A Quick Look: NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972 - color)

   Here's another movie far better than it's reputation would have you believe, 1972's giant killer rabbit opus NIGHT OF THE LEPUS. Biologists are trying to find a way to hormonally destroy the overpopulation of mongrel rabbits plaguing western ranches. Unfortunately, the scientists' daughter inadvertently releases one of the test animals and the results are cattle-sized hausenpfeffer with ravenous appetites. It's actually one of the best of the 70's monster movies, but apparently most critics have never seen any rabbits beyond those fluffy domesticated pet store types. The film has been continually run down not for any technical flaws, but singularly for it's basic premise of featuring killer rabbits. Based on the book "Year of the Angry Rabbit" and featuring some stunning miniature effects, the film also boasts one of the best casts you could assemble for such a thing. Stuart Whitman and Janet Leigh are the biologists, Rory Calhoun the rancher they're trying to help, DeForest Kelley the university connection, and Paul Fix is the Sheriff, continuing a standing tradition of older cowboy stars playing lawmen in science fiction movies. Worth checking out, provided you can watch a movie on it's own merits.

A Quick Look: YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (1967 - color)

   Coming in the wake of the massively successful THUNDERBALL, the lackluster spoof CASINO ROYALE, and the better-than-you'd-think OPERATION KID BROTHER, right at the very height of the spy craze, YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE was a pull-out-all-the-stops, give-the-audience-everything-it-wants-and-more grand scale adventure. An adventure Connery decided would also be his last as the world's most popular spy (such was his desire at the time, anyway). YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE follows Bond as he goes up against SPECTRE's scheme to trigger atomic war by stealing American and Russian space rockets from orbit and concealing them in their secret headquarters housed inside a Japanese volcano! Behind the whole plot is SPECTRE no.1 Ernst Stavro Blofeld, memorably brought to life by Donald Pleasance. The image of Pleasance, clad in his grey uniform, bald head, and ragged scar across his eye, became one of the most iconic of screen villainy. It was this enemy that Mike Meyers famously parodied as Dr. Evil some 30 years later. YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE contains some of the biggest action the series ever produced, not the least of which includes a commando raid against SPECTRE's most impressive secret lair. "Sean Connery IS James Bond!" the ads read in response to the same year's spy spoof. Nancy Sinatra provides the title tune, which, while sweet, seems a bit lounge for the series after the surging hits of the previous films (it foreshadowed perfectly the breathy ballads that defined the Moore era, however). Though the script isn't the strongest of the series, this one, like THUNDERBALL, makes up for it by being an out-and-out experience. Plus, this one has Ed Bishop and Shane Rimmer in the same shot, so it's automatically the coolest Bond film of all.

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A Quick Look: THE WAR IN SPACE (1977 - color)

   Here's an obscure one. THE WAR IN SPACE was Toho's STAR WARS cash-in, although the plot is sorta similar to the 60's film ATRAGON. Basically, the Martians start blowing up stuff and we're largely defenseless. One man has a blueprint for a super-duper space battleship/submarine, though, and he's recruited to build his machine and attack the invaders' home planet. Pop singer Yuko Asano puts in the most memorable bit when she's captured by the enemy and forced to wear a little black leather bathing suit. Somewhat counter-productively, she's shown almost exclusively in long shot when wearing this costume, even though it was shown heavily in advertising materials. Though entertaining, THE WAR IN SPACE isn't Toho's most exciting epic. In fact, even after a couple of viewings, I find I don't have many lasting memories of it. Still, I'm grateful to find the film was released on a nice disk from Tokyo Shock. If this one saw any screen action in the States I can't be sure, but there was a dub track for this Japanese adventure (actually, any Japanese film it was felt might play well in the States usually had a dub track commissioned by a Chinese outfit. These International dubs were pretty lousy, and most imports were re-dubbed by the pros at Titra Sound Studios. By the mid 70's, however, these Japanese films were being handled by much smaller distributors who stuck with the International dubs because it was cheaper. This film boasts only an International dub, so it's possible it played the States, although I can't confirm the fact).

Yuko Asano

A Quick Look at Matt Helm

   If James Bond is the Sinatra of the spy world, Matt Helm is the Dean Martin. Fittingly, Dean Martin played Matt Helm in a series of movies for Columbia Pictures in the 60's. The film Helm bears little to no resemblance to the ruthless assassin detailed in the books of Donald Hamilton, but it's hard to complain against such a wonderful series as THE SILENCERS, MURDERERS' ROW, THE AMBUSHERS, and THE WRECKING CREW. Unfortunately, Dino bowed out before he could make the promised fifth film and Tony Franciosa was groomed into a Dean-A-Like for a 70's TV pilot movie called MATT HELM, and the short-lived teleseries that followed. The movies are lighter in tone than the Bonds, but aren't outright spoofs. Really, they're near perfect 60's pop spy vehicles, and Martin's casting is so obvious you can't escape it. Fun stuff.

   THE SILENCERS finds Matt pulled away from his swinging bachelor pad (and day job as a girlie rag photographer) when ICE (Intelligence Counter Espionage) detects that enemy organization BIG-O is up to something on US soil. And indeed they are, as Victor Buono's Chinese madman Tung Se has arranged for a missile launch and underground atomic test to be conducted simultaneously -a combination which will destroy the States if BIG-O's missile controls can't be stopped! 

   In MURDERERS' ROW, Matt must track down a missing scientist who has developed a powerful laser beam that can wipe Washington off the map in one sweep! His main suspect is industrialist Julian Wahl, played by the great Karl Malden. Ann-Margret is the scientist's go-go dancer daughter who teams up with Helm to find that Wahl has her father on his private island. From the opening notes of the film's driving main theme, this one never stops delivering. The Helm series gets it's own Odd Job-like henchman in the form of Tom Reese's ruthless BIG-O assassin Ironhead. The climax features a hovercraft chase! While the Helms were never quite as opulent as the Bonds (or even the Flints), they remain relentlessly enjoyable pop fun.

   My first Helm was THE AMBUSHERS, the third in the series. This time around, Matt must team up with a female agent suffering amnesia after being tortured nearly to death -she the pilot of an experimental flying saucer. The saucer gives off a form of radiation harmful only to males, so female pilots are required. A Latin dictator captures the saucer and holds it ransom to the highest bidder, and BIG-O agent Senta Berger is among those looking to bid. It wasn't until this entry that we finally learned what BIG-O stands for: Bureau for International Government and Order. Matt, of course, works for I.C.E. -Intelligence Counter Espionage, and the opening of the film finds our hero at an I.C.E. training facility.  The film's titles are accompanied by a title tune that's plenty catchy and a whole lot of lounge. Unfortunately, the 45 version sounds completely different! By the way, a very similar flying saucer also turned up in an episode of I Dream of Jeannie as an experimental "jet-plate" and some have confused the two props as being the same. The TV saucer, however, isn't as wide. Oddly, though, what I'm pretty sure is Wahl's crane scoop from the second film can be glimpsed in a junkyard in another Jeannie episode.

   The last Helm movie is in kind of an odd position. Though it was a well-mounted effort, THE WRECKING CREW did lackluster business at the boxoffice. Dino also lost interest and the film would be his last as the swinging secret agent. The plot concerns an aristocrat who hijacks a billion dollar gold shipment and threatens to destroy the world economy. Matt blasts into action, despite his helpful fellow agent Sharon Tate causing him more trouble than good. The cast on this one is simply amazing, and the fight scenes are a step up from the previous films (in which Dino's stunt double handled much of the heavy action several yards away from the camera). Small wonder, since Bruce Lee helped choreograph the action. One of the henchmen is Lee student and future action superstar Chuck Norris! Unfortunately, the casting is also part of the problem. John Larch replaces James Gregory as Matt's boss, MacDonald. He's fine, but the change is jarring. He should've had one more film in order to make the transition smoother. And of course, Sharon Tate hangs over the film like a specter, given her brutal murder at the hands of the Manson family was not far off. Finally, the film's casting of Tina Louise as a gypsy henchgirl is more trivia than anything else. It was her first post-Island job, and her appearance didn't impress the critics. 

   The end of the movie promises a fifth adventure to be titled "The Ravagers." I like to think the 70's TV pilot film MATT HELM holds this slot. In MATT HELM, Tony Franciosa plays a Helm who has broken from the spy world and settled into the position of private dick. A short-lived series followed. Tony did an incredible job of playing the Dean Martin Helm, even copying expertly the same mannerisms. Still, a private Eye is quite a come down from a globe-trotting super spy.

TV's MATT HELM, 1975

A Quick Look: DESTINATION INNER SPACE (1966 - color)

   For a movie with such a cool monster, good pix from DESTINATION INNER SPACE are sure hard to come by! The film itself is essentially a remake of THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD set in an undersea research facility. The Navy sends a trouble-shooter to a remote sea lab when an underwater flying saucer begins making it's presence known. When the saucer settles down long enough for the scientists to check it out, an alien capsule is taken back to the lab where it begins to grow larger and larger... The cast is filled with familiar faces and voices, including Scott Brady, Gary Merrill, Sheree North, Wende Wagner, Mike Road, and James Hong. Frustratingly, the film is mighty obscure. The single "official" DVD release is a soft, blurry print with faded color (the print that surfaced on TV back in the 90's was gorgeous, so this is doubly disappointing). Also worth noting is Paul Dunlap's rousing score, largely re-recordings of his themes from THE ANGRY RED PLANET and I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF. Man, I sure miss these 60's underwater movies!

A Quick Look: THE WAR OF THE WORLDS (1953 - color)

   Released in 1953, THE WAR OF THE WORLDS was the first (and remains the best) cinematic adaptation of H.G. Wells' famous novel. I'm sure you've seen it, but it's always worth another look. A meteor crashes down in rural California, which turns out to be the flaming vanguard of an invasion from Mars! The film is filled with nice little human details, like a deputy bumming a cigarette without asking for it, a dog lapping up spilled cream from an abandoned ice cream cart, a boy running over to retrieve the rubber ball of a small girl during the exodus from Los Angeles, and so on. Terrific dialog from start to finish. Hauntingly beautiful Technicolor photography highlights Oscar-winning special effects. Most genre pictures of the 50's were B pictures, but THE WAR OF THE WORLDS joins a smaller number of color A productions. Producer George Pal tried to pitch a television series spinoff in the early 70's. The late 80's saw a Canadian sequel series emerge (fairly intriguing show at times, but it's a completely different animal). The film's achievements and all-around swellness have been discussed for decades, but this is one of those rare cases where all the praise is justified.