DVD Talk DVD Reviews

The Witches (1990) (Blu-ray)

Wed, 22 Jan 2020 15:33:54 UTC

DVD Talk Collector Series

Uniquely dark, even genuinely disturbing, Nicolas Roeg's The Witches (1990), adapted from Roald Dahl's novel and produced by Jim Henson's company, is one of the best children's films ever made. A difficult film to market, it should have been an enormous hit and be better-remembered today, but as with The Iron Giant distributor Warner Bros. failed to promote it wisely and the picture remains instead a much-admired cult film.

I liked it enormously when it was new - it was one the first I reviewed as a professional film critic - but I hadn't seen it since, partly due to the inadequacies of previous home video versions. Watching it again I was even more impressed and, for that matter, even more disturbed by its content.

The story opens in Norway, where eight-y...Read the entire review

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (Blu-ray)

Tue, 31 Dec 2019 17:49:19 UTC

Rent It

A wave of made-for-TV horror movies swept the airwaves in the early 1970s, Steven Spielberg's Duel (1971) and the original The Night Stalker (1972), and Trilogy of Terror (1975) being the most famous. Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (1973), directed by One Step Beyond's John Newland, also apparently has a strong reputation, even prompting a 2010 remake written by Guillermo del Toro and Matthew Robbins.

In this case, however, Don't Be Afraid of the Dark's reputation seems as driven by nostalgia as anything else. I remember being absolutely terrified by many of these TV-made horrors. After The Night Stalker was turned into a series I remember 10-year-old me frozen with horror by an episode called "Chopper," about a headless motorcycle rider. When I saw it again decades later, on DVD, well, it struck me as more silly than frightening.

Perhaps that also ex...Read the entire review

None But the Brave (Blu-ray)

Tue, 24 Dec 2019 18:29:26 UTC

Highly Recommended

Directed by and (technically) starring Frank Sinatra, None But the Brave (1965) is a World War II action-drama that doesn't get a lot of love from critics. The story has both American and Japanese soldiers marooned on the same remote Pacific island, eventually tenuously declaring a truce in light of their uncertain situation. This same basic premise was reworked just three years later for John Boorman's better-remembered Hell in the Pacific, though that self-consciously arty work doesn't play as well today, even though None But the Brave has problems of its own, mainly an absolutely terrible supporting performance by Tommy Sands. But Warner Archive's sparkling new Blu-ray (with one major caveat) shows off this unusual, handsome production well and, for the most part, it holds up, with many interesting qualities.

Read the entire review

My Favorite Year (Blu-ray)

Mon, 23 Dec 2019 14:53:50 UTC

Highly Recommended

My Favorite Year (1982), the Richard Benjamin-directed comedy starring Peter O'Toole and set in the world of live 1950s television, is a highly-satisfying, often delightful comedy. I hadn't seen it in many years, but watching it now on Blu-ray the movie strikes me then and now as having the same many wonderful qualities and, well, less wonderful qualities. Overall, it's very, very good. O'Toole is a delight, deserving of his Academy Award nomination that year, and there are plenty of magical or hysterically funny bits sprinkled throughout. However, there are other aspects that, while technically fine, played out by talented actors, don't entirely come off even where they seem like they ought to.

The picture was produced by Mel Brooks's production company, with write...Read the entire review

Shaft / Shaft's Big Score! / Shaft in Africa (Blu-ray)

Thu, 19 Dec 2019 15:18:19 UTC

Recommended

The Movies:

Warner Archive does right by ‘the black private dick whose a sex machine to all the chicks' with this three-disc collection bringing together all three of the original seventies Shaft films in high definition.

Shaft:

Directed by Gordon Parks and written by Earnest Tidymany (and based on his own book of the same name) and released in 1971, Shaft was a trendsetter, one of the first mainstream films to posit a black man as a tough talking, no-nonsense private investigator, the kind that didn't take any crap from anybody, regardless of skin color. We see this right away as John Shaft (Richard Roundtree) walks through thick Manhattan traffic, mouthing off to those who get in his way with a loud and clear ‘Up yours, baby!' As he heads to his office, he gets a tip: two bad dudes are looking for him. When they inevitably attack him, he's ready an...Read the entire review

Mr. Nice Guy (Blu-ray)

Tue, 17 Dec 2019 15:23:46 UTC

Recommended

The Movie:

Mr. Nice Guy, directed by the mighty Sammo Hung and released in 1997, stars Jackie Chan as… Jackie! He's co-hosts a cooking show in Australia with an older man named Baggio (Barry Otto) and lives a pretty swell life. All of this changes when, by chance, he's out shopping and stops to defend a woman named Diana (Gabrielle Fitzpatrick) who is under attack by some thugs. A fight ensues and the two escape, Diana leaving a tape in Jackie's car. Diana, see, is a journalist and she and her partner just did some covert surveillance of a crime lord named Giancarlo (Richard Norton) doing his crime lord thing.

Later that same day, Jackie heads to Baggio's place to cook dinner for his friend, Baggio's cop son Romeo (Vince Poletto) and their personal assistant Lakisha (Karen McLymont). He leaves Diana's tape with them when he splits, assuming it's the latest episode of thei...Read the entire review

The Fearless Vampire Killers (Blu-ray)

Tue, 17 Dec 2019 15:23:46 UTC

Recommended

The Movie:

The Fearless Vampire Killers OR Pardon Me, But Your Teeth Are In My Neck (to be referred to here on out in this review as simply The Fearless Vampire Killers purely for the sake of brevity, was directed by Roman Polanski in 1967 and released theatrically by MGM in a trimmed and altered version to American theaters. Warner Archive's Blu-ray release is the full length version of the film, just as their older DVD release was.

This period film begins when Professor Abronsius (Jack MacGowran) and his assistant Alfred (Polanski himself), a pair of vampire hunters, arrive at a remote tavern in the winter mountains run by a man named Shagal (Alfie Bass) and his surely wife (Jessie Robins). Abronsius is frozen upon their arrival but they quickly get him thawed out and set right. Also inhabiting the tavern is Shagal's gorgeous daughter Sarah (Sharon Tate) and the vo...Read the entire review

The Set-Up (Blu-ray)

Tue, 10 Dec 2019 23:54:59 UTC

Highly Recommended

"What about Stoker?"
"What about him?"
"Well, he's all set, ain't he? You told him, didn't ya?"
"Why cut him in?"
"I don't like it, Tiny. Stoker can still punch. If anything goes wrong, Little Boy's gonna..."
"Don't be a meathead. Nelson will butcher him. It's a hundred to one."
"That's just it! There's always the one."

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The best days of boxer Stok...Read the entire review

The Letter (Blu-ray)

Sun, 08 Dec 2019 20:06:41 UTC

Highly Recommended

The story told by Leslie Crosbie (Bette Davis) is accepted without reservation. Her husband Robert (Herbert Marshall) believes her. Attorney Howard Joyce (James Stephenson) believes her. We the audience – despite having seen her moments ago empty a revolver into Geoff Hammond, continuing to fire even when his lifeless body was sprawled across the dirt outside her bungalow – want to believe her. Mrs. Crosbie's is a tale that evokes great sympathy, fending off a drunken rapist in the dead of night. She's a respectable lady of privilege in British Malaya. She's able to recount every moment of the attack in horrifying detail, practically word-for-word no matter how many times she's questioned. The more that comes to light about Mr. Hammond – ga...Read the entire review

From Beyond the Grave (Blu-ray)

Wed, 04 Dec 2019 23:52:03 UTC

Highly Recommended

"My, customers. Come in, come in. I'm sure I have the very thing to tempt you. Lots of bargains. All tastes catered for. Oh, and a big novelty surprise goes with every purchase. Do come in anytime. I'm always open."

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The proprietor (Peter Cushing) of Temptations Limited doesn't trade in needful thin...Read the entire review

Summer Stock (Blu-ray)

Wed, 31 Jul 2019 20:05:03 UTC

Highly Recommended

Judy Garland's last film under her long-term MGM contract, Summer Stock (1950) is a mostly delightful musical. Made during a time when the studio was feeling unusually nostalgic, remaking Good News (1947) and (in the end) reuniting Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers for The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), Summer Stock, as originally conceived, was to pair Garland and Mickey Rooney for a kind of adult let's-put-on-a-show reunion, but by the time it was finally made the once-popular Rooney, for three years the Number One box-office draw in the country (1939-1941), had fallen precipitously, and instead Garland was teamed with Gene Kelly.

Garland's personal and professional problems grew worse during the filming of The Pirate (1948) when she suffered a nervous breakdown and attempted suicide. Easter Parade (also 1948) was a huge hit, as was In the Good Old Summertim...Read the entire review

The Prisoner of Second Avenue (Blu-ray)

Mon, 15 Jul 2019 21:03:18 UTC

Recommended

Generally considered one of the lesser Neil Simon comedies, The Prisoner of Second Avenue (1975) is an atypical but not entirely successful attempt by Simon to break into the realm of black comedy. An escalating series of big and little disasters drive white collar middle-executive Mel Edison (Jack Lemmon) into having a nervous breakdown, leaving long-suffering but devoted wife Edna (Anne Bancroft) to pick up the pieces. The first act is very well done, with Mel's mental deterioration realistic and funny at once, but then the story runs into problems. The middle-third is very dated by 2019 standards, and Lemmon's performance of a defeated, lost soul in the last-half of the story is too obviously actorly, and there's not much of a payoff at the end. Still, for the leading performances alone the film is worth seeing, even if its rewards are scattershot.

Read the entire review

The Golden Arrow (Blu-ray)

Wed, 03 Jul 2019 17:38:35 UTC

Recommended

The Golden Arrow (L'Arciere delle Mille e Una Notte, or "Archer of One Thousand and One Nights," 1962) is an Italian sword-and-sandal film starring Tab Hunter, and it's pretty much precisely what one would imagine an Italian sword-and-sandal film starring Tab Hunter might be. Gaudy, action-packed, dubbed into English, it's basically an Arabian Nights-type action fantasy, but otherwise very much in line with the peplum genre of the period.

What makes The Golden Arrow a bit unusual is that its studio, the Italian company Titanus, clearly spent significantly more on this production than the typical Hercules or Maciste programmer. For starters it was photographed in the expensive Technirama process, a widescreen format in which 35mm film negative ran through the camera horizontally rather than the usual vertical manner, exposing eight perforations (sprocket holes) of film per...Read the entire review

Frankenstein 1970 (Blu-ray)

Tue, 28 May 2019 19:34:23 UTC

Recommended

The horror movie genre was largely dormant for a ten-year stretch, from roughly 1946-1956. Universal, RKO, and poverty studios like Monogram and PRC, the main purveyors of such films, all abruptly stopped making them. The closest audiences got to good horror films during this period were science fiction movies with horror elements, pictures like The Thing (from Another World) (1951) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). Horror in a more classical, Gothic style was in the doldrums.

All that changed in 1957. In June, Hammer's first Gothic horror film, The Curse of Frankenstein, with its groundbreaking, in-color mixture of sex and blood, was released in America and proved spectacularly successful, grossing as much as $8 million against a production cost of just $270,000. Then in October Screen Gems, the television subsidiary arm of Columbia Pictures, released a 52-movie "Shock...Read the entire review

Bad Ronald (Blu-ray)

Thu, 18 Oct 2018 16:01:46 UTC

Recommended

The Movie:

Directed by Buzz Kulik, the director who also made Crawlspace, a movie that Bad Ronald has a fair bit in common with, this 1974 made for TV movie stars a young Scott Jacoby as the titular Ronald, a nerdy kid who lives in a creaky old Victorian era house with his overbearing mother (Kim Hunter, sans the ape mask). When Ronald finishes his birthday dinner with mom, he heads out to visit a pretty blonde he knows from school but after being made fun of, he's turned away. On the way back home he runs into a young girl on a bike named Carol (Angela Hoffman). She teases him and makes fun of his mother and Ronald flips out and pushes her. Carol's head hits a brick and she dies on the spot. Rather than go to the cops, Ronald decides to bury her and head home to tell his mom about the whole ordeal.

Not particularly pleased with her son's recent extracurricular activ...Read the entire review

The Swarm (Blu-ray)

Fri, 05 Oct 2018 18:21:43 UTC

Rent It

"Billions of dollars have been spent to make these nuclear plants safe...fail-safe. The odds against anything going wrong are astronomical, doctor."
"I appreciate that, doctor, but let me ask you: in all your fail-safe techniques, is there any provision against an attack by killer bees?"

Hmmm...

Read the entire review

The Cyclops (Blu-ray)

Thu, 04 Oct 2018 03:45:12 UTC

Recommended

Eye see you!

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There's a little something for everyone waiting in this perilous stretch of the Sierra Tarahumare. Millions – no, billions – of dollars' worth of uranium! A fiancé assumed dead for some three years who may still be alive and kicking! Perhaps a shot at redemption for ...Read the entire review

Big Wednesday (Blu-ray)

Wed, 03 Oct 2018 14:53:59 UTC

Recommended

The Movie:

As a fan of surfing movies (especially Bruce Brown's glorious, hokey, and gloriously hokey docs like The Endless Summer), the 1978 surf drama Big Wednesday has long lingered on my to-watch list. In the past 40 years, Big Wednesday has been over-trashed and over-praised in equal measure (I think it kinda depends on how much the film speaks to your own coming-of-age experiences). Judged now on Warner Archive Collection's new Blu-ray, the flick holds up as a solid Baby Boomer nostalgia piece, with some great stand-alone sequences and some great surf footage.

Writer-director John Milius (Read the entire review

Looker (Blu-ray)

Mon, 01 Oct 2018 16:01:24 UTC
Rent It
Even blockbuster fantasist Michael Crichton had his share of duds. Looker (1981), an original screenplay that he also directed is by all odds his dudliest, quite terrible from just about every angle. I wasn't impressed when it was new, hadn't seen it since and liked it even less on Blu-ray all these years later. Though built on a potentially interesting premise, this sci-fi thriller is shallow, generally ludicrous, and very poorly executed.
Theatrical prints were notably grainy back in 1981, and Warner Archive's Blu-ray makes Looker look as good as it can, though the inherent graininess, combined with much ugly production design, still leave the film pictorially unappetizing.
Busy Beverly Hills plastic surgeon Dr. Larry Roberts (Albert Finney) is bemused b...Read the entire review

The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (Blu-ray)

Sat, 22 Sep 2018 09:12:15 UTC
Recommended
The Movie:
A memorably bizarre melding of screenwriter John Milius's macho mythologizing and director John Huston's impish desire to tell a ripping yarn, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972) is one of the weirdest westerns to come out of a Hollywood studio. (And I say this, having just reviewed The Hired Hand.) It's easy to see what drew Milius to the material, with its real-life story of a man who tamed a small corner of the Wild West and forged it in his image. Huston, however, seems to show little interest in the reality of Judge Roy Bean's life, often replacing the already-ridiculous particulars of Bean's biography with wilder fabrications. Huston ...Read the entire review

The Last Hunt (Blu-ray)

Fri, 21 Sep 2018 11:50:39 UTC
Highly Recommended
An unusual, grim Western, The Last Hunt (1956) in many respects doesn't look or play like other ‘50s Westerns at all. Made by liberal producer Dore Schary (soon to be fired as head of production at MGM) and writer-director Richard Brooks, the film anticipates both the rougher, grimier Westerns of Sam Peckinpah and others, while its story incorporates environmental themes that wouldn't fully blossom in movies for another 15 years. From its casting on down to its strange, unexpected but satisfying final scene, The Last Hunt impresses and deserves to be better known.

Economic necessity forces modest rancher Sandy McKenzie (Stewart Granger), once a celebrated buffalo hunter, back into the trade in partnership with Charlie Gibson (Robert Taylor). The partnershi...Read the entire review

Queen of Outer Space (Blu-ray)

Wed, 12 Sep 2018 22:23:27 UTC
Highly Recommended
I'm your Venus!

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I'm your fire!

Read the entire review

The Naked and the Dead (Blu-ray)

Sun, 09 Sep 2018 21:38:45 UTC
Recommended
The Movie:

NOTE: The photos accompanying this article are taken from various online sources and do not represent the quality of the Blu-ray [which looks a LOT BETTER] under review.
The Warner Archive Collection has shifted gears somewhat and started offering some of its neglected titles on Blu-ray, even without putting them on DVD first. One of these recent titles is the 1958 WWII drama, The Naked and the Dead, adapted from Norman Mailer's infamous and acclaimed best-seller.
Now, I haven't cracked Mr. Mailer's massive tome, so I can't authoritatively report on how faithful screenwriters Denis and Terry Sanders (both better known for documentary work) and director Raoul Walsh (whose Read the entire review

Never So Few (Blu-ray)

Fri, 31 Aug 2018 11:15:03 UTC
Recommended
Never So Few (1959), a John Sturges-directed war film with a nearly equal quotient of romance and starring Frank Sinatra and Gina Lollobrigida, has a great cast and is certainly colorful, but is also trite when not ridiculous. Based on real-life accounts of OSS operatives in Burma fighting alongside native Kachin in Burma during World War II, the picture's main asset is Steve McQueen. It was just his fourth credited film role, a part he got only because Sinatra got into a spat with Sammy Davis, Jr., originally cast, over some mildly critical comments made about ol' Blue Eyes in a radio interview. McQueen was in the middle of his Western TV series Wanted: Dead or Alive and in Never So Few all attention turns to him whenever he's onscreen.
He and Sturges would work together again on The Magnificent Seven (1960) and The Great Escape (1963). Sturges probably looked bac...Read the entire review

Supergirl (Blu-ray)

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 12:48:13 UTC
Rent It
Supergirl Blu-ray Review
Supergirlis one of the first prominent comic-book films made tofeature afemale heroine as the lead (in fact, the first in the Englishlanguage). This makes the film significant in some respects for thatreason alone. Before Gal Gadot's Wonder Womanbecame acultural milestone and before the Marvel cinematic universeintroduced us to Scarlett Johansson's badass Black Widow this filmintroduced audiences Read the entire review

Home from the Hill (Blu-ray)

Mon, 27 Aug 2018 11:22:10 UTC
Recommended
Vincente Minnelli's Home from the Hill (1960) is a not-bad Southern-fried melodrama, neither as authentic nor profound as it seems to think it is, but fairly engrossing and fitfully rewarding here and there. The leading role was originally intended for Clark Gable but he declined; apparently after getting the bum's rush when his longtime MGM contract ran out, he was in no hurry to rush back to that studio. Instead, the part went to Robert Mitchum, who doesn't quite fit it as well. Mitchum is very good in some ways but the part doesn't really suit him for reasons explained below.

Adapted from William Humphrey's same-named 1958 novel, the long (two-and-a-half hours) film actually revolves around 17-year-old Theron Hunnicutt (George Hamilton, about 20 at the time), th...Read the entire review

Billy Budd (Blu-ray)

Tue, 07 Aug 2018 12:53:43 UTC
DVD Talk Collector Series
Premiering just four days after the opening of MGM's much-publicized, problem-plagued, mixed-bag remake of Mutiny on the Bounty, producer-director (and co-writer and co-star) Peter Ustinov's adaptation of Billy Budd (1962) is by far the superior picture. Adapting Herman Melville's final, unfinished novel, not published until 1924, more than 30 years after his death, Billy Budd is still maybe the finest seafaring drama ever made.
Its basic story resembles Bounty in some respects, but has little in the way of swashbuckler-type action. Colorful and technically accurate, most of the drama stems from the relationships of its three main characters, and a great deal of that is implicit. Terence Stamp is terrific as the naively optimistic title character, conscripted aboard the warship HMS Avenger, and Ustinov is typically excellent as the ship's pragmatic captain, but Rob...Read the entire review

Village Of The Damned (Blu-ray)

Wed, 25 Jul 2018 11:45:41 UTC
Recommended
The Movie:
Even if you're not familiar with Village of the Damned, chances are that you've seen it parodied a million times. Like other staples of popular sci-fi/horror pop culture references, "Here's Johnny" from The Shining, "It's people!" from Soylent Green, etc…, the creepy mind controlling alien/demon kids from Village of The Damned have been parodied and referenced in a way that makes the references far more famous than the film itself. And yes, of course there's an episode of The Simpsons that spoofs it.
Before the J-horror craze hit the western world in the early ‘90s, our go-to reference for creepy horror kids was a swarm of them with judgmental British eyes and judgmental British voices, wearing goofy blonde wigs, while controlling grown-ups' minds with bright white rays from their eyes. It's a typical cheesy image from the ‘60s b-movie sci-fi ...Read the entire review

Designing Woman (Blu-ray)

Thu, 19 Jul 2018 11:30:42 UTC
Recommended
Designing Woman Blu-ray
DesigningWomanis a classic Hollywood style comedywith a mixture of romance and fun thrown into the mix, with the greaticons GregoryPeck and Lauren Bacall bouncing off each other as the two leads. Thefilm followsthem as they fall in love with each other quickly before realizing theyaren'tsuch a perfect match. The film is produced by Dore Schary (Crossfire,Act One).

MikeHagen (Gregory Peck) is a high-profilewriter for a sports trade and Marilla Brown Hagen (Lauren Bacall) is ...Read the entire review

Two Weeks in Another Town (Blu-ray)

Sat, 07 Jul 2018 12:42:56 UTC
Rent It
I wasn't much enamored of Two Weeks in Another Town (1962), Vincent Minnelli's drama about a troubled Hollywood film production shooting in Rome, when it arrived on laserdisc in 1991. And, having seen the Blu-ray, I'm even less impressed with it now.
Considering all the talent involved - Minnelli; stars Kirk Douglas, Edward G. Robinson, Cyd Charisse, Claire Trevor, etc.; producer John Houseman; Charles Schnee adapting Irwin Shaw's novel, or the fact that most of the same team made the similar The Bad and the Beautiful ten years before, Two Weeks in Another Town should have been better.
Partly it plays like a typically glossy, middle-brow MGM movie, one of the very last gasps of that kind of film. At the same time, it tries hard to come off as sophisticated, worldly, literate, and adult, but instead the picture is merely lurid and overwrought, almost comically so. They might h...Read the entire review

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (Blu-ray)

Tue, 19 Jun 2018 21:22:39 UTC
Highly Recommended
The Movie:
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954) is the first musical I can remember being shown. My babysitter had it on VHS, and I'm sure we gave that tape plenty of use. Based on anecdotal evidence, I'm not alone. Seven Brides is a childhood favorite of many -- and often has been the gateway drug that opened up the world of movie musicals to countless impressionable minds. The combination of the film's colorful photography, catchy (if not quite classic) songs, inventive choreography, and gleefully goofy characters continue to impress six and a half decades after the film's initial release.
Howard Keel stars as Adam Pontipee, a red-headed backwoods farmer in mid-1800s Oregon. Adam is first seen bringing his wagon into the nearest to...Read the entire review

The Colossus of Rhodes (Blu-ray)

Wed, 13 Jun 2018 17:09:53 UTC
Recommended
The Movie:
Interesting more for what it foreshadows in terms of where Sergio Leone's career would go than for anything else, The Colossus Of Rhodes marks the masterful director's first full-fledged directorial credit (though he'd done The Last Days Of Pompeii two years prior, he was not credited for it). It's far from his best film, in fact compared to the westerns he's known for and the excellent Once Upon A Time In America it's rather unremarkable, but it is an interesting picture that offers up enough spectacle and visual flair that fans of the director will certainly want to check it out for themselves.
Set in the year 208 B.C., King Serse Of Rhodes (Roberto Carmadiel) is excited about the massive new bronze statue that has just been built and which the film is named after. Unfortunately, Serse might not be such a decent enough guy, what he doesn't realize is ...Read the entire review

Les Girls (Blu-ray)

Tue, 22 May 2018 11:50:23 UTC
Recommended
Although today MGM is most famous for its classic musicals, in truth many of the most beloved films from that era were much less successful than you might imagine, particularly during the 1950s. The decade began well, with Show Boat and An American in Paris (1951) both big hits, earning profits of $2.3 million and $1.3 million. Singin' in the Rain (1952) cost $3.2 million but made a profit of just $666,000.
The majority, however, sold a lot of tickets but also cost so much they ended up in the red. Summer Stock lost $80,000, The Band Wagon (1953) lost $1.2 million, Hit the Deck another $454,000, while Brigadoon (1954), It's Always Fair Weather (1955), Kismet (1955), Invitation to the Dance (1956), and Silk Stockings (1957) all flopped big, with losses of $1.5 million, $1.7 million, $2.2 million, $2.5 million, and $1.4 milli...Read the entire review

Gun Crazy (Blu-ray)

Sun, 13 May 2018 00:21:03 UTC
Highly Recommended
Gun Crazy opens with the committal of a crime.

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This comes as little surprise; Gun Crazy is, after all, a film noir. However, we're not talking about a crime that would quickly ensnare a hapless protagonist. It doesn't truly presage the dark path down which our central character would soon walk. This burgla...Read the entire review

The Black Scorpion (Blu-ray)

Fri, 13 Apr 2018 14:52:12 UTC
Recommended
Highly derivative and unique at once, The Black Scorpion (1957) is a ‘50s "big bug" sci-fi thriller notable for its stop-motion animation, supervised by the legendary Willis O'Brien (of King Kong fame) but animated mainly by his assistant, Pete Peterson.
The picture is almost emblematic of distributor Warner Bros.'s peculiar attitudes toward horror and sci-fi during the decade. They picked up for distribution but did not themselves produce The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953), the seminal Ray Harryhausen stop-motion movie, which proved a huge box office success. Their own in-house follow-up, Them! (1954), was enormously profitable as well but, oddly, they didn't follow that success with other science fiction films. Where studios like Universal and Columbia regularly made genre films until, creatively, they ran ‘em into the ground, Warners made a potful of dough then i...Read the entire review