Public domain treasures, part 3

We've done three roundups of Mill Creek Entertainment's great public domain collections. They here, here and here. And as we continue to watch them, we find more interesting (and sometimes forgotten) films in them. Here's a run through of a few more:
Western Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection and Gunslingers 50 Movie Pack Collection: Yup, it's Westerns featured in these two sets, pardner. All Westerns and nothing but. Between the two of them, films by John Wayne are plentiful, and so are several by singing cowboys Roy Rogers, Tex Ritter and Gene Autry. But that's not all. "Western Classics" features additional films starring Jane Russell, Chill Wills, Buster Crabbe, Burt Lancaster, William Boyd, Will Rogers and Randolph Scott, while "Gunslinger Classics" features Joel McCrea, Leslie Nielsen, Fred Williamson, Dennis Hopper, Dale Robertson, Raymond Burr and Clint Walker. If you have to choose, I guess it would be "Western Classics," which includes Howard Hughes' steamy "The Outlaw," John Wayne's delightful "McLintock" co-starring Maureen O'Hara and the aforementioned "Santa Fe Trail." If you're going to buy them both, get Western Classics 100 Movie Pack, which combines the two sets into one big 100 movie set and saves you a little money in the process.
Tales of Terror 50 Movie Pack Collection: More scary films featuring Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr. Vincent Price, Lyle Talbot, James Dunn, Dean Stockwell and Jack Pickford. Some of these are more funny than scary, as in Ken Utusi's "Evil Brain From Outer Space."
Dark Crimes Collection: 50 Movie Pack: The title of this one has a double meaning. Not only these all crime-related dramas, but they're all in black-and-white, with the latest one being from 1964 (the only one from that decade), the rest from the '30s to the '50s. It includes Edmund O'Brien's classic "D.O.A." (with more plot twists than a bag of pretzels), "The Last Mile," a downcast drama set on Death Row and the Oscar nominated "The Strange Love of Martha Ivers," starring Barbara Stanwyck, Kirk Douglas, Van Heflin and Judith Anderson about the mystery behind the death of a rich woman. Those starring in films here include DeForrest Kelley, Lee J. Cobb, Edward G. Robinson, Yul Brynner, Angela Lansbury, Hedy Lamarr, George Raft, Lloyd Bridges, Basil Rathbone, Erich Von Stroheim, Boris Karloff and Loretta Young. Outstanding. This box's a must.
Suspense Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection: An armload of nailbiters with stars such as Robert Vaughn, Cliff Robertson, Johnny Cash ("Five Minutes to Live," in which Cash plays a real cad), John Forsythe, Sondra Locke, Joe Don Baker, Robert DeNiro, Anthony Quinn, Kirk Douglas, Karl Malden, Telly Savalas and Rod Taylor.

More public domain treasures

In late February, we examined several box sets in Mill Creek Entertainment's 50 Movie Pack series, a great budget-priced series of collections of public domain films that contain a surprising number of gems. Here's a look at a few more:
Drive-In Movie Classics 50 Movie Pack: Of all the boxes in the series, this one ranks as one of our top 3 favorites. The majority of the films are mainly from the '70s and '80s, meaning nearly all of them are in color. These are pretty much schlocky classics, mixing in horror, blacksplotation, with a little touch of blood or nudity as befits films from those years. A few of the titles: "Vengeance of the Zombies," "Voodoo Black Exorcist," "Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride," "Snowbeast," "The Werewolf Vs. Vampire Women" and "Beast From Haunted Cave." Our favorite, though, is "Invasion of the Bee Girls," in which government researchers discover a female insect expert is using a process to give women bee-like qualities and then the women are killing men with sex. No, we're not making that up. Actors include Richard Burton, Carroll Baker, Christopher Lee, Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, Ursula Andress, and Mickey Rooney. Fun stuff. (12 discs.)
Comedy Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection: A nice sampling of comedy stretching from the days of silent films through recent times is collected here, including work by Fatty Arbuckle, solo Stan Laurel, Laurel and Hardy, the Keystone Cops, Harold Lloyd, Our Gang, Buster Keaton, the East Side Kids, James Cagney, Jimmy Durante, Humphrey Bogart, Walter Brennan, Pat O'Brien, Mickey Rooney, Carole Lombard, Laurence Olivier (in "As You Like It") and Peter Sellers. The real vintage stuff makes this one worth it.
Hollywood Legends 50 Movie Pack Collection: Star power drives this solid collection of films of varying quality that movie fans can enjoy just for the casting, if not for the film itself. Stars include Fred Astaire, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope (in "Road to Bali," not one of the standouts from the "Road" series but not bad, either), Greta Garbot, Fred MacMurray, Susan Hayward, Barbara Stanwyck, Frank Sinatra ("The Man With the Golden Arm"), Claudette Colbert (the charming "I Cover the Waterfront"), Jane Mansfield, Cary Grant, John Wayne, Merle Oberon, Gregory Peck, Gloria Swanson and Bette Davis.
All Stars 50 Movie Pack Collection: A collection of TV movies with some good, but most just OK. Still, a distingused list of actors is featured here in starring roles: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Martin Sheen, Lynn Redgrave, Anthony Perkins, Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor, Michael Landon, Glenn Ford, Lee Remick, Sissy Spacek, Sally Field, David Janssen, John Forsythe, Andy Griffith, Susan Sarandon and John Houseman. For the price, not a bad pickup if you are fans of some of these actors.
Nightmare Worlds 50 Movie Pack Collection: This one is one of our favorites because it's a time trip back to the old Saturday matinee days and has some of the best examples of the campiest sci-fi films ever. The three Ken Utsui films in the set ("Evil Brain From Outer Space," "Attack From Space" and "Atomic Rulers of the World") are the highlights. All feature a costumed hero named Starman and have some of the worst dialogue and special effects you'll ever see. Also included is a Flash Gordon film with Buster Crabbe ("Purple Death From Outer Space"), plus Grant Williams of "The Incredible Shrinking Man" in "The Doomsday Machine," Wallace Beery in the silent film "The Lost World", plus films with Bela Lugosi ("The Phantom Creeps," "Shadow of Chinatown"), Gene Autry (in "Radio Ranch"), Rock Hudson, William Boyd, Fred Williamson, Cameron Mitchell, Anthony Perkins and Stacy Keach. Break out the popcorn. This one's a big winner.
Chilling Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection: This collection of "Creature Features" campy sci-films includes such lovely titles as "Drive-In Massascre," "I Bury the Living," "Oasis of the Zombies," "The Milpitas Monster," "Lady Frankenstein," "Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter," "Dr. Tarr's Torture Jungle," "Silent Night, Bloody Night" and "War of the Robots." Mystery Science Theater films without the added narration. They don't make them like this anymore. Thank goodness.
Horror Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection: The traditional sci-fi fan will find a lot to like in this collection. Included are Lon Chaney Sr. in "The Phantom of the Opera" and "The Hunchback of Notre Dame," Max Schreck's "Nosferatu," George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead," John Barrymore in "Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde," Gustav Frohlich's landmark "Metropolis" plus films with Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, Fay Wray and J. Carroll Naish. A great way to get a bunch of film classics in one collection.

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There are still more of these Mill Creek sets we haven't covered and we'll catch up with more in a future column. For the most part, though, we recommend these. They're inexpensive and the films, which range from classics to camp, for the most part look fairly good, despite their age and the fact they're not studio-quality remasters. The fact is, though, some of these films have been unseen for years (some would say for a good reason, but that's another story). Outside of the fact that the films may include a brief logo, we think the sets are a great pickup and very entertaining. And as we said before, if you're not a big fan of modern-day films, these boxes herald back to perhaps a better time. For the money, you can't beat that.
Short takes: Among a slate of new releases in April, Mill Creek Entertainment will offer Crime Classics 50 Movie Pack (12pc), featuring films starring Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Ralph Byrd, George Raft and others.
Short takes: Miami Vice - Season Three and Miami Vice - Season Four: Two more seasons of the show with the sharp-dressed cops. It's more of the same from the first two seasons. Interesting note for John Lennon fans: The song "Imagine" opens the third season premiere.

Forbidden treasures

Cult Classics 20 Movie Pack (4 DVD) (Mill Creek Entertainment): They carried titles like "Chained For Life," "The Road to Ruin," "Child Bride" and "Reefer Madness." Even with the dramatic titles, they weren't dramas in the strict sense -- they were exploitation films of the '30s and '40s -- each a filmmaker's attempt to scare and sway his audience.
We laugh about them today. But they were no laughing matter back then, as seen in Mill Creek Entertainment's Cult Classics 20 Movie Pack, a fascinating budget-friendly four DVD set collecting 20 of these curios.
The films tackled subjects that were sometimes only whispered about back then. One could argue the films weren't for teaching, but for shock value. There's "Reefer Madness," the overly dramatic 1936 midnight-matinee cult favorite of recent years. The set also includes several other drug-related films: "Marihuana," "She Shoulda Said No," "The Marijuana Menace" and "The Cocaine Fiends," all from the mid-30s.
Other "shocking" subjects seen in the films include Siamese twins ("Chained For Life"), prostitution ("Slaves in Bondage," "Escort Girls") and infertility ("Test Tube Babies").
But maybe the most controversial film in the set is "Child Bride," a 1938 film starring Shirley Mills (who bears a slight resemblance to Shirley Temple) in a film about a teacher who tries to halt the practice of underage girls marrying older men. The film has what for its time -- and even now -- is quite a shocker -- a scene featuring a somewhat distant view of the young Mills swimming naked in a river -- and observed luridly by an older man from her town. It's surprising that such a scene would have been filmed in the '30s and one can only imagine the reaction it might have received from the public.
These films are available individually from other publishers, but this collection rounds up 20 of them in the most economic package we've seen. As with other releases by Mill Creek, the films aren't remastered. And purists may not be too happy about the company logos that pop up very briefly during each film.
But don't let that keep you from getting this set. It's a must for film history buffs, and film fans in general. It's entertainment and weirdness at the same time. We hope Mill Creek can dig up 20 more for a second set. It'll be worth it.
Short takes: Two other sets by Mill Creek are worth a mention. 150 Cartoon Classics is the biggest collection of public domain cartoons we've seen to date. It includes Popeye, Casper the Friendly Ghost, Felix the Cat, Betty Boop, Woody Woodpecker, Mutt and Jeff, Grampy, Little Lulu and many more. The cartoons appear to be grouped somewhat chronologically, with several black-and-white cartoons on the first disc, with color cartoons filling out the collection. Given the age of most of these cartoons, viewers will find a lack of political correctness they may be used to seeing in today's toons. Therefore, not all of these are for kids.
Mill Creek's Very Best of One Step Beyond (4pc) collects 50 episodes of this TV series, hosted by John Newland, which originally ran in the late '50s. Comparisons are often made with "The Twilight Zone," but there's a big difference between the two: While stories on "Zone" often dealt with fictional human stories punctuated with fantasy, "One Step Beyond" stories dealt with the paranormal based on real events like the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and the sinking of the Titanic. As with the cartoon collection, you'll find many DVDs of this material around, but this 50-episode box is by far the best for the money.


You can order "Cult Classics," "150 Cartoon Classics" or "The Best of 'One Step Beyond'" in our 50 Movie Pack Store in the right.