Category: Entertainment

Seven Great Movies You Did Not Know Were Remakes (and much more nonsense)

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Some of these are very loosely categorized as remakes, and I didn’t really learn anything from the text of the article (your mileage may vary), but I did pick up on some fascinating trivia in one of the accompanying posters.

What’s the connection between football great Crazylegs Hirsch, the movie Airplane!, and the hit song Unchained Melody? Read on.

I didn’t know that the legendary Crazylegs Hirsch was a movie star very briefly, not just by playing himself in his autobiographical role (the film was called Crazylegs), but by acting in fictional dramas like Zero Hour, where he had an important supporting role. (You may not know that Zero Hour was the inspiration for the comedy classic Airplane!) I guess I should have known this, given my interest in college football, my love of movies and my residency in Wisconsin (his home), and given that I once researched Hirsch’s football career after watching an episode of SCTV in which Harold Ramis played the station’s chairman, Crazy Legs Hirschman.

Following up on that, I also learned that the song Unchained Melody came from (appropriately enough, I suppose) a film called Unchained, the only fictional film that featured Crazylegs Hirsch as the topline star. I’m not really sure why the zany-legged one went no further in Tinseltown.

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R.I.P. Kevin Sullivan

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‘Rasslin’ has produced many memorable heels, like Roddy Piper, who became so popular that fans applauded them. Although they never really turned “good,” they did get to fight on the side of justice in some story lines.

Kevin Sullivan wasn’t that kind of baddie. Once he turned heel in the 1980s, he was dark and twisted, face-painted, and bad to the bone. He would film ominous promos in the desert or in a swamp, he would lean into evil iconography like skulls and snakes and fire, and he would use gibberish to call on bizarre supernatural entities.

My favorite Kevin Sullivan story line was when Kevin needed to reach deep into his occult powers to defeat some difficult opponents. He went to the beach, muttered some incantations, and before our very eyes he conjured a new partner, The Purple Haze, who arose in the Atlantic Ocean from the very depths of hell (or the dark side of the moon … or something).

Of course this “demon” looked just like Sullivan’s usual partner, “Maniac” Mark Lewin, but that was probably just a coincidence.

Despite all the resources of the dark arts at his beck and call, and despite conjuring an all-powerful immortal demon as his partner, Kevin still got his ass kicked regularly by the Road Warriors.

Just goes to show that Satan isn’t what he used to be.

There is an excellent and very thorough obit here.

A topic promoted from the comment section

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Per Mr. Haney:

Recently a Shatner appearance got me thinking. How many actors who appeared in the original “Twilight Zone” are still with us?

Off the top of my head I could name Shatner, Robert Redford and Carol Burnett. A little digging and I found that Robert Duvall had acted in one of the one hour episodes that I don’t recall. The beautiful Ruta Lee is still living and probably only ever displayed some cleavage but I would love to be proven wrong. I thought another lovely blond, Kathie Browne, was still living but I learned she has passed. I think I had her name confused with another actress whose name I can’t recall right now. And of course more of the child actors are still living, including Billy Mumy, Mary Badham, Ron Howard and Veronica Cartwright. I’m sure I could have found others with a little more digging.

Maybe some of the learned readers of this blog can chip in with some other names. Or even some of the unlearned.

Scoop’s note: Shat’s mortal enemy, George Takei, comes immediately to mind. If Shatner is this site’s honorary thunder god, then Takei is my Loki.

R.I.P. Bob Newhart, age 94

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Judd Apatow did a documentary about Bob’s friendship with Don Rickles,


Obit from The Hollywood Reporter

Rita Coolidge topless in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973)

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To my knowledge, this was Rita Coolidge’s only screen nudity.


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I have usually liked Sam Peckinpah films, especially The Wild Bunch and the Ballad of Cable Hogue, but this one was not a favorite when I watched it in a theater in 1973. I’m in good company. Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert each took a hearty dump on it. Peckinpah himself hated that version of the film and tried to get his name removed from it.

I found the pace too slow and the narrative too digressive in the theatrical version, but there were two later versions that I liked much better. I covered all three versions of this film in some detail here.

The best analysis of the problems with this film comes from an unlikely source – E. Jean Carroll, the lady from Trump’s sexual abuse trial. Her article/interview was called “Last of the Desperadoes: Dueling with Sam Peckinpah,” and it is worth quoting in detail:

Peckinpah wants to shoot in New Mexico for authenticity. Metro wants Mexico to cut costs. He loses. Peckinpah wants a Panavision repairman in Durango, Mexico, to fix the cameras. The studio says nothing doing. The first footage is sent to L.A. to be processed. The lab calls Peckinpah. Says the film’s out of focus. Panic in Durango.

Downtime. The camera is fixed and the paranoia sets in. The actors get sick. The crew gets sick. Peckinpah is puking every day. They fall behind schedule. James Aubrey, president of MGM, wants to save time and forbids Peckinpah to shoot a raft scene. Peckinpah shoots it. The scenarist, Rudy Wurlitzer, starts complaining. Says Peckinpah is rewriting the picture with the help of his old TV scripts. Jerry Fielding, Peckinpah’s music composer can’t work with Bob Dylan and quits.

Dylan’s unhappy. Kris Kristofferson (the Kid) says Rudy’s dialogue is corny. Rita Coolidge (Maria, the Kid’s lover) says all that remains of her role thanks to MGM is that of “a groupie.” James Coburn (Garrett) says Peckinpah is a creative paranoid who generates tension to give everyone the same experience to feed on during the film. A fight breaks out one Saturday night.

Two guys. One is on the phone ordering a couple of gunmen to Durango. Wants the other guy killed for threatening Peckinpah’s life. Whitey Hughes, Peckinpah’s stunt man, says they always have a good time, but on this film they aren’t having a good time. The hit is canceled at Peckinpah’s insistence. Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid is brought in 20 days over schedule and $1.5 million over budget.

MGM’s building a hotel in Vegas and needs cash. The studio moves the release date up and gives Peckinpah only two and a half months to edit. On the sly MGM duplicates the work print and employs another cutter. Peckinpah’s version runs between 122 and 126 minutes. The studio’s runs 106. The producer, Gordon Carroll, negotiates day and night. Gets nothing restored. The picture’s released. Peckinpah sues for $1.5 million. Orders all the cuts put back or his name taken off. Nada. Nada. Nada.