Two recent Blu-ray releases highlight very different attitudes to the crime thriller in the ’70s: Robert Culp’s Hickey and Boggs and Douglas Hickox’s Brannigan.
Law, disorder and cynicism in the ’70s
Author: Kenneth George Godwin
The return of Mad Max … kind of
Spectacular action reminiscent of the original Mad Max trilogy can’t quite overcome a disappointing script and weak lead performance in George Miller’s return to the post-apocalyptic world he created more than three decades ago.
Bias and preconception in movie-watching
We bring our whole personal history to every movie we see, even ones we’ve seen (many times) before; as we’re in a constant state of change, so the movies we watch seem to change with each viewing.
Viewing notes, March-April 2015: part two
Some impressions of the eclectic variety of movies I’ve watched in the past couple of months, from the obscure to the classic, from mainstream blockbusters to quirky independents.
Viewing notes, March-April 2015: part one
Recent viewing includes the big-budget Furious 7 and the smaller but better It Follows, as well as a collection of older genre movies on disk.
Criterion Blu-ray review: Carol Reed’s Odd Man Out (1947)
Criterion’s Blu-ray release of Carol Reed’s Odd Man Out (1947) should help to establish this masterpiece as the equal of Reed’s more famous The Third Man.
Blaxploitation and historical counter-narrative
Watching Blacula (1972) while reading James Baldwin’s The Devil Finds Work turns up some surprising depths in the cheap blaxploitation horror movie.
Val Guest on Blu-ray
Surprisingly, the underrated British director Val Guest has recently been represented by a flurry of Blu-ray releases, two of which highlight some of his finest work while the third makes available one of his lesser known minor films of the ’50s.
More recent animation
Studio Ghibli’s Isao Takahata creates a masterpiece in his final feature, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya, while Hiroyuki Okiura seems a worthy successor to the studio’s achievements with A Letter to Momo; less successful is Ari Folman’s live action/animation hybrid Robin Wright at The Congress.
The pleasures of hand-made animation
Despite the dominance of computer animation these days, there are qualities in hand-made animation, whether drawn or stop-motion, which offer a richer, more aesthetically pleasing viewer experience, as evidenced by a random selection of new and classic releases.
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