My Beatles Book Update

I have finished my basic reviews for George Harrison's material. Now I
am working on John Lennon's stuff. My plan right now is to then work
on Paul McCartney's and Ringo Starr's material followed by the group
material. I will then take a second pass at everything, actually
listening very closely to each track and give deeper insight to the
recordings. I tentatively plan to get everything done by the end of
2007, but it may be 2008. You can always check my progress at http://groups.google.com/group/martb

Regards,
Mark Arnold
http://funideas.home.att.net

Senor Coconut

I don't know if I've written about this before, but one of my favorite albums of all time is "Senor Coconut y Su Conjunto: El Baile Aleman". Why? On it, they do Merengue and Cha-Cha-Cha versions of Kraftwerk songs. Mind you, you probably have to be a Kraftwerk fan to truly appreciate this. However, the "Coconut" version of "Autobahn" is priceless for the opening alone. In the original, you hear a car start, in "Coconut's" version, you hear a car not turning over, playing on all the stereotypes and suceeding!

It's probably hard to find, but check out Ebay or something. I don't know. I got mine at Tower and you know where they are now...


Regards,
MARK ARNOLD
Fun Ideas Productions - P. O. Box 2616 - Saratoga, CA 95070
_________________________________________________________
Please click on my web sites:
Fun Ideas - http://funideas.home.att.net
MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/fun_ideas_productions
The Harveyville Fun Times! - http://thft.home.att.net
Richie Rich's Vault - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/richierichsvault
Mark's Rare Comics - http://rarecomics.home.att.net
Beatles - http://groups.google.com/group/martb
So Rare! Collectibles - http://sorare.home.att.net
Food Shop - http://foodshop.home.att.net
Blog - http://fun-ideas.blogspot.com
Protecto, the Little Robot - http://protecto.blogspot.com
Comicspace - http://www.comicspace.com/Mark_Arnold

BUY MY FIRST BOOK! "The Best of The Harveyville Fun Times!" today!
Go to Amazon or you can order it directly from the publisher by
clicking here: http://www.lulu.com/thft

An Ape Named APE

I worked the APE Convention (Amateur Press Exposition) over the weekend. I met quite a few people including Dan Vado of Slave Labor Graphics and Steve Wyatt of Super-Con fame and Raphael of Sonambulo fame. I worked for Lee Hester at Lee's Comics and saw a few friends from the Bay Area Comic Book Meet Up Group. We actually sold quite a bit of stuff and the atmosphere was most relaxed and set up and take down was relatively easy. If you are ever in San Francisco during the time of this show (typically April), I suggest checking it out.

I also purchased some books like "Girls with Corpses", "The Possum" and a comic on the Titanic and another on the Santa Cruz Beack Boardwalk and finally purchased Dan Fogel's "Underground Comic Book Price Guide". I got a few autographs and a few original sketches including one of Ren & Stimpy.

Totally fun...

Regards,
Mark Arnold
http://funideas.home.att.net

Grindhouse Good!!

I haven't gotten this excited about a movie since "Borat". As anyone who knows me, I am HIGHLY critical of most movies made these days. That's because I have seen so many movies in my life at this point: silents, action, drama, comedy, foreign, shorts, cartoons, documentaries, you name it, that I have become jaded that something's been done before ad nauseum. I cannot believe reviewers like Roger Ebert can consistently give films a "thumbs up" after the amount of films he's viewed, or it may be the fact that Ebert doesn't have any more discretionary taste or perhaps is even paid to give a more positive review for a bunch of so-so films.

I am not saying that "Grindhouse" is the best film ever made and even the concept is not original. Heck, they made "Movie/Movie" way back in 1978 where it was a double-feature genre parody/tribute. It just doesn't done with exploitation films.

The Robert Rodriguez movie ("planet Terror") in itself is reminiscent of Rodriguez and Tarantino's earlier "From Dusk Till Dawn" (also a great film). It's a typical zombie film but with the added elements of extreme gratuitous gore (but not as much as "Saw" or "Hostel") and strong elements of humor (like "Return of the Living Dead" or "Shaun of the Dead") My favorite scene *SPOILER* is where the owner of the BBQ is laying on the ground with his guts supposedly hanging out and it turns out that he just passed out with a bunch of sausage links with sauce on himself. *END OF SPOILER* For those disappointed with "Spy Kids 3-D", "Sharkboy and Lavagirl" and even "Sin City" will be happy with this superior feature, and if you like any of those, you'll love this even more!!

The trailers at the beginning and center of the two films are priceless and I won't spoil them here. I will say that one of them is directed by Rob Zombie, who is in a similar class to Rodriquez and Tarantino for this type of film. DON'T go to the bathroom during these trailers!! Really...DON'T! (There's a joke there, son.)

If you have to go, go during the opening credits of "Death Proof", Quentin Tarantino's film. There are no jokes here and you won't miss anything for about two minutes. There is an ironic punchline to this towards the end of the credits which *SPOILER* shows a girl walking along holding her groin area in a little bit of pain looking for a toilet. I laughed hysterically at this. It is similar to the scene in "Lawrence of Arabia" where Lawrence is crawling through the desert and ends up at an oasis right before Intermission! *END OF SPOILER*

Tarantino's film starts off slower and seems interminable compared to Rodriguez's film, but give it a chance, it really grows on you and show's you how GOOD a filmmaker Tarantino really is. He's not much of an actor (he appears briefly in both films), but his directing and song-selection is always top-notch. And, if you haven't seen "Pulp Fiction", "Kill Bill", Jackie Brown", and "Reservoir Dogs" by now, stop reading this and rent them all. It's basically a grisly car-chase film confidently attributed to "Vanishing Point" and starring the always excellent Kurt Russell and Rosario Dawson and others.

The main reason I think this movie is not doing so well is three-fold: 1) Unlike "Movie/Movie" this is truly a double feature complete with bogus trailers and no "true" intermission, so it clocks in at 191 minutes, which is a long time to sit if you want to digest every morsel of footage (which I HIGHLY recommend) and 2) I don't think most people "get it". Younger kids tend to go to the movies and most of them raised in this age of digital clarity and uncut features in first run movie houses don't remember the days of scratchy films with missing scenes and even having the film break or burn through! (someone even complained about these elements on IMDB!) And 3) exploitation films tend to not be made these days. There's not really a Roger Corman, Russ Meyer or William Castle-type out there. EVERYTHING is an A-picture from the biggest epic to the lowliest comedy. A Will Farrell film like "Blades of Glory" in traditional times would have been a B-picture, but not anymore...too bad...we need more movies like "Grindhouse", not made on big budgets, just plain fun...

PS There is also a book of the film filled with pictures and the original script and Rodriguez/Tarantino continued the quality by making it look like a well-read used book!! A must read!! Tell Lee to buy one for you!!

Regards,
MARK ARNOLD
Fun Ideas Productions - P. O. Box 2616 - Saratoga, CA 95070
_________________________________________________________
Please click on my web sites:
Fun Ideas - http://funideas.home.att.net
MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/fun_ideas_productions
The Harveyville Fun Times! - http://thft.home.att.net
Richie Rich's Vault - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/richierichsvault
Mark's Rare Comics - http://rarecomics.home.att.net
Beatles - http://groups.google.com/group/martb
So Rare! Collectibles - http://sorare.home.att.net
Food Shop - http://foodshop.home.att.net
Blog - http://fun-ideas.blogspot.com
Protecto, the Little Robot - http://protecto.blogspot.com
Comicspace - http://www.comicspace.com/Mark_Arnold

BUY MY FIRST BOOK! "The Best of The Harveyville Fun Times!" today!
Go to Amazon or you can order it directly from the publisher by
clicking here: http://www.lulu.com/thft

The Harveyville Fun Times! #67 is almost ready...

Included is an interview with Howard Post, and information about the upcoming Casper and Richie Rich books, and other information about all things Harvey and some Disney and other stuff. Check out http://thft.home.att.net for more information.

Regards,
Mark Arnold
http://funideas.home.att.net

Gene Deitch

I recently purchased this book about "Terr'ble Thompson" from Fantagraphics. This was a long lost comic strip by Gene Deitch, better known as an animation director for virtually all the studios in the 1950s and 60s. Primarily at UPA and Terrytoons. He created a number of characters and the Terr'ble Thompson character evolved into the animated Tom Terrific. I was able to contact him and set up an interview for a future issue of "Hogan's Alley"! Happy Day.

Regards,

Mark Arnold
Fun Ideas Productions
http://funideas.home.att.net