Breaking Even (1932, Aubrey Scotto)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 15, 2013
Breaking Even has a number of surprises. Its star, Tom Howard, came from vaudeville and it shows. Not in a bad way, the short’s structured for his style. The only bad thing about Even is its editing. Director Scotto can direct dialogue sequences fine, but when he’s got to move the camer read more
Wildcat Bus (1940, Frank Woodruff)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 14, 2013
Wildcat Bus is a tepid b picture about corruption in the hired car business. A group of bad guys–they run an unlicensed car firm–go after sweet old Oscar O’Shea’s bus company. It all hinges on a bankrupted blue blood (Charles Lang), his trusty sidekick (Paul Guilfoyle) and O read more
It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966, Bill Melendez)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 13, 2013
“It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” is near perfect. Director Melendez and writer Charles M. Schulz create this beautiful little experience. The special’s excellence is in its structure. “Pumpkin” has the main plot–Linus waiting for the Great Pumpkin, w read more
Number One with a Bullet (1987, Jack Smight)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 12, 2013
With a larger budget–and a different director–Number One with a Bullet might succeed. It’s a wry spoof of cop movies and TV shows, pairing crazy man Robert Carradine and urbane Billy Dee Williams. One has to assume Carradine’s casting against Revenge of the Nerds-type is par read more
The Senator Was Indiscreet (1947, George S. Kaufman)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 8, 2013
The Senator Was Indiscreet is a fun enough little film. It’s little for a few reasons; sadly, the primary one is the budget. Enough of the film takes place in William Powell’s hotel room, one would think it’s a play adaptation. The story is more ambitious than the finished film ca read more
Carrie (1976, Brian De Palma)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 7, 2013
In terms of De Palma’s direction, Carrie is a little bit of a mess. It’s a combination of Hitchcock as camp–which really cuts into the effectiveness of the finale–more religious imagery than, say, The Ten Commandments and, finally, some truly brilliant composition from De Pa read more
Real Genius (1985, Martha Coolidge)
The Stop Button Posted by on Feb 6, 2013
It’s hard to know where to start with Real Genius. It runs just over a hundred minutes, but gets so much done in the first forty, then so much different stuff done in the next thirty, the remainder is almost entirely separate. The plot evolves, expanding as events unfold. Genius isn’t i read more
Sons of Liberty (1939, Michael Curtiz)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 25, 2013
Despite Michael Curtiz directing and Claude Rains starring–Curtiz does better than Rains–Sons of Liberty is a rather tepid little short. Rains plays a Jewish proto-American (circa 1776) who sacrifices all for the United States. He even dies penniless because he won’t sign a docume read more
Enter Arsene Lupin (1944, Ford Beebe)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 24, 2013
It’s hard to find anything good about Enter Arsene Lupin. Ella Raines isn’t as bad as the other primary cast members, though she’s not as good as some of the bit players. The film does hold some historical value both in the use of the Universal European backlot set for EnglandR read more
The Horse (1973, Charles Burnett)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 23, 2013
The Horse plays a little like the end of another movie, like Burnett cut off the first hour and a half and just left the finale. He forces the viewer to distance him or herself from the film’s narrative as much as possible–the characters all know one another, the viewer never gets an in read more
The Greene Murder Case (1929, Frank Tuttle)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 18, 2013
If it weren’t so predictable, The Greene Murder Case would be a little better. Not much better–part of the film’s charm is the obvious foreshadowing, since director Tuttle’s obviously on a limited budget and he couldn’t do much anyway. There are no natural exteriors, w read more
Come Live with Me (1941, Clarence Brown)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 17, 2013
Come Live with Me features exquisite direction from Clarence Brown. Whether he’s pacing out a reveal, directing a conversation or just being inventive with composition, he does an outstanding job. George J. Folsey’s photography helps, as do the fantastic sets. It’s a shame good di read more
Barbarella (1968, Roger Vadim)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 16, 2013
In terms of badness, Barbarella is phenomenal. One could spend his or her time on the gender politics–someone must have in the last forty years. The film takes place in a post-gender future, where Jane Fonda’s titular character is the most relied upon person in the galaxy. However, the read more
The Studio Murder Mystery (1932, Joseph Henabery)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 11, 2013
The Studio Murder Mystery is a lame little short mystery. It takes place at a Hollywood studio, just before and after a troublesome star is murdered. The before parts aren’t so bad–Henabery has a little fun with the movie in the movie stuff and the scene at the commissary where the cast read more
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956, Alfred Hitchcock)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 10, 2013
The Man Who Knew Too Much is Hitchcock’s only remake and, as such, it probably ought to be a whole lot better. The resulting film suggests he really wanted to make a Moroccan travelogue and symphony picture… assuming he didn’t set out to make a turgid thriller. There’s also read more
A Day with the Boys (1969, Clu Gulager)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 9, 2013
Ah, the joys of boyhood. Watching A Day with the Boys, one quickly tires of all the outdoor activities director Gulager chronicles. The titular boys have no names and no dialogue–Boys is entirely dialogue-free–and they just act adorably rambunctious. When they’re sliding down a hi read more
Mark of the Vampire (1935, Tod Browning)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 4, 2013
MGM cut at least twenty-five percent out of Mark of the Vampire, which accounts for some of the plotting problems but still leaves the film a little messy. Ben Lewis’s editing is weak during dialogue exchanges, not just in general. And no amount of studio interference could have changed Brown read more
Isle of the Dead (1945, Mark Robson)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 3, 2013
The Greek anti-defamation league, if it existed, mustn’t have had much power when Isle of the Dead came out. It’s a quarantine drama, a genre I’m unfamiliar with but certainly has a lot of potential, set on a small Greek island. There’s nothing on the island besides an amate read more
Mad Max (1979, George Miller)
The Stop Button Posted by on Jan 2, 2013
While the low budget undoubtedly plays a hand in it, Mad Max is the epitome of narrative efficiency. It should have a big concept–a slightly post-apocalyptic future (but people still vacation and get ice cream and the beaches are nice) where the big cities are (probably) gone and the rural hi read more
Die, Monster, Die! (1965, Daniel Haller)
The Stop Button Posted by on Dec 28, 2012
For the first three quarters of Die, Monster, Die!, the biggest mystery in the film is how wheelchair-bound Boris Karloff gets around so well. The lifts become visible in the last act. Karloff’s British upper crust whose family name has fallen on hard times thanks to an embarrassing father. S read more