BITS & PIECES OF A MISPLACED LIFE: MOVIES #9

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ON THE FLASH GORDON SERIAL (1936) -ImbD Trivia

Despite its large budget, this serial utilized 
many sets from other Universal films, such as 
the laboratory and crypt set from The Bride of 
Frankenstein (1935), the castle interiors from 
Dracula's Daughter (1936), the idol from The Mummy (1932) 
and the opera house interiors from The Phantom of 
the Opera (1925). In addition, the outer walls of
 Ming's castle were actually the cathedral walls 
from The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923).
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HOMAGE TO FLASH GORDON SERIALS
 
         to be continued...

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TARZAN'S EFFECT ON CHILDREN

“A welfare worker has told us about one of
the newest discoveries of sociology. For a 
long time , it seems, the people assigned to 
checking on family relationships have been reporting inexplicable epidemics of unbearably boisterous 
behavior on the part of the children, spells which 
last several days. They all start acting up at about 
the same time, especially the boys. Finally some 
thoughtful investigator discovered that these 
outbursts of unruliness coincided roughly with 
the release dates of the Tarzan pictures. We 
understand somebody is writing a Ph.D theses on this."

New Yorker. "Talk of the Town" (December 5,1942)
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ROLLERBALL CREDITS

Recognizing their contribution to the film's many 
crucial action sequences, Rollerball was the 
first major Hollywood production to give screen 
credit to its stunt performers. 
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DOROTHY KILGALLEN ON THE DEATH OF MARILYN MONROE

"Why did the first doctor {arriving on the scene}
have to call the second doctor before calling
the police? Any doctor, even a psychiatrist,
knows a dead person when he sees one, especially
when rigor mortis has set in and there are marks
of lividity on the surface of the face and body.
Why the consultation? Why the big time gap in 
such a small town? Mrs. Murray gets worried at
about 3 a.m. and it's almost 6 a.m. before the
doctor arrives.
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FRANCIS COPPOLA & FINNIAN’S RAINBOW

Finnian’s Rainbow was not a happy experience for
Coppola nor for many critics and viewers. However,
There was one bright spot:

“The best review Finian got was from the government 
 South Africa, which banned it as a threat to 
apartheid.”

Michael Goodwin and Naomi Wise. On the Edge: The Life 
& Times of Francis Coppola (New York: William Morrow and Company, 1989)

The question, of course, is: “What films, beside 
Birth of a Nation would not be a threat to apartheid?

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JOHN WAYNE AND HIS BIRTH NAME


“My real name is Marion Michael Morrison. And if you were my size, wore cowboy boots and a big hat, outrode, outfought and outshot all the badmen in the west, how would you like to climb down off a horse, throw your saddle over the corral rail and then walk off-camera and sit in a chair labelled ‘Marion’?”

John Wayne

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A Brief History of Film Trailers, or: Turns Out 
This Post Is Not About Peter Orner
By Daniel DiStefano

Film trailers were conceived in 1913 by Nils Granlund, 
the advertising manager of Marcus Loew theaters, when 
he spliced together rehearsal footage of The Pleasure 
Seekers, a Broadway play at the time, into a mini 
promotional montage that trailed after films shown 
at Loew’s theaters. Thus began the trailer industry, 
which was hardly an industry then, operated by theaters 
and studios themselves at first, but in ways that never 
fully capitalized on the potential for both business and stylistic expansion. Then Herman Robbins created the 
National Screen Service in 1919, a company theaters
 and studios could outsource to do all the work for 
them, expanding the idea of what a trailer could 
and should do.
  The NSS held a virtual monopoly on 
the trailer game until the 1960s, when auteur filmmakers 
like Alfred Hitchcock and Stanley Kubrick began 
cutting trailers for their own films. The market 
changed again in the 1970s to promote Steven Spielberg’s 
Jaws, the world’s first summer blockbuster. "
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OLD THEATER JOKE IN A MOVIE

“There is a moment in the film Shakespeare in Love 
that I’m told is inspired by an old theatrical joke. 
The actor who plays the nurse is asked in the pub 
what this new play, Romeo and Juliet is about. “It’s
 about this nurse,” the actor begins.”

Laura Lippman. My Life as A Villainess (NY: 
William Morrow
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THE DIFFICULTY IN CREATING A CLERIHEW
TO REMEMBER PRISCILLA LANE (1915-1995)

Priscilla Lane
(Now if I only had a 2nd line)
Co-starred with Cary Grant in Arsenic and Old Lace.
(Maybe I cd repeat the 3rd line in this place?)
=
         JAMES BOND
James Bond --
Women were quite fond
Of 007, so he had many one nighters.
The same cannot be said about light verse writers.

Louis Phillips
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