This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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RedRiver
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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THIS ISLAND EARTH...I don't know. I liked the aliens. They were appropriately weird looking. The exotic sets looked like they were drawn. But that's OK. It lent an unworldly air to it. But the story is kind of slow. Scientific. I understand, from Svengoolie, the movie had some influence on the genre. I didn't know that. I can't say it's one of my favorites.

I should confess that I fell asleep for about twenty minutes. Missed a few things. Perfect. No reception issues this week. And I sleep through it! I did like Svengoolie's parody of "Lookin' Out My Backdoor"!

Anybody know what's up next week?
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Jezebel38
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

Post by Jezebel38 »

RedRiver wrote: Anybody know what's up next week?
May 5th - The Creature From The Black Lagoon

May 12th - Revenge of The Creature
RedRiver
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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Very good. Two movies by the talented Jack Arnold. Not his best work. But anytime a good filmmaker gets a little credit, it does us all a service.
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CineMaven
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

Post by CineMaven »

Gosh darn it. ME TV is NOT part of my cable system ( Optimum ) and this is a disappointment! ( :x ) Especially as I've spent just now reading this entire thread and see some of the great movies of my "Chiller Theatre" youth here in NYC, listed as airing. What a great name Svengoolie is. I've never heard of him, but I'd endure that, and commercials just to have the films playing in the background while I putter around the house. "Frankenstein Meets The Wolfman" "Dracula's Daughter" "The Mummy" and his ghost...hand...and tomb(?) and the etceteras on this channel, including the spectacular:

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[u][color=#0040BF]RED RIVER[/color][/u] wrote:I almost broke a date to watch THE INVISIBLE WOMAN a few weeks ago.
If she wouldn't understand, then that's not the girl for you!

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[u][color=#0040BF]MICHIGAN J[/color][/u] wrote:I think the original Mummy is one of the best horror films. Like many of the other 'monsters' that Karloff played, his Imhotep is deserving of sympathy. Plus the film is quite a love story, tool...
I felt bad for him as well. The movie has one of the greatest lines (IMO) in all of movies: "Call her. He's dragged her back to ancient Egypt. Call her. Her love for you will bridge the centuries." I saw it at The Egyptian at last year's TCM film fest at a midnight show. It was spooky walking down the dark corridor after everyone had gone in. (I was late); and just a little less scary at 1:30 in the morning even though I walked out with a crowd of people. And it was b'cuz of the movie...eighty years later.

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[u][color=#0040BF]MOIRA FINNIE[/color][/u] wrote:I saw a few minutes of The Mummy's Ghost (1944) on Saturday and liked it--especially Universal Pictures idea of a small New England town, complete with crackpots and crones. Who knew that so many "tanna leaves" from an extinct Egyptian plant would turn up in the rural Northeast? How could The Mummy be so deadly and yet so infernally slow?
Good one Moira...'crackpots and crones.' Man! ( :lol: ) Zombies couldn't beat a tortoise. I have friends who live in Worcester & Leominster, Massachusetts and not once did they offer me any of their tanna leaves. I don't get why they're holding out? Why so stingy? We've been friends since high school.

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[u][color=#0040BF]MOIRA FINNIE[/color][/u] wrote:Why was Evelyn Ankers even in this movie? Just to give Ralph Bellamy's slightly pompous but rational law man a romantic partner? Playing Hardwicke's child, there seemed to be no bond between the two--though I have to admit I enjoyed seeing Anker's strangely funny duds around the mansion, (I think she had a bedazzler stashed away) but this one that looked like bear claws on her front and back was my favorite:
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I love Evelyn Ankers, and I love her in this movie. She was the Scream Queen and there's a touch of class and hauteur about her. I totally remember that dress. (Bear claws...ha!!) There's no bond between 'father/daughter' Ankers and Hardwicke b'cuz he was a scientist and probably had her late in life. What would he know to do with a teenage daughter, when he's trying to reactivate life? The scene I always wait for in "The Ghost of Frankenstein" is when Evelyn is cornered by the monster and she tries to run past him to get to the door, and practically runs right into his arms. I bought a lot about monster movies...but even as a little kid, I never could figure out how she thought she was going to get past a seven-foot monster.

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[u][color=#0040BF]MR. ARKADIN[/color][/u] wrote:I'll be interested in what you think of Dracula's Daughter, Moira. It's the best Dracula sequel and in many ways better than the original as Mike says. The polygamy uproar story is interesting, but baffling, since the film pushes plenty of other boundaries (most notably, lesbianism), which somehow slipped past the censors.
Aaaaah, this movie warms the cockles of my heart. I love the dark unblinking and impassive beauty of Gloria Holden. Perfect casting, in my book. In fact, after watching "THE CONSPIRATORS" last nite, I think Gloria showed more emotion as Dracula's Daughter than Hedy Lamarr showed in that whole movie. How not one bit of human emotion flits across the perfection of Lamarr's face confounds me, yet I can still sit and watch her for two hours. But that's another story. "Dracula's Daughter" was not an "A" list film? Ha!!! You could have fooled me. (But you can't fool me about running right into the arms of a monster).

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[u][color=#0040BF]MR. ARKADIN[/color][/u] wrote:A good companion piece might be Blood and Roses (1960), which I consider perhaps the most beautiful vampire movie ever made:
"BLOOD & ROSES" Mr. Arkadin. Yeah...a great cult classic. Love it!

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[u][color=#0040BF]JEZEBEL38[/color][/u] wrote:Why does Irving Pichel look like Mrs Danvers? :P
ROFL!!! Love his black satin shirt and rouged lips. He actually reminds me of Shemp.

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I don't get ME TV. I'll have to be satisfied reading these good posts on this thread. Now, who can ship me some tanna leaves?
"You build my gallows high, baby."

http://www.megramsey.com
RedRiver
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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Thanks, for joining us, Maven! ME TV is practically the only channel I watch. (See THE RIFLEMAN thread in the Westerns forum!) Sitcoms, cop shows. PERRY MASON every night. Sunday Night Noir is too late, even for me. But, Boy, does it have the line-up!

If she wouldn't understand, then that's not the girl for you!

You're right. She wasn't.
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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Oooh. D'oh! More girls out there.
"You build my gallows high, baby."

http://www.megramsey.com
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moira finnie
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

Post by moira finnie »

Svengoolie Lineup for May--some familiar, some off-the-wall choices...

MAY 5
The Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954-Jack Arnold)
Never go sailing with Nestor Paiva, but if you do, don't forget your white one-piece swimsuit.

MAY 12
Revenge of the Creature (1955-Jack Arnold)
John Agar and Lori Nelson take on the guy in the gill suit again.

MAY 19
Horse Feathers (1932-Norman Z. McLeod)
No reason given and no monsters, though maybe you could make a case for Nat Pendleton as one.

MAY 26
The Mummy's Curse (1944-Leslie Goodwins)
The mummy goes down on the bayou. Could this swampy setting be what inspired Lon Chaney Jr.'s later masterpiece, The Alligator People?
Avatar: Frank McHugh (1898-1981)

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RedRiver
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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HORSE FEATHERS? Now I'm really confused! I hope I can watch "Blackie Lagoon" tonight. Not only is there the usual trouble with my signal. We had a thunderstorm last night. The channel went out completely.

ALLIGATOR PEOPLE would be a great choice for Svengoolie. A creepy, silly little B feature!
MikeBSG
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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"Horse Feathers" would seem to be an odd choice for a horror host's show, but I remember that sometimes the Cleveland horror hosts would so "International House" or "Million Dollar Legs." Maybe the hosts were moving away from "horror" toward "zany" and "non-conformist." Or maybe they are all black-and-white movies in the same syndication package.
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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BLACKIE LAGOON! Not one of my favorites. But I enjoyed watching it. This film moves slowly. A lot of things ALMOST happen before they really do. Even in this 79 minute running time, there should be more story. But it's cute and cheezy. Fun to know I'm sharing it with horror fans around the nation. I certainly had no complaints as a child!

There was a clip of Julie Adams promoting the program (probably from a few years ago) and wishing fans well. That was nice. I look forward to BLACKIE'S REVENGE next week!
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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From the deep, dark cavern of horror classics, comes a chilling nightmare you will never forget. It's the terrifying adventure of a lifetime. Don't miss...

HORSE FEATHERS?
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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Now that we're back (and thank you, moderators), I can comment on "The Creature." Another Jack Arnold film, with a fun second act. It's basically KING KONG, as the monster escapes cruel, profit driven captivity and terrorizes the community. That part is a blast. The first half is sluggish, with nothing you haven't seen before.

What came to me suddenly is, I root for this walking fish more than any other film monster. He's tortured! They shock him with an underwater cattle prod. At least, the writers created a "jerk scientist". He had to kill somebody! I wanted him get them all. Agar, Adams, the whole lot of them!

It's great to be back.
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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I agree that "Creature from the Black Lagoon" is basically the Skull Island part of "King Kong." Indeed, it has such a Thirties feel to me that when the scientists talk about space rockets it seems like the filmmakers are saying "We know it's really 1954, we really do!"

"Revenge of the Creature" reminds me of the New York City parts of "King Kong." What strikes me as interesting about this film is that even though the Creature gets loose in the United States, there isn't a sense of "We have to kill this invader." He retains a good deal of sympathy, which is odd for a 50s sci-fi film about a monster loose in the USA. "Twenty Million Miles to Earth" is sympathetic to its monster, but then he is only running amok in Italy.
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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I was watching the Bond Film, Thunderball with the audio commentary on. Among the guest commentators was Ricou Browning. Apparently, after playing the Gill Man he went on to become a director, with a specialization in underwater photography. There's a big action set piece towards the end of the Thunderball -- an epic undersea battle -- and that was his gig. I was pretty darn impressed.
"Immorality may be fun, but it isn't fun enough to take the place of one hundred percent virtue and three square meals a day."
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RedRiver
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Re: This week on SVENGOOLIE...

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That's fascinating about Ricou Browning! I hope they show A CREATURE WALKS AMONG US soon.
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