Day: April 7, 2020

Voting in Milwaukee

UncleScoopy

What a shit-show:

Brainscan’s Tribute to Harry Novak, Part 2: Hicksploitation

UncleScoopy

Brainscan once again takes a deep dive into the history of film nudity. In this presentation, he focuses on the exploitation master, Harry Novak, who filled the drive-ins and grindhouse theaters of America with some of their most memorable moments. All of the comments and collages below have been created by Brainscan.

We are up to the 1970’s when producer Harry Novak pretty much invented a sub-genre that has been dubbed “hicksploitation.” These were not the first exploitation films populated by a bunch of country bumpkins; they were not even the first to show a bit of skin – that honor belongs to 1939’s Child Bride – but they were the first to grab the idea by the throat.

Beginning with Tobacco Roody in 1970, Novak ran the same play he had run with Cleopatra and Romeo & Juliet. He hired a lot of attractive women, including Dixie Donovan again.

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He had the screenwriter put the beautiful women in ridiculous situations and made sure the director shot all of the women while they wore nothing. Competition with hard-core movies had begun and a few seconds of full frontal would not keep the grind house customers happy, so Harry gave them more, a whole lot more.

In fact, all you need do is look at the way Debbie Osborne

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and Wendy Winders

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pose in Tobacco to see what Novak intended.

Also naked in Tobacco Roody:

Gigi Perez

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Maxine Deville France

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Country Cuzzins, another 1970 production, is much tamer, but did have Susan Westcott.

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Here is the place to mention the original source for all the frames in these hicksploitation collages. Those who have read the Funhouse from the beginning or who have dived into the deep archives know that once upon a time, an artist named Tuna captured one movie a day, every day, for many years. He was a friend, who taught me how to do this sort of thing. And among the many great things he did was to post frames of actresses he could not identify, including those who appeared in Novak films. Well, in the time since Tuna posted his work, people have figured out the names of these previously unknown actresses. That is true for Ms. Wescott.

Novak followed with Midnite Plowboy in 1971, with Debbie Osborne again,

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but it was an actress named Christy Anna who shows the camera every square millimeter of herself.

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And he produced Southern Comforts, with a scene by Judy Angel that Sharon Stone would copy 20 years later in Basic Instinct. Well, that’s not fully accurate. Ms. Angel’s performance is Ms. Stone’s performance on steroids, huge quantities of steroids.

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In 1972, Novak did the world a great favor and cast Barbara Mills in Sweet Georgia.

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She was a slim brunette beauty who had some ability to act, and she was not the least bit shy, no she was not. But hey, if I were the male equivalent of her, I would never wear clothes.

And in 1972, he gave us Peggy Church in an immortal classic, The Pigkeeper’s Daughter.

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Ms. Church played what was the same role as the one Dixie Donovan played in Tobacco Roody, so it is no surprise she had many of the same, uh talents, as Ms. Donovan.

1973 brought us Tallie Cochrane and future pornstar Colleen Brennan in Sassy Sue

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The choice of an actress who starred in hardcore movies would be a recurring theme in the rest of Novak movies, as seen in his choices for Country Hooker (1974), the last of his hicksploitation movies. The three principal actresses,

Rene Bond,

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Maria Arnold

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and Sandy Dempsey,

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spent more time in triple X-rated films than in the softer fare that Novak produced for most of his career.

Part 1 of this series, The Sixties, can be found here.

Tomorrow: Part 3.

COVID-19 update

UncleScoopy

The stats: Coronavirus mapped and quantified.

ADDED 4/9: The USA’s # of cases held flat with the previous day (actually slightly down to 1,940 from 1,971).

The USA can be fairly compared to the “Big 5” European corona countries (France, Italy, Spain, Germany, UK), which together have a population of 323.4 million, which is almost identical to the population of the USA (327.2).

America has 435,000 corona cases, versus 575,000 for the Big 5
America has 15,000 deaths, versus 53,000 for the Big 5.
America has conducted 2.2 million tests, versus approximately 3.4 million for the Big 5.
America reported more new cases yesterday: 32,000-25,000
The Big 5 reported more new deaths yesterday: 3,100-2,000

The Big 5’s test numbers are estimated because of Spain. Worldometers has the up-to-date numbers for The UK, Germany and Italy. Worldometers has the wrong number for France, but the correct number can be calculated. France reports that 27% of their tests have been positive. Given their number of positives, they must have conducted about 418,000 tests. Nobody seems to know how many people Spain has tested, so my estimate of 600,000 for Spain is a total guess, based on assuming 25% positive tests, which is the average of France (27%) and the UK (22%).

US testing is still in the second tier. Germany has tested 15 people per 1000, Italy 13. The USA and France are about half that level. The UK lags far behind at 4 per 1000. Spain, as noted, is unknown.

UPDATED 4/9: BoJo, covid positive, still in intensive care, but now improving.

ADDED 4/8: Key coronavirus model revised downward, now predicts 60K deaths in US by August. The previous prediction from the same model was 81,000. You can find the data for your own state here. Click on “The United States of America” in green and white, and it will produce a drop-down menu of countries and states.

NOTE: this model assumes full social distancing in all 50 states until May 31, even though many states will be down to 0-2 deaths per day by May 1. I fear that many governors, seeing the numbers drop so dramatically, will rescind their stay-in-place orders, and that would create a new bump in the curve. I hope the forecasters are right in predicting a steady decline in fatalities after April 12th. That suggests we are nearly over the hump.

ADDED 4/7: This can’t be good. 51 recovered coronavirus patients test positive again in South Korea. For now, the KCDC’s director-general, Jeong Eun-kyeong, believes it is likely the infection was re-activated after remaining dormant in the patients, as opposed to them being reinfected. Either way, it strengthens fears that the contagion remains a hidden danger even after it appears to have gone — with whistleblowing Chinese doctors previously warning it is even deadlier the second time.

ADDED 4/3: “The Unemployment Rate Is Probably Around 13 Percent. It’s almost certainly at its highest level since the Great Depression.”

NEW 3/28: The data are beginning to reveal that covid-19 is much more dangerous for men. The data are consistent from country to country: men make up 72% of the intensive care unit admissions in Spain, 73% in France, 75% in Norway, 71% in the UK. While researchers cannot yet determine how much of the gender disparity can be attributed to behavioral components, it seems clear that the significance of the gap across cultures means that there must be some biological explanation.

NEW 3/28: Why is Germany’s death rate so much lower than everyone else’s? Nobody is certain. There are several possible reasons: (1) aggressive testing has identified many mild cases; (2) the average age of those infected is low – for example, it’s 46 in Germany, 63 in Italy; (3) they have a good healthcare system and an aggressive government; (4) the fatality numbers are not-apples-to-apples because other countries are routinely doing post-mortem tests on those who were not tested in life, while Germany is not. (When a corpse is tested positive, it adds to the infected total, as well as the total of those who had covid-19 and died – in effect weighing in a 100% death rate for that group.)

An MIT study, Will Coronavirus Pandemic Diminish by Summer?, suggests that 90% of transmission occurs within a narrow temperature band (37 to 63 F) and absolute humidity band. The scientists do not claim that transmission ceases outside those temperature and humidity bands, but that the spread occurs more slowly. If that holds, the Asian monsoon season, as well as the North American summer, should work against the disease.

Feb 26: “We have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better, just by, you know, even going to work. Some of them go to work, but they get better.”

Feb 26: “We’re going to be pretty soon at only five people. And we could be at just one or two people over the next short period of time..”

Feb 26: “We’re going down, not up. We’re going very substantially down, not up..”

Feb 26: “The 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”

Feb 24:

 


The Dow was at 27,960 that day. One month later it was at 18,592.