THE GOLDEN ARROW (Italy 1962), starring Tab Hunter and Rossana Podesta

Lush, entertaining Arabian-set fantasy with Tab Hunter, but not his voice

If you are looking for a mindless but entertaining fantasy film that would be great for children, has a lot of exciting twists and turns and magical happenings, THE GOLDEN ARROW fills the bill nicely. Tab Hunter is perfect visually as the outcast who must prove himself and defeat all foes to win the hand of his love. As this featured a major star, it had a bigger budget than many cheap Italian costume epics with lesser-known Americans (it’s comparable to, say , a Steve Reeves movie), so it’s colorful and visually exciting. Director Antonio Margheriti (aka Anthony Dawson) turned out all kinds of genre films in the 60s and after–westerns, peplums, horror, spy, erotic, giallo, science fiction, etc–and generally produced an exciting, fast-moving product.

The only flaw with this film–and, unfortunately, it’s a major one– is that Tab Hunter did not dub his own voice in the English version of the film (at least in the one I’m watching). That seems odd because Hunter has a distinctive voice that would have been well-known to American audiences of the day (as opposed to, say, Brad Harris or Richard Harrison or even Steve Reeves–who would know what THEIR real voices sounded like?). Also, in other European films that are quite obscure and were certainly NOT made with the US theatrical market in mind–films like SHOTGUN and THE LAST CHANCE– Hunter DOES do his own voice. He certainly is doing his own voice in Sidney Pink’s Spanish-made FICKLE FINGER OF FATE. Why MGM, a major studio, would not have paid Hunter to spend a few days in post-synchronization I don’t understand. The voice assigned him is not TOO ill-fitting for his character, but it clearly is not Tab Hunter. While I enjoy the film and have watched it a few times over the years, I find it difficult to forget this as I’m watching THE GOLDEN ARROW.

Still, it’s a fun way to kill 90 minutes on a rainy afternoon, and it looks great (my copy is letter-boxed, fortunately). If it had featured Mr. Hunter’s own voice, I’d consider it a classic.

BILL SHUTE, originally published elsewhere online in 2005

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

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NEUTRAL by Bill Shute

KSE #420, 125 pages, 6″ x 9″ perfect bound, softcover

published 2 January 2023

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A new book-length poem for 2023, and in some ways it is my most ambitious work (IMHO) since POINT LOMA PURPLE (2007).

MAIN STREET GIRL(S), aka Paroled From The Big House (1938), directed by Elmer Clifton

exciting low-budget crime film, marketed as exploitation film, from director Elmer Clifton

PAROLED FROM THE BIG HOUSE (the title on my copy, but also known as MAIN STREET GIRL) is an exciting crime film about a young lady (Jean Carmen, of Wolves of the Sea fame) whose father is killed when he refuses to go along with a protection racket. She vows revenge on the gangster who killed her father, and goes on a long quest which eventually succeeds. This is directed by the great Elmer Clifton, one-time associate of D.W. Griffith, and master of both exploitation films and westerns. Clifton had made the exploitation classics SLAVES IN BONDAGE and GAMBLING WITH SOULS for producer J.D.Kendis previous to this, but PAROLED is not really an exploitation film.

It starts off with a police commissioner (Milburn Stone) giving the audience a lecture on abuses of parole through payoffs by organized-crime linked criminals who can afford it, but other than the broadly-played criminals, a scene with a few girls in negligees, and a scene where the heroine is in a room with a psycho that ALMOST becomes distasteful, there’s no sleaze here. Judged against the competing poverty row crime films being produced by Monogram and Republic at this time, I’d have to say that PAROLED FROM THE BIG HOUSE works very well and is exciting. Jean Carmen is a unique looking lady who can command attention, and the script (from serial king George H. Plympton) has wonderful depression-era naturalistic touches, with Carmen pounding the pavement day after day, looking for work and homeless. There are a lot of close-ups, and as always Elmer Clifton can be given virtually no resources and the cheapest of sets and rear projection, yet make it flow.

The print used by SWV on my VHS tape, released in the early 90s, looks like it was made yesterday. So many 30s genre films are taken from duplicate prints made for TV showing, and they tend to get a bit fuzzier with each duplication, but the crispness and the sharpness of this copy help make the film even more impressive. If you get this thinking it is an exploitation film (it was marketed that way both in its original release and in its video release), you may well be let down. If you think of this in comparison with other poverty row crime films of the day (just remember that static, talky films made at Grand National!), it holds up quite well. Special mention should be made of the character “Torchy”, a pyromaniac member of the criminal organization, who is the film’s comic relief, lighting some of the other characters on fire when they are introduced into the film! He is played with relish by Ole Oleson, who looks like a cross between John Waters and the Wild Weed-era Jack Elam.

BILL SHUTE, originally published elsewhere online in 2005

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My newest poetry book for 2023…only $6.95 and available internationally at your local Amazon platform

NEUTRAL by Bill Shute

KSE #420, 125 pages, 6″ x 9″ perfect bound, softcover

published 2 January 2023

available for immediate order from https://amzn.to/3IFS5Vs

A new book-length poem for 2023, and in some ways it is my most ambitious work (IMHO) since POINT LOMA PURPLE (2007).

I’LL NAME THE MURDERER (1936), starring Ralph Forbes

1930’s newspaper gossip columnist solves whodunit

Florid, over-confident newspaper gossip columnist Tommy Tilton (Ralph Forbes) turns sleuth when his friend is blamed for the murder of an ex-girlfriend with a taste for blackmail. We’re introduced to a number of colorful supporting characters, with Tilton gradually figuring out the nature of the crime through a combination of bluff and insight. He also uses his column to “smoke out” the guilty party, even when he doesn’t yet know who the guilty party is! Director B.B. Ray was an old hand at low-budget action films and westerns, and with minimal sets and dialogue that describes actions that would be too expensive to film, Ray keeps the action moving at a swift pace. Forbes plays the part of Tilton as something of a dandy, with a lot of empty bravado. When Tilton proclaims “I’ll name the murderer” in the next day’s paper, even though he doesn’t yet have any proof, we audience members pull for him, WANTING him to crack the case. I’ll let you see the film yourself to see how all this is resolved… Overall, a solid 1930s poverty-row murder mystery from Puritan Pictures, best known for their 1935-36 series of interesting Tim McCoy westerns, including the classic MAN FROM GUNTOWN.

BILL SHUTE, originally published elsewhere online in 2002

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My newest poetry book for 2023…only $6.95 and available internationally at your local Amazon platform

NEUTRAL by Bill Shute

KSE #420, 125 pages, 6″ x 9″ perfect bound, softcover

published 2 January 2023

available for immediate order from https://amzn.to/3IFS5Vs

A new book-length poem for 2023, and in some ways it is my most ambitious work (IMHO) since POINT LOMA PURPLE (2007).

STORM OVER LISBON (Republic Pictures, 1944), starring Vera Hruba Ralston, Richard Arlen, and Erich Von Stroheim

Storm Over Lisbon (1944)

Republic Pictures’ answer to CASABLANCA, with Arlen and Ralston, instead of Bogart and Bergman

I’m not one of those people who has memorized CASABLANCA or who watch it once a year. It was a good b-movie, but there are thousands of other films I need to see, so I’ve moved on, and I’m not in the least bothered that STORM OVER LISBON is basically Republic Pictures’ low-budget echo of CASABLANCA, with Richard Arlen and Vera Ralston echoing Bogart and Bergman (after all, I can hear Republic president,and husband of Vera Ralston, Herbert Yates saying, “Bergman is a mysterious European with a seductive accent, so is Vera! This is a great vehicle for her.”).

The plot here is somewhat different, but there’s no question that this film would not even exist without CASABLANCA. There’s a lot of tension created in STORM OVER LISBON, and it’s well-acted by Arlen, Robert Livingston, Erich Von Stroheim, Otto Kruger, Eduardo Ciannelli, and Republic regulars Kenne Duncan and Roy Barcroft reprising their heavy roles, but this time instead of working for an evil town boss in a western, they are working for shady club owner Von Stroheim. There’s a well-staged dance sequence featuring Ms. Ralston, and after hearing for decades how bad she is, I was surprised at how bad she WASN’T. This was only her second dramatic film (I’m not counting her first two films, vehicles for her ice-skating prowess), and the script wisely does not give her many lines even though she is IN a lot of the film. The lack of dialogue helps to create a mysterious, seductive quality about Ms. Ralston, so whatever she DOES say we listen to and we apply a layer of mystery to. I don’t know if her English is phonetic or not, but after having seen films starring Madonna, Tara Reid, Roseanne, and Milla Jovovich, I have no complaints about Vera Ralston. Richard Arlen is always a comforting presence in a film–his gruff, virile persona is one we want to empathize with, and he has a natural quality that makes him believable.

A story of spies and intrigue and back-stabbing and desperation in the Lisbon of World War II, STORM OVER LISBON is a successful b-espionage film that is a great way to kill 70 minutes on a rainy day.

BILL SHUTE, originally published elsewhere online in 2005

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My newest poetry book for 2023…only $6.95 and available internationally at your local Amazon platform

NEUTRAL by Bill Shute

KSE #420, 125 pages, 6″ x 9″ perfect bound, softcover

published 2 January 2023

available for immediate order from https://amzn.to/3IFS5Vs

A new book-length poem for 2023, and in some ways it is my most ambitious work (IMHO) since POINT LOMA PURPLE (2007).

TWIST AROUND THE CLOCK (1961), produced by Sam Katzman, starring Chubby Checker

Twist remake of “Rock Around The Clock”–Chubby and Dion are fine, rest of film is weak

TWIST AROUND THE CLOCK, the first of two TWIST films produced by Sam Katzman and featuring the great Chubby Checker, is basically a remake of the old BIll Haley vehicle ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK, and like that film, the “star” here, Chubby Checker, is little more than a guest star in his own film. In the earlier film, Alan Dale is featured as the lead performer and his story is told, with Bill Haley merely being a “friend” who helps the lead character and who performs a handful of songs. Here, Clay Cole is featured, and Chubby Checker does three or four songs, has a few lines of dialogue, and performs in a group number at the film’s finale. Checker is a fine performer, and he handles the dialogue well–the NEXT Twist movie he was in, DON’T KNOCK THE TWIST, was MUCH better in that Checker was given a lot more importance in the story, and had much more dialogue with star Lang Jeffries. As for TWIST AROUND THE CLOCK, it also has Dion do three songs, and the vocal group the Marcels do a nice Christmas twist song. However, the dramatic sections of the film are weak, especially so since they are a carbon copy of the same plot in the earlier Bill Haley movie. If you take the Dion and Chubby songs, and the Marcels’ number, out of the film, there is really not much else worthwhile. Fans of DON’T KNOCK THE TWIST will recognize the same cheesy sets and tiny “stage” used as the TV studio in that film. Serious rock and roll fans should see this film ONCE so they can say they have seen ALL the pre-Beatles rock and roll films, but only the lip-synched Chubby Checker and Dion songs are worth keeping. This was aired a few years back on AMC, where I taped my copy and originally saw the film.

BILL SHUTE, originally published elsewhere online in 2005

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My newest poetry book for 2023…only $6.95 and available internationally at your local Amazon platform

NEUTRAL by Bill Shute

KSE #420, 125 pages, 6″ x 9″ perfect bound, softcover

published 2 January 2023

available for immediate order from https://amzn.to/3IFS5Vs

A new book-length poem for 2023, and in some ways it is my most ambitious work (IMHO) since POINT LOMA PURPLE (2007).