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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie Oleson" data-source="post: 388617" data-attributes="member: 8">Today it was a "the trouble with brothers" double feature.THE FINAL PROGRAMME (1973)[ATTACH=full]51068[/ATTACH]Protagonist Jerry Cornelius is the cocky dandy who also happens to be a renowned scientist, just like his father, the Nobel Prize winner who has developed a formula for some kind of immortality (I think). The formula, or programme, appears to be more topical than ever because the world is starting to crash under the pressure of WWIII. In fact, the world is about to end.Not much attempt has been made to make it look that way and overall there's no sense of dread or a high-stakes situation at all.A group of scientists contact Jerry in order to obtain a microfilm hidden in the Cornelius family mansion. The microfilm is needed to complete the Final Programme - the creation of a self-replicating hermaphrodite human being. Jerry is more interested in settling the score with his evil and deranged brother Frank who has entrenched himself in the mansion together with their sister Catherine.Catherine (played by Sarah Douglas) is constantly drugged by brother Frank and the whole situation kinda conjures up the idea of the Dragon who guards the princess in the castle.So, yes, it is beyond stupid (and to think that this was based on a novel) but I can't say that it's badly made. The actors play it as if they believe to be in that world, there's enough attention to dialogue and it just doesn't look as if it failed in whatever it attempted to be.Besides, I wasn't looking for a great story when I picked this film, I just wanted to be enterainingly outraged by something very cult-y. But I'm afraid that didn't happen.The few cool set designs are most unfortunately overshadowed by lots of tacky and unimaginative location scenes, the violence is almost non-existent and I also think there should have been much more nudity in it.Jerry wants to buy napalm from a man called Shades and this Shades thinks that pinball machines are part of a conspiracy. It's probably the best scene in the whole film and it also made me wonder what a filmmaker like Ken Russell would have done with The Final Programme.I'm glad I've watched it and I think it's memorable enough, but it wasn't the leave-no-stone-unturned cult extravaganza I had hoped for.PARANOIAC (1963)[ATTACH=full]51069[/ATTACH]The title shown in the film itself doesn't have the exclamation mark.This story starts with a memorial service instead of a funeral, and it turns out that the wealthy Ashbys were also survived by two sons and one daughter (who also spends a lot of time in her bedroom).The cruel and alcoholic son Simon Ashby (Oliver Reed) lives with his sister Eleanor and aunt Harriet in the family mansion and he's only three weeks away from coming into his inheritance. An inheritance he's reluctant to share with his sister but she's one of those frail types who could be institutionalized.The other brother has been dead for eight years, a suicide, so that wasn't going to be an issue.Until that very brother returns from the dead in a Philip Colby fashion (the church, Eleanor faints).Simon and Harriet think he's an impostor and that's true, he is an impostor who's in cahoots with the son of the family notary.Later it is revealed that Simon and Harriet knew   he was an impostor because they knew what really happened to son Anthony Ashby.The film feels a bit rushed and it also suffers from that typical Hammer hysterical melodrama, and I think this could have been a great story if they had focused on one particular angle rather than throwing everything into the mix.The characters are one-dimensional and only defined by what they say or do, and it strongly undermines the tragedy of the family secret.The PSYCHO style skeleton in the closet looks unintentionally hilarious. It's a good one for a remake and I would rewrite it as a whodunnit murder mystery, with some additional family members or associates.The only person who (pretends to) believe the impostor is the one who knows for sure that the original is dead, died by his or her hands.But when the body of the impostor turns up dead does that mean we're dealing with one and the same killer? Etc.</blockquote>

Verification: What month follows July?