Tuesday Trip to Monster Cafe!

I have covered Monster Cafe a couple of times now but I have never shown the MONSTERS on this blog before.  So without any hesitation and shameless self promotion I present....

Dracula was the first Monster we made at MC.  I wanted something at the entrance of the place that would stand out.  Invisible Man was considered but I wanted to make a statement with this one.  A gal named Bustamante made this.  Only $400!  That was pretty frickin expensive for Mexico but hey...I had to have it.  She next made a pink Frankenstein.  Yes pink.  She had seen a different picture of the Karloff frankenstein and painted him pink.  With gaudy eyelashes.  Wish I had a pic of that one.  I sent her back to the drawing board.  She refunded my money instead and in a huff never returned.  So I was without an artist.  We put out an ad in the local paper for another artist and found a gem!  Raymundo.  Great guy!  He also made the Dungeons and Dragons sign I had blogged about before.  Anyway he was MUCH cheaper than ole Bustamante.  I wanted figures that could mount to the walls and had a REASON for doing so.  Not just stick something on a wall.  So I came up with Phantom of the Opera sitting in his opera seat.

Now he is drilled into the wall hanging about 25 feet from the ground.  The head was from Cineart that I had acquired sometime ago and Raymundo just mounted the head onto the body he created.  So basically it is just the waist on up.  No legs. 

I am standing on a ladder to get this shot.  Ole Chaney looks pretty cool!

I wanted Frankenstein on the wall because really there was no other monster I could put standing up.  The only space I had was for Dracula.  All other spaces taken.  So then I thought of the scene where he is at the windmill. Had an artist paint the windmill in.  I am still not happy about the pants.  It is basically only made waist up...Oh and arms up!  Had no idea why Raymundo thought Franky should be doing the wave.  But hey, it works...

Wolfman was next.  I put him up a tree awaiting to pounce on an unexpected victim.  Remember, I had NO floor space.  That is for tables etc.  He works ok.  Even managed to put a little metal bat in there for kicks.

 

Loved the movie THEM! as a kid.  I can never get that ant noise out of my head.  So I had to incorporate them..haha get it them?  Anyway I had to put them into the place.  I wanted them busting out of the brick wall like they were invading but the artist had no idea what I was trying to say and drew it straight.  Oh well.  Perhaps one day.  That steel beam right below them I painted silver to look like something was breaking away...I included a shot of myself to give you an idea of the scale.  Yes that is a Willy Wonka autograph to my left and your right.  Or vice versa...I have more..

These aren´t real autographs but they ARE real pictures of autographs I found on Google.  I grabbed those autographs that meant something to me.

Again....Another one mounted on the wall.  I wanted to capture Chaney swinging from inside the church rafters.  Really pleased with this one. 

The Creature is our last Monster.  I wanted him coming up out of the lagoon so I did it waist up. 

Now this artist is NO Stan Winston but just a humble Mexican creator of awesomeness!  I didn´t have Universal´s budget to do this place.  I had no help.  I had no investors.  I had no partners to shoulder the responsibility.  I had my wife and I.  That is it.  I challenge anyone to do a better job with what we had to do this place with.  So I can say I am pretty proud of myself sometimes in what we did.  Hope you all enjoyed! 

 

Now off topic....my recent scores! 

See that price baby!  That is around $3 each!  WHOOO! Year One!  So stoked about it!  Saw Year One in Laredo for $15!  SO glad I waited.  I am a DVD junkie as well.