Welcome to BlogHub: the Best in Veteran and Emerging Classic Movie Blogs
You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
A World of Difference (1960, Ted Post)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 30, 2013
It’s another man in a weird world “Twilight Zone” from Richard Matheson. This time, Howard Duff is a regular American middle class guy who all of a sudden wakes up in a world where he’s an actor playing that regular guy. There’s a lot of great panic from Duff–he& read more
The Last Flight (1960, William F. Claxton)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 25, 2013
The Last Flight has some fantastic sound design. Especially at the beginning when Kenneth Haigh’s plane lands. He’s a World War I flier who journeys through time to the late fifties, landing on an American airbase. The sound for the base and the planes is just phenomenal. And the episod read more
And When the Sky Was Opened (1959, Douglas Heyes)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 23, 2013
The magic of And When the Sky Was Opened is Rod Taylor’s lead performance. He’s an astronaut who holds on while reality loses track of his astronaut copilots after they return to Earth. Whether he’s loud or quiet, Taylor makes the episode work. The concept is simple enough, but Ta read more
Frankenstein (1952, Don Medford)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 18, 2013
For a twenty minute and change live performance, Frankenstein could be a lot worse. Director Medford occasionally will find a good shot. Mary Alice Moore (as Elizabeth) is real good at the beginning and competent, if not quite good, at the end. Medford showcases her during her best parts. As the ma read more
The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942, Erle C. Kenton)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 13, 2013
The Ghost of Frankenstein is pretty bad stuff. Running less than seventy minutes, it’s unbearably boring from the twenty-five minute mark, once the picture focus on Cedric Hardwicke. Ghost opens with villagers pursuing Bela Lugosi’s evil hunchback. Though awful, Lugosi’s at least read more
Taxi! (1932, Roy Del Ruth)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 12, 2013
Even when the story falls apart, Del Ruth’s direction still keeps Taxi! somewhat afloat. It only runs seventy minutes and the first half is pretty good stuff. When it starts, the film’s about one cab company trying to muscle out its competitors–Guy Kibbee and James Cagney being so read more
The Phantom (1961, Harold Daniels)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 11, 2013
“The Phantom” is horrific. Between Lon Chaney Jr. trying a Cajun accent and Paulette Goddard’s hilariously bad turn as a Ms. Big, there’s no good acting. But these two guest stars aren’t even the worst–lead Roger Creed is unbearably awful. I’m sure he was h read more
Ski Troop Attack (1960, Roger Corman)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 10, 2013
The best thing in Ski Troop Attack is a forty or fifty second conversation between two characters about mortality. Writer Charles B. Griffith has a few other good observations in the dialogue, but they don’t resonate. Nothing in Ski resonates except that one conversation. And the acting isn&# read more
Godzilla, King of Monsters! (1956, Terry O. Morse and Honda Ishirô)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 5, 2013
Morse didn’t just direct the added American scenes for Godzilla, King of Monsters! but also did the hatchet job editing it. The concept–adding in footage of a reporter reporting on what would be an international news event–isn’t bad. But Morse (aided, undoubtedly, by Al C. W read more
The Shadow (1954, Charles F. Haas)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 4, 2013
So why not turn The Shadow into an amateur detective procedural? Haas’s pilot for a “Shadow” television series is a good reason, though it’s inexplicable why someone would want to turn it into such a thing. Not the procedural part, but the amateur detective part. Peter Barry read more
The Black Hole (1979, Gary Nelson)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jul 3, 2013
The Black Hole is a weird–and bad–movie. American science fiction usually avoids religion, at least literalizing religion, but Black Hole embraces it. Maybe I shouldn’t spoil it. But it’s from Disney too. It’s a Disney movie with Heaven and Hell. When the film cuts to read more
Steamboat Round the Bend (1935, John Ford)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jun 28, 2013
The best scene in Steambout Round the Bend is the wedding between Anne Shirley and John McGuire. Neither Shirley nor McGuire is particularly good in the film, but McGuire’s about to be hung and so they’re getting married. Steambout is often a comedy and Eugene Pallette–as the offi read more
Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987, John Hughes)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jun 24, 2013
Planes, Trains & Automobiles is probably most impressive technically. The narrative is problematic but not a bad narrative, it’s just a problematic one. Director Hughes can’t decide if he wants Planes to be a comedy with John Candy or a comedy about Candy. Candy’s able to be s read more
Three’s Company, the first unaired pilot (1976, Burt Brinckerhoff)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jun 4, 2013
What a difference a cast makes. It’s hard to determine the real star of the first attempt at “Three’s Company.” It’s either Valerie Curtin or Susanne Zenor, both of whom are–to the best of my recollection–very different from the similar characters on the ev read more
Deadline – U.S.A. (1952, Richard Brooks)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jun 3, 2013
Deadline – U.S.A. is about half a great movie. Director Brooks fills the film with a superb supporting cast of character actors–Paul Stewart, Audrey Christie and Jim Backus are the standouts–and lets them share the runtime with lead Humphrey Bogart. It’s a newspaper drama read more
British Intelligence (1940, Terry O. Morse)
The Stop Button Posted by on May 31, 2013
It should be obvious British Intelligence is based on a play, so much of it takes place in a single house, but director Morse and screenwriter Lee Katz open it up enough it never does. Actually, even though it’s a low budget picture, their expansive approach even obscures the concentration ar read more
Diner (1983, Barry Levinson)
The Stop Button Posted by on May 30, 2013
What a difference a cast makes. Barry Levinson’s pilot for a “Diner” television series reunites some of the film crew–editor Stu Linder does a wonderful job–but the only returning actors are Paul Reiser and Jessica James. Both are good–and Alison La Placa and Mad read more
The Body Snatcher (1945, Robert Wise)
The Stop Button Posted by on May 29, 2013
The Body Snatcher has half an excellent foundation. Nineteenth century medical genius Henry Daniell can’t escape his past associations with a shady cabman (Boris Karloff). These past associations being of the grave robbing variety. There’s also Daniell’s romance with his maid (Edi read more
The Blues Brothers (1980, John Landis)
The Stop Button Posted by on May 27, 2013
I wonder if Cab Calloway got upset he only got half a music video in The Blues Brothers while Ray Charles and Aretha Franklin both got full ones. While these interludes are completely out of place and break up the “flow” of the film, they’re at least somewhat competent. One can se read more
Galaxina (1980, William Sachs)
The Stop Button Posted by on May 24, 2013
Galaxina answers a number of burning questions. Most immediately, it shows practical special effects and miniatures is sometimes not the best way to do special effects. Because auteur William Sachs had a great cinematographer–Dean Cundey–yet the effects work in Galaxina is awful. But it read more