Here is an exuberant double bill pressbook for The Return of Dracula and The Flame Barrier. Notice how most of the box office promotion is geared toward Dracula and the vampire theme. The Return took a beating from Hammer's Horror of Dracula the same year (1958), but Francis Lederer and this United Artists release is not bad.
A simple pressbook for Boris Karloff's The Man With Nine Lives stands out with its photomontage centerfold spread (here shown in two pages). Notice how the "screen's master of horror" is the key selling point.
Here’s the theater herald for The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (the movie was very loosely based on Ray Bradbury’s short story, The Fog Horn). I’ll have the exciting pressbook posted soon. Note: the blank page on the cover is for the theater to add their own information. These were given away for free to promote the upcoming movie showing at the local theater.
One of my favorite movies to catch on local television, way back when, was World Without End. Giant spiders, gorgeous women, and mutants! This pressbook is large, 12 x 18.25 inches, and it has some interesting promotional gimmicks: Vargas, for one, drawing sexy futuristic women, and one product tie-in is a vacuum cleaner. Yup. They still need to clean, even in the future. Those giant spiders leave an awful mess.
The movie that had Siskel and Ebert, and most of America, putting it on the naughty list when it first hit the theaters.
From the redoubtable West Nelson, science fiction maven and geek extraordinaire, comes this news about the Monsters and Maidens poster showing at the Swann Auction Galleries.
"Get carried away! Every poster in this sale depicts a beautiful damsel in distress in the clutches of a monster (or monster of sorts). Images range from promotions of A-list classic films like Dracula and Frankenstein to posters for B movies and beyond."
Title: MONSTERS & MAIDENS: A FILM POSTER COLLECTION
Date: December 18, 2012
Time: at 1:30 PM
Exhibition: Fri., December 14, 10-6
Sat., December 15, noon-5
Mon., December 17, 10-6
Tues., December 18, 10-noon
Here are examples of the wonderful posters on display.
Looking to watch a good ghost story on a chilly December night, with hot chocolate and some pfeffernusse? Here you go.
From Tony Rivers’ collection comes this pressbook for Tarzan, the Ape Man (played by a light-haired Denny Miller and filled with stock footage from earlier Tarzan movies). Here’s what Tony says: “Denny Miller’s TARZAN THE APE MAN was considered the worst Tarzan movie until the Bo Derek version came out. It was cheaply done, even using some footage from the Weissmuller original and tinting it in color, and there is a scene where Tarzan fights an animal that you can easily see it’s a stuffed animal! Miller was the first blonde Tarzan and although he had fun making the film, it’s not that good. They even used the crocodile fight from TARZAN AND HIS MATE! Joanna Barnes plays Jane and it pretty much follows the same plot of the Weissmuller film.”
Courtesy of Tony Rivers comes this giveaway herald for Tarzan, the Ape Man starring Denny Miller.
Courtesy of Tony Rivers, this bare bones 4-page pressbook from Realart for The Mummy's Ghost does contain something interesting: "Make a Prop Mummy" in the Showmanship section.
This 11×17 inches pressbook is four pages and hypes the presence of "the Horror King" Bela Lugosi. Cheap picture, big horror stars: Bela Lugosi, George Zucco, and John Carradine. I can watch any movie with Lugosi in it; he never budgeted his acting for any role.
Here's the petite 6.5 x 13.5 inch British pressbook for The Incredible Shrinking Man.