Castle Freak: Stuart Gordon at the WCFTR

      The Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater research is a vast resource for all things weird, wild, old, new, and most importantly beautiful.  As I have explored our vault over the last year or so, many collections have stuck out as exceptional in their steadfast dedication to fearlessness in creativity.  One such collection, which also happens to be extremely appropriate for today’s Halloween celebrations, is the films and papers of Stuart Gordon.

      Stuart Gordon, for the uninitiated, started off as an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  While a theater student Gordon formed the Screw Theater troupe, a group founded in the same vein as Julian Beck and Judith Malina’s Living Theater using theater as a political tool.  Famous (or infamous) productions from this era included The Game Show in which planted actors in the audience were beaten and (seemingly) raped, and Peter Pan an acid-soaked take on the Pan story using the tumultuous political setting of late 60s Chicago as a backdrop.  Both of these productions led to both academic and criminal prosecution, leading Gordon to back away from academia and to found the Broom Street Theater in Madison, Wisconsin where he could engage in the experimental performances that inspired him.  Eventually Gordon moved on to Chicago where he started the Organic Theater Company.  It is with the OTS that Gordon eventually moved into the cinema.

      After success with the Organic Theater Company and early film productions, Gordon turned to an interest of his and his colleagues’ childhood: the stories of fantasy/horror writer H.P. Lovecraft.  In 1985 Gordon released the cult classic “Re-Animator” based on Lovecraft’s “Herbert West – Reanimator” and starring the lead players of the OTC.  Upon its release the film received excellent reviews, and is now a landmark film in the comedy-gore genre and is credited (along with Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead films) with revitalizing the genre.  After the success of Re-Animator Gordon continued with his interest in both Lovecraft (From Beyond 1986) and horror (the truly scary Dolls (1987), however after Dolls Gordon’s work began to receive less attention from studios and Gordon eventually teamed up with Full Moon Productions, a direct to video focused horror and science fiction company.  It is with these lower budget films that Gordon made throughout the 90s where his imagination exploded and his works, though sometimes excruciatingly campy due to standard low-budget traps, reached an elegant form. 

      And it is here in Gordon’s late 1980s through the 1990s period where the WCFTR’s collection shines.  Holding original 35mm prints (all in fantastic condition) of Robot Jox (1988), Daughter of Darkness (1990), The Pit and the Pendulum (1990), Fortress (1992), Castle Freak (1995), Space Truckers (1996), and The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1998), the collection is scary, funny, and ultimately a truly unique body of work.  Of all of these films however, Castle Freak has stood out as a jewel in the collection to myself.

      Castle Freak is based on the Lovecraft short story “The Outsider” and features Gordon regular Jeffrey Combs (star of The Re-Animator, From Beyond, as well as an excellent later appearance in Peter Jackson’s oft-overlooked The Frighteners) stars as John Reilly, whose recent inheritance of a castle from a long lost aunt (who also happens to be a duchess) finds him, his depressed wife, and their blind daughter relocated to an Italian mountain range.  Needless to say, things take a turn for the worse.  The film is absolutely wild and beautifully crafted.  The acting has many pitfalls of low-budget cinema but manages to pull of something that not many other b-horror can manage: a truly scary film.  In essence, the film is about a freak that has been locked up in a dungeon and upon breaking out, goes on a killing spree.  A pretty straightforward plot but an incredibly overlooked gem from the mid-90s, and this was the case with a lot of straight to video horror.   

      This is why I believe the collection at the WCFTR is so important.  To have 35mm prints of these works that have been seriously overlooked in the last twenty years is a true asset.  I believe that as the cult of Stuart Gordon grows (he and Combs currently have a one man show based on the life of Edgar Allen Poe that has received many accolades and will hopefully be turned in to a feature film soon), these films will be in much greater demand.  As often these films rarely featured theatrical releases, owning the prints will be a resource to horror fans for years to come. 

      And now in the spirit of Halloween, let’s conquer brain death.  Here are all of the trailers for the 80s and 90s gems available from the Stuart Gordon Collection:

Castle Freak

Dolls

Fortress

Robot Jox

Daughter of Darkness

The Pit and thePendulum

The Wonderful IceCream Suit

Space Truckers

From Beyond

 

And the classic Re-Animator

The Future is Now….

In the 21^stcentury we have flying cars, hover boards, capsules that create steak dinners by adding water, colonies on the moon, and – wait. None of this is true? That's right, looks like sci fi writers, scientists, futurists, and countless Jetsons fans have probably found themselves disappointed by 2013's lack of jet packs and crime free societies. But it's not allbad, right? Right?

"These large tubes were thought to be the norm in future crime fighting. This 'people sniffer" will identify criminals by their scent! Copyright CBS"

I personally, love anything sci fi or dealing with the history of the future (aka what people of the past thought the future was going to be), so I was really excited this summer when, working at the Wisconsin Center of Film and Theater Research, I was able to watch, describe, and catalog the classic show hosted by Walter Cronkite, The 21^st Century (1967-1968). The show centered on what professionals of various industries believed the 21^stcentury would bring for the residents of the world. Watch this video clip where Cronkite shows what a home of the future will look like: 

Sometimes they got it right. For instance, it was predicted that every home in the 21^stcentury would have a computer for work, education, and cat memes (okay, Cronkite probably wasn't prepared for the amount of cat .gifs to come, but who could have predicted the Internet's obsession with cats?). The show also foresaw GPS navigation in cars, faster and more secure air travel, men (and women) landing on the moon, the use of radiation against cancer cells, cleaning robots (Hello, Roomba!), and just the overall importance of computers in the 21^stcentury.

Why aren't we all sporting these "space fashions?" Let's get on this, America. Copyright CBS

Luckily there were some things that they were wrong about. Like when it was proposed that we might use skyscrapers as a way of growing and harvesting animals (not like modern animal farms are anything to be proud of, but seriously? Skyscrapers?!). Another scary, but-not-put-into-practice idea was the use of laundry detergent-like foam that would be used as riot control. The foam would engulf the crowd above their heads and makes it so they could not see or move easily. One police officer even stated that he hoped that the foam would be infused with mace for an even more sinister weapon.

So, while we may not have flying cars (yet), I'm actually kind of glad that not all predictions came true. The show centered was on science, entertainment, and industries, but it also centered on imagination. Even though we may not have it all, it's always fun to imagine the way life will be in the future.

Any predictions for the 22^nd century?

-Jamie Stanaway

The Emile de Antonio Collection

The Emile de Antonio Film collection at Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research


The Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research (WCFTR) was recently awarded a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) to support processing of the Center’s important archival collection on documentarian Emile de Antonio.

Here is an overview from the WCFTR website about the filmmaker:

Emile de Antonio (1919-1989) was an innovative documentary filmmaker, an art agent, and a political activist who was a force in the New Left movement of the 1960s-80s. The de Antonio collection documents the personal life, professional associations, political experiences, and filmmaking activities of an American polymath from the New Deal, through the radical 1960s, to the Reaganite 1980s. It constitutes a complete picture of the business of independent film production and distribution during the most fertile era of American independent cinema. His films addressed the major events of the Cold War era, including the McCarthy phenomenon, political assassinations, and the anti-war movement. The collection thus includes extensive research files and footage documenting post-War America, from the McCarthy hearings to the release of FBI files under the Freedom of Information Act, from the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and both Kennedy brothers to the Nixon administration, from the members of America's most influential art movements to the members of its most radical political groups.
The de Antonio collection is the most complete of the WCFTR’s personal manuscripts collections, but unfortunately it is also the most disordered. This processing project seeks to improve access to the collection by updating the tools for intellectual access, rearranging the manuscripts, and reducing duplicate moving image holdings. Increased use of the collection is the primary goal for both manuscript and moving image materials. 

The materials in the de Antonio collection are vast and varied. They include copies of his films and outtakes, pre-print materials, unedited audio recordings, and diaries. There are also unique correspondences and gifts from some of the most prominent figures of American art in the 20^thcentury such as Frank Stella, Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, John Cage, Diane Arbus, and others. These materials colorfully illustrate the feeling and energies of the leftist movement among artists in the 1960’s and 1970’s (de Antonio chose Madison as the repository for his archives because of the active Students for a Democratic Society [SDS] chapter here at the University of Wisconsin campus). 

The core of this collection is film and social activism and is a reflection of the importance WCFTR has in preserving some of the richest records of American film history.  These kinds of collections serve to introduce researchers, scholars, and film fans to the fantastic resources here in Wisconsin, and help to keep Madison on the map as a city that donates its care and resources to preserving our cultural heritage.
The processing of this collection made possible by the NHPRC grant will have not only a great impact on organization and accessibility within the archives, but also a cross-over impact for outreach and education in the wider community. Following the processing of this collection, there will be a retrospective and exhibition to showcase its unique content.  In this way, the archive will work to bridge the past with the present through collection, preservation, and education. Something we should all appreciate during Archives Month!
For more information on the resources and holdings at WCFTR, or to learn more about the Emile de Antonio collection, check out the following link: http://wcftr.commarts.wisc.edu/

[Post Created by Laurel Gildersleeve]

Orson Welles and His Masterpiece: Born in Wisconsin

The Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research is on the fourth floor of the Wisconsin Historical Society, and is accessible to anyone. The collection houses papers from celebrities like director John Ford, Groucho Marx, and Alan Alda, among others. In addition to these, it has some holdings related to Orson Welles, a Wisconsin native born in Kenosha on May 6^th, 1915, well known for his work in radio and film. In 1938, Welles did a radio production of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, which was so convincing that it caused a national “panic” where people believed that Martian invasion was actually happening. In 1941, Welles wrote and directed a screenplay of the film Citizen Kane. Other notable films include The Third Man and Touch of Evil. He died in 1985.

When I visited the Wisconsin Historical Society, I knew I needed to take a look at the final draft of the Citizen Kane script. I am a film buff, and reading that draft was a defining moment for me. I only read a portion, but I gained a deeper understanding of the film. Citizen Kane is about the life and last word (Rosebud) of Newspaper mogul, Charles Foster Kane. The film is loosely based on the life of Randolph Hearst, a media mogul.

Reading the final draft allowed me to understand the locations and plot of the film better. Xanadu, the famed estate of Charles Kane, is located in Florida. The nightclub scene with the last wife of Citizen Kane was incredibly written; the nightclub is located in Atlantic City, and Orson described the wife as “cheap.” When I saw the film, I didn’t notice her appearance as cheap, rather the dingy nightclub as sad. Orson’s description in the script was very accurate.

In the beginning of Citizen Kane, after the death of Charles Foster is announced, five newspapers are shown. Orson Welles notes in the script that he wants four newspapers from the United States, and one international paper to flash across the screen. This minor detail demonstrates Orson Welles’s masterful use of imagery; Charles Kane’s death is seen as an international event and this gives insight into the persona of Kane. By examining the script, which archives like the Wisconsin Historical Society allows us to do, we can more intimately understand the scope of the film in ways that aren’t always as obvious to the casual movie-goer. These archives help us not only to touch the past, but to think about it in new ways.

[Post written by Katherine Stotis.]