CARRY ON CHRISTMAS (1969) – Balladeer’s Blog’s 14th Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues with this 50-minute British television version of the Carol starring most of the Carry On regulars. The Carry On movies were long before my time and weren’t my kind of humor for the most part. (I’m more of a Monty Python, Blackadder, Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and Absolutely Fabulous sort of guy.)
For those readers who have never given the long series of Carry On movies a try, it all started in 1958 with Carry On Sergeant, a wacky, bawdy comedy about Brits doing their mandatory National Service in the military. The hilarity and horniness continued for 30 more films set in different time periods and locales, like Carry On Up the Khyber, Carry On Spying, Carry On Nurse, etc. Continue reading
Balladeer’s Blog remains the only site on the web that equally criticizes both elected Democrats and elected Republicans, depending on which party has been committing greater offenses at the moment.
RIPLEY and the other humans in the Alien films are American VOTERS. As we struggle to survive in this dangerous setting we need to stand together against the common threats. And that applies whether a voter considers themselves Independent or Democrat or Republican. Political labels have become meaningless for US as the Neo-Feudalists view all of us as peasants and cannon fodder, anyway. 
Over the years, Balladeer’s Blog has reviewed several of Jorg Buttgereit’s envelope-pushing, taboo-breaking horror films. Because I review everything from the extreme fringes like Buttgereit (at left) to mild, even family-friendly items let me offer a warning for readers who don’t like extreme violence or extreme concepts. If you fall into that category, please DO NOT look up my long-ago reviews of Jorg’s most notorious films and then blast me because the subject matter appalls you. I am giving fair warning about what they’re like. 
CAPTAIN BERLIN: RETTER DER WELT (1982) – Buttgereit was only 18 when he made this 10-minute short film. He wrote, directed and played the title superhero with Bela B. from the German punk band Die Ärzte co-starring as Mister Synth. This work about West Berlin’s only superhero fighting a monster from outer space is of interest only because of Buttgereit’s and Bela’s involvement. 
Decades later, Buttgereit would revive the Captain Berlin character in one of his stage show-radio show hybrids, titled Captain Berlin versus Hitler. That production – which I will review at some point in the future – was eventually filmed and released to theaters and on dvd. 
HORROR HEAVEN (1984) – Jorg starred as an old-fashioned Horror Movie Host introducing several horror shorts of his own making in this 24-minute project. Buttgereit structured it as a salute to Boris Karloff but with some gore thrown in. 
Regular readers of Balladeer’s Blog are familiar with my odd sense of humor. While searching for some more obscure films to watch and review, I came across this synopsis of the storyline for a 1974 Italian comedy. The movie in question is La Cugina (The Cousin), and the English translation of whatever the contributor actually wrote in Italian is … a bit garbled. Hilariously entertaining, but garbled nevertheless. 
I GO POGO (1980) – A possum for president? This stop-motion animation rendition of Walt Kelly’s iconic comic strip Pogo is, sad to say, even more aimless and unentertaining than the 1969 conventional animation show The Pogo Special Birthday Special. That IS the actual title, by the way. The approach to that half-hour cartoon special was, as the title indicates, so cloyingly cutesy that even Walt Kelly himself disliked it. 
Kelly was a master of making his political allegories blend so seamlessly into the tales of his cartoon animals that the deeper meaning would go over children’s heads as they enjoyed the antics of the Okefenokee Swamp’s denizens. For a comparison, think of how Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels was a very biting satire but the story outline is so perfect it survived as a children’s tale long after the political and social topics that Swift was writing about faded into history. 
Blame the 1969 television special and this 1980 bomb for helping to consign these brilliant cartoon figures to oblivion, even though they once rivaled the Disney Empire in merchandising. Peanuts and Winnie the Pooh had nothing on Pogo and company. 
Balladeer's Blog 