Last night's film was one of the craziest things we've ever seen. What do you get when you combine an Old Dark House mystery with a comedy cop caper featuring two nitwit detectives, throw in a Roger Corman monster for good measure (15 years before anyone heard of Roger Corman), and set the whole thing in a gloomy old lighthouse, three miles out in the ocean? Answer: You get "Sh! The Octopus"(1937). The title is as crazy as the movie. As it opens, a marine artist named "Paul Morgan" (John Eldredge) is taking residence at the lighthouse by permission of the government, which had shut it down due to the many unexplained deaths in the area. A "crime octopus" is said to be the culprit (and the local papers post that headline: "Crime Octopus At Large"), but whether they mean this literally or figuratively is anyone's guess, until the tentacles show up and start attacking people.
Meanwhile, back on land, the two Abbott & Costello-like detectives are driving in the pouring rain when they get a call saying that Det. Kelly's wife is having a baby and he'd better get to the hospital, pronto. Kelly (Hugh Herbert) seems surprised to learn he's gonna be a father, but he and his partner are set to high tail it when their police car gets a flat. While "Det. Dempsey" (Allan Jenkins) is changing the tire, a hysterical girl runs out of the darkness, saying she's being chased and that her father, the inventor of a world-domination Death Ray, has been murdered at a lighthouse out to sea. She says she has a boat that will take the two cops there, if they'll go with her. Det. Dempsey thinks it's the case that will finally get them noticed in the department, so they go with her, and all hell breaks loose. When they arrive at the lighthouse, it looks like the woman's father is indeed dead and hanging from the rafters in a shot that looks eerily like the hanging body in the Haunted Mansion belfry. Makes you wonder if Uncle Walt saw this movie. The cops want to recover the body, but there's no way to reach it, as the gubment has had the staircase removed so that no one could hang someone up there. Kind of a Catch-22 if you ask me..
Then, when the lady sees Paul Morgan the marine artist, she runs into his arms: "Oh, Paul! It's a miracle you're here!" Except that he doesn't know her, or so he tells the cops. Her name is "Vesta Vernoff" (Marcia Ralston) and she appears to be nuttier than a fruitcake. Just as the cops discover a trap door that leads to a hidden staircase ("I thought you said there were no stairs in this joint?"), the door to the lightnouse bangs open with the arrival of "Captain Hook" (George Roesner), who has a hook for a hand. He claims to be the former lighthouse keeper, and he's immediately contemptuous not only of Paul Morgan but the detectives, too. He doesn't honor their authority (would you?) and he struts around laughing maniacally and threatening to slice folks with his hook. Then he leaves again and returns with an old lady, who he claims to have just rescued from a storm. Finally, a middle-aged woman arrives out of the storm also. She's the only seemingly normal member of the group, at least for the moment. Later on, it will turn out that several of them are federal agents.
Once Captain Hook starts challenging the authority of the cops, he gets pulled through a windum by the tentacles belonging to the Octopus, who appears to have his own submarine. And no, this does not come off as cheesy, but more like a bizarre farce. So, the question becomes, who's in charge here? And is there really a brilliant Mad Scientist Octopus, who somehow got ahold of the Death Ray technology that Vesta Vernoff's dead father invented? The coppers think that's the case, and decide that the only way to find out for sure is to confiscate everyone's wallet for ID and any incriminating notes that may be inside. The wallet scene is crazy enough just by itself. Then here come those tentacles again! Reading this, the whole thing might sound incredibly stupid, but I can promise you it isn't. It works because a) it comes off as weird and funny as opposed to dumb, and b) the entire cast buys in, and has the talent to pull off the farce in a wide variety of roles. "Sh! The Octopus" gets Two Huge Thumbs Up, and is a guaranteed Absolute Must See. You've never seen a movie like it, and I think you'll love it as much as I did. The picture is razor sharp, and there's a twist near the end, with a special effect that - for 1937 - is nothing short of amazing. See it! ////
As for the previous night, it occasionally happens that when you watch over 350 movies a year, you're gonna get a rerun without intending to. Every once in a while, you start in on a film and think, "boy, this looks like a good one", and the opening scene is terrific, but the imagery is nagging at you. Then, you see something specific, maybe 5-6 minutes into the movie, and you start wondering, "hmmm.....have I seen this before?" Then other stuff happens that makes you almost sure you haven't seen it. But then, right after that, you see a very specific image, involving a particular actor or actress, that imprinted itself on your brain, and you go "yep, I knew it all along. I have seen this one." But now you've got fifteen minutes invested, so you figure, "might as well watch it again." In this case the movie was "Woman in the Dark" with Faye Wray, Ralph Bellamy and Melvyn Douglas, and I'm guessing we watched it right after Covid started. I know it had to be in the Youtube Era, and it was not within the past year. It has to do with Bellamy being paroled after serving time on a manslaughter charge. He goes back to his hometown to try and live a quiet life, but wouldn't you know it, the very first night he's home, Faye Wray - wearing an evening gown and heels - comes knocking on his door in the middle of a storm. She doesn't know Bellamy but asks him for refuge because she's trying to get away from her boyfriend Douglas, who's a real cad. But as the screenwriter would have it, Douglas is aware of Bellamy, whose manslaughter case was in all the papers, and he takes an immediate dislike to him, because it looks to Douglas like he's trying to hide Faye Wray, and/or protect her. What happens is that Douglas starts a fight that ends with one of his pals getting knocked unconcho by Bellamy. Douglas then sees an opportunity to send Bellamy back to prison, so he attempts to suffocate the pal while he's in the hospital recovering from his concussion, which will make it look like he died from the fight, and his death will be blamed on Ralph Bellamy. But by now, Bellamy has Faye Wray on his side as a witness. And Bellamy only decked the guy because he shot Bellamy's dog. If you wanna read a fuller review, I'm sure I wrote one, and you can probably find it somewhere in the titles for the 2020 blogs. But it definitely gets Two Big Thumbs Up and a high recommendation, and the picture is razor sharp. Even if you saw it the first time around, do as I did and watch it again. It's a good 'un.
Well, here's a blast from the past for ya: when was the last time I said "we had good singin' in church today." It had to be March 8 2020, which was the Sunday before Covid. Today I am saying it again, because I attended the choir reunion and sang five songs with them, including "Ride On, King Jesus", and "How Great Thou Art" (which allows me to channel my Inner Elvis). I was a little nervous about the shape of my voice, because I hadn't sung in 2 1/2 years, but other than a slight loss of power on the highest notes, it was in pretty good condition. I didn't have any trouble with breathing, and we got to sing without masks. It was a lot of fun, and very nice to see everyone. Being there without Pearl was a unique feeling and hard to put into words, but it felt like she was there anyway. For the moment, it was just a one-time thing, though I told my friends I will see them again before the year is out, and who knows what might happen after that. I do love singing, that much I know for sure. And, I'm glad I went. It's an awesome church with a wonderful congregation and pastor.
And that's all I know for the moment. My blogging music is "Bundles" by Soft Machine, which I hadn't heard before but is pretty good. Late night listening is Mahler's 8th, conducted by Leonard Bernstein. I hope you had a nice weekend and I send you Tons of Love as always. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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