Vintage Pulp

September 26 2021

HOUSE OF SECRETS

In New York City people of a certain class live on the Upper East Side. Stockbrokers, lawyers, Nazis...

This poster would have sucked us right through the moviehouse doors had we been around when it was on display. It has beautiful colors, an air of mystery, a nice design, and dramatic graphics. The House on 92nd Street, which starred William Eythe, Lloyd Nolan, and Signe Hasso (who we’ve seen a lot of lately), definitely doesn’t rise to the level of the promo art. It qualifies as a propaganda film, though the events depicted are accurate. But with J. Edgar Hoover appearing briefly in the prologue, a stentorian narration, stilted dialogue, and a soundtrack that veers toward the martial, it’s pretty hard to immerse yourself in what is undeniably a Hollywood-on-FBI stroke job.

If you take the plunge, the movie turns out to be about a German American student who is recruited by Nazis but instead becomes a double agent for the FBI during the period when World War II was raging in Europe but the U.S. wasn’t militarily involved yet. German spies had been deployed around the U.S., and the movie deals with a particular group that gets wind of an important military secret, the secret of—dum dum duuuuuuum—the bomb. You know. The big bomb. The A-bomb. The nuke. The edge. The be-all. The end-all. The mushroom cloud layin’, eyeball meltin’, city flattenin’, effervescently fissionatin’ ordnance both Germany and the U.S. thought would win the war. Good premise, actually.

But since World War II was almost over when the film came out, the plot’s outcome was a given. Did audiences feel any suspense? We aren’t convinced. Even if the FBI hadn’t routed out the spies, the skyrocketing Upper East Side real estate prices would have. The Nazis would have moved to the Bronx seeking cheaper rent. With the conclusion not in doubt, the movie’s thrills needed to be provided by the audience’s attachment to double agent Eythe, who’s in constant danger of being outed and de-cortexed by a Luger slug. Unfortunately, he’s mostly an empty suit, therefore the movie fails on that level. It was well reviewed in its day, but duh, critics need to eat too. We doubt many would have panned the movie at that time. But the lens of history is cruel and today the film is considered substandard.

The best aspect of The House on 92nd Street is Signe Hasso as the cast iron Frau Farbissina style bitch operating the nest of naughty Nazis, but she’s not enough to save the production—nor ultimately the spy ring. If the filmmakers had ditched the narration, the scare music, the scare Hoover, and gone less procedural and more personal, maybe there would have been a good film in this somewhere, but as it turned out it’s just a middling crime melodrama considered to be a fringy film noir—certainly one the genre could do without. The poster, though, remains very nice. The House on 92nd Street premiered today in 1945.

Germany, New York City, World War II, The House on 92nd Street, FBI, William Eythe, Lloyd Nolan, Signe Hasso, nazis, poster art, cinema, movie review

Vintage Pulp

June 7 2021

PULLING AN ALL-NIGHTER

All Through the Night is Bogart at his best.

There’s no single movie that made Humphrey Bogart a superstar—he built his brand with each outing. But surely All Through the Night was one of his most important pre-icon roles. You see its Italian promo poster above, which was painted by the great artist Luigi Martinati. We’ve featured Martinati often, and you can see his work here and here. After originally opening in the U.S. in 1942, All Through the Night premiered in Italy as Sesta colonna today in 1949. You can read more about the film here.

Italy, Sesta colonna, All Trough the Night, Humphrey Bogart, Conrad Veidt, Kaaren Verne, Peter Lorre, Luigi Martinati, poster art, cinema, nazis

Vintage Pulp

May 19 2021

LET THEM EAT CAKE

In the Ministry of Fear they bake better than they spy.

Fritz Lang was one of the most important directors of his era, both in his native Germany and in the U.S., and was a pioneer of the film noir form. Movies like Scarlet Street and especially The Big Heat are essential noir viewing. Ministry of Fear dates from a bit earlier and finds Lang saddled with what we consider to be a substandard script that through sheer artistry he makes into a watchable film. Ray Milland, Marjorie Reynolds, and Dan Duryea headline in a spy tale that revolves around Lang’s favorite villains—the Nazis. Jewish and German, he left his homeland for Paris and beyond during the ascent of the Nazis during the 1930s, so the subject was personal for him, and was one he’d dealt with in previous films such as Cloak and Dagger and Hangmen Also Die.

In Ministry of Fear Milland plays a man who spends two years in a British asylum and is released at a time when World War II is raging and London is being bombed. He goes to a charity carnival and is enticed into guessing a cake’s weight for a chance to win it, and because he’s been given the correct answer by a fortuneteller, is victorious. But it’s soon clear that the correct weight wasn’t supposed to be given to him, and he isn’t supposed to have won the cake. But he really wants it and resists attempts by the carny folks to take it back. He loses it during a train ride when a passenger beats the snot out of him for it, and at that point finally realizes the obvious—sweet though this confection may have been, it wasn’t sought by various and sundry for its flavor, but because inside was something important. He wants answers, and he’ll have to risk his neck to get them.

Generally with movies it’s best to simply accept the premise, but there are limits. We were never clear on why it was necessary to put this important item in a cake. We understand subterfuge is involved in the spy game, but why not just hand the item over in an alley, or a pub bathroom, or a parked car? And if food must be involved, why a cake? Why not a haggis, or something else very few people want to just gobble up on the spot? A dried cod maybe. A blood sausage would have done. Plus they’re easy to transport. You can just stick them in your pockets. And in a tight spot a whack across the nose with a blood sausage is far more effective than shoving cake in someone’s mug. The cake gimmick was probably—strike that—certainly better explained in Graham Greene’s source novel. We haven’t read it but we’re confident about that. It could have been Lang who screwed the pooch, but it was more likely Seton I. Miller. He was screenwriter as well as executive producer.

In any case Milland bumbles his way through a train trip, across a moor, in and out of a crazy séance, and into a maze of misdirection to the eventual revelation of what’s inside the cake, but the whole time we kept thinking the movie should be called Ministry of Cut-Rate Spies. We don’t mean to say it’s a total loss. It isn’t like the Eddie Izzard comedy routine, “Cake or Death.” You won’t choose death over cake. But it’s a pretty uninspiring flick. The old dramas that have survived have done so for a simple reason. Most of them are good. Ministry of Fear isn’t bad. It’s just meh. It’s like a cake that fell—it’s flat and dense, but teases you with how yummy it could have been. It premiered in England today in 1944.

Here, have your cake. And eat it too. Heh.

I prefer blood sausage for train trips, but I guess it’s better for you I’m not shoving one of those in your face, eh?

Wow, you sort of… crush the shit out of your cake before eating it.

Have I been eating cake wrong the whole time I’ve been in England?

England, London, World War II, Ministry of Fear, Fritz Lang, Ray Milland, Marjorie Reynolds, Dan Duryea, Graham Greene, Seton I. Miller, poster art, cinema, nazis, film noir, movie review

Vintage Pulp

May 11 2020

HITLER’S LITTLE HELPER

Once upon a time in the Reich there was a sadist named Ilsa.

Ilsa la belva delle SS, as it was called in Italy, is better known as Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS, and it’s not hyperbole to describe this naziploitation effort as one of the most widely reviled movies ever released. And for good reason. It’s significant as an example of just how out there and taboo shattering the sexploitation genre got during the 1970s. The poster was painted by Luciano Crovato, who produced a number of iconic movie promos, including the second and third pieces in this post. We’ll get back to him. If you want to know more about Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS look here. If you dare.

Italy, Ilsa la belva delle SS, Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS, Luciano Crovato, Dyanne Thorne, Adolf Hitler, poster art, cinema, sexploitation, women in prison, nazis

Vintage Pulp

April 10 2020

THE KIDS ARE ALL REICH

Troublesome Nazis bring bad intentions to Mexico City.

The much beloved Santo movies may not be good, but you certainly can’t complain about the promo posters. This winner was made for Santo en Anónimo mortal, aka Santo in Anonymous Death Threat, and it finds everyone’s favorite luchador once again battling the forces of evil. This time he’s called upon to help the latest in a line of men who’ve been sent anonymous notes informing them of the dates of their deaths. The previous recipients met nasty ends. The newest prospective victim doesn’t trust the police to keep him alive, so he appeals to the only man that can truly do the job—Santo el enmascarado de plata. Santo rightly wonders what the connection is between all these men. But viewers don’t have to wonder—it’s right there on the poster.

Yes, Nazis have made their sneaky way to Mexico. And just to ram the point home fully, Santo coincidentally has a match against a wrestler named El Nazi, who mid-round is shot dead, becoming yet another victim. Santo soon learns that all the departed—even El Nazi, who must have adopted his moniker due to a keen sense of irony—were witnesses at the war crimes trial of a Third Reich death merchant named Paul von Struber. This von Struber was sentenced to hang, but escaped to Mexico City, where he took an assumed identity. Now he wants revenge on everyone who testified against him because— Well, that’s hard to figure out. He really should just lay low, having evaded the hangman. But he’s a Nazi. They specialize in terrible ideas.

By the time this film appeared Santo had already battled vampires, zombies, and witches. The producers of these potboilers went big early. Overloaded with crazy concepts, they even had Santo go up against a carnivorous blob. Nazis, then, aren’t that big a deal. Santo doesn’t even have to cut his wrestling schedule short. When the evil von Struber captures him and locks him away in the secret Nazi lair, he quickly manages to break his ropes, beat the shit out of the flunkies guarding him, and bring down El Cuarto Reich before it even has a chance to stick its head out of its bunker. It’s good that Santo’s triumph is so perfunctory, because this was his forty-somethingth adventure and his knees had to be getting balky. Santo en Anónimo mortal premiered in Mexico today in 1975.

Wow, you’re a big’un, aren’t you? Ever considered pro wrestling? If you wanna meet up later I can teach you some submission holds.

Obergruppenführer! I have a question!

Mexico, Santo en Anónimo mortal, Santo in Anonymous Death Threat, Armando Silvestre, Tere Velazquez, Sasha Montenegro, Rodolfo Guzmán Huerta, poster art, cinema, nazis, lucha libre, movie review

Vintage Pulp

March 27 2020

EXECUTING STRATEGY

Gestapo goes to extraordinary lengths to cancel a Czech.

This striking poster for Hangmen Also Die might make you think you’re dealing with a death row film noir, but it’s actually a war drama about the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia. When a Czech assassin played by Brian Donlevy shoots the country’s cruel German administrator Reinhard Heydrich and escapes into Prague’s urban maze, the Nazis start executing people to force the population to turn over the shooter. As people die Donlevy struggles over whether to turn himself in.

This was made in 1943 and qualifies as war propaganda, complete with flourishes such as discordant brass when Hitler’s portrait appears onscreen, and a cheeseball closing song with a chorus of, “No surrender!” And to just bang the war drum even more, the movie premiered in, of all places, Prague, Oklahoma today in 1943, and the showing featured hanged effigies of Hitler, Hirohito, and Mussolini, while regional politicians made a point of attending. That must have been some night.

But while Hangmen Also Die may qualify as propaganda, it certainly isn’t untrue in any major sense. The film’s two architects, German director Fritz Lang and German writer Bertolt Brecht, both left their homeland to avoid the Nazis, and we can only imagine that their personal experiences made this project deeply important to them.

But even people working from personal experience need help, and they get a major boost from co-star Walter Brennan. You’ll sometimes read about him being a great character actor and this movie proves it. Watch him in this, then as the drunkard Eddie in To Have and Have Not, and you’ll find him physically unrecognizable. Only his distinctive voice identifies him as the same person. Meanwhile it’s Donlevy who’s asked to personify the classic moral dilemma of sacrifice for the greater good, and he’s mostly successful at portraying it as a heavy burden. While we wouldn’t call Hangmen Also Diea great movie, there’s no doubt it occupies its niche comfortably.

Czechoslovakia, Germany, Prague, World War II, Brian Donlevy, Walter Brennan, Anna Lee, Fritz Lang, Bertolt Brecht, poster art, cinema, movie review, nazis

Vintage Pulp

January 14 2019

WINTER IS COMING

Nobody knows who'll win the game of Thorne's.

Yes, she’s back. These posters were made for the 1977 naziploitation flick Ilsa the Tigress of Siberia, starring the inimitable Dyanne Thorne dealing out discomfort and death in the icy wastes of Gulag 14. In 1975’s Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS she was a member of the Third Reich, but here, only eight years after the Reich cratered, she’s somehow employed by the Nazis’ mortal enemies the Soviets. She must have nailed the interview.

Interviewer: “What’s your greatest strength, professionally?”

Ilsa: “Creatively making people suffer. Like the electrified dildo I invented at a previous gig. That’s standard gear for torture now. Stress positions, beatings. I mean, I love it all.”

Interviewer: “What would you say is your biggest weakness?”

Ilsa: “I sometimes work too hard. I’m a perfectionist. In a way, I’m harder on myself than I am on the people I torture.”

Interviewer: “Tell me about a challenge in a work situation, and how you dealt with it.”

Ilsa: “I had a prisoner who was problematic. His positivity was bringing hope to the camp. I had him castrated.”

Interviewer: “And did this solution work?”

Ilsa: “Yes, he became very negative.”

Interviewer: “I think I’ve heard enough. When can you start?”

Ilsa: “I already did. I took the initiative and killed the other applicants in the waiting room.”

It’s amazing that the first Ilsa flick generated two sequels, considering how bad it was. This third entry in the series actually played at the Sitges Film Festival in October 2018, which just goes to show that interest in terrible vintage sexploitation films runs beyond the fringe. We think this movie is almost as bad as entries one and two, but you can decide for yourself. After opening in Canada in 1977, Ilsa the Tigress of Siberia premiered in Japan today in 1978.

Japan, Soviet Union, Canada, Sitges, Ilsa the Tigress of Siberia, Dyanne Thorne, women in prison, poster art, cinema, sexploitation, nazis, movie review

Vintage Pulp

July 25 2018

CROSS PURPOSES

Girl meets girl and things get a little twisted.

You’d be surprised how many Japanese movie posters feature swastikas. Or backwards ones, anyway. This particular promo was made for the melodrama Manji, a movie known in English by the name Swastika, or sometimes All Mixed Up. Some of you out there might be saying right now that the crooked cross Westerners know as a Nazi symbol is also a Native American symbol, though turned backward. And you’d be right. Others of you may say it’s an ancient Sanskrit symbol, whether turned backward or forward. And you’d also be right. Still others of you, the more widely traveled perhaps, know that in Japan the backward swastika is a symbol used to mark the location of Buddhist temples on maps. And what the hell, we should also mention that younger Japanese sometimes say “manji” instead of “cheese” when posing for a photo.

Why did we go into all that? Because when you put a swastika on your website it’s prudent to explain why. There is no discussion of the symbol in Manji. The film is about bored housewife Kyôko Kishida embarking on an affair with a younger woman played by Ayako Wakao. It’s all fun and games at first, but Kishida, in the grip of middle age and an unfulfilling marriage, grows increasingly obsessed with her young girltoy. The movie’s makers seem to be using the cross ironically—in Sanskrit it symbolizes good luck, but the affair in Manji is anything but. You can find out yourself, though, because the entire thing is on YouTube for the moment—with English subtitles!—at this link. Say goodbye to ninety minutes of your life, cinephiles. Manji premiered in Japan today in 1964.

2021 update: the link has finally died. You’ll have to find the movie elsewhere.

Japan, Manji, Swastika, All Mixed Up, Ayako Wakao, Kyôko Kishida, poster art, cinema, lgbt, nazis

Vintage Pulp

January 27 2018

DEAD SILENCE

Counterfeiters and Nazi agents clash in wartime Los Angeles.

When we saw Quiet Please: Murder on the Noir City slate and realized we’d never heard of it we decided to watch it and were treated to an interesting flick about sellers of literary forgeries who get in over their heads when they cheat the representatives of Nazis.

Apparently, Hermann Göring is accumulating items he expects to maintain value in the event of post-war inflation, and a rare quarto of Hamlet fits the bill. George Sanders and Gail Patrick are the crooked vendors who run afoul of the Nazis, as well as the cop hero played by Richard Denning.

The movie is remembered for its central scene involving an air raid drill that plunges heroes and villains into a blackout at a crucial moment, but the primary benefit here is watching Sanders, who was Russian born but learned a clenched-jaw upper class English accent that made his voice unique in film. He’s a perfect baddie here, shooting a librarian to acquire the original Hamlet, pimp slapping his partner Patrick, and in general being shady as fuck. Thanks to him Quiet Please: Murder is an entertaining little b-noir.

Russia, Los Angeles, World War II, Quiet Please: Murder, George Sanders, Gail Patrick, Richard Denning, Hermann Göring, poster art, cinema, film noir, nazis, movie review

Vintage Pulp

January 22 2018

HOUSE HARMING PARTY

Come on in. Make yourself uncomfortable.

More bondage? Sure, why not? We don’t pick the release dates. We just post according to them. Above are two Italian posters for the infamous nazisploitation flick Casa privata per le SS, which premiered today in 1977. They don’t make them like this anymore, for good reason. The top poster isn’t signed, but the second one was painted by Aller, aka Carlo Alessandrini, who also painted the very famous French promo for the film. That promo is similar to the unsigned piece above, but without a signature or official attribution we can’t credit it to Aller, so into the mystery bin it goes for now. We did a small write-up on this film back in 2011, and if you’re curious you can see that here.

Italy, Casa privata per le SS, SS Girls, Bruno Mattei, Gabriele Carrara, Macha Magall, Aller, Carlo Alessandrini, poster art, sexploitation, nazis, cinema, bdsm

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

April 20

1939—Holiday Records Strange Fruit

American blues and jazz singer Billie Holiday records “Strange Fruit”, which is considered to be the first civil rights song. It began as a poem written by Abel Meeropol, which he later set to music and performed live with his wife Laura Duncan. The song became a Holiday standard immediately after she recorded it, and it remains one of the most highly regarded pieces of music in American history.

April 19

1927—Mae West Sentenced to Jail

American actress and playwright Mae West is sentenced to ten days in jail for obscenity for the content of her play Sex. The trial occurred even though the play had run for a year and had been seen by 325,000 people. However West’s considerable popularity, already based on her risque image, only increased due to the controversy.

April 19

1971—Manson Sentenced to Death

In the U.S, cult leader Charles Manson is sentenced to death for inciting the murders of Sharon Tate and several other people. Three accomplices, who had actually done the killing, were also sentenced to death, but the state of California abolished capital punishment in 1972 and neither they nor Manson were ever actually executed.

April 18

1923—Yankee Stadium Opens

In New York City, Yankee Stadium, home of Major League Baseball’s New York Yankees, opens with the Yankees beating their eternal rivals the Boston Red Sox 4 to 1. The stadium, which is nicknamed The House that Ruth Built, sees the Yankees become the most successful franchise in baseball history. It is eventually replaced by a new Yankee Stadium and closes in September 2008.

April 17

1961—Bay of Pigs Invasion Is Launched

A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in southern Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro. However, the invasion fails badly and the result is embarrassment for U.S. president John F. Kennedy and a major boost in popularity for Fidel Castro, and also has the effect of pushing him toward the Soviet Union for protection.