Extra Picture Perfect Wednesday: Creig Flessel and the Sandman

Illustrator Creig Flessel was there to help kick-start the comic book industry in the late 1930s, drawing covers for numerous titles, and providing pencils for many early "Sandman" tales. He wasn't the first artist to draw the character's adventures--that was Burt Christman--but it was Flessel's art that introduced the character to most readers, as he drew the cover for "Detective Comics" #40, the character's first appearance in a regular comic book series.


Flessel passed away on July 17, 2008. The illustrations in this post are all from the collection of Rob Stolzer, on digital display here.

Most date from the mid-1990s, but this 2006 drawing shows that he was a serious fine artist--because only serious fine artists draw nudes, right?

Click hereto read a review of The Golden Age Sandman Archives, Vol. 1 at Cinema Steve.

Picture Perfect Wednesday: Anita Ekberg, Miss Sweden 1950

They don't come much more picture perfect than Anita Ekberg. After earning the Miss Sweden title in 1950, she came to the United States. She first worked as a model, but then spent five years under contract to Universal Pictures in parts that demanded little more of her than to be gorgeous to look at. She returned to Europe, and by the late 1950s, her career had taken off, and she spent the next 30 years appearing in everything from sword-and-sandal fantasy flicks, horror films, comedies, and murder mysteries.

Abbott and Costello vs the Alien Amazons!

Abbott and Costello Go to Mars (aka "Rocket and Roll") (1953)
Starring: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Mari Blanchard, Robert Paige, Horace McMohan, and Anita Ekberg
Director: Charles Lamont
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When two workmen (Abbott and Costello) accidentally launch with an experimental space rocket, they think they end up on Mars. The truth is, they end up places far stranger than Mars... New Orleans during Mardi Gras and then Venus, a planet governed by immortal Amazons.


As my summary above states, Abbott and Costello never get to Mars in this film, despite the intentions of the builders of the top secret rocket and the movie's title. Instead, they move through a thin plot that is stretched to the breaking point to fill the movie's 77-minute running time, and every joke is beaten to death, particularly during the New Orleans segment. Things pick up a bit when the action moves to Venus (where Costello is made King), but it's only a slight improvement. I'm not even sure if it's the distraction of all the scantily clad beauty queens that tricked me into thinking the film got better.

This is one of the weakest Abbott & Costello pictures, and everyone but truly hardcore fans of their work should probably not bother with it.

What is the deadly secret of the 13th guest?

The Thirteenth Guest (aka "Lady Beware") (1932)
Starring: Lyle Talbot, Ginger Rogers, and J. Farrell MacDonald
Director: Albert Ray
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When Marie (Rogers), the young heiress to the Morgan fortune, is found mysteriously electrocuted in the family manor that has remained sealed since her father died during a dinner party 13 years prior, Police Captain Ryan (MacDonald) calls upon the assistance of playboy criminologist Phil Winston (Talbot) to help solve the baffling murder. Before Winston can even begin to investigate, the mystery takes an even stranger turn: The dead girl turns up alive and in police custody for car theft... and soon there's a second dead body at the old Morgan place.

"The Thirteenth Guest" is a pretty good little mystery movie for most of its running time. The three lead actors all give decent performances that are in line with what is to be expected from one of these "who-dunnit in the dark, old house" mysteries, and the murderer had a fairly clever set-up with which to commit the murder. There are also just enough plausible suspects and clever plot-twists make it real mystery film.

Unfortunately, for every clever twist there's a plot logic-hole that a truck could be driven through. Equally unfortunate is the presence of a truly lame comic relief character. And I won't even dignify the idiotic mask and cape they have the murderer prance around in with comment. (Hang on... did I just comment on the idiotic mask and cape? Curses!)

The good parts outweigh the bad parts--but only barely--in "The Thirteenth Guest." It's not a film I recommend you rush out to find a copy of, but if you're looking around for a little something to round out a "home film-festival" selection of mystery movies, this might be what you're looking for. Just don't make it the main attraction.

Bulldog Drummond vs George Zucco!

Arrest Bulldog Drummond (1939)
Starring: John Howard, Reginald Denny, E.E. Clive, Heather Angel, H.B. Warner, and George Zucco
Director: James Hogan
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

Hugh Drummond (Howard) ends up a murder suspect when an international freelance spy (Zucco) kills an inventor and steals an experimental beam-weapon that remotely detonates gunpowder and explosives. With his wedding plans yet again disrupted, Drummond, his best friend Algy (Denny), his ever-resourceful gentleman's gentleman Tenny (Clive), and his fiance Phyllis (Angel) travel to a tropical island to capture the spy and return the deadly weapon to British hands.

"Arrest Bulldog Drummond" starts sluggishly, has a darker tone than the other entries in the Paramount-produced "Bulldog Drummond" series, and what gags that are present are rather tepid. The film is saved by a strong third act, the usual excellent performances by Howard, Denny, Clive, and Angel (with Denny and Angel getting quite a bit of screen-time, and their characters of Algy and Phyllis taking more active roles in the plot than usual), and a nifty turn by George Zucco as the sinister spy Rolf Alferson. Unfortunately, Colonel Nielsen (Warner) is once again reduced to a blithering idiot by the writers (something which seems to be a hallmark of the worst installments in the series.)

With a near equal amount of good parts and bad parts, "Arrest Bulldog Drummond" is one of the weakest entries in the series, with the strong finish and good performances by Zucco and the regular cast members barely managing to elevate the film to the upper-end of average. It's okay, but you won't miss much if you skip it.

'Adam Strange' is fun sci-fi/pulp comics

Showcase Presents: Adam Strange, Vol. 1 (DC Comics, 2007)
Writer: Gardner Fox
Artists, Carmine Infantino, Murphy Anderson, Mike Sekowsky, Bernard Sachs, and Gil Kane
Rating: Nine of Ten Stars


With "Showcase Presents: Adam Strange, Vol. 1", DC Comics has added another great, low-priced book that reprints 500+ pages of some of the best American comics ever published. This time out, it's the earliest adventures of a man who lives in two worlds... an archeologist who every 62 days is transported by Zeta-Beam to the distant world of Rann where he straps on a rocketpack, grabs a raygun, and fights alien evils until the radiation wears off and he returns to Earth.


Originally published in issues of "Showcase" and "Mystery in Space" between 1958 and 1963, from the very first episode writer Gardner Fox spun some great pulp-flavored sci-fi adventures tales that read like a cross classic Flash Gordon and Edgar Rice Burrough's John Carter of Mars stories. They're excellent reading that can be enjoyed by kids of all ages, and the adventures are enhanced by the romantic relationship between Adam and the alien beauty Alanna.

The art is passable from the very beginning, but it doesn't become truly great until Carmine Infantino becomes the strip's regular penciller. When Murphy Anderson comes onboard as the inker in the second half of the book, readers are treated to some of the best-looking American comics art ever published. The team of Infantino and Anderson was a truly spectacular one.

If you enjoy well-done comics and sci-fi adventure tales, I think you'll enjoy "Adam Strange, Vol. 1".

Picture Perfect Wednesday: A Shot at Stardom