According to John Carr himself, at first this movie was not finished. Then, some portions of the filmed materials were incorporated in the "Night Train to Terror" anthology. After that, Carr left USA for England for a time. When he came back to the USA he was amazed to find that the producers made a "complete" version of his movie, using almost all the materials filmed. This version was released on VHS as "Scream Your Head Off". Later, John Carr decided to finish his movie and shot new sequences with John Philip Law (noticeably older) and incorporated Marilyn Monroe (played by Francine York) in the story. This last (?) version is the one known as "Marilyn Alive and Behind Bars", "completed" in 1992. In résumé, there are THREE versions of this movie: - 1) one as a segment of "Night Train to Terror" - 2) the illegitimate version, "Scream Your Head Off" (in VHS only) - 3) Marilyn Alive and Behind Bars. Apparently, during the first shooting some scenes were filmed twice, with girls more or less clothed. The nude version of these scenes was shown in "Night Train to Terror". It also seems that some shots in "Night Train to Terror" were gorier than the "Marilyn" version. But it COULD have been specially filmed material by the producers of "Night Train to Terror", as it was made for the two other movies "cannibalized": "Cataclysm", and "Death Wish Club". Special sequences involving SPFX were filmed when abridged versions of these two movies were included in "Night Train to Terror".
3 Reviews
THE NIGHT TRAIN KEPT A ROLLING!
BandSAboutMovies15 October 2021
Warning: Spoilers
First off, that 1992 that this was made? That's a misnomer. Much like Terror, Sexo Y Brujeria, this movie was partially made years before and then finished a decade or more later. And you've seen it before. And the fact that this movie was actually finished makes me overjoyed beyond belief.
Yes, Marilyn Alive and Behind Bars is really Scream Your Head Off, which was started by director John Carr and writer Philip Yordan in the early 80s. And yes, you guessed it, it was one of the segments in the infamous Night Train to Terror, a movie that has obsessed me enough to write about it more than a few times (example a and example b). While it was an unfinished film, it somehow had enough footage to make it into that bonkers anthology and even be released as its own standalone movie, which is probably all the proof you need to know just how much content needed to be out there for the dual-headed beast that was the video rental and nascent cable industry.
So even though this movie was already somewhat released twice - and shot twice, as there were nude and non-nude versions of some scenes - Carr decided to go back, grab Danger: Diabolik star John Philip Law despite the fact that he looks much older than he did in 1981 and make the movie that he always intended to film.
He also got Francine York (Secret File: Hollywood) to play Marilyn Monroe, who has been kept in an asylum for thirty years.
Obviously, the sheer weirdness of Night Train does not go away when you break it down into smaller parts.
Anyways...
Harry Billings (Law) was driving home with his new wife when he got sideswiped and she died, which leads to him sleeping barefoot on her grave. He tries to jump off a bridge on the very same road where this accident happened and gets brought to the asylum of Dr. Brewer (Arthur Braham, whose only other role is the mad scientist in the adult movie scenes within another Night Train component, Gretta AKA Death Wish Club AKA The Dark Side to Love), who uses his assistant Otto (Richard Moll, who has hair in one segment of Night Train and does not in this story) to abduct women and do whatever it is that evil geniuses do to ladies. And in that movie, that would be lobotomies and white slavery.
Oh yes, I neglected to mention that this movie willy nilly leaps from film footage to SOV back to film not caring about mixed media or taking you, the viewer, out of the experience.
The doctor also has a female partner, Dr. Fargo (Sharon Ratcliff, who only did this film), who has made a deal with an Arabic suit-wearing man to take all of the mind erased women and sell them to some harem on the other much more evil side of the world.
And then, after he himself is mind-wiped to serve as their slave, Harry finds Marilyn, who has been kept in a room filled with posters of herself and given to saying long moments of exposition: "The story they told me here was, when the studio dropped my contract, I was signed by an independent company to do a film. I didn't know that it was owned by powerful people! They never intended to make the film! They insured my life for millions of dollars, and then they murdered a lookalike Marilyn Monroe, and left her in my bedroom!"
Of course, she could just be an insane woman in a mental asylum who thinks she's Marilyn, but every time Harry steals away a new blonde for the evil powerful people, he stops in, visits her and falls in love. Most of the movie is Harry going to comical lengths to kidnap blondes, who are then electrocuted and then he goes back to try to woo the most famous blonde of all time. That's a lot of blondes.
I mean, this is a movie in which John Philip Law goes to church and doses a believer right in the midst of mass, then takes her back to the asylum.
This movie is a mess, packed with continuity, time lapse, sound quality, film to video and just plan weird errors. Yet it has moments of great fun, like Marilyn's long soliloquies and Moll looking through jars of decapitated heads, including one that has Harry's name on it just waiting for him to screw up.
Now, my quest will take me to find the VHS version of Scream Your Head Off, but even then, I don't feel like I'll ever get off the Night Train.
Yes, Marilyn Alive and Behind Bars is really Scream Your Head Off, which was started by director John Carr and writer Philip Yordan in the early 80s. And yes, you guessed it, it was one of the segments in the infamous Night Train to Terror, a movie that has obsessed me enough to write about it more than a few times (example a and example b). While it was an unfinished film, it somehow had enough footage to make it into that bonkers anthology and even be released as its own standalone movie, which is probably all the proof you need to know just how much content needed to be out there for the dual-headed beast that was the video rental and nascent cable industry.
So even though this movie was already somewhat released twice - and shot twice, as there were nude and non-nude versions of some scenes - Carr decided to go back, grab Danger: Diabolik star John Philip Law despite the fact that he looks much older than he did in 1981 and make the movie that he always intended to film.
He also got Francine York (Secret File: Hollywood) to play Marilyn Monroe, who has been kept in an asylum for thirty years.
Obviously, the sheer weirdness of Night Train does not go away when you break it down into smaller parts.
Anyways...
Harry Billings (Law) was driving home with his new wife when he got sideswiped and she died, which leads to him sleeping barefoot on her grave. He tries to jump off a bridge on the very same road where this accident happened and gets brought to the asylum of Dr. Brewer (Arthur Braham, whose only other role is the mad scientist in the adult movie scenes within another Night Train component, Gretta AKA Death Wish Club AKA The Dark Side to Love), who uses his assistant Otto (Richard Moll, who has hair in one segment of Night Train and does not in this story) to abduct women and do whatever it is that evil geniuses do to ladies. And in that movie, that would be lobotomies and white slavery.
Oh yes, I neglected to mention that this movie willy nilly leaps from film footage to SOV back to film not caring about mixed media or taking you, the viewer, out of the experience.
The doctor also has a female partner, Dr. Fargo (Sharon Ratcliff, who only did this film), who has made a deal with an Arabic suit-wearing man to take all of the mind erased women and sell them to some harem on the other much more evil side of the world.
And then, after he himself is mind-wiped to serve as their slave, Harry finds Marilyn, who has been kept in a room filled with posters of herself and given to saying long moments of exposition: "The story they told me here was, when the studio dropped my contract, I was signed by an independent company to do a film. I didn't know that it was owned by powerful people! They never intended to make the film! They insured my life for millions of dollars, and then they murdered a lookalike Marilyn Monroe, and left her in my bedroom!"
Of course, she could just be an insane woman in a mental asylum who thinks she's Marilyn, but every time Harry steals away a new blonde for the evil powerful people, he stops in, visits her and falls in love. Most of the movie is Harry going to comical lengths to kidnap blondes, who are then electrocuted and then he goes back to try to woo the most famous blonde of all time. That's a lot of blondes.
I mean, this is a movie in which John Philip Law goes to church and doses a believer right in the midst of mass, then takes her back to the asylum.
This movie is a mess, packed with continuity, time lapse, sound quality, film to video and just plan weird errors. Yet it has moments of great fun, like Marilyn's long soliloquies and Moll looking through jars of decapitated heads, including one that has Harry's name on it just waiting for him to screw up.
Now, my quest will take me to find the VHS version of Scream Your Head Off, but even then, I don't feel like I'll ever get off the Night Train.
This is Not a PG-13 Rated Film...
CMRKeyboadist13 January 2007
I really don't know where IMDb got its information from. For one, this movie was never officially released. I have a copy of the movie that would appear to be a straight bootleg of the work print. It is to bad that this movie does not have an actual release as it is a pretty fun story. Also, IMDb says something about Marilyn Monroe being in this story, Monroe has absolutely nothing to do with this movie.
Basically, a man kills his wife by accident in a car wreck. When he awakens from the wreck he is in an asylum. The asylum is controlled by two nuts that sell human beings and body parts to over seas byers. Richard Moll plays a crazed orderly that likes to chop up his victims.
Unfortunately, this movie is rather discombobulated. This simply has to do with the fact that the movie was never actually released. As a result, we get horrible editing and horrible sound. But this doesn't take away from the movie, as the film is rather fun and filled with violence and nudity. I would suggest watching the movie Night Train to Terror to basically see an extremely long trailer for the movie (those of you that have seen that movie, know what I am talking about).
If you can find a copy of this movie I would suggest picking it. Remember, if you do find a copy of it, it is going to be a bootleg most likely. 7/10
Basically, a man kills his wife by accident in a car wreck. When he awakens from the wreck he is in an asylum. The asylum is controlled by two nuts that sell human beings and body parts to over seas byers. Richard Moll plays a crazed orderly that likes to chop up his victims.
Unfortunately, this movie is rather discombobulated. This simply has to do with the fact that the movie was never actually released. As a result, we get horrible editing and horrible sound. But this doesn't take away from the movie, as the film is rather fun and filled with violence and nudity. I would suggest watching the movie Night Train to Terror to basically see an extremely long trailer for the movie (those of you that have seen that movie, know what I am talking about).
If you can find a copy of this movie I would suggest picking it. Remember, if you do find a copy of it, it is going to be a bootleg most likely. 7/10
See also
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