Battle of the Baddies 1966: Manos v. Night Train

Manos: The Hands of Fate
Directed by Harold P. Warren
Written by Harold P. Warren
1966/US
Norm-Iris/Sun City Films
First viewing/YouTube

[box] Master’s Wife: The woman is all we want! The others must die! They ALL must die! We do not even want the woman![/box]

A family of three gets lost in the desert, where they happen upon a hotel of sorts occupied by crazed caretaker Torgo.  Torgo is a devotee of The Master, the undead “husband” of multiple brides whom he defaces with a burning hand.  The mother is The Master’s intended next victim but he’s going to have to move fast to get in ahead of Torgo.

Fan trailer

Night Train to Mundo Fine (AKA Red Zone Cuba) 
Directed by Coleman Francis
Written by Coleman Francis
1966/US
Hollywood Star Pictures
First viewing/YouTube

[box] [last lines] Narrator: Griffin ran all the way to hell… with a penny, and a broken cigarette.[/box]

Plot?  We don’t need no stinkin’ plot!  Well, some guys decide to fly to Cuba and invade.  The team of eight is easily captured by an artificially bearded Castro look alike and executed one by one.  Three escape and somehow get back to the U.S. where they continue to fight each other.  With the producer and director in the leads and John Carradine acting daft and singing the theme song.

THE BATTLE

Needless to say, there would be no battle if these were not both exceedingly bad movies.  In that regard, they share lame dialogue, continuity errors, boring driving and walking sequences and bizarre soundtracks.  Now this is not a fair fight because I watched Manos sans riff track and Night Train in its Mystery Science Theater 3000 version because that was all that was available to me.  I would say that Manos has more boring bits than Night Train, which is just consistently bizarre.  I might say that Coleman Francis is an auteur along the lines of Edward P. Wood in the bad movie genre.  Harold P. Warren is a (un) talented amateur whose more endearing trademarks include making the wrong cinematic choice in virtually every situation.  If I had to pick one to rewatch, it would be Night Train to Mondo Fine.  The many death scenes are a hoot and that theme song can’t be beat!  So which movie is worse?  Depends on your perspective.

Random Internet user’s list. Note that all three Coleman Francis movies appear.