Welcome To Seattle!
I grew up in Seattle – which is a beautiful city full of nice people…and yes, it rains a lot, but that’s not the point here:
Behold Seattle’s Northgate Theater!
When I was growing up in Seattle’s north end, there was a single screen movie theater attached to Northgate mall. The Northgate Theater was my home away from home…
The Northgate Theater showed first run films for years, until a renovation of the mall spelled the end to this great movie theater…
One reason I love the internet is that you can find stuff you think is long lost…for example, here is one of the many ads for the theater:
Our Moviegoing Life!
We’ve all had great times at the movies. Here is a wonderful, well behaved youngster enjoying a film…
And then…there was US at the Northgate Theater:
Midnight Madness!
Yes, I went to many movies at the Northgate theater, but it was always chaos when my friends and I headed there for one of their wild midnight movie marathons:
These vintage newspaper ad always promised lots of bloody fun…but rally, the theater was just turning over its auditorium to a lot of young, drunk kids…who would pay to see ANYTHING at that hour of the night…and how do I know? I was there almost every week!
This is an homage to those great nights, when we took over the theater and embraced our youth!
All day long, the theater showed some of the biggest hits of the day, like this one:
“Love means never having to say you’re sorry…”
And then at midnight, we’d take over to see movies that were made to appeal to teenage boys! I mean, look at the ad for this film that offers a funny take on the “Love Story” ad – because it was a decidedly NON-Love Story!
“Love means never having to say you’re ugly.”
The Abominable Dr. Phibes!
Look at these various ads:
And It’s Rated GP!
OK, these campy ads are for the classic horror film starring Vincent Price called “The Abominable Dr. Phibes”…here is the trailer:
Doctors are being murdered in a bizarre manner: bats, bees, killer frog masks, etc., which represent the nine Biblical plagues.
The crimes are orchestrated by a demented organ player with the help of his mute assistant. The detective is stumped until he finds that all of the doctors being killed assisted a Dr. Vesalius on an unsuccessful operation involving the wife of Dr. Phibes, but he couldn’t be the culprit, could he? He was killed in a car crash upon learning of his wife’s death…
This is a camp classic! Vincent Price chews up the scenery, while veteran Actor Joseph Cotton no doubt wishes he could hide on this movie poster!
Great Trivia Thanks To IMDB!
Joseph Cotten would grumble on the set that he had to remember and deliver lines, while Vincent Price’s were all to be post-dubbed. Price responded, “Yes, but I still know them, Joe.” In fact, Price was well-known in Hollywood for his ability to memorize all of the characters’ lines in a given production, not just his own.
At the end of the day, “The Abominable Dr. Phibes” was a big hit and ushered in many more Vincent Price films, like “Dr. Phibes Rises Again” and “Theater Of Blood!”
Great New DVD Set!
Just released on October 22 is a great, 6-film DVD collection of great Vincent Price films, including Dr. Phibes!
You can read all about this collection, which really is terrific, by clicking here!
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00DOZNI8Y/dvdtalk
Johnny Depp IS Dr. Phibes!
And news just broke that Johnny Depp and Director Tim Burton are teaming up again – this time to remake “Dr. Phibes!”
So, let’s see if Johnny Depp ends up putting on the Dr. Phibes makeup and turns out looking like THIS!
Leave a comment and let me know what you think!
Categories: 70's Cinema, Action Films, Books / Media, Exploitation films, Great Films, Grindhouse, Halloween, Horror films, Movies, Obscure Movies, Revenge Movies, Talent/Celebrities, Uncategorized
johnrieber 
I saw this on release too, though we were much better behaved than you and your friends, John.
I thought it was hilarious that his wife was called ‘Vulvania’, and I enjoyed the imaginative way the murders were constructed. I was about twenty years old at the time, and I never did see the sequel…
Best wishes, Pete.
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