Gimme The Mermaid

Pantheon's post about The Little Mermaid reminded me of a weird video I saw a couple of years ago that featured Ariel. It was rumored that the video was made by a Disney animator on the sly which made it seem so very subversive. Turns out the rumor was true and here's the story according to the info on YouTube (You can find anything on YouTube. Love the YouTube.):

This piece was commissioned by the experimental sound collage group Negativland for the video compilation, "Our Favorite Things," soon to be released. The track had been cut by Negativland several years before, an audio document of their problems with copyright/trademark issues concerning their "U2" album. Many years and a painful settlement later, they had successfully transformed their experience into even more art, and a little activism besides. This little piece, made on Disney equipment after hours when no one was looking, remains quite popular. San Francisco experimental filmmaker Craig Baldwin has been kind enough to include it in "culture jamming" programs he has organized throughout the US and Europe. Several times has it been used in conferences and on panels about copyright for the legal profession. And it's fun, to boot. The statute of limitations has apparently run out on this piece, and it is now considered perfectly legal. What a relief!

Dirrrty Disney

The Little Mermaid (1989) was the film that brought Disney animation out of their Fox & the Hound toilet and into a 20-year reign as hitmakers of animated musical films with accompanying soundtracks of top 40 hits and Broadway shows. Speaking of cartoon tunes, doesn't Ashman-Menken's "Somewhere That's Green" (From their Little Shop of Horrors) sound alot like their later Mermaid's "Part of Your World?"

Oh well, it's all about 'Somewhere Over The Green Rainbow World' for those gays, I suppose.

People also made a fuss when the posters and home video design showed a phallic spire rising from the sea floor. The artist swears it was not intentional. Ofcourse when mags started talking about the cock in the shot - a concerned parent did a double take and complained - so the art work was later altered.

read the snopes details here

A couple years later, Disney's Aladdin would revise their original theatrical lyric about barbaric Baghdad as a place "Where they cut off your ear if they don't like your face" to "Where it's flat and immense and the heat is intense" on the later film/CD releases.

But back to the Little Spermaid (as I would have likely called it back then - if I was playing my time killer game of making up porn titles of current films while waiting in line at the cinema) -- why didn't they change the questionable lyric (for concerned parents with no life, ofcourse) in the film's song UNDER THE SEA?

I am referring to the saucy "Darling it's better down where it's wetter."
I mean Reeeeeeallly. Who are we kidding?
I guess sick minds think alike -- I found this on-line.

Long Live The New Flesh!

One of my favorite movies is Videodrome, mainly because it deals with the horrors of Cable TV and home taping (on Beta!!!), which are two things that scared 1983 Hollywood more than the average person. Never before has Hollywood so nakedly laid out it's fears for the world to see.

One Man's Niche-y Obsession

Steven Hills Movie Title Pages. Just....endless, hundreds, assloads of movie title screens. Has to be seen to:
A: Be believed
B: Be appreciated
let's face it - this stuff is an impact making few seconds of any film (for instance, in my house we say, "Cartoon opening; good movie." - think about it - it's true) and Senor Hill has made it his mission, with just a hint of "WTF?!?"

Jaan Pehechaan Ho

My favorite movie musical number ever, which circulated around for years on bootlegged VHS tapes from the Bollywood classic "Gumnaam" (I finally own a gorgeous DVD copy) before it surfaced for real in "Ghost World." Here it is in its original form:




now watch it lovingly referenced in "Om Shanti Om" - it starts about 2:10 with the familiar drum roll:



Thanks, Danielle!

Guilty Pleasure: BET's 'American Gangster'

Now, you know these shows. There's never a good ending. The guy's either in jail, or gets killed in jail, or is out of jail and dead. Imagine my delight when on last night's Midget Molley episode (he wore a crown! I mean, I love anyone who wears crowns - James Brown, Solomon Burke, King Vitamin - you name it, they're crowned, I'm their fan), Molley is not only a free man, he is a community activist in Atlantic City. And he's got his own youtube channel. Go, Midget!


Hmm - BET's page won't let me cut and paste. You can watch here. Oddly, it stars with a feminine hygiene ad. Maybe their know their audience. Want to know more? Here's a wiki, his myspace, and his website.

Just......shite

Take a vibrant work, and give it arthritis by beating it over and over with stars and cash then beat it with more stars and cash. Some mid-to-high points here and there but, as stated, arthritically executed. They should've taken Van Sant director's license away after this one.....plus where'd he get Sissy's thumbs? Spencer gifts? One might add, all that was missing was Drew Barrymore!

De-leet!



Please disagree with me - I need to see something in all that emptiness........

The Creature of the Black lagoon

The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) is by far one of the best monster movies of all time. Filmed in 3D as many new are now I thought it was a good time to remind people of not only a great film, but a pretty good trilogy. Many people don’t realize that «Creature» was a trilogy. «Revenge of the Creature» and «The Creature Walks Amoung US» followed up, with limited success at the box office but actually expanded teh mythos of the gillman in ways you just don’t see in today’s monster flicks. Many classic monsters we not just villians, in fact humans were usually the evil force... going into nature and distubing it’s natural balance, attacking things they didn’t unsterstand and sometimes people were just plain sadistic jerks in the name of «science».

The creature is no exception and even expands on the theme. In the first film, explorers go into the jungle find a living gillman and think of nothing but capturing him to make money off it, the second film, they bring him back to an aquarium and «experiment» on him by giving him electric shocks (where did these scientist go to school? Was Illsa - She wolf of the SS a professor there?). The third film really gets poignant as the gillman loses his gills and is made to wear clothes and become «one of us». In the end he finds his way back into tthe ocean... and drowns.

Technically, the costume of the monster is fantastic, scary and not at all like a cheap halloween costume some people expect from films from that era. The music is memorable particularly since the theme is played literally HUNDREDS of times through the film which sadly lends itself to parody despite the fact that little riff is quite jarring to hear. The 3D is as annoying as always (only the 1st 2 films use it BTW). 3D is almost always, without fail, a headache inducing, distracting experience, even with today’s «advancements» in the technology.

In short... spend a Saturday afternoon watching all 3 before it gets remade by Micheal Bay... seriously.

Oliver Twist

Dickens + Iron Curtain Musicals + the Czech Language + Big Hair + the Twist =

Anyone speak Czech?

PS. Want more? I'm on a bender at Lethal Dose.

John Zacherley - Dinner with Dracula

and here's "The Cool Ghoul" on the Mike Douglas Show.


Who is Zacherley? Read here. You can see my autographed pic of Zacherely here.