QUICKSAND - "The Eyes Have It" (1950)

I believe it was Sir Walter Scott who said it best, when he wrote "O, what a tangled web we weave; When we first practice to deceive!"

 This Saturday Night Special is called

"Quicksand"

The more you thrash around, the deeper you sink!

 Mickey Rooney is a naive and horny little shit named Dan. Dan is an auto mechanic, and this exotic chick named Vera agrees to go out with him, so he has to scramble to come up with 20 bucks to take her out! Just look at Vera's eyes, as played by Jeanne Cagney, and then try and tell me that she doesn't look exactly like her brother, James Cagney!

 "Quicksand" was shot almost entirely at a place in Santa Monica, Calif. called "Ocean Park Pier," which wasn't quite an amusement park, but it was a place where people went to have fun from 1926 to 1956. In 1958, it morphed into a full blown amusement park called "Pacific Ocean Park." P.O.P. was a neat place, and was originally intended to compete with Disneyland, but almost ten years after it opened, it closed for repairs, and never opened again!

 I was talking to my Mother the other night about whether two actors known for their eyes, Peter Lorre and Jack Elam were ever in a movie together, and that's how I tripped onto this movie called "Quicksand." Bigger than anything, both stars are in this film, unfortunately, they don't actually have a scene together, but good enough for me! Peter has the role of sleazy arcade owner Nick, and former boss and lover of Vera!

Dan is a cocky little jerk, but he didn't really mean to set off a whole string of bad incidents, one after another. He lifted twenty bucks from the cash drawer where he worked, planning on paying it back in a couple of days when his pal pays him back some money he owes him, but instead his life turns into a quagmire of despair that just gets deeper and deeper and he gets pulled further down.

First he goes to this loan shark, but doesn't have time for them to conduct a credit check so that doesn't work.

It gets worse when he finds a place that will sell him a $100.00 watch on a payment plan that he takes to a pawn shop and hocks for $30.00 to put the original twenty back, but they sic a private detective on him immediately after doing that, who demands that he now pays one hundred dollars for the watch in 24 hours. He thinks about trading in his car, but for what they would give him, he'd just be deeper in the hole, and without transportation, so he ditches that idea.

He goes into a bar to have a couple of drinks and that's when Jack Elam walks in for a small role as one of the patrons of the bar. On the other side of Dan is a drunk old dude with two fifty dollar bills in his wallet!
Super cool and weird at the same time, Jack Elam was in one of my favorite movies, "Kiss Me Deadly," and he was in the "Twilight Zone" episode "Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up?" and then in every western ever made in the 60's, 70's, and 80's, or at least it seems like it!

So when the drunk leaves the bar, Dan decides to roll him, and follows him to his car!

It gets deeper when it turns out there was a witness.

Luckily Dan runs into the beautiful Barbara Bates as Helen and her friend, which allows him to blend in with the rest of the crowd. Helen is very pretty, but a bit dim witted. She has a thing for Dan, even though he's busy chasing other skirts like Vera. In fact he ditches her on the spot when he remembers he was supposed to have a date with Vera!

Barbara Bates had all it takes to become a star, but her personal life was like living in quicksand too. Her last appearance was in 1962 in an episode of the TV series "The Saint," titled "The Loaded Tourist." Plagued with personal problems, her career fell apart, and she sadly took her own life in 1969 at the age of 43.

When People Were Shorter And Lived Near The Water - Mickey Rooney was a mere 5' 2" and Peter Lorre was only 5' 3½" tall.

It looks like everything just might turn out all right. 

NOT!!

It seems fifty dollar bills were not that common back in the fifties!

Dan is just about at the end of his rope!

Dan's bullshitting boss pushes him just a little too far, and once he falls off the edge, he strangles the old bastard to pay off his debt to him!

 

Dan is now on the lam for murder, kidnapping and grand larceny, and it was all over twenty bucks and a woman! I hope you kids get the message, and don't end up like this!

That quicksand will draw you in, and wrap you up like a fly in a black widow's web if you're not paying attention!

ACNE / A Horror Film By Rusty Nails - 2000

We head for the edge today with this weird story about Franny and Zooey, who wake up one morning, ready to go on a high school field trip, but their plans change when Zooey drinks some contaminated water and his head becomes a huge pustule!! When Franny comes to aid him, Zooey turns her into a monster like him and they then set off on a bizarre journey, mutating other teenagers, encountering locals and developing a very unusual craving for chocolate. The army starts a statewide manhunt for the infected teens as they struggle to remain human.

This is Zooey, played by Rusty Nails, he's having a nice cup of contaminated water, mmmm, rooks dericious! He immediately falls to the floor...

After he wakes up, his head looks like a big zit. He grabs some cream cheese and absorbs it by rubbing it on the pustule... Like, gross!

After Zooey infects Franny, they go out into the woods to figure things out.

In the meantime, we learn that some military dudes are discussing their great plan to infect the locals. Thing is, it only infects teenagers!! That's right, only teens... Genius!

Let's pay a little visit to Uncle Ubriaco's Grocery Store with its 50 cent paper sign! Anyway, Zooey and other infected kids head inside to sample some treats, especially chocolate.

In a weird little scene, a gypsy woman tells Zooey that he's part of a military experiment that has singled out teenagers. In other words, the back story on the military's involvement.

Back to the action, the military guys are looking at drawings of how the teens look after they're infected! And, they're proud of their work!

Zooey is real sick, so, a group of the teens take him to the doctor's office. The office looks like a bathroom with mom's reading lamp for light.

This my favorite still from the movie!

This thing is 80 minutes long and 40 minutes is spent just having the infected teens stagger around in the woods and on the tracks and roads.

It starts raining. The teens all fall down and pop seeds or eggs out of the tops of their puss filled heads!.. It's a madhouse!!

Then we find Zooey and Franny, still staggering along, all normal now, walking home... Go figure! Tune in tomorrow when we return with more Dungeon Cargo!

GIANT CLAWS - "When Nature Rebels, All Hell Breaks Loose" (1980)

This is a pretty fishy Weird Wednesday presentation, but I kinda liked it!

This thing is called "Island Claws," it was made in 1980, and it is a legitimate monster movie that wasn't made in Japan!

Just to start off with the writers are Jack Cowden and Ricou Browning! What do these two men know about underwater adventures? Jack Cowden was the main writer for the "Flipper" TV series, and Mr. Ricou Browning was also a writer for "Flipper" but will always be remembered around these parts for being the man inside the rubber suit in all three of Universal's 'Creature' films!

Considering his creds, the music is not as great as it could have been, probably because Bill Justis was just trying to show he had soundtrack skills! The real story is Bill arranged and led studio bands in Memphis in the 50's for people like Elvis, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis! 

Bill also had the killer smash number two hit in 1957 called "Raunchy!"

Bouncing back from his creepster role in Hitchcock's "Misadventure," 

Barry Nelson is research scientist Dr. McNeal!
Did you know that Barry Nelson was the first actor to play James Bond, not Sean Connery. In the 1954 TV series called "Climax." Season 01, Episode 03 was titled "Casino Royale," and Barry played James Bond! Peter Lorre was the villain!

Since they need some women to be attacked by crabs, we've got Martina (Ghost) Deignan and Jo (The Munster's Revenge) McDonnell joining Barry Nelson, and the other fellow is Steve (Mega Shark Vs. Mecha Shark) Hanks as Pete Adams!

Take away the silly story, and you've almost got a top shelf high school biology class film!

The beer mug art on the wall looks like an ice cream soda instead of beer, but it's beer all right. You just wait and see!

The "4-D" man Robert Lansing is in there as a guy whose name describes him best, Moody!

What was I telling you about the beer? These guys are thiristy, and there's lots of beer drinking going on inside the "Half Shell Bar."

Mal (Yeah, he was in "Flipper" too) Jones is the innocent enough musician named Ames, and the first crab casualty!

Ames says Aaaaaahhhhhh!!

Most people think this is a bad movie, and it is, but at least it's a good bad movie!

It's not so fun when crabs have a gang or pack mentality!

More beer drinking!

The local crabs are getting larger. Growth hormones and nuclear waste make for a mighty potent cocktail!

What's all the screaming about??

Oh, Nevermind!

I was pretty impressed with the fact that they built a full-size giant crab!

"Squeeze me, Please me, Never tease me!"

So I think you get the general idea. Slow start and action packed ending, and just like "The Hokey Pokey,"
 that's what it's all about!

The good news is they've got free crab cakes for weeks!

An alternative title could have been, "Break Out The Butter!"

 Whatever you do, don't confuse the alternate title of "Giant Claws" with.........

.....The classic 1957 film, "The Giant Claw!"