Follow Up to "London After Midnight" (1927) (lost)

Update May, 2012: Due to moving photos from one host to another, the photos on this blog entry will be removed, including the screen captures of the Horror Drunx thread that they deleted. If time permits, I will eventually add these back in. Meanwhile, try archive.org for an old version of this post to see all the photos and screen grabs. Thank you.

This is an update to my recent post regarding the false claim that “London After Midnight” (1927) had been found.

Since my post, some other information has come to my attention. Sid Terror claims to be the great-grandson of silent screen legend Max Schreck. Max Schreck had no children. It’s not just unlikely that Mr. Terror is the great-grandson of Max Schreck, it is biologically impossible. No, Max Schreck didn’t adopt any children, either.

Mr. Terror now claims that some “legitimate” people have come forward to help him with his quest. Well, several days ago I contacted one of these legitimate people, Mr. Michael F. Blake, make-up artist and Lon Chaney scholar. He wrote the definitive book on Lon Chaney, The Man Behind the Thousand Faces and appeared on the 2000 Lon Chaney bio “Lon Chaney: A Thousand Faces”. He has confirmed that he and one other person in the industry offered to help Mr. Terror get in touch with Warner Bros regarding this claim, yet Mr. Terror refused to reply. When Mr. Blake’s offer was posted on the Horror Drunx message board, it was deleted with a note from a moderator telling people to not link to “that board”, whatever “that board” may mean.

Montgomery Brando, a gentleman who wrote me on behalf of Sid Terror several days ago, had numerous complaints about my post. When I didn’t immediately respond to him, he took it upon himself to send copies of his email to fellow bloggers. You can see a copy of his email here.

Mr. Brando feels that it says a lot about me that I turned comments off on my LAM posts. Considering that Horror Drunx has deleted the entire thread about this and left only 4 posts by Mr. Terror in its place, I don’t believe I need to even respond to Mr. Brando’s implication.

However, I did get screencaps of the Horror Drunx thread a few days ago, before it was deleted, and I have posted links to the screencaps below. In a few days I will change the links on my previous post to go to the appropriate screencaps as well, as I cited the information there several times.

Mr. Brando doesn’t bring up anything that directly deals with the issue at hand, nor does he deny any of Mr. Terror’s most telling mistakes, so there’s nothing much for me to say to him. I notice he says to “give it a rest” about some mistaken details because Mr. Terror has forgotten things over the last 20 years. Yet we’re supposed to believe everything else Mr. Terror says about what happened 2 decades ago. Selective memory is a terrible thing, isn’t it, Mr. Terror? Perhaps they make a pill for that condition, or at the very least an analgesic cream.

Mr. Brando does mention that Dewey Dewitt is actually Tom “Dewey” Dewitt, who I presume is this gentleman. The point, however, is that there is absolutely nothing linking Sid Terror to the Dewitt brothers, Rosalind Dewitt, or “The Rose” (1979). And, as should be obvious, even if there was a link it would in no way bolster Mr. Terror’s story. It’s just self-aggrandizing fluff.

As for why Sid Terror would lie, well, I think the answer can be found here. (Pretty crappy screencap here.) Scroll down to the July 22nd entry where someone from Horror Drunx is advertising that in 48 hours they will reveal that they have discovered “the most notorious” lost film. “We’ve hinted about it for weeks,” they say. “Sign up on the message boards of our website NOW…”

If you believe Sid Terror, you’re being played. The man is a liar.

I’m done with this, but will leave you with screencaps of the Horror Drunx thread before it was deleted, as well as a few other links you may enjoy.

THANKS, LINKS, & SCREENCAPS

Thank you to Michael F. Blake, as well as to Ivan at Thrilling Days of Yesteryear and J.C. Loophole of The Shelf

Lon Chaney pictures (except LAM lobby card) from my own collection

A thread on AICN (Google cached as of now) containing plenty of skeptics and interesting info

The Classic Horror Film Board thread – a terrific thread on the issue. I probably could have just linked everyone to this from the beginning and saved myself some work. If nothing else good came out of this fiasco, I at least found this great forum.

The Silver Screen Oasis thread – another wonderful film forum.

In The Balcony – They have no thread about LAM, but I just wanted to give them a shout-out. I got a whopping 146 extra hits from my original LAM post, and since I am now Queen of the Internet, I figure I should share the love. It’s a fun film forum and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Max Schreck: A History of Horror website by Eric B. Olson

These screencaps of the Horror Drunx thread were taken on my widescreen laptop, so you may have to scroll left and right to see the entire thing. The red text doesn’t show very clearly, but is still legible.

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The current page as it stands, with almost all posts removed

Edited 8/8/08 1:45 AM