Today, we will watch the conclusion of Rebel Without a Cause. Your character sheets are due at the end of the period, as well as your Drive-in Theatre homework.
After the film: read, watch, and post a response to this post in 2-3 paragraphs or so about the clips and information you learn about William Castle (see below). This is due at the end of class.
With remaining time, please work on your fiction film project.
The Wonderful World of William Castle
Competing with a growing television audience, filmmakers in the 1950's had to entice viewers into seeing their films. The worse the film, the greater the need for effective trailers. Of the best promoters of his directing and producing work, William Castle shines over all others. See why below!
William Schloss was born in New York City. Schloss means "castle" in German, and William Castle probably chose to translate his surname into English to avoid the discrimination often encountered by Jewish entertainers of his time. He spent most of his teenage years working on Broadway in a number of jobs. He left for Hollywood at the age of 23, going on to direct his first film when he was 29. He also worked an as assistant to Orson Welles, doing much of the location work for Welles' noir film, The Lady from Shanghai.
Castle was famous for directing low budget B-films with many overly promoted gimmicks. Five of these were scripted by adventure novelist Robb White.
After a long career, William Castle died of a heart attack in Los Angeles in 1977.
His films include:
Macabre (1958): A certificate for a $1,000 life insurance policy from Lloyd's of London was given to each customer in case he/she should die of fright during the film. Showings also had fake nurses stationed in the lobbies and hearses parked outside the theater.
Utube clip: Macabre:
House on Haunted Hill (1959): Filmed in "Emergo". An inflatable glow in the dark skeleton attached to a wire floated over the audience during the final moments of some showings of the film to parallel the action on the screen when a skeleton arose from a vat of acid and pursued the villainous wife of Vincent Price. The gimmick did not always instill fright; sometimes the skeleton became a target for some audience members who hurled candy boxes, soda cups or any other objects at hand at the skeleton.
The Tingler (1959): Filmed in "Percepto". Some seats in theatres showing the Tingler were equipped with larger versions of the hand-held joy buzzers attached to the underside of the seats. When the Tingler in the film attacked the audience the buzzers were activated as a voice encouraged the real audience to "Scream - scream for your lives."
13 Ghosts (1960): Filmed in "Illusion-O". A hand held ghost viewer/remover with strips of red and blue cellophane was given out to use during certain segments of the film. By looking through either the red or blue cellophane the audience was able to either see or remove the ghosts if they were too frightening. 13 Ghosts.
Homicidal (1961): This film contained a "Fright break" with a 45 second timer overlaid over the film's climax as the heroine approached a house harboring a sadistic killer. A voiceover advised the audience of the time remaining in which they could leave the theatre and receive a full refund if they were too frightened to see the remainder of the film. About 1% demanded refunds, but were subjected to demasculation and called "cowards". Homicidal clip.
Mr. Sardonicus (1961): The audiences were allowed to vote in a "punishment poll" during the climax of the film - Castle appears on screen to explain to the audience their options. Each member of the audience was given a card with a glow in the dark thumb they could hold either up or down to decide if Mr. Sardonicus would be cured or die during the end of the film. Supposedly, no audience ever offered mercy so the alternate ending was never screened.
Zotz! (1962): Each patron was given a "Magic" (gold colored plastic) coin which looked nice, but did absolutely nothing.
Strait-Jacket (1964): Castle had cardboard axes made and handed out to patrons. This film, by the way, starred Oscar winner (not for this film) Joan Crawford - Mommy Dearest herself.
I Saw What You Did (1965): Seat belts were installed to keep patrons from being jolted from their chairs in fright.
Other film trailers from William Castle:
The Old Dark House (designed by Charles Addams: the illustrator/writer who created "The Addams Family")
The Night Walker
Let's Kill Uncle
Thirteen Frightened Girls
William Castle acted as producer to Roman Polanski's direction of:
Rosemary's Baby
The film remains one of the most artistic Castle productions ever made. Clip here.
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William Castle helped combat the television audience by largely promoting his own productions. He used gimmicks very frequently to attract moviegoers to his films, most of which were horror pictures. Examples include “magic,” “under-the-seat joy buzzers for “tingle,” “Illusion-O,” “Freight-Breaks,” and seat belts. Aside from a couple more creative works, including his production of Rosemary’s Baby, most of Castle’s films were these low budget B-pictures.
Shana Harris
I think that William Caste was one of the best film makers of all time, looking at some of his films. When I was viewing his films I found them very intresting and I enjoyed all of them. This flims are something that i believe I can see myself watching. It seems like William made many horror films. I think that he was the first director that brought about horror films, and he did them very well. Even though William had low budget films made, they still showed great and behind them they had a lot of meaning. I will enjoy watching his films! I hope we do!
Alicia G.
William Castle had very low buget films, you can compare them from then and now and tell that they are very didn't. One thing that seemed interesting about William Castle films were that his films seemed so surreal that would happen if ghost exist then the same played out horror films now. You can tell Castle was great when many of his films were remade, but very similar. I know that from my view these mores were right on awesome, when you can make a movie with seatbelts and cardboard props and still get away with having some great films.
With the emergence of television, movie theatres tried a series of new gimmicks in order to draw people from their comfortable living rooms and into movie theatres. Some of these gimmicks included smell-o-vision, a system that released orders during a film screening and cinemascope a lens that was used in order to produce widescreen movies. However, when smell-o-vision proved to be unsuccessful and cinemascope not too exciting, a man by the name of William Castle began to design his own types of gimmicks.
A number of Castle's films were marketed using these gimmicks. In trailers scripted by writer Robb White, Castle would let his audience in on the surprises to come when watching his movies. From 'emergo' to seat belts Castle was determined to increase the amount of viewers that came to see his films. One of the most interesting gimmick was the cardboard ax that was handed out to audience members before the movie started. While there is no exact reason why Castle had this done, gimmicks such as this were interesting and were sure to attract many audience members.
In conclusion, Castle was a very brilliant man. He knew how to attract viewers to the theaters and get them to keep coming back. While his gimmicks sometimes served no real purpose, he still tried his best to steal viewers away from their television sets.
William Castle appears to have been not only a prolific filmmaker, but also a skillful entrepreneur. He clearly understood his audience and drew them in with gimmicks like $1,000 insurance policies for audience members who died of fright, "Emergo," "Percepto," "Illusion-O," and many other tactics. The movies themselves are mostly horror, which lend themselves well to these gimmicks. The films feature lots of action, suspense, and terrified, screaming female leads. These films and their unusual promotions might seem a little tacky to today's audience, but at the time, it was probably quite a thrilling experience.
Absent
William Castle used his gimmicks to help promote his own productions and help create an increase in attendance at movie theaters, expecially his. He would use props and seatbelts to make the movie going experience more unique and interesting.
Most of Castle's films were thrillers which increased their popularity. Castle used techniques such as "illusion-o" "Fright Break" and "Emergo" in his productions. These gimmicks were in almost every case completley useless and held no real purpose but they made things fun for the audience and kept people coming back. This made his productions big hits at that time, even though the films were often low-budget films. A few of his films were even remade recently because of their success.
William Castle used gimmicks in order to attract audiences to his films and to combat the growing television audiences. His movies, which were mostly horror and suspense, were usually B-films but drew attention because of their gimmicky nature. The trailers for these films often featured scenes in which special effects were utilized and often left the viewer in suspense, wanting to know what happens in the full-length film. It was these gimmicks that allowed William Castle's B-films to be successful.
(late because our group was filming during class)
William Castle was able to keep some popularity in movies when it seemed as though TV were taking over that sort of "watchable" media through his extensive use of gimmicks that gave the audience member the impression that they were part of his b-movie horror films. Although clips of his films on youtube are (unfortunately) not equipped with the same techniques he was known for (i.e., the "punishment poll" that could determine an alternate ending of Mr. Sardonicus), Castle still had the cheap horror in all of his films that could attract audiences even without gimmicks.
William Castle was certainly an entrepreneur ahead of his time. He not only produced many B-films on relatively low budget that proceeded to make plenty of money, but he also developed many gimmicks that drew people to the theatre because they were so intrigued. For instance, one of his films, Macabre (1958) had a certificate for a $1,000 life insurance policy should any audience member die of fright while viewing the film. He pulled many other stunts such as convincing people that screaming was the only way to prevent an attack by the tingler. Overall, he was a skilled businessman with a flair for the dramatic which helped him hugely, and jump started his success, making him a legend in B-movies.
William Castle was able to come up with new gimmicks to bring people to the theatre. While these gimmicks primiarily promoted his own films, it drew people to the theatre instead of staying at home to watch television. William Castle's films were obviously low budget films and the acting/sets/staging were not of high quality but it provided entertainment for people and gave people what they wanted. Castle understood what his audience was looking for and used this to his advantage in getting an large audience and making money.
William Castle is primarily known for horror films which is very apparent in this selection of clips. While the movies don't seem scary because of their low quality and cheap tricks, they were still entertaining and served their purpose very effectively. William Castle's films show the concept of B-movies very well.
William Castle the director of a lot of B-Films. His films were clearly low budget and poorly acted. Perhaps it's the gap in generations that keep teens like me from being in awe of the film. Still, the actors put way to much energy into the characters and the theatre used cheezy techniques to make the films more scary like the glasses that make the ghosts appear and disappear. They were dumb films and maybe people knew that back then. All i can say is...O_o Really?
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