Scarecrow-88
Despite being 50% Country music concert film, this debacle which is a sad swan song for the likes of Basil Rathbone and Lon Chaney, Jr. (John Carradine somehow continued on into the 70s without missing a beat) has everything from a giant gorilla (pet to Chaney, Jr.) to espionage/counter-espionage criminal shenanigans (Rathbone, Chaney, Jr., and Carradine are in cahoots with Linda Ho's Chinese agent, Madame Wong to steal an atomic formula). This follows Ferlin Husky and Joi Lansing, country singers headed to Nashville along with their agent, Don Bowman, who happen upon cops shooting it out with mobsters (!), literally in the path of gunfire! Nonetheless the trio drive into a desolate ghost town, needing a place to rest until a storm (and night) blows over, and the gas station attendant tells them of the Beaugard mansion which could provide just that…what the attendant fails to tell them (it just kinda slips through his mind until the very moment they scat!) is that the mansion is supposedly haunted! So you have Husky as Woody Wetherby, Joi as Boots Malone, and Bowman as Jeepers (yes, Bowman's name is Jeepers), finding their way to the mansion, doing a run-through when not going into musical interludes. Our villains have added bedsheet ghosts and bat managed by wires, a werewolf mask on a dummy in the closet, and creepy sound effects to hopefully give the "invading hicks" the jolts, figuring once they realized this mansion was seriously haunted they'd hit the bricks…well, they don't get the point. So you have the gorilla snatching Boots, taking her to the secret room where the villains are hiding (they have equipment, like monitors to spy on areas of the house and grounds outside, telephone to keep in touch with their Chinese contact and provide the atomic formula, and controls to set off their haunted tricks), while Woody and Jeepers try to look around the house to find her. Soon an agent for the US government (they could only afford one, I guess), Jim Meadows (Richard Webb) comes looking for the enemy agents as well. Joining forces with Woody and Jeepers, Meadows will embark on a rescue mission and also hope to capture the villains. Chaney, Jr. has an Iron Maiden he'd like to imprison Boots in, but it seems all the spikes have been removed so all it could do was hold her inside (but with what I never determined). There's a scene where Rathbone and Carradine decipher Boots Malone's (believing she's a spy against them) name…that's kind of the microcosm of the comedy you get with this "film". I won't even try to go around the obvious no matter if there were times I enjoyed myself: this is a turkey in every shape and form. It gives way to a final thirty minutes of country music jamboree, for heaven's sake…for country music fans of the old school, this might be a fascinating curio (it even has Merle Haggard sing a couple songs). But for us horror fans of the great icons of the genre, this is a rather unfortunate example of what the industry was doing to them…this is what the likes of Rathbone, Chaney, Jr. and Carradine were subjected to. Not long before this Lugosi was treading in the excrement of Ed Wood, while Karloff was trying to maintain any semblance of credibility with Corman. Some will undoubtedly find reason to enjoy just seeing the icons together, but watching Rathbone trapped in a bedsheet, scrambling on the floor as Husky tries to wrangle him is a rather pitiful sight. Chaney, Jr. gets into his labcoat, with his badge, but neither is really needed as he enters an office complex (I reckon this was supposed to be a top secret atomic outpost, but only the janitor and one more suit are in the whole building which isn't even highly guarded!), gets the "formula" (later to be determined as a trick), and escapes without a hitch! At least the house of the film is fun with all its cobwebs, rickety stairs, aged furnishings, and dilapidated conditions. The "hillbillys" of the film are engaging enough personalities, with Joi still blessed with impressive curves and bust (sadly, she'd succumb to breast cancer in the coming years, cutting her life and career short). For whatever reason, the idea of gorilla dated back to the 30s, an act that inexplicably didn't tire until perhaps the 60s before mercifully being extricated from the genre. There's bad continuity (day for night, or sunny, blue skies opposing the supposed thunderstorm brewing, is all screwy and this Civil War hat one and off Jeepers' head is noticeable in one scene), odd decision making (why would Chaney and Ho decide to just leave the three alive when they could easily dispose of them?), rough comedy (Rathbone mentioning how a trip to a dry climate would be good for his sinuses, the mentioned Boots Malone spy name decipher, anything with the gorilla), and country music infiltration providing ammunition for pundits to place this right in "worst film ever" lists. If anything, it *is* a candidate. Yarbrough, a veteran director of film and television, might have made this, but his career was thankfully long enough to survive with rep still somewhat intact.
bkoganbing
A generation earlier country music stars the most prominent of them being Gene Autry got an outlet in films as B western singing cowboys. The B western having gone the way of the dodo bird for country stars to make it on the big screen they would have to find other outlets.Hillbillies In A Haunted House was the second of two films that country singer Ferlin Husky made as the same character, country artist Woody Wetherby, the first being Las Vegas Hillbillies. This time he and girl friend Joi Lansing and brain dead roadie Don Bowman are on the way to Nashville and stop at what they think is a deserted mansion. What it is though is the headquarters of enemy agents after a rocket fuel formula. A woman runs this spy ring played by Linda Ho and her three henchmen are Basil Rathbone, John Carradine, and Lon Chaney, Jr. three players who have acquitted themselves well in the horror film genre.All I can say is that mixing country music with Gothic horror must have stunk up the drive-ins from Saskatchewan to Nashville. I don't recall this film ever making it to New York City, but just as well it didn't. Rathbone, Carradine, and Chaney have the satisfied look of players whose paychecks have just cleared the bank and they're going through the motions. The spies have a pet gorilla around also for what is no discernible reason I can fathom other than to give Joi Lansing something to scream at. Now for country music fans there are a few interludes of some of the top C&W artists of the day like Husky, Molly Bee, Merle Haggard, Sonny James, etc. In fact the last fifteen minutes of the film is just these singers on stage doing numbers with no real attempt to give them background. Fans of the sounds from Nashville did well here, but quite frankly on the whole the film sank like the Titanic.What a comedown for Rathbone, Carradine, and Chaney.
bensonmum2
Two country singers and their manager are on their way to Nashville when they decide to find a place to stop and spend the night. They find a deserted mansion that seems to nicely fit the bill. But this mansion may be haunted. And if it's not, it certainly is the hideout of a group of baddies up to no good. Will the country crooners make through the night to live their dreams in Music City? What do you get when you mix a supposed haunted house, loads of country music, aging horror icons, and some ridiculous attempts at humor? In the case of Hillbillys in a Haunted House, you get this mess of a movie. To begin with, the "haunted house" is about as threatening looking as my neighbor's house. And by the time the spooks show up, who cares? I know I had lost interest long before any ghost made an appearance. And could the country music be any more dull? If I weren't already a non-fan of country music, I certainly would be after watching this movie. As I watched, I really felt sorry for Carradine, Chaney, and especially Rathbone. To have to appear in a disaster like this. If it weren't for Joi Lansing, I would have turned Hillbillys in a Haunted House off about halfway through. It's that bad!
