Sunday, April 20, 2008

IT'S LI'L ABNER SEASON AT ASIFA!!!!!!

I couldn't believe my eyes! It was just too good to be true!  Steve and Mike did a tribute to Al Capp on the ASIFA-Hollywood Archive site! What's up there now is the first installment and they say there's more to come! 

http/www.animationarchive.org/ 

This is a major, major event because the people putting it up are hardcore fans who know what the good stuff is.  Capp was immensely popular in his day. If you've only seen the second-rate strips then here's your chance to see what all the fuss was about!

"L'il Abner" was far and away the best comic strip ever to appear in American newspapers. From the vantage point of the minimalist present, it's hard to understand how Capp could have put so much detail and creativity into a daily strip.  Even with assistants, you wonder how he managed to get any sleep!


No doubt about it, Capp could draw women! He seemed to believe there were two types of women, the ugly and the beautiful. It's not surprising that he thought that way because that's not too far from the way that he caricatured men. His cartoonist instincts told him that humor lay at the extremes, a good lesson for us all!

 
According to Mike, Capp's assistant for a time was Frank Frazetta, one of the greatest girl artists of all time, but even when Frazetta drew the bodies (from Capp's rough layouts) Capp still insisted on drawing the heads and hands.  Capp's style of drawing female faces was absolutely unique.

 
I see Capp's influence on other stylists like Wood, Kurtzman, Elder and Davis, but who were Capp's influences? Maybe we'll find out during The ASIFA Season of Capp!

 
I don't know about you, but reading Capp makes me want to draw, which is the highest compliment one artist can give another. For cartoonists who can't afford art school here's a whole art education for the price of a few large paperback books!


L'il Abner lent itself mightily to merchandising. Collectors' stores are full of Capp stuff even now...most of it still worth having!


I'd buy anything endorsed by Fearless Fosdick! Can you still buy Wildroot? I want to get some, right now!



Friday, April 18, 2008

MAKE WAY FOR "ROCKET ROBINHOOD!"



What were the formative influences on John Kricfalusi? Clampett, Jones, Avery, Yogi and Quickdraw, right? Well, not exactly; there's one name missing from that list, and that name is...."Rocket Robin Hood!"


John's mentioned this show in the past, but I'll bet a lot of readers still haven't seen it. I just spent an hour looking at YouTube clips of it, and found myself laughing out loud the whole time. The limited animation cheats are hilarious, and some of the poses are to die for! How do you like the one above? The show is full of gems like that!

Rocket Robin Hood was a funky Canadian TV show made in the late 60s. It looks a little like a Filmation product, which is not surprising since Filmation's top layout supervisor, Alberto DiMello, worked on it. Shamus Culhane is credited as executive producer, but I don't see much of his influence on the art. Maybe he supervised the scripts.



Wikipedia credits "Fritz the Cat" producer Steve Krantz as executive producer and Ralph Bakshi as director. Holy Cow! Ralph really had to pay his dues! Anyway, there's a cartload of clips from this show on YouTube. The clip I was dying to use was the one showing the end titles, but YouTube wouldn't allow it to be embedded.


Here's a clip that john K recommends, also not embeddable : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7pcqYtKwJs&NR=1


And be sure to read John's comment on the comments page!

Thursday, April 17, 2008

ABOUT "JANE EYRE"



I must be going out of my mind! NOBODY wants to watch a ten-minute YouTube video, especially when it's about a novel! Oh well, if you don't have time for it, I'll understand.

The audio clips are from the film starring Orson Welles and Joan Fontaine. Maybe I should add Peggy Ann Garner who got an oscar for her role as the kid in this film. Does anyone know who I'm talking about? She was the idealistic girl in "A Tree grows in Brooklyn." Whatever happened to her? She was a genius! And Henry Daniell who plays the school master, might have delivered his best-ever performance here. I feel sorry for Garner and Daniell.  They were both brilliant but Hollywood didn't often make the kind of film that could take advantage of their kind of talent.  Two great performers, wasted!

Wasting classically eloquent actors was a common practice in old Hollywood. Maybe eloquent actors required eloquent scripts, and writers who could do that were in short supply.  Maybe Daniell's talent was perceived as being uniquely English, or suitable only for the stage. Maybe articulate actors suffered from the false perception that film was a visual medium that didn't require great dialogue. The feeling might have been, "Don't have an actor ask for the salt if he can accomplish that by just pointing." Actually I agree with that..most of the time...but if you have eloquent performers like Garner and Daniell then I want to see them beg for the salt, demand the salt, cry over the salt, have lordly disdain for the salt, get on their knees and cradle the salt. I want the ultimate request for salt that will forever after change the way I think about asking for salt!

I love the scene where Jane talks to the schoolmaster. In the hands of lesser actors and a lesser writer it would only have been about the collision between stern age and idealistic youth. Here it's much more nuanced. The schoolmaster takes pride in his ability with words. He spits them out like weapons. He's obviously bright and skilled, but the audience is repelled to think of the small-mindedness that must have led him to use these assets against a child.  The kid is earnest and full of passionate goodness, but she's also reckless.  She's ready to throw her life away over small things, and that makes her tragically vulnerable to the predatory adults. Two opposites are brought into conflict and given beautiful words to say...sheer bliss for the audience!


Monday, April 14, 2008

THE MEANING OF MUSIC



Here I am talking about the meaning of music. I don't mean the meaning of specific lyrics, I mean the meaning expressed by music itself, unencumbered by words. If anyone has thoughts about this I'd love to hear them.

The video is ten minutes long. Sorry about the length.

Saturday, April 12, 2008

THIS WILL BORE EVERYBODY!

This afternoon I spent a couple of hours on the floor of my local Borders perusing a couple of new books on the subject of fascism.  Holy Mackeral! There's a lot that I didn't know before! Apparently Mussolini was heavily influenced by the American pragmatist writers like William James (pragmatism = whatever works is good). Mussolini was a socialist, in fact he edited Italy's biggest socialist newspaper, but reading the Americans led him to think that there was a third way, which was neither capitalist nor socialist. It consisted of doing whatever seemed to work, whether the solution was a private or a public sector one.  The important thing for the pragmatists was to get things done!




This philosophy eventually created the Progressive movement in America, exemplified by Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt. Wilson believed in drastically beefing up the power of the central government so that, when that power was needed, it would be there to solve problems quickly and definitively, without the ball and chain of endless arguments by local politicians.  Putting the power in the hands of higher ups meant a lot less power for individuals and Wilson and Roosevelt were fine with that.  They felt that parts of the American founding documents were fine for their time but were antiquated in the modern world, which demanded fast, decisive action.  

Of course the problem faced by the pragmatists was how to break it to people that the new ideas involved less freedom, and the solution was education to produce a new citizen who was so hyped up and so civic-minded that he wouldn't mind giving up some of his traditional freedoms. Wow! Shades of the French Revolution! 

In America and Britain the pragmatist philosophy was diluted by long held traditions favoring individual rights, but in continental Europe the concept of American and British-style rights were still controversial.  For them the idea of centralizing power led to power being vested in Marxist-style authoritarian parties,  and leaders who were like kings.  Since pragmatism involved using any solution that seemed like it would work, and since the party leader(s) decided what worked, European pragmatism degenerated into the whims of tyrants.

Is this a fair analysis? I haven't the slightest idea since I know very little about the period.  If the books are wrong then I'm wrong.  I just find it interesting that an American philosophy like pragmatism may have had a bigger impact than I'd previously thought.

Is anybody still awake out there?  

Thursday, April 10, 2008

WHEN I'M RICH.....

I guess if I were rich I'd engage in the same mixture of shrewd investment and philanthropy that most rich people engage in now...but what if I was a special case? What if a rich benefactor left me his fortune, but only on the condition that I spend it for luxuries? Does that ever happen? It must have happened to somebody, somewhere...why not me? I've already prepared for the day the phone call arrives!

First off, I want to be surrounded by an entourage of naked women (above). They should go with me everywhere I go. 


I make an exception for the mens room. In that case they should wait outside (above) and cheer when I come out. 



But let's be practical. During the winter months it gets cold and then I'd permit them to wear little mini-fur coats (shorter than shown above). I would wear only pajamas and they would keep me warm by bundling all around me when we walk. 

 
I must have a pet lion....


...but I think I'd prefer to walk it while slowly driving in some kind of cool car with my women. I'd drive only on the sidewalk of course...my taxes would entitle me to that.
 

Lots of rich people live in castles or mansions.  Not me. I want to live in a super-modern house high atop the middle of a large and interesting city. 


I'd expect my architect to come up with something exciting and different.  How do you like this hallway? Not much room to walk, but it's sooooo cool!!!!!!!



And furniture? Only the best! 

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

HOW TO EAT A TANGERINE LIKE ZORBA THE GREEK

"Hi everybody! here's a quick tutorial on how to eat a tangerine like Zorba the Greek!  You remember Zorba don't you? He was the Greek guy in the book and the film who really knew how to live! Zorba had a passion for the moment!"



"Begin the way Zorba would, by smelling the fruit.  Even the skin of a tangerine is fragrant!  Notice the little lunar bumps and valleys. This is the way your skin looks to a flea!"



Don't just peel the tangerine...violate it!  Risk going to jail over it!  Be Zorba the Greek!  Rip that little sucker apart!


"Oops! I forgot about the strings! Isn't life always like that? Just when you're having fun you discover the strings!"


"Well, there's nothing for it but to let the strings fall willy-nilly to the ground.  Don't be a dweeb and put them in the wastebasket.  Zorba rips his fruit and doesn't worry about the consequences!"



"Now lovingly apply the fruit to the tongue.  Tomorrow everybody on the net will have photoshopped a penis into this picture, but I include it anyway, because I like the angle."



"Ooooh! Feel the flavor burst out of the little flavor sacks! That's the taste of liquid sunshine!"


"Feel the citric acid burn your mouth!"



"Man! That's good!"



"Huh....?"


"OK, there's seeds!  No big deal!"


"Yummy!"


"OK, there's even more seeds. Actually they never end.  Every tangerine has more seeds than the total volume of the fruit.  It's a mystery.  Don't try to understand it."


"What would Zorba do with the seeds?"



"Now, you may have noticed that by this time your fingers have gotten pretty sticky."



"Zorba would have just wiped his hands on somebody's sleeve,  but I have a six month-old restaurant towelette, so I think I'll use that."


"Rip it open with gusto...."


"...and marvel at how they manage to compress a whole wet towel into a small space like that."



"Smell the exotic perfume. How many camels in how many caravans were necessary to bring this precious scent to the West?"


"Now wipe the fingers, taking care not to miss a single spot." 


"Amazing! It's just a little Beatrix Potter-size towel but it gets the job done."



"Well, that's it! Join us next week when we eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich Michael Eisner-style." 

Monday, April 07, 2008

A DELICIOUS COMPARISON!



Everybody I know hates re-makes but I love them! There's no better way to study film than to see the same story handled differently by two different directors. The old argument, "If they have to do re-makes then they should only do films that weren't done right the first time" doesn't hold water for me. It's precicely the good films that I want to see re-done! That's how you learn the most!

So here's the leg lamp sequence from "Christmas Story," done well (below) and done badly (above). What lessons do you take away from this?





By the way, the better version of "Christmas Story" was done by Bob Clark, the same director who did "Porky's" 1 & 2, and "Black Christmas"! Clark died a year ago in a car accident on the Pacific Coast Highway.  He was a friend of Quentin Tarantino.


Sunday, April 06, 2008

THE AMAZING iSIGHT CAMERA

I can't stop fooling around with the built-in iSight camera on my computer. Maybe it has to do with the quality of the lenses or the electronics.  Maybe it's the program. Anyway, you can do some serious photography with this thing.

The moody picture above was lit with a flashlight. Think about it, a flashlight!  I look like a guy who's at the end of his rope, out of work and wondering how he's going to feed his family. In reality it's just me, wondering if there's any potato chips in the house, and the camera benignly transforms that expression into high tragedy.  Of course, it also makes me look a hundred years old! 

 
Here's my favorite (above)!  I look like a demon from a Hell that burns black flame. I shot it for the Potemkin post but wasn't able to fit it in.  Once again, the lighting was done with a flashlight. 


 

 Here's (above) a bit of gritty, 50s realism.  Theater in that era was thick and serious. The words poured like molasses.  One play that comes to mind is "Krapp's last Tape." It's terrible and just about unwatchable in my opinion, but it has a following, and it has the virtue that you could film the whole thing in YouTube type close-ups. Imagine that! A serious play shot just for YouTube! 

I think I'll try a couple of really heavy, dramatic readings here. They'll suck but, what the heck, it's a blog and blogs are for fun, not for perfection.  Like Clampett used to say, "What's the worst that can happen? Is the sky going to fall down?"


 ISight does a good job on color, too. Sometimes the color looks purple and washed-out, and other times it feels like Technicolor.  In the picture above the lighting makes me look like someone in "The Conformist."




Saturday, April 05, 2008

INTERVIEW WITH COWBOY BOB

ANNOUNCER:  "Today we're visiting the internationally famous star of stage and screen, the original singing cowboy.... Cowboy Bob! Hello, Cowboy Bob! Are we interrupting?"


COWBOY BOB:  "Why, no Bill! We got most of the cattle bedded down for the night, so a little jaw-jabberin' won't hurt!"


ANNOUNCER:  "Cowboy Bob, we have some letters from the fans. One fan writes in to ask, "Why does Cowboy Bob smoke? Doesn't that set a bad example for kids?"



COWBOY BOB: "Haw! That's a laugh! I don't smoke! Never have! It's a filthy habit! I carry the cigarettes for a friend, my horse!"


COWBOY BOB:  "Of course he gets the cigarettes all wet with slobber so they don't work so good anymore. If one gets really wet I'll let it dangle from my lip just to dry it out! 

Any more questions?"


ANNOUNCER:  "Yes, here's one.....this reader asks, "Cowboy Bob, Do you have your own ranch? Where do you bunk?"


COWBOY BOB: "Where do I bunk? No cowboy 'bunks' anymore. When I'm on a drive I stay at motels, just like everybody else."

 
COWBOY BOB (CONT):  "My favorite is 'Motel 6' because they leave a peppermint on the bed. Of course you never want to run an ultraviolet light over the bedspread but heck, even big hotels have that problem." 



COWBOY BOB:  "Well, there's the call to the chuck wagon! Gotta cut it short! It was real nice talkin' to you, Bill! Tell the kids out there to talk straight and stand tall like their friend Cowboy Bob! That, and always listen to their mothers!"



ANNOUNCER: "Will do, Cowboy Bob! It was nice talkin'...I mean 'talking'...to you!"


BTW: Thanks and a tip of the Cowboy Bob hat to Luke for the fine poster above!

Friday, April 04, 2008

AH, THE OLD WEST!!!



Here it is..."Uncle Eddie: Cowboy Commercial", Two minutes long, fresh from YouTube! I wish I could have added SFX. 'Hope you like it!

COWBOY BOB ON YOUTUBE!!!!!

I just transferred it to YouTube but I'm too sleepy to wait till they process it, so I can put it up here. If you just can't wait, go to YouTube and you'll find it under "Uncle Eddie: Cowboy Commercial." In the more likely event that you can wait, just hang loose and I'll post it here as soon as I'm able.

Wednesday, April 02, 2008

EXOTICA FOR HOUSEWIVES



Here's (above) something Mike turned me on to: Christopher Walkin's sketches on Saturday Night Live where he plays "The Continental." What a terrific idea! A woman we never see knocks on the Continental's door and he takes her in and tries to seduce her. Where's this been all my life? I want to see every episode!





Here's (above) a parody of the Walkin sketches which is even more overt than Walkin's. Hard-to-please YouTube fans gave this 2 1/2 stars, but I'd give it a 5. It's hilarious!





Housewives in the 50s were treated to some real exotica on TV! After being stimulated to distraction by the original (unfortunately short-lived) Continental show, they got to watch the king of the exotics, Korla Pandit (above) play the organ. I love the mystical narration at the start.

Monday, March 31, 2008

SOUP SLURPERS



Please, please, please forgive me for wiping out 13 perfectly fine comments in order to put a slightly improved version of the video up. I just couldn't bear to watch the video run silent for the last 45 seconds! If I'm able to re-cut this sometime in the future I'll run the music throughout instead of dimming it for the SFX. That and 50 other changes should fix it!

Friday, March 28, 2008

A LESSON FROM JUDY GARLAND



Here in one video are two terrific songs from Judy Garland's first feature, "Pigskin Parade." How old is she here? 14? 15? 16? Something like that.

She does a great job on the first song,"Texas Tornado," and when you hear it you think, "Well, that's it. She's not going to do better; nobody can,"...then she proceeds to top herself with the second song, which is nothing less than masterful.

This second song (which I've just forgotten the name of) must have been especially hard to sing. The lyrics and melody are awkward in the extreme. You get the feeling that she decided to make a big splash and if she couldn't do it with a good song, she'd hunker down and do it with a bad song. Listening to this is like watching soldiers fight door-to-door. She broke down the song into parts and somehow found a way to beat life into each separate segment.

I learned something important from this performance: if you can't find the perfect project to show the world what you can do, take the godawful project you're stuck with and force it to be great, one scene at a time.