Ryan Watches 50 Movies

It's only Tuesday morning, but I can tell you right now I'm not going to have a write-up of Bloodlust ready here on Wednesday night. That's for two reasons: 1. I'm going to be flying across the country on Wednesday, and 2. I haven't watched Bloodlust yet! But I'm looking forward to it, especially as the DVD sleeve claims it stars Robert Reed. Could be the same guy who played Mike on The Brady Bunch ? I can't wait to find out, and hopefully to see him fight zombies. I hope everyone has a thoroughly pleasant fourth Thursday of November. And now, in the spirit of Thanksgiving and horror movies, please enjoy this picture I found while doing a Google image search for monster turkey :

A Shriek in the Night stars Ginger Rogers, and was released in 1933. That means it came out two years before Top Hat , which as far as I know was the first musical to co-star Rogers and Fred Astaire. I was genuinely curious to see if there would be any singing or dancing in this movie, but alas, there is none... only shrieking in the night. So, that's too bad. Forty-two movies into this project and I can't even get a musical number. What else can I do to make things more interesting? How about if I write the synopsis in verse? Okay, I'll try that. Synopsis (in verse) Mr. Harker falls out his window Down he plummets -- watch him go! Suicide? Murder? Or accidental? Detective Russell wants to know. Harker's live-in secretary Is quite a pretty dame She's also an undercover reporter! To her this whole thing's like a game Her name is Pat, and she works hard For all the news that's fit But when her rival steals her story She's so mad she could spit! His

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "Hey! Hold the phone for one cotton-picking minute! Hasn't this clown already watched a silly movie called The Gorilla ?" And the answer is: Nope. Several weeks ago I watched The Ape , which is completely different from 1939's The Gorilla . For one thing, The Gorilla stars the Ritz Brothers , a film comedy team from the 1930s. As a guy who's perhaps more interested than most of my peers in movies made before my parents were born, I've long been vaguely aware of the Ritz Brothers, but I'd never seen any of their films, and they seem to have faded into obscurity. I was looking forward to this movie because I was curious about the Ritzes: Do they deserve to stand alongside the Marx Brothers, Laurel & Hardy, and other greats of their era, or is their "forgotten" status deserved? Synopsis Newspaper headlines scream the top story of the day: A crazed killer called the Gorilla is on the l

Wow, am I really on movie #40 out of 50? Why, it seems like just 40 weeks ago that I started this venture... or maybe more like 45 or 46 weeks ago, because of all the times I couldn't bring myself to watch and comment on one of these things. But now I'm 4/5 of the way through! And so far, I'm still sane! I think. You may have noticed that the poster over there does not carry the title Monster from a Prehistoric Planet . That's because... well, that's because the poster is in French. But it's also because this film, like many of the "horror classics," has been released under different titles over the years. In Japan, where the movie was produced, it was called Daikyojū Gappa , while the original title for the American release was Gappa, the Triphibian Monsters , which makes more sense, mainly because the monsters in the movie do not come from a prehistoric planet . They come from Earth! In the year 1967, which is when this movie was made! What the heck?