A big thanks to It Came From Hollywood who have now joined the Gang of Terror from Zombos’ Closet. With a huge archive of both Joe Kane’s (The Phantom of the Movies) movie memorabilia and their own, stretching across decades, you will be seeing a lot of cool stuff in its new home From Zombos’ Closet. Of course, we’ll need a bigger closet…but, to start, here’s The Sign of Zorror pressbook from It Came From Hollywood’s archive. Being a Disney pressbook, it is filled with merchandizing and promotional content galore. Guy Williams (Armando Joseph Catalano) also made a very dashing Zorror, too. His two notable roles were as Zorror and John Robinson (Lost in Space). Click each image to expand it–you will need a BIG screen–or right-click the expanded image to download it.) And you don’t have to read the signs to find more pressbooks, just rummage through our categories.
Here is the rare premier release of the Citizen Kane pressbook. There were two pressbooks created for the movie and this is the one that appeared first. After the movie did poorly–what with William Randolph Hearst’s minions bad-mouthing it as much as possible and killing adverts for it–a second pressbook was created with a different slant for advertising as the movie progressed through theaters. Through it all, Citizen Kane is THE movie that should be on your bucket list of must see cinema, no matter what kind of movie fan you are. Orson Welles visionary style, the fluid and timeless social commentary, and the emotional gut-wrenching by the soul-twisting characters, scripted between him and Herman J. Mankiewicz, are classic all the way. Read online or download these images: Citizen Kane Pressbook
One of Disney’s more troubled productions, The Watcher in the Woods hit theaters, was pulled from theaters, was re-edited, reshot, and re-written, and has multiple endings galore; although the 1981 version of the film’s re-release is the official ending. Yet, with Bette Davis, David McCallum, a creepy suspense permeated with a supernatural mood that gives way to science fantasy, it is one of Disney’s more compelling entries and ranks as a good horror movie (at least by this critic). One funny note: Bette Davis, who was pushing past 70 at the time, insisted on playing her younger self instead of another actor. After a lot of makeup and work to make her look younger, the director and Davis watched some test footage. The director told her it wasn’t working. Davis’s response: “You’re goddamn right.” For more Bette Davis-ness, see Dick Cavet’s interviews with her.
The most expensive animated film at the time, The Black Cauldron falls into Disney’s darker storytelling side for children and adults. After some scenes proved too intense for kids during a test screening, some removals and additions to soften the animated terrors were made, pushing the film to release a year later than scheduled. The Black Cauldron was the first Disney film to use computer-based animation. The Watcher in the Woods (1980) and Dragonslayer (1981), two live-action Disney films, also pushed toward the darker sides of fantasy, with both achieving cult status.
Here’s my short story, Tommy Boy, which first appeared in Shadow Masters: An Anthology from the Horror Zine, edited by Jeani Rector.
Tommy Boy by JM Cozzoli
With great effort, Frank hoisted himself off the treehouse floor and up to the glassless window. The sun would be up soon so he had to be ready this time. He had only one chance left and the steady leak of blood from the deep, jagged, rip along his right leg was making him woozy. Duct tape could only go so far.
He knew this time he couldn’t miss and with more light he wouldn’t. He was sure of that.
The pain made him vomit. Again. He wiped his lips as best he could with whatever clean space he could still find on his sleeve, and steadied himself by grabbing the windowsill tight, although the growing numbness in his hands made that difficult. He leaned over the sill, biting his lower lip hard, making it bleed as he concentrated all his remaining strength on getting a long, good look. The cool morning air fanning across the sweat on his face helped clear the nausea growing in his stomach. But only a little. …
Produced by Val Lewton and directed by Jacques Tourneur, The Leopard Man‘s initial release into movie theaters didn’t generate much excitement or critical acclaim. Over time, that has changed. The direction, plotting, and relationships are simple and direct, but done with a polish that belies the film’s more sinister aspects of madness, loneliness, and dreams unfulfilled.
The original post for this was lost when moving from Typepad to WordPress. So here you go again. Who doesn’t want more Halloween?
Ah, Halloween…that magical time of year when the air is crisp, the colorful leaves are falling, and the monsters and spooks are out in force. Halloween holds special memories for your old Granny, because it was my night to shine and torment all the little monsters who dared come my way. And for whatever reason, they kept coming, year after year after year. What was it that kept attracting them to my house? Was it the colorful decorations, the sounds of my haunted house playing in the background, or the goodies I gave away? Probably all the above.
I always greeted them with a friendly cackle and a warm smile, and escorted them to the table where my assistant, Creepy, gave them their candy treats and a spooky pencil or some such. Next, if they dared, they got to touch Uncle Edgar’s brain, floating in a big jar of formaldehyde. Few turned down that opportunity! Before they left, I always offered them a bug or spider, caught at the back of the house, and, to the female trick-or-treaters, a mouse, caught in the cellar. Oh, I’d keep the mice in a box and if they wanted one, I’d reach in, catch one by the tail, and try to put it in their loot bag while the little critter squirmed and twisted. Sometimes it was hard to hit the loot bag and the mouse would squirm up their arms or hands. It was fun to hear them squeal.
Creepy
Anyway, I’d eventually hit the bag and they would say “Thank you” and run off. Good times. I saw all kinds of horrible faces…some even had on costumes and masks (Hee Hee). There were vampires, ghosts, monsters of all kinds, zombies, superheroes and ghouls. And so I thought, what better time now to feature a variety of radio spots reflecting a wide diversity of movies and characters. Here they are, as varied as the apparitions that will visit your house on Halloween.
And, remember: As Uncle Oscar used to say, “Don’t spook until you’re spooken to!” Happy Halloween!
The Haunting
The Mummy
Alien
Captain Sinbad
King Kong (Re-release)
The Monsters Crash the Pajama Party
Do you have any radio spots you would like to share? Contact Granny at [email protected].
This striking lobby card, with its garish graphics and perfect inset scene, is more effective than the movie. Instead of a blazing hell-fire hound, this movie’s dog is rather docile when attacking anyone. Add the ludicrous head-piece to the scrawny four-legged fiend and any potential excitement is sucked away pretty quickly. With Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing (both men played Sherlock Holmes at various times), you would expect more Hammer terror. The travails of getting a “suitably ferocious Hound on film” are detailed in Brian Patrick Duggan’s excellently researched Horror Dogs: Man’s Best Friend as Movie Monster if you would like to know more.
Hammer’s The Hound of the Baskervilles Mexican Lobby Card
You can see the Cinderella Campaign Book – A (pressbook) over here. This Campaign B part of the pressbook contains the amazing, and versatile, marketing tie-ins and promotions for the movie. Beginning with Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney saw the potential of revenue streams coming from the Disney characters. Starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney’s movie merchandising simply exploded from that point on. Of course, toy tie-ins for his children’s fare did very well, while misfires like the toys for The Black Hole (1979), an ambitious if somewhat obtuse allegorical science fiction leaning on the darker side, scared the kids more than enthralled them. Disney’s best foray into the supernatural is the suspenseful The Watcher in the Woods (1980) with Bette Davis.
From the first issue of Comixscene (1972), Jim Steranko's news and history newspaper for comics art, come this Doc Savage centerfold and The Shadow splash page. The centerfold has Steranko's Doc surrounded by images from other notable artists. The splash page is the image that netted Steranko's work for The Shadow with DC. Both are awesome. Comixscene was very much like The Monster Times, although with less graphics and more text for each article. In his comics work, Steranko brought a new, adult intensity to his layouts, characters, and action sequences, melding pop art elements within the comic page that were mind-bending and ground-breaking for young guys like me reading his Nick Fury Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. My favorite memory of him is when I saw him during an early Phil Seuling-organized comic convention, behind his table, with two femme fatales at his sides. He was smartly dressed to the nines, and completely not conforming to the usual decorum for comic artists back then. I still don't know if he was doing a put on or he was serious, but man, he could draw like no one else so why not act like it? As I recall, he was also around my height (that would be…not tall), and he dabbled in escapology (which I was also doing at the time), so he reminded me of Houdini. He had the that tough, secure attitude too.
While the movie may rate only 5.7 on IMDb, I give its pressbook a higher rating. The cover is striking, using poster art from the movie. The use of darker and lighter green highlights adds a nice punch. Ricardo Cortez starred as Sam Spade in the 1931 Maltese Falcon, which is not my favorite Spade or Falcon. Wikipedia states this is a pre-code movie, but the Hays Code started in 1930, and was enforced by 1934. Oopsy?
Recurring themes in some movies of the 1930s and 1940s centered around boys, streetwise or collegiate, boy gangs, and boys in trouble, either with the law or through exploitation. In Boy Slaves, the trouble stems from exploitation. It's fascinating how much history we don't learn in school. In this instance, it's corrupt business through forced labor in a Turpentine Camp. Products derived from turpentine were big money during the 19th century. In the 1870s, camps of laborers to tap into pine trees sprung up in northwest Florida. By the 1930s, corruption and abuse took over, forcing prisoners, and those falsely accused of a crime to make them prisoners, into slave labor for these camps. Many black workers were also snared by putting them in debt so that they could never repay what they owed. Instead of cash, tokens or scrip (any substitute for legal money) were used instead. That song, Sixteen Tons, by Merle Travis, may have been about a coal mine company store, but the turpentine camp company store did the same thing to keep workers unable to pay off their debt. Luckily, times changed when other replacement chemicals and the uses for turpentine started drying up.
