THE HAUNTING / MGM - 1963 / Music by Humphrey Searle

Director/producer Robert Wise hit homerun tonight with very great spooky flick from yesteryear! Other movie Robert direct you may not know... THE CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE, THE BODY SNATCHER and THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN.

British music composer Humphrey Searle have decent career and work on THE BABY AND THE BATTLESHIP, THE ABOMINABLE SNOWMAN, THE MONSTERS and DOCTOR WHO!

Here was an excellent sample of Mr. Searle' work, and, truly spooky!

Julie Harris and Claire Bloom play psychic gurlies, and that why they there, to attract ghost!!

Creepy ghost like Julie best...

What the?!!

Oh, and not to fergit great performance by Richard Johnson and Russ Tamblyn. In 2008 Richard play Bernard Qualtrough on Brit TV series SPOOKS! In heyday, Russ be the dude!! Notice drink in Russ' hand?

Somebloody could get hurt aroun' here, so, might as well... have another beer!

Robert' wife show up and all Hell break loose!! Probably best to believe in spook!

DAMN PIGEON!!..

DEADLY IS THE FEMALE - "Gun Crazy" - King Brothers Productions (1950)

Welcome to a real Saturday Night Special down in The Dungeon, a .38 Special, that is!

My old pal, Arizona's amazing Al Perry told me this was his favourite film noir flick, and since it was already on my list, it seemed like the time was right!  The story was written by the brilliant blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo who also wrote such classics as "Rocketship X-M," and "Johnny Got His Gun!" Co-creator of Mr. Magoo Millard Kaufman allowed his name to be used in the credits as writer as a front for Dalton Trumbo! Figuring enough time had passed by 1992, Millard revealed the truth about the credits to the world!

 Just because a young man has an over-fascination with guns doesn't make him a criminal, that is, until he steals one!!  Meet young Barton Tare!

So it's off to reform school for the kind young man with a love for guns but a hatred for the killing of anything! He just likes to shoot the damn things! And despite all the pleas for leniency by his  sister, Bart is sent off for quite a few years! The young Bart Tare was played by none other than Russ Tamblyn (credited as Rusty Tamblyn) in his sixth film appearance!

One of the first things Bart does when he gets out of reform school is go to the carnival with his two best buddies from childhood that he's kept in touch with, and the most interesting thing is an act by sharpshooter Annie Laurie Starr as played by the super cute Peggy (Curse Of The Demon) Cummins!

Well, you might say it was love at first sight...................

...................But not until they were both in the sight of each other's guns! I'd like to see this act today where you invite a complete stranger up on stage from out of the audience to shoot out candles on your head! The grown up Bart Tare was actor John Dall, a man with a short but fruitful career! In his first film role ever, the movie "The Corn Is Green," John was nominated for 'Best Actor In A Supporting Role'! He was also in Alfred Hitchcock's classic "Rope!"

So there you go, Bart joins the act, but not for long after he has a dispute with the Boss about whose girl Annie is, and they off and get married!

These two crazy kids are so in love and life is beautiful! The song "Laughing On The Outside (Crying On The Inside) says it all, and was written by Bernie Wayne and Ben Raleigh, and was sung by Frances Irvin!

Unfortunately, the money that they have saved doesn't go very far after a couple of bad nights at the casino! It doesn't take them long to figure out that their one common talent might also be a way to generate economic success! At first they were only going to rob one place, but you know how that goes!

When they need a getaway car,  Annie pretend hitchhikes, and you know the first dirty old man who comes along is going to pick her up!

They do this a couple of times, where there's an interesting scene shot from the backseat of the car into the back of Bart and Annie's heads as they chit chat!

After a few heists, they start having to change up their identities to be able to get through the road blocks!

Then after a few close calls, they finally have a run-in with the police, and after a hot pursuit Bart shoots the tires of the police car, and even though he didn't shoot the officers, he still feels bad that they got hurt in the crash! Annie, on the other hand, feels no remorse at all!

On the run, broke, and now having to ride in a boxcar for transportation, Bart and Annie decide to try and pull off one last big robbery, and then call it quits forever, and try and lead a safe and sane life!

I love this movie, but right here they lost me! They devise a plan to rob the payroll of the Armour Meat packing plant, and somehow, Bart manages to land a job as a delivery guy to the plant, and Annie gets a job as a secretary in the office! If it was that easy to get a job, I'm thinking they should have stopped right there, and settled down, but I guess that would have made for a happy but dull ending!

It's now revealed that Annie can be a cold and ruthless killer! Bart on the other hand is still as kind hearted as ever, but because he loves her so much, he's willing to follow her to the bowels of Hell!

Thinking they've got it made now, the kids go out and have a good time! Here they are on the roller coaster! Unfortunately life is a like a roller coaster too, and they're about to hit the big dip! The serial numbers on the money they stole have been traced down, and it doesn't take long before their money is no good, and they're tracked down!

The final escape attempt includes this beautiful shot that all you car afficinados should be able to appreciate!

Whether you want to quote Jim Morrison or Bugs Bunny, it makes no difference because "This is the End," and "That's all, Folks!!"

Al was 100% right, "Gun Crazy" is a really fine film right up there with "Kiss Me Deadly!" Makes sense since the original title of this film was "Deadly Is The Female!" The original poster is so not this movie, and it doesn't take much thought to understand why they changed the look and the title to the much more dynamic "Gun Crazy!"                             

TWIN PEAKS - Season One In A Krazy Nutshell (1990)

The first season of "Twin Peaks" that hit the airwaves in 1990 was only eight episodes long! 

I binge watched them all and more this last weekend, at least I think it was last weekend, maybe it was a couple of years ago, I forget. You know, it is kind of like one big dream!

Here we go, the train is pulling into the station in Twin Peaks, Washington, a nice little town where everybody knows everybody, and they all live together in perfect harmony, more or less, or maybe not really at all, in fact most of them hate each other, but really, it's just your ordinary American small town!

"Twin Peaks" was created by Mark Frost and David Lynch, and Mark's Dad Warren was the town Doctor in the series! Warren just passed away not two weeks ago on February 17th! He was 91! Warren's career went all the way back to 1957, but in 1958, he had a small part in "War Of The Colossal Beast!" 

Warren's great as Doctor Will Hayward, and reprised his role in an upcoming version of "Twin Peaks" which is coming out in May of this year for 18 episodes! I can't wait! 

Eric (Starship Troopers) DaRe is as good of a homicidal maniac as television would allow in 1990! I would not like to drink a lot of beer and go hunting with this guy!

Miguel Ferrer is hilariously obnoxious as FBI Agent Albert Rosenfield! 

Seriously hard to believe, Miguel also just passed away not more than a few weeks ago on January 19th. He was only 61! I don't think this is going to be a good year!

The Major and his son! What a pair!

Don S. (Stargate SG-1) Davis as Major Briggs might not be a household name, but I'm sure out of his 143 acting credits, you've seen him more than a few times! Dana Ashbrook is the Major's son, madboy Bobby Briggs! Dana was only eleven when he first hit the silver screen in "Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes!"

Dungeon Hero for too many reasons to even try and explain, Russ Tamblyn is the local shrink with problems of his own, Dr. Lawrence Jacoby! To read about just about a few of those reasons, click HERE! So many of these original actors are in the new version, it really should be more than just interesting!

Chris Mulkey as the bastard Hank Jennings might just be one of the busiest men in Hollywood! Since 1976, he's racked up over 200 acting roles, and is in a number of things still coming up in 2017, but "Twin Peaks" won't be one of them!

Big Ed and Agent Cooper looked like they just stepped out of an episode of "Miami Vice" in this casino shot!

I used to have an album called "Fun At The Funeral" but I sold it on eBay!

For me, dream sequences are the hardest thing to pull off. You would think it would be easy since it can be totally nonsensical, but it just doesn't work out that way when most people try it! David Lynch, and one of my other favourites Werner Herzog, are about as good at it as anybody! This whole scene is extra mystical, and Michael J. Anderson is one of the suavest dancers ever! Michael had his own band in New York at one time called "Wayward Gene and the Natural Selection!" Damn! Those must have been some good times!!

So, that was the meat of the show, and the rest of the cast is beautiful insane women!

Drop dead gorgeous Joan (Judge Dredd) Chen is the utterly mysterious Jocelyn Packard!

Cute as a bug Mädchen Amick is sticky sweet Shelly Johnson! Mädchen will be back in the new series too!

The always beautiful and one of my all time favourites, Peggy (Mod Squad) Lipton is Norma Jennings!  I never really knew or planned on this being about the new series, but as I'm doing this and seeing how many of the original actors like Peggy Lipton are coming back, I'm really excited to see it! I've got the"Twin Peaks" fever, and it's hotter than a pepper's sprout!

 Piper (The Hustler, Carrie) Laurie is amazing as Catherine Martell, and more than ever in this scene where she goes out to try and dance with Leyland Palmer during one of his anxiety dance attacks, and by mimicking him gets the whole crowd of Icelandic people doing the dance too, and if you don't know what I'm talking about, then you need to binge watch "Twin Peaks" just like I'm doing!

All the flashbacks to the soap opera "Invitation To Love" imitate real life just like.........

...........A fresh stack of doughnuts!!!

Looks like a still out of a James Bond movie to me!

So at the end of the first series, Agent Cooper takes four slugs at close range; I guess they could have left it there if need be, but they didn't, and season two has twenty-two more episodes of which I have watched five so far. It's going to be a busy weekend! I know I left out a myriad of great characters, but I'll be back with Season 02, and next time I'll include Harry, and Benjamin, and Donna, and Audrey, and James, and Pete, and Lucy, and Andy, and Hawk, and Nadine etc. etc. etc. I promise!