Robin Hood (1922)

An epic silent movie, and indeed one of the most expensive ones to ever be made. Douglas Fairbanks is the Earl of Huntingdon who deserts from King Richard (Wallace Beery)'s forces away in the crusades after he hears of the cruel deeds being done by Prince John (Sam De Gasse) back home. The Earl is accused of being a traitor by the King and thus when the Earl returns to England he becomes the outlaw Robin Hood.

Robin Hood forms his merry band and challenges the evil Prince John and his henchman the Sherrif of Nottingham (William Lowery). Finally Robin Hood has to face his bitter rival and enemy Sir Guy (Paul Dickery) and rescue his love, the fair Maid Marian (Enid Bennett). All with the usual Fairbanks athleticism and daring-do of course!

The expense is obvious when you see this film, an large castle and village set were built. Set piece scenes with many extras are spectacular. The film is slightly too long though, while there is plenty of swashbuckling maybe at times the whole show needed a bit of editing. One interesting aspect of the film is that it concentrates heavily on how the Earl became Robin Hood, more than other movie Robin Hood films tend to do. The sets may have been big but Fairbanks was bigger, an astounding film in many ways.

Shock (1946)

A neat and dark little psychological thriller. Janet (Anabel Shaw) arrives at a hotel to be reunited with her husband Paul (Frank Latimore) who has just been released from a PoW camp. While she waits she witnesses a murder and is hurled into a paralytic shock. Luckily noted psychiatrist Dr Cross (Vincent Price) is on hand and offers to take her to his sanatorium. Of course the reason he was on-hand was because he has just murdered of his wife...

Dr Cross and his lover Elaine (Lynn Bari) conspire to have Janet declared insane to make sure the truth does not come out. However when the law is starting to sniff around the case of Dr Cross' dead wife the doctor is persuaded by Elaine to kill Janet to silence her forever...

We don't see how the doctor managed to get away with killing his wife in a full hotel and getting rid of her body unseen which maybe stretches credibility a bit. The sanatorium is creepy, the air of suspense lies heavy over everything. The darkest character is Elaine who is able to wrap Dr Cross around her little finger and manipulate him into committing all sorts of foul deeds.

Air Devils (1938)

A rather formulaic but decent action comedy. Two airmen (with nicknames natch) are in the employ of a South Seas territory constabulary, dropping bombs on restless natives and the like. Of course Horseshoe (Larry Blake) and Slats (Dick Purcell) are ex-marines buddies and now in an endless rivalry about pretty much everything... especially pretty girls like Marcia (Beryl Wallace).

While the authorities are trying to build an airbase the cafe owner Mordant (Charles Brokaw) is secretly planning a civil uprising, though for reasons of cash rather than anything noble. During the uprising Marcia is trapped and our two heroes manage to bumble their way into the fight...

So a plot not unlike a number of other films in the 1930s. The film is a bit of a meander at times, the comedy a bit overblown though the action scenes are reasonable, especially in the air. Politically, of course, it is of it's time.

Attack from Space (1965)

A hilarious compilation of two Japanese sci-fi TV serials. Starman (Ken Utsui) in his rather unflattering outfit is sent to Earth to warn them of the evil Sappharians and their plans to conquer Earth and/or the Universe. Meanwhile Dr Yamanaka (Hiroshi Hayashi) has built a spaceship but before he can use it he is captured (along with his children) by Sappharian agents.

The prisoners are taken to the Sappharian super secret base. Starman seems to end up in flames after being blown up by missiles, then various sites on Earth are blown up. Can Starman make a dramatic entrance to save the Earth?

As with all condensed versions of serials the storyline is rather confusing and disjointed with the frequent cliff hangers. The Sappharians, who are rather Nazi like even down to the salute, are rather useless. In one ridiculous scene a whole bunch of them are defeated by a teenage girl. 

Starman fights and defeats an entire army of the bad guys in what must be one of the longest single fight scenes in history. Campy nonsense for sure but a lot of fun.

The Mighty Peking Man (1977)

A superbly weird film just as you imagine the HK version of King Kong would be. Johnny Fang (Danny Lee) heads to the Himalayas to track down the mythical Peking Man or Utam, some sort of gigantic (although the size seems to vary between scenes) monstrous ape. Finally he discovers the creature but he is about to be crushed by it... until the arrival of a female Tarzan called Samantha (Evelyne Kraft) who was lost as a child in a plane crash in the Himalayas and bought up by Utam in the ..er.. jungles of the Himalayas.

Samantha falls for Johnny and he persuades her to bring Utam to HK so the whole world can see him. Utam ends up in a show but you just know it will end up badly...

An epic in monster mayhem, the destroyed buildings are so obviously models but the action scenes are tremendous set pieces. Samantha is a terrifically strange character, the fact she seems to hate wearing clothes adds to the sheer camp of much of the film. However amid the camp there is a lot of darkness in this film, Utam dies with honour, many of the humans die after being crushed by his giant feet. In fact Samantha (and maybe Johnny) apart, the humans in this film act terribly.