Where the Boys Are (1960)

If someone drew a triangle using the bubble-gum pop of Gidget (1959) and the knee-deep cheese of Frankie and Annette’s Beach Party (1963) as the base angles, and the steamy melodrama of A Summer Place (1959) as the apex angle, and then, after adding a little geometry to this triangulum, I think we'd find another coming of age flick set against the backdrop of sand and surf right smack in the middle: Where the Boys Are (1960).

While writing novels about people going on a journey, author Glendon Swarthout had himself quite the career in both print and on the big screen. They Came to Cordura, which focused on a ragtag group splintered off from Pershing's expedition into Mexico to hunt down Poncho Villa, for one example. Another, The Shootist, focused on the end of the journey for aging gunslinger, J.B. Books. Both books were adapted to films of the same names, Cordura in 1959 and The Shootist in 1976, starring Cary Cooper and John Wayne respectively.

But his most famous stories usually added a coming of age factor, with the likes of Bless the Beasts and the Children, adapted to film in 1971, and his wildly popular Where the Boys Are; a "zany satire on the holiday pursuits of the American teenage girl" which provided the first ever insider-look into the annual collegiate invasion of Florida over Spring Break.

As the legend goes, while serving as a professor of English studies at Michigan State, Swarthout took a group of his honors students to Fort Lauderdale over the Easter break; and what he witnessed during this two week excursion / field research opportunity would serve as the basis of the novel. And upon its release, some compared it to Margaret Mead’s anthropological study Coming of Age in Samoa, referring to it as Coming of Age in Florida.

 Glendon Swarthout.

“It occurred to me as the week progressed that this would make a very fine novel,” Swarthout said in a later interview with Larry King (1985). “I could at the same time write a kind of profile of that particular generation - their aspirations, their hopes, their fears and so on.”

"Why do (college kids) come to Florida?” asks Merritt Andrews, the lead character in Swathout’s novel. “Physically to get a tan. Also, they are pooped. Many have mono. Psychologically, to get away. And besides, what else is there to do except go home (for Spring Break) and further foul up the parent-child relationship?

Meanwhile, “Biologically, they come to Florida to check the talent. You've seen those movie travelogues of the beaches on the Pribilof Islands where the seals tool in once a year to pair off and reproduce. The beach at Lauderdale has a similar function. Not that reproduction occurs, of course, but when you attract thousands of kids to one place there is apt to be a smattering of sexual activity."

First published in 1958, MGM quickly swooped in and turned the novel around and made a tidy sum off their minimum budget.

However, one should point out that George Wells' screenplay only covers the first half of the book, as the second gets even zanier with the radicalization of Merrit as she tries to help smuggle guns into Cuba to help Uncle Fidel and the Fuller Brush Beard Brigade's revolution that ends in disaster.

No, the film adaptation of is more concerned with another revolution. And while Where the Boys Are definitely has the wholesome late 1950s sheen on the surface (-- beginning with Connie Francis' infectious theme song), down below it makes no bones about poking the taboo of premarital S-E-X right in the eye with a very sharp stick. 

From the opening scene, Merritt (Hart) is already duking it out with her uptight college professor over the elder's archaic views on sex and the dating habits of the young American female. But as the film plays out, Merritt has some major issues over the practice of what she's been preaching – a far cry from the character in the novel, who lost her virginity long before she headed south.

Also of note, in the novel Merritt only travels with one companion who basically disappears, leaving our protagonist to sleep with every male character we’re destined to meet in the film, gets pregnant, refuses all overtures of marriage, drops out of school, and moves home to regroup.

But Wells and director Henry Levin had something different in mind for the film, basically splitting Merritt into four different characters, giving us a quartet of anxious co-eds from a winter-socked and flu-ridden mid-western college ready for their own pilgrimage south, where the chief of police (Wills) preps his men for their upcoming battle with higher education, and where the boys outnumber the girls 3 to 1.

Good odds for these gals, each with their own goal: too tall Tuggle (Prentiss) is on the hunt for a husband, preferably one with feet bigger than hers that she can look in the eye without bending her knees both figuratively and literally; Melanie (Mimieux) also has her sights set high, wanting to notch a couple of Ivy Leaguers on her soon to be discarded chastity belt; and while the pugnacious Angie (Francis) will settle for just about anything, Merritt isn't really sure what she's looking for, if anything at all, really, romantically speaking.

Kudos to the casting director for filling those roles out, too. These seemingly mismatched puzzle pieces shouldn't fit but they do and the sense of camaraderie found with these girls is one of the film's strongest points.

And the resulting chemistry with their respective beaus-to-come is just as wonderful as the film follows them through the entire week of Spring Break, where the girls move from one bizarre locale to the next, taking in the sun, the suds and the scenery.

Along the way, Tuggle falls for the lanky TV Thompson (Hutton), and Angie finds romance with Basil, a myopic bass player (Gorshin), whose experimental jazz combo-band pays the audience to listen to them, dig?

The brainy Merrit also finds her match with Ryder Smith (an eerily untanned Hamilton), as they hurl intellectual barbs at one another over the "Stud / Slut Dichotomy" to keep him at arm’s length, allowing the reluctant Merritt to ease into the relationship.

And as TV's police-band radio constantly updates us on the collegiate shenanigans erupting around them (-- a favorite being a live hammerhead shark reported in a hotel swimming pool), the couples schmooze, snog, bicker over commitments, fight, break-up, make-up, snog some more, culminating in climactic calamity at a fancy dinner at a fancy seafood restaurant, where the whole gang winds up in a giant aquarium with the showcase aqua-bat, leading to a mass arrest.

To make matters worse, the overly naive Melanie has taken her best friend's Kinsey-backed advice to heart. And while the film's overall tone is comedic, it can also be downright brutal at times, with poor Melanie usually taking the brunt of it, serving as an abject lesson for the others when she's suckered to a private motel party by a couple of no-goodniks posing as Yale students.

When she finally susses out the ruse and tries to leave, it's too late. What happens next is only implied, but there is no mistaking the devastating final result once the motel door slams shut.

The other girl's relationship problems pale in comparison, but they are the bumps along the way just the same. TV wants to knock-boots with Tuggle but she's determined to wait until she's married. TV takes the hint, and the specter of a long term commitment frightens him off. And knowing that once Spring Break is over means the probable end of their relationship, a conflicted Merritt's hot and cold act is wearing awfully thin with Ryder, resulting in a similar nasty spat.

And then things get really twisted when everyone's relationships are saved or cemented as a direct result of Melanie's sexual assault.

And this is why I'm just as conflicted about my feelings for Where the Boys Are. On the surface, it's beautifully shot, filled with adorable characters, who we openly root for to make it work, and so immersive in the chaos of one raucous week I could almost enjoy it unconditionally -- almost.

Because underneath, it's mixed message of saying sex is OK but the only one who actively engages in it winds up raped, brutalized and in the hospital is a pretty twisted way to moralize away it's all fun and games until somebody gets hurt.

And, well, I kinda have a problem making all of that compute while trying to laugh at an aquarium full of goofballs.

Originally published on April 14, 2000, in the Bargain Bin.

Where the Boys Are (1960) Euterpe :: MGM / P: Joe Pasternak / D: Henry Levin / W: George Wells, Glendon Swarthout (Novel) / C: Robert Bronner / E: Fredric Steinkamp / M: George Stoll / S: Dolores Hart, Paula Prentiss, Yvette Mimieux, Connie Francis, George Hamilton, Jim Hutton, Frank Gorshin, Chill Wills

Zulu (1964)

Back in 1879 Great Britain suffered one of its worst military disasters on the mountain slopes of Isandhlwanda, Natal, Africa, when 1300 Redcoats were overwhelmed and massacred by a large force of Zulu warriors. (And I pause for historical accuracy to add that the Brits were the aggressors here.)

Flush with victory, chief Cetshwayo next sent his impis, 4000 strong, to finish clearing out these invaders by destroying the outpost at Rourke's Drift; a Swedish mission doubling as a military hospital, where a small Welsh unit of barely 100 men were stationed. This is where the film Zulu (1969) begins

When word of the massacre reaches the mission, Lt. Chard (Baker), a Royal Engineer, abandons the bridge he was sent to build and musters the company to shore up the small outpost's defenses. Outranked by only a few months, Lt. Bromhead (Caine, making his big screen debut), grudgingly relinquishes command of his men to Chard as the fortification continues.

And then the tension builds from the inside out as the barriers go up and the camera lingers on the meager force back-dropped against the vast African landscape, further fueled by the drunken ravings of Reverend Witt (Hawkins), who admonishes them all to leave or they will all most assuredly be killed when the tide of Zulus arrive and overrun them.

Judging by the trailer, I suppose you could consider Zulu as one of those old fashioned manly-men movies that could have easily been gleaned straight out of the lurid Sweats and male adventure magazines from the 1950s and '60s.

Sure, it's wrought with a few historical inaccuracies but I think that's selling it a bit short. Check out the great scene early on in the film, when the officers work on their defensive strategy with Ardendorff (Gert Van den Bergh), a Zulu expert and survivor of the earlier battle, and Bromhead dismisses the native levies who also died as "cowardly blacks." Here, he is quickly rebuffed and reminded that it isn't the Grenadier Guards coming to wipe them out.

Ardendorff also brought orders that they are to hold their position indefinitely, no matter what, to which Chard snipes about which "son or heir" -- who did nothing to earn their commission -- gave that asinine order? Now it's Bromhead's turn to be indignant, when he points out that they're "no one's son or heir now."

It's not very subtle, granted, but it does a nice job of evening out the playing field. You definitely feel the loss of humanity on both sides when the bullets and spears start flying, and you also witness bravery on both sides of the walls as well.

After that the politics are left to the politicians; this is a tale of soldiers and warriors, and the only preaching comes from the inebriated Witt. And when a panicky private asks why they have to fight, the answer is simple: because we're here.

About the first third of the film is just a warm-up, dedicated to the fortifications, while the rest of the film is basically just one long, sustained battle sequence with a few brief -- and I mean BRIEF -- respites.

Wave after wave of native warriors crash onto the makeshift walls but are beaten back with sound strategy and superior fire power. But with every Zulu they knock down, three seem to take his place. And as the battle rages all day and into the night, with casualties mounting and most of the outpost burning or burned out, come the dawn, they all know their luck won't hold out forever.

And when the sun does rise the next morning, I can only hope you all were as enthralled as I was when the Zulus sang and beat out their war chant and the British countered with their own hymn of defiance.

Then, when the stand-off ends, and the final battle finally breaks wide open, I'll warn you that just when you think it's all over it isn't, as there are several surprises and one huge "Oh shit" moment still left to be unveiled.

(L-R) Stanley Baker and Cy Endfield.

For a guy who never really did anything like this before, director Cy Endfield, with a helpful assist from cinematographer Stephen Dade, is to be commended for his staging and execution. The battle scenes last well over an hour and, with some artful framing and extended set-ups, are truly incredible to watch.

And more importantly, he took the time to let us get to know some of the men -- from malingerer turned hero, Hook (Booth), to the stiff upper lip of Sgt. Bourne (Green) -- so we care what happens to them.

There is some unintentional humor here, though, as the British troops are so regimented to a fault you half expect Graham Chapman -- decked out as the colonel from Monty Python -- to pop up and tell everyone to "Stop being silly" and then promptly take a Zulu spear to the chest. And to train his native extras, Endfield had to show them an old Gene Autry western so they could understand what they were doing.

As I said before, aside from a few bit parts, this was Michael Caine's big screen debut, and most of the art for the VHS and DVD covers tout this, and him, but the film really belongs to Richard Burton's drinking buddy, Stanley Baker. And if anyone steals the movie, it's not Caine but Nigel Green ( -- who, with all apologies to Steve Reeves, made a great Hercules in Jason and the Argonauts.

The Grand Island Independent (August 22, 1964).

But this film was Baker’s baby, and the tough, gritty, and highly combustible actor formed Diamond Films, secured financing from Joseph E. Levine, and hired the black-listed Endfield to write and direct this feature for him. Both lead actors do well anchoring the film, held up admirably by the supporting cast, and gives the carnage and story told here a lot of weight and emotional punch.

True, Zulu is not without its flaws. Sharp eyes will spot re-animated corpses on both sides; Hook's malcontent seems anachronistically out of place; and some intentional humor misses badly. But the pluses leave the minuses choking on a lot of dust.

From the actors, to the action, to one fantastic, rousing score from composer John Barry, Zulu has something that today's big and empty blockbusters just don't have. Sure, they try the same noise and thunder -- hell, Ridley Scott stole the Zulu's war chant for the "Unleash Hell" sequence in Gladiator (2000), but they always seem lacking when it comes to three simple words: sheer, scope, and magnitude.

I don't think you can make grandeur, I think grandeur happens -- and I sure as hell know you can't generate it on a computer. I mean, take a look at the scene when the Zulus first approach the mission:

At first we don't even see them, but it sounds like the approach of an oncoming train. And when they do finally appear, that's about 700 non-CGI extras on the bluffs encircling the camp.

So, do yourself a favor, when you track down a copy of this film, make sure you don't get the cheaper pan-n-scan version. You need to see this thing in its proper aspect ratio to fully appreciate the sheer magnitude of Zulu's epic scope.

Originally printed on June 23, 2000, for the Bargain Bin.

Zulu (1964) Diamond Films :: Paramount Pictures / EP: Joseph E. Levine / P: Stanley Baker, Cy Endfield / AP: Basil Keys / D: Cy Endfield / W: John Prebble, Cy Endfield / C: Stephen Dade / E: John Jympson / M: John Barry / S: Stanley Baker, Michael Caine, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Nigel Green

The College Girl Murders (1967)

Our Teutonic film of masked killers, daring (-- and somewhat dopey --) detectives, damsels in distress, mayhem, and mass murder at a girl's boarding school begins, quite inexplicably, in the secret lair of a couple of wütender wissenschaftlers, who feverishly work to put their new odorless, forensically undetectable, and fast-acting poison gas through one last test on a vat of rats.

When this experiment proves a rousing success, the elder scientist decides to field test the poison's dubious delivery device on his clueless assistant, too. And he dies almost instantly upon opening a ledger as instructed and the resulting puff of aerosol spray from the ensconced-doodad hits him square in the face.

Cut to a cemetery, where a sinister looking masked monk armed with a bullwhip stealthily lurks amongst the tombstones. (Well, as stealthily as you can in that scarlet get-up.) Meanwhile, nearby, that mad scientist delivers the poison gas and the gadget to deliver it, now secreted inside a bible, to the client who commissioned it.

Keeping to the shadows, we never do see The Client's face during this exchange. But when asked for payment, our mystery man tells the irascible inventor to remain right where he is and he'll get exactly what's coming to him. And so, after he leaves, the Scarlet Monk reveals himself and goes all Indiana Jones on the scientist, snapping his neck with that rawhide whip.

Cut to a prison, where Frank Keeny, a small-time hood, who would do almost anything for $1000, gets roped into a scheme by a fellow inmate wanting to test that theory.

With that, a baffled Keeny (Rauch) is swiftly (-- and rather easily --) secreted out of the prison and delivered to a palatial estate, where he's escorted into a secluded chamber / aquarium / secret lair / yes, it even has a pit of alligators / no I'm not kidding / and meets The Client, who gives the fugitive an offer he can't refuse.

Now, The Client is still being shy, seated with his back to Keeny, who angrily barks out instructions to his new henchman without ever turning around. Shown a picture of a teenage girl, Keeny is ordered to give a certain bible to her by any means necessary. And if he does exactly as told, The Client promises his reward will be great. But if he fails, well, yeah. *thwack* Anyhoo...

Cut to a church, where a gaggle of school girls file in for mass, including the girl in the picture, Pam Walsbury (Strömberg). Working quickly, Keeny manages to bump into her and deftly switches out bibles. And as the invocation kicks up, Pam opens the deadly tome to read along, gets a face-full of gas, convulses violently, and keels over into the aisle, much to the distress of her fellow classmates.

But no one noticed the gas attack, since Pam dropped the bible instantly and kicked it under a pew in her death throes, where it sits unseen and undetected. 

Then, as her best friend Ann Portland (Glas) and the school's headmistress, Harriet Foster (Lauenstein), move to help, they're already too late. The girl was dead before she even hit the floor.

Watching all of this several pews back, and quickly realizing he's gotten into something way, way, way over his head, Keeny flees the scene as fast as his feet will carry him.

And that, believe it or not, was basically just the preamble, Fellow Programs; for The College Girl Murders (alias Der Mönch mit der Peitsche, 1967) is only getting warmed up, destined to get even more screwier from here...

Born the illegitimate son of a stage actor and a chorus girl in April, 1875, Edgar Wallace had ditched school by the age of twelve to hock newspapers in London's Ludgate Circus, washed out as a printer's apprentice the next year, and then spent the next six years bouncing around, bilking, and getting fired from several menial jobs until enlisting in the army on his 18th birthday. In that capacity, he served in South Africa during the Boer War of 1896, as part of the Royal West Kent Regiment.

But sticking with the theme, Wallace wasn't too enamored with army life and wrangled a transfer to a medical outfit. This proved even worse, which soon had him on the move again until he apparently finally found what he was looking for in the military press corps.

 Edgar Wallace.

A voracious reader of military history and the ripping yarns of Rudyard Kipling, Wallace used these influences as inspiration for his stories and poems. According to legend, Wallace's dispatches so impressed Kipling that he arranged to meet the fledgling author (-- most reports place this meeting in Cape Town, South Africa, around 1898), and encouraged him to keep on writing once his enlistment was up.

And with the sale of his first book of ballads, The Mission that Failed, in 1898, Wallace sped up this process by using these profits to buy his way out of the army, got married, started a family, and moved back to England, determined to make writing a full-time career.

"Such is the insanity of the age that do not doubt for one moment the success of my venture," Wallace told his biographer, Margaret Lane (Edgar Wallace, the Biography of a Phenomenon, 1938).

Here, while still working as a reporter for the London Daily Mail, Wallace completed The Four Just Men, his first mystery novel concerning a quartet of proto-Batman-esque vigilantes, which he had to publish himself in 1905.

To help boost sales, Wallace concocted an ill-conceived publicity blitz with his employers, serializing parts of the novel in the Daily Mail, promising 500 pounds to any reader -- stress on the "any" and not "the first" -- who solved how the crimes were committed before the author's official solution was published. This was accompanied by a four-walling advertising campaign blitz throughout the Empire -- all done on credit. And as more and more correct guesses were mailed in, after the last chapter was published and no contest winners were announced, the lawsuits started flying.

Legally obligated to pay off all the winners, the paper's publishers stepped in to bail him out. Couple that catastrophe with several lingering libel lawsuits, and Wallace found himself fired. However, even though it cost him his job and bankrupted him, The Four Just Men did become a bestseller. However, one should note that this kind of enthusiastic self-sabotage would serve as a microcosm for Wallace's entire career.

With his journalistic reputation in tatters and the rights to his novel sold off for a pittance to satisfy some of his creditors, Wallace headed back to Africa at the behest of the publisher of the Weekly Tale-Teller; a sensationalist penny magazine, for which he chronicled the terrible atrocities the Belgians were inflicting on the Congolese native laborers at their rubber plantations.

He was also encouraged to write fictionalized accounts of his adventures in the jungle, which added a healthy dose of foreign exotica and taboo rituals into his stories. And along with his tales of adventure, private dicks, and amateur sleuths, Wallace also pioneered the police procedural by forgoing the middleman and making the elite detectives of Scotland Yard his protagonists.

As his popularity grew, so did his proficiency; according to legend, he cranked out The Ringer (1929) in just 14 hours. Again, this staggeringly massive output was by necessity to stave off his creditors and bookies.

Seems Wallace had a weakness for the ponies and throwing extravagant parties for the culturally elite, couldn't really afford either, but this never stopped him from partaking in both. And so, by now, the author had developed a formula that sold: “I am going to give [my readers] crime and blood and three murders to the chapter,” said Wallace (Lane, 1938); and adopted an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality as he pounded them out, published them, and immediately started on the next project.

Sustaining himself on copious amounts of tea and cartons of cigarettes, Wallace would go on to write 18 stage plays, 957 short stories, and over 170 novels (-- 12 of them in 1929 alone). It's been said during his reign (1910-1932) that one in four books being read in England were written by Wallace. And though contemporary authors found him both crude and lacking, and the critics thought his work was distasteful and without any merit, the reading public devoured his output to an estimated tune of 50 million copies sold.

Outside of Britain, a quarter of a million books were sold in America, but where his writing proved most popular internationally was in Germany -- both in print and at the movies.

Wallace's salaciously violent and violently salacious stories were a decadently perfect fit for pre-Nazi Germany. When films first evolved as an art form, the story was the most important element and the director, cinematographer, and actors were mere technicians, tasked to translate them into moving pictures. (The Germans referred to this as autorenfilm.)

Thus, the more prestigious the source material usually meant more box-office receipts. Again, Wallace seemed a perfect fit. And happy to find another source of quick cash, Wallace quickly signed off on The Unknown (alias Der große Unbekannte, 1927) and The Crimson Circle (alias Der rote Kreis, 1929).

About a half-dozen adaptations followed, ending in 1934 with E.W. Emo's Der Doppelgänger, when the rise of Hitler and National Socialism made this type of foreign materiel strictly verboten. When the German money dried up, Wallace turned to America, hoping to find the same success in Hollywood. He signed on with RKO, where he famously helped Merian C. Cooper flesh out a certain "gorilla movie". Maybe you've heard of it?

Alas, barely three months into his contract, Wallace tragically died in February, 1932, due to sudden and acute complications from an undiagnosed case of diabetes, bringing a premature end to his writing and filmmaking career.

But this is not the end of our tale. No. This is just the beginning. (Well, more like the middle.) For it seems the Germans weren't quite done with the author yet.

At the dawn of the 1950s there was a sudden resurgence in popularity for these kinds of seedy crime thrillers and two-fisted adventure pulps in Europe, especially in Italy and West Germany. And while the Italians had their gialli (yellow) paperbacks, the Germans had the taschenkrimis -- "pocket-sized crime novels.”

With their theaters also flooded with American films in the same vein, the distributors of the Frankfurt based Constantin Film decided to try and do something similar domestically. And looking to cash in on these pulp influences, they sent out feelers to several studios, hoping to get someone interested in adapting the westerns of Karl May, the espionage tales of Jerry Cotten, or the criminal capers of Edgar Wallace. But they found no takers until the Dutch-based Rialto Films agreed to take a gamble with them.

Remember, filmmaking in post-war Germany still hadn't really found its legs yet or established any kind of signature identity like it had in the heyday of Fritz Lang and Paul Wegener. But that was about to change when this risky endeavor quickly paid off with Der Frosch mit der Maske (1959).

Based on Wallace's The Fellowship of the Frog, a masked super-criminal and his gang of thugs terrorize and loot London while staying one step ahead of Scotland Yard. And the film proved so successful it quickly spawned a franchise that earned its own genre: the kriminalfilm -- or krimi for short.

Under the guiding hand of producers Preben Phillipsen and Horst Wendlandt, and directors Harald Reinl and Alfred Vohrer, these krimis flourished throughout the 1960s, where "femme fatales, gamblers, and other denizens of the underworld -- stooges, squealers, informers and the like -- shared screen time with heirs and heiresses, insane relatives, mad scientists, psychos, criminal masterminds and (other) worse (elements of horror) in the blurred borders of a corrupt society."

From 1959 thru 1972, with 32 films in-between, Constantin-Rialto seldom strayed from this formula. They were almost always set in England; the bad guys were always opposed by a rotating gallery of detectives from Scotland Yard and their odious comedy relief; all under the watchful eye of the bumbling chief inspector, Sir John (Schürenberg, who played this same character in 13 of these things), and his ever-revolving pool of perky secretaries.

And these investigators would then try to unravel the serpentine schemes of the master villain to save some hapless heroine from being cheated out of her rightful inheritance, being sold off to a white slavery ring, or getting her head chopped off by some guy dressed in a gorilla costume and sometimes a combination of all the above.

Combine all of that with an international cast, mindless violence, some eye-popping production design, a swingin' horn heavy soundtrack, more mindless violence, deep shadows, wild camera angles, and a staggering body count by film's end, once you're exposed to this insanity, there’s no turning back.

Their efforts also spawned dozens of imitators, who had to look elsewhere for inspiration since Rialto had locked up the exclusive rights to adapt Wallace's books; which would explain why most knock-offs would adapt the mysteries of Wallace’s son, Bryan Edgar Wallace, hoping no one would notice.

Each imitator tried hard to emulate the same formula but they always lacked the true delirium of the Constantin-Rialto series -- each bearing the signature Edgar Wallace stamp of a pre-credit sequence, where the screen would be riddled with bullets and then a ghostly voice would announce, "This is Edgar Wallace speaking," before the Constantin-Rialto fanfare took over.

Regardless, while watching these adaptations, it quickly becomes apparent that they were based on the source material the same way Roger Corman’s House of Usher (1960) was based on the poem of Edgar Allan Poe. And as the series progressed, things got even more violent, more decadent, and also a whole lot goofier, which brings us back to Alfred Vohrer's The College Girl Murders.

Like the rest of the series, The College Girl Murders plays out like an old Republic serial, mixed with the absurdity of a Gilligan's Island coconut-to-the-cranium dream sequence, with the overall look and feel and vibe of the old Batman TV show.

If you watched all of these films chronologically, by 1967, it's fairly obvious Constantin-Rialto's formula was on the verge of collapsing under the weight of its own, ever-increasingly convoluted plots. And if things weren't convoluted enough already, the plot proper kicks in when that perfect poison turns out to be not as undetectable as advertised.

With another bizarre homicide on his hands, Sir John assigns Inspector Higgins (Fuchsberger, another series regular) to assist him in the investigation. Now, as a fan of the series, I like Sir John enough, but I like the old goofball in small doses and he spends way too much time out from behind his office desk in this film, which is sorely lacking the true comedy relief of Eddi Arent, another regular, who, alas, doesn't appear in this entry.

Neither the faculty or the students are all that thrilled to have the police sniffing around the school for suspects and leads for Pam's murder, as everyone seems to be harboring a secret or having an illicit affair. Only Ann is willing to talk to Higgins, who earnestly but erroneously sends him sniffing down several false trails.

And as these red herrings keep piling up, The Client arms Keeny with another deadly device (-- which resembles a ray-gun that shoots lethal cotton-candy --) and keeps sending him back to the school to bump off more girls. And while Keeny reduces the student body, the Scarlet Monk starts wiping out the faculty before they can talk to the police.

Look, the thing you have to remember here, is the majority of the players are acting squirrely due to their own private skeletons that have nothing to do with the main murder thread. They act guilty because they are guilty, just not of murder.

Thus, due to this behavior, nearly everyone winds up a suspect in this thing. And as Higgins focuses on them, their life-expectancy can be measured in mere minutes as the true culprits bump them off to sow confusion or, more than likely, just employing a scorched-earth policy to eliminate any possible leaks.

And so, with all these false leads and false witness baring, there is no way in hell Higgins or the audience could ever solve the mystery of who was really behind this mad scheme; just a lot of loose dot-connecting, a five-car-twist-pile-up during the climax, and a last minute revelation that nearly explains away everything.

Here, The Client was basically carpet-bombing the school to create a pile of bodies big enough that no one would realize who the real target was and trace it back to him. How does the Scarlet Monk fit into all of this? Well, I've watched this film four times now and, You know what? I'm still not sure how they wound up in league together. That's me shrugging right now -- but he sure looked cool!

And even though the whackadoodle plot leads you in thirty different directions at once, there are some interesting twists if you can manage to glom onto them as they rocket by.

I like how the setting is another one of those European boarding schools where the only class appears to be lounging around the pool. But I especially dug The Client using prisoners as his lackeys, causing much confusion when several witnesses identify Keeny, who is always snuck back into his cell before the police arrive.

Fortunately, Keeny gets a little too greedy and pays the price. And this mistake finally provides a pivotal clue for Higgins, who sniffs out the revolving door to the prison in time to save Pam from that alligator pit.

Credit also to Vohrer, who directed nearly half of the Constantin-Rialto krimis, and cinematographer Karl Löb because, if nothing else, this film is a visual feast, over-compensating for the lack of cohesion everywhere else.

Now, before I wrap this up, it should be noted that these Constantin-Rialto krimis were also a huge hit in Italy, where their influence on the body count films of Mario Bava and Dario Argento cannot be discounted.

But as the Italian bred giallo evolved, and by the time The College Girl Murders was made, influences were definitely starting to cross-pollinate as the high contrast color schemes, eerie settings, and voluptuous eye-candy of Vohrer's film definitely has Mario Bava's Blood and Black Lace’s (1964) fingerprints all over it.

And as the series moved out of the 1960s and into the 1970s, with the likes of Umberto Lenzi's Seven Blood-Stained Orchids (alias Sette orchidee macchiate di rosso, 1972) and Sallamano's What Have You Done to Solange (alias Cosa avete fatto a Solange?, 1972), you could barely tell the difference between the genres anymore.

And then the whole thing finally collapsed that same year, along with half the European film industry, ending one of the greatest, goofiest, most brain-bending series in cinematic history. And consider this another clarion call from someone, anyone, -- Arrow? Severin? Synapse? -- to get a bona fide Region Free boxset release of the Constantin-Rialto catalogue.

Now, if you've made it this far, you may have inferred from my reservations about the cock-eyed plot that The College Girl Murders is a complete, intractable mess that might not be worth the time to endure. This, was not my intention at all and I hope it doesn't scare you off from checking it out -- or any other film from the Rialto series for that matter. It's more of a friendly warning to brace yourselves, there's gonna be a lot chucked at you for the next hour and a half but, oh, my Fellow Programs, is it ever worth it to find out -- no matter whodunit.

Originally published on June 21, 2014, at Micro-Brewed Reviews.

The College Girl Murders (1967) Rialto Film :: Constantin Film / P: Horst Wendlandt / D: Alfred Vohrer / W: Herbert Reinecker, Edgar Wallace (novel) / C: Karl Löb / E: Jutta Hering / M: Martin Böttcher / S: Joachim Fuchsberger, Uschi Glas, Grit Boettcher, Siegfried Schürenberg, Tilly Lauenstei, Ewa Strömberg