"Return Of The Living Dead" article

Note: this entry on "The Return of the Living Dead" was originally posted on my old blog "Sweet Skulls," but I am reposting it here since many might have missed it.

(Click on images to enlarge.)

Click to get a nice big image of this poster art.


The French poster for ROTLD, arguably better than the American.

Back from the dead and ready to party with a few friends.

The first issue of Forry Ackerman's new publication "Monster Land" which came out in February of 1985, contained an article on the then-upcoming movie "Return of the Living Dead." Poor old Forry, you remember, had been ousted from his position as editor of FM by the Warren company and this led to their parting. Forry was able to start up another virtual FM called Monster Land, with the "Monster" in the same familiar type and size as Famous Monsters, and this along with a painting of the Ackermonster, let fans know he was back in business... at least for a little while.

Below is the inside cover text which trumpeted the story of his return to publishing. Although not the focus of today's entry, I thought it still might be interesting to some that never saw it. Interesting phrasing of the copy, both for what it said in between the lines about the restrictions placed on him by Warren, as well as the "classic monsters" magazines versus the modern Fangoria-type mags. It was a sad reality that as his FM audience grew up, the younger readers coming to the magazine stands were looking for exactly what Fangoria was offering. And the older classic-monster fans who were still buying such publications were growing fewer. Even I fell into that category. What amused and amazed me as a kid no longer held the attraction, when Freddy Kruger and others were dripping blood and grue from the covers of Fango.

Another hi-rez artwork image for ya.

And now, for our feature presention... the ROTLD article. I remember that Zombie Summer... when so many classic Zombie and horror flicks came out. Aging fans still talk about it in hushed tones... it was like dying and going to zombie heaven... which I guess for a zombie is finding a schoolbus full of teens. And like they would have chowed down on such a gut-filled feast, we chowed down on the moist and meaty movies of 1985.

Tarman was happy to see the fresh-faced, "with-it" teens arrive to bring some life to the party.

Seeing ROTLD for the first time was an electrifying experience. Totally different than what was expected, it crackled with energy, humor and atmosphere. All we could do was sit back and be smacked in the face with one surprise after another, with the gore effects bringing screams to the audience in between the laughs. If zombie films are exciting today you can thank this movie for setting the tone for hyper-active undead action mixed with dark humor.

Enjoy the article below from 23 years ago, and relive the excitement of reading this before you saw the movie in the theater... or, for you young whippersnappers, try to imagine it. The article got me excited for it, but no-one was prepared for it when they saw it. I first watched it with a group of friends at a midnight showing, and I took my fabric pullover skull mask in my pocket. During the scene of the zombies coming out of the graves, I put it on and sat there watching the movie. In front of us were three already-scared teenage African-American girls, and when one looked back and saw me, she screamed, then the other two screamed, and they freaked. By the time the summoned usher came around with his flashlight, I had pocketed the mask and was wearing my best innocent face. Mean? Possibly. Fun? Oh, yeah...

Frank indulges in a bit of humorous foreshadowing.

It's interesting how designer Bill Stout refers to a "spore" being responsible for the return of the rotten ones, when the script revolves around the 2-4-5-Trioxin. So this interview must have been conducted early in the short production process. Also some of the designs and efforts he made to show various time periods were never seen in the film. Although a few make-ups of decaying zombies made it onto film, the majority of corpses in the crowd scenes just are regular people, albeit muddy, with very few make-up effects or even masks in view. The sudden change in make-up artists before the job was finished probably accounts for some of that, as time was running out to finish what was a big job. But the individuals we saw, such as Tarman, the woman half-corpse, and a few others, carried the film in terms of startling creations, the likes of which we had never seen before.

Orgy Of The Living Dead

Today's monster memories are of..."Orgy of the Living Dead."

Click the images to see a hi-rez versions.

(This post was originally written for an older blog of mine, "Sweet Skulls." I'm re-posting it here so those of you that missed it can enjoy it anew!) Folks, you are looking at one of the single most horrific, (and to my teen self, thrilling) pieces of artwork for a movie ad ever made, that ever fell under the category of "never appears in the movie." When this showed up in the newspaper on the movie ad page back in spring of 1972, my dark little heart skipped several beats as I feverishly cut it out to put in my scrapbook.

You see, I could never go see the movies they advertised, both because I was underage (13 years old), but also because my parents would never let me. The newspaper ads were often the only thing I could collect in association with the films I could never go see. So, I could only longingly feast my eyes on the promotional artwork, and imagine how awesome the movie must be. Little did I know then, that what I imagined was so much better than the actual movie. As I know now, the artwork was much better than the film, and misleading as to what you would see.

Right up front you should be warned that there is no orgy; not even a petting party... and precious few living dead, and those are of the vampiric variety and not zombies. The titular "orgy" was actually the name of the triple-feature under which all three of the films would show: "Revenge of the Living Dead," "Curse of the Living Dead," and "Fangs of the Living Dead." What I little dreamed was that the three films were not even related! One would think that they were all in a series of films that connected, like the Apes movies making the rounds in the butt-numbing "Ape-o-thons," but no... they were three movies completely unrelated to each other, simply renamed to make it seem that way.

But you have to hand it to the promoters here: they did a great job of packaging and promoting the films to maximum effect. The titles, picked to capitalise on Romero's zombie movie, though there were no zombies; the artwork, depicting an imaginary character that never made an appearance; and the idea of "three-movies-for-the-price-of-one" which made it a real bargain. Similar to a cheap smorgasboard of crummy food, you might complain that it didn't taste that good, but you had to admit you sure got a lot for your money.

The zombie/vampire artwork, indeed, the entire campaign, was created by Alan Ormsby, who was a multi-talented man indeed. Besides being an artist, he was a director and actor. You may have seen one of his more famous movies: "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things," another of those movies talked about in awed whispers on the playground. But I'm most in awe of his artwork for the promotion, which remains famous to this day. Look at the detail on that gruesome death's-head: rotted skin peeling back to show an exposed skull: with a hole in said skull revealing the brain beneath! An empty eye socket! A hole for a nose!

My 13-year-old mind could scarcely conceive of such horror. It was the most gory image I had ever seen, even considering the monster magazines I was beginning to get interested in, as I could find them. This was before I had found the comic magazines such as "Tales From the Tomb" and such, which took gore to a new level. Those I would find later, and we'll take a look at some of the outrageous images available to any kid, in a future posting.

Having such an impact on my impressionable mind, the image stood as the pinnacle in scary movie artwork, and was never surpassed. (Inspired, I drew my own copy of it, being somewhat talented in drawing things I could look at. Using felt-tip markers, I colored in my version, supplying the blood and gore that the paper ad didn't have.) So when, about ten years later as a young man I happened upon the entire press kit for the movies in a south Florida collector's shop, I snatched it up like a starving zombie gnoshing upon a handfull of fresh entrails. This was a true find! And seeing the entire ad campaign made me appreciate even more what went into promoting this event.

Here is the front of the actual press kit:

Inside page of the poster-sized pressbook:

Page three of the kit:

The ad I had seen and saved from the local paper (and still have, taped in my scrapbook) was only a small part of the overall kit.

Included with the kit was a sample "Madman 1 Sheet," that the theater owner could order to hand out to patrons (see below). On the front here was a photograph of a raving lunatic in a straitjacket, presumably a viewer who was driven insane by seeing the movies. The copy on the other side read, in part: "This is John Austin Frazier. It has been reported that he now resides at a Mental Hospital, the result of attending a showing of "Orgy of the Living Dead!" Because of this tragic event, we, the producers, have secured an insurance policy, insuring the sanity of each and every patron. If you lose your mind as a result of viewing this explosion of terror, you will receive free psychiatric care, or be placed, at our expense, in an asylum for the rest of your life! We urge you to take advantage of this protection! The insurance is free - anyone entering the theater without it does so at his own risk. Remember: WE WARNED YOU!!!

The copy about the handout reads "This hair-raising 'Madman' special one sheet, taken directly from ORGY's key art, is a guaranteed attention-getter! The Madman's distorted face screams out in anguished horror while the text of the poster contains a WARNING note for those about to enter the theater! A guaranteed crowd-raiser that will draw a quick line at the box office!" I'm sure it did.

Front of the handout:

Back of the handout:

Screengrab from the trailer for the film featuring the raving madman...
There is also copy in the kit about the trailers, TV spots and radio ads that the owner could order to help promote the event. Of particular interest is the language used to describe certain ones of the radio ads: "Two of the spots have been specially prepared for Black audiences, and all convey the spirit of the show-biz excitement that will draw the crowds to your box-office!" One supposes they sprinkled in some jive-talk in those.

Well, if you ever ran across this image of a skull with skin rotting from it in your youth, and it haunted your memory, now you can revel in it till your eyes ache. Thanks, Alan, for contributing not only to success of three movies that were ill-deserving of it, but mainly for enriching our childhoods (?) with such a lasting image.

Burial Ground

(click image for hi-rez version)

You know you'd buy a ticket to see this movie.

(Note: Since not all visitors to "My Monster Memories" are aware of another, earlier blog i did called "Sweet Skulls," I will occasionally be importing some of the more suitable entries into this one. If you have read this already on "Sweet Skulls," I apologize, but if you haven't, you might enjoy it here!)

The poster for 1981's "Burial Ground" is a classic bit of zombie movie artwork where once again the promotional effort is better than the movie... in this case, a whole lot better. That is one cool poster!

"Wa-wa-wait! I'll shave it off if you don't like it!"

But that's not to say the movie is completely worthless... not by a long shot. It has it's merits and I still enjoy putting it on occasionally, which is more than can be said for some others. I'd put it slightly below "Hell of the Living Dead" and above "Nightmare City." The proximity it shares with these other titles should give you some inkling of the quality; it resides firmly in that murky swamp of "so bad it's good" territory. In fact, the things that make this movie bad are the very things that make it fun to watch.

"WHAT is that I'm feeling in my underwear?"

A professor researching a burial ground of the ancient Etruscans in Italy makes a discovery of some kind that amazes him. But the ascot-wearing Etruscans buried there want to keep their secrets, so they arise and begin killing and eating all they encounter. Luckily for them, several vacationing couples have come to the Professor's castle-like mansion (apparently he needed some extra money to keep up his research) and they are more interested in getting down than getting out alive. Below are some screen captures I made to share with you. The living characters aren't interesting enough for you to care when they die; their main function is to become zombie chow, so the zombies are my main focus. Oh, and "little" Michael... we certainly can't forget Michael. Who could, having seen him? He's creepier than the zombies, and all he wears is a bad wig.

"Mother, may I have some warm milk before going to bed?"

Michael, a strange man-child, has a thing for his mother, which is understandable; lots of young boys have lusted after their hottie mothers. But she encourages it; when he shows up in the room where she and her boyfriend are giving the bedsprings a workout, she leaps up out of the bed naked, sauntering across the room to grab a sheet and halfway drape herself with it. When all she had to do was cover up a little more while in bed! Yep, the stunted kid is messed up physically, but his emotional problems stem from her unwillingness to let him grow up. Her own neediness and insecurity cause him to be confused about his budding sexuality.

Or, he could just be a horny midget with a slutty mother.

"Oh, man, a maggot just crawled in my mouth! Yuuuk!"

The ease with which the dead are accidentally raised by the hirsute, hapless professor studying the Etruscan tombs seems to indicate that some cemeteries should display "Quiet: Do Not Disturb The Dead!" signs. At least in most of these films some explanation is attempted; Trioxin gas, space radiation, black-magic voodoo, Egyptian curses, biological viruses, etc., but here they just seem to come out because he was being a little too noisy... or nosy, perhaps.

"Boo-gah boo-gah boo-gah!"

The "make-up" of the zombies seems to be composed of slathered-on plaster, into which assorted teeth, hair, eyeballs and live worms are implanted. Then as the "actor" goes through his paces, the dried mud-like layers crack, to reveal red stuff below. Although the effect could work to portray dried-up corpses to good effect, the overdone, hand-molded result hardly resembles human skeletal anatomy at all. Blackened noses poke through the caked mud and blackened lips show plainly behind "teeth," all too obvious in the lingering close-ups. Other zombies are fresh-faced youth with only a little make-up, though, belying the idea that they have all been dead for centuries. However, the makeup is certainly better then the oatmeal-wearing things in "Nightmare City," which seems to indicate that they all died while eating breakfast and keeled over face first into their bowl of Quaker Oats.

His mother warned him that sunbathing without enough tanning lotion would make his skin peel.

The director makes an attempt to mimic Lucio Fulci's Zombie, both with the inclusion of live maggots and nightcrawlers on the makeup, and even the wood-in-the-eyeball gag, only this time it's a glass shard. But the silliness of the living, and the intelligence of the dead, take away any tension and replace it with amusement. The tool-using zombies are so smart that one expects them to soon figure out how to hotwire one of the cars and ram the door with it. The only reason they don't have to is the idiocy of the people inside, who all too soon put themselves on the menu.

Somehow I don't think this fellow looked much better when he was alive.

"Miss! Can you get me out of this mudpack? It's drying out and hurting my skin."

These Etruscans really knew the secret to fertilizing their flowers!

Refreshed from his little dirt nap in a planter, this zombie has an appetite for mayhem.

"Should we get in the car and drive away?"
"No, they'll be expecting us to do that!"

"What... is there something on my face?"

"I'm too sexy for my ascot."

"By the power of the pitchfork, I command you!"

"Oh, no, you did not just pull a rake on me!"

"Aw, come on, you're making it so easy it's not even fun any more!"

Considering the amount of live worms these guys carry around, they'd be very handy to take fishing.

One death that will have you chuckling rather than upchucking is when a maid sticks her head out of a window. One of the zombies below nails her hand to the window sill with a thrown spike, while another slowly reaches up with a scythe. Putting it above her head behind her neck, he very slo-o-o-wly brings it down and severs her head as smoothly and easily as if her neck were made of warm liverwurst. Yes, super-strong and intelligent. The people never had a chance.

This fan completely lost her head over Episode 3: "The Revenge of the Scythe."

"Is this bugging you? Is this bugging you?"

Near the end one of the female characters is surounded by the zombies who advance slowly with hands outstreached. Apparently the are just trying to freak her out, as once they are inches away they all just hold the position while she screams. Must have been waiting for the director to yell "cut!" but he probably was off behind the set wall quaffing down a pint or feeling up the script-girl.

Whoever this mysterious "Black Spider" is, I wouldn't trust the prophetic writings of someone so bad at spelling.

Here's a good review of the film from someone better at that sort of thing that I am... AllThings Zombie.

"Did they just call for lunch? I can't hear a thing through all this junk!"

I'm not convinced this kid ever actually became a zombie. He was just acting normally.

Who these hooded guys are in the church next door is never explained. Sheesh, this late in the movie and you want explanations? They're just zombies, okay?