jefferson starshit.

Still trawling thru' my quality SciFi collection to prepare myself for The Rise of Skywalker but mixing it up a wee bit today with a slice of hard hitting truth teasing space-based shocks.

Plus this was released the same year as the original Star Wars so there's a kinda symmetry.

Enjoy.

Starship Invasions (AKA Alien Encounter, Project Genocide, and War of the Aliens. 1977).
Dir: Ed Hunt.
Cast:  Robert Vaughn, Christopher Lee, Daniel Pilon, Tiiu Leek, Helen Shaver, Henry Ramer, Victoria Johnson, Doreen Lipson, Kate Parr, Sherri Ross, Linda Rennhofer, Richard Fitzpatrick, Ted Turner, Sean McCann, Bob Warner and Kurt Schiegl.

Precariously perched atop his toy town tractor like a giant, plaid blancmange made flesh, the multi-chinned and five bellied farmer Rudy (Schiegl from Quest for Fire and the local cake shop) seems oblivious to the large inflatable flying saucer landing in his potato field.

Remarkably for a man of his stature he remains totally unfazed (and frighteningly non sweaty) as two black leotard clad male dancers mince from the craft and shuffle him aboard.

Is he dead?

Or just drunk?

I wish I were.

Sitting patiently like some stoned walrus, Rudy is prodded and probe by his captors only really getting interested when a curved hipped, Vegas style showgirl slowly strips in front of him before beginning what can only be a complex Martian seduction dance.

Crikey.

Ronnie Corbett gingerly ran thru' the giants fingers.

The next day Rudy can't wait to tell the locals about his escapades both inside a genuine UFO as well as inside a genuine space whore but unfortunately everyone reckons he's a drunken, inbred freak.

Which if I'm honest he is.

One person who does believe him tho' is sexily slick haired UFO specialist Professor Allan Duncan (Vaughn whose alimony must have been crippling that month) who makes a trip to visit our portly pal.

Examining both the landing site and Rudy's ample arse, Duncan reveals that both have recently been dowsed with radiation (tho' only one has been dowsed with Martian muck) and that incredibly aliens have been visiting the Earth for years.

My word!

Vaughn: skint.

Meanwhile, aboard the UFO, the evil plant pot wearing alien commander Ted Rameses (a seriously fucking unhappy Christopher Lee) and his motley band of space dancers are busy planning their next diabolical kidnap caper.

Lee: no shame.

It transpires that poor Rudy was not the first to be abducted (tho' he was by far the largest breasted) nor will he be the last for no sooner has Rameses explained the plot that the crew go searching for an Earth female to fiddle with too.

An preferably one in ill fitting flesh coloured pants just like your mums.

But for the love of God why? I hear you cry.

Well, it seems that Rameses and his racy chums are not, in fact, an intergalatic dance troupe but an invasion party from the distant planet Alpha.

A distant planet that's sun is about to go supernova.

So understandably our Alphanian chums are looking for a new planet (albeit one with a burgeoning spandex business) to colonise.

Simple when you think about it.

If you think she looks uncomfortable now just wait till the Martian mooth shite-in starts.

Unluckily for us it appears that Earth fits the bill nicely giving Rameses an excuse to unleash his massive weapon in order to kill all humanity before signalling the Alpha colony ships that are currently in hiding behind the dark side of the moon.

Tho' how an entire invasion fleet can keep itself hidden behind a Pink Floyd album is never explained.

I'm assuming that it's the vinyl version seeing as it would be considerably bigger than trying to conceal yourself behind a cassette or CD.

But I digress.

Humanity has one last line of defence tho', as the justice (and lard by the size of their waistlines) loving intergalactic council, the fantastically - and not at all cliché named  The League of Races have a secret base on Earth; a giant pyramid cunningly hidden under what seems to be the directors duck pond.

Christopher Lee, up the casino, Anchorhead, 1977....Yesch!

Knowing that he must destroy the base if his plan is to succeed, Rameses lands at the base and pretends that he needs the toilet.

The League, being either really nice or really dim send a giant silver sex toy named Deirdre to escort the rotten Rameses to the little boys room, giving his crew ample time to sabotage the cloaking device of a League UFO that's been busy taking photos of popular tourist attractions.

When the aforementioned flying saucer suddenly becomes visible to the local populace whilst hovering over the local Aldi the army have no choice but to blow it up.

The swines!

With all the good guys running about trying to figure out what caused the force field failure (try typing that when you're drunk, tho' thinking about it, it mustn't be too difficult as the writer managed to) Rameses and his crew have time to put bizarre laser firing matchbox and string contraptions on their fingers and take over the pyramid, murdering a room of space whores and seriously injuring Deirdre in the process.

Behold the future of pleasure! the android Jade Goody sex doll with hyper speed tit wanking action!

It's now time for our hideously hatted intergalactic bastard to contact his fellow Alphans and order them to aim their patented mentalist beam at Earth, turning hitherto normal folk into crazed murderers.

Rameses however hasn't realised that a small band of Leaguers, led by grand admiral Hilary Zoonie have managed to slip away in a UFO and are racing to contact the only humans who are gullible enough to help them in their fight.

Oh, and repair their space ship.

Yup that'll be Professor Duncan and his man-breasted computer expert brother Malcom (Ramer, from the TV movie Sodbusters and also your grannies bed).

Christopher Lee was startled by the space parrot that suddenly perched itself on his shoulder.

With Malcom's help (and his extra large underpants to cover a hole in the hull), Hilary can modify the UFO's communications system and send an S.O.S. to the main League headquarters - you'd think it'd be a wee bit more complicated than that wouldn't you? - but don't worry because whilst all this action-packed repair work is going on we can sit back and enjoy an arse numbing lecture on alien culture and technology as Duncan quizzes the crew about building the ancient pyramids and why the only woman on board has such wobbly thighs and a head so large that it has it's own gravitational field.

But saying that tho' she is the most attractive member of the cast.

Sorry Mr. Vaughn.

All I can say is how fucking stunning is this?

Finally, with humanity under attack by the aforementioned death ray and Duncan's wee girl slowly going mad and attacking tomatoes in the local Asda, the Alphan invasion fleet and the League saucers face-off in the inky blackness of outer space to start a war in the stars.

Obviously this would be way too expensive to show so it's back to Earth where rotten Rameses is using the superior calculators found aboard the League base to tip the scales in his favour, whilst Duncan's frighteningly plain (and bra-less) wife has picked up a kitchen knife and begun to slash at her wrists....

Will Hilary, Professor Duncan, that bald bird and Malcolm be able to defeat Rameses and stop the mad gun before Earth is destroyed?

Christopher Lee contemplates becoming the filling in a particularly crabs ridden sex sandwich.

Starting his career with the soft core porn classics Pleasure Palace and Diary Of A Sinner, it wasn't long before writer/director/producer and rhyming slang named UFO nut Ed Hunt - who by this point was obviously tired of exposed arses - decided instead to expose the truth behind UFO's, firstly with the little seen Nicky Fylan starrer Point of No Return and then with this universally acclaimed science factual epic.

Starship Invasions is quite possibly the greatest science fiction movie of that name ever to come out of Canada in 1977 and probably the only one to feature Christopher Lee painfully forced into a childs jumpsuit whilst wearing a pizza box on his head.

Blatantly ripped off by non-trick pony M Night Shyamalan in the hideous The Happening (tho' without the spaceships and the man from UNCLE obviously) Starship Invasions storyline was based in part on factual accounts of real UFO abductions with costumes and saucer designs taken from true life testimonies, in fact the terrifying 'probing of Rudy' scene was an exact duplicate of a situation the director found himself in as a teenager.

Imagine a Canadian Star Trek The Motion Picture, only shit(ter).

With a budget over almost £38 (the biggest amount ever invested in a Canadian film up to this point) Starship Invasions unfortunately sank into obscurity, beaten at the box office by a rival film that was hastily put into production to capitalise on the excitement caused by the announcement of Starship Invasions.

This immature imitator was Close Encounters of The Third Kind directed by Steven Spielberg (and whatever happened to him?) proving once and for all that when the audience has the choice between terrifying fact or whimsical fiction that they'll choose the latter every time.

Another reason for the films lack of financial success can possibly be attributed to the hyper real and almost documentary style in which it was shot.

Like all great auteurs Hunt litters his film with purposely mismatched military stock footage and endless, repeated shots of Rameses saucer in flight, imbuing the film with a nightmare quality associated with UFO encounters but wrongly attributed to cost cutting and incompetence by many ill educated 'critics' of the time.

But the directors greatest achievement in extra-terrestrial accuracy is in scenes featuring the aliens 'communicating'.

It's widely reported in the scientific world that many alien races communicate telepathically, a fact that many lesser research movies fail to adhere to due to the complex effects work that this would involve.

Hunt however embraced the challenge in both his sweaty, sausage like hands, hiring a massive team to actually teach the actors telepathy and mind controlling powers, his crew working alongside them to develop the worlds only pyschic camera to enable them to record the scenes.

Again naysayers and critics, their minds obviously blown by such a concept accused Hunt of cost cutting by filming many scenes without sound, recording and inserting the dialogue later.

This left Hunt a broken man and it was a long two years before he returned to directing.

And what a return it was, helming as he did probably the best episode of the epic teevee series Greatest Heroes of the Bible, the producers realising that only a genius of Hunt's talents would be worthy of re-imagining the classic tale of Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar and brave enough to cast ex-Happy Days star Donnie (Ralph Malph) Most as Daniel.

(Pie) Tin Machine.

But by this time a new younger breed of directors had come forward, spurned on by the aforementioned Spielberg and Star Wars creator George Lucas' kid friendly and non threatening science fiction style leaving Hunt's hyper-realistic visions to wallow unloved in the cinematic backwaters of celluloid obscurity, unknown but to only a few film historians and those fans lucky (and clever) enough to truly appreciate his genius.

bond age.

With the trailer to the new the James Bond film 'No Time To Die' debuting today I thought It'd be a good time to share an overview I wrote of my favourite Bond movie from way back in 2015.

Partly because it's not too badly written (for me) but mainly in the hope of attracting some (any?) new readers.

Originally published in the late lamented Multitude of Movies Magazine - hence the distinct lack of 'mooth shite' and 'laugh now' gags - sit back and enjoy (again if you read it first time around) some classic bondage as we revisit....


Licence To Kill (1989).
Dir: John Glen.
Cast: Timothy Dalton, Carey Lowell, Robert Davi, Talisa Soto, Anthony Zerbe, David Hedison, Benicio del Toro, Everett McGill, Desmond Llewellyn, Robert Brown and Wayne Newton.

“loyalty is more important than money”

It’s 1989 and the world of cinematic heroism is in a state of flux… as Indiana Jones rides off into the sunset in the company of his dad and Captain Kirk has a cut-price family-friendly face-off with God, a hero from our childhood is about to emerge onto the big screen darker, dourer and much, much more leathery than ever before…

Indeed, 1989 was the year of the Bat.

But Bob Kane’s eponymous Dark Knight detective wasn’t the only character of old being dragged kicking-and-screaming into the modern age.

Another 60’s pop culture icon was about to receive a much needed make-over.

Bond was back.

And, after the frankly schizophrenically scripted The Living Daylights tried somewhat unsuccessfully to mix Moore-style quips with Connery era arse-kicking, 007’s new adventure Licence Revoked looked to return to a Bond with a more realistic edge (but with a dreamy Welsh accent), the likes of which hadn’t been seen since the franchise’s very beginning.

But evil machinations of which Blofeld himself would be proud were about to scupper the super spy in his attempts to regain his action crown.

The least of which was the worry from Eon that no-one in America would know what ‘revoked’ meant.

And, if they did, would they assume that the title referred to Bond’s driving licence?

There is no such thing as a totally straight man, just a man who's never experienced Timothy Dalton as James Bond.

A dozen meetings and one swift title change later – well, I say swift… but not swift enough to save Eon from having to dump Robert Peak’s darkly daring promotional artwork and quickly replace it with what looked like a hastily Pritt-sticked community centre panto poster – and Licence To Kill was born.

And with it a grittier and, let’s be honest, a damn sight sexier Bond for a new and more dangerous age.

A Bond out for revenge and out for justice.

A Bond that bled, cried and wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty.

And, unfortunately, a Bond that no-one save the die-hard fan seemed to have had any interest in seeing.

Which is a pity really because those of us who did see it at the time realised that we were witnessing probably the greatest Bond movie ever.

And if you don’t believe me, then I’d happily listen to you explain why they’ve been remaking it every few years under a variety of titles only this time with Daniel Craig in the lead role.

Welcome to the weird, wonderful and high-wired world of Licence To Kill.
And by its end the Bond franchise will never be the same again.

But first, for those few who’ve still not seen it, I think a wee recap is in order.

Helping his best bud Felix Leiter (David Hedison, the only other actor save Jeffrey Wright to play the role twice) prepare for his wedding, suave super spy James Bond (Mr. Vegas himself Wayne Newton – nah, only joking, Timothy ‘Bloody’ Dalton obviously) finds himself and Leiter sidelined by the DEA to help in the capture of the evil drug kingpin Franz Sanchez (the great beast himself and star of Maniac Cop II and III, Robert Davi).

In a feat of airborne daring so great that Christopher Nolan would later rip it off for The Dark Knight Rises, Bond and Leiter – using only a big hook and a few metres of old rope – capture Sanchez by literally ‘fishing’ his plane out of the sky before parachuting into the wedding ceremony to a sexy Gladys Knight theme.

Phwoar indeed.

Unfortunately (for Felix, that is… I mean for us it’s a godsend, otherwise the movie would be over), Sanchez bribes slimy DEA agent Ed Killifer (Twin Peaks‘ Big Ed himself, Everett McGill) and escapes, but not before setting in motion a raging rampage of revenge that begins with feeding Felix to a shark before murdering his wife.

Bond, upon discovering this, is understandably a wee bit upset.

His temper isn't helped by the fact that the DEA refuse to assist our hero in bringing Sanchez to justice, due to him being out of his jurisdiction, leaving Bond – alongside his buddy Sharkey (Frank McRae) – to start their own investigation.

The dashing duo soon discover that not only is the nearby marine research centre run by a henchman of Sanchez, the twitchy, bitchy Milton Krest (the always fantastic Anthony Zerbe), but it’s also in reality a cover for Sanchez’ cocaine smuggling operation. As it happens, Killifer is there to pick up his cash.

What are the chances?

Bond, by this point not only annoyed about bits of his best friend becoming fish food but visibly angry at spending a whole 30 minutes without chinning someone, angrily feeds Killifer to the same shark (c’mon, they’re expensive to hire) that maimed Leiter.

Which is nice.

Imagine being the filling in this sandwich.

Concerned by Bond’s mood swings, M (Robert Brown) meets up with our hero and orders him to travel to Istanbul for a new assignment which frankly is the last thing Bond needs to hear, causing him to resign from the secret service before headbutting M’s bodyguards and legging it into the bushes.

Bond is now a rogue agent, bereft of official backing and on the run from both the US and UK secret services (and quite possibly Rumbelows), with only his trusty PPK and a suave line in blouson leather jackets and boating shoes for company.

Is there anyone Bond can turn to in his hour of need?

As luck would have it Major Boothroyd – or as we know him ‘Q’ (Desmond Llewellyn) – just happens to be taking a well earned holiday in exactly the same hotel that Bond is staying in; not only that, he’s come equipped with everything Bond could need to complete his mission.

All quite by chance, you understand.

The reunion has to wait though, as Bond has a drug shipment to foil.

Boarding Milton Krest’s ship, the none too originally monikered Wavekrest, Bond does indeed foil the shipment and also steals five million dollars of Sanchez’ cash in the process.

It’s not all joy and happiness though, as Sharkey ends up dead at the hands of the evil Dario (a frighteningly baby-faced Benicio Del Toro, sporting a fantastic quiff).

All this wanton violence is all well and good (and a little refreshing if I’m honest) but 007 soon realises that the film is missing one vital ingredient.

Yup it can’t be a proper Bond film without some top totty, so to that end James teams up with the tomboyish ex-CIA agent and bush pilot (ooeerr) Pam Bouvier (second best Bond girl Carey Lowell) who, alongside Bond and Q, head to the Republic of Isthmus where Sanchez holds court.

By that I mean he runs the joint, he doesn’t wander around in a powdered wig hitting a hammer on an old table whilst shouting “Order!” and the like.

Though he may have done in a deleted scene.

Who knows?

But I digress.

Posing as an unemployed hitman (his undercover binman disguise must have been in the wash), Bond manages to get a job working for the evil Sanchez but an attempt to ‘take out’ (in a non Paddy McGuinness way, obviously) the deranged drug dealer is thwarted by two jobs-worth Hong Kong narcotics agents who unceremoniously bundle our hero into the back of a van before taking him along to a deserted warehouse (is there any other kind?) where an MI6 operative named Fallon (Hammer stalwart Christopher Neame) is waiting to take Bond back to London.

Dead or alive.

Crikey.

Injected with a potent sleeping drug, wrapped in bubble wrap and bunged in a box, all looks lost for Bond… until that is a couple of Sanchez’s goons turn up, machine gun the three agents, and rescue our hero.

It appears that they thought that the secret service types were the actual assassins and that Bond was trying to stop them.

How more twisty turny can this plot get?

Sanchez handling his massive chopper.

Now well placed (on the right, just behind the drinks cabinet) in Sanchez’s inner circle, Bond decides to have some fun. Firstly, with the aide of Sanchez’s exotic girlfriend Lupe Lamora (Vampirella herself, the slinkily sexy Talisa Soto), he frames Krest by hiding the $5 million he stole earlier in one of the Wavekrest‘s hyperbaric (bless you) chambers, before dropping hints to Sanchez that it was Krest who nicked it.

Ever the reasonable employer Sanchez responds by locking Krest in the very same chamber, before smashing it with an axe causing the poor guy to explode.
Wondering how they’ll ever explain that to his Gran, Sanchez invites Bond along to his secret lair (cunningly hidden beneath a new-age meditation centre) to explain his plan to him – and us.

And what a plan it is.

Like a particularly over-excited child with a new toy, Sanchez explains how his scientists have discovered a way to dissolve cocaine in petrol, which they can them just roll out across the world in big trucks disguised as common or garden fuel and then sell it to evil Asian drug dealers.

Which is a pretty specific market if you ask me, but hey-ho what do I know about international drugs trafficking?

The best bit of the plan though is the fact that all of the dodgy drug transactions are conducted via the broadcasts of the centre’s leader, the porn ‘tashed televangelist Professor Joe Butcher (the afore-mentioned Mr. Las Vegas Wayne Newton), who just repeats whatever Sanchez’s ‘business manager’ Truman-Lodge (Iron Man himself, Starke) tells him to.

Obviously adding a “Praise The Lord!” or “Hallelujah!” occasionally, just to make sure no-one suspects anything.

Preparing to end Sanchez’s plan (and let’s be honest his life), Bond is surprised when Dario arrives unannounced and reveals 007’s true identity.

As a British agent, that is: he doesn’t turn up and shout “Bugger me, it’s Timothy Dalton star of Flash Gordon and Sextette!” because that would be silly.

Though probably perfectly acceptable in one of the latter Moore movies.

His cover blown, Bond does what any self respecting Welshman would do in that situation and sets fire to some stuff before attempting to flee.

But Dario has other plans and ties our hero up before dangling him feet first over a giant shredding machine.

Just as Bond is about to be sliced like so much bacon, Pam turns up and shoots Dario, allowing Bond, in one of the franchise’s most unpleasant deaths, to kick him into the shredder instead.

Which is as painful as it sounds.

Fleeing his burning base, Sanchez commandeers four tankers full of the cocaine and petrol mix and attempts to drive to freedom (or at least somewhere the Feds wont get him – Coventry, perhaps?) but Bond is in hot pursuit.

Well, actually he’s in a plane piloted by Pam, but let’s not be too anal about it.
Careering to an explosive climax, it’s soon one on one as Bond faces off with Sanchez…

Released on 13th June 1989, Licence To Kill, the 16th official James Bond, has a number of (fairly) interesting firsts and lasts attached to it.

It was last to be directed by long time Bond director John Glen (his fifth movie in succession) and the last to be produced by Albert ‘Cubby’ Broccoli who had handed the production reigns over to his stepson Michael G Wilson due to ill health, and last to make direct use of any of Ian Fleming’s story concepts and characters until Die Another Day in 2002, taking as it does elements from the novel Live and Let Die (the Leiter/shark scenes and the tactics employed by Sanchez to smuggle drugs) as well as from the short story The Hildebrand Rarity.

Though it’s been years since I read that so, to be honest, I really can’t remember which bits.

Probably the bit where Bond seduces a lady or something.

Pam Bouvier: Crick neck and side arm.

Staying true to Fleming didn’t go as far as the title though, it being the first not taken from a Fleming story (though A View To A Kill does cheat slightly by removing the ‘From’ from the short story title, allegedly to make it easier for Duran Duran to write the song).

Staying with songs, the film’s frankly fantastic title theme – as sung by Gladys Knight – was actually written as an homage to the classic Goldfinger*, meaning that composer John Barry – alongside lyricists Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley- received royalty payments from it, which is nice.

But the more things stayed the same,the more things changed: the main thing being that, due to budgetary concerns (which for a Bond movie is bizarre), the film was the first in the franchise to be shot totally outside the UK, though with locations in such glorious climes as Florida and Mexico I doubt the cast and crew complained.

I mean it’s not like they had a two week shoot in Bognor or something, was it?

And what of that sun-kissed cast I hear you cry?

Well, frankly, there’s never been a Bond film before this with such a top rate (or let’s be honest as sexy) cast than this.

Eon must have agreed as it took 17 years before they even attempted to up the sheer sexual magnetism and raw talent of the movies again when they gave us the frankly magnificent duo of Eva Green and Mads Mikklesen in Casino Royale.

And even then they had to balance out the sexiness and cast a big potato as Bond, for fear of a thousand spontaneous pregnancies during the card playing finale.

But let’s ignore Mr Craig and wax lyrical on the actor who, in my humble opinion, gave us the definitive portrayal of 007, Timothy Dalton.

The dark and gritty Man About The House remake looks good.

It’s reported that on securing the role Dalton admitted to never having seen a Bond movie so decided to head back to the books for his inspiration and here it shows.

Dalton gives us a Bond that we can believe in, a cold-blooded killer for Queen and country but with a softer edge around those who know him, a flawed hero who will risk everything for a friend, and, in a lovely throwback to his ill-fated marriage to Tracey, a man haunted by his past.

If anything, Licence To Kill can actually be seen as a sequel of sorts to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service as it’s the murder of his best (only?) friend’s wife that sends Bond over the edge and on the path to revenge and ultimately redemption.

Imagine this movie following OHMSS, with Blofeld replacing Sanchez and a rogue Bond out for his blood to avenge Tracey’s death, no that would have been a swansong for Connery plus with the added bonus of the franchise being still (relatively) new enough to actually make the audience doubt that Bond would return to the fold by the movie’s end.

And, whilst you sit back and imagine that scenario, let’s look at the supporting cast.

Like all good leads Dalton isn’t afraid to let his co-stars shine, especially franchise stalwart Desmond Llewelyn as ‘Q’ who, in a role far expanded on any other movie, positively revels in the genuinely warm father/son relationship the pair share. I anything it’s only beaten by Llewelyn’s final words to Bond in The World Is Not Enough which act as a fitting tribute to a much missed actor.

And it’s worth the price of admission for these scenes alone if I’m honest.

As for the villains, the casting director really struck gold with the amount of up and coming – and firmly established – talent on show, from a pitch-perfect Robert Davi, channeling real-life former dictator of Panama and all round bad boy Manuel Noriega, to Benicio Del Toro’s loon-tastically lecherous Dario, via Anthony Zerbe’s twitchy Krest.

The cast of villains are at the top of their game with every single one of them bringing something unique to their roles.

Not one main star or bit-part actor is out of place and all add to something, however small, to the film.

And in the much coveted ‘Bond Girl’ roles Talisa Soto is all exotically charged and smouldering beauty as bad-girl-with-a-heart Lupe Lamora, whilst Carey Lowell plays Pam with an energetic mix of wholesome cookie-cutting boy scout, wide-eyed sweetness and thighs you could happily ski down, ever so slightly reminiscent of Peanut‘s Lucy armed with a big gun.

Which says more about me than her, if I’m honest.

Any excuse.

If the film has any fault it’s that, with hindsight it was just too much of a departure too soon for those used to the Roger Moore style of Bond…but bravo to Eon for not taking the safe route and attempting something different when staying safe would have been the easier option.

At the film’s end we find Bond slightly shaken, with his loins stirred by the pouting Pam as the pair flirt in a swimming pool to the dulcet tones of Patti LaBelle warbling If You Asked Me To. Who would have guessed that it would be 6 years before Bond returned, refreshed and re-imagined again, but this time as a post Cold War warrior with a scary bouffant, a smart line in Moore-style quips and taking orders from the woman from A Fine Romance?

No sane person that’s for sure.

But that change resonated with a by-now more cinema-savvy audience, and once again cemented Bond as the world’s foremost action hero and, seemingly cemented Dalton as the true forgotten Bond, left awash in an uncertain point in the franchise’s history.

Which is why I feel it’s my duty to champion this, if not ‘unloved’ then ‘criminally neglected’ classic, because although I was brought up on a steady cinematic diet of Moore’s mischievous mayhem whilst encountering Connery on TV, Licence To Kill will always be ‘my’ Bond.

It’s genuine wit, style and grit (plus an over-reliance on 80’s hair products), perfectly summing up Bond in all its forms.

Plus, as an aside in these more enlightened days it’s the only action film I can think of that relies on the lead character being a smoker to defeat the villain.





































































































*It’s the sexy trumpet bit if you’re still wondering.

people you fancy but shouldn't (part 88).

Tiya Sircar - Vicky in The Good Place.

spazio oddity.

Amazing what you find when idly flicking channels, was deciding what film to watch next in preparation for The Rise of Skywalker when I came across what looks like a nth generation VHS copy of Alfonso (The Beast in Space, War of the Robots) Brescia's little seen Italian Sci-Fi masterpiece 'Battaglie Negli Spazi Stellari' (AKA War of The Planets) on Rai TV which bizarrely enough I can get thru' my media player thanks to being an Ubuntu kid.

Logo.

If you've never seen it (the film that is, not the channel) it's a lo-fi sci-fi blockbuster starring the fabulous John Richardson as the cream jump-suited womanly hipped Captain Alex Hamilton.

Hamilton is a kinda rougher (and considerably swarthier) penis nosed version of Jim Kirk, shouting at his computer, disagreeing with his superiors and leaving it till the last possible minute to save battery acid scarred crew members from certain death.

Unfortunately the picture quality is so washed out as to make it almost unwatchable so I only made it as far as Commander Armstrong (the wonderfully drunk Romeo Costantini) giving our hero a bollocking for refusing to investigate a scary alien signal that's interrupting Earth's entire communication network before having to switch off.

"Look it's probably just static or the gypsies" replies our hero to his superior, "Plus we're all a bit tired and want to come home for a holiday!"

Genius.
If I can be arsed I might dig my old VHS rip out for a rewatch if only for an early appearance of what looks like Hollywood heart throb Ed Harris painted green and wearing tiny pants playing a scary alien.

Until then this will have to do....

Sette uomini d'oro nello spazio (AKA Captive Planet, Metallica (no, really), Space Odyssey, Star Odyssey. 1979).
Dir: Alfonso Brescia.
Star: Yanti (meow) Sommer, Gianni Garko, Malisa Longo, Cristea Avram, Ennio Balbo, Aldo Amoroso Pioso, Pino Ferrara, Roberto Dell'Acqua, Fred West's dad and Filippo Perrone.

"Man meets an alien race at last, 

and greets them by disintegrating our vessel"

Somewhere in the inky blackness of space on a mysterious planet, a gathering of powerful aliens, known locally as the Lords of the Galaxy is busily bidding on various planets and suchlike to buy their wives as novelty Crimbo pressies.

Pat Mountain's mum tries to remember which
one of her brothers is her childs father.

The biggest offer of the day is a very familiar small blue/green planet named Sol 3, a planet in which the spiky headed, lank haired Lord Kev Korda is very interested in.

You see, if his bid is successful (it's kinda like an intergalactic Ebay but with fewer overpriced original Star Wars toys) he plans to use the natives of this world as cheap labour throughout the galaxy.

A wee bit like the Kosovans as my dear Brexiteer dad would say (but not I obviously) .

Confident as he is of getting the winning bid he's already set up a number of  window cleaning businesses and off-licenses in readiness of his takeover.

Which is nice.

But just to make sure he's definitely gonna win, our pen faced pal is not above using his almost Derren Brown like mind powers (well, a torch in front of his eyes) to scare his main rival away from the bidding table.

100 million credits poorer (but a whole lotta planet richer) Kev boards his spaceship and relaxes with his battered vhs copy of Cosmos: War of the Planets as he travels to view his newly acquired prize.

Hang on, I'm mistaken, it's not actually some clever self referential nonsense regarding a character in one movie watching the directors earlier work, it's just  Brescia being cheap and using old footage save him shooting any new effects stuff.

Silly me.

"I wanted to be a tiger!"

Scanning his new toy to find out what he's actually purchased (yes, I know it's a wee bit like not looking at a new house till you've paid for it but who are we to judge these aliens?), Kev discovers that not only has the planet 'widespread traces of pollution due to chemical combustion and nuclear waste' but that most of humanity live either underground or in sea cities due to the surface being used for growing food and feeding livestock.

Yup, the pikeys have inherited the Earth.

And down at Earth's fantastically minimalist (or just cheap) space command centre, Admiral Steve (probably, the subtitles are atrocious), being understandably shocked by the huge spaceship approaching, launch a fantastic interceptor craft to say hello to the visitor.

But Lord Kev, being a 100% patent bastard, responds by blasting it out of the sky.

"Shite in mah big tin mooth ya bastard!"

Mightily pissed off by this frankly outrageous act of aggression humanity decides to throw everything they've got at Kev's ship but even the combined fire-power of the entire planet is useless against him and serves only to make Kev a wee bit annoyed.

Yikes.

There's only one thing for it, Kev unleashes a terrifying barrage of grainy, black and white stock footage of exploding buildings, erupting volcanoes, cats looking nervous and archive newsreel shots of the battle of Britain in order to convince the human race that he is, in fact 'the daddy'.

London is totally destroyed, as is most of Australia (no loss there then) and (bizarrely) the Okinawa stadium, leaving the Admiral no choice but to call upon the maverick (not to mention "independent, stubborn and undisciplined") scientist Professor Barry Morey, a forest dwelling genius whose "intelligence puts him about two centuries above anyone else" and whose collars would enable him to fly at least two hundred miles above them too.

Desperate doesn't even touch it.

Fuck me! it's Fred West's dad!

Anyway, Admiral Steve begrudgingly phones the Professor, polishing his ego by telling him that he's Earth's last hope and it's greatest ever scientist/lover/kazoo player etc. before asking him if he can suggest anything to stop the terror from space.

Seeing as Earth is so desperate as to ask a balding, piss stained hippy type for help it comes as a wee bit of a surprise to hear that the planets government and military have refused to give him any cash, support or even a shiny new commode for his troubles if he agrees to help.

I even watched this bit twice to see exactly how this magnificent piece of reverse psychology works but I'm fucked if I could figure it out if I'm honest, so I'll put it down to being an Italian thing.

"Sod saving humanity there be tasty
lady arse a-going spare!"

Luckily the Professors hearing is going, meaning he misses everything except the "you're great please help us" bit and decides to give it a go.

Analysing the alien ship he quickly discovers that it's hull is constructed from a strange substance called iridium, which, it turns out is virtually indestructible.

As is the way in such movies, the Professor has the only other example of this rare metal locked in his garage, a keepsake from his research days when (and this is a scary coincidence so sit down now) him and his team of geeks were working on a way of breaking down iridium to its base molecular structure.

For what purpose I've no idea.

"Shymoo!" - Mickey Mouse's fetish parties were
always a big hit amongst his cartoon buddies.

Earths only hope is that the Professor can round up his old workmates (who all fucked off around the globe after the Professor was discredited for pissing himself in a funding review) and pick up the research where they left off.

If only he had access to a spaceship and daredevil pilot, it'd certainly be better (and more exciting) than catching the bus looking for his ex colleges.

Enter (OK if I must) the Professors beautifully bouncy - and scarily bouffanted - niece Irene (Sommer - in the city probably), whose boyfriend, Jeff, happens to be a hunky space pilot.

Even better is the fact that he spent the night at the house and his spaceship is parked outside!

But how can the kindly scientist convince him to help in his quest?

Would you believe that the Professor has the same spooky mind powers as Kev?!?

Within minutes Jeff is eating an onion as if it were an apple and flying off to round up this sci-fi A-Team whilst the Professor gets down to some serious 'work' in his lab.

First on the list is the roguish mercenary cum chemist (and first love of Irene...yes it really is that convoluted so i'd suggest that you begin taking notes, I know I did) Dirk Laramie (Dell'Acqua), who now spends his days fleecing alcoholics out of their dole money in seedy backstreet bars.

Yup, you guessed it, Dirk too has the very same scary mind powers as Barrie and Kev and has been using them to cheat at cards.

Obviously when the local council estate scum whose Giro's he's been taking find out about this they decide to administer a darn good kicking, which gives our man a chance to show off his sexy street fighting skills to impress his buxom ex, tho' if I'm honest Jeff seems much more impressed.

Sommer lovin': tell me more!

Meanwhile back in the main plot Lord Kev has unleashed an army of face stomping alien Nazi's across the planet to collect 'worker units' and, in a scene of ball aching badness, attack the planets sub-tropical continent, capturing 2000 dark-skinned human units to use as slaves.

Hmmm, see what they did there?

Whilst all this political musing is going on, Irene is off enjoying herself at a community centre boxing match where ex-scientist cum pugilist Bill Norman (The late, great Garko, looking for all the world like a pervier, cancer riddled Sporticus from Lazy Town) is having a girly slapping match with the frighteningly realised warrior robot Hercules (some poor guy in a Mickey Mouse gimp suit).

Being surprisingly fit for someone so close to deaths door Norman beats the crap outta poor Hercules before donning a silk disco jacket and joining our merry band.

"Yesch...gobble my spurtsh
candy wee man!"

Deciding to bring a couple of buddies with him, Norman leads the gang to a deserted junkyard (the producers garden) where they meet up with a couple of dwarfs dressed in silver painted bins decorated with the contents of their mums kitchen drawers and topped off with Orville The Duck sex masks.

Norman, keen to justify why the films overworked - and underpaid - designers would foist such monstrosities on an already threadbare production is quick (maybe too quick if you ask me) to point out that not only do our plastic pals have a full range of human emotions but they're also fitted with some kinda energy conversion bollocks that allows them to phase out of real space so that laser fire passes right through them (a wee bit like chocolate does with me).

Oh, and I forgot to add that due to their emotional chip the pair are in love.

"Duck off".

Meanwhile, back at the space command centre, it appears that Kev's spaceship (despite being big enough to comfortably hold the entire population of Earth plus a shed load of stormtroopers) is actually impossible to track via radar, showing up only when it lands to grab some slaves.

Have they tried turning the monitors on?

No-one dares make this suggestion tho' for fear of interrupting Admiral Steve's Oscar worthy performance as he grimly reads the list of humans already captured by Kev as his stunned comrades look on in mild apathy.

Hiroshima (how's your luck?), Russia, the Arabs and rather oddly "those farmers in the United States of Africa" have all been captured, leaving only the good ol' US of A, half of Govan and the West Midlands left to battle against this thoroughly bad man.

Always believe in your soul.

Whilst all this shit - as you youngsters say - is going down, our heroes (in case you thought I'd forgotten about them) are heading towards the notorious 'Moonspace', a space age Alcatraz orbiting the moon (obviously) in order to break out two other members of the aged professor's science club, some middle-aged bloke named Sean and a sexily square faced lady going by the name of Bridget ('played' by the infamous - well, around here she is - Malisa Longo, AKA Malisa Lang, one of Italy's greatest and most moon headed, exploitation stars and one of the few reasons to sit thru' this film).

Malisa: moooooooooooooooonhead.

The pair are being held in a 'suspension ray machine' designed to keep them awake but unable to move (why? you may ask), giving the lone guard a great excuse to quietly perv over her prostrate form whilst rubbing his leather clad thighs.

Ah, so that's why.

Unable to control his sexual desires any longer the guard turns off her suspension machine and gazes lustfully as she emerges from within, stretching and cooing like your mum after a particularly hard bingo session whilst complaining about how long it's been since she had a real man (hang on, that's exactly like your mum the morning after bingo) before slinking up to him and giving him a big girly kiss.

With tongues and everything.

Well not everything but you get the gist.

Of course, this is all just a ruse so she can release all the prisoners and escape herself in the ensuing sexual confusion.

Freed from their frozen confines the thawed out felons vent their frustrations by instigating a bitch-slapping fest of epic proportions as perky prisoners and leathery guards alike slowly kick and punch each other before taking it in turns to roll around the floor gurning and dribbling.
Don't fret tho' because the break-out is eventually subdued before it gets too embarrassing and/or homo-erotic and everyone involved is given a slap on the wrist before being put back in their cells.

Luckily for us (and the plot), our merry band have been pencilled in for a meeting with the prisons governor about releasing Sean and Bridget.

A pity then that he refuses to let them go free.

What a jobsworth bastard.

Remember tho', Dirk has those scary mind powers so it's only a matter of time before he's persuaded the guv to let them go (and convinced him that he's a dog) meaning that finally (thank fuck) that the science squad is fully assembled and that they can head on back to the Professor's house and prepare to kick some alien arse.

Which in Bridget's case involves getting trussed up in a skin tight leather dominatrix outfit.

Stephanie: Unfortunately
not the one in this movie, or this one.

Will our heroes defeat the evil Kev?

Will there be anyone left on Earth to save?

Will our robot pals ever consummate their relationship?

And, most importantly, will Kev be able to sell on Earth at the next space auction?

Alfonso Brescia's space epic with it's powerful social message regarding Colonialism and the ethno-centric belief that the morals and values of the colonising power are superior to those of the peoples being colonised is a little seen gem of the Italian Sci-fi genre.

Forget 2001 and The Last Jedi* because if it's high concept/budget busting interstellar adventure you're after then this is the movie for you.

I mean the social commentary is there alright, it's just that it's buried alive beneath a slurry pile of skid row acting, cheap robot suits, borrowed effects and scratchy old stock footage of second world war battles.

Was this a clever way of comparing Lord Kev's jackbooted minions to the Nazi Stormtroopers of yesteryear or just a lack of anything remotely resembling a budget?

You decide.

Tho' if you need a clue it's the latter by the way.

If, like me tho' you get bored with trying to justify a love of shite cinema by over intellectualizing every single thing about it then there's always the sight of Malisa Longo dressed up like a transvestite hooker as well as the Amazonian delights of Yanti Sommer's cleavage to keep you occupied.

And just in case you think I'm being sexist then don't forget that all you female viewers can gaze lustfully at the professors yellowing bald pate and wibbly wobbly manbreasts.

For everyone else there's a pulse pounding fart-tastic synth score and the chance to see some once great (OK, once so-so) actors such as Gianni Garko and Chris Avram, reduced to playing second fiddle to a couple of dwarfs in dustbins.

And be honest now, what more could you want from an evenings entertainment?








*Actually reading back I've realised that this movie is actually way more entertaining than that pile of shite.

But we all knew that anyway.

mary beard.

Been stuck in the house this week with a horrendous cold which means that I've gotten sod all done as everytime I try to work I end up covering the paper, my computer screen, the kids etc. with noxious green slime that seems to be constantly exploding from my nose.

Which is currently bright red and swollen.

Anyway in my weakened state this was the only movie I could reach to watch.


Hercules in the Haunted World (AKA Ercole al centro della terra, 1961).
Dir:Mario Bava.
Cast: Reg Park, Christopher Lee, Leonora Ruffo, George Ardisson, Marisa Belli, Ida Galli, Mino Doro, Gaia Germani, Franco Giacobini, Rosalba Neri (probably) and Ely Drago.

You know, I didn't think Hades would be anything like this.

After literally dozens of fantastically exciting (offscreen) adventures, legendary nappy clad strongman Hercules (English bodybuilder, businessman, actor and dad of Darth Maul, Park) is returning home to catch up with his girlfriend Princess Deianira (Ruffo from Pietro Francisci's fantastic Star Pilot where she plays the saucy space vixen Kaena) for a wee kiss and a cuddle.

And maybe a biscuit.

Custard Creams no doubt.

Yum.

But things are amiss in the city of Cleftpate - Deianira has been struck down by a mysterious malaise and her father has died leaving her uncle Lico (Lee, slumming it for fag money) to reluctantly - aye right - to take the throne.

And Hair styling tips from Dario Argento by the look of his barnet.

Fringe benefits.

Hercules, never one to give up so easily (ask your mum) quickly heads off to ask the saucy masked oracle lady Medea (Germani) for help.

Obviously Ms Teletext was busy.

And wouldn't you believe it, it turns out there's a cure for Deianira's condition (tho' not for her dad's obviously, Hercules isn't really that bothered about that tho' as he didn't want to fuck him), unfortunately it can only be found in the Underworld.

And by that I mean Hell, not the bar that used to be by Glasgow Central Station.

Tho' I did once bump into a man that looked like Christopher Lee in the toilets there once.

Or was it Christopher Plummer?

But that isn't important, unlike the fact that no mortal man has ever returned from that dreadful place.

Again it's Hell I'm talking about, not the Glasgow bar.

Or even the London one.

Born slippy.

Hercules as we know is no mortal man and eagerly agrees to take the challenge.

But first he'll need to get a crack team of heroes together to help.

Unfortunately everyone is busy so he's left with Aryan stud muffin - cum future sex criminal the way he's carrying on, it was a more innocent time etc. - Theseus (Ardisson, best known for Agent 3S3: Passport to Hell and Zorro the Fox) who, when we first meet him is busy trying to stick it in the ever more despairing Jocasta (Drago best known for playing a tourist in Avventura a Capri - aye me neither) and former animated kid sidekick and peeping tom Telemachus (comedy god Giacobini) who has been busying himself perving on Jocasta and Theseus as they go about their - dirty - business whilst telling anyone who'll listen that she is in fact his fiancee.

Honestly it makes more sense when you watch it.

"Are you looking at my bra?"

With his team assembled the first thing Hercules needs to do is find a magic ship capable of traveling to Hades and as luck (and dodgy plotting) would have it the local fisherman Brian has just such a vessel so Telemachus volunteers to go speak to him.

Comedy hi-jinks and almost bodily dismemberment ensues (turns out that Telemachus once tried to fuck his missis) resulting in Brian leaving the boat unguarded as he chases his beloved horses giving the team ample opportunity to steal it and sail to adventure.

Little do they realise tho' that Lico is actually the evil force behind the whole plot and he'll stop at nothing to make sure our heroes fail and secure his right to the throne.

Luckily his back up plan seems to involve leaving them to it whilst he struts about in a cape shouting in a badly dubbed American accent.

"Is it in yet?"

Their first port of call is a strange land ruled by purple tissue paper clad ladies who guard a magic apple that will allow Hercules to descend to Hell, luckily they don't seem to have a problem with him taking it and point him in the direction of the - albeit huge - apple tree in order to let him pick it.

Unfortunately tho' it's a magic tree protected by lightning and stuff that no-one has ever survived.

Hercules is made of stern stuff tho' and after telling his companions to go for a wee lie down he decides to climb the tree and grab the apple.

The girlie tribe tho' are ruled over by the evil Pluto who demands a sacrifice on occasions like this so sends Procrustes the giant rock monster to kill
Theseus and Telemachus whilst they sleep.

Gah.

"It could be you!"

As the rock monster (very) slowly approaches our prone pair Hercules is having trouble of his own, the lightning bolts keep breaking the branches he's holding on to and the small size of the set means that he appears to keep climbing up the same bit and never getting any higher leaving him - and the effects crew - no other option than to fashion a vine catapult capable of firing a polystyrene rock at the apple in the hope it'll fall down.

No, really.

Surprisingly this works first time and the lady boss excitedly tells Hercules that seeing as the apple is no longer on the tree that Pluto has no power over them and the ladies are now free of the patriarchy and the like.

If only it were that easy.

And as a thank you she explains that a rock monster is about to butcher his pals so Hercules heads off to save them, which he does by effortlessly lifting the beast and chucking it at a shoddily constructed wall which collapses, revealing the entrance to Hell.

Sorted.

"I am Groot."

Telemachus, being a wee bit more sussed than he lets on, volunteers to guard the entrance whilst Hercules and Theseus forge ahead soon coming across (not in that way but to be honest it's tempting) a naked lady chained to a tree begging for help.

Or at the very least a bucket to piss in.

Theseus is eager to help but Hercules reminds him of the oracles advice - 'believe not what you see'.

No me neither.

But there's no time to think about it as with that she disappears in a puff of smoke.

Which is a shame really as I'm sure she was portrayed by Rosalba Neri from Lady Frankenstein.

I mean according to various sources she is in the movie it's just that no-one seems to know where.

It's like Where's Wally but with nicer blouses.

Oh well.

What your mum really gets up to on bingo night.

This advice also helps when the pair are confronted by an imaginary but oh so terrifying - sea of flames blocking their path to the island of the magical stone of forgetfulness but not so much when they have to shimmy across a lake of molten lava as that turns out to be real when Theseus falls into it.

Don't get too worried tho' as by some bizarre quirk of fate Pluto was so annoyed at losing control of the ladies earlier that he totally missed Theseus dying so our (other) hero ends up safe and well in a paper-mache cave in the company of the beautiful Persephone (Galli AKA Evelyn Stewart from Fulci's The Psychic as well as Bava's The Whip And The Body) the mysterious and lonely daughter of Pluto.

It seems that she's bored of her pitiful existence and wishes to live in the mortal realm, much to her father's chagrin, and after falling madly - and quickly - in love with Theseus vows to accompany him home.

Theseus is sure Hercules will object so quickly stuffs her in his sock for safe-keeping whilst awaiting Hercules' triumphant return with the magic stone.

Look, it's not like we think he isn't going to succeed is it?

I mean fair enough they do try to add a touch of excitement by having the stone a wee bit hot so that Hercules burns his fingers every time he  tries to pick it up but he soon sorts this out by punching it till the glowing bit breaks off then wrapping it in his underwear to carry it.

Like I said, they tried.

There is such a thing as too much colour.

With apple and stone acquired it's time for our hero to head back to
Telemachus, stopping quickly to join up with Theseus - whom he just happily accept didn't burn to death in a lava pit for 'reasons' and then it's ship ahoy! for the trip home.

Theseus tells Hercules that he's very tired after his near death experience and retires below deck to 'sleep' leaving poor Telemachus to act as navigator, bosun and cabin boy as Hercules stands on the bow gazing into the middle distance whilst trying to move his nipples using only the power of the mind.

Luckily the crashing waves and howling winds cover the slurping noises coming from below as Theseus and Persephone go at it like (PG friendly) rabbits.

All this stormy weather is a bit worrying for Hercules as the purple ladies from earlier told him that the apple would grant him safe passage home, this is confirmed by Telemachus who surmises that there must be something/someone else onboard that shouldn't be there before dismissing this and going to ask Theseus for advice.

Theseus, wiping his engorged member on Telemachus' togo reckons it's nowt to do with him sneaking Pluto's daughter onboard so proceeds to throw the apple away which surprisingly does the trick and they make land without any further delay.

Phew.

"Oh Vic...I've fallen."

But something is wrong, the local populace are leaving their lands as it's become dry and arid, their livestock is dying and a sense of fear perminates the whole area. Superstition has it that Pluto is angry with the mortal world, almost as if something has been taken from him.

Hercules doesn't seem to care tho' as he's more interested in getting his end away, as does Theseus so the pair head back to the city leaving Telemachus to get back to stalking Jocasta.

It's a hobby I guess.

With the special stone sought and delivered Deianira is soon back to her normal - albeit still wooden self - and eagerly planning her wedding to Hercules but Lico has other ideas, for during the upcoming lunar eclipse - due in part to Pluto's wrath - he plans to sacrifice Deianira to the god of darkness (or Dave as we call him), drink her blood and rule the world with the aid of a curtain clad zombie army he has hidden in the basement.

Hercules can't fight him alone but with Theseus busy having 'the sex' how can our hero convince his friend that the old adage of Bro's before hoes isn't actually just childish sexism but the key to saving the world?

Poster.

Hot off the heels of his first 'official' film as sole director - the magnificent Black Sunday - genre god Mario Bava was hired to direct (as well as do the special effects, double as director of photography and no doubt make the tea) the second of the Reg Parks starring/ Achille Piazzi produced Hercules movie providing he could do so whilst keeping the budget under 30 quid and shooting it in a (fairly large) shed.

Bava always up for a challenge agreed on the proviso that he could shoot at least a few scenes in the local park and that they'd supply the Quality Street wrappers he'd need for the FX sequences.

Luckily for fans of quality cinema Piazzi said yes and the resulting movie is a triumph of pizazz over pennies with all the charm, ingenuity and stylish set-pieces that became trademarks of the directors output present and correct, the movie could be nothing else but prime Bava and he knows it.

"It was THIS big...I couldn't walk for weeks!"

And it's Bava's absolute confidence in his directorial - and design - abilities that makes the movie such a joy to watch, raising it head and - muscular - shoulders above its contemporaries -  whether it be scenes of Hercules holding back four wild horses in a classic strongman pose or the gorgeously framed aftermath of the handmaiden's murder as the camera calmly pans from her throat to a pool of blood, revealing Lico’s reflection within (later homaged by Argento in Deep Red) almost every frame could literally be a work of art.

Seriously, say what you like about the - at times minimal - acting style and admittedly paper thin plot cos the whole thing looks bloody gorgeous and you can see only two films in to his illustrious career why Bava was and is still regarded as The Master.