Glenn Erickson's Reviews: Month: July 2020

Raggedy Man 07/28/20

Here’s a story about a different kind of ‘lockdown.’ This near-perfect drama might be the real pinnacle of Sissy Spacek’s wonderful career. The no-baloney tale of rural life on the Texas coastline during WW2 is packed with strong emotions and solid sentiment. Wartime hardships and catch-as-catch-can romance strikes an uneasy balance with more threatening material, including a highly suspenseful finish. First-time director Jack Fisk hits this one out of the park, with help from Eric Roberts, William Sanderson, Tracey Walter, R.G. Armstrong, Sam Shepard and little Henry Thomas. This is one of those special pictures that creates a warm feeling about people. The ‘Rum and Coca Cola’ scene is perfection of a special kind. On Blu-ray from KL Studio Classics.
07/28/20

Orgasmo 07/28/20

Severin’s extravagant four-film six-disc Umberto Lenzi / Carroll Baker Giallo Collection is a luxurious trip into sexy, violent Italo thrill territory. CineSavant concentrates on the first Lenzi-Baker collaboration, a truly nasty bit of misanthropy that bridges the gap between standard ‘Lady In Peril’ fare and the full-bore giallos that would soon become the norm. It’s presented under its admittedly attention-getting original title, that sounds more appropriate for a porn movie. In the U.S. the given title was Paranoia — not to be confused with Hammer’s Paranoiac or Lenzi’s follow-up A Quiet Place to Kill, which was also titled Paranoia. With Lou Castel, Colette Descombes and Tino Carraro. On Blu-ray from Severin Films.
07/28/20

The Lady Eve 07/25/20

On his stellar directing roll at Paramount Preston Sturges graduates to a top-notch cast and a grade-A production budget, neither of which cramp his style one iota. This enlarged pun on the Garden of Eden myth touts that ‘Barbara Stanwyck has Henry Fonda bewitched and bewildered!’ Charles Coburn, Eugene Palette and William Demarest have socko comedy material to chew on, and the chemistry between Stanwyck and Fonda (“Snakes are my life!”) is genuinely hot & bothered steamy. We’re especially excited by this upgrade of a 2001 DVD; apparently the rumors that no good elements were available were unfounded. Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.

07/25/20

Elvira, Mistress of the Dark 07/25/20

We love Cassandra Peterson, a smart woman who made a go of horror host work in the tough Los Angeles TV market, long after the short-lived Vampira and just a few years after the passing of Sinister Seymour. After Elvira’s Movie Macabre she got to make this lively comedy feature, and thus planted her stake in the cinema firmament while at the top of her game. I’d give it an A+ for nostalgic sentiment, a B for quality, a B+ for wit, even if the adult humor does skew a bit infantile. Well, that was part of the Elvira personality too!   With Edie McClurg and William Morgan Sheppard. On Blu-ray from Arrow Video.
07/25/20

The Public Eye 07/21/20

Howard Franklin’s atmospheric, non hysterical tale of the New York underworld is told from a great viewpoint, that of a night-prowling shutterbug who documents life on the streets, from the swanky nightclubs to gangland killings on the cold sidewalks. Joe Pesci has his most endearing role in a part suggested by the famous photographer Weegee, a small man with ambitions for his ‘found photos’ of party revelers and bloody corpses to be viewed as art. Is Barbara Hershey’s club owner using him for selfish purposes?  What happens if the hoods suddenly regard him as a hindrance, instead of a boost to their egos? The colorful production elicits a marvelously atmospheric image of New York in wartime. The biggest surprise: Pesci’s dialogue is all PG-rated! (The movie itself is an ‘R’.) With Jared Harris, Stanley Tucci and Jerry Adler. On Blu-ray from KL Studio Classics.
0721//20

Romance on the High Seas 07/21/20

A bigger and brighter film debut couldn’t be imagined … Doris Day became America’s sweetheart in Michael Curtiz’s peppy production, graced with a witty script and several catchy, radio-ready song hits. And the color is better than new in this impressive Blu-ray remastering job — Woody Bredell’s Technicolor hues are literally eye-popping. It’s great fun seeing Ms. Day invent her natural, fresh-faced screen persona right before our eyes. With the always-terrific Janis Paige, and Jack Carson, Don DeFore, Oscar Levant and S.Z. Sakall. On Blu-ray from The Warner Archive Collection.
07/21/20

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea 07/21/20

A near-spotless restoration on the 104 year-old adaptation of the Jules Verne classic finally presents it in a form where we can judge its merits. The screenplay is an erratic jumble, imposing serial thrill elements onto an undigested amalgam of Vingt mille lieues sous les mers with its sequel L’Ile mystérieuse. But the physical production is state of the art for 1916, with an impressive live action submarine mockup and even more impressive scenes filmed underwater, reportedly a feature film first. Even better than the vivid restoration is a fact-filled expert commentary by film expert Anthony Slide. It’s no casual conversational chat track, but a wealth of good information about every aspect of the film, all delivered in good humor.. On Blu-ray from Kino Classics.
07/21/20

America as Seen by a Frenchman 07/18/20

This marvelous proto-documentary is a cultural travelogue, before such films became a conduit to express social outrage or moral condemnation. To the French filmmakers America in 1960 is still a land of wonders, a bigger-than-life fantasyland, where you can visit a places called Fantasyland and Frontierland and see your culture’s past play out as entertainment. It’s like Mondo Cane only in that it’s free-form, taking in whatever the director François Reichenbach encountered in 18 months spent wandering through the country with a Techniscope camera in tow. Helping in the journey are Michel Legrand and Chris Marker, with an assist from Frederic Rossif and Jean Cocteau … it’s class goods, a time machine to a lost Golden Age of consumerist, conformist harmony. On Blu-ray from Arrow Academy.
07/18/20

A Bullet for the President 07/18/20

Guest reviewer Lee Broughton tackles Tonino Valerii’s Spaghetti Western-cum-political conspiracy thriller. By brazenly transposing key aspects of John F. Kennedy’s assassination onto the assassination of James A. Garfield in 1881, Valerii gives both western and conspiracy film fans much food for thought. A career best performance by Giuliano Gemma, repurposed sets from Once Upon a Time in the West and great turns by a plethora of Sergio Leone’s regular supporting actors bring a sense of gravitas to this intriguing show. With Warren Vanders, Van Johnson, Maria Cuadra, Ray Saunders, Fernando Rey, and Benito Stefanelli. On Blu-ray from Wild East.
07/18/20

Pride and Prejudice 07/18/20

MGM in 1940 was just the movie factory to turn out a smart, compact version of the Jane Austen novel, with Greer Garson in fine form and Laurence Olivier possibly slumming but also contributing a flawless performance. Robert Z. Leonard’s direction is invisible but does no harm; adaptors Aldous Huxley and Jane Murfin telescope events and concoct an even happier ending, all with great skill. Sorry, despite persistent rumors, the story hasn’t a single zombie. With Mary Boland, Edna May Oliver, Maureen O’Sullivan, Edmund Gwenn, Ann Rutherford, Marsha Hunt, Frieda Inescort and Heather Angel; on Blu-ray from The Warner Archive Collection.
07/18/20

The Flesh and the Fiends 07/14/20

John Gilling’s chilling-est horror item is an historically accurate tale of bodysnatching in Edinburgh. When Peter Cushing’s Dr. Knox needs cadavers for his controversial anatomy studies, the enterprising Burke and Hare (George Rose & Donald Pleasence) procure them — creating corpses when the graveyards are guarded. It’s a straight demonstration of how idealistic scientists get the axe every time. The production is handsome and the cast ideal: June Laverick, Billie Whitelaw, John Cairney, Renee Houston, Dermot Walsh, Andrew Faulds. The incomparable Peter Cushing gives his all to the misguided surgeon with the paralyzed eyelid yet Donald Pleasence’s looney ghoul all but steals the show. Reviewer Charlie Largent shows us how to ‘Burke them,’ with style. On Blu-ray from KL Studio Classics.
07/14/20

The War of the Worlds 07/14/20

“It neutralizes mesons somehow. They’re the atomic glue holding matter together!”  For most of the 1950s George Pal’s Martian invasion spectacle reigned as the top Sci-fi spectacle about an alien invasion. All the money went into the visuals, beautifully turned out by Byron Haskin and Gordon Jennings. Paramount’s much-awaited full restoration job does the picture justice, even if fussy fans will continue to argue the ‘what about the wires?’ battle. Even more impressive than the visuals is the film’s superb sound design, which still blows audiences away whether in mono or a new 5.1 remix. Criterion’s extras don’t critique the film as much as they tout the high-class restoration (and minor revisions). On Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
07/14/20

The Day the Earth Caught Fire 07/11/20

What’s the best Ecological Thriller of all time?  Finally available in a good Region A disc is Val Guest and Wolf Mankowitz’s thrilling, realistic account of our world turned topsy-turvy, and perhaps plunging into a fiery oblivion. The violent shifts of climate and weather patterns echo today’s global warming chaos. Newspapermen Edward Judd and Leo McKern track down a frightening government secret; Janet Munro is the confidential clerk that leaks the truth. One of the top all-time British Science Fiction films is also a great newspaper story about the importance of a free press. The new extra is a Richard Harland Smith commentary. On Blu-ray from KL Studio Classics.
07/11/20

The Thief of Baghdad (1961) 07/11/20

It took us forever to get this to review!  Many fans of Steve Reeves consider this breezy Arabian nights adventure his best. Lavish and colorful, it gives Reeves a chance to be playful and clever — whether he takes advantage of that opportunity is open to debate. A trio of Italian writers drummed up the story, giving Reeves an object of affection in Princess Amina, played by the beautiful, fresh-faced Georgia Moll. Clever special effects abound as Karim goes on a quest that’s almost like a video game — encountering trees that walk, a cloak of invisibility and of course a flying horse. Reeves’s version joins those of Sabu (’40) and Douglas Fairbanks (’24), and all three are good. After a long wait on a shipment from Germany, we finally got our hands on the disc which Charlie Largent reviews. With Arturo Dominici. On Region Free Blu-ray from Colosseo Film.
07/11/20

Never Give a Sucker an Even Break 07/07/20

It’s appropriate that collaborator Charlie Largent would want to review this outlandish W.C Fields romp, as it’s the closest thing to Alice Through the Looking Glass Hollywood ever did. Fields’ crazy story begins with scenes in a movie studio, but the weirdness accumulates until people are making impossible jumps from airplanes, to a mountaintop aerie where dwells the amorous Margaret Dumont as ‘Mrs. Hemoglobin’ … and, sigh, Leon Errol. The whole thing is a visualization of Fields’s absurd movie pitch to ‘Esoteric Pictures’… W.C.’s last feature starring vehicle goes out with a bang. The disc’s audio commentary is by Eddy Von Mueller. On Blu-rayfrom KL Studio Classics.
07/07/20

Britannia Hospital 07/07/20

Lindsay Anderson got the opportunity to film a third ‘Mick Travis’ picture starring Malcolm McDowall, and with writer David Sherwin fashioned a wholly irreverent, savagely funny takedown of Great Britain… the whole country. The equivalent of hitting Big Ben with a custard pie, the satirical barbs are aimed at labor union obstructionism, Royal hauteur, class privilege, raucous demonstrators and devious journalistic snoops. Behind the island nation’s dysfunctional health system lurks a genuine mad scientist, who has diverted the funds of The National Health into a pair of sinister, abominable — but very ‘forward thinking’ experiments. Dr. Frankenstein would be proud. The great, funny cast features plenty of favorites: Leonard Rossiter, Graham Crowden, Malcolm McDowell, Vivian Pickles, Jill Bennett, Marsha A. Hunt, Joan Plowright, Mark Hamill, Peter Jeffrey, Robin Asquith, Robbie Coltrane and Arthur Lowe. On Region B Blu-ray from Powerhouse Indicator.
07/07/20

Come and See 07/04/20

The director of this unblinking account of the genocide in Belarus in 1942 and 1943 said that “people in America can’t watch my film. They have thrillers but this is something different.” He certainly got that right. A young farm boy is a witness to and victim of horrendous barbarism inflicted on a civilian population… now the most common kind of terror. The Politburo wanted a film to commemorate Victory Day, and director Elem Klimov gave them something nobody would forget. Although cinema gut-wrenchers have gone much further in the last 25 years, Kilmov’s unforgettable horrorshow rivets us through the haunted, paralyzed face of young actor Aleksei Kravchenko, who can scarcely process what he sees. On Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
07/04/20

Africa Screams 07/04/20

Abbott & Costello perform at full strength in this very good, very silly jungle safari comedy. It’s definitely for kids and nostalgic fans — with equal parts slapstick, cornball repetitive vaudeville gags, and Lou Costello’s weirdly endearing infantile schtick. An impressively beautiful restoration has pulled it back from the pit of Public Domain ugliness. Plus ClassicFlix & the 3-D Archive appoint this 2-D movie with a tall stack of creative, relevant extras. With Hillary Brooke, Clyde Beatty, Frank Buck, Max and Buddy Baer, Shemp Howard, Joe Besser, and Charles Gemora. On Blu-ray from ClassicFlix.
07/04/20