Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 13h

The "young Republicans" of the "I love Hitler" group chat were, I guarantee, teenagers on 4chan the day Trump came down the escalator. These are the apples that have fallen not far from the tree.

8 26

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 16h

Molloy has gone on record as saying, “The Tower is bad news. It represents sudden, dramatic, catastrophic change.” The film, ironically, was very much a representation of catastrophic change for Molloy, who had never directed a feature before, and never would again. 5/5 toddalcottgraphics.etsy.com

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 16h

The story was conceived as a satire on Yuppie culture: a young couple think they’ve found the perfect investment property in an ancient tower in a remote corner of Scotland but end up living in a nightmare. 4/5

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 16h

They finally released a 90-minute version that left audiences baffled by its dangling plot threads and bizarre narrative leaps. 3/5

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 16h

...and was plagued with delays and cost overruns brought on by expensive location shooting.

Molloy’s initial “director’s cut” was over four hours long and featured a dozen different subplots. The studio deemed it unreleasable and took over post-production. 2/5

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 16h

THE TOWER (1986): The Tower never really had a chance to succeed. Written and directed by the young Terence Molloy, who had shown great promise with his visually dynamic music videos, The Tower went into production without a completed script...1/5

1 1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 17h

It took me over 40 years, but I finally realized that Big Trouble in Little China is Carpenter doing a pulp "Yellow Peril" story like Spielberg did his pulp "occult Nazis" story, somehow overlooking how those stories are all really racist.

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

As Spielberg said of Raiders of the Lost Ark, "We wanted to make a movie that was all 'good parts.'" Every Drew Struzan poster promised a movie that was "all good parts." 4/4

1 3

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

I don't think any man my age sees a Drew Struzan poster without having his pulse quicken with memories of hiding inside the mall theaters of the 1980s, lost in the movies of the "film school generation" of directors, getting my 1940s movies filtered through 1970s sensibilities. 3/4

1 3

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

I was watching Big Trouble in Little China just the other day, and finally realized that Struzan' work, and John Carpenter's, and Steven Spielberg's, and so many others from the era, is taken from the pulp artwork of the 1940s. 2/4

2 2

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

It's indicative of Drew Struzan's effect on film history that so many movies of his era strived to look like one of his posters: the saturated colors, deep shadows, sharp white sidelight. 1/4

1 4 67

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

Winters put it this way: “Justice is not here to mess around. Justice has had enough and has arrived to take her due. She may be blind, but she is not unarmed.” toddalcottgraphics.etsy.com 4/4

toddalcottgraphics.etsy.com

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

When her family is killed and eaten by mutant cannibal hillbillies, Justice, despite her disability, hunts them down and makes them pay for their crimes. 3/4

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

Justice was Horror Tarot Studio’s contribution to the genre, directed by Anna Briscoe and starring Evelyn Winters as the aptly-named title character, blind lawyer Justine Justice. 2/4

1

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 1d

JUSTICE (1978): There was a vogue in the 1970s for revenge thrillers like low-budget successes They Took My Daughter and Nun with a Gun. 1/4

1 1 3

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 2d

Calcifer is unimpressed.

1 16

Todd Alcott @toddalcott.bsky.social · 2d

The Hermit, Major Arcana No 9, The Horror Tarot:
toddalcottgraphics.etsy.com