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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jan 23, 2008 19:39:34 GMT
As far as I can establish these were the only Aurora Glow Kits available in the 70's on a mass scale. I could be terribly wrong. Would I be considered an absolute a.....le if I proposed a poll to see which kits were owned by vault members?
(I have to add I found 'the guillotine' as well but don't remember seeing that anywhere.
Dr Jekyll as Mr Hyde
The Creature
Dracula
Godzilla
The mummy
The witch
Phantom of the Opera
Wolf Man
King Kong
The forgotten prisoner
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jan 23, 2008 20:18:06 GMT
The Bellringer (Hunchback) which i now remember I had. Technically I am talking about the 'Aurora Glow kit - Movie Monster kits'. My current research is now reaching mind boggling proportions as I discover that in 1969 there were 22 non glow but equally fascinating kits including ;The Pendulum' and this wonderful array. I quote 'Despite its ominous name, the Pain Parlour simply consisted of a hanging skeleton, an operating table, and an electronic console panel. Gruesome Goodies featured a table, lab equipment, a skull, and a generator. The other two accessory kits were a good deal more sinister. The Hanging Cage not only included a hanging cage and the winch and pulley from which it hung, but a "forge" filled with hot coals and a removable poker, as well as a sword. The Pendulum was exactly that--a pendulum of the sort from Edgar Allan Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum," complete with swinging pendulum blade.' from mercurie.blogspot.com/ |
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Post by dem bones on Jan 24, 2008 7:46:23 GMT
Never had any of the models, Craig, but when I was small there was a shop in Wealdstone that displayed at least two of the boxes in their window for what seemed like centuries - The Forgotten Prisoner and the guillotine one. They frightened me far more than any film I'd seen at the time. Much as I'd dread walking past the place, I never thought to cross to the other side of the road and I'm sure I always had a peek to see if they were still there. The lure of the morbid, eh?
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Post by killercrab on Jan 24, 2008 10:33:05 GMT
KING KONG and THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON here! Oh and Godzilla...:-)
ade
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jan 24, 2008 10:44:04 GMT
1. Dr Jekyll as Mr Hyde
2.The Creature
3. Dracula
4. Godzilla
5. The mummy
6. The Witch
7. Phantom of the Opera
8. Wolf Man
9. King Kong
10. The forgotten prisoner
11. The Bell Ringer (Hunchback)
I had Dr Jekyll as Mr Hyde, The Creature, Dracula, Wolfman, The forgotten prisoner and the Bellringer(Hunchback) and the mummy.
It's amazing. I had utterly forgotten I had these, and the obsession with them. Worst still I have nearly forgotten which ones I really had and which ones I would have killed to get. Endless hours staring at the boxes through windows and hoping Santa was a bit cooler than his Christmas advertsing campaign suggested.
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jan 24, 2008 10:47:27 GMT
Dem,
they were scarey enough in the shop windows but you definitely missed out by not owning your very own glow-in-the-dark forgotten prisoner. Couldn't sleep for weeks.
Craig
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Post by David A. Riley on Jan 24, 2008 11:03:00 GMT
I remember when I first saw these advertised when I was a young kid in the back pages of Famous Monsters of Filmland, which was then my favourite magazine. I was after buying one of them for ages, but never saw them in any of the shops in Accrington, where I lived. Then one day I cycled to Burnley and saw a model shop on the main road which had a stack of the boxes in its window. I was promised one for Christmas, which wasn't far off, and had a terrible time trying to decide which I wanted. In the end I settled on The Creature from the Black Lagoon, though it was decades before I actually got the opportunity to watch the film itself.
I must admit there was something magical about these things then - and going every month to the local newsagent to buy the latest issue of Famous Monsters.
David
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Post by franklinmarsh on Jan 24, 2008 15:29:33 GMT
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Post by David A. Riley on Jan 24, 2008 16:34:23 GMT
How much further did anyone go beyond buying the Aurora kits?
Inspired perhaps by Famous Monsters I went on to build a full laboratory and overhead graveyard for my creatures to live in. I even went to the extent of building my own creatures from scratch, using plastacene, cloth, glue, paint and eventually latex. I managed to make what then appeared to me to be very lifelike copies to scale of Christopher Lee's creature from The Curse of Frankenstein and Peter Cushing as the baron. I even did a copy of Oliver Reed's werewolf. I don't think I have the skill now to make lifelike heads any more - or the inclination - but I spent many happy hours in my youth building stuff like this.
Oh, well, confessions over.
David
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Post by andydecker on Jan 24, 2008 19:17:46 GMT
I still have the Dracula, which nerdy me bought - I honestly can´t remember, as those things never were avaiable abroad. Maybe I ordered it with this mail service advertising in the back pages of Vampirella. Suffice to say I wasn´t a kid anymore at the time.
Those were fun. In a shop I saw these days McFarlane Toys Bondage Dorothy. It sure gave me a chuckle, but those Aurora Kits had an appeal all those super sophisticated toys for aged fanboys sure don´t have.
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Jan 24, 2008 20:54:07 GMT
'overhead graveyard' sounds good David. I remember inviting friends round to sit in the dark and stare at the Prisoner. Ah, the heady days of youth...
Nerdy Andy? The moment one loses sight of the beauty of these little plastic toys is the moment to get the slippers out
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Post by dem bones on Jan 25, 2008 7:22:26 GMT
How much further did anyone go beyond buying the Aurora kits? Inspired perhaps by Famous Monsters I went on to build a full laboratory and overhead graveyard for my creatures to live in. I even went to the extent of building my own creatures from scratch, using plastacene, cloth, glue, paint and eventually latex. David I wish you had a photo of the full lab and overhead graveyard to show us - it sounds terrific! I don't have a creative bone in my body but, fortunately (I think!) , the Bride makes up for it. At present there are three paper-maché gargoyles living with us - three to four foot high, weigh a ton! In the past we've had a model of Millers Court at the time of the Ripper - don't look through that window! - which, appropriately, was destroyed by termites. Also, quite a range of handmade staked vampires - - like him. Totally agree with andy: the modern, super-sophisticated stuff I've seen in places like Forbidden Planet do nothing for me whatsoever. |
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Post by David A. Riley on Jan 25, 2008 8:57:40 GMT
I wish you had a photo of the full lab and overhead graveyard to show us
So do I, but at the time I never gave it a thought. And of course it's all long gone now, though it was fun at the time. A few years later I discovered writing and all this kind of stuff was jettisoned.
It did give me a bit of a jolt, though, when I read Stephen King's Salem's Lot, with the young lad in this novel who constructed plastic models of his favourite monsters. I'm sure a few of us identified with him.
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Post by dem bones on Jan 25, 2008 9:59:54 GMT
It did give me a bit of a jolt, though, when I read Stephen King's Salem's Lot, with the young lad in this novel who constructed plastic models of his favourite monsters. I'm sure a few of us identified with him. The one that really struck a chord with me was Richard Matheson's Drink My Blood when little Jules reads out his essay, My Ambition in class. “I want to live forever and get even with everybody and make all the girls vampires. I want to smell of death … I want to have a foul breath that stinks of dead earth and crypts and sweet coffins”. Replace "teachers" with "evil nuns" and that little bastard ripped off my act wholesale! ;D |
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Post by David A. Riley on Jan 25, 2008 10:33:39 GMT
That sounds like a book I should try and track down. What a sweet little misunderstood kid!
;D
David
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