Go Way Far Back To #1

 

Visiting a Genre Zine At Its Start

All hail Filmfax, thirty-four years since starting, and repository for film lore second to none. I misremember in-print fandom as something we had in abundance through the sixties and part of the seventies, followed by parch earth lasting a decade at least. Being a self-centered sort as is most of humanity, it took long while to recognize it was me what built a wall from genre publications for simple reason I outgrew them, or thought at the time I did. Castle of Frankenstein had quit in 1975, but Famous Monsters lingered till 1983, long after I gave it up. FM would surprise me thereafter for still being on stands, one Star War cover after another as reminder that new days were upon us, and who needed them? There was The Monster Times, begun in 1972, which for some reason I never came across, so imagined it sold only in boroughs of NY or kiosks in Jersey. A few I saw looked interesting, more tabloid than mag, which made MT distinctly urban-based. “Fanzines” emerged from a seeming desert, obscure but for pen-pals spreading word or tom-toms beat among those who kept lamps lit. But there were plenty circulating for those who paid attention. Cinefantastique went glossy and mainstream by 1970, heavy toward sci-fi, plus focus upon current releases. Fangoria sprung in 1979, but gory covers kept me at bay. Mags were thus out there in abundance, but I had taken my ball and gone home, wailing the while that FM/CoF bred readers were not being served as they should. Narrow is the path for ones who demand meals be cooked precise. Filmfax was a first to speak again for a fan base rooted most in 50’s and backward fare.

Ad on Page Two of Filmfax #2, Sky The Limit Thereafter. Also Note Below, From Issue #3, for a Collector Meet Circa 1986

Old mags are lots like standard DVD’s I mentioned a couple weeks back, orphans of a streaming or Blu-driven storm. My run of Filmfax sat lonely on shelves too long … why commit to closure of a set if you stop reading them? Issue One beckoned, so I took it down to see if charm was still intact. Nothing of the 80’s will move me unduly, no near-tears like a vintage CoF might arouse, but are there those for whom Filmfax was a beginner point and touchstone for genre dedication to follow? They might cry copious for recall of Filmfax beckoning from a store shelf long ago, and let’s face it, the 80’s was long ago. Filmfax has outlasted other genre mags but for a couple, Little Shoppe of Horrors, began by editor-publisher Richard Klemensen in 1972 comes to mind, then there is Midnight Marquee, which goes back to an astounding 1963. Appropriate that Shoppe should be in midst of memorializing genre-devoted magazines. But back to Filmfax #1. Like any issue, there are must-pieces and ones less a priority. #1 surprised me for being near-one hundred percent of interest, and not in a sense of info told/retold to tedium since. These 1986 articles were fresh as a daisy to me. From so much that was good, I pick an outstanding three to mention, each a treat. You read stuff this good and say yes, let’s push forward to (current) #156, not forgetting spin-off Outré (1995-2003). Trouble is but one lifetime to go back and again enjoy all of things we like.

I visited Space Patrol and similar ilk in 2006, have lost not my enthusiasm for early TV orbit-operatic since. Bugaboo is familiar, as in born too late to be transfixed before the tube at uniquely impressionable age, unique the more because Space Patrol could no way work unless you were there for its acme, plus access to gimcracks sold off cereal boxes or mail-in. Here was forty million earned in 1952 alone for plastic toys barely out of a box before they’d crack or go discarded. The Space Patrolling cast dashed from cloudy telecasts to supermarket opens, kid hospitals, any place intergalactic warriors might be worshipped. Familiar dismiss as mere “radio with pictures” might apply to Space Patrol, that neither fair, or enough, to describe magic the show wove for half a 50’s decade celebrating all things otherworldly. Filmfax coverage was in two parts, exhaustive (but not exhausting), and written by Jean-Noel Bassior, who grew up on the daily dose (radio, fifteen-minute live broadcasts, then nationwide feed on ABC in half-hours). Space Patrol was afternoon serial fix laced with gentle push to eat cereal that sponsored it (the Chex variety --- ever try them?). I seldom went box-top route, my loss in face of what it meant to a writer like Bassior who evangelizes yet for Space Patrol (via webpage, plus a McFarland book).

Ed Bernds directed a lot of Bowery Boy films and lived to tell it for Filmfax. He blows no kisses, however. Leo and Huntz were tabbed “the idiots” by producing heads, herewith Ed’s Gorcey estimate: “Leo was a pig, a miserable person, but he had a lot of talent --- which he eventually dissolved in alcohol.” Now there’s damning with faint praise, or should I say praising with un-faint damning? Gorcey would “have a shot of booze just before the camera started rolling,” a basis for Slip’s consummate wit? As to “Sach”/Hall, never mind. “Of the two, I disliked Huntz the most,” said Ed. So why stick around? Bernds said the work was genial otherwise, and there were creative opportunities, plus steady checks due to well-oil by overseeing Ben Schwalb. Ben, said Ed, “was very concerned with the quality of the pictures … willing to spend money to get an extra laugh.” I checked a Warner disc of High Society, nicely 1.85 instead of the old square screen, with fine quality, but could not stay a dreary course. Trouble is no child years sentiment for these. I hoped High Society was the one where Sach masquerades as landed gentry who by error spreads caviar on his monocle (it dropped among the crackers), pops it in his mouth, then says “Hmmm, kinda crisp” as we hear glass breakage on the track. Did I miss that highlight for not seeing High Society through, and was Sach eating the monocle part of Loose In London?

Keep Watching The Skies author Bill Warren contributed a chapter on Tobor The Great to Filmfax #1, this to preview Volume Two of KWTS, which would publish in 1986 and complete his definitive saga of sci-films released from 1950 through 1962. Tender feeling for fantasy went far back for Warren, who saw Tobor The Great in 1954 at age eleven. That made it a great picture, certainly by his definition. He viewed Tobor as a king-size robot customized for a kid-size audience, nuff said so far as my own view (a first time) of the DVD, which has Tobor wrecking no more than living room space before clomp-pursuit of Red operatives poised to blowtorch little Billy Chapin so his granddad will give up state secrets. Best thing about Tobor The Great may have been robot art on posters to fortify any den wall, assuming one has thousands to make the score, that after locating a specimen. Took invest like Warren’s to truly know and love Tobor, us the poorer for not being eleven when it ‘54 mattered most. Warren and Jean-Noel Bassior were birds of a feather in that respect. I enjoy writers who get personal in expressing love for this stuff. Their voices translate easy and inspire us to dig out and watch what was meaningful to them, Filmfax the ideal host for the many who made pages so entertaining and informative for years since 1986.