Should Past Life Perils Be Forgot? Not If They Involve "The Undead"- Tonight!

Tonight on MeTV- we wind up our 2023 movie schedule by going back in time-when a psychic researcher uses hypnosis to send a young woman to one of her earlier lives in the past- where she encounters love, witchcraft, and possibly the executioner’s axe- in “The Undead”!

This 1957 Roger Corman film plays off the ‘50s fascination with reincarnation (stemming from the book “The Search for Bridey Murphy”, which we’ll tell you about during our show). We meet Quintus, a psychic researcher, whose time in Tibet convinced him that people have indeed had past lives. He thinks he has refined techniques to allow them to visit those lives, and “recruits” Diana Love, a young “lady of the evening”, to be the subject of his experiment, under the careful observation of his former professor. Using hypnosis, Quintus will send Diana’s consciousness to one of her previous lives.

After many hours, keeping the woman in a trance- Quintus, through a mental bond established via his hypnotism with her, finds he has succeeded! Diana is now back in her past life as Helene, a young woman in the Middle Ages, imprisoned for allegedly being a witch and sentenced to execution for her supposed witchcraft. Amazingly, perhaps as a form of self-preservation, her future self sends her a message, encouraging her to escape- which she does! She ends up enlisting the help of Smolkin, a gravedigger who, ironically, is said to be one of the very people she has been accused of enchanting!

None of this is good news to the real witch responsible- the sultry Livia. Her main objective is to replace Helene as the love of a gallant knight, Pendragon- so it is imperative for her to make sure that Helene is taken out of the equation. The shape-shifting Livia and her familiar, an imp (no relation to our Ignatius Malvolio Prankenstein), go to work trying to keep Pendragon away for his true love through lies and schemes- culminating in major play for him at the witches’ Sabbath- which involves Satan himself!

However, other opposing forces play into the proceedings- Meg Maud, a sorceress enemy of Livia’s, and even Quintas himself! Having realized he may be endangering Helen’s future by changing her past, he uses his psychic bond with her to travel back in time himself! Will Helene survive-or fall victim to Livia’s association with the devil- and -will Quintas make history- or change it?

We’ll tell you about how this movie came about and evolved, and, of course, talk about the cast- which includes bombshell Allison Hayes of “Attack of the 50 Foot Woman”, as well as famed little person actor Billy Barty as her personal imp. Watch for a cameo by beloved character actor Dick Miller of “Bucket of Blood” and countless other films! Plus- we see the time when Toony the Tuna first campaigned to host a horror movie as “Sventoonie”! We’ll give you the word on a vintage record offer, which does NOT include this week’s song from Doug and yours truly- get a visit from our own Imp-and bring back some fun past experiences (no hypnotism needed) including the time I shared the stage with the one and only Elvira!!

“The Undead” (originally titled “The Trance of Diana Love”) airs tonight on MeTV at 8 pm eastern/pacific, 7 central. Should you need help finding what time we run – and on what channel- where you are, please your local listings or visit www.metv.com . Viewers on Twitter will wind up this year’s live-Tweeting during our show, and you can join in- using the hashtag #svengoolie. Chicago area viewers get an encore of the horror comedy “The Black Cat” at 11 am on CW26.

In the event that you have some gift money burning a hole in your coffin- or didn’t get the Sven swag you were hoping for- make sure you check out our store in the MeTV Mall! You can find the new Sven Squad merchandise, the variety of new Sven bumper stickers, and lots of our perennially best-selling t shirts and items!

Of course, as we wind down 2023, we want to thank you all for helping to make this a memorable and successful year- and wish you a happy, healthy, successful New Year- with the hope that you will be spending a lot of it with us!

Join us tonight to close out the old year with a visit to a year deep in the past-and see who will make it back to the present!