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Thursday 8/05/10

3:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
The Lion Hunters (1951 USA): First, the bad news: the Bowery Boys are nowhere to be seen on TCM’s August schedule. Now, the kinda good, this-is-some-sorta-recompense news: Bomba the Jungle Boy is back! TCM aired some of the earlier Bomba films a few years ago, but these later entries in the series have proven quite elusive. For those not familiar with the films, they star Johnny Sheffield as a white ape-boy living the life of Reilly in producer Walter Mirisch’s cardboard Monogram jungle. In The Lion Hunters, the strangely all-American lad takes on the titular sportsmen, who are eager to turn some of Bomba’s animal companions into living room ornamentation. Not so fast, fellas. It’s followed at 4:30 AM by African Treasure (1952), in which our hero faces off against diamond smugglers; at 6:00 AM (and continuing the morning’s jungle theme) by Tarzan’s Fight for Life (1958), featuring Gordon Scott as Edgar Rice Burroughs’ muscular vine swinger; and at 7:30 AM by Tarzan’s Three Challenges (1963), a classic of sorts featuring a severely emaciated, dysentery-racked Jock Mahoney wrestling a snake.

1:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Last Rebel (1971 USA): Football star and erstwhile thespian Joe Namath stars in this frankly dreadful western, which (for those of us obsessed with such matters) makes its widescreen television debut this afternoon. Broadway Joe plays Hollis, a Confederate soldier at the end of the War Between the States (known throughout the Deep South as the Great Patriotic War, I believe) who, along with chum Matt (Jack Elam), is on the run from the Damn Yankees. Fleeing through the badlands of Missouri, the two make common cause with Duncan (Woody Strode), an African-American they rescue from a lynching. Mighty fine o’ them Johnny Rebs to have tender feelins toward a Negro, doncha think? Later, money matters intrude, and Hollis and Duncan face off against Matt, who wants all the cash for himself. This is a truly bad film, but worth watching for Namath, whose appalling ‘acting’ has to be seen to be believed.

7:00 PM IFC
Motel Hell (1980 USA): Has there ever been a more memorable promotional tagline than the one attached to Motel Hell? “It takes all kinds of critters to make Farmer Vincent fritters” really says it all. Rory Calhoun, slumming but clearly having fun, plays Vincent Smith, a farmer who ‘grows’ people on a small plot of land, then sells their…by-products…from his roadside food stand. Locally grown organic produce is where it’s at today, and Farmer Vincent was already there decades ago. Wolfman Jack co-stars as gravel-voiced preacherman Reverend Billy.

7:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003 USA): A great cast makes up for a so-so story in this action-filled Robert Rodriguez flick, which makes its widescreen television debut this evening. A sequel to Rodriguez’ early masterpiece El Mariachi, the film features Antonio Banderas as a gun for hire brought out of retirement by CIA agent Sands (Johnny Depp) to help overthrow the Mexican government. The film is much too convoluted for its own good—the charm of the first film was, at least in part, due to the simplicity of its plot—but Banderas and Depp are ably assisted by a star-studded array of supporting actors, including Salma Hayek, Cheech Marin, Ruben Blades, Danny Trejo, Eva Mendes, Enrique Iglesias, Tito Larriva, Willem Dafoe, and Mickey Rourke. Interestingly (but entirely coincidentally), the original El Mariachi also airs this evening, on Encore Mystery at 10:35 PM.

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