John Travolta sets the recording straight.
Above is a Japanese poster for Brian De Palma's 1981 thriller Blow Out, his update of the classic British thriller Blowup. In the latter film a photographer thinks he's accidentally shot a photo of a murder, and in Blow Out a movie sound man thinks he's accidentally recorded one. And indeed he has, a political assassination actually, which brings highly connected villains out of the woodwork to engineer a cover-up. The movie stars John Travolta in his hunk incarnation, pouting his way through the twists and turns of the mystery, along with Nancy Allen as his shakedown artist sidekick. De Palma's movies often underwhelm upon release but usually age well. This is a good example. Audiences were cool toward Blow Out but it's a solid, giallo influenced thriller, wrapped in Kennedyesque conspiracy. It premiered in the U.S. in the summer of 1981 and reached Japan today in 1982 with the title ミッドナイトクロス, or Middonaito kurosu, which means “midnight cross.”
Sales of pig's blood hair conditioner plummet after high school slaughter. When Sissy Spacek starred in this adaptation of a Stephen King novel, did anyone really suspect she would go on to win an Academy Award? We don’t think so. For that matter, did anyone think John Travolta would go on years later to be nominated as well, long after his career had been given up for dead? No way. And as long as we’re on the subject, did anyone know Hollywood would eventually become so bedazzled by Stephen King that it would option even his old grocery lists into films? Not a chance. But if you did, it was today in 1976, when Carrie was unleashed on America, that you began to suspect.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1985—Theodore Sturgeon Dies
American science fiction and pulp writer Theodore Sturgeon, who pioneered a technique known as rhythmic prose, in which his text would drop into a standard poetic meter, dies from lung fibrosis, which may have been caused by his smoking, but also might have been caused by his exposure to asbestos during his years as a Merchant Marine. 1945—World War II Ends
At Reims, France, German General Alfred Jodl signs unconditional surrender terms, thus ending Germany's participation in World War II. Jodl is then arrested and transferred to the German POW camp Flensburg, and later he is made to stand before the International Military Tribunal at the Nuremberg Trials. At the conclusion of the trial, Jodl is sentenced to death and hanged as a war criminal. 1954—French Are Defeated at Dien Bien Phu
In Vietnam, the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, which had begun two months earlier, ends in a French defeat. The United States, as per the Mutual Defense Assistance Act, gave material aid to the French, but were only minimally involved in the actual battle. By 1961, however, American troops would begin arriving in droves, and within several years the U.S. would be fully embroiled in war. 1937—The Hindenburg Explodes
In the U.S, at Lakehurst, New Jersey, the German zeppelin LZ 129 Hindenburg catches fire and is incinerated within a minute while attempting to dock in windy conditions after a trans-Atlantic crossing. The disaster, which kills thirty-six people, becomes the subject of spectacular newsreel coverage, photographs, and most famously, Herbert Morrison's recorded radio eyewitness report from the landing field. But for all the witnesses and speculation, the actual cause of the fire remains unknown.
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