Tonight I'm afraid our winning streak came to an end, not catastrophically perhaps, but in a manner decisive enough that we're gonna have to regroup. Take stock, as they say. I should've known by the title, and I'm sorry I didn't take heed, but I'd already rejected "The Atomic Brain", which sounded promising (but wasn't), and "Invasion of the Saucer Men" (too goofy). I'd invested 10-15 minutes in each, but both sucked and I was running out of time. Gotta maintain a schedule (i.e shedge-yool), dontcha know, in this era of sickness and deprivation, to avoid going mad. It's like being in jail; you've gotta do your sit-ups, etc. Gotta maintain some discipline.
So I grabbed hold of the next thing I could find, which was entitled "The Hideous Sun Demon"(1958). Now, you are quite right in your ridicule, but I assure you that I only gave it a go because it was from the Youtube channel of "Cinema Cult Classics", from which we've had some recent winners, including the awesome "Brain From Planet Arous". I'm the kind of guy where, if you don't steer me wrong I'll keep coming back. And I did come back to this channel two or three times since we've been on public domain. But this time..........well, as I say, I should've considered the title, because any way you slice it, "The Hideous Sun Demon" doesn't sound good. If they'd called it "The Sun Demon", then maybe (and that actually removes it's power, makes it sound arty or Japanese), but you don't use a word like "Hideous" in a movie title, ever. It's too florid, too gauche - it's overwrought. But as I say, I was running out of time, so I jumped in whole hog, and here we stand : defeated, but for one night only.
On the bright side, there were a few minor redeeming qualities, including some great location shots down at the Long Beach Oil Fields, back when there used to be those "grasshopper" pumps lining the roads, also an old gas station and bar in the area, and a gigantic water tower where the final scene will play out. The 1950s scenery, in fact, was what kept me from throwing in the towel. And at the beginning, the premise sounded original......
An atomic scientist is working with a highly radioactive substance, but he's got a drinking problem and hasn't been sleeping. His hands are shaky that day and he drops the sample, which breaks open on the floor, exposing him to a massive dose of radiation. At the hospital, his doctor expects he won't live through the night, but by the next morning he seems fine. That afternoon, his nurse takes him outside for some fresh air and sunshine. She leaves him sitting in his wheelchair next to an elderly woman who is also recuperating. The sun is bright that day. Soon it's warmth has caused the scientist to doze off. After a while, we see him begin to writhe and sweat. His skin darkens, grows rough. Then the camera cuts away to face the old lady, who screams at the top of her lungs. The next shot is of the scientist running away, back inside the hospital where he is found hiding in a closet. He looks okay physically but we can see he is badly shaken.
It turns out he had "a reaction" to the sun's rays, which according to a Fellow Scientist acted as a catalyst to trigger the radiation that was latent in his body. There are some specifics about properties of the light spectrum to give the scene scientific credibility. What the man doesn't reveal is that he saw himself in a mirror after he ran inside. What happened was a whole lot worse than a skin reaction; for cryin' out loud, he turned into a Hideous Sun Demon! No wonder the old lady was screaming.
Well, his doctor and the Fellow Scientist tell him he should be okay, as long as he stays out of the sun. After his recent experience, you can bet your bottom dollar he's gonna do so! He's now a Night Owl, which suits his alcoholic lifestyle anyway, so he goes to a bar down the coast (much of the film was shot near PCH), and there he is enraptured by the establishment's singer/pianist, a statuesque young woman who returns his fancy. Later that night they will have a romp on the beach and ultimately fall asleep, only to awaken to - you guessed it - the rays of the rising sun. We see our man begin to Writhe and Sweat once again, his skin darkening in the process. Didn't he hear a thing his doctor said? I mean, good grief, what's wrong with this guy? He does have the excuse of the beautiful woman I suppose, and also.........he's got a drinking problem. He's not good at self-control. But now, as the Sun rises higher, he's gotta hightail it and leave the girl behind because he's turning into The Hideous Sun Demon again. He runs to his car and slams it into gear, flooring it down the highway and stranding the pianist on the sand. That will turn out to be a bad move, because what he doesn't know is that she's got a Mobster for a boyfriend.
The Mobster will come looking for him, and when he does he will order our friend outside so he can drive him away and shoot him. Unbeknownst to the Mobster, of course, is that it was a fatal mistake to order the scientist out in broad daylight. In the aftermath, the Mobster lies dead and the Demon is on the run, wanted for murder and only a few steps ahead of the cops. This is where the great location shots come in and the movie picks up a little steam. Before this upswing, though, you might be as hard pressed as I was to keep from pressing the "eject" button, because for the first 45 minutes, the film feels entirely flat. It simply has very little energy.
A gentleman named Robert Clarke wrote, directed and starred in this gem. His IMDB shows him to be a veteran actor with 171 credits, so he might've imagined himself an auteur after all that experience in Hollywood. Many another screen vet has tried his hand behind the camera, some with great success, so it could be that Clarke entered into this venture with great confidence in his ability to create a masterwork of science fiction, or at least a Good Bad Movie. But as it turned out, he was unable to do either, because..............well, hmmm.......I'll have to think about this for a moment.
Okay, I think I've deduced the problem. With "The Hideous Sun Demon", there was no vitality in the movie, no life. It appears that Clarke had no talent for working with actors, which is surprising given that he was one himself. But no one emotes here, save for a single scene in which Clarke cuts loose with the histrionics over his plight, and that scene is unintentionally funny. He also doesn't know where to put the camera, and most glaringly of all, he tried to record his soundtrack in situ, instead of dubbing it in a studio which even the lowest budgeted cheapies do, because even the most amateurish filmmakers know you cannot record good sound on location, not for a whole movie anyway. The result is dialogue that's hard to decipher for most of the picture, a major boo-boo. So the problem here is Clarke himself. He tried to do everything :, act, write and direct, but he should have left the last one alone because he doesn't know what he's doing, and here's the thing -
You've gotta be pro, even in these kinds of movies. Heck, especially in these kinds of movies. Witness the success of "The Killer Shrews", which despite using dogs as monsters for crying out loud!, was still highly effective (and even atmospheric) because it was professionally made. That's the difference. The director was a pro and so the movie had a professional look and was technically sound.
Robert Clarke could've had something here if he'd let someone else direct (and maybe changed the title), but he didn't and so we came up half-empty. "The Hideous Sun Demon" wasn't a total loss, but I'm only gonna give it one and a half thumbs, and lower case ones at that. See it if you're a completist, otherwise don't bother. ////
It's now Sunday evening and I'm gonna try to get my walk in before it rains. I am well and hanging in there and I trust you are too. See you tonight at the Usual Time.
Tons of love! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment