In this adventure, four explorers search for a vast treasure in the Amazon jungle. One of the explorers is a woman who got involved after she traveled from California to marry her fiance whom she hasn’t seen in two years. Another man tries to convince her that her fiance has become an alcoholic idealist obsessed with finding gold in the jungle. Another takes her into the jungle to find her love. En route he falls in love with her. Later they learn that her fiance has been killed by the Jivaro headhunters. The other man, who went in before them is also attacked, but the woman’s guide saves his life. This film did not use stock footage. Much of it was actually filmed in the jungle to provide the backgrounds.

Extra commentary track by Film Historians Jack Theakston, Hillary Hess, Mike Ballew and Greg Kintz is included.

2.57GB | 1h 31mn | 966×576 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/4B7FD7224560A1C/Jivaro.1954.576p.BluRay.AAC.x264-HANDJOB.mkv

Language:English
Subtitles:None

The post Edward Ludwig – Jivaro [+commentary] (1954) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Phil Karlson (“The Phenix City Story”/”Kansas City Confidential”/”Scandal Sheet”) directs with verve this gripping caper thriller based on a Good Housekeeping serialized magazine story that was based on the novel by Jack Finney and is well-written by John Barnwell, William Bowers, Stirling Silliphant and Frank Tashlin.

Four college chums from the fictitious Midwestern University, Al (Guy Madison), Brick (Brian Keith), Roy (Alvy Moore) and Ronnie (Kerwin Mathews), vacation in Reno and while gambling at the crowded Harold’s Casino are told by a cop that this casino is impossible to rob, after being humiliated when falsely accused of abetting a casino robber. Back at the university, the level-headed law student Al, the group’s leader, proposes to his club singer girlfriend Kay (Kim Novak). Kim’s vocals were dubbed by Jo Ann Greer. Meanwhile Al’s best bud, the sweet but volatile Brick, who saved his life in Korea during the war, has the former captain worried that he was released too early from his treatment at the VA’s mental ward for psychological problems caused by the war. In one incident, Brick goes violent on the new boyfriend of his ex-girlfriend and has to be pulled off the boy by Al or he might have murdered him.

By the time the next college vacation period rolls around later in the semester, rich boy Ronnie, whose dad is an oil man and owns a ranch near Reno, comes up with a foolproof scheme for the four roommates to rob the high-security Harold’s Casino that no one thinks can be robbed. Ronnie wants to rob the joint just to know he was able to do it and intends on returning the money. Brick, worried about flunking out of law school, and the always playful wise-cracking Roy, agree. But Ronnie insists they need Al to pull it off. Brick knowing Al wouldn’t agree to such a dumb prank, instead talks him into going with the boys to Reno with Kay, in the trailer Ronnie secretly just purchased, and marrying her in the place that calls itself ‘The biggest little city in the world.’

When Al is told about the heist on the road to Reno he confronts Brick, who pulls a gun and threatens to kill anyone not going along with the heist. Kay is recruited to be the driver of the getaway car.

The implausible heist is pulled off in a plausible enough manner, as the tension mounts when the boys enter the casino in disguises and force the casino money bag man (William Conrad) at gunpoint to cooperate or else. Under Karlson’s sharp direction, it becomes easy to forget that this heist for fun plot-line was a crackpot idea and highly unlikely to happen in real life. But as a movie story, it couldn’t be more entertaining. — Dennis Schwartz (Ozus’ World Movie Reviews)

2.25GB | 1h 23m | 1024×552 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/EFE2D4C1F7DD686/Phil_Karlson_-_(1955)_5_Against_the_House.mkv

Language(s):English
Subtitles:English

The post Phil Karlson – 5 Against the House (1955) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Fred Camper wrote:
This 1957 noir masterpiece by Jacques Tourneur stars Aldo Ray as a man fleeing a private investigator and Anne Bancroft as the barroom acquaintance who agrees to help him. Ray’s past is revealed gradually in a series of flashbacks, which are intercut with the couple’s flight and the investigator’s pursuit; by developing each narrative in a parallel space or time, Tourneur movingly articulates the theme of a character trapped by his history. The images have a smooth, almost liquid quality, the high-contrast lighting of most noirs replaced by a delicate lyricism that takes the natural world as the norm. Tourneur links this naturalism to Ray’s growing observational skills (“I know where every shadow falls,” he says), but it also contrasts with the story’s acute paranoia.

2.75GB | 1h 18mn | 1024×576 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/8649EF4D85053F0/Nightfall_-_Jacques_Tourneur_(1957).mkv

Language(s):English
Subtitles:English, French, HoH

The post Jacques Tourneur – Nightfall (1956) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Quote:
With its small cast, character-driven story, and modest production values, Sam Peckinpah’s first feature film seems very like another of his TV Western dramas–just one that happened to get shot in Panavision. The director’s favorite TV actor, Brian Keith, plays a surly loner named Yellowleg who ventures into Indian country with a dance-hall girl (Maureen O’Hara), the corpse of her little boy, and a pair of marginally human specimens (Steve Cochran and Chill Wills) who more than justify the title. Everybody has, or seems to have, a guilty or shameful secret: Why does Yellowleg keep his hat on? Was Kit (O’Hara) a widow, or a whore? Action, menace, and ethical dialogues come and go pretty much according to TV rhythms, and the visuals and editing are conventional. But there’s enough quirky character work and offbeat mood-making to hint at the singular filmmaker soon to arrive big-time. –Richard T. Jameson

1.41GB | 1h 33mn | 1019×434 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/C2DC9656DE9F360/The_Deadly_Companions_(1961)_–_Sam_Peckinpah.mkv

Language(s):English
Subtitles:Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish (muxed)

The post Sam Peckinpah – The Deadly Companions (1961) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Storyline
An honest union official named Blane is framed for the murder of another union official. Thus off the hook, the crime syndicate actually responsible for the crime is free to continue its activities. However, State’s Attorney Jim Fremont begins to suspect that Blane has been set up. Fremont launches a new investigation.

Written by Jim Beaver
Chicago Confidential may not have been the best of the late-1950s “expose” films, but it certainly boasted one of the most impressive casts. Based on the factual best-seller by Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer, the film stars Brian Keith as a State Attorney who vows to bring corrupt Chicago union officials to justice. It turns out that the union crooks are in cahoots with a gambling syndicate, conspiring to frame uncooperative union leader Dick Foran for murder. With the considerable assistance of his coworker-fiancee Beverly Garland, Keith strives to prove Foran’s innocence and punish the genuine miscreants. Crucial to the plotline is nightclub comedian Buddy Lewis, cast as an impressionist who helps to frame the troublesome Foran; also in the cast are such crime-flick perennials as Elisha Cook Jr., Paul Langton, Douglas Kennedy, Jack Lambert, John Indrisano, Phyllis Coates, and Thomas B. Henry.

https://nitro.download/view/6818BD8F19D7777/Chicago.Confidential.1957.DVDRip.XviD.avi

Language(s):English
Subtitles:None

The post Sidney Salkow – Chicago Confidential [Widescreen] (1957) first appeared on Cinema of the World.