Adaptation | Cagey Films

Mining a shrinking vein: The Vincent Price Collection III

Posted on April 27, 2016December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Vincent Price as Captain Robur, builder of the airship Albatross in William Whitney's Master of the World (1961)

The 3rd volume of Shout! Factory’s Vincent Price Collection, anchored by William Whitney’s severely under-budgeted Master of the World (1961), seems more threadbare than the previous volumes, although there are still points of interest. Roger Corman’s Tower of London (1962) seems ripe for reevaluation, and set allows viewers to compare Gordon Hessler’s original cut of Cry of the Banshee (1970) with the producer’s cut, released theatrically. The high point is Price’s one-man TV show An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe (1970).

Dan Ireland and The Whole Wide World

Posted on April 23, 2016May 22, 2024 by Kenneth George Godwin

Bob Howard shows Novalyne his beloved landscape, instilling it with a sense of living history in Dan Ireland's The Whole Wide World (1996)

Dan Ireland, director of The Whole Wide World (1996), died on April 14, aged 57.

Late winter viewing, part two

Posted on March 30, 2016December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Lucio Fulci creates a lot of atmosphere in the English village setting of The Black Cat (1981)

A mixed bag of recently viewed disks, from an obscure, poetic black-an-white drama to a garishly perverse piece of Greek exploitation, with some gialli and Japanese sci-fi animation thrown in.

Year End 2015

Posted on December 30, 2015December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Although I saw fewer movies in theatres than ever, this year offered a rich array of films on disk, belying continuing prophecies of the medium’s demise in the face of on-line streaming.

Recent viewing: November 2015

Posted on December 2, 2015November 11, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

The effects of alien radiation in Huan Vu's Lovecraft adaptation Die Farbe (The Color Out of Space, 2015)

A grab-bag of recently watched movies, some old, some new, covering a wide range of genres and styles.

Five Shades of B

Posted on October 28, 2015December 9, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

John Lithgow as Dr. Lizardo/Lord John Whorfin tries to pry the secret of the oscillation overthruster from Buckaroo in W.D. Richter's The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)

Since the end of the studio system, the term B-movie has come to refer more to content than budget; recent viewing covers a wide range of styles within this nebulous category.

Aleksei German’s Hard to Be a God (2013)

Posted on October 21, 2015December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Don Rumata (Leonid Yarmolnik) driven mad by his enforced role of detached observer in Aleksei German's science fiction epic Hard to Be a God (2013)

Hard to Be a God (2013), the final film of Russian director Aleksei German, more than a decade in the making, is a dense, obscure, visually stunning adaptation of a novel by the Strugatsky brothers. While German’s storytelling is extremely oblique, this depiction of a brutal medieval world which eventually corrupts Earth scientists who have traveled there to study a Renaissance which failed to happen, is realized with such visceral power that the viewer becomes immersed in the filth, madness and horror, occasionally gleaning brief moments of transcendent beauty.

Recent disks from Arrow Video

Posted on July 29, 2015July 2, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Arrow Video has become my favourite source for high quality releases of both serious films and exploitation titles. Their special editions rank with the best offered by prestige companies like Criterion and Masters of Cinema.

The “good German” in war movies

Posted on July 18, 2015May 2, 2024 by Kenneth George Godwin

Major Grau (Omar Sharif) witnesses General Tanz (Peter O'Toole)'s pleasure in destruction in Anatol Litvak's The Night of the Generals (1967)

A decade after the end of World War Two, with Germany now an important ally against the Soviet bloc, popular culture was making an effort to rehabilitate the former enemy by showing “good Germans” in the movies. Twilight Time have recently released a couple of examples on Blu-ray: Edward Dmytryk’s The Young Lions (1958) and Anatole Litvak’s The Night of the Generals (1967).

Criterion Blu-ray review: The Killers (1946/1964)

Posted on July 8, 2015March 26, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Criterion’s Blu-ray of The Killers, with two excellent new hi-def transfers of the 1946 Robert Siodmak and 1964 Don Siegel versions of Ernest Hemingway’s short story, as well as Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1956 student film, is a fascinating study in the process and possibilities of adapting literature to film.

Tag: Adaptation