Joblo.com's Arrow in the Head reports that director Robert Fuest has just died at the age of 84. Fuest is perhaps best known as the director of the classic Vincent price vehicles, The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) and Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1972). He also directed the original version of the suspense thriller And So the Darkness (1970) and also The Devil's Rain (1975), starring Ernest Borgnine and William Shatner, with Eddie Albert, Tom Skerritt, Ida Lupino, and Keenan Wynn. Rain also included in its cast a then unknown John Travolta, plus a cameo by Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey, who also acted as consultant. Fuest was said to be a friend of LaVey's, and to have based some of his vision of the eccentric, flamboyant, organ playing Phibes character on the eccentric, flamboyant, organ playing LaVey.
Witches, witchcraft, magic, and sorcery as portrayed in film and video.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Monday, February 13, 2012
The Three Movies of Oz
The last few months have seen a range of new film projects based on or inspired by the works of L. Frank Baum. First, The Witches of Oz, with Christopher Lloyd as the Wizard and Mia Sara as the Wicked Witch:
Also, there's the animated Dorothy of Oz, with the voices of Patrick Stewart, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Short, and Lea Michele.
Finally, we have Oz the Great and Powerful, with James Franco. This is said to be a prequel to The Wizard of Oz, based more on Baum's book than the MGM 1939 film, and centering on the Wizard's initial arrival in Oz and his early dealings with the good and wicked witches.
Also, there's the animated Dorothy of Oz, with the voices of Patrick Stewart, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Short, and Lea Michele.
Finally, we have Oz the Great and Powerful, with James Franco. This is said to be a prequel to The Wizard of Oz, based more on Baum's book than the MGM 1939 film, and centering on the Wizard's initial arrival in Oz and his early dealings with the good and wicked witches.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Nicol Williamson, R.I.P.
News has just been released that Scottish actor Nicol Williamson died this past December in the Netherlands after a long battle with cancer. Among his best known roles was that of Merlin in the 1981 film Excalibur, with Nigel Terry as King Arthur and Helen Mirren as the enchantress Morgan.. The "Charm of Making" used by both Merlin and Morgan in the film has become one of the most mnemonic pieces of dialogue among fans of fantasy films.
In 1985 Mr. Williamson played the Nome King in Disney's Return to Oz, allied with Jean Marsh as the witch Mombi. In one scene he reveals to Dorothy that it was her ruby slippers that enabled him to conquer Oz.
In 1982, he played the title role in a television production of Macbeth, part of the BBC Television Shakespeare series. Here, in Act IV, scene 1, Macbeth meets with the Three Witches.
Williamson also appeared in The Exorcist III with George C. Scott and in the 1997 film Spawn in his last film role. Nicol Williamson had had a long and distinguished career on stage, television, and film, and for many he remains the definitive movie Merlin. He is and will be sorely missed.
In 1985 Mr. Williamson played the Nome King in Disney's Return to Oz, allied with Jean Marsh as the witch Mombi. In one scene he reveals to Dorothy that it was her ruby slippers that enabled him to conquer Oz.
In 1982, he played the title role in a television production of Macbeth, part of the BBC Television Shakespeare series. Here, in Act IV, scene 1, Macbeth meets with the Three Witches.
Williamson also appeared in The Exorcist III with George C. Scott and in the 1997 film Spawn in his last film role. Nicol Williamson had had a long and distinguished career on stage, television, and film, and for many he remains the definitive movie Merlin. He is and will be sorely missed.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Agnes Moorehead and Endora
While the Wicked Witch of the West may be the first that comes to mind when mentioning witches on film, when speaking of witches on television, the first that usually comes to mind is meddling mother-in-law Endora, played by the incomparable Agnes Moorehead on the American situation-comedy series Bewitched from 1964 to 1972. Here is a fan compilation of some of her best scenes:
Prior to her eight season tenure as Endora, Ms. Moorehead had portrayed another famous witch, Mombi, in an adaptation of L. Frank Baum's The Marvelous Land of Oz presented on The Shirley Temple Show, with Frances Bergman as the good witch Glinda.
Agnes had also provided the voice for the Wicked Witch of the West in a radio series based on Baum's Oz books which aired on NBC in the 1940s. On other installments of the Shirley Temple Show, she played Hepzibah Pyncheon in "The House of the Seven Gables," and the witch in "Rapunzel."
In one of her last television roles, Agnes once again portrayed a witch, this one inspired by Macbeth but with a comedic bent, in the vignette "Witches' Feast" in an installment of Night Gallery, co-starring with Ruth Buzzi.
Prior to her eight season tenure as Endora, Ms. Moorehead had portrayed another famous witch, Mombi, in an adaptation of L. Frank Baum's The Marvelous Land of Oz presented on The Shirley Temple Show, with Frances Bergman as the good witch Glinda.
Agnes had also provided the voice for the Wicked Witch of the West in a radio series based on Baum's Oz books which aired on NBC in the 1940s. On other installments of the Shirley Temple Show, she played Hepzibah Pyncheon in "The House of the Seven Gables," and the witch in "Rapunzel."
In one of her last television roles, Agnes once again portrayed a witch, this one inspired by Macbeth but with a comedic bent, in the vignette "Witches' Feast" in an installment of Night Gallery, co-starring with Ruth Buzzi.
Monday, January 16, 2012
The Wizard of Oz (Selig, 1910)
This is the earliest surviving film version of the L. Frank Baum children's novel, produced by Selig Polyscope in 1910. The film shows influence both from the 1902 Broadway musical, - dancing girls form part of the Wizard's royal guard, - and Baum's 1900 novel, as well as it's 1904 sequel, The Marvelous Land of Oz. In addition to her dog Toto, Dorothy is accompanied by a cow, as she is in the 1902 musical. The main villian, as in the more familiar 1939 version, is the Wicked Witch, here named "Momba," a variation of "Mombi," the witch in the second Oz book. Glinda also appears, and is seen floating away in a manner similar to the way she floats away in a bubble in MGM's take on the tale. Like Margaret Hamilton's witch, Momba rides a broomstick, something the witch in Baum's book did not do. A nine year old Bebe Daniels plays Dorothy.
Satanic Rhapsody ("Rhapsodia Satanica" ) -1915
Rough translation of the introduction for this YouTube post from the original Italian:
Satanic Rhapsody is a 1915 film directed by Nino Oxilia.
The soundtrack is by Pietro Mascagni, one of the greatest composers of the period and the first composer of the profession in Italy to sign a soundtrack, in synchronization with the scenes of the film, working called "the long, arduous and difficult"
"The film, adapted from the poem" Dawn of Oltrevita "Fausto Maria Martini, directed by and starring Nino Oxilia an inspired and talented Lyda Borelli, has shown everyone in the Enchanted atmosphere of the early '900, telling the story of an old countess (Dawn of Oltrevita fact) who makes a pact with Mephistopheles, and in this way, in exchange for lost youth, agrees to renounce love. What's not easy for the woman, that the hand of Satan's accomplice, Sergio pushes suicide by refusing his attentions and grants him his brother Tristan. It will make it his soul to the devil before they have repented and returned to old . The star in this fine work is the music that Mascagni wrote in 1915 and masterfully adapted to film. By participating in the script, did not create a simple score, but managed to speak, whispering and shouting pictures by giving them an increase in tension that accompanies the listener until the dramatic ending. " Prologue of Alba was Oltrevita Castle of Illusion, the vestal white death. Silver hair, wrinkles on the forehead, wrinkles on the forehead, words full of a withering of autumn, from the melancholy urn, saw his own youth away, beyond the shadow reviving his regret, turned on the pupils of the onrushing guests to lure more gray among the gray castles ... She did not cry: aged, wise. The legend of equal thought of his past, marble sculptures, which resulted in the live blood brisk fire of love and welcomed his twenty years as a gift, returned to the limit of death, blue as the sunrise over the sea ...
Satanic Rhapsody is a 1915 film directed by Nino Oxilia.
The soundtrack is by Pietro Mascagni, one of the greatest composers of the period and the first composer of the profession in Italy to sign a soundtrack, in synchronization with the scenes of the film, working called "the long, arduous and difficult"
"The film, adapted from the poem" Dawn of Oltrevita "Fausto Maria Martini, directed by and starring Nino Oxilia an inspired and talented Lyda Borelli, has shown everyone in the Enchanted atmosphere of the early '900, telling the story of an old countess (Dawn of Oltrevita fact) who makes a pact with Mephistopheles, and in this way, in exchange for lost youth, agrees to renounce love. What's not easy for the woman, that the hand of Satan's accomplice, Sergio pushes suicide by refusing his attentions and grants him his brother Tristan. It will make it his soul to the devil before they have repented and returned to old . The star in this fine work is the music that Mascagni wrote in 1915 and masterfully adapted to film. By participating in the script, did not create a simple score, but managed to speak, whispering and shouting pictures by giving them an increase in tension that accompanies the listener until the dramatic ending. " Prologue of Alba was Oltrevita Castle of Illusion, the vestal white death. Silver hair, wrinkles on the forehead, wrinkles on the forehead, words full of a withering of autumn, from the melancholy urn, saw his own youth away, beyond the shadow reviving his regret, turned on the pupils of the onrushing guests to lure more gray among the gray castles ... She did not cry: aged, wise. The legend of equal thought of his past, marble sculptures, which resulted in the live blood brisk fire of love and welcomed his twenty years as a gift, returned to the limit of death, blue as the sunrise over the sea ...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)