Movie Musings

 Welcome!

Carol Burnett in Bob Mackie costume; Once Upon a Mattress

 My husband and I have been enjoying a few movies lately. We are old-fogey fans of dvds and blue-ray discs. We like to watch what WE want to see, not be limited by what is available through other sources.

You also know (if you read much of my blog at all) that I have a life-long love of paper dolls.

Vintage paper doll sheet, “Eva”

I thought, let’s combine the two! So hang onto your hat and let’s go for some Movie Musings.

We recently watched the made-for-tv movie (2005) “Once Upon A Mattress”, which is a musical based on the Princess and the Pea fairytale. Famous American actress Carol Burnett got her push to fame when she was performing in the same name play, playing the ‘Princess’, and a talent scout saw her.

Carol Burnett in a Bob Mackie costume for Once Upon A Mattress

Only in this movie Carol Burnett plays the Queen Mother (with a mostly silent Tommy Smothers playing the King). Bob Mackie created the fabulous gowns the Queen wears. Just seeing Ms. Burnett’s costumes is worth the price of the movie! Tracy Ullman plays the Princess and Denis O’Hare is the Prince.

Paper doll artist extraordinaire Cory drew the above paper dolls based on the movie.

Next we watched the Disney musical “Enchanted”. Amy Adams sings all of her songs in this movie, and again, the costumes are fun. Susan Sarandon plays the Evil Queen with Patrick Dempsey as the hapless bystander who gets sucked into this fairytale comedy/drama. Paper doll designer Cory does a great job with 2 different paper dolls of Giselle, the main princess character.

Paper dolls by Cory for “Enchanted”

When I was younger, every year our family looked forward to certain movies the networks would play, once a year. This was (gasp!) before there were vhs/dvd/cd/streaming options.

One of my favorites was (and still is) 

The Wizard of Oz.

Movie still, Wizard of Oz

It’s not too hard to find paper dolls depicting Dorothy, especially in her Judy Garland movie attire. I only found one paper doll set that had a (single) costume change for any of the other characters. Too bad. I think there are lots of opportunities for fun clothing changes in the movie (think Munchkins, beautiful witches and the Emerald City). Here are a few Dorothy dolls I found:

By artist Guillem Medina

By artist Ralph Hodadan?

A Dover Little Activity Book publication, artist Tom Tierney

Another movie we recently watched was Disney’s Malificent.

Movie still

This is a take on the Sleeping Beauty fairytale, with more of the evil fairy’s side of the story. (Fun trivia: Maleficent is derived from the Latin for do evil or harm.)

Angelina Jolie is simply excellent in her portrayal of a fantasy being going through a range of emotions. Her costumes were so scary they had a hard time casting a young Aurora, until Ms. Jolie’s own daughter Vivienne was chosen. She is just adorable and perfect for the part. Maleficent’s costumes are very original, and Ms. Jolie did all her own stunts throughout the movie.

Paper doll and costumes by Cory

I was chatting with a Disney fan and was horrified to discover she had never seen the original Disney Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Sleeping Beauty or Alice in Wonderland! These are classics!

Movie poster, first released Dec, 1937

There have been so many versions and remakes since then, but Disney produced the first full length animated movie. There are quite a lot of Snow White themed paper dolls to choose from. Here are just a few:

Spanish, from 1940-1960

The next set is from a Wee Wisdom magazine drawn for Disney by Dorothy Wagstaff. I believe it is dated 1938.

Both sets are most likely produced in the Philippines 

My next favorite movie is actually more of a character than a specific movie. I have collected and read most of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ novels (there are 91 of them!) including the 26 Tarzan novels. This led to me collecting Tarzan movies. There are quite a few, plus ‘jungle’ spin-offs and tv series. If you have never seen Elmo Lincoln’s silent movie of Tarzan, check it out!

A later Tarzan series, 1921

This was followed by a 1933 Tarzan series featuring Buster Crabbe.

The earliest Tarzan paper doll I found is from the Sunday Post, June 2, 1935. Charlotte Ware is the artist.

Surprisingly I did not find many Tarzan paper dolls. This is a Color Form set, similar to a paper doll.

Tarzan Cartoon Kit, Color Form; 1966

The last movie I want to mention is Hello Dolly!

I had the opportunity to see a live production of this musical recently. Many actresses have played the title role on Broadway and theaters all over. 

Pearl Bailey as Dolly

1966 production with Betty Grable starring

Barbra Streisand starred in the 1969 movie. Gene Kelly directed and Walter Matthau co-starred. The movie won 3 Academy Awards, and was nominated for 4 more.

Paper doll set by Tom Tierney

Carol Channing is best known for her portrayal of Dolly in theaters and Broadway.

Carol Channing

I found this great paper doll set of her by David Wolfe:

The set comes with more costumes!

While I have many more favorite movies, and MANY more favorite paper dolls, I’ll end for now.

I hope you have had fun with this blog, as I certainly had fun putting it together.

‘Til next time,

inkspired

A few of the websites I visited while researching for this blog, in no particular order:

concordtheatricals.com

Pinterest 

imbd.com

Wikipedia

Britannica.com

filmaffinity.com

eBay.com

Etsy.com

A Scottish peace with Galaxy Quest and lots 'o movies

fois

Scottish-Gaelic for 'Peace'

recycled bottlecap magnet with all recycled paper by inkspired

http://www.inkspired.etsy.com/

My little Scottish tribute to my fans in SCOTLAND!!

Thanks for allowing me to be part of your life!

 I just finished a good book -

"The Moche Warrior" by Lyn Hamilton.

Here is the amazon listing:

http://www.amazon.com/Moche-Warrior-Archaeological-Mysteries-No/dp/0425173089/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1318189349&sr=1-1

I liked it well enough to go and search for other books by Lyn Hamilton.

It is always refreshing to me to read a book that has a good story plot, and does not include steamy sex scenes or limited use of language

due to excessive swearing.

I raised my son regarding swearing with this:

'People that swear have a very poor grasp of the English language,

so they feel they have to fill in with cuss words.'

For really good insults, that don't include cuss words,

look to Monty Python!

There are some SUPER insults in the series
'Fawlty Towers'

a British Comedy starring John Cleese and a wonderful company of actors.

My favorite insult includes 'stick insect'.

tee hee - makes me laugh just thinking about it!

recycled bottlecap magnet humor by http://www.inkspired.etsy.com/

We just discovered that my sister-in-law has never seeen

****Galaxy Quest****

Oh, we can't let that go. Everyone should watch 'Galaxy Quest' at least once in their life!

Tim Allen, Sigourney Weaver, Tony Shaloub....great actors are cast!

Even the bad guy from 'Quigley Down Under' has a super part!

WHAT??? You've never seen 'Quigley Down Under' with Tom Selleck?

Ok, there is a list of movies that everyone should see,

and it is not the PBS list or the TCM list

or a list by some big movie critic.

Hmmm....I guess I better think about this one!

So today I will just suggest some of my absolute movie favorites.

The Crew

Burt Reynolds, Richard Dreyfuss + many more!

Hate the cussing. :0(

Disorganized Crime

Lou Diamond Phillips, Fred Guinn,+ many more!

Fred Guinn of 'Munster" fame is great as a gangster!

Galaxy Quest

No cussing, no sex except a sexy Sigourney Weaver, great humor!

Enchanted

Wonderful musical with music that makes you want to dance.

The opener is a great tease.

Short Circuit

Ally Sheedy, +many more you will recognize.

Great premise. If you like the 3 Stooges, you have to watch this one!

The Wild, Wild, Wild World of BatWoman

Mystery Science Theater version preferred

Get ready for some plain silliness, hilarious comments from the robots (MST) and a fantastically HORRIBLE bat tattoo!!! Go-go music too....(B rated)

Quigley Down Under

of course! A very good Tom Selleck movie.

Crocodile Dundee

Paul Hogan + It still is one of our favorites.

Lightning Jack

With Paul Hogan, Beverly D'Angelo, and Cuba Gooding Jr.,

who has one of the funniest scenes in movies ever. It's the bank robber scene.

My Cousin Vinnie

with caution.

Fred Guinn as the judge, Marisa Tomei (won an award for her part), Joe Pesci.

Wayyyy too much cussing, but if you can ignore that, it's a great movie.

Favorite moment - Marisa T. stomping her foot, and Joe P. stomps back!

ANY Tarzan movie!

Yep, I'm a big fan. I have all of Edgar Rice Burroughs books except just a couple. That includes the Tarzan series, the Mars series, the Pellucidar series....

You have to take them all rather tongue-in-cheek. ERB was really into Darwin's theories. Most of the movies are not at all like ERB wrote them.

Try to see the black & white with Elmo Leonard and one with Buster Crabbe.

Johnny Weissmuller did a great 'dumb' Tarzan. Love the way he pronounces 'Nazi' in one of the movies!(I think it is 'Tarzan and the Amazon Women')

The Scorpion King,

Mummy

Mummy II

Mummy III

I like them all! Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are a good combo.

Love 'the Rock' in Scorpion King, hate the way they animated the big SKing.

Just good entertainment.

The North Avenue Irregulars

and Lt. Robin Crusoe

These are both old Disney movies, but you can get them on DVD.

The first one is based on a true story of a group of church ladies out to stop the gambling in their small town.

Cloris Leachman, Karen Valentine, many others!

Lt. Robin Crusoe is a take off on the Robinson Crusoe story of course.

Dick Van Dyke plays Crusoe, and it is just a fun family movie.

think I'll stop there for today.

I do have more serious movies that are must-watches also.

And I haven't even started on John Wayne, Steven Seagal, Goldie Hawn....

oh the movies!

Ungawah!

inkspired

http://www.inkspired.etsy.com/

http://www.inkspiredmusings.blogspot.com/