This is the last entry from my old movie scrapbook and I've included those ads for this post that wouldn't neatly fit anywhere else. Thank goodness for that catch-all category called Miscellaneous!
1975 Movie Scrapbook (Post 11: Miscellaneous)
This is one of those movies that I remember seeing when it came out (In 1975, of course) and haven't seen since. However, I do seem to still have strong memories about what it was about. Two couples (Peter Fonda & Lara Parker and Warren Oates & Loretta Swit) while vacationing in a Winnebago, witness a group of satanists performing a virgin sacrifice. The satanists spot the couples witnessing the crime and spend most of the movie chasing them down. The two couples try to tell the authorities, but everyone seems to be against them and they have no idea who they can trust. At one point, they are at a roadblock where there is a school bus accident and Peter Fonda yells out, "A school bus on a Sunday! I don't think so!" After this proclamation, Fonda wheels the Winnebago around at breakneck speed! The satanists kill Lara Parker's little dog and put a snake in the Winnebago at different times. Loretta Swit also steals a library reference book in the film's most controversial scene (At least to a librarian). The satanists do catch up to them at the end. In retrospect, the film seems like sort of a combination of The Exorcist and Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
At least that's the way I remember it.
When I got a chance to talk with her, I asked her about Race With the Devil, though I didn't ask her about the controversial "library book theft" scene. She did sign the picture to the left for me.
2. Framed
Before he became better know (at least to me) as having his movies mocked on Mystery Science Theater 3000, there were quite a few Joe Don Baker movies made during the 70’s...Well, maybe for a couple of years, anyway.
The ad for Framed trumpets...“That Walking Tall Man is Back…He was taken By Everyone, For everything he had. All he had left was one obsession. To get even. To pay them back two for one!” The ad has a poorly drawn Joe Don leaping into the middle of the picture, I assume bent on revenge. I confess to never having seen Framed, but I did see Joe Don's movie Mitchell on Mystery Science Theater, which was probably more fun anyway.
3. Shampoo
The ad from Shampoo was a seemingly simple picture of hairdresser Warren Beatty holding a comb against the head of Gloria Hawn as Hawn and Julie Christie stare blankly into the camera. Understated and effective.
But....
...let us not forget the movie ad for Black Shampoo, which was much less subtle..."When he's mad...he's mean...he's a lovin' machine! (Oh, yeah!)
4. The Born Losers
The early seventies was the movie era of Billy Jack. The ad here says it all...BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND “BORN LOSERS” THE ORIGINAL SCREEN APPEARANCE OF TOM LAUGHLIN AS BILLY JACK.
I too, was a Billy Jack fan and had to see this 1967 film when it was re-released. The ad features the peace loving half-breed equipped with a shotgun and ready to take on the establishment, Nixon supporters, a corrupt city council or whomever else gets in his way!
I admit that I still have affection for the Billy Jack movies, though I didn’t vote for Tom Laughlin during the many times he ran for president.
5. The Three Days of the Condor
Shady CIA spooks under the background of a giant coin where Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway appear to be making out.
Espionage! Romance! And a menacing bird!
His CIA code name is condor. In the next seventy-two hours almost everyone he trusts will try to kill him!
6. Give Em Hell Harry
In 1975, James Whitmore received an Oscar nomination for his one man depiction of Harry Truman. I may have seen it. Or was that the one man show of Will Rogers? Or maybe that was Hal Holbrook as Mark Twain? Anyway, the giant ad is packed with positive reviews. Women’s Wear Daily says “Whitmore has an effect over his listeners that can only be described as hypnotic!” I include this because you may have been wondering what Women’s Wear Daily thought of Give ‘Em Hell Harry in 1975.
7. The Lion in Winter
The critically acclaimed 1968 Oscar Winner. This ad show off the film's three academy awards.
You Get it? This is from a 1975 scrapbook, but in those days, movies that were a few years old were often re-released and actually shown at movie theaters!
Hard to believe there ever was such a day.
8. Fantastic Planet
Ad depicts animation stills and brags about all the film festival prizes it won.
Today’s 70’s Miscellaneous movie experience is...
Fantastic Planet
This animated story of an alien culture called the Traags and their human-like pets who eventually rebel may seem like fairly standard sci-fi when the plot is recounted. What is most special about this film is the cut-out stop animation that is down right hypnotic at times.
I'd also like to point out that the first time I saw this film was on television as part of one of my favorite shows of the 80's called Night Flight. This show aired on the USA Network and showed such cult movie favorites as Eraserhead, Kentucky Fried Movie* as well as Fantastic Planet.
Night Flight also aired cutting edge videos (at least I thought them to be cutting edge videos at the time) from such artists as Kate Bush, Laurie Anderson and Mike Oldfield. I also remember them playing Frank Zappa's claymation classic Inca Roads, a bizarre video called Electric Mummy, which I can't seem to find anywhere on the Internet, and of course, Fish Heads by Barnes and Barnes.
On Night Flight, you also could relive the campy 50's sci-fi TV show Space Patrol or the Cold War clip show Atomic Cafe.
The point is you never new what to expect from Night Flight. It was definitely something to channel surf to during the 80's on a Saturday night. So if you ever find yourself channel surfing on a Saturday night during the 80's, give Night Flight a try.
*This is my fourth blog in a row with a reference to Kentucky Fried Movie. I am still mentioning this for no reason in particular.
Well, it's time to put my old movie scrapbook from 1975 back in the filing cabinet. I knew I'd find a use for it someday.
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