Buon Compleanno !! Rosalba Neri

 

    A VERY special Happy Birthday to this blog's favorite actress. Born on this day in 1939 in Forli, Italy, she won several beauty contests as a young girl and later attended il Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia (The Center for Experimental Cinematography) - that sounds like one heck of a film school ! She had an offer to attend the Actors Studio in the U.S., but for reasons never specified she did not accept. Her first role was in Pingunin ci guardano (The Penguins Watch Us) at the age of 15. Her last credited film was in 1977 and her last role was in the T.V. mini series Olge el Soui Fifli (Olga and Her Children) from 1985.
   I've included a couple of screen grabs of her below from the recent Italian DVD of Il Plenilunio Delle Vergini (AKA The Devil's Wedding Night 1973) in which Rosalba is interviewed in a documentary on the making of the film. She's appeared in a few of these recently and always looks to be very happy to reminisce about her films (she invariably finds a lot to smile about). I think she still looks pretty darn good. Her and Barbara Bouchet remain good friends to this day and its cool to picture them hanging out & exchanging pasta recipes and gossip and such. There was German TV special done on her in 2002 entitled The Italian Sphinx, which has yet to surface "out there".

Happy Birthday Lucio Fulci

  Born on this day in 1927 and passed away in 1996. Below is the haunting image of Emily (Cinzia Monreale) from 1981's The Beyond. The 3rd in Fulci's famous "quartet" of zombie/gothic horror films and his masterpiece.

Barbara Bouchet Tearin'' Up The The Dance Floor - In Harm's Ways 1965

    Here's future Italian giallo babe Barbara Bouchet throwing down some moves in 1965's In Harm's Way from director Otto Preminger. This was Barbara's first major role, playing the two-timing wife of Navy officer Kirk Douglas. In these, the opening scenes of the film, she's doing the wild drunk dance with Hugh O'Brian before heading off for some moonlight skinny dipping (complete with dashboard obscuring nudity). The next morning the pair are killed in a fiery wreak after being starfed by Japanese planes. Seems it was their bad luck to have picked Dec.7 1941 to wake up drunk on a beach in Hawaii.

   In Harm's Way is kind of a schizophrenic affair with older Hollywood stars like John Wayne, Kirk Douglas and Henry Fonda doing the gung-ho war movie thing along with bunches of soap opera stuff including still at the time somewhat taboo plot points such as rape & in your face infidelity (along with Barbara's orgasmic like dancing and semi-nude skinny dipping).
  Barbara did a few more movies & some TV stuff after this, then headed off to Italy where she stared in such classics as Black Belly of the Tarantula (1971), Amuck (1972 - with Rosalba Neri), The Lady in Red Kills Seven Times (1972) and Caliber 9 (1973). In 1959 she won the "Miss Gidget" beauty contest in San Francisco and was a dancer on the teen dance program KPIX Dance Party. She had a small role in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York from 2002.

Tiffany Bolling Movie Night # 4 - The Candy Snatchers 1972

 

                                                               "It Started Out As Such a Simple Crime"

    One of the more perversely twisted movies to come out of the 70's, The Candy Snatchers was screenwriter Guerdon Trueblood only directing credit (besides an episode on Barnaby Jones). Along with Tiffany Bolling's other two Arthur Marks 70's classics Bonnie's Kids and Centerfold Girls these three together form a very dark trilogy of the human psyche with The Candy Snatchers having a typical downward spiral to hell Arthur Marks ending.
  Tiffany plays Jesse, who together with her psycho brother Alan (Brad Davis) and troubled vet Eddy (Vincent Martorano) kidnap 16 year old Candy (played by very young looking 20 year old Susan Sennet) and bury her in a box tied & blindfolded. Because her father owns a jewelry store the gang believes he'll hand over a bag full of merchandise to let her go. The only trouble is Dad (Ben Piazza) has his own agenda and paying the ransom isn't very high on his list as he's busy fooling around with his assistant. As if this wasn't all enough Candy's mother is a alcoholic and the only person to have witnessed the crime and can save her is Sean, a small deaf & autistic boy (played by director Trueblood's son Christopher and looking like Klaus Kinski as a kid) who has the ultimate patents from hell.

   As the gang slowly waits out the never arriving ransom and their plan slowly unravels the plot descends into a harrowing mix of double crossings, rape, killing and sadism. Save for Candy and the small boy (who spends the entire movie desperately trying to get someone to understand him) none of the other characters seem to have much of any moral character. We're led to believe that Eddy is a decent guy as he attempts to protect Candy however he has a very disturbing scene with Tiffany (who seems to enjoy torturing & taunting their captive). Psycho serial killer brother Alan just looks forward to killing her and a side plot dinner party with the kid Sean's family and the Dad's boss even turns ugly.
   Along with all this is a very dark sense of humor (almost slapstick at some points) including a trip to a morgue to purchase an ear. The humor really doesn't do anything to lighten up the proceedings, but does somehow even add to the overall creepiness & unsettling atmosphere of the film. The rape scenes are particularly shocking with one being observed by the child and another Candy is forced to listen to while laying tied & blindfolded on the floor as she silently recites the lords prayer.

    Tiffany Bolling in the past always had a kind of tolerate and/or hate relationship with her career in these types of movies. In 1991 she did an interview with Kris Gilpin over at Temple of Schlock where she refers to this as "the worst movie ever made". On the Subversive DVD she appears in an on camera interview and shares a commentary with co-star Susan Sennet (who was also in Big Bad Mama). She says that this movie was the one that pretty much killed her chances at mainstream success and Sennet (who seems rather uncomfortable watching it) relates how she's suffered from claustrophobia since filming this. One of the greatest 70's grindhouse movies and a film that probably could only have been made in the 70's. Well worth checking out.

Steve McQueen & His 12 Gauge Shotgun - The Getaway 1972

   Steve McQueen as "Doc" McCoy in Sam Peckinpah's 1972 heist classic The Getaway. Noticing the police checking out his car, McQueen heads into a nearby gun shop, steals a 12 gauge shotgun (plus has it wrapped up "to go") and then uses it to totally destroy a police car. A great film and one on my favorites of both Peckinpah & McQueen. One of the (many) cool things about McQueen was that in his movies he always handled guns like "real" guns, not just props.
  IMO the only thing that lets this down is the performance of Ali McGraw in the female lead as McQueen's girlfriend. Supposedly Sam wanted Tuesday Weld (which would have been interesting) and Karen Black was also considered. Also featuring Al Lattieri in a great psycho role who takes Sally Struthers (All in the Family) & Jack Dodson (Andy Griffith) captive and embarks on the road trip from hell while pursuing McQueen.

 

Enter The Devil 1972

"Then it's Too Late For Exorcism !"

   Creepy little Texas shot regional horror film from 1972, which is part of the "Texas devil worshipping" sub genre of the 70's including Race With The Devil (1975) & The Devil's Rain (1975) and was directed by veteran TV producer/director & Texas film legend Frank Q. Dobbs.

   Ominously starting out with a car traveling down a desolate stretch of desert highway whose tire is then blown out by a rifle shot and the stranded motorist is picked up by an unseen man in a pick-up truck (with a rifle visible in the window rack). Later we see the mororist being dragged screaming into a cave. Called into to investigate the missing person is Deputy Sheriff Jason Brooks (stuntman David S. Cass Sr.) who arrives at a Hunting Lodge owned by Glenn (Josh Bryant). Also arriving soon after at the lodge are a group of hunters (and devil worship fodder) who proceed to drink a lot of beer, make inappropriate remarks to the female staff and to add some exploitation material to the plot, there's even an attempted rape.
  One of the hunters falls prey to an attacker who turns out is a member of a bunch of hooded devil worshippers who hang out in a large cave with an altar and sacrifice people by various ways - slicing & stabbing, thrown in a rattlesnake pit and tied up with barbed wire and burned at the stake.

   Local devil cult expert & college professor Dr. Leslie Culver (Irene Kelly) soon shows up to investigate the weird goings on and to start a romance with lodge owner Glenn (who puts the moves on her in his cool sunken den complete with really ugly shag carpeting and stone fireplace).
    There is something about this film - It's slow as hell at some points and you can see the ending coming for miles (but it does throw in a little downbeat twist). Some of the characters who die are a bit of a surprise and there's something kinda weird and off-kilter about the whole thing that holds your interest. The photography is above average for a low budget film and director Dobbs knows how to compose shots that really capture the eeriness and desolation of the desert. The film doesn't stick to usual horror movie cliches and cuts away from a lot of the blood & gore, but leaves just enough graphic stuff in to make it startling. A pretty cool, creepy little film. Josh Bryant later had a recurring role in TV's M.A.S.H as Sgt Scully.