Balladeer’s Blog’s annual end of the year retrospective resumes with this look at August’s best.
BAD MOVIE REVIEW: TOWING (1978) – Even though this film’s cast includes JOE MANTEGNA, SUE LYON and DENNIS FRANZ it is a thoroughly bizarre attempt at a comedy. It’s based on some real-life unethical procedures by towing companies in Chicago. Relentlessly unfunny and very weird. Click HERE.
ETRUSCAN MYTHOLOGY – Or “Those darn Etruscans” as their category was always called on Jeopardy. I took a look at some of their gods like Tinia, Hercle, Aita and Usil plus some of their goddesses like Uni, Turan, Vanth and Feronia. They’re all HERE.
FORGOTTEN TELEVISION – Bird of the Iron Feather (1970), the pioneering soap opera about the lives of black Chicagoans HERE. Barbary Coast (1975) starring William Shatner and Doug McClure working for the U.S. Secret Service on the 1870s Barbary Coast HERE. Espionage (1963), an anthology series about spy operations from the Cold War, World War 2 and earlier wars HERE.
SOME HILARIOUSLY INACCURATE ERRORS FROM A.I. YOUTUBE CHANNELS – Click HERE.
COOL NAMED COLLEGE SPORTS TEAM – Gulf Coast Christian College HERE.
WHISKEY JIM – A neglected Old West gunslinger who interacted with the likes of Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett, Hoodoo Brown, Bushwacking Joe and the 4th Cavalry. He also fought in the Buffalo Hunters War and later against the Las Lagunas Comanchero Gangs. Click HERE.
GULLIVAR JONES ON MARS (1905): ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION – The conclusion of this pre-John Carter novel about an American naval officer winding up on Mars where he romanced a woman named Princess Heru and had various adventures. Click HERE.
KARATE GIRL (1973) – This Turkish martial arts film is one of that country’s premier violent revenge flicks. Fun-bad yet badass all at once. I reviewed it in detail HERE.
COOL NAMED COLLEGE SPORTS TEAM: MONTCALM COLLEGE – Click HERE.
GIANT OF THE EVIL ISLAND (1965) – Mission Impossible‘s Peter Lupus starred in this swashbuckler movie about the Spanish Navy clashing with pirates who use a place called Evil Island as their base. Click HERE.
THE DEFENDERS: AFTER THE EVIL EYE – Marvel’s superteam the Defenders (Hulk, Dr. Strange, Sub-Mariner, Clea, Silver Surfer, Valkyrie, Nighthawk and Son of Satan) followed up their war with the Avengers over the Evil Eye of Avalon with battles against Xemnu, Nebulon, Magneto, Asmodeus and QuasiMoD.O. Click HERE. Continue reading
RICHARD DENNING’S PSYCHOTRONIC MOVIES – Before he was the governor on Hawaii Five-O, Richard Denning appeared in several campy sci-fi movies in the 1940s and 1950s. ** Those included Target Earth, about alien androids invading Chicago; Unknown Island, about “modern” people finding an island populated by dinosaurs; Creature with the Atom Brain, about atomic-powered zombie gangsters; Day the World Ended, about post-nuke survivors fighting a monster; The Black Scorpion, about two giant scorpions on the loose, and the iconic Creature from the Black Lagoon. They’re all 
THE DOUBLE DAGGERS (1877) – The second Dime Novel about the fictional masked Old West outlaw and champion of the underdog – Deadwood Dick. This time he and his Nighthawks face a traitor within and defeat a new set of villains. Plus, our hero falls in love and gets married in the finale! Click 
THE PENOBSCOT CAMPAIGN FROM THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR – The massive 1779 American effort to drive the British out of the area of Maine that they had seized and renamed New Ireland. Click 
FORGOTTEN TELEVISION – Stagecoach West (1960) starring Wayne Rogers as a gunslinging stagecoach driver who has adventures 
NATIONAL VCR DAY – I marked the day with this blog post reviewing 8 films from several genres and all released on video during the 1980s heyday of VCRs. Click 
FORGOTTEN TELEVISION – Paris (1979-1980) – James Earl Jones starred in Steven Bochco’s show about police detective Woody Paris 
DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS, JR.’s SWASHBUCKLER FILMS – The son of THE swashbuckler from Silent Movies appeared in several of his own, like The Corsican Brothers, Sinbad the Sailor, The Fighting O’Flynn and more. I reviewed all of them 
MINNIE’S BOYS (1970) – My review of the original production of this stage show about the hilarious comedy team the Marx Brothers. Click 
JOHN DEREK: HIS SWASHBUCKLER FILMS – The man who married Bo Derek, Ursula Andress, Linda Evans & Pati Behrs also starred in swashbuckler movies like Rogues of Sherwood Forest (1950), The Sword of Monte Cristo (1951), Prince of Pirates (1953) and The Adventures of Hajji Baba (1954). Click 
THE SILENT FILMS OF ALICE GUY-BLACHE – This pioneering woman was for a time the only female director in the industry. I reviewed her works from the 1890s to 1920, including comedies, dramas, westerns, black cast movies, love stories and horror movies like Esmeralda (1905) – the first known film adapting The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Click 
Balladeer's Blog 