The star-director team of Charles Bronson and Tom Gries (Breakheart Pass) combine their efforts again on Breakout. Bronson plays Nick Colton, a reckless pilot who heads to an unnamed South American country, in hopes of rescuing imprisoned Jay Wagner (Robert Duvall). Villain Harris Wagner (John Huston), who has framed Jay, has an unlimited supply of henchmen at his disposal, but they’re no match for the dauntless Colton. Jill Ireland, Bronson’s real-life wife, costars as Duvall’s missus.Read More »
In 1989, Stephen Sayadian, aka Rinse Dream, released one of the most iconic and fantastical works in American exploitation cinema. For the first time since its release, thanks to a new restoration, it will finally find its audience, and retroactively be appreciated as the underground masterpiece that it is. Bizarre, stunning, goofy and unsettling, DR. CALIGARI embraces the avant-garde in its exquisite and hilarious exploitation of America’s repressed libido. As the film’s title might suggest, the film is a loose remake of the German Expressionist classic, following Mrs. Van Houten, a woman who seems to be losing touch with reality, and her treatment under Dr. Caligari, who diagnoses her with a “disease of the libido”. Far more than just narratively similar, Sayadian’s background in set design and art keeps with the silent classic’s highly stylized design, updated with the bright, disorienting commercialism of 1980s Americana. DR. CALIGARI might be one of the American cinema’s most incisive and unique portraits of national excess ever to grace the screen.Read More »
A professional hit man is planning to retire, always a difficult move for one in such a profession. A young apprentice appears to be eager to learn all the skills of the trade – but is that all he wants?Read More »
Despite Lieutenant Frank Ochoa’s order to leave New York permanently in Death Wish (1974), Paul Kersey is back in the city to visit an old friend after taking down Nirvana’s gang of savage thugs in Death Wish II (1982). But, death seems to follow the grizzled executioner, and after a shocking discovery, Kersey cuts a deal with the Police Chief, Richard Shriker: kill as many creeps as he wants, provided that he keeps the police informed. This time, Paul means business, and as the sadistic gang of the unhinged sociopath, Manny Fraker, terrorises the tenants of a run-down tenement building, and the entire neighbourhood, Kersey’s brand-new .475 Wildey Magnum alone is not going to cut it. Can “The Vigilante” bring peace back to the once-quiet region?Read More »
The ten-part American Cinema series is superb entertainment for movie fans who want to acquire a deeper understanding of the history, development, techniques, and genres of the USA’s best export. It richly employs first-person interviews with modern directors, producers, screenwriters, cinematographers, actors, and a slew of other movie craftsmen. Each one- hour episode is liberally seasoned with film clips and includes archival interviews with dozens of the late greats of the first half of this century. Every self-labeled movie buff should watch this fine series.Read More »
A woman finds romance when she takes a job at an aircraft plant to help make ends meet after her husband goes off to war.
Quote: Swing Shift is a 1984 American romantic drama war film directed by Jonathan Demme and produced by and starring Goldie Hawn with Kurt Russell. It also starred Christine Lahti, Fred Ward and Ed Harris. Lahti earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her tragic portrayal of heart-broken ex-singer and Hawn’s character’s close friend Hazel, losing to Peggy Ashcroft for A Passage to India. Singer Belinda Carlisle made a foray into acting and Holly Hunter can be seen in one of her first movie roles.Read More »
Paul Kersey thought his days as a vigilante were long behind him. But when his daughter and housekeeper are savagely assaulted and murdered, Paul is forced to take the law back into his own hands, hitting the tough, gang-filled streets of Los Angeles and embarking on a violent quest for justice. Realizing he has a ruthless vigilante on his hands, Detective Frank Ochoa races to put an end to the building carnage.Read More »
Jason Robards and Olivia DeHavilland star in this 1966 TV adaptation of a short novel by American author Katherine Anne Porter, written and directed by Sam Peckinpah.Read More »
