Jack the Ripper Goes West a.k.a. A Knife for the Ladies 1974 Bryanston Productions
Director: Larry G. Spangler
Starring: Jack Elam and introducing the director's kid!
Out in the wild, wild west something sinister is going on. There's been a series of murders- all women of ill repute, found stabbed, with their throats slit. It's as if Jack the Ripper has shown up in Mescal, AZ! Get it?
Some young, hot-shot detective rides into town to help investigate the murders and this really irks the local sheriff (Elam, in one of millions of like roles). They have a big fist fight and then what else, become the best of friends! Their first order of business is to bring down a trio of vigilantes, who hanged a mexican for being seen with one of the victims.
Once that's done, they hit the science books(?) and figure out someone has syphilis (didn't everyone in the wild west have syphilis?). Anyway, in this town, only one guy could have syphilis and he's been dead for years! So they open the tomb and by damn... No body!
Next thing you know, sweet Jenny, the music teacher, is in the wrong place at the wrong time. She's in the killer's lair and doesn't even know it. Naturally, Sheriff Jack and Burns the Dick hear her scream and run to here immediate rescue.
In the end, it's all just a big morality tale. If you fuck prostitutes, you'll get syphilis and then one of your relatives will be forced to take revenge on said prostitutes, butchering them one by one as if that will cure your syphilis! This is not the best quality print (or transfer) and it's very dark in the literal sense. Kinda boring, but I've seen worse. XX
Jail Bait 1954 Wade Williams Productions
Director: Edward D. Wood, Jr.
Starring: Lyle Talbot and Steve Reeves
Ed Wood goes mainstream with this crime thriller. After his sister bails him out of jail, a would be gangster and son of a prominent plastic surgeon goes right back to his life of crime. He meets up with a petty gangster and sets out to rob a theatre. Things quickly go from bad to worse when the robbery goes awry and our rich kid turned bad shoots the night watchman- a retired cop!
Racked with guilt, the doc's son breaks away from the gangster and his girl. He goes to his dad's office and promises to turn himself in. Meanwhile, the cops (including Talbot and Reeves) are closing in. The pair was fingered by the girl who interrupted the robbery. The gangster finds the doc's son and brings him back to their hide-out, where he kills the poor bastard.
With the law on his tail and a corpse in the pantry, our criminal couple can't waste time. They hatch a plan- the perfect plan- to force the doctor to alter gangster johnny's (or in this case Brady's) face, so he is no longer identifiable to the cops... Or the pesky eyewitness! The doctor obliges, as he thinks it's the only way he'll see his son alive. Will these wanton criminals pull off the perfect con?
A departure from Wood's other work, this actually comes across as a pretty serious movie. It's well acted and with some help on the script, the dialog is as believable as any film from the period. In short, you'd hardly believe Ed Wood had anything to do with this film... Except his girlfriend Delores Fuller is the above mentioned sister. A decent '50s take on the '30s gangster genre. XXX
Jesse James meets Frankenstein's Daughter 1965 Embassy Films
Director: William Beaudine
To tell you the truth, I don't know which came first... This or Billy the Kid vs. Dracula. They seem to have come out at the same time! Either way, this time we have Jesse James and his sidekick, who hook up with the the "wild bunch" to rob a stage coach. Everything goes to hell, and Jesse's bodybuilder buddy gets shot. They manage to escape and meet up with some mexican sheepherders and their calienté daughter, Junita.
Juanita sneaks them out of camp that night and after being briefly kidnapped by an injun, Jesse saves her from the savage and they fall in love. (Violins play.) She takes them to the home of her former employer, Maria Frankenstein, who is actually the granddaughter of Baron von... Maria and her brother nurse our muscle-bound hunk back to life but with ulterior motives! Which can only be, to turn him into a freakish monster.
Now this whole time Johnny Lawman has been on Jesse's tail, scouring the town and surrounding hills for Jesse. Maria, she puts the moves on Jesse and when he refuses her she sends him to town to get "medicine", setting him up. A gunfight and Jesse makes it back, passing Juanita on the way. She would rather see him dead than in the hands of that Frankenstein bitch! Then the big showdown at the end...
This was even worse than the afore mentioned Billy the Kid vs. Dracula, as it lacked the humor of the former. It played more like a soap opera, all melodramatic and some of the most atrocious acting ever filmed! The monster was funny, just the same guy with his shirt off and some stitches around his shaved head! And she renamed him Igor. The worst part of this: She transplanted another brain into Jesse's friend, yet he still recognized Jesse and Juanita! Did anyone READ the script? ~
Journey to the Center of Time 1967 Borealis-Dorad Productions
Director: David L. Hewitt
A team of scientists, trying to travel time, is under the gun to produce some results or lose their funding under the new management, namely Stanton Junior. Seems senior died and left junior in charge of the company and junior is more interested in weapons than time travel. He gives the team 24 hours to come up with their "photo of the past".
Next morning, there's Stanton, at the lab, demanding results. The team- that is; Doc, Mark and Karen- throw out the safety manual and crank up the laser's "photon modulation frequency". Off they go, straight to 5968 AD! There is a war going on, waged mainly with lasers. Aliens enter the lab and take the lost earthlings to their leader, a pasty bald chick with magnificent orbs. As she lays mortally wounded, she warns them of the danger of lasers and sends them back to the lab.
They set the dials and head back, but something goes wrong and they pass right by the present to 1 million BC, where dinosaurs (er, pet store lizards) roam the earth! Stanton decides to take a walk outside(!) and the doc goes to rescue him. Soon, all are outside the lab and in a volcanic cave. While mission control struggles to bring them back, they struggle with the greedy Stanton and their own miscalculations in returning. Then a very puzzling ending...
Ultra low-budget drive-in fare. It has all the bullshit scientific jargon still heard today from prominent time-travel proponents. Maybe they developed their theories from this movie! As a movie, it was merely OK. XX