THE THREE STOOGES MEET HERCULES

Hercules shows off muscles to Curly

THE THREE STOOGES MEET HERCULES (1962). Director: Edward Bernds. 

The Three Stooges work in a drug store and have befriended a tall if nerdy scientist named Schulyer Davis (Quinn K. Redeker). Davis is working on a time machine, and when the stooges fiddle around with it they, Davis, and his fiancee, Diane (Vicki Trickett), all wind up back in Ithaca in 900 B.C. Greece. Their untimely arrival causes Ulysses to lose the battle against Odius (George N. Neise) with the added help of a rather unpleasant Hercules (Samson Burke). 

The stooges with the phony Herc

The rather brave stooges manage to free Ulysses from prison but for their efforts are turned into galley slaves. This enables Davis to develop muscles that put him on a par with Hercules. After escaping from the ship, Davis masquerades as the demi-god and gives him the reputation of a decent and honorable fellow. But he still has to face the real Hercules in the arena and get his girlfriend away from the odious King Odius. Odius happens to greatly resemble the stooges' boss, Mr. Dismal, back in the 20th century. 

Two-headed cyclops wants to make a meal of Moe

Well, what can you say about The Three Stooges Meet Hercules? You can say that for a full-length Stooges movie it is rather ambitious and has a more complicated storyline than the usual slapstick outing. Moe (Moe Howard) seems even a  bigger bully than usual in this picture, and although Joe DeRita is more than okay in the film, he is not my favorite Curly. Larry Fine (Larry) is as funny as ever, however. Redecker and Trickett are acceptable without making that much of an impression. 6 ft. 4 Samson Burke was a body builder and professional wrestler who turned to acting; he is fine as an unsympathetic and mean-spirited Hercules. George Neise specialized in sleazy and unlikable characters, but he is not notable in this. The movie is not tedious and it has amusing moments, but it couldn't be considered a "laff riot," either. The stooges have been funnier elsewhere, but this flick is not without interest for fans. 

Verdict: If the stooges are not your cup of java, tune out! **1/2.

VALLEY OF THE DRAGONS

VALLEY OF THE DRAGONS (1961). Director: Edward Bernds.

In 1881 Algeria two men, Hector Servadac (Cesare Danova) and Michael Denning (Sean McClory) are about to fight a duel over a woman when the earth shakes in a great cataclysm that they manage to survive. After a time they realize that a comet grazed the earth, as it has time and again in the past, and taken a bit of the planet into space with it, along with a chunk from the prehistoric past. When Servadac and Denning realize what has happened to them, they don't seem all that upset, a problem with both the screenplay and the acting. Most of the movie consists of stock footage of One Million B.C. with Danova [Honeymoon with a Stranger] and Clory [Them] cleverly inserted  into the action. Again we have two warring tribes, two women (Joan Staley, Danielle De Metz), and the big lizard cornering some natives in a big cavern in a hill and gulping down and chewing one of the luckless warriors. Three clips from Rodan are also used to fill in for pterodactyls, as well as what appears to be a prop spider from Bernds' World Without End. Joan Staley is a Ruta Lee lookalike. The premise of the film is good, taken from Jules Verne's novel "Hector Servadac" aka "Career of a Comet," although that did not include prehistoric monsters.

Verdict: The producers wrote the book on "How to Make One Movie Out of Another." **.

WORLD WITHOUT END

WORLD WITHOUT END (1956). Director: Edward Bernds.

Four American astronauts on a trip to observe but not land on Mars, wind up caught in a super-speed time warp and arrive on Earth in 2508 AD. There they find that one-eyed mutates rule over savage humans who roam the countryside, while the dregs of intelligent humanity hide inside a mountain HQ. The men are old and eunuch-like and wear hideous outfits, while the younger women are clad in glamorous gowns that show up sexy legs. Yes, welcome to the future -- or rather 1956! The astronauts also encounter two giant mutated spiders -- unconvincing mock-ups -- in a cavern. World Without End has a few ideas -- it's not as dumb, say, as Queen of Outer Space, also directed by Edward Bernds -- but most of them are recycled. Like Queen, this is also decked out in CinemaScope and Technicolor. The astronauts are played by Hugh Marlowe, Rod Taylor (who would have somewhat similar adventures in The Time Machine a few years later), Nelson Leigh (The Adventures of Sir Galahad), and Christopher Dark, while the attractive ladies are Nancy Gates, Shawn Smith (The Land Unknown), and Lisa Montell. Everett Glass plays aged Timmek, who rules the underground society, and Booth Colman is Mories, who can hardly wait to take over. The credits for most of these actors were largely on television. Not enough is made of the fact that the astronauts will never see their loved ones or time period again, but then this isn't exactly intellectual material. Very influential, for better or worse, on such later movies as Beyond the Time Barrier.

Verdict: Even big spiders can't save this from being rather boring. **.

BRIDELESS GROOM

Voice Professor Shemp Howard councils Ms. Dinklemeyer

BRIDELESS GROOM (1947). Director: Edward Bernds.

Before the Three Stooges got their television program, they made many short comedies that were shown in theaters. These were often funny and inventive and constitute the stooges' golden age. In Brideless Groom, Professor Shemp Howard is a voice coach with an impossibly shrill and awful pupil named Miss Dinkelmeyer (Dee Green), who is in love with him. He suggets that she "gargle with razor blades." It develops that Shemp will inherit half a million bucks if he gets married by six o'clock, but he ignores the nuptially-anxious Dinkelmeyer in favor of more attractive ladies who have no desire to tie the knot with him -- until they learn about the loot! Larry Fine and Moe Howard try to assist in the search for a willing bride, and there's a frenetic climax when money-hungry dames converge on the groom just before the ceremony and almost turn into literal battle-axes! The boys are in top form in this very funny 17 minute short.

Verdict: Zany antics with the stooges.

RETURN OF THE FLY

Philippe Delambre has a bit of a problem

RETURN OF THE FLY (1959). Director: Edward Bernds.

"Help me, I'm Philippe. Help me, I'm Philippe."

The Fly was a huge hit so a quick-buck sequel was rushed out the following year. This was also in CinemaScope, but not technicolor, and Vincent Price reprised his role of Francois Delambre [and seems slightly more enthusiastic this time, probably because of his pay check]. Philippe (Brett Halsey), the son of the scientist in the first film, is now grown, his poor mother dead, and demands to know all about his father's research. Despite Francois' dire warnings -- with good reason! -- Philippe steals away one of his uncle's [although never referred to as such] employees and practically blackmails him into giving him money for his own matter transmitter project. What Philippe doesn't know is that the employee -- now his partner --  Ronald (David Frankham), is actually a murderer using an alias, and that he plans to use a corpulent crumbum named Max (Dan Seymour) to sell off the technology to the highest bidder. No, a fly doesn't accidentally wind up in the disintegrator with Philippe, it is put there by the sadistic David, who knows of Philippe's terror of flies. Phillipe winds up in the same dire situation as his father before him, with his consciousness seemingly divided between his hulking giant fly-head form, and within the tiny, human-headed fly that cries out for help in a tiny voice. [For this effect Brett Halsey's head is simply superimposed over a fly's body, and the results are not very credible.] Return of the Fly  is slow-paced and minor, and not in the league of its predecessor. There is a creepy sequence showing a man with the hands of a guinea pig and vice versa. Brett Halsey of The Atomic Submarine gives a decent performance in this. Bernds also directed Queen of Outer Space and quite a bit of junk.

Verdict: Acceptable, but basically fritters away a lot of good ideas for a quick buck. **.

GOLD RAIDERS

GOLD RAIDERS (1951). Director: Edward Bernds.

Silent star and cowboy actor George O'Brien plays a character with the same name in this pretty terrible "comedy" supposedly starring the Three Stooges. Moe, Shemp and Larry are out in the wild west in the town of Red Mesa where they interact (minimally) with O'Brien; a pretty gal named Laura (Sheila Ryan); her father, who's an elderly doctor (Clem Bevans of She Couldn't Say No); and a bad guy involved in gold hijacking named Taggert (Lyle Talbot, who seems very out of place in this milieu). The Stooges are strangely subdued in this, and are completely lost in a dull story that is busy without ever being funny. There are literally no laughs in this. The stooges become insurance salesmen, but no great routines result. This is boring even for fans of the stooges. Sheila Ryan also appeared in Great Guns with Laurel and Hardy.

Verdict: Terrible. 1/2*.

SPACE MASTER X-7

SPACE MASTER X-7 (1958). Director: Edward Bernds. 

Dr. Pommer (Paul Frees) experiments with a piece of "blood rust," his name for the red fungus that covers the planet Mars and was brought back by a ship called "Space Master X-7,", and discovers to his regret that it's even more dangerous than he imagined. Laura (Lyn Green), the mother of his son, comes to visit and walks off unaware that she's carrying fungal spores. Agents John Hand (Bill Williams) and Joe Rattigan (Robert Ellis) begin a desperate search for the woman, finding traces of the fungus -- which sort of resembles a glistening, moving carpet -- wherever she's been. The climax occurs on a plane where the fungus begins to break out of the cargo hold. An amusing scene has the passengers reacting to the fungus as it covers the plane windows. Thomas Browne Henry of Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, Blood of Dracula, and many others, is in the cast as a Professor, and Moe Howard of the 3 Stooges is a helpful cab driver! The acting is more than adequate, and Frees has a better and bigger role than usual; he's excellent. This might have amounted to more if it had a bigger budget and more imaginative direction, but it has its moments. 

Verdict: Creepy in spite of itself. **1/2.

QUEEN OF OUTER SPACE

QUEEN OF OUTER SPACE (1958). Director: Edward Bernds.

Now classified as a "camp classic," Queen of Outer Space is simply a really awful movie. Being decked out in CinemaScope and Technicolor only makes its flaws more apparent. A spaceship in 1985 is hurled off course and lands on Venus, which is nothing like the way it's been described by scientists (no explanation is offered for this). Queen Yllana (Laurie Mitchell) has taken over the planet and banished the men whose war-mongering caused so much trouble, but she's just as bad. Zsa Zsa Gabor plays a scientist (yeah -- sure!) who is part of an underground conspiracy against the evil queen, and she and others help the earthmen to save their planet from a destructive blast from the queen's beta disintegrator. With costumes from Forbidden Planet (what an insult!), a plastic spider-prop from World Without End, and almost zero entertainment value, Queen of Outer Space isn't "so bad it's good"-- it's just bad. Slow pacing, a dumb script, and mediocre direction don't help. Some of the actors do the best they can -- Laurie Mitchell isn't bad -- but Zsa Zsa gives one of the worst performances by an actress in a professional (more or less) motion picture. Even Missile to the Moon (1959) and Fire Maidens of Outer Space (1955) were better than this! The bit with a deadly beam destroying a space station has some suspense to it even though the beam seems to come from a dozen different directions. A hilarious sequence has Gabor trying to imitate the queen as if none of the queen's guards would notice her accent!

Verdict: Not even the cheesecake and beefcake can save it. *.