The French Alps in VistaVision and Technicolor really sell this inspirational thriller. Spencer Tracy stars is the utterly ethical mountaineer, and young Robert Wagner his venal, verminous, just plain no damn good younger brother. Make that Much younger. Edward Dmytryk directs for big dimensions and strong emotions, and Paramount’s remaster makes the special effects of the mountain climb look good again. It’s a morality tale pitched at grade school level, and one of Tracy’s better late-career pictures. With Anna Kashfi as a plane crash victim deserving of rescue, and William Demarest as a French priest with a Preston Sturges accent.
The Mountain
Region Free Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint] #198
1956 / Color / 1:78 widescreen (VistaVision) / 105 min. / Street Date February 22, 2023 / Available from [Imprint] / Aud 34.98
Starring: Spencer Tracy, Robert Wagner, Claire Trevor, William Demarest, Barbara Darrow, Richard Arlen, E.G. Marshall, Anna Kashfi, Richard Garrick, Harry Townes.
Cinematography: Franz Planer
Costume Designer: Edith Head
Art Director: Hal Pereira,...
The Mountain
Region Free Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint] #198
1956 / Color / 1:78 widescreen (VistaVision) / 105 min. / Street Date February 22, 2023 / Available from [Imprint] / Aud 34.98
Starring: Spencer Tracy, Robert Wagner, Claire Trevor, William Demarest, Barbara Darrow, Richard Arlen, E.G. Marshall, Anna Kashfi, Richard Garrick, Harry Townes.
Cinematography: Franz Planer
Costume Designer: Edith Head
Art Director: Hal Pereira,...
- 2/28/2023
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Behold — it’s Indiana Jones in embryonic form. Paramount’s South American adventure exploits Peruvian scenery and the ’50s exotica phenomenon that was the unique songstress Yma Sumac. The production receives hearty input from Charlton Heston, Nicole Maurey and Thomas Mitchell, but it’s mostly a relic today. Not because the Raiders films have stolen its thunder . . . because it’s plenty hokey, even for 1954.
Secret of the Incas
Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint] 154
1954 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 102 min. / Street Date August 31, 2022 / Available from [Imprint] / au 39.95
Starring: Charlton Heston, Robert Young, Nicole Maurey, Thomas Mitchell, Glenda Farrell, Michael Pate, Marion Ross, Leon Askin, William Henry, Kurt Katch, Yma Sumac, Booth Colman.
Cinematography: Lionel Lindon, Irmin Roberts
Art Director: Hal Pereira, Tambi Larsen
Film Editor: Eda Warren
Original Music: David Buttolph
Written by Ranald MacDougall & Sydney Boehm, from stories by Boehm and Boehm Maximum
Produced by Mel Epstein
Directed by Jerry Hopper
Everybody loves a good...
Secret of the Incas
Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint] 154
1954 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 102 min. / Street Date August 31, 2022 / Available from [Imprint] / au 39.95
Starring: Charlton Heston, Robert Young, Nicole Maurey, Thomas Mitchell, Glenda Farrell, Michael Pate, Marion Ross, Leon Askin, William Henry, Kurt Katch, Yma Sumac, Booth Colman.
Cinematography: Lionel Lindon, Irmin Roberts
Art Director: Hal Pereira, Tambi Larsen
Film Editor: Eda Warren
Original Music: David Buttolph
Written by Ranald MacDougall & Sydney Boehm, from stories by Boehm and Boehm Maximum
Produced by Mel Epstein
Directed by Jerry Hopper
Everybody loves a good...
- 9/27/2022
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
This creepy-crawly epic enjoyed a strong reputation on my grade-school playground! Does George Pal’s man-versus-the-elements saga hold up 68 years later? The ‘exotic’ special effects get the point across but the real appeal is the suppressed lust between Charlton Heston and his mail order bride Eleanor Parker — all heavy breathing and stern reproaches. I’m surprised nobody has fully exploited the original short story, which back in the ’60s showed up in numerous best-of collections. “Marabunta” is not a new fragrance line from Arpege.
The Naked Jungle
All- Region Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint]
1954 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 95 min. / Street Date December 29, 2021 / Available from [Imprint], Amazon.us /
Starring: Charlton Heston, Eleanor Parker, William Conrad, John Dierkes, Abraham Sofaer, Douglas Fowley, Rodd Redwing.
Cinematography: Ernest Laszlo
Production Designer: Art Director: Hal Pereira, Franz Bachelin
Film Editor: Everett Douglas
Special Photographic Effects: John P. Fulton
Matte artist Jan Domela
Miniatures Ivyl Burks
Optical cinematography Paul K. Lerpae...
The Naked Jungle
All- Region Blu-ray
Viavision [Imprint]
1954 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 95 min. / Street Date December 29, 2021 / Available from [Imprint], Amazon.us /
Starring: Charlton Heston, Eleanor Parker, William Conrad, John Dierkes, Abraham Sofaer, Douglas Fowley, Rodd Redwing.
Cinematography: Ernest Laszlo
Production Designer: Art Director: Hal Pereira, Franz Bachelin
Film Editor: Everett Douglas
Special Photographic Effects: John P. Fulton
Matte artist Jan Domela
Miniatures Ivyl Burks
Optical cinematography Paul K. Lerpae...
- 1/29/2022
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The Criterion Channel’s February Lineup Includes Melvin Van Peebles, Douglas Sirk, Laura Dern & More
Another month, another Criterion Channel lineup. In accordance with Black History Month their selections are especially refreshing: seven by Melvin Van Peebles, five from Kevin Jerome Everson, and Criterion editions of The Harder They Come and The Learning Tree.
Regarding individual features I’m quite happy to see Abderrahmane Sissako’s fantastic Bamako, last year’s big Sundance winner (and Kosovo’s Oscar entry) Hive, and the remarkably beautiful Portuguese feature The Metamorphosis of Birds. Add a three-film Laura Dern collection (including the recently canonized Smooth Talk) and Pasolini’s rarely shown documentary Love Meetings to make this a fine smorgasboard.
See the full list of February titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
Alan & Naomi, Sterling Van Wagenen, 1992
All That Heaven Allows, Douglas Sirk, 1955
The Angel Levine, Ján Kadár, 1970
Babylon, Franco Rosso, 1980
Babymother, Julian Henriques, 1998
Bamako, Abderrahmane Sissako, 2006
Beat Street, Stan Lathan, 1984
Blacks Britannica, David Koff, 1978
The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution,...
Regarding individual features I’m quite happy to see Abderrahmane Sissako’s fantastic Bamako, last year’s big Sundance winner (and Kosovo’s Oscar entry) Hive, and the remarkably beautiful Portuguese feature The Metamorphosis of Birds. Add a three-film Laura Dern collection (including the recently canonized Smooth Talk) and Pasolini’s rarely shown documentary Love Meetings to make this a fine smorgasboard.
See the full list of February titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
Alan & Naomi, Sterling Van Wagenen, 1992
All That Heaven Allows, Douglas Sirk, 1955
The Angel Levine, Ján Kadár, 1970
Babylon, Franco Rosso, 1980
Babymother, Julian Henriques, 1998
Bamako, Abderrahmane Sissako, 2006
Beat Street, Stan Lathan, 1984
Blacks Britannica, David Koff, 1978
The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution,...
- 1/24/2022
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
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By Doug Oswald
Errol Flynn leads a group of American paratroopers into WWII Burma on a pre-invasion expedition in “Objective, Burma!” released on Blu-ray by the Warner Archive Collection. The mission for the paratroopers is to parachute into Burma behind enemy lines, destroy a Japanese radar station and meet up at an old British air strip to be picked up and returned to their base in India. Everything goes as planned and they succeed in destroying the radar installation with no casualties. Mission accomplished. There wouldn’t be much of a movie if things ended with a successful mission and rescue. Naturally, the Japanese are at the airfield ready to destroy the soon-to-arrive C-47 transport aircraft. Flynn orders the aircraft to leave them rather than risk their destruction and he takes his men to a more defendable position in the jungle.
By Doug Oswald
Errol Flynn leads a group of American paratroopers into WWII Burma on a pre-invasion expedition in “Objective, Burma!” released on Blu-ray by the Warner Archive Collection. The mission for the paratroopers is to parachute into Burma behind enemy lines, destroy a Japanese radar station and meet up at an old British air strip to be picked up and returned to their base in India. Everything goes as planned and they succeed in destroying the radar installation with no casualties. Mission accomplished. There wouldn’t be much of a movie if things ended with a successful mission and rescue. Naturally, the Japanese are at the airfield ready to destroy the soon-to-arrive C-47 transport aircraft. Flynn orders the aircraft to leave them rather than risk their destruction and he takes his men to a more defendable position in the jungle.
- 11/8/2021
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Errol Flynn goes to war! One of the last major direct-combat pictures to come out of Hollywood during the war, Raoul Walsh’s finely-crafted ode to the jungle fighters in Burma lets loose a powerful, almost frightening blast of anti-Japanese rage. Errol Flynn earned his pay slugging it out through the swamps, George Tobias provides the Brooklyn humor and Henry Hull the outrage over combat atrocities. And the English were none too happy either, claiming that the movie made it look as if America had done the heavy fighting in what was largely a Brit field of battle.
Objective, Burma!
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1945 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 142 min. / Street Date July 13, 2021 / 21.99
Starring: Errol Flynn, James Brown, William Prince, George Tobias, Henry Hull, Warner Anderson, John Alvin, Mark Stevens, Richard Erdman, Anthony Caruso, Erville Anderson, Hugh Beaumont, Douglas Henderson, William Hudson, Rodd Redwing, George Tyne.
Cinematography: James Wong Howe
Art...
Objective, Burma!
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1945 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 142 min. / Street Date July 13, 2021 / 21.99
Starring: Errol Flynn, James Brown, William Prince, George Tobias, Henry Hull, Warner Anderson, John Alvin, Mark Stevens, Richard Erdman, Anthony Caruso, Erville Anderson, Hugh Beaumont, Douglas Henderson, William Hudson, Rodd Redwing, George Tyne.
Cinematography: James Wong Howe
Art...
- 7/31/2021
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The Criterion Channel’s stellar offerings are continuing next month with a selection of new releases, retrospective, series, and more. Leading the pack is, of course, a horror lineup perfectly timed for Halloween, featuring ’70s classics and underseen gems, including Abel Ferrara’s The Driller Killer (pictured above), Tobe Hopper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, early films by David Cronenberg, Wes Craven, and Brian De Palma, Bill Gunn’s Ganja & Hess, and more.
Also of note is a New Korean Cinema retrospective, featuring a new introduction by critic Grady Hendrix and a conversation between directors Bong Joon Ho and Park Chan-wook, whose Barking Dogs Never Bite, The Host, Mother, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, and Lady Vengeance are part of the lineup, as well as Lee Myung-se’s Nowhere to Hide, and more titles to be announced. Bong’s short Influenza will also arrive, paired with Michael Haneke’s Caché.
Also of note is a New Korean Cinema retrospective, featuring a new introduction by critic Grady Hendrix and a conversation between directors Bong Joon Ho and Park Chan-wook, whose Barking Dogs Never Bite, The Host, Mother, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, and Lady Vengeance are part of the lineup, as well as Lee Myung-se’s Nowhere to Hide, and more titles to be announced. Bong’s short Influenza will also arrive, paired with Michael Haneke’s Caché.
- 9/29/2020
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Harry Belafonte in The World, The Flesh And The Devil is available on Blu-ray From Warner Archive. Order it Here
“Millions Flee from Cities! End of the World!” From a Manhattan skyscraper, Ralph Burton (Harry Belafonte) surveys the emptiness announced by that chilling newspaper headline. Nuclear doomsday has come. Ralph is sure he is the last person alive. Then, a woman (Inger Stevens) appears and the two form a cautious friendship that’s threatened when a third survivor (Mel Ferrer) arrives. Unlike other postapocalyptic thrillers, from The Time Machine to I Am Legend, there are no external monsters to battle here. Instead, the monsters – fear, intolerance, jealousy – lurk inside the all-too human beings. And heightening the intensity of writer/director Ranald MacDougall’s suspenseful and unsettling movie are stunning vistas of unpopulated New York: vast, empty and soulless.
Nuclear doomsday has come. Ralph (Harry Belafonte) is sure he is the last person alive.
“Millions Flee from Cities! End of the World!” From a Manhattan skyscraper, Ralph Burton (Harry Belafonte) surveys the emptiness announced by that chilling newspaper headline. Nuclear doomsday has come. Ralph is sure he is the last person alive. Then, a woman (Inger Stevens) appears and the two form a cautious friendship that’s threatened when a third survivor (Mel Ferrer) arrives. Unlike other postapocalyptic thrillers, from The Time Machine to I Am Legend, there are no external monsters to battle here. Instead, the monsters – fear, intolerance, jealousy – lurk inside the all-too human beings. And heightening the intensity of writer/director Ranald MacDougall’s suspenseful and unsettling movie are stunning vistas of unpopulated New York: vast, empty and soulless.
Nuclear doomsday has come. Ralph (Harry Belafonte) is sure he is the last person alive.
- 11/25/2019
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The world could come to an end in a lot of ways, but 1950s sci-fi was fond of making it end like a One-Act play. Harry Belafonte’s personal project soon drops the spectre of annihilation to cozy up to a statement about race relations. Despite the fact that his co-star Inger Stevens likely had the courage to take the material way, way farther, the last man and woman on Earth don’t even share a kiss. Can’t offend those distributors in Alabama, by golly. The film’s amazingly realistic vision of NYC abandoned after an atomic gas attack is stunning in HD — the show hasn’t lost its appeal, even if it deserts its second theme in favor of a rifle-toting showdown between Belafonte and Mel Ferrer’s villainous third-wheel survivor.
The World The Flesh and The Devil
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1959 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen / 95 min. / Street...
The World The Flesh and The Devil
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1959 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen / 95 min. / Street...
- 11/2/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
It’s tendon-biting combat, with guns, trains, planes, chainsaws, and an indestructible all-terrain vehicle (that still couldn’t stand the potholes in the street of Los Angeles)! Rod Taylor, Jim Brown and Yvette Mimieux blast their way through one of the roughest of the ’60s action spectacles, as mercenaries on a mission of mercy that’s really a venal grab to ‘rescue’ a fortune in diamonds. Director Jack Cardiff pushed the limits of acceptability on this one — legends persist about longer, more egregiously violent cuts.
Dark of the Sun
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1968 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 100 min. / The Mercenaries / Street Date December 18, 2011 / available through the Warner Archive Collection / 19.95
Starring: Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, Peter Carsten, Jim Brown, Kenneth More, André Morell, Olivier Despax, Guy Deghy, Bloke Modisane, Calvin Lockhart.
Cinematography: Edward Scaife.
Film Editor: Ernest Walter
Original Music: Jacques Loussier
Written by Quentin Werty (Ranald MacDougall), Adrian Spies from the...
Dark of the Sun
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1968 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 100 min. / The Mercenaries / Street Date December 18, 2011 / available through the Warner Archive Collection / 19.95
Starring: Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux, Peter Carsten, Jim Brown, Kenneth More, André Morell, Olivier Despax, Guy Deghy, Bloke Modisane, Calvin Lockhart.
Cinematography: Edward Scaife.
Film Editor: Ernest Walter
Original Music: Jacques Loussier
Written by Quentin Werty (Ranald MacDougall), Adrian Spies from the...
- 12/15/2018
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
You can tell it’s film noir — even the cabin cruiser has Venetian blinds. Ernest Hemingway’s favorite film adaptation of his work is this uncompromised story of a good man taking a criminal course on the high seas. John Garfield is again ‘one man alone’ against the system, and the moral quicksand all but swallows up Patricia Neal, Phyllis Thaxter and Wallace Ford.
The Breaking Point
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 889
1950 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 97 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date August 8, 2017 / 39.95
Starring: John Garfield, Patricia Neal, Phyllis Thaxter, Juano Hernandez, Wallace Ford, Edmon Ryan, Ralph Dumke, Guy Thomajan, William Campbell, Sherry Jackson, Donna Jo Boyce, Victor Sen Yung, Peter Brocco, John Doucette.
Cinematography: Ted D. McCord
Film Editor: Alan Crosland Jr.
Original Music: Howard Jackson, Max Steiner
Written by Ranald MacDougall from a novel by Ernest Hemingway
Produced by Jerry Wald
Directed by Michael Curtiz
After...
The Breaking Point
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 889
1950 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 97 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date August 8, 2017 / 39.95
Starring: John Garfield, Patricia Neal, Phyllis Thaxter, Juano Hernandez, Wallace Ford, Edmon Ryan, Ralph Dumke, Guy Thomajan, William Campbell, Sherry Jackson, Donna Jo Boyce, Victor Sen Yung, Peter Brocco, John Doucette.
Cinematography: Ted D. McCord
Film Editor: Alan Crosland Jr.
Original Music: Howard Jackson, Max Steiner
Written by Ranald MacDougall from a novel by Ernest Hemingway
Produced by Jerry Wald
Directed by Michael Curtiz
After...
- 7/22/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
“Cain, Curtiz, And Crawford”
By Raymond Benson
Mildred Pierce is one curious piece of cinema. As film critics Molly Haskell and Robert Polito point out in their fascinating conversation that is a supplement on this beautifully-presented Blu-ray release from The Criterion Collection, Pierce is a movie that almost doesn’t know what it wants to be. In many ways it is a woman’s picture, that is, a melodrama, but it’s disguised inside a manufactured film noir.
This reasoning is sound, for in spite of novelist James M. Cain being known for terrific pulp crime fiction (Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice), his 1941 novel Mildred Pierce is not a crime story, unless you want to say that a young woman having an affair with her stepfather is “criminal.” The book is indeed hardboiled and pulpy, but there is no murder in it.
On the other hand, Michael Curtiz...
By Raymond Benson
Mildred Pierce is one curious piece of cinema. As film critics Molly Haskell and Robert Polito point out in their fascinating conversation that is a supplement on this beautifully-presented Blu-ray release from The Criterion Collection, Pierce is a movie that almost doesn’t know what it wants to be. In many ways it is a woman’s picture, that is, a melodrama, but it’s disguised inside a manufactured film noir.
This reasoning is sound, for in spite of novelist James M. Cain being known for terrific pulp crime fiction (Double Indemnity, The Postman Always Rings Twice), his 1941 novel Mildred Pierce is not a crime story, unless you want to say that a young woman having an affair with her stepfather is “criminal.” The book is indeed hardboiled and pulpy, but there is no murder in it.
On the other hand, Michael Curtiz...
- 2/17/2017
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Stars: Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Ann Blyth, Bruce Bennett, Butterfly McQueen | Written by Ranald MacDougall, Catherine Turney | Directed by Michael Curtiz
The shadow of Casablanca will always loom over Michael Curtiz’s bumper filmography, but time has been nearly as kind to Mildred Pierce, an adaptation of James M. Cain’s 1941 novel. A Joan Crawford vehicle made in 1945, the movie is a solid and relevant story that was remade recently for television by Todd Haynes for HBO – albeit minus the murder subplot, which wasn’t in the original text.
Crawford plays Mildred Pierce-Beragon, a woman hauled in by the police following the shooting of her husband, Monte (a slithery Zachary Scott). Mildred is the prime suspect, but then the film flicks to flashback as she starts telling the story of her rises and falls, and we begin to learn of the machinations that ended in murder.
We meet the younger Mildred,...
The shadow of Casablanca will always loom over Michael Curtiz’s bumper filmography, but time has been nearly as kind to Mildred Pierce, an adaptation of James M. Cain’s 1941 novel. A Joan Crawford vehicle made in 1945, the movie is a solid and relevant story that was remade recently for television by Todd Haynes for HBO – albeit minus the murder subplot, which wasn’t in the original text.
Crawford plays Mildred Pierce-Beragon, a woman hauled in by the police following the shooting of her husband, Monte (a slithery Zachary Scott). Mildred is the prime suspect, but then the film flicks to flashback as she starts telling the story of her rises and falls, and we begin to learn of the machinations that ended in murder.
We meet the younger Mildred,...
- 2/10/2017
- by Rupert Harvey
- Nerdly
Mildred Pierce
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 860
1945 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 111 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date , 2017 /
Starring Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Ann Blyth, Bruce Bennett, Lee Patrick, Moroni Olsen, Veda Ann Borg, Jo Ann Marlowe, Butterfly McQueen.
Cinematography: Ernest Haller
Art Direction: Anton Grot
Film Editor: David Weisbart
Original Music: Max Steiner
Written by: Ranald MacDougall from the novel by James M. Cain
Produced by: Jerry Wald, Jack L. Warner
Directed by Michael Curtiz
James M. Cain’s 1941 novel Mildred Pierce offers a venal and self-destructive view of America not with a story of respectable bourgeois society, not the criminal underworld. A de-classed, suburb-dwelling nobody fights her way onto the social register by using men and by hard work… and then watches as her obsessive goals blow up in her face In Cain’s worldview it’s every woman for herself. He drags in an odd personal theme,...
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 860
1945 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 111 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date , 2017 /
Starring Joan Crawford, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Ann Blyth, Bruce Bennett, Lee Patrick, Moroni Olsen, Veda Ann Borg, Jo Ann Marlowe, Butterfly McQueen.
Cinematography: Ernest Haller
Art Direction: Anton Grot
Film Editor: David Weisbart
Original Music: Max Steiner
Written by: Ranald MacDougall from the novel by James M. Cain
Produced by: Jerry Wald, Jack L. Warner
Directed by Michael Curtiz
James M. Cain’s 1941 novel Mildred Pierce offers a venal and self-destructive view of America not with a story of respectable bourgeois society, not the criminal underworld. A de-classed, suburb-dwelling nobody fights her way onto the social register by using men and by hard work… and then watches as her obsessive goals blow up in her face In Cain’s worldview it’s every woman for herself. He drags in an odd personal theme,...
- 1/28/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Joan Crawford in 'Mildred Pierce.' 'Mildred Pierce' review: Very entertaining soap opera Time has a way of making some films seem grander than they really are. A good example is Mildred Pierce, the 1945 black-and-white melodrama directed by Casablanca's Michael Curtiz, and that won star Joan Crawford a Best Actress Oscar. Mildred Pierce is in no way, shape, or form great art, even though it's certainly not a bad film. In fact, as a soap opera it's quite entertaining – no, make that very entertaining; and entertainment is a quality that can stand on its own. (The problem in recent decades is that cinema has become nothing but entertainment.) In the case of Mildred Pierce, the entertainment is formulaic and rather predictable – but in an enjoyable, campy sort of way. Unbridled Hollywood melodrama Now, what makes Mildred Pierce a melodrama is something known as the Dumbest Possible Action – Dpa for short.
- 12/12/2015
- by Dan Schneider
- Alt Film Guide
This is the End: Zobel’s Post-Apocalyptic Love Triangle
Following the success of his galvanizingly uncomfortable 2012 film Compliance, director Craig Zobel teases his way into genre with subtle sci-fi in Z for Zachariah, based on the novel from Robert C. O’Brien, author of the text that provided the basis for the children’s classic The Secret of Nimh (1982). Zobel’s third film, his meditative take on an oft explored scenario is an intriguing change of pace, and along with screenwriter Nissar Modi, the film retains a low-key, vintage flavor that belies the origins of the source material. Racial identity and issues of science vs. faith break the peaceful lulls of three individuals warped into the death throes of a dying species, but despite the allegorical possibilities, Zobel prefers a slow burn of tenuous desire to simmer into a sometimes underwhelming broth. And yet, it’s exactly the type...
Following the success of his galvanizingly uncomfortable 2012 film Compliance, director Craig Zobel teases his way into genre with subtle sci-fi in Z for Zachariah, based on the novel from Robert C. O’Brien, author of the text that provided the basis for the children’s classic The Secret of Nimh (1982). Zobel’s third film, his meditative take on an oft explored scenario is an intriguing change of pace, and along with screenwriter Nissar Modi, the film retains a low-key, vintage flavor that belies the origins of the source material. Racial identity and issues of science vs. faith break the peaceful lulls of three individuals warped into the death throes of a dying species, but despite the allegorical possibilities, Zobel prefers a slow burn of tenuous desire to simmer into a sometimes underwhelming broth. And yet, it’s exactly the type...
- 8/26/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Joan Crawford Movie Star Joan Crawford movies on TCM: Underrated actress, top star in several of her greatest roles If there was ever a professional who was utterly, completely, wholeheartedly dedicated to her work, Joan Crawford was it. Ambitious, driven, talented, smart, obsessive, calculating, she had whatever it took – and more – to reach the top and stay there. Nearly four decades after her death, Crawford, the star to end all stars, remains one of the iconic performers of the 20th century. Deservedly so, once you choose to bypass the Mommie Dearest inanity and focus on her film work. From the get-go, she was a capable actress; look for the hard-to-find silents The Understanding Heart (1927) and The Taxi Dancer (1927), and check her out in the more easily accessible The Unknown (1927) and Our Dancing Daughters (1928). By the early '30s, Joan Crawford had become a first-rate film actress, far more naturalistic than...
- 8/10/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Commemorating Rod Taylor, we turn to Dark of the Sun, routinely dismissed as a nasty slice of thick-ear but admired by Scorsese for its unflinching brutality and lean, efficient technique: possibly the best film directed by great cinematographer Jack Cardiff, who otherwise could be said to have squandered years on dreck like Girl on a Motorcycle (lovely to look at, inane and obnoxious) and The Mutations (ugly to look at, inaner and obnoxiouser). It's always a bit of a crime when a great specialist becomes an undistinguished all-rounder, and Cardiff's belated return to cinematography was, on the whole, a happy day. His admired first film in the director's chair, Sons and Lovers, looks magnificent, but screenwriter Gavin Lambert felt Cardiff didn't really understand the material.
Well, in a sense the strength of Dark of the Sun, superficially an action/adventure yarn set in the Congo during revolution, is its simplicity:...
Well, in a sense the strength of Dark of the Sun, superficially an action/adventure yarn set in the Congo during revolution, is its simplicity:...
- 1/15/2015
- by David Cairns
- MUBI
Hollywood has given us ''global cooling'' on a grand scale with "The Day After Tomorrow," and it has given us comet strikes and air-borne contagions and "4:44." But when will Hollywood put "global warming" front and center on the silver screen? How much longer do we have to wait a real climate-related script to get greenlighted and for a powerful post-super storm Sandy super-movie era to emerge? Back in 1959, Ranald MacDougall made a sci-fi doomsday flick starring Harry Belafonte, who at the time was the peak of his career. The movie...
- 11/18/2012
- by Dan Bloom
- The Wrap
Those looking for a fun yet challenging way to practise their typing skills will love Learn With Pokémon: Typing Adventure for Nintendo DS, arriving into stores on 21st September 2012 bundled with the Nintendo Wireless Keyboard. Research over 400 Pokémon – including Legendary Pokémon – in this unique, typing-based game.
As you take on the role of the latest member of the Elite Typists’ Club, your typing skills will gradually be tested to the limit as you attempt to accurately type the names of any Pokémon you come across on your journey to help Professor Quentin Werty and his assistant Paige Down with their research.
Fun for beginners and typing pros alike, Learn With Pokémon: Typing Adventure starts you off gently, with early levels only tasking you to type the first letter of a Pokémon’s name before moving you on to much trickier exercises as your typing skills develop.
By typing their names...
As you take on the role of the latest member of the Elite Typists’ Club, your typing skills will gradually be tested to the limit as you attempt to accurately type the names of any Pokémon you come across on your journey to help Professor Quentin Werty and his assistant Paige Down with their research.
Fun for beginners and typing pros alike, Learn With Pokémon: Typing Adventure starts you off gently, with early levels only tasking you to type the first letter of a Pokémon’s name before moving you on to much trickier exercises as your typing skills develop.
By typing their names...
- 8/31/2012
- by Kat
- Nerdly
Point of No Return: A Curtiz Classic Resurrected
While history prizes a 1944 adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s story To Have and Have Not, there does exist a little seen (and more faithful to its source text) 1950 film version of the same story, helmed by Michael Curtiz, titled The Breaking Point. In retrospect, the earlier Howard Hawks version is all glitz and glamor and no guts, its claim to everlasting fame the guttural growl from Lauren Bacall concerning how to put your lips together to do something. Due to the insistence of screenwriter Ranald MacDougall (who wrote the screenplay for Curtiz’s Mildred Pierce and would later direct Ms. Crawford himself for his own debut in Queen Bee), the studio agreed to go forward with another adaptation, though got cold feet upon release due to star John Garfield being named in McCarthy’s witch hunt, and the film, unmarketed and unappreciated,...
While history prizes a 1944 adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s story To Have and Have Not, there does exist a little seen (and more faithful to its source text) 1950 film version of the same story, helmed by Michael Curtiz, titled The Breaking Point. In retrospect, the earlier Howard Hawks version is all glitz and glamor and no guts, its claim to everlasting fame the guttural growl from Lauren Bacall concerning how to put your lips together to do something. Due to the insistence of screenwriter Ranald MacDougall (who wrote the screenplay for Curtiz’s Mildred Pierce and would later direct Ms. Crawford himself for his own debut in Queen Bee), the studio agreed to go forward with another adaptation, though got cold feet upon release due to star John Garfield being named in McCarthy’s witch hunt, and the film, unmarketed and unappreciated,...
- 6/26/2012
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Joan Crawford, Cliff Robertson, Autumn Leaves Betty Barker (photo), Joan Crawford's longtime personal assistant, died last January 27 in Los Angeles. Barker was 95 years old. According to a paid obituary published in the Los Angeles Times, the Los Angeles-born (Sept. 30, 1916) Barker grew up in the L.A. suburb of Alhambra. Following a stint in Washington, D.C., in 1944 Barker returned to Los Angeles, where she began her secretarial career at Rko. Later, she was to become a personal secretary to Howard Hughes, who gained control of the studio in 1948. When Rko officially moved to Las Vegas in 1955, Barker opted to remain in Los Angeles. That's when she began her professional association with Joan Crawford, whom, as per the Times obit, she had known since the early 1930s. By then a Hollywood star for nearly three decades, Crawford was still busy, appearing in movies such as Ranald MacDougall's Queen Bee,...
- 2/16/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
On The Road Letter: Jack Kerouac Wanted Marlon Brando for Dean; Kerouac Would Play Sal [Photo: Leslie Caron.] On the Road was never made into a movie during Jack Kerouac's lifetime. However, the lesser-known The Subterraneans, which Kerouac mentions in his letter to Marlon Brando, was turned into an MGM movie in 1960. Needless to say, the final film had little in common with Kerouac's semi-autobiographical novella about an interethnic romance. In the Subterraneans movie, Kerouac's character, Leo Percepied, is played by George Peppard. The "colored" girl, Mardou Fox, minus the color but with the addition of a French accent is played by Leslie Caron. Others in the film's cast were Janice Rule, Roddy McDowall, Anne Seymour, and Jim Hutton (as the fictional Allan Ginsberg). Former screenwriter Ranald MacDougall (Mildred Pierce, Possessed, The Hasty Heart) directed from a screenplay by Robert Thom. "While none of the portrayals is distinguished," wrote A.H. Weiler in the New York Times,...
- 1/9/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Throughout the month of December, TV Editor Kate Kulzick and Film Editor Ricky D will review classic Christmas adaptions, posting a total of 13 each, one a day, until the 25th of December.
The catch: They will swap roles as Rick takes on reviews of television Christmas specials and Kate takes on Christmas movies. Today is day 14.
We’re No Angels (1955)
Written by Ranald MacDougall
Directed by Michael Curtiz
What’s it about?
A trio of escaped convicts on the lam, Joseph (Humphrey Bogart), Albert (Aldo Ray), and Jules (Peter Ustinov), duck into a shop run by the Ducotels (Leo G. Carroll as Felix and Joan Bennett as Amelie) planning to lay low on the roof ‘til dark, when they’ll rob the place blind and head to their getaway ship. Over the course of the day, however, they become invested in the Ducotels’ struggles and wind up cooking Christmas dinner...
The catch: They will swap roles as Rick takes on reviews of television Christmas specials and Kate takes on Christmas movies. Today is day 14.
We’re No Angels (1955)
Written by Ranald MacDougall
Directed by Michael Curtiz
What’s it about?
A trio of escaped convicts on the lam, Joseph (Humphrey Bogart), Albert (Aldo Ray), and Jules (Peter Ustinov), duck into a shop run by the Ducotels (Leo G. Carroll as Felix and Joan Bennett as Amelie) planning to lay low on the roof ‘til dark, when they’ll rob the place blind and head to their getaway ship. Over the course of the day, however, they become invested in the Ducotels’ struggles and wind up cooking Christmas dinner...
- 12/15/2011
- by Kate Kulzick
- SoundOnSight
Given the unrest across Africa today, it’s easy to forget that there was similar troubles as country after country gained their independence from colonization in the 1950s and 1960s. The Congo crisis, in particular, lasted from 1960-66 as it struggled to establish itself after Belgian rule. Over 100,000 people died during the ordeal and it inspired a 1965 novel, The Dark of the Sun, by Wilbur Smith.
The novel, rather than the actual events, led to the 1968 MGM film adaptation which is finally available on DVD from Warner Archive. The film has been a favorite of directors including Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino who lifted some of the score, and its lead Rod Taylor, for use in last year’s Inglorious Basterds.
Taylor plays mercenary Bruce Curry who is hired by the iron-fisted president Ubi (Calvin Lockhart) to retrieve $50 million in diamonds from the northern country. Accompanied by his Congolese friend...
The novel, rather than the actual events, led to the 1968 MGM film adaptation which is finally available on DVD from Warner Archive. The film has been a favorite of directors including Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino who lifted some of the score, and its lead Rod Taylor, for use in last year’s Inglorious Basterds.
Taylor plays mercenary Bruce Curry who is hired by the iron-fisted president Ubi (Calvin Lockhart) to retrieve $50 million in diamonds from the northern country. Accompanied by his Congolese friend...
- 6/17/2011
- by Robert Greenberger
- Comicmix.com
Jane Greer, Robert Mitchum, Ramon Novarro in Don Siegel's The Big Steal Judy Garland would have turned 89 today. It goes without saying that Garland is one of the stars featured in the Library of Congress Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation's June 2011 schedule. Unfortunately, the Garland screening of For Me and My Gal took place yesterday. So, it's too late for me to recommend it. However, I can still recommend several other gems awaiting movie lovers at the Packard Campus this month. Those include Franklin J. Schaffner's Planet of the Apes (June 10); Ranald MacDougall's Queen Bee (June 16); and the film [...]...
- 6/10/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Possessed (1947) Direction: Curtis Bernhardt Cast: Joan Crawford, Van Heflin, Raymond Massey, Geraldine Brooks, Stanley Ridges, John Ridgely, Moroni Olsen Screenplay: Silvia Richards and Ranald MacDougall; from a story by Rita Weiman Oscar Movies Van Heflin, Joan Crawford, Possessed From the moment we see her shuffling across town in a comatose stupor to the homicidal climax, Possessed is Joan Crawford's picture all the way. And once you get past some of its contrived psychobabble, this Curtis Bernhardt-directed melodrama is also one of her best. [Note: Spoilers ahead.] In Possessed, Crawford plays Louise Howell, a private-duty nurse inexplicably obsessed with David Sutton, a cynical, hard-drinking mechanical engineer played by Van Heflin. That brings up my biggest objection to Possessed: the casting of the bland Heflin in a role that required an actor with a certain amount of animal magnetism. This viewer, for one, was unable to understand what made him put the...
- 3/22/2011
- by Danny Fortune
- Alt Film Guide
Ann Blyth, Zachary Scott, Joan Crawford in Michael Curtiz's Mildred Pierce Mildred Pierce Review Part I Mildred Pierce was adapted from a novel of the same name by James M. Cain, who wrote Double Indemnity and The Postman Always Rings Twice. The adaptation was credited to Ranald MacDougall, though Catherine Turney (Of Human Bondage, A Stolen Life) and novelist William Faulkner were two among several uncredited writers who contributed to the project. Given what I’ve read of Faulkner’s melodramas, it’s no surprise this was right up his alley. Mildred Pierce also has a fine soap-operatic score by Max Steiner, with just enough gravy in the right places to make the silliness entertain. The cinematography by Ernest Haller (who won an Oscar for Gone with the Wind), and the editing by David Weisbart are solid if prosaic. The lack of a real "vision" in classic Hollywood films...
- 2/17/2011
- by Dan Schneider
- Alt Film Guide
With Double Indemnity and The Postman Always Rings Twice, James M. Cain wrote two classic hard-boiled novels that Hollywood turned into two of the best films noir ever made. After...
- 2/9/2011
- by Ryan Adams
- AwardsDaily.com
This is melodrama at its finest! But then again, the source material was a 1941 James M. Cain novel of the same name, which became a 1945 Academy Award-winning film starring Joan Crawford. The actress won an Oscar that year, and Eve Arden (Best Supporting Actress), Ann Blyth (Best Supporting Actress), Ernest Haller (Best Cinematography, Black-and-White), and Ranald MacDougall (Best Screenplay) were all nominated. The film was nominated for Best Picture as well but lost to "The Lost Weekend."
The film is a you-go-girl kinda movie where Mildred Pierce Beragon, frustrated by her unemployed cheating husband, seek out to support herself and her children. But then, there's her ungrateful child named Veda which is played by Evan Rachel Wood -- I love her!
Winslet plays Mildred Pierce, and judging from the trailer, she's great, but I'm wondering how this material will play with this generation now. It'll be interesting to see what...
The film is a you-go-girl kinda movie where Mildred Pierce Beragon, frustrated by her unemployed cheating husband, seek out to support herself and her children. But then, there's her ungrateful child named Veda which is played by Evan Rachel Wood -- I love her!
Winslet plays Mildred Pierce, and judging from the trailer, she's great, but I'm wondering how this material will play with this generation now. It'll be interesting to see what...
- 9/15/2010
- by Manny
- Manny the Movie Guy
[Safe] and Far From Heaven director Todd Haynes is moving to television for his next project, a mini-series adaptation of James M. Cain's classic noir novel Mildred Pierce. He's given Kate Winslet the nod to take the title role, a woman struggling to survive the depression and protect her daughter amidst a complex set of betrayals and even murder. It's the character that gave Joan Crawford her only Best Actress Oscar win, courtesy of Michael Curtiz' truly splendid 1945 feature film. Curtiz and his screenwriters Ranald MacDougall, William Faulkner and Catherine Turney took a number of creative liberties with Cain's novel, most notably changing its entire structure and set-up. Unlike the linear novel, the film recounts the story in flashback after Mildred Pierce has been arrested on suspicion of murder. It works quite wonderfully, and definitely creates even more of a sweaty and desperate tone than the novel has, and...
- 8/14/2009
- by Brendon Connelly
- Slash Film
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