Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Happy THREADS day.





Amazon UK link

How Threads (1984) came into being. Its progress can be traced through The War Game and A Guide To Armageddon. This is an extract from my new book, ATTACK WARNING RED: HOW BRITAIN PREPARED FOR NUCLEAR WAR, and features an interview with the director of Threads, Mick Jackson.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYIhJL671Lo

May 26, 1972: in Moscow, President Richard Nixon and General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev signed the Interim Agreement on Certain Measures With Respect to the Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (aka SALT I), freezing the number of ICBMs and SLBMs deployed by each country.



However, SALT I imposed no restrictions on bomber aircraft or warheads. This enabled both countries to significantly expand their nuclear arsenals by deploying unlimited numbers of MIRVs on their existing ballistic missiles.



MIRV = Multiple Independently Targetable Reentry Vehicle, is an exoatmospheric ballistic missile payload containing several warheads, each capable of being aimed to hit multiple targets for enhanced first-strike proficiency. Current active MIRV's (that we're told) is USA with the UGM-133 Trident II (8-14 warheads), Russia has several types up to 15 warheads; UK has same as US; China has several types up to 10 warheads; France has 1 type with 6-10 warheads; India has a few under development; Pakistan demo pending; Israel has the Jericho 3 with suspected capability, not announced, 2-3 technically possible.

In 1974, Nixon’s Secretary of State and National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, disingenuously told reporters, “I would say in retrospect that I wish I had thought through the implications of a MIRVed world more thoughtfully in 1969 and 1970 than I did.”
Retrospectives on MIRVing in the First Nuclear Age


Nixon and Brezhnev also signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which permanently restricted deployment of antiballistic missiles by each country to 200 at two locations—its capital and an ICBM base. A 1974 protocol further limited this to 100 interceptors at one location.


The Pyramid of North Dakota (48.590623, -98.357114)
The USA's only operational ABM (anti-ballistic missile) site, built within the constraints of the ABM Treaty with the USSR, and operational very briefly in 1975. This central complex includes launch silos for 30 Spartan missiles, 16 Sprint missiles, and a Missile Site Radar (MSR). Five remote sites include four other Sprint missile fields, 10-20 miles away, with a combined total of approximately 54 Sprint missiles, plus one Perimeter Acquisition Radar (PAR) site, 25 miles away. 6 billion dollars to build the complex and after just less than one day at full operational service, the Dr. Strangelove complex was shut down after a vote by the US House of Representatives. They deemed the facility to be ineffective; there was also concern that, because of its location, fallout from destroying missiles in that area could have unintended consequences. Mercy no, really?! WTF did the planning?

In 2012 it was auctioned off for $530,000 to the Hutterite Colony of Forbes, North Dakota. Hutterites aka Hutterian Brethren (German: Hutterische Brüder), are a communal ethno religious branch of Anabaptists, who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the early 16th century and have formed intentional communities.

In the 1994 Leonard Nimoy film "Holy Matrimony", Havana (Patricia Arquette) is on the run from the law and hides in a Hutterite community in Alberta, Canada, led by Wilhelm (actor Armin Mueller-Stahl).

In 2020, portions of the property including the Pyramid were sold to the Cavalier County Job Development Authority (CCJDA) for $462,900.

In July 2022, data center developer Bitzero Blockchain Inc. (NetZero, WEF, ESG-driven 2 yr-old company) acquired the pyramid from the CCJDA in order to restore and renovate the complex and convert it into a data center, with a slated $500 million going into the project. Local news story



May 26, 1970: BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES had its world premiere in Los Angeles. Proceeds went to the City of Hope charity. Russ Meyer and fiancée Edy Williams attended along with Clint Eastwood, Lee Majors, Farrah Fawcett, Tippi Hedren, Sam Elliott and many others!




BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES...Reimagineered poster art by Eric Powell.

The A to Z of Russ Meyer

Russ Meyer is the most cult-iest of cult movie directors.

Films like Faster Pussycat Kill Kill (1965), Vixen (1968) and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970) still pack out revival houses. His work continues to inspire critical analysis and attract new fans. Artwork from his movie remains in high demand for posters and T shirts.

Here’s an A to Z about the famous auteur.

A is for Alzheimer’s Disease, which afflicted Meyer during the last years of his life prior to his death in 2004, and is a downer of a way to start this article but you can’t ignore it happened. Meyer had an incredible life – lots of sex, fame, money, laughs and a job he loved, even some critical respect. He died a wealthy man with a devoted fan base – there was no Ed Wood/DW Griffith style languishing in obscurity and poverty for old Russ. That doesn’t guarantee you’ll go out well, though, and it didn’t for Meyer, whose health declined in the mid 1990s and developed into full blown Alzheimer’s. (Mental illness ran in the family – his mother and sister wound up in psychiatric hospitals.)
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E is for Eve Meyer, Meyer’s second wife, associate producer, lead model, star of his second film Eve and the Handyman and overall muse. The two drifted apart personally and professionally by the early ‘70s and, like many an auteur director, Meyer was never as good once he broke up with his wife (eg George Lucas, Peter Bogdanovich). She died in a plane crash on the Canary Islands in 1977.

F is for feminism, something Meyer is occasionally accused of, mostly due to having three strong female leads in Faster Pussycat Kill Kill and making a film about female sexual desire, Vixen. But try arguing that feminism after watching Charles Napier beat, strangle, stomp and electrocute Shari Eubank to a lingering death in Supervixens (1975); or Lorna Maitland learning to love sex by being raped in Lorna (1964) and then being murdered for liking sex; or have Alex Rocco in Motorpsycho (1965) ignore looking after his recently raped wife so he can go looking for revenge and flirt with Haji; or all of the comic rape in Up! (1976) and Beneath the Valley of the Ultra Vixens. One thing is certain though – Meyer’s films with female protagonists (Faster Pussycat, Vixen, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Mondo Topless) are a hell of a lot more entertaining and hold up much better than those where the action is driven by the men (Blacksnake, Supervixens, Finders Keepers Lovers Weepers). He never seemed to learn that lesson though and kept drifting back to stories with male protagonists.
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H is for homophobia, something Meyer is accused of, mostly because (spoilers) all the LGBTI characters in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls get murdered but also because of the gay caricatures in The Seven Minutes (1971), Up! (1976) and Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens, and Haji being a tragic doomed lesbian in Faster Pussycat. However, Meyer always depicts lesbian lovemaking as a positive, enjoyable thing (especially in Vixen) – indeed the climax of Cherry Harry and Raquel (1970) features two women happily going at it intercut with scenes of two men pointlessly shooting each other to death, making a surprisingly affecting point about sex being more worthwhile than violence. I am aware this doesn’t clear him of homophobia and he films everything very much through a straight male gaze (or leer), but he at least had queer characters in several of his movies when that wasn’t super common – half the characters in Up!, for instance, are bisexual.
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W is for Williams, Edy, who Meyer met during Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and became his wife number three. He overlooked her for lead roles in The Seven Minutes (she played a support) and Blacksnake. Meyer was going to put her in a star vehicle, Foxy but it was never made. Are you surprised to hear the marriage didn’t last? You know something, Edy Williams should have played the lead in Blacksnake – it would have been more fun.

X is for X rating which Meyer alternatively battled and embraced throughout his career. Battles with censors cost him a lot of money but he made it back in the success he enjoyed.
The A to Z of Russ Meyer

Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens (1979, got a Rated X) Writers: Roger Ebert & Russ Meyer.


It was aired in Finland on July 8, 1999 as a TV premiere!


ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES opened May 26, 1971 in Los Angeles.