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Obscure strange films that showed up on terrestrial TV back in the day

Started by George White, September 20, 2017, 09:53:57 AM

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George White

Obviously, you had Moviedrome, but also https://letterboxd.com/sizemore/list/moviedrome-the-alex-cox-years-1988-1994/page/2/

Some ones here. http://www.cultmovieforums.com/forum/threads/obscure-films-you-saw-on-tv.4764/page-3

Not so much arty stuff, but exploitation or low budget stuff. Obviosuly, Hammer, AIP, Corman stuff on late night ITV/BBC, but more obscure action stuff too, I think showed up.
Been looking through Radio Times on genome, and you get things like in early mornings, things like low-rent Southern hicksploitation like Smokey and the Goodtime Outlaws, and various regional family films like the Grizzly Adams films, various spinoffs like Spirit of the Eagle, Tender Warrior,  and things like the Wilderness Family. A few spaghetti westerns e.g. Deaf Smith and Johnny Ears and A Professional Gun on late-night BBC1.

Any weird ones that came to mind.

RTE surprised me when they showed Terence Hill films and things like Soggy Bottom USA and Charge of the Model T's, but they were budget-cut.

Viero_Berlotti

I remember being surprised to see early 1960s low budget cult horror Carnival Of Souls on the early hours of Xmas morning on BBC 2 about 20 years ago.

The days of stumbling across gems like that on TV are gone, but the internet has allowed me to discover so much more stuff online since then it's not something I can say I really miss.

Bad Ambassador

Quote from: Viero_Berlotti on September 20, 2017, 11:21:53 AM
I remember being surprised to see early 1960s low budget cult horror Carnival Of Souls on the early hours of Xmas morning on BBC 2 about 20 years ago.

According to Genome, that would be either in Moviedrome on 23 June 1991, then as the pre-closedown movie on either Friday 7 January 1994 or Christmas Eve 1997.

Viero_Berlotti

Quote from: Bad Ambassador on September 20, 2017, 11:29:56 AM
According to Genome, that would be either in Moviedrome on 23 June 1991, then as the pre-closedown movie on either Friday 7 January 1994 or Christmas Eve 1997.

It would be Christmas Eve 1997 then. I thought it may have been about 2am on Christmas Day but it must have broadcast earlier on Christmas Eve before midnight. I certainly remember watching it after I had come home from the pub, mustn't have had a lock in that night though.

Bad Ambassador


Viero_Berlotti

I also remember watching the 1991 Moviedrome broadcast with the Alex Cox introduction.

Phil_A

Delusion(1991)

Very odd road movie/thriller with no real "name" actors, although I think it was intended to be a breakout vehicle for model-turned-actress Jennifer Rubin.

There's a trailer on youtube which I won't link to as it pretty much gives away every plot point.

Ran a few times on BBC2 in the 90s, then BBC1 in the early hours(the last time was 2002 according to the ol' Genome)

It has cult classic written all over it, but didn't see a DVD release at all and is pretty much impossible to see unless you're prepared to deal with VHS resellers. Just about the only thing that's easily found is the score by Barry Adamson, no less.

Brundle-Fly



This 1948 film parable starring a very young Al from Quantum Leap turned up on telly in the mid-seventies when I first saw it. Not seen it since but according to Genome it has sporadically appeared a few times on BBC2 and last screened in 2004. It really spoke to nine year old me as I felt I didn't quite 'fit in' at my school. (Probably, because I didn't like bloody football, Kung Fu or British Bulldog, preferring to be in my own little imaginary world of robots, ghosts and monsters)  I've never met anyone else who had seen TBWGH and they used to think I imagined it. You couldn't remake it now because every other young person has green or blue hair these days.

It used to be all fields round here... etc

Ignatius_S

Quote from: Viero_Berlotti on September 20, 2017, 11:21:53 AM
I remember being surprised to see early 1960s low budget cult horror Carnival Of Souls on the early hours of Xmas morning on BBC 2 about 20 years ago.

The days of stumbling across gems like that on TV are gone, but the internet has allowed me to discover so much more stuff online since then it's not something I can say I really miss.

Talking Pictures very recently showed that.

Lisa Jesusandmarychain

I saw TBWGH at around the same time, Brundo,  and also haven't seen it since. I still remember that scene where the boy first sees his newly green hair in the bathroom mirror , and starts contorting it into all kinds of shapes, and that.

In a slightly similar vein, there is also watermelon man, in which a white gentleman wakes up one morning to find he has turned into a black gentleman, and gets into all kind of zany race- related scrapes. I forget the name of the actor who plays the character, but he was quite clearly a black gentleman in the first place, despite the efforts of the make- up artists in those non- CGI days. Last shown on telly on BBC 2 circa 1983, to the best of my knowledge.

Also, a film involving a young Jane Asher and a swimming pool.

Sebastian Cobb

Carnival of the Souls is fantastic. Caught that at the cinema a few years ago.

I think the most surreal period for me was in the school holidays of the early 2000's; 4 Later had a Troma season and I caught all sorts of Kaufman oddities like Tromeo and Juilet and Chopper Chicks From Zombietown.

In addition to that, films that I saw from the middle onwards a couple of times and vowed to watch properly then forgot about until they were on the telly again - The Burbs, Sneakers and Beware My Bretheren.


Lisa Jesusandmarychain

Quote from: Bad Ambassador on September 20, 2017, 03:16:18 PM
Deep End.

Yep, that's the one, and that would have been the time I saw it, too. Wonder if Brundle Fly also caught this screening?

Screen 2 on BBC 2 used to be a goldmine for this sort of stuff. It was this time slot in which I also first saw  " The Magic Christian" (alas, this film also belongs in the "films you shouldnae risk watching again" thread, no matter what Paul Merton says about it) , and " Brewster McCloud " (Robert Altman being a bit more zany than usual, Rene Auberjoinis gradually turns into a bird while narrating the tale of Bud Cort wanting to fly all bird-like, aided and abetted by a crime-committing Sally Kellerman, you've all seen it, I'm sure).

Blumf

Deep End is another one doing the rounds on Talking Pictures TV recently.

Not feature films as such, but you used to get loads of weird animation on TV back in the day. Hardly ever see that stuff now.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: Viero_Berlotti on September 20, 2017, 11:21:53 AM
The days of stumbling across gems like that on TV are gone

They really aren't, it's just that it doesn't tend to happen very often on the main five channels.  Check out Movies for Men, the Horror Channel, the aforementioned Talking Pictures, Sony Movie Channel and True Entertainment.  You'd be amazed at some of the stuff that turns up on those.

Also not forgetting Film4, ITV4 and BBC4, which throw up the odd surprise.

A lot of the films mentioned in this thread so far have been on terrestrial TV in the last few years on one of the above channels - Deep End was on Film4 a couple of years back, Carnival of Souls is shown regularly on Talking Pictures and Horror (one shows the black and white original, whilst the other shows the colourised one - can't remember which channel shows which, though), The Boy With Green Hair was on Film4 a couple of christmases ago (I know, because I watched it with my daughter, who was born in 2010), and Horror shows the odd Tromasterpiece as well.  The Magic Christian along with most of Sellers' middling also-ran films are on rotation on Talking Pictures, but it has been shown on 5 in recent years, as has its kissing cousin The Wrong Box. 

I don't think the Genome is 100% reliable...


Quote from: Lisa Jesusandmarychain on September 20, 2017, 01:57:23 PM
In a slightly similar vein, there is also watermelon man, in which a white gentleman wakes up one morning to find he has turned into a black gentleman, and gets into all kind of zany race- related scrapes. I forget the name of the actor who plays the character, but he was quite clearly a black gentleman in the first place, despite the efforts of the make- up artists in those non- CGI days. Last shown on telly on BBC 2 circa 1983, to the best of my knowledge.

Godfrey Cambridge in Melvin Van Peebles' only studio film.  Good little film it is, too.  Unfortunately it also happens to be largely responsible for Soul Man (the film).

DukeDeMondo

More of an arthouse picture, but I remember sitting on the carpet front the telly enraptured throughout a screening of I, The Worst Of All on Channel 4 when I was 16 or thereabouts. I taped it, which was just as well for I don't think it's been screened since.

Also The Unnamable Returns. Easy enough to get on video at the time but still, it was something to see something so bonkers on telly of an evening. A pseudo Lovecraftian mess of a thing coming down with all the diddies and devils in the world. I couldn't get enough of it. I haven't watched it again since, which is probably for the best. I suspect it's fucking hideous. I have watched the original The Unnamable again relatively recently, mind, and found it thoroughly enjoyable, if not terribly good.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: Lisa Jesusandmarychain on September 20, 2017, 03:28:58 PM
Yep, that's the one, and that would have been the time I saw it, too. Wonder if Brundle Fly also caught this screening?


Not au fait with that.

However...



Another example of Sunday afternoon in the mid-seventies matinee joy was this 1962 gem from the reliable George Pal stable. Again, I haven't seen the film since but remember being bewitched by it as a kid. Terry Thomas is at his most dastardly. It appears to have never been released in an English speaking format ever. God, I love a Blu-Ray.  Yet you can buy the soundtrack on iTunes. Frustrating.


Van Dammage

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on September 20, 2017, 03:43:20 PM
They really aren't,

Very true. Relatively recently I stumbled across Film 4 showing a film called "Boxer From Shantung" at about 2 am one night. I was about to go to bed but then decided to sit through it when I realised it was a lesser known Shaw Brothers martial arts film from the 70's. A very enjoyable film, solid fight scenes and essentially a scarface-esque story of a young lad you who climbs the crime ladder.

Viero_Berlotti

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on September 20, 2017, 03:43:20 PM
They really aren't

OK I'll rephrase it. FOR ME (and the growing numbers of people that don't watch live terrestrial TV anymore) the days of stumbling across gems like that on TV are gone.

Brundle-Fly

Fat Chance (1981)

Enjoyed this romcom shown on C4 a million years ago. I could've sworn it was called Fat Angels though.

An overweight man and woman become penpals but are too embarrassed to send each other photographs of themselves and instead exchange pictures of two thinner people. Comedic complications arise when the two penpals finally arrange to meet in person. Would love to see it again. Had some great lines.

One I dimly recall.

Hey tubs, maybe you should take a daily run to lose some of that weight....round the equator.




Keebleman

Quote from: Brundle-Fly on September 20, 2017, 04:58:19 PM
Not au fait with that.

However...



Another example of Sunday afternoon in the mid-seventies matinee joy was this 1962 gem from the reliable George Pal stable. Again, I haven't seen the film since but remember being bewitched by it as a kid. Terry Thomas is at his most dastardly. It appears to have never been released in an English speaking format ever. God, I love a Blu-Ray.  Yet you can buy the soundtrack on iTunes. Frustrating.

The reason this doesn't get shown much (I saw it on late-night ITV circa 1993) is because it was filmed in three-strip Cinerama and thus is borderline unwatchable in any other format.  On TV the letterboxing is extreme and where the strips of film meet it looks as if the image is curving in on itself.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: Keebleman on September 20, 2017, 10:50:19 PM
The reason this doesn't get shown much (I saw it on late-night ITV circa 1993) is because it was filmed in three-strip Cinerama and thus is borderline unwatchable in any other format.  On TV the letterboxing is extreme and where the strips of film meet it looks as if the image is curving in on itself.

Ah, that makes sense.

Glebe

I remember watching a bit of Morgan – A Suitable Case for Treatment when I was younger and thinking, "What the fuck?!"

Phil_A

Back when BBC2 used to run films in the late afternoon/early evening they once put on George Pal's 7 Faces Of Dr Lao, a film which I suspect is not shown much now to due to the issues involved with a white actor putting on "yellow face" (Tony Randall in this case). Shame, as it's not a bad film apart from that.


Shit Good Nose

Quote from: Phil_A on September 21, 2017, 12:25:32 PM
Back when BBC2 used to run films in the late afternoon/early evening they once put on George Pal's 7 Faces Of Dr Lao

Another one that Film4 has shown in recent years albeit, if memory serves, with a "warning" that it was basically of its time.  A warning they never use with One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing, oddly, and that's on every christmas.

olliebean

That Spanish short where a guy gets trapped inside a telephone box. If you've seen it, you'll know the one I mean.

Gulftastic

Quote from: olliebean on September 21, 2017, 08:30:35 PM
That Spanish short where a guy gets trapped inside a telephone box. If you've seen it, you'll know the one I mean.

Channel 4 seemed to show that a few times back in their first decade of existence.


One that gets mentioned a lot but seems to have disappeared off the face of the earth is The Gourmet, a short film made for c4 back in the 80s starring Charles Gray as an eccentric rich gourmet who has eaten every delicacy except one - ghost. It was written by Kazuo Ishiguro and the screenplay has been republished quite recently, but the film itself is still elusive.

jobotic

Think I first The Honeymoon Killers on TV. Then I bought it on VHS which I now cannot play.