Tag Archives: USA

Vampires Galen [Kevin Spirtas] and Miranda [Angelina High] have just moved to Los Angeles. Galen wants to lay low and get his blood from a nearby bloodbank while Miranda likes hers fresh, young, and virile. When Galen notices dancer Jennifer [Madison Clark] masturbating on her studio floor, he falls in love and sets out to pursue her. Miranda becomes jealous and seduces Jennifer, too, while Jennifer’s cop boyfriend Ryan [Brad Bartram] senses that she is becoming too friendly with Galen and Miranda. Meanwhile, Ryan and Detective Turner [Cliff Potts] have their hands full trying to figure out why bloodless bodies keep turning up with two puncture wounds on the neck. Then Jennifer is hit by a car, and Galen “saves” her by making her a vampire. When Ryan sees a wanted poster bearing a drawing of Galen, he grabs a stake and rushes over to Galen’s apartment, only to find Jennifer squating in a corner and crying. Does Ryan use that stake on Jennifer? You’ll have to wait for Embrace the Darkness 2 to find out.
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Not by any means a great film, The Devil Thumbs a Ride nonetheless has an indefinable audience allure that sucks the viewer into its labyrinthine storyline and doesn’t let go until the fade-out. Lawrence Tierney plays Steve Morgan, a charming but utterly sociopathic criminal who has just robbed and killed a movie theater cashier. Morgan hitches a ride with inebriated conventioneer Jimmy Furguson (Ted North). Later on, Furguson picks up two more hitchhikers: virginal Beulah Zorn (Nan Leslie) and good-time girl Agnes Smith (Betty Lawford). When circumstances lead Jimmy to believe that Steve is the fugitive whom the cops are looking for, Morgan sweet-talks his way into everyone’s confidence. Before he knows what’s happening, Jimmy is holed up in a beach house while Steve parties with Beulah and Agnes. Not even the most fervent of film noir fans will be able to predict the outcome of this one. Long ignored by movie buffs, The Devil Thumbs a Ride gained a large following through repeated TV showings in the 1960s and ’70s. It is now considered so representative of its genre that one film historian used the film’s title for a collection of his essays on B-melodramas.
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Jean, returning to Paris after three years of residence abroad and went to the fancy parties, there met his old acquaintance Claire. But she was not alone, but accompanied by a young and attractive blonde Anna. Going after a boring party at a restaurant, Clair said Jean that Anna is her property…
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The singing group, The Beatles, at the height of their popularity, made this cartoon of a land that is taken over by the Blue Meanies. They are recruited by an escapee to come and bring joy (and music) back to the land. The techniques are quite psychedelic in the cartoons and much care was taken to have the walks and mannerisms of the individual Beatles cartoons match the originals.
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Clad only in a slip, Diane hops into a travel trailer parked outside her mother’s New York apartment, which is then driven off by Dr. Larry Smith (Raymond). Larry is heading cross-country to San Francisco, as he plans to board a ship for China where he will work with a famous doctor on a cure for leukemia.
Needless to say, Larry’s a bit surprised to find a stowaway in his trailer, and when he refuses to believe his unexpected guest is the famous Diane North, Diane gives up and tells Larry her name is Maggie Jones. No one will be surprised that as Larry and Diane/Maggie travel across the United States, they fall in love.
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Taylor’s men are robbing incoming supply wagons to enable Taylor to sell goods at inflated prices. The Vigilantes led by Frank Jackson are doing the same so the ranchers won’t starve. Marshals Lash and Fuzzy arrive to try and find the real culprits.
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In the summer of 1971, Philip Zimbardo, Craig Haney, and Curtis Banks carried out a psychological experiment to test a simple question. What happens when you put good people in an evil place-does humanity win over evil, or does evil triumph? To explore this question, college student volunteers were pretested and randomly assigned to play the role of prisoner or guard in a simulated prison at Stanford University. Although the students were mentally healthy and knew they were taking part in an experiment, some guards soon because sadistic and the prisoners showed signs of acute stress and depression. After only six days, the planned two-week study spun out of control and had to be ended to prevent further abuse of the prisoners. This dramatic demonstration of the power of social situations is relevant to many institutional settings, such as the Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq.
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Rich playboy Drogo Gaines is in imminent danger of marrying a gold digger, and escapes by feigning insanity. The joke’s on him when he wakes up in an asylum full of comical lunatics. There he befriends Colonel Carraway, and together they escape, catching a ride with a beautiful blonde who proves to be Penguin Moore, carnival owner. The adventures of Drogo and the Colonel with Moore’s Carnival are replete with Hal Roach slapstick.
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Donna (Del Rio) is a diva of the stage and wants her lover Rico (Alvarado) as her leading man. To keep this from happening, the producers (Churchill, Cavanaugh) grab Roger Kerry (Marshall) off the street and say he has a contract. Donna and Roger butt heads, he’s replaced by Rico, and Donna’s play flops. While her fame flops, Roger rises as a huge radio star. The two eventually fall in love, and Roger wants both of them to leave their careers behind.
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An artist married to a wealthy but ill woman begins an affair with one of his models, who is after him solely for his money. His wife discovers the affair and threatens to cut him out of her will. In order to be able to keep both the wife’s money and his girlfriend, he begins to secretly poison his wife – but events take a surprising turn after she eventually dies.
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