| Vintage Pulp | Apr 26 2024 |
Every top notch private investigator knows the best clues are found in bed.
We wanted to show you another poster painted by John Solie, who was responsible for numerous blaxploitation, sexploitation, and action promos, all executed at the extremely high level you see here with his one sheet for Stacey. His other notable efforts include those for The Arena, Star Crash, Hit Man, and Hollywood Boulevard. You can click his keywords at bottom to see everything we've shared from him.
Naturally we watched Stacey and it's a cheesy detective tale starring erstwhile Playboy centerfold Anne Randall, who plays a model-turned-private dick hired to investigate a rich woman's extended family before any of them are allowed to be included in her will. Randall arrives just in time for intrigue and murder. Private investigators need to possess a Class C license in order to legally take on clients. The C on Randall's license probably stands for “casual sex.”
Even so, there's not much here. The detective elements are uninspiring despite a noir style voiceover, and the sexual elements, even with Randall and co-star Anitra Ford in occasional undress, are not going to blow your skirt up. To put the overall nothingness of the movie in perspective, consider the fact that we couldn't find a copy with sharp enough resolution to make screenshots worthwhile, nor enough official production photos to make them worth sharing. That's how much of a historical afterthought it is.
In lieu of imagery you could use your imagination, but we recommend not bothering. Stacey resides at the low end of grindhouse cinema characterized by numerous bold and outrageous entries. In our opinion it's notable only for being the first exploitation effort by director Andy Sidaris, who would go on to helm boobalicious ’80s throwaways such as Malibu Express, Hard Ticket to Hawaii, and Savage Beach. Stacey premiered in the U.S. this month in 1973.
StaceyMalibu ExpressHard Ticket to HawaiiSavage BeachPlayboyAnne RandallAlan LandersJames WestmorelandCristina RainesAnitra FordMiki GarciaJohn SolieAndy Sidarisposter artcinemamovie review
| Femmes Fatales | Dec 8 2023 |
She has others. But she never seems to get into them.
This promo image shows Colleen Moore, née Kathleen Morrison, who's not well known today but appeared in more than fifty films from 1916 to 1934. That's going back to an era of movies few casual fans have seen, but some of her highlights include Her Bridal Nightmare, So Long Lettty, and the 1934 version of The Scarlet Letter. You could be forgiven for thinking the latter was the first time Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel had been filmed, or even for thinking it was the second or third time, but it was, incredibly, the seventh film version. It was also Moore's last film. The above shot is from earlier, 1924, and was made for her comedy-drama Flirting with Love.
Flirting with LoveHer Bridal NightmareSo Long LetttyThe Scarlet LetterColleen MooreNathaniel Hawthorne
| Femmes Fatales | Nov 28 2023 |
The two distinct states of Ann Atmar.
In quantum science a particle can exist in unexcited and excited states simultaneously, though if you observe it you can only catch it in one state or the other. It's called superposition. U.S. actress Ann Atmar is observed twice above, in unexcited and exited states, a textbook example of super positioning, and she looks good in both. You might like her even better in this state, which we'll call disrobed. Science can be stimulating.
| Vintage Pulp | Oct 28 2023 |
Mid-century girly mags are always a winning draw.
As the Cole Porter song goes, in olden days a glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking—and exemplifying that concept is Ace, the “magazine for men of distinction,” which debuted in 1957 during the height of the cheesecake era. In this day and age Ace is strictly kid stuff. But that's why it's cool to look back at. Like other publications of its ilk, Ace came along to fill the void left by the slow demise of mens adventure magazines, and as was typical, it grew more daring as the years went by, before finally folding in 1982, itself a victim of changing tastes and more rawness provided by porn mags.
This particular issue, published this month in 1960, features the usual mix of humor, adventure, and models, including the amusingly named Beverly Hills, aka Carla Henderson, who gets a spread inside plus the eye-catching rear cover, Eve Post, who the editors claim was discovered by Jack Benny, and Brandy Kayse, who poses as "Eve." Several of the models, such as Frances Beck, Lacey Kelly, Virginia Remo, and Pat Gregory, managed minor film roles. Elsewhere in the magazine there's plenty of nice art, plus the usual "fact" (men are polygamous?) and fiction. Multiple scans below.
Ace MagazineFrances BeckPat GregoryLacey KellyVirginia RemoWinnie GrahamBeverly HillsCarla HendersonEve PostVirginia RogersDiane HartmanBrandy KayseJack Bennyburlesquemagazine artnudie magsnudity
| Vintage Pulp | Oct 19 2023 |
Gemser adds a few degrees to the equatorial heat.
Yup, Laura Gemser again. It's just one of those things. La donna della calda terra premiered in Italy two days after Emanuelle e gli ultimi cannibali, so you get to enjoy her twice this week. Above are two posters for the former film, which was originally made in Spanish and released as La mujer de la tierra caliente, then retitled in English as Emanuelle - A Woman from a Hot Country, and, more succinctly, Fury. By this point Gemser's Emanuelle series had pitted her against everything from slavers to cannibals, but here she headlines something close to a straight drama, as she meets Stuart Whitman while both are hitchhiking the hot backroads of Venezuela. As they sit together in a horse trailer being towed across the country, they tell each other their tragic histories.
We've made fun of the bizarre plots of Gemser's movies, but this attempt at unsensationalistic drama is conceptually flat and the screenplay is terrible. Our favorite line: “Don't pay too much attention to women. We have days in which we see everything distorted.” We'd retort that men have entire lifetimes in which they see everything distorted, which is why the world is fucked. *checking credits* Yeah, the screenplay was written by men. Well, they dropped the ball here, not just because of bad writing, but because—and we never thought we'd say this—Gemser's movies need rampant weirdness to be watchable. So give up being normal and enbrace the bizarre. Bring on the slavers and cannibals. They were sorely missed. After premiering in Spain in July 1978, La donna della calda terra opened in Italy today the same year.
SpainItalyVenezuelaLa donna della calda terraEmanuelle - A Woman from a Hot CountryFuryLaura GemserStuart WhitmanGabriele TintiPaola SenatorePilar VelazquezAmel Amorposter artcinemasexploitationnuditymovie review
| Vintage Pulp | Oct 9 2023 |
When the worst that can happen actually happens.
Nine years ago when we discussed Nightmare Alley we shared its West German poster, so we thought we'd circle back to the movie today, first because it was excellent, second because we wanted to share the U.S. poster, and third because Mexican auteur Guillermo del Toro remade it a couple of years ago, which made us think we needed to remind people there was a previous version. Well, here's the reminder: the original Nightmare Alley is one of the darkest films of the mid-century period. Tyrone Power is great in it, and Coleen Gray never hurts to have around, but what really makes the film worthwhile is that it's loaded with interesting subtext. If you want to know more about it, our previous write-up is here. Nightmare Alley premiered in the U.S. today in 1947.
| Intl. Notebook | Sep 26 2023 |
Dick Halloran and his late night guests.
We're revisiting the art of headshop posters with this image of an unidentified afro-topped beauty shot in 1979 by famed German lensman Cheyco Leidmann. This particular piece may look familiar to cinema fans. It's the poster that was over Scatman Crothers' bed in the 1981 scarefest The Shining. His character Dick Halloran was about as single as a man could be in that movie—living alone, hanging in his jammies, watching television late at night, with naked art looking down on him. Getting axed in the sternum was really a case of putting the poor guy out of his misery.
Halloran didn't have just one guardian angel on his walls. The reverse shot from that same sequence shows another poster, located over the television. That model we can identify. She's actress and centerfold Azizi Johari, who's made a few appearances here on the website. We even shared the very same poster a couple of years ago. But we decided to bring her back today so our visit to Halloran's bachelor pad would be complete. See more Johari here and here. She's well worth it.
| Vintage Pulp | Sep 16 2023 |
Gemser travels to many distant cities, and meets the worst people in every one of them.
To say that Laura Gemser's Emanuelle films are hit and miss is an understatement of epic proportions. While early entries have the happy softcore feel needed for thought-free diversion and occasional boners, later offerings veer into dark territory. Emanuelle - Perché violenza alle donne? is in the latter category. An Italian production, the title translates as “Emanuelle - Why violence against women?” Erotic cinema and social commentary don't usually mix well—not because they're mutually exclusive, but because the filmmakers never have the skill to pull it off. In the U.S. the movie was retitled Emanuelle Around the World, which sounds fine, but its international English title was changed to The Degradation of Emanuelle. Uh oh.
Gemser's adventures begin in San Francisco when her New York based photo-journalist character enjoys a satisfying boning in the back of a truck. But soon she's off on her next assignment, a titillating expose of a Kama Sutra commune in Asia. Once there she meets creepy guru George Eastman and uses her superior sexual skills to make his holiness transcendentally ejaculate too fast. Up to this point Perché violenza alle donne? is somewhat fun. But next Gemser meets up with pal Karin Schubert in Rome and joins an assignment to expose a sexual slavery ring. Wait—didn't she do that in Emanuelle and the White Slave Trade? Yup, but slavers never quit. This collection of bad men are unusually horrible. One is is a burn victim who rapes his captives. Another has a penchant for bestiality.
Obviously, during the 1970s filmmakers didn't really understand the idea of unintentionally minimizing serious subject matter the same way they do today. It was the “what-the-fuck-let's-give-it-a-try” era, and taking such risks produced some of the greatest cinema ever. But in this case writer/director Joe D'Amato and co-writers Maria Pia Fusco and Gianfranco Clerici failed. Badly. A movie on the subject of slavery and rape would be unpleasant but important if it were a Claire Denis drama or a Laura Poitras documentary. Mixing it into a flyweight sex film doesn't add dramatic weight—it adds discordance, embarrassment, and insult. It was a total miscalculation. You could potentially watch the film until Gemser departs the Kama Sutra commune, then turn it off. If you don't, you have nobody to blame but yourself.
However, we try to see the good in every movie we screen, so we should note that there are some high points. We'll list them. The Emanuelle films were typically shot in exotic locales, and in this case not only does D'Amato set scenes in New York City and San Francisco, but in Kathmandu, Rome, Hong Kong, and—for real—Teheran. Gemser is a limited actress, but one who always does her best with preposterous scripting. Schubert is a stolid co-star. Underutilized Don Powell is always a welcome sight. And lastly, many of the production photos, some of which appear below, are interesting. That's about all the good we can find. We'll just slide Emanuelle - Perché violenza alle donne? into ye olde metaphorical trash bin and forget it ever happened. It premiered in Italy today in 1977.
ItalyNepalKathmanduRomeNew York CitySan FranciscoEmanuelle - Perché violenza alle donne?Emanuelle Around the WorldThe Degradation of EmanuelleLaura GemserIvan RassimovKarin SchubertGeorge EastmanDon PowellJoe D'AmatoMaria Pia FuscoGianfranco Clericiposter artcinemasexploitationnuditymovie review
| Hollywoodland | Aug 21 2023 |
A long time ago in a hairstyling session far, far away.
And you thought the people at Lucasfilm thought up Princess Leia's double-bun hairdo. Nope. We'll admit they tightened it up a bit, but the earliest version of the style we've ever seen is in the above test shots with Peggy Cummins made for an unidentified movie. We thought we'd be able to identify the film because there are other shots from the session, and in some the slate being held in front of her bears a character name—Betty Cream.
But a scan on the interchannels shows no character by that name ever played by her. Possibly, it was a character whose name changed or whose part was cut, but here's what we think really happened. The only character in Hollywood history named Betty Cream was played by Helen Walker in 1946's Cluny Brown. That year was just before Cummins began scoring featured roles, so it's possible she did the hair/make-up sessions, but was axed. It happens, for various reasons.
Cummins and Walker had similar careers. They started near the same time, and had nearly the same number of roles, but while Walker did appear in a few notable crime movies such as Nightmare Alley and Call Northside 777, it was Cummins who made an indelible mark on crime cinema by playing the lead in Gun Crazy. It's a movie that remains much discussed today due to its depiction of a character obsessed with firearms, and what it implied about the U.S. You can read a little more about it here.
| Vintage Pulp | Jul 6 2023 |
Rubber in the right place and you'll get somewhere fast.
Above is another excellent poster for a b-movie—the gearhead drama Hot-Rod Girl. It's a teen oriented smalltown potboiler about how local do-gooder cop Chuck Connors tries to get reckless hot-rodding youth to confine their racing to a track built especially for the purpose, but despite his best efforts juvenile showdowns and rivalries spill over into the community. When a new racer arrives in town he bullies his way to top dog in the hot-rodding hierarchy and clashes with Connors. Only reluctant racer John Smith has the cred and guts to clip the newcomer's wings, but he's reluctant to get involved after hanging up his driving gloves due to being involved in a fatal accident.
It's a pretty dumb movie. It has nothing in the way of spark, and its final act relies upon the old car chase cliché—the one where the unwillingly pursued keeps speeding up rather than slowing down or stopping, even though the pursuer's only goal is to race: “Maybe I can outrun him!” On the other hand, the movie is interesting because Lori Nelson plays another hot-rodder rather than being relegated to a standard love interest, and Frank Gorshin, who later became the Riddler on the television show Batman, shows off a brand of mobile-faced wise-assery that will remind you of early Jim Carrey. We recommend Hot Rod Girl for car lovers willing to overlook its narrative shortcomings, but all others should probably speed past. It premiered this month in 1956.
Well, Chuck, we're talking port injection, newly stroked, incredible power to weight ratio, maximum torque, and I'm totally single. Car's nice too.
Well, Chuck, we're talking port injection, newly stroked, incredible power to weight ratio, maximum torque, and I'm totally single. Car's nice too.
Riddle me this. Actually, maybe it's just a question. Do all our dreams of major stardom lay in ruins thanks to this weak-ass b-movie?
American International PicturesHot Rod GirlBatmanLori NelsonChuck ConnorsJohn SmithFrank GorshinRoxanne Arlenposter artcinemamovie review
