The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies
Year:1963
Starring:Cash Flagg, Atlas King, Brett O'Hara, Sharon Walsh, Erina Enyo, Jack Brady, Introducing Carolyn Brandt, and Bill Ward as Himself!
Tagline#1 Look! Then Run for your life!
Tagline#2:See the Hunchback of the midway fight a duel of death with the Mixed-Up Zombie!
Tagline#3:SEE! The dancing girls murdered by the incredible night monsters of the midway!
Producer/Director: Ray Dennis Steckler
Distributed by: Media Blasters
Movie Critique:*****Incredibly Stange, Mixed-Up Bits of Trivia-Cash Flagg, the star, is actually Ray Dennis Steckler
-Carolyn Brandt was married to Steckler at the time
-Atlas King, Steckler's roommate in the film, did not know how to speak english and had to learn his lines phoenetically
-The cinematographers of this film are none other than Vilmos Szigmond, Laszo Kovacks and Joseph V. Mascelli! Zigmond said this was his big break, because it allowed him to get his first Union card
-Steckler had to change the title of his film
The Incredibly Strange Creatures OR:How I became a Mixed-up Zombie to the title you see because Stanley Kubrick who had made
Dr. Strangelove OR: How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Bomb, was threatening to sue him for 5 million bucks. And, BAM! Film history is made.
Review: A man is sitting in a dark, small room in a gypsy fortune-telling tent. The gypsy makes a pass at him, and he rejects her, pushing her to a wall to telling her, "try some of the sideshow freaks. She is angered, and calls her ugly, disfigured henchman to "make him like the other little pets." The man screams as the brutal, monstrous inhuman thing lunges at him, but it is too late. He wrestles the drunk to the floor, and the Fortuneteller pulls out a bottle of poison The drunk watches in horror as the gypsy opens the bottle, and douses the drunk's face in the burning liquid, obscuring his vision as he screams in burning agony. You can tell this is a Steckler movie, because already, we have no idea what the hell's going on here.
This is a very interesting film. It is about a lazy slacker named Jerry (Flagg) his bobby-soxer girlfriend Angie(Walsh) and his greek roommate Harold(King) who go to the carnival midway to have fun (really, I never would've guessed that these 3 types would go to a carnival, of all places) but Jerry becomes entranced by a tenth-rate Gypsy stripper named Carmelita (Enyo) who he thinks has the hots for him, but she is only the bait for a gypsy, Susan Hayward look-alike with a big wart on her cheek and ugly henchman Ortega assissting, who throws acid in people's faces and locks them in her back room (God knows why)! She then hypnotizes him with the "Hypno-Wheel" (they must've spent 50 cents on the special effects for the hypno wheel) so she can command him to do her evil bidding. In the midst of all of this, there are incredibly strange...Las Vegas...production numbers that are not very well choreographed. Well, needless to say, sooner or later, the zombies (there are only about four of them) escape and start a bloodthirsty, short-lived rampage. Unlike in Night of the Living Dead, however, the cavalry does get here in time. (Actually, a little too soon) Thank god that there were only 3 casualties!
The Villain(s)
rofl
Madame Estrella, Ortega, and Carmelita
The villains in this movie just kill me. All of them are gypsies, and yet, they all have mexican names. Gypsies are supposed to be from eastern Europe!Apparently, according to Joe Bob Briggs, they're all "Mexican Gypsies!"
Madame Estrella Madame Estrella is an evil, maniacal gypsy fortuneteller who throws acid in your face and locks you in her back room if you make her mad. She owns what they call "The Hypno Wheel," which is a paper pinwheel on a stick. Hey, it must work,though, because it takes someone 3 seconds to be in its power. Another thing she can do is that she can unintentionally make you laugh at otherwise completely unfunny lines like "You Shouldn't Have Done That!" and, "You Dirty, Filthy Pig!"
Distinguishing Features: Estrella bears the "The Wart of Horror," a hairy mole on her right cheek, just for atmosphere. She also has a voice that sounds like nails on a chalkboard.
Ortega An ugly, cigarette-smoking goof wearing suggestive hobo clothing who assists Madame Estrella by wrestling the victim to the floor while she splashes the victim with acid. He doesn't really do much else save idiotically letting the zombies out and getting his careless a** killed by one. I'll give him this, though: He is the coolest-looking cheap henchman I've seen. He's even cooler than Torgo in Manos Hands of Fate! (believe me, he's much cooler than a guy with abnormally-sized knees)
Distinguishing Features:Ortega sports a goofy, pointed nose and a five-o'clock shadow that looks like they covered his chin in glue and rolled it in black felt.
Carmelita Carmelita is a third-rate stripper and Estrella's (younger?) sister. She is, although very,
very pretty, a very inexperienced stripper who can't strip worth a rat's a**. She has the job of killing men with her good looks! (literally) She assists Madame Estrella by luring the victim backstage so her sister can hypnotize them and eventually turn them into incredibly strange creatures!
Distinguishing Features: Carmelita is hot. That's it. 'Nuff said.
Monster(s):
rofl Classification-Zombies
These zombies are some of the silliest ones I've seen in a movie, and the reason I say "silly" is because they are just guys in rubber masks! But I love them! This movie is so full of quirky charm, and the zombies only add to it. I really shouldn't call them zombies, 'cause if ya think about it, they really aren't. They're "mixed-up" zombies. What are mixed-up zombies, you ask? Well, they're just scruffy homeless people with acid thrown in their faces! Oh! yeah, and they want to
KILL! KILL! KILL!
Best QuotesDrunken Salesman-You couldn't make me buy enough booze to go for you. Why don't you try some of the sideshow freaks?
Madame Estrella- Yeeoou Dirty, Feelthee Pieg!
Note: Madam Estrella telling off a stereotypical drunken salesman just before she throws acid in his face. This is Brett O'Hara's attempt at a gypsy accent. I mean, I don't think she really talks like thatThe Carnival Barker-Twenty Beautiful girls, Only ten beautiful costumes!
Other Interesting Characters:Jerry- Goddamn! What a Bohemian jerk! He's a lazy slacker who doesn't think people need schooling or college and treats his girlfriend like "a back hoe with legs." He gets hypnotized by Estrella to kill two people, gets acid thrown in his face and finally gets shot down for no apparent reason.
Famous line: No, thanks. The world is my college.
Harold-The Man with the world's tallest pomedore!
This is Harold, Jerry's Greek roommate and a pretty nice guy...with an accent so thick you can cut it with a knife.
Bill Ward- The male dancing partner of Carolyn Brandt, but as Joe Bob Briggs says on the commentary for this film, "He looks like an androgynous android gigalo vampire from finland with a bad grecian formula job." In a word, a completely Aryan-looking guy
James Bowie-Worst Stand-up comic ever seen. Watch the movie. It's his delivery.
Ray Dennis Steckler delivering the line "A job? Be a little indiscreet about that, Someone's liable to hear ya!"
Final Note
I'll come right out and say it: This is a bad movie. the baddest of the bad. But, it's also great! This is a great example of what "so bad it's good" is like.This movie is made even better by the dance numbers and the camerawork of Zsigmond and Kovacks, two men who went on to win just about every award the film business had to offer, and the photography by Mascelli, who wrote the textbook on cinematography that all cinematographers use today. Steckler's direction is different than any other.The sets are fantastic for what they are, the acting is horrid, as are the production numbers. But you grow to love everything and anybody in the movie for one reason or another. I mean, Estrella throws acid in people's faces and locks them in the back room. Wouldn't it be easier if she killed people she didn't like?And when Steckler kills someone in the movie, he pulls his hood over his head as a disguise! These zombies don't eat people either. They appear to be "strangulation zombies"! I suggest you watch this first with the commentary by Joe Bob Briggs, (which is funny as hell, by the way) unless you can really stomach a LOT of pointless dance numbers that have nothing to do with the rest of the movie like I can. Either that, or if you want to hear even more about the movie, listen to the commentary with Steckler, who has lots of stories to tell. I feel like I know more about this movie more than anybody because I listened to him talk. This is indeed a very incredibly strange, mixed-up, colorful movie (with a dream sequence you'll have to see to believe). "The zombies look like showgirls, and the showgirls look like zombies. I'm Thanatos X. and I give this film,
The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies Five Stars
*****
