NoirCon

Noir: Señor Flatfoot

2012-02-14T19:36:00.000-05:00

N.Y.: Frank A Munsey Company / Argosy Weekly Pulp Magazine, Volume 296, # 5. February 3, 1940, 1st Edition, 1st Printing, 1940. Pulp. Book Condition: Good. Marshall Frantz Cover Art and Frontispiece (illustrator).

Noir: A Bunny Bashing?

2012-02-13T16:52:00.001-05:00

There’s Hef, ruining another perfectly good shot. (Photos by Erik Kabik | Retna)

Hugh Hefner's oldest son was arrested on Sunday night for allegedly attacking the 2011 Playmate of the Year and his girlfriend, Claire Sinclair.

Sources told the entertainment website that Marston Hefner punched and kicked Sinclair, leaving her with bruises and red marks. Cops showed up after Sinclair called family members, who called 911.

Hefner denies that he ever hit her. He was released on $20,000 bail a few hours after his arrest.

The 20-year-old Playmate has been dating Marston on and off since August 2010, TMZ reported.

Sinclair earned the legendary 52nd Playmate of the Year title at just 19. Hugh Hefner said that her style reminded him of Bettie Page, the famous 1950s pinup model, Fox News reported.

Noir: R.I.P. Philip Bruns

2012-02-13T10:34:00.000-05:00

Philip Bruns, 80, who played the father on the 1970s comedy series Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, died Wednesday in Los Angeles of natural causes.

Mr. Bruns appeared on two seasons of the show, playing Mary's father on the soap-opera parody. He also spent three years with Jackie Gleason on his comedy-variety show in the mid-1960s.

Born in Pipestone, Minn., Mr. Bruns attended Yale University's drama school, then began his career in New York on the stage and as a prolific actor in TV commercials.

He later went to Los Angeles, appearing in more than 40 feature films, including Flashdance, The Stunt Man, and My Favorite Year.

Mr. Bruns is survived by his wife, actress Laurie Franks.

Noir: Nazi Invasion From Space!

2012-02-13T09:43:00.000-05:00

The Nazis Are Coming. April 4th!

"Iron Sky", a B-movie spoof drawing the crowds at the 11-day event in the German capital, imagines that Hitler's surviving henchmen set up a lunar colony after the fall of the regime in 1945, biding their time to strike back.

The opportunity comes in 2018 when a US astronaut exploring the dark side of the moon comes face to face with a Nazi soldier clad in a black uniform and a breathing mask. The intergalactic farce produced mainly in Finland pits the would-be Fourth Reich against an America led by a Sarah Palin double, who is seen incessantly jogging in the Oval Office. The space Nazis use airships shaped like Zeppelin dirigibles and a giant craft called "Twilight of the Gods" to launch a batty Blitzkrieg, while an Earth-based coalition of the willing deploys a navy cruiser called the USS George W. Bush.

Noir: Texas Chain Saw Rage - Endyke Style

2012-02-13T09:22:00.001-05:00

Surveillance footage has surfaced of a chainsaw-wielding thug attacking pub patrons at a UK bar last year -- all because he wasn't allowed to smoke inside.

Dean Dinnen, 24, was arrested in August after he entered The Endyke Pub in Hull with a chainsaw, threatening customers and obliterating every object in his path.

The video shows Dinnen -- who was boozed up and on drugs at the time -- waltz casually into the pub, flailing his weapon and holding it near patrons' faces. He was looking for a man who had thrown him out for lighting a cigarette inside the pub, despite a smoking ban in the area.

Bar patrons armed themselves with kegs, pool cues and barstools, flinging them at Dinnen from a distance. He ripped open the arm of Adrian Pryor, 32, with the chainsaw, but realized during the melee that the guy he was actually looking for had already left.

Noir: Merle Miller - A Legacy Of Literature

2012-02-12T14:50:00.000-05:00

Noir: Opus Dei strikes Philadelphia!

2012-02-11T07:14:00.000-05:00

Montgomery County District Attorney asked the county coroner to examine the body of Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua last week because the timing of the 88-year-old prelate's death struck her as "peculiar." Prosecutors had asked him to examine the body "to make sure there were no intervening events that could have speeded up" the cardinal's death.
The cardinal died one day after a Philadelphia judge said Bevilacqua could be called to testify at the child sex-abuse and endangerment trial of three current and former priests.

"It struck many of us as odd, as peculiar, that the cardinal passed away so suddenly after the court ruling. . . . I just thought that someone should make sure that nothing happened that was inappropriate."

Bevilacqua died shortly after 9 p.m. Jan. 31 at his residence at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Wynnewood, just outside the city limits. He had been in declining health since his 2003 retirement as the leader of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Lawyers and church officials said he suffered from cancer, dementia, and other ailments.

Hoffman has deferred declaring a cause of death. He said he did not conduct a full autopsy, but declined to elaborate.

One of Bevilacqua's top aides, Msgr. William J. Lynn, faces trial in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court next month on child-endangerment charges, having allegedly recommended sexually abusive priests for assignments that gave them access to minors. As secretary for clergy, Lynn was responsible for reviewing abuse allegations and recommending treatment or placements for accused priests.

Bevilacqua was not charged in the case, but had become a central witness.

In November, Judge M. Teresa Sarmina declared the cardinal competent and let prosecutors from the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office question him during a closed hearing at the seminary. The assistant district attorneys cited Bevilacqua's frail health as one reason they wanted to preserve his testimony on videotape before the trial.

After the cardinal died, his body was transferred to Donohue Funeral Home in Upper Darby.

The body was already embalmed, but Hofman said embalming would not interfere with his exam. The body was returned to the funeral home that day.

Bevilacqua was entombed Tuesday in a crypt at the Cathedral Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul.

Noir: Lineal Consanguinity and $100 Million Dollars

2012-02-10T09:32:00.000-05:00

Oh my son's my son till he gets him a wife,

But my daughter's my daughter all her life.

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik, Young and Old

But my daughter can be my mistress as long as she has access to hundreds of millions of my dollars! John Goodman, JBG Children's Trust

Mr. Goodman is presently a defendant in a civil wrongful death lawsuit in Florida that arose out of a car wreck that occurred in 2010. In February 2011, Mr. Goodman allegedly ran a stop sign, struck another car and killed the driver, Scott Wilson. When arrested Mr. Goodman had a blood alcohol level more than twice as high as the legal limit for driving while intoxicated in Florida.

Mr. Goodman is a very wealthy man. In 1991 Mr. Goodman created the JBG Children's Trust and made a cash gift of just over $1.5 million to that trust. That trust is for the benefit of Mr. Goodman's descendants. Thanks to shrewd investments made by the trustee the trust grew in value to more than $100 million during its first 7 years and today is worth several hundred million. According to Mr. Bachi, none of the trust assets is available to the plaintiffs in the civil action since the trust was set up years before the drunk driving incident and Mr. Goodman is not a beneficiary of the trust.

In 2009 Mr. Goodman began a relationship with Heather Laruso Hutchins. That relationship gave Mr. Goodman so much pleasure that he wanted to strengthen it. One way he could have done that would have been to marry Ms. Hutchins, a step often taken by people who, during an affair, decide to make a more permanent commitment to each other. Mr. Goodman, however, had already been in a marriage that ended in divorce and did not want to risk that a second time. And this is where the clever estate planning technique comes in. He adopted Ms. Hutchins, who was then 42 years of age, as his daughter.

The JBG Trust is said to be for the benefit of Mr. Goodman's descendants. When it was created, he had two minor children and they were the only trust beneficiaries. By adopting his mistress, she became his child and is now entitled to distributions from the trust just as Mr. Goodman's other children are. Ms. Hutchins will presumably continue to live with Mr. Goodman, and he will now probably have the benefit of her share of any distributions made to beneficiaries of the trust since a dutiful daughter would certainly share with him if her father needed help.

Ms. Hitchens signed an agreement with Mr. Goodman that is not customary in an adoption. I

Mr. Goodman probably assumes that no one is going to invoke Florida Statute 826.04.

Whoever knowingly marries or has sexual intercourse with a person to whom he or she is related by lineal consanguinity, or a brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew, or niece, commits incest, which constitutes a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s.775.083, or s. 775.084. "Sexual intercourse" is the penetration of the female sex organ by the male sex organ, however slight; emission of semen is not required.

s. 47, ch. 74-383; s. 30, ch. 75-298; s. 1281, ch. 97-10

That statute says that anyone engaging in sexual intercourse with someone related by "lineal consanguinity" is guilty of a felony of the third degree. It is impossible to know whether Mr. Goodman and Ms. Huthins are now engaged in a meretricious relationship or whether they have assumed a more typical father-daughter relationship. If the former, Mr. Goodman may soon find a charge of incest added to the other criminal charges now facing him. That is probably the least of his worries.

(Hugh Hefner may wish that Mr. Bachi had been his lawyer. On June 16, 2011, his 25-year-old fiancée, Crystal Harris, called off their wedding 5 days before the eagerly awaited event. Had Mr. Bachi been his lawyer, he might have suggested that Hugh adopt Crystal. That would have enabled them to maintain the close relationship they had theretofore enjoyed without limiting her ability to enjoy other male companionship of the non-father daughter variety.)

Noir: Hanah Arendt's Banality Of Evil is alive and well in Missouri

2012-02-09T13:13:00.002-05:00

The teenage who killed her nine-year-old neighbor in October 2009 now knows her fate.

Judge Pat Joyce Wednesday morning sentenced Alyssa Bustamante to life in prison, plus 30 years for
armed criminal action, both have the possibility of parole.

Cole County Prosecuting Attorney, Mark Richardson said, “I believe that judge Joyce’s sentence was ajust sentence and in this case it serves the ends of justice." Alyssa's public defenders called her sentence "harsh", but are relieved there's a possibility of parole.

The defense argued Alyssa’s troubled childhood with parents who abused drugs and frequently left Alyssa alone caused an emotionally disturbed child. Don Catlett said, "A severely, mentally disturbed child who was facing a great deal of vulnerabilities and was struggling with depression."

The prosecution pointed out even with a mental illness; Alyssa, as a 15-year-old, knew right from wrong and knew what she was doing when she dug a grave days before the homicide and lured Elizabeth into the woods, by telling her she had a surprise.

Of the armed criminal action sentence, by law she's required to serve 33 percent before eligible for parole. That means the minimum Alyssa would serve is about 35 years, but if parole isn't granted could spend the rest of her life behind bars.

An Olten family spokesperson said this: "The sentencing process was extremely difficult for the family, as no sentence can adequately punish this heinous crime.

Noir: Strip Mining and Surface Mining Are Awesome For The Environment

2012-02-08T21:05:00.000-05:00

Gone baby Gone.

NEW USES FOR GOOD EARTH! (1960s)
Comic book for strip and surface mining. Published by the Mined-Land Conservation Conference.

Noir: R.I.P. Eugen Carl "Bo" Baynes and His Victims

2012-02-08T09:17:00.000-05:00

The Black Mafia is one of the bloodiest crime syndicates in modern US history. From its roots in Philadelphia’s ghettos in the 1960’s, it grew from a rabble of street toughs to a disciplined, ruthless organization based on fear and intimidation. Known in its “legitimate” guise as Black Brothers Inc, it held regular meetings, appointed investigators, treasurers and enforcers, and controlled drug dealing, loan-sharking, numbers rackets, armed robbery and extortion. Its ferocious crew of gunmen was led by Sam Christian, the most feared man on Philly’s streets. They developed close ties with the influential Nation of Islam and soon were executing rivals, extorting bookies connected to the city’s powerful Cosa Nostra crew, and cowing local gangs. Police say the Black Mafia was responsible for over forty killings, the most chilling being the massacre of two adults and five children in a feud between rival religious factions. Despite the arrests that followed, they continued their rampage, exploiting their ties to prominent lawyers and civil rights leaders. Convictions and sentences eventually shattered their strength—only for the crack-dealing Junior Black Mafia to emerge in their wake.

JANAZAH prayers will be said at 1 p.m. today for Eugene Carl "Bo" Baynes, a founder of the Black Mafia who died Saturday at age 73.

The service will be held in the Philadelphia Masjid, at 47th Street and Wyalusing Avenue.

According to law-enforcement files, Baynes joined with Sam Christian, Ronald Harvey, Robert "Nudie" Mims, Roosevelt "Spooks" Fitzgerald and others in the early '70s to create a criminal enterprise called Black Incorporated, which became known as the Black Mafia.

Baynes and other members of the gang were tried in 1974 on federal charges of drug-dealing, gun-trafficking and murder. Baynes was sentenced to 27 years in prison.

Bo Baynes had a varied background. He appeared as himself in the TV series "American Gangster" in 2006, and he was ostensibly the road manager for the popular singing group the Delfonics.

Sean Patrick Griffin, author of Black Brothers Inc.: The Violent Rise and Fall of Philadelphia's Black Mafia, wrote that Baynes worked for Philly Groove Records, which recorded the Delfonics. A Philadelphia Police organized-crime unit memo stated that Baynes' real job with Philly Groove was as an enforcer, hired to intimidate disc jockeys into playing the group's records.

Eugene Carl Baynes was born in Philadelphia and worked for a time as a city street-sweeper, a bartender and bar manager. He and his wife, Jacqueline, purchased a food market on South 56th Street, and later a variety store.

In June 1973, the organized-crime unit received word that a group of men had formed an organized-crime syndicate called Black Incorporated and that Baynes was one of the leaders.

Although Baynes was a founder of the Black Mafia, "Bo was more than that to many. From a father figure to many, big homie, teacher, worked with the Delfonics," Richard "Philly" Smith, of Elite Society Models wrote on his website, "Sophisticated Ignorance. "The big homie will truly be missed."

Burial will be in Rolling Green Memorial Park, West Chester.

These are the names of the identified victims who were murdered by the Black Mafia. This list is in chronological order.

Name	Date	Known Circumstances
Nathaniel "Rock and Roll" Williams	1969	Murdered on the street after setting up a crap game for the Black Mafia and then robbing it.
Shane Albert	1971	Janitor shot during the Black Mafia's robbery of the Dubrow furniture store.
Wardell Green	1971	Shot by Black Mafia member, Russell Barnes, for unknown reasons.
Velma Green	1971	Shot to death answering her door a week before she was to testify against Russell Barnes in her brother Wardell's murder.
Richard "Red Paul" Harris	1972	Shot in a bar at 17th and Dauphin sts. in North Philadelphia for cheating James "P.I." Smith, on a narcotics deal.
James "P.I." Smith	1972	Shot in a parking lot at 3700 Brown St. in Philadelphia for cheating Tyrone "Fat Ty" Palmer on the Richard "Red Paul" Harris narcotics deal.
Tyrone "Fat Ty" Palmer, "Mr. Millionnare"	1972	Shot to death by Samuel Christian in Atlantic City's Club Harlem for drug related reasons involving both the Harris and Smith murders.
Gilbert Satterwhite	1972	Shot to death with Palmer while serving as his bodyguard.
James Boatright	1972	Shot to death in South Philadelphia for unknown reasons.
Seven Hanafi Muslims	1973	Shot or drowned in a bathtub by seven Black Mafia affiliates stemming from an ideological dispute with Black Muslims.
Major "The Maje" Coxson	1973	Shot in his home at Cherry Hill, New Jersey home by Ronald Harvey and other Black Mafia members for owing $200,000 from a botched heroin deal.
Charles Cooper	1973	Shot to death with two other women in a West Philadelphia apartment by Russell Barnes, through a contract by the Black Muslims and the Black Mafia.
Lita Luby	1973	Shot along with her common-law father, Major Coxson.
Hilton Stroud	1973	Shot in Camden, New Jersey, for intercepting a drug shipment originally destined for Bo Baynes.
Walter Tillman	1973	Shot in Camden, New Jersey, for intercepting a drug shipment originally destined for Bo Baynes.
Thomas "Cadillac Tommy" Farrington	1973	Shot to death by Charles Russell, under contract by George "Bo" Abney, over a drug territory dispute.
Robert James	1973	Shot near his home for an unknown reason.
Joseph Borisch	1973	Shot in his home at Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, for an unknown reason.
John Clark	1973	Shot in Camden, New Jersey, for his involvement in a community group which was actually a Black Mafia front.
George "Bo" Abney	1974	Decapitated after the Black Mafia put out a hit on him for skimming narcotics proceeds from Thomas "Cadillac Tommy" Farrington's former drug distribution network.
Jeremiah Middleton	1974	Shot at 19th & Carpenter Sts. by Clarence Starks.
James Henry "Bubbles" Price	1974	Tortured and hanged in prison for turning states evidence against the Black Mafia in the Hanafi murder case. The rumor that Price had turned states evidence was started by the authorities in an effort to force his cooperation.
Herschell "Jolly Green Giant" Williams	1975	Shot by Jo-Jo Rhone and Roy Hoskins in a drug related dispute.
James Hadley	1976	Shot at 20th & Pierce Sts. by Jo-Jo Rhone over a dispute.
Louis Gruby	1976	Executed in his home for testifying against the Black Mafia in the Dubrow furniture store robbery case.
Yetta Gruby	1976	Executed with Louis in their home.
Barry Kelly	1980	Killed in retaliation for his father's incriminating testimony in a robbery/kidnapping case.
Frederick Armour	1980	Shot by Larris "Tank" Frazier over a territorial dispute in the Richard Allen Projects.

Noir: R.I.P. Florence Green

2012-02-08T08:53:00.002-05:00

A woman thought to be the world's last known surviving service member of World War I has died aged 110.

Florence Green, from King's Lynn, Norfolk, served as a mess steward at RAF bases in Marham and Narborough.

She died in her sleep on Saturday night at Briar House care home, King's Lynn. Mrs Green had been due to celebrate her 111th birthday on 19 February.

The 110-year-old had been at the care home since the end of November. She previously lived in King's Lynn with her daughter May, aged 90.

Born in London before moving to Norfolk, Mrs Green was 17 years old when she joined the Women's Royal Air Force (WRAF) on 13 September 1918 - two months before the armistice.

“During the First World War she worked at Narborough Airfield and RAF Marham, Norfolk, as an Officer’s Mess steward,” they write. “Mrs. Green spent her war days working ‘all hours’ serving officers breakfast, lunch and dinner and would often spend time wandering the base simply ‘admiring the pilots.’”

According to The National Archives, the WRAF was created to free up men for active service.

It said women had to undertake a variety of jobs and were used as drivers, mechanics, cooks and office clerks.

The WRAF was disbanded on 1 April 1920.

Mrs Green's funeral will be held at Mintlyn Crematorium, Bawsey, in Norfolk, on 16 February, her funeral directors confirmed.

Noir: R.I.P. George Esper

2012-02-06T20:45:00.001-05:00

George Esper, the tenacious Associated Press correspondent who refused to leave his post in the last days of the Vietnam War, remaining behind to cover the fall of Saigon, has died. He was 79.

Esper died in his sleep on Thursday night.

"George was most famous for his journalistic chops, his courage and tenacity, particularly in Vietnam. But those lucky enough to know him will celebrate his enormous generosity and boundless good cheer," said Kathleen Carroll, AP's executive editor and senior vice president.

Besides covering stories, Esper mentored young reporters in the AP and aspiring journalists he taught as a college professor.

"Hundreds of journalists learned from him in the field or in the classroom at West Virginia University and his words and his spirit inspire them every day," Carroll said. "He was a gentleman journalist and we will miss him sorely."

"He loved traveling the world and getting the story for The Associated Press," Thomas Esper said. "He was a selfless person who made friends wherever he went."

Esper was legendary for his dogged persistence in covering news in war and in peace.

"You don't want to be obnoxious and you don't want to stalk people, but I think persistence pays off," Esper said in an interview in 2000.

Born in Pennsylvania in 1932, the second youngest of eight children, Esper came from a family of Christian immigrants from Lebanon. The family operated a tavern by railroad tracks and, as a boy, George helped out by tending bar.

He was the first in his family to go to college – West Virginia University in Morgantown.

He tried to become a sports announcer but was fired after two weeks for what his boss called "butchering the English language." After writing sports for the Uniontown Morning Herald and the Pittsburgh Press, AP hired him in 1958, first in Philadelphia and then in New York.

In 1965, as the U.S. military in Vietnam shifted from an advisory role to deploying full combat divisions, Esper joined AP's growing Saigon staff. Other than a return to New York for several months in 1966, he stayed to the end.

Once, hearing that a U.S. jungle firebase was under attack, he managed to punch through by military phone to an officer in the middle of combat. "I can't talk now. We're under attack," the officer yelled into the phone.

The U.S. Military Assistance Command regarded Esper with wariness, respect and even affection. He was relentless. He recalled "pounding them with questions: `Why don't you know? You should know this. I know you know it.'" After the war, one retired public affairs chief included Esper's photo in a wall montage of "all the commanders I served under."

When President Lyndon B. Johnson made a hastily planned trip to Australia in 1967, it was widely assumed he would stop in Vietnam to visit U.S. troops.

Guessing that the coastal base at Cam Ranh Bay was the likely venue, Esper managed to phone the airport control tower, where an officer not only confirmed Johnson's visit but had tape-recorded his speech. Hours later, the secrecy-bound White House press corps arrived in Bangkok to find the story – their story – already on the AP wire.

Esper found his best stories through perseverance and guile. In December 1972, he landed an exclusive interview with a U.S. Air Force B-52 pilot facing court-martial for refusing to fly missions over North Vietnam. Tracked down in Thailand, the pilot gave Esper the full story. When he later told Esper he had been officially "muzzled" from further comment, Esper reported that, too.

Esper wrote his most memorable story on April 30, 1975, the day the war ended with the fall of Saigon to the North Vietnamese. He and two other AP reporters declined to join the frantic evacuation of foreigners from Saigon as the North Vietnamese army drove toward the city.

Two North Vietnamese soldiers entered the bureau, accompanied by a longtime freelance photographer for the AP who on that day revealed that he had been a communist spy. He assured the reporters they were safe. Esper offered them Coca Cola and stale cake – the only food on hand – then interviewed the soldiers. Hours later, AP's communications were abruptly cut, but not before the story got out. The New York Times ran it on its front page.

Esper said afterward he was struck by how similar the young Hanoi soldiers were to the American GIs he had covered.

On his return to the United States, Esper became an AP special correspondent – the news service's highest writing title – based in Columbus, Ohio, and later in Boston. He covered major stories such as the Jonestown massacre in Guyana in 1978 and the 1991 Gulf War.

In 1993, two years after the United States restored diplomatic ties in Indochina, he was chosen to open AP's first postwar Vietnam bureau in Hanoi and was bureau chief for more than a year

Noir: Dangerous Playgrounds of the 50's

2012-02-05T17:38:00.000-05:00

1950s safety comic on railroad yards, railroad tracks, and railroad crossings.

PROBLEM(s) DEALT WITH:
Loss of limbs, trapping legs on bridges, and other personal injury related to railroad yards, railroad tracks, and railroad crossings. Also addresses safety to other individuals, i.e. throwing rocks at the windows of passing passenger cars.

Noir: R.I.P. Zalman King Lefkovitz

2012-02-05T08:41:00.000-05:00

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Actor and filmmaker Zalman King, who became known for his erotic work after writing and producing his breakthrough film 9 ½ Weeks, has died. He was 70.

King's son-in-law Allison Burnett says the filmmaker died Friday morning at his home in Santa Monica, Calif., after a six-year battle with cancer.

Born Zalman King Lefkovitz in 1941, King began his career as an actor in the 1960s. He and wife, Patricia Louisianna Knop, collaborated on the screenplay for 9 ½ Weeks, which became a cult hit starring Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke.

King's other credits include Wild Orchid and Two Moon Junction, which he wrote and directed.

Noir: R.I.P. Ben (Biagio Anthony) Gazzara

2012-02-04T09:23:00.000-05:00

Ben Gazzara Is Dead at 81

The cause was pancreatic cancer, his lawyer, Jay Julien, said. Mr. Gazzara lived in Manhattan.

Mr. Gazzara studied with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio in Manhattan, where the careers of stars like Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger were shaped, and like them he had a visceral presence.

Wearing a slick white suit, he was a producer of pornographic movies in the Coen brothers’ “Big Lebowski” in 1998.

Mr. Gazzara was born Biagio Anthony Gazzara on the East Side of Manhattan on Aug. 28, 1930, the son of Antonio Gazzara, a laborer who did carpentry and laid bricks, and the former Angela Cusumano. Both his parents had immigrated from Italy, and they often spoke Italian at home, giving Mr. Gazzara a language skill that served him well when he began making films there. He grew up in a building at 29th Street and First Avenue, where, he wrote in his autobiography, he slept on the fire escape in summer and occasionally heard screams from the patients at Bellevue psychiatric hospital.

Mr. Gazzara met a German model, the former Elke Stuckmann, while filming the war movie“Inchon” in Seoul in 1979.

Mr. Gazzara was treated for oral cancer in 1999, but he said his bigger health battle was against depression, lasting on and off for decades. In a 2005 appearance before a group of mental health professionals, he recalled dealing with the condition 25 years earlier while shooting “They All Laughed.”

“I was in a depression during the whole shooting, and I was terrific in that film,” he said. “And I don’t remember doing it.”

Noir: R.I.P. Mike Kelly

2012-02-03T04:14:00.000-05:00

Artist Mike Kelley detected dead in Los Angeles abode

Kelley’s dead body was ascertained at his abode Tues nighttime and it looked he had perpetrated suicide, S Pasadena police force Sgt. Robert Bartl stated, without furnishing more info on the demise. A postmortem was unfinished.

The artist’s demise brings in a sad cease to a life history endowed by some a punk defiance and pop-culture kitsch.

“His piece of work was wide accumulated and demoed internationally,” aforementioned Stephanie Barron, elder conservator of advanced art at Los Angeles County Museum of Art. “He had a acquisitive appetency for whole sorts of art. He was tremendously peculiar and acted implausibly at his craft. He was ne’er alarmed to believe actually boastful. Artists suchlike that do not come round really frequently.”

A group of colleagues and friends including fellow artists Paul McCarthy and Jim Shaw and collector Kourosh Larizadeh sent an email that they said was "for all Mike's many friends near and far":

"Our dear friend the artist Mike Kelley (born 1954 in Detroit) has passed away. Unstintingly passionate, habitually outspoken and immeasurably creative in every genre or material with which he took up--and that was most of them, from performance and sculpture to painting, installation and video, from experimental music to writing in a thousand voices--Mike was an irresistible force in contemporary art. For Mike history existed only to be reconstructed, memory was selective, faulty and willful and life itself vibrant but often dysfunctional. We can hear him disagreeing with us. We cannot believe he is gone. But we know his legacy will continue to touch and challenge anyone who crosses its path. We will miss him. We will keep him with us."

Kelley was a student at the University of Michigan when he formed Destroy All Monsters with fellow artists Jim Shaw and Niagara. Those early days of the band reflected many of the elements that repeatedly cropped up in his visual work: A self-described “anti-rock” group, they performed on homemade and scavenged instruments such as broken keyboards, a vacuum cleaner, and a coffee can, crashing parties and generally causing a confusing ruckus.

Kelley left the band in 1978 to attend the California Institute of the Arts (where he studied under Laurie Anderson), while the band eventually recruited The Stooges’ Ron Asheton and the MC5’s Michael Davis, then went on to become a cult figure in the Detroit punk scene. In 1994, Kelley worked with Thurston Moore to compile a Destroy All Monsters anthology for Moore’s Ecstatic Peace label and participated in a reunion tour the next year.

That Sonic Youth connection—the result of Kelley’s longtime friendship with Kim Gordon—solidified in 1986, when the band backed him at a show at New York’s Artist Space, providing instrumental music and assorted droning behind Kelley’s recitation of his hour-and-a-half poem “Plato’s Cave, Rothko’s Chapel, Lincoln’s Profile.” (An audio recording of this surfaced on the Tellus Audio Cassette series, and excerpts can still be found on the Internet.)

And of course, Kelley did the artwork for Sonic Youth’s 1992 album Dirty, his worn textile creatures and what appeared to be stuffed animals fished out of the trash reflecting his trademark style of working within themes of abjection.

Kelley’s installations were legendary for what art critic Jerry Saltz described as their “clusterfuck aesthetics,” in which various randomly connected bits of multimedia, heaps of ephemera, and general piles of stuff collided in an overload of the senses, creating a dizzying array of emotions and guttural reactions.

Noir: R.I.P. Angelo (Mirena) Dundee

2012-02-02T20:52:00.000-05:00

Angelo Dundee, the renowned trainer who guided Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard to boxing glory, died on Wednesday in Clearwater, Fla. He was 90.

His death was announced by his son-in-law, James Coughlin, who said Dundee had recently been treated for blood clots.

In more than 60 years in professional boxing, Dundee gained acclaim as a brilliant cornerman, whether healing cuts, inspiring his fighters to battle on when they seemed to be reeling, or adjusting strategy between rounds to counter an opponent’s style.

“In that one minute, Angelo is Godzilla and Superman rolled into one,” Dr. Ferdie Pacheco, who often worked with Dundee and then became a TV boxing analyst, once remarked.

Dundee’s first champion was Carmen Basilio, the welterweight and middleweight titleholder of the 1950s from upstate New York. Although best remembered for Ali and Leonard, Dundee also trained the light-heavyweight champion Willie Pastrano, the heavyweight titleholder Jimmy Ellis and the welterweight champion Luis Rodriguez. Dundee advised George Foreman when he regained the heavyweight title at age 45. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1992.

He was born Angelo Mirena in Philadelphia, the son of a railroad worker. He became Angelo Dundee after his brother, Joe, fought professionally under the name Johnny Dundee, in tribute to a former featherweight champion; another brother, Chris, also adopted the Dundee name.

After working as a cornerman at military boxing tournaments in England while in the Army Air Forces during World War II, Dundee served an apprenticeship at Stillman’s Gym near the old Madison Square Garden, learning his craft from veteran trainers like Ray Arcel, Charley Goldman and Chickie Ferrara. In the early 1950s he teamed with his brother Chris to open the Fifth Street gym in Miami Beach. It became their longtime base, Angelo as a trainer and Chris as a promoter.

In the late 1950s, Dundee gave some tips to a promising amateur named Cassius Clay, and in December 1960, after Clay’s first pro bout, Dundee became his trainer, working with him in Miami Beach. He guided him to the heavyweight title with a knockout of Sonny Liston in February 1964.

When Cassius Clay became Muhammad Ali soon after winning the heavyweight title, his boxing management and financial affairs were handled by the Nation of Islam. Dundee was the only white man in his camp, and he grew disturbed over references to that fact.

In talking about his boxing savvy, Dundee liked to say, “When I see things through my eyes, I see things.”

“When Dundee speaks, traditional English usage is, to say the least, stretched and malapropisms abound,” Ronald K. Fried wrote in “Cornermen: Great Boxing Trainers.”

But he took pride in his craft. As he put it: “You’ve got to combine certain qualities belonging to a doctor, an engineer, a psychologist and sometimes an actor, in addition to knowing your specific art well. There are more sides to being a trainer than those found on a Rubik’s Cube.

Noir: "I Joined A Teen-Age Sex Club" (1951)

2012-02-02T18:37:00.000-05:00

Noir: R.I.P. Don Cornelius

2012-02-01T19:38:00.001-05:00

"Soul Train" creator Don Cornelius commits suicide

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Don Cornelius, creator of the iconic TV music and dance show "Soul Train" that helped introduce Americans to black pop culture, died on Wednesday after shooting himself in the head, Los Angeles officials said.

Police found the body of Cornelius, 75, at his house in the wealthy, hillside area of Los Angeles called Sherman Oaks at around 4 a.m on Wednesday. He was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.

"The death was reported as a suicide, a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head," Los Angeles coroner's Assistant Chief Ed Winter said. Police said there was no evidence of foul play.

SON OF THE '60s

Cornelius was born in 1936 in Chicago and as an adult, became a journalist who was active in the civil rights movement. For a time, he worked at local radio station WVON, and by the late 1960s he had dreamed up the idea of a TV show dedicated to the soulful sounds of African-American music.

"Soul Train" was born with the deep-voiced Cornelius as the host who gave hip kids of the '70s what "American Bandstand" creator Dick Clark offered TV viewers in the early days of rock 'n' roll -- a show mixing youth, music, fashion and pop culture.

A statement was posted on the Soul Train website calling Cornelius a "television visionary."

(Reporting By Lauren Keiper, Jill Serjeant and Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

Noir: Weegee Jumps For NoirCon 2012!

2012-01-31T21:54:00.000-05:00

‘Jump’, 1959, by Philippe Halsman

Noir: Treat Your M-16 Rifle Like A Lady

2012-01-31T21:44:00.000-05:00

COMICS WITH PROBLEMS issue #25

The Will Eisner M-16 U.S. Army Rifle Maintenance Booklet

32 Page M-16 Booklet, art by Will Eisner Studios, unknown author or authors.

Distributed to every U.S. soldier from 1968-1972 during Vietnam conflict. Originally sealed in plastic to accomodate weather concerns, and for jungle distribution.

PROBLEM(S) DEALT WITH: Vietcong, Communism, Lube

Noir: HEADLESS BODY IN TOPLESS BAR

2012-01-30T19:19:00.000-05:00

HEADLESS BODY IN TOPLESS BAR

(Reuters) - New York state authorities denied parole on Tuesday to the man convicted of the crime that generated one of the most famous headlines in U.S. journalism: the New York Post's "Headless body in topless bar."

The parole board denied early release for Charles Dingle, 53, convicted of the 1983 rampage in which he fatally shot the owner of a topless bar, took hostages, raped a woman and forced another to cut off the dead man's head in order to prevent police from linking the bullet to his gun.

Dingle, held in an upstate prison, has maintained his innocence despite numerous eyewitnesses and considerable physical evidence.

The headline, credited to Vincent Musetto, an editor and film critic who retired last year after 40 years at the Post, recalls a much more violent New York City than today's. There were nearly 2,000 murders in 1983 compared with 515 in 2011, according to police statistics.

The headline provided the title for the book "Headless Body in Topless Bar: The Best Headlines from America's Favorite Newspaper."

It also helped cement the Post's reputation as the most colorful of New York City's tabloid newspapers, which maintain an intense newsstand rivalry even in a digital world.

The Daily News went with "Queens night of horror" to chronicle Dingle's crime. Newsday, the Long Island paper that published a New York City edition at the time, titled the story "A night of terror." For The New York Times, it was, "Owner of a bar shot to death; suspect is held."

The rejection Tuesday was Dingle's third failed request for parole.

The parole board of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision on Tuesday noted Dingle's long prior criminal record, a "propensity for victimizing others," and at least 30 violations in prison including assaulting the staff.

"This continued poor behavior coupled with your disturbing criminal history makes your release incompatible with public safety and welfare," the three-person panel ruled. "To release you would so deprecate the serious nature of the instant offense and undermine respect for the law. Parole is denied."

In a 2010 interview with the Post, Dingle blamed the media frenzy for denying him a fair trial and faulted the parole board for asking him to "plead guilty and take responsibility for the crime."

"I can't do it because I didn't do it," he said.

Police told a very different story, based on accounts from people in the bar that night and the morning of April 14, 1983, including the victim's wife. One year later, a judge in a non-jury trial convicted him of second-degree murder, rape, kidnapping and robbery, sentencing him to 25 years to life in prison.

Dingle was drinking and using cocaine before getting into an argument with bar owner Herbert Cummings, 51, according to newspaper reports attributed to police at the time.

Dingle shot Cummings dead and took several hostages, one of whom he raped. Dingle ordered one hostage who happened to be a mortician to retrieve the bullet from Cummings' head. When she failed to find the bullet, he ordered her to cut off the head with kitchen knives.

"That woman had a lot of guts," police Lieutenant Dennis Cunningham told Newsday at the time. "She remained cool during this time and talked Dingle out of killing all of them."

The severed head was placed in a box labeled "Fine Wines" and stuffed with party streamers torn from a bar decoration. Dingle tried to flee with the head but his car would not start, so he called a cab.

When the cab driver arrived, Dingle locked him in the back of the bar and stole his car, taking two of the women "on a gruesome terror ride into Manhattan," the Post said.

With one of the women driving and the box in the front seat, Dingle passed out, allowing the two women to flee and call police. Police found Dingle just waking up and they wrestled the gun from him without firing a shot.

With the arrest happening on a Thursday morning, the Post had time to get the story in one of its afternoon editions. A front-page teaser headline read "Cops find headless body in topless bar -- Page 8."

By Friday morning, at least one of the editions carried the banner front-page headline "Headless body in topless bar," and a legend was born.

Musetto's headline also provided the title for the book "Headless Body in Topless Bar: The Best Headlines from America's Favorite Newspaper."

HAVE THEY LOST THEIR HEADS? If Dingle was given parole?

Noir: Scottish Brain Hemorrhage With A Twist

2012-01-30T18:19:00.000-05:00

This revolting thing is a cocktail called an "Alien Brain Hemorrhage": "To make an alien brain hemorrhage cocktail, fill a shot glass halfway with peach schnapps. Gently pour Bailey's Irish Cream on top. After the shot is almost full, carefully add a small amount of blue curacao. After it settles, add a few drops of grenadine syrup." Looks like it could be improved with a couple lumps of dry ice. Listening to these Scots, it looks about as appealing as Haggis!

Noir: A furtive felon and his furtive floozy sinisterly skulking sullenly

2012-01-30T09:07:00.000-05:00

In July 2010, The SF Examiner published a story about a “surly scoundrel” who defiantly stood in the driveway of a fire station, purposely blocking firefighters’ path as they were responding to a call. The crazed lowlife stuck out his middle finger at the firefighters and refused to budge until they threatened to get tough with him.

Although the odd tale was comical on its own, we found a San Francisco police captain’s use of the term “surly scoundrel” the most amusing.
Greg Corrales, a 42-year veteran of the Police Department, also called that scoundrel a “remorseless reprobate” in his colorful community newsletter out of the Mission Police Station, which he penned for the better part of two years and that read like a 1940s hard-boiled crime novel.
While the newsletter covering police activity in the Mission district was a hit among journalists and locals, particularly English teachers, the Jan. 13 edition was Corrales’ last.
The pulp-writing cop and ex-Marine was recently reassigned as police captain at San Francisco International Airport, and he said he doesn’t plan to write a newsletter in his new post.

Like Raymond Chandler’s detective thriller “Farewell, My Lovely,” Corrales’ final newsletter did not disappoint.

In reporting about a prostitution bust at 20th and Valencia streets, Corrales wrote that three cops “arrested a soiled dove for loitering for the purpose of tawdry faux amour.”

To describe a marijuana bust at County Jail, he wrote, “Officer Sands thwarted a sullen smuggler’s attempts to sneak a quantity of The Weed with Roots in Hell into the jail.”

He also penned a report about “a miscreant urinating on America.”

Corrales began writing the newsletter in 2009, during his second stint as Mission station captain. In putting out a newsletter, which is required of all station captains, Corrales said he mixed his love of being a cop with his passion for the hard-boiled style.

He collects books from the genre dating between the 1940s and mid-1960s.

Favorite authors include Cornell Woolrich, David Goodis and San Francisco’s own Dashiell Hammett, Corrales said.

“Pulp writers in those days got paid like a penny a word for producing stories,” Corrales said. “They used a lot of adjectives to up their payroll.”

Read more at the San Francisco Examiner:

Enjoy:“We had hoped that it would not be necessary to arrest anyone on Christmas, but there were several miscreants out there that gave us no choice in the matter.

Miscreant #1 – 3:23 AM Mariposa & Utah 111028953

While investigating reports of a man “casing” vehicles, Officers Cota & Wilgus discovered an auto burglar in flagrante delicto. When the brazen brigand was asked why he was in the victim’s auto, he replied, “The door was unlocked.”

Miscreant #2 – 7:13 AM 20^th & S. Van Ness 111029105

While investigating a possible child abuse case, Officers Akmese & Cruz encountered a suspicious scoundrel skulking sinisterly. Further investigation revealed that he was a fugitive from justice.

Miscreants #3 & 4 – 11:13 AM 13^th& Mission

Officer Fischer encountered a furtive felon and his furtive floozy skulking sullenly. Further investigation revealed that they were both fugitives from justice.

Miscreant #5 – 1:28 PM 23^rd & San Bruno 111029371

Officers McDonald, Gassen, & Lattig sought, located, and apprehended a flagitious fugitive parolee, and assured that he would be spending the new year with his homies in state prison.”

Creative use of a thesaurus

In the March 26 newsletter, for example, there is a reference to a fugitive who was “a very glib and convincing prevaricator.” However, “pursuant to their diligent investigation” officers “discovered the craven convict’s real identity.”

And then there was the March 13th incident, when officers encountered “a shameless scoundrel who was in the act of urinating on America. The bumptious brute violently resisted arrest.”

From his 1969 hiring through 2002, Corrales accumulated at least 80 misconduct complaints made by citizens and was a defendant in 18 lawsuits, according to court and department records. The last police misconduct lawsuit was filed against him in 1992, records show. Most of the suits alleged that Corrales and officers he worked with used unnecessary force in arresting citizens, often for minor crimes. City taxpayers have spent more than $280,000 in jury awards and settlements to resolve the cases in which he was a defendant. In one case, Corrales was accused of choking and clubbing a cabdriver who had committed a minor parking violation. An arbitrator who heard the case in 1985 ruled that the city should pay the cabbie $25,000 in damages and that Corrales should pay him another $15,000 personally. The city appealed the decision and later ended up settling for $45,000. In another case, the city paid $26,000 to settle a brutality lawsuit in which Corrales was accused of punching a motorist in the neck after detaining the man for double-parking. In a third, the city paid $12,500 for damage caused during an auto accident that occurred when Corrales suddenly made an illegal U-turn on the Golden Gate Bridge. According to court records, at one point in the early 1980s, Corrales was being sued three or four times a year.
Police Capt. Gregory Corrales, also indicted, was sued in 1985 for allegedly choking and clubbing a taxi driver who had committed a minor parking violation. The city settled the case for $45,000. According to court records, Corrales was named in three or four lawsuits in the early 1980s.