Hollywood has always been enamored of franchises. Universal became synonymous with horror movies in the 1930s with their Classic Monsters run, while MGM mined Mickey Rooney's Andy Hardy character for 16 films. And then there's the "Blondie" series based on Chic Young's comic strip, which Columbia Pictures wrung bone dry for a staggering 28 installments.
For the most part, these films were produced quickly and cheaply for a quick score at the box office. It wasn't until 1962, when United Artists made a killing with the first James Bond movie ("Dr. No"), that studios began to view franchises as cash cows. With the subsequent success of the "Pink Panther" and "Planet of the Apes" movies, the industry became increasingly eager to turn its blockbusters into ongoing sagas. This filmmaking approach went into hyperdrive in 1977 with the unprecedented phenomenon of "Star Wars." From that point forward, Hollywood quickly became a franchise-driven town.
For the most part, these films were produced quickly and cheaply for a quick score at the box office. It wasn't until 1962, when United Artists made a killing with the first James Bond movie ("Dr. No"), that studios began to view franchises as cash cows. With the subsequent success of the "Pink Panther" and "Planet of the Apes" movies, the industry became increasingly eager to turn its blockbusters into ongoing sagas. This filmmaking approach went into hyperdrive in 1977 with the unprecedented phenomenon of "Star Wars." From that point forward, Hollywood quickly became a franchise-driven town.
- 12/18/2023
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
The Jetsons: The Complete Original Series
Blu ray
Warner Archive
1962/ 1.33:1 / 629 min.
Starring George O’Hanlon, Penny Singleton
Directed by William Hanna, Joseph Barbera
In 1962 Kennedy’s New Frontier was in full effect – the country was still celebrating John Glenn’s heroics and Disney’s Tomorrowland had proved so popular it tacked on a monorail. Flush with the success of The Flintstones, Hanna-Barbara decided it was high time for The Jetsons, a space age sit-com set in a cartoon Utopia. Premiering on a Sunday night in the fall of ‘62 it was the first animated program to be broadcast in color, an eye-popping upgrade that only enhanced the show’s futuristic appeal.
The Flintstones owed its inspiration solely to The Honeymooners but The Jetsons relied on a long line of family-centric fare from The Life of Riley to Make Room for Daddy. The chief cook and bottle-washer was George Jetson, an...
Blu ray
Warner Archive
1962/ 1.33:1 / 629 min.
Starring George O’Hanlon, Penny Singleton
Directed by William Hanna, Joseph Barbera
In 1962 Kennedy’s New Frontier was in full effect – the country was still celebrating John Glenn’s heroics and Disney’s Tomorrowland had proved so popular it tacked on a monorail. Flush with the success of The Flintstones, Hanna-Barbara decided it was high time for The Jetsons, a space age sit-com set in a cartoon Utopia. Premiering on a Sunday night in the fall of ‘62 it was the first animated program to be broadcast in color, an eye-popping upgrade that only enhanced the show’s futuristic appeal.
The Flintstones owed its inspiration solely to The Honeymooners but The Jetsons relied on a long line of family-centric fare from The Life of Riley to Make Room for Daddy. The chief cook and bottle-washer was George Jetson, an...
- 10/19/2019
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
‘Hey Blondie!’ Dagwood, Blondie, Mr. Dithers and a victimized postman return for a stab at a TV revival of the 1940s series from Chic Young’s never-ending comic strip. It’s not bad, with Arthur Lake clowning up a storm and Pamela Britton a charming new embodiment of a character who began as ‘Blondie Boopadoop.’ It’s the entire one-season series.
Blondie The Complete 1957 Television Series
DVD
ClassicFlix
1957 / B&W / 1:33 TV aperture / 26 x 30 min. / Street Date September 25, 2018 / 39.99
Starring: Arthur Lake, Pamela Britton, Stuffy Singer, Florenz Ames, Ann Barnes, Harold Peary, Hollis Irving, Elvia Allman, Lucien Littlefield.
Cinematography: Lothrop B. Wort
Original Music: Mahlon Merrick
Written by John L. Greene, George Beck, George Carleton Brown, Jo Conway, Frank Gill Jr., Gordon T. Hughes, Don Nelson, Jay Sommers, Warren Spector from characters created by Chic Young
Produced by William Harmon
Directed by Hal Yates, Paul Landres, Gerald Freedman
Chic Young’s...
Blondie The Complete 1957 Television Series
DVD
ClassicFlix
1957 / B&W / 1:33 TV aperture / 26 x 30 min. / Street Date September 25, 2018 / 39.99
Starring: Arthur Lake, Pamela Britton, Stuffy Singer, Florenz Ames, Ann Barnes, Harold Peary, Hollis Irving, Elvia Allman, Lucien Littlefield.
Cinematography: Lothrop B. Wort
Original Music: Mahlon Merrick
Written by John L. Greene, George Beck, George Carleton Brown, Jo Conway, Frank Gill Jr., Gordon T. Hughes, Don Nelson, Jay Sommers, Warren Spector from characters created by Chic Young
Produced by William Harmon
Directed by Hal Yates, Paul Landres, Gerald Freedman
Chic Young’s...
- 11/13/2018
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Chic Young. Al Capp. Jimmy Hatlo. Carl Anderson. Ernie Bushmiller. Alex Raymond. Roy Crane. Those are some names I remember, some 70 years later, with no help from Google, from the “funny side” of the St. Louis Post Dispatch, the newspaper that landed, rolled and bound with wire, on the front lawn of the four family flat where we lived until I was 10 or 11. By then I was aware that there was another newspaper, The Star-Times, the one that the O’Neils didn’t read, with its own funnyside and its own names and I may have even known some, but with the exception of Chester Gould, I seem to have forgotten these, maybe because I didn’t see them every day.
Somewhere in early grade school – ah, Sister Helen, what became of you? – I must have realized, probably gradually, that these names had something to do with the comic strips...
Somewhere in early grade school – ah, Sister Helen, what became of you? – I must have realized, probably gradually, that these names had something to do with the comic strips...
- 4/21/2016
- by Dennis O'Neil
- Comicmix.com
Blacklisted screenwriter and president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
The screenwriter Fay Kanin, who has died aged 95, was the only female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in its 86-year history (apart from Bette Davis, who resigned after two months in 1941). She served as president from 1979 to 1983, for the maximum of four consecutive one-year terms. Kanin, who committed herself to the preservation of early Hollywood movies, was first elected president by a board consisting of 34 men and one woman.
"I'm a big feminist," she declared at the time that her play Goodbye, My Fancy opened on Broadway in 1948. "I've put into my play my feeling that women should never back away from life." The serious comedy, with Madeleine Carroll as a powerful congresswoman revisiting her alma mater to receive an honorary degree, ran for more than a year and was made into a 1951 film starring Joan Crawford.
The screenwriter Fay Kanin, who has died aged 95, was the only female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in its 86-year history (apart from Bette Davis, who resigned after two months in 1941). She served as president from 1979 to 1983, for the maximum of four consecutive one-year terms. Kanin, who committed herself to the preservation of early Hollywood movies, was first elected president by a board consisting of 34 men and one woman.
"I'm a big feminist," she declared at the time that her play Goodbye, My Fancy opened on Broadway in 1948. "I've put into my play my feeling that women should never back away from life." The serious comedy, with Madeleine Carroll as a powerful congresswoman revisiting her alma mater to receive an honorary degree, ran for more than a year and was made into a 1951 film starring Joan Crawford.
- 4/1/2013
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
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