Avalanche

Avalanche casts Bruce Cabot and Roscoe Karns as a pair Treasury agents on the trail of a tax evader. You know he must have owed a powerful lot of money to send two people who clearly weren't accountants after him. In any event the trail takes them to ski country and the guys are trapped with lodgers and staff and some murders start happening including the guy they're after.

Even though he film is barely 70 minutes it drags at an moeba like pace. Roscoe Karns is some comic relief with a talking crow who assists bartender Syd Saylor wh has the right slant n everyone. But when Veda Ann Borg ca't liven up a film you got trouble.

Now, this one is a true head-scratcher. Our heroes are two Treasury men (played by Bruce Cabot and Roscoe Karns), but instead of looking for counterfeiters ala T-MEN, they're on a manhunt for a nefarious... tax evader. Their search takes them to the cleverly named High Mountain and a snowbound ski resort, the few occupants of which soon become suspects in a handful of mysterious murders.

This low-budget PRC turkey takes full advantage of the location, with ski chase sequences which defy all rational logic and the occasional avalanche to liven things up. All the while, as the murders pile up and everyone acts as guilty as possible, a trained, talking crow serves drinks at the bar (I'm entirely serious). Oh, and there's a gratuitous marionette puppeting sequence, as well.

Bruce Cabot, he of "King Kong", is about as dynamic as a fence post in his role as the T-man-cum-Hercule Poirot, clumsily romancing Helen Mowery, who is often clad in a sweater embroidered with some sort of a note on her shoulder in the film's most peculiar fashion choice. Cabot gets a sweater, too: a real comfy-looking wintry number. Fuzzy.

Roscoe Karns, drunkenly hilarious in "His Girl Friday", provides a faltering attempt at comic relief here as the incoherent mystery deepens. Perhaps the film's greatest mystery, however, is how a sleeping person manages to avoid being shot in the head at close range by hearing the gunshots and moving out of the way of the bullets (which hit the pillow).

It's an astonishing little footnote in B-picture history. See what happens when you don't pay your taxes?

Everybody knows that producer and director Irwin Allen was the most known disaster films producer and director in Hollywood. This film director here is named Irving, and not Irwin, and the title could have suggested another - but very early - disaster yarn. Which is not at all. Just a bland, flat but not too boring thriller taking place in the mountains. And by the way, you also had another film titled AVALANCHE, and directed by another Allen: but still not Irwin, but Corey. No relation with Irwin I guess, for Coreyy, the REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE producer. But I maintain that Irwin Allen could have imagined a disaster flick called AVALANCHE. Corey Allen's yarn was indeed a disaster movie, starring Rock Hudson.

Mr. Eale's review of this PRC movie is right on target; nonetheless, I enjoyed it. Liked the snow bound ski resort setting, the odd assortment of characters and the occasional bits of humor. The humor (at least the intentional humor) is provided by Roscoe Karns. Loved the bit with the talking crow - worth watching the movie just for that. In addition to Karns, Veda Ann Borg and Sid Saylor give some pizazz to the movie. By a coincidence this is the second show I've seen Borg in today. An underrated supporting actor that always made the most out of her roles however small they were. The nominal star of the movie, Bruce Cabot, walks through the movie without adding anything interesting. He did, however, deliver my favorite line in the movie which was the last one: "See what happens when you don't pay your income taxes?"