Some brief comments on several recent movie-related deaths, plus random observations about an eclectic group of recently watched Blu-rays in various different genres.
Random thoughts: Summer 2017
Tag: Thrillers
The exploitation art of Frederick R. Friedel
Severin’s Blu-ray showcases the low budget art of independent filmmaker Frederick R. Friedel with excellent transfers of his two mid-’70s movies, Axe (aka Lisa, Lisa) and Kidnapped Coed (aka The Kidnap Lover).
Catching up with Twilight
Four Twilight Time releases showcase exceptional acting in a variety of styles: Spencer Tracy and Frederick March in Stanley Kramer’s Inherit the Wind (1960); Jeff Bridges, John Heard and Lisa Eichhorn in Ivan Passer’s Cutter’s Way (1981); Sean Penn and Christopher Walken in James Foley’s At Close Range (1986); and David Thewlis in Paul Greengrass’ Resurrected (1989).
Genre play in Germany
A pair of made-in-Germany genre-bending thrillers are well-served by excellent Blu-ray editions: Sam Fuller’s Dead Pigeon on Beethoven Street (1972) from Olive Films and Wolf Gremm’s Kamikaze ’89 (1982) from Film Movement.
Random thoughts: May 2017
A collection of random thoughts about recent viewing and reading, including an ambivalent excursion into Netflix streaming.
The disappearance of real-world disk retail
With HMV Canada going bankrupt and closing down, a disk addict gets a couple of months of increasingly cheap deals, leading to some great and some not-so-wise purchases.
Viewing notes, March 2017: Part One
A round-up of recent Blu-ray viewing, with some classics, an occasional dud, and a few old favourites.
Hammer Horror on Blu-ray
Hammer Films are, of course, best known for launching the modern era of horror with their late ’50s colour reworkings of the Universal classics from the ’30s, beginning with Curse of Frankenstein (1957) and Dracula (1958). These movies, colourful, somewhat perverse for the time, and more graphic than earlier films in the genre, inspired Roger […]
Twilight Time round-up
Although it’s impossible to keep up with all the disks from Twilight Time, I’ve recently been binging on some of their newer releases.
M. Night Shyamalan’s Split (2017)
M. Night Shyamalan’s Split (2017) in one of his most accomplished films yet, a taut, tense psychological thriller in which every character, even the “villain”, elicits audience sympathy.
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