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Well it’s Wednesday... three days ta Halloween. And
the Paramount Theater here in Austin was showing a
film that just never gets seen on the big screen.
ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET
FRANKENSTEIN. Noone I have known has ever
seen this film on the big screen, and that include
Father Geek, who was alive when wheels were made
of stone.
Today was actually quite exciting. I’ll probably tell
yall about what happened today, in about 3 weeks, if
some other publication doesn’t go and run it first.
You’ll know when you read it.
Anyways, Tom Joad, Sister Satan, Father Geek,
Quint, Hooper and I all went down to the Paramount
to see this classic.
FG and SS had left Joad and I to pay for supper
across the street. Joad and I eased ourselves on over
to the grand ol theater and parted through the doors.
Handing our tickets to the takers. We then walked
into the theater good and proper.
The first thing I notice is the screen is cropped to be
SQUARE shaped.... Ahhhhh, I remember once
talking to Guillermo Del Toro about SQUARE films.
Actually it was about 16 mm and he expressed his
undying love for the shape. Ya see, for some, the
greatest films... the ones with luminous presence’s
that seemed to define the screen. The films by
directors whom’s names are spoken with pride and
awe. The Golden Age of Cinema.
I’m walking down the aisle tripping in my head about
how cool it will be to watch those fun as heck
animated titles... animated in Black and White. When
suddenly I felt a disturbance in my force.... a dark
presence was near by... a chilly cold blade was
inserted into me as I heard the words....
“Hell... ooooooo... Hair...... Ree...”
I turn and I see... I see... but I can not tell....
You must you must...
A powerful and evil force... a force I will call Circe...
This being was once my girlfriend, I was beguiled by
this... Circe. I haven’t seen her in almost a year, and I
have not been her boyfriend for over 2 years. She
was my only girlfriend that I wish hadn’t happened. I
must’ve been blinded by some sort of witch’s brew.
Anyway... SHE was there. Her hair now bluer than
Captain America’s uniform. But those eyes... the
eyes that paralyze... they were there. Both of em.
They saw right through the back of my head. As I
turned, I almost had whiplash from turning back
away. One does not behold the Gorgon and expect to
live.
In the brief glance, I noticed no little guppy childling
with her. She used to feed the child.. tranquilizers...
It would just lay there. Other people tried to see if it
would awaken. But often time the only perception of
life was an opening and closing motion of the jaw.
Glen named the poor child, GUPPY CHILD. He
hated Circe and her Guppy Child. “Spawn of
Demons,” he fondly used to say.
Well, I had to wipe her clean from my mind. It’s
kinda like Orson Welles in Grandi’s bar in TOUCH
OF EVIL... there was a glass of whiskey there... right
there... But luckily my will was better than Hank
Quinlan’s.
I focused on my AMERICAN MOVIE CLASSIC
magazine with Bela Lugosi on the cover and Tim
Burton ala Johnny Depp in Don Juan Demarco inside.
I said a couple of prayers. She called me for a year
after we broke up, she would be at places I would
goto... awaiting me. And even a couple of times I’d
see her... standing... across the street.
I’m not afraid of zombies, demons, the NRG... but I
am afraid of CIRCE. And like Glen’s SATAN... all
must fear them.
Quickly though, things begin to happen on stage. A
lady from TIME/WARNER CABLE and a dude from
AMERICAN MOVIE CLASSICS come out to do a
little promotion thingee. I won’t talk bad about them,
but God I wanted to storm the stage and do an
introduction for the film. It cried out for a rambling
geekboy to at least do Costello’s impressions of
DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN.
Then the animated opening titles began.
What a pure joy. As I listen to the gleeful laughs of
children and adults alike, I begin to smile. Abbott
and Costello... The Universal Monsters... Still 50
years after the film was made... still after all this time,
they entertain.
Remember in HEAVY METAL when the Elmer
Bernstein music swells and we hear the narrator say
something along the lines of, “and a new Tarakian
was born...” Those goosebumps, the ones you get
thinking about the passing of Anakin’s lightsaber to
Luke via Obi-Wan? Well those were the goosebumps
I was getting watching Abbott and Costello being
passed down to children (3-14) and the high
schoolers, the college kids, the adults remembering...
I have never heard a Jim Carrey movie entertain an
audience like this movie did. The banter back and
forth between Abbott and Costello is delivered with
perfect timing.
Just a few weeks ago I saw John Landis explaining
what made Belushi magical. What he said was the
‘sweetness’. Belushi had an innate sweetness to
him, and because of it, the audience loved him. Lou
Costello had gigantic heaping loads of this sweetness.
Just watch him play with the girls, watch him
outsmart Abbott’s jibes. Watch him play with the
audience like your childhood toys.
Can you imagine how cool it would have been had
Boris Karloff come back to play the Monster? It’s
not that Glenn Strange didn’t do a good job, it’s that
the soul of the monster, Karloff’s eyes were not there.
Oh sure the Jack Pierce make-up was in place, but
when you get right down to it... the eyes, the lip
quiverings, the uplifted palms, the soulful moans...
This is what makes the classic Universal Frankenstein
Monster soooo powerful that all Frankenstein films
fall to the wayside.
Bela Lugosi. I believe, if memory serves, this is the
last time he played Dracula. His eyes were so
powerful. What I wouldn’t give to see him and
Anthony Hopkins in a staring contest. Watch his
eyes, they quiver back and forth ever so slightly.
Watch the fearful beguiling look in his face, the
motion of his hands. Watch the rippling of his
forhead and the tones of his voice. Grand...
Absolutely perfect.
Lon Chaney Jr. Like his Lawerence Talbot character
of the Wolfman... Chaney Jr was trapped in a curse he
wished to shed. Having seen his non-monster roles,
this man could do anything, but instead was typecast
as a monster because of his name. Now usually I
don’t feel sorry for people that make it, that begin
complaining or aren’t happy with their position in that
fame, but... Well Lon is just such a tormented
looking man. His face is so sorrowful and pleading
that I feel like time traveling and kicking asses for
him. For those that have seen his OF MICE AND
MEN... well you know this man’s potential. And
while I adore his body of fiendish work... one has to
wonder what could have been.
But I want to talk now about something kinda
important. This 50 year old film played like
gangbusters. The audience let loose with
THUNDERING applause afterwards. As loud as any
I have ever heard. There were no directors in
attendance. No actors, screenwriters. There was
simply a spontaneous explosion of tribute.
I think in this case it becomes important to look at
what Bud and Lou did, what the monsters did, and
how this film worked.
First off I don’t believe the film is a spoof. Bud and
Lou have their jokes, but the monsters are not played
as fools. It is a pure mixing of the characters. It was
placing A & C right smack dab with the monsters and
watching the results.
Dracula doesn’t go into a standup routine.
Frankenstein does no slapstick. The Wolfman
doesn’t fetch a bone. This is something that we can’t
even do in a horror series today. First off, each
character had been in multiple films and they didn’t
change.
Dracula is still a power hungry bloodsucker.
Frankenstein’s Monster is still his same ol self.
Lawerence Talbot is tormented by his very existence
and his inability to die. They don’t try to come up
with some wacky time traveling gimmick. They don’t
need cussing. They don’t need to make fun of
themselves. Instead everyone played it as they
always did.
Now I know that sounds like “what’s wrong with
Hollywood,” but it isn’t. What is it people like about
ROAD WARRIOR (aka MAD MAX 2)? They love
Max, whereas in Thunderdome he became a
lite-version of himself. From LETHAL WEAPON 1
to 4, we continue to see them two become further and
further away from their original characters.
In the good ol days Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce
stayed note perfect to their characters. What changed
was the STORY.
For example do you change your dramatic motivation
day to day? Well... I don’t. I am pretty much looney
24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for 26
years thus far. Maybe it was watching too many MR
MOTOs and SHERLOCK HOLMES and TARZAN
flicks. Where stabile characters that existed over a
decade or longer existed.
These series existed because the writers understood
the characters. They knew exactly how Abbott and
Costello should work. They knew exactly how the
Universal Monsters acted. What is sad, is you can
still see this sort of devotion to characters in an
animated show like BATMAN and SUPERMAN.
Where writers and directors understand their
characters, their audience and their material.
The studios and production companies were not run
by idiots like Jon Peters that could suggest that Polar
Bears should guard Dracula’s castle, or that
Frankenstein needed a new look for the toys, and
perhaps a Wolfmanmobile.
Instead sensible level headed types were in charge of
the series.
And talking about pair comedians. I’d love to see
Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan to go this route. Or
hey, how about Mel Gibson and Danny Glover.
Instead of doing yet another LETHAL WEAPON
how about putting (Basically those same characters)
in a completely different setting. Go watch RAT
PACK films or MARTIN AND LEWIS or BOWERY
BOYS or ABBOTT AND COSTELLO or THREE
STOOGES or LAUREL AND HARDY.
Watch how it is done. It’s amazingly simple. You
put the characters in NEW situations, not the situation
we just saw them in. Hell, you move the genre
around. From Western to Horror to SciFi to Musical
to outright Comedy to Cannibal film to Prison Film to
Crime film to Fantasy film and on and on. Stop doing
the same thing with the same characters. See what
they would do elsewhere.
Well, I guess that’s it for this rant. I just wish that
more people could see ABBOTT AND COSTELLO
MEET FRANKENSTEIN on the big screen. It really
is quite something.
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