From Zombos' Closet

Zombos' Closet...a vast trove of endearingly cheap thrills, including movie and book reviews, and scans of his collections of cinema pressbooks, goofy paper-cutout Halloween decorations, and his amazing collection of Mexican lobby cards from B-grade films. If you have time to descend into a serious rabbit-hole of marvelous trash-culture nostalgia, visit that site just as soon as you possibly can. (DangerousMinds.net)

about this blog From Zombos' Closet...

Louisiana Hussy (1959) Pressbook

Yes, the only reason I like this pressbook is the Cajun beauty poster art and tagline. How can anyone pass up on "born to take love and make trouble?" Sounds like a perfectly good trashy drive-in movie to me. You can catch it on YouTube if you have some time to kill. 

Comic reader version: Download Louisiana Hussy Pressbook

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Valley of the Lawless (1936) Pressbook

This pressbook for Johnny "Mack" Brown's Valley of the Lawless is red, white, and blue all over. Brown appeared in Dell comics and on Wheaties boxes as well as making over a hundred cowboy movies.

Comic reader version: Download Valley of the Lawless Pressbook

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SOS Submarine (1948) Pressbook

SOS Submarine, the American title for the Italian movie, Men on the Sea Floor (1941), had a surprisingly interesting pressbook created for it. While only four pages, plus a one-page supplement for double-billing with Harpoon, its cover is more sophisticated in design and execution than most foreign movies pressbooks. The American-dubbed version hit theaters in 1948.

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The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953) Mexican Lobby Card

On a relatively modest budget, The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms grossed millions. Beating Godzilla to the theaters, the giant monster here became the first to usher in the oops-we-dropped-an-atomic-bomb-and-this-happens movies that revitalized date-nights for countless teenagers in the 1950s. Ray Harryhausen does an excellent job of bringing the rhedosaurus to life and the script (helped along a little by Ray Bradbury's short story, The Fog Horn), keeps it all moving. Mental Floss provides 11 Deep Facts about the movie, which include the casting of a live reptile to play the monster (bad idea, glad they didn't), and Harryhausen devised the climax at Coney Island (a very good idea).

The Sinister Urge (1960) Pressbook

An Edward D. Wood Jr. movie; need I say more? This pressbook is pretty nifty, though, for an exploitation movie with an atom-sized budget. The die-cut cover opens to reveal poster art and photos, but no synopsis and an emphasis on newspaper advertising. 

Comic reader version: Download The Sinister Urge Pressbook

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Phantom From Space (1953) Pressbook

A colorful pressbook for an awful science fiction movie. Good for a few laughs. Very few. But this pressbook is quite impressive; I think they spent more money on this than the movie.

Comic reader version: Download Phantom From Space Pressbook

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Das Ratzel der grunen Spinne (1960) Mexican Lobby Card

In the Green Spider cabaret, somebody gets shot during a trumpet solo. Cue the crime drama mystery. This Mexican lobby card is just as mysterious.

Big House, U.S.A (1955) Mexican Lobby Card

A gorgeous and dynamic Mexican lobby card for Big House, U.S.A draws attention to the crime drama. Five criminals go after the loot. Who will survive? Lon Chaney Jr gets minuscule billing. (Note: I'm thinking this is a repop, not the original card, but still a beauty.)

 

 

Johnny O'Clock (1947) Mexican Lobby Card

Dick Powell made an excellent Philip Marlowe in Murder, My Sweet. He plays another tough guy here, successfully going against type (you know, the musical comedy leading man role that Hollywood wanted to peg him to). This Mexican lobby card shows the dames, the look, and the gun, essential elements for any noir crime drama.

Calamity Jane (1953) Mexican Lobby Card

Here's one for Doris Day's 97th birthday. I don't think she showed as much cleavage in the movie as shown here, but yee-haw! Keep 'em cracking, DD!

Heavy Traffic (1973) Pressbook

It's not often you see pinball used as the construct for a world view, but Ralph Bakshi liked to push the animation envelope in the 1970s. Possibly his biggest success was Heavy Traffic (which followed Fritz the Cat), but my favorite was his Lord of the Rings adaptation.

Comic reader version: Download Heavy Traffic Pressbook

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James Warren: Empire of Monsters Book Review

Zombos Says: Very Good

Just finished Bill Schelly's James Warren: Empire of Monsters. Let me put it this way. There are books I tend to dawdle over and books I have trouble putting down, once I start reading them, because something about them, maybe it's the style or the content or it's just the nature of the beast, so to speak, keeps my eyes glued to their pages. Schelly's book reached out and glued my eyes to its pages.

At 300-plus of those pages (though I wish there were more pictures), it flew by in a good way, a wonderful way. Schelly is not the kind of author who's better to read a Kindle edition of his book because you spend a lot of time looking up ten dollar words when a buck's worth would have sufficed--which I find very annoying (but enlightening, of course)--and his sentence structures aren't the academic jargonese, dog-eat-tail variety that takes turns scratching your head for you as you try to understand what the author is saying. Empire of Monsters leaves those complications for its subject matter: James Warren and the creative people he alternated between loving and hating and loving again, and the influential magazines they created.

James Warren is a very complicated guy, and the numerous quotes from those who worked with him (sometimes against him) to produce the monsterkid's wet dreams of Creepy, Eerie, Vampirella, Blazing Combat, Captain Company merchandise, and the icing on the cake, Famous Monsters of Filmland, are captured here in a way that presents a fascinating, perplexing, and, when all summed up, more than a snapshot's worth of the publishing versus creation versus mixed-bag personalities that came and went to nurture and sustain a growing fandom. And all this while still trying to make a buck and act like Hugh Hefner, a man whose larger than life appetites Warren wanted desperately to emulate. Hell, wouldn't we all!

This is where James Warren appears his most scrutiny-resistant. Aviation buff (complete with a yellow--his favorite color--Sopwith Camel replica in his front yard), purveyor of the excessive and quirky life (complete with Long Island party-hardy getaway and unabashed skinning dipping among his peers), and a personality that shifted between yelling not telling or nice guy to work with or not so nice guy to work with. Schelly keeps the level of narrative balanced and pretty neutral, presenting Warren's lovers and haters in equal measure through their quotes and interactions with him as he struggled to keep his publishing mini-empire running during both the gravy times and the threadbare ones, fighting for rack space against the likes of Marvel and Skywald.  What you won't find here is a lot of attention paid to Forrest J Ackerman and the Warren relationship. Some juicy tidbits you will find, but this is a book about Warren and his needs and dreams.

Depending on where you are coming from, whether you're a monsterkid who grew up with Warren's magazines on the racks or someone who's curiosity was piqued after reading a Creepy or Eerie archive edition, this book is for you. It's funny, but after watching Netflix's Love, Death & Robots, I couldn't help but think of these magazines. That illustrated short story format with a kicker ending was the hallmark of Warren Publishing's storytellers and illustrators. And don't get me started on Captain Company. That's one for us monsterkids to memory-drool over. You wouldn't think selling merchandise would be such a big deal, but as Schelly illuminates, it was a key player for Warren. Captain Company's merchandise profits kept underperforming magazines on the racks and paid for a lot of that wild life-style. 

There's triumph and tragedy here, a lot of history and personalities too, that all came together to create the monsters we still embrace today. Victor Frankenstein had an easier time of it but Warren Publishing did it best.