What Films Have You Seen Recently?

[Handyman Joe]

Let's go with a dirty dozen

The Two Mrs Carrolls - An old school entertainment. Melodramatic shenanigans laced with neat noir, Bogie as a tortured, torturing painter, Babs Stanwyck in silent era swooning mode, Nigel Bruce borderline unwatchable as a dipso doctor.
The worst Scottish accent outside of Brigadoon courtesy of garrulous help 'McGregor'. The storm lashed OTT climax is hilarious. Perfect lazy day fodder.

Inner Sanctum - A creepy old guy from the Twilight Zone dishes out prophecy on a hurtling train. A bored broad putting on make up isn't interested - she should be though. Cue flashback, killing, the worst 50s Gee Whizz kid ever (this little shit wears an aeroplane propeller hat), a murderous drifter, a blonde looking for a way out of Hicksville , drunken Uncle Willie - are you following this? The kind of whacked out obscurity that made me fall in love with 40s cinema.

Railroaded - Anthony Mann, James Alton - say no more - great tight little noir with John Ireland (see also Red River) memorable as a relentless thug.

Cinema Paradiso - Yet another classic I'd never seen - took a while to win me over - I'm a rotten cynic allergic to sentiment - but by the end I needed to see the directors cut - and I will.

Bend of the River - I love Jimmy Stewart, but Jimmy Stewart as a Western hero? - I'm not convinced - he just lacks the gravitas of a Wayne or a Scott, just too decent, he never seems the equal of these landscapes, these life or death situations. That said he's been in some classics - The Naked Spur and The Man From Laramie to name two. This though, is second tier - as usual Arthur Kennedy steals the show as the shifty villain - it's OK.

The House on Telegraph Hill - Dodgy concentration camp flashback (1949 - too soon?) segues into familiar inheritance based noir set in a not Gothic enough house. All a bit ho hum, Richard Basehart is a bland villain and nothing raises this above programmer level

Gaslight - the Cuckor one with Ingmar Bergman - a thoroughly classy affair, the old controlling monster, fragile heroine, sanity clause affair. Check out the 20 something Angela Landsbury as a cheeky maid. Joseph Cotten as the good guy. Well worth a look - I'll be checking out the British version this weekend.

The Breaking Point - CLASSIC - even if you don't normally watch vintage movies, make sure you see this John Garfield movie. It's simply a fantastic story, beautifully acted with a stunning last act. The final shot haunted me for days and prefigures US history to the present day.

We Are the Best - Great little movie about 3 girls in 80s Sweden trying to start a punk band. Feel good without being sickly and the ending brilliantly subverts all the underdog triumphant Billy Elliot type cliches. On Netflix UK

The Muppet Movie - Never seen it before! Great checklist of fame circa 1979. Steve Martins scene as a snotty waiter made me misty eyed for my teenage years when he was my comedy God. Orson Welles crops up!

Mad Max Fury Road - can only echo everyone else - unbelievable cinema experience. Best review I read - Fast and the Furious directed by Hieronymous Bosch - absolutely, every shot is a work of art yet it kicks vast arse. Amazing, bravo Mr Miller.

Red River - heard this was somewhat boring - not for me - I thought it was a blast with Wayne brilliant, possibly the best I've seen him . Ending rightly inspires controversy - bit of a cop out. Great film though.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by Handyman Joe

Bend of the River - I love Jimmy Stewart, but Jimmy Stewart as a Western hero? - I'm not convinced - he just lacks the gravitas of a Wayne or a Scott, just too decent, he never seems the equal of these landscapes, these life or death situations. That said he's been in some classics - The Naked Spur and The Man From Laramie to name two. This though, is second tier - as usual Arthur Kennedy steals the show as the shifty villain - it's OK.

Can i recommend Night Passage (1957) to you?

After a slow burn build up it's a terrific western with Stewart ably supported by Audie Murphy, Dan Duryea and Jack Elam, culminating in an excellent location shoot out at a saw mill.

[Buboven]

Crawlspace (1986)

This seems like an underrated effort with a brilliantly subtle performance by Klaus Kinski.

8/10.

[keirarts]

Originally Posted by Buboven

Crawlspace (1986)

This seems like an underrated effort with a brilliantly subtle performance by Klaus Kinski.

8/10.

[Vipp]

Originally Posted by Handyman Joe

Gaslight - the Cuckor one with Ingmar Bergman - a thoroughly classy affair, the old controlling monster, fragile heroine, sanity clause affair. Check out the 20 something Angela Landsbury as a cheeky maid. Joseph Cotten as the good guy. Well worth a look - I'll be checking out the British version this weekend.

That's a great mini review mate, I adore this movie, it still managed to pack a punch for me. I will eventually pick up the BFI blu-ray/dvd set of this.

[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Taken 3 (2014)

Nowhere near as good as Taken and probably not as good as the sequel. Taken 3 is still a hugely enjoyable action thriller with some exciting set pieces.

The whole Liam Neeson does The Fugitive thing felt a bit tired, and at times i was waiting for Tommy Lee Jones to show up. The whole thing just lacks that certain excitable energy that ran through the Paris set original, and to be honest, it could have been a vehicle for any of our current action stars.

Lovers of high octane action thrillers such as myself will enjoy Taken 3 ,but i doubt it will win over any new fans.

[iank]

Saw The Hound of the Baskervilles (1959) last night. Well made and well acted and entertaining enough, though it got a bit slow in the second half. Think I still prefer the Brett version all told.

[keirarts]

The Rain Killer.

A raincoat wearing killer is out in Los Angeles killing of women who were members of a support group for ex-addicts called the sowing circle. The killer is dubbed the rain killer as he only strikes on rainy nights washing away all the evidence. Two LA homicide detectives (including an early role for Michael Chicklis) team up with an FBI agent to track him down.

Executive produces by Roger Corman, Rain Killer is a Hard Boiled detective story set on the rainy, neon soaked streets of LA (in spite of it only raining twice a year in LA ) There's plenty of Booze, strippers and violence and shades of Italian Giallo pictures in the mix. It's made around 1990 so has some of the hangover of 80's cinema as well, however its plot is decent, the ending surprisingly bleak and the Scorpion Blu-ray looks phenomenal.


Food of the Gods

Some Football players head out to a remote island for some R&R and one of their group gets attacked by Giant wasps. Looking for help they stumble upon a farm house where the chickens have grown to huge size (cue some huge cock jokes from me) and the farmers wife, played by Ida Lupino advises them her husband has gone to the city to sell some of the weird shit that's started bubbling up from under the ground that has caused this enormous growth spurt. Having heard enough the Jocks leave, only to head back with shotguns. Unfortunately it may be too late as the local rat population has eaten some of the food and now the island is beset by giant rats.

Food is an entertaining monster movie from Bert I Gordon that has the traditional occasionally ropey effects work and giant monsters you would expect. It has a message about humans contaminating the food chain thats relevant today. My only real gripe is that some of those rat deaths look mighty realistic.

Frogs.

Sam Elliot plays a nature photographer who washes up on the island of Jason Crockett, played to curmudgeonly perfection by the late great Ray Milland. Jason lives on the island like a self styled southern gentleman, meaning he's a belligerent, patriarchal racist with anger management issues and a casual disregard for environmental issues. While its possible he could have been elected to a position of high authority in modern America he's decided instead to poison all the wildlife on his property. Mother nature is a vengeful bitch in these kinds of movies so Crockett and his family soon find nature has begun to rebel against them, all led by the numerous large frogs found around the island.

Frogs gets a lot of slagging in reviews, however I really like it. Tonally its reminiscent of the Australian film Long weekend though it actually came out a good few years before Weekend. It is a strange beast, frogs themselves are not an especially threatening creature (unless your phobic) however the constant monotonous croaking does add a weird, oppressive atmosphere to proceedings. The countless footage of reptiles and birds of all varieties is of a high standard and its depiction of upper class Americas wilful disregard for its own land is still relevant today.

Frogs is an underrated nature amok movie that deserves a reappraisal.

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

Originally Posted by keirarts

Frogs is an underrated nature amok movie that deserves a reappraisal.

The trailer is quite often played on Cult Labs radio which, with your review, makes me want to find my DVD and give it another watch.

[Nosferatu@Cult Labs]

I consider myself quite well educated in, and acquainted with, the slasher films of the 1970s and '80s, having spent more time and money than I should have watching the films and reading such books as Justin Kerswell's Teenage Wasteland. I'm consistently surprised at how many films I haven't seen, not just sequels, which are easily missed, but some of the numerous original films which and related from the genre's 'golden age'.

X–Ray (aka Hospital Massacre, Ward 13 and Be My Valentine, or Else…), was written and directed by Boaz Davidson, whose previous film was Lemon Popsicle, made four years previously, and was made for the Golan-Globus production team and Cannon Films.

It begins with an opening sequence similar to that in Prom Night, when a cruel joke perpetrated by two children results in a death – in this case, the popular Susan Jeremy receives a Valentine's card from a neighbourhood boy called Harold who, after seeing her crumple up the card, in a fit of anger, hangs her friend David from a hat stand.

Nineteen years later, the recently divorced Susan goes to the hospital on Valentine's Day to collect some test results and, on the way into the building, is watched by a man several floors up, who is dressed in surgical scrubs and stroking a photo of a young Susan. When she is on her way up, the masked stranger sabotages her elevator in order to murder the doctor who has her records. The unfortunate janitor who finds the body has his face dunked in acid! While she is waiting for the doctor, Susan persuades an intern into looking at her results, which he notices are strange, with something definitely amiss, but this may be due to a 'con job' and, when he goes to investigate, he disappears.

This is only the beginning of Susan's problems, because she is kept on the ward – even strapped to her bed – by medical staff who refuse to believe her when she tells them there is someone after her and her life may be in danger. Part of the film's appeal comes from the nightmarish setting, with events taking place inside the worst hospital in the entire world from which, at least for Susan, there is no escape. Whether it was intended to be a commentary on the American health care system, or whether that's an interpretation made after the fact is open for debate, but it works either way.

Probably because I'd seen Prom Night and other similar slasher films, I guessed the identity of the masked psychopath very early on, but this didn't spoil my enjoyment of the film. Davidson proves as adept with a horror/thriller as with a teen comedy and, even though his intention was to write the screenplay for someone else to direct and he found himself helming the project due to several factors which I won't go into here, he does a great job with some of the suspenseful scenes and, especially, the gory ones, also in eliciting a terrific performance from Playboy pin up Barbi Benton, who can scream with the best of them!

The A/V quality on the new 88 Films BD is excellent and there are two very good interviews, one with Boaz Davidson, and another with cinematographer Nicholas Josef von Sternberg. I haven't listened to the commentary with Calum Waddell and Justin Kerswell yet, but I intend to do this tonight.

Highly recommended.