MGM’s glamour factory hit heights of grandeur with this nostalgic disaster spectacle, which retains its power even as its pious sentimentality runs amuck. We don’t believe the characters but we believe the STARS: Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald and Spencer Tracy succeed with sheer personality. Best of all are the sensational special effects featuring the…
Blood, gore and the smell of gunpowder! Sam Peckinpah’s booze-soaked Odyssey sends Warren Oates on a grisly fool’s errand to retrieve a rotting, fly-bitten… oh, just read the title will ya? Resolutely sordid and debased, and soaked in ugly exploitation values, the tale of ‘Machete Bennie’ nevertheless scores as Peckinpah’s last successful movie —…
Frank Perry’s version of the shootout at the O.K. Corral shapes up as a fine western and an even better drama — the revisionist angle is supported by an excellent script and thoughtful, challenging characterizations. Tombstone’s frontier folk are dirty, vulgar and corrupt, but Stacy Keach and Faye Dunaway generate a rough-hewn romantic harmony….
The Arthur Freed MGM musical unit gives this 1927 musical remake the old College Try! It’s a vehicle for the wartime sweetheart June Allyson, aided by Peter Lawford, who is quite good if not real musical material. The fun original tunes are joined by a couple of new ones, including an all-time terrific song…
Peter Benchley’s follow-up to Jaws is a treasure hunt thriller starring Robert Shaw and filmed in the pearly waters off Bermuda. The exciting underwater scenes boosted the careers of Nick Nolte and Jacqueline Bisset but the memory that stuck in the minds of millions was a particular wardrobe decision for Bisset’s siren of the…
Paranoia strikes deep! Alan J. Pakula made THE Watergate-era conspiracy creepshow in this sinister extrapolation of political trends. Warren Beatty’s investigative reporter thinks he has an inside track to expose and destroy what looks like a shadow assassination bureau. If the technology of 1974 could be made this efficient, our own Brave New World…
The UK disc purveyors Powerhouse Indicator are back with a second installment of Region B Film Noir goodies from the darker end of the Columbia Torch Lady’s film vault. This time around we have a couple of Femme Fatale thrillers (does she or doesn’t she?), a trio of organized crime mellers, and a hit…
Few ’30s classics have held up as well as this MGM blockbuster, a costume thriller that in spirit is quite faithful to the great Charles Dickens novel. Heroes don’t come more sophisticated or noble than Ronald Colman’s Sydney Carton, nor as vile as Basil Rathbone’s Marquis St. Evrémonde. David O. Selznick’s impeccable production hits…
¡Ai Caramba! The best movie ever made about a killer Spanish Conquistador from beyond the grave (!) is probably the most satisfying of Richard Cunha’s monster romps, despite being rudimentary in all respects. The script is dire and the monster just a generic bogeyman, but the actors are pleasant and the locations attractive. The…
It takes too many words to properly describe Richard Kelly’s followup to Donnie Darko, but the oversized dystopian sci-fi epic just might grab audiences looking for weird extravagance. Cult hosannas aside, Kelly’s ‘crazy’ predictions closely resemble our present domestic chaos. Brilliant ideas rub shoulders with apocalyptic clichés and the acting styles are all over…
Cary Grant and co-star/missus Betsy Drake do honor to the ‘family picture’ genre — with a filmic boost to child foster programs that offers a positive message, avoids most clichés and generates some sly fun too. What we see resembles real life, even if Cary Grant should never be shown washing dishes. Betsy Drake’s…
All hail Blu-ray 3-D … a format still hanging on as one of the best features of home theater. Budd Boetticher’s trim action meller gives us Van Heflin (good) and Julie Adams (respectable) in a Mexican rebellion mini-epic with a backlot feel but rather good 3-D. The 3-D Film Archive’s experts have optimized the…
France’s Robert Bresson’s theory about a ‘pure’ cinema defies basic rules of the movie mainstream — like, ‘no acting allowed.’ But his movies remained faithful to his creed, even as they became increasingly pessimistic. This story of an unloved and abused young girl is considered one of Bresson’s masterpieces. The theme is human suffering…
This 1990 monster romp still feels bright, smart & fresh, a mix of light comedy and old-fashioned scares. The entire show is one long battle against smelly burrowing beasts called ‘Graboids.’ Desert handymen Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward must work hard to avoid taking their place in the Graboid Food Chain. Ambitious it ain’t,…
New superlatives are needed to express just how good is this wonderful Americana musical from the 1950s boom years. The Broadway creator tapped Hollywood’s most qualified (and creative) director of musicals for the stage to screen conversion, retaining much of the original New York talent. Doris Day is a sensation as Babe Williams, whose…
Viavision’s first deluxe Film Noir boxed set gives us four titles that emphasize star power — Glenn Ford, Ray Milland, Kirk Douglas and Lee J. Cobb. The Australian release includes three Columbia titles and the home video premiere of a rare Paramount picture. Which ones are core Noir and which are merely ‘noir adjacent?’…
Director René Clément brings an entertainingly eccentric David Goodis crime story to the screen in high style. A big score is being prepped by an odd gang, played by a terrific lineup of talent: Jean-Louis Trintignant, Robert Ryan, Aldo Ray, Lea Massari and the elusive Tisa Farrow. Only partly an action thriller, this one…
Giuseppe Tornatore’s romantic ode to the movies charmed America, convincing theater-goers that little Italian kids are the cutest in the world. Little Salvatore Cascio grows up in a projection booth under the life-tutelage of kindly Philippe Noiret. Arrow presents the theatrical version of this Best Foreign Picture Oscar winner in 4K Ultra HD. The…
All hail the cinematic delights of Luis Buñuel, a world-class directing genius whose work ranges from insightfully impish to point-blank outrageous. Driven from Spain by Fascists and from New York by commie hunters, he found a cinematic haven in Mexico, adapting his surreal mindset to popular film forms. These final three French features embrace…
Cornel Wilde’s directorial follow-up to his superb The Naked Prey was hot stuff in its day, a war movie with an unexpected emphasis on brutality and gore. Rip Torn bears down too hard on his stock character, while Wilde’s attempts to pull off associative thought memory montages come off as amateurish. But the movie…
This show has everything going for it, in fact, it has TOO much going for it: tragic drama, silly comedy, bland heart-tugs and saucy romance. Everybody’s working across purposes, with ‘stunt’ guest star Bobby Darin preening for awards attention. Angie Dickinson, Tony Curtis and Eddie Albert are terrific but are acting in different movies;…
What we know as Chino is a Charles Bronson star vehicle all the way, and less interesting as a western than for explaining the state of the film business in the early 1970s. A good coming of age story is reshaped to appeal to Bronson fans, while the formerly front rank director John Sturges…
Instead of a second review today I offer this end-of-the-year CineSavant Article suggested by some American-International promotional graphics from late 1961, saved by collector Bill Shaffer. It’s a fun ‘what is that movie?’ puzzle geared to specific fan curiosities. The target audience is the crowd that remembers reading ‘coming to your theater soon’ notices…
If you’re after real nonconformist filmmaking with a political bent, Shohei Imamura’s daring and often sexually candid pictures fit the bill. Arrow gathers three of his best from the 1980s, the international success The Ballad of Narayama, the stunning Hiroshima aftermath drama Black Rain and the largely unseen, often wickedly funny Zegen. Each is…
The Train is back, now at popular prices! The fan base for John Frankenheimer’s incredibly elaborate Occupation thriller is growing exponentially. The railroad and military hardware on view is 100% real, something that CGI-jaded moviegoers appreciate more than ever. Great acting and a terrific storyline propel a tale of sabotage into the top level…
Billy Wilder’s first big Oscar winner holds up as fine work in every respect, and serves as evidence of the writer-director’s moviemaking instincts at a time when he could do no wrong. Starring Ray Milland as a self-destructive alcoholic, Wilder and Charles Brackett manage to retain much of the sordid truth and nightmarish horror…