Wednesday, June 19, 2019

HIGH SCHOOL U.S.A. (1983) Vs HIGH SCHOOL USA (1984) - All-Stars

This 45 record has nothing to do with either of these movies, except it shares the title!
Welcome to another Weird Wednesday Dungeon style!

 There really was something very weird going on here. The 1983 version and the 1984 version are completely different stories. The first one starred Michael J. Fox and was titled U.S.A. instead of USA. They both also had Crystal (172 episodes of Wings) Bernard, Crispin (Back To The Future) Glover, Jon (Napoleon Dynamite) Gries, and Michael (Private School) Zorek in them as teenagers!
And they both have a shitload of classic 1960's sit-com actors as the adult supporting cast members!

Let's start with the 1983 version!
 First off, you've got actors like Dwayne Hickman and Steve Franken from "The Many Loves Of  Dobie Gillis" Brother Daryl Hickman makes a short appearance too!

  Bob Denver of Maynard and Gilligan fame was lookin' good!

There's awesome Angela Cartwright from "Make Room For Daddy" and "Lost in Space!"
 
 Elinor Donahue from "Father Knows Best" was also looking very good some 20 years later!

 Tony Dow will always be The Beaver's big brother Wally Cleaver no matter how old he gets!

Another famous big brother is David Nelson from "The Ozzie And Harriet Show" 

 And then there's Dawn Wells from"Gilligan's Island."
Three hour cruise, right!!

Now the 1984 version is something the same but completely different!
It's almost like these two movies were made in parallel universes!

To deny this wholesome 1984 version is about sex just ain't hardly possible!
Some of the other actors playing the high school students in this film have gone on to do a lot of good stuff, including Melody (Flash Gordon) Anderson, Anne-Marie (Robot Jox) Johnson, David (Splash) Knell, Ben (Apollo 13) Marley, Sam (Red Dawn) Slovick, Tegan (Hamburger Hill) West, and JoAnn (Real Genius) Willette!

But the real reason I find both these fairly bad films interesting once again is because of the supporting adult cast like Jerry Mathers "From Leave it To Beaver!"

The Beaver's Mom, Barbara Billingsley.

Also from "Leave It To Beaver," the kid everybody loved to hate, Ken Osmond, better known forever as Eddie Haskell is in both films as a different character with the same name.

 
From "The Ozzie And Harriet Show," this time they used Harriet Nelson, and her musician son....

.......The oh so talented and good lookin' Ricky Nelson!
This would be the last time the world ever got to see Rick Nelson, as he died in a plane crash in Texas seven months later!

Here's the fantastic Paul Peterson from "The Donna Reed Show."

Burt Ward aka Robin The Boy Wonder from "Batman."

Dick York from "Bewitched."

And last but not least, The Catwoman herself, one of the prettiest women ever concieved, Julie Newmar is a sleazy stripper!

Now I thought that was all  pretty weird, and way too much work to figure out!
Both movies suck, but are still fun to watch just for all the trivia involved!
You tell me which one had the more amazing cast, because I sure can't make that call!

Monday, June 17, 2019

TRILOGY OF TERROR / Dan Curtis Productions - 1975

Here's a TV movie from Dan (DARK SHADOWS) Curtis, there are three stories of Terror!.. The first tale's about a college student infatuated with his teacher, the second one, a paranoid tale of two sisters - one good, the other evil, and the third story's about a Native American tribal doll that comes to life and terrorizes a woman in her apartment. Story by Richard Matheson.

Karen Black stars in all the stories in four roles. She passed away in 2013 at age 74 and had 202 acting credits during her career. Other stars are Robert Burton, John Karlen, George Gaynes, Jim Storm, Gregory Harrison and Kathryn Reynolds.

It starts with this story about infatuation, Chad gets the hots for teacher after she passes by and a thought pops into his head, hmm, I like to see what she looks like without her clothes!

He asks her if she'd like to go to the drive in with him to see a Euro vampire flick even if teachers aren't supposed to date students...

Well, after he drugs her root beer from the snack bar, he takes her to a motel, strips her down and takes some photos for blackmail.

He's a pushy little bitch and orders her to do his bidding with a nasty note.

Unfortunately, she's a mystic serial murderer! She poisons Chad, then burns up his photo lab before leaving. She goes home and waits for the newspaper to come out so that she can add the clipping to her scrapbook!

In another sexually charged story, Karen plays sisters Millicent and Therese Larimore. Millicent is a total prude and Therese is an oversexed nymphomaniac!

So, fed up with Therese and her sexual escapades, Milliocent pulls out her voodoo kit and sticks a pin through the heart of the Therese doll, killing her!!

Not hard to figure out where this one was headed, the sisters are the same person...

In the last and most popular story, Amelia buys a fairly creepy Native American tribal doll for her boyfriend's birthday.

Well, when Amelia looks for the devilish doll after leaving the room, she can't find it, like, what in the Hell's going on around here?!..

Great shot as the doll attacks Amelia with its very sharp blade!

She somehow traps the crazy thing in a suitcase. It tries to cut its way out so Amelia goes after it with an ice pick! But, it gets out and bites her a number of times.

She finally tosses it into the oven and after a few minutes, the doll is burned to a crisp!

But remember, the doll bit her and now the evil spirit runs through her veins. She calls her boyfriend and invites him over for some fun!! Tune in again on Wednesday for more craziness, here, at The Dungeon!!..

Saturday, June 15, 2019

TERROR ON TOUR - "The Names Remain Insane" (1980)

 This Saturday Night Special puts the emphasis on the word turd in Sa-Turd-ay, but then maybe that's not such a bad thing!

This thing is called "Terror On Tour" and was made in 1980, and probably should have only been a three or four minute music video!

 I spent about 30 minutes trying to find out if the guys in The Names were the actors who play The Clowns in the movie. IMDB didn't tell me, but finally by going to their Facebook page and looking at a picture of an article written about them, I was able to match up the names. 
The Names are from Rockford, Illinois, and are actually a pretty good band! It seems the music they created for the film was heavier than their normal music, but then The Clowns were known for decapitating mannequins onstage!

 Here's a pretty cool rockin' power pop tune called "Baby You're A Fool" by The Names that's way better than anything in this movie in my opinion!

 P A R T E E! 

 The Clowns are a concept rock band, and now somebody is putting on their style of makeup and costumes and killing whores, drug dealers, and groupies!

 Women are getting killed all around them, so what do The Clowns do?
 P A R T E E ! !

 There's not a whole lot of thought process going on here.
There's lots of shots of putting on makeup, doing drugs, meaningless dialogue, dancing, and big knives like this!

 P A R T E E !!!

 I wonder if this film helped or maimed The Names career!

 It was like either two or three girls got killed in this make out room in a couple of days, and they never cleaned it, and the cops just looked at it and said okay, so I guess she deserves it, because good lord, it had to stink in there!

 Everybody becomes so indifferent to the killings, that this dancer even gets killed on stage and nobody notices!

 The grooviest thing about "Terror On Tour" is the list of credited female characters that includes Mod Girl, Freebase Chick, Next Girl, Well Endowed Lady, Young Girl, Screaming Girl, Operating Woman, Food Girl, Scantily Clad Girl # 1, Scantily Clad Girl # 2, Bleeding Woman, Girl With Pigtails, Girl In The Alley, Dead Victim Etc. Etc.

 Big shoes to fill, another famous rock band from Rockford looks more like clowns than these guys, Cheap Trick!

 By the way, if you seek more information and you do a search for a band called The Names, you're going to mostly find out about about a post punk band from Brussels, Belgium formed in 1978, so it was basically the same era. I don't know who has the rights to the name The Names, but Rockford wins the rock showdown musically!

YEAH I DID IT, WHAT THE HELL YOU GONNA DO ABOUT IT??
Hee, Hee, Hee, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ho, Ho, Ho!!!

Monster Music

Monster Music
AAARRGGHHH!!!! Ya'll Come On Back Now, Y'Hear??