Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 28th, 2003
Casablanca. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. The Big Sleep. TheMaltese Falcon. To Have and Have Not. All legendary titles, all among the very bestmovies Hollywood has ever made. Terrific adventures and mysteries, the fit together as acollection in fascinating ways, beyond simply having Bogart as the lead. To Have and HaveNot is structurally very much like a more upbeat version of Casablanca. TheMaltese Falcon is frequently held up as the first film no...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 28th, 2003
Synopsis
Drifter John Garfield arrives at a filling station which advertises “Man Wanted” (a sign to beinterpreted in more than one sense). The proprietor is the jovial but cheap and aging CecilKellaway, and his wife is bombshell Lana Turner. Garfield and Turner fall in love, and beforelong, they’re plotting the murder of Kellaway.
To say more would be unfair -- this is a film that is best experienced cold, so you can be hitby the twists and turns of the plot. I will ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 20th, 2003
Synopsis
The Earp brothers, Wyatt (Henry Fonda), Morgan, Virgil and James, are herding their cattlepast the town of Tombstone, Arizona. The cattle are stolen and James is murdered. Ex-MarshallWyatt suspects the Clanton family, but lacks proof. He becomes Tombstone’s lawman, biding histime, waiting for the Clantons to make a mistake. While he waits, he strikes up a pricklyfriendship with the cynical Doc Holliday (Victor Mature). The tension between the two men isintensified by...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on December 3rd, 2003
Willis O’Brien, the f/x magician behind King Kong and The Lost World, had always wanted to do a cowboys and dinosaurs film. It is no surprise that his prodigy Ray Harryhausen would accomplish the task. Using some of O’Brien’s design ideas, Harryhausen credibly put these two film icons together with mixed results. The script is certainly not the best Harryhausen had to work with. More Bronco Billy than Jurassic Park, this is more an entertaining film than anything to be taken seriously. James Franciscus does a fine job of playing to the f/x.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 11th, 2003
Soylent Green is an… interesting movie. Its one of the seventies movies that’s funny to look back on and recognize that people in the seventies thought that people in the year 2020 would still be dressing like… people in the seventies. Soylent Green steps beyond the traditional seventies sci-fi flick and into the boundaries of social activism, however, adding a further layer of irony to the film: as an apocalyptic tale its interesting to see how we haven’t traveled down the frightening route envisioned in Soylent Gre...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on November 11th, 2003
Everybody has their favorite Looney Tunes character and particular cartoon shorts. That’s the largest obstacle facing Warner Brothers in this ambitious project to restore and release these shorts on DVD. The first collection features 56 all time great shorts plus a ton of extras. If your favorites were not included, take heart. This is only the first of many promised releases. All in all it would take a Dickens’ Scrooge not to find something to love about this collection. It doesn’t matter if you’re 5 or 105, these cartoons have been a vital part of growing up for all of us.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on October 26th, 2003
Revenge is the theme of what many people consider H.G. Clouzot’s finest film, the 1955 thriller “Diabolique”. This is the story of two women who want to kill the same man. One is his kind and gentle wife, and the other is his attractive but hard-hearted mistress. The two work together to end his life, devising a plan that comes to fruition surprisingly early in the film. What initially appears to be a film about the plotting of a murder turns into a film about something else… something more sinister and unexpected. A...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on October 21st, 2003
Synopsis
The titles and the stars speak for themselves: Errol Flynn, Basil Rathbone and Olivia deHavilland in The Adventures of Robin Hood; James Cagney in Yankee DoodleDandy; Humphrey Bogart in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Of the three,Yankee Doodle Dandy, a musical biopic of singer/dancer/songwriter George M. Cohan,is the one that has been treated the least kindly by the years. Its front and centre flag-waving canbe a bit much, though Cagney’s trem...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on September 20th, 2003
Synopsis
Keith Carradine plays an independent director who has come to Cannes, hoping to sell hismovie (to which he has devoted two years of his life). French Customs seizes the film and won'tlet him bring it into the country. He is helped out by Monica Vitti, wife of a powerful Italianproducer. Before long Carradine and Vitti are in each other's arms. While we are constantlyaware of Vitti's guilt and worry about cheating on her husband, all references to Carradine'sgirlfriend back ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 28th, 2003
Synopsis
Charlton Heston drives around deserted Los Angeles. In the wake of a biological war, he isthe only human survivor of the plague. But he is not alone. At night, psychotic albino zombiescome out to kill him. After two years of war with the zombies (led by TV anchor turned madpreacher Anthony Zerbe), Heston discovers other human survivors. The race is on to see if hisblood can supply an antidote before these last people also perish of the plague. The first half ofthe fi...
