Alfalfa (Carl Switzer) and Butch the bully (Tommy Bond) from Our Gang are all grown up (mostly) in Gas House Kids in Hollywood. This is the third and last movie in the franchise. They mix it up with a mad scientist and a haunted house and cute "goils."
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You can read a review of this Victory Pictures serial over at The Files of Jerry Blake. Unfortunately, looks like the pressbook is more exciting than the serial or movie versions. Seems a small budget and less creativity kept the pacing and action to a minimum. Bela Lugosi, as always, deserved better.
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Monogram pulls down the noir shades with jumeuax identiques, in this crime whodunit based on a Cornell Woolrich story. (His book, Black Alibi, became The Leopard Man, directed by Jacques Tourneur.) For a budget movie, the pressbook is in color and well presented. I'm not sure the twin sundae idea is a good promotion, but crime and pretty dames times two sells seats anyway.
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John Stanley, in his Creature Features Strikes Again movie guide, wrote: "Fuzzy, unadjusted Bela Lugosi whodunit in which two brothers...are involved with development of TV. There's also a death ray..." Death rays were all the rage in the 1930s. Television must have been very mysterious and wondrous back then. Now, you can watch "television" on your cell phone, which kind of kills the wondrous aspect of it as we're so over-saturated with streaming content. We're spoiled rotten. Now, if my cell phone had a death ray...well, I'd be staring at it in wonder. I don't think anyone's written about putting death rays in cell phones yet, so you heard it here first. Then again, what if you pressed the death ray button instead of the camera button? On second thought, death rays on cell phones may prove disastrous for selfies. But I digress. There's an interesting article in this pressbook, Lugosi Make-Up Filmland Wonder. My guess is it's a fluff piece someone thought up, but I don't recall reading about Lugosi's talents with makeup. Usually, Lon Chaney was the one often mentioned, who puttied around with--oh, look, a pun!--the greasepaint and collodion.
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Mickey Spillane wasn't too happy with how Richard Aldrich's movie version of his book turned out. Mike Hammer wasn't nice at all, the dangerous and deadly something in the car trunk proved too hot to handle, and the downbeat storyline spiralling into worse makes Kiss Me Deadly quite an unnerving, unsavory, and brutal experience, permeated with existential fear. Perfect! You want film noir? This is the darkest you'll come across. Ralph Meeker is brutal. The pressbook may play up the dames angle for all it's worth, but the movie's not about dames. It's about death, violence, and more death. The deadly macguffin in the car trunk would be purloined by Repo Man (1984) with a less violent and fatal wind up.
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Ah, the good old days, when promotion contests were all about the beautiful dames in movies. Well, maybe not so good with all that objectification of women in the movies of the time. They were either angels or devils, and the men on screen always had trouble telling the difference. At least in film noir the women usually gave as good (or bad) as they got. Are women more dangerous? You be the judge. As film noir goes, this one may be too much for you to handle. Are you hardboiled enough to take it?
ComicRack reader version: Download Decoy (1946) Pressbook
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Target is getting smarter and putting up their Halloween merchandise earlier this year. They always have a wide selection of bones, costumes, and colorful Day of the Dead items. Some fun animations and decorations this time around, though I miss the excitement and glee I had the time they did the Universal Monsters items when that movie dud, The Mummy (2017), came out. However, the 5.5 inch animated Halloween TV and the 6 inch animated Halloween Pumpkin are to scream for. Dare I use the word "cute!" And I got one of them for a steal. Picture this: I come upon this cute Halloween animated TV scene; only one left and no sticker on it; the register person asks if I know the price--I don't,it was the last one on the shelf; she asks the floor manager (I'm presuming that's who the person was anyway); the floor manager turns it on, looks all over it for a clue, then says 5 bucks!; yup, a steal. Later that night I realized I could have (as well as that floor manager) just gone to the Target website, searched on Halloween, and found the item; I did! I saved 10 bucks! And I saw there was an animated pumpkin scene too; I ordered it online and picked it up this morning. Now that's a real Halloween treat , I'd say.
Here are some other highlights to drool over.
What says Halloween better than a cup of hot chocolate, sipped while reading a monster magazine as the autumn winds scuttle dead leaves throughout the gray day. Here are some Tales of Voodoo for you, printed in spendid black and white with heavy on the black; zombies, demons, and vampires, oh my!
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Having just watched Murder is My Beat with Barbara Payton, I couldn't resist posting this pressbook for Trapped, with her and Lloyd Bridges. As soon as I can find the Murder is My Beat pressbook I'll post that one too. Film noir, like horror, requires a refined taste for classy and deadly dames, hardboiled stamina and worn-shoes detectives, and star-crossed victims. Horror, of course, abounds with star-crossed victims. Trapped helped her into the spotlight, followed by an ample contract after her performance in Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye. Sadly, her presence in Bride of the Gorilla didn't boost her career, although her co-star, Raymond Burr, fared much better. A lot of bad relationships, drinking, and drugs trapped her into a downward spiral.
ComicRack reader version: Download Trapped (1949) Pressbook
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There are horror films and then there are horrors films. Taxi Driver is a horrors film. The horrors of a Travis Bickle, a walking wounded lifer, looking for meaning in all the meaningless places. Is he pushed or does he push himself to become a knight in shining armor, to channel his frustration against helplessness? Vigilantism was a cinematic peg hole for 1970s New York City. Between the crime, grime, and gaffiti, knights are hard to come by but often hoped for. Here's the 20-page pressbook for the movie, with many pages devoted to newspaper poster ads. By the 1970s, most pressbooks focused on the newspapers to sell the movie with poster ads; when people actually read newspapers.
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I met up with some nasties and ghoulies at Spirit Halloween recently. I'm not sure who does their production and art designs, but that person has some serious issues with clowns, kids, and holding onto sanity. Every time I walk into the place I find myself constantly looking around to make sure none of these monstrosities have left their pedestals (or stalking grounds). You never can be too sure in a Spirit Halloween store. I'm just waiting for them to finally have somebody dressed up as one of their pychotronic beasties and let the human-hybrid go after the customers. Just not when I'm in the store, though, please.
Here's a rogue's gallery of terror to whet your dreams. Or nightmares.
