Battlin’ Babs From Brooklyn Conquers the West!

When feisty Barbara Stanwyck’s hard-as-nails, incredibly successful businesswoman is blinded by love for the first time in her hardscrabble life, her selfish and immature younger brother takes the opportunity to ruin her empire.

Sounds kind of modern, right?

Well, it’s as close to a “Douglas Sirk” film that Sam Fuller would ever come to: 1957’s Forty Guns.

But since it’s Stanwyck and Fuller, it’s practically perfect.

In Praise of Jack Kirby (and we've been given the LIEBSTER AWARD—Huzzah!) (Spraining My Arm Patting Myself on the Back Edition)

LERNER INTERNATIONAL ENTERPRISES is lucky enough to have had the Liebster Award bestowed on it by that absolutely perfect blog, The Girl With the White Parasol, and we here in the LIE control room, say THANK YOU, and send many, many delicious telepathic chocolates her way!!!

  

More on The Liebster in a moment, but first, the illustrations for this post: you might be asking, “What’s with all the Jack Kirby?”

Well, The King (Mr. Kirby’s nickname—and shame on you if you didn’t know that) is the answer to one of the Liebster’s questions (see below) because he is one of my favorite artist/writer/storytellers ever.

Kirby’s is a clunky, yet beautiful and psychedelic style that has always stirred my imagination—not only was his art cosmic, so were his tales: supreme super-weirdness from beyond space and time, with storylines that were never mundane. No simple stopping of bank robbers for Kirby! It was routinely gods vs. man vs. demons, with the soul of the universe in the balance!

Welcome to the “Favorite That’s Not” Silver Medal Quiz! (Featuring Pix of B-List Kaiju)

Cinematic, Genre-Centric, Potentially Mayhem-Packed!

Yes’m, this is LERNER INTERNATIONAL’s First Quiz, and welcome to it!

Look, Hurricane Sandy has trapped you indoors if you live on the Eastern Seaboard of the US, so what else are you going to do? Take a movie opinion quiz!

Why “Silver Medal” and “Favorite That’s Not” Quiz?

One thing that bugs me most about some movie quizzes (aside from my frustration at the questions) is the lack of bandwidth, with the same answers appearing from all contestants.

Of course, there are classics out there that all filmgoers love across the board, and so you’ll get a million people all answering “Godzilla” or “Willis O’Brien’s King Kong,” when the question is “What Is Your Favorite Giant Monster?”

Let’s try and shake that up! (And doesn’t Hedora, the Smog Monster [above, at top] look like he’s made of silver?) (And NO, monsters are not the only topic discussed in this post...)

Questions below!

The Girl With the White Halloween Meme 2012

Despite our apparent differences, one of the sites LERNER INTERNATIONAL visits routinely is the wonderful The Girl With the White Parasol (and if you don’t recognize that movie reference, shame on you!).

Usually concentrating on more civilized films than us, Rachel’s The Girl With the White Parasol has posted its “Halloween Meme” quiz, and who are we to fight the inevitable?

Like ghosts drawn to the psychic, LERNER INTERNATIONAL is compelled!

Answers (and possible spoilers) below…