Him? (Updated)
I had a copy of The Golden Turkey Awards when I was in high school, and it was a fun little book that did its part to turn me on to the works of depraved filmmakers like Russ Meyer, Herschell Gordon Lewis and Edward D. Wood, Jr. Which is ironic since one of the two brothers who wrote the book, Michael Medved, is now basically "the conservative Christian film critic," and, as you can imagine, one of my least favorite figures in the media. Of all the crazy films listed in the book, the one that most intrigued me was Him, a gay porn film based on the life of Jesus. This was about the time that I was getting into John Waters movies, and this insanely offensive concept really appealed to me. I wanted to see the film badly, but never came across it.
The twist to this story was a disclaimer on the first page:
A Challenge To The Reader: Over 425 actual films are described in this book, but one is a complete hoax. Can you find it?
My friends and I tried to figure out which movie was the phony, and Him was of course one of the prime candidates. I argued that, while that certainly seemed like the least likely to actually exist, it didn't really seem like the authors' sense of humor. Knowing what I now know about Medved, it seems much more like something he would come up with. Besides, I really wanted to believe this film existed. The other probable suspect was a nominee in the "Worst Monster" category called something like The Creeping Terror, accompanied by a photo of a woman peaking out from under a rug, which implied that the monster was someone crawling around with a rug over their body.
Him has come up today, on Andrew Sullivan's blog. I think it may be the first time I've heard any mention of it since. Sullivan also links to this entry (from which I copied the "hoax" quote above), examining whether Him is a hoax or not. The evidence for its existence is scarce, but I lean toward The Creeping Terror being the real hoax.
UPDATE: For the last two days, for whatever reason, I had been unable to access the original article that prompted Sullivan's post. I have it now, and it obviously involves a great deal of research and scholarship, so please go read Phil Hall's Top 10 Lost Films list on Filmthreat. Him is actually not even the most tantalizing film on the list--he also discusses (heads up, Charlie!) the first werewolf movie, and a Japanese remake of King Kong from the late 30's which he refers to as "the first kaiju film." At the bottom of the list are links to previous installments, which will prove equally fascinating.
The twist to this story was a disclaimer on the first page:
A Challenge To The Reader: Over 425 actual films are described in this book, but one is a complete hoax. Can you find it?
My friends and I tried to figure out which movie was the phony, and Him was of course one of the prime candidates. I argued that, while that certainly seemed like the least likely to actually exist, it didn't really seem like the authors' sense of humor. Knowing what I now know about Medved, it seems much more like something he would come up with. Besides, I really wanted to believe this film existed. The other probable suspect was a nominee in the "Worst Monster" category called something like The Creeping Terror, accompanied by a photo of a woman peaking out from under a rug, which implied that the monster was someone crawling around with a rug over their body.
Him has come up today, on Andrew Sullivan's blog. I think it may be the first time I've heard any mention of it since. Sullivan also links to this entry (from which I copied the "hoax" quote above), examining whether Him is a hoax or not. The evidence for its existence is scarce, but I lean toward The Creeping Terror being the real hoax.
UPDATE: For the last two days, for whatever reason, I had been unable to access the original article that prompted Sullivan's post. I have it now, and it obviously involves a great deal of research and scholarship, so please go read Phil Hall's Top 10 Lost Films list on Filmthreat. Him is actually not even the most tantalizing film on the list--he also discusses (heads up, Charlie!) the first werewolf movie, and a Japanese remake of King Kong from the late 30's which he refers to as "the first kaiju film." At the bottom of the list are links to previous installments, which will prove equally fascinating.
posted by Chris Oliver at 1:36 PM
4 Comments:
"Him" is not the hoax in "The Golden Turkey Awards." Michael Medved told me (back in 1980, when the book came out) that "Dog of Norway" was the hoax in the book.
"Him" is a real film. Or it was -- it is believed to be lost. Andrew Sullivan quoted my Film Threat article on the subject, which also had a lost X-rated movie from 1970 directed by Ed Wood. Here is the original link to my article:
http://www.filmthreat.com/index.php?section=features&Id=1899
Thanks for the input. I had tried to follow the link to your article yesterday, but it wouldn't come up.
The link works -- I just checked it.
Or go to www.filmthreat.com and do a search for Lost Films.
Thanks
Rock! That sounds awesome. A shame, like many other things, it no longer exists.
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