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Loni Anderson wasn’t the first comic actress to turn stereotypes about blonde bombshells on their head. Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield and Mamie Van Doren entertained a generation of moviegoers with flirty, “not as dumb as she looks” performances. The idea that a sexy woman could also be smart shouldn’t have been a revelation, but it seemed to fool a lot of comedy lunks.

Anderson, who passed away Sunday just a few days shy of her 80th birthday, subverted those comic conventions on the sitcom Wkrp in Cincinnati. The harried executive’s buxom blonde secretary had been a staple of Playboy magazine cartoons and dirty jokes for decades, but Wkrp receptionist Jennifer Marlowe ignored the old punchlines. While she may have looked the part of the ditzy blonde, Marlowe was anything but. If Marilyn Monroe occasionally played dumb to trick others into getting her way, Marlowe played smart. Her receptionist title conveyed low status,...

In an interview on “Good Morning America” July 28, Jamie Lee Curtis — who has made many a-headline herself recently — said she has made it her mission to get Lindsay Lohan cast as Ann-Margret in a biopic of the legendary star.

“I’m going to out you now to the world — I want her to do the Ann-Margret story,” Curtis said. “So, every day on Instagram… I find videos of her back in the day, and I send [Lohan] every day videos [of Ann-Margret].” And Lohan added that she used to watch Ann-Margret’s movies with her grandmother.

In an interview with IndieWire, Ann-Margret said that she co-signs Lohan as her portrayer.

“I know that she wants to do that,” she said. “It just depends on what the dialogue is like. What can I say? I adore her. I think she’s full of talent, and I just would like to see what they can come up with.

Mamie Van Doren has outlived them all. One of the three heavy-hitter blonde bombshells of Hollywood’s golden age — the others, of course, being Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield — Van Doren is 94 years young and living a helluva life. On Labor Day weekend, she will be honored with the Legacy Award at the annual Cinecon Film Festival and present a screening of her underrated film noir, 1959’s “Guns, Girls and Gangsters.”

In the very definition of a wide-ranging interview, Van Doren spoke with IndieWire about her unique legacy, that string of movies in the ’50s and ’60s, but mostly her rollicking (and insanely interesting) personal life — a life that quite literally has included encounters with virtually every big name of the past 75 years. I mean, everyone. One of her first Universal Studios-arranged dates was with Rock Hudson. You know, the Rock Hudson that was an incredibly popular leading matinee idol,...

“Scream queen” Kathleen Hughes Rubin thrived for nearly a century in Hollywood. Despite her image as a sexy screen siren of the 1950s, she enjoyed an enduring marriage to producer Stanley Rubin, and was the beloved mother of four children and a joy to all who knew her.

The death of Kathleen Hughes May 19 at age 96 concluded a nostalgic chapter of cinematic history for the baby boomer generation who grew up with her films. For me, her passing was also the loss of a cherished friend. Kathy’s movie career began during the late 1940s as the studio system entered its Cretaceous Period by subsequently deploying CinemaScope, Vista Vision, Cinerama and similar innovations in an attempt to lure audiences away from their television sets and back into movie theaters. Science fiction and film noir became melded with the short-lived phenomenon of 3D, with Kathy becoming prominent by her appearances in...

Mara Corday, who was menaced by a huge hairy spider in the cult horror film Tarantula and appeared in several films thanks to Clint Eastwood, whom she called a “godsend,” has died. She was 95.

Corday died Feb. 9 at her home in Valencia, California, according to a death certificate filed with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health that was obtained by The Washington Post. The cause was arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease.

A onetime contract player at Universal-International, Corday also worked in many Westerns, among them Drums Across the River (1954), starring Audie Murphy; King Vidor’s Man Without a Star (1955), starring Kirk Douglas; and The Quiet Gun (1957), starring Forrest Tucker.

She said she was especially proud of her turn as a fun-loving French girl in the Technicolor romantic musical comedy So This Is Paris (1954), directed by Richard Quine and starring Tony Curtis and Gloria DeHaven.

Corday was married to actor Richard Long (Bourbon Street Beat,...

Clint Eastwood began his professional screen acting career in 1955, and he was able to land multiple small roles almost right away. In his first year of employment, Eastwood appeared in an episode of "Highway Patrol" and in the TV movie "Allen in Movieland." On the big screen, he made his debut in Jack Arnold's "Revenge of the Creature," a sequel to his 1954 classic "Creature from the Black Lagoon." Eastwood only had one scene, but he left an impression as a forgetful lab technician. That same year, the young Eastwood also appeared in "Francis in the Navy," the sixth of seven ultra-successful Francis the Talking Mule movies, as well as an uncredited Saxon warrior in the period drama "Lady Godiva of Coventry." 

Eastwood rounded out 1955 by re-teaming with Jack Arnold for the creature feature "Tarantula." A relatively well-regarded matinée monster movie, "Tarantula" is about, you guessed it, a giant tarantula...

When it comes to champions of forgotten sex symbols, you can’t do much better than Quentin Tarantino.

Snubs from the annual Oscars in memoriam segment are always uncomfortable, but 2023 was an especially awkward year for the Academy. Leslie Jordan, Anne Heche, Tom Sizemore, Paul Sorvino, and more celebrities who had recently passed were excluded from the ceremony. For the late Stella Stevens — a blonde bombshell known for decades of TV and film, and who at 83 had died just one month earlier from advanced Alzheimer’s disease — facing disrespect from the industry was always routine.

“I wrote letters to the Motion Picture Academy,” said filmmaker Andrew Stevens, Stella’s only son. With hundreds of credits to his name, the director, producer, and actor makes himself as busy as his late mother but is best known for appearing in 1978’s “The Boys in Company C.” Speaking with IndieWire earlier this January,...

Andrew Stevens pays loving but not hagiographic tribute to his late mother, famed actress Stella Stevens, in his documentary recently showcased at the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival. The film convincingly makes the case that its subject, best known for her performances in such pictures as The Poseidon Adventure and The Nutty Professor, is severely underrated, both as an actress and social activist. Stella Stevens: The Last Starlet aims to rectify that perception and, thanks to numerous clips of her work and effusive commentary by the likes of Quentin Tarantino and Vivica A. Fox, it succeeds beautifully.

The filmmaker (who appears frequently) admits that his relationship with his mother was rocky, to say the least, in the early years. Born in Yazoo City, Mississippi, Stevens got married at age 16 and had Andrew, her first and only child, six months later. The marriage soon dissolved, and when she moved to Hollywood to pursue an acting career,...

Peggy Moffitt, the iconic ’60s model who was also a contract player at Paramount and who appeared in Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blow-Up, died at her Beverly Hills home on Saturday from complications of dementia. Her son, Christopher Claxton, confirmed the news to the New York Times. She was 86.

Moffitt’s wide-ranging influence can be traced to the persona she created, often in collaboration with others. Her gamine, modern look was a construct made up of her signature pale skin, harlequin eye makeup, five-point Vidal Sassoon haircut and a sense of humor, all of which she never abandoned.

She had a cultural moment when, in 1964, she posed in a topless swimsuit from designer Rudi Gernreich. The controversial look referenced a schoolboy’s shorts, with thin suspenders rising in a “V” between the cleavage, but nothing else above the waistline. The resulting image, which ran in publications across the world, was condemned...

The days of Quentin Tarantino being tied to a Star Trek movie go back to 2017, with the project in development for a handful of years before being scrapped. And although it wouldn’t have been written by him — an out of character move for the auteur — it still would have had those Qt touches…like violence. So would we have gotten the surely iconic line, “Ah man, I shot Spock in the face!”?

Screenwriter Mark L. Smith recalled meeting with Tarantino at J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions, pitching an idea that felt authentically Qt. Smith would play a key role in writing the script, with Tarantino of course bringing his voice to it. As Smith put it, “I think his vision was just to go hard. It was a hard R. It was going to be some Pulp Fiction violence. Not a lot of the language, we saved a...

Francis the Talking Mule – 7 Film Collection

Blu ray

Kino Lorber

1950 – 1957 / 1.33:1, 2:1, 1.85:1

Starring Donald O’Connor, Chill Wills, Piper Laurie, Julie Adams

Written by David Stern, Oscar Brodney

Directed by Arthur Lubin, Charles Lamont

Born in 1909, David “Tom” Stern III was a journalist who lived a long and prosperous life—his father was media magnate J. David Stern, publisher of the now-defunct Philadelphia Record, the New York Post, and New Jersey’s Courier-Post. The younger Stern emulated his father’s success in the newspaper business; by 1949, Stern III was able to purchase the New Orleans Item-Tribune for 2,000,000. The rest of his fortune arrived in 1946 with Francis, The Talking Mule, Stern’s tall tale about a loquacious donkey. The scope of the book’s success was almost as unreal as the mule itself. In 1999, on Stern’s 90th birthday, a friend dedicated this verse;

Here’s a toast to Tom Stern

A man of great class.

The Girl Can’t Help It

Blu ray

Criterion

1957 / 2.35:1 / 98 Min.

Starring Jayne Mansfield, Tom Ewell, Edmond O’Brien

Written by Frank Tashlin

Directed by Frank Tashlin

In 1957 it was commonplace for burlesque comedians to share the bill with a musical act or two, but in New York’s theater district one of those revues stood out from the rest—it opened on February 8th at The Roxy, a magnificent theater dubbed “The Cathedral of the Motion Picture.” But that cathedral had never held a service like Frank Tashlin’s The Girl Can’t Help It—for 98 minutes the congregation was cajoled, regaled, and set free by a parade of clownish mobsters, gyrating showgirls and hyperventilating rockers raising the roof in 4 track stereo—the only thing missing was 3D—and who needed that with Jayne Mansfield center screen and busting out all over. William Castle introduced the gimmicky Emergo for House on Haunted Hill...

The psychotronic title is perhaps exploitation virtuoso Albert Zugsmith’s greatest gift to cinema. But ultimately, no film could live up to the forbidden delights promised although this one certainly tries. Anticipating Zugsmith’s gradual descent into total sleaze, this bizarre clunker features a ramshackle robot named “Thinko” (voiced by Al himself) who draws extra duty in the film’s alternate “International version” surrounded by a bevy of topless strippers. The diligent folks at Warner Archive have gifted us with this uncensored edition for their long-awaited (by Mamie Van Doren and bongo-playing chimp fans) stellar DVD release.

The post Sex Kittens Go to College appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

A nuclear age title suitable for a Mamie Van Doren movie, Atomic Blonde stars Charlize Theron as Lorraine Broughton, a CIA agent with killer looks and a lethal left hook. Powered by an eclectic cast featuring James McAvoy and John Goodman, director David Leitch’s critically acclaimed thriller was based on Antony Johnston and Sam Hart’s graphic novel, The Coldest City.

The post Atomic Blonde appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

Sometimes a long-running TV show finds itself linked to a certain holiday. Community had Christmas. The Simpsons has Halloween. Brooklyn 99 had Halloween, then changed it to Cinco de Mayo for scheduling reasons. Saturday Night Live has…Election Day, I guess? I probably should have thought this through a bit more.

While Mystery Science Theater 3000 has done a handful of Christmas-themed episodes, the series has a much deeper relationship with Thanksgiving. Turkey Day is essentially its legacy. It started on Thanksgiving and it always comes back to that one Thursday in late November, whether the show is on the air or not.

Back in 1988, Joel Hodgson created a new show idea inspired by a random image from the liner notes of an Elton John album, wherein a couple of silhouettes sit in front of a movie screen. He and some robot puppets would watch bad movies and crack jokes. While the...

Lori Nelson, the 1950s starlet who was kidnapped by an amphibious monster in Revenge of the Creature and portrayed Barbara Stanwyck’s younger daughter in Douglas Sirk’s All I Desire, has died. She was 87.

Nelson had been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease for several years and died Sunday at her home in the Porter Ranch section of Los Angeles, her daughter Jennifer Mann said.

In Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair (1952) and Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki (1955), Nelson played Rosie Kettle, one of the daughters of the characters played by Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride in the Universal series of films.

Nelson also made her mark in I Died a Thousand Times (1955), a remake of the Humphrey Bogart classic High Sierra in which she portrayed the club-footed love interest of Jack Palance’s crook; Pardners (1956), working opposite Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in their penultimate film together...

Even those who consider themselves experts in the subject will find a provocative treasure trove of images and anecdotes in “Skin: A History of Nudity in the Movies.” Danny Wolf’s documentary is a breezy, open-eyed, and often encyclopedic compendium of all the ways the cinema has celebrated, exploited, and negotiated the power of the naked body. The film opens with a montage of actors and directors recalling the first movie they ever saw that had nudity in it, and that allows the film, in its early moments, to leap through some of Nudity’s Greatest Hits.

As it moves back in time, one of the documentary’s fascinations is the way it’s constantly juxtaposing big Hollywood movies and European art movies and softcore exploitation films and everything in between. That, of course, is just as it should be. Aesthetically, there’s a world of difference between “Vixen” and “The Virgin Spring,...

Nudity in film has been around as long as the movies themselves — you just have to know where to look. Starting with the hedonistic pre-Code Hollywood all the way through the power-checking #MeToo moment, Danny Wolf’s comprehensive new documentary “Skin: A History of Nudity in the Movies” unpacks the political, artistic, and social landscapes that allowed nakedness to happen, or not, on the big screen. , especially those with a predilection for depravity, and should send even the most learned moviegoer home with plenty of material to revisit or discover anew.

“Skin: A History of Nudity in the Movies” opens with the idea that Hollywood, way back when, was far less prude than it is now — “the Sodom of the pacific,” one critic says — dating all the way back to D.W. Griffiths’ problematic early movies. But before the Hays Code made nudity in films a moral concern through its censorship guidelines,...

Hollywood icon Rock Hudson gets a new twist on his history in Netflix's Hollywood. If you're wondering whether the real Rock Hudson ever got married, you're in for a sad answer. Despite being gay, Hudson did get married in the 1950s. Although Hollywood gives him a much happier romance, the real Hudson's marriage was disastrous on all fronts.

In 1955, Hudson married Phyllis Gates, the secretary of his agent, Henry Willson. Gates actually does appear in a few scenes in Hollywood, though only in her capacity as Willson's secretary, not as Hudson's love interest; the show's alternate history has Hudson (played by Jake Picking) falling in love with a (wholly fictional) screenwriter, Archie Coleman (played by Jeremy Pope). In her 1987 book, My Husband, Rock Hudson, Gates said she had lived with and dated Hudson before he proposed and she had believed their marriage to be a love match at the time.

Gavin Jasper Nov 27, 2019

In 1988, an oddball comedy experiment hit a certain Uhf station on Thanksgiving and as it grew, so did the MST3K connection to the holiday.

Sometimes a long-running TV show finds itself linked to a certain holiday. Community had Christmas. The Simpsons has Halloween. Brooklyn 99 had Halloween, then changed it to Cinco de Mayo for scheduling reasons. Saturday Night Live has...Election Day, I guess? I probably should have thought this through a bit more.

While Mystery Science Theater 3000 has done a handful of Christmas-themed episodes, the series has a much deeper releationship with Thanksgiving. Turkey Day is essentially its legacy. It started on Thanksgiving and it always comes back to that one Thursday in late November, whether the show is on the air or not.

Back in 1988, Joel Hodgson created a new show idea inspired by a random image from the liner notes of an Elton John album,...

Former Another World writer Jan Merlin died on September 20 in Los Angeles. He was 94.

Born on April 3, 1925, Merlin was a torpedo man aboard U.S. Navy destroyers during World War II. He studied acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York and appeared in the ensemble in the original 1948 Broadway production of "Mister Roberts," starring Henry Fonda.

From 1950-54, Merlin starred as Roger Manning on the kids TV program Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, based on a comic strip.

He moved to Hollywood for a role in Six Bridges to Cross (1955), starring Curtis, then appeared with Mamie Van Doren in Running Wild (1955), with Dale Robertson in A Day of Fury (1956), with Tom Tryon in Screaming Eagles (1956) and with Ann Sheridan in Woman and the Hunter (1957).

In 1958-59, Merlin portrayed Lt. Colin Kirby on The Rough Riders, an ABC series set in the aftermath of the Civil War.

His credits also included the...

John Wayne! Janet Leigh! Nifty jet-age flying sequences! Goofy, bad-taste sex jokes! Hans Conreid as a chortling Russian army officer! Howard Hughes’ personal fun project took seven years to make while he played games with the aerial footage. It’s a highly-polished absurd joke, but it’s certainly entertaining. See Hughes try to do for Janet Leigh what he did for Jane Russell — I assume Ms. Leigh was too shrewd to sign any long-term contracts! This German disc has excellent widescreen image and audio.

Jet Pilot

Blu-ray

Explosive Media GmbH

1957 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 113 min. / Düsenjäger / Street Date June 14 2018, 2019 / 12.99 euros

Starring: John Wayne, Janet Leigh, Jay C. Flippen, Paul Fix, Richard Rober, Roland Winters, Hans Conried, Ivan Triesault, Hall Bartlett, Gregg Barton, Gene Evans, Paul Frees, Harry Lauter, Nelson Leigh, Denver Pyle, Gene Roth, Kenneth Tobey, Mamie Van Doren, Carleton Young.

Cinematography: Winton C. Hoch

Aerial Stunts: Chuck Yeager

Original Music:...

Mamie Van Doren Film Noir Collection

Blu ray

Kl Studio Classics

1957 – 1959 / 1.75:1, 1.85:1, / 216 Min. / Street Date – November 20, 2018

Starring Mamie Van Doren, Anne Bancroft, Lee Van Cleef, Lex Barker

Cinematography by Stanley Cortez, William Margulies

Directed by Howard Koch, Edward Cahn

Mamie Van Doren, née Joan Lucille Olander, was born in Rowena, South Dakota in 1931. In 1942 the family relocated to Hollywood where the camera-ready kid blossomed at the speed of light – a Pantages usherette at the age of 13, she racked up a string of attention-grabbing gigs that led to a reign as Miss Eight Ball and the inevitable merger with Tinseltown’s preeminent lounge lizard, Howard Hughes.

That arrangement generated a distinctly higher-profile for the industrious starlet – from an eye-popping Alberto Vargas pinup to swivel-hipped walk-ons in a series of forgettable potboilers and finally a contract at Universal. A cheeky studio exec christened her “Mamie” thereby hijacking the name of President...

This Jayne Mansfield documentary is bafflingly callous about her death in a car crash and focuses too much on her involvement with seedy self-publicist Anton Lavey

This scrappy, shallow, incurious documentary about the final two years in the life of movie star Jayne Mansfield is disappointing, despite an interesting lineup of interviewees – including Tippi Hedren, John Waters, Mamie Van Doren, Kenneth Anger – and some academic figures promising perspectives from feminist and queer studies that don’t really materialise.

I was hoping for an exuberant and clear-sighted reappraisal of Mansfield as an underappreciated entertainment star who was working within a very male Playboy-style idea of blond-bombshell sexiness. Instead, the film is bafflingly callous about her death in a car accident – and indeed the suffering of her young son, mauled by a lion at a private zoo – and weirdly obsessed with the tabloid headlines about Mansfield’s association with a very tiresome...

The Splathouse podcast team heads to Haddonfield with their new episode on Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, and you can listen to it in today's Horror Highlights. We also have a Q&A with the writer/director of Sightings, a new prize pack contest from our friends at Comet TV, a trailer for Aliens: Zone of Silence, release details and a trailer for the stranger than fiction documentary Mansfield 66/67, a look at Line Webtoon's horror anthology comic series, and details on the Kickstarter campaign for the Zombie Doctor tabletop game.

Listen to a New Episode of the Splathouse Podcast: From Splathouse: "One, two, Chucky’s coming for you, pinhead!

This week the goobs at Splathouse watched Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers (1995) and just barely survived! Pervy Paul (Don’t Call Me Stephen) Rudd, culty runes/ruins/ruse, miraculous household appliances, and the lack of any coherency: This movie has it all!

Killer Greek scenery in CinemaScope graces Jean Negulesco's relaxed thriller about art theft in the Aegean. But viewers are more likely to remember Sophia Loren's sexy wet diving costume that insured that her American debut didn't go unnoticed. Boy on a Dolphin Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 111 min. / Street Date October 25, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Alan Ladd, Clifton Webb, Sophia Loren, Alexis Minotis, Jorge Mistral, Laurence Naismith, Piero Giagnoni, Gertrude Flynn, Marni Nixon (voice), Scilla Gabel (Loren underwater). Cinematography Milton R. Krasner Film Editor William Mace Original Music Hugo Friedhofer Written by Ivan Moffat, Dwight Taylor from the novel by David Divine Produced by Samuel G. Engel Directed by Jean Negulesco

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Back when working on extras for The Guns of Navarone we saw documentation showing that Columbia Pictures had to jump through a lot of hoops with the Greek Royal Family...

The recent box office success of The Boss firmly establishes Melissa McCarthy as the current queen of movie comedies (Amy Schumer could be a new contender after an impressive debut last Summer with Trainwreck), but let us think back about those other funny ladies of filmdom. So while we’re enjoying the female reboot/re-imagining of Ghostbusters and those Bad Moms, here’s a top ten list that will hopefully inspire lots of laughter and cause you to search out some classic comedies. It’s tough to narrow them down to ten, but we’ll do our best, beginning with… 10. Eve Arden The droll Ms. Arden represents the comic sidekicks who will attempt to puncture the pomposity of the leading ladies with a well-placed wisecrack (see also the great Thelma Ritter in Rear Window). Her career began in the early 1930’s with great bit roles in Stage Door and Dancing Lady.

Noted moralist Albert Zugsmith takes the directorial reins on this smutty followup to "High School Confidential" that pushes the envelope about as far as a 1960 studio picture could go, and emerges as pretty entertaining for mostly the wrong reasons. Steve Allen (!) is the crusading sex researcher who seems to find Mamie Van Doren a suitable target — for study of course.

Noted moralist Al Zugsmith takes the directorial reins on this smutty followup to High School Confidential that pushes the envelope about as far as a 1960 studio picture could go, and emerges as pretty entertaining for mostly the wrong reasons. Steve Allen (!) is the crusading sex researcher who seems to find Mamie Van Doren a suitable target-- for study of course.

1958’s "High School Confidential" is an exploitation natural made by two pros who knew the genre inside and out: producer Albert Zugsmith ("Sex Kittens Go To College") and director Jack Arnold ("The Incredible Shrinking Man"). Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy "Bucket of Blood."...

1958’s High School Confidential is an exploitation natural made by two pros who knew the genre inside and out: producer Albert Zugsmith (Sex Kittens Go To College) and director Jack Arnold (The Incredible Shrinking Man). Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy Bucket of Blood.

Albert Zugsmith’s 1960 film about a motley band of misfits transported back to the Garden of Eden plays like a sexploitation farce written by Rod Serling. The movie never lives up to the salacious possibilities of its title but with its wacky casting coups (including Mickey Rooney as the devil and Mamie Van Doren as Eve!), who can complain? Boasting a B-movie dream cast including Tuesday Weld and Mel Torme, it was written by Robert Hill, the scribe behind Zugsmith’s similarly gonzo "Confessions of an Opium Eater."...

Albert Zugmith’s 1960 film about a motley band of misfits transported back to the Garden of Eden plays like a sexploitation farce written by Rod Serling. The movie never lives up to the salacious possibilities of its title but with its wacky casting coups (including Mickey Rooney as the devil and Mamie Van Doren as Eve!), who can complain? Boasting a B-movie dream cast including Tuesday Weld and Mel Torme, it was written by Robert Hill, the scribe behind Zugsmith’s similarly gonzo Confessions of an Opium Eater.

Curtis Harrington took an assignment nobody else would and fashioned a gem of low-budget Sci-Fi. A Russian space epic provides expensive-looking special effects scenes for a new horror show about a deadly alien rescued from a crash landing on Mars. The extras include excellent interviews with Roger Corman and effects specialist / historian Robert Skotak.

Queen of Blood Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1966 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 80 min. / Street Date December 1, 2015 / 29.95 Starring John Saxon, Basil Rathbone, Florence Marly, Judi Meredith, Dennis Hopper, Robert Boon, Don Eitner, Forrest J Ackerman. Cinematography Vilis Lapenieks Film Editor Leo Shreve Original Music Ronald Stein Written by Curtis Harrington from the Soviet film Mechte navstrechu Produced by Samuel Z. Arkoff, George Edwards Directed by Curtis Harrington

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

A.I.P. released some tacky movies in its day but none were less respected than those cobbled together from foreign imports spiked with new filmed-in-Hollywood storylines.

What could possibly connect the dots between early seventies softcore sexploitation, mid-seventies blaxploitation, and late-seventies giallo horror? Between cult B-flick hellcats Laurene Landon, Mamie Van Doren and Dyanne Thorne (Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS), and the lofty laureled likes of Orson Welles and Rex Harrison? Who else could claim he helped propel histrionic singing divas Pia Zadora and Lola Falana toward movie stardom…even if those efforts failed? Or that he repeatedly directed talents as wildly diverse as Millie Perkins (The Diary of Anne Frank), Hollywood’s favorite “drunk homeless dude” portraitist George “Buck” Flower, or the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling (aka G.L.O.W.)? Who but Matt Cimber?>> - Dennis Harvey...

What could possibly connect the dots between early seventies softcore sexploitation, mid-seventies blaxploitation, and late-seventies giallo horror? Between cult B-flick hellcats Laurene Landon, Mamie Van Doren and Dyanne Thorne (Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS), and the lofty laureled likes of Orson Welles and Rex Harrison? Who else could claim he helped propel histrionic singing divas Pia Zadora and Lola Falana toward movie stardom…even if those efforts failed? Or that he repeatedly directed talents as wildly diverse as Millie Perkins (The Diary of Anne Frank), Hollywood’s favorite “drunk homeless dude” portraitist George “Buck” Flower, or the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling (aka G.L.O.W.)? Who but Matt Cimber?>> - Dennis Harvey...

What could possibly connect the dots between early seventies softcore sexploitation, mid-seventies blaxploitation, and late-seventies giallo horror? Between cult B-flick hellcats Laurene Landon, Mamie Van Doren and Dyanne Thorne (Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS), and the lofty laureled likes of Orson Welles and Rex Harrison? Who else could claim he helped propel histrionic singing divas Pia Zadora and Lola Falana toward movie stardom…even if those efforts failed? Or that he repeatedly directed talents as wildly diverse as Millie Perkins (The Diary of Anne Frank), Hollywood’s favorite “drunk homeless dude” portraitist George “Buck” Flower, or the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling (aka G.L.O.W.)? Who but Matt Cimber?>> - Dennis Harvey...

What could possibly connect the dots between early seventies softcore sexploitation, mid-seventies blaxploitation, and late-seventies giallo horror? Between cult B-flick hellcats Laurene Landon, Mamie Van Doren and Dyanne Thorne (Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS), and the lofty laureled likes of Orson Welles and Rex Harrison? Who else could claim he helped propel histrionic singing divas Pia Zadora and Lola Falana toward movie stardom…even if those efforts failed? Or that he repeatedly directed talents as wildly diverse as Millie Perkins (The Diary of Anne Frank), Hollywood’s favorite “drunk homeless dude” portraitist George “Buck” Flower, or the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling (aka G.L.O.W.)? Who but Matt Cimber?>> - Dennis Harvey...

Simone Simon: Remembering the 'Cat People' and 'La Bête Humaine' star (photo: Simone Simon 'Cat People' publicity) Pert, pretty, pouty, and fiery-tempered Simone Simon – who died at age 94 ten years ago, on Feb. 22, 2005 – is best known for her starring role in Jacques Tourneur's cult horror movie classic Cat People (1942). Those aware of the existence of film industries outside Hollywood will also remember Simon for her button-nosed femme fatale in Jean Renoir's French film noir La Bête Humaine (1938).[1] In fact, long before Brigitte Bardot, Annette Stroyberg, Mamie Van Doren, Tuesday Weld, Ann-Margret, and Barbarella's Jane Fonda became known as cinema's Sex Kittens, Simone Simon exuded feline charm – with a tad of puppy dog wistfulness – in a film career that spanned two continents and a quarter of a century. From the early '30s to the mid-'50s, she seduced men young and old on both...

'Cat People' 1942 actress Simone Simon Remembered: Starred in Jacques Tourneur's cult horror movie classic (photo: Simone Simon in 'Cat People') Pert, pouty, pretty Simone Simon is best remembered for her starring roles in Jacques Tourneur's cult horror movie Cat People (1942) and in Jean Renoir's French film noir La Bête Humaine (1938). Long before Brigitte Bardot, Mamie Van Doren, Ann-Margret, and (for a few years) Jane Fonda became known as cinema's Sex Kittens, Simone Simon exuded feline charm in a film career that spanned a quarter of a century. From the early '30s to the mid-'50s, she seduced men young and old on both sides of the Atlantic – at times, with fatal results. During that period, Simon was featured in nearly 40 movies in France, Italy, Germany, Britain, and Hollywood. Besides Jean Renoir, in her native country she worked for the likes of Jacqueline Audry...

Jerry Lee Lewis kicks it off with some barn-burning rock n’ roll and then surrenders the stage to a cast made in B-movie heaven including Bad Girl Par Excellence, Mamie Van Doren and Russ Tamblyn as an undercover agent investigating a drug ring at the local high school. Roger Corman regular Mel Welles contributed a few lines of satirical poetry presaging the beatnik doggerel he’d compose for Corman’s 1959 horror-comedy "Bucket of Blood."...

Moviefone's Top DVD of the Week

"Belle"

What's It About? This 18th century English romance is about Dido Belle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), a biracial woman raised by her aristocratic great uncle and aunt, Lord and Lady Mansfield. She grows up alongside her cousin Elizabeth (Sarah Gadon) as equals and best friends, but as they come of age, their differences become all too apparent -- to each other and to their would-be suitors. Meanwhile, Lord Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson) is facing a trial as Lord Chief Justice of England that could change the future of slavery. Will Dido find love on her own terms?

Why We're In: It's an elegant period piece perfect for Jane Austen fans, and it's a subtle but effective examination of the intersection of class and race in 18th century England. Mbatha-Raw is fantastic, and director Amma Asante has an excellent eye for detail.

Moviefone's Top Blu-ray of the...

Here's a sampling of what's new on Warner Archive Instant for August 2014!

Warner Archive Instant, the streaming video service that features hundreds of movies and TV shows from Warner Bros.' extensive catalog, just added some great titles for August, including James Garner's critically accalimed western series Nichols and a personal favorite, the Hanna-Barbera live action animal disaster film The Beasts Are On The Streets. Yeah, you read that right - a live-action animal disaster film from cartoon greats Hanna-Barbera. You can click right here to read my review of the DVD for Cinelinx. It's cheesy 70's fun.

If you aren't currently subscribed to Warner Archive Instant, you can click right here to get a free two week trial. Trust me, if you love classic movies and television, it's worth it.

Here's what's new:

Nichols: The Complete Series (1971-72) James Garner stars as Nichols, an Army lifer who...

Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: Aug. 26, 2014

Price: DVD $24.95, Blu-ray $29.95

Studio: Olive Films

Jan Sterling (ctr.), Russ Tamblyn, Mamie Van Doren, and her torpedo bra star in High School Confidential!

High School Confidential! is generally regarded as one of the most memorable and iconic B-movies of the 1950s–a real cult favorite masquerading as a crime boiled crime drama….

The film stars Russ Tamblyn (West Side Story) as Tony Baker, the new kid at Santa Bellow High, whose cocky attitude and ambitious weed-dealing enable him to infiltrate the gang of a local narcotics boss played by Jackie Coogan (TVs The Addams Family).

Directed by Jack Arnold (Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Incredible Shrinking Man) and released in 1958, High School Confidential! deliciously swims in its exploitation of bad girls, fast cars and raunchy rock’n’roll.

Most notably, the movie features the sexy and shapely Mamie Van Doren in her most outrageous role,...

Warner Archive Week! kicks off at Trailers from Hell, with director and Tfh creator Joe Dante introducing "Sex Kittens Go to College."The psychotronic title is perhaps exploitation virtuoso Albert Zugsmith’s greatest gift to cinema. But ultimately, no film could live up to the forbidden delights promised although this one certainly tries. Anticipating Zugsmith’s gradual descent into total sleaze, this bizarre clunker features a ramshackle robot named “Thinko” (voiced by Al himself) who draws extra duty in the film’s alternate “International version” surrounded by a bevy of topless strippers. The diligent folks at Warner Archives have gifted us with this uncensored edition for their long-awaited (by Mamie Van Doren and bongo-playing chimp fans) stellar dvd release.

The psychotronic title is perhaps exploitation virtuoso Albert Zugsmith’s greatest gift to cinema. But ultimately, no film could live up to the forbidden delights promised although this one certainly tries. Anticipating Zugsmith’s gradual descent into total sleaze, this bizarre clunker features a ramshackle robot named “Thinko” (voiced by Al himself) who draws extra duty in the film’s alternate “International version” surrounded by a bevy of topless strippers. The diligent folks at Warner Archives have gifted us with this uncensored edition for their long-awaited (by Mamie Van Doren and bongo-playing chimp fans) stellar dvd release.

The post Sex Kittens Go to College appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: April 22, 2014

Price: DVD $29.95, Blu-ray $34.95

Studio: Music Box

The 2012 documentary Bettie Page Reveals All takes an intimate look at one of the world’s most recognized sex symbols, the legendary pin-up queen Bettie Page.

The first and only authorized film biography of the “Queen of Curves,” the movie is filled with iconic and rare photographs and film loops, including unseen images from private collections, the real Bettie Page emerges from 40 years of enigmatic seclusion to tell her story in her own words via audio interviews taped a decade prior to her death in 2008. With her lively Tennessee twang , Bettie recounts her life — from humble beginnings as one of six children in an impoverished Southern family, to high school salutatorian, to scandalous 50s pin-up model, to a short-lived first marriage and series of torrid affairs, up to her retirement in 1957 at the peak of her modeling career.

Also...

The life of famed 1950s pinup model Bettie Page is examined in a whole new way in the documentary Bettie Page Reveals All, which you can see in the first trailer. Director Mark Mori conducted interviews with the model herself, 10 years before her death in 2008, where she candidly tells her life story. Pop culture icons such as Dita Von Teese, Hugh M. Hefner, Rebecca Romijn and many more also share how Bettie Page influenced their lives. This documentary from Music Box Films opens in New York and Los Angeles November 29.

The world's greatest pinup model and cult icon, Bettie Page, recounts the true story of how her free expression overcame government witch-hunts to help launch America's sexual revolution.

Bettie Page Reveals All comes to theaters November 29th, 2013 and stars Bettie Page, Dita Von Teese, Hugh M. Hefner, Rebecca Romijn, Tempest Storm, Bunny Yeager, Perez Hilton, Mamie Van Doren. The film is directed by Mark Mori.

“What is most beautiful in virile men is something feminine; what is most beautiful in feminine women is something masculine,” observed Susan Sontag, who was both a little butch and a lot beautiful. I remembered this quote today in part because I noticed that "Victor/Victoria," starring Julie Andrews as the unemployed performer who finds a work as a male drag queen, was on TCM tonight. And in part because the image it conjured was watching "Taking Woodstock," when in walked Vilma, a musclebound blonde in a candy-pink dress, who resembled Mamie Van Doren with stubble. S/he spoke in a familiar voice, like honey mixed with molten asphalt. Holy cow! Liev Schreiber in drag?!? (In his first screen performance, "Mixed Nuts," he was also a cross-dresser.) In "Taking Woodstock," I particularly liked the contrast of pink frock and Deep Purple voice. I’d nominate him for cinema’s genderbender Hall of Fame.

Submit your vote for Reviewer of the Year!

Every year, the Classic Horror Film Board recognizes the best in the horror/sci-fi/fantasy realm with the Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards. Fans of the genre can vote for their favorites in over thirty categories, and this year, Cinelinx would like to ask you to vote for one of our own, staff writer Victor Medina, as Reviewer of the Year (Category 29)! We've even included the ballot below so you can vote!

Votes must be submitted by copying and pasting the ballot into your personal email, making your choices, including your name, and sending it in. Votes for Reviewer of the Year are write-in only, so you must be sure to include Vic's name yourself under Category 29 when you vote. Pre-filled ballots are not allowed, so we can't do it for you! Remember, you must write in "Victor Medina, Cinelinx.com" yourself.