 Devil worshippers give politicians another harsh lesson in Constitutional law. 
The folks at the Satanic Temple have engineered a cage fight against the political establishment once again. We wrote about how they made a group of Oklahoma lawmakers look like idiots a couple of years ago. The politicians had decided to use a legal loophole to allow a Ten Commandments monument to be placed on state property, despite the fact that it violated the federal separation of church and state requirement. But the problem with loopholes is that anyone can use them if they have the time and money. Which is exactly what the Satanic Temple did when it designed a Satanist monument for the same plot of land. Needless to say, chagrined lawmakers were left with no choice but ignominious retreat and removed their religious monument.
The Satanic Temple has now taken aim at Christian prayer clubs in public schools. The organization contacted nine school districts across the country this week seeking to launch after school Satanist prayer programs. Their reasoning is the same as before—if Christian clubs are okay on state property, then by extension Satanist clubs must be fine. After all, trenchcoated loners need a place to congregate too. With the Constitution's supremacy clause giving it legal authority over states in the matter, lawmakers have to either allow all religions, including Satanists, equal access to schools after hours, or admit that they are enforcing an unconstitutional preference for Christianity.
We get that it's disconcerting to imagine Luciferian chanting in public schools at night—we've seen our share of horror movies, after all—but even so, these politicians never learn. A charitable interpretation of their folly might be that they're so blinded by belief they've forgotten their religion is just one of many in the country, and one of thousands that have existed across time, but the truth is they're worse than blind—they're deluded. Rather than accept the undeniable fact that the country's founding fathers wanted state and religion kept separate, they've convinced themselves that Jefferson, Madison, et al simply forgot to write special standing for the Christian church into the Constitution. This despite the fact that they amended the document more than ten times, and the very first of those amendments explicitly denied Christianity and all other religions special rights.
When asked for comment, Satanic Church leader Lucien Greaves took time from etching pentagrams and deflowering virgins long enough to suggest that children being threatened with eternal hellfire need the healthy alternative belief system Satanism provides. He's being disingenuous, of course—the Satanists are really just atheists with a finely honed sense of humor. The confrontation promises to be political theater of a uniquely American sort, but it will inevitably end in judicial defeat for Christian clubs. At least until they manage to write Christianity into the U.S. Constitution—not so farfetched, considering there are politicians like Arizona's Sylvia Allen publicly pondering whether her state can force citizens to attend church. Maybe the founding fathers should have taken a tip from Satan and written the Constitution in blood. That way breaking the deal would cost politicians their souls.
 Hong Kong kidnappers have problems mastering possession, and so do the filmmakers. 
If Tarantino likes it, it must be tops. At least that's the assumption some would make upon learning that 1976's Ebony, Ivory & Jade, aka She-Devils in Chains, has Tarantino's stamp of approval. Well, despite the endorsement and status as a minor classic of the blaxploitation genre, the film isn't great. It has some highlights, including confidently staged action sequences and camerawork that does seem to have influenced Tarantino. But its failings are legion—bad script, wooden acting, and heavy duty crushed black levels that make the actors almost impossible to see in the night sequences. We'll give a pass on that last problem, because it could have happened during the video or DVD transfer.
We'll admit though, this flick is damned funny in parts—unintentionally so, foremost the character Stacy's beatdown of a bad guy who morphs into a dummy at the moment she hoists him overhead and helicopter spins him through a room divider. The basic idea of the film is also appealing—Hong Kong bad guys kidnap five female track stars for ransom, unaware that two of them happen to be martial arts experts that will cause no end of trouble once they untie themselves. Playboy playmate Rosanne Katon in the lead role is also a plus. But as blaxploitation, even a discernibly elevated budget doesn't lift the film above other entries in the genre.
As a side note, the above promo poster should help put to rest any idea that apostrophe illiteracy has something to do with modern education or the internet or whatever. It has always been a problem, and we see it all the time in vintage material. This particular failure to master the possessive form is pretty egregious, though. Yes, it's attached to a movie shot in the Philippines, but the error made it all the way through a phalanx of American writers, designers, pre-press workers, printers, and producers working in the U.S. of A. at—or at least for—Lawrence Woolner's Dimension Pictures. Pretty bad. Though as we've noted in the past, sometimes apostrophe placement can be legitimately tricky. 
 Something about Paris just makes you want to dance. 
This issue of Cancans de Paris, which is number 10, hit newsstands this month in 1966 featuring cover star Virginia Litz, someone we saw a while back in Folies de Paris et de Hollywood, but modeling under the pseudonym Arabelle. Turns out Litz may be a pseudonym too, as we've determined she's also known—and better known—as Christine Aarons. She pops up inside Cancans along with Gloria Paul, Dany Carrel, Sylvia Sorrente, and Uta Levka, as well as Sean Connery and Claudine Auger, who were starring together in Thunderball. We have Virginia Litz/Christine Aarons on at least one other mid-century magazine, which we'll post a bit later. In the meantime below are assorted scans from today's issue.                          
 I love you so much, money—er, I mean honey. 
As long as we're on poster art today, here's a colorful promo for the 1947 victorian thriller Love from a Stranger, starring Sylvia Sidney and John Hodiak in an adaptation of the Agatha Christie short story “Philomel Cottage,” the second pass Hollywood had taken at the material after a 1937 version starring Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone. The movie is a cautionary example of the dangers of failing to be satisfied with a good thing when you have it. Sidney's character Cecily Harrington wins money in a lottery and instead of marrying her perfectly adequate fiancée decides to ditch him for life as a one-percenter. Cue Hodiak, a gold-digger who has already offed three previous wives and gotten away with it. He sets his sights on Cecily—and her pile of cash. She's oblivious at first, of course, but after the two marry disturbing clues start to pile up. Luckily her jilted fiancée cares enough about her wellbeing to keep a concerned eye on her from afar. Us, we'd never do that. We'd be like, “What? You get rich and then dump me for an obvious serial killer? ’kay, good luck. Have fun during your suspiciously isolated honeymoon.” Decent flick, excellent poster. Love from a Stranger V.2 premiered today in 1947.
 The bad news is I was in such a hurry I forgot my dress. The good news is I don’t care! 
This fun promo photo with American actress Nancy Kovack was made for her role in the film Sylvia. Kovack appeared in several movies and many television shows, but is mainly remembered for playing Medea in 1963’s Jason and the Argonauts, and for a guest appearance on Star Trek. The image above dates from 1965.
 Macario Gomez shows an ability to see the bigger wicker. 
 A couple of years ago we shared some posters by the Spanish artist Macario Gomez, including one rather creative effort for La mansion de la niebla, aka Murder Mansion. But commercial art isn’t always about creativity. This Gomez effort for Emmanuelle, which premiered yesterday in 1974 (and we meant to post it yesterday, except we got deeply involved in a deadly combo of beachy weather and white wine), is an almost exact reproduction of the photographed French promo poster, at right.
We say almost, because you can see that Gomez, whose distinctive signature appears at middle left on the poster, put actress Sylvia Kristel in a bigger wicker chair than in the photo. Or maybe it’s rattan. Whatever, they’re known as peacock chairs, and when they appear in promo art they’re reliable signifiers that what you’re going to get is softcore or sexploitation. They especially pop up during the 1970s and early 1980s. It might even be the same chair each time. In any case, we really like this poster from Gomez. It’s nothing more than a portrait made from a photo, true, but the final product is very nice, we think. As for the movie, we talked about it a bit way back in 2008. If you’re into romantic softcore, it’s pretty much mandatory.
 They only have eyes for you.
We were researching our recent post on fascist-era femme fatale Isa Miranda when we stumbled across fourteen sets of eyes from some of the most famous starlets of the 1930s. They were on a Brazilian fashion blog called Cajon DeSastre, now defunct, and we gather they came from a book—Fashion at the Time of Fascism—which we’d love to read if we could find a copy. Anyway, just a little eye candy for Friday.
 
 She made the world believe in the power of Kristel. 
We didn’t have the time a couple of days ago, but today we want to acknowledge the passing of Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel. She had been hospitalized for months and finally died Wednesday. Her hazy, luminous film Emmanuelle changed cinematic erotica permanently. This great shot of her dates from around 1975.
 Baker offers up a special treat.  
Carroll Baker was one of the few American actresses who gave European contemporaries like Florinda Bolkan, Sylva Koscina, Anita Strindberg, et al, a run for their money in terms of the provocative roles she played. Her first showbiz jobs were during the early 1950s as a dancer and weather girl, but she later appeared in movies such as Baby Doll (condemned by the Legion of Decency), Sylvia (famously recut to reduce the impact of a rape scene), Baba Yaga (based on an adult comic and chopped up by censors), Orgasmo (retitled Paranoia in the U.S.), and Andy Warhol’s Bad. Baker retired from acting in 2003. These shots both date from the mid-1960s.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1939—Batman Debuts
In Detective Comics #27, DC Comics publishes its second major superhero, Batman, who becomes one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and then a popular camp television series starring Adam West, and lastly a multi-million dollar movie franchise starring Michael Keaton, then George Clooney, and finally Christian Bale. 1953—Crick and Watson Publish DNA Results
British scientists James D Watson and Francis Crick publish an article detailing their discovery of the existence and structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, in Nature magazine. Their findings answer one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of biology, that of how living things reproduce themselves. 1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs
Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule's main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule's descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission. 1986—Otto Preminger Dies
Austro–Hungarian film director Otto Preminger, who directed such eternal classics as Laura, Anatomy of a Murder, Carmen Jones, The Man with the Golden Arm, and Stalag 17, and for his efforts earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, dies in New York City, aged 80, from cancer and Alzheimer's disease. 1998—James Earl Ray Dies
The convicted assassin of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., petty criminal James Earl Ray, dies in prison of hepatitis aged 70, protesting his innocence as he had for decades. Members of the King family who supported Ray's fight to clear his name believed the U.S. Government had been involved in Dr. King's killing, but with Ray's death such questions became moot.
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