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You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 7: The Fatal Blast
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Apr 4, 2018
Shockingly, there is actually a blast in The Fatal Blast. Sadly it seems unlikely to be fatal enough, as there are eight more chapters to go. Not even halfway through Batman and Robin. After the cliffhanger resolution, which is yet another boring one, everyone thinks–as always–Batman and Robin are read more
Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert (2018, David Leveaux and Alex Rudzinski)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Apr 3, 2018
The opening of Jesus Christ Superstar is the only place the three leads really interact. Jesus, Mary, and Judas all interact. Through and behind the songs, this quick narrative plays out. In addition to showcasing the performers–John Legend is Jesus, Sara Bareilles is Mary, Brandon Victor Dixon is read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 6: Target – Robin!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Apr 2, 2018
Sadly, Johnny Duncan’s Robin is not actually a target in Target – Robin!. The chapter wouldn’t be any more compelling if he were, but it get Batman and Robin moving in a new direction. Instead, it’s more of the same. Tepid cliffhanger resolution, bad acting from Robert Lowery and Duncan, read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 5: Robin Rescues Batman!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Apr 1, 2018
Once again, the chapter title doesn’t have much to do with the chapter. Robin Rescues Batman. Okay, sure. If you count Robin (Johnny Duncan) hiding until the bad guys leave with the stolen formula then going in and checking on an unconscious Batman (Robert Lowery). The bad guys have this extended read more
Delicatessen (1991, Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 31, 2018
Delicatessen is often adorable. There’s a romance between Dominique Pinon and Marie-Laure Dougnac; they’re both adorable, so Delicatessen is often adorable. They’re star-crossed, though Pinon doesn’t know it (Dougnac does), living in a post-apocalyptic future where people eat people (though read more
Shadow of the Vampire (2000, E. Elias Merhige)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 30, 2018
Shadow of the Vampire opens with some title cards explaining the setup. Well, it opens with some title cards explaining the setup after what feels like nine minute opening titles. In reality… it’s six. Vampire ostensibly runs ninety-five minutes. Anyway. The title cards setup the making of Nosferat read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 4: Batman Trapped!
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 29, 2018
Most of this chapter, Batman Trapped, is a resolution of the previous chapter’s cliffhanger. There’s no trapped Batman in this chapter. There’s kidnapped Robin; more on that development in a bit. After the immediate resolution of the cliffhanger–thanks to Batman (Robert Lowery) having a lot read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 3: Robin’s Wild Ride
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 28, 2018
I actually can’t figure out why this chapter is called Robin’s Wild Ride. Robin (Johnny Duncan) does not have a wild ride. Unless they mean when he gets to drive the car for a bit at the beginning. The chapter’s cliffhanger resolution is pretty tepid, but Batman and Robin clearly isn’t trying read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 2: Tunnel of Terror
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 27, 2018
Even with Robert Lowery’s exceptionally questionable performance as Batman and Bruce Wayne, Tunnel of Terror is a relatively fine serial chapter. The cliffhanger resolution at the beginning is pretty weak, but then it turns out Lowery and Johnny Duncan have an almost superpower–they can sneak aroun read more
Batman and Robin (1949, Spencer Gordon Bennet), Chapter 1: Batman Takes Over
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 26, 2018
Batman and Robin gets off to a surprisingly reasonable start, even after a spectacularly absurd opening montage sequence. Gotham City is facing an unexplained crime wave; the footage they start with is a dairy hold-up. Then there are some clips from the previous Batman serial, which might be why th read more
House (1986, Steve Miner)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 25, 2018
House has got technical failures, acting failures, plotting failures (sort of), but it also has the mystery of William Katt’s hair. In some scenes it’s the standard Katt blond, but in other scenes, it’s brown. Sometimes it’s dark brown. Sometimes it looks like a perm. And it never looks like read more
Actor | Eleanor Parker, Part 4: Guest Star
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 24, 2018
When she starred in Eye of the Cat, Eleanor Parker had been in more than forty theatrical films. She was forty-seven years old. She had just been in the biggest movie of all time–1965’s The Sound of Music. When Eye of the Cat came out in June 1969, Sound of Music was still playing in theaters in read more
Blade Runner 2049 (2017, Denis Villeneuve)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 23, 2018
Whatever its faults, Blade Runner 2049 is breathtaking. Director Villeneuve’s composition, Roger Deakins’s photography, Dennis Gassner’s production design, all the CGI–the film is constantly gorgeous. It’s got nothing beautiful to show–the world of 2049 is a wasteland, all plant life is read more
Power of the Press (1943, Lew Landers)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 21, 2018
Power of the Press runs a thin–not slim, but thin–sixty-four minutes. It’s paced better than expected (publicity stills suggest quite a few cut scenes); scenes never seem rushed, scenes never seem truncated. Instead, they’re just deliberate. Otto Kruger is a blue blood New York City newspaper read more
Actor | Eleanor Parker, Part 3: Baroness
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 17, 2018
Going into the nineteen sixties, Eleanor Parker’s acting career seemed to have regained some of its recently lost momentum. Home from the Hill, released in March 1960, brought Parker into a genre she’d long avoided–the all-star soap. And–in addition to Parker being outstanding in the film, Hill read more
Futureworld (1976, Richard T. Heffron)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 16, 2018
Futureworld ends with a ten minute chase sequence. It feels like thirty. The movie runs 107 boring minutes and I really did think thirty of them were spent on Peter Fonda and Blythe Danner battling evil robots. And not even Danner. Fonda. Just Peter Fonda running around giant underground maintenanc read more
Westworld (1973, Michael Crichton)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 11, 2018
Westworld is a regrettably bad film. It doesn’t start off with a lot of potential. Leads Richard Benjamin and James Brolin are wanting. But then writer-director Crichton starts doing these montages introducing the behind-the-scenes of the park. Oh. Right. Westworld is about an amusement resort with read more
The Narrow Corner (1933, Alfred E. Green)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 4, 2018
The Narrow Corner runs seventy minutes; it speeds along. Robert Presnell Sr.’s script has somewhat lengthy, complicated scenes where he tries to fit in information. The movie doesn’t need all that information–the subplot about Reginald Owen translating a Portuguese epic poem–because director read more
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946, William Wyler)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 3, 2018
If it weren’t for the first half of the film, The Best Years of Our Lives would be a series of vingettes. The film runs almost three hours. Almost exactly the first half is set over two days. The remainder is set over a couple months. Director Wyler and screenwriter Robert E. Sherwood don’t really read more
Stardust (2007, Matthew Vaughn)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 2, 2018
Stardust has a problem with overconfidence. The overconfidence in the CG is one thing, but would be easily excusable if director Vaughn didn’t double down and go through tedious effects sequences. Ben Davis’s photography keeps Stardust lush, whether in the magic world or the real world–but that read more