Hi, my name is Bryian. I have a movie problem.(Hi Bryian!)
Yea, like this is news to anyone!
Anyway, last night I seem to have completed my classic horror
movie collection. I got a 2-disk set of Creature from
The Black Lagoon. All Right! What can I say; I love the old
horror movies. Not that they seem truly scary, compared to our
lives today, but when viewed from a historical perspective they
bring out some of our more base reaction. We watched
The Mummy last night. No, not the new one, but the original with
Boris Karloff. Man, what an actor. If you consider some of
the long list of roles he played he is something. Most people
do not know this but he was not listed as Boris Karloff on the
movie posters for this one. Surprise! He was listed as Karloff
the Incomparable. Cool, hu? He was one of the last of a
generation of great actors who were known only by their last
name. At least he was never called ‘squiggle’, the actor
formerly known as Karloff the Incomparable. Now why do I
like Karloff? Simple, he was a great physical actor. He would
sit for hours in makeup to do a 2 minute scene with no lines
and then have to spend several painful hours trying to get it
all off, but, if you want classic style and presence there is
only one; Bella Lugosi.
If you have yet to see Ed Wood, crawl out from under your
rock and get a copy as it is now on DVD. While the movie does
focus on Ed, there is a great amount about Bella in the later
years of his life.
So moving right along, it is still early and the day has yet
to completely blow up. Keep your fingers crossed and lets hope
it is nothing more than a pop.
I had meant to tell you, there's a set out of I think 50 classic horror movies on dvd for like $40... saw it in a catalog. Can't remember which one now. I just kinda chopped that part out before tossing the ret of the thing in the recycling bin. But you probably already have about all of them knowing you anyway. :P
ReplyDelete~Karyl
You know, I was out at Wally-World last night, buying food for the World's Most Evil Guinea Pig, and I saw the "Black Lagoon" set and thought, "Does Bry know this is out?"
ReplyDelete"Black Lagoon" was one of my all-time fave horror flicks.
Trivia: Early screen tests for "Black Lagoon" had problems because, while they were able to conceal a SCUBA tank in the creature costume, the bubbles expelled from the regulator obscured the shot. This further ruined the effect as producers pointed out if the Gilman was a true Gilman, he wouldn't be blowing bubbles.
So, the only possible workaround was to remove the SCUBA setup and just have a tank out of shot so the actor in the costume could breathe during setups, and then hold his breath through the take.
This made for very short shots that just didn't work.
The solution came in the form of a tall, thin hispanic diver by the name of Ricou Browning. Browning could hold his breath underwater for upwards of 5 minutes at a time, even while performing rather strenuous activities as swimming and menacing women in tight white bathing suits.
Problem solved.
Browning played the creature in all three films, including "The Creature Walks Among Us," in which he really didn't spend an incredible time in the water.
For Inside Hollywood, I'm Daniel Trout...
Another of my favorite monster movies!
ReplyDeleteThe Creature is still a creepy looking rubber suit, and at the time, it was bloody well cutting edge stuff.
Speaking of horror films--have you guys seen "Sean of the Dead" yet? If not, you should. When it is on DVD, Zak and I intend to have a movie night triple feature showing it with "Bubba Ho-Tep" and "Six String Samurai."
Yes a cult film extravaganza full of dead folks, cannibalism and butt-suckin' mummies.
Life is good.