His career began, he claimed, with a turn-of-the-century carnival scam, where, as the Living Hypnotic Corpse, he had allowed himself to be repeatedly buried alive in a ventilated coffin. Later, in vaudeville, he became acquainted with all the tricks of magicians' trunks and cabinets, a theme he would resurrect in picture after picture. His most famous film dealt with a perambulating Transylvanian vampire and his hiding boxes of native soil. From time immemorial boxes have symbolized secrets, the unconscious, and the occult.
And Tod Browning, perhaps more than any Hollywood director, had chosen to repeatedly exploit this symbol, while jealously guarding secrets of his own. His real name, for instance, wasn't Tod, but the professional alias couldn't have been better chosen -- in Old English, the name means "fox" or "trickster"; in German, it is the word for death. At the dead man's request, the visitor was to be permitted to spend the night and perform a final ritual.
The man, as far as anyone could remember, was called Lucky. He knew little about Browning's life in Hollywood, making his acquaintance as a house painter and drinking buddy. The box he brought with him was nothing mysterious or occult. It was a case of Coors beer. Before he died, Browning had asked Lucky to sit up with him and polish off a final batch.
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In another show of legerdemain, Browning presented himself as a "recovered" alcoholic who nonetheless consumed, quite openly, prodigious quantities of brew for the rest of his life. It was said, though never really substantiated, that he received a case a month as a perpetual personal gift from Adolph Coors -- the result of a favorable comment Browning had once made about the product to Coors himself at a racetrack, un-aware of the beer magnate's identity. Drinking, in Tod Browning's life, amounted to more than just a personal weakness; it precipi-tated two catastrophes that not only affected his own life but set in motion changes in a career that would have an outsize impact on the future of American film.
To Lucky, Tod Browning was a kindly and generous man who displayed no signs of the dark sensibility revealed in his films. He was a garrulous old man who lived on the sundrenched beach at Malibu, raised dogs and ducks, and loved nothing so much as preparing gourmet meals in his well-equipped kitchen. But to others, he was a classic Hollywood son of a bitch with a morbid streak a mile wide, who used the film medium to indulge his unhealthy obsession with physical disability and human predation.
Browning's critical reception was, and is, equally mixed. To some, he was an unassailable auteur of cinematic darkness; to others, he was a cynical hack, who mined the same thematic material over and over, not to any artistic purpose, but simply out of creative laziness. His most controversial film, Freaks , has been just as often praised as a compassionate masterpiece as it has been damned for its tasteless, exploitative excesses. One veteran executive at M-G-M, who did not want to be identified, offered the following, icy appraisal: Andrew Sarris, in , cited Browning as one of several directors who were "subjects for further research," but research materials remained maddeningly elusive, and no biography appeared, even with Browning's elevation to cult-director status with the s revival of Freaks on the art-house circuit.
Dark Carnival intends to fill the gap in the understanding of Browning and his career by drawing on dozens of unpublished interviews with the director's co-workers and friends, most now deceased, and new revelations from surviving, recently located family members and from previously untapped archives.
The secret of Japan’s mysteriously low crime rate
A good biographical subject ideally maintains a certain core of impenetrability, and Browning is no exception, but the present book should at least create a more multidimensional portrait of Browning than has ever been attempted. In a town that has traditionally worshiped fame, self-aggrandizement, and the glare of publicity, Browning's reclusive career and its dissolution amounted to one of Hollywood's most mysterious vanishing acts.
Dark Carnival , the authors hope, will shed some illumination on its methods and machinations. In October , when Tod Browning died, America was less interested in pondering the metaphors of stage magic than it was in the more tangible escape exploits of myriad tunnelers under the Berlin wall. The cold war was growing warm, and in a few short weeks the dark rite of the Cuban missile crisis would plunge Amer-ica into a collective ritual more terrifying than anything Browning had ever depicted in a film. Count Dracula's sarcophagus had long been replaced by the fallout shelter as a cultural locus of dread, and, unlike the vampire, the atom bomb didn't evaporate at dawn.
A quaintly morbid trickster forgotten in an impersonal age of mass destruction, Tod Browning vanished from this world with an intimate flourish of macabre celebration. For the dead man and his loyal friend in the Santa Monica slumber room, only one trick remained: Copyright c by David J.
Skal and Elias Savada. A Cultural History of Horror. A Cultural History of Halloween. A Norton Critical Edition. Encounters with the Undead. Mad Science and Modern Culture. A Conversation with David J. Essays on Gender, Race, and Culture. Hayes was the first American to be accepted as a personal student by Masaaki Hatsumi, the thirty-fourth master of the Togakure-ryu ninjutsu tradition.
The secret of Japan’s mysteriously low crime rate
Would you like to tell us about a lower price? If you are a seller for this product, would you like to suggest updates through seller support? Look past the legends and learn about the REAL ninjas of feudal Japan with this entertaining, illustrated ninjutsu guide. Ninjutsu, the least understood of the Japanese martial arts, is an ancient fighting style emphasizing natural movement, responsiveness to adversaries, and absolute practicality. In feudal Japan, ninja were feared for their skill in espionage and, particularly, assassination.
Masters of weaponry, stealth, and martial techniques, ninja were credited with supernatural powers because of the near-invincibility of their unique and deadly art. Hayes, reveals the secrets that lead to the perception of the ninja as warriors of almost sorcerous skill—the art of invisibility, special tools and weapons, and psychological training enabling the ninja to gain advantage in any situation.
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Hidden Techniques of Ninjutsu. The Complete Ninja Collection. The Art of the Invisible Warrior. The Grandmaster's Book of Ninja Training. Here's how restrictions apply. Review "Those trained in the art of ninjutsu are said to be able to run up trees, to cling to the ceiling and to be able to snatch a sword from the hand of a samurai as he attacks.
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I stumbled across this is at Epcot's Japan themed gift shop, of all places. It looked interesting, so I made a mental note and later picked up a used copy. I am glad I did. If you have not read much about Ninjitsu but had an interest, like myself, I would imagine this is a great place to start. The limited pictures in the book demonstrate a rough idea of many of the concepts Hayes tries to communicate to the reader.
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I suppose it would be silly to spend half a page describing a certain fighting stance and then NOT show a picture, and since this is a not a instruction manual oriented book - the pictures were a nice feature. Hayes Traditional Martial Arts gives him credibility and good footing on which to contrast the very different strategic fighting of the Ninja. I have to say, Hayes lost me a bit when he discussed some of the psuedo-spiritual and philisophical aspects of the Ninja "way".
On one hand I suppose that I WANT to buy into the mystique of such individuals able to harness unseen forces for an end goal or being on a higher level of enlightenment, but to a somewhat cynical Western perspective, it is a hard pill to swallow. Even though this book was initially published in it is still an excellent basic guide to those interested in Ninjutsu. The author was the first American to be accepted as a personal student by Masaaki Hatsumi, who is the thirty-fourth generation master of the Togakure-ryu Ninjutsu system.
This page paperback covers a basic introduction to this self-defense art. A short historical review of Ninjutsu as it applies to the past and present day training is explained. Unarmed combat techniques, weapons of the Ninja, stealth techniques and spiritual aspects are reviewed in this volume. Numerous illustrations are also included to show some of the many techniques of this interesting and effective martial art.
In conclusion, this is a very good introductory text on the art of Ninjutsu and is an excellent place to start learning about this martial art; however, like any athletic or self-defense system, you should study this book in combination with training under a certified Ninjutsu instructor to truly learn this art. Kindle Edition Verified Purchase. I read this book about 4 years ago.