From January of 1963 to December of 1966 Ernie Anderson, AKA Ghoulardi, ruled the Friday night airwaves in Cleveland with his b-movie show. To give you an idea of how popular his show was, Ghoulardi did what some of the top entertainers of their day consistently failed to do – HE BEAT JOHNNY CARSON’S TONIGHT SHOW IN THE RATINGS! Carson may have owned the rest of the country, but on Friday nights in Cleveland and vicinity Ghoulardi was the REAL king.
Ghoulardi, along with Vampira and Zacherley, is part of the Holy Trinity (or Trimurti if you prefer) of the early b-movie show hosts who proved so popular they ensured that the American folk art of hosting Grade Z films would not be just a passing fad. Those three pioneers (if you’re from Chicago you can add Mad Marvin) became pop culture icons and helped demonstrate how much fun bad movie culture can be.
In Ghoulardi’s case his catchphrases like “Stay sick” and “Ova dey!” were the “Hikeeba!” of their day. Anderson’s look was iconic, too, and his green lab coat predated Doctor Madblood’s and Trace Continue reading
CUCUMBER CASTLE (1970) – Eight years before the Bee Gees embarrassed themselves on the big screen with a horrible movie forcing a storyline to the Beatles album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band they embarrassed themselves on the small screen forcing a storyline to their own album Cucumber Castle. 
Cucumber Castle is so awful that not being in it was presumably brother Robin Gibb’s greatest professional triumph. He had recently left the Bee Gees in a huff to try a solo career, and little Andy Gibb was only twelve years old, so Barry and Maurice, who also produced, were left holding the 
THE GHOST GOES GEAR (1966) – Okay, how could anyone resist a film that features a song titled Show Me Your English Teeth? This movie was the Spencer Davis Group’s addition to all the imitation Help! flicks from the 1960s as so many British bands tried to replicate the Beatles’ big screen success but fell below even some of the worst Monkees episodes in quality. 
For those readers not familiar with them, the Spencer Davis Group was made up of THE Steve Winwood, his brother Muff Winwood (but not his sister Dick Winwood), Pete York and of course Spencer Davis. 
BLOOD SABBATH (1972) – Anthony Geary, best known as Luke Spencer on General Hospital when that soap opera was kicking off the absurd trend of daytime dramas being more like Republic Serials, has passed away. Balladeer’s Blog marks the sad event with this review of Geary’s most Psychotronic movie. 
For her part, Genie had to suffer through a real-life marriage to Commander Riker from Star Trek: The Next Generation and Anthony had to suffer through bombs like Blood Sabbath. 
This wraps up my look at three of Tom Selleck’s early starring roles in turkeys. 
THE WASHINGTON AFFAIR (1977) – Also released as A Very Intimate Washington Affair, and for all I know as A Very Brady Washington Affair, this movie was a remake of director Victor Stoloff’s own 1966 film Intimacy. Neither version was very successful, but trivia buffs remember the original and the remake for Barry Sullivan playing the exact same character in both. 
By ’77 even the production’s attempt to cash in on Watergate and other government scandals was a bit too late and the sexual angle would barely disturb a contemporary grandma. Add the facts that the script sucks, there are literally only two sets for the entire film, and the central camera gimmick is absurd. 
THE GYPSY WARRIORS (1978) – Yesterday I reviewed the godawful 
This 1978 tv-movie starts out by turning “show, don’t tell” on its ear. As bad as the opening of The Chinese Typewriter was, the opening to this World War Two snoozer is even worse. The beginning devotes FOURTEEN entire minutes of the 76-minute runtime to a portentous announcer merely narrating as we see mismatched footage of hands, arms and the backs of heads plus second unit film of buildings, airplanes and vehicles.
THE CHINESE TYPEWRITER (1979) – It’s tough to remember the time before Tom Selleck was a tv megastar. His looks made him stand out and he had “future success” written all over him. He even showed he had a knack for comedy when he made two appearances on The Rockford Files as the annoyingly perfect and cliche-ridden detective Lance White. (“I’m okay, Jim. It’s just a flesh wound.”) 
With those writing and directing pedigrees behind the project you should have been able to smell several seasons, big money and some Emmy Awards in the offing. 
HAPPY HALLOWEEN! Balladeer’s Blog wraps up its 2025 Halloween blog posts with a look at the horror films of the one and only Paul Naschy, real name Jacinto Molina, Spain’s King of Horror Cinema. 
THE MARK OF THE WOLFMAN (1968) – Paul Naschy wrote and starred in this first of his many movies as the tormented lycanthrope Waldemar Daninsky. This movie was also released under the title Frankenstein’s Bloody Terror with an edited-in introduction claiming that a branch of the Frankenstein family was cursed to become werewolves. That was done purely so the distributor could pass this off as a Frankenstein film. 
It turns out the couple are actually vampires who prey on victims all over Europe. They kill a few of Waldemar’s friends and then sic Wolfstein on him. Daninsky wins that battle of werewolves and kills Wolfstein, then fights and kills the Mikhelov vampires. 
AGAINST THE DARK (2009) – As Halloween night creeps ever closer, let’s take a look at the most atypical movie from Steven Seagal’s Down Years. Say what you will, but Against the Dark at least stands out among the Waddlin’ Warrior’s many direct to video turkeys during his Fat Elvis phase. 
Viewers are thrown right into the post-apocalypse setting. A disease has heavily reduced the global population. Many are dead but many more live on as violent predators who feed on the living.
Can you believe it’s just one week until Halloween! 
BARTHOLOMEW 
MISTER RABBEY
Balladeer's Blog 