Dario Argento's INFERNO (1980) Poster Art

 

The Bloody Pit #229 - BLACK DRAGONS (1942)

David Annandale and I walk back down Poverty Row just after the attack on Pearl Harbor to watch one of the most confusing and strange attempts at wartime propaganda a low budget studio could produce. BLACK DRAGONS (1942) has Bela Lugosi as a mysterious, menacing man who seems to be on a mission of revenge. But what does he have to do with the corpses that keep popping up on the steps of the Japanese embassy in Washington? Will FBI agent Clayton Moore be able to figure things out or will he spend his time chasing Joan Barclay around her uncle/father’s house until all the characters are dead? And how does David find a way to link Christopher Nolan and Bela Lugosi? Listen and learn!

 

BLACK DRAGONS is probably the oddest of the nine films Lugosi made for Poverty Row film producers and certainly the one with the most unintentionally funny dialog. Just as it was about to go into production the decision was made to shoehorn in topical plot elements ripped from the headlines. This means that the original reason behind events in the script has been lost leaving bits of their probable supernatural nature flapping around in the film. This is the only explanation I can imagine for the never addressed ability of Lugosi’s Monsieur Colomb to seemingly teleport in and out of moving taxicabs! But David has an interesting take on the film as a bizarre treatise on the subject of ‘acting’ both onscreen and within the structure of the story. His idea is a bold way to look at the picture as a whole and certainly makes it more entertaining as you try to figure out what the hell is happening at any point in the film’s hourlong running time. Rarely has such a barely planned collection of quirks and gaffs been so mesmerizing!

 

If you have any comments about this movie or any other film we’ve covered on the show thebloodypit@gmail.com is the place to send them. Thank you for listening and we’ll be back soon. 

Video - BLACK DRAGONS (1942)

If you have never seen this mad Poverty Row horror-espionage-mystery film then here it is on YouTube! This bizarre movie is the subject of the next episode of The Bloody Pit with David Annandale and I trying to figure out not just what is happening, but what it might mean. Like a message beamed from a different universe BLACK DRAGONS has always seemed like a film reassembled from fragments left over after a fire. It isn't coherent but it is fascinating! 

THE GHOST GALLEON (1974) is coming to Blu-Ray!

Vinegar Syndrome has announced the Blu-Ray release of the third of Amando De Ossorio's Blind Dead films and I am thrilled!

Pre-Order here.

 

Wild, Wild Podcast - PHENOMENA (1985)

An ill wind is blowing in the Swiss Alps, and it's going to take the combined might of a psychic teenager, a Scotsman in a wheelchair and a chimpanzee called Inga to do something about it - if they can hear themselves think over Iron Maiden being played at full blast!

Rod and Adrian are tackling the maestro Dario Argento for the first time, but thankfully it's one of his more restrained efforts to make it easier. Donald Pleasence naturally gets plenty of air time, but also discussed is the continued ineptitude of the Italian/Swiss police, what to do with several million unwanted flies and why you would try to escape in a boat when there's a perfectly good road right there to run down.

It's a new season, dedicated to that great quiet man of British cinema, Donald Pleasence, who spent a great deal of time in the 1980s in Italy.

We would love to hear from you about your favorite Donald Pleasence films from this period, or if you have ever been attacked by a chimp - visible or otherwise.

You can get in touch with us, follow us on social media, buy our merch, and all that stuff, through our LINKTREE.

PHENOMENA (1985) Poster Art

Dream logic and razor-wielding chimps!

 

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