Friday, June 4, 2010

THE BRAIN MACHINE / Howco Productions - 1977

Welcome to Friday Night Drive-In Frights & Freakouts here at the Dungeon, with your host Tabonga and his little 4-eyed hunchback tarantula helper buddy, Ralphie!

Howco also produced MESA OF LOST WOMEN, JAIL BAIT and UNTAMED MISTRESS!

Here's our story... "Four people with distinctly different backgrounds all volunteer for an experiment involving mind-altering and manipulation. The volunteers gather at a secret laboratory and are subject to a series of procedures that border on torture, including shock therapy and psychological torture. The final portion of the procedure involves the test subjects being exposed to an experimental device that alters their minds through the exposure of their innermost fears and darkest secrets."

Flick stars tons of TV actors, including James (uncredited crewman in FORBIDDEN PLANET) Best, Barbara (THE LAST PORNO FLICK) Burgess, Gerald (NIGHT OF BLOODY TERROR) McRaney and Marcus J. (KEEP OFF MY GRASS!) Grapes!

Jim Helms did the 'music' for THE BRAIN MACHINE and also worked on WOMEN AND BLOODY TERROR, THE PSYCHO LOVER, THE NIGHT OF THE STRANGLER and NIGHT CREATURE!

Today, Ralphie came up with funny soundclip title, so hit that big red 'GO' button and start the show, lil' pal!.. DAS BRAINZ MUSHEEN!

When you try and expose criminal activity in government sponsored weirdness, expect to be relentlessly tracked down! Filmed in Mississippi.

There are some great CIA jokes here, but we don't do political humor!

James plays Rev. Emory Neill. He had a similiar role in SHOCK CORRIDOR where he was in a nut house with various characters! Any time we feature James, it'd be funny to end the soundclip with Sheriff Rosco Coltrane's goofy laugh!

What good is a horror flick without showing some kind of weird looking skull?!

Interesting shots!

Okay, so, here's a great shot of the group... Before... Aw crap, the big door that seals them off is coming down... Sorry!

Dude got a little too close to the truth...

That's camera 3, right?

Tabonga swears, a lot of today's 'music' sounds like some of the stuff our band came up with after we got a digital delay!!

James gets his mind blown all the way to Hell!

OOPS!!

When you're the supreme pizza commander of the universe, you can easily have someone else framed to take the blame for your mistakes!

The ultimate fate of the volunteers and the people that know what's going on, is, well, you know... Not that great!

This is America, signing off!..

One of these days, we'll own the whole mutherfucker!!..

Right, boss!

**In a never-ending quest for cosmic balance, we're changing our lineup again... You are warned!

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

FOG ISLAND / PRC - 1945

Welcome again to another Wednesday Oldie Moldie B+W Bijou Flicktime Theater, here at the Dungeon wif' Tabonga and lil' helper, Rufus!

FOG ISLAND was released about 6 months before the end of WWII, and when the atomic bomb was nearly completed! Stars George (VOODOO MAN) Zucco, Lionel (MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM) Atwill, Jerome (THE JUNGLE CAPTIVE) Cowan and Veda Ann (REVENGE OF THE ZOMBIES) Borg. Storyline is basically... A man invites a group of 'friends' for a holiday at his creepy fog-ridden island home (it has secret passages and hidden doorways) and he intends to exact some twisted revenge after being released from prison, framed for embezzlement by these once trusted associates.

Music is by Mr. Karl Hajos who had a total of 85 composing and 142 music department credits! Here are some other movies he composed for - THE HAUNTED HOUSE (1928), THE LOVE DOCTOR, THE DUMMY, THE STUDIO MURDER MYSTERY, WOMAN TRAP, GRUMPY, THE SEA GOD, SUPERNATURAL, EIGHT GIRLS IN A BOAT, WEREWOLF OF LONDON, CIRCUS GIRL, HITLER'S MADMAN, CHARLIE CHAN IN THE SECRET SERVICE and THE MISSING CORPSE!

Lil' Rufus the Gnat yell real loud at Tabonga to tell him that he ready to push big red 'GO' button and make today's Eariffic Earclip roll up the hill to start show... So, here we go! Notice how Rufus have Tabonga change name of soundclip because he think it so funny!.. FROG ISLAND!

What Tabonga can say? Ta da!.. Fog Island!!

George Zucco lives with his stepdaughter in this creepy old house on Fog Island.

There's plenty of stereotypical characters, the dude with a hat looking in the window and the suspicious looking butler!

Veda Ann and Lionel are somewhat leary about being invited to George's house for the weekend!

And, old Georgie boy's working away with some boobie traps and such for his friends for after they arrive!

Such cleverness, all topped off with Geronimo's stolen skull!

What the eff!..

April Fool!

At the reunion party, George gives out special surprises for everbloody!

Great mug shot as George threatens Lionel.

Skeletons in shadows always disturbed Tabonga when he was lil' twigster!

This trap is an underground drowning pool!

Nice parting shot!! Happy screams, everbloody!

Monday, May 31, 2010

REAZIONE A CATENA - Stelvio Cipriani - "Twist Of The Death Nerve" (1971)

"A Bay Of Blood" reminds me a lot of dominoes, set 'em up in a line, and knock 'em right down!!! The music for this Mario Bava feature was composed by the Maestro Stelvio Cipriani, just one out of over 200 films he has written the soundtrack for. Stelvio is probably one of Italy's most famous composers, if not most prolific, for creating music for awesome titles like "Ski Mistress" and "Invasion By The Atomic Zombies" and "Sex and Black Magic" and one of his most famous outings, "Tentacles!"

Here's the basic storyline. This guy kills his wife, then he gets killed, then the person that killed him gets killed, then somebody else gets killed, and then somebody kills them, and later, more people get killed by other people who get killed too! Something like that!

It had always been my understanding that Mario Bava was a real goremeister, and I never did understand it, I mean like have you ever seen "Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs?" But after watching "Reazione A Catena" the original title of "A Bay Of Blood," I do understand why, because it's a real blood fest!!

Before they kill somebody, they gotta watch 'em real good first! Preferably at a distance and in hiding!

You have to give the producers of "Reazione A Catena" credit, they really tried to sell this film again and again using all kinds of different titles like "Ecology of a Crime" and "The Antecedent" or "The Last House on the Left Part II" or my favorite, "Twitch of the Death Nerve!" People thought Mario Bava made four slasher flicks all at the same time, and those are just some of the English titles!!

Just in case you ever wondered what the President of Iran did before his current gig!!

All right, so pretty much everybody else got killed, so let's bring on the teenagers!!

What a fun looking place, you can just almost hear the children laughing!

Card number 13 is the card of death!! What did you expect, pink bunnies?

Are those knockers on the fortune teller's ring, and what significance do they hold?

Still killing the killers and watching the watchers!!

If you know you're going to get killed anyway, what better time to do a nude swimming scene?

Lost and alone in a barn with more angles than a geometry class!

Try and get a good reflection shot in one of those new ugly spoked mags you see on a lot of cars today, and good luck with that!

I lost track of how many people got murdered. I was counting for a while, but then I got a splitting headache! I read later it was lucky 13!

It's not over yet, there's always time for one more gruesome murder!! A lot of people say that "Black Christmas" made in 1974 made by Bob Clark was the first modern day slasher flick, Bava's "A Bay Of Blood" preceded it by a full 3 years!!!

Monster Music

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