Wednesday, August 14, 2013

LA LOUVE SOLITAIRE - Francis Lai - "The Golden Claws Cat-Girl" (1968)

Welcome to Weirdsville Wednesday deep deep down in The Dungeon! Tonight's feature is a fairly obscure little flick outta France that was originally titled "La Louve Solitaire" starring Danièle Gaubert as the Cat-Girl!

The English version was released as "The Golden Claws Of The Cat-Girl," or as you can see here, "The Golden Claws Cat-Girl!" Once again, big kudos to Brian Horrorwitz over at The Trash Palace for providing us with a copy! When you need a fix for weird flix, Brian's the man!

Well, basically "The Golden Claws Cat-Girl" is just a vehicle for the lovely and sexy Danièle Gaubert to strut her stuff, and strut it she does!

The original music in the film was created by Francis (Love Story) Lai in one of his earlier efforts! Francis has worked steadily since the 60's and is still active today! That's quite a chord!

The Cat-Girl is essentially just an acrobatic cat burglar with a penchant for gold and jewels! She also has a very cool car!

She's also got a cool floor in her pad.......

............and a cool hidden safe built into her refrigerator that would make Walter go from White to Green with envy!

The Cat-Girl gets caught and is forced into doing a job for the government with the aid of Michel (Man With The Transplanted Brain) Duchaussoy as Bruno, a talented lip reader! Michel worked steadily until he passed away just last year! As Bruno, it's his job to spy on the bad guys, and by reading their lips from a distance, he'll know when it's safe for the Cat-Girl to swing on a roof top rope and go over and get the goods! It should be a piece of cake, as long as it doesn't rain!

It rains!!!

The bad guys want their stuff back, and hold Cat-Girl hostage with a needle gun!

This shot is just wacky looking!

Bruno tries to save the Cat-Girl, but he gets held hostage too, and when he attempts a daring escape, he gets shot with the needle gun, and does one of the weirdest ballet death dances ever put on film with a leap and a pirouette before landing splat on his face!

Before there were CD's there were cassettes, and before cassettes, there were 8 tracks, and before 8 tracks, there were 4 tracks!

Revenge is sweet!!

Just to prove that life's not fair, cover girl Danièle Gaubert passed away in 1987 at the tender age of 44, another victim of cancer!

Monday, August 12, 2013

CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS / Geneni Film Distributors - 1973

It's Zombified Monster Monday with Tabonga, here at The Dungeon!.. We gots lots of creepy fun with this one, all about casting spells at night in an old graveyard. Ted V. Mikels was executive producer... Boo-Wah, Ya'll!

Eegah!! sent over this soundclip with 'music' by Carl Zittrer from this lil' flick, sooooo, you can push the big red 'GO' button there next to the big bad book of spells, NOW, Ralphie The Tarantula! Here's our audio offering for... CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH DEAD THINGS!

A small band of stage actors go to a graveyard on a remote island in Florida to dig up some corpses for fun, led by their obnoxious director, Alan.

The whole thing was a set up by Alan using other actors to play the corpses, just to scare the crap out of everyone! Multi-talented Alan Ormsby plays Alan, and, besides co-writing the script, he also created the masks and makeup.

The real corpse, Orville, who was removed from the coffin for the laff, is totally disrespected when the guys cast a spell to reanimate him. Then they take him to the dilapidated old place they find to stay at.

Two things, Alan says he can hardly watch himself in this movie because of the twisted little weirdo he plays, also, those pants! I remember those damn things, I think they were made by Levis no less!

Seriously, what a teriffic shot!

The spell actually works, and, one by one, all the corpses start digging their way up to the surface. Guess what?.. They're freakin' hungry!!

Alan's pals are now becoming the victims of the spell and it's time to board the place up just like in NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD.

So, he looks in the big book of spells to see if he can find a solution to the problem, he even burns a few pages in the fireplace, nothing works.

That is one great looking zombie mask there!

Here, Alan and a girl try to make it to the last place in the house to get away from the zombies. He throws the girl to the zombies in order to get away!

So, in the end, Alan gets what's coming to him!

Saturday, August 10, 2013

TOPPER - Hoagy Carmichael - "Old Man Moon" (1936)

Tonight I've got a great Saturday Night Special for you from 1937 called "Topper!" I can't tell you how much I like this film, but it's a lot! It's just that good!!!

In the 50's, "Topper" was turned into one of my favourite TV series, with real life married couple Anne Jeffreys as Marion Kerby and Robert Sterling as George Kerby, and with the always amazing Leo G. Carroll as Cosmo Topper! Of course on the TV show, you had the added bonus of Neil the ghost St Bernard who died with the Kerbys! How could you not like a big lovable ghost dog?

This original version stars Constance Bennett and Cary Grant as the rich and fun loving couple Marion and George Kerby! As evidenced here as George drives with his feet, the Kerbys are one of the funnest pair of party monsters you're ever going to come in contact with!

George and Marion are out for another one of their nights on the town, and the hi-jinks never stop!

The Kerbys go non-stop from one club to another with each club having a different theme, but the music is the same song over and over just done in a number of different styles! The song in question is titled "Old Man Moon" and was written by the incomparable Hoagy Carmichael, who among his many accomplishments wrote the haunting "Georgia On My Mind!" Yeah!

Still my favourite is the club where the entrance is a slide! Are there any clubs in the whole world that still utilize this concept, if not, I want to know why!

Hoagy Carmichael himself plays the piano player in the last club the Kerbys go to, and sing their own drunken version of his tune as they close the whole town down!

This is where the story really starts, driving home, the Kerbys have a fatal crash!

But since this is a comedy, it's not a really horrible thing! They come back as fully interactive ghosts, and now the fun just really begins!

The over the top fantastic Kerby car was in reality a one of a kind modified 1936 Buick Roadmaster! In 1939 it was sold to the Gilmore Oil Company, re-modified and re-painted to promote "Red Lion" gasoline! In 2006, it was sold again for $132,000.00!!!

The Kerbys come back to haunt the super straight and severely henpecked Cosmo Topper. They only know Cosmo because he's the President of the bank that the Kerbys are major stockholders in! It seems the Kerbys are in a sort of Purgatory because they've never done any good deeds in their life, so they've chosen Topper as a likely candidate since he's so square! Cosmo Topper is played by Roland Young. His first role was in the 1922 film "Sherlock Holmes" as Dr. Watson! Roland would reprise the Topper role in "Topper Takes A Trip," and "Topper Returns!"

Before he met the Kerbys, Cosmo had never had a drink in his life, but all that is about to change! In case you're wondering, the Kerbys can morph back and forth from ghost to solid, but they can only remain solid for a limited amount of time before it uses up all their ectomorph energy!

Cosmo's wife is beside herself with the embarrassment her husband is bringing to the stoic Topper name! The local socialite ladies have a different opinion and are more than happy to meet the wife of the newest wild man about town! Mrs. Topper was played by Billie Burke! Billie was also Glinda in "The Wizard Of Oz"!

In a wild and sexy scene, a completely nude Marion Kerby takes a shower!

Marion, and now Topper's drink of choice was the once very stylish, but not that popular any more Pink Lady! I think it's time for a revival! The Pink Lady was made of gin, grenadine, and a bit of egg white that gave it a frothy meringue like head! In the 1930's, it was the choice of socialites everywhere!  I'll be trying it out some time soon, you can bet on that!

An outstanding reprise of  "Old Man Moon" is performed by the vocal quartet "Three Hits and a Miss!"

Before we go, we have to have at least one more look at that beautiful car! It's almost sacrilegious what they did to it later, except for the fin in the back, it's almost unrecognizable today!

Anybody that loves old movies and hasn't seen this classic has a real thrill in store for them. If I was you, I'd go out of my way to find a copy, and it won't be too difficult because there are copies available on Amazon for a couple of bucks, so give yourself a cheap treat, and tell 'em Eegah!! sent you!

Monster Music

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