This pressbook is as big as Tex Ritter's hat, when unfolded to show the centerfold, all of 24 inches by 18 inches. The page color, except for the centerfold, is a bit eye-popping, but lots of showmanship can be found, especially around the songs. The singing cowboy was pretty big early on in Westerns, giving way to the more gritty realism (or outlandishness) of the American and Italian films that followed, beyond the 1930s and 1940s strumming cowpokes.
Murder, My Sweet, with Dick Powell’s excellent portrayal of private eye Philip Marlowe, based on Raymond Chandler’s novel, Farewell, My Lovely, was followed by Cornered. Powell, after playing light crooner roles, wanted something more hard-boiled. His tough as nails everyman demeanor is strong noir at its core, and in Cornered he returns to France, after the war, to find his wife’s killer. Walter Slezak’s smarmy, not to be trusted, criminally-inclined character, Incza, rounds out the dark edges of this vengeance-thriller.
CBZ format for comics readers: Download Cornered
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Here's is the tribute reproduction pressbook for The Lone Ranger Rides Again, produced by Jack Mathis in the 1970s. His tribute pressbooks pop up now and then in auctions that list them as the originals (he really did a good job), but his produced versions have slight differences. In this one, the inside covers are not in color, whereas the 1939 pressbook's are. I came to the Lone Ranger through the television show with Clayton Moore as the masked ranger and Jay Silverheels as Tonto. If you've seen the awful 2013 mess of a movie with Johnny Depp as Tonto, you haven't seen the real thing. While the television series was aimed at a young audience, they kept the relationship between the Lone Ranger and Tonto on a fairly equal footing, with both men relying on each other through trust and a strong ethical code. Funny, but the other important duo from television, Jim West and Artemis Gordon from The Wild Wild West also got screwed on the big screen with poor casting, poor scripting, and yet another cantankerous relationship that never existed in the original. What's it with Hollywood thinking friction-filled relationships are the only way to go big screen with characters like these?
ComicReader and YacReader version: Download Lone Ranger Rides Again
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The Lone Ranger Rides Again (1939)
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Monogram Pictures was a low-budget producer of series films like Charlie Chan, Bomba, The East Side Kids, and The Cisco Kid. Along with a lot of westerns, Monogram filled movie theaters with memorable characters portrayed by Frankie Darrow, Mantan Moreland, and others. Notable stars also graced the Monogram productions, like Ginger Rogers, Alan Ladd, and Robert Mitchum. One of my favorite series is Charlie Chan. While politically and culturally questionable today, they were a staple of B (some would argue for C) movie fare for years, and actors like Mantan Moreland, a black man in a very white Hollywood, brought financial success to the movies he plied his comic trade in, as best he could, given the limitations of the times. He would have been fantastic as one of the Three Stooges (as Shemp's replacement). Note on the Exploitation page the casual suggestion of dressing someone in blackface for promoting the movie.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Shadows Over Chinatown
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With Shemp Howard and Joe Besser to assist in the craziness, as well as Hillary Brooke, Abbott and Costello poke fun at all those jungle safari movies popular at the time. Clyde Beatty supplies his own animals. Besser would eventually replace Shemp as one of the Three Stooges after Shemp's death. The film became public domain in 1977 and the original film stock was deteriorating, so the free versions you see are usually of poor quality. A kickstarter in 2019 aimed to restore the film to blu ray. Africa Screams pulled in 1.5 million dollars in 1949. The disparaging illustration of the native with a cook book was standard for the time, unfortunately.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Africa Screams Pressbook
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The Chinese fictional detective, Charlie Chan, was played, almost entirely, by non-Asian men. Warner Oland was the first to don the proverbs for Fox and became very popular with his self-effacing and always-at-ease demeanor. Later actors would give Chan a more acerbic bite, but Oland will always be my favorite. He went sleuthing through sixteen Chan movies for Fox before being replaced by Sidney Tolar. With Oland, his No. 1 son was played by Keye Luke. Luke joined Mr. Moto's Gamble (Moto was played by Peter Lorre) when Oland died before completing his last Chan film. Luke stayed around mostly to use already shot footage and do some audience-bridging to the Moto series opener. Wikipedia notes the Asian actors who have played Chan, in two early movies as a non-leading character (1926 and 1929), and five Shanghai and Hong Kong movies during the 1930s and 40s (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Chan#Films). Given today's climate with China, I doubt a new series would be successful. But you can enjoy the original one with Warner Oland and Keye Luke. For Bela Lugosi fans (me, me!), see Charlie Chan's The Black Camel (1931), shot on location in Honolulu. An excellent book on the series is Charlie Chan at the Movies by Ken Hanke.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Charlie Chan City in Darkness
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Nothing like a suave gay detective for women to fawn over and criminals to spar with. The 'gay' in the title, however, refers to the leading character, Gay Laurence, alias The Falcon. RKO used The Falcon (a staggering sixteen movies in all) to replace their The Saint series after falling out with Leslie Charteris; which, ironically, came about because Charteris blamed copyright infringement by RKO with The Falcon as a knock-off of The Saint. I tended to like George Sanders more than Tom Conway, who later took over for him around the fifth entry in the series. Both men looked alike since Tom Conway was Sanders' brother, but Sanders had that velvet-cake voice that was so sinister or disarming depending on the situation. He also played The Saint. The man kept busy for sure.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download The Gay Falcon
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Reading this pressbook I learned something I hadn't really thought about: Tarzan is a vegetarian. I bet you didn't know that either. I like the tagline, "Cheta makes with antics when the animal kingdom revolts." It is also reassuring that, even in a jungle, a family can thrive (with a lot of help from the studio crafts department). While many Tarzans that followed could speak, rather eloquently, I prefer my Tarzan with his grunts, umgawas, and hand gestures. The strength of Johnny Weismuller's characterization comes from the simplicity of an uneducated, uncivilized man who shows just how civilized and educated he can be through his actions. Now, if they could have lessened the "white beauties" angles and chose a more realistic approach, this series would be much better than it is, but having grown up with it, I still think it's pretty good, even with its faults. You can read more about the movie on ERBzine.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Tarzan and the Huntress pressbook
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In the first chapter of Bruce Gentry — Daredevil of the Skies serial, the mysterious villain, Recorder, sends a flying saucer (disc) to crash into Bruce’s plane. It happens within the first few minutes and the saucer is animated. The following year, The Flying Saucer (1950), had Soviet and American agents fighting over possession of a flying saucer. The term “flying saucer” was coined by a United Press newspaper man in 1947, after an amateur pilot saw nine objects in the sky giving off bright flashes of light. Of course, the U.S. Airforce now prefers the term UFO (unidentified flying object), but “flying saucer” has a cooler, vintage ring to it. The flying discs that Recorder controls remotely, acting more like drones, leads Bruce to investigate them to see if they can be repurposed for commercial use. I’m not sure if drones, which first saw action in 1917 during the First World War, were thought to have commercial potential in the 1940s, aside from their military uses. In 1935, the British began using the term “drone” to refer to their pilotless aircraft. And because drone is too simple a word, the term used today is UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle). That doesn’t quite roll off the tongue like drone. Long story short: the first appearance of a flying saucer in cinema may be credited to this serial. Although a bit wonky in the animation department (clearly basement budget), that’s still important to note.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Bruce Gentry Daredevil of the Skies
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Bruce Gentry — Daredevil of the Skies (1949)
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A noir with Lawrence Tierney. From the Nitrate Diva: “This pulpy, high-octane B noir from RKO flirts so outrageously with comedy that you may not see its nastiest blows coming. Deranged tonal shifts and a farfetched plot make The Devil Thumbs a Ride more disturbing than many comparatively somber and cohesive entries in the noir canon. Murder, sadism, depravity, greed, and betrayal: that’s business as usual. But peppered with wacky sitcom-style hijinks? Now that’s twisted.” Ditto, I say. There are slick slacks noirs, almost noirs, and plain trousers noirs; then there’s this one with Lawrence Tierney.
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Devil Thumbs a Ride Pressbook
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A light-hearted romp with the usual shenanigans. What cracks me up every time is the bit between Lou and Aunt Huddy (she dabbles in the black mountain arts). Lou wants a love potion. Both get into a tiff, make voodoo doll effigies of themselves and start sticking it to each other. I love it. Dorothy Shay (The Park Avenue Hillbillie) sings some songs. What’s not to love?
ComicRack and YakReader version: Download Abbott and Costello Comin Round the Mountain Pressbook
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Abbott and Costello in
Comin’ Round the Mountain (1951)
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Columbia focused on World War II saboteurs with The Batman and The Secret Code serials. In The Batman, J. Carrol Naish played Dr. Daka, a Japanese mastermind, who, with his henchmen, tangled with the caped crusader. In The Secret Code, the evil Nazi mastermind, Jensen, is played by Trevor Bardette. J. Carrol Naish, again sporting ludicrous makeup, played Charley Chan in the 1957 television series, The New Adventures of Charlie Chan. During an interview conducted by Ben Mankiewicz, the 93 year old James Hong, who played Chan's Number One Son, mentioned how Naish had him fired from the show because he missed a line. My respect for Naish has dropped quite a bit after that revelation. How absurd too: Naish gets the real Asian actor fired. Wild.
ComicRack and YACreader version: Download The Secret Code pressbook
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