Hey folks, Harry here... as many were merry this Christmas, sadness visited the geek film community under the mistletoe season of joy. Earlier this year, one of the B-Film Gods of Cinema passed away, John Agar - in April if memory recalls, as if to bookend that sad passing, perhaps the other KEY great B-Film God has passed into shadow, though his light will always illuminate the screens in our homes and revival screens. Kenneth Tobey has passed away...
I love Ken Tobey's films, in fact this Saturday, December 28th at The Alamo Drafthouse I'll be screening for the Saturday Morning Film Club that I host for the children of Austin... THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS in which Ken Tobey as Colonel Jack Evans must do battle with the awesome might of Ray Harryhausen's fantastic Rhedosaurus - of course he enlists the aid of a very young Lee Van Cleef and a flaming roller-coaster to take him down, but Tobey's bravery didn't end with just fighting to save the world from Saturday Evening Post inspired Harryhausen creatures, no he again came to fight Harryhausen's tentacled creature in...
IT CAME FROM BENEATH THE SEA!!! Kenneth was faced with the horror which 'suckered' the Golden Gate into the bay and did a damn fine job of it. Kenneth Tobey's submarine commander, Pete Matthews did more than help put this monument destroying primordial fiend down, he inspired an entire age of young men to become Submarine Commanders to do battle with nuclear-spawned sealife... and had he not, then my own Uncle Win would never have defeated that whole host of radiation-empowered blowfish under the perilous icecaps back in 85.. but that's a top secret story that I'm not supposed to know.
Speaking of Icecaps - Tobey's greatest creature showdown though was in the classic Howard Hawks film, THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD!!! This is one of the absolute most beloved films in the history of film geekdom. And with good reason, it pretty much invented the - isolated men versus lone unstoppable humanoid vegetable from outer space genre, which Roger Corman was later attempting to perfect with Beulah in IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, but again... that's another story. How classic is THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD? Well it entered the National Film Registry just last year, but really... that's not a measure of a great film. What really is, is that this year at Halloween, Make Up Genius and Sci-Fi/Horror Archivist Bob Burns in the revival of his classic Halloween productions, put on a new live version of this classic, thus making it absolutely worth living for all eternity!!! Even more important - if not for THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD - you would not be reading AINT IT COOL NEWS today. You see, in November of 1971 a college professor from the University of Texas walked into my parents' antique shop called N. E. MERCANTILE COMPANY with two 3-sheets, two 1-sheets, two inserts, two half-sheets, two sets of 8 lobby cards, a 16mm film print of THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD, annnnnd the 1st edition Hannes Bok dustcovered novel of WHO GOES THERE to sell my father. Dad, being a horse-trader of the finest fashion managed to work out a trade-cash offer ($300.00 and six old Jax, Pearl, and Lone Star "cone-top" beer cans) which highly benefitted him, but it represented the FIRST movie memoribilia that he had ever acquired. They hung the movie posters up in the shop and just a few days later a man asked Dad if they sold movie posters and that led to a deal that placed over 10 thousand pieces of movie paper into his hands, thus forcing my father to raise me as a movie fiend. Had those posters not walked in that antique shop, I might be running a sports website or political website or... gasp... shock... choke... I might even have a real *cough cough* job... Thank God for THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD and Kenneth Tobey for being such a strong square jawed American hero and abnormal terror fighter! By the time Tobey was finished with the killer carrot, all that was left of him was this forearm and hand which resided in the Ackermansion out in Karloffornia till some fucking lowlife scumbag stole it.... but here's a picture Father Geek took of me and the last remains of the Thing from Another World...
Now - most of you would probably most recognize Kenneth Tobey from his modern age film geek credits like: HONEY, I BLEW UP THE KID, GREMLINS 2, INNERSPACE, GREMLINS, STRANGE INVADERS and THE HOWLING. All film geek movies made by film geeks that knew the karmic value of casting such a B-movie star of yesteryear in a role here or there.
I don't want you to think though that the only thing that Ken Tobey did was play hero to B-Movie Monsters... Oh no, he did quite a bit more. He was a Deputy in the world of BILLY JACK... He was Augie McCullah opposite Buford Pusser. He was amazing as Carl in DIRTY MARY CRAZY LARRY - a film you MUST SEE! In John Sturges fantastic GUNFIGHT AT THE O.K. CORRAL he played Bat Masterson! He was also pretty darn great as Detective Fowler in the incredibly under-rated KISS TOMORROW GOODBYE with James Cagney... that's a real jewel!
However, for most everyone else in the world... the place they best know Kenneth Tobey is for his contributions to the world of Fess Parker and Walt Disney's DAVY CROCKETT!!! In 1954 - when Davy Crockett mania swept the nation as the single biggest film / television fad to ever hit this country - Kenneth Tobey was Arkansas Toothpick wielding Colonel Jim Bowie. Now, Uncle Walt liked Tobey so much, that when the popularity of Davy Crockett turned into a mania, and Walt realized that he needed to tell the 'further adventures' of Davy Crockett - he reached back and saved Tobey from Bowie's grave and cast him as Jocko one of the Mississippi River Boat Pirates that Crockett deals with in his adventures with the super genius character of Mike Fink!
Tobey was a hero of B-Americana Celluloid. He was constantly accessible to folks and making the rounds to conventions and taking parts in just about everything... In fact I wouldn't be suprised at all to see him pop up in Joe Dante's Looney Tunes movie that he's cooking up for next November, though I don't see his name in the credits just yet.
In 2002 - with the passing of John Agar and Kenneth Tobey... who will save us from atomic spawned creations, aliens from other planets, werewolves and giant babies? What will we do when we need to pull over for a smokeless ashtray or to rig a really cool electrical arc show? When the heroes of yesteryear fall, the heroes of today just don't measure up. Well, I'll see some of you this Saturday with your kids at the Saturday Morning Kids Club to see Kenneth Tobey fight that Rhedosaurus!!! What a perfect Saturday, if only Kenneth could've been there to tell all us kids, just how to take down a giant frozen dinosaur that came from that 27 mile pit in the ocean. Hehehehe...
Thank God for THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD and Kenneth Tobey for being such a strong square jawed American hero and abnormal terror fighter! By the time Tobey was finished with the killer carrot, all that was left of him was this forearm and hand which resided in the Ackermansion out in Karloffornia till some fucking lowlife scumbag stole it.... but here's a picture Father Geek took of me and the last remains of the Thing from Another World...
