Wednesday, October 2, 2024

The Man Who Wouldn't Die (1942)

Private investigator Michael Shayne is called to help with a mysterious case of a man who has come back from the dead!

Catherine (Marjorie Weaver) is staying at her father's (Paul Harvey) fancy county mansion, but at night a mysterious man appears in her room and takes a pot shot at her! Her father and the others dismiss this as a dream, but Catherine employs her friend Shayne (Lloyd Nolan) to pose as her new husband who her family haven't met yet. Shayne discovers a mysterious science lab but also a burial of a man in the house' large garden, but the grave is later found empty. Did the man come back to life?

An excellent crime B-movie romp, the Michael Shayne series was at full steam by now. A complicated plot involving Indian fakirs, theatrical tricks and blackmail passes by quickly with the usual fast moving action and plenty of wisecracks. 

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

Disaster at Silo 7 (1988)

An accident at a nuclear missile silo poses a real risk of the missile exploding, with a rather large nuclear warhead on top.

The accident occurs during refuelling of a Titan II missile causing a fuel spill. Team leader Sergeant Fitzgerald (Michael O'Keefe) is called in and immediately realises the risk of the fuel igniting and blowing the while thing up. He tells his wife (Patricia Charbonneau) to get out of town fast with his family, then heads back into the silo...

This is an enjoyable TV movie, it does fall back on TV movie tropes a bit but the action is solid, if stretches the budget a bit thinly at times. The film is based on a real incident that occurred in 1980, and it pretty accurate too so don't read up on the Damascus Titan explosion before you have seen this movie unless you don't mind spoilers!