State of the Temple Address 7

Remember in our last State of the Temple Address, when we said we’d be making several exciting announcements by the end of the week? Well, it’s four months later and we’re finally able to announce a few of the many projects we have on the burners at the moment. But before we get down to business, we’d like to thank everyone who’s written to us with words of encouragement and support during these last ten months, which have not been easy months for myriad reasons that we won’t discuss here because they have nothing to do with movies in general or schlock in particular. Rest assured that Temple of Schlock is still here and won’t be closing its door anytime soon. Quite the opposite, actually -– we’re finally in our new digs and busily unpacking at this very moment! Which reminds us that we owe a big thank-you to Edwin Samuelson, Patrick Lefcourt and Josie Peña for helping Po-Man get all the goodies out of storage and moved into the new Temple. Let’s also have a big round of applause for the Keeper of the Pit, John Charles, Lawrence Cohn, John W. Donaldson, Dylan Duarte, Tim Ferrante, Michael Gingold, Don Guarisco, Mike MacCollum, Nathaniel Poggiali, Jon Putnam, Paul Talbot, and Darrin Venticinque for contributing research and reviews and basically keeping the lights on for us during what would otherwise be our darkest days. Group hug everyone!

OK, time for those announcements...

Despite the fact that we barely have time to manage one blog, we've recently started a second one, The Paperback Film Projector, which is dedicated to novelizations and other movie tie-in books. This new blog is itself a tie-in, since it promotes a reference book that Temple of Schlock co-founder Chris Poggiali and Fangoria's Michael Gingold have been working on for years, The Paperback Film Projector: Novelizations & Movie Tie-Ins from A(ce) to Z(ebra). Once the book is published, the blog will then serve to update and expand on its contents. Please feel free to bombard the Temple with cover scans, ads, corrections, suggestions, etc. and we'll make sure you get a "special thanks" in the book. We're also accepting submissions for the blog, but please email us first with proposals. Oh, and we're also planning to do book giveaways in April and May, but in order to be eligible you must be a "follower" of the new blog, so head on over to The Paperback Film Projector and join the fun!

We've got good news and bad news regarding Bill Grefe's long-lost shocker THE DEVIL'S SISTERS (1966), which is Case File #11 on the Endangered List. First the good news: it's been found, and a special edition DVD-R should be out any day now. The bad news? The only print Bill could track down, after decades of searching, is missing the final seven minutes. However (boldfaced and underlined twice), with the help of Daniel Griffith and Ballyhoo Motion Pictures, Bill was able to recreate the ending of the film using promotional stills, original script pages, new storyboards and narration, and the final result is... Well, actually, we have no idea how it turned out, 'cause Daniel never sent us a test disc. But we did see the surviving 82 minutes of THE DEVIL'S SISTERS, and it kicks ass. The wild card in a filmography that's wild to begin with, we guarantee that THE DEVIL'S SISTERS will not disappoint Bill's fans. The DVD-R from Ballyhoo includes special features, none of which we can safely mention save for the liner notes by Temple of Schlock's Chris Poggiali (Wait a sec -- that's me!). Stay tuned for more details.

Above: One of several "world premieres" for THE DEVIL'S SISTERS

Above and below: THE DEVIL'S SISTERS on the Deuce, January 1967

Speaking of the Deuce, 42ND STREET FOREVER: THE BLU-RAY EDITION will be out May 8th. Running three hours and forty-five minutes, it contains the best trailers from the first two volumes of 42ND STREET FOREVER plus a bunch of new trailers and a full-length audio commentary by AV Maniacs chief Edwin Samuelson, Fangoria managing editor Michael Gingold, and Temple of Schlock's own Chris Poggiali (Holy shit! Me again!). And as a special bonus, all of you who are now following The Paperback Film Projector get to call out Gingold and Po-Man for not mentioning the COLLEGE GIRLS photonovel during the commentary!

It's been out since September, but the Synapse DVD/Blu-ray combo of THE EXTERMINATOR (1980) has been getting rave reviews, not only for the sparkling new transfer but also for the great audio commentary by director James Glickenhaus, which was recorded by Edwin Samuelson and moderated by Temple of Schlock's head honky in control, Chris Poggiali (Damn, I am everywhere!). Nothing is in stone yet, but rumors are swirling that this same team will also provide commentaries for two more James Glickenhaus films coming soon from Synapse, MCBAIN (1991) and SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS (1993). Check back with us later for more info on these gigs.

Way the hell back in August, when we were up to our eyebrows in mortgage paperwork, our pal Don Guarisco of Schlockmania and AllMovie sent a few tour buses our way by posting links to his Temple of Schlock contributions. We may have Tweeted about this, but we sure didn't properly thank him here in the Temple -- so thanks, Don! Next time we hang, the chicken & waffles are on us!

That's all for now, folks. Until next time, take it sleazy. -- Po

State of the Temple Address 6

Hey gang, thanks for swingin' by to say 'hi' on this fine November day. It’s hard to believe that 5 months have passed since the last State of the Temple Address, when Po-Man warned you all not to expect any kind of consistent posting out of him until September,
"'cause all the good stuff is boxed up and in storage," but there it is and here we are. All the good stuff is still boxed up and in storage, but things have calmed down enough for us to start posting again semi-regularly, with plans for a full-blast return on New Year's Day. Po-Man isn’t comfortable divulging family, health and other personal information online, nor does he want to bore you all with the mind-numbing details of his first and hopefully last real estate transaction, but he will say that the last 7 months have been grueling for all the reasons hinted at above, and he can’t wait for life to get back to normal. The good news is, he’s purchased a newer, bigger and better Temple -- located in downtown New Rochelle, just a short walk from his place of employment -- and he’ll be moved into it by the middle of December. And the bad news, you ask? Happily, there isn’t any bad news -- just more good news. Great news, actually, but we can’t tell you what it is...yet. Check back with us in a few days. Or, better still, follow us on Twitter and “like” us on Facebook so you don’t miss the big announcements.

State of the Temple Address 5

Hey guys & gals! Thank you, as always, for dropping by to say hi. A lot of you have been wondering where the heck we’ve been for the past month and a half. First of all, we appreciate all of the emails we’ve received inquiring about our health, financial state and general well-being, and we apologize if we haven’t had the time or energy to respond to them all in a reasonable fashion. We should've posted a simple "Be back soon!" or something else that would've set minds at ease, but we didn't, and our silence only fanned the flames of gossip. Yes, we’ve heard the rumors that have been circulating, so let’s put an end to one or two of the more eyebrow-raising ones that have come down the pike in the past 5 weeks. No, Po-Man was not Al Green’d into the emergency room by a crazy ex-girlfriend, nor was he shamed into seclusion by a certain pesky message board moderator who dared question your humble editor’s allegiances in a public forum a couple of months ago. You can also breathe easier knowing that we were not victims of Randy Quaid’s “star whacker” conspiracy, which may or may not have claimed the life of legendary Intervision Picture Corp. founder and president Larry Gold III earlier this year in Thailand. Nope, none of that.

So what the hell happened? Well, we took off on a month-long cross-country road trip back in April, and right about the time we were strolling into the Billy the Kid Museum in Fort Sumner, NM, we got a call from Quasi-Schlocko that all hell had broken loose back at the Temple. Instead of returning promptly to take care of business, we boldly (stupidly?) pushed on, hitting the Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Graceland and Stax and Sun Records in Memphis, the Buford Pusser Home & Museum in Adamsville, the Shiloh and Chickamauga battlefields, and a bunch of other places we'll post about eventually if we ever clear up the shitstorm that erupted in our absence and is still swirling around us.

The long and short of it: We have to move out of this Temple into a new Temple, so don't expect any kind of consistent posting from us until September, 'cause all the good stuff is boxed up and in storage.

State of the Temple Address 4

Hey gang! I'm just swinging by for a few minutes to let you know that I have a bunch of partially finished posts that will hopefully be ready to go live by the weekend. At the moment I'm preparing to record the audio commentary for Synapse Films' massive trailer compilation 42ND STREET FOREVER: THE BLU-RAY, which runs a staggering 3 hours and 40 minutes and will hopefully be available for purchase by February 2011. Most of the track will be recorded this weekend.

I'm also wrapped up in several TV and film projects that unfortunately I can't discuss, but Fangoria ran an article last week about WHY WON'T VALERIE DIE?, a nearly 40-year-old screenplay by William Grefe and Gary Crutcher that I recently rewrote, and you can read all about that HERE.  I also got a terrific 45-minute interview with Lou Arkoff last week for the Jack Starrett book.

OK, back to work. See you in a few days!

-- Chris Poggiali

State of the Temple Address 3

We’ve been busy with other projects as well as a lot of personal crap for the past few months, and have been somewhat remiss in our posting here at the Temple, but we’re hoping to remedy that soon with a handful of new pieces that have been on the backburner for a while now. Call it the intrusion of reality; lately it seems every time we sit down to bang out a quick post, scan a few ads, or simply watch a friggin’ movie, someone drops a quarter into the jukebox and selects the number about taxes, death and trouble, and before we know it another week has come and gone. But hey, instead of wasting time writing about how there’s never enough time, let’s get down to business, shall we?

(Above) The line outside the Silent Movie Theatre on March 30th

First off, we would like to extend a great big “thank you” to everyone who showed up for the screening of THE NAME OF THE GAME IS KILL on March 30th at the Cinefamily/Silent Movie Theatre, a beyond-sold-out affair with folding chairs quickly set up in the aisles to accommodate late arrivals. It was a great time, and we’re extremely happy that so many of you came out to support this event. Big thanks to our special guests -– cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, screenwriter Gary Crutcher, and composer Stu Phillips -- and filmmaker Joe Dante, who moderated the Q&A after the film.

(Above) Stu Phillips, Gary Crutcher, Vilmos Zsigmond, and Joe Dante

More big thanks to Hadrian Belove of the Cinefamily, who did the heavy lifting once Daniel Griffith and I located a 35mm print of the film, and thanks also to everyone at the George Eastman House who cut corners to make sure their print got to us by March 30th. Thanks also to Brian Quinn and Eric Caidin of the Grindhouse series at the New Beverly, who co-sponsored this special event with the Cinefamily, Ballyhoo Motion Pictures and Temple of Schlock, and Harry Guerro of Exhumed Films for providing the beautiful print of THE REINCARNATION OF PETER PROUD, the second feature of the evening (I'm very happy to report that more than half of the audience stuck around to watch it, too). Let’s also have a big round of applause for our friend Jim Healy at the George Eastman House, and also to Paul Rapp, who would’ve been another “special guest” if we had been able to secure a print of his film THE CURIOUS FEMALE as originally planned. Finally, my warmest thanks go to Daniel Griffith, Gary Crutcher and Bill Grefe, for allowing me to play D’Artagnon to their Three Musketeers for the past year and a half.


Never underestimate the power of ballyhoo. Daniel put together a sweet prize pack that consisted of a button (pictured above), a one-sheet reproduction and the “Pledge” card that was part of the film’s original ad campaign, and this went a long way in making what already was a really cool evening seem more like a special event. I stood at the entrance with Daniel and Brian Quinn and each of us handed out a different piece of the prize pack to the first 100 patrons who came through the door: Daniel distributed the one-sheets, I gave out the pledges -- instructing each ticketholder to sign it and swear not give away the film’s shock ending -- and Brian was on button duty. It’s always nice to feel like you’ve gotten an immediate return on your investment, and judging by the smiles I saw coming in that evening, these goodies really helped take the sting out of the $12 admission price. Daniel and I are planning to co-host another screening of the film in October or November at the George Eastman House, possibly on a double bill with PSYCH-OUT, and the prize pack will again be an integral part of the program. Stay tuned for more details.


Back in February we co-hosted (with Cultra DVD) a Friday night series of triple features on 35mm at the Cinefamily under the banner "The Art of Exploitation." We couldn't make it out to California for any of these shows unfortunately, but we're told they were a lot of fun. Below is a list of what was shown when.

2/4 - POOR PRETTY EDDIE, THE LONERS, and GIRL ON A CHAIN GANG
2/11 - FLESHPOT ON 42nd STREET, THE BODY BENEATH, and THE SINGLE GIRLS
2/18 - TEENAGE DIVORCEE, HONKY TONK NIGHTS, and TEENAGE TRAMP
2/25 - GAME SHOW MODELS, THE BOOB TUBE, and CHESTY ANDERSON, US NAVY


Our friend Jake Perlin, film curator at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, deserves a huge round of applause for organizing the recent Bill Gunn retrospective at BAM, which included the first public screening in 20 years (and only the second one in 40 years) of Gunn's ill-fated major studio production STOP (1970). Sadly, Warner Brothers couldn't (or wouldn't) provide BAM with a 35mm print, but co-star John Hoffmeister saved the day with his personal VHS copy, which was shown to a large, appreciative audience on Easter Sunday. Leading man Edward Bell was there and got up afterwards for an impromptu Q&A that went from informative to funny to downright weird, and Jake made sure everyone knew that the concession stand was fully stocked with copies of Gunn's long out-of-print novel Rhinestone Sharecropping, which loosely chronicles the making of this X-rated major studio head flick. Coming less than a week after our NAME OF THE GAME IS KILL screening at the Cinefamily, we thought this would pale in comparison, but instead it played out like the east coast equivalent in terms of excitement and overall enjoyment. Bravo, Jake!

(Above) Bill Gunn directs Linda Marsh and Edward Bell in STOP

Now we're gonna set the WABAC Machine to wayyyyyyy back in November '09 for our next long-awaited nod. Simply put, if you were within 10 miles of lower Manhattan on November 20th and you missed "A Night of 1,000 Dummy Deaths" at 92Y Tribeca, then you, my friend, are a dummy.


That's right, we called you a "dummy."


Plunging double dummy!


A great big dum-dum.


Nope, we're not finished with you yet, dummy!






A special presentation of Kevin Maher's monthly Kevin Geeks Out program, "A Night of 1,000 Dummy Deaths" was co-hosted by The Flying Maciste Brothers from Destructible Man, who for 2 solid hours came at us with film clips, special guests, cupcakes and fun, and I think the sharp, open-minded crowd actually learned a thing or two before it was done, hey hey hey.

Above: Kevin (not Marr) Maher of Kevin Geeks Out as Richard France in DAWN OF THE DEAD ("Dummies!")

Below: Kevin (not Maher) Marr and Howard S. Berger, a.k.a. The Flying Maciste Brothers

The program was such a big success and a kickass good time that I'm eager to see the Macistes take their show on the road -- so if you know of a venue near you that would be interested in doing a "Night of 1,000 Dummy Deaths," contact the Flying Maciste Brothers at destructibleman[at]gmail.com. The Dummyship may be landing in your town very soon, so don't miss the Connection!

Course, we've known the Macistes for nearly 20 years, so don't just take our word for it. Check out these other rave reviews:

Kevin Geeks Out

Love Train for the Tenebrous Empire


We have almost zero interest in reviewing new DVDs, but every so often a company will send us a screener to plug. We'll either forward it to Kris Gilpin to review or we'll try our hardest to string together a few of our own sentences of support for the product. About 8 months ago a very friendly young lady named Christy from Liberation Entertainment sent us a couple of DVDs that we were supposed to review, and instead we misplaced them somewhere in the Temple and never wrote a word about either one. Matter of fact, we got THE HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW before Fangoria received their screener of it, and we very nicely invited Mike Gingold over to the Temple for a showing so he could bang out a quick review for Fango (See, Christy? Sending us these discs wasn't a total loss!). Better late than never, we recommend both the special edition of THE HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW (without giving the time of day to the remake) and the double feature DVD of Greydon Clark's hilarious UNINVITED w/ Bud Cardos' very entertaining MUTANT.



As many of you have noticed, sometime back in January our long-running "Lost and Still Not Found" series underwent a quick overnight facelift and emerged from the blood-soaked bandages as "The Endangered List."


We did this because, frankly, we were getting fed up with all the e-mails that were coming in questioning our definition of "lost." Instead of packing up our pressbooks and ad mats and going home in a snit, we asked a handful of trustworthy and respected colleagues to come up with a more accurate label for this otherwise very popular Temple feature, and our friend Lars Nilsen of the Alamo Drafthouse hit the nail on the head with "The Endangered List." So thank you, Lars, and when we finally make it to Austin, the first couple of beers are on us!


Unfortunately, nature abhors a vacuum, and not five minutes after we rid our inbox of one headache, another began to appear. A half dozen people have written to us asking if we can burn them copies of Tom Hanson's THE BIG SCORE. We've talked to Mr. Hanson several times since the review was posted and he's told us he never saw a dime for this movie. Because he still has the uncut version (A TON OF GRASS GOES TO POT), we wouldn't want to undermine a potential DVD deal by disseminating the truncated Australian VHS transfer. Besides, I know at least one of you will upload it to Cinemageddon within five seconds of receiving it. So the answer is no.


Oh, and before we go, one last thing: scratch seven more films from our list of 100+ No-Shows on Region 1 DVD:

CHANDLER (Warner Archives)


DEALING: OR THE BERKELEY-TO-BOSTON FORTY-BRICK LOST-BAG BLUES (Warner Archives)


THE LANDLORD (MGM/Amazon)


SANDS OF THE KALAHARI (Paramount/Olive Films)


SLITHER (Warner Archives)


THE TERMINAL MAN (Warner Archives)


TROPIC OF CANCER (Paramount/Olive Films)

The Olive titles should be out by September, the others are already available. Phew! We need a drink now. Peace out. 5/8/10

State of the Temple Address 2

I just want to take a moment to extend a great big "thank you" to a few people. First, Amanda at Made for TV Mayhem gave us a "You Are a Great Read!" award over 2 weeks ago, but we've been so busy posting great stuff that we forgot to thank her! So... Thanks, Amanda! We think you're a great read also! And here are our choices for the "You Are a Great Read" award:

Fear of Darkness

The Acidemic Film Blog

Mondo 70: A Wild World of Cinema

The Horn Section


Next I want to thank John Charles of Video Watchdog and Marty McKee of Johnny Larue's Crane Shot for participating in a round table discussion of David Carradine's YOU AND ME and AMERICANA over a month ago, which will be posted here sometime this weekend. Also, a big thank you to Marc Morris for making the discussion possible by providing us with a copy of the very rare YOU AND ME.


Two more people to thank: Mike MacCollum for hooking me up with a couple of really rare movies and a ton of great research, and Max Allan Collins, who left a cool comment on the blog a couple of weeks ago just as I was finishing Spree, the last of his excellent Nolan adventures.


Our favorite film of the year, mostly because it has nothing to do with computers or goddamn cell phones, SOUL POWER is a decent documentary about the Zaire '74 music festival that was originally planned to coincide with the Ali-Foreman "Rumble in the Jungle" match; the concert went on as scheduled but the fight itself was delayed a month because of an injury Foreman sustained during a training session. I'm hoping SOUL POWER will become something more -- like a kickass concert film -- once the special edition DVD comes out jam-packed with all the great musical performances that are not in the 93-minute cut currently playing in New York. When a movie is advertised as "the greatest music festival that you have never seen" and people walk out feeling like they still haven't seen it, something's wrong. Performances by James Brown, The Spinners, Bill Withers, Miriam Makeba, Johnny Pacheco and the Fania All-Stars (with Celia Cruz), The Crusaders and others are terrific but barely add up to a third of the running time -- just an appetizer when the ads promise a meal -- while Etta James and The Pointer Sisters are nowhere to be found and Sister Sledge are only shown rehearsing backstage. In other words, unlike every other summer movie, this one would've been better if it had been 30 minutes longer.


And finally, the Warner Archive Collection is taking pre-orders for THE TERMINAL MAN and DEALING: OR THE BERKELEY-TO-BOSTON FORTY-BRICK LOST-BAG BLUES, two more titles we can now scratch off our list of 100+ No-Shows on Region 1 DVD.




Oh, and one more thing: We're getting ready to announce the very first Temple of Schlock blog-a-thon, so check back this weekend to find out what we're planning for October!