| Author | Message | ||
     Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
Has passed away of heart failure, aged 92. This man had such infectious joy bubbling away inside of him, it was impossible not be swept along when reading about him, or reading about the movies and books he treasured so much. A truly sad loss. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.205.243 |
I recently read a fiery exchange between him and Clark Ashton Smith in the letters column of The Fantasy Fan around 1933 – FJA is fifteen or so, articulate and resolutely unimpressed by CAS's work. While the argument is fierce it remains cordial and courteous. Ackerman's passing is a great loss to fandom, but he had a remarkable innings. Farewell to an icon of the science fiction and fantasy field. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.116 |
I wonder what will happen to his collection. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.159.137.23 |
Great shame - still got a copy or two of Famous Monsters... | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Alas! I visited the Ackermansion long ago with Jo Fletcher and Steve Jones, and it was all you'd imagine it was. I recall buying the first issue of FM, stamped 2/6 if I'm not mistaken, when I was twelve - two years too young to see any of the films represented within. By the time I started going to X films, I already knew many of the images from stills Forry had run. I remember a still of a drooling Mexican zombie that I've yet to see in a film. He started my interest in horror films, and I'm glad I was able to tell him. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.23.116 |
Apparently the collection got dispersed during Ackerman's lifetime: http://www.scifislacker.com/forrest_ackerman/ What a pity . . . It would have made a great museum. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.162.125 |
Would a zombie have its own saliva? Of course, it may have been drooling someone else's. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 79.187.206.46 |
Ref my grammar: A truly sad loss! What the fuck! | ||
| Jamie Rosen (Jamie) Username: Jamie Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 99.240.155.122 |
That's a shame. Especially after all the fighting he had to do with his "partners" in the last few years. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.212.11 |
This truly is the blackest year I can remember in terms of the deaths of public figures in entertainment. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
Anyone hear what happened to Denis Gifford? He filled his home with so much claptrap it drove his wife away, and his house became so full he couldn't move, like that old guy from that messy house programme on the beeb a few years back. Poor Forry. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
Kim Newman is being a bit sniffy about him, suggesting he was a bit mercenary and a bad writer. Thing is, Kim is a nice guy but a better writer when he being throwaway, casual: when he writes a review it can feel a bit dry and overly lengthy, like he's alternately being paid by the word and marked by an English teacher at the same time. He could do with a speck of Forry in his lingo. | ||
| Simon Strantzas (Nomis) Username: Nomis Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 99.225.111.224 |
Our boardmate Richard Gavin wrote a wonderful anecdote about Ackerman on his (Richard's) blog. Perhaps if close your eyes and wish it to be true, he'll retell it here. It would be a Christmas miracle! | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
I did! | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
"This truly is the blackest year I can remember in terms of the deaths of public figures in entertainment." I must admit every recent year looks that way at the time when I read the obituary list. Which other figures were you thinking of for this year? Would I rather not be reminded they've gone? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
I fear Kim's view of Forry has some merit. After all, there was the business of Bob Bloch's last autograph. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 160.6.1.47 |
Well, just looking at film: Roy Schneider Paul Newman Charlton Heston Sydney Pollack Richard Widmark Heath Ledger Anthony Mingella Arthur C. Clarke (at least involved in a film) I'm sure there are many more. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.206.216 |
Ramsey, going back to your first posting: does that mean you weren't really interested in horror films until after you had become known as a horror writer, and presumably some time after you had developed a strong interest in cinema as a whole? If so, that's unusual but understandable – I'm often shocked at the lack of general cinematic awareness shown by many horror fans, combined with their apparent ability to hail even vestigial film-making talent within the genre as 'genius' – but it seems a shame that you missed out on the adolescent 'getting scared to death' experience with films. Not that Hammer films were likely to provide that. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Well, I was fourteen when I managed to pass as sixteen and see every horror film I could. The original Hammer Dracula was pretty scary then, believe me, but was nothing to Psycho and Night of the Demon, two of my first adolescent filmgoing experiences. But I believe I was only fifteen when I saw, as the supporting film to Bert I. Gordon's The Cyclops, Bunuel's Los Olvidados, and that was a revelation. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.93.21.74 |
Actually, it's not fair of me to cite the Bloch autograph incident as proving either point - I think Forry just wanted it for his collection, not to sell. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
Ah, such moments are like finding our bones, or like the Iron Man finding his pieces along that beach. I remember as a kid seeing Lawrence of Arabia and being blown away by certain moments. Never went to the cinema on my own, and daftly I was quite scared of horror films so might never have gone anyway (wet the bed watching one on my portable b+w), much as I adored them. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.157.53.174 |
Oliver Postgate has died today, too, just to rub things in. His voice was like a balm. | ||
| Thomasb (Thomasb) Username: Thomasb Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 69.236.164.76 |
Forry Ackerman . . . sure, I remember fighting with my mom over FMF; she truly thought they were bad for me . . . and she was soooo right, heh heh heh |