Category: Watching

Movie: Arena (1989)

Unexpectedly, I had fun watching the first three films on Arrow’s blu-ray box Empire of Scream: Enter the Video Store.  These were low-budget films with aspirations well beyond their budgets.  Each actually had some effects, dialog, performances and plot developments I had not anticipated.  Then I got to the fourth disc, Arena, and it was […]

Movie: The Mad Room (1969)

1969’s The Mad Room is a suspense thriller with Shelley Winters in the largest of the supporting roles.  That alone may tell you everything you need to know about this film and decide whether or not it is right for you. The actual star is Stella Stevens, as the secretary to Winters.  Winters had been […]

Movie: Crime of Passion (1956)

Barbara Stanwyck is a newspaper columnist being pressured by a misogynist cop to surrender the location of a woman who murdered her husband.  Her face says “you and what army?” while her mouth says, “Make me.” This happens early in 1956’s Crime of Passion.  This is a picture usually labelled as a film noir, but […]

Movie: Targets (1968)

In the essays and extras accompanying the Criterion Collection blu-ray of Targets, Peter Bogdanovich goes to great pains to state his movie does not have an anti-gun perspective.  Methinks he protests too much, as it is hard to believe there wasn’t this intention behind it.  Then again, George Romero has always been insistent Night of […]

Movie: The Galloping Major (1951)

I’m not up to it anymore, but I have camped out on sidewalks overnight for many of the past years’ Record Store Days.  In 1951’s The Galloping Major, Basil Radford is much older than I am now, and yet he should have camped out overnight at a horse auction that is essential to the plot.  […]

Movie: Appointment with a Shadow (1957)

On October 3, 2027, I will have gone twenty years without a drink.  I look forward to celebrating that anniversary with a round of shots.  I kid!  Well, about the shots, at least.  About the temperance, not so much.  I guess since I write under an alias, I really put the “anonymous” in Alcoholics Anonymous. […]

Movie: The Black Cat (1941)

I am increasingly wondering what qualifies as “horror” in selections chosen for the Universal Horror series of blu-ray sets Scream Factory has been issuing.  Tower of London, to cite one example, was entirely a history drama, with the only trappings of the genre being the castle’s torture chamber. 1941’s The Black Cat is a comedy […]

Movie: One Way Street (1950)

Many movies stumble to some extent in their second acts.  On rare occasions, a picture might hit its stride in the second half, only for me to be let down by the third.  Such is the case with 1950’s One Way Street. This curious noir stars James Mason as a doctor who flees gangster Dan […]

Movie: Moonfall (2022)

How strange it is that, with studios creating any and all kinds of spectaculars to lure audiences back to theatres, we don’t have many big, loud and stupid sci-fi blockbusters anymore (emphasis on stupid).  Mind you, I always found films like Armageddon laughable, at best.  Today, it is rare for there to even be another […]

Movie: Undercover Girl (1950)

Except in melodramas, women were rarely top billed in features in 1950.  Alexis Smith is the lead of that year’s Undercover Girl, as the title character.  That this is a female-led noir is a reason to seek this out, but there is more of interest here than that. When we first meet Smith, at the […]

Movie: Angel Face (1952)

It is often hard to decide whether a film is noir or not.  In many regards, the 1952 feature Angel Face has the trappings of that genre.  On the other hand, it is very heavy on the melodrama.  That doesn’t automatically disqualify a film from being noir but, in my mind, it makes it more […]

Movie: David Lynch: The Art Life (2016)

Despite being a fan of most of the David Lynch’s films, I have always found him a tad suspect.  As time goes on, I increasingly find something off-putting about him.  This, despite his aw-shucks demeanor and Jimmy Stewart voice.  Or, it may be because of it.  I felt the same after watching the 2016 documentary […]