Wednesday, January 12, 2011

STARSHIP INVASIONS - Gil Mellé - "Proceed With The Attack" (1977)

Talk about your wacky!! "Starship Invasions" is about as wild as anything I've seen lately, and it's all once again, courtesy of the man with the best, worst taste around, hows about a 21 Death-Ray salute for Professor Grewbeard??

The fine gentleman who composed the music for "Starship Invasions" was Blue Note jazz musician, film composer, and artist, Gilbert John Mellé, who, in reality, is much bigger than this movie! He played the baritone and tenor sax with his own group, and also with such greats as Zoot Sims, Max Roach and Tal Farlow. As an artist, he designed the covers for record albums by Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk, and Sonny Rollins. He was an early pioneer of electronic music, to which he scored Rod Serling's TV chiller classic "Night Gallery," and he also wrote the scores for "The Andromeda Strain," "The Six Million Dollar Man" and "The Night Stalker," just to mention a few! Gil passed away in 2004, but what a legacy he left behind!

"Starship Invasions" had a budget and a vision, but "Star Wars" had just been released like 5 months earlier, and this thing although very fun to watch, is just pretty silly by comparison. The bar had been raised, and the playing field was anything but level!

Just for starters, they should have fired the pinhead costume designer!

This lucky stiff got to have sex with a good lookin' alien, and they didn't even dissect him or anything!

Normally a guy that can save any movie, Christopher Lee as Captain Rameses just looks as silly as the rest of them! Chris is 6'5" and with that stupid looking hat on, he had to be pushing 7 feet!! Part of the problem is these aliens are telepathic, so the normally eloquent Chris Lee, can only think his lines! What a waste!!

These aliens are so wicked, they even zapped a little boy and his family!

Now her they want to run some more tests on! That makes sense!

I just like this photo, it's pretty neat that they got a picture of the flying saucer with their Polaroid!

You know the story, Chris Lee and his Legion Of The Winged Serpent Brigade(The Men In Black)need to take over Earth because they need a new planet to move their dying civilization to! The twist is there's another laid back and tolerant alien group, called the League Of Races also known as the LOR, living here beneath the waters of The Bermuda Triangle, and their job is to protect the lesser intelligent earthlings!

Captain Rameses and his team come to the underwater base and tell his LOR counterpart that they come in peace!

Captain Rameses is impressed, the LOR are no slackers, they've got hookers to keep them entertained in this lonesome outpost!

They are starting to get the vibe that Captain Rameses and his crew are up to no good, but that's a pretty cool background!!

No more subtleties, now it's time to break out the death rays and take over this joint! In the process, they even fry the robots!!

Oh, No, don't kill the hookers, that's way over the top evil!

Captain Rameses has a little one on one battle with who I think is Sherri Ross as Sagnac! As you would suspect, she loses!!

The Legion Of The Winged Serpent takes complete control of The League Of Races stronghold, and sets this saucer orbiting around earth emitting rays that makes humans kill each other and also commit suicide! Mass carnage breaks out on Earth!

Actually, you can pretty much tell the whole story with just these three magazine covers!!! Renowned UFOlogist Professor Allan Duncan played by "The Man From U.N.C.L.E." Robert Vaughn is brought in to save the world, because he's the only one who knows anything about UFOs! Robert Vaughn will always be my hero, just for being the member of "The Magnificent Seven" who lost his courage!!

One LOR ship escaped, and they too ask for the professor's help, but he wants to bring along his buddy, to help him in case there's any math involved!

One of the LOR's robots wasn't completely destroyed, and comes back to life, and messes up the whole plan, just like that!!!

Two years later, writer and director Ed Hunt, would make a documentary movie entitled "Flying Saucers Are Real!" Imagine that!!

Monday, January 10, 2011

THE MONKEY KING / Shanghai Animation Film Studio - 1965

Welcome everbloody, to Mondo Monday, here at The Dungeon! Our feature tonight is a rare animated film from China about the anarchic Monkey King, Sun Wukong, he spends his days playfully directing millions of monkey children in martial arts training and bouncing around the beautiful Waterfall Forest they inhabit. After being deceptively lured into heaven by the Jade Emperor, the Monkey King then begins dismantling the Emperor's Confucian hierarchies. Using his spontaneous and creative magic, the Monkey King constantly undermines the Jade Emperor and his minions, then he returns to Earth to continue teaching the monkey children how to courageously fight their enemies!

The classic music is by Mr. Ying-Chu Wu, who had a total of 3 composing credits between 1965-87.

Okay then, let's bring in our little Dungeon Helper and pal, Rufus The Gnat. Hey, Rufus got a 3rd place ribbon in a coconut-creme pie eating contest yesterday! Anywho, it's time for him to push the big red 'GO' button over there and start our Eariffic Earclip, so, here's... THE MONKEY KING!

Our hero, Sun Wukong, Monkey King!

Sun is tricked into going to heaven. Dragon Ball has some interesting similarities!

Even getting to heaven is fraught with adventures!

This is Tabonga's favorite opponent of the Monkey King's! He's just plain cool!!

A real adventure wouldn't be complete without an encounter with some beautiful, mystical women, now, would it?

The awesome artwork never quits!

There's even time for some alcohol consumption. The Jade Emperor thinks by getting Sun drunk, he can dispose of him easier, but, it doesn't work.

He finally reaches the Jade Emperor's palace.

He has to go up against a giant stringed instrument that vibrates out lethal sound waves!

Then, he defeats the giant snake!

Monkey King makes it through every situation dealt to him by the Jade Emperor!

Yin and yang play an important part as to why the Monkey King always comes out on top!

Now, where was I before the adventure started?!.. Oh, yeah!!

Let's all give a thank you to Prof. Grewbeard for sending us this great movie to review!

Ghoulnight Everbloody!..

Monster Music

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