Lo strangolatore di Vienna (1971)

...aka: Mad Butcher, The
...aka: Mad Butcher of Vienna, The
...aka: Meat Is Meat
...aka: Strangler of Vienna, The
...aka: Vienna Strangler, The
...aka: Würger kommt auf leisen Socken, Der

Directed by:
Guido Zurli

Otto Lehman (Victor Buono), the self-proclaimed "best butcher in Vienna," has just been released from a lunatic asylum and into the care of his unloving wife Hannah (Karin Field), who can't wait to start nagging him about being overweight and fretting over what the neighbors will think of him being institutionalized for three years, amongst other things. Otto immediately returns to his butcher shop, shoos away his incompetent brother-in-law Karl ("Carl Stearns" / Luca Sportelli) and gets back to work, taking a break every once in awhile to take a gander at his sexy neighbor Berta Hensel (Franca Poleselli), who likes to strip at her window every night. Some neighborhood cats get on his nerves with their constant wailing, so he kills one with a wine bottle. His shrill wife doesn't let up on him either, so he snaps again, breaks her neck, puts her through his trusty industrial-sized grinder and makes sausages out of it. To his surprise, the new human meat product become an instant hit with customers and he has lines around the block, which means he now has an ideal way to dispose of any person who gets on his nerves.

Across town, bored reporter Mike Lawrence (Brad Harris) is so bored that he finds a news story in another town about a 15 year old boy raping an 80 year old woman to be "beautiful." He begins dating Berta, while getting on the nerves of an incompetent local police inspector (Dario Michaelis) investigating the disappearances of several local women, including a prostitute named Frieda (Hansi Linder) that Karl brings home one night. Otto gets fed up with Karl, kills him and then invites Berta to spend the night after her landlord throws her out. Can Mike come to the rescue before his new girl is turned into a sausage link?

This Italian/West German co-production aspires to be an outrageous and quirky black comedy but it misfires in the worst way possible. The movie is short on story as it is, but the filmmakers do absolutely nothing clever to help spice up an already simplistic scenario. The script, courtesy of producers Dag Molin and "Robert H. Oliver" / Dick Randall, is, in a word, terrible. There's not a single good one-liner or visual gag at any point in the film, it's not ambitious enough to bother finding something to actually satirize and it's not even up to the task of being in such bad taste that the premise can be worked for sick humor. We not only have a film that's not the least bit funny, but one that also fails at being horrific, with the few horror elements very restrained (off-screen, bloodless kills and 'light' music plays during them) throughout. The only thing it really has to offer are a few pairs of bare breasts and that's certainly no reason to sit through it.

Mr. Buono (who does what he can here under the circumstances) was one of Hollywood's most unique and wonderful character actors while he was around, but it's a shame to see him being wasted here on substandard material. If you want to see him utilized to his full potential, check out What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) or the underrated sleeper THE STRANGLER (1964). And if you want to see a dark comedy involving cannibalism done the right way, check out Eating Raoul (1982) or Delicatessen (1991).

The Something Weird DVD release, which retains the original U.S. theatrical release title The Mad Butcher for the packaging though Meat Is Meat is the actual on-screen title, is a surprisingly sharp, colorful, good-looking print of the film. Aside from Buono and Harris (whose real voices are used), the cast have been English-dubbed.

★1/2

Asylum of Satan (1972)

... aka: Satan Spectrum, The

Directed by:
William Girdler

Bill Girdler's dubious debut (originally titled The Satan Spectrum) was shot on 16mm on a budget of just 50,000 dollars in his usual stomping grounds of Louisville, Kentucky. Attractive pianist Lucina Martin (Carla Borelli) checks into an ordinary county hospital for fatigue but wakes up in a nuthouse called Pleasant Hill Hospital where she's told she's had a breakdown. Lucina's first introduced to the "butch" head nurse Martine, who speaks in a thick dubbed German accent and is obviously played by a man in drag! It isn't long before Lucina realizes she's being held there against her will. The doors and windows are locked, most of the wheelchair-bound patients are dressed in hooded white robes and hospital director Jason Specter (Charles Kissinger) refuses to let her leave or speak to her primary care physician. He also sends away Lucina's fiance Chris (Nick Jolley) when he shows up there looking for her. Good thing Lucina has Martine's loving touch to fall back on as she gently scrubs her back during a touching bath time interlude while someone spies on them through a peephole.

Chris goes to visit Lucina's real doctor, who claims his patient's father signed her release and that Dr. Specter is at least eighty years old. Knowing his future bride's father passed away when she was a child and couldn't have authorized a transfer and that Dr. Specter isn't anywhere near the age he's supposed to be, Chris suspects foul play and enlists the aid of copper Lt. Tom Walsh (Louis Bandy) to find out what's going on. Meanwhile, some of the patients at the asylum are being killed off. A woman in a wheelchair is pushed into a room, smoke pours from a vent and rubber bugs (I think they're supposed to be tarantulas) crawl all over her. Some of the hooded inmates burn a guy to death with torches and a blind girl (Sherry Steiner) is ambushed by snakes while taking a dip in the indoor pool. In case you haven't figured it all out already, the doctor, staff and some of the patients at Pleasant Hill are actually devil-worshippers sacrificing people to the almighty dark lord down below, who makes an eleventh hour cameo appearance here looking a paper mache creation designed by a 3rd grader.

Combining Satanism with loony bin antics is potentially a fun idea, but this is a poorly done movie regardless of the meager budget. It's badly written, badly directed, badly acted and badly lit and photographed. I also decided against giving it a "SBIG" merit badge. Despite a few cheap chuckles and moments of redeeming weirdness, most of the time it's just dull. I kept checking the clock to see when the 78 minutes were going to be up and the drawn-out finale seems like it lasts for an eternity. There are a couple of twists; one of which is completely predictable while the other is downright stupid. Though Kissinger has a few good moments, most of the rest of the cast is overwrought and annoying. But I guess I'll give Schupp and Snyder, Inc. a shout-out for their fabulous 70's fashions, including a stunning turtleneck with plaid bell bottoms ensemble.

Mimi Honce (Scalpel) and James Pickett (who also did the special effects and starred in Girdler's THREE ON A MEATHOOK next, along with Kissinger and Steiner) co-star. It was filmed in 1971 but not released until four years later. The DVD from Something Weird pairs it with the equally-awful (but much funnier and more interesting) SATAN'S CHILDREN (1973) and the utterly worthless short subject THE SOUL SNATCHER (1965).

★1/2

Gargoyles (1972) (TV)

Directed by:

B.W.L. Norton

Author, university professor and anthropologist Dr. Mercer Boley (Cornel Wilde), who specializes in demonology and the occult, and his daughter Diana (Jennifer Salt), take a station wagon trip across the desert. During a stop at Uncle Willie's Desert Museum in "Devil's Crossing," they learn from Uncle Willie himself (Woody Chambliss) about an Indian legend and then shows them a horned, winged inhuman-looking skeleton that he's found nearby. Dr. Boley is skeptical at first, but after something (or more specifically, some things) start attacking Willie's shed and punctures the roof with its claws, his doubt quickly vanishes. Willie is knocked out, burns up in a fire and Mercer and Diana flee with a skull of one of the creatures to an out-of-the-way hotel run by drunken, lonely old Mrs. Parks (Grayson Hall, who'd just wrapped her final season of the vampire soap Dark Shadows a year earlier). After unsuccessfully trying to warn the police, the gargoyles flip a car over, get their claws on Diana and retreat to their cave dwelling, while Dr. Boley tries to organize a posse to help locate her. Eventually everyone discovers that the evil creatures have been patiently waiting for 500 years for their opportunity to claim possession of the Earth.

This is one of several '70s tele-films that's semi-famous for scaring the bejesus out of countless children when it first debuted on ABC TV. So how well has does it hold up after all these years and for those of us who aren't looking at it through nostalgic rose-tinted glasses? Actually, not too bad. I enjoyed it for the most part. It moves along briskly, is well made and entertaining. The Emmy-winning lizard-like gargoyle designs and makeup (contributed by Del Armstrong, Ellis Burman and Stan Winston) are still wonderful creations. I must admit that I preferred the first half of the movie when things were a bit more obscured. Toward the end more fantasy-oriented things begin... Such as a couple of the gargoyles that start talking... In English... With bizarre, electronically-altered voices. I guess that was necessary to give them their motive, but it sucks the creep factor right out of the film. I could ask other questions, such as "Why would a winged monster need to ride a horse?" or "Why are the gargoyle eggs (yes, "gargoyle eggs") three times the size of a grown gargoyle?" but I guess it's not really all that important.

The cast includes Bernie Casey (who's excellent) as the lead gargoyle and a young Scott Glenn as a motorcyclist. Richard Moll is supposedly in there somewhere too but I don't recall seeing him. Perhaps, he plays one of the monsters? Unlike many other TV movies from its era, this title is very easy to find. There were several video releases, a laserdisc release and a 2000 DVD release from VCI Home Video (an excellent quality print).

★★1/2

Frankenstein - 1970 (1958)

...aka: Frankenstein 1960
...aka: Frankenstein 1975

Directed by:
Howard W. Koch

You can almost imagine the creators of this one sitting in an office successfully pitching their product to backers. For starters, Hammer's THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN and American International's (I WAS A) TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN were both big hits the previous year. Secondly, there's the novelty of having Boris Karloff, most associated with his role as "The Monster" in the classic Universal series of course, being able to tackle the mad doctor role for the very first time in a contemporary setting. Throw in some atomic age mumbo jumbo (very on-trend in the 50s) and some then-high tech lab sets located in catacombs beneath a Gothic castle and you've got a fairly clever premise that blends the old with the new. While the results are far from spectacular, this also isn't the complete washout I've seen it written off as either.

To celebrate the 230th anniversary of the writing of Mary Shelley's book, a small crew travels to Germany to film the pilot for a proposed TV series. They chose Castle Frankenstein as their shooting location and even tap sinister, facially-scarred Baron Victor Frankenstein (Karloff), the weary last descendant of the legendary family, to be one of the show's stars. Little do they know, but Victor's actually splicing together his own hulking monster in his lab... and he needs fresh body parts! When his kindly servant Shuter (Norbert Schiller) discovers what the mad doc is up to, he's hypotised, murdered and has his organs removed and transplanted into the creature. Instead of utilizing lightning (hey, this is 1958!), Victor sticks it in his "atomic steam generator" and is able to bring the monster (which is bandaged from head to toe) to life. The only catch is that it still needs a pair eyeballs...

The list of proposed organ donors includes film director Douglas Rowe (Don 'Red' Barry), starlet Carolyn Hayes (Jana Lund), script girl Judy Stevens (Charlotte Austin), publicist Mike Shaw (Tom Duggan), cameraman Morgan Haley (John Dennis) and even Victor's own friend and colleague Wilhelm Gottfried (Rudolph Anders). Karloff gets plenty of screen time here; some call his performance campy, and perhaps it is, but he's still a lot of fun to watch here. Still, we have to deal with the uninteresting love lives of the side characters. The director has the hots for his lead actress, but she's not interested, and the publicist is in love with the script girl, but she's the director's ex-wife and still carries a torch for him, etc. Though Karloff completely dominates the proceedings, Austin (who starred in the Ed Wood-scripted THE BRIDE AND THE BEAST the very same year) is the only one who manages to stand out amongst the supporting cast.

The sets are quite good (especially considering the 110K budget) and it was shot in Cinemascope, but the film suffers a lot from pacing problems and drags in the middle after a very promising and amusing opening twenty minutes. We also never get a look at the square-headed monster (played by Mike Lane) as it's covered from head to toe in bandages the entire time. In fact, the French release title of this translates to FRANKENSTEIN VS. THE INVISIBLE MAN!

It was released on VHS in 1997 by Warner Home Video (a pan/scan presentation) but wouldn't make its way to DVD until October of 2009 on the box set "Karloff & Lugosi Horror Classics," which is also distributed by Warner. The other titles on the set are THE WALKING DEAD (1936), YOU'LL FIND OUT (1940) and ZOMBIES ON BROADWAY (1945).

★★

Alien degli abissi (1989)

...aka: Alien: Creature from the Abyss
...aka: Alien: La creature des abysses
...aka: Alien from the Deep

Directed by:
Antonio Margheriti

Science professor/reporter Jane ("Julia McKay"/ Marina Guilia Cavalli) and her cameraman Lee (Robert Marius), both of whom work for Greenpeace, travel to a remote, barely-populated island to investigate claims of illegal toxic waste dumping. They sneak into E Chem; a large, heavily-guarded geothermal plant, catch them throwing barrels of waste into an active volcano and take video evidence. As they're leaving, security camera catch them snooping around. Gruff Colonel Kovacs (Charles Napier, doing that hard-ass, jaw-clenching bad guy routine we love him for), the guy who runs E Chem, sends out some guards to capture them. Lee is smart enough to hide the tape before being apprehended. Jane, on the other hand, stows away on a helicopter, manages to leap out into a lake and is then pursued by the guards through the jungle. Jane is lucky enough to bump into brainy-looking, tobacco-chewing "snake hunter" Bob (Daniel Bosch), who's there on the island to acquire snake venom to see to a pharmaceutical company. With his help, Jane manages to get to safety, at least temporarily. She still plans on sneaking back over to E Chem to rescue Lee and locate the hidden video. We are now over 50 minutes into this movie and only one question remains: "Where in the hell is that alien?"

Rest assured, it does finally show up. At first we get mere glimpses of the beast's giant claw as it reaches out and kills people. The monster burrows through the ground and also seems to have either acidic blood or toxic blood that's been effected by the dumped waste. In other words, getting the green blood-gunk on you is bad news as it melts away your flesh. Several characters refer to it as an alien here. What I don't get is why they even bothered having it be an alien in the first place. They've already spent so much time with the chemical dumping plot, so why not just make it a mutant creature spawned from toxic waste? Oh well, I guess "Mutant Metal Crustacion from the Deep" just doesn't have that special ring to it. Well actually, I like the ring of that better, but it probably wouldn't have the same ability to rope in fans of ALIEN (1979) and ALIENS (1986). Speaking of ALIENS, the finale here is almost an exact carbon copy of its finale. The James Cameron film featured a tank top clad Sigourney Weaver using one of those yellow loading dock contraptions to push the alien out of a time lock into space, while this one features a tank top clad heroine using a yellow bulldozer to push the alien into a volcano. So much for originality.

You will need some patience to make it through this one. It's slow moving, the dialogue is pretty cheesy ("Don't come on to me, you snake squeezer!") and many of actors are poorly dubbed, but patience is rewarded with one of the most bizarre-looking monsters ever created. The best way to describe it by calling it an upright scrap metal crab. It's black, oily, skinny and very tall... and its claws are bigger than its body! The fact that someone actually designed this huge thing full scale is also pretty great and makes me resent CG effects more than I already do. There's a decent amount of violence (including a face being ripped off) and jungle action (including a scene where three guys are killed by leaping cobras in a cave), quite a few explosions and some decent miniature model work of the plant being destroyed. Technically, it's a well-made, well-budgeted movie, but as a whole it's still a bit too predictable, derivative and routine to have much staying power. Prolific Euro horror regular "Alan Collins" / Luciano Pigozzi has a good-sized role as nuclear physicist Dr. Geoffrey.

There's no R1 DVD release. I don't think it was ever released here in the U.S. on video either. It was one of the last films from Margheriti (billed here under his usual "Anthony M. Dawson" alias), who worked steadily in Italian films from the late 50s until the early 90s (and passed away in 2002). His other genre work (as director) includes HORROR CASTLE (1963), CASTLE OF BLOOD (1964), THE LONG HAIR OF DEATH (1964), WILD WILD PLANET (1966), SNOW DEMONS (1967), SCHOOL GIRL KILLER (1968), SCREAMS IN THE NIGHT (1968), WEB OF THE SPIDER (1970), SEVEN DEATHS IN THE CAT'S EYE (1972), KILLER FISH (1978) and CANNIBAL APOCALYPSE (1980).

★★

Black Castle, The (1952)

Directed by:
Nathan Juran

Adapting the alias "Richard Beckett," Englishmen Sir Ronald Burton (Richard Greene) travels with his faithful servant Romley (Tudor Owen) to a small Austrian village to investigate the recent disappearances of two of his friends who were last seen in the area. He assumes Karl von Bruno (Stephen McNally), a sadistic count who seems to have a stranglehold over the entire village, has something to do with it because of an altercation that occured years earlier in Africa that cost him one of his eyes. Ronald has managed to snag an invitation to a hunting competition taking place on von Bruno's grounds (he's even imported a vicious black leopard in for the occasion) and decides to use the opportunity to search for either his friends (granted they're still alive) or evidence that will implicate the count in murder. What Ronald doesn't plan on is falling in love with his host's mistreated wife Elga (Rita Corday), who was forced into marrying a man who has no problem flaunting his infidelities in front of her. Various complications ensue, castle physician Dr. Meissen (Boris Karloff) becomes an unlikely ally and brutish, mute manservant Gargon (Lon Chaney, Jr.) lurks around in the hallways.

You certainly get your money's worth with this Universal production. Not only is it a well-made, extremely entertaining and nice-looking effort recalling the studio's classic era days, but it's also fast-paced, fairly well-plotted (Jerry Sackheim scripted) and offers up a pinch of just about every single genre under the sun. There's swashbuckling action, an exciting hunting adventure, romantic drama and excellent Gothic castle sets, secret passageways, a pit full of hungry alligators, a torture dungeon, a truly sadistic villain and Karloff and Chaney on hand for us horror fans. Both horror stars do what's asked of them here in their smaller supporting roles, but the film centers primarily around Greene and McNally. Thankfully, both actors are great in their roles. Greene is very charismatic and likable as our hero and McNally (in a role that will likely bring to mind the character of Count Zaroff in THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME) gives a terrific performance as the evil, eyepatch-wearing count. In addition, there are nice supporting turns from Michael Pate and John Hoyt as von Bruno's cronies and novel use is made of a fake death serum; an idea later recycled for the all-star Gothic horror THE BLACK SLEEP (1956).

Director Juran would go on to make the cult horror favorites 20 MILLION MILES TO EARTH (1957), THE BRAIN FROM PLANET AROUS (1957) and ATTACK OF THE 50 FOOT WOMAN (1958), but this is just as noteworthy - if not moreso - than his better-known films. The music score is all stock (including familiar snippets from THE WOLF MAN) and Bud Westmore (whose work adorns over 500 films) did the makeup.

Universal issued an excellent print of the film as part of their "Boris Karloff Collection" set, which also includes the films NIGHT KEY (1937), TOWER OF LONDON (1939), THE CLIMAX (1944) and THE STRANGE DOOR (1951; which was also written by Sackheim).

★★★

Sorcerers, The (1967)

Directed by:
Michael Reeves

Elderly, impoverished professor Dr. Marcus Monserrat (Boris Karloff) promises to painlessly cure stammering, self consciousness, anxiety and other psychological problems through "medical hypnosis." He and his wife/assistant Estelle (Catherine Lacey) run a small clinic out of their own home where they treat patients, but are actually looking for a guinea pig in their mind-control experiments as young antiquity store owner Michael (Ian Ogilvy) soon finds out. While hanging out in a cafe, Michael is approached by Marcus, who promises "an extraordinary evening" if he'll simply follow him home. Michael, who's looking for some excitement and getting a bit bored hanging out in swingin' London clubs with his mechanic best friend Alan (Victor Henry) and sort-of girlfriend Nicole (Elizabeth Ercy), takes him up on the offer, allows the professor to hook him up to a machine, some psychedelic swirls are projected onto his face and now the professor and his wife can control his every action. Not only that, they can also feel exactly what he feels.

Though Marcus wants to immediately share his discovery with the scientific community so it can be used for good, Estelle talks him out of it. She wants vindication for him having been laughed at and discredited by his peers 30 years earlier, which effectively ended his professional career and caused them financial hardship ever since. Estelle first uses their hold over Michael to make him break into a store and steal a fur coat. She then wants to feel the exhilaration of speeding across the country on a motorcycle and the adrenaline rush associated with physical violence. The more she experiences, the more power-mad she becomes. Estelle incapacitates her already frail husband, destroys his equipment and eventually forces Michael to stab his ex-girlfriend (Susan George) to death with a pair of scissors and strangle a pop singer (Dani Sheridan). Michael's chums begin to realize something's not quite right and the cops (led by Ivor Dean) start to close in on him.

.

I'm not quite sure what the "point" of this might be, but the storyline itself is full of subtext that helps to keep things interesting. We have an older couple controlling and living vicariously through a young host; experiencing the thrills and highs of a liberated, carefree youth that they likely never had a chance to experience in their own lifetime. As compromise, any time Michael experiences pain or injury, it's also felt by Marcus and Estelle. We also have the power play between husband and wife. From all indications, Estelle has been a supportive, subservient housewife for many years, always cooking her husband dinner and dilligently assisting him in his experiments. The very moment she gets a little control, she uses her newfound freedom to lash out, get the upper hand on her husband and enact out her own little violent scenarios.

.

Though the film certainly falls short of its true potential, often seems unfocused and spends too much time showcasing lame pop acts at the nightclub (likely to appeal to a younger audience), this still has its merits. Especially noteworthy are the two lead performances; Karloff does a fine job engaging our sympathies, and he's matched every step of the way by Lacey in the showier role as the increasingly unhinged wife.

.

Director Reeves had previously made THE SHE-BEAST (1965), went on to his greatest glory a year after this one with WITCHFINDER GENERAL (1968) and died of an "accidental barbituate overdose" in 1969 right before production was to begin on THE OBLONG BOX (1969), a project that was handed over to director Gordon Hessler. He was just twenty-five years old. Production company Tigon Film Distributors also released CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD (1964), which was co-written by Reeves, who also served as second unit director on the film.

.

Allied Artists handled theatrical distribution here in the U.S., though it's never been officially released here on DVD.

★★1/2