The Crazy Firehouse (film #67 on Open Source Movies). [Category: Sleaze & Outsider]

Another sign-language interpreted cartoon, and it’s a pretty silly one, featuring a pathetic group of animal firemen who are no match for anthropomorphic flames. The flames are actually pretty scary, as they are shown actually burning up some of the firemen, though in a humorous way, turning a pig into a smoked ham and a wiener dog into hot dogs. The sign language interpretation, though frequent, is not particularly intrusive, and does seem to clarify the action for the deaf kids. I’m just surprised this one was chosen for interpretation, considering it is more violent than what is usually considered acceptable for children today.

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

How to Buy Meat (film #710 on Prelinger Archive). [Category: Public Service]

This is actually a series of short segments on meat buying, made by the USDA and featuring a bland early 70s housewife who wears wonderfully outrageous early 70s housewife fashions. I love this sort of home economics thing, of course, though this is a little drier than most. Still, you would expect that from a government film, and it’s fun to groove on the housewife’s changing fashions, the huge cuts of meat she caresses so lovingly, and the “early American” kitchen she inhabits. Don’t forget to write for your free pamphlets on meat grading!

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

Ahead of Time (film #2 in the Action section of Brickfilms. Also, film #124 in the Comedy section of Brickfilms. Also, film #43 in the Drama section of Brickfilms). [Category: Outtakes & Obscurities]

This brickfilm is very hard to follow. It seems to involve a pair of burglars who defy the police and death itself. But it’s hard to tell. The sound is very bad, though that may be an artifact of my avi player, and the lighting is murky. Too bad––it looked like there was an interesting story here, just told badly.

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

BBC Evening News (film #24 in the News section of TVArk). [Category: News]

Extra BBC news report on the death of Pope John Paul II, showing the body lying in state in the Vatican. It sure doesn’t take long for these kinds of news reports to make it to the Internet, does it?

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

Air Defenses (film #2 on Universal Newsreels). [Category: Military & Propaganda]

50s newsreel featuring lots of cold war-related and conflict-around-the-world stories, including the testing of Nike Missiles, protests in South Korea, passive resistance protests in India, and the training of military helicopter pilots in France. In case this is too much war for you, they also included a “heartwarming” piece about a dog who saved a boy’s life. By the time 50s audiences got through this, they needed movies like The Blob for escapism.

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

Chevrolet Leader News, Vol. 3, No. 1 (in the Ephemeral section of Open Video Project. Also, film #302 on Prelinger Archive). [Category: Industrial]

In other Chevrolet news, bathing beauties throw baseballs at each other on the beach, then drive up into the mountains and throw snowballs at each other; the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge opens to traffic; people live in trailers; lobsters are trapped and sold to fancy restaurants; and dog food is made fresh and delivered to dog owners’ doors by the Dog Food Man. Must have been a slow news day at Chevrolet. No animal abuse this time, but two of the bathing beauties ride on the hood of the car all the way up into the mountains in those wacky carefree days before seatbelt laws.

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

Chaplin - The Immigrant (film #22 in the Silent section of Movieflix). [Category: Early Film & TV]

The Little Tramp takes a ship to America, in steerage, of course. On the ship he encounters a pretty woman and her sick mother and helps them out after winning some money in a card game. After they all make it to the States, he meets her again in a restaurant and treats her to lunch, only to find that the coin he found in the street that he was intending to use to pay for lunch has fallen through a hole in his pocket. This is a charming film with some great slapstick moments, such as our opening glimpse of the Little Tramp, and some shennanigans involving the coin mentioned above and a huge surly waiter. A 1917 Charlie Chaplin film.

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

Ancient Fistory (film #17 on Film Chest Vintage Cartoons). [Category: Hollywood]

Popeye plays Cinderella in this gender-reversed version of the tale, with Olive Oyl as the princess giving the ball, and Bluto as Popeye’s employer and rival. Popeye’s fairy godfather changes a can of spinach into a limousine that will change back at midnight. Popeye wins Olive’s heart, but Bluto butts in and foils Popeye with a cannon. Fortunately, at midnight, Popeye’s limo turns back into a can of spinach, which Popeye is able to use with the usual results. As it sounds here, this is a pretty wacked-out version of Cinderella, but that’s the great thing about cartoons––they can do this sort of thing and get away with it.

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

Bicycle Trick Riding No. 2 (film #2 on American Variety Stage: Physical Culture. Also, film #27 on Edison Film Archive. Also in the Historical section of Open Video Project). [Category: Early Film & TV]

A guy does some not-very-impressive stunts on a bike, such as riding backwards and propping himself up unsuccessfully on the handlebars. Sid Davis would later make a fortune making films telling kids not to do this sort of thing. But back in 1899, it was entertainment. Hey, what did they have back then, RKOs? An 1899 Edison film.

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

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (extra on Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein DVD (Universal, 2000)). [Category: Commercial]

Straightforward trailer for Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. Other than the rather silly assertion that the film is “SCARE-ewy!”, this is ordinary and unsurprising.

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

Brad Grinter, Nudist (extra on Blood Freak DVD (Something Weird, 2002)). [Category: Sleaze & Outsider]

A husband whose wife has a phobia about being nude brings her to a nudist camp as a form of “shock therapy.” There she sees lots of ordinary-looking folks with very noticeable tan lines frolicking and relaxing in the nude, and despite the fact that she originally had some bizarre voice running through her head saying something like, “Cooperate with your lover,” (or something, it’s hard to tell), indicating some incipient PTSD, she is quickly and totally cured of her phobia. This short features lots of bad acting, pathetically cheap-looking sets, and, unlike most nudist shorts, full-frontal nudity, men included. This makes it somewhat less sleazy than most, but it’s still pretty cheesy. The acting, in particular, is laughable, and the premise is far-fetched, smacking of sexual fantasy, which lessens any realism it might have considerably and indicates it probably had little audience outside of grindhouses.

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

Walk-In Triple Feature #1 (Sinister Cinema). [Category: Commercial]

Since this is a triple feature, it has two intermissions. Also since it's a triple feature, the intermissions are quite short, which is somewhat more justified in this case, since they needed to make room for another whole feature-length movie on the tape. Still, it makes it less interesting from an ephemera standpoint, although there are a few good moments, such as a nice print of "Let's All Go to the Lobby", an amusing "Giant Comedy Spookero" promo, and the "nutritious" Hollywood Candy Bars ad.

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

The House Fly (film #693 on Prelinger Archive). [Category: Public Service]

This Encyclopedia Britannica film is more strident than most, portraying the house fly as a carrier of filth and disease and a public health menace. Lots of anatomical diagrams of flies are shown, as well as lots of disgusting footage of flies buzzing around garbage, animal corpses, and dairy cattle, and that’s not even touching on the really disgusting footage of maggots. The flies seem to be everywhere in this film’s 50s world, despite attempts to control them with fly swatters, insecticide sprays, and widespread dissemination of poison. Although the film is straightforward and dry, in that EB way, it shows a disturbing picture of the seemy underbelly of 50s anxieties. This would be a good short to show before screenings of The Fly, another great example of 50s insect horror.

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

Combat America (in the Ephemeral section of Open Video Project. Also, film #352 on Prelinger Archive. Also, film #1 on Side A of Disc #10 of War Classics DVD Megapack (Treeline Films, 2004). Also, film #1 on Side A of Disc #9 of WWII: The Ultimate Collection DVD Boxed Set (Brentwood Home Video, 2004)). [Category: Military & Propaganda]

After his wife, Carole Lombard, was killed in a plane crash, a grieving Clark Gable couldn’t face Hollywood anymore, so he joined up with the Army Air Corps, requesting that he be sent into actual combat. So naturally the Army decided he should make a movie about his combat group, the 351st Bombardier Group. Gable narrates this complete portrait of his outfit and appears in several short scenes where he interviews his comrades-in-arms. The focus of the film, though, is the group itself, especially the gunners. The film starts just after training is complete and the group flies to England to begin flying actual missions. The film covers all aspects of the lives of the gunners, from actual combat to leisure time, and from goofy hijinks to the gritty reality of seeing your buddies get killed or seriously wounded in combat. The film is quite similar to The Memphis Belle, though perhaps not as engrossing as that film. Still, the film has quite a bit of historical value as a portrait of combat and army life, and in color to boot.

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

Abe’s Job (film #256 on Open Source Movies). [Category: Outtakes & Obscurities]

Apparently, Abe Lincoln is still alive and aggressively protecting his copyrights. I guess the makers of this film are in trouble, then. I wonder if he pals around with Elvis.

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

Atlas in Orbit: Radios Ike’s Message of Peace to World (film #128 on Universal Newsreels). [Category: News]

Newsreel story about the launch of the third Atlas missile, which, the narrator informs us, is way better than Sputnik, and which became one of the first communications satellites, broadcasting a message from President Eisenhower wishing everyone peace on earth. This was the space program in its infancy, folks, giving this some historical value, as well as some mild amusement when the narrator reports the dismal failures of the first two Atlas missiles, though he refers to them as “triumphs.”

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

Signals: Read 'Em or Weep (extra on Carnival of Souls DVD (Criterion Collection, 2000)). [Category: Industrial]

This safety film sponsored by Caterpillar features bungling construction workers fudging on safety in various ways, and then paying the price when their big ol' earth-moving machines bust up in various spectacular ways. More than any other safety film, this one makes you wonder how it was made without endangering the actors, 'cause big machines really do bust up before the camera. The best scene is the one where a faulty hose causes a big pipe to be dropped on the supervisor's truck, totalling it––the worker looks tremendously embarassed, but I'll bet the real construction workers in the audience where whooping and hollering. Not a bad piece of ephemera for being made as late as 1981.

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

A-Sub Epic: Nautilus Pioneers North Pole Seaway (film #135 on Universal Newsreels). [Category: Military & Propaganda]

Newsreel clip documenting maiden voyage of the atomic submarine Nautilus. Unfortunately, there are no “encounters with mythical sea creatures a la Jules Verne.” Instead, we get to watch sailors playing solitaire. Boy, those nuclear subs were exciting!

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

Brussels World’s Fair (film #119 on Universal Newsreels). [Category: Industrial]

Newsreel clip showing the construction of buildings for the Brussels World’s Fair, “the first world’s fair of the atomic age.” It includes the construction of a diorama showing the Highways of the Future, but it’s just not as much fun as the 1939 World of Tomorrow, darn it. Perhaps tomorrow had become today by that time.

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

The Devil's Ball (track #5 on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1913) (Sinister Cinema). Also, film #1 on Early Sci-Fi Fantasy Films (The Buyer's Gallery Home Video)). [Category: Hollywood]

This fragment of an early stop-motion cartoon is real nightmare stuff. Even the talking vegetables are evil, and that's saying a lot, coming from me. Like most dreams, it has lots of weird stuff in it and it doesn't make much sense. But you won't easily forget such images as dancing wineglasses that break themselves, an inflatable saxophone player, or a love triangle involving a shady character, a ballerina, and an ape. I wonder where they dug this one up.

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