Category: FILM REVIEWS
Argento at the TBL and Anthony Gilbert’s “The Woman in Red”
News: Toronto may have been blessed, because July 2nd the TIFF Bell Lightbox will be screening Dario Argento’s Suspiria (1977) and Opera (1987). Reviews: two versions of Anthony Gilbert’s novel “The Woman in Red” were made into films: the underrated My Name is Julia (1945) and Arthur Penn’s last great feature film, Dead of Winter (1987)…
Moguls & Studios: Part I
In Part I of yet another series, we have a review of the TCM mini-series Moguls & Movie Stars: A History of Hollywood (Warner Home Video), plus bonus editorial blather!
Gangsters – Part III
In Part III, we have Sergio Leone’s arty gangster epic, Once Upon a Time in America, released by Warner Home Video in a gorgeous Blu-ray edition…
Video Nasties, Part II
Synapse Films released a swanky new Blu-ray / DVD combo edition of Jeffrey Obrow and Stephen Carpenter’s slasher classic The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982) which, like Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead (1981), was branded by Britain’s paranoid censor board as a Video Nasty…
Hot Docs: Part I
Reviews of three films from Toronto’s Hot Docs film festival: Lotte Stoops’ debut, Grande Hotel (2010), Robert-Jan Lacombe’s short documentary Goodbye Mandima (2010), and Stefan Kolbe and Chris Wright’s doc Das Block / The Block…
Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds: Part I
In this first part examining Orson Welles’ 1938 radio drama of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds, I’ve a review of The Art of Time Ensemble’s 2011 stage production + director Andrew Burashko, and related reviews of The Night America Trembled (1957) and Without Warning (1994)…
Mortal Kombat: Part I
Review of New Line / Warner Home Video’s Blu-ray edition of Mortal Kombat (1995) , plus some editorial blather on the franchise and its latest online incarnation…
Big Science on the IMAX screen, Part I
This year marks the end of NASA’s shuttle program, and tied to the retirement of the fleet of three remaining ‘flying bricks’ are a trio of IMAX documentaries: Hubble 3D and Space Station 3D (both Warner Home Video), Solarmax from Sling Shot Entertainment, plus the 2000 non-IMAX Discovery Channel doc Inside the Space Station (Artisan)…
Cancon I: A Ticket to the Heavenly Mother Lode
In the first of an ongoing series on Cancon (Canadian content) films made during the tax shelter years, we start with Charlton Heston’s underrated directorial venture Mother Lode (Warner Home Video), which isn’t a Canadian film per se, but is loaded with Cancon talent and was filmed in B.C. Because the film co-starred Nick Mancuso, I’ve added a review of a true Cancon film, the equally underrated drama Ticket to Heaven (Echo Bridge), but check out the Editor’s Blog prior to the reviews…
Dog Tales II: Lassie Goes to War!
The second installment of pooch tales focuses again on Lassie in wartime America, and includes a review of Courage of Lassie (Warner Home Video) and a related period propaganda film, War Dogs (Internet Archive)…
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