For a while now I have been working at getting a decent collection of old TV series . When I say old I mean pretty old, from the mid to late 60’s to the mid 70’s. Pre-cable shows that I grew up on essentially I can sometimes find these in boxed sets here in China. For example I have both the complete original Star Trek and Hogan’s Heroes and one day am going to get the Addams Family at the DVD stores I drop into once in a while. Of course these are all pirated and cheap as hell but of excellent quality so far. Other shows are a bit harder to locate and I am using a Rapidshare based site now to piece together The Munsters series little by little. Those RS sites have lots of series but I am really lazy about copying and pasting the files one by one so I tend to put them together over a long period of time. The shows can also sometimes be found the shows on sites like Isohunt or Pirate Bay which is great. I got the complete run of Kung Fu with David Carradine from Isohunt as well as all of the Gilligan’s Islands episodes. I also have a membership at a ratio based TV show site connected to Cinemageddon but it can hard to maintain a good ratio at those type of sites –which can result in getting banned- and so I cannot get the things I want when I want them. So I have a membership but am afraid to download anything I like. Right now working on getting in season one of Hawaii 5-0 from that CG ratio based TV show site and may see if I can get somewhere else since I cannot seem to seed of any of it back. Well at the wonderful The Horror Charnel –another ration based site- I just got in the complete one season run of one of the best TV series of all time, Kolchak: The Night Stalker. I burned the 20 episodes and began watching them last night.
You can argue that if it was such a good series why did it last only one season? Who knows. We live in a world where Beyonce’s music and videos are in your face all day and night but not person I know owns a King Crimson or Andy Summers album. The show just did not fare well against its Friday night competition on NBC it seems. The series aired in 1974 on ABC and was based on the character Carl Kolchak –played to perfection by the Darren McGavin- created for the made for TV movies The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler. The shows follow the adventures of the shabbily dressed Carl Kolchak who works at the under-staffed and under-budgeted INS news bureau in Chicago where he employs his journalistic talents either covered mob hits or filling in for the “Dear Emily” writer when she is ill. We hardly ever see any of Chicago’s horrid winter weather as Carl drives around in near constant sunshine in his convertible Ford Mustang talking into his cassette recorder. Of course the shows hook is that he is constantly getting pulled into supernatural situation or another as his investigation of a recent murder unfolds. He encounters anything and everything from incarnations of Jack the Ripper to Werewolves and Vampires. Kolchak is the absolute quintessential non-hero. He packs no gun or knife and more often than not winds up screaming like a little girl and jumping out a window in the presence of the evil force he is facing. And to be honest Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson would have probably done the same thing in real life if confronted with a werewolf or vampire in their closet.
On top of supernatural terrors Kolchak must deal with one cynical police chief after another who ignores his questions at press conferences. But the greatest adversary he must contend with each week is his old school news paper chief Tony Vincenzo –played by perennial tough guy Simon Oakland- who spends each episode trying to pull Carl off each case and assigning him to some mundane story. Invariably Vincenzo winds up backing Kolchak and having his faith in his ‘star’ reporter restored… only to lose it again again next episode. The relationship between Vincenzo and Kolchak is classic and adds comic relief to the show’s themes of horror and mayhem. Also refreshing is that McGavin and I have only seen The Ripper episode and half of The Zombie so far but am about to hit the sofa –I am supposed to be studying Chinese- and watch a few more episodes this afternoon. This is classic TV. Before the idea of drama of comedy became a bunch of selfish over sexed yuppies insulting each other for an hour. It was a time when shows had a simple but effective formula they stuck to each week and milked it for all it was worth. Just look what was done with shows like Gilligan’s Island or Hogan’s Heroes. The same cast and same props every week but I never got tired of it. The same with Kolchak. The same clutterd office and grumpy boss each week but with a different monster and resourceful method of whacking the creature during the shows last five minutes. I guess I am just old school but this is a lot cooler than Lost or Prison Break in my book.
I came to learn a little about Metal music a bit late in life. I Have always felt there is no need to close doors to music simply becasue we get older. I think the first real Metal I bought (not counting stuff like Metallica or Megadeth) was an album by Naplam Death and I recall not liking it at all but thught the cover looked cool. As many years have gone I have developed a curious interest in the Metal genre and its different movements though I am by no means a true fan or follower. If I had to select a style I prefer the most it would be the Black Metal music of Norway over, lets say, the Death Metal style of the bands out of Florida like Cannibal Corpse. I do like some of the Morbid Angel material but they sound more European than American in their approach (in my opinion anyway) and I like some of the stuff by British band Carcass who is supposed to be a Grindcore band. I have read rabid forums posts about which bands are Thrash and which are Death Metal and which are Grindcore and so on. But I certainly have some fascination with bands with wild names like Carpathian Forest, Emperor, Mayhem Darkthrone and Satryicon. The songs are often epic in their scale and delivery and the sound is tastefully augmented with synthesizers, something not found on the hard core death metal albums. The lyrics typically focus on Norse mythology and similar grand themes.
Once a person has entered into the realm of 60’s nudist picture he has entered a realm where even angels fear to tread. The stuff was pioneered by the likes of Dave Friedman, Doris Wishman and H.G. Lewis and most of it has become available again to the desirous public due to the noble efforts of the fine folks over at Something Weird Video. In our jaded day and age we take for the granted the effect a bouncy cellulite endowed ass had on our fathers and grandfathers. The films where shot on nudist colonies –and therefore were of social and cultural value- and shown in art house theaters as opposed to more lucrative drive-in theaters of the day. Even great films like the Japanese classic Onibaba were shown in these sleazy little art theaters because there is a scene that showed bare breasts. The nudist films pushed the envelope as much as it could be pushed in the day and age and 1965’s The Beast That Killed Woman is a good starting point for the novice –such as myself- to begin his exploration of what early exploitation film makers were trying to get away with. By the time The Beast That Killed Women –released as a SWV double feature along with The Monster of Camp Sunshine which I am conducting a search for now- the film makers had decided that the films have higher degree of quality is some sort of storyline or plot where injected. Early nudist films where simply actual mondo style documentaries, at best, of flabby white families playing volleyball and sitting around campfires singing in the buff all day. Film maker Barry Mahon took this already engaging concept to the next logical level by having a guy in a hokey monkey suit run around the camp and kill girls. Well, a girl anyway. The movie should be called The Beast Who Kills One Woman actually. There is never explanation as to why a short gorilla is on the loose and why it is stalking the peace loving nekked members of this particular nudist camp but there you have it. There is equally no explanation why some members decide to stay at the camp anyway and why some members sleep in bungalows without doors.
Those that do not sleep in those stalker friendly bungalows sleep in barracks with bunk beds. There is often dispute as who gets to sleep on top and sometimes the girls sit in there see through black panties on the bed and engage in inane dialog about the ‘monster’ outside. Sometimes they boost each other up to the top bunk by shoving each other’s butt or when they hear a sound the girl on top jumps down to the bottom bunk and they both hide under the cover. This happens quite a lot actually. What else that happens a lot is shameless out of shape 60′s nude people walking about doing nothing. Just doing nothing. When they walk away from the camera they are completely nude but the ones coming towards the camera have their naughty bits strategically covered by a towel or shorts. Sometimes maybe two girls jump up and down and try to get a towel off a wall, or a group plays volleyball to run in an endless queue –showing their backsides one after the other- and jump into the pool. Some people are not nude however. Luckily some fat, hairy guys wear some sort of shorts. There are even some black girls at this nudist camp showing that Mahon was an equal opportunity pervert and visionary.
The dialog is hopelessly ridiculous at best and I have to be honest and confess I was hitting the fast forward at the last part of the film even though it only runs about 60 minutes. I know my dad and his buddies probably thought this was hot stuff but I have become far too jaded to be able to just sit and watch a line of butts prance off to the swimming pool without at lack the minimum of believable dialog or grade z acting to hold things together. Naked women alone just can’t do it for me anymore. The ape suit is one of the worst I have ever seen but I am a sucker for a guy in a monkey suit film so the fakier the suit the happier I am. I sort of wish there had been more of the hairy little guy and some sort of attempt to explain where he came from and why the nudists piss him off so much. The color on this little film. Very bright and vibrant. You just don’t see this kind of color anymore and I think that is a shame. While basically a total cheese festand it is a little fun at times. It is fun to watch the nudity down played all the time.The only time nudity is even mentioned is when our hospital bed ridden hero Byron (played, I think, by Mahon) tells the interviewing detective how his wife Delores got him into being a nudist –a bit like Adam blaming Eve here I think- and how the whole deal started because she needed to go to the camp to get an even tan. Why is Byron in the hospital? What tragedy befell him? I think you’ll have to see that –all along with all those brazen nekked 60’s ladies- with your own eyes to believe it.
AKA: Don’t Touch Me I’m Dangerous, Ore Ni Sawaru To Abunaize
Recently got in two films by Japanese director Yasuharu Hasebe. I watched Black Tight Killers first and later skimmed over Assault! Jack the Ripper! to just check the quality -if it is bad then I have to find another rip somewhere- and was fairly stunned at how different the two films were. Not only in style but content matter as well. Surely Black Tight Killers falls more into the category of films I prefer more and that is not to say the more graphic content matter of Assault! offended me in some way. It did not. But I am talking here of film style and presentation. A review of Assault! Jack the Ripper! will be made after I have watched all of the film but just from the few moments I watched I can tell it is more in the syle of the Pinky Violence films of the seventies -which along with the softcore Roman Porno films is what Nikkatsu wound up making almsot exclusively by the end of the 70′s- while Black Tight Killers is a stylized Nikkatsu Studios Yakuza type film which is paying homage in many scenes to the James Bond films of the time. Some of the scenes are similar to what Seijun Suzuki –for whom Hasebe worked as assistant director for eight years- was doing at the time though Suzuki seemed to prefer luscious b/w for his noir/gangster films. I do have some earlier Seijun Suzuki films that are in color but, to be honest, have not got around to watching them though what I have seen of them look marvelous. Anyway for Black Tight Killer Yasharu Hasebe chose not only to work in color but in a bright and lurid style of color that is reminiscent of some of Mario Bava’s work during the 60’s. Black Tight Killers has been compared to Bava’s 1968 Danger Diabolik and not without good reason though Black Tight Killer’s predates Danger Diabolik by a couple years so it could hardly have been influenced by Bava’s film. Both films have a comic book feel to the look and feel. Both films are lit rather garishly to say the least and both seem to be inspired by the Sean Connery James Bond films as far as the use of life saving secrets gadgets go. Of course Danger Diabolik was actually based a comic book character. I have actually read a couple reviews that said the lighting and photography of Black Tight Killers is horrible and I am at a complete lose as to what the hell these folks are talking about. And before moving on another element of the film that reminds me of Bava’s superb work of the 60’s is Hasebe’s use of how to stage and frame a shot. The technical word is mise-en-scène and there is some dispute over what the term actually refers to. I tend to keep things simple and define at as the total visual aspects of a scene. This includes the lighting and all props and placements of the objects in the scene. Bava –as an art director and cinematographer himself- understood this in his early films. I have only seen one complete Hasebe film –but have other lined up for downloading soon- and am not qualified to comment on those films at the moment but I can say I love the visual style of Black Tight Killers.
While I am working on my post for Black Tight Killers thought I would share these incredible Jim Steranko covers he did for some of Marvel’s horror themed comics. He actually redid his own covers here*. The pen and ink covers at the bottom came first for Supernatural Thrillers. Later when Marvel released a line of b/w titles under Curtis Publishing he reworked the covers in a more painterly fashion for the short lived Masters of Terror. Thought it would be nice to lay the covers out side by side and let you compare them. The design and layout stays basically the same with some slight changes from the pen and ink works to the painted covers. I really miss this style of rendering. I am not knocking the comic books artists of today who have fantastic technical prowess. The contemporary stuff I see can be as awesome in many cases and yet it lacks some simple magic that a man like Steranko possessed. Great works from one of the true legends of comic book history.
*IMPORTANT UPDATE: Tony from thedrawingsofsteranko.com cleared up the fact that the two magazines covers at the top were not in fact painted by Steranko but most likely by either Gray Marrow or Dan Adkins. I made the assumption they were drawn by Jim Steranko and I was wrong. Thanks Tony. They are still great covers as are the original comic books at the bottom that inspired them.
Can any help me and tell me who the singer is on the great theme song here for Yasuharu Hasebe’s stylish spy thriller Black Tight Killers. I am working on a review of the film right now and expect it to be my next post. The music is by Naozumi Yamamoto but I am curious as to who the guy singing the song is. It is simply great to say the least. I loe the filma dn will save my comments and critiques for the post but the opening title sequence is so cool that I made a clip of it and uploaded to my Viddler account. It is certainly paying homeage to (or simply ripping off) the James Bond opening theme songs but who cares because this is so nice to look at. Japanese girls in 60′s style hairdos, go-go boots and mini-skirts look so darn cute even when brandishing a swithblade. Unlike the James Bond theme song sequences that are elaborate but end when the film begins the luridly stunning visual techniques of The Balck Tight Killer’s theme song continue throughout the movie. I hope to have that review up in a day or two. Damn, in fact I still have twenty minutes of the film to finish and I had better get on that first. Enjoy this sample for now of some nice Nikkatsu style go-go dancing action.
UPDATE: The singer on the song is actor Akira Kobayashi himself. The song’s title is Don’t Cry Drifter. Lyrics by Hiroko Sekino and music by Jun Kitahara. Got this from the hardcodes subs over opening credits of all places though was not easy as the subtitles are white they are all but impossible to read in some places as they blend in with the white background. I had to guess at a few letters but think I got it right.
My homemade video clip for the Joseph Losey film The Servant now has half a million hits at my Youtube site. Maybe you didn’t know I have a Youtube site but now you do. Please check it out. I have over 200 uploads there but I do not really do much in the way of posting bulletins or responding to comments. Sorry. Lot of effort to maintain it via proxies from China where Youtube is blocked. But I was happy to get a little notice from the gents at Youtube along with some weird offer to make money off of the clip with Google Adsense. I am not interested in that at all and am saddened to see some sites I love now plastered with Google ads and Amazon.com stuff. No doubt I would slap a big ad on my site if it paid off in big bucks but I don’t think that will happen so I will not litter it with Adsense or Amazon stuff. Anyway, instead of making some offer to be a ‘partner’ with Adsense I would prefer if Youtube stopped blocking videos and sending me nerve-racking warnings because a nipple pops out of a fat girl’s blouse in a 60’s exploitation trailer or because Bettie Page gets spanked, tied up, gagged and thrown in a car trunk. Regardless I am happy this video is so popular but I disagree with some of the comments that slam Sara Miles. I love her. She’s hot in that real snobby way. Like I would need some sort of freaky shoe fetish to get anything going with her at all. That will never happen but let an old man dream okay. My link to the original post is here and it is a great film I have seen several times and will maybe re-watch again here shortly. I am of course including the award winning video here. The quality is pretty poor I see now and I could probably do it better these days since I am monkeying with the more advanced Sony Vegas 8. This meager experiment was done using ULead 10 and Windows Movie Maker and I remember having lots of problems as it was my first experiment in making clips from videos. For nostalgia’s sake watch at the very end and there is a little advertisement clip promoting my website way back when the URL was different. History in the making my dear readers.
For a while now I have been working at getting a decent collection of old TV series . When I say old I mean pretty old, from the mid to late 60’s to the mid 70’s. Pre-cable shows that I grew up on essentially I can sometimes find these in boxed sets here in China. For example I have both the complete original Star Trek and Hogan’s Heroes and one day am going to get the Addams Family at the DVD stores I drop into once in a while. Of course these are all pirated and cheap as hell but of excellent quality so far. Other shows are a bit harder to locate and I am using a Rapidshare based site now to piece together The Munsters series little by little. Those RS sites have lots of series but I am really lazy about copying and pasting the files one by one so I tend to put them together over a long period of time. The shows can also sometimes be found the shows on sites like Isohunt or Pirate Bay which is great. I got the complete run of Kung Fu with David Carradine from Isohunt as well as all of the Gilligan’s Islands episodes. I also have a membership at a ratio based TV show site connected to Cinemageddon but it can hard to maintain a good ratio at those type of sites –which can result in getting banned- and so I cannot get the things I want when I want them. So I have a membership but am afraid to download anything I like. Right now working on getting in season one of Hawaii 5-0 from that CG ratio based TV show site and may see if I can get somewhere else since I cannot seem to seed of any of it back. Well at the wonderful The Horror Charnel –another ration based site- I just got in the complete one season run of one of the best TV series of all time, Kolchak: The Night Stalker. I burned the 20 episodes and began watching them last night.
You can argue that if it was such a good series why did it last only one season? Who knows. We live in a world where Beyonce’s music and videos are in your face all day and night but not person I know owns a King Crimson or Andy Summers album. The show just did not fare well against its Friday night competition on NBC it seems. The series aired in 1974 on ABC and was based on the character Carl Kolchak –played to perfection by the Darren McGavin- created for the made for TV movies The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler. The shows follow the adventures of the shabbily dressed Carl Kolchak who works at the under-staffed and under-budgeted INS news bureau in Chicago where he employs his journalistic talents either covered mob hits or filling in for the “Dear Emily” writer when she is ill. We hardly ever see any of Chicago’s horrid winter weather as Carl drives around in near constant sunshine in his convertible Ford Mustang talking into his cassette recorder. Of course the shows hook is that he is constantly getting pulled into supernatural situation or another as his investigation of a recent murder unfolds. He encounters anything and everything from incarnations of Jack the Ripper to Werewolves and Vampires. Kolchak is the absolute quintessential non-hero. He packs no gun or knife and more often than not winds up screaming like a little girl and jumping out a window in the presence of the evil force he is facing. And to be honest Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson would have probably done the same thing in real life if confronted with a werewolf or vampire in their closet.
On top of supernatural terrors Kolchak must deal with one cynical police chief after another who ignores his questions at press conferences. But the greatest adversary he must contend with each week is his old school news paper chief Tony Vincenzo –played by perennial tough guy Simon Oakland- who spends each episode trying to pull Carl off each case and assigning him to some mundane story. Invariably Vincenzo winds up backing Kolchak and having his faith in his ‘star’ reporter restored… only to lose it again again next episode. The relationship between Vincenzo and Kolchak is classic and adds comic relief to the show’s themes of horror and mayhem. Also refreshing is that McGavin and I have only seen The Ripper episode and half of The Zombie so far but am about to hit the sofa –I am supposed to be studying Chinese- and watch a few more episodes this afternoon. This is classic TV. Before the idea of drama of comedy became a bunch of selfish over sexed yuppies insulting each other for an hour. It was a time when shows had a simple but effective formula they stuck to each week and milked it for all it was worth. Just look what was done with shows like Gilligan’s Island or Hogan’s Heroes. The same cast and same props every week but I never got tired of it. The same with Kolchak. The same clutterd office and grumpy boss each week but with a different monster and resourceful method of whacking the creature during the shows last five minutes. I guess I am just old school but this is a lot cooler than Lost or Prison Break in my book.
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