“In Search Of” was a documentary series hosted by actor Leonard Nimoy. The show ran in the 1970’s and it’s subject matter covered the mysterious, the supernatural, the uncanny and the just plain weird. Here is a sample episode that pursued the topic of Bigfoot. I remember watching this program religiously on Sunday evenings and enjoying it immensely. A precursor to the vast amount of supernatural/docudrama series which populate the cable TV landscape today. Worth seeking out.
The Joker is certainly one of my favorite comic book characters. Batman’s arch nemesis can be considered among the Top Ten of fictional super villains of any media. But, let’s face the facts. He is totally mad! Sometimes his plans and schemes can get a little out of control. And with the melding of “adult” themes with graphic art forms, The Joker’s naughtiness can basically be allowed to plummet any depth the author of the piece cares to pursue. Here are a few of The Joker’s darkest moments.
I stumbled upon this movie late at night and was instantly appalled! What a horrific, nightmarish spectacle it all is. A unit of Russian soldiers during World War II are unfortunate enough to wander into the Hell of a den of nearly unstoppable human/robot hybrids. The soldiers’ mission is to apprehend a latter day descendant of the evil Dr. Frankenstein himself and put a stop to his hideous killer creations. They should have gone AWOL and fled the mission. The creatures featured in this lovely gore fest are pieced together from dead bodies and curious mechanical parts the good doctor has lying around his lab. I’ll let you discover their grotesque makeup on your own. I guess this is one of the charms the film could boast. What insane mash up of corpse and metal might be coming next? It is possible for the entire concept of “Frankenstein’s Army” to build up a loyal fan base and a new horror franchise could be born. Plenty of gunplay, unrelenting action, explosions, freakish creatures, severed limbs, exposed brains, bloodshed and insane ranting to please even the most jaded horror movie fan. Truly sickening!!!
A self modulating video synthesizer is demonstrated here. Lots of pretty, shifting color patterns and an interesting audio soundtrack accompaniment follow. Maybe best to absorb in small doses? Noodling can be an intense experience at the time of creation but later playback always begs editing. Deciding what to cut and what to leave in can be an agonizing experience!
We visit Forrest J. Ackerman, the creator of “Famous Monsters of Filmland” magazine, and take an abbreviated tour of the “Ackermansion” memorabilia collection Ackerman amassed in Southern California. Plenty of pad puns and dusty monster/horror/science fiction movie artifacts await. How did Ackerman remember where everything was stored?
Dave Brock, longtime Hawkwind guitarist.
This concert footage of Hawkwind illustrates their cool use of stage dressing and lights. I mean, have you ever seen anything like this? Probably, since this was a tour which ran back in the early 1990’s. I saw them in a small club in Northern California a few years ago and the intensity of sound volume and shifting, strobing lights and lasers was pretty overwhelming. I loved it!
A perfect document of an intense rock band performing live. Here are The Who performing “Won’t Get Fooled Again”, live, as part of a filmed segment to be included in a documentary about the band’s history, “The Kids Are Alright”. Jeff Stein directed the documentary and caught and edited this spirited performance of the song which originally appeared on their studio release, “Who’s Next”. The Who have always excelled as a live act and this is surely one of their most classic live documents. Keith Moon tirelessly rattles out his drum parts. Roger Daltrey shrieks and howls his way through the lyrics. Pete Townsend prances, windmills and otherwise abuses his guitar and body throughout the song. And, the great bass virtuoso, John Entwistle, effortlessly produces amazingly fleet note runs on his instrument. Iconic.
My favorite song from Porcupine Tree, a rock outfit led by Steve Wilson. A sad, harrowing tale of a boy who grew up with “wiring loose inside (his) head” and who matures into, probably, a full blown serial killer candidate. Pretty unpleasant as you listen to the lyrics reflecting the main character’s reasoning that his acts are merely displays of love or romance toward his intended victims. He seems to know something is terribly wrong with him but it is probably too late to do anything about it. Haunting stuff. Crunching, power chords alternate with more gently strummed guitar passages. Steve Wilson has a knack for coming up with killer guitar parts!
Assemblage of concert footage features Pink Floyd in concert playing “Sheep”. This song appeared on their release “Animals”. The Pink Floyd concert experience was a mixed media event with film clips and visuals projected onto a massive screen, lasers, a light show, and huge props reflecting song subject matter. Here we witness a very saturated color film of the performance and hear the rich aural textures of synthesizer (Richard Wright), processed guitar (David Gilmour), reverberating vocals (Roger Waters) and driving drumbeats (Nick Mason) intermixed. Trippy to say the least. Nice use of vocoder near the end of this clip.
Glorious, orchestrated rock tune from Van Der Graaf Generator. I placed “Generator” in parentheses in the title because at this stage of the band’s career, they had decided to abbreviate their title. Anyway, “Pioneers” is an epic composition highlighted by Peter Hamill’s vocals which alternate between mournful wail and guttural snarls. Hammill possesses a truly unique voice in rock. Rob Halford of Judas Priest learned a few tricks from Hamill’s approach it would appear. I like the powerful, effects laden bass guitar. When I first purchased this live set, “Vital” on audio cassette(!!! I date myself), I felt the bass was overdone but it has grown on me through the years. Pretty unique sounding instrument. Fine string and woodwind accents contribute as well to a rich sonic soup in which Hammill spins his yarn of a group of astronauts hopelessly lost in some outer space no man’s land with no chance of ever returning home. “Pioneers Over C” is a fabulous and multi layered melancholic suite. I only wish we could have witnessed the actual performance and didn’t have to depend on the album/CD/record cover as our only visual for a 16 minute time span! Boring! But this piece of music is definitely not boring.
I mounted a Contour Action Cam to a Pinewood Derby car for laughs. The race goes by in a hurry but it’s kind of cool. The name of the car was Cyclops, of course.
Very influential, big budget science fiction film from the 1950’s. In the future, a starship from earth ventures to a remote planet to check on the well being of a colony established by earlier explorers. Only two survivors are found from the previous expedition but they flourish in their compound with the assistance of their super workhorse robot, Robby. It seems that survivor Dr. Morbius has learned a few tricks from the previous inhabitants of the planet, the uber advanced Krell. But not all knowledge is necessarily good to have. Morbius harbors some dark secrets of his own that have a bad habit of manifesting themselves in solid form thanks to tapping into Krell technology.
Among the movie’s strengths are very cool special effects, an otherworldly electronic music score from Louis and Bebe Barron, impressive movie sets and dioramas and, of course, the introduction of the amazing creation, Robby The Robot. The functioning of the earth ship and its captain and crew seem to have been an influence on Gene Roddenberry who created the TV series “Star Trek”. Leslie Nielsen played the captain of the second Earth starship.
Great Sixties science fiction/horror film from master fantasy director Mario Bava. Two ships in outer space end up setting down on an alien planet. After losing communications with one of the ships, the crew of the other vessel goes to investigate. Many of the occupants are found dead, having seemingly lost their minds and killed each other. Many crew members cannot be found. It appears that there is an alien presence on the planet that has taken over the bodies of one of the space crews. A struggle to survive the alien vampires and escape the evil planet and get back into space ensues. Among this film’s strengths are a very atmospheric, dark, planetary setting, a film shot with deeply saturated color, the intense buildup of paranoia. Barry Sullivan stars. This movie has been cited as a major influence on Dan O’Bannon who wrote the screenplay for “Alien” (1979). There are many similarities including the discovery of an ancient alien ship and it’s fossilized crew members. A nice melding of science fiction and horror elements.
This may be my favorite episode of Kolchak – The Night Stalker TV series. Kolchak ends up on an ocean cruise to do a fluff piece on the singles scene. It ends up being anything but a pleasure cruise for the intrepid reporter. A series of brutal attacks on the paying customers ensue and Kolchak theorizes that a werewolf may be responsible. It turns out one of the guests is harboring a dreadful secret that has a nasty habit of getting completely out of control when the full moon rises. This is a very suspenseful show full of dark shadows, memorable acting and plenty of spooky scenes. Eric Braeden (see “Colossus: The Forbin Project”) turns in a powerful performance as the tortured soul who suffers the curse of the werewolf. Well worth seeking out!
