Sam Balter Movies

Regarded by many critics as the ultimate film noir, and by many more as the finest movie adaptation of a book by Mickey Spillane, Kiss Me Deadly stars Ralph Meeker as Spillane's anti-social private eye Mike Hammer. While driving down a lonely road late one evening, Hammer picks up a beautiful blonde hitchhiker (Cloris Leachman), dressed in nothing but a raincoat. At first, Hammer assumes that the incoherent girl is an escaped lunatic; his mind is changed for him when he and the girl are abducted by two thugs. The men torture the girl to death as the semiconscious Hammer watches helplessly. He himself escapes extermination when the murderers' car topples off a cliff and he is thrown clear. Seeking vengeance, Hammer tries to discover the secret behind the girl's murder. Among those who cross his path in the film's tense, tingling 105 minutes are a slimy gangster (Paul Stewart), a turncoat scientist (Albert Dekker), and the dead woman's sexy roommate (Gaby Rodgers). All clues lead to a mysterious box -- the "Great Whatsit," as Hammer's secretary Velda (Maxine Cooper) describes it. Both the box and Velda are stolen by the villains, at which point Hammer discovers that the "Whatsit" contains radioactive material of awesome powers. The apocalyptic climax is doubly devastating because we're never quite certain if Hammer survives (he doesn't narrate the story, as was the case in most Mike Hammer films and TV shows). Director Robert Aldrich and scriptwriter Jack Moffit transcend Kiss Me Deadly's basic genre trappings to produce a one-of-a-kind melodrama for the nuclear age. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Ex-mobster Larry McCoy (Billy Nelson) is looking to make a comeback, and finds the means to do so in the work of his eccentric scientist neighbor (terling Holloway), who has invented a super-computer (referred to here as a "thinking machine"). The device, referred to by its maker as "Mr. Kelso," is capable of running multiple operations at once, and McCoy puts it to work -- at first duping the gullible scientist and then taking over control -- planning a series of seemingly perfect bank hold-ups. The Metropolis police are stymied, and Clark Kent (George Reeves) decides it's time for Superman to take a hand. But the computer offers McCoy a way of preventing Superman's interference. And when Lois Lane (oel Neill) starts to investigate, she ends up a captive of McCoy. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

On a pure storytelling level, Crazy Over Horses is one of the best entries in Monogram's "Bowery Boys" series. This time, Slip (Leo Gorcey), Sach (Huntz Hall) and the gang come into possession of a race horse. Slip is convinced that the horse, which he'd picked up as payment for a debt owed to sweet-shop owner Louie (Bernard Gorcey) by stable owner Flynn (Tim Ryan), is a thoroughbred. For once, he's right: the nag had been left with Flynn by a group of gamblers who'll do anything to get her back, even unto switching horses on the boys. The film leads steadily and logically to an exciting racetrack climax, capped by a final confrontation with the crooks. Comic patsy Huntz Hall is curiously unpleasant and abrasive in Crazy Over Horses, though he reverts to his old bumbling self in an extended sequence wherein he disguises himself as a black stablehand (this scene is usually removed when the film is shown on television). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Forgotten Women is Monogram's cut-rate 65-minute spin on MGM's The Women. The film deals with four lovely ladies, each of whom is plagued with Man Trouble. Elyse Knox is on the verge of divorce, Veda Ann Borg has been separated from her husband for months, Theodora Lynch's hubby doesn't want her to pursue a singing career, and Noel Neill (yes, Superman's Noel Neill) is a lonely gal looking for an eligible guy. In real life, Elyse Knox was the wife of football star Tom Harmon and the mother of film star Mark Harmon. Approximately 65 minutes too long, Forgotten Women could just as well have been titled Forgotten Movie. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide