THE INVISIBLE MAN'S REVENGE / THEY'RE MARKED...for DEATH! - 1944

Welp. looks like we've got another classic Universal movie today, this time, an eccentric scientist helps a fugitive running from the law become invisible, unwittingly giving him the power to exact revenge on his former friends and business partners...

It stars Jon (MONSTER FROM THE SURF) Hall, Leon (MEXICAN SPITFIRE'S ELEPHANT) Errol, John (THE UNEARTHLY) Carradine, Alan (PHILO VANCE'S SECRET MISSION) Curtis, Evelyn (THE WOLF MAN) Ankers, and Gale (THE BLACK CAT) Sondergaard.

It's a twisted tale to start with, Bob Griffin has made his way back to London from South Africa after he became ill and ended up in a mental hospital. He has escaped from South Africa by killing two interns at the hospital. Running from the law, Griffin shows up at his partner's home and demands his cut of the fortune (of which he has the contract with him) from their diamond mine (business partner Sir Jasper Herrick and his wife left South Africa after they thought Griffin would die from his illness) but finds out that they lost most of the money in an investment that went south.

Griffin gets angry and tells Herrick that he wants everything they have including their home! And their daughter, Julie!!.. But after Griffin has a drink, he becomes dizzy and faints. Thinking they're dealing with a madman, Jasper and Irene take the contract and then have their butler dump the body near a nearby lake.

At the lake, Griffin wakes up but is still dizzy, and falls in the water. Luckily, Herbert Higgins is strolling by and pulls him out of the lake. He takes Griffin home with him and lets him stay there while he recovers.

Griffin, paranoid, goes wandering (he had to leave the place he was staying because of the police) and comes across a large stone house. It's the home of the scientist, Doctor Drury. Asking for help, he tells the doctor that he's hiding from the police, and that he was being unjustly accused. The doctor lets Griffin come in, and he shows him his mad lab.

Then the doc shows him his faithful invisible German Shepard, and tells him the story of how one intruder found that out the hard way!

So, after Griffin becomes invisible and pummels the doctor, he heads off into the night.

Griffin sneaks into Jasper's house and gives him a big surprise, and has him write out a letter of guilt dictated by the invisible bully, and then he leaves.

He goes back to Herbert's place and spooks the Hell out of his friend!

But, Herbert doesn't have the rent money and is getting kicked out. So, Griffin comes up with a scheme. They go to the pub and bet 5 pounds that Herbert can hit the bulls eye with all his darts. the big guy on the right top takes him up on the bet. After Griffith assists Herbert by running the dart to the center of the bulls eye a number of times, the little guy shoots a dart off of a squeeze box and it hits its mark. The guy who's betting with Herbert finally loses his cool!

He takes his money back from the little guy and is ready to clock him when Griffin steps in and knocks the big guy out cold. Everyone thinks Herbert hit him!

Griffin is creeping around the doctor's house one night.

He sees the doc give his dog a transfusion where it becomes visible again!

Griffin has the doctor call the police, asking for Mark Foster, Julie's beau, to have him come to his house where he can find the invisible man. What Griffin wants Foster for is to drain his blood for the transfusion, and to get rid of him so that he can marry Julie. But, Mark is not there, so Griffin decides to use Dr. Drury, calling the police back (as the doctor) to say he didn't make the call.

Then Mark shows up and the officers tell him the odd story of the phone calls. Mark (a newspaper reporter) grabs a policeman and they drive out to the doctor's place to check the story out.

In the meantime, Griffin has finished the transfusion and starts the place on fire! The dog (now visible) escapes the house and follows Griffin through the woods.

Now visible himself, Griffin goes back to Jasper's house and tells him and the butler that he's a guest who is there to stay for a while, and his name's not Griffin, it's Fields!

Griffin's new plan is to get rid of Mark and marry into the money with Julie!

Herbert drops in to say hello to his friend, but the crazy man is thinking about using Herbert's blood for the next transfusion!! The little guy weasels his way out of the sticky situation, so, Griffin wants him to kills the dog that keeps howling and is driving him crazy. Herbert agrees after Griffin says that he'll give him 1,000 pounds to take care of the dog!!

But at lunch when Julie and Mark are there, Griffin starts to turn invisible again. He runs out of the room saying that he had cut his hand with a knife.

Mark is lured to the basement where Griffin locks him in, then begins to pummel the unsuspecting victim. The maniac knocks Mark out and puts him on a table where he starts performing the transfusion...

Herbert cannot control the dog and it gets loose and goes directly to the basement door where it scratches and howls.

The police show up and knock a hole in the door and the dog jumps through and goes directly at Griffin. By the time the cops break in, it's too late, the invisible man is Dead!! Mark recovers and there's a happy ending.

If the world doesn't end, we'll be back on Wednesday with who the Hell knows what, here at The Dungeon!!..

THE FAT MAN - "Radio's Great Detective...Now The Screen's Super Sleuth" (1951)

 This week's Saturday Night Special is an interesting film on multiple levels, one being that it was directed by future horror gimmick-meister William Castle!

 The gimmick here is that the lead role is really a fat man, a character created by Dashiell Hammett, the author of "The Maltese Falcon."

"Let's see, who shall I kill today?"

The poor unsuspecting dentist is then murdered........

.....And unceremoniously dumped out the window!

All because of some stupid dental records!

So, now we have to backtrack to find out what's going on!

The joke was making chefs look like surgeons in the middle of some serious operation!

Jayne (Undercurrent) Meadows is Jane Adams. She worked for the Doctor when he was alive.

Jayne was married to the extremely funny Steve Allen and was older sister to actress Audrey (Alice Kramden) Meadows.

J. Scott Smart is "The Fat Man," Detective Brad Runyon. He played the role on radio for five years before they decided to make it into a movie.

"The Fat Man" has a great cast that includes Rock Hudson as Roy Clark, a down and out guy who needs some dental work real bad!

A couple days later, he's rolling in the dough, and a few more days after that, he comes up missing!

"The Fat Man's" rather strange partner is Clinton Sundberg as Bill Norton!

The stunning Julie London has the role of Pat Boyd, Roy Clark's future wife!

Actually my favorite part of the whole movie is this scene where "The Fat Man" asks Pat Boyd if she'd like to dance, and the big guy goes out and cuts a mean rug! He's pretty light on his feet!

It wasn't exactly love at first sight for Pat and Roy!

 

But they warm up to each other pretty fast, and the next thing you know......

.........They get married, and he disppears!

The million dollar caper includes heisting an armored car, and making off with the daily receipts from the track!

Sure guys you don't look the least bit suspicious!

The world famous clown Emmett Kelly plays a clown named Deets using a different makeup from his normal routine!

Yeah, it's a little slow in places, and at times, it feels real odd, and then you remember,

Oh, Yeah, William Castle!

THE BEAT GENERATION - "Way-Out Parties Beyond Belief!" (1959)

Tonight's Saturday Night Special is the result of my reinvigorated interest in Vampira and her very cool career, and the path led me here, because in 1959 Albert Zugsmith, produced four movies that were all very fascinating for a number of reasons, but what I found most interesting was how they used a large number of the same actors in all four movies (Ala Roger Corman), and then each film also had it's own group of other special individuals.

Let me try and explain.
No slouch in the production department, Albert Zugsmith had already produced three of my favorite movies, "Written On The Wind," "The Incredible Shrinking Man," and "Touch Of Evil," before this, and in 1958 he produced "High School Confidential," starring Russ Tamblyn, but also in the cast were Mamie Van Doren, Ray Anthony, Jackie Coogan, Charles Chaplin Jr., and Norman Grabowski who would all be in his next three or four movies too, along with a lot of other notable names like Vampira!

The first movie of the 1959 series was "Night Of The Quarter Moon," and the second one was "The Beat Generation."
The third movie was called "The Big Operator," which I'll tell you more about on Wednesday, and the fourth was called "Girls Town."

So rather than try and explain all the complex intricacies of this movie called "The Beat Generation," I'm just going to introduce you to some of this crazy amazing cast!
Steve Cochran has the lead role in this film, and is the co-star of "The Big Operator."
He was also in the "Twilight Zone" episode titled "What You Need."
At the age of 48, Steve sailed off in his yacht to Guatemala, but died of a lung infection before he ever got there.

 Looking as good as ever, in this film, the versatile Mamie Van Doren plays a slutty tramp, but in "The Big Operator," she's Mrs. Everyday Housewife. She was also in "Girls Town."

 Ray Danton is a nasty serial rapist in this film, and in "The Big Operator," he plays an evil hit man called The Executioner. Personally, I like Ray better when he plays more humorous characters.

Jackie Coogan, aka Uncle Fester, is in three of the four movies. In this one he's a cop, In "The Big Operator," he's a crook!

 At this point in time, no one knew what an impact the cartoon character's of Charles Addams' world would have on pop culture. Did you know that when Maila Nurmi developed her Vampira character, one of her main influences was the wife in The Addams Family cartoons, who at that time, wasn't even known as Morticia yet? 

In "The Beat Generation," Maila was a beat poetess, and in "The Big Operator" she plays a hip gallery owner! She doesn't get enough screen time in either movie in my humble opinion!

 I also find it fascinating that in both movies, she is billed as Vampira. That would be kind of like billing Bela Lugosi as Dracula I think.

 
Trumpet playing band leader Ray Anthony is in all five of Albert Zugsmith's 1958-59 films!
Ray also performed the original theme song in Zugsmith's "The Incredible Shrinking Man."


Famed accordionist from Fresno, Calif, Dick (Daddy-O) Contino is also in "Girls Town."

 Just like me, Albert Zugsmith must have been a big music fan, because all of these films have music in them. Cathy Crosby performs a song in all but
"The Big Operator."

 
Margaret (13 West Street) Hayes was also in "Girls Town."


 Bill Daniels is also in three of the four movies, but he was also better known as a singer!


One of the characters working in all four of the 1959 Zugsmith films was the comedy relief guy Norman Grabowski. Not exactly a household name, Grabowski as they call him, is one of the most important people in this movie, especially to hot rod fans around the world since he was literally the creator of the T-Bucket style of hot rod. He also designed Kookie's hot rod in "77 Sunset Strip." That bit of information makes this pose a lot more understandable! Four to the floor and pedal to the metal!!

That brings us to another category! Charles Chaplin, Jr. was not only in all five of the 1958-59 films, he was also one of many actors used by Albert Zugsmith who were children of other very famous stars, in this case, Charlie Chaplin!


Robert Mitchum's son James or Jim, who has a stunning resemblance to his Dad, was also in "Girls Town!" Not in this movie, but other actors like this are John Drew Barrymore and Harold Lloyd Jr.


Albert Zugsmith either really liked music, or he knew that it really gave a film that extra punch, so when he wasn't using musicians as actors, he was using musicians as musicians, like Louis Armstrong.
In "High School Confidential," there was an appearance by Jerry Lee Lewis, and The Platters show up in "Girls Town."
Also, the main soundtrack for "The Beat Generation" was written by the guy who also did most of the music for Mr. B.I.G., the swingin' Albert Glasser!


And that brings us to a list of all the various and sundry actors and musicians of all ilks who make up the balance of very interesting characters in these movies like Fay (Hercules Conquers Atlantis) Spain!

Irish (Sheena: Queen Of The Jungle) McCalla!

Professional boxer turned actor, Slapsie Maxie Rosenblum! And the list of characters in the five films goes on and on with names like Michael Landon, Nora Hayden, Mel Welles, Julie London, Dean Jones, Agnes Moorehead, Nat 'King' Cole, Frank Gorshin, Mickey Rooney, Mel Torme, Jim Backus, Jay North, Leo Gordon, Paul Anka, Elinor Donahue, Gloria Talbott etc. etc. etc.
If you watch "The Beat Generation" and "The Big Operator" back to back, it can surrealistically seem like it's a continuing story. Steve Cochran quits his job as a cop and divorces Fay Spain, and Steve and Mamie Van Doren get married and have a kid, while Ray Danton goes from serial rapist to hit man, and Vampira never notices any of it because she's way too cool!!