neptunesdolphins: dolphins leaping (Default)
 
 
The movie “Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931)” ushered in the Golden Age of Classic Monsters. These movie monsters became the “trope codifiers” for future depictions of similar monsters. The website “TV Tropes” defines a trope codifier as the “template that all later uses of this trope follow or the example that has fingerprints of influence on all later examples of the trope.”
 
The Monster in “Frankenstein” (played by Boris Karloff) became known as “Frankenstein” to the general public. (The Monster was actually called “Frankenstein’s Monster.”) Make-up artist Jack Pierce developed the Monster’s look to represent an unnatural creation. The head would be flat since Frankenstein (the scientist) used a saw to cut open the skull. Clamps were placed to “hold the head together.” Pierce added bolts on the neck to represent electrodes since Frankenstein had used lightning to bring the Monster to life.
 
According to Boris Karloff, the eyes had to be heavy lidded and half-seeing. The goal was to show the Monster’s bewilderment and lack understanding. To demonstrate that the Monster was an animated corpse, Karloff used a shambling gait. Although, the Monster had been depicted earlier, Karloff’s interpretation became the standard. Even the TV comedy “The Munsters” featured Karloff’s version as Herman Munster, the father.
 
In directing his movie, James Whale explored the soldiers’ experiences of the Great War. For him, the Monster was the embodiment of the horrors and terrors of that war. The Monster’s life and death mirrored the PTSD of the veterans.
 
The last of the “Classic Movie Monsters” was “The Creature form the Black Lagoon (Jack Arnold, 1954)” In his essay “The 25 Best Classic Monster Movies,” William Bibbiani wrote “The Gill-Man (the creature) is an elegant creation who moves swiftly in the water and whose humanity is relatively in question.” According to “TV Tropes,” the Gill-Man is the most famous and imitated “fish person.” Like Frankenstein’s Monster, Gill-Man is a trope codifier.
 
The Gill-Man was based on a myth from the Amazon River Basin. A race of half-fish, half-humans were said to live deep in the region. In the movie, scientists seek this missing link from the Devonian period. The Gill-Man sees the female scientist swimming in the lagoon. He becomes obsessed with her and this seals his doom. In the last sequel, scientists implant lungs in the Gill-Man to convert him to being human. He escapes into the ocean and is believed drowned. As a tribute to the Gill-Man, Guillermo del Toro in “The Shape of Water (2017)” rewrote the story so that the creature ended up with the girl.
 
Designed by Millicent Patrick, the Gill-Man was a clawed bi-pedal amphibian. Two actors played him – Ben Chapman and Ricou Browning. On land, Chapman wore the heavier, more rigid costume, and waddled about smashing things. The Olympic swimmer, Browning swam underwater holding his breath. (Since the Gill-Man was amphibious, no air bubbles could be shown.) With Chapman shambling on land and Browning gliding underwater, the illusion of Gill-Man could be maintained.
 
In “Prehistoric Monsters: The Real and Imagined,” Allen Debus wrote “The implication is that there is a human being awaiting birth underneath the green scales and fins… In other words, Gill-Man is a terrifying manifestation of mankind’s most remote evolutionary past.” He reasoned that Gill-Man hinted at human evolution origins but chose to remain an amphibian. Now evil and primeval, the creature was more frightening since he represented the enemy within.
 
By the 1960s, the classic monsters lost their initial frightening qualities. They became more commonplace and hence more ordinary. A comedy TVseries, “The Munsters (1962-1964)” featured these monsters as a family of immigrants from Transylvania. Living in suburbia, the Munsters tried to adjust to life in America.
 
Lily Munster (played by Yvonne DeCarlo) exemplifies this level of being ordinary. As the daughter of Count Dracula, Lily is the wife of Herman (Frankenstein) and mother to Eddie (the Wolfman) and Marilyn (ordinary human). She possesses vampire qualities such as drinking blood. On sunny days, she uses a parasol. Unlike other vampires, Lily (and her father) eats regular food and sleeps at night.
 
Unlike the classic monsters, Lily is cheerful and loving. When the family needs money, she will seek work as a welder in a shipyard. However, Lily is not the typical suburban wife. She can knock a man out without trying. Gleefully, Lily vacuums to create more dust in the house. Known for her practical mind, she counterbalances her father and husband and their flights of fancy.
 
Lily, the vampire, is not threatening. To regular people, she only seems a bit odd. Lily exemplifies an immigrant’s experience rather than a monster’s one. As a foreigner, she tries to adjust to her neighbors and their cultural ways. Lily ceases to be a monster who is to be feared.
 
Works Used.
Bibbiani, William, “The 25 Best Classic Monster Movies,” Collider, 19, October 2020, https://collider.com/best-old-classic-monster-movies/.
Burns, Allan and Chris Hayward, creators. “The Munsters.” DeCarlo, Yvonne, performer. NBC and Universal Television, 1964-1966.
Burton, Nige, Classic Monsters, 2022. https://www.classic-monsters.com/.
“Creature from the Black Lagoon.” Directed by Jack Arnold, Ben Chapman as Gill-Man on land, Ricou Browning as Gill-Man underwater. Universal Pictures. 1954.
Debus, Allen, “Prehistoric Monsters: The Real and Imagined.” Jefferson (NC): McFarland. 2010.
“Frankenstein.” Directed by James Whale, Boris Karloff as the Monster, Universal Pictures. 1931.
Krinsky, Randy, “An Argument for the Uncanny: A Brief Analysis of James Whale’s ‘Frankenstein (1931).” Influx Magazine, 2022, https://influxmagazine.com/frankenstein-1931/.
Maxim, Gabiann, “Monsters and Creatures.” Summer Hill (Australia): Rockpool. 2018.
Richmond, Chris and Drew Schoentrup, TV Tropes, 2022, https://tvtropes.org/.
neptunesdolphins: dolphins leaping (Default)
 In pondering my encounters with “Living Pterosaurs” (Note 1), I discovered that some people see them while others in the same area do not. Why is that? Is viewing reality a subjective thing? Is it a matter of “if you are not looking for it, you do not see it?”
 
Jonathan David Whitcomb, who is considered the expert on “Living Pterosaurs” claims that people have been trained not to see. He explains in “The Girl Who Saw a Flying Dinosaur,” “refuse to believe in something and you will not be able to see it. In other words, if a thing is never looked for, it might never be found.”
 
People in modern western societies are inheritors of two main streams of thought. The Industrial Revolution spawned Marxism and Positivism. Steeped in economic materialism, Marxism stated that this would end the mastery of humans over their environment. Meanwhile Positivism applied the scientific method to studying society. Both movements lack a transcendental basis of truth. Moreover, they stripped the world of its inner and divine mysteries.
 
The noted occult writer, John Michael Greer offers his perspective in “Monsters.” He says that industrial society deliberately made no room for monsters. The reason for this was that monsters reveal the reality of the impossible. (Note 2.) Greer continues, “These entities have and still have, a reality that goes beyond the limits of human imagination and human psychology. For most people nowadays, such ideas would be terrifying.” By embracing rational materialism, the experience of mystery and otherness is rejected.
 
People’s actual experiences of “winged unknown beings” run counter to the world of scientific thought. (Note 3.) In reviewing people’s experiences, Lon Strickler in “Winged Cryptids” noted that people first felt fear. Furthermore, their experiences with these entities had pushed them to the edge of their capacity as humans. One witness told Strickler, “Accepting this was not easy as it negated all that I previously thought I knew.” Strickler, who maintains the “Phantoms & Monsters” blog, believed that these beings come from two worlds colliding in interdimensional reality. As evidence, he cites how people often complain of jet lag after their encounters.
 
The collection of experiences that Strickler details describes the same phenomena that Polytheists experience when encountering the Gods. The winged entities are attracted to certain persons or appear at certain times and places. Moreover, they look deeply into people’s souls. One witness reported, “And I’ll never forget the eyes. They were piercing and felt as if they looked right into my soul. It was an extremely very deep feeling.”
 
Cryptozoologists Jerome Clark and Loren Coleman wrote in “Creatures of the Outer Edge,” “Elusiveness and ambiguity seem implicit in the manifestations. They refuse to be understood.” The authors continue, “Borderland phenomena do not recognize boundaries. If we insist upon containing them, defining their territory, we are only fooling ourselves.” (This could be said of Atheists who insist that the Gods are other than what They are.) What Clark and Coleman are describing are liminal places.
 
Whitcomb reports in “Live Pterosaurs in America” about a woman in George who saw a “Living Pterosaur.” She said, “The world is now totally different. I feel blessed that God has allowed me to see this creature that should not be here.” For her, the world is now filled with wonder.
 
My experiences with “Living Pterosaurs” left me filled with awe and fear. I did feel in the presence of something otherworldly. Even though, I was young, I still ponder my experience. It remains a mystery for me to keep.
 
Notes:
Note 1. “Living Pterosaur” is put into scare quotes because the creature is not supposed to exist.
 
Note 2. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries, said, “When you eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”
 
Note 3. Doyle also noted “Our ideas must be as broad of Nature if they are to interpret Nature.”
 

Profile

neptunesdolphins: dolphins leaping (Default)
neptunesdolphins

July 2025

S M T W T F S
  1 234 5
6 789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 8th, 2025 12:21 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios