Welcome to the 350th E-Mail Club Message of Bruce Hershenson's Weekly E-Mail Club!

This club message is now found on our website (as are condensed versions of all past ones through #347, and full versions of #348 on!).  Every week, all members of this club receive just a brief e-mail giving the highlights of the latest club message, letting you know it is now available for viewing on our website (but the instructions stay the same, so you can always view the latest club e-mail without our brief e-mail, simply by bookmarking that page on our site).

IN THIS CLUB MESSAGE: WE NOW HAVE OUR NEW THURSDAY NIGHT AUCTIONS, AND THE FIRST ONE, CONSISTING ENTIRELY OF GREAT "BULK LOTS" IS ON EBAY RIGHT NOW! SEE BELOW FULL DETAILS!

Before I do anything else, I want to award the bonus sets of 29 FULL-COLOR movie poster books to those who voted in the last poll I held (the one about  "your favorite leading man from the 1940s").  Here are the names of THREE winners of bonus sets of 29 books (each is a $569.96 retail value!). They are:

Neil Jaworski of the UK
Richard Zahn of Canada
Gen Jones of Massachussets

The above THREE members need to now e-mail me with their exact current postal mailing addresses, and once they do so, I will send each of them a set of my 29 in-print full-color books (a $569.96 retail value)! I will even cover the cost of Media Mail shipping in the United States or Surface Mail shipping outside the U.S.

I am sorry that only THREE of those who voted can win, but I WILL be having one of these polls every time I send a club message, at least for the next few months, so if you did not win a set of books THIS time, be sure to keep voting and leaving comments, as your chances of winning will increase with every poll you participate in, and I think there is an excellent chance that, if you vote in every poll, you will almost surely eventually be a winner (especially since only around 100-200 people vote each time, and I may well end up giving 200 sets in all, so it is quite possible that every "regular" poll voter will eventually win a set)! Note that (in order to greatly increase the chances of everyone eventually winning, I try hard to avoid "repeat winners". Therefore, if you have already won, you likely will not win again, but I ask all past winners to PLEASE continue voting each week (that is the only "thank you" I would like from the winners!). These polls are just so much MORE enjoyable when lots of people vote!

If you have not looked at the results of this last poll (and more importantly, read the comments left by many members, you should do so now by going to http://www.emovieposter.com/club/club_comments.php.  Note that this is an "archive" page which provides you links to the results (vote totals AND comments) of ALL previous polls, with a link to the most recent ended poll at the top of that page. Also note that you will need to "sign in" to that page with your e-mail address (the one you signed up for the club with) in order to view the "poll archive page".

In all, 130 people voted in this latest poll (which asked who was your favorite leading man from the 1940s?) and 87 of you left comments, and you REALLY should take the time to read them, as lots of them are from very avid moviegoers, with lots of interesting info!

Remember that my goal in running these polls is NOT to determine any "winners" (the poll size is way, way too small to be meaningful), but rather to expose the members of this club to lots of the very best movies ever (or, in the case of this particular poll, the best of the 1940s leading men), and I feel they are succeeding very well.

In this latest poll, 8 people voted for "Other", so I have prepared a revised list of what 1940s leading men were voted for that is NOT on the poll archive page, for the below list includes the 1940s leading men that were named on the "I think a different detective series is better than all of the above" votes, followed by how many votes each 1940s leading men received. This list is as follows:

Humphrey Bogart 45
Cary Grant 35
James Stewart 29
Henry Fonda 4
Glenn Ford 4
Gregory Peck 3
Ronald Reagan 2
Ray Milland 1
Tyrone Power 1
Orson Welles 1
Joseph Cotten 1
Sabu 1
Robert Mitchum 1
Zachary Scott 1
Robert Taylor 1

Certainly, the results of this poll might have been somewhat different if voters had had the above list to refer to before voting, but I doubt it would have been much changed overall. If you are wondering why some people voted for the other names that were not on the original list of choices (Zachary Scott?!?), you will have to read those voters' comments which explains why they voted as they did!

Note that, due to a real rush in creating the choices for last week's poll, I accidentally omitted one 1940s star who REALLY well deserved to be on the list of choices, even though he surely could never have won, and that star is TYRONE POWER. Power was a HUGE star in his prime (I think it would be fair to say he was sort of a 1940s version of Brad Pitt!), and many people (mostly jealous guys felt he was just a "pretty boy" who was not a very good actor, but later in his career he turned in some fine performances in "un-pretty" roles in movies like Nightmare Alley and Witness For the Prosecution.

This points up a problem in last week's poll. I am older than most of you, and I (and likely many of you who are older than others) think of the phrase "leading man" in terms of ROMANTIC leading men, whereas it seems many of you think of the phrase in the Academy Award sense of "Actor in a Leading Role". It is not that one is right or wrong, just that there are two different interpretations of this phrase. For example, Paul Muni (to pick an actor from classic Hollywood) or Denzel Washington (to pick a modern actor) are both clearly among the finest leading men ever in the Academy Award sense, but I doubt that anyone would argue for either as a romantic leading man, for the simple reason that they both virtually never played a romantic role!

In the romantic sense, I think the best definition is a man that women swoon over and that men want to be like (and I believe that definition was coined about someone like Cary Grant or Errol Flynn or someone similar). These actors were hugely successful because every couple going on a date could both happily see their movies!

Of course, Humphrey Bogart is the most perplexing of all. I would never think of him as a classic romantic leading man, and yet he convincingly played the romantic leading man in four of the greatest romantic movies ever made (all in the 1940s), Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon, To Have and Have Not, and The Big Sleep!

And perhaps that explains why Bogart was the runaway winner this week (although Cary Grant and James Stewart made strong second and third place showings, and these three were so clearly the "class of the field" that the rest of the choices received very few votes, even such well-liked actors as Henry Fonda, Glenn Ford, and Gregory Peck.

In any event, I hope many of you who have never been exposed to many (or any!) of the best movies of these great 1940s leading men will take this as the time to finally check out at least one each of the best movies from these actors (I would suggest trying any the above four Bogart movies if you have somehow missed them, maybe Notorious or Mr. Lucky for Cary Grant, and The Shop Around the Corner or The Philadelphia Story for James Stewart). All of these are from the 1940s (in keeping with this week's poll, although of course each of these stars made great movies in other decades as well. All eight of these recommended 1940s movies are masterpieces that should equally appeal to men and women. Even if you THINK that you don't like "older" movies (or black and white movies in general) I am pretty certain you will have no trouble making an exception for these 1940s movies with wonderful romances at the center of them!

Speaking of movies from other decades, I full well know I was being pretty arbitrary in who I assigned as a 1940s star and who I rejected as belonging to another decade! But I was really trying to focus on the decade in which that particular star first achieved major stardom, and if it happened at the very end of a decade, I assign them to the next decade. Look at James Stewart and Robert Mitchum, as just two examples. Stewart had his first real role in 1935, and had some supporting parts in some major movies right away. Two of his greatest hits ever came in 1939, with Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and Destry Rides Again. He lost FOUR years in the early 1940s due to his service in WWII, but he still had lots of great films in that decade. But he didn't fade away at the end of the decade, and he made a bunch of great movies in the early 1950s, and then made some MORE great ones at the end of the 1950s, and had two of his VERY best roles ever in 1962 in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence and How the West Was Won!

And look at Robert Mitchum! He appeared in a bunch of "Hoppy" westerns as a "heavy" in the early 1940s, and then got his big break in 1945 in Story of G.I. Joe (although he was not the lead of that movie). He then played the lead in several very memorable film noirs of the late 1940s, including Out of the Past. Those movies made him a first-rate star, albeit not of "A" movies, but he had the lead in many enjoyable 1950s movies, including the chilling and unforgettable Night of the Hunter. Two of his very best roles ever came in 1960 and 1962, in The Sundowners and Cape Fear.

So what is the "right" decade for stars like these? There clearly is no "right" answer, so I am just using my own subjective judgment where stars belong, and all of you can either follow my lead, or "go on your own" and vote for someone I felt belonged in another decade!

I have already started a new weekly poll, my TWENTY-NINTH one (it ends Friday April 27th at noon CST). This NEW poll asks, "The 1940s saw big changes in Hollywood. Many of the top 1930s stars lost their prominence (some, like Garbo, retired), and many new stars emerged. My very favorite leading lady PRIMARILY from the 1940s is...  The listed choices are:
Veronica Lake
Rita Hayworth
Ingrid Bergman
Ann Sheridan
Lana Turner
Judy Garland
Vivien Leigh
Lauren Bacall
Maureen O'Hara
Simone Simon
Lizabeth Scott
Dorothy Lamour
Linda Darnell
Other (please be sure to list the name of the star FIRST in the comments field below, followed by your comments)

IMPORTANT NOTE: For our purposes, we are looking at female stars whose major stardom started in the 1940s (or the very late 1930s), even though they may have had tiny roles in several 1930s movies. We KNOW that many stars overlap many decades, so we are accepting of stars whose careers continued into the 1950s, and possibly beyond, as long as their greatest fame was in the 1940s, but we are specifically EXCLUDING stars whose stardom began earlier in the 1930s, which is why you do NOT find Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Katharine Hepburn, or so many other major stars listed as choices! We are also excluding stars who may have made some memorable movies in the 1940s, but who are primarily remembered as 1950s leading ladies. Please choose one of the below options, and if you think someone else who is not listed is your favorite choice, then please choose "other", and then list the name of that person in the "Comments" field below, followed by any comments you may wish to make. You are welcome to mention WHY the person you chose is your favorite 1940s leading lady movie star, what movies they did in the 1940s that you like the best, who your second or third choices were, or anything else you would like to share with the rest of the e-mail club.

f you have any opinions you wish to share, please do so in the "Comments" field below where you make your choice (and be sure to leave your comments BEFORE you vote, for you can't go back and vote again). NOTE THAT EVERYONE SHOULD LEAVE AT LEAST SOME SHORT COMMENTS IN THE "COMMENTS" FIELD, EVEN IF IT IS JUST A FEW WORDS! If you have particular favorite movies of your favorite 1940s leading lady, please be sure to mention those in the comments field, so that those club members who have not seen many or any of their movies will have a guide as to which ones to seek out first.

I WOULD CERTAINLY THINK MANY CLUB MEMBERS WOULD HAVE AN OPINION ON THIS! If you want to vote in this poll, go to http://www.emovieposter.com/club/currentpoll.php and take a few moments to indicate your feelings. After you vote in the poll, you will see the current results of the poll to that time, and of course, next week I will again send the results of the poll, along with a link to a page of the comments left, plus I will announce the winners for that week.

What are the prizes for this TWENTY-NINTH poll? I will give at least THREE bonus set of 29 books (each is a $569.96 retail value!) to at least THREE randomly chosen members who vote in the poll. Given that it is likely that at most around one to two hundred members will vote, and that even less will leave comments, your chances of getting a bonus set of books is REALLY good (compare these chances to the chance of winning a lottery or a prize under a bottle cap)! So why not take a few moments to cast your vote and leave a few of your thoughts on the subject of  "favorite 1940s leading lady"?

Over the coming weeks and months I will have LOTS more polls and contests, and give away a lot of sets of 29 books, and lots of smaller prizes as well! This will be a great way to get lots of interesting comments from club members each week on a specific subject. Whereas I used to be lucky to run 5 or 10 member e-mails, now you will likely get to read comments from at least dozens (and maybe 100 or more) of members each week! Each week you see the previous poll's results, plus a link to a web page with the comments. Of course, no comments will be deleted for holding an "opposing viewpoint", just for violating the simple rules of the polls.

CURRENT TUESDAY EBAY ITEMS: We have 700 U.S. window cards, Italian one and two-panels, French one-panels, and rare 1940s and 1950s Italian photobustas on eBay and they close Tuesday, April 24th!. Read more about these great items below, or go see them right now (with large thumbnails and direct links to these great auctions on eBay for easy bidding) in our Current Auction Image Gallery, which is updated EVERY FIVE MINUTES!

What is included in this weeks TUESDAY items? Some of the "better" titles include:
    Window cards: This Island Earth, All Quiet on the Western Front (1930 original!), African Queen, Night Nurse (super scarce early Stanwyck title!), Renegades (great image of super sexy young Myrna Loy!), I Married a Monster From Outer Space, Earth Vs The Flying Saucers, When Worlds Collide, Waterloo Bridge (the original 1931 version!), Doorway to Hell (1930), Underwater, A Connecticut Yankee (Will Rogers AND Myrna Loy), Rear Window, To Kill a Mockingbird, One Million Years B.C., It Came From Outer Space, Gone With the Wind (1939 original!), and much, MUCH, more!  This really is likely the very best offering of window cards EVER at one time on eBay from one seller!  If you have the slightest interest in this size, you will be amazed at what we are offering!  Also included this week are EIGHT very rare "mini window cards" (they are at the start of our listings).
    Italian posters: Lolita 1p, Manchurian Candidate 1p, Bullitt 1p, Tristana 2p, Cowboys 2p, Bride Wore Black 2p, Paths of Glory R60s 1p (great completely different art!), Barbarella 1p, and much, MUCH, more!  DO YOU LIKE ITALIAN PHOTOBUSTAS?  This week we are offering 50 EXTREMELY rare late 1940s and early 1950s Italian photobustas!  Photobustas from the 1960s on are relatively common posters, but you NEVER see ones from these years.  If these interest you, be sure to look at all 50 of them!
    French posters: Belle De Jour rare 4p, Chinatown 1p, Jaws 1p, Bullitt R06 1p (with the Mustang!), Destroy All Monsters 1p, and much, MUCH, more!  Note that we have separated out the 14 French one-panels which have artwork by Roger Soubie, one of the greatest French illustrators. They are near the start of our listings, and the rest of the French one-panels are later.  Titles include Silk Stockings, Blackboard Jungle, Seven Brides For Seven Brothers, Haunting, and Hud, but if you like great artwork posters, you really MUST check out all 14 of these!

    Note that this week's selection of posters includes a LOT of French and Italian posters!  184 OF THESE POSTERS ARE RARE "COUNTRY OF ORIGIN" POSTERS (meaning they were printed in the country where the movie itself was created and first released)!  Many collectors feel that having the "country of origin" poster from a movie is a very big plus!  Included among the Italian posters we are currently selling are a LOT of "sword and sandal" and "spaghetti western" movies that were made in Italy (and some may never have had a U.S. release). The titles of many of these may be unfamiliar to you, but I really strongly advise you to look at all the images, as many have really SPECTACULAR images (and some of them sell for surprisingly small amounts of money, but they really look incredible on your walls!).

REMEMBER THAT EVEN THOUGH THERE ARE LOTS OF EXCELLENT ITEMS ENDING THIS TUESDAY, every single one of our items started at just 99 cents with no reserve so there will surely be many real bargains and quite likely some outright steals! Most of our current 700 items ARE (for the moment) ALMOST ALL INSANELY LOW! But that just means this is a really great "buying opportunity" for those of you savvy enough to bid!
     As of this writing (Sunday afternoon, and there are only two days to go!), around 200 of these 700 items are still at their opening bid of 99 cents(!), around 300 are still under $3, around 400 are still under $7,  around 500 are still under $12, and around 600 are still under $28! And most of the 100 or so items that are over $28 are FAR under their regular retail price (the ones you could find anywhere else). And there are a HUGE percentage of items that retail for $20, $30, or $40 or more which are still only a few dollars each, so there are plenty of great bargains to be had!

Our first Thursday auctions consist of 85 bulk lots (one-sheets and pressbooks from the 1960s to the 1990s!) on eBay ending Thursday, April 26th beginning around 7 PM CST!  Read more about these great items below, or go see them right now (with large thumbnails and links to these great auctions on eBay for easy bidding) in our Thursday Auction Image Gallery (and don't forget to check out our 700 window cards, Italian, and French posters ending Tuesday, April 24th in our Tuesday Auction Image Gallery)!

What is included in this weeks THURSDAY NIGHT'S items? Some of the "better" lots include: 299 1980s 1sheets w/ Down by Law, 298 1970s 1sheets w/ The Conversation, 284 1970s 1sheets w/ Deep Red, 217 1990s 1sheets w/ Pulp Fiction, and much, MUCH, more! 
    Also included are more bulk lots from the Crown International collection including multiple examples of the same poster or pressbook such as 100 Deathrow Gameshow 1sheets, 68 Chain Gang Women 1sheets, 240 The Hellcats pressbooks, 240 Las Vegas Lady pressbooks (cool full-color cover!), 191 bad girl pressbooks (with 4 different titles!), 150 Road to Nashville pressbooks (Marty Robbins), 111 Pink Angels pressbooks, and much, much more!
    Finally, we are also offering quantities up to 100 each of single title of TRI-FOLDED one-sheets that came to us directly from a poster exchange.  Some of these include Shock Waves (100), Where the Green Ants Dream (100), Fear or Fantasy (100), Kung-Fu Halloween (58), Eager Beavers (as "Swinging Barmaids", 55), The Bodyguard (37, with Sonny Chiba), and much, much more!
    Note that the first 32 bulk lots we are offering all come from an excellent collection of 1970s to 1990s posters!  The owner of these posters had many more valuable earlier posters (which we have sold in our regular Tuesday night auctions), and he wanted us to liquidate the rest of his posters in these bulk lots.  These 32 lots are mostly in pretty nice condition (just about everything is "very good or better", and many are really nice), and they are NOT "picked through" at all, which is immediately evident when you look through the titles in each! Quite often, when someone offers a bulk lot of hundreds of posters, they are all pretty mediocre (either in terms of quality or condition or both), but THESE bulk lots contain lots of great items!  They can either provide the beginnings of an "instant collection", or it is quite likely that a dealer can purchase any of them for a wholesale price, and then break them up and sell them individually for a substantial profit!

REMEMBER THAT EVEN THOUGH THERE ARE LOTS OF EXCELLENT LOTS THIS WEEK, every single lot started at just 99 cents with no reserve so there will surely be many real bargains and quite likely some outright steals! As of this writing (Sunday afternoon, and of course there is a lot of time left), only a couple of the really fine lots have gotten close to $1 per poster, and most are selling for pennies per poster! Most are NOT ANYWHERE CLOSE to the combined retail price of the items in the lot!

Do you know about our Thursday Auction Image Gallery?  A high percentage of our bidders have discovered one of the worst kept "secrets" in the movie poster hobby, which is that it is FAR easier to look at our items through our Thursday Auction Image Gallery (actually, we have just opened our Thursday Auction Image Gallery, but most bidders are very well acquainted with our Tuesday Auction Image Gallery, but this new gallery works exactly in the same way, except you only see our THURSDAY items).  When you look at our items on eBay, you do not see an image of the item until you open the auction itself, which is very time consuming (we don't use their "gallery" image, both because it is absurdly overpriced as it costs twice as much as the auction itself, and because the gallery image is too tiny to see any details).  So instead, we have our own Thursday Auction Image Gallery, which has much larger images of each item, so that you can have a much better idea if an item interests you BEFORE you click on it, thus making your surfing time far more productive.  Also this gallery is searchable, by star, director, genre, year, or anything you want to search for! Once you discover our Thursday Auction Image Gallery we would be amazed if you go back to looking at our items directly on eBay.  NOTE THAT THIS GALLERY CAN BE SORTED BY PRICE (high to low or low to high), OUR LOT NUMBER, YEAR OF ORIGINAL RELEASE (from oldest to newest or newest to oldest), OR BY FILM TITLE!
     This Thursday Auction Image Gallery updates every 5 minutes.  The price under each item can only be up to 5 minutes old. Generally, this is no big deal, EXCEPT if you are looking at items as they are closing, then we recommend you bid on the actual eBay page (which you CAN access from our gallery pages).
     But because so many of our bidders now use our gallery, on rare occasions it has overwhelmed our server, and some of our bidders have not been able to access it, especially right when the auctions are closing.  Worse yet, this outage in our server means that you can't see the images on our eBay auctions, because our large and super-sized images are housed on the same server as our Thursday Auction Image Gallery. 
     WE HAVE ALSO CREATED A BACKUP "MIRROR" VERSION OF OUR CURRENT AUCTION IMAGE GALLERY.  It is located at http://www.emovieposter.info/agallery/7.html .  This is housed on a completely different server, and will always be available.  The only time you want to use it, however, is whenever you CAN'T access our regular Thursday Auction Image Gallery, OR when you can't view the larger images on our auctions.  PLEASE ADD http://www.emovieposter.info/agallery/7.html TO YOUR FAVORITES/BOOKMARKS.  You will likely either never need it, or only use it once, but if you are a regular bidder in our auctions, it will be invaluable to you the day you DO need it, for you will be able to see all of our large images, and use this "mirror" version of our Current Auction Image Gallery, even though the main version is unavailable.

Be sure to check out the 85 bulk lots (one-sheets and pressbooks from the 1960s to the 1990s!) on eBay IN OUR BRAND NEW THURSDAY NIGHT AUCTIONS ending Thursday, April 26th beginning around 7 PM CST (either by going to http://www.emovieposter.com/agallery/7.html or by using the link from our HOME page, http://www.emovieposter.com or by finding us by our eBay user ID, emovieposter.com). We feel certain that if you purchase even one of them and then once you see how honestly we describe them and how we charge only the actual shipping cost and how we send them right out promptly and well-packed, that you will declare your independence from those auction houses with the outrageous buyers premiums, the over-graded items, the misleading images that obscure defects, and the outrageous shipping! Good luck on whatever you may bid on.  This is really a sensational opportunity to purchase lots of great one-sheets at insanely low prices!

I want to make several REALLY AMAZING bonus offers to those of you who buy multiple items from EITHER this week's 700 TUESDAY items OR this week's 85 THURSDAY items!
I will give club members the following excellent bonuses if they purchase 12, 20, or 30 of our current 700 TUESDAY items (OR IF THEY PURCHASE JUST THREE, SIX, OR NINE OF THIS WEEK'S THURSDAY ITEMS):
Purchase any TWELVE Tuesday items (or THREE Thursday items) & you get Vintage Hollywood Posters 1-9 (all are full-color and retail for $20 each, a $180 retail value)!
Purchase any TWENTY Tuesday items (or SIX Thursday items) & in addition to the above, you also get 20 other full-color books, a total of 29 books (we are now including our two most recent books) with a combined retail of $569.96!
Purchase any THIRTY Tuesday items (or NINE Thursday items) & in addition to the above, you also get Crime Scenes, a great $35 oversized trade paperback, published by Lawrence Bassoff, and you also get Film Posters of the Russian Avante Garde, a great deluxe full-color HARDCOVER book, published at $45!

IF YOU PURCHASE ENOUGH FROM EACH DAY TO WIN BONUSES FROM BOTH, THEN YOU WILL RECEIVE TWO SETS OF THESE GREAT BONUSES!

Note that you must have been a registered member of this club as of 4/23, and your eBay e-mail address must match that of your registered club e-mail address (the address to which this e-mail was sent in order to qualify for these bonuses.

Note too, that we will cover the cost of sending the bonus books via Media Mail (in a separate package from your poster order) within the U.S., and of sending them via Surface Mail (in a separate package from your poster order), if you live outside the U.S.

Given that you need do nothing whatsoever to qualify for these great bonus books (except be a member of this club, which you are!) then this surely gives you some extra incentive to look over the current 700 Tuesday night items! Since around TWO HUNDRED Tuesday items are still at their opening bid of 99 cents (and another 100 are under $3), I think it is EXTREMELY likely you will be able to purchase 20 items for under $50 (especially if you focus on the lowest priced items) and so you may well get TWENTY different cool oversized items of your choice, PLUS 29 full-color books that have a combined cover price of $569.96, and you may pay under $50 for everything, and you will only pay $12 U.S. shipping for ALL these items, which seems pretty amazing to me! THIS IS A REALLY INCREDIBLE DEAL FOR THOSE WHO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT AND EVEN MORE SO FOR THE THURSDAY ITEMS, for there you only have to get any six items to get the 29 books, and those six lots can contain literally hundreds of posters and/or pressbooks!

ARE THESE OFFERS AS GREAT AS I MAKE THEM SOUND, AND DO PEOPLE REALLY GET SETS OF 29 BOOKS (and a bunch of posters) FOR VERY LOW AMOUNTS OF MONEY? ABSOLUTELY! All you have to do is find 20 or more items to bid on, and then watch them at the end of the auctions to make sure you END UP with the number of items you want to get the bonus you are trying for. Of course, this works best when you bid on a bunch of the least expensive items, for those are the ones that will hardly cost you anything. To verify this, look back at the last bunch of weeks and see what the bottom priced items went for (the number of items you needed to qualify for a set of 29 books). Here is a chart showing how many items you needed to get each week for the past TWELVE weeks, and the total amount you would have spent had you purchased the 20 (or whatever the amount needed was that week) items:

Date            Items Required    Cost of the Least Expensive items
3/20/2007             20                     $20.54
3/13/2007             20                     $95.47
3/6/2007                8                     $21.93
2/27/2007             20                     $25.07
2/20/2007             25                     $24.75
2/13/2007             20                     $21.16
2/6/2007               20                     $21.11
1/30/2007               7                     $60.54
1/23/2007              20                     $19.80
1/16/2007              20                     $22.89
1/9/2007               20                     $103.14
1/2/2007               20                     $20.39

NOTE THAT IN NINE OF THE TWELVE WEEKS IT ONLY TOOK $20-$25 TO PURCHASED THE NUMBER OF ITEMS NEEDED TO GET THE 29 BOOKS! This could be the week that YOU get 29 books, plus 20 posters for just $20-$25 for all, but that can't happen if you don't place the bids!

WHAT'S COMING UP IN OUR AUCTIONS?   WE HAVE SOME GREAT AUCTIONS JUST AROUND THE CORNER! On April 24th we will add 850 three-sheets, six-sheets, British Quads and Argentineans, PLUS an incredible selection of 6 giant advertising billboard posters, three thirty-sheets, and two 24-sheets! There are tons of great titles included (like a nice condition Star Wars three-sheet AND six-sheet, an Ocean's 11 6-sheet, and much, much more, and I think all of you collectors of any of those sizes will be very pleased with this offering!
     On April 26th (in our second Thursday offering) we will add a very nice collection of around 300 27" x 41" one-sheets that were either never folded, or were once folded but were stored flat for years, and this collection includes a lot of "newer" (1980s posters) but also a bunch of nice older posters including one of the best of the Marilyn Monroe posters, Don't Bother to Knock!

We have lots more auctions "in the works" after the above, including a large offerings of folded one-sheets, lobby cards, inserts and half-sheets, and many other sizes, but we have not selected exact dates for those items. Of course I will notify you in this club of what I am selling when!

Here is an e-mail we just received from a bidder on one of our recent eBay items. But first, the history behind it. The buyer sent the correct amount for the item (around $100), but "short-changed us $3 for shipping, EVEN THOUGH THE SHIPPING WAS CLEARLY STATED ON BOTH THE AUCTION AND THE E-MAILS WE SENT HIM.
     We USED to just "eat" these shortages, until we noticed that it was only a tiny percentage of people who did it, and that those people often did it several times each! So we started sending the items along with a "Balance Due" notice, but only a tiny percentage of people paid.
     So a few months ago we started NOT sending the items and just sending them a notice that they had underpaid us, and that we would send their item once they paid the full amount (sometimes just a few dollars, and sometimes $20 or more).
     Well, when this guy received our e-mail saying he needed to send $3 more, he replied with "Please refund my money" and nothing more. I think he was certain that NO ONE would turn down a $100 sale over $3, EVEN THOUGH HE WAS 100% IN THE WRONG!
     Well, obviously he does not know me very well at all, for I subscribe to the "millions for defense, but not one penny for tribute" school of thought, and I will never let anyone blackmail me in this way! So I replied that we would refund him first thing in the morning, to which he re-replied the following:

    "I won a single lobby card, it should be judged on what it costs to ship. If I had won the card for less money I would only be obligated for the $5.50. I am truly amazed that you would piss a customer off, and alienate them by quibbling over $3 especially when they only won a single item. CLEARLY I am penalized by the SALE COST of the item, NOT the COST OF SHIPPING.
     Yes I was offended by what I stated above, ALSO by your initial email stating you would hold delivery of the card (after receiving the initial money) until you get that $3. So, you would keep the card, the money and sit and wait? I never said I wouldn't pay. I asked you to return the money and I intend to re-send the amount + the $3 But I also will not do
business with you again, and I will add my remarks on a popular newsgroup so others can be aware of your style of doing business.
     Last time I bought something from you it was a half sheet of Blood and Sand your office misplaced the money orders I sent (hoping that a money order would speed up shipment) and it cost me $36 to have the stop/reissue ( the money orders I bought only went up to $500 so I had to have three, and it cost $12 per money order to do the stop payment) only to have your office call me THAT day (after waiting a month) saying it was "found" Was I ever reimbursed for my $36? No. Did you offer? No.
    Yea, I can see how you guys operate. Its all money, and all in your favor. Don't worry I will send the $3 along with the other amount once you refund the original. You guys suck. Big time. Hope your [sic] happy with yourself."

This is Bruce again. This guy is NOW telling me that his "Please refund my money" was a request to refund over $100 first so he could send extra $3, and he didn't bother to mention that this is what he was doing? Does he think I just fell off a turnip truck?

I think a more likely interpretation of the events is that he first tried to cheat me out of $3 because he thought I would either not notice or let it slide, and then, when he was called on it he AGAIN tried to bluff me (by demanding a refund) and now that that too failed he is threatening me with blackmail, threatening to smear me on a public newsgroup if I don't let him cheat me out of $3!

Some people think no rules should not apply to them, and others think they should be allowed to decide which rules they should have to obey, and that they can ignore ones they don't like. This auction says (in giant red letters) "Please don't bid on this auction if you won't pay the clearly quoted shipping" but he thought I meant "everyone but him"!

So here is what I replied to him:
     "This is Bruce Hershenson. Angie, my office manager, has dealt with this until now. I have reviewed everything that went on until now, and here are my thoughts.
    I think you are being disingenuous in saying that you never said you "wouldn't pay", because I believe that is the sole reasonable interpretation of what you did. You solely asked for your money back, and you did NOT say you would re-send the correct amount, and no reasonable person could interpret what you wrote in the way you are now re-inventing it!
    As to your being amazed that I would "piss a customer off, and alienate them by quibbling over $3" that is just plain silly. Go into your grocery store and try to pay them less than the sticker price for ANY item, and then say that you are amazed that they would "piss a customer off, and alienate them by quibbling over $3" especially since you are only buying a single item!
    I can't comment on your referencing the very old purchase of a half-sheet. If the facts are as you say, then I would certainly have refunded the money you paid for the stop payment and yet you seem to not say that I refused to do so, so you are apparently saying that you never told me about this cost. Of course, at this late date, I don't know that your facts are correct anyway, but the time to deal with that was when it occurred.
    So now the choice is yours. You can purchase the card for the price you paid, PLUS THE CORRECT SHIPPING, or you can cancel it. I will do either.
    As to your question about how I charge more for the higher price, the answer is that I am actually giving a DISCOUNT for lower priced items. I would charge $10 shipping for all items, but know that this would infuriate people who only spend $5 or $10. So I give a discount on the inexpensive items. I pack more expensive items better, which means they usually weigh more. I spend all of the money I collect on 99% of the items I send, and I spend more than the money I collect on many items.
    Finally, as to your threats, I think it is a poor arguing technique, and one you might do well to consider abandoning in the future. All it does is make me want to never deal with you again. But of course, that is your choice. I am sure you will find many other people to purchase vintage movie poster items from.
    Please let me know as soon as you can whether you will send the correct amount, or whether you want to cancel the transaction, and we will do either immediately. Good luck to you in the future. Thanks, Bruce"

    I have not yet received a reply, but only time will tell if this guy begins his smear campaign on newsgroups. But you know what? I am not sitting here worried about it, because I am pretty certain he gets into LOTS of these odd beefs (here he is STILL defending his intentionally short-changing me after repeated tries to get away with it), and I have a feeling that his negative views of people don't carry much weight with many collectors!

Here is one more e-mail from a buyer, a much more pleasant one (and, as I have often said, the good people in the poster hobby outweigh the wackos by a thousand to one, but I print most of the nutty e-mails I get, so it might seem otherwise to those who read this messages!

I often get complimented on many aspects of my business, but this is one I have NEVER heard before! He wrote:
    "Hey Guys, I received the linenbacked three-sheet poster I purchases from your linen sale yesterday, and it is good stuff. For an added bonus, the PVC pipe that the poster came in will not go to waste ! I own a plumbing firm here in Toronto. Great idea using that tube, as it is strong as hell! Regards"

     As I said, I have never before been told that someone could re-use the PVC pipe in their business. But several times I HAVE received worried e-mails from buyers who received linen posters in PVC pipe who, like this fellow, only knew of it as something to use in plumbing, and they wanted to make 100% certain that the pipes were not USED sewage pipes (and of course I assured them that I had purchased them brand-new!

Once you are done reading this e-mail, why not go to http://www.emovieposter.com/club/archive.php and look at our archive of information stored on our website. You'll find condensed versions of EVERY SINGLE ONE of our previous club e-mails (we leave out most of the dated or repetitive material, and there is even a Google search of the club messages to help you find the answers to questions you might have).

If you are a fairly new collector, go to http://www.emovieposter.com/faq/types.php where we have detailed information (with sample images!) of 51 of the most common movie poster sizes.

Don't forget to go to http://www.emovieposter.com/sales/priceguide.php (our online database) with just about ALL the results from our 17 years of selling movie paper. We keep adding our latest sales (it is now current through February 28th, our latest CONFIRMED sales), so there are now 264,185 entries in all, and just about every one, except for a very few of the oldest ones, is a 100% VERIFIED actual paid price!) You can use this to start searching for actual selling prices of the prices items you own (or items you would like to own!). Note that we don't add items to this database until around 30-60 days after they are sold, because we have to wait until AFTER we have paid our consignors for those items, which we do on the last day of each month.. We add to this database in this way so that there is NO CHANCE that any unconfirmed results can slip in (unlike every other online databases, which are FILLED with "guessed at" prices, and prices that may well be complete fictions (either because the sale "fell through", or the price was re-negotiated, or because the sellers "bought" the poster from themselves!). There have been over TWO MILLION TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND pages viewed in this database in the past 20 months alone!

Also don't forget to go to http://www.emovieposter.com/imagearchive/stars.php where you will find links to 84,024 movie poster images (including all the 972 lobby card sets we sold on 4/17). This is far and away the most movie poster images on ANY website! There have been over SIX MILLION SIX HUNDRED FIFTY-FIVE THOUSAND pages viewed in this archive in the past 20 months alone!

WE KEEP ADDING DATA AND IMAGES TO BOTH OF THE ABOVE GIANT DATABASES, SO IF YOU HAVEN'T BEEN TO EITHER IN THE PAST WEEK OR TWO, THEN THERE IS QUITE LIKELY LOTS OF NEW DATA OR IMAGES IN EITHER THAT YOU HAVEN'T YET SEEN!

BRUCE HERSHENSON P.O. Box 874 West Plains, MO 65775 phone 417 256 9616, fax 417 257 6948, e-mail mail@emovieposter.com, website http://www.emovieposter.com eBay user ID emovieposter.com