Japanese Spiderman: The Greatest Spiderman TV Show Ever!

          This is not to be confused with the Marvel Mangaverse version of Spiderman. This was the 1970s and Marvel, during the comic slump of the time, was looking to expand their properties. They saw that Japanese action cartoons were becoming popular. Battle of the Planets, Star Blazers, and Robotech all being prime examples. To grab some of this sweet fruit, they entered into a three year deal with Toei Entertainment, wherein each party could use the other’s characters in whatever way they deemed would work in their perspective markets. 

          Marvel adapted two of the Japanese characters to expand their Shogun Warriors (a sort of early Transformers) comic adaptation. While Toei created Battle Fever J, the Japanese Captain America of all things, an animated TV movie based on Marvel’s Tomb of Dracula comic, and this little gem. 

What did you expect it to look like?

          This isn’t your average spidey story. In fact the only similarities are the costume, some of the powers, and the web. The rest takes a sharp departure. The biggest being…? Well guess. Japan in the 70s making an action show geared towards kids? That has to include giant robots!

          So Spiderman was given the mighty robot Leopardtron to strike against the evils of the world. Not that you would recognize any of the villains. This Spiderman didn’t fight against the Green Goblin, Sandman, or good ol’ Doc Ock. Instead the main villain is Professor Monster and his Iron Cross Army, an alien organization (that looked human) with plans to rule the universe.

Leopardtron!

          As such with this series we have the monster of the week, or Machine BEMS, created by the Professor, who can change size from very small to huge, necessitating breaking Leopardtron out of storage and blasting it in a Voltron like battle.

          The origin story is as follows: Professional motorcycle racer Takuya Yamashiro sees a spaceship crash land which out pulling some wicked moves. He goes with his father a prominent “space archaeologist” to investigate, but the elder killed in their exploration. The incident also attracts the attention of Professor Monster and his boys, the evil Amazoness, and monster creations, who are on Earth to conquer it.

My favorite still.

          Takurya discovers a dying alien in the ship who bequeaths on him a green lant… oops I mean he discovers the last warrior of the planet Spider, who injects him with his blood, granting the young motorcyclist the powers of a spider- I guess- and the keys to the ship, called the Marveller, which can also transform into the aforementioned giant robot. Just before dying the alien gives the hero a mission: To fight and defeat Professor Monster and his evil Iron Cross Army!

          Now apart from the powers mentioned above the Japanese Spiderman also is granted the GP-7 flying car, complete with missiles and machine guns. The Spider Bracelet, which contains his costume that shoots out over his body as needed, dispenses the webbing he all known, and acts as a homing beacon for his vehicles.

          This series, while goofy, is an incredible amount of fun. Forty one episodes were produced between 1978 and 1979 with excellent titles like “The Hero's Shining Hot Blood”, "Professor Monster's Ultra Poisoning", "To the Flaming Hell: See the Tears of the Snake Woman",  "The Onion Silver Mask and the Boys' Detective Group" and  "From the Unexplored Amazon: Here Comes the Mummified Beautiful Woman". It is recommended that, if you can find a copy, to watch it with a group of pals with plenty of  alcohol.

Too much symbolism?

          I have been unable to find a full copy of an episode. There was a collection released in 2004 for Region 2 only, but you have to get it through Japan or a Taiwanese knockoff. But the soundtrack is available through Amazon Prime streaming if you are interested, it may be worth a listen. Marvel briefly had them streaming from their site, but have taken them down. So I have placed a few clips and Marvel’s official trailer for your gratification.

          Enjoy and Caveat Emptor!

                                                   Marvel Trailer

                                                A highlights clip

                          A monster fight scene with Leopardtron

                             Some of the transformations scenes.

                                            The series opening...

                                                          ... and the ending ballad. 

  

Attack!- A War Film Way Ahead of Its Time

          Often out image of the 1950s is one of fervent patriotism and home cooked peachy keenness, then we run across a film like Attack! and realize that it wasn’t. This is an incredible cynical film about corruption of the officer class in the United States Army during World War II. Not that the setting matters, the basic plot could be transported to any war and still ring true. It stars Eddie Albert, Jack Palance, Lee Marvin, and Richard Jaeckel.

          Eddie Albert is the standout character here. A living representative of the Peter Principle where a man can be promoted three or four rungs above their competence level. He is the son of a rich senator who gained his position through his family’s contacts. Planning to go into politics himself, the character needed some wartime credentials to seal the deal, but found he couldn’t handle the stress.

         His men suffer and die for it, as the cowardly captain refuses to go into dangerous situations to back up his own men. The captain is allowed to get away with it, because his commanding officer, played by Lee Marvin, who hopes to use the family’s connections to further his own career after the war. Sick of seeing his men die, Jack Palance is the only one who will stand up to him. This results in many arguments, an ultimate showdown that is both haunting and grim.

The Defense Department (as it had been recently renamed from the Department of War) refused to cooperate in any measure with the production of the film, hampering it immeasurably. Their objection, as will come to no surprise, was to Eddie Albert’s character, claiming in a letter that the personage “is a very distasteful story and derogatory of Army leadership during combat including weak leadership, cowardice, and finally, the murder of the Company Commander.” The director pointed out that there were many other fine examples of noble officers, but the government still rejected it. This meant no equipment, no uniforms, no vehicles, or even Army stock footage. The production had to make due with a pair of old ones on the Fox backlots and use creative editing to make there appear to be more.

This action by the military however turned out to be a boon for the film. Congressman Melvin Price openly criticized the military for their non-involvement in the film, calling it a "shameful attempt at censorship". The distributors, United Artists, exploited this with teaser posters asking "Is this the most controversial picture of the year?" Leading to a much higher profit margin than had been estimated.

The director, in his biography The Films and Career of Robert Aldrich, said of this film, “My main anti-war argument was not the usual 'war is hell,' but the terribly corrupting influence that war can have on the most normal, average human beings, and the terrible things it makes them capable of that they wouldn't be capable of otherwise.”

As you will see, he did an excellent job in this. The entire film is below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor. 

For more fun try books by Rex Hurst

Fort Apache, The Bronx: A Brutal Cop Drama

          The inspiration for the hit TV cop drama Hill Street Blues, this film opens with a drugged out hooker shooting two policemen dead in their car and goes roaring off from there. Starring Paul Newman and Ed Asner the action takes place in the South Bronx one of the poorest areas in the city. The precinct is one of the worst and most dilapidated in the entire department, approaching demolition and staffed mostly by officers who are unwanted by and have been transferred out of other precincts. Here we are treated to drug overdoses, police committing murders, riots, police corruption, bodies unloaded into dumpsters, racism, constant poverty, and just plain old bad NYC attitudes.

          While the film is somewhat uneven, I don’t see it as much of a flaw, and Paul Newman, while unable to conquer the proper accent, does a good job a world weary hard-drinking cop who is just trying to get through the day without the world around him dragging him down. Ed Asner play an ambitious new captain, looking to “clean up the area” and get himself a promotion in the process, is filled with snarling rancor which seems to come so easily from him. Over all the acting by these veterans hold the film together.

          The division presented here is New York's 41st Precinct in the South Bronx. It gets its nickname because the precinct house is more a fort in hostile territory, a reference to the famous Fort Apache of the old West.

          Before the film came out there was controversy. Various groups protested the filming and its opening claiming that it depicted only the negative elements of the Bronx and showed all Puerto Rican and Blacks living there only as criminals. Local youths were hired by the protestors to help swell the ranks. Eventually the producers acceded to the demands, making several script changes, adding more ethnic minorities in positive roles, and placing a title card at the beginning of the film stating,  “The picture you are about to see is a portrayal of the lives of two policemen working out of a precinct in the South Bronx, New York. Because the story involves police work it does not deal with the law abiding members of the community nor does it dramatize the efforts of the individuals and groups who are struggling to turn the Bronx around".

          Ironically the South Bronx had taken a major decline since this film was made, being even more crime ridden and drug polluted than is shown here. It had become an area of derelict buildings, with almost no growth, businesses, or opportunity. The schools in the area are some of the lowest performing in city, with necessary supplies in critically short supply. “There’s no hope where there’s dope.”

                    The entire film is below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor.

For more fun try Across the Wounded Galaxy by Rex Hurst

The Ruling Class: A Unique Film With a Brutal Message

          Based upon the play by Peter Barnes, this is a dark comedy, with jarring musical interludes, that centers around the protagonist of Jack Arnold Alexander Tancred Gurney, the 14^th Earl of Gurney who believes he is the God. The star, Peter O’Toole described it as a “comedy with tragic relief.” The film asks fundamental questions about privilege, humanity, and man's natural gravitation to the baser emotions. As Napoleon stated, "Men are more easily governed through their vices than their virtues."

          It is a savage look at the British class system and especially those at the top, or the “privileged assholes and crazy twats” as the leftist butler, played by Arthur Lowe, calls them. At several poignant moments throughout the film, the cast will suddenly break from straight-faced dialogue into a full-blown, song and dance numbers. In one case, a variation of `Connect 'dem Bones’ (called “Disconnect ‘dem Bones’) is ushered up to punctuate a scene with O'Toole lecturing the local gentry about the need for capital punishment.

Peter O'Toole in The Ruling Class

          After his father accidently hangs himself during a session of autoerotic asphyxiation, Jack returns from a mental institution to take up his role as the Earl and assuming his place in the House of Lords. He proclaims himself to everyone that he is the God of Love and sleeps hanging on a crucifix. His scheming family works hard to alternatively cure him and subvert him.  They hire a doctor to make him sane, but then trick him into marrying a local actress (and mistress of his Uncle) in order to produce an heir in case Jack’s condition cannot be reversed. As the child’s birth becomes imminent the doctor brings in another inmate from his asylum who also believes he is God- the AC/DC God, the Electric Christ. After a truly bizarre squaring off between the two, Jack seems to be cured, but it is revealed that his madness has simply shifted perspective and he takes his revenge on them all.

          The film was only made due to O’Toole’s obsession with it. Upon first seeing the play performed he went out and bought the film rights. According to director Peter Mendek, he had approached O’Toole several times about producing the film, without luck.  Eventually the project got started one night after he and O'Toole were returning from the theatre, which "meant stopping at every pub between Soho and Hampstead, and it didn't matter if it was after closing hour because he would knock on the door and just say 'Peter's here,' and every door opened for him”. Later on, at O'Toole's apartment, the drunk actor phoned his manager and said, "I'm with the crazy Hungarian and I know I'm drunk but I give you 24 hours to set this movie up." The next day, Medak received a call from United Artists and a deal was put together to shoot The Ruling Class. 

          This was such a passion project for O’Toole that he agreed to work for free. He was later compensated by having a large salary for appearing in the same studio’s musical Man of La Mancha, an adaptation of Don Quixote. Also Alistar Sims (famous for his portrayal of Ebenezer Scrooge in the 1951 version of A Christmas Carol) cast himself in the film. He rang up O’Toole out of the blue and told him, “Of course I’ll help you by taking the part”. It might seem presumptuous but Sims had the acting chops to play the part, so O’Toole agreed and cast him as the doddering old Bishop in the family,

          This is a unique film filled with great characters performed by some of the best actors in British cinema at the time, Peter O’Toole was nominated for Best Actor by the Oscars. Viciously funny with a twisted ending, no one walks away with a neutral opinion. It is a love it or hate it production.

              The full film is presented below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor.  

For more fun try books by Rex Hurst

For more fun try Across the Wounded Galaxy by Rex Hurst

The Honeymoon Killers: An Explotative Serial Killer Classic

        A classic low budget film from the 1970s that has since accrued cult status. And while the main actors are good at their roles, many of the extras were brought onboard for dubious reasons- perhaps just because they were willing to work for free- and the acting shows this. While much of the acting may be tough to get through, I am under the impression that it translates well into the romance languages, as it was much more popular outside of the United States. In fact influential director François Truffaut called it his favorite American film.
        It was banned for seemingly trivial reasons in various countries. The Australian censorship boards banned it due to obscenity. An attempt was made again in 1972, after the introduction of Australia's R 18 rating, but it was banned for "violence and indecency". A very odd decision as there is only one real scene of violence in the entire film.


Raymond Fernandez's mugshot

        The film is loosely based on the Lonely Hearts Killers case from the 1940s. A rare serial killer couple Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck killed up to 20 women between 1947 and 1949. They earned their moniker by their method of selecting victims, ie via the lonely hearts ads in big city newspapers. Fernandez, a former British intelligence agent, suffered a head wound which damaged his frontal lobe leading to his to aberrant sexual behavior. While in prison for theft, his cellmate taught him voodoo and black magic. He later claimed black magic gave him irresistible power and charm over women.

Martha Beck mugshot

         Beck was a nurse, sexually abused by her brother, with significant weight problems. She was also a hopeless romantic, devouring junk romance novels and films. She met Fernandez using the same lonely hearts ads that she lured other women in. She became absolutely devoted to Fernandez, even sending her own children away to be raised by the Salvation Army so she could further assist his criminal enterprises. She often posed as Fernandez's sister, to lend him a much needed air of respectability. Their victims, feeling more secure knowing there was another woman in the house, often agreed to stay with the pair. Beck also convinced some victims that she lived alone and that her "brother" was only a guest. Beck was violently jealous and would go to great lengths to make sure Fernandez and his victim never had sex. But when it did happen, she subjected both to her vicious temper.
          Their end came in Grand Rapids, Michigan where they met and stayed with Delphine Downing, a young widow with a two-year-old daughter. Eventually the pair ended up drugging and shooting the mother, then later drowning the child when she wouldn’t stop crying. They buried the bodies in the basement, then inexplicably stayed at the house several more days. Suspicious neighbors reported the Downings' disappearances, leading to Beck and Fernandez’s arrests.
          It was, of course, a sensationalized story. Apart from the three murders that could be positively attributed to them, the state of New York (where they were eventually extradited to) slapped another 17 murders on them, all of which the pair denied. Whether they were guilty or not, the solved crime statistics went up in New York City that year. The pair’s last words before execution were of their undying love for each other. Beck stating, “"My story is a love story. But only those tortured by love can know what I mean. I am not unfeeling, stupid or moronic. I am a woman who had a great love and always will have it. Imprisonment in the Death House has only strengthened my feeling for Raymond." And Fernandez going out with the shorter, "I wanna shout it out; I love Martha! What do the public know about love?"
          The film plays fast and loose with many of the events and characters from the real life story, despite what the opening credits claim. Some of that was for dramatic effect, others due to a lack of budget. Most notably would be beck’s contrition at the end, the historical Beck had absolutely no remorse. But a viewer can still get the general gist of the case from this sleeper.
          One additional note, apparently the initial director of the film was supposed to be Martin Scorsese, but was fired a week into shooting. This was because Scorsese was filming every scene in master shots and not shooting close-ups or other coverage, making the film impossible to edit.
          The entire film is below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor.

For more serial killer fun try The Foot Doctor Letters: A Serial Killer Speaks Out by Rex Hurst. Available in paperback and on kindle. 

Shock Corridor- Exploitation in a Madhouse

            Shock Corridor is a low budget film of a journalist going undercover in a mental institution to uncover the facts surrounding a mysterious murder. He achieves this by getting himself committed by his girlfriend, who poses as his sister, claiming that he has been trying to sexual assault her.

            If you think this is a little extreme for a 1960s picture, you are correct. But controversial is a stable diet for director Samuel Fuller’s films. The director started off writing pulp novels before moving onto films. The term “narrative tabloid” was used by critic Grant Tracey to describe the director. He never shied away from topics of prostitution, child molestation, mental illness, incest, racism, police corruption, etc. All somewhat taboo topics at the time. And while his films were not highly praised at their initial release, time has given them a second life. The French New Wave claimed his work as a major influence.

Though there certainly are noir elements

            There has been a discussion for years on whether Shock Corridor should be classified as film noir or exploitation, or both. While it certainly does have that striped down film noir feel, the sexual element- very shocking for the time- is often played here for shock value. Particular a scene where the protagonist accidently stumbles into the ward dedicated to the treatment of nymphomaniacs and is nearly torn apart by a dozen in a violent sexual frenzy. Not only was it ridiculous, but also totally unnecessary to the plot.  It is touches like this, and the reason he’s committed, which tip the balance towards to exploitation.

            Apparently the director wrote the original draft of the screenplay in the 1940s, while working for Fritz Lang, under the inferior title Straitjacket. The filming itself was incredibly cheap. It was shot over ten days. There was only one set and no exterior locations. Which helps to give the film a closed in claustrophobic feel. In fact the sound stage was so small, Fuller hired midgets to walk around in the distant section of the corridor to give the illusions of depth.

            As the film progresses, the protagonist comes into contact with the three witnesses to the murder, each suffering from bizarre delusions. The first is Stuart. Who was captured in the Korean War and was brainwashed into becoming a Communist. Stuart was ordered to indoctrinate a fellow prisoner, but instead the prisoner's unwavering patriotism reformed him. Stuart's captors pronounced him insane and he was returned to the US in a prisoner exchange, after which he received a dishonorable discharge and was publicly reviled as a traitor. The character imagines himself to be Confederate States of America General J.E.B. Stuart.

            The second is Trent was one of the first black students to integrate a segregated Southern university. The constant barrage of bigotry drove him over the edge. He imagines himself a member of the Ku Klux Klan, and stirs up the patients with white nationalist dogma and attacks the other black inmates. Third is Boden, an atomic scientist scarred by the knowledge of the devastating power of intercontinental ballistic missiles. He has regressed to the mentality of a six-year-old child.

Now while the protagonist is trying to get information out of each one, they eventually lapse into sanity and begin talking about the murder. While this is happening, the film shot in black and white, is spliced with hallucinogenic color footage. This is the part that actually makes the film, which causes it to stand one. One little artistic touch. The hallucination sequences include footage shot on location in Japan for House of Bamboo (1955), and footage shot by Fuller in Mato Grosso, Brazil for the unfinished film Tigrero.

After a hospital riot, the protagonist is straitjacketed and subjected to shock treatment. He begins imagining that his girlfriend really is his sister, and experiences many other symptoms of mental breakdown. He learns the identity of the killer and violently extracts a confession from him in front of witnesses. He then sits down and writes his story. Immediately afterwards he lapses into a catatonic state from which it is believed he will not recover.

Shock Corridor is a bizarre film that rises high above its low budget. In fact, the lack of budget is what caused the director to try innovative new techniques to make the film stand out. Which he succeeds at brilliantly.

The entire film is below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor.

                    For more fun try Across the Wounded Galaxy by Rex Hurst

Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS- Nazisploitation at its Finest

Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS is perhaps the definition of an exploitation film. It is a gory, violently sexual made expressly for the purpose of giving the audience a cheap and shocking thrill, yet still attempting to drape itself in the paper thin masquerade of being a serious expose of the atrocities of the past.

You can see this right at the beginning of the picture when a message from Herman Traeger, the film’s producer: The film you are about to see is based on documented fact. The atrocities shown were conducted as ‘medical experiments’ in special concentration camps throughout Hitler’s Third Reich. Although these crimes against humanity are historically accurate, the characters depicted are composites of notorious Nazi personalities; and the events portrayed have been reduced into one locality for dramatic purposes. Because of its shocking subject matter, this film is restricted to adult audiences only. We dedicate this film with the hope that these heinous crimes will never occur again. 

Directly after this high minded statement, we move into a sex scene where the incredibly buxom Ilsa is grinding away on a male prisoner whom she then orders to be castrated as punishment for not being able to satiate her nymphomaniac appetite.

Ilsa is the warden of Special Camp 9. Her goal, apart from some other sadistic games, is to prove that women can withstand more pain and suffering than men and therefore should be allowed to fight on the front lines. The movie includes the standard exploitation elements of sadism, degradation, whipping, sexual slavery, graphic torture, and a bloody finale with Ilsa shot dead and the camp set ablaze. I could more into detail on the plot, but I’m sure you get the general idea and by this time you are either interested or you are not.

It was shot in nine days on the set of Hogan's Heroes TV show- a much different take on the Nazi camps. The series had been cancelled, and, on learning that the movie had the camp being burned down at the end, the set was given over to save the cost of demolition. It also included amongst the women prisoners many porn actresses of the early 1970s, whose cleavage they never failed to flaunt.

 The film was a surprise hit on the drive-in theater and grindhouse circuit. Ilsa was resurrected for three profitable sequels that ignored her Nazi origins and her death. As a freelance mistress-for-hire, she became Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (1976), commander of a 1953 gulag in Ilsa, the Tigress of Siberia (1977), and the warden of a corrupt Latin-American prison in Ilsa, the Wicked Warden (1977). The last one was originally not meant to be an Ilsa sequel, but it was changed post production.

Ilse Koch

The character of Ilsa, played by the lovely Dyanne Throne, was loosely based on Ilse Koch "The Bitch of Buchenwald". She was the wife of Karl-Otto Koch, commandant of Buchenwald and later on Majdanek. In 1947, she became one of the first prominent Nazis to be tried by the U.S. military. She was well known for being promiscuous with many of the SS officers at the camp and involved in embezzling confiscated materials from the prisoners. Additionally she was accused of marking prisoners with tattoos for death so she could harvest the skin and make lampshades out of them. She was tried twice and garnered a life sentence, which she ironically protested about to the International Human Rights Commission. She committed suicide in prison in 1967.

Richard Kennedy

Additionally, this film sports Richard Kennedy (whom we covered before in the wonderful film The Love Butcher). Here he plays a Nazi General inspecting the camp and becomes enthralled with Ilsa, whom he sees as the ideal Aryan woman, a Goddess made manifest. And as such, wants her to urinate all over his face for his sexual gratification. He had appeared in episodes of a number of TV show, most notably, Happy Days, Beretta, and Little House on the Prairie, and handful of  other bad films- Henry Kissinger in Ilsa: Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks, and a hillbilly in Invasion of the Blood Farmers. His career continued on into the 80s where he died in 1985 at the age of 78.

She Wolf of the SS pioneered the subgenre of Nazisploitation. Usually they were a retread of the women-in-prison formula simply relocated to a concentration camp. The genre eventually died out as none of these films were very successful. Due, I believe, to a lack of campiness that the Ilsa films generated, despite the sex and gore. A few others, for those who are interested, are : The Beast in Heat, SS Hell Camp, Last Orgy of the Third Reich, Helltrain, Germany Year Zero, SS Experiment Love Camp, SS Special Section Women, Red Nights of the Gestapo, Nazi Love Camp 2, Helga, She Wolf of Stilberg, Fraulein Devil, and Nathalie: Escape from Hell- and so on and so on.

And surprisingly the genre has inspired actual critically acclaimed art house films. Liliana Cavani's The Night Porter , Pier Paolo Pasolini's Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (which we also have covered here), and Tinto Brass's Salon Kitty all are due in some part to Ilsa trail blazing brutality and demonstrating what can actually be gotten away in film. 

     For an exploitation Ilsa has tremendous staying power. It is campy and profane, sexual and sadistic. For those who like such things, it is a must see.

                      The entire film is below. Enjoy and Caveat Emptor!  

For more fun try Across the Wounded Galaxy by Rex Hurst