Cute Creeps From Pop Culture: Uncle Boris

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Uncle Boris

I adore Boris Karloff!!! Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, and The Mummy are three of my favourite films. Not only is the former William Henry Pratt (cousin of renowned Italian cartoonist, Hugo Pratt, by the way) deservedly famous for his convincingly horrid early screen roles,

he was able to laugh at himself and the genre later in his career, appearing in spoofs on several television variety shows and contributing to two of Monsterama's favourite animated films-- How the Grinch Stole Christmas , and Mad Monster Party .The drawing at right is, of course, by animation king Chuck Jones. Chuck Jones + Boris Karloff + Dr. Seuss = awesome. Below is a production drawing for Mad Monster Party

by the amazing Frank Frazetta. The Rankin/Bass stop-motion masterpiece is sited as a major influence on Tim Burton's puppet films, The Nightmare Before Christmas and The Corpse Bride. Rankin/Bass + Boris Karloff + Mad Magazine = also awesome. Karloff's voice was absolutely unique, and still much-imitated today when trying to invoke a creepy, mad scientist vibe. The Pitt has some really fabulous sound files of the Great Karloff and his spine-chilling lisp.

"Horror and humor have been on intimate terms at least since the time of Elisabethan and Jacobean drama. Shakespeare's darkest tragedies were leavened with a gallows wit..."

-David J. Skal The Monster Show

"Even as we deny that our flesh must decay, however, we surround ourselves with fictional images of the very fate we strive to hear nothing about. They are everywhere: in books, films, and TV, in advertising, in toys and games for all ages, in children's breakfast food. No American child (even one lucky enough to escape Count Chocula) can grow up without learning what a vampire is..."

-Walter Kendrick The Thrill Of Fear

"... through expressions such as the comical Hyakkiyagyõ emaki, an inversion occurs, and that which should not be gazed upon is rendered visible-- and gazed upon with pleasure. The unseen (unseeable) is transformed into spectacle; the mysterious spirits of untamed nature are transmuted into familiar everyday objects; terror turns into humor; pandemonium becomes parade."

- Michael Dylan Foster Pandemonium and Parade

"The horror movie asks you if you want to take a good close look at the dead cat (or the shape under the sheet, to use a metaphor from the introduction to my short story collection)... but not as an adult would look at it. Never mind the philosophical implications of death or the religious possibilities inherent in the idea of survival; the horror film suggests we just have a good close look at the physical artifact of death. Let us be children masquerading as pathologists."

-Stephen King Danse Macabre

"No one will ever love a story the way a kid loves a story, whether told in a novel or as a ghost tale furtively whispered around a campfire. That's because no adult has an imagination quite like that of a child, where monsters might be real and lurking just under the bed."

-Monica S. Kuebler Rue Morgue