Viewings: August 2023

Feel like I struck out this month as it’s mostly been a dour lot; the only notable film discovery was François Truffaut's The Bride Wore Black.

Film:

Anatomy of a Psycho (Boris Petroff, 1961)*

For a Few Dollars More (Sergio Leone, 1965)

The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism AKA The Blood Demon (Harald Reinl, 1967)

The Bride Wore Black (François Truffaut, 1968)*

Something Evil (Steven Spielberg, 1972)*

Kidnap Syndicate (Fernando Di Leo, 1975)*

Cat Murkil and the Silks AKA Cruisin’ High (John A. Bushelman, 1976)*

Blue Sunshine (Jeff Lieberman, 1977)

Arrebato AKA Rapture (Iván Zulueta, 1979)*

Tourist Trap (David Schmoeller, 1979)

Harlequin (Simon Wincer, 1980)

The Deadly Camp (Bowie Lau, 1999)*

Erotic Nightmare (Wai-Man Cheng, 1999)*

Television:

The Avengers (random episodes) (Sydney Newman, 1961 - 1969)* 

"New" Alfred Hitchcock Presents - Season 1, Episodes 0 - 4 (Christopher Crowe, Jon Slan & Michael Sloan, 1985)

Mastermind (random repeats) 

The Chase (random repeats)

 

* First time viewings.

 

Dada Debaser Notes:

• Blaming the Handover of Hong Kong on the decline of quality Cat. III films as the ones I watched this month were poor. There's a fine art to making exploitation, and The Deadly Camp and Erotic Nightmare lack any creatively OTT finesse.
• Arrebato isn’t the lost seventies masterpiece revisionist hipsters make it out to be. It’s an incoherent and boring mess themed around drugs and film making with a predictable climax.
• Although it’s a bit of a dud, Spielberg’s TV movie has some distinguishable elements that are later reused and improved in Poltergeist (1982); adding more credibility to the rumour he might have ghost directed it.
• Kidnap Syndicate was decent, but a real chore to sit through at times. Would have been more enjoyable without all the heavy-handed social commentary on classism weighing it down.
  
• Expected Anatomy of a Psycho to be another maniac film capitalising off the success of Psycho (1960). The reality is it's a dull juvenile deliquent movie.
  
• Revisiting Blue Sunshine and I've come to the conclusion it's basically a David Cronenberg film helmed by Larry Cohen instead. 
• Adding the Silks from Cat Murkil and the Silks in the same league as the Hi-Hats from The Warriors (1979) and the boat punters in Baby Love (1969) as lamest looking gang in a film. Surprisingly dark and twisted in places. Bloke who played Cat Murkil also briefly appeared in the intro to Halloween (1978) as Judith Myers's boyfriend. 
  
• While Christopher Lee might have top billing and is hardly in it, The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism is a gorgeous gothic euro horror. Because of this, I can't believe it's a German production and not an Italian or Spanish one. Also, Karin Dor is unrecognisable in it as a raven-haired brunette. Looked totally different when she played the S.P.E.C.T.R.E woman fed to the piranhas.

Other media related stuff I enjoyed while avoiding the Womens' World Cup: The Martorialist's songs that bring him joy; both volumes in Rob Hill's Alien knock-off films video essay; and the Emlyn Hughes of film criticism having a go at another movie I really like.