The world of exploitation film ripped open and laid raw for you to experience. From 70's grindhouse to current underground, it is all here. So ripe you can practically smell it.
THE ECCENTROPEDIA: THE MOST UNUSUAL
PEOPLE WHO HAVE EVER LIVED
Author – Chris Mikul
Headpress Books
Illustrations by Glenn Smith
The title of this book is not a
misnomer, it is indeed an encyclopedia. This thing is the size of a
phone book and had to have taken author Chris Mikul years to research
and produce. Mikul has been seeking out the odd, unusual and just
plain outrageous people for years from all the way back when he
produced his fanzine BIZZARRISM. So this is an accumulation of years and years of
his work in one massive volume. He sets up some rules from the get
go; there is a thin line between mental illness and eccentricity, so
he divides them into several categories: visionaries, entertainers,
contrarians, and theorists. In using these categories he also steers
clear of famous people with well known moments or foibles (as Mikul
puts it) instead concentrating on people whose entire lives
encompassed their eccentricity.
The book is just a huge compilation of
people from that point on. Some of the expected names are here, such
as SALVADOR DALI (His film work, his voyeurism, his move towards
signing blank paper and canvases and reselling them as artwork all
discussed) or CRISWELL from PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE, who had an 86 %
success rate in his psychic predictions, (though apparently he did
predict JFK was going to have some sort of trouble in 1963), HENRY
DARGER the recluse Janitor who turned out to be a brilliant artist
who made entire worlds with his art, and DIVINE (If you don't know who
Divine is, then why are you reading my blog).
But there are hundreds of less known
people in THE ECCENTROPEDIA and that is where the fun lies. Such as
Australian actor FRANK THRING who you may know from MAD MAX BEYOND
THUNDERDOME, you get you discover stories of him smuggling whole
roast chickens onto film sets, or his manager having to break into
his home when he vanished for a few days only to find him bound and
gagged naked. Or DELIA BACON who was among the first to challenge the
Shakespear;s legitimacy as a writer. Or how about DR. CHARLOTTE BACH
aka KAROLY HAJDU Transsexual Evolutionary Theorist who believed that
sexual deviation was the engine that powered evolution. And posed as
a man and woman at various times in her life.
When I got this book I was entertaining
friends, so the first thing I did was crack it open and just start
reading out loud various profiles. It is that kind of book, you can
dip in at any point and find something fascinating to share. Every
page has a great story, so you can literally flip it open anywhere
and start reading. In fact that maybe the best way to handle it, due
to the unyielding length, attempting to read it front to back might
be too much of a challenge.
CONSPIRACY CINEMA: Propaganda, Politics
& Paranoia (book) Author: David Ray Carter Publisher:
Headpress Books http://www.headpress.com
Friday November 22, 1963 President J.F.
Kennedy was assassinated. Thursday April 4th, 1968
Reverend Martin Luther King Jr was struck down by an assassin's
bullet as well. Approximately 9:02 am, April 19, 1995 Timothy McVeigh
parks a van full of fertilizer bombs in front of the Arthur P. Murrah
Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Creating to that point, the
largest act of domestic terrorism in the United states until...
September 11, 2001 when two hijacked air planes crash into the twin
towers in New York city causing them to ultimately collapse as well
as the third tower below. Killing an estimated three thousand innocent
people.
These moments in American History and
many more are the focal point of a new sub-genre of quasi documentary
film that has sprung up in the wake of what many have called desktop
filmmaking. Films that that have been enabled in the digital
revolution because the very medium has been democratized thanks to
technology, enabling those with the tools at their finger tips and
the ideas in their heads to make a movie on their own. This used to
be the domain of Public Access TV, but now thanks to the internet,
and free downloading these “Conspiracy Films” have found a much
wider audience.
Author David Ray Carter has taken on a
massive undertaking with this book to attempt to not only explore
this brave new world, but attempt a catalog of the films as well, A
job that in and of itself is no easy task considering the width and
breadth of material at hand. Carter says up front that the material
is sometimes hard to deal with, and that he doesn’t always agree
with it, often finding it offensive. But he doesn't a more than
admirable job of giving each documentary a fair shake, standing back
to take it on it's own cinematic terms. Leaving political views at
the door as much as possible. He interestingly enough in the
introduction talks of discovering these films after burning out on
doing normal film criticism and growing up on horror films. Coming to
them as almost an act of rebellion to the mainstream cinema norm.
Comparing them to Rock and Roll in that way because as you first are
introduced to the Conspiracy world you get seduced by the bad boy
nature of it. Sucked into the shadowy underworld of forbidden
knowledge and low hanging fruit. Just by virtue of looking you are
doing something transgressive, you become momentarily part of an
underground that normal people don't see, It feels naughty and good.
Eventually you start seeing the flaws in the logic, the
mis-communication of ideas, and how most of the puzzle pieces do
really fit, but for a while the ride is terrifying, fun and
exhilarating. As long as you eventually DO get off the ride.
But in this book we meet a myriad of
people who not only did NOT get off that ride, but rode it long and
hard enough to make multiple movies about how the shadow government
is part of the ride too. People who have made millions off the
idea like Alex Jones, or Lizard People chaser David Icke, or
Holocaust Denier David Cole. How about Cathy O'Brien who believes
many Presidents, luminaries and Country and western singers have used
her for Satanic Sex Rituals since she was a child? Or what about a
dude simply named “Freeman” who takes the whole Obama Birther
thing one step further as he believes Obama is actually the
reincarnation of the Egyptian god Akhenaton and his family also
descendents of Egyptian royalty...
There is a lot of fun crackpot stuff in
her to read about, loads of it dealing with the “New World Order”
and the “Illuminati” theories and films about them. But there is
also a lot of films discussed that seem to have put a of effort in to
try and be researched and as convincing as possible. One series
discussed in several chapters is something called EVIDENCE OF
REVISION. Which is in 6 parts each on covering a different topic from
the killing of JFK and RFK to the 9/11 Towers crash. What sets these
apart is there is only footage used that is already in the public
domain, but much of it unseen for years. These are well researched
and put together documents the shows the major events thought looking
glass of time, unfettered too much manipulation. The book makes them
look highly recommended. Unlike something such as the very popular
LOOSE CHANGE documentary that was really the first Conspiracy Film to
catch the attention of the public. The book goes into a lot of depth
on this film, and the various revisions that movie went under to
arrive at the cut we see now. What the book doesn't spent much time
on his how those revisions ended up discrediting the whole LOOSE
CHANGE project because if the entire thesis changes as the movie
changes then it makes the entire argument sound false and useless.
Other topics discussed include the Moon
Landing or in this case the lack of it happening (you can feel the
authors disdain in this chapter, but he keeps his cool), The murder
of Tupac and Biggie, Princess Diana, Weather Control, AIDS and other
Health issues (actually a few of these documentaries sound kind of
interesting), WACO (once again here he points out the well rounded
work on the docs, not so much in production value, but in
presentation of facts and ideas), Conspiracies on Religion (this is
where it gets dicey for the author as there is some Holocaust
revisionism stuff and other demonizing of people that clearly doesn't
sit well with him, and rightfully so. But he still treats all his
cinematic subjects with the same level of respect.) Carter makes it all easy to read too, with a breakdown in each chapter of the actual event's facts, how it historically went down, then how the Conspiracy people seem to think it went down. Then he dives into capsule reviews of each relevant film. A lot of work went into this project.
In fact it is the professional
detachment that makes this book so valuable, It never becomes a
parade of freaks, but a consistent study of the underbelly of the
world and the outre' ideas the shift under the crust. This book does
an entertainingly and admirably job of diving in deep into a pool
that very few would even think to swim in. It is a read well worth
taking. And a genre of film just getting revved up I'm afraid.
Below are some films discussed in the book. Some of these are interesting ( the first one on JFK) others completely offensive (JEWISH RITUAL MURDERS which seeks to use horror movies histrionics to prove that Jewish Folks actually commit Blood Libel and eat people!) The one on Satanism, the Anti-Christ and Jack Parsons Scarlett Women is more Occult Hooey, but good for a laugh, and lastly some 9/11 stuff that out of those films is actually one of the better made of the bunch. Make up your own mind about it's content though.
