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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

No idea how I lived this long without consciously being aware of Candi Staton's version of "Nights on Broadway," but life finds a way!

youtube.com

Candi Staton - Nights On Broadway (Official Video) [4K]

YouTube video by RHINO

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Big day for the Forster fan in 1970 Toronto with the debuts of both PIECES OF DREAMS and COVER ME, BABE. I've never seen the former. Honestly, I'd never _heard_ of the former. The former Forster. I like love stories. I enjoy being shocked. Well, at the pictures, at least. Intriguing!

First of two black and white newspaper ads from the Toronto Star, Friday, September 25, 1970.

An ad for the movie PIECES OF DREAMS, starring Robert Forster and Lauren Hutton, who are featured prominently in its photographic artwork. Forster, a dark-haired man on the left who appears to be wearing a clerical collar, stands behind looking forward at Hutton, facing away from him in a chambray shirt deeply unbuttoned.

These images are backgrounded by a much larger greyscale picture, vaguely pointilist or halftone, depicting the two actors in head-and-shoulder closeup, their eyes closed, full lips about to touch.

The tagline tells us it is "A love story that will shock you."

Will Geer's name is featured prominently in the credit block.

You can hear Ferrante & Teicher's "Pieces of Dreams," on United Artists Records. Or as interpreted by Johnny Mathis, on Columbia Records.

It's Adult Entertainment. Playing at the York.

This second black and white ad is for the movie COVER ME, BABE.

A variant of the film's photographic one-sheet artwork, featuring castmember Suzanne Benton, a longhaired blonde, naked from waist to philtrum. Her breasts are overlaid with the images of camera lenses.

(It's difficult to decipher the printed specs on their outer rings, but based on the visual cues provided by contrasting sizes of their respective front-facing elements, it would appear the lens on the left might be telephoto, where the one on the right... my best guess is it's a 1:1.8 50mm prime? I can't presently remember whether this information is relevant to the plot.)

The film's tagline, presented in the upper right corner, reads:

Life. Love.
Illusion.
At 24 frames
per second.

It's a 20th Century Fox presentation and, in this engagement, is doubled with BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, a small version of whose bold text block letter title treatment also appears in this ad.

It's Restricted.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Perhaps the most practical image I've ever seen.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Pretty significant day for the 1986 Toronto cinephile, with the debuts of BLUE VELVET, DOWN BY LAW, and STEWARDESS SCHOOL.

First of three newspaper ads from the September 19, 1986 Toronto Star.

This first one is a full page ad for David Lynch's BLUE VELVET, featuring a top half heavy with critical raves, which read:

"The warnings are all correct. David Lynch's new movie is warped and weird and wicked. It is also utterly fascinating."
-Bruce Kirkland, TORONTO SUN

"BLUE VELVET is a mystery...a masterpiece... a visionary story of sexual awakening, of good and evil, a trip to the underworld."
-David Thompson, CALIFORNIA MAGAZINE

"A nightmarish, intensely disturbing exploration of the hidden side of the soul. It is sure to cause a sensation."
-Ken Turan, GQ

"Brilliant and unsettling...this is the work of an all-American visionary-and a master film stylist."
-Stephen Schiff, VANITY FAIR

"...an eerie and erotic treat..."
-Richard Freedman, NEWHOUSE NEWSPAPERS

Below these, a centred film-sourced image of a bare-skinned dark-haired man (the actor Kyle Maclachlan) holding a reclining dark-haired woman (Isabella Rossellini).

Below this, the film's title in its stylised script.

It's playing at the Sheraton Centre.

This second ad, also full-page, advertisies Jim Jarmusch's DOWN BY LAW. A banner at the top reminds you it's recently played the Festival of Festivals, under which appear the following review quotes:

"...AN INSTANT HIT... THE HUMOUR IS DARK, SMOKY AND HYSTERICALLY SOMETIMES FUNNY... A DYNAMIC MOVIE."

-BRUCE KIRKLAND, TORONTO SUN

"THREE OF THE DAMNEDEST PERFORMANCES IN AN ECCENTRIC ENSEMBLE SINCE THE MARX BROTHERS."

-ANDREW SARRIS, VILLAGE VOICE

In the centre, a film-sourced image of three men (the actors Tom Waits, John Lurie, and Roberto Benigni) sitting on the metal-frame bunk beds inside a small barren jail cell.

The film's title appears at the bottom in faded block letter capitals, right justified and split over three lines.

This third ad, promoting STEWARDESS SCHOOL is considerably smaller. A reproduction of the film's one-sheet poster, reduced in both size and scope, it features a picture of the actress Judy Landers (here in the role of Sugar Dubois, a curly-haired blonde in sheer white négligée), reclining astride a motorcycle (maybe... an '84 Harley Shovelhead?).

A headline of quoted text above seems to suggest her saying "Gee, I've never done it on an airplane before."

We're told that STEWARDESS SCHOOL is "one flight we'll never forget," and shown that the cast includes Brett Cullen, Mary Cadorette, Donald Most, Sandahl Bergman, and Sherman Hemsley, each of whom are identified in a small horizontal line of individual photographs of their characters as they appear in the film.

There's a special late show at the Eaton Centre at 11.35 on Friday and Saturday nights.

Maybe I'll see you there.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Fifty years ago tonight, the Tardis first landed on TVO in Toronto with the Canadian debut of DOCTOR WHO (pictured, with Sonic Screwdriver).

Black and white clipping from the Starweek supplemental television guide from the Toronto Star, Saturday, September 11, 1976. A narrow column excerpted from the first of two annual Fall TV Preview issues promotes the Canadian premiere of DOCTOR WHO thusly:

"DR. WHO (TV Ontario, 7:30): A BBC-produced science fiction series which has been running in Britain since 1963, this half-hour weekly series stars Jon Pertwee (the third actor to take the role) as the title character, a Time Lord, one of an advanced race of beings from the planet Gallifry with extraordinary intellectual and psychic powers. Dr. Who has travelled through time and space via a machine called the Tardis to the planet Earth in the 20th century where, as a special adviser to UNIT (a United Nations intelligence group), he uses his powers to outwit an endless array of monsters and villainous forces."

Directly below this text, a black and white illustration of the performer Andy Williams, shown head-and-shoulders in a white suitjacket with extremely wide lapels and likely rendered in pen and ink in a halftone or stippled caricature style inclined toward realism. He holds a microphone. Smiling. Singing? Maybe? Probably!

Williams was about to debut his own (unrelated) variety program this same autumn.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Here's a timely 50 year-old ad, with Michael Dowse's MAD CANADIAN premiering at TIFF: come on down for the originally scheduled date of Ken Carter's notorious DEVIL AT YOUR HEELS jump across the St. Lawrence. ABC's WIDE WORLD OF SPORTS is gonna be there! Music. Entertainment. Only fifteen bucks!

Black and white plain text newspaper ad from the Toronto Star, Saturday, September 18, 1976, advertising Daredevil Ken Carter's upcoming rocket car jump across the St. Lawrence river. It reads:

"KEN CARTER THINKS EVEL KNIEVEL IS THE 2ND BEST DAREDEVIL IN THE WORLD.

SEE KEN CARTER PUT HIS POINT ACROSS IN THE KEN CARTER ROCKET CAR RIDE TO NEW YORK, SEPT. 25th

From Morrisburg Ontario to Ogden Island New York across the St. Lawrence Seaway.

A THRILL PACKED DAY FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY. North American Tractor Pull Championship featuring Art Arfons' Green Monster. Bennie "Boom Boom" Koske. Mystery Guest

TICKETS:
Advance Sale (orders postmarked before Sept. 15): Adults $12.75, Children (under 12) $3.75, 3 and under free. After Sept. 15 and at Site Box Office: Adults $15, Children (under 12) $5,3 and under free. Tickets available at Eatons, Eatons ATO and Sam the Record Man. For ficket outlet nearest you call: 416-597-1688 or write Ken Carter, Tickets, Morrisburg, Ontario KOC 1X0

MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENT

GATES OPEN AT 11:30 A.M.

SEE A MAN JUMP A COUNTRY MILE."

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Marty McKee @martymckeeofficial.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

RIP Gerrit Graham, who performed the greatest stunt I have ever seen in a motion picture. youtu.be/C2iT4iVj7uM?...

youtu.be

Used Cars (1980) - Gerrit Graham - red car freakout stunt

YouTube video by Stranger Things Hawkins Radio

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HBO MaXXXinoparsnip @dekkoparsnip2.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

This really bites -- Graham was often a high point in not-great movies and an equally high point in actually great ones.

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Norm Wilner @normwilner.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Double congratulations to Matthew Rhys! Maybe -now- we'll get another season of PERRY MASON.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

This past weekend marked the 50th (exclamation punctuation) of the Toronto debut of eventual video rental favourite SQUIRM. Been a looong haul since I'd rewatched it; happy to report it paid dividends capable of surprising even a longtime fan. (It's me -- I'm the wormface, now.)

First of two black and white newspaper ads from The Toronto Star from the weekend of September 10, 1976, advertising the release of the killer-worms-on-a-rampage motion picture SQUIRM.

A banner across the top tells us "THIS WAS THE NIGHT OF THE CRAWLING TERROR!" and we're further informed in a block of text that "...by the billions they came, swarming over the land, sucking the life from anything in their path."

It features the film's hand-painted promotional artwok, consisting of a thick-trunked gnarled deciduous tree, beneath which are a collection of gruesome impressionistic sketches of writhing reaching human bodies engulfed by slithering hungry worms. One dude is mostly skeleton, the flesh of his body wormed right off his bones! Prominent at the bottm of all this and peeking out is a bare, gape-jawed human skull.

The movie's title appears nearer the bottom, stylised to appear as though its letters are composed... of WORMS!!!

It's an American International Picture.

This second ad, with a slightly different layout, adds the helpful information that "This is a TERROR WORM. One can be dangerous. Two can be deadly. ... and a Billion can become a tidal wave of horror -- engulfing a whole town in a living, writhing, seething orgy of ravenous destruction."

You might reasonably assume -- given this is a low-budget, rurally-made production from the early 1970s -- that this ballyhoo is obvious hyperbole.

Reader? You would be mistaken.

And if you see it at the Northeast or Northwest Drive-Ins, you could see for yourself and stick around to catch FOOD OF THE GODS.

Or it's playing in Oshawa with SPECIAL DELIVERY.

(Not a difficult choice, imho.)

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I came to The Patrol late in life, and it has been one of the true joys of my middle-age watchlist. Sweaty square-jawed dudes fantailing jeeps through the desert doing sick jumps and fuckin up Nazis with machineguns, firebombs, and fists. Perfect late-nite zone out fuel. It rules.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Not a DRACULA, she's a Vampire. As in 'Vamp,' (per Theda Bara) although this is never vocalised. But Tashman gets some delectably scheming close-ups that remove any lingering doubt. Still -- False advertising! As is the title, which is, frankly, mystifying. Not re: MURDER, but definitely re: CLOCKs.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

95 years ago To-morrow -- the Toronto debut of MURDER BY THE CLOCK, booting Jackie Coogan from the Uptown. Real interested to find out if a man can be murdered twice. Can't deny the allure of a Female Dracula, either. And in a movie co-starring Dracula's Daughter's familiar-to-be? Hmm.

Black and white newspaper ad from the Toronto Star, Friday, September 11, 1931. A clipping advertising the premiere of the 1931 motion picture MURDER BY THE CLOCK, whose title appears in shivery black block letters.

The ad's embellished with a shadowy sketch of a reaching, clawlike hand that stretches toward a photograph of a slightly spooked blonde woman (the actress Lilyan Tashman) with waved chignon hair and a virtually nonexistent nightgown featuring remarkable decolletage.

A block of text bound within the graphic shape of a downward-pointing arrow asks "CAN a Man be murdered twice? Impossible? -- Not in this strange house of horror, where every tick of the clock brought a threat of Death!"

More text describes "A Female DRACULA! A Beautiful Woman -- whose MASTER MIND -- shcemes, plots -- making men do her bidding -- working with fiendish, clockwork precision -- a beautiful siren who deals death to her lovers!"

Admission is 25c until 6pm. Saturday it's 35c; then 50c to close.

"YOU'LL BE GLAD WHEN THE LIGHTS ARE TURNED ON!"

Well maybe we'll see about that.

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Marty McKee @martymckeeofficial.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Tonight is the 60th anniversary of THE GREEN HORNET and THE TIME TUNNEL.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Happy 60th to Ron Ely's TARZAN, which "sneak peek"ed this night in 1966, alongside Richard Mulligan's comedic western THE HERO. Also, the premiere of F TROOP's second season. In colour!

Sepia-toned newsprint clipping from the TV Guide issue dated September 3, 1966. A half page close-up highlighting the Debut of the TARZAN television series. The episode is called "Eyes of the Lion," and next to a small black and white picture of Ron Ely as Tarzan, with his tiny chimp Cheetah, the description reads:

"Tonight, a native named Oringa is stalking "The Red One," a lion who killed Oringa's father. But the native is not aware that another lion is in the area a peaceful beast said to be the companion of a jungle princess.
For TV, Tarzan is played by Ron Ely, who is the 15th Tarzan. Cheetah the chimpanzee will be at his side, but there will be no Jane.

Series regulars include Manuel Padilla Jr. as Jai, an orphaned village boy; Alan Caillou as Jason Flood, Jai's tutor; Rockne Tarkington as Rao, a vet- erinarian; and Stewart Rafill as Tall Boy, the vet's assistant.

Filmed in Brazil. Script by George F. Slavin. Director: Robert Day. (60 min.)

Guest Cast
Nara...Laurie Sibbald

Oringa...Ned Romero"

Another clipping from the same TV Guide issue, this one promoting an "Advance Premiere" of F TROOP. At 8:00. In Color. A small black and white picture shows the program's three leads, Civil war-era military men (from L-R, Parmenter, O'Rourke, and Agarn, respectively played by Ken Berry, Forrest Tucker, and Larry Storch) standing around a desk (Parmenter's, inside his office at Ft. Courage's HQ).

A full-page advertisement from the same TV Guide issue, promoting the "Sneak a Peek at NBC Week!" with details and artwork from three television programs debuting on this Thursday night, September 8, 1966. Clockwise from the top, the shows are TARZAN, whose painted artwork depicts a rampaging elephant smashing through the giant block letters of a title treatment as other jungle animals (gorillas, giraffes, etc.) scatter; THE HERO, where a painted portrait of the actor Richard Mulligan in western garb leans slightly with his legs crossed, an arrow through his cowboy hat; and also STAR TREK.

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Scott Drebit @sdrebit.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

This week I’m in awe of another Lee/Cushing joint. Have a read, if you like!

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Here's Luana Patten in JOE DAKOTA.

Collection of four screengrabs from the 1957 Universal Pictures Eastmancolor western JOE DAKOTA.

Each one shows the actress Luana Patten -- here an attractive, pale young woman with long sandy brown or reddish hair and bright red lips -- alone in the frame.

In this first one, she's leaning against the corner of an adobe building on the plains, arms folded in a green and yellow gingham dress. Short, dry grass fills the space behind her. She looks up and out of frame, considering.

Here, in a lilac-coloured flower print dress with a lace collar, she's leaning through parted lace curtains out the window of an adobe building, looking offscreen. It may be night.

On a street beneath the covered porch outside a barbershop, holding on to a square wooden column, wearing the same yellow dress from the first image. Behind her in the distance rises the bank of a scrub-covered foothill. It's morning or afternoon.

Finally, she's leaning on a cast iron lift-pump, head tilted, smiling dreamily. Behind her across scrubby grass, a small wooden pen in disrepair and a tall narrow wooden derrick. In the distance, rolling low-forested hills against a hazy tan afternoon sky.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

67 years ago today, Toronto's Odeon Theatres offered exhausted CNE patrons a surefire spa moment with a double bill of NERVE SHATTERING SHOCK!

Black and white newspaper ad from the Toronto Star, Friday August 28, 1959 promoting a double bill of RETURN OF THE FLY and THE ALLIGATOR PEOPLE, featuring elements of both films' painted promotional artwork (oversized clawhanded flies stepping on the faces of scientists, ample-bosomed women shrieking, scaly-faced alligator dudes, things of this nature).

They're billed as "2 SUPER-MONSTROUS DOUBLE-CHILL SENSATIONS!"

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Marty McKee @martymckeeofficial.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

A thread of Whit Bissell getting choked out. First, BARNABY JONES.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

No time for robots, huh? Okay -- how about a LORDS OF FLATBUSH sequel in the form of Brooke Adams sitcom? Its pilot aired this Tuesday night in 1976. Please enjoy FLATBUSH/AVENUE J:

youtube.com

Flatbush Avenue J (1976) - Pilot ABC

YouTube video by Dario Salvi

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

45 years ago tonight, you could have watched the pilot for ABC's potentially hot new sitcom NUTS & BOLTS, starring Rich Little, Eve Arden, and WISHMASTER's Tammy Lauren.

Black and white clipping from the teevee listings, Monday, August 24, 1981. Channel 7 (shoutout WKBW!) is airing "Nuts & Bolts," described as: "A computer engineer uses some of his inventions to help raise his children."

Its iMDB summary says it's about "A widowed computer engineer who created two robots which help him raise his children contemplates selling one of his creations to send his daughter to an expensive music school."

First of three NUTS & BOLTS promotional images, in colour, taken from and watermarked by Getty Images.

In this first one, Eve Arden, here with frizzy red hair and wearing a rose-coloured checkerboard print outfit, sits on the end of a bed, apparently arguing with a approximately human-shaped grey and boxy homemade metal robot with a pained and painted human face on its cubed head. The robot, standing, its clawlike hands folded appears to be grimacing. Or... contrite?

This second picture shows Rich Little -- here with salt and pepper gray hair and wearing a v-necked pullover and brown slacks -- in what appears to be the garage of a suburban home. It's likely a lab or workshop, populated by banks of rudimentary electronic knob and switch machinery. He's smiling to the camera while jamming a screwdriver into the previously observed boxy metal robot's chestplate.

A second robot is also here, this one constructed to look like some kind of humanoid butler in a metallic white tuxedo. This robot's hand is placed to its temple in a gesture of apparently mild consternation.

This third picture shows Eve Arden, Rich Little, and a young girl of about twelve (the actress Tammy Lauren), and a young boy about ten (the actor Justin Dana). They stand together in a familial embrace at the bottom of a sitcom staircase, flanked by the two previously mentioned robots. They're by the front door, near a bookcase and underneath a barometer.

They sure look happy!

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Marc Edward Heuck @meheuck.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

This machine didn't sell a lot of units, but everyone who bought it started a pinball league.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Stairs on the moon. How did they get there?

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Hey, look at that. The Mummy made it! (Rewatched this, imagining it 30ft high, robust multitechnicolor beaming into a hat-wearing world with few similar options. Struck by Lee's _amazing_ presence; a loping goopy goon longing for love. Hit right in the heart bone. Some dents and dings. Worthwhile!)

Black and white newspaper ad for the opening of THE MUMMY, from The Toronto Star, Monday, August 17, 1959.

A wide horizontal rectangle featuring elements of the film's painted promotional artwork. The title, stylised to resemble its having been scrawled or painted in dripping... blood? The Mummy himself looms large slightly right of centre, a shotgun having blown a hole through his bandage-wrapped chest leaking bright white light. In the lower left a woman screams.

It's "In Terrifying Technicolor," and we're reliably informed that "only the spectacular dimension of giant screen and Technicolor could capture the monstrous magnificence of the world's mightiest masterpiece of horror!"

It's also double-billed with a "2nd chilling hit!" of "heart-stopping horror!" -- CURSE OF THE UNDEAD.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

67 years ago today, it was only three days until Hammer's THE MUMMY would shamble into Toronto. Seems like a pretty good deal, too?

Black and white newspaper clipping from The Toronto Star, Friday, August 14th, 1959.

An advertisement in advance of the Toronto premiere of Hammer's THE MUMMY: Simple line drawing illustration of a corpulent, hairy-armed gravedigger, balding, wearing a white t-shirt, his top half poking out of a perfectly squared rectangular grave plot he is in the process of digging, depositing mounds of earth to his left atop a small pile of soil.

He looks a little like Tor Johnson?

Beneath him, a large dark coffin with swing bar and huckles is tied with a bowed ribbon securing a dainty arrangement of funereal flowers.

The text informs us that

"The HEIGHT of HORROR is coming

IF IT FRIGHTENS YOU TO DEATH WE'LL BURY YOU IN YOUR OWN BACK YARD...FREE OF CHARGE!"

The title -- "THE MUMMY" -- appears in its advertising iteration; stylised to look as though it were scratched into wood or stone, or dripping with blood or goop.

It's IN TERRIFYING TECHNICOLOR!

You are advised to "See it with someone who can carry you home... feet first!"

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Eric Veillette @veilletteinto.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

I’ve launched an “essential guide” to the history of film censorship in Ontario. A one-stop shop, if you will. thedowntowntheatre.substack.com/p/the-histor...

thedowntowntheatre.substack.com

The history of film censorship in Ontario

The essential guide to Ontario’s film censors, their decisions, and the legacy they left behind.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

It's that time again. Here's a snapshot of some Toronto area lots on this August long 50 years ago:

Black and white newspaper ad from The Toronto Star, July 31, 1976, advertising the dusk-to-dawn programs at seven Toronto area drive-ins for the August long weekend.

A wide rectangle composed of narrower vertical divisions for the bill at each theatre, punctuated by tiny snippets of selected films' advertising art. Playing across seven different screens are sixteen movies:

DEATH MACHINES ("The Killers of the future are ready now")
DEATH RIDERS ("See the most dangerous and terrifying stunts ever filmed")
MARK OF THE DEVIL ("Positively the most horrifying films ever made")
DR. FRANKENSTEIN ON CAMPUS
THE GUMBALL RALLY ("It's a hilarious outrageous road race."
BLAZING SADDLES ("Keeps the audience howling!")
THE BLOB ("Original version with Steve McQueen")
BEWARE THE BLOB
EQUINOX ("Unbearable bloody horror")
ASTRO ZOMBIES
THE SHOOTIST
PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM
TO THE DEVIL...A DAUGHTER
PRIME CUT
DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS ("Every combination of sex is explored! Beautiful!")
THE VIRGIN WITCH

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

45 years since the Toronto release of Lech Kowalski's D.O.A. (Not its Toronto *premiere*, which I just now learned was also its *World* premiere at the previous year's Festival of Festivals).)

Black and white newspaper ad from The Toronto Star, July 31, 1981.

Advertising the movie D.O.A. A RIGHT OF PASSAGE, it features a detail of the film's one-sheet artwork -- a painted image of a spiky-haired woman lying supine on a cobblestone street. She wears a slim black leather bikini top, banded in a choker about her neck accentuated with a thin metal dogcollar chain.

Behind her, the chrome bumper of what appears to be a midcentury sedan, an oversized safety pin puncturing one of its white-walled tires.

The film's title appears in large stylised capitals that may represent their having been created with a can of spray paint.

In between the "O" and the "A" of "D.O.A."... a tiny human skull. Could it be one of the woman's... earrings? The high contrast of this ad has blown out any real significant detail and so it's difficult to say for certain.

It "Starts Today!"

(Directed by Lech Kowalski. Starring The Sex Pistols, Terry and the Idiots and the Decline and Fall of the Western World. With Iggy Pop, The Clash, The Dead Boys, Stiv Bators, Rich Kids, X-Ray Specs, Generation X, Sham 69, Augustus Pablo and much more than meets the eye.)

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

SPIDER IN THE NIGHT! Happy 67th to the 1st season finale of CBC's suspense anthology series THE UNFORESEEN. (Brought to my attention in the previous week's Star, which mentions the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers assistance in filming what one assumes was the episode's climax (uh... spoilers(?))

Black and white image of a portion of The Toronto Star, dated Friday, July 24th, 1959.

Beneath the headline "CBC Monster Dies... Courtesy Canadian Army" are two small captioned photos of an improbably giant spookshow spider.

(It bears a striking resemblance to the memorably ratty Lunar Spider from MISSILE TO THE MOON. Although that's likely because it's... you know... a giant spider. See, also, CAT WOMEN OF THE MOON, obviously.)

In the picture on the left, it appears to be crawling out of the ground-floor window of a building, two of its spindly, hairy forelegs stretching toward the ground, its large sabretoothed mandibles arcing toward the ground beneath the twin orbs of lifeless white eyes. Eek!

"LITTLE MISS MUFFETT," the caption says, "isn't the only one who'd run from this giant spider. He'll be scaring viewers on a CBC-TV drama, "Spider in the Night.""

In the slightly larger, more widely-framed picture on the right, the spider is, indeed, crawling out of a building -- a sort of tiny clapboard shack next to a white picket fence. The entire structure is in the process of being ENGULFED by FLAME and SMOKE, billowing into the sky from its low-sloped roof. The spider itself is burning.

A small wooden peach basket at the building's left corner appears untouched.

As the caption describes:

"THE MONSTER (not as real as it looks) meets doom courtesy of the Canadian army, which co-operated with CBC and burned spider in a Toronto construction shack for cameramen. Molotov cocktails were used to set the shack ablaze."

The photos are credited to The Star's Hank Rifle.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

My God... It's Full of Stars

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Got out of the habit of checking, so imagine my great surprise when I just now discovered four complete episodes of THE TROUBLE WITH TRACY are on YT. Why, here's one right here:

youtube.com

Trouble With Tracy "Tracy's Horse"

YouTube video by Bruce Button

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Got out of the habit of checking, so imagine my great surprise when I just now discovered four complete episodes of THE TROUBLE WITH TRACY are on YT. Why, here's one right here:

youtube.com

Trouble With Tracy "Tracy's Horse"

YouTube video by Bruce Button

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

Essential work, here. Just great.

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

*CORPUS CALLOSUM (Snow, 2002)

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

It wouldn't see wide release until September, but its World Premiere was at Sault Ste. Marie's Algoma theatre. An actual, all-out, red carpet affair. Holbrook interrupted a vacation to attend; RITUALS meant more to him than the majority of his other work. If you've seen it, it's easy to agree...

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

From The Toronto Star, 40 years ago. Something is coming. What on earth could it be? Bugs? *Talking* bugs? Could be talking bugs!

Full page black and white newspaper advertisment from The Toronto Star, Saturday July 19th, 1986.

Giant black sans serif block letters monopolise about 75% of the otherwise flat white real estate, informing us *something* is "COMING AUGUST 8TH."

Relegated to the page's extreme lower left corner, a tiny unassuming housefly (Musca domestica), which the ad seems to suggest is itself saying "help me. please help me."

Weird.

(It's probably a teaser for a movie, given that this page appears in the Entertainment section, and the fact that, just outside the ad's bottom left border, Theatres Branch Ontario tells us it -- whatever "it" is -- is "SUBJECT TO CLASSIFICATION.")

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

Great stuff for the nuts 'n' bolts crowd:

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Geoff. @cinterrobang.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

So... what exactly is the headpiece of the Staff of Ra?

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