I
first became acquainted with director Peter Medak’s work in 1983 when I saw his
1980 masterwork The Changeling, one
of the most frightening ghost stories shot in color. Also known for 1972’s The Ruling Class and 1990’s The
Krays, Mr. Medak made the film noir Romeo
is Bleeding, shot in 1992 and released on Friday, February 4, 1994. The film is told in an elliptical narrative
fashion, starting with the end and going back in time to show us how the
protagonist got to where he is. We first
see Jack Grimaldi in a dilapidated diner, his voiceover indicative of a man
full of regrets who is probably in the Witness Protection Program and forced to
lead a life bereft of any true purpose or feeling. Once upon a time, he was a police officer in
New York City and his partners are comprised of actors we know well today: Scully
(David Proval from Mean Streets and The Sopranos), Martie (Will Patton from 24), John (Gene Canfield from Law & Order), and Joey (Larry Joshua
from NYPD Blue). Unfortunately, his lust for money gets the
better of him and he sells out the criminal witnesses to the Mafia. His wife Natalie (Annabella Sciorra) knows
that he’s up to something and is on to his affairs as well (he dilly dallies
with Sheri, a nineteen year-old mistress played by Juliette Lewis who dances
for him among other things), and catches a glimpse of the secret hiding place
that he foolishly stashes his cash in the corner of the backyard.
Mona Demarkov (Lena Olin) is a Russian
assassin who is out to take down the Mafia that Jack works for. The head of that organization is Don Falcone
(Roy Scheider) who pays Jack to kill her and wants the job done yesterday. Unfortunately for Falcone, Mona is drop dead
gorgeous and Jack weakens in her presence while he is guarding her a dumpy
hotel that the police use to hold suspects. Mona exerts a tremendous amount of sexual power and although Jack seems
to buckle under her spell, the two of them also realize that their couplings
are only business. Jack may love
Natalie, but she apparently cannot give him what he gets from Sheri and Mona,
which is to be dominated. Jack uses both
sex and money as a drug, he cannot seem to get enough of either one of
them.
It’s interesting to note that the film
is written by a woman, Hilary Henkin, who also wrote Fatal Beauty (1987), Road
House (1989), and Wag the Dog
(1997). There is an obvious female slant
to the story as the men are reduced to squirming little gerbils while the women
wield all the power. Even Natalie
momentarily and jokingly turns the tables on Jack while pointing a gun at him. We are not sure if she is kidding knowing
what we, the audience, knows and Jack isn’t sure either. It’s a moment that seems to last a very long
time. After all the craziness that
occurs between this moment and the end of the film, we are right bar at the bar
with Jack as he waits for Natalie to show, and we cannot help but wonder if she
ever will.
Much of the covert action takes place
at night where the probability of being discovered is high. There are moments of questionable judgment,
such as Mona forcing Jack to dig a grave for Falcone in full view of the
Brooklyn Bridge and nearby building complexes, and Jack digging through his
money while any of his neighbors could easily see him. The late Mr. Scheider, who appeared in
a slew of terrific films in the 1970’s (Klute,
The French Connection, The Seven-Ups, Jaws, Marathon Man, Sorcerer, Jaws 2, All
That Jazz), is one of my favorite actors but he is unusually stiff in the
role of mobster Falcone. He also didn’t
look well, as his death from Multiple Myeloma in 2008 confirmed that he was
probably sick for some time. The late Dennis
Farina, on the other hand, after having played Jimmy Serrano in Martin Brest’s brilliant
1988 comedy Midnight Run, does a
funny turn as a mobster turncoat in the single scene that he appears in.
I liked Romeo is Bleeding far more than I did in 1994. I was very naïve about mob life at the time
and how the police handle such matters, so after my graduation from The Sopranos the plot is far more obvious
than it was twenty-two years ago. The
new limited edition (3,000 units) Blu-ray from Twilight Time boasts a really nice transfer. However, if you are looking for a special feature-laden
set, this is not it. Aside from a
booklet with a nice essay from Julie Kirgo and an isolated score, this is a
very slim package. I love running
commentaries and would have enjoyed one from director Medak who provided an
informative feature-length commentary on the Dutch DVD release of The Changeling.
Time Life has released "Bob Hope: Entertaining the Troops", a priceless presentation of Hope's famous USO shows for American troops serving overseas. The two programs, presented uncut, are a wonderful time capsule of the era. At the time the Vietnam War was raging and the only glimpses concerned Americans got of the fighting men were grim images squeezed into the half-hour evening news during this pre-cable TV era. Thus, Hope's merry band of entertainers allowed some welcome views of the servicemen getting a rare and well-deserved laugh from the songs, skits and stand up presented by Hope and his troupe. Not surprisingly, the biggest reactions are afforded to the sex symbols who traveled with him. In this case, they include Connie Stevens, Lola Falana, Romy Schneider and Ursula Andress. Admittedly, the humor creaks with age but the spirit and good will is timeless. One of the shows is interesting from a historical perspective, as Hope and company kick off their tour at the White House in the presence of President Nixon, then still riding high from his first election and a couple of years away from the Watergate scandal that would bring down his entire administration. There are also some bonus extras, described in the press release below:
"The legendary Bob Hope, one of the greatest entertainers of
the 20th century, was best known for his Christmas specials.Traveling with special guests, he visited US
troops in dozens of locations around the world, performing on battleships and
battlefields -- and sometimes even accompanied by the sound of fighter jets
overhead.His missions were often
dangerous, his schedule brutal, yet for thousands of servicemen and women far
from home there was no one like Hope for the holidays.
On May 10, Time Life®, creator and direct marketer of unique
music and home entertainment products, will deliver BOB HOPE: ENTERTAINING THE
TROOPS, a single DVD featuring three TV Christmas Specials: a rare,
never-before-released 1951 special from The Korean War Era , along with shows
from 1970 and 1971 – two of the most-watched shows in TV history! Featuring Hope’s hilarious monologues and
guest stars aplenty, these shows prove that laughter is truly the best medicine, regardless of the time zone or
terrain. With this DVD release, Hope’s
fans will enjoy more than two and a half hours of Hope’s house calls across
three special troop shows:
The Bob Hope Christmas Special: Around the World with the
USO (Original Airdate: January 15, 1970) --
Hope and company embark on another Christmas tour to
entertain the troops, starting with a send-off from the White House. The 16-day tour then continues through
Germany, Italy, Turkey, Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan, Guam, and on-board the USS
Ranger and the USS Sanctuary. Highlights
include Neil Armstrong, recently back from his historic moon walk, answering
questions from the service members, and Connie Stevens singing the “Wedding
Bell Blues†to four service members named Bill.
The Bob Hope Christmas Special: Around the Globe with the
USO (Original Airdate: January 14, 1971) --
Hope visits U.S. military bases to entertain the troops and
bring them Christmas cheer, starting with rehearsals at West Point and with
stops in England, Germany, Thailand, Vietnam, Korea, Alaska, and to the USS
John F. Kennedy in the Mediterranean, and the USS Sanctuary in the South China
Sea. Highlights include Hope and Lola Falana doing a song and dance, Hope trading
zingers with Cincinnati Reds catcher Johnny Bench, plus a routine with Ursula
Andress, Gloria Loring and Miss World Jennifer Hosten.
Chesterfield Sound Off Time (Airdate: December 23, 1951) – This
rare, never-before-released special was filmed during the Korean War aboard the
aircraft carrier the USS Boxer. Highlights include Hope and Connie Moore crooning
“I Wanna Go Home (With You)â€, the Nicholas Brothers performing their acrobatic
style of tap dancing, and Hope, in an extended comedy sketch, taking command of
the ship and sailing it on a secret mission."
Who doesn’t love watching giant monster
movies from the 1950s? The Beast from 20,
000 Fathoms (1953), Them! (1954),
Tarantula (1955), Godzilla, King of the Monsters! (1956), 20 Million Miles to Earth (1957) and Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957) are
just a few of my favorites. Some of those titles are better than others and
there are many more that are worse such as 1957’s unintentionally hilarious The Giant Claw, but the decade that gave
us rock 'n' roll also created a giant monster flick that never seemed to get
the respect it deserved, which is ironic being that it’s a top-notch production
with a pretty convincing and scary monster. Of course, I’m talking about the
often overlooked 1957 classic, The
Monster That Challenged the World.
Directed by Arnold Laven (The Rifleman), The Monster That Challenged the World, which was solidly written by
Pat Fielder (The Vampire, The Return of
Dracula) and based on a story by David Duncan (The Time Machine, Fantastic Voyage), begins when an underwater
earthquake releases a horde of enormous, prehistoric creatures from
California’s Salton Sea. After one of these creatures kills a sailor,
Lieutenant John Twillinger (Tim Holt from The
Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The
Magnificent Ambersons) discovers an unknown, slimy substance which he
brings to Dr. Jess Rogers (Hans Conried, The
5,000 Fingers of Dr. T). Rogers analyzes it and not only deduces that it comes
from a giant mollusk, but also figures out that, if the creatures aren’t
stopped soon, they’ll multiply by the thousands and destroy every human being
on the planet. With the help of Dr. Rogers’ beautiful secretary (Audrey Dalton,
Mr. Sardonicus), the lieutenant and
the good doctor do everything in their power to stop the creeping terror before
it’s too late.
Made for only $254,000, The Monster That Challenged the World, which was originally titled The Kraken,is an entertaining monster movie that always seems to be
overshadowed by many of the titles I listed earlier. This is strange because
the fun movie is filled with tight, solid direction, plenty of atmosphere and a
great-looking, mechanical creature created by August Lohman (Moby Dick). The well-made film also
benefits from an interesting story as well as some pretty pleasing performances.
To begin with, Tim Holt is appropriately calm, rational and, at times, a bit
stiff as Lieutenant Twilliger, but he also gives his character much-needed doses
of humanity and likeability. Up next, the great Hans Conried is totally
convincing as the knowledgeable Dr. Rogers. He delivers his dialogue about the
giant creatures completely straight and because he seems to believe everything
that he’s saying, we believe it too. Last, but not least, the beautiful Audrey
Dalton is wonderful as secretary, single mom and love interest, Gail. Dalton
brings an inner strength and intelligence to her role, making her character
more than just a screaming, helpless woman who needs saving. All in all, The Monster That Challenged the World is
a well-done creature feature and a bit more than you would expect from a late
50s, sci-fi monster mash.
The Monster That
Challenged the World has
been released on a region one Blu-ray by Kino Lorber and is presented in its
original 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The beautiful HD transfer boasts sharp, crystal
clear images and the disc not only contains the original theatrical trailer,
but also an extremely informative and enjoyable audio commentary by film
historian Tom Weaver who tells us just about everything we ever wanted to know
about this entertaining film; great stuff. (Weaver leaves briefly to allow 50s
monster music expert David Schecter of Monstrous Movie Music to discuss the
film’s effective score by Heinz Roemheld). If you’re a lover of 1950s giant
monster movies, this one is definitely above average and I highly recommended
the excellent Blu-ray.
I
was first introduced to comic books in 1979 by my father’s cousin, Dan, who had
an unusually large collection of them in his parent’s basement. I had already seen Richard Donner’s Superman: The Movie (1978) twice and
loved it, completely enthralled with the big screen adventures of the Man of
Steel as embodied by Christopher Reeve. I
knew of Superman’s origins with DC Comics. Dan’s mother remarked, while he was in the basement of course, that she
wished that he would “get rid of the comic booksâ€. It’s a good thing he didn’t. Today, along with Jim Lee, Dan DiDio is the
current Co-Publisher of DC Comics. In
the years hence, I have followed my fair share of comic book characters, but
never with the level of enthusiasm that is on display at the annual San Diego
Comic Con or the New York Comic Con (for the uninitiated, here “con†is
industry shorthand for “conventionâ€, a gathering of fans who exalt with others
over their favorite comic book characters and movies). The level of enthusiasm on display at these
gatherings on opposite coasts, as well as the financial support they give to
their favorite superheroes, are what keep the artists and writers
employed.
Comix: Beyond the Comic Book Pages is the new 85-minute documentary that
takes viewers behind the scenes not only at the cons, but also into the world
of making comic books, and what it takes to prevail in a saturated market. It’s also a film about gratitude and
appreciation. Many people give thanks to
their relatives for buying them comic books; others thank the artists for their
favorite characters; still others thank both the artists and publishers for
their advice. Directed by Michael
Valentine, the film is fittingly a valentine to the creators and the fans. Heavyweights in the comic book arena who
appear are Stan Lee, the creator of Spiderman
(he has an amusing story about that); Mike Richardson, the founder of Dark
Horse Comics; Neal Adams; Frank Miller of Sin
City and 300; Todd MacFarlane; John
Romita, Jr.; and Renae Geerlings.
When
I watch a documentary, I am eager to learn something new. The history of comic books is fascinating as
they were deemed unfit for children, and there was a movement afoot to keep
them out of the hands of the little ones. The making of a comic book is also discussed in-depth in a way that I
had not heard before. There is a distinction
made between the artist who draws with pencils and the inker who applies the
colors. Very often the writers (who
provide character development and dialog) and the artists never speak to one
another!
Comix is accentuated by a spirited score by composer Michael
Crane. The fans depicted in the film are
all shapes and sizes and come from the far corners of the globe. A veritable melting pot of people
encompassing all races and creeds who converge on these convention centers
armed with backpacks, cameras, posters, photos, action figures, and just about
anything else that you can think of to have autographed and the opportunity to
meet their favorite artists, actors/actresses, and writers up close. What amazes me is the phenomenon of Cosplay
(a contraction of “costume playâ€) wherein fans dress up to look exactly like
the comic book characters they love. As
a frequent convention goer for twenty-nine years, I have noticed a demonstrable
surge in attendance of fans who partake in this role-playing lifestyle. The segments involving Cosplay made me
realize something that I had not thought of before. These people don’t just dress up. They want to become their favorite characters for the duration of the
convention. Their costumes are
magnificent, often indistinguishable from the big-screen counterparts. As a child, Halloween gave me the opportunity
to wear some truly awful and cheap-looking “costumesâ€. I was a Star
Wars Stormtrooper and wore this costume with a picture on my chest of the
Stormtrooper holding a gun! The
Stormtroopers that fans dress us as at the conventions look like they stepped
out of the actual movie. No comparison
whatsoever.
The
film is now available from Kino Lorber in a nicely illustrated 2-disc DVD set
that comes with a mini comic book and a whole host of extras. On disc one is the documentary, as well as
the following extra outtakes that equal roughly 70 additional minutes:
Anime
and Manga (3:56)
The
Art of Collaboration (10:17)
Comics
and the Movies (8:07)
Hardest
Things to Draw (3:43)
Influences
(7:22)
Insights
(4:14)
Making
History (18:29)
More
on Comic Book Conventions (6:13)
Outtakes
(7:57)
Trailer
(2:43)
Disc
two consists of interviews with Frank Miller (64 minutes) and Stan Lee (58
minutes).
It has just been announced that movie comedy legend Gene Wilder has passed away at age 83 after years of battling heath problems. The official cause of death was complications related to Alzheimers disease. Wilder made his feature film debut in the 1967 classic "Bonnie and Clyde", playing an undertaker who is kidnapped and befriended by the infamous outlaws. He hit pay dirt when Mel Brooks cast him opposite Zero Mostel in the 1968 comedy "The Producers". Wilder's performance as the neurotic accountant earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting actor. He collaborated again with Brooks on two other 70s comedy classics, "Blazing Saddles" and "Young Frankenstein". He also starred in the 1972 children's film favorite "Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory". In the 1980s Wilder teamed with Richard Pryor for several big screen comedy hits. He married comedienne Gilda Radner of "Saturday Night Live" fame but the marriage was short-lived when Radner died from cancer. Wilder became involved in raising funds to battle the disease that killed his beloved wife. He also wrote a memoir detailing their love affair. Wilder had not been seen on the big screen since 1991, as his health began to decline. He did, however, occasionally appear as a guest star on TV shows and won an Emmy in 2003 for his performance on the sitcom "Will & Grace". For more click here For a look at Wilder's most memorable roles, click here.
Ray
Liotta is a police forensics scientist in “Unforgettable†a 1996 crime thriller
available for the first time on Blu-ray by Kino Lorber. The movie co-stars
Linda Fiorentino as a university researcher who has developed a drug which
allows lab rats to relive the memories of other rats.
David
Krane (Liotta) has been trying to clear his name after being framed for the
murder of his wife during a drunken rage after he discovers she’s having an
affair. He’s found passed out on the lawn after his wife is found brutally
murdered. A high profile trial results in his release on a technicality. He
returns to work on the police force and moves on with his life, but there’re a
lot of doubts regarding his innocence by family, friends and colleagues. He lost
custody of his daughters who now live with his sister-in-law Kelly (Kim
Cattrall), but sees them on weekends.
While
attending a lecture by Martha Briggs (Fiorentino) on the topic of her memory
research, David introduces himself and sets up an appointment to learn more. The
drug works in combination with another rat’s DNA while the recipient rat
remains in the location of the DNA’s donor rat in order to experience that
donor rat’s memories. David receives a demonstration of the memory drug and
asks if it’s gone through human trials. It hasn’t and Martha explains the
dangerous side effects including heart attacks and death. Naturally, David
steals a vile of the drug and also takes DNA samples from the victims of a
multiple homicide in a grocery store where he finds a clue that may link those murders
to his wife’s murderer. Martha does some checking, discovers who David is and
realizes he wants to use the drug to find his wife’s killer.
Martha’s
discovery is too late as David has already tried the drug and is on the trail
of the killer after injecting himself with the victim’s DNA at the grocery
store. We see what he experiences in the first person through the victim’s eyes
in a sort of foggy dream-like state. He identifies the killer as Eddie Dutton
(Kim Coates) and starts tracking the man which leads to Eddie’s death in a
shootout at a church.
David’s
boss, Don Bresler (Peter Coyote), is relieved and supportive of David and believes
they got the man who murdered his wife. Fellow cop Stewart Gleick (Christopher
McDonald) has always believed David got away with murder and is not so easily
convinced. David injects himself with Eddie’s DNA along with the memory drug at
the scene of his wife’s murder when Martha arrives. She helps him do it again
using a mixture of his wife’s DNA. David and Martha realize there’s much more
to the murder than anyone realized as they unravel a conspiracy involving the
revelation of his wife’s secret life.
The
movie has elements of crime thriller, Hitchcockian suspense and science
fiction. The memory drug is a fascinating plot element, but the thing I don’t
get is how memories are transferred through blood samples when our memories are
contained in our brain. It really doesn’t matter because it all works to move
the plot as long as one suspends disbelief and accepts the science fiction
elements.
Liotta
and Fiorentino are very good and have nice screen chemistry. McDonald is also good
as the tough cop who believes Liotta got away with murder. David Paymer appears
as Liotta’s frazzled forensics partner and Kim Cattrall is underutilized and
seen briefly in a couple of scenes. Kim Coates plays the low-life creep to
great effect and Peter Coyote is on hand giving his measured and usual fine
performance throughout the movie.
The
movie underperformed upon its US release in February 1996 and didn’t receive a
release in the UK until nearly a year and a half later in July 1997. Produced
by Dino & Martha De Laurentiis and directed by John Dahl, the movie
deserved to do better. Nat King Cole’s version of “Unforgettable†is heard on
the soundtrack of the trailer which is a nice touch. Use of the song would
appear to be an obvious marketing angle, but for some reason is not heard
during the movie.
The
Blu-ray looks and sounds very good indeed and the 117 minute thriller has aged
well. Extras on the Kino release include the trailer, a five minute making of
featurette, unedited B rolls consisting of set-up shots and outtakes, and seven
short sound bites by cast, director and producer. The extras are interesting
and worth a look.
You’re an escaped convict who’s just busted out of San
Quentin. You get picked up on the road by a stranger who asks too many
questions, and when he hears the guy on the radio say there’s been a bust out
at the prison he puts two and two together. You tell him to stop the car and
you slug him. You drag him into the bushes and another car comes along. It’s a
beautiful woman named Irene Jansen who looks like Lauren Bacall and knows who
you are and wants to help you. You go with her and hide out at her San
Francisco apartment. But you know you’ve got to run or the cops’ll nab you. Irene
buys you a fresh suit of clothes and gives you some dough, because for some
crazy reason, she believes you’re innocent. You don’t remember her, but she was
at your trial every day. After a few days you take off in the middle of the
night and get picked up by a cab driver who just happens to know a good plastic
surgeon and for a couple of hundred he fixes your face so nobody’ll know who
you are. You go back to Irene/Bacall’s apartment wrapped up in gauze like the
Mummy. After a week or two you take the bandages off and guess what? Now you
look like Humphrey Bogart!
Such is the improbable and gimmicky plotline for “Dark
Passage†(1947), the third feature film vehicle from Warner Bros. to star Betty
and Bogie. And if that were all there were to it, it wouldn’t be much of a
movie. But the flick is based on a novel by David Goodis, the poet laureate of Philadelphia
noir, and in typical Goodis fashion, after Vincent Parry becomes Bogie, his
troubles only multiply. He’s caught in a situation that seems to have no
resolution. He was sent to San Quentin for murdering his wife. Of course, he’s
innocent but the evidence was stacked against him. Now that he’s free, he wants
to find out who did kill her and clear his name. Easy? Not on your life.
The plot involves a shrill harpy played by Agnes
Moorehead, a friend of Irene who seems to get a kick of out of kicking people
when they’re down-- when she isn’t annoying them. There’s the guy who first
picked Parry up and got dumped in the bushes for his trouble. He shows up later
as a blackmailer, because he knows about the plastic surgery. There’s a nice
enough guy played by Bruce Bennet who was too nice to close the deal with
Betty, and knows he’s got no chance with her now that Bogie’s around. There’s a
tough cop at an all-night diner played by Douglas Kennedy who sizes Parry up as
a man on the run and wants to take him downtown. It all spins round and round
with Parry caught in a circumstantial whirlpool, dragging him down into
oblivion.
“Dark Passage†came out the same year as Robert
Montgomery’s “Lady in the Lake.†In that adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s
novel, Montgomery filmed the entire movie using the camera as Philip Marlowe’s
point of view. Everything is seen as though through Marlowe’s eyes. As if “Dark
Passage†doesn’t have a gimmicky enough plot, Daves decided to really gimmick
it up by following Montgomery’s example. He shot the entire first half of the
film using a hand-held camera, one of the first of its kind. All the action in
the first half of the film is from Parry’s eye-level view of things. Sid
Hickox’s cinematography provides some great imagery, especially at the
beginning, as Parry gets his first view of freedom from inside an empty oil
drum. The scenes where Parry is in the chair facing a really creepy plastic
surgeon (Housely Stevenson) and the subsequent nightmare he has about it later,
are classic examples of film noir cinematography.
As
of this summer, all of Amicus Production’s Edgar Rice Burroughs adaptations are
now on Blu-ray from Kino-Lorber: The Land
That Time Forgot (1974); At the
Earth’s Core (1976) and ThePeople That Time Forgot (1977). All
three have excellent transfers and each release features special features to
boot. Overall all three films’ Blu-ray releases are some of the more
extravagant ones from the company. The
Land That Time Forgot and At the
Earth’s Core even come with reversible covers with different poster art on
each side (though The People That Time
Forgot curiously does not).
The
disc for At the Earth’s Core features
an on camera interview with the director of all three films, Kevin Connor, who
discusses these films along with his other genre output. It also features a
great on camera interview with Caroline Munro, who played Dia in the film,
which even covers her role in The Spy Who
Loved Me (1977). The film’s vintage making-of feature, A Special Art: Monsters, is also included along with the original trailer
and an audio commentary by Connor. The
Land That Time Forgot has the vintage Master
of Adventure making-of featurette of the film, along with the release
trailer and another commentary by Connor, this time moderated by Brian
Trenchard-Smith, director of such films as Leprechaun
3 (1995). The People That Time Forgot
features the film’s trailer along with another Connor/Smith commentary. Naturally,
Connor can’t pack every minute of the commentaries with juicy behind-the-scenes
anecdotes as the movies were made forty years ago, but there are still
interesting nuggets of info to be found that make them worth listening to. One
of the more interesting bits of trivia that Connor drops is that the reason they
never made film adaptations of Out of
Time’s Abyss (the third book in Burroughs Land That Time Forgot trilogy), Pellucidar
(the sequel to At the Earth’s Core)
and the John Carter of Mars series was that the Burroughs Estate began upping
their licensing fees after The People
That Time Forgot. So instead the production team decided to concoct an
original adventure story for their next picture, the result being Warlords of Atlantis (1978). The most
informative pieces on People’s disc are
actually the interviews conducted with female stars Dana Gillespie and Sarah
Douglas. Among the interesting information related is the fact that Gillespie also
auditioned for the role of Ursa for Superman
II, the role her co-star Douglas got. Although relatively short (a little
less than 20 minutes each) they are nearly as informative as the commentary
track in some respects.
So
in summary, if you already own the films on DVD, the improved picture and
features make the Blu-rays worth the update. And, for more information on the
films’ histories, see Paul Thomson’s article Monsters, Inc. in Cinema Retro #27.
CLICK HERE TO ORDER "THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT" FROM AMAZON
CLICK HERE TO ORDER "AT THE EARTH'S CORE" FROM AMAZON
CLICK HERE TO ORDER "THE PEOPLE THAT TIME FORGOT" FROM AMAZON
John LeMay is the author of The Big Book of Japanese Giant Monster Movies Vol. 1: 1954-1980. (Click here to order from Amazon)
The
NoHo 7, the Playhouse 7, and the Royal in Los Angeles will all be showing a
double feature of two of Doris Day’s best-known films on Monday, August 29,
2016. At 7:00 pm The Man Who Knew Too Much, the classic 1956 film directed by Alfred
Hitchcock, will be screened as part of its 60th anniversary. At 4:30 pm and again at 9:30 pm, 1961’s Lover Come Back, directed by Delbert
Mann, will be screened as part of its 55th anniversary.
From
the press release:
Doris Day Double
Feature
Part
of our Anniversary Classics series. For details, visit: laemmle.com/ac.
Click here to buy tickets to the 4:30PM Lover
Come Back (includes admission to the 7PM The Man Who Knew Too Much).
Click here to buy tickets to the 7PM The Man Who
Knew Too Much (includes admission to the 9:30PM Lover Come Back).
Laemmle’s Anniversary Classics presents
a tribute to Doris Day, one of the last surviving stars of Hollywood’s Golden
Age. Day was the number one female box office star of the 20th century, but she
was sometimes underrated as an actress. She excelled in musicals, comedy, and
drama and during the 1950s and 60s she was one of the few actresses who
regularly played working women. We offer a double feature of two of her most
popular films, the 60th anniversary of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) and
the 55th anniversary of Lover Come
Back (1961). So you won’t miss any of the fun, the Doris Day double bill
plays at three locations: the Royal in West L.A., Laemmle NoHo 7, and the
Playhouse 7 in Pasadena on Monday, August 29.
We will have trivia contests with
prizes at all three locations.
In ‘The Man Who Knew Too Much,’ one of
Doris Day’s rare forays into the thriller genre, the actress introduced one of
her most successful songs, the Oscar-winning hit, “Que Sera Sera.†But she also
demonstrated her versatility in several harrowing and suspenseful dramatic
scenes. She plays the wife of one of Hitchcock’s favorite actors, James
Stewart. The movie was a box office bonanza for all parties. Hitchcock’s
success during the 1940s allowed the director to employ bigger budgets and
shoot on location for several of his Technicolor thrillers in the 1950s,
including To Catch a Thief, Vertigo, and North by Northwest. For The Man Who
Knew Too Much, a remake of his own 1934 film, Hitchcock traveled to Morocco and
to London for some spectacular location scenes. In his famous series of
interviews with the Master of Suspense, Francois Truffaut wrote, “In the
construction as well as in the rigorous attention to detail, the remake is by
far superior to the original.†The plot turns on kidnapping and assassination,
all building to a concert scene in the Royal Albert Hall that climaxes
memorably with the clash of a pair of cymbals.
‘Lover Come Back’ was the second comedy
teaming of Doris Day with Rock Hudson, on the heels of their huge 1959 hit, Pillow
Talk. Day and Hudson play rival advertising executives who vie for an account
that doesn’t exist, dreamed up by Hudson to throw Day off the track, further
complicated by their romantic entanglement. Screenwriters Stanley Shapiro (who
won an Oscar for ‘Pillow Talk’) and Paul Henning concocted a witty scenario
with deft sight gags, targeting the influence of Madison Avenue in the era, and
their original screenplay was Oscar-nominated in 1961. Day, Hudson, and a
winning supporting cast including Tony Randall, Edie Adams and Jack Kruschen
are all at the top of their game, nimbly directed by Delbert Mann. The New York
Times’ Bosley Crowther raved about “…this springy and sprightly surprise, which
is one of the brightest, most satiric comedies since ‘It Happened One Night.’
The Times also celebrated the box office smash as “the funniest picture of the
year.â€
No matter the
conveyor-belt of bubblegum product proliferating at 21st century multiplexes,
it will always be the classics that endure. Robert Louis Stevenson's celebrated
novel “Kidnapped†– initially serialised in magazine form before being
published as a single volume in 1886 – has been tailored for cinema and
television many times, notably (for the big screen) in 1948 starring Dan
O'Herlihy and Roddy McDowell and in 1959 featuring Peter Finch and James
McArthur. 1971’s Kidnapped from
director Delbert Mann doesn't seem to get as much love as some of its siblings,
but for this writer it’s one of the most enjoyable of the clan, specifically
due to the presence of Michael Caine atop the cast.
Following the terrible
slaughter at the battle of Culloden, during which the Jacobite forces are
overthrown by government troops, an orphaned lad, David Balfour (Lawrence
Douglas) arrives at the home of his Uncle Ebenezer (Donald Pleasence) to claim
his inheritance. However, intent on securing it for himself, the grasping old
man slyly arranges for his nephew to be shanghaied, whereupon David finds
himself prisoner at sea of Captain Hoseason (Jack Hawkins), destined for sale
into slavery. When they run across notorious Jacobite rebel Alan Breck (Michael
Caine), David seizes the opportunity to ally with Breck and escape. They make
it back to shore and seek refuge with Breck's relatives, his uncle, James
Stewart (Jack Watson), and cousin Catriona (Vivien Heilbron). But their
adventure is only just beginning.
Although, of all Robert
Louis Stevenson's stories, "Treasure Island" remains the premier
boys' own adventure, "Kidnapped" is a cracker of a good yarn. Jack
Pulman's screenplay for this 1971 adaptation draws not only on that story but
also a chunk of its 1893 sequel "Catriona". And regardless of the
fact it all ends rather sorrowfully, it's still a rousing piece of fiction, the
recounting of which is well worth journeying alongside.
Delbert Mann (Oscar winner
for romantic drama Marty and much
admired by this writer for early 60s Doris Day rom-coms That Touch of Mink and Lover
Come Back) treated movie-goers to a star-studded and colourful period
costume drama whose glue, as previously remarked upon, is indisputably Michael
Caine. Admittedly the actor's Scottish accent waivers dreadfully at times, but
otherwise he's on excellent form with his infinite charisma and inexhaustible
brio serving to paper over any perceivable cracks. He certainly outshines
co-star Lawrence Douglas, whose David is more than a touch insipid; Douglas
worked almost exclusively in minor TV roles, with Kidnapped representing his only silver screen appearance of note.
Flame-haired Vivien Heilbron fares a little better as the lovely Catriona and
there's strong support from dependables Jack Watson as her father, Trevor
Howard as the surly Lord Advocate, Gordon Jackson as lawyer Charles Stewart,
Freddie Jones as cardsharp Cluny, and Jack Hawkins as the odious Captain
Hoseason (discernibly dubbed by Charles Gray who, due to Hawkins suffering from
throat cancer, often re-voiced the actor during this period of his career).
Special word for Donald Pleasence (who’s delicious as the slimy and duplicitous
Uncle Ebenezer) and a young Geoffrey Whitehead, nicely reptilian as Loyalist
Lieutenant Duncansby.
Thesps aside, the
undisputed star of the film is the beautiful location photography of Paul
Beeson (whose skills can also be admired in the likes of Mosquito Squadron, The Sound
of Music, Never Say Never Again
and the Indiana Jones trilogy); seldom have the Scottish Highlands looked so
stunningly beautiful. Arguably, Vladimir Cosma's music for a late 70s TV
adaptation will probably never be surpassed (so gorgeously honeyed that, if the
mood is right, it has the power to move this writer to tears). However, Roy
Budd's score for Mann's film – along with the closing romantic ballad performed
by Mary Hopkin – is memorably redolent and contributes immeasurably towards
making this more than respectable screen adaptation of its source story a very
worthy investment of one's time.
Network Distributing, who
originally released Kidnapped on DVD
in the UK in 2007, have reissued it in a nicely fulsome package as part of
their continuing 'The British Film' series. The feature itself is a clean
2.35:1 ratio presentation with only the most minimal traces of wear. Caine fans
will delight in the inclusion of no less than three lengthy archive interviews (with
a combined running time of over an hour), two of them hosted by Russell Harty
during the actor's promotional tours for Sleuth
and The Eagle Has Landed, one by
Gloria Hunniford focusing on Educating
Rita. Then there’s a short 1971 behind-the-scenes featurette hosted by
Lawrence Douglas, a gallery of poster art, FOH and lobby cards and an extensive
collection of production stills, plus an original trailer. For those hesitant
as to whether the film alone is sufficient inducement to warrant purchase, the
wealth of supplementary material served up on Network’s disc should definitely
clinch the deal.
Actor Steven Hill has died at age 94. Hill came to prominence in 1966 as the original star of the "Mission: Impossible" TV series. He played Dan Briggs, the head of the Impossible Mission Force, who led a select team of diverse members on highly dangerous espionage missions. Hill, who was an Orthodox Jew, found that the filming schedule conflicted with his religious obligations. He left the series after one season and was replaced by Peter Graves as Jim Phelps, who remained with the franchise henceforth. Hill retired from acting for almost a decade before returning to TV as District Attorney Adam Schiff on the popular NBC show "Law & Order". He stayed with the series for years and earned two Emmy nominations. Among his feature films are "Billy Bathgate", "Yentl", "The Firm", "Brighton Beach Memoirs" and "Legal Eagles". For more click here.
Zev
Guttman (Christopher Plummer) is an elderly Jewish New York nursing home
resident whose wife, Ruth, recently passed on. In the early stages of dementia, he finds himself forgetting things,
such as Ruth’s death, which is evident each time that he awakens and calls out
her name. Zev is also a survivor of the
Auschwitz concentration camp (presumably Auschwitz II-Birkenau, which was a
combination concentration camp and extermination camp). Another nursing home resident, Max Rosenbaum
(Martin Landau), recognizes Zev from the camp. While Zev is able-bodied and mentally declining, Max is confined to a
wheelchair yet as smart as a whip and in full control of his faculties. Max reminds Zev that their families were
murdered during World War II at the hands of a ruthless Blockführer named Otto
Wallisch who fled Germany under the name of “Rudy Kurlanderâ€. Max has managed to locate four people living
in the United States under this assumed name and has a hunch that once of them
is the one and only Otto Wallisch. He
has spared no expense to send Zev out on a mission, armed with thousands of
dollars in cash, a handgun, and written instructions to find and murder Wallisch
in retaliation for his actions. Zev
sneaks out of the nursing home and escapes detection, much to the dismay of his
son and daughter-in-law who frantically search for him. When Zev makes his way across the country
looking for the various Rudy Kurlander’s, he comes face to face with people who
fled German occupied countries and sympathizes with them. Bruno Ganz plays the first such fleer and his
role is a small one, however it is revealed on the commentary that he had a
much longer monologue and I wish that it had been reinstated for the home video
release. This actor also played Adolph
Hitler in Downfall (2004).
The
second Rudy Kurlander is a bedridden homosexual whose plight moves Zev to
tears. Later, a case of mistaken
identity lands Zev unwittingly in the home of an anti-Semite played with
horrific gusto by Dean Norris, an actor who just gets better with every role he
plays. By the time he makes it to the
home of the fourth man he is looking for, the ending is not what we expect, and
it’s easy to carp about whether or not it’s effective or predictable.
I
have never seen a boring film by Atom Egoyan. One of the most interesting directors working today, Mr. Egoyan’s films
are fascinating cinematic revelations which I look forward to each time he
announces a new project. Canadian
audiences are probably most familiar with his earlier work which consist of Family Viewing (1987) and Speaking Parts (1989). His best works, The Adjuster (1991), Exotica
(1994), and The Sweet Hereafter
(1997), brought him worldwide attention and rightfully so as they are easily
three of the greatest films to come out of the Canadian film industry. Remember
does not quite reach the heights of these three films (it is less cinematically
interesting than its predecessors), but it is still an interesting outing given
his output since 2005’s Where the Truth
Lies which, 2008’s Adoration
notwithstanding, has been fairly uneven. Most of Remember’s detractors
fault the screenplay and the aforementioned denouement, in addition to the
questionable choice of using the Holocaust as a subject for a revenge drama
with characters seemingly fashioned after modern-day stereotypes. All that aside, watching Christopher
Plummer’s portrayal of Zev kept me captivated. It’s a carefully understated interpretation of a role that was written
with him in mind. I first saw him
onscreen as Sir Charles Litton in Blake Edwards’s The Return of the Pink Panther in the summer of 1975 when I was
almost seven years-old and found him to be funny and charming. His turn as Zev is, obviously, much
different, as we follow him through his routines of getting dressed, falling
asleep and waking up in a confused state. Mr. Plummer plays the role with maximum efficiency and basically
inhabits Zev’s skin. His forgetfulness and
need to refer to written notes calls to mind Christopher Nolan’s Memento (2000).
The
Blu-ray from Lionsgate comes with some nice extras. There is a full-length audio commentary with director Egoyan, producer
Robert Lantos and screenwriter Benjamin August who discuss how the project came
about and the casting of those involved. I have always loved commentaries as they give you a terrific insight
into how the creators intended certain scenes to play and how they actually are
presented. Mr. Egoyan has always been
especially articulate when discussing his films and this commentary is no
exception.
There
is also a featurette entitled Performances
to Remember which runs roughly 17 minutes and is essentially a
behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film and on-set interviews
conducted with some of the performers regarding their roles. More than a few minutes are spent on the set
of the anti-Semite’s house and the director explains how it was deliberately
built to accommodate Paul Sarossy’s camera (Mr. Egoyan’s longtime
cinematographer) from a multitude of angles. Mr. Plummer also weighs in on his role of Zev.
A Tapestry of Evil: Remembering the
Past is a featurette that runs about 14
minutes and it focuses on screenwriter Benjamin August’s desire to write a film
about the hunt for Nazi war criminals.
Historians of Hollywood’s Golden Age will surely remember
the name of Louella Parsons. Using the long
reach of the Hearst Newspaper Corporation as her platform, Parsons was crowned
the “Queen of Hollywood.†She was one of the earliest and foremost conveyors of
tinsel-town gossip. A radio personality
as well as a syndicated columnist, Parsons’ star would only dim when a rival, the
notorious Hedda Hopper, arrived in town circa 1938.
Regardless of the competition, Parsons would soldier on
and enjoy a long career. In her column
of October 28, 1958 (“Shocker Dueâ€), the magpie broke the news that Steve Broidy,
the president of Allied Artists, Inc. had “turned over†the studio’s newest
project “Confessions of an Opium Eater
to Producer-Director William Castle.†The forty-four year-old Castle, only then in the earliest stages of
elevating promotional ballyhoo to an
art form, had already been in the movie business for a decade and a half. Though
no one would confuse Castle as an auteur,
the producer-director-writer could reliably churn out marketable low-budget westerns,
adventure films and thrillers for such studios as Columbia, Monogram, and
Allied Artists.
In 1958, Castle would direct the moody and atmospheric
horror-mystery Macabre for Allied. Then, in September of that same year, the
filmmaker was busy wrapping up principal shooting on yet another low-budget
horror The House on Haunted Hill. Though The
House on Haunted Hill (with star Vincent Price) would not see release until
February 1959, studio bookkeepers immediately recognized the film’s box-office
potency. Allied moved quickly to sign
the work-for-hire Price to appear in what would turn out to be a more dissolute,
under-performing quickie titled The Bat
(1959).
Parsons reportage was too early out of the gate. For starters, she was misinformed regarding William
Castle’s involvement in Confessions of an
Opium Eater. Not only had she reported
that the acknowledged “Poor Man’s Hitchcock†was to leave for Tokyo, Japan in
January 1959 for location scouting, Parsons also leaked several other bits of
erroneous information: that Japanese Miiko Taka (“Marlon Brando’s screen-love
in Sayonarraâ€) had signed on as lead
actress, that the film would be shot in color, and that the resulting
production would be one of the studio’s “high budget pictures for the year.†None of this, of course, would turn out to be
true. Following the success of House on Haunted Hill, both Castle and Price
were able to strike a better deal with Columbia. It was through that studio that the (mostly
monochrome) low-budget horror-flick The
Tingler would be released in late 1959.
It’s difficult to determine exactly why Allied would
choose to press on in their desire to bring Thomas De Quincey’s slim book Confessions of an English Opium Eater to
the big-screen. The fact that it was a
public domain work and therefore free to pillage as source material cannot be
discounted. Truth be told, it’s neither
a particularly engaging story nor a tale worthy of being committed to celluloid.
Originally published in 1821 as a
serial in London magazine, the tale recounts
- in a rather straightforward if vividly described manner - the author’s
addiction to opiates. As a harrowing
medical and psychological treatise, De Quincey’s work was invaluable but, not too
surprisingly, almost nothing other than the slightly amended and grim
exploitative title would be utilized in this subsequent 1962 screen version.
Though the studio was able to entice Vincent Price – if
only briefly - back into the fold, Confessions
of an Opium Eater was the last of four films the actor would appear in for Allied. (His penultimate film for the company was a walk-on
role in the prison drama Convicts 4). Though usually cast in elegant and villainous
roles, Price is – at long last - a hero in this one, though he’s positively
raffish as first person narrator De Quincey. This is odd as the actual Thomas De Quincey was born into a British
mercantile family of means and prestige. Though a wild youth, he attended college, maintained
friendships with such colleagues as Wordsworth and Coleridge, and reportedly never
left the British Isles in the course of his lifetime. In the film however, this educated man of
letters is more provocatively cast as a tough gun-runner who developed a taste
for opium while working the tough streets of China’s mainland. Upon his 1902 return from the exotic east to
the gritty brick and clapboard streets of San Francisco’s rough and tumble Chinatown,
Price’s De Quincey’s conscience is stirred by the sad plight of the sorrowful
women we’re introduced to near the film’s beginning. The women have been kidnapped from their
families or torn from English-speaking Christian missions back home. Upon their arrival in the city by the Bay, they’re
abused, starved, and manhandled by ruthless Tongs who plan to barter their
charms in exchange for opium.
This is the sort of derring-do adventure-thriller programmer
that Monogram Pictures (the forebear of Allied) had churned out plentifully during
the 1940s. Nearly all of the creaky trademark
Monogram tropes are put into play: inscrutable
Asian villainy, exotic, smoky rooms containing secret passageways, routes to
underground labyrinths, trapdoors, drugs, crime, and bamboo-caged damsels-in-distress. The problem is this film was released in 1962
and such caricatures were from a time out of mind and would soon bring swift
condemnation. Price’s
biographer-daughter notes that Confessions
was “caught in unwelcome controversy when the Los Angeles Committee against
Defamation of the Chinese protested its release.â€
Robert Hill’s purple prose fortune cookie of a screenplay
is possibly the weakest link in a production of already tenuous value. Though the black and white film runs only eighty-five
minutes, it seems much longer. A lengthy
opium-induced hallucination scene goes on too long and is ridiculously unconvincing. Near the film’s climax, there’s a trio of writhing
slave-trade dance numbers featuring a bevy of reluctant female conscripts. These auction-block “interpretative dances†are
merely a preamble to the round of bidding before an audience of salacious Tong
members. These dances were so painful to
sit through that I nearly found myself tempted to partake in a mind-numbing taste
of the special stash myself.
To the film’s credit, the producer was not afraid to cast
an almost-exclusive Asian cast to essay the roles of Asians, no matter how thin
or racially-insensitively drawn these characters were. There’s no casting of such British colonials
as Boris Karloff or Christopher Lee, or Swede Warner Oland, to play ethnic Fu Manchu or Charlie Chan type roles. It’s interesting to note that Confessions
was released the same year as Eon Productions’ Dr. No: in the first James Bond film it’s a Canadian, Joseph
Wiseman, who would assume the role as the titular, sinister and half-Asian
super-villain. So such casting was par
for the course. The problem is that Confessions is no Dr. No. Even for us diehard Vincent
Price fans, this film is little more than a curiosity.
Producer-Director Albert Zugsmith’s Confessions of an Opium Eater is made available as a Warner Archive
DVD-R release. The film is presented in its
original back and white and in a Widescreen 1.66.1 transfer. A true bare bones release, the set features
only the movie itself without even the nominal addition of a chapter selection menu
or theatrical trailer. Though the most
indefatigable of Vincent Price fans (of which I’m one) will likely choose to
add this film to their home library, more casual fans – if interested at all - are
best advised to stream the movie as a one-off.
CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM THE CINEMA RETRO MOVIE STORE
Angela Gray (Emma Watson), a young woman living with her father
and grandmother in rural Minnesota, accuses her father of sexually molesting
her. The father, John (David Dencik), is
brought in by the police for questioning. A reformed alcoholic and widower, John claims to have no memory of
abusing his daughter, but he is reluctant to deny the accusation because, he
says confusedly, “It must be true. Angela would never lie.†The
department brings in psychologist Dr. Kenneth Raines (David Thewlis) to consult
on the case, and Raines suggests that he hypnotize John to see if he can unlock
the repressed memory. Under hypnotic
regression, John “remembers†being in Angela’s bedroom, witnessing a sexual
assault on his daughter, and photographing it, but he says the rapist was
actually one of the department’s own officers and a family acquaintance, George
Nesbitt (Aaron Ashmore). The senior
investigator assigned to the case, Det. Bruce Kenner (Ethan Hawke), is quick to
believe the accusations. Convincing his
commanding officer to detain both Gray and Nesbitt, he goes full tilt to find
evidence.
Supported by Reverend Beaumont (Lothaire Bluteau), the pastor of
the fundamentalist church that she and her family attended, Angela begins to
level increasingly bizarre charges. She
alleges that her grandmother Rose (Dale Dickey) was also involved in the abuse
as a member of a robed, hooded satanic cult that holds secret orgies and
sacrifices infants. “They’re
everywhere,†she tells Kenner, and suggests that the car crash that killed her
mother four years before was no accident. As evidence of her story, she fearfully shows the detective an inverted
cross branded on her stomach. “Now
they’ll kill you too,†she warns. For
Kenner, her charges are given additional weight by a barrage of TV media
reports about a covert nationwide network of Satan worshippers.
Filmed in Canada but supposedly situated in a grim, gray
American Midwest locale that looks like a backdrop from one of H.P. Lovecraft’s
gothic horror stories, writer-director Alejandro Amenábar’s “Regression†(2015)
is presented as a mystery story with horror overtones: Is Angela telling the
truth? Where are the photographs that
would substantiate her story and John’s hypnotically “retrieved†memory? If devil-worshippers lurk among the everyday
townspeople of Hoyer, Minn., who are they?
Viewers under 30 may be just as confounded as Hawke’s driven,
ultra-caffeinated investigator. Others
who are old enough to have watched tabloid TV in the mid-1980s will catch on
faster, especially since Amenábar tips his hand at the outset by informing us
that the story takes place in 1990. During the 1980s, in a series of sleazy TV shows presented as fact,
Geraldo Rivera, Sally Jessy Raphael, and others fostered the scary notion that
devil worshippers formed an incestuous, murderous underground movement in many
American towns and cities. The specious
stories were founded on lurid “memoirs†of people who claimed to be the victims
of satanists, cases of alleged “ritual†child abuse prosecuted by overzealous
authorities on the basis of shoddy investigative techniques (notably, hypnotic
regression), the rantings of deluded or unscrupulous TV preachers, and leftover
memories of the 1969 Manson murders. If
they weren’t true believers already, many middle-class viewers were convinced
when they tuned in to “The Devil Worshippers,†a segment of ABC’s prime-time
“20/20†show in May 1985, and heard host Hugh Downs proclaim: “There’s no
question that something is going on out there.†If the normally unflappable Hugh Downs was worried, they should be
too. Besides, tens of thousands of
parents were already fretting that their kids were being seduced to the Dark
Side by satanic symbolism in Black Sabbath rock videos.
The panic eventually subsided in the early 1990s as the
salacious stories were discredited and clearer thinking finally prevailed. In the meantime, the tabloid hacks had lost
interest and moved on to other worthy endeavors, like cracking Al Capone’s
money vault. But the damage had already
been done to the careers and reputations of many innocent people who had been
slandered as rapists and degenerates.
The
2016 Anchor Bay DVD of “Regression†is
crisp and sharp. Hawke, Watson, and
Amenábar discuss the film in four short features added as supplements.
The new Metrograph Theater on Ludlow
Street in New York just finished a series called “This is PG?!†which screened
35mm prints of films that traumatized youngsters during their initial releases
after having been granted a PG-rating by the Motion Picture Association of America. Films that were released prior to the July
1984 introduction of the PG-13 rating such as Jaws (1975), Burnt Offerings
(1976), Invasion of the Body Snatchers
(1978), Tourist Trap (1979), Poltergeist (1982) and, most
specifically, Indiana Jones and the
Temple of Doom (1984) all had a hand in helping to create the new rating to
bridge the gap between PG-rated films that weren’t quite R-rated material. Released in New York in February 1976,
actor/director Ray Danton’s Psychic
Killer could have easily been a part of this screening as it, too, secured
a PG-rating. There is a fair amount of
violence and bloodshed in this film, not to mention a fairly gory Psycho-inspired shower murder with
nudity, to raise more than a few eyebrows (ironically, 1960’s Psycho has been given an R rating!)
Ostensibly shot between April and July
of 1974, Psychic Killer is a time
capsule of a film, a veritable authenticated record of gaudy clothes, bad
hairdos, enormous cars and men with oversized ties. Timothy Hutton’s father, Jim Hutton, fresh
from screaming at Kim Darby and her little imaginary creatures running around
the house in ABC-TV’s Don’t Be Afraid of
the Dark (1973), plays Arnold Masters, a sort of mama’s boy who lives like
a bit of a hermit. He is blamed for the
murder of a doctor (he didn’t kill him) and lands in prison where he meets
other disturbed persons. While
incarcerated, his mother passes away and this infuriates him as he feels that
her death is directly attributed to his absence. Masters soon obtains a medallion that has
mystical powers (it almost looks like the headpiece to the Staff of Ra in
Steven Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost
Ark from 1981) and gives him the ability to leave his body in a sort of
Out-of-Body-Experience (OBEE) and seek out revenge against those who put him in
prison and those he deems responsible for his mother’s death (David Cronenberg
wrote a similar storyline several years later in one of his best films, 1979’s The Brood. That film was controversial as it employed
young children as mutant killers). When
Masters kills in this state, his body goes into a condition wherein he appears
dead. The film’s premise is based upon
the Kirlian Effect, which was written about extensively
in the 1970s. The idea is, if nothing
else, intriguing.
Two
cops assigned to the case are Lieutenant Anderson (Aldo Ray) and Lieutenant
Morgan (Paul Burke), partners who are desperate to stay one step ahead of Masters
before he can kill again. Also eager to
stop Masters is the prison psychiatrist, Dr. Laura Scott (Julie Adams,
real-life then-wife of director Danton). Mrs. Adams may have fled the clutches of TheCreature
from the Black Lagoon, but she has a tougher time bolting from the
occasional silliness that seeps into the script. There is a psychic expert in tow also, one
Dr. Gubner (Nehemiah Persoff) who informally teams with Dr. Scott to stop
Masters.
Psychic
Killer was previously
issued on DVD in 1999 and 2008. The new
Blu-ray/DVD combo, which are mastered from a 2K scan of the original camera
negative, are obvious steps above these previous releases, so the third time is
indeed a charm. This version by the fine
folks at Vinegar Syndrome comes with some nice extras specifically made for the
Blu-ray/DVD combo:
The
Danton Force
featurette (8:55) is comprised of onscreen interviews with relatives of the
late director of the film, Ray Danton. Steve Danton and Mitchell Danton, his sons, talk about how the film came
about and what it was like to be on the set. Their father’s work ethic had a huge impact on them and their chosen
professions. Their mother, Julie Adams,
appears briefly, as does Ronald L. Smith, the first assistant director. The opening prologue of the film, which
attempts to set the audience up with a serious tone, contains a voice over by
director Danton: "Why should any phenomenon be assumed impossible? The
universe begins to look more and more like a great thought, than a great
machine.â€
The Aura
of Horror featurette (8:05) features Mardi Rustam, a Kurdish movie fan born
in Iraq who dreamed of making it in Hollywood. Amiable and well-spoken, Mr. Rustam describes writing to the movie
moguls of the day and making his was to the United States. Psychic
Killer’s original script title was I
Am a Demon. He also produced Raphael
Nussbaum’s Candice Rialson vehicle Pets
(1973), Tobe Hooper’s Eaten Alive
(1976), and 1985’s Evils of the Night,
which is due for a Blu-ray release by the end of the month also from Vinegar
Syndrome.
The Psychic
Killer Inside Me (13:32) focuses on producer Greydon
Clark, also
known for Satan’s Cheerleaders (1973), Without Warning (1980),and Joysticks
(1983). He heard about the Kirlian
Effect on the radio and was intrigued by it and thought it would make a great
premise for a film. The Kirlian Effect was also the working title of the film. Mr. Clark also wrote On the Cheap, a book about his adventures in the screen trade.
Rounding out the extras are multiple
television spots and the original theatrical trailer.
For fans of 1970’s cult cinema, Psychic Killer is a fun ride.
All struggling young reporter Mike Ward (John McGuire)
wants is a break. He needs money so he can move out of his crummy room in a
three story boarding house, get his own place, and marry his girl, Jane
(Margaret Tallichet). His break arrives when he becomes the star witness to the
murder of Nick, the owner of Nick’s Coffee Pot, a neighborhood eatery right
across the street from where he lives. The newspaper he works for gives him a raise
and assigns him to cover the murder trial. At first he and Jane are elated
about Mike’s turn of fortune, and they began planning their future. But soon Jane
wonders if the young man Mike is going to testify against, a young cab driver
named Briggs (Elisha Cook, Jr.), is really the killer. “He’s so young,†she
says. Her attitude begins to put a damper on their relationship. After a trial
that seems a mockery of justice, Briggs is convicted on the basis of Mike’s
testimony and sentenced to death. Jane becomes more estranged from Mike as a
result. The lucky break Mike had hoped for now doesn’t seem so lucky.
“Stranger on the Third Floor,†directed by Boris Ingster,
and released by RKO Radio Pictures in 1940, is considered to be the first film
noir ever made. Based on a script by Frank Partos and an uncredited Nathaniel
West, it tells the story of the steady erosion of Mike’s confidence that he did
the right thing testifying against Briggs, and how easy it is to suddenly have
“the fickle finger of fate pointing at you.†The night after the conviction, he
comes home alone and finds a weird-looking stranger (Peter Lorre, looking more bizarre than usual), sitting
on the front steps of his building.
Mike goes up to his room and the film becomes more
introspective, with the addition of Mike’s voiceover, telling us what he’s
thinking. We get an inside look at his
life. He hates the place he lives in. He especially hates the neighbor in the
next room, a man named Meng (Charles Waldron), who is heard snoring on the
other side of the thin walls. In flashbacks, we see how Meng makes life
miserable for him. For one thing, he complained about Mike to the landlady
because of the noise he made when he used to work on his typewriter in the
evenings. In another incident he complained when Mike brought Jane up to the
room to get her out of a rain storm. Unpleasant words were exchanged.
Mike tries to shrug it off. When he goes to use the
bathroom down the hall, he sees the stranger who had been sitting outside,
standing on the stairway. He asks him what he’s doing there and the stranger
runs for it. Mike goes back upstairs, and notices Meng’s room is quiet. He
suddenly wonders if the stranger did something to him. He’s afraid to find out.
He remembers now that at least twice he threatened to kill Meng in front of
witnesses. If he found Meng dead, and reported it to the cops, he might end up
suspect No. 1. With his mind in turmoil, he falls asleep and goes into a dream.
Ingster and cinematographer Nicholas Musuraca, (who went
on to lens such classics as “Out of the Past,†“The Blue Gardenia,†“Where
Danger Lives,†and “Clash by Nightâ€) pulled out all the stops for the lengthy dream
sequence that makes up the centerpiece of the film. It’s the thing that most
people talk about and remember about “Stranger on the Third Floorâ€. Full of noir imagery derived from German
expressionism, with exaggerated camera angles, lots of dark shadows, and some
brilliant lighting, the sequence is daring and cinematically compelling. It is
a bit heavy-handed, however, in the way it shows how anyone can be caught in a
criminal justice system that doesn’t care if your guilty or innocent. The
defense attorney is an incompetent shyster who urges him to plead guilty, the
jury is literally asleep during the trial, and all the press cares about is
whether it makes a good story. Even dear Jane is forced to give testimony that
only sinks him deeper. It may be overwrought, but it makes its point.
When Mike awakens from the dream he finally checks on Meng
and finds him dead. His throat is slashed the same way Nick’s was. His first
instinct is to run, but Jane persuades him to call the cops. He does and you
can guess what happens.
It all sounds a little far-fetched and I suppose it is,
but somehow the script manages to bring all of its paranoid element together in
a reasonable fashion, even if the nice, tidy ending is a bit of a stretch. As
you watch “Stranger on the Third Floor,†the filming techniques and the story
line, having become so familiar by now, you may think you’ve seen it all
before. I’m sure you have. It’s been imitated hundreds of times in film and TV.
But this arguably was the first of its kind.
Warner Archive has released this remastered print of “A
Stranger on the Third Floor,†on DVD only. The film looks good, the stark black
and white cinematography has been well transferred to disc. Don’t be alarmed
when you start the movie though. The opening credits look terrible, but after
that, it’s all good. They must have had to use a different film element for the
opening. There are literally no extras on the disc. This obscure 64-minute
movie is well worth watching and is more than just a curiosity. Definitely for any
fan of film noir. The only thing better would be a Blu-ray with some film
historian commentary giving the picture its due.
CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM THE CINEMA RETRO MOVIE STORE
John M. Whalen is the author of "Hunting Monsters is My Business: The Mordecai Slate Stories" . Click here to order the book from Amazon)
Are you a MOVIE BUFF? Do you think you know a lot about
MOVIES? Well, then, Movie Buff is the party accessory for you!
What is it? Movie Buff is a fast-paced, open-ended, very clever trivia card
game for “folks who love spouting movie lines and film facts.†It’s tag line is
“Finally!—a place for all that useless knowledge!â€
During the course of the game, players
create “Takes†that consist of a movie title, actor(s) in the movie, role(s) in
the same film, and even applicable quote(s). “Strategy†cards can be thrown to
manipulate the play of the game. Because the game relies on players’ own store
of trivia knowledge, the same game can never be played twice. No expansion
decks needed!
Recently, Cinema Retro correspondent and reviewer RAYMOND BENSON encountered
JUSTIN PURVIS, the creator/designer of Movie
Buff, at Chicago’s Flashback Weekend. He sat down with Justin to find out a
little more about Movie Buff.
CINEMA
RETRO: How did Movie
Buff come about? What’s the origin
story?
JUSTIN: Honestly, I feel
like I've been working on Movie Buff my entire life. Ever since I was old
enough to start watching movies, I have had this connection with films and the
actors in them. And movies became a huge part of my life when I was fourteen,
and I was diagnosed with a rare degenerative eye disease that began to slowly
steal my eyesight, leaving me with less than 10% of my vision remaining today.
But when I was diagnosed, I had no idea how long I would be able to see, so I
dove into the escapism of movies, and found that I had a knack for remembering
useless knowledge, like actors in small roles in movies and lines of dialogue
after only watching a movie once. My brother and I would even have
conversations and movie quotes around my parents and they would sit there
quizzically looking at us as if we were speaking a foreign language.
As I grew older, my friends and I started playing different games
to try and stump one another; one was a game that we just called "the
movie game," where I would name an actor and then the next person would
have to name a movie that that actor was in and then the next person had to
name a different actor in that same movie and then the next person had to name
a different movie that the second actor was in, continually moving from a movie
to actor to movie until one of us was stumped and couldn't figure out another
movie or another actor without repeating them. And then in the 90s the game 6° of Kevin Bacon became extremely
popular where any actor can be connected to Kevin Bacon within six steps using
the movie they've done, so my brother and I and our friends would play games
where instead of naming an actor we connect to Kevin Bacon, you name any two
actors, and we would connect them in six steps or less, seeing who can connect
them either the fastest, or in the shortest amount of connections, or in the
most obscure ways.
And coming from a military family, we traveled around a lot. Every
time we would move, we met new friends and found that they were playing this
game that I thought I had invented. And they always had different kinds of
spins on it, anything from the ability to go obscure once in a while, or if you
did something, you could reverse it back on the other person. That got me
thinking about ways that we could create a unifying game that everyone could
play and share their love of films without being snobbish about it, or not
being as snobbish about it. Which prompted me to take this verbal game
that I had been playing most of my life and turning it into a physical game
with more strict rules to cement the game's idea, but also provide the ability
to play strategies to help you overcome obstacles that show up eventually.
Around 2005 or so, I had finally decided that I was going to try
make a prototype of this game and I went online to a "create your own
cards" website and bought the software and the card stock, creating my
very first prototype of what I was calling Movie
Buff at the time, On Set! I went
and got some generic images from the Internet and put them on these cards and
used them, play testing it with friends or with students that I would teach. I
used to teach Improv in Washington DC, and after the classes or the shows we'd
go out for drinks and I would break out the game and we'd play it.
Slowly over that time, in between full-time jobs, full-time life,
and full-time hobbies, I kept chipping away at the idea, putting it aside
whenever something "more important " came along. It wasn't until 2014
when my wife became pregnant with our first child that I realized I had to get
a real job, or make this game a reality. It was after a long conversation with
my wife, Corrie, that I sat back down to re-write out the entire rules and make
sure all the cards I had were the right ones for the game. We then launched
into starting a Kickstarter campaign and reaching out for help in finding a
print house and graphic designer, as well as making sure all of our legal
obligations were met in protecting the game. And then, nine months after our
successful campaign ended in August 2014, I had the very first printing of Movie Buff in my hands. We immediately
began selling it up and down the East Coast at conventions and festivals, as
well as in local comic and game shops. Never being afraid of a challenge, I
even approached non-gaming stores. I'm proud to say that you can even find Movie Buff in the occasional hardware
store and RV sales buildings. Because, let's face it, everyone can benefit from
Movie Buff!
CINEMA
RETRO: Are there plans to try and sell it to a bigger
company/distributor?
JUSTIN: Absolutely! Every
convention we go to, we make new connections with people and we find out new
ways to spread the word about Movie Buff.
And we have been introduced to many people who are connected with game
companies/distributors. We are currently in conversations with a few companies
and are very excited about the prospects of this upcoming year. Of course, we
will let people know any good news we hear from these companies once we lock
down something with them.
On a potential side note, one of the ways we have really felt like
we have made headway is with the celebrities at the conventions we attend. For
those who have seen us at conventions, you know that we have a fun spread set
out, we make fresh popcorn to give out to people, we have a candy dish filled
with goodies, and when we are less busy, I try to make my rounds to the
celebrity tables to offer them popcorn and candy, since they don't always get a
chance to leave and get a meal until the end of the day. And at a lot of these
conventions, after a weekend of plying the celebs with chocolates and popcorn,
they usually ask me about two things - 'what's the deal with the cane?' (I am
legally blind, so I usually have my cane out when I am delivering candy, just so
people don't think I’m a jerk if I bump into them) and 'what is Movie Buff?' (which I then tell them
briefly about and, on many occasions, has resulted in them buying a copy from
me). So there is a small group of celebrities who have become as in love with
the game as we are, which we couldn't be happier about.
CINEMA
RETRO:Tell us about future updates or spin-offs.
JUSTIN: We have some great
games in the Buff Family coming your way soon! For December 2016, we are
debuting TWO new games. Or, rather, one new game and one Director's Cut!
First we are going to have Movie
Buff - Director's Cut!, which will have three new Trivia Cards to add to
the already amazing game. Also debuting will be the second game in our Buff
family, TV Buff. As we have discovered
through our travails in the convention world, we have a pretty unique game
mechanic and it lends itself to some awesome spin-offs. Much like Fluxx, or Monopoly, you can use the same game dynamic and take it in a whole
new direction. TV Buff will use your
own “useless knowledge†of TV shows and make you the Big Shot of the Boob-tube!
After that, we will be debuting Music Buff in Summer 2017, and following that more additions to the
Buff Family will include Comic Book Buff,
Video Game Buff, History Buff, Sports Buff,
and many others, that will allow every single person who has been told that
they have “useless knowledgeâ€' a venue to prove it is worth something
extraordinary!
CINEMA
RETRO: Has
anyone ever said you remind them of Paul Rudd?
JUSTIN: Yes, they have. And
every single time they do, I have one thing to tell them - Totes Magotes,
Joben. I am very glad to hear it, since he is an incredibly handsome man and
quite funny to boot! In fact, when the movie I Love You, Man first came out, I sat down and watched it with my
girlfriend at the time, and when it was over, she turned to me and said, "This
is like watching a home movie of you."
*
Check out the Movie Buff website to watch other demo videos, find out where
Justin Purvis will be demonstrating the game near you, and how to order the
game, t-shirts, caps, and other useless ephemera to go with Movie Buff. The game itself sells for
only $25.00 plus shipping.
Wikipedia
defines “mockumentary†as a portmanteau (a linguistic blending of two words) of
the words mock and documentary. Essentially, it’s a phony,
comic documentary. Woody Allen didn’t invent this sub-genre of the comedy
motion picture, but he delivered two of its more successful examples—his very
first directorial feature, Take the Money
and Run (1969), and Zelig, released
in 1983. The latter can safely be counted as among the writer/director/actor’s best
movies—and seeing that to date he has directed forty-six titles (and that’s not
counting pictures he wrote but didn’t direct), that’s saying a lot.
Zelig, which takes place
in the late 1920s to the early 30s,is
the story of Leonard Zelig (Allen), a “chameleon man,†a nobody who
inexplicably assumes the physical and aural characteristics of whoever he’s
with. If he’s around scientists, he begins to speak the lingo and carry himself
in an academic, erudite fashion; if he’s associating with Chinese folks, he turns
Chinese, facial features included; and if he’s around African-Americans, his
skin darkens. No one can figure out why this marvel occurs.
Before
he knows it, Zelig becomes an international personality. The newsreels “of the
day†are full of him as he rubs elbows with the contemporary rich and famous like
F. Scott Fitzgerald or Jack Dempsey or even Adolf Hitler (all of whom appear in
some way in the remarkable footage on display in this picture). As it was the
“jazz age,†Leonard Zelig’s strange ability is celebrated in popular songs,
dance crazes (everybody is “Doing the Chameleonâ€!), and merchandise befitting
the lizard-like misfit.
Allen
and his cinematographer, Gordon Willis (who was nominated for an Academy Award
for the first time, unbelievably, for Zelig
after acting as DP for such titles as The
Godfather, The Godfather Part II,
All the President’s Men, Annie Hall, and Manhattan, among many others) painstakingly inserted Woody Allen
into frames of black and white still photographs and old newsreels—Forrest Gump-style, but without the
benefit of CGI—to accomplish the amazing visual treatment for Zelig. The look of the film is simply
remarkable, and totally believable, even more so than in Gump.
Additionally,
color footage features 1983-era intellectual luminaries, such as Susan Sontag,
Saul Bellow, and Irving Howe, providing “interviews†and commenting on the
Leonard Zelig phenomenon as if it had really occurred.
The
only other star of note besides Allen is Mia Farrow, who plays a psychiatrist
who attempts to treat the “chameleon man.†Of course, Zelig and his doctor fall
in love—it wouldn’t be a Woody Allen romantic comedy without the romance. It’s
interesting to note that Allen actually started filming Zelig after Stardust Memories
(1980) and it was the first of twelve films he made with Farrow. However,
the visual effects took so much longer to achieve after principle photography
was shot, that Allen wrote, directed, and released A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy (1982) before Zelig was completed.
Narrated
by Patrick Horgan, a British actor with a voice that sounds astonishingly like
one of those war-era documentarians, Zelig
is a top-notch, sophisticated, and very funny comedy that is brilliantly photographed and directed.
It was well-received at the time, and it launched Allen into a very successful
run of several financially and critically-acclaimed pictures in the mid-1980s.
And, as with all of the writer/director’s films, it helps if the audience knows
a little bit about history, art, and literature—Woody Allen’s movies, then and
now, are intended for a cultured crowd.
Twilight
Time’s Blu-ray edition looks terrific—and you can’t complain about the
artifacts and blemishes in the images because these were all intentional to
make the old newsreel footage that much more believable. The disk comes with an
isolated score track (and the “original†20s-era music, adapted by Dick Hyman,
is hilarious and dead-on), and the theatrical trailer. A collector's booklet with extensive liner notes by Julie Kirgo about the making of the film is also included.
You,
too, will be singing along with “You May Be Six People, But I Love You.†Limited
to only 3000 copies, Zelig is a
must-grab for Woody Allen fans.
In the early 1970s celebrated purveyors of screen terror Hammer
Films went through a phase of adapting popular British television sitcoms into
big screen romps. This included churning out at no less than three On the Buses escapades as well as
one-offs for Man About the House, Nearest and Dearest, That's Your Funeral and Love Thy Neighbour. The latter four were
directed by John Robins who, glancing at his CV, largely forged his career out
of light comedy. Where most of these films were fairly weak in terms of entertainment,
they were never less than money-spinning. Love
Thy Neighbour, a box office hit upon its original release, has just been
gifted Blu-Ray status by Network as part of their continuing "The British
Film" collection, though whether it's a film deserving of such lavish
treatment is open to debate.
Love Thy
Neighbour started life in 1972 as a primetime ITV sitcom and ended up
running for 56 episodes across 7 series spanning 4 years. Created by Vince
Powell and Harry Driver (who wrote the lion's share of the televised episodes)
it revolved around the conflict between two next door neighbours, working-class
white socialist bigot Eddie Booth (Jack Smethurst) and educated black conservative
Bill Reynolds (Rudolph Walker), along with the more amicable relationship
between their long-suffering wives, Joan (Kate Williams) and Barbie (Nina
Baden-Semper). The root of the problem between the husbands was Eddie's stubbornly
racist mind-set (though it could be selective when the moment was propitious;
he certainly had a roving eye where Bill's shapely wife Barbie was concerned)
and the constant squabbles derived therefrom. With the two protagonists
frequently hurling insults at each other (which I shall refrain from quoting
here!), using language that simply wouldn't be permitted on mainstream
television today, 21st century viewers would probably be aghast. But
back in the day the programme was enormously popular and frequently topped the
weekly ratings. Additionally, those who retrospectively accuse the show itself of being racist tend to overlook
the fact that for all Eddie's unforgivably offensive remarks towards Bill
(which, admittedly, viewers were being invited to laugh at), most of the time
the guys rubbed along quite well, and Bill not only gave as good as he got, he
usually came out on top, the emphasis falling upon just how foolish Eddie's
small-mindedness was.
Three series had already been screened by the time Hammer's film rolled
into cinemas in the summer of 1973. Starring all four of its television
incarnation’s leads and again scripted by Powell and Driver, it doesn't waste
any time with introductory faff, working instead on the safe assumption that
audiences by and large would already be familiar with the characters. There's
no real plot as such either, just several intertwined storylines (each of which
could have stood alone as a series episode) –
the guys get caught out by their wives when they attend a boozy striptease
show; the guys fall out over union matters in the factory where they work; the
guys' elderly parents (Patricia Hayes and Charles Hyatt) meet and get along
famously, much to their sons' mutual chagrin. The results make for a
mildly amusing if unremarkable time-passer that's very much of its era and the
appeal of which nowadays will boil down to how offended one is (or is not) by the writers' efforts to milk
laughs from both the pervasive racial disharmony and the derogatory insults
tossed around with abandon.
Network's Blu-Ray release presents viewers with the option of
watching the film in its 1.66:1 theatrical ratio or open matte 4:3. Although
the latter opens up picture information top and bottom, it isn't in high
definition – in fact it's
exceptionally poor definition – so having shelled out the extra £s to
own the film in pristine form, I'd suggest few people are likely to want to
watch it that way. The disc also includes a release trailer and an image
gallery comprising production photos, artwork and promotional materials from
the film's original release. It has been simultaneously issued on DVD.
True enthusiasts will be pleased to learn that Network has released
the entire TV series as a 9-platter box set too, packed with bonus enticements
that include the never aired pilot (in essence what would later become the
opening episode, only featuring Gwendolyn Watts instead of Kate Williams as
Eddie's wife), several Christmas and New Year TV specials...and Hammer's big screen film!
Though saddened by the passing of Sir Christopher Lee in
early summer of 2015, few admirers could argue that the tall, aquiline and
sepulcher-voiced actor had not lived out his ninety-three years to the
fullest. His occasionally checkered
feature -film legacy stands at well over two hundred motion pictures. I’ve no
doubt statistics of his television appearance resume are only slightly less
impressive. While I’m certain there are
a few wonks out there that have had the time and pleasure of screening every
frame of celluloid of the actor’s oeuvre that circulates… Well, for the rest of
us there are still plenty of rare films out there to discover and enjoy on the
backend.
Two of Lee’s less celebrated mid-60’s films for the
sometimes notorious producer Harry Alan Towers, Circus of Fear (1966) and Five
Golden Dragons (1967), have recently been brought together by Blue
Underground on Blu-ray for this splendid double-feature disc. This release has been my pleasing introduction
to Five Golden Dragons, a suspense-thriller
I somehow missed all these years and would, happily and surprisingly, enjoy a
lot more than first expected.
Five Golden Dragons
is capably handled by Jeremy Summers whose earlier work would include directing
stints for such British thriller melodramas as The Saint, Secret Agent,
and International Detective. Five
Golden Dragons was merely one of three low-budgeted Hong Kong based assignments
the director would tackle for producer Harry Alan Towers in 1966/1967. He had earlier helmed The Vengeance of Fu Manchu, the third of Tower’s five film cycle of
hit-and-miss thrillers starring an unlikely Christopher Lee as Sax Rohmer’s
sadistic Asian villain. Summers would
later satisfy his contract with Towers by introducing another horror-veteran, Vincent
Price, as a white-slave trader in The
House of 1,000 Dolls. The screenplays for both Circus of Fear and Five
Golden Dragons are credited to “Peter Welbeck,†a regular pseudonym of
Tower’s.
There are a lot of familiar faces on-screen, though Lee
fans, in particular, should take caution. The actor doesn’t appear for sometime well into the film, and then is
seen very sparingly. The uncontested
star of the enterprise is Robert “Bob†Cummings, the celebrated leading man of
such Alfred Hitchcock thrillers as Saboteur
(1942) and Dial M for Murder (1954). Cummings would, much later on, serve as a recognizable
1950s and 1960s TV-personality with a gift for muggery and light-comedy. In Five
Golden Dragons, Cummings plays the amiable Dr. Bob Mitchell, a Kansas-bred,
Stanford University-educated playboy who is, ostensibly, in Hong Kong to shore
up tar-gum deal for a confectionary conglomerate. In
true Hitchcockian fashion, this playful, wise-cracking innocent is accidentally
swept into a dangerous game of intrigue when a lawyer he met in passing while
in Manila scrawls the curious designation “Five Golden Dragons†on a sheet of
paper. The lawyer, who is soon thrown to
his demise from a twelfth-floor balcony by a black-hooded assassin, had inexplicably
earlier asked his cabbie to deliver the note to Mitchell at his temporary
residence at the plush Bangkok Suite at the Hong Kong Hilton.
Not too surprisingly, Mitchell becomes a person of interest
when the cabbie passes the dead man’s note to two Hong Kong police inspectors,
played by the crusty and beloved Rupert Davies and Hong Kong’s own Roy
Chiao. Davies, supposedly Chiao’s
superior, is something of a Shakespeare buff, casually dropping fractured,
dimly-remembered lines from the Bard’s pen to underscore the dramatic events
unfolding before him. When the more pragmatic
and sensible Inspector Chiao comes to call on Mitchell, incriminating note in
hand, the playboy is relaxing poolside with two comely German sisters, Ingrid
(Maria Rohm) and Margret (Maria Perschy). It’s through Margret that Mitchell eventually learns that the Golden
Dragons are “five of the most evil men the world has ever known.†This five-man syndicate, ruthless business
partners but strangers to one another, control Asia’s underground gold market
through front-offices in Paris, Rome, Majorca, Bombay and Hong Kong.
With the Hong Kong police on alert and peering through
binoculars, we learn that four of the feared Five Golden Dragons are to convene
– for the very first time – to discuss the liquidation of their secret order
and to divvy up their ill-gotten assets that total some 50 million dollars. That money has been sitting well hidden in a
Swiss bank account, and will be dispensed when the syndicate turns over their
smuggling operation to the Mafia – a deal that was to be brokered by the
ill-fated lawyer at the film’s beginning. The identity of the fifth and most mysterious Golden Dragon is played
out melodramatically in the film’s climax.
Though not a classic, the film is fun and colorful and has
that delicious Playboy-era 60s-vibe. Summers certainly makes good use of Hong
Kong’s exotic locations; it’s all sunshine, ports, poolside encounters, east
meets west opulent hotels, colorful crowded streets, and visually stunning
topography. The clothes and hairstyles
are all straight from a trendy and glossy 60’s magazine - as are the requisite wood-paneled
walls, go-go dancing, transistor radios, Yashica cameras, and boxes of Dutch
Masters cigars. Malcolm Lockyer’s exotic
score expertly mixes occidental eastern melodies with sweeping western
orchestral arrangements ala John Barry; though some of his overly dramatic
music cues underscoring several only mildly
suspenseful moments might cause one to smile. The musical sequences at the shady, syndicate controlled Blue World
nightclub featuring the vocal talents of the plotting Magda (Margaret Lee) and
the Japanese pop-singer Yukari Ito are mostly superfluous to the plot but their
songs are tuneful and catchy and will surely be welcomed by devotees of 1960s
lounge music.
Summers provides no fewer than three elongated chase scenes
that offers great glimpses of Hong Kong travelogue but, sadly, only an
occasional thrill. These sequences tend
to be remarkably slow-moving and stilted. This is unfortunate as tighter editing of these chase scenes would have plainly
been more effective. There’s a wild
pursuit of unsure footing on the city’s canals amidst the bobbing Saipan and
Junks, a more comical rickshaw chase through the city’s market street and,
lastly, a perhaps too-cartoonish battle on the balconies of the famed Tiger
Pagoda. There’s the requisite ‘60s James
Bond reference as well, when Cumming scolds his enemies for the delay in
meeting the villain he describes as “Goldfinger no. 5.†This is the
wise-cracking Bob Cummings show throughout, and it’s not too difficult to find
him a likable if unusually unorthodox hero.
German actor Klaus Kinski is on hand as well, a sadistic
minion of the Five Golden Dragons. Kinski’s “Gert†is a dour, serpentine figure,
with sunken eyes and an expressionless face. He’ so primped and powdered in this film that he looks as if he might
have once served as master of ceremonies at Cabaret’s Kit Kat Club of
Berlin. The film’s heralded four “guest
stars†(Christopher Lee, George Raft, Dan Duryea, and Brian Donlevy) mostly sit
uneasily in the chairs of the Golden Dragons and, sadly, share little screen
time or dialogue. Lee would later recall
that the gathered actors “spent most of our time sitting around a table in
bizarre clothes.†In Five Golden Dragons Lee’s appearance
totals a few minutes at most, but he is at least allowed to deliver a few lines
of stentorian dialogue. The same cannot
be said for poor George Raft whose talents are almost entirely wasted here.
Christopher Lee figures more prominently as the mysterious
lion tamer Gregor in Circus of Fear (issued
in the U.S. under the more exploitative title Psycho-Circus). Sadly, Lee
is somewhat hamstrung here as well as his menacing visage is mostly hidden
beneath a black hood throughout. As far as John Moxey’s Circus of Fear is concerned… Well, I don’t wish to go into too much
detail here. Last year I attended a
“theatrical†screening of this film at a drive-in hosting a triple-bill of
Christopher Lee films. That night
moviegoers were treated to the gritty, black and white A.I.P. cut of the film
intended for U.S. audiences (with a running time slashed by a near unforgivable
twenty-two minutes), but my nonetheless favorable impression of the film itself
can be found by clicking here.
Having said that, I’m happy to report that this new Blu-ray
issue presents the film uncut in its complete international version form and in
the brightest hues of Eastman Color – there’s nary a scratch or visual blemish
to be found. This addition of a color
palette is a true revelation, and effectively changes the entire tone of the
gritty, monochrome noir I viewed in truncated form at the Drive-in into
something quite different. Previously
issued on DVD in 2003 as part of Blue Underground’s The Christopher Lee Collection, the Blu-ray of Circus of Fear contains all the bells and whistles of its earlier
counterpart. Not to be missed is
director John Moxey’s excellent supplemental commentary. Moxey (City
of the Dead, The Night Stalker) reminisces about his long career in Britain
and Hollywood, the making of Circus of
Fear in particular, and the actors and technicians who brought this low
budget but riveting mystery to the big screen.
Blue Underground’s Blu-ray of Circus of Fear features a 2K High Definition (1080 HD) transfer
from the original British color negative. It’s presented in a widescreen 1:66:1 ratio in HD mono audio. Along with the wonderful Moxey commentary,
the disc also features a scene selection menu and both the International and
U.S. trailers in both Color and Black and White versions. There’s also a colorful poster and still
gallery included. Five Golden Dragons makes its first appearance on any U.S. home
video format, with the film newly re-mastered in High-Def from the original
uncut negative, with a Widescreen 2:35:1 format and monaural HD sound. The set also includes the obligatory poster
and still gallery and international theatrical trailer.
In
the late 1950s, a film movement emerged in Britain known as “Free Cinema.†Some
of the U.K.’s most celebrated filmmakers of the 1960s and 70s were among its
practitioners—Lindsay Anderson, Karel Reisz, Lorenza Mazzetti, and Tony
Richardson. The directors made low budget, short documentaries about the
working class with an almost deliberate “non commercial†sensibility. It was
radical and exciting, and it was a precursor to the British New Wave that
dovetailed with the French New Wave that was so influential on filmmakers
everywhere.
Many
of the pictures of the British New Wave, released between 1959 and 1964,
focused on characters described as “angry young men,†and the films themselves
were referred to by critics and theorists as “kitchen sink dramas.†This was
because the movies were presented in a harsh, realistic fashion and were indeed
about the gritty, working class lives of “ordinary†(but actually,
extraordinary) people. Some of the titles you’ll recognize—Look Back in Anger, Room at
the Top, Saturday Night and Sunday
Morning, The Loneliness of the Long
Distance Runner, This Sporting Life,
and others.
A Taste of Honey, released in 1961
and directed by Tony Richardson, was a product of the early Free Cinema
Movement and the British New Wave. Based on a controversial but highly
successful stage play by first-time dramatist (at age 19) Shelagh Delaney, Taste is remarkable for several reasons.
For one, it is about an “angry young woman.â€
It isalso shockingly frank for its
time. The British Board of Censors approved the picture only for persons over
the age of 16, for it deals with these then taboo subjects—female promiscuity,
alcoholism, interracial sex, pregnancy out of wedlock, and homosexuality. There’s
even a bit of nudity. (As a “kitchen sink drama,†it indeed has everything
but!)
The
story focuses on Jo (expertly played by newcomer Rita Tushingham), who lives
with her tramp of a mother, Helen (Dora Bryan), in a Manchester ne’er-do-well
working class environment. Helen seems to flit from man to man and doesn’t care
all that much for her daughter, now 16. Jo, frustrated and dissatisfied with
the status quo, has a relationship with a black sailor (Paul Danquah) who’s in
town for a few days. Helen runs off with a new beau, Peter (Robert Stephens), and
gets married, leaving Jo alone and pregnant. Jo then finds solace by
befriending a gay man, Geoffrey (courageously portrayed by Murray Melvin), who
moves in with her until Helen decides to leave her husband and return.
This
was bold stuff in 1961. In fact, it was still against the law in England to be
homosexual at the time. It is to Delaney’s credit to bring the Geoff character
to life on the stage without saying he’s
gay, but letting the audience know without a doubt that he is. The film version
accomplishes the same thing (Melvin is the only cast member who was also in the
original stage production), handling the subject matter with honesty, grace,
and empathy.
Filmed
entirely on location, the picture captures the grime and hardships of these
people but also manages to be brilliantly entertaining. The acting is
top-notch, and Richardson’s direction is flawless. The camerawork by Walter
Lassally, often hand-held, provides a documentary feel to the proceedings that
expound on the earlier stylistic traits of the Free Cinema Movement.
The
Criterion Collection Blu-ray release features a new, restored 4K digital
transfer with an uncompressed monaural soundtrack, and it looks marvelous.
Supplements include: new interviews with Rita Tushingham and Murray Melvin (the
latter’s is especially enlightening); an audio interview with Tony Richardson
from 1962, accompanied by stills and clips; an excerpt from a 1960 television
interview with Shelagh Delaney; a 1998 interview with DP Walter Lassally; a new
piece with film scholar Kate Dorney about the film’s origins and the stage
production’s director, Joan Littlewood; and Momma
Don’t Allow, a 1956 Free Cinema documentary short co-directed by Richardson
and Karel Reisz and shot by Lassally. The booklet contains an essay by film
scholar Colin MacCabe.
While
the storyline and subject matter might sound drab and dire, A Taste of Honey does have an
under-flavor of sweetness that makes viewing the film a truly rewarding
experience. Recommended.
The
horror sub-genre generally known as 'Nature Attacks' blossomed in the 1970s and
probably reached perfection with Jaws (1975). Certainly Jaws was not the first
movie to put humans at the mercy of a relentless animal antagonist but it's
success guaranteed that it would never be the last. Being very well respected
and most profitable film of its type there was little doubt that more such
movies would be made but while much fun can be had watching the various carbon
copies with monsters of all types, it's the nature attacks tales that stretch
outside the basic formula of Jaws that are the most interesting. That's not to
say that most of these films are good but they are usually fascinating viewing just
to see what threat from the animal kingdom can be blown up to epic proportions
to frighten the public. I'm sure the producers of The Bees (1978) had
Hitchcock's brilliant The Birds in mind as a template but that is a level of
competence that this film could never reach.
Somewhere
in South America a United Nations science outpost has Dr. Miller (Claudio
Brook) running some tests and experiments on African killer bees. Miller is
part of a team that is working to figure out a way to increase the production
of honey and their plan is to crossbreed African killer bees with less deadly
bees to create a new, less aggressive but highly industrious breed.
Unfortunately, the lure of top grade honey is too enticing for a local villager
who, along with his young son, sneaks into the killer bee compound at night.
The pair of would-be thieves disturb the bees, resulting in the son’s death and
the father's disfigurement. The nearby villagers blame the death on Dr. Miller
so they storm the research compound, releasing the bees and killing Dr. Miller.
Dr.
Miller’s wife Sandra (Angel Tompkins) smuggles some of the remaining bees
back to America and takes them to Dr. Sigmund Hummel (John Carradine) who also
happens to be her uncle. Siggy, as he is called, is the head man of this UN bee
project in the States and has been working in the field for years. With the assistance
of John Norman (John Saxon) and Sandra, Dr. Hummel tries to continue Dr.
Miller’s research. While their work progresses, a group of greedy American
businessmen try illegally importing some killer bees of their own into the
United States. Their plan goes horribly wrong and their courier is killed in
transit, thus releasing his bee stash into North America and off we go into
disaster film territory. The bees set up shop in a cave near a public park (!),
begin multiplying, building hives and occasionally stinging a person to death.
As
the bees become a bigger and more deadly problem threatening to destroy the
human race, the UN team begins to make some real progress and actually slow the
insects' advance for a while. But at that point the bees evolve into a species
smarter and more deadly than anyone could have imagined, leaving Dr. Norman,fighting
to find a way to communicate with the creatures to stave off the end of
humanity. I don't want to give away the completely mad ending so that the curious
can marvel at it's unusual solution to the problem. I'll just say that finale
is almost worth getting through the rest of the movie just to witness.
Let's
be clear about this now - The Bees is a terrible film. It's inept in a dozen
different ways with awful dialog, a ridiculous romance angle, ham-fisted
villainy and generally wretched acting. The only two actors that make it out of
this mess with their self-respect intact are Saxon and Carradine, even if that
venerable actor is saddled with a truly stupid German accent. I love John
Carradine and it was great to see him featured so prominently in a film this
late in his career. He’s good in his role but I did find myself constantly
distracted by the sight of his arthritic, crippled hands. I'm aware of Mr.
Carradine's arthritis problems later in life but this was the first time I've
seen a director choose not to hide this deformity onscreen. It drew my
attention repeatedly and made me wince whenever I saw him holding things or
picking up objects. Saxon is the only actor who seems to be rewriting his
dialog on the fly, which is to say that his lines sound the least stilted and juvenile
throughout. Saxon finds a way to seem naturalistic in his role even when he is
being asked to do some pretty dumb things and, as a plus, he gets to have a
gratuitous fist fight.
I
wish The Bees was a better movie. I really enjoy the nature attacks sub-genre and
the idea of swarms of malevolent insects engulfing people automatically gives
me the chills, so I'm a fair mark for the story being told here. But this film
is so poorly produced and badly written that it is impossible to ever take
anything seriously. I can get behind the film's basic message of dialing back
the harm we do to the environment before we damage something vital but the
entire affair just seems like an under budgeted amateur mess. Most of the time
it feels like a 1970s Saturday morning cartoon script that somehow got made
into a feature film. On the plus side I do have to give the director credit for
some creative use of (a lot) of stock footage to show the military's fight
against the invading bee horde. This footage is well integrated and the scenes
of the Rose Parade were very well done with a surprise appearance by President
Gerald Ford before the bees descend.
Just
one more note about the film that I can't ignore. The sort of jazzy score by Richard
Gillis is pretty bad and entirely inappropriate to the events it is used under.
It feels like music written for another story idea that got grafted onto this
film out of necessity. It is almost always out of place and distracting
especially after the seventh or eighth time the same few bars of music leap out
of the soundtrack to emphasize whatever is happening. The music might work in another movie but
here it's overused and its repetitive nature just grates on the viewer's
nerves.
Luckily
for fans of nature amok movies The Bees has been release on Blu-ray by the
fine folks at Vinegar Syndrome. The movie looks and sounds fantastic putting to
shame the poor quality transfers from video sources I've seen in the past. In
fact, I can't imagine a better looking presentation of the film and one might
even say the excellence in evidence here is better than the film deserves. The
only special features are the movie's trailer and a very nice ten minute interview
with the film’s director Alfredo Zacarias. Zacarias speaks with a lot of
passion about The Bees and it's clear he really felt he was doing
something important. I certainly don't think this is a good movie but I can appreciate
the work the director put into this project and hearing his story from his own
lips might have been the best part of this Blu-ray.
Writer Derek Pykett (whose excellent book " MGM
British Studios: Hollywood in Borehamwood" was
reviewed here earlier this year) has turned his hand to directing; setting up
and playing host to a dozen intimate interviews with some of Britain's
most respected and beloved thesps, the results are now available on DVD with
"From Stage to Screen", a privately produced, limited edition 6-disc
box set.
With each performer given their own ‘episode’ and a total running
time of 15 hours, there's so much material here that it'll take the average
viewer a number of sittings to get through it all. Beyond starting with disc
one and working through methodically, where one begins is probably going to be
proportionate to the level of esteem in which the viewer holds each particular
actor or actress represented within the set; I confess that at the time of
writing I still have a fair bit to get through. However, I've adopted the
latter approach and, being a 007 fan, I zeroed in first on the hour devoted to
Julian Glover (who played villain Ari Kristatos in For Your Eyes Only), following up with Where Eagles Dare's charmingly poisonous Major Von Hapen, Derren
Nesbitt, and The Elephant Man's
outright wicked showmaster Bytes, Freddie Jones.
Also included in this collection – which could potentially be the
first of a series – are Michael Medwin, Shirley Ann Field, Michael Craig,
Michael Jayston, Joss Ackland, Roy Dotrice, Vera Day, Lee Montague and Sarah
Miles.
The episodes are supplemented with a selection of trailers
representing each interviewee's most renowned films. All the participants
regale the viewer with some marvellous and often amusing anecdotes, and it's
pleasant to be reminded of just how much they have actually achieved over the
decades, as well as some of the iconic figures they've worked with. Even though
the interviews average out at a little over an hour apiece, so extensive are
the careers under discussion that there's plenty of gold still to be mined and
one is definitely left with a thirst for more (for example, the aforementioned
Glover interview – disappointingly, given my passion for Bond – touches only
very briefly on For Your Eyes Only).
Although, being as it’s a documentary, the set is exempt from
classification, potential purchasers should be warned that there's a smattering
of fruity language throughout.
Proceeds from the sales of "From Stage to Screen" will
be divided between two charities, Alzheimer's Society and All Dogs Matter.
Though I’m generally not wishy-washy in my assessment of…
well, practically anything, I admit to holding a decidedly middle-ground
opinion on the work of Jesus “Jess†Franco. There are some films by this
controversial Spanish director that inspire me to become more intimate with his
work. Conversely, there are others that actually discourage me from seeking out additional titles. His films, particularly those from 1972-1973
following, have proven to be polarizing to cineastes. Though he attracted notice in the early 1960s
with such more or less traditionally-mannered horror films as The Awful Dr. Orloff and The Diabolical Dr. Z (both shot in
atmospheric black and white and both quite entertaining), Franco was a restless,
creative soul eager to push the envelope.
By the mid-70s Franco had attained a reputation as a competent
and bankable director of exploitation features. Even his detractors – and there are many – cannot argue that the
director had an ability to bring a film to market both quickly and under-budget. Beginning in the early-1970s, he would controversially
begin to introduce elements of soft-core pornography within the framework of
otherwise more conventional horror or historical-period films. Some find these films artful and intriguing;
others see them as sadistic, lurid celebrations of sexual violence. These controversial films would often be seen
as pandering to an audience that four-time Franco collaborator Christopher Lee
would later deride as the “raincoat crowd.†Whether you found Franco’s films as artful unabashed celebrations of the
female form or as unrelentingly sordid cinema that’s unapologetically
misogynistic in construction… Well, this would all depend on your own moral compass.
Blue Underground has just released two of Franco’s earliest,
most notorious – and, to be fair, occasionally artful – films on Blu-ray. Both films originate from the era that
historians perceive as the controversial director’s transitional period: Eugenie… the story of her journey into
perversion (1970) and Justine (1969). Both films were inspired by the works of the
notorious eighteenth century French novelist the Marquis de Sade, an author for
whom Franco clearly shares an affinity.
Though his name is offered on publicity materials as one
of the film’s two stars (the other being the gorgeous Swedish actress Marie
Liljedahl), Christopher Lee recalls Eugenie
as the only motion picture in his career that he was moved to ask his name
being struck from advertising. The
distinguished British actor has long told a tale that, a mere six months
following his work on the film, a friend tipped him off that the final cut of Eugenie
was not playing in the usual cinemas in and around London. Quickly following
up on his friend’s observation, Lee was reportedly horrified upon discovery the
film had been relegated to the sordid “blue†cinemas of Compton Street in the
city’s Soho district. He was especially
troubled by a scene where a completely nude woman, surrounded by a gaggle of
Sadists, was strapped to a table in the background of one of his shots. In the early 1980s, Lee dismissively told
Robert W. Pohle Jr. and Douglas C. Hart, authors of The Films of Christopher Lee (Scarecrow Press, 1983), “that I was
entirely ignorant of what was going to take place behind my back after I had
finished the comparatively innocuous scenes I appeared in.â€
In the eighteen-minute and informative supplement Murderous Passions: The Delirious Cinema of
Jesus Franco (also included on this Blue Underground release) film
historian Stephen Thrower suggests that Lee might have been somewhat
disingenuous with his claim of being unaware of the debauch scene playing out
behind him. As Lee was a self-acknowledged worldly and literate man of
the arts, the author suggests that it would be highly unlikely that the actor
would have not been at least partly familiar with the writings of de Sade. Surely this cultured English gentleman would
be well aware of what sort of film this was to be? Having suggested this,
Thrower nonetheless admits willingness to accept Lee’s victim-hood at face value;
he acknowledges neither Franco nor producer Harry Alan Towers were the type to suffer
moral ambiguities in the countenance of such deception.
In any event, and regardless of his excised headline
billing, Lee is hardly a main player in the production. The actor recalls the “bits and pieces†in
which he was involved were shot on a Barcelona sound-stage in all of two
days. In his single primary scene, the
actor was even made to supply his own wardrobe: a red velvet smoking jacket he
had appropriated following the shooting of the East German-French-Italian
co-production Sherlock Holmes and the
Deadly Necklace (1962). What is
certain is that Lee would not work with the director again. Though belated release dates on the continent
and in the U.S. might suggest otherwise, Lee collaborated on four films with
Jesus Franco from late 1968 through mid-1969. Along with Eugenie, there were
The Castle of Fu Manchu (1970), The Bloody Judge (1970), and Count Dracula (1972).
If Lee harbored any lasting hard feelings for Franco’s
perceived betrayal of his trust, it apparently wasn’t long-lasting. In
one supplement Lee magnanimously describes the Spaniard as “a much better
director than he’s given credit for.†He suggests the filmmaker was handicapped
not by any lack of talent in his craft, but by tight schedules (most of Franco’s
films were given three to four weeks of photography at a maximum) and shoestring
budgets. If this is Lee’s genuine
appraisal of Franco’s talents, it’s not one shared by the director himself. The filmmaker is surprisingly dismissive of
his own work, only acknowledging with dispassion, “of all my films [Eugenie is] the one I hate the least.â€
Though not a neat break from his past oeuvre, historians
of continental film are of the mind that Eugenie
was more-or-less a transitional movie for Franco, a pivotal catalyst for the
director’s turn from more traditional movie-making forms to a more seamy and
steamy catalog of cult-films. In the
final analysis, Eugenie was a
difficult film to market in 1970 as it had a cinematic foothold in two
disparate worlds. U.S. distributor,
Jerry Gross, didn’t even want the final product as he found the film too artsy
and tame and wanted to see more flesh on-screen. Franco would defend the finished film as
“erotic but not pornographic.†Depending on where one draws the line between
art and pornography, I suppose this is a somewhat truthful self-assessment on
Franco’s part. It took no fewer than
three attempts to market the film in Germany due to censorship issues, and in
the U.K. there was no general release.
Though no
less exploitative than Eugenie, Franco’s Justine is actually a visually
softer and more lavish production. It’s
a moody costume-drama set in the time of de Sade’s world, a time replete with
castles, and lush gardens, and baroque music. The film is also mounted in a more traditional format, the many sordid indignities
suffered by the title character recounted in an unrelenting episodic
style. Like Eugenie, Justine (the beautiful
Romina Power, the eighteen-year old daughter of screen-legend Tyrone Power) is degraded in equal measure by religious figures, criminals, noblemen, and low
caste boarding house tenants. Also as in
Eugenie, the young girl is savaged with moral disregrad by both predatory
men and women. The film voyeuristically drifts
from episode to episode as Justine endures a series of humiliations. The film is unrelentingly grim, and the
filmmaker’s almost casual depictions of sexual violence rarely pauses a moment
so one can catch a breath.
One
of the hallmarks of 1960s art house cinema was Hiroshi Teshigahara’s Woman in the Dunes, adapted by Japanese
author/playwright KÅbÅ Abe from his own
1962 novel. The picture won the Special Jury Prize at Cannes in 1964 and was
nominated that same year for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.
The following year, Teshigahara was nominated for Best Director (but lost to
Robert Wise for The Sound of Music).
This
is avant-garde cinema at its finest—or perhaps its most tedious, depending on
your taste.
The
story is straight-forward. Niki (played by Eiji Okada, the male lead from Hiroshima mon amour),a schoolteacher and amateur
entomologist (he studies bugs), has ventured to a desert-like area of Japan
(does one exist?) near the sea to find specific species of insects. He is
stranded and needs a place to stay overnight. The “villagers†(we never see a
village) point to a dilapidated shack at the bottom of a deep sand pit where a
young woman lives. They throw a rope ladder over the side of the pit so that he
can meet the woman (KyÅko Kishida). She seems nice and welcoming
enough, and she’s attractive, too. The next morning, the rope ladder is gone.
Niki is stuck in the sand pit with the nameless woman, despite several attempts
to leave.
It
is the woman’s “job†to shovel sand from the pit, which is raised by the
villagers to be used in concrete for sale. It also prevents the shack from
sinking into the sand and being forever buried. Niki is forced to be her
helper, whether he likes it or not. Weeks and months go by—eventually he
becomes the woman’s lover. Even when Niki does manage to escape, he is caught
and brought back to the pit. The sand becomes his lot in life (pun intended).
All
this takes place over 2-1/2 hours. Is it entertaining? Yes and no.
The
symbolism and metaphors may have been revelatory in 1964, and I always tell my film
history students to judge a film within the context of when it was
released, not by whether it “holds up†today. In that perspective, Woman in the Dunes is fascinating. It’s
obviously meant to be a modern-day take on the myth of Sisyphus, a Greek king
who was punished by the gods to continually roll a heavy stone up a hill, only
to have it roll down again. Niki and the woman toil with the sand, day after
day, and yet there’s always more sand. The couple represent, of course, man and
woman, the pit represents life, and the villagers are the “taskmasters†or
perhaps the gods. It’s not a spoiler to say that Niki, in the end, accepts his fate.
As
to whether or not a young audience today will find much to like about the
picture is a matter of aesthetics. The film is beautifully shot in glorious
black and white (but in the old Academy ratio, i.e. not widescreen, unusual for
1964) by Hiroshi Segawa. The shots of sand, in particular, are striking—sand
slipping, sand falling, sand on skin, microscopic sand, sand everywhere. The arty love scenes (there is some nudity, but this was Japan, not
America, in 1964) are notable because the sand coats the sweaty bodies, causing
one to wonder where all that sand is going. Ouch.
The
Criterion Collection released the film a few years ago on DVD as part of a set
of Teshigahara’s pictures. Now comes a stand-alone Blu-ray edition with a new
high-definition digital restoration, with an uncompressed monaural soundtrack.
The images are suitably grainy (sorry,
couldn’t resist). Supplements are ported over from the earlier release: a 2007
video essay on the film by film scholar James Quandt; four short films by the
director—Hokusai (1953), Ikebana (1956), Tokyo 1958 (1958), and Ako (1965);
Teshigahara and Abe, a 2007 documentary
about the collaboration between the director and writer; and the trailer. The
booklet contains an essay by film scholar Audie Bock and a 1978 interview with
Teshigahara.
Woman in the Dunes is an important work
of international cinema from the 60s and will be appreciated by serious art
house cinephiles; the rest of the audience might feel like taking a shower
after a viewing.
Often
called the Spaghetti Western version of The
Dirty Dozen, A Reason to Live, A
Reason to Die! is out on Blu-Ray from Kino-Lorber. Despite a superstar trio
of actors in the form of James Coburn, Bud Spencer, and Telly Savalas along
with an established director Tonino Valerii (Day of Anger; My Name is
Nobody) and gorgeous sets, the film is nonetheless something of a mixed bag
that doesn’t take off until the third act.
The
plot concerns Colonel Pembroke (Coburn), a Union officer out for revenge
against Major Ward (Savalas), the Confederate officer in charge of Fort Holman
who also killed Pembroke’s son. With the support of the Union Army, Pembroke
and his second in command, Eli Sampson (Spencer), enlist several Union officers
condemned to the hangman’s noose who can have their freedom if they help
Pembroke overtake Fort Holman.
Most
all fans and critics of the genre unanimously agree that the movie is tediously
boring until Coburn and his men finally arrive at Fort Holman and the battle
begins. And what a glorious battle it is with Gatling guns and exploding gun
powder kegs galore (some sources claim this scene was shot in only five days).
In essence, this scene manages to be the film’s saving grace. That being said,
it is usually the teaming of the three leads that alerts many movie fans to the
film’s existence. After all, any movie sporting James Coburn, Bud Spencer and
Telly Savalas on the poster certainly catches the eye.
James
Coburn had been to Almeria the previous year to film Sergio Leone’s somewhat
divisive Duck You Sucker! in 1971. He
plays a similarly laconic role in A
Reason to Live, A Reason to Die! However, depending on what version of the
film you are watching (and there are several) his character can come across as
sadly underdeveloped and mysterious. According to Marco Giusti’s book Dizionario del western all'italiano Coburn
and director Valerii did not gel well, and a bored Coburn spent most of his
time between takes doing yoga. Telly Savalas is also curiously underdeveloped
as the villain. His best moment probably comes when he executes a deserter
during the final battle. As such, Bud Spencer actually comes out of this film
as the one to watch, chewing the most scenery and receiving the majority of the
screen time (ironically, this role was originally supposed to have gone to Eli
Wallach). Firmly entrenched as a European superstar after the release of They Call Me Trinity (1970) and its
sequel, Spencer plays his part in a fairly comical fashion. He manages to
lighten the mood well—but not to the extent that it seems as though he walked
on set from another movie—and the film would suffer greatly without him.
Spencer is dubbed in this film by the same man who dubbed him on the Trinity films and several others.
Sharp-eared viewers may notice Spencer interacting with another actor who is
himself dubbed by the same man who later dubbed Spencer in his other films like
Crime Busters (1977). The observation
is made all the more amusing when this character tells Spencer, “You seem
familiar.†This isn’t a joke though, but a set-up for something in the plot
later on when he outs Spencer as a Union spy.
Despite
the larger than life trio of super stars that headline the film, in some
respects the sets still manage to be the real star of the show. In a word, Fort
Holman is as gorgeous and grand as any movie set could hope to be. As eagle
eyed movie fans will notice Fort Holman is actually the set built for El Condor (1970) the previous year which
starred Lee Van Cleef and was directed by John Guillermin. And if my eyes don’t
deceive me, the large ranch house that Coburn and the convicts visit is the
McBain residence from Once Upon a Time in
the West.
As
to the Blu-Ray, don’t let the first grainy shot fool you, the picture quality
is actually excellent. This is probably as good a place as any to mention this
is the cut 92 minute American version, hence the grainy opening shot which is
in fact taken from the film’s climax, not the uncut 112 minute version which
has a different opening. The uncut version reportedly does a much better job of
fleshing out the characters of Coburn and Spencer and their motivations are
both clearer. This still isn’t as bad as a 79 minute German version though,
which was cut with the intent of making it into a Bud Spencer comedy! All in
all, though the first half drags on a bit, this film is still highly
recommended for Spaghetti Western and Bud Spencer fans.
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974) feels like a working man’s
thriller. Its bad guys come from varying backgrounds—military, mafia, experience
on just the type of train they are hijacking—but none of them are exceptionally
slick or formidably imposing in a supervillain sort of way. There is no global
catastrophe, no city under siege; there isn’t even a single building at risk of
explosion or collapse. These men want $1 million. Period. Sure, they have
kidnapped about two dozen hostages, but in an age now when cinematic baddies
detain entire metropolitan regions, this arrangement seems almost quaint by
comparison. Leading the attempt to thwart the four antagonists are a couple of
guys just doing their job, as capably and confidently as they would any other
day. Written by Peter Stone, based on John Godey’s (Morton Freedgood) novel, this
model of 1970s American movie grit stands out in form and function for the way
its unpretentious, low-key scheme is conceived of and enacted, and the
systematic, procedural manner in which the plot is hindered by men with evident
occupational know-how.
Starting with the
motorman trainee who recites the stop-start routine for a train as it pulls in
and out of a station, Pelham goes for
realistic detail at most every turn, setting up how this operation works and economically
dispersing the minutiae that will prove integral to the plot as the film moves
along. Scarcely any nuance of character or indication of incident, from Green’s
(Martin Balsam) sniffles to the description of the subway lines to hypothetical
escape routes, is mentioned or shown without having some later relevance. Quirks
and gradually revealed backstories imbue each of the four criminals with
definable features that become resiliently realistic. The paunchy Green (code
name for Harold Longman), adorned by craggy grey hair and thick glasses, is
hardly the embodiment of a criminal mastermind, but he is experienced in the
ways of the rails and that is what matters. Brown (AKA George Steever, played
by Earl Hindman), the most irrelevant of the four, is marred by a stutter,
while Grey (Giuseppe Benvenuto, played by Hector Elizondo) is a sleazy, pervy
wildcard. The man in charge, Blue (Bernard Ryder - Robert Shaw), is introduced
by a subtle shuffle on the station landing and later bides his time with
crossword puzzles. These are like the bad guys next door.
The four criminals
institute a time-limit in which to receive the required money and the necessary
accommodations for escape, but the race-against-the-clock scenario that
develops in The Taking of Pelham One Two
Three takes its time increasing gears. Contrary to flash-pan hyper-stylized
action vehicles that move along at an instantly expedient rate (like the late
Tony Scott’s 1999 remake—still a decent film), Pelham gingerly amps up the velocity. There are brief moments of
ruthless action, in which the crooks express their disciplined seriousness and
potential for fatal violence, but generally, at least in the beginning, Blue and
his associates are methodically efficient. “We’re in no hurry,†he says, testing
the patience of Garber and his team while suggesting the potential of yet-to-be-revealed
plans that give the film part of its sweeping suspense.
Then the train
starts rolling. As a satisfying crescendo to the carefully orchestrated first
two acts, the accelerating conclusion of Pelham
gets everyone and everything in motion. The good and the bad spring into action,
and in a fascinating display of proficiency and well-oiled coordination, Garber
and the officers begin a rapid radio relay, going through the chain of command
and hashing out the best way to proceed. The deadline nears, the sickly mayor
agrees to pay the ransom, the money counting begins, and soon the transport of
the fastidiously arranged cash is underway. (The mayor’s flu is another of
those curious character traits that make these individuals more than just
generic mechanisms.) As the situation underground grows hazy, and the placement
of the criminal quartet and their prospective getaway becomes uncertain, David
Shire’s tremendous score, a vital component of the film throughout, now becomes
a driving composition, recalling a film noir or television police drama with its
urban intensity and pounding pace. Combine this with the editing of Robert Q.
Lovett and Gerald B. Greenberg, the latter having won an Oscar for his
similarly dynamic cutting on The French
Connection (1971), and The Taking of
Pelham One Two Three barrels toward its exhilarating destination in both
image and sound.
When I hear the name Jack Hill the first thing that
comes to mind is the roster of gritty exploitationers he shot with Pam Grier – Coffey, Foxy Brown, The Big Doll
House, The Big Bird Cage – or
perhaps the bizarre, comic horrors of Spider
Baby. What my thinking seldom, if ever, gravitates towards is 1974's The Swinging Cheerleaders, one of Hill's
last directorial spins and an altogether rather humdrum bag of tricks.
Preparing an article for
the Mesa College newspaper on what she considers to be the demeaning nature of
cheerleading, student Kate Cory (Jo Johnston, in her only film role) sets out
to get herself selected as a member of the football team's resident
cheerleading squad, alongside Andrea (Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith), Mary Ann
(Colleen Camp) and Lisa (Rosanne Katon). When Mary Ann learns of Kate's true
motives and, worse yet, that their new inductee is making a play for her
boyfriend, ace footballer Buck (Ron Hajak), she's too distracted to notice her
father, the college Dean (George Wallace), is masterminding a get-rich-quick
gambling scheme; in cahoots with the team coach (Jack Denton) and the maths
professor (Jason Sommers), he’s rigging football matches to line his pockets.
Co-written by Hill and Rape Squad scribe David Kidd (under the noms des plumes Jane Witherspoon and
Betty Conklin) and shot in just 12 days, The
Swinging Cheerleaders is a strange one; essentially suffering from a genre
identity crisis, it's thematically all over the shop. Bearing in mind the title
and the premise – not to mention the suggestive promotional poster art – one
could be forgiven for expecting a saucy, gag-fuelled campus comedy in the vein
of an Animal House or a Porky's, and in many respects that seems
to be what Hill was striving for (in fact, he claims that he imagined it as a
'Disney Sex Comedy', whatever that concept
might constitute!); there are a number of situations, some played out with jaunty
musical accompaniment, that are clearly aiming for laughs. However, material
that gives rise to chuckles is patchy at best and much of it frankly isn't
funny at all. But then that's hardly surprising given that it’s sandwiched
between sleaziness more suited to Hill's aforementioned exploitationers, for
example brutish rogue cops force feeding a bottle of liquor to the hero, or
(off screen) gang rape.
What the show cries out
for but sorely fails to muster up is a hefty dose of genuine funnies; the core ingredients are all present and correct – a lecherous coach who leers at cheerleaders’
posteriors through his binoculars, randy male students eager to disrobe their
female classmates, a Dean who’s far from the upstanding pillar his position commands
– it's simply that the measures are all
wrong and the resulting confection leaves a bitter taste on the palate. Thus,
regardless of its pretensions as to otherwise, what The Swinging Cheerleaders ends up as is a lukewarm, borderline
schmaltzy drama, with Kate finally realising that cheerleading isn't such a
terrible thing after all and bagging the football team's star player into the
bargain. One slapstick sequence does
stand out, but for the wrong reasons: As a procession of characters file past a
bad guy, each of them lands a punch on him whilst he just stands there taking
it and going full pelt on theatrical mugging. The scene is so completely out of
step with the rest of the picture that it feels as if it has snuck in from
another film. This off kilter tone carries through to other aspects of the film
too, notably the character of the dodgy Dean, who vacillates between being
genuinely unpleasant (he slaps Mary Ann around when she foul mouths him) and
slipping into moments of pantomime villainy.
Speaking of characters, it
doesn't help that some of them are plain objectionable. Actually, scratch that,
all of them are objectionable. Which
isn’t to say the performers aren’t easy on the eye – particularly Smith (who
first caught this reviewer's attention in The
Incredible Melting Man, in which she loses her shirt and stumbles over a
headless corpse all in the space of a few seconds), Camp (still working today),
future Playboy centrefold (September 1978) Katon, and (for the female audience)
Hajak and Ric Carrott – even if they're prime examples of that cardinal college
movie 'sin' of looking too old to convince as teen students.
Truthfully, were it not for Quentin Tarantino's
enthusiastic flag-waving when he programmed The Swinging Cheerleaders as part of his first film festival back in the mid-90s, I suspect
it's one that may have escaped my attention. And that would be a shame, because
although it's hardly on a par with the cream of Hill’s c.v., despite the prevalent
tang of negativity shrouding this piece, the man himself singles it out from
his oeuvre as the one he most enjoyed working on, which alone makes it worthy
of attention.
The
Swinging Cheerleaders has been released on dual format
Blu-ray and DVD in the UK from Arrow, its unwarranted 18-certificate playing
guilty accomplice to the implication it’s something far more salacious than it
actually is. The presentation itself is derived from a 2K restoration of the
original film elements and on the Blu-Ray under review here the image is
pleasingly bright and colourful with a moderate level of grain present
throughout. The highlight bonus is a feature-accompanying commentary with
the eminently entertaining Hill (moderated by Ejijah Drenner, who works up a
nice rapport with the director). Then, along with an on-camera interview with
Hill and one with DoP Alfred Taylor, there's an old (poorly filmed) interview
with Hill hosted by Johnny Legend, a 2012 Q&A with Hill, Camp and Katon (sadly
it too was amateurishly shot), and some original release TV spots (the tone of
which also misrepresent the film as a laughfest).
Though
it may be a little too campy for some, Captain
Apache (1971) makes for one of the more wildly entertaining Spaghetti
Westerns. Actually, some critics go so far as to group this film into a western
subgenre called the “Acid Western†(the likes of which include El Topo and other surrealistic fare).
The film was not an Italian project but was made by Benmar Productions out of Great Britain which
produced A Town Called Hell the same
year (as such, the fantastic church set from that film reappears in a redressed
fashion for Captain Apache). Though initially
Yul Brynner was announced as the star in April of 1970, Spaghetti superstar Lee
Van Cleef eventually took the role (though Brynner certainly would have looked
the part more than Van Cleef). Despite the declining state of European Westerns
in 1971, this was one three that Van Cleef made that same year, the other two
being The Return of Sabata and Bad Man’s River.
Though
the film isn’t as surreal as other Acid Westerns, it does have quite a milieu
of elements in play. Its main claim to fame is the fact that Lee Van Cleef
sings the title song. Apparently Van Cleef had seen Lee Marvin singing in Paint Your Wagon (1969) and wanted to
give it a try himself. The results aren’t as bad as one might expect, though
the film’s composer revealed in an interview that Van Cleef was somewhat
difficult to work with in the recording sessions. Van Cleef also notoriously appears
in the film wearing a wig and is minus his mustache (as Native Americans don’t typically
have facial hair). Then there is the near constant assault of gags and one
liners to the extent that this almost seems to be a “beans western†like They Call Me Trinity. A witch and her
hallucinogenic potion even adds a semi-supernatural element to the story. Most
all Spaghettis have a sequence where the hero is captured and then tortured or
beat up, in the case of this film Captain Apache is forced to ingest the
witch’s potion and goes on a strange hallucinogenic journey to the underworld.
But mostly the film plays like an Old West version of the James Bond series for
many reasons. A bedroom scene where Van Cleef is romancing Carroll Baker is
particularly Bond-like when she puts a knife to his neck and he coolly responds
by putting a gun to hers. Van Cleef’s verbal duels with Stuart Whitman over
dinner is another Bond-like element as are a pair of identical twin gunmen
henchmen that menace Van Cleef on Whitman’s behalf.
In
many respects, though produced in 1971, the film’s campy flavor is more in line
with cinema of the late 1960s more so than the early 1970s—the music in
particular. Many will no doubt be surprised to learn that the film’s composer
Dolores Claman later wrote “The Hockey Theme†for Hockey Night in
Canada—Canada’s most recognizable piece of music aside from their national
anthem. Though the score is no Morricone level masterpiece, it is still
enjoyable in its own zany way. The same can also be said of the direction by
American Alexander Signer. This was one of few feature films he shot as he
mostly stuck to directing episodes of TV series such as The Fugitive and The Man from
U.N.C.L.E. to name a few.
For
Van Cleef completests and fans of off-beat Spaghettis Captain Apache is a worthwhile addition to their Blu-Ray library.
Like other Kino Lorber releases, the picture is excellent (as is the sound) and
the release also includes trailers for two other Van Cleef films: Sabata and Barquero. Otherwise there are no special features to speak of.
John LeMay is the author of several western non-fiction titles, among them Tall Tales and Half Truths of Billy the Kid. Click here to order from Amazon.
Huddleston and John Wayne in Howard Hawks' 1970 Western "Rio Lobo".
BY LEE PFEIFFER
Like many character actors, David Huddleston's name may not be familiar to movie fans- but they certainly would recognize him, especially if they are retro film fans. Huddleston, who this week at age 85, was a star of stage and screen. He began making feature films in the 1960s and became steadily employed in both low-budget and major Hollywood productions, generally playing folksy, good old boy Southern characters, though he did snag the title role in the 1985 Salkind production of "Santa Claus" as well as the 1998 Coen Brothers cult classic "The Big Lebowski". He scored with audiences for his performance as the foul-mouthed town dignitary in Mel Brooks' "Blazing Saddles" and appeared in "Capricorn One", 'Smokey and the Bandit II", "Haunted Honeymoon" and two films with John Wayne: Howard Hawks' "Rio Lobo" and John Sturges' "McQ". In the first he played a small town dentist who humorously performs painful dental surgery on Wayne's character in order to deceive the villains. In the latter film, he played a private detective named Pinky who works with Wayne's maverick police detective in Seattle. Huddleston also worked up until recent years in many major TV series. He was especially proud of his acclaimed performance as Ben Franklin in the 1997 Broadway stage revival of "1776". For more click here.
Dazed and Confused, the first major
feature from director/writer Richard Linklater, was released in 1993. The
story, set in 1976, concerned one day in the life of a group of Texas high
school students on their last day of classes. The proceedings were so high on
nostalgia the film could very nearly be mistaken for a documentary. The movie
(which included the likes of Ben Affleck and Mathew McConaughey) was ignored in
theaters, but soon began flying off of video rental store shelves. Quickly it
achieved cult-hit status, and for the last twenty-some years fans have begged
for a sequel. Though Linklater had no desire to revisit that film’s characters,
he did occasionally remark about doing a quasi-follow-up set in college in the
1980s. Finally in 2015 the long gestating “sequel†began filming.
However,
when Linklater shot Dazed and Confused
he was in his early thirties, with high school still fresh in his memory. It
could even be said he caught the perennial lightning in a bottle in capturing the
film’s perfect atmosphere. In his mid-fifties by 2015 when filming on Everybody Wants Some!! commenced, could
Linklater accomplish the same feat twice?
Surprisingly
the answer is a resounding yes. However, to call Everybody Wants Some!! a sequel to Dazed and Confused isn’t 100% correct, as there are no continuity
ties to that film—at least none that anyone has spotted yet—though it’s still
reasonable to assume they take place in the same little world. And though some
call this the “1980s Dazed and Confused,â€
it should be noted this movie only takes place in the late summer of 1980, well
before the decade of excess had managed to establish itself, so really the
period’s not too terribly different from the late 1970s. That being said, this
film doesn’t attempt to imitate its predecessor as much as one would expect.
For instance, in Dazed it’s difficult
to say just who the main character really is due to its large ensemble, whereas
Blake Jenner’s lead character Jake, a freshman college baseball player, is the
singular point of view in Everybody Wants
Some!! Nor does this story take place over the course of only one day,
which would have been a disservice to the character’s relationships. In the
case of Dazed, most of the characters
had established friendships/relationships as they had several years of high
school under their belt. But in Everybody
Wants Some!! Jake has no prior existing relationships with any of his new
roommates/teammates whom he is moving into a frat house with. As such the
storyline more or less chronicles Jake adapting to living on his own and bonding
with his new roommates over the course of one party-filled weekend, the film
ending with him starting his first day of college classes.
As
one can tell from the brief synopsis above, Everybody
Wants Some!! is not a high-concept film by any means. Like Boyhood and other Linklater films, the
focal point is human interaction itself, with a heavy dose of philosophizing—some
of which is naturally fueled by marijuana. Actually, aside from the “getting
high and having a strange conversation scene†Everybody Wants Some!! really isn’t too heavy on call-backs to Dazed and Confused. Other than the
aforementioned scene, only the hazing of the new players on a baseball field
and the climax involving an all-night party strongly harken back to Dazed. And like its predecessor, the
final scenes don’t consist of the typical movie deaths, explosions, fist fights
or first kisses. As a coming of age film, it naturally ends on the note of the
lead character firmly realizing he has entered a new phase of his life. (Beware of spoilers) The final scene,
where Jake attends his first class after having pulled off an all-nighter, sees
him tiredly watching his history teacher writing “Frontiers are where you find
them†on the chalkboard. Jake closes his eyes to sleep, and then smiles.
Naturally,
the joy of the film is found in the nostalgia factor in remembering back to
one’s college days and early youth. Much of this joy is found in the lengthy
conversations/interactions as Linklater proves he still reigns supreme as the
king of realistic movie dialogue. Ever watch a movie with bad dialogue? Of
course you have, and there’s absolutely nothing more distracting than bad
dialogue. Simply put, Linklater gets how people—specifically in this case
college guys—actually interact with each other. Every scene felt completely
natural, including Jake’s introduction to his roommates. For other
writers/directors these scenes can often come across as clunky or heavy on
exposition, but Linklater perfectly captured the awkward “first day of school†feeling
for Jake walking into the frat house for the first time. Credit also goes to
Jenner’s wide-eyed acting, taking in his new surroundings in believable
fashion. Likewise, all of his roommates are well balanced in that they manage
to entice plenty of laughter without losing their believability. The only
exception is the character of Jay, an arrogant loud mouthed pitcher portrayed
by Juston Street. While Street is hilarious in his part, his character is the
only one that’s perhaps too much of a caricature and upsets the near perfect
illusion of realism. Granted, wacky people like that do exist, but they’re
fairly rare in the real world.
And
speaking of humor, in a day and age where all the funniest bits are in the trailers
more often than not, Everybody Wants
Some!! is the exact opposite. There’s nothing particularly funny in the
trailers (at least not as far as this writer is concerned) but in the context
of the actual film the witty dialogue and gags are hilarious. Nor are they
set-up to the point that they feel forced, and they come quickly enough that
the viewer can’t see the punchline coming before it lands.
In
summary, Everybody Wants Some!! may
come from the same mold as Dazed and
Confused but still manages to be its own film, and is far more than just
“Dazed and Confused 2.†Its run in theaters is currently over, but it has just
been released on DVD/Blu-ray and is available for digital download now.
John LeMay is the author of several western non-fiction titles, among them Tall Tales and Half Truths of Billy the Kid. Click here to order from Amazon.
Cinema Retro has received the following press announcement:
For the first time on DVD a brand new series
of relaxed, intimate, face to face interviews with some of Britain’s finest,
much loved actors, who share with us moments from their lives and work in
theatre, television and films.
With careers that span over seven decades,
we hear stories about the greatest theatres (The National; The Old Vic; The
Royal Shakespeare Company); the theatrical knights (Olivier; Gielgud; Richardson);
the bright lights of Broadway, and the most celebrated movie directors of the
twentieth century (Spielberg; Fellini; Huston; Chaplin; Visconti; Lean).
Featuring an extensive archive of rare
photographs and film trailers, it is a nostalgic trip down memory lane in the
company of highly respected actors who have given us some unforgettable
performances.
Joss Ackland, Michael Medwin, Vera Day,
Julian Glover, Michael Craig, Roy Dotrice, Sarah Miles, Lee Montague, Michael
Jayston, Derren Nesbitt, Freddie Jones, Shirley Anne Field
A specific type of film genre that has all but vanished is that of the circus movie. In decades past circuses provided the backdrop for spectacle (i.e. Demille's The Greatest Show on Earth), horror (Todd Browning's Freaks), uplifting musicals (MGM's Jumbo) and cheesy but fun thrillers (Berserk!). Indeed, there is something very old fashioned and timeless about traditional circuses and that is part of their appeal. For a few thousand years circuses have entertained audiences with their combination of exotic animals and feats of derring do. Yet, while circuses still maintain their popular appeal they have been designated by studio executives as being too quaint for modern movie audiences. Thus we have to look into the past to relish them on film. One of the more prominent circus-related production was The Big Show, which was released in 1961 and for which Esther Williams stepped out of a swimming pool briefly in order to play a mature character in a mature drama. Despite receiving first billing, however, Williams is primarily relegated to serving as window dressing in this compelling, well-acted story that served as a career boost for Cliff Robertson and Robert Vaughn. The film was loosely based on a novel by Jerome Weidman titled I'll Never Go There Anymore that had been previously adapted into two other films, Broken Lance and House of Cards.
Nehemiah Persoff plays Bruno Everard, the widowed head of a traveling German circus that he and his late wife built from humble beginnings. The circus now has a loyal following and is financially successful but Bruno wants it to expand even further. He runs the business with his eldest son Josef (Cliff Robertson) and his two other sons Hans (Kurt Pecher) and Fredrik (Franco Andrei). Their 18 year-old sister Garda (Carol Christensen) joins her brothers in their responsibility to perform in the circus as trapeze artists but suffers from her father's patronizing and overly-protective oversight of every aspect of her life. Bruno's fourth son, Klaus (Robert Vaughn) is the black sheep of the family. Due to a fear of heights, he cannot serve as a trapeze artist. Consequently, Bruno regards him as emasculated and weak. Klaus tries to contribute by performing a knife-throwing act and also acting as a bookkeeper behind the scenes yet he constantly receives humiliating insults from his father, who says the knife throwing act is too amateurish to be part of a major circus.Bruno is less a family patriarch than a tyrant. He exercise dictatorial control over the circus and only occasionally listens to Josef's advice and suggestions. He also has demanded that none of his children may ever date or marry anyone he has not approved of because he doesn't want an outsider to share in the fortunes of the circus that he has so painstakingly built. Bruno feels the best way to expand the circus is by forging a partnership with a competitor, Pietro Vizzini (Peter Capell), an elderly man in frail health. Like Bruno, he is widowed and has a daughter, Teresa (Renate Mannhardt), a rather homely young woman who is primarily known for her dangerous circus act of taming and interacting with polar bears. The calculating Bruno feels that the business merger will only happen if one of his sons marries Teresa and he basically orders Josef to propose to her. Josef refuses. Turns out he's dating Hillary Allen (Esther Williams), a playgirl socialite who has been visiting the circus and making eyes at him while he performs his trapeze act. The handsome Klaus, in an attempt to please his father, courts Teresa and convinces her to marry him, which does cement the joint the venture between Bruno and her father. However, much to his distress, Bruno still can't say a kind word to Klaus and continues to publicly humiliate him, thus setting in motion events that will inevitably tragedy to both families. Meanwhile, Bruno- like the character of Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof- finds that his children are resisting his dictatorial demands. Once Josef disobeys him to court Hillary, Garda does the same by dating a young American G.I., Eric Solden (David Nelson). When Bruno insists that they break up their relationship, Eric and Garda inform him that they intend to marry and move to America. Suddenly, Bruno's world begins to fall apart. A suicide and a tragic accident put the circus in jeopardy. When it appears that Bruno will be found guilty of negligence and jailed due to the accident that killed several of his people, Josef bravely accepts the blame and serves a five year jail sentence. When he returns to the circus from prison he finds Klaus has now manipulated his weak brothers into allowing him to take control, thus leading to a one-on-one deadly confrontation with Josef.
The Big Show was filmed in Germany and utilized the performers from an actual circus. The film is essentially a soap opera centering of the challenges encountered by lovers and would-be lovers. There's a bit of tension in the relationship between Hillary and Josef after he proposes to her when she begins to speak of their lavish life on Park Avenue. Josef is dedicated to a life in the circus and this causes them to temporarily break up. Similarly, when Klaus informs his new bride Teresa that he only married her for business reasons, his cruel remarks lead to a predictable but dramatic outcome. Most of the drama, however, is related to Bruno's relationship with virtually everyone around him. He has the ability to turn on the charm when it's for his own gain but for the most part he is a humorless, dour man whose inability to compromise leads to his downfall. Nehemiah Persoff is outstanding in the role and dominates every scene he's in. His nuanced performance makes the character of Bruno less a villain than a well-intentioned but misguided man who simply wants to ensure the future of the business that he built from scratch. Persoff gets strong support from Robertson, who is handsome, dignified and understated in the manner in which he deals maturely with his father's bombastic demands. Josef respects and admires his father but has also earned his respect by standing up to him, whereas his weak brothers are used by Bruno as human door mats. All of the other actors are adequate enough in their roles with the exception of David Nelson, who was then starring in the popular Ozzie and Harriet TV series. He comes across as impossibly polite and is more virginal than the innocent girl he wants to marry. Esther Williams goes against type by playing a woman who is, initially at least, self-centered and irresponsible. She does a fair enough job but the producers couldn't resist inserting a superfluous sequence in which she enters a swimming pool. Because Williams' character is the least interesting it's no surprise that the actress is routinely overshadowed by other cast members. The most complex character is Klaus and he is exceptionally well-played by Vaughn. Although he turns into an outright villain, we can see the reasons why. When he tries to do the right thing he is constantly rejected by his father. Thus, it's no surprise he develops serious "daddy issues". Interestingly, Vaughn made his mark with three major films in succession in which he played emotionally fragile young men. In his Oscar-nominated turn in "The Young Philadelphians" he was a young aristocrat who falls into alcoholism and finds himself framed for murder. In "The Magnificent Seven" he was the member of the macho group who had to cope with inherent cowardice and in "The Big Show" he plays a man driven to extremes by his failure to live up to his father's expectations. Ironically once he reached stardom a few years later he would generally known for playing self-assured men of action and confidence.
"The Big Show", ably directed by James B. Clark, is certainly not an underrated classic. However, it is consistently engrossing and highly entertaining with some wonderful footage of trapeze artists and tightrope walkers achieving feats that still seem impossible. The good news is that the film has finally been released as a region-free DVD by Fox Cinema Archives , the studio's "Made-On-Demand" service. The print utilized is adequate but not much more due to certain sequences that display a good deal of grain and/or artifacts but we won't gripe about that, given how long we waited for the DVD release. The biggest complaint we have is that this is yet another Fox MOD title that was shot in widescreen and released in a matted format that approximates "pan-and-scan". What were they thinking? Whoever makes such decisions is living in a time warp from the 1990s when audiences were unfamiliar with widescreen video presentations. (Remember when TCM had to recruit world famous directors to explain to viewers that, despite the black bars on the screen, the audience was getting the full picture as opposed to a cropped version?) If Fox's MOD division thinks audiences are still reluctant to accept widescreen movies they are wrong. Years ago Wal-mart thought the same thing and demanded that widescreen DVD releases also have a pan-and-scan version released simultaneously. However, they soon learned that consumers overwhelmingly preferred the original widescreen version and the pan-and-scan option quickly vanished. Fox should understand that any consumer who has gone on-line to track down a movie such as "The Big Show" is a purist and would want to see the film its original format. The decision to bypass the widescreen process on "The Big Show" was not an error on someone's part. The video opens with a notice that the movie has been intentionally "modified" from its original format. The opening titles are presented in their original glory but once the film proper starts, the pan-and-scan version kicks in and you feel your aggravation level rise. Perhaps the film should be re-titled "The Semi-Big Show". The studio has done a service to retro movie lovers by making so many obscure titles available. However it is ironic that Fox, which pioneered the widescreen process in the 1950s, is the last major studio to utilize its benefits when it comes to home video. Cinema Retro has long been championing the quality of MOD titles and trying to dispense with the unfounded notion that they are somehow inferior in quality to regular DVDs. However, we can't condone altering a film's original format. Fox should realize that consumers who purchase MOD product are extremely sophisticated when it comes to reverence for film history. C'mon guys, get on the ball and we'll sing your praises- and while you're at it, please consider including at least a trailer or stills gallery on your bare-bones releases. These type of bonus features are readily available to you and add to the commercial appeal of the releases not to mention the enjoyment of the viewing experience.
CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM THE CINEMA RETRO MOVIE STORE
Filmmaker
Terrence Malick has perhaps out-mystique’d the great Stanley Kubrick in terms
of his public perception. Famously reclusive, Malick never allows photographs
of himself to be used, and he never appears in “making of†documentaries about
his films. A Rhodes Scholar and a Harvard graduate, he is obviously a brilliant
man. Once he got into the film business, he worked as a script doctor until he
made his first feature, Badlands (1973).
It was critically acclaimed and established Malick as a hot addition to the
“New Hollywood†movement. Next came Days
of Heaven in 1978, also critically lauded.
And
then... he disappeared. For twenty years.
In
1998, he appeared on the scene again, and Hollywood was more than ready to open
checkbooks and fund his third feature film, The
Thin Red Line.
It
takes a lot of mystique for that scenario to happen.
Malick’s
fourth picture, The New World,
continued the director’s journey in exploring what has become signature
stylistic and thematic traits—to make movies in which the plot is secondary to
image, sound, music, and emotion. Malick is more interested in inventing a
different kind of cinema—one that is certainly not mainstream. Terrence Malick
uses film to create visual and sonic poetry, expound philosophy and
existentialism, and touch upon a very basic and primal chord in his audience.
He wants us to feel as well as think,
and to fill us with awe and wonder. But make no mistake—in a Malick film, the
story is not essential to the journey.
The
director’s work of late is even more elliptical, impressionistic, and free form.
Beginning with The Tree of Life, the
Oscar-nominated treatise on the creation of the world and how that spark is
inside each and every human being, Malick threw down the gauntlet to audiences,
asking, “Are you with me or not?†The believers will follow him wherever he
goes. Most everyone else will scratch their heads and... walk out of the
theater (which happened a lot when I
first saw The Tree of Life!) For the
record, I’m a follower.
The New World has more in common
with The Thin Red Line than Malick’s
more recent works. There is a story
in The New World, it’s just told very
unconventionally, the same way he freely adapted The Thin Red Line into a lyrical piece about war and nature. The New World is also about nature, and
in fact, “Mother†is probably the central character.
The
year is 1607, and English adventurers have just landed in Virginia. Among them
is Captain John Smith (Colin Farrell). The “Naturals,†as Captain Newport
(Christopher Plummer) calls the Native Americans, at first cautiously welcomes
them. Smith meets the free-spirited Pocahontas (astonishingly well-portrayed by
14-year-old Q’orianka Kilcher) and they fall in love. Then things go sour
between the two peoples. A little later, another Englander, John Rolfe
(Christian Bale), enters Pocahontas’ life, and she accompanies him back to meet
the King and Queen of the United Kingdom. That’s the story in a nutshell.
What
Malick does with this is extraordinary. With the aid of cinematographer
Emmanuel Lubezki (the first of a collaboration that would continue for the
remainder of Malick’s work), the director presents a collage of spectacularly
beautiful images that emphasizes how fresh and virginal the land of this “new
world†is. In addition, the depiction of the Powhatan people is arguably the
most realistic and accurate portrayal of Native Americans in a Hollywood film, compounding
the notion that they knew how to live with
nature, whereas the newcomers fight
“Mother†the entire way. The film is a meditation, like most of Malick’s work,
on man’s relationship with the earth.
The
Criterion Collection has pulled out all the stops with this new, lavish box set
of three disks containing three different cuts of the film. The main attraction
is a new 4K digital restoration of the “extended cut†(172 minutes), supervised
by Lubezki and Malick. Also included are high-definition transfers of the
original “first cut†(150 minutes, released for the first time on home video),
which was the version that premiered in L.A. and New York in December 2005 and
ran for a week in order to be considered for Academy Awards, and the
“theatrical cut†(135 minutes), which was the version most audiences saw during
the film’s wide release in early 2006.
Which
version is better? Difficult to say. The extended cut is probably Malick’s
preferred assembly, and if you’re a fan of the director’s work, then this is
definitely the one to watch. The theatrical cut is much leaner, thereby making the
storyline stronger. But the first cut, while only fifteen minutes longer than
the theatrical one, fills out the gaps of the shorter version quite well with
Malick’s elegiac, stylistic choices—it’s a nice compromise between the extended
and theatrical editions.
A
5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack accompanies all three cuts, and you
can hear every cricket and bird chirp as if they’re in your living room.
Supplements
include new interviews with Farrell and Kilcher, producer Sarah Green,
production designer Jack Fisk, and costume designer Jacqueline West. There’s an
informative piece on the differences between the three versions as told by
co-editor Mark Yoshikawa, as well as new interviews with editors Yoshikawa,
Hank Corwin, and Saar Klein. Making “The
New World†is an approximately 90-minute documentary directed and edited by
Austin Jack Lynch (David’s son), detailing the production in Virginia and
England. The theatrical and teaser trailers are also included. The thick
booklet contains an essay by film scholar Tom Gunning, a 2006 interview with
Lubezki from American Cinematographer,
and a selection of research materials that inspired the production.
The Criterion Collection always produces quality
material—their release of The New World stands
as one of the company’s most impressive packages.
Cinema Retro has received the following press release:
“That’s the beauty of
music. They can’t get that from you†- Andy Dufresne
On August 12th, 2016, nearly 22 years after the film’s original
theatrical release, SPACELAB9 is honored to present, for the first time ever on
vinyl format, THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION: ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE
SOUNDTRACK DOUBLE LP. The critically acclaimed soundtrack album includes
the full 18-track score from award-winning composer Thomas Newman (The Green
Mile, American Beauty, Spectre) as well as additional tracks by The Ink Spots
and Hank Williams plus a stunning performance of Mozart’s “The Marriage of
Figaro†by the Deutsche Opera Berlin, recalling one of the most memorable
scenes from the ï¬lm.
The deluxe 180 gram double LP package includes a gatefold jacket highlighted
with sleek silver foil stamping and features several images from the iconic
film as well as exclusive liner notes by composer Thomas Newman. A limited
“Prison Blues†blue vinyl variant is available from Barnes & Noble, while
the “Suds on the Roof†yellow vinyl variant will be made available for
pre-order on August 2nd, exclusively at SPACELAB9.com and will also
be available in extremely limited quantities from the label’s booth at New York
Comic Con in October.
The film adaption of the Steven King novella "Rita Hayworth and the
Shawshank Redemption, renamed simply The Shawshank Redemption by
screenwriter and director Frank Darabont (The Green Mile, The Walking Dead),
although not a hit at the box office upon its 1994 theatrical release, gained
traction the following year having been nominated for seven Academy Awards.
Following the home video release in 1995, The Shawshank Redemption became
the most rented film of the year and would continue to grow in popularity
throughout the next two decades to become one of the most iconic, endearing and
enduring films of all time. The Shawshank Redemption has sat at #1 on IMDB’s
user-generated list of the 250 top rated films since 2008 and in 2015 the
United States Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the
National Film Registry, finding it to be “culturally, historically, or
aesthetically significantâ€.