We did get quite a lot of this type of Double Bill at the Cinema – certainly in the mid to late Fifties.  As we have seen, some of them were full of gimmicks to pull the customers in – we had 3D and Emergo then seats that gave us an electric shock – although really it was this sort of Poster that tended to sell the film to us.

Somehow they were cleverly able to lure us in and although time has passed since those days, I can still see why as looking at them I get a tinge of excitement. The Wasp Woman 1959

The Wasp Woman.

One of Film director Roger Cormans’ most beloved pictures and it is great fun. Nowadays it has become something of  a minor  classic. Roger  Corman regular Susan Cabot  plays Janice Starlin, a 40 year old cosmetics magnate who fears getting old. One day, she makes the acquaintance of mad scientist Eric Zinthrop.    He’s developed a serum, derived from wasp enzymes, that can restore youth to living things.      She insists that she be the first human guinea pig, with devastating results: she sometimes turns into a humanoid monster with a wasp head and hands, and seems  compelled to kill.

Beast from Haunted Cave 1959

Another one from Roger Corman. This  plot centres on a  group of gold-robbers who unwittingly run into trouble when they become stalked by a strange spider-like beast while hiding out  in the woods. This film has an  ending which is a  surprisingly effective climatic showdown with the monster which is certainly entertaining.

This is the scene ABOVE outside a Cinema in Sydney in the 50s.    At first I was looking at the programme with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis but also Copper Canyon supporting – this must have been in the early fifties because Dean and Jerry went their separate ways quite early in the decade – but then I became intrigued with WVDASCOPE screen which must only have been at this cinema – unless it was an Australian style I don’t know.

It is billed elsewhere as the ‘Giant WVDAscope’ screen.

Well, The Fly and Return of the Fly really need no introduction to film fans.

Another Double Bill ABOVE – Featured on the front cover of Radio Times

Even a Triple Bill ABOVE  – ‘The Astounding She Monster’ dates from 1957 and is billed in England as ‘The Mysterious Invader’