THE MONSTER CLUB - "Happy Halloween" (1981)

 Well, tonight's Saturday Night Special wraps up my Countdown To Halloween 2017, and it's a good one! Thanx again to John Rozum for organizing this whole thing one more year, and all the contributors new and olde!

 Tonight's special Halloween presentation is a curious movie made in 1981 that should be the go to Halloween movie because it's got it all! It's called "The Monster Club," and it not only has an all-star cast, it also has an all-star cast of musical performers! How in the Hell can it get much better than that??

 All three members of this power trio were still going strong in 1981 thank goodness!

"The Monster Club" is a movie that there is so much going on story wise and music wise that it's just too much for this format! It's a trilogy of terror with rockin' fun horror based music interspersed in between the story segments! In other words, it's almost freakin' prefect!

Vincent Price is an olde vampire that, after just taking a neck-sip wants  his almost-victim John Carradine to join him in a members only place called "The Monster Club!"

"The Monster Club" is literally a jumpin' place! They serve up terrific Bloody Marys using real blood, but they substitute tomato juice in John's drink since he's human!

 Vincent explains to John the whole lineage of monsterology! Even I, before watching this had never thought about how Werewolves, Vampires, and Ghouls are all related, and all the cross species you never even normally hear about, like shadmocks, and humghouls!

 Random shots of evil! I know, I have a split face calico cat in my face every morning at 5:00 AM!

 I am a sucker for long hall/path shots, and I just never ever get tired of this perspective!

 One of the stories is about a monster guy who is quasi-normal some of the time, but if you upset him, and he starts whistling, this is what can happen to you! 

 B.A. Roberstson performs "I'm A Sucker For Your Love!"
 Slurp, Slurp!! 
It just doesn't get much better than this!
TURN IT UP!!

The always beautiful Britt Ekland is the vampire's wife in one story!

This is the front door of the vampire's house! Other than that, they're just a normal family with a Father that works nights!

This trio are the notorious vampire killers! That's Donald Pleasence in the middle!

The band called Night with Stevie Lange on vocals, rocks the house down with a song called......

..... "The Stripper!" 

 Drop dead goregous Suzanna Willis takes it ALL off!!

And you can watch the show for free right HERE!  

I guess there's no soundtrack CD available, which is too bad because the music is killer throughout! The Pretty Things, and The Viewers also perform, and the solid background music is provided by UB40!

Way back in 1981, and these creatures still look more gruesome than current members of the walking dead. I think it's the smiles! These things are having way too much fun!!

As always, Stuart Whitman puts in a fine performance, this time as a movie maker looking for a quaint village location he can exploit! Stuart's going to be 90 this coming February, and we wish him well!

As a human, John Carradine questions why he is invited to be a member of a monster club, so Vincent the vampire in a nice monologue enlightens him to the fact that humans are the biggest monsters of all, and are single-handedly responsible for more death, mayhem and malice than all types of monsters combined! No vampires, ghouls or werewolves have ever created an atomic bomb etc, and you know what? He's right!!

Come on back on Monday when Tabonga will bring you our last Countdown to Halloween feature of the year!

~ HAMMER FIFTIES SCI-FI MOVIES ~

Here's a cool post featuring Hammer's sci-fi movies from the fifties, although there are only five of them, they pack a wallop of bizarro thrills to never be forgotten!..

First up is FOUR SIDED TRIANGLE from 1953, it's about a couple who are helped by their friend to develop a "reproducer" machine which can exactly duplicate any object, including the girl of two men's dreams. What the Hell could go wrong?! Terence Fisher wrote the screenplay.

Also in 1953, Hammer releases their first space opera, SPACEWAYS. I used to watch this boring flick on TV in the fifties, but, the rubber space monster never showed up!! Terence Fisher directs this one. Love those space helmets!!

Then in 1955, Hammer ratchets up the horror with THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT, a space infection enters the body of Victor Carroon and the creep show begins!! Val Guest directs.

In 1956, Hammer brings in master writer, and my favorite, Jimmy (THE CRAWLING EYE) Sangster to pen this brutal fright fest!! Hammer came under much condemnation for this unbelievable horror tale. I mean, like, they even kill off a young boy!!!

Last on the list is QUATERMASS 2, luckily, I got to see this one when it came out in 1957. Loved the crap out of it, blobs intrigue me big time. For the rest of the fifties though, Hammer concentrated on horror films with vampires and Frankenstein monsters... Tune in tomorrow and Monday for our last Halloween Countdown posts, I've been saving a very special movie for our last submission!!

LA DAMA ROSSA UCCIDE SETTE VOLTE - "The Red Queen Kills Seven Times" (1972)

Hey! Welcome to my last Wednesday of the Countdown to Halloween! I thought I had a good one for you, but this movie isn't near as Halloweenie as I thought it was going to be!

But......It is what it is!

The title is "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte," and the literal translation is "The Red Queen Kills Seven Times!" If you want to get really confused, it was also released as "Horror House," "Blood Feast," "Feast Of Flesh," and "The Corpse Which Didn't Want To Die!" For the record, most of those titles have nothing to do with the actual movie!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" can be quite opulent at times!

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the main ingredient in most Italian Giallos is the colour red, blood red!

I show you this still for two reasons, 1972 stereo, and 1972 phone!

Here's our decennial shout out to all you Vespa lovers!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" goes from high fashion to.........

.......Super low fashion!!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is worth a watch just for arty interiors and fashion like this! 1972 only happened once, and it was different!

"La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is chock full of beautiful women like Pia Giancaro of "The Evil Eye," and "Curse Of The Butterfly" fame!

But don't forget, it is a bloody murder mystery!

As what can only be considered the ultimate insult, the maniac not only kills this gal, she also steals her bug!

How about those glasses? Wow!

And what about this cat's pad? Ever seen anything like that before?

Don't forget that despite all the fashion, "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is a grisly and garish slasher film!

Here she comes again now now!

The real title says it all, and indeed, the Queen does commit seven murders, but whether she's really the Red Queen or not is a different story!

Pretty good nightmare visit from the Red Queen!

We don't usually show much nudity, but it's hard to get a shot of Sybil (Naughty Nymphs) Danning with her clothes on, and besides, everybody's seen her naked at least once anyway!

The elegant Marina (Seven Blood-Stained Orchids, All The Colors Of The Dark) Malfatti just passed away last year at the age of 83!

 The last and main beauty in the cast was Barbara Bouchet who is still working today! Thank goodness for small miracles! She might not be a household name, but besides an array of Giallo flicks, Barbara was in "In Harm's Way," and "Agent For H.A.R.M.!!" She was Moneypenny in "Casino Royale," she was in a "Star Trek," and a "Man From U.N.C.L.E." episode. She was in "Don't Torture A Duckling," "Duck In Orange Sauce," and "Death Rage!"

 But when it's all said and done, personally, I think the weirdest thing about "La Dama Rossa Uccide Sette Volte" is that the killer Red Queen is named Evelyn, and she has essentially come back from the grave, and that Director Emilio Miraglia's previous movie before this was called "The Night Evelyn Came Out Of The Grave!"

Despite all the thrashing and slashing, I'm thinking Emilio was having a pretty good laugh on us all!