The Devil Plays (1931)

This film (also known as The Murdock Affair) is a pretty decent murder mystery. It has a very Golden Age type story with the initial crime taking place in a big house packed full of beautiful and wealthy people in posh frocks and dinner jackets, and an amateur detective (a crime writer to boot) helps out the police.

Jameson Forrest is that amateur and very suave he is too. The victim (Richard Tucker) though is a bit of a cad and various people have motive to kill him including Forrest's lover played by Florence Britton. It can't be the Quincys in the next room though as they were drugged. Or were they?

The film is well plotted and keeps you guessing though isn't without it's flaws. Some of the acting is strangely stilted and a couple of the characters (such as the police sergeant played by Lew Kelly) are a bit annoying. Well never mind that, as a 1930s whodunnit it is very well done indeed.

The Gamma People (1956)

The Gamma People is a bizarre science-fiction film starring Leslie Phillips and Paul Douglas as a couple of journalists who are mysteriously diverted into a tiny Central European country. Here depraved experiments are being conducted (by Walter Rilla playing a suitably sinister mad scientist) on children with gamma rays to turn them into fanatical geniuses (or mindless monsters if the treatments fail as they often do).

Not everyone is keen on these experiments and the two journalists are dragged into the struggle. It is a really strange idea for a film and is played with quite a lot of camp. Playing for a laughs was a good idea as the film is just too silly to take seriously. It is still not a good film by any measure though, more gamma rays needed.

Stars On Parade (1936)

Stars On Parade collects a variety of music hall acts (comedians, singers, dancers et cetera) and what a nostalgia fest it is.

It doesn't all work, some of the comedy sketches are a little drawn out but the next act is usually up pretty quickly anyway. The best acts were the singer Navarre, the magician Horace Goldin, the detective dog Dr Watson, a high energy dance number by the Sherman Fisher Girls and a lovely accordion-backed song by Pat Hyde.

The acts hang on a vague storyline about an investigation into a poisoning but don't take much notice of that! It is very entertaining (at times), quite corny at others and sometimes simply odd (a horse painted white posed as a statue, whats that all about?) A world that's now long gone and that's a shame.

Milano Calibro 9 (1972)

A brutal tale of organised crime hoodlums in Milan, it's also a masterpiece in early 1970s interior design and style.

It stars Gastone Moschin as a hood released from prison who is suspected by his boss of stealing $300,000. Obviously such a situation is not good for someone's life expectancy or health.

This is a dark violent tale where everyone seems to be double crossing everyone else. Even the police are at each other's throats though the Commissioner played by Frank Wolff ends up vindicated in the end. The film keeps you guessing as to who has played the biggest double cross and is very well done indeed.

Glamour is provided by Barbara Bouchet but the real beauty is in the interior furnishings. This film could easily be filed under Interior Design Porn.

Alibi Breaker (1937)

Also known as "Double Exposures", this is a neat little film though plagued with a few annoying one-dimensional characters too many. It stars Basil Langton as a cheeky journalist who tries and fails to get an interview with a frightful pompous bore of an industrialist (Julien Mitchell) and his frightful bore of a snobby wife (Ruby Miller).

The industrialist's secretary (a rotter played by Brian Buchel) and lawyer are concocting a plan to rip him off and framing the industrialist's useless son for the crime. The crime is an ingenious one with cast iron alibis for the criminals... until Basil ruins the alibi with the help of some photographs.

It is an enjoyable and flighty little film with plenty of farce, just at times a little too annoying. It is also wrapped up a little too neatly (just in time for tea). As a period piece though it is wonderful.

Till Death Do We Scare (1982)

The first few minutes of Till Death Do We Scare are among the funniest in movie history, thats if someone getting crushed by a steamroller (with the film then cutting to the funeral with a totally flat coffin) is enough to make you laugh. Hey it worked for me.

After that the film meanders a bit too much to truly be considered "winning" though the ending is fairly exciting with some nice ghost monster touches. There probably wasn't enough script for a whole movie but the good start and decent ending make the film worth watching.

Till Death Do We Scare stars Olivia Cheng as a three-times widow who is wooed by Alan Tam.

Olivia's three deceased husbands (present as ghosts) want her to be happy and stay alive to maintain their legacy so try their best to get Olivia and Alan together and then, as they fear Alan will also die soon after marriage, do their best to try and split them up. Alan's sidekick Eric Tsang gets scared by a chair and menaced by the Ghost King's daughter playing the fall guy for a lot of the jokes as he does so well.

Its often quite hilarious and also pretty stupid, like many other HK comedies of the period. The comedy is goofy and slapstick though at times highly inventive. As a horror film it works too sometimes, the horror is quite frightening though at other times utter cheese. It isn't perfect by any means but overall it is worth persevering with.

The Black Gestapo (1975)

The Blaxploitation genre film often employed some really quite strange ideas but maybe one of the oddest was in The Black Gestapo. It starred Rod Perry as a black gang leader who forms an army to defeat the mob in his neighbourhood (and who are basically busting his ass). He is usurped by one of his officers (Charles Robinson) who uses Nazi methods and techniques to strengthen his grip on the city.

Funky Jive talking Nazi stormtroopers then, you wouldn't get away with that kind of thing these days - and it is a wonder they did in 1975 to be honest!

So is the film any good? Not really, it is all rather shoddy with numerous poorly choreographed fight scenes and gratuitous nudity. The sheer weirdness of the premise of the film is the only real reason to see it. Well it is enough I suppose.