Ben Johnson

[MissGoddess]

ha! i never heard that one before, "jellybean clothes".

[pvitari]

Ben always had a unique way of expressing himself. :)

In the forward to Herb Fagen's White Hats and Silver Spurs, Christopher Mitchum writes that Ben called a universally-disliked person who everyone had been discussing "the most unnecessary son-of-a-b**** I ever met."

LOL -- "unnecessary." Christopher Mitchum adds that that was "the most unkind thing I ever heard Ben say about anyone."


ADDENDUM. HA! Silver Screen Oasis put the **** into the B-word up above, I didn't. Ben would approve, I suspect. :) No "barn talk" (another one of his expressions) allowed in front of the women and children.

[Maricatrin]

Amazon is the pits for ordering MOD discs -- you can wait forever. I hope your order ships soon, Mary-Kate. (Or has it shipped?)

I hope so too - and nope, not yet. But the good news is that my Fort Defiance idea actually worked! And Stranger On My Land arrived today, so my holdup is going to be Amazon, I guess.

I think the taupe and brown gives the site more of a spare Western look ... I like it (and all the new additions, of course;-)

The Silver Spurs Award was a good idea .... Westerns tend to get overlooked at the Oscars, so it gave prolific Westerners a chance at an award. And that is a nice picture - but what did become of Mr. Johnson's bluejeans!?

That's marvelous; the boards are Ben-rated! What happens if I try a movie quote?: "Fill your hands, you son of a b****!"
...amazing

[pvitari]

the boards are Ben-rated!

ROFL! He's still looking out for us. :)

The Tomboy and the Champ DVD arrived today -- by some miracle, I snagged the one copy available at DVD Empire.

It's what you'd expect a 20-something open matte master transferred to DVD-R to look like, i.e., acceptable, and a big improvement over the VHS tape. That said, it's nobody's idea of a reference disc. The picture is somewhat faded with a bit too much sepia-greenish tint, though the color can vary from shot to shot (see the last two screencaps in this post). But I'm not complaining -- I really didn't think I'd ever see this on DVD! Maybe someday they'll do Slim Carter and then I KNOW pigs will be flying.

VHS tape


New DVD


No more warping of the image, and a lot more detail.

OK, two quickie batches of screencaps. One of these days -- but not any time soon -- I'll redo all of Ben's scenes in this movie.





































On to the rest of them ----->

[pvitari]

Batch two.









Rex Allen and Candy Moore

[Maricatrin]

The Tomboy and the Champ DVD arrived today -- by some miracle, I snagged the one copy available at DVD Empire.

Glad to hear someone's copy arrived; and the pictures show definite improvement! Thanks for the 2nd batch too, they serve as a nice "preview".

Mine still hasn't shipped yet, and the enigmatic delivery estimate says: "Monday January 30, 2012 - Friday February 3, 2012". Doesn't sound good, does it? Hopefully I won't, in someone's words, "grow old and die before they ship."

[pvitari]

Mary-Kate, cancel that Amazon order and order it from Screen Archives -- it's a few dollars less and I think will ship more quickly:

http://www.screenarchives.com/display_results.cfm

Since it's MOD, you do have to wait for them to put the order through to the manufacturer so they can crank out your copy, but it shouldn't take long.

I just don't get why it's not available from classicmoviesnow.com, which is usually the best place to order discs manufactured by Allied Vaughn (except for the discs they make for the Warner Archive and Sony, which you can order through the Warner Archive site). Classicsmovienow.com ships super-fast.

Oldies.com is usually another good place -- I have ordered other VCI Vault discs from them -- but mysteriously they also don't seem to have it.

For some reason, DVD Empire actually had one copy in stock, which is strange since it's MOD, but I was lucky and noticed it was there. So that's how I managed to get one already.

[Maricatrin]

Mary-Kate, cancel that Amazon order and order it from Screen Archives -- it's a few dollars less and I think will ship more quickly:

Hmmm ... trouble is, I bought it (at $15.99) with some $10 discs, bringing the total up to $25 (free shipping). But strangely, they shipped half my order, and that half has arrived. If I cancel, I wonder how the shipping charges will work out? (this is all thinking aloud, pardon any imbecilities! ) I think I will give them till Feb. 3rd, and then if they move the date ahead to March 3rd, I'll go ahead and cancel, regardless.

In any case, thanks for the link, I will bookmark the site for future reference.

And by the way, have you ever contacted Douglas O'Neal? I would like to use the Ben and Carol picture he has here http://dougoneal.com/ben_johnson.html, and though I can easily save it, I don't want to use it without permission. But I can't find any email listings...

[pvitari]

Yes, Doug actually e-mailed me not too long after I started the Ben page. PM me a message you'd like to send him, and I'll forward it.

[pvitari]

The tushes have it! ;)

According to the info on the back of the photo, which is dated January 15, 1954, the three gentlemen are Ben, Roy Dee Fort and Don Davies. Two seconds research on the internet (yay internet!) reveals that Roy Dee Fort is the son of rodeo champ and New Mexico rancher Troy Fort. (I have a 1966 issue of Western Horseman magazine with an article about Troy Fort and a busy day on his ranch.) The photo was taken by Cloyd Teter, Denver Post staff photographer, so presumably this was at a rodeo in Colorado.

Why am I not surprised that Ben is holding the little boy so he won't fall? That is so Ben.

[Maricatrin]

Yes, Doug actually e-mailed me not too long after I started the Ben page. PM me a message you'd like to send him, and I'll forward it.

I just sent the message off; thank you kindly! What would we do around here without you?

[pvitari]

Aw shucks ma'am. :)

[pvitari]

I'm working on screencaps for Fort Defiance, and I was looking around the internet for information about the film, and stumbled across a webpage with a series of absolutely gorgeous black and white publicity stills for the movie. There are only three of Ben, but two are eye-popping close-ups:





The other is a photo I already own and scanned in and is on my webpage, so I'm not going to bother to post it here. But you can see it and the other photos -- which include some real beauties of Peter Graves -- here:

http://hartford.thistv.com/view/movie/6 ... 20Defiance

[JackFavell]

I've only ever seen either of those as tiny little avatar sized pictures! I'm so glad you found them large scale.

[pvitari]

They're even bigger at that website -- I shrank 'em down a little to post here.