Ed Nelson Movies
Muscular leading man Ed Nelson started out as a member of quickie-filmmaker Roger Corman's stock company, appearing in such drive-in fodder as Hot Rod Girl (1956), Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957) and Cry Baby Killer. In these and other low-budgeters of the late 1950s, Nelson not only starred, but doubled on the technical crew: he was one of several production assistants portraying the title crustacean in The Attack of the Crab Monsters (1956), and designed and operated the parasite props in 1958's The Brain Eaters, which he also produced. Eventually outgrowing such things, Nelson rose to TV stardom as Dr. Michael Rossi on the prime time soap opera Peyton Place, which ran from 1964 through 1969. He later starred as Ward Fuller on The Silent Force (1970) and as Dr. Michael Wise in Doctor's Private Lives (1979). In 1969, Nelson hosted a daily, syndicated talk show, which he was ultimately forced to give up when he decided to enter politics ("conflict of interests" and "equal time" were still considerations back then). Ed Nelson has continued accepting supporting film and TV roles to the present time; he recently harked back to his short career in public service when he played President Truman in the 1992 Brooke Shields flick Brenda Starr. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1950
As an actor, Eddy Arnold was a good country-western singer. In Hoedown, Eddy plays himself, while the acting burden was carried by Miss Jeff Donnell, Jock O'Mahoney (aka Jock Mahoney), and Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. O'Mahoney plays Stoney Rhodes, a cowboy star who is fired from his studio because he can't sing. Accompanied by Vera Wright (Donnell), Rhodes heads southward, where he attends a hoedown staged by Arnold and his C&W confreres. When bank robbers invade the party, Rhodes finds that he's not much help without his stuntmen to back him up. Eventually, however, he proves that he's a genuine hero, thereby assuring himself a renewed movie contract, not to mention the undying adoration of Wright. Among the musical guest stars featured in Hoedown are Carolina Cotton, The Pied Pipers and the Oklahoma Rangers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddy Arnold, Jeff Donnell, (more)
- 1955
Hot on the heels of Warner Bros.' New York Confidential came Columbia's New Orleans Uncensored. Lensed in semi-documentary fashion by future horror maven William Castle, the film stars Arthur Franz as New Orleans dockworker Dan Corbett. Attempting to remain honest, Corbett runs afoul of crime kingpin Zero Saxon (Michael Ansara), who controls the dockworkers union and runs a smuggling operation on the side. When his best friend is killed by Saxon's goons, Corbett agrees to cooperate with the authorities in bringing the racketeer to justice. As a means of "balancing" the picture, several real-life New Orleans civic leaders and union heads--all with purportedly clean records--appear as themselves. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Arthur Franz, Beverly Garland, (more)
Swamp Diamonds is the family-trade title for the sweaty Roger Corman crime melodrama Swamp Women. Policewoman Carole Mathews dons her torpedo bra and tight jeans to infiltrate a dangerous all-female criminal gang, currently serving time in a Louisiana Prison. The ladies escape and head to the swamp, where they've hidden a fortune in diamonds. Along the way, they kidnap geologist Touch Connors (later known as Mike Connors). For a while, it looks as though the girls will get away with their perfidy and Connors will end up as alligator bait, but Mathews saves the day. The supporting cast of Swamp Diamonds is a roll-call of 1950s "tough broads": Marie Windsor, Beverly Garland, Susan Cummings, Jil Jarmyn. Watch for Jonathan Haze, future star of Little Shop of Horrors, and Ed Nelson, future talk-show host and politician, in minor roles. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marie Windsor, Carole Mathews, (more)
- 1957
Invasion of the Saucer Men can't make up its mind whether it wants to be a comedy, a j.d. melodrama or a horror outing. When a spaceship lands in the woods, Johnny (Steve Terrell) and Joan (Gloria Castillo) accidentally run over one of the aliens. In retaliation, the saucer-men kill Joe (Frank Gorshin), an opportunistic boozehound who stumbles across the body. Meanwhile, the hand of the extraterrestrial corpse detaches itself from its body and wreaks havoc on the countryside. But the aliens are foiled when it is discovered that they cannot withstand the glare of automobile headlights! The Saucer Men costumes were designed by Paul Blaisdell, who was certainly capable of better work. Lyn Osborn, the former Cadet Happy on TV's Space Patrol, makes his final screen appearance as Frank Gorshin's drinking buddy. Originally released on a double bill with I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Invasion of the Saucer Creatures was cheaply remade for television as The Eye Creatures (1966). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Steve Terrell, Gloria Castillo, (more)
- 1957
Its title notwithstanding, Roger Corman's Rock All Night is a tense little hostage melodrama. Corman regular Dick Miller stars as Shorty, a much-maligned hanger-on at the Cloud Nine tavern. Shorty's hotheaded pugnaciousness comes in handy when a pair of gunmen (played by Russell Johnson--yes, "The Professor" on Gilligan's Island! -- and Jonathan Haze) invade the Cloud Nine and terrorize the patrons. Mel Welles, who later played the kvetching flower-store proprietor in Little Shop of Horrors, is a riot as a hip-talking showbiz agent. Also on hand is Abby Dalton, the soon-to-be star of Corman's Viking Women and the Sea Serpent. The film's very brief musical interludes are provided by the Platters and the Blockbusters. Rock All Night was originally released on a double bill with Dragstrip Girl. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Abby Dalton
- 1957
Journalist Helmut Dantine, having spent eight years as a convict on Devil's Island, devotes his energies to exposing the horrible conditions at the notorious penal colony. The governor of French Guinea is sympathetic but helpless, since the Devil's Island overseer (William Talman) has technically committed no crime. Investigating the situation, Dantine learns that Talman is the mastermind of a gold-smuggling operation run by the owners of a nearby plantation. The reporter catches Talman in the act, breaks up the operation, and claims the governor's daughter (Donna Martell) for the fadeout clinch. Hell on Devil's Island is one of a group of inexpensive second features produced by 20th Century-Fox's Regal Films division in the late 1950s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Helmut Dantine, William Talman, (more)
- 1957
The calculatedly sleazy Bayou stars Lita Milan as Marie, the daughter of slovenly Cajun fisherman Herbert (Douglas Fowley). Marie falls in love with Northern architect Martin (Peter Graves), which rests not at all well with her ardent--and psychotic--local suitor Ulysses (Tim Carey at his most loathsome). Martin is afraid to fight the brutish Ulysses, but for Marie's sake he summons up the courage for a violent climactic set-to. Sharp-eyed viewers will notice that, in addition to his role as the heroine's father, Douglas Fowley doubles in a bit as the hero's contractor friend. A model of decorum by today's standards, Bayou nevertheless enjoyed a healthy second life on the exploitaiton circuit under the title Poor White Trash. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Graves, Lita Milan, (more)
A group of scientists arrive on a remote Pacific island to investigate what became of the previous team, which was sent out there as observers of American hydrogen bomb tests and disappeared without a trace. They island is uninhabited and devoid even of most animal life, except for a few land crabs. The group's arrival is marred by the death of one of the navy crewmen accompanying them, who falls into the ocean and comes up with his head taken off. Then the navy plane that carried them there is blown out of the sky before it can get airborne, leaving them stranded and unaccounted for. Led by Dale Drewer (Richard Garland) and Dr. Karl Weigand (Leslie E. Bradley), they find the journal of the previous team, but no explanation of what happened to them, only that they'd noticed evidence of strange creatures and inexplicable physical phenomena on the island. Soon the scientists are hearing the voices of members of the previous scientific party, calling to them in the night. Their own radio is sabotaged and something has been probing the area where they're living; finally, the group is lured into the caverns where the real menace is hiding -- gigantic, bloodthirsty mutated land crabs that communicate telepathically and seem to have all of the knowledge of the previous team's members. One by one, all but three of the members -- Brewer, electrical engineer Hank Chapman (Russell Johnson), and scientist Martha Hunter (Pamela Duncan) -- are killed off and their minds and memories absorbed by the mutant crabs, who also have the power to focus infrared radiation into deadly, destructive beams that they use to gradually pulverize large sections of the island. By the end, a single giant crab has run the trio to ground on a remaining parcel of land just a few dozen yards across. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Garland, Pamela Duncan, (more)
- 1957
Producer-director Roger Corman serves up another thinly plotted musicfest in Carnival Rock. Corman regular Susan Cabot stars as Natalie, a singer for an oceanside carnival. Smitten by Natalie, high-stakes gambler Stanley (Brian Hutton) wins the carnival in a poker game so that he can be near the girl. Christy (David J. Stewart), the carnival's ex-owner, is likewise in love with the girl, so he stays on as a baggy-pants burleycue comic. As in most films of this nature, the plot can be blissfully ignored in favor of the musical highlights, which in this case are performed by the likes of The Platters, David Houston, Bob Luman, The Shadows and The Blockbusters. And what would a Roger Corman flick be without Dick Miller in a supporting role? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Susan Cabot, Brian G. Hutton, (more)
The Teenage Doll in this Roger Corman-directed "J. D." opus is a little number named Barbara (June Kenney). Basically a good girl, she falls into bad company when she impulsively decides to rebel against her parents. It isn't long before Barbara accidentally kills her tough-babe romantic rival (Barboura Morris), whereupon she is pursued all over town by femme gang leader Hel (Fay Spain) and her henchgirls (Barbara Wilson, Ziva Rodann). Barbara runs to her punk boy friend Eddie (John Brinkley) for protection, setting the stage for a climactic rumble. And remembers, kids: This could happen to you, so keep your record clean and stay home nights! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- June Kenney, Fay Spain, (more)
The familiar rocks and rills of LA's Bronson Caverns are seen to good advantage in Night of the Blood Beast. The story begins when a manned space rocket develops trouble and plummets back to earth, apparently killing its occupant, Major John Corcoran (Michael Emmet). Unfortunately, Corcoran's body has become a breeding ground of extraterrestrial embryos, picked up while the rocket was in outer space. The tiny monsters grow and multiply, and before long Corcoran revives from the dead, literally impregnated by the alien beasts. After this promising and decidedly unorthodox buildup, the film goes downhill, settling for standard eek-eek shocks and a most unconvincing "blood beast", whose costume wouldn't have even passed muster at a Halloween party. Still, Night of the Blood Beast is at least half of a good, well-constructed horror flick. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Emmet, Angela Greene, (more)
In this occult obscurity, an old hillbilly named Pete Jensen (Ed Nelson) makes a pact with the Devil and returns to the town of Furnace Flats, NM, as a much younger man. Claiming to be his own nephew, Nick Richards, he romances pretty Nell Lucas (Jean Allison). Her fiancée David (Richard Crane) is mauled by his own dog, leaving him scarred and bitter. Doc Lucas (Edgar Buchanan) and Sheriff Fuller (Spencer Carlisle) figure it out and shoot Richards down after he turns into a snake and a horse. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- 1958
In this adventurous yarn, a group of former Army buddies have a reunion in New Orleans and decide to go looking for buried treasure. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1958
This odd drama features Jack Nicholson, then only 21-years old, in his first feature film. He plays a young delinquent who thinks he may have killed one of the two thugs who were pursuing him. He hides out in a local drive-in where he takes three hostages and barricades himself and them in a storeroom. Police surround the place and try to negotiate with the frightened boy but even his friends cannot reach him. Meanwhile, the media has learned of the situation and soon a TV news crew arrives followed by a crowd of spectators. Soon concessions are being sold, and the event becomes a circus. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Harry Lauter, Jack Nicholson, (more)
- 1958
When a mysterious cone, 50-feet tall by 50-feet across at its base, is discovered sticking out of the ground near the town or Riverdale, IL, a group of investigators from Washington, D.C., are sent in to determine its origins. They discover that various townspeople have been murdered, while others, including the mayor, have disappeared; and when they reappear, they're under some form of outside control. The interior of the cone seems to violate every known law of physics and, from somewhere inside, there emerges a horde of hideous, insect-like creatures that attach themselves to human bodies for purposes of taking control. The team soon finds itself overwhelmed by thane increasing number of humans under alien control, and not even close to finding out what these creatures want or why they're here. The Brain Eaters was adapted without permission -- or the knowledge of distributor American International Pictures -- from Robert A. Heinlein's novel The Puppet Masters, and the makers were later forced to pay a settlement. The movie vanished from theaters but found a second life on television during the 1960s. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ed Nelson, Alan Frost, (more)
- 1958
In this violent drama, a young juvenile delinquent gets into more trouble when he gets involved with a gang that steals auto parts and resells them on the black market to pay for their beer parties. It looks as if he might actually turn his life around after he meets a good-hearted woman, when he decides to run a final game of chicken against a juvenile delinquent girl who gets killed in the ensuing crash. The terrified boy then takes his girlfriend and splits. He is later shot-down by the police. Later the authorities learn that the boy was set upon his crooked path by policemen who beat him when he was younger. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Bakalyan, June Kenney, (more)
A fine example -- perhaps the best available -- of "B"-movie overlord Roger Corman's "Weekend Wonders" from the producer/director's early career (see also the original Little Shop of Horrors), this horror-comedy was also the first of beloved actor Dick Miller's dozen-odd portrayals of the character Walter Paisley. A geeky waiter and busboy at a happening Beatnik café, Walter is intensely jealous of the swinging social lives of the artistic types who hang there. A bizarre twist of fate changes everything; when Paisley accidentally kills his landlady's cat, his frantic attempts to hide the body lead him to encase it in a layer of clay, creating a morbid sculpture -- which is eventually discovered and hailed as an artistic triumph by the unwitting Bohemian art crowd. (When asked what he's named the piece, the befuddled Walter stammers, "Uhh... Dead Cat?") Beset by numerous requests for similar "truthful" works, the moronic Paisley is forced to find inspiration -- a matter which is readily solved when a nosy undercover cop tries to slap a heroin-possession charge on him and finds himself on the business end of a cast-iron skillet. Before long, the creative urge prods Walter to narrow the competition by whacking his peers with various blunt or sharp implements, and the demand for more sculptures just keeps growing. Miller's tour-de-force performance, writer Charles B. Griffith's hilarious "Daddy-O" dialogue, and Corman's emphasis on the story's more lurid aspects raise this bargain-basement production (ultra-cheap even by Corman's standards) to classic status. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dick Miller, Barboura Morris, (more)
In this crime drama, a courageous high-schooler goes undercover and joins a teen-age gang so he can get revenge upon his father. When his cover is blown, his life is endangered. Fortunately, the second-in-command has a change of heart and tries to help the young man. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1959
The aristocratic Deverall family engages the services of Paladin (Richard Boone) to save the life of wealthy, arrogant young Pierre Deverall (Ed Nelson). Although he has been accused of murder and sentenced to hang, Deverall is smugly certain that his "good name" will prevent his execution. But Paladin doubts this, especially considering Deverall's very close association with a notorious outlaw (or group of outlaws) known as The Black Handkerchief. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1959
Benjamin Coey (Mort Mills) insists that he is innocent of the murder of a man named Bryson, but the fact that he has molested Bryson's wife (Barbara Hayden) and killed two members of the posse sent to find him does not help his credibility. Nonetheless, Paladin (Richard Boone) agrees to protect Coey long enough to stand trial--placing himself in the line of fire from Mrs. Bryson's vengeful brothers. This is the first of several Have Gun--Will Travel episodes directed by Ida Lupino. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1959
Thanks to the false testimony of freight owner Will Stanhope (Lewis Martin), Ed Stacy (Ed Nelson) was wrongly sent to prison. Now that Stacy has been paroled, Stanhope hires Paladin (Richard Boone), ostensibly to protect him from the ex-convict's wrath. But since Stanhope had previously hired Paladin to help him imprison Stacy the first time around, the erudite gunslinger suspects that it is not Stanhope whose life is truly in peril. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1959
In this conventional drama about a killer on the loose, the usual psychological interplay of a disturbed mind and the killer's potential victims is emphasized. Jamie (Steven Marlo) is running away from a murder he just committed, apparently unable to control his homicidal urges once they arise. Ann and Benjie (Luana Patten and Tom Selden) are the young couple who pick up Jamie while they themselves are running away from the police. Their reasons are hardly criminal, they believe the police will try to stop them from getting married. As the association with Jamie continues, the young couple begin to suspect he might be even more dangerous than the police they are trying to evade. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Steven Marlo, Luana Patten, (more)
- 1959
In another of scriptwriter Marion Hargrove's "westernizations" of classic literary material, this episode is based on 18th century British playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan's drawing-room comedy "The Rivals". In the original 1775 play, two young men, Jack Absolute and Ensign Beverly, exchange identities so that the wealthier Jack can win the heart of heroine Lydia Languish, who would otherwise reject him because of his wealth. In the Maverick version, Bret Maverick (James Garner is the "Beverly" counterpart, trading places with British playboy Jack Vandergelt (played by future Maverick costar Roger Moore), who pines for the beautiful Lydia Linley (Pat Crowley). The supporting cast includes Neil Hamilton (Batman's "Commissioner Gordon") as Jack's irascible father, who shows up at precisely the wrong time; Barbara Jo Allen (aka "Vera Vague" of radio fame) as language-mangling Mrs. Mallaver, the Maverick equivalent of the original play's imperishable Mrs. Malaprop; and Dan Tobin as Mrs. Mallaver's would-be suitor Lucius Benson ("Lucius O'Trigger" in the Sheridan play). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1960
In this crime drama, the FBI seeks a novelist, and former gangster, living in Mexico. They need him to testify in front of a Senate committee. He is also hunted by hit men, sent out by gangsters angered by the name-dropping the author does in his books. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1960
Weakly etched characters are one of the problems in this simple story of three thieves on the run. Wayne (John Hudson), Jan (Lyn Bernay), and Dino (Ed Nelson) try pulling off a heist of a lumber company's payroll, and everything seems to go wrong right from the beginning, in spite of Dino's expertise. The trio take off for the woods in Canada with Wayne suffering from a wound and the law in hot pursuit. To complicate matters slightly there is a romantic tie-up with Jan, someone too tough and efficient to be easily won over. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Hudson, Lynn Bernay, (more)
