Celebrate the return of one of the most popular, beloved and influential movie magazines ever – Famous Monsters of Filmland. Legendary fan, literary agent and writer Forrest J. Ackerman started the magazine with publisher James Warren in 1958, and it continued to publish under their guidance until 1983 when it folded after 191 scare-packed issues. The publication’s fortunes fluctuated through a roller-coaster of legal issues from 1993 until just this year. Make scary at the re-launch of the magazine and its website.
It’s all happening at the Egyptian Theatre on Saturday, May 30the beginning at 7:30 PM with a Double Feature:
Son Of Frankenstein, 1939, Universal, 99 min. Dir. Rowland V. Lee. The third atmospheric installment in Universal’s Frankenstein franchise finds Henry Frankenstein’s grown-up son Wolf (Basil Rathbone) returning to the family estate with his wife and son (Josephine Hutchinson and Donnie Dunagan) after many years. The laboratory is in ruins – nevertheless Wolf soon becomes enmeshed in his family’s nefarious legacy when he finds the dormant monster (Boris Karloff) being looked after by a vengeful gallows’ survivor, the crook necked Ygor (a very creepy Bela Lugosi). Universal was firing on all cylinders with their bolt-necked creature when they released this exceptionally entertaining tall tale. Watch for Lionel Atwill as the one-armed police chief (he lost his missing appendage to a previous encounter with the monster).
Ghost Of Frankenstein, 1942, Universal, 67 min. Universal’s horrors became much more formulaic and by-the-numbers in the 1940s, but the creative juices were still amply flowing in this fourth time out with the Frankenstein monster. Director Erle C. Kenton (Island Of Lost Souls) helms this fast-moving tale of Wolf Frankenstein’s brother Ludwig (Cedric Hardwicke) trying to live down the ignominy of the family name. Too bad for him that Ygor (Bela Lugosi) and the monster (now played by Lon Chaney, Jr.) survived somehow at the end of SON OF… Now they’re back knocking on his door for help in reviving the ailing monster, hoping to restore him to his former glory. Adding to Ludwig’s headaches are an envious, formerly illustrious doctor (Lionel Atwill) and Ludwig’s beautiful daughter Elsa (Evelyn Ankers). Introduction to first film by Sara Karloff. Introduction to second film by Janet Ann Gallow.
For additional information, visit: Egyptian Theatre
