CineSavant
Krakatoa East of Java
'Things Blowing Up Good' has been surefire entertainment since the beginning of cinema, but this ill-fated Cinerama extravaganza about the biggest explosion…
Articles by Glenn Erickson
CineSavant
The Law and Jake Wade
Many of MGM's productions were scraping bottom in 1958, yet the studio found one more acceptable western vehicle for their last big…
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Kid Galahad
He sings, he fixes cars, and he takes punches better than De Niro's Raging Bull. Elvis Presley excels in one of his…
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Red Line 7000
It's finally here in all its glory, the Howard Hawks movie nobody loves. The epitome of clueless '60s filmmaking by an auteur…
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Festival: Folk Music at Newport, 1963-1966
We thought all the great vintage music documentaries were accounted for, but Murray Lerner's look at the Newport Folk Festival in the…
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Certain Women
Is this the new feminist minimalism? Director Kelly Reichart doesn't like labels, and to her credit as a woman director, her amalgam…
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The Noose Hangs High
Even lesser Abbott & Costello movies are still comedy gravy to the avid fans of the fast-talking duo. Their first film deal…
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The Stranger
Edward G. Robinson uncovers another killer, but this time he's after a Nazi mass murderer, not an insurance salesman. Orson Welles' most…
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The Long, Hot Summer
Barns are a-burning, Paul Newman is recommended to Joanne Woodward as 'a big stud horse' and Lee Remick oozes sexuality all over…
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Held for Questioning (Der Aufenthalt)
Sylvester Groth shines in this East German movie about a luckless private in a Polish prison, thrown in with a group of…
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Prizzi’s Honor
Richard Condon and John Huston's show is like a gangland version of Moonstruck, bouncing effortlessly between earnest romanticism and cynical satire. Hit…
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Stalker
Andrei Tarkovsky's bizarre philosophical science fiction epic may be his most successful picture overall -- every image and word makes its precise…
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The Man with Two Brains
Steve Martin brings down the house with this adoring, hilarious pastiche of mad doctor and disembodied brain motifs -- surely the epitome…
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Tobor the Great
Robot roll call! This also-ran robotic fantasy from the 1950s is precisely the kind of movie one would expect from Republic, a…
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Night Moves
Arthur Penn's detective movie is one of the best ever in the genre, one that rewards repeat viewings particularly well. Gumshoe Harry…
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Ronin
Robert De Niro picks up a gun once again as a highly paid spy-mercenary-thief hired for a bit of international larceny, the…
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Duel in the Sun
David O. Selznick's absurdly over-cooked western epic is a great picture, even if much of it induces a kind of hypnotic, mouth-hanging-open…
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The Good, The Bad and The Ugly 50th Anniversary
Sergio Leone's Civil War gunslinger epic is everybody's favorite western, and most everybody has a bone to pick regarding problems with the…
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Meantime
Nobody stands up for Britons in the lower class trenches like the fierce, opinionated and outright brilliant Mike Leigh; his unusual writing…
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The Crimson Kimono
Another great Samuel Fuller film on Blu-ray -- this one is a crime tale set in downtown Los Angeles' Little Tokyo, that…
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Beggars of Life
A happy discovery! This is a major late- silent-era gem on the order of Von Sternberg's Docks of New York -- a…
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Freebie and the Bean
Here's how one pushed the limits of good taste in 1974. James Caan and Alan Arkin run the gamut of racist, raunchy,…
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The Dinner
How far will the new American aristocracy go to protect its privileges? Oren Moverman's intense four-way war of wills is sourced from…
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Hopscotch
A generic spy story becomes an inspired light comedy with the application of great talent led by the star-power of Walter Matthau.…
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Silkwood
It's a quality true-life mystery-exposé that doesn't come off as tabloid trash or Oliver Stone hysteria -- the true story of Karen…
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Night People
Nunnally Johnson hands us a well-written spy & hostage drama set in Cold War Berlin, with plenty of intrigue and good humor…