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Best of Everything, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on May 6th, 2005

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Synopsis

The setting is a top New York publishing house, and our central characters are three womenbeginning their careers at the bottom of the secretarial ladder. Hope Lange is the smart one witha will, who might make a first-class editor. Diane Baker is the naive innocent, doomed to bepreyed on. Suzy Parker wants to dump the office pool for acting, and she begins a difficultrelationship with theatre director Louis Jourdan. Meanwhile, there is tyrannical editor JoanCrawford (whose …
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Steve McQueen Collection

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on May 1st, 2005

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Synopsis

This is an interesting collection, with two of the films being among the most famous SteveMcQueen was ever involved with, and the other two being noticeably less high profile. TheMagnificent Seven (1960) is one of the last and greatest of the straightforward westerns,before the deconstruction of the genre at the hands of Sergio Leone and Sam Peckinpah, andeven here the death of the west is foregrounded theme, with Yul Brynner, McQueen, JamesCoburn, Charles Bronson an…
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Frank Sinatra Collection

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 27th, 2005

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Synopsis

Directed by Gordon (Them!) Douglas, these three crime thrillers have Frank Sinatra doing his best hard boiled as he unravels complicated (and not always entirely comprehensible) mysteries.

Tony Rome (1967) has Sinatra in Miami Beach as the titular PI, a former cop who still has plenty of connections. A simple task — returning a drunk young woman to her rich father — leads to a web of murder and blackmail as all sorts of interested parties chasing around, beating up …
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Attack on the Iron Coast

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 26th, 2005

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Synopsis

Lloyd Bridges is the Major in the Canadian forces who is seeking redemption for a failed raid. His audacious plan is to attack the German’s fortified docks in occupied France. His scheme is opposed by Brit Captain Andrew Keir, whose son died in the earlier raid, but Keir finds himself captaining the substandard ship as the raid begins.

This is pretty run-of-the-mill WWII action, the kind of film that is virtually indistinguishable from uncountable others, all fodder for three-a.m. …
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Stella Dallas

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 26th, 2005

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Synopsis

Miner’s daughter Barbara Stanwyck sets her cap for John Boles, a New England aristocrat who has fled financial disgrace and sought honest work far from home. She lands him, and they marry, but almost immediately their very different backgrounds create tension. When he finds work in New York, she refuses to move with him, and they grow further apart. Meanwhile, their daughter spends most of her time with Stanwyck, but her visits to New York become more and more wonderful, as far as she is con…
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Quiet American, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 13th, 2005

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Synopsis

Michael Redgrave is a cynical British journalist posted in 1952 Saigon, happily far awayfrom his estranged wife. He views both sides of the French and Communist war with equalindifference, and likes the comfortable arrangement he has with his Vietnamese girlfriend(Giorgia Moll), a woman whose intelligence he hardly seems to respect. Everything goes tosmash for him when a polite young American (Audie Murphy) shows up. Redgrave finds hisidealism suspicious, if not actively da…
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Amityville Horror Collection, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 4th, 2005

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Synopsis

The Amityville Horror (1979) remains one of the most successful haunted house movies ever. Based on a supposedly true story (emphasis on “supposedly”), the film sees George and Kathy Lutz (James Brolin and Margot Kidder) buy their dream home, only to be driven out by supernatural events (little girl makes friends with demonic piggie, blood runs from the walls, and so on). In scenes that have so little to do with the rest of the action they might almost belong to a separate movie, Rod …
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Barbary Coast

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 21st, 2005

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Synopsis

During the gold rush, Miriam Hopkins arrives in the lawless new city of San Francisco, onlyto discover that her fiancé has been killed. Penniless, but determined to make her way, she hastop-dog casino owner Edward G. Robinson fall in love with her, though she strategically holdshim at bay. She makes a financial killing, but the price she has paid is driven home when sheencounters poet/prospector Joel McCrea.

McCrea is an odd casting choice as a poet, and he is a poe…
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Jonny Quest – The Complete First Season

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 13th, 2005

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This show the bomb diggity yo! Seriously though, Jonny Quest in a way revolutionized cartoons in the sense of realism that they tried to convey. Some of the cartoons that have come out since have done a pretty good job of it, but not too many shows were touching on topics such as laser technology, rockets and other concepts then looked at as “futuristic.” And put up against other shows of that era, the animation on Jonny Quest had an almost comic-book like feel to it, and it was a nice change of pace from the …
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Bustin’ Loose

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 12th, 2005

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Synopsis

Incorrigible and not altogether competent small-time crook Richard Pryor has pulled one fastone too many. His exasperated parole officer threatens him with a long jail term unless he agreesto drive a group of special education students in a rickety bus from Philadelphia to Seattle, wherethey will find a new home. All sorts of misadventures await along the road trip.

There’s a vaguely gritty atmosphere, which helps defuse some of the sentimentality, and thekids are h…
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Francis of Assisi

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 25th, 2005

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Synopsis

The saint of the title (Bradford Dillman) begins as a very secular young man, eager to sign upfor the war in which the Pope is engaged. But it is during this conflict that he receives a visionfrom God, and renounces violence. This is perceived as cowardice by some (such as the father ofhis sweetheart) but as inspiring principle by others (such as said sweetheart, Dolores Hart). Thehumble holy man eventually runs up against politics within the Church.

Michael Curtiz …
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Panic in the Streets

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 22nd, 2005

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Synopsis

Feeling deathly ill, an illegal immigrant leaves a poker game, only to be ambushed andmurdered by three of the other players (the most notable of whom are Zero Mostel and a youngand scary Jack Palance, here appearing as Walter Jack Palance). When his body is found the nextmorning, the victim is discovered to have been sick with pneumonic plague. Doctor RichardWidmark, in charge of public health, takes over, and is initially at loggerheads with DetectivePaul Douglas, who is …
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Agony and the Ecstasy, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 22nd, 2005

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Synopsis

Charlton Heston is Michelangelo, busy at work on the monumental sculptures he proposesfor the tomb of Pope Julius II (Rex Harrison). Julius has other ideas, however, and ordersMichelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, which is the last thing the sculptor wantsto do. The film then follows his struggles with the monumental task, as well as the clash ofpersonalities.

There’s more than a whiff of Heston as Michelangelo as Moses, and Harrison as Julius as…
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Laura

Posted in Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 21st, 2005

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Synopsis

Dana Andrews is in suitably hard-boiled mode as the detective called in to investigate thedeath of beautiful society woman Laura (Gene Tierney). There are plenty of suspects, as Laurainspired passion on all sides. Accompanying Andrews on his investigation is misanthropiccolumnist Clifton Webb, whose protege Laura was. Chief suspect is fickle fiancé Vincent Price,but Andrews isn’t ruling anyone out, as his questioning leads to flashbacks that take us towardthe moment of the …
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Room with a View, A

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on June 10th, 2004

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Joe Queenan is one of my favorite writers. He is the author of wonderfully amusing essays and books dealing with the subject of film. In his book Confessions of a Cineplex Heckler, he is bold enough to take on the challenge of watching every Merchant Ivory film, back-to-back. At one point late in the narrative, he has this to say:

As I sat there in my reclining chair with my kids lighting matches to my feet, I realized that God had created Merchant and Ivory for only one reason: because otherwise …
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Great Escape, The

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 27th, 2004

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All too often, films with an ensemble cast are a dream for the studio’s marketing department, but end up being a nightmare for the moviegoer. They are the very definition of the phrase, “too many Chiefs and not enough Indians”. There are exceptions to this rule (such as Steven Soderberg’s re-make of Ocean’s 11), but more often than not, such films fall flat, as everybody leads in their own direction, and nobody follows.

Thankfully, this is one of those rare exceptions. Each member of the cast of T…
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Give My Regards to Broad Street

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on May 5th, 2004

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As a music lover, the phrase, “written by Paul McCartney” almost always signifies excellence in the performance to come. For a movie lover, this is not necessarily the case. Sure, A Hard Day’s Night is a great film, Help! is better than average, and Yellow Submarine is a fun departure from mainstream animation. Heck, even Magical Mystery Tour has a campy sort of charm to it.

Apparently, the same rule that applies to music also applies to cinema; without the rest of The Beatles, P…
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High Wind in Jamaica, A

Posted in Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on March 28th, 2004

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Often, the success of one film in theaters will bring on a wave of classics on DVD with a similar theme. In this case, the new films are Pirates of the Caribbean and Master and Commander. These modern box office successes have prompted 20th Century Fox to release some classic films about the high seas onto DVD. One such film is A High Wind in Jamaica.

There are quite a few problems with this film, but most of them lie within the narrative. The technical aspects are all handled well, wit…
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