BY RICH DREES

On set tensions between stars or between stars and directors are about as old as the Lumiere Brothers. Sometimes that friction can have a negative consequence on the project and sometimes it can be a positive. The Robert Redford vehicle “Little Fauss And Big Halsy” is one of those odd examples where the tensions yielded both positive and negative results. The antagonism that Redford reportedly felt towards co-star Michael J Pollard certainly helps inform their performances in the second half of the film, but the differing ideas that Redford and director Sidney J. Furie had for handling the movie's thematic material creates a frisson that undermines the final film. Even if you were unaware of the differing motivations of Redford and Furie, you couldn't help but suspect that something was up between the two.

To begin with, “Little Fauss And Big Halsy” is fairly thin on plot. Itinerant motocross racer Halsy Knox (Redford) wanders from town to town, scraping together whatever he can to get to the next race. After an accident breaks the leg of Little Fauss (Pollard) and gets his racing license suspended, Halsy persuades Little to let him race under his name while tagging along as his mechanic. The arrangement seems to work for a while until Rita Nebraska (Lauren Hutton) joins the pair on their travels. Tired of being offered breadcrumbs from Halsy's plate, Little walks away after Halsy tries to pass Rita to him as just another leftover scrap. Rita later engineers something of a reconciliation between the two, but that turns out to be even more fragile than their initial friendship.

Although it may share some surface similarities with 1969's “Winning” (starring Redford's “Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid” co-star Paul Newman), “Little Fauss And Big Halsy” is clearly smack dab in the center of the boom of films exploring the then-current aimlessness of the American spirit that came in the wake of “Easy Rider” released the previous year. Director Furie cut his teeth on Cliff Richards rock and roll musicals before graduating to thrillers like “The Ipcress Files” and “The Naked Runner.” Nothing on his resume would suggest that he would be a good fit for the material- and that is born out in the finished film, which feels like he is trying to make a racing picture. With Redford more interested in plumbing the psychology of Halsy, the two differing approaches don't jell very well. And with Furie more focused on the incidences in the screenplay than exploring the characters who inhabit it – big events in the characters' lives such as the death of a parent happen off-screen and only get a passing mention on-screen – it falls to a string of Johnny Cash tunes on the soundtrack to hold the often episodic proceedings together.

Despite being a rather unsympathetic character on the page, Redford's breezy charm still makes the character one you want to see coming out on the winning side. And that performance becomes a necessity if the film's ending – sorry, no spoilers - is to have any impact at all. Pollard's Little is just the right combination of naivete, twitchiness and fumbling social graces to be endearing. He manages to shade his performance with enough subtlety that it is only in hindsight do we see his growing frustration with Halsy that culminates with their falling out. Hutton makes the most of her underwritten role, fleshing it out (and flashing a bit of flesh in the process) more so than one would expect from an actor relatively new to the profession.

Olive Film's new Blu-ray release of “Little Fauss And Big Halsy” marks the first time that the film is available in a digital home video format and for the first time in its original theatrical aspect ratio in the US. The transfer is relatively crisp and clean with no real apparent defects or scratches. It definitely shows off the dusty browns of the film's California desert towns as captured by cinematographer Ralph Woolsey. Those looking for anything beyond the movie though are bound to be disappointed as the disc is bare-bones with not a single trailer, featurette or commentary track to enrich the experience.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

There are so few good roles nowadays for older actresses that any film that defies this sorry practice is more than welcome no matter how modest its pleasures may be. "Wild Oats" is a recent comedy starring two Oscar winners: Shirley MacLaine and Jessica Lange and directed by Andy Tennant. It speaks volumes that the movie was barely released theatrically and to date has amassed a boxoffice gross of $22,000, indicating it played an abbreviated run in one theater probably to fulfill contractual requirements. It's a pity because "Wild Oats", which sometimes plays more like a saucy sitcom episode than a feature film, does offer a number of delightful elements, the most obvious being good roles for the two leading ladies. MacLaine plays Eva, a recently widowed elderly woman who is facing a bleak financial future. Her husband's life insurance policy is worth only $50,000 and she is already struggling with the costs of day-to-day living along with the inescapable frailties that come with age.  Her best friend Maddie (Jessica Lange), although younger, is facing dilemmas of her own. After enduring a loveless, sexless marriage for many years, her husband has just dumped her for his 25 year-old secretary. The two women commiserate with each other and appear to be consigned to a rather joyless view of their so-called "Golden Years". Then a quirk of fate changes everything. When the life insurance check arrives, Eva notices that it has been accidentally made out for $5 million instead of $50,000. At the urging of Maddie, the normally conservative Eva does something she once would have found unthinkable: she deposits the money in her bank account and then sets out to spend as much as she can so that she and Maddie can have one last big fling, the consequences be damned. They end up in a fabulous resort in the Canary Islands where they indulge in every type of pampering imaginable. They add to their winnings when they unexpectedly strike gold in the hotel casino and place the jackpot of $450,000 in cash a safe inside their suite. 

While living the high life and spending the insurance loot like drunken sailors, Eva and Maddie draw the attention of Chandler (Billy Connolly), a charming, erudite British man whose eccentricities appeal to them. He squires them about the island and before long reawakens Eva's dormant sexual desires. Similarly, Maddie has an encounter with a twenty-something hunk named Chip (Jay Hayden) who she quickly seduces and ends up almost crippling during some intense sexual encounters. The film's non-too-subtle message to its intended audience- older women- is that just because you collect a Social Security check doesn't mean that you can't be vivacious. The film's sub-title could well be "Revenge of the Cougars". It doesn't give much away to point out that Chandler turns out to be a con man who absconds with the ladies' casino winnings. This plot device is obvious from minute one. Meanwhile, an insurance investigator, Vespucci (Howard Hessman in fine form) tracks Eva to the island and tells her she must return the insurance money or go to jail. Eva, Maddie and Vespucci need to track down Chandler and get back the casino winnings in order to compensate for what they've already spent of the insurance funds. It's at this point that the film goes off coursewith the trio tracing Chandler to the villa of a much-feared local crime baron, Carlos (Santiago Segura), whose tough guy image is shattered when they discover he is actually a nerd who is perpetually hen-pecked by his young wife. The shtick involving Carlos brings a level of surrealism to the film. Such scenarios can sometimes work, as in the case of "The In-Laws", but here it plays out in an over-the-top fashion that undermines what had been until now a believable premise. Things get back on track in the final act in which the story provides a Hallmark-style, feel-good ending that nevertheless leaves a couple of holes in the plot. 

"Wild Oats" plays out like a glorified TV movie from the Lifetime cable channel, albeit with better production values and a more impressive cast. Its pleasures may be modest but there is great satisfaction in seeing two excellent actresses in strong, well-written roles and they deliver the goods. (It should be noted that Demi Moore is criminally wasted in an under-written role as Eva's daughter). Director Andy Tennant keeps the proceedings going at a brisk pace and allows for some poignant sequences that speak to the down side of the aging process. The movie is about the rejuvenation of body and soul and will hopefully get a second chance to find its audience through the DVD release from Anchor Bay. The transfer is great but the release is devoid of any extras. It's a pity because the cast appears to have had the time of their lives making this movie and it would have been great to have them discuss it on a commentary track. Although the movie is clearly geared to an older female audience, it's hard to imagine anyone who won't appreciate seeing MacLaine and Lange in top form. 

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Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

Mad Max fans will have something to put atop their holiday gift lists with the Mad Max High Octane Collection, debuting December 6 from Warner Bros. Home Entertainment (WBHE). All four films from visionary director George Miller’s blockbuster sci-fi franchise -- Mad Max (1979); Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981); Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985); and MadMax: Fury Road (2015), now with Tom Hardy as Max Rockatansky -- are together in one collection.

The Mad Max High Octane Collection is available to own in both Blu-ray ($79.99 SRP) and DVD ($54.97 SRP) versions. Both collections include the four films and five hours of bonus content, including the visually stunning Mad Max: Fury Road “Black & Chrome” Edition. The Blu-ray collection will also include a 4K-Ultra HD version and a UV Digital Copy of Mad Max: Fury Road.

The Mad Max: Fury Road “Black & Chrome Edition” will also be available on Blu-ray 
($29.98 SRP) in a two film collection including the theatrical version of the film and a special introduction by George Miller describing his vision.

High Octane Collection Special Features and Additions:

 NEW! *Fury Road “Black & Chrome” Edition â€“ Witness the surreal black and white version of mastermind George Miller’s Fury Road.

 NEW! *George Miller Introduction to the Mad Max Fury Road: Black and Chrome Edition â€“ Special introductory piece by George Miller describing his vision.

NEW! Road War â€“ In 1982, the world was blindsided by George Miller’s masterpiece of apocalyptic destruction: The Road Warrior.  For the first time ever George Miller, Terry Hayes and star Mel Gibson tell the story of the car-crushing production that redefined action cinema forever.  

Madness of Max â€“ The previously released Mad Max (1979) documentary is a feature-length documentary on the making of arguably the most influential movie of the past thirty years. With over forty cast-and-crew interviews, hundreds of behind-the-scenes photographs and never-before-seen film footage of the shoot, this is, without a doubt, the last word on Mad Max (1979). Interviews include: George Miller, Byron Kennedy, Mel Gibson, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Steve Bisley, Roger Ward, Joanne Samuel, David Eggby, Jon Dowding and many more. From the Producers to the Bike Designers to the Traffic Stoppers, this is the story of how Mad Max was made.

Mad Max: Fury Road Two Film Collection

Special Features and Additions:

NEW! *George Miller Introduction to the Mad Max Fury Road: Black and Chrome Edition â€“ Special introductory piece by George Miller describing his vision.

About The Films

Mad Max (1979)

George Miller's first entry in the trilogy, Mad Max packs brutal action and insane stunts as it follows the inevitable downfall of relentless cop Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) in a world gone mad. Living on the edge of an apocalypse, Max is ready to run far away from it all with his family. But when he experiences an unfortunate encounter with a motorcycle gang and its menacing leader, the Toecutter, his retreat from the madness of the world is now a race to save his family's life.

Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1982)

The sequel to Mad Max, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior provides action-packed “automotive” entertainment, telling the story of a selfish-turned-selfless hero and his efforts to protect a small camp of desert survivors and defend an oil refinery under siege from a ferocious marauding horde that plunders the land for gasoline.

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)

Mel Gibson returns for his third go-round as the title hero who takes on the barbarians of the post-nuclear future - and this time becomes the savior of a tribe of lost children. Music superstar Tina Turner co-stars as Aunty Entity, a power-mad dominatrix determined to use Max to tighten her stranglehold on Bartertown, where fresh water, clean food and gasoline are worth more than gold.

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

Haunted by his turbulent past, Mad Max (Tom Hardy) believes the best way to survive is to wander alone. Nevertheless, he becomes swept up with a group fleeing across the Wasteland in a War Rig driven by an elite Imperator, Furiosa (Charlize Theron). They are escaping a Citadel tyrannized by the Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne), from whom something irreplaceable has been taken. Enraged, the Warlord marshals all his gangs and pursues the rebels ruthlessly in the high-octane Road War that follows.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

By  the late 1960s many popular actors found that their family-friendly trademark films were going the way of the dinosaur. Elvis Presley's popularity on screen waned thanks to Colonel Parker's Svengali influence that saw him block The King's desires to expand into meaningful dramas. Don Knotts, whose low-budget Universal comedies were hugely popular, lost much of his audience when he added some sexual elements to "The Love God?" Equally affected was Doris Day, a genuine cinematic legend who, only a few years earlier, could be counted on to bring in big bucks at the box-office through her romantic comedies. The running gag was that Day always played goodie-goodie characters (one comedian quipped "I knew Doris Day before she was a virgin!") This was not entirely true. Day often played mature women who were either married or quite modern in their views of sexual relationships. Still, she was never less than wholesome even in her pursuit of romance. However,  as the Sixties neared an end the sweeping changes in popular culture, spurred by the new wave of rock artists, extended into cinema as well. Doris knew her day was over on the big screen. She had a lifeline of sorts but she tossed it away when she refused to play the role of Mrs. Robinson in "The Graduate". Her manipulative husband, Martin Melcher, wanted to wring the last few dollars out of her film career and often coerced her into starring in middling projects that she had little enthusiasm for. Her final role as a leading lady on the big screen came in 1968 in the comedy "With Six You Get Eggroll" (you have to see it to understand the relevance of the title.) The film is a factory-made concoction that uses the well-worn trappings of other recent films that tried to combine traditional Hollywood elements with the burgeoning youth market and the new cinematic realism that was all the rage. Generation Gap comedies were churned out by studio executives in an attempt to capture the market for both older and teenage movie-goers.  The highly popular "Yours, Mine and Ours" had immediately preceded  "Eggroll"'s release and the desperate-to-be-hip"The Impossible Years" would open a month later. They all played like extended sit-coms but did offer up legendary actors in starring roles. "Eggroll" is as nondescript as the other films in this peculiar niche but it isn't without its simple, unpretentious pleasures. 

The most refreshing aspect of the movie is the one-and-only teaming of Doris Day and Brian Keith, who was then starring in his own popular sit-com "Family Affair", a sugary confection that is all but unwatchable today. Yet Keith had a raw masculinity that allowed him to excel in playing both light comedy and gritty men of action. In any event, he and Day make for a likable twosome. The familiar story line finds Day as Abby McClure, a widowed mother of an 18 year-old son Flip (John Findlater)  who has just graduated high school and his two very young brothers.  Abby seems content trying to cope with being a single mother as well as that rarest of species in 1968: a successful businesswoman. (She is the hands-on owner of a thriving construction firm.) It's all she can do to fulfill her responsibilities to both her business and her family, which gives the otherwise dated script a somewhat topical element that many women of today can identify with. Abby's sister (Pat Carroll) keeps needling her about the need to find a new boyfriend and potential husband and contrives a meeting with Jake Iverson (Brian Keith), a widower with a teenage daughter Stacey (Barbara Hershey). Abby and Jake have known each other on a casual basis for years but sparks do fly when they meet up at an otherwise disastrous house party Abby hosts. Most of the film covers predictable turf: Abby and Jake decide to get married but their bliss is short-lived when they realize that the blending of two families causes major personality conflicts between Flip and Stacey. Additionally, both teens take pride in the fact that they had been relied on heavily by their parent and feel threatened by the presence of a new spouse who might usurp their adult responsibilities. The constant fighting extends to jealousy about what house they all reside in so, to keep the peace, Abby and Jake devise an cumbersome plan where the family alternates their abode every night. Abby and Jake also find they have very little quality time together and a running gag has them sneaking away to a late night coffee house drive-in where they are greeted with familiarity and plenty of wise-cracks by one of the servers, played by up-and-coming comedy legend George Carlin. The gags are all familiar and highly predictable but director Howard Morris, himself a noted comedic actor, keeps the action moving at a brisk pace and prevents blandness from turning into boredom. At times the movie threatens to become almost poignant when it examines the challenges of blending two families together under one roof with the kids having no choice but to accept a new mom/dad. One scene, in which Abby finally breaks through and earns respect from Stacey, is actually quite touching. However, the finale delves into absurdity when a wild car chase ensues that encompasses some lovable hippies (two of whom are played by future "M*A*S*H" TV stars Jamie Farr and William Christopher.) Whenever family films of this era attempted to present members of the Flower Power movement, the results were generally cringe-inducing and this is no exception. The final scene has a chaotic mess in which everyone converges on a police station- a scenario that I believe I have seen played out about a dozen times in similarly-themed films of this time period. 

Despite its flaws, "With Six You Get Eggroll" is never as bad as you probably fear it will be. The sets are cheesy and poorly lit and the laughs somewhat meager, but I found myself enjoying seeing the teaming of Doris Day and Brian Keith. The mind reels at what the possibilities might have been if they had been cast in a mature adult romance. The only hints we have are a few topical references to sex that occasionally surface in the movie. This type of innocent comedy would be all-but-gone by the time Bob and Carol got into bed with Ted and Alice the very next year. Ms. Day would go on to star in a hit sitcom that ran for years before virtually retiring from show business and the public eye (though she did re-emerge with a cable TV show in the 1980s dedicated to her life's passion: caring for animals.) Keith would go on to star in some very worthy films, among them "The McKenzie Break" and "The Wind and the Lion" and scored a hit with the tongue-in-cheek action series "Hardcastle and McCormick". "Eggroll" is elevated from sheer mediocrity by their presence in the film.

"With Six You Get Eggroll" is available as a bare-bones DVD from Paramount.

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BY SARA REINEKE

While navigating through the labyrinth of collectibles, comic books, and dealer tables at the New York Comic Con this past October, I came upon a vendor selling copies of old horror films. As is usual, I had to stop for a moment and thumb through the boxes of DVDs and Blu-rays labeled simply as “Classic Horror.” There were, of course, the standard bearers that you would expect to find; such black and white Universal classics as The Wolfman (1941) and Frankenstein (1931), as well as such latter-age British horror favorites as Vincent Price’s Theatre of Blood (1973).

Continuing to flip through the boxes, I was surprised to see The Horrible Dr. Hichcock (1964), a mostly obscure Italian horror film that I had never had the opportunity to see. In truth, I’d never even heard of the film before – and before you scold me for my ignorance, please keep in mind I’m only nineteen years old. Even Jason and Freddy Krueger are old-school to me. Still, I admit my immediate thought was that this copy of The Horrible Dr. Hichcock was likely misplaced. Was this little known film deserving of having been sandwiched between the revered classics of Universal and Hammer Studios?

Shortly afterwards, the Olive Films Blu-ray of The Horrible Dr. Hichcock dropped into my mailbox. Now that I’ve finally gotten the chance to watch the film, I realize the suspenseful and eerie tale is indeed a worthy addition to the canon of “Classic Horror.”

Olive Films new Blu-ray release of The Horrible Dr. Hichcock brings – if you excuse the expression – “new life” to this now half-century old and unsettling melodrama. Dr. Bernard Hichcock (Robert Flemyng) seems an OK guy. He’s a celebrated and much admired surgeon, but also a tortured soul hiding a perverse secret. He’s completely given to necrophilic fantasies, of which his wife Margaret (Teresa Fitzgerald) is strangely accepting and willing to indulge her husband’s strange desires. However, things take a tragic turn when the not-so-good Dr. unintentionally kills her with an accidental overdose of the anesthetic, emphasizing that there can in fact be too much of a good thing.

The film then flashes forward several years. Dr. Hichcock returns from a long absence from the village, returning to his old stately home with a new paramour: the understandably jittery Cynthia (played by Italian “Scream Queen” Barbara Steele of Black Sunday and Nightmare Castle fame). It isn’t long before things again turn weird as Cynthia begins to see the apparition of Hichcock’s former wife walking the estate grounds. She is tormented by the spirit.

Despite the film’s somewhat confusing plotline, the movie possesses what I like to call “the Universal Horror aesthetic.” The film is rife with the atmospheric elements I look forward to in every classic horror film: eerie fog, misty graveyards, a creaking near-abandoned manor, and a devilish doctor who, more likely than not, is up to something no good. As these elements are all welcomingly in place here, The Horrible Dr. Hichcock was deservedly slotted in the “Classic Horror” section at Comic Con. Or perhaps it was the moments of suspense and mystery that, when moodily combined with Roman Vlad’s ominously eerie score, left me guessing about who (or what) might be waiting behind every corner of the dreary house.

There are many such memorable moments of mystery and apprehension in The Horrible Dr. Hichcock. I found the film somewhat reminiscent of The House on Haunted Hill and The Haunting, as there are so many twists that the audience is constantly forced to change their minds about what might happen next. Whether due to a less than cohesive script or specific choices made by director Robert Hampton to keep things from being too formulaic, The Horrible Dr. Hichcock succeeds in keeping the audience engrossed and guessing. Though I found the ending to be slightly confusing – some elements of the film’s story threads were not explained to my satisfaction – this is a movie that’s worthy of a second viewing. Until then, I am content to say that The Horrible Dr. Hichcock has definitely earned a place of honor in my personal library of classic horror.

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BY DOUG OSWALD

Told from the point of view of an idealistic and patriotic German boy from high school graduation and military basic training to the trenches of WWI battlefields, “All Quiet on the Western Front” is a classic tale of the horrors of war. Written by Erich Maria Remarque and published in 1929, the German WWI veteran based the novel on his own experiences in the trenches of WWI. A Hollywood movie quickly followed staring Lew Ayres as Paul. Produced and released in Hollywood by Universal, it was awarded the Best Picture and Best Director Oscars for 1930, a few short years before the rise of Adolf Hitler who banned the book and movie.

Fifty years after the novel’s release, a made-for TV movie was broadcast on American TV in November 1979. It starred Richard Thomas as Paul Baumer, who was fresh off the hit TV series “The Waltons” when he went to work on this movie which is not so much a remake as it is a new adaptation of the classic book. The wide-eyed innocence of Thomas, who was in his late twenties at the time, works well in his interpretation of Paul as he transforms from German patriot seeking adventure to disillusioned soldier tired of war.

The movie follows Paul, a thoughtful and likable student who enjoys art, literature and intellectual conversations; as he joins his friends who become soldiers at the outbreak of the war. His school teacher, Donald Pleasence as Kantorek, is an outspoken patriot who urges Paul to join the army. Paul and his friends, the local postman, Himmelstoss (Ian Holm), as they bully him and knock him to the ground for not serving in the army. We also meet Paul’s mother, played by Patricia Neal (Thomas’ mother in the TV pilot for “The Waltons” TV series - the Christmas classic, “The Homecoming”) saying his goodbyes to his family before heading off with his friends to their military training.

When Paul and his friends arrive at basic training, they’re met by now Army Corporal Himmelstoss who has not forgotten their cruelty toward him and returns it to them during their training. I never got the sense that Himmelstoss was overtly cruel during the training sequences. All basic trainees wish they were elsewhere during boot camp, but we are led to believe that he is over-the-top in his cruelty. Holm does sport a menacing mustache and he has harsh words for the recruits, but its typical stuff and the scenes are too brief to get a sense that anything cruel is occurring apart from what we learn from the characters.

The movie moves along at a predictable pace and finally settles into the meat of the story when Paul and his friends arrive at the front and meet up with their mentor, Stanislaus Katczinsky, played by Ernest Borgnine. He’s the old soldier who advises the inexperienced recruits and tells them to forget everything they learned in basic training because he’s going to tell them the correct way of doing things in order to survive.

Paul and his friends become seasoned soldiers after months of fighting in the trenches. Friends are killed and wounded and Paul ends up in the hospital after he is wounded where we see soldiers suffering from shell shock, commonly known today as PostTtraumatic Stress Disorder. After his recovery, Paul is allowed a brief visit home where he visits with his mother and Kantorek. Himmelstoss ends up being transferred to the front with the boys, but he disappears from the story without explanation shortly after his arrival. It was good to see Holm, Pleasence and Neal once more, but they have too little screen time.

Thomas does a good job as Paul, but it felt like something was missing. I never got the sense Paul was truly transformed in the end of that any of them were experiencing the horrors of war. Thomas and the actors playing his friends are credible, but are not quite up to the screen presence of the more seasoned actors in this movie. Borgnine carries much of the water in the film and he is a welcome part of the production in every scene he appears, but the movie is not about him.

The production is very good television and it is an impressive version of a classic tale that benefits from the cast of great actors and by the on-location filming in Yugoslavia. Perhaps I’m simply jaded after the superior production values in similarly themed television projects like “Band of Brothers” and “The Pacific” which depicted warfare in graphic detail as well as combat related post traumatic stress. This production touches on it in a way that was acceptable on 1979 television, but which appears dated today.

The movie was directed by Delbert Mann who moved very successfully from Emmy winning TV director to Oscar winning movie director in the 1950s and returned to TV in the early 1970s after directing a string of dramas and light comedies during the 50s and 60s including the Oscar winning best picture “Marty,” his motion picture debut, which also starred Ernest Borgnine. Pleasence, Neal and Holm’s scenes are welcome, but all too brief and little more than cameo roles. Borgnine is wonderful in every scene and works well with Thomas.

The movie is presented in widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, although I doubt it was originally broadcast in that format in 1979. Its possible the movie was filmed in widescreen with the safety area left open when broadcast on television and on early home video releases. The run time is also longer here on the Blu-ray than in the original CBS broadcast of 131 minutes clocking in at 156 minutes on this Shout! Factory release. The Blu-ray looks and sounds terrific and includes the trailer and a photo gallery as extras. The movie is an entertaining and welcome release.

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By John M. Whalen

In the early Fifties movie studios were worried because fewer people were going to see movies in the theater. They’d rather stay home and watch that new-fangled gadget—television. To lure audiences out of their homes and away from their TV sets, Twentieth Century Fox’s Spyros P. Skouras developed the anamorphic widescreen filming process known as Cinemascope. “The Robe” (1953) was the first film shot in this format and was an instant hit. More movies in widescreen with stereophonic sound soon flooded into neighborhood theaters.

To take advantage of the widescreen, Twentieth Century Fox’s early Cinemascope movies were often filmed in beautiful, far off locations. These films were part travelogue, part-adventure, and romance, with lush music soundtracks. Jean Negulesco, the Romanian-born director who made dozens of films in the 1940s including “Nobody Lives Forever” (1946), “Humoresque” (1946), and “Johnny Belinda” (1948) became a specialist at making these kinds of movies. His Cinemascope work includes “Three Coins in the Fountain” (1954), which he shot in Rome, “The Pleasure Seekers” (1964), filmed in Madrid, and “Boy on a Dolphin” (1957), filmed in the Greek Islands.

“Boy on a Dolphin” (1957) starred Alan Ladd and is notable for being the film that introduced Sophia Loren to American audiences. She plays Phaedra, an earthy Greek sponge diver who finds a rare, and valuable, centuries-old statue of a golden boy riding a dolphin down in the water off the coast of one of the islands. Ladd plays Dr. James Calder an American archeologist whom Phaedra first asks for help in recovering the statue so she can become rich. Their relationship starts well but takes a bad turn when scoundrel Clifton Webb shows up as the nefarious Victor Parmalee, an unscrupulous art collector who wants the statue for himself. He convinces Phaedra to double cross Calder, who wants to put the golden boy and his fish in a museum. Parmalee convinces her that he’ll make her rich if she helps him get the statue.

There isn’t a whole lot of plot in this film, which was directed by Jean Negulesco. Mostly it’s Phaedra leading Calder on and telling him to dive in all the wrong places so he won’t find the statue, and helping Parmalee locate it and hide it. There’s a ne’er-do-well boyfriend named Rhif (Jorge Mistral), who is jealous of Calder, double crosses Phaedra, and makes his own deal with Parmalee.

The plot may be overly simplistic but it doesn’t matter much. “Boy on a Dolphin” is one of those films that you don’t think about or analyze. You just sit back and let all that scenery and soundtrack music wash over you. Milton Krasner’s beautiful color photography of the Greek Isles fills almost every frame with dazzling sunlight, azure seas and sky, and the magnificent architectural scenery that took three thousand years to create. It’s a treat for the eyes. Hugo Friedhofer’s score is beautifully lush and very Debussey. The Kino Lorber Blu-ray presents the film in a magnificent 4k restoration with gorgeous color and glorious stereophonic sound. I’ve always admired the sound of these fifties Fox films. The sound recording is in some more impressive than what we hear in today’s films. For this writer, these “golden oldies” often offer more spatial dynamics between the actors’ voices that give it a more true-to-life sound- and it isn’t so loud it blows your ear drums out. Modern sound engineers should go back and study these films to learn how to record realistic soundtracks.

While “Boy on a Dolphin” was Loren’s big screen debut in the US., sadly, it also marked the beginning of the decline of one of Hollywood’s most charismatic stars. In a real-life “A Star is Born” kind of way, the young Loren fills the screen with life and radiance and comes out of the sea like Venus on the half-shell. Ladd, on the other hand, though he still had that deeply resonant voice that carried so well, seemed tired, disinterested, and diminished. There was no chemistry at all between him and Loren in the stiffly acted love scenes. It was only four years after the magnificent “Shane” (1953), but somehow the ruins of ancient Greece seemed a cruel reflection of the star himself, whose days of glory were already beginning to fade. He died only seven years later, going on to make ten more films of varying quality, finally rallying with his last great performance in “The Carpetbaggers” (1964).

Kino Lorber has done a terrific job presenting this film under its KL Studio Classics banner in a brand new 4k 1080p Restoration. Picture and sound are excellent. The extras include trailers for other Loren films, including “Marriage Italian Style” and “Sunflower”. Recommended.

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John M. Whalen is the author of "Hunting Monsters is My Business: The Mordecai Slate Stories" . Click here to order the book from Amazon)

BY TIM GREAVES

Director Joe Dante's 1993 comic-drama Matinee is a loving ode to the monster movies that enthralled him during his youth. Equally it's a Valentine to film producer William Castle, without whose uniquely innovative approach to film exhibition a generation of moviegoers would have been denied such wonders as ‘Emergo’ (for The House on Haunted Hill), ‘Percepto’ (for The Tingler) and ‘Illusion-O’ (for Thirteen Ghosts). 

During the fraught two- week period of the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, brothers Gene (Simon Fenton) and Dennis (Jesse Lee) are thrilled to learn that not only is new horror picture Mant! getting a sneak preview at their local movie emporium the Key West Strand, but that the screening is going to be attended by showman extraordinaire Lawrence Woolsey (John Goodman), who's planning to test run his newest attraction, ‘Atomo Vision’. Woolsey is a second-rate producer of third-rate pictures who peddles his wares on the back of gimmickry, and he rigs out the Strand with all manner of electronic wizardry to optimise the viewing experience, much to the chagrin of its unimpressed manager (Robert Picardo). But as the evening of the big show approaches so the threat of nuclear annihilation heats up...

Set against the backdrop of the infamous and alarming political confrontation between America and the Soviet Union, we get glimpses throughout Matinee of the understandable mania that gripped a terrified public – the stripping of shelves in grocery stores in order to stock up for post-strike survival, the mind-boggling naiveté of the futile drills instructing schoolchildren on how to live through such an attack – but as with several other Dante films including Small Soldiers, Explorers and The Hole, the nucleus of the narrative concerns a bunch of kids and a childhood adventure. The four youngsters who assume the key roles here â€“ Simon Fenton, Omri Katz, Lisa Jakub and Kellie Martin – are all very likeable and bring a nice measure of charm to the party. And, unsurprisingly, John Goodman has a fine old time chewing up the scenery as the larger-than-life showmaster with a pretty girl on his arm (Cathy Moriarty), a big fat cigar in one hand and a litany of wild ideas in the other. 

For those who enjoy such things – and I certainly do – the setting of Matinee in a cinema makes for an unparalleled nostalgia trip, Gene and Dennis’s wide-eyed enthusiasm for movies provoking heady memories of the sheer excitement of those childhood trips to the pictures, brimming with barely restrained anticipation for what might emerge from the shaft of light beaming out over my head. Certainly anyone with a fondness for old sci-fi and horror titles, particularly the vast catalogue that emerged during the 1950s, should get a thrill out of the ambience that Dante conjures up; just look at the gorgeous period decor of The Strand, its walls a haven of gorgeous movie art, its facade bedecked with splashy posters and stills...not to mention the two enormous rubber ant legs extending out over the marquee. A snapshot of a joyous era of showmanship sadly long since dispensed with.

And then, of course, there's Mant! itself, a fun homage to the very best (and worst) of those sci-fi/horror clunkers and a recognisable hybrid of Them! and The Fly. Dante, a dyed in the wool monster movie buff himself, treats us to several extended scenes of this film-within-a-film, which concerns Bill, a man who has an unfortunate reaction to a dental x-ray and thereafter metamorphoses into a giant ant. The dialogue, delivered with deliciously straight-faced sincerity, is very funny indeed, for example this line from Kevin McCarthy as a military General loud-hailing the mammoth insect scaling a tower block: "Bill…come down off that building – we've got sugar for you!" Supported by a typically euphonious and playful score from the always reliable Jerry Goldsmith, Matinee may not be Dante at his best – for that I would point to Gremlins or Innerspace, or more recently Burying the Ex – but it's certainly Dante given reign to express his passion for a cinematic genre so dear to his heart.

Arrow has issued Matinee on a dual format Blu-ray/DVD release in the UK. The 1.85:1 ratio image is very nice with only a couple of scenes bearing particularly noticeable grain. Supplements are bountiful, the highlight for this writer being the feature-length version of Mant! itself, seen teasingly in interrupted chunks during Matinee; okay, so it runs for just 16-minutes, but it's easily as much fun as the old films to which it pays tribute and there's even a mock, distinctly Castle-esque trailer for it dropped in for good measure. Additionally we get interviews with Joe Dante, cinematographer John Hora and editor Marshall Harvey, a piece concerning some of the director’s stock players (Robert Picardo, Archie Hahn, Belinda Balaski, John Sayles and, of course, Dick Miller – hey, what would such a featurette be without input from him?), deleted and extended sequences, some behind-the-scenes footage, a vintage electronic press kit (how antiquated those once revolutionary, pre-Internet promotional packages look 20+ years on!), and a theatrical trailer. The disc comes housed in a reversible sleeve, offering fans a choice of original or newly commissioned art, and it’s also accompanied by a collectible booklet.

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Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

BURBANK, Calif., November 3, 2016 – To mark the 75^th anniversary of Orson Welles’ cinematic masterpiece “Citizen Kane,”Warner Bros. Home Entertainment (WBHE) will release a new Blu-ray™ and DVD on November 15, and the American Film Institute (AFI) will mount a special screening of the restored master at AFI FEST presented by Audi, the Institute's annual film festival in Hollywood, on November 13. The screening will take place at the Egyptian Theatre at 1:30 p.m., followed by an AFI Master Class, featuring close personal Welles friend Peter Bogdanovich and a celebrity and academic panel to be announced.

The film’s central character is powerful publisher Charles Foster Kane, who aspires to be president of the United States. Newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst claimed “Citizen Kane” was a thinly veiled and slanderous account of his own life and sought to use his formidable muscle to halt the film’s production and distribution and ultimately to destroy Welles himself.

By the early 1960s “Citizen Kane” had been out of circulation for many years when a panel of top industry tastemakers, selected by the AFI, voted it as the Greatest Film of All Time. Since then, “Citizen Kane” has remained # 1 or # 2 on countless critics’ lists and other surveys including those from Roger Ebert, The BBC, Rolling Stone Magazine, Pauline Kael, among many others.

One-time dean of American movie reviewers, Pauline Kael, noted, “Citizen Kane is perhaps the one American talking picture that seems as fresh now as the day it opened. It may seem even fresher.” Ebert echoed, “This towering achievement is as fresh, as provoking, as entertaining, as sad, as brilliant as it ever was. Many agree it is the greatest film of all time.”

According to Martin Scorsese, Welles and the film are “responsible for inspiring more people to be film directors than anyone else in the history of cinema.” Woody Allen: “Welles takes a quantum leap above every American director with that intangible thing called genius. Just an exhilarating movie.” Mel Brooks: “Maybe the best American picture ever. A masterpiece with artistic genius on a ‘Beethoven’ level.” Richard Dreyfuss: “I usually avoid questions about my favorite movie but then people keep pressing me. ‘OK, ‘Citizen Kane’ is my favorite movie. It’s the greatest movie ever made, OK?’ Without a doubt the only film you can watch 138 times, and each time you’ll still see something new.” And finally, Steven Spielberg: “Just one of the great movies ever made. A great American experience in cinema.”

Citizen Kane” also heads a long list of film dramas about the media including such classics as “All The President’s Men,” “Sweet Smell of Success,” “The Killing Fields,” “Absence of Malice,” “The Paper,” and last year’s Academy Award®-winning Best Picture, “Spotlight.”

Not only did he star in the film, but the then only 25-year-old Orson Welles also produced, directed and co-wrote the film which won the Academy Award® for Best Writing, Original Screenplay (Welles and Herman J. Mankiewicz) and captured nine nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Director (Welles). Joseph Cotten made an impressive screen debut as Jedidiah Leland, newspaper reporter and Kane’s longtime friend, from whom he had become estranged over the issue of journalistic integrity. Other actors included Everett Sloane, Agnes Moorehead, Ruth Warrick, Paul Stewart and William Alland as the investigative reporter who delves into Kane’s life and his mysterious “Rosebud.” Alan Ladd and Arthur O’Connell appear uncredited as reporters. Gregg Toland was the film’s cinematographer and Robert Wise, later a two-time Academy Award-winning director, edited the picture.

Remastered and restored from original nitrate elements in 4K resolution, the film (certified 100% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) will be available on DVD ($14.97) and Blu-ray ($19.98). A wide variety of DVD and Blu-ray extras will be included in all editions.

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BY DAWN DABELL

Fans of Sophia Loren will be ecstatic to learn new independent label CultFilms is in the process of releasing a collection of her award-winning movies. Launching this fine set is the wonderful Two Women aka La Ciociara (previously reviewed in Issue #34 of Cinema Retro), followed by A Special Day aka Una Giornata Particolare (which is reviewed here). Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, Marriage Italian Style and Boccaccio 70’ are to follow. This collection showcases Loren at the top of her acting game and will be warmly welcomed by her fans and fans of Italian cinema generally.

Fascist housewife and mother of six Antoinetta (Sophia Loren) is busy trying to ready her family so they can attend a parade to celebrate Hitler’s state visit with Mussolini. Rushed off her feet, it becomes apparent she won’t be able to attend the momentous occasion as she has too much housework to deal with and is getting no help from her husband. Deflated that her family has left her with this mountain of work, she resigns herself to another mundane day and sets about her daily chores. To make things worse, their pet bird escapes and lands on the ledge of a neighbouring apartment. This seemingly innocuous event leads to a chance encounter with neighbour Gabriele (Marcello Mastroianni) which changes the course of her day. Instead of endless chores with no appreciation from those around her, she converses, dances and even begins to fall for this charming stranger who, like her, cannot attend the parade. The pair discuss life, love and politics and, in a short space of time, seem to enjoy each other’s company. But does Gabriele harbour a dark secret which has kept him away from the parade? Will Antoinetta be as loyal to the ideology of the fascist state after her educational encounter with Gabriele? Will things ever be the same for either of them after this day?

Most people think of Loren as a glamorous leading lady, able to make men drool at her phenomenal beauty while women can do nothing but begrudgingly acknowledge what a stunning woman adorns the screen before them. A Special Day deliberately goes against this perceived image, making Loren look far from glamorous as a character who is haggard and severely run down due to the strains of motherhood. She plays a woman expected to wait on her family slavishly: a dutiful wife trapped by the Mussolini-era philosophy that women should be viewed simply wives and mothers, nothing more, mere baby-making machines and domestic workers. In real-life, Mussolini introduced incentives to men whose wives bore them lots of children: it was the fascist dictator’s way of increasing the Italian population. In the film Antoinetta and Emanuele are shown to have six children, and it becomes apparent he wants her to have another as soon as possible as a seventh child will make him exempt from paying taxes. So many children will obviously take a toll on the mother, but none of that comes into anyone’s considerations. Instead of the usual glamorous make-up and elegant clothing, we see Loren wearing dull, oversized and scruffy garments which merely serve a practical purpose. It’s clear from her demeanour that she has given up on life. In one scene Emanuele needs to dry his hands and, unable find anything close at hand, he simply uses the skirt of his wife’s outfit. From very early on viewers are prompted to be angered and outraged at Antoinetta’s treatment at the hands of her ungrateful family.

Like Loren, Mastroianni puts in a remarkable performance as a radio journalist who has been fired from his job due to his sexual orientation. Right from his opening scene, Mastroianni shows great passion, fighting his demons while contemplating suicide. At this point we don’t realise what issues are weighing so heavily on his mind, making him consider ending his life. The characterisation could have fallen flat in another actor’s hands, but he performs it superbly and generates audience sympathy right from the start. He keeps us engrossed with his poignant performance throughout.

Loren and Mastroianni worked together on a number of films, including Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963), Marriage Italian Style (1964), The Priest’s Wife (1970), Sunflower (1970) and Sex Pot (1975), among many others. They were an acting duo to rival Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn. Here, they manage to convey an important message to their audience: even when it feels like all is lost, you may yet find comfort and support in the strangest of places.

Throughout the duration of the day, it becomes increasingly apparent that Antoinetta is becoming attracted to Gabriele and believes he reciprocates her feelings. This leads to an altercation between the two, forcing him to share his sexual secret with her. Regardless of this, Antoinetta’s overwhelming need for human contact - for someone to view her as a human being, an equal - overpowers everything else and causes her to be drawn to him once more. Eventually they make love, though Gabriele seems very dazed and confused throughout the event. This scene has caused considerable debate, with some audiences questioning whether Antoinette takes advantage of Gabriele, forcing herself on him. Anyone who watches carefully, though, will note how he tenderly grabs her breast while she is kissing him. It can be interpreted that both give the other something they need in order to survive. Gabriele is about to be sent to exile and lacks companionship. His sexual orientation means he is classed as a degenerate who people want little to nothing to do with and Antoinetta needs to feel like a beautiful woman, to be appreciated and not treated like a baby-making-machine or slave. Gabriele knows he can give her the contact she craves even though we see the pain and conflict on his face as he allows events to unfold. These two people show each other that there is more to life if you are prepared to take a chance. They know that once the day is over, things probably won’t really change; everything will go back to how it was but, for the moment at least, they can feel a sense of hope and take solace from the knowledge they don’t always have to be so neglected and isolated.