Poster: Phantom of the Opera (1925) Lon Chaney

 

This was one I wanted to add to my monster poster series for a while but finding the right image was not so easy. I went through the restored version of the film and many publicity photos to find something I thought was at least a little out of the ordinary. I blew up a frame from the masquerade sequence, which was also filmed in early colour, as well was reached out images of that Red death costume from other sources. I kept the composition simple, like the rest of the series. Even though ti was technically "in colour" and restored, the image was still not as detailed as I would have liked and the early colour was sort of all over the place frame by frame. Some things red in one frame were orange in another and some shadows were variations of green.  I like to do folds in cloth and this certainly has plenty of that! 

The logo was taken from the 1925 posters and lobby cards. I hand drew it from the references and tried to keep the colours true to the original. 

The Wolf Man!

You can keep your vampires, kiddies - I've always been a Larry Talbot kinda gal. When I heard Benicio was going to play him, I could barely contain myself! We'll still have to wait until February, but at least the trailer is out, and it looks gloriously cheesy:



Here's the original, as a refresher:

The Unholy Three (1930 version)

There are few things more terrifying than a sadistic midget dressed as a baby, but throw in ventriloquism, old lady drag, and an emasculated strongman terrorized by a gorilla and you've got "The Unholy Three." Maybe because I saw this movie quite a few times on LSD (I was never a "peace and love" type) it's had quite an effect on me, and last night I watched it again on TCM. I should have blogged it sooner in case some of you who hadn't seen it could have set your DVRs, but hopefully it will rerun again soon. Here's some screenshots.


Here's the film's opener. Note, this is the talkie remake directed by Jack Conway, but just as good.