Before Raiders - Dr. Jones & The Magic Coin

If you're an old geek, you might remember some movies that presaged later big hits. For example, when the first Terminator movie came out, a lot of us saw echoes of Cyborg 2087 - an old Michael Rennie flic wherein he plays a cyborg sent back from a dystopian future on a mission of murder while pursued through time by a pair of 'terminator' (Tracer) cyborgs seeking to prevent him from changing the future.

Terminator was a very different movie, but felt familiar nonetheless.

Today i'm thinking about another old movie i loved in younger days (and still very much enjoyed when viewing it again recently). A couple of decades before Raiders Of The Lost Ark hit the theatres, but several years after the events within the film...

Dr. Jones is using his knowledge of ancient languages to translate the markings on an archeological find - a strange coin held by a religious statue uncovered on a dig. He finds that the coin is a magic artifact, which he's accidentally activated with his blood. It can be used to painfully incapacitate with a gesture, or kill with a gesture and a word (the name of the ancient god). It can even slow the passage of time with "the power of retarded movement".

He tries to tell the Pentagon about the coin's power, but that goes about as well as one might expect. However - enemy agents learn of its existence and Jones must use the power of the coin to protect himself, his country, and one who maybe his new-found love.

Sound like an Indiana Jones movie?

This movie, however, was a romantic comedy first, adventure film second.

That's Jonathan Jones. The movie changed it to Professor Jones from the original Doctor Jones in the book. To an oddnik like myself, it's a treasure - both book and movie, though those, too, are quite different from each other.

This was the movie that first taught me the name William Castle, and that he made films. From the opening frames, he was subverting expectations. The classic Columbia Pictures logo which opened their films was portrayed by an live actress...

 ...with Castle himself sitting in his director's chair looking on...

And then he stood...

Zotz!
And so it began - already flying off the rails before even getting to the title.

Those who remember Tom Poston today rarely remember him back in his leading man days. He's better (and fondly) remembered as George Utley, the handyman of the Stratford Inn on Newhart back in the '80s. (Oddly enough, years later in '01 he married Suzanne Pleshette, who play Bob Newhart's wife on the show. But i digress...)
You might also know him from scores of other roles over the half century of his career. He worked continuously up until his death a dozen years ago. But here (and in the picture above) he's playing Johnathan Jones, eccentric college professor and expert in ancient and archaic languages. And wielder of mystic power.

Poston was joined by Julia Meade as his romantic interest (and inevitable damsel in distress) with a supporting cast that included such familiar notables as Jim Bacchus, Margaret Dumont, Fred Clark, and Cecil Kellaway.

Since the movie has been released on Blu Ray, i won't go all spoilery into the plot. At least, not any more than i already did in the quick summary above. The film keeps a light, slightly off-kilter, comedy tone throughout - even through kidnappings and looming death. To some extent, the characters and situations feel like Kurt Russell's Disney flics of a decade later. One could easily think some scenes might have been lifted directly out of some unseen Dexter Riley movie if this film hadn't come first.

Let me pause to note how much i enjoyed the bubbly jazz music as the society party descends into chaos. Bernard Green did a mighty fine job with the soundtrack. (Enough to make me look to see who did it)

The special effects are simple but generally effective. The power to slow movement is cleverly used at times, and perhaps cruelly at other times. But he doesn't usually drink. (Well - sauerkraut juice...)

It's a fun little film that's stuck with me over the decades, and one of the very few 'special powers' movies in those days so long before comic book heroes ruled Hollywood. (Ever see George Hamilton in The Power - about a war between telekinetics?)
It's worth catching if you enjoy them old black & white films.

The book was very different. (Not the 'worth catching' part - it's an old favorite, too.)

Before we get into that - let's talk about the people who wrote it - Walter Karig, a naval officer who wrote battle reports like Asia's Good Neighbor and War In The Pacific; Carolyn Keene, author of 3 of the first 10 Nancy Drew novels; Detective novelist Keats Partick; Mystery author Clinton W. Locke; and...

oh,wait. Never mind.

The book was written by Walter Karig.

Captain Walter Karig, U.S. Navy, in Honolulu, one year after Zotz! was published.

He's all those other people, too. Along with Julia K. Duncan and maybe some other authors as well.

What exists as a brief diversion in the movie to trigger the story's 'big bad' antagonists is actually the main focus of the book. Part of Karig's time in the Navy was spent in the USN's Public Information Office and, drawing upon that experience, the book was a wicked satire on both the bureaucracy of the government and the nature of people.

The book takes place during World War II, and Jones spends most of the book trying to penetrate the system so he might be able to end the war with his (partially different) powers. But - Spoiler! Select the parenthetically demarcated area to read:
(By the time he finally gets through the layers of government to be actually able to do something, the war has already ended.
In a very different ending from the movie, he waits - exterminating cockroaches to keep in practice for the next war... )

stills from Zotz! (1962)