I hope you are as fascinated by modern Asian popculture as I am these days. I’ve seen the modern Indian superhero-movie Krrish recently and I liked it.
Bollywood has outgrown cheesy and camp ripoffs of Western movies for a long time now but this is exactly where Krrish was nurtured. (Yes, action scenes and CG-FX are not state of the art in ‘Krrish’ – but who cares for those. I like singing and dancing in a superhero movie! A polka-dancing Hugh Jackman would have changed ‘Wolverine’ into a modern classic.)
So enjoy the movie-clip above and dance merrily with the Indian superman (no, not that one) and… ...Spiderwoman?
After that you may even buy Krrish here
or check out other Indian superheoes like Jumbu, Bantul, Raaka or Gupi-Bagha.
Or watch 338 Shaktimaan TV-shows for free here.
“Big Man Japan” is a parody on the whole Japanese megamonster-movie-mayhem and on superheroes in general. Daisato is the son of a famous superhero and like him he can mutate to a giant, when electrically charged. (Don’t try at home, kids!)
But the job of the skyscraper-sized-monster killer is not as popular as it was in the Golden Age of Godzilla, as this mockumentary proofs.
It’s very funny and bizarre and out on DVD since May, you can order it via Amazon here.
When I recently searched the web for Tarzan movies I stumbled upon “Tarzan Comes To India” – a cheesy Bollywood movie from 1962 starring Dara Singh. Singh is the most prominent Indian Pehlwani -wrestler of all times and moved into the movie industry in 1962. If you check his filmography on IMDB you can see that he played parts like: King Kong, The Emperor, Alexander the Great, Tarzan, Tarzan’s nemesis, First Man on the Moon, Krishna and – his greatest success – Hanuman.
Even more bizarre: Dara Singh seems to be the Indian bogeyman! I read this article about the lawsuit against Ajmal Amir Kasab, the only surviving gunman behind the Mumbai terror attacks: “On Thursday, when he was laughing at their banter, prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam turned to him and said: “Don’t laugh. Be serious. Otherwise I will call Dara Singh,” a reference to the legendary Indian wrestler often invoked by parents to keep their children quiet. Kasab laughed even more.”
This is not made up by me. There actually IS a movie that’s called “Pinocchio in Outer Space”, I swear by Walt’s moustache! Let me quickly summarize the plot for you: Because the blonde boy named Pinocchio misbehaves about 10 minutes after his transition from wood, the vengeful Blue Fairy retimbers him. Moral: Only if he is a good boy, blah-blah…
Look, up there in space! Is it a rocket? Is it an obese superhero? No – it’s a whale! And he is about to smash the earth! What can we do? Who will help us?
So our little wooden Flash Gordon jumps into a rocket Gepetto builds for him (Hey, it’s not like rocket science needs rocket scientists, an average carver will do, Mr. Branson) and up and away to Mars! But before the countdown starts he meets the secret agent Nurtle the Twurtle, who apparently is just a turtle. (‘Meeting’ in this case is to be understood as standing near an UFO as it lands in your garden. It’s a loan word from Tibetan.)
After our Italian role model and this alien parrot land on Mars and after Pinocchio tried to hypnotize the whale in vain and after they blew up planet Mars (No joke: Atom bomb, explosion = no more Mars.)AND after Pinocchio is swallowed by the whale, they meet the Blue Fairy, get out of the whale through its blowhole and manage to hypnotize the monster successfully. Then our favorite little log is burned to death by accident. Pinocchio is dead.
Don’t halloo till you’re out of the wood! With a little magic dust from the Blue Lady he is resurrected, turned to flesh and honored with medals. Like he just saved the world or what!
This movie from the 60ies was drawn by only two animators and a handful of inbetweeners and was directed and produced by Ray Goosens. The character animation will give you the same strange gooey feeling my description just gave you. Yes, you can buy it at Amazon. Medical advice: Use the DVD only with the hallucinogen of your choice. It’s from the sixties!
Next week, dear loyal reader, I will tell you something about another Pinocchio movie: The Erotic Adventures of Pinocchio – “It’s not his nose that grows!” Stay tuned!
Yes. Always. Do you remember “Greystoke”, the movie where Christopher Lambert played Tarzan? Well, that one was so famous for the realistic gorilla costumes, but I thought they were pathetic. The actors tried their very best to act like real apes, but their legs were just too long and the masks were ridiculous. (A balding silverback, come on!)
Have a look at all the movie Tarzans here:
Stop! There is one movie where a gorilla costume is properly used. No, not that one, but this one.!
PS: I forgot to mention this fascinating video It demonstrates a famous example for “Inattentional Blindness” – people so focused on what they do, that no one actually SEES the gorilla as it passes right through the group.
This website claims to be the ‘primary Internet resource for references to stinking badges’, and I, for one, see no reason to doubt it – even if some other Internet resource for references to stinking badges actually existed, it could hardly be more comprehensive than this one: More than 120 references to stinking badges (or variations thereof) from movies, TV, books and comics – most of them documented with links, video- or audioclips, or images.
The only thing I’m missing on that site: an explanation what makes that particular phrase so enduringly popular.
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