Thursday, July 7th
I’d been looking forward to this year’s Monster Bash for quite some time. The fact that they were going to have guests from the film Robot Monster actually had me excited for a show. That doesn’t happen often these days. Plus, I just love the feel of this show, not to mention the killer dealer room.
George Barrows
Born Feb. 7th, 1914 – Died Oct. 17th, 1994
George Barrows is most known for the roles he played where you didn’t even see his face. He was one of those ‘guys in a gorilla suit’. But not just that, he was one of the BEST in that league, appearing in tons of movies and TV shows as a gorilla. Barrows actually had made his own suit, and spent quite a bit of time studying real gorillas to get their movements down. Of course, one of his most famous roles was that in the the 1953 film Robot Monster.
He also appeared in plenty of shows and movies in small bit parts, as well as working as a stuntman. He is one of those “men in suit” guys that never received proper screen credit for the hard work that they did over the years, only because they were hidden underneath their costume. This is something that needs to be changed.
I Cannot, Yet I Must: The True Story of the Best Bad Monster Movie of All Time
by Anders Runestad
Published by Radiosonde Books, 2015. 680 Pages.
“I cannot – yet I must. How do you calculate that?
At what point on the graph do “must” and “cannot” meet? Yet I must – but I cannot!”
Last weekend, we were at the Cinevent Classic Film Convention in Columbus and had a lot of fun. Sure, it would have been nice to have a few more bodies coming through the door, but that didn’t stop us from selling a few things, meeting a few people (including another die-hard Naschy fan), as well as picking up a few things for my own collection. This show is a good old fashion memoribilia show. No guests charging money for autographs, but just a bunch of dealers selling everything from posters to lobby cards to stills and much more. Yes, this wasn’t just a horror show, but we were still able to find some good stuff. Although, I have to say, when you come across a table with about 8 stacks of movie posters, each about six inches high, and the dealer says “all posters are a buck each”, you know your back is going to killing you when you’re done going through them all, but you do it anyway. We’re going to plan on going to this show again next year and see how it goes. If we do well again, maybe we’ll make this a regular stop on our World Tour!
One of the things that I really love about Monster Bash is the guests that they get are not the ones that you’re going to typically see at most shows. Sure, that may be because of the ones they do try and get are from the older and classic films. And by that I mean ones that came before the 80s! Not that there is anything wrong, but most of those names you will be able to see at a half a dozen different shows throughout the year. But like Cinema Wasteland, Ron Adams at Monster Bash tries to do it a little different.
Any fan of cult movies, turkeys, MST3K, or just a lover of crazy sci-fi/horror films, knows of the 1953 classic Robot Monster. You know the one…featuring a man in a gorilla suit wearing a space helmet? An image that is kind of hard to forget. It is usually found at the top of most Best of the Worse Film Lists. But no matter how bad some might think it is, or that it was supposedly shot in only 4 days, or that the title terror has to be one of the most unique movie monsters ever, it is still an entertaining movie, even if you are shaking your head through most of the time! And if you are entertained, then it is not a bad movie, right?
But what is even more astounding is the fact that someone has written a book about this movie and the people behind it. And not just a book…but one that is just shy of 700 pages!!!
kitleyskrypt.com 