#the black cat 1941

[weirdlookindog]

Anne Gwynne in The Black Cat (1941).

#the black cat 1941 #anne gwynne #1941 #1940s movies #horror

[mrcowboytoyou]

why are there two movies called "The Black Cat" made within 7 years of each other that BOTH star Bela Lugosi as a guy with a 'V' name... are yoU KIDDING ME. I kept waiting for Boris Karloff to show up and now I feel like an idiot...

#bela lugosi #The Black Cat 1934 #The Black Cat 1941 #i thought they were like the same movie all along or something #basil rathbone #boris karloff #they have completely different plots

[animals-in-old-films]

The many cats in The Black Cat (1941)

bonus sippy:

#animals #cats #kittens #The Black Cat 1941 #the black cat #1940s #old horror movies #old hollywood #old movies #animals in old movies #black and white #1940s movies #cinema #films

[gameraboy2]

Bela Lugosi in The Black Cat (1941)

#bela lugosi #the black cat #1941 #1940s #vintage #film #movie

[vintage-every-day]

April 29 1941: A black cat found dropped in a mailbox on West 42nd Street with some pretzels and clams to snack on. Photo by WeeGee.

#vintage #daily life #1940s

[stuffaboutminneapolis]

Black Bomber, a Manx cat belonging to Mrs. Charles Smith, poses in front of a calendar page for Friday the 13th (1941) via @hclib

#friday the 13th #minneapolis #minnesota #twin cities #history #travel #midwest #aesthetic #black cat #vintage

[ohmygodshesinsane]

Drop-Off | A Jily Micro-Oops

James Potter takes Lily Evans home, and wants to make something clear.

words: 1941 | for @jilymicro-oops | april prompt 22: ridiculous

sequel to unlicensed

read on ao3 or under the cut

“Hilarious, Potter. Left again.” James made a face and did as she said, playing it off like a laugh, still barely able to believe that she was in his car, in his proximity, breathing the same air as him.

“It’s like a rollercoaster.”

“It should be shut down.”

“Oi.” He jabbed his pinkie finger at the indicator and nudged it up, though the street was deserted. The blinker click-click-clicked, and a cat watched him from the top of a faded brick letterbox, tail flicking.

These roads were unfamiliar. They nestled together only a few blocks from the beach, but they were distinct from the shiny rows of glassy mid-rises, with their acai shops and coastal boutiques tucked beneath sprawling apartments. Sad single-storey brick homes dominated the little suburb of Cokeworth, gutters wonky, red-tile roofs slumping in the blunted sunlight. A leather lounge teetered on the curb, its peeling seats and flaking arms praying for a good home. James’s foot hovered on the brake, idling them along.

“Your joint’s around here?” he asked, frowning. In all his daydreams, he had never imagined Lily Evans living here. None of these places had room for the Beauty-and-the-Beast library her good grades demanded, or a pool for her to lay by in summer’s heights. No old ladies fidgeted, waiting for a reckless do-gooder to escort them across the street. A dog barked through the missing panes of a grey-wood fence.

“Nah,” Evans said, shrugging hard. “Just thought we’d take the scenic route.” She rapped her knuckles on the window. “Entertained?”

James swallowed. Touchy. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, cruising along, squashing down the sinking feeling that her sharp little remarks always wrought. She was just some girl in his class. She wasn’t Lizzie – Lizzie, who would be coming round later to ‘study for Chem’ in the media room, Lizzie who James had just invited to Pete’s birthday, Lizzie from the netball team, Lizzie who he reckoned he might properly ask out soon. Lizzie, not Lily.

Sure, some girl he’d liked when he was thirteen was sitting in the front seat, dark red hair pulled back in the swish of a ponytail, one knee slung over the other at the edge of her regulation black skirt, but it was whatever. She shifted, and her maroon jumper rose with the arch of her back and the stretch of her arms, revealing a swathe of the white cotton blouse beneath. Tiny gold hoop things glinted in her ears, and the light caught the flecks of forest in the emeralds of her gaze –

“Bump!” As Evans shouted, the car hit it, and the car hiked awkwardly over the raised crossing. “Jesus, again. It’s not GTA.”

“GTA’s not allowed in my house,” James answered flippantly. “It’s offensive to women.”

Evans guffawed; in the corner of his vision (because he really was trying to focus on the road now), she folded her arms indignantly, cheeks red. Bugger. Truth be told, he couldn’t say precisely why he had offered up his vaguely-illicit chauffeur service when he’d seen Snape stalk off without her. Evans had working legs – no, James wasn’t going to think about them, moving on – and was capable of walking herself home without that idiot hanging around. His eyes sharpened, raking down the sides of the street, as if the git might materialise. But in any case, it wouldn’t be dark for hours. Evans could have got herself home no worries. The words had just flung out of James’s mouth before he could think, and then he’d nearly keeled over with shock when she’d accepted, and so – here they sat.

Maybe the guilt from lunchtime had crept in. James had copped a week of detentions and a call home, but Lily had been hauled into McGonagall’s office, despite being innocent in the whole matter. She hadn’t destroyed Snape’s project. That fucker deserved it. James’s knuckles whitened around the wheel. Where the hell did he get off, talking to her that way? And now the whole school was muttering about prissy prefect Lily Evans getting a talking-to, and she’d not done a thing wrong – she was the one who had been wronged. His fingers itched for Snape’s throat. Half of James wanted to chuck a u-turn and speed back until he found the sulky little Slytherin, and then he could land one right in the middle of his stupid, petulant, ugly –

“Are you kidding?” Oh, shit. James was doing fifteen over. Not that Evans’s eyes were on the speedo – she grinned at him, mirth sparkling, and his heart somersaulted. “You don’t play GTA because you’re such a feminist?”

James made a rude hand gesture, swerving a little as he looked back at her. He scrambled to correct it.

“I am a feminist,” he said, a little offended. “Mum banned it besides. She goes mental whenever Sirius sticks the girly pictures up. Bad for body image. And what would Lizzy think, if I spent all my time murdering hookers and dealing drugs? In real life, sure, it’s street cred and money, but online that’s just depressing.” That wasn’t an exact summary of why he avoided it, but he wasn’t about to imitate a video essay. He watched too many of those. Really, though, Lara Croft has gone through the wringer! He’d nodded along with the Youtuber’s words while Sirius killed cultists on their Xbox.

Evans’s eyes narrowed. “Next right, and it’s two from the end on the left,” she said off-handedly, gaze still roaming across the planes of his face. He slowed, waiting for a car to pass before he made the turn. “I don’t know if I believe you.”

“Believe me?” James took the gap and lurched down the cul-de-sac. “I mean it, Evans. Street cred is everything. If I was a loser, I wouldn’t be a Marauder, would I?”

She rolled her eyes. “You are a loser. Nobody who’s actually cool gives themselves such stupid nicknames. It’s not like you’re a band.”

“We’ve considered it.”

“I remember Remus on the clarinet at the ANZAC assembly; please stop considering it.”

The brakes screeched; James stopped halfway down the lane, head whipping around. Evans clapped her hands over her mouth, cheeks flaming.

“Oh my god,” she said, irises as wide as starbursts. “Shit. Oh my god. That was a horrible thing to say.”

Electricity crackled from the top of his head to the tips of his fingers; had Lily Evans really just said that? Laughter burst from his lips, chest aching, stomach spasming as he gasped for air. Perfect prefect Evans thought Remus was shit at clarinet. Of everything today, that was the strangest.

“No,” Evans said, “shut up, don’t laugh – I didn’t mean that –”

“You did, though,” James gasped, eyes swimming with tears. Her red hair swirled into the air like tendrils of smoke, in the blur of his vision.

“It was a mistake,” she insisted. “I meant…”

“That Remus’s performances make you envy the deaf?”

Evans whacked him lightly on the arm. James lost his breath. The warmth of her touch burned like embers in a hearth, long after her fleeting fingers knotted together, far from his skin.

“He’s your mate,” she accused. “Shouldn’t you be defending his honour?”

James’s tongue poked at the fleshy inside of his cheek. “He works hard, he’s a laugh, he keeps us on track… sort of. I’ll defend that. But honesty is my policy, Evans. Sirius and I have fantasised about throwing that bloody thing in the creek.”

“So we have the same fantasies,” Evans grumbled. “Fantastic.”

His nails left crescent moons on the leather of the wheel. Probably not, he thought. Definitely not.

“The truth comes out in your mistakes, Evans. When your guard’s down.” He lifted his foot, rolling the little way down the rest of the street. She inhaled - the change of tone in his voice had been clearer than he'd intended.

“When people are angry, they say things they don’t mean.” He pulled up outside the second house from the end. This one was timber rather than brick, older than the others, raised on a brick platform. Low shrubs and strangled flowers lined the concrete path from the curb, and further down, gravel tracks rolled down the side of the house and out the back. Rickety stairs led up to the front door, the security screen rusted and faded. Yellow curtains hung in the windows. An old wooden chair waited on the porch, beneath two hand-painted signs – one welcoming all, and a second warning off ‘Jehovers’. Bits of hose littered the front garden. The red-lidded bin bulged with black rubbish bags. Evans shifted, turning her body as if to block the view of the house out the passenger window. The colour leeched from her face; her eyes were luminous. She tugged at the collar of her school jumper.

“I don’t know if I agree with you,” James said frankly, shifting the car into ‘park’ and pulling the handbrake. Evans’s hand rested on the handle of the door.

“I fight with my sister all the time,” Evans said. “I don’t really hate her.”

“Not now,” James said, “but in that moment… I don’t know. Maybe. It’s a feeling, not a resolution. I don’t think you say anything you haven’t felt before. Anger doesn’t make you a different person, you know? It just sort of… sharpens bits.”

The door opened, and Evans scooped up her backpack, halfway out the car.

“Thanks,” she said sharply. “For the ride.”

“Evans –”

“Thank you.”

James unclicked his belt, climbing over the gearbox. He caught the door as it swung shut, opening it again.

“Evans!” She stilled with her back to him, standing on the browning grass, bag hanging by one strap. James took a deep breath. “Evans, you have to know that – that word doesn’t just slip out.”

She whirled around, face hard, eyes wet. “It’s not really up to you to decide what I have to know, actually, Potter.” But she was listening to him. He ran his fingers through his hair, the gearstick digging into his stomach as he leaned across. He looked like an idiot, probably. He didn’t care.

“You deserve better,” he said. Evans flinched. Her lips curled cruelly.

“What, someone like you? I heard what you said to him. You’re not any better –”

“I didn’t call him that –”

“He’s been my friend since I was seven, Potter.” Her face crumpled; she turned her face to the sky, eyes shut. “You don’t get it. You could never get it. He’s the one that knows.” An angry arm flicked at the street. “I bet your bedroom’s air-conditioned.”

James frowned. “Yeah,” he said, flummoxed – what did that have to do with anything? “I mean – not me. I didn’t mean me. We would never… but not Snape. You deserve better than him. You have more than two options, you know.”

Slowly, she looked down at him. Trails shone on he cheeks. James pushed himself up on his hands, awkwardly manoeuvring back to his seat. Her mouth moved wordlessly; she rubbed her face, wiping the tears.

“Please don’t tell Remus what I said,” she said quietly.

“I won’t,” James said. “I promise.”

Evans smiled tightly, and then the door swung shut. James took a shuddering breath, watching as she crossed the grass and slumped up the stairs, shoving a key into the door and letting herself in. His mind churned. What didn’t he get? What didn’t he understand? The answer was beyond his reach, tantalising. He pressed his forehead to the wheel, sighing.

Lily Evans always left him with questions. He didn’t mind that. He just wished he knew how to find the answers.

#jily #jilymicrofics #jilymicroops #lily evans #james potter #hp #fanfic

[thesullengrrrl]

We'll Meet Again

When retired time traveler Elaine Byrne accidentally goes back to 1941, she meets Robert Rosenthal on the eve of his enlistment.

Author's note: I wrote this fic few weeks ago and I only now had the guts to post it here in Tumblr. Thank you to the lovely people who read and commented my work in AO3. If you prefer to read there, I got you...here's the link. I've not written for a long time, so I hope you will enjoy this. Thank you! ❤️

Chapter 1

For the past three years, Elaine Byrne avoided being alone in dark enclosed spaces or visualizing vivid sceneries with her eyes closed. Whenever she feels bad about life, she smokes in the nearest smoking area or writes it down in her journal.

However, this time it was different. 

This time she forgot that she’s not supposed to go inside the restaurant’s cold room on her own. It was Friday and the chef was chewing her ear off over a wrong order. Her energy was already depleted and all she wants to do is go home. Almost instinctively, she went straight to the cold room to shed some tears. 

As she walked back to the dining area, faint jazz music could be heard. It grew louder as she continued on, and Elaine does not remember a band being hired that night. A male waiter almost bumped into her, half-shouting, “Hey! You can’t be here!” She took note of his uniform. It was a shirt with a bow tie, black pants and a white apron covering half his pants. 

The sight of her destination surprised her. 

It was the same dining area, with stage and piano in it, except that the people now are wearing clothing from a bygone time. Men were in suits, women in knee length dresses with slightly defined shoulders. The upholstery and furniture are no longer the same color. The air was filled with smoke and the smell of alcohol and sweat made her gag a little. 

She has done it again. The very activity she avoided for the past three years. With this realization, she went to the bathroom and luckily, it’s still in the same place where she remembered it.

Picking the last sink in a row, she opened the faucet, and splashed some water on her face. When she finally faced the mirror, her mouth fell open. Besides from the water droplets falling from her face, her makeup is not her usual. She now has a redder lip and defined eyebrows. Her brown hair is now curled and pinned in ways she would never do. 

She took some paper towels on the side and dabbed her face in it. This time, Elaine took a longer moment to observe the image in the mirror. Aside from the makeup, she finally noticed her change of clothing. No longer in her trusty vested white polo and black slacks, but now she’s donning a dark red dress with slightly puffed sleeves and triangular cut outs on the collar. It was slightly figure hugging, which highlighted her curves that were often lost in her waitress uniform. Elaine held up her hand and touched the mirror’s surface. It’s me. This makes me feel like Peggy Carter minus the combat skills.

She was about to go when she heard heels clicking towards her direction. For some reason, she locked herself in one of the stalls and someone started sniffing and a vague ‘There, There’ could be heard. 

“Oh Mabel,” a high pitched voice said. “At least he let you down gently and did not lead you on. You know Beth in Accounting? Her man just left her without a word!” 

“That’s because he’s just feeling sorry for me!” Mabel cried. “I already thought about the wedding we could’ve had, Jo.” 

Jo audibly sighed. “Mabel, you know you were only seeing him for three weeks, right?” 

“He’s dreamy and nice! A lawyer! And my cat even likes him!” 

Mabel’s own statement made her cry even more. 

“I know, but at least he let you down gently. He has a point. You don’t have to wait around for him anymore,” Jo comforted. 

The two women she was eavesdropping kept quiet for a little after that. Then she heard the faucet running and paper towels being ripped off. A few clinking more and she heard someone exhale loudly. 

“Are you ready to say goodbye?” Jo asked. 

A sniff. “Okay, let’s go, Jo.” 

“That’s more like it,” Jo replied. Their heels started clicking away from the bathroom. Elaine waited for a minute or two just to make sure they weren’t coming back and she emerged from her stall. 

She gazed at the mirror one last time and exited. Inhaling the strong scents of tobacco and alcohol, she scouted for a place to sit in. It was hard to see who’s sitting alone or not at first glance, so she slowly dragged her feet, hoping for the one.  

Instinctively, she touched her side and thanked the heavens for its pockets. She reached in and instead of a phone, she felt a small notepad, a pencil and coins. Helpful .

Finally, she saw her target.

The one was a lone, mustachioed man with a half-empty glass of beverage in front of him. He seemed to be in deep thought while his fingers were tapping the table in tune with what was being played on stage. He looks nice. Taking a deep breath, Elaine strode towards his table and pulled a chair beside him. He was startled with the sound of chair legs against the floor.  

“What–” 

“Hi there,” Elaine greeted, flashing her best smile. “Great night?”

“It was until I heard the news,” the man replied. She was about to ask what was the news but he beat her to it. 

“The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.” 

“Oh, that’s what it is,” Elaine realized. “A woman in the bathroom was crying because her boyfriend was enlisting.” 

The information made the man perk up and turned to her. “Was she blonde? In a purple dress?”

“I don’t know. I was hiding in one of the stalls.”

This amused the man beside her. “What? Why were you hiding?” 

“I was having a moment, then I heard them come in. They were coming in fast, click click click, so I hid. Then someone started crying and I didn't want to intrude, so I stayed there.” Elaine explained.

“‘They’?” he asked. 

“Yeah. Two women. Jo and Mabel,” she shared. 

“Ah, yes. They were with me earlier. Mabel wanted to go home, so I guess it’s official now.” 

Elaine scrunched up her nose. “Ah, that sucks, man. Too bad her cat loves you.” 

“Hmmm. Yeah, Mr. Giggles.” 

“Although,” she started. “You do know you could be in a relationship while overseas, right?”

He shook his head. “I can’t afford to have any distractions. And I don’t want life to pass her by because she was waiting for me. What if I never return?” 

“What if you do?” she countered. “Have a little faith.”

“How do you know that?” 

She kept quiet, feeling like his question was rhetorical. He has a point. When he’s on the battlefield, the chances of him coming back are slim to none. 

As the band played another tune, the upcoming war entered her mind. This man is enlisting in the army tomorrow to fight Nazis. Jesus Christ, what was the closest thing she could experience to that? The thing that came to her mind was nothing compared to going to war on the other side of the world.

“Oh well. You’ll meet other women,” she assured him. Then she proceeded to scan his appearance. “You’re tall, handsome, and that pornstache would definitely rake in the girls.”

“Porn-what?” he asked, eyeing her suspiciously.

Elaine closed her eyes at her words. Her hand went to her head, scrunching her eyes to think of what to say. Of course, the day she dreaded finally came. The day where her weird attraction to 70s mustaches will be her downfall. 

“Never mind. It’s your mustache,” she corrected, motioning his face. “And those baby blue eyes? Ridiculous.”

Her companion was about to answer when a blond man came to their table. 

“Good evening, Miss.” 

It took her a moment to realize that a man standing on their table was referring to her. She smiled at him. The man she was with eyed the stranger with suspicion. “Hello there.” 

“The tune’s pretty swell, can I dance with you? Miss…?” 

Elaine scanned the man’s appearance. He was tall and thin with wide shoulders and almost white hair. He seemed to be in his mid-twenties. Who are you supposed to be, Draco Malfoy?

“I’m Elaine,” she introduced. You are?”

“Albert.” 

For a moment, her mission of attempting to know which year she was in felt futile. What’s a little dancing when you’re time traveling? Without taking a second look to her companion, she nodded and took the man’s hand and made their way to the dance floor. With their hands on their proper positions, they started swaying to the music. 

They were having a nice conversation until the guy started to lean in for a kiss. She managed to avoid this and his lips landed on her cheek. The reek of alcohol from his mouth made her wince. She gave him a fake smile, hoping that all of this will be over soon. They swayed once again, but this time she felt his hand moving from the small of her back to her butt and grabbed it. 

Her eyes widened and pushed him away. This made a mini domino effect on the other couples on the dance floor, earning them weird looks and glares.

“Back off,” Elaine warned. 

This did not deter him and took it as a challenge instead. 

“Aww, baby, you’re feisty. I like that,” Albert taunted, cornering her like a prey. 

Elaine took short breaths to calm herself, her right hand slowly turning into a fist.

Suddenly, a loud thud of falling tables was heard. The music stopped. 

“Fight! Fight!”

He rushed where the scream was. He was observing her in a distance to somewhat guard her, as if she was someone he needed to look after. The man she was dancing with did not seem trustworthy enough for him, especially when he saw his companions laugh at them for some reason. 

The blond man was bleeding out of his nose while she was grunting in pain.

“Fuck you!” Elaine yelled.

He went to her and took her hand. “What happened?” 

“That asshole,” Elaine growled, pointing to the man on the floor, “was feeling me up!”

A small crowd gathered where they were. One older man lunged at Elaine’s curly haired companion and started throwing punches. He missed and continued pursuing. Elaine jumped into the brawl, attempting to break them apart. Few patrons, probably thrilled with this sudden turn, dove in as well, unknown whether to pull her out of the commotion or punch the other guy.

It continued on for a few minutes until someone blew a whistle.

The crowd departed and it revealed a portly, semi-bald man with a whistle hanging on his neck. 

“WHAT ON EARTH IS HAPPENING HERE?” he roared. Those in the brawl slowly detached themselves from each other. Everyone was in varying degrees of bleeding and pain, most especially that man who felt up Elaine. 

The portly manager glared at all of them then his eyes filled with recognition. “Robert? Is that you, boy?” 

Elaine looked at who he was referring to. 

It was the lonely, mustachioed man who broke up with Mabel. His name is Robert.

He does look like a Robert, Elaine thought. The carefully gelled curly hair, neat mustache, smell of manly perfume with hints of tobacco and alcohol…It’s like she was transported to a 1940s movie with Cary Grant as the lead star and she’s the fast-talking femme fatale. 

“Minty!" Robert smiled and shook hands with the man as if there were no two slightly injured persons in front of them. The manager pulled him from the floor and when they stood up, he towered over Minty.

“Minty, I’m so sorry about the mess. This guy made moves on my friend and she just defended herself. I had to jump in,” he explained.

“Picking fights already? Save some for those Nazis!” Minty exclaimed. He snapped his fingers and two broad men appeared. He ordered the troublemakers to be taken outside the club.

Robert only smiled sheepishly. Minty seemed charmed by this and asked both of them to follow him. Elaine looked at him suspiciously. “Where are we going?”

“I know him, don’t worry,” he assured her. 

The trio entered a small office. The walls were painted red and there was a sturdy table that is the main piece of the room. It has a matching leather chair behind it and several crates of alcohol stacked up to the ceiling. Papers are haphazardly piled up and a clothes rack near the window. It felt like a claustrophobic’s nightmare. 

“Sit down, sit down, kids,” Minty motioned to the two leather chairs in front of the table. The two sat and Elaine’s eyes laid at the calendar hanging behind Minty. 

DECEMBER 1941

Ah, fuck. Wrong guess! All of the numbers on the first row were crossed except for number seven. They watched Minty pour three glasses of whiskey (or scotch?) and gave them one each. 

“What’s your name, doll?” 

“I’m Elaine. Elaine Byrne.”

“So, how did the two of you meet?” Minty asked, eyeing the two of them. 

“Um–” Elaine started. Robert covered her hand and started talking. 

“We only met tonight. Mabel stormed out when she found out I was enlisting. Told her I don’t want her waiting for me while I fight.” 

Minty nodded in understanding. “I wouldn’t take it away from Rosie to meet a girl after breaking up with one!” 

Elaine glanced at the two men curiously. 

“Why is that, Minty?” she questioned. “Is Rosie here a player?” 

This made Rosie blush a little. Minty shook his head. 

“No, doll, he’s a lawyer! He sweet talks for a living!” 

Elaine turned to her companion. “A lawyer, huh? Interesting.” 

“Yes, ma’am,” Rosie confirmed. “Although, I don’t sweet talk anyone, Minty.” 

“Tell that to anyone who would listen, Rosie.”

“Why is he called Rosie?” Elaine wondered, looking at Minty. “Is it the rosy cheeks?” 

“Ah, it’s because of his surname. Rosenthal. Only friends and family are allowed. That’s why I only called him that in here,” Minty informed her. 

Elaine listened to the two men catch up with their lives. Rosie confirmed his enlistment tomorrow, and Minty seemed to be worried about his young friend. Rosie is a strapping young man of twenty-four and Minty said that America joining the war will be a bloodbath. 

“I will be fighting for my people and country, Minty,” Rosie solemnly reasoned. “These people we will be protecting, they can’t fight for themselves, can they?”

“You seem like you made up your mind quite fast,” Minty observed. Rosie only nodded. 

The three of them sat in silence. Elaine was feeling a bit uncomfortable with it, so she downed the glass of amber liquid given to her. She coughed a little, for she rarely drinks this type of liquor. Call her childish, but she would rather sit happily with her colorful drinks with an umbrella in it than pretend to be like Don Draper. “What is it, whiskey?”

“Scotch,” the older man confirmed. “Too strong for you?” 

Elaine agreed. “Yeah.”

When she finished the drink, Rosie stood up. “We better be going now, Mint.”

“Say hi to your mother for me,” Minty told Rosie. He nodded. 

“Thank you for the scotch,” Elaine said, waving Minty goodbye. The two made their way back to the dining hall. They did not see Minty smiling at the sight of them.

The band was playing something more slow, and the atmosphere felt like no brawl happened. However, it felt more somber. Maybe it’s the music that the band was playing. The dance floor seemed shinier, the lights dimmer, and couples are dancing closer than ever. It was probably the news of the Pearl Harbor attack that made them rethink the time they have. 

For them, it’s only the beginning. 

For Elaine, it’s only looking at the past at a closer look. Beyond the bigger picture that history books offer. She is no longer reading these big events in a book, but the individuals that will soon be affected by this attack. 

For a night, she’s one of them. 

Rosie was observing her as she watched the dance floor. Her hair is still quite a mess after the brawl and yet, the out-of-place hair strands seemed to be framing her face instead. She seemed oblivious to any of the music being played, but then maybe she’s not a fan of jazz and prefers something else. 

This strange, pretty woman felt like trouble. Minutes within meeting her, and he was already fighting in a brawl for her. He never did that to any girl he went out with. He felt guilty about what happened between him and Mabel and maybe he’ll think about it tomorrow still. 

But he cannot deny wanting to get to know Elaine more after tonight. 

“Let’s dance, Rosie,” Elaine invited, extending her hand to him. Rosie gazed at her hand, thought about it, and took it. She pulled him into the dance floor, slightly squeezing in among the sea of couples. He placed his hands on its proper positions and she did the same. Slowly, they swayed along, closer than ever.

“Is it okay if I call you Rosie? Minty said only friends and family are allowed to call you that,” she wondered aloud. 

“You’re already calling me Rosie anyway, so go ahead.” 

“What were you thinking about earlier?” 

“When?” 

“When I asked you to dance, you’re deep in thought. Any thoughts you want to share?” 

He sighed. “You won’t let this go, won’t you?” 

“Nope,” she smiled. “I want to hear it.” 

“I was thinking about what you said. That maybe I’ll come back from the war alive? Have a little faith?” 

Elaine glanced at her side, suddenly feeling shy. She was only trying to encourage him to take a chance on romance during the war. She did not realize he would pick on it and discuss it further. 

“Well, going to war alone seemed like a sad thing to do. Sure, it might be invigorating for you as a man, getting in combat and all, but what happens when you’re all alone in some trench?” Elaine explained. 

“I can write letters home,” he reasoned. 

“But can you share what you’ll see in the field with them?” 

“I can’t share it with my imaginary girlfriend either, Elaine.”

With no answer to give him anymore, she rolled her eyes. Rosie caught it and found it endearing.

“Speechless? No rebuttal?” Rosie challenged.

“Shut up, Robert.”

“So it’s Robert now when I annoy you?” he teased.

“Yes, Robert,” she pointed out, trying to hide a grin. 

Rosie pulled her a little closer and she felt his hands get a little sweaty. She tried not to chuckle, but her body reacted before it was too late. The band played another new song, and when she glanced at him, she watched him mouth the words.

“Do you know this song?” she asked. 

“We’ll Meet Again,” he replied, looking down at her.

“I doubt that, Rosie.” 

Rosie chuckled at her. “Silly. I mean, it’s the title. We’ll Meet Again.” 

She rested her head at his chest, once again embarrassed by her blunder. “Oh god. I’ve been just an embarrassing person all night, am I?” 

“This is the most interesting night I’ve had for a while. Don’t worry about it,” he assured her.

She only nodded. She took in his scent, and wondered if he noticed it. I hope he didn’t. But maybe he did. My inhale was pretty obvious. As the song went on, Elaine thought of why she is here at this very moment. She could’ve been back in Minton’s by now by going back where she came from—in the cold room. 

Instead, she stayed and now slow dancing with a man she just met. 

Elaine stopped time traveling on purpose three years ago. It was once an exciting thing to discover at eighteen, but now at twenty-six, it felt like an unhealthy coping mechanism. She made mistakes on those travels and made her run away from her life. She stayed far too long in some places and saw the consequences blow right up to her face. 

However, tonight, she did not time travel on purpose. 

And there must be a reason why it happened.

The song finished and everyone clapped. Rosie and Elaine removed their hands from each other and joined the crowd. Backing away from the dance floor, they sat in an empty booth.

As she stared at Rosie, she knew she had to go home. Rosie felt her eyes at him and they spent a good few seconds memorizing each other’s details, like taking a photograph. Elaine took in his blue eyes and the styled curly mop of hair, while Rosie gazed at her hazel green eyes and a small scar on her forehead. She wondered how it would appear if not styled with sticky gel. Rosie blushed a little at the intensity of her gaze, smiling shyly at her. Elaine chuckled at how ridiculous and romantic it all must have looked like. 

A gentleman with a big camera managed to capture this romantic scene. The blinding flash  surprised the two, making them jump in their seats. The bulb was still smoking.

“I’ll send it to Minty once it’s developed!” the man with a camera said. “You’re one good looking couple!”

“That’s one big camera,” Elaine observed. “That flash almost blinded me!”

He laughed at her observation. “Will they ever make a flash bulb less blinding?”

“I don’t think so,” she answered, smiling.

They settled for a moment and Rosie waved at a waiter. The waiter was quick at his feet and reached them. However, Elaine grabbed his arm to stop him. “I need to go home now.”

“Oh, is that so?” he asked, a slight disappointment in his tone. The waiter seemed to sense this and looked at Elaine. She lifted her head to dismiss him, which the waiter did.

“Yeah, it’s quite late and I’m on opening shift,” she reasoned. It was true though. 

“If that’s the case, I’ll take you home,” he declared. “Where do you live?” 

He can’t take you home! You don’t live in 1941, girl!

“Just a few blocks away, but I’ll be fine. I’ll walk.” 

He looked at her with disbelief. “Elaine, I’ll walk you home. Or at least call you a cab. You can’t walk by yourself at this hour after what happened.” 

“I can. I can throw in a punch, you know.” 

“Elaine, no.” 

The way Rosie said her name made her melt a little. That deep dulcet tone with a hint of concern (or was it disappointment with hardheadedness) made her rethink about her decision to leave. One more drink can’t hurt, right?

“Fine. But first, I need to go to the ladies’ room,” she said. 

“All right. I’ll wait here.” 

Elaine made her way to the ladies’ room, her heart beating so fast it’s the only thing she could hear. This is the moment she leaves him. It has to be. Damn that dulcet voice for making her doubt. When she reached the ladies’ room, she took the notepad and pencil inside her pocket and quickly scribbled. After that, she folded it neatly and got out. She waved to the same passing waiter who almost took their order earlier.

“Yes, ma’am?” the waiter said. 

“Can you pass this to the gentleman with the mustache?” she requested, pointing him to Rosie who was chatting with an elderly man.

“You mean Rosie? No problem, ma’am.”

“Thank you,” she whispered. When the waiter was out of sight, she made her way to the turn. She wondered if she would take one last look at Rosie. But she decided against it. 

The storage room was there, waiting for her. Sighing, she took one last look at her surroundings, checking if she was being watched. Then she slid the door and entered. 

She murmured and closed her eyes.

Moments later, there’s knocking at the door. “Elaine! Get out! I need some supplies!” 

Maybe we’ll meet again, Rosie.

“Coming, Bunny!” 

—

When Elaine left to go home, the new busboys were left after they cleaned up the place. They sat to rest before actually going home. One of them, Jerry, was looking at the wall filled with pictures and memorabilia from old patrons and past owners from different decades. Their jazz club had been open since the late 1930s and it could feel like a museum sometimes. 

While he was scanning the frames, one picture stood out to him. It was a photo of a couple in a booth, staring at each other adoringly. The picture seemed like straight from a movie scene, which made Jerry think if it was a screenshot from an unknown movie of the time. 

He leaned in closer and noticed the woman in the photo. She looked like one of their waitresses. Elaine! But the woman in the photo was with better hair and of course, wearing vintage clothing. She was gazing at the mustachioed man as if studying him, and the man was doing the same to her. They looked cozy and adorable.

“Hey Bunny, look at this,” Jerry called. The woman he was calling came to him almost immediately.

“What is it, Jer?” she asked. 

“She looks a lot like Elaine, no?” 

Bunny leaned in as well to check the photo. “Oh yeah, she does. Maybe her grandma or something?”

“Maybe,” Jerry replied. 

“We’ll tell Elaine tomorrow,” Bunny said.

What the two failed to notice was the small inscription at the lower right edge of the photo. It said:

Rosie & Elaine, 1941

#masters of the air #we'll meet again #mota #mota fic #masters of the air fic #rosie rosenthal #time travel #oc: elaine byrne #time travel au #rosie rosenthal x oc

[peterlorrefanpage]

Peter Lorre & Stairs

Stranger on the Third Floor (1940):

Mr. District Attorney (1941):

All Through the Night (1942):

(Dying on steps like a crumpled cat still counts.)

Arsenic and Old Lace (1944):

Black Angel (1946):

Obliquely, I suddenly recalled a line from The Bishop's Mantle (by Agnes Sligh Turnbull, 1947 - read it here) where Lexa, the young bishop's firecracker of a wife, refers to one of the parishioners as being in a very fast crowd - "it really steps!"

So now I'm conflating Peter Lorre on stairsteps as symptomatic of him really steppin'.

We'll close with just one more (because I Arsenic and Old Laced myself out of space) -

Columbia photoshoot (1935):

#peter lorre #stairs #staircase #peter lorre stairs #peter lorre steps #he's so damn cool #peter lorre columbia #black angel #mr. district attorney #arsenic and old lace #stranger on the third floor #all through the night #peter lorre movies #columbia photoshoot

[ozu-teapot]

Films Watched in the Interim (August - October 2023)

Memento | Christopher Nolan | 2000

Whip It | Drew Barrymore | 2009

Go West | Buster Keaton | 1925

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves | John Francis Daley / Jonathan Goldstein | 2023

Turning Red | Domee Shi | 2022

Barbie | Greta Gerwig | 2023

Gothic | Ken Russell | 1986

The Fall of the Louse of Usher: A Gothic Tale for the 21st Century| Ken Russell | 2002

Bottoms | Emma Seligman | 2023

Pink Hill | Robert Flanagan | 2019

4 O'Clock | Robert Flanagan | 2021

Amelia and the Angel (Short) | Ken Russell | 1959

The Black Cat | Edgar G. Ulmer | 1934

The Black Cat | Harold Hoffman | 1966

The Owl Service | Peter Plummer | 1969

Seddok, l'erede di Satana (AKA Atom Age Vampire) | Anton Giulio Majano | 1960

Saint Maud | Rose Glass | 2019

The Babadook | Jennifer Kent | 2014

The Maze | William Cameron Menzies | 1953

Blood Bath | Jack Hill / Stephanie Rothman | 1966

Les yeux sans visage (Eyes Without a Face) | Georges Franju | 1960

Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny and Girly (AKA Girly) | Freddie Francis | 1970

The Velvet Vampire | Stephanie Rothman | 1971

Coco | Lee Unkrich / Adrian Molina | 2017

Blue Sunshine | Jeff Lieberman | 1977

A Candle for the Devil | Eugenio Martín | 1973

Lost Hearts | Lawrence Gordon Clark | 1973

Guest House Paradiso | Adrian Edmondson | 1999

Flesh and Fantasy | Julien Duvivier | 1943

The Ghost Train | Walter Forde | 1941

BOLD = Top Ten

Some notes: So at the end of July I was off film and off tumblr and not sure if I'd be back but I guess now I am, to some extent at least. The very start of this list is a bit innacurate. I probably watched a few more films than I've listed and maybe in a different order but from Gothic onwards it's correct - not that it really matters! I really must try to get back into having a themed Halloween watch list, which I haven't done since the japanese one in 2019, it's more fun. Am I doing Noirvember? I don't know.

#Film Log

[weirdlookindog]

The Black Cat (1941)

#the black cat 1941 #bela lugosi #basil rathbone #1940s movies #horror comedy

[miss-multi45]

Hello again, peeps.

I'm redoing my intro post.

Hello, I'm Cassiopeia, you can shorten that down to whatever is good for you.

I will write for these Harry Potter characters:

Fred Weasley

George Weasley

Hermione Granger

Harry Potter

Ronald Weasley

Ginny Weasley

Luna Lovegood

Draco Malfoy

Cedric Diggory

I will write for these Creepypasta characters:

Jeff the Killer

Homicidal Liu and Sully

BEN_Drowned

Sally Williams

Lazari

Zalgo

Stripes

Lifeless Lucy

Ticci Toby

The Hooded Man/Hoodie

The Masked Man/Masky

X-Virus

Rouge/The Prowler and Wilson the Basher

Nurse Ann

Dr Pain

Dr Smiley

Eyeless Jack

KageKao

Jason the Toymaker

Candypop

Laughing Jack

Laughing Jill

Papa Grande de Magico

Nathan the Nobody

Clockwork

Nina the Killer

Jane Everlasting/Jane the Killer

Judge Angels

Bloody Painter

The Puppeteer

The Pianist

The Bartender 1941

Dark Link

Glitchy Red

The Cat Hunter

The Black Wolf

Frankie the Undead

The Chessmaster

Vine the Dollmaker

Kate the Chaser

Sam Williams

Zero

Emra

Suicide Sadie

The Roadwalker

Isaac Grossman

Candy Cane

April Fools

The Item Stealer

Lulu

Lily Kennent

I will write for these Call of Duty characters:

Simon 'Ghost' Riley

John 'Soap' Mactavish

John Price

König

Kim 'Horangi' Hong-jin

Alejandro Vargas

Kyle 'Gaz' Garrick

Rodolfo 'Rudy' Parra

Valeria Garza

Keegan P. Russ

Phillip Graves

Kate Laswell

I will write for these Lockwood and Co. characters:

Anthony Lockwood

Lucy Carlyle

Quill Kipps

George Karim

I will write for these Ghost members:

Dewdrop/Sodomizer

Swiss Army Ghoul/ Swiss

Rain

Phantom

Aether

Mountain

Cirrus

Cumulus

Aurora

Sunshine

Omega

Alpha

Ifrit

Mist

Terzo

Cardinal Copia

Any Papas

I will write for these Sleep Token members:

Vessel

II

III

IV

The Vesselettes

I will NOT write p*d*philia, zoophilia, rape, b**stiality. Or anything too gory, like, Black Christmas 2006 level gore or Terrifier level gore, because it makes me extremely uncomfortable.

I WILL write for angst, smut, fluff, crack (funny stuff), Incorrect Quotes, headcanons, scenarios, imagines (same as scenarios??), wholesome shit, and I will write matchups and create a scenario/headcanons with your oc as long as you describe them to me.

#my writing #harry potter #harry potter x reader #creepypasta #creepypasta x reader #creepypasta fandom #ghost the band #ghost x reader #sleep token band #sleep token x reader #i need sleep #lockwood and co #lockwood and Co. x reader

[howardhawkshollywoodannex]

The first four days of filming The Dark Knight (2008) resulted in nothing being filmed. Each day Christopher Nolan screened a double feature. The film combinations were Heat (1995) and Cat People (1942), Citizen Kane (1941) and King Kong (1933), Batman Begins (2005) and Black Sunday (1977), and A Clockwork Orange (1971) and Stalag 17 (1953).

#dark knight #heath ledger #christian bale

[mogwai-movie-house]

A Film A Year

Going through an old hard drive today I found this almost-completed list from 2015 in which I'd set myself the task of choosing a single film for each year of the preceding hundred. It was interesting to see in what ways my tastes had changed and just how many more films I'd discovered and fallen in love with in the meantime.

Anyways, I thought I'd finish it off and update it to the present: I very much tried to keep it to just one film per year, but the competition some years was just too high so they've had to share joint first places:

1915 A Night In The Show 1916 The Vagabond 1917 Easy Street 1918 A Dog's Life 1919 Sunnyside 1920 One Week 1921 The Kid 1922 Dr Mabuse, The Gambler 1923 Safety Last / Why Worry? 1924 Sherlock Jr / The Last Laugh 1925 The Gold Rush 1926 The General 1927 Sunrise / Seventh Heaven 1928 The Last Command / Steamboat Jr. / The Man Who Laughs / The Passion of Joan of Arc 1929 The Love Parade / Un Chien Andalou / Lucky Star 1930 All Quiet On The Western Front 1931 City Lights/ The Smiling Lieutenant 1932 Horse Feathers / Love Me Tonight 1933 Duck Soup / The Invisible Man 1934 It Happened One Night 1935 The 39 Steps 1936 My Man Godfrey 1937 Nothing Sacred 1938 Adventures Of Robin Hood / Pygmalion 1939 The Cat And The Canary / The Wizard of Oz / The Hunchback of Notre Dame 1940 His Girl Friday / Pinocchio 1941 Citizen Kane / The Maltese Falcon / Dumbo / Sullivan's Travels 1942 Casablanca 1943 Le Corbeau 1944 Arsenic & Old Lace 1945 Les Enfants du Paradis / And Then There Were None 1946 A Matter of Life and Death 1947 Black Narcissus 1948 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre 1949 The Third Man / Kind Hearts & Coronets 1950 Sunset Blvd. / La Ronde 1951 A Streetcar Named Desire 1952 Singin' In The Rain / Le Plaisir 1953 Calamity Jane 1954 Hobson's Choice 1955 The Night Of The Hunter /The Ladykillers 1956 The Searchers 1957 The Seventh Seal 1958 Vertigo 1959 North By Northwest / Ballad of A Soldier 1960 Psycho / The Virgin Spring / Two Women 1961 Breakfast At Tiffanys 1962 Le Doulos 1963 The Great Escape / The Birds 1964 Onibaba 1965 For A Few Dollars More 1966 Blow Up 1967 Le Samourai / Cool Hand Luke 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey 1969 Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid 1970 Le Cercle Rouge 1971 Get Carter / Harold & Maude 1972 The Godfather 1973 Don't Look Now 1974 The Godfather Part II / Chinatown 1975 Jaws / The Rocky Horror Picture Show 1976 Network 1977 Star Wars / Annie Hall 1978 Halloween / Superman 1979 Apocalypse Now / Alien / Life Of Brian / Manhattan 1980 Stardust Memories / Raging Bull 1981 Raiders Of The Lost Ark 1982 Blade Runner / The Thing 1983 The Dead Zone / Zelig 1984 Ghostbusters / The Terminator / Blood Simple 1985 Back To The Future 1986 Hannah & Her Sisters / The Fly 1987 Withnail & I / Wings of Desire 1988 Dangerous Liaisons 1989 Crimes & Misdemeanors / Dead Poets Society 1990 Goodfellas 1991 The Silence of The Lambs / Terminator 2 1992 Reservoir Dogs / The Player 1993 Schindler's List / Groundhog Day 1994 Pulp Fiction 1995 Se7en / Casino / The Usual Suspects 1996 Fargo 1997 LA Confidential / Grosse Point Blank / Boogie Nights 1998 The Truman Show / Happiness / Buffalo '66 1999 American Beauty / Magnolia / Being John Malkovich / Fight Club 2000 Memento 2001 Mulholland Drive / The Royal Tennenbaums / The Piano Teacher 2002 Adaptation / The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers 2003 Lost In Translation 2004 Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind / The Life Aquatic 2005 Me & You & Everyone We Know 2006 The Prestige / Perfume 2007 No Country For Old Men / There Will Be Blood 2008 The Dark Knight / Let The Right One In / Tropic Thunder 2009 Cold Souls / Up / Zombieland 2010 I Saw The Devil / The Ghost Writer 2011 The Hidden Face 2012 The Avengers 2013 Her 2014 The Grand Budapest Hotel / The Winter Soldier 2015 The Survivalist / The Lobster 2016 Like Crazy 2017 Coco 2018 Deadpool 2 2019 The Irishman 2020 Kajillionaire 2021 The French Dispatch 2022 The Banshees of Inisherin

#the real oscars #a century of film

[honourablejester]

While we’re on this topic of old films we watched and enjoyed, some random movie recs from the 1910s through to the 1970s based on the things that popped into my head fastest. Warning in advance, I like horror, noir, swashbucklers, dark comedy and dodgy fantasy films.

1910s

Fantômas serials (1913/1914) – As I said in the previous post, if you ever get a random hankering for silent-era pulpy French crime thrillers, these are an excellent start.

1920s

Metropolis (1927) – the imagery in this movie is absolutely stunning, even if the morals are extremely heavy-handed. Worth it for the Robot Maria transformation sequence alone. Also, and I feel mean for thinking this, because the poor man’s going through hell, but there are moments where Freder is truly hilarious. And also, Batman: The Animated Series owes so much, visually, to this movie. It single-handedly shape a vision of what cities and the future and architecture and transport could look like.

Nosferatu (1922) – imagery. The Germans were so fucking good at imagery in early cinema. Admittedly the movie does some very strange things to the Dracula mythos, and is probably the source of a lot of later ideas of him that have nothing to do with the novel (the sunlight thing), but it’s so cool.

1930s

M (1931) – Peter Lorre is incredible. And actually the whole set up of this movie is so creepy and tense and enthralling, and then the court scene busts it wide open. Deals with some heavy things, including child murder, vigilante justice and mental illness, but it’s so good. And you will never hear ‘Hall of the Mountain King’ the same way again.

The Thin Man (1934) and sequels – they’re half hardboiled noir and half screwball comedy, but they’re not a parody, because they predate most of the noir genre, so this is more of a funny hybrid precursor series. And they’re really funny. If you just want some pep and jazz in your life, a good time for an hour or so, totally watch these, they’re adorable.

The Prisoner of Zenda (1937) – Okay. I just like a good swashbuckler? You will see Zenda several times on this list, because I enjoy a lot of versions of this, but of all of them you need to start with this one, because Douglas Fairbanks Jnr. No one else will ever do Rupert of Hentzau like him. If you like your charming, snarky villains, if you like your Lokis, Rupert of Hentzau. Douglas Fairbanks Jnr. If you also like your villain and your hero to have powerful sexual tension and lean very close to each other while crossing blades, again. Rupert of Hentzau. Just watch. You’ll see.

Son of Frankenstein (1939) – I’m not going to lie, I watched this movie purely to see where Young Frankenstein (1974, also very much worth a look) was getting a lot of its in-jokes and gags from (Inspector Kemp in YF is riffing off Inspector Krogh in this movie). But it is worth watching wholly on its own merits. Among other things, Inspector Krogh is a genuinely cool and compelling character (as a kid, the monster ripped his arm out during its first rampage, and during this movie Krogh fully stands up to that childhood nightmare and has a cool moment with his prosthetic arm), and if you have any interest in Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff or Bela Lugosi, this movie is fantastic. Lugosi in particular as Igor does so much in this movie. If all you picture when you think of him is Dracula, try this. (And The Black Cat (1934), which also has Karloff and Lugosi, but is significantly more intense).

1940s

The Mark of Zorro (1940) – Okay. I like swashbucklers. I like movie sword fights. This movie has the best movie sword fight ever. Basil Rathbone vs Tyrone Power. No contest. And, I mean, yes, the rest of the movie is also good. But watch it for the sword fight. Perfection.

The Wolf Man (1941) – This movie and Casablanca between them gave me a bit of a thing for Claude Rains. I don’t know, he’s just really compelling to watch. Very soft-spoken, but very there. And if you want the tragedy of the werewolf curse, this is the movie that started it all. This is not a monster movie. This is a psychological horror story of one man breaking apart under the burden of a curse. It’s so good.

Casablanca (1942) – I mean, it’s everyone’s answer. It’s stereotypical, the classic movie. But it is very, very good. Extremely quotable. I wish to punch Rick in the face several times over. And Claude Rains as Renault is so sleazy, but also so compelling.

Arsenic & Old Lace (1944) – If you ever wondered what the deal with Cary Grant was. This movie. His face. The whole movie just rides on his face. His reactions, his body language. I mean, the movie does a lot of things spectacularly. If you enjoy dark comedy, this is the pinnacle. Hiding bodies in window seats, kill count competitions between a psychotic criminal and his maiden aunts, the extremely morbid running gags of ‘yellow fever’ and Teddy charging up the stairs and the elderberry wine. But really it’s all Cary Grant and his fucking expressions. There are several points in this movie where I can’t breathe. For a man with so many suave, serious leading roles, his physical comedy was incredible.

The Big Sleep (1946) – This was the movie that introduced me to noir. Not the Maltese Falcon, not Double Indemnity, not Sunset Boulevard. This one. The Big Sleep. And you can argue that it’s not the best of the noirs, it’s a bit too caught up in itself, the plot if you pay attention has some big holes in it, and if you compare it to the book one female character in particular got rather cheated. But. As an introduction. It does land, very definitely. Bumpy Go-Cart (sorry, Humphrey Bogart) and Lauren Bacall are all that and then some. If you want to pick a noir, you can do a lot worse.

1950s

The Prisoner of Zenda (1952) – Mostly I like this as a compare/contrast to the 1937 one. It’s damn near a shot-for-shot remake, and while that could be a bad thing, it’s fascinating what differences and interpretations show up because of that. Watch the ’37 one first, and then watch this one. It’s just cool to compare them. And, you know. It’s still a really fun swashbuckler.

The Court Jester (1955) – Just the best time. The best. I have an unreasonable amount of fondness for this film, this gentle send-up of previous swashbucklers and period dramas in the vein of The Adventures of Robin Hood, and basically every movie Basil Rathbone ever made. Watch it for Danny Kaye, watch it for the tongue twisters, watch it for a baby Angela Lansbury, watch it for an absolutely hysterical duel scene, watch it for Maid Jean being the single most competent character there. Just watch it. I cannot entertain criticism on this point. It’s excellent, and I’m not sane about it.

Some Like It Hot (1959) – Jack Lemon is going to show up again later in this list, and for good reason, (as is Tony Curtis, but we don’t care as much about him), but Some Like It Hot is also, for a 1959 movie, a really gentle, funny, interesting look at gender roles? I mean, the premise is two dudes going undercover as female musicians with an all-female band to avoid mob hitman, and one of them keeps getting hit on by rich man while the other struggles to get it on with Marilyn Monroe in his male persona while trying to hide from mob assassins in a female persona, so it could be such a hot mess, but it actually … It’s quite gentle. Marilyn’s Sugar gets to talk about what men expect when they see her and, because he’s pretending to be a woman, Tony Curtis’ Joe has to listen to her, Jack Lemmon’s Jerry/Daphne gets to get genuinely swept up in the feeling of being romanced as a woman to the point that he’s semi-seriously talking about marriage, and in the end, when Jerry reveals he’s a man to Osgood, the rich old idiot who’s been trying to romance ‘Daphne’, Osgood famously just goes ‘well, nobody’s perfect’, and still appears perfectly willing to marry ‘her’. I mean, it has its issues still, but there’s such a lot of gentleness in it for a comedy movie made in 1959.

1960s

The Innocents (1961) – One of my two all-time favourite horror movies, on raw atmosphere alone. It’s so eerie. SO EERIE. It’s horrible and twisted and goes heavy places (child death, a child acting ambiguously sexually while possibly possessed, strong questions of sanity), but it’s done so gracefully and gently and eerily. If Gothic Horror is of interest to you as a genre, if you enjoyed Crimson Peak, try this. It is all beautiful sunshine and sprawling lawns and twisted desires and paranoid terrors and the single eeriest scene I’ve ever seen in anything ever. Watch the lake scene. It’s stunning.

The Raven (1963) – Pivoting back to comedy horror, this time with added fantasy. Vincent Price has been in a lot of better movies, but I’m not sure if he’s been in many funnier ones. Him and Peter Lorre just own this movie. Wall to wall ham. Just. Just go in, just watch it. There’s a loose frame plot of duelling magicians, vague references to Poe’s ‘The Raven’, Boris Karloff returning as a villain, animal transformations, and the obligatory young romance getting embroiled in their sorcerous parents’ plots (although, jarringly, the young romantic lead is a baby Jack Nicholson, which sure gives it a weird vibe), but honestly? You’re here for Vincent Price and Peter Lorre and the wizard duel.

The Great Race (1965) – Jack Lemmon is back, as is Tony Curtis, but we only care about the former of those, because Professor Fate (obligatory shouting). Okay. I don’t know how many people remember the old Hanna-Barbera Wacky Races cartoons? Am I aging myself here? But this is the movie they were based on, and Professor Fate is who Dick Dastardly was based on. The premise is a 1910s global car race between Curtis’ Great Leslie (you will want to punch him, and that’s perfectly natural) and Lemmon’s Professor Fate, an exaggerated eccentric conman and cheater and over the top cartoon villain of man, and you will love him. He’s the best thing in it. But there’s also Natalie Woods as the reporter who also enters the race, and a young Peter Falk as Fate’s sidekick Max. That’s a baby Columbo as the ‘villain’s more competent henchman. AND. For me, for bonus points, a huge section at the end of the rest is basically a whole-plot Prisoner of Zenda reference in which Professor Fate is the hero. Look. Look. Do you ever want to watch a live-action cartoon? This is that movie. Trust me. It’s fantastic. The romance has aged terribly, you will want to throw Leslie off a cliff, it has several extremely sixties tropes in it, but it’s that movie. Watch it. Have fun.

1970s

The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973) – Right. So. 70s fantasy movie. Not politically correct in the slightest, and some extremely unfortunate choices were made in it. But. Ray Harryhausen. Stop motion fantasy effects of awesome. And, also, I just really enjoyed the character of the Vizier. He doesn’t really get to do anything, he’s kinda just set-dressing, but he is the horrifically maimed advisor to the king who fell afoul of our sorcerous villain, and he has a cool golden mask to cover his scars, and you think he’s going to turn out to be treacherous but no, he’s rock-solid calm and noble and helpful the entire way through, and I just really really like him. The image of him stuck in my head for years.

Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) – My other all-time favourite horror movie, and again it’s the eeriness. Pure eeriness. Nothing happens in this movie. There’s no monsters, there’s no explanations. 3 girls go missing on a rock in early 1900s Australia, in the midst of baking heat and sunshine and the looming shape of a volcanic geological formation, and the movie just follows their society unravelling in the aftermath. No one knows what happened. Grief and terror and unanswered questions destroy people. Reactions, prejudice, respectability and hidden flaws, loss of innocence, the unpredictable reactions of people unstrung by grief and fear, all of it snowballs in the wake of the disappearances, and over it all looms the sunshine and the rock. The score and the cinematography of this movie work so well to create this pervasive, eerie, unreal mood, this sense of something watching, this ancient force presiding over the unravelling of the false civilisation layered over top of it. I fucking love this movie. It’s stunning.

Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) – A rather big jump in genres, we’re back to crime thrillers here, which we haven’t really touched since the 1910s on this list, but the sustained tension in this movie is par excellence. The opening half hour. A theme for the seventies movies on this list is going to be sunshine and drifting tension, and Precinct 13 does it so well. Heat, claustrophobia, urban isolation, siege mentality. And the character relationships that develop inside that siege mentality, the alliances and bedrock life-or-death trust that evolves between enemies, and then are brutally cut short by the re-establishment of the outside world at the end, the rude reintroduction of law and connectedness and social consequences, is just … amazing. The movie is a heat dream, a bubble of disconnectedness and violence and blood and faith, and then the ‘real’ world slams back down at the end. It’s good. It’s so well paced. Watch this movie.

Nosferatu (1979) – Just to, again, tie things back to the earlier entries on this list. Werner Herzog’s 70s remake of Nosferatu was actually the first version I saw, as it was considerably easier to get hold of. And it stuck. Even after seeing the original. And a lot of that, I think, was because of the opening, which is just spectacularly eerie. The drifting, eerie music, the monastic chant, the heartbeat under it, the panning shots of the mummies in the catacombs (which are from Mexico, but howandever). I mean, there are a lot of problems with this movie, Werner Herzog is not exactly the most upright and sensitive of dudes, (and it added some more questionable elements to the Dracula mythos), but for sheer imagery and tone-setting, this opening was incredible. And the movie does keep that tone, that eerie drifting, especially once Dracula starts bringing the plague behind him. Again, the 70s theme of sunshine and eeriness. It’s worth a look.

#movie recs #classic movies #1910s #1920s #1930s #1940s #1950s #1960s #1970s #horror #swashbucklers #crime thrillers #fantasy #noir #comedy #random selection based on my idiosyncratic memory

[non-binary-laurie-strode]

Reflections on my Universal Horror marathon

It is November 1st, 2023. As anyone can tell after being around me for, I don't know, five minutes, I am a huge horror queen. For my birthday this year, I got a big book on Universal horror, filled with production photos, background, trivia, actor bios, etc. I decided to use this book as a sort of guided reading list, where I would marathon all of the movies discussed in the book and read along. When I was first seriously doing a deep dive into horror in 2018, the classic 30s horror franchises were some of the first that I chose to get into, and so it had been five years or so since I had seen some of my old monster friends. (And many of the movies on this list I had not seen before!) I was excited for this project and decided to start it at 99 days until Halloween; I had found a Sam (1) "Countdown to Halloween" clock that counted from 99 days to 0 days last year, at the Spirit Halloween clearence sale. (2) So, 99 days to do a book's worth of movies—how hard could it be?

(1) from Trick r Treat, 2007

(2) He's currently sitting on my bedside table, at 0 days left!

Turns out, it was rather difficult! I hadn't expected the book to have so many entries in it.

The entire list of films that I did is as follows, broken down by chapter:

Silent Era (5 films): The Hunchback of Notre Dame 1923, The Phantom of the Opera 1925, The Phantom of the Opera 1943, The Cat and the Canary 1927, The Man Who Laughs 1928

Dracula (5 films): Dracula 1931, Drácula 1931, Dracula's Daughter 1936, Son of Dracula 1943, House of Dracula 1945

Frankenstein (4): Frankenstein 1931, Bride of Frankenstein 1935, Son of Frankenstein 1939, Ghost of Frankenstein 1942

The Wolf Man (5): Werewolf of London 1935, The Wolf Man 1941, Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man 1943, House of Frankenstein 1944, She-Wolf of London 1946

The Mummy (5): The Mummy, The Mummy's Hand, The Mummy's Tomb, The Mummy's Ghost, The Mummy's Curse

The Invisible Man (5): The Invisible Man 1933, The Invisible Man Returns 1940, The Invisible Woman 1941, Invisible Agent 1942, The Invisible Man's Revenge 1944

The Gill Man (3): Creature From the Black Lagoon 1954, Revenge of the Creature 1955, The Creature Walks Among Us 1955

"Universal's Lesser Known Monsters" (3+3+6): Paula the Ape Woman—Captive Wild Woman 1943, Jungle Woman 1944, The Jungle Captive 1945; The Creeper—Pearl of Death 1944, House of Horrors 1946, The Brute Man 1946; The Inner Sanctum Mystery Series—Calling Dr Death 1943, Weird Woman 1944, Dead Man's Eyes 1944, The Frozen Ghost 1944, Strange Confession 1945, Pillow of Death 1945

Non-serial horror (14): The Old Dark House 1932, Murders in the Rue Morgue 1932, The Black Cat 1934, The Raven 1935, Black Friday 1940, Man-Made Monster 1941, Horror Island 1941, Night Monster 1942, The Mad Ghoul 1943, The Strange Door 1951, The Black Castle 1952, Tarantula 1955, The Mole People 1956, Monster on the Campus 1958

That's 68 movies in 99 days by my reckoning. I also only did these on the nights that Mack worked or was dancing, which further tightened the number of days that I had. Good thing they were each about 60 minutes. I could never do this in the modern era where everyone bloats their movies to an absurd degree.

See, I thought it would be something small, with like... 30 movies in 99 days. I didn't expect all of this! Maybe I should have checked how many movies that would be before solidly deciding to do this challenge, eh? And it's not even allll of the Universal horror movies—Lugosi and Karloff did like six "duet" movies like The Raven and The Black Cat, but the book only focused on two and briefly name-dropped the others. By the mid-October, when I was in the final chapter, I was doing two or three movies per night, and it was quite a stressful thing, not knowing how I'd get it all to line up before Mack took his Halloweek vacation!

But I did it. I'm extremely proud that I stuck to it. And also, I will absolutely not do it again! Perhaps in another five years I'll have a craving for the Universal horror movies again, and I'll do my favourite 30 or so, but this insanity will not be repeated, or at least not with this time scale.

Anyway. Here are some things I wish to talk about:

Appreciating Silent Film

The silent era has always been one that I've wanted to get into, but I've never known how exactly to break into it. I've done a few silent movies before—if you're looking for a rec, Häxan from 1923 is a very disturbing and deeply effective look at medieval witchcraft—but I never felt like I had a sure footing in it.

And, well, the book starts at 1923 with Hunchback, no easing into it. And, turns out, it was mostly fine!

The 1925 Phantom was stunning. I love the tinted vibes of the silent era, and this film had a rare Technicolor sequence during the Masquerade bit where all the costumes were in colour, and it was amazing to see. There's a 19...29, I think?, scored version, which is what I watched, and the score pops off.

The 1927 Cat and the Canary ended up as one of my favourites of the whole marathon—there's no scoring option for this, but it's so fun I didn't care. The story revolves around a will reading on a dark and stormy night, a will reading, and a sudden heiress who has to prove her sanity as a condition of the will, all while an antagonistic family and a killer are loose in the mansion. It's a horror-comedy, and it is such a good time. I had rated it 5/5 on letterboxd years ago, but I had forgotten why, and I quickly rediscovered the reason!

So yeah, I got a couple silents to add to my résumé, next to stuff like Häxan and the typical Dr Caligari.

2. The Evolution of What Horror Is

One of my favourite things to think about and consider is what society's horror fixation is in a given era and how it all ties together in a sort of greater historiography.

This marathon covers the 20s through the late 50s, with most of it happening in the 30s and 40s. There's a pretty clear chain of where the focus goes in these—in the 20s, it's a lot of classic adaptations that have a gruesome element but which may not be yknow categorical Genre Horror as we recognise it and label it on a dvd box. The 30s explore the more typical folk myths and superstitions, such as vampires and werewolves; if there is science, it is either rather crude or primitive (Frankenstein using lightning bolts and sewing pieces of body together) or even has a mystical connection (Werewolf of London's Tibetan miracle flower—often this mysticism can unfortunately veer into Orientalist tropes :/). The 40s, and particularly around 1945 with the atomic bomb, the old superstitions lose steam and modern science begins to catch up, to the point that the 50s horror movies are, essentially, all a world away in terms of science—I mean, they try behavioural therapy on the Creature from the Black Lagoon in Revenge of the Creature! The later "Monster Mash" movies where all of the classic monsters join up have them turning to modern science to solve their problems—I believe it's in House of Dracula where the Wolf Man is legitimately ""cured"" by a cranial surgery based on some science, and Dracula gets cured by looking at the particulates in his blood and stuff. Anyway, continuing in the 50s, There's all this talk of atoms and radiation and such, and it's such a strong blend of science fiction and horror, such that the two genres are practically constant bedmates for this era. (Contrary to a popular tumblr post comparing Godzilla to 50s superhero comics, radiation actually did inspire a lot of monsters in America too; you just needed to know where to look, and it's here, in the giant Creature Features, where Godzilla would fit right in.)

I remember shortly after House of Dracula, I was talking to Mack, and I essentially launched into a ten minute lecture about this stuff, how it all ties into what was happening in society and whatnot. I have so much to say, but I won't word vomit it here.

3. These Movies Said, Continuity WHO?

One of the recurrent jokes I had while watching these movies is that the writers were clearly not interested in keeping continuity between films. There are two instances that I internally screamed at because of how insane they were—(1) In House of Frankenstein, Dracula is destroyed in the sunlight, The Wolf Man is shot by a silver bullet and dies, and the Frankenstein creature sinks into quicksand and disappears. Most of the plot of House of Frankenstein is quickly retold by the mad scientist character of House of Dracula; he leaves out the Wolf Man's death, probably because it would upset the Wolf Man, to whom he is speaking. Dracula is also back without explanation. (2) The Mummy's Ghost is set in Connecticut; they are very emphatic that they are in Connecticut. It is said over and over. At the end, the Mummy is chased into the swamp of Connecticut (yknow, the famous swamps of Connecticut) —at the very beginning of The Mummy's Curse, they point to a stretch of swampland, say that THIS is where Kharis sank all those years ago (it was 6 months in real time btw), and that he should still be there. This movie is set in the bayou of Louisiana, with a cheerful barkeep woman singing in French to evoke the whole "Cajun French" world. How Kharis went from Connecticut to "this is the exact spot where he fell" in Louisiana? Never mentioned.

Additionally, in one of the later Frankensteins, Ygor has his brain transplanted into the Frankenstein Monster in a scheme; Ygor-Frankenstein Monster triumphantly turns to the assembled characters and speaks to them, telling them how he tricked them and won. In the next movie, which I believe is Meets The Wolf Man, the Frankenstein Monster is a mute brute once more, and Ygor does not exist anymore. Now, the wildest thing is that this is not the writers cherrypicking what is canon and what is not—no, in the script the Frankenstein Monster-Ygor was to have deep conversations with the Wolf Man, and this was recorded. It was only in post-production that all of this was struck; all those scenes were either tossed or edited down. Apparently there are visuals of those scenes in the movie where you can watch the FM's mouth move, but the audio has been replaced with music or sound effects. Wild stuff.

There's more, plenty more, but you get the picture. I suppose in a world without home video, where your audience may not have seen the previous films or may not remember them well, you can convince them of anything and continuity matters less.

4. Some of these movies destroyed my will to go on (with the marathon)

Overall, I greatly enjoyed my time with this marathon. I found most of these movies to be very interesting and illuminating.

But there are two series in this that just crushed my spirit—The Mummy and Paula the Ape Woman. They were so awful that it made me not want to keep going.

The Mummy is just such a confused mess; the worst time I had was with The Mummy's Tomb. Tomb is the third movie in the series, so of course there's some catch-up that has to be done to get the audience up to speed. (They all do it, it's normal.) Now, this is a 60 minute movie. Tomb begins with a TWELVE MINUTE "recap" of the first two movies, using a flashback to show scenes from the old movies—all the while narrating them to construct a new story of what supposedly happened and wildly making up new stuff that directly contradicts what is visible on screen. TWELVE MINUTES out of SIXTY, one fifth of the movie, is just incredibly out of context scenes to do whatever the writers want.

And that's not even getting into the cultural sensitivity discussions around these movies, because girl........... girl. It's rough on that front, to say the least. (They reuse an Incan temple, if I remember right, as an Egyptian tomb in the last one, I think it was, and you can clearly see Mesoamerican imagery all over the walls, but they're yelling about pharoahs and stuff. And that's the tip of the iceberg.)

Paula the Ape Woman is about an ape who gets a brain and blood transplant and becomes a real woman, or at least temporarily. Now, audience, given that this an early 40s movie... do you think this uncontrollable, animalistic beast of a woman is going to be white or no? :////

The Paula movies just need to be forgotten. Not every Universal horror movie is a lost gem in the sands of time. Let's just say that.

5. James Whale, Lon Chaney Jr, and thoughts on recurring names and faces

With the studio system firmly in place for most of this marathon's concerned eras, there are many repeating names throughout the movies. It became something of a scavenger hunt to find "Gowns by Vera West" in the title credits of most movies—according to letterboxd, I think I hit 37 movies with her credited on wardrobe.

Some of these repeating names I grew to really like. James Whale really is among the greats, isn't he? Bride of Frankenstein is nothing short of a masterpiece, and his other work (especially The Old Dark House) is great. I would love to do a deeper dive just into his other works. He seems so fascinating! And he was gay, and apparently very very open about it.

A name I came to dislike, unexpectedly really, was Lon Chaney Jr, most known for The Wolf Man. I went in with a higher opinion of him, only knowing him from The Wolf Man; he eventually became a bit of a golden boy on the Universal horror sets, and so he got into a ton of different projects. And boy, did he ever only play one character across everything! He's extremely good at it, but he only ever played a sad, pathetic little man who is overwhelmed by the weight of the world! We get it, dude. Play a different character!

6. Conclusions

This is getting away from me, so I'll wrap this up. Thank you if you even skimmed this far!

I really did enjoy this marathon. It was stressful, a little, but a fun stress, all things considered.

Rapidshot overall favs: The Bride of Frankenstein, the Cat and the Canary, Revenge of the Creature, Dracula, The Old Dark House, Tarantula, 1925's Phantom of the Opera, the Raven.

Rapid boots: The Mummy franchise, Paula the Ape Woman series, She-Wolf of London, the Black Cat, Ghost of Frankenstein.

I love this era of horror: It's almost a cosy horror to me, with giant fog machines, goofy big analog science contraptions, and painted backdrops (you can see the painted backdrops and their flatness during the early 30s ones especially). I like that there are fewer cuts compared to the modern day: They hold the camera on the actors, and often the camera is not on a close-up, giving plenty of time for interesting physicality. It almost feels staged or traditionally theatrical in a way that modern movies do not. (Which makes sense, as the earlier writers and directors and actors all came from and routinely did theatre. Lugosi got Dracula after he did the stage version of it.) Many of them are very comfortable feeling, and they're short too!

I don't think I could do another grand tour like this again for years, at mininum,—and I won't revisit Paula and probably not The Mummy—but I do want to revisit it more than I have in the last few years. These monsters are my FRIENDS!

Anyway. Stan Boris Karloff, James Whale, and especially Elsa Lanchester

#my universal horror marathon #thank you to anyone who reads #i mostly just wanted to write this up for me