Count Yorga, Vampire.

Review #2283: Count Yorga, Vampire.

Cast:

Robert Quarry (Count Yorga), Roger Perry (Dr. James "Jim" Hayes), Michael Murphy (Paul), Michael Macready (Michael "Mike" Thompson), Donna Anderson (Donna), Judy Lang (Erica Landers), Edward Walsh (Brudah), Julie Conners (Cleo), Paul Hansen (Peter), and Sybil Scotford (Judy) Written and Directed by Bob Kelljan.

Review: 

Admittedly, you really could make a vampire movie out of any half-baked idea if you have enough luck involved. Michael Macready was a producer that wanted to make a movie with Bob Kelljan on the cheap in softcore horror, tentatively calling their movie "The Loves of Count Iorga"; Kelljan had made his debut as a director with the skin flick Flesh of My Flesh (1969), which he starred and co-produced with Macready. They asked Robert Quarry about possibly doing their softcore movie. He had done a handful of features in either small or uncredited nature while in a small theater group that happened to include Macready. Quarry wanted to do a "straight horror movie", although they compromised and shot a few scenes that could be used as softcore if the film wasn't going well. His recollections of the film stated that there were just four crewmembers and a budget of just under $100,000 (he shot the film in the night while shooting a small part in WUSA [1970] in the day). The result, as distributed by American International Pictures (who made the suggestion to go with "Yorga" for easier pronunciation) was a hit. A sequel came up immediately with The Return of Count Yorga, which was directed and written by Kelljan. Quarry wanted to do a third film (apparently wanting to do one where he is broken and recovering in the sewers); The Deathmaster (1973) sometimes gets confused as related to Count Yorga due to its killer vampire (now a hippie), complete with AIP promoting the movie with similar beats to Yorga. As for Kelljan, he directed three further films (Scream Blacula Scream, Act of Vengeance, Black Oak Conspiracy) before going on to direct in television prior to his death in 1982; the rights for any Yorga film lapsed to Macready, who Quarry did not want to work with. 

While Quarry did not become a grand star of stature with AIP (who due to Yorga had him for a contract with ideas of succeeding Vincent Price as their guy) due to their fading status in horror, he was quite happy with his experiences making the Yorga films and recollected his experiences often prior to his death in 2009. You don't have that many vampire movies set in its current day for that era, unless you want to dig in for films such as The Return of the Vampire, The Return of Dracula or The Vampire. It does prove to be a slick little movie, one that benefits from its modern setting with the sinister elegance leading the way from Quarry. It isn't often you get to see a séance lead off a movie (after narration from George Macready, son of Michael), that much is for sure. Quarry plays off the title role as a mystic that glides from scene to scene for a movie that is sometimes offbeat and sometimes funny for 93 minutes. This works out for better or worse because of the fact that the rest of the actors are only mildly interesting to begin with, unless you count Walsh playing a murky-looking heavy. The folks get into the vampire belief schtick a bit early, which is somewhat amusing. Some of the time you can tell where the budget ends and where the soft stuff could play out (particularly with one bit involving two ladies), but at least it isn't too skimpy on the weird nature of vampire-people relations. The ending is at least interesting for where exactly it ends up even with the usual "sure, the threat is dead..." bit, mainly because it ends on a freeze-frame that actually seems earned for once. In general, it might be an average horror film by the usual merits one would approach the genre, but it is generally involving enough to win out with a suitable enough lead presence and some interesting moments of blood to make one at least be curious to inquire further with Quarry and company.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

The Trip (1967).

Review #2030: The Trip.

Cast: 

Peter Fonda (Paul Groves), Susan Strasberg (Sally Groves), Bruce Dern (John), Dennis Hopper (Max), Salli Sachse (Glenn), Barboura Morris (Flo), Judy Lang (Nadine), Luana Anders (Waitress), and Dick Miller (Cash) Produced and Directed by Roger Corman (#368 - The Little Shop of Horrors, #684 - It Conquered the World, #852 - The Terror, #931 - Not of This Earth, #1007 - Attack of the Crab Monsters, #1039 - Five Guns West, #1042 - War of the Satellites, #1136 - Gas-s-s-s, #1147 - X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes, #1186 - A Bucket of Blood, #1423 - The Wild Angels, #1425 - The St. Valentine's Day Massacre, #1674 - Machine-Gun Kelly, #1684 - Creature from the Haunted Sea, and #1918 - House of Usher)

Review: 

"I wanted the picture not to be a pro-LSD picture and not to be an anti-LSD picture because my trip was very good, I had no bad effects in my trip at all. It was wonderful. Yet I felt I really shouldn’t be accused of proselytizing for LSD, and at the same time I knew people had had bad trips, so I was trying to be neutral, and I had to ask people what had happened on their bad trips, and incorporate some of what they had experienced into it to make it neutral."

Admittedly, when I think of Roger Corman, the words "counterculture trilogy" don't exactly come to mind. Research by others involving films involving so-called "hippies" has labeled The Trip as the second of his films involving the counterculture, with Gas-s-s-s (1970) being thought of as the last of the three and The Wild Angels (1966) being the first. Whatever Corman intended, one thing is clear when it comes to The Trip: it was meant to be quite an interesting experience in line with what Corman usually tried to do with American International Pictures. Hell, he certainly tried to do his own research to get things moving, which first involved reading the work of Timothy Leary, a noted psychologist, author, and advocate for psychedelic drugs which in this case involved lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), although others would also know Leary for phrases that he came up with, such as "turn on, tune in, drop out". This drug, if you didn't know, was first synthetized in 1938 by Albert Hofmann. I would like to mention that Hofmann (after accidentally finding out the effect of LSD with ingestion years later) argued for LSD as a possible tool for psychiatry within the right place of awareness and safety rather than used for entertainment. So yes, he had plenty to think about the counterculture and their use of something he called "medicine for the soul". As for Corman, he eventually came to the conclusion that reading and asking folks about it was not enough, he had to try LSD for himself. After all of that, Corman, having a good trip, decided to make a film relying on experiments with cinematography and visual elements to carry a film that isn't really about much besides a drug trip. Of course, I can't forget that the film was also written by Jack Nicholson, which came about after Corman had Charles B. Griffith (his writer on previous material) write a couple of drafts, one of which was done as a musical; Nicholson apparently wanted to play a role in the film, but Corman wanted to reuse Dern from the aforementioned Angels film (which he and Fonda both starred in). The film was released less than a month after Corman's one big-budget venture with The St. Valentine's Day Massacre, but The Trip (made on a budget 1/4th the size of the other one) was a major hit for AIP. If you didn't connect the dots already, Fonda and Hopper would star together in a future film involving the road and the counterculture (with Nicholson and Anders in tow) in Easy Rider (1969).

Evidently, the way to go with this film is to turn off one's mind, relax, and float downstream. Regardless of how one feels about the attempt of neutrality, there is something quite, uh, offbeat about how the film goes about in wandering for 82 minutes. Strangely though, I find it far more interesting of the counterculture films that Corman did as compared to Wild Angels or with Gas-s-s-s, probably because the raucous biker experience of "freedom" of the former and the latter's attempt at "post-apocalyptic dark comedy" seem quite hollow compared to the simple goals presented here. It certainly won't be as ridiculous to watch as say, Reefer Madness. Those who find it tedious will have as much justification to say so as the folks who label it as pure cinematic exercise. It all depends on how much patience on has with lingering sequences of a man going through a really weird time that includes fantasy sequences, folks accidentally breaking into people's houses, and musical backdrops involving jazz or organ and horns for a score. With that in mind, Fonda actually does a pretty good job here, a dazed performance that is totally inviting and right for the scenario presented that doesn't seem ripe for exploitation. You get bits and pieces of who he is around and during the trip, and it namely involves vulnerability that one would think about when it comes to one's awareness being tuned into weird putty. Hopper and Dern play the guides on the would-be road of awakening, which is mostly amusing in bits and pieces. The women in the film in Strasberg and Sachse come and go in a rate that suggests discussion over just what they actually mean to Fonda beyond what they look on the surface, but remember that LSD was indeed meant more than just tripping out, so take that in mind. A handful of psychedelic/counterculture films would come and go in the coming months, whether that involved Something Weird (1967), or say, Head (1968), or Skidoo (1968), you get the idea, but The Trip should prove just fine for the curious at heart that like entertaining looks at the experience of doing a trip with useful imagery that is both what you think and don't think would happen if you were the one put in the lead scenario here. And for that, Corman clearly was in his element here in a decent experience.

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.