The Bloody Pit

132 - AMERICAN RICKSHAW (1989)

John Hudson and the mighty Bobby Hazzard return to discuss this late 80’s mystical mystery filmed in Miami.

Directed by Sergio Martino, AMERICAN RICKSHAW (1989) surely would not be nearly as entertaining or as coherent if it had been handled by someone with less experience behind the camera. Juggling enough disparate elements for two movies Martino somehow makes it all come together in a mad mishmash of sex criminals, televangelists, magical fires, mysterious ladies and the stolen pig idol that starts the whole crazed affair. Along the way we are witness to Donald Pleasence drifting in and out of a Southern American accent which might be worth the price of the Blu-Ray all on its own. Our hero is played by Olympian Mitch Gaylord and, for some reason, his performance gets better the more unshaven and sweatier he becomes. Maybe desperation breeds more believable acting in professional athletes?

Our conversation meanders all over the film and its various strange elements as we attempt to come to grips with the way that the plot is both insane and – eventually – straightforward. Of course, it is impossible from the start to realize that this tale of a poor college student working as a rickshaw driver in Miami will transform into the endgame of a decades long mystic war between rival sorcerers so I think it is understandable that we can’t maintain a straight-line plot discussion. In fact, it might just be impossible to talk about AMERICAN RICKSHAW in a completely linear fashion. There are simply too many things going on all at the same time! Luckily, I think we only lose track of what we’re doing a couple of times with the worst moment being when we are nearly derailed by tales of small-town strip clubs. And Hudson is still obsessed with transparent simians. Of course.

If you have any comments or questions thebloodypit@gmail.com is the email address where notes or recordings can be sent. Thank you for listening to the show and please let others know if you enjoy what we do here.

131 - THE MUMMY'S TOMB (1942)

Troy and I return to the Mummy movies made by Universal Studios in the 1940’s.

 
THE MUMMY’S TOMB (1942) has always been the film in this series that is the easiest to dump on. It begins with almost ten minutes of flashback footage from the previous movie THE MUMMY’S HAND (1940) and with a running time that barely breaks the one-hour mark it is one of the shortest features Universal ever released. Add to the film’s perceived crimes the decision to advance the story thirty years and bump off the first film’s cast and you have the foundation of decades of fan sneering. But is this film truly as bereft of horror thrills or as ridiculous as the carping has claimed? A deeper look may reveal some hidden qualities. 

In this episode Troy and I follow Kharis through his change of actor and his change of address to Middleton, USA as the undead Egyptian monster stalks those who dared to violate the tomb of Ananka. We talk about the addition of Lon Chaney to the cast, the mysterious survival of the previous film’s High Priest and the fact that the 1970’s look a lot like the 1940’s. We use Thomas Feramisco’s book The Mummy Unwrapped to explore the alterations made from script to screen complete with the details of a few choice bits that should have been left in the film. I lay out my preferred version of this story and we discuss how some of the changes make for a less involving return for the characters. I think longtime listeners will be shocked by our final assessment of this entry as well as our ratings near the end. 

We are joined by Beth in the final show segment for some feedback about our recent Sherlock Holmes episodes. It seems that some radio shows are not so accurate in their geological descriptions of England! And then we wrap the episode with a song from Nashville’s amazing punk band Peachy, giving us a blast of rock coolness for the summer. 

130 - HARD BOILED (1992)

John Hudson returns to the show to discuss one of director John Woo’s greatest achievements. 

The Hong Kong genre known as ‘Heroic Bloodshed’ was born out of a desire to move away from martial arts action stories and to present a different vision of the modern criminal underclass. Triad tales quickly  became the Hong Kong version of American gangster movies with the addition of the viciousness being turned up to eleven! At the forefront of this movement was John Woo, who employed slow motion shots and graphic bullet hits in ways not seen since the days of Sam Peckinpah’s ‘beautiful violence’ movies such as THE WILD BUNCH (1969). And, like Peckinpah, Woo built his films around tales of men of violence trying to forge a path through a world that often rejects them because of their bloody ways. The films are exciting and tense but with a sympathetic core that serves to enhance their emotional effect on the viewer. The characters in a John Woo film are not just cartoon heroes and villains set In place to fight each other for our amusement. They become people we are invested in seeing succeed even as we harbor doubts about their motivations. Violently complex, perhaps?

 
After a brief look at how we first encountered HARD BOILED (1992) Hudson and I dig into the film to find the things that still impress us nearly thirty years later. The movie’s rollercoaster ride structure and protracted final ‘cops vs gangsters’ battle make up a lot of our conversation but we also remark on the acting that sells the central character’s internal conflicts. Our personal history with collecting the film is a topic as well as the ways we sought out Woo’s earlier gangster movies from bootleggers. Hudson’s tale of seeking guidance from a professional to obtain the film’s soundtrack CD is a surprise and ties strangely into his recent rewatch of NYPD Blue! Connections are often in the oddest places.

 
Any comments or suggestions can be sent to thebloodypit@gmail.com where we’ll be glad to hear from you. Thank you for listening to the show! 

129 - William Castle Westerns Part 4

Monster Kid Radio’s Derek Koch makes his belated return to the show so that we can finally wrap up our multipart series on William Castle westerns of the 1950’s! It certainly took us long enough, huh? Without us realizing it this episode could have been labeled a Patricia Medina double feature! But are these last two movies actually westerns? Listen and find out. 

DUEL ON THE MISSISSIPPI (1955) is close since it takes place in 1820’s Louisiana and it involves a duel with pistols. But it is really much more a plantation adventure with river pirates stealing sugarcane and a romantic plotline that is more than obvious from the beginning. It’s a colorful widescreen tale filled with bad guys, a sort-of bad girl and a fair amount of time spent on a riverboat. The cast is uniformly excellent with easily a dozen faces familiar to fans of older movies with Lex Barker and Miss Medina leading the dance. We spend a good deal of time discussing her career and marveling at her range. 

URANIUM BOOM (1956) is a much more modern tale focused on the men swarming through Colorado in the 1950’s as part of the rush to find the titular radioactive ore. Dennis Morgan and William Talman become partners in search of riches but run into trouble when they realize they are in love with the same woman. The film becomes a darker tale than expected with these two men fighting to control their mining operation and with Talman’s character pulling some downright nasty tricks to break up his buddy’s marriage. It’s an interesting story and well worth seeing even if Miss Medina has significantly less screen time than in the earlier picture. 

If you have any comments or suggestions about the podcast or this episode in particular thebloodypit@gmail.com is where we can be reached. And, of course, Derek can be heard every single week over on Monster Kid Radio. How does he do it? Thanks for listening! 

128 - SEVEN DEATHS IN A CAT'S EYE (1973)

Adrian Smith comes back to the show to discuss this giallo dressed up in gothic clothing.

 
Longtime listeners to The Bloody Pit will notice that this is the second time I’ve talked about SEVEN DEATHS IN A CAT’S EYE (1973) on the podcast. Normally we wouldn’t repeat a film but Adrian really wanted the chance to pick apart this colorful Antonio Margheriti film and compare it to his earlier black & white gothic movies. Plus it’s coming out on Blu-Ray in the states soon so now might be the time for it to reach a larger audience. We talk about the cast, the use of colored lighting and the oddities of giallo plotting that can often lead a bizarre chase to the same places. Adrian is amused by the not very Scottish location shooting and the distinct absence of Scottish accents among most of the cast of characters. He also gets a bit confused by the MacGrieff family legend that insinuates that dead people might pop back up as vampires. We advance a few theories about why the titular cat might have been chosen for its color and Adrian points to some very non-period music that plays during a fireside romantic scene. Oh! And we do spoil the killer’s identity simply because we wanted to talk about the ways in which this story slots very comfortably into the genre. We close out the show with some information about Adrian’s two podcasting ventures including one of which I will be a part. Busy, busy!

 
If you have any comments or suggestions the email address is thebloodypit@gmail.com and we’d love to hear from you. Thank you for listening to the show and we’ll be back soon. 

127 - THE FINAL PROGRAMME (1973)

Randy Fox returns to dive back into the science fiction films of the 1970’s.

Unfortunately, THE FINAL PROGRAMME (1973) is one of the lesser-known SF movies from the 70’s. There are many reasons for that including it being savagely cut for American release and that its cast is devoid of major movie stars. But a more relevant reason it is largely unknown is the type of science fiction tale it tells. Adapted rather faithfully from the first of Michael Moorcock’s series of Jerry Cornelius novels it hews closely to the arch tone of the book in ways that might frustrate some viewers. Plot points are not spoon-fed, explanations for odd occurrences are not always made and anyone looking for a solid hero will be left wanting. The motivations for the main character are, by turns, dark or driven by melancholic grief when they aren’t just completely inscrutable. Aware that the world is crumbling around him Jerry seems content to chase his psychotic brother Frank but often affects a disinterest in nearly everything else. “Well, for a start, I'm going to sit here and get smashed out of my mind. And I also have it on very good authority that the world is coming to an end. I thought I'd go home and watch it on television.” 

Randy and I spend the first thirty minutes of the show discussing the book series with a focus on the first, of course. We then (eventually) get into a deep look at the film using a faulty synopsis that causes me to complain about one of the more common errors made when summarizing this movie. We talk about the fine cast, the director’s comments about the movie and the difficulty of crafting such a large-scale tale on a small-scale budget. We touch on the locations and the music as well as author Moorcock’s choice for sonic accompaniment that was overridden by designer/writer/director Robert Fuest. And we finally wind our way to the mad ending that is the sole false note for Randy. This touches off a spirited discussion of how I would have liked the final scenes to play out to move things closer to the unfilmable ideas in the book. And then I quote star Jon Finch from an old interview about his involvement in the film. We have a pretty good time!

If you have any comments on the film or the podcast thebloodypit@gmail.com is the place to reach us. Which 1970’s science fiction film should we dig into next time? Let us know. And thank you for listening! 

126 - Sherlock Holmes Radio

After our last episode we thought it would be interesting to dig a little deeper into the radio tales of Sherlock Holmes. As Beth is such a fan of both the character and classic radio dramas, I asked her to pick two different audio tales that we could fashion into a short show to introduce listeners unfamiliar with the form to a couple of solid examples. I expected her to stick with the series that starred Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, but she surprised me by also finding a much later show that unexpectedly did an excellent Holmes adaptation. If you enjoy the two shows we present here you can easily find more online in various places and we highly recommend the search. We might even do some future episodes like this to discuss why they stand out or if they are particularly unusual in some way. Hope you enjoy this first presentation. 

If you have any comments or suggestions about the podcast please write to us at thebloodypit@gmail.com where we’ll be happy to hear from you. Not Petri Wine happy, but happy nevertheless. Thanks for listening! 

125 - SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE VOICE OF TERROR (1942)

There have been roughly a billion Sherlock Holmes movies made over the last century and the master detective has been portrayed by enough people to populate a full reenactment of the California Gold Rush. But only a handful of these actors became so identified with the role that their physical appearance influenced most future visions of the character. Basil Rathbone played Holmes onscreen fourteen times and in hundreds of radio programs. His voice so perfectly captured the public imagination that his mannerisms and style of speech became the standard for Holmes for decades afterward and he is still considered one of the best to have ever attempted the role. Rathbone’s acting often elevates movies and he brings a level of competence and skill to his Sherlock performances that can help even the weakest of them entertain effectively. Luckily, he was often working with a cast that matched his abilities and a story that was worthy of the Holmes name. Not that there weren’t problems to overcome…..

Universal’s series of Sherlock Holmes adventures are considered a part of the studio’s 1940’s horror output and certainly several of them qualify as scary movies. But not all of them are so obviously part of that genre with most leaning into the expected mystery/suspense field. Strangely, their first Holmes film would stray from mystery more than most and ends up playing more like an espionage story with Holmes as a spy master. This grows out of the decision to set the Holmes and Watson characters in contemporary times instead of their usual Victorian or Edwardian period. This means the war with Germany takes center stage allowing the brilliant Holmes the opportunity to add his efforts to the battle against fascism. But does the change of time period and the repurposing of this great character as a WWII combatant work? We’ll be glad to let you know our thoughts in this episode. 

Troy and I are joined by Sherlock Holmes aficionado Beth Morris for this (and all future Holmes films). She adds her own perspective on Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce and the 1940’s version of the characters filtered through her obsessive reading of the original Doyle tales and every pastiche story that she can get her hands on. We discuss the film’s story, the extraordinary cast, the brilliant lighting and the lack of detective work the film has for Holmes. I dig into the way the film treats Eveyln Anker’s character Kitty, probably spending far too much time railing against the Hay’s office rules that force certain irritating actions at the film’s conclusion. I get a bit salty about it and I apologize for my enthusiasm and inability to let it go. But it is infuriating! 
We end the show with an email giving details about this year’s Blob-fest in Lehighton, PA. If you live near enough to attend, we envy you. I’ve really got to try to get to that show one year. 

Here’s a link to the full info – LINK! 

If you have any comments or suggestions thebloodypit@gmail.com is the email address and we’d love to hear from you. Thank you for listening to the podcast and we’ll be back soon! 

124 - TURKEY SHOOT (1982)

We’ve never before dug into the fertile field of Australian genre movies here on The Bloody Pit which means it is long overdue. The classic Ozploitation period is generally thought of has having lasted from the middle of the 1970’s to the late 1980’s which seems a short length of time until you look at the number of films that fall into this category. There are more than three dozen movies produced just in the 1980’s that comfortably fit under the Ozploitation umbrella with several worldwide hits like MAD MAX 2 (1982), ROAD GAMES (1981), RAZORBACK (1984) and DEAD-END DRIVE-IN (1986) being most well-known. Add to that list 70’s stunners such as MAD DOG MORGAN (1976), THE MAN FROM HONG KONG (1975), PATRICK (1978) and the ground breaking MAD MAX (1979) and it becomes clear that the Australian output of horror, action and post-apocalyptic cinema has had powerful, long lasting influence. But, in many cases, the Aussie versions of exploitation fodder was following the prevailing trends and copying successes as best they could. And that brings us to this movie!

 
Director Brian Trenchard-Smith has described TURKEY SHOOT (1982) as a movie in which "1984 meets The Camp on Blood Island where they play 'The Most Dangerous Game'". If that isn’t a perfect enticement for curious, thrill-seeking movie goers I don’t know what could be! John Hudson and Bobby Hazzard join me for a rollicking discussion of this astonishing piece of sadistic insanity. We marvel at the actors willing to put themselves through this crazed scenario with emphasis on the pure hell of trying to shoot a film under very difficult circumstances. We toss around many strange metaphors as we attempt to describe the action of the story and have great fun watching people blow up real good! I’m not sure how but somehow Gilligan’s Island is invoked alongside a discussion of pants stuffed with raw meat and dummy deaths. Oh! And Bobby manages to make me do an actual spit-take! Waste of good beer, sadly. 

If you have any comments or questions thebloodypit@gmail.com is the email address for the show. Let us know what you think of TURKEY SHOOT or your favorite Ozploitation film. Should we cover more of them? Could be fun! Thank you for listening. 

123 - INVISIBLE AGENT (1942)

We return to the Universal Invisible Man series of movies for a wartime adventure! 

As the United States entered the World War effort in 1942 Hollywood joined in with dozens of films bent around the changed state of political events. A number of the movies produced at the time could be seen as propaganda pieces and INVISIBLE AGENT (1942) certainly fits that description. Picking up with the grandson of the original Invisible Man the story is a mixture of many elements. Our main character is pressed into service for the Allied fighting forces after Pearl Harbor turns him from isolationist to intelligencer. Parachuting into Germany our transparent hero searches for a list of infiltrated undercover Axis agents and then discovers a plot to bomb New York City! How will he warn the American Defense Department in time to stop the massacre of millions? And can he escape from the clutches of the dastardly Nazi army that seems to know he is lurking about? 

Troy and I pull this exciting film apart, examine its flaws and then rave about how much we love it. Sporting two excellent villains played by Sir Cedric Hardwick and Peter Lorre the movie manages to generate some real menace when they are onscreen. Both actors are so good as antagonistic German and Japanese representatives that watching them dance around each other waiting for a mistake is delicious. In fact, the only real problems we find with the film is the unfortunate need to indulge in some silly, out of place Nazi-humiliation scenes that are played for cheap laughs. I would argue that this sequence could have been best left out. Luckily, the movie has more than enough action to keep an audience riveted as the race to stop the Axis baddies ramps up to a special effects laden climax that is fantastic!

 
If you have any comments or suggestions thebloodypit@gmail.com is the address to use to make your feelings known. Thank you for listening and please rate and/or review the podcast wherever you catch the show.