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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 15, 1987)
Blob, monsters, Dracula this week The Glassy Eye By Dave Meile Friday, 8 p.m. Ch. 17: “Of Unknown Origin” (1983) Actors of unknown origin, a giant rat. A yuppie guy and his wife (a former Playboy playmate) arejiar assed by a giant rat. It’s in the woodwork! It’s inside Junior’s birthday cake. Ooh, that’s scary. Shades of Willard. Friday, midnight. KMTV, ch.3: “The Night Stalker” (1974) TV series Remember “The Night Stalker?” A great made-for-TV movie with Darrin McGavin as Carl Kolchak, a wiseacre reporter who stumbles upon Janos Skorzeny, a 200-year-old vampire living in Las Vegas. The follow up, a ’73 TV movie entitled “The Night Strangler,” was less success ful and featured a Jaek-the-Ripper killer living in the smelly under ground of Seattle. In 1974, ABC decided to try a series. Each week Kolchak (aided by some decent scripts by renowned sci-fi/horror writer Richard Mathcson) tracks down mummies, zombies, mud monsters, naked mannequins and vampires. There was just one ma jor problem. Sooner or later, say after about 20 weeks, you run out of monsters to chase. # A great idea just hit me. For the f second season they could’ve rc I named it “The Nightclub Stalker.” Kolchak could haunt old bars and clubs tracking down hideous night clubcomics. Think of the possibili ties! Tonight, Kolchak battles with Larry Storch! At the Aku-Tiki lounge, Kolchak locks horns with Shecky Greene, still doing the same jokes from 15 years ago. Other enemies could include Ron nie Schell, Slappy White, Rip Taylor, Joey Bishop and Art Mctrano. in the scries, cbviously nobody was paying attention because Kol chak went through a series of jobs at every major newspaper in the country, and the series bit the dust after one season. “The Night Stalker” remains a scary, if some what far-fetched, little scries. Friday, 11:30 p.m. WGN, ch. 2: "The Blob” (1958) Steve McQueen, Aneta Corseaut. Despite the fact that this isn’t really great sci-fi, it remains a well known late-night favorite. You know the story. Steve McQueen (still wet behind the ears) and Helen Crump from “Andy Grif fith” help fight off a hideous, rustic Courtesy of Universal Pictures The original movie poster for “House of Dracula." munching blob from outer space. The blob slithers into the town movie house and inhales a projec tionist. Local kids arc watching “Daughter of Horror,” an incred ible 1955 noir-type horror film with no dialogue except for the narration by Ed McMahon! Groove to awesome theme song “Beware of the Blob,” written by schlockster Burt Bacharach and performed by The Five Blobs. Next stop for Steve McQueen: a double-barreled shotgun/pistol totin’ bounty hunter on the “Wanted Dead or Alive” TV se ries. Friday, midnight and 4 a.m. Ch. 17: "Black Dragons" (1942) Bela Lugosi, Clayton "Lone Ranger" Moore. I don’t admit this to just any body, but it look me about four viewings to figure out exactly what happens in this film. In this Mono gram Studios cheapic (for which Lugosi was reportedly paid only S500anick) Bela is an insane Nazi plastic surgeon who turns Japanese guys into American businessmen. Featuring the Lone Ranger sans mask, the same music used in 8 million other monogram films and an award to I. Stanford Jolley for the worst Japanese dialect in a cheap horror film. Sixty-five min utes of pure bliss. A prerequisite for your “history of scary guys in film” course. Saturday, 9:30 a.m. Ch. 2: "Charlie Chan ' in Egypt” (1935) Warner Oland. Pat Pater son. Oland is considered about the best interpreter of the Chan charac - ter. Look for Rita Hayworth (still using her real name, Rita Cansino) as Nayda. It was only her third film role. Saturday, 4:45 a.m. WOWT, ch. 6: "House of Dracuta’ (1945) Lon Chaney Jr., John Carrctdine. Within minutes of each other, Count Dracula and lycanthrope Larry Talbot arrive at the castle of Dr. Edclmann seeking cures for their afflictions. Edclmann is as sisted by his nurse with a heart of gold and a pillow' stuffed down the back of her smock. The Franken stein monster (Sam the bartender from “Gunsmoke”) is found in a cave. Great screen villain and pom enthusiast Lionel Atwill is the police inspector. The oily-skinned villager with the beady eyes and Cockney accent is the one and only Skelton Knaggs, once one of sev eral people billed as “the ugliest man in pictures.” Other Knaggs credits include “Dick Tracy meets Gruesome,”“Bedlam” and “Ghost Ship.” “House of Dracula” boasts the usual great Universal Studios pro duction with great sets, haunting music and fine performances throughout. Erie C. Kentons* di rection is imaginative, and the script actually tries to explain the creatures in honest-to-goodness scientific terms. Dr. Edelmann even gets wacky when he scores a contaminated blood transfusion from the count The Frankenstein monster is wasted and lies around for the duration only to pummel stray vil lagers at the fiery finale. Not quite as good as its counterpart, “House of Frankenstein,” hut essential viewing nonetheless. Stoke up that VCR; Uicse movies will not be on TV forever y’know. Next Week Dept.: Wednesday, 1:30 a.m. Ch. 4: "The Explosive Generation" (1961) Captain Kirk, The Bad Seed. Long before “Star. Trek” and “T.J. Hairpiece,” Bill Shatner worked his way up doing low budget films (like Corman's anti racist “The Intruder”) and TV shows like “Twilight Zone” and “Outer Limits.” Here, the big guy is a hip teacher who tries to teach our kids about sex! The parents get all bent out of shape, the kids pro test, and there's a basketball game(?). With Patty McCormack, the bad little girl in “The Bad Seed,” and Billy Gray (Bud on “Father Knows Best’O, who be came persona non grata in Holly wood after a pot bust and a problem with heroin.