Signal Watch Reads: 1960's Austin Gangsters - Organized Crime That Rocked the Capital

Not too long ago, I read Jesse Sublett's follow up to this book, Last Gangster in Austin.  I enjoyed the book and determined to check out his first installment, 1960's Austin Gangsters: Organized Crime That Rocked the Capital.  

There's less of a clear narrative to this book than the follow-up.  That's not a product of poor writing or research with this first book - instead, there's a wider scope, more folks involved, and it takes place over a longer timeline.  All of that territory means you have to think in bullet points while adding some color.

In 1960's Austin Gangsters, Sublett charts the rise and fall of regional criminals in what was then the sleepy college and State Capital town of Austin, Texas.  

I listened to the audiobook version, which ran less than five hours.  Much to my delight, it was narrated by former Superman voice actor, George Newbern, who gets almost all of the Texas locations correct, minus one or two.*

Chabert Watch: What If God Were The Sun? (2007)

Watched:  02/07/2026

Format:  Disc

Viewing:  First

Director:  Stephen Tolkin

We're still working our way through the Chabert-a-Tron 3000, and this checks another box.  I think I've only found one more movie was released on disc, so after that... who knows?

A pre-Hallmark Chabert had such a weird career.  Maybe all actors have an odd, bumpy start, but this movie was made in the thick of the period where Chabert was doing a lot of roles in scrappy indie movies you've never heard of, but then she was getting good work in smaller movies like Reach For Me which feel like they're at least trying to do something a bit more meaningful.  

I'm not really familiar with the Lifetime Network oeuvre, but this movie is much more in line with Reach For Me than it is, say, Be My Baby or The Pleasure Drivers.  And, it's another one of Chabert's movies where she works with one of the greats.  This time, her co-star is Gena Rowlands.

The six degrees of separation with Chabert is bananas.

Wise Noir Watch: Born to Kill (1947)

Watched:  02/07/2026

Format:  DVD

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  Robert Wise

In the world of film noir, there's movies that are a bit gritty, and then there's movies like Born to Kill (1947) that look around at the shadier movies and say "hold my beer".  

First - we don't talk enough about Claire Trevor.  Stunningly good actor who has been largely forgotten by non-classic film buffs, but who won an Academy Award the year after this movie for her remarkable role in Key Largo.  Trevor didn't just work in noir, but in noir - she's one of the most active women of the genre, and is who you give a role to when you know the character is going to get extreme and you need for them to still feel like someone you might know in real life.  She's also fantastic in Murder, My Sweet, Raw Deal, Dead End, and you might know her from Stagecoach.    

Here, she plays a woman seeking a divorce in classic 1940's fashion - by going to Reno for six weeks and then being granted her divorce.  As she's planning her return home, her neighbor is murdered by a jealous boyfriend, played by Lawrence Tierney.*  She doesn't know it was him, but she stumbles on the bodies but doesn't call the cops - wanting to stay out of whatever happened and just get home.

Welsh Watch: How Green Was My Valley (1941)

Watched:  02/07/2026

Format:  Prime

Viewing:  First

Director:  John Ford

Pondering how many Maureen O'Hara movies I'd actually seen, I noted I'd never seen How Green Was My Valley (1941), a massive Academy Award winner than got Best Picture the year Citizen Kane was nominated.  It's funny as not much changes with the Academy - a deeply sentimental movie with some good social points and dripping with nostalgia beat out a technical and narrative achievement that trades weepy for chilling.  

Based on a popular 1939 novel, the movie retains the approach, like a memoir detailing the various incidents and threads that shape the decline of a mining community in Southern Wales presumably in the late 19th Century.  In addition to O'Hara as the sister in a family with five brothers, the movie's focal point and narrator is a very young Roddy McDowall, who slowly loses his innocence and idyllic youth.  We also have Walter Pidgeon as a pastor at the church, Donald Crisp as the father navigating the changes - sometimes well, sometimes less well.  And there's an army of people you'll recognize from The Quiet Man, part of Ford's company of players.  

First Watch: The Parent Trap (1961)

Watched:  02/05/2026

Format:  Disney+

Viewing:  First

Director:  David Swift

So, The Parent Trap (1961) is one of those movies that gets so heavily referenced, I figured I was good skipping it.  Twins (Hayley Mills and Hayley Mills) are separated at birth, one goes with Mom (a radiant Maureen O'Hara) and one goes with Dad (Brian Keith) - and neither is supposed to know the other exists.  For reasons.

Kids meet at camp, figure out they're sisters, and swap places for a bit til it's time to reveal who they are and force their parents back together.  Wackiness ensues.  

After we finished The Muppet Show special on Disney+, the menu offered up this movie, and I mentioned I'd never seen it, and Jamie insisted.  I mean, it was not exactly a hard sell.  I'll watch Maureen O'Hara read the dictionary.

Anyhoo, my impression of the plot was largely right.  What I wasn't prepared for is the kind of dark sense of humor the movie has, and that it's even a little bawdy at times - for a live-action Disney movie from 1961.  It's really funny.

Yeah, I really liked The Parent Trap.  Who knew?

Up All Night Watch: Assault of the Party Nerds (1989) & Assault of the Party Nerds 2 (1995)

Watched:  01/17 and 02/04/2026

Format:  YouTube - Up All Night

Viewing:  First/ First

Director:  Richard Gabai

Rhonda Shear is back with an all-new version of her 90's show Up All Night, now playing on YouTube.  

Look, I'm not going to discuss these two movies.  They're B movies from jump, and proud of it.  One is a Revenge of the Nerds knock-off, and one is a movie about our lead/ director as now a private detective.

Of note - Linnea Quigley appears in both movies.  Troy Donahue appears in the first.  Burt Ward, Rhonda Shear appear in the second.

While both movies are exactly the stunning material you're used to from Up All Night, the Rhonda-starring Up All Night bumpers are the highlight.  Richard Gambai appears with both movies, but he and Rhonda do a bit of a retrospective and talk about their 90's glory days.  It's kind of interesting to hear about working in the fringes during that period.  

If the show seems like it's trying to figure itself out - in all fairness, Up All Night was also reinventing itself constantly over its 8 year run.  So it's just kind of whatever it needs to be at any given time.

The Muppet Show is back. Sort of. Maybe.

Mind blowing.  

We've all seen so many reboots or relaunches as they try to recapture the magic - including with The Muppet Show which has had Muppets Tonight, that weird ABC thing, and other specials and attempts - and if anything out there gets even partially close, we all cheer.

But, holy cats, is the new episode of The Muppet Show on Disney+ like a very real continuation of the original series.  Was happy to see all my old Muppet friends in their natural environs.  

Anyway, my social media is ablaze with people celebrating the mighty return of the show, which means you've likely seen it, or will.  And maybe Disney will let them keep doing this?  

Kudos to Sabrina Carpenter for being the ideal Muppet Show guest.  And Maya Rudolph for being Maya Rudolph.  

Loved it.  Will watch if Disney greenlights more episodes.  

Happy Birthday, Ida Lupino

Happy birthday, Ida Lupino, born this day in 1918.

She's actually British born, but fine, Google robot.

Western Watch: How The West Was Won (1962)

Watched:  02/02/2026

Format:  Disc

Viewing:  First

Directors:  John Ford - Henry Hathaway - George Marshall

The word that leaps to mind watching How The West Was Won (1962) is "spectacle".  Really, I'm not sure I've ever seen anything else quite like it.  

It's a movie with an overture and intermission and exit music.  Its runtime is almost three hours.  There are three big directors!

It was shot for Cinerama - one of two movies ever shot in the format.  It's intended to be a nigh-immersive experience, with three sync'd 35mm projectors running in unison against a curved screen that surrounds you at about 140 degrees.  

Raimi Watch: Send Help (2026)

Watched:  02/02/2026

Format:  Alamo

Viewing:  First

Director:  Sam Raimi

So, two things before we get started.

1.  Back in college, my movie buddy was CB.  We went to film school together back in the day and saw lots and lots of movies together.  Turns out, CB now lives very close to me, and for the first time in decades we were taking in a genre movie like it was the mid-90's all over again.  (I saw Dead Alive with CB, for example).  Shout out to CB!

2.  I have Rachel McAdams face blindness.  It's a serious condition.  Jamie thinks it's a funny game to ask me occasionally who that person is on TV or in an ad or whatever, and I never know who she is.  I have no idea why.  She's a perfectly lovely woman, but if I was the witness when she committed a crime, she'd get off scot free.  Sure, I'll recognize her here, but when she's in her next movie trailer, Jamie will ask me again who that actress is, and I will have no idea.

This is also the third movie I've seen inside of a month that was about getting marooned on an island.  January 4th, we watched a Hallmark movie, Lost in Paradise and last week we watched A Game of Death.  Love an unintentional theme.  

If you've seen the trailer, you know what this movie is about.