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[bowers]

I picked up my Blackie discs about four years ago on e-bay. Amazon.com has a link to a 15 movie set for about $40.00 from somebody named Skaryguy.com, but it looks like it may be a pirate.  Some oldtime radio companies do sell a combination disc with both radio and tv episodes. Sharpe's Rifles discs are pretty easy to find but can be quite pricey. Luckily for me there is a discount video/bookstore outlet (Hastings) in our city. I've been able to buy about ten episodes, mostly used for about $ 10.00. New ones are around $25.00. Certainly not cheap! Cheers, Bowers

[narfstar]

Blackie is public domain so they are not really pirated. I burned my Sharpe disks when it ran on BBC America. So I have a set. Netflix carries them but not online. They also do not carry it as any kind of series so you can only get one DVD at a time send it back wait for another. Which for anyone who has not seen Sharpe I would recommend as well worth it. The strong attitude of superiority by birth is strange to Americans were we practice superiority by wealth. Being sarcastic of course because we are supposed to practice equality and advancement by personal effort. Reality is what what is.

[josemas]

Good to hear I was not the only one who liked Skyline. I think most would if they know what to expect. I just watched the Dr Who Christmas Carol on DVR. It was OK not a favorite but OK. I used to watch Santa Conquers the Martians every year on Chiller Theater the Saturday night scifi/horror show hosted by Chilly Billy Cardilly who was Bill Cardill who was used as the newscaster for the original Night of the Living Dead. Was a double feature but turned to single in its later years. Cardill used to do little skits like the Mighty Carson Art Players from the Tonight Show. He had a character that could not lie that we just loved. The show was often sponsored by Subaru.

We had some of those horror hosts over the years out here in Phoenix too.  The last one was Edmus Scarey (real name Ed Muscare) who was still going strong and was quite popular into the late 1980s when he vanished from the airwaves abruptly in the wake of an unfortunate child molestation incident.

Best

Joe.   

[paw broon]

The new season pf Primeval did start at the weekend and did not disappoint.  This series was cancelled and I think it was something to do with ITV's financial problems but it's back with a bang.  Don't want to give the story away, although anyone who has seen the trailer will have a good idea. A year has past since Connor, Abby and Danny were stranded in the past........  Monsters are still well done and my wife and I both thought it was rather exciting.  Get on board ASAP.
Too much american football and cricket to watch many films but we squeezed in Smokescreen, a well done British b&w B film with Peter Vaughn and Gerald Flood. Also, 7 Days to Noon, a Boulting Brothers from 1950 with Andre Morell. How to make taut little thrillers in an easy lesson?  Just watch this.

[paw broon]

The new (to us, anyway) series of Castle started here last night. What an explosive storyline. Very exciting, great villain, bit of a stonker all round. Don't know how far behind we are in U.K so if anyone is going to talk about plots, please keep it very general.  Ta.

[bowers]

Just watched the new episode of "Primeval" and enjoyed it very much. I had never even heard of this show until reading Paw's post. It just very recently became available on BBC America (which I don't get). I do however get their small "On Demand" selection of programs and, luckily, "Primeval" was on the list. Hope to see some of the earlier episodes sometime. Cheers, Bowers

[narfstar]

We got the DVD of Grown Ups from Netflix. We did not even finish watching it and sent it back. What a waste of talents

[paw broon]

New season of Hustle started on BBC last night.  Nice, easy, good fun watch with a really good con.
NFL playoffs for us tonight.  Just made a meatball sauce for spaghetti, so that with a bottle of decent Italian red and hours of football is just about perfect.

[narfstar]

I will be making chili a little later for supper. I have to drink my glass of red wine about half an hour before bed because it puts me to sleep. Believe it or not my favorite is in a box. Franzia Chillable Red I really enjoy. Since taste is subjective, the higher price may not mean it tastes better to me and I like my box 

[josemas]

Blackie is public domain so they are not really pirated. I

Narf,

I think you may be in error about this.  One of my film buddies had me look up several of the Chester Morris Boston Blackie movies in the Film Superlist a few years back and all of the titles he had me check had their copyrights renewed.

Best

Joe

[narfstar]

Well the guy selling them on ebay has burned discs. Scaryguy may have something to be afraid of if reported.
Pretty sure the OTR are public domain. I mentioned burning my Sharpe DVD's but I do not sell them they are mine which is legal 

[CharlieRock]

Classic Dr. Who, Inspector Gadget, the Jackie Chan Adventures, Have Gun Will Travel, and a seriously campy gore-flick from Japan called Samurai Princess that I thought from the preview would be a serious movie. (Boy, was I surprised when the bad guy had a rocket propelled chainsaw for a foot)

[narfstar]

I watched a pretty neat movie called Heroic Trio dubbed Japanese film on IFC

I watched a couple of episodes of Have Gun will Travel last night.

Hey a rocket propelled chainsaw foot sounds cool.

[josemas]

I watched a pretty neat movie called Heroic Trio dubbed Japanese film on IFC

I watched a couple of episodes of Have Gun will Travel last night.

Hey a rocket propelled chainsaw foot sounds cool.

Ah, The Heroic Trio.  Very fun 1990s Hong Kong flick with three top Asian actresses of the era-Maggie Cheung, Michelle Yeoh and Anita Mui.  I used to rent a lot of Hong Kong videos back in the 1990s from Chinese and Vietnamese video shops.  It was about the only way to see them back then.  Now they're much more available via the internet, cable, satellite, DVD etc...
There's a sequel to The Heroic Trio called The Executioners which I never thought was as good as the first.

I gotta admit Charlie also caught my attention with that "rocket propelled chainsaw foot" reference.  I'll have to look for that one!

Best

Joe

[Roygbiv666]

Has anyone seen the 1960s Italian movie, "the Three Fantastic Supermen"? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061646/

I saw it and wanted the poster when it was shown at a Saturday matinee when I was a kid in the 1970s:

http://www.moviepostershop.com/the-three-fantastic-supermen-in-the-orient-movie-poster-1020507592.jpg

It was pretty stupid, but .. nice poster.

I watched a pretty neat movie called Heroic Trio dubbed Japanese film on IFC

I watched a couple of episodes of Have Gun will Travel last night.

Hey a rocket propelled chainsaw foot sounds cool.

Ah, The Heroic Trio.  Very fun 1990s Hong Kong flick with three top Asian actresses of the era-Maggie Cheung, Michelle Yeoh and Anita Mui.  I used to rent a lot of Hong Kong videos back in the 1990s from Chinese and Vietnamese video shops.  It was about the only way to see them back then.  Now there much more available via the internet, cable, satellite, DVD etc...
There's a sequel to The Heroic Trio called The Executioners which I never thought was as good as the first.

I gotta admit Charlie also caught my attention with that "rocket propelled chainsaw foot" reference too.  I'll have to look for that one too!

Best

Joe

[paw broon]

I remember watching Heroic Trio and thoroughly enjoying it.  Haven't seen the sequal or 3 Fantastic Supermen and the others in the series.  Extracts here:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tVBr2RXjd4
Always fancied it.  Forgive me if I've mentioned this before but there are a load of Turkish superhero films out there, which used to be on sale from Onar Films.   I have some of them and they are pretty awful, but fun.  Heaven only knows how the makers got away with it as they rip off Batman, Superman, Cap America, Phantom. Spy Smasher, El Santo, some James Bond music and much more.  I think You Tube has clips of Killink, a Turkish version of Kriminal and Killing, which was an Italian costumed villain in photo strip comics.
Just checked and I'm glad I didn't post a link to Killink on youtube as I'd forgotten how adult it is.
There is also stuff such as Puma Man, Argoman and lots more cheap superhero movies available.  I particularly enjoy Neutron, even though he is more a masked wrestler.

[narfstar]

I do not appreciate those types of movies as much as I once did. I was a big fan of the Mexican wrestler heroes but not so much any more. I would like to see clips of all those characters. The 3 Supermen poster does look cool like Stuntman. I put up some of those Italian Photo comics on GCD recently. BTW does anyone here know anything about the UK comic Tiger? It went through several combinations but need to know what issue numbers it carried which titles.

[paw broon]

Re. Tiger, I hope this is what you need.  There were a total of 1555 issues but they were only numbered up to #245. Title started in 1954 and on 21st. Oct. 1959, it merged with Comet, becoming Tiger and Comet.
(That's when you find those great Jet Ace Logan stories, which had run in Comet.) On 15th. May 1965, Tiger merged with Hurricane, becoming Tiger and Hurricane (Now it has the excellent Val Venture by Jesus Blasco.)
On 5th. Apr. 1969 it became Tiger and Jag, having swallowed up Jag.) And finally, on 1st. Nov. 1980 it merged with Speed and became Tiger and Speed.  Title came to an end on 8th Nov. 1965.  There were 2 unnumbered and undated  issues between June and Aug. 1959 and it went fortnightly (as opposed to weekly) Mar - Apr. 1974.  There were also hardback annuals from 1957 to 1987.
Most of the above is accurate, I think.  Tiger was part of a stable of weeklies published by Fleetway and always seemed to me when I was young, to play second fiddle to The Lion. The other great publisher of weekly comics (originally storypapers) was D.C. Thomson, a Scottish company, who had Hotspur, Adventure,
Rover etc. I'll try to find some web refs. now for Tiger and Thomson stuff and get back if I find them.
If this isn't what you wanted, sorry.  But let me know what other info.you require.
A bit on Tiger (the rest of the blog's worth a look, too.  Lew's a really nice guy :-
http://lewstringer.blogspot.com/2010/12/fleetway-annuals-for-1986.html#uds-search-results

[narfstar]

Thanks Paw big help. So it looks like when it merged Comet it stopped being numbered on used just the date like so many others. I will try to get all this set up at the GCD.

[paw broon]

Some Tiger covers:-
http://www.comicvine.com/tiger/49-37555/
If you type in the following names,you'll get a few covers of each comic.  Lion; Hotspur; Adventure; Rover; Rover and Wizard.  Enjoy.

[Geo (R.I.P.)]

Here's a link for the DVD of "The Three Fantastic Supermen": http://www.gottaseedvds.com/catalog/item/1369047/1763430.htm
for those inquiring minds.

Here's one in english, (3 movie set): http://www.ioffer.com/i/3-fantastic-supermen-set-162565221

Geo

[narfstar]

Anymore low brow new comedies. Previews to Grown Ups looked funny so I got it from Netflix. Neither my wife nor I liked it so did not even finish watching it before sending it back. It was replaced by Get Him to the Greek. I gave up on it and sent it back. Now i know better.

[josemas]

Some recent Movie Night viewings

Radio Parade of 1935-1934-Associated British Pictures-BIP-   Will Hay leads the cast of this musical comedy which features quite a number of the popular British radio and music hall performers of the day.  The final sequences were filmed in the rarely used Dufaycolor.  A real crowd pleaser with the Movie Night group.  We were especially surprised and pleased to see that one of the color sequences featured the famed blues-jazz singer Alberta Hunter (the only film of her in her prime, IIRC).

The Phantom Light-1935-Gaumont-Gainsborough   Years before he was directing classics like Black Narcissus and The Red Shoes, Michael Powell was learning his craft by directing quota quickies like this one.  To be fare this film does have a slightly better budget than many such quota quickies and Powell makes the most of it getting some great location shooting in Wales that adds considerably to the film's atmosphere.  The films lead is the always reliable Gordon Harker and blond Binnie Hale adds a lot of sex appeal to the film.

Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood-1995-(6 one hour episodes)-   Kevin Brownlow and David Gill's worthy followup to their earlier documentary Hollywood (1980) which like its predecessor covers the silent era of film. 

So You Want a Television Set-1953-Warner Bros-Vitaphone-1 rl- & So You Want to be a Gladiator-1955-Warner Bros-Vitaphone-1 rl-  a couple more delightfully funny entries in the Joe McDoakes comedy series demonstrate why this series was so popular and lasted so long.

We also finished up our Western serial Battling with Buffalo Bill-1931- (overall a thumbs up from the group) and started our next serial The Spider Returns-1941- which we have high hopes for because it is directed by one of our favorite serial directors, James W. Horne.

On DVD

Pandorum-2009-   Interesting sci-fi-mystery story with Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster and a few others trying to find out what has gone wrong when they unexpectedly wakeup from hibernation aboard a huge spaceship.

Lost Boys: The Tribe (uncut)-2008-   So-so followup to the 1990s original about a group of vampires.  Has some humor here and there that livens it up but ultimately just mediocre.

Toy Story 3-2010-   IMHO Pixar just can't turn out anything but winning films.  I have yet to watch a film of their's that I didn't like.   A big hit with both the Lil' Missus and myself.

The Day the Earth Stood Still-2008-   Remake of the 1950s sci-fi classic in which an alien arrives on earth a creates a big stir.  Not bad but nowhere near as good as the original.

Los Cronocrimenes (Timecrimes)-2008-   Pretty neatly written (if relatively low budget) sci-fi tale of time travel.  Best to pay close attention to it and see if you can unravel what's actually going on.

Best

Joe

[profh0011]

Anyone remember Timothy Hutton's previous series, "Nero Wolfe"? He both produced and co-starred in this series, along with the recently deceased Maury Chaykin. The series had a wonderful '50s look and feel. Hutton also cleverly used the same group of actors to play different characters throughout the series, giving it a real  "theatrical group" type of feeling. Definitely some very good TV.

I'm watching NERO WOLFE right now. I had NO IDEA Maury Chaykin had passed away until this minute. I never heard about it at all last summer. Damn. It's a funny thing, I've seen him in a couple of other parts, and I don't think I ever would have thought of him as Wolfe. But he was superb in the role.


I've seen 3 different actors play Wolfe.  My first was William Conrad. The show was good-- Conrad was AWFUL. And I like Conrad. The problem was, he had all the abusiveness and none of the class.

I've also seen the 1977 tv-movie with Thayer David (from DARK SHADOWS).  He was by a wide margin the BEST thing about it (David Hurst as Fritz a close second). The rest was dull, uninspired, and had NO style at all. Despite this, I actually give David a slight edge on Chaykin. It's a shame he didn't get to do more. He actually passed away before his NW film was finally aired by the network, which kept dragging its feet.


THE GOLDEN SPIDERS was very impressive, but when they came back for the regular series, there was a MASSIVE jump in quality. That's when Hutton took over. I never really liked anything he did before that, but Archie Goodwin seemed a role he was born to play.  One of the best decisions they could have made was to make Archie the main character (which he did not appear to be in the 1981 series). He's SO likeable, you just wanna follow everything he does.

NERO WOLFE is one of those rare series where the quality was SO good, it stands apart from most of the detective series made over the years. I'd put it in the same class with the Jeremy Brett SHERLOCK HOLMES, the David Suchet POIROT, and the Powers Booth PHILIP MARLOWE (well, the 1st season, anyway, the ones with the Maurice Binder opening credits).

NW is also one show where I find the plots almost impenetrable, and often impossible to follow... but the show has so much STYLE, I don't care! I'm usuallly enjoying myself too much, figuring, why worry about the plot, it'll make sense by the end.

I wish they'd done a LOT more.


It recently occured to me there was another actor in the 80's who COULD have, should have played Wolfe.  He was the right size for it, he was able to project both power and sensitivity, AND, in real life, he loved orchids!
Raymond Burr.

[profh0011]

Peter D had the misfortune of following the ultra popular (in the US) Tom Baker Doctor. It took me a while to get used to him but I did enjoy his run. The third Doctor is the one I just could not get into.

Peter Davison also had the misfortune of having mostly-unlikeable companions, dodgy writing at least half the time, and a general attitude of the producer to make him seem helpless instead of dynamic.

MY 1st "Doctor" was actually Peter Cushing (the 2 feature films), so when Jon Pertwee arrived in the US, I wondered for some time, what connection do these stories have with those movies? Philadelphia's Channel 17 even had the stupidity to begin the run with "The Silurians", SKIPPING Pertwee's excellent debut story "Spearhead From Space", which went unseen in my area until the mid-80's! (It's funny, Pertwee actually goes thru that whole story "doing" Troughton.)

The real irony of the early Pertwee run was, his character was SO surly and angry about being stuck on Earth, the show's recurring VILLAIN, The Master (Roger Delgado) wound up having much more charisma, even though he kept killing so many people!  I liked watching Delgado much more than I did Pertwee.

The 1st story where Pertwee began to melow out was really "Day Of The Daleks"-- and wouldn't you know, THAT was the last story Channel 17 ran! I dind't get to see the rest of his run until the 80's, either. By the time you get to "The Time Warrior" (the one that introduced Sarah Jane Smith), he was back using the TARDIS again, and a much "happier camper".


But long before I got to see that, for me there was a "jump" from "Day Of The Daleks" to "Robot" (the 1st Tom Baker story). I recall seeing a photo of Baker, and wondering, could this GOOFY-looking guy be The Doctor? But I got to LIKE him by the end of his very 1st episode! (Ditto for Sylvester McCoy.)