THE OPENING MISTY BEETHOVEN BRAND NEW ARTWORK

We wanted to do something very special for this collector’s edition of The Opening of Misty Beethoven. So we commissioned a local artist, Anthony Palumbo, to create a brand new look and feel for “Misty”. Ian Culmell(creative director at 435 productions) came up with the concept and our first sketches were done in February. After many weeks of going back and forth with the artist, we settled on a gorgeous design, it captures the essence of this great film. We were fortunate to be able to follow the artist through all stages of completion, including a visit to his studio in Philadelphia. The whole process took over 3 months, and the final product speaks for itself. I am so proud of this design, and so happy we were able to connect with Anthony. We treated the box art just like every other aspect of this project, with love, with passion.

The final painting is oil on canvas and it is approx, 27 inches by 40 inches. It is an amazing piece of art!! It was easily transformed to fit into our box art, and is also used for menu creation, posters, t shirts, etc!! We also go into a bit of detail, on  the creation of the box cover and the history of the box art for “Misty” in our Behind the Scenes feature, on the upcoming , special collector’s edition 2 disc set.

Artist’s second sketch based on our concept, Late February.

Philadelphia artist, Anthony Palumbo, in front of work in progress, late April.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am proud to announce for the first time ever, the brand new box cover art for Radley Metzger’s 1975 classic, The Opening of Misty Beethoven, 2012!!

Henry Paris’ “Pamela Mann”…Behind the Scenes of a Deleted Scene

The infamous "rape" scene

Eric Edwards..a walk down mammory lane

Radley Metzger….the maestro of erotic films

Joe Sarno’s sexploitation film posters

In the early 1960′s Joe Sarno embarked on his journey into the world of sexploitation. His films were very charming and took a good looking cast and combined them with a well written plot, witty-dialog, eroticism and some great music. Many of his early films were shot exclusively for Distribpix. Some of these posters are available for sale at our official online store at www.videoxpix.com.

David Friedman – Dec 24, 1923- Feb 14, 2011

As most of you already know, legendary film maker David Friedman died on Monday. I was fortunate to get to meet Dave on several occasions, mainly when he came into NYC to meet with my father, as they were very friendly and fond of each other. My father would also travel to Alabama, and they had some good times together. The last time I saw Dave was about 8 years ago in NYC and we just started to release the old classics on DVD and it was priceless to see and hear his reaction to seeing these one time 35 mm clunkers in these mini silver disc things called DVD’s, he was having fun with it, but I do remember him taking a copy of Armand Weston’s, ‘Take Off’ with him. At the time, he was staring to lose his hearing, but was still getting around just fine. I did hear that his health had gotten worse over the past years and particularly more recently. And then on Monday, he finally passed.

Dave leaves behind a legacy of gore, exploitation, fascination, sexy shockers and he did it all with his carnival charm.

This is a picture from my father’s personal collection and I like this one, it really is a great shot.

David Friedman – Dec 24, 1923 – February 14, 2011

David Friedman 1995

Davie Friedman and Angel

An Original Armand Weston

The archive that keeps on giving……

In addition to making some of the most amazing XXX features, like Take Off and Expose Me Lovely, Armand Weston was also a very talented artist. Some of his art was used for the movie posters for classics like his Take Off and Radley Metzger’s Maraschino Cherry. In addition to having the original art for those 2 films, I recently discovered this very rare gem!!

It is an original Armand Weston oil painting on canvas, and it was used for the artwork for his 1979 horror “The Nesting”. It is in great condition with very minimal damage. The irony of the whole situation is that it was part of 4 pallets of original artwork that was going to be thrown into dumpsters, thank god it was all saved.

I wonder what I am going to find next???

Enjoy!!

The Nesting- Original artwork by Armand Weston - copyright 2011 Distribpix Inc.

 

Some Behind the Scenes Photos

In the last 2 years I have taken some extra time while going through literally thousands of slides, photos, contact sheets and negatives. Something that I have found most intriguing lately, are the abundance of ‘behind the scenes’ shots of the director and crew at work, or the actors taking a break or shots of the set, lights and film equipment. These pictures tell a story of what was going on behind the camera and without this archival material, they would never be seen. Here is a quick look at some of these rare and never before seen pictures:

Behind the scenes on the set of Armand Weston's 1979 thriller, 'The Nesting'

On the set, 1977 footage from the archives of Metzger's " Maraschino Cherry"

Behind the Scenes: Armand Weston's 1978 masterpiece, 'Take Off'', the crew is hard at work

Behind the Scenes: William Hennigar's 1968 sexploitation classic, 'Surfside Sex', notice the camera/umbrella

Behind the Scenes: Joe Sarno's 1966 Sexploitation film, 'The Bed and How to Make It", which was shot for NYC based Distribix. The film's producers are pictured in the background.

Behind the Scenes: Ron Sullivan's 1967 hit, 'Lust Weekend',which was shot for Sam Lake Enterprises, notice that a young Ron is assisting his DP

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JOHN LESLIE PASSES AWAY….ANOTHER LEGEND IS GONE

FROM AVN.com

Posted Dec 06th, 2010 08:16 AM

MILL VALLEY, Calif.—John Leslie, award-winning director and AVN Hall of Fame performer, passed away yesterday of an apparent massive heart attack at his home at the age of 65. He was discovered by his wife of 23 years, Kathleen, when she returned from grocery shopping.

His close friend Joey Silvera, who had been travelling to New York on business, returned to Northern California to be with Kathleen.

“It is with regret that the Evil Angel family announces the passing of John Leslie,” said Christian Mann, general manager of Evil Angel. “This is very shocking, sad and unexpected news. Everyone in the Evil Angel family is deeply saddened and our thoughts are with Kathleen at this difficult time.”

 

THE PASSIONS OF CAROL-PLATINUM ELITE COLLECTION-box art

Coming soon…shooting for a Christmas release!!