TCM Schedule for Thursday, October 24, 2019 -- What's On Tonight: The Undead

[Staph]

Daylight hours - heroes of Greek mythology. Prime time - TCM continues their usual October theme of horror classic films. Today's sub-theme is the Undead. Enjoy!



7:00 AM -- HIGH PRESSURE (1932)
A scheming promoter tries to get rich selling artificial rubber.
Dir: Mervyn LeRoy
Cast: William Powell, Evelyn Brent, George Sidney
BW-73 mins, CC,

In the opening scene in a speakeasy, Colonel Ginsburg takes a sip of beer, grimaces and says "I can taste the needles". This refers to "needle beer" which was made by taking legal, low-alcohol beer and adding grain alcohol to it, often by injecting into the keg with a needle.


8:15 AM -- MEXICAN SPITFIRE AT SEA (1942)
An advertising executive and his temperamental wife sail to Hawaii in search of business.
Dir: Leslie Goodwins
Cast: Lupe Velez, Leon Errol, Charles "Buddy" Rogers
BW-73 mins, CC,

Fifth of eight Mexican Spitfire films.


9:30 AM -- CAPTAIN SINDBAD (1963)
Sinbad takes on an evil wizard to save the princess he loves.
Dir: Byron Haskin
Cast: Guy Williams, Heidi Brühl, Pedro Armendariz
C-85 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

Guy Williams, who acted Sindbad in this film, was no stranger to swashbuckling because performed as the titular Spaniard on Disney's television series Zorro (1957).


11:00 AM -- SINBAD AND THE EYE OF THE TIGER (1977)
When a witch turns a young prince into a baboon, Sinbad fights to save him.
Dir: Sam Wanamaker
Cast: Patrick Wayne, Taryn Power, Jane Seymour
C-113 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

An uncredited Peter Mayhew is the live suit actor stand-in for the stop-motion Minaton (the bronze mechanical minotaur), whose name is a portmanteau of "minotaur" and "automaton". Before filming, Mayhew was working as a hospital attendant at King's College Hospital in London. Producer Charles H. Schneer saw Mayhew's photo, in which he was literally standing above the crowd around him. Filmed in 1975, this was Mayhew's very first role, right before playing his more famous role of Chewbacca in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977), filmed in 1976. Both films were released in 1977 (but ironically, "Star Wars" was released three months ahead of "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger&quot .


1:00 PM -- JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS (1963)
The legendary hero enlists the help of the gods to steal the golden fleece.
Dir: Don Chaffey
Cast: Todd Armstrong, Nancy Kovack, Gary Raymond
C-104 mins, CC,

After Ray Harryhausen received the Gordon E. Sawyer Award recognizing his contributions to the film industry at the Oscars' Science & Technical Ceremony in 1992, Tom Hanks, the host of the event, said, "Some people say Citizen Kane (1941) or Casablanca (1942). I say 'Jason and the Argonauts' is the greatest movie ever made."


2:45 PM -- ATLANTIS, THE LOST CONTINENT (1960)
A Greek fisherman gets caught up in court intrigue in a land of scientific wonders.
Dir: George Pal
Cast: Anthony Hall, Joyce Taylor, John Dall
C-90 mins, CC,

When a preview of this film was shown, a questionnaire was distributed among the viewers asking what scene they liked. One person answered, "The scene where Robert Taylor saved Deborah Kerr from the fire." This was in reference to the fact that much of the stock footage used in the film came from Quo Vadis (1951).


4:30 PM -- HERCULES, SAMSON & ULYSSES (1963)
When two legendary Greek heroes are marooned, they're pushed into conflict with the famed Biblical strongman.
Dir: Pietro Francisci
Cast: Kirk Morris, Richard Lloyd, Liana Orfei
C-86 mins, CC,

U.S. fans regard this as the last of the big Italian sword and sandal/muscle-man epics. It was directed by Pietro Francisci, who had started the craze with his Hercules (1958).


6:00 PM -- CLASH OF THE TITANS (1981)
A Greek hero fights a series of monsters, including the dreaded gorgon, to win the woman he loves.
Dir: Desmond Davis
Cast: Harry Hamlin, Judi Bowker, Burgess Meredith
C-118 mins, CC,

The sea monster, seen at the start of the movie, that destroys the city of Argos was derived from Norwegian mythology. In Greek mythology, the sea monster that threatened Andromeda's people was called Cetus (whale). The Norwegian/Swedish name Kraken is now used as a synonym for the giant squid.



TCM PRIMETIME - WHAT'S ON TONIGHT: THE UNDEAD



8:00 PM -- HORROR OF DRACULA (1958)
The legendary count tries to turn his enemies' women into his bloodthirsty brides.
Dir: Terence Fisher
Cast: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Michael Gough
C-81 mins, CC,

In the U.S. the title was changed to "Horror of Dracula" to avoid confusion with the classic (Dracula (1931)). This was a real concern since the Bela Lugosi version was still being booked into theaters (through Realart) until the Shock Theatre package of classic Universal horror movies was released to television.


9:30 PM -- THE GORGON (1964)
A mythical monster turns men to stone in a remote European village.
Dir: Terence Fisher
Cast: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Richard Pasco
C-89 mins, CC,

Barbara Shelley (Carla Hoffmann) wanted to play the part of The Gorgon as well for continuity, and suggested to Producer Anthony Nelson Keys that she use a special wig with live green garden snakes woven into it for a more realistic effect. Her idea was rejected by Keys due to budget and time considerations. When Keys saw the abysmal Gorgon effects in the finished movie, he told Shelley that he should have listened to her suggestion. As Sir Christopher Lee quips, "The only thing wrong with "The Gorgon" is The Gorgon!"


11:15 PM -- THE PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES (1966)
A small town noble uses zombies to work his tin mine and kill his enemies.
Dir: John Gilling
Cast: Andre Morell, Diane Clare, Brook Williams
C-90 mins, Letterbox Format

Before allowing the film to be released, the B.B.F.C instructed "Hammer" to trim one or two scenes. Amongst them, the scene where Andre Morell decapitates the zombie in the graveyard with a shovel had to be reduced from showing four blows with the weapon to just the one.


1:00 AM -- NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968)
A space probe unleashes microbes that turn the dead into flesh-eating zombies.
Dir: George A. Romero
Cast: Judith O'Dea, Russell Streiner, Duane Jones
BW-96 mins, CC,

When the zombies are eating the bodies in the burnt-out truck they were actually eating roast ham covered in chocolate sauce. The filmmakers joked that it was so nausea inducing that it was almost a waste of time putting the makeup on the zombies as they ended up looking pale and sick anyway.


3:00 AM -- THE HUNGER (1983)
A centuries-old female vampire falls for a beautiful young research doctor.
Dir: Tony Scott
Cast: David Bowie, Susan Sarandon, Catherine Deneuve
C-96 mins, CC, Letterbox Format

David Bowie said that, in order to make his voice suitably hoarse for when he aged so drastically in the movie, he stood on the George Washington Bridge every night and screamed all the punk rock songs he knew.


4:45 AM -- NOSFERATU (1922)
In this silent film, a beautiful woman risks her life to end a vampire's plague of death and pestilence.
Dir: F. W. Murnau
Cast: Alexander Granach, Max Schreck, Gustav von Wangenheim
BW-95 mins,

The movie was banned in Sweden due to excessive horror. The ban was finally lifted in 1972.