Workmanlike cheapie actioner. Sony Picture's Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library has released Too Tough to Kill, the 1935 programmer from Columbia Pictures starring Victor Jory, Sally O'Neil, Thurston Hall, Johnny Arthur, Robert Gleckler, Robert Middlemass, Monte Carter, and Ward Bond. Set amid deadly industrial sabotage at the site of a massive public works tunnel, fans of these kinds of B actioners will probably get a mild kick out of Too Tough to Kill's recognizable 30s genre conventions...as well as with the amusing production cost-cutting measures. No extras for this good fullscreen black and white transfer.

18 cities in the American southwest are awaiting water and power from the Parker Dam via the brand new $220 million dollar Colorado River aqueduct system--350 miles of conduit and tunnels, all ready to go...except for 18 lousy miles of unfinished t...Read the entire review

Same-o' same-o' with the blam-o blam-o. Sony Picture's Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has released Lightning Guns, the 1950 B-Western from Columbia, the 50th (!) entry in that studio's long-running Durango Kid Western series starring Charles Starrett, with Smiley Burnett tagging along again as comic relief. Directed by human B-movie dynamo Fred F. Sears, Lightning Guns moves as fast as its name suggests, delivering up competent, unpretentious oater fun for fans of the genre. No extras for this super-clean fullscreen black and white transfer.

The Old West, in the 1880s, back in the remote hinterlands where ever-encroaching civilization's calming effect has yet to be felt. A feud is heating up in the Piute...Read the entire review

THE MOVIE:

1936's And So They Were Married is a whiffle ball of a romantic comedy. Sure, it's light and airy and it really moves, but oh, those holes! Anything of substance falls right through.

The film stars Mary Astor (The Maltese Falcon) and Melvyn Douglas (Hud) as Edith and Stephen, a wealthy divorcee and widower, respectively. The pair meets at a mountain lodge just before Christmas. Due to an avalanche, they are the only guests there. They hate each other at first, but as the solitude and annoying hotel staff push them together, their feelings soften. To add complications to this buddi...Read the entire review

THE MOVIE:

If you're tired of the same old Christmas movies and looking for more alternative choices, then may I recommend you consider the 1949 Glenn Ford vehicle Mr. Soft Touch? It's a heart-warming crime film set on Christmas Eve and spilling over onto Christmas Day, and it's full of the kind of family-centric humor and redemptive themes that make for the best holiday entertainment.

Ford plays Joe Miracle (no ambiguity here), a war veteran with a shady past. Joe has returned to San Francisco after many years spent in hiding to find that his best friend is dead and organized crime has taken possession of their casino. At the start of Mr. Soft Touch, Joe is in a car chase with the police. He just robbed the casino, though the more sympathetic byst...Read the entire review

An oddball little movie directed by and starring Hugo Haas, a bush-league Orson Welles who nonetheless helmed 20 features between 1933-62, Bait (1954) reflects most of Haas's directorial quirks and, though not without interest and entertainment value for seekers of the outré like this reviewer, is justifiably minor and forgotten. Blonde bombshell Cleo Moore and John Agar, the latter in an amusingly awful performance, co-star in this cut-rate reworking of Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948).

Bait looks like it was shot 1.37:1 full frame but its roomy title cards suggest it may have been released in cropped widescreen, possibly 1.66:1 according to Bob Furmanek's superb article on the first year of widescreen studio releases. The transfer, from Sony's manufactured-on-demand line, is excellent.

Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64819 Sat, 31 May 2014 06:44:44 UTC Recommended

Most everyone is familiar with the Spaghetti Western, the subgenre spearheaded by Sergio Leone's "Dollars" trilogy with Clint Eastwood. The huge European and Asian success (and, a bit later, in America, too) of those movies resulted in many hundreds of Italian-made Westerns produced, broadly speaking, between 1960-1980.

Few Americans, however, realize that parallel to the Spaghetti Western there co-existed a marvelous series of primarily German-made Westerns, particularly West German movies made by Rialto Film and shot on location in Yugoslavia, in the Paklenica karst river canyon of what's now Croatia.

Dominating this sub-genre was the Winnetou film series, movies based on late-19th century Western novels by German author Karl May. He wrote lovingly about the American West, even though he'd never even visited America when he wrote most them. So popular were May's stories that, long after his dea...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64754 Fri, 16 May 2014 11:53:27 UTC Recommended

In one year, Louis Malle's 1985 drama Alamo Bay will celebrate its 30th anniversary. Considering this, it's a bit depressing that the racial tension depicted in it remains overwhelmingly relevant today, both at face value and also when considering similar discrimination such as gender, class, and sexual orientation. The film centers on a Texas fishing community which is struggling to adapt to the presence of Vietnamese refugees in the wake of the Vietnam war, and Malle's depiction of the way racism corrupts the soul is still affecting, anchored by the performances of real-life husband and wife Amy Madigan and Ed Harris and a wistful guitar score by Ry Cooder. The film was issued on Blu-Ray last year by boutique distributor Twilight Time, but for those who remain DVD only, or just balk at the label's $30 price tag, Sony has also released the title as part of their line of "manufactured-on-deman...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64743 Wed, 14 May 2014 13:31:01 UTC Skip It

In 1974, Confessions of a Window Cleaner launched a short series of films based on books of the same name by author Timothy Lea. The films followed Lea (Robin Askwith) on a series of adventures working for his brother-in-law, Sidney (Anthony Booth), with each new profession being the gateway to a number of comic sexual escapades with a bevy of beautiful women. For some reason, Sony's disc-on-demand department have decided to issue the first and third of these films, but not the second and fourth. Hopefully it wasn't a matter of quality over popularity, because Confessions of a Driving Instructor is a noticeable step down from the first film in the series.

Following the events of Confessions of a Pop Performer, Sidney has just scored a deal on a driving school...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64737 Tue, 13 May 2014 11:24:41 UTC Rent It

THE MOVIE:

The 1957 film noir The Burglar is the kind of film that I'm almost compelled to embrace and champion as a lost curiosity. Directed by Paul Wendkos, who went on from here to direct a ton of television, and adapted by David Goodis (Dark Passage) from his own novel, The Burglar is a bizarre, almost impressionistic take on the usual small-time heist drama. I say almost, as you'd be hard-pressed to make a case for its disjointed quirks being intentional. When it comes down to it, The Burglar is a bit of a mess.

Dan Duryea leads the low-rent vehicle as Nat, an equally low-rent crook who spies a wealthy woman's jewelled necklace in a newsreel. He and his crew ...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64734 Sun, 11 May 2014 16:53:18 UTC Rent It

Although the series was popular enough to spawn four entries, Timothy Lea's Confessions... films seem to have just about disappeared into the fog of pop culture history. These good-natured sex comedies were adapted from Lea's books of the same names, and each entry stars Robin Askwith as Lea, who takes on whatever new odd job his brother-in-law Sidney (Anthony Booth) has concocted. This eventually leads to him ending up in bed, in trouble, or both with any number of the organization's beautiful clients. The films were British, but were mostly funded by Columbia Pictures in United States, and were very successful by way of their minimal budgets.

It's hard to critique what was little more than a simple formula, followed four times, kind of like a lengthy R-rated television show for movie theaters. Confessions of a Window Cleaner is not a film that anyone is likely to blindly seek ...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64730 Sat, 10 May 2014 03:28:31 UTC Highly Recommended

"I, a citizen of the Union of the Soviet Socialists and Republics entering the ranks of the Red Army Workers and Peasants, take this oath: I swear to my last breath to be faithful to my Comrades, my Soviet land, my Government of Workers and Peasants. If I violate this solemn oath, may I be struck by the hand of the Soviet law, and by the hatred and contempt of all the Workers! "

The Little Rascovites. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has dug up a real curio here (which is exactly what they should be doing): The Boy from Stalingrad, the obscure 1943 programmer from Columbia Pictures, scripted by Ferdinand Reyher, directed by Sidney Salkow, and starring Bobby Samarzich, Conrad Binyon, Mary Lou Harrington, Scotty Beckett, Steven Muller, Donald Mayo, and John Wengraf. One of a handful of pro-Soviet WWII propaganda movies Holl...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64717 Thu, 08 May 2014 00:45:22 UTC Rent It

Mildly engrossing '50s B oater has some interesting twists...in an uninteresting approach. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has released The White Squaw, the 1956 Western from Columbia Pictures starring David Brian, May Wynn, William Bishop, Nancy Hale, Myron Healey, Frank DeKova, George Keymas, Roy Roberts, Paul Birch, and Grant Withers. In The White Squaw, displaced Indians are the ones pushing White settlers out of the way...but don't expect too much psychology married to mise-en-scene when we're talking about "Quick Draw McGraw" Ray Nazarro at the helm. Still...Western fans looking for a competent if unremarkable oater will probably enjoy it. No extras for this nice-looking anamorphically-enhanced widescreen black and white transfer.

Against the wishes of his son, Knute (Robert C. Ross), cattleman Sigrod Swans...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64712 Tue, 06 May 2014 12:51:38 UTC Highly Recommended

Tight, suspenseful chamber piece from Hammer...until everyone goes all silly beggars at the end. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has re-released Cash on Demand, the 1961 thriller from U.K. Hammer Studios (distributed here in the States through Hammer's releasing partner, Columbia Pictures) starring Peter Cushing, Andre Morell, Richard Vernon, Norman Bird, Kevin Stoney, Barry Lowe, Edith Sharpe, Lois Daine, Alan Haywood, Vera Cook, and Charles Morgan. A trim, gripping little bank robbery outing, Cash on Demand sticks to a couple of claustrophobic sets and lets good actors Cushing and Morell and Vernon turn the screws on each other with memorable results--a winner, until the compromised end. No extras for this very nice anamorphically enhanced black and white transfer.

It's Christmas-time at the Haversham branch of the Cit...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64650 Thu, 01 May 2014 05:41:05 UTC Highly Recommended

Remarkably see-sawing Castle outing--at times hallucinatingly good then laughably inept--with Crawford operating on a whole different plane. Sony Picture's Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has re-released Strait-Jacket, the 1964 shocker from producer/director William Castle, written (at least initially, before Crawford got ahold of it) by Psycho's Robert Bloch, and starring Joan Crawford, Diane Baker, Leif Erickson, Howard St. John, John Anthony Hayes, Rochelle Hudson, George Kennedy, Edith Atwater, and Vice President of PepsiCo, Mitchell Cox (who does just fine, despite the carps). Now watched primarily by people who go in expecting to laugh at its admitted excesses and missteps, Strait-Jacket does have those often startling moments of nightmarish, cartoonish weirdness, too, that underrated (and unashamed) Castle deliv...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64649 Thu, 01 May 2014 05:41:05 UTC Recommended

"Nous sommes des degourdis, nous sommes des lascars,
Des types pas ordinaires,
Nous avons souvent notre cafard,
Nous sommes des Legionnaires.

Au Tonkin, la Legion immortelle
A Tuyen-Quang illustra notre Drapeau.
Heros de Camerone et freres modeles
Dormez en paix dans vos tombeaux.

Nos anciens ont su mourir
Pour la Gloire de la Legion,
Nous saurons bien tous perir
Suivant la tradition.

Au cours de nos campagnes lointaines,
Affrontant la fievre et le feu,
Nous oublions avec nos peines
La mort qui nous oublie si peu
Nous, la Legion. "

Surely you Geste. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has re-released Adventure in Sahara, the 1938 B-actioner from Columbia Pictures that plays like Beau Geste Joins the Mutiny on the Bounty. Featuring a host of familiar low-rent faces...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64489 Thu, 17 Apr 2014 23:00:26 UTC Highly Recommended

Delightful little domestic comedy; a must-have for fans of Tish Tash. Sony Picture's Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has released The First Time, the 1952 comedy from Columbia Pictures, directed by Frank Tashlin (his first official feature job), and starring Robert Cummings, Barbara Hale, Bill Goodwin, Jeff Donnell, Carl Benton Reid, Mona Barrie, Kathleen Comegys, Paul Harvey, Bea Benaderet, and Cora Witherspoon. An energetic, nicely snappish look at the emotional and financial perils of having a baby during America's post-WWII economic boom, The First Time's universal, humorous truths about marriage and parenting ring just as true today, while fans of director Tashlin will have fun here spotting satirical themes and visual gags that will crop up in his later big-screen efforts. No extras for this sharp fullscreen black and white transfer.

Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64485 Wed, 16 Apr 2014 20:59:55 UTC Highly Recommended

Despite the silly construction, some solid old-school circus thrills. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has released Rings Around the World, the 1966 circus documentary featuring some of the greatest acts then working under the big top: Rudy Cardenas, The Larible Trapeze Act, La Mara, Marco, Mendez and Seitz, Pablo Noel, Pauline Schumann, Lilly Yokoi, The Tongas, Gunther Gebel-Williams, and more. A big-screen quasi-version of NBC's European-shot International Showtime TV variety series, Rings Around the World also features International's emcee, Don Ameche. Unlike his hosting gig for that series, though, where he appeared as himself, here in Rings Around the World, Ameche is clumsily inserted as a fictional author musing and writing about the circus--all completely unnecessary when we're given such spectacular ...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64344 Tue, 08 Apr 2014 12:28:48 UTC Recommended

One of the last ‘60s Hammer films heretofore unavailable on home video, The Crimson Blade (original British title: The Scarlet Blade, 1963) is a well-made if mostly routine historical melodrama-swashbuckler set during the 17th century English Civil War. Made near the end of Hammer's prolific and genre-varied co-production deal with Columbia Pictures, there's little about the film that truly stands out. On the other hand, it's a pity the company would soon all but give up on ambitious little films like this to concentrate almost solely on increasingly by-the-numbers Gothic horrors.

A Sony Choice Collection manufactured-on-demand release, The Crimson Blade is presented in a somewhat grainy but acceptable 16:9 enhanced widescreen transfer under its American title. (The versions are otherwise identical.) No extras.

Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64339 Sun, 06 Apr 2014 01:32:21 UTC Recommended

Moderately amusing romantic comedy-drama. Sony Picture's Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has re-released Lady By Choice, the 1934 hit from Columbia Pictures starring Carole Lombard, May Robson, Roger Pryor, Walter Connolly, Arthur Hohl, Raymond Walburn, James Burk, and Henry Kolker. Clearly designed by Columbia to remind ticker buyers of the studio's previous year's huge hit with Robson, Lady for a Day, Lady By Choice isn't nearly as well-written or directed as its iconic inspiration...but it's mildly diverting, nonetheless, particularly when Lombard and Robson trade lines. No extras for this terrific 16 x 9-platformed fullscreen black and white transfer.

Judge Daly (Walter Connolly) has had it with drunken troublemaker Patsy Patterson (May Robson). Making her eighth inebriated appearance in front of his bench--this time f...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64290 Sun, 30 Mar 2014 13:02:31 UTC Recommended

Glossy, competent made-for-TV noir, highlighted by Nicol Williamson's snappy, amusing turn. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find library and cult titles has released Passion Flower, the 1986 CBS made-for-TV movie starring Bruce Boxleitner, Barbara Hershey, Nicol Williamson, John Waters, and Dick O'Neill. Anybody who's seen even just a handful of noirs is going to know where Passion Flower is headed, while the tame sex is strictly "1986 network safe." However, the script is full of punchy, fun stingers, with veteran helmer Joseph Sargent fashioning the familiar story elements into an enjoyable, unpretentious meller. No extras for this good-looking fullscreen transfer.

Fabulously wealthy Julia Gaitland (Barbara Hershey) is having a nightmare. She's a little girl again, watching a Singapore parade with her "businessman" father, Albert Co...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64250 Thu, 27 Mar 2014 01:07:27 UTC Recommended

"The murder syndicate, the vice ring, the fixed race, the shakedown, the paid gun--all made America's winter playground the world's capital of crime...till Miami blasted back and shoved the underworld into the sea--lock, stock, and B-Girl!
The screen now dares to bring you the brutality, the excitement, the truth about the terrifying struggle between the law and the lawless that raged in the streets of Miami!"

Enjoyably pulpy low-budget crime meller. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection of hard-to-find cult and library titles has released The Miami Story, the 1954 Columbia Pictures thriller from producer Sam Katzman and director Fred F. Sears, starring Barry Sullivan, Luther Adler, John Baer, Adele Jergens, Beverly Garland, and George E. Sto...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64249 Thu, 27 Mar 2014 01:07:27 UTC Rent It

"You want what you can't have."

A disappointment. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find cult and library titles has re-released Affair in Trinidad, Columbia Pictures' half-baked Caribbean spy thriller/film noir from 1952 that re-teamed the famous Gilda co-stars Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford. Rita dances a couple of times (to paralyzing effect) and Ford works himself up into an angry, tight, impotent sweat throughout, while spies (or saboteurs or gun runners or whatever the hell they are) make things difficult for the photogenic couple--and all to very little effect. You'll remember Rita's bumps and grinds, but that's about it for this whisper-thin exercise in foreign intrigue and romance. No extras this time around for this good-looking fullscreen black and white transfer (it appears to be the same one used for Sony's previous Martini Movies ...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64236 Mon, 24 Mar 2014 02:26:15 UTC Recommended

THE MOVIE:

The 1931 drama The Miracle Woman is the kind of movie that few folks besides Frank Capra could pull off. It's a film that manages to simultaneously be a sincere portrayal of faith while maintaining a healthy sceptical cynicism in regards to human nature. While other directors might find a hard time striking a balance between these two themes, their own personal interests or agenda causing them to lean heavily one way or the other, Capra deftly works between them without ever seeming like he's pushing a message.

Barbara Stanwyck stars in The Miracle Wom...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64233 Sun, 23 Mar 2014 14:41:18 UTC Highly Recommended

Harrowing suspense from Hammer. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection line of hard-to-find cult and library titles has released Never Take Candy From a Stranger (original U.K. title: Never Take Sweets From a Stranger), the 1960 "horror" film from famed Hammer Studios (released here by Columbia Pictures) starring Patrick Allen, Gwen Watford, Janina Faye, Niall MacGinnis, Alison Leggatt, Bill Nagy, Michael Gwynn, Estelle Brody, Robert Arden, and Felix Aylmer. Hammer's first and last attempt at an out-and-out "message" movie--the dangers of child molesters...along with equally nefarious small-town politics--Never Take Candy From a Stranger was a notorious flop for the famed British studio during a time when its straight horror outings were making Hammer an international name. Seen today, despite its modern trappings and its decidedly un-supernatural crimes, Never Take Cand...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64234 Sun, 23 Mar 2014 14:41:18 UTC Recommended

Watchable land-locked swashbuckler from Hammer. Sony Pictures' Choice Collection of hard-to-find cult and library titles has re-released The Pirates of Blood River, the 1961 Hammer actioner (handled here in the States by Columbia Pictures) starring Kerwin Matthews, Glenn Corbett, Christopher Lee, Peter Arne, Marla Landi, Oliver Reed, Andrew Keir, Michael Ripper, David Lodge, and Dennis Waterman. Cut prior to its original release to receive a general audiences "U" rating from the British censors, one can only wonder if what was left on the editing room floor might have boosted The Pirates of Blood River's name recognition with fans of the studio and of vintage 60s action-adventures. As it stands, The Pirates of Blood River is likeable-enough comic book action, aided by Hammer's usual colorful dash when putting over these relatively cheapo period productions. The comme...Read the entire review

]]> DVD Video https://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/review/64113 Sat, 22 Mar 2014 01:14:48 UTC Recommended

Please Note: The stills used here are taken from promotional materials and other sources, not the DVD edition under review.

The Movie:

Now out as part of Sony's Choice Collection line of made-to-order DVD reissues, I Am the Law provided a mildly entertaining vehicle for Edward G. Robinson. By the time this routine, ripped-from-the-headlines crime drama was released in 1938, Robinson had made the transition from heavies and gangsters to cultured authority figures who went after the heavies and gangsters.

Like his fellow compadre-in-crime James Cagney, Robinson had the versatility and talent to overcome his early typecasting as a crude criminal. This particular film, however, found the he...Read the entire review

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