The pale pink panther

I'd completely forgotten that they had made a Clouseau movie without Peter Sellers or director Blake Edwards until I ran across this ad from its initial Columbus run in August of 1968. It seems to be largely forgotten (though it is available on Blu-Ray) and, as it stars Alan Arkin and is directed by Bud Yorkin--known more for TV work--it's usually considered to be outside the Pink Panther canon. (Imagine a Harry Potter movie with, I dunno, Michael Cera instead of Daniel Radcliffe!)

Dick Miller, 1928-2019

When character actor Dick Miller died last week, most of the obituary headlines mentioned his roles in Gremlins or The Terminator. But out of his 100+ parts, I'll remember him for his work in Roger Corman's early B-films. He usually showed up in supporting parts (Little Shop of Horrors, The Terror) but I'll remember him best in two starring roles for Corman. In A Bucket of Blood, he plays simpering loser Walter Paisley (above), so desperate to make friends in an arty beatnik crowd that he resorts to murder. With Paisley, Miller created the most well-rounded (and sympathetic) character in any Corman movie I've seen. Miller was also able to play it completely straight in his top-billed role in the Corman SF flick War of the Satellites (below). He actually has less screen time than the villain, Richard Devon, but he is memorable and got to play the hero like he rarely had the chance to. He was always a welcome presence in any film.
  

Teenage Frankenstein

I believe that this double feature was the first time I was allowed to go to the movies by myself. I saw this in Grove City, Ohio, probably in 1964 when I was 7 or 8. and it was Teenage Frankenstein that made the bigger impression for a few reasons: the monster was scarier looking than the werewolf; the black & white film switches to color for the last minute when the creature is electrocuted; Gary Conway was a good-looking, well-built guy whom I would have been familiar with from the TV show Burke's Law. Though I don't recall having any sexual feelings at that age, Conway's appearance in a snug t-shirt (and even shirtless in one brief scene) stuck in my head for years. The movie itself is just OK, and the real star is the adequate but uninspiring villain played the fairly colorless Whit Bissell.

October forever

I became a fan of Ray Bradbury at the age of 9, first through his short stories, then via the wonderful novel Something Wicked This Way Comes. Aside from The Great Gatsby, this is the novel I've re-read the most over the years. As a young reader, the last half of the book fell down a bit with its speculations on aging and fatherhood, but the first half never lets me down, particularly the first 30 or 40 pages which introduce the main characters. This is a picture of my original copy from 1967. I also own two other paperback editions and a hardcover, but this copy, still holding together, is the one I go back to.

Every year when October rolls around again, and leaves start swirling in the twilight wind, I think of this book. I consider that feeling and those images gifts from Ray Bradbury.

Lena Horne

No, I'm not old enough to have seen Stormy Weather when it came out in 1943. But I did see Lena Horne in person when she took her one-woman Broadway hit Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music on the road in the mid-80s. In her sixties, she had more energy than I had in my thirties when I saw her. It was a fabulous show. She never got the movie career she deserved, but she shines in this movie, just released on Blu-Ray in a lovely print. There's not much plot--this is one of those big studio revues that is essentially a string of production numbers with just enough narrative to keep them all together. But with Horne, Bill Robinson, Cab Calloway, and the amazing Nicholas Brothers, you don't really need a plot.

I Want to Bite Your Hand

As an 8-year-old in 1964, I was caught up in Beatlemania thanks to my babysitter, a high school student named Susan. It was because of her that I watched the Beatles debut on Ed Sullivan and asked for Beatles records for my birthday (which to my parents' credit, I got). I was also at the beginning of my obsession with monster movies. So my mom got me this album full of parody rock songs with a monster-movie twist. I loved it and listened to it almost as much as I listened to Meet the Beatles.

The man who created the album, Gene Moss, mostly worked in children's television, including spending a few years producing segments for Sesame Street. This album actually made the Billboard charts for a few weeks. I don't remember all the songs, but I can still hear Moss in his best Dracula voice singing "I Want to Bite Your Hand," and I know "The King Kong Stomp" ("The jungle swings with a mighty sound/When King Kong starts to monkey around.") Mom knew what I'd like.

New year, new purpose

I will try to revive my moribund blog by focusing on mementos and artifacts (ads and photos) of movies, books, songs and albums that have been important to me, with a few brief words on why. I have been posting movie ads from newspapers in a Facebook group, which gave me the idea for doing the same here, with added personal commentary. Most of the ads will be from papers in Tucson AZ or Columbus OH, where I spent by formative years, though I will also posts ads and other artifacts from other sources. Some are from microfilm, so pardon the iffy quality.

I begin with Walt Disney's BABES IN TOYLAND (1961), the first movie I remember seeing in a theater. This ad is for its original run (Dec. '61) in a downtown theater in Columbus, Ohio, though I remember my dad taking me to see it at a drive-in, so it probably would have been a 2nd or 3rd run sometime in spring or summer of '62 when I would have been 5 years old. I have fond memories of it, but when I rewatched it a few years ago, it felt pretty bland. I think I had a little crush on Annette, whom I would have known from the Mickey Mouse Club, and I knew Ray Bolger was the Scarecrow from Oz. Had I seen this as an adolescent, I probably would have been more taken with Tommy Sands...