Retro Puppet Master (1999)

A really bizarre and grotesque horror film, a prequel in the long-running Puppet Master series.

Toulon (Guy Rolfe) and his puppets, possessed by the spirits of dead people, is in Switzerland. He tells a story about how it all started, going back to Egypt - which for some reason is all blue. The ancient sorcerer Afzel (Jack Donner) has stolen the secret of life from the god Sutekh. He heads to Paris (which is also all blue, no reason for this is ever given) pursued by Sukekh's mummies. Afzel is attacked outside a theatre where young Toulon (Greg Sestero) and his friends hold creepy puppet shows.

Afzel teaches Toulon how to transfer the spirit from the dead to a puppet (of course!) The mummies of Sutekh now also go after Toulon too, they kill his friends. Toulon places their spirits into his puppets to create an army to fight evil! The mummies force Toulon into a showdown on a train by kidnapping Ilsa (Brigitta Dau), a girl Toulon likes...

Very strange film indeed. The film is very macabre in look and feel, and very atmospheric. The pacing and acting is often fairly off, sometimes the puppets move with more fluidity. It all adds to the weirdness and the enjoyment.

The Girl from Rio (1969)

A bizarre crime action film. There are many films which make little sense, but this film makes none whatsoever.

The all-female queendom of Femina, under the rule of Sumitra (Shirley Eaton), wants to conquer the world. Jeff (Richard Wyler) has arrived in Rio with $10 million. The gangster Sir Masius (George Sanders), whose men drive around incognito in gaudy hearses, is after his money though his hoods are pretty useless in a fight. Sumitra also wants the cash as well and captures Jeff. Jeff is take to Femina and ends up in a glass cell along with Ulla (Marta Reeve) being tortured. We discover that Jeff is really here to rescue her. Though, he seems to pick up quite a harem along the way.

It's terrible campy nonsense really, but looks pretty funky. Sumitra's fortress is a concrete Brutalist marvel. Her tortures involve many strange early electronic noises. Her army of females are (of course) fairly scantily dressed. Well it was 1969, who needed acid when films like this were around?

L' Orgie Romaine (1911)

The hedonistic lives of the Roman Emperors (at least in popular imagination) have always been a rich subject for film. In this early film we follow the notorious Heliogabalus (Jean Aymé) as he indulges himself with a harem of women, boys and also lions!

Heliogabalus comes to a sticky end though when the Pretorian Guard finally tire of his cruelty and deviance. Live by the orgy, die by the sword as they probably never said.

A luscious film that certainly had no shortage of extras and fancy costumes. The camera is rather static and the acting frequently over dramatic but a good story is told none the less.

Gog (1954)

A bit slow and steady but a satisfying (and fairly realistic) sci-fi horror.

Dr Sheppard (Richard Egan) is assigned to a secret scientific base in the desert to investigate a couple of unexplained deaths in the lab. Dr Van Ness (Herbert Marshall) is keen to show him the scientific marvel he commands, everything controlled by a computer. That includes a couple of robots (one of them called Gog which explains the mysterious title).

However, an unnamed foreign power has infiltrated the base and is using radio waves to gain control of the computer and the robots. Can Sheppard and Merritt (Constance Dowling) stop the robots from blowing up the base in an atomic explosion?

This is a marvellous feast for fans of early computing with it's punched paper tape controlled robots and IBM teletype terminals. The film makes great use of real scientific footage to appear as plausible as possible (especially for the time period and genre). This does make the film slow at times but it is well worth it. No aliens to scare you this time but plenty of SCIENCE.

All Coppers Are... (1972)

Although not perfect, a really enjoyable early 1970s crime film.

Wannabe gangster Barry (Nicky Henson) has worked out a blag on a London cigarette factory. He meets Sue (Julia Foster) at a party, as well as Joe (Martin Potter). The three form a love triangle, though when Barry and Sue discover Joe is a police constable that all changes. Although Sue has real feelings for Joe (as does he, despite his wife (Wendy Allnut) and child!) her future is with Barry who is getting ready to raid the factory, though you just know Joe will get involved...

This is one of those films which you need to approach the right way to truly enjoy. That way to treat this as including footage from a long episode of the Sweeney. Wade (Ian Hendry) provides most of that with his cockney hardman character. The film has plenty of flaws, including most of the lead characters being rather unlikeable. It does look great though.

A really nostalgic film for 1970s London, when real working class people could live there, and you could easily find a parking space.