~ HAMMER FIFTIES SCI-FI MOVIES ~

Here's a cool post featuring Hammer's sci-fi movies from the fifties, although there are only five of them, they pack a wallop of bizarro thrills to never be forgotten!..

First up is FOUR SIDED TRIANGLE from 1953, it's about a couple who are helped by their friend to develop a "reproducer" machine which can exactly duplicate any object, including the girl of two men's dreams. What the Hell could go wrong?! Terence Fisher wrote the screenplay.

Also in 1953, Hammer releases their first space opera, SPACEWAYS. I used to watch this boring flick on TV in the fifties, but, the rubber space monster never showed up!! Terence Fisher directs this one. Love those space helmets!!

Then in 1955, Hammer ratchets up the horror with THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT, a space infection enters the body of Victor Carroon and the creep show begins!! Val Guest directs.

In 1956, Hammer brings in master writer, and my favorite, Jimmy (THE CRAWLING EYE) Sangster to pen this brutal fright fest!! Hammer came under much condemnation for this unbelievable horror tale. I mean, like, they even kill off a young boy!!!

Last on the list is QUATERMASS 2, luckily, I got to see this one when it came out in 1957. Loved the crap out of it, blobs intrigue me big time. For the rest of the fifties though, Hammer concentrated on horror films with vampires and Frankenstein monsters... Tune in tomorrow and Monday for our last Halloween Countdown posts, I've been saving a very special movie for our last submission!!

LA DAMA ROSSA UCCIDE SETTE VOLTE - "The Red Queen Kills Seven Times" (1972)

Hey! Welcome to my last Wednesday of the Countdown to Halloween! I thought I had a good one for you, but this movie isn't near as Halloweenie as I thought it was going to be!

But......It is what it is!

The title is "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte," and the literal translation is "The Red Queen Kills Seven Times!" If you want to get really confused, it was also released as "Horror House," "Blood Feast," "Feast Of Flesh," and "The Corpse Which Didn't Want To Die!" For the record, most of those titles have nothing to do with the actual movie!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" can be quite opulent at times!

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the main ingredient in most Italian Giallos is the colour red, blood red!

I show you this still for two reasons, 1972 stereo, and 1972 phone!

Here's our decennial shout out to all you Vespa lovers!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" goes from high fashion to.........

.......Super low fashion!!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is worth a watch just for arty interiors and fashion like this! 1972 only happened once, and it was different!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is chock full of beautiful women like Pia Giancaro of "The Evil Eye," and "Curse Of The Butterfly" fame!

But don't forget, it is a bloody murder mystery!

As what can only be considered the ultimate insult, the maniac not only kills this gal, she also steals her bug!

How about those glasses? Wow!

And what about this cat's pad? Ever seen anything like that before?

Don't forget that despite all the fashion, "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is a grisly and garish slasher film!

Here she comes again now now!

The real title says it all, and indeed, the Queen does commit seven murders, but whether she's really the Red Queen or not is a different story!

Pretty good nightmare visit from the Red Queen!

We don't usually show much nudity, but it's hard to get a shot of Sybil (Naughty Nymphs) Danning with her clothes on, and besides, everybody's seen her naked at least once anyway!

The elegant Marina (Seven Blood-Stained Orchids, All The Colors Of The Dark) Malfatti just passed away last year at the age of 83!

 The last and main beauty in the cast was Barbara Bouchet who is still working today! Thank goodness for small miracles! She might not be a household name, but besides an array of Giallo flicks, Barbara was in "In Harm's Way," and "Agent For H.A.R.M.!!" She was Moneypenny in "Casino Royale," she was in a "Star Trek," and a "Man From U.N.C.L.E." episode. She was in "Don't Torture A Duckling," "Duck In Orange Sauce," and "Death Rage!"

 But when it's all said and done, personally, I think the weirdest thing about "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is that the killer Red Queen is named Evelyn, and she has essentially come back from the grave, and that Director Emilio Miraglia's previous movie before this was called "The Night Evelyn Came Out Of The Grave!"

Despite all the thrashing and slashing, I'm thinking Emilio was having a pretty good laugh on us all!

MICKEY MOUSE In "The Mad Doctor" / Disney - 1933

I wuz watching some old Thunderbean cartoons yesterday and came across this wild Mickey Mouse cartoon. What I noticed was that Disney cartoons were a cut above the average laff!

This thing has Mickey, Pluto, a Chicken and a Mad Doctor in a very weird tale of Horror!!

It starts on a stormy, rainy night. The still shows Mickey's house as a lightning bolt lights up the place, you can see the beautiful artwork the Disney team was capable of!

Well, Pluto goes missing... He's being taken by a phantom character for some unknown reason, to an old castle built on a bolder that looks like a giant skull.

Mickey follows them and is pulled through the door as he holds on to the bell ringing cord! You can see that the place belongs to DR. XXX!

Once inside, Mickey is attacked by a bunch of huge Wolvertonesque bats, so cool!

Mickey goes into a room with a blazing fireplace, he turns around to see he's surrounded by two big ghastly monsters... But, it's only iron fireplace figurines!

Then, Mickey has a few bouts with skeletons. One pops out of a pillar and blows out his match, others pop out of stairs to terrify him!

Once Pluto is secured along with a hen, the Phantom rips off his cloak to reveal who he really is... The freakin' Mad Doctor!!

Okay then, see if you can figure out the doc's equation for his experiment... Yes, he's going to cut Pluto and the hen in half, attach them together and make a new creature, a dog-chicken that lays eggs!!

Gee whiz, I wonder why they call him the Mad Doctor!

Mickey's still trying to locate Pluto and falls into a giant spider web with a bony spider!

In the lab, the doctor shows Pluto what he has in mind, he cuts his shadow in half!!

Now it's Mickey's turn to face the saw that cuts things in half!!

But, as always when things seem a little too weird in a cartoon, well of course, it was nothing more than a bad dream! Pluto and Mickey are fine, making for a happy ending! We keep Halloween Countdown 2017 rolling along on Wednesday, be there, or...