Robert Altman's Groovy Scopitone!

From the Scopitone site:

"I've heard this is directed by Robert Altman but can't seem to find any info on that on the internets...can anyone confirm?

UPDATE: Bob Orlowsky of the Scopitone Archive has the scoop (of course): "Hey Spike, I saw your question about Altman and Bittersweet Samba. If you do a Google search for Altman Color-Sonics Fortier, you'll find a PDF file from a college film seminar on Altman, which has an interview with Altman that includes a brief reference to a film that is clearly Bittersweet Samba:

"Q: While you were waiting for your break into features, you made some comic short films, three of which you’ve occasionally allowed people to see: The Kathryn Reed Story, a birthday present for your wife; The Party, with Robert Fortier as a hapless guest at a very 1960s party, one of a projected series of juke-box movies called ColorSonics; and Pot au feu, a parody of a TV cookery programme explaining the recipe for a perfect marijuana joint.

A: I did those just for myself. They were unfinanced, just bringing together a few friends, borrowing a camera, and so on. But because of one of those films I got hired to do M*A*S*H: Ingo Preminger looked at Pot au feu and loved it, so it served its purpose."

http://scopitones.blogs.com/scopitonescom/2007/05/bittersweet_sam.html


This is not your average cheesy Scopitone! I'm trying to work out which came first, "The Party" directed by Blake Edwards and starring my favorite actor, Peter Sellers, or this!? Clearly there's some mutual admiration between the two!






I might even prefer Altman's party...but then I'm a big fan of Herb Alpert and his Tijuana Brass!

Sonny: KING of Men!

Plastic letters make you think of Blondie, you say?


When I first came across this unbelievable piece of Celluloid, I had to know more. I looked up Sonny in the Vegas phone book (this was in the days before google, around 1996) and we became phone pals. I sent it to him, and he cried (not over me, but tears of joy.) He had never seen it. The blonde was his late wife. "She was Miss France," he told me. "Frank was the godfather," of their daughter. An old friend of Martin and Lewis from Atlantic City's 500 Club, he appeared in "Robin and the Seven Hoods." Sonny continued to perform at the Bootlegger in Vegas up until his death a few years ago - and our own Mavis Martini has the pix!