1932 - CHANDAU THE MAGICIAN, is 1930's escapism at it's most entertaining.

Chandau the Magician (Edmund Lowe) has graduated from yoga school where he has mastered the powers of hypnotism, teleportation and some other rather dubious mental abilities.  His first order of business is to stop the evil Roxor (Bela Lugosi).  Roxor has kidnapped a scientist in order to have him build a weapon that will destroy cities.  Chandau must also rescue the scientist's pretty daughter from a slave auction in addition to romancing Egyptian Princess Nadji.  It goes without saying for a film set in the Middle East, every actor in the cast is played by white people.

Chandau the Magician could almost be the grandfather of Indiana Jones.  There's lots of action combined with fantasy elements and plenty of narrow escapes.  In fact you could probably argue that this film is in many ways more entertaining than that series.  It's also has a short running time something these present day overstuffed adventure epics on the streaming services constantly plague the viewer with.  These films never seem to know when to wrap it up.

 

This film has the benefit of some impressive behind the camera talent. The legendary Chinese cameraman James Wong Howe was responsible for the photography. Howe was one of the best black and white stylists in film.  The director was the famous production designer and special effects expert William Cameron Menzies. The film has an interesting look to it and for a film made in 1932 the special effects are still impressive. 

If you are looking for a visually sophisticated looking film with an amusingly naive story line you should enjoy this.  The film is action packed and fast moving even by today's ADHD standards of film making.  The film was co-directed by Marcel Varnel.  William Cameron Menzies was a great filmmaker in a lot of areas but working with actors was not one of his strong points.

The film was written by Barry Conners and Philip Klein. The running time is 71 minutes.

1936 - THINGS TO COME, large scale 30's science fiction film

There hasn't been anything like this film.  Socialist writer H.G. Welles was given a lot of say in the making of this science fiction epic by the producer Alexander Korda.  Welles was primarily known for his science fiction stories, The Invisible Man, The First Men in the Moon, The War of the Worlds and The Island of Dr. Moreau.  In fact much to his irritation these were the books he was remembered for.  But Welles primary interest was in being a social critic and much of his science fiction ideas contained criticisms of contemporary British society something not always recognized by his readers.  

Producer Alexander Korda was interested in making a film out of an original story written by Welles.  Welles was lured into the film production with an unprecedented amount of control on the production, something that turned out to be to the determent of the film. Korda sparred no expense on Things To Come.  This was a large scale production with a top cast and for it's time state of the art special effects.  The film's story is about the world being lured into a large scale world war.  Only after the devastation of society does a new world order arise that aims to create a utopia for mankind.  

 

The film was directed by William Cameron Menzies who had made his name as a "production designer" on such films as Gone With The Wind.   Menzies was a great visual artist but was apparently fairly deficient when it came to working with actors.  Although Welles wrote the screenplay, it's kind of a lumpy thing.  The actors are not really characters anyone can identify with.  They are essentially mouthpieces for Welles outdated ideas about society and government.  Welles clearly thought the answer to mankind's problems was an embrace of futuristic technology.  Today we can see that this is rather a naive political view. 

Still this film is really something to see, the sets have a real 30's design to them by people who were trying to imagine what the future would look like.  The visual look is impressive even if the acting isn't so hot.  I suppose you could say the film is a magnificent science fiction folly of a film. but definitely worth watching.

The running time is 108 minutes.       

1953-THE MAZE a 3D movie in 2D on my TV set

Short, minor and not exciting 3D horror film.  If the film is to be remembered at all, it's mostly because it was directed by William Cameron Menzies.  Menzies was the man who the word "Production Designer" was invented for.  Starting out in silent films, William Cameron Menzies became responsible for the look of the film, he was an influence on almost every director and photographer he worked with.

 

 

David O Selznick recognized his genius early on and used him on a number of his pictures.  He gets a large credit on Gone With The Wind with the credit,  "Production Designed by."  Menzies was responsible for the overall unifying look of the film as well as directing the burning of Atlanta sequences.  Selznick went through so many directors, photographers and writers on Gone With The Wind that it was amazing he actually produced a film that made sense, much less  a film classic, a lot of the credit for this went to Menzies.

Towards the end of his career Menzies took a shot at directing a couple of cheap films for Allied Artists.  Invaders from Mars and The Maze. For working with some pretty small budgets Menzies got a lot of atmosphere and feeling into those films.  The Maze is about some strange stuff going on at a Scottish Castle, the fiance of the current Lord of the Castle, attempts to get to the bottom of it and the story climax takes place in a maze naturally.

 

 

Frankly the story is pretty stupid but it does allow Menzies to show his stuff, with people sneaking around creepy noirish stairways and halls which leads to an inevitable showdown with a scary monster lurking in the castle maze.  As for the 3D stuff, well I don't have 3D.

The final explanation of the monster is so entertainingly ridiculous it has a silly charm to it.  A strange minor piece of a brilliant filmmaker's career.

Written by Daniel Ullman, the running time is 80 minutes.