The Odyssey of the Mummy

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Boris Karloff is best known for his performances as Frankenstein's monster in the original movie and its sequels, but he also portrayed the Mummy in "The Mummy," which premiered on this day 85 years ago.

In the movie The Mummy's remains were found — along with a magic scroll that had the power to bring the dead back to life — by a team of British archaeologists. The discovery of an Egyptian tomb was a rather timely subject, given the fact that the tomb of King Tut had been discovered a decade earlier, and tales of the curse it contained were widely disseminated. "Frankenstein," by comparison, was published more than a century before the movie was made.

Audiences were probably more inclined to see "The Mummy" as a plausible horror story in 1932 — but audiences in 2017 are more prone to see it as almost a parody of itself. After all, the classic performances of Karloff and Bela Lugosi and their ilk that truly terrified audiences in the 1930s led to the rampant cliches of today. Considering that the motion picture industry was still evolving and learning about itself 85 years ago, I suppose that was inevitable — and that it is something of a compliment.

Imitation, they say, is the sincerest form of flattery.

After being discovered in 1921, the Mummy was brought back to life through that scroll I mentioned before. Fast forward 10 years. Clothed as a modern Egyptian, the Mummy went looking for his lost love, whom he believed had been reincarnated as a modern (i.e., 1932) girl.

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It was established earlier that the Mummy's forbidden love led to his gruesome death in which he apparently had been buried alive. That was his punishment for committing sacrilege when he attempted to resurrect her.

Now reincarnated he went looking for his lost love.

The Mummy encountered a half–Egyptian woman (Zita Johann) he believed was the reincarnation of his lost love. Consequently The Mummy tried to kill her as part of his plan to mummify her, resurrect her and then marry her. She was saved when, after remembering her past life, she prayed to the goddess Isis for rescue — and her prayer was answered.

In a scene that modern movie viewers may find quite similar to one in "Raiders of the Lost Ark," Isis discharged a beam of light that set fire to the scroll, breaking the spell of immortality, and the Mummy crumbled to dust.

Johann's work in the movie was good, but "The Mummy," like most horror movies of the 1930s, did not rely on acting as much as it did on atmosphere.

For folks who have been brought up in an era dominated by flashy computer–generated special effects, the pace of "The Mummy" and other horror movies of its time may seem pedestrian.

But it made for a spine–tingling experience for the audiences of the day.

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When Karloff made "Frankenstein," his rival in the horror genre, Lugosi, complained that Karloff didn't act, he merely grunted. Lugosi, a native Hungarian, had to deliver his lines in "Dracula" in English, which he considered more demanding than Karloff's performance.

I haven't heard what Lugosi's opinion was of "The Mummy," but by Lugosi's previously stated standards, he must have been more impressed. The British–born Karloff had to deliver his lines with an Egyptian accent.

My opinion, having seen both the Karloff version and the 1999 remake starring Brendan Fraser (I haven't seen the new one with Tom Cruise), is that Karloff gave a masterful performance. Stripped of modern special effects and multimillion–dollar production budgets, I doubt that anyone could carry a horror story the way Karloff could.

Johann's story is an interesting one. Her film career was brief and interrupted by more than half a century in which she focused on her theatrical work and, later, teaching acting to people with learning disorders. Was the exotic beauty disillusioned in Hollywood? I don't know, but I can't help but wonder if she might have been a major star of the silver screen had she not been lured to the stage.

When Less Was More

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"I like the dark. It's friendly."

Irena (Simone Simon)

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The Christmas season hardly seems like the time for a horror movie to be showing on America's silver screens, but that was the case 75 years ago.

I suppose for most people living today, when someone mentions the movie "Cat People," thoughts immediately turn to the 1982 movie starring Nastassja Kinski.

But that was actually a remake of a movie of the same name that premiered on this day in 1942. There were some differences between the two, especially in their directors' and producers' visions of what a horror movie should be — and what it could be, given the times when they were made.

Producer Val Lewton was hired by RKO Pictures to make horror films on less than $150,000 — and they were to be adapted to titles Lewton was given by the studio. Even though things cost less in 1942, $150,000 was still a pretty modest outlay to make a movie, and being given a title with no story was a challenge, to say the least, but Lewton did his job well. He recycled RKO's leftover sets, and director Jacques Tourneur completed filming in less than four weeks, coming in about seven grand under budget.

The movie made $4 million in its first two years, rejuvenating RKO financially.

When the movie began, a Serbian woman (Simone Simon) made sketches of a panther at New York's Central Park Zoo. She caught the eye of a young man who approached her and struck up a conversation.

The two ended up marrying, but Irena believed that she carried a Serbian curse and would become one of the fabled cat people of her homeland if they were intimate.

Thus followed an at times over–the–top story, although there was no denying that animals did react oddly to Irena. She couldn't walk into a pet store without frightening the birds there and provoking the dogs into barking fits.

Her fear of releasing the beast she believed to be within her kept her at arm's length from her boyfriend/husband and drove him into the arms of a co–worker. Audiences in 1942 had to imagine what went on with those two since the Hays Code was still in effect.

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But viewers could assume what had happened between the two — as Irena surely did, and it provoked a powerful response from her. Suffice to say the beast had been released.

Frankly, the 1982 version was inferior to the original and pretty heavy on special effects and nudity, not so much graphic violence although there was some of that. It wasn't as heavy on dialogue as the '42 version, either.

By modern standards, I suppose the '42 version would be considered more suspense than horror. That was something Alfred Hitchcock knew well and employed in his movies. Hitchcock knew that sometimes it is better to show nothing than something. If he had shown more of the details of Norman Bates' mother during the infamous shower scene in "Psycho," it wouldn't have had the lasting impact it had.

You will still encounter people who believe Hitchcock directed horror movies, but his style was suspense, as I have mentioned here before. So, too, it would appear was it the style of Tourneur and Lewton.

At least in this movie.

In fact, it is clear to anyone who has watched Hitchcock's movies and the movies of Val Lewton that Hitchcock borrowed at least two scenes from Lewton productions. One was the pet shop scene in "Cat People," which was lifted almost shot for shot in "The Birds" two decades later. And the shower scene in "Psycho" bore a striking resemblance to a scene in "The Seventh Victim," which premiered in 1943.

For that matter Stephen King's books tend to be more suspense than horror, but he made his concessions to modern audiences in some of his books — and, consequently, in the movies that were based on them.

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As I said sometimes it's better to show nothing than something. Viewers never saw the cat and never saw Irena's transformation into a cat. But, like the shark in "Jaws," the audience was always aware of the threat nearby.

"Cat People" of 1942 blended classic horror with pure suspense. Sadly, it is underrated and mostly forgotten today, but it is a reminder of Hollywood at its best — when it didn't hesitate to let the viewers be afraid of what lurked in their own minds.

Bette Davis Eyes

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"I didn't bring your breakfast because you didn't eat your din–din!"

Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis)

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If it is true what they say about the eyes being the windows of the soul, then Bette Davis' eyes spoke volumes in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?"

Davis' and Joan Crawford's hatred for each other was probably the worst–kept secret in Hollywood — ever — which made them the perfect choices to play sisters who hated each other in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?" which premiered on this day in 1962.

You may think that you know all about sibling rivalry. You may even think that you know all about it from personal experience. But trust me, you don't know sibling rivalry until you have seen "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?"

Davis and Crawford weren't siblings, of course. They only played siblings in the movie. But their loathing for each other was at the heart of the movie's initial appeal.

When the movie began and the siblings were young girls, Baby Jane was the star of the family while her older sister Blanche toiled in her shadow. But as they got older, their roles reversed. Blanche (Crawford played the adult version) was the success while Jane (played by Davis) was a flop.

Blanche's career came to an abrupt end when she was paralyzed from the waist down in a car accident that was shrouded in mystery. Unofficially it was blamed on Jane — who became Blanche's caretaker and lived with her in a house that had been bought with Blanche's movie earnings.

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But caretaker was far from the right word for Jane. She was a mentally ill alcoholic who believed she should have been a star but that Blanche had stolen it from her. Consequently she was abusive and cruel to her sister, who told her one day that she had decided to sell the house. Jane descended further into her mental abyss, removing the telephone from her sister's room and serving her a dead parakeet and a dead rat for her meals.

Jane also became obsessed with reviving her career and began looking for a pianist to accompany her on the songs she used to sing when, as Baby Jane, she had enchanted audiences everywhere. Victor Buono, as a down–on–his–luck pianist, responded to an ad she had placed in a local newspaper and encouraged her to seek the spotlight again.

He was unaware of some of the things Jane had already done to keep her dream alive — she had severely beaten her sister and she had killed the housekeeper when she became too inquisitive.

But when he discovered Blanche bound in her bed, he left to notify the authorities.

I always felt the Buono–Davis relationship was intriguing. When I was a young reporter at my first newspaper job, one of my standing assignments was to cover the police beat. In the process, I learned a lot more about the law and law enforcement than I ever did in my college courses.

One of the things I learned was how, sometimes, two people brought together become capable of things that neither would have done alone. It's like they create a third personality. I have always seen Buono and Davis as being that way — or, at least, they could have been.

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There is no telling what would have happened if they had continued to work together, but when Buono bailed, Jane took her emaciated sister to the beach, which led to the climax of the story. I won't share that with you. Everyone should see it.

And today, being Halloween, would be a good time to see it.

It wouldn't be right to wrap this up without saying a little more about the Davis–Crawford feud.

"What Ever Happened to Baby Jane" was nominated for five Oscars. Davis was nominated for Best Actress, and Buono was nominated for Best Supporting Actor. Neither won.

Crawford contacted the other Best Actress nominees and offered to accept the award on their behalf if they won but could not attend. Anne Bancroft, the eventual winner, took Crawford up on the offer. She was performing in a play in New York the night of the Oscars ceremony.

Davis claimed that Crawford lobbied against her with Oscar voters — in spite of the fact that an Oscar for Davis would have meant considerably more money at the box office. Both actresses had agreed to lower salaries so they could share in the movie's profits.

'Invasion' Proved My Point About Remakes

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I have a definite opinion about remakes.

Usually, they aren't improvements on the originals. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Oh, I concede that technical advances in filmmaking have made it possible for a remake to be better than the original. But even in the 21st century, remakes are rarely, if ever, improvements.

I offer, as Exhibit A, "The Invasion," which premiered on this day in 2007.

Film critic Roger Ebert wrote that "The Invasion" was "the fourth, and the least, of the movies made from Jack Finney's classic science fiction novel." I don't feel qualified to agree or disagree with that statement since I haven't seen all three of the previous incarnations. But Ebert's assessment surely affirms my own of remakes.

I also have a definite opinion about Nicole Kidman, the female lead of "The Invasion." I like her. I liked her the first time I can remember seeing her — in "Dead Calm." And I have liked other movies in which she appeared — "To Die For," "The Others" and "Eyes Wide Shut" come to mind. So does "Moulin Rouge," for that matter.

But Kidman has had about as many misses as hits in her career, especially in recent years, and I would put "The Invasion" on that list.

And it isn't necessary to see the other three film versions of the story to reach that conclusion, either.

All four movies do have a few things in common — primarily, the extraterrestrial invasion. The first couple of movies were transparently titled "Invasion of the Body Snatchers." The third was named, simply, "Body Snatchers."

(Returning — ever so briefly — to the plausibility angle, Ebert asked, "Do you expect a movie titled 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' to be plausible?" It is a fair question, and my answer, after careful reflection, would be, "Yes. It doesn't have to be completely plausible — which is good since it is hard to imagine how it could be. But there needs to be enough plausibility to allow the viewers to suspend considerable disbelief.")

As I presume it was with each movie version of Finney's novel, "The Invasion" opened with the arrival of alien spores on Earth. In the only version I saw previously (and I have heard it was the same in the other two), these spores took the form of pods that encased their victims. They changed that a bit in "The Invasion" — the spores apparently attached themselves to a space shuttle that crashed following re–entry and scattered its debris from Dallas to Washington (that's a pretty impressive debris field). The debris was contaminated, and anyone who touched it became infected. When the victims fell into deep sleep, the infection seized control of them entirely.

Replacing the pods in "The Invasion" was a kind of film that covered the victim while he/she slept.

No one really seemed to notice what was happening at first. Oh, there were reports in the news of some strange virus in the U.S., and there were more dire reports from abroad. But, like most people, Kidman (a Washington–area psychiatrist in the movie) went about her daily routine, oblivious to what was happening until one of her patients, a victim of domestic abuse (Veronica Cartwright, who appeared in the 1978 version of the story), told her, "My husband just isn't my husband anymore."

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Now, given the conversations those two were sure to have had in the past, it would be plausible for Kidman not to understand that Cartwright wasn't discussing abusive behavior — but rather the zombie–like behavior of those under the influence of the aliens. Her husband was one of them. The viewers never saw that character when he wasn't under the aliens' influence, but they knew it the first time they saw him sitting in Kidman's waiting room.

He had the look.

If you ever saw "The Stepford Wives," you would recognize the look — flat, dull, emotionless. Bloodless. Soulless. Measured in words and actions.

Kidman's character had to become proficient at the look, pretending to be one of them in order to maneuver around the city without drawing attention. That required her to maintain total outward neutrality no matter what was happening around her.

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Absent any real plausibility, "The Invasion" suffered when it asked viewers to accept some pretty preposterous things.

Like, for example, the fact that a medical researcher (played by underrated actor Jeffrey Wright), a colleague of Kidman's love interest (played by Daniel Craig), was able to discern all kinds of information about this previously unknown virus from a single sample — in a couple of days. He was also able to determine how to eradicate the virus. Cancer researchers who watched this movie must have been jealous.

That would have been enough as far as I was concerned, but then there was a scene when Kidman and her young son were trying to get away in a car that was set afire by a Molotov cocktail. After it was struck the car could be seen virtually engulfed in flames, and I am pretty sure the windshield was broken when the vehicle was hit, but the car kept going, even seemed to accelerate, toward the occupants' appointed rendezvous with a helicopter.

I had to wonder how would it be plausible for someone to keep driving with flames all around like that? I mean, I was never any great shakes at science when I was in school, but you don't have to be a physics major to imagine what would happen to someone who tried to keep driving under those conditions.

Sorta like someone trying to continue driving with one flat tire. Common sense tells you it won't end well.

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Then there were things that required specific knowledge of how they do things in Washington to comprehend how off the charts the plausibility factor had become.

For example, in Washington the law prohibits any building in the city from being taller than the Capitol — yet the movie clearly showed the helicopter landing on top of a (nonexistent) D.C. skyscraper.

I know how Hollywood loves to run a good thing into the ground, but trust me, this story has been driven deep into the ground. Let's move on to something new, shall we?

At the Heart of What Scares You

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"Oh God! Now I know what it feels like to be God!"

Dr. Frankenstein (Colin Clive)

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By modern standards, the Boris Karloff version of "Frankenstein," which was showing on the big screen on this date in 1931, seems hopelessly primitive. It has no splashy special effects, and there was not a slasher in sight.

But there is probably no more iconic horror movie in film history — and there was no more successful movie in 1931–32 than "Frankenstein." In those early Depression years, "Frankenstein" easily outdistanced all comers at the box office.

Karloff and Bela Lugosi were the archetypal stars of the 1930s horror genre and long–time staples of midnight movies on TV, but Lugosi had little regard for Karloff. In reference to Karloff's performance in "Frankenstein," Lugosi dismissed Karloff's acting as "grunting." There was a certain amount of truth to that — although, to be fair, that was what the role called for. Karloff was not instructed to speak actual words in his role.

Lugosi considered — and perhaps rightfully so — the fact that he had to recite lines in English in spite of his heavy Hungarian accent a challenge that London–born Karloff did not face.

But even though "Frankenstein" is 85 years old today, do not make the mistake of thinking it is irrelevant, outdated or anything similar. It is still unsettling in its examination of the mad genius (Colin Clive) who brought the monster to life.

In short, it is at the heart of what scares you.

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And even after 85 years, it is still the definitive monster movie, along with Lugosi's "Dracula," which also was released in 1931.

The American Film Institute ranked "Frankenstein" #56 on its list of the Top 100 thrilling movies while "Dracula" came in #85.) Now regarded as film classics, both were ignored by the fledgling Academy Awards.

Many elements of "Frankenstein" have become cliches over the years. Some were parodied in Mel Brooks' "Young Frankenstein," one of my favorite comedies.

There were other parts of "Young Frankenstein" that parodied elements from two other movies in the "Frankenstein" series, too, so it would be a mistake to think that "Young Frankenstein" only made references to the first film.

But one of my favorite scenes from Brooks' parody was when the monster (played by Peter Boyle) encountered the young girl. In the original, the monster threw her into the lake. That portion of the movie was considered so terrifying that it was edited by censorship boards in New York, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.

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I guess audiences had never really seen anything like it before — even though "Dracula" was in theaters nearly a year earlier.

Planting a Bad Seed

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"sociopath — a person with a psychopathic personality whose behavior is antisocial, often criminal, and who lacks a sense of moral responsibility or social conscience."

Random House Dictionary

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"The Bad Seed," which premiered on this day in 1956, was a thought–provoking — for its time — contribution to the debate over nature vs. nurture that influences so many behavioral discussions.

In this case, the discussion centered on sociopaths. We've all known sociopaths, even if we didn't know that was what they were. The term sociopathy came into use in the 20th century — but I'm sure sociopaths have been around since time began. The defining feature of sociopathy is antisocial behavior. Some psychiatrists caution laymen to avoid using the terms sociopathy and psychopathy interchangeably as the former is less likely than the latter to be mistaken for psychosis — and socioopathic behavior is not necessarily the same as psychotic behavior.

And, while I am not a trained psychiatrist, it seems to me that antisocial behavior is more or less in the eyes of the beholder. I have known people who judged certain behaviors that did not conform to their preconceived notions too harshly and labeled them sociopathic when most people probably would consider them introverted.

The things that seem to define sociopaths are the frequently criminal nature of their behavior and the complete absence of any kind of remorse for their actions. They are concerned only with themselves. All others exist — or cease to exist — to serve the sociopath's needs.

In "The Bad Seed," Patty McCormack played a young girl who, on the surface, appeared to be every parent's dream child — brilliant in school, excelling in all things. But if you looked closely enough, you could see a pattern of vicious behavior when things didn't go young Rhoda's way.

For the adults in her world, it was easier to simply dismiss some things as childish misbehavior that she would certainly outgrow.

But a time came when the behavior could no longer be so easily excused.

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That was when Rhoda did not win a medal for penmanship that she had believed she would win. When the boy who did win the medal turned up drowned at a school picnic, those closest to Rhoda began to examine her behavior with alarm. She just didn't respond to the tragedy the way the adults expected. A young girl, they reasoned, should be traumatized by such an event, but when Rhoda came home, all she said was that she was hungry because the picnic had been canceled before anyone could eat.

The boy's mother, played by Eileen Heckart, knew something — somehow. Perhaps she sensed it. It was known that Rhoda had been the last person to see the boy alive; they had been seen struggling near the lake where the boy's body was found.

Anyway, the boy's mother showed up at Rhoda's home, clearly intoxicated and accusing Rhoda's teacher of concealing information about how her son had died.

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And Leroy the handyman (Henry Jones) stumbled on to Rhoda's secret — and paid for it with his life when he was set on fire by Rhoda.

Rhoda's mother (Nancy Kelly) confronted her daughter with her suspicions and Rhoda tearfully confessed that she had killed the boy — and also confirmed her mother's suspicion that she had been responsible for the death of an elderly lady who had lived near them at one time. The elderly lady promised Rhoda she could have a trinket that she had admired "after I'm gone." Rhoda arranged for things to be moved up.

All this came at the same time that Rhoda's mother learned she had been adopted when she was young — and her biological mother had been a serial killer.

Thus the question of whether sociopathic behavior is learned or inherited was introduced into the story.

Rhoda's mother believed it was inherited, that she and her biological mother were responsible for this "bad seed" that she had spawned, and she took it upon herself to end it, once and for all. She gave Rhoda a lethal dose of barbiturates, then shot herself in the head. The sound of the gunshot brought people to the scene. The mother died, but the daughter was rushed to a hospital, where she was saved.

And it appeared that evil would triumph over good. Except ...

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When a recovered Rhoda went out to the lake to retrieve the medal, she was struck by lightning.

The movie received four Oscar nominations in three categories but lost them all.

Kelly was nominated for Best Actress but lost to Ingrid Bergman in "Anastasia." Heckart and McCormack were both nominated for Best Supporting Actress but lost to Dorothy Malone in "Written On The Wind." Harold Rosson was nominated for Best Black–and–White Cinematography but lost to "Somebody Up There Likes Me."

The Sudden Transformation of a Friendly Pet

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"It would perhaps not be amiss to point out that he had always tried to be a good dog. He had tried to do all the things his MAN and his WOMAN, and most of all his BOY, had asked or expected of him. He would have died for them, if that had been required. He had never wanted to kill anybody. He had been struck by something, possibly destiny, or fate, or only a degenerative nerve disease called rabies. Free will was not a factor."

Stephen King, Cujo (1981)

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When I was a child, I grew up in the country on a manmade lake surrounded by hills that may have existed before the lake did but if they did, they were certainly enhanced by the lake's creation.

Homes were scattered in lots along the hillside and for me to visit my friends — usually by bike because it took too long to walk — I had to pass by a house where dwelled a Doberman pinscher. You had to move slowly when you went past that house because if you didn't and that dog happened to be loose on the property, it would come barreling down the hill barking viciously.

I found myself in that position one day. I thought the dog was going to kill me, and I screamed. Fortunately for me the dog's owner came outside and called the dog back, but the experience left its mark on me. I still remembered it years later when I read Stephen King's novel "Cujo," which was published on this day in 1981.

And it sent a chill down my spine.

"Cujo," you see, was about an amiable St. Bernard named Cujo who was bitten by a rabid bat when he was chasing a rabbit one day and, in due course, went mad, attacking and killing people whenever they happened to cross his path. King's descriptions of what Cujo was feeling as the disease gnawed at his brain were incredibly insightful, much like James Michener's descriptions of the thoughts of the dinosaurs and wildlife that lived in the area of Colorado of which he wrote in "Centennial" a few years earlier. Really fascinating stuff that cries out to be told on the big screen.

But, as it has been with so many of King's masterfully written books, it proved extremely challenging to put that on film.

That didn't keep an attempt from being made a couple of years later. Technology has never really been adequate to tell one of King's scary stories in movie form, but a story like "Cujo" — which has no supernatural element at all — requires a director with a cutting–edge vision. The director of that movie didn't possess such a vision, and while the movie was a modest success at the box office, it received mixed reviews from critics.

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Actually, it isn't exactly true that there was no supernatural element in the story (I guess it wouldn't be a Stephen King novel without at least a whisper of the supernatural). There was one, but it was implied and indirect. It was strongly suggested early in the book that what happened to Cujo was due to some supernatural force that made an appearance in that small Maine town every few years or so, but from a broader perspective, animals — and humans — can get rabies in many — frequently unexpected — ways. That's what made the story so scary — the sense that this could easily happen.

And, as King observed, free will would not be a factor.

Most of us realize the chances of the kind of stuff that usually takes place in a Stephen King novel occurring in real life are virtually nil — but "Cujo" was about the kind of thing that really could happen. Many of my friends have dogs. I had one at one time. We always had dogs around our house when I was growing up — and, as I say, I grew up in the country. We allowed our dogs to run loose there all the time.

In hindsight, they could have been bitten by a rabid creature at any time. Or some other unfortunate incident could have occurred.

Most of the dogs in my life have been friendly, but how quickly they could have been changed by a chance encounter with a diseased animal.

Isn't that what makes a story truly scary — the belief that it really could happen to you — and without warning? The truly great writers, and I believe King is one of the great writers of this or any era, can make it seem as if something like the topic of a story could happen in real life — even if the topic was as unlikely as they come — but if it is a plausible story to the reader, that makes all the difference.

I liked the book, and apparently so did King, who confessed he could hardly remember writing it, having done so during a time when he was drinking heavily.

Like many of King's stories, this one took place in Maine and centered on two families, one a longtime resident of the town, the other a newcomer. The family with the local roots was the one that owned Cujo. The newcomers frequented the home auto repair business run by the first family. The mother and child from the newcomers were trapped in their car when they took it in for some work, not knowing that a now–mad Cujo had killed the man of the house and was all alone on the property.

A novel can be made more dramatic by the introduction of angles that might not be present in a real–life scenario like the one I have described, and so it was with "Cujo." There were several examples of unsavory adult behavior that certainly exacerbated the conditions.

But the fact remained that being trapped by a rabid dog — or rabid animal of any kind — would be a terrifying experience — and hardly one that anybody, regardless of behavior, deserved.

Using Edgar Allan Poe's Work as the Basis for a Movie

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"Do you know where you are, Bartolome? I'll tell you where you are. You are about to enter hell, Bartolome, hell! The netherworld. The infernal region. The abode of the damned. The place of torment. Pandemonium. Abaddon. Tophet. Gehenna. Naraka. The pit! And the pendulum."

Don Nicholas Medina (Vincent Price)

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Stephen King is one of my favorite authors. No one can write a thriller the way he can. But he sure can be wordy sometimes. Maybe that is unavoidable when it is necessary to explain every character's mental perception of the events that are at the core of King's book — and that frequently is necessary in a Stephen King book.

Edgar Allan Poe was different. Many of his works were short stories, and they were really short, sometimes just a few pages; his poems were even shorter.

Take "The Pit and the Pendulum," for example. It was a short story that was quite short.

I saw director Roger Corman — who directed and produced a full–length motion picture that was based on that short story and made its debut on this day in 1961 — being interviewed about it on Turner Classic Movies a few months ago. He conceded that, in order to make a full–length movie, it was necessary for writers to speculate — a lot — about the characters and events that led up to the climactic event of which Poe wrote.

That was something with which Corman was quite familiar. A year earlier, he directed and co–produced an adaptation of Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher." And his writers' efforts to be as true as possible to the spirit of Poe's writing were good enough that Corman went on to direct six more adaptations of Poe's works. All but one starred Vincent Price.

Price actually started out as a character actor and transitioned into horror movies in the '50s so he was already a veteran of several horror movies by the time he started appearing in Corman's films.

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But he was seldom the star — nor did he have a reputation for appearing in horror movies — until he teamed up with Corman.

I've heard that Corman believed that, after "House of Usher," Poe's strongest works were "Masque of the Red Death" and "Pit and the Pendulum." As I recall, his preference for his second film based on Poe's work was "Red Death," but he ultimately concluded the name (not the subject matter) would be seen as too similar to a Swedish movie that was in the theaters a few years earlier so "Pit and the Pendulum" became his followup.

Corman did make a movie based on "Red Death" a few years later.

I don't know if Price's work with Corman was entirely responsible for his reputation as a horror movie villain, but it is sure to have played a role.

By the way, in case you didn't know it, Corman made some appearances in front of the camera, too. I always think of his role as one of the lawyers in the law firm that Tom Hanks sued in "Philadelphia," but he was also in "The Godfather Part II" and "The Silence of the Lambs."

Doing the Time Warp

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"I'm just a sweet transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania."

Dr. Frank N. Furter (Tim Curry)

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On this day in 1975, I don't think anyone really noticed the debut of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." I have no memory of it having a traditional theatrical run — of course, it's possible that the two–screen theater that served my hometown in those days chose not to show it when it had the opportunity — and it might have slipped into movie obscurity altogether had it not been for someone's inspiration to turn it into a cult movie with midnight showings on Friday and Saturday nights.

I don't know who thought of doing that — but whoever it was really earned a bonus for that one. In the late '70s and early '80s, a majority of the theaters in the United States had midnight showings of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" at some point — and nearly everyone in his/her late teens and/or early 20s in those days went to see "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" at least once. I was in college around that time, and it was a social event on campus — as it was elsewhere. People dressed in costumes inspired by the movie and brought appropriate props with them — toast, rice, umbrellas, newspapers. You probably needed to see the movie once before joining the audience participation — if only to have some idea what was going on.

I don't think it would be an exaggeration to assert that most people probably went to see it dozens of times. That doesn't mean it was a good movie — it certainly was not — but it had a campy appeal that was decidedly its own.

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In fact, the more I think about it, a good way to judge the honesty of people of that generation would be to ask them how many times they went to midnight showings of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." You'll know they're lying if they give you a specific number. If they are truly honest, their answers will be somewhat vague — "Oh, I don't know. Several."

After all, who could be precise after being exposed to all the marijuana smoke those midnight showings always had?

However, there are always those who expect precision of a sort. Film critic Roger Ebert wrote, "It's one of those movies," he wrote, "you have to use a lot of hyphens to explain. A horror–rock–transvestite–camp–omnisexual–musical parody. It's about two clean–cut kids from the 'Ike Age,' Janet and Brad, who stumble through a time warp and into a sinister Gothic mansion where the annual Transylvanian Convention is taking place (pardon me, boys, is this the Transylvanian orgy?). The mansion is presided over by the bizarre Dr. Frank N. Furter, who is, he explains, a transvestite from the planet Transsexual in the galaxy Transylvanian."

And that, in a nutshell, is the plot.

Janet was played by Susan Sarandon, an actress in her 20s but already a veteran of some half a dozen movies. Brad was played by Barry Bostwick, an actor who was about 30 and who probably hasn't had as noteworthy a career as Sarandon. Dr. Frank N. Furter was played by Tim Curry — who always seems to land outrageous roles (and really hit the jackpot with this one).

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No one who saw "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" could ever forget the titles of the songs — "The Time Warp," "Dammit Janet," "Sweet Transvestite," just to name a few.

I keep thinking that, in today's hopelessly politically correct culture, "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" would be mercilessly hammered as insensitive — not the generational event that it was.

A Clear Case of Mental Stalking

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"The girl is certain she is going to die. She's praying. In her mind she's praying."

Cayce (Ally Sheedy)

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I remember a time in 1991 when one of the premium movie channels — HBO or Cinemax or Showtime, I don't remember which one — was doing one of its periodic free weekends, when all the subscribers to the cable provider got the service for free for a few days. Presumably, it would show the subscribers what they were missing and convince some of them to add it to their service.

I suppose they still have those free weekends from time to time. I never seem to be aware of one, though, until it is too late.

Expanding my cable package was never an option for me in those days. I was in graduate school at the time and seldom had time to watch much TV when classes were in session. In fact, on that particular weekend, as I recall, I was busy with some sort of school–related project, probably the sort of thing that kept me in the library for hours, and I had to video tape things to watch later. Much later.

One of the things that I taped was a movie called "Fear," which actually made its debut on this day in 1990. Originally, I think the plan was to show it at theaters first, then move on to cable and then video distribution — but I don't think it ever made it to the theaters. For whatever reason, I think it made its debut on one of those premium movie channels and then was sold on video. That was why I had no memory at the time of it being in movie theaters. It never was.

In hindsight, I was glad I taped it — because I have never seen it again. It is possible that it was scheduled for broadcast a time or two in an area where I happened to be living, and I just didn't know it. But my experience has been that it is rarely, if ever, shown so, if you get the chance to see it, don't let it slip through your fingers.

Anyway, on this occasion, the movie wasn't going to be shown while I was in the library; it was going to be shown at a time when I would be in bed. So I set my VCR to record it, and I put the tape aside to watch later. I tried watching it piecemeal — you know, while I was getting ready to go to work in the morning, when I came home for lunch, etc. — but I discovered that did not work.

The movie put me under its spell. I had to watch it from start to finish. No interruptions.

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Ally Sheedy was the star of the show. Well, actually, she was at her peak in popularity a few years earlier as a member of Hollywood's heralded "Brat Pack" (Sheedy, Emilio Estevez, Anthony Michael Hall, Rob Lowe, Andrew McCarthy, Demi Moore, Judd Nelson and Molly Ringwald). By the time she made "Fear," she was probably on the downside of her career — even though she was only 28.

Sheedy played a psychic whose special skills included mentally seeing images or scenes from a distance and experiencing what another person experienced simply by being wherever whatever it was had happened or seeing photographs of the scene or touching clothing that had been worn by the victim — or touching an object at the scene. She often assisted the police in cracking murder cases — as she had the ability to mentally connect with murderers without their knowledge — and she used that skill to help the police catch them. It was her special advantage — or so she thought.

Sometimes she was able to prevent a terrible crime. Most of the time, she could only help the police find the person who committed a terrible crime — or a series of them.

Anyway, she was helping the police track another serial killer when she discovered that the suspect was a psychic, just like she was — and he was better at it than she was, too. He used that ability to terrorize Sheedy and Lauren Hutton — who, as I recall, played Sheedy's friend and agent.

The Shadow Man, as he was called, wanted to experience the fear of his victims, whatever scared them the most. He fed on it. And he seemed to have an almost orgasmic reaction to the knowledge that he and Sheedy could connect mentally. While it wasn't called this in the movie, I would label it mental stalking.

As I watched it unfold, it struck me that this would be an enormous invasion of privacy. Every thought a person might have would hold the potential to wreak tremendous havoc — for that individual and everyone who was close to him/her. Everything that was secret or personal or confidential would be an open book.

Through Sheedy, the Shadow Man learned that Hutton's character feared suffocation — so that is how he killed her, by holding a plastic bag over her face until she died. As I recall, Sheedy didn't even have the thought. Hutton's character confessed her phobia to Sheedy, and the Shadow Man heard the confession.

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Sheedy learned of what was happening to her agent/friend when she was powerless to do anything about it. The movie did a superb job of making the audience feel her helplessness as, in her mind's eye, she could only watch her friend die — and feel the terror that engulfed her.

With the help of a good Samaritan friend (played by Michael O'Keefe — lots of folks remember his performance in "Caddyshack" a decade earlier), Sheedy was able to foil the Shadow Man in a real battle of wills as the hunter became the hunted. It was nicely done.

Oh, I knew I was being manipulated. But it was one of those times when you enjoy being manipulated. The movie experience would be incomplete without it. You know what I mean?

As I say, I suggest you watch it if you can.

An Alien Experience

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"In space no one can hear you scream."

"Alien" tagline

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It was my own fault.

I had been to see director Ridley Scott's "Alien" not long after it hit the theaters on this day in 1979, and I knew how many scary scenes there were in it. Before I went to see it, I saw Sigourney Weaver making what I assume was her first appearance on The Tonight Show, and I remember she told Johnny Carson that "Alien" did "all the things a piece of celluloid is supposed to do."

After I heard her say that, I had to see it.

Anyway, I went to see it by myself the first time. I didn't know much about it, other than it was supposed to be one of the scariest movies in years — and it was. When I left the theater, I felt drained.

Not long after that, Mom was making noises about wanting to see it. She had been hearing and reading a lot about it, and she was intrigued.

Now, when Mom was alive, I enjoyed watching movies with her, and I watched many of the best movies that were ever made with her — sometimes at the theater, other times at home on our TV set. We talked about the movies after we watched them, and she often pointed out things to me that I had missed. I have often longed for those conversations since her death.

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I knew that intense movies had a particular effect on her, though. See, whenever Mom was watching a (pardon the pun) gripping movie, she had a tendency to grip the arm of the person sitting next (or perhaps I should say closest) to her in the especially intense moments — preferably someone she knew, but, if it happened to be a stranger, well, she wasn't bashful about grabbing that person's arm.

If it was an arm and it was close to her, it was fair game.

I suppose Dad had been to enough movies with Mom to know better than to go to a scary one with her. He didn't mind going to the comedies with her, and they often went to dramatic movies together, but he left the task of taking her to scary movies to others.

On this occasion, I miscalculated.

See, I figured that, since I had seen "Alien" before, I had a pretty good idea how intense it was — and when the especially intense scenes were coming up. I must have figured that I could be prepared for Mom's reaction to those scenes. I figured wrong.

Before the movie was over, my right arm was a mass of bruises.

"Alien" was really one of the first sci–fi/horror movies to be set in the dark depths of space — and the promoters capitalized on it.

"In space no one can hear you scream" was the tagline on the trailers and the movie posters. I feel it had to be the inspiration for the scary movies set in space that came after — although it certainly wasn't the first.

It just gave a fresh — and plausible — spin to an old theme.

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The American Film Institute ranks it seventh among the sci–fi movies. It continues to be cited as a groundbreaking movie that still influences filmmakers today. Yet it won only one Oscar (visual effects).

Still, it was hugely successful, earning more than $200 million after being made for a paltry (by comparison) $9 million — and it can truly be said to have launched Weaver's career.

The movie was nominated for two Oscars, winning for visual effects.

I wonder how many other arms were bruised during the showing of that movie.

(P.S. H.R. Giger, the artist who designed the monster for "Alien," died less than two weeks ago at the age of 74.)

'The Stand' Against Evil

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Thirty–five years ago this month, Stephen King published his lengthy novel, "The Stand," which was almost immediately proclaimed, by just about everyone I knew, to be his best.

I'll grant you, the list of his published works wasn't too long in 1978. "The Stand" was his fifth novel — the last count I heard indicated he has now published 50. Obviously, there is a lot more competition now than there was.

But, even 35 years later, I still hear people say it is his best. I haven't read all of his books, but I've read quite a few, and I, too, say — as I have been saying for 35 years — that it is his best.

Of course, what I read 35 years ago was the abridged version. In 1990, he published the original, uncut edition. I read that one, too.

The plot was deceptively simple. At an Army base, a deadly strain of the flu that has been created to be used as a weapon gets loose. Most of the people who become infected will die — but a handful will prove to be immune to it.

The survivors migrate into two camps — one dedicated to evil, the other mostly dedicated to good — and an apocalyptic confrontation is inevitable.

I remember thinking when the book came out — as I always do when I read a Stephen King book — that it would make a splendid movie.

And, eventually, it did. It was a four–part TV movie in 1994.

But the problem always has been that King's narratives seem to spend a lot of time inside the characters' heads.

The plot of "The Stand" was easy enough to follow. The American military had developed a weaponized strain of the flu, which was informally known as Captain Trips. It was released accidentally, causing an epidemic that killed more than 99% of the world's population.

The few who survived — and usually showed no symptoms — gravitated to two camps in the Western United States, and the story evolved into a battle between good and evil.

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All of which set up a final confrontation between the two sides.

The first version I read ended on a suitably ambiguous note. A baby was born to two of the survivors who lived in the good camp. One asked if humanity had learned from its experience. The other replied, "I don't know."

The longer version had a different ending, much darker. The antagonist, who somehow survived the apocalyptic battle, awakened with a case of amnesia and began to recruit new followers among an illiterate race of people who treated him like a god.

The clear implication was that another stand would be necessary.

The TV movie was pretty faithful to the story, but there were a few differences. If you've only seen the TV movie, you owe it to yourself to read the book.

An Active Afterlife

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"I'm the ghost with the most, babe."

Michael Keaton
Beetlejuice

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Other folks would have their own nominee for most quirky movie direcrtor, I'm sure, but I think I would be safe in picking Tim Burton.

Burton's had some mainstream hits, like 1989's "Batman," but mostly he has directed movies that could best be described as "quirky."

Let me be clear. I have nothing against quirky. I didn't particularly care for his first effort "Pee–wee's Big Adventure" in 1985, but I know people who liked it very much.

"Beetlejuice," the movie that made its debut 25 years ago today, was his next directorial project. And I liked it very much. It was just good offbeat fun.

The plot was centered on a young recently deceased couple (Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin) haunting the home they occupied before their deaths. Their objective is to frighten the folks who have bought the house and are making changes that the former occupants find intolerable.

Doing his best to throw a monkeywrench into the works was Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton), a bio–exorcist who appeared to be aiding the young couple but, in fact, was motivated by his desire for the daughter (Winona Ryder) of the house's new owners. She could see the ghosts, but her father couldn't and neither could her stepmother.

She was also — shall we say — a bit goth. Well, more than a bit.

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Lydia (Winona Ryder): "My whole life is a dark room. One. Big. Dark. Room."

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Beetlejuice's offensive behavior created a wedge between him and the couple, and he proceeded to pursue Ryder's somewhat naive character, with no regard for Davis or Baldwin.

Beetlejuice could not be trusted.

And no one could have played that role better than Keaton.

I've seen him in several movies now. I guess the first movie I saw that featured Keaton was "Night Shift," in which he and Henry Winkler (then best known as the Fonz from Happy Days) played night–shift attendants in a morgue.

Keaton was probably about 30 when he appeared in that movie. He was closer to 40 when he appeared in "Beetlejuice," and he had persuaded me, by that time, that he was capable of a wide range of movie roles, not just comedic ones.

But I guess I've mostly thought of him as a comedic actor.

Everyone knows his famous line, "I'm the ghost with the most," and I do think of that line when I think of Keaton playing Beetlejuice — but I think of other lines, too.

Like ... "Go ahead ... make my millenium." A nice Clint Eastwood allusion there.

Or ... "It's showtime!" after Ryder's character recited his name the requisite three times. Conjuring memories of Roy Scheider in "All That Jazz."

But my absolute favorite is when Beetlejuice is asked for his qualifications, and he replies ...

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"I attended Julliard. I'm a graduate of the Harvard business school. I travel quite extensively. I lived through the Black Plague and had a pretty good time during that. I've seen the EXORCIST ABOUT 167 TIMES, AND IT KEEPS GETTING FUNNIER EVERY SINGLE TIME I SEE IT ... NOT TO MENTION THE FACT THAT YOU'RE TALKING TO A DEAD GUY ... NOW WHAT DO YOU THINK? You think I'm qualified?"

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I liked Davis since I first saw her in a small role in "Tootsie" a few years earlier, and she played another likeable character in "Beetlejuice." Baldwin was another matter. I've seen him in some good things since "Beetlejuice" was released, but I wasn't overly impressed with his performance, and I don't think I had seen him in anything else before "Beetlejuice."

Sylvia Sidney was, well, a different matter entirely. In her late 70s in 1988, most of Sidney's film work was before my time when, apparently, she was in some demand as a leading lady. My memory of her is spotty — and mostly of her in supporting, not leading, roles. When I saw her in other movies, I recognized the face but could rarely recall her name.

As Juno the afterlife counselor, though, she made quite an impression on me with her deadpan delivery. She didn't win Best Supporting Actress for her peformance — she wasn't even nominated — but "Beetlejuice" co–star Geena Davis did win it for "The Accidental Tourist."

Shining On

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"We all shine on
Like the moon and the stars and the sun
Yeah, we all shine on
C'mon and on and on, on, on."

John Lennon

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Stephen King has been one of my favorite writers since I was in my teens.

And I always thought his stories would make splendid movies.

But even when I was a teenager I knew that it was almost impossible — given the technology that existed at the time — to transfer his stories from the printed page to the big screen.

Nothing illustrated that better, I think, than the film version of "The Shining" that came out in 1980. It was a spine–tingling horror movie with a great cast (Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Scatman Crothers) and a great director (Stanley Kubrick) — and King was a fan of Kubrick's work — but ultimately King was disappointed in the results, as well he should have been.

I have often said that so much of what happens in a King novel seems to happen in the characters' minds. Sure, there are genuinely spooky things that happen in King's books. It's just hard for a filmmaker to re–create many of them, even with all the developments there have been since "The Shining" was published 35 years ago this month.

Twenty years after the book was published, a three–part TV miniseries was aired. King, whose dissatisfaction with Kubrick's version was behind the remake, was deeply involved in the teleplay.

It may well have been that King made such a personal investment in the project because he had gone to such great lengths to write the book in the first place. It was early in his writing career, and his first two books had been set in his native Maine. King apparently felt it was necessary to have a change of scenery.

He randomly chose Boulder, Colo., and relocated his family there. He was inspired to write "The Shining" during a family trip to a resort hotel in nearby Estes Park.

Later, King acknowledged that the story was, in part, a confession. The protagonist of the story, Jack Torrance, has seriously injured his young son in the past while under the influence of alcohol and desperately wants to make amends.

King, who struggled with his addictions to tobacco, alcohol and both prescription and street drugs until about 10 years after "The Shining" was published, admitted to "occasional feelings of real antagonism toward my children." I don't think King ever injured his own children; perhaps "The Shining" provided him with a creative outlet that helped him let off some steam before it became destructive.

But his ability to empathize with his characters, even the ones his readers find repugnant, is the trait that makes King's books so special.

And, while there was a lot more about "The Shining" that made it King's first hardback bestseller, that factor always stood out for me.

Several years later, I learned the inspiration for the title. It came from a line from John Lennon's "Instant Karma," which was one of my favorite songs before the book was published.

I didn't know, when the book was published 35 years ago this month, that it inspired the name. But the thought did cross my mind.

And now you know the rest of that story.

The Story of an Awkward Teenager

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Thirty–five years ago today, the screen adaptation of Stephen King's "Carrie" made its debut.

Almost immediately, the final scene, in which a hand reaches up from the rubble and grabs Amy Irving by the wrist, became iconic. Virtually everyone, it seems, even those who have never seen the movie, is familiar with it.

I, however, had not heard of that scene when I saw the movie a few weeks after its premiere — and I jumped in my seat when I first saw it — just as I did a few years later when I saw "Alien" on the big screen or when I saw the climactic scene of "Silence of the Lambs" more than a decade later.

If only one could enact an enforceable law that would prevent people from revealing the ending of a movie like "Carrie" to someone who hasn't seen it. It's like blowing the punch line of a joke ...

It was a story to which anyone who ever felt awkward as a teenager could relate.

Carrie (played by Sissy Spacek, who was mostly unknown at the time, at least in comparison to her status after the movie made the theatrical rounds) was an outcast in her high school, taunted and abused by her classmates.

Life wasn't any better for her when she got home from school, either, with a domineering religious fanatic of a mother (memorably played by Piper Laurie) waiting for her.

Of course, no one realized that Carrie had a very special power — telekinetic power — and Carrie herself was reluctant to acknowledge its existence. But when she was upset, it bubbled to the surface and almost took on a life of its own, and, when she could no longer deny what she saw happening around her, she felt compelled to research the possibility.

If only the folks in her world had been paying attention, they might have seen the tell–tale signs that her power was growing beyond her control and becoming more of a threat to others.

But, as humans are apt to do, they were obsessed with their own lives and didn't notice when a light bulb shattered in the girls' locker room and an ashtray sitting on the principal's desk flipped off and broke on the floor.

From most outward appearances, Carrie was a typical shy teenage girl fully engaged in the emotional roller coaster ride known as puberty.

But, if you were paying attention, she was boiling volcano about to erupt.

Well, I suppose the rest of the story is pretty well known by now. Carrie was set up to be escorted to the prom and then to be elected prom queen — and, as she was being crowned, a bucket of blood would be dumped on her — all of which transpired as planned.

But then the unplanned happened.

Carrie's telekinetic powers took over, slamming shut all exits from the gym and starting a fire that killed everyone who wasn't killed in another way. In a truly zombie–like state, Carrie strolled through the carnage out into the night and walked home, her dress still drenched in blood, where she killed her mother with flying knives that pinned her to the wall in a pose that resembled the crucifixion.

That part was a little heavy handed for me.

Both Carrie and her mother were crushed when Carrie used her powers to bring the house down, leaving a pile of rubble where Irving's wrist would be grabbed in the film's climactic scene.

In hindsight, I guess, that scene had the same shock value for that generation as the shower scene in "Psycho" had for the previous one.

And that really isn't surprising, given the admiration that director Brian De Palma has for the work of Alfred Hitchcock.

Clearly, the name of the high school — Bates High School — was taken from the villain of "Psycho" — Norman Bates. (I don't recall the name of the high school in King's original novel, but I am quite sure it was not Bates.)

And, while it wouldn't qualify as a variation from the book, De Palma used the same violin theme from "Psycho" whenever Carrie had a telekinetic episode.

There were other differences between the movie and the Stephen King book that inspired it — as there always are — but King himself told an interviewer that it was a "good movie" — and so it was.

It is a bit dated now, but it is still a good movie.

The Story of It

For some reason, my favorite authors tend to be rather wordy.

Most of my reading preferences were inherited from my parents, I suppose. From my father, I got my appreciation for the works of James Michener — and if you have ever picked up even one of his novels, you know that they were usually more than 1,000 pages long.

My mother leaned to somewhat shorter — although still lengthy by many people's standards — works by the likes of Mark Twain and Allen Drury.

Mom and I discovered the books by Stephen King at about the same time. For awhile, we would read King's books and exchange them when we had finished, getting double mileage from each paperback.

I forget which of us read which books first; I only know that we both read "The Shining," "The Stand" and "Carrie" — and others — over the course of the same summer. I still have those books on my bookshelf.

By 1986, I was living on my own, and I don't know if Mom ever read King's book that was published on this day that year, "It," but I did.

A friend of mine was a big fan of King's work and always got his books in hardback. I borrowed "It" from her a month or two after it came out. I enjoyed it, savored it, as I did every Stephen King book.

The book was typical Stephen King fare, I suppose, but with a unique plot — one that was probably a little better than most. It told the story of a group of seven friends who bonded as children to battle a malevolent creature known mostly as "It" who terrorized a small town in Maine.

It preyed mostly on children and seemed to go into hibernation for decades at a time, but, when not hibernating, It frequently appeared to people in the form of a seemingly benevolent clown named Pennywise. And Pennywise had razor–sharp teeth.

In spite of that, the seven faced down the creature and made a pledge to return to Maine if It was ever aroused again. They reunited as adults to intervene again when It awakened from its slumber so two stories were being told simultaneously.

Many people knew little about the book until four years later, when ABC aired a two–part adaptation that starred, among others, Tim Curry, John Ritter, Richard Thomas and Annette O'Toole. Curry, incidentally, played Pennywise.

I thought the adaptation was good, but it couldn't match the book, which was understandable for several reasons.

For one thing, you simply couldn't dramatize everything, even in a three–hour made–for–TV movie.

And that was for the same reason that most adaptations of King's works eventually fall short of his fans' expectations: so much of what takes place in a Stephen King novel is mental — often a person's perceptions of what might be real and what might not.

I learned long ago that Stephen King likes to play with your head — and it's probably for the best to allow him to do so because he's going to take you on an exciting ride, whether someone brings it to the screen or not.

And "It" was a pretty good ride, indeed.

Not to be Overlooked ...

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There was a lot of anxiety in America at this time 30 years ago.

The eruption of Mount St. Helens was still in the news. So was the battle between President Carter and Ted Kennedy for the Democratic nomination. And the hype was steadily building for the June 1 debut of Cable News Network.

Speaking of hype, I don't know if there had ever been as much hype as there was for the sequel to "Star Wars," but "The Empire Strikes Back" actually lived up to the hype — and may have exceeded it — when it was released to the theaters on May 21, 1980.

And then things really began to heat up — literally.

At some point in June, a devastating heat wave settled in over North America and stayed until September. I spent part of that summer in Dallas, where temperatures way over 100 became the daily norm.

Movie theaters provided a cool oasis, as they always do in the summer, but "The Empire Strikes Back" wouldn't give you that delicious chill down your spine that a real suspense/horror flick would.

And that is where "The Shining" — which made its theatrical debut 30 years ago yesterday — comes in.

Now, at this point in the ongoing cultural conversation, it probably goes without saying that a lot of things have changed in 30 years.

These days, some movies are barely in theaters a few days before they're yanked and redistributed to make more money via video tape and DVD sales and rentals. But in 1980, much of the emphasis still was on theaters. DVD technology was many years in the future; heck, home VCRs were still rare so there was no rush to cash in on video sales.

Sure, there were premium movie channels from which some money could be made, but cable television was not as widespread in 1980 as it became only a few years later.

So, in 1980, I guess most of a movie's revenue came from the box office. And, in that category, "The Empire Strikes Back" certainly dwarfed everything else.

(That was probably to be expected. It received that family friendly PG rating, and, weeks before "Empire" hit the big screens, toy stores all over America were selling little Luke, Leia, Darth Vader and Han Solo action figures. I don't remember if Yoda was included in the line before the movie came out, since his character hadn't been introduced in the story yet. But, let me tell you, after "Empire" made its debut, that puppet was a real stud.)

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Anyway, the point I was leading up to is this: Both "The Empire Strikes Back" and "The Shining" were released to theaters in late May — and you could still see them in theaters a couple of months later. And, as I recall, it was sometime in late June that my mother and I went to see "The Shining."

At the time, I was living with my parents and my brother in Fayetteville, Ark., in a house on a hill with a spectacular view of the valley below. The city's elevation (1,400 feet) isn't nearly what it is in Denver (5,280), but it's high enough. And, speaking as one who grew up in the lowlands of Arkansas, I can assure you the elevation of Fayetteville worked in its favor during the summer months.

Usually.

Hundred–degree days were rare in Fayetteville that summer, but what you have to understand is that typical summer days in Fayetteville are in the mid– to upper 80s — warm but not unpleasantly so. Once in awhile, it might get up around 90 — but the nights ordinarily were mild enough that you could sleep with your windows open.

That summer, though, the daily highs were frequently 10 degrees warmer — and temperatures in that range in the thin atmosphere of Fayetteville were as tough to handle as the 110° days that became routine in Dallas (elevation 430) and my hometown in central Arkansas (elevation 312).

For that reason more than any other, I suppose, I really enjoyed going to movies that summer. It's the last summer I can remember when I could enjoy one of the simple summer pleasures of my childhood — feeling the perspiration disappear in an icy cold theater on a hot summer day.

And, sometimes, if the movie was especially suspenseful, the sweat would be replaced by goose bumps.

"The Shining" was especially suspenseful.

I don't remember why I hadn't yet seen "The Shining." It seems like I had seen most of the hits that came out earlier that summer — "Airplane!" "Urban Cowboy," "The Blues Brothers" — along with some of the lesser known flicks. Maybe "The Shining" hadn't been showing long in Fayetteville.

We may have gone at Mom's suggestion. She was in her Stephen King phase, and, as I recall, she had just finished reading the book on which the film was based.

I had been reading some of Stephen King's books by that time, too, but I had not yet read "The Shining." Still, Mom insisted on pointing out to me where the book and the movie differed.

Granted, there were variations. There always were when Stanley Kubrick adapted a story to the big screen. He always did things his way.

And so much of a Stephen King plot seems to be cerebral. Until the fairly recent maturation of film animation and computer–generated graphics, there were always variations in film adaptations of King's stories. I was aware of the difficulties posed by attempts to make movies of King's tales long before "The Shining" hit the big screen.

In keeping with the hype surrounding "The Empire Strikes Back," "The Shining" had hype of its own. No action figures or lunch boxes or anything else — but cover articles on the major news magazines, which were still thriving in 1980 in that pre–CNN, pre–internet time.

Anyway, whatever the reason, I hadn't yet seen it so, on a late June evening in 1980, I sat next to my mother, and we watched "The Shining" in a cold (and crowded) movie theater in Fayetteville, Ark.

Mom had a distinctive habit. Whenever she went to a suspenseful movie, she would latch her hands like claws around the upper arm of anyone who was sitting next to her during the most suspenseful parts — and she would release her grip only when the suspense subsided.

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But, in typical Stephen King fashion, the suspense just got more and more intense — and, by the time we left the theater, I had bruises on my arm.

I guess I should have known better than to see that movie with Mom. I had seen "Alien" with her the summer before!

Mom was really taken by the film account of the possessed Overlook Hotel and decided to give that name to our home in Fayetteville that summer. When old friends visited around the Fourth of July, Mom took them on a tour of the "Overlook," which concluded at the room in which they would be sleeping.

As an inside joke, Mom taped a piece of paper on the door labeling it "Room 237" (if you don't know the significance of that number, you need to see the movie).

Well, May 23, 1980, was a big day for Kubrick and his cast and crew, which notably included Jack Nicholson and Shelley Duvall — but it also happened to be the 70th birthday of co–star Scatman Crothers.

Consequently, yesterday was the 100th anniversary of Scatman's birth.

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I guess he's mostly remembered today for his work in the movies and on TV, but he was, first and foremost, an entertainer who sang and danced through most of his life and only began making movie and TV appearances in his 40s.

He died nearly a quarter of a century ago, but he continues to influence children whenever his voiceovers in cartoons like "Hong Kong Phooey" are shown. He can still be seen in reruns of popular television shows, like Bewitched, Dragnet, Charlie's Angels and Sanford and Son.

And, of course, as Dick Hallorann, the chef at the Overlook Hotel.