Vintage Pulp

February 12 2024

FURY ROAD

Mature and Dors pair up for a bloc buster thriller.

The 1957 Victor Mature/Diana Dors vehicle The Long Haul premiered in Italy today in 1958 as La strada è bloccata, which means “the road is blocked.” The art here is by Italian illustrator Anselmo Ballester. This is one of his better efforts, we think, with his Dors figure reflecting light from some off-canvas source, while a fire lights the background. You can see more from him here and here. As for the movie, we talked about it a while ago. You can read our thoughts here. And you can see a cool Japanese poster for the film here.

Italy, La strada è bloccata, The Long Haul, Victor Mature, Diana Dors, Anselmo Ballester, poster art, cinema

Hollywoodland

September 9 2023

FACE TIME

Movie stars were always willing to give each other a hand.

Once again we’ve been struck, so to speak, by the sheer number of cinema promo images featuring actors and actresses pretending to slap each other. They just keep turning up. The above shot is more about the neck than the face, but it still counts, as Gloria Swanson slaps William Holden in 1950’s Sunset Boulevard. Below we have a bunch more, and you can see our previous collection at this link. Since we already discussed this phenomenon we won’t get into it again, except briefly as follows: pretend slaps, film is not reality, and everyone should try to remember the difference. Many slaps below for your interest and wonder.

Diana Dors smacks Patrick Allen blurry in 1957’s The Long Haul.

Mob boss George Raft menaces Anne Francis in a promo image made for 1954’s Rogue Cop.

Bud Abbott gets aggressive with Lou Costello in 1945’s Here Come the Co-Eds.

Jo Morrow takes one from black hat Jack Hogan in 1959’s The Legend of Tom Dooley.

Chris Robinson and Anita Sands get a couple of things straight about who’s on the yearbook committee in Diary of High School Bride.

Paul Newman and Ann Blyth agree to disagree in 1957’s The Helen Morgan Story.

Verna Lisi shows Umberto Orsini who gives the orders in the 1967 film La ragazza e il generale, aka The Girl and the General.

What the fuck did you just call me? Marki Bey slaps Betty Anne Rees loopy in the 1974 horror flick Sugar Hill.

Claudia Cardinale slaps (or maybe punches—we can’t remember) Brigitte Bardot in the 1971 western Les pétroleuses, known in English for some reason as The Legend of Frenchie King.

Audrey Totter reels under the attentions of Richard Basehart in 1949 Tension. We’re thinking it was probably even more tense after this moment.

Anne Baxter tries to no avail to avoid a slap from heel Steve Cochran in 1954’s Carnival Story.

Though Alan Ladd was a little guy who Gail Russell probably could have roughed up if she wanted, the script called for him to slap her, and he obeyed in the 1946 adventure Calcutta.

Peter Alexander guards his right cheek, therefore Hannelore Auer crosses him up and attacks his left in 1964’s Schwejk’s Flegeljahre, aka Schweik’s Years of Indiscretion.

Elizabeth Ashley gives Roddy McDowall a facial in in 1965’s The Third Day.

Tony Anthony slaps Lucretia Love in 1972’s Piazza pulita, aka Pete, Pearl and the Pole.

AndreÌ Oumansky goes backhand on Lola Albright in 1964’s Joy House.

Frank Ferguson catches one from Barbara Bel Geddes in the 1949 drama Caught.

This looks like a real slap, so you have to credit the actresses for their commitment. It’s from 1961’s Raisin in the Sun and shows Claudia McNeil rearranging the face of Diana Sands.

Gloria Grahame finds herself cornered by Broderick Crawford in 1954’s Human Desire.

Bette Davis, an experienced slapper and slappee, gets a little assistance from an unidentified third party as she goes Old West on Amanda Blake in a 1966 episode of Gunsmoke called “The Jailer.”

There are a few slaps in 1939’s Gone with the Wind, so we had our pick. We went with Vivien Leigh and Leslie Howard.

Virginia Field takes one on the chin from Marshall Thompson in Dial 1119.

Clint Eastwood absorbs a right cross from nun Shirley MacLaine in 1970’s Two Mules for Sister Sara.

Sunset Boulevard, The Long Haul, Rogue Cop, Here Come the Co-Eds, The Legend of Tom Dooley, Diary of High School Bride, The Helen Morgan Story, La ragazza e il generale, The Girl and the General, Sugar Hill, Les pétroleuses, The Legend of Frenchie King, Tension, Carnival Story, Calcutta, Schwejk's Flegeljahre, Schweik's Years of Indiscretion, The Third Day, Joy House, Caught, Human Desire, Gunsmoke, Gone with the Wind, Dial 1119, Gloria Swanson, William Holden, Diana Dors, Patrick Allen, Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Jo Morrow, Jack Hogan, Chris Robinson, Anita Sands, Virna Lisi, Umberto Orsini, Marki Bey, Betty Anne Rees, Claudia Cardinale, Brigitte Bardot, Richard Basehart, Audrey Totter, Anne Baxter, Steve Cochran, Alan Ladd, Gail Russell, Hannelore Auer, Peter Alexander, Elizabeth Ashley, Roddy McDowall, André Oumansky, Lola Albright, Frank Ferguson, Barbara Bel Geddes, Claudia McNeil, Diana Sands, Broderick Crawford, Gloria Grahame, Bette Davis, Amanda Blake, Vivien Leigh, Leslie Howard, Virginia Field, Marshall Thompson, Clint Eastwood, Shirley MacLaine, cinema, television

Vintage Pulp

November 13 2022

A LOAD OF DYNAMITE

Victor Mature offers a ride and accidentally opens a Dors to big trouble.

Above is a nice cover for the movie tie-in edition from Avon Publications of The Long Haul by Mervyn Mills, which is about a trucker who gives a ride to a gangster’s moll and as a result has to deal with numerous life threatening problems. It was published in 1957 and immediately adapted to the big screen, with the movie starring Victor Mature and Diana Dors appearing the next year. The art on this, which we think is great, is modeled after the movie poster and is unattributed, possibly because it’s a photo-illustration, though we can’t 100% sure on that.

Avon Publications, The Long Haul, Mervyn Mills, Victor Mature, Diana Dors, cover art, literature, cinema

Vintage Pulp

May 23 2022

EVERYTHING’S HAUL RIGHT NOW

Victor Mature goes one blonde over the recommended limit.

This Japanese poster was made to promote the Victor Mature/Diana Dors drama The Long Haul, which deals with a truck driver who discovers that his outfit is in the grip of organized crime. For that reason the film was given the Japanese title Yakuza tokkyū, or “Yakuza express.” Our favorite part of the poster are little speed lines on the title. This one does move pretty fast, as we mentioned last year, and Dors makes a particularly tempting femme fatale. After opening in England in 1957 The Long Haul premiered in Japan today in 1959.

Japan, Yakuza tokkyÅ«, The Long Haul, Victor Mature, Diana Dors, poster art, cinema

Femmes Fatales

November 27 2021

DI TRYING

Hold on a sec. I dropped my moral compass.

This photo of British star Diana Dors was made as a promo for her 1957 crime drama The Long Haul, and we’re sure we don’t need to explain our subhead. Or do we? Let’s just say Lady Di was no lady, and what she was into back in the day would, in our modern era, land her in prison and on the lifelong sex offender list. See what we mean here.

Britain, The Long Haul, Diana Dors

Vintage Pulp

August 22 2021

CASH AND CARRY

Victor Mature transports hot merchandise.

One good Victor Mature movie deserves another. Mr. M impressed us so much in Kiss of Death we decided to watch another of his early films. The amazing poster above was made to promote his crime thriller The Long Haul, which is set in Britain and concerns an American ex-soldier who takes a trucking job only to run afoul of an organized-crime syndicate that controls the trucking industry. British star Diana Dors plays the glamorous girlfriend of one of the mobsters, and after a couple’s spat she ends up in Mature’s truck begging him to drive her to safety. This turns out to be a dangerous decision in two areas—his health, and his marriage.

Because The Long Haul was originally made in Britain it’s a bit more frank than the typical American film concerning matters of sex and marriage. There’s no vagueness about Mature and Dors doing the mattress dance, which we found refreshing. The family drama sections of crime movies are often throw-ins, but here Mature’s marital difficulties really help drive the plot. In the end he needs to deal with these issues, but he also, naturally, has to survive crossing the mob boss, who’s not sanguine about losing Dors, nor about other transgressions committed by Mature. It’s trouble on two fronts, which makes for a pretty good movie. Decent work from Mature. The Long Haul premiered in Britain today in 1957.

Britain, The Long Haul, Victor Mature, Diana Dors, Patrick Allen, poster art, cinema, movie review

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

April 25

1939—Batman Debuts

In Detective Comics #27, DC Comics publishes its second major superhero, Batman, who becomes one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and then a popular camp television series starring Adam West, and lastly a multi-million dollar movie franchise starring Michael Keaton, then George Clooney, and finally Christian Bale.

April 25

1953—Crick and Watson Publish DNA Results

British scientists James D Watson and Francis Crick publish an article detailing their discovery of the existence and structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, in Nature magazine. Their findings answer one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of biology, that of how living things reproduce themselves.

April 24

1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs

Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule’s main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule’s descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission.

April 23

1986—Otto Preminger Dies

Austro-Hungarian film director Otto Preminger, who directed such eternal classics as Laura, Anatomy of a Murder, Carmen Jones, The Man with the Golden Arm, and Stalag 17, and for his efforts earned a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, dies in New York City, aged 80, from cancer and Alzheimer’s disease.

April 23

1998—James Earl Ray Dies

The convicted assassin of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., petty criminal James Earl Ray, dies in prison of hepatitis aged 70, protesting his innocence as he had for decades. Members of the King family who supported Ray’s fight to clear his name believed the U.S. Government had been involved in Dr. King’s killing, but with Ray’s death such questions became moot.

April 22

1912—Pravda Is Founded

The newspaper Pravda, or “Truth”, known as the voice of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, begins publication in Saint Petersburg. It is one of the country’s leading newspapers until 1991, when it is closed down by decree of then-President Boris Yeltsin. A number of other Pravdas appear afterward, including an internet site and a tabloid.

April 22

1983—Hitler's Diaries Found

The German magazine Der Stern claims that Adolf Hitler’s diaries had been found in wreckage in East Germany. The magazine had paid 10 million German marks for the sixty small books, plus a volume about Rudolf Hess’s flight to the United Kingdom, covering the period from 1932 to 1945. But the diaries are subsequently revealed to be fakes written by Konrad Kujau, a notorious Stuttgart forger. Both he and Stern journalist Gerd Heidemann go to trial in 1985 and are each sentenced to 42 months in prison.