Blu-ray/DVD/Streaming Reviews & News
Entries from May 2009
By Lee Pfeiffer The Warner Archive, which offers a treasure trove of burn-to-order DVDs for consumers, has made available Soldier in the Rain, the 1963 comedy starring the oddball pairing of Steve McQueen and Jackie Gleason as two U.S. Army con men who live the easy life on a military base by swindling virtually everyone they encounter. Gleason is the top sergeant and the brains of the operation, while McQueen, playing against type, is his doofy Gomer Pyle-like right hand man. The two manage to connive their way out of doing any heavy lifting during their work day, and in the evening find ways to seduce impressionable women. The film was not well-reviewed in its day and was considered rather racy, with its abundance of sex jokes. However, I've always found it very enjoyable, even though McQueen is miscast. The centerpiece of the film is really Gleason, who is in top form as the crooked sergeant who knows all the angles. Critics complained about the climax of the film, which suddenly deviates from a comedy to a violent action sequence that still shocks in terms of its brutality. For my money, it's one of the screen's best brawl sequences, rivaling even that great pool room scene in Clint Eastwood's Coogan's Bluff. The film also benefits from a good supporting cast that includes Tony Bill, Tuesday Weld, Tom Poston and Adam West. Click here to order - and check out the latest batch of movies available only through the Warner Archive.
By Lee Pfeiffer Severin Films is noted for releasing deluxe DVD editions of cult European horror and sexploitation films such as the Emmanuelle movies and the recently-reviewed Sinful Dwarf. Thus, when I received a screener from Severin of their newly released French import The Hairdresser's Husband (Le mari de la coiffeuse), my natural inclination was to assume that this, too, had a tinge of the grotesque to it. However, the first clues that this would not be the kind of film generally appreciated by overweight, middle-aged men who live in their mother's basements was the fact that the DVD sleeve boasted a rave from Roger Ebert and the notation that the 1990 film was nominated for 7 Cesar Awards (the French equivilent of the Oscars) - a legacy that somehow escaped The Sinful Dwarf. I watched the film without even reading the synopsis and was quickly hypnotized by this strange, but fascinating love story. There is nary a murder or ill-tempered dwarf in sight, but you are never certain until the last frame what direction the story might move in. The film centers on Antoine (Jean Rochefort), a rather mundane middle-aged man who lives a relatively non-descript life. He reflects back on his childhood and his first love: the local hairdresser who would cut his hair. She was a plump, buxom woman who served as little Antoine's first sexual obsession. He became obsessed with her breasts and would use every available opportunity to get a haircut- much to his mother's bewilderment. It was from these early encounters that Antoine decided he had but one goal in life: to marry a hairdresser. The story shifts to the recent past, as Antoine recalls how he managed to fulfill his dream by marrying a beautiful, much younger woman who ran a hair salon. Â
Continue reading "DVD REVIEW: "THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND" COMES TO REGION 1 DVD"
By Lee Pfeiffer
Even if you've never heard of Jack Taylor, if you've seen a movie since the 1940s, you're familiar with his work. Taylor is - ironically- a tailor. More precisely, he's the probably the most famous tailor in the world, having been a fixture in Beverly Hills for decades. He's the man who started a modest clothing business in New York and wound up being the last word on style when it came to the personal clothing preferences for Hollywood legends ranging from Jackie Gleason to Frank Sinatra, and most notably, Cary Grant - the man who is regarded as the epitome of male glamour. All of these artists entrusted their sartorial matters to Taylor, a cantankerous, out-spoken, quick-witted and no-nonsense perfectionism who rules over his shop like a benign dictator. Most amazingly, he continues to do so even though he's in his 90s. His long-suffering, but adoring major domo is his charming wife Bonnie, who has been his inseparable partner for over 60 years. Jack and Bonnie are the subject of a wonderful documentary titled Jack Taylor of Beverly Hills. It's a first-time movie effort by novice filmmaker Cecile Leroy Beaulieu, an Italian who was raised watching classic Hollywood movies. She fell in love with the sense of style stars once had and while in Beverly Hills with her husband, accompanied him to Jack's store in the naive belief they would have a seersucker suit custom-made. Jack Taylor was appalled by the notion and flat-out refused to comply with their request, despite the fact that the job would have netted him a hefty sum. Beaulieu was so intrigued by this man of principle that she decided to make a documentary about his remarkable career.The result is Jack Taylor of Beverly Hills,which has won acclaim at film festivals and which has now been released on DVD through Indiepix. Considering the fact that it represents Beaulieu's first attempt at making a film, it's a rather remarkable achievement.
Continue reading ""JACK TAYLOR OF BEVERLY HILLS" : A TRIBUTE TO A HOLLYWOOD LEGEND"
By Lee Pfeiffer
"A young bride left alone to the lewd passions of an evil dwarf!" So read the American release ads for the 1973 Danish horror flick The Sinful Dwarf. It was truth in advertising, because if you like your dwarfs sinful, this one wrote the book on such behavior. Variety called the film "repulsive" and that was one of the more complimentary reviews. Universally despised by those who saw it, the movie also sparked an outcry from Little People's organizations. The titular character is played by an actor known only as Torben in the credits. 'Lest you think he might have enjoyed Liberace-like status among the sinful dwarf set that allowed him to use only one name, in reality he was more widely known as Torben Bille, and was primarily employed in Denmark as the host of a children's TV show! In the film, Torben plays Olaf, an ugly, leering little man who runs a tenement-like boarding house with his equally perverted mother, Lila (Clara Keller).They lure pretty young women to take rooms as tenants, then kidnap them, forcibly turn them into heroin addicts and chain them up naked in a hidden attic prison where they are ritually abused by men who are happy to pay Olaf and his mother for the privilege.The story follows a young couple, Ann and Peter (Anne Sparrow and Tony Eades) who are unemployed and who have very reluctantly accepted a room at the house, which is the only lodging they can afford.Both mom and Olaf size up Ann as being worthy of their stable of captive girls, an opinion reinforced when Olaf uses a peephole to spy on Ann and Peter having sex.Ultimately, Ann is knocked unconscious and forced to join her fellow hapless captives, while her disbelieving husband is told she has simply run away.
Continue reading "REVIEW: SEVERIN FILMS RELEASES "THE SINFUL DWARF" ON DVD"
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