I have recently come to the conclusion that
THE best worst movies of the 60's musically speaking, and sometimes otherwise, by and large, came out of, not L.A., and damn sure not N.Y, but fer sure, maybe Nawlins', or just possibly the one place where they still know what to do with a possum, Texas!! "The Giant Gila Monster," "Manos: The Hand Of Fate," "Ghosts Of Hanley House," "Beyond The Time Barrier," "The Killer Shrews," and anything with Scotty McKay in it, or made by Larry Buchanan, that's what I'm talkin' about!! With all these goldurn freakin' amazing titles, one thing stands out the most, and that is, no matter what you want for nothing, Texas has got a whole lot of it! So, now it's time for tonight's special feature, straight out of the Lone Star state, and the perfect alternate title for this blog,
"The Yesterday Machine!"
I read a review somewhere where a guy wrote something like "why would you expect anything good out of a movie that begins with a girl twirling a baton!" I beg to differ, because for my money, it's the direct opposite, any movie that starts with a cute Texan gal twirling a baton and dancing to some funky music makes me wonder how it could get any better..........
.........that is, of course, in this case, until she opens her mouth! This is Miss Linda Jenkins as wild child Margie De Mar, and it's almost impossible to believe, but Linda was only ever in one other film, the well regarded student film "Loose Ends" in 1976!
"Lostville!"
Margie and her boyfriend Jay Ramsey as Howie Ellison are in a lot of trouble, and unbeknownst to them, they have discovered the entrance to a time warp! Howie gets shot by some Confederate soldiers, and Margie disappears!!
Cut to the club where Margie's sister Sandy De Mar is performing nightly!
The joint is jumpin' to the killer sounds of the Nick Nicholas Band, that included members Bobby Thomas, Jack Pierce, and Richard Hill! Don Zimmers gets the credits for the musical score!
"And now ladies and gentlemen, it is my privilege to present our heavenly little headliner, a collector of two gold records, the girl with the orchid voice, Miss Sandra De Mar!"
Sandy De Mar is played by Miss Ann Pellegrino in her sole outing, and she performs "Leave Me Alone," a song written by the Producer and Director of this movie, Russ Marker. The arrangement was by Jerry Hunt!
The guy in the middle here is a Police Detective played by Larry Buchanan regular Bill Thurman in his first recorded role, and the guy on the left, also in his first ever role, Charles Young as Detective Lasky!
Here's a good shot of yet another Dungeon Legend, Tim Holt as Police Lt. Partane, doing a fine job of looking like everybody's favorite Bob of the Sub-Genius variety! Why is Tim Holt a legend? Because we love old cowboy movies too, and Tim was in a bunch of them with great titles like "Thundering Hoofs," "Guns Of Hate," "Masked Raiders," and "Pistol Harvest." Tim was such a popular cowboy character, that at one point, he played the character of Tim Holt in 10 movies! Tim was also in "The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre," and "The Monster That Challenged The World!"
James Britton has the role of Sandy De Mar's boyfriend, Jim Crandall!
While Sandy and Jim try and find out how Margie disappeared, they too stumble upon the time warp door!
Hey, WTF, how come everything looks so different?!
Jim and Sandy are then transported to the mad lab of the smarter than Einstein, Professor Ernest Von Hauser!!
At this point it's time for Jack Herman as the Nazi mad scientist Professor Ernest Von Hauser to give Jim and Sandy, and us, about a 20 minute ranting and raving diatribe on the virtues of superspectronic relativity and the minus ray, and other glorious stuff!
Professor Hauser is friendly until somebody disagrees with him, and then you see his true side! He's a Nazi!!
Sandy is lead off to visit her imprisoned sister by a Nazi guard and a woman captured from the past by the mad professor, Olga Powell as Didiyama!
Margie is tired from the whole ordeal, and after a brief reunion between the two sisters, she is taken away by the Nazi guard, because the professor needs her for another experiment!!
It turns out that Didiyama is not that happy living in a Texas future, and she turns on one of the guards and stabs him in the back, which gives Sandy just enough time to escape!!
C'Mon, this is as close as you're going to get to seeing a pre-code comic on film! Time Machines, Nazis, Majorettes and more, and "The Yesterday Machine" has got it all!
And what's one of the best things about living in 2011, you can watch or download
"The Yesterday Machine" for free at the Internet Archive! Life
IS Good! Enjoy yerself!!!
There's no music except at the beginning and end, and no mention in the credits or at IMDb, so, enjoy the soundclip of banal and amateurish exchanges among this typical cast of oddball characters Eegah!! haz put together for everbloody!..
The dude known as The Phantom escapes from prison and is able to jump onto a train car as it passes by. Small location design flaw!
Besides that, he has an airplane with a rope ladder waiting to pick him up and take him to a hidden location.
Revenge is on the mind of The Phantom, and, it seems that local district attorney, John Hampton, is the target... Sez it right there!
Weird stuff's going on at the old Hampton mansion! Wild-eyed Violet Knights plays the over-amped, Lucy the maid.
Allene Ray plays socialite daughter, Ruth Hampton, here she is with pops.
Lucy does quite a bit of carpet hugging throughout the flick.
And, Ruth spends quite a bit of time looking fine!
There's only one problem, The Phantom wants to strangle her!
But, which way did The Phantom go, George?!..
..Eye'll never tell!
An interesting shot from under the table!
There's Bobby Dunn as Shorty, the chauffeur and Lucy's boyfriend. He delivers the totally embarrassing lines... " If there's anybody in this place here, then, they better watch out, I ain't afraid of anybody in this place here, I'm warnin' you, bla bla bla, bla bla..."
It'd be nice if we could get a little bit of this stuff!..
Eye'm back!..
Good gag! The hand came out of an opening in a door!
Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams plays Dick, top photo shows him fighting in a basement decorated with skulls!
Sheldon Lewis, The Phantom, gets credited as 'The Thing!'
Ghoulnight Everbloody!!..
