Category Archives: 1963

The Haunting
Directed by Robert Wise
Written by Nelson Giddings from the novel The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
1963/USA
Argyle Enterprises
Repeat viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Theodora: Haven’t you noticed how nothing in this house seems to move until you look away and then you just… catch something out of the corner of your eye?[/box]

Jack-of-all-trades Robert Wise made a haunted house movie truly scary through implication learned at the hands of Val Lewton.

Many residents of Hill House have died shocking deaths during the previous 90 years of its existence.  Local people are thoroughly convinced it is haunted and none will be there after dark.  Dr. John Markway, a researcher in the paranormal and supernatural, invites a carefully curated list of people with paranormal bents to spend a few days investigating the house.  In the event, all of these drop out save psychic Theodora (Claire Bloom) and Eleanor Vance (Julie Harris), an emotionally fragile “outsider” who somehow believes that the mansion may be her real home.  Along for the ride is skeptic Luke Sanderson (Russ Tamblyn) who stands to inherit the house and doesn’t want any dark rumors depressing its market value.

I’ll not reveal much more except that this film takes the haunted house concept very, very seriously while still leaving it open that some of the more horrific occurrences may be aided or created by Eleanor’s mental state.

It takes more and more to give me the shivers the longer I am on this journey.  This movie does the job right.  I was yelling at my TV set “don’t go up those stairs!”.  The acting is all great and the black-and-white cinematography super atmospheric.  Recommended.

Spencer’s Mountain
Directed by Delmer Daves
Written by Earl Hamner Jr and Delmer Daves
1963/USA
Warner Bros.
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Miss Parker: The world steps aside to let any man pass if he knows where he is going.[/box]

This pleasant family film has the same homespun wisdom of The Waltons TV series which it spawned.

Granpa (Donald Crisp) and Grandma Spencer beget a brood of nine sons.  They all work in a quarry in the Snake River Valley.  Eldest son Clay (Henry Fonda) and wife Olivia (Maureen O’Hara) also have nine children, this time a mixed brood.  Clay’s dream is to build Livvie a dream house atop Spencer’s mountain.  The couple have the grander dream of seeing their children better off than they are.  Clayboy (James MacArthur) manages to graduate high school.  The family must overcome various adversity to send him to college.In the meantime, Claris Coleman relentlessly pursues the somewhat obtuse Clayboy in a bid for the altar.  With Wally Cox as a preacher.

This is a sweet movie with some beautiful mountain scenery.  It was hard to imagine Henry Fonda or Maureen O’Hara as hillbillies but they do pretty well at it.  I doubt if this will stay in my memory long.

Trailer

Lord of the Flies
Directed by Peter Brook
Written Peter Brook from a novel by William Golding
1963/UK
Two Arts Ltd.
First viewing/FilmStruck

[box] Jack: We’ve got to have rules and obey them. After all, we’re not savages. We’re English! And the English are best at everything![/box]

Well, this is a hell of a note to end a year on.

The film begins with a group of still photographs that wordlessly tell of a coming war and the evacuation of children.  The story proper finds the boys located on a desert island which will be their new home following a plane crash.  These are evidently all upper class public school pupils but strangers to each other.  It takes no time at all before the youngsters form up tribes, select leaders, and descend into brutality.

The movie tells a very simple story in which a few rational but weak boys are no match for a few bullies and the groupies they attract.  It’s not clear whether the savagery depicted is fascist or anarchist but I suppose it doesn’t matter.  I really was not in the mood for something that held out so little hope for mankind.

Blood Feast
Directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis
Written by Allison Louise Downe, David F. Friedman and Herschell Gordon Lewis
1963/USA
Friedman-Lewis Productions
First viewing/Netflix rental

Fuad Ramses: Have you ever had… an Egyptian Feast?

The granddaddy of all slasher flicks seems mighty tame nowadays.

Socialite Dorothy Freemont is looking for something “unusual” for celebrating her daughter’s birthday.  Bad luck takes her to Egyptian caterer Faud Ramses who suggests an ancient feast offered to the goddess Ishtar.  This appeals due to the daughter’s interest in ancient Egyptian culture.

Unbeknownst to mom or daughter, the feast features various organs and body parts of virgins.  Ramses proceeds to collect these leaving behind maximum blood and gore in the process.

I have a queasy stomach but this did not hit the yuck meter for me.  The blood is far too fake for that. Bad acting and dialogue did not add to the effect.  The Something Sinister DVD contains a commentary by the producers that is far superior to the actual film.

Ingmar Bergman Makes a Movie (Ingmar Bergman gör en film)
Directed by Vilgot Sjöman
1963/Sweden
Sveriges Radio
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] To shoot a film is to organize an entire universe. — Ingmar Bergman[/box]

Anyone who has an interest in the filmmaking process or in Bergman owes it to himself to see this film.

The movie in question is Winter Light (1963).  We follow the production from an interview with Bergman on scripting, to selecting locations, to rehearsals and actual shooting.  We see the same short scene rehearsed many times and then shot over several takes.  This could be tedious but is fascinating.

The action then moves to the editing process with Bergman sharing additional insights on adding dynamics and rhythm through cutting.  After additional post-production, Bergman is interviewed on his expectations for the film’s reception and his relations with his critics.

I love Bergman and my respect for him went up a notch after watching this documentary. It’s so interesting how the little things matter.  Very highly recommended.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRNPEZgoXTY

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The Comedy of Terrors
Directed by Jacques Tourneur
Written by Richard Matheson and Elsie Lee
1963/USA
Alta Vista Productions
First viewing/Amazon Instant

[box] Felix Gillie: [stuck on a roof] Why did I ever escape from prison? It was so peaceful there.[/box]

With this cast and director you can’t help having fun.

The deaf and ancient Amos Hinchley (Boris Karloff) and Waldo Trumbull (Vincent Price) are partners in a mortuary firm.  Waldo came into the business via a marriage to Hinchley’s daughter Amaryllis, whom he despises more every time she opens her mouth.  Hinchley’s assistant Felix Gille admires Amaryllis from a far.

The business is far from prospering.  Understandable since they reuse the same coffin for each burial, Amos can’t deliver a eulogy to save his life, and Amaryllis insists on singing over the body.  Finally. landlord John Black (Basil Rathbone) demands the rent money or else.  Waldo decides that doing away with Jack will kill two birds with one stone.  But Black’s catalepsy throws a spanner in the works.

This isn’t exactly laugh out loud hilarious but it is fun to see all these folks do their stuff.  My favorite was Karloff as a thoroughly befuddled old man.  I hadn’t seen him like that before and he has nice comic timing.

Trailer

The Yesterday Machine
Directed by Russ Marker
Written by Russ Marker
1963/USA
Carter Film Productions
First viewing/YouTube

Police Lt. Partane: Yesterday should be left alone because today the world has enough problems just trying to make sure we’ll have a tomorrow.

By 1963, poor Tim Holt had been reduced to playing bit parts in bad Nazi time travel flicks.

Their car breaks down when two teenagers are on the way to the big football game – thus giving us the opportunity to watch the long baton twirling performance of the young lady. They foolishly disregard the no trespassing sign to seek help at a farmhouse.  Before they can get there, they are waylaid by ruffians in Civil War uniforms.  The boy survives a scuffle but the girl goes missing.

A reporter and the girl’s sister – a nightclub singer so we can catch her act – join the police to solve the mystery. This involves a mad Nazi scientist whose experiments in time travel are designed to create an eternal Third Reich.

Very bad indeed with the excess of filler characterizing these things.  There are some camp pleasures to be had however.

Clip with new soundtrack

Twice Told Tales
Directed by Sidney Salkow
Written by Robert E. Kent from stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne
1963/USA
Robert E. Kent Productions
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Beatrice Rappaccini: Your daughter is a fine specimen, too, isn’t she father? A specimen of the most deadly thing that was ever given life.[/box]

Vicent Price stars in an omnibus production of three mildly scary tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

The first story comes from “Dr. Heddiger’s Experiment” in which a scientist (Sebastian Cabot) who lost his beloved on their wedding day comes across a liquid that can turn back time.  The second, is “Rappaccini’s Daughter”.  A scientist (Price) seeks to keep his child eternally faithful buy making her very touch deadly poison.  The final story is from the novel The House of the Seven Gables, about a family cursed through many generations by its greed and evil.

I don’t have much to say about this one.  It is OK, with Price in fine form.  There are more horror moments than perhaps Hawthorne intended but it’s a little too camp to be really chilling.

Trailer

Cleopatra
Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Written by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Ranald MacDougall, and Sidney Buchman based on ancient histories and a book “The Life and Times of Cleopatra” by Carlo Maria Franzero
1963/Switzerland/UK/USA
Twentieth Century Fox/MCL Films S.A./Walwa Films S.A.
First viewing/Netflix rental

Marc Antony: [his last words] A kiss… to take my breath away…

An all-out spectacle without the energy to support it.

As the story begins, Cleopatra’s (Elizabeth Taylor) brother Ptolemy has ousted her from their joint throne.  The joint monarchy in Egypt was guaranteed by Rome.  When Julius Caesar (Rex Harrison) arrives in Alexandria, the wildly ambitious Cleo schemes to make herself undisputed queen of Egypt and, if possible, first lady of an Imperial Rome.  She gets part way there with a “marriage” to the already wed Caesar and later birth to his only son.  The Romans are not enthusiastic about Caesar’s new plans to make himself Emperor and he is famously assassinated.

Years later, Marc Antony (Richard Burton) arrives in Egypt on a military mission.  He beholds the comely Cleo and it is deja-vu all over again.

Everything about this three-plus hour movie struck me as false.  The acting and dialogue manage to veer wildly from 1963 to Shakespearean and back again in a single scene.  The production is the thing here.  Although I doubt that ancient times were quite that splendid, it is still something to behold.

Cleopatra won Academy Awards in the categories of Best Cinematography, Color; Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color; Best Costume Design, Color; and Best Effects, Special Visual Effects.  It was nominated in the categories of Best Picture; Best Actor (Harrison); Best Sound; Best Film Editing; and Best Music, Score – Substantially Original.

Trailer