Happy Birthday Lucille Ball

A hideously un-original title post, but perhaps we'll get some traffic from the people clicking on google today?

Don't get to excited to see this blog post up, because no, I have not been planning a "Lucy's Birthday Blog Bash" for a week. Actually, I just clicked on my Google and saw it there. Very sad, I know. I brag about knowing the names of Humphrey Bogart's parents, Peter Lorre's wives, and Marx Brother's elementary school, but I don't even remember Lucille Ball's birthday. I hang my head in shame.

So what can I tell you? That Lucille Ball is amazing? Certainly. But you probably already knew it. I often call "I Love Lucy" my "connection point" when I want to talk to people about classic television/movies, the subject I'm most versed in besides Volkswagen. Because, obviously, everyone loves Lucy. I'll give you a few facts about it first off; Lucy and Ricky were really married. They tied the knot in 1940, when Ricky was an up-and-coming bandleader. At the time Lucy was already the popular star of "My Favorite Husband", basically the I Love Lucy of radio days but without Ricky, Ethel and Fred to round out the cast. Preparing to bring the popular show to television, Lucy asked if the part could be played by her real life husband. The producers refused, saying that the television audience would never except a "Latino-type" like him. Irked, Lucy quit the show, and with their own out-of-pocket money they started I Love Lucy, predicted to end within one season, it has been on the air now for 61 years.

Why do people love Lucy? Easy. Slightly homely, dizzy, cocky, but well meaning and hilarious, and most of all behind that act of vanity it's easy to spot a very real, down-to-earth woman. Having worked hard to prove herself a good actress (Her drama coach at the academy told her she had absolutely no future as a performer) Her natural comedic talents managed to make the standard 1950's dumb-housewife formula an unforgettable icon for the often-lost patience and unconditional love of American marriage.

And did I read any of that on some other blog or tribute site? Absolutely not. No sarcasm intended.

So I sign off. If I had known today was her birthday I might have looked extra hard for her biography yesterday at the library, but instead I picked up Child Star by Shirley Temple Black, Gracie; A Love Story by George Burns and Audrey Hepburn, An Elegant Spirit by Sean Hepburn Ferrer. I'll keep you posted how they are.

So in conclusion, if you wanna make yourself happy, find some I Love Lucy on T.V. and watch it. It's still on, and if the Lord be willing, it'll be on for my kid's to watch too.

P.S. I love her for all the above mentioned reason, but she also appeared with some of my favorite people;


P.S.S. I, sadly, cannot watch I Love Lucy as we have no cable. Actually now, when I realize that the last thing I saw Lucy in was "Room Service", is the only time I've ever regretted that fact. Go figure.

No Time For Seargents or Contests or Blue Mushrooms

I absolutely hate obligation.

Obligation turns normal, happy teenagers into huddled masses of self-loathing goo, to lazy and perfectionist to actually fulfill the said torturer, and yet unable to enjoy life and laziness because of the ever-present looming task. Never mind, I take all that back. I actually like blogging.

Heat, heat, heat. Gotta love this over-one-hundred degree heat we get here in the south! I tried playing "Sunshine on my Shoulders" by John Denver, but the meaning was kind of lost since it's actually party cloudy here, so it's more muggy and humid then sunny. I'm enjoying it thoroughly though, because yesterday night, a big ugly spider was seen under my bed and got away, and I wouldn't get back in the bed for two hours and even then I slept with horrible nightmares and cold-chills. So now, I like to believe that this spider who thinks he's all big and bad because he got away like that, is shriveling up and dying somewhere because his small hairy body can't take the 100 degree temperatures.

I believe in seeing the bright side of every situation, and that's about the only one there is.

And here I am without a Marx brothers post still (and please don't let that make you think I have something awesome planned, cause' I don't) I just thought I'd drop in and give you my opinion on the little feature I saw last night, a completely un-nostalgic war piece called "No Time For Sergeants".


*UPDATE*
This post was written at least six days ago, in that time, I've done absolutely nothing to help the world and humanity. And I still didn't finish any blog post. I believe in being honest as well as optimistic. I am a wonderful person.

Your movie today features Andy Griffith, young and curly headed, as a barefooted backwoods boy who gets drafted into the air force. Some guy named Nick Adams (who looks like a mix between Woody Allen and Don Knotts, and manages to be more annoying then the latter could ever dream of being) plays his friend Benjamin Whitledge, a nerd who also get drafted into the air force but wants to be in the infantry. As Wikipedia will tell you, in real life, the air force doesn't have an infantry. Just a cute little plot-loop I thought I'd bring up. But anyway, his obnoxious little friend wants to go, complaining that "In the Civil war, it was the infantry that did the fighting." A very interesting argument, especially since airplanes weren't invented yet. Aren't plot-loops fun? As you can probably tell, I didn't like that guy much. Anyway, goodhearted Will sets out to get them both transferred, which leads us to the second bad point about this (the first being his whiny sidekick); the plot starts halfway through the movie.

Also contributing is Myron McCormic, who I've never seen before, but God bless him. He looks like some kind of fish. He plays a Sergeant who's near-retirement is shattered by our dim-witted hero. I'd give you the rest of the plot but...that's it, basically. Some movies keep you guessing about the plot because they move to fast; this one does the opposite. It confuses you with the "Wait, we've been watching this for two hours? But nothing's happened! What in the world are they going to do in the rest of the movie?" I'll try summing it up this way, plot-point by plot-point;

1. Idiot get's drafted into the army.
2. Idiot meets nerd-friend.
3. Sun glass-wearing mean guy picks on idiot and nerd-friend (I suppose this plot would have worked equally well in a high-school setting?)
4. Very long, but admittedly funny bathroom joke that kills at least twenty minutes of film.
5. Other stuff happens.
6. More stuff.
7. the movie ends.

Sorry about that.

It could have been helpful or funny, but like I said I'm battling a sever case of the lazy. Let that be no reflection on the movie OR this blog.

Or numbered lists, which rock.

So on to analysis, the whole premise of this movie centers around the fact that Will Stockdale (Andy Griffith) is suppose to be as dumb as it is hot outside, which is an illusion I find hard to fall into after watching him play the wise old sheriff of a country town for as long as I can remember. Then there are other flaws, like the hopelessly un-likable complainer of a sidekick who is supposedly the smart one of the bunch, and the fact that it portrays nearly every other member of the air force and draft board as mean and corrupt. There was a refreshing cameo by Don Knotts, even though it wouldn't have been a cameo since he had no real career until the Andy Griffith show. I can tell you without looking on Wiki that Andy Griffith had something to do with his small role in the movie. The two were palls, and there would never have been any kind of Barney Fife at all if, a few weeks before shooting started on the Andy Griffith show, Don Knotts hadn't called up his friend to practically beg for a part. (Mr. Bird says I should run next years course on "Early 20'th century pop culture, just sayin') It's a funny little piece but it doesn't last long, and can't really save the movie which spends way too much of it's time building up for jokes that, funny as they are, aren't really worth the wait.

So it's not on my favorite movie list, but if your either a big fan of Andy Griffith or Don Knotts (who's film debut this is) It is of course recommended.


So moving on, I thought while we were all waiting for me to get off my lazy posterior I'd treat you to a little contest. Remember I said nothing could be cuter then movie stars with kids? I thought of something cuter; movie stars as kids! I saw them do this on Disney channel once, except that you will have to deal with grainy old black and white photos, of which I only found a few, for the obvious reasons that movie star's kids would get a heck of a lot more press then kid's before they were movie stars. Your job is to try and guess who's who, and comment with your best idea.I can't promise a prize but I do have a darn cool blue mushroom I found in the woods if you win. Here are your photo's;

1. This one is impossible, and not because the actor isn't well known, try not to think of "small, sweet and vulnerable.."


2. I'll let the prop in the photo speak for itself... 3. This is a girl, if you can't tell. When I who it is you'll laugh that you ever asked that.


4. Hasn't changed much at all, especially hair.

5. Now that I think about it and compare photos, this one hasn't really changed much either. The girl in the background does not matter.

6. It is important to note that both boys are famous.



7. I'll let you figure it out yourself, but look carefully at the face.


And there you have it. I hope my insipid little comments helped a little. Write in with your best guess if you think you know it and by 5:00 tomorrow I will leave a comment with all the names.



P.S. It should also be helpful to note that most of the people on here were featured with their kids in the last post, but you probably figured that out.

P.P.S. It took so long to write this I have no PPS. Enjoy going without, be glad you don't feel obligated to write for yourself everyday.

Just kidding! Keep commenting, keep me obligated!

Father's Day Film Nior Style!

I know it is not father's day anymore. Seriously, did you expect me to spend father's day on my laptop writing odes to you people when I could be spending time with my Dad? Sheesh!

Just for that, I decided to wait a week to give you your blog post.

So anyway, HAPPY FATHER'S DAY! I labored long and hard trying to come up with a good idea about what to do to make it a special occasion on this blog, something I don't often do. How do you make classic movies and father's day fit in together? Recommend a good movie about fathers and children? Give free copies of somebody's biography written by their kid? Finally it occurred to me, movie stars are people too, and most of them had kids at some point. What on Earth could be cuter then collected photographs of movie stars and their kids?

So whether you agree or not, that's the agenda, but first I'd like to say a few words about my Dad;

"There was a young lady from Niger,
Who smiled as she rode on a tiger.
After the ride
She was inside,
And the smile was on the face of the tiger."

That's actually a limerick. It's a five-line poem, and so far this is the worst Father's day tribute ever. So here is Naomi to tell you what she thinks of Dad;

"Uhm..he tickles! He is a tickle guy! He tickle us! I love him!"

Esther said; "Daddy is a goober head...Daddy is MY FAVORITE IN THE WORLD next to Bumbo. Actually...Bumbo is next to daddy." (Bumbo is a sock-puppet operated by Ruby)

Isabel said "Say...uhm...that he leaves his socks everywhere, he's a goober and I love him. And he is really really really weird. In a cosmic sort of way."

Ruby; "I love him very much and he's a great father and I love going fishing with him."

I love him very very much to. He is crazy, awesome, smart, funny and an expert on every nerdy little thing I could ask for. Nobody can be the perfect father, but in absolute honesty my Dad is the closest I've seen. He is an awesome Dad, a great friend and the best illustration for self-improvement and leadership in my life.

But sometimes, just sometimes, he reminds me very much of Mr. Krabs;

On we push, we can't all have my dad, so let's "aww" over some movie stars kid's shall we?

And so, in honor of Father's day, I present a father-themed celebration film-nior style by giving you guys a bunch of pictures of the movie stars I cover often here with their children, because as I said, nothing is cuter than movie stars with babies. Some of the pictures are pretty small but I was able to get most of the information about them from Wikipedia; I hope you enjoy and comment to tell me the cutest picture, somebody else you'd like me to look up, etc.

First off we have Bing Crosby with his wife and his two sons Nathaniel and Gary, probably sometime in the late 50's;

Then, to make things a little scary, Boris Karloff welcomes his first and only daughter Sara into the world, about November 23, 1938;

I should probably put the Marx brothers in their own post since I found several photos with them, these first two are Groucho with his youngest daughter Melinda (for some unknown reason all the Marx's daughters had names beginning with "M");

A family photo of Chico Marx with his wife, Betty, and only daughter Maxine, circa 1930's. And another, probably on the movie set for "Duck Soup";

These last four pictures are all Harpo's children, he adopted four; Bill (who I think is the one in the third picture, the oldest) Alex, Jimmy, and Minnie. The first one is from Wikipedia, taken in 1954, Los Angeles, and I think the last one is at their home, with his wife Susan, probably early sixties?

The saddest photo on the list, Lou Costello with his young son Lou Jr. nicknamed Butch. I heard this story several places before reading it in both Mel Blanc and Jack Benny's autobiography. Here is what Wikipedia says, and if it doesn't depress you I don't know what will, but in some ways, keeping with the spirit of Father's day;

"Upon arriving at the NBC studio, Lou received word that his infant son Lou Jr. had accidentally drowned in the family pool. The baby was just two days short of his first birthday. Lou had asked his wife to keep Butch up that night so the boy could hear his father on the radio for the first time. Rather than cancel the broadcast, Lou said, "Wherever he is tonight, I want him to hear me," and went on with the show. No one in the audience knew of the death until after the show when Bud Abbott explained the events of the day, and how the phrase "The show must go on" had been epitomized by Lou that night."

Then we have Danny Kaye playing piano and stretching on the golf field with his only daughter Dena (Dena Kaye, get it?) and wife Sylvia;

Don Knotts and some other unidentified people holding his daughter Karen. (looking up Andy Griffith's children only brought pictures of Ronnie Howard)

Lucy and Dezi, with their children....also named Lucie and Dezi;

Jack Benny, Mary Livingston (who was actually his wife, if you didn't know) and their daughter Joan, who looks weirdly like her mother for someone who was adopted. She was the co-author of "Sunday Nights at Seven", the biography of Jack Benny that I read. Long story short, she spoke very highly of her relationship with her father, and they make an awful cute family;

She was also the best friend of George Burns and Gracie Allen's children Sandra and Ronnie. No information on the first but the second was taken on the Matson flag ship, 1938. (from Wikipedia) Both George Burns and Gracie Allen and Jack Benny and Marie Livingston's marriages were life-long;

Humphrey Bogart visits Peter Lorre holding his only daughter Catherine (from TCM database) and Peter Lorre and wife Anne-Marie and Catherine at home in 1962, two years before his death.

And the piece de` Resistance, several adorable pictures of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall with their young son Stephen;



So I'll stop putting photo's on before blogger sues me. I'm off to watch an MST3K with my Dad, one of the many traditions we have. So once again, HAPPY (slightly late) FATHER'S DAY!

All Thwough The Night

Look..... It's DANNY KAYE!!


That is to wash the bad taste out of your mouth that's been given to you thanks to the seemingly endless string of Peter Lorre photo's going down on this blog. I just got it networked, which means I now have a Facebook page, and I realized that my last post (disregarding the one by Isabel), nay my last several posts, are simply chocked full of Peter you-know-who's pictures. I'm sure all you facebookians were oh so appreciative of that. The picture of Danny is also my little way of apologizing for not blogging sooner. (I love this idea, from now on, all my apologies are going to come in the form of a photo of Danny Kaye texted to someone's phone or posted to their fb wall. My theory being that eventually this way, I will have no friends left to apologize to) The first few weeks my excuse was a sincere one, as I was deep in the bowls of an educational pit I had dug for my self by not preparing for my final exam sooner. But after the finals were over, on the 3rd, I found myself so relieved, so free, and so not-caught-up on my movie reviewing that the mere idea of putting together a coherent block of wording for any reason whatsoever of my own free will was unfathomable. "After all," I figured, "I haven't blogged, emailed, or facebooked in awhile, maybe they'll just assume me dead, and go on with their lives never knowing what happened to me..."
But then I remembered that I don't blog by public demand, I blog because it's fun for me. And the realization that it had been so long since I blogged and no one said anything about it, even though you'd think that would be less motivation, did nothing but transform my subconscious into a bitter monster that will now blog and make you read every single post because I feel so utterly betrayed. Or maybe I'm just bored. You'll never, ever know.
So I'm now finally going to take time out from doing nothing to bring you a movie that I rented, watched and sent back at least a month ago, and never actually reviewed anyway besides concocting the dictionary guide which will be enclosed. And before you get your hopes up, it does have Peter Lorre in it, but not in a starring role. I decided the best way to cope with the unending string of his movies and their reviews was just to bite my lip and mention him as a member of the cast with no snarky comments about size, looks, or creepiness, before I get sued by his surviving family members, burned at the stake by some creepy fan club of his, or the zombie of the long dead movie star comes back and strangles me in my sleep. That's actually the least scary of the three, since he's pretty dang short and being an old dude when he died.....snap, I'm doing it again.
But anyway, as I'm sure you'll be grateful, I'll now try and get to the review. Our movie this week (I have no better introduction, darn it) is called "All Through the Night" and the title of the post, rather than being a typo, which wouldn't be super-surprising, is a reference to our lovely leading lady. But she's unimportant as I'm about to mention our leading man- HUMPHREY BOGART!!! I want to make that sound as cool as possible since it's gonna have to make up for a lot of other stuff, like plot and coherence and acting and climax...

But don't let me drop before I dish. Whatever that means.

This movie is one of those wonderfully predictable and yet cozy patriotic attempts on the part of Warner brothers. Made in 1942, it embodies the spirit of America during the time when even hardened criminals like gangsters were so much better than Nazis, you could make a whole movie about it. And who to lead the ball in the greatest face-off since ninjas and pirates? No one but Humphrey Bogart, who's gangster lingo will either make you giggle or cringe but either way is gonna seriously confuse you. Bogart plays tough-guy Gloves (that should be a warning) Donahue, a kind of comically harmless gangster type who although he can talk the talk and walk the walk, and threaten waiters, still takes care of his Aunt-Bea-esque Irish mother and buys the cheesecake from his friend, kindly-old German man who's name is unimportant. And who, subsequently, gets knocked off by Peter Lorre, a Nazi in league with a group of fifth-columnists (that means Nazi, I didn't know that) that are out to wreak havoc on native New York. The trail eventually leads to the beautiful but R-labialization-prone nightclub singer Leda Hamilton, played by the beautiful Mrs. Kawwen Vewn. Look, I know it's not nice make fun of people, but how can they seriously expect me not to crack up in the end when she looks at the camera, no shame, and says "I feel a little like the pwincess who been wescued fwom the dwagon by the white knight." Besides, I just found out she's Peter Lorre's wife. Kawwen Lowwe! This non-vindictiveness thing is getting harder and harder.

But moving on, we get Humphrey Bogart impersonating a Nazi, Phil Silvers and Jackie Gleason impersonating gangsters, and a mish-mosh of semi-climatic scenes and lots of dead-end kids style lingo impersonating a movie. The villain is played by the wonderfully cold Conrad Viedt (the super-bad Nazi guy from "Casablanca") who, ironically, is like the only German actor in the movie that played a Nazi and wasn't actually Jewish.

The movie is...cute, cute because it tries so hard to be cool. All the characters talk fondly of their days in the Bronx and in reform school (cause' apparently everybody in New York went to reform school at some time or other) and talk so much crazy Brooklynese you need a gangster to English dictionary to decipher it all. "A what?" you say. A gangster to English dictionary, and I'm giving one out free right here. This is a collection of common gangster words and phrases translated in to regular old snobbish English, so if you ever get transported back to the thirties and forties and find yourself on the streets of Brooklyn, your totally covered.


GANGSTER TO ENGLISH
-Guide for da average joik


"Serve you with a blackout." ----------- "I shall make you unconscious."

"We catch them with their panzers down" ---- "We defeat them using the element of surprise."

"Five grand on the snoz. ----"I am betting five thousand dollars on the previously stated party."

"Paid quite a load a' scratch for it." --------- "Purchased with a significant amount of money."

"Got a date with the hot-seat." ---------- "Is wanted for murder."

"Got me figured all wrong." ---------- "You have wrongly interpreted my intentions."

"Makes us look like little bo peep." ---------- "Significantly dwarfed our lawlessness."

"Used your joint to do their finagling in." --------- "They utilized your property for nefarious deeds."

"Some place across da drink." --------- "A location beyond the Atlantic ocean."

"Spill it to the cops." ---------- "Disclose the information to the authorities."

"No soap." --------- "But naught."

"Those babies are strictly no good from way down deep." -------- "This group of individuals is wicked to the soul."

"The first one of dem' babies I tag I'm gonna kick em' in da swastika." -------- "To the first human being I overpower, I will deliver a blow to the posterior."

"Somebody yanked him." --------- "He was abducted by an unknown person."

I swear every one of those is from the movie. I just went through at complete random, it was that bad. But anyway, and whether or not you decide that's actually amusing, this post has gone way too long. I want to direct you to something that's actually funny before I leave. You've probably heard me talk about the Marx brothers. Not on here, yet, but on facebook and stuff, and you probably know that in a few days when I find my blogging 'feet' again, your gonna get a heck of a lot of Marx brothers stuff. I want you to have a good introduction. On the "reviews" section of "Night In Casablanca" which is on the Netflix instant, someone posted a link to some letters by Groucho Marx. These letters were written to Warner Brothers after they sent a warning notice about the title of "Night in Casablanca", saying it was too similar to "Casablanca" and threatening legal action if it wasn't changed. This letter was sent in response, and is now enshrined in the Smithsonian museum. If this doesn't give you an idea of what your up against with the Marx brothers, nothing can.


So to conclude, I'm back, and unless I get really lazy, I'm gonna stay that way. Except that I am really lazy. So this conclusion was really un-helpful. Sorry.

P.S. I didn't mention God in this post. That's bad. I'm sorry God, you are good. No sarcasm intended. I feel better now. Sentence fragments are fun. I tend to end these things with an apology a lot. Huh.


P.P.S. So I look for Karren Verne pictures and this comes up. This is not even fair. This is Peter Lorre absolutely getting squashed by his wife who's ten-times his size, and I'm not supposed to say anything about it. Forget being nice, I'll risk the zombie attack. >insert uncontainable evil cackling<

Beware Your Dentist- A post by Isabel Hooker

Uhm, OK...once upon a time there was a dentist and the kid went to the dentist and the dentist said "Don't eat bad food and stuff because you know how you see old ladies crossing the road with no teeth? That's cause' they eat ALL that yucky food and all their teeth fell out and now they eat GOOEY MUSH! So remember you brush your teeth or you'll have to eat mush toooo....." The End

-By Isabel Rose Hooker

The Man Who Knew Stuff

And Now....

From the inner santum-ish depths of Alfred Hitchock, I bring you a 1935 thriller.....

THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH

Wow. I hate thinking up beginnings to these things.

Well first off, I'll tell you how I came to be watching a 1935 Hitchcock. I'm not a brave person when it comes to movies, I'm really not. And I have enough brains to know that turning on an ancient movie that's been on the freeplay for so long I'm liable to end up banging my cranium against a blunt object to rid myself of intense boredom. However, that night ( many moons ago, I wrote this post back in the days of no internet. Well, less internet) I was feeling especially brave, and with Ruby, a cozy blanket and some popcorn I figured I couldn't go wrong with any movie. I turned on "The Man Who Knew Too Much" from a million other Hitchcocks just off the very slightly interesting fact that it was Peter Lorre's ( I told you we would be seeing a lot of him, poor people) second film and first in Britain, so he didn't know any English and learned his lines phonetically. No, not really enough to keep attention if the movie became really boring (which I might as well tell you, it did) but it still enabled us to add some clever quips during the really confusing parts, when the wonderful Mr. Hitchcock seems to lapse into his own little world and knowing English doesn't help a bit.

Basically, the movie follows the adventures of some high-life family unfortunate enough to make friends with a French spy- just in time to see him get knocked of. Even more unfortunate is when the spy passes on some vital information about a planned assassination (read it again, that rhymed) to them, prompting the baddies (predictably Peter Lorre) to kidnap their daughter in order to ensure their silence. And so, the lovely wife, her not-so-lovely husband, and some weirdo with a greasy mustache who apparently lives in their house set out to prevent the killing and rescue their daughter. I mentioned the boring, which isn't really as bad as may be expected from something this ancient. I also mentioned that some scenes tend to spiral into utter confusion, like an interestingly random chair-throwing sequence and some weirdness about skiing in the alps. To add a few to the list of cons, nobody in the two Alfred you-know-who's I've seen seem to know what dying or taking a bullet looks like. Not that I do, but I would assume that when being shot and dying slowly one would experience some kind of pain and perhaps exclaim or express this in voice or facial expression, however in Hitchcock the process seems to be to look down, notice the bullet hole and slowly fall asleep, whenever it is comfortable and convenient.

So there you have it. I really wish I had some funny pictures to post except this next one, which is a freakishly and realistically sad idea of what Peter Lorre looked like in "The Man Who Knew Too Much" by my (quote from her) "lovable, adoring sister Ruby..." And before you scroll down I would like all of you with weak hearts to leave and the rest to take a deep breath because this thing can be pretty horrifying;

Yeah, I'm sorry. The utter and complete terror that you are experiencing is a completely normal human emotion, so you may feel free to scream. The repugnance is only increased by the fact that the monstrosity has no neck or head and is floating on a field of ghostly white. Thanks Ruby, now my entire readership are going to be reduced to panicky weirdos who lock themselves in their houses and huddle under their covers for fear that the zombie of Peter Lorre will come and eat them. And as much as I can't think of any reason why she would do such a thing, I am equally perplexed about my mental condition when I assembled this;

It's a collection of Peter Lorre's caricature's in various cartoons, and yes, Ren is one of them. It was originally meant to be funny. I even added the little "Coming to get you" thing in order to make it seem like an effort in humor. But it's not. It's scary and I'm beginning to fear that my blog will become a place that people stumble upon to and are instantly taken aback by the fact that it looks like a Peter Lorre fan club. I just thought it was interesting that there were that many children's cartoons terrorized by the image of Peter Lorre. Sorry again.

P.S. I know what your thinking, and yes, I do a lot besides sit around and think up ways to publicly humiliate a guy who's been dead for 50 years.

P.P.S. I didn't even give you a recommendation. Yes, watch it. It probably won't entertain you but at least if you survive you'll know your tough enough to take any old movie I can dish at you, plus it's great for riffing like your an MST3K expert. And another thing; Blogger did it again. I don't even have to say. Thank you blogger. Not.

A Guide To Peter Lorre's Facial Expressions (And The Boogie Man Will Get You)

I have like, a million and one reasons not to be blogging right now. A poster project that is due tomorrow, a memorization project to work on, and exams to study for plus I already have four reviews written and saved on my computer. However I couldn't resist since I watched this movie last night and it is still fresh in my mind. And, for a brief moment, wonderful, gracious Windstream has allowed us access to the internet we paid for. So without further a due;

The Boogie Man Will Get You
( a completely irrelevant title, when you think about it. There is actually no mention whatsoever of a boogie man, but during the last few scenes, I wouldn't have been surprised if he showed up as a pizza man, it got that random.)

Now you may think that any movie titled "The Boogie Man Will Get You" would star either Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi or Peter Lorre- and you'd be right. Welcome to horror-comedy-pun
heaven.


Of all three heroes of horror, only Lugosi is missing, and you'll never even notice he's gone- the movie's breakneck-speed plot and confusing elements will make sure of that. Meanwhile, Boris Karloff stars as a dim-witted, well-meaning doctor who lives in the basement of a proverbially creepy old tavern, where he preforms his experiments to create the ultimate superman. Winnie Slade (Miss Jeff Donnell) a perky minnie-mouse-esque girl with an eye for antiques, purchases the tavern, complete with professor and laboratory, with the intent of making it into a hotel. Peter Lorre (I told you he'd be in it) plays the towns resident mayor/coroner/sheriff/ hair-tonic salesman/crazy cat guy who assists in the professor's experiment with eye on potential profit. And because that isn't nearly enough to keep a plot going according to director Lew Lahr, there's also two farm-animal obsessed old servants who'd kill to get a homestead, a choreographer who's not really one, a random old man who gets murdered, an extremely stupid powder-puff salesman, two really thick cops, a nearby ammunition plant and eventually, a human bomb. Plus Larry Parks as Winnie's long-suffering ex-husband, who although he tries really hard, just can't be Cary Grant. I'm sorry.

If it sounds confusing to you, congratulations, your right. With creaky old houses, an abundance of dead bodies, murderous old people and Peter Lorre, it's no surprise my first thought was "Sequel to Arsenic and Old Lace", but it will have to qualify as prequel, since it was made a good two years before. And since I know your wondering, yes it's funny, no it is no where near Arsenic and Old Lace, but it is funny.

And speaking of Peter Lorre-

I have seen way to many of his movies. It's unreal. Seriously, I'm looking right now and all the reviews I have saved here are Peter Lorre films, or at least have him in it. Wowzers, that's frightening. Kind of like Peter Lorre. Still in the advent of seeing so many you-know-who movies, I have found that I am now able to read his facial expressions, and have here created a helpful beginner's guide to the looks of impending doom he gives the other cast members throughout his movies. Would you like to see it? Of course you would. Let's take for example The Boogie Man Will Get You. This first one is very easy, it says;

This one is just a bit more complicated, but if you look very hard, I think you can figure it out;

And we've all had that happen to us. This is one we see a lot;



Sorry if the wording is small but the look must be preserved. This is also a common one I think we all have on our face at least once a day. This look means;


This look holds a very precise warning;




And to finish off;


So there you have it. If that many pictures of Peter Lorre doesn't keep you from sleeping for a week I don't know what will.

P.S. I love you all like you were my grandmother ( some of you are) and that will stop me from killing you, which is why I will go now before my mother bans me from blogging at risk of losing any kind of future career. Thank you.

P.P.S. Another review tomorrow, I promise! God Bless!