Electronic Pinocchio

What could be better than hearing stories about Menahem Golan and John Ford as told by Lee Marvin?

Hausu!!!

What? Still not at all interested?



If I had seen this in 1977 I would have been scarred for life.

The Medusa Touch

a year ago the fires raged

Roughly, a year ago, Toronto lost the Queen Street West location of Suspect Video, along with several other businesses. Hard to believe it was a year. Nothings happened with the space. Just rubble and memories.

Here is the post about the original tragedy.

Inside the pink cinema

No, I don't mean that kind of pink cinema, I mean this kind of pink cinema. Pal of Sticky Floors, Jason Gray posted about his experience going to one of the remaining pink cinemas in Tokyo over at his blog. You can also see some of the buildings in their surroundings in this post of his.

V is for...

return of the puffy monsters

I promised Deadilicious that I would post pics of the kooky illustrated board that the monster stickers were stapled to (see earlier post). Here it is in all its glory.

Survivor

we got Dardos!

Wow! We'd like to take a bow for the recognition of being presented with The Dardos Award twice, first by those swell French pastry chefs over at Deadilicious, and then by Samuel at MONDO 70: A Wild World of Cinema! Wow! What an honour!

"The Dardos Award is given for recognition of cultural, ethical, literary, and personal values transmitted in the form of creative and original writing. These stamps were created with the intention of promoting fraternization between bloggers, a way of showing affection and gratitude for work that adds value to the Web."

Like a chain letter awards, we must pass the award over to five other blogs that we like. We put our heads together, had to pull some short straws, but came up with these WINNERS!

The Undead Film Critic - Sadly, what since the time that me and the lads picked our winners, one of them is no more. While there is no set order to the awards, we would very much like to single out The Undead Film Critic, whose time with us was far too brief. I checked it daily and his flurry and variety of visual posts was a source of constant delight. I was away from regular internet access earlier this month and when I sat down to catch up on what UFC had been up to, I found that Blogger had pulled the plug on his blog which upset me to no end. We have heard from him since and he promises this:

"It might be awhile but I shall return. Zombies don't die, but we sure are slow as hell."

Please stay tuned at the end of this blog for some photos of UFC in happier days. The Scandy Factory posted an obit here.

Rad Dudes
The title says it all...
The only non-film blog here. You need a break sometimes.

The Shoot Actors Don't They
A bunch of Toronto nerdlingers stand on a soapbox and spout off on what they like and love about movies. The Finnish love them.

Cinebeats: Confessions of a Cinephile
" One woman's love affair with '60s & '70s era cinema."
It's been awhile since she posted, but when she does, we snap to it and read it!

If Charlie Parker Was a Gunslinger,
There'd Be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats

I compare this blog to a desk day calendar that regularly inspires me from others endeavours and greatness. Simple, no frills and that's all you need. (It also has Cinebeats' Kimberly Lindbergs as a contributor.

The Dardos Award Rules are:
1) Accept the award by posting it on your blog along with the name of the person that has granted the award and a link to his/her blog.
2) Pass the award to another five blogs that are worthy of this acknowledgement, remembering to contact each of them to let them know they have been selected for this award.

And now some memories of UFC.
(Lights dim and fade in "We've Only Just Begun" by The Carpenters)

R.I.P. Shirley Jean Rickert

One time Little Rascal and then, later, burlesque queen, Shirley Jean Rickert passed away last week just a month before her 83rd birthday.

She wasn't a star or regular in the Our Gang shorts but you may recall her, as I did, as that little blonde girl with the distinctive curls. Good hair!





I'm not too pained to bring you this news since I really don't know much about her and wouldn't have at all if not for the help of a hip poster seller from California (it's rumoured he used to date Mary Woronov!) who I arranged a trade with and my end included this beast of a 40" X 60' poster affixed to heavy cardboard and showing obvious signs of loving use and stamps indicating that it was property of the Sonney Amusements family of roadshow film exhibitors. Great history for people like me!

Anyway, here she is in all her fancy-dancing glory on the bottom right hand corner of the poster...





If you visit me, you can look at her more closely (but not one-on-one) as you remove your shoes.

And here's a window card for the same film. These pieces are no longer created for contemporary movies but they used to be quite popular at one time. 14" x 22" with a space for the theatre to write in the specifics on show dates and times. They'd be posted about small towns and such in storefront/diner windows or community boards...that type of thing.

Shirley was known, on stage, as Gilda.



Comely, to say the least.

One man's sexy...

Kilka dobrych polskich filmow plakaty

Some of my favourites...

Solaris

Blade Runner

Missing

Yesterday's Enemy

El Topo

Something Wild

What recession?

Took this the other night when walking in the snowy streets. Toronto's last adult cinema got a new coat of paint and a change of colour. Red! Now that says class!