BY FRED BLOSSER

George Pal’s “The Time Machine” (1960) is an iconic science-fiction movie. For more than a half-century, from the big screen to perennial TV broadcasts to a wide range of home-video formats, it has rarely been out of sight or beyond reach. On the other hand, Alejandro Jodorowsky’s “Dune” is famous among SF and cinema aficionados precisely because it is unobtainable. It was conceptualized but never produced.

Both films, the real and the phantom, are highlighted in new Blu-ray products released coincidentally this month on the same day, July 8.

Pal’s movie, adapted from the classic 1895 H.G. Wells novel, is nostalgically remembered by us “monster kids” of the Space Age generation. My formative viewing was my first, as a 10-year-old watching the film in a theater on its initial release. The new Blu-ray edition from Warner Home Video offered the chance to sit down and give the movie careful attention again, not simply snatch glimpses of favorite scenes in occasional cable broadcasts.

I was particularly curious to see if Pal’s vision held up against criticisms that the film is too old-fashioned for today’s younger audiences yet too much of a kiddie movie for adults, that it plays too fast and loose with the revered novel, that the technical effects are hopelessly antiquated in today’s CGI world. I’m happy to say with benefit of grown-up critical acumen that the movie didn’t disappoint. The visual elements and production values were as polished and engaging as I remembered them, the script by David Duncan was thoughtful, inventive, and fundamentally respectful to Wells, and the actors hit all the right notes in their performances with old-school professionalism and charm.

Among Wells purists, it’s widely asserted that Pal’s “The Time Machine” betrays the novel because it deviates from Wells’ basic, thought-provoking speculation about humanity’s evolutionary destiny and simplifies his conception of the far-future world of 802,701 to which the Time Machine travels. The protagonist of the novel, referred to only as the Time Traveler, finds that our distant descendants have separated into two new species. The indolent, physically childlike Eloi live in leisure aboveground in a communal society, apparently without industry or government. The brutish Morlocks lurk underground, able to come out only in dusk or darkness.

The Time Traveler theorizes that the two species are the evolutionary outcome of social divisions that began in his own time, when the idle rich and the miserable urban poor began to draw further and further apart. He comes to realize that the Eloi are no more than “mere fatted cattle” whose clothes and food are provided by the Morlocks. The underground people sustain the Eloi for the ultimate purpose of eating them.

In the movie, the dynamic between the two species, the eater and the eaten, remains the same. However, in the movie’s version of 802,701, the Time Traveler, George (Rod Taylor), discovers that the Eloi and Morlocks divided as the result of war and devastation over eons, not class differences. As repeated attacks and reprisals with nuclear and chemical weapons poisoned the surface of the earth, societies fled underground to survive. One branch of humanity eventually returned to the surface after nature recovered, and the other remained below. George learns this history from recordings on “talking rings” that he finds in a ruined museum to which the Eloi guide him.

Given that the social concerns of 1895 were unlikely to pull American audiences of 1960 into their local movie houses, it’s difficult to fault Pal and Duncan for updating the story to reflect the more compelling contemporary fear of A-bomb and H-bomb annihilation. Pausing in the year 1966, George barely escapes the strike of an “atomic satellite” that destroys London, a frightening image then and still a disturbing one now. In hindsight, this apocalyptic vision gives the movie its own flavor as social documentary that tells today’s youngsters more about the mindset of the Cold War than any dry textbook. And it also provides a framework for the overall story that, arguably, tightens its dramatic structure for the screen.

Where Wells’ Time Traveler was motivated by scientific curiosity, Taylor’s character wants to escape his own era. Scanning headlines of military mobilization for the Boer War, he says, “I don’t much care for the time I was born into. People aren’t dying fast enough these days. They call upon science to invent a new, more efficient weapon to depopulate the earth.” He sets off from 1899 to find a more congenial future, but in visiting 1917, 1940, and 1966, he discovers that societies will only continue to seek “more effective means of destroying each other.” The Eloi and the Morlocks are the logical outcome. In 802,701, he watches as the Eloi dazedly march to their doom in the Morlock underworld through the open door of a sinister Great Sphinx (splendid visualization of a key image from the novel). They are hypnotically lured by the same wail of sirens that herded Londoners into their bomb shelters in 1966.

Whether Duncan wandered too far from Wells’ model is mostly a matter of personal taste (and in the novel, Wells’ narrative leaves open the possibility that the Time Traveler’s class theory is the likely explanation but not necessarily the right one). As an artistic question, credit Duncan and Pal for incorporating their changes skillfully and thoughtfully. For that matter, Wells himself may have approved had he lived long enough to consult with the moviemakers: in later years, he increasingly brooded on the threat of humanity destroying itself in global war, as dramatized in his own script for the venerable 1936 movie “Things to Come,” directed by William Cameron Menzies.

Fortunately, the movie’s prediction of atomic wipeout in 1966 was never realized, but its anticipation of the Eloi society as mop-haired, passive blond teens (another modification from Wells’ conception, but not completely different, if you read the book closely) seems inspired. By the end of the decade, Pal’s Eloi had arrived in the form of the Boomers’ hippie, surfer, and stoner cultures.

Should you invest in the new Blu-ray edition? That may depend on whether or not you’re a completest who wants “The Time Machine” in every available video format. By and large, the color and clarity of the image appears to be incrementally better than the earlier DVD, released by Warner in 2000 -- I’ll leave that judgment to consumers with a sharper eye and higher-end equipment than mine -- but the package doesn’t expand on the earlier DVD extras of the movie’s theatrical trailer and a featurette.

The latter, “The Time Machine: The Journey Back,” originally produced for TV in 1993, features then-new interviews with Taylor, co-star Alan Young, and the movie’s creative FX technicians, and a skit with Taylor, Young, and supporting actor Whit Bissell. The skit apparently incorporated material that Pal developed for a never-produced sequel. The veteran technicians’ remarks about the movie’s stop-motion, time-lapse, matte, and other pre-CGI effects are fascinating, and it’s heartening to see talented movie people enthusiastically describe their creative work and speak fondly of their colleagues, but if you have the DVD, you have the featurette.

Click here to order the Warner Home Video Blu-ray from Amazon.

By Don L. Stradley

Arbor's life is rough. He's 13, he's on medication to control his mood swings, his brother is a drug addict, and his mother owes money to everybody in the neighborhood. But as bad as Arbor's home life may be, his friend Swifty's life is worse. At Swifty's, the family's furniture has been repossessed. There's no place to sit but on the floor. He spends most of his nights at Arbor's, where there are chairs.

During the day, Swifty and Arbor endure classes they have no use for. They wander around town. They get into fights. The town they live in seems bereft of life. The only sound one hears at night is the humming of nearby power lines. You might call it 'working class,' but no one is working. This is the world of The Selfish Giant, a stirring new film from UK writer/director Clio Barnard.

Arbor and Swifty are the type of inseparable mates that are only seen in childhood. They need each other, if only because no one else wants them. Arbor, a terror who loses his temper often, mouths off to teachers and other adults, feeling there is nothing they can do to him that is any worse than the poverty he lives in. He seems unlikable at first, the sort of kid you don't know what to do with, but over time he reveals a strangely adult side. When his older brother and stressed mother seem too incapacitated to look after themselves, Ardor practically assumes the "man of the house" role.

Arbor's loyalty to Swifty is also admirable. One afternoon, when he sees Swifty being picked on, Arbor boldly leaves his classroom and assaults the bully. The resulting fight sees Arbor and Swifty being kicked out of school. This is ok with them, for they've discovered a way to make money by collecting roadside junk for a local scrap dealer, a foul-mouthed lug named Kitten (Sean Gilder). Kitten seems like a character out of Dickens, putting kids to work for him in what is obviously an illegal operation. Kitten isn't impressed with the boys, until he learns that Swifty has a way with horses. Kitten owns a trotting horse that he hopes to enter in local contests, and he needs Swifty to work with him. As Swifty becomes Kitten's favorite, Arbor finds himself being pushed aside.

Connor Chapman is brilliant as Arbor, and ultimately won me over. He's resourceful when he's out on the road scrapping, and isn't afraid of trying for things beyond his reach, including cable from the always menacing power lines. He's as world-weary as a 13-year-old can be; he's never been a child. He seems to have born angry, and ready to fight. Shaun Thomas is also very fine as Swifty, a sensitive boy who is big enough to throw a punch, but needs a little coaxing from Arbor, and would probably rather be in a barn with the horses, anyway.

The Selfish Giant isn't an easy movie. The squalor is unsettling. The northern England accents are so thick that the movie has subtitles. The characters aren't always likable. The climax is upsetting, the ending a little vague. Still, it's a strong film, and I felt affection for the two boys. There's a scene where they receive their first pay from the scrap dealer. Arbor asks Swifty if he can now buy back some of the furniture his family had to give up. When Swifty nods yes, Arbor's smile lights up the screen. He couldn't have been any happier if he'd won the lottery. The film says otherwise, but Arbor's smile almost makes you think that something as simple as friendship can conquer any hardship.

On a side note, there's been a persistent meme that the movie is based on an Oscar Wilde story of the same name. Trust me, it’s not “a modern reworking” of anything, as several reviewers have tried to say. The Wilde story is about a literal giant who finds a child in his garden who turns out to be Christ. While Bernard acknowledges that her movie is a fable, the influence of Wilde’s story is very loose. Bernard, who is interested in stories from the area where the movie was made, described her Selfish Giant as a “re-telling of a fairy tale based on fact.” Maybe Wilde’s influence is in there, but there’s also a bit of The Bicycle Thieves and The 400 Blows. (For those curious about Wilde’s story, there was an animated version that aired on Canadian television in 1972.)

Bernard’s movie was nominated for a BAFTA Award this year for Best British Film. It lost to Gravity. I would've voted for The Selfish Giant.

Now on DVD from MPI Home Video, the extra features include interviews with the director and cast, plus deleted scenes.

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BY FRED BLOSSER

A particular kind of film was popular in, and almost unique to, the 1970s. I would call them “A-minus” movies. Not quite “A” because they didn’t feature trendy mega-stars like Newman, Redford, McQueen, Eastwood, Streisand, or Beatty, but not quite “B” either. Typically, they were international packages that starred a mix of American actors who, although past the peak of their popularity, still retained some marquee appeal for older moviegoers, and European actors who would draw overseas audiences. They usually were built around B-movie crime, spy, and thriller stories, but bigger-budgeted and more sophisticated than the standard “B,” and filmed on European locations, not a studio backlot in Culver City.

Henri Verneuil’s “Le Casse” (1971),” released in the States by Columbia Pictures in 1972 as “The Burglars,” exemplifies the genre -- French director; on-location filming in Greece; score by Ennio Morricone; the names of Jean-Paul Belmondo, Omar Sharif, and Dyan Cannon above the title; an able supporting cast of Robert Hossein (“Les Uns et Les Autres”), Renato Salvatori (“Luna”), and Nicole Calfan (“Borsalino”); and a script by Verneuil and Vahé Katcha based on David Goodis’ 1953 paperback crime noir, “The Burglar.”

Verneuil had recently aced a big hit in Europe and a modest hit in the U.S. with “Le Clan des Siciliens” (1969), also known as “The Sicilian Clan.” “The Sicilian Clan” is relatively easy to find in a sharp print on home video and TV (there was a 2007 Region 2 DVD, a 2014 Region 2 Blu-ray, and periodic airings on Fox Movie Channel). Unfortunately for A-minus aficionados, “The Burglars” is more elusive in a really good, English-language video print.

Professional thief Azad (Belmondo) and his partners (Hossein, Salvatori, and Calfan) have cased a villa in Athens whose jet-setting owners are away on vacation. A safe in the house holds a million dollars in emeralds. The thieves break into the house, crack the safe, and make off with the jewels, but two glitches arise. First, a police detective, Zacharias (Sharif), spots the burglars’ car in front of the villa. Azad chats with the detective and spins a cover story of being a salesman with engine trouble. Zacharias leaves, but it seems like too easy an out for the thieves.

Next, the plan to flee Greece immediately on a merchant ship falls through. The gang arrives at the dock and finds the ship undergoing repairs: “Storm damage. It will be ready to sail in five days.” They stash the money, split up, and agree to wait out the delay. Zacharias reappears, playing cat-and-mouse with the burglars. He’s found the opportunity to cash out big. Offered a meager reward by the billionaire owner of the jewels and “10 percent of the value” by the insurance company, he decides he’ll do better by finding and keeping the emeralds himself. In the meantime, Azad meets and romances Lena, a vacationing centerfold model (Cannon), whose role in the story turns out to be more relevant than it first seems.

Goodis’ novel was filmed once before as “The Burglar” (1957), a modestly budgeted, black-and-white programmer with Dan Duryea, Jayne Mansfield, and Martha Vickers, directed by Paul Wendkos. The script by Goodis himself, the photography in gritty Philadelphia and Atlantic City, Duryea’s hangdog performance, and Mansfield’s surprisingly vulnerable acting faithfully captured the bleak spirit of the novel.

Retooling the story as a shinier A-minus, Verneuil made significant changes. Duryea’s character, Nat Harbin, runs ragged trying to keep his fractious gang together and protect his ward Gladden, the young female member of the team, whose father had been Harbin’s own mentor. Verneuil tailors the corresponding character Azad to Belmondo’s exuberant, athletic personality and changes the dynamic between Azad and Helene, Calfan’s character. Where Gladden is brooding and troubled, Helene seems to be well-adjusted if somewhat flighty. When Nat realizes that he loves Gladden, it comes too late to save their doomed relationship. Azad and Helene find a happier resolution. The opportunistic cop in the novel and earlier movie, Charley, has little interaction with Harbin, but Belmondo and Sharif share ample screen time and charm as the two equally wily antagonists. Their final showdown in a grain-storage warehouse brings to mind, of all classic movie references, the climactic scene in Carl Dreyer’s “Vampyr” (1932).

Updating the technical details of the story, Verneuil turns the safecracking into a lengthy scene in which Azad uses a high-tech, punch-card gizmo to visually scan the scan the safe’s inner workings and manufacture a key that will open it. Roger Greenspun’s June 15, 1972, review in “The New York Times” took a dim view of Verneuil’s meticulous, step-by-step depiction: “Such a machine might excite the envy of James Bond's armorer, or the delight of Rube Goldberg. But what it does for Henri Verneuil is to fill up a great deal of film time with a device rather than with an action.” In fact, Verneuil was simply paying homage to similar, documentarian scenes in John Huston’s “The Asphalt Jungle” (1949) and Jules Dassin’s “Rififi” (1955) -- incidentally, one of Robert Hossein’s early films -- and at the same time avoiding repetition by employing the kind of Space Age gadget that fascinated 007 fans in the early ‘70s.

Greenspun also objected to “an endless (and pointless) car chase,” but the chase, choreographed by Rémy Julienne, isn’t exactly pointless: it adds an overlay of menace to the second, verbally cordial meeting of Azad and Zacharias. Besides, in the era of “Bullitt” (1968) and “The French Connection” (1971), a car chase in a crime film was good box office, as Verneuil certainly knew. The chase isn’t shot and edited as electrically as the ones staged by Bill Hickman for Peter Yates and William Friedkin, but it’s easily as entertaining as Julienne’s stunts for the Bond films.

Ennio Morricone’s eclectic score includes a jazzy, Europop-inflected title tune; dreamy easy-listening background music in the hotel cafe where Azad and Lena meet cute; sultry music in a sex club where Morricone seems to be channeling Mancini and Bachrach; and airy, Manos Hatzidakis-style string music in a Greek restaurant where Azad and Zacharias meet. It’s an inventive score, but not as well known as some of Morricone’s others, perhaps because it borrows so freely (with an affectionate wink and a nod) from his contemporaries.

There are a couple of versions of “The Burglars” as the French-language “Le Casse” on YouTube, only one of them letterboxed, and neither with English subtitles. Web sources indicate that Sony released the German-language version of the film, “Der Coup,” for the German DVD market in 2011; some say it includes English subtitles, others say it doesn’t. There was a letterboxed Alfa Digital edition of “The Burglars” in 2007 for the collectors’ market, and a letterboxed print occasionally runs on Turner Classic Movies. Those are probably the best bets for an English-track, properly widescreen (2:35-1) print, although in both cases the colors are muddy, dulling the bright cinematography by Claude Renoir that I remember seeing on the big screen in 1972.

Belmondo, Sharif, and Cannon probably have little name recognition among younger viewers today, and a scene in which Azad slaps Lena around, activating a clapper that cuts the lights in Lena’s apartment and then turns them back on with each slap, would never be included in a modern film. On the other hand, the mixture of crime, car chase, and romance might pique the interest of today’s “Fast & Furious” fans. In fact, with some rewriting (and further separation from Goodis’ noir universe), it could easily be remade as a future installment in the franchise, with Belmondo’s Azad repositioned as Vin Diesel’s Dom Toretto, and Sharif’s Zacharias rewritten and softened as Dwayne Johnson’s Agent Luke Hobbs.

It’s heartening that Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has begun to move older Columbia genre releases from its vaults to DVD and cable TV, often in first-rate condition. For example, a pristine print of “Thunder on the Border” (1966) ran recently on GetTV, Sony’s cable outlet for the Columbia vault. As another example, “Hurricane Island” (1951) has aired on Turner Classic Movies in perfectly transferred or restored Supercinecolor. It would be nice to see Sony offer a comparably refurbished print of “The Burglars” on American Blu-ray. If nothing else, the movie’s 45th Anniversary is only a year and a half away.

Warner Home Video, in association with Paramount Pictures, is commemorating the 50th anniversary of Jerry Lewis' "The Nutty Professor" with the release of a deluxe Blu-ray gift set. The film is understandably Lewis' personal favorite- and with good reason. His clever comedic take on the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde legend remains a remarkably inventive and funny film, with Lewis not only in the director's chair, but also giving a tour-de-force performance as the nerdy academic who manages to transform himself into a different kind of "monster"- a suave lady's man with a huge ego and no regard for the people in his life. In a personal letter included in the set, Lewis states: "This is a very special film with a lot of heart and soul. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing, directing, acting, editing, scoring and extensive promotion of the film. It is what I always dreamed of doing when I was growing up, watching Charlie Chaplin on the big screen. I am so happy to offer the unique elements of this collection for the first time, and I'm thankful to Warner Bros. and Paramount Pictures for the opportunity to collaborate on this great release of 'The Nutty Professor', my very special child."

Warner Home Video has packed the set with many impressive bonus extras, some of which have been released previously and some of which are new to this set. They include:

• "Jerry Lewis: No Apologies"- a new documentary about his life and career.
• A specially written letter commemorating the anniversary.
• Phoney Phone Calls 1959-1972- an audio CD of prank calls made by Lewis.
• 48 page book of original storyboards
• 44 page cutting script with notes by Lewis
• Behind the scenes footage
• Deleted scenes
• Promo footage of Lewis and co-star Stella Stevens
• Bloopers
• Screen tests
• Outtakes
• Original mono tracks
• Trailers
• two bonus feature films: "Cinderfella" and "The Errand Boy", both with bonus extras including audio commentary tracks by Lewis and entertainer Steve Lawrence.

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Cinema Retro has received the following press release from Shout! Factory:

A visionary creator unlike any other, with a passion for unveiling truths about nature and existence by blurring the line between reality and fiction, Werner Herzog is undoubtedly one of cinema’s most controversial and enigmatic figures. Audiences the world over have marveled at his uniquely moving, often disturbing, but always awe-inspiring stories, and his ever-growing body of work has inspired an untold number of filmmakers. He is, and continues to be, the most daring filmmaker of our time.

In celebration of this cinematic vanguard, Shout! Factory will release Herzog: The Collection on July 29^th, 2014.  Limited to 5,000 copies, the 13-disc box set features 16 acclaimed films and documentaries, 15 of which are making their Blu-ray debuts. Herzog: The Collection also features a 40 page booklet that includes photos, an essay by award-winning author Stephen J. Smith, and in-depth film synopses by Herzog scholars Brad Prager and Chris Wahl. Bonus features include English and German audio commentaries, the documentaries Herzog in Africa and Portrait: Werner Herzog, interviews and original theatrical trailers. 

The first 100 fans to order their copies from ShoutFactory.com will receive a copy autographed by Werner Herzog himself. As an addition bonus, box sets ordered directly through ShoutFactory.com will be shipped three weeks before street date. Collectors can place their orders now by visiting https://www.shoutfactory.com/product/herzog-collection-limited-edition .

Herzog: The Collection includes:

Even Dwarfs Started Small

Land of Silence and Darkness

Fata Morgana

Aguirre, the Wrath of God

The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser

Heart of Glass

Stroszek

Woyzeck

Nosferatu the Vampyre

Fitzcarraldo

Ballad of the Little Soldier

Where the Green Ants Dream

Cobra Verde

Lessons of Darkness

Little Dieter Needs to Fly

My Best Fiend

Special Features:

• English Audio Commentaries: Even Dwarfs Started Small, Fata Morgana, Aguirre, the Wrath of God, The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser, Heart of Glass, Strozek and Cobra Verde.
• German Audio commentaries: Nosferatu the Vampyre, Fitzcarraldo, Where the Green Ants Dream.
• In Conversation - Werner Herzog and Laurens Straub (in German with English Subtitles)
• The Making of Nosferatu The Vampyre
• Portrait: Werner Herzog documentary
• Herzog In Africa documentary
• Theatrical Trailers

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By Lee Pfeiffer

This summer, in between watching Godzilla and the Transformers wreaking havoc on the earth, you might pause and remind yourself that every now and then a worthwhile movie is released that deals with real people and real-life situations. Granted, it's hard to find such fare in theaters- at least until Oscar season- but there is an abundance of fine, largely undiscovered films available on-demand and on home video. Sony Pictures Choice Collection  has re-released one such title as a burn-to-order DVD. "Owning Mahowny" is a 2003 Canadian film that won plenty of praise and awards "North O' the Border" when it was nominated for numerous Genies (the Canadian equivalent of the Oscars.) Based on a true story that was evidently a bit of a sensation in the early 1980s, the story centers of Dan Mawhowny (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a relatively nondescript mid manager at a Toronto bank. Mahowny is respected for his dedication to the bank, his reliability and his talent for putting together important bank loans in a charming, low-key manner that gains the trust of high profile clients. For his efforts Mahowny is promoted and given oversight of the bank's largest loans. He does a good job, too, impressing the top brass by continuing to convince well-heeled people in the business community to take out large loans through his bank branch. Mahowny's personal life is equally nondescript. He lives modestly, drives an old clunker of a car and has a devoted girlfriend, Belinda (Minnie Driver), who he is about to move in with. All seems well- except Mahowny is harboring a troubling secret. He is addicted to illegal sports betting and has run up sizable debts with the local bookie, a sleazy character named Frank Perlin (Maury Chaykin). In desperation, Mahowny falls into the inevitable trap of all gambling addicts: in order to pay off the debt, he borrows even more and takes riskier bets hoping to strike it big. Meanwhile, he has to maintain a normal life at work and with Belinda. Soon, however, he crosses an ethical line when, by virtue of his new powers at the bank, he finds he can manipulate customer loan accounts and take large sums for himself. Like all gambling addicts, he justifies his actions by convincing himself that he is only "borrowing" the funds and will repay them before anyone notices. However, Mahowny hits a major losing streak that causes him such emotional distress that even Belinda begins to suspect the real truth. He becomes evasive and inattentive, consumed by the daily challenge of covering up his crimes even as he diverts more and more money into his own accounts. In desperation, he makes trips to Atlantic City, where his sizable losings gain him the personal attention of the casino manager, a manipulative, greedy man named Victor Foss (John Hurt). Foss recognizes a sucker when he sees one and lavishes high roller perks on Mahowny to ensure he continues to to lose his money at Foss's casino. Mahowny does stray one time: on a trip to Las Vegas, where he ends up with the potential to walk away with $9 million in winnings. However, like everything in Mahowny's life, he seizes defeat from the jaws of victory. 

"Owning Mahowny" came and went at the American boxoffice with a barely noticeable blip. However, it is a highly engrossing film and is brilliantly enacted by Hoffman and the supporting cast. Had the film received more exposure in America, he would certainly have nailed down an Oscar nomination. Director Richard Kwietnioski builds almost unbearable suspense as we watch Mahowny having to deftly avoid being discovered by bank auditors, his own bosses and law enforcement, as his "borrowings" run into millions. The film is also impressive for the fact that the story remains set in the early 1980s and the production team does a fine job of recreating this long-gone, pre-internet era. The supporting cast impresses throughout with Driver doing fine work as the long-suffering girlfriend who won't give up on Mahowny. Hurt is a villain in the classic movie style, all charm and graciousness on the exterior, but with a Machiavellian nature underneath. Maury Chaykin, looking as scruffy and repugnant as porn star Ron Jeremy, is particularly good in this film, as the man who holds the key to Mahowny's fate.

This is first-rate movie making. You probably missed the film in theaters, but don't fail to view it on the Sony DVD. The only gripe is that the film calls out for bonus extras, especially when it comes to delving into the real James Mahowny, who became quite prominent in gambling circles after his case made the press. However, the DVD is sans any bonus extras at all.  

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By Lee Pfeiffer

Twilight Time has released the Fox WWI epic The Blue Max as a limited edition (3,000 units) Blu-ray. The studio had excelled in producing excellent war movies during the 1960s and early 1970s  including The Longest Day, The Sand Pebbles, Tora! Tora! Tora! and Patton. The Blue Max has not remained as revered as those films but in many ways it is no less impressive. By 1966, the year the film was released, WWI had been largely ignored by Hollywood in favor WWII films. Not only was that conflict far more recent, unlike the complex issues that made "The War to End All Wars" a reality, the forces of good and evil were much easier to define in WWII. Prior to The Blue Max, the most ambitious relatively recent WWI film had been Kubrick's Paths of Glory, released almost a decade before. The Blue Max was based on the bestselling novel by Jack Hunter, who felt there were still shards of chivalry during the WWI era that would ultimately be replaced  by the sheer barbarism of the second world war. The protagonist of the story is Lt. Bruno Stachel, a lowly infantryman who decides to rise above the horrors of trench warfare in favor of the German air corps. He arrives at his barracks and immediately isolates his fellow squadron mates with his arrogant and conceited nature. Stachel has a chip on his shoulder: unlike most of the other pilots, he is not a dilettante and comes from a very modest social background. The squadron's hero is Willi von Klugerman (Jeremy Kemp), who is acknowledged as their flying ace. Willi is also the recipient of the coveted Blue Max, Germany's highest decoration for courage in combat. In order to earn the medal, a pilot must have twenty verifiable "kills" of enemy aircraft. Although Stachel and Willi form a friendship, it has shaky foundations. Willi knows that Stachel's obsession is to outperform him and also be awarded the Blue Max. The rivalry between the two men extends to their personal lives: they are both bedding Countess Kaeti von Klugerman (Ursula Andress), the vivacious wife of Willi's uncle, the influential General General Count von Klugerman (superbly played by James Mason). Willi enjoys making humorous references to his lover as "my aunt". With Stachel's appearance, however, things become complicated, as Kaeti, who enjoys an open marriage with her husband, is free to indulge in her fantasies of bedding air aces and turning them into rivals. Stachel's valor in the skies earns him the respect, if not affection, of his comrades and General von Klugerman engages in a campaign of deception in order to build up morale by making Stachel a "working class hero" for propaganda purposes. In doing so, both men cross ethical lines by awarding Stachel "kills" he did not earn, much to the disgust of Stachel's commanding officer (Karl Michael Vogler), a man who represents old world military honor and integrity.

While the bedroom aspects of The Blue Max are compelling, it is the aerial sequences that dominate the film. They are brilliantly photographed by Douglas Slocombe and are set to Jerry Goldsmith's impressive and atmospheric musical score. The film, shot in Ireland (doubling for France) features several incredible dogfights and stunt flying sequences that are never less than thrilling. With America's late entry into the war, German fortunes diminish and the ragtag squadron's attack on advancing Allied infantry forces is epic in scope. Director John Guillerman, long underrated by the way, deftly weaves the action on the battlefield with the action in the boudoir and is helped significantly by the intelligent screenplay which has a highly creative and satisfying climax that improves upon the ending of the book and calls to mind the old adage from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance: "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."

If there is a flaw in the film it is that there is no one other than Karl Michael Vogler's supporting character to cheer for. Stachler is a shameless opportunist without respect for anyone around him. George Peppard fulfills the basic requirements of the role: he's handsome and cocky, but the character is underwritten. If you are going to have a heel as the central protagonist, he must be embellished with some likable qualities aside from hunky good looks. Consider Paul Newman in Hud and The Hustler: two equally selfish characters, but both of whom had enough redeeming values to make you at least occasionally like them. Similarly, the sexual predator played by Andress is also a despicable person on a moral basis, as she enjoys playing her lovers against each other and reducing her husband to the role of cuckolded spouse. As for the General, he, too, is an opportunist who willingly trashes military protocol to create a national hero based on exaggerations and lies. As for Kemp's character, Willi, he is a genuine hero, but also an elitist snob with a superiority complex who will go to any length to retain his status of golden boy of his squadron. With this pack of knaves and rogues dominating the screen, it's hard to feel empathy for any of them.

Guillerman provides some haunting clues regarding the consequences of Germany's fortunes, as it becomes obvious to the main characters that the war is lost. In a sequence set in Berlin, the military brass and their wives continue to live and dine in opulence, oblivious to the fact that the citizenry is forming soup kitchens and engaging in bread riots. The General's babble about retaining the integrity of the military in order to prevent revolution is filled with hypocrisy because he is deceiving the German people through his phony propaganda campaigns. Similar tactics, of course, would be key to the rise of National Socialism in the 1930s. 

Unlike the other Fox war movies mentioned previously, the film's cachet among retro movie lovers seems to have diminished over the years. It deserves to be re-evaluated and enjoyed by anyone who respects the kind of old fashioned, roadshow epics they just don't make any more.  The Blue Max is superb on many levels and had a great impression on future directors George Lucas and Peter Jackson (who salvaged and restored Peppard's plane from the film!).

The Twilight Time release is one of the most impressive we've seen from this company, with a flawless transfer that does justice to this rich-looking film. The set includes the usual, informative liner notes by Julie Kirgo, an isolated audio track of Goldsmith's score and a second track with alternative music and commentary by Kirgo and fellow film historians Nick Redman and Jon Burligame. A theatrical trailer is also included.

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Click here to order limited edition 2 disc CD original soundtrack 

HOTTER THAN GEORGIA ASPHALT

By Raymond Benson

One critic described it as a “kinky fairy tale,” which is quite apt. It’s also a love story, a crime thriller, a road movie, and one of director Lynch’s signature works. Made at a time when the public and critical acclaim of Lynch’s innovative and striking television series, Twin Peaks (co-created by Mark Frost), was at its peak, Wild at Heart represents some of the director’s most bravura filmmaking. In other words, he was on a roll during this period, only to hit an unfortunate snag when the Twin Peaks movie, Fire Walk With Me, was released in 1992 to public and critical derision. (However, that particular film will be reassessed and discussed further in the coming weeks with the release of the entire Twin Peaks saga on Blu-ray, along with ninety minutes of footage deleted from Fire Walk With Me. This material is the “holy grail” for Peaks fanatics.)

Based on a novel by Barry Gifford, Wild at Heart follows the story of Sailor (Nicolas Cage) and Lulu (Laura Dern)—their passionate and rock ‘n’ roll love for each other, and their pursuit across a surreal America by Lulu’s mother and her various henchmen. The movie is violent, colorful, sexy, loud, tender, and a hell of a lot of fun. This might be the closest thing Lynch ever got to making a comedy, but there are a lot of laughs in Wild at Heart, as well as a number of disturbing and shocking bits that are the director’s trademarks. In many ways, Lynch is an American heir to Luis Buñuel, the master of surrealism in cinema. Lynch loves the dream world, and this obsession is reflected in all of his important works. One fine example is the scene in which Sailor and Lulu stop in the middle of a highway at night because an isolated, recent car accident blocks the way. There, they meet a survivor, played by Peaks alumnus Sherilyn Fenn, whose dazed and confused monologue makes the sequence one of the director’s most haunting.

Both Cage and Dern are terrific. Dern especially sells the movie with her sensuality and wild-child persona. Dern’s real-life mother, Diane Ladd, was nominated for a Supporting Actress Oscar for her role as Lulu’s evil mom, portrayed in the film as something akin to the Wicked Witch of the West. In fact, references to The Wizard of Oz abound, as do nods to Elvis Presley, personified by Sailor’s fascination and mimicry of the singer. Other Lynch regulars show up—Harry Dean Stanton, Jack Nance, Grace Zabriskie, Isabella Rossellini, Crispin Glover, Sheryl Lee—but the scariest guy in the picture is Willem Dafoe as “Bobby Peru,” a truly creepy hit man.

Twilight Time has released a limited Blu-ray edition (3,000 units)  which appears to be a port over from the U.S. MGM/UA (Fox Home Video) edition. The transfer looks good, but it doesn’t appear to have undergone a restoration. All the extras are the same—a thirty minute documentary on the making of the film, deleted scenes, interviews, a vintage making-of film, two short pieces with Lynch, a number of TV spots, and trailer. New for the Blu-ray is an isolated music track, so you can just listen to Angelo Badalamenti’s haunting score, along with the bounty of rock ‘n’ roll numbers like Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game,” if you want.

At any rate, David Lynch’s take on the classic “lovers on the run” theme is well worth the ride. As Dern’s Lulu proudly announces, it’s “hotter than Georgia asphalt.” Just be careful—you might get blisters.

(This title has sold out at the distributor, Screen Archives. Click here for availability on Amazon)  

By Don L. Stradley 

I remember a kid in my old neighborhood who owned a Ken doll. Ken, you may remember, was the sexually ambiguous boyfriend of the infinitely more famous Barbie. If that wasn’t weird enough, this kid kept his Ken doll in a state of near nudity, stripping off his safari gear until poor Ken was down to a pair of bright red swimming trunks. The kid would walk around the neighborhood with his near naked Ken doll tucked under his arm, and occasionally visit my yard, where I and my Neanderthal pals were having fun with our far more manly “action figures,” which included the likes of GI Joe, and Stretch Armstrong.  Ken wasn’t a natural fit – he was too small, his hair too perfect, and he was always smiling. The kid claimed that if you left Ken in the sun for a while, he’d actually get a tan. We eventually let the boy join us because we didn’t figure Ken would last long, not with the way we brutalized our toys. Yet, as we dragged our guys through the mud and hurled them from rooftops, Ken showed surprising durability. Barbie hadn’t totally emasculated him, after all. Then, a fat kid named Bobby Harris showed up with an Evel Knievel doll, perhaps the toughest damned toy in the history of mankind, and all bets were off. Ken joined GI Joe and the others in immediate obsolescence.

I thought of that kid and his Ken doll while watching A Brony Tale, a cute, good-hearted documentary about the surprising male fandom surrounding ‘My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.’ The Pony program is made for young girls, but apparently attracts everyone from military men to bikers. “Don’t underestimate the things that make you happy,” says one of the movie’s more emotionally fragile fellows. He’d returned from military duty a depressed wreck but was rejuvenated by his love of the animated show. His comment is perhaps the most useful of the 97 minute feature, and he’s certainly more to the point than the various grown men who drone about their right to enter a toy store and buy something in the Pony aisle.

One practicing psychologist suggests the phenomenon of “Bronies,” as the male fans are called, is a reaction to the post 9/11 decade, and proposes these burly misfits are just trying to get away from the violence and uncertainties of the past 10 years. Ok, maybe. No one understands better than me that pop culture can help shield a person from what ails him. Yet, the spectacle of 200 Bronies gathering for a group hug strikes me as less about the alleged magical elements of the show and more about lonely people trying something, anything, to find a connection.

The movie loses steam in its middle, as director Brent Hodge focuses on younger Bronies. Neither the junior high school fans nor the older, college age fans add much to the story. When you’ve heard one melancholy loner tell about the redemptive qualities of My Little Pony, you’ve heard them all.

The meat of the film involves Ashleigh Ball, the young Canadian woman who provides the voices of Applejack and Rainbow Dash, two of My Little Pony’s most beloved characters. Ball is slightly bewildered by the show’s swelling fandom, and after attending a Brony convention in Manhattan, she’s still slightly bewildered. She’s involved in something with a power she hadn’t imagined – Ball was a voice over artist who played in a band and took the Pony gig because it offered a paycheck. Now, to her surprise (and discomfort?), Ball may end up as the William Shatner of Brony world.

It’s disappointing that Hodge misses out on the most obvious question: What do little girls think of these much older men who watch the show? How do they feel when they go into a toy store only to learn that the last available book of Rainbow Dash decals has been scooped up by some 38-year-old loser? I found it unfortunate that the Manhattan convention was devoid of the show’s real target audience, and that Ball didn’t get to mingle with some of the very young girls who would’ve loved meeting her. Instead, she’s on a podium fielding questions from a bunch of depressed types who should really be trying to bust out of their arrested puberty.

It’s also odd that no mention is made of the show’s creators, illustrators, or producers, as if the program simply exists in a vacuum. It’s impossible to imagine a documentary about Star Wars fans that didn’t mention George Lucas, but not a single Brony interviewed gives credit to any creative types. Apparently, all that goes on in a Brony’s mind is his own love for the show, his own needs, and his own impossibly sad depths that can only be eased by a girly cartoon.

To Hodge’s credit, he doesn’t dwell on what could be construed as the more prurient aspects of the story. He lets us think what we will of grown men who are strangely attached to images of sweet little horses made to sound like young girls. Is watching the show merely a safe way to stare at little girls, to enter their innocent fantasies? I can’t say for certain. The old ‘Davey and Goliath’ series offered positive messages, too, but I don’t recall a lot of middle-aged guys being into it.

I’d never heard of ‘My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.’ From the clips in the documentary, it appears to be a friendly program about girl ponies learning life lessons. It’s a safe place to be, this world of pretty ponies, probably much nicer than a muddy backyard in the suburbs, where an afternoon with your buddies might be interrupted by a half-naked Ken doll.

*

A BRONY TALE is the first title in the new "Morgan Spurlock Presents” line of documentaries to be released by Virgil Films in conjunction with Morgan Spurlock's Warrior Poets and theatrical distributor Abramorama. It opens in select theaters on July 8 and will debut on Video on Demand July 15. 

Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

The year is 1964 and Beatlemania is in full swing. The biggest band on the planet are about to make their big screen debut. The film is A Hard Day’s Night, a seminal piece of filmmaking that shows The Beatles as they’ve never been seen before.

To celebrate its 50^th Anniversary the film will be presented in a new 4k digital restoration approved by director Richard Lester, with three audio options - a monoaural soundtrack in addition to newly created stereo and 5.1 surround mixes supervised by sound producer Giles Martin and engineer Sam Okell at Abbey Road Studios. The film will be in cinemas, on-demand and available to download from 4 July, followed by a special edition Blu-ray and two-disc DVD release on 21 July 2014, courtesy of Second Sight Films.

A Hard Day’s Night will have an Extended Run at BFI Southbank from 4 July 2014, with a special preview and talk with Richard Lester on 3 July 2014. The UK theatrical release will be handled by Metrodome Distribution.

Director Richard Lester used his experience of working on television adverts combined with slapstick comedy, a nod to the French ‘New Wave’ movement and a documentary style, and alongside screenwriter Alun Owen created a unique and innovative film that went on to influence a whole generation of music videos and films.

A Hard Day’s Night follows a ‘typical’ day in the life of the Fab Four as they try to make it to their big show. As the title track roles we see John, Paul, George and Ringo mobbed by a group of fervent fans as they catch a train to London along with their manager Norm (Norman Rossington – The Longest Day), his assistant Shake (John Junkin – Hooray For Laughter) and Paul’s troublesome Grandfather (Wilfred Bramble – Steptoe and Son).

A series of hilarious escapades follow, with Grandfather bribing a butler for his clothes to go to a casino, Ringo leaving the band to go solo and ending up in a police station and John’s disagreements with a disgruntled TV producer (Victor Spinetti – Help). Will the boy’s make it in time for their big concert?

This is all set to a brilliant soundtrack of classic Beatles tracks including I Should Have Known Better, And I Love Her, Tell Me Why, If I Fell and Can't Buy Me Love, and features a stand out supporting cast including comedienne Anna Quayle, cartoonist Bob Godfrey, TV host Robin Ray, dancer Lionel Blair, Harrison's future wife Patti Boyd, and director Lester himself.

Bonus features include:

• ‘In Their Own Voices’ - a new piece combining 1964 interviews with The Beatles with behind-the-scenes footage and photos

• ‘You Can’t Do That’: The Making of A Hard Day’s Night, a documentary by producer Walter Shenson including an outtake performance by The Beatles

• ‘Things They Said Today’, a documentary about the film featuring director Richard Lester, music producer George Martin, screenwriter Alun Owen and cinematographer Gilbert Taylor

• ‘Picturewise’ - a new piece about Richard Lester‘s early work featuring a new audio interview with the director.

• ‘Anatomy of a Style’ - a new piece on Richard Lester‘s methods

• New interview with author Mark Lewisohn

• Audio commentary featuring cast and crew

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CLICK HERE TO ORDER DVD SET FROM AMAZON UK

(This review pertains to the BFI UK Blu-ray release on Region 2 format)  

By Paul Risker

When François Truffaut ordained Werner Herzog, “The most important filmmaker alive” wisdom would have suggested that there was not one film within his body of work to stand out as his most important. Only a body of work threaded together with consistency; a combination of great filmic works would warrant such a claim.

Following the infliction of National Socialism on the German artistic tradition and consciousness, Nosferatu the Vampyre is Werner Herzog reaching into the past to reconnect with his true cinematic roots. The film that he looked to was not only a masterpiece of German Expressionism, but more broadly of cinema – F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu. If Truffaut ordained Werner Herzog to be “The most important filmmaker alive” then Nosferatu the Vampyre is the arguably the filmmaker’s most important for this single reason.

In 1979, on the Herzogian moors a strange creature was sighted - a genre picture in the shadow of the vampyre. As recently as 2009 another similar breed of creature was spotted - Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. The latter has struggled to escape the shadow of Herzog’s earlier genre masterpiece, which remains masterful example of a director turning his hand to genre. Alongside Bad Lieutenant, Nosferatu establishes him as a filmmaker with multiple creative identities, mining art house, documentary and genre to carve out his cinematic landscape.

Herzog opens his vampyre tale to a series of haunting pictorial and musical beats. It is difficult to imagine the pan of mummies as existing separate of the music - the two fused together in a dance of death. The music echoes like the tragic voices of the living that are in a state of desperation and terror, before their cries are interrupted by the bat riding the evocative musical waves. But the terror is not death; rather it is the living dead – a frightening version of a mongrel creature trapped between life and death.

Klaus Kinski, along with the other cast of actors to walk in the shadow of the undead, highlights the Shakespearean shades of Stoker’s Dracula that is open to interpretation. Herzog’s film possesses a sensuality that, aside from Murnau’s Nosferatu, is perhaps absent in the others. Alongside Schreck’s creature of the night, Kinski creates a monstrous incarnation that is surreal and sensual when compared to the sexual predators of later years. The journey of Dracula on screen is a journey of sensuality versus sexuality and the sensual ode to life versus the emphasis on sexual seduction.

Seven years on from Aguirre, Wrath of God, Nosferatu finds Herzog working within a more rigid narrative structure, and yet his attention appears to still be drawn to the experience. He continues to create a distinct sense of feeling that has become a trademark of his cinema - an aura that surrounds his films that resemble the medieval spires of a cathedral that reach into the sky, and which are hard to miss on the cinematic horizon. The narrative unfolds slowly in moments, affording itself the opportunity to appreciate the landscape, especially in those scenes where Jonathan Harker (Bruno Ganz) makes his way through the hills and mountains to Count Orlok’s (Klaus Kinski’s) residence.

Shot to the operatic sound of Wagner, the landscape becomes a character that recalls the importance of space in Herzog’s cinema. Yet more significantly, this spatial aesthetic contributes to a meditation of man versus nature, and which depicts man and the vampyre as a mere extension. Perhaps Herzog’s Nosferatu unearths the idea of the cyclic nature of life, death and rebirth, where the grandiose images of the landscape form the backdrop of a journey that sets us the protagonists against our supernatural antagonists. The urban wilderness and the expansive waters that link continents are a backdrop we pale in comparison to, yet we define the narratives that exist in the foreground of the image.

Bruno Ganz matches Kinski’s physical onscreen presence in a performance that begins with a sprightly step before spiralling into deterioration and rebirth. Meanwhile Isabelle Adjani as the pale lady is almost responsible for a collision between the telepathically connected vampire and spectre. As in Possession only two years later, Adjani shows a propensity to walk out to the edge of the cliff and hold herself on the brink between life and death, the emotions of the performance teetering on a knife edge between outpouring and restraint. Three celebrated actors who each possess a transformative quality that imbues the film with a surreal, sensual and evocative identity that comes directly from the beating or silent hearts of its characters, and radiates outward to infect sound and image.

Nosferatu remains only second to Murnau's earlier masterpiece, but it's patient and sensual feel betray its European roots. Compared to the extras that made the Aguirre, Wrath of God disc shine, the BFI have struggled to make this package as in-depth. However, Herzog's commentary (moderated by Norman Hill) restores faith in the reason for audio commentaries in general, as he once again takes you into the human experience of the making of the film. The original 1979 on-set promotional film offers anecdotes and insights that are missing from the audio commentary, with candid footage in which both writer-director Herzog and star Klaus Kinski take centre stage. If Herzog's words take you behind the film, this supplementary additional feature offers some fascinating visuals as well. Inevitably there are the standard features such as original theatrical trailer and stills gallery but the illustrated booklet comes with a thoughtful newly written essay by acclaimed composer Laurie Johnson that offers an interesting perspective on this classic European genre picture. Most ironic, perhaps, is the white design of the limited edition Steelbook, when one considers that Nosferatu  is a tale of darkness that is centred on a creature that lurks in the shadows. 

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