"13 Frightened Girls" (1963) d/ William Castle

Contrary to popular belief, this one isn't about what's on Bill Cosby's voicemail. Instead, it's another offering from the schlock king, William Castle, some extremely light espionage fare that saw the filmmaker put out a worldwide casting call for the prettiest girls from thirteen countries for the production, filming slightly different versions showcasing each girl for their respective homeland. Personally, I would have rathered a plastic skeleton on a wire or a cheap joy buzzer under my theater seat, but that's just me. On board for this cold war Gidget Goes Mata Hari, are the likes of Murray Hamilton, who you'll remember as the mayor of Shark City in Jaws (1975), and Emil Sitka, who you may recall catching a custard pie or two in the mush throughout many Three Stooges shorts. In the lead is Kathy Dunn, who would go on to appear on Days of Our Lives in 1965. The story goes like this...


"Think of it as payback for the days of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force..."
Candy (Kathy Dunn) is the teenage daughter of an American ambassador, who's home on vacation from a prestigious finishing school with thirteen (fifteen, if you're actually paying attention) other international beauties. She's hopelessly in love with a C.I.A. agent named Wally (Murray Hamilton), a friend of her father's  who's already engaged to one of his colleagues nicknamed "Soldier" (Joyce Taylor) and old enough to be her Uncle Vaughn, the mayor of Amity Island...alright, alright,  no more Jaws jokes. Anyway, Wally's been slacking with his spying, and Candy eavesdrops on her old man (Hugh Marlowe) chewing him a new one during the chauffeured family ride, and if he doesn't provide some valuable information on a cat named Kagenescu pron-fuckin'-to, he'll be forced to seek employment elsewhere. I hear Amity Island is electing a new mayor soon, buddy. Candy vetoes the haughty tennis matches,  formal parties, and hours endlessly yapping on the phone to boys that normally comprises the vacation of a diplomat's daughter, and decides to help her unrequited love keep his job by becoming a secret agent named "Kitten". She dips her pet cat's paw in ink and signs her anonymous tip notes with its paw, too. What an adorable little coquette.


"...but Alex Kintner was supposed to be my prom date!", sobs Candy (Kathy Dunn).
Naturally, nobody in the entire American embassy can figure out who "Kitten" is, as she gathers more secret information than any agent under employment by the country. She's visiting Mai-Ling (Lynne Sue Moon), the Chinese communist friend she ought not have, when she stumbles upon Kagenescu's body hung on a meat hook in the basement, with her father's letter opener sunk into his bread basket, gathers the murder weapon, avoids detection by crawling on all fours (apparently, the Chinese are incapable of looking down when they're searching for someone), and delivers the vital evidence to dad anonymously through Wally. She courageously thwarts a planned student uprising by vamping it up for a Russian fellow masquerading as a Swede at his apartment, even sending him plummeting from the balcony to his death just as he's about to do the same to her. I can't see Sandra Dee pulling that one off. Things eventually heat up to where those sneaky Chinese kidnap "Soldier", demanding "Kitten" in exchange, hiring a super secret agent named "The Spider" to remove the pesky operative from the Asian equation. Does Candy get eighty-sixed on the job? See this one for yourselves and find out.


"Steam rice extra unless you buy combo!", exclaims Mai-Ling (Lynne Sue Moon).
Even by Castle's usually pretty tame standards, this one is torentially drippy and twice as bathetic as an hour and a half of Gidget reruns on Antenna TV, save for a few moments where Candy discovers the hanging corpse. Unless you've taken a fancy to Ms. Dunn, who resembles an early sixties version of Miley Cyrus, this is rough terrain for most genre folks to tread, I'd imagine. Castle completists will want to check it out, certainly, but speaking as one, myself, and somebody who's not entirely opposed to watching goofy shit now and again (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, as an example...), I didn't draw much from it. Two Wops seems like a good fit for this baker's dozen of chicks, none of which seemed all that frightened by anything that transpired throughout the movie. Unfortunately, that's something we had in common.


"Cry all you want. I'm taking you to Cleveland."

"Mr. Sardonicus" (1961) d/ William Castle

Tonight we return to the wonderfully gimmicky world of William Castle, the B-Movie King of the 50's and 60's, the filmmaker responsible for such beloved genre schlock as House on Haunted Hill (1959), The Tingler (1959), 13 Ghosts (1960), and a driving inspiration/cinema idol for later directors like John Waters and Robert Zemeckis. His publicity gimmicks were legendary; from life insurance policies in case theatergoers died of fright with Macabre (1958), to "Percepto", shock buzzers fastened to the bottom of theater seats, in The Tingler (1959), to the "Punishment Poll" of tonight's feature, where audience members held up card with glow in the dark thumbs to vote whether or not the titular fiend, Sardonicus, should suffer further or not. Of course, legend has it that no audience ever voted to pardon him for his crimes, bypassing the kinder, gentler ending that Castle himself said was filmed and screened a few times... however unlikely the existence of such footage is, say I.

 
"I misplaced the Twister mat, we'll have to play Leech-face again, instead...," quips Krull (Oscar Homolka).
Enter Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis), a David Hasselhoff lookalike/eminent physician in 1880's London, whose groundbreaking work with tissue massage (pronounced MASS-age, of course) and proficiency with experimental instruments such as the "hypodermic needle" have traveled as far as Gorslava, a central European region beset with dry ice and miniature landscapes, where a certain mysterious Baron named Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe) has requested the good doctor's presence through an urgent letter penned by his wife, Maude (Audrey Dalton), a former flame of Cargrave's. Robert is deftly carriaged off  past crappy set pieces to the carshole by Krull (Oscar Homolka), not to be confused with the British big budgeted sci-fi adventure of the same name, rather, he's a one-eyed grinning underling of the Baron, who gets his kicks laying live leeches on the faces of screaming servant chicks who've effed up. How difficult is it to hire good help these days, indeed.

 
"Del Shannon! Delllllllll! Oh my GODDDD!!! I LOOOOOOOOVE YOU, DELLLLLL!"
 At the aforementioned carshole, Sardonicus proves an enigmatic chap, draping his grill in an emotionless Ben Cooper-looking mask at all times, and sickeningly slurping slop in secret in his chambers like Michael Moore on a bottomless vat of chicken rice soup at Old Country Buffet. He relates his tragic tale to the physician, in hopes that it will sway him to lend his talents to the Baron's current facial dilemma. It seems he was once a humble normal-faced Euro-peasant married to a hypergamous greenback-crazy harlot, when a winning lottery ticket is mistakenly buried with his father, forcing him to explore the definition of "ghoul" on a personal level, by digging up his dad's corpse and rummaging through his pockets for the winning numbers. Only, he's shocked to find his father's remains locked in a sardonic death-grin, and so shocked, in fact, that his own facial muscles are frozen in the same expression, leading to his current state of lonely solitude, save for that infrequent call from Hollywood, asking him to stunt double for Cesar Romero. Will Cargrave give the Baron's rotten puss a revitalizing rubdown? Will Maude make off with her former flame, who's never enjoyed the company of another woman since? If you're not sure of the answers to these and other questions, I suggest you pick up a copy of Sardonicus, and answer them for yourselves...

 
That new Whiskey toothpaste has done wonders for your bicuspids.
Castle, a favorite of mine since I was knee high to my old man's 1930's shoeshine box, may have been the last of the true Hollywood showmen, always adding mirth and mayhem to his low budget productions with goofy gimmicks and corny cameos, and tonight's review is no exception to any of these concepts. Speaking of my old man and regarding Sardonicus, he'd often tuck his upper lip up into his face and stare at you until you mentioned something, back then. Yeah, Dad, yeah. Mr. Sardonicus. I know. I blame the Famous Monsters of Filmland cover art by Basil Gogos on Issue 126 for the frequent annoyance. He also did a horrendous imitation of Peter Lorre that we won't elaborate further upon. Sardonicus is available in a five movie box set collection of Castle cult classics that's inexpensive enough that you've got no good excuse for failing to see it. Two Wops.


"If they don't get the joke...pull the rope and let them choke! Ooh, hoo, haa-haa, haa-haa! How delicious!"

"The Tingler"(1959)d/William Castle

Though we're a month late for official Vincentennial celebrations(you never met me in St Louie, ya mamaluccos), covering campy cult classics starring the late genre king is never untimely, especially when they're produced and directed by the legendary showman William Castle, who dusted off one of his greatest theatrical gimmicks for the film, in "Percepto!", where he had certain seats in larger theaters wired up with small buzzers from leftover WW2 surplus that vibrated upon cue from the projectionist when the titular Tingler breaks loose in the film.In some instances, Castle even hired planted moviegoers who'd faint and scream, and even faux nurses and ambulances to gurney off the phony vertiginous victims.The uncredited actor portraying the projectionist was Dal McKennon, the voice of familiar green claymation icon, Gumby.The movie, released as a 40th Anniversary Special Edition dvd in 1999, also boasts of an ahead-of-it's-time color sequence, a wonderfully rotten rubber spinal loberstail/centipede combo creature, and Vincent Price trippin' face on acid.Really, how fucking great is that?

Trippin' balls, Dr. Chapin(Vincent Price) suddenly gets The Strawberry Alarm Clock.
After a historic three screaming disembodied head prologue by Castle himself, we're introduced to Dr. Warren Chapin(Vincent Price), on hand to perform the autopsy for a state execution by electric chair; a sideline for pathological studies into the very nature of fear itself.While cracking open the ex-convict up like a gruesome pistacchio in front of the man's brother-in-law, Ollie(Philip Coolidge), Chapin discovers vertebrae that have been pulverized by tremendous pressure, which the good doctor surmises must have originated in the power of fear.Makes sense.After driving him home to the movie theater he helps his deaf mute wife run, the doctor accidentally cuts himself which sends Martha(Judith Evelyn), unable to scream and release her expression of hemophobia, into a psychosomatic coma.He revives the theater's owner/moneyhandler, who immediately rushes to the safe nearby, ensuring her money is still all there.Oh, it's one of those marriages.Suffering a toxic union of his own, Chapin's wife Isabel(Patricia Cutts) is a philandering floozie who not only conspires against her sister Lucy(Pamela Lincoln) and her main squeeze David(Darryl Hickman), who works as Warren's lab assistant, but also poisoned her pops for her legacy.After peeping the bold bitch's latest indiscretion tangling tongues with her in the street, Chapin puts a hot lead one in Isabel's labonza, afterwards throwing her on an x-ray slab and exposing a few plates.He then revives her, revealing that he merely plugged her with blanks as part of his latest research experiment.The frazzled harlot remarks that when she turns the tables on her husband, it won't be an experiment.Whoa.The next day, Warren shows David the photographic fruit of his labors, evidence of a creepy-crawlie that exists in all human spinal columns, absorbing fear and growing along the vertebrae, only shrinking back to its original microscopic size when the feeling subsides.Chapin proudly remarks that he's dubbed the beastie, "Tingler"(how scientific!).

"Forty bucks worth of hardshell Maine lobstertail!Papa's chowin' like an Ottoman suzerain tonight!"
To further research his findings, Chapin jabs himself with 100 micrograms of a new experimental drug, lysergic acid diethylimide 25(sigh....cue the stomach butterflies of love), cartoonishly freaks out on a bad trip, screams like a girl, and passes the fuck out.Later he gives Ollie a script for sleepers for his troubled mate, who comes off her dose only to see self-opening and closing windows and doors, a disfigured fiend with obligatory shiv in her bed, and in the bathroom, a tub full of claret from which an arm rises ominously.The mute, unable to scream and pushed to the brink, collapses dead.Ever the opportunist, Warren hurriedly autopsies the bitch, extricating the fear-eater which overpowers the doctor, wrapping its pincers around his arm until his pain-laden yelp freezes the thing.Isabel, confessing she's been unworthy, suggests a celebratory drink to his astounding find, that contains a mickey her husband ironically drinks after switching glasses with her as a safeguard against just that.She unleashes the "Tingler" on his throat, but Lucy arrives screamingly before the scare-sucking lobster can kill him.Warren, unwilling to further play God after discovering the creature is virtually indestructible, decides to replace the "Tingler" in Martha's corpse from whence it came...only Ollie hasn't contacted the authorities or a funeral parlor as of yet.Chapin stumbles in on him as he's packing for an abrupt get-outski,and while confronting him about his criminality, the "Tingler" breaks loose from its steel box and into a packed theater.Cue:Percepto.Warren announces to the audience:"The Tingler is loose in the theater! Scream! Scream for your lives!"as the screen goes dark amidst ad libs from the crowd.The chill-chewing crustacean latches onto the projectionist whose scream immobilizes it long enough for Chapin to subdue it and place it back into Martha's dead body before he leaves to alert the authorities.Ollie tries to make a break for it, but his attempt is met by windows and doors slamming shut on their own, and the shrouded corpse of his dead wife rising from the table and walking towards him, his face twisted into an inaudible scream...

Martha(Judith Evelyn) regrets her thrifty switch to Mr. Plasma from Mr. Bubble.
Despite the obvious stretches-in-basic biological principles this classic's plot be-nudgingly asks the viewer to accept with or without sodium chloride, this, like most of Castle's work during his period of theatrical carny exploits, is highly enjoyable fluff of the campiest order.Price, as always, purveys more emotion with his eyes alone than a dozen of Hollywood's current upper eschelon could with full bodies.Revisiting movies like this only reinforce what an irreplaceable force he was on the silver screen.As a memorial to genre icons like Castle and Price, Tingler is a must for the shelves of horror fans of any generation to enjoy, and well-deserving of the three wops it receives on the rating scale.Highly recommended.

Insert comic book scream here.You know, something like..."YEEEEEAAAAARRRGHHHH!!!"

"Shanks"(1974)d/William Castle

Yeah,Shanks for nothin',Castle.
When somebody mentions a genre giant like William Castle,titles like "13 Ghosts"(1960),"The House on Haunted Hill"(1959),"The Tingler"(1959),or "Strait-Jacket"(1964) immediately come to mind,and leave one with fond memories of the cinema's greatest showman and his indelible legacy therein.Tonight's selection,"Shanks",his final directorial morsel,on the other hand,probably does not.There's a reason for that.You'll find no "Percepto!","Emergo!","Coward's Corner","Fright Break",or even "Illusion-O" here.Long-time Castle staple Vincent Price isn't on board,either.Unfortunately for anyone on board for the 93 minutes of strangeness served up here,this film's gimmick is "Mime-O".That's right,ninety-three minutes of pantomime-based weird.They didn't call 'em "dumbshows" for nothing,ya know.I needed Castle's electric shock in my seat just to stay awake this time around.Hell,a cheap plastic skeleton on a wire might have kept me from snoring out loud,too.Loosen your cravat,throw on your most colossal pair of seventies bellbottoms,and let's walk against the wind into this little number together,shall we?

Is that the tv remote you've got there,Malcolm Shanks(Marcel Marceau)?For the love of God,turn yourself off!
Once upon a time,there was a downtrodden mute puppeteer named Malcolm(Marceau) who lived with his abusive drunken brother and his wife,and only derived pleasure from putting on puppet shows for the neighborhood children,one of which,a pretty young girl named Celia(Cyndy Eilbacher,of "Bad Ronald" and "Slumber Party Massacre 2" fame),he's kinda creepily fixated upon.When he's not being talked down to or watching his soused sibling riverdancing on his handcrafted puppet heads,he works for Old Walker(also Marceau)in his laboratory experimenting on bringing dead animals back to life with electrodes and a crude remote control box.You know,I bet later on in the story,they're gonna try to use this morbid scientific discovery to bring people back to life.After Old Walker eats sudden geryatric death,Malcolm decides to use the codger's electrodes and channel changer on his stiffened corpse,resulting in a puppetesque mockery of life,all controlled by Shanks twisting a primitive knob or two.When Malcolm's brother suspects foul play after not having weekly pay to siphon from,the mute uses his ancient employer's corpse to add his brutally bellicose brother to the bodycount.His foul mouthpiece of a wife follows soon after.To avoid suspicion from the authorities,he reanimates the awful pair as well,and awkwardly stumbles them through town with a pair of channel changers hidden under his long coat.Wait,now there's three mimes clowning around on camera?I didn't sign up for this,Castle!

Where's "deliciously grotesque"?All I see is platitudinous vanilla.
With his pain-in-the-ass hovelmates effectively removed from the equation,our ascot-sporting anti-hero can finally focus his attention on corrupting the morals of minor galpal Celia.The young girl gets over the initial shock of her mute mate monkeying with puppet-cadavers and the strange couple retreat to Old Walker's mansion to play dress up with the flesh-dummies as macabre man-servants,only to be interrupted by perhaps the most effeminate biker gang to ever grace the silver screen since Larry G. Brown's "The Pink Angels"(1971),looking for a place to party in,and perhaps a young girl to strangle,a bell-bottomed mute to slap around.You know the drill.Before long,the bikers have their greasy mitts on the corpse controllers and make the rotting remains do even more stupid dead body tricks.When the leader...ahem..."Genghis Khan" decides he'd like to strangle Celia for kicks,Malcolm reanimates Old Walker,who he'd buried in the cemetery outside earlier,and a corpse-puppet v. corpse-puppet/corpse-puppet v. sissy biker battle-to-the-death(undeath?) ensues.Malcolm is victorious,but when he goes to rescue his young friend,he finds Celia is already dead.Alas,it's all just an elaborate daydream in the mute puppeteer's head afterall.She's alive,it's the movie itself that died about ninety-three minutes earlier...

Make it strangle the screenwriter,Malcolm!
Though I should put my ballot in the pro-mime box,as Commedia dell'arte dell'improvvisazione is unmistakably Italian in origin,I can't honestly say that I'm at all proud of that little morsel of information.That pantomime combines with a piss-weak screenplay here to form a rotten piece of celluloid masquerading as a "horror movie" only reinforces that for me.Director Castle makes a cameo here as a supermarket grocer,and genre staple Don "Return of the Living Dead" Calfa also punches the clock as a biker/victim of the morbid mannekins.Composer Alex North uses an effective score,previously rejected for "2001:A Space Oddysey"(1971),but none of these things could ever save this boring mess.I'd urge Castle completists to avoid this altogether,and enjoy the incendiary cockroaches of "Bug!"(1975) instead.Imagine yourself somehow trapped in a claustrophobic invisible box full of SUCK.The Wopsploitation scale rating here is also deservedly invisible.

Two stiffs standing in the weeds.Move over,Avatar.Excitement has a new name...


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