| Intl. Notebook | Jun 14 2023 |
You can think about it, but first you have to know what “it” is.
Stop us if you already know this. Back during the ’60s and ’70s stores that sold items related to tobacco and weed consumption were known as headshops. The hippest sectors of town—your Haight-Ashburys, Capitol Hills, and Greenwich Villages—were home to these establishments, and among the many products on offer counterculture posters were big sellers. These would be Che Guevara posters, naked-woman-smoking-a-bong posters, fluorescent black light posters, etc., genrally aimed at young male customers. Above is an example of that collectible art form. The shot was made by Dozier Mobley, who you see here. 
He was a photojournalist for the Atlanta Journal, the Associated Press, and United Press International, and later went on to work extensively with NASCAR.
He was a photojournalist for the Atlanta Journal, the Associated Press, and United Press International, and later went on to work extensively with NASCAR.The message of the poster may seem self-explanatory (most websites say it calls for revolution), but we aren't sure. While that's an understandable interpretation, we actually think, because the model is nude, this is more likely a sex-not-war, anti-Vietnam type thing aimed specifically at black buyers, who had been sent overseas in disproportionate numbers (particularly early in the war, and particularly when compared to earlier wars). The “Think About It!” tag suggests an anti-war message, we feel, as in, “Think about what you'll lose.” But we'll never know the exact meaning. It's a headshop poster. The message is up to each buyer to determine. Mobley would probably know, but he died in 2009. The model might know too, but she's unidentified, sadly. Unidentified—but unforgettable.
| Modern Pulp | May 31 2023 |
Just because she's high class doesn't mean she can't get down.
This lovely poster was made for the roman porno movie Yamanote fujin: Seiai no hibi, known in English as Uptown Lady: Days of Eros, and the star is the incomparable Izumi Shima, centerpiece of at least three dozen films for Nikkatsu Studios in a mere four years from 1977 to 1981. Here she plays the young wife of an old, blind classical dance teacher, and becomes the focus of romantic feelings from her husband's son from an earlier marriage. The two are around the same age, which is probably one reason Shima begins to have feelings too, though it's oh so very wrong. Would it be incest to boink your son-in-law? We don't know the legal ramifications, but it would certainly be a case of bad judgment. This exact type of bad judgment is of course standard territory for Nikkatsu, but under the direction of Masaru Konuma Seiai no hibi is gentler and more poetic than the usual fare. After seeing Shima receive forced enemas in other roman pornos this was a nice change.
Shima eventually gives in to her son-in-law in a hot and sweaty/oily sequence. The encounter features a sixty-nine and some pretty concentrated nipple licking by Shima that sent a ripple through our innards. Some guys don't like their nipples licked, but we think they're crazy. In our view, the nipples are a required pitstop on any excursion along the body, whatever the ultimate destination. Shima and her son-in-law have a second encounter, also of the wet and shiny variety, this time in a red-lit room, and once more it's a well shot and stimulating scene. But it's here that we must issue our standard warning to novices that roman porno is not porno—the appellation stands for “romantic porno,” and the movies are softcore, with no genitalia displayed. In order to find them stimulating, you have to use your imagination. That might be a problem for anyone under age thirty.
Anyway, for Shima's husband to not know something's going on he'd have to be blind—doh! rimshot! Read the premise again. He's a blind dance teacher. You know that cliché about the blind compensating with their other senses to the extent that they don't miss their vision at all? This movie hews to that concept. However, Shima's hubby is circumspect in marriage, if domineering as a teacher, so he doesn't let on that he knows—at first. Since Shima is not just his wife but also his star student, she has her career as a future natori to consider, and he knows that. How it eventually concludes we'll leave for you to discover on your own. We can tell you that serious roman porno enthusiasts tend to find this movie too sedate, but the less bizarre approach worked great for us. Of course, anything with Shima works great for us. Yamanote fujin: Seiai no hibi premiered in Japan today in 1980.
JapanNikkatsuUptown Lady: Days of ErosYamanote fujin: Seiai no hibiIzumi ShimaMegumi Ogawaposter artcinemapinkuroman pornosexploitationnuditymovie review
| Intl. Notebook | May 30 2023 |
Reading for pleasure takes on a new dimension.
Remember that Paul H. Oelman nude we shared a while back? We thought we'd bring him back today because he has a shot that might be of interest to people who enjoy reading, which you see above. It's titled, for obvious reasons, “Bookends.” The model here, doubled to serve as both halves of the set, is unidentified. It seems as if Oelman didn't usually bother with attributions, which is no surprise, since he worked mainly with amateurs far from the professional model-filled coasts, in the unlikely base of Cincinnati. See the other Oelman and learn a little about him here.
| Intl. Notebook | May 18 2023 |
What you learn won't be correct, but it'll at least be stimulating.
We have more tabloidy goodness for you with an issue of the venerable National Informer Reader published today in 1975. Inside is the expected sex advice and investigatory smut, but what's interesting is that by this point Reader was growing more gender inclusive by publishing photos of nude men, particularly in its personal ads section. There are about eight pages but we'll spare you most of them—neither the men nor women are what you'd call model types. But we've shared the guys from the interior stories. We even zoomed on a couple. It's only fair, considering all the naked women this publication has provided over the years. Macho-sensitives be forewarned—swinging dicks below. Even with its forays into male nudity and lesbianism, however, Reader was still mainly a heterosexual men's tabloid. Where else would you find a banner: “Do You Lust for Your Neighbor's Snatch”? We have only a few more issues to share, and while we could restock, we'll probably move on to new brands. There's no shortage of them to choose from. Twenty scans below.
| Intl. Notebook | May 18 2023 |
Lindberg unveils more than just her movie for the Cannes press corps.
The above image shot today in 1971 shows Swedish star Christina Lindberg in Cannes, France, where she was promoting her movie Exponerad at the Cannes Film Festival. She was also at the prestigious event in 1973 to promote Thriller - en grym film, aka Thriller: A Cruel Picture, so you have to give her production companies Olympic Film and BAV points for effort, even though Lindberg's movies are just arthouse sleaze when boiled down to their essence. And when your movies are not of particular merit what better way to bring attention to them than with random nudity? Shedding clothing was a go-to gimmick for Cannes starlets back when the line between mainstream and erotic film was blurrier than today.
In the first photo Lindberg is on the patio of a Cannes bar, and from her perch atop a table she stripped off everything except her panties while dozens of photographer captured her likeness and bystanders gawped at the spectacle. You can see some of assembled press in the fuzzy reverse angle at right. A bit later, on the terrace of the Majestic Hotel where she was staying, her clothes hit the tiles again, as you see below.She wasn't remotely finished. Here's her memory of a publicity stunt that set Cannes ablaze: “I was going to meet the press out on a pier over the water. After having signed about a thousand invitations, which were given out to select people, I was lowered down from a rented helicopter to the pier topless. There were hundreds of photographers.”
We find it amazing that so few photos of such an event seem to survive today. There must have been thousands of frames shot of that helicopter stunt. Lindberg's recollection of so many photographers shows you the sheer volume of imagery that's lost to time. Luckily, she's well documented anyway thanks to the photo sessions she made for various international magazines and her 1973 photo book. A few of our favorites are here, here, and here. She'll return to Pulp Intl. soon.
| Femmes Fatales | May 10 2023 |
She always wanted people to think of her as sizzling hot.
You don't see many photos like these. They were published in Playboy Italy in 1980, and feature Italian actress Maria Rosaria Omaggio, who appeared in such films as Roma a mano armata, aka The Tough Ones, and Squadra antiscippo, aka The Cop in Blue Jeans. These images are yet more imaginativeness from famed photographer Angelo Frontoni. This time he took his cue from Omaggio when she said she collected writings on witches and the occult. Playboy shared an example: The candelabrum: go at night to the place reputed to hide a treasure, carefully watching the oscillations of the flame. When the flame goes out, it will be a sign that you have the coveted treasure under your feet. Groovy.
The text goes on to note that during the Italian Renaissance, and later during the Counter-Reformation, contraception, birth control, and infertility came to be defined as witchcraft. So the eclectic Frontoni, in collaboration with Omaggio, took all that info onboard came up with this immolative concept. Don't forget, this was during an era when photographers and models generally saw nudity as an expression of freedom and power. In other words, Frontoni and Omaggio, by using nude-witch-at-the-stake imagery, were saying, “Strip away all the excuses and this is what many men really hate and fear most: women.” Heavy handed? Maybe. But very much on target, we think.
ItalyRoma a mano armataThe Tough OnesSquadra antiscippoThe Cop in Blue JeansPlayboy ItalyMaria Rosaria OmaggioAngelo Frontoninudity
| Intl. Notebook | May 8 2023 |
National Bulletin's fake cover story was unconscionable even in 1972.
This issue of National Bulletin published today in 1972 features a cover touting rapists going on strike. Do we have any doubt that this sprang from the brows of middle-aged editors with smoker's coughs, fallen arches, and no dates? As we've documented before, cheapie tabloids often trafficked in such imaginary stories. This one is akin to comedy—unamusing, tone-deaf comedy. The gist is that the head of RUFF—the Rapist's Union for Fun and Frolics—says raping women isn't fun anymore because they're too liberated and actually enjoy it. It would have been crude already in 1972 (that's why the editors did it), but these days such sentiments send a cringe through the deepest recesses of your body. The honchos at National Bulletin would, of course, say they're just riffing, yet the fact that the idea was considered by them to be viable as humor still says so much. And what it says isn't good.
So why share such items? Well, we're mainly interested in the art and graphics of old paperbacks and movie posters, and the rare photos of celebrities found in period tabloids. There are starphotos in these publications that literally don't exist online until we upload them. As lovers of old Hollywood, it's mandatory that we do so. But also, in our view, it's important to document vintage social attitudes. And here's why—after enough time passes it's easy for bad faith entities to pretend such beliefs never existed. Sharing these tabloids reminds us both of where we came from, and where we're going. In terms of promotional art and aesthetics, we believe we've ended up someplace worse than before—no matter how many book design awards are given to whichever Photoshopped covers of whatever year. Conversely, in terms of social development, we believe things are generally—despite an eddy of a few years or a decade here or there—improving.
So we're presented with divergent movement—trains traveling in opposite directions on parallel tracks during the mid-century era. On one track is excellent and commemorable visual content, and on the other is a set of social attitudes with which we tend to disagree. While it's true we could separate the art from its context, we think that's a bad practice. Many of the emails we've gotten from students, researchers, filmmakers, writers, and history buffs curious about these magazines indicate to us that without context, understanding the true characteristics of art is impossible. It'd be like looking at Picasso's “Guernica” without knowing there was such as thing as the Spanish Civil War. Yeah, it's still a great painting. But knowing its political genesis makes it more interesting. Knowledge is armor.
Bulletin moves on from the fictional rape story to offer up slightly less horrible fare in its other pages. Readers learn about lesbian communes, consensual bondage, prostitute conservationists, and sexually depraved athletes. Editors also tell readers Americans are losing the “sex race”—i.e. formerly virile men are becoming weak and impotent. If you're thinking you've heard similar masculine moaning on modern cable television, you'd be right, but the sad difference is that Bulletin's story is meant to be farce, whereas modern cable news is deadly serious about “feminization.” Accompanying the text is a photo of a woman taking the pants off a smiling wax figure of Richard Nixon. That is legitimately funny. We've enlarged it below. Feel free to spread that marvelous image far and wide. More tabloids to come.
| Intl. Notebook | Apr 30 2023 |
Because the Louvre and Versailles don't stay open late.
Above are the cover and various interior pages from Cancans de Paris issue thirty-three, which hit newsstands this month in 1966. The magazine was one of several that explored Parisian burlesque, along with Folies de Paris et de Hollywood, Paris Frou Frou, Regal, and others. For more from Cancans just click the keywords below and scroll.
| Femmes Fatales | Apr 29 2023 |
There are very few limits to how fur she'll go for fashion.
This shot of Italian actress Femi Benussi made by prolific lensman Angelo Frontoni is from a 1977 issue of Ciné-Revue, and shows her wrapped (sort of) in a fur vest, probably made of skunk, which was a trendy choice for coats at the time. Benussi appeared in more than eighty films, among them Tarzana sesso selvaggio and Nude per l'assassino, aka Strip Nude for Your Killer. At some point she became a fixture in commedie sexy all'italiane, a sub-genre of goofy titillation flicks, with humor so sophomoric you'll beg for mercy. Well, you don't have to beg to see Benussi back on Pulp Intl. There are a few more movies of hers we'd like to check out, so she'll return.
| Vintage Pulp | Apr 22 2023 |
The story's on the verge of ending badly for all of them.
The above issue of Adam once again features two men about to fall to their deaths while fighting. The magazine used this idea often, including on our last example. The art, which is probably by Jack Waugh, illustrates Eric. J. Drysdale's tale, “Ransom Double-Cross,” about a rich man whose wife is kidnapped for $200,000 ransom. He later learns that she's in on the scheme and wants to have him murdered so she can inherit everything. But you can't keep a good man down. His wife goes over a cliff, as do her two accomplices. The inside front cover of this issue is graced by Italian actress and occasional space femme Ornella Muti, while the rear cover model, just above, is familiar, but unidentified for now. We'll have more from Adam later.
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