There’s a varying degree of enthusiasm regarding famous horror franchises like the Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street and The Exorcist movies. All start from a first film by reputable director followed by a series of misfires, oddities, cash grabs and...
“Everyone knows families don’t work.” So proclaims one disaffected Southern California teenage punk rocker in the waning minutes of Penelope Spheeris’ harshly, mournfully beautiful Suburbia (out now on Blu-ray from Shout! Factory). It’s not a surprising conclusion for a movie...
When we accuse a movie of being “dated,” we usually mean that its faults have been gradually revealed by time. And George P. Cosmatos Cobra, out now on Blu-ray from Shout! Factory, certainly has elements—like the glaring product placement of...
The Appaloosa sees Marlon Brando as Mateo, a tormented soul looking for revenge. A buffalo hunter and soldier only a decade or so removed from the Civil War, Mateo (or Matt, as only the credits call him) returns to his...
The Bounty is a unique motion picture. On the surface, it looks like your average, neo-colonialist high-seas adventure film with heaving oceans, high stakes and, given the title, a power struggle to boot. Yes, there’s all that, as well as...
Before watching Lewis R. Foster’s 1949 Western El Paso, I probably couldn’t have described to you, off the top of my head, what Cinecolor was. But within a few seconds of the opening scene, I could have told you confidently that...
Flicker Alley has made a kind of cottage industry out of releasing Georges Méliès’ short films on home video. But that’s not to imply that they’re cynically packaging and repackaging the same content over and over again. On the contrary,...
In the league of cult movies that are “so-bad-they’re-good,” Silent Night, Deadly Night 2 is, at this point in time, a damn classic. But the road to this newfound reputation was long. The second life of Silent Night, Deadly Night...
Little Annie Rooney stars Mary Pickford as the titular scamp and leader of a gang of young ruffians and street urchins who have found themselves in an embittered battle against a similarly tempered crew of rogues and rascals. While the...
From the moment she appears onscreen in James Kirkwood’s 1915 Fanchon, the Cricket, before we know anything about her, we know that Mary Pickford is playing our beloved hero and things goddamn better go well for her. That’s the power...
