Mid-Week Movie Break: Black Tight Killers

Biff! Bang! Pow! All we’re missing are the flashing onomatopoeia title cards in this swinging 1966 time capsule of the grooviest aspects of the mid-60’s pop culture mania, for this week’s Mid-Week Movie Break. This week we highlight the tongue-in-cheek spectacle Black Tight Killers, starring Akira Kobayashi and Chieko Matsubara.

Screen grab showcasing some of the oddball club interiors seen in the film.

Sandwiched between the tail end of the Nikkatsu noir movies of the 1960’s, and the first wave of the Pinky Violence exploitation films on the 1970’s, Black Tight Killers (Ore ni Sawaru to Abunaize) is a pop art spectacle well worth the time it takes to seek it out.  For a taste of what’s in store for you, you can watch the trailer here.

Akira Kobayashi 45 on Colombia

Our hero (Kobayashi) is a combat photographer named Hondo. Hondo is enchanted by a young stewardess named Yuriko (Matsubara) during his flight back home from a recent assignment, and she concedes to have dinner with him. The date doesn’t end well, as Yuriko is kidnapped and Hondo is framed for the death of a gangster. The real killers? A group of women in black tights and jackets with knives hidden in their hair brushes; the titular Black Tight Killers! It appears Yuriko is a marked woman, as a coalition of hoods–formed by American mafioso and Japanese yakuza–are after her to get their hands on some gold her father may have stolen and hidden away during WWII. As Hondo tries to clear himself with the police and track down the missing Yuriko, he’s constantly hindered, and helped, by the group of assassins who employ such bizarre weaponry as exploding golf balls, chewing gum bullets to spit into the eyes of their enemies, deadly tape measures, and 45rpm records thrown like throwing stars. And get this, when they aren’t out foiling Hondo or knocking off gangsters, the ladies moonlight as a troupe of go-go dancers in a crazy rock club! What is their part in all of this madness? Watch and find out!

Take all of the best camp elements of The Man From U.N.C.L.E., James Bond and Batman, throw in some Takeshi Terauchi surf guitar and Japanese Group Sounds 45s, some secret agent jazz, a little skin (though no visible nudity), go-go dancing film breaks, blend well, then you have the crazy concoction that is Black Tight Killers. Want more proof of the candy colored madness that awaits you? Watch this dream sequence from the film (not the original music, though)! It’s like The 5.6.7.8.’s got their own girl gang flick!

The Black Tight Killers in a masked go-go dance frenzy

The film was directed by Yasuharu Hasebe, who went on to direct Alleycat Rock: Female Boss, about warring female biker gangs, and a number of the aforementioned Pinky Violence films. Lead actor Akira Kobayashi did some film and television work through the early 1970s, was a popular crooner for a while, including the title tracks to a number of his films, then became a professional golfer. Actress Chieko Matsubara was spotted at a beauty contest and has since starred in over 115 films, including the classic Tokyo Drifter which came out the same year as our feature, and is still working today. She also apparently did some crooning of her own, as suggested by the sleeve pictured below. She released some singles in he late 60s on Columbia. The amazing soundtrack is provided by prolific film and television composer Naozumi Yamamoto, and as far as I can tell, is not available in any format, which is a damn shame.

Note the Goldfinger-esque gold-painted dancers. This is a plot point in how
the crooks intend to do away with Yuriko.

Chieko Matsubara 45 for Colombia Records.

Mid-Week Movie Break: The Adventures Of The Masked Phantom

“Maybe he’s got something on his chin he can’t erase/ and that’s why he wears that silly mask upon his face.…” Yes, the anthem our cloaked cowpoke The Masked Phantom is saddled with (joke intended) is more mockery than tribute, but fun all the same. This week’s Mid-Week Movie Break features a caped cowboy avenger lodged firmly somewhere between The Lone Ranger and The Shadow, and the only starring vehicle for one-time stunt pilot Monte ‘Alamo’ Rawlins, an aw-shucks John Wayne wannabe playing the part of a drifter named “Alamo” and the titular hero.

 The plot involves some nefarious goings-on at an ore mine owned and operated by young Stan Barton and his grandma Mary. Stan’s an upstanding, virtuous character, but his silent partner Robert Murdock, a shady business man from “back East”, has secretly taken control of the outfit, laundering stolen gold from his friends back home and mixing it with the ore mined from the Barton excavation site. The feds are on the track of the crooks, and with Murdock being a “silent” partner, all roads lead to Stan for the frame-up. Barton intends to hit the road and leave Stan holding the bag, but then fate lends a hand by having Alamo and his sidekick Boots The Wonder Dog (also billed as Boots The Human Dog) wander into the valley to intervene. Alamo steps in during a shootout between Stan and Murdock’s hired hands after the reveal of Murdock’s misdeeds. Stan and Alamo lose each other in the proceeding fracas, but Alamo makes his way to the Barton ranch where a surly Granny tells him of the legend of The Masked Phantom, a do-gooder who would throw a knife with a death’s head carved into the handle, bringing justice to a lawless valley years back. Alamo decides to take up the mantle of The Phantom to try and take down Murdock’s gang, believing that criminals are “a superstitious lot” (seems I’ve heard that somewhere before). With the help of crooning cowhand Tooney and gyrating goofball Dumpy, Alamo goes on a knife-throwing rampage to right all wrongs before trotting off into the sunset again. This was clearly staged as the hopeful first entry in a series of films for Alamo and his roving pals Dumpy and Tooney, but alas it wasn’t to be.

George Douglas as Sheriff Dubbitt (right) in Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman

Monte 'Alamo' Rawlins (left) and Tooney (Art Davis, billed as Larry Mason)
with Boots the Wonder Dog, who's just retrieved the Phantom's knife.

The Adventures Of The Masked Phantom is a 1939 low budget oater from the days of quickie b-westerns, produced by B.F. Zeidman Productions Ltd, who made a slew of quick exploitation pictures between 1922 and 1939. There are plot holes you could build a U-Store-It in, but the momentum here is pulp adventure fun, so leave reason under the sofa and enjoy the ride. I say that The Masked Phantom is lodged somewhere between The Lone Ranger and The Shadow because like The Lone Ranger, our hero wears a mask and dispenses some six-gun justice on dastardly evildoers, but his main offensive seems to be playing on the fear of the legend of The Phantom itself. The legend goes if you see the knife of The Phantom, you have twelve hours to live, so a good deal of Alamo’s time using the guise of our cloaked character seems to be dedicated to throwing knives at crowded boardwalks and cackling loudly to spook Murdock and his goons. 

Betty Burgess - photo from Univ. of Washington archives.

As stated above, Monte Rawlins was a stunt pilot from Washington who eventually made his way to Hollywood to try his hand at acting. He did some aerial stunt work and played a couple uncredited bit parts as cowhands until cast here in his lone starring role. Shorty after The Adventures Of The Masked Phantom he joined the Marine Corps during WWII, then became a sound engineer for poverty row production house Monogram Pictures and Disney Studios. Our crooning cowhand Tooney was played by b-western stalwart Art Davis who played largely uncredited roles in films like Border G-Man and Code Of The Cactus. Sadly, despite a majority of his roles being musical, I’ve yet to find evidence that he actually recorded any music. If anyone can provide anything that suggests otherwise, I’d be greatly interested in hearing it. Our comic relief Dumpy is played by bit part actor and skilled dancer Sonny Lamont; you can see him hot footin’ it in MGM’s A Letter for Evie with Marsha Hunt and John Carroll, as well as in The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers. Baddie Murdock is played by actor George Douglas, the member of the cast list who has the most credits to his name, including parts in Ichiban friendly favorites like Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman (as Sheriff Dubbitt) and The Colossus Of New York. Stan is played by Matty Kemp, actor and producer who later became the caretaker of the estate of actress Mary Pickford. Stan’s hardly utilized love interest Carol is played by actress Betty Burgess, whose white bra is seen burning through her sweater the entire picture. You’d think someone would’ve pointed that out to her, but with a sweater so tight that it looks like you’d need a potato peeler to remove it, maybe there just wasn’t time for a wardrobe change. The picture was directed by Charles Abbott, who directed only one other picture, another b-western called The Fighting Texan, two years prior. My favorite character, Granny, played by Dot Karroll in her only film role, sings a song called “A Rip Snortin’ Two Gun Gal” while firing off a pair of pistols in the living room. That wasn’t pressed to 78 either, unfortunately, but that same year Patsy Montana and the Prairie Ramblers recorded a version for Okeh, and you now have the privilege of hearing it here.