PSYCHOTRONIC NETFLIX VOL. 41



Welcome to another edition of PSYCHOTRONIC NETFLIX! This week we’ve got ten flicks featuring various members of the Carradine clan, the multi-generational family that serves as the Redgraves of crap. Will Ever Carradine live up to her family potential? Only time will tell!



(For the record, no I didn’t forget about DEATH RACE 2000. I mentioned it in this same column six weeks ago, and try to avoid duplication whenever necessary. So there!)



10. Return of the Ape Man (1944)







Family patriarch John Carradine stars with Bela Lugosi as a pair of scientists who discover a frozen caveman during an Arctic expedition, and then try to give him a new brain. Short and standard, but with a solid performance by Lugosi and footage from a 1926 Alaskan travelogue.



9. Adventures in Plymptoons (2011)







Non-Carradine animator Bill Plympton is profiled in this entertaining doc, with Martha Plimpton (the daughter of Keith Carradine) among the huge roster of folks interviewed, including Matthew Modine, PES, Ralph Bakshi, Terry Gilliam, Tom Kenny, Lloyd Kaufman, Jerry Beck, Weird Al Yankovic and more.



8. Kill Zone (1993)







The prolific Cirio Santiago helmed this Vietnam war flick (shot in the Philippines) starring David Carradine as an American colonel fighting for his life. It cheap and crap, but features Carradine chomping cigars, which is always entertaining.



7. The Black Sleep (1956)







Reginald (HOUSE OF WAX) Le Borg directed this mad scientist flick starring Basil Rathbone as a loopy doc who kidnaps folks and examines their brains to cure his wife’s brain tumor, with John Carradine, Lon Chaney Jr., Tor Johnson and Bela Lugosi among those at his mercy. (Don’t get too excited, as it’s all Rathbone’s show — thankfully, he plays it to the hilt.)



6. Number One with a Bullet (1987)







Robert Carradine is white! Billy Dee Williams is black! They’re cops! It’s a typical ’80s buddy cop film that’s a touch grimier than average, with Valerie Bertinelli, Peter Graves, Doris Roberts, Mykelti Williamson and Jon Gries, from Jack Smight, the director of DAMNATION ALLEY.



5. Face of Marble (1946)







William “One Shot” Beaudine is the man behind this mad doc pic, featuring John Carradine as a scientist trying to being the dead back to life. Noteworthy for being one of the elder Carradine’s few starring roles, and with Willie Best.



4. Grey Lady Down (1978)







A solid submarine thriller starring Charlton Heston, David Carradine, Stacy Keach and Ned Beatty, GREY LADY DOWN fits nicely into the realm of ’70s disaster flicks, but it’s also more serious than the likes of POSEIDON ADVENTURE and deserves a better reputation than it has.



3. Lone Wolf McQuade (1983)







David Carradine faces off against SIDEKICKS star Charles Norris is Steve Carver’s great action flick, as Carradine plays a drug kingpin up against a Texas Ranger. With Barbara Carrera, Leon Isaac Kennedy, Robert Beltran, L.Q. Jones, R.G. Armstrong, William Sanderson and Dana Kimmell.

2. Thieves Like Us (1974)







One of Robert Altman’s best films (and that’s no small feat) is his 1936-set story about the lives and loves of a trio of bank robbers, featuring Keith Carradine, John Schuck, Bert Remsen, Shelley Duvall and Louise Fletcher. Highly recommended.



1. Boxcar Bertha (1972)







…and you can even pair it with another ’30s crime pic with a Carradine, this time the early Martin Scorsese flick about a couple (David Carradine and Barbara Hershey) who turn to crime to go against the management of a railroad. With Barry Primus, Bernie Casey, John Carradine and Victor Argo.

