vintage and modern pulp fiction; noir, schlock and exploitation films; scandals, swindles and news
Anita Ekberg’s film noir Screaming Mimi opened in West Germany today in 1960. We’ve had a look at one West German poster, but today we’ve decided to share another one. This version is similar to the U.S. promo, but the unusual color palette makes it seem like a completely different design. We think’s it’s really beautiful.
It took us a while to figure it out, but this is a West German poster for Anita Ekberg’s drama Screaming Mimi, which we talked about a couple of years ago. Die blonde Venus is a pretty generic re-titling, in our opinion, but we do like this unusual visual approach for the poster. The movie is about a woman suffering from the effects of a traumatic event in her past, who takes on a new identity and suffers the double misfortune of being dominated by her lover and targeted by a killer. It’s definitely worth a watch. You can read more about it here. After opening in 1958 it finally premiered in West Germany today in 1960.
A B-52 Stratofortress carrying two H-bombs experiences trouble during a refueling operation, and in the midst of an emergency descent breaks up in mid-air over Goldsboro, North Carolina. Five of the six arming devices on one of the bombs somehow activate before it lands via parachute in a wooded region where it is later recovered. The other bomb does not deploy its chute and crashes into muddy ground at 700 mph, disintegrating while driving its radioactive core fifty feet into the earth.
The International Opium Convention is signed at The Hague, Netherlands, and is the first international drug control treaty. The agreement was signed by Germany, the U.S., China, France, the UK, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Persia, Portugal, Russia, and Siam.
U.S. president Harry S. Truman establishes the Central Intelligence Group or CIG, an interim authority that lasts until the Central Intelligence Agency is established in September of 1947.
The New York City “Mad Bomber,” a man named George P. Metesky, is arrested in Waterbury, Connecticut and charged with planting more than 30 bombs. Metesky was angry about events surrounding a workplace injury suffered years earlier. Of the thirty-three known bombs he planted, twenty-two exploded, injuring fifteen people. He was apprehended based on an early use of offender profiling and because of clues given in letters he wrote to a newspaper. At trial he was found legally insane and committed to a state mental hospital.
American lawyer Alger Hiss is convicted of perjury in connection with an investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), at which he was questioned about being a Soviet spy. Hiss served forty-four months in prison, but maintained his innocence and fought his perjury conviction until his death in 1996 at age 92.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter pardons nearly all of the country’s Vietnam War draft evaders, many of whom had emigrated to Canada. He had made the pardon pledge during his election campaign, and he fulfilled his promise the day after he took office.
