek, but he's not very good at it, because he's a freakin' Mummy!

 When the Mummy attacks, Kowalski pushes the panic button, and finally gets somebody's attention!

 The Captain destroyed the circuit board and the Seaview is headed into a nosedive.

Now the sub is damaged inside and out, and there's a Mummy on the loose causing all kinds of havoc!

  After each encounter with the Mummy, somebody tries to shoot it to no avail, so the Admiral comes up with a plan to nuke it!

The Mummy has now sustained a fair amount of damage and ain't looking that suave and debonair any more!

 You can't shoot it, but you can shock the Hell out of it! Go figure!

I guess if there's nothing left but Mummy Chicharonnes, he can't do much more harm to anybody!

 "Oh Wow, did you see that? Big tough Mummy burnt up like a little bitch!"

"There are some things that are better left unexplained."

And you can take that to the bank!

FIVE GOLDEN DRAGONS - "Time Of Our Lives" (1967)

The soup du jour for this Saturday Night Special is one of the most bizarre films I've seen lately! I've seen a lot of weird movies, but "Five Golden Dragons" is right up there at the top, especially in the category of bigger budget movies! They have nothing in common, but for some reason, this film reminds me of William Castle's "13 Frightened Girls," I guess just because it's so odd!

They claim it to be an Edgar Wallace story, which would explain a lot, but IMDB only credits Harry Alan Towers and Peter Welbeck as writers!

I've always been a big fan of Bob Cummings, because I used to watch his TV show "Love That Bob" aka "The Bob Cummings Show," all the time as a kid, and in the context of that show, I always thought he was hilarious, but in "Five Golden Dragons," he just seems lost! In fact, about half the time, he doesn't even seem to know that he's in this movie!

What's much more important than the five dragon characters is the trio of Euro beauties used in "Five Golden Dragons!" It gets pretty confusing too since Maria Perschy seen here is a character named Margaret!

And Maria Rohm is a gal named Ingrid!

And Margaret Lee is a club singer named Magda!

So out of three actresses, two are named Maria, and two are named Margaret!

The two Marias are of Austrian descent, and Margaret Lee is British.

Maria Perschy's Margaret is the first to go!

 I don't usually notice screw ups, but it's hard not to notice Margaret's dead eyes blinking as the scene ends.

You know it's got to be an Edgar Wallace film because Klaus Kinski is in it, looking as cool and weird as ever in his Pee-wee Herman polka dot bow tie!

Here's the original mock up for the title card!

This movie has got everything including a rickshaw chase scene!

Almost every moment Bob Cummings is on screen is awkward especially when he's in a scene with Margaret Lee.

One thing I really liked about "Five Golden Dragons" was there were three songs performed in the club. Two songs were performed by Margaret Lee and....

..........Yukari Itô also gets a chance to do a number!

I was just wondering if they did this because of the popularity of the song "Sukiyaki (Ue o Muite Arukou)" by Kyu Sakamoto. "Sukiyaki" reached number one on the Billboard charts in the United States in 1963, and has sold over 13 million copies worldwide!

Robert Cummings was in the "Twilight Zone" episode titled "King Nine Will Not Return," and if you want to see him in a better role than this, then go watch Hitchcock's "Dial M For Murder!"

I think this was the second guy that got tossed off a building!

Finally, it's time for the "Five Golden Dragons" to show up. Five guys who are so rich and powerful, they run everything, but this is going to be the first time they ever meet!

The first dragon is Dan (The Bamboo Saucer, Black Angel) Duryea!

Brian (The Creeping Unknown, Quatermass II) Donlevy is dragon number 2.

Sir Christopher Lee is dragon number 3.

And looking like he'd rather not be bothered, George Raft is dragon number four!

 There's still time for Klaus Kinski's character to eat it!

So, yeah, these super rich and powerful men get together, put on these stupid costumes, and play a sophisticated game of Russian Roulette, kind of, except nobody found the bullet!

Dragon number five finally shows up too!

I saw at least five different posters from around the world for "Five Golden Dragons," and only one of them even had a picture of the star of the movie, Bob Cummings in it, and even on that one, he was very small!
The big sell was these four guys, and those three girls!
Just Weird!!