Vintage Pulp

August 23 2024

LUKEWARM COCOA

Whatever Lola wants Lola gets—except a decent script and a sufficient budget.

A low rent poster usually indicates a low rent movie. The poster you see here for Lola Falana’s crime drama Lady Cocoa, which premiered today in 1975, is obviously underwhelming. Sometimes, though, digging into the dusty archive of cheap cinema yields forgotten gems. But not in this instance. You know you’re in trouble with Lady Cocoa right from the opening theme, which is a sort of mash-up between a disco song and, “Pop Goes the Weasel.” Literally, that’s the chorus. We’ve come across some terrible theme songs (who can forget the indelible strains of “Flare-Up”?—but this one might take the booby prize.

Falana plays a Reno gangster’s girlfriend who’s spent eighteen months in prison for reasons that are obscure, possibly because she’s insanely annoying. She’s released into protective custody when she finally decides to testify against her man. She doesn’t seem to understand the gravity of her decision, but there’s a reason for that—she has no intention of testifying. She just wants out of the joint for a while. She has total confidence her boyfriend will intuit this, but she’s wrong—kingpins don’t become kingpins through trust. He sends assassins to perforate her, and the movie becomes a standard witness protection actioner. While this basic plot has been done many times, it has rarely been done with dialogue so poor.

Gene Washington: “I remember when I got it in Nam.”

Falana: “Nam?”

Gene Washington: “Yeah. Vietnam.”

Let’s fix that exchange of dialogue for them:

Gene Washington: “I remember when I got it in Nam.”

Falana: “It?”

Gene Washington: “Yeah. Syphilitic meningitis.”

See? Much better. Poor Lola never had a chance in this one. But there are a few items of note. Falana, who’s really cute even playing a grating harpy, spends a lot of the movie in a towel and flashes a backside that’ll leave a permanent impression. Late in the program she and co-star Gene Washington share a real-deal hot tango of a tongue kiss, which is something you rarely see actors do. And one of the assassins is played by Joe Greene, as in Mean Joe Greene, as in the Pittsburgh Steelers. If he’d sacked the producers before they had a chance to make the movie, Hollywood would have given him an honorary Oscar. No such luck.

Despite your ample sexual charms I’m irrationally annoyed I have to bodyguard you.

Still hate me?

Abso-goddamned-lutely.

You sure?

I can’t even budge I’m so filled with loathing.

What if I let you slowly rub this lotion all over me, we enjoy some leisurely oral sex, then fuck like beasts?

Then again, I’m only human.

Nevada, Lake Tahoe, Lady Cocoa, Lola Falana, Gene Washington, Millie Perkins. Joe Greene, Mean Joe Greene, James A. Watson Jr., poster art, cinema, blaxploitation, movie review

Vintage Pulp

April 28 2016

PAST LIFE REGRESSION

Like Shakespeare wrote, what's past is prologue.

This unusual poster was made to promote the Spanish run of Retorno al pasado, a movie better known as Out of the Past. The title says it all. A man who thinks he’s left his sordid past behind sees it rear its ugly head and threaten to ruin the good future he’s planned for himself. Starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, and Kirk Douglas, this is one of the top noir thrillers, in our opinion. Certainly it’s one of the most beautifully shot, thanks to director Jacques Tourneur and cinematographer Nicholas Mesuraca. Like the poster art by Macario Gomez, the film is richly textured and lushly black, which makes for a nice sense of gathering danger, especially in the pivotal fight sequence about forty minutes in. Plus it has the always compelling Mexico connection used by many excellent noirs, as well as nice location shooting around Lake Tahoe and Reno. Highly recommended, this one. After opening in the U.S. in November 1947 it had its Spanish premiere in Madrid today in 1948.

Spain, Mexico, Madrid, Lake Tahoe, Reno, Retorno al pasado, Out of the Past, Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, Kirk Douglas, Rhonda Fleming, Jacques Tourneur, Nicholas Mesuraca, Macario Gomez, poster art, cinema, film noir, movie review

Intl. Notebook

March 31 2010

LAKE CONSEQUENCE

Landmark Cal-Neva Lodge shutters gaming operations.

Frank Sinatra made a lot of nightspots famous. His mere presence—along with that of his Rat Pack—sprinkled gold dust on bars and eateries from end to end of the U.S., bestowing places such as 21, Toots Shor’s, and Chasen’s with fame that lasted long after the Rat Pack had died. That fame helped many of those old haunts survive into the new millennium, but now one of the most magical Rat Pack hangouts—the Cal Neva Lodge in Lake Tahoe, Nevada—is on the endangered list as it closes its gaming rooms today due to low profitability.

Sinatra owned the Cal-Neva between 1960 and 1963, his star power drawing Hollywood’s top celebrities, along with mob figures who he reportedly shuttled back and forth to various points around the property via old bootlegging tunnels. He made the Cal-Neva Lodge the jewel of Lake Tahoe, a piece of Tinseltown in what was little more than an alpine village.

But the Cal-Neva’s fortunes have been in decline for decades due to the proliferation of nearby Indian casinos, and the general dominance of Las Vegas. When the recent recession hit, the current owners—who had laid off about a hundred employees since 2006—finally decided they could not keep their gaming rooms in operation. Officially, at least, today’s closure is temporary, but industry insiders note that Rat Pack chic is not enough to draw modern gamblers to an older casino like the Cal-Neva Lodge. If so, it’s quite possible that not only will the gaming rooms never reopen, but that the entire Lodge has begun its final decline.

Nevada, Lake Tahoe, Las Vegas, Cal-Neva Lodge, Toots Shor’s, Chasen’s, Frank Sinatra, mafia

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

November 6

1935—Parker Brothers Buys Monopoly

The board game company Parker Brothers acquires the forerunner patents for Monopoly from Elizabeth Magie, who had designed the game (originally called The Landlord’s Game) to demonstrate the economic ill effects of land monopolism and the use of land value tax as a remedy for them. Parker Brothers quickly turns Monopoly into the biggest selling board game in America.

November 6

1991—Gene Tierney Passes Away

American actress Gene Tierney, one of the great beauties in Hollywood history and star of the seminal film noir Laura, dies in Houston, Texas of emphysema. Tierney had begun smoking while young as a way to help lower her high voice, and was hooked on cigarettes the rest of her life.

November 5

1937—Hitler Reveals His Plans for Lebensraum

Adolf Hitler holds a secret meeting with Nazi officials and states his intention to acquire “lebensraum,” or living space for Germany. An old German concept that dated from 1901, Hitler had written of it in Mein Kampf, and now possessed the power to implement it. Basically the idea, as Hitler saw it, was for the Nazis to kill, deport, or enslave the Polish, Russian and other Slavic populations to the east, whom they considered inferior, and to repopulate those lands with a Germanic upper class.

November 5

1991—Fred MacMurray Dies

American actor Fred MacMurray dies of pneumonia related to leukemia. While most remember him as a television actor, earlier in his career he starred in 1944’s Double Indemnity, one of the greatest films noir ever made.

November 4

1955—Cy Young Dies

American baseball player Cy Young, who had amassed 511 wins pitching for five different teams from 1890 to 1911, dies at the age of 88. Today Major League Baseball’s yearly award given to the best pitcher of each season is named after Young.

November 4

1970—Feral Child Found in Los Angeles

A thirteen year-old child who had been kept locked in a room for her entire life is found in the Los Angeles house of her parents. The child, named Genie, could only speak twenty words and was not able even to walk normally because she had spent her life strapped to a potty chair during the day and bound in a sleeping bag at night. Genie ended up in a series of foster homes and was given language training but after years of effort by various benefactors never reached a point where she could interact normally in society.