It’s ’60s style over substance in this soft-core spoof directed by Robert Freeman, best known for photographing The Beatles’ album covers. David Anthony plays a rock idol kidnapped by four adoring fans. True to Freeman’s background the Mod fashions and psychedelic settings take precedence over the slight story by Donald Cammell (before he teamed up…
Like Little Shop of Horrors, this modest exploitation film engendered an avalanche of mainstream success. Initially unnoticed, it became a hit at midnight screenings and was followed by three sequels, a tv cartoon, comic books, merchandise and at least three stage musicals. It brought good fortune to the House of Troma, whose majordomo Lloyd Kaufman…
John Frankenheimer’s 1965 World War II film is an admirable attempt to fuse the action genre with art-house drama a la The Wages of Fear. Thanks to Frankenheimer’s clean craftsmanship and star Burt Lancaster’s ambivalent performance – part rough and tumble leading man, part existential anti-hero – the movie succeeds on most counts. Burt is…
Franz Kafka’s 1925 novel about an office clerk who is arrested for a crime that is never revealed to him becomes a nightmarish black comedy in Orson Welles’ memorable adaptation. Baroque, surreal and graphically striking, it plays like a two hour dream sequence. Essential Welles. The full film can be seen in okay quality here.
The second in Tom Laughlin’s increasingly idiosyncratic Billy Jack trilogy, this three hour sequel is a passionate if ungainly political diatribe that touches on everything from Native American rights to the My Lai massacre. Delores Taylor, Laughlin’s wife and writing partner, returns as the director of the “Freedom School”, a counterculture haven for restless young…
Writer Jack Nicholson and star Peter Fonda told Roger Corman he couldn’t make a movie about LSD without trying it at least once. So Roger took a caravan of pals to Big Sur, where he dutifully dropped acid and communed with the elements. Out of it all came his most personal and revealing film, a…
To celebrate the Independence Day holiday, for the entire week we’re presenting what may be The Ultimate Trailer From Hell! It’s a transmission from an alternative facts universe. Keep telling yourself, It’s Only A Movie. It’s Only A Movie. Isn’t it? With thanks to Valerie Breiman and Mitch Watson. Josh’s sartorial T shirt can be ordered here.
A middle-aged couple views their failed marriage through the lens of their daughter’s upcoming wedding and discovers their relationship was more profound than they gave it credit for. Written and directed by former critic Jim Hemphill, this astute romantic comedy really flew under the radar upon its release in 2012. Starring John Shea and Lea…
Notorious in its day as the movie where Jekyll becomes Hyde by turning his back and -quick!- pulling his beard off, this is actually one of Hammer’s more interesting literary adaptations. Coproducer Columbia Pictures passed on it for US release and it went out in a cut version via AIP under the titles Jekyll’s Inferno…
Starring Catherine Deneuve, Jacques Demy’s dramatic musical won raves for its unique blend of popular music and light opera leanings (the film’s dialog is recited in rhythmic cadence). Michel Legrand composed the score and the brilliantly bright photography was courtesy of Jean Rabier.
Filmed under the title The Trance of Diana Love, this period time travel fantasy is one of Roger Corman’s most distinctive AIP cheapies, wackily conceived and almost absurdly ambitious, but resourcefully shot on a shoestring. Probably the sexiest showcase the statuesque Allison Hayes ever had. We get witches, imps, reincarnated courtesans and the Devil himself,…
If you want monsters, this last gasp (circa 1957) of the old-fashioned mad doctor movie delivers in spades. Made for a division of ABC television.
Directed by Lewis Allen, this elegant ghost story from 1944 is a consistently creepy yet surprisingly moving study of a dysfunctional family whose problems extend into the afterlife. Ray Milland is the skeptical but good-humored leading man and sad-eyed Gail Russell plays the troubled young woman whose mother may (or may not be) haunting her. Stella…
Managed by Andy Warhol, the Velvet Underground were ground zero for art-rock bands, though their stripped down sound influenced a multitude of musical genres from punk to low-fi to emo. Superfan Todd Haynes directed this fine documentary in 2021 with cooperation from the band’s surviving members, John Cale and Mo Tucker. We’ll never know how…
A supernatural tale of terror steeped in Jewish tradition and memories of the Holocaust, The Vigil stars Dave Davis as Yakov Ronen, a man charged with keeping watch over a deceased man who was interred at Buchenwald. Keith Thomas’s film premiered at 2019’s Toronto International Film Festival and was praised for its original approach and eerie…
Irony of ironies, Franklin Schaffner’s 1965 epic, The War Lord, was based on a play called The Lovers. Stalwart Charlton Heston plays a medieval knight tasked with defending a Druid village where he promptly falls in love with local lass Rosemary Forsyth. Richard Boone co-stars along with Maurice Evans who would reunite with Schaffner and Heston under far…
The War of the Gargantuas was planned as the sequel to Inshirō Honda’s Frankenstein Conquers the World but director Inshirō Honda had problems; he was in a contract dispute with the studio and star Tab Hunter was replaced by a less than cooperative Russ Tamblyn. Nevertheless Honda got his movie made with two of Toho’s…
“A beautiful woman by day. A lusting queen wasp by night!” If that doesn’t sound good to you, you’re on the wrong website. Roger Corman’s revamp of The Fly is a fun quickie with a great poster which completely misrepresents the film, but that’s part of the charm after all.
Bruce Lee’s third film for Raymond Chow’s Golden Harvest saw him awarded total control — he starred, wrote, directed and choreographed the action. In his second film appearance karate champ Chuck Norris challenges Lee to a knock-down-drag-out martial arts battle in the Roman Coliseum. Norris also made his way into the revamped version of Game…
Dan Ireland directed this 1996 film about pulp writer Robert E. Howard (Conan the Barbarian) and his bittersweet romance with school teacher Novalyne Price Ellis (who co-wrote the screenplay). Vincent D’Onofrio plays the troubled writer and Renée Zellweger stands in for his bookish sweetheart. The movie was widely praised, winning the Grand Jury Prize at the 1996…
It’s Christianity vs. Paganism and Guess Who comes out on top in Robin Hardy’s cult classic which initially suffered from poor distribution but is now widely considered a landmark horror film. Partially instigated by star Christopher Lee (it’s his favorite role), who is mysteriously absent from this confusing British trailer. Paul Giovanni’s memorable Celtic song…
In Roald Dahl’s 1983 novel The Witches, a young boy and his grandmother stumble upon a gathering of child-hating spell-casters. The book was typical Dahl; sardonic yet playful and Nicholas Roeg’s pitch-perfect 1990 adaptation hits each bullseye, from the mouse-eye perspectives of a boy-turned-rodent to the funny-ghastly witch make-up devised by Jim Henson’s studio for…
A storybook musical staged with the exuberance of a vaudeville show and the wit of a Marx Brothers movie. Judy Garland plays Dorothy Gale, a lonely farm girl swallowed by a tornado and dropped into a rainbow-hued Xanadu inhabited by singing-dancing doppelgängers of her Kansas cronies. This 1939 classic stays fresh as a daisy thanks…
A quintessential film noir, Fritz Lang’s 1944 thriller checks off all the boxes; Edward G. Robinson plays a college professor in over his head with a beautiful but dangerous mystery woman played by Joan Bennett. Written by Nunnally Johnson, the film seals its noirish credentials with Milton Krasner’s shadowy black and white photography.
There was a man in the director’s chair but none in front of the camera for George Cukor’s classic satire about high society and savage instincts. The film stars the most powerful actresses in Hollywood, each vying for a top of the heap position, including Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, and Rosalind Russell in a hilariously…
George Pal’s roadshow fairy tale was epic in every regard, featuring an all-star cast and filmed in the lavish but soon-to-be extinct widescreen process known as Cinerama. Twilight Zone scribe Charles Beaumont was among the screenwriters who reenergized classic tales like The Cobbler and the Elves which took full advantage of Pal’s Puppetoons while special…