Daydream Notes

 So in my "long day's journey into emotional sterility" I watched a few 70s disaster films. In 1975, Jaws became the first blockbuster of a young Stephen Spielberg, and the Jaws-like subgenre was a kind of disaster film, except one where the disaster had intention.  Rob Hill  of the Bad Movie Bible has you covered if you want to know more. For Spooky Halloween, I thought I'd do another favorite...horror? film of mine, which is definitely a disaster: the Swarm, from 1978.  The Swarm is about swarms of angry killer bees, and it was directed by Irwin Allen, the producer/director of The Poseidon Adventure and The Towering Inferno.  In fact, the cast and crew are all recognizable names, especially if you know period disaster films. It stars Michael Caine as a  heroic entomologist,  Dr. Bradford Crane, and in the first sentence of description, it has already gotten silly. This movie is basically an alien invasion film, where the aliens were replaced by bees...

The movie opens with two Frenchmen in a swamp who've just escaped prison. One is played by Lionel Barrymore, and for readers of these words he is Drew Barrymore's Grandfather? Great-Grandfather? A famous actor of the day, most seen today in It's a Wonderful Life (1947) where he plays Mr. Potter, and if you want to pretend Paul Lavond is Mr. Potter a bit earlier in life, be my guest. Anyway, Frenchmen escaping swamp prison. Paul spent 17 years in that hell, done in by shitty business partners who framed him. Paul also makes it clear he is fueled by hate. He might literally say that; he spent 17 years in Prison, and he's out for vengeance. His accomplice, Marcel, stayed alive with the hope of continuing some nonspecific work. Cut to: a swamp There's a line slipped in that they've given the police the slip 'for weeks' but you could be forgiven for thinking this was the same swamp. It could be the same swamp. Paul and Marcel get to Marcel's swamp shack, ...