THE DEATH RAY MIRROR OF DR. MABUSE

Dead or only resting? Dr. Mabuse

THE DEATH RAY MIRROR OF DR. MABUSE (aka Die Todesstrahlen des Dr. Mabuse/The Death Ray of Dr. Mabuse/1964). Director: Hugo Fregonese.

Following the events of Dr. Mabuse vs. Scotland Yard, Professor Pohland (Walter Rilla) claims that he was forced to do his evil deeds detailed in the last film by the spirit of Dr. Mabuse. There seems to be a new Dr. Mabuse in town, and his adversary this time is Major Bob Anders (Peter van Eyck, who played a different character in the previous film but is basically in the same role as agent). Anders is sent to Malta to protect Professor Larsen (O. E. Hasse), who has invented a deadly "death ray mirror" that is coveted by Mabuse. Anders brings along an old, rather dumb girlfriend named Judy (Rika Dialyna) for cover, and also dallies with Larsen's daughter, Gilda (Yvonne Furneaux), and the Oriental beauty, Mercedes (Yoko Tanio). Other characters are Director Botani (Claudio Gora), the eye-patched Admiral Quency (Leo Genn of Personal Affair), and Gilda's boyfriend, Mario (Gustavo Rojo of Tarzan and the Mermaids), one of whom may be the evil Mabuse. While Death Ray Mirror is better than Scotland Yard, it's still a far cry from a good movie. Like the other sixties Mabuse films, this one is an ersatz Eurospy movie, with all of the usual elements but without the budget and elan to make them come alive in any really entertaining fashion. The "death ray mirror" never really comes into play and has little to do with anything. Peter van Eyck handles the derring do as well as anyone. This is the last of the sixties German Mabuse series, but not the last outing for the bad German doctor.

Verdict: Mabuse deserves better. **.

DR. MABUSE VS SCOTLAND YARD

Possessed by Dr. Mabuse: Walter Rilla

DR. MABUSE VS SCOTLAND YARD (aka Scotland Yard jagt Dr. Mabuse/1963). Director: Paul May.

Although the evil criminal mastermind Dr. Mabuse (Wolfgang Preiss) has died, his spirit has taken over the mind of sanitarium director, Professor Pohland (Walter Rilla). Therefore there is a new Dr. Mabuse afoot, one who is determined to take over the British government. To that end he enlists the aid of Ernest (Wolfgang Lukschy), whom he helps escape from police and who gets a new face. Ernest and others steal a device invented by Professor Merton (uncredited) -- this can take over the minds of anyone the device is trained upon and turn them into Mabuse's slaves. Fighting Mabuse are Inspector Vulpius (Werner Peters), and agent Bill Tern (Peter van Eyck), who lives with his feisty mother, Gwendolyn (Agnes Windeck). There are assorted plots and counter-plots; successful and abortive assassinations; the kidnapping of a princess (Ruth Wilbert) and Bill's steady, Nancy (Sabine Bethmann); a train robbery and a copter chase; but none of this is very interesting or handled with any real suspense or excitement. Along with van Eyck, Klaus Kinsiki is another familiar face as an agent who is temporarily mind-controlled by Mabuse. An interesting touch is how "Mabuse," once captured, is just a harmless, pitiful old man after the master criminal's spirit has left his body. This is a sequel to The Terror of Dr. Mabuse. Peter van Eyck also appeared in The 1000 Eyes of Dr. Mabuse but played a different character. Mabuse would return. By this time the Mabuse films had turned into nominal spy pictures with Mabuse in the place of, say, Dr. No.

Verdict: Manages the amazing feat of making Mabuse very dull. *1/2.

THE 1000 EYES OF DR. MABUSE

Wolfgang Preiss

THE 1000 EYES OF DR. MABUSE (aka Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/1960. Director: Fritz Lang.

A series of murders and strange occurrences center around the Hotel Luxor. When a woman, Marion Menil (Dawn Addams of The Vault of Horror), stands out on a ledge threatening to jump, she is coaxed in by American millionaire scientist Henry Travers (Peter van Eyck of The Wages of Fear). As Travers tries to determine the reason for Marion's despair, Commissioner Kras (Gert Frobe) investigates the murder of a reporter who is shot while his car is stopped in traffic -- a murder that reminds Kras of a similar death that the late criminal Dr. Mabuse was responsible for (and which occurred in Lang's The Testament of Dr. Mabuse.) Assisting Kras is the blind psychic Peter Cornelius, even as Marion is assisted by her physician, the striking Dr. Jordan (Wolfgang Preiss). Whoever is behind the goings-on has outfitted the Hotel Luxor with television monitors in each room, as well as two-way mirrors. A bomb in the Commissioner's phone nearly ends the case for him.  The 1000 Eyes of Dr. Mabuse, Fritz Lang's final Mabuse film, is an absorbing thriller with lots of twists and turns and a satisfying wind-up. The performances are good, with Wolfgang Preiss [The Terror of Dr. Mabuse] being especially notable.

Verdict: Dr. Mabuse has denied that he had anything to do with the 2016 US presidential election. ***.

TARZAN'S HIDDEN JUNGLE

Cute but tough: Gordon Scott

TARZAN'S HIDDEN JUNGLE (1955). Director: Harold Schuster.

Dr. Celliers (Peter van Eyck of The Wages of Fear) is bringing medicine to members of a certain lost tribe across the river who "fanatically worship animals" and who kill anyone who harms one. Burger (Jack Elam of Lure of the Swamp), DeGroot (Charles Fredericks) and Reeves (Richard Reeves) are hunters masquerading as movie photographers. The doctor's nurse, Jill (Vera Miles), importunes him to allow the "photographers" to travel with them so as to spread the message of his work, but she is unaware that Tarzan (Gordon Scott) already knows that these men have injured a baby elephant in an attempt to kill the pachyderm. Jill gets caught in quicksand, with a boa constrictor sliding down a tree towards her for added measure, and she and the doctor are nearly fed to a pride of lions when the natives blame the couple for the hunters' intrusion. There's the usual elephant stampede with the bad guys' heads falling conveniently under some mighty big feet at the climax. As Tarzan, Scott is strong, mostly silent, and cute; and a pre-Psycho Miles is fine as Jill, with adept supporting performances from the others, but the script is so weak that it reminds one of a lesser Bomba or Jungle Jim programmer instead of a true Tarzan movie. "Cheta" -- yet another spelling of the chimp's name -- is played by a talented fellow named Zippy, and seems to have an even more adorable girlfriend with whom he smooches at the end. Speaking of romance, Tarzan seems to give Jill some lingering looks throughout the movie which may be why Scott and Miles got married soon after. This was Scott's first appearance as Tarzan.

Verdict: Essentially unmemorable Tarzan movie but it led into a four year marriage for Gordon Scott and Vera Miles. **.

THE WAGES OF FEAR

Yves Montand

THE WAGES OF FEAR aka La salaire de la peur/1953). Director: Henri-Georges Clouzot.

"If I'm going to be a corpse, I want to be presentable."

"Just takes a few months to get to be a hundred."

In a grubby, hopeless town in South America, four desperate men agree to drive two trucks loaded with nitroglycerin over rough terrain to deliver to a fiery oil well for a great deal of money. The two main characters are Mario (Yves Montand) and his fellow Frenchman, Jo (Charles Vanel), with whom he strikes up an affectionate father/son friendship which is sorely tested and pretty much defeated by their ordeal. In the second truck are Mario's former friend, Luigi (Folco Lulli) and Bimba (Peter van Eyck). What sets this movie apart from its Hollywood remake, William Friedkin's Sorcerer, is the intense, more dimensional characterization that has you caring what happens to these not always likable individuals. The Hollywood version is also afflicted with "Indiana Jones" fever in which the situations the drivers and trucks find themselves in are sometimes like something out of a cliffhanger, while Clouzot manages to generate suspense over more reasonable travails. The acting is excellent, with Vanel in particular etching a memorably superb portrait of a tough guy who has to deal with thoughts of age and fear as the taut and terrifying journey continues, but the others are also marvelous. Luis De Lima, Vera Clouzot, and William Tubbs also register as another wannabe driver, Mario's sometime girlfriend, and the supervisor in the oil company who's much more concerned with the nitro getting through than he is about human lives. The Wages of Fear is imperfect and overlong and builds slowly [although there are tense scenes even in the first half hour, such as a confrontation between Jo and Luigi in a tavern] but it is arresting and moving. At one point Mario allows his desperation and exasperatioin with Jo to go too far, but in a very satisfactory conclusion it all comes full circle. Clouzot also directed Le Corbeau.

Verdict: A classic French film well worth the viewing. ***1/2.

THE SNORKEL

THE SNORKEL (1958). Director: Guy Green.

You learn right at the start of the movie that Jacques Duval (Peter van Eyck) murdered his wife, but the well-made film holds your attention in spite of it. Good acting and tense situations certainly don't hurt. The murdered woman's daughter, Candy (Mandy Miller, a young beauty), alleges that she saw Jacques murder her father some years before, and is convinced that he somehow managed to murder her mother even though her death, which occurred in a locked bedroom, has been ruled a suicide. Betta St. John plays Jean, a relative who is a sort of governess or companion to Candy. One of the best scenes has Jacques making an attempt on Candy's life while she's swimming. A very satisfying wind-up. Peter van Eyck strikes the perfect note as the cold-blooded murderer. Co-written by the prolific Jimmy Sangster but not as gimmicky has some of his stories.

Verdict: Engaging time passer. ***.

RUN FOR THE SUN

RUN FOR THE SUN (1956). Director: Roy Boulting. 

Although this will probably hold your attention if you're unfamiliar with earlier versions, this is a fairly lamentable remake of the far superior Most Dangerous Game. Whereas the first film got us right into the action, this variation takes forever to get to the main event, with a protracted sequence wherein Jane Greer plays a magazine reporter trying to find out why famous writer Michael Latimer (Richard Widmark) vanished to Mexico when he was at the top of his game. After an hour or so of this, Widmark offers to fly Greer out of the village he's buried himself in but they crash land in an even more remote area where Trevor Howard and Peter van Eyck have taken up residence. The bad guys in this picture don't actually hunt humans as the villain did in The Most Dangerous Game -- stripping this version of the story's most interesting aspect -- they just don't want Widmark and Greer to get away knowing their secret (which isn't much anyway, although one can understand why they don't want their uninvited guests going off and telling anyone). The scene when the plane nearly crashes is well done, but the climactic chase is slack and unexciting. Roy Boulting was never a good choice to direct thrillers; years later he made a botch of Twisted Nerve. Jane Greer radiates her usual refined sexiness and Widmark, while never a great actor, is full of his usual insolent authority. Trevor Howard is merely wasted in a throwaway part. The music is okay but the widescreen cinematography is unimpressive. It all looks like it was shot on a back lot anyway. 

Verdict: Watch The Most Dangerous Game instead. **.