1968 Cinema Memorabilia: The Swimmer

Newly arrived in the mail this afternoon...  A cool eBay purchase.  Lobby card (size 11" x 14") showing a production still from the 1968 Burt Lancaster film The Swimmer.  Filmed in the Summer of 1966 and based on a John Cheever novel (which I have, but have not yet read) it wasn't released until 1968.  

The film is an oddball favorite of mine... A bit of an expensive rarity to find on DVD, but one that I've watched over and over again.  Upon seeing it for the first time, I was drawn to its dark tone, sweeping orchestral score (which I have on vinyl) and story of a man who decides to swim across his affluent Connecticut county by going pool to pool through the backyards of friends, acquaintances and (as it turns out) some folks who are less than pleased to see him.  

Charm Illustrated: Ads Of The 1940s

Dorothy Lamour sings in colorful tones whilst Hotel Berlin appears to be on something of a cloak and dagger lockdown.  Tense nerves make a body quarrelsome while khaki pants-wearing gentlemen folk sip whisky after gardening.  A Helena Rubenstein cosmetic color wheel acts as a guide to ladies looking for that elusive combination of enviable luxury and seemingly effortless glamour.  Coal is busy making steel while "bluejackets" revel in a moist shave.  Such was life in the advertising of the (now seemingly innocent) 1940s... colorful and comical in some places, stark and dramatic in others.

Souvenir 1978: The Bee Gees' EPIC Sgt. Pepper Disaster

Many thanks to Janie for this awesome piece of folly of pop culture tomfoolery.

What do we think ever became of the career of that poor Sandy (Strawberry Fields) Farina?

Eleven years after The Beatles' landmark Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band LP, Robert Stigwood Productions actually thought it would be a FANTASTIC idea to put The Bee Gees, Peter Frampton and George Burns in a $12,000,000.00 cinematic send-up of those (and other) Fab Four songs.  Clearly, everyone was riding high on more than just The Bee Gees' Post-Saturday Night Fever hubris and I'm certain that more than a few people got fired when the tidal wave of critical brickbats started swinging.  

Elizabeth Taylor FOREVER

Sleep tight, violet eyes... Rest easy.  Thanks for everything.

1957 Times Square: The Sweet Smell Of Success

Several stills from another NYC film great: Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis' dual-star vehicle called "The Sweet Smell Of Success".  The Times Square we see here (1956 - 1957) is decidedly less grimy than the one depicted in later film fare, but the latter-day film noir touches used here create a moody foreshadowing of the dark times this district would see a decade later.

Cinerama 1940s

Several more 1940s movie advertisements, charmingly illustrated.