London After Midnight: The Lost Film Hardcover just released

[John Pertwee]

London After Midnight: The Lost Film Hardcover popped up on Amazon and I decided to take the plunge. It just arrived today and it is a beautiful book. I'll be going through it all week so I will come back to let you know what I think. At 452pages, It might take me a while.



https://www.amazon.com/London-After-Midnight-Lost-Film/dp/1399939890/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=london+after+midnight+the+lost+film&link_code=qs&qid=1673888084&sourceid=Mozilla-search&sr=8-1

[MonsterBaker666]

I'd be anxious to hear your review.  I heard it has some images taken from a print of the film.  I wonder where they came from.  Awhile back some appeared and they thought they might have come from a trailer to to film...none of Chaney in makeup,  tho.

[Mike Scott]

If only they had released an 8mm digest version of the movie, like so many others. At least we'd have that!

[Paul L]

I've been excited about LAM every since I learned of it in Famous Monsters. I'm very tempted to buy this book, but after the Riley book (Riley has his critics, but I like it), decades of articles, discussions, rumors, collectables & the TCM reconstruction, I just want to see the movie at this point. But it probably ain't gonna happen. And I've made peace with that.

[MonsterBaker666]

Yeah, the film is likely lost to all time, sadly enough.  I too have the Riley book, and it is interesting, though as pointed out it appears as if the film differs from the script, so who really knows what the film is like.  Of course the director did a remake of the film, Mark Of The Vampire, and if London After Midnight is close to that film, I don't think it was a very good film, story wise, as Mark of The Vampire bores me silly.  A few scary looking scenes, but the plot itself is just dull.  . 

I also have the Riley book on A Blind Bargain, and that one looks and sounds better than London After Midnight.  Sure wish someone would find that one. 

[Sir Masksalot]

If only they had released an 8mm digest version of the movie, like so many others. At least we'd have that!

I have very dim memories of watching an 8mm excerpt of it at a public library when I was much younger.
Only one other "monster kid" I know has ever shared this experience with me but it's still something I rarely
make mention of, simply because no one ever believes me anyway. 'Cool image, Mr Pertwee.

[Mike Scott]

I have very dim memories of watching an 8mm excerpt of it at a public library when I was much younger.
I rarely make mention of, simply because no one ever believes me anyway.

It's hard to believe, because if it had been released as a "home movie" by Castle, Ken, or another company, there would have to be, at least, hundreds of copies still floating around, but there's not so much as even a mention in a sales catalog. It's much easier to believe that it's a false memory.

[Sir Masksalot]

It's much easier to believe that it's a false memory.

That could very well be, General. Here's what I remember:

Our library, as many still do, had research rooms that students could reserve for an hour or two
of private study. They weren't used that often so I could and did stay well past my allotted time.
I'd usually write "horror movies" on the requisition slips and the librarians would bring me boxes
of them. They (or some lab at their behest) had re-formatted the clips from reels to cartridges,
much easier for the general public to load and unload. The "projectors" looked more like VCRs,
in the years before home video was developed. These "film cassettes" were packaged in plain
white boxes with masking tape labels and one clearly read "London After Midnight". I wasn't yet
aware of the movie's notoriety but was intrigued by its mysterious title so I watched it ...
along with many other film clips that day. That's probably why my memory is so cloudy. Being
a kid, my attention span prohibited me from watching entire movies, especially silent ones,
but film clips were just my speed. I started collecting Castle Film digests not long afterwards.

Right now, I feel like Ellie Arroway at the end of Contact (1997). Is it possible I imagined it all?
Did I watch a mislabelled clip from some other movie instead? 'Just one more stop to schedule
on the old time machine ...   

[MonsterBaker666]

Could be some weird false memory. 

MGM kept a VERY close eye on their prints, and prints were to be returned to them after screening in theaters, and as far as I know never released any of them in 8mm format (or 16mm for that matter like Universal did), even in clip format.  That's one of the reasons the film is lost today - MGM held on to their prints, and eventually the last remaining print was destroyed in a fire.  Originally film was nitrate based - highly volatile and flammable.  And it deteriorated if not stored properly.  So when sound films came in vogue, silents were pretty much scrapped.  BUT nitrate film had silver in them, so they'd have the silver removed from the film and tossed what was left after that extraction process.

Highly unlikely that MGM put a clip of the film in some reel to be released to libraries.   

[John Pertwee]

With it being the number one lost horror movie that monster kids want to see, there is zero chance that this could

I'd be anxious to hear your review.  I heard it has some images taken from a print of the film.  I wonder where they came from.  Awhile back some appeared and they thought they might have come from a trailer to to film...none of Chaney in makeup,  tho.

They are non sequential frames of actual film, and less than 20 of them were found. Some showed Chaney in makeup and some as Burke. Someone collected them and put them in an album. The gentleman had quite a few frames of Nitrate stock images from lost films.
It is interesting to see them since the "set photos" we have all seen were staged for the photographer. This is the first time many of us will get to see actual images from the film.

[John Pertwee]

Highly unlikely that MGM put a clip of the film in some reel to be released to libraries.   

Yes, very unlikely. With so many Monster Fans out there looking for even a clip of the film, if it existed in that form, it should have popped up by now.

But, if this really happened, and you contacted that library, and they had a record of having something like that, or even still had it, you would be universally loved by thousands of LAM fans for getting even a clip recovered. The skeptic in me says it can't happen, but the optimist in me says why not?

[Mike Scott]

Is it possible I imagined it all? Did I watch a mislabeled clip from some other movie instead?

Do you have any memory of the film (clip), or just the title. If it's just the title, maybe it was some travelogue.

[Sir Masksalot]

Do you have any memory of the film (clip)

To wring anything more out of me, we'll probably have to call in a hypnotist.

[MonsterBaker666]

There were a series of nudie / cutie shorts back in the day...Paris After Midnight, Bangkok After Midnight, Rome After Midnight, London After Midnight...surely the library wouldn't have copies of THOSE!

[Mike Scott]

To wring anything more out of me, we'll probably have to call in a hypnotist.