Cinema

Family-friendly Blu-ray Castle movies for the holidays

November 22nd, 2016

A month ago I reviewed a pair of William Castle horror films released on a double-feature Blu-ray this summer by Mill Creek Entertainment. The same day, Mill Creek released another Castle double-bill with titles that sound like horror films but are really something else, especially the second.

Castle aimed his memorable thrillers “Homicidal” and “Mr. Sardonicus” (both 1961) mainly at teen and adult audiences. Both were serious horror films played straight, except for Castle’s…

Talking in Circles: Villeneuve’s Close Encounter “Arrival”

November 22nd, 2016

Following Oscar-nominated breakthrough “Incendies,” filmmaker Denis Villeneuve put together a hat trick of beautifully shot features, stylish enough to straddle the line between auteurist individuality/prestige and studio-massaged commercial aspirations.

“Prisoners,” “Enemy,” and “Sicario” are now joined by “Arrival,” a cerebral, or ersatz cerebral – depending on your tolerance for beautiful people expressing deep thoughts – science fiction drama in the thematic…

Noirs pushing mid-century sexual taboos

November 16th, 2016

The subgenre of crime thrillers known as “film noir” was at its height during the 1940s and 1950s. It is noted for cynical anti-heroic characters, a pervasive sense of inexorable fate, usually leading to the doom of one or more characters, and moody low-key cinematography featuring plenty of shadows with expressionistic lighting and camera angles.

Often there is a strong female character, frequently an aggressive “femme fatale,” and as often as not a seething sexual subtext that…

Food for the soul: Gabbert strikes “Gold”

November 16th, 2016

In Laura Gabbert’s “City of Gold,” which unfolds like a gustatory companion to Thom Andersen’s “Los Angeles Plays Itself,” chef Andrew Zimmern summarizes the appeal of Pulitzer Prize-winning subject Jonathan Gold’s approach to food writing by saying, “…the great human ill is contempt prior to investigation.” That statement, which alludes to the way in which Gabbert weaves together her portrait of another celebrated, middle-aged white man by focusing as much on Los…

O.J.: made in America

November 9th, 2016

Two decades have passed since the surreal and shocking events that transformed Orenthal James Simpson from USC legend, Heisman Trophy recipient, Buffalo Bills star, professional football Hall of Fame inductee, sports broadcaster, and actor into a divisive reminder of America’s ongoing struggle to come to terms with its legacy of racism.

And while the seemingly bottomless coverage of the so-called “Trial of the Century” may have exhausted widespread interest in the years following…

Peacetime veterans celebrated in new Blu-ray

November 9th, 2016

This Friday, November 11, is Veterans Day, once called Armistice Day, to mark the ceasefire that ended World War I hostilities on that date in 1918. It’s one of the very few national holidays that does not move to the nearest Monday (although it did for several years in the 1970s). The date still calls to mind “the war to end all wars,” but after World War II and the Korean War the name was changed to Veterans Day. Since 1954 it officially honors military veterans in general, not…

“Demon”: all hell breaks loose at a country wedding

November 2nd, 2016

Finally winding its way through a limited theatrical release following a 2015 Toronto International Film Festival debut, Marcin Wrona’s “Demon” blends folklore, supernatural mystery, and wedding disaster comedy.

Adapted by Wrona and Pawel Maslona from Piotr Rowicki’s 2008 play “Adherence,” the film starts with plenty of promise, intrigue, and atmosphere, but fails to maintain those qualities through the concluding frame.

As possessed protagonist Piotr, a young man traveling…

Marx Brothers Blu’s the ideal antidote to Election Day blues

November 2nd, 2016

By Christopher P. Jacobs

christopher.jacobs@email.und.edu

Next week’s presidential election is perhaps the most divisive and least-anticipated in recent history. None of the three main candidates comes close to having a majority voter appeal or enthusiastic support, to the extent that a vote for any one of them is essentially a vote against the other two. It’s a week that will likely inspire various modes of personal escape, even if only temporary, from the cares and fears of modern…

DuVernay’s “13th” essential viewing

October 26th, 2016

Featuring a deep bench of authorities, scholars, politicians, ex-convicts, and dissenters, Ava DuVernay’s outstanding documentary “13th” arrives on the eve of a national election.

Put together in near secrecy and opening the New York Film Festival, “13th” uses as its starting point the titular reference to the United States Constitution’s amendment that abolished slavery – “except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” That minor…

Castle horror classics on Blu-ray double-feature

October 26th, 2016

This summer Mill Creek Entertainment released four William Castle films on bargain double-feature Blu-rays. Several additional Castle movies are available from different companies. The best introduction to his work is probably the disc containing “Homicidal” and “Mr. Sardonicus.” Both are 1961 productions and make ideal Halloween season viewing.

Producer-director William Castle made a wide variety of films and TV programs from 1939 through 1975. But he gained a public reputation…