Loew’s Capitol Theater, New York City, 1968
Hoyts Regent Theatre, Sydney, Australia, 1968
Warfield Theatre, San Francisco, 1973
(Photos via William Burge via Cinema Retro)
Archive for January, 2013
Movie Theater Marquees: Planet of the Apes (1968, 1973)
Published January 8, 2013 Movie Theaters/Marquees , Planet of the Apes 5 CommentsMusic from Outer Space: Martin Denny’s Exotic Moog (1969)
Published January 8, 2013 Music from Outer Space 3 CommentsMartin Denny’s first album, 1957’s Exotica, spawned a genre of the same name based on “what a lot of people imagined the [South Pacific] islands to be like.” He described it as “pure fantasy,” which is really the foundation of all lounge music: the musical evocation, by non-natives, of exotic and fantastic locations.
Exotic Moog, released in ’69, is a reinterpretation of 12 standards using the Moog (early synthesizer). The album is totally out there and incredibly hard to find. The few songs I’ve come across make me feel like I’m drifting drowsily through space in an abandoned tiki bar.
In other words, I’m a big fan.
EDIT (1/17/13): I’ve now found 7 of the 12 songs on the album and made up a playlist. Enjoy.
(Videos via LittleMissLounge, John Kalama, synthastia, Alfonso, Jessica Ess, sirisohk, and clantogw)
A Portrait of Young (and Older) Geeks Playing D&D
Published January 7, 2013 D&D , D&D Portraits Leave a Comment
These are both from a nice Gary Gygax tribute at A Dark and Sinister Force for Good. The first shot shows the lads back in the day—late ’70s, it looks like. Check out that awesome Batman glass.
In the second shot we see the lads circa 2008. The Batman glass has been replaced by Diet Coke and booze.
The dice never stop rolling.
Disney Read-Along #381: The Black Hole
Published January 7, 2013 Black Hole, The , Disney , Disney Movies , Disney Read-Alongs , Records (LPs) and Cassettes 2 Comments
Quick Movie Reviews: Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann (1982)
Published January 4, 2013 '80s Movies/TV , Movie Reviews 2 Comments
Beware: Spoilers ahead.
Dude in the middle of a motorcycle race gets zapped back in time by some incompetent scientists to the year 1877, where evil cowboys try to steal his fancy machine and he (the motorcycle dude) has sex with his great, great grandma (the motorcycle dude is in fact his own great, great grandpa).
Fred Ward (Remo Williams, Tremors) plays the motorcycle dude, and everybody loves Fred Ward, but not even Fred Ward can make one of the worst scripts ever written okay. I’m sorry, he just cant. And the motorcycle is just a motorcycle. It doesn’t shoot cool lasers or anything.
Good things I can say about Timerider include:
- The poster is awesome.
- It’s an early time travel flick, predating both Terminator and Back to the Future.
- Everybody loves Fred Ward.
- The evil cowboys are played in appropriate over-the-top fashion by Peter Coyote (the scientist with all the keys in E.T.), Richard Masur (Clark in The Thing, the dad in License to Drive), and Tracey Walter (the cook in City Slickers).
- Michael Nesmith, one of The Monkees, wrote the music and co-wrote the script. The music was fun.
(Poster image via SciFi-Movies)
Micronauts: Terraphant (Mego, 1979)
Published January 4, 2013 Ken Kelly , Mego , Micronauts 2 Comments
I’ve never seen “The Terrifying Mammoth from the Remote World of Visceros” before. It rules, obviously. The alien script is a brilliant touch. I’m not sure the “hydrocannon” is all that terrifying, but you never know, maybe water is deadly to Viscerians (Viscerosians?).
The box art is by Ken Kelly. Check out his Micronauts gallery at Innerspace Online.
The Official Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Coloring Album
Published January 3, 2013 Coloring/Activity Books , D&D , D&D Art , D&D Non-Gaming Merchandise , Troubador Press 2 Comments
UPDATE (1/11/13): I found the full book. Please see my updated post here.
As the poor bastard in the second pic below found out, beholders are very, very nasty.
Beyond Tomorrow Lunar Space Station and the Story of Multiple Toymakers
Published January 2, 2013 Multiple Toymakers/MPC , Space Toys/Playsets 5 Comments
Look familiar? Remember the Star Base Command Tower and the Galactic Attack Dome? Well, I’ve been trying to figure out who made all these similar looking space sets in the late ’70s and early ’80s, and the short answer is Multiple Toymakers, which at the time was a division of Miner Industries.
According to a short bio I found in the Standard Catalog of Farm Toys, Multiple Products Corporation (MPC) started out circa 1950, changing its name to Multiple Products, Inc. in 1964. In 1967 MPI became Multiple Toymakers. MPC/Multiple churned out a number of plastic figures, play sets, rack toys, and model kits during this time, including a popular Planet of the Apes and James Bond line.
The XL5 in the Beyond Tomorrow description refers to Multiple’s 1963/1964 Fireball XL5 Space City play set, as Plaid Stallions pointed out here.
Multiple creatively recycled many of its toys and sets, and in or around 1970, the company became a division of Miner Industries.
Now, take a look at the Star Base Command Tower again.
If you’ll recall, I was confused by the ‘Major’ label on the top left of the box. Luckily, I found a press release from a 1979 issue of Toy and Hobby World:
Miner Industries, Inc. and Union Group Co., Inc. of Baltimore have entered into a joint venture to manufacture and market toys and games. The company, named Union Major, lnc., will be a Miner-managed affiliate…
That’s all I could get from the snippet view, but it’s clear that `Major’ refers to Union Major. Here’s a package of space men listing both Major and Miner Industries.
And here’s a flyer from Plaid Stallions showing Union Major as an affiliate of Miner.
(Image sources: Remembering the ’70s, Plaid Stallions, eBay, John Kenneth Muir, Bonanza)
2 Warps to Neptune 