Random movie ads: The Independent-International edition, Part 2

And don't forget to check back later in the week for our interview with Independent-International Pictures owner and co-founder Samuel M. Sherman!

Hippie psychos on a mad murder spree!

Continuing our Sam Sherman retrospective, longtime TOS contributor John W. Donaldson sent in these frame scans from the B&W addition to the SATAN'S SADISTS trailer, which was quickly thrown together after the Sharon Tate murders. Thanks, John!

One-Sheet of the Week: VOYAGE TO THE EDGE OF THE WORLD (1975)

VOYAGE AU BOUT DU MONDE (1975)

U.S. release beginning in December of 1975 as VOYAGE TO THE EDGE OF THE WORLD

This Week on 42nd Street -- 1979

Here are the double and triple features that played the Deuce thirty years ago this week. Theaters are listed in east-to-west order.

North Side of the Street

Victory: KUNG FU MASTER, BRUCE LEE STYLE / LIGHTNING SWORDS OF DEATH / THE HOT, THE COOL, AND THE VICIOUS

Lyric: NURSE SHERRI / HOUSE OF PSYCHOTIC WOMEN

Times Square: SCREAMS OF A WINTER NIGHT / THE REDEEMER

Selwyn: ROCKY II / EBONY, IVORY & JADE


South Side of the Street

New Amsterdam: THE KOREAN CONNECTION / THE BIG RIP-OFF

Cine 42
Theater I: THE HITTER / GOOD GUYS WEAR BLACK
Theater II: THE LEGACY / CHAMPION OF DEATH

Harris: EDGE OF FURY / SNUFF

Liberty: PATRICK / BODY SNATCHER FROM HELL

Empire: BRONSON LEE, CHAMPION / SOUL OF CHIBA / PORK CHOPPER

Anco: ALIEN / DAMIEN: OMEN II

The Endangered List (Case File #49)

THE CAPTIVES (1970)

Directed by
Carl Borch
[Lee Frost]

Produced by
B.T. København
[Armand Atamian]

Photographed by
E.R. Frederiksen

Assistant Director
Brüel Marquart

Sound Recording
Hans Sørensen

Editing Supervisor
Peter Cooke

CAST
Brigit Krøyer (Avi)
Karl Hansen (Max C. Kragh)
Orla Nsu (Edith)
Leif Betheas (Jorgen)
Annelise Dette (Liala)
Emil Kjarum (Steen)

Rating: self-applied X

Released by
Phoenix International Films


PLOT

Max C. Kragh (Karl Hansen), a wealthy industrialist, and his wife Edith (Orla Nsu) are traveling through the hills of Denmark heading toward their weekend retreat, when they see a young girl, Avi (Birgit Krøyer), thumbing for a ride. They stop for the girl, and suddenly Max is pulled from the car by two of Avi’s friends, Steen (Emil Kjarum) and Jorgen (Leif Betheas), while Liala (Annelise Dette) watches happily from the other side of the road.

The kids seem unmotivated in their violence, as though they were a representation of a future generation of wild human animals that our society has only begun to get a taste of.

Half crazed with drugs, they kidnap Max and his wife and break into an unoccupied house. Now their hidden, depraved thoughts are brought out into the open. The night becomes an orgy of lust and terror for Max and Edith. They are subjected to countless indignities. Max best represents their hatred for the establishment and becomes the focal point of their terror. At last, Edith is sexually assaulted by all while Max is forced to watch, the final act of debasement in an already lust filled night.

Film director Carl Borcht moves his cast expertly through a story that on occasion seems almost stylized and unreal, which only heightens by contrast the scenes concerning human sex. The film has a message far greater than “don’t stop for hitchhikers.” Denmark is the first country in the world to legalize pornography. Perhaps through that the generation depicted here could be possible.


The second of three micro budgeted, non-sync-sound softcore quickies that director Lee Frost and producer Armand Atamian made using short-end scraps of film and then passed off as Danish productions through their Phoenix International Films -- the other two "imports" being RIDE HARD, RIDE WILD (1970) and SLAVES IN CAGES (1971) -- THE CAPTIVES first hit theaters in March of 1971. Phoenix International later collapsed into Freeway Films when Atamian started producing hardcore hits like BEACH BLANKET BANGO, CONFESSIONS OF A TEENAGE PEANUT BUTTER FREAK and the Johnny Wadd series. According to Atamian's niece, Julia St. Vincent, Frost loosely remade this for Freeway as the hardcore SWEET CAPTIVE (1979), starring Rhonda Jo Petty, John Holmes and Paul Thomas.


The older actor pictured below -- credited as "Karl Hansen" -- looks a lot like John Dunn from Richard Robinson's ADULTERY FOR FUN & PROFIT and IS THERE SEX AFTER MARRIAGE?


Julia St. Vincent and her sister worked for their Uncle Armand while they were in high school and designed many of the Phoenix International one-sheets and ad mats, including the ones featured here.

View-Master: JULIA

Two weeks ago at the Cinema Wasteland convention we heard Fred Williamson proudly recount how he smooth-talked producer Hal Kanter into giving him the recurring role of Steve Bruce, steady boyfriend of nurse and single mom Julia Baker (Diahann Carroll) on the TV show JULIA, and we made a mental note to dig up this View-Master packet from the Temple archives. Controversial at the time but in retrospect viewed as something of a joke, despite the fact that it was the first program centered around a black professional woman in a non-demeaning role, JULIA ran on NBC from September 17, 1968 until March 23, 1971 (86 episodes) and had a number of product tie-ins including paper doll books, a lunchbox, Colorforms, a line of Mattel dolls (including a talking Julia doll) and this View-Master pack issued in 1969. Carroll took a lot of heat from large segments of the black community because of the show's safe, lighthearted, nonpolitical and unrealistic depiction of African-American life, but we'll bet JULIA plays better nowadays than it did during the turbulent sixties. It looks great in steroscopic 3-D anyway! We can't post any of the pictures, sadly, but below is the booklet that was issued with the pack. Enjoy!

"EEEK! Scream Night at the Drive-In"

by David Beard
(Cleveland Plain Dealer, September 22, 1981, p. 1-D)

Every so often, something unspeakable occurs in the safest of places, something that in one day shatters forever an entire community’s illusions of security.

The unspeakable happened Saturday in Wickliffe.

At 7 p.m., carloads of people started to congregate just east of Denny’s restaurant, slowing traffic. By 8, nearly 2,000 people had gathered -- dating couples, high-school buddies with beer and wine. Something was in the air -- anxiety, perhaps, or violence.

Leonard J. and Kathy G. were there, on their first date. Within minutes, they had witnessed a murder. By 9:30 they had seen 10 more die and had heard a police order to “Burn them, bludgeon them or shoot them in the head.”

They loved it. They paid $3.50 each to see it.

They were at the Euclid Ave. Outdoor Theater, 28737 Euclid, watching NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, the first of five blood-filled horror films in a dusk-till-dawn show. They drank white wine from plastic tumblers as walking corpses began eating lead characters on the screen.

“It would really be gross if it was in color,” observed Kathy, 26, of Euclid. “This film is a classic.”

She turned her head for a moment -- and checked to see if her door was locked.

“We’re gory people. We like kinky things,” dead-panned Leonard, 24, of Willowick.

They weren’t alone. Manager Philip G. McCauley called it one of the busiest nights of the year, as he watched a steady stream of cars and vans pour through the entrance gates.

Radio and newspaper ads had labeled it “a date with death.” After DEAD would come such sterling features as LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT PART II, MASSACRE AT CENTRAL HIGH, THE RATS ARE COMING, THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE, and, as a finale, THE FLESH GRINDERS, the sad story of a struggling cat food company.

“Last night we had as many people as we had all last week,” McCauley said. “Tonight there are even more. We’ve had cars tonight with seven and eight persons crammed in.”

The five features ran three nights, Friday through Sunday.

“Don’t ask me why, but in the fall, horror movies do tend to draw the most,” McCauley added. “A year ago, when THE AMITYVILLE HORROR was playing, we had cars backed up for a mile. We had to send ushers out to turn them away.”

As he spoke, the area came alive with a crescendo of car horns. McCauley shook his head and smiled.

“It could be (a problem with) the audio,” he said. “That, or else somebody got murdered. I can always tell when there’s a gory part by the honking.”

On the screen, a sheriff’s posse worked its way toward a graveyard, shooting walking corpses in the head. Outside, couples snaked their way toward the concession stand, trying to beat the crowds to the popcorn and to the restrooms. In the back row, not a soul appeared above the dashboard.

“I don’t think too many people are watching the movie,” said the projectionist, Thomas C. Draper, 33. “This is their last fling before school, before the summer ends.”

“Look at this,” he added, indicating the red-eyed crowd angling for Cokes and popcorn. “The munchies.”

As DEAD ended, a group from Euclid lit a charcoal grill and talked of horror flicks.

“Before this, the last one I saw was TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE,” said James A., 20, as he stoked the coals. “In this last (movie), I was getting kind of sick with all the people eating intestines. But I’m up to some sausage now.”

James brought lawn chairs and a cooler of beer for his friends. The circle decided horror movies are good because “they got girls scared” and guys had to be brave to sit through them. They said that after one or two killings they get numb, and everything starts to seem funny.

“I try to see the humor in it all,” said Walter A., 21, as he hugged his girlfriend. He looked up to see the first minute of LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT PART II, in which an elderly woman in a wheelchair is hanged by an unknown assailant.

“Wow,” exclaimed Walter, “I never saw that before.”

LAST HOUSE squeezed in 15 murders before it ended. Then came MASSACRE AT CENTRAL HIGH, in which a likable loner gets mad at some bullies and decides to blow them up. Then there are more bullies – and more bombs. Finally, near the end of the film, the hero concludes that everybody in the school is a bully.

The high school is in California. The drive-in crowd hated Californians. The horns honked.

Even Leoanrd and Kathy were worn out after MASSACRE.

“We’re going to Denny’s,” Leonard yelled over his idling motor.

Kathy recommended tonight’s showing of SALEM’S LOT on WJKW Channel 8: “It’s on TV, and it’s still scary.”

By the time frenzied house cats had chewed up the villain in FLESH GRINDERS, the night’s carnage was complete: 55 murders, not counting a few walking corpses.

About a third of the original 1,928 patrons stayed until the bitter end at 3:20 a.m. Ushers tried vainly to awaken half of them. A lone police car waited outside the drive-in.

As manager McCauley walked toward the exit gate, he spotted a man leaning out of a speeding car.

The man was screaming, “Not enough blood!”

One-Sheet of the Week: FISTS OF BRUCE LEE (1978)

FU JI (1977)

U.S. release as FISTS OF BRUCE LEE in 1978

The Endangered List (Case File #48)

THERE IS NO 13 (1974)

Written and directed
by William Sachs

Produced by
Robert Boggs and William Sachs

Cinematography by
Ralf D. Bode

Music by
Riz Ortolani

Edited by
George T. Norris

CAST
Mark Damon (as George Thomas)
Margaret Markov (as Number Eleven)
Harvey Lembeck (as Older George)
Jean Jennings (as Number Twelve)
Lee Moore (as Dr. Honneycutt)
Reuben Schafer (as Mr. A.)
Bonnie Inch (as Rosie)

91 minutes
No MPAA rating (?)
Released by Film Ventures International circa 1976-1977

Variety review

This first feature item by William Sachs is an ambitious (perhaps overly so) and interesting attempt to put onto film the day and nightmares of war vets, and with them to convey the deterrent horrors and permanent mental physical mutilations that result from any violent conflict.

Though intricately patterned and thought out via flashes forward and back, and despite some amusing and well-routined components to the mosaic, too much of the pic remains talky (key character speaks almost endlessly at camera) and jumpy to form an effective whole, and its chances must ultimately be assessed as spotty.

Action revolves principally around a youth (well played by Mark Damon) and his vocally and visually-expressed daydreams (or reminiscences, or both: it’s that kind of picture) on life, love, death and existence in general. We witness, among many other things, his 11th and 12th love affairs but, as the title says, there is to be no thirteenth, not in the traditional sense anyway, as evidenced by the deliberately shock-tactic finale.

Though one may have one’s doubts about the core of the film rather than some of its more effective passages, there is no denying the director’s sincere emotional involvement with his subject, and despite some youthful pretension, a sure knowledge of his medium. With above reservations, all departments a very smooth and attractive job. – Hawk.

(Reviewed July 2, 1974 at the Berlin Film Festival. Published in Variety on July 10, 1974)

Thanks to Robin Bougie and Fred Adelman for the Variety advertisement

One-Sheet of the Week: DAUGHTERS OF SATAN and SUPERBEAST (1972)

DAUGHTERS OF SATAN and SUPERBEAST (1972) combo

Claudia Jennings Weekend Blog-A-Thon Links

Here's the list of the blogs participating in the Claudia Jennings Weekend Blog-A-Thon.

POPCORN & STICKY FLOORS
Claudia Jennings: 30 Years Gone

MADE FOR TV MAYHEM
Claudia on THE BRADY BUNCH
Claudia in SISTERS OF DEATH

JOHNNY LARUE'S CRANE SHOT
Claudia Jennings Weekend Blog-A-Thon

JOHN CAIRNS
The Late, Great Claudia Jennings

Special thanks to Amanda by Night of Made For TV Mayhem, Michael Greenwood of Popcorn & Sticky Floors, John Cairns, and Marty McKee of Johnny Larue's Crane Shot.