The Skull (1965) - Newspaper Ad [San Francisco Examiner - September 28, 1965]

September 28, 1965

Despite my growing up on a semi-regular diet of assorted Hammer and Amicus films broadcast on television, coupled with my burning through all the Robert Bloch novels and short stories I could get my hands on in the late 80s and early 90s, a viewing of The Skull has eluded me.

The source material for the film was a short story by Bloch titled The Skull of the Marquis de Sade, which was first published in the September 1945 edition of Weird Tales. While I have read the story twice - first in Final Reckonings, the first volume of The Complete Stories of Robert Bloch, and again in the 1963 anthology Bogey Men - I have zero recall of it.

The Skull was first released on a double-bill with The Mad Executioners, a German 'Krimi' film from 1963. It appears to be one of a very few to receive wide distribution in the United States. If the IMDB is to be believed, that is.

Creature from Black Lake (1976) - Newspaper Ad [San Francisco Examiner - September 22, 1976]

Creature from Black Lake is one of a handful of films from my childhood that I deemed to be "far too scary" to see, because the ads were scary enough, thank you.

I finally caught up with this particular piece of regional filmmaking cheese when it played after an episode of Kolchak The Night Stalker on the CBS Late Night Movie. At least that is how I remember it.

Creature from Black Lake turned out to be an inoffensive little thing, about as scary as an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man featuring Bigfoot (Andre the Giant). My being a fan of Dennis Fimple, Jack Elam, and Dub Taylor no doubt helped keep my interest...

Up from the Depths (1979) - Newspaper Ad [Oakland Tribune - September 1, 1979]

One of an innumerable number of ads that were better (much, much better, in fact) than the film being advertised. Considering some of the broad performances, goofy dialog, and whatnot, it came as no surprise to learn that director Charles B. Griffith intended, or wanted, Up from the Depths to be much more of a broad comedy than producer Roger Corman "allowed" it to be.

Or, maybe, the comedy just was not all that funny to begin with? No idea. I just know that the movie itself, while it does have some goofy so bad it's good charm to it, is best consumed by seasoned b-movie aficionados only.