MUTINY IN OUTER SPACE / Hugo Grimaldi 1965 / Gordon Zahler music supervisor

Time for 'nother Tabonga Tuesday! Tonight is cool sci-fi flick MUTINY IN OUTER SPACE. Dumb title! Really not much to do with mutiny, more about screeching fungus from Moon!! What gives?!.. Okay, Gordon Zahler was supervisor, but, use stock music by Leith Stevens, Hans J. Salter and Walter Greene!! 

 

So, blast off into... Outer Space infected with screeching fungus!

 Everybloody want to hang out with Faith Montaine, including Tabonga!! 

 

Whoa!.. Look at meteors whizzing by space station!!

 YUCK!!.. This actually dude's head after he touch space fungus! So, kids!!.. Keep away from space fungus, even if uncle Fred say okay!! 

 

Tabonga like this still, look like Russians! 

 

Most sexy wearing glasses and looking through big microscope!.. HOT!!

 Oh, look! Germans expose Dick Cheney, but, you never gonna hear about it here in US!.. 

 

Stupid fungus can ruin whole day!!

 Doctor barely touch fungus, so, they put him in big jar?! 

 

This pic is boss!! General none other than Glenn Langan, aka, THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN!

 

Bad idea to try and carpet space station!

GHOST OF DRAGSTRIP HOLLOW - Ron Stein - "The Challenge" (1959)

So it must be time to add the final piece of the musical puzzle we know as "Ghost Of Dragstrip Hollow", and.........as you can plainly see, there really was a ghost!! 

 

Sadly, this was master monster-maker and all-around cool guy Paul Blaisdell's last movie! 

 

You see, they didn't need Paul anymore when they had cool new makeup and special effects like this!! To keep the party moving, some of the most rocking swing he's ever written is served up by Ronald Stein one more time! What A Guy!!! Just keep those twin and triplet saxes coming and you'll have a winner every time, throw in some hot guitar licks, and just jump back and watch!! The in-house band "The Renegades" manage to mime their way through the whole thing! 

 

In the end of this film, there's a costume party where the girls have one final meeting at which a challenge to a final drag race is decided. The gauntlet is thrown down, the party goes on, and ........Hey, what happened? The movie is over! Weren't they supposed to have one more race?? They go to a place that is so nice and quiet, it doesn't even exist! Director William J. Hole Jr. should have let them pull hair and scratch instead!!! 

 

Don't worry, it will all be over soon!!!

R.I.P. BO DIDDLEY - The Gunslinger Is Gone!

Today is indeed a sad day with the passing of a true musical giant, another one of our heroes, Mr. Bo Diddley. In the Vietnam era, who did you run cadence with in basic training? It was "Hey Bo Diddley!" He was an innovative guitarist and songwriter with a great spirit and a keen sense of humor! And in Bo's own words, "You can kill my body, but you cannot kill my spirit! Still, we're going to miss him!

Just in case you missed it the first time, from his 1973 London Sessions LP, here's the now immortal Bo Diddley with "You Can Kill My Body !!!

VOODOO ISLAND / Bel-Air Studios 1957 / Les Baxter & Dr. Samuel (our hero) Hoffman

Finally, they bring in some muscle!! Sheesh! Looks like Rodan'll be doing Sunday Classics now, giving those two other weaklings a little break!! Remember, Rodan can knock over buildings by just flapping his wings!!.. So, my first assignment is this little island paradise called VOODOO ISLAND, with Boris and the 'incredible diminishing' gang! 

 

Welcome to VOODOO ISLAND... Here's a Creepy Exotic Island Mixture by Les and Sam. 

 

Boris is having some trouble communicating with this zombified guy. Then, the guy stands up and falls flat on his face, so, they pick him up. 

 

Hey, did anyone ever notice that lamp sticking out of his head?! 

 

Now, some good stuff!.. The girls in this movie seem to attract big rubber things!! It looks like Jean is actually topless there! 

 

Here's a still from a weird little scene where it looks like the crazy plant is trying to suckle Beverly's breast! Its strange to watch, she has to hold it so it looks like its stuck to her or something. 

 

Ain't latex rubber cool?! 

 

Here's a close-up of one of those plant's suction mouth! They sway around and hit you when you're not looking! Mean little creeps related to Tabonga, I believe! 

 

This scene is great! Murvyn is sleeping only to wake up and open his eyes just as one of the swaying plants dips down to within inches of his face!! YOW!!

 Murvyn is totally shaken and takes off blindlessly into the jungle. After awhile, he stops and sees two girls playing. Still dazed, he watches as the smaller girl falls onto one the the odd looking plants... 

 

Gripped in horror, he then sees the plant quickly ball up and trap the helpless girl inside!!.. Daaaaammn!!!

 He keeps watching as the girl's piece of dress slowly disappears into the plant!! Man, that was brutal in 1957!!.. A year earlier, though, a boy dies from radiation poisoning in Hammer's X: THE UNKNOWN!

 Anyways, that was enough to drive Murvyn permanently into Coocoosburg! 

 

So, here's the ones who make it this far! That's Rhodes Reason, one-time bro-in-law of Sanita Pelkey and there's Elisha Cook, Jr. (Elisha then gets it good just a few moments later!) 

 

THIS CRAP IS ALWAYS SUPER COOL!!

 Oh, Tabonga asked (nicely) and I said okay, to say... GOODNIGHT, EVERYBLOODY!

THE TIME TRAVELERS - Richard La Salle - "Lost In Time" (1964)

Just like last night's film, this movie, "The Time Travelers" had an outstandingly odd cast of characters that is almost beyond Pop Culture belief. For some reason, you don't hear much about this film, and it's also very hard to find a copy!!! The music by composer Richard La Salle is literally all over the place, including space. What you're going to hear here is the main theme followed by something very akin to cartoon music crossed with some off the wall sitcom, as we tour the android assembly facilities! 

 

This crazy film starred Preston Foster, who was more known for his tough guy western roles. Merry Anders was in "Hypnotic Eye" and a couple of other scary features. John Hoyt we know from his roles in "Attack Of The Puppet People", "Curse Of The Undead" and "X." If you combined all the TV appearances from this troupe in the 50's and 60's, it would probably be a number around 1000. 

 

Steve Franken's face will always stand out as the guy who played rich kid Chatsworth

 Osborne Jr. in 29 episodes of "The Many Loves Of Dobie Gillis" TV show! 

 

Reena was played by June, 1960 Playmate of The Month, Delores Wells!! 

 

Then you have Phillip Carey, a face easily recognized in TV commercials as Granny Goose. "I got your bag right here!!" 

 

After Reena invites Danny up to her cubicle, she plays her "Lumichord" for him as part of her seduction plan. It's 1960's bachelor pad space age lounge music at it's best!!! 

 

Now what shall we do?? 

 

The space spa scene is pretty racy as Merry Anders stands strategically behind the luminescent bars of a future tanning booth, as Reena and the other gals lounge around! 

 

This movie has a lot of tongue in cheek action going on, so it's a perfect place and a perfect role for our hero, Forrest J. Ackerman to do his bit as the Square-Frame Technician. 

 

Right about the time you get ready to write off the whole thing as just a campy space opera, all hell breaks loose into a giant melee of ugly bloody mutants and androids slamdance!! 

 

The writer and director of "The Time Travelers" was none other than IB Melchior, the man responsible for "The Angry Red Planet", "Reptilicus", "Journey To The Seventh Planet" and "Robinson Crusoe On Mars" among a mess of other things!! Thanx IB!!! And you can also thank not one, but two other mighty magnificent names for the way this film looks. Those would be the eyes of László Kovács and Vilmos Zsigmond. From working with Arch Hall, Al Adamson and Ray Dennis Steckler, all the way to winning Oscars, these two guys have done cinematography and camera work on more incredible movies than almost anybody, no matter what the budget, and have made some of the cheapest movies look fantastic. This was a very early effort for both of them!! Speaking of Ray Dennis Steckler, don't forget to go out and grab the latest issue of "Screem" magazine, issue #16. There's an very intriguing article in it called "Ray Dennis Steckler: One More Time" written by our favorite heckler and commenteer, Greg Goodsell. You owe it to yourself to read it!! Starting tomorrow, our "Classic Sunday Night Feature" is going to have a new host, everybody's hero, and all around nice guy, our best buddy, Rodan!!! We've known Rodan a long time and even though he's a mutant pterosaur, he's got a lot of knowledge up in that petrified cranium of his to share with you, and even better, I get another night off!! Get the popcorn and the Margaritas ready!! I'm going to watch a movie!!

THE VAMPIRE - Gerald Fried - "Turn Off That Stupid Record" (1957)

You don't normally hear a lot about the 1957 feature "The Vampire" and I'm not quite sure why that is, because it's a good little movie and quite entertaining. They try some different angles on the vampire theme, and it's a good twist where the good guy and the bad guy are the same guy!! 

 

Dabbs Greer on the right, as Dr. Will Beaumont has one of the most recognizable faces you'd probably never lay a name to, having been in hundreds of TV shows from "Gomer Pyle" to "Lizzie McGuire," and movies until passing away just last year!!! James Griffith in the shades, was a musician turned actor whose face you've seen if you have ever seen any TV westerns, here, he plays the very weird Henry Winston. Being the consummate musician James went on to be a member of the Spike Jones Orchestra. 

 If the Doc's daughter Betsy looks even vaguely familiar to you, it's because right after this movie she was in 44 episodes or about 6 years worth of the TV series "The Real McCoys" as daughter Hassie McCoy! 

 

Collen Gray is absolutely fantastic as the ever caring Nurse Carol Butler and went on to also be in "Leech Woman" and "Phantom Planet" and stayed active for many years, on TV shows like "77 Sunset Strip" and "Mr. Ed"!! 

 

Mauritz Hugo as Joe the sick waiter had a commanding career that spanned from Kit Carson To Commander Cody. In 1943 he was in "The Batman" and "Revenge Of The Zombies" and he worked way into the 70's having recurring roles on every TV show imaginable before passing away in 1974! 

 

John Beal as the good doctor had a very distinguished career going all the way back to 1933, mostly TV and movie dramas with this film being pretty much his solo horror effort, although he had been in "The Cat And The Canary" back in 1939 with Bob Hope, and went on to play in 9 episodes of the horror soap opera, "Dark Shadows" as Judge Vail! To round out the cast, Paul Brinegar was "Rivero" in the classic "How To Make A Monster" and finish it off with the immense talents of Kennth Tobey and Herb Vigran(It would take me all night to write these guys credits!), and this is one powerhouse package! 

 

So you can start to see, with a line up of talent like that, just why this might be a film worth really checking out! It is a good one for any lovers of the genre, and the cast is a seemingly endless array of genius! 

 

We've written about the amazing composer Gerald Fried here before because of his work on "The Return Of Dracula," so you can check out the archives for more data on him. Just let it be known, history would have been different without him, he actually contributed that much, and what he contributes here is cool and swings when it needs too!