This year I’ve had the privilege to do a lot of work for Corinth Films in aid of their 60th anniversary release of The Bicycle Thief. (NOTE: “Bicycle Thieves” is the title most often used in Canada and elsewhere these days because it’s a more accurate translation of the Italian title “Ladri di biciclette” but [...]
Posts from ‘October, 2009’
Time for Halloween and “Top Ten” lists
It’s Halloween and I’ve been getting requests for a “Top Ten” list. This list is my “fun” one. It identifies movies I tend to habitually re-screen because of the unique, often personal, pleasures they offer. The descriptions attempt to detail what those are. I found myself incapable of limiting them to only ten, hence this [...]
Halloween Pick # 1 | “Dawn of the Dead” (1978)
Most agree if you can make it through the gory National Guard scene that opens the film, you can stomach the rest of it. It’s worth it if you can. The story of Dawn of the Dead is one of my favorite set-ups. Zombies overrun the world and our heroes manage to find temporary haven [...]
Halloween Pick # 2 | “Dead Alive” (aka “Braindead”)
When I heard Peter Jackson was making the Lord of the Rings films, I knew it would impressive. I had already seen all of his early films and, despite their much smaller budgets, he made sure he stretched every penny. He never skimped on putting as much on the screen as he could. Imagine what [...]
Halloween Pick # 3 | “Evil Dead II”
Just like Peter Jackson, Spider-Man director Sam Raimi proved his ability to make exciting cinema on a low budget with his first film The Evil Dead. He then topped himself with Evil Dead II, which is more like a remake done Three Stooges-style. Our hero is Ash (Bruce Campbell) who takes his girlfriend to a [...]
Halloween Pick # 4 | “Gremlins 2: The New Batch”
You really have to be a movie geek to appreciate and enjoy Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Rarely has a film paid homage to so many movies that few have ever seen, including a centrepiece musical number from the 1934 musical Dames. After Gremlins was a success in 1984 Warner Brothers hounded director Joe Dante [...]
Halloween Pick # 5 | “The Hitcher” (1986)
This is one tight little thriller. The story involves a young man named Jim Halsey (C. Thomas Howell) who meets a serial killer (Rutger Hauer) and does the one thing no other victim has done before. He escapes. With that he wins the grand prize — the honor of being the one who gets to [...]
Halloween Pick # 6 | “Jaws”
This story of a killer shark that menaces a resort beach is one box-office hit that still holds up well after nearly 35 years. Director Steven Spielberg later admitted that Jaws works because the shark didn’t. He originally intended to have more graphic footage of the shark in action, but the mechanical prop they built [...]
Halloween Pick # 7 | “Manhunter”
Manhunter originally did poorly in theatres and, my guess is, it’s because the poster art was terrible. The film has since gained a more appreciative audience on video, as well as curiosity for it being the first film to introduce the character of Hannibal Lector. To me Brian Cox‘s quiet portrayal of Lector, trapped in [...]
Halloween Pick # 8 | “Shaun of the Dead”
When IDT Entertainment (now Starz Media) was doing pre-production on Masters of Horror they asked for my opinion about possible directors they wanted to approach. They were thinking about people like Eli Roth and Rob Zombie. I suggested Kevin Smith (even though the closest thing he came to horror was the poop-monster in Dogma). To [...]
Halloween Pick # 9 | “The Shining”
Like all of Stanley Kubrick‘s films, The Shining gets better with age and repeated viewings. Despite the popular perception that Kubrick was fiercely independent, and a Hollywood outsider (he had made England his home since the 1960s) he really had a warm relationship with Warner Brothers. After 2001: A Space Odyssey they signed a unique [...]
Halloween Pick # 10 | “Starship Troopers”
I love space adventures. Hollywood never makes enough of them, and I don’t know why. I know I’m not alone. Television is full of popular series in this genre and, with CGI as effective as it is today, it should be easy to produce gobs of them. For now I have to relish the few [...]
Halloween Pick # 11 | “The Thing From Another World” (1951)
If enough time passes between viewings of The Thing, I forget when the scary bits happen. Nowadays I’m so jaded by the horror genre, few things frighten me anymore. But this one always gets me. Especially the big “Boo!” moment. You’ll know it when it happens. Watch that scene carefully, kids. If you want to [...]
Halloween Pick # 12 | “Tremors” & “Tremors 2: Aftershocks”
When I lived in the town of Whitby many years ago, I had a summer job where I rode around in a beat-up truck, emptying garbage cans and doing maintenance work. My companion was a grizzled middle-aged guy who always insisted on driving. He was the boss, and he was grumpy, but we had fun. [...]
The Goodies and the “Baby Army”
PBS scored themselves a big hit when they started broadcasting Monty Python’s Flying Circus in the 1970s and, to help keep the ball rolling, they also briefly aired another popular Brit series called The Goodies. While Monty Python was more adult in nature (occasional coarse language and nudity), and had a heavy reliance on verbal [...]
New on video for October 27/09 | “Night of the Creeps”
Director: Fred Dekker Writer: Fred Dekker Cast: Tom Atkins, Jason Lively, Jill Whitlow, Steve Marshall Distributor: TriStar Pictures Cdn video distributor: Sony Pictures Night of the Creeps is a zombie/sci-fi/comedy hybrid that mostly passed without notice when released in 1986. Over the years the film has steadily developed a cult following amongst horror fans. Generally [...]
New on video for October 27/09 | “Whatever Works”
2009 | U.S. | 92 minutes Director: Woody Allen Writer: Woody Allen Cast: Larry David, Evan Rachel Wood, Patricia Clarkson, Ed Begley Jr. Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics Cdn video distributor: Maple Pictures Woody Allen has always insisted his films are not autobiographical, but when a Jewish New York filmmaker, who married his ex-lover‘s adopted daughter [...]
New on video for October 20/09 | “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”
2009 | U.S. | 150 minutes Director: Michael Bay Writers: Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, John Turturro, Ramon Rodriguez Distributor: DreamWorks SKG Cdn video distributor: Paramount Home Entertainment The negative reviews for Transformers: The Revenge of the Fallen all share a similar opinion. It’s noisy and incomprehensible. These naysayers [...]
New on video for October 13/09 | “The Stepfather”
1987 | U.S./U.K. | 89 minutes Director: Joseph Ruben Writer: Donald E. Westlake Cast: Terry O’Quinn, Shelley Hack, Jill Schoelen, Charles Lanyer, Stephen Shellen Distributor: New Century Cdn video distributor: Shout Factory The 1980s were a popular time for slasher films but, by the late 1980s, the formula of gory death at the hands of [...]
New on video for October 13th/09 | “Sunchaser”
1996 | U.S. | 122 minutes Director: Michael Cimino Writer: Charles Leavitt Cast: Woody Harrelson, Jon Seda Distributed by: Warner Brothers Cdn video distributor: Warner Home Video By the time Michael Cimino directed Sunchaser in 1996, his name had long-lost its star power. The film didn’t even get a theatrical release (at least not in [...]