Hello!

No April Fool nonsense here!  Gary Teetzel has an urgent message for all Real Americans:

Do you ever find yourself lying awake at night, pondering: “Gee, the Creature from the Black Lagoon is a great monster, but I wonder what his internal organs looked like?” Well now, at long last, that burning question can be answered. In the tradition of the old ‘Visible Man’ and ‘Visible Woman’ model kits from the ’60s and ’70s, visionary plastic model kit makers now bring us a new, improved Visible Creature.   Experts agree that it appears to be a translucent version of the old Aurora kit with visible pink guts n’ stuff added. Highly educational, we’re sure.

Boy, I can remember being wide-eyed at the sight of tall stacks of the original Aurora monster models at the hobby store, in those long boxes with the sensational color art — the boxes weren’t even shrink wrapped. The first four were Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolf Man and The Mummy, but I believe The Creature followed fairly quickly. It was a favorite, even though the first thing we did was cut away the little plastic teeth someone had added to it. The kits originally cost 99¢ apiece … the cost for the new Gill Man kit ought to include tartar sauce, a lemon wedge and a side of scallops.

Our only question about this new model kit — do The Gill Man’s newly-revealed internal organs include a pair of unused lungs, as per the third film in the original trilogy?  That, and how could they overlook the internal organs of the fat lizard sitting behind on a slimy rock?  We don’t want a class-action lawsuit about species discrimination, later on.

And Joe Dante forwards a link to the best-quality image I’ve yet seen, of one of the most historically significant political Television Spots of all time:  “Daisy,”  the controversial 1964 Lyndon Johnson Presidential campaign ad.

A full accounting of the ad is at Wikipedia. I remember being shocked by it at age 12, and hearing my father say, right then and there, that the anti-Goldwater ad will win the election for Johnson. They say it was only aired once, so I’m not sure I saw its initial broadcast — The Wiki article says it was replayed on the news, so maybe my exact memory has warped over time.

Even in the ’80s when editing TV commercials, I heard ad men talking about it — it was created by Madison Avenue and considered by many to be ‘cheating’ on a mass scale: Using national media for propaganda to influence an election — Democracy is doomed.  We’re certainly glad that never happened again.

In the year of Dr. Strangelove, when awareness of the close call of the Cuban Missile Crisis was fully understood, this TV spot was a powderkeg, a “turning point in political and advertising history.”  The Wiki article has a lot of interesting detail, saying that the “Goldwater = Nukes equation” came in through Johnson’s press secretary Bill Moyers.

“These are the stakes!  To make a world in which all of God’s children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other, or we must die.”  Johnson’s Texas twang makes for an incredible sound bite. The Daisy spot may have been 100% propaganda, but I wish we were being inundated by Public Service Spots applying awesome voicovers like this to the issues of guns and Global Warming.

Mr. Moyers is a hero, I hope he’s doing well. Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

Here’s an ancient, very good article unearthed by Gary Teetzel in a 1923 issue of ‘The Motion Picture Studio,’ written by none other than the better half of the Hitchcock legend, Alma Reville. Her piece Cutting and Continuity is a thoughtful lesson in basic editorial sense. She makes a good good case for editing as an art.

This second Alma Reville- related article, from a 1925 ‘The Picturegoer’ is a profile piece that explains Ms. Reville’s impressive career rise, before meeting Alfie. Reading Alma in Wonderland we become convinced that she was irreplaceable for helping Hitchcock as well. The article makes mention that she has recently worked with Hitch, and then concludes by noting that she has never had time to get married. According to the IMDB, they got officially ‘hitched’ one year later.

As part of its April Tribute to Warner Bros. on the studio’s 100th Anniversary, Turner Classic Movies has released its special screening lineup, which reveals some genuine goodies.

On Monday, April 3, a screening of a newly remastered  Helen of Troy  by Robert Wise, and a screening of a remastered (rescued from oblivion, actually) Safe in Hell by William Wellman. →

Monday April 10, has an all-evening Hammer gala, including the remastered (in 2020) The Curse of Frankenstein.

Friday, April 14 brings a remastered (hooray!) The Land of the Pharaohs by Howard Hawks. This ought to be a revelation. Its stereophonic soundtrack was one of scores of titles rescued in the 1990s by WB special projects producer Michael Arick.  ↑  I wish the reader who keeps telling me to spell the possessive for Howard Hawks as Hawks’s could see the above ad . . . although he’d probably tell me the ad is wrong.

Other remasters: Howard Hawks’ Rio Bravo (Monday April 17); Paul Newman’s Rachel, Rachel (Friday April 21); Elia Kazan’s East of Eden.

Two other ‘remastered’ re-premieres are 1941’s The Strawberry Blonde, 1951’s Storm Warning and 1953’s A Lion in the Streets, which has prompted disc-watchers to predict that Helen of Troy and Land of the Pharaohs will also be along soon from the Warner Archive.

TCM will hit all the studio’s ‘big’ titles, including scores of interesting-sounding short subjects and a great many celebrity-driven video pieces on filmmakers and performers.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

Our first entry on this hopefully-dry California day comes from the dependable Gary Teetzel, who is always on the prowl for anything Karloff-related. A YouTube poster named Gino Cuddy has loaded up an entire old filmed celebrity quiz show from 1941,  Information Please! with Boris Karloff.

This certainly feels rare to us. We’re told that the RKO quiz short was based on a radio show. Some visual clues are added to make it more suitable for the movies. It’s unusual to see extended footage of Boris ‘out of character’ from this period in his career. He doesn’t do particularly well in the quiz, but the final answer he gives is rather appropriate given his screen image. One of the ‘guest interrogators’ on the Information Please! panel is Oscar Levant.

Was the Shock and Awe of last year’s Babylon too much for you — but you still crave a noxious dose of show business shame and sleaze?  CineSavant correspondent Michael McQuarrie may have found the answer.

From the vaunted Internet Archive comes a 1922 pamphlet publication that assures us was ‘Reported by a Hollywood Newspaper Man’: The Sins of Hollywood, by the Hollywood Publishing company. I can firmly attest that the grammar and spelling therein are fairly commendable. I noted that they called the Mexican town Tijuana, ‘Tia Juana.’  I think that was common, though.

Hide this from the kids!  Sampled chapters: “Strip Poker and Paddle Parties” … “A Wonderful Lover” … “The Girl Who Wanted Work” … “Sodom Outdone.”

I looked really hard, honest, and regret to report that I found nothing about the raw, naked truth of Elephants at Hollywood orgies.

The good news has already circulated, but CineSavant has no qualms about reporting it after everyone else has: Kino Lorber says it has a 4K Ultra HD disc for Charles Laughton’s superlative The Night of the Hunter on the way. I’m assured that the 4K scan is definitely NEW.

This one hasn’t faded one iota in 68 years — it’s Americana art from the get-go, disturbing and powerful and unique. It ought to look great in 4K. Tim Lucas is the audio commentator of note. Kino’s stats say the show will carry an isolated Music and Effects Track. That’s good news, as the original vinyl soundtrack for this show is a rare, rare item. The projected street date is May 30.

Film devotees really need TWO discs of Night of the Hunter. If the older Criterion disc is still available, its feature-length extra by UCLA archivist Robert Gitt is a must-see: an assembly of sync sound outtakes, preserved by Elsa Lanchester. It’s an incredible record of Laughton’s direction. It’s biggest surprise is that it shows Robert Mitchum giving a major directing assist with the child actors. Mitchum would seem the most creatively co-operative, patient leading movie star in Hollywood.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

A link from Gary Teetzel makes us aware of something new for Kaiju fans.

Well, here’s a surprise: The University of Minnesota Press is going to publish English translations of the original 1950s novelizations of Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Again written by novelist Shigeru Kayama, who is credited with the original stories for both films. Kayama also contributed to Half Human and The Mysterians. According to the description on Amazon.com: “The novellas reveal valuable insights into Kayama’s vision for the Godzilla story, feature plots that differ from those of the films, and display the author’s strong anti-nuclear, pro-environmental convictions.”

The listing states that these are ‘the first English translations of the original novellas about the iconic kaijû Godzilla.”  We’ll have to find out if a 1950s Japanese film novelization is better than the average U.S. novelization, at least the ones written to capitalize on fantasy, horror and sci-fi movies.

According to Steve Ryfle and Ed Godziszewski’s book on Ishiro Honda, Kayama was mostly a writer of detective fiction and ‘speculative adventure’ tales a la H. Rider Haggard. Prior to writing the treatment for Godzilla, he wrote a short story called Jira Monster in which a ‘giant bullet-repelling lizard that walks on its hind legs terrorizes primitive people.’

This link goes directly to the Amazon page: The Original Godzilla Novels.

Gary T. is always on the lookout for horror and Sci-fi rarities on the web, as when he found episodes of The Jack Benny Show with Billy Wilder and Rod Serling.

Continuing the tradition of behind-the-scenes personnel appearing as themselves in 1950s sitcoms, here’s an episode of The Phil Silvers Show in which the legendary producer and showman Michael Todd appears as himself. I can’t remember seeing much if any footage of Mike Todd, anywhere.

Depending on the source we check, this aired in either March or April of 1957, a few months after Around the World in 80 Days premiered, and slightly less than a year before Todd’s death: The Phil Silvers Show (Sgt. Bilko) “Bilko Goes Around the World.”

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson

Hello!

The Warner Archive Collection’s esteemed George Feltenstein announced the WAC’s titles for April, and in a Podcast yesterday also let loose an unexpected and very welcome bit of news for fans of pre-Code ‘Forbidden Hollywood’ cinema. Thanks to a newly recovered film element, the WAC will be releasing a much improved Blu-ray of William Wellman’s ‘damned’ 1931 pre-Code melodrama Safe in Hell starring the cult figure Dorothy Mackaill. It’s one of the most uncompromisingly lurid pre-Codes of them all, with a jaw-droppingly downbeat finish. The WAC released a barely passable DVD in 2011 made from the only known surviving 16mm print.

I got the story from George Feltenstein two days ago — he located an improved film element for this title by chasing documentation of Warner Bros.’ 1956 sale of pre- 1949 films to a TV syndication company that later became ‘Associated Artists Productions.’

George examined three bound books of elements turned over to the TV people, discovering that the original negatives to several major WB features were gone even way back then. But the logs did include one 35mm nitrate release print of Safe in Hell. The print itself was found in the collections of the Library of Congress. George reports that “It’s amazing to see it look and sound so good.”  This disc ought to be something special, for the existing DVD is a pale shadow that almost looks like a kinescope, and surviving stills are choice.

Could today’s emphasis on inclusion and diversity have helped spur this Blu-ray release?  Safe and Hell features the acting and singing participation of the celebrated Nina Mae McKinney, a major figure in African-American show biz history. Director Wellman tossed out the script’s ‘Negro dialect’ speeches and allowed McKinney and the other black actors (Clarence Muse, Noble Johnson) to talk normally.

The April lineup for the Warner Archive is all classic-era pix: besides Safe in Hell:  William Powell and Kay Francis in Tay Garnett’s  One Way Passage,  James Cagney, Olivia de Havilland and Rita Hayworth in Raoul Walsh’s  The Strawberry Blonde,  Ginger Rogers, Doris Day, Ronald Reagan and Steve Cochran in the Klu-Klux Klan-themed  Storm Warning,  and James Cagney in a tale of a political demagogue, also from Walsh,  A Lion Is in the Streets. Feltenstein promises more exciting surprises to come.

For Los Angeles area fans of The Outer Limits: associate & friend David J. Schow reports that TONIGHT, Saturday March 18th, at 7:30 p.m. at the Billy Wilder Theater at the Hammer Museum in Westwood will be a special screening of two episodes of the 1963 TV show, using original 16mm and 35mm network prints.

The premiere episode The Galaxy Being will be shown from the episode’s original 35mm pilot print. The program notes for the second episode The Bellero Shield (presented with its original commercials) quotes Jeffery Sconce:

“a rich and conflicted text in what it says about the relationship of marriage, gendered ambition, and domestic asylum in the early ’60s.”

Yes, that’s hard core Sci-fi, all right. Speaking in person will be authors Joanne Morreale, David J. Schow, and Marc Scott Zicree; family members of Joseph Stefano & Leslie Stevens will be present. Admission is free — the full info is at this UCLA library Link for We Are Controlling Transmission.

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson