Cult Oldies

[chas]

A gaming buddy has recently secured me a bunch of cult oldies that are hard or impossible to find in the USA. To do it he had to do online research and order from places like Greece and the Phillippines. We've been searching for some of them for as long as ten years! I have built up quite a collection of such films, as you probably have too.

Luckily, I now have a JVC DVD player that plays all world formats--all of the below are NTSC unless noted. Here is the latest bunch that I have just obtained or will soon have, in a group I now call "The Clean Sweep," as it includes everything left on our old Wanted Lists. Check them out. What are your own unusual cinematic favorites?

Young Winston: Dir. Richard Attenborough, 1972. Simon Ward, Anne Bancroft, Robert Shaw, John Mills, Anthony Hopkins. I saw it when it first came out in the movies as a student in London. They projected a Union Jack on the curtain, which then waved like a flag, as the older (WWII generation) Brits stood up to strains of God Save the King as did I; but the other younger audience members looked on seated and amused. See military action in India, the Sudan, and South Africa. The Director, who also made Ghandi, considers the two of them to be the most important historical figures of the modern era.

Atlantis the Lost Continent: Dir. George Pal, 1960. See Ed Platt as an Atlantean priest, the Trial of Fire and Water, death rays, animal men, and more in this epic set in Ancient Greece!

Aces High: One of the best and most realistic of the WWI Flying films, starring Malcolm Mcdowell and Simon Ward.

Lafayette Escadrille: Another WWI flying movie starring Tab Hunter, Clint Eastwood (!?!), and Will Hutchins. Make my sky, punk...

Sign of the Pagan: See Jack Palance chew the scenery as Attila the Hun, while Jeff Chandler looks on. One of JPs most famous performances.

By The Sword Divided: (Seasons One and Two, early 80s, 4 disks/10 episoes per season) I'd only seen part of the first season on PBS during its original broadcast. This BBC TV Series is set during the English Civil War, and follows a family with members on both sides. It costs twice as much to get it in NTSC format; so I got in it PAL (Australian). More talking than action, but a great historical costume drama with accurate depictions of the social and political order of the time, and those great Three Musketeer outfits.

Doc Savage: This early and low budget effort is the only cinematic effort to date treating the beloved 30's pulp hero, whose paperback series I devoured as a teen. Ron Ely as Doc. Thanks to a note on its availability to our site member "Doc Savage"--who else? I've role played Doc or his assistants twice in adventures at gaming Cons--before Superman, there was Doc.

The Conqueror: Oh no! Its John Wayne as Ghengis Khan!!! Filmed soon after WWII, Wayne and all of the principles later died of cancer. Could it have anything to do with the fact that they made the movie near the Trinity Site? That was the only WWII Atomic Bomb Test Site, and the radiation was still lingering...

Your pal,
Chas
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[kboleen]

I have a copy of Atlantis. I enjoyed it. I recently found a VHS of a Full Moon Video release of Pit and the Pendulum with Lance Henrickson. Now I'm keeping an eye out for Full Moon's Subspecies. A month or so ago I found a DVD of four old Hammer Horror Peter Cushing/Christopher Lee movies. They're Frankenstein and Dracula classics.