Ziva Rodann Movies

One year after his financially successful Promises Promises with Jayne Mansfield, director Tommy Noonan released another nudie comedy with Three Nuts in Search of a Bolt. This time, it is Mamie Van Doren who gets to show various parts of her anatomy as she plays a stripper who collaborates with two other "nuts" seeking psychiatric help. Her partners in the fiasco are a used car salesman Paul Gilbert who gets a thrill from cheating customers and a male model John Cronin who dislikes women. Unable to afford the doctor's fees, the three set out to find a proper patient to represent each of them for the price of one. After they convince the perfect sucker, (Noonan), to play out each of their personalities, Doctor Myra Von (Ziva Rodann) inadvertently televises the sessions to several other doctors--worldwide. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide

Before going into the furniture business full-time, actor George Montgomery produced and directed a number of lively Philippine-based actioners. In Samar, Montgomery plays a mercenary who is shipped off to a 19th-century Spanish penal colony. The man in charge of Samar, played by Gilbert Roland, is a kindly sort who operates his prison on democratic principles. Evil inspector Nico Minardos disapproves of Roland's humanitarian treatment of his prisoners, and orders that Samar be closed. Roland responds by destroying the camp, freeing the prisoners, and taking Minardos hostage. With Montgomery's help, Roland escapes into the jungle, seeking out a new, more remote location for his idealized prison without walls. Samar is more laudable for its good intentions than its uneven execution. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This parody of Genesis caused an uproar before and during its release (the final version was reworked and cut) though its routine or worse cinematic level would not encourage large audiences. The story begins with a busload of men and women with hang-ups in the romance department, all heading for Reno. A sudden rainstorm brings on flooding, and the passengers have to hole up in a church. That setting, apparently, suggests the skewed "dream" of Genesis that follows. The Catholic Legion of Decency gave this film a Condemned rating. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A low-budget, low-standard drama about voodoo and death in Brazil, Macumba Love is directed by Douglas Fowley (Doc Holliday in the Wyatt Earp TV series). A writer travels to the land of the samba in order to investigate its voodoo practitioners and several suspicious-looking murders that could be laid at their doorstep. As his investigations start hitting too close to their target, his own continued existence looks more and more problematical. Songs and some wild dancing, as well as Playboy centerfold June Wilkinson add spice to the otherwise uninspired tale. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this fantasy adventure, Jason and Orpheus leave Thessaly to quest for the magical Golden Fleece. Along the way they encounter an assortment of monsters, wizards and a conniving witch. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Mickey Rooney plays labor racketeer Little Joe Braun in this fast-paced and surprisingly violent drama about one man's determination to clean up his union. Bill Gibson (Steve Cochran) is Little Joe's nemesis and is one of the men who can testify that he saw the labor boss in an incriminating conversation with a known criminal -- something that Little Joe denied under oath. Knowing that Cochran and one other witness can bring him down, the crooked labor boss starts on a campaign of terror. One of Bill's friends is set on fire, someone else is thrown into a cement mixer (in the opening scenes), and finally, Little Joe kidnaps Bill's son Timmy (Jay North). The odds at this point, seem very much in the labor boss' favor. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Just outside the small town of Pauley, a Native American woman is attacked by two riders on horseback, raped, and killed. Her husband, Matt Morgan (Kirk Douglas), the town marshal, has only two clues to their identity, a fancy saddle with the initials "C.B." that one of the men left behind, and the fact that his wife cut one of the two men deep across the cheek with a buggy whip. Morgan traces the saddle to Craig Belden (Anthony Quinn), an old friend and now a wealthy rancher in the town of Gun Hill, but he knows Belden well enough to know that he couldn't have had anything to do with attacking his wife. Morgan's arrival with Belden's saddle sets off ugly rumblings in Gun Hill, and when he confronts the rancher, he discovers that it was his son Rick (Earl Holliman) who had his horse and the saddle, and rode out with a cowhand friend of his, Lee (Brian G. Hutton) -- but they claim their horses were stolen. Belden tries to convince Morgan, and wants to believe himself that whoever stole the horses must have killed his wife, but when Morgan mentions the cut that one of the killers will have on his face, they both know the truth. He vows to take Rick and Lee back to Pauley to stand trial, while Belden swears he'll do anything it takes to protect his son. Belden is virtually all the law there is in Gun Hill -- the sheriff (Walter Sande) won't help Morgan serve his arrest warrants on the two men, or even let him use the jail to hold them until the last train that night; there's not a working man, a shopkeeper, or even a prostitute in the whole town that will go against the rancher, and Belden's foreman Beero (Brad Dexter) and his men will strongarm anyone who might start feeling brave. Only Linda (Carolyn Jones), a woman who has been both romanced and abused by Belden, will lift a finger on Morgan's behalf. The marshal is nothing if not resourceful, however, and Rick Belden is also too stupid for his own good, and manages to fall into Morgan's hands in short order. Very quickly, a standoff ensues, with Morgan holding Rick in one of Belden's buildings against virtually the entire town, while the deadline -- the last train out of Gun Hill that night -- approaches. People die and a chunk of Belden's holdings are destroyed, but Morgan is about to get Rick onto the train and off to trial when suddenly, one sudden act of violence destroys father and son in a matter of seconds. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Future "Master of Disaster" Irwin Allen produced this curious but inarguably fascinating adaptation of Henrik Willem Van Loon's best- selling historical volume. A Celestial Tribunal has been convened to decide the fate of the Earth after the invention of nuclear weapons, with The Devil (Vincent Price) and The Spirit of Man (Ronald Colman) debating if humankind should be allowed to continue or be exterminated once and for all. Both men present examples of human behavior at its best and worst, including Dennis Hopper as Napoleon, Hedy Lamarr as Joan of Arc, Virginia Mayo as Cleopatra, Peter Lorre as Nero, Edward Everett Horton as Sir Walter Raleigh, and Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, and Chico Marx as, respectively, Peter Minuit, Sir Isaac Newton, and a monk (yes, the producers had the daring and vision to cast the Marx Brothers without having them play any scenes together). The Story of Mankind proved to be the last film for both Ronald Colman and Hedy Lamarr; it was also the last time the three Marx Brothers appeared in the same film, though the individual Marxes appeared in a few films following this. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Producer Howard W. Koch's impoverished Bel-Air company lensed this quasi-horror film somewhere in California's Death Valley. Affecting a none-too-convincing British accent Mark Dana stars as Captain Storm, heading a colonial escort to a lonely archeological dig in Egypt in 1902. Along the way, the party, which includes the American wife (Diane Brewster) of the chief archeologist (George N. Neise), encounters a mysterious girl, Simira (Ziva Shapir aka Ziva Rodann, "Miss Israel of 1957), who warns them not to mess with the dead. They do anyway, of course, drawing the ire of the Gods. One by one, the scientists are decimated by Simira's brother Numar (Alvaro Guillot), who is the reincarnation of the tomb keeper and grows older by the minute. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Shortly before signing on for TV's The Rifleman, Johnny Crawford played the juvenile lead in Courage of Black Beauty. Feeling alienated from his rancher father John Bryant,Crawford invests all his affections in his pet foal. Through his love for the horse--who of course grows up to become Black Beauty--Crawford learns to better appreciate his own lot in life. For a while, it looks as though the horse will be destroyed, but when this doesn't happen, Crawford draws even closer to his dad. No screen credit is afforded Anna Sewell, author of the original Black Beauty. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide