Just for the Hell of It (1968)

A teenage gang led by the vicious Dexter; his girlfriend Mitzi; and friends Denny and Lummonx; create havoc in a small Florida town by harassing various people, vandalizing property, well... just for the hell of it. When a former gang member, Doug, tries to prevent their ever increasing violent antics, Denny takes it upon himself and a few loyal members of the gang to target Doug's girlfriend, Jeanne, to make him back off.

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1960s, 1968, Drama, Thriller,

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Face of the Screaming Werewolf (1964)

Experimenting in hypnotic regression to past lives, Dr. Edmund Redding of the Cowan Institute in Pasadena has discovered that Ann Taylor is a reincarnated Aztec woman. Via her recovered memories, she is able to lead Redding and his associates to a hidden chamber in the Great Pyramid of Yucatan, where they hope to find the lost treasure of the Aztecs. Instead, they find two mummified bodies - one of a modern man, quite dead, and the other of an ancient Aztec, quite alive. They are able to return safely to Pasadena with both finds, but a rival professor, Janney, kills Redding and steals the body of the modern man-mummy. This he subjects to a resurrection experiment, which works - only the mummy proves to be a werewolf. This creature breaks free of Janney's lab. Meanwhile, a hired thief sent by Janney to steal the other, living mummy, is overcome and that creature escapes also. Two supernatural menaces roam the city that night...

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1960s, 1964, Horror,

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Cape Fear (1962)

Small-town lawyer Sam Bowden's life becomes torturous when Max Cady re-enters his life. Cady went to jail for 8 years after Bowden testified that Cady attacked a young woman. Now that Cady has been released, he begins to terrorize Bowden and his family, particularly targeting Bowden's daughter, Nancy. Initially, Cady uses his newfound knowledge of the law (learned in prison) to annoy the Bowdens, then poisons the family dog... Who's next ?

Later remade by Martin Scorcese, the original Cape Fear is one of the most unsettling thrillers to be released in a post Psycho Hollywood. Convicted felon Max Cady (Robert Mitchum) is released from prison and proceeds to stalk Sam Bowden (Gregory Peck), the lawyer who helped put him behind bars. At first the harassment is just annoying. Then the family dog is killed. Bowden soon finds out that Cady plans to take revenge on his family, and plans on committing a crime far worse than murder.

Though the remake is better in many ways, the original Cape Fear is far more stomach churning for one reason. This Max Cady is a child rapist. The movie all but spells out that Cady plans to take revenge on Bowden by raping his daughter, who in this film is a mere twelve years old. The film is full of unsettling scenes of Cady leering at the girl, glaring at her on a boat dock, following her to school, and eventually cornering her in a boathouse, his eyes filled with lust. That she is much younger here than in the remake, the threat against her is so much more sinister. Mitchum's performance as the pedophilic maniac is enough to make you feel dirty just by looking at him, and one of the many reasons this film is still very scary.

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1960s, Drama, Thriller,

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Witchcraft (1964)

Since the 17th Century when the Lanier's buried a Whitlock woman alive as a witch and took over the Whitlock estate, the Whitlocks have hungered for revenge. Against the wishes of both families, Amy Whitlock and Bill Lanier are planning on getting married. The Laniers have sent bulldozers onto the old Whitlock Estate to level the land for a construction project. Morgan Whitlock and his daughter Amy make a futile effort to stop the bulldozers that overturn headstones and churn up graves in the Whitlock Cemetery. That night, an overturned coffin opens and Vanessa Whitlock, the witch buried centuries ago, rises from the grave. Together with Morgan, they use their supernatural powers and soon, one-by-one, the Laniers meet with fatal accidents. Tracy Lanier follows Amy into the family crypt and is astonished to see Vanessa and her witches in weird supernatural rites.

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1960s, 1964, Horror,

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Scum of the Earth (1963)

Kim Sherwood is a young naive teenager who is asked by a friend to model for a shady photographer named Harmon. The photographer works for an unscrupulous businessman who is in league with a local Miami teenage gang in illegally selling photos of young girls in the nude being used and abused. When Kim wants out, the gangster Mr. Lang, blackmails her into staying on by using his strong-armed thugs to enforce order.

One of the earliest of "roughie" films of the 60s, this cheap Florida film about how nudie photographers lure innocent cuties to shed their clothes and morals is pretty dull with only brief flashes of H.G. Lewis' brand of low-grade brilliance. Acting that ranges from overwrought to amateurish plus static direction keeps this from being a good film but a vicious belt-whipping scene keeps it from being too timid with its seedy subject matter. Look for much of the cast of Lewis' classic film BLOOD FEAST in this.

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1960s, 1963, Drama, Thriller,

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