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CAMPING EXPEDITION!!! • SITTING PRETTY (1948), • MEAT, DRINK AND BE MERRY (c1961), • FRACTURED FLICKERS (1963), • HOLD ME WHILE I'M NAKED (1971), • SITTING PRETTY (1948)
PLEASE NOTE, SCREEN TIME IS NOW 7.30pm, FOR THE DURATION!
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SPLODGE! NOTES:
1st. Mon. in FEBRUARY (04/02/08)
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ON THE FIRST MONDAY OF EVERY MONTH
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a community FilmEdSoc project,
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Unusual films of discernment, still presented in convivial surroundings!
ALL PRESENTED ON
GROOVY 16 MILLIMETRE FILM!
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714 NICHOLSON (CNR. SCOTCHMER) STREET,
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1st. Quartile
FEBRUARY
AD 2008
ON THE FIRST MONDAY OF EVERY MONTH
(except JANUARYs!)
a community FilmEdSoc project,
WE CONTROL THE CONTENT
************ ********* ********* *********
Unusual films of discernment, still presented in convivial surroundings!
ALL PRESENTED ON
GROOVY 16 MILLIMETRE FILM!
the back room
714 NICHOLSON (CNR. SCOTCHMER) STREET,
NORTH FITZROY
splodgeburger@ yahoo.com
************ ********* ********* *********
1st. Quartile
FEBRUARY
AD 2008
MONDAY 04th
Registration: 7.00 - 7.30 pm
Screening: >>>>> 7.30 (*SEVEN THIRTY*!!!! ) pm <<<<<
TONIGHT: STRICTLY MEMBERS-ONLY
TONIGHT: STRICTLY MEMBERS-ONLY
MEMBERSHIPS STILL AVAILABLE AT THE DOOR ON THE NIGHT
DETAILS BELOW
TONIGHT! -
CAMPING EXPEDITION !!!
• MEAT, DRINK AND BE MERRY,
TONIGHT! -
CAMPING EXPEDITION !!!
• MEAT, DRINK AND BE MERRY,
(c1961),
Silly
Sidney, that craaaazy elephant, is always trying to fit in with the jungle crowd, but is never quite able to carry it off. In tonight's cartoon, Sidney, tired of being a vegetarian - as elephant's so often are - goes after some "meat" for a change - but he finds out that he doesn't have the heart to kill his friends!
SIDNEY THE ELEPHANT (aka "Silly Sidney") may not have the aggressiveness of HECKLE & JECKLE, the imagination of GANDY GOOSE, or the panache of TOM TERRIFIC, but he has one thing none of them have — an Oscar™ nomination!
Yes, unbelievable as it may seem, Sidney is one of the (only) two Terrytoons characters ( - the other being, understandably, MIGHTY MOUSE) to ever have one of his cartoons nominated for an Academy Award™. He achieved this distinction with his second outing, SIDNEY'S FAMILY TREE, which was directed by Art Bartsch, and released in December, 1958. (No Terrytoon, by the way, ever actually won an Oscar™.)
Sidney's first cartoon ( - ‘tho he'd appeared earlier as an incidental character in TOM TERRIFIC) was SICK, SICK SIDNEY, which was also
directed by Bartsch, and released in 1958, as part of a "new wave" of Terrytoons.
The studio had recently been bought by CBS, and the new artistic director, Gene Deitch (who would later produce a brief - but vividly remembered - series of Tom & Jerry cartoons for MGM), scrapped the ongoing characters and started from scratch. Gone were LITTLE ROQUEFORT and DINKY DUCK; in their place were CLINT CLOBBER and GASTON LE CRAYON. But the voices were by studio regulars - Sidney's by Lionel Wilson (TOM TERRIFIC), who also did some of Sidney's pals, and other pals by Dayton Allen (DEPUTY DAWG).
Deitch received most of his training at UPA, the studio that changed the face of animation in the 1950s, where he got his start on GERALD MCBOING-BOING's TV show; and so, the Sidney cartoons represented the UPA-influenced '50s style in both appearance and content.
The Elephant was both bumbling and, in the spirit of the times, neurotic. The cartoons were mostly about his friends, Stanley the Lion (who spoke just like NED SPARKS!) and Cleo the Giraffe, trying to keep him from knocking down the whole
jungle.
Deitch's Terrytoons reign was brief, and so were the careers of most of the new characters. In fact, when MIGHTY MOUSE and HECKLE & JECKLE returned, in 1959, Sidney was the only one from the Deitch era to remain in production.
Over a dozen and a half Sidney cartoons were made, the last few appearing only on TV as part of the 1963-64 HECTOR HEATHCOTE SHOW. Sidney made a similar impact in comic books, appearing only
in the back pages of a few comics where other Terrytoons characters were the stars.
Sidney's Oscar™ nomination led to a revival, of sorts, decades later - he turned up in a Tiny Toons episode - as a villain! He kidnapped Bugs Bunny and tried to frame Daffy Duck, as revenge for "stealing" his award. (It was Bugs who'd won that year!) But if it hadn't been for that nomination, Sidney would be pretty much forgotten by now.
Prod Co: TerryToon Cartoons, CBS Productions. Distributed by: 20th Century Fox. Directed By Dave Tendlar. Prod: Gene Deitch. Anim: Ed Donnelly, Juan Guidi, Mannie Davis. Wr: Larz Bourne, Tom Morrison. Characters: Sidney the Elephant, Cleo the Giraffe, Stanley the Lion. 7 mins. RM
• FRACTURED FLICKERS,
(1963),
From the weirded-out minds of JAY WARD and Bill Scott comes FRACTURED FLICKERS, an irreverent tribute to silent pictures. It used movie clips from the silent-film era featuring old-time stars like STAN LAUREL, DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS, HARRY HOUDINI, HARRY LANGDON, BEN TURPIN and LON CHANEY, and mixed in old newsreel footage with goofy plot lines! Then, using talented voice actors of the calibre of PAUL FREES and JUNE FORAY, the films were edited and dubbed to create new, hilarious segments.
Created by WARD, a FLEISCHER STUDIO-ex [ - whom MATT (SIMPSONS) GROENING claims as a major influence on his own work], and Bill Scott - the geniuses responsible for CRUSADER RABBIT, HOPPITY HOOPER and the (transcendental) ROCKY & BULLWINKLE cartoons, this show is an irreverent, yet reverent ( - don't ask me how they did it, they're geniuses!! - ) tribute to silent film. Yes, yes, sacrilege, I know, butchering old silents for the purpose of sending 'em up, but an incredible show - virtually lost - nonetheless!
WARD was a big fan of the silent cinema, which showed up nowhere better than in DUDLEY DORIGHT: the title cards, iris head shots, and melodramatic situations were all spoofs of the movie serials of WARD's youth.
Hosted by a genial, dead-pan HANS CONRIED (pictured here standing on his head), FF took classic films ( - some
clips featuring stars like STAN LAUREL, HARRY LANGDON and LON CHANEY - ; tons of newreel and stock footage), cut them down to around 20 minutes, and gave them nutty new plots with goofy jokes and silly voice-over dialogue by sound-booth stars of the calibre of (the great) PAUL FREES and JUNE FORAY, amongst others.
Over its 26 episode run, aired in Melbourne (a lonnngggg time ago) on Sir Reggie Ansett's Channel 0, the show played host to a mighty cast of guest celebrity
interviewees - whom CONRIED sourced from his time on STUMP THE STARS - including GYPSY ROSE LEE, ALLAN SHERMAN, ANNETTE FUNICELLO, EDWARD EVERETT HORTON, PAULA PRENTISS, SEBASTIAN CABOT, CONNIE STEVENS, ROD SERLING, CAESAR ROMERO, DIANA DORS, PAUL LYNDE, ANNA MARIA ALBERGHETTI, BARBARA EDEN, BOB DENVER, URSULA ANDRESS, and even BULLWINKLE J. MOOSE.
CONRIED graciously cops it as much as he dishes it in this fabbo 24th installment of this truly bizarre and notoriously hilarious series. This ep features hot jokester of the period, BOB NEWHART, picketing the show for exploiting footage of dead silent film
comedians.
I loved this show when it aired in the 60s. The copyright notice at the beginning reads "1961-Ponsonby Britt OBE" while at the end the notice goes "1963-Jay Ward Productions". The conflicting notices supposedly invalidate each other, making the series Public Domain according to US Copyright law! Now Bob Newhart definitely DOES have something to beef about!
A unique, unmissable once-in-a-lifetime, gob-smackingly hilarious experience, and here are some samples in Real Media format!:
-Opening Credits:
http://www.toontracker.com/bullwink/flickers.ram
http://www.toontracker.com/bullwink/flickers.ram
-Old footage "gets the treatment":
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fractured.ram
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fractured.ram
-Hans Interviews Roddy McDowell:
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fracturehans.ram
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fracturehans.ram
-Closing credits:
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fracturedendthe.ram
http://www.tvparty.com/vault2/fracturedendthe.ram
Prod Co: JAY WARD Productions. Prod: JAY WARD, Bill Scott, Ponsonby Britt, O.B.E. Dir: Bill Hurtz. Wr: George
Atkins, Al Burns, Jim Critchfield, Chris Hayward, Chris Jenkyns, Jim MacGeorge, John Marshall, PAUL MAZURSKY, Jack Mendelsohn, Bill Scott, Larry Tucker, Lloyd Turner. Ed: Skip Craig, Roger Donley. Mus: Dennis Farnon, Sheldon Allman. Host: HANS CONRIED. 26 mins. RM(JF)
• HOLD ME WHILE I'M NAKED, 
OK. Here is (what is purported to be) John Water's favourite short film, ( - so you can just imagine what's coming). Its semblance of a plot concerns the frustrated efforts of an inept filmmaker ( - played by director George Kuchar - ) to make a soft-core art film, the loss of his female lead, and his ill-fated attempts to replace her.
Events soon devolve into an ill-defined combination of Kuchar-as-character experiencing both creative and sexual confusion, and Kuchar-as-actual-director using his narrative to voice his own frustrations at making his version of a Hollywood film ( - or, "Hollywood in the Bronx", as David James put it).
These loose ends come together at the film's climax, where the film's original lead actress and her replacement ( - both played by Donna Kerness, a frequent Kuchar collaborator - ) make exuberant love in their respective boyfriends in the shower, whilst Kuchar, dressed like his leading lady, desperately attempts to share this passion.
Notable for its lurid melodrama, garish colour pallet and bombastic soundtrack. Prod Co: Kuchar Film Presentation. Dir: George Kuchar. 15 mins. Courtesy of Screensound.
(1966),
Events soon devolve into an ill-defined combination of Kuchar-as-character experiencing both creative and sexual confusion, and Kuchar-as-actual-director using his narrative to voice his own frustrations at making his version of a Hollywood film ( - or, "Hollywood in the Bronx", as David James put it).
These loose ends come together at the film's climax, where the film's original lead actress and her replacement ( - both played by Donna Kerness, a frequent Kuchar collaborator - ) make exuberant love in their respective boyfriends in the shower, whilst Kuchar, dressed like his leading lady, desperately attempts to share this passion.
Notable for its lurid melodrama, garish colour pallet and bombastic soundtrack. Prod Co: Kuchar Film Presentation. Dir: George Kuchar. 15 mins. Courtesy of Screensound.
followed by:
•SITTING PRETTY, 
(1948)
The King family, Tacey and Harry – a post-WWII suburban couple - have a trio of terrible post-war JD brats that no human can
control. Tacey puts an ad in the paper for a live-in babysitter, and the ad attracts some correspondence from a Lynn Belvedere.
But when “she” arrives, the “she” turns out to be a man! And not just any man, but a most eccentric, outrageously forthright self-proclaimed genius, with seemingly a million careers and experiences behind him. Belvedere's superiority is never in question: when asked at what he works, he simply and unequivocally states, " I am a genius ". (Four years later, Chuck Jones would have his Wile E. Coyote utter these same words in
OPERATION RABBIT [1952] ).
Raymond C. Hair, Jr. and CLIFTON WEBB in SITTING PRETTY (1948)
This professed child-hating bachelor proves to be a godsend for the bewildered baby-boom breeders. Within days Mr. Belvedere’s unconventional mix of child psychology and strict discipline works miracles with the three rambunctious boys - faced with an infant who insists on spattering him with oatmeal, he simply dumps the bowl on the tyke's head. But the Kings have no idea just what he's doing with his evenings off.
However, trouble “in paradise” begins when snoopy, pompous neighbour Clarence Appleton – played by the ever-waspish RICHARD HAYDEN - the voice of the Caterpillar in Disney's ALICE IN WONDERLAND (1951) - spreads gossip of an "improper relationship" between Mr. Belvedere and Tacey, which sends hot-headed Papa ballistic.
Just as things are looking pretty grim, Belvedere turns the tables on the neighbourhood when the real reason of his suburban relocation is revealed!
The magnificent CLIFTON WEBB brings the sanguine, imperious fussiness that made him a prissy Film Noir icon – as the drole, acid-tongued Waldo Lydecker in LAURA (1944 and THE DARK CORNER (1946) - to the role of Lynn Belvedere, the fastidious, self-proclaimed, Spockish ( - one can imagine Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock recreating the role! - )
genius who takes the position nannying the Kings’ bratty trio.
It is hard to know where to begin in detailing Webb’s incredible artistic achievements, ranging from high comedy in CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN (1950) , and DREAMBOAT (1952) to high drama in THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS (1956) , or TITANIC (1953). Webb received an Oscar ™ nomination for his portrayal of Belvedere. (It’s also a curious footnote that he was a champion ballroom dancer, crossing paths with the legendary FRED and ADELLE ASTAIRE.)
Webb's comedic timing is underrated and the plot twists and supporting characters entertain and delight throughout. Webb's Belvedere is uptight, prissy, unflappable, and decidedly unamused, even in the most farcical situations, which, of course, only adds to the fun. The tension between Belvedere and his "nemesis", Clarence Appleton, is particularly notable for it's "good twin / bad twin" dimension, particularly in the high abrasion scene between the two.
Note here also, particularly - in the long tradition of the excesses of the worst schoolyard level of brutality - the assignment of campy names to oddballs, “geniuses” and the like, ie. Mr. Peabody, Belvedere, Pennypacker, Murgatroid, Mervin, Marvin, Melvin, Irving, Clarence et c., et c. We might reflect on the social dialectic of individuals formed by their names as much as they are reflected in them. CHUCK JONES seemed so mesemerised by the goofiness of the Belvedere name that he used it only two years later in a CHARLIE DOG cartoon - DOG GONE SOUTH (1950).
Director Walter Lang underplays his hand so much that the film takes on all the style of a ‘Fifties TV sitcom ( - Mr Belvedere even became a sit-com, albeit not a very good one, in the 1980s!), but his fine direction of performers brings out the humour of this middle-class family satire with warmth and wit.
Ultimately, however, the film belongs to Webb, whose witheringly snide insults and cutting comments roll off his tongue with comic effortlessness, and made a hugely popular hit. Robert Young and Maureen O'Hara as Harry & Tacey King were supposedly the headliners in this film, but support character Lynn Belvedere (Clifton Webb) stole the show, so much so that Mr. Belvedere “spun off” into two sequels of his own - MR. BELVEDERE GOES TO COLLEGE (1949) and MR. BELVEDERE RINGS THE BELL (1951).
The fantasy of the Über-nanny appearing mysteriously to enrich our
lives and control our household is worthy of a suburban comedy like this. MARY POPPINS (1964), or indeed, even THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1965) ( - which also featured RICHARD HAYDEN, in the part of Max Detweiler - ) are kinds of benchmarks for this sort of thing. It's an early look at the new-fangled (at that time) concept of ”baby sitting”, brought about by post-war “nuclearisation” of the family, and women's new freedom to explore options outside the home.
Lynn Belvedere: Mrs. King, I happen to dislike all children intensely. But I can assure you that I can readily
attend to their necessary - though unpleasant - wants.
Lynn Belvedere: I am, in my way, a philosopher.
Harry King: Oh, I see, you just sit and think.
Lynn Belvedere: Mr. King, if more people just sat and thought, the world might not be in the stinking mess that it is.
Harry King: Oh, I see, you just sit and think.
Lynn Belvedere: Mr. King, if more people just sat and thought, the world might not be in the stinking mess that it is.
Lynn Belvedere: Mrs. King, as I told you last night, I dislike children intensely and yours, if I may say so, have peculiarly repulsive habits and manners.
Harry King: You know, Mrs. King, it's really all your fault.
Tacey King: Hnh?
Harry King: If you weren't so darned pretty, we wouldn't have so many kids for people to sit with!
Tacey King: Hnh?
Harry King: If you weren't so darned pretty, we wouldn't have so many kids for people to sit with!
Prod Co: Twentieth Century -Fox Film Corporation.
Credits: Prod: Samuel G. Engel. Dir: Walter Lang. Wr: F. Hugh Herbert (scr); Gwen Davenport (novel). Phot: Norbert Brondine. Mus: Alfred Newman. Cast: CLIFTON WEBB, Robert Young, Maureen O'Hara, RICHARD HAYDN, Louise Allbritton, Ed Begley, John Russell. 85 mins. Courtesy of Screensound.
Minor programme changes may occur due to unforseen circumstances.
Feature runs last; shorts order may vary from listing.
* Acknowledging ACMI Inc. & ScreenSound Australia ;) *
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ADMISSION IS RESTRICTED TO MEMBERS FOR THIS PROGRAMME
Credits: Prod: Samuel G. Engel. Dir: Walter Lang. Wr: F. Hugh Herbert (scr); Gwen Davenport (novel). Phot: Norbert Brondine. Mus: Alfred Newman. Cast: CLIFTON WEBB, Robert Young, Maureen O'Hara, RICHARD HAYDN, Louise Allbritton, Ed Begley, John Russell. 85 mins. Courtesy of Screensound.
Minor programme changes may occur due to unforseen circumstances.
Feature runs last; shorts order may vary from listing.
* Acknowledging ACMI Inc. & ScreenSound Australia ;) *
************ ********* ********* *********
ADMISSION IS RESTRICTED TO MEMBERS FOR THIS PROGRAMME
THIS IS A FILM SOCIETY SCREENING OPEN TO MEMBERS
BUT IF YOU WISH TO BECOME A MEMBER,
THE JOINING FEE IS SO LOW,
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MEMBERSHIP RATES:
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Generally Socially-Oppressed: $6.00
BUT IF YOU WISH TO BECOME A MEMBER,
THE JOINING FEE IS SO LOW,
IT MIGHT AS WELL BE FREE!
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MEMBERSHIP RATES:
Quarterly*:
Generally Socially-Advantaged : $7.00
Generally Socially-Oppressed: $6.00
*annual and half-yearly memberships available on request
If you wish to join on the night, we strongly advise you
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If you wish to join on the night, we strongly advise you
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For e-mail notification, spam your Subscribe-Request to:
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or visit:
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or register* via snail-mail (address below).
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