Ch-ch-ch-Changeling

For October, the Nitrate Diva has been tweetering a list of favorite horror films. Most I've either seen (a few) or are not available to me. But she did recommend The Changeling (1980), so we got it.

It starts with George C. Scott and his wife and daughter, on vacation. Their car has broken down on a snowy road, and he goes to a nearby phone to call for help - just in time to see his family killed when a snow plow hits a car and crushes them.

He can't stand to stay in his NY apartment, so he moves to Seattle to work at his old alma mater. He is a famous composer - and I rather like his old-fashioned Mozart-ish (?) melodies. The local historical society offer him the use of an old mansion (and the lady, Trish Vandevere from the society is pretty cute). So things are going pretty well for him, other than the tragedy and all. Until the weird happenings start.

It's the usual - noises, doors slamming, etc. Everyone says that nothing creepy has happened in the house for 40 years, which ignores the fact that it's over a hundred years old. He does the old micro-fiche in the library thing and finds out that the house was built by the father of a US senator, old Melvyn Douglas. Douglas grew up in the house, a sickly, crippled boy. Then his father took him to Europe for a while, and he came back hale and healthy. Does the title now make sense?

This is a pretty slick, well-produced, well-constructed ghost movie. Ms. Spenser didn't like that they had to go to another, semi-related property to solve the last puzzle. It was gratuitous, but I didn't think it hurt the plot or pacing. Also, I think she might have preferred something a little scarier. And of course, the bad guy (Douglas) didn't really do anything wrong - it all happened when he was a little kid. Oh well, can't have everything. At least Scott was great throughout.

The Boys in the Black Room

 The Black Room / The Man They Couldn't Hang (1935) is another of those great Karloff double-bills. Maybe not the best of them but pretty great. 

The Black Room takes place in ye olde times. A baby is born to the Count, which is cause for great jubilation. But wait! It's twins, cause for great lamentation. For as Sir Exposition tells us, the first Count was killed by his younger twin, in the Black Room. And the family motto is, "As it begins, so shall it end".

Also, the younger has a paralyzed arm. 

So the twins grow up to both be Boris Karloff. The elder becomes Count. He is a slimy, sloppy, lustful, and all around creepy guy. The younger is a lovely man - he leaves for the big city (Prague) because he makes the Count nervous. But he comes back when the Count calls for him. You see, he's so unpopular that the peasants are trying to kill him daily. All he wants to do is letch on the women of the town, especially the daughter of the mayor, Marian Marsh (Trilby). When young Karloff meets her he can see why (because she plays the harp).

The Count's plan is simple: He will abdicate and let his brother take over - everyone loves him. He assure him that he holds no ill will - look, he's had the Black Room bricked up. He just wants to show him one thing first. Around the back, and through a secret door in the fireplace, it's - the secret entrance to the Black Room. Which contains a pit full of the bodies the Count has killed. So he stabs young Karloff and throws him down to die. Then he just has to fake a paralyzed arm, and bang - he's now the good brother.

If one Karloff is good, two must be better, right? Especially when he has a chance to play such opposites - the sunny younger twin and evil older. He even gets a Great Dane - possibly one of his own, since he kept Great Danes in real life. Maybe his best acting role ever.

The Man They Couldn't Hang isn't as great, and also resembles a few other movies, like Before I Hang or The Man with Nine Lives. Karloff as Dr. Savaard (great name) plans to halt the life processes of (kill) a volunteer, then keep him alive with an external artificial heart, and revive him. The volunteers girlfriend, however, calls the police and they prevent him from reviving him. He is arrested, tried for murder, and hanged.

But his daughter, Lorna Gray, takes the body, and his assistant uses the heart machine. They fix up his neck while he is dead, which is a big labor saver. Then they revive him. And the members of the jury that convicted him start dying. And the ones left alive are all invited to a party...

It's a bit of a mess, but still fun. 

Silent Cage

We aren't really Nic Cage fans. We appreciate his commitment to weirdness, but it isn't always our thing. So I don't really know why I queued up Willy's Wonderland (2021).

It starts with Cage getting a flat on a lonely country road. A voluble tow truck driver comes by and picks him up. Cage responds to his questions with a silent pained look - which is all you get from him this entire movie.

Since he doesn't have cash to pay for the repairs, the tow truck driver offers to let him clean up Willy's Wonderland overnight. Willy's Wonderland is a kiddy's restaurant with animatronic characters from an obscure TV show - a sort of local Chuck E. Cheese. But when kids started to go missing, it closed and fell into disrepair. But with a little clean up, they might re-open.

So the driver and a local business man lock Cage in the restaurant, and share some conspiratorial comments. Cage puts a six-pack of energy drink in the fridge, sets an alarm on his watch, and starts cleaning.

Meanwhile we meet Emily Tosta, the teenaged ward of Beth Grant, the crusty old sheriff. Tosta and a group of her friends, including a slut and her jock boyfriend, a puppy-dog good guy, and another guy, are all dedicated to destroying Willy's Wonderland, which they believe is evil, and responsible for the death of many young people. We never doubted it.

It turns out that the townspeople are propitiating the spirits in the animatronics by bringing them sacrifices. Oh, you figured that out already? Right. 

While he is cleaning, Cage is attacked by one of the animatronics - and he crushes it, kills it with his mop. Then his alarm goes off, so he takes a 15-minute break, drinks an energy drink, sets the alarm again, and gets back to work.

Tosta and crew are ready to burn down the place, but she insists on going in to warn Cage. They all wind up inside, and of course, start dying. When they find Cage and warn him, he gives them that silent pained look and goes back to cleaning. He only stops to kill a doll when it attacks, or to take his breaks when the alarm goes off. Even if it's in the middle of an attack. 

It's a pretty funny movie, as far as the action goes. The kids are pretty 2D, except Tosta and her friend Caylee Cowen, a tart with smarts. The animatronics kills are accompanied by "cute" songs which are pretty forgettable, for which I guess I'm thankful. 

And through it all, Cage never speaks, or, I think, changes expression. Honestly it's a good look on him. 

Baba Bah

I went into Baba Yaga (1973) knowing little except that it was a 70s European psychedelic horror thriller. That plus the title sold me. Should have looked a little deeper.

It is based on an erotic comic strip by Italian Guido Crepax. We first meet Isabella de Funes as Valentina, a photographer, at a modish party in Milan. Some men take her home, but she asks them to drop her off so she can walk home. But her walk is interrupted when she is struck by an expensive car driven by Carroll Baker. Baker is an chic. blonde older woman who says her name is Baba Yaga. She helps get de Funes home, and fondles her camera in an odd way, commenting that it can freeze time. 

De Funes visits Baker in her home for a photoshoot, and Baker gives her a doll in bondage gear. Soon, de Funes is having strange erotic dreams. Also, if she takes a picture of something, it freezes - a film camera stops rolling, and a person stops breathing. 

When de Funes goes to Baker's mansion to have it out, Baba Yaga lets rip - de Funes endures a series of hallucinations of Nazis, sees the doll come alive, and is stripped and whipped bloody. (Although the next day she finds no trace of wounds.)

All of this is surrounded by de Funes taking sexy photoshoots and talking crap politics with her boyfriend who directs commercials. 

It's a pretty drab affair, unless you enjoy the naked breasts enough to make up for it. The horror of Baba Yaga controlling de Funes mind, and torturing her in dreams is fine, but somehow static. It doesn't really raise the tension, just sort of sits there. 

And of course, Baba Yaga isn't Baba Yaga. You know how they call John Wick Baba Yaga, and it's ridiculous because (among other things), "baba" means "granny"? At least he's scary. Baker is to pretty and not scary enough - although she did have a creepy vibe. I don't insist on a cabin with chicken legs, but give us something.

However, although this Baba Yaga was missing a real Baba Yaga, it did have a real Golem (unlike Limehouse Golem). They watch the old silent film die Golem on TV at one point. 

Red House Over Yonder

Edward G. Robinson is famous as a gangster, but he had a lot more roles than that. Like The Red House (1947), a horror movie.

It starts by describing a small rural town as full of twisty roads that lead to deadends, and farms where families keep to themselves. But these days, it just a normal country town. (It looks like California, of course.) The school bus is dropping kids off. Julie London (the singer, but as a high school girl) is inviting Lon McAllister to go swimming, just the two of them - and they can change at the lake. But first he has to help out Allene Roberts. She lives on a lonely farm with her adoptive father (Robinson) and mother. They are considered reclusive by the townspeople, but welcome him warmly and feed him well. Robinson has an artificial leg, and Robertswants him to hire McAllister to help out. Since his widowed mom isn't making much with the general store she runs, he could use the money.

It all goes fine until McAllister decides to take a shortcut home through the woods. Robinson tells him it's dangerous and gets more and more anxious to keep him from going through. He might stumble upon the Red House - which would be bad for reasons he won't explain. McAllister goes anyway, but gets spooked and heads back, and winds up sleeping in the barn.

The next time he comes, he's determined to make it. He comes to Robinson's place through the woods to work out the route. He heads home that way again against Robinson's wishes. But this time, he's conled over the head. Turns out that Robinson has let local layabout Rory Calhoun hunt the woods if he keeps everyone else out.

Roberts and McAllister start getting curious, and start combing the woods for the Red House, along with London. It's getting pretty plain that Roberts is actually trying to steal McAllister away from London (whose character has the ridiculous name of Tibby). But when London makes McAllister take her out, Roberts goes house hunting herself.

Calhoun spots her, thinking it's McAllister and starts shooting at her - aiming to miss, but getting too close. Roberts falls and breaks her leg. This really gets to Robinson. It seems he lost his leg in the woods, something about the Red House, or the ice house. He starts acting strange, calling Roberts "Jeannie", her mother's name. When Roberts' leg heals, everything comes to a head.

As horror goes, this is mild enough. But as a thriller, it's great. The cast is solid, the setting beautiful and creepy when it needs to be. And Robinson is charming and sweet, until he isn't anymore. Director Delmer Daves did all right. 

Expressionist Impression

We don't watch a lot of silent movies, but thought that Terror-tober is the right month to finally watch The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920).

It starts with a young man (Frederic Feher) telling his troubles to an older man in a garden. It seems that a certain Dr. Caligari (Werner Krauss) had come to the fair in his town to display a somnabulist. Caligari was a weird looking man in a cape, top hat, and round glasses. Feher and a friend went to see his act. Caligari opened a coffin-like cabinet to display Cesar the somnabulist (Conrad Veidt). Cesar is deathly pale and thin, and appears to be sleeping. Caligari has him get out of the coffin, and claims he can answer any question. When Feher's friend asks him when he will die, Cesar says "before dawn!". 

And it comes true, because Cesar, still in a trance, sneaks into his room and kills him. And this isn't the only mysterious killing in this town.

Feher and his girl Lil Dagover suspect that Caligari and Cesar are behind these killings. And so, with a dummy in his cabinet, Cesar sets out to kill Dagover. But he can't do it - instead he grabs her and carries her away over the rooftops. But the townspeople give chase, and finally Cesar drops her, and collapses dead.

Caligari runs off with Feher chasing, and ducks into an insane asylum - and it turns out that he is the director. And, in the end, it turns out that Feher and Dagover are inmates of the asylum. And the man he was talking to in the garden (of the asylum) is his doctor. 

It's an interesting and bizarre tale, but the visual elements are the real excitement. This is the height of German Expressionism, with wildly tilted scenery, painted shadows, and cartoonishly graphic painted backdrops. Veidt's Cesar is also very Expressionist, dressed in a black skinsuit, with angular elbows and a sinuously curved spine - rather Nijinksy. He made a great monster.

Svengooli

Svengali (1931) isn't usually considered a classic horror movie, but I don't know why not. It makes a good one.

We meet Svengali (John Barrymore) in a garret in Paris. He is a music teacher, with long hair, a long pointy nose, and a straggly beard. His vocal student, a middle-aged woman with little talent - she sings the kind of thing you hear in Three Stooges shorts. She then confesses her love, and tells him she has left her husband for him - without taking a cent in settlement. He fixes her with his glowing stare, and throws her out. 

Later, when we find out she has killed herself, Sven and his violinist pal, Gecko (Luis Alberini), decide to go sponge off of some English acquaintances, old artists Donald Crisp and Lumsden Hare. They are having a bath and decide to bathe Svengali as a joke. So they dump him in the tub fully dressed and go to meet their younger (better looking) fellow artist Bramwell Fletcher. 

Sven gets out of the bath and steals one of the artists best suits, right when Trilby (Marian Marsh) waltzes in. She is a model, and seems to be wearing nothing but a military coat. Mistaking Svengali for one of the artists, she poses for him, singing a little air. Svengali decides that, although she can't sing, she has a perfect mouth cavity for a soprano, and decides to make her a star. Meanwhile, Fletcher gets a look at her and falls in love.

Svengali is able to use his burning, hypnotic gaze to make her sing brilliantly. Her debut is a big success, and it really is quite astounding - I wonder who did the vocals for the performance. But Fletcher starts showing up at performances to shame Svengali, causing him to break the concentration needed to control Trilby. He flees across Europe and they wind up performing in an Egyptian cabaret. The hypnosis seems to be taking a toll on Svengali. Also, he has fallen in love with Trilby, which she doesn't reciprocate - unless he commands her under hypnosis, which he says is "just Svengali talking to Svengali".

Directed by Archie Mayo, the movie has a very German Expressionist feel. The sets are full of crooked halls and massive beams at odd angles, with massive shadows. Svengali and Gecko are strangely humorous characters, considering how dangerous Svengali is. Of course, Luis Alberni is always good for a laugh. There's more than a hint that Svengali is a dirty Jew, but never explicit enough to be able to call it anti-Semitic.

More importantly, Marsh never wears the narrow-brimmed hat that took the name of her character Trilby. To bad.