Drive-In Double Features

[CineMaven]

MARA CORDAY TRIPLE FEATURE

Who is this Mara Corday? What manner of actress is she? I say a very good one. I've seen these three pictures countless times, but to see them back-to-back-to-back, I really had a chance to check her out. And I think she is very good indeed. In fact, she is my favorite sci-fi heroine/lady scientist.

"TARANTULA":

A giant tarantula is on the loose because an angry assistant scientist, injected with Leo G. Carroll's crazy serum inducing acromegaly, fights Carroll and smashes the spider's container. While the two men duke it out, (the most strenuous activity I've ever seen the slow talking Carroll do in movies), the tarantula mosies out the door into the desert air. That's a pretty big spider there, but you ain't seen nuthin' yet.

Mara Corday plays lady scientist, Stephanie Clayton, but prefers to be called Steve. I found her very believable as the scientist. (She looks like contemporary actress Gina Gershon of "BOUND" fame and "SHOWGIRLS" infamy). "Steve"/Mara doesn't trip over any of big ol' science words...but when she has to bring a mouse out of its cage, we never actually see the mouse. (I suspect Mara wasn't going to touch a mouse).

The desert scenery is beautiful but the music is a bit too darned dramatic scoring underneath it when she and Agar go visit it. When she and John Agar hook up (he's the male lead and love interest) he drives her out to her job and their car goes out of frame; shortly behind their car, a now giant tarantula comes into frame. I’'m a little shocked Mr. Shirley Temple didn't spot the spider in his car's rear view mirror. (Or hear the BIG music from the film's composer).

"Science is science but a girl must get her hair done."

Well when you sort of look like Ava Gardner, I suppose you have to. When you're an Old Maid Lady Scientist like "Miss Branding" in "BLOOD OF DRACULA" well... you've got to make sure your Science makes sense and you don't mix up your Isotoners with your Isotopes.

The tarantula is at the top and in back of this rock formation the couple sit on. Rocks rain down on their spot and they scamper away. She's skeptical about how the rocks just moved. She's a scientist. She has questions. But Agar blows it off:

"Rocks that have stayed for a thousand years...they just move. There's no figuring it," he says. Some doctor he is.

When Mara gets a gander at the change in Leo G., this was her window of opportunity to hightail it outta there. But she stays. Guys, Leo's starting to look gamey. Later when horses/cattle and rancher alike are found dead, nothing but skin and bones...well, bones - flesh picked clean...I couldn't believe how Agar took a lick of the evidence, a white milky substance left near the bones. What kind of doctor is this guy?

"There's more venom in this test tube than there are in a hundred tarantulas," says Raymond Bailey. Apparently before Mr. Drysdale became a banker for a bunch of hillbillies (I mean Appalachianly-challenged), he was a scientist.

VENOM?! And this is the stuff Agar put in his mouth?? Aye yi yi!

I like when the tarantula lumbers across the highway, it knocks down power lines, but doesn't leave much of a shadow on the desert floor in the midday sun.

Mara/"Steve", in her pajamas cramming the books, gets ready for bed and doesn't see the giant tarantula-ed Peeping Tom looking into her window. Whoa! I don't know how she missed it but she IS focused. Mara's scream seemed very very real. Jumping Jupiter, the tarantula is as big as a house now. Mara manages to run out, but Leo G. Carroll, is now so totally deformed he can't see his hands in front of his mis-shapened face, much less out of his room. That hairy eight-legged thing does look kind of terrifying. (And I LOVE 1950's day-for-night shots).

Clint Eastwood saves the day as a fighter pilot carrying napalm that finally does in the Tarantula where bullets and dynamite failed. And you know...he saved the day with Mara Corday b'cuz she has a small part as a waitress in his film "SUDDEN IMPACT." When I saw "Sudden Impact" in the movies, she looked familiar but I couldn't place her. Now I know her. And I love that Clint remembered her.

"THE BLACK SCORPION":

This time, Mara is land baron, Teresa Alvarez. She wears a flat brimmed sombrero and tight pants. Looking good Mara. And she is Mexican. Mara kind of looks like Raquel Welch. Richard Denning is Hank your blonde hunky stalwart hero with the square jaw. I always wondered why he and William Lundigan didn't make it really big. They were handsome enough. But I guess blonde men in the 40's didn't go over big (other than Alan Ladd).

Look at that scorpion go...it must be moving about 50mph on its tippy toes, thanks to Willis O'’Brien. The scorpion attacks the line men. They don't stand a chance!

Mara wants to come along when Richard Denning and cohort Carlos Rivas (as Artur Ramos, and kind of looks like a cross between Valentino and Alex D'Arcy) is going to go after the tarantula.

"I wouldn’'t ask to come along if I didn'’t think I could help."

She knows the country like the back of her hand and is a good shot. Denning doesn't mind at all. When they kiss:

TERESA: "Why did you do that?"

HANK: "Maybe I wanted to see what you would do."

TERESA: "How did I do?"

HANK: "You did alright."

Hank and Ramos are lowered into the bottomless pit of a cave and to go exploring for scorpion. They get more scorpions than you can shake a stick at. They get more than they bargained for...including that street urchined little boy stowing away in the bucket. They see a nest of scorpions. And everytime there's a close-up shot of one of them things, it's slobbering and very spittle-mouthed. One of the scorpions has a terrific battle with a thirty foot worm. The kid gets out of the bucket and starts walking around. I say call the Childrens Aid Society. No wait...better yet, leave him down there.

It was kind of tense when the bucket carrying Hank and Ramos is destroyed by one of the cave-dwelling scorpions and they have to be hoisted up by rope. That was just too much for Ramos to take...slippin' and slidin' with that rope. (I wonder how he did in gym class).

SCORPION ON THE TRACKS! SCORPION ON THE TRACKS!

Ooooh, that was chiling when the train ran into the scorpion and the scorpion met it head on; then it attempts to impale the people inside the tossed aside toy train car. But why these scorpions start attacking each other instead of getting some humans, is beyond me.

In real life, up in Beverly Hills, when Richard Denning was reading the script on his side of their twin beds with wife Evelyn Ankers, I wonder what Evelyn said to him.

Having been a fly on the wall in one of my past lives, it probably went something like this:

"Oh Richard, put down that script and turn out the light! I know how that movie's going to end with my eyes closed. Now scoot on over here and let’s play WolfMan!"

Again, my empathies get misplaced when I saw the scorpion being attacked and bombed and thrashed by the military. Poor thing.

THE SILLIEST LOOKING MONSTER IN THE HISTORY OF CINEMA: "THE GIANT CLAW." ROBERT OSBORNE SAYS SO.

Maybe when folks saw it, they laughed themselves to death? This was just a silly movie. All you need to know is:

( * ) The beast is a bird as big as a battle ship.

( * ) Mara plays a mathematician and Systems Analysts and she's a pretty sexy Mathematician and Systems Analysts.

( * ) In Spanish the bird is called "La Cacanya." (Use this little mark: to help your pronounciation: ~ ) Well...they got the ca-ca part right.

I liked the banter between Mara and co-star Jeff Morrow. She can handle the lines with a nice touch. They kiss and turn off the plane's overhead light to make out. Hmmmm... a little 'mile-high club' inference in that scene too, ey? Ooooh and in 1957. She handles the quips, and she handles the scientific jargon and she handles Rex Reason ...I mean Jeff Morrow. I’'m really impressed with Mara Corday. Somebody should have given her a chance; a real chance in some real movies.

( * ) I love how they blur the turkey I mean the Claw to show its speed.

( * ) How lazy is the Claw that when people parachute out of burning airplanes, he scoops 'em right up in the sky. Tsk! Like shootin' humans in a barrel.

Here are some gems of dialogue that Paddy Chayefsky only WISHES he could have written:

( * ) "Charlie’'s gone. Chute and all."

( * ) "It doesn't make sense. It's just a bird. A bird!"

( * ) "Only not electronic spitballs...atomic spitballs!"

( * ) "That bird is extra-terrestrial. It comes from outer space, some anti-matter galaxy millions and millions miles from earth."

Yeah, it is just plain silly. But I can't resist.

[moira finnie]

Gee, CineMaven, I wish I'd recorded these movies. You make them sound like such fun. Instead I've been catching a few moments of many films in this month's films. So far, the fakiest thing I've seen has been the hand belonging to the leading lady in Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958). No budget? No problem! Just stuff newspapers into some old sheets sewn to vaguely resemble a human hand--and don't forget to give her a manicure while you're at it.

[Rita Hayworth]

Dear All,

It was fun watching all these movies all month long on Thursday Nights in June on TCM. Last Night, there were some great ones like the Magnetic Monster, H-Man, and others. After watching all of these movies; what amazed me is this:

The creativity of writers back in those days from the 50's.
Incredible Special Imagery - what they done was unreal and frightening realistic.
Great Photography & Visual Effects
Beautiful Damsels in Distress & Heroes
Great Actors and Surprising Cameos ... Clint Eastwood as the Jet Pilot in Tarantula.
Most of these movies were made light-years ahead of its time ... Because some of these classics were made by Ray Harryhausen as Robert Osborne pointed out many times in the month of June on Turner Classic Movies.

I watched a lot of these movies back in 1970's and I was in awe back then; and still in awe as in today. I know that these movies will stand for the test of times & I hope future generations will get a big kick of seeing these wonderful movies made in the 50's.

I also wanted to point out that Turner Classic Movies did an excellent job of selecting various movies on Thursday Nights & I had fun watching them all over again.

Drive-In Double Features was a Hoot!