Plaid Stallions

As a perfect companion site to Shawn's Branded in the 80's website, anyone who appreciates 70's and early 80's fashion and toys MUST check out Plaid Stallions . The pictures below are just a snippet of the amazing stuff Plaid Stallions has posted from old catalogues.

Turn your little boy into a stud!

This brings back so many preschool memories.

Gaetti!

Well, well, looks like there is some interest in Gary Gaetti. Don't give me that "Gary who???" crap. You know who I'm talking about. Enjoy this interview some small Missouri newpaper did with him. It's so rare to ever see anything like this publically, the man could be discussing the intricate workings of a belt buckle and I'd still watch it. And still laugh.

And, is it me, or has his schnozz gotten smaller?

No "pez' between Pez Co. and Burlingame Museum

For many years a couple of hardcore pez candy aficionados ("Pezheads" to those in the know) operated and maintained a large collection of pez dispensers and memorabilia in a little store front south of San Francisco in the town of Burlingame. The dedication started and still stands as a labor of Pezhead love. More than a decade ago, I myself was something of a Pezhead and part of the official Pezhead email distribution list. The museum owners we also on this list.

Say what you will about people, most of which were middle age adults, who elect to revolve their waking lives around a candy dispenser, but the one thing all the Pezheads shared was burning passion for their dispensers and trying to obtain as many as they could. And this was a time when "new" dispensers were uncommonly produced by Pez USA (which was an entirely separate company from the Pez Co that was still based in Austria). Before there were 100 different kinds of NASCAR Pez. When Pez purposefully avoided putting "realistic" human heads on dispensers, before there was a really nasty looking Darth Sidious dispenser. Or this ridiculous abomination. And, what kid or collector wouldn't want an exciting Mozart Pez ? I mean, that last one's like right out of an Archie McPhee catalog.

Pez!

The Pezheads behind the Burlingame Pez Museum even made what Guiness recognized as the World's Largest Pez Dispenser. These guys were serious. And in the mid-90's when Pezheads were made contact with Pez USA, the candy maker was always very friendly to its fans. I'm pretty sure they took no objection to the Burglingame Museum, and were even receptively amused by it.

The Giant Pez Dispenser that may get Joan of Arc'ed

But, my how things have changed in the last ten years (coughGreedycough). The Museum is now being sued by the Pez company over licensing infringement issues and even calls for the destruction of the giant pagan Pez god the museum proprietors created ("Thou shalt have no false Pez!")

In an ironic way, the Pezheads may have brought this upon themselves, though it was a long time in the making. Back in the mid-90's, Pezheads all over the world were clamoring for more and more Pez dispensers to be made. Pez production, particularly in North America, had really hit a lull since the 60's and 70's and while there were not too many new dispenser models released each year, it seemed Europe and often Canada would get new dispenser liness that the US was constantly not privy to (i.e. Pink Panthers, Super Mario and gang, Asterix & Obelix, just to name a few.) By the late-90's Pez finally realized they could tap into financial gains from the pent-up domestic pez demand, which started with putting dispenser heads on a variety of stem colors (instead of just one color per head), then introducing florescent colored stems, and then introducing a limited-time premium dispenser, which Pezheads could obtain through mail order. [I actually like the premium promotion because the dispensers were re-molds of classic dispensers like the Psychedelic Eye with Hand or the Bride & Groom.]

Anyway, Pezheads ate this stuff up. After years of it, the Pez company finally realized they had some clout they had long been without. And now you find Pez everywhere, not just in a corner fo a Michael's or CVS. Pezheads fed a monster that got out of control and is now turning on its own fan base. I'm not saying it's right, but I do see the legal merit behind Pez's claim that Burlingame cease from creating "non-licensed" materials. I just think calling for the destruction of the giant Snowman dispenser is a bit ridiculous. I suppose there isn't really anything to gain by Pez co. seizing the giant dispenser - what would they do with it?

I'd think the Burlingame guys would be able to claim it was "fan art" and not something they were trying to "dupe" people into believing was sanctioned by the Pez company. And it's not like they were making multiples and selling them. They made one and kept it in an obscure museum. Quit being so greedy and self-important, Pez Co. You're lucky enough to have had a revival of interest. Count yourself lucky and move-on. By the looks of the Museum, I don't think you're really leaving anything on the table by allowing these dedicated fans and free promoters of your product to continue doing their thing. And, if they are actually making any significant money from unlicensed T-shirts, why don't you just cut a deal with them? Or, make your own to sell to people, if you must cut the Burlingame folks out.

Thy humble Burlingame Pez Museum

Well, I'm sure the Burlingame folks are "pezzed off" over this, but it'll be interesting to see what the result of the suit is.

Read the article here

Photos used here courtesy of the Burlingame Pez Museum website.

The Mysterious Cloning of Ernie Hudson

I saw Ghostbusters in the 80's when I was a kid and I loved it. Sure, I might have been only 8 or 9 when I first saw it and didn't get all the jokes, but I knew it was funny. And the older I got the more the movie grew endeared itself to me as a comedy standard. I knew Ackroyd and Murray from old SNL reruns and other movies. Ramis was new to me, but I dug the nebbish tech-geek he played in the movie. And then there was Winston. The "new guy" who comes in in the second half of the movie willing to believe anything they say, as long as there's a steady paycheck in it. They didn't give Winston much to do, except say a few funny lines and play the "outsider" for a little bit.

All was well and good when a sequel was announced and was released June 1989. We got a new villain in Viggo; Dana Barrett returns; Janoz as the new dweeb gunning for her, a slightly re-vamped version of Slimer (who now seems to have turned traitor on his fellow ghosts), Louis Tulley reprising his role, and all four original ghostbusters....or were they?

I had no problem recognizing all of the other actors reprising their roles, but I didn't even know they had kept the same actor to play Winston in the sequel. You think that sounds silly, in recent years I've encountered other people who also saw GB II as kids and didn't realize it was the same actor. Or, supposed to be.

Take a look at the pictures above and try to tell me that there isn't something fishy going on. GB II was released in 1989, which means it was filmed in 1988. Assuming the original GB was filmed a year before its release in 1984, that makes a five year gap between the two productions. There's no way that the visage of Ernie Hudson changed that much in such a short amount of time. Sure, the actor playing Winston in GB II looks Ernie Hudson from GB I, but anyone can see there are some subtle, but obvious differences.

What am i getting at? A late-April Fool's joke? No. A conspiracy to replace the real Ernie Hudson with a clone at some point in time after GB I? Maybe.

I wish I could find a bigger picture of Mr. Hudson from GB I than the one above, but it's all I got.

I'm not saying this conspiracy is real. I'm just saying that the guy playing Winston in GB is not the same one in GB II. Why? Who would want or need to create this kind of conspiracy? Who knows. But they should know that there's a few of us out there who are on to them. Oh yes, we can tell. And we'll be watching.

Star Wars: REALLY Special Edition

some say it's even better than those damn prequels:

Rough Seas

This is security footage of a dining room of a cruise boat as it hits rough seas. The video starts of a bit slow but by the end the dining room is completely destroyed.

http://www.break.com/index/are-we-having-fun-yet1.html

In a rush? Skip to the highlights:
1:30- 2:15 - it starts in earnest here
5:00 - the real fun begins
5:58 - watch for the guy in the bottom left corner
6:10 - watch him slide back!
6:35 - Watch everyone flee to, well, another part of the ship....?

I'm sure this was terrible for the poor folks on this boat, but it's so insane to watch now, I expected to see a truck load of muppets and herd of cows come flying through there at any minute.

A Van Damme Movie You May ACTUALLY Want to SEE?

In this world, there seems to be so little left to leave me surprised and amazed. The Georgia Bigfoot was a hoax: no surprises there. Obama won the election: blind and deaf men were telling me this months ago. The stock market had another volatile week: yawn.

And then something happens like Prop 8 PASSING in California (what the hell, California?) Or, Van Damme making a movie that somewhat parodies his life, but actually looks really entertaining.

Check out the US trailer below for "JCVD":




If this pans out half as well as the trailer suggests it might, JC might have found a way to re-invigorate his career.

Best Halloween Costume Ever...for a dog?

I'm not generally someone who thinks it's all cutesy when people dress their twin Yorkies up like Sonny & Cher, or strap a Princess Leia bikini from Return of Jedi on their daschund. But this may be the best animal costume I've ever seen.

Just Because: "Goonies 'R' Good Enough"

If you grew up in the 80's you're certainly aware of a little film called The Goonies . In general most 80'snicks have a pretty fond nostalgia for the film, myself entirely included. I recognize it's got its problems and at times some of the acting isn't Oscar quality, but since when did either of these things disqualify a film from being enjoyable?

Which brings me to Cyndi Lauper's Goonies theme song, "Goonies 'R' Good Enough", which I present to you via YouTube without further ado:



I had forgotten how silly and fun "professional" wrestling was by the mid-80's. Roddy Piper, Iron Shiek, Ivan Dragoff(?) - these guys are a riot. Why'd wrestling need to go and get all "Undertaker/Goldberg" serious in the 90's?

Goonies takes the daring adventure of a lifetime that every kid (every boy at least) wanted to have, combines it with a mildly retarded strongman with an animatronic ear and sets it all against some fun pop music; Produced by Steven Spielberg, directed by Dick "Superman" & "Lethal Weapon" Donner and written by Chris Columbus. It has all the hallmarks of a great 80's film.

This video was apparently shown in two parts on MTV around the time The Goonies was released, but for some reason I just don't remember ever seeing it. The Goonies DVD that came out a few years back has this full-length video on it, as well as some behind the scenes footage.

To be sure, Cyndi's video has a lot more of the "quirkiness" that probably went along more with Ms. Lauper's 1980's image more so than the movie this video was shot for. The pro wrestlers want to open up a sushi bar? (Is this a backlash against 80's yuppie culture?); Cyndi's 'terrified" reactions to pirate skeletons; Andre the Giant showing up out of thin air at the end (why didn't Cyndi just do this at the beginning?) I also love when the video suddenly cuts to Steven Spielberg sounding more lost that he ever has on-camera.

But the real reason to love this is for the song and the nostalgic feelings it so imminently brings back. In fact, I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me want to leave work right now and go hunt for treasure out in the parking lot.

As a fan of 80's comedies, if you've never seen the "Goonies Vacation" fanfilm, click that link and watch it now. It's the best (and only?) mash up of Goonies and Vacation you've ever seen watching two Goonies die hards make a roadtrip pilgrimage from California to the Goonies filming locations in Oregon.

I don't know about you readers or Rowdy Roddy Piper, but Cyndi, Mom & Pop, Dave, Wendy, and Andre the Giant lived happily ever after!

Bigfoot caught?

Can it be true?

UPDATE- Nope.

I doubt it. HIGHLY doubt it. Just because the New York Times runs this story doesn't account for much validity. And the guys in the picture below don't do instill alot of faith in me as to the veracity of their story.


Hit the link for a picture of what's inside that freezer coffin next to those guys. (No, it's not a bunch of beers.)

New Transformer 2 Images?

Well, I was tooling around the Internet today and found these amazing pictures of what could be new vehicles used in Michael P.H. Bay's Transformers sequel (2009).


Is this the "new" Jazz??



Wait untilt he fanboys get a load of the new RODIMUS PRIME!!




Has Bay decided to include Inferno in the sequel?


Could this be a new Decepticon? ?





A new Autobot? (Brawn, perhaps?)

Looks like only time will tell.....

Fried Food Bonanza at the OC Fair

I was at the Orange County Fair this past weekend, which is usually an enjoyable experience. If for no other reason, I'm always surprised what new ways peopel have found to "enliven" the deep fried food groups with new "delicacies."

Case in point, the picture below.

A "doughnut chicken sandwich"? Really? You know, the City of Los Angeles just banned fast food restaurants in low-income areas. Does this mean they now have to travel to County fairs just to get their fill of unhealthiness?

At least you get honey AND raspberry sauce for the delectable "sandwich" above. And you can enjoy a "Totally Fried" Pop Tart for dessert!

WATCHMEN:The Trailer is the Beginning is the End

I wanted to post more of my thoughts about this last week, but was just too busy at the office. You can check it out on the official site, but I also found a slightly better version of the trailer on YT and put it below just for kicks. Watch it again, won't you?



Simply put, the trailer is great. It delivers exactly what I hoped and would have expected to see from Snyder's production. So far just about everything I've seen from this production has captured the look and feel of the source material almost EXACTLY.

Sure, bitch about Ozymandias' costume or less than hunky stature; bitch that the 1985 Comedian isn't pudgy enough; bitch that you already know Snyder's ending will be different than the comic. But there's so much other stuff in the details that IS right, it more than makes up for it.

Rorschach, Dr. Manhattan, New York - 1985, the drop of blood on the Smiley Face, Rorschach, Nite Owl's vehicle breaking out of the East River, Rorschach, Dr. Manhattan's crystalline structure rising up on Mars (yes, I know it looks subtley different from the comic, but is it germaine? No.)

I love that the music they selected for the trailer (which works very, very well for this trailer) was part of the soundtrack for Batman & Robin, the fourth and final movie that drove the stake into in the original Batman movie series (thank you WB and Joel Schumacher!) Ironic that they decided on music from one of the most laughable, often considered the most cartoonish and overblown superhero movies in modern cinema (the only Batman movie that didn't even make it's production budget back in gross domestic box office receipts,) in a trailer for a movie that essentially turns the "comic book superhero" notion on its head.

Snyder, you done right so far. Don't let us down.

Friday the 13th Poster

So, the new teaser poster for the remake showed up at Comic Con this past week. I'm not sure I like te direction it's going. I mean, the hockey mask is still there, but it has jowels.

Read some amusing talkback reactions here on Ain't It Cool.

WATCHMEN: Official Trailer

Things continue to look very promising for Zack Snyder's adaptation of the Watchmen graphic novel. I personally can't wait to see this film next year!

George Carlin - Rest In Peace

A great comedic mind is no longer with us.

There is no one today that is really a direct successor to George Carlin's brand of humor. Sure, the guy waned a bit in his twilight years, but so do most of the greats. For almost his entire career he was way out in front of the "edge" of popular comedy. His insights and use of language (both "dirty" and not) were incomparable among stand-ups contemporaries. Only in the later 90's did America start seeing increasing numbers of comedians who took their humor to "the edge", making it more "raw" and covering topics or using language that was previously considered "socially extreme". Now everybody does it. But when you go back and watch Carlin's older stuff (I'm most familiar with his 80's stuff and the early 90's gem, Jammin in New York) you see just how far he sails above all of today's comics.


George Carlin, you've given this world a great many laughs, often to tears. And now, we shed a collective tear back to you for all the laughs you gave us.
Rest In Peace, you funny fucker.

Just Because / Music To Live By: Gremlins Movie Score

Well, I've been back from the honeymoon on Kauai for two weeks now and work has kept me incredibly busy. But during those many busy hours I've found some solace in my YouTube playlists , which help to pass the time (when I'm not continually interrupted with meetings and fires to put out in the office.)

I couldn't really decide whether this fell into the category of a random YouTube link for you guys to enjoy (Just Because), which is what I originally intended this post to be. Or if this is more of a score review (Music To Live By). It turned out to be something of both.

Gremlins: The Score

One of the playlists I listened to several times last week was Jerry Goldsmith's great score for Gremlins, the 1984 movie written by Chris Columbus, directed by Joe Dante, and executive produced by Spielberg. What a team! Special thanks to YouTuber Aldabarran for uploading this hard-to-find and out of print score to the Internet.

What I really like about Goldsmith's score - besides how instantly it brings back the fun of the movie it was written for - is how it captures both the film's lighter and darker tones. Goldsmith uses an interesting synth sound for some parts of the score used when the Gremlins are running amok. A combination of this synth music and some skillful violin work bring uniquely identifiable and eery cues for scenes with the Gremlins. He also does a great job of weaving in some lighter, holiday themed cues with Gizmo's theme throughout as the score threads between its heros and Gremlins.

You may also find it interesting to know that Goldsmith's violin based Gremlins theme didn't actually make its first appearance in the titular movie. Movie score fans will know that Goldsmith scored the Twilight Zone movie from the early 80's, which cmainly onsisted of 4 separate stories. One of those stories was about a man (played by John Lithgow) who sees a monster on the wing of the airplane he is flying on. During this story, the monster is referred to as a "gremlin", one of those little monsters that cause mechanical things to go wrong and break down, but that people never see. If you listen to the track for "Nightmare at 20,000 feet" on the Twilight Zone score, you'll hear a familiar violin theme when the Gremlin appears at about 3:20.

Or, you can hear part of the music in the first minute of this clip, especially from 00:47 - 1:03:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwEclI_ffOA

Come to think of it, this segment of this film a) is really well done, and b) really left an impression on me when I saw it as a kid.

Steven Spielberg directed one of the four stories in the Twilight Zone movie, so it's no coincidence at all that Goldsmith was chosen to score Gremlins when it came along.

Here's some random trivia for you:
- This original TZ episode starred William Shatner. Shatner starred in Star Trek.
- Jerry Goldsmith scored the original Star Trek movie.
- Goldsmith also scored this segment of the Twilight Zone movie that was executive produced by Steven Spielberg. Goldsmith also scored Gremlins, which was also exec produced by Spielberg. Not coincidentally, the Gremlins movie features very similar "gremlin" music for the little green monsters as the little bit of violin music you hear when Lithgow sees the monster on the wing of the plane.
- Spielberg also exec produced The Goonies, which was directed by Dick Donner.
- Dick Donner directed this original TZ episode of Nightmare at 10,000 feet.


Gremlins: The Movie
I watched this movie recently for the first time in a number of years and darn it if it still isn't enjoyable! As a kid I always remembered the movie being funny, but sometimes scary. Watching it again now, I see a much greater dichotomy between the film's comedic moments and the moments that are downright horror-like. One minute Gremlins are popping out at a character for a cheap scare, then their killing an old lady mischeivously, but then you get a whole 60 second scene with nothing but Gremlins hanging out in a bar, dancing to 80's disco wearing a Flashdance outfit, beating each other up with cartoon sound effects in the background, and a Gremlin flasher who exposes, well, nothing underneath his mini, Gremlin-sized trenchcoat.

Some might cite all these things as evidence of just how uneven the film's tone is. However, I think these guys knew exactly what they were doing. They wanted it to be a little scary, a little funny, and a little heartwarming. In fact, I think it's a pretty rare breed of movie that can pull off that kind of combination HALF as successfully as Gremlins does.

Anyway, enjoy listening to Gremlins!

Gizmo, ka-ka!

Sweep the Leg!

I'm sure this isn't new to some, but I was just recently introduced to the video for "Sweep the Leg", which features the titular song by the group No More Kings. The video spoofs a few 80's pop culture moments, but most notably Karate Kid.

Written and directed by Johnny himself, William Zabka and his Cobra Kai buddies (yes, they reassembled his close gang of Cobra Kais 20 years leater) sit around their trailer watching Karate Kid over and over until Johnny's old mentor comes back and Johnny sets out to right the wrong done to him by Larusso's crane kick many years ago. The guy who played Principal Belding on Saved By The Bell also makes a cameo appearance in the beginning and I'm pretty sure that's Ralph Macchio there at the end.

"Get him a body bag, Johnny! Yeeeaaaaahhh!"

Indy IV Score Samples on Amazon

Greetings Indyfans!

30-second samples of the tracks on the score for Kingdom of the Crystal Skull showed up on Amazon.com recently.
Do Beware of SPOILERS in reading the track titles. I know, I know - if it's on published material, is it really still a "spoiler"? I say "no", but as this is the first Indy movie anyone's had in almost 20 years, some of the fan community on the web has become uptight about this kind of thing.

I like what little I can hear so far. A little of it reminds me of Williams' work on the Star Wars prequel scores, work I personally enjoyed (in some ways more than the movies themselves.)

I really dig that part of "The Map Room" theme from Raiders shows up in the track called "The Spell of the Skull" and "Marion's Theme" also makes an appearance on this CD in the last cue (if not elsewhere that we can't hear yet!)

Indyfans and the Quest for Fortune and Glory

UPDATE

The Raider.net picked up my article on GoSightSee.com and mentioned it in their Indyfans article on their site today. Too cool!

I went to the "premiere" of Brandon Kleyla's new Indiana Jones fanumentary on April 28 in Newport Beach. Check out my synopsis over at the GoSightSee Travel Blog.


I didn't know it at the time, but apparently the Girls Next Door came to the premiere in Indy fedoras, too.