Hello!

I must admit that I was pleased when my discussion of the missing American-International movies (CineSavant Column 8/24/19) got some good things going, primarily two terrific Greenbriar Movie Shows articles, on September 2 (“American-International This Week – Exploitation Brought To a 50’s Boil – Part One”) and September 5 (“Round Two for Jim-Sam: AIP Time For Whatever Turned a Dime”).

The whole shebang was begun by a web board hint that some of the Sam Arkoff-owned A.I.P. titles might be on their way to Blu-ray. Well, correspondent ‘woggly’ aka ‘B’ found a legit announcement about Shout! Factory TV that lists a few Arkoff titles soon to be on that service. (So I haven’t betrayed any confidences.) ‘B’ saw the following Roger Corman-directed titles mentioned: Day The World Ended, Machine Gun Kelly, Rock All Night, Sorority Girl and The Undead.

It’s a helluva list. One genuine Sci-fi classic (Lori Nelson, Touch Connors!), one classic gangster romp (Charles Bronson, Susan Cabot, Barboura Morris!), one kooky horror oddity (Pamela Duncan, Allison Hayes!), one jukebox crime opus (Dick Miller, Abby Dalton!) and one psycho sorority meller (Susan Cabot, Dick Miller, Barboura Morris!).

The upshot of this is this … is it irresponsible to surmise that some or all of those particular Arkoff AIP’s might be among the titles hinted to possibly be coming out on Blu-ray?  CineSavant doesn’t mind stirring up rumors like this, if my guesses are based on legit information available to others. Shout! Factory can always clip my wings if I’m wrong, and they shouldn’t mind the publicity.

I went to that Shout! Factory TV link, and saw a ‘Roger Corman Classics’ festival mentioned… and with a little poking around, stumbled onto a free live stream of Day the World Ended. It looks to be be in widescreen, if not full SuperScope.

That 1955 sci-fi title seems doubly relevant right now, ’cause the demolition boys have just finished leveling the old Sportsmen’s Lodge out on Ventura Boulevard in the Valley, prime Raymond Chandler country. I was tipped off long ago that some shots for the pond scenes in Day the World Ended were filmed in the Lodge’s restaurant pool — during the quiet time in the afternoon! If that’s true, late lunchers and busboys may have witnessed Lori Nelson menaced by Paul Blaisdell’s monster.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson