We'll be back after the break...

Commercial for Sears Craftsman lawn mowers:

Public Service Announcement

"We're Not Candy!" PSA from your friendly neighborhood Poison Control Center:

We'll return after these important messages...

Magnavox TV commercial with Lloyd Bridges:

We'll be right back...

I never went back when I was young people, but I do remember seeing this commercial many, many times watching TV (how could I ever forget that music?), and I always wanted to go to this magical camp where smiley face balloons talk, days are filled with fun activities and one can take "long swims in the pool".

Here's a commercial for Young People's Day Camp:

Musica Moonday

"That Happy Feeling" by Bert Kaempfert:

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Commercial for totally awesome Rocks & Bugs & Things toys:

Don't touch that dial...

Colorful station ID for WPIX, channel 11:

Public Service Announcement

Een Zone of Twilight, forest fires prevent YOU!

(With apologies to both Rod Serling and Yakov Smirnoff.)

We'll return after these messages...

Commercial for Dutch Wonderland amusement park in Lancaster, Pennsylvania:

Musica Moonday

"The Tra La La Song (One Banana, Two Banana)" by the Banana Splits:

We'll be right back...

Commercial for the fun 'n' deadly Action Park in Vernon, New Jersey; also referred to as "Traction Park", "Accident Park" or "Class Action Park" by area emergency room doctors due to six confirmed fatalities that occurred there during its original incarnation between 1978-1996:

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Here's Evel Knievel for AMF Roadmaster bicycles:

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This program brought to you by Popeil's Pocket Fisherman:

We'll return in a moment...

Forever burnt into my brain:

Have a summer of fun in the Poconos,
At your host with the most in the Poconos:
Beautiful Mount Airy Laaaaahhhdge!

Musica Moonday

Here's the incomparable Don Knotts crooning "I Wish I Were a Fish" from the 1964 Lovecraftian kiddie film The Incredible Mr. Limpett:

Obscurantist Drivel's First Birthday

Huzzah!  Obscurantist Drivel is one year old today.

Awwwww, isn't Obscurantist Drivel just adorable drooling all over itself?  Uh oh, smells like Obscurantist Drivel just pooped itself...

Enjoy this slice of a virtual Carvel Cookie Puss ice cream cake while I take care of business (thank you):

What the Peeper Saw

"Poor Marcus, poor little devil..."

I first came across What the Peeper Saw back in the late 1980s at my best friend Robby McDonald's house in rural New Jersey late one Saturday night as we were channel surfing trying to find something else to watch after Saturday Night Live.  According to James Arena in his fantastic 2012 retrospective tome, Fright Night on Channel 9: Saturday Night Horror Films on New York's WOR-TV, 1973-1987, this 1972 film aired in the final year of Fright Night's fourteen year long run on channel 9 WOR-TV on May 9, 1987, so this was probably the exact date my buddy and I stumbled across it.  I don't think we watched the whole thing but probably caught it already in progress as we flipped back and forth during commercial breaks between Night Flight or Saturday Night Dead, intrigued by the radiant Swedish beauty of Britt Ekland and the suggestive incestuous overtones between her and her young stepson--though admittedly if Britt Ekland was my stepmother I would probably go crazy with Oedipal yearnings as well.

Watching this film again for the first time several decades later I found there was quite a bit of tastefully shot soft focus nudity which I'm sure was mostly cut out of that late night airing so long ago but I do seem to recall seeing quite a bit of skin back then which had kept this memorable title stuck in my brain ever since; for several years afterwards Robby and I--hopped up on coffee and cigarettes or, later on in high school, semi-zonked out of our heads on harsh locally grown skunk weed and/or oregano--would channel surf the analog airwaves late at night in vain, always searching for What the Peeper Saw, hoping to catch another airing of that weird Euro trash movie about the pervy kid and his hot blond step mom we saw that one time.

Marcus, the sociopathic kid at the center of the film played effectively by Mark Lester, has a memorably creepy scene early on in the film where he unabashedly takes a bath in front of his new step mother Elise, the aforementioned Ms. Ekland; he proceeds to play with a rubber bath toy, evocatively squeezing it so that water squirts from it in a not very subtle Freudian act before groping her bosom from behind while she's on the telephone with his recently widowed father.  This was the very scene that Robby and I saw years ago, after which we just looked at each other and said in unison, "what the fuck is this movie we're watching, and how have we never seen it on TV before?".

After finally seeing the entire uncut film again on the recent Blu-ray release from VCI, I can say this really is one great little fucked up movie, with a fucked up ending to match, though I can see why it was probably only ever shown once or twice late at night and not frequently aired during daylight hours in a Saturday afternoon monster movie matinee slot for the kiddies!

A few other small and probably insignificant observations from this sleazy exploitation psycho-drama:

• The main titles look like something straight out of a Wes Anderson film:

• The movie was produced by Leisure-Media, Inc., the most seventies sounding film production name ever.

• Young master Marcus has a German Shepherd named Trotsky(!?)

• There's an odd scene occurring in the background during the latter half of the film that takes place at a swinging shindig where several party guests gather around a human table comprised of a presumably naked black woman laying on her back with fruit perched on top of her body for the guests to partake of and enjoy.

• There's a strange painting of what looks like a three headed horse or perhaps a bull's head in the main couple's bedroom, the type of painting that would traumatize a young child for life.

I'm sure there are other similar little details that I missed but these were the ones that stuck out for me.

Here's the trailer, enjoy!