Tay Garnett's The Postman Always Rings Twice, adapted from the James M. Cain novel of the same name, is film noir boiled down to its rawest essence. Its plot is frankly preposterous, twisty and packed with one absurd contrivance after another, and yet
One usually doesn't think of a stridently avant-garde filmmaker like Derek Jarman making rock music videos, but during the late 70s and 80s the British director frequently contributed to the music video form, crafting videos for the Sex Pistols and Marianne
None of the films producer Val Lewton made for RKO in the 40s could be described as conventional horror films, despite their pulp novel titles and horror premises, but The Ghost Ship, Lewton's fifth film and second with director Mark Robson, is possibly
With his snub-nosed mug, intense squint and purposeful stride, Lee Marvin is an archetypal screen tough guy, an image of brutality and stoicism carved in unflinching stone. In John Boorman's pulpy neo-noir Point Blank Marvin plays Walker, a mystery man
Rainer Werner Fassbinder's final film was the bizarre, abrasive and often unbearably silly Querelle, an unsettling final note in a brief but prolific career defined by the director's near-total disregard for conventions. An adaptation of a novel by Jean
Paul Landres' overlooked 50s horror great The Return of Dracula could be subtitled, with some justification, "Dracula Goes to the Suburbs." And yet the film does not, as that premise might suggest, play up the campy silliness or incongruity of the blood-sucking
In its opening minutes, Dr. Cyclops promises something incredibly rare in the annals of trashy B movies: a lurid, creepy tale of sci-fi horror shot in gorgeous, eye-popping Technicolor, its sickly green hues and expressionist lighting schemes enhancing
Nearly all of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's many films revolve around the human need for love, affection, respect, and acceptance, but perhaps none of his films treat this subject with the intense focus of In a Year With 13 Moons. It is arguably one of
[All through the month of February, Jeremy Richey at Moon in the Gutter has declared a tribute to films that are "M.I.A. on Region 1 DVD." This post is a contribution to this series.]Hurlevent is Jacques Rivette's stark, emotionally naked adaptation
Stagecoach was the first film to unite director John Ford with both his iconic genre, the Western, and the actor who would come to be his most iconic star, John Wayne. Ford and Wayne both made Westerns before this, of course, but their collaboration
The second film in the series of Nick and Nora Charles mysteries, After the Thin Man, closely follows the template established by the original film that started it all, The Thin Man. And why not? The formula was obviously a success: the couple's easygoing
Even tho the Oscars annoy the beejesus out of me, I wouldn't be a proper film blog without at least mentioning it, and the two Black actresses nominated, Taraji P. Henson and Viola Davis. One, I've never been a fan of and her tired, overacting style,
The Tell-Tale Heart is a solid, enjoyable horror short adapted from Edgar Allen Poe's famous short story. It is one of many such short-form literary adaptations used to fill up pre-feature time on Hollywood screens in the 30s and 40s, but this happens
