Don't Go Near The Park

Lawrence Foldes was just 19 years old when he directed, produced, and co-wrote DON’T GO NEAR THE PARK, a confusing, ambitious, rambling, and inept gore pic, in the Los Angeles area, primarily the old Paramount ranch and Griffith Park.

It opens "12,000 years ago" with two caveperson siblings being stricken by a curse that dooms them to a life of immortality. To remain young-looking, they kill teenagers and chomp on their entrails to drain their youth. The only way the two can ever die is if one has a female child and sacrifices her on her 16th birthday.

Gar ("Crackers Phinn," a nom de plume for Robert Gribbin, who was okay using his real name in TEEN LUST, HITCHHIKE TO HELL, and TRIP WITH THE TEACHER, which should tell you something about DON’T GO NEAR THE PARK) makes it happen by stalking a cute blonde (Linnea Quigley) and mesmerizing her into marriage. Gar’s devotion to their daughter Bondi (Tamara Taylor) earns Linnea's resentment, and a fight between the parents spurs Bondi to run away from home on her 16th birthday.

Surviving a rape attempt by potheads in a shitty custom van by using the power of The Force locked inside her magic amulet to explode the van, Bondi ends up at an abandoned cabin hidden inside Griffith Park, where dozens of children have gone missing over the centuries. The cabin's only inhabitants are Nick (Meeno Peluce from TV's VOYAGERS wearing a Wacky Packages T-shirt), a wiseass 10-year-old; Cowboy (Chris Riley), a wimpy teen; and—coincidentally—Gar's sister Tre.

Tre, usually seen in a gray wig and an eyepatch, is played by a pseudonymous actress named "Barbara Monker." Foldes claims Monker is actually Barbara Bain, the Emmy-winning co-star of MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE and SPACE: 1999, but she clearly isn’t. I don’t know whether Foldes is mistaken or lying (moderator David Gregory inexplicably doesn’t challenge Foldes’ assertion on the Dark Sky DVD’s commentary track), but there’s no doubt that Barbara Monker is not Barbara Bain.

Aldo Ray, a former Academy Award nominee on hard times, pops up briefly as an investigative reporter looking into the mysterious Griffith Park deaths who tries to rescue Nick from his homelessness. More murders occur until the far-out climax inside Bronson Caverns that includes zombies, fire, eye lasers (!), and more ridiculousness. And it’s all based on actual events, according to the film’s opening card!

It's pretty obvious that Foldes and his co-writer Linwood Chase had no idea what they were doing when they snapped this picture together. Making sense of the story is a fool’s errand. Trying to determine why Aldo Ray is in this movie is a fool’s errand. The only thing that’s crystal-clear about DON’T GO NEAR THE PARK is the reason a young, imaginative, but untalented Foldes was handed $100,000 to make this movie: rich parents.

My Blood Runs Cold

William Conrad, the corpulent character actor best known at the time for playing Marshal Matt Dillon on the GUNSMOKE radio show, directed three straight horror films that were released by Warner Brothers in the first half of 1965. In addition to acting jobs for hire, Conrad had stepped behind the camera for the occasional directing gig in episodic television, as well as producing Warner Brothers shows like KLONDIKE and 77 SUNSET STRIP.

MY BLOOD RUNS COLD was the middle child of Conrad’s horrific triptych, balanced between the equally medium-budgeted TWO ON A GUILLOTINE and BRAINSTORM. Oddly, after grinding out these three chillers, Conrad ditched directing for good, more or less, and became an unlikely late-in-life TV star on CANNON, a CBS detective show for Quinn Martin that aired five seasons from 1971 to 1976. He didn’t direct even an episode. Maybe he got the bug out of his system at Warners.

Shot in black-and-white and widescreen Panavision by Oscar winner Sam Leavitt (THE DEFIANT ONES), who keeps the camera gliding smoothly and surely under Conrad’s direction, MY BLOOD RUNS COLD is a thriller about reincarnation. Let’s call it a mix of Bridey Murphy and Norman Bates, as the clean-cut young man who meets cute with rich girl Julie Marriday (Joey Heatherton) when her car sideswipes his motorbike turns out to be a raving psychopath.

It’s love at first sight for Ben Gunther (Troy Donahue), who tries to convince Julie that he loved her in a past life and forks over a century-old locket with a photo of Julie’s lookalike great-great-grandmother inside. Julie’s wealthy widowed father, Julian (Barry Sullivan), who disapproves of her stoic wimp boyfriend Harry (Nicolas Coster), pushes Ben and Julie together at first. But...something just ain’t right with that boy.

I called MY BLOOD RUNS COLD a thriller because that’s the way it was always described in TV GUIDE, but it may be the least thrilling thriller of 1965. GUNSMOKE producer John Mantley wrote the screenplay from BEN CASEY producer John Meredyth Lucas’ story, and it plays like a middling TV show — lots of dialogue, a low body count, and not a thing to threaten the censors. All the murders are depicted off-screen, and it takes forever for Donahue’s character to show off his true flipped-out nature. Conrad acts more interested in the sibling rivalry between Sullivan’s Julian and his more free-spirited sister, played by Jeanette Nolan.

The Beasts Are On The Streets

In the wake of JAWS came a gaggle of movies about animals running amok on both the big (GRIZZLY, DAY OF THE ANIMALS, PROPHECY) and small screens (ANTS, TARANTULA: THE DEADLY CARGO, THE SAVAGE BEES). THE BEASTS ARE ON THE STREETS, which was produced in Texas by Hanna-Barbera (!), is neither the best or the worst of the killer-animal genre, and its standout title is the most memorable thing about it.

Whereas most of these movies were content to unleash just one species against man, be it spiders or bears or bees or dogs, writer Laurence Heath (a former MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE producer) goes hog wild in his teleplay for BEASTS, unleashing an entire wildlife sanctuary against a Texas populace fattened up for the kill from all that local barbecue. Lions and tigers and bears and oh my elephants and buffalo and zebras and you name it prey on some of the dumber members of the human species (“I just wanna see what’s going on.”).

Heath resists appending a supernatural or mystery element to the animals’ behavior. They’re just acting like wild animals. An ersatz combination of road-raged hunters Billy Green Bush (ELECTRA GLIDE IN BLUE) and Burton Gilliam (HONEYMOON IN VEGAS) and pill-popping trucker Bill Thurman (a mainstay of Larry Buchanan’s Texas schlock) results in the African Wildlife Park’s fenceline demolished and an army of hungry animals on the loose.

The director is a slumming Peter Hunt, making his first foray into American television after helming big action films like ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE and SHOUT AT THE DEVIL. So it’s no surprise that the animal-attack scenes contain a decent level of thrills, though necessarily bloodless, thanks to network standards of 1978 (although the suspense would hold more weight if we didn’t see a whole crew of worry-free filmmakers reflected in the windows of cars being assaulted by wildlife).

The human characters are no less shallow than usual for the disaster genre, but they seem like they are because of the colorless cast, including undistinguished Dale Robinette (BILLION DOLLAR THREAT), wispy Carol Lynley (THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE), and future Tubbs Philip Michael Thomas. Filmed at the long-gone Lion Country Safari drive-through park in Grand Prairie, Texas, THE BEASTS ARE ON THE STREETS definitely has its share of knuckleheaded scenes, but the variety of animals involved gives the film a certain cheesy spectacle that’s worth a watch.

Hercules In The Haunted World

Although it was not unusual for Italian sword-and-sandal adventures to pit their musclebound heroes against monsters or strange creatures, this atmospheric fantasy from acclaimed director Mario Bava (BLACK SUNDAY) careens way over past other pepla into the horror genre.

Back as the titular Greek god is Reg Park, who had just played Hercules for director Vittorio Cottafavi in HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN. Not only is HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD a marvelously sumptuous treat for the eyes with its fascinating color schemes and imaginative visual effects, but it also provides Hercules with a strong opposite—not physically, of course, but no less dangerous than if he were beefed up to Parkian proportions—in Christopher Lee, then well known for playing Dracula and the Frankenstein Monster in Hammer productions.

Unfortunately, Lee’s distinctive baritone is dubbed by another actor, which dilutes his performance to some degree. Lee uses his stern countenance to good avail as the evil Lico, the uncle of Hercules’ betrothed, the beautiful Princess Deianira (Leonora Ruffo). Hercules (Park) returns home from his latest adventure to learn from Lico that Deianira has taken ill and is unable to rule, leaving her uncle in charge. Actually, Lico has hypnotized her into a zombie state in order to seize the throne.

To cure his special lady and restore her to her rightful place as ruler of Ecalia, Hercules teams up with his best friend Theseus (Giorgio Ardisson) and Telemachus (Franco Giacobini) to first retrieve a golden apple from a creepy tree, and then use it to gain entrance to Hell, where a magic stone that can restore Deianira’s soul rests. But, hey, that’s all child’s play next to the zombie army Lico keeps in his catacombs to ward off intruders while he sacrifices his niece to the gods.

Less exciting than the earlier CAPTIVE WOMEN, HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD makes up for its relative lack of action by washing everything in cool green and red and blue colors or drenching its strange worlds in shadows. Bava does deliver some rousing heroics, of course, and Park is more than up to the task—for instance, the opening, in which he tosses a huge wagon at a band of invaders. Bava’s use of glass paintings, gels, and miniatures are sublime. HAUNTED WORLD is one of the best pepla.

-30-

It's a little disappointing not to be covering NATIONAL LAMPOON'S ANIMAL  HOUSE for the Jack Webb Blogathon. As you may know, director John Landis really wanted the DRAGNET star to play Dean Wormer in his 1978 comedy classic (and Kim Novak to play Wormer's wife!). He even met with Webb, who hadn't acted on-screen since a 1971 episode of the Don Adams police sitcom THE PARTNERS. It isn't clear whether Webb turned down the role, Universal rejected the notion, or both. At any rate, John Vernon (CHARLEY VARRICK) was hired to play Wormer and was terrific.

So, to a film that Webb did star in. Not only that, but he was also the director and producer of -30-, Webb's first film since DRAGNET went off the air in 1959 after 276 episodes (and many more on radio).

Webb takes Joe Friday to the big screen and a newspaper office in 1959's -30-, a simultaneously cynical and sentimental drama about reporters and editors pounding a beat, so to speak. And, boy, are they glib, at least according to screenwriter William Bowers (THE GUNFIGHTER), who can’t resist making the whole damn city room sound like a Hope & Crosby routine.

Led by night managing editor Sam Gatlin (Webb), the staff of a big-city newspaper working the 3pm-midnight shift tries to fill pages on what starts out as a slow night.

Before you know it, a lost three-year-old is wandering around the storm drains, rewrite woman Lady’s (Louise Lorimer) test pilot grandson is flying into danger, the boss’ influential friends are touring the newsroom, Gatlin frets over his wife's (HAZEL's Whitney Blake, later the co-creator of ONE DAY AT A TIME) decision to adopt a child, and city editor Jim Bathgate (William Conrad) is risking a buck on the sex of an Italian movie star’s new baby. All while a torrential thunderstorm rages.

Being a Jack Webb joint, the banter occasionally slows for a self-righteous monologue, but the dialogue is generally paced like a DRAGNET episode at 78 rpm. In fact, -30- rips by so quickly that, a minute after learning of a newsroom tragedy, Gatlin and Bathgate are making jokes again. As weird as it is to see Jack Webb laughing, he carries the picture well, and the blustering Conrad (CANNON) nearly steals it off Webb’s shoulders.

Joe Flynn (MCHALE’S NAVY), Richard Deacon (THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW), Howard McNear (THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW), and David Nelson (THE ADVENTURES OF OZZIE AND HARRIET) are also on the paper’s staff. Webb directed one more feature before returning to television to produce G.E. TRUE, 77 SUNSET STRIP, TEMPLE HOUSTON, and a revamp of DRAGNET. Warner Brothers originally released -30- on a double bill with the Clint Walker western YELLOWSTONE KELLY.

This post is part of the Jack Webb Blogathon being hosted by The Hannibal 8. Make sure you drop by this weekend for plenty of wild Webbness.

Pledge Night

If PLEDGE NIGHT holds any significance for anyone, it’s because of a brief role by Joey Belladonna, who at the time was the lead singer of Anthrax, the thrash metal band that also performed the film’s score. The directorial debut of Paul Ziller, who went on to a prolific career making awful movies with titles like SNAKEHEAD TERROR, ANDROID APOCALYPSE, and YETI: CURSE OF THE SNOW DEMON, this slasher movie plays like a less mature hybrid of REVENGE OF THE NERDS and SLAUGHTER HIGH.

Belladonna appears very briefly in a flashback as Sidney Snyder, a 1960s hippie (he doesn’t look like one) who dies in an acid bath during a hazing prank gone awry. In 1988, it’s Hell Week at Phi Epsilon Nu, where some dickweed frat guys humiliate their new pledges by making them pick up bing cherries with their ass cheeks and walk around with corn cobs tied to their cranks. These are just two of the interminable procession of tortures the freshmen endure for the sole purpose of becoming one of the douchebags making them do it.

Because producer/screenwriter Joyce Snyder was influenced by the A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET sequels — the ones where the gnarled Freddy would make quips after creative kills — the horror part of PLEDGE NIGHT follows no rules of logic or narrative structure (I didn’t say she understood the NIGHTMARE films). Suffice to say that Sid returns to life twenty years later with his face and body horribly disfigured (and a different actor in the role) and starts killing the pledges, their frat brothers, and their girlfriends (Sid makes sure their breasts are exposed first).

The acting is amateurish, and the characters unlikable and not worthy of rooting for (the exception being Todd Eastland, who is sympathetic as “townie” pledge Larry). PLEDGE NIGHT is a bad film by most units of measurement, but it also is not dull, often hilarious, and packed with bare breasts and surprisingly good special effects. The splatter is expertly created on what must have been less than a reasonable budget, most notably a shot of Sid emerging from the chest of a screaming freshman ALIEN-style.

Is PLEDGE NIGHT worth seeing? Heaven help me, for some of us, it is. The killer is absurd — “That’s for Spiro Agnew,” he says after twisting a guy’s head off, whatever that means — and the ending is beyond stupid. Even though you know how it’s going to end, you won’t be prepared for how inane it really is. But, well, gore, boobs, creative kills, and many laughs — at it, not with it. Filmed on the Rutgers University campus, if you can believe it.

The Snorkel

Like the best COLUMBO episodes, THE SNORKEL opens with an elaborate, ingenious murder being committed by a cold, brilliant man.

Paul Decker (Peter Van Eyck) drugs his wife, plugs the cracks in the doors and windows, opens the gas jets operating the room’s lamps, and watches her succumb to the fumes while he sits calmly wearing a snorkel with rubber tubes that feed him fresh air from outdoors. The next morning, he crawls beneath the floorboards through a hidden trapdoor and listens to the investigating detective (Gregoire Aslan) and an official from the British consulate (William Franklyn) declare the death a suicide.

But Candy (Mandy Miller) knows better. She knows her stepfather Paul has murdered her mother, because she saw him murder her father years earlier. Nobody believed her then, and nobody, not even her governess Jean (Betta St. John), believes Paul is a murderer now.

Peter Myers and Jimmy Sangster’s tightly constructed screenplay turns into a bit of cat-and-mouse, as Candy starts to figure out how Paul, who claims to have been in another country at the time of the suicide and has the passport stamp to prove it, could have done the murder, and he realizes she’s beginning to figure it out.

The only Hammer film for both Van Eyck and director Guy Green, THE SNORKEL rests upon their more-than-capable work, wringing as much suspense as possible out of the concept (which was hatched by DR. NO actor Anthony Dawson). Van Eyck plays Decker like a real creep, particularly a scene in which he reads Candy a fake suicide note allegedly penned by her mother.

Unfortunately, Miller’s performance—the film’s most important—is not up to Van Eyck’s, and she seems a bit old for the role too. It isn’t a fatal misstep, however, and THE SNORKEL is a delightful thriller with a thoroughly hissable villain.