Hello!

I’d forgot this existed… way back in prehistoric times Tom Terrific was a cartoon feature on the Captain Kangaroo TV show. I was told I watched it religiously, apparently before I formed permanent memories of what I did and didn’t watch on TV. But around 1956, on Edwards Air Force Base, our primitive B&W TV received only two or three Los Angeles stations. I was up early to see the station ID test pattern, the one with the Indian. Then came the Today Show (I think), and then definitely some channel that showed silent Farmer Alfalfa cartoons.

The B&W Tom Terrific must have been designed to be watchable with the worst reception possible. If not exactly funny it was certainly cheerful. Seeing it again was a big surprise: it’s so primitive yet I think the animation is pretty good and creative, and I love the voice of Tom’s dog, ‘Mighty Manfred the Wonder Dog.’ Manfred isn’t malformed, it’s just an ‘in between’ frame, and he’s in the process of turning around.

Yes, you can see an episode of Tom Terrific at this Youtube site. Isn’t it about time for this cartoon masterpiece to be remastered in 8K with Atmos audio?

Advisor, authority and pull-Glenn-back-from-the-edge-of-subjournalistic-disaster friend Gary Teetzel sends along a short Rapid TV News blurb about a film library changing hands. The headline reads Cinedigm acquires Films Around The World content library. The short article lacks details but says that ‘150 Feature Films’ are involved.

At first this might not appear all that significant to us disc collectors — most of film history is held by companies and corporations that distribute very few of them, fewer all the time. This news raises interest because one of the companies owned by Cinedigm is The Film Detective, a Blu-ray boutique that CineSavant watches very carefully … just last Tuesday I touted some of their future releases.

The Film Detective has confirmed on Facebook that, yes, there will be Blu-ray releases coming from the deal.

Among the horror & sci-fi titles that Films Around The World distributed are: The Brute Man, The Flying Serpent, Strangler of the Swamp, The Devil Bat’s Daughter, Two Lost Worlds, Night Caller from Outer Space and several Todd Slaughter features. They used to distribute 1948’s Unknown Island, but according to Tom Weaver, Wade Williams bought it from them.

Many of the titles appear to be from PRC (Producer’s Releasing Corporation); Films Around The World also distributed several Edgar G. Ulmer movies and a couple of early noirs from Anthony Mann — Railroaded, Strange Impersonation. Image Entertainment put out many FATW titles on DVD, but the quality ranged from decent to dupey public domain stuff. Do better quality film sources still exist?

Rumors from a long time ago, held that the early inheritors of the PRC library may have made dupe negatives for television distribution, and then junked the 35mm vault materials. It would be nice to be corrected on this point, and discover that some of these features could be fully restored. In the case of Edgar G. Ulmer, good news would be especially welcome, for Arrianne Ulmer Cipes’ sake!

We’ve also always wanted to see a good version of Frank Wisbar’s Strangler of the Swamp, even if that horror film didn’t suddenly transform into a timeless classic. ↑  I always thought that The Cannon’s Group’s film Shy People by Andrei Konchalovsky played as if it were inspired by the Wisbar film (and its German original).

Could there exist better printing elements for Cinedigm and The Film Detective can access?  Crazier things have happened, and I’ll be eager to find out. We all need more reasons to stay alive.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

Yes, just for novelty’s sake, we have real disc announcements here at CineSavant today, some less than a hundred hours old!

This must be the day for The Film Detective. The disc boutique has been announcing and leaking upcoming disc news from the Wade Williams Collection, with the online film board help of Tom Weaver. We got a rather good Blu-ray of Giant from the Unknown back in December-January, with the hope that the other three Richard Cunha horror/sci-fi thrillers would follow.

But first, the word is that on June 20 TFD will release a Blu-of the 1951 Monogram thriller Flight To Mars, produced by Walter Mirisch and starring Cameron Mitchell and Marguerite Chapman. It’s the first of an unofficial trilogy, with Allied Artists’ later World Without End and Queen of Outer Space. All three share shots of the same swept-wing space rocket miniature.

The announcement touts a new 4K restoration made from the original 35mm Cinecolor separation negatives. That bodes well — as the show is from 1951 this ought to be the SuperCinecolor camera system and special process, which was also used on Invaders from Mars. Wade Williams’ DVD release looked pretty beat-up so we’re hoping for visual brilliance. The special edition will have video extras by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures.

According to Tom Weaver, Williams / Film Detective Frankenstein’s Daughter Blu-ray has encountered Covid-related delays. It is now expected to be released around Halloween. Other Wade Williams titles are “already in the pipeline.”

Meanwhile, I’ve received direct word that more Film Detective fantastic disc-ery is on the horizon, coming even earlier.

The epic sword-and-sandal adventure Hercules and the Captive Women is due to arrive on Blu-Ray & DVD from the company on April 13th, ‘with a stunning 4K restoration and exclusive special features.’ The original Italo title of the 1961 Vittorio Cottafavi movie is Ercole alla conquista di Atlantide, (Hercules Conquers Atlantis) and it stars Reg Park (Hercules in the Haunted World) and Fay Spain (Teenage Doll). In addition to extras from Daniel Griffith and Ballyhoo, this one will have a commentary by Tim Lucas.

Not everything is perfect — the disc will contain the American version released in 1963, presumably dubbed and with no Italian-language audio track. The original was seven minutes longer. Filmed in Super Technirama 70, in Italy the show was released in 70mm. I’m hoping for an early review on this one.

And finally, this Japanese NHK TV show might have turned up on your Facebook feed as well: It’s 3/11 – The Tsunami: The First 3 Days. Edited from on-the-spot NHK video coverage, the nicely produced docu tells the story from a generalized public-concern POV. It keeps saying that disturbing video is coming up, but they avoid the more violent video that I watched firsthand in 2011, where we witnessed what looked like people being swallowed up by the onrushing waves — on foot, in cars.

What we see is plenty disturbing anyway, all of it you-are-there reaction on the ground before, during and in the two days after the earthquake and tsunami. The scenes of rescue work are very moving, even simple shots of the Japanese evacuees in shelters. After waiting for over a day for any kind of emergency food they politely express gratitude instead of outrage or threats of lawsuits. It’s a really good show, I wish it were available in better visual quality.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

I know you’ve come here for the latest semi-recent news about new Blu-ray discs, restorations, old gossip, etc… but it’s desperation time I was inspired by my jaunt into the CineSavant Attic of Doom the other day, the one where I found the old Apocalypse Now program. I’ve been answering mail and having fun discussing that for more than two weeks now. So as a further demonstration of unrestrained self-interest look in at the world of not-so-impressive collecting, here’s a random assortment of goodies that I’ve kept for upwards 55 years. I’m too shy to splatter this stuff all over Facebook, so why do I post it here?  Only my analyst knows.

Everything was found in one dusty box. Above, from left to right we start with some Swedish money. Being ignorant, I Google-discovered that Sweden is in the European Union but hasn’t adopted the Euro yet. So I could be rich!  Next is my 1966 Mustang owner’s booklet, and it’s pretty grimy. My daughter has the car now; I’ll put it aside to give to her.   Then in two pieces is my original Draft Card issued in 1971. I didn’t tear it apart, it fell apart in my wallet.  Above and further right is one of those ‘Chick’ proselytizing comic books… being fascinated by propaganda, I tried to buy the whole set. I actually found my first on a bus stop bench… left there to spread the good word.  The Castle Films Box, which once held two minutes of wretched quality 8mm footage of the first Mercury launch, was found by my sister and mailed to me a few years back. I’ve got five or six original Castle boxes of monster movies … they had colorful covers.  And finally, one of my Editors’ Guild cards. Yes, I am an actual card carrying member of local 700.

Just above is a grouping of items that are at least tangentially movie-related. The black ‘You Are My Lucky Star’ Button was handed out in Westwood on the first day of the 1979 release of Alien. Fox must have already passed on that promotional tagline in favor of ‘In Space No One Can Hear You Scream,’ and were just getting rid of thousands of buttons that some (likely pink-slipped) publicity flack had ordered.  Next just above is my MGM security entrance card, which I palmed instead of turned in when I left the company. Actual corporate employees were escorted out, the old cardboard box ritual. Since I was a Guild contractee, I was able to slip back in for several days to grab up all the personal stuff in my editing room, which I should never have allowed to pile up. Imagine my surprise when the damn card stopped working!  They probably kept a security file with photos of me leaving with cart after cart of books, etc.

Moving to the right and just below is a News Clipping from 1970 or so; I got an award arranged by Ray Ussery at the Air Force Film and Photo installation at Norton AFB (chronicled here). I think the award was window dressing for the real award given to the great David L. Wolper. I have a photo of me being congratulated by Wolper but it’s so hideous it will remain under wraps. Most of the $2500 ended up being for film services I could never use, but the CFI Lab did indeed honor some promised credit there four years later.   Next over, the two little buttons on top. The second is just a memento of Ecuador, but the first is a Promo Button for the brief reissue of The Wicker Man around 1978. They organized the ad campaign around the pagan sun god. Nice little item, but just as with the Alien button, nobody could tell what it refers to.  The big green and red insignia shoulder patch was given to me by John Milius on 1941; he told us they were the Official Special Forces Patch designed for Apocalypse Now. Modelmaker Ken Swenson wore his but I didn’t have an appropriate jacket to put mine on. I never remember to look for the patch in the movie — maybe it was only something the movie crew wore.

The rubbish priceless mementos continue in the photo below.   The Bullet is a dummy, one of many that came in a leather ‘bandido’ style bullet belt that a girlfriend bought at the MGM Auction. The hole drilled in it was apparently to let crew people know it wasn’t real. The colorful Rising Sun Patch is of course from the movie 1941: I don’t know if a Japanese person would have found it offensive, then or now.   The Four Teeth were pulled all at once in 1972 by an Air Force doctor. As a starving student, I got onto Norton AFB with my expired parking pass and presented a note from my dentist spelling out the oral surgery I needed. The young military doctor noted I was 21 years old and no longer qualified for dependent military medical care. I stood up, but he said, ‘Can’t you take a joke? Sit down, kid.’ In about five minutes he yanked them all out like I never knew what hit me. God Bless the Air Force…  The Last Button is of course from the Cannon film with Dolph Lundgren.  And the Team Banzai Sticker is indeed from The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai. I think production personnel put them on their cars or something; I found a stack of them in editorial boxes of daily outs that I went through while working on the DVD release.

And finally I know you need to know everything about the famous Panama Hats, which are actually made in Ecuador. Relatives sent me two over time … the really fine and fancy high grade ones come unfinished and rolled up in balsa wood boxes like this. On 1941 costumer Ed Wynigear referred me to these two marvelous little men who worked way up in the loft in Western Costume on Melrose (long gone). They blocked it for me; in 1979 I couldn’t find anyone anywhere else who still knew how to block a hat. Very stylish!  The box says ‘Sombreros Finos Montecristi.’

But Wait — a real CineSavant column item did come in, thanks to friend Craig Reardon. On last week’s review for The Flame Barrier I asserted that the famous effects makeup man Dick Smith is consistently credited for a number of films he didn’t work on, where special mold appliance work was actually done by another, older makeup specialist with the same name, Dick or Richard Smith.  Craig found the proof in this page from a 1959 magazine. It looks like Famous Monsters to me.

The article even verifies that this 20th Fox-based Dick Smith worked for Ben Nye, on The Fly (1958) and The Alligator People (1959).  Yes, CineSavant is the place for meaningful information we all need to better navigate our daily lives.

(All images on this page enlarge when opened in a new window.)

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

Exciting discs to review today — and a new batch of discs came in so I can predict even more enthusiastic reviews up for the next few weeks.

→  This go-round we’ve got the equivalent of a book review via Dick Dinman’s DVD Classics Corner on the Air: Dick interviews author Jeremy Arnold about his latest Turner Classic Movies book TCM The Essentials Volume 2 — 52 More Must-See Movies and Why They Matter. No, they don’t run through the entire index but pick three movies each to discuss.

Colleague Jeremy Arnold just marked a COVID milestone on Facebook — last Friday March 6 was the one-year anniversary of ‘the night that everything shut down’ for him… and coincidentally me too. I also attended the first night of the NOIR CITY festival on March 6 2020, to see a pair of Argentinian noirs. The car radio on the way to the Egyptian Theater was already talking about the exploding infection rate, and simple habit kept us from turning back (our nights out are not frequent during the community college semester).

My wife and I hadn’t been in a big crowd in a while, and Noir City at the Egyptian is always a socially-fun mob scene. The psychological undertow that night was powerful: amid all those people, the theater suddenly felt like Germ City. When the break came we didn’t even stop for a drink, but instead went straight home…

… and like most everybody else that could, stayed home for this full year.

Just like Jeremy we haven’t been to a movie since, as is the case with most of the rest of the country. We’re fortunate in that for us relative isolation is practical — we both have work that can be done from home. Almost no in-person meetings for a full year. Last month I recorded a joint commentary remotely, with one participant in a studio and myself on a Zoom call. I most often ran into Jeremy at the Academy’s Margaret Herrick research library, which is now closed. No more commentaries for me until it reopens.

I once thought my parents had seen everything, that I’d never live through the world-altering disasters they had. Who would have predicted that I’d spend an entire year living like a gopher in the Erickson Burrow, watching these cascading health and political disasters unfold?  Yep, let’s hope that this time next year we’ll be wearing masks out of courtesy instead of fear, and that we’ll be seeing our loved ones in person again.

Stop worrying, because MGM has a new animated logo. I’m sure you’ve been waiting for this day as impatiently as I have, and it’s now up on YouTube. I’m told that, yes indeed, the lion is not CGI generated, which doesn’t mean that Leo hasn’t been put through a digital Cuisinart twenty or thirty times. You’ll also be happy to know that MGM has finally made Leo logo-friendly for viewers not educated in the classics: the age old motto is now translated.

Back at The Cannon Group promo director Liz Beckman designed a great jacket logo for our fearless Cannon Trailer Department, a parody of the MGM Logo with a slightly different motto: “Ars Gratia Pecunae.”   Look it up, Pilgrim!

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello Synthetic Flesh!

Everybody’s happy that even amid the pandemic, Warner Bros. is coming through with a new restored Blu of the Two-Color Technicolor Doctor X, a vintage horror thriller to follow up last year’s sensational restoration of the great Mystery of the Wax Museum. The same expert commentators and historians will be on board — Scott MacQueen, Alan K. Rode and a featurette I believe by Constantine Nasr. This disc will also contain a fully restored encoding of the alternate B&W version of Dr. X.. I don’t know the specific differences myself, but I have friends that prefer some elements in the B&W version.

The release date is less then sixty days away, in April. Here’s a good Video Attic interview with Scott MacQueen about the restoration: Exclusive on Doctor X At the end MacQueen mentions that his unit is working on Preston Sturges’ The Sin of Harold Diddlebock and William Dieterle’s All That Money Can Buy, aka The Devil and Daniel Webster.

Suddenly See More.

Just when the mailbox is growing cobwebs, new life springs upon the CineSavant doorstep. Some much-desired Blu-ray titles have arrived and we’re jumping on new reviews. Besides the three above from Kino and The Warner Archive, we’ve got writing going on a pair of Powerhouse Indicator titles… and if the robo-mail ‘delivery imminent’ messages I’ve been getting are true, February’s Viavision [Imprint] titles will soon be crossing the CineSavant threshold as well. Thanks very much for all the notes in reaction to reviews and the ‘image of the day’ at the top of the CineSavant page. I try to respond to every email.

The reader comments over on Trailers from Hell are another story. I’ve enjoyed over five years of great hosting but I still haven’t found out how to reliably respond to reader comments over there. Maybe that’s how it’s supposed to be… I get to say my piece, so I shouldn’t interfere with the comment process.

Gee, the warming weather outside almost but not quite permits going outside without shoes or socks, which to me is heaven. Being a California boy I subscribe to the Endless Summer theory of life. Have a great weekend!

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson