Executive Action 1973 Who Really Killed JFK?

Many people, myself included, have been captivated by the Kennedy assassination. Many conspiracy theories have been talked about and at some point one of them may have told us the truth. We may never know. This movie comes to the conclusion that it involved more then one person. I have always thought that. It stars Burt Lancaster, Robert Ryan and Will Greer. It was directed by David Miller and the screenplay was written by Dalton Trumbo. They use the facts and news footage to come to their conclusion. They can’t tell you exactly what the conspirators said to each other but the film never strays from the facts. The film never exactly tells who the group of people is. Are they big business executives? Are they the CIA? The FBI? Mafia? We are not told. The audience is allowed to come to their own conclusion on that matter. The most chilling moment comes at the end of the film. Pictures of people who witnessed the killing are showed and we are told that by Feb. of 1967 all of them were dead. The commentator says that “In the three years after the murders of John F. Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald eighteen material witnesses died, 6 by gunfire, 3 by motor accidents, 2 by suicide, 1 by a cut throat, 1 by a karate chop to the neck, 3 by heart attacks, 2 from natural causes. An actuary engaged by the London Sunday Times concluded: On November 22, 1963, the odds of these witnesses being dead by Feb. 1967 are one hundred thousand trillion to one.”
If you are a history buff or into the Kennedy conspiracy theories you should watch this movie. Executive Action was originally released in 1973.

Corvette Summer

The year is 1978. You have just starred in the biggest blockbuster movie of all time. The movie that brought science fiction back to theaters and changed the face of films for all time. I am talking about Star Wars. So what is your next career move? Why of course star in a cheap teenage road comedy. Actually the movie wasn’t too bad. It stars Mark Hamill and Annie Potts with a small cameo role for former Partridge Family cast member Danny Bonaduce. The real star is the Corvette. The car was hot. The story revolves around Mark Hamill as a high school car fanatic who rebuilds a Corvette Stingray during his senior year of high school as a school project. When the car is stolen his search for the car takes him from Los Angeles to Las Vegas where he meets a would be hooker named Vanessa played by Annie Potts. They find the car and fall in with the ring of car thieves who stole it. They help the police bust the ring and get the car back. Mark finds out that his mentor his high school shop teacher was in with the thieves and had been setting up a lot of car thefts for them for years. So he has to have him arrested too. Mark’s character grows up a lot on his journey and drives the car back home with his new girlfriend. This is a fun, exciting adult comedy adventure disguised as a cheap teenage road comedy. I recommend that you rent or buy this movie. Eugene Roche also stars as the high school shop teacher. Here is a Corvette Summer fan site. 

Happy Mother's Day Mrs. Andrews

Another comic book mother figure is Archie's mom. Always there to help Archie and his friends. She helped get Arch out of trouble and gave him good parental advice. Usually helped him with any girl troubles he had and tried to let him see that he should date Betty not Veronica. So Mrs. Andrews I hope you had a happy Mother's Day. 

Be the Head Not the Tail

If you listen to these commands of the Lord your God and carefully obey them, the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you will always have the upper hand. You must not turn away from any of the commands I am giving you today not to follow after other gods and worship them.
Deuteronomy 28:13-14 NLT

The head and not the tail

When reading Deuteronomy 28, it is pleasant to focus on the blessings in Moses' message, yet we cannot avoid the fact that there were two sides to this oracle. Blessings would rain on the children of Israel as a result of their obedience, but harsh consequences awaited those who served other gods.…When the children of Israel turned from God, they would return to him only when they realized that they had placed themselves under the yoke of a far less benevolent master. Therein lies the curse—willingly abandoning a loving God to follow one whose intent is not to bless but to destroy. God still longs to bless us, but there is another who prowls about seeking to destroy those who are precious to God. Choose today to serve the God who longs to make you the head and the not the tail. 

Marvel's 50 Greatest Characters

Overat live journal http://anw.livejournal.com/302697.html they have listed Marvels 50 greatest characters. The list is hard to argue with but Beta Ray Bill? Give me a break! It makes me wonder what are the 50 greatest characters in mainstream comics. Write or comment to me what you think and if I get enough response I will post it here.

Happy Mother's Day!

Just wanted to say Happy Mother's Day to everyone out there. So let Mom sleep in then take her out to eat breakfast and go for a drive in the country. Do whatever you want today Mom. You deserve it. The above photo of Aunt May is used as she was Spider-Man mother figure. There is also a good fan site for her at The Women of Marvel Comics. 

Batman 1966 newspaper strips

I was just reading the book Batman: The Sunday Classics 1943-1946. In the back they had the above photos of the strips from Batman in the 1960's. The Batman strip came out at the height of the TV show fame. According to the book it was distributed by the Ledger Syndicate and written by Whit Ellsworth and later the great E. Nelson Bridwell. Art was supplied by a variety of artist from Sheldon Moldoff to Carmine Infantino to Nick Cardy. As you can see since they had the DC bullpen to pull from the art was probably the best of any cartoon newspaper strip of it's day. It says that the strip ran until 1974. I don't remember it lasting that long in my local newspaper. Knowing how the papers in this area tend to only follow the trends they probably only ran it for a year. By that time the show was about to be canceled so the strip was too. I was only about 5 or 6 when is came out but I still have a memory of my Mom, Dad and Grandma sitting in our living room. One of them opened up the paper to a full page ad showing in beacutiful black and yellow the Bat signal and announcng that Batman was comming to the cartoon section. At that time I couldn't read too much so I just looked at the pictures. I hope that someone puts a book out on the 1966 strips. That would really be great for us baby boomers. If you click on the photo above you should be able to read the strips. 

Five for Fridays and Happy Birthday Marv Wolfman

The Comics Reporter's Five for Fridays is out today and you can see my answer to their current question. Also, they remind us that one of the best writers in comic books is celebrating a birthday today. Happy Birthday to one of my favorite writers...Marv Wolfman. Long may your characters run and have a piece of cake on me. 

Snowball Express

During Disney's wonder years of movie making in the 60's and early 70's they had many family friendly hits like The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes, The World's Greatest Athlete, The Love Bug, Million Dollar Duck and others. Most of them were so big that they had 2 or 3 sequals. My favorite of them all is Snowball Express. It was a hit but unfortunately not big enough for any sequals. This movie is one of Dean Jones best. Mr. Jones is Johnny Baxter a big city accountant who inherits a Ski Lodge in the Rocky Mountains. Seeing this as his way out of a dead end job he quits and packs his family to move to the resort sight unseen. Once there he is sadded to see that the Lodge is baddly in need of repair before he can ever open it for business. They find that a man who these days would probably be called homeless has been living there. He is played by Harry Morgan and as long as he wants to help them fix up the place and work there they will give him room and board. A young teenage boy named Wally is hired to help and be the ski instructor. Actually he wants the job so he can be near Johnny's daugther. The town banker wants the land the hotel is on and is about to forclose on the land because Johnny's relative still owed him money. The Baxters enter a snowmobile race to win the money but come in last. Finally the day comes that Johnny can't pay and is about to sign the Lodge over to the banker. However, at the last minute he finds that the Lodge comes with 3000 acres of douglas fir trees that the banker wants to cut down and that the land the town is on is also his. His relative gave the town the land as long as they built a library, a church and 2 hospitals. Johnny's son tells his Dad that he didn't see any library in town so how come the town doesn't revert back to him? This means that Johnny Baxter may own the whole town. That includes the bank. The Baxters keep the Lodge and all is well.
The people at Disney are masterworkers with this type of film. At times they have tried to duplicate that success again with movies like Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and most recently with Herbie Fully Loaded. Hopefully they will have a big success with this again real soon. The first time I saw this movie was at the Madison in Covington, Ky. At that time that was the closest theatre to my home. Years later I actually had a hard time finding this movie on tape years ago. I got to thinking about it and how I would like to have it in my video collection. Every store I went to either never heard of it or was sold out. Then I called Suncoast Video and they had one copy left. I drove there right away to buy it. 

Happy Anniversary Dial B

Happy one year anniversary to the most original web log in comics history. No not this web log. My blog isn't a year old yet. I am talking about Dial B for Blog as it is 1 year old today. I stop by on occassion and am always amazed at the information Robby Reed has. As well as the wonderful fake comic book covers. I suppose I shouldn't be amazed at the inside info. After all Robby is a comic book superhero himself. The above cover of House of Mystery starring Dial H for Hero is from Wikipedia the free encyclopedia. 

The Bradys and Kings Island

Well it’s almost summer and people will soon be heading to various amusement parks for family fun. The one that is closest to my home is Kings Island. It replaced the old Coney Island that sat on the banks of the Ohio. Ironically the old Coney Island site is sort of making a small comeback with smaller attractions at a more affordable price these days. When I was younger and it was considered old fashioned I didn’t understand the need for a new park. Every night there would be ads saying something like only 7 days left till Coney Island closes for good. I was so angry for the closing of Coney that each time I saw one of those ads I almost didn’t want to go to Kings Island. But next year when it was opened my family went. I remember the first day and being more tired from walking around there then I ever was at the end of the day with Coney. KI was bigger. So big I almost put a hole in my shoe from all the walking. However, KI to me was not better. My favorite place then as well as now was the Coney Island area where they had the old rides from Coney. Kings Island did have one promotional gimmick that Coney never had. On one trip in the early 70’s America’s favorite family came for a visit. The Brady Bunch came to Kings Island. According to Barry Williams’s book Growing Up Brady, these kids who had been to Hawaii and the Grand Canyon were looking forward to their visit to Cincinnati to shoot an episode of their show. What they didn’t know was that at that time Cincinnati was not use to TV and film crews who practically have to take over the area to get the job done. Add in that the park was not closed down for those days but open to the public and KI was in a small town suburb with only one motel and you have a recipe for disaster. When that episode of the show airs on TV you can see people in the park looking twice at the actors and pointing. At the end of a hard day of work the actors had a hard time getting to their rooms. With only one motel in town it was not hard for fans to figure where they were staying and each day had a huge crowd of fans to politely push their way through to get to and from the park. I am sure the kids on the show looked forward to the Cincinnati trip thinking it would be mostly them getting the A list treatment to all the rides on the park. As small towns go they probably did get the best treatment they could get at the time. But no one was ready for all of it. The chapter about this experience in Mr. Williams’s book is called The Fishbowl. So you know exactly how he felt about it. One experience could have cost them all their lives if not for Robert Reed and how he got sick on rollercoaster’s. Because of this Mr. Reed is not on the rollercoaster scene. He did watch them set up for it and saw how the camera was mounted looking backwards so they could show the kids faces as they rode it. Mr. Reed wondered what would happen to the camera once it hits 60 mph and gets to the overhead stuff on the tracks. He had them measure it and they found out that they had to lower the camera or it would have hit something and flew off and hit the kids in their faces. Just as all seemed well the producer said to run the car through without anyone on it. The crew thought it was a waste of time as they were ready to shoot but they did. To their horror the car came back without the mounted camera. They set it up again and ran another test. This time everything was fine. The actors were then put in and the scene was shot. Barry Williams said when you see that episode and think they look horrified it is because they were. So this is a very memorable show of the Brady Bunch for all concerned. 

Bell Science Films

I don’t know if any of these video’s are being used today but Bell Telephone had a science series of films that were use to introduce children to science. They were produced by the Oscar winning director Frank Capra. Not many people may know this but Capra studied to be a scientist. He turned to movie directing when he couldn’t find work in the field of science. I am sure that his love of science and people in general are what led him to create this series. It always starred the same two gentlemen. Dr. Frank Baxter as the scientist of course and Richard Carlson as the television reporter. The cover of the one pictured above, Hemo The Magnificent, even has Capra veteran Sterling Halloway in a small part as Jim a technician. Each film usually had the reporter asking the Dr. questions about the subject. They always used what they called the magic screen. Here is where the animated characters came in. They appeared on screen as interview subjects but the Dr. usually taught them things about themselves that they never knew. Hemo is the one that I remember the best. Hemo is treated as a King as he is the giver of life. The Dr. shows how Hemo is important but it is really a team effort to give life to the body. This series made science fun to learn when I was a kid. I hope it or something like it is still around. 

Hey Cartoon Network! How About A Metal Men Series?

Well tonight was the final episode of one of my favorite shows. Seventh Heaven is now only in reruns and on DVD boxed sets. Another of my favorites will be that way after this Saturday night. Justice League will be no more on Cartoon Network according to what I have been reading. It has had a long successful run and the Teen Titans are still going strong so lets keep up the momentum. I think that the long neglected team of the Metal Men would make a wonderful addition to the Cartoon Network line up. It has adventure, romance, action, mystery and personality already built into it's main storyline. The action and adventure come naturally. There is romance between Doc Magnus and lovestruck Platinum. Gold is a natural born leader. Mercury is the hot tempered one in the group with a good heart. Tin seems timid and unsure of himself but will do all he can to prove his worth. Lead and Iron are the two strong men of the group. Also, did Doc Magnus bring these robots to life or is there something else involved in their origin that even Doc doesn't know about. If you are with Cartoon Network and reading this I urge you to talk to Warner Brothers/DC Comics and see if you can get this project going. 

Free Comic Book Day Is It Really Helping? An Editorial

Yesterday I took my young cousin out for awhile. It started out with lunch and we were supposed to go to a movie. However, there were no movies that caught our attention so he wanted to show me something that he saw at Comic Book World that he was interested in. The moment I walked in the door I saw how busy it was and I remembered that it was Free Comic Book Day. I actually said that out loud and immediately saw a pained expression from a person behind the counter. I could only imagine that he was thinking no sale here just giving away the freebies. My little cousin grabbed 4 copies of some free books that he wanted and I grabbed a couple too. I also bought a copy of Ion #1 just to not feel guilty but after reading the book I should ask for my money back. But I have said all this as it made me wonder...does Free Comic Book Day really advance the comic book business. When it first started a few years ago I saw signs for it everywhere on the internet and in book stores. With the success of X-Men and Spider-man at the movies people were interested in comic books again. For that brief period it did advance the business. Some movie goers who had never been in a comic book store most likely became comic book fans. Now it just seems word of mouth and with no advance notice it seems like it has just become a day when old fans can go get freebies from their local store. There is nothing wrong with that. With the average comic book now costing $2.99 each we deserve something free now and again. But with that high cost per issue come a lower demand in readership. The average person is making a considerable financial commitment. A 4 issue mini-series will wind up costing you around $12 and if it is an ongoing series with multi-part storylines and subplots I doubt the old wallet can take much more. Add in the high cost of living with gas food and putting a roof over your head and something has to go at some point. Yes the industry has tried to make it more affordable by taking some mini-series and putting them out in paperback but sometimes it saves you time but not money. What is needed in my opinion to help save our favorite past time is economizing and more imagination. First I think they need to stop using the expensive paper that they print on right now. Newspaper print was cheaper and still looked pretty good before. That will bring down the cost. You might see a dip in readership for a little while but they will come back. Next is get better plots. Some writers are doing pretty well like Mark Waid or Will Pfeifer. However, some stories feel like they are repeats for the 100th time. The two books I picked up at free comic book day were Archie that you see above and Superman/Batman. The Archie story dealt with Archie’s family had to get ready to leave Riverdale and the whole town gets a party together to wish them goodbye. Of course it turns out that they don’t have to leave. I have seen this story done in Archie before. In Superman/Batman the story revolved around how Supes and Bats are the same but different. Both lost their parents in tragic accidents but Superman grew to fly high and live in a bright shiny city that he protects. Batman is said to prowl the back alleys of Gotham and is an urban legend like the boogeyman. Again this is a story I have read before. To think that these are the stories that free comic book day is using to hook new readers. Whoever is deciding what needs to be given out for the next Free Comic Book day I hope they give out a better selection to choose from. Then we can really push a marketing campaign for that day into the mainstream and be proud of it.

True Security

Those who trust in the Lord are as secure as Mount Zion; they will not be defeated but will endure forever. Just as the mountains surround and protect Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds and protects his people, both now and forever.

Psalm 125:1-2 NLT

What does it mean to trust the Lord? It means looking to him as the source of our security and putting our faith in the grace, love, power, and protection of God when the inevitable pressures of life come. It means knowing as the psalmist did that the mountains surround Jerusalem, God himself surrounds and shields his people. When we trust the Lord, we don't have to focus on the wicked and what they are doing or might do to us. We don't have to rehash our own woes. Even though there are problems the size of mountains facing us, we can cry out to the Lord who created the mountains and is able to move them. As we focus on him and his truth, he will encourage our hearts and help us to claim the great promise of verse 2: The Lord will surround and protect his people, now and forever.

LORD, I put my trust in you today. You are my security and protection, my shield, my fortress, and my hiding place, and I praise you. When enemies surround me and troubles multiply, help me to remember that you are ever faithful and that you surround and protect me, both now and forever.

Captain America 1990

In recent years Marvel Comics has had alot of success with marketing their characters for movies. That has not always been the case. This movie aboiut Captain America is really not that good but for fans of Cap and comics it is a must have. The movie stars Matt Salinger as Cap and Ronny Cox as the President. Mr. Salinger looks great in costume and if the script and production had been better this could have been a major hit for him. The only thing is that the superheroics and getting him into costume didn't occur till the last few minutes of the film. Up till then we just dealt with the origins and the pains of being out of your own time era. It starts off, as any Captain America film should, in WWII. He is fighting the Red Skull. It is with the Red Skull that they show the first signs that this movie is on it's way downhill. As all lovers of comic books know the Skull is German. However, for the purpose of this film they made him Italian. I have not idea why. Also, the Skull feels that he and Cap are brothers of a sort because the super solider formula made them both what they are. For my generation that is not what made up the Red Skull. Hitler raised him to be the Red Skull and that was it. Anyway they have a fight that sends Cap to be frozen in ice. Years later in 1990 he is released from his icy prison and finds that the Red Skull is still alive planning on taking over the world. Part of the plan is that the Skull has to kidnap the President. Cap releases the President but when he fights the Skull it is Cap who is in trouble and President Ronny Cox delivers the fatal blow to the Skull and saves the day. Shouldn't the star of the movie who is known for fighting this villian be the one who saves the day?
This movie did get release in a straight to video format. Actually it was almost straight to video. The tape showed up at comic book conventions before the studio saw that there was some interest in it. Then they released an official version and later I saw it show up on television in syndication. Sorry for the poor scan photo. My tape didn't have a cover so I found this on the internet and printed it out to make a cover for the box. 

The Comics Reporter Five For Fridays

As they do every Friday the Comics Reporter ask 5 questions. This Friday they asked you to name the first comic book you remember reading and its price. Name the first comic book you remember buying yourself and its price, your most recent comic book & it's price. Any Particular big time bargain you stumbled across and the most you ever spent on a comic. If you want to see my answers you can click here to go to the Comics Reporter.

JLA Live Action Movie

Ok now here is a movie that some of you may not have seen before. The live action movie version of the JLA. It was a pilot for a TV series in 1997. For some reason it was never released. I don’t know why. It was pretty good. I can understand how expensive it may have been to produce every week. Don’t you think that they should have at least showed the movie since it was already produced? The show has Miguel Ferrer as the villain the Weatherman. Why didn’t they call him the Weather Wizard? That seemed to me who he was really playing. The rest of the cast is pretty much unknown to me except for David Ogden Stiers as The Martian Manhunter. Yes Dr. Charles Emerson Winchester of MASH is every comic book lovers favorite martian superhero. He was the leader of the JLA in this movie. He stayed hidden from the rest of the world as he didn’t want to alarm the rest of Earth that a crash landed alien was living among them. He gave advice and orders to the younger superheroes Green Lantern, Flash, Atom, Fire and Ice. With the humor that was injected in the story it was really Keith Geffin’s version of the JLA. The Atom was really the JSA Golden Age Atom. They got things a little mixed up with the personalities of Green Lantern and Flash. GL was called Guy Gardner and looked and acted like Hal Jordan. Flash was Barry Allen but acted more like Wally West or perhaps Impulse. Maybe the writers didn’t read the comic book regularly or perhaps the personality switches made it easier to write. But for my money it would have been easier to go along with the story if they got the personalities right. At least they could have called GL Hal and not Guy. For a live action version of the JLA it was pretty good.
With the advancements in computer effects today perhaps we may see a regular weekly version one day soon. 

Mystery Date

In the 80’s the rage in movies was to turn old TV shows into hit movies. Most of them were, in my opinion, pretty bad except for the Star Trek movies. However, Hollywood had struck a cord with the movie going public. What was the next movie success? Why turning board games into movies of course. They tried to with Clue and Mystery Date. With Clue I was hoping for a Murder By Death type of movie but it wasn’t that funny. The concept that they tried was daring. Since the game had a different outcome on who the killer was and the location and motive of the murder. The movie was given different endings and the movie would end differently in each movie theater. The problem was that if you went on Friday to see it at the Village Cinema it may have Mr. Green as the killer in the Den with the candlestick as the weapon. If you had a friend of yours to see it on that same night at the Bijou across town he may see it end with Professor Plum as the killer with a rope in the Kitchen. So you really couldn’t discuss the movie with each other. When it was released on video it was even worse. They had all the endings on the VHS tape. You had to sit through all the endings to decide which one that you liked best. I have no idea how the do it when it plays on television.
Mystery Date was also turned into a movie. The game was played by little girls, like my cousin Rachel. The basis of the game was when you got to the door you had to guess who was behind the door and would be the date for the evening. This movie actually came late to the party as it was released in 1991. It starred Ethan Hawke as Tom and Terri Polo as Geena the object of his affection. Tom is too shy to ask her out but his older brother Craig sets up everything and lets Tom borrow his car. He picks Geena up and they head out on their date. Everything seems set for a perfect evening but Tom is mistaken for his brother who is wanted by a pair of crooked cops, a crime lord (played by B.D. Wong) and a crazy delivery guy (played by Fisher Stevens). I haven’t seen it in quite along time but if I remember correctly it was actually a pretty good film. So if you want to rent a good date movie this is one way to go.

Electric Dreams

Electric Dreams was billed as the most unusual triangle in the history of love. A boy, a girl and A Computer. It lived up to the billing. There were no big names in the film but Virginia Madsen and Maxwell Caulfield did eventually make names for themselves. Mr. Caulfield was not the star of the film. That went to Lenny Von Dohlen. He played Miles an architect who buys a new computer to help him design bricks that are earthquake proof. The computer steals the show with, as he is billed, special participation of Bud Cort, as the voice of Edgar the computer. The computer helps Miles get involved with Madeline the beautiful cellist who lives in the upstairs apartment. However, Edgar has fallen in love with her too. Edgar plays havoc with Miles life. He locks him out of the apartment, bounces his checks, and even calls the police. Steve Baron gained fame as the director of the Michael Jackson video Billie Jean. Since he directed the movie that may be why Jeff Lynne submitted a song to the soundtrack. His four year ban against movie soundtracks was over. This movie is a very light hearted and charming romantic comedy. I recommend it to anyone who likes this type of film. Unfortunately this is one that may not have done well at the boxoffice. I never heard of the film till it got to the video stores. If you see this for sale or rental I highly recommend that you get it. 

Xanadu...ONJ All The Way

Here is another movie that I think got an unfair rap as a bad movie. After the wild success of Grease Olivia Newton-John was getting movie offers from everywhere. One of them that she chose to do was Xanadu. The other actors in the film are Gene Kelly and Michael Beck. Michael Beck is a frustrated artist who is barely making a living by making giant sized paintings of album covers to hang in record stores. If a real place was used on the cover he sometimes goes to the location and takes pictures of it so it looks better when he paints it. One day he is on location and Olivia roller stakes in front of him and gets in the picture. He notices it before they paint it but keeps her in the painting anyway. Now he has to find this girl. Not just because he kept her in the picture but because it was love at first sight. Hey back then it was the same for any red blooded male who saw ONJ. They meet and along the way they meet a wealthy man played by Gene Kelly. It turns out that ONJ is a muse. One of the daughters of Zeus and she is going to help make the dream of these two men come true. Here is where the movie does fall apart a little bit. The two men’s combined dream is to open up what looks to be a restaurant/roller rink. A very stylish one but that is what it comes down to. They come to it in such a lighthearted and entertaining way that I didn’t care. I was having fun. ONJ has to go home and Michael looses the girl he loves. Before the movie is over he meets another who looks exactly like ONJ. A cop out to be sure but it left you feeling that he still had a chance at love. The movie was a light hearted fun filled fantasy. The special effects were state of the art for its day. However, computer graphics have improved by leaps and bounds since 1980 and will look old fashioned compared to movies today. The music was provided by Jeff Lynne and his group ELO and by ONJ and John Farrar. I would love to see a copy of the first script as Jeff Lynne said that was what got him interested in doing the score of the movie. The revisions of the film kept getting worse but he was already under contract to the film. He thought it was so bad he didn’t want anything else to do with movie soundtracks. Too bad this sound track was very good. The song Magic made it to number one. It fared better with musical audiences then the movie did at the boxoffice. I went to see the movie with my cousin Rachel and two of her friends. When I saw a concert video of Olivia Newton John and she started to sing Magic a man in the audience mentioned that he saw Xanadu. She said “Oh so you’re the one.” I wanted to say no he was the fifth one. Later Mr. Lynne must have gotten over his hurt feelings as he made contributions to other movies. I plan on telling you of one here later. Electric Dreams.
PS. I was self-indulgent with the title as I added the ONJ all the way at the last minute. The reason why was for nostalgia for me. When I was about 13 a freind of mine Dave Smith had a label maker and used it to type that saying out and posted it all over his room to show his affection for her. So that was for you Dave. If you see it I hope you like it.

For Your Consideration...Ishtar

Here is a bad movie that could have been saved. Ishtar has gone down in history as one of the worst movies made. But it didn’t have to be that way. Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty are a struggling musical act. They are on the road and performing in Ishtar. There they wind up being used as pawns between the USA and Ishtar when they meet CIA Agent Jim Harrison and a beautiful revolutionary. The fate of the Middle East winds up in their hands. Everything is actually pretty humorous up to this point. In the end they get the two countries to come to peace but one of the conditions is that the USA has to pay for them to release an album and go on tour to promote it. The tour and the album don’t go over well. That is where the movie ends. This film is a perfect example that a movie needs a good ending to do well. It all builds up to where you are expecting a wacky war scene at the end. Like a war scene from a Marx Brothers film. But no! We got a tour and an album that wound up in the cut out bins. That would have been the fate of the soundtrack if they had released it. Hoffman and Beatty made Mel Brooks sound as if he should win a Grammy. Considering how the movie fared at the box office Mr. Beatty must have been embarrased. You see I heard that in his contract for the movie Warren had a clause that they had to take out ads during Oscar time that said "For Your Consideration For Best Actor...Warren Beatty in Ishtar." They probably considered it for about 5 seconds. This movie had a pretty good plot. It had good acting. It had good directing by Elaine May. It just needed a better ending. 

Stick To What You Do Best

Above is the VHS case for, in my opinion, one of the worst movies ever. Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, along with their wives at that time, play themselves. Paul has just finished his new album and it is ready to be shipped to music stores. The advance sales on the album have made it worth millions. He gives the box of recordings to be delivered to an ex-con that he has hired hoping it will help him get his life back on track. However, the recordings never arrive. Everyone wants to the police involved and have the man arrested but they can't find him. Paul still believes in him and tries to find him before the police do. He retraces the route that the man was to take. He ends up at the train station and finds the box on a bench. He hears a noise coming from the rest room. It turns out the man set the box on the bench when he went to the rest room. Then the rest room door got stuck and the man was in there all day till Paul came along. So Paul saved the day but it wasn't exactly Sherlock Holmes.
It also showed me something. Now this isn't a hard and fast rule but it would seem to me that unless you are Ringo Starr or Phil Collins most rock stars should not try acting. Paul was the worst actor in the film but Ringo came off pretty good. All of the Beatles have tried acting together and alone. Of course we all know of A Hard Days Night and Help! where they played themselves. They were fun but little acting was required. Ringo started getting roles in films like Magic Christian and a few television roles. John did How I Won The War. I don't know how well he did as I have never seen it. Perhaps he did well but turned back to music or maybe he didn't do well at all. Either way it would explain why he was not seen in movies after that. George took some small roles but they were usually in films that he produced. Paul was the smart one. He did get offered roles like the lead in the 1960's film Romeo and Juliet but he wisely turned them down. Then in 1985 he decided to make his leading man debut in Give My Regards to Broadstreet. What was he thinking? I have always thought Mr. McCartney was a pretty bright fellow. However, film wise he was the one who made the biggest film blunder. While I think Ringo is a pretty good actor I would have to place him in 2nd place since he co-starred with him in the film. The one good thing about the film is that the soundtrack is a good solid soft rock album. See Paul. You should stick to what you do best. MUSIC! 

Who You Gonna Call? Ghostbusters 1975

Sorry for the bad photo but it was the best I could find. These guys were the first Ghostbusters. Forrest Tucker and Larry Storch we're back on network television roughly 10 years later. Storch was Eddie Spencer. Their pet gorilla was played by Bob Burns and was named Tracy. Forrest was Kong. It was on for 13 weeks on Saturday morning in 1975. Each week they would get a new assignment to fight ghost, vampires, werewolves etc. Comey and adventure ensued. Almost like a live version of Scooby Doo. Of course the smartest one of the trio was Tracy the gorilla. While it would never win any awards it was a fun and innocent show for kids. I wished they would have let it stay around for 13 more episodes. When the Bill Murray movie Ghostbuster became a hit I heard there were lawsuits over the rights of the name. Eventually a video tape of the Saturday morning show was released. I believe they released it under the name of The Real Ghostbusters. While I like both versions this one holds a special place in my heart. No matter if it is F-Troop or Ghostbusters it is always a pleasure to see the classic comedy of Tucker and Storch. The Abbott and Costello of classic TV. 

Meeting Local Celebrities

I use to work off and on in the local broadcasting industry. While trying to break into it I had some interesting meetings with local celebrities and some near misses. I already told you about Uncle Al when I was a kid. A few years later during Christmas time Mom and I were at a local drug store. I recognized the man in front of Mom. It was Larry Smith. For those of you not from the Cincinnati area Mr. Smith had a show called Larry Smith and His Puppets on Channel 19 WXIX (clever promotion as XIX is the roman numerals for 19). It's stars were Ruddy the rooster and Teaser the mouse. Another character on the show was Hattie the Witch who was spun off into her own series. Finally there was a third show spun off from Hattie's N.O.T. short for Nasty Old Thing. He was a monster who lived in Hatties dungeon. Snarfie R Dog was another popular character but didn't get his own show. Monday through Friday Larry Smith ruled the afternoons on channel 19. He was a very big star so I was starstruck when I saw him. When we got to the cashier she told us who that was. My Mom asked if I knew it was Larry Smith. I said I did. She wanted to know why I didn't say anything. The truth is I was too shy.
Mr. Smith has his own website right here.
When I was trying to get into broadcasting my Dad called an old Air Force buddy to show me around. He was Walt Maher who was the sportscaster on WKRC television. Now I have never been big on sports. I played some ball in the neighborhood but never watched much on tv unless the Red were in the World Series or the Bengels made the Super Bowl. So I really didn't know what to ask this kind gentleman. He talked about sports and how he helped some people become DJ's by taking them under his wing. Guess I should have asked him to do the same for me. He took me to a photographers studio where they were going to shoot promo photos for the newscast. On the way I asked questions about other reporters, news stories, etc. Once there at the studio I was introduced to his two co-anchors Glenn Ryle and Vicki Yates-Orr. I almost felt as starstruck with Glenn Ryle as I did with Larry Smith. At one time he had one of the biggest kids shows in the area. Second only to Uncle Al. He was Skipper Ryle. You can read more about him and Mr. Smith at Booksteve's Library. Glenn Ryle was a broadcasting utility man for the station. He not only anchored the news and hosted a kidde show but he hosted Bowling for Dollars and movie programs did commercials and was at times side kick on local variety shows. He was an ex-Marine and didn't come off as the rough and tough solider but was very kind to me. Ms. Yates-Orr was the co-anchor person and a very nice and attractive woman. I remember that day how Mr. Ryle said his single friends were always asking him to fix them up with her. He said he had to keep telling them "Guys she's married!"
After the photo shoot Mr. Maher and I got back to the station and my Dad picked me up. He asked what we did and Mr. Maher said that he took me out on assignment.
A few years out of school I went to see a movie at the Showcase Cinemas in Erlanger, Ky. I was waiting for the movie and a very young boy almost bumped into me. His Father said sorry and something else I don't remember but I do remember that we shared a laugh about it. As he walked away I thought he seemed familier to me. Maybe we went to school together but I couldn't remember. Later that night I was watching the news and they told how former Bengels Quaterback Boomer Esiason was in town. That was when I remembered him. I was talking to Boomer Esiason. At least it was a pleasant meeting.
Another clelbrity I met long before he became famous. I am talking about George Clooney. He and I had a broadcasting class together. We said hi to each other a couple of times but never got to know each other. I do have one memory that I may have mentioned here before but for those who don't know it I will tell it again. George and his friend wanted everyone to come into class wearing a funny hat. The day came but no one other then George and his friend had on a hat. So they asked us to turn our chairs around and face the back of the classroom to get a reaction from Dr. Byron Renz our teacher. We did and the only reaction from Dr. Renz was to say "Well you can turn around or I can come to the back of the room to teach you." He said it with a laugh so we all laughed and turned our chairs around to face him.
Now on to our cover boy. Never thought that anyone would refer to Al Schottelkotte as a cover boy. Mr. Schottelkotte was the Walter Cronkite of the Cincinnati news industry. He was so respected nationwide that he could get any of the big network news reporters to do nearly anything for WCPO. Cronkite and Dan Rather both came to Cincinnati to do news promos with him. So he was very big. My friend Chuck and I were doing and intership at the station. The newsroom was very busy. There was a drawer that was open and people were going past it very fast and barely missing it. Chuck and I tried to close it so no one would be hurt. It would not close. There seemed to be something blocking it from closing so I reached in to find it and move it. At that time Al Schottelkotte came up to us. It turned out it was the drawer that he kept his stuff in. He looked at my hand in the drawer then looked at me. I took my hand out and told him I was trying to close the drawer. Mr. Schottelkotte reached in moved something and closed the drawer. He looked at me and smiled and said "Simple!" Then he walked away. Chuck just looked at me and said "I can't believe your first meeting with Al Schottelkotte and he almost thought you were stealing from him. Only you." I bet he rememberd me for awhile. Mr. Schottelkotte passed away in 1996. You can read his obit here.
All in all these local stars were very nice to me and left me with a favorable impression.

My breakfast with Uncle Al and Captain Wendy

The above picture is from the "Uncle Al Show" that was on WCPO TV in the 1960's. This was an early morning kids show that I remember watching during the breakfast hour. It starred AL Lewis and his wife Wanda as Captain Wendy. I wanted to show this on April 16th as "Uncle" Al Lewis is shown holding up that day's date being the 16th. However, the 16th was Easter so I waited till today. Captain Wendy is standing in the back next to the beanstalk holding up another child. I can't see the month but from the way the kids are dressed it looks like fall to me. I and my cousin's Rachel and Randy were on the show that day. It was my first glimpse behind the magic that was television. First teh kids were seperated into different age groups. Rachel was younger the Randy and I so she was off in one group while we were in another. Rachel's group went into one room while randy and I were led into another. It was the segment where Uncle Al and the kids were suppose to climb a beanstalk to meat Mr. Giant. There the Giant would show the kids cartoons. On the way in I was encountered with what I now know was a learning experience. A young lady stopped me on the way into the room and asked me if I wanted to be Mr. Policeman. In the Mr. Policeman segment you would dress like a traffic cop and Uncle Al would interview you. I was hoping I would get to be Mr. Policeman and now here was my chance. Randy was right behind me. I knew if I left for the segment that Randy would be left alone and there was no one in our group that he knew but me. I didn't want him to be alone so I said no to the offer of a lifetime. When I got in the room I was dissappointed to see that the Giant was just a plywood cut out and we were expected to sit and watch a cartoon on TV. I turned to say something to Randy but I couldn't find him. I looked everywhere. I couldn't even find Uncle Al. Why weren't they both there? Because when I turned it down Randy was asked next and he took the job. At that moment he was being interviewd by Uncle Al. I am happy that if I didn't take the offer that Randy did. I learned that if an oppertunity comes up that you want you should take it. If you look closely at the center of the picture you will see me. I am laughing very hard as I was on my favorite show and having the time of my life and I got to share it with two of my closest cousins who I dearly love. Randy is to my left and seated to my right is my other cousin Rachel. They had no idea that we were all related. It just worked out that way.
If you want to know more about the Uncle Al show you can click here to go to WCPO's website. Many interesting things about it there. Like till 2002 it was the longest running kids show in history. Even though it was canceled in the early 1980's. 

The Honeymooners in Color with the June Taylor Dancers

Thanks to TVshowsonDVD.com I have just seen that the Honeymooners will be release this summer. The color version from the 60's. For those of you born after the 1976, the 1960's had alot of musical variety shows. Jackie Gleason had his first hit with the Honeymooners in the 50's and then hosted one of those musical variety shows that was called, modestly enough, "The Jackie Gleason Show." Around 1966 color tv was the new thing. Alot like stero television with surround sound is today. It was not uncommon for shows to add "in color" to their title sequence. That year Gleason toyed with the musical variety format a bit by having Art Carney, Sheila MacRae and Jane Kean join the cast and did musicals of the Honeymooner scripts. Most famously their trip to Europe. They kept the June Taylor Dancers and it was not uncommon to see Ralph and Norton to break out in song. I was about 5 or 6 at the time but I still remember it to this day. Which is more then I can say for my 2 years of high school spanish. Any way I can't wait for this to be released and since I don't have any of the DVD case artwork I have given you this cover from a late 60's TV Guide from this auction. 

Ultraman on DVD

I was over at Bubblegumfink and he had a link to this site telling of the date of release for Ultraman. The hero who helped the Science Patrol keep Godzilla and other monsters from destroying Japan will be back in July with series one. 

The Sentinel On DVD

I just got The Sentinel Season one on DVD. It is a very good action series produced by the same people who brought you "The Flash." I watched most of the episodes before it went off the air but the one that I missed, even in re-runs, was the first episode. So I was very happy to get this DD boxed set. For those of you not familier with the series it is about Jim Ellison who was lost for a year and a half in the jungle. To survive, his five senses get sharpened to an amazing height. When he gets home he joins the police force. The rest of the series he is shown getting use to his new senses in the city and hoe they give him an edge over the criminals. It is sort of like Daredevil joining the police department and he can see. Get this DVD set if you see it for sale anywhere.