A Touch of Magic (in the Ephemeral section of Open Video Project. Also, film #7 on Our Secret Century, Vol. 1: The Rainbow Is Yours CD-ROM (Voyager). Also, film #1539 on Prelinger Archive). [Category: Industrial]

Nuveena's at it again in this sequel to Design for Dreaming. This was made in 1960, near the end of the populuxe era, and you can tell––the magic seems to be fading from this sort of film. Nuveena and her beau dance a tribute to medieval chivalry, but when the audience shows up, they actually look embarassed (that was certainly not a problem in Design for Dreaming). The time shifts to the present and the couple displays the 1961 GM cars. Then they get married, move into a new house (and not a Home of Tomorrow, just an ordinary new house), and have a housewarming party. Instead of fixing all the food by pushing a few magic buttons in the Kitchen of Tomorrow, Nuveena sends her beau into the Kitchen of Today to do all the cooking while she gets on the phone and invites all the guests (which, let's face it, is almost as good). The guests turn out to be all invisible imaginary friends, though they have real cars and eat all the real food. Then Nuveena and her beau demonstrate proper dishwasher loading by literally throwing all the dishes in the general direction of the dishwasher (they all land in perfect order and the dishwasher starts itself). Not as otherworldly as Design for Dreaming, but still pretty weird.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: *****. Weirdness: *****. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ****.