Kill Me - The First Time

When there is a great movie, there is a desire to make it even better. Throwing out claims that it was the first time "That" had been done in a film, or saying that all other movies have copied it ever since. Alien (1979) is no exception. It is one of my all time favorite horror films (it is a horror film, not science fiction, and Aliens  is an actions film), so I am usually willing to believe the praise that is heaped upon it. With the recent passing of the great H.R. Giger there were a good deal of Facebook post recounting trivia about the film Alien and one stuck out at me. It was the claim that a deleted scene involving Dallas, cocooned by the Alien, being  found by Ripley and him begging her to kill  him was the first time the now cliched line of "Kill Me" was used in a film.

It bothered me. I came out in 1979, so it may have been possible that it was the first, but it was also cut from the film. So how was it so emulated? Well I think I found the real first time "Kill Me" was used in a film and it mirrors Alien perfectly...

Before/After Stonewall

This documentary is Before Stonewall, a 1984 film from directors Greta Schiller and Robert Rosenburg, about the gay and lesbian community before the Stonewall Riots of 1969 that was a major impetus in the gay liberation movement in the United States.
After the jump is After Stonewall from 1999 from director John Scagliotti - not as good, but worth including...

Holy Mountain

Alejandro Jodorowsky 1973 film Holy Mountain - I will not try to describe what the film is about, beyond saying John Lennon and Yoko Ono fronted money so the film could be made, beyond that I will let the trailer take over from there  - full film after the jump.

Night Of The Galactic Railroad

Night of The Galactic Railroad is a 1985 animated film from director Gisaburo Sugii based on the novel by Kenji Miyazawa. It is about two kittens that take a metaphysical journey on a magical train - and if you are wondering, no, there were no cats in the original novel...

The Chimes At Midnight

The Chimes At Midnight is a 1965 Orson Wells film about Shakespeare's character Falstaff, of who the film is named after in its non-US release. 

When The Wind Blows

When The Wind Blows is a cheery 1986 film from director Jimmy T. Murakami about nuclear war. It has the theme to tune by David Bowie and features animation set against an actual 3D background - and is a total downer...

Rudi Gernreich: Basic Black

For the late fashion icon Rudi Gernreich, Basic Black is anything but. Featuring muses Peggy Moffitt and Leon Bing, this short is a forerunner of  of the fashion video (maybe dead today?).

Miracle Mile

I'm feeling romantic for LA. I got back here about three weeks ago and didn't realize how much I missed being here while in Chicago. 

Miracle Mile is a 1988 film staring Anthony Edwards and Mare Winningham from director Steve De Jarnatt. The movie starts with Edwards getting a date with Winninghan to pick her up at the diner (Johnie's Coffee Shop) where she works when she gets off - he oversleeps and rushes out to meet her. He is too late and calls her from the payphone outside at 4am. He leaves her a message and waits around the diner for her to come back. While waiting the phone in the booth rings and the voice on the end of the line begins rambling bout a missile set to hit Los Angels in 70 minutes.

Not only does the film unfold in about real time it is set in LA in the late 80's! 

Bellow is the trailer followed by full length film after the jump. 

Debbie does Giger

Maybe that should be Giger does Debbie... Anyway, I get to show you something cool about two of my favorite artists. 

in 1981 Deborah Harry released here first solo album, KooKoo, between the Blondie albums Autoamerican and The Hunter. For the cover, the Swiss designer H.R. Giger painted her portrait as well as directing two promotional videos - this was fairly fresh off of his Oscar win for his work on the film Alien. 

The Results, Ummm... See for yourself.

Here is a BBC interview with both Debbie and Giger...

The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On

This is one of my favorite documentaries...

The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On is a 1987 documentary from Kazuo Hara about 62-year-old Okuzaki Kenzo. He was a veteran of the Japanese occupation of  New Guinea during  World War II who gained notoriety by slingshoting ball-bearings  at Emperor Showa protesting  the ruler's war crimes. The documentary follows Okusaki as he sets out to conduct interviews with survivors and relatives... Things get violent quickly but he ends up getting the information he wants.

You may need to play with the closed captioning on the video - they seem to be in Spanish so you'll need to set the Translate caption to your desired language...

 

Phil Ochs

I've recently become obsessed  with Phil Ochs' music. I found out about him a few years back and only recently began listening to him. right now I think he tops my list of songwriters, but it's his voice that amazes me. There are a few singers that when I hear their voices and I'm floored - Cass Elliot, Scott McMicken of Dr. Dog are two  others - but Ochs tops the list.

Ochs was born in El Paso,  Texas in 1940. He attended Ohio State University for three years before dropping out and moving to Greenwich Village where he began singing at open mic nights and by 1964 was well established enough to release his first album. His songs were for the most part highly political and varied between extremely lighthearted and farcical to extremely dark in tone.  He suffered from Bipolar disorder and was a heavy drinker before his suicide in 1975 at age 35.

One of my personal favorites of Ochs' songs is the The War Is Over from 1968 - here he is singing live from The Bitter End... 

The beginning of The Shining, the end of Blade Runner

It seems like there is no end to the amount of information there is about Stanley Kubrick's The Shining of 1980 and Ridley Scott's Blade Runner of 1982, well here is something to add to the list...

Did you hear that? The closing sequence from the theatrical release of Blade Runner came from unused footage from the opening sequence of The Shining given Ridley Scott by Stanley Kubrick.