Go Take a Flying Dutchman

Pandora and the Flying Dutchman (1951) seems to be well known and well loved (I read about it in Farran Nehme's blog. But it took Netflix a long time to serve up. Once it came off of the Saved list, I ordered it up.

It was made on location on the coast of Spain. Some fishermen are chatting in dialect when they find something washed up on the beach - two bodies, a man and a woman. English ex-pat archeologist Harold Warrender, who has been watching from his villa, tells us the story.

Eva Gardner plays Pandora, a nightclub signer and playgirl. Warrender flashes back to an evening in a restaurant when a young poet (Marius Goring), desperately in love with her, kills himself when she won't marry him. She doesn't exactly laugh it off, but it doesn't seem to affect her deeply, either.

One of the other men hopelessly in love with her is Nigel Patrick, a racecar driver aiming to beat the land speed record. She lets him take her driving in his racecar, and they park overlooking the ocean. She asks him what he would sacrifice for her. When he says "anything", she asks him to push his car over the cliff. He does and she agrees to marry him.

But on their way home, after meeting with Warrender, she spots a yacht offshore. When the men decline to row her out to it to meet the owner, she strips naked and swims out. There, soaking wet and wrapped in a sail cover, she meets this mysterious man. It is James Mason, a Dutch ship-owner, painting a portrait of a woman in the style of de Cirico (although it was actually painted by Man Ray) - a rather stiff woman on a perspective-lined plain. The woman has Pandora's face.

So Gardner and Mason begin to fall in love, although she has already promised to marry Patrick. Warrender, the archeologist, asks Mason for some help on translating an old Dutch journal, which turns out to be the journal of the Flying Dutchman - a sailor who killed his wife and blasphemed against God. He was cursed to sail the seas eternally, allowed to land every 7 years. In that time, if he can find a woman willing to die for him, he can be set free. Guess who turns out to be the Dutchman? And who will sacrifice herself for him? It's no spoiler, it's the movie's opening scene.

This is an incredibly lush and romantic movie. It was directed by Albert Lewin (Picture of Dorian Grey) but Jack Cardiff was the cinematographer. Lewin supplied the symbolism and surrealism (he was a collector of modern art) and Cardiff the rich technicolor, and a few process shots. 

This is also a somewhat silly movie, with quotes from the Rubaiyat (the Moving Finger verse) and made up quotes from Greek philosophers. There is even a bullfighter, one of Gardner's conquests, come back to claim her. But I, at least, got swept up in the passion and the grandeur. Or maybe I just like Ava Gardner's face, like everyone else. 

Ghost Wife

Extra Ordinary (2019) almost fits into our Heavy Metal Horror Comedy festival - missing the Heavy Metal though. 

It stars Maeve Higgins, an ordinary, heavy-set Irish woman who has a one-woman driving school. She gets home to listen to her voice mails - her outgoing messages tells callers to leave a message if they want driving lessons, but not about "that other thing" - she doesn't do that any more. That other thing turns out to be laying ghosts to rest. Her dad was a ghost expert with a line of VHS lectures, who was killed in an exorcism gone wrong that Higgins blames herself for.

Meanwhile, Barry Ward is at home getting ready for work, and being haunted by the ghost of his dead wife. Ward is also an ordinary guy, a woodworking instructor named Martin Martin (possibly because he is sort of playing Martin Freeman - the same kind of slightly annoyed everyman). His teen daughter, Claudia O'Doherty, wants him to find a ghost expert to get her mom laid to rest. Having a ghost around is kind of annoying.

The last thread involves Will Forte, as the singer of the one-hit wonder "Cosmic Lady". He needs another hit and the only way to get it is to sacrifice a verge to Satan. His virgin detector leads him to O'Doherty.

So Ward tries to get Higgins to deal with his dead wife, while Forte is scheming to get at O'Doherty. Higgins is also kind of falling for Ward - or at least wouldn't mind if he took an interest in her. She also needs to team up with him, because he can detect ghosts. He will let the ghosts inhabit his body, and then she can lay them, releasing them from this plane. One problem that arises - Ward's wife inhabits his body, and she's an evil-tempered, chain-smoking shrew, who thinks Higgins is a loose hussy after her Martin. 

The humor in this comedy is mostly mild and situational. Higgins' single woman with father issues gets interesting when ghosts are added to the mix. Ward's absolutely ordinary life with a ghost wife is cute too. This kind of low-key deadpan humor suits Will Forte of course, as well. The main joke is that these people are extremely ordinary - extra ordinary. 

SPOILER - it has a happy ending: Higgins doesn't marry Ward.

Dystopian Roller Disco

I had never heard of Solarbabies (1986) when I heard its How Did This Get Made episode (now behind paywall?). It sounded bonkers - but the back story is maybe even better.

The capsule description is teen roller-skaters in post-apocalyptic dystopia meet mystic orb. It takes place in a future where the rains have stopped and water scarcity controls the populace. All children are rounded up and placed into militaristic orphanages. We meet our heroes playing a late night game of centrifugal bumble-puppy - or maybe it's skate lacrosse: two teams on skates with hockey sticks with cups on the blade. You have to pick up the ball and deposit it in a central basket. This is done with much care and very little athleticism. 

Anyway, the orphanage heat, known as the ePolice, show up and our team scatters into the mines they are skating around. By the way, there are a lot of "eSomethings" in this movie, but it stands for "eco". not "electronic". The young deaf team mascot, Lukas Haas, discovers a glowing orb that seems to talk to him, and also cures his deafness. This orb is called Bodhi, which he pronounces to rhyme with "Lodi". He makes this point several times, but it isn't any kind of plot point. He takes this back to the barracks. 

Somehow, the faux-Native American kid, Darkstar (Adrian Pasdar) steals the orb to take back to his gypsy tribe. The voice in his head tells Haas to go rescue the orb. And so our gang goes after him. Although the land is supposed to be a lifeless desert, they do meet up with a number of communities, although none are as colorful as Bartertown.

I haven't mentioned many of the actors involved, because they seem to be pretty much non-entities. The Girl in the group is Jami Gertz. The slightly sympathetic warden of the orphanage is a sweaty Charles Durning. That's about it. 

Now, the backstory. The podcasters got an interview with producer Mel Brooks - yes, that one. It was one of his first projects, and looked like a nice, cheap script for a first time director Alan Johnson. Because Johnson was a first-timer, his costs spun out of control, and Brooks wound up mortgaging his house and putting up a ton of his own money to finish the movie. He wound up $9 million in the hole. But there's a happy ending: little by little over the years, the residuals have come in, and he figures that he finally broke even. 

So go out and buy a copy - Brooks could use the dough.

The Man and Then the Lady Vanishes

Not sequels to the recent Leigh Whannel movie, we watched an invisible black and white double bill: The Invisible Man Returns / The Invisible Woman (1940).

Returns stars Vincent Price, a beloved owner of a coal mine. He is in prison for the murder of his brother. At the last minute, his friend, the Invisible Man's brother John Sutton, slips him the potion, allowing him to escape. Invisible Price flees naked to be with his betrothed, Nan Grey. Then he sets out to find the true murderer. But will he be able to before the invisibility drives him mad?

Chief suspects include Alan Napier (Alfred the butler) and Sir Cedric Hardwicke, while Cecil Kellaway plays the police detective looking for Price. We enjoyed this, although it is a little busy. Also, a disappointingly happy ending. Not much of a horror movie at all.

Woman is definitely not a horror movie - it's straight up comedy. John Howard is a playboy, spending vast sums of money to make women go away. He also supports the sciences, as in mad sciences. He pays John Barrymore to do unspecified research. But when his account Charles Ruggles tells him he is broke, he has to tell Barrymore that the experiments are over.

However, Barrymore has discovered the secret of invisibility, which will make Howard a fortune. They just need a human guinea pig. Virginia Bruce, recently unemployed model, answers the advert. However, as soon as she's invisible, she heads out to torment her old boss, Charles Lane. 

Meanwhile, gangster Oscar Homolka and his thugs Shemp Howard, Ed Brophy,  and Donald MacBride steal the invisibility machine. The effects have worn off for Bruce, but she discovers that alcohol, applied topically or ingested, brings it back. So it thugs vs. invisible drunk woman. 

You might have noticed a pretty formidable lineup of character actors in this (as in the previous), but aside from Barrymore, they don't have much to do. Bruce is beautiful, but I'm not sure she's a great comedian. The writing is pretty scattershot, anyway. So this was a bit of a bagatelle. Not great but fun enough. 

Very Nice?

We watched Nomad (2005) mainly for Mark Dacascos, one of our favorite martial artists. It's too bad, he is barely recognizable in it. But it was worth watching for the novelty: a movie about the Kazakh national hero myth, filmed in Kazahkstan in the Kazakh language.

It starts with wandering wise man Jason Scott Lee looking for the child of prophecy, who can unite the tribes of the Kazakh people to fight the Jungars. The Kazakhs are too independent to get together like that, but Lee sets up a warrior school for the prophetic child and the children from all the other tribes. The child, Kuno Becker, is best buds with another kid, Jay Hernandez. They grow up together, fight together, and are the strongest and fastest of their little group. They are also both sweet on Dilnaz Akhmadieva.

It all culminates with a big Jungar attack on Turkestan, the Kazakh fortified city. There's lots of extras, lots of action, etc.

In fact, the whole movie is full of action, beautiful scenery, and good looking actors. It's a little short on acting and writing. I also had a hard time with the whole Chosen One narrative. When Hernandez wants to be recognized, everyone is like - no, Becker is the chosen one, just support him, OK? Mostly, it seems like Kazakhs are kind of jerks.

I haven't seen any Borat, so I'm not being influenced by his Kazakhstan. And this isn't a bad B-grade action/martial arts/costume drama. The setting is new and interesting, and it's fun to hear the movie in Kazakh with subtitles. But it just isn't great.

Oh, and Mark Dacascos? He plays the villain and gets killed pretty early on, with no really good fight scenes. Tough luck.

Fisher Queen

I don't know if there are any fans for Phryne Fisher out there, but for you, Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears (2020) is a must.

If you don't know, Phryne Fisher is the star of a series of mystery novels written by Kerry Greenwood, and the TV series based on them, starring Essie Davis. The series is set in Australia, between the wars. Ms. Fisher is a somewhat older flapper from a Bohemian family who inherited a lot of money when WWI killed off most of her richer relatives. She lives the life of a wild adventuress, solving crimes and bedding lovers, with the help of her maid Dot, her commie union red ragger mates Bert and Cec, Constable Hugh, who is Dot's fiancee and the handsome but grumpy Inspector Jack Robinson (Nathan Page) - who has been very slowly falling for her.

But this movie starts in the Palestine, under the British mandate (shooting Australia for Middle East, I think). Miss Fisher (Davis) is retrieving the daughter of a sheik who lives in England, and is a friend of a friend of Miss Fisher. The daughter is suspected of political intrigue, but Miss Fisher just busts her out. She makes it safely away, but Miss Fisher is killed in the attempt.

Very sad. There's a funeral in England, and Dot is pregnant by Hugh, and can't attend. Neither can Bert or Cec - they're just workers, not the type to go flying to England. Sadly, that's the last we see of them in this movie at least. But Robinson does go.

When he gets there, the funeral is buzzed by a small airplane, which lands on the grounds, and the pilot is - Phryne Fisher of course! No explanation for how she escaped or why she played dead, but that doesn't matter. What does matter is that Robinson is very put out. He came all the way for a funeral and what does he get?

But no matter how mad he gets, he has to back up Miss Fisher when it looks like she's going to get into trouble. So he joins her on this preposterous adventure. It winds its way through England and back to the Palestine, with ancient amulets and astrolabes and the extremely made up crypt of tears. 

Now, this whole movie is full of nonsense - made up legends, a setting fraught with political intrigue that is ignored to focus on the made up stuff, obvious but poorly motivated villains, etc. But it does have Essie Davis and Nathan Page doing their thing as Jack and Phryne. And Davis is wonderful. She is blithe, fearless and sexy, even though she is a bit too old to be a Bright Young Thing. It may be that Davis is getting too old for the part - but that's part of the allure. She is ageless, and even death doesn't slow her down. 

I kind of doubt that you would get much out of this without having watched the series (and possibly reading the novels). But if you're a fan, you'll want to watch this. Even if you can't buy the nonsense, the final kiss makes it all worthwhile.

Horror Strikes Out!

It's a new film quiz! This one looks very tricky - it's baseball-horror themed, and I don't know anything about baseball.

1) Ricky Vaughan or Nuke LaLoosh? (question courtesy of our main Maine monster, Patrick Robbins)

I said, I don't know anything about baseball! But you've got to love a name like Nuke LaLoosh.

2) Best moment in the Friday the 13th film series.

Also, I've never watched any Friday the 13th films.

3) Henry Hull or Oliver Reed?

Uncle Frank and Athos - Oliver Reed.

4) What is the last movie you saw in a theater?

In the pandemic?!? Just joking, we don't go to movie theaters.

5) Best movie casting for a real-life baseball player, or best casting of a real-life baseball player in a movie.

Gary Cooper in Damn Yankees. What - I told you know don't know anything about baseball or baseball movies.

6) D.B. Sweeney or Ray Liotta?

Haven't seen Sweeney in anything, as far as I can tell. Ray Liotta has a small part in Smokin' Aces, so him.

7) Given that the fear factor in 2020 is already alarmingly high, is there a film or a genre which you would hesitate to revisit right now?

Although Ms. Spenser like horror more than me, she goes pretty easy on me. So most of what we've watched we would watch again (if it was good). 

Sometimes movies with crowds make me a little nervous, but it's not that bad,

8) The Natural (1984)-- yes or no?

Did not see.

9) Peter Cushing or Colin Clive?

Clive for Dr. Frank, Cushing for body of work.

10) What’s the lamest water-cooler hit you can think of? Of course, define “lamest” however you will, but for “water-cooler hit” Dr. Savaard is thinking about something zeitgeist-y, something everyone was talking about the weekend it opened and beyond, something everyone seemingly had to see—The Other Side of Midnight residing at #1 in 1977 for two weeks is not what the professor has in mind.

Ms. Spenser says: Happyness. In the same vein, I thought of Crash.

11) Greatest single performance in horror movie history.

Boris Karloff, in The Black Cat. The scene where he sits up in bed, next to the sleeping beauty is so striking.

12) Ingrid Pitt or the Collinson Twins?

I'm not a Hammerhead, but Pitt has a certain something. 

13) Name one lesser-known horror film that you think everyone should see. State your reason.

How about language-is-a-virus zombie movie Pontypool? I'm not sure it's actually for everyone, though. How about Annihilation?

14) Do the same for an underseen or underappreciated baseball movie.

OK, here's a baseball movie question I can answer: Rhubarb. It's the story of a cat, Rhubarb, who inherits a baseball team. The cat is played by Orangey, also seen in Comedy of Terrors, and The Incredible Shrinking Man. 

I saw this as a kid hoe sick from school on Dialing for Dollars. It's stuck to me all this time

15) William Bendix or Leslie Nielsen?

Bendix for so many reasons, like Jeff in The Glass Key. "He went and t'rowed another Joe."

16) Would you go back to a theater this weekend if one reopened near you?

Ha! I'd rather lick the floor of a 2019 movie theater than attend one now. Also, we never go to the movies.

17) Your favorite horror movie TV show/host, either running currently or one from the past.

Can I say Count Floyd? If not, Mr, Lobo from Cinema Insomnia. We never saw him on TV, but he sometimes co-hosts Foothill College's Psychotronic Film Festivals - 16-mm fun for the whole family. 

18) The Sentinel (1977)—yes or no?

Never heard of it, but it looks bonkers.

19) Second-favorite Ron Shelton movie.

I've only seen Bull Durham, so there is no second favorite.

20) Disclaimer warnings attached to  broadcasts of films like Gone With the Wind and Blazing Saddles-- yes or no?

This is actually a tough question. Maybe before all movies - except ones I approve of.

21) In the World Series of baseball movies, who are your NL and AL champs?

I still don't watch baseball movies.

22) What was the last horror film you saw?

Depends on what you mean by "horror". We watched the DVD double-feature Invisible Man Returns and The Invisible Woman. I think the first counts, the second is really a comedy, not even comedy-horror.

23) Geena Davis or Tatum O’Neal?

I suspect O'Neal is a stronger actor, but I might not have ever seen her in anything. I haven't seen a lot of Davis, but I just like her wide-mouthed charm.

24) AMC is now renting theaters for $100 - $350, promising a more “private,” catered party-movie experience. What do you like or dislike about this idea? 

It's fine if you like that kind of thing. I'll watch at home, thanks.

25) Name the scariest performance in a baseball movie.

Sigh.

26) Second-favorite Jack Arnold movie.

I'm going to say The Mouse that Roared. First is, of course, Space Children (MST3K version).

27) What would be the top five films of 2020 you’ve seen so far?

• The Invisible Man - Maybe the best
• Fantasy Island - Better than I expected, and pretty funny
• Underwater - Interesting addition to the undersea monster genre but not that good
• Color Out of Space - Pretty bad, but since Nic Cage is in it, that's sort of baked in
• Emma - This one doesn't seem to fit...

28) What are your top three pandemic-restricted movie viewing experiences so far in this... unusual year?

I'm going to say watching all the Marx Bros movies on discs we've bought, all of the Thin Man movies from the boxed set we ordered, and The Mad Miss Manton, which we also now own.

Ms. Spenser says watching the Alien movies and Prometheus, in her Weyland-Yutani tee-shirt - which she wears all the time because she doesn't have to dress for work.

And now the host has put his answers up! Read them all!