LA CASA DE LAS MIL MUÑECAS - Carlos Camilleri - Don Black & Mark London - Cliff Bennett & The Rebel Rousers - "House Of 1000 Dolls" (1967)
"House Of A Thousand Dolls" has too many bonus Dungeon elements in it for me to say anything bad about it! It's NOT the best movie ever made, but any fan of the genre or the characters involved should go on and jump in head first! So, as The Routers would say in 1962, "Let's Go!"
Just like these tourists, this freakin' movie was driving me nuts, and here's the reason why! When I was getting ready to write this, I was looking at the stills, and one of them was for the music credits, and a song called "House of a 1000 Dolls" performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers! Well, since I'm a recently converted apostle, expounder, and supporter of the Cliff Bennett experience, I couldn't figure out what was going on because I couldn't remember hearing a real song during the movie, so I went back and watched the whole thing again, and no song! So I was like WTF?! I went to IMDB, to see if anyone wrote about it and where the song was, and there was a review where a gal had written that the song wasn't on the VHS tape, and I guessed the copy I have has the same problem, so then I went on a search for the song by itself, and finally came up with this, I hope you dig it: "House of a 1000 Dolls" by the amazing Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers!
"House Of 1000 Dolls" has an amazing cast that includes Dungeon regular Maria Rohm as Diane! I don't know why, but I get Maria and Rosanna Yanni mixed up for some reason! I think it's the Jess Franco connection!
Next up is Dungeon Hero George "Jerry Cotton" Nader as Stephen Armstrong!
Welcome to Tangiers! Here's the bad news, this is one of the good guys!
Everybody knows good guys finish last, dead last in this case!!
The story revolves around Vincent Price as Hypnotist Felix Manderville, and Martha Hyer as his lovely assistant Rebecca! They work for the Mob and in their act, they disappear young women from around the world, and turn them into sex slaves in a high dollar brothel in Tangiers! You know, regular every day stuff!!
To get into the exclusive club, you have to have one of these stupid little dolls as kind of a pass key!!
Once inside the club, the patrons get a two-way mirror's view of the international bevy of beauties, aka, The Dolls!!
Look familiar? José Jaspe is the pimp/bodyguard/enforcer Ahmed! I'm sure you've seen him in one his other 121 roles in flicks like "Póker De Ases," or "A Stroke Of A 1000 Millions."
In Tangiers, they still celebrate the traditional annual event known as "The Ritualistic Burning of the Buick!"
The Dolls are a feisty bunch, and I'm not sure if this is her or not, but one of them, Caroline Coons, has become a very successful artiste, and at one time managed The Clash, and took photos used on Clash and Police records!
Every film like this has to have the seemingly incompetent police officer, and this one trying to hassle George Nader is Wolfgang Kieling as Inspector Emil! Wolfgang had a great career in German film, and in one of his few forays into Hollywood, he was Hermann Gromek in Hitchcock's "Torn Curtain!"
Two of the Dolls try a valiant escape to no avail except recapture and torture!
Martha Hyer's not a name you normally associate with the term psychotronic, but when you realize she was in everything from "Abbott & Costello Go To Mars," or "Pyro...The Thing Without A Face," to Bikini Beach," "First Men In The Moon," and "Picture Mommy Dead," you might want to give it another thought!
I just like this shot of Vincent Price, and this is still the anniversary of what would have been his 100th birthday as of the 27th of the last May!
You gotta know things are going to start getting ugly when they try and disappear George Nader's wife Marie, as played by Ann Smyrner! The Danish beauty had roles in some great Dungeon classics like "Journey To The 7th Planet, "Reptilicus," and "Kommissar X - Drei Gelbe Katzen!"
"The Queen of Hearts she made some tarts all on a summer's day; The Knave of Hearts he stole the tarts and took them clean away. The King of Hearts called for the tarts and beat the Knave full sore. The Knave of Hearts brought back the tarts and vowed he'd steal no more." - Lewis Carroll
I think this would be the only film that Vincent Price and George Nader appeared in together! That fact by itself is enough reason to seek out this movie!
Classic portrait of George Nader!!
Marie and Diane watch in horror as information is extracted from one of the other Dolls! Besides Caroline Coons, the gals fleshing out the cast and credited simply as "and the Dolls" are Andrea"The Cups Of San Sebastian"Lascelles, Ursula"Il Vostro Super Agente Flit"Janis, Karin"LSD Flesh Of Devil"Skarreso, Loli Munoz, Marisol, Jill Echols, Monique Aimé, Sandra Petrelli, Lara Lenti, and Francoise Fontages who never appeared in other films, and finally Kitty Swan who was in some real zingers like "Barbarella," "Deadlier Than The Male," and "Wild, Wild Planet!"
While George sorts it all out, I almost forgot that besides the killer theme song that was written by Don Black and Mark London and performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, the rest of the music in the film was by Modernist composer Carlos Camilleri who only had one other composing credit, "Sax Rohmer's The Castle Of Fu Manchu." Carlos went on to be the Professor of Composition at the Toronto Conservatory of Music, and ended his career as a Professor of Music at Malta University!
You know we don't normally do videos, but the first time I saw this, over at René Claude's blog Pour15 Minutes D'amour, I was blown away. To do a Beatles' cover "live" with horns, and knock it out, well, it's something everybody should see and hear at least once! Ladies and Gentlemen, Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers!!!!
Welcome to the last 2011 Halloween Countdown post with Tabonga!.. Tonite we have a big bag full of colorized eye candy to hand out, here at The Dungeon! This poster is a fine example of kitsch art, and, the lobby card proudly adorns our MMM splash panel! The movie is a remake of CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON. The music's by Nicholas Carras, who only had 23 composing credits, but, just the same, worked on these fine flicks... FEMALE JUNGLE, JUNGLE HELL, SHE DEMONS, DRAGSTRIP RIOT, FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER, HIGH SCHOOL CAESAR, DATE BAIT, HONEYMOON OF TERROR, DR. SEX, GIRL IN GOLD BOOTS, THE ASTRO-ZOMBIES, THE DOLL SQUAD and OMEGA SYNDROME. Lettuce bring in our fuzzy lil' Dungeon helper and button pusher, that 7-eyed freek, Ralphie The Tarantula!.. Howdy there, Ralphie! He's here to start our Eariffic Soundclip for the last day of our countdown, so, push the big red 'GO' button near the granite slab, now, Ralphie! Here's... MISSILE TO THE MOON! Richard Travis plays...
More than just wacky, "Island Of The Lost" is more like The Young-Holt Trio's instrumental hit from the same magical year, 1967, because it's "Wack, Wack!" And why is it such a wild and weird production? Well, you can blame it all mostly on the guy in charge of everything, Mr. Ivan Tors! The MacRae family is getting ready to set sail for an anthropological expedition and adventure to the South Pacific!! Richard Greene is the philosophical pipe smokin' Sub-Genius Bob of a father, Josh MacRae!! From 1955 to 1960, Richard held the lead role in the very popular TV series "Robin Hood" for 143 episodes, and he also played the Nayland Smith role in a couple of "Fu Manchu" flicks! On the right is Luke Halpin as Stu MacRae, and sitting with him is family friend and fellow adventurer Irene Tsu as Judy Hawllani! Luke was Sandy Ricks in the original "Flipper" movies, and also in all 88 episodes of the "Flipper" TV series from...
I searched and searched for a copy of "Catalina Caper," for a couple of years after reading that it had a cracking soundtrack! It's kind of like an extension of the beach blanket bongo scene as quasi-thriller, and I'm not sure what's older, the story or the kids, but I am sure they had a great time on the island over the course of a weekend with Director Lee "Rollem" Sholem at the helm! You know, it's like this, "Okay, somebody start a bonfire, now everybody start dancing, Roll camera! Yeah!! That's a take!! Smoke 'em if you got 'em! Next!!" Tommy Kirk has two roles, one as himself and the other as the girl he falls in love with! Tommy Kirk is in the the deepest part of the 'Dungeon Hall Of Fame' and never fails to deliver an all-star performance no matter what film he's in! Actually the girl is Ulla Strömstedt, the multi-lingual Swedish beauty probably best known for her role as Ulla Norstrand on the "Flipper...
"House Of A Thousand Dolls" has too many bonus Dungeon elements in it for me to say anything bad about it! It's NOT the best movie ever made, but any fan of the genre or the characters involved should go on and jump in head first! So, as The Routers would say in 1962, "Let's Go!"
Just like these tourists, this freakin' movie was driving me nuts, and here's the reason why! When I was getting ready to write this, I was looking at the stills, and one of them was for the music credits, and a song called "House of a 1000 Dolls" performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers! Well, since I'm a recently converted apostle, expounder, and supporter of the Cliff Bennett experience, I couldn't figure out what was going on because I couldn't remember hearing a real song during the movie, so I went back and watched the whole thing again, and no song! So I was like WTF?! I went to IMDB, to see if anyone wrote about it and where the song was, and there was a review where a gal had written that the song wasn't on the VHS tape, and I guessed the copy I have has the same problem, so then I went on a search for the song by itself, and finally came up with this, I hope you dig it: "House of a 1000 Dolls" by the amazing Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers!
"House Of 1000 Dolls" has an amazing cast that includes Dungeon regular Maria Rohm as Diane! I don't know why, but I get Maria and Rosanna Yanni mixed up for some reason! I think it's the Jess Franco connection!
Next up is Dungeon Hero George "Jerry Cotton" Nader as Stephen Armstrong!
Welcome to Tangiers! Here's the bad news, this is one of the good guys!
Everybody knows good guys finish last, dead last in this case!!
The story revolves around Vincent Price as Hypnotist Felix Manderville, and Martha Hyer as his lovely assistant Rebecca! They work for the Mob and in their act, they disappear young women from around the world, and turn them into sex slaves in a high dollar brothel in Tangiers! You know, regular every day stuff!!
To get into the exclusive club, you have to have one of these stupid little dolls as kind of a pass key!!
Once inside the club, the patrons get a two-way mirror's view of the international bevy of beauties, aka, The Dolls!!
Look familiar? José Jaspe is the pimp/bodyguard/enforcer Ahmed! I'm sure you've seen him in one his other 121 roles in flicks like "Póker De Ases," or "A Stroke Of A 1000 Millions."
In Tangiers, they still celebrate the traditional annual event known as "The Ritualistic Burning of the Buick!"
The Dolls are a feisty bunch, and I'm not sure if this is her or not, but one of them, Caroline Coons, has become a very successful artiste, and at one time managed The Clash, and took photos used on Clash and Police records!
Every film like this has to have the seemingly incompetent police officer, and this one trying to hassle George Nader is Wolfgang Kieling as Inspector Emil! Wolfgang had a great career in German film, and in one of his few forays into Hollywood, he was Hermann Gromek in Hitchcock's "Torn Curtain!"
Two of the Dolls try a valiant escape to no avail except recapture and torture!
Martha Hyer's not a name you normally associate with the term psychotronic, but when you realize she was in everything from "Abbott & Costello Go To Mars," or "Pyro...The Thing Without A Face," to Bikini Beach," "First Men In The Moon," and "Picture Mommy Dead," you might want to give it another thought!
I just like this shot of Vincent Price, and this is still the anniversary of what would have been his 100th birthday as of the 27th of the last May!
You gotta know things are going to start getting ugly when they try and disappear George Nader's wife Marie, as played by Ann Smyrner! The Danish beauty had roles in some great Dungeon classics like "Journey To The 7th Planet, "Reptilicus," and "Kommissar X - Drei Gelbe Katzen!"
"The Queen of Hearts she made some tarts all on a summer's day; The Knave of Hearts he stole the tarts and took them clean away. The King of Hearts called for the tarts and beat the Knave full sore. The Knave of Hearts brought back the tarts and vowed he'd steal no more." - Lewis Carroll
I think this would be the only film that Vincent Price and George Nader appeared in together! That fact by itself is enough reason to seek out this movie!
Classic portrait of George Nader!!
Marie and Diane watch in horror as information is extracted from one of the other Dolls! Besides Caroline Coons, the gals fleshing out the cast and credited simply as "and the Dolls" are Andrea"The Cups Of San Sebastian"Lascelles, Ursula"Il Vostro Super Agente Flit"Janis, Karin"LSD Flesh Of Devil"Skarreso, Loli Munoz, Marisol, Jill Echols, Monique Aimé, Sandra Petrelli, Lara Lenti, and Francoise Fontages who never appeared in other films, and finally Kitty Swan who was in some real zingers like "Barbarella," "Deadlier Than The Male," and "Wild, Wild Planet!"
While George sorts it all out, I almost forgot that besides the killer theme song that was written by Don Black and Mark London and performed by Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, the rest of the music in the film was by Modernist composer Carlos Camilleri who only had one other composing credit, "Sax Rohmer's The Castle Of Fu Manchu." Carlos went on to be the Professor of Composition at the Toronto Conservatory of Music, and ended his career as a Professor of Music at Malta University! 
