Santa Claus is Coming to Town!

It's that time of year again, a joyous time to bring back holiday memories by showing the old films.  Christmas really is a time to recall childhood and happy times, and what better way for the older generation than to re-watch TV shows you might have seen in the 1950s?   For all you youngies, take a chance.  They still offer timeless entertainment and holiday spirit that never ages.

Virtually every TV series in the 1950s created special Christmas themed shows year after year, including Robin Hood, Captain Gallant of the Foreign Legion, Four Star Playhouse, Racket Squad, Burns and Allen and more. The TV shows that I offer can be found on various DVDs HERE or on posters that promote Christmas Programs for movie theaters, TV stations or home viewing.

The poster on the right gathers the very best of the best, or ones guaranteed to entertain and uplift today.  A Howdy Doody Christmas is silly but short -- Howdy and Buffalo Bob fly to the North Pole to rescue Santa, all in 8 minutes.  Santa's Surprise is the first Little Audry cartoon; she and some ethnic friends from around the world stow away in Santa's sleigh and give him a big present back at the Pole.  Betty White always delights, and in this 1957 episode of "Date with the Angels" she works in a department store where the aged Santa starts giving away all the presents.  In a rare episode of Ozzie and Harriet from 1953, The Miracle, Ozzie recalls a childhood Christmas incident.  Ricky plays Oz in the flashback while Ozzie and Harriet play his parents and David is his brother.  Um, don't try to figure that out, but do try to see it someday.  "Christmas Shopping Show" is a hilarious Jack Benny Show in which he shops for a present but sends clerk Mel Blanc to the loony bin.  In "Cop and the Anthem," Red Skelton as Freddy the Freeloader tries to break into jail Christmas Eve to get a good meal.

All of these are included in the 13 DVD volumes listed later on the page, so get one for the best shows or get em all like a small TV station did this past week.  They plan to run a segment of TV shows, cartoons or features every day until Christmas, starting as soon as they get them this coming week.

Lots of other good shows are on the other discs like Our Gang in "Good Cheer" (1926) on Volume 13:

On Christmas Eve, it's bitter cold in a raging snowstorm. (How did they do that on the Roach lot?) Poverty and misery are shaking hands. The gang enjoys what they can: watching a Santa in a toy-shop window and smelling bread baking. But hope is in short supply when Joe says that all Santas are fake. The kids ask the shoemaker who tells them Santa is real, you just have to wish hard enough. Mickey and Jackie want to make the younger kids' Christmas happy; the Spirit of Santa helps them out by giving them an idea to sell hot bricks to peddlers, beat cops, and others stuck outside. With the money, they buy presents to distribute that night. Meanwhile, the Mob is using a dozen fake Santas to steal toys; the police force them down a chimney right where the Gang lives, so.... 


Also on this disc is a DuPont Theater episode from 1956 "Three Young Kings."  As part of the Christmas festivities in a Latin-American village, 3 youngsters dressed as the Magi traditionally distribute gifts to other children whose parents purchased the presents. But one year passing through the poor section of town they give all the gifts away to the truly needy.
  
You can watch all of these and more for free soon -- hey, it's Christmas time -- on Flictopia.


Visit my website at  Festival Films

Lines & Fines & Sid Melton

Beloved character actor Sid Melton died on Nov. 2 at the age of 94.  I heard about Sid's death a few weeks ago while listening to the "Alex Bennett" radio show.  Alex mentioned that celebrities always seem to die in 3s, and the current deaths were Andy Rooney, Joe Frazier and Sid Melton.  Who doesn't fit in this group?  The first two!


Yup, that's Sid on the left.  If you ever enjoyed 1950s TV, then you often spotted Sid and said something like, "Oh, there's that guy again!"  I first knew him as sidekick "Ikky" on the Jet Jackson show.  Sid can be spotted unbilled from 1941's "Shadow of the Thin Man" to "White Heat," "Knock On Any Door" and "On the Town."  Features in which he did have a part were Sam Fuller's war classic "Steel Helmets," the sci-fi clunker "Lost Continent" and "Lemon Drop Kid" with Bob Hope.  His salary in all three of these was $140 per week.


"For years I auditioned for producers and directors who would fall on the floor laughing, but then I'd never hear from them again. Go ask them why I'm not working. Believe me, there's a lot more to working steadily than being a name and delivering the laughs. There's a certain--let's call it kowtowing--that I'm not prepared to do." -- Sid Melton


Sid was short at only 5-4, and remarkably ... remarkable looking, but we loved him anyways.  He provided long-standing comic relief for Danny Thomas on his classic TV show as Charlie Halper, owner of the Copa Club where Danny performed. Eventually Pat Carroll was added to the cast playing Halper's wife Bunny. Frequently kidding with the press, he told reporters he got the part of Charlie because Sid was the only person Thomas could find that was homelier than he was.


So Sid has passed on.  Name another character actor from the 1950s who is still with us.  OK, how about Frank Cady at age 96.  Frank played Doc Williams on Ozzie and Harriet and had numerous appearances   on Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres and Petticoat Junction.  But I defy you to recall the image of Frank Cady as easily as Sid's unforgettable kisser, so back to Sid...


I have a pretty incredible TV show called "Lines and Fines" thanks to my friend Derek Myers.  At first glance it seems to be a game show similar to "I've Got a Secret."  Then you think it's a spoof when they say at the very start, "The greatest brains in show business" which turn out to be Sid Melton, Mike Mazurki, Gretchen Wyler, George Tobias and quiz mistress Pat Tillman.  But no, it's really the world's first infomercial.  Every single question is about Admiral Refrigerators.  The inane questions and fake answers will leave your mouth agape.  Here is a short sample:





We sold the one and only episode of "Lines and Fines" to Alpha video some time ago, so look for it to someday appear as a bonus on some release or other.


Visit my website at www.fesfilms.com

Surprising Stuff!

So, B-Western fans, do you ever wonder why you have seen lots of Buster Crabbes and Bob Steeles but very few Lash LaRues or Tim Holts?  The answer, other than that perhaps I have no western readers, is that many films starring the first two cowboys are in the public domain, while no Tim Holts from Columbia are PD and only one Lash LaRue from PRC.  I knew about the Tim Holt films, and saw a few of them on TCM a few years ago.  They are just inexpensive B-westerns like so many others and not as enjoyable as many, though that could be because of unfamiliarity.

I was surprised this week to discover that "Law of the Lash" starring guess who is the only PD Lash cowboy film.  I did not happen to have it, but do now.  I also found out that Lash had a short-lived TV series in 1953 called "Lash of the West."  I screened one poor quality chapter that seems to have survived.  It opens with Lash discussing one of his adventures with two guys, who may have acted in the films with Lash, then cuts to highlights from one of his Columbia films, who knows which?  They are 15 minute segments so you can't cram in as much as the half-hour Gabby Hayes Show managed.  At the end of a chase they return to talk, but the show is about over.

Codger with mustache: "I'm sure glad that Trader Joe got what was coming to him, but what was on that stagecoach the outlaws wanted?"

Younger guy: "I want to find out what Lash did with the man behind it all.  I think he knows too."

Lash: "Yes, I'm sure he does, but I'll have to tell you all about it next time.  I'll see you all real soon."




*****

Switching gears radically, the very nice, original German still, from Metropolis shown here just sold at auction by www.emovieposter.com. How much?  $6,820.  Now that surprised me?  What is the top price paid for any 8x10" glossy still?  I will close with their lengthy description of this rare and pricey item:

"Note that this is an extremely rare "country of origin" still for this German movie! It has the UFA logo at bottom right, the "Parufamet" logo at lower left, and a faint embossed German "approved" stamp in the top right! Also note that this German still measures 9 1/4" x 11 3/4" [23 x 30 cm]. Also note that original German movie paper of any kind from this classic movie is incredibly rare and ultra expensive (the most expensive movie poster ever sold is the original German three-sheet from this movie!). 

On November 2, 2010, we auctioned four other original German Metropolis stills, and they auctioned for $4005, $585, $545, and $310, and on September 18, 2011, we auctioned five additional stills (one of them was a duplicate of the one we auctioned for $310) from the same consignor (who has had them for many decades) and those five auctioned for between $311 and $881. Now, our consignor has given us their remaining 12 stills, and we are auctioning six of them (in separate auctions) in these Halloween auctions, and the final six of them will be auctioned in our December Mini/Major Auction. 


Note that of all the 21 Metropolis stills owned by this collector, only TWO showed an image of the iconic robot (the one we auctioned on 11/2/10 for $4005, and the one we are auctioning in this current Halloween set of auctions!)."


In the same auction they sold an original German program for Metropolis for $3,105. One of the interior pages is reprinted here.


From Lash LaRue to Metropolis, always something old that's new comes to light.  Love it!


Visit my website at www.fesfilms.com.


-- Ron Hall

Black History Month -- Every Day!

Introducing ToonWhiz Pictures, a great idea with a promising future.  First off, Toon-Whiz has an illustrious past before the new venture I became involved with about three weeks ago.  You can read about founder and CEO Troy Walker HERE and follow the link on that page to his listing on Wikipedia where it says: 

Troy Walker is an American cartoonish, toy inventor, creative producer and founder of TWP Cartoon Studios. Walker is best known for creating off beat cartoon characters. He got his first commercial break with the wacky children's novelty fad, Hairy Pops finger puppets, used for promotion by the Supercuts chain of hair salons. 

Troy Walker's mother Williejean was the young black girl eating a watermelon in an iconic advertising image from the 1940s.  When Troy described it to me, the picture came right into my head:


I know ToonWhiz Pictures as a storefront theater at 155 Filbert Street in the tourist section of downtown Oakland, CA.  I have never walked around that area, but I get the impression it is the Oakland equivalent of Hollywood Boulevard or San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf.  In other words, large crowds of tourists visit the area shops and restaurants and take in tourist attractions like Ripley's Believe It Or Not.

ToonWhiz offers something unique -- a rare chance to watch vintage African-American / Black Heritage films from Hollywood's golden era.

The theater has been open a short while on weekends and does get walk-in customers.  It is currently expanding from something like 20 seats before a large-screen TV to 80 seats watching projected films.  Admission is inexpensive.  While the details are sketchy to me, I do know the films well because I am supplying them, posters and DVDs to sell.

For the walk-in tourists they wanted a short show that has quickly evolved into the one on this poster.  The Puppetoon "Jasper in a Jam" opens, followed by Soundies with Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong and Nat King Cole -- then a Popcorn Intermission break where they make the real money -- Cab Calloway doing "Minnie the Moocher" and closing with Lena Horne's two-reeler "Boogie Woogie Dream" with Teddy Edwards Orchestra.  It runs about 45 minutes with the Intermission.

That show is designed to run during the day when they can usher in a new audience every hour, or folks can enter in the middle of the show, I guess, if it isn't full.  Then in the evening ToonWhiz plans longer programs with shorts and features.  I have already prepared these shows:

1)  Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho with "Jasper in a Jam" and Duke Ellington's "Symphony in Black."
2)  Paul Robeson's "Emperor Jones" with cartoon and Bessie Smith in "St. Louis Blues."
3)  Louis Jordan's "Reet, Petite and Gone" with cartoon "Scrub Me Mama with a Boogie Beat" and Cab Calloway's "Jitterbug Party."
4)  Lena Horne in "The Duke is Tops" with cartoon "Inki and the Minah Bird" and Ethel Waters in "Bubbling Over."
5)  Black Toon Festival.

I am also preparing the last one as a Festival Films release that will appear in my Cartoon Section soon.  Some of the cartoons do contain offensive images by today's standards, so I put the following statement at the head of my program: "Some black caricatures in cartoons of the 1930s and '40s may be offensive to some today.  The images of mammys, spooks, watermelons, Uncle Tom and Little Black Sambo were neither true nor funny.  However, the cartoons are presented here for their perspective on a part of black history that society has moved far beyond."

Troy Walker, definitely black and proud of it, has a more liberal viewpoint that requires little apology.  This is expressed in the foreword to each ToonWhiz program, as you can see in this video.  The music selection is Paul Whiteman conducting his orchestra in "Mammy."


 



Visit my website at Festival Films

Supreme Court Ponders On....

The ten-year lawsuit I have been a part of, now called "Golan Vs. Holder," was argued in the Supreme Court on Oct. 5. To recap briefly, in 1995 Congress passed a law that allowed foreign countries to restore copyrights to films that were in the public domain in the USA, films I had been selling from Metropolis to Grand Illusion to Seventh Seal.  The Constitution says that once works fall into the public domain they can not be removed from it.

Ten years later, the ultimate hearing.  I knew Oct. 5 was the date, but had heard nothing from Stanford Law School on or afterward, so I finally searched for news on the Internet. As I should have known, legal arguments take place at that level on one day and decisions are announced some time later. We are still waiting.  Here is an excellent summation of what took place that day:

Alex Wong/Getty Images

The United States Supreme Court today considered arguments in Golan v. Holder, one of the most important copyright cases in the country's history and a case that will decide whether millions of creative works, including early-to-mid 20th century foreign masterpieces from H.G. Wells, Fritz Lang, Frederico Fellini, and Igor Stravinsky, will be copyrighted or in the public domain.

The issue presented in the case is whether the U.S. government wrongfully took many foreign works out of the public domain and violated the free speech rights of the American public by joining an international treaty.

The named plaintiff in the case is an orchestral conductor named Lawrence Golan, who wished to create a derivative work based on compositions by Dmitri Shostakovich, but found himself out of luck after the U.S. led a new international treaty signed in Uruguay in 1994 that harmonized many intellectual property laws around the globe.

The moves established copyright protection in the U.S. for some foreign authors who either never enjoyed it or whose initial copyright term had elapsed without renewal, which upset many educators, performers, publishers, film archivists, and some motion picture distributors, who joined with Golan in fighting the removal of important works from the public domain.

At the hearing today, Anthony Falzone of the Stanford Center for Internet and Society represented the petitioners and argued that Section 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA) violated the U.S. Constitution, particularly the Copyright Clause ("to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts...") and the First Amendment.

"The progress of science corresponds roughly to the creation and spread of knowledge and learning," said Falzone today. "A statute that does nothing, like this one, does nothing but take old works out of the public domain without any impact or prospective incentives, cannot stimulate the creation of anything...All it can do is restrict the spread of things."

Advocates for the other side argue that Congress was perfectly within its right to ratify the treaty, and many interested parties including large Hollywood companies and trade associations believe that the URAA went a long way to bolstering copyright protection around the world. 

At the hearing today, representing the side of the respondents, U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verilli told the justices,  "The policy-making branches of our government decided we needed to be, and was in the national interest, to be part of the international copyright system."

Verilli argued the treaty was merely intended to "rectify a problem" for foreign authors -- not establish perpetual copyright terms or make new protection on terms that had run its course.

But Verilli encountered deep skepticism from several justices who questioned whether extending copyright protection backwards offered real incentives for artists to create.

Talking about foreign authors who come to the United States to market works already created, Justice Scalia mused, "It makes more money for the guy who wrote it, but doesn't incentivize anybody."

Justice Roberts also admitted that he found the petitioner's arguments to be appealing on an "intuitive level."

"One day I can perform Shostakovich," he said. "Congress does something, the next day I can't. Doesn't that present a serious First Amendment problem?"

Verilli answered that it wasn't so simple, and that Congress had made changes to the copyright system before that may have interfered with speech once freely enjoyed.

For his part, Falzone also was peppered with tough questions, particularly from Justice Ginsburg, who seemed to accept the viewpoint that the treaty was meant to rectify a problem. The justice wondered whether the copyright term ever really began for foreign authors and questioned why they shouldn't receive the same protections that American authors get.

Justice Ginsburg asked: "We are talking about Shostakovich, Stravinski, and I say: Well, what's wrong with giving them the same time that Aaron Copland got?"

During the hearing, Falzone warned that if the Supreme Court upholds the treaty, it could potentially open the door to more actions from Congress.

All Congress would need to do to move Alexis de Tocquieville's 19th century books out of the public domain, he argued as an example, would be to extend existing copyright terms 100 years and apply it retroactively. 

Falzone warned about the consequences of such an event. "Then you never know if you've reached the limit or not," he told the justices.

Lotsa Ideas! Lotsa Projects!

I have been pretty silent on this blog the last six weeks.  To anyone who has checked in to Nothing New, my apology.  I've just been busy with a lot of diverse projects.  No time!  I'm late!  Ta, ta, I must be going.  OK, here's just a bit about a lot, and more cookin' in the oven, with further reports when each project gets a goin'.

I met with a man who wants to start an All-Comedy Internet site.  When his father was dying with cancer over an extended period his main relief was watching vintage comedy, so the son would like to make laughter more available to hospitals.  I found out about "Laughing Rooms" in hospitals, still experimental, where patients can gather together to laugh at videos.  The same idea might be popular with retirement homes so I put together 4 programs I currently call "Lotsa Laffs!" Each 2-hour DVD has one hour of short comedy highlights designed to be a single movie session for seniors. One hour at a time seems to be ideal for this audience. The second hour is composed of two classic comedy TV shows from the 1950s. You can see the complete line-up of the four volumes  HERE.

I have a new plan for creating the next volumes of Movie Memories, which is to first find and gather short segments along a theme, then turn into MM segments and lastly put together balanced programs.  So operating helter-skelter like I often proceed, I put cars, trains, travelogs and small town documentaries from the 1940s and 50s onto 3 DVDs that I call "See the USA."  It is ready to sell on its own if I ever put it on my website, or the segments are ready to have questions added to become Movie Memories.

I have turned most of the Paramount Color Screen Song cartoons into Movie Memories with the 4 questions at the end.  I did not bother with a few that would be deemed racist today.  "Camptown Races" features the all-star animal case of hippos, elephants, dogs, etc. in black face putting on a minstrel show! "Jingle, Jangle, Jungle" also has black stereotypes and you can imagine the jokes in "Heap, Hep, Injuns."

I also started a new project of collecting Musical Soundies from the 1940s.  These are 3-minute musical films that were played on juke boxes called Panorams, as per the charming photo on the left.  Major swing and jazz musicians like Jimmy Dorsey, Stan Kenton, Gene Krupa, Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller and Cab Calloway made Soundies.  Doris Day, Alan Ladd and Cyd Charisse made their first film appearances in Soundies.  Anyone interested in Soundies sinply must get "The Soundies Book" by Scott MacGillivray and Ted Okuda.  Try Amazon.com!

Some I have so far are merely copycat Soundies that probably played in the same machines.  Rudy Valle sings "Lydia, the Tatooeed Lady," for example.  Another I particularly like is "At Your Service," 1941 by Featurettes, Inc.  Three lovely carhops at a drive-in sing as they serve burgers to attentive male diners.  Since over 1800 Soundies were produced, this is a long range project to get a lot of the best ones I am still missing.

I have a new partner who thinks he has an outlet for selling DVDs.  I supply the films and ideas and he will do packaging, manufacturing and sales.  To keep the costs down, each release must run under 3 and 3/4 hours.  We want to offer a variety of features and shorts so the buyer gets a lot for their money.

A wrinkle on B-westerns is to take the intros and exits from "The Gabby Hayes Show" and wrap them around B-westerns that star Gabby.  You can see the cover here.  The first volume will contain these: "Ridin' Down the Range" with Gabby and Roy Rogers, "In Old Santa Fe" with Gabby and Ken Maynard and Gene Autry and "The Star Packer" with Gabby and John Wayne, plus one complete episode of the real "Gabby Hayes Show" where he presents a Buster Crabbe western.

However, our first release is called "The Wicked Road to Ruin" and contains 3 short exploitation features:

"The Road to Ruin," (1934)  little seen and the inspiration for the title name.
"Reefer Madness" (1936)  being the most seen as well as most famous exploiter.  I recall seeing this in a packed movie theater revival in the 1970s, and I was never into the marijuana scene.  I made a poor hippie!
"Maniac" (1934) by Dwayne Esper is a special favorite that I find as funny and jaw-dropping awesome as Ed Wood's "Glen or Glenda."

A few JD (that's Juvenile Delinquent) shorts and trailers like for "Marijuana, the Weed with Roots in Hell" will round out the depravity... which I hope sells, though I don't know where yet!

I coulda, shoulda written about one of these ideas each week over the past months.  I planned to talk about even more today, like offering just the chapter endings from serials.  Not all my ideas are winners, but a web surfer might prefer to see the last 3 minutes over a complete chapter.  Hmm...


Visit my website at Festival Films

The Ultimate Silent Movie Presentation!

My wife Chris and I go back a long way with Kevin Brownlow's restoration of Abel Gance's Napoleon (1927). Here's a mini-history of Mr. Brownlow's lifetime labor of love:

The first major Brownlow/BFI restoration culminated in a screening at the Telluride Film Festival in 1979, with 89-year-old Gance watching from a nearby hotel window. Under the auspices of Francis Ford Coppola and Robert A. Harris, a version of this restoration, accompanied by a score composed by Mr. Coppola's father Carmine, was presented to great acclaim at Radio City Music Hall and other venues in the U.S. and around the world in the early 1980s. Mr. Brownlow and the BFI did additional restoration work in 1983.

Left out is mention of the American premier of the restoration with the tryptych (3 projector) finale, which to our great amazement and joy was held at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. It was co-ordinated by the Walker film curator Rich Peterson, who was a good friend. The projectionist was another friend, Rich Landry, who showed us in advance how he planned to synch the three 35mm projectors for the finale. Piano accompaniment was by Arthur Kleiner, former head of the music department at MOMA, who had retired to the Twin Cities.

My time guess for the event is January, 1980.  I know it was winter because a blizzard was in full flurry. Abel Gance had been invited but the storm delayed his appearance at the screening itself. We met Mr. Gance at a reception in the Walker the next day.  Film restorer Robert Harris attended, as did composer Carmine Coppola who saw the film he was about to score for the first time. We were enlisted to drive Carmine and his wife back to their hotel after the showing, things being a bit frantic what with the blizzard.

The film and event were unforgettable, which is why I have never re-watched Napoleon on video or TV. It did come out on VHS, but due to some rights disputes over that particular restoration with Coppola's score, it has never been issued on DVD.

Now Napoleon is coming back in what promises to be the cinematic event of a lifetime. Four performances only will be held in Oakland's Paramount Theater next March 24-25 and March 31-April 1. The screenings sponsored by the San Francisco Silent Film Festival will also mark the U.S. premiere of the renowned orchestral score, written over 30 years ago (and twice expanded since), by Carl Davis, who will conduct the Oakland East Bay Symphony. Full details of this once-in-a-lifetime event are HERE! You can also pick your own seats and order tickets today!

Fans from around the world have already made plans to attend.  A late winter trip to San Francisco is not hard to take either!

Visit my website at Festival Films