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IN THE BALCONY

Where We Take A Week Off Only So The Crowd Will Appreciate It When We Return With a Michael Gross Movie

Presents  Its

Friday Night Film Depreciation Society

For December 5, 2008

Popeye, the Three Stooges, Cap'n Marvel, and the dad from Family Ties... What more couldja ask for in an evening's entertainment, eh?

CARTOON CARNIVAL

Because we were out of town the past several days, we're running a little bit behind (you can help us by coming over and taking a swig o' milk from the ol' Balcony icebox; does it taste funny to you?) so we're gonna try 'n' keep our smart-ass comments brief this week. Please, try to hold your applause.

Well, maybe this ain't the 49th best cartoon ever, but it's still a pretty good one this week as Olive Oyl operates a school for wayward boys only they won't eat their spinach, see. So she calls in a certain half-blind sailor friend of hers named Popeye to show 'em the error of their ways. Either that, or to simply beat the crap out of the tots. Strong to the Finich was directed by Dave Fleischer and released on June 29, 1934. It continues our chronological listing of Popeye cartoons, being the 12th such frolic to be produced.

INSIDE OUR SHORTS

Well, what th' heck. Lets continue our chronological listing of Three Stooges shorts, too, also with #12. Moe, Larry, and Curly are exterminators who decide to drum up a little business by planting vermin at a swank party full o' swells in Ants in the Pantry. This 2-reeler was directed by Jack White and released on February 6, 1936.

Reviewers on the Independent Movie Data Base gave this particular short a cumulative rating of 7.9, roughly equal to Gone with the Wind. Hey, I don't make up this stuff, I just report it.

SERIAL BOX

So, kids, the last time we saw Billy 'n' Betty, they'd gotten themselves all blowed up in the house of doom. Well, I'm sure Whitey can handle things fairly well by himself from here on out, right?

Say, did you know that Captain Marvel was originally intended to be called Captain Thunder? Well, he was. That got changed to "Captain Marvelous" in a story too long and boring to go into here. That got shortened to his current name, and aren't we all glad of that? In the current funnybooks, though, they can't call him "Captain Marvel" on the cover 'cause Marvel Comics would sue him so they just call him "Floyd T. Garrity, Super-Guy". No, no, no, just kidding. Sheesh. They call him "Shazam" oddly enough. Where were we? Oh, right. Billy, Betty, blowed up. This week's episode of The Adventures of Captain Marvel  is called "Boomerang" and it was released on May 30, 1941.

FEATURE FILE

While we specialize in cheap "B" movies of the '30s, '40s, and '50s for our feature entertainment, every once in a while we like to see sequels of Kevin Bacon movies that Kevin Bacon isn't in. Hence this week's world FNF premiere of Tremors 2: Aftershocks.

Those big scary underground-dwelling Graboids are back, and they're going to battle an all star cast of... uhh... Fred Ward, Helen Shaver, and Michael Gross? Well, okay, perhaps "all star cast" is a little strong. We'll just call it a cast and leave well enough alone.

We've prepared a comprehensive, in-depth and lively 10,000-word essay on the making of this film that includes a interview with the all star... with the cast and behind-the-scenes... oh, golly, look at the time. Well, we'll have to save that material for Tremors 3: Mexicans Get Eaten or whatever the hell the next sequel was called.

Tremors 2: Aftershocks was released on April 9, 1996. It was written and directed by S.S. Wilson, who also wrote Short Circuit 2, Ghost Dad, and the big-screen version of The Wild Wild West. Holy crap, what are we DOING watching this movie?!? Well, it has to be better than we're afraid it's gonna be, right? I mean, aren't sequels always better than the originals? Like Godfather II and The Dark Knight and Francis Joins the WACs?

COMING DISTRACTIONS

Next week, it's our 23rd annual Amazing Colossal Christmas Pageant Extravaganza, with holiday cartoons and shorts and a movie and all good stuff like that. Coming soon: Jerry Lewis!

Say, what th' heck IS FNF, anywayses?

A little history. The very first official Balcony Friday Night Frights (FNF) was held in September, 1986 on Staten Island, New York. Your Balcony Webmaster had just moved from Ohio with his then-wife and two sons, Weasel Gravy (age 7) and Bone Gravy (age 5) and not knowing anybody in town and not having much in the way of entertainment dollars, television and reading were the diversion of choice on most nights. Well, to make a long story short, one Friday night we found ourselves with a trio of cheap video tapes, Creature from the Black Lagoon (from a yard sale, $10), a Looney Tunes compilation (from a Manhattan street fair, $7), and a cheap two-tape set of Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (K-Mart, $13). We put together a little show with a cartoon (Robin Hood Daffy), serial chapter, and monster movie, looking to amuse the kids. Little did we know that 22 years later, we’d still be enjoying the show. Over the years, friends and family joined us, and in 1993 we introduced the first FNF Newsletter, a little weekly B&W Xeroxed publication made with a word processor and a glue stick. In 1996, we celebrated our 10th anniversary with congratulatory messages from such FNF celebrities as Kevin “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” McCarthy, Linda "The Tiger Woman" Stirling, Marla “Tarantula” Corday, and Jonathan “Little Shop of Horrors” Haze.

In 1999, we moved across this great country of ours, leaving New York City and settling in Sacramento, where the weather is better and you can turn right on a red light, and we brought FNF with us to entertain a new generation of kids, neighbors, friends, and parents. The FNF Newsletter continued, now in full color (computer science improved). Our parties generally include 4-8 kids and 6 grownups (relatively speaking) every week, and we usually serve pizza, popcorn, candy, and a variety of other treats. Traditionally, we open with a cartoon, then a serial episode, a comedy or educational short, a music video and some trailers, and then a feature attraction. The house is decorated with lobby cards and one-sheet posters from the films, too, and there are theme nights throughout the year; more on those later.

Having established the In The Balcony website in September 2005, we felt it was time to merge these two fine enterprises and begin offering an online version of the FNF Newsletter. And here we are! Remember, all Balconeers are invited to our show; bring a pizza.

In The Balcony: Fulfilling all your needs since Sept. 1, 2005. Practically all, anyway. All material (c)2005-2008 inthebalcony.com. All rights reserved. This means you, bub. And what are you doing reading this tiny print way down here, anyway? Get outta here!