Posts Tagged ‘Vincent Price’
Posted by Movies Unlimited in DVD & Blu-Ray, Featured Columns, Latest News, Movies Unlimited on July 19th, 2010
There are Star Wars people, and Star Trek people. Some people dig Bugs Bunny; others love Mickey Mouse. There’s DC folks, and those who Make Theirs Marvel. There’s the “boxers” crowd…and the “briefs” bunch. Red states. Blue states. You may have heated debates over any (or none) of these ways of seeing the world, but most of the time, the stakes of these discussions aren’t as very high as they might initially seem.
There are those who think humanity is worth preserving, and those who believe we ought to self-destruct our way back into a feral wasteland. That’s the discussion that takes place in Irwin Allen’s first live-action feature film, The Story of Mankind.
And that discussion is a hoot and a half!
Readers of Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States and devotees of Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen’s A Patriot’s History of the United States can at last rally around something, and that something is this always daffy, sometimes dull, and surprisingly still provocative 1957 film based on the children’s history book by Hendrik Willem van Loon.
Cult film fanatics who’ve yet to see this one can’t call their education complete until they do. Imagine Ed Wood mounting a historic costume production based on Conversations with Elie Wiesel and you start to get the unique flavor of this one-of-a-kind celestial courtroom drama.
OK, maybe the Ed Wood comparison is not really fair – it’s Irwin Allen, after all, the man who would eventually give us enduring disaster classics like The Poseidon Adventure and The Towering Inferno – and, it’s a little too easy to say that some members of the all-star cast embarrass themselves in career-low appearances, and that the philosophical content plays a little too much like “Cosmos of the Network Stars.”
Cheesy? Oh, yeah. Sadly laughable? In parts.
Still got something to say?
Amazingly, yes!
The film opens with a blustery musical overture, with each cast member receiving his (or her) own trumpet fanfare: RONALD COLMAN! VINCENT PRICE! HEDY LAMARR! GROUCHO MARX! CHICO MARX! HARPO MARX! JOHN CARRADINE! CHARLES COBURN! VIRGINIA MAYO! CESAR ROMERO! PETER LORRE! DENNIS HOPPER! AGNES MOOREHEAD! HENRY DANIELL! CEDRIC HARDWICKE!
If that assemblage of star power doesn’t sell you already, read on. Here’s the setup:
Fade up on a vast starscape and a conversation taking place between two angels (depicted as twinkling stars). The angels are hemming and hawing over mankind’s “discovery of the Super H-Bomb” (which sounds a lot like the Solaranite device of Wood’s legendarily bad-great Plan 9 from Outer Space). It isn’t so much that man has discovered the bomb, it’s that he’s perfected the lethal doomsday device “60 years before he was scheduled to do so.”
“Why, they’re not ready or wise enough to handle it yet. If exploded now, the bomb would blow man and his Earth sky high!”
This dialogue is pure joy. And there’s so much more to come.
Disturbed by mankind’s moral transgression, otherworldly judges immediately convene a trial…in outer space. Chosen to represent the world’s people is the Spirit of Man (Colman), “a wanderer through time who was a combination of all men, of the pious and the fallen; the bold and the meek; the dreamers and the builders; the chaste and the guilty; the great and the small men of all times.”
Prosecuting the case—that is, making the argument that mankind deserves to perish for its numerous sins—is none other than the great Satan himself, personified by the suave, smoothly rude Mr. Scratch (Price). If, by the end of the trial, mankind is found worthy of preservation, divine intervention will prevent the bomb’s explosion. If not, we are told, the imminent detonation of the bomb will be permitted to destroy the world.
The ground rules for the trial are set – with both Colman and Price allowed to “visit” Earth at any time or place to present evidence to the interstellar court. And thus the sweeping rush through time begins!
After a brief stop in the caveman era where the quest for fire is quickly re-enacted, Scratch calls Egyptian pharaoh Khufu (Carradine) as his first witness—since the ruler apparently made a deal with Scratch to facilitate the construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza. We’re whisked into the world of ancient Egypt—which is to say that we’re treated to a clumsy blend of grainy stock footage mixed with inserts that include somnambulist extras walking in and out of frame as the stars stare offscreen.
At this point in the proceedings, friends, we’re about a half hour into the movie. And we’re only at the time of the pyramids. Here’s where viewers might start thinking, “My God. This is going to be a long, painful slog.”
But then, we get Peter Lorre as Nero, in maybe the most wrongfully enjoyable screaming fit ever filmed, left unequaled until Gene Kelly took to the screen in Viva Knievel! We get Christopher Columbus (Anthony Dexter) counseled by Chico Marx. We get Harpo Marx as (the harp-playing) Sir Isaac Newton. And, we finally get to Groucho, who portrays Peter Minuit, the man who reportedly swindled Native Americans out of Manhattan for what amounted to $24.
It’s hard not to notice Groucho looking deeply uncomfortable onscreen even as he gamely makes his way through some Marx-style banter that’s a pale shadow of the anarchic wit he and his brothers perfected in their best comedies:
“So you think you’re being robbed, eh? Be glad it’s not 300 years later. You might have been wiped out in the stock market.”
Yes, it’s a train wreck kind of pleasure you get when Lamarr’s Joan of Arc goes up against Daniell’s Bishop Cauchon in a perversely odd sequence that plays like an unholy collision between Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc and Victor Fleming’s tussle with La Pucelle starring Ingrid Bergman.
I haven’t even scratched the surface involving the scenes depicting Moses (Francis X. Bushman), Queen Elizabeth and Shakespeare (Moorehead and Reginald Gardner), Abraham Lincoln (Austin Green) and Adolf Hitler (Bobby Watson). The highlight of the whole enterprise, however, is decidedly the sequence involving Napoleon (the very, very young Dennis Hopper). When Josephine casually remarks to him that modesty isn’t one of his virtues, you can really see that Frank Booth look come into his eyes, decades before David Lynch cast him as everyone’s favorite gas-huffing madman.
The trial finds Colman and Price continually countering one another, examples of mankind’s transgressions met with stories about humanity’s continuing moral progress. The burning of Joan was an outrage? Sure, but there was the Renaissance! It doesn’t make a whole lot of narrative sense to have Mr. Scratch’s panties in a bunch over Joan’s martyrdom–after all, if the event really represented one of man’s most egregious moral failures, you’d think he’d be thrilled and not indignant, as he is.
“Love and Hate are really the same.” Logic weeps.
The Story of Mankind offers a truly kaleidoscopic experience of mad wonderments. The film is a colossal aggravation and hypnotic in its appeal. The picture’s most bizarre charm, however, rests in how the film manages to burrow its way into your head and, yes, for a few moments here and there, actually forces you to think about the onerous issues concerning our lives and behavior here on the Big Blue Marble.
The film audaciously promises a sequel after a climax that actually took me by surprise. The producer of When Time Ran Out is long gone, but I say it’s up to someone to bravely take up this mantle and assemble a cast to rival this one. There’s a lot of historical pageantry to add to this film’s material, since Mankind has a lot to crow about—and answer for—since the dropping of the atomic bomb.
Spirit of Man? Morgan Freeman. Mr. Scratch? Penn Jillette, with Teller alongside him (just as Price comes with a sidekick).
The High Judge? Why not Betty White? She’s up for everything now, isn’t she?
And since Mel Gibson’s The Birth of a Nation remake has probably been stuffed promptly into turnaround (just kidding, kids—as in, he’s not planning one), maybe this would be the perfect new epic project for him.
Don’t miss this movie. Cult fans of a younger generation won’t recognize some of the once-world-famous faces (as I certainly did not), but there’s so much to devour here. You can see it, and be dazzled, or not.
“THIS CHOICE IS ENTIRELY UP TO YOU.”
George D. Allen produces the MovieFrightFare videos hosted here on FM (which will return soon–we promise!), and also writes articles for and produces videos for the Movies Unlimited blog MovieFanFare.
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Posted by Earl in A Walk Through the Forrest with Earl Roesel, Books, Latest News on November 21st, 2009
Having acquainted myself with just who this Forrest J Ackerman was via The Horror Hall of Fame and Horray for Horrorwood!, the next step was inevitably a brush with Famous Monsters itself. Though James Warren’s version of FM had faded away when I was three years old, nixing any chance I had to grow up with this mightiest of monster magazines, fate conspired with chance (in the words of Brother Theodore) to save me.
When I was about 13-years old my mother brought home a number of science fiction digests from a local drug store. These were not quite in my line but I still perused them with interest, particularly the ads. Before Ebay, Amazon and Ioffer, this was the only way to locate unusual items otherwise unavailable in one’s area. I remember pouring over the full-page spreads hawking Hildebrandt-style fantasy art and bejeweled daggers – somehow those stark, simple images transported me to another world much more vividly than the purple prose that surrounded them.
I sent away for a number of the catalogs offered by various companies in the classified section. One was for something called Bud Plant. I almost forgot about it until one day something the size of a telephone book came in the mail for me. Bud Plant was a comics/collectibles dealer and their catalog was truly a Bible on the subject. I lost myself in page after page of illustration and description in black and white newsprint. Superhero comics, underground comics, reprints of those EC comics I’d heard about on The Horror Hall of Fame, Disney, Dark Horse and Dr. Octopus. Everything was there. I was, and am, not a comic book fan per se but the thrill of discovering this material for the first time was nevertheless exhilarating.
One listing was especially enticing. It was for Famous Monsters of Filmland # 201; the cover, as best I could make out given the blotchy printing, depicted the then-just-deceased Vincent Price in Masque of the Red Death. So somebody decided to re-launch this thing, eh? The description noted the issue’s contents and the fact that Forry Ackerman was at the helm. I decided to order immediately; at last I’d have a look at what I’d heard the likes of John Landis, Joe Dante and Rick Baker tout so enthusiastically.
Famous Monsters # 201, which I still retain after 16 years. It has since been signed by Forry and Jim Warren.
I’m fairly certain there was such a thing as First Class, if not Priority, mail in 1993 but neither I nor my mother were apparently adept enough to choose that option. It was, as I recall, two agonizing months until I finally received the package containing FM # 201, a copy of Stephen Jones’ excellent The Illustrated Vampire Movie Guide (a book I‘d get much use out of for years to come), and an issue of Cult Movies that no 13-year old should’ve been reading.
It was an extremely fortuitous issue of FM to begin with. There was much coverage of Forry and his interests that further filled in the gaps in my knowledge of him. Also included was an extensive look at an FM convention held in Virginia to celebrate the re-launch of the mag. Many genre celebrities that I recognized took part and, from the photos, the dealer tables were stacked high with monster-related bric-a-brac. It would’ve been nirvana for me, if only I’d known such a thing was taking place – but then, it wouldn’t have made much difference anyway. I was in Kentucky to stay and my mother always made it plain that we were in no economic condition to go on trips.
I received the Bud Plant catalogs regularly thereafter. The next FM I got through them was 202, with a painting of Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein Monster on the cover. This was done by an artist named Osman Askin. Little did I know then that one day I’d be working in the name of the Forrest J Ackerman estate, cataloging examples of this artist’s work for one of the world’s major auction houses.
Posted by Earl in A Walk Through the Forrest with Earl Roesel, Books, Latest News on November 6th, 2009
The series of articles that will hereby commence are not in any way, shape, or form intended to “explain” Forrest J Ackerman. It would be futile for anyone to attempt such a feat, let alone one who personally knew the man a scant two years. Even that seems uncertain to me because, in retrospect, I wonder whether I really knew him at all. Yet no single individual is as responsible for more change in my life than he, the Ackermonster, Mr. Sci-Fi, the Boy Who Was Born on Mars – the man whose hand I held as he passed from this earth nearly a year ago.
I so vividly recall the first time I became aware of his existence. I was ten-years-old at the time, living a generally unhappy existence in Newport, Kentucky. My parents had divorced two years earlier; and the trials and travails of those proceedings lumbered along their miserable course. I lived with my mother in a two-story brick house, the top floor of which contained my bedroom. Not having the means to amass a collection of the sort I’d later find in the Acker-mini-mansion, my proudest possession, an autograph of Vincent Price purchased for $50 via mail order, stood out lonely and distinguished on the otherwise bare walls. This was the setting into which, one late October night in 1990, The Horror Hall of Fame came beaming.
THHF appears to have been, more or less, an attempt by Universal to create a horror aficionado’s version of the Oscars. Fright flicks of the past and present, along with their creators, were presented not with a golden Deco Adonis, but rather a grimmer than grim reaper, hood down, atop a slab of marble for achievements in various fields of genre-related endeavor. The show was hosted by Robert Englund and featured a particularly moving appearance by Vincent Price; the sickly actor was still a sport, accepting his award from Roddy McDowall via satellite.
What most captured my imagination, however, was a profile on one of the other inductees into the Horror Hall of Fame, a man I’d never heard of before, someone called Forrest J Ackerman who lived in a grand mansion in Hollywood that was filled from top to bottom with sci-fi (a word he’d invented!) and horror memorabilia. My eyes grew wide with fascination as the camera prowled down the mind-bogglingly overstuffed hallways of his Ackermansion. I wanted to drink in every angle, every detail no matter how fleeting. I found him ten times more fascinating than any of the feature films discussed on the program that night. Here was a man who lived, breathed, ate, and slept the things that I loved and made a living doing it in faraway, fairytale Hollywood, CA. It was absurd to even think that I’d ever make my way to sunny SoCal, let alone cross paths with this curious character.
And yet, somehow I just knew…some faint but firm voice was whispering into my ear, “Here lies your destiny.” And so it was.
Posted by Dominic in Latest News on April 3rd, 2009
A couple of cool action-figure announcements for those of us crazy enough to spend our hard earned dollars on molded plastic figures during these harsh economic times. Okay, that held a hint of sarcasm, honestly I would buy toys even if a meteor was heading towards Earth and we only had six months until total destruction.
The gods over at Hot Toys have recently announced the ultimate X-Men movie line, featuring characters spanning all four films, including the upcoming X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Even though I wasn’t a fan of the X-Men trilogy, I do have a glimpse of hope for Wolverine and I am curious to see what Hot Toys will do with such a vast array of cool characters. According to Cool Toy Review the line is expected to launch with a figure from each film. Expect to see images of Rogue, Nightcrawler, Colossus and Deadpool, with the main X-Men coming later. I know Medicom has produced a decent line of 12-Inch Marvel figures over the past few years based on their comic-book incarnations-I even own the Wolverine-but I can’t help but hope that Hot Toys will take a crack at the Marvel comic world if the X-Men movie line is a success.
In other toy news, head over to Sideshow to pre-order a few awesome figures from Amok Time:
Vincent Price as Masque of the Red Death.
IT! The Terror from Beyond Space.
Boris Karloff as Frankenstein’s Monster.
I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again; it’s a great time to be a toy collector!
Posted by Dominic in Movies on March 5th, 2009
Just as Amok Time revealed their 1/6th scaled Vincent Price as Mask of the Red Death figure, now they’ve listed another Vincent collector figure for pre-order on their website.
I had mentioned in my previous post that my two favorite Vincent films are Mask of the Red Death and Last Man on Earth, both from 1964. I also mentioned that I would love for Amok (or anyone for the matter) to produce a 1/6th scaled Vincent as Dr. Robert Morgan and though this figure doesn’t exactly fit that wish it does have potential. The Vincent likeness is spot on and the perfect age for a possible custom Robert Morgan figure. Sure, I won’t get a fully decked out Last Man on Earth 4-color window box, but beggars can’t be choosers. Of course I’ll have to buy two of the figures, one to keep in period costume and one to custom but ‘tis the life a toy collector who wants it all.
Don’t wait, order your Vincent Leonard Price Jr. fully articulated 1/6th scaled figure in period costume now, and in December you’ll have a couple little Vincent’s under the tree.
Posted by Dominic in Movies on March 4th, 2009
A couple of weeks ago I reported that Amok Time was producing a 1/6th scaled Boris Karloff, equipped with three interchangeable heads that show Boris at three very distinct periods of his life.
This week the horror film loving lads over at Amok Time have again overjoyed horror film fans everywhere by revealing the 1/6th scaled Vincent Price as the Mask of the Red Death Collectable Figure from the 1964 film of the same name. Ironically my two favorite Vincent Price films are both from 1964, Mask of the Red Death and the forever underrated Last Man on Earth.
The figure includes blood red robes, belt and removable mask. Head over and pre-order this figure, and who knows, with the way things are going maybe we’ll soon have a Vincent as Dr. Robert Morgan equipped with tiny wooden stakes and gas mask…
Posted by Dominic in Latest News, Movies on December 12th, 2008
With the remake of the 1951 sci-fi classic The Day the Earth Stood Still opening today I thought I’d post a little treat for the fans of the original. Introduced in the Robert Wise directed original was one of the coolest, deadliest alien robots ever, Gort. (In my opinion only Forbidden Planets Robby the Robot is cooler.) Accompanying Klaatu (Michael Rennie) on is message of caution, Gort, played by Lock Martin, is a giant metal robot who is said to be part of an interstellar police force. He reacts only to violence and, though he was created to keep the peace, he can destroy whole worlds if provoked.
Yesterday Sideshow Collectables posted Amok Times 16-inch Gort for pre-order. The PVC figure is movie accurate, with six points of articulation, and retro styled packaging with a deluxe 4-color window box with a fifth panel. The figure runs $74.99, and is a must have for any classic sci-fi buff out there looking to surprise himself for Christmas.
And as a little added bonus Sideshow also listed for pre-order Amok Times first ever Vincent Price statue. The statue is of Vincent as Don Nicholas Medina from the Roger Corman directed The Pit and the Pendulum, and includes a torture dungeon base, and light up cauldron and poker. How cool is that. Check out the statue over at Sideshow and if you can afford the $149.99 price tag swoop this little gem up as soon as you can, you won’t regret it.
Posted by Dominic in Events on December 7th, 2008
With the recent passing of Forry Ackerman I felt compelled to relay some of my thoughts about a man I’d only met a handful of times-but through mutual friends and his contributions to the horror fan community felt I’d known him my whole life. A man whom if not for his passion and love for classic horror films and stories I would not be sitting here, on my laptop, writing for Famous Monsters of Filmland. To even be able to say I am a part of his creation is overwhelming and often I feel undeserving of such an honor.
Here was a man who allowed strangers into his home to view and enjoy a collection he cherished for decades. Unfortunately the world is full of dishonest and jealous individuals and some of these said fans stole from Forry limiting the amount of people he allowed into his home. And now Forry is gone, another loss in a community that can’t afford to dwindle much more.
Horror has given way to splatter, shock, exaggeration and filth. Reflecting the current state of our society everything is cheap and easy. With trash like the Saw pictures and countless others the terror of the golden age of horror, the 1920’s to mid 60’s, have long since faded into distant memory, or in many cases onto dusty DVD shelves.
I don’t want to seem negative or even disillusioned about the current state of horror films, but I can’t help but cringe every time I’m searching for stories of interest to post on the site. I avoid 99% of the crap that is out there, and the rest, well I make do with what is given to me. Call this creative snobbery, but I, like many other silent voices loathe what’s happened to the monster community.
There are, however, many individuals, like Phil Kim, Robert Aragon and Bob Burns, etc who keep the essence of the classics alive and well. Like Forry, they believed in the pathos fused deep into the souls of the world of Gods and Monsters.
Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, Bella Lugosi, Peter Lorre and Lon Chaney have been replaced by the immature trash of Jason Voorhees, Freddie Kruger, Leatherface and Pinhead, who created the present dismemberment of true terror and, like the Monster Dr. Frankenstein created, have replaced perfection with parts from the dead, and unimaginative.
So I sit at an impasse. The damage has been done, and continues to roll off the cutting room floors and into the theatres and home entertainment centers of our lives. We cannot return to the age of brilliance, no more than we can close shop and give up on the horror genre. What we can do is remind ourselves to keep the classics alive. Show them to our children before they are corrupted by the blood and guts of modern movies, television and video games. Teach them who Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi were, let them feel the magic of a black and white monster closing in on them in the middle of the night on a school night. Let them live the terror and awe of perfection, then let them decide, like all of us have, what the true essence of horror is.
Posted by dominie in Latest News, Movies on September 26th, 2008
Everything you ever want to know about The Fly! Yesterday I received a lovely email from Diane Kachmar whose been working with David Hedison, star in the original 1958 Kurt Neumann Sci-Fi classic The Fly with Vincent Price. Their new book, The Fly at Fifty: The Creation and Legacy of a Classic Science Fiction Film celebrates original tale about a scientist’s (Andre Delambre played by Hedison) horrific accident when teleportation experiment malfunctions. The fifty-year anniversary book is 200 pages of loaded history since The Fly debuted, including over 50 photographs that will feature rare, never-before-seen shots from the private archive of make-up designer Ben Nye.
See below for more details and order your copy of The Fly at Fifty here.
“Help me! Help me!”
Andre Delambre is a devoted husband, a loving father and a brilliant scientist. When his body is found in his laboratory with his arm and head crushed by a hydraulic press, his wife Helene admits to having killed him. Believing Helene incapable of such a crime, Andre’s brother slowly uncovers the truth – that an experiment with Andre’s new teleportation device went horribly wrong and Andre persuaded Helene to assist him in suicide.
When the American Film Institute distributed a ballot with 400 nominated movie quotes to a jury of over 1500 film industry figures, the abovequote came in 123rd. But this film’s influence extends far beyond a simple quote. The movie’s concept, ending and the quote have permeated pop culture from 1958 to The Simpsons to a 2008 opera based on a 1986 film remake by David Cronenberg.
The original movie The Fly was the surprise hit on 1958. Shot in 18 days at a cost of $450,00 dollars, it brought in $6 million, which at time when Fox Studios was in desperate need of a hit. It was the biggest box office film of director Kurt Neumann but he would never know – he died one month after the premiere (a week before the movie was released nationally).
This film made a star of David Hedison and cemented Vincent Price’s place among the horror film immortals. It is more than a tale of science gone wrong and hideous mutants. It is a film classic, the rare perfect blending of story, cast and crew, with the fantastic elements in sync with the universality of Andre’s struggle with what he had hoped to do with this technology and what actually happened to him. That struggle touches everyone who has ever watched this film and why, after 50 years, it remains a classic. (more…)
Posted by dominie in Latest News, Movies on September 26th, 2008
I’m going to have to agree with Dread Central that Legend Films’ colorization of old black & white horror and sci-fi films doesn’t sit very high in my book. But, luckily since they are doing it regardless of what the fans think, the colorization treatment will render a newly restored black & white version of the film included in the DVD package for only $10-$15. There are definitely no complaints on that end.
Legend Films’ will release the following old horror films October 21.
The Last Man on Earth (1964)—based on a loose adaptation of Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend and starring the legendary Vincent Price, Ublado Ragona’s The Last Man on Earth tells the tale of Dr. Robert Morgan as the only survivor of a devastating world-wide plague due to a mysterious immunity he acquired to the bacterium while working in Central America years ago. He is all alone now…or so it seems.
Creature from the Huanted Sea (1961)—directed by Roger Corman, this monster comedy is about a crook who decides to rid the members of his inept crew and blame their deaths on a legendary sea creature—only he doesn’t know that the creature is real. (more…)
There are Star Wars people, and Star Trek people. Some people dig Bugs Bunny; others love Mickey Mouse. There’s DC folks, and those who Make Theirs Marvel. There’s the “boxers” crowd…and the “briefs” bunch. Red states. Blue states. You may have heated debates over any (or none) of these ways of seeing the world, but most of the time, the stakes of these discussions aren’t as very high as they might initially seem.
Prosecuting the case—that is, making the argument that mankind deserves to perish for its numerous sins—is none other than the great Satan himself, personified by the suave, smoothly rude Mr. Scratch (Price). If, by the end of the trial, mankind is found worthy of preservation, divine intervention will prevent the bomb’s explosion. If not, we are told, the imminent detonation of the bomb will be permitted to destroy the world.
But then, we get Peter Lorre as Nero, in maybe the most wrongfully enjoyable screaming fit ever filmed, left unequaled until Gene Kelly took to the screen in Viva Knievel! We get Christopher Columbus (Anthony Dexter) counseled by Chico Marx. We get Harpo Marx as (the harp-playing) Sir Isaac Newton. And, we finally get to Groucho, who portrays Peter Minuit, the man who reportedly swindled Native Americans out of Manhattan for what amounted to $24.
