#rank organization

[threewavylines]

How can this guy not be my favorite villain? 😉

[screamscenepodcast]

Hammer Horror and Terence Fisher tackle THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1962), but what they deliver is a simplified adaptation, a sympathetic Phantom, and a Joan of Arc opera. At least stars Michael Gough, Edward de Souza, and Herbert Lom seem to be having a good time!

Context setting 00:00; Synopsis 42:23; Discussion 55:34; Ranking 1:24:55

[i-like-his-charm]

I Like My Ridiculousness

I wonder if he knew that women yearned for him. I’m betting he did. Nobody would do the kind of photos he posed for and not know that women all over the world (or at least where they were showing Danger Man) were breathing a little harder when they looked at those. And even before Danger Man… heck, those Rank photos to promote him were super hot photos. Give me a break. He HAD to know that the ladies were swooning all over the place. We STILL swoon. 

I’ll bet he had mixed feelings about that. Any red-blooded normal male would have to be a little pleased at being admired so intensely, but he would have also been a bit appalled seeing as he had such strong feelings about family and fidelity. Possibly his repulsion against that might have been made stronger as it could have caused him a bit of temptation from time to time. I mean, let’s be realistic, even the most faithful of us DO notice other people (aren’t we noticing PMG?) Personally, I love my husband and, although I know couples who joke and say that some celebrity or other are each other’s “free square,” I don’t really need or want a “free square.” Even if PMG were alive and willingly available, I wouldn’t want a “free square.” It’s never what it seems. There was a time when Mel Gibson would have been my “free square.” After what I heard him saying to his ex-girlfriend on the phone, he repulses me now. And there was a time when Harrison Ford would have been my “free square.” After he left his wife for Calista Flockhart, he lost my respect. So, a long time ago, I realized, I don’t really want a “free square.” My husband knew he didn’t want one long before I did. It’s meaningless. But, yes, I have a certain yearning for PMG. I yearn to touch his face. If I did have my way with him LOL, I would touch his face. Every inch of his face. And maybe even more, but nothing else, just touch,

Still, it’s just as well that I’ll never see him in person. I like sinking into the unreality of it all. I LIKE believing in John Drake, Number 6, David Jones, any of those characters. I LIKE believing that, of course, the mythical Patrick McGoohan — some sort of fable person — never smelled like smoke when he smoked cigarettes. Was never angry about anything out of line. Never got drunk from all those drinks he drank ;-) (and Drake was constantly drinking!) I just like to sit back and make up this imaginary person. I want to fill in all the blanks with perfections or with flaws that are sorta perfect flaws. His shirts always felt starched but never scratchy. He smelled faintly of cologne but something better. His skin was smooth but still had that roughness of a man’s chin. His nails were never dirty, always manicured, but he never had to bother with that stuff because they were just that way naturally. 

And 6, well, in Many Happy Returns, when he’s all waterlogged and has been wearing the same torn up sweater for however many weeks and staggered through sand and field and over highway, he still smelled great when he got to his old place and sat on the couch next to that nasty woman who betrayed him (which I would have never done ;-) ) 

This is getting too long and ridiculous… but I like my ridiculousness.

[screamscenepodcast]

From the ashes of the Rank Organization rises producer Guido Coen and THE MAN WITHOUT A BODY (1957) from director W. Lee Wilder!

Starring Robert Hutton, George Coulouris, Julia Arnall and Nadja Regin, this low-budget B movie certainly is... an experience you won't see coming!

Context setting 00:00; Synopsis 16:50; Discussion 35:19; Ranking 1:01:27

[screamscenepodcast]

From Eagle-Lion Films and director Bernard Vorhaus comes THE AMAZING MR. X / THE SPIRITUALIST (1948)! Turhan Bey stars alongside Lynn Bari and Cathy O'Donnell, but can his charm save this big-budget B-movie?

We swoon over the stylish cinematography from John Alton and struggle with the old-fashioned flavour of Crane Wilbur's writing. But at the end of the day, what genre is this?

Context setting 00:00; Synopsis 19:30; Discussion 29:10; Ranking 1:02:54

[screamscenepodcast]

Dead of Night (1945, Various) Hear our take on the granddaddy of horror anthology flicks in episode 132 “Horror Compilation Album”: https://screamscenepodcast.tumblr.com/post/188548695744/its-six-horror-films-for-the-price-of-one-this