CAPTAIN Z-RO / Roy Steffens - 1955

Hello everbloody, and welcome to Moldie Oldie Monday, here at The Dungeon! Tonight we have a rarity from the airwaves of 1955. This program was the brainchild of writer/actor, Roy Steffens. Alive today, this was the only project Roy was ever part of!.. Weird!

Usually, Captain Z-RO used his time machine to go back in time to assure that history is not not changed by historical characters through the years. It seems that without his influence throughout history (26 episodes), the world would be a much different place!! And, now that I think about it, I'd bet the idea for Mr. Peabody came from this series!!

Even Tabonga in Hell has no idea who composed the music, and since it's moldie, who cares?!.. So, we might as well bring in our lil' Dungeon Pal, Rufus The Gnat, what's gonna be pushing that there big red 'GO' button, and start our Eariffic Earclip, here's... CAPTAIN Z-RO!

Our episode tonight is "Meteor" - seconds to death in the ZX99.

This is Captain Z-RO and Jet in a remote laboratory, somewhere on Earth!.. Hey, cool rocket!!

No, you look sillier!!

Nice shot of the remote lab and their rocket, the ZX99!

5... 4... 3... 2... 1.. Z-RO!!!

Looks like the Capt. is sitting in a big bucket!

Coffee in space, probably not a good idea! You listenin' Starbucks?! Especially them triple shots!

Here's a shot looking out the ZX99's Video Plate, and that's what the Earth looked like from space in the fifties!

And the winner is...... Beetle-Bomb!!

Beetlebomb hit the ZX99... Wait, no, the meteor hits the ZX99 and The Captain has to go out and evaluate the damage...

Boy, it's lucky the ship didn't start spinning around!..

Aw, crap!

I can't work like this! Notice that even upside down, it still reads.. 'Z'

UH... HELP, MR. WIZARD!!!...

Jet's not buying the old fart's patriotic idea about 'Going out in a blaze of glory!'

Then, out of nowhere, Captain Z-RO jumps into the scene!

Then, there's a teriffic explosion as the meteor zeroes in on them!

Everything's cool and back to normal, all because The Captain was able to jump into the scene before there was that explosion!.. That's how simple things were, back in the fifties!

Ghoulnight Everbloody!!

LES CAUCHEMARS NAISSENT LA NUIT - Bruno Nicolai - "Nightmares Come At Night" (1970)

The title of tonight's outing is "Les Cauchemars Naissent La Nuit" , and in my humble and most respectful opinion, this is not Jess Franco's best effort! I mean, "Nightmares Come At Night" sounds kinda scary, but it's really just soft-core art sleaze! You would need to be very stoned to be able to get into this movie, and I don't know if it's possible to get that high, and not fall asleep or die!! My French ain't that great, so I thought the title had something to do with giant cockroaches from Mars, not seemingly endless and actually quite boring sex scenes leading up to a big crescendo of a nothing ending that you could care less about by the time you get there!

Diana Lorys as Anna de Istria was also in "The Awful Dr. Orlac," "Fangs Of The Living Dead," "Night Of The Blood monster," and "House Of Psychotic Women," which are all a Heck of a better watch than "Les Cauchemars Naissent La Nuit!"

Coming off of a real nice run of three terrific flicks, "Sax Rohmer's The Castle of Fu Manchu," "Küß Mich, Monster," and "Venus In Furs," it seemed like Jess Franco couldn't do anything wrong, but this "Erotic Nightmare" is just exactly what it claims to be! Jesus Franco has directed 192 films, so it would be asking a lot for each and every one to be good, even if he is one of THE best directors of all time!

"Les Cauchemars Naissent La Nuit" is one of those kinds of movies, where pretty much the only saving grace is that, it has a lot of pretty cool and sleazy music, brought to you by the Maestro Bruno Nicolai, the man who was conductor and musical director in the Clint Eastwood classics, "The Good, The Bad And The Ugly," and "For A Few Dollars More" and also composed the music for another 96 films like "Spy Pit," "Island Of Despair," and "Eugenie - The Story Of Her Journey Into Perversion!"

Paul Muller as Dr. Paul Lucas does manage to get in a few choice lines! Paul has been in the movies since 1948, in titles like "Goliath and The Sins Of Babylon," the Jerry Cotton feature "Murderers Club Of Brooklyn," and "Nightmare Castle" just to name a couple of his 241 achievements!

Soledad Miranda was also in "Les Cauchemars Naissent La Nuit" along with Maria Rohm, but both are used minimally, to the point that this shot of this airplance ride is a lot more interesting! Howard Vernon is also in this film lurking around somewhere!

"Les Cauchemars Naissent La Nuit" makes major stinker of a film "Manos: The Hands Of Time" look like a Spielberg flick! This would be a good movie to watch if you were having a swinger's party in a big castle with different movies showing in each room, and you only had time to glance up at the screen once in a while!

Normally boring and sex are not words that should even be used in the same sentence, so I think you get the idea, it's either overly arty, or Jesus needed some quick cash! This club scene seemed to go on forever, and then some!

Colette Giacobine as Cynthia Robins has a very familiar look, but she was only ever in a total of seven films. In this movie she was credited as Colette Jack!

If you don't believe me or if this is your favorite genre of film, then by all means, check it out yourself, I think I'm going to find the soundtrack myself. Just like with a lot of music videos, sometimes your ears and imagination would have been plenty good enough!

EMPIRE OF THE ANTS / Mr. B.I.G. - 1977

Hello everbloody an' welcome to Friday Night Drive-In, here at The Dungeon! Get ready for Mr. BIG's weird tale of EMPIRE OF THE ANTS, a variation of FOOD OF THE GODS which stars Joan Collins and Robert Lansing. Joan was in TALES THAT WITNESS MADNESS and was 'The Siren' on the BATMAN TV series. Robert was the 4-D MAN and was 'Gary 7' in the STAR TREK TV series.

The storyline for tonight's flick goes like this... "Sleazy scam artist Joan Collins tries to sell phony real estate deals down in the Florida everglades. What she and her unsuspecting buyers don't know is the area has been taken over by giant ants!"

This is the ant, better treat it with some respect!! That's r-e-s-p... e-c-t!

What?.. Man treat anything with respect? You're out of yer freakin' mind!!

The music is by Dana Kaproff, and I believe his very first appearance, here at The Dungeon! Mr. Kaproff gets most of his composing credits for TV, a few things he worked on are THE BIONIC WOMAN, THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, FALCON CREST, CAGNEY & LACEY and MATLOCK.

Awrat then, time to bring in our lil' Dungeon helper and furry 6-eyed freek, Ralphie The Tarantula, since the atomic clock on the wall sez it's time 2 B pushin' that big red 'GO' button over there, which starts our Eariffic Earclip for... EMPIRE OF THE ANTS!

Oopise! Now, how'd that happen?.. It was supposed to sink!

You gotta admit, it looks delicious!

Okay, now that everbloody's drunk on their ass, time to board the tram and go sell some real estate! Wheeeee... hic!

This is what a giant ant sees right before it gets you!!

It's scenes like this where Bert totally blows it! The boat and dock are not even on the same plane besides those fakey looking ants!

You'd think that an outhouse would be off limits for those critters, but noooooo!

Wait, where'd the hot chicks go?..

Exit... Stage left!!

YAH.. HOO.. HOO.. HOOEY!!!

Check out dude's helping hand!

Here's where all the fun takes place!

Hold on now, you're gonna hafta show me your tickets!

Oh man, that's a real gasser!..

Sometimes, Antie's in the mood for a threesome!

Yeah, that guy tried to crowd...

Joan finds out that sex with a giant ant ain't half bad!

Hey!.. What'd I just tell you about cutting in line?!!..

Huh, I wundur whut happins if'fin I do this here?

You can pee later!.. RUN!!!

There wuz nutin' left 'cept a big old pile-o toasted crispy critters!..

Ghoulnight Everbloody!!