Film Review: The Last Man on Earth (1964)

Also known as: I Am Legend, The Naked Terror (working titles), The Damned Walk at Midnight (alternative title)
Release Date: May 6th, 1964
Directed by: Sidney Salkow, Ubaldo B. Ragona
Written by: Logan Swanson, William F. Leicester, Furio M. Monetti, Ubaldo B. Ragona
Based on: I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Music by: Paul Sawtell, Bert Shefter
Cast: Vincent Price, Franca Bettoia, Emma Danieli, Giacomo Rossi Stuart

Associated Producers (API), Produzioni La Regina, 86 Minutes

Review:

“Another day to live through. Better get started.” – Robert Morgan

When I was a kid, this was a movie that bored me to tears. I didn’t revisit it again for decades because I thought it was so drab and slow. However, I wanted to give it a fair shot and this time around, I liked it a lot. 

I guess my memories of it weren’t all that accurate either, as I just remembered the scenes of Vincent Price driving around with bodies everywhere and then spending all his time reinforcing his house and lying around on the couch as zombie vampires called his name from outside. All these things do happen, however there is much more to the picture.

We do get flashbacks to the time before the virus completely wrecked the planet. We see Price as a scientist who has a hard time believing what’s happening because it’s… well, so unbelievable. After spending so much time with Price alone, these flashback scenes are a welcome sight, as we get to see him interact with human beings again. All the slow, monotonous stuff served a real purpose with the narrative and tone of the film. Like Price, you yearn for more humans and when you get them, you feel that emotional effect.

Apparently, this film was supposed to be produced and shot by Hammer Films. For whatever reason, that didn’t happen and production moved to an Italian company. They were able to lock down Vincent Price and frankly, despite my poor taste as a kid, the end result is something incredibly worthwhile.

This film also features one of Price’s best performances, which is very reserved and somber. Price acts very much in contrast to what most people remember him for, which was his flamboyant and energetic characters. Seeing Price play his role this way, also adds to the emotional effect of the picture. I’ve seen enough of Price to understand his range and this wasn’t the first or last time he played a softer, more subdued character, but this story might make it his best version of that.

The Last Man On Earth is a film that most horror historians look at really fondly. I had a bad take on it for years and I’m glad that I decided to give it a chance. After seeing it now, I feel like maybe I never finished it, as a kid, as all I remembered from it was the stuff that happened in the first act.

I certainly didn’t remember the ending, which is quite impactful.

Rating: 8.5/10
Pairs well with: early zombie films, as well as other films based off of this story like The Omega Man and I Am Legend.

Film Review: Nightmare (1964)

Also known as: Here’s the Knife, Dear: Now Use It (alternative title), Satan with Long Lashes (Germany)
Release Date: February 28th, 1964 (Germany)
Directed by: Freddie Francis
Written by: Jimmy Sangster
Music by: Don Banks
Cast: David Knight, Moira Redmond, Brenda Bruce, Jennie Linden

Hammer Films, 83 Minutes

Review:

“You found me out there, didn’t you? That part of it wasn’t a dream! Where does the dream finish and reality begin?” – Janet

This movie is a bit of departure in style from what one would expect from Hammer Films in the mid-’60s.

To start, it’s in black and white. Secondly, it doesn’t really star anyone of note or any of the regular faces that you’d see in a Hammer production during their peak.

However, this is written by Jimmy Sangster, who penned a lot of Hammer’s best scripts. It’s also directed by Hammer regular Freddie Francis. So there was at least a solid crew behind the camera.

Still, this isn’t quite what one would expect from a Hammer picture and that probably has a lot to do with why I hadn’t watched it until now. It’s not a bad film, by any means, but it’s unique and strange.

I found it mostly enjoyable, even if it wasn’t as fantastical and visually alluring as the studio’s typical output. This felt much more like a low budget indie horror movie of the ’60s and tonally, reminded me a lot of the black and white Roger Corman productions of the time, as well as Francis Ford Coppola’s Dementia 13.

The story is about a young boarding school student that has nightmares of her institutionalized mother haunting her. Because of her horrible dreams, the girl is expelled from school and sent back home. Once there, things get even worse.

While it’s an interesting enough setup, the story does feel a bit paint-by-numbers. It kind of goes in the direction you’d expect.

I did like the over-the-top acting in some scenes and actually thought that it was really effective, as the main character slipped further and further into madness.

Still, this is far from Hammer’s best and while it’s a neat experiment and departure from their style, it also shows that the studio was at its best when it was sticking to the great style it had already perfected.

Rating: 6/10
Pairs well with: other Hammer horror films of the ’60s.

Film Review: The Best Man (1964)

Also known as: Gore Vidal’s Best Man (complete title)
Release Date: April 5th, 1964 (New York City premiere)
Directed by: Frank J. Schaffner
Written by: Gore Vidal
Music by: Mort Lindsey
Cast: Henry Fonda, Cliff Robertson, Edie Adams, Margaret Leighton, Shelley Berman, Lee Tracy, Ann Sothern, Gore Vidal (cameo, uncredited)

Millar/Turman Productions, United Artists, 102 Minutes

Review:

“Y’know, it’s not that I object to your being a bastard, don’t get me wrong there. It’s your being such a stupid bastard that I object to.” – President Art Hockstader

Today is Election Day, so I wanted to watch a film about the subject. Yesterday, I reviewed 2011’s George Clooney directed The Ides of March and was fairly disappointed by it. This film, written by the legendary Gore Vidal, was at least a better experience.

One big selling point on me choosing this film to watch was due to it coming out in ’64, a year that featured one of the most interesting presidential races of all-time and because it starred two greats: Henry Fonda and Cliff Robertson. Plus, I’ve never seen this and have been meaning to check it out for years.

While I can’t call this an impressive film, as I did anticipate it to be really good, it’s still engaging and it explores morality at the highest level of American politics in the time that this was made. Frankly, things were nowhere near as bad as they have become nearly sixty years later. But that’s okay, we lived in a politically charged and changing world back then but something about it was more wholesome and honest.

The performances in this movie were top notch but honestly, I was more captivated by the political debates and candidates’ platforms. It’s funny because the core things behind their issues aren’t that different from what we’re dealing with today. Although, in modern times, people are a lot more extreme and there is a widening divide that feels like it could lead to institutional collapse. But let’s not dwell on that.

The Best Man is thought provoking and engaging and it makes me wish that politicians in 2020 were in the game for the right reasons. Obviously, there were opportunists and assholes in 1964 but at least it felt more pure, less divided and both sides appeared as if they wanted to work together in some regard.

If anything, this film just made me yearn for a simpler, more unified time where our differences didn’t tear us apart but instead opened up genuine debate in an effort to make the world better.

Rating: 7/10
Pairs well with: other films about presidential elections.

Film Review: The Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb (1964)

Release Date: October 18th, 1964 (UK)
Directed by: Michael Carreras
Written by: Michael Carreras, Alvin Rakoff
Music by: Carlo Martelli
Cast: Terence Morgan, Fred Clark, Ronald Howard, Jeanne Roland, George Pastell, Michael Ripper

Swallow Productions Ltd., Hammer Films, 78 Minutes

Review:

“We’re all doomed to die for this act of desecration.” – Hashmi Bey

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from this movie despite it being a Hammer film based on a classic monster.

For one, it doesn’t star any premier Hammer regulars. Well, except for Michael Ripper but what wasn’t he in from Hammer?

Additionally, other than the first Mummy film from Hammer, I don’t really remember these that well. I think it’s because they didn’t leave an impression and that they may have just been paint-by-numbers rehashes of the first movie and the many mummy monster movies that pre-date them.

Well, I’m not wrong on that, at least with this one. However, seeing it now, I was still pretty entertained by it and even though I’ve seen this, it was like watching it for the first time.

What I really liked about this one was the story and I also thought that the monster was pretty good, even if the man inside wasn’t Christopher Lee. This mummy was still imposing, intimidating and kind of cool, where mummies are typically a bit boring.

I also loved the final sequence in the film, which saw the mummy go into the sewers with the pretty lady. It’s not the most memorable moment of a Hammer picture or even close to that but it was a nice climax to a pretty fun and enjoyable mummy movie.

Although, this film’s original poster is kind of bizarre as it makes the mummy look like a giant and the woman look like she’s toddler size.

Rating: 6.5/10
Pairs well with: the other Hammer Mummy pictures.

 

Film Review: The Devil-Ship Pirates (1964)

Release Date: May, 1964
Directed by: Don Sharp
Written by: Jimmy Sangster
Music by: Gary Hughes
Cast: Christopher Lee, John Cairney, Barry Warren, Andrew Keir, Philip Latham, Natasha Pyne, Duncan Lamont, Michael Ripper, Suzan Farmer

Hammer Films, Columbia Pictures, 86 Minutes

Review:

“They’re Spaniards! I know their stink!” – Harry

I’ve known about this movie for decades but I’ve never been able to find it streaming anywhere and tracking down a copy of it has been met with difficulty. However, I did notice that it’s streaming for free on YouTube, right now. That probably won’t last long, though.

For those who enjoy the horror movies that were put out by Hammer Films, you might also enjoy their swashbuckling/pirate-centric movies of which, there are only three.

This one stars Hammer legend Christopher Lee as the captain of a Spanish warship that has docked next to a British village following the fleet’s defeat to British forces. The captain and his men, however, convince the village that the Spaniards won the war and were now there to take over the town. As the film rolls on, tensions rise and the villagers start to suspect that the Spaniards are lying.

While this is light on the swashbuckling, it does feature Christopher Lee wielding a sword, which is always a plus. It almost plays like a political thriller with pirate-y and Hammer horror vibes mixed in.

It’s pretty well acted for what it is and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing Lee play this villainous character, which was a good departure from his other Hammer work.

Ultimately, I kind of wish that Hammer would’ve done more films like this. Hopefully, I can find The Pirates of Blood River in the near future, as I’ve always wanted to see that one too.

Rating: 6.5/10
Pairs well with: other swashbuckling/pirate movies by Hammer like Captain Clegg a.k.a. Night Creatures and The Pirates of Blood River. 

Film Review: Crypt of the Vampire (1964)

Also known as: La cripta e l’incubo (original Italian title), Crypt of Horror (UK), Terror In the Crypt (US alternative title)
Release Date: May 27th, 1964 (Italy)
Directed by: Camillo Mastrocinque
Written by: Tonino Valerii, Ernesto Gastaldi
Based on: Carmilla by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
Music by: Carlo Savina
Cast: Christopher Lee, Adriana Ambesi, Pier Anna Quaglia, Freidrich Klauss

E.I. Associates Producers, Hispamer Films, Alta Vista, 82 Minutes

Review:

“It’s so beautiful here. Perhaps nature has purposely set the stage and is waiting for the actors to enter. But who knows if the play is farce … or tragedy. This is a spot where one could come for pleasure … or for death.” – Lyuba

Being that Christopher Lee is one of my favorite actors of all-time, it’s always cool checking out one of his films for the first time. While I’ve seen all the fairly well-known ones and most of his Hammer work, there are those odd ones that have slipped through the cracks over the years. But the guy has close to 300 acting credits to his name, so there are still several of his movies that I haven’t seen.

This one was a low budget production by Italian and Spanish studios that came out during the height of his career, just before he’d make The Devil-Ship Pirates and The Gorgon for Hammer that same year.

Also, this film is an adaptation of Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, which Hammer would also use as source material for their Karnstein trilogy of films, as well as Captain Kronos.

While Lee was no stranger to vampire films, this one provides him with a very different role. It doesn’t push him into another version of a Dracula character and instead, he plays a human count that is concerned that his daughter may be possessed by an evil spirit that brought his lineage trouble in the past.

This film is kind of slow and pretty drab for the most part. However, what it lacks in energy and poor pacing, it makes up for in atmosphere. This is a dark, haunting picture. The surviving prints of this film that have made it online and in spite of being digital, are of pretty mediocre quality. But this actually seems to work for the film, as it appears darker and in a higher contrast than what was probably originally released.

Overall, this picture looks superb, even with the physical elements working against the physical film that they eventually digitized. It’s not an exciting picture, though, but at least Lee gives a solid, convincing performance and the film convincingly manufactures a thick sense of dread and claustrophobia.

Rating: 5.5/10
Pairs well with: other horror films that Christopher Lee starred in apart from Hammer.

Film Review: The Tomb of Ligeia (1964)

Also known as: Edgar Allan Poe’s The Tomb of Ligeia (complete title), House at the End of the World (working title), Tomb of the Cat (Yugoslavia)
Release Date: November, 1964 (London premiere)
Directed by: Roger Corman
Written by: Robert Towne
Based on: Ligeia by Edgar Allan Poe
Music by: Kenneth V. Jones
Cast: Vincent Price, Elizabeth Shepherd, John Westbrook, Oliver Johnston

Alta Vista Productions, Warner-Pathe, Anglo Amalgamated, 81 Minutes

Review:

“Christopher, not ten minutes ago I… I tried to kill a stray cat with a cabbage, and all but made love to the Lady Rowena. I succeeded is squashing the cabbage and badly frightening the lady. If only I could lay open my own brain as easily as I did that vegetable, what rot would be freed from its grey leaves?” – Verden Fell

While this is my least favorite of the Roger Corman and Vincent Price adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe’s work, it is still a movie that I quite enjoy, as Price is as good as always and this had some great sets and location shooting.

It feels like it is the driest and the slowest of the Poe adaptations but I wouldn’t call it boring, as the plot is pretty interesting and not as predictable as you might think, at first.

This also features one of my favorite Price performances. After having done a half dozen or so movies with Corman and in this style, he really hits it out of the park. He’s really likable and tragic and while that fits most of his characters from the Poe adaptations, there is just another layer to it here. He just feels so human and strangely relatable. Granted, I also lost the love of my life at a point and I guess it may speak to me in a way it might not to those who haven’t experienced that sort of loss.

Overall, this feels like a really refined version of the Price-Corman-Poe formula. My only issue is that it feels slower and that it’s too formulaic. Despite Price’s stellar performance, this does feel as if the creatives are sort of just running through the motions.

Still, it deserves its place alongside the other films in this series of pictures.

Rating: 7.25/10
Pairs well with: the other Edgar Allan Poe adaptation done by collaborators Roger Corman and Vincent Price.

Film Review: Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)

Also known as: Mosura tai Gojira (original Japanese title), Godzilla Against Mothra (Japanese English title), Panik in Tokyo (Germany), Godzilla Fights the Giant Moth (Worldwide English title)
Release Date: April 29th, 1964 (Japan)
Directed by: Ishirō Honda
Written by: Shinichi Sekizawa
Music by: Akira Ifukube
Cast: Akira Takarada, Yuriko Hoshi, The Peanuts, Hiroshi Koizumi, Yu Fujiki, Kenji Sahara, Jun Tazaki, Yoshifumi Tajima

Toho Co. Ltd., 89 Minutes

Review:

“I’m not as afraid of Godzilla as I am of the editor… he’s meaner.” – Reporter Jiro Nakamura

While not my favorite Godzilla movie of the Shōwa era, this one still holds a pretty special place in my heart, as it pits Godzilla against Mothra for the first time. Granted, they’d become solid allies after this movie, as Godzilla would evolve into a hero and Earth’s protector once King Ghidorah shows up in the picture following this one.

This is still a fun film that merges the two monsters into the same franchise, this being Godzilla’s fourth movie and Mothra’s second after 1961’s simply titled Mothra.

The story sees one of Mothra’s eggs get taken from Infant Island, the kaiju’s tropical Tiki-esque home, and put on display in Japan. Godzilla shows up, the egg hatches and we get some great kaiju action. In fact, the battles and the effects are some of my favorite in the series, so hats off, once again, to effects maestro Eiji Tsuburaya.

And while I’m mentioning Tsuburaya, his miniatures in this are some of the best he’s done. The vehicles looked and performed superbly.

The film also stars some of Toho’s regular actors from the tokusatsu genre, which I always consider a good thing despite familiar faces appearing multiple times throughout the franchise as different characters. In this one, we get Kenji Sahara, who I always enjoy, and Hiroshi Koizumi.

Mothra vs. Godzilla has a simple story but it works. This is a kaiju movie from the best kaiju studio from the best era in the kaiju genre. It brings together two of the most popular characters in film history and it is pretty much exactly what you would expect it to be while slightly exceeding those expectations.

This doesn’t have much of anything wrong with it and its just enjoyable through and through: a true tokusatsu classic.

Rating: 8.25/10
Pairs well with: other Shōwa era Godzilla movies.

Film Review: Teen-Age Strangler (1964)

Also known as: Terror In the Night (re-release title)
Release Date: 1964
Directed by: Ben Parker
Written by: Clark Davis
Music by: Danny Dean
Cast: Bill Bloom, John Ensign, Jo Canterbury, John Humphreys

Ajay Film Company, American Diversified Services, Original Six, 61 Minutes

Review:

“And he didn’t steal no bike either! I did!” – Mikey Walton

Mystery Science Theater 3000 never ran short of juvenile delinquent movies from the ’50s and ’60s and this picture is just one more to add to the list.

While this is a terrible movie, it’s kind of interesting in that this one is a proto-slasher film. There isn’t any actual slashing but there is a serial killer that is targeting teens and strangling them to death. I guess you could also consider this an American giallo, although it’s devoid of a vibrant color palette and anything resembling actual style.

This only clocks in at 61 minutes but it is still a slog to get through. It lacks excitement is littered with bad acting, questionable directing decisions and it’s a “how to” on how not to light a film.

It has an interesting enough plot though, as it’s about a delinquent kid suspected of the murders, who is actually innocent, but has no alibis to deflect suspicion.

In the end, the killer isn’t even a juvenile delinquent so maybe by 1964, these films were making some social progress and didn’t blame everything on angst-y teens in car/biker culture.

Despite all its flaws, it does have one thing working for it and that’s the light rockabilly score by Danny Dean, who is probably most known for fronting the rockabilly band Danny Dean and The Homewreckers. While that band wasn’t massively successful, Dean was a pretty talented musician for his scene and his contribution in this film, at the very least, gives it a feeling of authenticity.

Sadly, the film itself doesn’t do much to capitalize off of the tunes and mostly cancels out Dean’s work, as everything else is so lackluster that it drowns out the positives.

Rating: 2.25/10
Pairs well with: other juvenile delinquent movies that made it on to MST3K.

Film Review: Two Thousand Maniacs! (1964)

Also known as: Centennial (fake working title), 2000 Maniacs (alternative spelling)
Release Date: March 20th, 1964
Directed by: Herschell Gordon Lewis
Written by: Herschell Gordon Lewis
Music by: Larry Wellington
Cast: William Kerwin, Connie Mason, Jeffrey Allen

Jacqueline Kay, Friedman-Lewis Productions, Box Office Spectaculars, 83 Minutes

Review:

“Has it occurred to you that nobody has told us what this centennial is all about? Now, this is 1965, and a hundred years ago it was 1865, right? So, what happened in 1865?” – Tom White, “It was the ending of Civil War. The war between states!” – Terry Adams, “Well then you tell me why would a southern town want northerners as guests of honor at the centennial. It must has something to do with what happened a hundred years ago. So, something is very wrong with this town.” – Tom White

A year before this film, Herschell Gordon Lewis disgusted audiences with his debut film Blood Feast. That picture was a gore spectacle that paved the way for future gore cinema. It’s become legendary and survived the test of time because of how shocking it was in 1963. But it helped champion in an era of exploitation and grindhouse films that populated seedy theaters and drive-ins for a good decade and a half.

That being said, Blood Feast is a terrible, terrible film. It’s not really good on any level except in how it disgusted people and opened the floodgates for other penniless filmmakers to start pumping out their gore-littered schlock.

But I can’t quite call Herschell Gordon Lewis a bad filmmaker, as the man somehow took his terrible, basic formula, refined it, actually put together an interesting plot and then gave us this film just eight months later.

Two Thousand Maniacs! is not a good motion picture by any stretch of the imagination but it is at least a compelling one that is so bizarre you kind of want to know how the hell this insanity is happening.

The plot focuses on a small town in the middle of Nowheresville, Georgia. The residents of this town are putting up detour signs on the highway to lure in some outsiders. Once they arrive in the town, confused, the outsiders learn that the town is celebrating its Centennial. They feel like things are a bit off but since they’re being treated like prized guests, they soak it up.

However, each person is then killed in extremely violent ways. Two of them do survive and escape in the end but then we learn the batshit crazy truth: the town was a ghost town that was destroyed in the Civil War exactly one hundred years earlier. The town came back to life to get revenge on a half dozen Yankees because why the hell not.

This of course raises a lot of questions like how did these people know how to use telephones, cars and other technology that didn’t exist in their time? Why were they dressed in the finest Southern fashion of the 1960s and not the 1860s? Well, the whole movie is full of things that make you go “huh?” once you know what the big reveal is.

Still, suspending a lot of disbelief, the film works in a lot of ways regardless of all the nonsensical shit, the shoddy direction and the atrocious acting.

I’d be lying if I said that this didn’t lure me in, peak my interest and keep me glued to the screen.

While this has been remade, I’m assuming that one isn’t very good, this is the sort of film that should be remade with a competent director and a script writer that can actually work out some of the kinks and issues this original movie had. I think the concept is neat and that it could be improved upon, which is usually the only way I’ll support the idea of a remake or a reboot.

While several of the gore scenes are over the top and gratuitous, I’d say that this is actually less gory than Blood Feast. The camera cuts away a lot and some of the violence is implied with a finishing shot of a dead body covered in blood and meat. A lot of the shots during these scenes are of the reactions of the townsfolk who are getting off on the carnage.

Ultimately, this is not a good movie. But for gore pictures, it is one of the better ones and it at least has a story that works for what this is.

I’m not sure if Herschell Gordon Lewis actually displayed some directing talent or if he just kind of got lucky. Gorehounds will of course claim that the guy was a genius but I think that he was just a schlockmeister that developed his own unique style.

Rating: 5.25/10
Pairs well with: Herschell Gordon Lewis’ other films.