The 1968 Exhibit: Covering 1968 - December, 2011

Night of the Living Dead, 1968

Thu, 2011-12-29 21:46 — Brian Horrigan

 


"The Nightmare that keeps on giving" 


 


On tonight's (Friday, 12/30) Turner Classic Movies lineup (1:30 am Central Time-- so it's actually on 12/31 at 1:30 am) is one of the GREAT movies from 1968:  George Romero's Night of the Living Dead.  The progenitor of an entire film library of zombie flicks (not to mention such great, if derivative, TV shows as The Walking Dead),  NOTLD is one of the six films from 1968 chosen for the prestigious National Film Registry of the Library of Congress-- awarded to films of "cultural, historic, or esthetic significance."  (The others:  Bullitt, The Producers, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Planet of the Apes, and Once Upon a Time in the West.)  


125


This blog has been to Living Dead land (i.e., Pittsburgh) before, of course-- but it's never a bad idea to pay another visit.  And you can see a clip from the movie in the 1968 Exhibit at the Minnesota History Center.  


 


To quote from the TCM website:  



"It's hard to convey just how appalled some people were when Night of the Living Dead started popping up on movie screens back in 1968.... Drive-ins and second-tier theaters were used to showing tacky movies, of course, many of which contained horrific creatures. But despite its obvious low budget, there's something very convincing about George Romero's nightmare vision of a small hamlet that's been overrun by flesh-eating zombies.


"Night of the Living Dead is one of the first horror films that refused to turn away from its own gruesomeness, and the terror it reveals can't be arrived at logically. The characters seem fated to simply live in a hell that they can't comprehend, until it breaks into their makeshift fortress and eats them alive. It's rather hard to believe, then, that this ultra-bleak vision was created by a gang of Pittsburgh-based filmmakers who normally churned out industrial films, sports coverage and local TV commercials.... 

 Night of the Living Dead remains unnerving because its black-and-white verite images look like they were recorded by accident. ... Much of Night of the Living Dead is hilarious. Let's face it, these zombies can be scared away by a burning La-Z-Boy recliner. But it can still give you a serious case of the creeps if you let it. Against all odds, a bunch of guys out in Pittsburgh, who apparently didn't know what they were doing, filmed your worst nightmare. And, as new generations of horror fans discover Night of the Living Dead, it's the nightmare that keeps on giving."


You can actually watch the whole movie online, for free, in High Definition-- but it might look a little better on your TV. 


 


 


 

The Pueblo Incident comes to an end: December 23, 1968

Thu, 2011-12-22 18:16 — Brian Horrigan

THE PUEBLO INCIDENT COMES TO AN END, 1968

Since North Korea has been much in the news this past week, it would be timely to revisit the worst single incident in the long-standing-- and continuing-- Cold War standoff between North Korea and the United States:  the infamous capture of the USS Pueblo and its crew by North Korean forces in January 1968.  (The "Great Leader" of North Korea -- aka the DPRK-- in those days was Kim il-Sung, the grandpappy of today's heir apparent, the Michael Jordan superfan, Kim Jung-un.)

124

The Pueblo, officially known as AGER-2, was built during World War II, but by 1966 had been re-purposed as a Navy intelligence-gathering vessel, with a crew of 83.  On January 23, 1968, it was doing exactly what it was supposed to be doing-- gathering intelligence on North Korea from off-shore, in what it claimed to be outside of that Communist-led country's territorial waters.  The DPRK forces thought otherwise, and chased down the US ship, issuing demands for surrender and firing its weapons.  During one salvo, one US serviceman was killed.   After frantically attempting to destroy classified documents and intelligence-gathering equipment, the Pueblo's crew surrendered, the ship was boarded by DPRK forces, and the ship was led into a North Korean port. 

The 82 men of the Pueblo, including their commander, Lloyd M. Bucher, were imprisoned and tortured for almost the entire year of 1968.  After finally submitting a forced apology and confession, the crew was released on December 23, 1968-- exactly 43 years ago.  The crew was returned, one by one, walking over the "Bridge of No Return" on the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.  

The USS Pueblo--still a commissioned ship in the US Navy-- remains in the possession of North Korea, and is, in fact, a popular museum and tourist attraction in Pyongyang--pictured above.  You can read much more about the incident here.  BETTER STILL:  Watch this segment of a terrific documentary made by North Koreans about the incident:

Vaclav Havel's 1968 visit to NYC

Mon, 2011-12-19 15:36 — Brian Horrigan

 

Vaclav Havel, the writer and intellectual who became the president of a post-Communist Czechoslovakia in 1989, has died at age 75.  You can read his obituary here.

122

Havel made his first trip to the United States in May 1968.  (This photo shows Havel in 1968, when he was 31 years old.)  He had already begun to distinguish himself  as a dissident with the publication of an article, "On the Theme of an Opposition,‚Äù which advocated the end of single-party rule, so it was somewhat surprising that the Communist regime let him out of the country.  But he was allowed to visit New York on an invitation by Joe Papp--producer of the New York Shakespeare Festival--to see the theater's production of Havel's second play, The Memorandum. 

It was the last time Havel was allowed out of the country under Communist rule.  

During the "Prague Spring," the brief period when reform Communists, led by Alexander Dubcek, believed that ‚Äúsocialism with a human face‚Äù was possible, Havel argued--correctly, as it turned out--that Communism could never be tamed.  

The reforms were brutally crushed by Soviet and Eastern bloc troops in August 1968.  

Laura Nyro, Eli and the Thirteenth Confession, released 1968

Sat, 2011-12-17 13:43 — Brian Horrigan

Last weekend, Scott Simon, host of NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday, gave a classy  on-air tribute to Laura Nyro, one of the most extraordinary singer-songwriters of the 1960s and 1970s.  "Extraordinary" in the true sense of "out of the ordinary."  There was never any one quite like her, and last week, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  Her 1968 album was Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. 

Here's how Scott concluded his essay:  "In the long, hot summer of 1968, wars overseas were blowing up at home. Protests rang in the streets. Fires and fury raged. And Laura Nyro went into a studio and sang out the passions of the times. Who does that today?"

 

118

 

Check out the link above to Scott Simon's essay and also this YouTube video of Laura Nyro at the piano--she was an amazing musician--singing her great song "Save the Country."  

 

Ramparts, May 1968: American flag cover

Sun, 2011-12-11 09:30 — Brian Horrigan

Dugald Stermer, renowned was the art director for Ramparts, the left-wing firebrand magazine of the 1960s and 1970s, has died.  You can read his obituary here.   You can also read a 2009 interview with Stermer and with Peter Richardson, author of A Bomb in Every Issue:  How the Short, Unruly Life of Ramparts Magazine Changed America.  

117

One of Stermer's finest covers for Ramparts was for the May 1968 double issue--a re-creation of an American flag as imagined by none other than Mark Twain in 1901.  For this cover, an actual cloth flag was stitched together, with red-and-black stripes and skull-and-crossbones "stars."