Savant's new reviews today are
Portland Expose & They Were So Young Warners
Echoes of Forgotten Places Microcinema / Scribble
Without Warning! Dark Sky and
All Passion Spent Acorn Media
Greetings! Had sort of a monster fan evening on Sunday night. The publicity people promoting a new docu disc called The Sci-Fi Boys had a screening at Universal. Since it was on the lot I left my camera at home only to discover that it was a wide open photo-op with (beware, idle name-drop warning) some top fan luminaries present: Ray Harryhausen, John Landis, Forry Ackerman, Bob Burns, Ann Robinson, Basil Gogos and filmmaker Paul Davids.
The movie was an ode to fandom, extolling the inspiration of Harryhausen, George Pal and others as broadcast to hundreds of thousands of 1960s boomer kids through Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine. Present effects and makeup masters talk about how they got hooked on fantasy and monsters. Feature clips illustrate discussion about the takeover of CGI effects. The show is definitely aimed at a splinter audience - the kind eager to see clips from the ancient Famous Monsters contest movie, "Siegfried Saves Metropolis!"
Key interviews are dated from 2003 (although we see ol' Forry through the ages, bless him) and the project seems to have come about with Universal money from the King Kong ad campaign. Peter Jackson provides opening and closing statements. It gets a bit sentimental with Ackerman, the Don of monster fandom.
Davids announced a new organization called CINEROUGE, which bestowed an award on Ray Harryhausen after the show ... a really impressive sculpture of Lon Chaney as the Phantom. (Photos by Gil Frazee) The Sci-Fi Boys is at present a Best Buy exclusive.
Savant received his discs of the Arkoff features (finally) but didn't feel like rushing a review out in just one evening ... I guess I have to admit to having a lot of Sci Fi boy blood in my veins. Next time. Thanks for reading, Glenn Erickson
Posted by DVD Savant at May 01, 2006 03:17 PM