Multiplex Mash-Up :: A Jumbo Jungle Joy Ride! (October, 1977)

 

 

 

 

 

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Multiplex Mash-Up :: Just When You Thought It Was Safe to Go Back into the Water… (July, 1978)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
My brilliant dissertation on JAWS 2:

Not enough people get eaten.

The End.

And between you and me, I think I prefer the sailboat art over the happy water-skier that’s about to get munched.

The William Castle Blogathon :: A Career that Ended in Fire and Ash… (September, 1975)

 

 

 

 
Here, we finally come to the ignominious end of William Castle’s career. After Rosemary’s Baby, Paramount kinda threw Castle under the bus, and, to add insult to injury, all the major studios finally wised up and started making the same B-pictures he was making only with an A-budget, evidenced by the teaser ads currently pushing our feature film right off the page. Yeah, JAWS absolutely buried BUG at the box-office, but this bizarre, fever dream of a flick is a lot better than you’ve heard. Trust me.
 

 
Alas, this is my last post for Goregirl’s Dungeon and The Last Drive-In’s The William Castle Blogathan, a week long tribute to the King of Schlock. Follow the linkage, Boils & Ghouls. It’s been a great week with a ton of cool stuff to see and read and experience. Now get going!

Bug (1975) William Castle Productions :: Paramount Pictures / P: William Castle / D: Jeannot Szwarc / W: William Castle, Thomas Page (novel) / C: Michel Hugo / E: Allan Jacobs / M: Charles Fox / S: Bradford Dillman, Joanna Miles, Richard Gilliland, Jamie Smith-Jackson, Patty McCormack, Jesse Vint

Going Swimming? You Might Want to See This First (September-October, 1975)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Is it me, or is the Shark getting closer with each successive ad? Anyways … A classic example of less is more — the less, in this case, still scaring the living bajeebus out of you, I honestly don’t know what more I can add that hasn’t already been said or written about Spielberg’s JAWS that will shed any new light or angle on the subject. Well, except, for, maybe, a desire to see Spielberg regain his nerve and try his hand at a popcorn thriller again because he (– at least he used to be) really, really, really damned good at. You want proof? How long can you be in the water, salt of fresh, before that low thrum and those familiar, primal chords has you wondering what’s lurking just below the surface? A friendly reminder, perhaps, that in some instances we are no longer on top of the food chain anymore as you make the water just a tad bit warmer before vacating it for drier environs post haste.

JAWS (1975) Zanuck/Brown Productions :: Universal Pictures / P: David Brown, Richard D. Zanuck / D: Steven Spielberg / W: Carl Gottlieb, Peter Benchley (novel) / C: Bill Butler / E: Verna Fields / M: John Williams / S: Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfuss, Lorraine Gary, Murray Hamilton, Jeffrey Kramer

Entering the 3rd Dimension :: A Lion in Your Lap, a Lover in Your Arms! (May, 1953)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
It was while on a stock-footage expedition to Kenya in 1948 that famed radio personality and burgeoning filmmaker Arch Oboler first became intrigued by J.H. Patterson’s novel, The Man-Eaters of Tsavo, which recounted the tale of two lions that wreaked havoc on a railway construction crew. Soon determined to turn this harrowing tale into a movie, it was Oboler’s cameraman on the same expedition, William Snyder, who suggested that, when he did, he should shoot it in a new process called Natural Vision; an improved technique in the rapidly evolving 3-D process. But when no studios showed interest in his pet project, Oboler set out to make it on his own, with the majority of the financing coming from star Robert Stack’s mother. And, using the stock-footage they’d already shot in Kenya to flesh it out, the majority of the film was shot on the Paramount ranch. And when it was finished, with fingers crossed, Bwana Devil was released, with a hope and a pair of tinted glasses that a curious audience would come and see.
 

 
It was famed film exploitationeer Sidney Pink (of Reptilicus and The Angry Red Planet infamy), who had earlier salvaged Oboler’s post-apocalyptic flick Five, that coined A Lion in Your Lap … A Lover in Your Arms… for the ad campaign. It worked beautifully, and after United Artists saw how much money Bwana Devil was raking in, despite an almost universal critical drubbing, took over the distribution. And, when the receipts kept on rolling, Bwana Devil triggered an avalanche of other 3-D films over the next couple of years to cash in.

Bwana Devil (1952) Gulu Productions :: United Artists / P: Arch Oboler / AP: Sidney W. Pink / D: Arch Oboler / W: Arch Oboler / C: Joseph F. Biroc / E: John Hoffman / M: Gordon Jenkins / S: Robert Stack, Barbara Britton, Nigel Bruce, Ramsay Hill

18-feet of Gut-Crunching, Man-Eating Terror! (May, 1976)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Grizzly (1976) Montoro Productions Ltd. :: Joda Productions :: Film Ventures International / EP: Edward L. Montoro / P: Harvey Flaxman, David Sheldon / AP: Lee Jones / D: William Girdler / W: Harvey Flaxman, David Sheldon / C: William Asman / E: Bub Asman / M: Robert O. Ragland / S: Christopher George, Andrew Prine, Richard Jaeckel, Joan McCall, Joe Dorsey

Random Drive-In Mash-Up :: Beyond the Power of Priest or Science to Exorcise! (July, 1976)

 

 

 

 

For the Love of Hitchcock :: Nothing Will Prepare You for Such Sheer Stabbing SHOCK! (April, 1963)

 

“Why are they doing this?”

“They said when you got here the whole thing started.”

“Who are you? What are you?!”

“Where did you come from!?!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other Points of Interest:

Full film review of The Birds at the Brewery.

 
This post is part of the For the Love of Film Blogathon, a new age telethon to raise funds for The National Film Preservation Foundation to help bring The White Shadow (a/k/a White Shadows), an early silent film that a certain master of suspense did just about everything for except direct — assistant director, screenwriter, film editor, production designer, art director, and set decorator, to the streaming masses and help defray the costs of adding a new musical soundtrack.
 

 
There’s no donation too small, folks. So please, click on the link above, wherever you see it this week and give what you can. Thanks. For more information, check out the group’s Facebook page. Big thanks, as always, to Ferdy on Film, The Self-Styled Siren and This Island Rod for throwing such a wide net for contributors. Until tomorrow, then, I bid you all a good ev-ah-ning.
 

I’m participating. Are you?

 

The Birds (1963) Universal Pictures / P: Alfred Hitchcock / D: Alfred Hitchcock / W: Evan Hunter, Daphne Du Maurier (story) / C: Robert Burks / E: George Tomasini / M: Bernard Hermann / S: Rod Taylor, Tippi Hedren, Suzanne Pleshette, Jessica Tandy, Veronica Cartwright, Ethel Griffies

Random Multiplex Mash-Up :: You Are in a Race Against Time and Terror! (September, 1977)

 

 

 

 

Thee Monster Movie? Well, Not Quite… (June, 1979)

 

 

 

 

 

Other Points of Interest:

Full film review of Prophecy at 3B Theater.

The poster campaign for Prophecy at the Archive.

Prophecy (1979) Paramount Pictures / P: Robert L. Rosen / D: John Frankenheimer / W: David Seltzer / C: Harry Stradling Jr. / E: Tom Rolf / M: Leonard Rosenman / S: Robert Foxworth, Talia Shire, Armand Asante, Victoria Racimo, George Clutesi, Richard Dysart