Classic Horrors Club

Vinegar Syndrome describes its Reviver sub-label as releasing:

…lost films and missing movies found within the Vinegar Syndrome Film Archive. Each release is a “mystery box” of archival curios scanned from their best-surviving film elements and programmed by VS archivist & vault manager Oscar Becher. Purchases of Reviver releases directly fund archival expenses and day-to-day maintenance of the film archive.

They aren’t kidding by calling it a mystery box. The description on their website is redacted and nowhere on the packaging or disc itself are the two movies in the Reviver 2 set identified. If you’re like me and have been able to avoid social media or a website that reveals the titles and you don’t want to know what they are until you discover them yourself, then close this post now!

It’s hard to write about them, though, without spoiling the fun, so if you don’t care or you’ve already learned what they are, please, by all means, continue reading. I won’t be writing about the origins of the films, where they were found, or how they were restored, but there are short, excellent bonus features on the disc that share these details… well, as much as is known about the two movies at this time.

Title #1

A coffin-like box floats to the surface and a fisherman wades into the water to bring it to shore. After kicking it around the edges like he’s checking the tires on a used car, he opens the lid to find a skeleton. Not thinking much about it, I guess, he returns to his boat. From somebody’s (or something’s) point of view, the camera approaches him from behind. He turns, reacts in terror, and takes a swing at us/the camera.

The next morning, his body is found on the beach. The skeleton lies next to him with its arm across the fisherman’s chest. We, the audience, can put two and two together, but of course, our characters can’t. The doctors and scientists want to explain how the bones are held together without muscle, skin, and tendons. But the detective thinks it’s some kind of trick and orders them to just get the facts and he’ll draw the conclusions.

The best way to describe The Horror from Beyond (1965) is to say it’s simply fun… so much fun! It has all the characteristics of a late Atomic Age B-movie, yet something extra. Besides the more detailed questions about the skeleton than we normally get about a potential monster, the screenplay by J.A. Encino (their only credit of which we’re aware) is smart and provides terrific character moments, the best of them for the detective.

For example, never revealing to the doctors and scientists that he might be suspecting something out of the ordinary, he mugs in front of a mirror to imagine what a skeleton that’s regenerating and growing might look like. Raising his arms to estimate the height, his wife stares at him incredulously from the dinner table. Of course, he eventually comes around, but this scene acts as a bridge between two points of view that’s usually missing from similar fare.

When the damsel in distress takes a bullet to save the creature, you suspect you’re watching something special. And when the creature carries away a little girl and the detective says she’s only one life among 20, you know you’re watching something special. At a brisk 76-minute running time, The Horror from Beyond has the familiar production values monster kids love, but much more.

Title #2

Paradise of Terror (1965) is only 84-minutes long but could have benefitted by cutting eight minutes to match The Terror from Beyond. This isn’t to say it’s necessarily slow or plodding, because it’s not. It’s a very different type of film, though, more psychological thriller, perhaps even ghost story, and carries a different vibe. However, there are still moments when a variety in pacing would increase its impact.

A military flight carrying a representative from Washington with a briefcase handcuffed to his wrist crashes in some Asian country the pilot calls “rebel territory.” IMDb labels the film as “Sci-Fi,” so perhaps the conflict unfolding on the ground is a futuristic one with which we’re not familiar. It doesn’t matter. The story is more about what happens to the five men when they seek refuge in what might be a haunted house.

There’s obvious conflict between the man from Washington, who seems to know more about what’s happening, and his military companions. However, there’s also conflict among the military companions as their situation escalates and they start playing the blame game, each with their own ideas about what to do next, if anything. You can’t complain about character development in a low-budget B-movie.

Once inside the house, they can’t get out. Finding themselves inexplicably cleanshaven and in fresh clothes, they soon meet the women of their dreams when they’re away from the other men. (A unique detail which has nothing to do with the plot is that each man seems to have a “type” of woman… blonde, brunette, Asian…) As they come to their senses and try harder to leave, the house gets angry, kitchen cabinets banging open and closed.

Paradise of Terror is an extended episode of The Twilight Zone (not literally, of course.) Why are they there? What is happening? Why is it happening? Which leads, then, to what the twist is going to be. It has one and bless writer Lea Kim for leaving a precise interpretation up to the viewers. Also, bless her for this line, one that I’d be delighted and surprised to hear in any movie of any kind or decade: “Who are you calling a supercilious ape?!?”

---