Throughout the 60s and 70s American cinema underwent a tonal shift; gone were the days of the sweet sentimentalism of directors like Frank Capra and here was the growing cynicism from people like William Friedkin and Don Siegel. The latter two directors released two highly influential films in the world […]
Movies & Documentaries
Edge of Sanity (1989) Jekyll, Hyde & Jack the Ripper in thinly-spread Erotic Horror (Review)
Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) is one of the more regularly adapted and reimagined texts in science fiction literature, up there with Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Whilst based on historical fact, conspiracy and theory, Jack the Ripper has enjoyed just as many takes throughout […]
Théo and the Metamorphosis (2021): uncomfortable for the right reasons (Cinema Review)
Among the many veterans making a comeback at the moment – Kate Bush, the cast of the original Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs from the original Jurassic Park – let’s take a moment to celebrate caves. They’ve been around forever – literally – but they’re hotter than ever now, with Robert […]
The Initiation of Sarah (1978): Psychic Sister Doing It For Herself (Blu-Ray Review)
There’s a discussion to be had about how the age of streaming has either destroyed the concept of a made-for-television movie or revived it. Either way, The Initiation of Sarah shows its age as a nearly forty-five-year-old broadcast for television while being exactly the sort of film you could stumble […]
The Shaolin Plot (1977) Sammo has always been a Win (Blu-Ray Review)
It does need to be said: Eureka is doing a wonderful thing for all of us Hong Kong Action fans. From the stone-cold classics of Police Story to adjacent obscurities like Joseph Kuo, Hong Kong Legends is alive and well through Masters of Cinema parent company (and 88 films). A […]
Moon 66 Questions (2021): subtly strange carer’s story that resists easy comparisons (Cinema Review)
Recently there’s been a surprising number of films about people with degenerative diseases, an apparently uncommercial subgenre that’s actually produced a number of sleeper hits and Oscar winners. If Jacqueline Lentzou’s Moon, 66 Questions doesn’t join them on the Kodak Theater stage, it will be for the noblest of reasons: […]
Execution in Autumn (1972) Melodrama, Sadness and the Taiwanese Experience (Review)
Before directors like Hou Hsiao-Hsien and Edward Yang reinvented Taiwanese cinema with their new wave films in the 80s (such as Dust in the Wind and Terrorizers respectively) the Taiwan film industry was much more closed off to the Western world. Despite directors like King Hu gaining a lot of […]
Kill Them All and Come Back Alone (1968): The Dirty Half-Dozen of the Spaghetti Western (Review)
Released to Blu-ray on Studio Canal’s Cult Classics label comes a rip-roaring Spaghetti Western from 1968, Enzo G. Castellari’s wonderfully titled Kill Them All and Come Back Alone starring Chuck Connors, the rangy former basketball and baseball player and star of popular Western TV serials The Rifleman and Branded and […]
Outside the Law (1920): dated depictions can’t overshadow Tod Browning’s genius (Review)
Readers, what emotion comes over you when I ask you to imagine Lon Chaney playing a character called “Ah Wing”? A shudder of unease, I’d imagine, one of a very different kind to the shudders he produced in his more famous horror roles. And yet it’s worth indulging Outside the […]
Scare Us (2021) The Pick and Mix of Anthology Horror (Review)
The anthology is an interesting sub-genre. Classics like Twilight Zone: The Movie, Trick ‘r Treat and more recent offerings such as Bad Candy, Ghost Stories and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark have demonstrated both the potential benefits and the pitfalls of telling multiple stories within a single overarching […]