The Invisible Man Appears & The Invisible Man vs. The Human Fly 04/17/21
Arrow Video
Blu-ray
Reviewer Charlie Largent takes on the challenge of figuring out this pair of vintage sci-fi pictures from Japan. The invisible man of the first film (1949) takes second place to an odd crime yarn about a thief that wants to possess a particular jewel. The invisibility idea makes little internal sense — the film’s most interesting aspect is the unusual actress Takiko Mizunoe. The second ‘invisible thriller’ is even more of a puzzle, a battle between and invisible man and a criminal who can shrink himself. Arrow’s extras help us understand what’s going on… a little bit, anyway! On Blu-ray from Arrow Video.
04/17/21
Spacewalker 04/17/21
Capelight
Blu-ray
Dmitriy Kiselev’s overlooked Russian thriller is an exciting and inspirational true account of the first walk in space by a Soviet cosmonaut — a mission that nearly became a tragedy. It’s almost as emotional an experience as Apollo 13 — the worthy cosmonauts demonstrate ‘the right stuff’ under much more trying conditions. The beautifully produced and splendidly acted show makes it seem a crime that foreign movies this good are routinely denied theatrical exhibition here. The Blu-ray comes with an excellent pair of featurettes, with the participation of the original spacewalker Alexey Leonov. On Blu-ray from Capelight.
04/17/21
Irma Vep 04/17/21
The Criterion Collection
Blu-ray
Olivier Assayas takes a very different trip into silent movie nostalgia, with a director’s ill-fated attempt to remake the 1915 serial Les Vampires. Hong Kong action star Maggie Cheung is cast as the erotic rooftop nightcrawler Irma Vep! We see the state of Paris filmmaking in the mid-90s, with a clueless, frustrated director (Jean-Pierre Léaud) out of ideas — what business has Irma Vep in the modern world? Meanwhile, Cheung dons her vinyl catsuit for a personal creepy crawly mission — just to see if it gives her a thrill. Criterion’s special edition contains both a full episode of the silent serial plus a must-see documentary on the life and work of the legendary Musidora, a major sex symbol of the silent era. With Nathalie Richard, Bulle Ogier and Lou Castel. On Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
04/17/21
CineSavant Column
Hello!
We’re all hoping for the best with Pacific’s Cinerama Dome theater and the Arclight theaters. Marc Edward Heuck theorizes that the chain and their landlord will be negotiating to work out a better deal, and various activists say that the Dome was protected from redevelopment demolition way back in 1998. I don’t think the movie habit is going to go away when the pandemic recedes, so it doesn’t make sense to chloroform this high-class chain.
I did get in touch with David Strohmaier to assure myself that this problem with Pacific Theaters wouldn’t compromise his upcoming disc restoration of the full 3-panel Cinerama MGM feature The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm. Nope, says Dave, the disc release is still on track. He sent along an image he prepared for the Home Theater Forum a couple of weeks ago, comparing the previous DVD composite with what he’s doing combining the three Cinerama panels. The images can be ‘zoomed,’ or they get bigger when opened in a new window.
Oh — since I wrote David Strohmaier, this Variety article came out, and it’s more informative anyway…
And correspondent Martin Hennessee tips me off to this ComicBook.com article by Spencer Perry, The Wild and Complicated Story of the Rights to King Kong. It’s a little brief, but it reads well enough … I’ve been reading about the tangled Kong franchise ever since the Toho King Kong vs. Godzilla.
Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson
The Furies 04/13/21
The Criterion Collection
Blu-ray
When not making tons of money collaborating with James Stewart, Anthony Mann directed some really grim westerns. This mini-epic spells out the ugly real-life Code of The West: seizing land and establishing private empires. Walter Huston’s T.C. Jeffords maintains his sprawling fiefdom through economic tyranny (he prints his own money and expects banks to accept it) — and by simple violence, murdering the people that have lived on ‘his’ land for generations. Barbara Stanwyck is the feisty heir who wages generational war on her piratical father. It’s the darkest and most subversive of HUAC-era ‘noir’ westerns. With Wendell Corey, Judith Anderson, Gilbert Roland and Thomas Gomez. On Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
04/13/21
The Man in Search of his Murderer 04/13/21
Kino Classics
Blu-ray
The name talent attached makes this late- Weimar thriller a must-see proposition: Billy Wilder, Robert & Curt Siodmak, Franz Waxman. Their dark murder farce resembles what would later become the self-aware Black Comedy. The trouble begins when a suicidal nice guy can’t pull the trigger, and hires a crook to do the job for him. The satire is clever but the execution is awkward — the filmmakers set up big laughs that the heavy German filming style doesn’t deliver. Just the same, the situations seem extremely progressive, ahead of their time. On Blu-ray from Kino Classics.
04/13/21
CineSavant Column
Hello!
Good news from Kino — we’re finally getting a Blu of John Farrow’s long-absent ‘eerie’ noir Night Has a Thousand Eyes. I haven’t seen it since UCLA in the early ’70s — the fledgling film archive took possession of all of Paramount’s studio screening prints, and many were nitrate copies. All I remember is that it was definitely dark, and that Gail Russell’s eyes were haunting, as always. Russell had the saddest eyes of any film star ever. The moody noir also stars Edward G. Robinson and John Lund.
One of my daydream ideas for a revival theater was to program quirky lead-in music that would work like an overture — turn the house lights down by half, etc.. Of course, the whole point would be to not play music from the movie, but instead songs suggested by the movie. For Thousand Eyes the obvious item would be this Bobby Vee tune, written fourteen years later. Counter-programming, you know.
Kino is also being kind to Universal completists, announcing upcoming discs of The Spider Woman Strikes Back with Gale Sondergaard and Rondo Hatton, and the 1941 Basil Rathbone mystery movie The Mad Doctor. I haven’t seen either one, but the Spider Woman movie seems to have attracted fan love and attention for completely inverted reasons. Here’s a quote from an email I received yesterday: “The release will serve the purpose of putting to rest any claims that The Spider Woman Strikes Back is a hidden programmer jewel or something. To me it’s the nadir of Universal output of the era. Even Sondergaard and Hatton can’t liven it up. It’s just bad on so many levels.”
Gee, what an endorsement, now I have to see it. Kino ought to be able to extract some great advertising bites from that quote.
And hey, I got a nice surprise over the weekend. The first visit from my daughter in 14 months, due to you-know-what… and she brings me a flying saucer- themed cookie jar with COOKIES in it. It looks like a ‘glass ray’ is beaming down from the saucer. It’s time to count one’s blessings, here.
Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson
Perdita Durango 4K Ultra HD 04/10/21
Severin Films
Blu-ray
What could sear your retinas as thoroughly as forbidden cult cinema in 4K Ultra HD? The unrestrained crime-shock transgressors Perdita and Romero cut a path of lust, cult ritual madness and amoral nastiness across the U.S./Mexico border. Kidnapping, murder and theft are among their printable crimes. Álex de Iglesia’s beautifully produced slice of post- Tarantino excess arrives in a completely uncut original version. With James Gandolfini, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Don Stroud and Alex Cox. On Ultra HD + Blu-ray from Severin Films.
04/10/21
Black Sunday 04/10/21
Viavision [Imprint]
Blu-ray
John Frankenheimer’s biggest production since Grand Prix turns the touchy subject of international terrorism into a frightening, outlandish story of a plot to kill thousands of spectators during one of America’s defining rituals, the Super Bowl. Black September operative Marthe Keller seduces disturbed Viet Vet Bruce Dern into perpetrating the crime; Israeli agent Robert Shaw races to stop them. The super-crime is both outrageous and credible — making the show seem very modern, even prophetic. True to form, Frankenheimer filmed much of the movie’s final 40-minute suspense sequence during a real Super Bowl game. With Fritz Weaver, Bekim Fehmiu, Steven Keats and Michael V. Gazzo. On Blu-ray from Viavision [Imprint].
04/10/21
CineSavant Column
Hello!
Associate Allan Peach sends along a link to an illustrated lecture, from the Museum of Jurassic Technology: Dr. Olesya Turkina’s talk is called Kosmos, Russian Space Flights of the Imagination, from Tsiolkovsky to Klushantsev. The lecture uses documents, photos and sketches by the seminal space scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, plus film clips from several Soviet space films, including one I’ve reviewed, Kosmitcheskiy reys. Ms. Turkina’s accent requires some close listening, but it’s a rewarding talk. A film from 1965 gets very specific about conditions on the moon — being accurate in some ways and way off in others.
And CineSavant just secured a screener of Severin’s latest massive cult box set The Dungeon of Andy Milligan Collection. A review copy was not easy to come by, but now CineSavant’s intrepid reviewer Charlie Largent will be able to broaden his high art horizons with screenings of pristine, restored HD encodings of most of Milligan’s surviving cinematic oeuvre. With titles like this, who can resist?: Torture Dungeon, Bloodthirsty Butchers, The Curse of the Full Moon, Man with Two Heads, The Rats Are Coming! The Werewoves are Here!, Fleshpot on 42nd Street and Carnage! The long list of extras, swag and other cancer-causing content is at the Severin Films Shop.
Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson
Doctor X 04/06/21
The Warner Archive Collection
Blu-ray
It’s the disc everyone wants right now — vintage Hollywood horror fully restored to its amazing original Technicolor luster. A scientific investigation into some grisly Full Moon Murders culminates in a bizarre experiment in the fantastic lab of five potential mad doctors. Fay Wray and Lionel Atwill became horror stars, Lee Tracy provides the sidebar laughs, and then the unknown killer divulges his horrifying, Cronenberg-like secret: Synthetic Flesh! The Warner Archive scores with a follow up to last year’s The Mystery of the Wax Museum. With Preston Foster, who keeps a beating heart (not his own) in a glass jar. On Blu-ray from The Warner Archive Collection.
04/06/21
Hercules and the Captive Women 04/06/21
The Film Detective
Blu-ray
This debut of muscleman favorite Reg Park is one of the better sword ‘n’ sandal epics; it has good action and a terrific villainess in Fay Spain. The okay story is Benoit’s L’Atlantide, re-shaped to fit the fad for all things Hercules. The Film Detective’s disc is the Woolner Bros.’ American release, trimmed by half a reel and given an entirely new audio mix. It’s still an impressive show. On Blu-ray from The Film Detective.
04/06/21
CineSavant Column
Hello!
The new Godzilla-King Kong movie opened up a few days back, and I’ve been getting plenty of emails on the appeal of giant monsters and related subjects. We noticed this on-air blurb announcing a vintage Toho Kaiju romp on Spectrum cable’s program schedule… which misreads the storyline of Mosura tai Gojira but atones by giving concerned parents a badly-needed warning as to how this dangerous film can damage impressionable young minds. ↑ (Actually, Mothra vs. Godzilla is harmless, wholly suitable for any child not terrified by Disney’s The Three Little Pigs.)
We scratched our heads trying to think of what the ‘adult situations’ in this particular show might be … or is it just one ‘situation?’ The all-knowing Gary Teetzel says
“Shame on Spectrum, which failed to warn parents that the movie includes smoking! The only reasonable conclusion to be drawn here, is that Spectrum is in the pocket of Big Tobacco.”
Reader Mark Throop sends along a pair of great links to two separate performances of the same song, by the same artiste, but separated by fifty-three years. First up, French songstress Mireille Mathieu belts out the energetic, rousing call to battle “Paris en colère”. Written by Maurice Vidalin and Maurice Jarre, the tune is part of the Maurice Jarre music score for the 1966 René Clément epic Is Paris Burning? My personal opinion is that that much-disparaged movie needs some kind of big-scale revival — it’s an awesome recreation of the re-taking of Paris from its occupiers in 1944. This B&W piece is a simple pre-music video TV recording, perhaps lip-synched to playback.
In the second link Ms. Mathieu sings “Paris en colère” again in 2019, celebrating 130 Years of the Eiffel Tower. This second recording is live, on location, and spectacular. I’ve read a translation of the lyrics but I don’t know in what regard the song is held in France. Who cares? — to me it’s inspiring. We hope to see the city’s Notre Dame cathedral fully restored sooner than later.
And as we were assured would happen, The Warner Archive Collection confirmed yesterday on their Facebook page a series of upcoming remastered and restored Blu-ray titles. They don’t say when, but can we assume that the planned month is April? The list:
Drunken Master II, The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, They Won’t Believe Me, The Yearling, and Mr. Blandings Builds his Dream House.
Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson
Secrets and Lies 04/03/21
The Criterion Collection
Blu-ray
Director Mike Leigh’s social-personal observations of life as it is lived in the U.K. always get to me — this one may simply be a more realistic soap opera, but it’s so good that one pays no attention to technical matters, who the actors are or when they are ‘acting.’ It just ‘is,’ and it’s so involving that one becomes anxious over the smallest thing. The actors grab our attention from the outset: Timothy Spall, Brenda Blethyn, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Phyllis Logan, Claire Rushbrook. It’s Leigh’s most acclaimed feature and the perfect antidote for bloated event filmmaking. And unlike some of his pictures, you walk out with a smile on your face. Extras include new interviews with Mike Leigh and Marianne Jean-Baptiste. On Blu-ray from The Criterion Collection.
04/03/21
Dynasty 3-D 04/03/21
KL Studio Classics
3-D Blu-ray
3-D goes Kung-Fu in Super-Touch! The 3-D Film Archive restores a Far East oddity from the year of Star Wars, an all-action sword, fist and supernatural magic combat spectacle. The big battles play like choreographed dance numbers, but with sound effects and screams taking the place of music. The disc’s 3-D extras are of special interest — we take a tour of every display section of a 1955 department store in full dimensional images. Starring Tao-Liang Tan, Ying Bai, Kang Chin, David Wei Tang, and that irresistible charmer Bobby Ming. On 3-D Blu-ray from KL Studio Classics.
04/03/21