Get An Exclusive First Look At Michael Gingold’s AD ASTRA
Back in the day, my parents would automatically open the morning newspaper to show us kids the weekend’s movie showtimes. Sometimes there would be nothing new. Other times you’d find a big black and white ad informing you this or that movie had finally come out. We didn’t really know from release dates back then, so it was always a great surprise, especially for films that didn’t warrant giant television ad campaigns.
Those days are basically gone now, but the great Michael Gingold (legendary over at Fangoria and no stranger to BMD) has put together a book highlighting these delightful newspaper movie ads called Ad Astra.
We’re very excited to share with you a few pages of the book to help give you an idea of what you're in for. And for those attending Fantasia, Michael will be there previewing Ad Astra. You can catch that July 16 at 5:30pm EST.
You can find more information below:
Growing up, film fanatic Michael Gingold would carefully cut out movie ads he saw in local newspapers, leaving him with a collection tracing cinema's storied history via both blockbusters and obscurities. The results of this painstaking work first surfaced in his hit 2018 book Ad Nauseam: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1980s, which served as a comprehensive look at mainstream and underground '80s horror movie culture.
On September 10, 2019, the long-time Fangoria writer and editor is dipping back into his vintage newsprint stash for the 1984 Publishing title Ad Astra: 20 Years of Newspaper Ads for Sci-Fi & Fantasy Films. The 270-page, full-color, hardbound book revisits childhood-shaping '80s and '90s films via alternate artwork, capsule summaries, and review quotes for beloved classics (Star Trek, The Empire Strikes Back, Blade Runner, RoboCop), cult favorites (Starship Troopers, The Dark Crystal, Highlander, Dark City), and notorious misfires (Megaforce, Howard the Duck, MAC and Me). Screenwriter Larry Karaszewski (Ed Wood, The People vs. Larry Flynt, Man on the Moon, Big Eyes) was a fan of Ad Nauseam and penned a foreword for the book.
Gingold will be previewing Ad Astra at a special presentation at the Fantasia International Film Festival in Montreal, July 16, at 5:30 p.m. EST.
Two weeks later, Gingold is also revisiting the horror genre with a second volume of Ad Nauseam. On September 24, 2019, the 270-page, full-color, hardbound book Ad Nauseam II: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1990s and 2000s—a 1984 Publishing title presented by Toronto-based horror periodical Rue Morgue—will highlight the many terrifying trends in 1990s and 2000s horror cinema, as well as the rising careers of key filmmakers such as Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson, James Wan, and Rob Zombie.
"The response to the first Ad Nauseam was thrilling and gratifying," says Gingold, who's also a contributor to Rue Morgue, Birth.Movies.Death, and Scream. "We heard from so many people who also collected movie newspaper ads as kids—and as adults—and shared the love of this lost pop-cultural art form.
"And since I had so many more ads still lurking in my archives, it seemed natural to continue this particular history of horror through the 1990s and 2000s, and also to explore the many worlds of science fiction and fantasy that hit theaters in the '80s and '90s. It's been very exciting to take these two further trips back in time and form a trilogy."
As with the first volume, Ad Nauseam II features well over 500 rare, vintage ads culled from Gingold's personal archive. Ad Nauseam II's vivid visuals encompass big-budget gothics (Bram Stoker's Dracula, Interview With The Vampire), gruesome franchises (Saw, Final Destination), remakes (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Dawn of the Dead), found footage (The Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity), and the slasher-film revival (Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer ).
Both Ad Nauseam II: Newsprint Nightmares from the 1990s and 2000s and Ad Astra: 20 Years of Newspaper Ads for Sci-Fi & Fantasy Films retail for $ 34.95 USD and will be available online via Amazon and local bookstores worldwide. Pre-order Ad Nauseam II here and Ad Astra here.
