ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

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William Grefe, veteran director of numerous horror and drug-culture films, steps cautiously over the line into science fiction.

John Vella plays a marine biologist's assistant who experiments with Portuguese man 'o war in an effort to discover a cure for his disfigured face. Instead he goes from bad to worse, turning into a jellyfish monster that terrorizes the seacoast tourists.

The monster is played by Doug Hobart. Musical guest star: Neil Sedaka. William Grefe later became a second unit director for James Bond films.

* About that poster: In a just and sane world, the check used to pay the artist would have bounced . . .
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[scotpens]

Neil Sedaka appears in a poolside party scene, singing a genuinely awful song called "Do the Jellyfish." Around the same time, he also showed up in the psycho-murderer melodrama Playgirl Killer (aka Decoy for Terror), performing "The Waterbug" in another poolside party scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzadUo474Lo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC_Yu6kK81c

The man must have had a thing for pool parties and aquatic creatures.

[Bud Brewster]

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Hey, this is a swingin' rock tune from the 1960s, and I think I'll add it to the thread called Sci-Fi Love Themes and Rock Riffs from the 50s and 60s
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____________ Do The Jellyfish by Neil Sedaka


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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Brent Gair]

My favorite Neil Sedaka story as told by Neil Sedaka...

His mother was understandably heart-broken when Neil abandoned classical music in pursuit of pop music.

Upon receiving his first royalty cheque from his first big song, Neil took the cheque to his mother as proof that he could make a living as a song writer.

"Look ma...they sent me a cheque for five hundred and eighty dollars!"

His mother looked at the cheque. "Neil...this isn't five hundred and eighty dollars. It's fifty-eight thousand dollars."

I'm guessing that made her heart less broken .

And I love Do the Jellyfish. I have STING OF DEATH on DVD.

[Bud Brewster]

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Here's a few interesting things I learned about Sting of Death.

The Spanish poster is considerably more imaginative than the one I posted above. Take a look at THIS masterpiece!





I'm surprised there isn't at least one bathing-suit clad beauty being ensnared by those tentacles, but I do appreciate the addition of the horrified swordfish on the right.

Nice dramatic touch.

As you might expect, this is not what the monster looks like, but I gotta hand it to the producers, because they took a crack at making a stunt man look like a jellyfish.

A black wet suit was adorned with thin colorful tentacles drooping down on all sides, and a pair of fairly well-done "monster hand" gloves were added to this. A pair of swim fins were cut to look like frog feet with webbed toes.

And for the monster's head they . . . well, they put a big inflated translucent plastic bag over the man's head!

Seriously.





If you're thinking, "That looks ridiculous!" you'd get no argument from any sane person. But in fact the brief close-ups are actually creepy, because the incredible head seems to be the huge nebulous body of a jellyfish with a human head trapped inside!





With a really good makeup job, that would make a pretty disturbing monster!

If you're envious of Brent for owning the DVD of this movie, you can ease your pain by downloading the full movie (with a fine picture) from DailyMotion. Watch the first five minutes and you'll be convinced that Brent knows a rare gem when he sees one!

_____________ Sting Of Death (1965) - Feature


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And on a semi-related note, I found this artwork while looking for a thumbnail for the video above. It's gorgeous!

But what is it!



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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

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Ah=HA! I found out the Surflamingo is a rock group who've recorded instrumentals similar to the Ventures.

Here's an example. Good stuff!

_________ Surflamingo - Campanillas Diabólicas


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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[tmlindsey]

Even though I've never even heard of this film let alone seen it (yet), I get a sense of deja vu from the creature description since most of the people who live around my area have jelly-like, inflated sacks for heads
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"Have you never wondered what it would be like to walk between the ticks and tocks of Time?"

[Bud Brewster]

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That, sir, can be explained by a simple chemical reation. When someone has shit for brains, the production of methane is inevitable.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)