Kerwin Mathews Movies

This adventurous horror movie chronicles the exploits of a boy whose father is changed into a wolfman. The trouble begins after the newly separated father and his son are attacked by a werewolf on a camping trip. Once the wife figures out what happened, she divorces him. The boy tries to explain it to the authorities, but they disbelieve him at first. Eventually they do believe, and the werewolf is finally slain. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In the conclusion of a two-part story (originally telecast as a single two-hour episode), Ironside (Raymond Burr) works in concert with attorney Ken Klaven (Cameron Mitchell) to secure the release of Walter Booth (William Campbell), whom the Chief had sent to prison on a manslaughter charge seven years before. Though now convinced of Booth's innocence, Ironside encounters a great deal of trouble persuading the DA's office. The Chief's only hope is to force a young woman to come forward with testimony she'd withheld during the original trial--but there are mysterious forces who are determined to silence both Ironside and his witness for keeps! Prominent in the supporting cast is Geraldine Brooks, who had played the sniper responsible for the Chief's confinement to a wheelchair in the original 1967 Ironside pilot film. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This 1971 TV movie remake of the 1934 film of the same name (see the above synopsis) adds little to the original story about Death assuming human form to discover why mankind fears him. In updating the story, the scenarists removed much of the "nobility" of the principal characters--and also a lot of their charm. Melvyn Douglas and Myrna Loy are superb in roles played in 1934 by Sir Guy Standing and Helen Westley, while Monte Markham is okay but nothing more in the old Fredric March role as "Death". Yvette Mimieux is utterly forgettable as the enigmatic Grazia; her wisecracking American friend (originally Gail Patrick) is played by Maureen Reagan, a few years before the daughter of Ronald Reagan and Jane Wyman (rather wisely) abandoned acting. Whatever appeal Death Takes a Holiday had in 1934 utterly withers and expires in this halfhearted remake. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Lee Van Cleef plays a fiercely independent river ferryman in the Old West. Bandit Warren Oates, fresh from decimating a local town, rides up with his gang and demands that Van Cleef transport the crooks and their booty across the river. He refuses, and is taken prisoner. Biding his time, Van Cleef is able to turn the tables on the vicious gang. Heavily influenced by the ultraviolent "spaghetti western" school, Barquero attempts to add a contemporary note to the proceedings by having Warren Oates take an hallucinatory "trip" after smoking an unidentified weed. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Whatever happened to Kerwin Mathews, the Wisconsin-born star of Ray Harryhausen's Seventh Voyage of Sinbad? Inexpensive espionage mellers like The Killer Likes Candy, that's what. Mathews plays a CIA agent, assigned to protect a foreign potentate. Keep both eyes peeled for an assassin with a sweet tooth. Outside of no budget and galloping anachronisms, The Killer Likes Candy is an okay time filler. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this Italian mystery-adventure, a government agent is assigned to look into a mysterious outbreak of a deadly virus in Southeast Asia. While attending a party, he meets an enemy agent and his pretty sister. Later the enemy captures the agent and his own sister who has fallen for the American. Soon the Yankee operative discovers that the evil agent is planning the genocide of all races he deems inferior. In their place, he is trying to engineer a race of superhumans. Fortunately, the American and the sister escape. He eventually finds the lab where the virus is cultivated and is again captured. This time, the sister and her friend save him and set the lab afire. The woman's friend is killed. Later her brother accidently falls into a pit filled with infected rats. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Nathan Juran, director of The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, tries to make the magic happen again on a much more attenuated budget in Jack the Giant Killer. Torin Thatcher, another Sinbad alumnus, plays a wicked wizard who kidnaps toothsome-princess Judi Meredith. Kerwin Mathews, still another veteran of Sinbad, plays Jack, who rescues Meredith and promises to escort her to safety. Stop-motion animator Jim Danforth creates several fire-breathing perils along the same lines as Ray Harryhausen's special effects in Sinbad; happily, Danforth emulates the Harryhausen style without stooping to imitation. Prominent among the supporting actors is Don Beddoe as an impish genie. In the recently reissued prints of Jack the Giant Killer, most of the original voices have been dubbed over, and incongruous musical numbers added. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Spencer Tracy plays an American priest tending to the natives of a South Sea island. A plane carrying three convicts -- Harry (Frank Sinatra), Marcel Gregoire Aslan and Charlie Bernie Hamilton) -- lands on the island; Father Doonan (Tracy) manages to enlist their (reluctant) aid in working at a children's hospital. When the island falls victim to a series of earthquakes, Father Doonan and the convicts work together to evacuate the hospital staff and the children. Harry, the least cooperative of the prisoners, becomes a hero during a volcanic eruption by going back to rescue the priest, who with convict Charlie has been holding a bridge in order to allow the others to escape. Father Doonan and the two convicts are killed, but all the children are rescued. Blighted by bad special effects and ponderous direction, Devil at Four O'Clock is less interesting than the behind-the-scenes rumors concerning the friction between Spencer Tracy and Frank Sinatra. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Top-heavy with wild action scenes and female pulchritude, this routine Italian costume adventure is set in the 7th century B.C. on the island of Lesbos, where the immortal poetess Sappho (Tina Louise) is leading a revolt against the corrupt government of Mytilene. Aiding her in overthrowing the yoke of tyranny is the handsome Phaon (Kerwin Mathews). For some reason it is the temple of Aphrodite that is the focus of attention in this supposed battle for the rights of the ordinary people, and not the temple of Mars. Sappho's sexual orientation is a moot point. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Whilst Sinbad (Kerwin Mathews) is on his way to Baghdad, transporting the Princess Parisa (Kathryn Grant), who is to become his bride and secure peace between her kingdom and his, the ship encounters the isle of Colossa. Sinbad and his men are attacked by a gigantic, bestial one-eyed Cyclops, and are saved only when the mysterious magician Sokurah (Torin Thatcher) appears and uses a magic lamp to protect Sinbad's men. But in the process of escaping harm, Sokurah loses the lamp to the Cyclops. He desperately wants to retrieve it and tries to persuade Sinbad to put about and return to Colossa -- but the captain won't jeopardize the safety of the princess or the success of his mission, and the Caliph of Baghdad (Alec Mango) feels the same way, even after Sokurah amazes the court by conjuring up a snake-woman. It is only when the princess is shrunk by an evil spell, the breaking of which requires the shell from the egg of the giant Roc -- which resides on Colossa -- that Sokurah can get his expedition mounted, with Sinbad in command. With a crew made up of a handful of his bravest men and some of the most desperate convicts in the Caliph's prison, he has to contend with potential mutiny at every turn, and the men are driven almost to madness before they even reach Colossa. Once there, they find terrors as great as the Cyclops and the treachery of the magician, but Parisa -- in her tiny state -- also discovers the beautiful world inside the lamp, and the lonely boy genie (Richard Eyer) who inhabits it. They strike the bargain that, when Sinbad's bravery is added to the equation, will bring their quest to an end. If, that is, they can all survive the dangers that Sokurah puts in their path. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi