R.I.P. James Caan

 

He always made it look easy.

George Pérez Comic Book Art

Rest In Peace

 

Neal Adams Artwork

Rest In Peace

 

In Memoriam - Paul Naschy (1934- 2009)

Yesterday was Jacinto Molina's birthday. He is missed but his flame still burns. 

Trailers From Hell - 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA (1954)

Rest in Peace Kirk Douglas. 

Celebrating Paul Naschy on the Anniversary of His Passing

Ten years ago today we lost Paul Naschy (Jacinto Molina) and, on that day, the world of fantastic cinema became a little less bright. Still possessing a creative mind right up to the end his passing was a huge loss that still reverberates through the Spanish horror community, inspiring fans to this day. In the last few years we have seen a resurgence of interest in his body of work with nearly two dozen of his horror films currently available on Blu-Ray. His legend and legacy seems to be cemented with his movies becoming much easier to see, new books being written about him and new fans being created constantly. So, as much as I continue to mourn his death a decade ago I'm very happy to see that his name is now better known than when he left us. Even with my sorrow that he is gone I don't feel sad when I watch his movies. I feel excited or chilled or surprised by what he wrote and I marvel at how he crafted a fictional world of monsters and madmen that I keep wanting to return to. He was a man that gave his best to the work and his talent shines through in even the weakest of his films. So, I miss Paul Naschy but, lucky for me, he is right there on my television screen anytime I want.

We miss you El Hombre Lobo, but you will never be far from our hearts. 

RIP Stelvio Cipriani

Italian composer Stelvio Cipriani passed away the other day. I've been impressed with his work from the first time I heard it in Mario Bava's BAY OF BLOOD (1971). I've collected several of his scores over the years and always found them to be excellent listening experiences even divorced from their intended film use. He was a man of rare talent.

Darwyn Cooke 1962-2016

In so many ways it feels like he was just getting started. 

Vince Rotolo - Podcasting Mentor

About ten years ago I first learned about the world of podcasts and immediately started searching for shows focused on my off-kilter interests. Vince Rotolo's B-MovieCast was one of the first shows I subscribed to and not long after that time I realized that I wanted to put in my two cents worth. Vince made that easy by having a phone number set up for fans to call and so - after screwing up my courage - I called, left a message and thus began a long series of sometimes crazy contributions to that show. If truth is to be told I was trying to do a couple of things with those dozens (?) of phone calls. Sure, I wanted to add some information about the movies being covered on the podcast BUT - I was also trying to make Vince laugh. I really, really wanted to make Vince laugh. I knew that if he was amused he'd surely include me in his show. That's how it works, right? If you put a smile on the boss' face he lets you stick around.

Well, he did include my calls in the B-MovieCast and I could hear him laughing so I knew I was cool. B-MovieCast cool. And even when he wasn't audibly laughing you could hear the grin that was plastered on his face. That's right. Vince was the kind of host that could not keep the sound of his voice from telling you how much fun he was having making his show. He was enjoying himself the entire time, even when he was wrestling with Skype problems that made recording with his distant co-hosts a start and stop pain. Of course, I should have figured out long before I actually did that I didn't have to work so hard to make Vince laugh. He wanted people to join the conversation and as long as I added to the show he was happy to have me. Indeed, he seemed to be happy to include everyone that took the effort to be a part of the B-Movie love that he started the show to foster. I was far from the only listener to add my voice to the party and Vince weaved us all in no matter how nutty we got. Hell! I used his show to jokingly call another podcasting legend a heretic for not watching more Godzilla movies! (Sorry about that, Derek!) But Vince took it all in stride and juggled us lunatics like a professional. He made us all feel welcome in his place even when we acted like crazy people. He created the gold standard for this kind of podcast because he treated us all as friends - even those of us he had never met.

On this past Wednesday night I received a phone call from B-Movie co-host Nic Brown to inform me that Vince Rotolo had unexpectedly passed away just hours before. I was at a friend's house preparing to record a podcast of my own and as I sat down on the couch I felt sure that I was imagining this call. But I wasn't. Nic gave me the details he had and we sat miles away from each other, listening to our own breathing, stunned into confused silence. He was able to assure me that Vince's wife Mary was doing as well as could be expected but, being used to hearing her every week on the podcast, I could imagine her voice cracking with grief with the same words Nic was using. No matter what this was doing to me, Nic, or any other fan of his show I knew Mary was in a far more terrible place and I just wanted to help her. But there are no sympathetic words that aren't obvious. No phrase that will heal this pain. Not for her, not for Vince's family or for any of us.

I only met Vince and Mary once several years ago at the Monster Bash convention in Pittsburgh. I was so thrilled to be able to shake his hand and he was very gracious but also kind of shy. He smiled a lot and as soon as we all started hunting the dealer's room for goodies it was like kid's in a candy store. He might have seemed standoffish but as soon as the conversation turned to our common interests we were cool! I know he talked me into at least one purchase and I think I was able to point some cool pieces out to him as we searched too. It was magical and I can still see him holding a British Blu-Ray of WITCHFINDER GENERAL in his hand and pondering the price.

I'm planning to be at this summer's Monster Bash for the first time since I met Vince there. A big part of why I was excited to go was to talk face to face with him. I had plans to email him in the next few weeks to ask if he would be willing to sit down at the show and record a little for my own podcast. I wanted to dig into his childhood and ask him about his memories. I had visions of getting inside the head of a first generation Monster Kid. What was his first monster film? When did he realize how important movies were for him? What were his thoughts on how the movies of his youth formed his adult tastes? I wanted to know about his job and how he ended up living in the southern US. I wanted to pick his brain about Ray Harryhausen and the day he spent at his house. But mostly I wanted to spend some time with Vince. Some more time. Two or three hours a week for most weeks of the year just didn't seem to be enough. Not for me. And probably not for a lot of other people either. I started missing Vince Wednesday night and I'm going to be missing him every day for the rest of my life. He was a long distance friend; a podcasting mentor; a movie fan and an incredibly nice guy. A light went off this week and, unfortunately, we aren't waiting for the movie to begin on the screen in front of us - we're saying goodbye to that light forever. 

Loving the Alien - David Bowie

It's been a very difficult few weeks for celebrity deaths. Legendary cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, Phantasm film star Angus Scrimm, Motorhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister and acclaimed actor Alan Rickman are just a few of the talented and beloved entertainers that have left us recently. Truly it seems that Death is overdue for a damned long holiday after this string of reaping.

But the death that has hit me the hardest is the passing of David Bowie. Not only was it unexpected but it comes so soon after the release of his latest album that it seems like something seriously wrong has occurred. As if there was some odd crack in reality I've stepped through where Bowie is creating some new project that requires his apparent death to set up a third act revival to the strains of a song that will forever be a part of my internal soundtrack. Because that is what so much of his music has become over the years - the soundtrack of my life. I love much music and the playlist in my head is vast and diverse, but one eternal is that I always return to Bowie's albums year after year. And, much like any good piece of art, I see new things in his work each time I revisit it. Things I thought and felt in my teens or twenties seem incredibly distant but his music can bring those memories rushing back even as my older self reflects on how different I am now. A song I've listened to hundreds of times can remind me of my youth and simultaneously clarify something that I'm experiencing at that moment allowing me to see a connection between the past and future I could not imagine before Bowie's voice and music threw it into sharp focus. It is this stunning ability, this magical gift for showing us ourselves in the mirror that he could hold up, that makes me weep that he is gone. He helped me know myself for over thirty years just by being the creative man that he was naturally. And now that is gone. And I know I'm not done looking in that mirror or needing the help he afforded me. And I fear that the time will come when I need his voice - a new song, a new insight - and I'll have to hope that age continues to bring me fresh ways of understanding what he has already said. Because David Bowie is dead. And he won't be there to offer his vision or his sound anymore.

Loving the Alien 

Watching them come and go
The Templars and the Saracens
They're traveling the holy land
Opening telegrams

Torture comes and torture goes
Knights who'd give you anything
They bear the cross of Coeur de Leon
Salvation for the mirror blind

But if you pray, all your sins are hooked upon the sky
Pray and the heathen lie will disappear
Prayers they hide, the saddest view
(Believing the strangest things, loving the alien)

And your prayers they break the sky in two
(Believing the strangest things, loving the alien)
You pray 'til the break of dawn
(Believing the strangest things, loving the alien)
And you'll believe you're loving the alien
(Believing the strangest things, loving the alien)

Thinking of a different time
Palestine, a modern problem
Bounty and your wealth in land
Terror in a best laid plan

Watching them come and go
Tomorrows and the yesterdays
Christians and the unbelievers

Hanging by the cross and nail

RIP - Christopher Lee (1922- 2015)

Although we have been expecting his passing for a long time it is still quite sad to say goodbye to such a towering cinema presence. He was all the things listed above and much more. We are better for having had you around to entertain us. 

Ray Harryhausen - RIP

I just learned that famed stop-motion special effects man and filmmaker Ray Harryhausen has passed away at age 92. Although not unexpected this is very sad news for me and any fan of classic fantastic cinema. I have spent hundreds of hours being entertained by Mr. Harryhausen's brilliant work and I will spend many more in the years to come. I will never be able to fully thank him for the joys he crafted that fired uncounted imaginations around the world. I got to meet the Great man in the late 1990s and got him to autograph my Laser Disc of JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS and a lobby card from the film as well. He was a wonderfully nice gentleman and fielded what I'm sure were a series of silly fanboy questions with wit and generosity. I wish he had been able to make at least ten more movies.