Godzilla meets Misery

Yes, they are releasing special additions of classic Toho Godzilla films on DVD in their original Japanese language, uncut, unedited and English subtitled. Yeah, they are buying full page ads in magazines to herald the debut. People are exited.

I been there and done that a decade ago. And boy, do I have a lot to say about it.

Respect for the Toho films was something that was fought for long and hard. The mainstream basically treated with contempt and the true history of the Godzilla series was never really presented. But, if you were a kid who grew up on the series, then the series has a tendency to mean a great deal to you. It sort of stays with you in a latent manner and then at some point later in life, you feel the need to purchase new releases of the films and revisit them. Sort of the way I did circa 1999 when I lurked around New York City.




“I’m lonely and I tired and I can’t take anymore pain. Take away this ball and chain.”
So went the song BALL AND CHAIN by Social Distortion.

Much of the lyrics of that song could easily sum up my late 1990’s sojourn in the TV and magazine business and my subsequent fall into economic collapse and what seemed, at the time, the end of a bright career before it ever really started.

Then again, how can it really get started when substance abuse issues get you fired by not one, but two television jobs on Park Avenue? Or what about blowing a job interview with one of the biggest publishing houses in the world due to showing up super loaded for a job interview? Oh, and that major magazine gig I ruined….oh man.

But I could take solace in my empty $400 a room. Even though I couldn’t hold a real job, I could bounce from temp agency to temp agency collecting take home pay in the neighborhood of $212 a week. That would, sometimes, give me enough cash to play with. Now, if I told you some of the things I purchased while in that terrible of financial shape you would probably flip out at my irresponsibility.

Well, guess? This entry is about something I used to buy: pirate copies of Toho films. They were VHS dubs of Japanese Laserdisks. Now, this was nothing new. People had been doing it for years. However, in the early days of home computing, some maniacs figured out a way to subtitle video! This was radical stuff in1997 made even more outrageous that people were sitting in front of their TV’s, watching the Japanese laserdiscs and translating them. Madness, it was.

And, for some reason, at this low point in my life I reached for the mail order catalogue and purchase these pirate tapes for $15 postage paid. (Sorry, I name of this long defunct company escapes me)

The very first tape I purchased was an uncut version of TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA, a movie so special to me I will discuss it at length in the future.
The second film I purchased was INVASION OF THE ASTRO MONSTERS.




If you are saying “huh?” at that one, I couldn’t blame you. With all the great Godzilla films I out there, the second one I purchased was one of the weaker films in the series. A sequel to the far superior film GHIDORAH, THE THREE HEADED MONSTER, INVASION (Released in the USA in 1966 as MONSTER ZERO) brought Godzilla and Rodan back to battle Ghidorah, but the fight scenes numbered a whopping TWO making this one of the duller films in the series.


It was also a film I rented in the mid 1980’s when my family bought the home’s first VCR. It didn’t grab me then when I was watching tons of Godzilla films in a way of revisiting age 7 when these films were common on local TV, but had been noticeably absent for years.

With my life in a downward spiral that seems endless, there needed to be a relief, a reprieve. I could get that reprieve in the form of revisiting my Toho films in the safety of the late night darkness of my dreary $400 room which had two windows, both cracked.

So why purchase another copy of the film…a pirated version of the Japanese laserdisc….subtitled into English thanks to maniacal fans? Because you never start with the best or your favorites or it’ll be a downfall from there. Sure, you check out your favorite to kick start things (TERROR OF MECHAGODZILLA) and then you move on to more conservative fare such as INVASION OF THE ASTRO MONSTERS. You see, you prolong the good stuff. When you do that, hope is there in the future somewhere and it is in the form of KING KONG VS GODZILLA, Japanese language version, subtitled in English.

It’s all about the hope

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Upcoming Toho Releases

Why isn’t this creature smiling?


Could it be because he is disturbed at being referred to as Frankenstein's Dinosaur? Yes, believe it or not, Godzilla was known as Frankenstein's Dinosaur in Germany. The reason for this is that Toho monsters simply could not draw at the box office in Europe back in the 1960's. In Italy, for example, Godzilla's name was DROPPED from KING KONG VS GODZILLA and the film retitled TERROR OF KING KONG....and it didn't get released in Italy until 1972...a full decade after it was originally released to huge box office in the USA and Japan.

Ok....this is way off topic from the title of the thread, but bear with me.

"I can not tell you who I am because who I am is all I have and I can not give it away."

That was the response to a classic psychology book entitled WHY AM I AFRAID TO TELL YOU WHO I AM.

In a somewhat similar vein, all I have in life is my 30 year old PLANET OF THE APES Milk Mug and my unending supply of trivia and you ARE NOT getting my milk mug so you are stuck with my trivia...

Anyway, all of the classic Toho monster films are being released on DVD UNCUT, UNEDITED and in their original Japanese language with English subtitles. It's about time!

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And Now The Screaming Starts on AMC

What can you say about a movie where one of the stars, Christopher Lee, insists that the film was about an alien invasion yet there is no mention of aliens at all in the film? For those who haven't experienced it, the 1973 goofball 'classic' AND NOW THE SCREAMING STARTS (featuring Mr. Lee, Vincent Price and Peter Cushing) is playing this week on AMC at 230am (sorry, I forget the day...you need to look it up yourself). Without a doubt, this is one of the most utterly incomprehensible films in movie history so if you've never seen it....this week is your chance.

Crocodile II and Alligator, Too

I am watching the incredibly silly (yet fun) Sci-Fi Channel airing of Crocodile 2. This is one of those films that you’re already seen even though you’ve never seen it. (Hey…look…it’s that character actor guy from CAGNEY AND LACEY. What’s he doing there?) Crocodile is a one in a long line of rip-off giant monster on the loose films that were born of the success of ANACONDA in the late 1990’s. So, it would be unfair to call it a rip-off of the classic John Sayles’ film ALLIGATOR (1980) I’m going to go in depth on my memories of ALLIGATOR through the course of a couple of posts. I’m sorry, but this is all a stream of semi-consciousness deriving from this silly Sci-Fi Channel film.

Ah. ALLIGATOR (1980). I remember it well, although I am only remembering bits and fragments of my memory of the film. It has, after all, been 27 years since the film was released in theaters and I was REAL young. But I remember the television ads for the film: “An alligator that big can’t survive down there. It’d starve to death.” says the lady of the film whose name escapes me. That was the line of dialogue used to push the ‘drama’ of this satirical film. I also remember the way every one of the ALLIGATOR commercials ended: with the big lug rising up from out of the sewer BREAKING through the concrete! Scary stuff folks.

But, I admit it, I never saw the film in the theaters. I saw it when it debuted on network TV. Might have been 1982 or 1983. I’m leaning to 1982 because by 1984 I had a VCR and ALLIGATOR was not something I rented or cared to rent. This would have been the case with any film I saw relatively recently so that rules out a 1983 or 1984 airing. Who knows? Maybe it popped up on TV in 1981.

BREAKING NEWS - I'm watching CROCODILE TWO as I type. They stole a famous scene from JAWS 2 for CROCODILE 2. You'll know it when you see it. END OF BREAKING NEWS


Watching ALLIGATOR on a small screen, Black and White TV (yes, I know I reference my old Black and White TV sets, but they are a large part of my youth) was quite the experience, I tell you…and I will in the next installment.

Digital Frames

I used to love the old WOLFMAN poster that I had when I was in High School. I also owned a neat Frankenstein poster that was proudly displayed on my wall as well. (As you can see, I am a sentimental person) Luckily, I owned these posters when I was a ten and not a small child because these posters were so realistic, the six year old version of myself may have feared that the poster's subject matter would walk out of their poster prison and come to life.

Then again, if you really want to see a pictoral image come to life, you may wish to examine a digital photo frame from digitalframez.com. Yes, the cool LCD picture frame offered by Digital Framez can bring any image to life whether it be a loving relative or a feared monster. After all, anything you have a digital picture off can be a unique experience as it is displayed with an incredibly lucid and clear digital picture frame. Gone are the old days of blowing up a photograph and hanging it on up on your wall inside a traditional wooden frame. Now, an LCD frame will store the digital image and then ‘project’ the image in the frame. (Some digital frames can even loop digital video images as well) So please, visit Digitalframez.com and check out their expansive selection of these brilliant frames.

John Carpenter's The Thing in Seal Beach

No, the shapeshifting creature from John Carpenter's classic 1982 re-make of THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD has not attacked Seal Beach, CA. Considering that Seal Beach has a huge US naval presence, such an attack would be crazy. Then again, it would also be a good idea for a sequel. (BTW - IMDB lists THE THING (2009) being in development)

ANYWAY....John Carpenter's cool remake is playing on the big screen tonight at the following theater: Bay Theater - Seal Beach 340 Main Street, Seal Beach, CA, 90740

Favorite Moments Revisited - THE Avengers and the Cybernauts

It has been a while since I made a new entry in the "Favorite Moments" mentions. (And I think I need to come up with something a little more catchy than the title "Favorite Moments) Regardless, I need to highlight a particularly famous moment from my childhood viewing experience. (I could mention my one and only viewing of the BRILLIANT Marx Brothers comedy A NIGHT AT THE OPERA in 1981 on an old Black and White TV set, but it wasn't a horror movie so I will leave that to another day)

So what memorable moment do I want to highlight? The CBS Late Movie Airing of the Avengers' Return of the Cybernauts. (Yes, the Avengers was a TV program and not a movie, but CBS was in love with calling their late night reruns of TV programs 'movies.') I will never forget the bizarre beginning:

Slow moving. Deliberate. Methodical. A man (or what appears to be a man) is carrying another man over his shoulders. The second man is clearly unconcious and being kidnapped. Who is doing such a thing? The person doing it is dressed in a black hat, clothes and dark sunglasses. His face, however, is SILVER. He is not human. He is a menacing robot.



Let me tell you....that image scared me like crazy when I was 8 years old. It left a stirring image in my head that still resonates many years later.

Recently, I watched a DVD of it and, well, the episode doesn't hold up well. It is pretty repetitive and dull. (Before there was a RETURN OF THE CYBERNAUTS episode there was an episode entitled THE CYBERNAUTS that I also recently viewed and it is a TREMENDOUS episode) However, regardless of how flawed the episode itself is, those opening moments that I first saw many years ago still remain with me to this day.

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Literary Criticism and Analysis

If there ever was an underappreciated realm of reading material, it would some of the more academic minded writings on the history of horror. It is unfortunate that many will dismiss such essays and articles on the basis that they are too "college oriented" for reading material. This is an unfortunate dismissal.

Often, most critical writings on horror deal mainly with reviews of films. In general, most reading material on horror films deal with the history of the genre. Of course, there is nothing wrong with that nor is there anything wrong with publishing reviews, interviews, etc. In fact, there are a number of phenomenal books out there on the subject.

But there is a decided lack of collections of critical writings on the subject of horror. Yes, there are a few out there, but their numbers are far and few between. This is unfortunate when you consider the various brilliant underlying themes that are present in horror classics such as Frankenstein and its relation to man's playing God or Dracula and its relation to how fear of Christian symbols provides a method of reaffirming faith in God or how the Mummy teaches us that love is eternal even when love is misguided. Yes, there are a number of deep and rich themese well worh exploring. I don't want to be the one stuck writing them. I want to be able to enoy reading them. Something tells me, though, that I am going to be the one who ends up doing all the writing.

Dracula and Christianity

I've had a bit of writer's block for this blog so I haven't written anything for a few days. Then, lo and behold, a brilliant topic dropped into my lap. While skimming the net, I came across an essay that mentioned the relationship of Christian imagery in Dracula. This provided quite a bit of food for thought. I've been pondering the relationship between the two, but having not read Dracula in a few years, but first thing tomorrow I am going to skim that classic novel (that I read for the first time in college in 1992)once again so I can review the text in light of looking at it from the perspective of placing Christian imagery within its presentation within the strange context of a horror novel.

More to come

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Why Short Story Horror

In my previous post, I exlcusively mentioned short story horror and neglected to mention the anything about horror novels. Was this a slught on my part towards horror novels? Of course not. I am a huge fan of horror novels and authors. My reasning for mentioning short story horror is that, often, my life is so busy that I can not properly get into a lengthy novel. Hence, I do a lot of short fiction reading. If you were looking for a grand, intellectual assessment here, I am sorry to disappoint. Sometimes, the fantastic lives exclusively in the mundane

Short Story Horror

Oh, the ability to craft short story horror is a lost art. Ok, that is a bit of a stretch because great short story horror is written every day. Sadly, I had been burned far too often by poorly written horror anthology collections and decided to cease purchasing anthologies. Big mistake on my part, as I am sure I missed some gems here and there.

Of those GREAT anthologies that I have read, I would have to mention the HOT BLOOD series, SHOCK ROCK, BOOK OF THE DEAD and mostly anything edited by Martin Greenberg. (In particular, his Dracula anthology was tremendous)

So what makes horror tales so interesting to read? I think a great deal of it has to do with the morality tale aspect of horror. Most of the people who befall bad ends in a horror narrative usually befall those ends because they have done something morally wrong and must face retribution. (After all, if the victims were innocent people, then the genre would be too grim to be popular)

This is where the short stories (or any reading material) becomes intriguing. When it becomes a morality tale that draws you in, you do not so much read it as much as you experience it. In a way, you become part of the experience on an emotional level. This is what separates well crafted horror from contrived horror. After one too many experiences with contrived horror, I kind of ditched the scene.

Maybe it istime that I went back.

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The Hulk's Lost Love 3

As previously mentioned, the 1972 -1973 era of the Incredible Hulk saw the series take a dramatic turn when Betty Ross married Glenn Talbot, effectively ending the relationship bewteen Betty/Bruce Banner/The Hulk (Betty was not a two-timer. She simply thought the Hulk was killed after a battle with Dr. Doom)

This added a unique dimension to the series that was even odd by Marvel's weird, anti-hero policies. Essentially, it added the daramtic action of a man having to deal with the fact that the woman he loves is with another man.

If the mere loss of a loved one is painful, the notion that a former lover is with someone else is positively heartwrenching and we see this emotional struggle played out through the pages of the Hulk in two forms: Banner's self pity mized with selflessness. That is, he realizes Betty is far better off with someone else and not with a person who splits his time between being a human being and a monstrous, rampaging alter-ego. On the other hand, The Hulk simply refuses to accept the fact Betty is with another (perhaps he is used to it because he has to share her with his hated alter ego Banner) and decides to find her.

It becomes curious as to how the authors of the series decided to fixate on such mature themes (granted, it is still presented in the traditional, corny manner of over the top Incredible Hulk melodrama)Was it, perhaps, the authors' way of cleansing their one personal demons over loss as had been the case when Len Wein (one of the writers in these Hulk issues) had done previously in his creation of the Swamp Thing in 1969?

Or, perhaps, were the authors reaching out to their audience of alienated youth? (Marvel had an unusually high number of high school and college readers for the time period)Was it, in a way, the comic reaching out to a legion of nebbish fans who felt the pain of not getting the girl and having to see her with another person? After all, most Marvel Comics were devised so that the audience could ampathize with the heroes.

regardless of the motivation for this particular employed dramatic action, the darama works and works well within the framework that it is presented. As such, these issues collected in ESSENTIAL INCREIBLE HULK VOL 4 become higly prized reading and well worth pobdering upon

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Ultraman DVDs

I recently picked up the complete run of the old Ultraman DVD series. If you are a Gen-X'er, there is simply no way you could have grown up without being glued to the TV set to watch this Ultra-cool program that reached America's shores in the 1970's after their original run in Japan in 1967. While the remastering is not the greatest (Actually, the DVD looks worse than an old VHS tape!), it is a real joy to see the series on DVD...finally! (Yes, I remember episodes 1-4 were released in the late 1990's, but that was a decade ago and no subsequent episodes were released)

So when are we going to see DVD releases of SPACE GIANTS of JOHN SOCKKO AND HIS FLYING ROBOT?

The Hulk's Lost Love Part 2

Ad previously mentioned in my prior blog...there is an adult theme present in the 1972-74 stories present in The Incredible Hulk that betray a theme quite unique to any form of storyltelling much less the very primitive world of comic books circa three decades before.

Of course, Marvel Comics was also filled with themes of heroes with flawed characters whose alter egos were perpetually plagued by female troubles. (The Amazing Spiderman was thoroughly loaded with these types of themes) The Hulk was no excpetion as the series centered on the shattered love affair between Bruce Banner and the Hulk. Not only was it shattered because Banner is now cursed with becoming The Hulk, the situation is even FURTHER complicated because THE HULK falls for Betty as well.

For the bulk of the series, Betty primarily remained true to Bruce hoping that he would somehow be cured so they could live together. (A far more brutal and cycinal version of this love affair was recreated in the modern era in Marvel's Ultimate line of books) So, there existed a hanging cloud of unrequetted love and missed opportunity.

What made the Marvel heroes so unique and original was the fact that there were far more complex from the black and white heroes and villians of rival DC comics. While in the actual story, the long for lost love derives from Banner's curse at becoming the Hulk, it can easily be symbolic of a number of things that plague people in the proverbial real world. While no one is turning green, gaining 2000lbs and smashing cities, they do have responsibilities that tie then down such as jobs, family commitments, illness, etc that can each contribute to the decline and fall of what (under normal circumstances) could have been a stable relationship. While the unrequetted love of the Hulk is surrounded by fight scenes, over the top villians and general chaos, the poignancy of the Hulk's loss and longings is not lost on its readers. The tale of lost love and complicated romance resonates with the alienated audience that would find a character like the Hulk appealing.

This takes on a further complex dimension when Betty marries Bruce's rival Glenn Talbot
Continued

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The Incredible Hulk and Love's Labor Lost

In my previous blog about the Hulk, I waxed nostalgic about re-reading the Hulk Comics that I enjoyed back in the early 1980's. (Although they were reprints that were originally published in 1972. For some extreme trivia, the reprint series was dubbed Marvel Superheroes Presents The Incredible Hulk) While my original goal was to bring you back to those formulative years where the Hulk left and impression on me, I delved into the "frankenstein mythology that surrounds the Hulk. That is, the Hulk appeals to kids because he is, after all, a big lumbering kid not much different than the Frankenstein Monster and the Frankenstein Monster also has a certain appeal to kids. However, upon re-reading the stories, I noticed there was an extreme complexity found within those comic tales. This complexity deals with the horror of unrequetted love. Yes, the Hulk series was also a love story that centered on the weird triangle of Bruce Banner, Betty Ross and The Hulk. Actually, circa 1972-1973, it was closer to a love rectangle (square?) as the addition of Betty (thinking the Hulk is dead) marries Banner's rival Major Glenn Talbot. So, underneath all the "Hulk Smash" fight scenes with oversized villians, we get a strange personal insght into lost romance.

Continued