#the black cat 1941

[weirdlookindog]

The Black Cat (1941) & Black Friday (1940) - Trade ad

[mrcowboytoyou]

why are there two movies called "The Black Cat" made within 7 years of each other that BOTH star Bela Lugosi as a guy with a 'V' name... are yoU KIDDING ME. I kept waiting for Boris Karloff to show up and now I feel like an idiot...

[animals-in-old-films]

The many cats in The Black Cat (1941)

bonus sippy:

[schlock-luster-video]

On December 23, 2023, The Black Cat was screened on Svengoolie.

[fanofspooky]

Scream King - Bela Lugosi

[driveintheaterofthemind]

The Majestic Theatre in Springfield Ohio, promoting Basil Rathbone in The Black Cat and Bela Lugosi in the Invisible Ghost in June of 1941. "2 first run features! Recommended by The Horror Club!"

[haveyouseenthishorrormovie]

SUMMARY: Elderly Henrietta Winslow lives in an isolated mansion with her housekeeper and beloved cats. As her health fails, her greedy relatives gather in anticipation of her death.

[gameraboy2]

Bela Lugosi in The Black Cat (1941)

[haveyouseenthismovie-poll]

End of month update - June

Hello, all! This is the end-of-month update, where I post Tumblr’s current top four films that have received the highest percentage of “yes,” “no,” and “haven’t even heard of this movie” votes.

As of today, the top four films with the highest percentage of “yes” votes are:

Finding Nemo (2003) | Shrek (2001) | Monsters, Inc. (2001) | The Lion King (1994)

Next, the top four films with the highest percentage of “no” votes are:

Sausage Party (2016) | Pinocchio(2019) | Sharknado 2: The Second One (2014) | All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

Finally, the top four films with the highest percentage of “haven’t even heard of this movie” votes are:

Faat Kiné (2001) | Now Add Honey (2015) | Like a Cat on a Highway (2017) | Dean Spanley (2008)

This top four changed through the new additions of Faat Kiné (2001) and Now Add Honey (2015), which replaced Monica and Friends: Bonds (2019) and Monsturd (2003).

Currently, The Incredibles (2004) is the still the only film to receive absolutely zero “haven’t heard of this” votes.

That’s it for June’s end-of-month update! Remember that you can view last month’s update by clicking here. Additionally, you can view the full ranked Letterboxd lists of movies that have come up on this blog by clicking the following links:

This list is ranked from highest-to-lowest percentage of “yes” votes.

This list is ranked from highest-to-lowest percentage of “no” votes.

This list is ranked from highest-to-lowest percentage of “haven’t even heard of this movie” votes.

Remember to vote on the polls that are currently running: The Road Within (2014) | About a Boy (2002) | Spy Kids (2001) | Frozen II (2019) | High Noon (1952) | Horns (2013) | Im Himmel ist die Hölle los (1984) | In Bruges (2008) | Sideways (2004) | Pokémon: The First Movie - Mewtwo Strikes Back (1998) | Sailor Moon SuperS: The Movie: Black Dream Hole (1995) | Mamma Mia! (2008) | Down with Love (2003) | Stonehenge Apocalypse (2010) | This is Spinal Tap (1984) | The Kids Are Alright (1979) | Lisztomania (1975) | A Little Chaos (2014) | Redline (2009) | The Stepford Wives (1975) | Blancanieves (2012) | Clerks (1994) | Promising Young Woman (2020) | What's Up, Doc? (1972) | The Apple (1980) | Broken (1993) | The Virgin Suicides (1999) | The Phantom of the Opera (2004) | The Wolf Man (1941) | The Boxtrolls (2014) | Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) | The Perfect Score (2004) | The Man from Earth (2007) | Shapeshifter (1999) | The Lighthouse (2019)

Also, remember that the ask box will open for requests some time before July 4th! There will be a post announcing when it's open, so keep an eye out for that if you'd like to request some movies!

[soisaidfine]

Ethel Cain, Powerlines, Marcel Proust, the lesson of Chardin... 'The artistic sense discovers the strange within the ordinary, the new that lies within the old, the pure within the impure; it restores power'

lilf4iryh0e said on Ethel Cain’s Reddit: ‘Is it just me or when I look at tall powerlines I think of Ethel Cain now??’

photo @mothercain: the decommissioned bruce mansfield plant on black and white polaroid 600 (tumblr)

I feel the same way, and now I search for them in landscapes, thinking of Ethel Cain and appreciating their power and beauty through Ethel Cain's perspective.

This is one of the most beautiful gifts that artists give us: they enrich our daily lives with beauties we didn’t notice before and that we love through the lens they have cast on these things.

Marcel Proust spoke of this as ‘the lesson of Chardin,’ referring to the painter who made him appreciate ordinary things in daily life, like a messy table after a meal, in a humble interior. In the same way, powerlines were once often considered ugly, and environmentalists fought against them, wanting to hide or bury them, believing they marred the beauty of nature. And Ethel Cain reveals their beauty to us.

"Chardin enters like light, giving each thing its color, evoking from the eternal night where they were buried all the beings of still or animated nature, with the brilliance of their form so clear to the eye, yet so obscure to the mind" - Marcel Proust

ethel cain, powerline tattoo (tumblr @vacillator)

Powerline Valley (demo) - Ethel Cain

. . .

"The artistic sense discovers the strange within the ordinary, the new that lies within the old, the pure within the impure; it restores power to worn-out words through a process contrary to the Carnot principle of sensitivity, which is the degradation by habit."

Paul Valéry, 1941, Notebooks II, Poïetics

. . .

"So many things you haven't even noticed in this street where you pass six times a day, in your room where you spend so many hours each day! - Look at the angle formed by this edge of the furniture with the plane of the window. You must capture it in its ordinariness, in the visible that is unseen, - save it, - give it what you so readily give, through imitation or the insufficiency of your sensitivity, to the slightest sublime landscape, sunset, sea storm, or to some museum piece. These are pre-made gazes. But give this poor thing, this corner, this bland hour and object - and you will be rewarded a hundredfold."

Paul Valéry, 1940, Notebooks II

. . .

Chardin's Lesson (Marcel Proust):

"Imagine a young man of modest means, with artistic tastes, sitting in the dining room at that banal and melancholy moment just after lunch has ended, when the table has not yet been fully cleared. With his mind filled with the glory of museums, cathedrals, the sea, and mountains, he looks with discomfort and boredom, with a sensation close to disgust, a feeling akin to melancholy, at a lone knife left on the half-pulled tablecloth hanging down to the floor beside the remains of a bland, bloody chop. On the sideboard, a bit of sunlight, cheerfully touching the glass of water left almost full by thirsty lips, cruelly accentuates, like an ironic laugh, the traditional banality of this unaesthetic scene. At the back of the room, the young man sees his mother, already seated at her work, calmly unwinding a skein of red wool with her daily tranquility. And behind her, perched on top of a cabinet next to a biscuit kept in reserve for a ‘special occasion,’ a fat, short cat seems to be the malevolent and unimpressive spirit of this domestic mediocrity.

The young man averts his eyes, and they fall upon the gleaming, polished silverware, then lower onto the shining andirons. More irritated by the orderliness of the room than by the disorder of the table, he envies the tasteful financiers who move only among beautiful things, in rooms where everything, down to the fireplace tongs and the door handle, is a work of art. He curses the surrounding ugliness, and ashamed of having spent a quarter of an hour not feeling shame but rather disgust and a kind of fascination, he rises and, if he cannot catch a train to Holland or Italy, goes to the Louvre to seek visions of palaces by Veronese, princes by Van Dyck, ports by Claude Lorrain, which tonight will once again be tarnished and exacerbated by his return to the familiar setting of daily scenes.

If I knew this young man, I wouldn’t dissuade him from going to the Louvre; rather, I would accompany him. But leading him to the Lacaze Gallery and the gallery of 18th-century French painters, or some other French gallery, I would stop him in front of the Chardins. And when he was dazzled by this opulent painting of what he once called mediocrity, this delightful painting of a life he found dull, this great art depicting a nature he thought was trivial, I would say to him: Are you happy? Yet what have you seen here but a well-to-do housewife showing her daughter the mistakes she made in her embroidery (The Diligent Mother), a woman carrying bread (The Provider), a kitchen interior where a living cat walks over oysters while a dead skate hangs on the wall, a sideboard already half-cleared with knives left on the tablecloth (Still Life with Fruit and Animals)? Even less, mere table or kitchen objects, not just the pretty ones like Saxon porcelain chocolate pots (Various Utensils), but those that seem to you the ugliest, a gleaming lid, pots of every shape and material (the salt shaker, the skimmer), the sights that repulse you, dead fish lying on the table (in the painting The Ray), and the sights that disgust you, half-emptied glasses and too many full glasses (Still Life with Fruit and Animals).

If all of this now seems beautiful to you, it is because Chardin found it beautiful to paint. And he found it beautiful to paint because he found it beautiful to see. The pleasure you take from his painting of a room where people sew, a pantry, a kitchen, a sideboard is the same pleasure he took in seeing a sideboard, a kitchen, a pantry, a room where people sew—captured in passing, extracted from the moment, deepened, eternalized. These two pleasures are so inseparable that if he could not stop at the first and wanted to give himself and others the second, you will not be able to stop at the second and will inevitably return to the first. You already experienced this pleasure unconsciously, the pleasure that comes from the sight of humble life and still life; otherwise, it would not have risen in your heart when Chardin, with his imperative and brilliant language, came to call it forth. Your awareness was too inert to reach it. It had to wait for Chardin to awaken it in you and elevate it to your consciousness. Then you recognized it and tasted it for the first time. If, when looking at a Chardin, you can say to yourself: this is intimate, comfortable, as alive as a kitchen, then when you walk through a kitchen, you will say: this is as beautiful as a Chardin. Chardin was merely a man who took pleasure in his dining room, among fruits and glasses, but a man of a keener awareness, whose intense pleasure overflowed into rich brushstrokes and eternal colors. You will become a Chardin, perhaps less great, great to the extent that you love him, to the extent that you become him again, but for whom, as for him, metals and stoneware will come to life, and fruits will speak.

Seeing that he shares with you the secrets he has learned from them, they will no longer hesitate to reveal these secrets to you as well. Still life will become, above all, living nature. Like life itself, it will always have something new to say to you, some charm to shine forth, some mystery to reveal; the everyday life will enchant you, if for a few days you have listened to its painting as a lesson; and by understanding life through his painting, you will have gained the beauty of life.

In these rooms where you see nothing but the image of others' banality and the reflection of your own boredom, Chardin enters like light, giving each thing its color, evoking from the eternal night where they were buried all the beings of still or animated nature, with the brilliance of their form so clear to the eye, yet so obscure to the mind. Like the awakened Princess, each is brought back to life, regains its colors, begins to converse with you, to live, to endure. On this sideboard, where everything from the stiff folds of the half-pulled tablecloth to the knife lying sideways with its blade protruding, everything bears the memory of the servants' haste, everything bears witness to the guests' gluttony. The compote dish, still as glorious and already as stripped as an autumn orchard, is crowned at the top with plump peaches, pink as cherubs, inaccessible and smiling like immortals. A dog that lifts its head cannot reach them, making them more desirable for being vainly desired. His eye savors them, catching on the down of their skin, moistened by it, the sweetness of their flavor. Transparent like daylight and as desirable as springs, glasses in which a few sips of sweet wine laze as if at the bottom of a throat, sit next to glasses almost empty, like emblems of quenched thirst beside emblems of burning thirst. Tilted like a wilted corolla, one glass is half-tipped over; the beauty of its posture reveals the spindle of its stem, the delicacy of its joints, the transparency of its glass, the nobility of its flare. Half-cracked, now independent of the needs of men it will no longer serve, it finds in its useless grace the nobility of a Venetian carafe.

Light as pearly cups and fresh as the seawater they offer us, oysters lie on the tablecloth like fragile and charming symbols on the altar of gluttony.

In a pail, fresh water spills onto the floor, still pushed by the quick foot that hastily disturbed it. A knife hastily hidden there, marking the urgency of indulgence, lifts the golden slices of lemons that seem placed there by the hand of gluttony, completing the apparatus of voluptuousness. Now come to the kitchen, whose entrance is sternly guarded by the tribe of vessels of all sizes, capable and faithful servants, a laborious and beautiful race. On the table, the active knives, which go straight to the point, rest in a threatening yet harmless idleness. But above you, a strange monster, still fresh like the sea where it swam, a skate is hanging, its sight blending the desire for indulgence with the curious charm of the calm or storms of the sea, of which it was the formidable witness, evoking memories of the Jardin des Plantes through a restaurant’s taste. It is opened up, and you can admire the beauty of its delicate and vast architecture, tinged with red blood, blue nerves, and white muscles, like the nave of a polychrome cathedral. Beside it, in the abandonment of their death, fish are twisted into a stiff and desperate curve, lying flat on their bellies, their eyes bulging. Then a cat, adding the mysterious life of its more knowing and conscious forms to this aquarium, its eyes fixed on the skate, slowly maneuvers the velvet of its paws over the oysters, revealing at once the caution of its nature, the greed of its palate, and the boldness of its enterprise. The eye, which loves to play with the other senses and to reconstruct, with the help of a few colors, not just a whole past but a whole future, already feels the coolness of the oysters that will wet the cat’s paws, and one can already hear, at the moment when the precarious pile of these fragile shells collapses under the weight of the cat, the small crack of their breaking and the thunder of their fall."

Marcel Proust, Rembrandt and Chardin, 1895

. . .

Marcel Proust: Elstir’s Lesson.

In his novel, Marcel Proust revisits the elements of his article on Chardin. But this time the painter is named Elstir (a character invented by Marcel Proust). And this painter teaches the narrator to find beauty in things that the narrator previously did not notice or did not like:

"I now willingly stayed at the table while it was being cleared, and if it wasn’t a moment when the young girls of the little group might come by, I no longer looked solely towards the sea. Since I had seen them in Elstir’s watercolors, I sought to rediscover in reality what I loved as something poetic: the interrupted gesture of knives still askew, the rounded bulge of a disheveled napkin where the sun intersperses a piece of yellow velvet, the half-empty glass that thus better shows the noble flare of its shapes and, at the bottom of its translucent glass, a remnant of dark yet sparkling wine, the shifting of volumes, the transformation of liquids by lighting, the alteration of plums passing from green to blue and from blue to gold in the already half-stripped compote dish, the movement of old chairs that twice a day come to sit around the tablecloth, set on the table like an altar where the feasts of indulgence are celebrated, and on which, at the bottom of oysters, a few drops of lustral water remain like in small stone fonts; I tried to find beauty where I had never imagined it could be, in the most ordinary things, in the deep life of ‘still lifes.’"

Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time

Jean Siméon Chardin (1699-1779)

[weirdlookindog]

Anne Gwynne in The Black Cat (1941)

[thewarmestplacetohide]

Dread by the Decade: 1940s Horror (Pt. II)

👻 You can support me on Ko-fi ❤️

The Stranger on the Third Floor (1940 | USA): a reporter fears he helped an innocent get sentenced to death. ★★★½

The Black Cat (1940 | USA): a wealthy woman's heirs are stalked by a killer. ★★

The Devil Commands (1940 | USA): a scientist tries to speak to his dead wife's ghost. ★★½

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1940 | USA): a kind doctor transforms into his darker side. ★★½

Horror Island (1941 | USA): a strange group search for buried treasure. ★½

Man-Made Monster (1941 | USA): scientists subject a man to electrical shocks. ★½

The Monster and the Girl (1941 | USA): a man's brain is transplanted into a gorilla. ½

The Tell-Tale Heart (1941 | USA): a murderer is haunted by guilt. ★★½

The Wolf Man (1941 | USA): a nobleman is cursed to become a werewolf. ★★★

Spooks Run Wild (1941 | USA): teenage hooligans encounter a possible murderer. ★½

Hold That Ghost (1941 | USA): two bumbling gas station attendants inherit a haunted tavern. ★★★

[agirlwithbigdreamsforher]

FOUND YOU IN A PLACE OF CHAOS: CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 1

Pairing: Eric (AQPDO) x Mary (OFC)

Summary: Eric met Mary on the ferry that was taking them away from New York. What would the future holds when you are living the end of the world?

Warnings: Any mistakes are my own. Language.

A/N: Words in italics is a dream.

Disclaimer: I do not give permission for any of my works to be copied, used, translated nor reposted anywhere else but here on this blog. Do not steal what you didn’t work for. Minors and ageless blank blogs don’t interact with me or my works. Reblogs and likes are always welcome. Remember reblogs do more than likes. Thank you for reading this work of fiction.

Word count: 1941

GIF'S NOT MINE, YOU CAN FIND THE CREDITS UNDER IT.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Eric opened his eyes when the metal walls of the boat cracked. He looked around and remembered where he was, he took a deep breath and let his head fall against the wall. His sight was stuck at a point on the opposite wall, not really paying attention to his surroundings.

“What are you looking at?” A man who was sitting in the direction he was staring at spoke to him, “HEY!” Eric blinked and now really looked at the man, “What are you looking at?!”

“I…” Eric said a bit confused at the man’s tone.

The man stood and walked towards him, grabbed him by his collar and pushed him against the wall. Eric let go of Frodo and the cat ran away. “Stop Fucking staring at me!”

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t…”

“Do you have a problem?” Eric could smell a hint of alcohol in his breath.

“No, please. I don’t want any trouble. I wasn’t staring, I promise.”

“You listen to me, you fucking…”

“Leave him alone!” The man who helped him get on the boat spoke, “Let him go. I won’t ask you twice.”

“Oh really? And what are you going to do about it?”

“Just leave him alone, he wasn’t doing anything. He is in shock, just like most of the people in this fucking ferry. So let him go.”

The man let go of Eric, who tripped and fall in his place, the man walked pass the black man.

“And cut it with the drinking.” He said to the man as he passed by him. “Are you ok?” Eric nodded tearfully. “Here.” He gave Eric his hand and helped him stand, “I’m Henri.”

“I’m Eric.”

“Are you hungry?”

“Yeah.”

“Come with me.”

They walked another level up and headed to a group of people surrounding boxes.

“This is my wife, Zena.” The woman smiled to Eric, “He hasn’t eaten.”

Zena nodded and open one of the boxes. When she turned she handed Eric a plastic bag with piece of bread, an apple and a bottle of water.

“Thank you, ma’am.” He rapidly opened the bag and bit the bread.

“Easy there. You’re gonna chock on yourself.” Henri saw Eric drank from his water, “You’re not from around.”

“No, sir. I’m from England.”

“Well, you are certainly far from home.”

“RUN!” The voice of her mother was filled with fear and just as she stood in the middle of the living room, her mom disappeared in the middle of a cloud of dust making Mary fell in her place.

The screams of hundreds of people on the street filled her ears, the sound of car alarms going off, sirens of ambulances and police cars, everything was loud. 

“Aunt Mary!” The voice of her niece caught her attention.

“NO!” her sister screamed and just as her mother, her sister and niece were dragged out of the hole that was now on the side of the building.

Mary watched in shock and covered her mouth to stop herself from screaming. She moved as fast as she could to get to her room and hid in her closet. She tried to calm her breaths, her family was gone and she had no idea what was going on.

Once the noise died down, she left her hiding spot, walked carefully to the living room and scream.

“Mary, wake up!” Lucy shook her, “Wake up!”

Mary opened her eyes and took a breath that made her lungs hurt.

“Easy, you’re ok. It was a nightmare.” Mary’s breaths were short and panicked. “Look at me, you are safe.” Tears were streaming down of Mary’s eyes.

“I…” She kept breathing, “They’re gone.”

“I know, darling.”

“I was about to be with them.” She cried and Lucy hold her.

“Shhhh.” She swayed her side to side. Lucy’s hand rubbed her back and soon after Mary began to breathe normal and Lucy helped her lay down.

Mary look at the ceiling. “What time is it?” she said above a whisper.

“Eight o’clock. You’d slept for 3 hours.”

Mary tried to sit down and hissed when she felt the sting in her right thigh. Lucy helped sit with her back against the wall of the boat. Mary lifted the blanket and saw the bandage.

“Where’re my pants?”

“We had to cut them.” Lucy lifted the material that was bunched next to them. “I’ll find something for you to wear I promise.”

“How bad is it?”

“It was just a bit deep but long. You’re lucky it didn’t cut in a major vein.”

“But the kid is alive.” She smiled tiredly looking at the black kid sitting among others survivor kids on the opposite side. “I should be dead.”

“Yeah, but you’re not. I was not going to leave you there. Your mom…”

“My mom is gone. All my family is gone and so it’s yours.”

“Your mom was my best friend and you are like a daughter to me, I was not going to leave you to die.”

Mary’s eyes soften and watered. “I’m so scared.”

“I know. I am too.”

Mary sniffed and clean her tears with the back of her hand.

“It’s getting cold.” Lucy said, “I’ll help you put your sweatshirt on.” She took the item and easily put it on Mary.

“Where do you plan to get me some pants?”

“I don’t know, I’ll figure something out. What kind of lady would I be if I let you walk around in your underwear?” She laughed a bit. “Besides you have a hole in your panties.”

“What?” Mary looked down, her black panties were dusty but not ripped. Lucy fulling laughed this time, “I’m glad you are having fun at my expenses.” She smiled lovingly to Lucy. Mary grabbed her tote bag and took out a bag of cookies. She opened it and offered it to Lucy. “Do you know where we going?”

“Some island, you know those things can’t swim, so.”

“When are we getting there?” she bit her vanilla cookie.

“I don’t know. They don’t tell me much. But I hope when the sun rise we will be somewhere safe.”

They kept eating quietly when a soft meow made them turned her heads around.

“Hey!” Mary said with a full smiled on her face. Lucy’s heart fluttered when she saw Mary smiling. “Who are you?” The cat got near and jumped on her lap. “Oh! Hello!” Mary scratched its ears and the cat purred. “Oh you like that, don’t you?” The cat rubbed its face against her chest, “How you get here?”

“That´s the cat from the last man that got here.”

“What?”

“There was a man that swam from a pier to the ferry.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No! We don’t know who help him to make noise to distract the creatures so he could get here. He almost got caught, I saw it. He was really lucky.”

“You actually believe everyone in this boat is lucky when most of us have lost our families and friends.” She said as she hug the cat.

“I like to be optimistic. It was not our time to died, not yet at least. We have the chance to start over.”

“And how are we starting over when is the end of the world?

“How is my favorite survivor?” They were interrupted by Henri. He had found them on their way to the ferry and stayed by their side.

“I don’t have pants on.”

“Lucy told me. We are trying to find something for you. I will be forever in your debt for saving Osahar.” He smiled lovingly to Lucy and then to her, “How you feeling?”

“Sore and tired.”

“Frodo!” Mary turned when she heard an unknown manly voice. The man stopped on his tracks when Lucy, Henri and Mary turned to see him. “Sorry.” Mary locked eyes with him. He had the biggest and softest eyes she had ever seen in a man. “That’s my cat.” He said shyly.

“Oh!” Mary said and lifted the cat, “He just got here.” She smiled as Eric got closer and took the cat in his arms. He recognized her as the girl who was sleeping when Lucy was curing his hand.

Lucy and Henri share a knowing look, and then Henri cleared his throat.

“So, Lucy; Zena was telling me if you’d like to help her with some stuff upstairs.”

“Why? Of course! Do you think you can keep an eye on her?” She said looking at Eric.

“Me?”

“Yes, you…Eric, right?”

“Yes.” He thought for a moment, “I can stay while you come back.”

“Perfect.” Lucy stood up, “We’ll come back later.”

Eric stood in silence while Mary stared at him. When he turned he saw her giving him a tight smile.

“Hi.” Mary said.

“Hi!” Eric’s voice shrieked, he cleared his throat, “Hi.”

“Eric?”

“Yes.”

“I’m Mary.” She extended her hand towards him and waited until he took it. “wanna sit?” She patted the floor next to her.

Eric looked around as if he were waiting for someone to tell him not to sit, but eventually he sat down. Mary reached for her cookies and gave him one.

“So Eric, I’m going to assume you are the last man who got in the ferry.” He nodded, “Lucy told me about you, he said you swam.” Eric nodded again, “You don’t talk much, do you?”

“Sorry, I… my friend helped me get here.”

“And where are they?” Eric remained silent and blink his tears away, “You don’t have to tell me, I understand.”

“Do you?”

“My whole family is dead. I saw when those things took them.”

“So Lucy is not your mom?” His voice was clearer and louder this time.

“No, she was my mom’s best friend. We lived in the same building.” She took a deep breath, “When the noise died down she went there to check if there was any survivors and she found me in the kitchen putting food in my bag.” She lifted her cookie. “I like your accent.”

“Thanks.” He smiled, “I like yours.”

“How about you?” She bit her cookie. “What’s your story?”

“I’m… was a law student.”

“Wow! You must be really smart then. I heard it’s difficult to get in.”

“And expensive.” Eric added, “I was in the subway and some pipes exploded. Next thing I know I was coming out of the water and finding Frodo outside the subway station. He took me to his owner, the woman who distracted the creatures so I could be here.” Just in that moment Frodo jumped from Eric grip to Mary’s lap and purred, “He likes you.” Mary turned to see him and his eyes were shining.

“What part of London are you?”

“Kent. Have you been?”

“No, I was studying to be a nurse. But you know it was in the plans after I finish. Travel the world… Now there is no place in the world where those creature aren’t.”

“Well, let’s hope that wherever we going, it’ll be free of those things.”

Both of them stayed in silence for a moment. It wasn’t awkward, it felt peaceful.

“Eric?” he hummed, “Can I do something?” He nodded.  Mary got closer and he moved backwards a bit. Her hands land on her tie. She gracefully undo his tie and another button of his shirt.

“It was a present from my mom. She gave it to me before I came to the States.”

She smiled, took the tie, folded and put it in her tote back. “It will be safe there.”

By the time Lucy came back she found Mary with her head on Eric’s shoulder, both of them sleeping peacefully.

[schlock-luster-video]

On December 6, 1941, The Black Cat debuted in Sweden.

Here's a new portrait of Gale Sondergaard to celebrate!

[maudeboggins]

End of Year Review Every year I like to create a review of media I consumed. Here is 2024:

Books: In 2024 I read 68 books. My favourites were:

Clyde Fans (Seth, 2019)

Brother (Ania Ahlborn, 2015)

The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride (Daniel James Brown, 2009)

Revenge (Yoko Ogawa, 1998)

Audition (Ryu Murakami, 1997)

Piercing (Ryu Murakami, 1994)

Coin Locker Babies (Ryu Murakami, 1980)

Life is a Banquet (Rosalind Russell, 1977)

Rosemary's Baby (Ira Levin, 1967)

I'll Cry Tomorrow (Lillian Roth, 1954)

A Kiss Before Dying (Ira Levin, 1953)

The Beast in the Jungle (Henry James, 1903)

I read 7 books on Arctic and Antarctic exploration (1 fiction). I read 3 books on Garbo. I read 12 Japanese books. I read 7 graphic novels. I read 15 non-fiction books.

Films:

I watched 437films in 2024

Favourite new to me films:

The Vampire Lovers (1970)

Horrors of Malformed Men (1969)

Strait-Jacket (1964)

Sorry, Wrong Number (1948)

The Body Snatcher (1945)

The Youngest Profession (1943)

It Started with Eve (1941)

The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)

The Black Cat (1934)

Cleopatra (1934)

After Tomorrow (1932)

Love Me Tonight (1932)

Lucky Star (1929)

Favourite Re-Watches:

Ninotchka (1939)

Jezebel (1938)

Favourite new release: La Chimera

Favourite actors of the year:

Lupe Velez, Marion Davies, Clara Bow, John Barrymore, Gary Cooper, Sylvia Sidney, Greta Garbo, Jeanette Macdonald, Norma Shearer, Goria Swanson, Rochelle Hudson, Christopher Lee & Peter Cushing