daytimer59

If you like your mysteries on the strange side, this movie is the one. I keep wondering how they filmed it without any people on the streets. Stock footage to bolster an obviously low budget helps somewhat, but this movie depicts Chicago in the middle of the night, and the only car on the street is the police car occupied by our hero. But this was 1953, so it was a different world at 3:00 a.m. There is a little of "The Asphalt Jungle" in this one--including the crooked lawyer, a pretty woman too evil for comfort, a safe to steal something from and the usual payment at the end. Then there is the twist -- the "ghost" influence -- who is in the middle of the evening's events, and who also narrates. Plus there's a guy portraying a store window mechanical man. Like I said, this is a strange one, but worth a curious look.

I never did think of "Canyon Passage" as a western -- more like a frontier-homesteader movie, but it still had the adventure and drama that makes a fine film. I agree with those that said there is something mysteriously appealing about this film, as I have remembered it since it came out in 1946 when so many other movies have long faded from memory. Ward Bond was not known for playing villains, and this performance was truly scary and sinister. Lloyd Bridges plays the friendly good guy that characterized his roles, and Dana Andrews is perfectly cast as the leader. The film is rather hard to find, and I am hoping a DVD will one day be available. It is well worth watching and collecting.

This 1962 disaster was reportedly described by the director as "almost unreleasable," and after seeing it, I can understand why. I honestly thought "Plan 9 from Outer Space" was the worst movie I had even seen, but now I'm not so sure. I cannot believe a film could be more horribly conceived or ineptly carried out than this one. The acting and dubbing add up to a total embarrassment, and you watch this thing more in amazement than interest. The plot line concerning a monster drawing out the spacemen's thoughts to create a world for them is not a bad idea, although it has been seen in various sci-fi vehicles over the years. The production values doomed this one and the acting buried it. The corny song at the end was totally out of creative synch with a film that never had any synch to begin with. John Agar was the only bright spot in this film, but even he could not save it. The film was made in Denmark, and it is my feeling that it should have stayed there. ##