Atom Man vs. Superman (1950, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 5: Atom Man Tricks Superman
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 13, 2018
Atom Man Tricks Superman disappoints in just about every possible way. It doesn’t have a good cliffhanger resolution–it might even be a cheat from the footage shown last chapter–and no one is at all surprised Kirk Alyn didn’t vaporize. Well, almost no one. Noel Neill is surprised until Alyn read more
Flying Padre (1951, Stanley Kubrick)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 12, 2018
Flying Padre has three types of impressive shots. The first two types involve an airplane. The short is about a New Mexico priest who flies around his 4,000-square mile parish. There are interior and exterior shots of the plane and director Kubrick gets some fantastic shots from inside out. He’s al read more
Atom Man vs. Superman (1950, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 4: Superman Meets Atom Man!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 11, 2018
Superman Meets Atom Man! has what ought to be a big scene–Lyle Talbot’s Lex Luthor (in his Atom Man disguise) vanquishing Kirk Alyn to oblivion. Only it’s not a big scene, not even in the moment. Obviously Superman’s not going to be vanquished in the fourth chapter, but still. They could have read more
Chicken in the Rough (1951, Jack Hannah)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 10, 2018
Chicken in the Rough is constantly charming. It feels incomplete, but it’s still constantly charming. Chip ‘n’ Dale are collecting nuts near a farm. On that farm, the rooster is waiting for a hen’s eggs to hatch. Anthropomorphizing roosters and hens is one heck of a thing, i read more
Coffins on Wheels (1941, Joseph M. Newman)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 9, 2018
Coffins on Wheels opens with Roy Gordon directly addressing the camera, explaining used car salesman–despite most being all right (check your Better Business Bureau)–can be dangerous. There’s a scrupleless “lunatic fringe.” Then the narrative starts with trusting Walter Baldwin buying a used read more
The Stepford Wives (1975, Bryan Forbes)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 8, 2018
The Stepford Wives puts in for a major suspension of disbelief request in the second scene–what is Katharine Ross doing married to Peter Masterson. They’ve gone from being a somewhat posh New York couple to a New York couple with kids and so they’re moving to Connecticut. Lawyer Masterson is going read more
Atom Man vs. Superman (1950, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 3: Ablaze in the Sky!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 7, 2018
Ablaze in the Sky! has got a bunch of action. Kirk Alyn is in his tights for some of it, but not all of it. Not even most of it. Instead, he gets to duke it out–twice–as Clark Kent. Alyn’s willingness to put himself in danger makes Noel Neill’s accusations of cowardice incongruous. Especially read more
A Child Is Waiting (1963, John Cassavetes)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 6, 2018
A Child Is Waiting had all kinds of production clashes between producer Stanley Kramer and director Cassavetes. And, apparently, between stars Burt Lancaster and Judy Garland and director Cassavetes. Kramer even fired Cassavetes during editing; none of those problems come through in the finished pr read more
Atom Man vs. Superman (1950, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 2: Atom Man Appears!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 5, 2018
Atom Man, complete with his sparkling bucket helmet, does indeed appear in Atom Man Appears!. He and his goons kidnap Tommy Bond (pretty much by accident) and Atom Man gives Bond a villain speech before sending him back to the Daily Planet. The Daily Planet where boss Pierre Watkin doesn’t believe read more
Atom Man vs. Superman (1950, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 1: Superman Flies Again
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 4, 2018
Superman Flies Again establishes a few things I’m very curious to see if Atom Man vs. Superman keeps going with over the course of the serial. Firstly, is Pierre Watkin always completely wrong about everything. Playing newspaper editor Perry White, Watkin calls his staff–Kirk Alyn, Noel Neill, Tomm read more
Judex (1916, Louis Feuillade)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 3, 2018
The first chapter of Judex doesn’t get a chapter title; it’s just the prologue. While the action in the prologue leads directly into the action of the first chapter, throwing young, wealthy widow Yvette Andréyor into despair (financial and emotional), the first titled chapter ends up having less read more
Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017, Rian Johnson)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 2, 2018
The Last Jedi is a long two and a half hours. It’s an uneven split between Daisy Ridley, Oscar Isaac, and John Boyega. Ridley’s off with Mark Hamill–but really having a FaceTime via the Force arc with Adam River–while Isaac is doing his damndest to get everyone killed because he doesn’t want read more
Touched with Fire (2015, Paul Dalio)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jun 1, 2018
Somewhere early in Touched with Fire’s third act, it becomes clear there’s not going to be any performance potential from leads Luke Kirby and Katie Holmes. The movie doesn’t really want to be about them. Director (and writer) Dalio skips all the character development, leaving Holmes dulled and read more
Judex (1916, Louis Feuillade), Epilogue
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 31, 2018
Judex’s epilogue further wraps things up for the cast. There’s some definite resolution for young René Poyen as far as his living situation, some humor with Marcel Lévesque, and some humility from Louis Leubas. René Cresté and Yvette Andréyor get a romantic send-off, with Cresté finally able read more
Judex (1916, Louis Feuillade), Episode 12: Love’s Forgiveness
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 30, 2018
The title of the episode is Love’s Forgiveness so there’s not much in the way of surprises. René Cresté risks it all by reuniting Yvette Andréyor with father Louis Leubas, then discovers mom Yvonne Dario has already told Andréyor all and she–Andréyor–is in love with him–Cresté. The multiple read more
Hot Biskits (1931, Spencer Williams)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 29, 2018
Hot Biskits refers to lead Thurston Briggs. He’s Hot Biskits, only he uses a pseudonym because he’s a con man. He’s got a cushy job as a miniature golf course manager; the owner is a crooked cop, who’s fine just so long as the managers don’t make any money on the side. Although Briggs can’t read more
Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend: The Flying House (1921, Winsor McCay)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 28, 2018
The Flying House does a lot in its eleven minute runtime. First and maybe foremost–it’s questionable given where the film ends up–it’s a successful, ambitious format change for the Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend comic strip. Adapted by its creator, McCay–who’s got his twenty-five year-old son, read more
Johnny English (2003, Peter Howitt)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 27, 2018
Johnny English runs just under ninety minutes, which is one of the film’s secret weapons–nothing ever goes on too long, not the good stuff, not the bad stuff, not the mediocre stuff. There’s not a lot of bad stuff–more varying degrees of mediocre; when things then get better, when things finally read more
Naked Alibi (1954, Jerry Hopper)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 26, 2018
The first half hour of Naked Alibi–the film runs just under ninety minutes so the entire first third–is separate from the remainder. Set in a small city (shot on the backlot, but rather well thanks to Russell Metty’s glorious photography), chief of detectives Sterling Hayden has been getting a read more
DeepStar Six (1989, Sean S. Cunningham)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on May 25, 2018
DeepStar Six is a bad looking movie. There’s maybe one decent special effects moment–very limited, slightly gory–and it comes at the end, after the film has flubbed bigger effects sequences and other gore moments. Director Cunningham pretends he’s doing “Jaws at the ocean floor” for a while, read more