Pop Culture from an Alternate Dimension

       If you sat through the end credits (if you sat through the film at all) of Bubba Ho-Tep , the last words on screen were "Elvis Returns in Bubba Nosferatu: "Curse of the She-Vampires" ". The first didn't break any box office records so no sequel happened. but BH-T has gotten a cult following and director/screenwriter Don Coscarelli has wanted to do the sequel for a while. The original star, Bruce Campbell, was not interested and Coscarelli considered Kurt Russell for the role. Russell's first collaboration with director John Carpenter was as Elvis in a TV movie. Paul Giamatti was slated to play Col. Parker and Angus Scrimm playing take off of Boris Karloff. I can't imagine what the final product would be like but above is my best interpretation of it.

       When the movie The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension ended, there was a teaser that he would return in Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League . The small but loyal fan base waited but, mostly because of one man (look up David Begelman), that didn't happen. Rumours would pop up once in a while that Rauch and Richter (the people behind the original) were working on a sequel. Rauch did write a comic book version and a novel for the sequel, which were different from each other. This is my take on if Buckaroo got the respect I think he deserved and the sequel got made in the '80s.

       With Batman Begins  starting a new series of Batman movies in 2005 and Superman Returns  promising a new series of Superman movies 2006, comic fans thought we might see the "dark knight" and "the man of tomorrow" joining forces in the 2000s. It did happen in 2016 but not with Routh and Bale. For the main villain of this "what if" version I chose The Riddler. After Christopher Nolan made his first two Batman movies, the plan was to have The Riddler be in the third installment. There were rumors that Leonardo DiCaprio (with whom Nolan made I nception ) was to play the character. I used a fan image someone posted online for the back cover.

       This week is a full matinee from the '30s on an alternate Earth, replete with a cartoon, a comedy short, a serial, a trailer and the main attraction.  CARTOON The video for "The Ghost of Stephen Foster" by the Squirrel Nut Zippers was made to look like an old Max and Dave Fleischer cartoon. It directly references the Betty Boop cartoon of "Minnie the Moocher" and "Bimbo's Initiation".  COMEDY SHORT In 1991 Rob Reiner introduced six episodes of a television show called "Morton and Hayes". They were supposedly lost comedy shorts of Chick Morton and Eddie Hayes (played by Kevin Pollack and Bob Amaral). The shorts were played in the style of great comedy duos like Abbott & Costello, Laurel & Hardy and the Three Stooges. SERIAL Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow was Kerry Conran's love letter to the old serials. It was originally going to have cliffhangers and chapters with title cards.  TRAILER The fake trailer for ...

        Kentucky Fried Movie  hit the theaters in 1977. It was the first movie from the twisted minds of Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, who went on to make Airplane!  and the tv series Police Squad. They hired John Landis to direct, who had only made Schlock  before this, but this got him hired to direct National Lampoon's Animal House . KFM was mostly short sketches skewering television and movies. The longest section was Fistful of Yen, a spoof of Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon.          There was a theater that used to show different double and triple features each night. I saw Enter the Dragon  along with Jackie Chan's The Big Brawl  but they also included the Fistful of Yen section. The downside was they played before the Bruce Lee movie so when the audience watched EtD  they would laugh thinking about the scenes spoofed with Evan Kim.       You can watch Kentucky Fried Movie ...

       With talk of a new James Bond, I thought it was time to do another "man who would be Bond". Last time I talked about American James Brolin auditioning for the part, this time it is New Zealander Sam Neill. Roger Moore yet again did not want to return to the role. Producer Michael G. Wilson, director John Glen, Dana and Barbara Broccoli were impressed with Neill's screentest and wanted to cast him , however Albert "Cubby" Broccoli disagreed. Pierce Brosnan was also considered but didn't get the part until 1995's GoldenEye.       The theme song could have been different as well. Instead of a-ha, it was almost Pet Shop Boys. Sam Neill as James Bond - Screentest (1986) The Living Daylights 1987 - Alternative Title Sequence With The Pet Shops Boys Rejected Theme. - YouTube

       Singin' in the Rain  is a classic musical released in1952. It is a comedy dealing with a studio in the 1920s trying to adapt to making sound pictures. While making The Dueling Cavalier  they realize they need to change in a musical, so it becomes The Dancing Cavalier . When I was designing this "what if" DVD cover I was thinking about when I would look through the old Blackhawk Films catalogs. They specialized in great forgotten movies, especially silent films. I thought they should be the ones release this "lost" classic.

       The 1988 movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit (based on the novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit ) had a world where Baby Herman and Roger Rabbit starred in Maroon Cartoons. The character was popular enough that Disney made a new short with the duo that showed before Honey, I Shrunk the Kids . Dark Horse made a spoof of serials called Monarch of the Moon  that showed American flying hero Yellow Jacket versus Japanese villainess Dragonfly. Now that I had the cartoon and serial I needed the main feature. I chose Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid , which not only stars Steve Martin but has Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and many more stars of the Golden Age.      Put these all together and you have a 1940s movie-going experience from a past similar to our own,   Tummy Trouble - Roger Rabbit Short [HD] - YouTube Monarch of the Moon Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982) Original Trailer [HD] - YouTube

       For a long time, I have been wondering "what if Highlander  was made in the 1940s?". I would love to see Errol Flynn as the immortal swordsman. It would be great to see Basil Rathbone with him as an ally instead of an enemy, so I cast him in Sean Connery's role of Ramirez. William Keighley was a director who (in my mind) could direct any style well so I think he would have the right flair for a cross-genre movie like this.  Include a score by Max Steiner and I would be in heaven.

           Most of my favorite silent movie actors are the comedians but I also love Douglas Fairbanks (Sr.) for adventure and Lon Chaney (Sr.) for pathos. Although mostly known as a horror actor for the make-up he designed and wore as Quasimodo in The Hunchback of Notre Dame  and as the Phantom of Opera he played a variety of roles. Having been raised by deaf parents he could express so much without a word, which helped in silent films.      He made ten films with the great director Tod Browning ( Dracula and Freaks ). One of them is the subject of this blog. London After Midnight  may well be the most famous lost film. Surprisingly a copy of it still exited in 1965 when the vault it was in at MGM went up in flames. No actual footage is known to exist. I imagined what if this movie still exited and Phantom of the Opera  had been lost. A reconstruction was made based on the script and the existing photos from the film.   ...

  September of last year I mentioned my friend Stefan had the idea of putting popular songs into a movie that only had incidental music. I've posted my version, which was Blade Runner , and he has allowed me to share his musical choices. Of course, being me, I designed the cd booklet and tray card. Star Wars alternate soundtrack - YouTube You can find Stefan's kindle books here: Amazon.com : stefan boales

  To continue with the 1960s I present another movie from 1969. Unlike the last one that was written, produced and directed by Anthony Newley to showcase himself, this one was written, produced and directed by Carl Reiner to showcase his friend Dick Van Dyke. The Comic  is about a silent film comedian narrating his life and talking about his bad breaks, the flashbacks however show that he was the problem. The "modern day" parts are drama, but it has clips of the character's old movies where you can see Van Dyke doing classic slapstick. Michelle Lee played Billy's wife and Mickey Rooney played a fellow silent comedian. Here is a clip that shows some of "Billy Bright's" work:  Dick van Dyke - The Comic (1969) - video Dailymotion