In Search of Ancient Astronauts is a 1973 TV movie that’s an edited down and re-dubbed (by Rod Serling) version of a 1970 German documentary titled Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (“Chariots of the Gods”). The film explores Swiss author Erich von Däniken “paleo-contact” and “ancient astronauts” theories that space aliens landed on Earth in prehistoric times and were responsible for many of mankind’s oldest mysteries and religious myths, including Stonehenge, the Egyptian pyramids, the Nazca lines and the Moai of Easter Island.

Erich von Däniken’s books were absolutely huge best sellers throughout the 1970s, but his work has always been shunned by establishment archaeologists, historians and religious scholars. Carl Sagan referred to his work as “object lessons in sloppy thinking.”

What was not widely-known about him then is that at the time of his first book’s success, von Däniken was in prison on fraud and embezzlement charges. Over a period of twelve years von Däniken had falsified records and credit references of his employer, the Hotel Rosenhügel in Davos, Switzerland, in order to take out loans totaling $130,000 to pay for his book’s research expenses, which included world travel to exotic places. His second book, Gods from Outer Space, was written while he was in prison and with the money earned from publishing—his books sold in the millions—-he was able to pay restitution on his crimes and get out early.

And although he apparently went legit—and seems to believe what he espouses—many feel that this hotel manager cum “expert on the ancient world” is still on the make and accuse him of lying and falsifying evidence. Erich von Däniken’s theories have been debunked conclusively over and over and over again, but never mind that, von Däniken is still being taken semi-seriously to this day on TV shows like History Channel’s Ancient Aliens series.

This is what really set off the whole Erich von Däniken craze of the 1970s. In Search of Ancient Astronauts was the blueprint for producer Alan Landsburg’s long-running In Search Of… TV series narrated by Leonard Nimoy.

“This may be the most startling and controversial film you’ll ever see…”

At least it’s campy fun.
 

 
The great Italian director Federico Fellini was in the midst of production on Satyricon—his self-described “sci-fi” film that looked back at the pre-Christian Romans as if they were Martians—when he shot Fellini: A Director’s Notebook, a light-hearted quasi-documentary “introducing” himself to Americans for NBC.

It’s a testament to the times that such a thing could have been broadcast on an American network television. And it’s “a Fellini” in every way, so the project was, shall we say, already quite extraordinary to begin with. That it burst into millions of American homes for one night in 1969, as easily accessed as running water… well, wow. That takes it to a whole other level.

Fellini: A Director’s Notebook features his wife Giulietta Masina, actress Caterina Boratto, composer Nino Rota and Marcello Mastroianni (we even get a look at Mastroianni’s home). We seeing him working on the set. There are also appearances by Genius the Medium, some very Fellini-esque hippies and a variety of whimsical and eccentric characters who come into the director’s office wanting to audition for him. Fellini descends into the subways, goes to a slaughterhouse and visits the Appian Way, all the while discussing his creative search for atmosphere and the bizarre.

As with all of Fellini’s films, this boasts some of the most extraordinary faces—the faces, as he says of “real Romans”—that you’ll ever see. The master’s eye was so attuned to the smallest detail in his films, but it’s Fellini’s faces that are unique in all of cinema. Every face in this film is a work of art.
 

 
In the last 12 or so years, we’ve all become informal experts on what a post-apocalyptic world would look like.  After 28 Days Later, Shaun of the Dead, The Road, The Walking Dead, Zombieland, The Last of Us, and World War Z, we’ve all experienced enough zombie-overrun wastelands to last us, well, until the apocalypse itself.

Clearly, a lot of us are wondering how this big unwieldy ocean liner we call “civilization” is going to go down when it finally does.

Add to the list one more compelling vision of the end of modern urban society—that of James Cauty, once one of the masterminds behind The KLF and The Orb. Cauty has constructed a vast and meticulously detailed model of a significant swath of an English metropolis—certainly similar to London, if not so identified—in the throes of a society-wide meltdown, complete with a breakdown of traditional authority, a great many flashing blue police lights, and lots and lots and rubble. Cauty used miniature model-making kits, the traditional playthings of children and hobbyists everywhere. The model, at 1:87 scale, clocks in at 448 square feet—the area represented is about a square mile—and apparently features as many as 5,000 tiny little plastic police officers. Over the last two weeks (Sunday was the last day, unfortunately) the model, bearing the title “The Aftermath Dislocation Principle,” was on display at Hoxton Arches, located under the arches at Hoxton Station, on Cremer Street in London.
 

 
Partly inspired by the G20 riots of 2009 and 2010, Cauty was also fascinated by the media reportage—his chilling comment on the piece is “Nothing is quite what it seems, and yet it is exactly as it seems.” Making the work all the more sinister is that the overarching narrative is never revealed—in other words, the viewer doesn’t really know what’s going on, which forces contemplation of the individual dramas, tragedies, and victories to be found in the model but also prompts speculation that maybe this IS the modern world in which we’re living, not a projection of an imagined future.

Accompanying the huge model was a collection of several hundred mini-confrontations in a similar style, based on Cauty’s 2011 work entitled “A Riot in a Jam Jar,” consisting of a series of scale dioramas depicting violent confrontations between British rioters and police, each contained within an inverted glass jar. For £250 (about US$400) you can buy your own apocalyptic breakdown in a jam jar.

“The Aftermath Dislocation Principle, part 1”

 
via designboom
 
A whole bunch more pictures of “The Aftermath Dislocation Principle” after the jump….

 
As parliamentary voting gets going in the Czech Republic this week, artist David Cerny is sending a message to President Milos Zeman by floating a HUGE purple “f*ck you” finger on the Vltava River pointed directly at Prague Castle.

According to BBC News:

Mr Cerny has shocked and mocked politicians and public figures in the past, says the BBC’s Rob Cameron.

This latest piece is clearly his message to the leftist President Zeman and the political party recently set up by his supporters, our correspondent says.

It is unclear how long the finger will stay there; Cerny himself declined to say too much about the piece, telling reporters the gesture spoke for itself - what mattered, he said, was which way it was pointing.

Alrighty then…

 
Via Nerdcore

 
In 1985 CRL Group PLC (whoever that is) released a game for the Commodore 64 system based on the classic midnight movie The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
 

Do you wish to be the “asshole” or the “slut”?
 
In the game, the player can play as Brad or Janet. It’s a bit difficult to follow, but the task seems to be to construct a machine that will counteract the effects of the Medusa Transducer, pieces of which (and keys to open various portals) are scattered all over the castle, in order to free your partner from stone and escape the castle before it blasts off for the planet Transsexual, in the galaxy of Transylvania. The castle’s freaky denizens attempt to block your progress by stealing your clothes and your inventory (but more interestingly, your clothes—your character spends big chunks of the game “starkers”). Riff-Raff has a deadly laser gun, and Eddie can run the player over with his motorcycle, and so on.
 

Janet in the Rocky Horror castle

Considering that six years had passed since the introduction of Adventure for the Atari 2600 system (in which the player runs around a series of rooms avoiding dragon and picking up keys etc.), the gameplay of The Rocky Horror Show Computer Game is disappointingly crude.

The presence of Richard O’Brien’s name in the title—the actual name of the game appears to be “Richard O’Brien’s Rocky Horror Show Computer Game”—certainly lends the proceedings a veneer of credibility, but the slight alteration in the title prompts the speculation that perhaps this game was not officially licensed? Or maybe they were playing with the fact that since this was not a movie version, it can’t be a “picture show”?

Here’s a brief video showing some of the dysfunctional gameplay, complete with Max Von Sydow soundalike commentary:

 
This video is longer and presents a more thorough exploration of successful gameplay—however, no amusing commentary:

 
via William Caxton Fan Club (a.k.a. John Darnielle’s Tumblr)

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
70s Michael Stipe in drag at ‘Rocky Horror’
On Location With ‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show’ from 1975

 
Reddit user Irish_317 “ran across a bracelet vendor at the night market in Chiang Mai, Thailand.”

Whatever twisted, epigrammatic mind came up with these ridiculous bracelets deserves a round of applause for sheer verbal inventiveness. There are so many wonderful, mind-frying sentiments expressed here. It’s well worth looking at the whole picture in detail—it’s just so much hyper-compressed, fuck-crazy wordplay…..
 

 
There’s a demented genius at work here.

Oh—and then, apropos of nothing: “Fuck Liverpool”—all right!
 

 
Tommy Campbell shot some of the Thai bracelets and posted a video to Funny or Die. Note: A lot of these bracelets are pretty foul. You have been warned.
 

 
via reddit
 
Thanks to Mark Davis!

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Black Thai Sabbath
Mindblowing psychedelia from Thailand

 
Barnacle Bill’s Semi-Factual Nautical Tales is a fun new Australian TV series from Doug Bayne—he’s one half of the team behind the ultra-dirty, totally hilarious “Oglaf” comic—and Craig Anderson (The Elegant Gentleman’s Guide to Knife Fighting, Double the Fist). It’s “loosely” inspired by Carl Sagan’s famous Cosmos series, except that unlike the late scientist, they’ve got no budget for decent special effects and not much actual knowledge about the matters they cover.  Bayne says:

“Then I started thinking ‘I can make animations and know nothing at all about science - I’m like a profoundly ignorant Carl Sagan. I can use animation to share my ignorance with the world.’”

The duo describe their series as “an incredible voyage of discovery.”

Bayne’s “Oglaf” partner, illustrator Trudy Cooper is also involved with the production, which goes out at 11:40pm on Friday nights on ABC1. You can watch each short episode after they’ve aired on ABC’s website.
 

 
Thank you Taylor Jessen!

Hunter S. Thompson and Bill Murray from Where the Buffalo Roam.

Polaroid photographs are used by make-up artists, costume designers, props, and set designers to maintain visual continuity in films and television dramas. It doesn’t always work, as I recall one tale (probably apocryphal) told to me during the filming of the BBC’s drama Your Cheating Heart, which was written by artist John Byrne, and starred Tilda Swinton, John Gordon Sinclair and Ken Stott. In one scene, Byrne was allegedly unhappy that the set was not “messy” as he had described it in the script. Therefore, he supposedly moved props around the set to make it more convincing, in particular a yellow telephone. After lunch break, Byrne returned to the set and moved the props again. This (allegedly) happened throughout the day’s filming. The end result was apparent on screen, as the yellow telephone was visibly seen moving around the back shot in one key scene.

This is a selection of Polaroids taken for continuity or for fun on a variety of film sets from the 1960s to 2004.
 

Winona Ryder, Girl Interrupted.
 

Johnny Depp, Benny and Joon.
 

Kate Winslet and Jim Carey, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
 

Sean Young and Harrison Ford, Blade Runner.
 
More film set photos, after the jump…

 
In the August 1966, The Kinks’ Ray Davies reviewed The Beatles’ latest album, Revolver, for Disc and Music Echo Magazine. He didn’t like it. In fact he thought it was garbage, or “rubbish” as we Brits say, and that was even after listening to each track three or four times.

BEATLES and Brian Epstein were so delighted with “Eleanor Rigby” and “Yellow Submarine”, two of the tracks on the new “Revolver” LP out next Friday (August 5), that they’re also being issued a single for the same date.

But if that celebrated songwriter Ray Davies is a reliable judge, the Beatles have made a big mistake. Ray thinks Miss Rigby was definitely dedicated to John and Paul’s music teacher back in primary school; while “Submarine” should sink into a dustbin. “It’s a load of rubbish, really”, remarks Ray.

Disc and Music Echo decided to turn over the task of reviewing the Revolver album - and the Kink certainly spoke his mind.

Here’s the album, track by track, with Ray’s inter-round summaries:

Side One:

“Taxman” - “It sounds like a cross between the Who and Batman. It’s a bit limited, but the Beatles get over this by the sexy double-tracking. It’s surprising how sexy double-tracking makes a voice sound.”

“Eleanor Rigby” - “I bought a Haydn LP the other day and this sounds just like it. It’s all sort of quartet stuff and it sounds like they’re out to please music teachers in primary schools. I can imagine John saying: ‘I’m going to write this for my old schoolmistress’. Still it’s very commercial.”

“I’m Only Sleeping” - “It’s a most beautiful song, much prettier than “Eleanor Rigby”. A jolly old thing, really, and definitely the best track on the album.

“Love You Too” - “George wrote this - he must have quite a big influence on the group now. This sort of song I was doing two years ago - now I’m doing what the Beatles were doing two years ago. It’s not a bad song - it’s well performed which is always true of a Beatles track.”

“Here There and Everywhere” - “This proves that the Beatles have got good memories, because there are a lot of busy chords in it. It’s nice - like one instrument with the voice and the guitar merging. Third best track on the album.”

“Yellow Submarine” - “This is a load of rubbish, really. I take the mickey out of myself on the piano and play stuff like this. I think they know it’s not that good.”

“She Said She Said” - “This song is in to restore confidence in old Beatles sound. That’s all.”

Side Two:

“Good Day Sunshine” - “This’ll be a giant. It doesn’t force itself on you, but it stands out like “I’m Only Sleeping”. This is back to the real old Beatles. I just don’t like the electronic stuff. The Beatles were supposed to be like the boy next door only better.”

“And Your Bird Can Sing” - “Don’t like this. The song’s too predictable. It’s not a Beatles song at all.”

“Dr. Robert” - “It’s good - there’s a 12-bar beat and bits in it that are clever. Not my sort of thing, though.”

“I Want To Tell You” - “This helps the LP through though it’s not up to the Beatles standard.”

“Got To Get You Into My Life” - “Jazz backing - and it just goes to prove that Britain’s jazz musicians can’t swing. Paul’s sings better jazz than the musicians are playing which makes nonsense of people saying jazz and pop are very different. Paul sounds like Little Richard. Really, it’s the most vintage Beatles track on the LP.”

“Tomorrow Never Knows” - “Listen to all those crazy sounds! It’ll be popular in discotheques. I can imagine they had George Martin tied to a totem pole when they did this.”

So, after listening to each track three or four times, the Ray Davies verdict:

“This is the first Beatles LP I’ve really listened to in it’s entirety but I must say there are better songs on Rubber Soul. Still, “I’m Only Sleeping” is a standout. “Good Day Sunshine” is second best and I also like “Here, There and Everywhere.” But I don’t want to be harsh about the others. The balance and recording technique are as good as ever.”

There you have it…
 

 

The Beatles—‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ (Take One) Semi-Acappela.
 

The Beatles—‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ Isoalted Guitar Solo—not backwards.
 

The Beatles—‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ Partial backing tape—Isolated Drums and Bass.
 

The Beatles—‘Tomorrow Never Knows’—Tape Loops.
 

The Beatles—‘Tomorrow Never Knows’—Drums and Vocals.
 
H/T ‘The Classic Rockers Network’