THE BRIDES OF FU MANCHU - Bruce Montgomery - "13 Slaves" (1966)

Down time! Hard to face it when there doesn't seem to be a whole Helluva lot going on; still recovering from The Kev-Dog's grilled Easter "Bacon Explosion" backed up with that three litre batch of my own signature "Acai Margaritas" which will have me stupefied for who knows how long, but somehow it still all adds up to the same conclusion film-wise, and that is "The Brides Of Fu Manchu"!!!!!

Sure, absolutely, and without a doubt, Sax Rohmer's Fu Manchu is a classic character, and it's not within me, or without me, to say anything bad about Christopher Lee in any role, but a Fu Manchu movie that's not directed by Jesus Franco, and that doesn't have a fiery character like Sancho Lopez in it, does not even stand a chance of being as good as one that does! Okay, Here you go, this is what I figgered out the other night! Think of any, yes ANY movie you have ever seen in your entire life, a really good one you liked a lot, or the worst piece of crap you ever wasted two seconds of your life on! Now, close your eyes, and envision the same movie directed by Jesus Franco! Potentially a night and day situation, if you get my meaning!

So, You want Brides?? Okay, Here come the Brides!!! There were no individual credits, only as a group credited as "The Brides Of Fu Manchu!"

What do you expect me to do with her, you've got her upside down!!

The Brides, aka Sex Slaves, did try to escape, but never made it out of the building!!

Don't worry about them, somehow they do finally manage to escape in The End!!! Imagine that!!!

Director Don Sharp ain't no chump himself, having directed more than a few excellent titles we've written about here like "Psychomania", "Witchcraft", & "Kiss Of The Vampire" just to name a few, but try comparing Don Sharp to Jess Franco, and it's like trying to compare Picasso and Dali, although they've both got amazing skills, Dali, like Jess Franco, had a more surreal vision, and knows how to convey it to you!!! Part of that vision is the use of music, and it sounds like to me that composer Bruce Montgomery was a little bit more focused on writing mystery and Sc-Fi books that he was on writng the music for this movie, his last film score!!

UNKNOWN WORLD / Lippert Pictures - 1951 / Music by Ernest Gold

As promised, here's another 'World' we're featuring here at the Dungeon!.. I was raised on this movie, I mean, we got our 1st TV in 1953, and, I swear, this thing played about every 2 months, and, I loved it! Also, the numerous 'Caves' Viewmaster disks were my absolute favorites, I could really get lost in those! And, the Cyclotram knocked me out too, because, I was very into car design... Wasn't everyone?

Ernest Gold does the honors tonight here at the Dungeon... He composed the music for UFO and THE SCREAMING SKULL, but here's a short list of other TV and movie composing accomplishments: GERALD McBOING! BOING!, MAGOO SLEPT HERE, THE DEFIANT ONES, ON THE BEACH, INHERIT THE WIND, EXODUS, JUDGEMENT AT NUREMBERG, IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD!! 'Nuf said!

He does a nice job with sci-fi elements, remember, its 1951! So, get ready to enter THE UNKNOWN WORLD!

This was actually a fairly intelligent movie, really questioning the reality of what was happening in the world at that time. Dr. Morley has an plan to see if living under the Earth would be possible in case of nuclear disaster topside.

You get some investors together (plus a hot chick) and show them the plans for the Cyclotram, an awesome machine that can drill through rock whenever necessary, on it's way to the center of the Earth!

Once the Cyclotram is built and finally delivered to Alaska, we can begin the journey!..

Sucker can climb!!

Of course, there's adventure after adventure!

And, finally, they find their UNKNOWN WORLD!

But, it turns on them in a display of devastation!

The giant cavern floods and they are driven to the bottom of unknown depths!

Slowly, but, surely, they begin to head in an upward direction.

After desperate hours, the Cyclotram surfaces.

That reminds me, it even bothered me as a kid, the crappy look of that depth guage printing!! Yow!

Man, some unbelievable luck!!

PAROXISMUS - Mike Hugg, Manfred Mann, Stu Phillips, Barbara McNair - "Venus In Furs" (1969)

Now how the Hell can you go wrong with a beautifully shot, supremely esoteric tale of mystery about a jazz trumpeter, filmed by Jesus Franco, and starring James Darrin??? The answer is, you can't!!! "Venus In Furs" is a great film, and once again, I gotta say, this is a lucky time to be living when films like this can just be delivered to your door for an astronomically low price! Not that very long ago, if you wanted to see a film like this, it was like tough grunt! Wait for it to come to your local art theatre or college campus, a few years later, you might have been able to get it on beta or VHS, but it would probably cost a fortune, and the quality wouldn't even be that good! So all us movie lovers are really blessed to live in this time!

SOUNDCLIP NOT AVAILABLE

I'm not going to try and explain much about this film, but I will tell you, there's a lot of great music, and it all starts with James as Jimmy Logan, digging up his horn where he had buried it on the beach in Instanbul!!

It doesn't take long before James finds a dead body washed up on the beach, and we're about to find out that Maria Rohm as Wanda Reed, ain't no Gidget, that's one thing for sure!!

"Paroxismus" also features Herr Klaus Kinski, and anytime Klaus is in a movie, it always ups the ante on the weirdness factor a notch or two!! No exception here!!

When Wanda starts showing up at the gigs, Jimmy rightfully gets really confused!

So, just to keep it lively, Jesus moves the whole scene to Rio, and by now, it should be pretty obvious, the music isn't going to stop any time soon!!

And as a matter of fact, Jimmy has a singer girlfriend in Rio named the lovely Rita, played by multi-talented jazz vocalist Barbara McNair, who shows you that Shirley Manson wasn't the first female singer to writhe on the floor while delivering the vocal goods!!

Just one more reason this is such a damn fine film is a lot of the music was written and delivered by Mike Hugg and Manfred Mann of the original Manfred Mann Band who everyone knows because of their major hit "Do Wah Diddy Diddy!" Here's an interesting little side note. "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" was actually a cover tune, having been originally recorded (but it wasn't a hit) by the all girl group "The Exciters" who everyone knows for their hit single "Tell Him" in 1963! In 1965 Phil Anastasia recording as Dean Parrish would record an answer version cover of the tune, and call it "Tell Her!" Whew!!!

It just keeps going, and getting weirder with more music and more Wanda!!

In the end, Jimmy ends up back on the beach in Instanbul, metaphorically speaking!!! You can thank Jesus!!!