Vintage Pulp

June 24 2024

LESS IS MORE

Sinatra and his band of merry men hit movie screens in streamlined form.

In 1960 the amusing self-promotional film known as Ocean’s Eleven hit cinemas with Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack in the starring roles. Four years later the Pack—minus Joey Bishop and Peter Lawford—assembled for another crime comedy with another numerical title—Robin and the 7 Hoods, which premiered today in 1964 (and came after the Sinatra/Dean Martin vehicle 4 for Texas). You see the movie’s insert style poster above. It’s a period piece set in Chicago during the gangster era, and deals with Sinatra and his cohort waging a crime war against wannabe kingpin Peter Falk, along the way becoming like the Robin Hood of legend by stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.

Ocean’s Eleven is a very famous movie, perhaps even a landmark, as we discussed a while back, but we didn’t love it. We thought Robin and the 7 Hoods would be worse, but we have to confess we liked it better. After we forgave ourselves for such heretical thoughts, we decided it’s just possible that without the entire Rat Pack to apportion screen time to the writing is actually a bit better. Have you ever seen rats fight over food? Scripts, being made of paper, are particularly fragile. Could be, too, that fewer Rat Packers meant a bit less extemporizing.

But the main improvement over Ocean’s Eleven is in the ancillary casting. Barbara Rush doesn’t rise, perhaps, to the level of Angie Dickinson, but casting Falk as the villain was a masterstroke. He already had that Falk thing down pat, which meant that his screen time was engaging from beginning to end. An Edward G. Robinson cameo never hurts, either. Having him open the film as an aging Chicago capo was also a nice choice. Even so, we’re not going out on a limb and claiming that Robin and the 7 Hoods is exactly a good movie. But in the end, whatever its flaws, it has Sinatra. And that’s always enough.

Chicago, Robin and the 7 Hoods, Ocean's Eleven, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Barbara Rush, Peter Falk, Bing Crosby, Victor Buono, poster art, cinema, movie review

Vintage Pulp

December 22 2023

BOOMTOWN RATS

Sinatra and company swarm Las Vegas and try to escape with the cheese.

Above: an alternate poster for Colpo Grosso, aka Ocean’s Eleven, to stand alongside the version we showed you last year. This, like the previous effort, was painted by Averado Ciriello. We talked about the movie and, long story short, it doesn’t live up to the legend of its stars, but in the end you can’t really knock the Rat Pack. They were ahead of their time.

Italy, Colpo grosso, Ocean's Eleven, Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Angie Dickinson, Peter Lawford, Averado Ciriello, poster art, cinema

Mondo Bizarro

July 4 2023

ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

Yeah, gimme a Carlsberg. And when you get a chance can you put out more peanuts?

The above photo, another one of those shots that could only have been made during the 1950s, shows the interior of the Santa Monica watering hole Chez Jay, which owner Jay Fiondella opened 4th of July weekend 1959 with showgirls and a rented elephant in attendance. The elephant, according to stories, dented the bartop when one of the models annoyed it. Chez Jay exists today and the bar supposedly still has the dent. Later clients who were less disruptive—and only slightly less, we imagine—included Frank Sinatra and Steve McQueen, who along with other celebs visited the bar partly due to a no paparazzi rule. You know what’s most amazing about Chez Jay? We lived in L.A. for four years and never went there. And for those of you who don’t know us, we do bars. Well, next trip maybe. By the way, elephants prefer Carlsberg because one of its logos features an elephant (and a swastika, but we’ll set that aside for now). Drink up!

Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Jay Fiondella, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin

Vintage Pulp

December 22 2022

OCEANS APART

Expectation and reality don't meet in Rat Pack classic.

This is a tasty poster for Colpo grosso, and at first glance you’d expect the movie to be a dark thriller, giallo, or film noir. But then you notice the cast list at top—Martin, Sinatra, Davis, Jr.—and it probably dawns on you that this must be Ocean’s Eleven. The poster was painted by Averado Ciriello and we have no idea why he went so dark with what is basically a comedy, but it’s great work. Actually, it’s better than the movie. For Sinatra-philes, Rat Pack lovers, or people who haven’t yet seen Ocean’s Eleven, that statement may seem sacriligious, so we won’t try to back it up with our words—we’ll just note that reviews of the day called it lazy and too long, and currently it has less than a 50% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Basically, despite being a cultural touchstone of a film, it isn’t that good, with its main problem being that it’s plain boring in parts. However…

The movie has tremendous value. A lot of contemporaneous reviews hated it because of its insouciant attitude toward the heist. New York Times reviewer Bosley Crowther said it was “nonchalant and flippant towards crime,” and also described it as amoral. “Young people,” he wrote, “are likely to find this more appropriate and bewitching than do their elders. The latter are likely to feel less gleeful in the presence of heroes who rob and steal.” So it’s clear that Ocean’s Eleven flagrantly defied the strictures of the Hays Code censorship regime, which was weakening but still intact. The Code stated that in no film should the sympathy of the audience be “thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil, or sin,” yet audiences loved Sinatra and his party bros, and their laissez faire attitude was a needed course correction after decades of creative suppression. It’s a shame then, that Ocean’s Eleven isn’t just a bit better.

Italy, Colpo grosso, Ocean's Eleven, Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Angie Dickinson, Joey Bishop, Peter Lawford, Richard Conte, Cesar Romero, Henry Silva, George Raft, Averado Ciriello, poster art, cinema, movie review

Vintage Pulp

October 27 2022

HOMICIDE SQUAD

There's no reason killing has to be ugly.

We have something fun for you today, a collection of door panel promo posters made by Columbia Pictures for its 1967 cheeseball spy adventure The Ambushers, which was the third of four installments starring Dean Martin as secret agent Matt Helm. The films featured deadly women known as Slaygirls. There were many Slaygirls, but we’re reasonably sure only five ever graced these large posters for The Ambushers. That’s Penny Brahms above, and below you’ll find Marilyn Tindall, unidentified (possibly Karin Feddersen with her hair chopped off), Alena Johnston, and Jan Watson. You can see more from the Slaygirls, including a set of door panel posters made for The Wrecking Crew, here.

Columbia Pictures, The Ambushers, Dean Martin, Penny Brahms, Marilyn Tindall, Alen Johnston, Jan Watson, poster art, cinema

Sex Files

July 28 2022

HIPS AND LIPS

Notable show business encounters: the Pelvis meets the Throat.

Issues of National Informer on back-to-back days? Sure, why not? The above example, published today in 1974, is five years older than yesterday’s, and in the intervening timeframe the editors seem to have stopped woman bashing. They’re still treating them as complete sex objects, but that’s what Informer was all about. They’ve also replaced the (not so) Great Criswell with new psychic Mark Travis. We’re still curious who actually bought these mags (we do it for scientific purposes, so we don’t count), and exactly how seriously they took it. Our guess is not very.

The main attraction in this issue is the story on swivel-hipped musical star Elvis Presley and Linda Lovelace, centerpiece of the xxx smash Deep Throat. Lovelace, who was purportedly involved—at least for a few hours at a time—with such aging stars as Richard Burton, Rex Harrison, Bob Hope, Dean Martin, and (of course) Frank Sinatra, as well as young Hollywood rebels Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, and Dennis Hopper, is alleged to have met up with Presley in Las Vegas. You could be forgiven for assuming that nature took its course, but it didn’t. At least, according to reports.

What on Earth could have stopped these two sex elementals from joining forces? Presley allegedly told Lovelace he was temporarily hors de combat because he had hurt himself having sex with Natalie Wood the previous week. Hey, we just relay this stuff. We make no claim that any of it is true. And we thought Natalie was so sweet. Well, you should never judge a book by its cover. Tabloids, on the other hand, you can safely evaluate at a glance. Informer is just as down and dirty as it looks.

Las Vegas, Deep Throat, National Informer, Elvis Presley, Linda Lovelace, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison, Bob Hope, Dean Martin, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando, Dennis Hopper, Tony Curtis, Frank Sinatra, Natalie Wood, Mark Travis, tabloid, nudity, xxx

Intl. Notebook

August 30 2021

PARTY NEVER STOPS

All the best people showed up.

The West German pop culture and celeb magazine Party, which was produced in Hannover by Lehning Press, is an obscure publication. It’s very vivid, with bright color, many full page photos, and many film celebrities represented. Equal time is given to unknowns too, for example, the cover features Annelies Niessner, who was… we have no idea, and inside a color page is given to Cornelie, identified only as a “millionärstochter geht eigene wege,” a millionaire’s daughter who goes her own way.

In terms of celebs you get Carol Lynley, Jane Russell, Sandra Dee, Stella Stevens, Laya Raki, a beautiful portrait of Jane Fonda, numerous shots of Ursula Andress, and many others. This publication didn’t waste words, even on the copyright date. The cover tells us this is issue eight, so we’re going to say it came in August, and we’re thinking it’s from 1967. Though it may be short on info, Party is an appropriate name, because it’s a very fun magazine. We have several more issues, so look for those later.

Vintage Pulp

August 16 2019

THE DEAN MARTIN SHOW

With special guests the Slaymates of the year.

Today we have some beautiful rarities, a set of door panel posters made for the 1968 Dean Martin spy movie spoof The Wrecking Crew. Martin played the wise-cracking and woman-loving Matt Helm, a character created by novelist Donald Hamilton. There have been a lot of loveable drunks in cinema, but Martin certainly was one of the most popular. Boozy Matt Helm was a perfect role for him, and the first film became the launching point for a series that stretched to four entries.

The Wrecking Crew was the last film, coming after 1966’s The Silencers and Murderer’s Row, and 1967’s The Ambushers. The movies were populated by a group of women known as Slaygirls, and the actresses on the posters below are posing as members of that deadly cadre. They are, top to bottom, Sharon Tate, Elke Sommer, Nancy Kwan, Tina Louise, and a fifth woman no other website seems able to identify, but who we’re pretty sure is Kenya Coburn.

These posters are 51 x 152 centimeters in size, or 20 x 60 for you folks who measure in inches, and they caught our eye mainly because of Tate. There’s been renewed interest in her, including portrayals in two 2019 films—The Haunting of Sharon Tate and Quentin Tarantino’s new effort Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Her poster is definitely one of the nicest pieces of Tate memorabilia we’ve seen.

We glanced at The Silencers a while back and found it just a little too dumb to consider slogging through the series, but maybe we’ll have another go at it. We’re sort of newly interested in Tate too, and since The Wrecking Crew was her next-to-last screen role, we want to have a look. Allegedly, Dean Martin quit this highly successful franchise because it felt wrong to go on with it after the Tate–LaBianca murders in August 1969. From what we’ve read about the era, Martin was far from the only person who felt as if that event changed everything. These days Tate’s death makes anything she’s in seem ironic and portentous, even, we suspect, a piece of fluff like The Wrecking Crew.

The Wrecking Crew, The Silencers, Murderer's Row, The Ambushers, Dean Martin, Elke Sommer, Tina Louise, Nancy Kwan, Sharon Tate, Kenya Coburn, Donald Hamilton, Leno LaBianca, Rosemary LaBianca, Charles Manson, poster art, cinema

Hollywoodland

November 14 2018

A BITE OUT OF HOLLYWOOD

Confidential sinks its teeth into the juiciest celebrity secrets.

Confidential magazine had two distinct periods in its life—the fanged version and the de-fanged version, with the tooth pulling done courtesy of a series of defamation lawsuits that made publisher Robert Harrison think twice about harassing celebrities. This example published this month in 1955 is all fangs. The magazine was printing five million copies of each issue and Harrison was like a vampire in a blood fever, hurting anyone who came within reach, using an extensive network spies from coast to coast and overseas to out celebs’ most intimate secrets.

In this issue editors blatantly call singer Johnnie Ray a gay predator, spinning a tale about him drunkenly pounding on doors in a swanky London hotel looking for a man—any man—to satisfy his needs. The magazine also implies that Mae West hooked up with boxer Chalky White, who was nearly thirty years her junior—and black. It tells readers about Edith Piaf living during her youth in a brothel, a fact which is well known today but which wasn’t back then.

The list goes on—who was caught in whose bedroom, who shook down who for money, who ingested what substances, all splashed across Confidential‘s trademark blue and red pages. Other celebs who appear include Julie London, Jack Webb, Gregg Sherwood, and—of course—Elizabeth Taylor. Had we been around in 1955 we’re sure we would have been on the side of privacy rights for these stars, but today we can read all this guilt-free because none of it can harm anyone anymore. Forty panels of images below, and lots more Confidential here.

Femmes Fatales

July 6 2018

HOME COOKING

How can I be making your mouth water? I haven't even put the food in the pot yet.

This shot of superstar Kim Novak was made when she was filming Billy Wilder’s 1964 comedy Kiss Me, Stupid. This was one of Novak’s most memorable characters—Polly the Pistol, party girl with attitude, waitress at a roadhouse called the Belly Button, and sometime prostitute. The movie is worth it for her alone, but she happens to co-star with Dean Martin and he’s always a bonus.

Kiss Me Stupid, Kim Novak, Dean Martin, Billy Wilder

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

October 13

1970—Angela Davis Arrested

After two months of evading police and federal authorities, Angela Davis is arrested in New York City by the FBI. She had been sought in connection with a kidnapping and murder because one of the guns used in the crime had been bought under her name. But after a trial a jury agreed that owning the weapon did not automatically make her complicit in the crimes.

October 12

1978—Sid Vicious Arrested for Murder

Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious is arrested on suspicion of murder after the body of his girlfriend Nancy Spungen is found in their room at New York City’s Chelsea Hotel. Vicious and Spungen had a famously stormy relationship, but Vicious proclaims he is innocent. He is released on bail and dies of a heroin overdose before a trial takes place.

October 12

1979—Adams Publishes First Hitchhiker's Book

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the first of five books in a series, is published by Douglas Adams. The novels follow on the heels of the tremendously successful British television series of the same name.

October 11

1976—China Coup Thwarted

The new head of the Chinese Communist Party, Hua Goufeng, snuffs out a coup led by Chairman Mao’s widow Jiang Qing and three other party members. They become known as the Gang of Four, and are tried, found guilty of treason, and receive death sentences that are later commuted to lengthy prison terms.

October 11

1987—Loch Ness Expedition Ends

A sonar exploration of Scotland’s Loch Ness, called Operation Deepscan, ends after a week without finding evidence that the legendary Loch Ness Monster exists. While the flotilla of boats had picked up three sonar contacts indicating something large in the waters, these are considered to be detections of salmon schools or possibly seals.

October 10

1971—London Bridge Goes Up

After being sold, dismantled and moved to the United States, London Bridge reopens in the resort town of Lake Havasu City, Arizona.

October 10

1975—Burton and Taylor Marry Again

British actor Richard Burton and American screen star Elizabeth Taylor secretly remarry sixteen months after their divorce, then jet away to a second honeymoon in Chobe Game Park in Botswana.