Word: filmland
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...things and many more: literary agent for such science fiction authors as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, A.E. van Vogt, Curt Siodmak and L. Ron Hubbard; actor and talisman in more than 50 films (The Howling, Beverly Hills Cop III, Amazon Women on the Moon); editor of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine and creator of the Vampirella comic book franchise. But each of these trades was an exponent of his educated ardor for science fiction, fantasy and horror, and his need to share that consuming appetite...
...found out about "King Kong" from "Famous Monsters of Filmland." This was a magazine founded in 1958 by a guy named Forrest J. Ackerman, a true enthusiast of horror films (nowadays he'd be putting up an obsessive web site with hundreds of pages). If there were people screaming, "Famous Monsters" covered it: the latest Vincent Price film, Japanese monster flicks, any flavor of Dracula or Frankenstein. There were stories on makeup, on directors, on actors, on special effects techniques. There was the "Fangmail" and the monthly "Horrorscope." The back of the book sold items like magic kits...
Inside "Famous Monsters of Filmland" #27 was Part 2 of an article on the making of "King Kong." I mean, I'd heard of it, of course, but I really had no idea of what I had been missing. Keep in mind that I'd been a stop-frame fan for years, and here was this article with these fantastic photos that implied that I had somehow missed the greatest stop-frame flick of them all. It was the movie that had inspired Harryhausen...
...budget horror movies; characters are named after some of the more mediocre talents ever to win a Directors Guild card (Lew Landers, Roy William Neill, Erle C. Kenton); Roger Corman, godfather to many young directors, makes a cameo appearance, as do Forrest Ackerman, editor of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine, and Sayles himself. Trouble is The Howling is too insistent on parading its enshocklopedic knowledge to raise Hackle One on any moviegoer's neck. Rob Bottin's special makeup effects may deserve extended study, but the movie shouldn't stop dead in its lycanthropic tracks while...
...Many, many thanks for your entertaining cover story on filmland's most exciting and beautiful actress. May Wonder Woman continue to give Mere Man a "real good time" for many years...