From Zombos' Closet

Famous Monsters Back Cover: Surprise Movie of the Year!

I didn't see this movie from James Warren. Did any of you see Screen Thrills? Was is ever released?

Courtesy of Professor Kinema.

Horror Movie Lobby Cards

Here are more examples of the subdued layout employed by English language lobby cards: a picture framed by text and illustration. In contrast, Mexican lobby cards usually go heavier on the illustration and shrink the picture.

 (cards courtesy of Professor Kinema)

 
 
 
 

Famous Monsters Back Cover: What Are They Afraid Of?

My guess is they're afraid of Harold Camping making another stupid Rapture prediction.

Courtesy of Professor Kinema

The Thing With Two Heads (1972) Pressbook

"They transplanted a white bigot's head onto a soul brother's body! The doctor really blew it!" Say what you want about the movie, but this pressbook is awesome.

Cry of the Banshee (1970) Pressbook

Famous Monsters Back Cover: Of "Curse"

Medieval Coneheads? People waiting for the Rapture in the Dark Ages? Cosplayers doing people waiting for the Rapture in the Dark Ages?

Of "Curse" not! It's another eye-catching back cover from Famous Monsters of Filmland.

Courtesy of Professor Kinema

Gullibles Travels Or, Been There And Back Again

With the Rapture soon upon us--not, I take comfort in reading the many books on the folly of crowds, parade of madness-spouting end-of-dayers, and unfathomable stupidity of endlessly gullible followers who apparently have no day job to keep them busy. And yes, I believe in God, but not the religions that have sprung up like weeds, so intent on constantly interpreting the Word. Neither do I suffer the doomsday prognostications of silly interpreters who--seriously--need to brush up on their spiritual language skills. And since God's busy running the Universe, he leaves us alone to make our own decisions, no strings attached. The only strings are the ones we pull, and boy, there are a lot of puppets doing crazy dances out there.

Me, I'm going to IHOP tomorrow and getting a big honking stack of pancakes to celebrate another doomsday missed, but not forgotten. Any of you Rapture folk want to join me, I'm buying.  Besides, it's not even 2012 yet!

• Extraordinary Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles MacKay -- now available for 99 cents as a Kindle ebook. Like a circus sideshow, you will be amazed and amused, but here it's how dumb people can be enraptured in the ballyhoo of the masses.
• The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind by Gustave Le Bon -- written in the 1800s so language and discussion is based on the time period and its events. Still contains valuable insights on "crowd contol."
• How to Be a Charlatan and Make Millions by Jim Williams -- ten lessons in cheating, lying, and taking advantage of the gullible to reach the top of the heap.
• Mystics and Messiahs: Cults and New Religions in American History by Philip Jenkins -- yeah, what's new is old is new again.

For those disapppointed the world is still here come May 22, get over it.

Movie Review: Priest (2011)

Zombos Says:  Good

I saw Priest and Thor on the same day, but in different theaters. Both used a prologue (backstory preamble) to prep the audience for their stories. My favorite prologue, by the way, is the Sauron battle in Lord of the Rings.

Priest uses an animated one, which, like the one in Jonah Hex , is unnecessary and ill-fitting: the cartoon story transitions poorly to the live action one. I would have preferred being dropped knee-deep in Priest's Blade Runner cities, Mad Max wastelands, and Old West outposts without a cartoon explanation. It's about vampires running rampant. I get that. It's about the church using the vampire threat to create a controlled and repressed society dominated by Christian faith. I got that, too.

The CGI vampires in Priest are blind, monstrous, and live in hives held together by their slimy body fluids. They look and move like typical video game monsters and have protruding upper and lower fangs much too long. There’s a queen mother for the hive, like Alien, and human familiars—Renfield-like servants to the vampires—who look moribund themselves. People live in large walled cities or Wild West looking  settlements. The cities are all slimy, techno-grunge decay with video-confession kiosks arranged like Porta-Johns on the streets, and the settlements are located in the wastelands outside the cities, a post-apocalyptic landscape with high radioactivity and voracious vampires looking to make a comeback, led by a hybrid super vampire with dreams of gory.

It works in spite of its derivative dialog and posturing because the plot is uncomplicated--a renegade priest risks excommunication by declaring the vampires are back--and the action is straightforward--the priests (and priestesses) trained to be vampire-killers are kick ass at what they do.  What doesn't work is the 3D because it's ignored: in daylight the wastelands are bleached white, leaving no contrast for depth, and at night it's too dark for highlights, which again are needed for depth. Worse, the movie was 2D changed to 3D.

When a homestead is attacked and a girl (Lily Collins) taken by the vampires, Priest (Paul Bettany) defies Monsignor Orelas (Christopher Plummer) and heads to the wasteland, on a rad motorcycle, to kick up some dust. He teams with Sherif Hicks (Cam Gigandet) to find the girl. The monsignor sends priests and a priestess (Maggie Q) after Priest. They ride rad motorcycles, too.

At Mira Sola, a vampire hive Priest still has nightmares over, a tangle with a large hive guardian and a discovery of what the vampires are up to leads to a showdown aboard a fast moving train heading to Cathedral City, where the sun never shines. Motorcycles replace horses, and Black Hat (Karl Urban) fills the role of villain. 

Horror Movie Lobby Cards

Here are examples of English language horror movie lobby cards that minimize illustration and text in favor of a larger picture highlighting action or actors. World Without End is still a guilty pleasure of mine. (These cards come from the Professor Kinema archives.)

English Horror Movie Lobby Cards

Unlike Mexican lobby cards, English language horror and sci fi cards usually have a larger picture surrounded by a more sedate layout of illustration and text.  

 Lobby cards courtesy of Professor Kinema.

Jack Davis Frankenstein Pin-up

I never really liked the Jack Davis Frankenstein pin-up, so I didn't get that promised "100 hours of laughs and thrills." Don't get me wrong, it's a great drawing, but maybe it's that fuzzy vest, annoying me deep down on some Pavlovian level. My mom bought me one of those Carnaby Street Mod vests on a whim. Seriously. She expected me to wear it to school, looking like some Michael Saracin wannabe in it. Maybe that's why I don't like this poster.

More Famous Monsters Back Covers

More promotional Famous Monsters of Filmland back covers from Professor Kinema. I seriously doubt any reader wound up with one million  dollars, fantastic secret or not, but I'll bet lots of kids spent the money in their imagination while trying to win it. I met Robert Lansing (4D Man) and sold an accounting program to him  way back in the 1980s, while I was working at B. Dalton's Software Etc. store on 5th Avenue in New York City. He was shorter than I imagined.