For lovers of movies from the silent era to modern day with an emphasis on horror, sci-fi, exploitation, WIP, westerns and anything of the fantastic and bizarre. THIS SITE IS DEDICATED TO BOB WILKINS, GEORGE ROMERO, ALAN FREED, ROGER CORMAN, HELGA LINE, CAROLINE MUNRO, JOHN FREDRIKSEN, JOHN ZACHERLE, CLEO MOORE , ROSALBA NERI, ERIKA BLANC, FEMI BENUSSI, SHIRLEY CORRIGAN, ROSANNA YANNI, MIRTA MILLER, KARIN DOR, BARBARA BOUCHET, MAMIE VAN DOREN, BARBARA STEELE and, of course, CASEY KASEM.
Sunday, July 7, 2024
Saturday, July 6, 2024
80,000 SUSPECTS 1956 (NETWORK) BLU-RAY
Well made drama directed by Val Guest.
Dr. Steven Monks (Richard Johnson) and hie beautiful wife Julie (Claire Bloom) have a shaky marriage as we are introduced to them during a New Year's Eve Party.
Their marriage is soon put to even further tests as a huge smallpx epidemic breaks out in London and Steven has to race to find where it started and put an end to it.
This is the simple plot that director Guest takes and makes into a very watchable film. Johnson and Bloom make the film work, and these two also worked together well in the 1961 fright fest entitled "The Haunting".
I enjoyed this more than I thought I would for the very reasons I stated above..the actors do a magnificent job and Johnson's character of Steve Monks is a very torn and guilty character but it is never overplayed.
Clair Bloom looks terrific as always and her class and style help make this a winner. The rest of the cast is made up of very familiar faces from many Hammer horror films.
Some of those cast members are e Dolan, Cyril Cusack, Mervyn Johns, Kay Walsh, Ray Barret, and Ursula Howells.
If you get the chamce, check out this underrated and underseen film.
Friday, July 5, 2024
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST 1946 (CRITERION) BLU-RAY
This French film will always be my favorite version of the classic fairy tale.
Josette Day stars as Belle in this all time gem of a movie. She is the beautiful woman who takes her fathers place as a captive of the Beast (Jean Maris) after he steals a rose from The Beasts' garden.
Slowly Belle comes to realize that the Beast is far more human and humane than most people in the outside "normal" world.
I know there have been countless versions made of this including a TV series and animated films from Disney, but this one is the ONLY one that has any cinema magic in it, and if you've seen it you know what I mean.
The Blu-ray presentation is simply gorgeous and this film has never looked so good. I hadn't seen this movie for ovder 45 years when I first saw it on PBS TV as a child.
The film is brilliant and shouldn't be missed by any fan of cinema. I do admit there was another version of the movie I liked when I saw it in later years and that was the one made in 1961 and directed by Edward L. Cahn, but it's not even close to this version.
Thursday, July 4, 2024
SPECIES 1995 (MGM) BLU-RAY
I'm a little late to the game on this one, as I am sure most of you have seen this, but for me it was new.
When this first came out in the mid 90's it was a smash hit for such a standard sci-fi film, but the reason for that is simple...Natasha Henstridge.
The story revolves around a center for alien information obtaining a message from space in 1974 and using the technology they were given by the aliens for evil purposes.
The film opens with a young girl in a glass booth and as soon as she wakes up a doctor named Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley) orders her killed with cyanide gas.
She escapes and then we learn she was a cross between alien and human DNA and she has remarkable powers. She morphs into a grown woman only hours after escaping and then leads Fitch and his men on a merry chase thru Los Angeles as the creature referred to as Sil (Natasha Henstridge) seeks to mate.
The cat and mouse game is a lot of fun for the viewer, and Henstridge is so damned beautiful it should be against the law...lol. The effects are good and the gore is kept to a minimum, but it is effective.
I believe this was followed by 3 sequels. The rest of the cast includes Michael Madson, Marg Helgenberger, Forest Whitaker, Alfred Molina, Michelle Williams and Jordan Lund.
A cool looking monster and a plot that keeps moving makes this a winner.
Wednesday, July 3, 2024
RIP ROBERT TOWNE 1934-2024
First we lost Roger Corman, now a great screenwriter who worked with him.
Towne got his start writing when he worked with Corman and wrote the screenplay for "Last Woman On Earth" and he even acted in the film as one of the three leads.
He also acted in the unforgettable "Creature From The Haunted Sea" for Corman.
Towne went on to write some of the most classic movies in history including "Tomb Of Ligeia", "Chinatown", "Heaven Can Wait" and he also wrote an episode of the original Outer Limits entitled "The Chameleon" from 1964.
Robert Towne passed away on July 1, 2024 at the age of 89.
LYST 2017 (ANOTHER WORLD) BLU-RAY
My God what a bleak film this is.
This is a movie about a young female author who writes crime books with an erotic edge is raped by an obsessed fan.
She locks herself in her apartment and never goes out. We see her slowly lose the ability to know what is real or not. This is shades of "Repulsion" from 1962, but far, far more bizarre and bleak.
This really isn't a horror film, but neither is it a standard crime drama. It was filmed in Denmark and it just really shows what kinds of movies other countries are making that we almost never get to see.
Magdalena From Delis is very good as the writer Lisa Rostorp and everyone else does a very good job as well. There are some shocking scenes involving a hammer and I could barely look atthem they are so damned good.
If you're looking for something a bit different you might want to check this out. There are a lot of negative things said about this film, but I say watch and decide for yourself. You'll never forget it..and what a twist at the end!!
Tuesday, July 2, 2024
RIP MARIA ROSARIA OMAGGIO 1957-2024
The classy Italian actress has passed away.
Maria appeared in over 45 films in her career, most of which I haven't seen. I should remedy that soon.
I and many fans know her from the classic 1980 Italian shocker "Nightmare City" in which she played Sheila Holmes and was killed by those darned zombies.
A very beautiful woman. She died on July 1, 2024 at the age of 67.
EXECUTIONERS OF VENICE 1963 (SINISTER CINEMA)
Here is a movie I hadn't seen in almost 27 years.
This was a fun 1963 Italian swashbuckler, and it was just as fun to see it again after all these years.
During the Spanish Inquisition a man named Sandrigo Bembo (Lex Barker) is accused of treason by a Grand Inquisitor named Rodrigo Zeno (Guy Madison) which everyone knows is a false charge.
However Zeno is in love with Leonora Danin (Alessandra Panaro) and she plans to marry Bembo, so what a better way to despose of his competition. This is the very simple plot of the film.
What makes ther movie so good to me is the performances by all involved and that even with a threadbear plot, the story never slows down or fails to hold the interest of the viewer.
There is a lot of action and Barker is great as always in these kinds of films. The presentation from Sinister is very good and I also believe this is streaming on TUBI right now as well.
The rest of the cast includes Mario Petri, Alberto Farnese, Mirella Roxy and John Bartha.
A good one for fans of the genre.
Monday, July 1, 2024
WARRIOR AND THE SLAVE GIRL 1958 (LOVING THE CLASSICS)
just an ok Italian peplum film.
I was sort of disappointed in this movie as it didn't really hold my attention up until the last 20 minutes or so.
The story revolves around Marcus Numidius (Ettore Manni) who is sent to Armenia to put down a revolt. He actually ends up capturing their leader named Aselepius (Georges Marchal).
In the meantime the evil Princess Amira (Gianna Maria Canale) wants to be queen and is very jealous at how much the people respect Aselepius and so she plans to hve him killed in the arena.
Things don't go quite as planned as you may guess. The plot goes in a lot of directions with Amira's plans being thrown out the window and several other characters trying to either revolt of stop same said revolt.
I won't give too much away, but lets just say that we really see how evuil Amira is at the conclusion of the movie. I can recommend this for genre fans I guess, but it's not the best. Hey, the women are at least very beautiful.
The rest of the cast includes Mara Cruz, Lina Rosales, Vega Vinci, and Renato Montalbano.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO...
Pamela Anderson is 57, Jean Marsh is 90, Leslie Caron is 93, Debbie Harry is 79, and Robby The Robot is 69.
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