Bad Movies In Bay View
In the interest of attracting audiences, the newly-minted Alchemist Theatre has begun showing vintage B-grade films between certain weekends. It’s not a bad deal: for $2 you get a domestic beer, free popcorn and two classically bad films. Here’s a brief glance at what’s coming-up:MARCH 11TH and 12TH: HORROR MOVIE DOUBLE FEATURE: MANFISH and GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE
MANFISH (1956)
Almost sort of inspired by Poe’s The Telltale Heart, this was one of Lon Chaney Jr.’s four appearances on the big screen in 1956. Here Chaney plays it big and dumb as the first mate of a vessel searching for treasure on the high seas. Oddly enough, Chaney isn’t playing the title character here. The title is the name of the vessel he and Captain Brannigan (John Bromfeld) helm.
Total drinking time: 76 minutes
GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE (1974)
From writer/director Jon Hayes, (evidently the auteur behind such films as 1970's Dream No Evil and Jailbait Babysitter in 1977) comes this mid-‘70’s father/son vampire film. A vampire named Croft (Michael Pataki) returns from the dead to rape a woman who then bears a child who can only drink blood from his mother’s breast. Hard to believe this one wasn’t a bigger hit.
Total Drinking Time: 95 minutes
MARCH 19TH and 20TH: CRAPTACULAR SCI-FI DOUBLE FEATURE: WAR OF THE PLANETS and PHANTOM PLANET
WAR OF THE PLANETS (1977)
In Italy, they called it Battaglie negli spazi stellari. In America, they didn’t really call it anything. In 1977, Americans were too busy being glued to a reasonably better sci-fi film out of Hollywood by that guy who directed American Graffiti. War of the Planets is an enigmatic film caught somewhere between the cheesiness of 1960’s Hollywood space opera and a mid-1970’s European cinema aesthetic. Having come out when it did, it could be argued that this was the last 1960’s B-grade Sci-Fi film.
Total Drinking Time: 95 minutes
PHANTOM PLANET (1961)
This one is a classically bad film from the golden age of misdirected, well-meaning science fiction. An astronaut travels to a distant planet where he encounters a race of really short people. Before long, the planet’s physics shrink him to six inches in height. He is accosted by a few women to help the denizens of the planet fend off an attack from weird, rubbery aliens. Or something like that.
Total drinking time: 82 minutes
------
More bad movies are scheduled to hit the Alchemist in April.
For more info, check out the alchemist's website.
Posted by rbickerstaff on 03/02 at 02:09 PM